PREFACE    TO    THE    1897    EDITION

THE  task  of  preparing  this  volume  for  the  press  has'  been  a  difficult  and  anxious  one,  and  it  is  necessary  to  state  clearly  what  has  been  done.

The  papers  given  to  me  by  H.P.B.  were  quite  unarranged,  and  had  no  obvious  order :  I  have  therefore,  taken  each  paper  as  a  separate  Section,  and  have  arranged  them  as  sequentially  as  possible.

With  the  exception  of  the  correction  of  grammatical  errors  and  the  elimination  of  obviously  un-English  idioms,  the  papers  are  as  H.P.B.  left  them,  save  as  otherwise  marked.

In  a  few  cases  I  have  filled  in  a  gap,  but  any  such  addition  is  enclosed  within  square  brackets,  so  as  to  be  distinguished  from  the  text.

In  4t  The  Mystery  of  Buddha  "  a  further  difficulty  arose  ;  some  of  the  Sections  had  been  written  four  or  five  times  over,  each  version  containing  some  sentences  that  were  not  in  the  others  ;  I  have  pieced  these  versions  together,  taking  the  fullest  as  basis,  and  inserting  therein  everything  added  in  any  other  versions.

It  is,  however,  with  some  hesitation  that  I  have  included  these  Sections  in  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE.

Together  with  some  most  suggestive  thought,  they  contain  very  numerous  errors  of  fact,  and  many  statements  based  on  exoteric  writings,  not  on  esoteric  knowledge.

They  were  given  into  my  hands  to  publish,  as  part  of  the  Third  Volume  of  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE,  and  I  therefore  do  not  feel  justified  in  coming  between  the  author  and  the  public,  either  by  altering  the  state-  ments, to  make  them  consistent  with  fact,  or  by  suppressing  the  Sections.

She  says  she  is  acting  entirely  on  her  own  authority,  and  it  will  be  obvious  to  any  instructed  reader  that  she  makes—  possibly  deliberately — many  statements  so  confused  that  they  are  mere  blinds,  and  other  statements — probably  inadvertently — that

8  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

are  nothing  more  than  the  exoteric  misunderstandings  of  esoteric  truths.

The  reader  must  here,  as  everywhere,  use  his  own  judg-  ment, but  feeling  bound  to  publish  these  Sections,  I  cannot  let  them  go  to  the  public  without  a  warning  that  much  in  them  is  certainly  erroneous.

Doubtless,  had  the  author  herself  issued  this  book,  she  would  have  entirely  re- written  the  whole  of  this  division  ;  as  it  was,  it  seemed  best  to  give  all  she  had  said  in  the  different  copies,  and  to  leave  it  in  its  rather  unfinished  state,  for  students  will  best  like  to  have  what  she  said  as  she  said  it,  even  though  they  may  have  to  study  it  more  closely  than  would  have  been  the  case  had  she  remained  to  finish  her  work.

The  quotations  made  have  been  as  far  as  possible  found,  and  correct  references  given  ;  in  this  most  laborious  work  a  whole  band  of  earnest  and  painstaking  students,  under  the  guidance  of  Mrs.

Cooper-Oakley,  have  been  my  willing  assistants.

Without  their  aid  it  would  not  have  been  possible  to  give  the  references,  as  often  a  whole  book  had  to  be  searched  through,  in  order  to  find  a  paragraph  of  a  few  lines.

This  volume  completes  the  papers  left  by  H.P.B.,  with  the  exception  of  a  few  scattered  articles  that  yet  remain  and  that  will  be  published  in  her  own  magazine  Lucifer.

Her  pupils  are  well  aware  that  few  will  be  found  in  the  present  generation  to  do  justice  to  the  occult  knowledge  of  H.  P.  B.  and  to  her  magnificent  sweep  of  thought,  but  as  she  can  wait  to  future  generations  for  the  justifi-  cation of  her  greatness  as  a  teacher,  so  can  her  pupils  afford  to  wait  for  the  justification  of  their  trust.

1897  ANNIE  BESANT

TABLE  OF  CONTENTS  Volume

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PREFACE  TO  THE  1897  EDITION,  BY  ANNIE  BESANT          .

INTRODUCTORY  ...

Misconceptions  of  the  Ancient  Wisdom—  The  Objects  of  this  Volume  :  1 .  To  indicate  Esoteric  Allegory  and  Symbolism  in  old  Aryan,  Greek  and  other  Philosophers  of  Note ;  2.  To  prove  that  the  Key  of  Interpretation,  furnished  by  the  Eastern  Hindu-Buddhistic  Canon  of  Occultism  fits  the  Christian  Gospels  and  Archaic  Egyptian,  Greek,  Chaldean,  Persian  and  Hebrew-Mosaic  Books — Scholars  deny  Hidden  Meanings  in  Ancient  Writings — The  Landmarks  left  upon  Philosophy  and  Physical  Science  by  ancient  Medieval  Scholars — Initiates  and  the  Secret  Knowledge  imparted  in  the  Mysteries — Only  an  Initiate  can  understand  Plato's  7/maeus —  Without  the  "  Key  "  correct  Interpretations  of  any  Scriptures  are  not  possible — Ammonius  Founder  of  the  Neo-Platonic  School — The  Doctrines  of  Pythagoras  and  Plato  are  Oriental.

SECTION  1— PRELIMINARY  SURVEY    .  ...

Knowledge  of  Initiates  traced  back  to  the  Fourth  Root  .Race — The  "  Protectors "  of  China — Marco  Polo's  Travels  in  Central  Asia — The  A.  B.  C.  of  Magic — The  East  the  Land  of  Knowledge  and  Learning — Magic  is  as  old  as  Man — Ancient  Peoples  cultivated  Magic  to  the  Highest  Degree  —The  SECRET  DOCTRINE  of  the  East  contains  the  Alpha  and  Omega  of  Universal  Science — Occultists  and  their  Archaic  Science  slowly  vindicated  — The  Gnosis  of  the  Secret  Brotherhood  still  flourishes — Learned  Kabal-  ists  throughout  Europe  and  America — Conscious  and  Unconscious  Sorcery — Black  Magic  and  Hypnotism — White  Magic  and  Black  Magic —  The  Existence  of  a  SECRET  UNIVERSAL  DOCTRINE,  and  its  practical  Methods  of  Magic,  is  no  Fiction.

SECTION  2— MODERN  CRITICISM  AND  THE  ANCIENTS        .  .  5t

Honour  rendered  to  Genuine  Scientists — What  is  a  Myth  ? — Progress  made  by  Philosophy,  Symbolism  and  Comparative  Religion — Profundity  of  Chaldean  Oracles.

10  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

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SECTION  3— THE  ORIGIN  OF  MAGIC  .  .

Different  Views  on  Hermetic  Philosophy— Accuracy  of  the  Writings  of  Hermes  Trismegistus — Homer  and  Hesiod  borrowed  from  the  Orphic  Hymns — What  is  the  Origin  of  the  Occult  Sciences,  or  Magic  ? — Works  of  Occult  Sciences  in  the  Days  of  Clemens — No  Evidence  in  favour  of  a  Devil — Egypt  was  the  Birthplace  of  Chemistry.

SECTION  4— THE  SECRECY  OF  INITIATES  .  .

Initiates  propagated  Truths  in  Parable — Silence  with  regard  to  the  True  Meaning  of  Bible  Texts — Compiler  of  the  Zohar  imparted  his  Doctrine  Orally  only — The  SECRET  DOCTRINE  of  Ammonius  Saccas,  Pythagoras  and  Plato  derived  from  the  Books  of  Thoth  which  originated  with  Eastern  Sages — The  First  Initiator — "  Dark  Sayings  "  in  the  Old  and  New  Testa-  ments— Selfishness  caused  the  Withdrawal  of  Knowledge  and  Power — A  Crime  perpetrated  when  Selfish  Prayers  were  invented  to  propitiate  "  God  " — Learning  regarded  as  sinful  by  Early  Christians — Why  Great  Truths  are  Allegorized — Occult  Truths  concealed  in  Poetry  and  Satire —  The  Esoteric  Doctrine  or  Wisdom  Religion

SECTION  5— SOME  REASONS  FOR  SECRECY

Reasons  for  withholding  Occult  Sciences — The  Master  Key  of  Practical  Theurgy — What  is  meant  by  the  Personal  God  of  Man — Occultists  know  that  "Gods"  are  Conscious  Living  Principles — Every  Mortal  has  his  Immortal  Archetype — States  of  Consciousness  in  high  Adepts — The  Three  Ways  open  to  an  Adept — Why  it  is  "Unlawful"  to  pursue  Occult  Sciences  without  the  requisite  Qualifications — Man  must  know  Himself  to  become  an  Adept — "Now  that  the  Dead  are  raised"  means  actual  Rebirth — Some  of  Christ's  Parables  and  "  Dark  Sayings  "

SECTION  6— THE  DANGERS  OF  PRACTICAL  MAGIC  .

Magic  is  a  Dual  Power — Unity  is  the  Real  Basis  of  the  Occult  Sciences  —  Cosmogonies  closely  related  to  Numerals  and  Geometric  Figures — Upon  true  Mathematics  rests  the  Knowledge  of  the  Kosmos — Why  Modern  Chemists  and  Physicists  have  shunned  Occult  Sciences — The  "  Three  Mothers"  of  the  Ancients  are  but  Light,  Heat,  and  Electricity — The  Kabalah  is  of  the  essence  of  Masonry — The  Bible  last  and  latest  of  the

Occult   Works   of  Antiquity Moses  was  thoroughly  versed  in  Occult

Knowledge — Moses  clothed  the  Truths  revealed  to  him  under  Ingenious  Imagery.

SECTION  7— OLD  WINE  IN  NEW  BOTTLES  .

Protestants  knew  nothing  of  the  true  Origin  of  Christianity — Ancient  Dogmas  and  Symbols  regarded  by  Christians  as  a  Clever  Plagiarism  by  the  Evil  One — Jesus  must  have  known  the  Language  of  the  oldest  Ritual  of  Initiation — The  Bible  borrows  from  Esoteric  Archaic  Science.

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SECTION  8— THE  "  BOOK  OF  ENOCH  "  THE  ORIGIN  AND  FOUNDATION  OF

CHRISTIANITY     .  .  .  .  .  .

The  Book  of  Enoch  rejected  because  a  Magic  Work — Present  Book  of  Enoch  a  Transcript  from  far  Older  Texts — What  the  Book  of  Enoch  teaches — The  Prophecies  of  the  Book  of  Enoch  cover  Five  Races  out  of  the  Seven — The  first  "  Son  of  Man  "  means  the  Divine  Initiates  of  the  first  Human  School  of  Men  at  the  close  of  the  First  Root  Race — The  Doctrines  of  the  Gospels  and  Old  Testament  taken  from  the  Book  of  Enoch—  The  "  Lord  of  the  Sheep,"  the  Christ,  is  the  Hierophant  Victim  — The  Supreme  Initiator  on  Earth — All  Great  Hierophants  end  by  Violent  Deaths — Esotencally  Enoch  is  symbolically  the  first  sub-race  of  the  Fifth  Root  Race.

SECTION  9— HERMETIC  AND  KABALISTIC  DOCTRINES  .  .

The  Nebular  Theory  is  solved  in  the  Cosmogony  of  the  Archaic  Doctrine  — One  of  the  Secret  Names  of  the  One  Eternal — Secret  Knowledge  of  Simeon  Ben  Jochai — The  Taro  or  Rota  of  the  Book  of  Enoch — In  Occultism  every  God  has  three  Biographies,  Historical,  Astronomical,  and  Mythical — What  the  Pharaonic  "  Source  of  Measures  "  originated — Astro-  nomically Abraham  is  the  Sun  Measure,  while  Enoch  is  the  Solar  Year.

SECTION   10— VARIOUS  OCCULT  SYSTEMS  OF  INTERPRETATIONS  OF  ALPHABETS

AND  NUMERALS  .  .  .  .

The  chief  figures  of  the  Pythagorean  System — The  Symbolism  of  Num-  bers and  their  Mathematical  Inter-relations  is  a  Branch  of  Magic —  Devanagan,  Hermetic,  Chaldean  and  Hebrew  Alphabets  have  Occult  Significance — The  Hindu  Esoteric  System  of  Numerals  solves  the  prob-  lem of  Cosmogony— Kabalistic  Anagrams  and  Diagrams — The  Signifi-  cance of  the  Triangle — The  Symbology  of  the  Lotus  and  the  Water-  lily — A  Universal  Language  among  Initiates Devanagari  and  Hebrew

Characters  have  several  Secret  Meanings.

SECTION  11— THE  HEXAGON  WITH  THE  CENTRAL  POINT,  OR  THE  SEVENTH  KEY

The  great  Power  of  the  Hexagon — Occult  Weapons— The  real  Tarot  found  only  in  Babylonian  cylinders.

SECTION  12— THE  DUTY  OF  THE  TRUE  OCCULTIST  TOWARD  RELIGION

The  Thaumaturgical  Powers  of  Adepts — The  Student  of  Occultism  will  show  respect  to  every  Creed  and  Faith  if  he  would  become  an  Adept  of  the  Good  Law — The  first  Post-Christian  Adepts

SECTION  13— POST-CHRISTIAN  ADEPTS  AND  THEIR  DOCTRINES

The  Apochryphal  Gospels  contain  historically  true  Events — Who  was  Simon  Magus  ? — Simon  Magus  was  a  Kabalist  and  a  Mystic — The  Allegoric-  al Language  used  by  Simon  Magus — The  Mystic  and  Numerical  Meaning  of  Abraxas — Saturnilus  was  an  Asiatic  Gnostic — Simon  was  an  Adept  among  the  Kabalists.

12  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

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SECTION  l4_SiMON  AND  His  BIOGRAPHER  HIPPOLYTUS  .  .

Why  Simon  Magus  was  accused  of  Blasphemy  against  the  Holy  Ghost —  "Divine  Miracles"  were  produced  through  Powers  acquired  by  great  Purity  of  Life  and  Ecstasy — Why  the  Dogma  of  Infallibility  grew  up —  Simon  could  levitate  himself.

SECTION  15— ST.  PAUL  THE  REAL  FOUNDER  OF  PRESENT  CHRISTIANITY  .

When  the  Disciples  were  first  called  Christians — Only  Initiates  can  abro-  gate the  Law Jesus  belonged  to  the  Nazars,  a  Class  of  Chaldean

Initiates.

SECTION  16— PETER  A  JEWISH  KABALIST,  NOT  AN  INITIATE  .

The  Oriental  Church  held  to  the  Primitive  Teachings  of  the  Apostles —  The  word  Peter  (Patar)  connects  him  with  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE  and  the  Mysteries — Peter  did  not  found  the  Latin  Church,  he  died  at  a  good  old  Age  at  Babylon.

SECTION   17— APOLLONIUS  OF  TYANA  .  .  .  .

The  Journey  to  India  represents  the  Trials  of  a  Neophyte — Why  the  Christians  prevented  the  circulation  of  Apollonius'  Biographies — The  Secret  Records  have  noted  his  Birth  and  subsequent  Career — Apollonius  the  Uncompromising  Enemy  of  all  Bigotry  and  Hypocrisy — Ethics  of  Apollonius  based  upon  Mystic  Philosophy — Apollonius  represented  as  an  Obedient  Medium  of  Satan — With  what  have  we  to  reproach  Apol-  lonius ? — Memorials  erected  in  Gratitude  to  Apollonius.

SECTION  18_FACTS  UNDERLYING  ADEPT  BIOGRAPHIES     .  .  .

The  names  of  Jesus  and  Apollonius  (Apollo)  are  alike  names  of  the  Sun  in  the  Heavens — Apollonius  an  Initiate  of  the  same  School  as  Pythagoras,  Buddha,  etc  — Their  Biographies  deal  with  the  Mystic  Record  of  their  Public  and  Inner  lives  as  Neophytes  and  Initiates — Each  "  Saviour  "  is  tempted,  persecuted  and  finally  "  murdered  "  at  the  end  of  the  Rite  of  Initiation — Initiates  descend  into  the  Kingdom  of  Matter  and  emerge  therefrom  as  "  Suns  of  Righteousness  " — Stages  of  Sacrifice  in  Initiation  —Founders  and  their  Religions  are  different  Versions  of  the  same  Primeval  Mystery — Difficulties  concerning  the  Biography  and  Genealogies  of  Jesus  — Early  Views  concerning  the  Nature  of  Christ — The  Proper  Translation  of  Eli,  Eli,  Lamah  azabvtha-ni — How  these  words  were  falsified — The  Cross  a  Secret  Sign  of  Recognition  among  Neophytes  and  Adepts  before  Adoption  as  a  Christian  Symbol — The  "  Secret  Doctrine  "  of  Jesus — The  Cross  and  the  Crucifix— The  Origin  of  Early  Christian  Emblems —  Narrative  of  Jesus  based  on  the  Signs  of  the  Zodiac — Esoteric  Symbols  concealed  Cosmogonical  Mysteries — The  primitive  "  Woman  " — 1. N.R.I,  in  Mystic  and  Kabalistic  Glyphs — Kabalistic  reading  of  the  Gospel  Narratives  — Rites  of  Initiation  and  the  History  of  Jesus.

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SECTION  19— ST  CYPRIAN  OF  ANTIOCH  .  .

Cyprianus  a  Self-confessed  Black  Magician,  subsequently  raised  to  the  rank  of  Saint  for  his  Contrition  and  Humility — The  Confession  of  St.  Cyprian — He  suffered  Martyrdom  under  the  Emperor  Diocletian.

SECTION  20— THE  EASTERN  GUPTA  VIDYA  AND  THE  KABALAH         .

The  Esoteric  Language  of  the  Alchemists  was  a  Blind — Mystic  Christian  Dogma  engulfs  every  old  Pagan  Symbol — Modern  Masonry  the  dim  anH  hazy  Reflection  of  Primeval  Occult  Masonry — The  Kabalistic  Teachings  are  older  than  the  Jewish  Nation — Kabalistic  Literature  not  recorded  in  Writing  for  the  First  Century  A  D. — The  Authorship  of  the  Zohar —  Kabalistic  Tenets  came  to  the  Jews  from  the  Chaldeans — When  Hebrew  ceased  to  be  a  Spoken  Language — The  present  Old  Testament  does  not  contain  the  Original  Books  of  Moses — Concerning  the  First  Speaking  Races  or  Ad-am — Language  of  Abraham  was  Chaldaic— Apparent  Discrepancies  in  Genesis  cloak  Kabalistic  Secrets — The  Bible  depends  for  accuracy  on  the  Genuineness  of  the  Septuagint — The  oldest  Languages  of  Persia  are  the  Chaldaic  and  Sanskrit — The  Universal  Mystery-Language

being    Lost,    Nations  were   restricted  to   their  own  National  Tongues

Hebrew  Esotericism  not  Primitive — Elohistic  and  Jehovistic  Schools  in  the  Hebrew  Scriptures — The  Ain-5cyh  of  the  Chaldeans  a  Copy  of  the  Vedic  Deity — The  Pre-Cosmical  Triad — The  One,  the  Three  and  the  Cube  from  which  emanates  the  whole  Kosmos — True  Meaning  of  the  Name  of  Jehovah — Eve  stands  as  the  Evolution  of  Nature— The  Seven  Names  of  Sephira — The  Three  Groups  of  Sephiroth — From  the  Two  Potencies  (Chokmah  and  Binah)  emanate  all  other  Sephiroth,  Builders —  The  Kabalah  must  be  checked  by  the  Chaldean  Boole  of  Numbers  or  by  the  Tenets  of  the  Eastern  Secret  Science.

SECTION  21—  HEBREW  ALLEGORIES  ...  .

Masonic  Symbolism  must  be  studied  in  the  Aryan  Light— The  Jewish  Bible  as  now  extant  contains  little  Truth — Who  corrupted  the  0/cf  Testa-  ment Text ? — Language  of  Initiates  in  the  Days  of  Moses  identical  with  that  of  the  Egyptian  Hierophants — The  "  Sacred  Text  "  dragged  down  to  the  level  of  gross  Phallic  Religions — Creation  and  the  Seven  Creative  Gods — The  Two  Adams  are  old  Aryan  Allegories — Sophia  is  Aditi  with  her  Seven  Sons — Seven  Keys  to  all  Allegories — Neither  Septi-  form  Chronology  nor  Septiform  Theogony  of  Divine  Origin  in  the  Bible

The  Seven  Creators — Adam  was  the  Chief  of  the  Seven  who  fell  from

Heaven—Universal  Echoes  of  the  Primitive  SECRET  DOCTRINE.

SECTION  22— THE  ZOHAR  ON  CREATION  AND  THE  ELOHIM  .

Theories  of  Creation  and  Occult  Symbology — The  most  Scientific  and  Numerical  Reading  of  the  First  Sentence  and  Chapter  in  Genesis  to  be  found  in  Tfie  Source  of  Measures — Gnostic  and  Christian  Views  on

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Creation  and  "  Builders  " — The  Planets  are  the  Visible  Bodies  of  the  Seven  Planetary  Angels— Who  are  the  Elohim  ? — The  Hebrew  Elohim  correspond  to  the  Hindu  Prajapati — Monad,  Duad  and  Triad — Voice,  Spirit  and  Word — The  Elohim  are  a  Host,  the  Army  of  Creative  Powers

The  Function  of  these  Creative  Powers — "  God  the  Host  "  is  called  in

the  SECRET  DOCTRINE  the  Dhyan  Chohans — Jehovah  is  Adam  Kadmon,  used  by  the  Logos  as  a  Vehicle  in  His  Descent  towards  Manifestation —  All  the  Older  Cosmogonies  are  found  in  St.  Paul's  Epistles

SECTION  23— WHAT  THE  OCCULTISTS  AND  KABALISTS  HAVE  TO  SAY

Origin  of  the  Zohar,  a  Veil  of  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE—"  The  Sun  of  Initiation  " — Julian  the  last  of  the  Solar  Priests  in  Europe — The  "  Unknown  Cause  "  was  not  Jehovah  or  Jupiter— Students  of  Astrology  and  Magic  knew  about  the  Occult  Forces  emanating  from  the  Constellations.

SECTION  24— MODERN  KABALISTS  IN  SCIENCE  AND  OCCULT  ASTRONOMY

The  Need  of  Intelligent  Ruling  and  Guiding  Forces  in  Science —  Speculations  of  Scientists  on  the  Nature  of  Force — Occult  Theory  with  regard  to  Neptune — Perpetual  Motion  or  Self-Generation,  Ex  Nihilo?—"  Can  Blind  Force  Regulate  Blind  Matter?  ".

SECTION  25— EASTERN  AND  WESTERN  OCCULTISM

The  Western  KabaJistic  Occuftiim  of  Eliphas  Levi — The  "  Great  Deep  "  or  Primordial  Darkness— What  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE  teaches  on  the  Reconstruction  of  the  Universe — Eliphas  Levi  tried  to  reconcile  Jewish  Magic  with  Roman  Ecclesiasticism — Orientalists  cannot  make  away  with  the  Landmarks  set  up  in  the  Rig  Veda — Between  the  "  Father  "  of  All  and  the  Infinite  Deity  stretches  an  Abyss — The  Water  of  Life  stands  for  the  Fifth  Principle  of  Kosmos — Secret  Meaning  of  Water  and  Earth.

Prima  Materia  and  the  Creative  (Feminine)  Principle — Chaos,  Space,  the  Container  of  Everything  in  the  Universe — -Numbers  which  show  Chro-  nology up  to  the  Flood.

SECTION  26— THE  IDOLS  AND  THE  TERAPHIM    .  .  .  .

The  Teraphim  were  the  Gods  who  revealed  Themselves  through  the  Initiated  Priests  and  Adepts — Divinations  accomplished  with  the  Help  of  Elementals — The  Thummim  and  Urim  of  the  Jews  similar  to  the  Breast-  plate of  the  Egyptian  High  Priests — The  Purpose  of  the  "  Tabernacle  "

How  Scientific  Occult  Rites  become  "  Superstition."

SECTION  27— EGYPTIAN  MAGIC        ...  .

Egyptian  Papyri  witness  to  Ancient  Magic— Most  Papyri  have  White  or  Black  Magic  mixed  up  in  Them — Egyptologists  on  Egyptian  Magic  and  Sorcery— Meanings  to  be  ascribed  to  a  Papyrus  at  the  Louvre—Common

Symbols  hide  Ancient  Secrets — Egyptian  Original  of  the  Pastoral  Crook

Egyptian  Symbols  for  Reincarnation — In  the  Funeral  Mysteries  Initiates  re-enacted  the  Drama  of  the  Birth  and  Death  of  each  Race

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The  "  Evil  Eye  "  is  Cosmic  in  its  Origin — Some  Common  Superstitions —  Judiciary  Astrology  Scientifically  Possible — Amulets  and  Mystic  Names —  Obsession  in  Egypt — Communications  with  the  Gods  in  Egypt — Divine  Evocations — Magic  was  considered  a  Divine  Science— Magical  Statues —  Ungodly  Atlantean  Sorcery  caused  Practical  Magic  to  be  withdrawn.

SECTION.

28— THE  ORIGIN  OF  THE  MYSTERIES  .

The  Mysteries  imparted  to  the  Elect  of  the  Fourth  Root  Race,  by  King-  Initiates — Hercules  of  Indian  Origin,  the  last  Incarnation  of  one  of  the  "  Lords  of  the  Flame  ",  as  Balarama — Dvaraka  the  site  of  Raivata's  ancient  Kushasthah — Knowledge  reigned  universally  in  the  Golden  Age — Logical  and  Scientific  Observation  of  Natural  Phenomena  leads  to  Knowledge  of  Eternal  Truths — Why  Primeval  Truths  remained  in  the  Hands  of  Initiates  — A  True  Priesthood — The  Healing  Powers  of  Initiates — Wonderful  Know-  ledge of  Egyptian  Priests — Mysteries  preceded  Hieroglyphics — Initiation  was  the  Science  of  Sciences — Precepts  taught  by  Initiates  spread  all  over  the  World — Why  Sages  and  Writers  of  Antiquity  praised  the  Mysteries —  The  Second  Epistle  of  Peter  refers  to  the  Destruction  of  the  Fifth  Race  and  the  Appearance  of  a  New  Continent  for  the  Sixth

SECTION  29— THE  TRIAL  OF  THE  SUN  INITIATE  .  .  .

The  "  Sun,"  the  Neophyte,  descends  into  the  Nether  Regions  and  emerges  in  the  Glory  of  his  Regeneration — Mystery  Gods — Real  Initia-  tions cannot  be  made  Public — Why  Grand  Initiates  Disappear,  but  do  not  Die — The  Masonic  Rite  of  Initiation  modelled  upon  Egyptian  and  still  earlier  Symbolism — Freemasonry  possesses  a  considerable  portion  of  the  Symbolism,  Formulae,  and  Ritual  of  Occultism — What  the  Jesuits  have  done  to  destroy  Masonry — Masonic  Symbolism  typifies  a  whole  Drama  of  the  Cycle  of  Life.

SECTION  30— THE  MYSTERY  -  SUN  OF  INITIATION  "...

In  Egypt  the  Mysteries  known  since  the  Days  of  Menes ;  Orpheus  introduced  them  to  Greece  from  India — In  Europe  in  Secret  Places  the

Mysteries  still   Enacted — Who  was  the  "  Sun  of  Righteousness  "  ? The

Sun,  Sol,  Verbum,  Helios,  the  Image  of  Divine  Wisdom — Ja-va  or  IAO  was  the  Secret  Name  of  a  Mystery  God— The  Identity  of  Jehovah  and  Bacchus,  Dionysos.

SECTION  31— THE  OBJECTS  OF  THE  MYSTERIES  .  .

Pythagoras,  Plato  and  lamblichus  took  part  in  the  Mysteries — Few  attained  the  Higher  and  Final  Initiation — Initiates  enjoyed  Theophany,  i.e.,  saw  Visions  of  Gods — Indian  Chelas  of  the  Third  Degree  of  Initiation  have  Two  Gurus — Masonry  rests  upon  Three  Fundamental  Degrees — The  Mysteries  in  South  and  Central  America  existed  to  the  Day  of  the  Spanish  Invaders

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SECTION  32—TRACES  OF  THE  MYSTERIES         .

"  Round  Towers  "  were  connected  with  the  "  Mystery-Initiation  " —  Initiates  of  the  Left  Path  took  these  venerable  Ruins  and  turned  them  into  Phallic  Monuments — The  Meaning  of  the  Word  Chrestos  in  Initiation,  Difference  between  the  terms  Chrest  and  Christ — The  "  Pit"  in  Eastern  Symbolism—The  Serpent  or  Satan  was  the  "  God  of  Secret  Wisdom  " —  NSgSrjuna  initiated  many  in  China  and  Tibet  into  the  Hidden  Mysteries  of  Gautama  Buddha — The  Hidden  Symbolism  of  NaYada — Christian  Symbols  before  Christianity — Saviours  were  Good  Shepherds — The  Judgment  of  the  "  Soul  "• — The  Neophyte  commanded  to  govern  his  Passions — Book  of  Job  is  the  Poem  of  Initiation — Man  is  Born  in  the  present  way  as  the  Consequence  of  the  Law  of  Natural  Evolution —  Mysteries  Commemorate  the  Transformation  of  Humanity  into  truly  Physical  Men — Ancient  Knowledge  of  the  Science  of  Physiology — The  Crucified  Rose  is  the  most  Unveiled  of  all  Sexual  Symbols — The  Pure  Ideal  of  Mystic  Nature  was  Personified  in  the  "  World  Virgins  " — The  Vedas  and  the  Orphic  Hymns  orally  transmitted  from  one  Generation  to  Another.

SECTION  33— THE  LAST  OF  THE  MYSTERIES  IN  EUROPE      .

Why  the  Scribes  and  Hierophants  had  to  form  and  establish  Secret  Societies  and  Brotherhoods — The  Destruction  of  the  Druids,  College-  Priests  and  Neophytes  at  Alesia  in  Gaul- — In  Bibractis  died  for  Europe  the  Secrets  of  the  Great  Mysteries — Genuine  Adepts  become  Scarce —  Alchemy  was  first  taught  in  Egypt  by  her  Learned  Priests.

SECTION  34— THE  POST  CHRISTIAN  SUCCESSORS  TO  THE  MYSTERIES   .

Eleusinian  Mysteries  in  the  Neo-Platonic  School  of  Ammonius  Saccas —  Neo-Platonism  echoed  the  Belief  of  the  Vedantins  concerning  a  Single  Supreme  Essence- — Mankind  from  the  First  to  the  Last  is  com-  pounded of  one  and  the  same  Company — Fundamental  Truths  per-  formed in  Allegorical  Plays  and  Images  during  the  Mysteries — Gnosticism  in,  the  Days  of  the  Apostles  —Ammonius  attempted  to  benefit  the  World

by    teaching    Permissible    Portions    of    the    Secret    Science Eclectic

Theosophical    System    earlier    than     the    Third    Century    A.D  — Neo-  Platonic    Teachings    of   Ammonius    Saccas — The    Neo-Platonic    School  \  of     Alexandria    founded    by   Ammonius    the    Prototype    proposed   for

The    Theosophical    Society — Philalethians    had    Esoteric  Teachings — The

modern  Candidate  like  his   Predecessor  of  Old  must  Conquer  or  Die

Rules  and  Methods  for  producing  Ecstasy  came  from  the  same  Lore  of  the  Divine  Vidya  as  the  Gnosis — Under  the  Tftle  of  Magic  was  Taught  every  Science — The  Neo-Platonic  School  was  closed  by  Order  of  the  Emperor  Justinian — Ancient  Treatises  spoiled  and  Porphyry's  Volumes  burned  and  destroyed  by  the  Church  Fathers

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SECTION  35— SYMBOLISM  OF  SUN  AND  STARS  .

The  "  Seven  Spirits  of  the  Presence  '  were  the  Kabiri  Gods  of  the  Ancients — Meaning  and  Application  of  the  Word  Kabiri — Urim  and  Thummim  were  Symbolical  Hieroglyphics  of  the  Kabiri — Sacred  "  Circle

Dances  " — Origin  of  the  Sentence  "  I  will  send  my  Son  from  the  Sun  "

Christian    Astrolatry  authoritatively  stopped — Astrological  Meaning  of  the

Seven- Branched  Candlestick — St.   Paul  spoke   of  the  Cosmocratores

Ormuzd   and    Mithra   have  become  the  Devs  of  Christ  and  Mikael — The

Heliocentric   System   Taught   for   Thousands  of  Years    before  Galileo

Jehovah  is  the  Sun  and  the  Christ  of  the  Roman  Church --How  Christians  limited  the  Solar  Gods.

SECTION  36— PAGAN  SIDEREAL  WORSHIP  OR  ASTROLOGY  .

Astrology  existed  before  Astronomy — Esoteric  Astrolatry  taught  of  the  Regents  or  "  Souls  "  of  Planets— Angels  are  mentioned  in  the  Pentateuch  under  the  Word  Tsaba — The  Identity  between  the  KumaYas  and  the

Seven  Angels  of  the  Stars — The  Archangel  Michael  and  Sanat  Kumara

Seven  Rectors  were  the  Co- Workers  of  the  Demiourgos — "  Spheres  "  and  "  World-Wheels  "—The  Seventh  Planet  the  Hidden  Divine  Hiero-  phant — "  Baptism  by  Fire  "  is  a  Mystery.

SECTION  37— THE  SOULS  OF  THE  STARS,  UNIVERSAL  HELIOLATRY  .

The  difference  between  the  Planets  and  their  Spirits— Astrology  and  Occultism  tabooed  by  the  Churches — The  Seven  Chief  Dhyani-Buddhas

found   in   many   Symbols — Mikael   the   Regent   of  the   Planet  Saturn

Kabalistic  and  Chaldean  Theogony  very  similar  to  Roman  Catholic  Angelolatry  and  Theodicy — Origin  of  the  Words  "  Our  Lord  the  Sun  "  used  in  Early  Christian  Prayers

SECTION  38— ASTROLOGY  AND  ASTROLATRY

Vast  Difference  between  Egyptian  Astrologers  and  Quacks  under  the  last  Emperors  of  Rome — Sidereal  Influence  is  Physiological  and  Spiritual

White     and    Black    Astrology — Primitive    Astrology  far  above  Modern

Judiciary  Astrology — The  Regent  of  every  Planet-Star  shoots  out  from  Itself  every  Soul  born  under  Its  House — Primitive  Occult  Astrology  on  the  decline  in  the  Days  of  Daniel — Greece  got  her  Astrological  Instruction  direct  from  Orpheus — Ancient  Learned  Astrologers

SECTION  39— CYCLES  AND  AVATARAS

The  Figures  4,  3,  2,  have  a  Cosmic  Evolutionary  Significance — When  the  Future  Avataras  will  come  forth  from  Shamballa— Characteristics  of  the  Kali  Yuga,  and  the  "Coming  of  Christ  " -Great  and  Small  Secret  Cycles.

SECTION  40— SECRET  CYCLES      •  .

Cycle  Records  near  Benares  and  in  Stonehenge — The  First  Secret  Cycle  of  600,  the  Naros— India  the  Birthplace  of  Arithmetic  and  Mathematics  FF

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The  Age  of  the  Vedas — Astronomical  Calculations  proving  the  Antiquity

of  the  Vedas Theories  about  the  Hindu  Yugas

SECTION  41 —THE  DOCTRINE  OF  AVATARAS  .  .  .      349-

Gautama  Buddha  had  two  Doctrines  One  for  the  Masses  the  other  for  the  Arhats— Was  the  Buddha  an  Avatara  of  Vishnu  ?— The  Buddha  a  Direct  Incarnation  of  One  of  the  "  Seven  Sons  of  Light  " — Avataras  are  Sons  of  Their  "  Father  " — The  Divine  Incarnations  called  Avataras — The  Difference  between  Avataras  and  Jivanmuktas  .  an  Avatara  "  is  "  ,  a  Jivanmukta  "becomes" — Mysterious  Incarnations  of  Adepts — Incarna-  tions of  Dharmakayas  and  Nirmanakayas — Adepts  can  guide  their  Inner  Principles  to  a  New  Body — -Cardinal  de  Cusa  incarnated  in  Copernicus — The  Theory  of  Rebirth  as  applied  to  Special  Cases — Why  a  Buddha,  a  Shankaracharya  or  a  Jesus  can  be  said  to  animate  several  Persons  at  the  same  time — A  Dharmakaya  "without  Remains  "  cannot  reincarnate — A  Nirmanakaya  "  with  Remains  "  returns  to  help  Humanity  The  "  Man  of  Sorrows  "  has  returned  more  than  once

SECTION  42— THE  SEVEN  PRINCIPLES  .

A   Knowledge   of  the  Seven  Principles  elucidates  the  Mystery  of  Buddha  — In   Occult   Philosophy   Consciousness  per  se  is  the  Highest  Quality  of  '         the  Divine  Soul

SECTION  43— THE  MYSTERY  OF  BUDDHA  363-

The  Mystery  is  .  Gautama,  an  Incarnation  of  Pure  Wisdom  had  to  be  Initiated  into  the  World's  Secrets  until  He  emerged  to  preach  in  the  Groves  of  Benares — The  Buddha  revealed  too  much — The  Karma  of  this  necessitated  His  Rebirth  as  Shankaracharya — Shankaracharya  not  an  Incarnation  of  the  Buddha  but  an  Avatara — The  Buddha  as  a  Dharmakaya  abandoned  the  World  but  left  behind  the  Nirmanakaya  to  work  after  Him  -Three  Kinds  of  Buddhas — The  Nirvana  of  the  Buddhists  and  of  the  Brahmans — Shankaracharya  used  the  Principles  once  attached  to  Gautama  — Everyone  has  his  Bodhisattva  and  his  Dhyani-Buddha,  "  Father  of  the

Son  " — Similarity  of  the  Two  Saviours,  Gautama  and  Jesus Jesus  could

leave  but  little  to  His  Disciples — The  Karma  attached  to  the  Rebirth  of  a

Nirmanakaya — The  Meaning  of  the  Sacrificial  Lamb The  Shruti,  Divine

Revelation,    is    Eternal,  Gautama  heard  it  and  revealed  it Gautama  and

Jesus  flung  open  the  Doors  of  the  Forbidden  Sanctuary  to  those  of  Low  Estate — Shankaracharya  disappeared,  yet  is  supposed  to  be  living  still  among  the  Brotherhood  of  Shamballa

SECTION  44_"  REINCARNATIONS  "  OF  BUDDHA  .  .  .

The  Bodhisattva  became  a  Buddha  through  Personal  Effort  and  Merit—  The  Qualities  a  Buddha  must  acquire — The  Sacrifice  of  the  Buddha  -for  the  Sake  of  Humanity — The  Nature  of  the  Worlds  in  which  a  Buddha  operates — Secret  ^Volumes  of  the  Lives  of  Great  Sages  in  Tibetan

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Lamaseries — Shankaracharya  put  off  his  Mortal  Body  at  Thirty-three,  freeing  the  Bodhisattva  that  served  His  Personality — The  Karmic  Mystery  of  Shankaracharya  and  the  Buddha — Tsong-Kha-Pa  an  "  Incarnation  "  of  the  Buddha — "  Seat  of  the  Three  Secrets  "

SECTION  45— AN  UNPUBLISHED  DISCOURSE  OF  BUDDHA  .

An  Address  to  Arhats  on  the  Mystery  of  Being  and  Non-Being — The  Freed  Spiritual  Self  on  Whom  Maya  has  no  more  hold.

SECTION  46— NIRVANA-MOKSHA  .  38t

What  the  Buddha  held  as  Eternal,  according  to  the  Northern  and  Southern  Churches — The  Ether,  Akasha,  Space,  the  Eternal  Root  of  All,  Explored  by  the  Seers  of  every  Age — Plato's  "God"  is  "Universal  Ideation  "--  Schopenhauer's  Views  on  Will — Life  in  every  Atom — The  Orientalists  misunderstood  the  Nature  of  Nirvana — The  True  Meaning  of  Annihilation

SECTION  47—THE  SECRET  BOOKS  OF  LAM.RIN  AND  DZYAN  .  .

The  Book  of  Dzyan  is  the  First  Volume  of  Commentaries  upon  the  Secret  Folios  of  Kiu'te — The  Book  of  the  Secret  Wisdom  of  the  World,  the  Archaic  Origin  of  Voluminous  Commentaries — Great  Teachers  of  the  Snowy  Mountains  possess  True  Knowledge — Ancient  Commentar/es  must  be  read  with  a  Key

SECTION  48— AMITA  BUDDHA,  KWAN-SHAI-YIN,  AND  KWAN-YIN     WHAT  THE

••  BOOK  OF  DZYAN  ••  AND  THE  LAMASERIES  OF  TSONG-KHA-PA  SAY  .

Tsong-Kha-Pa  a  direct  Incarnation  of  Amita  (or  Amida)  Buddha — The  Meaning  of  the  Word  Amida  or  Amitabha

SECTION  49— TSONG-KHA-PA,  LOHANS  IN  CHINA  .

Tsong-Kha-Pa,  a  Buddha  Incarnation,  forbade  Necromancy — The  "  Hall  of  the  Five  Hundred  Lohans  "  near  Pekin — Persecution  caused  the  Arhats

to   leave  India  and  seek  Solitude  in  China,  Tibet,  Japan  and  elsewhere

Gifted  Sadhus  and  Yogis  in  India  keep  themselves  Unnoticed — When  the  Initiates  of  the  Inner  Temples  chose  Their  Supreme  Council  and  Supreme  Chief — Initiates  of  India  and  Tibet  could  dissipate  thick  Mists  hanging  over  the  History  of  Occultism — Tsong-Kha-Pa  enjoined  Arhats  to  attempt  to  enlighten  the  World.

SECTION  50    A  FEW  MORE  MISCONCEPTIONS  CORRECTED  .  .

The   grand   Teachings   of   the    Buddha   appreciated   only  by  Initiates

Buddhism  not  properly  understood — The  Words  of  the  Buddha  convey  a  Double  Meaning — The  Seven  and  Twelve  Degrees  of  the  Hierarchy  of  Adeptship  based  on  Three  Chief  Degrees  :  Pratyeka  Buddhas,  Bodhi-  sattvas  and  "Perfect"  Buddhas — The  Teachings  of  Nagarjuna  and  Aryasanga — State  of  Paramartha  a  State  above  all  Illusion — Yoga-

charya  Systems  are  Esoteric  -  -Yogacharya  and  Tibetan  Vishishtadvaitas

The  Dharmakaya   Bodhisattva   infallible  when  in  real  Samadhi—  The  Path

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to  Emancipation  reached  through  Knowledge  (Initiation) — Materialistic  Orientalists — The  Date  of  Tibetan  Buddhism.

SECTION  51— THE  "DOCTRINE  OF  THE  EYE"  AND  THE  ••  DOCTRINE  OF  THE

HEART,"  OR  THE  "  HEART'S  SEAL  "

Truth  lingers  in  the  Trans-Himalayan  Fastnesses — Religion  cannot  be  Understood  until  the  Symbols  of  every  Religion  yield  their  Final  Secrets —  "  Eye  Doctrine  "  means  Dogmas  and  Dead-letter  Form — "  Heart  Doctrine"  the  only  Real  One — Genuine  Esoteric  Literature  still  inacces-  sible— Esoteric  Buddhism  still  Preserved — Buddhism  in  China  founded  by  Bodhidharma — How  to  Master  the  Mysteries  of  Esotericism

SOME   PAPERS   ON   THE   BEARING   OF

OCCULT    PHILOSOPHY   ON    LIFE  PAPER  1  .  .

A  Warning  :  A  Strange  Law  in  Occultism — The  Occult  Axiom,  |(now  Thyself --OM  •  The  Fifth  Race  Mantra— OM-MANI-PADME-HUM  :  The  Fourth  Race  Mantra— Why  the  Formula  OM-MANI-PADME-HUM,  "  I  am  in  Thee  and  Thou  art  in  Me  "  means  also  "  The  Jewel  in  the  Lotus  " — The  Potency  of  SOUND,  COLOUR,  and  NUMBER— The  Nature  of  the  Upper  Triad  — Cosmic  and  Human  Processes  Compared — TAT,  THAT,  the  Unknowable  Rootless  Root — The  Numbers  Ten  and  Seven — The  One  in  Three  and  the  Seven  Principles — The  Sacred  Auric  Body — Cosmic  Centres  and  their  Microcosmic  Principles — Correspondences  of  Planets  with  Eyes — We  are  Seven  in  ONE — Seven  States  of  Consciousness — Woman  is  the  Perfect  Cosmic  Number  Ten — Each  Human  Being  is  an  Incarnation  of  his  "  Heavenly  Father  "—The  Power  of  the  Word  AUM  or  OM,  and  AMEN—  Why  Prayer  should  be  Uttered  in  Private — The  Planets,  the  Days  of  the  Week ;  their  Corresponding  Colours  and  Metals — Brahmavidya  the  Primeval  Wisdom — What  may  be  achieved  by  Unselfish  Love  of  Humanity.

PAPER  2          ...  ...

"  Blinds  "  and  Occult  Terms — Ten  is  the  Universe  as  a  Whole — The  Predominance  of  one  Principle  over  another — The  Correspondence  of  Planets,  Metals,  and  Colours — Physical  Planets  are  Types  of  Psychic  and  Spiritual  Worlds — What  happens  when  the  Individual  Consciousness  is  turned  inwards — The  Guardian  Angels  of  the  Four  Corners  of  the  Earth  — The  Esoteric  School  divided  into  Inner  and  Outer  Circles — The  Signifi-  cance of  the  Linga  Sharira — Esoteric  and  Exoteric  Meaning  of  Colours —  The  Seven  Prismatic  Colours  are  direct  Emanations  from  the  Seven  Hierarchies  of  Being — Physical  Planets  rule  only  the  Physical  Body  and  Functions  •  Mental,  Emotional,  Psychic  and  Spiritual  Faculties  influenced

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by  Occult  Properties  which  Emanate  from  the  Hierarchies  of  the  Spiritual  Rulers  of  the  Planets — The  Seven  Stages  that  culminate  «n  the  "  Princi-  ples "  of  Man — The  "Great  Tone"  in  Nature — Symbolism  of  the  Planets  and  the  Principles.

WHAT  MAGIC  is  IN  REALITY  ...

Divine  Magic  is  the  Knowledge  of  Inseparableness  from  our  Divine  Selves  — By  "  Magic  "  Simon  Magus  meant  the  Knowledge  of  Initiates — The  Significance  of  Fire — Syzygies  or  Active  and  Passive  £ons — The  First  Six  /Eons  and  the  Seventh — ONE  LIFE,  the  Intelligent  Divine  Flame — Simon's  Third  World  with  its  third  Series  of  Six  >Eons — Man  must  develop  the  Potency  of  his  "  Fathers  " — Of  what  the  Triple  >Con  Consists — Kriya-  shakti,  the  Power  of  producing  Forms  objectively  through  the  Potency  of  Ideation  and  Will  from  Invisible,  Indestructible  Matter — Magic  now  called  Theosophia  or  Divine  Wisdom,  Power  and  Knowledge—  "Miracles"  of  Simon — Simon  and  Helena  or  "Divine  Thought"  Misunderstandings  of  the  Story  of  Helena,  the  Shakti  of  the  Inner  Man  — Real  Theurgy  the  True  Divine  Science  of  Raja  Yoga — Two  Kinds  of  Theurgy — What  a  Man  arrives  at  through  Theurgy  or  Raja  Yoga — None  but  a  High  Adept  can  perceive  a  "  God  "  in  Its  True  Transcendental  Form  — The  Jewel  in  the  Lotus  is  Spiritual  Man,  or  God- — The  Seven  Principles  are  Derived  from  the  Seven  Great  Hierarchies — Our  Plane  the  Plane  of  Reflection — The  Musical  Scale  and  Colours  according  to  the  Number  of  Vibrations  proceed  from  the  World  of  Gross  Matter  to  that  of  Spirit —  Colour,  Sounds  and  Forms  and  their  Correspondences — Colours  and  Principles — Students  must  master  the  Right  Correspondence  between  the  Human  or  Nature  Principles  and  those  of  Kosmos — The  Roots  of  Colour  and  Sound — Orders,  Hierarchies  and  Man— The  Unity  of  Deity.

PAPER  3— A  WORD  CONCERNING  THE  EARLIER  PAPERS  .  .

The  Study  of  Occultism  proceeds  from  Universals  to  Particulars — Diagrams  intended  to  familiarize  Students  with  Leading  Ideas  of  Occult  Corres-  pondences— Concerning  Secrecy — Whole  Truth  too  Sacred  to  be  given  out  promiscuously  ;  Knowledge  of  Details  and  Missing  Links  in  Exoteric  Teachings  too  dangerous  in  Profane  Hands — The  Mission  of  Planetary  Spirits  is  but  to  strike  the  Keynote  of  Truth,  then  disappear  — Awful  Sacredness  of  the  Pledge — "Dark  Brothers"  and  their  Workings  on  Human  Brains — The  Difference  between  a  Brother  of  Light  and  a  Brother  of  Darkness — The  Light  Side  and  the  Dark  Side  of  Nature  — Value  of  Practising  Genuine  Concentration  and  Meditation — The  reason  for  "  Blinds  "  in  Occult  Books — The  Seven  Tattvas — Eternal  Basic  Principles  and  Transitory  Aspects  produced  by  Them — Nature  of  the  Auric  Egg  in  its  Several  Meanings — Operations  of  Karma  and  Rebirth  — Tattvic  Correlations  and  Meanings — Sound  the  Substratum  of  Akasha  — The  Seven  Tattvas  as  taught  in  Esotericism — The  Three  and  the  Forty-  nine  Fires — Esoteric  and  Tantra  Tables  of  the  Tattvas — Pranayama,  the

22  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

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Science  of  the  Five  Breaths— The  Three  Nadis  .  Sushumna,  Ida  and  Pmgala— The  Difference  between  the  Raja  and  Hatha  Yoga  Systems —  The  Functions  of  the  Pineal  Gland  and  Pituitary  Body — The  Pineal  Gland  called  by  Eastern  Occultists  the  "  Divine  Eye  " — The  Seven  Master  Chakras  are  all  situated  in  the  Head- — Sons  of  Fohat  •  Motion,  Sound,  Heat,  Light,  Cohesion,  Electricity  or  Electric  Fluid,  and  Nerve-Force  or  Magnetism — The  Psychic  Aura  around  every  Individual- — Colours  of  the  Tattvas  when  used  reversed  tend  to  Black  Magic — Exoteric  "  Blinds"  and  the  Death  of  the  Soul — Pentacle  with  Point  Upwards  the  Sign  of  White  Magic — The  Divine  Ego  combines  with  the  Fostus  at  the  comple-  tion of  the  Seventh  Month — Life  in  the  Spiritual  Consciousness  is  Con-  scious Existence  in  Spirit,  not  Matter — "  Second  Death  "  and  Soulless  People — Personality  and  Individuality — The  Higher  Ego  in  Devachan —  Different  Kinds  of  "  Death  "—Above,  LIGHT ,  below,  Life— Illusory  Nature  of  the  Physical  Personality — The  Fifth  and  the  Seventh  Principles  in  Man — The  Function  of  Buddhi  and  Manas — Individual  Ego  Immortal  throughout  Eternity — Nature  and  Function  of  Antahkarana — No  Per-  sonality reaches  Atma  except  through  Buddhi-Manas — Avttchi  and  Soulless  Human  Beings — What  happens  when  the  Reincarnating  Ego  breaks

asunder  from  the  Psycho-animal  Soul Who  are  Candidates  for  Avitchi  ?

— Potency  of  a  Word  or  Name  lies  in  its  Rhythm  or  Accent — Become  Immortal  by  Identification  with  Atma-Buddhi-Manas,  AUM,  or  God —  Divine  Justice  of  Karma.

NOTES  ON  PAPERS  1,2  AND  3  .  .  .  .  .

Every  Letter  in  the  Alphabet  has  its  own  Colour — Colour  and  Number  of  Planets,  also  of  Zodiacal  Constellations  corresponding  to  every  Letter  of  the  Alphabet  necessary  to  make  any  special  Syllable  or  even  Letter  Operative — Pythagorean  Tetraktys  a  Symbol  of  Kosmos — The  Triangle,  the  Quaternary  and  their  Correspondences  and  Colours — Vibrations  and  the  Seven  Senses.

NOTES  ON  SOME  ORAL  TEACHINGS    .  .  .

The  Three  Vital  Airs — The  Auric  Egg  of  an  Adept,  of  a  Child,  of  an  Idiot  —  Hypnotism  and  Mesmerism — Individual  Karma  cannot  come  into  play  till  the  Descent  of  Manas — The  Dweller  on  the  Threshold — The  Adept's  Purity,  Love,  and  Working  with  Nature,  Karma  and  his  Inner  God  give  him  his  Power — What  constitutes  Karma  for  the  Reincarnating  Ego — Both  Good  and  Bad  Karma  are  Binding — The  Nature  of  Mahat  and  its  Emana-  tions— Only  the  Knowledge  of  Atma-Buddhi-Manas  can  enclose  the  Past  and  the  Future  in  the  Present — The  Turiya  State  and  Atma-Buddhi-  Manas — Psychic  Vision  not  to  be  desired — The  Triangle  and  the  Quater-  nary— The  Nidanas  are  produced  by  Dhyan  Chohans  and  Devas — The  Three  and  the  Forty-nine  Sons  of  Agni — The  Sixth  Race  will  have  two  Spinal  Cords,  in  the  Seventh  the  two  will  merge  into  one — Antahkarana  is  the  imaginary  Bridge  from  the  Higher  to  the  Lower  Manas — Seven  Divisions

TABLE  OF  CONTENTS

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in  Antahkarana  ,  Mulaprakriti,  Akasha,  Mahat  and  the  Auric  Egg,  Sushumna,  Ida  and  Pingala — Organs  of  the  Body  and  their  Correspondences —  The  Physical  Body  not  a  Principle — Fourteen  signifies  the  Inter-relation  of  two  Planes — All  Nature  is  a  Sounding  Board — The  Sixth  and  Seventh  Senses  will  merge  into  the  Akashic  Sounds — Prana  is  the  Motor-Principle  in  Life — Plato  and  Euclid  were  Initiates — Seven  Planes  of  Kosmic  Con-  sciousness and  their  Explanation — Mahat  is  the  Highest  Entity  in  Kosmos —  Mahat  differentiates  when  informing  the  Universe — Manvantaric  Aspect  of  Parabrahman  and  Mulaprakriti — Astral,  Kama-Pranic,  Kama-Manasic,  Manasic  and  Buddhic  Consciousness — Concerning  the  Silent  Watcher,  the  Dhyan  Chohans,  the  Pitns  and  the  Hierarchies — Atma-Buddhi-Manas  in  Man  corresponds  to  the  Three  Logoi  in  Kosmos — Suggestions  on  the  Three  Logoi  1.  Potentiality  of  Mind  (Absolute  Thought)  ;  2.  Thought  in  Germ ,  3.  Ideation  in  Activity— Imagination  the  First  Step  towards  the  accomplishment  of  Kriyashakti — The  Sun  we  see  a  Reflection  of  the  True  Sun — The  Moon — Planets  and  our  Solar  System — The  Use  of  Sanskrit  Terms  in  Occultism — Explanation  of  the  States  of  Consciousness  corres-  ponding to  the  Vedantic  Classification  of  Lokas-  -Further  Explanations  of  the  Senses — Seven  Divine  and  Seven  Terrestrial  Lokas  compared —  The  Fourteen  Lokas  form  the  extent  of  the  Whole  Brahmanda  (World) —  Lokas  and  Talas  are  Reflections  the  one  of  the  other — States  of  Con-  sciousness— Mother-Love — H.  P  B  Challenges  Western  Views  on  Con-  sciousness— The  Seven  Scales  of  Consciousness — Proofs  of  the  Ego —  The  Pineal  Gland  and  the  Heart — The  Astral  Body  is  Molecular,  the  Ego  is  Atomic,  Spiritual — Lower  Manas  emanates  from  Higher  Manas —  Qualities  determine  the  Properties  of  Selfhood — The  Feeling  of  Responsi-  bility is  the  Beginning  of  Wisdom — The  Fires  and  Kundalini — Seven  Stages  of  Perception — The  Spiritual  Man  is  in  the  Heart,  the  Psycho-  Intellectual  Man  in  the  Head — Nothing  in  the  Macrocosm  that  is  not  in  the  Microcosm — Will  and  Desire — Our  Manas  is  a  Ray  from  the  World-  Soul  and  is  Withdrawn  at  Pralaya — Names  and  Explanations  of  the  Twelve  Nidanas — Skandhas  are  the  Germs  of  Life  on  dl  the  Seven  Planes  of  Being  in  Subtle  Bodies — Fire  is  a  Divine  Thing — Hints  on  the  Future-  -  Explanations  of  the  Ego  —Monadic  Evolution — Nature  and  Function  of  the  Astral  Body — Devachan  is  a  State  on  a  Plane  of  Spiritual  Con-  sciousness— Kama-Loka  is  a  Place  of  Physical  Consciousness.

ADDITIONAL  NOTES  .

BIBLIOGRAPHY

ADDITIONAL  BOOKS  FOR  REFERENCE  .  .

INTRODUCTORY

"  POWER  belongs  to  him  who  knows  "  ;  this  is  a  very  old  axiom,  Knowledge  — the  first  step  to  which  is  the  power  of  comprehending  the  truth,  of  discern-  ing the  real  from  the  false — is  for  those  only  who,  having  freed  themselves  from  every  prejudice  and  conquered  their  human  conceit  and  selfishness,  are  ready  to  accept  every  and  any  truth,  once  it  is  demonstrated  to  them.

Of  such  there  are  very  few.

The  majority  judge  of  a  work  according  to  the  respective  prejudices  of  its  critics,  who  are  guided  in  their  turn  by  the  popu-  larity or  unpopularity  of  the  author,  rather  than  by  its  own  faults  or  merits.

Outside  the  Theosophical  circle,  therefore,  the  present  Volume  is  certain  to  receive  at  the  hands  of  the  general  public  a  still  colder  welcome  than  its  two  predecessors  have  met  with.

In  our  day  no  statement  can  hope  for  a  fair  trial,  or  even  hearing,  unless  its  arguments  run  on  the  line  of  legitimate  and  accepted  enquiry,  remaining  strictly  within  the  boundaries  of  official  Science  or  orthodox  Theology.

Our  age  is  a  paradoxical  anomaly.

It  is  pre-eminently  materialistic  and  as  pre-eminently  pietistic.

Our  literature,  our  modern  thought  and  progress,  so  called,  both  run  on  these  two  parallel  lines,  so  incongruously  dissimilar  and  yet  both  so  popular  and  so  very  orthodox,  each  in  its  own  way.

He  who  presumes  to  draw  a  third  line,  as  a  hyphen  of  reconciliation  between  the  two,,  has  to  be  fully  prepared  for  the  worst.

He  will  have  his  work  mangled  by  reviewers,  mocked  by  the  sycophants  of  Science  and  Church,  misquoted  by  his  opponents,  and  rejected  even  by  the  pious  lending  libraries.

The  absurd  misconceptions,  in  so-called  cultured  circles  of  society,  of  the  ancient  Wisdom-  Religion  (Bodhism)  after  the  admirably  clear  and  scientifically-presented  ex-  planations in  Esoteric  Buddhism,  are  a  good  proof  in  point.

They  might  have  served  as  a  caution  even  to  those  Theosophists  who,  hardened  in  an  almost  life-long  struggle  in  the  service  of  their  Cause,  are  neither  timid  with  their  pen,  nor  in  the  least  appalled  by  dogmatic  assumption  and  scientific  authority.

Yet,  do  what  Theosophical  writers  may,  neither  Materialism  nor  doctrinal  pietism  will  ever  give  their  Philosophy  a  fair  hearing.

Their  doctrines  will  be  systematically  rejected,  and  their  theories  denied  a  place  even  in  the  ranks  of

26  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

those  scientific  ephemera,  the  ever-shifting  "  working  hypotheses  "  of  our  day.

To  the  advocate  of  the  "  animalistic  "  theory,  our  cosmogenetical  and  anthropogenetical  teachings  are  "fairy-tales"  at  best.

For  to  those  who  would  shirk  any  moral  responsibility,  it  seems  certainly  more  convenient  to  accept  descent  from  a  common  simian  ancestor  and  see  a  brother  in  a  dumb,  tailless  baboon,  than  to  acknowledge  the  fatherhood  of  Pitris,  the  "  Sons  of  God,"  and  to  have  to  recognise  as  a  brother  a  starveling  from  the  slums.

"  Hold  back  !  "  shout  in  their  turn  the  pietists.

"  You  will  never  make  of  respectable  church-going  Christians  Esoteric  Buddhists  !

Nor  are  we,  in  truth,  in  any  way  anxious  to  attempt  the  metamorphosis.

But  this  cannot,  nor  shall  it,  prevent  Theosophists  from  saying  what  they  have  to  say,  especially  to  those  who,  in  opposing  to  our  doctrine  modern  Science,  do  so  not  for  her  own  fair  sake,  but  only  to  ensure  the  success  of  their  private  hobbies  and  personal  glorification.

If  we  cannot  prove  many  of  our  points,  no  more  can  they  ;  yet  we  may  show  how,  instead  of  giving  historical  and  scientific  facts — for  the  edification  of  those  who,  knowing  less  than  they,  look  to  Scientists  to  do  their  thinking  and  form  their  opinions — the  efforts  of  most  of  our  scholars  seem  solely  directed  to  killing  ancient  facts,  or  distorting  them  into  props  to  support  their  own  special  views.

This  will  be  done  in  no  spirit  of  malice  or  even  criticism,  as  the  writer  readily  admits  that  most  of  those  she  finds  fault  with  stand  immeasurably  higher  in  learning  than  herself.

But  great  scholarship  does  not  preclude  bias  and  prejudice,  nor  is  it  a  safeguard  against  self-conceit,  but  rather  the  reverse.

Moreover,  it  is  but  in  the  legitimate  defence  of  our  own  statements,  i.e.,  the  vindication  of  Ancient  Wisdom  and  its  great  truths,  that  we  mean  to  take  our  "  great  authorities  "  to  task.

Indeed,  unless  the  precaution  of  answering  beforehand  certain  objections  lo  the  fundamental  propositions  in  the  present  work  be  adopted — objections  which  are  certain  to  be  made  on  the  authority  of  this,  that,  or  another  scholar  concerning  the  Esoteric  character  of  all  the  archaic  and  ancient  works  on  Philosophy — our  statements  will  be  once  more  contradicted  and  even  discredited.

One  of  the  main  points  in  this  Volume  is  to  indicate  in  the  works  of  the  old  Aryan,  Greek,  and  other  Philosophers  of  note,  as  well  as  in  all  the  world-scriptures,  the  presence  of  a  strong  Esoteric  allegory  and  symbolism.

Another  of  the  objects  is  to  prove  that  the  key  of  interpretation,  as  furnished  by  the  Eastern  Hindu-Buddhistic  canon  of  Occultism — fitting  as  well  the  Christian  Gospels  as  it  does  archaic  Egyptian,  Greek,  Chaldean,  Persian,  and  even  Hebrew-Mosaic  Books — must  have  been  one  common  to  all  the  nations,  however  divergent  may  have  been  their  respective  methods  and  exoteric  "  blinds."  These  claims  are

INTRODUCTORY

vehemently  denied  by  some  of  the  foremost  scholars  of  our  day.

In  his  Edinburgh  Lectures,  Prof.

Max  Muller  discarded  this  fundamental  statement  of  the  Theosophists  by  pointing  to  the  Hindu  Shastras  and  Pandits,  who  know  nothing  of  such  Esotericism.1  The  learned  Sanskrit  scholar  stated  in  so  many  words  that  there  was  no  hidden  meaning,  no  Esoteric  element  or  "  blinds,"  •either  in  the  Puranas  or  the  Upanishads.

Considering  that  the  word  "  Upani-  shad  "  means,  when  translated,  the  "  SECRET  DOCTRINE,"  the  assertion  is,  to  say  the  least,  extraordinary.

Sir  M.  Monier  Williams  again  holds  the  same  view  with  regard  to  Buddhism.

To  hear  him  is  to  regard  Gautama,  the  Buddha,  as  an  enemy  of  every  pretence  to  Esoteric  teachings.

He  himself  never  taught  them  !  All  such  "  pretences  "  to  Occult  learning  and  "  magic  powers  "  are  due  to  the  later  Arhats,  the  subsequent  followers  of  the  "  Light  of  Asia  "  !  Prof.

B.  Jowett,  again,  as  contemptuously  passes  the  sponge  over  the  "  absurd  "  interpretations  of  Plato's  Jimaeus  and  the  Mosaic  Books  by  the  Neo-Platonists.

There  is  not  a  breath  of  the  Oriental  (Gnostic)  spirit  of  Mysti-  cism in  Plato's  Dialogues,  the  Regius  Professor  of  Greek  tells  us,  nor  any  approach  to  Science,  either.

Finally,  to  cap  the  climax,  Prof.

Sayce,  the  Assyriologist,  although  he  does  not  deny  the  actual  presence,  in  the  Assyrian  tablets  and  cuneiform  literature,  of  a  hidden  meaning —

Many   of   the  sacred  texts  ...  so   written   as   to   be   intelligible  only  to  the  initiated —

yet  insists  that  the  "  keys  and  glosses  "  thereof  are  now  in  the  hands  of  the  Assyriologists.

The  modern  scholars,  he  affirms,  have  in  their  possession  clues  to  the  interpretation  of  the  Esoteric  Records,

Which  even  the  initiated  priests  [of  Chaldea]  did  not  possess.

Thus,  in  the  scholarly  appreciation  of  our  modern  Orientalists  and  Pro-  fessors, Science  was  in  its  infancy  in  the  days  of  the  Egyptian  and  Chaldean  Astronomers.

Panini,  the  greatest  Grammarian  in  the  world,  was  unacquainted  with  the  art  of  writing.

So  was  the  Lord  Buddha,  and  everyone  else  in  India  until  300  B.C  The  grossest  ignorance  reigned  in  the  days  of  the  Indian  Rishis,  and  even  in  those  of  Thales,  Pythagoras,  and  Plato.

Theosophists  must  indeed  be  superstitious  ignoramuses  to  speak  as  they  do,  in  the  face  of  such  learned  evidence  to  the  contrary !

Truly  it  looks  as  if,  since  the  world's  creation,  there  has  been  but  one  age  of  real  knowledge  on  earth —  the  present  age.

In  the  misty  twilight,  in

1  The  majority  of  the  Pandits  know  nothing  of  the  Esoteric  Philosophy  now,  because  they  have  lost  the  key  to  it ,  yet  not  one  of  these,  if  honest,  would  deny  that  the  Upanishads,  and  especially  the  Puranas,  are  allegorical  and  symbolical  ,  nor  that  there  still  remain  in  India  a  few  great  scholars  who  £ould,  if  they  would,  give  them  the  key  to  such  interpretations.

Nor  do  they  reject  the  actual  existence  of  MahatmSs— initiated  Yogis  and  Adepts — even  in  this  age  of  Kali  Yuga.

28  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

the  grey  dawn  of  history,  stand  the  pale  shadows  of  the  old  Sages  of  would  renown.

They  were  hopelessly  groping  for  the  correct  meaning  of  their  own,  Mysteries,  the  spirit  whereof  has  departed  without  revealing  itself  to  the  Hierophants,  and  has  remained  latent  in  space  until  the  advent  of  the  initiates  of  modern  Science  and  Research.

The  noontide  brightness  of  knowledge  has  only  now  arrived  at  the  "  Know-All,"  who,  basking  in  the  dazzling  sun  of  induction,  busies  himself  with  his  Penelopeian  task  of  "  working  hypotheses,"  and  loudly  asserts  his  rights  to  universal  knowledge.

Can  anyone  wonder,  then,  that  according  to  present  views  the  learning  of  the  ancient  Philosopher,  and  even  sometimes  that  of  his  direct  successors  in  the  past  centuries,  has  ever  been  useless  to  the  world  and  valueless  to  himself  ?  For,  as  explained  repeat-  edly in  so  many  words,  while  the  Rishis  and  the  Sages  of  old  have  walked  far  over  the  arid  fields  of  myth  and  superstition,  the  medieval  Scholar,  and  even  the  average  eighteenth  century  Scientist,  have  always  been  more  or  less  cramped  by  their  "  supernatural  "  religion  and  beliefs.

True,  it  is  generally  conceded  that  some  ancient  and  also  medieval  Scholars,  such  as  Pythagoras,  Plato,  Paracelsus,  and  Roger  Bacon,  followed  by  a  host  of  glorious  names,  had  indeed  left  not  a  few  landmarks  over  precious  mines  of  Philosophy  and  un-  explored lodes  of  Physical  Science.

But  then  the  actual  excavation  of  these,  the  smelting  of  the  gold  and  silver,  and  the  cutting  of  the  precious  jewels  they  contain,  are  all  due  to  the  patient  labours  of  the  modern  man  of  Science.

And  is  it  not  to  the  unparalleled  genius  of  the  latter  that  the  ignorant  and  hitherto-  deluded  world  owes  a  correct  knowledge  of  the  real  nature  of  the  Kosmos,  of  the  true  origin  of  the  universe  and  man,  as  revealed  in  the  automatic  and  mechanical  theories  of  the  Physicists,  in  accordance  with  strictly  scientific  Philos-  ophy ?  Before  our  cultured  era,  Science  was  but  a  name,  Philosophy  a  delusion  and  a  snare.

According  to  the  modest  claims  of  contemporary  authority  on  genuine  Science  and  Philosophy,  the  Tree  of  Knowledge  has  only  now  sprung  from  the  dead  weeds  of  superstition,  as  a  beautiful  butterfly  emerges  from  an  ugly  grub.

We  have,  therefore,  nothing  for  which  to  thank  our  forefathers.

The  Ancients  have  at  best  prepared  and  fertilised  the  soil  ;  it  is  the  Moderns  who  have  planted  the  seeds  of  knowledge  and  reared  the  lovely  plants  called  blank  negation  and  sterile  agnosticism.

Such,  however,  is  not  the  view  taken  by  Theosophists.

They  repeat  what  was  stated  twenty  years  ago.

It  is  not  sufficient  to  speak  of  the  "  untenable  conceptions  of  an  uncultured  past  "  (Tyndall)  ;  of  the  "  parler  enfant/n  "  of  the  Vaidic  poets  (Max  Muller)  ;  of  the  "  absurdities  "  of  the  Neo-Platonists  (Jowett) ;  and  of  the  ignorance  of  the  Chaldeo-Assyrian  initiated  Priests  with  regard  to  their  own  symbols,  when  compared  with  the  knowledge

INTRODUCTORY

thereon  of  the  British  Orientalist  (Sayce).  Such  assumptions  have  to  be  proven  by  something  more  solid  than  the  mere  word  of  these  scholars.

For  no  amount  of  boastful  arrogance  can  hide  the  intellectual  quarries  out  of  which  the  representations  of  so  many  modern  Philosophers  and  Scholars  have  been  carved.

How  many  of  the  most  distinguished  European  Scientists  have  derived  honour  and  credit  for  the  mere  dressing-up  of  the  ideas  of  these  old  Philosophers,  whom  they  are  ever  ready  to  disparage,  is  left  to  an  impar-  tial posterity  to  say.

Thus  it  does  seem  not  altogether  untrue,  as  stated  in  Isis  Unveiled,  to  say  of  certain  Orientalists  and  Scholars  of  dead  languages,  that  they  will  allow  their  boundless  conceit  and  self-opinbnatedness  to  run  away  with  their  logic  and  reasoning  powers,  rather  than  concede  to  the  ancient  Philosophers  the  knowledge  of  anything  the  modern  do  not  know.

As  part  of  this  work  treats  of  the  Initiates  and  the  secret  knowledge  imparted  during  the  Mysteries,  the  statements  of  those  who,  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  Plato  was  an  Initiate,  maintain  that  no  hidden  Mysticism  is  to  be  discovered  in  his  works,  have  to  be  first  examined.

Too  many  of  the  present  scholars,  Greek  and  Sanskrit,  are  but  too  apt  to  forego  facts  in  favour  of  their  own  preconceived  theories  based  on  personal  prejudice.

They  conveniently  forget,  at  every  opportunity,  not  only  the  numerous  changes  in  language,  but  also  that  the  allegorical  style  in  the  writings  of  old  Philosophers  and  the  secret  -  iveness  of  the  Mystics  had  their  raison  d'etre  ;  that  both  the  pre-Christian  and  the  post-Christian  classical  writers — the  great  majority  at  ail  events — were  under  the  sacred  obligation  never  to  divulge  the  solemn  secrets  communicated  to  them  in  the  sanctuaries  ;  and  that  this  alone  is  sufficient  sadly  to  mislead  their  translators  and  profane  critics.

But  these  critics  will  admit  nothing  of  the  kind,  as  will  presently  be  seen.

For  over  twenty-two  centuries  everyone  who  has  read  Plato  has  been  aware  that,  like  most  of  the  other  Greek  Philosophers  of  note,  he  had  been  Initiated  ;  that  therefore,  being  tied  down  by  the  Sodalian  Oath,  he  could  speak  of  certain  things  only  in  veiled  allegories.

His  reverence  for  the  Mysteries  is  unbounded  ;  he  openly  confesses  that  he  writes  "  enigmatically,"  and  we  see  him  take  the  greatest  precautions  to  conceal  the  true  meaning  of  his  words.

Every  time  the  subject  touches  the  greater  secrets  of  Oriental  Wisdom — the  cosmogony  of  the  universe,  or  the  ideal  pre-existing  world —  Plato  shrouds  his  Philosophy  in  the  profoundest  darkness.

His  Jimaeus  is  so  confused  that  no  one  but  an  Initiate  can  understand  the  hidden  meaning.

As  already  said  in  Isis  Unveiled  :

The  speculations  of  Plato  in  the  Banquet  on  the  creation,  or  rather  the  evolution,  of  primordial  men,  and  the  essay  on  cosmogony  in  the  Jimaeus,  must  be  taken

30  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

allegoncally  if  we  accept  them  at  all  It  is  this  hidden  Pythagorean  meaning  in  T/'maeus,  Craty/us,  and  Parmen/des,  and  a  few  other  trilogies  and  dialogues,  that  the  Neo-Platonists  ventured  to  expound,  as  far  as  the  theurgical  vow  of  secrecy  would  allow  them.

The  Pythagorean  doctrine  that  God  is  the  universal  mind  diffused  through  all  things,  and  the  dogma  of  the  soul's  immortality,  are  the  leading  features  in  these  apparently  incon-  gruous teachings.

His  piety  and  the  great  veneration  he  felt  for  the  Mysteries  are  sufficient  warrant  that  Plato  would  not  allow  his  indiscretion  to  get  the  better  of  that  deep  sense  of  responsibility  which  is  felt  by  every  Adept.

"  Constantly  perfecting  himself  in  perfect  MYSTERIES,  a  man  in  them  alone  becomes  truly  perfect,"  says  he  in  the  Phaedrus.

He  took  no  pains  to  conceal  his  displeasure  that  the  Mysteries  had  become  less  secret  than  formerly.

Instead  of  profaning  them  by  putting  them  within  the  reach  of  the  multitude,  he  would  have  guarded  them  with  jealous  care  against  all  but  the  most  earnest  and  worthy  of  his  disciples.1  While  mentioning  the  Gods  on  every  page,  his  monotheism  is  unquestionable,  for  the  whole  thread  of  his  discourse  indicates  that  by  the  term  "  Gods  "  he  means  a  class  of  beings  lower  in  the  scale  than  Deities,  and  but  one  grade  higher  than  men  Even  Josephus  perceived  and  acknowledged  this  fact,  despite  the  natural  prejudice  of  his  race.

In  his  famous  onslaught  upon  Apion,  this  his-  torian says  •  "  Those,  however,  among  the  Greeks  who  philosophized  in  accordance  with  the  truth  were  not  ignorant  of  anything,  .  .  nor  did  they  fail  to  perceive  the  chilling  superficialities  of  the  mythical  allegories,  on  which  account  they  justly  despised  them.

...  By  which  thing  Plato,  being  moved,  says  it  is  not  necessary  to  admit  any  one  of  the  other  poets  into  '  the  Commonwealth,'  and  he  dismisses  Homer  blandly,  after  having  crowned  him  and  pouring  unguent  upon  him,  in  order  that  indeed  he  should  not  destroy  by  his  myths,  the  orthodox  belief  respecting  one  God."

And  this  is  the  "  God  "  of  every  Philosopher,  God  infinite  and  im-  personal.

All  this  and  much  more,  which  there  is  no  room  here  to  quote,  leads  one  to  the  undeniable  certitude  that  (a),  as  all  the  Sciences  and  Philosophies  were  in  the  hands  of  the  temple  Hierophants,  Plato,  as  initiated  by  them,  must  have  known  them  ;  and  (6),  that  logical  inference  alone  is  amply  sufficient  to  justify  anyone  in  regarding  Plato's  writings  as  allegories  and  "  dark  sayings,"  veiling  truths  which  he  had  no  right  to  divulge.

This  established,  how  comes  it  that  one  of  the  best  Greek  scholars  in  England,  Prof.

Jowett,  the  modern  translator  of  Plato's  ,works,  seeks  to  demonstrate  that  none  of  the  Dialogues — including  even  the  7/maeus — have  any  element  of  Oriental  Mysticism  about  them  ?  Those  who  can  discern  the  true  spirit  of  Plato's  Philosophy  will  hardly  be  convinced  by  the  arguments  which  the  Master  of  Balliol  College  lays  before  his  readers.

"  Obscure  and  repulsive"  to  him,  the  T/maeus  may  certainly  be;  but  it  is  as  certain  that  this  obscurity  does  not  arise,  as  the  Professor  tells  his  public,  "  in  the  infancy

1  This  assertion  is  clearly  corroborated  by  Plato  himself,  who  writes  •  "  You  say  that  in  my  former  discourse  I  have  not  sufficiently  explained  to  you  the  nature  of  the  First  I  purposely  spoke  enigmatic-  ally, that  in  case  the  tablet  should  have  happened  with  any  accident,  either  by  sea  or  land,  a  person  without  some  previous  knowledge  of  the  subject  might  not  be  able  to  understand  its  contents  "  (Plato.

Ep  ,  ii,  312  ,  Cory's  Ancient  Fragments,  p  304  )  [Not  in  the  new  edition  ]

8  ls»s  Unveiled,  I,  pp.  287-8.

INTRODUCTORY

of  physical  science,"  but  rather  in  its  days  of  secrecy;  not  "out  of  the  confusion  of  theological,  mathematical,  and  physiological  notions,"  or  "  out  of  the  desire  to  conceive  the  whole  of  Nature  without  any  adequate  knowledge  of  the  parts."1  For  Mathematics  and  Geometry  were  the  back  bone  of  Occult  cosmogony,  hence  of  "Theology,"  and  the  physiological  notions  of  the  ancient  Sages  are  being  daily  verified  by  Science  in  our  age ;  at  least,  to  those  who  know  how  to  read  and  understand  ancient  Esoteric  works.

The  "knowledge  of  the  parts  "  avails  us  little,  if  this  knowledge  only  leads  us  the  more  to  ignorance  of  the  Whole,  or  the  "  nature  and  reason  of  the  Universal,"  as  Plato  called  Deity,  and  causes  us  to  blunder  most  egregiously  because  of  our  boasted  inductive  methods.

Plato  may  have  been  "  incapable  of  induc-  tion, or  generalization  in  the  modern  sense  "  ; 2  he  may  have  been  ignorant  also,  of  the  circulation  of  the  blood,  which,  we  are  told,  "  was  absolutely  unknown  to  him,"  3  but  then,  there  is  naught  to  disprove  that  he  knew  what  blood  Is — and  this  is  more  than  any  modern  Physiologist  or  Biologist  can  claim.

Though  a  wider  and  far  more  generous  margin  for  knowledge  is  allowed  the  "physical  philosopher"  by  Prof.

Jowett  than  by  nearly  any  other  modern  commentator  and  critic,  nevertheless,  his  criticism  so  considerably  outweighs  his  laudation,  that  it  may  be  as  well  to  quote  his  own  words,  to  show  clearly  his  bias.

Thus  he  says  :

To  bring  sense  under  the  control  of  reason ;  to  find  some  way  through  the  labyrinth  or  chaos  of  appearances,  either  the  highway  of  mathematics,  or  more  devious  paths  suggested  by  the  analogy  of  man  with  the  world  and  of  the  world  with  man ,  to  see  that  ail  things  have  a  cause  and  are  tending  towards  an  end — this  is  the  spirit  of  the  ancient  physical  philosopher.4  But  we  neither  appreciate  the  conditions  of  know-  ledge to  which  he  was  subjected,  nor  have  the  ideas  which  fastened  upon  his  imagin-  ation the  same  hold  upon  us.  For  he  is  hovering  between  matter  and  mind ,  he  is  under  the  dominion  of  abstractions  ,  his  impressions  are  taken  almost  at  random  from  the  outside  of  nature ,  he  sees  the  light,  but  not  the  objects  which  are  revealed  by  the  light ;  and  he  brings  into  juxtaposition  things  which  to  us  appear  wide  as  the  poles  asunder,  because  he  finds  nothing  between  them.

The  last  proposition  but  one  must  evidently  be  distasteful  to  the  modern  "physical  philosopher,"  who  sees  the  "objects  "  before  him,  but  fails  to  see  the  light  of  the  Universal  Mind,  which  reveals  them,  i.e.,  who  proceeds  in  a  diametrically  opposite  way.

Therefore  the  learned  Professor  comes  to  the

1  The  Dialogues  of  Plato,  translated  by  B.  Jowett,  Regius  Professor  of  Greek  at  the  University  of  Oxford,  ni,  p.  523.

*Opcit.,p.  561  3Opcit,  p.

4  This  definition  places  (unwittingly,  of  course),  the  ancient  "  physical  philosopher  "  many  cubits  higher  than  his  modern  "  physical  "  confrere,  since  the  ultima  thu/e  of  the  latter  is  to.  lead  mankind  to  believe  that  neither  universe  nor  man  have  any  cause  at  all — not  an  intelligent  one  at  all  events —  and  that  they  have  sprung  into  existence  owing  to  blind  chance  and  a  senseless  whirling  of  atoms.

Which  of  the  two  hypotheses  is  the  more  rational  and  logical  is  left  to  the  impartial  reader  to  decide.

32  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

"Conclusion  that  the  ancient  Philosopher,  whom  he  now  judges  from  Plato's  Jimasus,  must  have  acted  in  a  decidedly  unphilosophical  and  even  irrational  way.

For :

He  passes  abruptly  from  persons  to  ideas  and  numbers,  and  from  ideas  and  numbers  to  persons,*  he  confuses  subject  and  object,  first  and  final  causes,  and  in  dreaming  of  geometrical  figures  J  is  lost  in  a  flux  of  sense.

And  now  an  effort  of  mind  is  required  on  our  parts  in  order  to  understand  his  double  language,  or  to  apprehend  the  twilight  character  of  the  knowledge  and  the  genius  of  ancient  philosophers  which,  under  such  conditions  [?],  seems  by  a  divine  power  in  many  instances  to  have  antici-  pated the  truth

Whether  "  such  conditions  "  imply  those  of  ignorance  and  mental  stolidity  in  "the  genius  of  ancient  philosophers"  or  something  else,  we  do  fiot  know.

But  what  we  do  know  is  that  the  meaning  of  the  sentences  we  •have  italicized  is  perfectly  clear.

Whether  the  Regius  Professor  of  Greek  believes  or  disbelieves  in  a  hidden  sense  of  geometrical  figures  and  of  the  Esoteric  "  jargon,"  he  nevertheless  admits  the  presence  of  a  '•  double  lan-  guage "  in  the  writings  of  these  Philosophers.

Thence  he  admits  a  hidden  meaning,  which  must  have  had  an  interpretation.

Why,  then,  does  he  flatly  contradict  his  own  statement  on  the  very  next  page  ?  And  why  should  he  deny  to  the  T/mseus — that  pre-eminently  Pythagorean  (mystic)  Dialogue — any  Occult  meaning  and  take  such  pains  to  convince  his  readers  that

The  influence  which  the  Jimaeus  has  exercised  upon  posterity  is  partly  due  to  a  misunderstanding.

The  following  quotation  from  his  Introduction  5s  in  direct  contradiction  with  the  paragraph  which  precedes  it,  as  above  quoted  :

In  the  supposed  depths  of  this  dialogue  the  Neo-Platonists  found  hidden  fneanings  and  connections  with  the  Jewish  and  Christian  Scriptures,  and  out  of  them  they  dictated  doctrines  quite  at  variance  with  the  spirit  of  Plato.

Believing  that  he  was

1  Italics  are  mine.

Every  tyro  in  Eastern  Philosophy,  every  Kabalist,  will  see  the  reason  for  such  an  association  of  persons  with  ideas,  numbers,  and  geometrical  figures  For  number,  says  Philolaus,  "  is  the  dominant  and  self-produced  bond  of  the  eternal  continuance  of  things  "  Alone  the  modern  Scholar  remains  blind  to  the  grand  truth.

3  Here  again  the  ancient  Philosopher  seems  to  be  ahead  of  the  modern  For  he  only  "  confuses  .  .  .  first  and  final  causes"  (which  confusion  is  denied  by  those  who  know  the  spirit  of  ancient  scholarship),  whereas  his  modern  successor  is  confessedly  and  absolutely  ignorant  of  both.

Mr.  Tyndall  shows  Science  "  powerless  "  to  solve  a  single  one  of  the  final  problems  of  Nature  and  "  disciplined  [read,  modern  materialistic]  imagination  retiring  in  bewilderment  from  the  contemplation  of  the  .problems  ' '  of  the  world  of  matter  He  even  doubts  whether  the  men  of  present  Science  possess  "  the  Intellectual  elements  which  would  enable  them  to  grapple  with  the  ultimate  structural  energies  of  Nature."  But  for  Plato  and  his  disciples,  the  lower  types  were  but  the  concrete  images  of  the  .higher  abstract  ones  ,  the  immortal  Soul  has  an  arithmetical,  as  the  body  has  a  geometrical,  beginning,  as  the  reflection  of  the  great  universal  Archaeus  (Anima  Mundi),  is  self-moving,  and  from  the  centre.

This  beginning  diffuses  itself  over  the  whole  body  of  the  Macrocosm.

3  Op.  at.,  p.  523.

INTRODUCTORY

jnspired  by  the  Holy  Ghost,  or  had  received  his  wisdom  from  Moses,1  they  seemed  to  find  in  his  writings  the  Christian  Trinity,  the  Word,  the  Church  .  .  .  and  the  Neo-  Platonists  had  a  method  of  interpretation  which  could  elicit  any  meaning  out  of  any  words.

They  were  really  incapable  of  distinguishing  between  the  opinions  of  one  philosopher  and  another,  or  between  the  serious  thoughts  of  Plato  and  his  passing  fancies/  .  .  [But]  there  is  no  danger  of  the  modern  commentators  on  the  Jimaeus  falling  into  the  absurdity  of  the  Neo-Platonists.

No  danger  whatever,  of  course,  for  the  simple  reason  that  the  modern  commentators  have  never  had  the  key  to  Occult  interpretations.

And  before  another  word  is  said  in  defence  of  Plato  and  the  Neo-Platonists,  the  learned  master  of  Balliol  College  ought  to  be  respectfully  asked  :  What  does,  or  can  he  know  of  the  Esoteric  canon  of  interpretation  ?  By  the  term  "  canon  "  is  here  meant  that  key  which  was  communicated  orally  from  "  mouth  to  ear  "  by  the  Master  to  the  disciple,  or  by  the  Hierophant  to  the  candidate  for  initiation  ;  this  from  time  immemorial  throughout  a  long  series  of  ages,  during  which  the  inner — not  public — Mysteries  were  the  most  sacred  institution  of  every  land.

Without  such  a  key  no  correct  interpretation  of  either  the  Dialogues  of  Plato  or  any  Scripture,  from  the  Vec/as  to  Homer,  from  the  Zend  A  vesta  to  the  Mosaic  Books,  is  possible.

How  then  can  the  Rev.

Dr.  Jowett  know  that  the  interpretations  made  by  the  Neo-Platonists  of  the  various  sacred  books  of  the  nations  were  "  absurdities?  "  Where,  again,  has  he  found  an  opportunity  of  studying  these  "  interpretations  "  ?  History  shows  that  all  such  works  were  destroyed  by  the  Christian  Church  Fathers  and  their  fanatical  catechumens,  wherever  they  were  found.

To  say  that  such  men  as  Ammonius,  a  genius  and  a  saint,  whose  learning  and  holy  life  earned  for  him  the  title  of  Theodidaktos  ("  God-taught "),  such  men  as  Plotinus,  Porphyry,  and  -Proclus,  were  "  incapable  of  distinguishing  between  the  opinions  of  one  philosopher  and  another,  or  between  the  serious  thoughts  of  Plato  and  his  fancies,"  is  to  assume  an  untenable  position  for  a  Scholar.

It  amounts  to  saying  that,  (a)  scores  of  the  most  famous  Philosophers,  the  greatest  Scholars  .and  Sages  of  Greece  and  of  the  Roman  Empire  were  dull  fools,  and  (6)  that  all  the  other  commentators,  lovers  of  Greek  Philosophy,  some  of  them  the  acutest  intellects  of  the  age — who  do  not  agree  with  Dr.  Jowett — are

1  Nowhere  are  the  Neo-Platonists  guilty  of  such  an  absurdity.

The  learned  Professor  of  Greek  must  have  been  thinking  of  two  spurious  works  attributed  by  Eusebius  and  St.  Jerome  to  Ammonius  Saccas,  who  wrote  nothing  :  or  must  have  confused  the   Neo-Platonists  with  Phito  Judaeus.

But  then  Phito  lived  over   130  years  before  the  birth  of  the  founder  of  Neo-Platonism.

He  belonged  to  the  School  of  Aristobulus  the  Jew,  who  lived  under  Ptolemy  Philometer  (150  years  B.C  ),  and  is  credited  with  having  inaugurated  the  movement  which  tended  to  prove  that  Plato  and  even  the  Peripatetic  Philosophy  were  derived  from  the   "revealed"    Mosaic  Books.

Valckenaer  tries  to  show  that  the  author  of  the  Commentaries  on  the  Books  of  Moses,  was  not  Aristobulus,  the  sycophant  of  Ptolemy.

But  whatever  he  was,  he  was  not  a  Neo-Platonist,  but  lived  before,  or  during  the  days  of  Philo  Judaeus,  since  the  latter  seems  to  know  his  works  and  follow  his  methods.

2  Only  Clemens  Alexandrinus,  a  Christian  Neo-Platonist  and  a  very  fantastic  writer.

FF

34  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

also  fools  and  no  better  than  those  whom  they  admire.

The  patronising  tone  of  the  last  above-quoted  passage  is  modulated  with  the  most  naive  'conceit,  remarkable  even  in  our  age  of  self-glorification  and  mutual-  admiration  cliques.

We  have  to  compare  the  Professor's  views  with  those  of  some  other  scholars.

Says  Prof.

Alexander  Wilder  of  New  York,  one  of  the  best  Platonists  of  the  day,  speaking  of  Ammonius,  the  founder  of  the  Neo-Platonic  School  :

His  deep  spiritual  intuition,  his  extensive  learning,  his  familiarity  with  the.

Christian  Fathers,  Pantaenus,  Clement,  and  Athenagoras,  and  with  the  most  erudite  philosophers  of  the  time,  all  fitted  him  for  the  labour  which  he  performed  so  thoroughly.1  He  was  successful  in  drawing  to  his  views  the  greatest  scholars  and  public  men  of  the  Roman  Empire,  who  had  little  taste  for  wasting  time  in  dialectic  pursuits  or  superstitious  observances  The  results  of  his  ministration  are  perceptible  at  the  present  day  in  every  country  of  the  Christian  world  ,  every  prominent  system  of  doctrine  now  bearing  the  marks  of  his  plastic  hand.

Every  ancient  philosophy  has  had  its  votaries  among  the  moderns ,  and  even  Judaism  .  has  taken  upon  itself  changes  which  were  suggested  by  the  "  God-taught  "  Alexandrian  .  He  was  a  man  of  rare  learning  and

endowments,  of  blameless  life  and  amiable  disposition  His  almost  superhuman  ken  and  many  excellencies  won  for  him  the  title  of  Theodidaktos ,  but  he  followed  the  modest  example  of  Pythagoras,  and  only  assumed  the  title  of  Philalethian,  or  lover  of  truth

It  would  be  happy  for  truth  and  fact  were  our  modern  scholars  to  follow  as  modestly  in  the  steps  of  their  great  predecessors.

But  not  they —  Philalethians  '

Moreover,  we  know  that  -

Like  Orpheus,  Pythagoras,  Confucius,  Socrates,  and  Jesus  himself,1  Ammonius  committed  nothing  to  writing  '  Instead  he  .  communicated  his  most  important  doctrines  to  persons  duly  instructed  and  disciplined,  imposing  on  them  the  obligations  of  secrecy,  as  was  done  before  him  by  Zoroaster  and  Pythagoras,  and  in  the  Mysteries

v  The  labour  of  reconciling  the  different  systems  of  religion  -  New  Platonism  and  Alchemy,  by  Alex   Wilder.

M.D  .  pp.  7.

3  It   is  well-known  that,  though  born  of  Christian  parents.

Ammonius  had  renounced  the  tenets  of  the  Church — Eusebius  and   Jerome  notwithstanding      Porphyry,   the  disciple  of   Plotmus,  who  had5  lived  with  Ammonius  for  eleven  years  together,   and  who   had   no   interest  for  stating  an  untruth,  positively  declares  that  he  had   renounced   Christianity  entirely      On  the  other  hand,  we  know  that  Ammonius  believed  in  the  bright  Gods,   Protectors,   and  that  the   Neo-Platonic  Philosophy  was  as  "  pagan  "   as  it  was   mystical.

But  Eusebius.

the  most  unscrupulous  forger  and  falsifier  of  old  texts,  and   St   Jerome,   an  out-and-out  fanatic,    who   had  both   an   interest  in  denying  the  fact,  contradict  Porphyry     We  prefer  to  believe  the  latter,  who  has  left  to  posterity  an  unblemished  name  and  a  great  reputation  for  honesty

4  Two  works  are  falsely  attributed  to  Ammonius      One,  now  lost,  called  De  Consensu  Moysis  et  Jesu,    is  mentioned  by   the  same  "  trustworthy  "  Eusebius.

the  Bishop  of  Caasarea,  and  the  friend  of  the  Christian  Emperor  Constantme,  who  died,  however,  a  heathen      All  that  is  known  of  this  pseudo-  work  is  that  Jerome  bestows  great  praise  upon  it  (Vir   Illust  ,  8  55  ,  and  Euseb.,  H.  E  ,  vi,  19)      The  other  spurious  production  is  called  the  Diatesseron  (or  the   "  Harmony  of  the  Gospels  ").     This  is  partially  extant.

But  then,   again,   it  exists  only  m  the  Latin  version  of  Victor,  Bishop  of  Capua  (sixth  century),  who  attributed  it  himself  to  Tatian,  and  as  wrongly,  probably,  as  later  scholars  attributed  the  0»atesseron  to  Ammooius.

Therefore  no  great  reliance  can  be  placed  upon  it,  nor  on  its  "  esoteric  "  interpretation  of  the  Gospels      Is  it  this  work,  we  wonder,  which  led  Prof   Jowett  to  regard  the  Neo-  Platonic  interpretations  as  "  absurdities  "  ?

INTRODUCTORY

Except   a  few  treatises  of  his  disciples  we  have  only  the  declarations  of  his  adversaries  from  which  to  ascertain  what  he  actually  taught.

It  is  from  the  biassed  statements  of  such  "  adversaries/'  probably,  that  the  learned  Oxford  translator  of  Plato's  Dialogues  came  to  the  conclusion,  that  :

That  which  was  truly  great  and  truly  characteristic  of  him  [Plato],  his  effort  to  realise  and  connect  abstractions,  was  not  understood  by  them  [the  Neo-Platonistsl  at  all  [?].

He  states,  contemptuously  enough  for  the  ancient  methods  of  intellectu-  al analysis,  that :

In  the  present  day  .  .  an  ancient  philosopher  is  to  be  interpreted  from  himself  and  by  the  contemporary  history  of  thought."

This  is  like  saying  that  the  ancient  Greek  canon  of  proportion  (if  ever  found),  and  the  Athena  Promachus  of  Phidias  have  to  be  interpreted  in  the  present  day  from  the  contemporary  history  of  architecture  and  sculpture,  from  the  Albert  Hall  and  Memorial  Monument,  and  the  hideous  Madonnas  in  crinolines  sprinkled  over  the  fair  face  of  Italy.

Prof.

Jowett  remarks  that  "  mysticism  is  not  criticism."  No  ;  but  neither  is  criticism  always  fair  and  sound  judgment.

La  critique  est  aisee,  mais  Tart  est  difficile

And  such  "  art  "  our  critic  of  the  Neo-Platonists — his  Greek  scholarship  notwithstanding — lacks  from  a  to  z.  Nor  has  he,  very  evidently,  the  key  to  the  true  spirit  of  the  Mysticism  of  Pythagoras  and  Plato,  since  he  denies,  even  in  the  f/maeus  an  element  of  Oriental  Mysticism,  and  seeks  to  show  Greek  Philosophy  reacting  upon  the  East,  forgetting  that  the  truth  is  the  exact  reverse  ;  that  it  is  "  the  deeper  and  more  pervading  spirit  of  Orientalism  "  that  had — through  Pythagoras  and  his  own  initiation  into  the  Mysteries —  penetrated  into  the  very  depths  of  Plato's  soul.

But  Dr.  Jowett  does  not  see  this  Nor  is  he  prepared  to  admit  that  anything  good  or  rational — in  accordance  with  the  "  contemporary  history  of  thought  " — could  ever  come  out  of  that  Nazareth  of  the  Pagan  Mysteries  ;  nor  even  that  there  is  anything  to  interpret  of  a  hidden  nature  in  the  Jimaeus  or  any  other  Dialogue  For  him,

The  so-called  mysticism  of  Plato  is  purely  Greek,  arising  out  of  his  imperfect  knowledge  '  and  high  aspirations,  and  is  the  growth  of  an  age  in  which  philosophy  is  not  wholly  separated  from  poetry  and  mythology.

1  Op   cit  ,  p   7  -Op   at. ,111,  p.

*  "  Imperfect  knowledge"  of  what?  That  Plato  was  ignorant  of  many  of  the  modern  "working  hypotheses" — as  ignorant  as  our  immediate  posterity  is  sure  to  be  of  the  said  hypotheses  when  they  in  their  turn  after  exploding  join  the  "  great  majority  " — is  perhaps  a  blessing  m  disguise

4  Op.  cit ,  p    524.

36  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Among  several  other  equally  erroneous  propositions,  it  is  especially  the  assumptions  (a)  that  Plato  was  entirely  free  from  any  element  of  Eastern  Philosophy  in  his  writings,  and  (b)  that  every, modern  scholar,  without  being  a  Mystic  and  a  Kabalist  himself,  can  pretend  to  judge  of  ancient  Esotericism —  which  we  mean  to  combat.

To  do  this  we  have  to  produce  more  authorita-  tive statements  than  our  own  would  be,  and  bring  the  evidence  of  other  scholars  as  great  as  Dr.  Jowett  if  not  greater,  specialists  in  their  subjects,  moreover,  to  bear  on  and  destroy  the  arguments  of  the  Oxford  Regius  Pro-  fessor of  Greek.

That  Plato  was  undeniably  an  ardent  admirer  and  follower  of  Pythagoras  no  one  will  deny.

And  it  is  equally  undeniable,  as  Prof.

Matter  has  it,  that  Plato  had  inherited  on  the  one  hand  his  doctrines,  and  on  the  other  had  drawn  his  wisdom,  from  the  same  sources  as  the  Samian  Philosopher.1  And  the  doctrines  of  Pythagoras  are  Oriental  to  the  backbone,  and  even  Brahman-  ical ;  for  this  great  Philosopher  ever  pointed  to  the  far  East  as  the  source  whence  he  derived  his  information  and  his  Philosophy,  and  Colebrooke  shows  that  Plato  makes  the  same  profession  in  his  Epistles,  and  says  that  he  has  taken  his  teachings  "from  ancient  and  sacred  doctrines."2  Furthermore,  the  ideas  of  both  Pythagoras  and  Plato  coincide  too  well  with  the  systems  of  India  and  with  Zoroastrianism  to  admit  any  doubt  of  their  origin  by  anyone  who  has  some  acquaintance  with  these  systems.

Again :

Pantaenus,   Athenagoras,  and  Clement  were  thoroughly  instructed  in  the  Platonic  philosophy,  and  comprehended  its  essential  unity  with  the  Oriental  systems

The  history  of  Pantaenus  and  his  contemporaries  may  give  the  key  to  the  Platonic,  and  at  the  same  time  Oriental,  elements  that  predominate  so  strik-  ingly in  the  Gospels  over  the  Jewish  Scriptures.

1  Histoire  Critique  du  Gnosticisme,  by  M  J.  Matter,  Professor  of  the  Royal  Academy  of  Strasburg,  "It  is  in  Pythagoras  and  Plato  that  we  find,  in  Greece,  the  first  elements  of  [Oriental]  Gnosticism,"  he  says  (Vol.

i,  pp  48  and  50.)

<J  Asiat.

Trans  ,  i,  579.     [Transact/ons  of  the  Royal  Asiatic  Society,  Vol.

i,  p.  579.     Quoted  in  Cole-  brooke's  Miscellaneous  Essays,  Vol.

1,  p   378,  and  in  Asiatic  Researches,  Vol.

ix,  p.  288.]  J  New  Platonism  and  Alchemy,  p.

SECTION

PRELIMINARY  SURVEY

INITIATES  who  have  acquired  powers  and  transcendental  knowledge  can  be  traced  back  to  the  Fourth  Root  Race  from  our  own  age.

As  the  multiplicity  of  the  subjects  to  be  dealt  with  prohibits  the  introduction  of  such  a  historical  chapter,  which,  however  historical  in  fact  and  truth,  would  be  rejected  a  priori  as  blasphemy  and  fable  by  both  Church  and  Science — we  shall  only  touch  on  the  subject.

Science  strikes  out,  at  its  own  sweet  will  and  fancy,  dozens  of  names  of  ancient  heroes,  simply  because  there  is  too  great  an  element  of  myth  in  their  histories;  the  Church  insists  that  biblical  patriarchs  shall  be  regarded  as  historical  personages,  and  terms  her  seven  "  Star-angels  the  "historical  channels  and  agents  of  the  Creator."  Both  are  right,  since  each  finds  a  strong  party  to  side  with  it.  Mankind  is  at  best  a  sorry  herd  of  Panurgian  sheep,  following  blindly  the  leader  that  happens  to  suit  it  at  the  moment.

Mankind — the  majority  at  any  rate — hates  to  think  for  itself.

It  resents  as  an  insult  the  humblest  invitation  to  step  for  a  moment  outside  the  old  well-beaten  tracks,  and,  judging  for  itself,  to  enter  into  a  new  path  in  some  fresh  direction.

Give  it  an  unfamiliar  problem  to  solve,  and  if  its  mathematicians,  not  liking  its  looks,  refuse  to  deal  with  it,  the  crowd,  unfamiliar  with  mathematics,  will  stare  at  the  unknown  quantity,  and  getting  hopelessly  entangled  in  sundry  x's  and  y's,  will  turn  round,  trying  to  rend  to  pieces  the  uninvited  disturber  of  its  intellectual  Nirvana.

This  may,  perhaps,  account  for  the  ease  and  extraordinary  success  enjoyed  by  the  Roman  Church  in  her  conversions  of  nominal  Protestants  and  Free-thinkers,  whose  name  is  legion,  but  who  have  never  gone  to  the  trouble  of  thinking  for  themselves  on  these  most  important  and  tremendous  problems  of  man's  inner  nature.

And  yet,  if  the  evidence  of  facts,  the  records  preserved  in  History,  and  the  uninterrupted  anathemas  of  the  Church  against  "Black  Magic"  and  Magicians  of  the  accursed  race  of  Cain,  are  not  to  be  heeded,  our  efforts  will  prove  very  puny  indeed.

When,  for  nearly  two  millenniums,

38  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

a  body  of  men  has  never  ceased  to  lift  its  voice  against  Black  Magic,  the  inference  ought  to  be  irrefutable  that  if  Black  Magic  exists  as  a  real  fact,  there  must  be  somewhere  its  counterpart — White  Magic.

False  silver  coins  could  have  no  existence  if  there  were  no  genuine  silver  money.

Nature  is  dual  in  whatever  she  attempts,  and  this  ecclesiastical  persecution  ought  alone  to  have  opened  the  eyes  of  the  public  long  ago.

However  much  travellers  may  be  ready  to  pervert  every  fact  with  regard  to  abnormal  powers  with  which  certain  men  are  gifted  in  "  heathen  "  countries  ;  however  eager  they  may  be  to  put  false  constructions  on  such  facts,  and — to  use  an  old  proverb — "to  call  white  swan  black  goose,"  and  to  kill  it,  yet  the  evidence  of  even  Roman  Catholic  missionaries  ought  to  be  taken  into  consideration,  once  they  swear  in  a  body  to  certain  facts.

Nor  is  it  because  they  choose  to  see  Satanic  agency  in  manifestations  of  a  certain  kind,  that  their  evidence  as  to  the  existence  of  such  powers  can  be  disregarded.

For  what  do  they  say  of  China  ?  Those  missionaries  who  have  lived  in  the  country  for  long  years,  and  have  seriously  studied  every  fact  and  belief  that  may  prove  an  obstacle  to  their  success  in  making  conversions,  and  who  have  become  familiar  with  every  exoteric  rite  of  both  the  official  religion  and  sectarian  creeds — all  swear  to  the  existence  of  a  certain  body  of  men,  whom  no  one  can  reach  but  the  Emperor  and  a  select  body  of  high  officials.

A  few  years  ago,  before  the  war  in  Tonkin,  the  archbishop  in  Pekin  [Peiping]  on  the  report  of  some  hundreds  of  missionaries  and  Christians,  wrote  to  Rome  the  identical  story  that  had  been  reported  twenty-five  years  before,  and  had  been  widely  circulated  in  clerical  papers.

They  had  fathomed,  it  was  said,  the  mystery  of  certain  official  deputations,  sent  at  times  of  danger  by  the  Emperor  and  ruling  powers  to  their  Sheu  and  Kiuay,  as  they  are  called  among  the  people.

These  Sheu  and  Kiuay,  they  explained,  were  the  Genii  of  the  mountains,  endowed  with  the  most  miraculous  powers.

They  are  regarded  as  the  protectors  of  China,  by  the  "ignorant"  masses;  as  the  incarnation  of  Satanic  power  by  the  good  and  "learned"  missionaries.

The  Sheu  and  Kiuay  are  men  belonging  to  another  state  of  being  from  that  of  the  ordinary  man,  or  from  the  state  they  enjoyed  while  they  were  clad  in  their  bodies.

They  are  disembodied  spirits,  ghosts  and  larvae,  living,  nevertheless,  in  objective  form  on  earth,  and  dwelling  in  the  fastnesses  of  mountains,  inaccessible  to  all  but  those  whom  they  permit  to  visit  them.

In  Tibet  certain  ascetics  are  also  called  Lha,  Spirits,  by  those  with  whom  they  do  not  choose  to  communicate.

The  Sheu  and  Kiuay,  who  enjoy  the  highest  consideration  of  the  Emperor  and  Philosophers,  and  of  Confucianists

1  This  fact  and  others  may  be  found  in  Chinese  Missionary  Reports,  and  in  a  work  by  Monseigneur  Delaplace,  a  Bishop  m  China,  Annates  de  la  Propagation  de  la  Foi

PRELIMINARY  SURVEY

who   believe   in   no  "  Spirits,"    are   simply   Lohans — Adepts   who   live  in  the  greatest  solitude  in  their  unknown  retreats.

But  both  Chinese  exclusiveness  and  Nature  seem  to  have  allied  them-  selves against  European  curiosity  and —  as  it  is  sincerely  regarded  in  Tibet —  desecration.

Marco  Polo,  the  famous  traveller,  was  perhaps  the  European  who  ventured  farthest  into  the  interior  of  these  countries.

What  was  said  of  him  in  1876  may  now  be  repeated.

The  district  of  the  Gobi  wilderness,  and,  in  fact,  the  whole  area  of  Independent  Tartary  and  Tibet  is  carefully  guarded  against  foreign  intrusion.

Those  who  are  permitted  to  traverse  it  are  under  the  particular  care  and  pilotage  of  certain  agents  of  the  chief  authority,  and  are  in  duty  bound  to  convey  no  intelligence  respecting  places  and  persons  to  the  outside  world.

But  for  this  restriction,  many  might  contribute  to  these  pages  accounts  of  exploration,  adventure,  and  discovery  that  would  be  read  with  interest  The  time  will  come,  sooner  or  later,  when  the  dreadful  sand  of  the  desert  will  yield  up  its  long-buried  secrets,  and  then  there  will  indeed  be  unlooked-for  mortifications  for  our  modern  vanity

"  The  people  of  Pashai,"1  says  Marco  Polo,  the  daring  traveller  of  the  thirteenth  century,  "  are  great  adepts  in  sorceries  and  the  diabolic  arts."  And  his  learned  editor  adds  "  This  Pashai,  or  Udyana,  was  the  native  country  of  Padma  Sambhava,  one  of  the  chief  apostles  of  Lamaism,  i.e.,  of  Tibetan  Buddhism,  and  a  great  master  of  enchant-  ments The  doctrines  of  Sakya,  as  they  prevailed  in  Udyana  in  old  times,  were  pro-  bably strongly  tinged  with  Sivaitic  magic,  and  the  Tibetans  still  regard  the  locality  as  the  classic  ground  of  sorcery  and  witchcraft  "

The  "  old  times  "  are  just  like  the  "  modern  times  "  ,  nothing  is  changed  as  to  magical  practices  except  that  they  have  become  still  more  esoteric  and  arcane,  and  that  the  caution  of  the  adepts  increases  in  proportion  to  the  traveller's  curiosity  Hiouen-Thsang  says  of  the  inhabitants  "  The  men  .  are  fond  of  study,  but  pursue  it  with  no  ardour.

Jhe  science  of  magical  formulae  has  become  a  regular  professional  business  with  them  "  "  We  will  not  contradict  the  venerable  Chinese  pilgrim  on  this  point,  and  are  willing  to  admit  that  in  the  seventh  century  some  people  made  "  a  pro-  fessional business  "  of  magic  ,  so,  also,  do  some  people  now,  but  certainly  not  the  true  adepts  Moreover,  in  that  century,  Buddhism  had  hardly  penetrated  into  Tibet,  and  its  races  were  steeped  in  the  sorceries  of  the  Bon, — the  pre-lamaic  religion.

It  is  not  Hiouen-Thsang,  the  pious,  courageous  man  who  risked  his  life  a  hundred  times  to  have  the  bliss  of  perceiving  Buddha's  shadow  in  the  cave  of  Peshawar,  who  would  have  accused  the  good  lamas  and  monkish  thaumaturgists  of  "  making  a  professional  business  "  of  showing  it  to  travellers.

The  injunction  of  Gautama,  contained  in  his  answer  to  King  Prasenajit,  his  protector,  who  called  on  him  to  perform  miracles,  must  have  been  ever-present  to  the  mind  of  Hiouen-Thsang.

"  Great  king,"  said  Gautama.

"  I  do  not  teach  the  law  to  my  pupils,  telling  them,  '  Go,  ye  saints,  and  before  the  eyes  of  the  Brahmans  and  householders  perform,  by  means  of  your  supernatural  powers,  miracles  greater  than  any  man  can  perform  '  I  tell  them  when  I  teach  them  the  law,  '  Live  ye  saints,  hiding  your  good  works,  and  showing  your  sins.'  "

Struck  with  the  accounts  of  magical  exhibitions  witnessed  and  recorded  by  travellers  of  every  age  who  had  visited  Tartary  and  Tibet,  Colonel  Yule  comes  to  the

1  The   regions  somewhere  about  Udyana  and  Kashmir,  as  the  translator  and  editor  of  Marco  Polo  (Colonel  Yule)  believes  (i,  173).

2  Voyage  des  Pelerms  Bouddhistes,   Vol.

I,  Htstoire  de  la  Vie  de  Hiouen-Jhsang,  etc.,  traduit  du  chmois  en  francais,  par  Stanislas  Julien.

40  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

conclusion  that  the  natives  must  have  had  "  at  their  command  the  whole  encyclopaedia  of  modern  Spiritualists."  Duhalde  mentions  among  their  sorceries  the  art  of  producing  by  their  invocations  the  figures  of  Laotseu  l  and  their  divinities  in  the  air,  and  of  making  a  pencil  write  answers  to  questions  without  anybody  touching  it,"  ~

The  former  invocations  pertain  to  the  religious  mysteries  of  their  sanctuaries  ;  if  done  otherwise,  for  the  sake  of  gain,  they  are  considered  sorcery,  necromancy,  and  strictly  forbidden.

The  latter  art,  that  of  making  a  pencil  write  without  contact,  was.

known  and  practised  in  China  and  other  countries  before  the  Christian  era.

It  is  the  A  B  C  of  magic  in  those  countries.

When  Hiouen-Thsang  desired  to  adore  the  shadow  of  Buddha,  it  was  not  to  "  professional  magicians  "  that  he  resorted,  but  to  the  power  of  his  own  soul-invocation  ;  the  power  of  prayer,  faith,  and  contemplation.

All  was  dark  and  dreary  near  the  cavern  in  which  the  miracle  was  alleged  to  sometimes  take  place.

Hiouen-Thsang  entered  and  began  his  devotions.

He  made  one  hundred  salutations,  but  neither  saw  nor  heard  anything.

Then,  thinking  himself  too  sinful,  he  cried  bitterly  and  despaired.

But  as  he  was  about  to  give  up  all  hope,  he  perceived  on  the  eastern  wall  a  feeble  light,  but  it  disappeared.

He  renewed  his  prayers,  full  of  hope  this  time,  and  again  he  saw  the  light,  which  flashed  and  disappeared  again.

After  this  he  made  a  solemn  vow  •  he  would  not  leave  the  cave  till  he  had  the  rapture  to  see  at  last  the  shadow  of  the-  "  Venerable  of  the  Age."  He  had  to  wait  longer  after  this,  for  only  after  two  hundred  prayers  was  the  dark  cave  suddenly  "  bathed  in  light,  and  the  shadow  of  Buddha,  of  a  brilliant  white  colour,  rose  majestically  on  the  wall,  as  when  the  clouds  suddenly  open,  and  all  at  once  display  the  marvellous  image  of  the  '  Mountain  of  Light.'  A  dazzling,  splendour  lighted  up  the  features  of  the  divine  countenance  Hiouen-Thsang  was  lost  in  contemplation  and  wonder,  and  would  not  turn  his  eyes  away  from  the  sublime  and  incomparable  object."  Hiouen-Thsang  adds  in  his  own  diary,  See-yu-kee,  that  it  is  only  when  man  prays  with  sincere  faith,  and  if  he  has  received  from  above  a  hidden  im-  pression, that  he  sees  the  shadow  clearly,  but  he  cannot  enjoy  the  sight  for  any  length  of  time  (Max  Muller,  Buddhist  Pilgrims.)

From  one  end  to  the  other  the  country  is  full  of  mystics,  religious  philosopher's,  Buddhist  saints  and  magicians  Belief  in  a  spiritual  world,  full  of  invisible  beings  who,  on  certain  occasions,  appear  to  mortals  objectively,  is  universal.

"  According  to  the  belief  of  the  nations  of  Central  Asia,"  remarks  J.  J.  Schmidt,  "  the  earth  and  its  interior,  as  well  as  the  encompassing  atmosphere,  are  filled  with  spiritual  beings,  which  exercise  an  influence,  partly  beneficent,  partly  malignant,  on  the  whole  of  organic  and  inorganic  nature.

.  .  Especially  are  deserts,  and  other  wild  and  uninhabited  tracts,  or  regions  in  which  the  influences  of  nature  are  displayed  on  a  gigantic  and  terrible  scale,  regarded  as  the  chief  abode  or  rendez-vous  of  evil  spirits.

And  hence  the  steppes  of  Turan,  and  in  particular  the  great  sandy  desert  of  Gobi,  have  been  looked  on  as  the  dwelling  place  of  malignant  beings,  from  days  of  hoary  antiquity."

The  treasures  exhumed  by  Dr.  Schliemann  at  Mycenae,  have  awakened  popular  cupidity,  and  the  eyes  of  adventurous  speculators  are  being  turned  toward  the  localities  where  the  wealth  of  ancient  peoples  is  supposed  to  be  buried,  in  crypt  or  cave,  or  beneath  sand  or  alluvial  deposit.

Around  no  other  locality,  not  even  Peru,  hang  so  many  traditions  as  around  the  Gobi  Desert.

In  independent  Tartary  this  howling  waste  of  shifting  sand  was  once,  if  report  speaks  correctly,  the  seat  of  one  of  the  richest  empires  the  world  ever  saw.

Beneath  the  surface  is  said  to  lie  such  wealth  in  gold,  jewels,  statuary,  arms,  utensils,  and  all  that  indicates  civilization,  luxury,  and  fine  arts,  as,

1  Lao-tse,  the  Chinese  philosopher

2  The  Book  of  Ser  Marco  Polo,  i,  318.  See  Isis  Unveiled,  i,  p.  599-

PRELIMINARY  SURVEY  4V

no  existing  capital  of  Christendom  can  show  to-day  The  Gobi  sand  moves  regularly  from  east  to  west  before  terrific  gales  that  blow  continually.

Occasionally  some  of  the  hidden  treasures  are  uncovered,  but  not  a  native  dare  touch  them,  for  the  whole  district  is  under  the  ban  of  a  mighty  spell  Death  would  be  the  penalty  Bahti — hideous,  but  faithful  gnomes — guard  the  hidden  treasures  of  this  prehistoric  people,  awaiting  the  day  when  the  revolution  of  cyclic  periods  shall  again  cause  their  story  to  be  known  for  the  instruction  of  mankind  '

The  above  is  purposely  quoted  from  /s/s  Unveiled  to  refresh  the  reader's  memory.

One  of  the  cyclic  periods  has  just  been  passed,  and  we  may  not  have  to  wait  to  the  end  of  Maha  Kalpa  to  have  revealed  something  of  the  history  of  the  mysterious  desert,  in  spite  of  the  Bahti,  and  even  the  Rakshasas  of  India,  not  less  "  hideous."  No  tales  or  fictions  were  given  in  our  earlier  volumes,  their  chaotic  state  notwithstanding,  to  which  chaos  the  writer,  entire-  ly free  from  vanity,  confesses  publicly  and  with  many  apologies.

It  is  now  generally  admitted  that,  from  time  immemorial,  the  distant  East,  India  especially,  was  the  land  of  knowledge  and  of  every  kind  of  learn-  ing.

Yet  there  is  none  to  whom  the  origin  of  all  her  Arts  and  Sciences  has  been  so  much  denied  as  to  the  land  of  the  primitive  Aryas  [Aryans].  From  Architecture  down  to  the  Zodiac,  every  Science  worthy  of  the  name  was  imported  by  the  Greeks,  the  mysterious  Yavanas — agreeably  with  the  decision  of  the  Orientalists  !  Therefore,  it  is  but  logical  that  even  the  knowledge  of  Occult  Science  should  be  refused  to  India,  since  of  its  general  practice  in  that  country  less  is  known  than  in  the  case  of  any  other  ancient  people.

It  is  so,  simply  because  :

With  the  Hindus  it  was,  and  is,  more  esoteric,  if  possible,  than  it  was  even  among  the  Egyptian  priests.

So  sacred  was  it  deemed  that  its  existence  was  only  half  ad-  mitted, and  it  was  only  practised  in  public  emergencies  It  was*more  than  a  religious  matter,  for  it  was  [and  is  still]  considered  divine  The  Egyptian  hierophants,  notwith-  standing the  practice  of  a  stern  and  pure  morality,  could  not  be  compared  for  one  moment  with  the  ascetical  Gymnosophists,  either  in  holiness  of  life  or  miraculous  powers  developed  in  them  by  the  supernatural  abjuration  of  everything  earthly.

By  those  who  knew  them  well  they  were  held  in  still  greater  reverence  than  the  magians  of  Chaldea.

"  Denying  themselves  the  simplest  comforts  of  life,  they  dwelt  in  woods,  and  led  the  life  of  the  most  secluded  hermits,"  •'  while  their  Egyptian  brothers  at  least  congregated  together  Notwithstanding  the  slur  thrown  on  all  who  practised  magic  and  divination,  history  has  proclaimed  them  as  possessing  the  greatest  secrets  in  medical  knowledge  and  unsurpassed  skill  in  its  practice  Numerous  are  the  volumes  preserved  in  Hindu  Mathams,  in  which  are  recorded  the  proofs  of  their  learning  To  attempt  to  say  whether  these  Gymnosophists  were  the  real  founders  of  magic  in  India,  or  whether  they  only  practised  what  had  passed  to  them  as  an  inheritance  from  the  earliest  Rishis  *

1  Isis  Unveiled,  i,  599-601 .  603,  598.  *  Ammianus  Marcellmus,  xxm,  6.

3  The  Rishis— the  first  group  of  seven  in  number — lived  in  days  preceding  the  Vedic  period  They  are  now  known  as  Sages  and  held  in  reverence  like  demigods.

But  they  may  now  be  shown  as  something  more  than  merely  mortal  Philosophers  There  are  other  groups  of  ten,  twelve  and  even  twenty-one  in  number  Haug  shows  that  they  occupy  in  the  Brahmamcal  religion  a  position  answer-  ing to  that  of  the  twelve  sons  of  Jacob  in  the  Jewish  Bible  The  Brahmans  claim  to  descend  directly  from  the  Rishis

42  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

— the     seven    primeval    sages — would   be    regarded    as    mere    speculation    by   exact  scholars.

Nevertheless,  this  must  be  attempted.

In  Isis  Unveiled,  all  that  could  be  stated  about  Magic  was  set  down  in  the  guise  of  hints ;  and  thus,  owing  to  the  great  amount  of  material  scattered  over  two  large  volumes,  much  of  its  importance  was  lost  upon  the  reader,  while  it  still  more  failed  to  draw  his  attention  on  account  of  the  faulty  arrangement.

But  hints  may  now  grow  jnto  explanations.

One  can  never  repeat  it  too  often — Magic  is  as  old  as  man.

It  cannot  any  longer  be  called  charlatanry  or  hallucination,  when  its  lesser  branches — such  as  mesmerism,  now  miscalled  "  hypnotism,"  "  thought  reading,"  "  action  by  suggestion,"  and  what  not  else,  only  to  avoid  calling  it  by  its  right  and  legitimate  name — are  being  so  seriously  investigated  by  the  most  famous  Biologists  and  Physiologists  of  both  Europe  and  America.

Magic  is  indissolubly  blended  with  the  Religion  of  every  country  and  is  inseparable  from  its  origin.

It  is  as  impossible  for  History  to  name  the  time  when  it  was  not,  as  that  of  the  epoch  when  it  sprang  into  existence,  unless  the  doctrines  preserved  by  the  Initiates  are  taken  into  consideration.

Nor  can  Science  ever  solve  the  problem  of  the  origin  of  man  if  it  rejects  the  evidence  of  the  oldest  records  in  the  world,  and  refuses  from  the  hand  of  the  legitimate  Guardians  of  the  mysteries  of  Nature  the  key  to  Universal  Symbology.

Whenever  a  writer  has  tried  to  connect  the  first  foundation  of  Magic  with  a  particular  country  or  some  historical  event  or  character,  further  research  has  shown  his  hypothesis  to  be  groundless.

There  is  a  most  lament-  able contradiction  among  the  Symbologists  on  this  point.

Some  would  have  it  that  Odin,  the  Scandinavian  priest  and  monarch,  originated  the  practice  of  Magic  some  70  years  B  C .  although  it  is  spoken  of  repeatedly  in  the  Bible,  But  as  it  was  proven  that  the  mysterious  rites  of  the  priestesses  Valas  (Voilers)  were  greatly  anterior  to  Odin's  age, '  then  Zoroaster  came  in  for  an  attempt,  on  the  ground  that  he  was  the  founder  of  Magian  rites  ;  but  Ammianus  Marcellinus,  Pliny  and  Arnobius,  with  other  ancient  Historians,  have  shown  that  Zoroaster  was  but  a  reformer  of  Magic  as  practised  by  the  Chaldeans  and  Egyptians,  and  not  at  all  its  founder.

Who,  then,  of  those  who  have  consistently  turned  their  faces  away  from  Occultism  and  even  Spiritualism,  as  being  "  unphilosophical "  and  therefore  unworthy  of  scientific  thought,  has  a  right  to  say  that  he  has  studied  the  Ancients  ;  or  that,  if  he  has  studied  them,  he  has  understood  all

1  Isis  Unveiled.

I,  p   90.

-  See  MUnter  "  On  the  most  Ancient  Religions  of  the    North  before  Odm  "     Memo/res  de  la  Societe  des  Ant/quaires  de  France,  n,  230.  3  Anr.mianus  Marcellinus,  xxvi,

PRELIMINARY  SURVEY

they  have  said  ?  Only  those  who  claim  to  be  wiser  than  their  generation,  who  think  that  they  know  ail  that  the  Ancients  knew,  and  thus,  knowing  far  more  to-day,  fancy  that  they  are  entitled  to  laugh  at  their  ancient  simple-  mindedness  and  superstition  ;  those,  who  imagine  they  have  discovered  a  great  secret  by  declaring  the  ancient  royal  sarcophagus,  now  empty  of  its  King  Initiate,  to  be  a  "  corn-bin,"  and  the  Pyramid  that  contained  it,  a  granary,  perhaps  a  wine  cellar  ' *  Modern  society,  on  the  authority  of  some  men  of  Science,  calls  Magic  charlatanry.

But  there  are  eight  hundred  millions  on  the  face  of  the  globe  who  believe  in  it  to  this  day  ;  there  are  said  to  be  twenty  millions  of  perfectly  sane  and  often  very  intellectual  men  and  women,  members  of  that  same  society,  who  believe  in  its  phenomena  under  the  name  of  Spiritualism.

The  whole  ancient  world,  with  its  Scholars  and  Philosophers,  its  Sages  and  Prophets,  believed  in  it.  Where  is  the  country  in  which  it  was  not  practised?  At  what  age  was  it  banished,  even  from  our  own  country?  In  the  New  World  as  in  the  Old  Country  (the  latter  far  younger  than  the  former),  the  Science  of  Sciences  was  known  and  practised  from  the  remotest  antiquity.

The  Mexicans  had  their  Initiates,  their  Priest-Hierophants  and  Magicians,  and  their  crypts  of  Initiation.

Of  the  two  statues  exhumed  in  the  Pacific  States,  one  represents  a  Mexican  Adept,  in  the  posture  prescribed  for  the  Hindu  ascetic,  and  the  other  an  Aztec  Priestess,  in  a  head-gear  which  might  be  taken  from  the  head  of  an  Indian  Goddess  ,  while  the  "  Guatemalan  Medal  "  exhibits  the  "Tree  of  Knowledge  " — with  its  hundreds  of  eyes  and  ears,  symbolical  of  seeing  and  hearing — encircled  by  the  "Serpent  of  Wisdom  "  whispering  into  the  ear  of  the  sacred  bird.

Bernard  Diaz  de  Castilla,  a  follower  of  Cortez,  gives  some  idea  of  the  extraordinary  refinement,  intelli-  gence and  civilization,  and  also  of  the  magic  arts  of  the  people  whom  the  Spaniards  conquered  by  brute  force.

Their  pyramids  are  those  of  Egypt,  built  according  to  the  same  secret  canon  of  proportion  as  those  of  the  Pharaohs,  and  the  Aztecs  appear  to  have  derived  their  civilization  and  religion  in  more  than  one  way  from  the  same  source  as  the  Egyptians  and,  before  these,  the  Indians.

Among  all  these  three  peoples  arcane  Natural  Philosophy,  or  Magic,  was  cultivated  to  the  highest  degree.

1  The  date  of  the  hundreds  of  pyramids  in  the  Valley  of  the  Nile  is  impossible  to  fix  by  any  of  the  rules  of  modern  science  ,  Herodotus  informs  us  that  each  successive  king  erected  one  to  com-  memorate his  reign,  and  serve  as  his  sepulchre  But,  Herodotus  did  not  tell  all,  although  he  knew  that  the  real  purpose  of  the  pyramid  was  very  different  from  that  which  he  assigns  to  it  Were  it  not  for  his  religious  scruples,  he  might  have  added  that,  externally,  it  symbolized  the  creative  principle  of  Nature,  and  illustrated  also  the  principles  of  geometry,  mathematics,  astrology  and  astronomy.

Internally,  it  was  a  majestic  fane,  in  whose  sombre  recesses  were  performed  the  Mysteries,  and  whose  walls  had  often  witnessed  the  initiation  scenes  of  members  of  the  royal  family  The  porphyry  sarco-  phagus, which  Professor  Piazzi  Smyth,  Astronomer  Royal  of  Scotland,  degrades  into  a  corn-bin,  was  the  baptismal  font,  upon  emerging  from  which,  the  neophyte  was  '  born  again,'  and  became  an  adept."  (Isis  Unveiled,  I,  pp.  518-9.)

44  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

That  it  was  natural,  not  supernatural,  and  that  the  Ancients  so  regarded  it,  is  shown  by  what  Lucian  says  of  the  "laughing  Philosopher/1  Democritus,  who,  he  tells  his  readers,

Believed  in  no  [miracles]  .  .  .  but  applied  himself  to  discover  the  method  by  which  the  theurgists  could  produce  them  ;  in  a  word,  his  philosophy  brought  him  to  the  conclusion  that  magic  was  entirely  confined  to  the  application  and  the  imitation  of  the  laws  and  the  works  of  nature

Who  then  can  still  call  the  Magic  of  the  Ancients  "  superstition  "  ?

[In  this  respect]  the  opinion  of  [Democritus]  the  "laughing  philosopher"  is  of  the  greatest  importance  to  us,  since  the  Magi  left  by  Xerxes,  at  Abdera,  were  his  in-  structors, and  he  had  studied  magic,  moreover,  for  a  considerable  time  with  the  Egyptian  priests,1  For  nearly  ninety  years  of  the  one  hundred  and  nine  of  his  life,  this  great  philosopher  had  made  experiments,  and  noted  them  down  in  a  book,  which,  according  to  Petronius,*  treated  of  nature — facts  that  he  had  verified  himself  And  we  find  him  not  only  disbelieving  in  and  utterly  rejecting  miracles,  but  asserting  that  every  one  of  those  that  were  authenticated  by  eye-witnesses,  had,  and  could  have  taken  place,  for  all,  even  the  most  incredible,  were  produced  according  to  the  "  hidden  laws  of  nature."  ;t  .  .  Add  to  this  that  Greece,  the  "  later  cradle  of  the  arts  and  sciences,"  and  India,  cradle  of  religions,  were,  and  one  of  them  still  is,  devoted  to  its  study  and  practice — and  who  shall  venture  to  discredit  its  dignity  as  a  study,  and  its  profundity  as  a  science  ?

No  true  Theosophist  will  ever  do  so.  For,  as  a  member  of  our  great  Oriental  body,  he  knows  indubitably  that  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE  of  the  East  con-  tains the  Alpha  and  the  Omega  of  Universal  Science  ,  that  in  its  obscure  texts,  under  the  luxuriant,  though  perhaps  too  exuberant,  growth  of  allegorical  Symbolism,  lie  concealed  the  corner-  and  the  key-stones  of  all  ancient  and  modern  knowledge.

That  Stone,  brought  down  by  the  Divine  Builder,  is  now  rejected  by  the  too-human  workman,  and  this  because,  in  his  lethal  material-  ity, man  has  lost  every  recollection,  not  only  of  his  holy  childhood,  but  of  his  very  adolescence,  when  he  was  one  of  the  Builders  himself;  when  "the  morning  stars  sang  together,  and  the  Sons  of  God  shouted  for  joy,"  after  they  had  laid  the  measures  for  the  foundations  of  the  earth — to  use  the  deeply  significant  and  poetical  language  of  Job,  the  Arabian  Initiate.

But  those  who  are  still  able  to  make  room  in  their  innermost  selves  for  the  Divine  Ray,  and  who  accept,  therefore,  the  data  of  the  Secret  Sciences  in  good  faith  and  humility,  they  know  well  that  it  is  in  this  Stone  that  remains  buried  the  absolute  in  Philosophy,  which  is  the  key  to  all  those  dark  problems  of  Life  and  Death,  some  of  which,  at  any  rate,  may  find  an  explanation  in  these  volumes.

The  writer  is  vividly  alive  to  the  tremendous  difficulties  that  present  themselves  in  the  handling  of  such  abstruse  questions,  and  to  all  the  dangers

1  Diog    Laert  ,  in  "  Democnt.

Vitae  "  -  Satyric,  lib.

ix,  Cap.

•'  Pliny,  H/st.  Nat  .  fsis  Unveiled,  \,  p.  512  '  See  Isis  Unveiled,  \,  p.  521.

PRELIMINARY  SURVEY

of  the  task.

Insulting  as  it  is  to  human  nature  to  brand  truth  with  the  name  of  imposture,  nevertheless  we  see  this  done  daily  and  accept  it.  For  every  occult  truth  has  to  pass  through  such  denial  and  its  supporters  through  martyr-  dom, before  it  is  finally  accepted  ;  though  even  then  it  remains  but  too  often —

A  crown,  Golden  in  show,  yet  but  a  wreath  of  thorns.

Truths  that  rest  on  Occult  mysteries  will  have,  for  one  reader  who  may  appreciate  them,  a  thousand  who  will  brand  them  as  impostures.

This  is  only  natural,  and  the  only  means  to  avoid  it  would  be  for  an  Occultist  to  pledge  himself  to  the  Pythagorean  "  vow  of  silence,"  and  renew  it  every  five  years.

Otherwise,  cultured  society — two-thirds  of  which  think  themselves  in  duty  bound  to  believe  that,  since  the  first  appearance  of  the  first  Adept,  one  half  of  mankind  practised  deception  and  fraud  on  the  other  half — cultured  society  will  undeniably  assert  its  hereditary  and  traditional  right  to  stone  the  intruder.

Those  benevolent  critics,  who  most  readily  promulgate  the  now  famous  axiom  of  Carlyle  with  regard  to  his  countrymen,  of  being  "  mostly  fools,"  having  taken  preliminary  care  to  include  themselves  safely  in  the  only  fortunate  exceptions  to  this  rule,  will  in  this  work  gain  strength  and  derive  additional  conviction  of  the  sad  fact,  that  the  human  race  is  simply  composed  of  knaves  and  congenital  idiots.

But  this  matters  very  little.

The  vindication  of  the  Occultists  and  their  Archaic  Science  is  working  itself  slowly  but  steadily  into  the  very  heart  of  society,  hourly,  daily,  and  yearly,  in  the  shape  of  two  monster  branches,  two  stray  off-shoots  of  the  trunk  of  Magic — Spiritual-  ism and  the  Roman  Church.

Fact  works  its  way  very  often  through  fiction.

Like  an  immense  boa -constrictor,  Error,  in  every  shape,  encircles  mankind,  trying  to  smother  in  her  deadly  coils  every  aspiration  towards  truth  and  light.

But  Error  is  powerful  only  on  the  surface,  prevented  as  she  is  by  Occult  Nature  from  going  any  deeper  ;  for  the  same  Occult  Nature  encircles  the  whole  globe,  in  every  direction,  leaving  not  even  the  darkest  corner  unvisited.

And,  whether  by  phenomenon  or  miracle,  by  spirit  hook  or  bishop's  crook,  Occultism  must  win  the  day,  before  the  present  era  reaches  "  Shani's  (Saturn's)  triple  septenary  "  of  the  Western  Cycle  in  Europe  in  other  words —  before  the  end  of  the  twenty-first  century  "  A.D  "

Truly  the  soil  of  the  long  by-gone  past  is  not  dead,  for  it  has  only  rested.

The  skeletons  of  the  sacred  oaks  of  the  ancient  Druids  may  still  send  shoots  from  their  dried-up  boughs  and  be  reborn  to  a  new  life,  like  that  handful  of  corn,  in  the  sarcophagus  of  a  mummy  4,000  years  old,  which,  when  planted,  sprouted,  grew,  and  "gave  a  fine  harvest."  Why  not  ?  Truth  is  stranger  than  fiction.

It  may  any  day,  and  most  unexpectedly,  vindicate  its

46  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

wisdom  and  demonstrate  the  conceit  of  our  age,  by  proving  that  the  Secret  Brotherhood  did  not,  indeed,  die  out  with  the  Philalethians  of  the  last  Eclectic  School,  that  the  Gnosis  flourishes  still  on  earth,  and  its  votaries  are  many,  albeit  unknown.

All  this  may  be  done  by  one,  or  more,  of  the  great  Masters  visiting  Europe,  and  exposing  in  their  turn  the  alleged  exposers  and  traducers  of  Magic.

Such  secret  Brotherhoods  have  been  mentioned  by  several  well-  known  authors,  and  are  spoken  of  in  Mackenzie's  Royal  Masonic  Cyclopaedia.

The  writer  now,  in  the  face  of  the  millions  who  deny,  repeats  boldly,  that  which  was  said  in  Isis  Unveiled.

If  they  [the  Initiates]  have  been  regarded  as  mere  fictions  of  the  novelist,  that  fact  has  only  helped  the  "  brother-adepts  "  to  keep  their  incognito  the  more  easily.

.  .  .

The  St  Germains  and  Cagliostros  of  this  century,  having  learned  bitter  lessons  from  the  vilifications  and  persecutions  of  the  past,  pursue  different  tactics  now-a-days  '

These   prophetic  words  were  written  in  1876,  and  verified  in  1886.    Never-  theless, we  say  again,

There  are  numbers  of  these  mystic  Brotherhoods  which  have  naught  to  do  with  "civilized"  countries,  and  it  is  in  their  unknown  communities  that  are  concealed  the  skeletons  of  the  past.

These  "  adepts  "  could,  if  they  chose,  lay  claim  to  strange  ancestry,  and  exhibit  verifiable  documents  that  would  explain  many  a  mysterious  page  in  both  sacred  and  profane  history  •  Had  the  keys  to  the  hieratic  writings  and  the  secret  of  Egyptian  and  Hindu  symbolism  been  known  to  the  Christian  Fathers,  they  would  not  have  allowed  a  single  monument  of  old  to  stand  unmutilated  '

But  there  exists  in  the  world  another  class  of  adepts,  belonging  to  a  brotherhood  also,  and  mightier  than  any  other  of  those  known  to  the  profane.

Many  among  these  are  personally  good  and  benevolent,  even  pure  and  holy  occasionally,  as  individuals.

Pursuing  collectively,  how-  ever, and  as  a  body,  a  selfish,  one-sided  object,  with  relentless  vigour  and  determination,  they  have  to  be  ranked  with  the  adepts  of  the  Black  Art.

These  are  our  modern  Roman  Catholic  "fathers"  and  clergy.

Most  of  the  hieratic  writings  and  symbols  have  been  deciphered  by  them  since  the  Middle  Ages.

A  hundred  times  more  learned  in  secret  Sym-  bology  and  the  old  Religions  than  our  Orientalists  will  ever  be,  the  per-  sonification of  astuteness  and  cleverness,  every  such  adept  in  the  art  holds  the  keys  tightly  in  his  firmly  clenched  hand,  and  will  take  care  the  secret  shalf  not  be  easily  divulged,  if  he  can  help  it.  There  are  more  profoundly  learned  Kabalists  in  Rome  and  throughout  Europe  and  America,  than  is  generally  suspected.

Thus  are  the  professedly  public  "brotherhoods"  of  "black"

1  Op.  at p.  403.

2  This  is  precisely  what  some  of  them  are  preparing  to  do.  and  many  a  "  mysterious  page  "  in  sacred  and  profane  history  are  touched  on  in  these  pages.

Whether  or  not  their  explanations  will  be  accepted — is  another  question

*  Ibid.

PRELIMINARY  SURVEY

adepts  more  powerful  and  dangerous  for  Protestant  countries  than  any  host  of  Eastern  Occultists.

People  laugh  at  Magic  !  Men  of  Science,  Physiologists  and  Biologists,  deride  the  potency  and  even  the  belief  in  the  existence  of  what  is  called  in  vulgar  parlance  "Sorcery"  and  "Black  Magic"!  The  Archaeologists  have  theii^  Stonehenge  in  England  with  its  thousands  of  secrets,  and  its  twin-brother  Karnac  of  Brittany,  and  yet  there  is  not  one  of  them  who  even  suspects  what  has  been  going  on  in  its  crypts,  and  its  mysterious  nooks  and  corners,  for  the  last  century.

More  than  that,  they  do  not  even  know  of  the  existence  of  such  "magic  halls"  in  their  Stonehenge,  where  curious,  scenes  are  taking  place,  whenever  there  is  a  new  convert  in  view.

Hundreds  of  experiments  have  been,  and  are  being  made  daily  at  the  Salpetriere,  and,  also  by  learned  hypnotisers  at  their  private  houses.

It  is  now  proved,  that  certain  sensitives — both  men  and  women — when  commanded  in.  trance,  by  the  practitioner,  who  operates  on  them,  to  do  a  certain  thing —  from  drinking  a  glass  of  water  up  to  simulated  murder —  on  recovering  their  normal  state  lose  all  remembrance  of  the  order  inspired — "  suggested  "  it  is  now  called  by  Science.

Nevertheless,  at  the  appointed  hour  and  moment,  the  subject,  though  conscious  and  perfectly  awake,  is  compelled  by  an  irresist-  ible power  within  himself  to  do  that  action  which  has  been  suggested  to  him  by  his  mesmeriser ,  and  that  too,  whatever  it  may  be,  and  whatever  the  period  fixed  by  him  who  controls  the  subject,  that  is  to  say,  holds  the  latter  under  the  power  of  his  will,  as  a  snake  holds  a  bird  under  its  fascination,  and  finally  forces  it  to  jump  into  its  open  jaws.

Worse  than  this  :  for  the  bird  is  conscious  of  the  peril ;  it  resists,  however  helpless  in  its  final  efforts,  while  the  hypnotized  subject  does  not  rebel,  but  seems  to  follow  the  sugges-  tions and  voice  of  his  own  free-will  and  soul.

Who  of  our  European  men  of  Science,  who  believe  in  such  scientific  experiments — and  very  few  are  they  who  still  doubt  them  now-a-days,  and  who  do  not  feel  convinced  of  their  actual  reality — who  of  them,  it  is  asked,  is  ready  to  admit  this  as  being  Black  Magic  ?  Yet  it  is  the  genuine,  undeniable  and  actual  fascination  and  sorcery  of  old.

The  Mulu  Kurumbas  of  Nilgiri  do  not  proceed  otherwise  in  their  envoutements  when  they  seek  to  destroy  an  enemy,  nor  do  the  Dugpas  of  Sikkim  and  Bhutan  know  of  any  more  potential  agent  than  their  will.

Only  in  them  that  will  does  not  proceed  by  jumps  and  starts,  but  acts  with  certainty ;  it  does  not  depend  on  the  amount  of  receptivity  or  nervous  impressibility  of  the  "subject."  Having  chosen  his  victim  and  placed  himself  en  rapport  with  him,  the  Dugpa's  "fluid  "  is  sure  to  find  its  way,  for  his  will  is  immeasur-  ably more  strongly  developed  than  the  will  of  the  European  experimenter —  the  self-made,  untutored,  and  unconsc/ous  Sorcerer  for  the  sake  of  Science —

48  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

who  has  no  idea  (or  belief  either)  of  the  variety  and  potency  of  the  world-old  methods  used  to  develop  this  power,  by  the  conscious  sorcerer,  the  "  Black  Magician  "  of  the  East  and  West.

And  now  the  qestion  is  openly  and  squarely  asked  :  Why  should  not  the  fanatical  and  zealous  priest,  thirsting  to  convert ^some  selected  rich  and  influential  member  of  society,  use  the  same  means  to  accomplish  his  end  as  the  French  Physician  and  experimenter  uses  in  his  case  with  his  subject  ?  The  conscience  of  the  Roman  Catholic' priest  is  most  likely  at  peace.

He  works  personally  for  no  selfish  purpose,  but  with  the  object  of  "  saving  a  soul  "  from  "eternal  damnation."  In  his  view,  if  Magic  there  be  in  it,  it  is  holy,  meritorious  and  divine  Magic.

Such  is  the  power  of  blind  faith.

Hence,  when  we  are  assured  by  trustworthy  and  respectable  persons  of  high  social  standing,  and  unimpeachable  character,  that  there  are  many  well-  organised  societies  among  the  Roman  Catholic  priests  which,  under  the  pre-  text and  cover  of  modern  Spiritualism  and  mediumship,  hold  seances  for  the  purposes  of  conversion  by  suggestion,  directly  and  at  a  distance— we  answer :  We  know  it.  And  when,  moreover,  we  are  told  that  whenever  those  priest-hypnotists  are  desirous  of  acquiring  an  influence  over  some  individ-  ual or  individuals,  selected  by  them  for  conversion,  they  retire  to  an  under-  ground place,  allotted  and  consecrated  by  them  for  such  purposes  (w'z.,  ceremonial  Magic)  ;  and  there,  forming  a  circle,  throw  their  combined  will-power  in  the  direction  of  that  individual,  and  thus  by  repeating  the  process,  gain  a  complete  control  over  their  victim — we  again  answer  :  Very  likely.

In  fact  we  know  the  practice  to  be  so,  whether  this  kind  of  ceremonial  Magic  and  envoutement  is  practised  at  Stonehenge  or  else-  where.

We  know  it,  we  say,  through  personal  experience ,  and  also  because  several  of  the  writer's  best  and  most  loved  friends  have  been  unconsciously  drawn  into  the  Romish  Church  and  under  her  "  benign  "  protection  by  such  .means.

And,  therefore,  we  can  only  laugh  in  pity  at  the  ignorance  and  stubbornness  of  those  deluded  men  of  Science  and  cultured  experimentalists  who,  while  believing  in  the  power  of  Dr.  Charcot  and  his  disciples  to  "  en-  voute  "  their  subjects,  find  nothing  better  than  a  scornful  smile  whenever  Black  Magic  and  its  potency  are  mentioned  before  them.

Eliphas  Levi,  the  Abbe-Kabalist,  died  before  Science  and  the  Faculte  de  Medecine  of  France  had  accepted  hypnotism  and  influence  par  suggestion  among  its  scientific  experiments,  but  this  is  what  he  said  twenty-five  years  ago,  in  his  Dogme  et  Rituel  de  la  Haute  Magie,  on  "  Les  Envoutements  et  les  Sorts  "  :

That  which  sorcerers  and  necromancers  sought  above  all  things  in  their  evoca-  .tions  of  the  Spirit  of  Evil,  was  that  magnetic  potency  which  is  the  lawful  property  of

PRELIMINARY  SURVEY

the  true  Adept,  and  of  which  they  desired  to  obtain  possession  for  evil  purposes.

.  One  of  their  chief  aims  was  the  power  of  spells  or  of  deleterious  influences  .  .  .  That  power  may  be  compared  to  real  poisonings  by  a  current  of  astral  light.

They  exalt  their  will  by  means  of  ceremonies  to  the  degree  of  rendering  it  venomous  at  a  distance.

We  have  said  in  our  "  Dogma  "  what  we  thought  of  magic  spells,  and  how  this  power  was  exceedingly  real  and  dangerous.

The  true  Magus  throws  a  spell  without  ceremony  and  by  his  sole  disapproval,  upon  those  with  whose  conduct  he  is  dissatisfied,  and  whom  he  thinks  it  necessary  to  punish  , '  he  casts  a  spell,  even  by  his  pardon,  over  those  who  do  him  injury,  and  the  enemies  of  Initiates  never  bng  enjoy  impunity  for  their  wrong-doing  We  have  ourselves  seen  proofs  of  this  fatal  law  in  numerous  instances.

The  executioners  of  martyrs  always  perish  miserably  ,  and  the  Adepts  are  the  martyrs  of  intelligence.

Providence  [Karma]  seems  to  despise  those  who  despise  them,  and  puts  to  death  those  who  would  seek  to  prevent  them  from  living.

The  legend  of  the  Wandering  Jew  is  the  popular  poetry  of  this  arcanum.

A  people  had  sent  a  sage  to  crucifixion  ;  that  people  had  bidden  him  "  Move  on  I  "  when  he  tried  to  rest  for  one  moment.

Well  !  that  people  will  become  subject,  henceforth,  to' a  similar  condemnation  ;  it  will  become  entirely  proscribed,  and  for  long  centuries  it  will  be  bidden  "  Move  on  '  move  on  '  "  finding  neither  rest  nor  pity.*

"  Fables,"  and  "  superstition,"  will  be  the  answer.

Be  it  so.  Before  the  lethal  breath  of  selfishness  and  indifference  every  uncomfortable  fact  is  transformed  into  meaningless  fiction,  and  every  branch  of  the  once  verdant  Tree  of  Truth  has  become  dried  up  and  stripped  of  its  primeval  spiritual  significance.

Our  modern  Symbologist  is  superlatively  clever  only  at  detect-  ing phallic  worship  and  sexual  emblems  even  where  none  were  ever  mear.t.  But  for  the  true  student  of  Occult  Lore,  White  or  Divine  Magic  could  no  more  exist  in  Nature  without  its  counterpart  Black  Magic,  than  day  without  night,  whether  these  be  of  twelve  hours  or  of  six  months'  duration.

For  him  every-  thing in  that  Nature  has  an  occult — a  bright  and  a  night  side  to  it.  Pyramids  and  Druid's  oaks,  dolmens  and  Bo-trees,  plant  and  mineral — everything  was  full  of  deep  significance  and  of  sacred  truths  of  wisdom,  when  the  Arch-Druid  performed  his  magic  cures  and  incantations,  and  the  Egyptian  Hierophant  evoked  and  guided  Chemnu,  the  "lovely  spectre,"  the  female  Frankenstein-  creation  of  old,  raised  for  the  torture  and  test  of  the  soul-power  of  the  candi-  date for  initiation,  simultaneously  with  the  last  agonising  cry  of  his  terrestrial  human  nature.

True,  Magic  has  lost  its  name,  and  along  with  it  its  rights  to  recognition.

But  its  practice  is  in  daily  use  ;  and  its  progeny,  "  magnetic  influence,"  "  power  of  oratory,"  "  irresistible  fascination,"  "whole  audiences  subdued  and  held  as  though  under  a  spell,"  are  terms  recognised  and  used  by  all,  generally  meaningless  though  they  now  are.

Its  effects,  however,  are  more  determined  and  definite  among  religious  congregations  such  as  the

1  This  is  incorrectly  expressed.

The  true  Adept  of  the  "Right  Hand  "  never  punishes  anyone,  not  even  his  bitterest  and  most  dangerous  enemy  ,    he  simply  leaves  the  latter  to  his  Karma,  and  Karma  never  fails  to  do  so,  sooner  or  later

2  Op.  cit..  u,  pp.  239,  241,  240.

FF

50  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Shakers,  the  Negro  Methodists,  and  Salvationists,  who  call  it  "  the  action  of  the  Holy  Spirit"  and  "grace."  The  real  truth  is  that  Magic  is  still  in  full  sway  amidst  mankind,  however  blind  the  latter  to  its  silent  presence  and  influence  on  its  members,  however  ignorant  society  may  be,  and  remain,  to  its  daily  and  hourly  beneficent  and  maleficent  effects.

The  world  is  full  of  such  un-  conscious magicians — in  politics  as  well  as  in  daily  life,  in  the  Church  as  in  the  strongholds  of  Free-Thought.

Most  of  those  magicians  are  "  sorcerers  "  unhappily,  not  metaphorically  but  in  sober  reality,  by  reason  of  their  inherent  selfishness,  their  revengeful  natures,  their  envy  and  malice.

The  true  student  of  Magic,  well  aware  of  the  truth,  looks  on  in  pity,  and,  if  he  be  wise,  keeps  silent..  For  every  effort  made  by  him  to  remove  the  universal  cecity  is  only  repaid  with  ingratitude,  slander,  and  often  curses,  which,  unable  to  reach  him,  will  react  on  those  who  wish  him  evil.

Lies  and  calumny-— the  latter  a  teething  lie,  adding  actual  bites  to  empty  harmless  falsehoods — become  his  lot,  and  thus  the  well-wisher  is  soon  torn  to  pieces,  as  a  reward  for  his  benevolent  desire  to  enlighten.

Enough  has  been  given,  it  is  believed,  to  shew  that  the  existence  of  a  Secret  Universal  Doctrine,  besides  its  practical  methods  of  Magic,  is  no  wild  romance  or  fiction.

The  fact  was  known  to  the  whole  ancient  world,  and  the  knowledge  of  it  has  survived  in  the  East,  in  India  especially.

And  if  there  be  such  a  Science,  there  must  be  naturally,  somewhere,  professors  of  it,  or  Adepts.

In  any  case  it  matters  little  whether  the  Guardians  of  the  Sacred  Lore  are  regarded  as  living,  actually  existing  men,  or  are  viewed  as  myths.

It  is  their  Philosophy  that  will  have  to  stand  or  fall  upon  its  own  merits,  apart  from,  and  independent  of  any  Adepts.

For  in  the  words  of  the  wise  Gamaliel,  addressed  by  him  to  the  Synedrion .  "If  this  doctrine  is  false  it  will  perish,  and  fall  of  itself;  but  if  true,  then — it  cannot  be  destroyed."

SECTION

MODERN  CRITICISM  AND  THE  ANCIENTS

THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE  of  the  Aryan  East  is  found  repeated  under  Egyptian  symbolism  and  phraseology  in  the  Books  of  Hermes,  At,  or  near,  the  begin-  ning of  the  present  century,  all  the  books  called  Hermetic  were,  in  the  opinion  of  the  average  man  of  Science,  unworthy  of  serious  attention.

They  were  set  down  and  loudly  proclaimed  as  simply  a  collection  of  tales,  of  fraudulent  pretences  and  most  absurd  claims.

They  "  never  existed  before  the  Christian  era,"  it  was  said  :  "  they  were  all  written  with  the  triple  object  of  speculation,  deceiving  and  pious  fraud;"  they  were  all,  even  the  best  of  them,  silly  apocrypha.1  In  this  respect  the  nineteenth  century  proved  a  most  worthy  scion  of  the  eighteenth,  for,  in  the  age  of  Voltaire  as  well  as  in  this  century,  everything,  save  what  emanated  direct  from  the  Royal  Academy,  was  false,  superstitious,  foolish.

Belief  in  the  wisdom  of  the  Ancients  was  laughed  to  scorn,  perhaps  more  so  even  than  it  is  now.

The  very  thought  of  accepting  as  authentic  the  works  and  vagaries  of  "  a  false  Hermes,  a  false  Orpheus,  a  false  Zoroaster,"  of  false  Oracles,  false  Sibyls,  and  a  thrice  false  Mesmer  and  his  absurd  fluid,  was  tabooed  all  along  the  line.

Thus  all  that  had  its  genesis  outside  the  learned  and  dogmatic  precincts  of  Oxford  and  Cambridge,2  or  the  Academy  of  France,  was  denounced  in  those  days  as  "  unscientific,"  and  "  ridiculously  absurd."  This  tendency  has  survived  to  the  present  day.

Nothing   can   be   further   from  the  intention  of  any  true  Occultist — who  stands  possessed,   by  virtue  of  his  higher  psychic  development,  of  instruments

1  See,  in  this  connection  Des  Espnts,  by  the  Marquis  de  Mirville,  who  devotes  six  large  volumes  to  show  the  absurdity  of  those  who  deny  the  reality  of  Satan  and  Magic,  or  the  Occult  Science— the  two  being  with  him  synonymous.

•  We  think  we  see  the  sidereal  phantom  of  the  old  Philosopher  and  Mystic — once  of  Cambridge  University — Henry  More,  moving  about  m  the  astral  mist  over  the  old  moss-covered  roofs  of  the  ancient  town  in  which  he  wrote  his  famous  letter  to  Glanvil  about  "witches  "  The  "  soul"  seems  restless  and  indignant,  as  on  that  day  of  May,  1678.  when  the  doctor  complained  so  bitterly  to  the  author  of  Sadduasmus  Triumphatus  of  Scot,  Adie  and  Webster.

"  Our  new  inspired  saints,"  the  soul  is  heard  to  mutter,  '  sworn  advocates  of  the  witches  .  .  .  who  against  all  sense  and  reason  .  .  .  will  have  no  Samuel  but  a  confederate  knave  .  .  .  these  in-blown  buffoons,  puffed  up  with  .  .  .  ignorance,  vanity  and  stupid  infidelity  I  "  (See  "  Letter  to  Glanvil,"  and  Isis  Unveiled,  I,  205-6.)

52  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

of  research  far  more  penetrating  in  their  power  than  any  as  yet  in  the  hands  of  physical  experimentalists — than  to  look  unsympathetically  on  the  efforts  that  are  being  made  in  the  area  of  physical  enquiry.

The  exertions  and  labours  undertaken  to  solve  as  many  as  possible  of  the  problems  of  Nature  have  always  been  holy  in  his  sight.

The  spirit  in  which  Sir  Isaac  Newton  remarked  that  at  the  end  of  all  his  astronomical  work  he  felt  a  mere  child  picking  up  shells  beside  the  Ocean  of  Knowledge,  is  one  of  reverence  for  the  boundlessness  of  Nature  which  Occult  Philosophy  itself  cannot  eclipse.

And  it  may  freely  be  recognised  that  the  attitude  of  mind  which  this  famous  simile  describes  is  one  which  fairly  represents  that  of  the  great  majority  of  genuine  Scientists  in  regard  to  all  the  phenomena  of  the  physical  plane  of  Nature.

In  dealing  with  this  they  are  often  caution  and  moderation  itself.

They  observe  facts  with  a  patience  that  cannot  be  surpassed  They  are  slow  to  cast  these  into  theories,  with  a  prudence  that  cannot  be  too  highly  commended.

And,  subject  to  the  limitations  under  which  they  observe  Nature,  they  are  beauti-  fully accurate  in  the  record  of  their  observations.

Moreover,  it  may  be  conceded  further  that  modern  Scientists  are  exceedingly  careful  not  to  affirm  negations.

They  may  say  it  is  immensely  improbable  that  any  discovery  will  ever  conflict  with  such  or  such  a  theory,  now  supported  by  such  and  such  an  aggregation  of  recorded  facts.

But  even  in  reference  to  the  broadest  generalizations — which  pass  into  a  dogmatic  form  only  in  brief  popular  text  books  of  scientific  knowledge — the  tone  of  "  Science  "  itself,  if  that  abstraction  may  be  held  to  be  embodied  in  the  persons  of  its  most  distinguished  represent-  atives, is  one  of  reserve  and  often  of  modesty.

Far,  therefore,  from  being  disposed  to  scoff  at  the  errors  into  which  the  limitations  of  their  methods  may  betray  men  of  Science,  the  true  Occultist  will  rather  appreciate  the  pathos  of  a  situation  in  which  great  industry  and  thirst  for  truth  are  condemned  to  disappointment,  and  often  to  confusion.

That  which  is  to  be  deplored,  however,  in  respect  to^modern  Science,  is  in  itself  an  evil  manifestation  of  the  excessive  caution  which  in  its  most  favour-  able aspect  protects  Science  from  over-hasty  conclusions :  namely,  the  tardiness  of  Scientists  to  recognise  that  other  instruments  of  research  may  be  applicable  to  the  mysteries  of  Nature  besides  those  of  the  physical  plane,  and  that  it  may  consequently  be  impossible  to  appreciate  the  phenomena  of  any  one  plane  correctly  without  observing  them  as  well  from  the  points  of  view  afforded  by  others.

In  so  far  then  as  they  wilfully  shut  their  eyes  to  evidence  which  ought  to  have  shown  them  clearly  that  Nature  is  more  complex  than  physical  phenomena  alone  would  suggest,  that  there  are  means  by  which  the  faculties  of  human  perception  can  pass  sometimes  from  one  plane  to  the

MODERN  CRITICISM  AND  THE  ANCIENTS

other,  and  that  thejr  energy  is  being  misdirected  while  they  turn  it  exclusively  on  the  minutiae  of  physical  structure  or  force,  they  are  less  entitled  to  sympathy  than  to  blame.

One  feels  dwarfed  and  humbled  in  reading  what  M.  Renan,  that  learned  modern  "destroyer"  of  every  religious  belief,  past,  present  and  future,  has  to  say  of  poor  humanity  and  its  powers  of  discernment.

He  believes

Mankind   has   but   a   very   narrow   mind ;  and   the  number   of  men  capable  of  seizing  acutely  (finement)  the  true  analogy  of  things,  is  quite  imperceptible.

Upon  comparing,  however,  this  statement  with  another  opinion  expressed  by  the  same  author,  namely,  that :

The  mind  of  the  critic  should  yield  to  facts,  hands  and  feet  bound,  to  be  dragged  by  them  wherever  they  may  lead  him,'

one  feels  relieved.

When,  moreover,  these  two  philosophical  statements  are  strengthened  by  a  third  enunciation  of  the  famous  Academician,  which  declares  that :

Tout  parti  pris  a  priori,  doit  etre  banni  de  la  science,*

there  remains  little  to  fear.

Unfortunately  M.  Renan  is  the  first  to  break  this  golden  rule.

The  evidence  of  Herodotus — called,  sarcastically  no  doubt,  the  "  Father  of  History,"  since  in  every  question  upon  which  modern  Thought  disagrees  with  him,  his  testimony  goes  for  nought — the  sober  and  earnest  assurances  in  the  philosophical  narratives  of  Plato  and  Thucydides,  Polybius,  and  Plutarch,  and  even  certain  statements  of  Aristotle  himself,  are  invariably  laid  aside  whenever  they  are  involved  in  what  modern  criticism  is  pleased  to  regard  as  a  myth.

It  is  some  time  since  Strauss  proclaimed  that :

The   presence   of  a  supernatural  element  or  miracle  in  a  narrative  is  an  infallible  sign  of  the  presence  in  it  of  a  myth  ,

and  such  is  the  canon  of  criticism  tacitly  adopted  by  every  modern  critic.

But  what  is  a  myth — pvOos — to  begin  with  ?  Are  we  not  told  distinctly  by  ancient  writers  that  the  word  means  tradition  ?  Was  not  the  Latin  term  tabula,  a  fable,  synonymous  with  something  told,  as  having  happened  in  pre-historic  times,  and  not  necessarily  an  invention.

With  such  autocrats  of  criticism  and  despotic  rulers  as  are  most  of  the  French,  English,  and  German  Orientalists,  there  may,  then,  be  no  end  of  historical,  geographical,  ethnological  and  philological  surprises  in  store  for  the  century  to  come.

Travesties  in  Philosophy  have  become  so  common  of  late,  that  the  public  can  be  startled  by  nothing

1  Etudes  Religieuses.

-  Etudes  Historiques

1  Memo/re  read  at  the  Acad6mie  des  Inscriptions  des  Belles  Lett  res,  in  1859    [Obstinate  prejudice  has  no  place  in  Science  ]

54  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

in  this  direction.

It  has  already  been  stated  by  one  learned  speculator  that  Homer  was  simply  "  a  mythical  personification  of  the  epopee  "  [epic  poem]1  ;  by  another,  that  Hippocrates,  son  of  Esculapius  "  could  only  be  a  chimera  "  ;  that  the  Asclepiades,  their  seven  hundred  years  of  duration  notwithstanding, might  after  all  prove  simply  a  "  fiction  "  ,  that  "  the  city  of  Troy  (Dr.  Schliemann  to  the  contrary)  existed  only  on  the  maps,"  etc.

Why  should  not  the  world  be  invited  after  this  to  regard  every  hitherto  historical  character  of  days  of  old  as  a  myth  ?  Were  not  Alexander  the  Great  needed  by  Philology  as  a  sledge-  hammer wherewith  to  break  the  heads  of  Brahmanical  chronological  preten-  sions, he  would  have  become  long  ago  simply  "  a  symbol  for  annexation,"  or  "a  genius  of  conquest,"  as  has  been  already  suggested  by  some  French  writer.

Blank  denial  is  the  only  refuge  left  to  the  critics.

It  is  the  most  secure  asylum  for  some  time  to  come  in  which  to  shelter  the  last  of  the  sceptics.

For  one  who  denies  unconditionally,  the  trouble  of  arguing  is  unnecessary,  and  he  also  thus  avoids  what  is  worse,  having  to  yield  occasionally  a  point  or  two  before  the  irrefutable  arguments  and  facts  of  his  opponent.

Creuzer,  the  greatest  of  all  the  modern  Symbologists,  the  most  learned  among  the  masses  of  erudite  German  Mythologists,  must  have  envied  the  placid  self-confidence  of  certain  sceptics,  when  he  found  himself  forced  in  a  moment  of  desperate  perplexity  to  admit  that  :

We  are  compelled  to  return  to  the  theories  of  trolls  and  genii,  as  they  were  understood  by  the  ancients  ,  [it  is  a  doctrine]  without  which  it  becomes  absolutely  impossible  to  explain  to  oneself  anything  with  regard  to  the  Mysteries

of  the  Ancients,  which  Mysteries  are  undeniable.

Roman  Catholics,  who  are  guilty  of  precisely  the  same  worship,  and  to  the  very  letter — having  borrowed  it  from  the  later  Chaldeans,  the  Lebanon  Nabatheans,  and  the  baptized  Sabeans,1  and  not  from  the  learned  Astronomers  and  Initiates  of  the  days  of  old — would  now,  by  anathematizing  it,  hide  the  source  from  which  it  came.

Theology  and  Churchianism  would  fain  trouble  the  clear  fountain  that  fed  them  from  the  first,  to  prevent  posterity  from  looking  into  it,  and  thus  seeing  their  original  prototype.

The  Occultists,  however,  believe  the  time  has  come  to  give  everyone  his  due.

As  to  our  other  opponents — the  modern  sceptic  and  the  Epicurean,  the  cynic  and  the  Sadducee — they  may  find  an  answer  to  their  denials  in  our  earlier

1  See  Alfred  Maury's  Histoire  des  Religions  de  /a  Grece,  i,  248  ,  and  the  speculations  of  Holzmann  in  Zeitschrift  fur  Vergleichende  Sprachforschung,  ann.

1852,  p   487,  sq

2  Creuzer's  Introduction  des  Mysteres.

Vol.

in,  p.  456.

•'  The  later  Nabatheans  adhered  to  the  same  belief  as  the  Nazarenes  and  the  Sabeans,  honoured  John  the  Baptist,  and  used  Baptism  (See  his  Unveiled,  II,  p  127  ,  Munck,  Palestine,  p  525  ,  Dunlap,  Sod,  the  Son  of  Man,  etc.)

MODERN  CRITICISM  AND  THE  ANCIENTS

volumes.

As  to   many  unjust  aspersions  on  the  ancient  doctrines,  the  reason  for  them  is  given  in  these  words  in  Isis  Unveiled  :

The  thought  of  the  present-day  commentator  and  critic  as  to  the  ancient  learning,  is  limited  to  and  runs  round  the  exoter/sm  of  the  temples  ;  his  insight  is  either  unwilling  or  unable  to  penetrate  into  the  solemn  adyta  of  old,  where  the  hierophant  instructed  the  neophyte  to  regard  the  public  worship  in  its  true  light.

No  ancient  sage  would  have  taught  that  man  is  the  king  of  creation,  and  that  the  starry  heaven  and  cur  mother  earth  were  created  for  his  sake  '

When  we  find  such  works  as  Phallicism  ~  appearing  in  our  day  in  print,  it  is  easy  to  see  that  the  day  for  concealment  and  travesty  has  passed  away.

Science,  in  Philology,  Symbolism  and  Comparative  Religion,  has  progressed  too  far  to  make  wholesale  denials  any  longer,  and  the  Church  is  too  wise  and  cautious  not  to  be  now  making  the  best  of  the  situation.

Meanwhile,  the  "  rhombs  of  Hecate  "  and  the  "  wheels  of  Lucifer,"  <l  daily  exhumed  on  the  sites  of  Babylonia,  can  no  longer  be  used  as  clear  evidence  of  a  Satan-worship,  since  the  same  symbols  are  shown  in  the  ritual  of  the  Latin  Church.

The  Jatter  is  too  learned  to  be  ignorant  of  the  fact  that  even  the  later  Chaldeans,  who  had  gradually  fallen  into  dualism,  reducing  all  things  to  two  primal  Principles,  never  worshipped  Satan  or  idols,  any  more  than  did  the  Zoroas-  tnans,  who  now  lie  under  the  same  accusation,  but  that  their  Religion  was  as  highly  philosophical  as  any  ;  their  dual  and  exoteric  Theosophy  became  the  heirloom  of  the  Jews,  who,  in  their  turn,  were  forced  to  share  it  with  the  Christians.

Parsts  are  to  this  day  charged  with  Heliolatry,  and  yet  in  the  Chaldean  Oracles,  under  the  "  Magical  and  Philosophical  Precepts  of  Zoroaster  "  one  finds  the  following

Direct  not  thy  mind  to  the  vast  measures  of  the  earth  ,

For  the  plant  of  truth  is  not  upon  ground.

Nor  measure  the  measures  of  the  sun,  collecting  rules,

For  he  is  carried  by  the  eternal  will  of  the  Father,  not  for  ycur  sake

Dismiss   the   impetuous   course   of  the   moon  ,   for  she  runs  always  by  work  of

necessity.

The  progression  of  the  stars  was  not  generated  for  your  sake

There  was  a  vast  difference  between  the  true  worship  taught  to  those  who  showed  themselves  worthy,  and  the  state  religions.

The  Magians  are  accused  of  all  kinds  of  superstition,  but  this  is  what  the  same  Chaldean  Oracle  says  :

The  wide  aerial  flight  of  birds  is  not  true,

Nor  the  dissections  of  the  entrails  of  victims  ,  they  are  all  mere  toys,

The  basis  of  mercenary  fraud  ,  flee  from  these

1  Vol.

I,  535  -  By  Hargrave  Jennings.

{  See  De  Mirville's  Des  Espnts.

Tome  in,  pp.  207  et  seq.

56  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

If  you  would  open  the  sacred  paradise  of  piety,  Where  virtue,  wisdom,  and  equity  are  assembled.

As  we  say  in  our  former  work  :

Surely  it  is  not  those  who  warn  people  against  "  mercenary  fraud  "  who  can  be  accused  of  it ,  and  if  they  accomplished  acts  which  seem  miraculous,  who  can  with  fairness  presume  to  deny  that  it  was  done  merely  because  they  possessed  a  knowledge  of  natural  philosophy  and  psychological  science  to  a  degree  unknown  to  our  schools  ?  *

The  above  quoted  stanzas  are  a  rather  strange  teaching  to  come  from  those  who  are  universally  believed  to  have  worshipped  the  sun,  and  moon,  and  the  starry  hosts,  as  Gods.

The  sublime  profundity  of  the  Magian  precepts  being  beyond  the  reach  of  modern  materialistic  thought,  the  Chaldean  Philosophers  are  accused  of  Sabeanism  and  Sun-worship,  which  was  the  religion  onty  of  the  uneducated  masses.

1  Psel/us,    4  ,    «n    Cory's    Ancient    Fragments,    269      [This    is  to   be  found  only  in  the  early  and  unrevised  edition.]

5  his  Unveiled.

I.  535-

SECTION

THE  ORIGIN  OF  MAGIC

THINGS  of  late  have  changed,  true  enough.

The  field  of  investigation'  has  widened  ,  old  religions  are  a  little  better  understood  ,  and  since  that  miserable  day  when  the  Committee  of  the  French  Academy,  headed  by  Benjamin  Franklin,  investigated  Mesmer's  phenomena  only  to  proclaim  them  charlatanry  and  clever  knavery,  both  heathen  Philosophy  and  Mesmerism  have  acquired  certain  rights  and  privileges,  and  are  now  viewed  from  quite  a  different  standpoint.

Is  full  justice  rendered  them,  however,  and  are  they  any  better  appreciated  ?  We  are  afraid  not.

Human  nature  is  the  same  now,  as  when  Pope  said  of  the  force  of  prejudice  that :

.  .  The  difference  is  as  great  between  The  optics  seeing,  as  the  objects  seen  All  manners  take  a  tincture  from  our  own,  Or  some  discolour'd  through  our  passions  shown.

Or  fancy's  beam  enlarges,  multiplies,  Contracts,  inverts,  and  gives  ten  thousand  dyes

Thus  in  the  first  decades  of  the  nineteenth  century  Hermetic  Philo-  sophy was  regarded  by  both  Churchmen  and  men  of  Science  from  two  quite  opposite  points  of  view.

The  former  called  it  sinful  and  devilish  ;  the  latter  denied  point-blank  its  authenticity,  notwithstanding  the  evidence  brought  forward  by  the  most  erudite  men  of  every  age,  including  our  own.

The  learned  Father  Kircher,  for  instance,  was  not  even  noticed  ;  and  his  assertion  that  all  the  fragments  known  under  titles  of  works  by  Hermes  Trismegistus,  [thrice-greatest  Hermes  or  Mercury]  Berosus,  Pherecydes  of  Syros,  etc.,  were  rolls  that  had  escaped  the  fire  which  devoured  100,000  volumes  of  the  great  Alexandrian  Library — was  simply  laughed  at.  Nevertheless  the  educated  classes  of  Europe  knew  then,  as  they  do  now,  that  the  famous  Alexandrian  Library,  the  "  marvel  of  the  ages/'  was  founded  by  Ptolemy  Philadelphus  ;  that  numbers  of  its  MSS,  had  been  carefully  copied  from  hieratic  texts  and  the  oldest  parchments,  Chaldean,  Phoenician,  Persian,  etc.

,  and  that  these

58  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

transliterations  and  copies  amounted,  to  another  100,000  rolls,  as  Josephus  and  Strabo  assert.

There  is  also  the  additional  evidence  of  Clemens  Alexandrinus,  that  ought  to  be  credited  to  some  extent.1  Clemens  testified  to  the  existence  of  an  addi-  tional 30,000  volumes  of  the  Books  of  Thoth,  placed  in  the  library  of  the  Tomb  of  Osymandias,  over  the  entrance  of  which  were  inscribed  the  words,  "  A  Cure  for  the  Soul  "

Since  then,  as  all  know,  entire  texts  of  the  "  apocryphal"  works  of  the  "false  "  Pymander,  and  the  no  less  "false  "  Asclepias,  have  been  found  by  Champollion  in  the  most  ancient  monuments  of  Egypt.-  As  said  in  /s/s  Unveiled  :

After  having  devoted  their  whole  lives  to  the  study  of  the  records  of  the  old  Egyptian  wisdom,  both  Champollion-Figeac  and  Champollion  Junior  publicly  declared,  notwithstanding  many  biassed  judgments  hazarded  by  certain  hasty  and  unwise  critics,  that  the  Books  of  Hermes  "truly  contain  a  mass  of  Egyptian  traditions  which  are  •constantly  corroborated  by  the  most  authentic  records  and  monuments  of  Egypt  of  the  hoariest  antiquity."  '

The  merit  of  Champollion  as  an  Egyptologist  none  will  question,  and  if  he  declares  that  everything  demonstrates  the  accuracy  of  the.

writings  of  the  >mysterious  Hermes  Trismegistus,  and  if  the  assertion  that  their  antiquity  runs  back  into  the  night  of  time  be  corroborated  by  him  in  minutest  details,  then  indeed  criticism  ought  to  be  fully  satisfied.

Says  Champollion  :

These  inscriptions  are  only  the  faithful  echo  and  expression  of  the  most  ancient  verities

'  The  forty-two  Sacred  Books  of  the  Egyptians,  mentioned  by  Clement  of  Alexandria  as  having  existed  in  his  time,  were  but  a  portion  of  the  Books  of  Hermes  [otromata.

Vol  II,  p  324]  lambli-  chus,  on  the  authority  of  the  Egyptian  priest  Abammon.

attributes  1,200  of  such  Books  to  Hermes,  and  Manetho  36,000  But  the  testimony  of  lamblichus  as  a  Neo-Platomst  and  Theurgist  is  of  course  rejected  by  modern  critics  Manetho,  who  is  held  by  Bunsen  in  the  highest  consideration  as  a  "  purely  historical  personage,"  with  whom  "  none  of  the  later  native  historians  can  be  compared  "  (see  £gypte,  i,  p  97),  suddenly  becomes  a  Pseudo-Manetho,  as  soon  as  the  ideas  propounded  by  him  clash  with  the  scientific  prejudices  against  Magic  and  the  Occult  knowledge  claimed  by  the  ancient  priests  However,  none  of  the  Archaeologists  doubt  for  a  moment  the  almost  incredible  antiquity  of  the  Hermetic  books  Champollion  shows  the  greatest  regard  for  their  authenticity  and  truthfulness,  corroborated  as  it  is  by  many  of  the  oldest  monuments  And  Bunsen  brings  irrefutable  proofs  of  their  age,  From  his  researches,  for  instance,  we  learn  that  there  was  a  line  of  sixty-one  kings  before  the  days  of  Moses,  who  preceded  the  Mosaic  period  by  a  clearly-traceable  civilization  of  several  thousand  years  Thus  we  are  warranted  in  believing  that  the  works  of  Hermes  Trismegistus  were  extant  many  ages  before  the  birth  of  the  Jewish  law-giver  "  Styh  and  inkstands  were  found  on  monuments  of  the  fourth  Dynasty,  the  oldest  in  the  world,"  says  Bunsen  If  the  eminent  Egyptologist  rejects  the  period  of  48, 860  years  before  Alexander,  to  which  Diogenes  Laertius  carries  back  the  records  of  the  priests,  he  is  evidently  more  embarrassed  with  the  ten  thousand  of  astronomical  observations,  and  remarks  that  "  if  they  were  actual  observations,  they  must  have  extended  over  10,000  years"  (p  14)  "  We  learn,  however,"  he  adds,  "  from  one  of  their  own  old  chronological  works  .  that  the  genuine  Egyptian  traditions  concerning  the  mythological  period  Seated  of  myriads  of  years."  (Egypte,  i,  p  15,  /s/s  Unveiled,  I,  p  33  )

-'  These  details  are  taken  from  Oes  Espnts,  Tome  iii,  pp    204,  205  J  Egypte,  i,  p    143  ,  /s/s  Unveiled,  Vol   I,  p

THE  ORIGIN  OF  MAGIC

Since  these  words  were  written,  some  of  the  "apocryphal"  verses  by  the  "  mythical  "  Orpheus  have  also  been  found  copied  word  for  word,  in  hieroglyphics,  in  certain  inscriptions  of  the  Fourth  Dynasty,  addressed  to  various  Deities.

Finally,  Creuzer  discovered  and  immediately  pointed  out  the  very  significant  fact  that  numerous  passages  found  in  Homer  and  Hesiod  were  undeniably  borrowed  by  the  two  great  poets  from  the  Orphic  Hymns,  thus  proving  the  latter  to  be  far  older  than  the  Iliad  or  the  Odyssey.

And  so  gradually  the  ancient  claims  come  to  be  vindicated,  and  modern  criticism  has  to  submit  to  evidence.

Many  are  now  the  writers  who  confess  that  such  a  type  of  literature  as  the  Hermetic  works  of  Egypt  can  never  be  dated  too  far  back  into  the  prehistoric  ages  The  texts  of  many  of  these  ancient  works,  that  of  Enoch  included,  so  loudly  proclaimed  "  apocryphal  "  at  the  beginning  of  this  century,  are  now  discovered  and  recognised  in  the  most  secret  and  sacred  sanctuaries  of  Chaldea,  India,  Phoenicia,  Egypt  and  Central  Asia.

But  even  such  proofs  have  failed  to  convince  the  bulk  of  our  Material-  ists.

The  reason  for  this  is  very  simple  and  evident.

All  these  texts — held  in  universal  veneration  in  Antiquity,  found  in  the  secret  libraries  of  all  the  great  temples,  studied  (if  not  always  mastered)  by  the  greatest  statesmen,  classical  writers,  philosophers,  kings  and  laymen,  as  much  as  by  renowned  Sages — what  were  they  ?  Treatises  on  Magic  and  Occultism,  pure  and  simple  ;  the  now  derided  and  tabooed  Theosophy — hence  the  ostracism.

Were  people,  then,  so  simple  and  credulous  in  the  days  of  Pythagoras  and  Plato  ?  Were  the  millions  of  Babylonia  and  Egypt,  of  India  and  Greece,  with  their  great  Sages  to  lead  them,  all  fools,  that  during  those  periods  of  great  learning  and  civilization  which  preceded  the  year  one  of  our  era — the  latter  giving  birth  but  to  the  intellectual  darkness  of  medieval  fanaticisnrv — so  many  otherwise  great  men  should  have  devoted  their  lives  to  a  mere  illusion,  a  superstition  called  Magic  ?  It  would  seem  so,  had  one  to  remain  content  with  the  word  and  conclusions  of  modern  Philosophy

Every  Art  and  Science,  however,  whatever  its  intrinsic  merit,  has  had  its  discoverer  and  practitioner,  and  subsequently  its  proficients  to  teach  it.  What  is  the  origin  of  the  Occult  Sciences,  or  Magic  ?  Who  were  its  professors,  and  what  is  known  of  them,  whether  in  history  or  legend  ?  Clemens  Alexandrinus,  one  of  the  most  intelligent  and  learned  of  the  early  Christian  Fathers,  answers  this  question  in  his  Stromata.

That  ex-pupil  of  the  Neo-Platonic  School  argues  :

And  if  there  is  instruction,  you  must  seek  for  the  master.'

1  Stromata,    Bk     vi,    ch     vn,    p     336,   et   seq        The  following  paragraph  is  paraphrased  from  the  same  chapter

60  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

And  so  he  shows  Cleanthes  taught  by  Zeno,  Theophrastus  by  Aristotle,  Metrodorus  by  Epicurus,  Plato  by  Socrates,  etc.

And  he  adds  that  when  he  had  looked  further  back  to  Pythagoras,  Pherecydes,  and  Thales,  he  had  still  to  search  for  their  masters.

The  same  for  the  Egyptians,  the  Indians,  the  Babylonians,  and  the  Magi  themselves.

He  would  not  cease  questioning,  he  says,  to  learn  who  it  was  they  all  had  for  their  masters.

And  when  he  (Clemens)  had  traced  down  the  enquiry  to  the  very  cradle  of  mankind,  to  the  first  generation  of  men,  he  would  reiterate  once  more  his  questioning,  and  ask,  "  Who  is  their  teacher  ?  "  Surely,  he  argues,  their  master  could  be  "no  one  of  men."  And  even  when  he  should  have  reached  as  high  as  the  Angels,  the  same  query  would  have  to  be  offered  to  them  .  "Who  were  their  (meaning  the  '  divine  '  and  the  '  fallen  '  Angels)  masters  ?  "

The  aim  of  the  good  father's  long  argument  is  of  course  to  discover  two  distinct  masters,  one  the  preceptor  of  biblical  patriarchs,  the  other  the  teacher  of  the  Gentiles.

But  the  students  of  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE  need  go  to  no  such  trouble.

Their  professors  are  well  aware  who  were  the  Masters  of  their  predecessors  in  Occult  Sciences  and  Wisdom.

The  two  professors  are  finally  traced  out  by  Clemens,  and  are,  as  was  to  be  expected,  God,  and  his  eternal  and  everlasting  enemy  and  opponent,  the  Devil  ;  the  subject  of  Clemens'  enquiry  relating  to  the  dual  aspect  of  Her-  metic Philosophy,  as  cause  and  effect.

Admitting  the  moral  beauty  of  the  virtues  preached  in  every  Occult  work  with  which  he  was  acquainted,  Clemens  desires  to  know  the  cause  of  the  apparent  contradiction  between  the  doctrine  and  the  practice,  good  and  evil  Magic,  and  he  comes  to  the  conclusions  that  Magic  has  two  origins — divine  and  diabolical.

He  perceives  its  bifurcation  into  two  channels,  hence  his  deduction  and  inference.

We  perceive  it  too,  without,  however,  necessarily  designating  such  bifurcation  diabolical,  for  we  judge  the  "  left-hand  path  "  as  it  issued  from  the  hands  of  its  founder.

Otherwise,  judging  also  by  the  effect  of  Clemens'  own  religion  and  the  walk  in  life  of  certain  of  its  professors,  since  the  death  of  their  Master,  the  Occultists  would  have  a  right  to  come  to  somewhat  the  same  conclusion  as  Clemens.

They  would  have  a  right  to  say  that  while  Christ,  the  Master  of  all  true  Christians,  was  in  every  way  godly,  those  who  resorted  to  the  horrors  of  the  Inquisition,  to  the  extermination  and  torture  of  heretics,  Jews  and  Alchemists,  the  protestant  Calvin  who  burnt  Servetus,  and  his  persecuting  Protestant  successors,  down  to  the  whippers  and  burners  of  witches  in  America,  must  have  had  for  their  Master,  the  Devil.

But  Occultists,  not  believing  in  the  Devil,  are  precluded  from  retaliating  in  this  way.

THE  ORIGIN  OF  MAGIC

Clemens'  testimony,  however,  is  valuable  in  so  far  as  it  shows  (1)  the  'enormous  number  of  works  on  Occult  Sciences  in  his  day  ;  and  (2)  the  extraordinary  powers  acquired  through  those  Sciences  by  certain  men.

He  devotes,  for  instance,  the  whole  of  the  sixth  book  of  his  Stromata  to  this  research  for  the  first  two  "  Masters  "  of  the  true  and  the  false  Philosophy  respectively,  both  preserved,  as  he  says,  in  the  Egyptian  sanc-  tuaries.

Very  pertinently  too,  he  apostrophises  the  Greeks,  asking  them  why  they  should  not  accept  the  "  miracles  "  of  Moses  as  such,  since  they  claim  the  very  same  privileges  for  their  own  Philosophers,  and  he  gives  a  number  of  instances.

It  is,  as  he  says,  >£achus  obtaining  through  his  Occult  powers  a  marvellous  rain  ;  it  is  Aristaeus  causing  the  winds  to  blow  ;  Empedocles  quieting  the  gale,  and  forcing  it  to  cease,  etc.

The  books  of  Hermes  Trismegistus  most  attracted  his  attention.1'  He  is  also  warm  in  his  praise  of  Hystaspes  (or  Gushtasp),  of  the  Sibylline  books,  and  even  of  the  right  Astrology.

There  have  been  in  all  ages  use  and  abuse  of  Magic,  as  there  are  use  and  abuse  of  Mesmerism  or  Hypnotism  in  our  own.

The  ancient  world  had  its  Apollonii  and  its  Pherecydae,  and  intellectual  people  could  discriminate  then,  as  they  can  now.

While  no  classical  or  pagan  writer  has  ever  found  one  word  of  blame  for  Apollonius  of  Tyana,  for  instance,  it  is  not  so  with  regard  to  Pherecydes.

Hesychius  of  Miletia,  Pholi  of  Byblox  and  Eusthathius  charge  the  latter  unstintingly  with  having  built  his  Philosophy  and  Science  on  demoniacal  traditions — I.e.,  on  Sorcery.

Cicero  declares  that  Pherecydes  is,  pot/us  divinus  quam  medicus.

"  rather  a  sooth-  sayer than  a  physician,"  and  Diogenes  Laertius  gives  a  vast  number  of  stories  relating  to  his  predictions.

One  day  Pherecydes  prophesies  the  shipwreck  of  a  vessel  hundreds  of  miles  away  from  him  ;  another  time  he  predicts  the  the  capture  of  the  Lacedemonians  by  the  Arcadians  ;  finally,  he  foresees  his  own  wretched  end.

Bearing  in  mind  the  objections  that  will  be  made  to  the  teachings  of  the  Esoteric  Doctrine  as  herein  propounded,  the  writer  is  forced  to  meet  some  of  them  beforehand.

Such  imputations  as  those  brought  by  Clemens  against  the  "  heathen  "  Adepts,  only  prove  the  presence  of  clairvoyant  powers  and  prevision  in  every  age,  but  are  no  evidence  in  favour  of  a  Devil.

They  are,  therefore,  of  no

1  See  Des  Espnts,  Tome  in.  p,  207  Therefore  Empedocles  [of  Ayngentum]  is  called  /C&\.v6<ive/J,os,  the  "  dommator  of  the  wind,"  ["  Checker  of  Winds"]  Strom  ,  Bk  vi,  ch  MI,  p.  320.

3  Ibid  ,  iv.  '  Summarised  from  Des  Espnts,  Tome  in,  p    209«

62  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

value   except  to  the   Christians,    for  whom  Satan  is  one  of  the  chief  pillars  of  the  faith.

Baronius  and  De  Mirville,  for  instance,  find  an  unanswerable  proof  of  Demonology  in  the  belief  in  the  co-eternity  of  Matter  with  Spirit !  De  Mirville  writes  that  Pherecydes

Postulates  in  principle  the  primordiality  of  Zeus  or  Ether,  and  then  on  the  same  plane,  a  principle,  coeternal  and  coactive,  which  he  calls  the  fifth  element,  or  Ogenos,

He  then  points  out  that  the  meaning  of  Ogenos  is  given  as  that  which  shuts  up,  which  holds  captive,  and  that  is  Hades,  "  or  in  a  word,  hell."

The  synonyms  are  known  to  every  schoolboy  without  the  Marquis  going  to  the  trouble  of  explaining  them  to  the  Academy ;  as  to  the  deduction,  every  Occultist  will  of  course  deny  it  and  only  smile  at  its  folly  And  now  we  come  to  the  theological  conclusion.

The  resume  of  the  views  of  the  Latin  Church — as  given  by  authors  of  the  same  character  as  the  Marquis  de  Mirville — amounts  to  this  .  that  the  Hermetic  Books,  their  wisdom — fully  admitted  in  Rome — notwithstanding,  are  "  the  heirloom  left  by  Cain,  the  accursed,  to  mankind."  It  is  "generally  admitted,"  says  that  modern  memorialist  of  Satan  in  History  •

That  immediately  after  the  Flood  Cham  and  his  descendants  had  propagated  anew  the  ancient  teachings  of  the  Cainites  and  of  the  submerged  Race.'

This  proves,  at  any  rate,  that  Magic,  or  Sorcery  as  he  calls  it,  is  ar>  antediluvian  Art,  and  thus  one  point  is  gained.

For,  as  he  says  :

The  evidence  of  Berosius  makes  Ham  identical  with  the  first  Zoroaster,  founder  of  Bactna,  the  first  author  of  all  the  magic  arts  of  Babylonia,  the  Chemesenua  or  Cham,'  the  infamous  '  of  the  faithful  Noachians,  finally  the  object  of  adoration  for  Egypt,  which  having  received  its  name  ^/zeia,  whence  chemistry,  built  in  his  honour  a  town  called  Choemnis,  or  the  "  city  of  fire  "  '  Ham  adored  it,  it  is  said,  whence  the  name  Cham-  ma/m  given  to  the  pyramids ;  which  in  their  turn  have  been  vulgarised  into  our  modern  noun  "  chimney  "  ''

1  Loc    at  -  Op.  at,  Tome  in,  p

{  The  English  speaking  people  who  spell  the  name  of  Noah's  disrespectful  son  "  Ham  "  have  to  be  reminded  that  the  right  spelling  is  "  Kham  "  or  "  Cham  "

1  Black  Magic,  or  Sorcery,  is  the  evil  result  obtained  in  any  shape  or  way  through  the  practice  of  Occult  Arts  .  hence  it  has  to  be  judged  only  by  its  effects  The  name  of  neither  Ham  nor  Cam,  when  pronounced,  has  ever  killed  any  one  ,  whereas,  if  we  have  to  believe  that  same  Clemens  Alexandrinus  who  traces  the  teacher  of  every  Occultist,  outside  of  Christianity,  to  the  Devil,  the  name  of  Jehovah  (pronounced  Jevo  and  in  a  peculiar  way)  had  the  effect  of  killing  a  man  at  a  distance  The  mysterious  Schemham-phorasch  was  not  always  used  for  holy  purposes  by  the  Kabalists,  especially  since  the  Sabbath  or  Saturday,  sacred  to  Saturn  or  the  evil  Sham,  became— with  the  Jews — sacred  to  "Jehovah  "

'•  Khoemms,  the  pre-historic  city,  may  or  may  not  have  been  built  by  Noah's  son.

but  it  was  not  his  name  that  was  given  to  the  town,  but  that  of  the  Mystery  Goddess  Khoemnu  or  Khoemms  (Greek  form)  ;  the  deity  that  was  created  by  the  ardent  fancy  of  the  neophyte,  who  was  thus  tantalised  during  his  "  twelve  labours  "  of  probation  before  his  final  Initiation  Her  male  counterpart  is  Khem  The  city  of  Choemnis  or  Khemmis  (to-day  Akhmen)  was  the  chief  seat  of  the  God  Khem.

The  Greeks  identifying  Khem  with  Pan,  called  this  city  "  Panopolis  "

(i  Oes  Esprits,  Tome  in,  p.  210.  This  looks  more  like  pious  vengeance  than  philology.

The  picture,  however,  seems  incomplete,  as  the  author  ought  to  have  added  to  the  "  chimney  "  a  witch  flying  out  of  it  on  a  broomstick

THE  ORIGIN  OF  MAGIC

This  statement  is  entirely  wrong.

Egypt  was  the  cradle  of  Chemistry  and  its  birth-place — this  is  pretty  well  known  by  this  time.

Only  Kenrick  and  others  show  the  root  of  the  word  to  be  chemi  or  chem,  which  is  not  Cham  or  Ham,  but  Khem,  the  Egyptian  phallic  God  of  the  Mysteries.

But  this  is  not  all.

De  Mirville  is  bent  upon  finding  a  satanic  origin  even  for  the  now  innocent  Tarot.

He  goes  on  to  say  .

As  to  the  means  for  the  propagation  of  this  evil  Magic,  tradition  points  it  out,  in  certain  runic  characters  traced  on  metallic  plates  [or  leaves,  des  lames]  which  have  escaped  destruction  by  the  Deluge  '  This  might  have  been  regarded  as  legendary,  had  not  subsequent  discoveries  shown  it  far  from  being  so  Plates  were  found  covered  with  curious  and  utterly  undecipherable  characters,  characters  of  undeniable  antiquity,  to  which  the  Chamites  [Sorcerers,  with  the  author]  attribute  the  origin  of  their  marvel-  lous and  terrible  powers  -

The  pious  author  may,  meanwhile,  be  left  to  his  own  orthodox  beliefs.

He,  at  any  rate,  seems  quite  sincere  in  his  views  Nevertheless,  his  able  arguments  will  have  to  be  sapped  at  their  very  foundation,  for  it  must  be  shown  on  mathematical  grounds  who,  or  rather  what,  Cain  and  Ham  really  were.

De  Mirville  is  only  the  faithful  son  of  his  Church,  interested  in  keeping  Cain  in  his  anthropomorphic  character  and  in  his  present  place  in  "  Holy  Writ."  The  student  of  Occultism,  on  the  other  hand,  is  solely  interest-  ed in  the  truth  But  the  age  has  to  follow  the  natural  course  of  its  evolution

1  How  could  they  escape  from  the  Deluge  unless  God  so  willed  it  ?  This  is  scarcely  logical

2  Loc   cit  ,  p

SECTION

THE  SECRECY  OF  INITIATES

THE  false  rendering  of  a  number  o\  parables  and  sayings  of  Jesus  is  not  to  be  wondered  at  in  the  least.

From  Orpheus,  the  first  initiated  Adept  of  whom  history  catches  a  glimpse  in  the  mists  of  the  pre-Christian  era,  down  through  Pythagoras,  Confucius,  Buddha,  Jesus,  Apollonius  of  Tyana,  to  Am-  monius  Saccas,  no  Teacher  or  Initiate  has  ever  committed  anything  to  writing  for  public  use.

Each  and  all  of  them  have  invariably  recommended  silence  and  secrecy  on  certain  facts  and  deeds  ;  from  Confucius,  who  refused  to  explain  publicly  and  satisfactorily  what  he  meant  by  his  "  Great  Extreme,"  or  to  give  the  key  to  the  divination  by  "  straws,"  down  to  Jesus,  who  charged  his  disciples  to  tell  no  man  that  he  was  Christ 1  (Chrestos),  the  "  man  of  sorrows  "  and  trials,  before  his  supreme  and  last  Initiation,  or  that  he  had  produced  a  "  miracle  "  of  resurrection.

•  The  Apostles  had  to  preserve  silence,  so  that  the  left  hand  should  not  know  what  the  right  hand  did  ;  in  plainer  words,  that  the  dangerous  proficient  in  the  Left  Hand  Science- — the  terrible  enemies  of  the  Right  Hand  Adepts,  especially  before  their  supreme  Initiation — should  not  profit  by  the  publicity  so  as  to  harm  both  the  healer  and  the  patient.

And  if  the  above  is  maintained  to  be  simply  an  assumption,  then  what  may  be  the  meaning  of  these  awful  words  :

Unto  you  it  is  given  to  know  the  mystery  of  the  kingdom  of  God ;  but  unto  them  that  are  without  all  these  things  are  done  in  parables  ;  that  seeing  they  may  see  and  not  perceive  ,  and  hearing,  they  may  hear  and  not  understand  ,  lest  at  any  time  they  should  be  converted  and  their  sins  should  be  forgiven  them/

Unless  interpreted  in  the  sense  of  the  law  of  silence  and  Karma,  the  utter  selfishness  and  uncharitable  spirit  of  this  remark  are  but  too  evident.

These  words  are  directly  connected  with  the  terrible  dogma  of  predestination.

Will

1  Matthew,  xvi,  20.  2  Mark,  v,  43  3  Mark,  iv,  11,  12.

THE  SECRECY  OF  INITIATES

the  good  and  intelligent  Christian  cast  such  a  slur  of  cruel  selfishness  on  his  Saviour  ?

The  work  of  propagating  such  truths  in  parables  was  left  to  the  disciples  of  the  high  Initiates.

It  was  their  duty  to  follow  the  key-note  of  the  Secret  Teaching  without  revealing  its  mysteries.

This  is  shown  in  the  histories  of  all  the  great  Adepts.

Pythagoras  divided  his  classes  into  hearers  of  exoteric  and  esoteric  lectures.

The  Magians  received  their  instructions  and  were  initiated  in  the  far  hidden  caves  of  Bactria.

When  Josephus  declares  that  Abraham  taught  Mathematics  he  meant  by  it  "Magic,"  for  in  the  Pythagorean  code  Mathematics  means  Esoteric  Science,  or  Gnosis.

Professor  Wilder  remarks  :

The  Essenes  of  Judea  and  Carmel  made  similar  distinctions,  dividing  their  adher-  ents into  neophytes,  brethren  and  the  perfect  .  .  Ammonius  obligated  his  disciples  by  oath  not  to  divulge  his  higher  doctrines,  except  to  those  who  had  been  thoroughly  instructed  and  exercised  [prepared  for  initiation]  a

One  of  the  most  powerful  reasons  for  the  necessity  of  strict  secrecy  is  given  by  Jesus  Himself,  if  one  may  credit  Matthew.

For  there  the  Master  is  made  to  say  plainly  .

Give  not  that  which  is  holy  unto  the  dogs,  neither  cast  ye  your  pearls  before  swine ,  lest  they  trample  them  under  their  feet,  and  turn  again  and  rend  you  '

Profoundly  true  and  wise  words.

Many  are  those  in  our  own  age,  and  even  among  us,  who  have  been  forcibly  reminded  of  them — often  when  too  late/

1  Is  it  not  evident  that  the  words  "  lest  at  any  time  they  should  be  converted  (or  "  lest  haply  they  should  turn  again" — as  in  the  revised  version)  and  their  sins  be  forgiven  them  " — do  not  at  all  mean  to  imply  that  Jesus  feared  that  through  repentance  any  outsider,  or  "them  that  are  without,"  should  escape  damnation,  as  the  literal  dead-letter  sense  plainly  shows — but  quite  a  different  thing  ?  Namely,  "  lest  any  of  the  profane  should  by  understanding  his  preaching,  undisguised  by  parable,  get  hold  of  some  of  the  secret  teachings  and  mysteries  of  Initiation — and  even  of  Occult  powers  ?  "Be  converted  "  is,  in  other  words,  to  obtain  a  knowledge  belonging  exclusively  to  the  Initiated  .  "and  their  sins  be  forgiven  them,"  that  is,  their  sins  would  fall  upon  the  illegal  revealer,  on  those  who  had  helped  the  unworthy  to  reap  there  where  they  have  never  laboured  to  sow,  and  had  given  them,  thereby,  the  means  of  escaping  on  this  earth  their  deserved  Karma,  which  must  thus  re-act  on  the  revealer,  who,  instead  of  good,  did  harm  and  failed.

3  New  Platomsm  and  Alchemy,  1869,  pp.  7-9  '  Ch.  VH,  6.

4  History   is  full  of  proofs  of  the  same      Had  not  Anaxagoras  enunciated  the  great  truth  taught  in  the   Mysteries,    viz  ,   that  the  sun  was  surely  larger  than  the  Peloponnesus,  he  would  not  have  been  persecuted  and   nearly  put  to  death   by  the  fanatical  mob.

Had  that  other  rabble  which  was  raised  against  Pythagoras   understood  what  the  mysterious  Sage  of  Krotona  meant  by  giving  out  his  remem-  brance of  having  been  the  "  Son  of  Mercury  " — God  of  the  Secret  Wisdom — he  would  not  have  been  forced  to  fly  for  his  life  ,   nor  would  Socrates  have  been  put  to  death,  had  he  kept  secret  the  revela-  tions of  his  divine  Daimon.

He  knew  how  little  his  century— save  those  initiated— would  understand  his  meaning,  had  he  given  out  all  he  knew  of  the  moon.

Thus  he  limited  his  statement  to  an  allegory,  which  is  now  proven  to  have  been  more  scientific  than  was  hitherto  believed      He  maintained  that  the  moon  was  inhabited  and  that  the  lunar  beings  lived  in  profound,  vast  and  dark  valleys,  our  satellite  being  airless  and  without  any  atmosphere  outside  such  profound  valleys  ,  this,  disregarding  the  revela-  tion full  of  meaning  for  the  few  only,  must  be  so  of  necessity,  if  there  is  any  atmosphere  on  our  bright  Selene  at  all      The  facts  recorded   in  the  secret  annals  of  the  Mysteries  had  to  remain  veiled  under  penalty  of  death

FF

66  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Even  Maimonides  recommends  silence  with  regard  to  the  true  meaning  of  the  Bible  texts.

This  injunction  destroys  the  usual  affirmation  that  "  Holy  Writ"  is  the  only  book  in  the  world  whose  divine  oracles  contain  plain  unvarnished  truth.

It  may  be  so  for  the  learned  Kabalists  ;  it  is  certainly  quite  the  reverse  with  regard  to  Christians.

For  this  is  what  the  learned  Hebrew  Philosopher  says  :

Whoever  shall  find  out  the  true  sense  of  the  Book  of  Genesis  ought  to  take  care  not  to  divulge  it.  This  is  a  maxim  that  all  our  sages  repeat  to  us,  and  above  all  res-  pecting the  work  of  the  six  days.

If  a  person  should  discover  the  true  meaning  of  it  by  himself,  or  by  the  aid  of  another,  then  he  ought  to  be  silent,  or  if  he  speaks  he  ought  to  speak  of  it  obscurely,  in  an  enigmatical  manner,  as  I  do  myself,  leaving  the  rest  to  be  guessed  by  those  who  can  understand  me

The  Symbology  and  Esoterism  of  the  Old  Testament  being  thus  confessed  by  one  of  the  greatest  Jewish  Philosophers,  it  is  only  natural  to  find  Christian  Fathers  making  the  same  confession  with  regard  to  the  New  Testament,  and  the  Bible  in  general.

Thus  we  find  Clemens  Alexandrinus  and  Origen  admit-  ting it  as  plainly  as  words  can  do  it  Clemens,  who  had  been  initiated  into  the  Eleusinian  Mysteries,  says  that .

The  doctrines  there  taught  contained  in  them  the  end  of  all  instructions  as  they  were  taken  from  Moses  and  the  prophets,

a  slight  perversion  of  facts  pardonable  in  the  good  Father.

The  words  admit,  after  all,  that  the  Mysteries  of  the  Jews  were  identical  with  those  of  the  Pagan  Greeks,  who  took  them  from  the  Egyptians,  who  borrowed  them,  in  their  turn,  from  the  Chaldeans,  who  got  them  from  the  Aryans,  the  Atlanteans  and  so  on — far  beyond  the  days  of  that  Race.

The  secret  meaning  of  the  Gospel  is  again  openly  confessed  by  Clemens  when  he  says  that  the  Mysteries  of  the  Faith  are  not  to  be  divulged  to  all.

But  since  this  tradition  is  not  published  alone  for  him  who  perceives  the  magnifi-  cence of  the  word ,  it  is  requisite,  therefore,  to  hide  in  a  Mystery  the  wisdom  spoken,  which  the  Son  of  God  taught  l

Not  less  explicit  is  Origen  with  regard  to  the  Bible  and  its  symbolical,  fables.

He  exclaims  :

If  we  hold  to  the  letter,  and  must  understand  what  stands  written  in  the  law  after  the  manner  of  the  Jews  and  common  people,  then  I  should  blush  to  confess-  aloud  that  it  is  God  who  has  given  these  laws  ,  then  the  laws  of  men  appear  more  excellent  and  reasonable  a

And  well  he  might  have  "  blushed,"  the  sincere  and  honest  Father  of  early  Christianity  in  its  days  of  relative  purity.

But  the  Christians  of  this  highly

1  Clement  of  Alexandria.

Vol  I.  Stromata,  Ch   xn,  p.

-  See  Homilies  7,  in  Levit  ,  quoted  in  The  Source  of  Measures,  pp    306-

THE  SECRECY  OF  INITIATES

literary  and  civilised  age  of  ours  do  not  blush  at  all  ;  they  swallow,  on  the  contrary,  the  "  light  "  before  the  formation  of  the  sun,  the  Garden  of  Eden,  Jonah's  whale  and  all,  notwithstanding  that  the  same  Origen  asks  in  a  very  natural  fit  of  indignation  :

What  man  of  sense  will  agree  with  the  statement  that  the  first,  second  and  third  days  in  which  the  evening  is  named  and  the  morning,  were  without  sun,  moon,  and  stars,  and  the  first  day  without  a  heaven  ?  What  man  is  found  such  an  idiot  as  to-  suppose  that  God  planted  trees  in  Paradise,  in  Eden,  like  a  husbandman,  etc  ?  I  believe  that  every  man  must  hold  these  things  for  images,  under  which  the  hidden  sense  lies  concealed  '

Yet  millions  of  "  such  idiots  "  are  found  in  our  age  of  enlightenment  and  not  only  in  the  third  century.

When  Paul's  unequivocal  statement  in  Ga/at/ans,  iv,  22-25,  that  the  story  of  Abraham  and  his  two  sons  is  all  "  an.  allegory,"  and  that  "  Agar  is  Mount  Sinai  "  is  added  to  this,  then  little  blame,  indeed,  can  be  attached  to  either  Christian  or  Heathen  who  declines  to  accept  the  Bible  in  any  other  light  than  that  of  a  very  ingenious  allegory.

Rabbi  Simeon  Ben-"  Jochai,"  the  compiler  of  the  Zohar,  never  imparted  the  most  important  points  of  his  doctrine  otherwise  than  orally,  and  to  a  very  limited  number  of  disciples.

Therefore,  without  the  final  initiation  into  the  Mercavan,  the  study  of  the  Kabalah  will  be  ever  incomplete,  and  the  Mercavah  can  be  taught  only  "  in  darkness,  in  a  deserted  place,  and  after  many  and  terrific  trials."  Since  the  death  of  that  great  Jewish  Initiate  this  hidden  doctrine  has  remained,  for  the  outside  world,  an  inviolate  secret.

Among  the  venerable  sect  of  the  Tanaim,  or  rather  the  Tananim,  the  wise  men,  there  were  those  who  taught  the  secrets  practically  and  initiated  some  disciples  into  the  grand  and  final  Mystery.

But  the  Mishna  Hagiga,  2nd  Section,  say  that  the  table  of  contents  of  the  Mercaba  •  "  must  only  be  delivered  to  wise  old  ones  "  The  Gemara  is  still  more  dogmatic  "  The  more  important  secrets  of  the  Mysteries  were  not  even  revealed  to  all  priests  Alone  the  initiates  had  them  divulged  "  And  so  we  find  the  same  great  secrecy  prevalent  in  every  ancient  religion  :<

What  says  the  Kabalah  itself  ?  Its  great  Rabbis  actually  threaten  him  who  accepts  their  sayings  verbatim.

We  read  in  the  Zohar  :

Woe  .  to  the  man  who  sees  in  the  Thorah,  i.e.,  Law,  only  simple  recitals  and  ordinary  words  I  Because  if  in  truth  it  only  contained  these,  we  would  even  to-day  be  able  to  compose  a  Thorah  much  more  worthy  of  admiration.

For  if  we  find  only  the  simple  words,  we  would  only  have  to  address  ourselves  to  the  legislators  of  the  earth,4  to  those  in  whom  we  most  frequently  meet  with  the  most  grandeur  It  would

1  Ongen     Huet  ,  Ongemana.

167  ,   Franck,  p

2  [Mercavah].  3  his  Unveiled.

Vol   II,  p

4  The  materialistic  "  law-givers,"  the  critics  and  Sadducees  who  have  tried  to  tear  to  shreds  the  doctrines  and  teachings  of  the  great  Asiatic  Masters  past  and  present — no  scholars  in  the  modern  sense  of  the  word— would  do  well  to  ponder  over  these  words  No  doubt  that  doctrines  and  secret  teachings  had  they  been  invented  and  written  in  Oxford  and  Cambridge  would  be  more  brilliant  out-  wardly Would  they  equally  answer  to  universal  truths  and  facts,  is  the  next  question  however

68  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

be  sufficient  to  imitate  them,  and  make  a  Thorah  after  their  words  and  example.

But  it  is  not  so  ,  each  word  of  the  Thorah  contains  an  elevated  meaning  and  a  sublime  mystery.

.  The  recitals  of  the  Thorah  are  the  vestments  of  the  Thorah.

Woe  to  him  who  takes  this  garment  for  the  Thorah  itself  .  The  simple  take  notice  only  of  the  garments  or  recitals  of  the  Thorah,  they  know  no  other  thing,  they  see  not  that  which  is  concealed  under  the  vestment.

The  more  instructed  men  do  not  pay  attention  to  the  vestment,  but  to  the  body  which  it  envelops.

Ammonius  Saccas  taught  that  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE  of  the  Wisdom-  Religion  was  found  complete  in  the  Books  of  Thoth  (Hermes),  from  which  both  Pythagoras  and  Plato  derived  their  knowledge  and  much  of  their  Philos-  ophy ;  and  these  Books  were  declared  by  him  to  be  "  identical  with  the  teachings  of  the  Sages  of  the  remote  East."  Professor  A.  Wilder  remarks  .

As  the  name  Thoth  means  a  college  or  assembly,  it  is  not  altogether  improbable  that  the  books  were  so  named  as  being  the  collected  oracles  and  doctrines  of  the  sacerdotal  fraternity  of  Memphis  Rabbi  Wise  has  suggested  the  same  hypothesis  in  relation  to  the  divine  utterances  recorded  in  the  Hebrew  Scriptures  '

This  is  very  probable.

Only  the  "  divine  utterances  "  have  never  been,  so  far,  understood  by  the  profane.

Philo  Judaeus,  a  non-initiate,  attempted  to  give  their  secret  meaning,  and — failed.

But  Books  of  Thoth  or  Bible,  Vedas  or  Kabalah,  all  enjoin  the  same  secrecy  as  to  certain  mysteries  of  nature  symbolised  in  them.

"  Woe  be  to  him  who  divulges  unlawfully  the  words  whispered  into  the  ear  of  Manushi  by  the  First  Initiator."  Who  that  "  Initiator  "  was  is  made  plain  in  the  Book  of  Enoch  .

From  them  [the  Angels]  I  heard  all  things,  and  understood  what  I  saw  ,  that  which  will  not  take  place  in  this  generation  [Race],  but  in  a  generation  which  is  to  succeed  at  a  distant  period  [the  6th  and  7th  Races]  on  account  of  the  elect  [the  Initiates]  '

Again,  it  is  said  with  regard  to  the  judgment  of  those  who,  when  they  have  learned  "  every  secret  of  the  angels,"  reveal  them,  that :

They  have  discovered  secrets,  and  they  are  those  who  have  been  judged  ,  but  not  thou,  my  son  [Noah]  thou  art  pure  and  good  and  free  from  the  reproach  of  discovering  [revealing]  secrets.'

But  there  are  those  in  our  century,  who  having  "  discovered  secrets  "  unaided  and  owing  to  their  own  learning  and  acuteness  only,  and  who  being,  nevertheless,  honest  and  straightforward  men,  undismayed  by  threats  or  warning  since  they  have  never  pledged  themselves  to  secrecy,  feel  quite  startled  at  such  revelations.

One  of  these  is  the  learned  author  and  dis-  coverer of  one  "  Key  to  the  Hebrew- Egyptian  Mystery."  As  he  says,  there

1  Vol.

in,  fol.

1526,  quoted  in  Myer's  Qabbalah,  p

•'  New-Platontsm  and  Alchemy,  p

'Ch    i,  p   2  «  Ch    Ixiv,  p

THE  SECRECY  OF  INITIATES

are  "  some  strange  features  connected  with  the  promulgation  and  condition  "  of  the  Bible.

Those  who  compiled  this  Book  were  men  as  we  are  They  knew,  saw,  handled  and  realized,  through  the  key  measure,1  the  law  of  the  living,  ever-active  God.-  They  needed  no  faith  that  He  was,  that  He  worked,  planned,  and  accomplished,  as  a  mighty  mechanic  and  architect  '  What  was  it,  then,  that  reserved  to  them  alone  this  know-  ledge, while  first  a,s  men  of  God,  and  second  as  Apostles  of  Jesus  the  Christ,  they  doled  out  a  blinding  ritual  service,  and  an  empty  teaching  of  faith  and  no  substance  as  proof,,  properly  coming  through  the  exercise  of  just  those  senses  which  the  Deity  has  given  all  men  as  the  essential  means  of  obtaining  any  right  understanding  ?  Mystery  and  parable,  and  dark  saying,  and  cloaking  of  the  true  meanings  are  the  burden  of  the  Testaments,  Old  and  New.

Take  it  that  the  narratives  of  the  Bible  were  purposed  inventions  to  deceive  the  ignorant  masses,  even  while  enforcing  a  most  perfect  code  of  moral  obligations  How  is  it  possible  to  justify  so  great  frauds,  as  part  of  a  Divine  economy,  when  to  that  economy,  the  attribute  of  simple  and  perfect  truthfulness  must,  in  the  nature  of  things,  be  ascribed  ?  What  has,  or  what  by  possibility  ought  mystery  to-  have,  with  the  promulgation  of  the  truths  of  God  ?  '

Nothing  whatever  most  certainly,  if  those  mysteries  had  been  given  from  the  first.

And  so  it  was  with  regard  to  the  first,  semi-divine,  pure  and  spiritual  Races  of  Humanity.

They  had  the  "  truths  of  God,"  and  lived  up  to  them,,  and  their  ideals.

They  preserved  them,  so  long  as  there  was  hardly  any  evil,  and  hence  scarcely  a  possible  abuse  of  that  knowledge  and  those  truths.

But  evolution  and  the  gradual  fall  into  materiality  is  also  one  of  the  "  truths  "  and  also  one  of  the  laws  of  "  God."  And  as  mankind  progressed,  and  became  with  every  generation  more  of  the  earth,  earthly,  the  individuality  of  eacb  temporary  Ego  began  to  assert  itself.

It  is  personal  selfishness  that  develops  and  urges  man  on  to  abuse  of  his  knowledge  and  power  And  selfishness  is  a  human  building,  whose  windows  and  doors  are  ever  wide  open  for  every  kind  of  iniquity  to  enter  into  man's  soul.

Few  were  the  men  during  the  early  adolescence  of  mankind,  and  fewer  still  are  they  now,  who  feel  disposed  to  put  into  practice  Pope's  forcible  declaration  that  he  would  tear  out  his  own  heart,  if  it  had  no  better  disposition  than  to  love  only  himself,  and  laugh  at  all  his  neighbours.

Hence  the  necessity  of  gradually  taking  away  from  man  the  divine  knowledge  and  power,  which  became  with  every  new  human  cycle  more  dangerous  as  a  double-edged  weapon,  whose  evil  side  was  ever

'  The  key  is  shown  to  be  "  in  the  source  of  measures  originating  the  British  inch  and  the  ancient  cubit  "  as  the  author  tries  to  prove.

-'  The  word  as  a  plural  might  have  better  solved  the  mystery  God  is  ever-present  ,  if  he  were  ever-active  he  could  no  longer  be  an  infinite  God — nor  ever-present  in  his  limitation.

1  The  author  is  evidently  a  Mason  of  the  way  of  thinking  of  General  Pike  So  long  as  the  American  and  English  Masons  will  reject  the  "  Creative  Principle  "  of  the  "  Grand  Orient  "  of  France  they  will  remain  in  the  dark

1  The  Source  of  Measures,  pp    308-9.

70  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

threatening  one's  neighbour,  and  whose  power  for  good  was  lavished  freely  only  upon  self.

Those  few  "elect"  whose  inner  natures  had  remained  un-  affected by  their  outward  physical  growth,  thus  became  in  time  the  sole  guardians  of  the  mysteries  revealed,  passing  the  knowledge  to  those  most  fit  to  receive  it,  and  keeping  it  inaccessible  to  others.

Reject  this  explanation  from  the  Secret  Teachings,  and  the  very  name  of  Religion  will  become  synonymous  with  deception  and  fraud.

Yet  the  masses  could  not  be  allowed  to  remain  without  some  sort  of  moral  restraint.

Man  is  ever  craving  for  a  "  beyond  "  and  cannot  live  without  an  ideal  of  some  kind,  as  a  beacon  and  a  consolation.

At  the  same  time,  no  average  man,  even  in  our  age  of  universal  education,  could  be  entrusted  with  truths  too  metaphysical,  too  subtle  for  his  mind  to  comprehend,  without  the  danger  of  an  imminent  reaction  setting  in,  and  faith  in  Gods  and  Saints  mak-  ing room  for  an  unscientific  blank  Atheism  No  real  philanthropist,  hence  no  Occultist,  would  dream  for  a  moment  of  a  mankind  without  one  tittle  of  Religion.

Even  the  modern  day  Religion  in  Europe,  confined  to  Sundays,  is  better  than  none.

,But  if,  as  Bunyan  put  it,  "  Religion  is  the  best  armour  that  a  man  can  have,"  ,«t  certainly  is  the  "  worst  cloak  "  ;  and  it  is  that  "  cloak  "  and  false  pretence  which  the  Occultists  and  the  Theosophists  fight  against.

The  true  ideal  Deity,  the  one  living  God  in  Nature,  can  never  suffer  in  man's  worship  if  that  out-  ward cloak,  woven  by  man's  fancy,  and  thrown  upon  the  Deity  by  the  crafty  hand  of  the  priest  greedy  of  power  and  domination,  is  drawn  aside.

The  hour  has  struck  with  the  commencement  of  this  century  to  dethrone  the  "  highest  God  "  of  every  nation  in  favour  of  One  Universal  Deity — the  God  of  Immutable  Law,  not  charity  ;  the  God  of  Just  Retribution,  not  mercy,  which  is  merely  an  incentive  to  evil-doing  and  to  a  repetition  of  it.  The  greatest  crime  that  was  ever  perpetrated  upon  mankind  was  committed  on  that  day  when  the  first  priest  invented  the  first  prayer  with  a  selfish  object  in  view.

A  God  who  may  be  propitiated  by  iniquitous  prayers  to  "  bless  the  arms  "  of  the  worshipper,  and  send  defeat  and  death  to  thousands  of  his  enemies — his  brethren  ;  a  Deity  that  can  be  supposed  not  to  turn  a  deaf  ear  to  chants  of  laudation  mixed  with  entreaties  for  a  "fair  propitious  wind  "  for  self,  and  as  naturally  disastrous  to  the  selves  of  other  navigators  who  come  from  an  opposite  direction — it  is  this  idea  of  God  that  has  fostered  selfish-  ness in  man,  and  deprived  him  of  his  self-reliance.

Prayer  is  an  ennobling  action  when  it  is  an  intense  feeling,  an  ardent  desire  rushing  forth  from  our  very  heart,  for  the  good  of  other  people,  and  when  entirely  detached  from  any  selfish  personal  object ;  the  craving  for  a  beyond  is  natural  and  holy  in  man,  but  on  the  condition  of  sharing  that  bliss  with  others.

One  can

THE  SECRECY  OF  INITIATES

understand   and  well  appreciate  the  words  of  the    "  heathen  "   Socrates,  who  declared  in  his  profound  though  untaught  wisdom,  that :

Our   prayers   should   be  for  blessings  on  all,  in  general,  for  the  Gods  know  best  what  is  good  for  us.

But  official  prayer — in  favour  of  a  public  calamity,  or  for  the  benefit  of  one  individual  irrespective  of  losses  to  thousands — is  the  most  ignoble  of  crimes,  besides  being  an  impertinent  conceit  and  a  superstition.

This  is  the  direct  inheritance  by  spoliation  from  the  Jehovites — the  Jews  of  the  Wilder-  ness and  of  the  Golden  Calf.

It  is  "  Jehovah,"  as  will  be  presently  shown,  that  suggested  the  necessity  of  veiling  and  screening  this  substitute  for  the  unpronounceable  name,  and  that  led  to  all  this  "  mystery,  parables,  dark  sayings  and  cloaking."  Moses  had,  at  any  rate,  initiated  his  seventy  Elders  into  the  hidden  truths,  and  thus  the  writers  of  the  Old  Testament  stand  to  a  degree  justified.

Those  of  the  New  Testament  have  failed  to  do  even  so  much,  or  so  little.

They  have  disfigured  the  grand  central  figure  of  Christ  by  their  dogmas,  and  have  led  people  ever  since  into  millions  of  errors  and  the  darkest  crimes,  in  His  holy  name.

It  is  evident  that  with  the  exception  of  Paul  and  Clement  of  Alexandria,  who  had  been  both  initiated  into  the  Mysteries,  none  of  the  Fathers  knew  much  of  the  truth  themselves.

They  were  mostly  uneducated,  ignorant  people ,  and  if  such  as  Augustine  and  Lactantius,  or  again  the  Venerable  8ede  and  others,  were  so  painfully  ignorant  until  the  time  of  Galileo l  of  the  most  vital  truths  taught  in  the  Pagan  temples — of  the  rotundity  of  the  earth,  for  example,  leaving  the  heliocentric  system  out  of  question — how  great  must  have  been  the  ignorance  of  the  rest !  Learning  and  sin  were  syno-  nymous with  the  early  Christians.

Hence  the  accusations  of  dealing  with  the  Devil  lavished  on  the  Pagan  Philosophers.

But  truth  must  out  The  Occultists,  referred  to  as  "  the  followers  of  the  accursed  Cain,"  by  such  writers  as  De  Mirville,  are  now  in  a  position  to  reverse  the  tables.

That  which  was  hitherto  known  only  to  the  ancient  and  modern  Kabalists  in  Europe  and  Asia,  is  now  published  and  shown  as  being  mathematically  true.

The  author  of  the  Key  to  the  Hebrew -Egyptian  Mystery

1  In  Oes  Espr/ts,  Tome  iv,  pp  105-12,  the  Marquis  de  Mirville  claims  the  knowledge  of  the  helio-  centric system— earlier  than  Galileo — for  Pope  Urban  VIII  The  author  goes  further  He  tries  to  show  that  famous  Pope,  not  as  the  persecutor  but  as  one  persecuted  by  Galileo,  and  calumniated  by  the  Florentine  Astronomer  into  the  bargain.

If  so,  so  much  the  worse  for  the  Latin  Church,  since  her  Popes,  knowing  of  it,  still  preserved  silence  upon  this  most  important  fact,  either  to  screen  Joshua  or  their  own  infallibility  One  can  understand  well  that  the  Bible  having  been  so  exalted  over  all  the  other  systems,  and  its  alleged  monotheism  depending  upon  the  silence  preserved,  nothing  remained  of  course  but  to  keep  quiet  over  its  symbolism,  thus  allowing  all  its  blunders  to  be  fathered  on  its  God.

72  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

or  The  Source  of  Measures  has  now  proved  to  general  satisfaction,  it  is  to  be  hoped,  that  the  two  great  God-names,  Jehovah  and  Elohim,  stood,  in  one  meaning  of  their  numerical  values,  for  a  diameter  and  a  circumference  value,  respectively  ,  in  other  words,  that  they  are  numerical  indices  of  geometrical  relations ;  and  finally  that  Jehovah  is  Cain  and  vice  versa.

This  view,  says  that  author,

Helps  also  to  take  the  horrid  blemish  off  from  the  name  of  Cain,  as  a  put-up  job  to  destroy  his  character ,  for  even  without  these  showings,  by  the  very  text,  he  [Cam]  was  Jehovah  So  the  theological  schools  had  better  be  alive  to  making  the  amend  honorable,  if  such  a  thing  is  possible,  to  the  good  name  and  fame  of  the  God  they  worship.

This  is  not  the  first  warning  received  by  the  "  .theological  schools,"  which,  however,  no  doubt  knew  it  from  the  beginning,  as  did  Clemens  of  Alexandria  and  others.

But  if  it  be  so  they  will  profit  still  less  by  it,  as  the  admission  would  involve  more'  for  them  than  the  mere  sacredness  and  dignity  of  the  established  faith

But,  it  may  also  be  asked,  why  is  it  that  the  Asiatic  religions,  which  have  nothing  of  this  sort  to  conceal  and  which  proclaim  quite  openly  the  Esoterism  of  their  doctrines,  follow  the  same  course  ?  It  is  simply  this :  While  the  present,  and  no  doubt  enforced  silence  of  the  Church  on  this  subject  relates  merely  to  the  external  or  theoretical  form  of  the  Bible — the  unveiling  of  the  secrets  of  which  would  have  involved  no  practical  harm,  had  they  been  explained  from  the  first — it  is  an  entirely  different  question  with  Eastern  Esoterism  and  Symbology.

The  grand  central  figure  of  the  Gospels  would  have  remained  as  unaffected  by  the  symbolism  of  the  Old  Testament  being  revealed,  as  would  that  of  the  Founder  of  Buddhism  had  the  Brahmanical  writings  of  the  Pi/ranas,  that  preceded  his  birth,  all  been  shown  to  be  allegorical.

Jesus  of  Nazareth,  moreover,  would  have  gained  more  than  he  would  have  lost  had  he  been  presented  as  a  simple  mortal  left  to  be  judged  on  his  own  precepts  and  merits,  instead  of  being  fathered  on  Christendom  as  a  God  whose  many  utterances  and  acts  are  now  so  open  to  criticism.

On  the

1  Op  at.  App  vii,  p  296.  The  writer  feels  happy  to  find  this  fact  now  mathematically  demon-  strated When  it  was  stated  in  Isis  Unveiled  that  Jehovah  and  Saturn  were  one  and  the  same  with  Adam  Kadmon,  Cain,  Adam  and  Eve,  Abel,  Seth,  etc  .  and  that  all  were  convertible  symbols  in  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE  (see  Vol  2.  pp  132.  134,  149,  et  seq  )  .  that  they  answered,  in  short,  to  secret  numerals  and  stood  for  more  than  one  meaning  in  the  6/b/e  as  in  other  doctrines — the  author's  state-  ments remained  unnoticed  Is/s  had  failed  to  appear  under  a  scientific  form,  and  by  giving  too  much,  in  fact,  gave  very  little  to  satisfy  the  enquirer.

But  now,  if  mathematics  and  geometry,  besides  the  evidence  of  the  Bible  and  Kabalah  are  good  for  anything,  the  public  must  find  itself  satisfied  No  fuller,  more  scientifically  given  proof  can  be  found  to  show  that  Cam  is  the  transformation  of  an  Elohim  (the  Sephira  Bmah)  into  Jah-Veh  (or  God-Eve)  androgyne,  and  that  Seth  is  the  Jehovah  maler  than  in  the  combined  discoveries  of  Seyffarth,  Knight,  etc.,  and  finally  in  Mr  Ralston  Skinner's  most  erudite  work  The  further  relations  of  these  personifications  of  the  first  human  races,  in  their  gradual  development,  will  be  given  later  on  in  the  text

THE  SECRECY  OF  INITIATES

other  hand  the  symbols  and  allegorical  sayings  that  veil  the  grand  truths  of  Nature  in  the  Vedas,  the  Brahmanas,  the  I/pan/shads  and  especially  in  the  Lamaist  Cfiagpa  Thogmed  and  other  works,  are  quite  of  a  different  nature,  and  far  more  complicated  in  their  secret  meaning.

While  the  Biblical  glyphs  have  nearly  all  a  triune  foundation,  those  of  the  Eastern  books  are  worked  on  the  septenary  principle  They  are  as  closely  related  to  the  mysteries  of  Physics  and  Physiology,  as  to  Psychism  and  the  transcendental  nature  of  cosmic  elements  and  Theogony;  unriddled  they  would  prove  more  than  injurious  to  the  uninitiated  ,  delivered  into  the  hands  of  the  present  generations  in  their  actual  state  of  physical  and  intellectual  development,  in  the  absence  of  spirituality  and  even  of  practical  morality,  they  would  become  absolutely  disastrous.

Nevertheless  the  secret  teachings  of  the  sanctuaries  have  not  remained  without  witness  •  they  have  been  made  immortal  in  various  ways.

They  have  burst  upon  the  world  in  hundreds  of  volumes  full  of  the  quaint,  head-breaking  phraseology  of  the  Alchemist ,  they  have  flashed  like  irrepressible  cataracts  of  Occult  mystic  lore  from  the  pens  of  poets  and  bards  Genius  alone  had  certain  privileges  in  those  dark  ages  when  no  dreamer  could  offer  the  world  even  a  fiction  without  suiting  his  heaven  and  his  earth  to  biblical  text.

To  genius  alone  it  was  permitted  in  those  centuries  of  mental  blindness,  when  the  fear  of  the  "  Holy  Office  "  threw  a  thick  veil  over  every  cosmic  and  psychic  truth,  to  reveal  unimpeded  some  of  the  grandest  truths  of  Initiation.

Whence  did  Ariosto,  in  his  Orlando  Furioso,  obtain  his  conception  of  that  valley  in  the  Moon,  where  after  our  death  we  can  find  the  ideas  and  images  of  all  that  exists  on  earth  ?  How  came  Dante  to  imagine  the  many  descriptions  giver*  in  his  Inferno — a  new  Johannine  Apocalypse,  a  true  Occult  Revelation  in  verse — his  visit  and  communion  with  the  Souls  of  the  Seven  Spheres  ?  lr>  poetry  and  satire  every  Occult  truth  has  been  welcomed— none  has  been  recognised  as  serious.

The  Comte  de  Gabalis  is  better  known  and  appreciated  than  Porphyry  and  lamblichus.

Plato's  mysterious  Atlantis  is  proclaimed  a  fiction,  while  Noah's  Deluge  is  to  this  day  on  the  brain  of  certain  Archae-  ologists, who  scoff  at  the  archetypal  world  of  Marcel  Palingenius'  Zodiac,  and  would  resent  as  a  personal  injury  being  asked  to  discuss  the  four  worlds  of  Hermes  Trismegistus — the  Archetypal,  the  Spiritual,  the  Astral  ar.d  the  Elementary,  with  three  others  behind  the  opened  scene.

Evidently  civilised  society  is  still  but  half  prepared  for  the  revelation.

Hence,  the  Initiates  will  never  give  out  the  whole  secret,  until  the  bulk  of  mankind  has  changed  its  actual  nature  and  is  better  prepared  for  truth.

Clemens  Alexandrinus  was  positively  right  in  saying,  "  It  is  requisite  to  hide  in  a  mystery  the  wisdom  spoken  " — which  the  "  Sons  of  God  "  teach.

74  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

That  Wisdom,  as  will  be  seen,  relates  to  all  the  primeval  truths  delivered  to  the  first  Races,  the  "Mind-born,"  by  the  "Builders"  of  the  Universe  Themselves.

There  was  in  every  ancient  country  having  claims  to  civilisation,  an  Esoteric  Doctrine,  a  system  which  was  designated  WISDOM,1  and  those  who  were  devoted  to  its  prosecution  were  first  denominated  sages,  or  wise  men.

.  Pythagoras  termed  this  system  r;  yvwo-w  TWV  OVTMV,  the  Gnosis  or  Knowledge  of  things  that  are.

Under  the  noble  designation  of  WISDOM,  the  ancient  teachers,  the  sages  of  India,  the  magians  of  Persia  and  Babylon,  the  seers  and  prophets  of  Israel,  the  hierophants  of  Egypt  and  Arabia,  and  the  philosophers  of  Greece  and  the  West,  included  all  knowledge  which  they  considered  as  essentially  divine  ,  classifying  a  part  as  esoteric  and  the  remainder  as  exterior  The  Rabbis  called  the  exterior  and  secular  series  the  Mercavah,  as  being  the  body  or  vehicle  which  contained  the  higher  knowledge/'

Later  on,  we  shall  speak  of  the  law  of  the  silence  imposed  on  Eastern  cheias.

1  The  writings  extant  in  olden  times  often  personified  Wisdom  as  an  emanation  and  associate  of  the  Creator.

Thus  we  have  the  Hindu  Budha,  the  Babylonian  Nebo,  the  Thoth  of  Memphis,  the  Hermes  of  Greece  ,  also  the  female  divinities,  Neitha,  Metis,  Athena,  and  the  Gnostic  potency  Achamoth  or  Sophia.

The  Samaritan  Pentateuch  denominated  the  Book  of  Genesis,  Akamouth,  or  Wisdom,  and  two  remnants  of  old  treatises,  the  Wisdom  of  Solomon  and  the  Wisdom  of  Jesus,  relate  to  the  same  matters  The  Book  of  Mashalim—  the  Discourses  or  Proverbs  of  Solomon — thus  personifies  Wisdom  as  the  auxiliary  of  the  Creator.

In  the  Secret  Wisdom  of  the  East  that  auxiliary  is  found  collectively  in  the  first  emanations  of  Primeval  Light,  the  Seven  Dhyan-Chohans,  who  have  been  shown  to  be  identical  with  the  "  Seven  Spirits  of  the  Presence  "  of  the  Roman  Catholics

-  New  Platonism  and  Alchemy,  p

SECTION

SOME  REASONS  FOR  SECRECY

THE  fact  that  the  Occult  Sciences  have  been  withheld  from  the  world  at  large,  and  denied  by  the  Initiates  to  Humanity,  has  often  been  made  a  matter  of  complaint.

It  has  been  alleged  that  the  Guardians  of  the  Secret  Lore  were  selfish  in  withholding  the  "  treasures  "  of  Archaic  Wisdom  ;  that  it  was  positively  criminal  to  keep  back  such  knowledge — "if  any" — from  the  men  of  Science,  etc.

Yet  there  must  have  been  some  very  good  reasons  for  it,  since  from  the  very  dawn  of  History  such  has  been  the  policy  of  every  Hierophant  and  J' Master."  Pythagoras,  the  first  Adept  and  real  Scientist  in  pre-Christian  Europe,  is  accused  of  having  taught  in  public  the  immobility  of  the  earth,  and  the  rotatory  motion  of  the  stars  around  it,  while  he  was  declaring  to  his  privileged  Adepts  his  belief  in  the  motion  of  the  Earth  as  a  planet,  and  in  the  heliocentric  system.

The  reasons  for  such  secrecy,  however,  are  many  and  were  never  made  a  mystery  of.  The  chief  cause  was  given  in  Isis  Unveiled.

fit  may  now  be  repeated.

From  the  very  day  when  the  first  mystic,  taught  by  the  first  Instructor  of  the  "  divine  Dynasties "  of  the  early  races,  was  taught  the  means  of  communication  between  this  world  and  the  worlds  of  the  invisible  host,  between  the  sphere  of  matter  and  that  of  pure  spirit,  he  concluded  that  to  abandon  this  mysterious  science  to  the  desecration,  willing  or  unwilling,  of  the  profane  rabble — was  to  lose  it.  An  abuse  of  it  might  lead  mankind  to  speedy  destruction  ;  it  was  like  surrounding  a  group  of  children  with  explosive  substances,  and  furnishing  them  with  matches.

The  first  divine  Instructor  initiated  but  a  select  few,  and  these  kept  silence  with  the  multitudes  They  ^recognised  their  "  God  "  and  each  Adept  felt  the  great  "  SELF  "  within  himself.

The  Atman,  the  Self,  the  mighty  Lord  and  Protector,  once  that  man  knew  him  as  the  "  I  am,"  the  "  Ego  Sum,"  the  "  Asmi,"  showed  his  full  power  to  him  who  could  recog-  nise the  "  still  small  voice  "  From  the  days  of  the  primitive  man  described  by  the  first  Vedic  poet,  down  to  our  modern  age,  there  has  not  been  a  philosopher  worthy  of  that  name,  who  did  not  carry  in  the  silent  sanctuary  of  his  heart  the  grand  and  mysteri-  ous truth.

If  initiated,  he  learnt  it  as  a  sacred  science  ;  if  otherwise,  then,  like  Socrates  repeating  to  himself  as  well  as  his  fellow-men,  the  noble  injunction,  "  O  man,  know  thyself,"  he  succeeded  in  recognising  his  God  within  himself  "  Ye  are  Gods,"  the

76  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

king-psalmist  tells  us,  and  we  find  Jesus  reminding  the  scribes  that  this  expression  was  addressed  to  other  mortal  men,  claiming  for  themselves  the  same  privilege  without  any  blasphemy.

And  as  a  faithful  echo,  Paul,  while  asserting  that  we  are  all  "  the  temple  of  the  living  God,"  cautiously  remarked  elsewhere  that  after  all  these  things  are  only  for  the  "  wise,"  and  it  is  "  unlawful  "  to  speak  of  them  '

Some  of  the  reasons  for  this  secrecy  may  here  be  given.

The  fundamental  law  and  master-key  of  practical  Theurgy,  in  its  chief  applications  to  the  serious  study  of  cosmic  and  sidereal,  of  psychic  and  spiritual,  mysteries  was,  and  still  is,  that  which  was  called  by  the  Greek  Neo-Platonists  "  Theophania."  In  its  generally-accepted  meaning  this  is  "  communication  between  the  Gods  (or  God)  and  those  initiated  mortals  who  are  spiritually  fit  to  enjoy  such  an  intercourse."  Esoterically,  however,  it  signifies  more  than  this.

For  it  is  not  only  the  presence  of  a  God,  but  an  actual — howbeit  temporary — incarnation,  the  blending,  so  to  say,  of  the  personal  Deity,  the  Higher  Self,  with  man — its  representative  or  agent  on  earth.

As  a  general  law,  the  Highest  God,  the  Over-soul  of  the  human  being  (Atma-Buddhi),  only  overshadows  the  individual  during  his  life,  for  purposes  of  instruction  and  revelation  ;  or  as  Roman  Catholics — who  erroneously  call  that  Over-soul  the  "  Guardian  Angel  " — would  say,  "  It  stands  outside  and  watches."  But  in  the  case  of  the  theophanic  mystery,  it  incarnates  itself  in  the  Theurgist  for  purposes  of  revelation.

When  the  incarnation  is  temporary,  during  those  mysterious  trances  or  "  ecstasy,"  which  Plotinus  defined  as

The   liberation   of  the   mind   from  its   finite   consciousness,    becoming  one  and  identified  with  the  Infinite,

this  sublime  condition  is  very  short.

The  human  soul,  being  the  offspring  or  emanation  of  its  God,  the  "  Father  and  the  Son  "  become  one,  "the  divine  fountain  flowing  like  a  stream  into  its  human  bed."  -  In  exceptional  cases,  however,  the  mystery  becomes  complete  ;  the  World  is  made  Flesh  in  real  fact,  the  individual  becoming  divine  in  the  full  sense  of  the  term,  since  his  personal  God  has  made  of  him  his  permanent  life-long  tabernacle — 'the  temple  of  God,"  as  Paul  says.

Now  that  which  is  meant  here  by  the  personal  God  of  Man  is,  of  course^  not  his  seventh  Principle  alone,  as  per  se  and  in  essence  that  is  merely  a

1  Vol    II,  pp   317-8.     Many  verbal  alterations  from  the  original  text  of  /sis  Unveiled  were  made  by  H.P  B    in  her  quotations  therefrom,  and  these  are  followed  throughout

2  Proclus   claims   to   have   experienced  this  sublime  ecstasy  six  times  during  his  mystic  life  ,  Porphyry  asserts  that  Apollonius  of  Tyana  was  thus  united  four  times  to  his  deity— a  statement  which  we    believe  to  be  a  mistake,  since  Apollonius  was  a  Nirmdnakdya  (divine  incarnation — not  AvatSra)—  and  he  (Porphyry)  only  once,  when  over  sixty  years  of  age.

Theophany  (or  the  actual  appearance  of  a  God  to   man),   Theopathy  (or   "assimilation  of   divine  nature  "),  and  Theopneusty  (inspiration,  or  rather  the    mysterious    power  to   hear   orally   the   teachings   of   a    God)  have   never  been   rightly  understood.

SOME  REASONS  FOR  SECRECY

beam  of  the  infinite  Ocean  of  Light.

In  conjunction  with  our  Divine  Soul,  the  Buddhi,  it  cannot  be  called  a  Duad,  as  it  otherwise  might,  since,  though  formed  from  Atma  and  Buddhi  (the  two  higher  Principles),  the  former  is  no  entity  but  an  emanation  from  the  Absolute,  and  indivisible  in  reality  from  it.  The  personal  God  is  not  the  Monad,  but  indeed  the  prototype  of  the  latter,  what  for  want  of  a  better  term  we  call  the  manifested  Karanatma  *  (Causal  Soul),  one  of  the  "  seven  "  and  chief  reservoirs  of  the  human  Monads  or  Egos.

The  latter  are  gradually  formed  and  strengthened  during  their  in-  carnation-cycle by  constant  additions  of  individuality  from  the  personalities  in  which  incarnates  that  androgynous,  half-spiritual,  half-terrestrial  principle,  partaking  of  both  heaven  and  earth,  called  by  the  Vedantins  Jiva  and  Vijnanamaya  Kosha,  and  by  the  Occultists  the  Manas  (mind)  ;  that,  in  short,  which  uniting  itself  partially  with  the  Monad,  incarnates  in  each  new  birth.

In  perfect  unity  with  its  (seventh)  Principle,  the  Spirit  unalloyed,  it  is  the  divine  Higher  Self,  as  every  student  of  Theosophy  knows.

After  every  new  incar-  nation Buddhi-Manas  culls,  so  to  say,  the  aroma  of  the  flower  called  personality,  the  purely  earthly  residue  of  which — its  dregs — is  left  to  fade  out  as  a  shadow.

This  is  the  most  difficult — because  so  transcendentally  metaphysical — portion  of  the  doctrine.

As  is  repeated  many  a  time  in  this  and  other  works,  it  is  not  the  Philosophers,  Sages,  and  Adepts  of  antiquity  who  can  ever  be  charged  with  idolatry.

It  is  they  in  fact,  who,  recognising  divine  unity,  were  the  only  ones,  owing  to  their  initiation  into  the  mysteries  of  Esotericism,  to  understand  correctly  the  VTTOVOIO,  (hyponoia),  or  underlying-meaning  of  the  anthropomorphism  of  the  so-called  Angels,  Gods,  and  spiritual  Beings  of  every  kind.

Each,  worshipping  the  one  Divine  Essence  that  pervades  the  whole  world  of  Nature,  reverenced,  but  never  worshipped  or  idolised,  any  of  these  "  Gods,"  whether  high  or  low — not  even  his  own  personal  Deity,  of  which  he  was  a  Ray,  and  to  whom  he  appealed.1'

The  holy  Triad  emanates  from  the  One,  and  is  the  Tetraktys ,  the  Gods,  daimons,  and  souls  are  an  emanation  of  the  Triad  Heroes  and  men  repeat  the  hierarchy  in  themselves

Thus  said  Metrodorus  of  Chios,  the  Pythagorean,  the  latter  part  of  the  sentence  meaning  that  man  has  within  himself  the  seven  pale  reflections  of  the  seven  divine  Hierarchies  ;  his  Higher  Self  is,  therefore,  in  itself  but  the  refracted  beam  of  the  direct  Ray.

He  who  regards  the  latter  as  an  Entity,  in  the  usual  sense  of  the  term,  is  one  of  the  "  infidels  and  atheists,"  spoken

1  Karana   Sharlra   is  the  "  causal  "  body  and  is  sometimes  said  to  be  the  "  personal  God  "     And  so  it  is,  in  one  sense

-  This  would  be  in  one  sense  Self-worship

78  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

of  by  Epicurus,  for  he  fastens  on  that  God  "  the  opinions  of  the  multitude  "  — an  anthropomorphism  of  the  grossest  kind.1  The  Adept  and  the  Occultist  know  that  "  what  are  styled  the  Gods  are  only  the  first  principles  "  (Aristotle).  None  the  less  they  are  intelligent,  conscious,  and  living  "  Principles,"  the  Primary  Seven  Lights  manifested  from  Light  unmanifested — which  to  us  is  Darkness.

They  are  the  Seven — exoterically  four — Kumaras  or  "  Mind-Born  Sons  "  of  Brahma.

And  it  is  they  again,  the  Dhyan  Chohans,  who  are  the  prototypes  in  the  aeonic  eternity  of  lower  Gods  and  hierarchies  of  divine  Beings,  at  the  lowest  end  of  which  ladder  of  being  are  we — men.

Thus  perchance  Polytheism,  when  philosophically  understood,  may  be  a  degree  higher  than  even  the  Monotheism  of  the  Protestant,  say,  who  limits  and  conditions  the  Deity  in  whom  he  persists  in  seeing  the  Infinite,  but  whose  supposed  actions  make  of  that  "  Absolute  and  Infinite  "  the  most  absurd  paradox  in  Philosophy.

From  this  standpoint  Roman  Catholicism  itself  is  immeasurably  higher  and  more  logical  than  Protestantism,  though  the  Roman  Church  has  been  pleased  to  adopt  the  exotericism  of  the  heathen  "  multitude  "  and  to  reject  the  Philosophy  of  pure  Esotericism.

Thus  every  mortal  has  his  immortal  counterpart,  or  rather  his  Archetype,  in  heaven.

This  means  that  the  former  is  indissolubly  united  to  the  latter,  in  each  of  his  incarnations,  and  for  the  duration  of  the  cycle  of  births  ;  only  it  is  by  the  spiritual  and  intellectual  Principle  in  him,  entirely  distinct  from  the  lower  self,  never  through  the  earthly  personality.

Some  of  these  are  even  liable  to  break  the  union  altogether,  in  case  of  absence  in  the  moral  individual  of  binding,  viz.,  of  spiritual  ties.

Truly,  as  Paracelsus  puts  it  in  his  quaint,  tortured  phraseology,  man  with  his  three  (compound)  Spirits  is  suspended  like  a  foetus  by  all  three  to  the  matrix  of  the  Macrocosm  ;  the  thread  which  holds  him  united  being  the  "  Thread-Soul,"  Sutratma,  and  Taijasa  (the  "  Shining  ")  of  the  Vedantins.

And  it  is  through  this  spiritual  and  intellectual  Principle  in  man,  through  Taijasa — the  Shining,  "  because  it  has  the  luminous  internal  organ  as  its  associate  " — that  man  is  thus  united  to  his  heavenly  prototype,  never  through  his  lower  inner  self  or  Astral  Body,  for  which  there  remains  in  most  cases  nothing  but  to  fade  out

Occultism,  or  Theurgy,  teaches  the  means  of  producing  such  union.

But  it  is  the  actions  of  man — his  personal  merit  alone — that  can  produce  it  on  earth,  or  determine  its  duration.

This  lasts  from  a  few  seconds — a  flash — to  several  hours,  during  which  time  the  Theurgist  or  Theophanist  is  that  over-  shadowing "  God  "  himself ;  hence  he  becomes  endowed  for  the  time  being

1  ' '  The  Gods  exist, ' '  said  Epicurus,  ' '  but  they  are  not  what  hoi  polloi  [the  multitude]  suppose  them  to  be  Me  is  not  an  infidel  or  atheist  who  denies  the  existence  of  Gods  whom  the  multitude  worship,  but  he  is  such  who  fastens  on  the  Gods  the  opinions  of  the  multitude."

SOME  REASONS  FOR  SECRECY

with  relative  omniscience  and  omnipotence.

With  such  perfect  (divine)  Adepts  as  Buddha 1  and  others  such  a  hypostatical  state  of  avataric  condition,  may  last  during  the  whole  life  ;  whereas  in  the  case  of  full  Initiates,  who  have  not  yet  reached  the  perfect  state  of  Jivanmukta,'  Theopneusty  when  in  full  sway,  results  for  the  high  Adept  in  a  full  recollection  of  everything  seen,  heard,  or  sensed.

Taijasa  has  fruition  of  the  supersensible  '

For  one  less  perfect  it  will  end  only  in  a  partial,  indistinct  remembrance  ;  while  the  beginner  has  to  face  in  the  first  period  of  his  psychic  experiences  a  mere  confusion,  followed  by  a  rapid  and  finally  complete  oblivion  of  the  mysteries  seen  during  this  super-hypnotic  condition.

The  degree  of  recollec-  tion, when  one  returns  to  his  waking  state  and  physical  senses,  depends  on  his  spiritual  and  psychic  purification,  the  greatest  enemy  of  spiritual  memory  being  man's  physical  brain,  the  organ  of  his  sensuous  nature

The  above  states  are  described  for  a  clearer  comprehension  of  terms  used  in  this  work.

There  are  so  many  and  such  various  conditions  and  states  that  even  a  Seer  is  liable  to  confound  one  with  the  other.

To  repeat:  the  Greek,  rarely-used  word,  "  Theophania,"  meant  more  with  the  Neo-Platonists  than  it  does  with  the  modern  maker  of  dictionaries.

The  com-  pound word,  "Theophania"  (from  "theos,"  "God,"  and  "  phainomai,"  "to  appear  "),  does  not  simply  mean  "  a  manifestation  of  God  to  man  by  actual  appearance" — an  absurdity,  by  the  way — but  the  actual  presence  of  a  God  in  man,  a  divine  incarnation.

When  Simon  the  Magician  claimed  to  be  "  God  the  Father,"  what  he  wanted  to  convey  was  just  that  which  has  been  explain-  ed, namely,  that  he  was  a  divine  incarnation  of  his  own  Father,  whether  we  see  in  the  latter  an  Angel,  a  God,  or  a  Spirit;  therefore  he  was  called  "that  power  of  God  which  is  called  Great,"4  or  that  power  which  causes  the  Divine  Self  to  enshrine  itself  in  its  lower  self — -man

This  is  one  of  the  several  mysteries  of  being  and  incarnation.

Another  is  that  when  an  Adept  reaches  during  his  lifetime  that  state  of  holiness  and  purity  that  makes  him  "equal  to  the  Angels,"  then  at  death  his  apparitional  or  astral  body  becomes  as  solid  and  tangible  as  was  the  late  body,  and  is  transformed  into  the  real  man.*  The  old  physical  body,  falling  off  like  the

1  Esoteric,  as  exoteric,  Buddhism  rejects  the  theory  that  Gautama  was  an  incarnation  or  Avatara  of  Vishnu,  but  teaches  the  doctrine  as  herein  explained  Every  man  has  in  him  the  materials,  if  not  the  conditions,  for  theophanic  intercourse  and  Theopneusty,  the  inspiring  "  God  "  being,  however,  in  every  case,  his  own  Higher  Self,  or  divine  prototype

-  One  entirely  and  absolutely  purified,  and  having  nothing  in  common  with  earth  except  his  body.

1  Mandukyopamshad,  4.  4  Acts,  vm,  10  (Revised  Version)

'  See  the  explanations  given  on  the  subject  in  "  The  Elixir  of  Life,"  by  G.  M.  (From  a  Chela's  Diary),  F/ve  Years  of  Theosopny.

pp  18,  et  seq,

30  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

cast-off  serpent's  skin,  the  body  of  the  "  new  "  man  remains  either  visible  or,  at  the  option  of  the  Adept,  disappears  from  view,  surrounded  as  it  is  by  the  Akashic  shell  that  screens  it.  In  the  latter  case  there  are  three  ways  open  to  the  Adept :

1.  He    may    remain   in  the  earth's  sphere   (Vayu  or    Kama-loka),  in  that   ethereal    locality   concealed   from    human   sight   sav%    during   flashes   of  clairvoyance.

In  this   case   his   astral    body,    owing   to   its   great   purity  and  spirituality,    having   lost  the  conditions  required  for  Akashic  light  (the  nether  or  terrestrial  ether)  to  absorb  its  semi-material  particles,  the  Adept  will  have  to  remain  in  the  company  of  disintegrating  shells — doing  no  good  or  useful  work.

This,  of  course,  cannot  be.

2.  He  can   by   a   supreme   effort  of  will  merge  entirely  into,  and  get  united  with,   his   Monad.

By  doing   so,   however,   he  would  (a)  deprive  his  Higher  Self  of  posthumous  SamSdhi — a   bliss  which  is  not  real  Nirvana — the  astral,    however   pure,    being   too   earthly   for   such  state  ;  and  (b)  he  would  thereby  open  himself  to   Karmic   law ;  the  action  being,  in  fact,  the  outcome  of  personal  selfishness — of  reaping  the  fruits   produced  by  and  for  oneself  — alone.

3.  The  Adept  has  the  option  of  renouncing  conscious  Nirvana  and  rest,  to    work   on    earth    for   the    good  of  mankind.

This  he  can  do  in  a  two-fold  way :    either,   as   above   said,    by   consolidating    his   astral   body  into  physical  appearance,   he  can  reassume  the  self-same  personality ,  or  he  can  avail  him-  self of  an   entirely  new  physical  body,  whether  that  of  a  newly-born  infant  or  — as   Shankaracharya   is  reported  to  have  done  with  the  body  of  a  dead  Raja  — by   "entering   a   deserted   sheath,"    and   living  in  it  as  long  as  he  chooses.

This  is  what   is  called   "continuous  existence."     The  Section  entitled  " The  Mystery   about    Buddha  "    will   throw   additional    light   on   this  theory,  to  the  profane  incomprehensible,    or   to   the    generality  simply  absurd.

Such  is  the  doctrine  taught,  everyone  having  the  choice  of  either  fathoming  it  still  deeper,  •or  of  leaving  it  unnoticed.

The  above  is  simply  a  small  portion  of  what  might  have  been  given  in  Isis  Unveiled,  had  the  time  come  then,  as  it  has  now.

One  cannot  study  and  profit  by  Occult  Science,  unless  one  gives  himself  up  to  it — heart,  soul,  and  body.

Some  of  its  truths  are  too  awful,  too  dangerous,  for  the  average  mind.

None  can  toy  and  play  with  such  terrible  weapons  with  impunity.

Therefore  it  is,  as  St.  Paul  has  it,  "unlawful"  to  speak  of  them.

Let  us  accept  the  reminder  and  talk  only  of  that  which  is  "  lawful."

The  quotation  on  p.  75  [from  /sis  Unveiled]  relates,  moreover,  only  to  psychic  or  spiritual  Magic.

The  practical  teachings  of  Occult  Science  are

SOME  REASONS  FOR  SECRECY

.entirely  different,  and  few  are  the  strong  minds  fitted  for  them.

As  to  •ecstasy,  and  such  like  kinds  of  self-illumination,  this  may  be  obtained  by  one-  self and  without  any  teacher  or  initiation,  for  ecstasy  is  reached  by  an  inward  command  and  control  of  Self  over  the  physical  Ego ;  as  to  obtaining  mastery  •over  the  forces  of  Nature,  this  requires  a  long  training,  or  the  capacity  of  one  born  a  "natural  Magician."  Meanwhile,  those  who  possess  neither  of  the  requisite  qualifications  are  strongly  advised  to  limit  themselves  to  purely  spirit-  ual development.

But  even  this  is  difficult,  as  the  first  necessary  qualification  is  an  unshakable  belief  in  one's  own  powers  and  the  Deity  within  oneself ;  -otherwise  a  man  would  simply  develop  into  an  irresponsible  medium.

Through-  out the  whole  mystic  literature  of  the  ancient  world  we  detect  the  same  idea  of  spiritual  Esoterism,  that  the  personal  God  exists  within,  nowhere  outside,  the  worshipper.

That  personal  Deity  is  no  vain  breath,  or  a  fiction,  but  an  immortal  Entity,  the  Initiator  of  the  Initiates,  now  that  the  heavenly  or  Celestial  Initiators  of  primitive  humanity — the  Shishta  of  the  preceding  cycles — are  no  more  among  us.  Like  an  undercur-  rent, rapid  and  clear,  it  runs  without  mixing  its  crystalline  purity  with  the  muddy  and  troubled  waters  of  dogmatism,  an  enforced  anthropomorphic  Deity  and  religious  intolerance.

We  find  this  idea  in  the  tortured  and  barbar-  ous phraseology  of  the  Codex  Nazaraeus,  and  in  the  superb  Neo-Platonic  .language  of  the  Fourth  Gospel  of  the  later  Religion,  5n  the  oldest  Veda  and  *n  the  Avesta,  in  the  Abhidharma,  in  Kapila's  Sankhya,  and  the  Bhagavad  Gita.

We  cannot  attain  Adeptship  and  Nirvana,  Bliss  and  the  "  Kingdom  of  Heaven,"  unless  we  link  ourselves  indissolubly  with  our  Rex  Lux,  the  Lord  of  Splendour  -and  of  Light,  our  immortal  God  within  us.  "  Aham  eva  param  Brahman  " —  "  I  am  verily  the  Supreme  Brahman  " — has  ever  been  the  one  living  truth  in  the  heart  and  mind  of  the  Adepts,  and  it  is  this  which  helps  the  Mystic  to  become  one.

One  must  first  of  all  recognise  one's  own  immortal  Principle,  .and  then  only  can  one  conquer,  or  take  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven  by  violence.

Only  this  has  to  be  achieved  by  the  higher — not  the  middle,  nor  the  third—  man,  the  last  one  being  of  dust.

Nor  can  the  second  man,  the  "  Son  " — on  this  plane,  as  his  "  Father"  is  the  Son  on  a  still  higher  plane — do  anything  without  the  assistance  of  the  first,  the  "  Father."  But  to  succeed  one  has  to  identify  oneself  with  one's  divine  Parent.

The  first  man  is  of  the  earth,  earthy  ;  the  second  [inner,  our  higher]  man  is  the  Lord  from  heaven.

.   .       Behold,  I  show  you  a  mystery  '

Thus  says   Paul,    mentioning   but   the   dual   and   trinitarian    man  for  the  tbetter  comprehension  of  the  non-initiated.

But  this  is  not  all,  for  the  Delphic

1  I.  Cor  ,  xv,  47.  51  FF

82  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

injunction  has  to  be  fulfilled :  man  must  know  himself  in  order  to  become  a  perfect  Adept.

How  few  can  acquire  the  knowledge,  however,  not  merely  in  its  inner  mystical,  but  even  in  its  literal  sense,  for  there  are  two  meanings  in  this  command  of  the  Oracle.

This  is  the  doctrine  of  Buddha  and  the  Bodhisattvas  pure  and  simple.

Such  is  also  the  mystical  sense  of  what  was  said  by  Paul  to  the-  Corinthians  about  their  being  the  "temple  of  God,"  for  this  meant  Esoten-  cally :

Ye  are  the  temple  of  [the,   or  your]  God,  and  the  Spirit  of  [a,  or  your]  God  dwelleth  in  you.

This  carries  precisely  the  same  meaning  as  the  "I  am  verily  Brahman  "  of  the  Veddntin.

Nor  is  the  latter  assertion  more  blasphemous  than  the  Pauline — if  there  were  any  blasphemy  in  either,  which  is  denied.

Only  the  VedSntin,  who  never  refers  to  his  body  as  being  himself,  or  even  a  part  of  himself,  or  aught  else  but  an  illusory  form  for  others  to  see  him  in,  constructs  his  asser-  tion more  openly  and  sincerely  than  was  done  by  Paul.

The  Delphic  command  "Know  thyself"  was  perfectly  comprehensible  to  every  nation  of  old.

So  it  is  now,  save  to  the  Christians,  since,  with  the  exception  of  the  Mussulmans,  it  is  part  and  parcel  of  every  Eastern  relig-  ion, including  the  Kabalisticaily  instructed  Jews.

To  understand  its  full  meaning,  however,  necessitates,  first  of  all,  belief  in  Reincarnation  and  all  its  mysteries ;  not  as  laid  down  in  the  doctrine  of  the  French  Reincarnationists.

of  the  Allan  Kardec  school,  but  as  they  are  expounded  and  taught  by  Esoteric  Philosophy.

Man  must,  in  short,  know  who  he  was,  before  4ie  arrives  at  knowing  what  he  is.  And  how  many  are  there  among  Europeans  who  are  capable  of  developing  within  themselves  an  absolute  belief  in  their  past  and  future  reincarnations,  in  general,  even  as  a  law,  let  alone  mystic  knowledge  of  one's  immediately  precedent  life?  Early  education,  tradition  and  training  of  thought,  everything  is  opposing  itself  during  their  whole  lives  to  such  a  belief.

Cultured  people  have  been  brought  up  in  that  most  pernicious  idea  that  the

1  I.  Cor  ,  HI,  16.  Has  the  reader  ever  meditated  upon  the  suggestive  words,  often  pronounced  bv  Jesus  and  his  Apostles?  "Be  ye  therefore  perfect  as  your  Father  .  .  .  is  perfect "  (Matt.,  v,  48),  says  the  Great  Master,  the  words  are,  "  as  perfect  as  your  Father  which  is  in  heaven,"  being  interpreted  as  meaning  God.

Now  the  utter  absurdity  of  any  man  becoming  as  perfect  as  the  infinite,  all-perfect  omniscient  and  omnipresent  Deity,  is  too  apparent  If  you  accept  it  in  such  a  sense,  Jesus  is  made  to  utter  the  greatest  fallacy.

What  was  Esoterically  meant  is,  "  Your  Father  who  is  above  the  material  and  astral  man,  the  highest  Principle  (save  the  Monad)  within  man,  his  own  personal  God.

or

the  God  of  his  own  personality,  of  whom  he  is  the  '  prison  '  and  the  '  temple.

If  thou  wilt  be

perfect  (i.e.,  an  Adept  and  Initiate)  go  and  sell  that  thou  hast "  (Matt.,  xix,  21).  Every  man  who  desired  to  become  a  neophyte,  a  chela,  then,  as  now.

had  to  take  the  vow  of  poverty.

The  "  Perfect,"  was  the  name  given  to  the  Initiates  of  every  denomination.

Plato  calls  them  by  that  term,  the  Essenes  had  their  "Perfect,"  and  Paul  plainly  states  that  they,  the  Initiates,  can  only  speak  before  other  Adepts.

"We  speak  wisdom  among  them  [only]  that  are  perfect "  (I.  Cor,  11,  6.)

SOME  REASONS  FOR  SECRECY

wide  difference  found  between  the  units  of  one  and  the  same  mankind,  or  even  race,  is  the  result  of  chance  ;  that  the  gulf  between  man  and  man  in  their  respective  social  positions,  birth,  intellect,  physical  and  mental  capacities  — every  one  of  which  qualifications  has  a  direct  influence  on  every  human,  life — that  all  this  is  simply  due  to  blind  hazard,  only  the  most  pious  among  them  finding  equivocal  consolation  in  the  idea  that  it  is  "  the  will  of  God."  They  have  never  analysed,  never  stopped  to  think  of  the  depth  of  the  opprobrium  that  is  thrown  upon  their  God,  once  the  grand  and  most  equit-  able law  of  the  manifold  re-births  of  man  upon  this  earth  is  foolishly  rejected.

Men  and  women  anxious  to  be  regarded  as  Christians,  ofterv  truly  and  sincerely  trying  to  lead  a  Christ-like  life,  have  never  paused  to  reflect  over  the  words  of  their  own  Bible.

"  Art  thou  Elias  ?  "  the  Jewish  priests  and  Levites  asked  the  Baptist.1  Their  Saviour  taught  His  disciples  this  grand  truth  of  the  Esoteric  Philosophy,  but  verily,  if  His  Apostles  compre-  hended it,  no  one  else  seems  to  have  realised  its  true  meaning.

No  ;  not  even  Nicodemus,  who,  to  the  assertion  ;  "  Except  a  man  be  born  again  "  he  cannot  see  the  Kingdom  of  God,"  answers  :  "  How  can  a  man  be  born  when  he  is  old  ?  "  and  is  forthwith  reproved  by  the  remark  :  "  Art  thou  a  master  in  Israel  and  knowest  not  these  things  ?  " — as  no  one  had  a  right  to  call  himself  a  "  Master  "  and  Teacher,  without  having  been  initiated  into  the  mysteries  (a)  of  a  spiritual  re-birth  through  water,  fire  and  spirit,  and  (b)  of  the  re-birth  from  flesh.3  Then  again  what  can  be  a  clearer  expression  as  to  the  doctrine  of  manifold  re-births  than  the  answer  given  by  Jesus  to  the  Sadducees,  "  who  deny  that  there  is  any  resurrection,"  i.e.,  any  re-birth,  since  the  dogma  of  the  resurrection  in  the  flesh  is  now  regarded  as  an  absurdity  even  by  the  intelligent  clergy  :

They    who    shall    be    accounted  worthy  to  obtain  that  world  [Nirvina] 4  .   .   .  neither  marry  .         neither  can  they  die  any  more,

1  John,  .,

-  John,  in  "  Born  "  from  above,  viz.,  from  his  Monad  or  divine  EGO,  the  seventh  Principle,  which  remains  till  the  end  of  the  Kalpa,  the  nucleus  of,  and  at  the  same  time  the  overshadowing  Principle,  as  the  Karanatmd  (Causal  Soul)  of  the  personality  in  every  re-birth.

In  this  sense,  the  sentence  "  born  anew  "  means  "  descends  from  above,"  the  last  two  words  having  no  reference  to  heaven  or  space,  neither  of  which  can  be  limited  or  located,  since  one  is  a  state  and  the  other  infinite,  hence  having  no  cardinal  points  (See  New  Testament,  Revised  Version,  loc.

cit )

3  This  can  have  no  reference  to  Christian  Baptism,  since  there  was  none  in  the  days  of  Nicode-  mus and  he  could  not  therefore  know  anything  of  it,  even  though  a  "  Master  "

4  This  word,  translated  in  the  New  Testament  "  world  "  to  suit  the  official  interpretation,  means,  rather  an  "  age  "  (as  ahown  in  the  Revised  Version)  or  one  of  the  periods  during  the  Manvantara.

a  Kalpa,  or  /Eon.

Esotencally  the  sentence  would  read  .   "He  who  shall  reach,  through  a  series  of  births  and  Karmic  law,  that  state  in  which  Humanity  shall  find  itself  after  the  Seventh  Round  and  the  Seventh  Race,  when  comes  Nirvana,  Moksha.

and  when  man  becomes  '  equal  unto  the  Angels  '  or  Dhyan  Chohans,   is  a   '  son  of  the  resurrection  '  and   '  can  die  no  more  '  ,  then  there  will  be  no  marriage,   as  there  will  be  no  difference  of  sexes  "—a  result  of  our  present  materiality  and  animalism.

84  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

which  shows  that  they  had  already  died,  and  more  than  once.

And  again  :

But  that  the  dead  are  raised  even  Moses  shewed  .  .  when  he  calleth  the  Lord  the  God  of  Abraham,  and  the  God  of  Isaac,  and  the  God  of  Jacob.

But  he  is  not  the  God  of  the  dead  but  of  the  living  '

The  sentence  "  But  that  the  dead  are  raised  "  evidently  applied  to  the  then  actual  re-births  of  the  Jacobs  and  the  Isaacs,  and  not  to  their  future  resurrection  ;  for  in  such  case  they  would  have  been  still  dead  in  the  interim,  and  could  not  be  referred  to  as  "  the  living."

But  the  most  suggestive  of  Christ's  parables  and  "  dark  sayings  "  is  found  in  the  explanation  given  by  him  to  his  Apostles  about  the  blind  man  :

Master,  who  did  sin,  this  man  or  his  parents,  that  he  was  born  blind  ?  Jesus  answered,  Neither  hath  this  [blind,  physical]  man  sinned  nor  his  parents  ,  but  that  the  works  of  [his]  God  should  be  made  manifest  in  him  a

Man  is  the  "tabernacle,"  the  "building"  only,  of  his  God;  and  of  course  it  is  not  the  temple  but  its  inmate — the  vehicle  of  "  God  "  ''' — that  had  sinned  in  a  previous  incarnation,  and  had  thus  brought  the  Karma  of  cecity  upon  the  new  building.

Thus  Jesus  spoke  truly ;  but  to  this  day  his  followers  have  refused  to  understand  the  words  of  wisdom  spoken.

The  Saviour  is  shown  by  his  followers  as  though  he  were  paving,  by  his  words  and  explanation,  the  way  to  a  preconceived  programme  that  had  to  lead  to  an  intended  miracle.

Verily  the  Grand  Martyr  has  remained  thenceforward,  and  for  eighteen  centuries,  the  Victim  crucified  daily  far  more  cruelly  by  his  clerical  disciples  and  lay  followers  than  he  ever  could  have  been  by  his  allegorical  enemies.

For  such  is  the  true  sense  of  the  words  "  that  the  works  of  God  should  be  made  manifest  in  him,"  in  the  light  of  theological  inter-  pretation, and  a  very  undignified  one  it  is,  if  the  Esoteric  explanation  is  rejected.

Doubtless  the  above  will  be  regarded  as  fresh  blasphemy.

Neverthe-  less there  are  a  number  of  Christians  whom  we  know — whose  hearts  go  out  as  strongly  to  their  ideal  of  Jesus,  as  their  souls  are  repelled  from  the  theo-  logical picture  of  the  official  Saviour — who  will  reflect  over  our  explanation  and  find  in  it  no  offence,  but  perchance  a  relief.

1  Luke,  xx,  37-8.  *  John,  .x,  2,

•'  The  conscious  Ego,  or  Fifth  Principle  Manas,  the  vehicle  of  the  divine  Monad  or  "  God."

SECTION

THE    DANGERS    OF    PRACTICAL    MAGIC

MAGIC  is  a  dual  power  :  nothing  is  easier  than  to  turn  it  into  Sorcery  ;  an  evil  thought  suffices  for  it.  Therefore,  while  theoretical  Occultism  is  harmless,  and  may  do  good,  practical  Magic,  or  the  fruits  of  the  Tree  of  Life  and  Knowledge,1  or  otherwise  the  "  Science  of  Good  and  Evil,"  is  fraught  with  dangers  and  perils.

For  the  study  of  theoretical  Occultism  there  are,  no  doubt,  a  number  of  works  that  may  be  read  with  profit,  besides  such  books  as  the  Finer  Forces  of  Nature,  etc.,  the  Zohar,  Sepher  Yetzireh,  The  Book  of  Enoch,  Franck's  Kabbala,  and  many  Hermetic  treatises.

These  are  scarce  in  European  languages,  but  works  in  Latin  by  the  medieval  Philosophers,  generally  known  as  Alchemists  and  Rosicrucians,  are  plentiful.

But  even  the  perusal  of  these  may  prove  dangerous  for  the  unguided  student.

If  approach-  ed without  the  right  key  to  them,  and  if  the  student  is  unfit,  owing  to  mental  incapacity,  for  Magic,  and  is  thus  unable  to  discern  the  Right  from  the  Left  Path,  let  him  take  our  advice  and  leave  this  study  alone  ;  he  will  only  bring  on  himself  and  on  his  family  unexpected  woes  and  sorrows,  never  suspecting  whence  they  come,  nor  what  are  the  powers  awakened  by  his  mind  being  bent  on  them.

Works  for  advanced  students  are  many,  but  these  can  be  placed  at  the  disposal  of  only  sworn  or  "  pledged  "  chelas  (disciples),  those  who  have  pronounced  the  ever-binding  oath,  and  who  are,  therefore,  helped  and  protected.

For  all  other  purposes,  well-intentioned  as  such  works  may  be,  they  can  only  mislead  the  unwary  and  guide  him  im-  perceptibly to  Black  Magic  or  Sorcery — if  to  nothing  worse.

The  mystic  characters,  alphabets  and  numerals  found  in  the  divisions  and  sub-divisions  of  the  Great  Kabalah,  are,  perhaps,  the  most  dangerous  portions

1  Some  Symbologists,  relying  on  the  correspondence  of  numbers  and  the  symbols  of  certain  things  and  personages,  refer  these  "  secrets  "  to  the  mystery  of  generation.

But  it  is  more  than  this  The  glyph  of  the  "  Tree  of  Knowledge  of  Good  and  Evil  "  has  no  doubt  a  phallic  and  sexual  element  in  it,  as  has  the  "  Woman  and  the  Serpent"  ;  but  it  has  also  a  psychical  and  spiritual  significance.

Symbols  are  meant  to  yield  more  than  one  meaning

86  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

in  it,  and  especially  the  numerals.

We  say  dangerous,  because  they  are  the  most  prompt  to  produce  effects  and  results,  and  this  with  or  without  the  experimenter's  will,  even  without  his  knowledge.

Some  students  are  apt  to  doubt  this  statement,  simply  because  after  manipulating  these  numerals  they  have  failed  to  notice  any  dire  physical  manifestation  or  result.

Such  results  would  be  found  the  least  dangerous  :  it  is  the  moral  causes  produced  and  the  various  events  developed  and  brought  to  an  unforeseen  crisis,  that  would  testify  to  the  truth  of  what  is  now  stated  had  the  lay  students  only  the  power  of  discernment.

The  point  of  departure  of  that  special  branch  of  the  Occult  teaching  known  as  the  "Science  of  Correspondences,"  numerical  or  literal  or  alphabetical,  has  for  its  epigraph  with  the  Jewish  and  Christian  Kaba lists,  the  two  mis-interpreted  verses  which  say  that  God

ordered  all  things  in  number,  measure  and  weight  ; '  and  :

He  created  her  in  the  Holy  Ghost,  and  saw  her,  and  numbered  her,  and  measured  her.*

But  the  Eastern  Occultists  have  another  epigraph  :  "  Absolute  Unity,  x,  within  number  and  plurality."  Both  the  Western  and  the  Eastern  students  of  the  Hidden  Wisdom  hold  to  this  axiomatic  truth.

Only  the  latter  are  perhaps  more  sincere  in  their  confessions.

Instead  of  putting  a  mask  on  their  Science,  they  show  her  face  openly,  even  if  they  do  veil  carefully  her  heart  and  soul  before  the  inappreciative  public  and  the  profane,  who  are  ever  ready  to  abuse  the  most  sacred  truths  for  their  own  selfish  ends.

But  Unity  is  the  real  basis  of  the  Occult  Science — physical  and  metaphysical.

This  is  shown  even  by  Eliphas  Levi,  the  learned  Western  Kabalist,  inclined  as  he  is  to  be  rather  Jesuitical.

He  says  :

Absolute  Unity  is  the  supreme  and  final  reason  of  things.

Therefore  that  reason  can  be  neither  one  person,  nor  three  persons  ;  it  is  Reason,  and  pre-eminently  Reason  [ra/son  par  exce//ence].

The  meaning  of  this  Unity  in  Plurality  in  "  God  "  or  Nature,  can  be  solved  only  by  the  means  of  transcendental  methods,  by  numerals,  as  by  the  corres-  pondences between  soul  and  the  Soul.

Names,  in  the  Kabalah  as  in  the  Bible,  such  as  Jehovah,  Adam  Kadmon,  Eve,  Cain,  Abel,  Enoch,  are  all  of  them  more  intimately  connected,  by  geometrical  and  astronomical  relations,  with  Physiology  (or  Phallicism)  than  with  Theology  or  Religion.

Little  as  people  are  as  yet  prepared  to  admit  it,  this  will  be  shown  to  be  a  fact.

If  all  those

1  Wisdom,  xi,  21       Douay  version.

-  E cc/es/ast/cus,  i,  9.     Douay  version.

•'  Dogme  et  Rituel  de  /a  Haute  Magie.

i,  360-1.

THE  DANGERS  OF  PRACTICAL  MAGIC

names  are  symbols  for  things  hidden,  as  well  as  for  those  manifested,  in  the  Bible  as  in  the  Vedas,  their  respective  mysteries  differ  greatly.

Plato's  motto  "  God  geometrises  "  was  accepted  by  both  Aryans  and  Jews;  but  while  the  former  applied  their  Science  of  Correspondences  to  veil  the  most  spiritual  and  sublime  truths  of  Nature,  the  latter  used  their  acumen  to  conceal  only  one —  to  them  the  most  divine — of  the  mysteries  of  Evolution,  namely,  that  of  birth  ^ nd  generation,  and  then  they  deified  the  organs  of  the  latter.

Apart  from  this,  every  cosmogony,  from  the  earliest  to  the  latest,  is  based  upon,  interlinked  with,  and  most  closely  related  to,  numerals  and  geometric  figures.

Questioned  by  an  Initiate,  these  figures  and  numbers  will  yield  numerical  values  based  on  the  integral  values  of  the  Circle — "the  secret  habitat  of  the  ever-invisible  Deity  "  as  the  Alchemists  have  it — as  they  will  yield  every  other  Occult  particular  connected  with  such  mysteries,  whether  anthropographical,  anthropological,  cosmic,  or  psychical.

"  In  reuniting  Ideas  to  Numbers,  we  can  operate  upon  Ideas  in  the  same  way  as  upon  Numbers,  -and  arrive  at  the  Mathematics  of  Truth,"  writes  an  Occultist,  who  shows  his  great  wisdom  in  desiring  to  remain  unknown.

Any  Kabalist  well  acquainted  with  the  Pythagorean  system  of  numerals  and  geometry  can  demonstrate  that  the  metaphysical  views  of  Plato  were  based  upon  the  strictest  mathematical  principles  "True  mathematics,"  says  the  Mag/con,  "  is  some-  thing with  which  all  higher  sciences  are  connected ,  common  mathematics  is  but  a  deceitful  phantasmagoria,  whose  much  praised  infallibility  only  arises  from  this — that  materials,  conditions  and  references  are  made  to  foundation."  .  .

The  cosmological  theory  of  numerals  which  Pythagoras  learned  in  India,  and  from  the  Egyptian  Hierophants,  is  alone  able  to  reconcile  the  two  units,  matter  and  spirit,  and  cause  each  to  demonstrate  the  other  mathematically.

The  sacred  numbers  of  the  universe  in  their  esoteric  combination  can  alone  solve  the  great  problem,  and  explain  the  theory  of  radiation  and  the  cycle  of  the  emanations.

The  lower  orders,  before  they  develop  into  higher  ones,  must  emanate  from  the  higher  spiritual  ones,  and  when  arrived  at  the  turning-point,  be  reabsorbed  into  the  infinite  '

It  is  upon  these  true  Mathematics  that  the  knowledge  of  the  Kosmos  and  of  all  mysteries  rests,  and  to  one  acquainted  with  them,  it  is  the  easiest  thing  possible  to  prove  that  both  Vaidic  and  Biblical  structures  are  based  upon  "  God-  in-Nature  "  and  "  Nature-in-God,"  as  the  radical  law.

Therefore,  this  law — as  everything  else  immutable  and  fixed  in  eternity — could  find  a  correct  expres-  sion only  in  those  purest  transcendental  Mathematics  referred  to  by  Plato,  especially  in  Geometry  as  transcendentally  applied.

Revealed  to  men — we  fear  not  and  will  not  retract  the  expression — in  this  geometrical  and  symbolical  garb,  Truth  has  grown  and  developed  into  additional  symbology,  invented  by  man  for  the  wants  and  better  comprehension  of  the  masses  of  mankind  that

1  Isis  Unveiled,  Vol.

I,  pp.  6-7.

88  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

came  too  late  in  their  cyclic  development  and  evolution  to  have  shared  in  the  primitive  knowledge,  and  would  never  have  grasped  it  otherwise.

If  later  on,  the  clergy — crafty  and  ambitious  of  power  in  every  age — anthropomorphised  and  degraded  abstract  ideals,  as  well  as  the  real  and  divine  Beings  who  do  exist  in  Nature,  and  are  the  Guardians  and  Protectors  of  our  manvantaric  world  and  period,  the  fault  and  guilt  rests  with  those  would-be  leaders,  not  with  the  masses.

But  the  day  has  come  when  the  gross  conceptions  of  our  forefathers  during  the  Middle  Ages  can  no  longer  satisfy  the  thoughtful  religionist.

The  mediasval  Alchemist  and  Mystic  are  now  transformed  into  the  sceptical  Chemist  and  Physicist ;  and  most  of  them  are  found  to  have  turned  away  from  truth,  on  account  of  the  purely  anthropomorphic  ideas,  the  gross  Materialism,  of  the  forms  in  which  it  is  presented  to  them.

Therefore,  future  generations  have  either  to  be  initiated  gradually  into  the  truths  underlying  Exoteric  Religions,  including  their  own,  or  be  left  to  break  the  feet  of  clay  of  the  last  of  the  gilded  idols.

No  educated  man  or  woman  would  turn  away  from  any  of  the  now  called  "superstitions"  which  they  believe  to  be  based  on  nursery  tales  and  ignorance,  if  they  could  only  see  the  basis  of  fact  that  underlies  every  "  super-  stition." But  let  them  once  learn  for  a  certainty  that  there  is  hardly  a  claim  in  the  Occult  Sciences  that  is  not  founded  on  philosophical  and  scientific  facts  in  Nature,  and  they  will  pursue  the  study  of  those  Sciences  with  the  same,  if  not  with  greater,  ardour  than  that  they  have  expended  in  shunning  them.

This  cannot  be  achieved  at  once,  for  to  benefit  mankind  such  truths  have  to  be  revealed  gradually  and  with  great  caution,  the  public  mind  not  being  prepared  for  them.

However  much  the  Agnostics  of  our  age  may  find  themselves  in  the  mental  attitude  demanded  by  modern  Science,  people  are  always  apt  to  cling  to  their  old  hobbies  so  long  as  the  remembrance  of  them  lasts.

They  are  like  the  Emperor  Julian — called  the  Apostate,  because  he  loved  truth  too  welt  to  accept  aught  else — who,  though  in  his  last  Theophany  he  beheld  his  beloved  Gods  as  pale,  worn-out,  and  hardly  discernible  shadows,  nevertheless  clung  to  them.

Let,  then,  the  world  cling  to  its  Gods,  to  whatever  plane  or  realm  they  may  belong.

The  true  Occultist  would  be  guilty  of  high  treason  to  mankind,  were  he  to  break  for  ever  the  old  deities  before  he  could  replace  them  with  the  whole  and  unadulterated  truth — and  this  he  cannot  do  as  yet.

Nevertheless,  the  reader  may  be  allowed  to  learn  at  least  the  alphabet  of  that  truth.

He  may  be  shown,  at  any  rate,  what  the  Gods  and  Goddesses  of  the  Pagans,  denounced  as  demons  by  the  Church,  are  not,  if  he  cannot  learn  the  whole  and  final  truth  as  to  what  they  are.

Let  him  assure  himself  that  the  Hermetic  "  Tres  Matres,"  and  the  "  Three  Mothers  "  of  the  Sepher

THE  DANGERS  OF  PRACTICAL  MAGIC

Yetzireh  are  one  and  the  same  thing  ;  that  they  are  no  Demon -Goddesses,,  but  Light,  Heat,  and  Electricity,  and  then,  perchance,  the  learned  classes  will  spurn  them  no  longer.

After  this,  the  Rosicrucian  Illuminati  may  find  followers  even  in  the  Royal  Academies,  which  will  be  more  prepared,  perhaps,  than  they  are  now,  to  admit  the  grand  truths  of  archaic  Natural  Philosophy,  espe-  cially when  their  learned  members  shall  have  assured  themselves  that,  in  the  dialect  of  Hermes,  the  "  Three  Mothers  "  stand  as  symbols  for  the  whole  of  the  forces  or  agencies  which  have  a  place  assigned  to  them  in  the  modern  system  of  the  "  correlation  of  forces.

"  l  Even  the  polytheism  of  the  "super-  stitious "  Brahman  and  idolater  shows  its  ra/son  d'etre,  since  the  three  Shaktis  of  the  three  great  Gods,  Brahma,  Vishnu,  and  Shiva,  are  identical  with  the  "  Three  Mothers  "  of  the  monotheistic  Jew.

The  whole  of  the  ancient  religious  and  mystical  literature  is  symbolical.

The  Books  of  Hermes,  the  Zofiar,  the  Ya-Yakav,  the  Egyptian  Boole  of  the-  Dead,  the  Vec/as,  the  Upanishads,  and  the  Bible,  are  as  full  of  symbolism  as  are  the  Nabathean  revelations  of  the  Chaldaic  Qu-tamy  ;  it  is  a  loss  of  time  to  ask  which  is  the  earliest ;  all  are  simply  different  versions  of  the  one  primeval  record  of  prehistoric  knowledge  and  revelation.

The  first  four  chapters  of  Genesis  contain  the  synopsis  of  all  the  rest  of  the  Pentateuch,  being  only  the  various  versions  of  the  same  thing  in  different  allegorical  and  symbolical  applications.

Having  discovered  that  the  Pyramid1  of  Cheops  with  all  its  measurements  is  to  be  found  contained  in  its  minutest  details  in  the  structure  of  Solomon's  Temple  ;  and  having  ascertained  that  the  biblical  names  Shem,  Ham  and  Japhet  are  determinative

of  pyramid  measures,  in  connection  with  the  600-year  period  of  Noah  and  the  500-year  period  of  Shem,  Ham  and  Japhet,  .  .  the  term  "Sons  of  Elohim "  andi  "  Daughters  "  of  H-Adam,  [are]  for  one  thing  astronomical  terms

the  author  of  the  very  curious  work  already  mentioned — a  book  very  little  known  in  Europe,  we  regret  to  say — seems  to  see  nothing  in  his  discovery  beyond  the  presence  of  Mathematics  and  Metrology  in  the  Bible.

He  also  arrives  at  most  unexpected  and  extraordinary  conclusions,  such  as  are  very  little  warranted  by  the  facts  discovered.

His  impression  seems  to  be  that  because  the  Jewish  biblical  names  are  all  astronomical,  therefore  the  Scriptures  of  all  the  other  nations  can  be  "  only  this  and  nothing  more."  But  this  is  a

1  "  Synesius  mentions  books  of  stone  which  he  found  in  the  temple  of  Memphis,  on  one  of  which  was  engraved  the  following  sentence  '  One  nature  delights  in  another,  one  nature  overcome*  another,  one  nature  overrules  another,  and  the  whole  of  them  are  one

"  The  inherent  restlessness  of  matter  is  embodied  in  the  saying  of  Hermes  '  Action  is  the  life  of  Phta  '  ;  and  Orpheus  calls  nature  7ro\v/J,ij%aVo<i  ftaTT/p,  '  the  mother  that  makes  many  things,'  or  the  ingenious,  the  contriving,  the  inventive  mother  " — /sis  Unveiled,  I,  p.

•  The  Source  of  Measures,  p.  x

90  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

great  mistake  of  the  erudite  and  wonderfully  acute  author  of  The  Source  of  Measures,  if  he  really  thinks  so.  The  "  Key  to  the  Hebrew-Egyptian  Mystery  "  unlocks  but  a  certain  portion  of  the  hieratic  writings  of  these  two  nations,  and  leaves  those  of  other  peoples  untouched.

His  idea  is  that  the  Kabalah  "  is  only  that  sublime  Science  upon  which  Masonry  is  based  "  ;  in  fact  he  regards  Masonry  as  the  substance  of  the  Kabalah,  and  the  latter  as  the  "  rational  basis  of  the  Hebrew  text  of  Holy  Writ."  About  this  we  will  not  argue  with  the  author.

But  why  should  ail  those  who  may  have  found  in  the  Kabalah  something  beyond  "  the  sublime  Science  "  upon  which  Masonry  is  alleged  to  have  been  built,  be  held  up  to  public  contempt  ?

In  its  exclusiveness  and  one-sidedness  such  a  conclusion  is  pregnant  with  future  misconceptions  and  is  absolutely  wrong.

In  its  uncharitable  criticism  n't  throws  a  slur  upon  the  "  Divine  Science  "  itself.

The  Kabalah  is  indeed  "  of  the  essence  of  Masonry,"  but  it  is  dependent  on  Metrology  only  in  one  of  its  aspects,  the  less  Esoteric,  as  even  Plato  made  no  secret  that  the  Deity  was  ever  geometrising.

For  the  uninitiated,  however  learned  and  endowed  with  genius  they  may  be,  the  Kabalah,  which  treats  only  of  "  the  garment  of  God,"  or  the  veil  and  cloak  of  truth,

is  built  from  the  ground  upward  with  a  practical  application  to  present  uses  '

Or  in  other  words  represents  an  exact  Science  only  on  the  terrestrial  plane.

To  the  initiated,  the  Kabalistic  Lord  descends  from  the  primeval  Race,  generated  spiritually  from  the  "  Mind-born  Seven."  Having  reached  the  Earth,  the  Divine  Mathematics — a  synonym  for  Magic  in  his  day,  as  we  are  told  by  Josephus — veiled  her  face.

Hence  the  most  important  secret  yet  yielded  by  her  in  our  modern  day  is  the  identity  of  the  old  Roman  measures  and  the  present  British  measures,  of  the  Hebrew- Egyptian  cubit  and  the  Masonic  inch.

The  discovery  is  most  wonderful,  and  has  led  to  further  and  minor  un-  veilings  of  various  riddles  in  reference  to  Symbology  and  biblical  names.

It  is  thoroughly  understood  and  proven,  as  shown  by  Nachanides,  that  in  the  days  of  Moses  the  initial  sentence  in  Genesis  was  made  to  read  B'rash  ithbara  Elohim,  or  "In  the  head-source  [or  Mulaprakiti — the  Rootless  Root]  developed  [or  evolved]  the  Gods  [Elohim],  the  heavens  and  the  earth  "  :  whereas  it  is  now,  owing  to  the  Masora  and  theological  cunning,  transformed  into  B'rashith  bara  Elohim,  or,  •«  In  the  beginning  God  created  the  heavens  and  the  earth  "  — which  word  juggling  alone  has  led  to  materialistic  anthropomorphism  and  dualism.

How  many  more  similar  instances  may  not  be  found  in  the  Bible,

1  Masonic  Review,  July,  1886.  -  See  The  Source  of  Measures,  pp.  47-50,  et  pass

THE  DANGERS  OF  PRACTICAL  MAGIC

the  last  and  latest  of  the  Occult  works  of  antiquity  ?  There  is  no  longer  any  doubt  in  the  mind  of  the  Occultist,  that,  notwithstanding  its  form  and  outward  meaning,  the  8/b/e — as  explained  by  the  Zohar  or  M/drasn,  the  Yetzireh  (Book  of  Creation)  and  the  Commentary  on  the  Ten  Seph/rot/i  (by  Azariel  Ben  Manachem  of  the  12th  century) — is  part  and  parcel  of  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE  of  the  Aryans,  which  explains  in  the  same  manner  the  Vedas  and  all  other  alle-  gorical books.

The  Zohar,  in  teaching  that  the  Impersonal  One  Cause  mani-  fests in  the  Universe  through  Its  Emanations,  the  Sephiroth — that  Universe  being  in  its  totality  simply  the  veil  woven  from  the  Deity's  own  substance — is  undeniably  the  copy  and  faithful  echo  of  the  earliest  Vedas.

Taken  by  itself,  without  the  additional  help  of  the  Vaidic  and  of  Brahmanical  literature  in  general,  the  Bible  will  never  yield  the  universal  secrets  of  Occult  Nature.

The  <:ubits,  inches,  and  measures  of  this  physical  plane  will  never  solve  the  prob-  lems of  the  world  on  the  spiritual  plane — for  Spirit  can  neither  be  weighed  mor  measured.

The  working  out  of  these  problems  is  reserved  for  the  "  mystics  and  the  dreamers  "  who  alone  are  capable  of  accomplishing  it.

Moses  was  an  initiated  priest,  versed  in  all  the  mysteries  and  the  Occult  knowledge  of  the  Egyptian  temples — hence  thoroughly  acquainted  with  primitive  Wisdom.

It  is  in  the  latter  that  the  symbolical  and  astronomical  meaning  of  that  "  Mystery  of  Mysteries,"  the  Great  Pyramid,  has  to  be  sought.

And  having  been  so  familiar  with  the  geometrical  secrets  that  lay  •concealed  for  long  aeons  in  her  strong  bosom — the  measurements  and  pro-  portions of  the  Kosmos,  our  little  Earth  included — what  wonder  that  he  should  have  made  use  of  his  knowledge  ?  The  Esoterism  of  Egypt  was  that  of  the  whole  world  at  one  time.

During  the  long  ages  of  the  Third  Race  it  had  been  the  heirloom,  in  common,  of  the  whole  of  mankind,  received  from  their  In-  structors, the  "  Sons  of  Light,"  the  primeval  Seven.

There  was  a  time  also  when  the  Wisdom- Religion  was  not  symbolical,  for  it  became  Esoteric  only  gradually,  the  change  being  necessitated  by  misuse  and  by  the  Sorcery  of  the  Atlanteans.

For  it  was  the  "  misuse  "  only,  and  not  the  use,  of  the  divine  gift  that  led  the  men  of  the  Fourth  Race  to  Black  Magic  and  Sorcery,  and  finally  to  become  "  forgetful  of  Wisdom  "  ;  while  those  of  the  Fifth  Race,  the  inheritors  of  the  Rishis  of  the  Treta  Yuga,  used  their  powers  to  atrophize  such  gifts  in  mankind  in  general,  and  then,  as  the  "  Elect  Root,"  dispersed.

Those  -who  escaped  the  "  Great  Flood  "  preserved  only  its  memory,  and  a  belief  founded  on  the  knowledge  of  their  direct  fathers  of  one  remove,  that  such  a  Science  existed,  and  was  now  jealously  guarded  by  the  "  Elect  Root  "  exalted  by  Enoch.

But  there  must  again  come  a  time  when  man  shall  once  more  become  what  he  was  during  the  second  Yuga  (age),  when  his  probationary

92  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

cycle  shall  be  over  and  he  shall  gradually  become  what  he  was — semi-  corporeal  and  pure.

Does  not  Plato,  the  Initiate,  tell  us  in  the  Phaedrus  all  that  man  once  was,  and  that  which  he  may  yet  again  become  :

Before  man's  spirit  sank  into  sensuality  and  became  embodied  through  the  loss-  of  his  wings,  he  lived  among  the  Gods  in  the  airy  spiritual  world  where  everything  is  true  and  pure  '

Elsewhere  he  speaks  of  the  time  when  men  did  not  perpetuate  them-  selves, but  lived  as  pure  spirits.

Let  those  men  of  Science  who  feel  inclined  to  laugh  at  this,  themselves  unravel  the  mystery  of  the  origin  of  the  first  man.

Unwilling  that  his  chosen  people — chosen  by  him — should  remain  as  grossly  idolatrous  as  the  profane  masses  that  surrounded  them,  Moses  utilised  his  knowledge  of  the  cosmogonical  mysteries  of  the  Pyramid,  to  build  upon  it  the  Genesiacal  Cosmogony  in  symbols  and  glyphs.

This  was  more  accessible  to  the  minds  of  hoi  polloi  than  the  abstruse  truths  taught  to  the  educated  in.  the  sanctuaries.

He  invented  nothing  but  the  outward  garb,  added  not  one  iota  ,  but  in  this  he  merely  followed  the  example  of  older  nations  and  Initiates.

If  he  clothed  the  grand  truths  revealed  to  him  by  his  Hierophant  under  the  most  ingenious  imagery,  he  did  it  to  meet  the  requirements  of  the  Israelites  ;  that  stiff-necked  race  would  accept  of  no  God  unless  He  were  as  anthropo-  morphic as  those  of  the  Olympus ;  and  he  himself  failed  to  foresee  the  times  when  highly  educated  statesmen  would  be  defending  the  husks  of  the  fruit  of  wisdom  that  grew  and  developed  in  him  on  Mount  Sinai,  when  communing  with  his  own  personal  God — his  divine  Self.

Moses  understood  the  great  danger  of  delivering  such  truths  to  the  selfish,  for  he  understood  the  fable  of  Prometheus  and  remembered  the  past.

Hence,  he  veiled  them  from  the  pro-  fanation of  public  gaze  and  gave  them  out  allegorically.

And  this  is  why  his  biographer  says  of  him,  that  when  he  descended  from  Sinai,

Moses  wist  not  that  the  skin  of  his  face  shone          and  he  put  a  veil  upon  his  face

And  so  he  "  put  a  veil  "  upon  the  face  of  his  Pentateuch  ;  and  to  such  an  extent  that,  -using  orthodox  chronology,  only  3376  years  after  the  event  people  begin  to  acquire  a  conviction  that  it  is  "a  veil  indeed."  It  is  not  the  face  of  God  or  even  of  a  Jehovah  shining  through  ;  not  even  the  face  of  Moses,  but  verily  the  faces  of  the  later  Rabbis

No  wonder  if  Clemens  wrote  in  the  Stromata  that :

Similar,  then,  to  the  Hebrew  enigmas  in  respect  to  concealment,  are  those  of  the  Egyptians  also.'

1  See  Gary's  translation,  pp    322-3  -  Exodus,  xxxtv.

29.  33.

•<  Op  at.,  Vol.

II,  Bk  V.  ch.  vii.

p

[This  section  is  essentially,  often  verbally,  the  same  as  half  of  Section  li  in  the  1886  MS._Ed.]

SECTION

OLD  WINE  IN  NEW  BOTTLES

IT  is  more  than  likely  that  the  Protestants,  in  the  days  of  the  Reformation,  knew  nothing  of  the  true  origin  of  Christianity,  or,  to  be  more  explicit  and  correct,  of  Latin  Ecclesiasticism.

Nor  is  it  probable  that  the  Greek  Church  knew  much  of  it,  the  separation  between  the  two  having  occurred  at  a  time  when,  in  the  struggle  for  political  power,  the  Latin  Church  was  securing,  at  any  cost,  the  alliance  of  the  highly  educated,  the  ambitious  and  influential  Pagans,  while  these  were  willing  to  assume  the  outward  appearance  of  the  new  worship,  provided  they  were  themselves  kept  in  power.

There  is  no  need  to  remind  the  reader  here  of  the  details  of  that  struggle,  well-known  to  every  educated  man  It  is  certain  that  the  highly  cultured  Gnostics  and  their  -leaders — such  men  as  Saturnilus,  an  uncompromising  ascetic,  as  Marcion,  Valentinus,  Basilides,  Menander  and  Cerinthus — were  not  stigmatised  by  the  (now)  Latin  Church  because  they  were  heretics,  nor  because  their  tenets  and  practices  were  indeed  "  ob  turp/tud/nem  portentosam  n/m/um  et  horribilem,"  11  monstrous,  revolting  abominations,"  as  Baronius  says  of  those  of  Carpo-  crates  ;  but  simply  because  they  knew  too  much  of  fact  and  truth.

Kenneth  R.  H.  Mackenzie  correctly  remarks  :

They  were  stigmatised  by  the  later  Roman  Church  because  they  came  into  conflict  with  the  purer  Church  of  Christianity— the  possession  of  which  was  usurped  by  the  Bishops  of  Rome,  but  which  original  continues  in  its  docility  towards  the  founder,  in  the  Primitive  Orthodox  Greek  Church  '

Unwilling  to  accept  the  responsibility  of  gratuitous  assumptions,  the  writer  deems  it  best  to  prove  this  inference  by  more  than  one  personal  and  defiant  admission  of  an  ardent  Roman  Catholic  writer,  evidently  entrusted  with  the  delicate  task  by  the  Vatican.

The  Marquis  de  Mirville  makes  desperate  efforts  to  explain  in  the  Catholic  interest  certain  remarkable  discoveries  in  Archaeology  and  Palaeography,  though  the  Church  is  cleverly

1  Jhe  Royal  Masonic  Cyclopaedia,  under  '   Gnosticism

94  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

made  to  remain  outside  of  the  quarrel  and  defence.

This  is  undeniably  shown  by  his  ponderous  volumes  addressed  to  the  Academy  of  France  between  1803  and  1865.  Seizing  the  pretext  of  drawing  the  attention  of  the  materialistic  "  Immortals  "  to  the  "  epidemic  of  Spiritualism,"  the  invasion  of  Europe  and  America  by  a  numberless  host  of  Satanic  forces,  he  directs  his  efforts  towards  proving  the  same,  by  giving  the  full  Genealogies  and  the  Theogony  of  the  Christian  and  Pagan  Deities,  and  by  drawing  parallels  between  the  two.

All  such  wonderful  likenesses  and  identities  are  only  "  seeming  and  superficial,"  he  assures  the  reader.

Christian  symbols,  and  even  characters,  Christ,  the  Virgin,  Angels  and  Saints,  he  tells  them,  were  all  personated  centuries  beforehand  by  the  fiends  of  hell,  in  order  to  discredit  eternal  truth  by  their  ungodly  copies.

By  their  knowledge  of  futurity  the  devils  anticipated  events,  having  "  discovered  the  secrets  of  the  Angels."  Heathen  Deities,  all  the  Sun-Gods  named  Soters — Saviours — born  of  immacu-  late mothers  and  dying  a  violent  death,  were  only  Ferouers ' — as  they  were  called  by  the  Zoroastrians — the  demon-ante-dated  copies  (copies  anticipes)  of  the  Messiah  to  come.

The  danger  of  recognition  of  such  facsimiles  had  indeed  lately  become  dangerously  great.

It  had  lingered  threateningly  in  the  air,  hanging  like  a  sword  of  Damocles  over  the  Church,  since  the  days  of  Voltaire,  Dupuis  and  other  writers  on  similar  lines.

The  discoveries  of  the  Egyptologists,  the  finding  of  Assyrian  and  Babylonian  pre-Mosaic  relics  bearing  the  legend  of  Moses  "  and  especially  the  many  rationalistic  works  published  in  England,  such  as  Supernatural  Religion,  made  recognition  unavoidable  Hence  the  appearance  of  Protestant  and  Roman  Catholic  writers  deputed  to  explain  the  inexplicable  ;

1  In  the  Ferouers  and  Devs  of  Jacobi  (Letters  F  and  D  )  the  word  "  Ferouer  "  is  explained  in  the  following  manner  The  Ferouer  is  a  part  of  the  creature  (whether  man  or  animal)  of  which  it  is  the  type  and  which  it  survives  It  is  the  Nous  of  the  Greeks,  therefore  divine  and  immortal,  and  thus  can  hardly  be  the  Devil  or  the  satanic  copy  De  Mirville  would  represent  it  (see  Memoires  de  I'Academie  des  Inscriptions,  Vol  XXXVII,  p  623,  and  chap  xxxix  p.  749).  Foucher  contradicts  him  entirely.

The  Ferouer  was  never  the  "principle  of  sensations,"  but  always  referred  to  the  most  divine  and  pure  portion  of  Man's  Ego — the  spiritual  principle.

Anquetil  says  that  the  Ferouer  is  the  purest  portion  of  man's  soul.

The  Persian  Dev  is  the  antithesis  of  the  Ferouer,  for  the  Dev  has  been  transformed  by  Zoroaster  into  the  Genius  of  Evil  (whence  the  Christian  Devil),  but  even  the  Dev  is  only  finite  ,  for  having  become  possessed  of  the  soul  of  man  by  usurpation,  it  will  have  to  leave  it  at  the  great  day  of  Retribution  The  Dev  obsesses  the  soul  of  the  defunct  for  three  days,  during  which  the  soul  wanders  about  the  spot  at  which  it  was  forcibly  separated  from  its  body  ,  the  Ferouer  ascends  to  the  region  of  eternal  Light.

It  was  an  unfortunate  idea  that  made  the  noble  Marquis  de  Mirville  imagine  the  Ferouer  to  be  a  "satanic  copy"  of  a  divine  original  By  calling  all  the  Gods  of  the  Pagans-  Apollo,  Osiris,  Brahmd,  Ormazd,  Bel.

etc  .  the  "Ferouers  of  Christ  and  of  the  chief  Angels,"  he  merely  exhibits  the  God  and  the  Angels  he  would  honour  as  inferior  to  the  Pagan  Gods,  as  man  is  inferior  to  his  Soul  and  Spirit .  since  the  Ferouer  is  the  immortal  part  of  the  mortal  being  of  which  it  is  the  type  and  which  it  survives  Perchance  the  poor  author  is  unconsciously  prophetic ,  and  Apollo,  Brahma,  Ormazd.

Osiris,  etc  ,  are  destined  to  survive  and  replace — as  eternal  cosmic  verities  —the  evanescent  fictions  about  the  God.

Christ  and  Angels  of  the  Latin  Church  !

-  See  George  Smith's  Babylon  and  other  works.

OLD  WINE  IN  NEW  BOTTLES

to  reconcile  the  fact  of  Divine  Revelation  with  the  mystery  that  the  divine  personages,  rites,  dogmas  and  symbols  of  Christianity  were  so  often  identical  with  those  of  the  several  great  heathen  religions.

The  former — the  Protestant  defenders — -tried  to  explain  it,  on  the  ground  of  "  prophetic,  precursory  ideas  "  ;  the  Latinists,  such  as  De  Mirville,  by  inventing  a  double  set  of  Angels  and  Gods,  the  one  divine  and  true,  the  other — the  earlier — "  copies  ante-dating  the  originals  "  and  due  to  a  clever  plagiarism  by  the  Evil  One  The  Protestant  stratagem  is  an  old  one,  that  of  the  Roman  Catholics  is  so  old  that  it  has  been  forgotten,  and  is  as  good  as  new.

Dr.  Lundy's  Monumental  Christianity  and  A  Miracle  in  Stone  belong  to  the  first  attempts  ;  De  Mirville 's  Pneumatologie  [Des  Espr/ts]  to  the  second.

In  India  and  China,  every  such  effort  on  the  part  of  the  Scotch  and  other  missionaries  ends  in  laughter,  and  does  no  harm  ;  the  plan  devised  by  the  Jesuits  is  more  serious  De  Mirville's.  volumes  are  thus  very  important,  as  they  proceed  from  a  source  which  has  undeniably  the  greatest  learning  of  the  age  at  its  service,  and  this  coupled  with  all  the  craft  and  casuistry  that  the  sons  of  Loyola  can  furnish.

The  Marquis  de  Mirville  was  evidently  helped  by  the  acutest  minds  in  the  service  of  Rome.

He  begins  not  only  by  admitting  the  justice  of  every  imputation  and  charge  made  against  the  Latin  Church  as  to  the  originality  of  her  dogmas,  but  by  taking  a  seeming  delight  in  anticipating  such  charges  ;  for  he  points  to  every  dogma  of  Christianity  as  having  existed  in  Pagan  rituals  in  Antiquity.

The  whole  Pantheon  of  Heathen  Deities  is  passed  in  re-  view by  him,  and  each  is  shown  to  have  had  some  point  of  resemblance  with  the  Trinitarian  personages  and  Mary.

There  is  hardly  a  mystery,  a  dogma,  or  a  rite  in  the  Latin  Church  that  is  not  shown  by  the  author  as  having  been  "  parodied  by  the  Curvati  " — the  "  Curved,"  the  Devils.

All  this  being  admitted  and  explained,  the  Symbologists  ought  to  be  silenced.

And  so  they  would  be,  if  there  were  no  materialistic  critics  to  reject  such  omnipotency  of  the  Devil  in  this  world.

For,  if  Rome  admits  the  likenesses,  she  also  claims  the  right  of  judgment  between  the  true  and  the  false  Avatara,  the  real  and  the  unreal  God,  between  the  original  and  the  copy — though  the  copy  precedes  the  original  by  millenniums.

Our  author  proceeds  to  argue  that  whenever  the  missionaries  try  to  convert  an  idolater,  they  are  invariably  answered  :

We  had  our  Crucified  before  yours.

What  do  you  come  to  show  us  ?  '  Again,  what  should  we  gain  by  denying  the  mysterious  side  of  this  copy,  under  the  plea  that  according  to  Weber  all  the  present  Puranas  are  remade  from  older  ones,  since  here  we

1  This  is  as  fanciful   as  it  is  arbitrary      Where  is  the  Hindu  or  Buddhist  who  would  speak  of  his  "Crucified"?

96  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

have  in  the  same  order  of  personages  a  positive  precedence  which  no  one  would  ever  think  of  contesting.

And  the  author  instances  Buddha,  Krishna,  Apollo,  etc.

Having  admitted  all  this,  he  escapes  the  difficulty  in  this  wise  :

The  Church  Fathers,  however,  who  recognized  their  own  property  under  all  such  sheep's  clothing  knowing  by  means  of  the  Gospel  all  the  ruses  of  the

pretended  spirits  of  light ,  the  Fathers,  we  say,  meditating  upon  the  decisive  words,  "  all  that  ever  came  before  me  are  robbers  "  (John,  x.  8),  did  not  hesitate  in  recogniz-  ing the  Occult  agency  at  work,  the  general  and  superhuman  direction  given  beforehand  to  falsehood,  the  universal  attribute  and  environment  of  all  these  false  Gods  of  the  nations  ,  "  omnes  cf/7  gentium  daemonia  (elilim)  "  (Psalm,  xcvi )  '

With  such  a  policy  everything  is  made  easy.

There  is  not  one  glaring  resemblance,  not  one  fully  proven  identity,  that  could  not  thus  be  made  away  with.

The  above-quoted  cruel,  selfish,  self-glorifying  words,  placed  by  John  in  the  mouth  of  Him  who  was  meekness  and  charity  personified,  could  never  have  been  pronounced  by  Jesus.

The  Occultists  reject  the  imputation  indignantly,  and  are  prepared  to  defend  the  man  as  against  the  God,  by  showing  whence  come  the  words  plagiarised  by  the  author  of  the  Fourth  Gospel.

They  are  taken  bodily  from  the  "  Prophecies  "  in  the  Book  of  Enoch.

The  evidence  on  this  head  of  the  learned  biblical  scholar,  Archbishop  Laurence,  and  of  the  author  of  the  Evolution  of  Christianity,  who  edited  the  translation,  may  be  brought  forward  to  prove  the  fact.

On  the  last  page  of  the  Introduc-  tion to  the  Book  of  Enoch  is  found  the  following  passage

The  parable  of  the  sheep  rescued  by  the  good  Shepherd  from  hireling  guardians  and  ferocious  wolves,  is  obviously  borrowed  by  the  fourth  Evangelist  from  Enoch,  Ixxxix,  in  which  the  author  depicts  the  shepherds  as  killing  and  destroying  the  sheep  before  the  advent  of  their  Lord,  and  thus  discloses  the  true  meaning  of  that  hitherto  mysterious  passage  in  the  Johannme  parable  "  All  that  ever  came  before  me  are  thieves  and  robbers  " --language  in  which  we  now  detect  an  obvious  reference  to  the  allegorical  shepherds  of  Enoch

"  Obvious  "  truly,  and  something  else  besides  For,  if  Jesus  pronounced  the  words  in  the  sense  attributed  to  him,  then  he  must  have  read  the  Book  of  Enoch — a  purely  Kabalistic,  Occult  work,  and  he  therefore  recognised  the  worth  and  value  of  a  treatise  now  declared  apocryphal  by  his  Churches.

Moreover,  he  could  not  have  been  ignorant  that  these  words  belonged  to  the  oldest  ritual  of  Initiation.1  And  if  he  had  not  read  it,  and  the  sentence

1  Op   c.t  .  «v,  237  -  Loc   c.t  ,

'"Q      Who  knocks  at  the  door  ?

A      The  good  cowherd

Q  •  Who  preceded  thee  ?

A      The  three  robbers

Q.     Who  follows  thee  ?

A      The  three  murderers,"  etc  ,  etc

Now  this  is  the  conversation  that  took  place  between  the  priest-initiators  and  the  candidates  for  initiation  during  the  mysteries  enacted  in  the  oldest  sanctuaries  of  the  Himalayan  fastnesses.

The

OLD  WINE  IN  NEW  BOTTLES

.belongs  to  John,  or  whoever  wrote  the  Fourth  Gospel,  then  what  reliance  can  be  placed  on  the  authenticity  of  other  sayings  and  parables  attributed  to  the  Christian  Saviour  ?

Thus,  De  Mirville's  illustration  is  an  unfortunate  one.

Every  other  proof  brought  by  the  Church  to  show  the  infernal  character  of  the  ante-ahd-anti-  Christian  copyists  may  be  as  easily  disposed  of.  This  is  perhaps  unfortunate,  but  it  is  a  fact,  nevertheless — Magna  est  veritas  et  prevalebit  [Great  is  truth  and  will  prevail.]

The  above  is  the  answer  of  the  Occultists  to  the  two  parties  who  charge  them  incessantly,  the  one  with  "  Superstition,"  and  the  other  with  "  Sorcery."  To  those  our  Brothers  who  are  Christians,  and  twit  us  with  the  secrecy  imposed  upon  the  Eastern  Chelas,  adding  invariably  that  their  own  "  Book  of  God  "  is  "  an  open  volume  "  for  all  "  to  read,  understand,  and  be  saved,"  we  would  reply  by  asking  them  to  study  what  we  have  just  said  in  this  Section,  and  then  to  refute  it — if  they  can.

There  are  very  few  in  our  days  who  are  still  prepared  to  assure  their  readers  that  the  Bible  had

God   for   its  author,  salvation  for  its  end,  and  truth  without  any  mixture  of  error  for  its  matter

Could  Locke  be  asked  the  question  now,  he  would  perhaps  be  unwilling  to  repeat  again  that  the  Bible  is

all  pure,  all  sincere,  nothing  too  much,  nothing  wanting

The  Bible,  if  it  is  not  to  be  shown  to  be  the  very  reverse  of  all  this,  sadly  needs  an  interpreter  acquainted  with  the  doctrines  of  the  East,  as  they  .are  to  be  found  in  its  secret  volumes  ,  nor  is  it  safe  now,  after  Archbishop  Laurence's  translation  of  the  Book  of  Enoch,  to  cite  Cowper  and  assure  us  that  the  Bible

gives  a  light  to  every  age,  It  gives,  but  borrows  none.

for  it  does  borrow,  and  that  very  considerably ,  especially  in  the  opinion  of  those  who,  ignorant  of  its  symbolical  meaning  and  of  the  universality  of  the  truths  underlying  and  concealed  in  it,  are  able  to  judge  only  from  its  dead-  letter  appearance  It  is  a  grand  volume,  a  master-piece  composed  of  clever,  ingenious  fables  containing  great  verities  ;  but  it  reveals  the  latter  only  to  those  who,  like  the  Initiates,  have  a  key  to  its  inner  meaning ,  a  tale  sublime  in  its  morality  and  didactics  truly — still  a  tale  and  an  allegory ;  a  repertory  of

•ceremony  is  still  performed  to  this  day  in  one  of  the  most  ancient  temples  in  a  secluded  spot  of  Nepal  It  originated  with  the  Mysteries  of  the  first  Krishna,  passed  to  the  First  Tirthankara  and  ended  with  Buddha,  and  is  called  the  Kurukshetra  rite,  being  enacted  as  a  memorial  of  the  great  battle  and  death  of  the  divine  Adept  It  is  not  Masonry,  but  an  initiation  into  the  Occult  teachings  of  that  Hero  —Occultism,  pure  and  simple  FF

98  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

invented  personages  in  its  older  Jewish  portions,  and  of  dark  sayings  and  parables  in  its  later  additions,  and  thus  quite  misleading  to  anyone  ignorant  of  its  Esotericism.

Moreover  it  is  Astrolatry  and  Sabean  worship,  pure  and  simple,  that  is  to  be  found  in  the  Pentateuch  when  it  is  read  exoterically,  and  Archaic  Science  and  Astronomy  to  a  most  wonderful  degree,  when  interpreted  — Esoterically.

SECTION

THE  BOOK  OF  ENOCH  THE  ORIGIN  AND  THE  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIANITY

WHILE  making   a   good   deal   of  the  Mercavah,  the  Jews,   or   rather   their  synagogues,   rejected  the  Book   of  Enoch,  either  because  it  was  not  included  from  the  first  in  the  Hebrew  Canon,  or  else,  as  Tertullian  thought,  it  was  Disavowed  by  the  Jews  like  all  other  Scripture  which  speaks  of  Christ.

But  neither  of  these  reasons  was  the  real  one.

The  Synedrion  would  have  nothing  to  do  with  it,  simply  because  it  was  more  of  a  magic  than  a  purely  kabalistic  work.

The  present  day  Theologians  of  both  Latin  and  Protestant  Churches  class  it  among  apocryphal  productions,  nevertheless  the  New  Testament,  especially  in  the  Acts  and  Epistles,  teems  with  ideas  and  doctrines,  now  accepted  and  established  as  dogmas  by  the  infallible  Roman  and  other  Churches,  and  even  with  whole  sentences  taken  bodily  from  Enoch,  or  the  "  pseudo-Enoch,"  who  wrote  under  that  name  in  Aramaic  or  Syro-  Chaldaic,  as  asserted  by  Bishop  Laurence,  the  translator  of  the  Ethiopian  text.

The  plagiarisms  are  so  glaring  that  the  author  of  The  Evolution  of  Chris-  tianity, who  edited  Bishop  Laurence's  translation,  was  compelled  to  make  some  suggestive  remarks  in  his  Introduction.

On  internal  evidence 2  this  book  is  found  to  have  been  written  before  the  Christian  period  (whether  two  or  twenty  centuries  does  not  matter).  As  correctly  argued  by  the  Editor,  it  is

either  the  inspired  forecast  of  a  great  Hebrew  prophet,  predicting  with  miracu-  lous accuracy  the  future  teaching  of  Jesus  of  Nazareth,  or  the  Semitic  romance  from  which  the  latter  borrowed  His  conceptions  of  the  triumphant  return  of  the  Son  of  man,  to  occupy  a  judicial  throne  in  the  midst  of  rejoicing  saints  and  trembling  sinners,  expectant  of  everlasting  happiness  or  eternal  fire  ;  and  whether  these  celestial  visions

1  Book  of  Enoch,  Archbishop  Laurence's  translation      Introduction,  p  v

-  The  Book  of  Enoch  was  unknown  to  Europe  for  a  thousand  years,  when  Bruce  found  m  Abyssinia  some  copies  of  it  in  Ethiopic  ,  it  was  translated  by  Archbishop  Laurence  in  1821,  from  the  text  in  the  Bodleian  Library,  Oxford

100  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

be  accepted  as  human  or  Divine,  they  have  exercised  so  vast  an  influence  on  the  destinies  of  mankind  for  nearly  two  thousand  years  that  candid  and  impartial  seekers  after  religious  truth  can  no  longer  delay  enquiry  into  the  relationship  of  the  Book  of  Enoch  with  the  revelation,  or  the  evolution,  of  Christianity

The  Book  of  Enoch

also  records  the  supernatural  control  of  the  elements,  through  the  action  of  individual  angels  presiding  over  the  winds,  the  sea,  hail,  frost,  dew,  the  lightning's  flash,  and  reverberating  thunder.

The  names  of  the  principal  fallen  angels  are  also  given,  among  whom  we  recognize  some  of  the  invisible  powers  named  in  the  incantations  [magical]  inscribed  on  the  terra-cotta  cups  of  Hebrew-Chaldee  conjurations

We  also  find  on  these  cups  the  word  "  Halleluiah,"  showing  that

A  word  with  which  ancient  Syro-Chaldeans  conjured  has  become,  through  the  vicissitudes  of  language,  the  Shibboleth  of  modern  Revivalists  '

The  Editor  proceeds  after  this  to  give  fifty-seven  verses  from  various  parts  of  the  Gospels  and  Acts,  with  parallel  passages  from  the  Book  of  Enoch,  and  says :

The  attention  of  theologians  has  been  concentrated  on  the  passage  in  the  Epistle  of  Jude,  because  the  author  specifically  names  the  prophet ;  but  the  cumulative  coincidence  of  language  and  ideas  in  Enoch  and  the  authors  of  the  New  Testament  Scripture,  as  disclosed  in  the  parallel  passages  which  we  have  collated,  clearly  indicates  that  the  work  of  the  Semitic  Milton  was  the  inexhaustible  source  from  which  Evangelists  and  Apostles,  or  the  men  who  wrote  in  their  names,  borrowed  their  conceptions  of  the  resurrection,  judgment,  immortality,  perdition,  and  of  the  universal  reign  of  righteous-  ness, under  the  eternal  dominion  of  the  Son  of  man  This  evangelical  plagiarism  culminates  in  the  Revelation  of  John,  which  adapts  the  visions  of  Enoch  to  Christianity,  with  modifications  in  which  we  miss  the  sublime  simplicity  of  the  great  master  of  apocalyptic  prediction,  who  prophesied  in  the  name  of  the  antediluvian  patriarch

In  fairness  to  truth,  the  hypothesis  ought  at  least  to  have  been  suggested,  that  the  Book  of  Enoch  in  its  present  form  is  simply  a  transcript — with  numerous  pre-Christian  and  post-Christian  additions  and  interpolations — from  far  older  texts.

Modern  research  went  so  far  as  to  point  out  that  Enoch  is  made,  in  Chapter  Ixxi,  to  divide  the  day  and  night  into  eighteen  parts,  and  to  represent  the  longest  day  in  the  year  as  consisting  of  twelve  out  of  these  eighteen  parts,  while  a  day  of  sixteen  hours  in  length  could  not  have  occurred  in  Palestine  The  translator,  Archbishop  Laurence,  remarks  thus :

The  region  in  which  the  author  lived  must  have  been  situated  not  lower  than  forty-five  degrees  north  latitude,  where  the  longest  day  is  fifteen  hours  and  a-half,  nor  higher  perhaps  than  forty-nine  degrees,  where  the  longest  day  is  precisely  sixteen  hours  This  will  bring  the  country  where  he  wrote  as  high  up  at  the  least  as  the  northern  districts  of  the  Caspian  and  Euxine  Seas  .  .  .  the  author  of  the  Book  of  Enoch  was  perhaps  a  member  of  one  of  the  tribes  which  Shalmaneser  carried  away,  and  placed  "  in  Halah  and  in  Habor  by  the  river  Goshen,  and  in  the  cities  of  the  Medes  "

1  Op   at  ,  p.  xx  -  Loc    cit.

{  Op  at  ,  p   xiv.

note

4  Op    cit  ,  p    xxxv  '  Op    cit  ,  p    xin

ORIGIN  AND  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIANITY

Further  on,  it  is  confessed  that :

It  cannot  be  said  that  internal  evidence  attests  the  superiority  of  the  Old  Testa-  ment to  the  Book  of  Enoch.

.  The  Book  of  Enoch  teaches  the  pre-existence  of  the  Son  of  man,  the  Elect  One,  the  Messiah,  who  "  from  the  beginning  existed  in  secret,1  and  whose  name  was  invoked  in  the  presence  of  the  Lord  of  Spirits,  before  the  sun  and  the  signs  were  created  "  The  author  also  refers  to  the  "other  Power  who  was  upon  Earth  over  the  water  on  that  day  " — an  apparent  reference  to  the  language  of  Genesis,  i,  2  -'  [We  maintain  that  it  applies  as  well  to  the  Hindu  Narayana — the  "  mover  on  the  waters."]  We  have  thus  the  Lord  of  Spirits,  the  Elect  One,  and  a  third  Power,  seemingly  foreshadowing  this  Trinity  [as  much  as  the  Trimurti]  of  futurity  ,  but  although  Enoch's  ideal  Messiah  doubtless  exercised  an  important  influence  on  primitive  concep-  tions of  the  Divinity  of  the  Son  of  man,  we  fail  to  identify  his  obscure  reference  to  another  "  Power  "  with  the  Trinitananism  of  the  Alexandrine  school ,  more  especially  as  "  angels  of  power "  abound  in  the  visions  of  Enoch  *

An  Occultist  would  hardly  fail  to  identify  the  said  "  Power."  The  Editor  concludes  his  remarkable  reflections  by  adding  :

Thus  far  we  learn  that  the  Book  of  Enoch  was  published  before  the  Christian  Era  by  some  great  Unknown  of  Semitic  [?]  race,  who,  believing  himself  to  be  inspired  in  a  post-prophetic  age,  borrowed  the  name  of  an  antediluvian  patriarch  4  to  authenti-  cate his  own  enthusiastic  forecast  of  the  Messianic  kingdom  And  as  the  contents  of  his  marvellous  book  enter  freely  into  the  composition  of  the  New  Testament,  it  follows  that  if  the  author  was  not  an  inspired  prophet,  who  predicted  the  teachings  of  Christi-  anity, he  was  a  visionary  enthusiast  whose  illusions  were  accepted  by  Evangelists  and  Apostles  as  revelation—  alternative  conclusions  which  involve  the  Divine  or  human  origin  of  Christianity  '

The  outcome  of  all  of  which  is,  in  the  words  of  the  same  Editor  •

The  discovery  that  the  language  and  ideas  of  alleged  revelation  are  found  in  a  pre-existent  work,  accepted  by  Evangelists  and  Apostles  as  inspired,  but  classed  by  modern  theologians  among  apocryphal  productions "

This  accounts  also  for  the  unwillingness  of  the  reverend  librarians  of  the  Bodleian  Library  to  publish  the  Ethiopian  text  of  the  Book  of  Enoch.

The  prophecies  of  the  Book  of  Enoch  are  indeed  prophetic,  but  they  were  intended  for,  and  cover  the  records  of,  the  five  Races  out  of  the  seven  — everything  relating  to  the  last  two  being  kept  secret.

Thus  the  remark  made  by  the  editor  of  the  English  Translation,  that .

Chapter  xcn  records  a  series  of  prophecies  extending  from  Enoch's  own  time  to  about  one  thousand  years  beyond  the  present  generation/

is  faulty.

The  prophecies  extend  to  the  end  of  our  present  Race,  not  merely  to  a  "thousand  years  "  hence.

Very  true  that :

In  the  system  of  [Christian]  chronology  adopted,  a  day  stands  [occasionally]  for  a  hundred,  and  a  week  for  seven  hundred  years.^

T  The  Seventh  Principle,  the  First  Emanation

2  Op   at,  pp   xxxvii  and  xi  *  Op   cit  ,  pp    xl  and  li

4  Who  stands  for  the  "Solar  "  or  Manvantaric  Year  5  Op   cit  ,  pp   xli,  xln.

(1  Op    cit  ,  p   xlviu  7  Op    cit  ,  p  xxiii  s  Loc    cit

102  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

But  this  is  an  arbitrary  and  fanciful  system  adopted  by  Christians  to  make  Biblical  chronology  fit  with  facts  or  theories,  and  does  not  represent  the  original  thought.

The  "days"  stand  for  the  undetermined  periods  of  the  Side-Races,  and  the  "weeks"  for  the  Sub-Races,  the  Root  Races  being  referred  to  by  an  expression  that  is  not  even  found  in  the  English  translation.

Moreover  the  sentence  at  the  bottom  of  page  150 :

Subsequently,  in  the  fourth  week  .  .  .  the  visions  of  the  holy  and  the  righteous  shall  be  seeh,  the  order  of  generation  after  generation  shall  take  place,

is  quite  wrong.

It  stands  in  the  original:  "  the  order  of  generation  after  generation  had  taken  place  on  the  earth,"  etc.

,  that  is,  after  the  first  human  face  procreated  in  the  truly  human  way  had  sprung  up  in  the  Third  Root  Race;  a  change  which  entirely  alters  the  meaning.

Then  all  that  is  given  in  the  translation — as  very  likely  also  in  the  Ethiopic  text,  since  the  copies  have  been  sorely  tampered  with — as  about  things  which  were  to  happen  in  the  future,  is,  we  are  informed,  in  the  past  tense  in  the  original  Chaldean  MSS.,  and  is  not  prophecy,  but  a  narrative  of  what  had  already  come  to  pass.

When  Enoch  begins  "to  speak  from  a  book""  he  is  reading  the  account  given  by  a  great  Seer,  and  the  prophecies  are  not  his  own,  but  are  from  the  Seer.

Enoch  or  Enoichion  means  "internal  eye"  or  Seer.

Thus  every  Prophet  and  Adept  may  be  called  "  EnoTchion,"  without  becoming  a  pseudo-  Enoch.

But  here,  the  Seer  who  compiled  the  present  Book  of  Enoch  is  distinctly  shown  as  reading  out  from  a  book :

I  have  been  born  the  seventh  in  the  first  week  [the  seventh  branch,  or  Side-  Race,  of  the  first  Sub-Race,  after  physical  generation  had  begun,  namely,  in  the  third  Root  RaceJ  .  But  after  me,  in  the  second  week  [second  Sub-Race]  great  wicked-  ness shall  arise  [arose,  rather]  and  in  that  week  the  end  of  the  first  shall  take  place,  in  which  mankind  shall  be  safe.

But  when  the  first  is  completed  iniquity  shall  grow  up  '

As  translated  it  has  no  sense.

As  it  stands  in  the  Esoteric  text,  it  simply  means,  that  the  First  Root  Race  shall  come  to  an  end  during  the  second  Sub-  Race  of  the  Third  Root  Race,  in  the  period  of  which  time  mankind  will  be  safe ;  all  this  having  no  reference  whatever  to  the  biblical  Deluge.

Verse  10  speaks  of  the  sixth  week  [sixth  Sub-Race  of  the  Third  Root  Race]  when

All  those  who  are  in  it  shall  be  darkened,  the  hearts  of  all  of  them  shall  be  forgetful  of  wisdom  [the  divine  knowledge  will  be  dying  out]  and  in  it  shall  a  man  ascend.

This  "  man  "  is  taken  by  the  interpreters,  for  some  mysterious  reasons  of  their  own,  to  mean  Nebuchadnezzar ;  he  is  in  reality  the  first  Hierophant  of  the  purely  human  Race  (after  the  allegorical  Fall  into  generation)  selected  to  perpetuate  the  dying  Wisdom  of  the  Devas  (Angels  or  Elohim).  He  is  the

1  CXH,  9.  -  Op  cit ,  xcn,  4  3  Op,  cit,  xcii,  4-7.

ORIGIN  AND  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIANITY

first  "  Son  of  Man  " — the  mysterious  appellation  given  to  the  divine  Initiates  of  the  f*rst  human  school  of  the  Manushi  (men),  at  the  very  close  of  the  Third  Root  Race.

He  is  also  called  the  "Saviour,"  as  it  was  He,  with  the  other  Hierophants,  who  saved  the  Elect  and  the  Perfect  from  the  geological  conflagration,  leaving  to  perish  in  the  cataclysm  of  the  Close  '  those  who  forgot  the  primeval  wisdom  in  sexual  sensuality.

And  during  its  completion  [of  the  "sixth  week,"  or  the  sixth  Sub-Race]  he  shall  burn  the  house  of  dominion  [the  half  of  the  globe  or  the  then  inhabited  continent]  with  fire,  and  all  the  race  of  the  elect  root  shall  be  dispersed.

The  above  applies  to  the  Elect  Initiates,  and  not  at  all  to  the  Jews,  the  supposed  chosen  people,  or  to  the  Babylonian  captivity,  as  interpreted  by  the  Christian  theologians.

Considering  that  we  find  Enoch,  or  his  perpetuator,  mentioning  the  execution  of  the  "  decree  upon  sinners  "  in  several  different  weeks,'  saying  that  "  every  work  of  the  ungodly  shall  disappear  from  the  whole  earth  "  during  this  fourth  time  (the  Fourth  Race),  it  surely  can  hardly  apply  to  the  one  solitary  Deluge  of  the  Bible,  still  less  to  the  Captivity.

It  follows,  therefore,  that  as  the  Book  of  Enoch  covers  the  five  Races  of  the  Manvantara,  with  a  few  allusions  to  the  last  two,  it  does  not  contain  "  Biblical  prophecies,"  but  simply  facts  taken  out  of  the  Secret  Books  of  the  East  The  editor,  moreover,  confesses  that  :

The  preceding  six  verses,  viz  ,  13th,  14th,  15th,  16th,  17th,  and  18th,  are  taken  from  between  the  14th  and  15th  verses  of  the  nineteenth  chapter,  where  they  are  to  -be  found  in  the  MSS.'

By  this  arbitrary  transposition,  he  has  made  confusion  still  more  confused.

Yet  he  is  quite  right  in  saying  that  the  doctrines  of  the  Gospels,  and  even  of  the  Old  Testament,  have  been  taken  bodily  from  the  Book  of  Enoch,  for  this  is  as  evident  as  the  sun  in  heaven.

The  whole  of  the  Pentateuch  was  adapted  to  fit  in  with  the  facts  given,  and  this  accounts  for  the  Hebrews  refusing  to  give  the  book  a  place  in  their  Canon,  just  as  the  Christians  have  subsequently  refused  to  admit  it  among  their  canonical  works.

The  fact  that  the  Apostle  Jude  and  many  of  the  Christian  Fathers  referred  to  it  as  a  revelation  and  a  sacred  volume,  is,  however,  an  excellent  proof  that  the  early  Christians  accepted  it  ;  among  these  the  most  learned — as,  for  instance,  Clement  of  Alexandria — understood  Christianity  and  its  doctrines  in  quite  a  different  light  from  their  modern  successors,  and  viewed  Christ  under  an  aspect  that

1  At  the  close  of  every  Root  Race  there  comes  a  cataclysm,  in  turn  by  fire  or  water.

Immediately  after  the  "  Fall  into  generation  "  the  dross  of  the  Third  Root  Race— those  who  fell  into  sensuality  by  falling  off  from  the  teaching  of  the  Divine  Instructors— were  destroyed,  after  which  the  Fourth  Root  Race  originated,  at  the  end  of  which  took  place  the  last  Deluge  (See  the  "  Sons  of  God  "  mentioned  m  Isis  Unveiled,  I,  pp.  593  et  seq  )

-  Op    cit  ,  xii,  11  lOp    at.  XCH,  7,  11,  13,  15  4  Op   cit  ,  note,  p

104  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Occultists  only  can  appreciate.

The  early  Nazarenes  and  Chrestians,  as  Justin  Martyr  calls  them,  were  the  followers  of  Jesus,  of  the  true  Chrestos  and  Christos  of  Initiation  ;  whereas,  the  modern  Christians,  especially  those  of  the  West,  may  be  Papists,  Greeks,  Calvinists,  or  Lutherans,  but  can  hardly  be  called  Christians,  i.e.,  the  followers  of  Jesus,  the  Christ.

Thus  the  Book  of  Enoch  is  entirely  symbolical.

It  relates  to  the  history  of  the  human  Races  and  of  their  early  relation  to  Theogony,  the  symbols  being  mterblended  with  astronomical  and  cosmic  mysteries.

One  chapter  is  missing,  however,  in  the  Noachian  records  (from  both  the  Paris  and  the  Bodleian  MSS.),  namely,  Chapter  Iviii,  in  Sect.

X;  this  could  not  be  remodelled,.  and  therefore  it  had  to  disappear,  disfigured  fragments  alone  having  been  left  of  it.  The  dream  about  the  cows,  the  black,  red  and  white  heifers,  relates  to  the  first  Races,  their  division  and  disappearance.

Chapter  Ixxxvm,  in  which  one  of  the  four  Angels  "  went  to  the  white  cows  and  taught  them  a  mystery,"  after  which,  the  mystery  being  born  "  became  a  man,"  refers  to  (a)  the  first  group  evolved  of  primitive  Aryans,  and  (b)  to  the  "  mystery  of  the  Hermaphrodite  "  so  called,  having  reference  to  the  birth  of  the  first  human  Races  as  they  are  now.

The  well-known  rite  in  India,  one  that  has  survived  in  that  patriarchal  country  to  this  day,  known  as  the  passage,  or  rebirth  through  the  cow — a  ceremony  to  which  those  of  lower  castes  who  are  desirous  of  becoming  Brahmans  have  to  submit — has  originated  in  this  mystery.

Let  any  Eastern  Occultist  read  with  careful  attention  the  above-named  chapter  in  the  Book  oi  Enoch,  and  he  will  find  that  the  "  Lord  of  the  Sheep,"  ir>  whom  Christians  and  European  Mystics  see  Christ,  is  the  Hierophant  Victim  whose  name  in  Sanskrit  we  dare  not  give  Again,  that  while  the  Western  Churchmen  see  Egyptians  and  Israelites  in  the  "  sheep  and  wolves,"  all  these  animals  relate  in  truth  to  the  trials  of  the  Neophyte  and  the  mysteries  of  initiation,  whether  in  India  or  Egypt,  and  to  that  most  terrible  penalty  incurred  by  the  "  wolves  " — those  who  reveal  indiscriminately  that  which  is  only  for  the  knowledge  of  the  Elect  and  the  "  perfect."

The  Christians  who,  thanks  to  later  interpolations,1  have  made  out  in  that  chapter  a  triple  prophecy  relating  to  the  Deluge,  Moses  and  Jesus,  are  mis-  taken, as  in  reality  it  bears  directly  on  the  punishment  and  loss  of  Atlantis  and  the  penalty  of  indiscretion.

The  "  Lord  of  the  sheep  "  is  Karma  and  the  "  Head  of  the  Hierophants  "  also,  the  Supreme  Initiator  on  earth.

He  says

1  Those   interpolations  and  alterations  are  found  almost  in  every  case  where  figures  are  given-  especially  whenever  the   numbers  eleven   and  twelve  come  in — as  these  are  all  made  (by  the  Chris-  tians) to  relate  to  the  numbers  of  Apostles,  and  Tribes,  and  Patriarchs.

The  translator  of  the  Ethiopic  text—  Archbishop  Laurence — attributes  them  generally  to  "  mistakes  of  the  transcriber  "  whenever  the  two  texts,  the  Pans  and  the  Bodleian  MSS  ,  differ.

We  fear  it  is  no  mistake,  in  most  cases

ORIGIN  AND  FOUNDATION  OF  CHRISTIANITY

to   Enoch,    who    implores   him  to   save  the   leaders   of  the  sheep  from  being  devoured  by  the  beasts  of  prey  .

I   will   cause   a   recital  to   be  made  before  me  how  many  they  have

delivered   up  to   destruction,    and  what   they   will  do  ,  whether  they  will  act  as  I

have  commanded  them  or  not

Of  this,  however,  they  shall  be  ignorant ,  neither  shalt  thou  make  any  explana-  tion to  them,  neither  shalt  thou  reprove  them ,  but  there  shall  be  an  account  of  all  the  destruction  done  by  them  in  their  respective  seasons  '

.   He   looked   in   silence,   rejoicing   they   were  devoured,  swallowed  up,  and  carried  off,  and  leaving  them  in  the  power  of  every  beast  for  food    .        *

Those  who  labour  under  the  impression  that  the  Occultists  of  any  nationi  reject  the  Bible,  in  its  original  text  and  meaning,  are  wrong  As  well  reject  the  Books  of  Tfiotfi,  the  Chaldean  Kabalah  or  the  BOOK  OF  DZYAN  itself.

Occultists  only  reject  the  one-sided  interpretations  and  the  human  element  in  the  Bible,  which  is  an  Occult,  and  therefore  a  sacred,  volume  as  much  as  the  others.

And  terrible  indeed  is  the  punishment  of  all  those  who  transgress  the  permitted  limits  of  secret  revelations.

From  Prometheus  to  Jesus,  and  from  Him  to  the  highest  Adept  as  to  the  lowest  disciple,  every  revealer  of  mysteries  has  had  to  become  a  Chrestos,  a  "  man  of  sorrow  "  and  a  martyr,  "  Beware,"  said  one  of  the  greatest  Masters,  "  of  revealing  the  Mystery  to  those  without" — to  the  profane,  the  Sadducee  and  the  unbeliever.

All  the  great  Hierophants  in  history  are  shown  ending  their  lives  by  violent  deaths —  Buddha,3  Pythagoras,  Zoroaster,  most  of  the  great  Gnostics,  the  founders  of  their  respective  schools  ;  and  in  our  own  more  modern  epoch  a  number  of  Fire-Philosophers,  of  Rosicrucians  and  Adepts.

All  of  these  are  shown —  whether  plainly  or  under  the  veil  of  allegory — as  paying  the  penalty  for  the  revelations  they  had  made.

This  may  seem  to  the  profane  reader  only

1  Op.  cit ,  Ixxxviu,  99,

•  Loc.

cit.,  94      This  passage,  as  will  be  presently  shown,  has  led  to  a  very  curious  discovery

'  In  the  profane  history  of  Gautama  Buddha  he  dies  at  the  good  old  age  of  eighty,  and  passes  off  from  life  to  death  peacefully  with  all  the  serenity  of  a  great  saint,  as  Barthelemy  St  Hilaire  has  it.  Not  so  in  the  Esoteric  and  true  interpretation  which  reveals  the  real  sense  of  the  profane  and  allegori-  cal statement  that  makes  Gautama,  the  Buddha,  die  very  unpoetically  from  the  effects  of  too  much  pork,  prepared  for  him  by  Tsonda  How  one  who  preached  that  the  killing  of  animals  was  the  greatest  sin,  and  who  was  a  perfect  vegetarian,  could  die  from  eating  pork,  is  a  question  that  is  never  asked  by  our  Orientalists,  some  of  whom  made  (as  now  do  many  charitable  missionaries  in  Ceylon)  great  fun  at  the  alleged  occurrence  The  simple  truth  is  that  the  said  rice  and  pork  are  purely  allegorical.

Rice  stands  for  "forbidden  fruit,"  like  Eve's  "  apple,"  and  means  Occult  knowledge  with  the  Chinese  and  Tibetans  ,  and  "  pork  "  for  Brahmanical  teachings — Vishnu  having  assumed  in  his.

first  Avatara  the  form  of  a  boar,  in  order  to  raise  the  earth  on  the  surface  of  the  waters  of  space  It  is  not,  therefore,  from  "pork"  that  Buddha  died,  but  for  having  divulged  some  of  the  Bra" hmamcal  mysteries,  after  which,  seeing  the  bad  effects  brought  on  some  unworthy  people  by  the  revelation,  he  preferred,  instead  of  availing  himself  of  Nirvana,  to  leave  his  earthly  form,  remaining  still  in  the  sphere  of  the  living,  in  order  to  help  humanity  to  progress  Hence  his  constant  reincarnations  in  the  hierarchy  of  the  Dalai  and  Teshu  Lamas,  among  other  bounties  Such  is  the  Esoteric  explanation-  The  life  of  Gautama  will  be  more  fully  discussed  later  on

106  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

coincidence.

To  the  Occultist,  the  death  of  every  "  Master "  is  significant,  and  appears  pregnant  with  meaning.

Where  do  we  find  in  history  that  "  Messenger"  grand  or  humble,  an  Initate  or  a  Neophyte,  who,  when  he  was  made  the  bearer  of  some  hitherto  concealed  truth  or  truths,  was  not  cruci-  fied and  rent  to  shreds  by  the  "  dogs  "  of  envy,  malice  and  ignorance?  Such  ,is  the  terrible  Occult  law  ;  and  he  who  does  not  feel  in  himself  the  heart  of  a  lion  to  scorn  the  savage  barking,  and  the  soul  of  a  dove  to  forgive  the  poor  ignorant  fools,  let  him  give  up  the  Sacred  Science.

To  succeed,  the  Occultist  must  be  fearless ;  he  has  to  brave  dangers,  dishonour  and  death,  to  be  for-  •giving,  and  to  be  silent  on  that  which  cannot  be  given.

Those  who  have  vainly  laboured  in  that  direction  must  wait  in  these  days — as  the  Book  of  Enoch  teaches — "  until  the  evil-doers  be  consumed  "  and  the  power  of  the  wicked  annihilated.

It  is  not  lawful  for  the  Occultist  to  seek  or  even  to  thirst  for  revenge  :  let  him

Wait   until  sin  pass  away  ,  for  their  [the  sinners']  names  shall  be  blotted  out  of  the  holy  books  [the  astral  records],  their  seed  shall  be  destroyed  and  their  spirits  slam  '

Esoterically,  Enoch  is  the  "  Son  of  man,"  the  first;  and  symbolically,  the  first  Sub-Race  of  the  Fifth  Root  Race  2  And  if  his  name  yields  for  purposes  of  numerical  and  astronomical  glyphs  the  meaning  of  the  solar  year,  or  365,  in  con-  formity to  the  age  assigned  to  him  in  Genesis,  it  is  because,  being  the  seventh,  he  is,  for  Occult  purposes,  the  personified  period  of  the  two  preceding  Races  with  their  fourteen  Sub-Races.

Therefore,  he  is  shown  in  the  Book  as  the  •great  grandfather  of  Noah  who,  in  his  turn,  is  the  personification  of  the  mankind  of  the  Fifth,  struggling  with  that  of  the  Fourth  Root  Race — the  great  period  of  the  revealed  and  profaned  Mysteries,  when  the  "  sons  of  God  "  coming  down  on  Earth  took  for  wives  the  daughters  of  men,  and  taught  them  the  secrets  of  the  Angels;  in  other  words,  when  the  "  mind-born  "  men  of  the  Third  Race  mixed  themselves  with  those  of  the  Fourth,  and  the  divine  Science  was  gradually  brought  down  by  men  to  Sorcery.

1  Op   cit.,  cv,

'  In  the  8»b/e  (Genesis,  iv  and  v)  there  are  three  distinct  Enochs  (Kanoch  or  Chanoch)— the  son  of  Cam,  the  son  of  Seth,  and  the  son  of  Jared  ,  but  they  are  all  identical,  and  two  of  them  are  mentioned  for  purposes  of  misleading  The  years  of  only  the  last  two  are  given,  the  first  one  being  left  without  further  notice.

SECTION

HERMETIC  AND  KABALISTIC   DOCTRINES

THE  cosmogony  of  Hermes  is  as  veiled  as  the  Mosaic  system,  only  it  is  upon  its  face  far  more  in  harmony  with  the  doctrines  of  the  Secret  Sciences  and  even  of  modern  Science.

Says  the  thrice  great  Trismegistus,  "  the  hand  that  shaped  the  world  out  of  formless  pre-existent  matter  is  no  hand  "  ;  to  which  Genesis  is  made  to  reply,  "The  world  was  created  out  of  nothing,"  although  the  Kabalah  denies  such  a  meaning  in  its  opening  sentences.

The  Kabalists  have  never,  any  more  than  have  the  Indian  Aryans,  admitted  such  an  absurdity.

With  them,  Fire,  or  Heat,  and  Motion  !  were  chiefly  instru-  mental in  the  formation  of  the  world  out  of  pre-existing  Matter.

The  Para-  brahman  and  Mulapraknti  of  the  Vedantins  are  the  prototypes  of  the  Ain  Soph  and  Shekinah  of  the  Kabalists.

Aditi  is  the  original  of  Sephira,  and  the  Prajapatis  are  the  elder  brothers  of  the  Sephiroth.

The  nebular  theory  of  modern  Science,  with  all  its  mysteries,  is  solved  in  the  cosmogony  of  the  Archaic  Doctrine  ,  and  the  paradoxical  though  very  scientific  enunciation,  that  "  cooling  causes  contraction  and  contraction  causes  heat ;  therefore  cooling  causes  heat,"  is  shown  as  the  chief  agency  in  the  formation  of  the  worlds,  and  especially  of  our  sun  and  solar  system.

All  this  is  contained  within  the  small  compass  of  Sepher  Yetzireh  in  its  thirty-two  wonderful  Ways  of  Wisdom,  signed  "  Jah  Jehovah  Sabaoth,"  for  whomsoever  has  the  key  to  its  hidden  meaning.

As  to  the  dogmatic  or  theological  interpretation  of  the  first  verses  in  Genesis  it  is  pertinently  answered  in  the  same  book,  where  speaking  of  the  Three  Mothers,  Air,  Water  and  Fire,  the  writer  describes  them  as  a  balance  with

The  good   in   one  scale,   the  evil  in  the  other,  and  the  oscillating  tongue  of  the  Balance  between  them.'

'The    eternal    and    incessant    "  in-breathing  and  out-breathing  of  Parabrahman  "    or  Nature,  the  •Universe  in  Space,  whether  during  Manvantara  or  Pralaya.

-  Op.  cit ,  in.  i.

108  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

One  of  the  secret  names  of  the  One  Eternal  and  Ever-Present  Deity  was  in  every  country  the  same,  and  it  has  preserved  to  this  day  a  phonetic  likeness  in  the  various  fanguages.

The  Aum  of  the  Hindus,  the  sacred  syllable,  had  become  the  *A«»v  with  the  Greeks,  and  the  £vum  with  the  Romans — the  Pan  or  All.

The  "thirtieth  way"  is  called  in  the  Sepher  Yetzireh  the  "  gathering  understanding,"  because

Thereby  gather  the   celestial  adepts  judgments  of  the  stars  and  celestial  signs,  and  their  observations  of  the  orbits  are  the  perfection  of  science  l

The  thirty-second  and  last  is  called  therein  the  "  serving  understanding,"  and  it  is  so-called  because  it  is

A  disposer   of  all  those  that  are   serving   in  the  work  of  the  Seven  Planets,  according  to  their  Hosts  '

The  "  work  "  was  Initiation,  during  which  all  the  mysteries  connected  with  the  "  Seven  Planets  "  were  divulged,  arjd  also  the  mystery  of  the  "  Sun-  Initiate  "  with  his  seven  radiances  or  beams  cut  off — the  glory  and  triumph  of  the  anointed,  the  Christos  ;  a  mystery  that  makes  plain  the  rather  puzzling  expression  of  Clemens  :

For   we  shall  find  that  very  many  of  the  dogmas  that  are  held  by  such  sects  [of  Barbarian  and   Hellenic  Philosophy]  as  have  not  become  utterly  senseless,  and  are  not  cut  out  from  the  order  of   nature   ["  by  cutting  off  Christ,"  '  or  rather  Chrestos]  correspond  in  their  origin  and  with  the  truth  as  a  whole

In  Isis  Unveiled,*  the  reader  will  find  fuller  information  than  can  be  given  here  on  the  Zohar  and  its  author,  the  great  Kabalist,  Simeon  Ben  Jochai.

It  is  said  there  that  on  account  of  his  being  known  to  be  in  pos-  session of  the  secret  knowledge  and  of  the  Mercaba,  which  insured  the  reception  of  the  "  Word,"  his  very  life  was  endangered,  and  he  had  to  fly  to  the  wilderness,  where  he  lived  in  a  cave  for  twelve  years  surrounded  by  faithful  disciples,  and  finally  died  there  amid  signs  and  wonders.

(>  His  teach-  ings on  the  origin  of  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE,  or,  as  he  also  calls  it,  the  Secret

1Op  cit,  30  -Op.  at.,

'  Those  who  are  aware  that  the  term  Christos  was  applied  by  the  Gnostics  to  the  Higher  Ego  (the  ancient  Pagan  Greek  Initiates  doing  the  same),  will  readily  understand  the  allusion  Christos  was  said  to  be  cut  off  from  the  lower  Ego,  Chrestos,  after  the  final  and  supreme  Initiation,  when  the  two  became  blended  in  one  ,  Chrestos  being  conquered  and  resurrected  in  the  glorified  Christos  — Franck,  Die  Kaba/a,  75  .  Dunlap,  Sod,  Vol  II

*  Stromata,  The  Miscellanies.

Bk   I  ,  ch.  xiu,  p.  389.  '  Op   cit  ,  n,  ch   vm

"  Many  are  the  marvels  recorded  as  having  taken  place  at  his  death,  or  we  should  rather  say  his  translation  .  for  he  did  not  die  as  others  do,  but  having  suddenly  disappeared,  while  a  dazzling  light  filled  the  cavern  with  glory,  his  body  was  again  seen  upon  its  subsidence  When  this  heavenly  light  gave  place  to  the  habitual  semi-darkness  of  the  gloomy  cave — then  only,  says  Ginsburg,  "  the  disciples  of  Israel  perceived  that  the  lamp  of  Israel  was  extinguished  "  His  biographers  tell  us  that  there  were  voices  heard  from  Heaven  during  the  preparation  for  his  funeral,  and  at  his  interment,  when  the  coffin  was  lowered  into  the  deep  cave  prepared  for  it,  a  flame  broke  forth  and  a  voice  mighty  and  majestic  pronounced  these  words  "  This  is  he  who  caused  the  earth  to  quake,  and  the  kingdoms  to  shake  !  "

HERMETIC  AND  KABALISTIC  DOCTRINES

Wisdom,  are  the  same  as  those  found  in  the  East,  with  the  exception  that  in  place  of  the  Chief  of  a  Host  of  Planetary  Spirits  he  puts  "God,"  saying  that  this  Wisdom  was  first  taught  by  God  himself  to  a  certain  number  of  Elect  Angels ;  whereas  in  the  Eastern  Doctrine  the  saying  is  different,  as  will  be  seen.

Some  synthetic  and  kabahstic  studies  on  the  sacred  Book  of  Enoch  and  the  Taro  (Rota)  are  before  us.  We  quote  from  the  MS  copy  of  a  Western  Occultist,  which  is  prefaced  by  these  words  :

There  is  but  one  Law,  one  Principle,  one  Agent,  one  Truth  and  one  Word  That  which  is  above  is  analogically  as  that  which  is  below  All  that  which  is,  is  the  result  of  quantities  and  of  equilibriums

The  axiom  of  Eliphas  Lev!  and  this  triple  epigraph  show  the  identity  of  thought  between  the  East  and  the  West  with  regard  to  the  Secret  Science  which,  as  the  same  MS.  tells  us,  is :

The  key  of  things  concealed,  the  key  of  the  sanctuary  This  is  the  Sacred  Word  which  gives  to  the  Adept  the  supreme  reason  of  Occultism  and  its  Mysteries  It  is  the  Quintessence  of  Philosophies  and  of  Dogmas ,  it  is  the  Alpha  and  Omega ,  it  is  the  Light,  Life  and  Wisdom  Universal

The  Taro  of  the  sacred  Book  of  Enoch,  or  Rota,  is  prefaced,  moreover,  with  this  explanation  :

The  antiquity  of  this  Book  is  lost  in  the  night  of  time  It  is  of  Indian  origin,  and  goes  back  to  an  epoch  long  before  Moses  It  is  written  upon  detached  leaves,

which   at   the  first  were  of  fine  gold  and  precious  metals  It  is  symbolical,  and  its

combinations  adapt  themselves  to  all  the  wonders  of  the  Spirit.

Altered  by  its  passage  across  the  Ages,  it  is  nevertheless  preserved--  thanks  to  the  ignorance  of  the  curious  — in  its  types  and  its  most  important  primitive  figures

This  is  the  Rota  of  Enoch,  now  called  Taro  of  Enoch,  to  which  De  Mirville  alludes,  as  we  saw,  as  the  means  used  for  "  evil  Magic,"  the  "  metallic  plates  [or  leaves]  escaped  from  destruction  during  the  Deluge"  and  which  are  attributed  by  him  to  Cain.

They  have  escaped  the  Deluge  for  the  simple  reason  that  this  Flood  was  not  "  Universal."  And  it  is  said  to  be  "  of  Indian  origin,"  because  its  origin  is  with  the  Indian  Aryans  of  the  first  Sub-Race  of  the  Fifth  Root  Race,  before  the  final  destruction  of  the  last  stronghold  of  Atlantis.

But,  if  it  originated  with  the  forefathers  of  the  primitive  Hindus,  it  was  not  in  India  that  it  was  first  used.

Its  origin  is  still  more  ancient  and  must  be  traced  beyond  and  into  the  Himaleh  [Himalaya],1  the  Snowy  Range.

It  was  born  in  that  mysterious  locality  which  no  one  is  able  to  locate,  and  which  is  the  despair  of  both  Geographers  and  Christian  Theologians — the  region  in

1  Pockocke,  may  be,  was  not  altogether  wrong  in  deriving  the  German  Heaven,  Himmel,  from  Himalaya  ,  nor  can  it  be  denied  that  it  is  the  Hindu  Kailasa  (Heaven)  that  is  the  father  of  the  Greek  Heaven  (Koilon),  and  of  the  Latin  Coelum.

110  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

which  the  Brlhman   places  his   Kailasa,  the  Mount  Sumeru,  and  the  Parvati  Pamir,  transformed  by  the  Greeks  into  Paropamisus.

Round  this  locality,  which  still  exists,  the  traditions  of  the  Garden  of  Eden  were  built.

From  these  regions  the  Greeks  obtained  their  Parnassus  l ;  and  thence  proceeded  most  of  the  biblical  personages,  some  of  them  in  their  day  men,  some  demi-gods  and  heroes,  some — though  very  few — myths,  the  astronomical  doubles  of  the  former.

Abram  was  one  of  them — a  Chaldean  Brahman, '  says  the  legend,  transformed  later,  after  he  had  repudiated  his  Gods  and  left  his  Ur  (pur,  "  town  "  ?)  in  Chaldea,  into  A-brahm  J  (or  A-braham)  "no-brahman"  who  emigrated.

Abram  becoming  the  "father  of  many  nations  "  is  thus  explained.

The  student  of  Occultism  has  to  bear  in  mind  that  every  God  and  hero  in  ancient  Pantheons  (that  of  the  Bible  included),  has  three  biographies  in  the  narrative,  so  to  say,  running  parallel  with  each  other  and  each  connected  with  one  of  the  aspects  of  the  hero — historical,  astronomical  and  perfectly  mythical,  the  last  serving  to  connect  the  other  two  together  and  smooth  away  the  asperities  and  discordances  in  the  narrative,  and  gathering  into  one  or  more  symbols  the  verities  of  the  first  two.

Localities  are  made  to  correspond  with  astronomical  and  even  with  psychic  events.

History  was  thus  made  captive  by  ancient  Mystery,  to  become  later  on  the  great  Sphynx  of  the  nineteenth  century.

Only,  instead  of  devouring  her  too  dull  querists  who  will  unriddle  her  whether  she  acknowledges  it  or  not,  she  is  desecrated  and  mangled  by  the  modern  CEdipus,  before  he  forces  her  into  the  sea  of  speculations  in  which  the  Sphynx  is  drowned  and  perishes.

This  has  now  become  self-evident,  not  only  through  the  Secret  Teachings,  parsimoniously  as  they  may  be  given,  but  by  earnest  and  learned  Symbologists  and  even  Geometricians.

The  Key  to  the  Hebrew  Egyptian  Mystery,  in  which  a  learned  Mason  of  Cincinnati,  Mr.  Ralston  Skinner,  unveils  the  riddle  of  a  God  with  such  ungodly  ways  about  him  as  the  Biblical  Jah-ve,  is  followed  by  the  establishment  of  a  learned  society  under  the  presi-  dentship of  a  gentleman  from  Ohio  and  four  vice-presidents,  one  of  whom  is  Piazzi  Smyth,  the  well-known  Astronomer  and  Egyptologist.

The  Director  of  the  Royal  Observatory  in  Scotland  and  author  of  The  Great  Pyramid,  Pharaonic  by  name,  Humanitarian  by  fact,  its  Marvels,  Mysteries,  and  its  Teachings,  is

1  See  Pockocke's  India  m  Greece,  and  his  derivation  of  Mount  Parnassus  from  Pa"rnasa,  the  leaf  and  branch  huts  of  the  Hindu  ascetics,  half  shrine  and  half  habitation  "  Part  of  the  Par-o-Pamisus  (the  hill  of  Bamian),  is  called  Parnassus.

'  These  mountains  are  called  Devanika,  because  they  are  so  full  of  Devas  or  Gods,  called  "  Gods  of  the  Earth,"  Bhu  Devas.

They  lived,  according  to  the  Purlnas,  in  bowers  or  huts,  called  Parnasas,  because  they  were  made  of  leaves  '  (Parnas),"  p.

-  Rawlinson  is  justly  very  confident  of  an  Aryan  and  Vedic  influence  on  the  early  mythology  and  history  of  Babylon  and  Chaldea

1  This  is  a  SECRET  DOCTRINE  affirmation,  and  may  or  may  not  be  accepted.

Only  Abrahm,  Isaac  and  Judah  resemble  terribly  the  Hindu  Brahma1,  Ikshvdku  and  Yadu

HERMETIC  AND  KABALISTIC  DOCTRINES  1 1 1,

seeking  to  prove  the  same  problem  as  the  American  author  and  Mason  :  namely,  that  the  English  System  of  measurement  is  the  same  as  that  used  by  the  ancient  Egyptians  in  the  construction  of  their  Pyramid,  or  in  Mr.  Skinner's  own  words  that  the  Pharaonic  "  source  of  measures  "  originated  the  "  British  inch  and  the  ancient  cubit."  It  "  originated  "  much  more  than  this,  as  will  be  fully  demonstrated  before  the  end  of  the  next  century.

Not  only  is  every-  thing in  Western  religion  related  to  measures,  geometrical  figures,  and  time-  calculations,  the  principal  period-durations  being  founded  on  most  of  the  historical  personages,1  but  the  latter  are  also  connected  with  heaven  and  earth,  truly,  only  with  the  Indo-Aryan  heaven  and  earth,  not  with  those  of  Palestine.

The  prototypes  of  nearly  all  the  biblical  personages  are  to  be  sought  for  in  the  early  Pantheon  of  India.

It  is  the  "  Mind-born  "  Sons  of  Brahma,  or  rather  of  the  Dhyani-Pitris  (the  "  Father-Gods  "),  the  "  Sons  of  Light,"  who  have  given  birth  to  the  "Sons  of  Earth  " — the  Patriarchs,  For  if  the  Rig  Veda  and  its  three  sister  Vedas  have  been  "  milked  out  from  fire,  air  and*  sun,"  or  Agni,  Indra,  and  Surya,  as  Manu-Smriti  tells  us,  the  Old  Testament  was  most  undeniably  "  milked  out  "  of  the  most  ingenious  brains  of  Hebrew  Kabalists,  partly  in  Egypt  and  partly  in  Babylonia — "  the  seat  of  Sanskrit  literature  and  Brahman  learning  from  her  origin,"  as  Colonel  Vans  Kennedy  truly  declared.

One  of  such  copies  was  Abram  or  Abraham,  into  whose  bosom  every  orthodox  Jew  hopes  to  be  gathered  after  death,  that  bosom  being,  localised  as  "  heaven  in  the  clouds  "  or  Abhra."

From  Abraham  to  Enoch's  Taro  there  seems  to  be  a  considerable  dis-  tance, yet  the  two  are  closely  related  by  more  than  one  link.

Gaffarel  has-  shown  that  the  four  symbolical  animals  on  the  twenty-first  key  of  the  Taro,  at  the  third  septenary,  are  the  Teraphim  of  the  Jews  invented  and  worshipped  by

1  It  is  said  in  The  Gnostics  and  their  Remains,  by  C  W  King  (p  13),  with  regard  to  the  names  of  Brahma  and  Abram  ,  "  This  figure  of  the  man,  Seir  Anpm,  consists  of  243  numbers,  being  the  numerical  value  of  the  letters  in  the  name  '  Abram  '  signifying  the  different  orders  in  the  celestial  Hierarchies  In  fact  the  names  Abram  and  Brahma  are  equivalent  in  numerical  value  "  Thus  to  one  acquainted)  with  Esoteric  Symbolism,  it  does  not  seem  at  all  strange  to  find  in  the  Loka-palas  (the  four  cardinal  and  intermediate  points  of  the  compass  personified  by  eight  Hindu  Gods)  Indra's  elephant,  named  Abhra — (matanga)  and  his  wife  Abhramu  Abhra  is  in  a  way  a  Wisdom  Deity,  since  it  is  this  elephant's  head  that  replaced  that  of  Ganesha  (Ganapati)  the  God  of  Wisdom,  cut  off  by  Shiva  Now  Abhra  means  "  cloud,"  and  it  is  also  the  name  of  the  city  where  Abram  is  supposed  to  have  resided — when  read  backwards — "  Arba  (Kirjath)  the  city  of  four  ,  Abram  is  Abra  with  an  appended  m  final,  and,  Abra  read  backward  is  Arba  "  (Key  to  the  Hebrew  Egyptian  Mystery  appendix  11,  p  211.)  The  author  might  have  added  that  Abra  meaning  in  Sanskrit  "  in,  or  of,  the  clouds,"  the  cosmo-astronomicah  symbol  of  Abram  becomes  still  plainer  All  of  these  ought  to  be  read  in  their  originals,  in  Sanskrit  ,

•  Before  these  theories  and  speculations— we  are  willing  to  admit  they  are  such --are  rejected,  the  following  few  points  ought  to  be  explained  (1)  Why,  after  leaving  Egypt,  was  the  patriarch's  name  changed  by  Jehovah  from  Abram  to  Abraham  (2)  Why  Sarai  becomes  on  the  same  principle  Sarah  (Gen.,  xvn,  15)  (3)  Whence  the  strange  coincidence  of  names?  (4)  Why  should  Alexander  Polyhistor  say  that  Abraham  was  born  at  Kamarma  or  Una,  a  city  of  soothsayers,  and  invented  Astronomy  ?  (5)  "The  Abrahamic  recollections  go  back  at  least  three  millenniums  beyond  the  grand-  father of  Jacob,"  says  Bunsen  (Egypt's  Place  in  History,  v,  p  35.)

112  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Abram's  father  Terah,  and  used  in  the  oracles  of  the  Urim  and  Thummim.

Moreover,  astronomically  Abraham  is  the  sun-measure  and  a  portion  of  the  sun,  while  Enoch  is  the  solar  year,  as  much  as  are  Hermes  or  Thot ;  and  Thot,  numerically,  "  was  the  equivalent  of  Moses,  or  Hermes,"  •'  the  lord  of  the  lower  realms,  also  esteemed  as  a  teacher  of  wisdom,"  the  same  Mason-  mathematician  tells  us  ;  and  the  Taro  being,  according  to  one  of  the  latest  bulls  of  the  Pope,  "  an  invention  of  Hell,"  the  same  "  as  Masonry  and  Occul-  tism/' the  relation  is  evident.

The  Taro  contains  indeed  the  mystery  of  all  such  transmutations  of  personages  into  sidereal  bodies  and  vice  versa.

The  "  wheel  of  Enoch  "  is  an  archaic  invention,  the  most  ancient  of  all,  for  it  is  found  in  China.

Eliphas  Levi  says  there  was  not  a  nation  but  had  it,  its  real  meaning  being  preserved  in  the  greatest  secrecy.

It  was  a  universal  heirloom.

"  As  we  see,  neither  the  [Book  of  Enoch  (his  "  Wheel  "),  nor  the]  Zohar,  nor  any  other  kabalistic  volume,  contains  merely  Jewish  wisdom  The  doctrine  itself  being  the  result  of  whole  millenniums  of  thought,  is  therefore  the  joint  property  of  Adepts  of  every  nation  under  the  sun  Nevertheless,  the  Zohar  teaches  practical  Occultism  more  than  any  other  work  on  that  subject ;  not  as  it  is  translated  and  commented  upon  by  its  various  critics  though,  but  with  the  secret  signs  on  its  margins  These  signs  contain  the  hidden  instructions,  apart  from  the  metaphysical  interpretations  and  apparent  absurdities  so  fully  credited  by  Josephus,  who  was  never  initiated  and  gave  out  the  dead  letter  as  he  had  received  it !

»  Isis  Unvetled,  II,  p.

[This  Section  contains  only  a  portion  of  Section  II  of  the  1886  MS.]

SECTION

VARIOUS  OCCULT  SYSTEMS  OF  INTERPRETATIONS  OF  ALPHABETS  AND  NUMERALS

THE  transcendental  methods  of  the  Kabalah  must  not  be  mentioned  in  a  public  work  ;  but  its  various  systems  of  arithmetical  and  geometrical  ways  of  unriddling  certain  symbols  may  be  described.

The  Zohar  methods  of  calcu-  lations, with  their  three  sections,  the  Gematria,  Notaricon  and  Temura,  also  the  Albath  and  Algath,  are  extremely  difficult  to  practise.

We  refer  those  who  would  learn  more  to  Cornelius  Agrippa's  works.1  But  none  of  those  systems  can  ever  be  understood  unless  a  Kabalist  becomes  a  real  Master  in  his  Science.

The  Symbolism  of  Pythagoras  requires  still  more  arduous  labour.

His  symbols  are  very  numerous,  and  to  comprehend  even  the  general  gist  of  his  abstruse  doctrines  from  his  Symbology  would  necessitate  years  of  study.

His  chief  figures  are  the  square  (the  Tetraktys),  the  equilateral  triangle,  the  point  within  a  circle,  the  cube,  the  triple  triangle,  and  finally  the  forty-seventh  proposition  of  Euclid's  Elements,  of  which  proposition  Pythagoras  was  the  inventor.

But  with  this  exception,  none  of  the  foregoing  symbols  originated  with  him,  as  some  believe.

Millenniums  before  his  day,  they  were  well  known  in  India,  whence  the  Samian  Sage  brought  them,  not  as  a  speculation,  but  as  a  demonstrated  Science,  says  Porphyry,  quoting  from  the  Pythagorean  Moderatus.

The  numerals  of  Pythagoras  were  hieroglyphical  symbols  by  means  whereof  he  explained  all  ideas  concerning  the  nature  of  things  *

1  See  Isis   Unveiled,     II,    298-300.     Gsmatna    is   formed    by  a   metathesis  from  the  Greek  word  ypa/jL/jLareLa  J    Notaricon   may  be  compared  to   stenography ,   Temura   is  permutation     a  way  of  •dividing  the  alphabet  and  shifting  letters

2  De  Vita  Pythag.

FF

114  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

The  fundamental  geometrical  figure  of  the  Kabalah,  as  given  in  the  Book  of  Numbers,1  that  figure  which  tradition  and  the  Esoteric  Doctrines  tell  us  was  given  by  the  Deity  Itself  to  Moses  on  Mount  Sinai,-'  contains  the  key  to  the  universal  problem  in  its  grandiose,  because  simple,  combinations.

This  figure  contains  in  itself  all  the  others.

The  Symbolism  of  numbers  and  their  mathematical  inter-relations  is  also  one  of  the  branches  of  Magic,  especially  of  mental  Magic,  divination  and  correct  perception  in  clairvoyance.

Systems  differ,  but  the  root  idea  is  every-  where the  same  As  shown  in  the  Royal  Masonic  Cyclopaedia,  by  Kenneth  R.  H.  Mackenzie :

One  system  adopts  unity,  another  trinity,  a  third  quinquinity  ,  again  we  have-  sexagons,  heptagons,  novems,  and  so  on,  until  the  mind  is  lost  in  the  survey  of  the  materials  alone  of  a  science  of  numbers  '

The  Devanagari  characters  in  which  Sanskrit  is  generally  written,  have  all  that  the  Hermetic,  Chaldean  and  Hebrew  alphabets  have,  and  in  addition  the  Occult  significance  of  the  "  eternal  sound,"  and  the  meaning  given  to  every  letter  in  its  relation  to  spiritual  as  well  as  terrestrial  things.

As  there  are  only  twenty-two  letters  in  the  Hebrew  alphabet  and  ten  fundamental  numbers,  while  in  the  Devanagar?  there  are  thirty-five  consonants  and  sixteen  vowels,  making  altogether  fifty-one  simple  letters,  with  numberless  combinations  in  addition,  the  margin  for  speculation  and  knowledge  is  in  proportion  consider-  ably wider.

Every  letter  has  its  equivalent  in  other  languages,  and  its  equiv-  alent in  a  figure  or  figures  of  the  calculation  table.

It  has  also  numerous  other  significations,  which  depend  upon  the  special  idiosyncrasies  and  char-  acteristics of  the  person,  object,  or  subject  to  be  studied.

As  the  Hindus  claim  to  have  received  the  Devanagari  characters  from  Sarasvati,  the  inventress  of  Sanskrit,  the  "  language  of  the  Devas  "  or  Gods  (in  their  exoteric  pantheon),  so  most  of  the  ancient  nations  claimed  the  same  privilege  for  the  origin  of  their  letters  and  tongue.

The  Kabalah  calls  the  Hebrew  alphabet  the  "  letters  of  the  Angels,"  which  were  communicated  to  the  Patriarchs,  just  as  the  Devanagari  was  to  the  Rishis  by  the  Devas.

The  Chaldeans  found  their  letters  traced  in  the  sky  by  the  "  yet  unsettled  stars  and  comets,"  says  the  Book  of  Numbers  ,  while  the  Phoenicians  had  a  sacred  alphabet  formed  by  the  twistings  of  the  sacred  serpents.

The  Natar  Khari  (hieratic  alphabet)  and  secret

1  We  are  not  aware  that  a  copy  of  this  ancient  work  is  embraced  in  the  catalogue  of  any  European  library  ,  but  it  is  one  of  the  "  Books  of  Hermes,"  and  it  is  referred  to  and  quotations  are  made  from  it  in  the  works  of  a  number  of  ancient  and  medieval  philosophical  authors  Among  these  authorities  are  Arnoldo  di  Villanova's  Rosarium  Phi/osopri  ,  Francesco  Arnuphi's  Opus  de  Lapide,  Hermes  Tnsme-  gistus'  Tractates  de  Jransmutatione  Meta//orum  and  Tabula  Smaragdtna.

and  above  all  the  treatise  of  Raymond  Lully,  Ab  Angelts  Opus  DiVfnum  de  Quinta  Essentia

•  Exodus,  xxv.

40  •'  Op   cit  ,  sub-voce,   "  Numbers,"  p

OCCULT  INTERPRETATIONS  OF  ALPHABETS  AND  NUMERALS

(sacerdotal)  speech  of  the  Egyptians  is  closely  related  to  the  oldest  "  SECRET  DOCTRINE  Speech."  It  is  a  Devanagari  with  mystical  combinations  and  addi-  tions, into  which  the  Senzar  largely  enters.

The  power  and  potency  of  numbers  and  characters  are  well  known  to  many  Western  Occultists  as  being  compounded  from  all  these  systems,  but  are  still  unknown  to  Hindu  students,  if  not  to  their  Occultists.

In  their  turn  European  Kabalists  are  generally  ignorant  of  the  alphabetical  secrets  of  Indian-  Esoterism.

At  the  same  time  the  general  reader  in  the  West  knows  nothing  of  either  ,  least  of  ail  how  deep  are  the  traces  left  by  the  Esoteric  numeral  systems  of  the  world  in  the  Christian  Churches.

Nevertheless  this  system  of  numerals  solves  the  problem  of  cosmogony  for  whomsoever  studies  it,  while  the  system  of  geometrical  figures  represents  the  numbers  objectively.

To  realise  the  full  comprehension  of  the  Deific  and  the  Abstruse  enjoyed  by  the  Ancients,  one  has  to  study  the  origin  of  the  figurative  representations  of  their  primitive  Philosophers.

The  Books  of  Hermes  are  the  oldest  reposi-  tories of  numerical  Symbology  in  Western  Occultism.

In  them  we  find  that  the  number  ten  l  is  the  Mother  of  the  Soul,  Life  and  Light  being  therein  united.

For  as  the  sacred  anagram  Teruph  shows  in  the  Book  of  the  Keys  (Numbers),  the  number  1  (one)  is  born  from  Spirit,  and  the  number  10  (ten)  from  Matter  r  "  the  unity  has  made  the  ten,  the  ten,  the  unity  "  ,  and  this  is  only  the  Pantheistic  axiom,  in  other  words  "  God  in  Nature  and  Nature  in  God."

The  kabalistic  Gematria  is  arithmetical,  not  geometrical.

It  is  one  of  the  methods  for  extracting  the  hidden  meaning  from  letters,  words,  and  sentences.

It  consists  in  applying  to  the  letters  of  a  word  the  sense  they  bear  as  numbers,  in  outward  shape  as  well  as  in  their  individual  sense.

As  illustrated  by  Ragon  :

The  figure  I  signified  the  living  man  (a  body  erect),  man  being  the  only  living  being  enjoying  this  faculty  A  head  being  added  to  it,  the  glyph  (or  letter)  P  was  obtained,  meaning  paternity,  creative  potency  ,  the  R  signifying  the  walking  man  (with  his  foot  forward)  going,  /ens,  iturus  '

The  characters  were  also  made  supplementary  to  speech,  every  letter  being  at  once  a  figure  representing  a  sound  for  the  ear,  an  idea  to  the  mind  ,  as,  for  instance,  the  letter  F,  which  is  a  cutting  sound  like  that  of  air  rushing  quickly  through  space  ,  f  ury,.  fusee,  fugue,  all  words  expressive  of,  and  depicting  what  they  signify  *

But  the  above  pertains  to  another  system,  that  of  the  primitive  andl  philosophical  formation  of  the  letters  and  their  outward  glyphic  form — not  to  Gematria.

The  Temura  is  another  kabalistic  method,  by  which  any  word  could  be  made  to  yield  its  mystery  out  of  its  anagram.

So  in  Sepher  Yetzireh

1  See  Johannes  Meursius,  Denarius  Pytbagoncus

2  Ragon,  Ma^onnerie  Occulte,  p   426,  note  '  Ibid  ,  p  432.  note.

116  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

we  read  "  One — the  Spirit  of  the  Alahim  of  Lives."  In  the  oldest  kabalistic  diagrams  the  Sephiroth  (the  seven  and  the  three)  are  represented  as  wheels  or  circles,  and  Adam  Kadmon,  the  primitive  Man,  as  an  upright  pillar.

"  Wheels  and  seraphim  and  the  holy  creatures  "  (Chioth),  says  Rabbi  Akiba.

In  still  another  system  of  the  symbolical  Kabalah  called  Albath — which  arranges  the  letters  of  the  alphabet  by  pairs  in  three  rows — all  the  couples  in  the  first  row  bear  the  numerical  value  ten  ;  and  in  the  system  of  Simeon  Ben  Shetah  (an  Alexandrian  Neo-Platonist  under  the  first  Ptolemy)  the  uppermost  couple — the  most  sacred  of  all — is  preceded  by  the  Pythagorean  cypher  :  one,  and  a  nought — 10.

All  beings,  from  the  first  divine  emanation,  or  "  God  manifested,"  down  to  the  lowest  atomic  existence,  "  have  their  particular  number  which  distin-  guishes each  of  them  and  becomes  the  source  of  their  attributes  and  qualities  as  of  their  destiny."  Chance,  as  taught  by  Cornelius  Agrippa,  is  in  reality  only  an  unknown  progression  ;  and  time  but  a  succession  of  numbers.

Hence,  futurity  being  a  compound  of  chance  and  time,  these  are  made  to  serve  Occult  calculations  in  order  to  find  the  result  of  an  event,  or  the  future  of  one's  destiny.

Said  Pythagoras  :

There  is  a  mysterious  connection  between  the  Gods  and  numbers,  on  which  the  science  of  anthmancy  is  based.

The  soul  is  a  world  that  is  self-moving  ,  the  soul  con-  tains in  itself,  and  is,  the  quaternary,  the  tetraktys  [the  perfect  cube]

There  are  lucky  and  unlucky,  or  beneficent  and  maleficent  numbers.

Thus  while  the  ternary — the  first  of  the  odd  numbers  (the  one  being  the  perfect  and  standing  by  itself  in  Occultism) — is  the  divine  figure  or  the  triangle ;  the  duad  was  disgraced  by  the  Pythagoreans  from  the  first.

It  represented  Matter,  the  passive  and  evil  principle — the  number  of  Maya,  illusion.

While  the  number  one  symbolized  harmony,  order  or  the  good  principle  (the  one  God  expressed  in  Latin  by  Solus,  from  which  the  word  Sol,  the  Sun,  the  symbol  of  the  Deity),  number  two  expressed  a  contrary  idea.

The  science  of  good  and  evil  began  with  it.  All  that  is  double,  false,  opposed  to  the  only  reality,  was  depicted  by  the  binary.

It  also  expressed  the  contrasts  in  Nature  which  are  always  double  night  and  day,  light  and  darkness,  cold  and  heat,  dampness  and  dryness,  health  and  sickness,  error  and  truth,  male  and  female,  etc  .  The  Romans  dedicated  to  Pluto  the  second  month  of  the  year,  and  the  second  day  of  that  month  to  expiations  in  honour  of  the  Manes.

Hence  the  same  rite  established  by  the  Latin  Church,  and  faithfully  copied.

Pope  John  XIX,  instituted  in  1003  the  Festival  of  the  Dead,  which  had  to  be  celebrated  on  the  2nd  of  November,  the  second  month  of  autumn.

On  the  other  hand  the  triangle,  a  purely  geometrical  figure,  had  great  honour  shewn  it  by  every  nation,  and  for  this  reason  :

In   geometry   a   straight  line   cannot  represent  an  absolutely  perfect  figure,  any  more  than  two  straight  lines      Three  straight  lines,  on  the  other  hand,  produce  by  their  1  Extracted  from  Ragon,  Mafonnene  Occu/te,  p   427,  note

OCCULT  INTERPRETATIONS  OF  ALPHABETS  AND  NUMERALS

junction  a  triangle,  or  the  first  absolutely  perfect  figure.

Therefore,  it  symbolized  from  the  first  and  to  this  day  the  Eternal — the  first  perfection  The  word  for  deity  in  Latin,  as  in  French,  begins  with  D,  in  Greek  the  delta  or  triangle,  A ,  whose  three  sides  symbolize  the  trinity,  or  three  kingdoms,  or,  again,  divine  nature  In  the  middle  is  the  Hebrew  Yod,  the  initial  of  Jehovah  [see  Eliphas  Levi's  Dogme  et  Rituel,  i,  154],  the  animating  spirit  or  fire,  the  generating  principle  represented  by  the  letter  G,  the  initial  of  "  God  "  in  the  northern  languages,  whose  philosophical  significance  is  generation  '

As  stated  correctly  by  the  famous  Mason  Ragon,  the  Hindu  Trimurti  is  personified  in  the  world  of  ideas  by  Creation,  Preservation  and  Destruction,  or  Brahma,  Vishnu  and  Shiva  ;  in  the  world  of  matter  by  Earth,  Water  and  Fire,  or  the  Sun,  and  symbolised  by  the  Lotus,  a  flower  that  lives  by  earth,  water,  and  the  sun  -  The  Lotus,  sacred  to  Isis,  had  the  same  significance  in  Egypt,  whereas  in  the  Christian  symbol,  the  Lotus,  not  being  found  in  either  Judea  or  Europe,  was  replaced  by  the  water-lily.

In  every  Greek  and  Latin.

Church,  in  all  the  pictures  of  the  Annunciation,  the  Archangel  Gabriel  is  depicted  with  this  trinitartan  symbol  in  his  hand  standing  before  Mary,  while  above  the  chief  altar  or  under  the  dome,  the  Eye  of  the  Eternal  is  painted  within  a  triangle,  made  to  replace  the  Hebrew  Yod  or  God.

Truly,  says  Ragon,  there  was  a  time  when  numbers  and  alphabetical  characters  meant  something  more  than  they  do  now — the  images  of  a  mere  insignificant  sound.

Their  mission  was  nobler  then  Each  of  them  represented  by  its  form  a  complete  sense,  which,  besides  the  meaning  of  the  word,  had  a  double 3  interpretation  adapted  to  a  dual  doctrine  Thus  when  the  sages  desired  to  write  something  to  be  understood

1  Summarised  from  Ragon,  ibid  ,  p.  428,  note

2  Ragon   mentions  the  curious  fact  that  the  first  four  numbers  in  German  are  named  after  the  elements.

"  Em,  or  one,  means  the  air,  the  element  which,  ever  in  motion,  penetrates  matter  throughout,  and  whose  continual  ebb  and  tide  [flow]  is  the  universal  vehicle  of  life

"  Zwei,  two,  is  derived  from  the  old  German  Zweig,  signifying  germ,  fecundity  ,  it  stands  for  earth  the  fecund  mother  of  all.

"  Drei.

three,  is  the  trienos  of  the  Greeks,  standing  for  water,  whence  the  Sea-gods,  Tritons  ,  and  trident,  the  emblem  of  Neptune— the  water,  or  sea,  in  general  being  called  Amphitnte  (surrounding  water)

"  Vier,  four,  a  number  meaning  in  Belgian  fire  It  is  in  the  quaternary  that  the  first  solid

figure  is  found,  the  universal  symbol  of  immortality,  the  Pyramid,  '  whose  first  syllable  means  fire  '  Lysis  and  Timaeus  of  Locris  claimed  that  there  was  not  a  thing  one  could  name  that  had  not  the  quaternary  for  its  root  .  The  ingenious  and  mystical  idea  which  led  to  the  veneration  of  the  ternary  and  the  triangle  was  applied  to  number  four  and  its  fiqure  it  was  said  to  express  a  living  being,  1,  the  vehicle  of  the  triangle,  4,  vehicle  of  God,  or  man  carrying  in  him  the  divine  principle

Finally  "  the  Ancients  represented  the  world  by  the  number  five.

Diodorus  explains  it  by  saying  that  this  number  respresents  earth,  fire,  water,  air  and  ether  or  spintus  Hence,  the  origin  of  Rente  (five)  and  of  Pan  (the  God)  meaning  in  Greek  all."  (Compare  Ragon,  op  cit  ,  pp  428-30  )  It  is  left  with  the  Hindu  Occultists  to  explain  the  relation  this  Sanskrit  word  Pancha  (five)  has  to  the  elements,  the  Greek  Pente  having  for  its  root  the  Sanskrit  term

*  The  system  of  the  so-called  Senzar  characters  is  still  more  wonderful  and  difficult,  since  each  letter  is  made  to  yield  several  meanings,  a  sign  placed  at  the  commencement  showing  the  true  meaning

118  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

only  by  the  savants,  they  confabulated  a  story,  a  dream,  or  some  other  fictitious  subject  with  personal  names  of  men  and  localities,  that  revealed  by  their  lettered  characters  the  true  meaning  of  the  author  by  that  narrative  Such  were  all  their  religious  creations.

Every  appellation  and  term  had  its  raison  d'etre.

The  name  of  a  plant  or  mineral  denoted  its  nature  to  the  Initiate  at  the  first  glance.

The  essence  of  everything  was  easily  perceived  by  him  once  that  it  was  figured  by  such  characters  The  Chinese  characters  have  preserved  much  of  this  graphic  and  pictorial  character  to  this  day,  though  the  secret  of  the  full  system  is  lost,  Nevertheless,  even  now,  there  are  those  among  that  nation  who  can  write  a  long  narrative,  a  volume,  on  one  page  ;  and  the  symbols  that  are  explained  historically,  allegorically  and  astronomically,  have  survived  until  now.

Moreover,  there  exists  a  universal  language  among  the  Initiates  which  an  Adept,  and  even  a  disciple,  of  any  nation  may  understand  by  reading  it  in  his  own  language.

We  Europeans,  on  the  contrary,  possess  only  one  graphic  sign  common  to  all,  &  (and)  ;  there  is  a  language  richer  in  metaphysical  terms  than  any  on  earth,  whose  every  word  is  expressed  by  like  common  signs.

The  Litera  Pythagorae,  so  called,  the  Greek  T  (the  English  capital  Y)  if  traced  alone  in  a  message,  was  as  explicit  as  a  whole  page  filled  with  sentences,  for  it  stood  as  a  symbol  for  a  number  of  things — for  white  and  black  Magic,  for  instance.1'  Suppose  one  man  enquired  of  another :  To  what  School  of  Magic  does  so  and  so  belong  ?  and  the  answer  came  back  with  the  letter  traced  with  the  right  branch  thicker  than  the  left,  then  it  meant  "to  right  hand  or  divine  Magic,"  but  if  the  letter  were  traced  in  the  usual  way,  with  the  left  branch  thicker  than  the  right,  than  it  meant  the  reverse,  the  right  or  left  branch  being  the  whole  biography  of  a  man.

In  Asia,  especially  in  the  Devanagari  characters,  every  letter  had  several  secret  meanings.

Interpretations  of  the  hidden  sense  of  such  apocalyptic  writings  are  found  in  the  keys  given  in  the  Kabalah,  and  they  are  among  its  most  sacred  lore.

St.  Hieronymus  assures  us  that  they  were  known  to  the  School  of  the  Prophets  and  taught  therein,  which  is  very  likely.

Molitor,  the  learned  Hebraist,  in  his  work  on  tradition  says  that  •

The  two  and  twenty  letters  of  the  Hebrew  alphabet  were  regarded  as  an  emana-  tion, or  the  visible  expression  of  the  divine  forces  inherent  in  the  ineffable  name

These  letters  find  their  equivalent  in,  and  are  replaced  by  numbers,  in  the  same  way  as  in  the  other  systems.

For  instance,  the  twelfth  and  the

1  Ragon,  op.  cit  ,  p   431,  note

-  The  Y  exotencally  signifies  not  only  the  two   paths  of  virtue  or  vice,  but  stands  also  for  the  numeral  150  and  with  a  dash  over  the  letter  Y  for  150,000.

OCCULT  INTERPRETATIONS  OF  ALPHABETS  AND  NUMERALS

sixth  letter  of  the  alphabet  yield  eighteen  in  a  name  ,  the  other  letters  of  that  name  added  being  always  exchanged  for  that  figure  which  corresponds  to  the  alphabetical  letter  .  then  all  those  figures  are  subjected  to  an  algebraical  process  which  transforms  them  again  into  letters ;  after  which  the  latter  yield  to  the  enquirer  "  the  most  hidden  secrets  of  divine  Permanency  (eternity  in  its  immutability)  in  the  Futurity."

[Much  of  this   Section,   often  verbally  the  same,  is  the  first  part  of  Section  the  1886  MS— Ed]

SECTION

THE    HEXAGON    WITH    THE    CENTRAL    POINT,    OR  THE    SEVENTH    KEY

ARGUING  upon  the  virtue  in  names  (Baalshem),  Molitor  thinks  it  impossible  to  deny  that  the  Kabalah — its  present  abuses  notwithstanding — has  some  very  profound  and  scientific  basis  to  stand  upon.

And  if  it  js  claimed,,  he  argues,

that  before  the  Name  of  Jesus  every  other  Name  must  bend,  why  should  not  the  Tetragrammaton  have  the  same  power  ?  l

This  is  good  sense  and  logic.

For  if  Pythagoras  viewed  the  hexagon,  formed  of  two  crossed  triangles  as  the  symbol  of  creation,  and  the  Egyptians,  as  that  of  the  union  of  fire  and  water  (or  of  generation),  the  Essenes  saw  in  it  the  Seal  of  Solomon,  the  Jews  the  Shield  of  David,  the  Hindus  the  Sign  of  Vishnu  (to  this  day)  ;  and  if  even  in  Russia  and  Poland  the  double  triangle  is  regarded  as  a  powerful  talisman — then  so  widespread  a  use  argues  that  there  is  something  in  it.  It  stands  to  reason,  indeed,  that  such  an  ancient  and  universally  revered  symbol  should  not  be  merely  laid  aside  to  be  laughed  at  by  those  who  know  nothing  of  its  virtues  or  real  Occult  significance.

To  begin  with,  even  the  known  sign  is  merely  a  substitute  for  the  one  used  by  the  Initiates.

In  a  Tantrika  work  in  the  British  Museum,  a  terrible  curse  is  called  down  upon  the  head  of  him  who  shall  ever  divulge  to  the  profane  the  real  Occult  hexagon  known  as  the  "  Sign  of  Vishnu,"  "  Solomon's  Seal,"  etc.

The  great  power  of  the  hexagon — with  its  central  mystic  sign  the  T,  or  the  Svastika,  a  septenary — is  well  explained  in  the  seventh  key  of  Jhings  Con-  cealed, for  it  says  :

The  seventh  key  is  the  hieroglyph  of  the  sacred  septenary,  of  royalty,  of  the  priesthood  [the  Initiate],  of  triumph  and  true  result  by  struggle.

It  is  magic  power  in  all  its  force,  the  true  "  Holy  Kingdom."  In  the  Hermetic  Philosophy  it  is  the  quintessence  resulting  from  the  union  of  the  two  forces  of  the  great  Magic  Agent  [Akasha,  Astral  Light.]  .  .  It  is  equally  Jakin  and  Boaz  bound  by  the  will  of  the  Adept  and  overcome  by  his  omnipotence

1  Tradition,  chap   on  "  Numbers  "

THE  HEXAGON  WITH  THE  CENTRAL  POINT  12t

The  force  of  this  key  is  absolute  in  Magic.

All  religions  have  consecrated  this  sign  in  their  rites.

We  can  only  glance  hurriedly  at  present  at  the  long  series  of  antediluvian  works  in  their  postdiluvian  and  fragmentary,  often  disfigured,  form.

Although  all  of  these  are  the  inheritance  from  the  Fourth  Race — now  lying  buried  in  the  unfathomed  depths  of  the  ocean — still  they  are  not  to  be  rejected.

As  we  have  shown,  there  was  but  one  Science  at  the  dawn  of  mankind,  and  it  was  entirely  divine.

If  humanity  on  reaching  its  adult  period  has  abused  it —  especially  the  last  Sub- Races  of  the  Fourth  Root  Race — it  has  been  the  fault  and  sin  of  the  practitioners  who  desecrated  the  divine  knowledge,  not  of  those  who  remained  true  to  its  pristine  dogmas  It  is  not  because  the  modern  Roman  Catholic  Church,  faithful  to  her  traditional  intolerance,  is  now  pleased  to  see  in  the  Occultist,  and  even  in  the  innocent  Spiritualist  and  Mason,  the  descendants  of  "  the  Kischuph,  the  Hamite,  the  Kasdim,  the  Cephene,  the  Ophite  and  the  Khartumim  " — all  these  being  "  the  followers  of  Satan,"  that  they  are  such  indeed.

The  State  or  National  Religion  of  every  country  has  ever  and  at  all  times  very  easily  disposed  of  rival  schools  by  professing  to  believe  they  were  dangerous  heresies — the  old  Roman  Catholic  State  Religion  as  much  as  the  modern  one.

The  anathema,  however,  has  not  made  the  public  any  the  wiser  in  the  Mysteries  of  the  Occult  Sciences.

In  some  respects  the  world  is  all  the  better  for  such  ignorance.

The  secrets  of  Nature  generally  cut  both  ways,  and  in  the  hands  of  the  undeserving  they  are  more  than  likely  to  become  murderous.

Who  in  our  modern  day  knows  anything  of  the  real  significance  of,  and  the  powers  contained  in,  certain  characters  and  signs — talismans — whether  for  beneficent  or  evil  purposes  ?  Fragments  of  the  Runes  and  the  writing  of  the  Kischuph,  found  scattered  in  old  medieval  libraries  ;  copies  from  the  Ephesian  and  Milesian  letters  or  characters  ,  the  thrice  famous  Book  of  Thoth,  and  the  terrible  treatises  (still  preserved)  of  Targes,  the  Chaldean,  and  his  disciple  Tarchon,  the  Etruscan — who  flourished  long  before  the  Trojan  War — are  so  many  names  and  appellations  void  of  sense  (though  met  with  in  classical  literature)  for  the  educated  modern  scholar  Who,  in  the  nineteenth  century,  believes  in  the  art,  described  in  such  treatises  as  those  of  Targes,  of  evoking  and  directing  thunder-bolts?  Yet  the  same  is  described  in  the  Brahmanical  literature,  and  Targes  copied  his  "thunder-bolts  '"  from  the  Astra,1  those  terrible  engines  of  destruction  known  tp  the  Maha-  bharatan  Aryans.

A  whole  arsenal  of  dynamite  bombs  would  pale  before  this

1  This   is  a  kind  of  magical  bow  and  arrow  calculated  to  destroy  in  one  moment  whole  armies  ,    it  is  mentioned  in  the  Ramayana.

the  Puranas  and  elsewhere

122  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

•art — if  it  ever  becomes  understood  by  the  Westerns.

It  is  from  an  old  fragment  that  was  translated  to  him,  that  the  late  Lord  Bulwer  Lytton  got  his  idea  of  Vril.

It  is  a  lucky  thing,  indeed,  that,  in  the  face  of  the  virtues  and  philanthropy  that  grace  our  age  of  iniquitous  wars,  of  anarchists  and  dynami-  ters, the  secrets  contained  in  the  books  discovered  in  Numa's  tomb  should  ihave  been  burnt  But  the  science  of  Circe  and  Medea  is  not  lost.

One  can  discover  it  in  the  apparent  gibberish  of  the  Tantrika  Sutras,  the  Kuku-ma  of  the  Bhutan?  and  the  Sikhim  Dugpas  and  "  Red-caps  "  of  Tibet,  and  even  in  the  sorcery  of  the  Nilgiri  Mula  Kurumbas.

Very  luckily,  few  outside  the  high  practitioners  of  the  Left  Path  and  of  the  Adepts  of  the  Right — in  whose  hands  the  weird  secrets  of  the  real  meaning  are  safe — understand  the  "  black  "  •evocations.

Otherwise  the  Western  as  much  as  the  Eastern  Dugpas  might  jnake  short  work  of  their  enemies.

The  name  of  the  latter  is  legion,  for  the  direct  descendants  of  the  antediluvian  sorcerers  hate  all  those  who  are  not  with  them,  arguing  that,  therefore,  they  are  against  them.

As  for  the  "  Little  Albert  " — though  even  this  small  half -esoteric  volume  •has  become  a  literary  relic — and  the  "  Great  Albert  "  or  the  "  Red  Dragon,"  together  with  the  numberless  old  copies  still  in  existence,  the  sorry  remains  of  the  mythical  Mother  Shiptons  and  the  Merlins — we  mean  the  false  ones — all  these  are  vulgarised  imitations  of  the  original  works  of  the  same  names.

Thus  the  "  Petit  Albert  "  is  the  disfigured  imitation  of  the  great  work  written  in  Latin  by  Bishop  Adalbert,  an  Occultist  of  the  eighth  century,  sentenced  by  the  second  Roman  Concilium.

His  work  was  reprinted  several  centuries  later  and  named  Albert!  Parvi  Luc/i  Libe/lus  de  Mirabilibus  Natures  Arcanis.1  The  severities  of  the  Roman  Church  have  ever  been  spasmodic.

While  one  learns  of  this  •condemnation,  which  placed  the  Church,  as  will  be  shown,  in  relation  to  the  Seven  Archangels,  the  Virtues  or  Thrones  of  God,  in  the  most  embarrassing  position  for  long  centuries,  it  remains  a  wonder  indeed  to  find  that  the  Jesuits  have  not  destroyed  the  archives,  with  all  their  countless  chronicles  and  •annals,  of  the  History  of  France  and  those  of  the  Spanish  Escurial,  along  with  them.

Both  history  and  the  chronicles  of  the  former  speak  at  length  of  the  priceless  talisman  received  by  Charles  the  Great  from  a  Pope.

It  was  a  little  volume  on  Magic — or  Sorcery,  rather — all  full  of  kabalistic  figures,  signs,  mys-  terious sentences  and  invocations  to  the  stars  and  planets.

These  were  talismans  against  the  enemies  of  the  King  (/es  ennem/s  cfe  Charlemagne),  which  talismans,  the  chronicler  tells  us,  proved  of  great  help,  as  "  every  one  •of  them  [the  enemies]  died  a  violent  death."  The  small  volume,  Encfiir/c/tum  Leonis  Papas,  has  disappeared  and  is  very  luckily  out  of  print.

Again  the  1  [The  Little  Book  of  Albertus  Parvus  Lucius  concerning  the  Hidden  Wonders  of  Nature]

THE  HEXAGON  WITH  THE  CENTRAL  POINT

Alphabet  of  Thoth  can  be  dimly  traced  in  the  modern  Tarot  which  can  be  had  at  almost  every  bookseller's  in  Paris  As  for  its  being  understood  or  utilised,  the  many  fortune-tellers  in  Paris,  who  make  a  professional  living  by  it,  are  sad  specimens  of  failures  of  attempts  at  reading,  let  alone  at  correctly  interpreting,  the  symbolism  of  the  Tarot  without  a  preliminary  philosophical  study  oftheScience.

The  real  Tarot,  in  its  complete  symbology,  can  be  found  only  in  the  Babylonian  cylinders,  that  any  one  can  inspect  and  study  in  the  British  Museum  and  elsewhere.

Any  one  can  see  these  Chaldean,  antediluvian  rhombs,  or  revolv-  ing *  cylinders,  covered  with  sacred  signs;  but  the  secrets  of  these  divining  "wheels,"  or,  as  de  Mirville  calls  them,  "  the  rotating  globes  of  Hecate,"  have  to  be  left  untold  for  some  time  to  come.

Meanwhile  there  are  the  "  turning-tables  "  of  the  modern  medium  for  the  babes,  and  the  Kabalah  for  the  strong.

This  may  afford  some  consolation.

People  are  very  apt  to  use  terms  which  they  do  not  understand,  and  to  pass  judgments  on  pr/ma  fade  evidence.

The  difference  between  White  and  Black  Magic  is  very  difficult  to  realize  fully,  as  both  have  to  be  judged  by  their  motive,  upon  which  their  ultimate  though  not  their  immediate  effects  depend,  even  though  these  may  not  come  for  years.

Between  the  "  right  and  the  left  hand  [Magic]  there  is  but  a  cobweb  thread,"  says  an  Eastern  proverb.

Let  us  abide  by  its  wisdom  and  wait  till  we  have  learned  more.

We  shall  have  to  return  at  greater  length  to  the  relation  of  the  Kabalah  to  Gupta  Vidya,  and  to  deal  further  with  esoteric  and  numerical  systems,  but  we  must  first  follow  the  line  of  Adepts  in  post-Christian  times.

[This  Section  is  much  of  the  second  half  of  Section  III  in  the  1886  MS  --Ed.]

SECTION

THE  DUTY  OF  THE  TRUE    OCCULTIST  TOWARD   RELIGIONS

HAVING  disposed  of  pre-Christian  Initiates  and  their  Mysteries — though  more  has  to  be  said  about  the  latter — a  few  words  must  be  given  to  the  earliest  post-Christian  Adepts,  irrespective  of  their  personal  beliefs  and  doctrines,  or  their  subsequent  places  in  History,  whether  sacred  or  profane.

Our  task  is  to  analyze  this  adeptship  with  its  abnormal  thaumaturgical,  or,  as  now  called,  psychological  powers ;  to  give  each  of  such  Adepts  his  due,  by  considering,  firstly,  what  are  the  historical  records  about  them  that  have  reached  us  at  this  late  day,  and  secondly,  to  examine  the  laws  of  probability  with  regard  to  the  said  powers.

And  at  the  outset  the  writer  must  be  allowed  a  few  words  in  justification  of  what  has  to  be  said.

It  would  be  most  unfair  to  see  in  these  pages  any  defiance  to,  or  disrespect  for,  the  Christian  religion — least  of  all,  a  desire  to  wound  anyone's  feelings.

The  Theosophist  believes  in  neither  Divine  nor  Satanic  miracles.

At  such  a  distance  of  time  he  can  only  obtain  pr/ma  facie  evidence  and  judge  of  it  by  the  results  claimed.

There  is  neither  Saint  nor  Sorcerer,  Prophet  nor  Soothsayer  for  him  ;  only  Adepts,  or  proficients  in  the  production  of  feats  of  a  phenomenal  character,  to  be  judged  by  their  words  and  deeds.

The  only  distinction  he  is  now  able  to  trace  depends  on  the  results  achieved — on  the  evidence  whether  they  were  beneficent  or  malefi-  cent in  their  character  as  affecting  those  for  or  against  whom  the  powers  of  the  Adept  were  used.

With  the  division  so  arbitrarily  made  between  profi-  cients in  "  miraculous  "  doings  of  this  or  that  Religion  by  their  respective  followers  and  advocates,  the  Occultist  cannot  and  must  not  be  concerned.

The  Christian  whose  Religion  commands  him  to  regard  Peter  and  Paul  as  Saints,  and  divinely  inspired  and  glorified  Apostles,  and  to  view  Simon  and  Apollonius  as  Wizards  and  Necromancers,  helped  by,  and  serving  the  ends  ofr  supposed  Evil  Powers — is  quite  justified  in  thus  doing  if  he  be  a  sincere  ortho-  dox Christian.

But  so  also  is  the  Occultist  justified,  if  he  would  serve  truth  and  only  truth,  in  rejecting  such  a  one-sided  view.

The  student  of  Occultism  must  belong  to  no  special  creed  or  sect,  yet  he  is  bound  to  show  outward

THE  DUTY  OF  THE  TRUE  OCCULTIST  TOWARD  RELIGIONS

respect  to  every  creed  and  faith,  if  he  would  become  an  Adept  of  the  Good  Law.

He  must  not  be  bound  by  the  pre-judged  and  sectarian  opinions  of  anyone,  and  he  has  to  form  his  own  opinions  and  to  come  to  his  own  con-  clusions in  accordance  with  the  rules  of  evidence  furnished  to  him  by  the  Science  to  which  he  is  devoted.

Thus,  if  the  Occultist  is,  by  way  of  illustration,  a  Buddhist,  then,  while  regarding  Gautama  Buddha  as  the  grandest  of  all  the  Adepts  that  lived,  and  the  incarnation  of  unselfish  love,  boundless  charity  and  moral  goodness,  he  will  regard  in  the  same  light  Jesus —  proclaiming  Him  another  such  incarnation  of  every  divine  virtue.

He  will  reverence  the  memory  of  the  great  Martyr,  even  while  refusing  to  recognise  in  Him  the  incarnation  on  earth  of  the  One  Supreme  Deity,  and  the  "  Very  God  of  Gods  "  in  Heaven.

He  will  cherish  the  ideal  man  for  his  personal  virtues,  not  for  the  claims  made  on  his  behalf  by  fanatical  dreamers  of  the  early  ages,  or  by  a  shrewd  calculating  Church  and  Theology.

He  will  even  believe  in  most  of  the  "  asserted  miracles,"  only  explaining  them  in  accordance  with  the  rules  of  his  own  Science  and  by  his  psychic  discernment.

Refusing  them  the  term  "  miracle  " — in  the  theological  sense  of  an  event  "  contrary  to  the  established  laws  of  nature  " — he  will  nevertheless  view  them  as  a  deviation  from  the  laws  known  (so  far)  to  Science,  quite  another  thing.

Moreover  the  Occultist  will,  on  the  prima  facie  evidence  of  the  Gospels — whether  proven  or  not — class  most  of  such  works  as  beneficent,  divine  Magic,  though  he  will  be  justified  in  regarding  such  events  as  casting  out  devils  into  a  herd  of  swine  *  as  allegorical,  and  as  pernicious  to  true  faith  in  their  dead-letter  sense.

This  is  the  view  a  genuine,  impartial  Occultist  would  take.

And  in  this  respect  even  the  fanatical  Mussulmans  who  regard  Jesus  of  Nazareth  as  a  great  Prophet,  and  show  respect  to  Him,  are  giving  a  wholesome  lesson  in  charity  to  Christians,  who  teach  and  accept  that  "  religious  tolerance  is  impious  and  absurd,"  ~  and  who  will  never  refer  to  the  prophet  of  Islam  by  any  other  term  but  that  of  a  "false  prophet."  It  is  on  the  principles  of  Occultism,  then,  that  Peter  and  Simon,  Paul  and  Apollonius,  will  now  be  examined.

These  four  Adepts  are  chosen  to  appear  in  these  pages  with  good  reason.

They  are  the  first  in  post-Christian  Adeptship — as  recorded  in  pro-  fane and  sacred  writings — to  strike  the  key-note  of  "  miracles,"  that  is  of  psychic  and  physical  phenomena.

It  is  only  theological  bigotry  and  intolerance  that  could  so  maliciously  and  arbitrarily  separate  the  two  harmonious  parts  into  two  distinct  manifestations  of  Divine  and  Satanic  Magic,  into  "  godly  "  and  "  ungodly  "  works.

1  Matthew.

VIM,  30-4  -  Dogmatic  Theology,  in,  345.

SECTION

POST-CHRISTIAN    ADEPTS    AND   THEIR    DOCTRINES

WHAT  does  the  world  at  large  know  of  Peter  and  Simon,  for  example  ?  Profane  history  has  no  record  of  these  two,  while  that  which  the  so-called  sacred  literature  tells  us  of  them  is  scattered  about,  contained  in  a  few  sentences  in  the  Acts.

As  to  the  Apocrypha,  their  very  name  forbids  critics  to  trust  to  them  for  information.

The  Occultists,  however,  claim  that,  one-  sided and  prejudiced  as  they  may  be,  the  apocryphal  Gospels  contain  far  more  historically  true  events  and  facts  than  does  the  New  Testament,  the  Acts  included.

The  former  are  crude  tradition,  the  latter  (the  official  Gospels)  are  an  elaborately  made-up  legend.

The  Sacredness  of  the  New  Testament  is  a  question  of  private  belief  and  of  blind  faith,  and  while  one  is  bound  to  respect  the  private  opinion  of  one's  neighbour,  no  one  is  forced  to  share  it.  Who  was  Simon  Magus,  and  what  is  known  of  him  ?  One  learns  in  the  Acts  simply  that  on  account  of  his  remarkable  magical  Arts  he  was  called  ••  the  Great  Power  of  God."  Philip  is  said  to  have  baptised  this  Samaritan  ;  and  subsequently  he  is  accused  of  having  offered  money  to  Peter  and  John  to  teach  him  the  power  of  working  true  "  miracles,"  false  ones,  it  is  asserted,,  being  of  the  Devil 1  This  is  all,  if  we  omit  the  words  of  abuse  freely  used  against  him  for  working  "  miracles  "  of  the  latter  kind.

Origen  mentions  him  as  having  visited  Rome  during  the  reign  of  Nero,"  and  Mosheim  places  him  among  the  open  enemies  of  Christianity  ;  >{  but  Occult  tradition  accuses  him  of  nothing  worse  than  refusing  to  recognise  "  Simeon  as  a  Vicegerent  of  God,  whether  that  "  Simeon  "  was  Peter  or  anyone  else  being  still  left  an  open,  question  with  the  critic.

That  which  Irenaeus  '  and  Epiphanius r>  say  of  Simon  Magus — namely,  that  he  represented  himself  as  the  incarnated  trinity ;  that  in  Samaria  he  was  the  Father,  in  Judea  the  Son,  and  had  given  himself  out  to  the  Gentiles  as  the

1  Acts  vui.

9,  10  2  Adv   Ce/sum.

'  Ecc/es   Hist  ,  Vol    i,  p    140.

Contra  Haereses,  I,  xvin,  1-4  •"•  Contra  Haereses,  \\,  1-

POST-CHRISTIAN  ADEPTS  AND  THEIR  DOCTRINES

Holy  Spirit — is  simply  backbiting.

Times  and  events  change ;  human  nature  remains  the  same  and  unaltered  under  every  sky  and  in  every  age  The  charge  is  the  result  and  product  of  the  traditional  and  now  classical  odium  theologicum.

No  Occultists — all  of  whom  have  experienced  personally,  more  or  less,  the  effects  of  theological  rancour — will  ever  believe  such  things  merely  on  the  word  of  an  Irenaeus,  if,  indeed,  he  ever  wrote  the  words  him-  self.

Further  on  it  is  narrated  of  Simon  that  he  took  about  with  him  a  woman  whom  he  introduced  as  Helen  of  Troy,  who  had  passed  through  a  hundred  reincarnations,  and  who,  still  earlier,  in  the  beginning  of  aeons,  was  Sophia,  Divine  Wisdom,  an  emanation  of  his  own  (Simon's)  Eternal  Mind,  when  he  (Simon)  was  the  "Father"  ;  and  finally,  that  by  her  he  had  "be-  gotten the  Archangels  and  Angels,  by  whom  this  world  was  created,"  etc.

Now  we  all  know  to  what  a  degree  of  transformation  and  luxuriant  growth  any  bare  statement  can  be  subjected  and  forced,  after  passing  through  only  half  a  dozen  hands.

Moreover,  all  these  claims  may  be  explain-  ed and  even  shown  to  be  true  at  bottom.

Simon  Magus  was  a  Kabalist  and  a  Mystic,  who,  like  so  many  other  reformers,  endeavoured  to  found  a  new  Religion  based  on  the  fundamental  teachings  of  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE,  yet  with-  out divulging  more  than  necessary  of  its  mysteries.

Why  then  should  not  Simon,  a  Mystic,  deeply  imbued  with  the  fact  of  serial  incarnations  (we  may  leave  out  the  number  "one  hundred,"  as  a  very  probable  exaggeration  of  his  disciples),  speak  of  any  one  whom  he  knew  psychically  as  an  incarnation  of  some  heroine  of  that  name,  and  in  the  way  he  did — if  he  ever  did  so  ?  Do  we  not  find  in  our  own  century  some  ladies  and  gentlemen,  not  charlatans  but  intellectual  persons  highly  honoured  in  society,  whose  inner  conviction  assures  them  that  they  were — one  Queen  Cleopatra,  another  one  Alexander  the  Great,  a  third  Joan  of  Arc,  and  who  or  what  not?  This  is  a  matter  of  inner  conviction,  and  is  based  on  more  or  less  familiarity  with  occultism  and  belief  in  the  modern  theory  of  reincarnation  The  latter  differs  from  the  one  genuine  doctrine  of  old,  as  will  be  shown,  but  there  is  no  rule  without  its  exception

As  to  the  Magus  being  "one  with  God  the  Father,  God  the  Son,  and  God  the  Holy  Ghost,"  this  again  is  quite  reasonable,  if  we  admit  that  a  Mystic  and  Seer  has  a  right  to  use  allegorical  language ;  and  in  this  case,  moreover,  it  is  quite  justified  by  the  doctrine  of  Universal  Unity  taught  in  Esoteric  Philosophy.

Every  Occultist  will  say  the  same,  on  (to  him)  scientific  and  logical  grounds,  in  full  accordance  with  the  doctrine  he  professes.

Not  a  Vedantin  but  says  the  same  thing  daily :  he  is,  of  course,  Brahman,  and  he  is  Parabrahman,  once  that  he  rejects  the  individuality  of  his  personal  spirit.

128  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

and  recognises  the  Divine  Ray  which  dwells  in  his  Higher  Self  as  only  a  reflec-  tion of  the  Universal  Spirit.

This  is  the  echo  in  all  times  and  ages  of  the  primitive  doctrine  of  Emanations.

The  first  Emanation  from  the  Unknown  is  the  "  Father,"  the  second  the  "  Son,"  and  all  and  everything  proceeds  from  the  One,  or  that  Divine  Spirit  which  is  "unknowable."  Hence,  the  assertion  that  by  her  (Sophia,  or  Minerva,  the  Divine  Wisdom)  he  (Simon),  when  yet  in  the  bosom  of  the  Father,  himself  the  Father  (or  the  first  collective  Emana-  tion), begot  the  Archangels- — the  "Son" — who  were  the  creators  of  this  world.

The  Roman  Catholics  themselves,  driven  to  the  wall  by  the  irrefutable  arguments  of  their  opponents — the  learned  Philologists  and  Symbologists  who  pick  to  shreds  Church  dogmas  and  their  authorities,  and  point  out  the  plurality  of  the  Elohim  in  the  Bible — admit  to-day  that  the  first  "creation  "  of  God,  the  Tsaba,  or  Archangels,  must  have  participated  in  the  creation  of  the  Universe.

Might  not  we  suppose  •

Although   "  God   alone  created  the  heaven  and  the  earth  "  that  however

unconnected  they  [the  Angels]  may  have  been  with  the  primordial  ex  nihilo  creation,  they  may  have  received  a  mission  to  achieve,  to  continue,  and  to  sustain  it ? '

exclaims  De  Mirville,  in  answer  to  Renan,  Lacour,  Maury  and  the  tutti  quant/  of  the  French  Institute.

With  certain  alterations  it  is  precisely  this  which  is  claimed  by  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE.

In  truth  there  is  not  a  single  doctrine  preached  by  the  many  Reformers  of  the  first  and  the  subsequent  centuries  of  our  era,  that  did  not  base  its  initial  teachings  on  this  universal  cosmogony.

Consult  Mosheim  and  see  what  he  has  to  say  of  the  many  "  heresies "  he  describes.

Cermthus,  the  Jew,

Taught   that   the   Creator   of  this  world  the  Sovereign  God  of  the  Jewish

people,  was  a  Being   .          who  derived  his  birth  from  the  Supreme  God  ;

that  this  Being,  moreover,

Fell  by  degrees  from  his  native  virtue  and  primitive  dignity

Basilides,  Carpocrates  and  Valentinus,  the  Egyptian  Gnostics  of  the  second  century,  held  the  same  ideas  with  a  few  variations  Basilides  preach-  ed seven  £ons  (Hosts  or  Archangels),  who  issued  from  the  substance  of  the  Supreme  Two  of  them,  Power  and  Wisdom,  begot  the  heavenly  hierarchy  of  the  first  class  and , dignity  ;  this  emanated  a  second  ;  the  latter  a  third,  and  so  on  ;  each  subsequent  evolution  being  of  a  nature  less  exalted  than  the  precedent,  and  each  creating  for  itself  a  Heaven  as  a  dwelling,  the  nature  of  each  of  these  respective  Heavens  decreasing  in  splendour  and  purity  as  it

1  Des  Espnts,  Tome  n,  p.  337.

POST-CHRISTIAN  ADEPTS  AND  THEIR  DOCTRINES

approached  nearer  to  the  earth.

Thus  the  number  of  these  Dwellings  amounted  to  365  ;  and  over  all  presided  the  Supreme  Unknown  called  Abraxas,  a  name  which  in  the  Greek  method  of  numeration  yields  the  number  365,  which  in  its  mystic  and  numerical  meaning  contains  the  number  355,  or  the  man  value.

J  This  was  a  Gnostic  Mystery  based  upon  that  of  primitive  Evolu-  tion, which  ended  with  "  man."

Saturnilus  of  Antioch  promulgated  the  same  doctrine  slightly  modified.

He  taught  two  eternal  principles,  Good  and  Evil,  which  are  simply  Spirit  and  Matter.

The  seven  Angels  who  preside  over  the  seven  Planets  are  the  Builders  of  our  Universe — a  purely  Eastern  doctrine,  as  Saturnilus  was  an  Asiatic  Gnostic.

These  Angels  are  the  natural  Guardians  of  the  seven  Regions  of  our  Planetary  System,  one  of  the  most  powerful  among  these  seven  creating  Angels  of  the  third  order  being  "  Saturn,"  the  presiding  genius  of  the  planet,  and  the  God  of  the  Hebrew  people  :  namely,  Jehovah,  who  was  venerated  among  the  Jews,  and  to  whom  they  dedicated  the  seventh  day  or  Sabbath,  Saturday — "Saturn's  day"  among  the  Scandinavians  and  also  among  the  Hindus.

Marcion,  who  also  held  the  doctrine  of  the  two  opposed  principles  of  Good  and  Evil,  asserted  that  there  was  a  third  Deity  between  the  two — one  of  a  "  mixed  nature  " — the  God  of»the  Jews,  the  Creator  (with  his  Host)  of  the  lower,  or  our,  World.

Though  ever  at  war  with  the  Evil  Principle,  this  intermediate  Being  was  nevertheless  also  opposed  to  the  Good  Principle,  •whose  place  and  title  he  coveted.

Thus  Simon  was  only  the  son  of  his  time,  a  religious  reformer  like  so  •many  others,  and  an  Adept  among  the  Kabalists.

The  Church,  to  which  a  belief  in  his  actual  existence  and  great  powers  is  a  necessity — in  order  the  .better  to  set  off  the  "miracle"  performed  by  Peter  and  his  triumph  over  Simon — extols  unstintingly  his  wonderful  magic  feats.

On  the  other  hand,  scepticism,  represented  by  scholars  and  learned  critics,  tries  to  make  away  with  him  altogether.

Thus,  after  denying  the  very  existence  of  Simon,  they  have  finally  thought  fit  to  merge  his  individuality  entirely  in  that  of  Paul.

The  anonymous  author  of  Supernatural  Religion  assiduously  endeavoured  to  prove  that  by  Simon  Magus  we  must  understand  the  Apostle  Paul,  whose  Epistles

1  Ten  is  the  perfect  number  of  the  Supreme  God  among  the  "  manifested  "  deities,  for  number  1  is  the  symbol  of  the  Universal  Unit,  or  male  principle  in  Nature,  and  number  0  the  feminine  symbol,  Chaos,  the  Deep,  the  two  forming  thus  the  symbol  of  Androgyne  nature  as  well  as  the  full  value  of  the  solar  year,  which  was  also  the  value  of  Jehovah  and  Enoch,  Ten,  with  Pythagoras,  was  the  symbol  of  the  Universe  ;  also  of  Enos,  the  Son  of  Seth,  or  the  "  Son  of  Man  "  who  stands  as  the  symbol  of  the  solar  year  of  365  days,  and  whose  years  are  therefore  given  as  365  also  In  the  Egyptian  Symbology  Abraxas  was  the  Sun,  the  "  Lord  of  the  Heavens  "

The  circle  is  the  symbol  of  the  one  Unmanifestmg  Principle,  the  plane  of  whose  figure  is  in-  finitude eternally,  and  this  is  crossed  by  a  diameter  only  during  Manvantaras.

FF

130  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

were  secretly  as  well  as  openly  calumniated  and  opposed  by  Peter,  and  charged  with  containing  "  dysnoetic  learning."  Indeed  this  seems  more  than  probable  when  we  think  of  the  two  Apostles  and  contrast  their  characters.

The  Apostle  of  the  Gentiles  was  brave,  outspoken,  sincere,  and  very  learned  ,  the  Apostle  of  Circumcision,  cowardly,  cautious,  insincere,  and  very  ignorant  That  Paul  had  been,  partially  at  least,  if  not  completely,  initiated  into  the  theurgic  mysteries,  admits  of  little  doubt  His  language,  the  phraseology  so  peculiar  to  the  Greek  philo-  sophers, certain  expressions  used  only  by  the  Initiates,  are  so  many  sure  ear-marks  to-  that  supposition  Our  suspicion  has  been  strengthened  by  an  able  article  entitled  "  Paul  and  Plato,"  by  Dr  A.  Wilder,  in  which  the  author  puts  forward  one  remarkable  and,  for  us,  very  precious  observation.

In  the  Epistles  to  the  Corinthians,  he  shows  Paul  abounding  with  "  expressions  suggested  by  the  initiations  of  Sabazius  and  Eleusis,  and  the  lectures  of  the  (Greek)  Philosophers.

He  (Paul)  designates  himself  an  idiotes  —-a  person  unskilful  in  the  Word,  but  not  in  the  gnosis  or  philosophical  learning  '  We  speak  wisdom  among  the  perfect  or  initiated,'  he  writes,  even  the  hidden  wisdom,  '  not  the  wisdom  of  this  world,  nor  of  the  Archons  of  this  world,  but  divine  wisdom  in  a  mystery,  secret — which  none  of  the  Archons  of  this  world  knew.'  "  '

What  else  can  the  Apostle  mean  by  those  unequivocal  words,  but  that  he  him-  self, as  belonging  to  the  Mystae  (Initiated),  spoke  of  things  shown  and  explained  only  in  the  Mysteries  ?  The  "  divine  wisdom  in  a  mystery  which  none  of  the  Archons  of  this  world  knew,"  has  evidently  some  direct  reference  to  the  Basileus  of  the  Eleusinian  Initiation  who  did  know.

The  BasMeus  belonged  to  the  staff  of  the  great  Hierophant,  and  was  an  Archon  of  Athens  ,  and  as  such  was  one  of  the  chief  Mystae,  belonging  ta  the  intenor  Mysteries,  to  which  a  very  select  and  small  number  obtained  an  entrance  ~  The  magistrates  supervising  the  Eleusinia  were*  called  Archons  H

We  will  deal,  however,  first  with  Simon  the  Magician.

1  See  I.  Cor.,  11,  6-8.  -  Compare  Taylor's  E/eusm/an  and  Bacchic  Mysteries,

3  |j.s  Unveiled.

II.  89-90.

SECTION

SIMON  AND  HIS  BIOGRAPHER  HIPPOLYTUS

AS  shown  in  our  earlier  volumes,  Simon  was  a  pupil  of  the  Tanaim  of  Samaria r  and  the  reputation  he  left  behind  him,  together  with  the  title  of  "the  Great  Power  of  God/'  testify  in  favour  of  the  ability  and  learning  of  his  Masters.

But  the  Tanaim  were  Kabalists  of  the  same  secret  school  as  John  of  the  Apocalypse,  whose  careful  aim  it  was  to  conceal  as  much  as  possible  the  real  meaning  of  the  names  in  the  Mosaic  Books.

Still  the  calumnies  so  jealously  disseminated  against  Simon  Magus  by  the  unknown  authors  and  compilers  of  the  Acts  and  other  writings,  could  not  cripple  the  truth  to  such  an  extent  as  to  conceal  the  fact  that  no  Christian  could  rival  him  in  thaumaturgic  deeds.

The  story  told  about  his  falling  during  an  aerial  flight,  breaking  both  his  legs  and  then  committing  suicide,  is  ridiculous.

Posterity  has  heard  but  one  side  of  the  story.

Were  the  disciples  of  Simon  to  have  a  chance,  we  might  perhaps  find  that  it  was  Peter  who  broke  both  his  legs.

But  as  against  this  hypothesis  we  know  that  this  Apostle  was  too  prudent  ever  to  venture  himself  in  Rome.

On  the  confession  of  several  ecclesiastical  writers,  no  Apostle  ever  performed  such  "  supernatural  wonders,"  but  of  course  pious  people  will  say  this  only  the  more  proves  that  it  was  the  Devil  who  worked  through  Simon.

He  was  accused  of  blasphemy  against  the  Holy  Ghost,  only  because  he  introduced  as  the  "  Holy  Spiritus  "  the  Mens  (Intelligence)-  or  "the  Mother  of  all."  But  we  find  the  same  expression  used  in  the  Book  of  Enoch,  in  which,  in  contradistinction  to  the  "  Son  of  Man,"  he  speaks  of  the  "  Son  of  the  Woman."  In  the  Codex  of  the  Nazarenes,  and  in  the  Zohar,  as  well  as  in  the  Books  of  Hermes,  the  same  expression  is  used  ;  and  even  in  the  apocryphal  Evangelium  of  the  Hebrews  we  read  that  Jesus  admitted  the  female  sex  of  the  Holy  Ghost  by  using  the  expression  "  My  Mother,  the  Holy  Pneuma."

After  long  ages  of  denial,  however,  the  actual  existence  of  Simon  Magus  has  been  finally  demonstrated,  whether  he  was  Saul,  Paul  or  Simon.

A  manuscript  speaking  of  him  under  the  last  name  has  been  discovered  in  Greece  and  has  put  a  stop  to  any  further  speculation.

132  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

In  his  Histoire  des  Jrois  Premiers  5/ec/es  de  I'Eglise  1  M.  de  Pressense  gives  his  opinion  on  this  additional  relic  of  early  Christianity.

Owing  to  the  numerous  myths  with  which  the  history  of  Simon  abounds — he  says — many  Theologians  (among  Protestants,  he  ought  to  have  added)  have  concluded  that  it  was  no  better  than  a  clever  tissue  of  legends.

But  he  adds :

It  contains  positive  facts,  it  seems,  now  warranted  by  the  unanimous  testimony  of  the  Fathers  of  the  Church  and  the  narrative  of  Hippolytus  recently  discovered

This  MS.  is  very  far  from  being  complimentary  to  the  alleged  founder  of  Western  Gnosticism.

While  recognising  great  powers  in  Simon,  it  brands  him  as  a  priest  of  Satan — which  is  quite  enough  to  show  that  it  was  written  by  a  Christian.

It  also  shows  that,  like  another  "servant  of  the  Evil  One"  as  Manes  is  called  by  the  Church — Simon  was  a  baptised  Christian ;  but  that  both,  being  too  well  versed  in  the  mysteries  of  true  primitive  Christianity,  were  persecuted  for  it.  The  secret  of  such  persecution  was  then,  as  it  is  now,  quite  transparent  to  those  who  study  the  question  impartially.

Seeking  to  preserve  his  independence,  Simon  could  not  submit  to  the  leadership  or  authority  of  any  of  the  Apostles,  least  of  all  to  that  of  either  Peter  or  John,  the  fanatical  author  of  the  Apocalypse.

Hence  charges  of  heresy  followed  by  "anathema  maranatha."  The  persecutions  by  the  Church  were  never  directed  against  Magic,  when  it  was  orthodox  ;  for  the  new  Theurgy,  established  and  regulated  by  the  Fathers,  now  known  to  Christendom  as  "grace  "  and  "miracles,"  was,  and  is  still,  when  it  does  happen,  only  Magic — whether  conscious  or  uncon-  scious.

Such  phenomena  as  have  passed  to  posterity  under  the  name  of  "divine  miracles"  were  produced  through  powers  acquired  by  great  purity  of  life  and  ecstasy.

Prayer  and  contemplation  added  to  asceticism  are  the  best  means  of  discipline  in  order  to  become  a  Theurgist,  where  there  is  no  regular  initiation.

For  intense  prayer  for  the  accomplishment  of  some  object  is  only  intense  will  and  desire,  resulting  in  unconscious  Magic.

In  our  own  day  George  Muller  of  Bristol  has  proved  it.  But  "  divine  miracles  "  are  produced  by  the  same  causes  that  generate  effects  of  Sorcery.

The  whole  difference  rests  on  the  good  or  evil  effects  aimed  at,  and  on  the  actor  who  produces  them.

The  thunders  of  the  Church  were  directed  only  against  those  who  dissented  from  the  formulae  and  attributed  to  themselves  the  production  of  certain  marvellous  effects,  instead  of  fathering  them  on  a  personal  God  ;  and  thus,  while  those  Adepts  in  Magic  Arts  who  acted  under  her  direct  instructions  and  auspices  were  proclaimed  to  posterity  and  history  as  saints  and  friends  of  God,  all  others  were  hooted  out  of  the  Church  and  sentenced  to  eternal  calumny  and

'  Op.  cit.,  Vol.

ii,  p.  395  3  Quoted  by  De  Mirville,  Des  fspnts,  Tome  vi,  pp.  41  and  42.

SIMON  AND  HIS  BIOGRAPHER  HIPPOLYTUS

curses  from  their  day  to  this,  Dogma  and  authority  have  ever  been  the  curse  of  humanity,  the  great  extinguishers  of  light  and  truth.

It  was  perhaps  the  recognition  of  a  germ  of  that  which,  later  on,  in  the  then  nascent  Church,  grew  into  the  virus  of  insatiate  power  and  ambition,  culminating  finally  in  the  dogma  of  infallibility,  that  forced  Simon,  and  so  many  others,  to  break  away  from  her  at  her  very  birth.

Sects  and  dissensions  began  with  the  first  century.

While  Paul  rebukes  Peter  to  his  face,  John  slanders  under  the  veil  of  vision  the  Nicolaitans,  and  makes  Jesus  declare  that  he  hates  them.-  Therefore  we  pay  little  attention  to  the  accusations  against  Simon  in  the  MS.  found  in  Greece.

It  is  entitled  Philosophumena.

Its  author,  regarded  as  Saint  Hippolytus  by  the  Greek  Church,  is  referred  to  as  an  "  unknown  heretic"  by  the  Papists,  only  because  he  speaks  in  it  "  very  slanderously  "  of  Pope  Callistus,  also  a  Saint.

Nevertheless,  Greeks  and  Latins  agree  in  declaring  the  Philosophu-  mena  to  be  an  extraordinary  and  very  erudite  work.

Its  antiquity  and  genuineness  have  been  vouched  for  by  the  best  authorities  of  Tubingen.

Whoever  the  author  may  have  been,  he  expresses  himself  about  Simon  in  this  wise  :

Simon,  a  man  well  versed  in  magic  arts,  deceived  many  persons  partly  by  the  art  of  Thrasymedes,'1  and  partly  with  the  help  of  demons  4  .  .  He  determined  to  pass  himself  off  as  a  god.

.  .  .  Aided  by  his  wicked  arts,  he  turned  to  profit  not  only  the  teachings  of  Moses,  but  those  of  the  poets.

.  His  disciples  use  to  this  day  his  charms.

Thanks  to  incantations,  to  phi'tres,  to  their  attractive  caresses ''  and  what  they  call  "  sleeps,"  they  send  demons  to  influence  all  those  whom  they  would  fascinate.

With  this  object  they  employ  what  they  call  "  familiar  demons."  r>

Further  on  the  MS   reads  :

The  Magus  (Simon)  made  those  who  wished  to  enquire  of  the  demon  write  what  their  question  was  on  a  leaf  of  parchment ;  this,  folded  in  four,  was  thrown  into  a  burning  brazier,  in  order  that  the  smoke  should  reveal  the  contents  of  the  writing  to

1  Mr.   St    George   Lane-Fox  has  admirably  expressed  the  idea  in  his  eloquent  appeal  to  the  many  rival   schools  and  societies  in  India       "  I  feel  sure,"  he,  said,  "  that  the  prime  motive,  however  dimly  perceived,  by  which  you,  as  the  promoters  of  these  movements,  were  actuated,  was  a  revolt  against  the  tyrannical  and  almost  universal  establishment  throughout  all  existing  social  and  so-called  religious  institutions  of  a  usurped  authority  in  some  external  form  supplanting  and  obscuring  the  only  real  and  ultimate  authority,  the  indwelling  spirit  of  truth  revealed  to  each  individual  soul,  true  conscience  in  fact,   that  supreme  source  of  all  human  wisdom  and  power  which  elevates  man  above  the  level  of  the  brute."     (To  the  Members  of  the  Arya  Sama/,  the  Theosophical  Society,  Brahmo  and  Hindu  Sama'i  and  other  Religious  and  Progressive  Societies  m  India  )

2  Revelation,  11,

3  This    "  art "    is  not  common  jugglery,   as  some  define   it   now     it   is  a  kind  of  psychological  jugglery,   if  jugglery  at  all,  where  fascination  and  glamour  are  used  as  means  of  producing  illusions.

It  is  hypnotism  on  a  large  scale.

4  The  author  asserts  in  this  his  Christian  persuasion

•*  Magnetic  passes,  evidently,  followed  by  a  trance  and  sleep

(1  "  Elemental  "  used  by  the  highest  Adept  to  do  mechanical,  not  intellectual  work,  as  a  physicist  uses  gases  and  other  compounds

134  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

the  Spirit  (demon)  (Philos.,  IV,  iv).  Incense  was  thrown  by  handfuls  on  the  blazing  coals,  the  Magus  adding,  on  pieces  of  papyrus,  the  Hebrew  names  of  the  Spirits  he  was  addressing,  and  the  flame  devoured  all  Very  soon  the  divine  Spirit  seemed  to  over-  whelm the  Magician,  who  uttered  unintelligible  invocations,  and  plunged  in  such  a  state  he  answered  every  question — phantasmal  apparitions  being  often  raised  over  the  flaming  brazier  (ibid  ,  iii) ;  at  other  times  fire  descended  from  heaven  upon  objects  previously  pointed  out  by  the  Magician  (ibid.)  ,  or  again  the  deity  evoked,  crossing  the  room,  would  trace  fiery  orbs  in  its  flight  (ibid  ,  ix) l

So  far  the  above  statements  agree  with  those  of  Anastasius  the  Sinaite  :

People  saw  Simon  causing  statues  to  walk  ,  precipitating  himself  into  the  flames  without  being  burnt ;  metamorphosing  his  body  into  that  of  various  animals  [lycan-  thropy]  ;  raising  at  banquets  phantoms  and  spectres  ;  causing  the  furniture  in  the  rooms  to  move  about,  by  invisible  spirits  He  gave  out  that  he  was  escorted  by  a  number  of  shades  to  whom  he  gave  the  name  of  "  souls  of  the  dead."  Finally,  he  used  to  fly  in  the  air  .  .  (Anast  ,  Patrol  Grecque,  vol.

Ixxxix,  col.

523,  quaest  xx.)

Suetonius  says  in  his  Nero,

In  those  days  an  Icarus  fell  at  his  first  ascent  near  Nero's  box  and  covered  it  with  his  blood  *

This  sentence,  referring  evidently  to  some  unfortunate  acrobat  »who  missed  his  footing  and  tumbled',  is  brought  forward  as  a  proof  that  it  was  Simon  who  fell.4  But  the  latter's  name  is  surely  too  famous,  if  one  must  credit  the  Church  Fathers,  for  the  historian  to  have  mentioned  him  simply  as  "  an  Icarus."  The  writer  is  quite  aware  that  there  exists  in  Rome  a  locality  named  Simonium,  near  the  Church  of  SS.  Cosmas  and  Daimanus  (Via  Sacra),  and  the  ruins  of  the  ancient  temple  of  Romulus,  where  the  broken  pieces  of  a  stone,  on  which  it  is  alleged  the  two  knees  of  the  Apostle  Peter  were  im-  pressed in  thanksgiving  after  his  supposed  victory  over  Simon,  are  shown  to  this  day.

But  what  does  this  exhibition  amount  to  ?  For  the  broken  fragments  of  one  stone,  the  Buddhists  of  Ceylon  show  a  whole  rock  on  Adam's  Peak  with  another  imprint  upon  it.  A  crag  stands  upon  its  platform,  a  terrace  of  which  supports  a  h,uge  boulder,  and  on  the  boulder  rests  for  nearly  three  thousand  years  the  sacred  foot-print,  of  a  foot  five  feet  long.

Why  not  credit  the  legend  of  the  latter,  if  we  have  to  accept  that  of  St.  Peter?  "  Prince  of  Apostles,"  or  "  Prince  of  Reformers,"  or  even  the  "  First-born  of  Satan,"  as  Simon  is  called,  all  are  entitled  to  legends  and  fictions.

One  may  be  allowed  to  discriminate,  however.

That  Simon  could  fly,  i.e.,  raise  himself  in  the  air  for  a  few  minutes,  is  no  impossibility.

Modern  mediums  have  performed  the  same  feat  supported  by

1  Quoted  from  De  Mirville,  op   cit  ,  vi,

'Ibid.,  vi,  45.  -Moid.,  p.

4  Ame'de'e  Fleury,   Rapports  de  St   Paul  avec  Seneque,  11,  100      The  whole  of  this  is  summarised  from  De  Mirville  in  Des  Esprits

SIMON  AND  HIS  BIOGRAPHER  HIPPOLYTUS

a  force  that  Spiritualists  persist  in  calling  "  spirits."  But  if  Simon  did  so,  it  was  with  the  help  of  a  self-acquired  blind  power  that  heeds  little  the  prayers  ,and  commands  of  rival  Adepts,  let  alone  Saints.

The  fact  is  that  logic  is  against  the  supposed  fall  of  Simon  at  the  prayer  of  Peter.

For  had  he  been  defeated  publicly  by  the  Apostle,  his  disciples  would  have  abandoned  him  after  such  an  evident  sign  of  inferiority,  and  would  have  become  orthodox  Chris-  tians.

But  we  find  even  the  author  of  Philosophumena,  just  such  a  Christian,  showing  otherwise.

Simon  had  lost  so  little  credit  with  his  pupils  and  the  masses,  that  he  went  on  daily  preaching  in  the  Roman  Campania  after  his  supposed  fall  from  the  clouds  "  far  above  the  Capitolium,"  in  which  fall  he  broke  his  legs  only  !  Such  a  lucky  fall  is  in  itself  sufficiently  miraculous,  one  would  say.

SECTION

ST.   PAUL  THE  REAL  FOUNDER  OF  PRESENT  CHRISTIANITY

WE  may  repeat  with  the  author  of  Phallicism  :

We  are  all  for  construct/on — even  for  Christian,  although  of  course  philosophical  construct/on  We  have  nothing  to  do  with  reality,  m  man's  limited,  mechanical  scientific  sense,  or  with  rea//sm  We  have  undertaken  to  show  that  mysticism  is  the  very  life  and  soul  of  religion  ,  '  .  .  that  the  Bible  is  only  misread  and  mis-represented  when  rejected  as  advancing  supposed  fabulous  and  contradictory  things  ;  that  Moses  did  not  make  mistakes,  but  spoke  to  the  "  children  of  men  "  in  the  only  way  in  which  children  in  their  nonage  can  be  addressed  ,  that  the  world  is,  indeed,  a  very  different  place  from  that  which  it  is  assumed  to  be  ;  that  what  is  derided  as  superstition  is  the  only  true  and  the  only  scientific  knowledge,  and  moreover  that  modern  knowledge  and  modern  science  are  to  a  great  extent  not  only  superstition,  but  superstition  of  a  very  destructive  and  deadly  kind.

All  this  is  perfectly  true  and  correct.

But  it  is  also  true  that  the  New  Testament,  the  Acts  and  the  Epistles — however  much  the  historical  figure  of  Jesus  may  be  true — are  all  symbolical  and  allegorical  sayings,  and  that  "  it  was  not  Jesus  but  Paul  who  was  the  real  founder  of  Christianity  ;  "  '*  but  it  was  not  the  official  Church  Christianity,  at  any  rate.

"  The  disciples  were  called  Christians  first  in  Antioch,"  the  Acts  of  the  Apostles  tell  us,4  and  they  were-  not  so  called  before,  nor  for  a  long  time  after,  but  simply  Nazarenes.

This  view  is  found  in  more  than  one  writer  of  the  present  and  the  past  centuries.

But,  hitherto,  it  has  always  been  laid  aside  as  an  un-  proven  hypothesis,  a  blasphemous  assumption  ;  though,  as  the  author  of  Paul,  the  Founder  of  Christianity 5  truly  says  :

Such  men  as  Irenaaus,  Epiphanius  and  Eusebius  have  transmitted  to  posterity  a  reputation  for  such  untruth  and  dishonest  practices  that  the  heart  sickens  at  the  story  of  the  crimes  of  that  period.

1  But  we  can  never  agree  with  the  author  "  that  rites  and  ritual  and  formal  worship  and  prayers,  are  of  the  absolute  necessity  of  things,"  for  the  external  can  develop  and  grow  and  receive  worship-  only  at  the  expense  of,  and  to  the  detriment  of,  the  internal,  the  only  real  and  true.

3  H.  Jennings,  op   cit  ,  op   37,  38  {  See  /sis  Unve//ed.  n,  574  '  Ch.  xi,

"'  Art  ,  by  Dr   A   Wilder,  in  Evolution

ST.  PAUL  THE  REAL  FOUNDER  OF  PRESENT  CHRISTIANITY

The  more  so,  since  the  whole  Christian  scheme  rests  upon  their  sayings.

But  we  find  now  another  corroboration,  and  this  time  on  the  perfect  reading;  of  biblical  glyphs.

In  The  Source  of  Measures  we  find  the  following  :

It  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  our  present  Christianity  is  Pauline,  not  Jesus  Jesus,  in  his  life,  was  a  Jew,  conforming  to  the  law  ,  even  more,  he  says  "  The  scribes  and  pharisees  sit  in  Moses'  seat ;  whatsoever  therefore  they  command  you  to  do,  that  observe  and  do  "  And  again  "  I  did  not  come  to  destroy  but  to  fulfil  the  law."  Therefore,  he  was  under  the  law  to  the  day  of  his  death,  and  could  not.

while  in  life,  abrogate  one  jot  or  tittle  of  it  He  was  circumcised  and  commanded  circumcision  But  Paul  said  of  circumcision  that  it  availed  nothing,  and  he  (Paul)  abrogated  the  law  Saul  and  Paul — that  is,  Saul,  under  the  law,  and  Paul,  freed  from  the  obligations  of  the  law--  were in  one  man,  but  parallelisms  in  the  f/esh,  of  Jesus  the  man  under  the  law  as  observ-  ing it,  who  thus  died  in  Chrestos  and  arose,  freed  from  its  obligations,  in  the  spirit  world  as  Chnstos,  or  the  triumphant  Christ  It  was  the  Christ  who  was  freed,  but  Christ  was  in  the  Spirit  Saul  in  the  flesh  was  the  function  of,  and  parallel  of  Chrestos  Paul  in  the  flesh  was  the  function  and  parallel  of  Jesus  become  Christ  in  the  spirit,  as  an  early  reality  to  answer  to  and  act  .for  the  apotheosis ,  and  so  armed  with  all  autho-  rity in  the  flesh  to  abrogate  human  law  l

The  real  reason  why  Paul  is  shown  as  "  abrogating  the  law  "  can  be  found  only  in  India,  where  to  this  day  the  most  ancient  customs  and  privileges  are  preserved  in  all  their  purity,  notwithstanding  the  abuse  levelled  at  the  same.

There  is  only  one  class  of  persons  who  can  disregard  the  law  of  Brahmanical  institutions,  caste  included,  with  impunity,  and  that  is  the  perfect  "  Svamis,"  the  Yogis — who  have  reached,  or  are  supposed  to  have  reached,,  the  first  step  towards  the  Jivanmukta  state — or  the  full  Initiates.

And  Paul  was  undeniably  an  Initiate.

We  will  quote  a  passage  or  two  from  Isis  Un-  veiled, for  we  can  say  now  nothing  better  than  what  was  said  then  :

Take  Paul,  read  the  little  of  original  that  is  left  of  him  in  the  writings  attributed  to  this  brave,  honest,  sincere  man,  and  see  whether  anyone  can  find  a  word  therein  to  show  that  Paul  meant  by  the  word  Christ  anything  more  than  the  abstract  ideal  of  the  personal  divinity  indwelling  in  man  For  Paul,  Christ  is  not  a  person,  but  an  embodied)  idea.

"  If  any  roan  is  in  Christ  he  is  a  new  creation,"  he  is  reborn,  as  after  initiation,  for  the  Lord  is  spirit — the  spirit  of  man  Paul  was  the  only  one  of  the  apostles  who  had  understood  the  secret  ideas  underlying  the  teachings  of  Jesus,  although  he  had'  never  met  him.

But  Paul  himself  was  not  infallible  or  perfect.

Bent  upon  inaugurating  a  new  and  broad  reform,  one  embracing  the  whole  of  humanity,  he  sincerely  set  his  own  doctrines  far  above  the  wisdom  of  the  ages,  above  the  ancient  Mysteries  and  final  revelation  to  the  Epoptae

Another  proof  that  Paul  belonged  to  the  circle  of  the  "  Initiates  "  lies  in  the  following  fact.

The  apostle  had  his  head  shorn  at  Cenchreae,  where  Lucius  (Apu/e/us)  was  initiated,  because  "  he  had  a  vow."  The  Nazars — or  set  apart — as  we  see  in  the  Jewish  Scriptures,  had  to  cut  their  hair,  which  they  wore  long,  and  which  "  no  razor  touched  "  at  any  other  time,  and  sacrifice  it  on  the  altar  of  initiation  And  the  Nazars.

were  a  class  of  Chaldean  Theurgists  or  Initiates.*

1  Op.  at.,  p    262  -  /sis  Unveiled,  II,  p.

138  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

It  is  shown  in  I  sis  Unveiled  that  Jesus  belonged  to  this  class.

Paul  declares  that  •  "  According  to  the  grace  of  God  which  is  given  unto  me,  as  a  wise  master-builder,  I  have  laid  the  foundation."  (/.  Corinth.,  in,  10.)

The  expression,  master-builder,  used  only  once  in  the  whole  Bible,  and  by  Paul,  may  be  considered  as  a  whole  revelation  In  the  Mysteries,  the  third  part  of  the  sacred  rites  was  called  Epopteia,  or  revelation,  reception  into  the  secrets.

In  substance  it  means  the  highest  stage  of  clairvoyance — the  divine  ,  but  the  real  significance  of

the  word  is  "  overseeing,"  from  oTrrofMcu — "  I  see  myself  "  In  Sanskrit  the  root  ap  had  the  same  meaning  originally,  though  now  it  is  understood  as  meaning  "to  obtain."  !

The  word  epopteia  is  compound,  from  eVt  "  upon,"  and  oirTopai  "  to  look,"  or  an  overseer,  an  inspector — also  used  for  a  master-builder.

The  title  of  master-  mason,  in  Freemasonry,  is  derived  from  this,  in  the  sense  used  in  the  Mysteries.

There-  fore, when  Paul  entitles  himself  a  "  master-builder,"  he  is  using  a  word  pre-eminently  kabalistic,  theurgic,  and  masonic,  and  one  which  no  other  apostle  uses  He  thus  declares  himself  an  adept,  having  the  right  to  initiate  others.

If  we  search  in  this  direction,  with  those  sure  guides,  the  Grecian  Mysteries  and  the  Kabalah,  before  us,  it  will  be  easy  to  find  the  secret  reason  why  Paul  was  so  persecuted  and  hated  by  Peter,  John,  and  James  The  author  of  the  Revelation  was  a  Jewish  Kabalist,  pur  sang,  with  all  the  hatred  inherited  by  him  from  his  fore-  fathers toward  the  pagan  Mysteries  a  His  jealousy  during  the  life  of  Jesus  extended  even  to  Peter ;  and  it  is  but  after  the  death  of  their  common  master  that  we  see  the  two  apostles — the  former  of  whom  wore  the  Mitre  and  the  Petaloon  of  the  Jewish  Rabbis — preach  so  zealously  the  rite  of  circumcision.

In  the  eyes  of  Peter,  Paul,  who  had  humiliated  him,  and  whom  he  felt  so  much  his  superior  in  "  Greek  learning  "  and  philosophy,  must  have  naturally  appeared  as  a  magician,  a  man  polluted  with  the  "  Gnosis,"  with  the  "  wisdom  "  of  the  Greek  Mysteries — hence,  perhaps,  "  Simon  the  Magician  "  as  a  comparison,  not  a  nickname  '

1  In   its   most  extensive  meaning,  the  Sanskrit  word  has  the  same  literal  sense  as  the  Greek  term  ,  both  imply  "  revelation,"  by  no  human  agent,  but  through  the  "  receiving  of  the  sacred  drink  "     In  India   the   initiated   received  the   "  Soma,"    sacred   drink,   which  helped  to  liberate  his  soul  from  the  body  ,    and   in  the  Eleusmian  Mysteries  it  was  the  sacred  drink  offered  at  the  Epopteia.

The  Grecian  Mysteries  are  wholly  derived  from  the  BrShmanical  Vaidic  rites,  and  the  latter  from  the  Ante-Vaidic  religious  Mysteries — primitive  Wisdom  Philosophy.

2  It  is  needless  to   state  that  the  Gospel  according  to  John  was  not  written  by  John,  but  by  a  Platonist  or  a  Gnostic  belonging  to  the  Neo-Platonic  school.

3  Ibid.,  vol   II,  pp.  90-1      The  fact  that  Peter  persecuted  the  '  Apostle  to  the  Gentiles  '  under  that  name,  does  not  necessarily  imply  that  there  was  no  Simon  Magus  individually  distinct  from  Paul.

It  may   have   become   a   generic   name   of   abuse      Theodoret  and  Chrysostom,  the  earliest  and  most  prolific   commentators   on   the   Gnosticism   of   those  days,  seem  actually  to  make  of  Simon  a  rival  of  Paul    and   to    state   that   between   them    passed    frequent    messages      The  former,  as  a  diligent  pro-  pagandist of  what  Paul  terms  the  "  antithesis  of  the  Gnosis  "  (/   Epistle  to  Timothy),  must  have  been  a  sore  thorn  in  the   side  of  the  apostle.

There  are  sufficient  proofs  of  the  actual  existence  of  Simon  Magus.

[See  footnote,  /sis.

II,  p   91  ]

SECTION

PETER  A  JEWISH   KABALIST,  NOT  AN  INITIATE

AS  to  Peter,  biblical  criticism  has  shown  that  in  all  probability  he  had  no  more  to  do  with  the  foundation  of  the  Latin  Church  at  Rome  than  to  furnish  the  pretext,  so  readily  seized  upon  by  the  cunning  Irenaeus,  of  endowing  the  Church  with  a  new  name  for  the  Apostle — Petra  or  Kiffa — a  name  which,  by  an  easy  play  upon  words,  could  be  readily  connected  with  Petroma.

The  Petroma  was  a  pair  of  stone  tablets  used  by  the  Hierophants  at  the  Initiations,  during  the  final  Mystery.

In  this  lies  concealed  the  secret  of  the  Vatican  claim  to  the  seat  of  Peter.

As  already  quoted  in  Isis  Unveiled,  II,  p.  92  .

In   the   Oriental   countries  the  designation  Peter  (in  Phoenician  and  Chaldaic  an  .interpreter),  appears  to  have  been  the  title  of  this  personage.

So  far,  and  as  the  *'  interpreters"  of  Neo-Christianism,  the  Popes  have  most  undeniably  the  right  to  call  themselves  successors  to  the  title  of  Peter,  but  hardly  the  successors  to,  least  of  all  the  interpreters  of,  the  doctrines  of  Jesus,  the  Christ ,  for  there  is  the  Oriental  Church,  older  and  far  purer  than  the  Roman  hierarchy,  which,  having  ever  faithfully  held  to  the  primitive  teachings  of  the  Apostles,  is  known  historically  to  have  refused  to  follow  the  Latin  seceders  from  the  original  Apostolic  Church,  though,  curiously  enough,  she  is  still  referred  to  by  her  Roman  sister  as  the  "Schismatic"  Church.

It  is  useless  to  repeat  the  reasons  for  the  statements  above  made,  as  they  may  all  be  found  in  Isis  Unveiled,2  where  the  words,  Peter,  Pater,  and  Pitar,  are  explained,  and  the  origin  of  the  "  Seat  of  Pitah  "  is  shown.

The  reader  will  find  upon  referring  to  the  above  pages  that  an  inscription  was  found  on  the  coffin  of  Queen  Mentuhept  of  the  Eleventh  Dynasty  (2250  B.C  according  to  Bunsen),  which  in  its  turn  was  shown  to  have  been  transcribed  from  the  Seventeenth  Chapter  of  the  Book  of  the  Dead,  dating  certainly  not  later  than  4500  B.C  or  496  years  before  the  World's  Creation,  in  the  Genesiacal  chronology.

Nevertheless,  Baron  Bunsen  shows

x  Taylor's  Eleusmian  and  Bacchic  Mysteries,  Wilder's  ed.,  p    x.  2  Vol    II,  pp    91-4.

140  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

the  group  of  the  hieroglyphics  given  (Peter-ref-su,  the  "  Mystery  Word  ")  and  the  sacred  formulary  mixed  up  with  a  whole  series  of  glosses  and  various  interpretations  on  a  monument  4,000  years  old.

This  is  identical  with  saying  that  the  record  (the  true  interpretation)  was  at  that  time  no  longer  intelligible.

.  .  We  beg  our  readers  to  understand  that  a  sacred  text,  a  hymn,  containing  the  words  of  a  departed  spirit,  existed  in  such  a  state,  about  4,000-  years  ago,  as  to  be  all  but  unintelligible  to  royal  scribes.

"  Unintelligible  "  to  the  non-initiated — this  is  certain  ;  and  it  is  so  proved  by  the  confused  and  contradictory  glosses.

Yet  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  it  was — for  it  still  is — a  mystery  word.

The  Baron  further  explains ;

It  appears  to  me  that  our  PTR  is  literally  the  old  Aramaic  and  Hebrew  "  Patar,"  which  occurs  in  the  history  of  Joseph  as  the  specific  word  for  interpreting,  whence  also  Pitrum  is  the  term  for  interpretation  of  a  text,  a  dream  J

This  word,  PTR,  was  partially  interpreted  owing  to  another  word  similarly  written  in  another  group  of  hieroglyphics,  on  a  stele,  the  glyph  used  for  it  being  an  opened  eye,  interpreted  by  De  Rouge3  as  "  to  appear,"  and  by  Bunsen  as  "illuminator,"  which  is  more  correct.

However  it  may  be,  the  word  Patar,  or  Peter,  would  locate  both  master  and  disciple  in  the  circle  of  Initiation,  and  connect  them  with  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE;  while  in  the  "Seat  of  Peter"  we  can  hardly  help  seeing  a  connection  with  Petroma,  the  double  set  of  stone  tablets  used  by  the  Hierophant  at  the  Supreme  Initiation  during  the  final  Mystery,  as  already  stated,  also  with  the  Pitha-sthana  (seat,  or  the  place  of  a  seat),  a  term  used  in  the  Mysteries  of  the  Tantriks  in  India,  in  which  the  limbs  of  Sati  are  scattered  and  then  united  again,  as  those  of  Osiris  by  Isis.1  Pitha  is  a  Sanskrit  word,  and  is  also  used  to  designate  the  seat  of  the  initiating  Lama.

Whether  ail  the  above  terms  are  due  simply  to  "coincidences"  or  otherwise  is  left  to  the  decision  of  our  learned  Symbologists  and  Philologists.

We  state  facts — and  nothing  more.

Many  other  writers,  far  more  learned  and  entitled  to  be  heard  than  the  author  has  ever  claimed  to  be,  have  sufficient-  ly demonstrated  that  Peter  never  had  anything  to  do  with  the  foundation  of  the  Latin  Church  ;  that  his  supposed  name  Petra  or  Kiffa,  also  the  whole  story  of  his  Apostleship  at  Rome,  are  simply  a  play  on  the  term,  which  meant  in  every  country,  in  one  or  another  form,  the  Hierophant  or  Interpreter  of  the  Mysteries ,  and  that  finally,  far  from  dying  a  martyr  at  Rome,  where  he  had  probably  never  been,  he  died  at  a  good  old  age  at  Babylon.

In  Sepher  To/cfotr)  Jeshu,  a  Hebrew  manuscript  of  great  antiquity — evidently  an  original*

1  Bunsen,  Egypt's  Place  in  History,  v,  90.  -  Ibid  :?  Stele,  p.  44.

4  See  Dowson's  Hindu  Classical  Diet  .  sub-voce..  "  Pitha-sthAnam  "

PETER  A  JEWISH  KABALIST,  NOT  AN  INITIATE

and  very  precious  document,  if  one  may  judge  from  the  care  the  Jews  took  to  hide  it  from  the  Christians — Simon  (Peter)  is  referred  to  as  "  a  faithful  servant  of  God,"  who  passed  his  life  in  austerities  and  meditation,  a  Kabalist  and  a  Nazarene  who  lived  at  Babylon  "  at  the  top  of  a  tower,  composed  hymns,  preached  chanty,"  and  died  there.

SECTION

APOLLONIUS  OF  TYANA

IT  is  said  in  Isis  Unveiled  that  the  greatest  teachers  of  divinity  agree  that  nearly  all  ancient  books  were  written  symbolically  and  in  a  language  intelligible  only  to  the  Initiated.

The  biographical  sketch  of  Apollonius  of  Tyana  affords  an  example.

As  every  Kabalist  knows,  it  embraces  the  whole  of  the  Hermetic  Philosophy,  being  a  counterpart  in  many  respects  of  the  traditions  left  us  of  King  Solomon.

It  reads  like  a  fairy  story,  but,  as  in  the  case  of  the  latter,  sometimes  facts  and  historical  events  are  presented  to  the  world  under  the  colours  of  fiction.

The  journey  to  India  represents  in  its  every  stage,  though  of  course  allegorically,  the  trials  of  a  Neophyte,  giving  at  the  same  time  a  geographical  and  topographical  idea  of  a  certain  country  as  it  is  even  now,  if  one  knows  where  to  look  for  it.  The  long  discourses  of  Apollonius  with  the  Brahmans,  their  sage  advice,  and  the  dialogues  with  the  Corinthian  Menippus  would,  if  interpreted,  give  the  Esoteric  Catechism.

His  visit  to  the  empire  of  the  wise  men,  his  interview  with  their  King  Hiarchas,  the  oracle  of  Amphiaraus,  explain  symbolically  many  of  the  secret  dogmas  of  Hermes — in  the  generic  sense  of  the  name — and  of  Occultism.

Wonderful  is  this  to  relate,  and  were  not  the  statement  supported  by  numerous  calculations  already  made,  and  the  secret  already  half  revealed,  the  writer  would  never  have  dared  to  say  it.  The  travels  of  the  great  Magus  are  correctly,  though  allegorically  described — that  is  so  to  say,  all  that  is  related  by  Damis  had  actually  taken  place — but  the  narrative  is  based  upon  the  Zodiacal  signs.

As  transliterated  by  Damis  under  the  guidance  of  Apollonius  and  translated  by  Philostratus,  it  is  a  marvel  indeed.

At  the  conclusion  of  what  may  now  be  related  of  the  wonderful  Adept  of  Tyana  our  meaning  will  become  clearer.

Suffice  it  to  say  for  the  present  that  the  dialogues  spoken  of  would  disclose,  if  correctly  understood,  some  of  the  most  important  secrets  of  Nature.

Eliphas  Levt  points  out  the  great  resemblance  which  exists  between  King  Hiarchus  and  the  fabulous  Hiram,  from  whom  Solomon  procured  the  cedars  of  Lebanon  and

APOLLONIUS  OF  TYANA

the  gold  of  Ophir.

But  he  keeps  silent  as  to  another  resemblance  of  which,  as  a  learned  Kabalist,  he  could  not  be  ignorant.

Moreover,  according  to  his  invariable  custom,  he  mystifies  the  reader  more  than  he  teaches  him,  divulging;  nothing  and  leading  him  off  the  right  track.

Like  most  of  the  historical  heroes  of  hoary  antiquity,  whose  lives  and  works  strongly  differ  from  those  of  commonplace  humanity,  Apollonius  is  to  this  day  a  riddle,  which  has,  so  far,  found  no  GEdipus.

His  existence  is  surrounded  with  such  a  veil  of  mystery  that  he  is  often  mistaken  for  a  myth.

But  according  to  every  law  of  logic  and  reason,  it  is  quite  clear  that  Apollonius  should  never  be  regarded  in  such  a  light.

If  the  Tyanean  Theurgist  may  be  put  down  as  a  fabulous  character,  then  history  has  no  right  to  her  Caesars,  and  Alexanders.

It  is  quite  true  that  this  Sage,  who  stands  unrivalled  in  his  thaumaturgical  powers  to  this  day — on  evidence  historically  attested — came  into  the  arena  of  public  life  no  one  seems  to  know  whence,  and  disappeared  from  it,  no  one  seems  to  know  whither.

But  the  reasons  for  this  are  evident  Every  means  was  used— especially  during  the  fourth  and  fifth  centuries  of  our  era — to  sweep  from  people's  minds  the  remembrance  of  this  great  and  holy  man.

The  circulation  of  his  biographies,  which  were  many  and  enthusiastic,,  was  prevented  by  the  Christians,  and  for  a  very  good  reason,  as  we  shall  see.

The  diary  of  Damis  survived  most  miraculously,  and  remained  alone  to  tell  the  tale.

But  it  must  not  to  be  forgotten  that  Justin  Martyr  often  speaks  of  Apollonius,  and  the  character  and  truthfulness  of  this  good  man  are  unim-  peachable, the  more  in  that  he  had  good  reasons  to  feel  bewildered.

Nor  can.

it  to  be  denied  that  there  is  hardly  a  Church  Father  of  the  first  six  centuries  that  left  Apollonius  unnoticed.

Only,  according  to  invariable  Christian  cus-  toms of  charity,  their  pens  were  dipped  as  usual  in  the  blackest  ink  of  odium  theologicum,  intolerance  and  one-sidedness  St.  Jerome  (Hieronymus)  gives  at  length  the  story  of  St.  John's  alleged  contest  with  the  Sage  of  Tyana — a  competition  of  "  miracles  " — in  which,  of  course,  the  truthful  saint1  describes  in  glowing  colours  the  defeat  of  Apollonius,  and  seeks  corroboration  in.  St.  John's  Apocrypha  proclaimed  doubtful  even  by  the  Church.

-

1  See  Preface  to  St  Mathew's  Gospel,  Baronius,  i.  752,  quoted  in  De  Mirville,  Tome  vi,  p  63  Jerome  is  the  Father  who  having  found  the  authentic  and  original  Evangel  (the  Hebrew  text),  by  Matthew  the  Apostle-publican,  in  the  library  of  Caesarea,  "  written  by  the  hand  of  Matthew"  (Hieronymus  De  V»ns,  Illust  Chap  in) — as  he  himself  admits— set  it  down  as  heretical,  and  substituted  for  it  his  own  Greek  text  And  it  is  also  he  who  perverted  the  text  in  the  Book  of  Job  to  enforce  belief  in  the  resurrection  in  flesh  (see  his  Unveiled,  II,  pp  181,  182,  et  seq  ),  quoting  in  support  the  most  learned  authorities

-  De  Mirville  gives  the  following  thrilling  account  of  the  "  contest."

"  John,  pressed,  as  St.  Jerome  tells  us,  by  all  the  churches  of  Asia  to  proclaim  more  solemnly  [m  the  face  of  the  miracles  of  Apollonius]  the  divinity  of  Jesus  Christ,  after  a  long  prayer  with  his  disciples  on  the  Mount  of  Patmos  and  being  in  ecstasy  by  the  divine  Spirit  made  heard  amid  thunder

144  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

£

Therefore  it  is  that  nobody  can  say  where  or  when  Apollonius  was  born,  and  everyone  is  equally  ignorant  of  the  date  at  which,  and  of  the  place  where  he  died.

Some  think  he  was  eighty  or  ninety  years  old  at  the  time  of  his  death,  others  that  he  was  one  hundred  or  even  one  hundred  and  seventeen.

But,  whether  he  ended  his  days  at  Ephesus  in  the  year  96  A  D.,  as  some  say,  or  whether  the  event  took  place  at  Lindus  in  the  temple  of  Pallas-Athene,  or  whether  again  he  disappeared  from  the  temple  of  Dictynna,  or  whether,  as  others  maintain,  he  did  not  die  at  all,  but  when  a  hundred  years  old  renewed  his  life  by  Magic,  and  went  on  working  for  the  benefit  of  humanity,  no  one  can  tell.

The  Secret  Records  alone  have  noted  his  birth  and  subsequent  career.

But  then — "  who  hath  believed  in  that  report?  "

All  that  history  knows  is  that  Apollonius  was  the  enthusiastic  founder  of  a  new  school  of  contemplation.

Perhaps  less  metaphorical  and  more  practical  than  Jesus,  he  nevertheless  inculcated  the  same  quintessence  of  spirituality,  the  same  high  moral  truths.

He  is  accused  of  having  confined  them  to  the  higher  classes  of  society  instead  of  doing  what  Buddha  and  Jesus  did,  instead  of  preaching  them  to  the  poor  and  the  afflicted.

Of  his  reasons  for  acting  ,in  such  an  exclusive  way  it  is  impossible  to  judge  at  so  late  a  date.

But  Jcarmic  law  seems  to  be  mixed  up  with  it.  Born,  as  we  are  told,  among  the  -aristocracy,  it  is  very  likely  that  he  desired  to  finish  the  work  undone  in  this  particular  direction  by  his  predecessor,  and  sought  to  offer  "  peace  on  earth  and  good  will  "  to  all  men,  and  not  alone  to  the  outcast  and  the  criminal.

Therefore  he  associated  with  the  kings  and  the  mighty  ones  of  the  age.

Nevertheless,  the  three  "  miracle-workers  "  exhibited  striking  similarity  of  purpose.

Like  Jesus  and  like  Buddha,  Apollonius  was  the  uncompromising  enemy  of  all  outward  show  of  piety,  all  display  of  useless  religious  ceremonies,  -bigotry  and  hypocrisy.

That  his  "  miracles  "  were  more  wonderful,  more  varied,  and  far  better  attested  in  History  than  any  others,  is  also  true.

Materialism  denies  ;  but  evidence,  and  the  affirmations  of  even  the  Church  herself,  however  much  he  is  branded  by  her,  show  this  to  be  the  fact.

The  calumnies   set   afloat  against  Apollonius  were   as  numerous  as  they  were  false.

So    late  as  eighteen   centuries    after   his    death    he    was   defamed   by  Bishop

and  lightning  his  famous  In  Prfncipio  erat  Verfaum.

When  that  sublime  extasis,  that  caused  him  to  be  named  the  'Son  of  Thunder,'  had  passed,  Apollonius  was  compelled  to  retire  and  to  disappear.

Such  was  his  defeat,  less  bloody  but  as  hard  as  that  of  Simon,  the  Magician.

("  The  Magician  Theur-  gist,"  Tome  vi,  p.  63.)  For  our  part  we  have  never  heard  of  extasis  producing  thunder  and  lightning  and  we  are  at  a  loss  to  understand  the  meaning.

1  This  is  the  old,  old  story.

Who  of  us,  Theosophists,  but  knows  by  bitter  personal  experience  what  clerical  hatred,  malice  and  prosecution  can  do  in  this  direction  ,  to  what  an  extent  of  falsehood,  calumny  and  cruelty  these  feelings  can  go,  even  in  our  modern  day,  and  what  exemplars  of  Christ-like  -charity  His  alleged  and  self-constituted  servants  have  shown  themselves  to  be  !

APOLLONIUS  OF  TYANA

Douglas  in  his  work  against  miracles.

In  this  the  Right  Reverend  Bishop  crushed  him-  self against  historical  facts  For  it  »s  not  in  (he  miracles,  but  in  the  identity  of  ideas  and  doctrines  preached  that  we  have  to  look  for  a  similarity  between  Buddha,  Jesus  and  Apollonius.

If  we  study  the  question  with  a  dispassionate  mind,  we  shall  soon  perceive  that  the  ethics  of  Gautama,  Plato,  Apollonius,  Jesus,  Ammontus  Sakkas,  and  his  disciples,  were  all  based  on  the  same  mystic  philosophy  —that  all  worshipped  one  divine  Ideal,  whether  they  considered  it  as  the  "  Father  "  of  humanity,  who  lives  in  man,  as  man  lives  in  Him,  or  as  the  Incomprehensible  Creative  Principle.

All  led  God-  like lives  Ammonius,  speaking  of  his  philosophy,  taught  that  their  school  dated  from  the  days  of  Hermes,  who  brought  his  wisdom  from  India  It  was  the  same  mystical  contemplation  throughout  as^that  of  the  Yogi  the  communion  of  the  Brahman  with  his  own  luminous  Self — the  "  Atman  "  ]

The  groundwork  of  the  Eclectic  School  is  thus  shown  to  be  identical  with  the  doctrines  of  the  Yogis — the  Hindu  Mystics  ;  it  is  proved  that  it  had  a  common  origin,  from  the  same  source  as  the  earlier  Buddhism  of  Gautama  and  of  his  Arhats.

The   /neffab/e   Name   in   the  search  for  which  so  many  Kabalists unacquainted

with  any  Oriental  or  even  European  Adept- — vainly  consume  their  knowledge  and  lives,  dwells  latent  in  the  heart  of  every  man  This  minfic  '  name  which,  according  to  the  most  ancient  oracles,  "  rushes  into  the  infinite  worlds,  d^oirijra)  (TTpo<t>d\iy<yt,"  '  can  be  obtained  in  a  twofold  way  •  by  regular  initiation,  and  through  the  "  small  voice  "  which  Elijah  heard  in  the  cave  «f  Horeb,  the  mount  of  God  And  "  when  Elijah  heard  it  he  wrapped  his  face  m  his  mantle  and  stood  in  the  entering  of  the  cave  And  behold  there  came  the  voice  "

When  Apollonius  of  Tyana  desired  to  hear  the  "  small  voice,"  he  used  to  wrap  himself  up  entirely  in  a  mantle  of  fine  wool,  on  which  he  placed  both  his  feet,  after  having  performed  certain  magnetic  passes,  and  pronounced  not  the  "  name  "  but  an  invocation  well  known  to  every  adept.

Then  he  drew  the  mantle  over  his  head  and  face,  and  his  translucid  or  astral  spirit  was  free  On  ordinary  occasions  he  no  more  wore  wool  than  the  priests  of  the  temples.

The  possession  of  the  secret  combination  of  the  "name"  gave  the  Hierophant  supreme  power  over  every  being,  human  or  otherwise,  inferior  to  himself  in  soul-strength.

To  whatever  school  he  belonged,  this  fact  is  certain,  that  Apollonius  of  Tyana  left  an  imperishable  name  behind  him.

Hundreds  of  works  were  written  upon  this  wonderful  man  ;  historians  have  seriously  discussed  him  ;  pretentious  fools,  unable  to  come  to  any  conclusion  about  the  Sage,  have  tried  to  deny  his  very  existence.

As  to  the  Church,  although  she  execrates  his  memory,  she  has  ever  tried  to  present  him  in  the  light  of  a  historical  character.

Her  policy  now  seems  to  be  to  direct  the  impression  left  by  him  into  another  channel — a  well  known  and  a  very  old  stratagem.

The  Jesuits,  for  instance,  while  admitting  his  "  miracles,"  have  set  going  a  double  current  of  thought,  and  they  have  succeeded,  as  they  succeed  in  all  they  undertake.

1  /s»s  Unveiled,  II,  p    342.  "  ["Wonderful."]

3  [Untrodden  or  inaccessible  circle,  or  cycle.]  4  Op.  cit.,  Vol.

II,  pp»  343-4.

FF

146  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Apollonius  is  represented  by  one  party  as  an  obedient  "  medium  of  Satan,"  surrounding  his  theurgical  powers  by  a  most  wonderful  and  dazzling  light  f  while  the  other  party  professes  to  regard  the  whole  matter  as  a  clever  romance,  written  with  a  predetermined  object  in  view.

In  his  voluminous  Memoirs  of  Satan,  the  Marquis  de  Mirville,  in  the  course  of  his  pleading  for  the  recognition  of  the  enemy  of  God  as  the  producer  of  spiritual  phenomena,  devotes  a  whole  chapter  to  this  great  Adept.

The  following  translation  of  passages  in  his  book  unveils  the  whole  plot.

The  reader  is  asked  to  bear  in  mind  that  the  Marquis  wrote  every  one  of  his  works  under  the  auspices  and  authorisation  of  the  Holy  See  of  Rome.

It  would  be  to  leave  the  first  century  incomplete  and  to  offer  an  insult  to  the  memory  of  St.  John,  to  pass  over  in  silence  the  name  of  one  who  had  the  honour  of  being  his  special  antagonist,  as  Simon  was  that  of  St  Peter,  Elymas  that  of  Paul,  etc.

In  the  first  years  of  the  Christian  era,  .  there  appeared  at  Tyana  in  Cappadocia  one  of  those  extraordinary  men  of  whom  the  Pythagorean  School  was  so  very  lavish  As  great  a  traveller  as  was  his  master,  initiated  in  all  the  secret  doctrine  of  India,  Egypt  and  Chaldea,  endowed,  therefore,  with  all  the  theurgic  powers  of  the  ancient  Magi,  he  bewildered,  each  in  its  turn,  all  the  countries  which  he  visited,  and  which  all — we  are  obliged  to  admit — seem  to  have  blessed  his  memory.

We  could  not  doubt  this  fact  without  repudiating  real  historical  records  The  details  of  his  life  are  transmitted  to  us  by  a  historian  of  the  fourth  century  (Philostratus),  himself  tfie  translator  of  a  diary  that  recorded  day  by  day  the  life  of  the  philosopher,  written  by  Damis,  his  disciple  and  intimate  friend  l

De  Mirville  admits  the  possibility  of  some  exaggerations  in  both  recorder  and  translator ;  but  he  "  does  not  believe  they  hold  a  very  wide  space  in  the  narrative."  Therefore,  he  regrets  to  find  the  Abbe  Freppel  "  in  his  eloquent  Essays,2  calling  the  diary  of  Damis  a  romance."  Why?

[Because]  the  orator  bases  his  opinion  on  the  perfect  similitude,  calculated  as  he  imagines,  of  that  legend  with  the  life  of  the  Saviour  But  in  studying  the  subject  more  profoundly,  he  [Abbe  Freppel]  can  convince  himself  that  neither  Apollonius,  nor  Damis,  nor  again  Philostratus  ever  claimed  a  greater  honour  than  a  likeness  to  St.  John  This  programme  was  in  itself  sufficiently  fascinating,  and  the  travesty  as  sufficiently  scandalous ,  for  owing  to  magic  arts  Apollonius  had  succeeded  in  counterbalancing,  in  appearance,  several  of  the  miracles  at  Ephesus  [produced  by  St.  John],  etc  '

The  anguis  in  herba  [snake  in  the  grass]  has  shown  its  head.

It  is  the-  perfect,  the  wonderful  similitude  of  the  life  of  Apollonius  with  that  of  the-  Saviour  that  places  the  Church  between  Scylla  and  Charybdis.

To  deny  the  life  and  the  "  miracles  "  of  the  former,  would  amount  to  denying  the  trust-  worthiness of  the  same  Apostles  and  patristic  writers  on  whose  evidence  is  built  the  life  of  Jesus  himself.

To  father  the  Adept's  beneficent  deeds,  his  raisings  of  the  dead,  acts  of  charity,  healing  powers,  etc.,  on  the  "  old  enemy  '"

1  Des  Espnts,  Tome  vi,  p.  62  *  Les  Apologistes  Chrelens  au  Second  Siecle,  p.  106.

3  De*  £spr/ts,  ibid.

APOLLONIUS  OF  TYANA

would  be  rather  dangerous  at  this  time.

Hence  the  stratagem  to  confuse  the  ideas  of  those  who  rely  upon  authorities  and  criticisms.

The  Church  is  far  more  clear-sighted  than  any  of  our  great  historians.

The  Church  knows  that  to  deny  the  existence  of  that  Adept  would  lead  her  to  denying  the  Emperor  Vespasian  and  his  historians,  the  Emperors  Alexander  Severus  and  Aurelianus  and  their  historians,  and  finally  to  deny  Jesus  and  every  evidence  about  Him,  thus  preparing  the  way  to  her  flock  for  finally  denying  herself.

It  becomes  interesting  to  learn  what  she  says  in  this  emergency,  through  her  chosen  speaker,  De  Mirville.

It  is  as  follows  :

What  is  there  so  new  and  so  impossible  in  the  narrative  of  Damis  con-  cerning their  voyages  to  the  countries  of  the  Chaldees  and  the  Gymno-  sophists  ? — he  asks.

Try  to  recall,  before  denying,  what  were  in  those  days  those  countries  of  marvels  par  excellence,  as  also  the  testimony  of  such  men  as  Pythagoras,  Empedocles  and  Democritus,  who  ought  to  be  allowed  to  have  known  what  they  were  writing  about.

With  what  have  we  finally  to  reproach  Apollonius  ?  Is  it  for  having  made,  as  the  Oracles  did,  a  series  of  prophecies  and  predictions  wonderfully  verified  ?  No  :  because,  better  studied  now,  we  know  what  they  are.1  The  Oracles  have  now  become  to  us,  what  they  were  to  every  one  during  the  past  century,  from  Van  Dale  to  Fontenelle.

Is  it  for  having  been  endowed  with  second  sight,  and  having  had  visions  at  a  distance  ?  2  No  ;  for  such  phenomena  are  at  the  present  day  endemical  in  half  Europe  Is  it  for  having  boasted  of  his  knowledge  of  every  existing  language  under  the  sun,  without  having  ever  learned  one  of  them  ?  But  who  can  be  ignorant  of  the  fact  that  this  is  the  best  criterion  l5  of  the  presence  and  assistance  of  a  spirit  of  whatever  nature  it  may  be  ?  Or  is  it  for  having  believed  in  transmi-  gration (reincarnation)  ?  It  is  still  believed  in  (by  millions)  in  our  day.

No  one  has  any  idea  of  the  number  of  the  men  of  Science  who  long  for  the  re-esta-  blishment of  the  Druidical  Religion  and  of  the  Mysteries  of  Pythagoras.

Or  is  it  for  having  exorcised  the  demons  and  the  plague  ?  The  Egyptians,  the  Etruscans  and  all  the  Roman  Pontiffs  had  done  so  long  before.4  For  having  conversed  with  the  dead  ?  We  do  the  same  to-day,  or  believe  we  do  so —  which  is  all  the  same.

For  having  believed  in  the  Empuses  ?  Where  is  the  Demonologist  that  does  not  know  that  the  Empuse  is  the  "  south  demon  "

1  Many  are  they  who  do  not  know  •  hence,  they  do  not  believe  in  them.

-  Just  so.  Apollonius,  during  a  lecture  he  was  delivering  at  Ephesus  before  an  audience  of  many  thousands,  perceived  the  murder  of  the  Emperor  Domitian  in  Rome  and  notified  it  at  the  very  moment  it  was  taking  place,  to  the  whole  town  ;  and  Swedenborg,  in  the  same  manner,  saw  from  Gothenburg  the  great  fire  at  Stockholm  and  told  it  to  his  friends,  no  telegraph  being  in  use  in  those  days

•'  No  criterion  at  all.

The  Hindu  Saddhus  and  Adepts  acquire  the  gift  by  the  holiness  of  their  lives.

The  Yoga-Vidya  teaches  it,  and  no  "  spirits  "  are  required.

1  As  to  the  Pontiffs,  the  matter  is  rather  doubtful.

148  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

referred  to  in  David's  Psalms,  and  dreaded  then  as  it  is  feared  even  now  in  all  Northern  Europe  ?  l  For  having  made  himself  invisible  at  will  ?  It  is  one  of  the  achievements  of  mesmerism.

For  having  appeared  after  his  (supposed)  death  to  the  Emperor  Aurelian  above  the  city  walls  of  Tyana,  and  for  having  compelled  him  thereby  to  raise  the  siege  of  that  town  ?  Such  was  the  mission  of  every  hero  beyond  the  tomb,  and  the  reason  of  the  worship  vowed  to  the  Manes.2  For  having  descended  into  the  famous  den  of  Trophonius,  and  taken  from  it  an  old  book  preserved  for  years  after  by  the  Emperor  Adrian  in  his  Antium  library?  The  trustworthy  and  sober  Pausanias  had  descended  into  the  same  den  before  Apollonius,  and  came  back  no  less  a  believer.

For  having  disap-  peared at  his  death  ?  Yes,  like  Romulus,  like  Votan,  like  Lycurgus,  like  Pythag-  oras,3 always  under  the  most  mysterious  circumstances,  ever  attended  by  apparitions,  revelations,  etc.

Let  us  stop  here  and  repeat  once  more  :  had  the  life  of  Apollonius  been  simple  romance,  he  would  never  have  attained  such  a  celebrity  during  his  lifetime  or  created  such  a  numerous  sect,  one  so  enthusiastic  after  his  death.

And,  to  add  to  this,  had  all  this  been  a  romance,  never  would  a  Cara-  calla  have  raised  a  heroon  to  his  memory,4  or  Alexander  Severus  have  placed  his  bust  between  those  of  two  Demi-Gods  and  of  the  true  God,5  or  an  Empress  have  corresponded  with  him.

Hardly  rested  from  the  hardships  of  the  siege  at  Jerusalem,  Titus  would  not  have  hastened  to  write  to  Apollonius  a  letter,  asking  to  meet  him  at  Argos  and  adding  that  his  father  and  himself  (Titus)  owed  all  to  him,  the  great  Apollonius,  and  that,  therefore,  his  first  thought  was  for  their  benefactor.

Nor  would  the  Emperor  Aurelian  have  built  a  temple  and  a  shrine  to  that  great  Sage,  to  thank  him  for  his  apparition  and  communication  at  Tyana.

That  posthumous  conversation,  as  all  knew,  saved  the  city,  inasmuch  as  Aurelian  had  in  consequence  raised  the  siege.

Furthermore,  had  it  been  a  romance,  History  would  not  have  had  Vopiscus,

1  But  this  alone   is  no  reason  why  people  should  believe  in  this  class  of  spirits      There  are  better  authorities  for  such  belief

2  De  Mirville's  aim  is  to  show  that  all  such  apparitions  of  the  Manas  or  disembodied  Spirits  are  the  work  of  the  Devil,  "  Satan's  simulacra."

3  He  might  have  added     like  the  great  Shankardcharya,  Tsong-Kha-Pa,  and  so  many  other  real  Adepts — even  his  own  Master,  Jesus  ,  for  this  is  indeed  a  criterion  of  true  Adeptship,  though    '  to  dis-  appear "  one  need  not  fly  up  in  the  clouds.

4  See  Dion  Cass/us,  XXVII,  xvm,  2.  :>  Lampndius,  Adrian,  xxix,  2.

"  The  passage  runs  as  follows  •  "  Aurelian  had  determined  to  destroy  Tyana,  and  the  town  owed  its  salvation  only  to  a  miracle  of  Apollonius  ,  this  man  so  famous  and  so  wise,  this  great  friend  of  the  Gods,  appeared  suddenly  before  the  Emperor,  as  he  was  returning  to  his  tent,  in  his  own  figure  and  form,  and  said  to  him  in  the  Pannonian  language  '  Aurelian,  if  thou  wouldst  conquer,  abandon  these  evil  designs  against  my  fellow-citizens ;  if  thou  wouldst  command,  abstain  from  shedding  innocent  blood  ,  and  if  thou  wouldst  live,  abstain  from  injustice.'  Aurelian,  familiar  with  the  face  of  Apollonius,

APOLLONIUS  OF  TYANA

one  of  the  most  trustworthy  Pagan  Historians,  to  certify  to  it  Finally,  Apollonius  would  not  have  been  the  object  of  the  admiration  of  such  a  noble  character  as  Epictetus,  and  even  of  several  of  the  Fathers  of  the  Church  ;  Jerome  for  instance,  in  his  better  moments,  writing  thus  of  Apollonius  .

This  travelling  philosopher  found  something  to  learn  wherever  he  went  ,  and  pro-  fiting everywhere  thus  improved  with  every  day  !

As  to  his  prodigies,  without  wishing  to  fathom  them,  Jerome  most  undeniably  admits  them  as  such  ;  which  he  would  assuredly  never  have  done,  had  he  not  been  compelled  to  do  so  by  facts.

To  end  the  subject,  had  Apollonius  been  a  simple  hero  of  a  romance,  dramatised  in  the  fourth  century,  the  Ephesians  would  not,  in  their  enthusiastic  gratitude,  have  raised  to  him  a  golden  statue  for  all  the  benefits  he  had  conferred  upon  them.

whose  portraits  he  had  seen  in  many  temples,  struck  with  wonder,  immediately  vowed  to  him  (Apol-  lonius) statue,  portrait  and  temple,  and  returned  completely  to  ideas  of  mercy  "  And  then  Vopiscus  adds :  "  If  I  have  believed  more  and  more  in  the  virtues  of  the  ma/est/c  Apollonius,  it  is  because,  after  gathering  my  information  from  the  most  serious  men,  I  have  found  all  these  facts  corroborated  in  the  Books  of  the  Ulpian  Library"  (See  Ravius  Vopiscus,  Aure/ianus)  Vopiscus  wrote  in  250  and  con-  sequently preceded  Philostratus  by  a  century

1  Ep.  ad  Paulmum

2  The  above  is  mostly  summarised  from  De  Mirville,  Tome  vi,  pp   66-

[This  Section,  from  the  paragraph  beginning  "  Like  most  of  the  historical  heroes,"  etc.,  to  the  words  Alexander  Severus,  is  practically  the  same  as  Section  IV  of  the  1886  MS  —Ed  ]

SECTION

FACTS  UNDERLYING  ADEPT  BIOGRAPHIES

THE  tree  is  known  by  its  fruits  ;  the  nature  of  the  Adept  by  his  words  and  deeds.

These  words  of  charity  and  mercy,  the  noble  advice  put  into  the  mouth  of  Apollonius  (or  of  his  sidereal  phantom),  as  given  by  Vopiscus,  show  the  Occultists  who  Apollonius  was.

Why  then  call  him  the  "  Medium  of  Satan  "  seventeen  centuries  later  ?  There  must  be  a  reason,  and  a  very  potent  reason,  to  justify  and  explain  the  secret  of  such  a  strong  animus  of  the  Church  against  one  of  the  noblest  men  of  his  age.

There  is  a  reason  for  it,  and  we  give  it  in  the  words  of  the  author  of  the  Key  to  the  Hebrew-Egyptian  Mystery  in  The  Source  of  Measures,  and  of  Professor  Seyffarth.

The  latter  analyses  and  explains  the  salient  dates  in  the  life  of  Jesus,  and  thus  throws  light  on  the  conclusions  of  the  former.

We  quote  both,  blending  the  two.

According  to  solar  months  (of  thirty  days,  one  of  the  calendars  in  use  among  the  Hebrews)  all  remarkable  events  of  the  Old  Testament  happened  on  the  days  of  the  equinoxes  and  the  solstices  ,  for  instance,  the  foundations  and  dedications  of  the  temples  and  altars  [and  consecration  of  the  tabernacle]  On  the  same  cardinal  days,  the  most  remarkable  events  of  the  New  Testament  happened  ;  for  instance,  the  annunciation,  the  birth,  the  resurrection  of  Christ,  and  the  birth  of  John  the  Baptist  And  thus  we  learn  that  all  remarkable  epochs  of  the  New  Testament  were  typically  sanctified  a  long  time  before  by  the  Old  Testament,  beginning  at  the  day  succeeding  the  end  of  the  Creation,  which  was  the  day  of  the  vernal  equinox.

During  the  crucifixion,  on  the  14th  day  of  Nisan,  Dionysius  Areopagita  saw,  in  Ethiopia,  an  eclipse  of  the  sun,  and  he  said,  "  Now  the  Lord  (Jehovah)  is  suffering  something."  Then  Christ  arose  from  the  dead  on  the  22d  March,  17  Nisan,  Sunday,  the  day  of  the  vernal  equinox  (Seyf.,  quoting  Phtlo  de  Septen) — that  is,  on  Easter,  or  on  the  day  when  the  sun  gives  new  life  to  the  earth  The  words  of  John  the  Baptist  "  He  must  increase,  but  1  must  decrease,"  serve  to  prove,  as  is  affirmed  by  the  fathers  of  the  church,  that  John  was  born  on  the  longest  day  of  the  year,  and  Christ,  who  was  six  months  younger,  on  the  shortest,  22d  June  and  22d  December,  the  solstices

This  only  goes  to  show  that,  as  to  another  phase,  John  and  Jesus  were  but  epitomisers  of  the  history  of  the  same  sun,  under  differences  of  aspect  or  condition  ;  and  one  condition  following  another,  of  necessity  the  statement,  Luke,  ix,  7,  was  not  only  not  an  empty  one,  but  it  was  true,  that  which  "  was  said  of  some,  that  (in  Jesus)  John  was  risen  from  the  dead."  (And  this  consideration  serves  to  explain  why  it  has been  that  the  Life  of  Apollonius  of  Tyana,  by  Philostratus,  has  been  so  persistently  kept  back  from  translation  and  from  popular  reading.


Those  who  have  studied  it  in  the  original  have  been  forced  to  the  comment  that  either  the  Life  of  Apollonius  has  been  taken  from  the  New  Testament,  or  that  the  New  Testament  narratives  have  been  taken  from  the  Life  of  Apollonius,  because  of  the  manifest  sameness  of  the  means  of  con-  struct/on of  the  narratives  The  explanation  is  simple  enough,  when  it  is  considered  that  the  names  of  Jesus,  Hebrew  2T,  and  Apollonius,  or  Apollo,  are  alike  names  of  the  sun  in  the  heavens ;  and  necessarily  the  history  of  the  one,  as  to  his  travels  through  the  s;gns,  with  the  personifications  of  his  sufferings,  triumphs  and  miracles, -could  be  but  the  history  of  the  other,  where  there  was  a  widespread,  common  method  of  describing  those  travels  by  personification.)  It  seems  also  that,  for  long  afterward,  all  this  was  known  to  rest  upon  an  astronomical  basis  ,  for  the  secular  church,  so  to  speak,  was  founded  by  Constantme,  and  the  objective  condition  of  the  worship  established  was  that  part  of  his  decree,  in  which  it  was  affirmed  that  the  venerable  day  of  the  sun  should  be  the  day  set  apart  for  the  worship  of  Jesus  Christ,  as  Sun-day  There  is  some-  thing weird  and  startling  in  some  other  facts  about  this  matter  The  prophet  Daniel  (true  prophet,  as  says  Graetz),1  by  use  of  the  pyramid  numbers,  or  astrological  numbers,  foretold  the  cutting  off  of  the  Mesh/ac,  as  it  happened  (which  would  go  to  show  the  accuracy  of  his  astronomical  knowledge,  if  there  was  an  eclipse  of  the  sun  at  that  time)  .  Now,  however,  the  temple  was  destroyed  in  the  year  71 ,  in  the  month  Virgo,  and  71  is  the  Dove  number,  as  shown,  or  71  x  5  355,  and  with  the  fish,  a  Jehovah  number

"  Is  it  possible,"  queries  further  on  the  author,  thus  answering  the  intimate  thought  of  every  Christian  and  Occultist  who  reads  and  studies  his  work :

Is  it  possible  that  the  events  of  humanity  do  run  co-ordinately  with  these  number  forms  ?  If  so,  while  Jesus  Christ,  as  an  astronomical  figure,  was  true  to  all  that  has  been  advanced,  and  more,  possibly,  He  may,  as  a  man,  have  filled  up,  under  the  numbers,  answers  in  the  sea  of  life  to  predestined  type.

The  personality  of  Jesus  does  not  appear  to  have  been  destroyed,  because,  as  a  condition,  he  was  answering  to  astro-  nomical forms  and  relations  The  Arabian  says,  "  Your  destiny  is  written  in  the  stars  "  *

Nor  is  the  "personality"  of  Apollonius  "destroyed"  for  the  same  reason.

The  case  of  Jesus  covers  the  ground  for  the  same  possibility  in  the  cases  of  all  Adepts  and  Avataras — such  as  Buddha,  Shankaracharya,  Krishna,  etc.

— all  of  these  as  great  and  as  historical  for  their  respective  followers  and  in  their  countries,  as  Jesus  of  Nazareth  is  now  for  Christians  and  in  this  land.

But  there  is  something  more  in  the  old  literature  of  the  early  centuries,  iamblichus  wrote  a  biography  of  the  great  Pythagoras.

The  latter  so  closely  resembles  the  life  of  Jesus  that  it  may  be  taken  for  a  travesty.

Diogenes  Laertius  and  Plutarch  relate  the  history  of  Plato  according  to  a  similar  style.

1  A  "true  prophet"  because  an  Initiate,  one  perfectly  versed  m  Occult  astronomy

-  Key  to  Hebrew-Egyptian  Mystery,  pp  259  et  seq.

Astronomy  and  physiology  are  the  bodies,  astrology  and  psychology  their  informing  souls  ,  the  former  being  studied  by  the  eye  of  sensual  per-  ception, the  latter  by  the  inner  or  "  soul-eye  "  ,  and  both  are  exact  sciences

'  New  P/atonism  and  Alchemy,  p

152  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Why  then  wonder  at  the  doubts  that  assail  every  scholar  who  studies  all  these  lives?  The  Church  herself  knew  all  these  doubts  in  her  early  stages ;  and  though  only  one  of  her  Popes  has  been  known  publicly  and  openly  as  a<  Pagan,  how  many  more  were  there  who  were  too  ambitious  to  reveal  the  truth  ?

This  "  mystery,"  for  mystery  indeed  it  is  to  those  who,  not  being  Initiates,  fail  to  find  the  key  of  the  perfect  similitude  between  the  lives  of  Pythagoras,  Buddha,  Apollonius,  etc.

— is  only  a  natural  result  for  those  who  know  that  all  these  great  characters  were  Initiates  of  the  same  School.

For  them  there  is  neither  "  travesty  "  nor  "copy  "  of  one  from  the  other ;  for  them  they  are  all  "originals,"  only  painted  to  represent  one  and  the  same  subject:  the  mystic,  and  at  the  same  time  the  public,  life  of  the  Initiates  sent  into  the  world  to  save  portions  of  humanity,  if  they  could  not  save  the  whole  bulk.

Hence,  the  same  programme  for  all.

The  assumed  "  immaculate  origin  "  for  each,  referring  to  their  "  mystic  birth  "  during  the  Mystery  of  Initiation,  and  accept-  ed literally  by  the  multitudes,  encouraged  in  this  by  the  better  informed  but  ambitious  clergy.

Thus,  the  mother  of  each  one  of  them  was  declared  a  virgin,  conceiving  her  son  directly  by  the  Holy  Spirit  of  God ;  and  the  Sons,  in  consequence,  were  the  "  Sons  of  God,"  though  in  truth,  none  of  them  was  any  more  entitled  to  such  recognition  than  were  the  rest  of  his  brother  Initiates,  for  they  were  all — so  far  as  their  mystic  lives  were  concerned — only  "the  epito-  misers  of  the  history  of  the  same  Sun,"  which  epitome  is  another  mystery  within  the  Mystery.

The  biographies  of  the  external  personalities  bearing  the  names  of  such  heroes  have  nothing  to  do  with,  and  are  quite  independent  of  the  private  lives  of  the  heroes,  being  only  the  mystic  records  of  their  public  and,  parallel  therewith,  of  their  inner  lives,  in  their  characters  as  Neophytes  and  Initiates.

Hence,  the  manifest  sameness  of  the  means  of  construction  of  their  respective  biographies.

From  the  beginning  of  Humanity  the  Cross,  or  Man,  with  his  arms  stretched  out  horizontally,  typifying  his  kosmic  origin,  was  connected  with  his  psychic  nature  and  with  the  struggles  which  lead  to  Initiation.

But,  if  it  is  once  shown  that  (a)  every  true  Adept  had,  and  still  has,  to  pass  through  the  seven  and  the  twelve  trials  of  Initiation,  symbolised  by  the  twelve  labours  of  Hercules  ;  (fa)  that  the  day  of  his  real  birth  is  regarded  as  that  day  when  he  is  born  into  the  world  spiritually,  his  very  age  being  counted  from  the  hour  of  his  second  birth,  which  makes  of  him  a  "  twice-born,"  a  Dvija  or  Initiate,  on  which  day  he  is  indeed  born  of  a  God  and  from  an  immaculate  Mother  ;  and  (c)  that  the  trials  of  all  these  personages  are  made  to  correspond  with  the  Esoteric  significance  of  initiatory  rites — all  of  which  corresponded  to  the  twelve  zodiacal  signs — then  every  one

FACTS  UNDERLYING  ADEPT  BIOGRAPHIES  153-

will  see  the  meaning  of  the  travels  of  all  those  heroes  through  the  signs  of  the  Sun  in  Heaven  ;  and  that  they  are  in  each  individual  case  a  personification,  of  the  "  sufferings,  triumphs  and  miracles  "  of  an  Adept,  before  and  after  his  Initiation.

When  to  the  world  at  large  all  this  is  explained,  then  also  the  mystery  of  all  those  fives,  so  closely  resembling  each  other  that  the  history  of  one  seems  to  be  the  history  of  the  other,  and  vice  versa,  will,  like  every-  thing else,  become  plain.

Take  an  instance.

The  legends — for  they  are  all  legends  for  exoteric  purposes,  whatever  may  be  the  denials  in  one  case — of  the  lives  of  Krishna,  Hercules,  Pythagoras,  Buddha,  Jesus,  Apollonius,  Chaitanya  On  the  worldly  plane,  their  biographies,  if  written  by  one  outside  the  circle,  would  differ  greatly  from  what  we  read  of  them  in  the  narratives  that  are  preserved  of  their  mystic  lives.

Nevertheless,  however  much  masked  and  hidden  from  profane  gaze,  the  chief  features  of  such  lives  will  all  be  found  there  in  common.

Each  of  those  characters  is  represented  as  a  divinely  begotten  Soter  (Saviour),  a  title  bestowed  on  deities,  great  kings  and  heroes  ;  everyone  of  them,  whether  at  their  birth  or  afterwards,  is  searched  for,  and  threatened  with  death  (yet  never  killed)  by  an  opposing  power  (the  world  of  Matter  and  Illusion),  whether  it  be  called  a  king  Kansa,  king  Herod,  or  king  Mara  (the  Evil  Power).  They  are  all  tempted,  persecuted  and  finally  said  to  have  been  murdered  at  the  end  of  the  rite  of  Initiation,  i.e.,  in  their  physical  personalities,  of  which  they  are  supposed  to  have  been  rid  for  ever  after  spiritual  "  resurrection  "  or  "  birth."  And  having  thus  come  to  an  end  by  this  supposed  violent  death,  they  all  descend  to  the  Nether  World,  the  Pit  or  Hell — the  Kingdom  of  Temp-  tation, Lust  and  Matter,  therefore  of  Darkness,  whence  returning,  having  overcome  the  "  Chrest-condition,"  they  are  glorified  and  become  "  Gods."

It  is  not  in  the  course  of  their  everyday  life,  then,  that  the  great  similarity  is  to  be  sought,  but  in  their  inner  state  and  in  the  most  important  events  of  their  career  as  religious  teachers.

All  this  is  connected  with,  and  built  upon,  an  astronomical  basis,  which  serves,  at  the  same  time,  as  a  foundation  for  the  representation  of  the  degrees  and  trials  of  Initiation  :  descent  into  the  Kingdom  of  Darkness  and  Matter,  for  the  last  time,  to  emerge  therefrom  as  "  Suns  of  Righteousness,"  is  the  most  important  of  these  and,  therefore,  is  found  in  the  history  of  all  the  Soters — from  Orpheus  and  Hercules,  down  to  Krishna  and  Christ.

Says  Euripides  :

Heracles,  who  has  gone  from  the  chambers  of  earth,  Leaving  the  nether  home  of  Pluto  l

1  Heracles,

154  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

And  Virgil  writes  :

At  Thee  the  Stygian  lakes  trembled  ;  Thee  the  janitor  of  Orcus  Feared  A  Thee  not  even  Typhon  frightened.

.  .   .

Hail,  true  son  of  Jove,  glory  added  to  the  Gods  '

Orpheus  seeks,  in  the  kingdom  of  Pluto,  Eurydice,  his  lost  Soul  ;  Krishna  goes  down  into  the  infernal  regions  and  rescues  therefrom  his  six  brothers,  he  being  the  seventh  Principle  ;  a  transparent  allegory  of  his  becoming  a  "  perfect  Initiate,"  the  whole  of  the  six  Principles  merging  into  the  seventh.

Jesus  is  made  to  descend  into  the  kingdom  of  Satan  to  save  the  soul  of  Adam,  or  the  symbol  of  material  physical  humanity.

Have  any  of  our  learned  Orientalists  ever  thought  of  searching  for  the  origin  of  his  allegory,  for  the  parent  "  Seed  "  of  that  "  Tree  of  Life  "  which  bears  such  verdant  boughs  since  it  was  first  planted  on  earth  by  the  hand  of  its  "  Builders  "?  We  fear  not.

Yet  it  is  found,  as  is  now  shown,  even  in  the  exoteric,  distorted  interpretations  of  the  Vedas — of  the  Rig  Veda,  the  oldest,  the  most  trustworthy  of  ail  the  four — this  root  and  seed  of  ail  future  Initiate-  Saviours  being  called  in  it  the  Vishvakarman,  the  "  Father  "  Principle,  "  beyond  the  comprehension  of  mortals  ;  "  in  the  second  stage  Surya,  the  "  Son,"  who  offers  Himself  as  a  sacrifice  to  Himself ;  in  the  third,  the  Initiate,  who  sacrifices  His  physical  to  His  spiritual  Self.

It  is  in  Vishvakarman,  the  "  omnificent,"  who  becomes  (mystically)  Vikartana,  the  "  sun  shorn  of  his  beams,"  who  suffers  for  his  too  ardent  nature,  and  then  becomes  glorified  (by  purification),  that  the  keynote  of  the  Initiation  into  the  greatest  Mystery  of  Nature  was  struck.

Hence  the  secret  of  the  wonderful  "  similarity."

All  this  is  allegorical  and  mystical,  and  yet  perfectly  comprehensible  and  plain  to  any  student  of  Eastern  Occultism,  even  superficially  acquainted  with  the  Mysteries  of  Initiation.

In  our  objective  Universe  of  Matter  and  false  appearances  the  Sun  is  the  most  fitting  emblem  of  the  life-giving,  beneficent  Deity.

In  the  subjective,  boundless  World  of  Spirit  and  Reality  the  bright  luminary  has  another  and  a  mystical  significance,  which  cannot  be  fully  given  to  the  public.

The  so-called  "  idolatrous  "  Parsis  and  Hindus  are  certainly  nearer  the  truth  in  their  religious  reverence  for  the  Sun,  than  the  cold,  ever-  analysing,  and  as  ever-mistaken,  public  is  prepared  to  believe,  at  present.

The*  Theosophist,  who  will  be  alone  able  to  take  in  the  meaning,  may  be  told  that  the  Sun  is  the  external  manifestation  of  the  Seventh  Principle  of  our  Planetary  System,  while  the  Moon  is  its  Fourth  Principle,  shining  in  the  bor-  rowed robes  of  her  master,  saturated  with  and  reflecting  every  passionate  impulse  and  evil  desire  of  her  grossly  material  body,  Earth.

The  whole  cycle

!>€ne/d   VIM,  274,  ff -of  Adeptship  and  Initiation  and  all  its  mysteries  are  connected  with,  and  sub-  servient to,  these  two  and  the  Seven  Planets.


Spiritual  clairvoyance  is  derived  from  the  Sun  ;  all  psychic  states,  diseases,  and  even  lunacy,  proceed  from  the  Moon.

According  even  to  the  data  of  History — her  conclusions  being  remark-  ably erroneous  while  her  premisses  are  mostly  correct — there  is  an  extra-  ordinary agreement  between  the  "  legends"  of  every  Founder  of  a  Religion  (and  also  between  the  rites  and  dogmas  of  all)  and  the  names  and  course  of  constellations  headed  by  the  Sun.

It  does  not  follow,  however,  because  of  this,  that  both  Founders  and  their  Religions  should  be,  the  one  myths,  and  the  other  superstitions.

They  are,  one  and  all,  the  different  versions  of  the  same  natural  primeval  Mystery,  on  which  the  Wisdom-Religion  was  based,  and  the  development  of  its  Adepts  subsequently  framed.

And  now  once  more  we  have  to  beg  the  reader  not  to  lend  an  ear  to  the  charge — against  Theosophy  in  general  and  the  writer  in  particular — of  disrespect  toward  one  of  the  greatest  and  noblest  characters  in  the  History  of  Adeptship — Jesus  of  Nazareth— nor  even  of  hatred  to  the  Church.

The  expression  of  truth  and  fact  can  hardly  be  regarded,  with  any  approximation  to  justice,  as  blasphemy  or  hatred.

The  whole  question  hangs  upon  the  solution  of  that  one  point :  Was  Jesus  as  "  Son  of  God  "  and  "  Saviour  "  of  •Mankind,  unique  in  the  World's  annals  ?  Was  His  case — among  so  many  similar  claims — the  only  exceptional  and  unprecedented  one  ;  His  birth  the  sole  supernaturally  immaculate  ;  and  were  all  others,  as  maintained  by  the  Church,  but  blasphemous  Satanic  copies  and  plagiarisms  by  anticipation  ?  Or  was  He  only  the  "  son  of  his  deeds,"  a  pre-eminently  holy  man,  and  a  re-  former, one  of  many,  who  paid  with  His  life  for  the  presumption  of  en-  deavouring, in  the  face  of  ignorance  and  despotic  power,  to  enlighten  mankind  and  make  its  burden  lighter  by  His  Ethics  and  Philosophy  ?  The  first  necessi-  tates a  blind,  all-resisting  faith  ;  the  latter  is  suggested  to  every  one  by  reason  and  logic.

Moreover,  has  the  Church  always  believed  as  she  does  now — or  rather,  as  she  pretends  she  does,  in  order  to  be  thus  justified  in  directing  her  anathema  against  those  who  disagree  with  her — or  has  she  passed  through  the  same  throes  of  doubt,  nay,  of  secret  denial  and  unbelief,  suppressed  only  by  the  force  of  ambition  and  love  of  power  ?

The  question  must  be  answered  in  the  affirmative  as  to  the  second  alternative.

It  is  an  irrefutable  conclusion,  and  a  natural  inference  based  on  facts  known  from  historical  records.

Leaving  for  the  present  untouched  the  lives  of  many  Popes  and  Saints  that  loudly  belied  their  claims  to  infallibility  and  holiness,  let  the  reader  turn  to  Ecclesiastical  History,  the  records  of  the

156  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

growth   and  progress  of  the  Christian  Church  (not  of  Christianity),  and  he  will  find  the  answer  on  those  pages.

Says  a  writer  :

The  Church  has  known  too  well  the  suggestions  of  freethought  created  by  enquiry,  as  also  all  those  doubts  that  provoke  her  anger  to-day ,  and  the  "  sacred  truths  "  she  would  promulgate  have  been  in  turn  admitted  and  repudiated,  transformed  and  altered,  amplified  and  curtailed,  by  the  dignitaries  of  the  Church  hierarchy,  even  as  regards  the  most  fundamental  dogmas

Where  is  that  God  or  Hero  whose  origin,  biography,  and  genealogy  were  more  hazy,  or  more  difficult  to  define  and  finally  agree  upon,  than  those  of  Jesus  ?  How  was  the  now  irrevocable  dogma  with  regard  to  His  true  nature  settled  at  last  ?  By  His  mother,  according  to  the  Evangelists,  He  was  a  man  — a  simple  mortal  man  ;  by  His  Father  He  is  God  !  But  how  ?  Is  He  then  man  or  God,  or  is  He  both  at  the  same  time  ?  asks  the  perplexed  writer.

Truly  the  propositions  offered  on  this  point  of  the  doctrine  have  caused  floods  of  ink  and  blood  to  be  shed,  in  turn,  on  poor  Humanity,  and  still  the  doubts  are  not  at  rest.

In  this,  as  in  everything  else,  the  wise  Church  Councils  have  contradicted  themselves  and  changed  their  minds  a  number  of  times.

Let  us  recapitulate  and  throw  a  glance  at  the  texts  offered  for  our  inspection.

This  is  History.

The  Bishop  Paul  of  Samosata  denied  the  divinity  of  Christ  at  the  first  Council  of  Antioch  ;  at  the  very  origin  and  birth  of  theological  Christianity,  He  was  called  "Son  of  God"  merely  on  account  of  His  holiness  and  good  deeds.

His  blood  was  corruptible  in  the  Sacrament  of  the  Eucharist.

At  the  Council  of  Nicaea,  held  A  D  325,  Arius  came  out  with  his  premisses,  which  nearly  broke  asunder  the  Catholic  Union.

Seventeen  bishops  defended  the  doctrines  of  Arius,  who  was  exiled  for  them.

Nevertheless,  thirty  years  after,  A  D  355,  at  the  Council  of  Milan,  three  hundred  bishops  signed  a  letter  of  adherence  to  the  Arian  views,  notwithstand-  ing that  ten  years  earlier,  A  D  345,  at  a  new  Council  of  Antioch,  the  Eusebians  had  proclaimed  that  Jesus  Christ  was  the  Son  of  God  and  One  with  His  Father.

At  the  Council  of  Sirmium,  A.D  357,  the  "  Son  "  had  become  no  longer  consubstantial.

The  Anomaeans,  who  denied  that  consubtantiality,  and  the  Arians  were  triumphant.

A  year  later,  at  the  second  Council  of  Ancyra,  it  was  decreed  that  the  "  Son  was  not  consubstantial  but  only  similar  to  the  Father  in  his  substance."  Pope  Liberius  ratified  the  decision.

During  several  centuries  the  Councils  fought  and  quarrelled,  supporting  the  most  contradictory  and  opposite  views,  the  fruit  of  their  laborious  travail  being  the  Holy  Trinity,  which,  Minerva-like,  issued  forth  from  the  theological brain,  armed  with  all  the  thunders  of  the  Church.


The  new  mystery  was  ushered  into  the  work!  amid  some  terrible  strifes,  in  which  murder  and  other  crimes  had  a  high  hand.

At  the  Council  of  Saragossa,  A  D  380,  it  was  proclaimed  that  the  Father,  Son  and  Holy  Spirit  are  one  and  the  same  Person,  Christ's  human  nature  being  merely  an  "illusion" — an  echo  of  the  Avataric  Hindu  doctrine.

"  Once  upon  this  slippery  path  the  Fathers  had  to  slide  down  ad  absurdum — which  they  did  not  fail  of  doing."  How  deny  human  nature  in  him  who  was  born  of  a  woman  ?  The  only  wise  remark  made  during  one  of  the  Councils  of  Constantinople  came  from  Eutyches,  who  was  bold  enough  to  say:  "  May  God  preserve  me  from  reasoning  on  the  nature  of  my  God  " — for  which  he  was  excommunicated  by  Pope  Flavius.

At  the  Council  of  Ephesus,  A  D  449,  Eutyches  had  his  revenge.

As  Eusebius,  the  veracious  Bishop  of  Caesarea,  was  forcing  him  into  the  admission  of  two  distinct  natures  in  Jesus  Christ,  the  Council  rebelled  against  him  and  it  was  proposed  that  Eusebius  should  be  burned  alive.

The  bishops  arose  like  one  man,  and  with  fists  clenched,  foaming  with  rage,  demanded  that  Eusebius  should  be  torn  into  two  halves,  and  be  dealt  by  as  he  would  deal  with  Jesus,  whose  nature  he  divided.

Eutyches  was  re-established  in  his  power  and  office,  Eusebius  and  Flavius  deposed.

Then  the  two  parties  attacked  each  other  most  violently  and  fought.

St.  Flavius  was  so  ill-treated  by  Bishop  Diodorus,  who  assaulted  and  kicked  him,  that  he  died  a  few  days  later  from  the  injuries  inflicted.

Every  incongruity  was  courted  in  these  Councils,  and  the  result  is  the  present  living  paradoxes  called  Church  dogmas.

For  instance,  at  the  first  Council  of  Ancyra,  A  D  314,  it  was  asked,  "  In  baptizing  a  woman  with  child,  is  the  unborn  baby  also  baptized  by  the  fact  ?"  The  Council  answered  in  the  nega-  tive ;  because,  as  was  alleged,  "the  person  thus  receiving  baptism  must  be  a  consenting  party,  which  is  impossible  to  the  child  in  its  mother's  womb."  Thus  then  unconsciousness  is  a  canonical  obstacle  to  baptism,  and  thus  no  child  baptised  nowadays  is  baptised  at  all  in  fact.

And  then  what  becomes  of  the  tens  of  thousands  of  starving  heathen  babies  baptised  by  the  missionaries  during  famines,  and  otherwise  surreptitiously  "saved"  by  the  too  zealous  Padres?  Follow  one  after  another  the  debates  and  decisions  of  the  number-  less Councils,  and  behold  on  what  a  jumble  of  contradictions  the  present  infallible  and  Apostolic  Church  is  built !

And  now  we  can  see  how  greatly  paradoxical,  when  taken  literally,  is  the  assertion  in  Genesis :  "God  created  man  in  his  own  image."  Besides  the  glaring  fact  that  it  is  not  the  Adam  of  dust  (of  Chapter  ii),  who  is  thus  made  jn  the  divine  image,  but  the  Divine  ^idrogyne  (of  Chapter  i),  or  Adam

158  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Kadmon,  one  can  see  for  oneself  that  God — the  God  of  the  Christians  at  any  rate — was  created  by  man  in  his  own  image,  amid  the  kicks,  blows  and  murders  of  the  early  Councils.

A  curious  fact,  one  that  throws  a  flood  of  light  on  the  claim  that  Jesus  was  an  Initiate  and  a  martyred  Adept,  is  given  in  the  work,  (already  so  often  referred  to)  which  may  be  called  "a  mathematical  revelation  " — The  Source  of  Measures.

Attention  is  called  to  the  part  of  the  46th  verse  of  the  27th  Chapter  of  Matthew,  as  follows  :  "  Eli,  Eli,  Lama  Sabachthani  ?  — that  is  to  say,  My  God,  my  God,  why  hast  thou  forsaken  me  ?  "  Of  course,  our  versions  are  taken  from  the  original  Greek  manuscripts  (the  reason  why  we  have  no  original  Hebrew  manuscripts  concerning  these  occurrences  being  because  the  enigmas  in  Hebrew  would  betray  themselves  on  comparison  with  the  sources  of  their  derivation,  the  Old  Testament)  The  Greek  manuscripts,  without  exception,  give  these  words  as~

'HX/   'TlA/   \afjia   crapaxftavi  They  are  Hebrew  words,  rendered  into  the  Greek,  and  in  Hebrew  are  as  follows  •

^D-nraizr  nth  -6x  ^x

The  Scripture  of  these  words  says,  "that  is  to  say,  My  God,  my  God,  why  hast  thou  forsaken  me  ?  "  as  their  proper  translation  Here  then  are  the  words,  beyond  all  dispute  ;  and  beyond  all  question,  such  is  the  interpretation  given  of  them  by  Scripture.

Now  the  words  will  not  bear  this  interpretation,  and  it  is  a  false  rendering.

The  true  meaning  is  /ust  the  opposite  of  the  one  given,  and  is —

My  God,  my  God,  how  thou  dost  gloniy  me  '

But  even  more,  for  while  lama  is  why,  or  how,  as  a  verbal  it  connects  the  idea  of  to  dazzle,  or  adverbially,  it  could  run  "  how  dazzlmgty,"  and  so  on.  To  the  unwary  reader  this  interpretation  is  enforced,  and  made  to  answer,  as  it  were,  to  the  fulfilment  of  a  prophetic  utterance,  by  a  marginal  reference  to  the  first  verse  of  the  twenty-  second  Psalm,  which  reads  .

"  My  God,  my  God,  why  hast  thou  forsaken  me  ?  "  The  Hebrew  of  this  verse  for  these  words  is —

^D-nmir  nai>  -^x  -^x

as  to  which  the  reference  is  correct,  and  the  interpretation  sound  and  good,  but  with  an  utterly  different  word  The  words  are —

Eli,  Eli,  lamah  azabvtha-ni?

No  wit  of  man,  however  scholarly,  can  save  this  passage  from  falseness  of  rendering  on  its  face ;  and  as  so,  it  becomes  a  most  terrible  blow  upon  the  proper  first-face  sacredness  of  the  recital.

For  ten  years  or  more  sat  the  revisers  (?)  of  the  Bible,  a  most  imposing  and  solemn  array  of  the  learned  of  the  land,  the  greatest  Hebrew  and  Greek  scholars  of  England,  purporting  to  correct  the  mistakes  and  blunders,  the  sins  of  omission  and  of  commission  of  their  less  learned  predecessors,  the

1  Appendix,  vn,  pp.  300- translators  of  the  Bible.


Are  we  going  to  be  told  that  none  of  them  saw  the  glaring  difference  between  the  Hebrew  words  in  Psalm  xxii,  azabvtfia-n/,  and  sabachthani  in  Matthew ,  that  they  were  not  aware  of  the  deliberate  falsification  ?

For  "  falsification  "  it  was.

And  if  we  are  asked  the  reason  why  the  early  Church  Fathers  resorted  to  it,  the  answer  is  plain :  Because  the  Sacra-  mental words  belonged  in  their  true  rendering  to  Pagan  temple  rites.

They  were  pronounced  after  the  terrible  trials  of  Initiation,  and  were  still  fresh  in  the  memory  of  some  of  the  "  Fathers  "  when  the  Gospel  of  Matthew  was  edited  into  the  Greek  language.

Because,  finally,  many  of  the  Hierophants  of  the  Mysteries,  and  many  more  of  the  Initiates  were  still  living  in  those  days,  and  the  sentence  rendered  in  its  true  words  would  class  Jesus  directly  with  the  simple  Initiates.

The  words  "  My  God,  my  Sun,  thou  hast  poured  thy  radiance  upon  me  !  "  were  the  final  words  that  concluded  the  thanksgiving  prayer  of  the  Initiate,  "  the  Son  and  the  glorified  Elect  of  the  Sun."  In  Egypt  we  find  to  this  day  carvings  and  paintings  that  represent  the  rite.

The  candidate  is  between  two  divine  sponsors;  one  "  Osiris-Sun  "  with  the  head  of  a  hawk,  representing  life,  the  other  Mercury — the  ibis-headed,  psychopompic  genius,  who  guides  the  Souls  after  death  to  their  new  abode,  Hades — standing  for  the  death  of  the  physical  body,  figuratively.

Both  are  shown  pouring  the  "  stream  of  life,"  the  water  of  purification,  on  the  head  of  the  Initiate,  the  two  streams  of  which,  interlacing,  form  a  cross,  The  better  to  conceal  the  truth,  this  basso -re//evo  has  also  been  explained  as  a  "  Pagan  presentment  of  a  Christian  truth."  The  Chevalier  des  Mousseaux  calls  this  Mercury  :

The  assessor  of  Osiris-Sol,  as  St.  Michael  is  the  assessor,  Ferouer,  of  the  Word.

The  monogram  of  Chrestos  and  the  Labarum,  the  standard  of  Con-  stantine — who,  by  the  by,  died  a  Pagan  and  was  never  baptised — is  a  symbol  derived  from  the  above  rite  and  also  denotes  "  life  and  death."  Long,  before  the  sign  of  the  Cross  was  adopted  as  a  Christian  symbol,  it  was  employed  as  a  secret  sign  of  recognition  among  Neophytes  and  Adepts.

Says.

Eliphas  Lev! :

The  sign  of  the  cross  adopted  by  the  Christian  does  not  belong  exclusively  to-  them  It  is  kabalistic,  and  represents  the  oppositions  and  quaternary  equilibrium  of  the  elements.

We  see  by  the  occult  verse  of  the  Pater,  to  which  we  have  called  attention-  in  another  work,  that  there  were  originally  two  ways  of  making  it,  or,  at  least,  two  very  different  formulas  to  express  its  meaning  one  reserved  for  priests  and  initiates  ;  the  other  given  to  neophytes  and  the  profane  '

1  Dogme  et  Ritual  c/e  la  Haute  Magie.

Vol.

ii.  p.

160  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

One  can  understand  now  why  the  Gospel  of  Matthew,  the  Evangel  of  the  Ebionites,  has  been  for  ever  excluded  in  its  Hebrew  form  from  the  world's  curious  gaze.

Jerome  found  the  authentic  and  original  Evangel  written  in  Hebrew,  by  Matthew  the' Publican,  at  the  library  collected  at  Caesarea  by  the  martyr  Pamphilius  "/  received  permission  from  the  Nazareans,  who  at  Beraea  of  Syria  used  this  (gospel),  to  translate  it,  "  he  writes  toward  the  end  of  the  fourth  century.1  "  In  the  Evangel  which  the  Nazarenes  and  Ebionites  use,"  said  Jerome,  "  which  recently  I  translated  from  Hebrew  into  Greek,  and  which  is  called  by  most  persons  the  genuine  gospel  of  Matthew,"  etc

That  the  apostles  had  received  a  "  secret  doctrine  "  from  Jesus,  and  that  he  himself  taught  one,  is  evident  from  the  following  words  of  Jerome,  who  confessed  it  in  an  unguarded  moment.

Writing  to  the  Bishops  Chromatius  and  Helioclorus,  he  com-  plains that  "  a  difficult  work  is  enjoined,  since  this  (translation)  has  been  commanded  me  by  your  Felicities,  which  St.  Matthew  himself,  the  Apostle  and  Evangelist,  did  not  wish  to  be  openly  vvntten  For  if  this  had  not  been  secret,  he  (Matthew),  would  have  added  to  the  Evangel  that  what  he  gave  forth  was  his  ,  but  he  made  up  this  book  sealed  up  in  the  Hebrew  characters,  which  he  put  forth  even  in  such  a  way  that  the  book,  written  in  Hebrew  letters  and  by  the  hand  of  himself,  might  be  possessed  by  the  men  most  religious  ,  who  also,  in  the  course  of  time,  received  it  from  those  who  preceded  them  But  this  very  book  they  never  gave  to  any  one  to  be  transcribed,  and  its  text  they  related  some  one  way  and  some  another >M  And  he  adds  further  on  the  same  page  .  "  And  it  happened  that  this  book,  having  been  published  by  a  disciple  of  Mani-  chaeus,  named  Seleucus,  who  also  wrote  falsely  The  Acts  of  the  Apostles,  exhibited  matter  not  for  edification,  but  for  destruction  ;  and  that  this  (book)  was  approved  in  a  synod  to  which  the  ears  of  the  Church  properly  refused  to  listen  "'

Jerome  admits,  himself,  that  the  book  which  he  authenticates  as  being  written  "  by  the  hand  of  Matthew,"  was  nevertheless  a  book  which,  notwithstanding  that  he  translated  it  twice,  was  nearly  unintelligible  to  him,  for  it  was  arcane  Nevertheless,  Jerome  coolly  sets  down  every  commentary  upon  it  but  his  own  as  heretical  More  than  that,  Jerome  knew  that  this  Gospel  was  the  only  original  one,  yet  he  becomes  more  zealous  than  ever  in  his  persecution  of  the  "  Heretics."  Why?  Because  to  accept  it  was  equivalent  to  reading  the  death  sentence  of  the  established  Church  The  Gospel  according  to  the  Hebrews  was  well  known  to  have  been  the  only  one  accepted  for  four

1  (Hieronymus,  De  Vins  Illust  .  in.)  "It  is  remarkable  that,  while  all  Church  Fathers  say  that  Matthew  wrote  in  Hebrew,  the  whole  of  them  use  the  Greek  text  as  the  genuine  apostolic  writing,  without  mentioning  what  relation  the  Hebrew  Matthew  has  to  our  Greek  one  !  It  had  many  peculiar  additions  which  are  wanting  in  our  (Greek)  Evangel."  (Olshausen,  Nachunwe/s  der  Echtheit  der  Sammt-  fichen  Schr/ften  des  Neuen  Test.,  p  32  ,  Dunlap,  Sod,  the  Son  of  Man,  p,  44.)

-'  Co/nmen  to  Matthew  (xii,  13)  Book  II  Jerome  adds  that  it  was  written  in  the  Chaldaic  language,  but  with  Hebrew  letters.

1  "  St.  Jerome."  v,  445  ,  Dunlap,  Sod,  the  Son  of  Man,  p.  46.

4  This  accounts  also  for  the  rejection  of  the  works  of  Justin  Martyr,  who  used  only  this  "  Gospel  according  to  the  Hebrews,"  as  also  did  most  probably  Tatian.

his  disciple.

At  what  a  late  period  the  divinity  of  Christ  was  fully  established  we  can  judge  by  the  mere  fact  that  even  in  the  fourth  century  Eusebius  did  not  denounce  this  book  as  spurious,  but  only  classed  it  with  such  as  the  Apocalypse  of  John  ;  and  Credner  (Zur  Gesch  des  Kan,  p.  120)  shows  Nicephorus  inserting  it,  together  with  the  Revelation,  in  his  Stichometry,  among  the  Antilegomena.

The  Ebionites,  the  genuine  primitive  Christians,  rejecting  the  rest  ot  the  Apostolic  writings,  make  use  only  of  this  Gospel  (Adv.

Hoer.,  i,  26)  and  the  Ebionites,  as  Epiphanius  declares,  firmly  believed,  with  the  Nazarenes,  that  Jesus  was  but  a  man,  "  of  the  seed  of  a  man." centuries  by  the  Jewish  Christians,  the  Nazarenes  and  the  Ebionites.


And  neither  of  the  -latter  accepted  the  divinity  of  Christ.

The  Ebionites  were  the  first,  the  earliest  Christians,  whose  representative  was  the  Gnostic  author  of  the  Clementine  Homilies,  and  as  the  author  of  Supernatural  Religion  shows,"  Ebionitic  Gnosticism  had  once  been  the  purest  form  of  Christianity.

They  were  the  pupils  and  followers  of  the  early  Naza-  renes— the  kabalistic  Gnostics.

They  believed  in  the  £ons,  as  the  Cerinthians  did,  and  that  "  the  world  was  put  together  by  Angels  "  (Dhyan  Chohans),  as  Epiphanius  complains  (Contra  Eb/on/tas)  :  "  Ebion  had  the  opinion  of  the  Nazarenes,  the  form  of  Cerinthians."  "  They  decided  that  Christ  was  of  the  seed  of  a  man,"  he  laments.3  Thus  again  :

The  badge  of  Dan-Scorpio  is  death-life,  in  the  symbol  f ,  as  cross-bones  and  skull,  .  or  life-death  .  .  the  standard  of  Constantine,  the  Roman  Emperor.

Abel  has  been  shown  to  be  Jesus,  and  Cam-Vulcain,  or  Mars,  pierced  him.

Constantine  was  the  Roman  Emperor  whose  warlike  god  was  Mars,  and  a  Roman  soldier  pierced  Jesus  <on  the  cross.

But  the  piercing  of  Abel  was  the  consummation  of  his  marriage  with  Cain,  and  this  was  proper  under  the  form  of  Mars  Generator  ;  hence  the  double  glyph,  one  of  Mars-Generator  [Osiris-Sun]  and  Mars-Destroyer  [Mercury  the  God  of  Death  in  the  Egyptian  basso-re//evo]  in  one  ;  significant,  again,  of  the  primal  idea  of  the  living  cosmos,  or  of  birth  and  death,  as  necessary  to  the  continuation  of  the  stream  of  life

To  quote  once  more  from  Isis  Unveiled  :

A  Latin  cross  of  a  perfect  Christian  shape  was  found  hewn  upon  the  granite  slabs  of  the  Adytum  of  the  Serapeum  ,  and  the  monks  did  not  fail  to  claim  that  the  cross  had  Jaeen  hallowed  by  the  Pagans  ma"  spirit  of  prophecy."  At  least,  Sozomen,  with  an  air  of  triumph,  records  the  fact  '  But  archaeology  and  symbolism,  those  tireless  and  .implacable  enemies  of  clerical  false  pretences,  have  found  in  the  hieroglyhics  of  the  legend  running  round  the  design  at  least  a  partial  interpretation  of  its  meaning

According  to  King  and  other  numismatists  and  archaeologists,  the  cross  was  placed  there  as  the  symbol  of  eternal  life.

Such  a  Tau,  or  Egyptian  cross,  was  used  in  the  Bacchic  and  Eleusmian  Mysteries.

Symbol  of  the  dual  generative  power,  it  was  Jaid  upon  the  breast  of  the  Initiate,  after  his  "  new  birth*"  was  accomplished,  and  the  Mystaa  had  returned  from  their  baptism  in  the  sea.

It  was  a  mystic  sign  that  his  spiritual  birth  had  regenerated  and  united  his  astral  soul  with  his  divine  spirit,  and  that  he  was  ready  to  ascend  in  spirit  to  the  blessed  abodes  of  light  and  glory — the  Eleusinia.

The  Tau  was  a  magic  talisman  at  the  same  time  as  a  religious  emblem  It  was  adopted

1  Isis  Unveiled,  II,  pp    181-3  -  Op    c.t  ....

•'  See  also  /sis  Unveiled,  II,  p    180,  to  end  of  chapter

4  Source  of  Measures,  p.  299.  This  "  stream  of  life  "  being  emblematized  in  the  Philloc  basso-  relievo  just  mentioned,  by  the  water  poured  in  the  shape  of  a  Cross  on  the  initiated  candidate  by  •Osiris — Life  and  the  Sun—and  Mercury— Death  It  was  the  finale  of  the  rite  of  Initiation  after  the  seven  and  the  twelve  tortures  in  the  Crypts  of  Egypt  were  passed  through  successfully

'  Another  untrustworthy,  untruthful  and  ignorant  writer,  an  ecclesiastical  historian  of  the  fifth  century.

His  alleged  history  of  the  strife  between  the  Pagans,  Neo-Platonists,  and  the  Christians  of  Alexandria  and  Constantinople,  which  extends  from  the  year  324  to  439,  dedicated  by  him  to  Theo-  xJosius,  the  younger,  is  full  of  deliberate  falsifications.

FF

162  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

by  the  Christians  through  the  Gnostics  and  Kabalists,  who  used  it  largely,  as  their  numerous  gems  testify.

These  in  turn  had  the  Tau  (or  handled  cross)  from  the  Egyptians,  and  the  Latin  Cross  from  the  Buddhist  missionaries,  who  brought  it  from  India  (where  it  can  be  found  even  now)  two  or  three  centuries  B  C,  The  Assyrians,.  Egyptians,  ancient  Americans,  Hindus  and  Romans  had  it  in  various,  but  very  slight  modifications  of  shape.

Till  very  late  in  the  middle  ages,  it  was  considered  a  potent  spell  against  epilepsy  and  demoniacal  possession,  and  the  "signet  of  the  living  God  "  brought  down  in  St.  John's  vision  by  the  angel  ascending  from  the  east  to  "  seal  the  servants  of  our  God  in  the  foreheads,"  was  but  the  same  mystic  Tau — the  Egyptian  Cross.

In  the  painted  glass  of  St.  Denis  (France)  this  angel  is  represented  as  stamping  this  sign  on  the  forehead  of  the  elect ;  the  legend  reads,  SIGNUM  TAY  In  King's  Gnostics,  the  author  reminds  us  that  "  this  mark  is  commonly  borne  by  St  Anthony,  an  Egyptian  recluse."  '  What  the  real  meaning  of  the  Tau  was,  is  explained  to  us  by  the  Christian  St.  John,  the  Egyptian  Hermes,  and  the  Hindu  Brahmans  It  is  but  too  evident  that,  with  the  Apostle  at  least,  it  meant  the  "  Ineffable  Name  ,"  as  he  calls  this  "  signet  of  the  living  God  "  a  few  chapters  further  on2  the  "  Father's  name  written  in  their  foreheads  "

The  Brahmatma,  the  chief  of  the  Hindu  Initiates,  had  on  his  head-gear  two  keys,  symbol  of  the  revealed  mystery  of  life  and  death,  placed  cross-like ;  and  in  some  Buddhist  pagodas  of  Tartary  and  Mongolia,  the  entrance  of  a  chamber  within  the  temple,  generally  containing  the  staircase  which  leads  to  the  inner  dagoba,'  and  the  porticos  of  some  Prachidas  '  are  ornamented  with  a  cross  formed  of  two  fishes,  as  found  on  some  of  the  zodiacs  of  the  Buddhists  We  should  not  wonder  at  all  at  learning  that  the  sacred  device  in  the  tombs  in  the  catacombs  at  Rome,  the  "  Vesica  PISCIS,"  was  derived  from  the  said  Buddhist  zodiacal  sign.

How  general  must  have  been  that  geometrical  figure  in  the  world-symbols,  may  be  inferred  from  the  fact  that  there  is  a  Masonic  tradition  that  Solomon's  temple  was  built  on  three  foundations,  forming  the  "  triple  Tau  "  or  three  crosses

In  its  mystical  sense,  the  Egyptian  cross  owes  its  origin,  as  an  emblem,  to  the  realisation  by  the  earliest  philosophy  of  an  androgynous  dualism  of  every  manifestation  m  nature,  which  proceeds  from  the  abstract  ideal  of  a  likewise  androgynous  deity,  while  the  Christian  emblem  is  simply  due  to  chance  Had  the  Mosaic  law  prevailed,  Jesus  should  have  been  lapidated  '  The  crucifix  was  an  instrument  of  torture,  and  [as]  utterly  common  among  Romans  as  it  was  unknown  among  Semitic  nations  It  was  called  the  "  Tree  of  Infamy."  It  is  but  later  that  it  was  adopted  as  a  Christian  symbol  ,  but  during  the  first  two  decades  the  apostles  looked  upon  it  with  horror h  It  is  certainly  not  the  Christian  Cross  that  John  had  in  mind  when  speaking  of  the  "  signet  of  the  living  God,"  but  the  mystic  Tau — the  Tetftagrammaton,  or  mighty  name,  which,  on  the  most  ancient  Kabalistic  talismans,  was  represented  by  the  four  Hebrew  letters  composing  the  Holy  Word

The  famous  Lady  Ellenborough,  known  among  the  Arabs  of  Damascus,  and  in  the  desert,  after  her  last  marriage,  as  Hanoum  Med/ouye,  had  a  talisman  in  her  possession,  presented  to  her  by  a  Druse  from  Mount  Lebanon.

It  was  recognised  by  a

1  Gems  of  the  Orthodox  Christians,  vol.

I,  p    135  -  Revelation,  xiv,  1.

J  A  DSgoba  is  a  small  temple  of  globular  form,  in  which  are  preserved  the  relics  of  Gautama

4  Prachidas  are  buildings  of  all  sizes  and  forms,  like  our  mausoleums,  and  are  sacred  to  votive  offerings  to  the  dead

•''  The  Talmudistic  records  claim  that,  after  having  been  hanged,  he  was  lapidated  and  buried  under  the  water  9t  the  junction  of  two  streams.

M/shna  SanheoY/n,  Vol.

VI,  p.  4  ,  Talmud,  of  Babylonv  same  article,  43a,  67 a

{>  Coptic  Legends  of  the  Crucifixion,  MSS.,  XI certain  sign  on  its  left  corner  as  belonging  to  that  class  of  gems  which  is  known  in  Palestine  as  a  "  Mess/an/c  "  amulet,  of  the  second  or  third  century  B.C  It  is  a  green  stone  of  a  pentagonal  form  ;  at  the  bottom  is  engraved  a  fish  ,  higher,  Solomon's  Seal ;  l  and  still  higher,  the  four  Chaldaic  letters — Jod,  He,  Vau,  He,  IAHO,  which  form  the  name  of  the  Deity  These  are  arranged  in  quite  an  unusual  way,  running  from  below  upward,  in  reversed  order,  and  forming  the  Egyptian  Tau.


Around  these  there  is  a  legend  which,  as  the  gem  is  not  our  property,  we  are  not  at  liberty  to  give  The  Tau,  in  its  mystical  sense,  as  well  as  the  Crux  ansata,  is  the  Tree  of  Life.

It  is  well  known  that  the  earliest  Christian  emblems — before  it  was  ever  attempted  to  represent  the  bodily  appearance  of  Jesus — were  the  Lamb,  the  Good  Shepherd,  and  The  Fish  The  origin  of  the  latter  emblem,  which  has  so  puzzled  the  archaeologists,  thus  becomes  comprehensible  The  whole  secret  lies  in  the  easily  ascertained  fact  that,  while  in  the  Kabalah  the  King  Messiah  is  called  "  Interpreter,"  or  Revealer  of  the  Mystery,  and  shown  to  be  the  fifth  emanation,  in  the  Talmud — for  reasons  we  will  now  explain — the  Messiah  is  very  often  designated  as  "  DAG,"  or  the  Fish.

This  is  an  inheritance  from  the  Chaldees,  and  relates — as  the  very  name  indicates  —  to  the  Babylonian  Dagon,  the  man-fish,  who  was  the  instructor  and  interpreter  of  the  people,  to  whom  he  appeared  Abarbanel  explains  the  name,  by  stating  that  the  sign  of  his  (Messiah's)  coming  is  the  conjunction  of  Saturn  and  Jupiter  in  the  sign  Pisces  -  Therefore,  as  the  Christians  were  intent  upon  identifying  their  Christos  with  the  Messiah  of  the  Old  Testament,  they  adopted  it  so  readily  as  to  forget  that  its  true  origin  might  be  traced  still  further  back  than  the  Babylonian  Dagon  How  eagerly  and  closely  the  ideal  of  Jesus  was  united,  by  the  early  Christians,  with  every  imaginable  kabalistic  and  pagan  tenet,  may  be  inferred  from  the  language  of  Clemens  of  Alexandria,  addressed  to  his  co-religionists

When  they  were  debating  upon  the  choice  of  the  most  appropriate  symbol  to  remind  them  of  Jesus,  Clemens  advised  them  in  the  following  words  .  "  Let  the  engraving  upon  the  gem  of  your  ring  be  either  a  dove,  or  a  ship  running  before  the  wind  (the  Argha),  or  a  fish  "  Was  the  good  father,  when  writing  this  sentence,  labouring  under  the  recollection  of  Joshua,  son  of  Nun  (called  Jesus  in  the  Greek  and  Slavonian  versions)  ,  or  had  he  forgotten  the  real  interpretation  of  these  pagan  symbols  ?  >{

And  now,  with  the  help  of  all  these  passages  scattered  hither  and  thither  in  Isis  and  other  works  of  this  kind,  the  reader  will  see  and  judge  for  himself  which  of  the  two  explanations — the  Christian  or  that  of  the  Occultist — is  the  nearer  to  truth.

If  Jesus  were  not  an  Initiate,  why  should  all  these  allegorical  incidents  of  his  life  be  given?  Why  should  such  extreme  trouble  be  taken,  so  much  time  wasted  trying  to  make  the  above  :  (a)  answer  and  dovetail  with  purposely  picked  out  sentences  in  the  Old  Testament,  to  show  them  as  prophecies  ;  and  (b)  to  preserve  in  them  the  initiatory  symbols,  the  emblems  so  pregnant  with  Occult  meaning,  and  all  of  these  belonging  to  Pagan  mystic

1  We  are  at  a  loss  to  understand  why  King,  in  his  Gnostic  Gems,  represents  Solomon's  Seal  as  a  five-pointed  star,  whereas  it  is  six-pointed,  and  is  the  signet  of  Vishnu  in  India.

2  King  (Gnostics)  gives  the  figure  of  a  Christian  symbol,  very  common  during  the  middle  ages,  of  three    fishes  interlaced  into    a  triangle,  and  having  the  FIVE  letters  (a  most  sacred   Pythagorean  number)  1X(R)TS  engraved  on  it      The  number  five  relates  to  the  same  kabalistic  computation.

3  Op.  at.,  II,  pp.  253-6.

164  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Philosophy  ?  The  author  of  the  Source  of  Measures  gives  out  that  mystical  intent ;  but  only  once  now  and  again,  in  its  one-sided,  numerical  and  kabalistic  meaning,  without  paying  any  attention  to,  or  having  concern  with,  the  primeval  and  more  spiritual  origin,  and  he  deals  with  it  only  so  far  as  it  relates  to  the  Old  Testament.

He  attributes  the  purposed  change  in  the  sentence  "Eli,  Eli,  lama  sabachthani "  to  the  principle  already  mentioned  of  the  crossed  bones  and  skull  in  the  Labarum,

as  an  emblem  of  death,  being  placed  over  the  door  of  life  and  signifying  birth,  or  of  the  mtercontainment  of  two  opposite  principles  in  one,  just  as,  mystically,  the  Saviour  was  held  to  be  man-woman  l

The  author's  idea  is  to  show  the  mystic  blending  by  the  Gospel  writers  of  Jehovah,  Cain,  Abel,  etc.,  with  Jesus  (in  accordance  with  Jewish  kabalistic  numeration);  the  better  he  succeeds,  the  more  clearly  he  shows  that  it  was  a  forced  blending,  and  that  we  have  not  a  record  of  the  real  events  of  the  life  of  Jesus,  narrated  by  eye-witnesses  or  the  Apostles.

The  narrative  is  all  based  on  the  signs  of  the  Zodiac :

Each  .  .  a  double  sign  or  male-female  [in  ancient  astrological  Magic]  viz  it  was  Taurus-Eve,  and  Scorpio  was  Mars-Lupa,  or  Mars  with  the  female  wolf  [in  relation  to  Romulus].  So,  as  these  signs  were  opposites  of  each  other,  yet  met  in  the  centre,  they  were  connected  ;  and  so  in  fact  it  was,  and  in  a  double  sense,  the  conception  of  the  year  was  in  Taurus,  as  the  conception  of  Eve  by  Mars,  her  opposite,  in  Scorpio.

The  birth  would  be  at  the  winter  solstice,  or  Christmas.

On  the  contrary,  by  con-  ception in  Scorpio — viz.,  of  Lupa  by  Taurus — birth  would  be  in  Leo  Scorpio  was  Chrestos  in  humiliation,  while  Leo  was  Christos  in  triumph.

While  Taurus-Eve  fulfilled  astronomical  functions,  Mars-Lupa  fulfilled  spiritual  ones  by  type.'

The  author  bases  all  this  on  Egyptian  correlations  and  meanings  of  Gods  and  Goddesses,  but  ignores  the  Aryan,  which  are  far  earlier.

Muth  or  Mouth,  was  the  Egyptian  cognomen  of  Venus,  (Eve,  mother  of  all  living)  [as  Vach,  mother  of  all  living,  a  permutation  of  Aditi,  as  Eve  was  one  of  Sephira]  or  the  moon.

Plutarch  (Isis,  374)  hands  it  down  that  Isis  was  sometimes  called  Muth,  which  word  means  mot/ier  .  .  .  (Issa,  JnttfK,  woman.

Isis,  p.  372).  Isis,  he  says  is  that  part  of  Nature,  which,  as  feminine,  contains  in  herself,  as  (nutrix)  nurse,  all  things  to  be  born  .  "  Certainly  the  moon,"  speaking  astronomically,  "  chiefly  exercises  this  function  in  Taurus,  Venus  being  the  house  (in  opposition  to  Mars,  generator,  in  Scorpio),  because  the  sign  is  luna,  hypsoma.

Since  .  .  .  Isis  Metheur  differs  from  Isis  Muth  and  that  in  the  vocable  Muth  the  not/on  of  bringing  forth  may  be  concealed,  and  since  fructification  must  take  place,  Sol  being  joined  with  Luna  in  Libra,  it  is  not  improbable  that  Muth  first  indeed  signifies  Venus  in  Libra  ,  hence  Luna  in  Libra,"  (Beitrage  zur  Kenntniss,  pars.

II,  S.  9,  under  Muth.)  '

Then  Fuerst,  under  Bohu,  is  quoted  to  show

the  double  play  upon  the  word  Muth  by  help  of  which  the  real  intent  is  produced  in  the  occult  way  .  sin,  death  and  woman  are  one  in  the  glyph,  and  correlatively  connected  with  intercourse  and  death.*

1  Op.  cit.,  p.  301       All  this  connects  Jesus  with  great  Initiates  and  solar  heroes  ,  all  this  is  purely  Pagan,  under  a  newly-evolved  variation,  the  Christian  scheme.

»  Op  at,  p  296.  *  Pp  294-5  «  P.  293.


All  this  is  applied  by  the  author  only  to  the  exoteric  and  Jewish  euhe-  merised  symbols,  whereas  they  were  meant,  first  of  all,  to  conceal  cosmo-  gonical  mysteries,  and  then,  those  of  anthropological  evolution  with  reference  to  the  Seven  Races,  already  evoluted  and  to  come,  and  especially  as  regards  the  last  branch  races  of  the  third  Root  Race.

However,  the  word  void  (primeval  Chaos)  is  shown  to  be  taken  for  Eve-Venus-Naamah,  agreeably  with  Fuerst's  definition  ;  for  as  he  says  :

In  this  primitive  Signification  [of  void]  was  IDS  [bohu]  taken  in  the  Biblical  cos-  mogony, and  used  in  establishing  the  dogma  [J^ND  BP  Jes  (us)  m'aven,  Jes-us  from  nothmg],  respecting  creation.

[Which  shows  the  writers  of  the  New  Testament  con-  siderably skilled  in  the  Kabalah  and  Occult  Sciences,  and  corroborates  still  more  our  assertion.]  Hence  Aquila  translates  ovSev,  vulg.

vacua  (hence  vacca,  cow)  [hence  also  the  horns  of  Isis — Nature,  Earth,  and  the  Moon — taken  from  Vach,  the  Hindu  "  Mother  of  all  that  lives,"  identified  with  Viraj  and  called  in  Atharvaveda  the  daughter  of  Kama,  the  first  desires  :  "  That  daughter  of  thine,  O  Kama,  is  called  the  cow,  she  whom  sages  name  Vacn-V/ra/,"  who  was  milked  by  Brihaspati,  the  Rishi,  which  is  another  mystery]  Onkelos  and  Samarit.

Mpi"!

The  Phoanician  cosmogony  has  connected  Bohu  ina,  Baau,  into  a  personified  expression  denoting  the  primitive  substance,  and  as  a  deity,  the  motner  of  races  of  the  gods  [which  is  Aditi  and  Vach].  The  Aramean  name  DTD,  nirQ,  SmrQ,  Ba&>0,  Bu#-o9,  Buto,  for  the  motner  of  the  gods,  which  passed  over  to  the  Gnostics,  Baby-  lonians and  Egyptians,  is  identical  then  with  Mot  (fflO,  our  Muth)  properly,  (Bo>0)  originated  in  Phoenician  from  an  interchange  of  6  with  m  !

Rather,  one  would  say,  go  to  the  origin.

The  mystic  euhemerisation  of  Wisdom  and  Intelligence,  operating  in  the  work  of  cosmic  evolution,  or  Buddhi  under  the  names  of  Brahma,  Purusha,  etc.,  as  male  power,  and  Aditi-  Vach,  etc.,  as  female,  whence  Sarasvatl,  Goddess  of  Wisdom,  who  became  under  the  veils  of  Esoteric  concealment,  Butos,  Bytnos-Depth  the  grossly  material,  personal  female,  called  Eve,  the  "  primitive  woman  "  of  Irenaeus,  and  the  world  springing  out  of  Nothing.

The  workings  out  of  this  glyph  of  4th  Genesis  help  to  the  comprehension  of  the  division  of  one  character  into  the  forms  of  two  persons  ;  as  Adam  and  Eve,  Cam  and  Abel,  Abram  and  Isaac,  Jacob  and  Esau,  and  so  on  [all  male  and  female]  .  Now,  as  linking  together  several  great  salient  points  in  the  Biblical  structure-  (1)  as  to  the  Old  and  New  Testaments ;  with  also  (2)  as  to  the  Roman  Empire  ;  (3)  as  to  confirming  the  meanings  and  uses  of  symbols  ,  and  (4)  as  to  confirming  the  entire  explanation  and  reading  of  the  glyphs ,  as  (5)  recognising  and  laying  down  the  base  of  the  great  pyramid  as  the  foundation  square  of  the  Bible  construction ;  (6)  as  well  as  the  new  Roman  adoption  under  Constantine — the  following  given  .  *

Cain  has  been  shown  to  be  ...  the  360  circle  of  the  Zodiac,  the  perfect  and  exact  standard,  by  a  squared  division ;  hence  his  name  of  Melchizadik  .  .  .  [The

1  Pp.  295-6.

2  Had  we  known  the  learned  author  before  his  book  was  printed,  he  might  have  been  perchance  prevailed  upon  to  add  a  seventh   link  from  which  all  others,  far  preceding  those  enumerated   in  point  of  time,   and  surpassing  them  in   universally  philosophical  meaning,  have  been  derived,  aye,  even  to  the  great  pyramid,  whose  foundation  square  was,  in  its  turn,  the  great  Aryan  Mysteries.

166  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

geometrical  and  numerical  demonstrations  here  follow.]  It  has  been  repeatedly  stated  that  the  object  ot  the  Great  Pyramid  construction  was  to  measure  the  heavens  and  the  earth  .  .  .  [the  objective  spheres  as  evolutmg  from  the  subjective,  purely  spiritual  Kosmos,  we  beg  leave  to  add] ;  therefore,  its  measuring  containment  would  indicate  all  the  substance  of  measure  of  the  heavens  and  the  earth,  or  agreeably  to  ancient  recognition,  Earth,  Air,  Water  and  Fire.1  (The  base  side  of  this  pyramid  was  diameter  to  a  circumference  in  feet  of  2400.  The  characteristic  of  this  is  24  feet,  or  6  x  4  -  24,  or  this  very  Cain-Adam  square  )  Now,  by  the  restoration  of  the  encampment  of  the  Israelites,  as  initiated  by  Moses,  by  the  great  scholar,  Father  Athanasius  Kircher,  the  Jesuit  priest,  the  above  is  precisely,  by  Biblical  record  and  traditionary  sources,  the  method  of  laying  off  this  encampment  The  four  interior  squares  were  devoted  to  (1)  Moses  and  Aaron  ,  (2)  Kohath ;  (3)  Gershom ,  and  (4)  Merari-  the  last  three  being  the  heads  of  the  Levites  The  attributes  of  these  squares  were  the  primal  attributes  of  Adam-Mars  and  were  concreted  of  the  elements,  Earth,  Air,  Fire,  Water,  or  £"*  lam  Water,  173  Nour  Fire,  HH  Rouach  Air,  and  HTW  labeshah  Earth  The  initial  letters  of  these  words  are  INRI — the  symbol  usually  translated  as  /esus  Nazarenus  Rex  ludaeorunrv  "  Jesus  of  Nazareth,  King  of  the  Jews  "  This  square  of  INRI  is  the  Adam  square,  which  was  extended  from,  as  a  foundation,  into  four  others  of  144  x  2  288,  to  the  side  of  the  large  square  of  288  x  4  1152,  the  whole  circum-  ference But  this  square  is  the  display  of  also  circular  elements  and  115-2  can  denote  this.

Put  INRI  into  a  circle,  or  read  it  as  the  letters  stand  in  the  square,  as  to  its  values

of  1521,  and  we  have  {i    jj  which  reads  115-2  of  this  fact

But  as  seen  Cain  denotes  this  as,  or  in,  the  115  of  his  name  ,  which  115  was  the  very  complement  to  make  up  the  360  day  year,  to  agree  with  the  balances  of  the  standard  circle,  which  were  Cain.

The  corner  squares  of  the  larger  square  are,  A  Leo,  and  B  Dan  Scorpio  ,  and  it  is  seen  that  Cam  pierces  Abel  at  the  inter-section  of  the  equinoctial  with  the  solstice  cross  lines,  referred  to  from  Dan-Scorpio  on  the  celestial  circle  But  Dan-Scorpio  borders  on  Libra,  the  scales,  whose  sign  is  =c=  (which  sign  is  that  of  the  ancient  pillow  on  which  the  back  of  the  head  to  the  ears2  rested,  the

pillow  of  Jacob),    and  is  represented  for  one  symbol  as  x  P  8  Also  the  badge  of

Dan-Scorpio   is   death-life,    in   the   symbol  J;r  Now  the  cross  is  the  emblem  of  the

origin  ot  measures,  in  the  Jehovah  form  of  a  straight  line  ONE  of  a  denomination  ot  20612,  the  perfect  circumference,  hence  Cam  was  this  as  Jehovah,  for  the  text  says  that  he  was  Jehovah  But  the  attachment  of  a  man  to  this  cross  was  that  of  113  355  to  6561  5153  x  4  20612,  as  shown  Now,  over  the  head  of  Jesus  crucified  was  placed  the  inscription,  of  which  the  initial  letters  of  the  words  have  always  been  retained  as  symbolic,  and  handed  down  and  used  as  a  monogram  of  Jesus  Chrestos — viz.,  INRI  or  Jesus  Nazarenus  Rex  Jucfaeorum  ,  but  they  are  located  on  the  cross,  or  the  cubed  form  of  the  circular  origin  of  measures  which  measure  the  substance  of  Earth,  Air,  Fire  and  Water,  or  INRI  1152,  as  shown.

Here  is  the  man  on  the  cross,  or  113  355  com-  bined with  6561  5153  x  4  20612.  These  are  the  pyramid-base  numbers  as  coming  from  113  355  as  the  Hebrew  source  ,  whence  the  Adam-square,  which  is  the  pyramid  base,  and  the  centre  one  to  the  larger  square  of  the  encampment.

Bend  INRI  into  a  circle,  and  we  have  1152,  or  the  circumference  of  the  latter  But  Jesus  dying  (or

1  We  would  say  cosmic  Matter,  Spirit.

Chaos,  and  Divine  Light,  for  the  Egyptian  idea  was  identical  m  this  with  the  Aryan.

However,  the  author  is  right  with  regard  to  the  Occult  Symbology  of  the  Jews.

They  were  a  remarkably  matter  of  fact,  unspintual  people  at  all  times  ,  yet  even  with  them  "  Ruach  "  was  Divine  Spirit,  not  "  air."

-  Mr.  Ralston  Skinner  shows  that  the  symbol  I  »  the  crossed  bones  and  skull,  has  the  letter  P  Koph,  the  half  of  the  head  behind  the  ears.

The  Source  ot  Measures,  p Abel  married)  made  use  of  the  very  words  needed  to  set  forth  all.


He  says,  £//,  EH,  Lama  Sabachthani  .      .   Read  them  by  their  power  values,  in  circular  form,  as  produced

from  the  Adam  form  as  shown,  and  we  have  "6x  113,  "6x  113,  or  113-311  HD^  345.  or  Moses  in  the  Cain-Adam  pyramid  circle  ni"DET  710,  equals  Dove,  or  Jonah

and  710  —  2  355,  or  355—553 ,  and  finally,  as  determinative  of  all  F  or  ni,  where  3  nun,  fish  565,  and  ">  1  or  10  ,  together  565  "*  HTiT  or  the  Christ  value.

.  .  .

[All  of  the  above]  throws  light  on  the  transfiguration  scene  on  the  mount  There  were  present  there  Peter  and  James  and  John  with  Jesus ,  or  Dn  lami,  James,  water ;  ntW,  Peter,  earth,  nTT,  John,  spirit,  air,  and  Tir  Jesus,  fire,  life— together  INRI.

But  behold  Eli  and  Moses  met  them  there,  or  *b#  and  HDb  or  Eli  and  Lamah,  or  113  and  345.  And  this  shows  that  the  scene  of  transfiguration  was  connected  with  the  one  above  set  forth.

This  kabalistical  reading  of  the  Gospel  narratives — hitherto  supposed  to  .record  the  most  important,  the  most  mystically  awful,  yet  most  real  events  of  the  life  of  Jesus — must  fall  with  terrible  weight  upon  some  Christians.

Every  honest  trusting  believer  who  has  shed  tears  of  reverential  emotion  over  the  events  of  the  short  period  of  the  public  life  of  Jesus  of  Nazareth,  has  to  choose  one  of  the  two  ways  opening  before  him  after  reading  the  aforesaid  :  either  his  faith  has  to  render  him  quite  impervious  to  any  light  coming  from  human  reasoning  and  evident  fact ,  or  he  must  confess  that  he  has  lost  his  Saviour.

The  One  whom  he  had  hitherto  considered  as  the  unique  incar  nation  on  this  earth  of  the  One  Living  God  in  heaven,  fades  into  thin  air  on  the  authority  of  the  properly  read  and  correctly  interpreted  Bible  itself.

More-  over, since  on  the  authority  of  Jerome  himself  and  his  accepted  and  authentic  confession,  the  book  written  by  the  hand  of  Matthew  "  exhibits  matter  not  for  edification  but  for  destruction  "  (of  Church  and  human  Christianity,  and  only  that)  what  truth  can  be  expected  from  his  famous  Vulgate  ?  Human  mysteries,  concocted  by  generations  of  Church  Fathers  bent  upon  evolving  a  religion  of  their  own  invention,  are  seen  instead  of  a  divine  Revelation  ;  and  that  this  was  so  is  corroborated  by  a  prelate  of  the  Latin  Church.

Saint  Gregory  Nazianzen  wrote  to  his  friend  and  confidant,  Saint  Jerome :

Nothing  can  impose  better  on  a  people  than  verbiage  ,  the  less  they  understand  the  more  they  admire  ,  .  Our  fathers  and  doctors  have  often  said,  not  what  they  thought,  but  that  to  which  circumstances  and  necessity  forced  them

Which  then  of  the  two — the  clergy,  or  the  Occultists  and  Theosophists  — are  the  more  blasphemous  and  dangerous  ?  Is  it  those  who  would  impose  upon  the  world's  acceptance  a  Saviour  of  their  own  fashioning,  a  God  with  human  shortcomings,  and  who  therefore  is  certainly  not  a  perfect  divine

1  Pp  296-302  By  these  numbers,  explains  the  author,  "Eli  is  113  (by  placing  the  word  in  a  circle)  ,  [I]  amah  being  345,  is  by  change  of  letters  to  suit  the  same  value  ftB7lD  (in  a  circle)  or  Moses,  while  Sabachth  is  John  or  the  dove,  or  Holy  Spirit,  because  (in  a  circle)  it  is  710  (or  355  X  2)  The  termination  ni,  as  mem  or  5651.  becomes  Jehovah  "

168  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Being ;  or  those  others  who  say :  Jesus  of  Nazareth  was  an  Initiate,  a  holy,  grand  and  noble  character,  but  withal  human,  though  truly  "  a  Son  of  God?  '"  If  Humanity  is  to  accept  a  so-called  supernatural  Religion,  how  far  more  logical  to  the  Occultist  and  the  Psychologist  seems  the  transparent  allegory  given  of  Jesus  by  the  Gnostics.

They,  as  Occultists,  and  with  Initiates  for  their  Chiefs,  differed  only  in  their  renderings  of  the  story  and  in  their  symbols,  and  not  at  all  in  substance.

What  say  the  Ophites,  the  Nazarenes,  and  other  "heretics"7  Sophia,  "the  Celestial  Virgin,"  is  prevailed  upon  to  send  Christos,  her  emanation,  to  the  help  of  perishing  humanity,  from  whom  llda-  Baoth  (the  Jehovah  of  the  Jews)  and  his  six  Sons  of  Matter  (the  lower  terrestrial  Angels)  are  shutting  out  the  divine  light.

Therefore,  Christos,  the  perfect,

uniting  himself  with  Sophia  [divine  wisdom]  descended  through  the  seven  planet-  ary regions,  assuming  in  each  an  analogous  form  [and]  entered  into  the  man  Jesus  at  the  moment  of  his  baptism  in  the  Jordan  From  this  time  forth  Jesus  began  to  work  miracles ,  before  that  he  had  been  entirely  ignorant  of  his  own  mission

Ilda-Baoth,  discovering  that  Christos  was  bringing  to  an  end  his  kingdom  of  Matter,  stirred  up  the  Jews,  his  own  people,  against  Him,  and  Jesus  was  put  to  death.

When  Jesus  was  on  the  Cross,  Christos  and  Sophia  left  His  body,  and  returned  to  Their  own  sphere.

The  material  body  of  Jesus  was  abandoned  to  the  earth,  but  He  Himself,  the  Inner  Man,  was  clothed  with  a  body  made  up  of  aether.

-

Thenceforth  he  consisted  merely  of  soul  and  spirit.

.  During  his  sojourn  upon  earth  of  eighteen  months  after  he  had  risen,  he  received  from  Sophia  that  perfect  knowledge,  that  true  Gnosis,  which  he  communicated  to  the  small  portion  of  the  Apostles  who  were  capable  of  receiving  the  same.'

The  above  is  transparently  Eastern  and  Hindu  ,  it  is  the  Esoteric  Doctrine  pure  and  simple,  save  for  the  names  and  the  allegory.

It  is,  more  or  less,  the  history  of  every  Adept  who  obtains  Initiation,  The  Baptism  in  the  Jordan  is  the  Rite  of  Initiation,  the  final  purification,  whether  in  sacred  pagoda,  tank,  river,  or  temple  lake  in  Egypt  or  Mexico.

The  perfect  Christos  and  Sophia — divine  Wisdom  and  Intelligence — enter  the  Initiate  at  the  moment  of  the  mystic  rite,  by  transference  from  Guru  to  Chela,  and  leave  the  physical  body,  at  the  moment  of  the  death  of  the  latter,  to  re-enter  the  Nirmanakaya,.  or  the  astral  Ego  of  the  Adept.

The  spirit  of  Buddha  [collectively]  overshadows  the  Bodhisattvas  of  his  Church  says  the  Buddhist  Ritual  of  Aryasanga.

1  The  Western  personification  of  that  power,  which  the  Hindus  call  the  8i/a,  the  "  one  seed"  or  Maria  Vishnu— a  power,  not  the  God— or  that  mysterious  Principle  that  contains  in  Itself  the  Seed  of  Avatansm

*  "  Arise  into  Nervi  from  this  decrepit  body  into  which  thou  hast  been  sent.

Ascend  into  thy  former  abode.

O  blessed  Avatir  I  "

1  The  Gnostics  and  their  Remains,  King,  pp.  100- Says  the  Gnostic  teaching  .


When  he  [the  spirit  of  Chnstos]  shall  have  collected  all  the  Spiritual,  all  the  Light  [that  exists  in  matter],  out  of  lldabaoth's  empire,  Redemption  is  accomplished  and  the  end  of  the  world  arrived  '

Say  the  Buddhists

When  Buddha  [the  Spirit  of  the  Church]  hears  the  hour  strike,  he  will  send  Maitreya  Buddha — after  whom  the  old  world  will  be  destroyed.

That  which  is  said  of  Basilides  by  King  may  be  applied  as  truthfully  to  every  innovator,  so  called,  whether  of  a  Buddhist  or  of  a  Christian  Church.

In  the  eyes  of  Clemens  Alexandrinus,  he  says,  the  Gnostics  taught  very  little  that  was  blameable  in  their  mystical  transcendental  views.

In  his  eyes  the  latter  [Basilides],  was  not  a  heretic,  that  is  an  innovator  uport  the  accepted  doctrines  of  the  Catholic  Church,  but  only  a  theosophic  speculator  who  sought  to  express  old  truths  by  new  formulae  J

There  was  a  SECRET  DOCTRINE  preached  by  Jesus  ;  and  "  secrecy  "  ir>  those  days  meant  Secrets,  Mysteries  of  Initiation,  all  of  which  have  been  either  rejected  or  disfigured  by  the  Church.

In  the  Clementine  Homilies  we  read  :

And  Peter  said  "  We  remember  that  our  Lord  and  Teacher,  commanding  us,  said  '  Guard  the  mysteries  for  me  and  the  sons  of  my  house.'  "  Wherefore  also  he  explained  to  His  disciples  privately  the  Mysteries  of  the  Kingdom  of  the  Heavens.'

1  Loc.

cit.

-  Op,  c.t  ,  p    258  *  Homilies  XIX,  xx,  1.

SECTION

ST.   CYPRIAN  OF  ANTIOCH

THE  >€ons  (Stellar  Spirits) — emanated  from  the  Unknown  of  the  Gnostics,  and  identical  with  the  Dhyan  Chohans  of  the  Esoteric  Doctrine — and  their  Pleroma,  having  been  transformed  into  Archangels  and  the  "  Spirits  of  the  Presence  "  by  the  Greek  and  Latin  Churches,  the  prototypes  have  lost  caste.

The  Pleroma  '  was  now  called  the  "  Heavenly  Host,"  and  therefore  the  old  name  had  to  become  identified  with  Satan  and  his  "  Host."  Might  is  right  in  every  age,  and  History  is  full  of  contrasts.

Manes  had  been  called  the  "  Paraclete  "  *  by  his  followers.

He  was  an  Occultist,  but  passed  to  posterity,  owing  to  the  kind  exertions  of  the  Church,  as  a  Sorcerer,  so  a  match  had  to  be  found  for  him  by  way  of  contrast.

We  recognise  this  match  m  St.  Cypnanus  of  Antioch,  a  self-confessed  if  not  a  real  "  Black  Magician,"  it  seems,  whom  the  Church —  as  a  reward  for  his  contrition  and  humility — subsequently  raised  to  the  high  rank  of  Saint  and  Bishop.

What  history  knows  of  him  is  not  much,  and  it  is  mostly  based  on  his  own  confession,  the  truthfulness  of  which  is  warranted,  we  are  told,  by  St.  Gregory,  the  Empress  Eudoxia,  Photius  and  the  Holy  Church.

This  curious  document  was  ferreted  out  by  the  Marquis  de  Mirville, '  in  the  Vatican,  and  by  him  translated  into  French  for  the  first  time,  as  he  assures  the  reader.

We  beg  his  permission  to  re-translate  a  few  pages,  not  for  the  sake  of  the  penitent  Sorcerer,  but  for  that  of  some  students  of  Occultism,  who  will  thus  have  an  opportunity  of  comparing  the  methods  of  ancient  Magic  (or  as  the  Church  calls  it,  Demonism)  with  those  of  modern  Theurgy  and  Occultism.

1  The  Pleroma  constituted  the  synthesis  or  entirety  of  all  the  spiritual  entities      St    Paul  still  used  the  name  in  his  Epistles

J  CL  op.  at  .  Tome  vi,  pp.  169-83,

ST.  CYPRIAN  OF  ANTIOCH

The  scenes  described  took  place  at  Antioch  about  the  middle  of  the  third  century,  252  A  D  ,  says  the  translator.

This  Confession  was  written  by  the  penitent  Sorcerer  after  his  conversion  ;  therefore,  we  are  not  surprised  to  find  how  much  room  he  gives  in  his  lamentations  to  reviling  his  Initiator  "  Satan,"  or  the  "  Serpent  Dragon,"  as  he  calls  him.

There  are  other  and  more  modern  instances  of  the  same  trait  in  human  nature.

Converted  Hindus,  Parsis  and  other  "  heathen  "  of  India  are  apt  to  denounce  their  fore-  fathers' religions  at  every  opportunity.

Thus  runs  the  Confession  :

O  all  of  you  who  reject  the  real  mysteries  of  Christ,  see  my  tears  I  .  You  who  wallow  in  your  demoniacal  practices,  learn  by  my  sad  example  all  the  vanity  of  their  [the  demons']  baits  .  .  I  am  that  Cypnanus,  who,  vowed  to  Apollo  from  his  infancy,  was  early  initiated  into  all  the  arts  of  the  dragon  '  Even  before  the  age  of  seven  I  had  already  been  introduced  into  the  temple  of  Mithra  three  years  later,  my  parents  taking  me  to  Athens  to  be  received  as  citizen,  I  was  permitted  likewise  to  penetrate  the  mysteries  of  Ceres  lamenting  her  daughter,2  and  I  also  became  the  guardian  of  the  Dragon  in  the  Temple  of  Pallas

Ascending  after  that  to  the  summit  of  Mount  Olympus,  the  Seat  of  the  Gods,  as  it  is  called,  there  too  I  was  initiated  into  the  sense,  and  the  real  meaning  of  their  [the  Gods']  speeches  and  their  clamorous  manifestations  (strep/tuum)  It  is  there  that  I  was  made  to  see  in  imagination  (phantasia)  [or  Maya]  those  trees  and  all  those  herbs  that  operate  such  prodigies  with  the  help  of  demons ;  .  and  I  saw  their  dances,  their  warfares,  their  snares,  illusions  and  promiscuities  I  heard  their  singing  J  I  saw  finally,  for  forty  consecutive  days,  the  phalanx  of  the  Gods  and  Goddesses,  sending  from  Olympus,  as  though  they  were  Kings,  spirits  to  represent  them  on  earth  and  act  in  their  name  among  all  the  nations

At  that  time  I  lived  entirely  OP  fruit,  eaten  only  after  sunset,  the  virtues  of  which  were  explained  to  me  by  the  seven  priests  of  the  sacrifices.'

When  I  was  fifteen  my  parents  desired  that  I  should  be  made  acquainted,  not  only  with  all  the  natural  laws  in  connection  with  the  generation  and  corruption  of  bodies  (on  earth,  in  the  air  and  in  the  seas,  but  also  with  all  the  other  forces  grafted6  (insitas)  on  these  by  the  Prince  of  the  World  in  order  to  counteract  their  primal  and  divine  con-  stitution/ At  twenty  I  went  to  Memphis,  where,  penetrating  into  the  Sanctuaries,  I  was  taught  to  discern  all  that  pertains  to  the  communications  of  demons  [Daimones  or  Spirits]  with  terrestrial  matters,  their  aversion  for  certain  places,  their  sympathy  and

1  "  The  great  serpent  placed  to  watch  the  temple,"  comments  De  Mirville.

"  How  often  have  we  repeated  that  it  was  no  symbol,  no  personification  but  really  a  serpent  occupied  by  a  god  '  "—he  exclaims  ,  and  we  answer  that  at  Cairo  in  a  Mussulman,  not  a  heathen  temple,  we  have  seen,  as  thousands  of  other  visitors  have  also  seen,  a  huge  serpent  that  lived  there  for  centuries,  we  were  told,  and  was  held  in  great  respect.

Was  it  also  "  occupied  by  a  God,"  or  possessed,  in  other  words  ?

-  The  Mysteries  of  Demeter,  or  the  "  afflicted  mother  "  {  By  the  satyrs.

4  This  looks  rather  suspicious  and  seems  interpolated  De  Mirville  tries  to  have  what  he  says  of  Satan  and  his  Court  sending  their  imps  on  earth  to  tempt  humanity  and  masquerade  at  seances,  cor-  roborated by  the  ex-sorcerer

'  This  does  not  look  like  sinful  food.

It  is  the  diet  of  Chelas  to  this  day.

fi  "  Grafted  "  is  the  correct  expression  "  The  seven  Builders  graft  the  divine  and  the  beneficent  forces  on  to  the  gross  material  nature  of  the  vegetable  and  mineral  kingdoms  every  Second  Round  "  —  says  the  Catechism  ot  Lanoos.

7  Only  the  Prince  of  the  World  is  not  Satan,  as  the  translator  would  make  us  believe,  but  the  collective  Host  of  the  Planetary.

This  is  a  little  theological  back-biting.

172  THE    SECRET  DOCTRINE

attraction  for  others,  their  expulsion  from  certain  planets,  certain  objects  and  laws,  their  persistence  in  preferring  darkness  and  their  resistance  to  light.1  There  I  learned  the  number  of  the  fallen  Princes/'  that  which  takes  place  in  human  souls  and  the  bodies  they  enter  into  communication  with

I  learnt  the  analogy  that  exists  between  earthquakes  and  the  rams,  between  the  motion  of  the  earth  {  and  the  motion  of  the  seas  ;  I  saw  the  spirits  of  the  Giants  plunged  in  subterranean  darkness  and  seemingly  supporting  the  earth  like  a  man  carry-  ing a  burden  on  his  shoulders  '

When  thirty  I  travelled  to  Chaldea  to  study  there  the  true  power  of  the  airr  placed  by  some  in  the  fire  and  by  the  more  learned  in  light  [Akasha].  I  was  taught  to  see  that  the  planets  were  in  their  variety  as  dissimilar  as  the  plants  on  earth,  and  the  stars  were  like  armies  ranged  in  battle  order.

I  knew  the  Chaldean  division  of  Ether  into  365  parts,  and  I  perceived  that  every  one  of  the  demons  who  divide  it  among  themselves  (>  was  endowed  with  that  material  force  that  permitted  him  to  execute  the  orders  of  the  Prince  and  guide  all  the  movements  therein  [in  the  Ether]  '  They  [the  Chaldees]  explained  to  me  how  those  Princes  had  become  participants  in  the  Council  of  Darkness,  ever  in  opposition  to  the  Council  of  Light

I  got  acquainted  with  the  Mediatores  [surely  not  mediums  as  De  Mirville  ex-  plains !],  *  and  upon  seeing  the  covenants  they  were  mutually  bound  by,  I  was  struck  with  wonder  upon  learning  the  nature  of  their  oaths  and  observances.

Believe  me,  I  saw  the  Devil ,  believe  me  I  have  embraced  him  "'  [like  the  witches  at  the  Sabbath  (?)]  when  I  was  yet  quite  young,  and  he  saluted  me  by  the  title  of  the  new  Jambres,  declaring  me  worthy  of  my  ministry  (initiation)  He  promised  me  con-  tinual help  during  life  and  a  principality  after  death  n  Having  become  in  great  honour  [an  Adept]  under  his  tuition,  he  placed  under  my  orders  a  phalanx  of  demons,  and

1  Here  the  Elemental  and  Elementary  Spirits  are  evidently  meant.

*  The  reader  has  already  learned  the  truth  about  them  in  the  course  of  the  present  work

I  Pity  the  penitent  Saint   had   not  imparted  his  knowledge  of  the  rotation  of  the  earth  and  helio-  centric  system   earlier  to   his  Church      That  might  have  saved   more  than  one  human  life — that  of  Bruno  for  one

4  Chelas  in  their  trials  of  initiation,  also  see  in  trances  artificially  generated  for  them,  the  vision  of  the  Earth  supported  by  an  elephant  on  the  top  of  a  tortoise  standing  on  nothing— and  this,  to  teach  them  to  discern  the  true  from  the  false

r>  Relating  to  the  days  of  the  year,  also  to  7x7  divisions  of  the  earth's  sublunary  sphere,  divided  into  seven  upper  and  seven  lower  spheres  with  their  respective  Planetary  Hosts  or  "  armies

''  Daimon  is  not  "  demon,"  as  translated  by  De  Mirville,  but  Spirit

'  All  this  is  to  corroborate  his  dogmatic  assertions  that  Pater  £ther  or  Jupiter  is  Satan  I  and  that  pestilential  diseases,  cataclysms,  and  even  thunderstorms  that  prove  disastrous,  come  from  the  Satanic  Host  dwelling  in  Ether — a  good  warning  to  the  men  of  Science  '

s  The  translator  replaces  the  word  Mediators  by  mediums,  excusing  himself  in  a  foot-note  by  saying  that  Cyprian  must  have  meant  modern  mediums  '

"  Cypnanus  simply  meant  to  hint  at  the  rites  and  mysteries  of  Initiation,  and  the  pledge  of  secrecy  and  oaths  that  bound  the  Initiates  together  His  translator,  however,  has  made  a  Witches'  Sabbath  of  it  instead

10  "  Twelve  centuries  later,  in  full  renaissance  and  reform,  the  world  saw  Luther  do  the  same  [em-  brace the  Devil  he  means?] — according  to  his  own  confession  and  in  the  same  conditions,"  explains  De  Mirville  in  a  foot-note,  [Oes  Espnts.

Tome  vt,  p  176],  showing  thereby  the  brotherly  love  that  binds  Christians.

Now  Cypnanus  meant  by  the  Devil  (if  the  word  is  really  in  the  original  text)  his  Initiator  and  Hierophant  No  Saint — even  a  penitent  Sorcerer — would  be  so  silly  as  to  speak  of  his  (the  Devil's)  rising  from  his  seat  to  see  him  to  the  door,  were  it  otherwise.

II  Every  Adept  has  "a  principality  after  his  death."

ST.  CYPRIAN  OF  ANTIOCH

when  I  bid  him  good-bye,  "  Courage,  good  success,  excellent  Cyprian,"  he  exclaimed,  rising  up  from  his  seat  to  see  me  to  the  door,  plunging  thereby  those  present  into  a  profound  admiration  l

Having  bidden  farewell  to  his  Chaldean  Initiator,  the  future  Sorcerer  and  Saint  went  to  Antioch.

His  tale  of  "  iniquity  "  and  subsequent  repentance  is  long  but  we  will  make  it  short.

He  became  "an  accomplished  Magician,"  surrounded  by  a  host  of  disciples  and  "candidates  to  the  perilous  and  sacri-  legious art."  He  shows  himself  distributing  love-philtres  and  dealing  in  deathly  charms  "to  rid  young  wives  of  old  husbands,  and  to  ruin  Christian  virgins."  Unfortunately  Cyprianus  was  not  above  love  himself.

He  fell  in  love  with  the  beautiful  Justine,  a  converted  maiden,  after  having  vainly  tried  to  make  her  share  the  passion  one  named  Aglaides,  a  profligate,  had  for  her.

His  41  demons  failed  "  he  tells  us,  and  he  got  disgusted  with  them.

This  disgust  brings  on  a  quarrel  between  him  and  his  Hierophant,  whom  he  insists  on  identifying  with  the  Demon  ;  and  the  dispute  is  followed  by  a  tournament  between  the  latter  and  some  Christian  converts,  in  which  the  "  Evil  One  "  is,  of  course,  worsted,  The  Sorcerer  is  finally  baptised  and  gets  rid  of  his  enemy.

Having  laid  at  the  feet  of  Anthimes,  Bishop  of  Antioch,  all  his  books  on  Magic,  he  became  a  Saint  in  company  with  the  beautiful  Justine,  who  had  converted  him  ,  both  suffered  martyrdom  under  the  Emperor  Diocletian ;  and  both  are  buried  side  by  side  in  Rome,  in  the  Basilica  of  St.  John  Lateran,  near  the  Baptistery.

1  Which   shows  that  it  was  the  Hierophant  and  his  disciples.

Cyprianus  shows  himself  as  grateful  .as  most  of  the  other  converts  (the  modern  included)  to  his  Teachers  and  Instructors

SECTION

THE  EASTERN  GUPTA  VIDYA  AND  THE  KABALAH

WE  now  return  to  the  consideration  of  the  essential  identity  between  the  Eastern  Gupta  Vidya  and  the  Kabalah  as  a  system,  while  we  must  also  show  the  dissimilarity  in  their  philosophical  interpretations  since  the  Middle  Ages.

It  must  be  confessed  that  the  views  of  the  Kaballsts — meaning  by  the  word  those  students  of  Occultism  who  study  the  Jewish  Kabalah  and  who  know  little,  if  anything,  of  any  other  Esoteric  literature  or  of  its  teachings — are  as  varied  in  their  synthetic  conclusions  upon  the  nature  of  the  mysteries  taught  even  in  the  Zohar  alone,  and  are  as  wide  of  the  true  mark,  as  are  the  dicta  upon  it  of  exact  Science  itself.

Like  the  mediaeval  Rosicrucian  and  the  Alchemist —  like  the  Abbot  Trithemius,  John  Reuchlin,  Agrippa,  Paracelsus,  Robert  Fludd,  Philalethes,  etc  — by  whom  they  swear,  the  continental  Occultists  see  in  the  Jewish  Kabalah  alone  the  universal  well  of  wisdom ;  they  find  in  it  the  secret  lore  of  nearly  all  the  mysteries  of  Nature — metaphysical  and  divine — some  of  them  including  herein,  as  did  Reuchlin,  those  of  the  Christian  Bible  For  them  the  Zohar  is  an  Esoteric  Thesaurus  of  all  the  mysteries  of  the  Christian  Gospel  ;  and  the  Sepher  Yetzireh  is  the  light  that  shines  in  every  darkness,  and  the  container  of  the  keys  to  open  every  secret  in  Nature  Whether  many  of  our  modern  followers  of  the  medieval  Kabalists  have  an  idea  of  the  real  meaning  of  the  symbology  of  their  chosen  Masters  is  another  question.

Most  of  them  have  probably  never  given  even  a  passing  thought  to  the  fact  that  the  Esoteric  language  used  by  the  Alchemists  was  their  own,  and  that  it  was  given  out  as  a  blind,  necessitated  by  the  dangers  of  the  epoch  they  lived  in,  and  not  as  the  Mystery-language,  used  by  the  Pagan  Initiates,  which  the  Alchemists  had  re-translated  and  re-veiled  once  more.

And  now  the  situation  stands  thus :  as  the  old  Alchemists  have  not  left  a  key  to  their  writings,  the  latter  have  become  a  mystery  within  an  older  mystery.

The  Kabalah  is  interpreted  and  checked  only  by  the  light  which  medieval  Mystics  have  thrown  upon  it,  and  they,  in  their  forced  Christology, had  to  put  a  theological  dogmatic  mask  on  every  ancient  teaching,  the  result  being  that  each  Mystic  among  our  modern  European  and  American  Kabalists  interprets  the  old  symbols  in  his  own  way,  and  each  refers  his  opponents  to  the  Rosicrucian  and  the  Alchemist  of  three  and  four  hundred  years  ago.


Mystic  Christian  dogma  is  the  central  maelstrom  that  engulfs  every  old  Pagan  symbol,  and  Christianity — Anti-Gnostic  Christianity,  the  modern  retort  that  has  replaced  the  alembic  of  the  Alchemists — has  distilled  out  of  all  recognition  the  Kabalah,  i.e.,  the  Hebrew  Zohar  and  other  rabbinical  mystic  works.

And  now  it  has  come  to  this :  The  student  interested  in  the  Secret  Sciences  has  to  believe  that  the  whole  cycle  of  the  symbolical  "Ancient  of  Days,"  every  hair  of  the  mighty  beard  of  Macroprosopos,  refers  only  to  the  history  of  the  earthly  career  of  Jesus  of  Nazareth  '  And  we  are  told  that  the  Kabalah  "was  first  taught  to  a  select  company  of  angels  "  by  Jehovah  himself — who,  out  of  modesty,  one  must  think,  made  himself  only  the  third  Sephiroth  in  it,  and  a  female  one  into  the  bargain.

So  many  Kabalists,  so  many  explanations.

Some  believe — perchance  with  more  reason  than  the  rest — that  the  substance  of  the  Kabalah  is  the  basis  upon  which  Masonry  is  built,  since  modern  Masonry  is  undeniably  the  dim  and  hazy  reflection  of  primeval  Occult  Masonry,  of  the  teaching  of  those  divine  Masons  who  established  the  Mysteries  of  the  pre-  historic and  prediluvian  Temples  of  Initiation,  raised  by  truly  superhuman  Builders.

Others  declare  that  the  tenets  expounded  in  the  Zohar  relate  merely  to  mysteries  terrestrial  and  profane,  having  no  more  concern  with  metaphysical  speculations — such  as  the  soul,  or  the  post-mortem  life  of  man — than  have  the  Mosaic  books  Others,  again — and  these  are  the  real,  genuine  Kabalists,  who  had  their  instructions  from  initiated  Jewish  Rabbis — affirm  that  if  the  two  most  learned  Kabalists  of  the  medieval  period,  John  Reuchlin  and  Paracelsus,  differed  in  their  religious  professions — the  former  being  the  Father  of  the  Reformation  and  the  latter  a  Roman  Catholic,  at  least  in  appearance- — the  Zohar  cannot  contain  much  of  Christian  dogma  or  tenet,  one  way  or  the  other.

In  other  words,  they  maintain  that  the  numerical  language  of  the  Kabalistic  works  teaches  universal  truths — and  not  any  one  Religion  in  particular.

Those  who  make  this  statement  are  perfectly  right  in  saying  that  the  Mystery-language  used  in  the  Zohar  and  in  other  Kabalistic  literature  was  once,  in  a  time  of  unfathomable  antiquity,  the  universal  language  of  Humanity.

But  they  become  entirely  wrong  if  to  this  fact  they  add  the  untenable  theory  that  this  language  was  invented  by,  or  was  the  original  property  of,  the  Hebrews,  from  whom  all  the  other  nations  borrowed  it.

They  are   wrong,   because,   although   the  Zohar  ("1H7  ZHR),  The  Book  of  Splendour  of  Rabbi   Simeon   Ben  Jochai,  did  indeed  originate  with  him — his

176  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

son,  Rabbi  Eleazar,  helped  by  his  secretary,  Rabbi  Abba,  compiling  the  Kabalistic  teachings  of  his  deceased  father  into  a  work  called  the  Zohar — those  teachings  were  not  Rabbi  Simeon's,  as  the  Gupta  Vidya  shows.

They  are  as  old  as  the  Jewish  nation  itself,  and  far  older.

In  short,  the  writings  which  pass  at  present  under  the  title  of  the  Zohar  of  Rabbi  Simeon  are  about  as  original  as  were  the  Egyptian  synchronistic  Tables  after  being  handled  by  Eusebius,  or  as  St.  Paul's  Epistles  after  their  revision  and  correction  by  the  -Holy  Church."

Let  us  throw  a  rapid  retrospective  glance  at  the  history  and  the  tribulations  of  that  very  same  Zohar,  as  we  know  of  them  from  trustworthy  tradition  and  documents.

We  need  not  stop  to  discuss  whether  it  was  written  in  the  first  century  B.C.  or  in  the  first  century  A.D  Suffice  it  for  us  to  know  that  there  was  at  all  times  a  Kabalistic  literature  among  the  Jews  ,  that  though  historically  it  can  be  traced  only  from  the  time  of  the  Captivity,  yet  from  the  Pentateuch  down  to  the  Talmud  the  documents  of  that  literature  were  ever  written  in  a  kind  of  Mystery-language,  were,  in  fact,  a  series  of  symbolical  records  which  the  Jews  had  copied  from  the  Egyptian  and  the  Chaldean  Sanctuaries,  only  adapting  them  to  their  own  national  history — if  history  it  can  be  called.

Now  we  claim — and  it  is  not  denied  even  by  the  most  prejudiced  Kabalist, — that  although  Kabalistic  lore  had  passed  orally  through  long  ages  down  to  the  latest  Pre-Christian  Tanaim,  and  although  David  and  Solomon  may  have  been  great  Adepts  in  it,  as  is  claimed,  yet  no  one  dared  to  write  it  down  till  the  days  of  Simeon  Ben  Jochai.

In  short,  the  lore  found  in  Kabalistic  literature  was  never  recorded  in  writing  before  the  first  century  A.  D.

This  brings  the  critic  to  the  following  reflection  :  While  in  India  we  find  the  Vedas  and  the  Brahmanical  literature  written  down  and  edited  ages  before  the  Christian  era — the  Orientalists  themselves  being  obliged  to  concede  a  couple  of  millenniums  of  antiquity  to  the  older  manuscripts  ;  while  the  most  important  allegories  in  Genesis  are  found  recorded  on  Babylonian  tiles  centuries  B.C. ;  while  the  Egyptian  sarcophagi  yearly  yield  proofs  of  the  origin  of  the  doctrines  borrowed  and  copied  by  the  Jews  ;  yet  the  Monotheism  of  the  Jews  is  exalted  and  thrown  into  the  teeth  of  all  the  Pagan  nations,  while  the  so-called  Christian  Revelation  is  placed  above  all  others,  like  the  sun

1  This  is  proved  if  we  take  but  a  single  recorded  instance  J.  Picus  de  Mirandola,  finding  that  there  was  more  Christianity  than  Judaism  in  the  Kabalah,  and  discovering  m  it  the  doctrines  of  the  Trinity,  the  Incarnation,  the  Divinity  of  Jesus,  etc  .  wound  up  his  proofs  of  this  with  a  challenge  to  the  world  at  large  from  Rome  As  Gmsburg  shows:  "  m  1486,  when  only  twenty-four  years  old,  he  [Picus]  published  nine  hundred  [Kabalistic]  theses,  which  were  placarded  in  Rome,  and  undertook,  to  defend  them  in  the  presence  of  all  European  scholars  whom  he  invited  to  the  Eternal  City,  promising  to  defray  their  travelling  expenses." above  a  row  of  street  gas-lamps.


Yet  it  is  perfectly  well  known,  having  been  ascertained  beyond  doubt  or  cavil,  that  no  manuscript,  whether  Kabalistic,  Talmudistic,  or  Christian,  which  has  reached  our  present  generation,  is  of  earlier  date  than  the  first  centuries  of  our  era,  whereas  this  can  certainly  never  be  said  of  the  Egyptian  papyri  or  the  Chaldean  tiles,  or  even  of  some  Eastern  writings.

But  let  us  limit  our  present  research  to  the  Kabalah,  and  chiefly  to  the  Zohar — called  also  the  Midrash.

This  book,  whose  teachings  were  edited  for  the  first  time  between  70  and  110  AD.,  is  known  to  have  been  lost,  and  its  contents  to  have  been  scattered  throughout  a  number  of  minor  manuscripts,  until  the  thirteenth  century.

The  idea  that  it  was  the  composition  of  Moses  de  Leon,  of  Valladolid  in  Spain,  who  passed  it  off  as  a  pseudograph  of  Simeon  Ben  Jochai,  is  ridiculous,  and  was  well  disposed  of  by  Munk — though  he  does  point  to  more  than  one  modern  interpolation  in  the  Zohar.

At  trje  same  time  it  is  more  than  certain  that  the  present  Book  of  Zohar  was  written  by  Moses  de  Leon,  and,  owing  to  joint  editorship,  is  more  Christian  in  its  colouring  than  is  many  a  genuine  Christian  volume.

Munk  gives  the  reason  why,  saying  that  it  appears  evident  that  the  author  made  use  of  ancient  docu-  ments, among  these  being  certain  Midraschim,  or  collections  of  traditions  and  Biblical  expositions,  which  we  do  not  now  possess.

As  a  proof,  also,  that  the  knowledge  of  the  Esoteric  system  taught  in  the  Zohar  came  to  the  Jews  very  late  indeed — at  any  rate,  that  they  had  so  far  forgotten  it  that  the  innovations  and  additions  made  by  de  Leon  provoked  no  criticism,  but  were  thankfully  received — Munk  quotes  from  Tholuck,  a  Jewish  authority,  the  following  information  :  Haya  Gaon,  who  died  in  1038,  is  to  our  knowledge  the  first  author  who  developed  (and  perfected)  the  theory  of  the  Sephiroth,  and  he  gave  them  names  which  we  find  again  among  the  Kabalistic  names  used  by  Dr.  Jellinek.

Moses  Ben  Schem-Tob  de  Leon,  who  held  intimate  intercourse  with  the  Syrian  and  Chaldean  Christian  learned  scribes,  was  enabled  through  the  latter  to  acquire  a  knowledge  of  some  of  the  'Gnostic  writings.

Again,  the  Sepher  Yetzireh  (Book  of  Creation) — though  attributed  to  Abraham  and  though  very  archaic  as  to  its  contents — is  first  mentioned  in  the  eleventh  century  by  Jehuda  Ho  Levi  (Chazari).  And  these  two,  the  Zohar  and  Yetz/reh,  are  the  storehouse  of  all  the  subsequent  Kabalistic  works.

Now  let  us  see  how  far  the  Hebrew  sacred  canon  itself  is  to  be  trusted.

The  word  "  Kabalah  "  comes  from  the  root  "  to  receive,"  and  has  a  meaning  identical  with  the  Sanskrit  "  Smriti  ("  received  by  tradition  ") a

1  This  account  is  summarised  from  Isaac  Myer's  Qabbalah,  pp.  10,  et  seq.

FF

178  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

system  of  oral  teaching,  passing  from  one  generation  of  priests  to  another,  as  was  the  case  with  the  Brahmanical  books  before  they  were  embodied  in  manuscript.

The  Kabalistic  tenets  came  to  the  Jews  from  the  Chaldeans  ;  and  if  Moses  knew  the  primitive  and  universal  language  of  the  Initiates,  as  did  every  Egyptian  priest,  and  was  thus  acquainted  with  the  numerical  system  on  which  it  was  based,  he  may  have — and  we  say  he  has — written  Genesis  and  other  "scrolls."  The  five  books  that  now  pass  current  under  his  name,  the  Pentateuch,  are  not  withal  the  original  Mosaic  Records.1  Nor  were  they  written  -in  the  old  Hebrew  square  letters,  nor  even  in  the  Samaritan  charac-  ters, for  [both  alphabets  belong  to  a  date  later  than  that  of  Moses,  and  Hebrew— -as  it  is  now  known — did  not  exist  in  the  days  of  the  great  lawgiver,  either  as  a'ianguage  or  as  an  alphabet.

As  no  statements  contained  in  the  records  of  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE  of  the  East  are  regarded  as  of  any  value  by  the  world  in  general,  and  since  to  be  understood  by  and  convince  the  reader  one  has  to  quote  names  familiar  to-  him,  and  use  arguments  and  proofs  out  of  documents  which  are  accessible  to  all,  the  following  facts  may  perhaps  demonstrate  that  our  assertions  are  not  merely  based  on  the  teachings  of  Occult  Records .

1.  The     great    Orientalist    and     Scholar,    Klaproth,    denied     positively  the  antiquity  of  the  so-called  Hebrew  alphabet,  on  the  ground  that  the  square  Hebrew  characters  in  which  the  Biblical  manuscripts  are  written,  and  which  we  use  in  printing,   were   probably  derived  from  the  Palmyrene  writing,  or  some  other    Semitic   alphabet,    so  that   the    Hebrew   Bible    is  written  merely  in  the  Chaldaic  phonographs  of  Hebrew  words.

The  late  Dr.  Kenealy  pertinently  remarked  that  the  Jews  and  Christians  rely  on

a    phonograph    of    a    dead    and    almost   unknown  language,  as  abstruse  as  the  cuneiform  letters  on  the  mountains  of  Assyria."

2.  The  attempts  made  to  carry  back  the  square  Hebrew  character  to  the  time  of  Esdras  (B  C  458)  have  all  failed.

3.  It  is  asserted  that  the  Jews  took  their  alphabet  from  the  Babylonians  during   their   captivity.

But  there   are   scholars  who  do  not  carry  the  now-  known     Hebrew    square    letters    beyond    the    late     period    of   the    fourth  century,  AD

The   Hebrew   Bible   is  precisely  as  if  Homer  were  printed,  not  in  Greek,  but  in-  English  letters  ;  or  as  if  Shakespeare's  works  were  phonographed  in  Burmese  *

1  There  is  not  m  the  decalogue  one  idea  that  is  not  the  counterpart,  or  the  paraphrase,  of  the  dogmas  and  ethics  current  among  the  Egyptians  long  before  the  time  of  Moses  and  Aaron.

(The  Mosaic  Law  a  transcript  from  Egyptian  Sources  ,  vide  Geometry  m  Religion,  1890.)

2  Book  of  God      Ken*aly,  p    383      The  reference  to  Klaproth  is  also  from  this  page

3  See  As/at   jour  ,  N  S   vn,  p   275,  quoted  by  Kenealy  4  Book  of  God,  loc  cit.


4.  Those  who  maintain  that  the  ancient  Hebrew  is  the  same  as  the  Syraic  or  Chaldaic  have  to  see  what  is  said  in  Jeremiah,  wherein  the  Lord  is  made  to  threaten  the   house  of   Israel  with   bringing  against  it  the  mighty  and  ancient  nation  of  the  Chaldeans  :

a     nation    whose     language    thou    knowest   not,   neither  understandest  what  they  say.

This  is   quoted  by  Bishop  Walton  a  against  the  assumption  of  the  identity  of  Chaldaic  and  Hebrew,  and/ought  to  settle  the  question.

5.  The   real  Hebrew  of  Moses  was  lost  after  the  seventy  years'  captivity,  when  the   Israelites   brought  back  Chaldaic  with  them  and  grafted  it  on  their  own    language,   the   fusion   resulting    in  a  dialectical  variety  of  Chaldaic,  the  Hebrew  tincturing   it  very  slightly  and  ceasing  from  that  time  to  be  a  spoken  language.

As  to  our  statement  that  the  present  Old  Testament  does  not  contain  the  original  Books  of  Moses,  this  is  proven  by  the  facts  that  :

1.  The  Samaritans  repudiated  the  Jewish  canonical  books  and  their  "  Law  of   Moses."      They  will   have  neither  the   Psalms  of  David,  nor  the  Prophets,  nor   the    Talmud   and    M/sfina  :   nothing    but   the  real  Books  of  Moses,  and  in  quite   a   different  edition.4     The  Books  of  Moses  and  of  Joshua  are  disfigured  out  of  recognition  by  the  Talmudists,  they  say.

2.  The  "  black  Jews"  of  Cochin,  Southern  India, — who  know  nothing  of  the   Babylonian  Captivity  or  of  the  ten  "  lost  tribes  "  (the  latter  a  pure  inven-  tion  of  the   Rabbis),  proving  that  these  Jews  must  have  come  to  India  before  the  year  600  B  C  — have  their  Books  of  Moses  which  they  will  show  to  no  one.

And   these    Books   and   Laws  differ  greatly  from  the  present  scrolls.

Nor  are  they    written    in    the    square    Hebrew   characters    (semi-Chaldaic    and    semi-  Palmyrean)    but  in  the  archaic  letters,  as  we  were  assured  by  one  of  them —  letters  entirely  unknown  to  all  but  themselves  and  a  few  Samaritans.

3.  The  Karaim  Jews  of  the  Crimea — who  call  themselves  the  descendants  of   the   true   children   of   Israel,  i.e.,  of  the  Sadducees — reject  the  Torah  and  the  Pentateuch   of  the   Synagogue,    reject  the  Sabbath  of  the  Jews  (keeping

1  Op.  cit  ,  v,  15  *  Prolegomena,  in,  13,  quoted  by  Kenealy,  p.

J  See  Book  of  God,  p  385  "  Care  must  be  taken."  says  Butler  (quoted  by  Kenealy,  p.  489),  "to  distinguish  between  the  Pentateuch  in  the  Hebrew  language  but  in  the  letters  of  the  Samaritan  alpha-  bet, and  the  version  of  the  Pentateuch  in  the  Samaritan  language  One  of  the  most  important  differences  between  the  Samaritan  and  the  Hebrew  text  respects  the  duration  of  the  period  between  the  deluge  and  the  birth  of  Abraham  The  Samaritan  text  makes  it  longer  by  some  centuries  than  the  Hebrew  text,  and  the  Septuagmt  makes  it  longer  by  some  centuries  than  the  Samaritan."  It  is  observable  that  in  the  authentic  translation  of  the  Latin  Vulgate,  the  Roman  Church  follows  the  com-  putation expressed  in  the  Hebrew  text ,  and  in  her  Martyrology  follows  that  of  the  Seventy,  both  texts  being  inspired,  as  she  claims

4  See  Rev.

Joseph  Wolff's  Journal,  p

180  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Friday),  will  have  neither  the  Books  of  the  Prophets  nor  the  Psalms — nothing  but  their  own  Books  of  Moses  and  what  they  call  his  one  and  real  Law.

This  makes  it  plain  that  the  Kabalah  of  the  Jews  is  but  the  distorted  echo  of  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE  of  the  Chaldeans,  and  that  the  real  Kabalah  is  found  only  in  the  Chaldean  Book  of  Numbers  now  in  the  possession  of  some  Persian  Sufis.

Every  nation  in  antiquity  had  its  traditions  based  on  those  of  the  Aryan  SECRET  DOCTRINE  ;  and  each  nation  points  to  this  day  to  a  Sage  of  its  own  race  who  had  received  the  primordial  reve[ation  from,  and  had  recorded  it  under  the  orders  of,  a  more  or  less  divine  Being.

Thus  it  was  with  the  Jews,  as  with  all  others.

They  had  received  their  Occult  Cosmogony  and  Laws  from  their  Initiate,  Moses,  and  they  have  now  entirely  mutilated  them.

Adi  is  the  generic  name  in  our  Doctrine  of  all  the  first  men,  i.e.,  the  first  speaking  races,  in  each  of  the  seven  zones — hence  probably  "  Ad-am."  And  such  first  men,  in  every  nation,  are  credited  with  having  been  taught  the  divine  mysteries  of  creation.

Thus,  the  Sabeans  (according  to  a  tradition  preserved  in  the  Sufi  works)  say  that  when  the  "  Third  First  Man  "  left  the  country  adjacent  to  India  for  Babel,  a  tree  l  was  given  to  him,  then  another  and  third  tree,  whose  leaves  recorded  the  history  of  all  the  races  ;  the  "  Third  First  Man  "  meant  one  who  belonged  to  the  Third  Root  Race,  and  yet  the  Sabeans  call  him  Adam.

The  Arabs  of  Upper  Egypt,  and  the  Mohammedans  generally,  have  recorded  a  tradition  that  the  Angel  Azaz-  el  brings  a  message  from  the  Wisdom-Word  of  God  to  Adam  whenever  he  is  reborn  ;  this  the  SOfis  explain  by  adding  that  this  book  is  given  to  every  Seli-Allah  ("  the  chosen  one  of  God  ")  for  his  wise  men.

The  story  narrated  by  the  Kabalists — namely,  that  the  book  given  to  Adam  before  his  Fall  (a  book  full  of  mysteries  and  signs  and  events  which  either  had  been,  were,  or  were  to  be)  was  taken  away  by  the  Angel  Raziel  after  Adam's  Fall,  but  again  restored  to  him  lest  men  might  lose  its  wisdom  and  instruction  ;  that  this  book  was  delivered  by  Adam  to  Seth,  who  passed  it  to  Enoch,  and  the  latter  to  Abraham,  and  so  on  in  succession  to  the  most  wise  of  every  gene-  ration— relates  to  all  nations,  and  not  to  the  Jews  alone.

For  Berosus  narrates  in  his  turn  that  Xisuthrus  compiled  a  book,  writing  it  at  the  com-  mand of  his  deity,  which  book  was  buried  in  Zipara  2  or  Sippara,  the  City  of  the  Sun,  in  Ba-bel-on-ya,  and  was  dug  up  long  afterwards  and  deposited  in  the  temple  of  Belos  ;  it  is  from  this  book  that  Berosus  took  his  history  of  the

1  A  tree  is  symbolically  a  book — as  "  pillar  "  is  another  synonym  of  the  same  a  The  wife   of  Moses,   one  of  the  seven  daughters  of  a  Midian  priest,  is  called  Zipporah      It  was  Jethro,  the  priest  of  Midian,   who  initiated  Moses,  Zipporah,  one  of  the  seven  daughters,  being  simply  one  of  the  seven  Occult  powers  that  the  Hierophant  was  and  is  supposed  to  pass  to  the  initiated antediluvian  dynasties  of  Gods  and  Heroes,  /tlian  (in  N/mrod)  speaks  of  a  Hawk  (emblem  of  the  Sun),  who  in  the  days  of  the  beginnings  brought  to  the  Egyptians  a  book  containing  the  wisdom  of  their  religion.


The  Sam-Sam  of  the  Sabeans  is  also  a  Kabalah,  as  is  the  Arabic  Zem-Zem  (Well  of  Wisdom).

We  are  told  by  a  very  learned  Kabalist  that  Seyffarth  asserts  that  the  old  Egyptian  tongue  was  only  old  Hebrew,  or  a  Semitic  dialect  ,  and  he  proves  this,  our  correspondent  thinks,  by  sending  him  "  some  500  words  ir>  common  "  in  the  two  languages.

This  proves  very  little  to  our  mind.

It  only  shows  that  the  two  nations  lived  together  for  centuries,  and  that  before  adopting  the  Chaldean  for  their  phonetic  tongue  the  Jews  had  adopted  the  old  Coptic  or  Egyptian.

The  Israelitish  Scriptures  drew  their  hidden  wisdom  from  the  primeval  Wisdom-Religion  that  was  the  source  of  other  Scriptures,  only  it  was  sadly  degraded  by  being  applied  to  things  and  mysteries  of  this  Earth,  instead  of  to  those  in  the  higher  and  ever-present,  though  invisible,  spheres.

Their  national  history,  if  they  can  claim  any  autonomy  before  their  return  from  the  Babylonian  captivity,  cannot  be  carried  back  one  day  earlier  than  the  time  of  Moses.

The  language  of  Abraham — if  Zeruan  (Saturn,  the  emblem  of  time — the  "  Sar,"  "  Saros,"  a  "  cycle  ")  can  be  said  to  have  any  language — was  not  Hebrew,  but  Chaldaic,  perhaps  Arabic,  and  still  more  likely  some  old  Indian  dialect.

This  is  shown  by  numerous  proofs,  some  of  which  we  give  here  ;  and  unless,  indeed,  to  please  the  tenacious  and  stub-  born believers  in  Bible  chronology,  we  cripple  the  years  of  our  globe  to  the  Procrustean  bed  of  7,000  years,  it  becomes  self-evident  that  the  Hebrew  cannot  be  called  an  old  language,  merely  because  Adam  is  supposed  to  have  used  it  in  the  Garden  of  Eden.

Bunsen  says  in  Egypt's  Place  in  Universal  History  that  in  the

Chaldean  tribe  immediately  connected  with  Abraham,  we  find  reminiscences  of  dates  disfigured  and  misunderstood  as  genealogies  of  single  men,  or  figures  of  epochs.

The  Abrahamic  recollections  go  back  at  least  three  millennia  beyond  the  grandfather  of  Jacob.

The  Bible  of  the  Jews  has  ever  been  an  Esoteric  Book  in  its  hidden  meaning,  but  this  meaning  has  not  remained  one  and  the  same  throughout  since  the  days  of  Moses.

It  is  useless,  considering  the  limited  space  we  can  give  to  this  subject,  to  attempt  anything  like  the  detailed  history  of  the  vicissitudes  of  the  so-called  Pentateuch,  and  besides,  the  history  is  too  well  known  to  need  lengthy  disquisitions.

Whatever  was,  or  was  not,  the  Mosaic  Book  of  Creation — from  Genesis  down  to  the  Prophets — the  Pentateuch  of  to-day  is  not  the  same.

It  is  sufficient  to  read  the  criticisms  of  Erasmus,  and

1  See  for  these  details  the  Book  of  God,  pp   244,  250  2  Op.  at.,  v,  p    85.

182  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

even  of  Sir  Isaac  Newton,  to  see  clearly  that  the  Hebrew  Scriptures  had  been  tampered  with  and  remodelled,  had  been  lost  and  rewritten,  a  dozen  times  before  the  days  of  Ezra.

This  Ezra  himself  may  yet  one  day  turn  out  to  have  been  Azara,  the  Chaldean  priest  of  the  Fire  and  Sun-God,  a  renegade  who,  through  his  desire  of  becoming  a  ruler,  and  in  order  to  create  an  Ethnarchy,  restored  the  old  lost  Jewish  Books  in  his  own  way.

It  was  an  easy  thing  for  one  versed  in  the  secret  system  of  Esoteric  numerals,  or  Symbology,  to  put  together  events  from  the  stray  books  that  had  been  pre-  served by  various  tribes,  and  make  of  them  an  apparently  harmonious  narra-  tive of  creation  and  of  the  evolution  of  the  Judean  race.

But  in  its  hidden  meaning,  from  Genesis  to  the  last  word  of  Deuteronomy,  the  Pentateuch  is  the  symbolical  narrative  of  the  sexes,  and  is  an  apotheosis  of  Phallicism,  under  astronomical  and  physiological  personations.1  Its  co-ordination,  however,  is  only  apparent ;  and  the  human  hand  appears  at  every  moment,  is  found  everywhere  in  the  "  Book  of  God."  Hence  the  Kings  of  Edom  discuss  in  Genesis  before  any  king  had  reigned  in  Israel ;  Moses  records  his  own  death,  and  Aaron  dies  twice  and  is  buried  in  two  different  places,  to  say  nothing  of  other  trifles.

For  the  Kabalist  they  are  trifles,  for  he  knows  that  all  these  events  are  not  history,  but  are  simply  the  cloak  designed  to  envelope  and  hide  various  physiological  peculiarities  ;  but  for  the  sincere  Christian,  who  accepts  all  these  "dark  sayings"  in  good  faith,  it  matters  a  good  deal.

Solomon  may  very  well  be  regarded  as  a  myth  2  by  the  Masons,  as  they  lose  nothing  by  it,  for  all  their  secrets  are  Kabalistic  and  allegorical — for  those  few,  at  any  rate,  who  understand  them.

For  the  Christian,  however,  to  give  up  Solomon,  the  son  of  David — from  whom  Jesus  is  made  to  descend — involves  a  real  loss.

But  how  even  the  Kabalists  can  claim  great  antiquity  for  the  Hebrew  texts  of  the  old  Biblical  scrolls  now  possessed  by  the  scholars  is  not  made  at  all  apparent.

For  it  is  certainly  a  fact  of  history,  based  on  the  con-  fessions of  the  Jews  themselves,  and  of  Christians  likewise,  that :

Since   the    Scriptures    having    perished    in    the    captivity    of    Nabuchodonosor,  Esdras,   the   Levite,    the   priest,    in   the  time  of  Artaxerxes,  king  of  the  Persians,  having

1  As  is  fully  shown  in  Trie  Source  of  Measures  and  other  works

-  Surely  even  Masons  would  never  claim  the  actual  existence  of  Solomon  ?  As  Kenealy  shows,  he  is  not  noticed  by  Herodotus,  nor  by  Plato,  nor  by  any  writer  of  standing  It  is  most  extraordinary,  he  says,  "  that  the  Jewish  nation,  over  whom  but  a  few  years  before  the  mighty  Solomon  had  reigned  in  all  his  glory,  with  a  magnificence  scarcely  equalled  by  the  greatest  monarchs,  spending  nearly  eight  thousand  millions  of  gold  on  a  temple,  was  overlooked  by  the  historian  Herodotus,  writing  of  Egypt  on  the  one  hand,  and  of  Babylon  on  the  other — visiting  both  places,  and  of  course  passing  almost  necessarily -within  a  few  miles  of  the  splendid  capital  of  the  national  Jerusalem  ?  How  can  this  be  accounted  for  ?  "  he  asks  (Book  of  God,  p.  457).  Nay,  not  only  are  there  no  proofs  of  the  twelve  tribes  of  Israel  having  ever  existed,  but  Herodotus,  the  most  accurate  of  historians,  who  was  in  Assyria  when  Ezra  flourished,  never  mentions  the  Israelites  at  all  .  and  Herodotus  was  born  in  484  B.C.  How  is  this?


become   inspired,    in   the  exercise  of  prophecy  restored  again  the  whole  of  the  ancient  Scriptures  l

One  must  have  a  strong  belief  in  "  Esdras,"  and  especially  in  his  good  faith,  to  accept  the  now-existing  copies  as  genuine  Mosaic  Books  ;  for :

Assuming  that  the  copies,  or  rather  phonographs  which  had  been  made  by  Hilkiah  and  Esdras,  and  the  various  anonymous  editors,  were  really  true  and  genuine,  they  must  have  been  wholly  exterminated  by  Antiochus ,  and  the  versions  of  the  Old  Testament  which  now  subsist  must  have  been  made  by  Judas,  or  by  some  unknown  compilers,  probably  from  the  Greek  of  the  Seventy  long,  after  the  appearance  and  death  of  Jesus/

The  Bible,  therefore,  as  it  is  now  (the  Hebrew  texts,  that  is),  depends  for  its  accuracy  on  the  genuineness  of  the  Septuagint ;  this,  we  are  again  told,  was  written  miraculously  by  the  Seventy,  in  Greek,  and  the  original  copy  having  been  lost  since  that  time,  our  texts  are  re-translated  back  into  Hebrew  from  that  language.

But  in  this  vicious  circle  of  proofs  we  once  more  have  to  rely  upon  the  good  faith  of  two  Jews — Josephus  and  Philo  Judaaus  of  Alexandria — these  two  Historians  being  the  only  witnesses  that  the  Septuagint  was  written  under  the  circumstances  narrated.

And  yet  it  is  just  these  circum-  stances that  are  very  little  calculated  to  inspire  one  with  confidence  For  what  does  Josephus  tell  us  ?  He  says  that  Ptolemy  Philadelphus,  desiring  to  read  the  Hebrew  Law  in  Greek,  wrote  to  Eleazar,  the  high-priest  of  the  Jews,  begging  him  to  send  him  six  men  from  each  of  the  twelve  tribes,  who  should  make  a  translation  for  him.

Then  follows  a  truly  miraculous  story,  vouchsafed  by  Aristeas,  of  these  seventy-two  men  from  the  twelve  tribes  of  Israel,  who,  shut  up  in  an  island,  compiled  their  translation  in  exactly  seventy-two  days,  -etc.

All  this  is  very  edifying,  and  one  might  have  had  very  little  reason  to  doubt  the  story,  had  not  the  "ten  lost  tribes"  been  made  to  play 'their  part  in  it.  How  could  these  tribes,  lost  between  700  and  900  B  C  .  each  send  six  men  some  centuries  later,  to  satisfy  the  whim  of  Ptolemy,  and  to  disappear  once  more  immediately  afterwards  from  the  horizon  ?  A  miracle,  verily.

We  are  expected,  nevertheless,  to  regard  such  documents  as  the  Septuagint  as  containing  direct  divine  revelation  :  Documents  originally  written  in  a  tongue  about  which  nobody  now  knows  anything  ;  written  by  authors  that  are  practically  mythical,  and  at  dates  as  to  which  no  one  is  able  even  to  make  a  defensible  surmise  ;  documents  of  the  original  copies  of  which  there  does  not  now  remain  a  shred.

Yet  people  will  persist  in  talking  of  the  ancient  Hebrew,  as  if  there  were  any  man  left  in  the  world  who  now  knows

1  Clement,  Vol    I,  Stromata,  Ch   xxn,  p  448  -  Book  of  God,  p

184  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE.

one  word  of  it.  So  little,  indeed,  was  Hebrew  known  that  both  the  Septua-  g/nt  and  the  New  Testament  had  to  be  written  in  a  heathen  language  (the  Greek),  and  no  better  reasons  for  it  given  than  what  Hutchinson  says,  namely,  that  the  Holy  Ghost  chose  to  write  the  New  Testament  in  Greek.

The  Hebrew  language  is  considered  to  be  very  old,  and  yet  there  exists  no  trace  of  it  anywhere  on  the  old  monuments,  not  even  in  Chaldea.

Among  the  great  number  of  inscriptions  of  various  kinds  found  in  the  ruins  of  that  country  :

One  in  the  Hebrew  Chaldee  letter  and  language  has  never  been  found ,  nor  has  a  single  authentic  medal  or  gem  in  this  new-fangled  character  been  ever  discover-  ed, which  could  carry  it  even  to  the  days  of  Jesus.

The  original  Book  of  Dan/el  is  written  in  a  dialect  which  is  a  mixture  of  Hebrew  and  Aramaic  ;  it  is  not  even  in  Chaldaic,  with  the  exception  of  a  few  verses  interpolated  later  on.  According  to  Sir  W.  Jones  and  other  Oriental-  ists, the  oldest  discoverable  languages  of  Persia  are  the  Chaldaic  and  Sanskrit,  and  there  is  no  trace  of  the  "  Hebrew  "  in  these.

It  would  be  very  surprising  if  there  were,  since  the  Hebrew  known  to  the  Philologists  does  not  date  earlier  than  500  BC,  and  its  characters  belong  to  a  far  later  period  still.

Thus,  while  the  real  Hebrew  characters,  if  not  altogether  lost  are  nevertheless  so  hopelessly  transformed —

a  mere  inspection  of  the  alphabet  showing  that  it  has  been  shaped  and  made-  regular,  in  doing  which  the  characteristic  marks  of  some  of  the  letters  have  been  retrenched  in  order  to  make  them  more  square  and  uniform —

that  no  one  but  an  initiated  Rabbi  of  Samaria  or  a  "  Jain  "  could  read  them,  the  new  system  of  the  masoretic  points  has  made  them  a  sphinx-riddle  for  ail.

Punctuation  is  now  to  be  found  everywhere  in  all  the  later  manuscripts,  and  by  means  of  it  anything  can  be  made  of  a  text ;  a  Hebrew  scholar  can  put  on  the  texts  any  interpretation  he  likes.

Two  instances  given  by  Kenealy  will  suffice  .

In  Genesis,  xlix,  21,  we  read  ,

Naphtali  is  a  hind  let  loose  ;  he  giveth  goodly  words  by  only  a  slight  alteration  of  the  points  Bochart  changes  this  into  Napthali  is  a  spreading  tree,  shooting  forth  beautiful  branches !  '  So,  again,  in  Psalms,  xxix,  9,  instead  of :  The  voice  of  the  Lord  maketh  the  hinds  to  calve,  and  discovereth  the  forests  ;  Bishop  Lowth  gives  The  voice  of  the  Lord  striketh  the  oak,  and  discovereth  the  forests  The  same  word  in  Hebrew  signifies  God  and  Nothing

With  regard  to  the  claim  made  by  some  Kabalists  that  there  was  in-  antiquity  one  knowledge  and  one  language,  this  claim  is  also  our  own,  and  it

1  Book  of  God,  p.  453  •  Asiatic  Journal,  vn.  p   275,  quoted  by  Kenealy,  p

•<  Book  of  God,  p is  very  just.


Only  it  must  be  added,  to  make  the  thing  clear,  that  this  knowledge  and  language  have  both  been  esoteric  ever  since  the  submersion  of  the  Atlanteans.

The  Tower  of  Babel  myth  relates  to  that  enforced  secrecy.

Men  falling  into  sin  were  regarded  as  no  longer  trustworthy  for  the  reception  of  such  knowledge,  and,  from  being  universal,  it  became  limited  to  the  few,  Thus,  the  "one-lip" — or  the  Mystery-language — being  gradually  denied  to  subsequent  generations,  all  the  nations  become  severally  restricted  to  their  own  national  tongue  ;  and  forgetting  the  primeval  Wisdom-language,  they  stated  that  the  Lord — one  of  the  chief  Lords  or  Hierophants  of  the  Mysteries  of  the  Java  Aleim — had  confounded  the  languages  of  all  the  earth,  so  that  the  sinners  could  understand  one  another's  speech  no  longer.

But  Initiates  remained  in  every  land  and  nation,  and  the  Israelites,  like  all  others,  had  their  learned  Adepts.

One  of  the  keys  to  this  Universal  Knowledge  is  a  pure  geometrical  and  numerical  system,  the  alphabet  of  every  great  nation  having  a  numerical  value  for  every  letter,1  and,  moreover,  a  system  of  permutation  of  syllables  and  synonyms  which  is  carried  to  perfection  in  the  Indian  Occult  methods,  and  whicR  the  Hebrew  certainly  has  not.

This  one  system,  contain-  ing the  elements  of  Geometry  and  Numeration,  was  used  by  the  Jews  for  the  purpose  of  concealing  their  Esoteric  creed  under  the  mask  of  a  popular  and  national  monotheistic  Religion.

The  last  who  knew  the  system  to  perfection  were  the  learned  and  "  atheistical  "  Sadducees,  the  great-  est enemies  of  the  pretensions  of  the  Pharisees  and  of  their  confused  notions  brought  from  Babylon.

Yes,  the  Sadducees,  the  Illusionists,  who  maintained  that  the  Soul,  the  Angels,  and  all  similar  Beings,  were  illusions  because  they  were  temporary — thus  showing  themselves  at  one  with  Eastern  Esotericism.

And  since  they  rejected  every  book  and  Scripture,  with  the  exception  of  the  Law  of  Moses,  it  seems  that  the  latter  must  have  been  very  different  from  what  it  is  now.

1  Speaking  of  the  hidden  meaning  of  the  Sanskrit  words,  Mr  T    Subba  Row.

in  his  able  article  on  "  The  Twelve  Signs  of  the  Zodiac,"  gives  some  advice  as  to  the  way  in  which  one  should  proceed  to  find  out  "the  deep  significance  of  ancient  Sanskrit  nomenclature  m  the  old  Aryan  myths.

1      Find  out  the  synonyms  of  the  word  used  which  have  other  meanings     2     Find  out  the  numerical  value  of  the  letters   composing  the  word   according   to  the   methods  of  the  ancient  Tantnk  works  [Tantrika  Shastra — works  on   Incantation   and  Magic]     3     Examine  the  ancient  myths  or  allegories,  if  there  are  any,   which   have  any  special  connection  with  the  word  in  question.

4    Permute  the  different  syllables  composing  the  word  and  examine  the  new  combinations  that  will  thus  be  formed  and  their  meanings,"  etc.

But  he  does  not  give  the  principal  rule      And  no  doubt  he  is  quite  right      The  Tantrika  Shastras  are  as  old  as  Magic  itself      Have  they  also  borrowed  their  Esotericism  from  the  Hebrews?

2  Their  founder,   Sadoc,  was  the  pupil,  through  Antigonus  Saccho,  of  Simon  the  Just      They  had  their  own   secret  Book  of  the   Law  ever  since  the  foundation  of  their  sect  (about  400  B  C  )  and  this  volume  was  unknown  to  the   masses.

At  the  time  of  the  Separation  the  Samaritans  recognised  only  the  Book  of  the  Law  of  Moses  and  the  Book  of  Joshua,  and  their  Pentateuch  is  far  older,  and  is  different  from  the  Septuagmt     In  168  B.C.  Jerusalem  had  its  temple  plundered,  and  its  Sacred  Books — namely,  the  Bible  made  up  by  Ezra  and  finished  by  Judas  Maccabeus — were  lost  (see  Burder's  Josephus,  vol  n,  pp    331-5)  ,  after  which  the  Masorah  completed  the  work  of  destruction  (even  of  Ezra's  once  more

186  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

The  whole  of  the  foregoing  is  written  with  an  eye  to  our  Kabalists.

Great  scholars  as  some  of  them  undoubtedly  are,  they  are  nevertheless  wrong  to  hang  the  harps  of  their  faith  on  the  willows  of  Talmudic  growth — on  the  Hebrew  scrolls,  whether  in  square  or  pointed  characters,  now  in  our  public  Jibraries,  museums,  or  even  in  the  collections  of  Paleographers.

There  do  not  remain  half-a-dozen  copies  from  the  true  Mosaic  Hebrew  scrolls  in  the  whole  world.

And  those  who  are  in  possession  of  these — as  we  indicated  a  few  pages  back — would  not  part  with  them,  or  even  allow  them  to  be  examined,  on  any  consideration  whatever.

How  then  can  any  Kabalist  claim  priority  for  Hebrew  Esotericism,  and  say,  as  does  one  of  our  correspondents,  that  "  the  •Hebrew  has  come  down  from  a  far  remoter  antiquity  than  any  of  them  [whether  Egyptian  or  even  Sanskrit !],  and  that  it  was  the  source,  or  nearer  to  the  old  original  source,  than  any  of  them  "  ? l

As  our  correspondent  says:  "  It  becomes  more  convincing  to  me  every  day  that  in  a  far  past  time  there  was  a  mighty  civilization  with  enormous  learn-  ing, which  had  a  common  language  over  the  earth,  as  to  which  its  essence  can  be  recovered  from  the  fragments  which  now  exist."

Aye,  there  existed  indeed  a  mighty  civilization,  and  a  still  mightier  secret  learning  and  knowledge,  the  entire  scope  of  which  can  never  be  discovered  'by  Geometry  and  the  Kabalah  alone  :  for  there  are  seven  keys  to  the  large  entrance-door,  and  not  one,  nor  even  two,  keys  can  ever  open  it  sufficiently  to  allow  more  than  glimpses  of  what  lies  within.

Every  scholar  must  be  aware  that  there  are  two  distinct  styles — two  schools,  so  to  speak — plainly  traceable  in  the  Hebrew  Scriptures :  the  Elohistic  and  the  Jehovistic.

The  portions  belonging  to  these  respectively  are  so  blended  together,  so  completely  mixed  up  by  later  hands,  that  often  all  •external  characteristics  are  lost.

Yet  it  is  also  known  that  the  two  schools  were  antagonistic  ;  that  the  one  taught  esoteric,  the  other  exoteric,  or  theolo-  gical doctrines  ;  that  the  one,  the  Elohists,  were  Seers  (Roch),  whereas  the

adjusted  8»b/e)  begun  by  the  change  into  square  from  horned  letters  Therefore  the  later  Pentateuch  accepted  by  the  Pharisees  was  rejected  and  laughed  at  by  the  Sadducees  They  are  generally  called  atheists  ,  yet,  since  those  learned  men,  who  made  no  secret  of  their  freethought,  furnished  from  among  their  number  the  most  eminent  of  the  Jewish  high-priests,  this  seems  impossible  How  could  the  Pharisees  and  the  other  two  believing  and  pious  sects  allow  notorious  atheists  to  be  selected  for  such  posts  ?  The  answer  is  difficult  to  find  for  bigotry  and  for  believers  in  a  personal,  anthropomorphic  God,  but  very  easy  for  those  who  accept  facts  The  Sadducees  were  called  atheists  because  they  believed  as  the  initiated  Moses  believed,  thus  differing  very  widely  from  the  latter  made-up  Jewish  legislator  and  hero  of  Mount  Sinai

1  The  measurements  of  the  Great  Pyramid  being  those  of  the  temple  of  Solomon,  of  the  Ark  of  the  Covenant,  etc  ,  according  to  Piazzi  Smyth  and  the  author  of  Trie  Source  of  Measures,  and  the  Pyramid  of  Gizeh  being  shown  on  astronomical  calculations  to  have  been  built  4950  B  C  ,  and  Moses  having  written  his  books — for  the  sake  of  argument — not  even  half  that  time  before  our  era,  how  can  this  be  ?  Surely  if  any  one  borrowed  from  the  other,  it  is  not  the  Pharaohs  from  Moses  Even  philolo-  gy shows  not  only  the  Egyptian,  but  even  the  Mongolian,  older  than  the  Hebrew.


other,  the  Jehovists,  were  prophets  (Nabhi),1  and  that  the  latter — who  later  became  Rabbis — were  generally  only  nominally  prophets  by  virtue  of  their  official  position,  as  the  Pope  is  called  the  infallible  and  inspired  vicegerent  of  God.

That,  again,  the  Elohists  meant  by  "  Elohim  "  "forces,"  identifying  their  Deity,  as  in  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE,  with  Nature ;  while  the  Jehovists  made  of  Jehovah  a  personal  God  externally,  and  used  the  term  simply  as  a  phallic  symbol — a  number  of  them  secretly  disbelieving  even  in  metaphysical,  abstract  Nature,  and  synthesizing  all  on  the  terrestrial  scale.

Finally,  the  Elohists  made  of  man  the  divine  incarnate  image  of  the  Elohim,  emanated  first  in  all  Crea-  tion ;  and  the  Jehovists  show  him  as  the  last,  the  crowning  glory  of  the  animal  creation,  instead  of  his  being  the  head  of  all  the  sensible  beings  on  earth.

(This  is  reversed  by  some  Kabalists,  but  the  reversion  is  due  to  the  designedly-  produced  confusion  in  the  texts,  especially  in  the  first  four  chapters  of  Genesis.)  Take  the  Zohar  and  find  in  it  the  description  relating  to  Ain-Soph,  the  Western  or  Semitic  Parabrahman.

What  passages  have  come  so  nearly  up  to  the  Vedantic  ideal  as  the  following :

The  creation  [the  evolved  Universe]  is  the  garment  of  that  which  has  no  name,  the  garment  woven  from  the  Deity's  own  substance.'

Between  that  which  is  Ain  or  "  nothing,"  and  the  Heavenly  Man,  there  ds  an  Impersonal  First  Cause,  however,  of  which  it  is  said  :

Before  It  gave  any  shape  to  this  world,  before  It  produced  any  form,  It  was  alone,  without  form  or  similitude  to  anything  else.

Who,  then,  can  comprehend  It,  how  It  was  before  the  creation,  since  It  was  formless  ?  Hence  it  is  forbidden  to  represent  It  by  any  form,  similitude,  or  even  by  Its  sacred  name,  by  a  single  letter  or  a  single  point.

The  sentence  that  follows,  however,  is  an  evident  later  interpolation  ;  for  it  draws  attention  to  a  complete  contradiction  :

And  to  this  the  words  (Deut.

iv,  15),  refer — "  Ye  saw  no  manner  of  similitude  on  the  day  the  Lord  spake  unto  you."

But  this  reference  to  Chapter  iv,  of  Deuteronomy,  when  in  Chapter  v  God  is  mentioned  as  speaking  "  face  to  face  "  with  the  people,  is  very  clumsy.

Not  one  of  the  names  given  to  Jehovah  in  the  Bible  has  any  reference  whatever  to  either  Ain-Soph  or  the  Impersonal  First-Cause  (which  is  the  Logos)  of  the  Kabalah  ;  but  they  all  refer  to  the  Emanations.

1  This  alone  shows  how  the  Books  of  Moses  were  tampered  with      In  Samuel  (ix,  9),  it  is  said  "  He  that  is  now  a  prophet  [Nabhi]  was  beforetime  called  a  Seer  [Roch]  "     Now  since  before  Samuel,  the  word  "  Roch  "  is  met  nowhere  in  the  Pentateuch,  but  its  place  is  always  taken  by  that  of  "  Nabhi,"  this  proves  clearly  that  the  Mosaic  text  has  been  replaced  by  that  of  the  later  Levites      (See  for  fuller  details  Jewish  Antiquities,  by  the  Rev   D   Jennings,  D  D  )

2  Zohar,  .,  2a.  '  Zohar,  42b.

188  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

It  says  :

For  although  to  reveal  itself  to  us,  the  concealed  of  all  the  concealed  sent  forth  the  Ten  Emanations  [Sephiroth]  called  the  Form  of  God,  Form  of  the  Heavenly  Man,  yet  since  even  this  luminous  form  was  too  dazzling  for  our  vision,  it  had  to  assume  another  form,  or  had  to  put  on  another  garment,  which  is  the  Universe.

The  Universe,  therefore,  or  the  visible  world,  is  a  farther  expansion  of  the  Divine  Substance,  and  is  called  in  the  Kabalah  "  The  Garment  of  God."

This  is  the  doctrine  of  all  the  Hindu  Puranas,  especially  that  of  the  Vishnu  Parana.

Vishnu  pervades  the  Universe  and  is  that  Universe  ;  Brahma  enters  the  Mundane  Egg,  and  issues  from  it  as  the  Universe  ;  Brahma  even  dies  with  it  and  there  remains  only  Brahman,  the  impersonal,  the  eternal,  the  un-  born, and  the  unqualifiable.

The  Ain-Soph  of  the  Chaldeans  and  later  of  the  Jews  is  assuredly  a  copy  of  the  Vedic  Deity  ;  while  the  "  Heavenly  Adam,"  the  Macrocosm  which  unites  in  itself  the  .totality  of  beings  and  is  the  Esse  of  the  visible  Universe,  finds  his  original  in  the  Puranic  Brahma.

In  Sod,  "  the  Secret  of  the  Law,"  one  recognizes  the  expressions  used  in  the  oldest  fragments  of  the  Gupta  Vidya,  the  Secret  Knowledge.

And  it  is  not  venturing  too  much  to  say  that  even  a  Rabbi  quite  familiar  with  his  own  special  Rabbin-  ical Hebrew  would  only  comprehend  its  secrets  thoroughly  if  he  added  to  his  learning  a  serious  knowledge  of  the  Hindu  philosophies.

Let  us  turn  to  STANZA  I,  of  the  BOOK  OF  DZYAN  for  an  example.

The  Zohar  premises,  as  does  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE,  a  universal,  eternal'  Essence,  passive — because  absolute — in  all  that  men  call  attributes.

The  pregenetic  or  pre-cosmical  Triad  is  a  pure  metaphysical  abstraction.

The  notion  of  a  triple  hypostasis  in  one  Unknown  Divine  Essence  is  as  old  as  speech  and  thought.

Hiranyagarbha,  Hari,  and  Shankara — the  Creator,  the  Pre-  server, and  the  Destroyer — are  the  three  manifested  attributes  of  it,  appearing  and  disappearing  with  Kosmos  ;  the  visible  Triangle,  so  to  speak,  on  the  plane  of  the  ever-invisible  Circle.

This  is  the  primeval  root-thought  of  thinking,  Humanity  ;  the  Pythagorean  Triangle  emanating  from  the  ever-concealed  Monad,  or  the  Central  Point.

Plato  speaks  of  it  and  Plotinus  calls  it  an  ancient  doctrine,  on  which  Cud-  worth  remarks  that  :

Since  Orpheus,  Pythagoras,  and  Plato,  who  all  of  them  asserted  a  trinity  of  divine  hypostases,  unquestionably  derived  their  doctrine  from  the  Egyptians,  it  may  be  reasonably  suspected  that  the  Egyptians  did  the  like  before  them  ~

1  Zohar,  i.   2a     See   Dr    Ch     Gmsburg's  essay  on  The  Cabbalah,  its  Doctrines,  Developments  and  Literature.

3  Cudworth.

I.  ni,  quoted  by  Wilson,  Vishnu  Parana.

Vol    i,  p    14,  note.


The  Egyptians  certainly  derived  their  Trinity  from  the  Indians.

Wilson  justly  observes  :

As,  however,  the  Grecian  accounts  and  those  of  the  Egyptians  are  much  more  perplexed  and  unsatisfactory  than  those  of  the  Hindus,  it  is  most  probable  that  we  find  amongst  them  the  doctrine  in  its  most  original,  as  well  as  most  methodical  and  signifi-  cant form.

This,  then,  is  the  meaning  :

•'  Darkness  alone  filled  the  Boundless  All,  for  Father,  Mother  and  Son  were  once  more  One."

Space  was,  and  is  ever,  as  it  is  between  the  Manvantaras.

The  Universe  in  its  pre-kosmic  state  was  once  more  homogeneous  and  one — outside  its  aspects.

This  was  a  Kabalistic,  and  is  now  a  Christian  teaching.

As  is .  constantly  shown  in  the  Zohar,  the  Infinite  Unity,  or  Ain-Soph,  is  ever  placed  outside  human  thought  and  appreciation  ;  and  in  Sepher  Yetzireh  we  see  the  Spirit  of  God — the  Logos,  not  the  Deity  itself — called  One.

One  is  the  Spirit  of  the  livmq  God  who  liveth  for  ever  Voice,  Spirit,  [of  the  Spirit],  and  Word  :  this  is  the  Holy  Spirit.

— and    the    Quaternary.

From    this    Cube    emanates    the    whole    Kosmos.

Says  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE  :

"  It  is  called  to  life.

The  mystic  Cube  in  which  rests  the  Creative  Idea,  the  manifesting  Mantra  [or  articulate  speech — Vach]  and  the  holy  Purusha  [both  radiations  of  prima  materia]  exist  in  the  Eternity  in  the  Divine  Substance  in  their  latent  state

— during  Pralaya.

And  in  the  Sepher  Yetzireh,  when  the  Three-in-One  are  to  be  called  into  being — by  the  manifestation  of  Shekinah,  the  first  effulgency  or  radiation  in  the  manifesting  Kosmos — the  "  Spirit  of  God,"  or  Number  One,1  fructifies  and  awakens  the  dual  Potency,  Number  Two,  Air,  and  Number  Three,  Water ;  in  these  "  are  darkness  and  emptiness,  slime  and  dung  " — which  is  Chaos,  the  Tohu-Vah-Bohu.

The  Air  and  Water  emanate  Number  Four,  Ether  or  Fire,  the  Son.

This  is  the  Kabalistic  Quaternary.

This  Fourth  Number,  which  in  the  manifested  Kosmos  is  the  One,  or  the  Creative  God,  is  with  the  Hindus  the  "  Ancient,"  Sanat,  the  Prajapati  of  the  Vedas  and  the  Brahma  of  the

•  V,shnu  Purana.

Wilson,  Vol  I,  p    14.  »  STANZA  1     4.

1  Mishna,  i,

'  In  its  manifested  state  it  becomes  Ten,  the  Universe.

In  the  Chaldean  Kabalah  it  is  sexless  In  the  Jewish,  Shekmah  is  female,  and  the  early  Christians  and  Gnostics  regarded  the  Holy  Ghost  as  a  female  potency  In  the  Book  of  Numbers  "  Shekina  "  is  made  to  drop  the  final  "  h  "  that  makes  it  a  feminine  name  Narayana,  the  Mover  on  the  Waters,  is  also  sexless  ,  but  it  is  our  firm  belief  that  Shekinah  and  Daivipraknti,  the  "  Light  of  the  Logos,"  are  one  and  the  same  thing  philosophically

190  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Brahmans — the  heavenly  Androgyne,  as  he  becomes  the  male  only  after  separating  himself  into  two  bodies,  Vach  and  Viraj.

With  the  Kabalists,  he  is  at  the  first  the  Jah-Havah,  only  later  becoming  Jehovah,  like  Viraj,  his  proto-  type ;  after  separating  himself  as  Adam-Kadmon  into  Adam  and  Eve  in  the  formless,  and  into  Cain-Abel  in  the  semi-objective,  world,  he  became  finally  the  Jah-Havah,  or  man  and  woman,  in  Enoch,  the  son  of  Seth.

For  the  true  meaning  of  the  compound  name  of  Jehovah — of  which,  unvoweled,  you  can  make  almost  anything — is  :  men  and  women,  or  humanity  composed  of  its  two  sexes.

From  the  first  chapter  to  the  end  of  the  fourth  chapter  of  Genesis  every  name  is  a  permutation  of  another  name,  and  every  personage  is  at  the  same  time  somebody  else.

A  Kabalist  traces  Jehovah  from  the  Adam  of  earth  to  Seth,  the  third  son — or  rather  race — of  Adam.1  Thus  Seth  is  Jehovah  male  ;  and  Enos,  being  a  permutation  of  Cain  and  Abel,  is  Jehovah  male  and  female,  or  our  mankind.

The  Hindu  Brahma-Viraj,  Viraj-  Manu,  and  Manu-Vaivasvata,  with  his  daughter  and  wife,  Vach,  present  the  greatest  analogy  with  these  personages — for  anyone  who  will  take  the  trouble  of  studying  the  subject  in  both  the  Bible  and  the  Puranas.

It  is  said  of  Brahma  that  he  created  himself  as  Manu,  and  that  he  was  born  of,  and  was  identical  with,  his  original  self,  while  he  constituted  the  female  portion  Shata-  rupa  "  (hundred-formed).  In  this  Hindu  Eve,  "  the  mother  of  all  living  beings,"  Brahma  created  Viraj,  who  is  himself,  but  on  a  lower  scale,  as  Cain  is  Jehovah  on  an  inferior  scale  :  both  are  the  first  males  of  the  Third  Race,  The  same  idea  is  illustrated  in  the  Hebrew  name  of  God  (mm).  Read  from  right  to  left  "  Jod  "  (•»)  is  the  father.

••  He  "  (n)  the  mother,  ••  Vau  "  (l)  the  son,  and  "  He  "  (n),  repeated  at  the  end  of  the  word,  is  generation,  the  act  of  birth,  materiality.

This  is  surely  a  sufficient  reason  why  the  God  of  the  Jews  and  Christians  should  be  personal,  as  much  as  the  male  Brahma,  Vishnu,  or  Shiva  of  the  orthodox,  exoteric  Hindu

Thus  the  term  of  Jhvh  alone — now  accepted  as  the  name  of  "  One  living  [male]  God  " — will  yield,  if  seriously  studied,  not  only  the  whole  mystery  of  Being  (in  the  Biblical  sense,)  but  also  that  of  the  Occult  Theogony,  from  the  highest  divine  Being,  the  third  in  order,  down  to  man.

As  shown  by  the  best  Hebraists  :

The  verbal  iTn.

or  Hayah,  or  E-y-e,  means  to  be,  to  exist  while  mn  or  Chayah,  or  H-y-e,  means  to  live,  as  mot/on  of  existence.*

1  The  Elohim  create  the  Adam  of  dust,  and  in  him  Jehovah-Bmah  separates  himself  into  Eve,  after  which  the  male  portion  of  God  becomes  the  Serpent  tempts  himself  in  Eve,  then  creates  himself  in  her  as  Cain,  passes  into  Seth,  and  scatters  from  Enoch,  the  Son  of  Man,  or  Humanity,  as  Jod  heva

3  The  Source  of  Measures,  p.

THE  EASTERN  GUPTA  VIDYA  AND  THE  KABALAH  19T

Hence  Eve  stands  as  the  evolution  and  the  never-ceasing  "  becoming  '"  of  Nature.

Now  if  we  take  the  almost  untranslatable  Sanskrit  word  Sat,  which-  means  the  quintessence  of  absolute  immutable  Being,  or  Be-ness — as  it  has  been  rendered  by  an  able  Hindu  Occultist — we  shall  find  no  equivalent  for  it  in  any  language  ;  but  it  may  be  regarded  as  most  closely  resembling  "  Ain,"  or  "  En-Soph/'  Boundless  Being.

Then  the  term  Hayah,  "  to  be,"  as  passive,  changeless,  yet  manifested  existence  may  perhaps  be  rendered  by  the  Sanskrit  Jivatma,  universal  life  or  soul,  in  its  secondary  and  cosmic  mean-  ing ;  while  Chayah,  "  to  live/'  as  "  motion  of  existence,"  is  simply  Prana,  the  ever  changing  life  in  its  objective  sense.

It  is  at  the  head  of  this  third  cate-  gory that  the  Occultist  finds  Jehovah — the  Mother,  Binah,  and  the  Father,  Are-  lim.

This  is  made  plain  in  the  Zohar,  when  the  emantion  and  evolution  of  the  Sephiroth  are  explained  :  First,  Ain-Soph,  then  Shekinah,  the  Garment  or  Veil  of  Infinite  Light,  then  Sephira  or  the  Kadmon,  and  thus  making  the  fourth,  the  spiritual  Substance  sent  forth  from  the  Infinite  Light.

This  Sephira  is  called  the  Crown,  Kether,  and  has  besides,  six  other  names — in  all  seven.

These  names  are:  1.  Kether;  2.  the  Aged,  3.  the  Primordial  Point;  4.  the  White  Head ,  5.  the  Long  Face ,  6.  the  Inscrutable  Height ;  and  7.  Ehejeh  ("  I  am  ".)[  This  septenary  Sephira  is  said  to  contain  in  itself  the  nine  Sephiroth.

But  before  showing  how  she  brought  them  forth,  let  us  read  an  explanation  about  the  Sephiroth  in  the  Talmud,  which  gives  it  as  an  archaic  tradition,  or  Kabalah.

There  are  three  groups  (or  orders)  of  Sephiroth :  1 .  The  SephirotK  called  "divine  attwbutes "  (the  Triad  in  the  Holy  Quaternary)  ;  2.  the  sidereal  (personal)  Sephiroth ;  3.  the  metaphysical  Sephiroth,  or  a  periphrasis  of  Jehovah,  who  are  the  first  three  Sephiroth  (Kether,  Chokmah  and  Binah),  the  rest  of  the  seven  being  the  personal  "Seven  Spirits  of  the  Presence"  (also-  of  the  planets,  therefore).  Speaking  of  these,  the  angels  are  meant,  though  not  because  they  are  seven,  but  because  they  represent  the  seven  SephirotK  which  contain  in  them  the  universality  of  the  Angels.

This  shows  (a)  that,  when  the  first  four  Sephiroth  are  separated,  as  a  Triad-Quaternary — Sephira  being  its  synthesis — there  remain  only  seven.

Sephiroth,  as  there  are  seven  Rishis  ;  these  become  ten  when  the  Quaternary,  or  the  first  divine  Cube,  is  scattered  into  units ,  and  (6)  that  while  JehovaK  might  have  been  viewed  as  the  Deity,  if  he  be  included  in  the  three  divine  groups  or  orders  of  the  Sephiroth,  the  collective  Elohim,  or  the  quaternary

1  This  identifies  Sephira,  the  third  potency,  with  Jehovah  the  Lord,  who  says  to  Moses  out  of  the  burning  bush  "(Here)  am  I"  (Exodus,  in,  4.)  At  this  time  the  "Lord"  had  not  yet  become  JehovaK  It  was  not  the  one  Male  God  who  spoke,  but  the  Elohim  manifested,  or  the  Sephiroth  in.  their  manifested  collectivity  of  seven,  contained  in  the  triple  Sephira

192  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

indivisible  Kether,  once  that  he  becomes  a  male  God,  he  is  no  more  than  one  of  the  Builders  of  the  lower  group — a  Jewish  Brahma.1  A  demonstration  is  now  attempted.

The  first  Sephira,  containing  the  other  nine,  brought  them  forth  in  this  order :  (2)  Hokmah  (Chokmah  or  Wisdom),  a  masculine  active  potency  re-  presented among  the  divine  names  as  Jah ;  and,  as  a  permutation  or  an  •evolution  into  lower  forms  in  this  instance — becoming  the  Auphanim  (or  the  Wheels — cosmic  rotation  of  matter)  among  the  army,  or  the  angelic  hosts.

From  this  Chokmah  emanated  a  feminine  passive  potency  called  (3)  Intelli-  gence, Binah,  whose  divine  name  is  Jehovah,  and  whose  angelic  name,  among  the  Builders  and  Hosts,  is  Arelim.'  It  is  from  the  union  of  these  two  poten-  cies, male  and  female  (or  Chokmah  and  Binah)  that  emanated  all  the  other  Sephiroth,  the  seven  orders  of  the  Builders.

Now  if  we  call  Jehovah  by  his  divine  name,  then  he  becomes  at  best  and  forthwith  "  a  female  passive "  potency  in  Chaos.

And  if  we  view  him  as  a  male  God,  he  is  no  more  than  one  of  many,  an  Angel,  Arelim.

But  straining  the  analysis  to  its  highest  point,  and  if  his  male  name  Jah,  that  of  Wisdom,  be  allowed  to  him,  still  he  is  not  the  "  Highest  and  the  one  Living  God  ;  "  for  he  is  contained  with  many  others  within  Sephira,  and  Sephira  herself  is  a  third  Potency  in  Occultism,  though  regarded  as  the  first  in  the  exoteric  Kabalah — and  is  one,  moreover,  of  lesser  importance  than  the  Vaidic  Aditi,  or  the  Primordial  Water  of  Space,  which  becomes  after  many  a  permutation  the  Astral  Light  of  the  Kabalist.

Thus  the  Kabalah,  as  we  have  it  now,  is  shown  to  be  of  the  greatest  im-  portance in  explaining  the  allegories  and  "dark  sayings  "  of  the  Bible.

As  an  Esoteric  work  upon  the  mysteries  of  creation,  however,  it  is  almost  worthless  as  it  is  now  disfigured,  unless  checked  by  the  Chaldean  Book  of  Numbers  or  by  the  tenets  of  the  Eastern  Secret  Science,  or  Esoteric  Wisdom.

The  Western  nations  have  neither  the  original  Kabalah,  nor  yet  the  Mosaic  8/b/e.

Finally,  it  is  demonstrated  by  internal  as  well  as  by  external  evidence,  on  the  testimony  of  the  best  European  Hebraists,  and  the  confessions  of  the  learned  Jewish  Rabbis  themselves,  that  "  an  ancient  document  forms  the  essential  basis  of  the  8/b/e,  which  received  very  considerable  insertions  and  supplements ,  "  and  that  "  the  Pentateuch  arose  out  of  the  primitive  or  older

1  The  Brahmans  were  wise  in  their  generation  when  they  gradually,  for  no  other  reason  than  this,  abandoned  Brahma,  and  paid  less  attention  to  him  individually  than  to  any  other  deity  As  an  abstract  synthesis  they  worshipped  him  collectively  and  in  every  God,  each  of  which  represents  him.

As  Brahma,  the  male,  he  is  far  lower  than  Shiva,  the  Ltngam,  who  personates  universal  generation,  or  Vishnu,  the  preserver— both  Shiva  and  Vishnu  being  the  regenerators  of  life  after  destruction.

The  Christians  might  do  worse  than  follow  their  example,  and  worship  God  in  Spirit,  and  not  in  the  male  Creator.

"  A  plural  word,  signifying  a  collective  host  genencally  ,  literally,  the  "  strong  lion." document  by  means  of  a  supplementary  one."  Therefore  in  the  absence  of  the  Book  of  Numbers,1  the  Kabalists  of  the  West  are  only  entitled  to  come  to  definite  conclusions,  when  they  have  at  hand  some  data  at  least  from  that  ^'ancient  document  " — data  now  found  scattered  throughout  Egyptian  papyri,  Assyrian  tiles,  and  the  traditions  preserved  by  the  descendants  of  the  disciples  of  the  last  Nazars.


Instead  of  that,  most  of  them  accept  as  their  authorities  and  infallible  guides  Sabre  d'  Olivet — who  was  a  man  of  immense  erudition  and  of  speculative  mind,  but  neither  a  Kabalist  nor  an  Occultist  either  Western  or  Eastern — and  the  Mason  Ragon,  the  greatest  of  the  "  Widow's  sons,"  who  was  even  less  of  an  Orientalist  than  d'  Olivet,  for  Sanskrit  learning  was  almost  unknown  in  the  days  of  both  these  eminent  scholars.

1  The  writer  possesses  only  a  few  extracts,  some  doxen  pages  in  all,  verbatim  quotations  from  the  priceless  work,  of  which  but  two  or  three  copies,  perhaps,  are  still  extant.

FF

SECTION

HEBREW  ALLEGORIES

HOW  can  any  Kabalist,  acquainted  with  the  foregoing,  deduce  his  con-  clusions with  regard  to  the  true  Esoteric  beliefs  of  the  primitive  Jews  from  that  only  which  he  now  finds  in  the  Jewish  scrolls  ?  How  can  any  scholar-  even  though  one  of  the  keys  to  the  universal  language  be  now  positively  discovered,  the  true  key  to  the  numerical  reading  of  a  pure  geometrical  system — give  out  anything  as  his  final  conclusion  ?  Modern  Kabalistic  specula-  tion is  on  a  par  now  with  modern  "  speculative  Masonry  ;  "  for  as  the  latter  tries  vainly  to  link  itself  with  the  ancient — or  rather  the  archaic — Masonry  of  the  Temples,  failing  to  make  the  link  because  all  its  claims  have  been  shown  to  be  inaccurate  from  an  archaeological  standpoint,  so  fares  it  also  with  Kabalistic  speculation.

As  no  mystery  of  Nature  worth  running  after  can  be  revealed  to  humanity  by  settling  whether  Hiram  Abif  was  a  living  Sidonian  builder,  or  a  solar  myth,  so  no  fresh  information  will  be  added  to  Occult  Lore  by  the  details  of  the  exoteric  privileges  conferred  on  the  Collegia  Fabrorum  by  Numa  Pompilius.

Rather  must  the  symbols  used  in  it  be  studied  in  the  Aryan-  light,  since  all  the  Symbolism  of  the  ancient  Initiations  came  to  the  West  with  the  light  of  the  Eastern  Sun.

Nevertheless,  we  find  the  most  learned  Masons  and  Symbologists  declaring  that  all  these  weird  symbols  and  glyphs,  that  run  back  to  a  common  origin  of  immense  antiquity,  were  nothing  more  than  a  display  of  cunning  natural  phallicism,  or1  emblems  of  primitive  typology.

How  much  nearer  the  truth  is  the  author  of  The  Source  of  Measures,  who  declares  that  the  elements  of  human  and  numerical  construction  in  the  Bible  do  not  shut  out  the  spiritual  elements  in  it,  albeit  so  few  now  understand  them.

The  words  we  quote  are  as  suggestive  as  they  are  true  :

How  desperately  blinding  becomes  a  superstitious  use,  through  ignorance,  of  such  emblems,  when  they  are  made  to  possess  the  power  of  bloodshed  and  torture,  through  orders  of  propaganda  of  any  species  of  religious  cultus  When  one  thinks  of  the  horrors  of  a  Moloch,  or  Baal,  or  Dagon  worship  ;  of  the  correlated  blood-deluges  under  the  Cross  baptized  in  gore  by  Constantine,  at  the  initiative  of  the  secular  Church  ;

HEBREW  ALLEGORIES

when  one  thinks  of  all  this  and  then  that  the  cause  of  all  had  been  simply  ignorance  of  the  real  radical  reading  of  the  Moloch,  and  Baal,  and  Dagon,  and  the  Cross  and  the  J'phillm,  all  running  back  to  a  common  origin,  and  after  all  being  nothing  more  than  a  display  of  pure  and  natural  mathematics,  .  .  .  one  is  apt  to  feel  like  cursing  ignorance,  and  to  lose  confidence  in  what  are  called  /ntu»t/ons  of  religion  ,  one  is  apt  to  wish  for  a  return  of  the  day  when  all  the  world  was  of  one  lip  and  of  one  knowledge  But  while  these  elements  [of  the  construction  of  the  pyramid]  are

rational  and  scientific,  .  let  no  man  consider  that  with  this  discovery  comes  a  cutting-off  of  the  spirituality  '  of  the  Bible  intention,  or  of  man's  relation  to  this  spiritual  foundation  Does  one  wish  to  build  a  house  ?  No  house  was  ever  actually  built  with  tangible  material  until  first  the  architectural  design  of  building  had  been  accomplished.

no  matter  whether  the  structure  was  palace  or  hovel  So  with  these  elements  and  numbers.

They  are  not  of  man,  nor  are  they  of  his  invention.

They  have  been  revealed  to  him  to  the  extent  of  his  ability  to  realize  a  system,  which  is  the  creat/ve  system  of  the  eternal  God.

.  .  But  spiritually,  to  man  the  value  of  this  matter  is  that  he  can  actually,  in  contemplation,  bridge  over  all  material  construction  of  the  cosmos,  and  pass  into  the  very  thought  and  mmd  of  God,  to  the  extent  of  recognizing  this  system  of  design  for  cosmic  creation — yea,  even  before  the  words  went  forth  :  "  Let  there  be  '"  '

But  true  as  the  above  words  may  be  when  coming  from  one  who  has  re-discovered,  more  completely  than  anyone  else  has  done  during  the  past  centuries,  one  of  the  keys  to  the  universal  Mystery  Language,  it  is  impossible  for  an  Eastern  Occultist  to  agree  with  the  conclusion  of  the  able  author  of  The  Source  of  Measures.

He  "  has  set  out  to  find  the  truth,"  and  yet  he  still  believes  that  .

The  best  and  most  authentic  vehicle  of  communication  from  [the  creative]  God  to  man  .   .      is  to  be  found  in  the  Hebrew  Bible

To  this  we  must  and  shall  demur,  giving  our  reasons  for  it  in  a  few  words.

The  "  Hebrew  Bible  "  exists  no  more,  as  has  been  shown  in  the  foregoing  pages,  and  the  garbled  accounts,  the  falsified  and  pale  copies  we  have  of  the  real  Mosaic  8/b/e  of  the  Initiates,  warrant  the  making  of  no  such  sweeping  assertion  and  claim.

All  that  the  scholar  can  fairly  claim  is  that  the  Jewish  8/b/e,  as  now  extant — in  its  latest  and  final  interpretation,  and  according  to  the  newly-discovered  key — may  give  a  partial  presentment  of  the  truths  it  contained  before  it  was  mangled.

But  how  can  he  tell  what  the  Pentateuch  contained  before  it  had  been  re-composed  by  Esdras  ;  then  corrupted  stilt  more  by  the  ambitious  Rabbis  in  later  times,  and  otherwise  remodelled  and  interfered  with  ?  Leaving  aside  the  opinion  of  the  declared  enemies  of  the  Jewish  Scriptures,  one  may  quote  simply  what  their  most  devoted  followers  say.

Two  of  these  are  Home  and  Prideaux.

The  avowals  of  the  former  wilf  be  sufficient  to  show  how  much  now  remains  of  the  original  Mosaic  books,

1  Aye  ,  but  that  spirituality  can  never  be  discovered,  far  (ess  proved,  unless  we  turn  to  the  Aryan  Scriptures  and  Symbology.

For  the  Jews  it  was  lost,  save  for  the  Sadducees,  from  the  day  that  the  "  chosen  people  "  reached  the  Promised  Land,  the  national  Karma  preventing  Moses  from  reaching  it.

'Op.  at,  pp.  317-

196  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

unless  indeed  we  accept  his  sublimely  blind  faith  in  the  inspiration  and  editor-  ship of  the  Holy  Ghost.

He  writes  that  when  a  Hebrew  scribe  found  a  writing  of  any  author,  he  was  entitled,  if  he  thought  fit,  being  "  conscious  of  the  aid  of  the  Holy  Spirit,"  to  do  exactly  as  he  pleased  with  it — to  cut  it  up,  or  copy  it,  or  use  as  much  of  it  as  he  deemed  right,  and  so  to  incorporate  it  with  his  own  manuscript.

Dr.  Kenealy  aptly  remarks  of  Home,  that  it  is  almost  impossible  to  get  any  admission  from  him

that  makes  against  his  church,  so  remarkably  guarded  is  he  [Home]  in  his  phraseology,  and  so  wonderfully  discreet  in  the  use  of  words.

His  language,  like  a  diplomatic  letter,  perpetually  suggests  to  the  mind  ideas  other  than  those  which  he  really  means  ;  I  defy  any  unlearned  person  to  read  his  chapter  on  "  Hebrew  characters,"  and  to  derive  any  knowledge  from  it  whatever  on  the  subject  on  which  he  professes  to  treat.

And  yet  this  same  Home  writes  :

We  are  persuaded  .  .  .  that  the  things  to  which  reference  is  made,  proceeded  from  the  original  writers  or  compilers  of  the  books  [Old  Testament].  Sometimes  they  took  other  writings,  annals,  genealogies,  and  such  like,  with  which  they  incorporated  additional  matter,  or  which  they  put  together  with  greater  or  less  condensation.

The  Old  Testament  authors  used  the  sources  they  employed  (that  is,  the  writing  of  other  people)  with  freedom  and  independence.

Conscious  of  the  aid  of  the  Divine  Spirit,  they  adapted  their  own  productions,  or  the  productions  of  others,  to  the  wants  of  the  times.

But  in  these  respects  they  cannot  be  said  to  have  corrupted  the  text  of  Scripture  They  made  the  text.

But  of  what  did  they  make  it  ?  Why,  of  the  writings  of  other  persons,  justly  observes  Kenealy  :

And  this  is  Home's  notion  of  what  the  0/d   Testament  is a  cento  from  the

writings  of  unknown  persons  collected  and  put  together  by  those  who,  he  says,  were  divinely  inspired.

No  infidel  that  I  know  of  has  ever  made  so  damaging  a  charge  as  this  against  the  authenticity  of  the  0/d  Testament

This  is  quite  sufficient,  we  think,  to  show  that  no  key  to  the  universal  language-system  can  ever  open  the  mysteries  of  Creation  in  a  work  in  which,  whether  through  design  or  carelessness,  nearly  every  sentence  has  been  made  to  apply  to  the  latest  outcome  of  religious  views — to  Phallicism,  and  to  nothing  else.

There  are  a  sufficient  number  of  stray  bits  in  the  Elohistic  portions  of  the  Bible  to  warrant  the  inference  that  the  Hebrews  who  wrote  it  were  Initiates ;  hence  the  mathematical  co-ordinations  and  the  perfect  harmony  between  the  measures  of  the  Great  Pyramid  and  the  numerals  of  the  Biblical  glyphs.

But  surely  if  one  borrowed  from  the  other,  it  cannot  be  the  archi-  tects of  the  Pyramid  who  borrowed  from  Solomon's  Temple,  if  only  because  the  former  exists  to  this  day  as  a  stupendous  living  monument  of  Esoteric

1  The  Book  of  God,  pp,  388-9.

-  See  Home's  /ntroc/uction  (10th  edition),  vol    u,  p.  33,  as  quoted  by  Dr.  Kenealy,  p   389.

HEBREW  ALLEGORIES

records,  while  the  famous  temple  has  never  existed  outside  of  the  far  later  Hebrew  scrolls.1  Hence  there  is  a  great  distance  between  the  admission  that  some  Hebrews  were  Initiates,  and  the  conclusion  that  because  of  this  the  Hebrew  Bible  must  be  the  best  standard,  as  being  the  highest  representative  of  the  archaic  Esoteric  System.

Nowhere  does  the  Bible  say,  moreover,  that  the  Hebrew  is  the  language  of  God;  of  this  boast,  at  any  rate,  the  authors  are  not  guilty.

Perhaps  because  in  the  days  when  the  Bible  was  last  edited  the  claim  would  have  been  too  preposterous — hence  dangerous.

The  compilers  of  the  Old  Testament,  as  it  exists  in  the  Hebrew  canon,  knew  well  that  the  language  of  the  Initiates  in  the  days  of  Moses  was  identical  with  that  of  the  Egyptian  Hierophants ;  and  that  none  of  the  dialects  that  had  sprung  from  the  old  Syriac  and  the  pure  old  Arabic  of  Yarab — the  father  and  progenitor  of  the  primitive  Arabians,  long  before  the  time  of  Abraham,  in  whose  days  the  ancient  Arabic  had  already  become  vitiated — that  none  of  those  languages  was  the  one  sacer-  dotal universal  tongue.

Nevertheless  all  of  them  included  a  number  of  words  which  could  be  traced  to  common  roots.

And  to  do  this  is  the  business  of  modern  Philology,  though  to  this  day,  with  all  the  respect  due  to  the  labours  of  the  eminent  Philologists  of  Oxford  and  Berlin,  that  Science  seems  to  be  hopelessly  floundering  in  the  Cimmerian  darkness  of  mere  hypothesis.

Ahrens,  when  speaking  of  the  letters  as  arranged  in  the  Hebrew  sacred  scrolls,  and  remarking  that  they  were  musical  notes,  had  probably  never  studied  Aryan  Hindu  music.

In  the  Sanskrit  language  letters  are  continually  arranged  in  the  sacred  Ollas  so  that  they  may  become  musical  notes.

For  the  whole  Sanskrit  alphabet  and  the  Vedas,  from  the  first  word  to  the  last,  are  musical  notations  reduced  to  writing ;  the  two  are  inseparable.2  As  Homer  distinguished  between  the  "  language  of  Gods"  and  the  "  language  of  men,"3  so  did  the  Hindus.

The  Devanagari,  the  Sanskrit  characters,  are  the  "  speech  of  the  Gods,"  and  Sanskrit  is  the  divine  language.

1  The  author  says  that  Parker's  quadrature  is  "  that  identical  measure  which  was  used  anciently  as  the  perfect  measure,   by  the  Egyptians,  in  the  construction  of  the  Great  Pyramid,  which  was  built  to  monument  it  and  its  uses,"   and  that  "  from  it  the  sacred  cubit-value  was  derived,  which  was  the  cubit-value^  used   in  the  construction  of  the  Temple  of  Solomon,  the  Ark  of  Noah,  and  the  Ark  of  the  Covenant  "  (Source  of  Measures,  p   22)    This  is  a  grand  discovery,  no  doubt,  but  it  only  shows  that  the  Jews  profited  well  by  their  captivity  in  Egypt,  and  that  Moses  was  a  great  Initiate

2  See  The  Theosophist,  November,  1879,  art.

"Hindu  Music,"  p   47.

3  The  Sanskrit  letters  are  far  more   numerous  than  the  poor  twenty-two  letters  of  the  Hebrew  alphabet.

They  are  all  musical,  and  they  are  read — or  rather  chanted — according  to  a  system  given  in  very  old  Tantrika  works,   and  are  called  Devanagari,  the  speech,  or  language,  of  the  Gods      And  since  each  letter  answers  to  a  numeral,  the  Sanskrit  affords  a  far  larger  scope  for  expression,  and  it  must  necessarily  be  far  more  perfect  than  the  Hebrew,  which  followed  the  same  system  but  could  apply  it  only  in  a  very  limited  way.

If  either  of  these  two  languages  were  taught  to  humanity  by  the

198  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

It  is  argued  in  defence  of  the  present  version  of  the  Mosaic  Books  that  the  mode  of  language  adopted  was  an  "accommodation  "  to  the  ignorance  of  the  Jewish  people.

But  the  said  "mode  of  language"  drags  down  the  "  sacred  text "  of  Esdras  and  his  colleagues  to  the  level  of  the  most  unspiri-  tual  and  gross  phallic  religions.

This  plea  confirms  the  suspicions  entertained  by  some  Christian  Mystics  and  many  philosophical  critics,  that :

(a)  Divine   Power   as   an  Absolute  Unity  had  never  anything  more  to  do  with  the  Biblical  Jehovah  and  the  "  Lord  God  "  than  with  any  other  Sephiroth  or  Number.

The  Ain-Soph  of  the  Kabalah  of  Moses  is  as  independent  of  any  relation  with  the  created  Gods  as  is  Parabrahman  Itself.

(b)  The  teachings   veiled  in  the  Old  Testament  under  allegorical  expres-  sions are  all  copied  from  the  Magical  Texts  of  Babylonia,  by  Esdras  and  others,  while  the  earlier  Mosaic  Text  had  its  source  in  Egypt.

A  few  instances  known  to  almost  all  Symbologists  of  note,  and  especially  to  the  French  Egyptologists,  may  help  to  prove  the  statement.

Furthermore,  no  ancient  Hebrew  Philosopher,  Philo  no  more  than  the  Sadducees,  claimed,  as  do  now  the  ignorant  Christians,  that  the  events  in  the  Bible  should  be  taken  literally.

Philo  says  most  explicitly  :

The  verbal  statements  are  fabulous  [in  the  Book  of  the  Law]  :  it  is  in  the  allegory  that  we  shall  find  the  truth.

Let  us  give  a  few  instances,  beginning  with  the  latest  narrative,  the  Hebrew,  and  thus  if  possible  trace  the  allegories  to  their  origin.

1.  Whence  the  Creation  in  six  days,  the  seventh  day  as  day  of  rest,  the  seven  Elohim,1  and  the  division  of  space  into  heaven  and  earth,  in  the  first  chapter  of  Genesis

The  division  of  the  vault  above  from  the  Abyss,  or  Chaos,  below  is  one  of  the  first  acts  of  creation  or  rather  of  evolution,  in  every  cosmogony.

Hermes  in  Pymander  speaks  of  a  heaven  seen  in  seven  circles  with  seven

Gods,  surely  it  would  more  likely  be  the  Sanskrit,  the  perfect  form  of  the  most  perfect  language  on  earth,  than  the  Hebrew,  the  roughest  and  the  poorest.

For  once  anyone  believes  in  a  language  of  divine  origin,  he  can  hardly  believe  at  the  same  time  that  Angels  or  (jods  or  any  divine  Messengers  have  had  to  develop  it  from  a  rough  monosyllabic  form  into  a  perfect  one,  as  we  see  in  terrestrial  linguistic  evolution.

1  In  the  first  chapter  of  Genesis  the  word  "  God  "  represents  the  Elohim — Gods  in  the  plural,  not  one  God.

This  is  a  cunning  and  dishonest  translation.

For  the  whole  Kabalah  explains  sufficiently  that  the  Alhim  (Elohim)  are  seven  .  each  creates  one  of  the  seven  things  enumerated  in  the  first  chapter,  and  these  answer  allegorically  to  the  seven  creations  To  make  this  clear,  count  the  verses  in  which  it  is  said  "  And  God  saw  that  it  was  good,"  and  you  will  find  that  this  is  said  seven  times —  in  verses  4,  10,  12,  18,  21,  25,  and  31  And  though  the  compilers  cunningly  represent  the  creation  of  man  as  occurring  on  the  sixth  day,  yet,  having  made  man  ''  male  and  female  in  the  image  of  God,"  the  Seven  Elohim  repeat  the  sacramental  sentence,  "  It  was  good,"  for  the  seventh  time,  thus  making  of  man  the  seventh  creation,  and  showing  the  origin  of  this  bit  of  cosmogony  to  be  in  the  Hindu  creations.

The  Elohim  are,  of  course,  the  seven  Egyptian  KhnOmO,  the  assistant-architects  "  ;  the  seven  Amshaspends  of  the  Zoroastnans  ;  the  Seven  Spirits  subordinate  to  lldabaoth  of  the  Nazareans  ,  the  seven  Prajdpati  of  the  Hindus,  etc.

HEBREW  ALLEGORIES

<3ods  in  them.

We  examine  the  Assyrian  tiles  and  find  the  same  on  them —  the  seven  creative  Gods  busy  each  in  his  own  sphere.

The  cuneiform  legends  narrate  how  Bel  prepared  the  seven  mansions  of  the  Gods  ;  how  heaven  was  .separated  from  the  earth.

In  the  Brahmanical  allegory  everything  is  septen-  ary, from  the  seven  zones,  or  envelopes,  of  the  Mundane  Egg  down  to  the  seven  continents,  islands,  seas,  etc.

The  six  days  of  the  week  and  the  seventh,  the  Sabbath,  are  based  primarily  on  the  seven  creations  of  the  Hindu  Brahma,  the  seventh  being  that  of  man  ;  and  secondarily  on  the  number  of  generation.

It  is  pre-eminently  and  most  conspicuously  phallic.

In  the  Babylonian  system  the  seventh  day,  or  period,  was  that  in  which  man  and  the  animals  were  created.

2.  The    Elohim    make   a   woman   out   of   Adam's   rib.1     This  process  is  found  in  the  Magical  Texts  translated  by  G.  Smith.

The  seven  spirits  bring  forth  the  woman  from  the  loins  of  the  man,  explains  Mr.  Sayce  in  his  Hibbert  Lectures.

'J

The  mystery  of  the  woman  who  was  made  from  the  "man  is  repeated  in  every  national  religion,  and  in  Scriptures  far  antedating  the  Jewish.

You  find  it  in  the  Avestan  fragments,  in  the  Egyptian  Book  of  the  Dead,  and  finally  in  Brahma,  the  male,  separating  from  himself,  as  a  female  self,  Vach,  in  whom  •he  creates  Viraj.

3.  The  two  Adams  of  the  first  and  second  chapters  in  Genesis  originated  from  garbled  exoteric  accounts  coming  from  the  Chaldeans  and  the  Egyptian  Gnostics,    revised    later   from   the    Persian   traditions,   most  of  which  are  old  Aryan   allegories.

As  Adam   Kadmon  is  the  seventh  creation, s  so  the  Adam  of  dust  is  the  eighth  ;   and  in  the  Puranas  one  finds  an  eighth,  the  Anugraha  creation,   and   the    Egyptian   Gnostics   had   it.      Irenaeus,    complaining  of  the  heretics,  says  of  the  Gnostics  :

Sometimes  they  will  have  him  [man]  to  have  been  made  on  the  sixth  day,  and  sometimes  on  the  eighth.

The  author  of  The  Hebrew  and  Other  Creations  writes  .

These  two  creations  of  man  on  the  sixth  day  and  on  the  eighth  were  those  of  the  Adamic,  or  fleshly  man,  and  of  the  spiritual  man,  who  were  known  to  Paul  and  the  Gnostics  as  the  first  and  second  Adam,  the  man  of  earth  and  the  man  of  Heaven.

Irenaeus  also  says  they  insisted  that  Moses  began  with  the  Ogdoad  of  the  Seven  Powers  and  their  mother,  Sophia  (the  old  Kefa  of  Egypt,  who  is  the  Living  Word  at  Ombos)/

Sophia  is  also  Aditi  with  her  seven  sons.

1  Gen.,  ii,  21,  22  2  Op   at  ,  p   395,  note.

1  The  seventh  esotencally,  exotencally  the  sixth

4  Contra  Haereses,  \,  xvii.

2  •'  Op    cit    by  Gerald  Massey,  p.

200  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

One  might  go  on  enumerating  and  tracing  the  Jewish  "  revelations  "  acf  infinitum  to  their  original  sources,  were  it  not  that  the  task  is  superfluous,  since  so  much  is  already  done  in  that  direction  by  others — and  done  thorough-  ly well,  as  in  the  case  of  Gerald  Massey,  who  has  sifted  the  subject  to  the  very  bottom.

Hundreds  of  volumes,  treatises,  and  pamphlets  are  being  written  yearly  in  defence  of  the  "  divine-inspiration  "  claim  for  the  Bible  ;  but  symbolical  and  archaeological  research  is  coming  to  the  rescue  of  truth  and  fact — therefore  of  the  Esoteric  Doctrine — upsetting  every  argument  based  on  faith  and  breaking  it  as  an  idol  with  feet  of  clay.

A  curious  and  learned  book,  Jhe  Approaching  End  of  the  Age,  by  H.  Grattan  Guinness,  professes  to-  solve  the  mysteries  of  the  Bible  chronology  and  to  prove  thereby  God's  direct  revelation  to  man.

Among  other  things  its  author  thinks  that .

It   is   impossible   to   deny  that  a  sept/form  chronology  was  divinely  appointed  irv  the  elaborate  ritual  of  Judaism.

This  statement  is  innocently  accepted  and  fervently  believed  in  by  thousands  and  tens  of  thousands,  only  because  they  are  ignorant  of  the  Bibles  of  other  nations.

Two  pages  from  a  small  pamphlet,  a  lecture  by  Mr.  Gerald  Massey,1  so  upset  the  arguments  and  proofs  of  the  enthusiastic  Mr.  Grattan  Guinness,  spread  over  760  pages  of  small  print,  as  to  prevent  them  from  ever  raising  their  heads  any  more.

Mr.  Massey  treats  of  the  Fall,  and  says :

Here,  as  before,  the  genesis  does  not  begin  at  the  beginning.

There  was  an  earlier  Fall  than  that  of  the  Primal  Pair.

In  this  the  number  of  those  who  failed  and'  fell  was  seven.

We  meet  with  those  seven  in  Egypt— eight  with  the  Mother — where  they  are  called  the  "  Children  of  Inertness,"  who  were  cast  out  from  Am-Smen,  the  Paradise  of  the  Eight ;  also  in  a  Babylonian  legend  of  Creation,  as  the  Seven  Brethren,  who  were  Seven  Kings,  like  the  Seven  Kings  in  the  Book  of  Revelation  ,  and  the  Seven  Non-Sentient  Powers,  who  became  the  Seven  Rebel  Angels  that  made  war  in  heaven  The  Seven  Kronidae,  described  as  the  Seven  Watchers,  who  in  the  beginning  were  formed  in  the  interior  of  heaven.

The  heaven,  like  a  vault,  they  extended  or  hollowed  out ,  that  which  was  not  visible  they  raised,  and  that  which  had  no  exit  they  opened  ,  their  work  of  creation  being  exactly  identical  with  that  of  the  Elohim  in  the  Book  of  Genesis.

These  are  the  Seven  elemental  Powers  of  space,  who  were  continued  as  Seven  Timekeepers  It  is  said  of  them  :  "In  watching  was  their  office,  but  among  the  stars  of  heaven  their  watch  they  kept  not,"  and  their  failure  was  the  Fall.

In  the  Book  of  Enoch  the  same  Seven  Watchers  in  heaven  are  stars  which  transgressed  the  com-  mandment of  God  before  their  time  arrived,  for  they  came  not  in  their  proper  season,  therefore  was  he  offended  with  them,  and  bound  them  until  the  period  of  the  con-  summation of  their  crimes,  at  the  end  of  the  secret,  or  great  year  of  the  World,  i.e.,  the  Period  of  Precession,  when  there  was  to  be  restoration  and  rebeginning.

The  Seven'  deposed  constellations  are  seen  by  Enoch,  looking  like  seven  great  blazing  mountains  overthrown — the  seven  mountains  in  Revelation,  on  which  the  Scarlet  Lady  sits.*

1  Op  cit  ,  p.

•  The  Hebrew  and  other  Creations  ,  with  a  reply  to  Professor  A.  H.  Sayce,  p

HEBREW  ALLEGORIES  20  T

There  are  seven  keys  to  this,  as  to  every  other  allegory,  whether  in  the  Bible  or  in  pagan  religions.

While  Mr.  Massey  has  hit  upon  the  key  in  the  mysteries  of  cosmogony,  John  Bentley  in  his  Hindu  Astronomy  claims  that  the  Fall  of  the  Angels,  or  War  in  Heaven,  as  given  by  the  Hindus,  is  but  a  figure  of  the  calculations  of  time-periods,  and  goes  on  to  show  that  among  the  Western  nations  the  same  war,  with  like  results,  took  the  form  of  the  war  of  the  Titans.

In  short,  he  makes  it  astronom/ca/.  So  does  the  author  of  The  Source  of  Measures :

The  celestial  sphere  with  the  earth,  was  divided  into  twelve  compartments  [astronomically],  and  these  compartments  were  esteemed  as  sexed,  the  lords  or  husbands  being  respectively  the  planets  presiding  over  them  This  being  the  settled  scheme,  want  of  proper  correction  would  bring  it  to  pass,  after  a  time,  that  error  and  confusion  would  ensue  by  the  compartments  coming  under  the  lordship  of  the  wrong  planets  Instead  of  lawful  wedlock,  there  would  be  illegal  intercourse,  as  between  the  planets,  "  sons  of  Elohim,"  and  these  compartments,  "  daughters  of  H-Adam,"  or  of  the  earth-man  ;  and  in  fact  the  fourth  verse  of  sixth  Genesis  will  bear  this  interpretation  for  the  usual  one,  viz.,  "  In  the  same  days,  or  periods,  there  were  untimely  births  in  the  earth  ;  and  also  behind  that,  when  the  sons  of  Elohim  came  to  the  daughters  of  H-Adam,  they  begat  to  them  the  offspring  of  harlotry,"  etc.,  astronomically  indicating  this  confusion.

Do  any  of  these  learned  explanations  explain  anything  except  a  possible  ingenious  allegory,  and  a  personification  of  the  celestial  bodies,  by  the  ancient  Mythologists  and  Priests  ?  Carried  to  their  last  word  they  would  undeniably  explain  much,  and  would  thus  furnish  one  of  the  right  seven  keys,  fitting  a  great  many  of  the  BiblicaJ  puzzles,  yet  opening  none  naturally  and  entirely,  instead  of  being  scientific  and  cunning  master-keys.

But  they  yet  prove  one  thing — that  neither  the  septiform  chronology  nor  the  septiform  theogony  and  evolution  of  ail  things  is  of  divine  origin  in  the  Bible.

For  let  us  see  the  sources  at  which  the  Bible  sipped  its  divine  inspiration  with  regard  to  the  sacred  number  seven.

Says  Mr.  Massey  in  the  same  lecture :

The  Book  of  Genesis  tells  us  nothing  about  the  nature  of  these  Elohim,  erro-  neously rendered  "  God,"  who  are  creators  of  the  Hebrew  beginning,  and  who  are  them-  selves pre-extant  and  seated  when  the  theatre  opens  and  the  curtain  ascends  It  says  that  in  the  beginning  the  Elohim  created  the  heaven  and  the  earth.

In  thousands  of  books  the  Elohim  have  been  discussed,  but  .  .  with  no  conclusive  result.

.  .  The  Elohim  are  Seven  in  number,  whether  as  nature-powers,  gods  of  constellations,  or  planetary  gods,  ...  as  the  Pitris  and  Patriarchs,  Manus  and  Fathers  of  earlier  times  The  Gnostics,  however,  and  the  Jewish  Kabalah  preserve  an  account  of  the  Elohim  of  Genesis  by  which  we  are  able  to  identify  them  with  other  forms  of  the  seven  primordial

powers Their  names  are  lldabaoth,  Jehovah  (or  Jao),  Sabaoth,  Adonai,  Eloeus,

Oreus,   and   Astanphaeus.

lldabaoth   signifies   the  Lord  God  of  the  fathers,  that  is  the  fathers  who   preceded   the   Father  ,  and   thus   the   seven   are  identical  with  the  seven

1  Op  cit  ,  p

202  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Pitris  or  Fathers  of  India  (Irenaeus,  B.  I,  xxx,  5).  Moreover,  the  Hebrew  Elohim  were  pre-extant  by  name  and  nature  as  Phoenician  divinities  or  powers,  Sanchoniathon  mentions  them  by  name,  and  describes  them  as  Auxiliaries  of  Kronos  or  Time.

In  this  phase,  then,  the  Elohim  are  time-keepers  in  heaven  '  In  the  Phoenician  mythology  the  Elohim  are  the  Seven  sons  of  Sydik  [Melchizedek],  identical  with  the  Seven  Kabiri,  who  in  Egypt  are  the  Seven  sons  of  Ptah,  and  the  Seven  Spirits  of  Ra  in  The  Book  of  the  Dead ,  ...  in  America  with  the  seven  Hohgates,  ...  in  Assyria  with  the  seven  Lumazi.

.  .  They  are  always  seven  in  number  .  .  .  who  Kab — that  is,  turn  round,  together,  whence  the  "  Kab-in."  .  .  They  are  also  the  Hi  or  Gods,  in  Assyrian,  who  were  seven  in  number  I  .  .  They  were  first  born  of  the  Mother  in  Space,1  and  then  the  Seven  Companions  passed  into  the  sphere  of  time  as  auxiliaries  of  Kronos,  or  Sons  of  the  Male  Parent.

As  Damascius  says  in  his  Primitive  Principles,  the  Magi  consider  that  space  and  time  were  the  source  of  all ;  and  from  being  powers  of  the  air  the  gods  were  promoted  to  become  time-keepers  for  men.

Seven  constellations  were  assigned  to  them.

...  As  the  seven  turned  round  in  the  ark  of  the  sphere  they  were  designated  the  Seven  Sailors'  Companions,  Rishis,  or  Elohim.

The  first  "  Seven  Stars  "  are  not  planetary.

They  are  the  leading  stars  of  seven  constellations  which  turned  round  with  the  Great  Bear  in  describing  the  circle  of  the  year.'2  These  the  Assyrians  called  the  seven  Lumazi,  or  leaders  of  the  flocks  of  stars,  designated  sheep.

On  the  Hebrew  line  of  descent  or  development,  these  Elohim  are  identified  for  us  by  the  Kabalists  and  Gnostics,  who  retained  the  hidden  wisdom  or  gnosis,  the  clue  of  which  is  absolutely  essential  to  any  proper  understanding  of  mythology  or  theology.

.  There  were  two  constellations  with  seven  stars  each.

We  call  them  the  Two  Bears.

But  the  seven  stars  of  the  Lesser  Bear  were  once  considered  to  be  the  seven  heads  of  the  Polar  Dragon,  which  we  meet  with — as  the  beast  with  seven  heads — in  the  Akkadian  Hymns  and  in  Revelation.

The  mythical  dragon  originated  in  the  crocodile,  which  is  the  dragon  of  Egypt.

.  .  Now  in  one  particular  cult,  the  Sut-Typhonian,  the  first  god  was  Sevekh  [the  seven-fold],  who  wears  the  crocodile's  head,  as  well  as  the  Serpent,  and  who  is  the  Dragon,  or  whose  con-  stellation was  the  Dragon.

...  In  Egypt  the  Great  Bear  was  the  constellation  of  Typhon,  or  Kepha,  the  old  genetnx,  called  the  Mother  of  the  Revolutions  ;  and  the  Dragon  with  seven  heads  was  assigned  to  her  son,  Sevekh-Kronos,  or  Saturn,  called  the  Dragon  of  Life  That  is,  the  typical  dragon  or  serpent  with  seven  heads  was  female  at  first,  and  then  the  type  was  continued,  as  male  in  her  son  Sevekh,  the  Sevenfold  Serpent,  in  Ea  the  Sevenfold,  .  .  .  lao  Chnubis,  and  others.

We  find  these  two  in  The  Book  of  Revelation.

One  is  the  Scarlet  Lady,  the  mother  of  mystery,  the  great  harlot,  who  sat  on  a  scarlet-coloured  beast  with  seven  heads,  which  is  the  Red  Dragon  of  the  Pole  She  held  in  her  hand  the  unclean  things  of  her  fornication.

That  means  the  emblems  of  the  male  and  female,  imaged  by  the  Egyptians  at  the  Polar  Centre,  the  very  uterus  of  creation,  as  was  indicated  by  the  Thigh  constellation,  called  the  Khepsh  of  Typhon,  the  old  Dragon,  in  the  northern  birthplace  of  Time  in  heaven.

The  two  revolved  about  the  pole  of  heaven,  or  the  Tree,  as  it  was  called,  which  was  figured  at  the  centre  of  the  starry  motion.

In  The  Book  of  Enoch  these  two  constellations  are  identified  as  Leviathan  and  Behemoth-Bekhmut,  or  the  Dragon  and  Hippopotamus  Great  Bear,  and  they  are  the  primal  pair  that  were  first  created  in  the  Garden  of  Eden.

So  that  the  Egyptian  first  mother,  Kef  a  [or  Kepha]  whose  name  signifies  "  mystery,"  was  the  original  of  the  Hebrew  Chavah,  our  Eve  ,  and  therefore  Adam  is  one  with  Sevekh  the  sevenfold  one,  the  solar  dragon  in  whom  the  powers  of  light  and  darkness

1  When  they  are  the  Anupadakas  (Parentless)  of  the  Secret  Doctrine.

See  STANZA,  I  .  9,  Vol.

1 .

-These  originated  with  the  Aryans,  who  placed  therein  their  "  bright-crested  "  (Chitra-Shikhan-  dan)  Seven  Rishis.

But  all  this  is  far  more  Occult  than  appears  on  the  surface

HEBREW  ALLEGORIES

were  combined,  and  the  sevenfold  nature  was  shown  in  the  seven  rays  worn  by  the  Gnostic  lao-Chnubis,  g&d  of  the  number  seven,  who  is  Sevekh  by  name  and  a  form  of  the  first  father  as  head  of  the  Seven

All  this  gives  the  key  to  the  astronomical  prototype  of  the  allegory  in  Genesis,  but  it  furnishes  no  other  key  to  the  mystery  involved  in  the  seven-  fold glyph.

The  able  Egyptologist  shows  also  that  Adam  himself  according  to  Rabbinical  and  Gnostic  tradition,  was  the  chief  of  the  Seven  who  fell  from  Heaven,  and  he  connects  these  with  the  Patriarchs,  thus  agreeing  with  the  Esoteric  Teaching.

For  by  mystic  permutation  and  the  mystery  of  primeval  rebirths  and  adjustment,  the  Seven  Rishis  are  in  reality  identical  with  the  seven  Prajapatis,  the  fathers  and  creators  of  mankind,  and  also  with  the  Kumaras,  the  first  sons  of  Brahma,  who  refused  to  procreate  and  multiply.

This  apparent  contradiction  is  explained  by  the  seven-fold  nature — make  it  four-fold  on  metaphysical  principles  and  it  will  come  to  the  same  thing — of  the  celestial  men,  the  Dhyan  Chohans.

This  nature  is  made  to  divide  and  separate  ;  and  while  the  higher  principles  (Atma-Buddhi)  of  the  "  Creators  of  Men  "  are  said  to  be  the  Spirits  of  the  seven  constellations,  their  middle  and  lower  principles  are  connected  with  the  earth  and  are  shown

without     desire    or    passion,    inspired   with   holy   wisdom,   estranged  from   the  universe  and  undesirous  of  progeny,

remaining  Kumaric  (virgin  and  undefiled)  ;  therefore  it  is  said  they  refused  to  create.

For  this  they  are  cursed  and  sentenced  to  be  born  and  reborn  "Adams,"  as  the  Semites  would  say.

Meanwhile  let  me  quote  a  few  lines  more  from  Mr.  G.  Massey's  lecture,  the  fruit  of  his  long  researches  in  Egyptology  and  other  ancient  lore,  as  it  shows  that  the  septenary  division  was  at  one  time  a  universal  doctrine  :

Adam  as  the  father  among  the  Seven  is  identical  with  the  Egyptian  Atum,  .  .  whose  other  name  of  Adon  is  identical  with  the  Hebrew  Adonai  In  this  way  the  second  Creation  in  Genesis  reflects  and  continues  the  later  creation  in  the  mythos  which  explains  it.  The  Fall  of  Adam  to  the  lower  world  led  to  his  being  humanized  on  earth,  by  which  process  the  celestial  was  turned  into  the  mortal,  and  this,  which  belongs  to  the  astronomical  allegory,  got  literalized  as  the  Fall  of  Man,  or  descent  of  the  soul  into  matter,  and  the  conversion  of  the  angelic  into  an  earthly  being.

.  It  is  found  in  the  [Babylonian]  texts,  when  Ea,  the  first  father,  is  said  to  "grant  forgive-  ness to  the  conspiring  gods,"  for  whose  "  redemption  did  he  create  mankind  "  (Sayce  ,  Hib.

Lee  ,  p  140)  .  The  Elohim,  then,  are  the  Egyptian,  Akkadian,  Hebrew,  and

Phoenician  form  of  the  Universal  Seven  Powers,  who  are  Seven  in  Egypt,  Seven  in  Akkad,  Babylon,  Persia,  India,  Britain,  and  Seven  among  the  Gnostics  and  Kabalists.

They  were  the  Seven  fathers  who  preceded  the  Father  in  Heaven,  because  they  were

1  Op.  at.,  pp.  19-22.

2  Vishnu  Purana,   Wilson's  Trans.,   vol.

i,  p.  101.     The  period  of  these  Kumaras  is  Pre-Adamic,  re.,  before  the  separation  of  sexes,  and  before  humanity  had  received  the  creative,  or  sacred,  fire  of  Prometheus.

204  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

earlier  than  the  individualised  fatherhood  on  earth  .  When  the  Elohim  said  •  "  Let  us  make  man  in  our  image,  after  our  likeness,"  there  were  seven  of  them  who  repre-  sented the  seven  elements,  powers,  or  souls  that  went  to  the  making  of  the  human  being  who  came  into  existence  before  the  Creator  was  represented  anthropomorphic-  ally,  or  could  have  conferred  the  human  likeness  on  the  Adamic  man.

It  was  in  the  sevenfold  image  of  the  Elohim  that  man  was  first  created,  with  his  seven  elements,  principles  or  souls,1  and  therefore  he  could  not  have  been  formed  in  the  image  of  the  one  God.

The  seven  Gnostic  Elohim  tried  to  make  a  man  in  their  own  image,  but  could  not  for  lack  of  virile  power  *  Thus  their  creation  in  earth  and  heaven  was  a  failure  .  .  because  they  themselves  were  lacking  in  the  soul  of  the  fatherhood  '  When  the  Gnostic  lldabaoth,'1  chief  of  the  Seven,  cried  •  "  I  am  the  father  and  God,"  his  mother  Sophia  [Achamoth]  replied  .  "  Do  not  tell  lies,  lldabaoth,  for  the  first  man  (Anthropos,  son  of  Anthropos)4  is  above  thee."  That  is,  man  who  had  now  been  created  in  the  image  of  the  fatherhood  was  superior  to  the  gods  who  were  derived  from  the  Mother-Parent  alone '  '  For,  as  it  had  been  first  on  earth,  so  was  it  afterwards  in  heaven  [the  Secret  Doctrine  teaches  the  reverse] ,  and  thus  the  primary  gods  were  held  to  be  soulless  like  the  earliest  races  of  men.

.  The  Gnostics  taught  that  the  Spirits  of  Wickedness,  the  inferior  Seven,  derived  their  origin  from  the  great  Mother  alone,  who  produced  without  the  fatherhood  !  It  was  in  the  image,  then,  of  the  seven-  fold Elohim  that  the  seven  races  were  formed  which  we  sometimes  hear  of  as  the  Pre-  Adamite  races  of  men,  because  they  were  earlier  than  the  fatherhood,  which  was.

individualised  only  in  the  second  Hebrew  Creation  ''

This  shows  sufficiently  how  the  echo  of  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE — of  the  Third  and  Fourth  Races  of  men,  made  complete  by  the  incarnation  in  humanity  of  the  Manasa  Putra,  Sons  of  Intelligence  or  Wisdom — reached  every  corner  of  the  globe.

The  Jews,  however,  although  they  borrowed  of  the  older  nations  the  groundwork  on  which  to  build  their  revelation,  never  had  more  than  three  keys  out  of  the  seven  in  their  mind,  while  composing  their  national  allegories  — the  astronomical,  the  numerical  (metrology),  and  above  all  the  purely  anthropological,  or  rather  physiological  key.

This  resulted  in  the  most  phallic  religion  of  all,  and  has  now  passed,  part  and  parcel,  into  Christian  theology,  as  is  proved  by  the  lengthy  quotations  made  from  a  lecture  of  an  able  Egypt-  ologist, who  can  make  naught  of  it  save  astronomical  myths  and  phallicism,  as  is  implied  by  his  explanations  of  "  fatherhood  "  in  the  allegories.

1  The  Secret   Doctrine  says  that  this  was  the  second  creation,  not  the  first,  and  that  it  took  place  during  the  Third  Race,  when  men  separated,  /  e  ,  began  to  be  born  as  distinct  men  and  women.

See  Vols   3  and  4  of  this  work,  STANZAS  and  Commentaries

2  This  is  a  Western  mangling  of  the  Indian  doctrine  of  the  Kumdras

'  He  was  regarded  by  several  Gnostic  sects  as  one  with  Jehovah      See  Isis  Unveiled,  II,  p

4  Or   "  man,   son  of  man  "     The  Church  found  in  this  a  prophecy  and  a  confession  of  Christ,  the  '  Son  of  Man  1  "

•''  See  STANZA  2  •  5,  Volume  3,  p   63  "  Op   cit.,  pp.  23.  24.

SECTION

THE  -ZOHAR"  ON  CREATION  AND  THE  ELOHIM

THE  opening  sentence  in  Genesis,  as  every  Hebrew  scholar  knows,  is  :

irwn  DNI  D^DOTI  nx  o-ni»x  N-O  rvwna

Now  there  are  two  well-known  ways  of  rendering  this  line,  as  any  other  Hebrew  writing  :  one  exoteric,  as  read  by  the  orthodox  Bible  interpreters  (Christian),  and  the  other  Kabalistic,  the  latter,  moreover,  being  divided  into  the  Rabbinical  and  the  purely  Kabalistic  or  Occult  method.

As  in  Sanskrit  writing,  the  words  are  not  separated  in  the  Hebrew,  but  are  made  to  run  together — especially  in  the  old  systems.

For  instance,  the  above,  divided,  would  read  :  "  B'rashith  bara  Elohim  eth  hashamayim  v'eth  h'areths  ,  "  and  it  can  be  made  to  read  thus :  "  B'rash  ithbara  Elohim  ethhashamayim  v'eth'-  arets,"  thus  changing  the  meaning  entirely.

The  latter  means,  "  In  the  beginning  God  made  the  heavens  and  the  earth,"  whereas  the  former,  pre-  cluding the  idea  of  any  beginning,  would  simply  read  that  "  out  of  the  ever-  existing  Essence  [divine]  [or  out  of  the  womb — also  head — thereof]  the  dual  [or  androgyne]  Force  [Gods]  shaped  the  double  heaven  ;  "  the  upper  and  the  lower  heaven  being  generally  explained  as  heaven  and  earth.

The  latter  word  means  Esoterically  the  "  Vehicle,"  as  it  gives  the  idea  of  an  empty  globe,  within  which  the  manifestation  of  the  world  takes  place.

Now  accord-  ing to  the  rules  of  Occult  symbolical  reading  as  established  in  the  old  Sepher  Yetz/reh  (in  the  Chaldean  Book  of  Numbers  l)  the  initial  fourteen  letters  (or  "  B'rasitb'  raalaim  ")  are  in  themselves  quite  sufficient  to  explain  the  theory  of  "  creation  "  without  any  further  explanation  or  qualification.

Every  letter  of  them  is  a  sentence  ;  and,  placed  side  by  side  with  the  hieroglyphic  or  pictorial  initial  version  of  "  creation  "  in  the  BOOK  OF  D2YAN,  the  origin  of  the  Phoenician  and  Jewish  letters  would  soon  be  found  out.

A  whole  volume

1  The  Sepher  Yetzireh  now  known  is  but  a  portion  of  the  original  one  incorporated  in  the  Chaldean  Book  of  Numbers.

The  fragment  now  in  possession  of  the  Western  Kabalists  is  one  greatly  tampered  with  by  the  Rabbis  of  the  Middle  Ages,  as  its  masoretic  points  show.

The  "  Masorah  "  scheme  is  a  modern  blind,  dating  after  our  era  and  perfected  in  Tiberias  (See  Isis  Unveiled,  II,  pp  430-31  )

206  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

of  explanations  would  give  no  more  to  the  student  of  primitive  Occult  Sym-  bology  than  this  :  the  head  of  a  bull  within  a  circle,  a  straight  horizontal  line,  a  circle  or  sphere,  then  another  one  with  three  dots  in  it,  a  triangle,  then  the  Svastika  (or  Jaina  cross)  ;  after  these  come  an  equilateral  triangle  within  a  circle,  seven  small  bulls'  heads  standing  in  three  rows,  one  over  the  other ;  a  black  round  dot  (an  opening),  and  then  seven  lines,  meaning  Chaos  or  Water  (feminine).

Anyone  acquainted  with  the  symbolical  and  numerical  value  of  the  Hebrew  letters  will  see  at  a  glance  that  this  glyph  and  the  letters  of  "  B'rasitb'  raalaim  "  are  identical  in  meaning.

"  Beth  "  is  "  abode  "  or  "  region  "  ;  "  Resh,"  a  "  circle  "  or  "  head  ;  "  "  Aleph,"  "  bull  "  (the  symbol  of  generative  or  creative  power  ')  ;  "  Shin,"  a  "  tooth  "  (300  exoterically — a  trident  or  three  in  one  in  its  Occult  meaning)  ;  "  Jodh,"  the  perfect  unity  or  "  one  "  ; 2  "  Tau,"  the  "  root  "  or  "  foundation  "  (the  same  as  the  cross  with  the  Egyp-  tians and  Aryans)  :  again,  "  Beth,"  "  Resh,"  and  "  Aleph."  Then  "  Aleph,"  or  seven  bulls  for  the  seven  Alaim ;  an  ox-goad,  "  Lamedh,"  active  procrea-  tion ;  "  He,"  the  opening  "  or  "  matrix  "  ;  "  Yodh,"  the  organ  of  procrea-  tion ;  and  "  Mem,"  "  water  "  or  "  chaos,"  the  female  Power  near  the  male  that  precedes  it.

The  most  satisfactory  and  scientific  exoteric  rendering  of  the  opening  sentence  of  Genesis — on  which  was  hung  in  blind  faith  the  whole  Christian  religion,  synthesized  by  its  fundamental  dogmas — is  undeniably  the  one  given  in  the  Appendix  to  The  Source  of  Measures,  by  Mr.  Ralston  Skinner.

He  gives,  and  we  must  admit  in  the  ablest,  clearest,  and  most  scientific  way,  the  numerical  reading  of  this  first  sentence  and  chapter  in  Genesis.

By  the  means  of  number  31,  or  the  word  "  El  "  (1  for  "  Aleph  "  and  30  for  "  Lamedh  "),  and  other  numerical  Bible  symbols,  compared  with  the  measures  used  in  the  great  pyramid  of  Egypt,  he  shows  the  perfect  identity  between  its  measure-  ments— inches,  cubits,  and  plan — and  the  numerical  values  of  the  Garden  of  Eden,  Adam  and  Eve,  and  the  Patriarchs.

In  short,  the  author  shows  that  the

1  In  the  oldest  symbolism— that  used  in  the  Egyptian  hieroglyphics—when  the  bull's  head  only  is  found  it  means  the  Deity,  the  Perfect  Circle,  with  the  procreative  power  latent  in  it.     When  the  whole  bull   is  represented,   a   solar  God,   a  persona/  deity  is  meant,  for  it  is  then  the  symbol  of  the  acting  generative  power.

2  It  took  three  Root  Races  to  degrade  the  symbol  of  the  One  Abstract  Unity  manifested  in  Nature  as  a  Ray  emanating  from  infinity  (the  Circle)  into  a  phallic  symbol  of  generation,  as  it  was  even  in  the  Kabalah.

This  degradation  began  with  the  Fourth  Race,  and  had  its  ra/son  d'etre  in  Polytheism,  as  the  latter  was  invented  to  screen  the  One  Universal  Deity  from  profanation.

The  Christians  may  plead  ignorance  of  its  meaning  as  an  excuse  for  its  acceptance.

But  why  sing  never-ceasing  laudations  to  the  Mosaic  Jews  who  repudiated  all  the  other  Gods,   preserved  the  most  phallic,  and  then  most  impudently   proclaimed  themselves  Monotheists  ?  Jesus  ever  steadily  ignored  Jehovah      He  went  against  the  Mosaic  commandments.

He  recognized  his  Heavenly  Father  alone,  and  prohibited  public  worship

THE  "  ZOHAR  "  ON  CREATION  AND  THE  ELOHIM

pyramid  contains  in  itself  architecturally  the  whole  of  Genesis,  and  discloses  the  astronomical,  and  even  the  physiological,  secrets  in  its  symbols  and  glyphs  ;  yet  he  will  not  admit,  it  would  seem,  the  psycho-cosmical  and  spiritual  mysteries,  involved  in  these.

Nor  does  the  author  apparently  see  that  the  root  of  all  this  has  to  be  sought  in  the  archaic  legends  and  the  Pantheon  of  India.1  Fail-  ing this,  whither  does  his  great  and  admirable  labour  lead  him  ?  Not  further  than  to  find  out  that  Adam,  the  earth,  and  Moses  or  Jehovah  "  are  the  same  "  — or  to  the  a-b-c  of  comparative  Occult  Symbology — and  that  the  days  in.  Genesis  being  "  circles  "  "  displayed  by  the  Hebrews  as  squares,"  the  result  of  the  sixth-day's  labour  culminates  in  the  fructifying  principle.

Thus  the  8/b/e  is  made  to  yield  Phallicism,  and  that  alone.

Nor — read  in  this  light,  and  as  its  Hebrew  texts  are  interpreted  by  Western  scholars — can  it  ever  yield  anything  higher  or  more  sublime  than  such  phallic  elements,  the  root  and  the  corner-stone  of  its  dead-letter  mean-  ing.

Anthropomorphism  and  Revelation  dig  the  impassable  chasm  between,  the  material  world  and  the  ultimate  spiritual  truths.

That  creation  is  not  thus  described  in  the  Esoteric  Doctrine  is  easily  shown.

The  Roman  Catholics  give  a  reading  far  more  approaching  the  true  Esoteric  meaning  than  that  of  the  Protestant.

For  several  of  their  saints  and  doctors  admit  that  the  formation  of  heaven  and  earth,  of  the  celestial  bodies,  etc.,  belongs  to  the  work  of  the  "  Seven  Angels  of  the  Presence."  St.  Denys  calls  the  "  Builders  "  "the  co-  operators  of  God,"  and  St.  Augustine  goes  even  farther,  and  credits  the  Angels  with  the  possession  of  the  divine  thought,  the  prototype,  as  he  says,  of  everything  created.2  And,  finally,  St.  Thomas  Aquinas  has  a  long  disserta-  tion upon  this  topic,  calling  God  the  primary,  and  the  Angels  the  secondary,  cause  of  all  visible  effects.

In  this,  with  some  dogmatic  differences  of  form,  the  "Angelic  Doctor"  approaches  very  nearly  the  Gnostic  ideas.

Basilides  speaks  of  the  lowest  order  of  Angels  as  the  Builders  of  our  material  world,  and  Saturnilus  held,  as  did  the  Sabeans,  that  the  Seven  Angels  who  preside  over  the  planets  are  the  real  creators  of  the  world  ;  the  Kabalist-monk,.  Trithemius,  in  his  De  Secundis  Deis,  taught  the  same.

1  Is  it  everything  to  have  found  out  that  the  celestial  circle  of  360°  is  determined  by  "  the  full  word-form  of  Elohim,"  and  that  this  yields,  when  the  word  is  placed  in  a  circle,  "  3'1415.  or  the  relation  of  circumference  to  a  diameter  of  one  "  This  is  only  its  astronomical  or  mathematical  aspect.

To  know  the  full  septenary  significance  of  the  "  Primordial  Circle,"  the  pyramid  and  the  Kabalistic  Bible  must  be  read  in  the  light  of  the  figure  on  which  the  temples  of  India  are  built.

The  mathematical  squaring  of  the  circle  is  only  the  terrestrial  resume  of  the  problem.

The  Jews  were  content  with  the  six  days  of  activity  and  the  seventh  of  rest.

The  progenitors  of  mankind  solved  the  greatest  problems  of  the  Universe  with  their  seven  Rays  or  Rishis.

3  Genesis  begins  with  the  third  stage  of  "  creation,"  skipping  the  preliminary  two

208  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

The  eternal  Kosmos,  the  Macrocosm,  is  divided  in  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE,  like  man,  the  Microcosm,  into  three  Principles  and  four  Vehicles,1  which  in  their  collectivity  are  the  seven  Principles.

In  the  Chaldean  or  Jewish  Kabalah,  the  Kosmos  is  divided  into  seven  worlds  :  the  Original,  the  Intelligible,  the  Celestial,  the  Elementary,  the  Lesser  (Astral),  the  Infernal  (Kama-loka  or  Hades),  and  the  Temporal  (of  man).  In  the  Chaldean  system  it  is  in  the  Intelligible  World,  the  second,  that  appear  the  "  Seven  Angels  of  the  Pre-  sence," or  the  Sephiroth  (the  three  higher  ones  being,  in  fact,  one,  and  also  the  sum  total  of  all).  They  are  also  the  "  Builders  "  of  the  Eastern  Doctrine  :  and  it  is  only  in  the  third,  the  celestial  world,  that  the  seven  planets  and  our  solar  system  are  built  by  the  seven  Planetary  Angels,  the  planets  becoming  their  visible  bodies.

Hence — as  correctly  stated — if  the  universe  as  a  whole  is  formed  out  of  the  Eternal  One  Substance  or  Essence,  it  is  not  that  ever-  lasting Essence,  the  Absolute  Deity,  that  builds  it  into  shape  ;  this  is  done  by  the  first  Rays,  the  Angels  or  Dhyan  Chohans,  that  emanate  from  the  One  Element,  which  becoming  periodically  Light  and  Darkness,  remains  eternally,  ,in  its  Root-Principle,  the  one  unknown  yet  existing  Reality.

A  learned  Western  Kabalist,  Mr.  S.  L.  MacGregor  Mathers,  whose  reasoning  and  conclusions  will  be  the  more  above  suspicion  since  he  is  untrained  in  Eastern  Philosophy  and  unacquainted  with  its  Secret  Teachings,  writes  on  the  first  verse  of  Genesis  in  an  unpublished  essay  :

Berash/th  Bara  Elohim — "  In  the  beginning  the  Elohim  created '  "  Who  are  these  Elohim  of  Genesis  ?

Va-Y»Vra  Elohim  Ath  Ha- Adam  Be-Jzalmo,  Be-Tze/em  Elohim  Bara  Otho,  Zakhar  Vingebah  Bara  Otham — "  And  the  Elohim  created  the  Adam  in  Their  own  Image,  in  the  Image  of  the  Elohim  created  They  them,  Male  and  Female  created  They  them  I  "  Who  .are  they,  the  Elohim  ?  The  ordinary  English  translation  of  the  Bible  renders  the  word  Elohim  by  "God  "  it  translates  a  plural  noun  by  a  singular  one.

The  only  excuse  brought  forward  for  this  is  the  somewhat  lame  one  that  the  word  is  certainly  plural,  but  is  not  to  be  used  in  a  plural  sense  :  that  it  is  "  a  plural  denoting  excellence."  But  this  is  only  an  assumption  whose  value  may  be  justly  gauged  by  Genesis,  i,  26,  translated  in  the  orthodox  Biblical  version  thus  .  "  And  God  [Elohim]  said,  '  Let  us  make  man  in  our

1  The  three  root-principles  are,  exotencally  Man,  Soul,  and  Spirit  (meaning  by  "  man  "  the  in-  telligent personality),  and  esotencally  Life,  Soul,  and  Spirit ,  the  four  vehicles  are  Body,  Astral  double,  Animal  (or  human)  Soul,  and  Divine  Soul  (SthOla-Sharira,  Linga-Sharira,  Kama-rupa,  and  Buddhi,  the  vehicle  of  Atma  or  Spirit).  Or,  to  make  it  still  clearer .  (1)  the  Seventh  Principle  has  for  its  vehicle  the  Sixth  (Buddhi) ,  (2)  the  vehicle  of  Manas  is  Kama-rupa  ,  (3)  that  of  Jiva  or  Prana  (life)  is  the  Linga-Sharira  (the  "  double  "  of  man  ,  the  Linga-Sharira  proper  can  never  leave  the  body  till  death  ,  that  which  appears  is  an  astral  body,  reflecting  the  physical  body  and  serving  as  a  vehicle  for  the  human  soul,  or  intelligence) ,  and  (4)  the  Body,  the  physical  vehicle  of  all  the  above  collectively.

The  Occultist  recognizes  the  same  order  as  existing  for  the  cosmical  totality,  the  psycho-cosmical  Universe.

THE  ••  ZOHAR  "  ON  CREATION  AND  THE  ELOHIM

own  image,  after  our  likeness  '."   Here  is  a  distinct  admission  of  the  fact  that  "  Elohim  "  js  not  a  "  plural  of  excellence,"  but  a  plural  noun  denoting  more  than  one  being.

What,  then,  is  the  proper  translation  of  "  Elohim,"  and  to  whom  is  it  referable  ?  "  Elohim  "  is  not  only  a  plural,  but  a  feminine  plural !  And  yet  the  translators  of  the  Bible  have  rendered  it  by  a  masculine  singular !  Elohim  is  the  plural  of  the  feminine  noun  El-h,  for  the  final  letter,  -h,  marks  the  gender.

It,  however,  instead  of  forming  the  plural  in  -oth,  takes  the  usual  termination  of  the  masculine  plural,  which  is  -im.

Although  in  the  great  majority  of  cases  the  nouns  of  both  genders  take  the  terminations  appropriated  to  them  respectively,  there  are  yet  many  masculines  which  form  the  plural  in  -oth,  as  well  as  feminine  which  form  it  in  -im  while  some  nouns  of  each  gender  take  alternately  both.

It  must  be  observed,  however,  that  the  termination  of  the  plural  does  not  affect  its  gender,  which  remains  the  same  as  in  the  singular.

.

To  find  the  real  meaning  of  the  symbolism  involved  in  this  word  Elohim  we  must  go  to  that  key  of  Jewish  Esoteric  Doctrine,  the  little-known  and  less-understood  Kabalah.

There  we  shall  find  that  this  word  represents  two  united  mascdme  and  feminine  Poten-  cies, co-equal  and  co-eternal,  conjoined  in  everlasting  union  for  the  maintenance  of  the  Universe — the  great  Father  and  Mother  of  Nature,  into  whom  the  Eternal  One  con-  forms himself  before  the  Universe  can  subsist.

For  the  teaching  of  the  Kabalah  is  that  before  the  Deity  conformed  himself  thus — /  e  ,  as  male  and  female-  -the  Worlds  of  the  Universe  could  not  subsist,  or  in  the  words  of  Genesis,  that  "the  earth  was  formless  and  void  "  Thus,  then,  is  the  conformation  of  the  Elohim,  the  end  of  the  Formless  and  the  Void  and  the  Darkness,  for  only  after  that  conformation  can  the  Ruach  Elohim  — the  "  Spirit  of  the  Elohim  " — vibrate  upon  the  countenance  of  the  Waters.

But  this  is  a  very  small  part  of  the  information  which  the  Initiate  can  derive  from  the  Kabalah  concerning  this  word  Elohim.

Attention  must  here  be  called  to  the  confusion — if  not  worse — which  reigns  in  the  Western  interpretations  of  the  Kabalah.

The  Eternal  One  is  said  to  conform  himself  into  two  :  the  Great  Father  and  Mother  of  Nature.

To  begin  with,  it  is  a  horribly  anthropomorphic  conception  to  apply  terms  implying  sexual  distinction  to  the  earliest  and  first  differentiations  of  the  One.

And  it  is  even  more  erroneous  to  identify  these  first  differentiations — the  Purusha  and  Prakriti  of  Indian  Philosophy — with  the  Elohim,  the  creative  powers  here  spoken  of ;  and  to  ascribe  to  these  (to  our  intellects)  unimagin-  able abstractions,  the  formation  and  construction  of  this  visible  world,  full  of  pain,  sin,  and  sorrow.

In  truth,  the  "  creation  by  the  Elohim  "  spoken  of

1  St.  Denys,  the  Areopagite,  the  supposed  contemporary  of  St.  Paul,  his  co-disciple,  and  first  Bishop  of  St.  Denis,  near  Pans,  teaches  that  the  bulk  of  the  "work  of  creation  "  was  performed  by  the  "Seven  Spirits  of  the  Presence  " — God's  co-operators,  owing  to  a  participation  of  the  divinity  in  them  (Hierarcfi.,  p.  196.)  And  Saint  Augustine  also  thinks  that  "  things  were  rather  created  in  the  angelic  minds  than  in  Nature,  that  is  to  say,  that  the  angels  perceived  and  knew  them  (all  things)  in  their  thoughts  before  they  could  spring  forth  into  actual  existence."  (See  De  Genesw  ad  litteram  i.  II  )  (Summarized  from  De  Mirville,  Tome  n,  pp.  337-38.)  Thus  the  early  Christian  Fathers,  even  a  non-initiate  like  St.  Augustine,  ascribed  the  creation  of  the  visible  world  to  Angels,  or  Secondary  Powers,  while  St.  Denys  not  only  specifies  these  as  the  "Seven  Spirits  of  the  Presence,"  but  shows  -them  owing  their  power  to  the  informing  divine  energy— Fohat  in  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE.

But  the  egotistical  darkness  which  caused  the  Western  races  to  cling  so  desperately  to  the  Geo-centric  System,  made  them  also  neglect  and  despise  all  those  fragments  of  the  true  Religion  which  would  have  deprived  them  and  the  little  globe  they  took  for  the  centre  of  the  Universe  of  the  signal  honour  of  having  been  expressly  "  created  "  by  the  One,  Secondless,  Infinite  God  '

FF

210  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

here  is  but  a  much  later  "  creation,"  and  the  Elohim  far  from  being  supreme,  or  even  exalted  powers  in  Nature,  are  only  lower  Angels.

This  was  the  teaching  of  the  Gnostics,  the  most  philosophical  of  all  the  early  Christian  Churches.

They  taught  that  the  imperfections  of  the  world  were  due  to  the  imperfection  of  its  Architects  or  Builders — the  imperfect,  and  therefore  in-  ferior, Angels.

The  Hebrew  Elohim  correspond  to  the  Prajapati  of  the  Hindus,  and  it  is  shown  elsewhere  from  the  Esoteric  interpretation  of  the  Puranas  that  the  Prajapati  were  the  fashioners  of  man's  material  and  astral  form  only  :  that  they  could  not  give  him  intelligence  or  reason,  and  therefore  in  symbolical  language  they  "  failed  to  create  man."  But,  not  to  repeat  what  the  reader  can  find  elsewhere  in  this  work,  his  attention  needs  only  to  be  called  to  the  fact  that  ''creation"  in  this  passage  is  not  the  Primary  Creation,  and  that  the  Elohim  are  not  "  God,"  nor  even  the  higher  Planetary  Spirits,  but  the  Architects  of  this  visible  physical  planet  and  of  man's  material  body,  or  encasement.

A  fundamental  doctrine  of  the  Kabalah  is  that  the  gradual  development  of  the  Deity  from  negative  to  positive  Existence  is  symbolized  by  the  gradual  development  of  the  Ten  Numbers  of  the  denary  scale  of  numeration,  from  the  Zero,  through  the  Unity,  into  the  Plurality  This  is  the  doctrine  of  the  Sephiroth,  or  Emanations.

For  the  inward  and  concealed  Negative  Form  concentrates  a  centre  which  is  the  primal  Unity.

But  the,  Unity  is  one  and  indivisible .  it  can  neither  be  increased  by  multiplication  nor  decreased  by  division,  for  I  x  I  I,  and  no  more ,  and  I  —  I-  I,  and  no  less.

And  it  is  this  changelessness  of  the  Unity,  or  Monad,  which  makes  it  a  fitting  type  of  the  One  and  Changeless  Deity  It  answers  thus  to  the  Christian  idea  of  God  the  Father,  for  as  the  Unity  is  the  parent  of  the  other  numbers,  so  is  the  Deity  the  Father  of  All

The  philosophical  Eastern  mind  would  never  fall  into  the  error  which  the  connotat/on  of  these  words  implies.

With  them  the  "  One  and  Changeless  "  — Parabrahman — the  Absolute  All  and  One,  cannot  be  conceived  as  standing  in  any  relation  to  things  finite  and  conditioned,  and  hence  they  would  never  use  such  terms  as  these,  which  in  their  very  essence  imply  such  a  relation.

Do  they,  then,  absolutely  sever  man  from  God  ?  On  the  contrary.

They  feel  a  closer  union  than  the  Western  mind  has  done  in  calling  God  the  "  Father  of  All,"  for  they  know  that  in  his  immortal  essence  man  is  himself  the  Changeless,  Secondless  One.

But  we  have  just  said  that  the  Unity  is  one  and  changeless  by  either  multiplica-  tion or  division  ;  how  then  is  two,  the  Duad,  formed  ?  By  reflection.

For,  unlike  Zero,  the  Unity  is  partly  definable — that  is,  in  its  positive  aspect ;  and  the  definition  creates  an  Eikon  or  Eidolon  of  itself  which,  together  with  itself,  forms  a  Duad ;  and  thus  the  number  two  is  to  a  certain  extent  analogous  to  the  Christian  idea  of  the  Son  as  the  '  Second  Person.

And  as  the  Monad  vibrates,  and  recoils  into  the  Darkness  of  the  Primary  Thought,  so  is  the  Duad  left  as  its  vicegerent  and  representative,  and  thus

THE  "ZOHAR"  ON  CREATION  AND  THE  ELOHIM

co-equal  with  the  positive  Duad  is  the  Triune  Idea,  the  number  three,  co-equal  and  co-  eternal  with  the  Duad  in  the  bosom  of  the  Unity,  yet,  as  it  were,  proceeding  therefrom  in  the  numerical  conception  of  its  sequence.

This  explanation  would  seem  to  imply  that  Mr.  Mathers  is  aware  that  this  "  creation  "  is  not  the  truly  divine  or  primary  one,  since  the  Monad —  the  first  manifestation  on  our  plane  of  objectivity — "  recoils  into  the  Darkness  of  the  Primal  Thought,"  i.e.,  into  the  subjectivity  of  the  first  divine  Creation.

And  this,  again,  also  partly  answers  to  the  Christian  idea  of  the  Holy  Ghost,  and  of  the  whole  three  forming  a  Trinity  in  unity.

This  also  explains  the  fact  in  geometry  of  the  three  right  lines  being  the  smallest  number  which  will  make  a  plane  rectilineal  figure,  while  two  can  never  enclose  a  space,  being  powerless  and  without  effect  till  completed  by  the  number  Three.

These  three  first  numbers  of  the  decimal  scale  the  Qabalists  call  by  the  names  of  Kether,  the  Crown,  Chokmah,  Wisdom,  and  Binah,  Understanding  ,  and  they  furthermore  associate  with  them  these  divine  names :  with  the  Unity,  Eheich,  "  I  exist ;  "  with  the  Duad,  Yah  ,  and  with  the  Triad,  Elohim  ,  they  especially  also  call  the  Duad,  Abba — the  Father,  and  the  Triad,  Aima — the  Mother,  whose  eternal  conjunction  is  symbolized  in  the  word  Elohim

But  what  especially  strikes  the  student  of  the  Kabalah  is  the  malicious  persistency  with  which  the  translators  of  the  Bible  have  jealously  crowded  out  of  sight  and  suppressed  every  reference  to  the  feminine  form  of  the  Deity.

They  have,  as  we  have  just  seen,  translated  the  feminine  plural  "  Elohim,'  by  the  masculine  singular,  "  God."  But  they  have  done  more  than  this  they  have  carefully  hidden  the  fact  that  the  word  Ruach — the  "  Spirit  " — is  feminine,  and  that  consequently  the  Holy  Ghost  of  the  New  Testament  is  a  feminine  Potency  How  many  Christians  are  cognizant  of  the  fact  that  in  the  account  of  the  Incarnation  in  Luke  (i,  35)  two  divine  Potencies  are  mentioned  ?

"  The  Holy  Ghost  shall  come  upon  thee,  and  the  Power  of  the  Highest  shall  overshadow  thee."  The  Holy  Ghost  (the  feminine  Potency)  descends,  and  the  Power  of  the  Highest  (the  masculine  Potency)  is  united  therewith  "  Therefore  also  that  holy

thing  which  shall  be  born  of  thee  shall  be  called  the  Son  of  God  " of  the  Elohim

namely,  seeing  that  these  two  Potencies  descend.

In  the  Sepher  Yetz/reh,  or  Book  of  Formation,  we  read  :

"  One  is  She  the  Ruach  Elohim  Chiim — (Spirit  of  the  Living  Elohim).  .  .  .  Voice,  Spirit,  and  Word  ;  and  this  is  She,  the  Spirit  of  the  Holy  One."  Here  again  we  see  the  intimate  connection  which  exists  between  the  Holy  Spirit  and  the  Elohim.

Furthermore  farther  on  in  this  same  Book  of  Format/on — which,  is,  be  it  remembered,  one  of  the  oldest  of  the  Kabalistical  Books,  and  whose  authorship  is  ascribed  to  Abraham  the  Patriarch — we  shall  find  the  idea  of  a  Feminine  Trinity  in  the  first  place,  from  whom  a  masculine  Trinity  proceeds  ;  or,  as  it  is  said  in  the  text :  "  Three  Mothers  whence  proceed  three  Fathers."  And  yet  this  double  Triad  forms,  as  it  were,  but  one  complete  Trinity.

Again  it  is  worthy  of  note  that  the  Second  and  Third  Sephiroth  (Wisdom  and  Understanding)  are  both  distinguished  by  feminine  names,  Chokmah  and  Binah,  notwithstanding  that  to  the  former  more  particularly  the  masculine  idea,  and  to  the  latter  the  feminine,  are  attributed,  under  the  titles  of  Abba  and  Aima  (or  Father  and  Mother).  This  Aima  (the  Great  Mother)  is  magnificently  symbolized  in  the  twelfth  chapter  of  the  Apocalypse,  which  is  undoubtedly  one  of  the  most  Kabalistical  books  in  the  Bible.

In  fact,  without  the  Kabalistical  keys  its  meaning  is  utterly  unintelligible.

Now,  in  the  Hebrew,  as  in  the  Greek,  alphabet,  there  are  no  distinct  numeral  characters,  and  consequently  each  letter  has  a  certain  numerical  value  attached  to

212  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

it.  From  this  circumstance  results  the  important  fact  that  every  Hebrew  word  constitutes  a  number,  and  every  number  a  word.

This  is  referred  to  in  the  Revelation  (xiii,  18)  in  mentioning  the  "number  of  the  beast."  In  the /(aba/ah  words  of  equal  numerical  values  are  supposed  to  have  a  certain  explanatory  connection  with  each  other.

This  forms  the  science  of  Gematria,  which  is  the  first  division  of  the  Literal  /Caba/af).  Furthermore,  each  letter  of  the  Hebrew  alphabet  had  for  the  Initiates  of  the  Kabalah  a  certain  hieroglyphical  value  and  meaning  which,  rightly  applied,  gave  to  each  word  the  value  of  a  mystical  sentence  ;  and  this  again  was  variable  according  to  the  relative  positions  of  the  letters  with  regard  to  each  other.

From  these  various  Kabalistical  points  of  view  let  us  now  examine  this  word  Elohim.

First  then  we  can  divide  the  word  into  the  two  words,  which  signify  "  The  Feminine  Divinity  of  the  Waters  "  ;  compare  with  the  Greek  Aphrodite,  "  sprung  from  the  foam  of  the  sea  "  Again  it  is  divisible  into  the  "  Mighty  One,  Star  of  the  Sea,"  or  "  the  Mighty  One  breathing  forth  the  Spirit  upon  the  Waters."  Also  by  combination  of  the  letters  we  get  "  the  Silent  Power  of  lah."  And  again,  "  My  God,  the  Former  of  the  Universe,"  for  Mah  is  a  secret  Kabalistical  name  applied  to  the  idea  of  Formation  Also  we  obtain  "Who  is  my  God."  Furthermore  "  the  Mother  in  lah  "

The  total  number  is  1  -f  30  4-  5  +  10  +  40  =  86  =  "  Violent  heat,"  or  "the  Power  of  Fire."  If  we  add  together  the  three  middle  letters  we  obtain  45,  and  the  first  and  last  letters  yield  41,  making  thus  "the  Mother  of  Formation."  Lastly,  we  shall  find  the  two  divine  names  "  El  "  and  "  Yah,"  together  with  the  letter  m,  which  signifies  "  Water,"  for  Mem,  the  name  of  this  letter,  means  "  water."

If  we  divide  it  into  its  component  letters  and  take  them  as  hieroglyphical  signs  we  shall  have  :

"  Will  perfected  through  Sacrifice  progressing  through  successive  Transformation  by  Inspiration."

The  last  few  paragraphs  of  the  above,  in  which  the  word  "  Elohim  "  is  Kabalistically  analyzed,  show  conclusively  enough  that  the  Elohim  are  not  one,  nor  two,  nor  even  a  trinity,  but  a  Host — the  army  of  the  creative  powers.

The  Christian  Church,  in  making  of  Jehovah — one  of  these  very  Elohim  — the  one  Supreme  God,  has  introduced  hopeless  confusion  into  the  celestial  hierarchy,  in  spite  of  the  volumes  written  by  Thomas  Aquinas  and  his  school  on  the  subject.

The  only  explanation  to  be  found  in  all  their  treatises  on  the  nature  and  essence  of  the  numberless  classes  of  celestial  beings  mentioned  in  the  8/b/e — Archangels,  Thrones,  Seraphim,  Cherubim,  Messengers,  etc.

— is  that  "The  angelic  host  is  God's  militia."  They  are  "  Gods  the  creatures,"  while  he  is  "  God  the  Creator  ;  "  but  of  their  true  functions — of  their  actual  place  in  the  economy  of  Nature — not  one  word  is  said.

They  are

more  brilliant  than  the  flames,  more  rapid  than  the  wind,  and  they  live  in  love  and  harmony,  mutually  enlightening  each  other,  feeding  on  bread  and  a  mystic  beverage — the  communion  wine  and  water  ? — surrounding  as  with  a  river  of  fire  the  throne  of  the  Lamb,  and  veiling  their  faces  with  their  wings.

This  throne  of  love  and  glory  they  leave  only  to  carry  to  the  stars,  the  earth,  the  kingdoms  and  all  the  sons  of  God,  their  brothers  and  pupils,  in  short,  to  all  creatures  like  themselves  the  divine  influence.

...  As  to  their  number,  it  is  that  of  the  great  army  of  Heaven  (Sabaoth),  more  numerous  than  the  stars.

.  .  .  Theology  shows  us  these  rational  luminaries,  each

THE  "ZOHAR"  ON  CREATION  AND  THE  ELOHIM

constituting  a  species,  and  containing  in  their  natures  such  or  another  position  of  Nature  :  covering  immense  space,  though  of  a  determined  area  ,  residing — incorporeal  though  they  are — within  circumscribed  limits  ,  .  .  more  rapid  than  light  or  thunder-  bolt, disposing  of  all  the  elements  of  Nature,  providing  at  will  inexplicable  mirages  [illusions  ?],  objective  and  subjective  in  turn,  speaking  to  men  a  language  at  one  time  articulate,  at  another  purely  spiritual  '

We  learn  farther  on  in  the  same  work  that  it  is  these  Angels  and  their  hosts  who  are  referred  to  in  the  sentence  of  verse  1 ,  chapter  ii,  of  Genesis  :  Igitur  perfect!  sunt  coeli  et  terra  et  omnis  ornatus  eorum  :"- and  that  the  Vulgate  has  peremptorily  substituted  for  the  Hebrew  word  "  tasba  ("  host  ")  that  of  "  ornament  "  ;  Munck  shows  the  mistake  of  subsitution  and  the  derivation  of  the  compound  title,  "  Tsabaoth-Elohim,"  from  "tsaba."  More-  over, Cornelius  a  Lapide,  "  the  master  of  all  Biblical  commentators,"  says  de  Mirville,  shows  us  that  such  was  the  real  meaning.

Those  Angels  are  stars.

All  this,  however,  teaches  us  very  little  as  to  the  true  functions  of  this  celestial  army,  and  nothing  at  all  as  to  its  place  in  evolution  and  its  relation  to  the  earth  we  live  on.  For  an  answer  to  the  question,  "  Who  are  the  true  Creators?  "  we  must  go  to  the  Esoteric  Doctrine,  since  there  only  can  the  key  be  found  which  will  render  intelligible  the  Theogonies  of  the  various  world-religions.

There  we  find  that  the  real  creator  of  the  Kosmos,  as  of  all  visible  Nature — if  not  of  all  the  invisible  hosts  of  Spirits  not  yet  drawn  into  the  "Cycle  of  Necessity,"  or  evolution — is  "the  Lord — the  Gods,"  or  the  "Working  Host,"  the  "  Army  "  collectively  taken,  the  "  One  in  many."

The  One  is  infinite  and  unconditioned.

It  cannot  create,  for  It  can  have  no  relation  to  the  finite  and  conditioned.

If  everything  we  see,  from  the  glorious  suns  and  planets  down  to  the  blades  of  grass  and  the  specks  of  dust,  had  been  created  by  the  Absolute  Perfection  and  were  the  direct  work  of  even  the  First  Energy  that  proceeded  from  It,3  then

1  Oes  Espnts,  Tome  11,  294-5.

2  [Thus  the  heaven  and  the  earth  were  finished,  and  all  the  hosts  of  them  ]

3  To  the  Occultist  and  Chela  the  difference  made  between  Energy  and  Emanation  need  not  be  explained      The  Sanskrit  word   "  Shakti  "  is   untranslatable.

It   may  be  Energy,   but  it  is  one  that  proceeds  through  itself,  not  being  due  to  the  active  or  conscious  will  of  the  one  that  produces  it     The  "  First-Born, "    or  Logos,  is  not  an  Emanation,  but  an  Energy  inherent  in  and  co-eternal  with  Parabrah-  man,  the  One.

The  Zohar  speaks  of  emanations,  but  reserves  the  word  for  the  seven  Sephiroth  emanated  from  the  first  three — which   form  one  triad — Kether,  Chokmah.

and  Binah.

As  for  these  three,   it  explains  the  difference  by  calling  them  "  immanations,"  something  inherent  to  and  coeval  with  the  subject  postulated,  or  in  other  words,  "  Energies  "

It  is  these  "Auxiliaries,"  the  Aupham'm,  the  half-human  Prajapatis,  the  Angels,  the  Architects  under  the  leadership  of  the  "  Angel  of  the  Great  Council,"  with  the  rest  of  the  Kosmos-Builders  of  other  nations,  that  can  alone  explain  the  imperfection  of  the  Universe  This  imperfection  is  one  of  the  arguments  of  the  Secret  Science  in  favour  of  the  existence  and  activity  of  these  ' '  Powers  ' '  And  who  know  better  than  the  few  philosophers  of  our  civilised  lands  how  near  the  truth  Philo  was  in  ascribing  the  origin  of  evil  to  the  admixture  of  inferior  potencies  in  the  arrangement  of  matter,  and  even  in  the  formation  of  man — a  task  entrusted  to  the  divine  Logos

214  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

every  such  thing  would  have  been  perfect,  eternal,  and  unconditioned,  like  its  author.

The  millions  upon  millions  of  imperfect  works  found  in  Nature  testify  loudly  that  they  are  the  products  of  finite,  conditioned  beings —  though  the  latter  were  and  are  Dhyan  Chohans,  Archangels,  or  what  ever  else  they  may  be  named.

In  short,  these  imperfect  works  are  the  unfinished  production  of  evolution,  under  the  guidance  of  the  imperfect  Gods.

The  Zohar  gives  us  this  assurance  as  well  as  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE.

It  speaks  of  the  auxiliaries  of  the  "Ancient  of  Days,"  the  "Sacred  Aged,"  and  calls  them  Auphanim,  or  the  living  Wheels  of  the  celestial  orbs,  who  participate  in  the  work  of  the  creation  of  the  Universe.

Thus  it  is  not  the  "Principle,"  One  and  Unconditioned,  nor  even  Its  re-  flection, that  creates,  but  only  the  "  Seven  Gods  "  who  fashion  the  Universe  out  of  the  eternal  Matter,  vivified  into  objective  life  by  the  reflection  into  it  of  the  One  Reality.

The  Creator  is  they — "God  the  Host  "—called  in  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE  the  Dhyan  Chohans ;  with  the  Hindus  the  Prajapatis ;  with  the  Western  Kabalists  the  Sephiroth  ;  and  with  the  Buddhist  the  Devas — impersonal  be-  cause blind  forces.

They  are  the  Amshaspends  with  the  Zoroastrians,  and  while  with  the  Christian  Mystic  the  "Creator"  is  the  "  Gods  of  the  God,"  with  the  dogmatic  Churchman  he  is  the  "  God  of  the  Gods,"  the  "  Lord  of  Lords,"  etc.

"Jehovah  "  is  only  the  God  who  is  greater  than  all  Gods  in  the  eyes  of  Israel.

I  know,  that  the  Lord  [of  Israel]  is  great  and  that  our  Lord  is  above  all  gods  '

And  again  ;

For  all  the  gods  of  the  nations  are  idols,  but  the  Lord  made  the  heavens.

The  Egyptian  Neteroo,  translated  by  Champollion  "  the  other  Gods  "  are  the  Elohim  of  the  Biblical  writers,  behind  which  stands  concealed  the  One  God,  considered  in  the  diversity  of  his  powers.3  This  One  is  not  Parabrahman,  but  the  Unmanifested  Logos,  the  Demiourgos,  the  real  Creator  or  Fashioner,  that  follows  him,  standing  for  the  Demiourgoi  collectively  taken.

Further  on  the  great  Egyptologist  adds :

We  see  Egypt  concealing  and  hiding,  so  to  say,  the  God  of  Gods  behind  the  agents  she  surrounds  him  with  ;  she  gives  the  precedence  to  her  great  gods  before  the  one  and  sole  Deity,  so  that  the  attributes  of  that  God  become  their  property.

Those  great  Gods  proclaim  themselves  uncreate.

.  .  Neith  is  "  that  which  /$,"  as  Jehovah  ;

1  Psalms,  cxxxv,  5.  2  Psalms,  xcvi,  5.

3  Rather  as  Ormazd  or  Ahura-Mazda.

Vit-nam-Ahmi,  and  all  the  unmanifested  Logoi.

Jehovah  is  the  manifested  Viraj,  corresponding  to  Bmah,  the  third  Sephira  in  the  Kabalah,  a  female  Power  which  would  find  its  prototype  rather  in  the  Prajdpati,  than  in  Brahma,  the  Creator.

4  Nelth  is  Aditi,  evidently

THE  "ZOHAR"  ON  CREATION  AND  THE  ELOHIM

Thoth  is  self-created  '  without  having  been  begotten,  etc  Judaism  annihilating  these  potencies  before  the  grandeur  of  its  God,  they  cease  to  be  simply  Powers,  like  Philo's  Archangels,  like  the  Sephiroth  of  the  Kabalah,  like  the  Ogdoades  of  the  Gnostics—  they  merge  together  and  become  transformed  into  God  himself/

Jehovah  is  thus,  as  the  Kabalah  teaches,  at  best  but  the  "  Heavenly  Man,"  Adam  Kadmon,  used  by  the  self-created  Spirit,  the  Logos,  as  a  chariot,  a  vehicle  in  His  descent  towards  manifestation  in  the  phenomenal  world.

Such  are  the  teachings  of  the  Archaic  Wisdom,  nor  can  they  be  repudi-  ated even  by  the  orthodox  Christian,  if  he  be  sincere  and  open-minded  in  the  study  of  his  own  Scripture.

For  if  he  reads  St.  Paul's  Epistles  carefully  he  will  find  that  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE  and  the  Kabalah  are  fully  admitted  by  the  "Apostle  of  the  Gentiles."  The  Gnosis  which  he  appears  to  condemn  is  no  less  for  him  than  for  Plato  "the  supreme  knowledge  of  the  truth  and  of  the  One  Being ;  "  '*  for  what  St.  Paul  condemns  is  not  the  true,  but  only  the  false,  Gnosis  and  its  abuses :  otherwise  how  could  he  use  the  language  of  a  Platonist  pur  sang?  The  Ideas,  types  (Archai),  of  the  Greek  Philosopher;  the  Intelligences  of  Pythagoras ;  the  /Eons  or  Emanations  of  the  Pantheist ;  the  Logos  or  Word,  Chief  of  these  Intelligences ;  the  Sophia  or  Wisdom  ;  the  Demiourgos,  the  Builder  of  the  world  under  the  direction  of  the  Father,  the  Unmanifested  Logos,  from  which  He  emanates ;  Ain-Soph,  the  Unknown  of  the  Infinite  ;  the  angelic  Periods ;  the  Seven  Spirits  who  are  the  representatives  of  the  Seven  of  all  the  older  cosmogonies — are  all  to  be  found  in  his  writings,  recognized  by  the  Church  as  canonical  and  divinely  inspired.

Therein,  too,  may  be  recognized  the  Depths  of  Ahriman,  Rector  of  this  our  World,  the  "  God  of  this  World  ;  "  the  Pleroma  of  the  Intelligences  ;  the  Archontes  of  the  air ;  the  Principalities,  the  Kabalistic  Metatron  ,  and  they  can  easily  be  identi-  fied again  in  the  Roman  Catholic  writers  when  read  in  the  original  Greek  and  Latin  texts,  English  translations  giving  but  a  very  poor  idea  of  the  real  contents  of  these.

JThe  Self-created  Logos,  Narayana.

Purushottama.

and  others  2  Mere  d'Apis.

pp.  32-5      Quoted  by  De  Mirville.

J  See  Republic,  I,  vi.

SECTION

WHAT  THE  OCCULTISTS  AND  KABALISTS  HAVE  TO  SAY    '

THE  Zohar,  an  unfathomable  store  of  hidden  wisdom  and  mystery,  is  very  often  appealed  to  by  Roman  Catholic  writers.

A  very  learned  Rabbi,  now  the  Chevalier  Drach,  having  been  converted  to  Roman  Catholicism,  and  being  a  great  Hebraist,  thought  fit  to  step  into  the  shoes  of  Picus  de  Mirandola  and  John  Reuchlin,  and  to  assure  his  new  co-religionists  that  the  Zohar  contained  in  it  pretty  nearly  all  the  dogmas  of  Catholicism.

It  is  not  our  province  to  show  here  how  far  he  has  succeeded  or  failed  ,  only  to  bring  one  instance  of  his  explanations  and  preface  it  with  the  following  :

The  Zohar.

as  already  shown,  is  not  a  genuine  production  of  the  Hebrew  mind.

It  is  the  repository  and  compendium  of  the  oldest  doctrines  of  the  East,  transmitted  orally  at  first,  and  then  written  down  in  independent  treatises  during  the  Captivity  at  Babylon,  and  finally  brought  together  by  Rabbi  Simeon  Ben  Jochai,  toward  the  beginning  of  the  Christian  era.

As  Mosaic  cosmogony  was  born  under  a  new  form  in  Mesopotamian  countries,  so  the  Zohar  was  a  vehicle  in  which  were  focussed  rays  from  the  light  of  Universal  Wisdom.

Whatever  likenesses  are  found  between  it  and  the  Christian  teachings,  the  compilers  of  the  Zohar  never  had  Christ  in  their  minds.

Were  it  otherwise  there  would  not  be  one  single  Jew  of  the  Mosaic  law  left  in  the  world  by  this  time.

Again,  if  one  is  to  accept  literally  what  the  Zohar  says,  then  any  religion  under  the  sun  may  find  corroboration  in  its  symbols  and  allegorical  sayings  ;  and  this,  simply  because  this  work  is  the  echo  of  the  primitive  truths,  and  every  creed  is  founded  on  some  of  these ;  the  Zohar  being  but  a  veil  of  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE.

This  is  so  evident  that  we  have  only  to  point  to  the  said  ex-Rabbi,  the  Chevalier  Drach,  to  prove  the  fact.

In  Part  III,  fol.

87  (col.

346th)  the  Zohar  treats  of  the  Spirit  guiding  the  Sun,  its  Rector,  explaining  that  it  is  not  the  Sun  itself  that  is  meant  thereby,  but  the  Spirit  "  on,  or  under  "  the  Sun.

Drach  is  artxious  to  show  that  it  was  Christ  who  was  meant  by  that  "Sun,"  or  the  Solar  Spirit  therein.

In  his

WHAT  THE  OCCULTISTS  AND  KABALISTS  HAVE  TO  SAY

comment  upon  that  passage  which   refers  to  the  Solar  Spirit  as  "that  stone  which  the  builders  rejected,"  he  asserts  most  positively  that  this

Sun-stone  (p/erre  sofe»l)  is  identical  with  Christ,  who  was  that  stone,  and  that  therefore

The  sun   is  undeniably  (sans  contredit)  the  second  hypostasis  of  the  Deity,1  or  Christ.

If  this  be  true,  then  the  Vaidic  or  pre-Vaidic  Aryans,  Chaldeans  and  Egyptians,  like  all  Occultists  past,  present,  and  future,  Jews  included,  have  been  Christians  from  all  eternity.

If  this  be  not  so,  then  modern  Church  Christianity  is  Paganism  pure  and  simple  exoterically,  and  transcendental  and  practical  Magic,  or  Occultism,  esoterically.

For  this  "stone"  has  a  manifold  significance,  a  dual  existence,  with  gradations,  a  regular  progression  and  retrogression.

It  is  a  "  mystery  "  indeed.

The  Occultists  are  quite  ready  to  agree  with  St.  Chrysostom,  that  the  infidels — the  profane,  rather —

Being   blinded  by  sun-light,  thus  lose  sight  of  the  true  Sun  in  the  contemplation  of  the  false  one

But  if  that  Saint,  and  along  with  him  now  the  Hebraist  Drach,  chose  to  see  in  the  Zonar  and  the  Kabalistic  Sun  "the  second  hypostasis,"  this  is  no  reason  why  all  others  should  be  blinded  by  them.

The  mystery  of  the  Sun  is  the  grandest  perhaps,  of  all  the  innumerable  mysteries  of  Occultism.

A  Gordian  knot,  truly,  but  one  that  cannot  be  severed  with  the  double-edged  sword  of  scholastic  casuistry.

It  is  a  true  deo  dignus  vindice  nodus,  and  can  be  untied  only  by  the  Gods.

The  meaning  of  this  is  plain,  and  every  Kabalist  will  understand  it.

Contra  so/em  ne  loquaris  [Do  not  speak  against  the  sun],  was  not  said  by  Pythagoras  with  regard  to  the  visible  Sun.

It  was  the  "  Sun  of  Initiation  "  that  was  meant,  in  its  triple  form — two  of  which  are  the  "  Day-Sun  "  and  the  "  Night-Sun."

If  behind  the  physical  luminary  there  were  no  mystery  that  people  sensed  instinctively,  why  should  every  nation,  from  the  primitive  peoples  down  to  the  Parsis  of  to-day,  have  turned  towards  the  Sun  during  prayers  ?  The  Solar  Trinity  is  not  Mazdean,  but  is  universal,  and  is  as  old  as  man.

All  the  temples  in  Antiquity  were  invariably  made  to  face  the  Sun,  their  portals  to  'open  to  the  East.

See  the  old  temples  of  Memphis  and  Baalbec,  the  Pyramids  of  the  Old  and  of  the  New  (?)  Worlds,  the  Round  Towers  of  Ireland,  and  the  Serapeum  of  Egypt.

The  Initiates  alone  could

1  Harmonie  entre  I'Eglise  et  la  Synagogue,  t  II,  p    427,  by  the  Chevalier  Drach      See  Oes  Esprits.

Tome  iv,  pp.  38-

218  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

give  a  philosophical  explanation  of  this,  and  a  reason  for  it — its  mysticism  notwithstanding — were  only  the  world  ready  to  receive  it,  which  alas  !  it  is  not.

The  last  of  the  Solar  Priests  in  Europe  was  the  Imperial  Initiate,  Julian,  now  called  the  Apostate.1  He  tried  to  benefit  the  world  by  revealing  at  least  a  portion  of  the  great  mystery  of  the  Tpi7r\d<rio<;  ~  and — he  died.

"There  are  three  in  one,"  he  said  of  the  Sun — the  central  Sun  3  being  a  precaution  of  Nature  :  the  first  is  the  universal  cause  of  all,  Sovereign  Good  and  perfection  ;  the  Second  Power  is  paramount  Intelligence,  having  domin-  Jon  over  all  reasonable  beings,  voepol?  ,  the  third  is  the  visible  Sun.

The  pure  energy  of  solar  intelligence  proceeds  from  the  luminous  seat  occupied  by  our  Sun  in  the  centre  of  heaven,  that  pure  energy  being  the  Logos  of  our  system  ;  the  "  Mysterious  Word  Spirit  produces  all  through  the  Sun,  and  never  operates  through  any  other  medium,"  says  Hermes  Trismegistus.

For  it  is  in  the  Sun,  more  than  in  any  other  heavenly  body  that  the  [unknown]  Power  placed  the  seat  of  its  habitation.

Only  neither  Hermes  Trismegistus  nor  Julian  (an  initiated  Occultist),  nor  any  other,  meant  by  this  Unknown  Cause  Jehovah,  or  Jupiter.

They  referred  to  the  cause  that  produced  all  the  manifested  "  great  Gods  "  or  Demiourgoi  (the  Hebrew  God  included)  of  our  system.

Nor  was  our  visible,  material  Sun  meant,  for  the  latter  was  only  the  manifested  symbol.

Philolaus  the  Pythagorean,  explains  and  completes  Trismegistus  by  saying  :

The  Sun   is  a  mirror  of  fire,  the  splendour  of  whose  flames  by  their  reflection  in  that  mirror  [the  Sun]  is  poured  upon  us,  and  that  splendour  we  call  image.

1  Julian  died  for  the   same  crime  as  Socrates.

Both  divulged  a  portion  of  the  solar  mystery,  the  heliocentric  system   being  only  a  part  of  what  was  given  during  Initiation— one  consciously,  the  other  unconsciously,  the  Greek  Sage  never  having  been  initiated      It  was  not  the  real  solar  system  that  was  preserved   in  such  secrecy,   but  the  mysteries  connected  with  the  Sun's  constitution.

Socrates  was  sentenced  to  death   by  earthly  and  worldly  judges  .  Julian  died  a  violent  death  because  the  hitherto  protecting   hand  was  withdrawn  from   him,   and,   no   longer  shielded  by  it,  he  was  simply  left  to  his  destiny  or  Karma      For  the  student  of  Occultism  there  is  a  suggestive  difference  between  the  two  kinds  of  death      Another  memorable  instance  of  the  unconscious  divulging  of  secrets  pertaining  to  mysteries  is  that  of  the  poet,  P.  Ovidius  Naso,  who,  like  Socrates,  had  not  been  initiated      In  his  case,  the  Emperor  Augustus,  who  was  an  Initiate,  mercifully  changed  the  penalty  of  death  into  banishment  to  Tomos  on  the  Euxme      This  sudden  change  from  unbounded  royal  favour  to  banishment  has  been  a  fruitful  scheme  of  speculation  to  classical  scholars  not  initiated  into  the  Mysteries.

They  have  quoted  Ovid's  own  lines  to  show  that  it  was  some  great  and  heinous  immorality  of  the  Emperor  of  which  Ovid   had  become  unwillingly  cognizant.

The   inexorable  law  of  the  death  penalty,  always  following  upon  the  revelation  of  any  portion   of  the  Mysteries  to  the  profane,  was  unknown  to  them.

Instead  of  seeing  the  amiable  and  merciful  act  of  the  Emperor    in  its  true  light,  they  have  made  it  an  occasion  for  traducing  his  moral  character.

The  poet's  own  words  can  be  no  evidence,  because  as  he  was  not  an  Initiate,   it  could  not  be  explained   to  him  in  what  his  offence  consisted      There  have  been  com-  paratively modern  instances  of  poets   unconsciously  revealing  in  their  verses  so  much  of  the  hidden  knowledge  as  to  make  even  Initiates  suppose  them  to  be  fellow-Initiates,  and  come  to  talk  to  them  on  the  subject      This  only   shows  that  the  sensitive  poetic  temperament  is  sometimes  so  far  transported  beyond  the  bounds  of  ordinary  sense  as  to  get  glimpses  into  what  has  been  impressed  on  the  Astral  Light      In  the  Light  of  Asia  there  are  two  passages  that   might  make  an  Initiate  of  the  first  degree  think  that  Mr.  [Sir]  Edwin  Arnold  had  been  initiated  himself    in  the  Himalayan   ashrams,  but  this  «  not  so.

2  [Three-fold  ]  '  A  proof  that  Julian  was  acquainted  with  the  heliocentric  system

WHAT  THE  OCCULTISTS  AND  KABALISTS  HAVE  TO  SAY

It  is  evident  that  Philolaus  referred  to  the  central  spiritual  Sun,  whose  beams  and  effulgence  are  only  mirrored  by  our  central  Star,  the  Sun.

This  is  as  clear  to  the  Occultist  as  it  was  to  the  Pythagoreans.

As  for  the  pro-  fane of  pagan  antiquity,  it  was,  of  course,  the  physical  Sun  that  was  the  "  highest  God  "  for  them,  as  it  seems — if  Chevalier  Orach's  view  be  accepted  — to  have  now  virtually  become  for  the  modern  Roman  Catholics.

If  words  mean  anything,  the  statement  made  by  the  Chevalier  Drach  that  "this  sun  is,  undeniably,  the  second  hypostasis  of  the  Deity,"  imply  what  we  say  ;  as  "this  Sun"  refers  to  the  Kabalistic  Sun,  and  "  hypostasis  "  means  substance  or  subsistence  of  the  Godhead  or  Trinity — distinctly  personal.

As  the  author,  being  an  ex-Rabbi,  thoroughly  versed  in  Hebrew,  and  in  the  mysteries  of  the  Zohar,  ought  to  know  the  value  of  words  ;  and  as,  moreover,  in  writing  this,  he  was  bent  upon  reconciling  "  the  seeming  contradictions,"  as  he  puts  it,  between  Judaism  and  Christianity — the  fact  becomes  quite  evident.

But  all  this  pertains  to  questions  and  problems  which  will  be  solved  naturally  and  in  the  course  of  the  development  of  the  doctrine.

The  Roman  Catholic  Church  stands  accused,  not  of  worshipping  under  other  names  the  Divine  Beings  worshipped  by  all  nations  in  antiquity,  but  of  declaring  idolat-  rous, not  only  the  Pagans  ancient  and  modern,  but  every  Christian  nation  that  has  freed  itself  from  the  Roman  yoke.

The  accusation  brought  against  herself  by  more  than  one  man  of  Science,  of  worshipping  the  stars  like  true  Sabeans  of  old,  stands  to  this  day  uncontradicted,  yet  no  star-worshipper  has  ever  addressed  his  adoration  to  the  material  stars  and  planets,  as  will  be  shown  before  the  last  page  of  this  work  is  written  ;  none  the  less  is  it  true  that  those  Philosophers  alone  who  studied  Astrology  and  Magic  knew  that  the  last  word  of  those  sciences  was  to  be  sought  in;  and  expected  from,  the  Occult  forces  emanating  from  those  constellations.

[This   Section   is   almost   exactly  the  same  as  sub-section  2,  of  Section  V,  in  the  1886  MS  —Ed.]

SECTION

MODERN    KABALISTS    IN    SCIENCE    AND    OCCULT  ASTRONOMY

THERE  is  a  physical,  an  astral,  and  a  super-astral  Universe  in  the  three  chief  divisions  of  the  Kabalah  ;  as  there  are  terrestrial,  super-terrestrial,  and  spiritual  Beings.

The  "  Seven  Planetary  Spirits  "  may  be  ridiculed  by  Scientists  to  their  hearts'  content,  yet  the  need  of  intelligent  ruling  and  guiding  Forces  is  so  much  felt  to  this  day  that  scientific  men  and  specialists,  who  will  not  hear  of  Occultism  or  of  ancient  systems,  find  themselves  obliged  to  generate  in.  their  inner  consciousness  some  kind  of  semi-mystical  system.

Metcalf's  "sun-  force  "  theory,  and  that  of  Zaliwsky,  a  learned  Pole,  which  made  Electricity  the  Universal  Force  and  placed  its  storehouse  in  the  Sun,1  were  revivals  of  the  Kabalistic  teachings.

Zaliwsky  tried  to  prove  that  Electricity,  producing  "  the  most  powerful,  attractive,  calorific,  and  luminous  effects,"  was  present  in  the  physical  constitution  of  the  Sun  and  explained  its  peculiarities.

This  is  very  near  the  Occult  teaching.

It  is  only  by  admitting  the  gaseous  nature  of  the  Sun-reflector,  and  the  powerful  Magnetism  and  Electricity  of  the  Solar  attraction  and  repulsion,  that  one  can  explain  (a)  the  evident  absence  of  any  waste  of  power  and  luminosity  in  the  Sun — inexplicable  by  the  ordinary  laws  of  combustion  ;  and  (b)  the  behaviour  of  the  planets,  so  often  contradicting  every  accepted  rule  of  weight  and  gravity.

And  Zaliwsky  makes  this  "solar  electricity  "  differ  from  anything  known  on  earth."

Father  Secchi  may  be  suspected  of  having  sought  to  introduce

Forces  of  quite   a   new   order  and   quite  foreign  to  gravitation,  which  he  had  discovered  in  Space,'

in  order  to  reconcile  Astronomy  with  theological  Astronomy.

But  Nagy,  a  member  of  the  Hungarian  Academy  of  Sciences,  was  no  cleric,  and  yet  he

1  La  Gravitation  par  I'Electncite,  p.  7,  quoted  in  Oes  Espnts   Tome,  iv,  p

2  Ibid  ,p

KABALISTS  IN  SCIENCE  AND  OCCULT  ASTRONOMY

develops  a   theory  on  the   necessity  of  intelligent  Forces  whose  complacency  "  would  lend  itself  to  all  the  whims  of  the  comets."   He  suspects  that :

Notwithstanding   all  the  actual  researches  on  the  rapidity  of  light — that  dazzling

product   of  an   unknown  force   .   .   .  which  we  see  too  frequently  to  understand that

light  is  motionless  in  reality  !

C.  E.    Love,    the    well-known    railway   builder   and    engineer    in    France,  tired   of   blind   forces,    made   all   the    (then)  "  imponderable  agents  " — now  called  "  forces  " — subordinates  of  Electricity,  and  declares  the  latter  to  be  an  Intelligence — albeit  molecular  in  nature  and  material.'

In  the  author's  opinion  these  Forces  are  atomistic  agents,  endowed  with  intelligence,  spontaneous  will,  and  motion,3  and  he  thus,  like  the  Kabalists,  makes  the  causal  Forces  substantial,  while  the  Forces  that  act  on  this  plane  are  only  the  effects  of  the  former,  as  with  him  matter  is  eternal,  and  the  Gods  also ;  4  so  is  the  Soul  likewise,  though  it  has  inherent  in  itself  a  still  higher  Soul  [Spirit],  pre-existent,  endowed  with  memory,  and  superior  to  Electric  Force  ,  the  latter  is  subservient  to  the  higher  Souls,  those  superior  Souls  forcing  it  to  act  according  to  the  eternal  laws.

The  concept  is  rather  hazy,  but  is  evidently  on  the  Occult  lines.

Moreover,  the  system  proposed  is  entirely  pantheistic,  and  is  worked  out  in  a  purely  scientific  volume.

Monotheists  and  Roman  Catholics  fall  foul  of  it,  of  course  ;  but  one  who  believes  in  the  Planetary  Spirits  and  who  endows  Nature  with  living  Intelligences  must  always  expect  this.

In  this  connection,  however,  it  is  curious  that  after  the  moderns  have  so  laughed  at  the  ignorance  of  the  ancients,

who,  knowing  only  of  seven  planets  [yet  having  an  ogdoad  which  did  not  include  the  earth  I],  invented  therefore  seven  Spirits  to  fit  in  with  the  number,

Babinet   should   have  vindicated  the  "  superstition  "   unconsciously  to  himself.

In  the  Revue  des  Deux  Mondes  this  eminent  French  Astronomer  writes  :

The  ogdoad  of  the  Ancients  included  the  earth  [which  is  an  error],  /  e.,  eight  or  seven  according  to  whether  or  not  the  earth  was  comprised  in  the  number.'

Dr.  Mirville  assures  his  readers  that :

M.  Babinet  was  telling  me  but  a  few  days  ago  that  we  had  in  reality  only  eight  big  planets,  including  the  earth,  and  so  many  small  ones  between  Mars  and  Jupiter  .  .  .  Herschel  offering  to  call  all  those  beyond  the  seven  primary  planets  asteroids ' h

1  Memo/re,  on  the  Solar  System,  p   7  ,  Des  Espnts,  Tome  iv,  p.  157.

2  Essai  sur  I'ldentite  des  Agents  Producteurs  du  Son,  c/e  la  Lum/ere.etc.,  p.  15,  Ibid.

3  Ibid.,  p   218  4  Summarised  from  Ibid.,  p.  213  .    Des  Espr/ts,  Tome  iv,  p.  158.  r>  May,  1855,  Ibid  ,  p    139  "  (>  La  Terre  et  notre  Systeme  so/a/re    Ibid

222  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

There  is  a  problem  to  be  solved  in  this  connection.

How  do  Astron-  omers know  that  Neptune  is  a  planet,  or  even  that  it  is  a  body  belonging  to  our  system  ?  Being  found  on  the  very  confines  of  our  Planetary  World,  so  called,  the  latter  was  arbitrarily  expanded  to  receive  it ;  but  what  really  mathematical  and  infallible  proof  have  Astronomers  that  it  is  (a)  a  planet,  and  (b)  one  of  our  planets?  None  at  all  !  It  is  at  such  an  immeasurable  distance  from  us.  the

apparent  diameter  of   the  sun   being  to  Neptune  but  one-fortieth  of  the  sun's  apparent  diameter  to  us,

and  it  is  so  dim  and  hazy  when  seen  through  the  best  telescope  that  it  looks  like  an  astronomical  romance  to  call  it  one  of  our  planets.

Neptune's  heat  and  light  are  reduced  to  ^~  part  of  the  heat  and  light  received  by  the  earth.

His  motion  and  that  of  his  satellites  have  always  looked  suspicious.

They  do  not  agree — in  appearance,  at  least — with  those  of  the  other  planets.

His  system  is  retrograde,  etc.

But  even  the  latter  abnormal  fact  resulted  only  in  the  creation  of  new  hypotheses  by  our  Astronomers,  who  forthwith  suggested  a  probable  overturn  of  Neptune,  his  collision  with  another  body,  etc.

Was  Adams'  and  Leverrier's  discovery  so  welcomed  because  Neptune  was  as  necessary  as  was  Ether  to  throw  a  new  glory  upon  astronomical  prevision,  upon  the  certitude  of  modern  scientific  data,  and  principally  upon  the  power  of  mathematical  analysis  ?  It  would  so  appear.

A  new  planet  that  widens  our  planetary  domain  by  more  than  four  hundred  million  leagues  is  worthy  of  annexation.

Yet,  as  in  the  case  of  terrestrial  annexation,  scientific  authority  may  be  proved  "right"  only  because  it  has  "might."  Neptune's  motion  happens  to  be  dimly  perceived  :  Eureka  '  it  is  a  planet '  A  mere  motion,  how-  ever, proves  very  little.

It  is  now  an  ascertained  fact  in  Astronomy  that  there  are  no  absolutely  fixed  stars  in  Nature,1  even  though  such  stars  should  con-  tinue to  exist  in  astronomical  parlance,  while  they  have  passed  from  the  scientific  imagination.

Occultism,  however,  has  a  strange  theory  of  its  own  with  regard  to  Neptune.

Occultism  says  that  if  several  hypotheses  resting  on  mere  assumption —  which  have  been  accepted  only  because  they  have  been  taught  by  eminent  men  of  learning — are  taken  away  from  the  Science  of  Modern  Astronomy,  to

1  If,  as  Sir  W.  Herschel  thought,  the  so-called  fixed  stars  have  resulted  from,  and  owe  their  origin  to  nebular  combustion,  they  cannot  be  fixed  any  more  than  is  our  sun,  which  was  believed  to  be  motionless  and  is  now  found  to  rotate  around  its  axis  every  twenty-five  days.

As  the  fixed  star  nearest  to  the  sun,  however,  is  eight-thousand  times  farther  away  from  him  than  is  Neptune,  the  illusions  furnished  by  the  telescopes  must  be  also  eight-thousand  times  as  great  We  will  therefore  leave  the  question  at  rest,  repeating  only  what  A.  Maury  said  in  his  work  (La  Terre  et  /'  Homme,  published  in  1858)  "  It  is  utterly  impossible,  so  far,  to  decide  anything  concerning  Neptune's  constitution,  analogy  alone  authorising  us  to  ascribe  to  him  a  rotary  motion  like  that  of  other  planets  "  (Ibid.,  p.  140).

KABALISTS  IN  SCIENCE  AND  OCCULT  ASTRONOMY

which  they  serve  as  props,  then  even  the  presumably  universal  law  of  gravi-  tation will  be  found  to  be  contrary  to  the  most  ordinary  truths  of  mechanics.

And  really  one  can  hardly  blame  Christians — foremost  of  all  the  Roman  Catholics — however  scientific  some  of  these  may  themselves  be,  for  refusing,  to  quarrel  with  their  Church  for  the  sake  of  scientific  beliefs.

Nor  can  we  even  blame  them  for  accepting  in  the  secrecy  of  their  hearts — as  some  of  them  do — the  theological  "  Virtues  "  and  "  Archons  "  of  Darkness,  instead  of  all  the  blind  forces  offered  them  by  Science.

Never  can  there  be  intervention  of  any  sort  in  the  marshalling  and  the  regular  precession  of  the  celestial  bodies  '  The  law  of  gravitation  is  the  law  of  laws ,  who  ever  witnessed  a  stone  rising  in  the  air  against  gravitation  ?  The  permanence  of  the  universal  law  is  shown  m  the  behaviour  of  the  sidereal  worlds  and  globes  eternally  faithful  to  their  primitive  orbits  ;  never  wandering  beyond  their  respective  paths.

Nor  is  there  any  intervention  needed,  as  it  could  only  be  disastrous.

Whether  the  first  sidereal  incipient  rotation  took  place  owing  to  an  intercosmic  chance,  or  to  the  spontaneous  develop-  ment of  latent  primordial  forces ,  or  again,  whether  that  impulse  was  given  once  for  all'  by  God  or  Gods— it  does  not  make  the  slightest  difference  At  this  stage  of  cosmic  evolution  no  intervention,  superior  or  inferior,  is  admissible.

Were  any  to  take  place,,  the  universal  clock-work  would  stop,  and  Kosmos  would  fall  into  pieces

Such  are  stray  sentences,  pearls  of  wisdom,  fallen  from  time  to  time  from-  scientific  lips,  and  now  chosen  at  random  to  illustrate  a  query.

We  lift  our  diminished  heads  and  look  heavenward.

Such  seems  to  be  the  fact:  worlds,  suns,  and  stars,  the  shining  myriads  of  the  heavenly  hosts,  remind  the  Poet  of  an  infinite,  shoreless  ocean,  whereon  move  swiftly  numberless  squadrons,  of  ships,  millions  upon  millions  of  cruisers,  large  and  small,  crossing  each  other,  whirling  and  gyrating  in  every  direction  ;  and  Science  teaches  us,  that  though  they  be  without  rudder  or  compass  or  any  beacon  to  guide  them,  they  are  nevertheless  secure  from  collision — almost  secure,  at  any  rate,  save  in  chance  accidents — as  the  whole  celestial  machine  is  built  upon  and  guided  by  an  immutable,  albeit  blind,  law,  and  by  constant  and  accelerating  force  or  forces.

"  Built  upon  "  by  whom  ?  "  By  self -evolution,"  is  the  answer.

More-  over, as  dynamics  teaches  that

a  body  in  motion  tends  to  continue  m  the  same  state  of  relative  rest  or  motion'  unless  acted  upon  by  some  external  force,

this  force  has  to  be  regarded  as  self-generated — even  if  not  eternal,  since  this  would  amount  to  the  recognition  of  perpetual  motion —  and  so  well  self-  calculated  and  self-adjusted  as  to  last  from  the  beginning  to  the  end  of  Kosmos.

But  "self-generation"  has  still  to  generate  from  something,  generation  ex-nihr/o  being  as  contrary  to  reason  as  it  is  to  Science.

Thus  we  are  placed  once  more  between  the  horns  of  a  dilemma  :  are  we  to  believe  in  perpetual  motion  or  in  self-generation  ex-nihilo  ?  And  if  in  neither,

224  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

who  or  what  is  that  something,  which  first  produced  that  force  or  those  forces  ?

There  are  such  things  in  mechanics  as  superior  levers,  which  give  the  impulse  and  act  upon  secondary  or  inferior  levers.

The  former,  however,  need  an  impulse  and  occasional  renovation,  otherwise  they  would  themselves  very  soon  stop  and  fall  back  into  their  original  status.

What  is  the  external  force  which  puts  and  retains  them  in  motion  ?  Another  dilemma  !

As  to  the  law  of  cosmical  non-intervention,  it  could  be  justified  only  in  one  case,  namely,  if  the  celestial  mechanism  were  perfect ;  but  it  is  not.

The  so-called  unalterable  motions  of  celestial  bodies  alter  and  change  incessantly  ;  they  are  very  often  disturbed,  and  the  wheels  of  even  the  sidereal  locomotive  itself  occasionally  jump  off  their  invisible  rails,  as  may  be  easily  proved.

Other-  wise why  should  Laplace  speak  of  the  probable  occurrence  at  some  future  time  of  an  out-and-out  reform  in  the  arrangement  of  the  planets , 1  or  La-  grange  maintain  the  gradual  narrowing  of  the  orbits  ;  or  our  modern  Astron-  omers, again,  declare  that  the  fuel  in  the  sun  is  slowly  disappearing  ?  If  the  laws  and  forces  which  govern  the  behaviour  of  the  celestial  bodies  are  immutable,  such  modifications  and  wearing-out  of  substance  or  fuel,  of  force  and  fluids,  would  be  impossible  ;  yet  they  are  not  denied.

Therefore  one  has  to  suppose  that  such  modifications  will  have  to  rely  upon  the  laws  of  forces,  which  will  have  to  self-regenerate  themselves  once  more  on  such  occasions,  thus  producing  an  astral  antinomy,  and  a  kind  of  physical  palinomy,  since,  as  Laplace  says,  one  would  then  see  fluids  disobeying  themselves  and  re-acting  in  a  way  contrary  to  all  their  attributes  and  properties.

Newton  felt  very  uncomfortable  about  the  moon.

Her  behaviour  in  progressively  narrowing  the  circumference  of  her  orbit  around  the  earth  made  him  nervous,  lest  it  should  end  one  day  in  our  satellite  falling  upon  the  earth.

The  world,  he  confessed,  needed  repairing,  and  that  very  often.2  In  this  he  was  corroborated  by  Herschel.3  He  speaks  of  real  and  quite  considerable  deviations,  besides  those  which  are  only  apparent,  but  gets  some  consolation  from  his  conviction  that  some  body  or  something  will  probably  see  to  things.

We  may  be  answered  that  the  personal  beliefs  of  some  pious  Astron-  omers, however  great  they  may  be  as  scientific  characters,  are  no  proofs  of  the  actual  existence  and  presence  in  space  of  intelligent  supramundane  Beings,  of  either  Gods  or  Angels.

It  is  the  behaviour  of  the  stars  and  planets  them-  selves that  has  to  be  analysed  and  inferences  must  be  drawn  therefrom.

1  Exposition  du  vrai  Systeme  du  Monde,  p

-'  See  the  passage  quoted  by  Herschel  in  Natural  Philosophy,  p    273  Des  Esprits,  Tome  iv,  p    105.

J  Loc    cit

MODERN  KABALISTS  IN  SCIENCE

Renan   asserts   that   nothing   that  we  know  of  the  sidereal  bodies  warrants  the  idea  of  the  presence  of  any  Intelligence,  whether  internal  or  external  to  them.

Let   us   see,    says    Reynaud,    if   this   is   a  fact,  or  only  one  more  empty  scientific  assumption.

The  orbits  traversed  by  the  planets  are  far  from  being  immutable.

They  are,  on  the  contrary,  subject  to  perpetual  mutation  in  position,  as  in  form.

Elongations,  contractions,  and  orbital  widenings,  oscillations  from  right  to  left,  slackening  and  quick-  ening of  speed  and  all  this  on  a  plane  which  seems  to  vacillate  '

As  is  very  pertinently  observed  by  des  Mousseux  :

Here  is  a  path  having  little  of  the  mathematical  and  mechanical  precision  claimed  for  it ;  for  we  know  of  no  clock  which,  having  gone  slow  for  several  minutes  should  catch  up  the  right  time  of  itself  and  without  a  turn  of  the  key

So  much  for  blind  law  and  force.

As  for  the  physical  impossibility — a  miracle  indeed  in  the  sight  of  Science — of  a  stone  raised  in  the  air  against  the  law  of  gravitation,  this  is  what  Babinet — the  deadliest  enemy  and  opponent  of  the  phenomena  of  levitation — (cited  by  Arago)  says :

Everyone   knows  the  theory  of  bolides  [meteors]  and  aerolithes    .  In  Con-

necticut an  immense  aerolith  was  seen  [a  mass  of  eighteen  hundred  feet  in  diameter],  bombarding  a  whole  American  zone  and  returning  to  the  spot  [in  mid-air]  from  which  it  had  started/

Thus  we  find  in  both  of  the  cases  above  cited — that  of  self-correcting  planets  and  of  meteors  of  gigantic  size  flying  back  into  the  air — a  "  blind  force  "  regulating  and  resisting  the  natural  tendencies  of  "blind  matter,"  and  •even  occasionally  repairing  its  mistakes  and  correcting  its  failures.

This  is  far  more  miraculous  and  even  ".extravagant,"  one  would  say,  than  any  "Angel-  guided  "  Element.

Bold  is  he  who  laughs  at  the  idea  of  Von  Haller,  who  declares  that :

The  stars  are  perhaps  an  abode  of  glorious  Spirits  ,  as  here  Vice  reigns,  there  is  Virtue  master.

1  Terre  et  Get,  p   28      Ibid.

•  CEuvres  d'  Arago,  vol    i,  p.  219  ;  quoted  in  Des  Espnts,  Tome  ni,  p.  462.  •'  "  Die  Sterne  sind  vief/eicht  efn  Sit*  verfclarter  Geister ,  Wie  hier  das  Laster  herrscht,  1st  dort  die  Jugend  Meister."  FF

SECTION

EASTERN  AND  WESTERN  OCCULTISM

IN   The    Theosophist  for  March,   1886,1  in  an  answer  to  the  "  Solar  Sphinx,"  9  member  of  the  London  Lodge  of  the  Theosophical  Society  wrote  as  follows  :

We  hold  and  believe  that  the  revival  of  occult  knowledge  now  in  progress  wilt  some  day  demonstrate  that  the  Western  system  represents  ranges  of  perceptions  which  the  Eastern — at  least  as  expounded  in  the  pages  of  The  Theosophist — has  yet  to  attain  v

The  writer  is  not  the  only  person  labouring  under  this  erroneous  impres-  sion.

Greater  Kabalists  than  he  had  said  the  same  in  the  United  States.

This  only  proves  that  the  knowledge  possessed  by  Western  Occultists  of  the  true  Philosophy,  and  the  "ranges  of  perceptions"  and  thought  of  the  Eastern  doctrines,  is  very  superficial.

This  assertion  will  be  easily  demonstrated  by  giving  a  few  instances,  instituting  comparisons  between  the  two  interpretations  of  one  and  the  same  doctrine — the  Hermetic  Universal  Doctrine.

It  is  the  more  needed  since,  were  we  to  neglect  bringing  forward  such  comparisons,  our  work  would  be  left  incomplete.

We  may  take  the  late  Eliphas  Levi,  rightly  referred  to  by  another  Western  Mystic,  Mr.  Kenneth  Mackenzie,  as  "  one  of  the  greatest  representa-  tives of  modern  Occult  Philosophy,"  3  as  presumably  the  best  and  most  learned  expounder  of  the  Chaldean  Kabalah,  and  compare  his  teaching  with  that  of  Eastern  Occultists.

In  his  unpublished  manuscripts  and  letters,  lent  to  us  by  a  Theosophist,  who  was  for  fifteen  years  his  pupil,  we  had  hoped  to

1  Op.  at.,  p.

-  Whenever  Occult  doctrines  were  expounded  in  the  pages  of  The  Theosoph/st,  care  was  taken  each  time  to  declare  a  subject  incomplete  when  the  whole  could  not  be  given  in  its  fulness,  and  no  writer  has  ever  tried  to  mislead  the  reader.

As  to  the  Western  "  ranges  of  perception  "  concerning  doctrines  really  Occult,  the  Eastern  Occultists  have  been  made  acquainted  with  them  for  some  time  past.

Thus  they  are  enabled  to  assert  with  confidence  that  the  West  may  be  in  possession  of  Hermetic  philosophy  as  a  speculative  system  of  dialectics,  the  latter  being  used  in  the  West  admirably  well,  but  it  lacks  entirely  the  knowledge  of  Occultism.

The  genuine  Eastern  Occultist  keeps  silent  and  unknown,  never  publishes  what  he  knows,  and  rarely  even  speaks  of  it.  as  he  knows  too  well  the  penalty  of  indiscretion.

''  See  The  Royal  Masonic  Cyclopaedia,  art     "  Sepher  Yetzireh,"  p.

EASTERN  AND  WESTERN  OCCULTISM

find  that  which  he  was  unwilling  to  publish.

What  we  do  find,  however,  dis-  appoints us  greatly.

We  will  take  these  teachings,  then,  as  containing  the  essence  of  Western  or  Kabalistic  Occultism,  analyzing  and  comparing  them  with  the  Eastern  interpretation  as  we  go  on.

Eliphas  Levi  teaches  correctly,  though  in  language  rather  too  rhapsodic-  ally  rhetorical  to  be  sufficiently  clear  to  the  beginner,  that

Eternal  life  is  Motion  equilibrated  by  the  alternate  manifestations  of  force.

But  why  does   he  not  add  that  this  perpetual  motion  is  independent  of  the  manifested  Forces  at  work  ?   He  says  :

Chaos  is  the   Tohu-vah-bohu  of  perpetual   motion  and  the  sum  total  of  pri-  mordial matter ;

and  he  fails  to  add  that  Matter  is  "  primordial  "  only  at  the  beginning  of  every  new  reconstruction  of  the  Universe  ;  matter  in  abscond/to,  as  it  is  called  by  the  Alchemists,  is  eternal,  indestructible,  without  beginning  or  end.

It  is  re-  garded by  Eastern  Occultists  as  the  eternal  Root  of  all,  the  Mulaprakriti  of  the  Vedantin,  and  the  Svabhavat  of  the  Buddhist,  the  Divine  Essence,  in  short,  or  Substance  ;  the  radiations  from  This  are  periodically  aggregated  into  graduated  forms,  from  pure  Spirit  to  gross  Matter ;  the  Root,  or  Space,  is  in  its  abstract  presence  the  Deity  Itself,  the  Ineffable  and  Unknown  One  Cause.

Ain-Soph  with  him  also  is  the  Boundless,  the  infinite  and  One  Unity,  secondless  and  causeless  as  Parabrahman.

Ain-Soph  is  the  indivisible  point,  and  therefore,  as  "  being  everywhere  and  nowhere,"  is  the  absolute  all.

It  is  also  "  Darkness  "  because  it  is  absolute  Light,  and  the  Root  of  the  seven  fundamental  Cosmic  Principles.

Yet  Eliphas  Levi,  by  simply  stating  that  "  Darkness  was  upon  the  face  of  the  Earth,"  fails  to  show  (a)  that  "  Dark-  ness "  in  this  sense  is  Deity  Itself,  and  he  is  therefore  withholding  the  only  philosophical  solution  of  this  problem  for  the  human  mind  ;  and  (6)  he  allows  the  unwary  student  to  believe  that  by  "  Earth  "  our  own  little  globe — an  atom  in  the  Universe — is  meant.

In  short,  this  teaching  does  not  embrace  the  Occult  Cosmogony,  but  deals  simply  with  Occult  Geology  and  the  formation  of  our  cosmic  speck.

This  is  further  shown  by  his  making  a  resume  of  the  Sephirothal  Tree  in  this  wise  :

God  is  harmony,  the  astronomy  of  Powers  and  Unity  outside  of  the  World.

This  seems  to  suggest  (a)  that  he  teaches  the  existence  of  an  extra -  cosmic  God,  thus  limiting  and  conditioning  both  the  Kosmos  and  the  divine  Infinity  and  Omnipresence,  which  cannot  be  extraneous  to  or  outside  of  one  single  atom  ;  and  (b)  that  by  skipping  the  whole  of  the  pre-cosmic  period —  the  manifested  Kosmos  here  being  meant — the  very  root  of  Occult  teaching,

228  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

he  explains  only  the  Kabalistic  meaning  of  the  dead-letter  of  the  Bible  and  Genesis,  leaving  its  spirit  and  essence  untouched.

Surely  the  "  ranges  of  perception  "  of  the  Western  mind  will  not  be  greatly  enlarged  by  such  a  limited  teaching.

Having  said  a  few  words  on  Tohu-vah-bohu — the  meaning  of  which  Wordsworth  rendered  graphically  as  "  higgledy-piggledy  " — and  having  ex-  plained that  this  term  denoted  Cosmos,  he  teaches  that  :

Above  the  dark  abyss  [Chaos]  were  the  Waters  ,  .  .  .  the  earth  [la  terre  /]  was  Tohu-vah-bohu,  /.e.,  in  confusion,  and  darkness  covered  the  face  of  the  Deep,  and  vehement  Breath  moved  on  the  Waters  when  the  Spirit  exclaimed  [?],  "  Let  there  be  light,"  and  there  was  light.

Thus  the  earth  [our  globe,  of  course]  was  in  a  state  of  cataclysm  ;  thick  vapours  veiled  the  immensity  of  the  sky,  the  earth  was  covered  with  waters  and  a  violent  wind  was  agitating  this  dark  ocean,  when  at  a  given  moment  the  equilibrium  revealed  itself  and  light  reappeared  ;  the  letters  that  compose  the  Hebrew  word  "  Bereshith  "  (the  first  word  of  Genesis)  are  "  Beth,"  the  binary,  the  verb  mani-  fested by  the  act,  a  ieminine  letter  ;  then  "  Resch,"  the  Verbum  and  Life,  number  20,  the  disc  multiplied  by  2  ;  and  "  Aleph,"  the  spiritual  principle,  the  Unit,  a  masculine  letter.

Place  these  letters  in  a  triangle  and  you  have  the  absolute  Unity,  that  without  being  included  into  numbers  creates  the  number,  the  first  manifestation,  which  is  2,  and  these  two  united  by  harmony  resulting  from  the  analogy  of  contraries  [opposites],  make  1,  only.

This  is  why  God  is  called  Elohim  (plural).

All  this  is  very  ingenious,  but  is  very  puzzling,  besides  being  incorrect.

For,  owing  to  the  first  sentence,  "  Above  the  dark  abyss  were  the  Waters,"  the  French  Kabalist  leads  the  student  away  from  the  right  track.

This  an  Eastern  Chela  will  see  at  a  glance,  and  even  one  of  the  profane  may  see  it.  For  if  the  Tohu-vah-bohu  is  "  under  "  and  the  Waters  are  "  above,"  then  these  two  are  quite  distinct  from  each  other,  and  this  is  not  the  case.

This  statement  is  a  very  important  one,  inasmuch  as  it  entirely  changes  the  spirit  and  nature  of  Cosmogony,  and  brings  it  down  to  a  level  with  exoteric  Genesis  — perhaps  it  was  so  stated  with  an  eye  to  this  result.

The  Tohu-vah-bohu  is  the  "  Great  Deep  "  and  is  identical  with  "  the  Waters  of  Chaos,"  or  the  primordial  Darkness.

By  stating  the  fact  otherwise  it  makes  both  "  the  Great  Deep  "  and  the  "  Waters  " — which  cannot  be  separated  except  in  the  phenom-  enal world — limited  as  to  space  and  conditioned  as  to  their  nature.

Thus  Eliphas  in  his  desire  to  conceal  the  last  word  of  Esoteric  Philosophy,  fails —  whether  intentionally  or  otherwise  does  not  matter — to  point  out  the  funda-  mental principle  of  the  one  true  Occult  Philosophy,  namely,  the  unity  and  absolute  homogeneity  of  the  One  Eternal  Divine  Element,  and  he  makes  of  the  Deity  a  male  God.

Then  he  says :

Above  the  Waters  was  the  powerful  Breath  of  the  Elohim  [the  creative  Dhyan  Chohans].  Above  the  Breath  appeared  the  Light,  and  above  the  Light  the  Word  „  .  .  that  created  it.

EASTERN  AND  WESTERN  OCCULTISM

Now  the  fact  is  quite  the  ^reverse  of  this  :  it  is  the  Primeval  Light  that  creates  the  Word  or  Logos,  Who  in  His  turn  creates  physical  light.

To  prove  and  illustrate  what  he  says  he  gives  the  following  figure  :

Now  any  Eastern  Occultist  upon  seeing  this  would  not  hesitate  to  pro-  nounce it  a  "  left-hand  "  magic  figure.

It  is  entirely  reversed,  and  it  represents  the  third  stage  of  religious  thought,  that  current  in  Dvapara  Yuga,  when  the  one  principle  is  already  separated  into  male  and  female,  and  humanity  is  approaching  the  fall  into  materiality  which  brings  the  Kali  Yuga.

A  student  of  Eastern  Occultism  would  draw  it  thus  :

For  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE  teaches  us  that  the  reconstruction  of  the  Universe  takes  place  in  this  wise  :  At  the  periods  of  new  generation,  perpetual  Motion  becomes  Breath ;  from  the  Breath  comes  forth  primordial  Light,  through  whose  radiance  manifests  the  Eternal  Thought  concealed  in  darkness.

230  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

and  this  becomes  the  Word  (Mantra).1     It  is  That  (the  Mantra  or  Word)  from  which  all  This  (the  Universe)  sprang  into  being.

Further  on  Eliphas  Levi  says :

This  [the  concealed  Deity]  radiated  a  ray  into  the  Eternal  Essence  [Waters  of  Space]  and,  fructifying  thereby  the  primordial  germ,  the  Essence  expanded,2  giving  birth  to  the  Heavenly  Man  from  whose  mind  were  born  all  forms.

The  Kabalah  states  very  nearly  the  same.

To  learn  what  it  really  teaches  one  has  to  reverse  the  order  in  which  Eliphas  Levi  gives  it,  replacing  the  word  "  above  "  by  that  of  "  in,"  as  there  cannot  surely  be  any  "  above  "  or  41  under  "  in  the  Absolute.

This  is  what  he  says  :

Above  the  waters  the  powerful  breath  of  the  Elohim ,  above  the  Breath  the  Light ;  above  Light  the  Word,  or  the  Speech  that  created  it  We  see  here  the  spheres  of  evolution .  the  souls  [?]  driven  from  the  dark  centre  (Darkness)  toward  the  luminous  circumference.

At  the  bottom  of  the  lowest  circle  is  the  Tohu-vah-bohu,  or  the  chaos  which  precedes  all  manifestation  [Na/ssances — generation] ,  then  the  region  of  Water ;  then  Breath  ;  then  Light ;  and,  lastly,  the  Word.

The  construction  of  the   above  sentences  shows  that  the  learned  Abbe_  had  a  decided  tendency  to  anthropomorphize  creation,  even  though  the  latter  has  to   be   shaped   out   of   pre-existing    material,    as  the  Zohar  shows  plainly  enough.

This  is  how  the  "  great  "  Western  Kabalist  gets  out  of  the  difficulty  :  he  keeps  silent  on  the  first  stage  of  evolution  and  imagines  a  second  Chaos.

Thus  he  says  :

The  Tohu-vah-bohu  is  the  Latin  Limbus,  or  twilight  of  the  morning  and  evening  of  life.3  It  is  in  perpetual  motion,4  it  decomposes  continually,''  and  the  work  of  putrefaction  accelerates,  because  the  world  is  advancing  towards  regeneration.6  The  Tohu-vah-bohu  of  the  Hebrews  is  not  exactly  the  confusion  of  things  called  Chaos  by  the  Greeks,  and  which  is  found  described  in  the  commencement  of  the  Metamorphosis  of  Ovid  ;  it  is  something  greater  and  more  profound  ;  it  is  the  foundation  of  religion,  it  is  the  philosophical  affirmation  of  the  immateriality  of  God.

Rather  an  affirmation  of  the  materiality  of  a  personal  God.

If  a  man  has  to  seek  his  Deity  in  the  Hades  of  the  ancients — for  the  Tohu-vah-bohu,  or  the  Limbus  of  the  Greeks,  is  the  Hall  of  Hades — then  one  can  wonder  no

1  In  the  exoteric  sense,  the  Mantra  (or  that  psychic  faculty  or  power  that  convevs  perception  or  thought)  is  the  older  portion  of  the  Vee/as,  the  second  part  of  which  is  composed  of  the  Brahmanas  In  Esoteric  phraseology  Mantra  is  the  Word  made  flesh,  or  rendered  objective,  through  divine  magic.

2  The  secret  meaning  of  the  word  "  Brahml  "  is  "  expansion,"  "  increase,"  or  "  growth."

3  Why  not  give   at  once  its  theological  meaning,   as  we  find   it  in  Webster  ?  With  the  Roman  Catholics  it  means  simply  "  purgatory,"  the  borderland  between  heaven  and  hell  (Limbus  patrum  and  Limbus  infantum),  the  one  for  all  men,  whether  good,  bad  or  indifferent ,  the  other  for  the  souls  of  unbaptized  children  !  With  the  ancients  it  meant  simply  that  which  in  Esoteric  Buddhism  is  called  the  Klma  Loka,  between  Devachan  and  Avitchi.

4  As  Chaos,  the  eternal  Element,  not  as  the  Kama  Loka  surely.

5  A  proof  that  by  this  word  £liphas  Levi  means  the  lowest  region  of  the  terrestrial  Akasha.

6  Evidently  he  is  concerned  only  with  our  periodical  world,  or  the  terrestrial  globe.

EASTERN  AND  WESTERN  OCCULTISM

longer  at  the  accusations  brought  forward  by  the  Church  against  the  "  witches  "  and  sorcerers  versed  in  Western  Kabalism,  that  they  adored  the  goat  Mendes,  or  the  devil  personified  by  certain  spooks  and  Elementals.

But  in  face  of  the  task  Eliphas  Levi  had  set  before  himself — that  of  reconciling  Jewish  Magic  with  Roman  ecclesiasticism — he  could  say  nothing  else.

Then  he  explains  the  first  sentence  in  Genesis  :

Let  us  put  on  one  side  the  vulgar  translation  of  the  sacred  texts  and  see  what  Js  hidden  in  the  first  chapter  of  Genesis

He  then  gives  the  Hebrew  text  quite  correctly,  but  transliterates  it :

Bereschith   Bara    Eloim  uth  aschamam  ouatti  aares  ouares  ayete  Tohu-vah-bohu.

.   Ouimas  Eloim  rai  avur  ouiai  aour.

And  he  then  explains  :

The  first  world,  "  Bereschith,"  signifies  "  genesis,"  a  word  equivalent  to  "  nature."

"  The  act  of  generation  or  production,"  we  maintain  ;  not  "  nature."  He  then  continues  :

The  phrase,  then,  is  incorrectly  translated  m  the  Bible.

It  is  not  "  in  the  begin-  ning," for  it  should  be  at  the  stage  of  the  generating  force,1  which  would  thus  exclude  every  idea  of  the  ex-nihtlo  ...  as  nothing  cannot  produce  something.

The  word  "  Eloim  "  or  "  Elohim  "  signifies  the  generating  Powers,  and  such  is  the  Occult  sense  of  the  first  verse.

.  .  .  "  Bereschith  "  ("  nature  "  or  ••  genesis  "),  "  Bara  "  ("  created  ")  <(  Eloim  "  ("the  forces  ")  "  Athat-ashamaim  "  ("  heavens  ")  "  ouath  "  and  "  oaris  "  ("  the  earth  ");  that  is  to  say,  "  The  generative  potencies  created  indefinitely  (eternally2)  those  forces  that  are  the  equilibrated  opposites  that  we  call  heaven  and  earth,  meaning  the  space  and  the  bodies,  the  volatile  and  the  fixed,  the  movement  and  the  weight.

Now  this,  if  it  be  correct,  is  too  vague  to  be  understood  by  any  one  ignorant  of  the  Kabalistic  teaching.

Not  only  are  his  explanations  unsatis-  factory and  misleading — in  his  published  works  they  are  still  worse — but  his  Hebrew  transliteration  is  entirely  wrong  :  it  precludes  the  student,  who  would  compare  it  for  himself  with  the  equivalent  symbols  and  numerals  of  the  words  and  letters  of  the  Hebrew  alphabet,  from  finding  anything  of  that  he  might  have  found  were  the  words  correctly  spelt  in  the  French  transliteration.

Compared  even  with  exoteric  Hindu  Cosmogony,  the  philosophy  which  Eliphas  Levi  gives  out  as  Kabalistic  is  simply  mystical  Roman  Catholicism  adapted  to  the  Christian  Kabalah.

His  Histoire  de  la  Magie  shows  it  plainly,

1  In  the  "  reawakening  "  of  the  Forces  would  be  more  correct,

2  An  action  which  is  incessant  in  eternity  cannot  be  called  "  creation  ,  "  »t  is  evolution,  and  the  eternally  or  ever-becoming  of  the  Greek  Philosopher  and  the  Hindu  Veddntm  ,  it  is  the  Sat  and  the  one  Beingness  of  Parmenides,  or  the  Being  identical  with  Thought.

Now  how  can  the  Potencies  be  said  to  "  create   movement,"  once  it  is  seen  movement  never  had  any  beginning,  but  existed  in  the  Eternity  ?  "Why  not  say  that  the  reawakened  Potencies  transferred  motion  from  the  eternal  to  the  temporal  plane  of  being  ?  Surely  this  is  not  Creation.

232  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

and  reveals  also  his  object,  which  he  does  not  even  care  to  conceal.

For,  while  stating  with  his  Church,  that

The  Christian  religion  has  imposed  silence  on  the  lying  oracles  of  the  Gentiles  and  put  an  end  to  the  prestige  of  the  false  gods/

he  promises  to  prove  in  his  work  that  the  real  Sanctum  Regnum,  the  great  Magic  Art,  is  in  that  Star  of  Bethlehem  which  led  the  three  Magi  to  adore  the  Saviour  of  the  World.

He  says  :

We  will  prove  that  the  study  of  the  sacred  Pentagram  had  to  lead  all  the  Magi  to  know  the  new  name  which  should  be  raised  above  all  names,  and  before  which  every  being  capable  of  worship  has  to  bend  his  knee.'

This  shows  that  Levi's  Kabalah  is  mystic  Christianity,  and  not  Occultism  ;  for  Occultism  is  universal  and  knows  no  difference  between  the  "  Saviours  "  (or  great  Avatar  as)  of  the  several  old  nations.

Eliphas  Levi  was  not  an  exception  in  preaching  Christianity  under  a  disguise  of  Kabalism.

He  was  undeniably  "  the  greatest  representative  of  modern  Occult  Philosophy,"  as  it  is  studied  in  Roman  Catholic  countries  generally,  where  it  is  fitted  to  the  preconceptions  of  Christian  students.

But  he  never  taught  the  real  universal  Kabalah,  and  least  of  all  did  he  teach  Eastern  Occultism.

Let  the  student  compare  the  Eastern  and  Western  teaching,  and  see  whether  the  philosophy  of  the  Upanishads  "has  yet  to  attain  the  ranges  of  perception"  of  this  Western  system.

Everyone  has  the  right  to  defend  the  system  he  prefers,  but  in  doing  this,  there  is  no  need  to  throw  slurs  upon  the  system  of  one's  brother.

In  view  of  the  great  resemblance  between  many  of  the  fundamental  "  truths  "  of  Christianity  and  the  "  myths"  of  Brahmanism,  there  have  been  serious  attempts  made  lately  to  prove  that  the  Bhagavad  G/ta  and  most  of  the  Brahmanas  and  the  Puranas  are  of  a  far  later  date  than  the  Mosaic  Books  and  even  than  the  Gospels.

But  were  it  possible  that  an  enforced  success  should  be  obtained  in  this  direction,  such  argument  cannot  achieve  its  object,  since  the  Rig  Veda  remains.

Brought  down  to  the  most  modern  limits  of  the  age  assigned  to  it,  its  date  cannot  be  made  to  overlap  that  of  the  Pentateuch,  which  is  admittedly  later.

The  Orientalists  know  well  that  they  cannot  make  away  with  the  land-  marks, followed  by  all  subsequent  religions,  set  up  in  that  "  Bible  of  Human-  ity "  called  the  Rig  Veda.

It  is  there  that  at  the  very  dawn  of  intellectual  humanity  were  laid  the  foundation-stones  of  all  the  faiths  and  creeds,  of  every  Fane  and  church  built  from  first  to  last ;  and  they  are  still  there.

Universal

1  Histoire  c/e  la  Magie      Int.,  p    1  -  Ibid.,  p

EASTERN  AND  WESTERN  OCCULTISM

"  myths,"  personifications  of  Powers  divine  and  cosmic,  primary  and  secondary,  and  historical  personages  of  all  the  now-existing  as  well  as  of  extinct  religions,  are  to  be  found  in  the  seven  chief  Deities  and  their  330.000,000  correlations  of  the  Rig  Veda,  and  those  Seven,  with  the  odd  millions,  are  the  Rays  of  the  one  boundless  Unity.

But  to  THIS  can  never  be  offered  profane  worship.

It  can  only  be  the  "  object  of  the  most  abstract  meditation,  which  Hindus  practise  in  order  to  obtain  absorption  in  it."  At  the  beginning  of  every  "  dawn  "  of  "  Creation,"  eternal  Light — which  is  darkness — assumes  the  aspect  of  so-called  Chaos  :  chaos  to  the  human  intellect ;  the  eternal  Root  to  the  superhuman  or  spiritual  sense.

"  Osiris  is  a  black  God."  These  were  the  words  pronounced  at  "  low  breath  "  at  Initiation  in  Egypt,  because  Osiris  Noumenon  is  darkness  to  the  mortal.

In  this  Chaos  are  formed  the  "Waters,"  Mother  Isis,  Aditi,  etc.

They  are  the  "  Waters  of  Life,"  in  which  primordial  germs  are  created — or  rather  reawakened — by  the  primordial  Light.

It  is  Purushottama,  or  the  Divine  Spirit,  which  in  its  capacity  of  Narayana,  the  Mover  on  the  Waters  of  Space,  fructifies  and  infuses  the  Breath  of  life  into  that  germ  which  becomes  the  "  Golden  Mundane  Egg,"  in  which  the  male  Brahma  is  created  ,J  and  from  this  the  first  Prajapati,  the  Lord  of  Beings,  emerges  and  becomes  the  pro-  genitor of  mankind.

And  though  it  is  not  he,  but  the  Absolute,  that  is  said  to  contain  the  Universe  in  Itself,  yet  it  is  the  duty  of  the  male  Brahma  to  manifest  it  in  a  visible  form.

Hence  he  has  to  be  connected  with  the  pro-  creation of  species,  and  assumes,  like  Jehovah  and  other  male  Gods  in  subsequent  anthropomorphism,  a  phallic  symbol.

At  best  every  such  male  God,  the  "  Father  "  of  all,  becomes  the  "  Archetypal  Man."  Between  him  and  the  Infinite  Deity  stretches  an  abyss.

In  the  theistic  religions  of  personal  Gods  the  latter  are  degraded  from  abstract  Forces  into  physical  potencies-  The  Water  of  Life — the  "  Deep  "  of  Mother  Nature — is  viewed  in  its  terrestrial  aspect  in  anthropomorphic  religions.

Behold,  how  holy  it  has  become  by  theological  magic  !  It  is  held  sacred  and  is  deified  now  as  of  old  in  almost  every  religion.

But  if  Christians  use  it  as  a  means  of  spiritual  purification  in  baptism  and  prayer  ;  if  Hindus  pay  reverence  to  their  sacred  streams,  tanks,  and  rivers  ;  if  Pars?,  Mahommedan  and  Christian  alike  believe  in  its  efficacy,  surely  that  element  must  have  some  great  and  Occult  signifi-  cance.

In  Occultism  it  stands  for  the  Fifth  Principle  of  Kosmos,  in  the  lower

1  The  Vaishnavas,  who  regard  Vishnu  as  the  Supreme  God  and  the  fashioner  of  the  Universe,  claim  that  Brahma  sprang  from  the  navel  of  Vishnu,  the  "  imperishable,"  or  rather  from  the  lotus,  that  grew  from  it.  But  the  "  navel  "  here  means  the  Central  Point,  the  mathematical  symbol  of  in-  finitude, or  Parabrahman,  the  One  and  the  Secondless.

234  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

septenary  :  for  the  whole  visible  Universe  was  built  by  Water,  say  the  Kabalists  who  know  the  difference  between  the  two  waters — the  "  Waters  of  Life  "  and  those  of  Salvation — so  confused  together  in  dogmatic  religions.

The  "  King-Preacher"  says  of  himself  :

I,  the   Preacher,  was  king  over  Israel  in  Jerusalem,  and  I  gave  my  heart  to  seek  and  search  out  by  wisdom  concerning  all  things  that  are  done  under  heaven.

Speaking  of  the  great  work  and  glory  of  the  Elohim  • — unified  into  the  ''Lord  God"  in  the  English  Bible,  whose  garment,  he  tells  us,  is  light  and  heaven  the  curtain — he  refers  to  the  builder

Who  layeth  the  beams  of  his  chambers  in  the  waters,'

that  is,  the  divine  Host  of  the  Sephiroth,  who  have  constructed  the  Universe  out  of  the  Deep,  the  Waters  of  Chaos.

Moses  and  Thales  were  right  in  saying  that  only  earth  and  water  can  bring  forth  a  living  Soul,  water  being  on  this  plane  the  principle  of  all  things.

Moses  was  an  Initiate,  Thales  a  Philosopher — i.e.,  a  Scientist,  for  the  words  were  synonymous  in  his  day.

The  secret  meaning  of  this  is  that  water  and  earth  stand  in  the  Mosaic  Books  for  the  prima  materia  and  the  creative  (feminine)  Principle  on  our  plane.

In  Egypt  Osiris  was  Fire,  and  Isis  was  the  Earth  or  its  synonym  Water ;  the  two  opposing  elements — just  because  of  their  opposite  properties  — being  necessary  to  each  other  for  a  common  object :  that  of  procreation.

The  earth  needs  solar  heat  and  rain  to  make  her  throw  out  her  germs.

But  these  procreative  properties  of  Fire  and  Water,  or  Spirit  and  Matter,  are  symbols  but  of  physical  generation.

While  the  Jewish  Kabalists  symbolized  these  elements  only  in  their  application  to  manifested  things,  and  reverenced  them  as  the  emblems  for  the  production  of  terrestrial  life,  the  Eastern  philosophy  noticed  them  only  as  an  illusive  emanation  from  their  spiritual  prototypes,  and  no  unclean  or  unholy  thought  marred  its  Esoteric  religious  jtymbology.

Chaos,  as  shown  elsewhere,  is  Theos,  which  becomes  Kosmos  :  it  is  Space,  the  container  of  everything  in  the  Universe.

As  Occult  Teachings  assert,  it  is  called  by  the  Chaldeans,  Egyptians,  and  every  other  nation  Tohu-  vah-bohu,  or  Chaos,  Confusion,  because  Space  is  the  great  storehouse  of  Creation,  whence  proceed  not  forms  alone,  but  also  ideas,  which  could  receive  their  expression  only  through  the  Logos,  the  Word,  Verbum,  or  Sound.

1  Ecc/es/astes,  i,  12,  13.

2  As  everyone  knows,  the   Protestant  Bible  is  not  a  word-for-word  rendering  of  the  earlier  Greek  and  Latin  Bibles,  the  sense  is  very  often  disfigured,  and  "  God  "  put  where  "  Jahve  "  and  "  Elohim  "  stand.

3  Psalms,  civ,    3.

EASTERN  AND  WESTERN  OCCULTISM

The  numbers  1,  2,  3,  4  are  the  successive  emanations  from  Mother  [Space]  as  she  forms  running  downward  her  garment,  spreading  it  upon  the  seven  steps  oi  Creation.

}  The  roller  returns  upon  itself,  as  one  end  joins  the  other  in  in-  finitude, and  the  numbers  4,  3  and  2  are  displayed,  as  it  is  the  only  side  of  the  veil  that  we  can  perceive,  the  first  number  being  lost  in  its  inaccessible  solitude.

.  .  .  Father,  which  is  Boundless  Time,  generates  Mother,  which  is  infinite  Space,  in  Eternity  ;  and  Mother  generates  Father  in  Manvantaras,  which  are  divisions  of  durations,  that  Day  when  that  world  becomes  one  ocean.

Then  the  Mother  becomes  Nara  [Waters — the  Great  Deep]  for  Nara  [trie  Supreme  5p/r/t]  to  rest — or  move — upon,  when,  it  is  said,  that  1,2,3,  4  descend  and  abide  in  the  world  of  the  unseen,  while  the  4,  3,  2,  become  the  limits  in  the  visible  world  to  deal  with  the  manifestations  of  Father  [T/me].

This  relates  to  the  Mahayugas  which  in  figures  become  432,  and  with  the  addition  of  noughts,  4,320,000.

Now  it  is  surpassingly  strange,  if  it  be  a  mere  coincidence,  that  the  numerical  value  of  Tohu-vah-bohu,  or  "  Chaos,"  in  the  8/b/e — which  Chaos,  of  course,  is  the  "  Mother  "  Deep,  or  the  Waters  of  Space — should  yield  the  same  figures.

For  this  is  what  is  found  in  a  Kabalist  manuscript :

It  is  said  of  the  Heavens  and  the  Earth  in  the  second  verse  of  Genesis  that  they  were  "  Chaos  and  Confusion  " — that  is,  they  were  "  Tohu-vah-bohu  ,  "  "  and  darkness  was  upon  the  face  of  the  deep,"  /  e.,  "  the  perfect  material  out  of  which  construction  was  to  be  made  lacked  organization  "  The  order  of  the  digits  of  these  words  as  they  stand — i.e., l  the  letters  rendered  by  their  numerical  value — is  6,526,654  and  2,386.  By  art  speech  these  are  key-working  numbers  loosely  shuffled  together,  the  germs  and  keys  of  construction,  but  to  be  recognized,  one  by  one,  as  used  and  required.

They  follow  symmetrically  in  the  work  as  immediately  following  the  first  sentence  of  grand  enunciation :  "  In  Rash  developed  itself  Gods,  the  heavens  and  the  earth  "

Multiply  the  numbers  of  the  letters  of  "Tohu-vah-bohu  "  together  continuously  from  right  to  left,  placing  the  consecutive  single  products  as  we  go,  and  we  will  have  the  following  series  of  values,  viz.,  (a)  30,  60,  360,  2,160,  10,800,  43,200  or  as  by  the  characterizing  digits ;  3,  6,  36,  216,  108,  and  432 .  (b)  20,  120,  720,  1,440,  7,200,  or  2,  12,  72,  144,  72,  432,  the  series  closing  in  432,  one  of  the  most  famous  numbers  of  antiquity,  and  which,  though  obscured,  crops  out  in  the  chronology  up  to  the  Flood

1  To  avoid   misunderstanding   of  the  word    "  creation  "  so  often  used  by  us,  the  remarks  of  the  author  of  Through   the  Gates  of  Gold  may  be  quoted  owing  to  their  clearness  and  simplicity      "  The  words   '  to  create  '   are  often  understood  by  the  ordinary  mind  to  convey  the  idea  of  evolving  some-  thing out  of  nothing.

This   is   clearly  not  its   meaning.

We  are   mentally  obliged  to  provide  our  Creator  with  chaos  from  which  to  produce  the  worlds      The  tiller  of  the  soil,  who  is  the  typical  pro-  ducer of  social  life,   must  have  his  material,  his  earth,  his  sky,  rain  and  sun,  and  the  seeds  to  place  within  the  earth  ;  out  of  nothing  he  can  produce  nothing.

Out  of  a  void,  nature  cannot  arise  ,  there  is  that  material   beyond,   behind,  or  within,  from  which  she  is  shaped  by  our  desire  for  a  universe,"  pp.  71-

2  Commentary  on  STANZA  9,  on  Cycles

3  Or,   read  from  right  to  left,  the  letters  and  their  corresponding  numerals  stand  thus     "  t,"  4  ,  "h"  5;  "bh."  2,  "  v,"  6,  "v,"  6,  "h,"  5,  "  v"  or  "w,"  6,  which  yields  "  thuvbhu,"  4566256.  or  "Tohu-vah-bohu."

4  Mr.  Ralston  Skinner's  MS.

236  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

This  shows  that  the  Hebrew  usage  of  play  upon  the  numbers  must  have  come  to  the  Jews  from  India.

As  we  have  seen,  the  final  series  yields,  besides  many  another  combination,  the  figures  108  and  1008 — the  number  of  the  names  of  Vishnu,  whence  the  108  grains  of  the  Yogi's  rosary — and  clo$e  with  432,  the  truly  "  famous  "  number  in  Indian  and  Chaldean  antiquity,  appearing  in  the  cycle  of  4,320,000  years  in  the  former,  and  in  the  432,000  years,  the  duration  of  the  Chaldean  divine  dynasties.

SECTION

THE  IDOLS  AND  THE  TERAPHIM

THE  meaning  of  the  "  fairy-tale  "  told  by  the  Chaldean  Qu-tamy  is  easily  understood.

His  modus  operand!  with  the  "  idol  of  the  moon  "  was  that  of  all  the  Semites,  before  Terah,  Abraham's  father,  made  images  —  the  Teraphim,  called  after  him  —  or  the  "  chosen  people  "  of  Israel  ceased  divining  by  them.

These  teraphim  were  just  as  much  "  idols  as  is  any  pagan  image  or  statue.1  The  injunction  "  Thou  shalt  not  bow  to  a  graven  image,"  or  teraphim,  must  have  either  come  at  a  later  date,  or  have  been  disregarded,  since  the  bowing-  down  to  and  the  divining  by  the  teraphim  seem  to  have  been  so  orthodox  and  general  that  the  "  Lord  "  actually  threatens  the  Israelites,  through  Hosea,  to  deprive  them  of  their  teraphim.

For  the  children  of  Israel  shall  abide  many  days  without  a  king,  without  a

sacrifice,  and  without  an  image.

Matzebah,  or  statue,  or  pillar,  is  explained  in  the  Bible  to  mean  "  with-  out an  ephod  and  without  teraphim."  •

Father  Kircher  supports  very  strongly  the  idea  that  the  statue  of  the  Egyptian  Serapis  was  identical  in  every  way  with  those  of  the  seraphim,  or  teraphim,  in  the  temple  of  Solomon.

Says  Louis  de  Dieu  :

They  were,  perhaps,  images  of  angels,  or  statues  dedicated  to  the  angels,  the  presence  of  one  of  these  spirits  being  thus  attracted  into  a  teraphim  and  answering  the  inquirers  [consultans]  ;  and  even  in  this  hypothesis  the  word  "  teraphim  "  would  become  the  equivalent  of  "  seraphim  "  by  changing  the  "  t  "  into  "  s  "  in  the  manner  of  Syrians.

What  says  the  Septuagint  1  The  teraphim  are  translated  successively  by  a  —  forms   in  someone's   likeness  ;    eidolon,  an  "  astral  body  ;  "

1  That  the  teraphim  was  a   statue,   and   no   small  article  either,  is  shown  in  1  Samuel,  xix,  where  Michal  takes  a   teraphim   ("  image,"   as   it  is  translated)   and   puts   it  in   bed   to  represent   David,  her  husband,   who  ran  away  from  Saul  (see  verse  13,  et  seq.).     It  was  thus  of  the  size  and  shape  of  a  human  figure  —  a  statue  or  real  idol.

2  Op    cit  ,  lii,  4.          '  Louis  de  Dieu,  Genes/s,  xxxi,  19.     See  Des  Espnts,  Tome  in,  p.  257.

238  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

—  the  sculptured  ;  Kwrdfyia  —  sculptures  in  the  sense  of  containing  some-  thing hidden,  or  receptacles  ;  0r)\ovs  —  manifestations  ;  a\ri6eia<;  —  truths  or  realities  ;  /io/^w/iara  or  0&mo>tov9  —  luminous,  shining  likenesses.

The  latter  expression  shows  plainly  what  the  teraphim  were.

The  Vulgate  translates  the  term  by  "  annuntientes,"  the  "  messengers  who  announce,"  and  it  thus  be-  comes certain  that  the  teraphim  were  the  oracles.

They  were  the  animated  statues,  the  Gods  who  revealed  themselves  to  the  masses  through  the  Initiated  Priests  and  Adepts  in  the  Egyptian,  Chaldean,  Greek,  and  other  temples.

As  to  the  way  of  divining,  or  learning  one's  fate,  and  of  being  instructed  by  the  teraphim,1  it  is  explained  quite  plainly  by  Maimonides  and  Seldenus.

The  former  says  :

The  worshippers  of  the  teraphim  claimed  that  the  light  of  the  principal  stars  [planets],  penetrating  into  and  filling  the  carved  statue  through  and  through,  the  angelic  virtue  [of  the  regents,  or  animating  principle  in  the  planets]  conversed  with  them,  teaching  them  many  most  useful  arts  and  sciences  ''

In  his  turn  Seldenus  explains  the  same,  adding  that  the  teraphim  <{  were  built  and  fashioned  in  accordance  with  the  position  of  their  respective  planets,  each  of  the  teraphim  being  consecrated  to  a  special  "  star-angel,"  those  that  the  Greeks  called  stoichae,  as  also  according  to  figures  located  in>  the  sky  and  called  the  "  tutelary  Gods  "  :

Those  who  traced  out  the  (rroiyela  were  called  arToixeiwjjLaTiKol  or  the  diviners  by  the  planets  and  the  o-ro^em  [elements  ]  '

Ammianus  Marcellinus  states  that  the  ancient  divinations  were  always  accomplished  with  the  help  of  the  "  spirits  "  of  the  elements  (spiritus  ele-  mentorum),  or  as  they  are  called  in  Greek  'jrv^^aia  r&v  <rrotx«W  Now  the  latter  are  not  the  "  spirits  "  of  the  stars  (planets),  nor  are  they  divine  Beings  ;  they  are  simply  the  creatures  inhabiting  their  respective  elements,

1  "  The  teraphim  of  Abram's  father,  Terah,  the  '  maker  of  images,'  were  the  Kabiri  Gods  and  we  see  them  worshipped  by  Micah,  by  the  Danites,  and  others.

(Judges,  xvu-xviii,  etc.)  Teraphim  were  identical  with  seraphim,  and  these  were  serpent  images,  the  origin  of  which  is  in  the  Sanskrit  '  Sarpa  '  (the  '  Serpent  ')  a  symbol  sacred  to  all  the  deities  as  a  symbol  of  immortality  Kiyun,  or  the  God'  Kivan,  worshipped  by  the  Hebrews  m  the  wilderness,  is  Shiva,  the  Hindu  Saturn.

[The  Zendic  '  h  '  is's'  in  India  ,  thus,  '  Hapta  '  is  '  Sapta  ,  '  'Hindu'  is  '  Smdhaya.'  (Prof.

A.  Wilder)  '  The  "s"  continually  softens  to  "h"  from  Greece  to  Calcutta,  from  the  Caucasus  to  Egypt  '  says  Dunlap  Therefore  the  letters  '  k,'  '  h/  and  '  s  '  are  interchangeable.]  The  Greek  story  shows  that  Dardanus  the  Arcadian,  having  received  them  as  a  dowry,  carried  them  to  Samothrace,  and  thence  to  Troy  and  they  were  worshipped  long  before  the  days  of  glory  of  Tyre  or  Sidon,  though  the  former  had  been  built  2760  B  C.  From  where  did  Dardanus  derive  them  1  "  his  Unveiled,  I,  p

*  Maimon,  More  Nevochim,  III,  xxx.

J  Those  dedicated  to  the  sun  were  made  in  gold,  and  those  to  the  moon  in  silver.

4  De  Diis  Syri/s,  Teraph.

II,  Syat,  p.  31.

THE  IDOLS  AND  THE  TERAPHIM

called  by  the  Kabalists,  elementary  spirits,  and  by  the  Theosophists  elementals.1  Father  Kircher,  the  Jesuit,  tells  the  reader :

Every  god   had  such  instruments  of  divination  to  speak  through.

Each  had  his  speciality.

Serapis  gave  instruction  on  agriculture  ;  Anubis  taught  sciences ;  Horus  advised  upon  psychic  and  spiritual  matters  ;  Isis  was  consulted  on  the  rising  of  the  Nile,  and  so  on.

This  historical  fact,  furnished  by  one  of  the  ablest  and  most  erudite  among  the  Jesuits,  is  unfortunate  for  the  prestige  of  the  "  Lord  God  of  Israel  "  with  regard  to  his  claims  to  priority  and  to  his  being  the  one  living  God,  Jehovah,  on  the  admission  of  the  0/cf  Testament  itself,  conversed  with  his  elect  in  no  other  way,  and  this  places  him  on  a  par  with  every  other  Pagan  God,  even  of  the  inferior  classes.

In  Judges,  xvii,  we  read  of  Micah  having  an  ephod  and  a  teraphim  fabricated,  and  consecrating  them  ta  Jehovah  (see  the  Septuag'mt  and  the  Vulgate)  ;  these  objects  were  made  by  a  founder  from  the  two  hundred  shekels  of  silver  given  to  him  by  his  mother.

True,  King  James'  "  Holy  Bible  "  explains  this  little  bit  of  idolatry  by  saying  :

In  those  days  there  was  no   king  in  Israel,  but  every  man  did  that  which  was  right  in  his  own  eyes,

Yet  the  act  must  have  been  orthodox,  since  Micah,  after  hiring  a  priest,  a  diviner,  for  his  ephod  and  teraphim,  declares .  "  Now  know  I  that  the  Lord  will  do  me  good."  And  if  Micah's  act — who

had  an  house  of  Gods,  and  made  an  ephod  and  teraphim  and  consecrated  one  of  his  sons

to  their  service,  as  also  to  that  of  the  "  graven  image  "  dedicated  "  unto  the  Lord  "  by  his  mother — now  seems  prejudicial,  it  was  not  so  in  those  days  of  one  religion  and  one  lip.

How  can  the  Latin  Church  blame  the  act,  since  Kircher,  one  of  her  best  writers,  calls  the  teraphim  "  the  holy  instruments  of  primitive  revelations  ;  "  since  Genesis  shows  us  Rebecca  going  "  to  enquire  of  the  Lord,"  *  and  the  Lord  answering  her  (certainly  through  his  teraphim),  and  delivering  to  her  several  prophecies  ?  And  if  this  be  not  sufficient,  there  is  Saul,  who  deplores  the  silence  of  the  ephod,4  and  David  who  consults  the  thummim,  and  receives  oral  advice  from  the  Lord  as  to  the  best  way  of  killing  his  enemies.

1  Those  that  the  Kabalists  call  elementary  spirits  are  sylphs,  gnomes,  undines  and  salamanders,  nature-spirits,  in  short.

The  spirits  of  the  angels  formed  a  distinct  class.

2  (Ed/pus,  it,  444.  3  Op.  at.,  xxv,  22,  et  seq

4  The  ephod  was  a  linen  garment  worn  by  the  high  priest,  but  as  the  thummim  was  attached  to  it,  the  entire  paraphernalia  of  divination  was  often  comprised  in  that  single  word,  ephod.

Seel  Sam.,  xxviii,  6,  and  xxx.

7,  8.

240  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

The  thummim  and  urim,  however — the  object  in  our  days  of  so  much  conjecture  and  speculation — was  not  an  invention  of  the  Jews,  nor  had  it  originated  with  them,  despite  the  minute  instruction  given  about  it  by  Jehovah  to  Moses.

For  the  priest-hierophant  of  the  Egyptian  temples  wore  a  breast-  plate of  precious  stones,  in  every  way  similar  to  that  of  the  high  priests  of  the  Israelites.

The  high-priests  of  Egypt  wore  suspended  on  their  necks  an  image  of  sapphire,  called  Truth,  the  manifestation  of  truth  becoming  evident  in  it.

Seldenus  is  not  the  only  Christian  writer  who  assimilates  the  Jewish  to  the  Pagan  teraphim,  and  expressed  a  conviction  that  the  former  had  borrowed  them  from  the  Egyptians.

Moreover,  we  are  told  by  Dollinger,  a  pre-  eminently Roman  Catholic  writer  :

The  teraphim  were  used  and  remained  in  many  Jewish  families  to  the  days  of  Josiah.

As  to  the  personal  opinion  of  Dollinger,  a  Papist,  and  of  Seldenus,  a  Protestant — both  of  whom  trace  Jehovah  in  the  teraphim  of  the  Jews  and  "  evil  spirits"  in  those  of  the  Pagans — it  is  the  usual  one-sided  judgment  of  odium  theologicum  and  sectarianism.

Seldenus  is  right,  however,  in  arguing  that  in  the  days  of  old,  all  such  modes  of  communication  had  been  primarily  established  for  purposes  of  divine  and  angelic  communications  only.

But

The  holy  Spirit  (spirits,  rather)  spake  [not]  to  the  children  of  Israel  [alone]  by  urim  and  thummim,  while  the  tabernacle  remained,

as  Dr.  A.  Cruden  would  have  people  believe.

Nor  had  the  Jews  alone  need  of.  a  "tabernacle  "  for  such  a  kind  of  theophanic,  or  divine  communication  ;  for  no  Bath-Kol  (or  "  Daughter  of  the  divine  Voice  "),  called  thummim,  could  be  heard  whether  by  Jew,  Pagan,  or  Christian,  were  there  not  a  fit  tabernacle  for  it.  The  "  tabernacle  "  was  simply  the  archaic  telephone  of  those  days  of  Magic  when  Occult  powers  were  acquired  by  Initiation,  just  as  they  are  now.

The  nineteenth  century  has  replaced  with  an  electric  telephone  the  "  taber-  nacle "  of  specified  metals,  wood,  and  special  arrangements,  and  has  natural  mediums  instead  of  high  priests  and  hierophants.

Why  should  people  wonder,  then,  that  instead  of  reaching  Planetary  Spirits  and  Gods,  believers  should  now  communicate  with  no  greater  beings  than  elementals  and  animated  shells  — the  demons  of  Porphyry  ?  Who  these  were,  he  tells  us  candidly  in  his  work  On  the  Good  and  Bad  Demons ;

They  whose  ambition  is  to  be  taken  for  Gods,  and  whose  leader  demands  to  be  recognized  as  the  Supreme  God.

1  Paganism  and  Judaism,  iv,  p

THE  IDOLS  AND  THE  TERAPHIM

Most  decidedly — and  it  is  not  the  Theosophists  who  will  ever  deny  the  fact — there  are  good  as  well  as  bad  spirits,  beneficent  and  malevolent  "Gods"  in  all  ages.

The  whole  trouble  was,  and  still  is,  to  know  which  is  which.

And  this,  we  maintain,  the  Christian  Church  knows  no  more  than  her  profane  flock.

If  anything  proves  this,  it  is,  most  decidedly,  the  numberless  theological  blunders  made  in  this  direction.

It  is  idle  to  call  the  Gods  of  the  heathen  "devils,"  and  then  to  copy  their  symbols  in  such  a  servile  manner,  enforcing  the  distinction  between  the  good  and  the  bad  with  no  weightier  proof  than  that  they  are  respectively  Christian  and  Pagan.

The  planets — the  elements  of  the  Zodiac — have  not  figured  only  at  Heliopolis  as  the  twelve  stones  called  the  "  mysteries  of  the  element*  "  (elementorum  arcana).  On  the  authority  of  many  an  orthodox  Christian  writer  they  were  found  also  in  Solomon's  temple,  and  may  be  seen  to  this  day  in  several  old  Italian  churches,  and  even  in  Notre  Dame  of  Paris.

One  would  really  say  that  the  warning  in  Clement's  Stromata  has  been  given  in  vain,  though  he  is  supposed  to  quote  words  pronounced  by  St.  Peter.

He  says :

Do  not  adore  God  as  the  Jews  do,  who  think  they  are  the  only  ones  to  know  Deity  and  fail  to  perceive  that,  instead  of  God,  they  are  worshipping  angels,  the  lunar  months,  and  the  moon  l

Who  after  reading  the  above  can  fail  to  feel  surprise  that,  notwithstand-  ing such  understanding  of  the  Jewish  mistake,  the  Christians  are  still  worship-  ping the  Jewish  Jehovah,  the  Spirit  who  spoke  through  his  teraphim  '  That  this  is  so,  and  that  Jehovah  was  simply  the  "tutelary  genius,"  or  spirit,  of  the  people  of  Israel — only  one  of  the  pneumata  ton  stoicheion  (or  "  great  spirits  of  the  elements"),  not  even  a  high  "  Planetary" — is  demonstrated  on  the  authority  of  St.  Paul  and  of  Clemens  Alexandrinus,  if  the  words  they  use  have  any  meaning.

With  the  latter,  the  word  aroi^ela  signifies  not  only  ele-  ments, but  also

generative  cosmological  principles,  and  notably  the  signs  [or  constellations]  of  the  Zodiac,  of  the  months,  days,  the  sun  and  the  moon.a

The  expression  is  used  by  Aristotle  in  the  same  sense.

He  says,  rwv  aa-TpMv  <rro*%e£a,  [principles  of  the  Stars],3  while  Diogenes  Laertius  calls  Sw&eica  <rrot%6ta,  the  twelve  signs  of  the  Zodiac.4  Now  having  the  positive  evidence  of  Ammianus  Marcellinus  to  the  effect  that

Ancient  divination  was  always  accomplished  with  the  help  of  the  spirits  of  the  dements,

i  Op.  cit  ,  I,  vi,  5  ~  Discourse  to  the  Gentiles,  p,  146.

'  De  Gener.,  I,  II,  iv  *  See  Cosmos,  by  Manage,  I,  vi,

FF

242  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

or  the  same  TrvevfAara  TWV  a-ro^cicav  [spirits  of  the  elements],  and  seeing  in  the  Bible  in  numerous  passages  that  (a)  the  Israelites,  including  Saul  and  David,  resorted  to  the  same  divination,  and  used  the  same  means  ;  and  (6)  that  it  was  their  "  Lord  " — namely,  Jehovah — who  answered  them,  what  else  can  we  believe  Jehovah  to  be  than  a  "  spiritus  elementorum  "  ?

Hence  one  sees  no  great  difference  between  the  "  idol  of  the  moon  "  — the  Chaldean  teraphim  through  which  spoke  Saturn — and  the  idol  of  urim  and  thummim,  the  organ  of  Jehovah.

Occult  rites,  scientific  at  the  beginning  — and  forming  the  most  solemn  and  sacred  of  sciences — have  fallen  through  the  degeneration  of  mankind  into  Sorcery,  now  called  "  superstition."  As  Diogenes  explains  in  his  History :

The  Kaldhi,  having  made  long  observations  on  the  planets  and  knowing  better  than  anyone  else  the  meaning  of  their  motions  and  their  influences,  predict  to  people  their  futurity  They  regard  their  doctrine  of  the  five  great  orbs — which  they  call  interpreters,  and  we,  planets — as  the  most  important  And  though  they  allege  that  it  is  the  sun  that  furnishes  them  with  most  of  the  predictions  for  great  forthcoming  events,  yet  they  worship  more  particularly  Saturn  Such  predictions  made  to  a  number  of  kings,  especially  to  Alexander,  Antigonus,  Seleucus,  Nicanor,  etc  ,  .  .  have  been  so  marvellously  realised  that  people  were  struck  with  admiration.

It  follows  from  the  above  that  the  declaration  made  by  Qu-tamy,  the  Chaldean  Adept — to  the  effect  that  all  that  he  means  to  impart  in  his  work  to  the  profane  had  been  told  by  Saturn  to  the  moon,  by  the  latter  to  her  idol,  and  by  that  idol,  or  teraphim,  to  himself,  the  scribe — no  more  implied  idolatry  than  did  the  practice  of  the  same  method  by  King  David.

One  fails  to  perceive  in  it,  therefore,  either  an  apocrypha  or  a  "  fairy-tale."  The  above-named  Chaldean  Initiate  lived  at  a  period  far  anterior  to  that  ascribed  to  Moses,  in  whose  day  the  Sacred  Science  of  the  sanctuary  was  still  in  a  flourishing  condition.

It  began  to  decline  only  when  such  scoffers  as  Lucian  had  been  admitted,  and  the  pearls  of  the  Occult  Science  had  been  too  often,  thrown  to  the  hungry  dogs  of  criticism  and  ignorance.

1  Op.  cit ,  I,  i

SECTION

EGYPTIAN  MAGIC

FEW  of  our  students  of  Occultism  have  had  the  opportunity  of  examining  Egyptian  papyri — those  living,  or  rather  re-arisen  witnesses  that  Magic,  good  and  bad,  was  practised  many  thousands  of  years  back  into  the  night  of  time.

The  use  of  the  papyrus  prevailed  up  to  the  eighth  century  of  our  era,  when  it  was  given  up,  and  its  fabrication  fell  into  disuse.

The  most  curious  of  the  exhumed  documents  were  immediately  purchased  and  taken  away  from  the  country.

Yet  there  are  a  number  of  beautifully-preserved  papyri  at  Bulak,  Cairo,  though  the  greater  number  have  never  yet  been  properly  read.

Others — those  that  have  been  carried  away  and  may  be  found  in  the  museums  and  public  libraries  of  Europe — have  fared  no  better.

In  the  days  of  the  Vicomte  de  Rouge,  some  twenty-five  years  ago,  only  a  few  of  them  "were  two-thirds  deciphered";  and  among  those  some  most  interesting  legends,  inserted  parenthetically  and  for  purposes  of  explaining  royal  expenses,  are  in  the  Register  of  the  Sacred  Accounts.

This  may  be  verified  in  the  so-called  "  Harris  "  and  Anastasi  collections,  and  in  some  papyri  recently  exhumed  ;  one  of  these  gives  an  account  of  a  whole  series  of  magic  feats  performed  before  the  Pharaohs  Ramses  II  and  III  A  curious  document,  the  first-mentioned,  truly.

It  is  a  papyrus  of  the  fifteenth  century  B.C  ,  written  during  the  reign  of  Ramses  V,  the  last  king  of  the  eight-  eenth dynasty,  and  is  the  work  of  the  scribe  Thoutmes,  who  notes  down  some  of  the  events  with  regard  to  defaulters  occurring  on  the  twelfth  and  thirteenth  days  of  the  month  of  Paophs.

The  document  shows  that  in  those  days  of  "  miracles  "  in  Egypt  the  taxpayers  were  not  found  among  the  living

1  "The  characters  employed  on  those  parchments,"  writes  De  Mirville,  "  are  sometimes  hiero-  glyphics, placed  perpendicularly,  a  kind  of  lineary  tachygraphy  (abridged  characters),  where  the  image  is  often  reduced  to  a  simple  stroke  ;  at  other  times  placed  in  horizontal  lines  ,  then  the  hieratic  or  sacred  writing,  going  from  right  to  left  as  in  all  Semitic  languages  ;  lastly,  the  characters  of  the  country,  used  for  official  documents,  mostly  contracts,  etc.,  but  which  since  the  Ptolemies  has  beer*  also  adopted  for  the  monuments,"  Des  E sprits,  Tome  v,  pp.  81-2.  A  copy  of  the  Harris  papyrus,  translated  by  Chabas — Papyrus  magique — may  be  studied  at  the  British  Museum

244  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

alone,  but  every  mummy  was  included.

All  and  everything  was  taxed  ;  and  the  Khou  of  the  mummy,  in  default,  was  punished  "  by  the  priest-exorciser,  who  deprived  it  of  the  liberty  of  action."  Now  what  was  the  Khou  ?  Simply  the  astral  body,  or  the  aerial  simulacrum  of  the  corpse  or  the  mummy — that  which  in  China  is  called  the  Hauen,  and  in  India  the  Bhut.

Upon  reading  this  papyrus  to-day,  an  Orientalist  is  pretty  sure  to  fling  it  aside  in  disgust,  attributing  the  whole  affair  to  the  crass  superstition  of  the  ancients.

Truly  phenomenal  and  inexplicable  must  have  been  the  dullness  and  credulity  of  that  otherwise  highly  philosophical  and  civilized  nation  if  it  could  carry  on  for  so  many  consecutive  ages,  for  thousands  of  years,  such  a  system  of  mutual  deception  !  A  system  whereby  the  people  were  deceived  by  the  priests,  the  priests  by  their  King-Hierophants,  and  the  latter  themselves  were  cheated  by  the  ghosts,  which  were,  in  their  turn,  but  "  the  fruits  of  hallucina-  tion." The  whole  of  antiquity,  from  Menes  to  Cleopatra,  from  Manu  to  Vikramaditya,  from  Orpheus  down  to  the  last  Roman  augur,  were  hysterical,  we  are  told.

This  must  have  been  so,  if  the  whole  were  not  a  system  of  fraud.

Life  and  death  were  guided  by,  and  were  under  the  sway  of,  sacred  "  conjuring."  For  there  is  hardly  a  papyrus,  though  it  be  a  simple  document  of  purchase  and  sale,  a  deed  belonging  to  daily  transactions  of  the  most  ordinary  kind,  that  has  not  Magic,  white  or  black,  mixed  up  in  it.  It  looks  as  though  the  sacred  scribes  of  the  Nile  had  purposely,  and  in  a  prophetic  spirit  of  race-hatred,  carried  out  the  (to  them)  most  unprofitable  task  of  deceiving  and  puzzling  the  generations  of  a  future  white  race  of  unbelievers  yet  unborn  !  Anyhow,  the  papyri  are  full  of  Magic,  as  are  likewise  the  stelae.

We  learn,  moreover,  that  the  papyrus  was  not  merely  a  smooth-surfaced  parchment,  a  fabric  made  of

Ligneous   matter  from   a  shrub,  the  pellicles  of  which  superposed  one  over  the  other  formed  a  kind  of  writing-paper ;

but  that  the  shrub  itself,  the  implements  and  tools  for  fabricating  the  parch-  ment, etc.,  were  all  previously  subjected  to  a  process  of  magical  preparation  — according  to  the  ordinance  of  the  Gods,  who  had  taught  that  art,  as  they  had  all  others,  to  their  Priest-Hierophants.

There  are,  however,  some  modern  Orientalists  who  seem  to  have  an  inkling  of  the  true  nature  of  such  things,  and  especially  of  the  analogy  and  the  relations  that  exist  between  the  Magic  of  old  and  our  modern-day  phenom-  ena.

Chabas  is  one  of  these,  for  he  indulges,  in  his  translation  of  the  41  Harris  "  papyrus,  in  the  following  reflections:

Without   having  recourse  to  the  imposing  ceremonies  of  the  wand  of  Hermes,  or  to  the  obscure  formulae  of  an  unfathomable  mysticism,  a  mesmerizer  in  our  own  day

EGYPTIAN  MAGIC

will,  by  means  of  a  few  passes,  disturb  the  organic  faculties  of  a  subject,  inculcate  the  knowledge  of  foreign  languages,  transport  him  to  a  far-distant  country,  or  into  secret  places,  make  him  guess  the  thoughts  of  those  absent,  read  in  closed  letters,  etc  .  .  .  The  antre  of  the  modern  sybil  is  a  modest-looking  room,  the  tripod  has  made  room  for  a  small  round  table,  a  hat,  a  plate,  a  piece  of  furniture  of  the  most  vulgar  kind ,  only  the  latter  is  even  superior  to  the  oracle  of  antiquity  [how  does  M.  Chabas  know?],  inasmuch  as  the  latter  only  spoke,1  while  the  oracle  of  our  day  writes  its  answers.

At  the  command  of  the  medium  the  spirits  of  the  dead  descend  to  make  the  furniture  creak,  and  the  authors  of  bygone  centuries  deliver  to  us  works  written  by  them  beyond  the  grave.

Human  credulity  has  no  narrower  limits  to-day  than  it  had  at  the  dawn  of  historical  times  ...  As  teratology  is  an  essential  part  of  general  physiology  now,  so  the  pretended  Occult  Sciences  occupy  in  the  annals  of  humanity  a  place  which  is  not  without  its  importance,  and  deserve  for  more  than  one  reason  the  attention  of  the  philosopher  and  the  historian.

Selecting  the  two  Champollions,  Lenormand,  Bunsen,  Vicomte  de  Rouge,  and  several  other  Egyptologists  to  serve  as  our  witnesses,  let  us  see  what  they  say  of  Egyptian  Magic  and  Sorcery.

They  may  get  out  of  the  difficulty  by  accounting  for  each  "superstitious  belief  "  and  practice  by  attributing  them  to  a  chronic  psychological  and  physiological  derangement,  and  to  collective  hysteria,  if  they  like ;  still  facts  are  there,  staring  us  in  the  face,  from  the  hundreds  of  these  mysterious  papyri,  exhumed  after  a  rest  of  four,  five,  and  more  thousands  of  years,  with  their  magical  containments  and  evidence  of  antediluvian  Magic.

A  small  library,  found  at  Thebes,  has  furnished  fragments  of  every  kind  of  ancient  literature,  many  of  which  are  dated,  and  several  of  which  have  thus  been  assigned  to  the  accepted  age  of  Moses.

Books  or  manuscripts  on  ethics,  history,  religion  and  medicine,  calendars  and  registers,  poems  and  novels — everything — may  be  had  in  that  precious  collection  ;  and  old  legends  — traditions  of  long  forgotten  ages  (please  to  remark  this  •  legends  recorded  during  the  Mosaic  period) — are  already  referred  to  therein  as  belonging  to  an  immense  antiquity,  to  the  period  of  the  dynasties  of  Gods  and  Giants.

Their  chief  contents,  however,  are  formulae  of  exorcisms  against  black  Magic,  and  funeral  rituals :  true  breviaries,  or  the  vade  mecum  of  every  pilgrim-traveller  in  eternity.

These  funeral  texts  are  generally  written  in  hieratic  characters.

At  the  head  of  the  papyrus  is  invariably  placed  a  series  of  scenes,  showing  the  defunct  appearing  before  a  host  of  Deities  successively,  who  have  to

1  And  what  of  the   "  Mene,   mene,  tekel,   upharsm,"  the  words  that  "  the  fingers  of  a  man's  h*and,"  whose  body  and  arm  remained  invisible,  wrote  on  the  walls  of  Belshazzar's  palace?  (Daniel,  v,  5.)     What  of  the  writings  of  Simon  the  Magician,  and  the  magic  characters  on  the  walls  and  in  the  air  of  the   crypts  of   Initiation,   without  mentioning  the  tables  of  stone  on  which  the  finger  of  God  wrote  the  commandments  ?   Between  the  writing  of  one  God  and  other  Gods  the  difference,  if  any,  lies  only  in  their  respective  natures ,  and  if  the  tree  is  to  be  known  by  its  fruits,  then  preference  would  have  to  be  given  always  to  the  Pagan  Gods      It  is  the  immortal  "  To  be  or  not  to  be  "     Either  all  of  them  are— or  at  any  rate,  may  be — true,  or  all  are  surely  pious  frauds  and  the  result  of  credulity

2  Papyrus  Magique,  p.

246  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

examine  him.

Then  comes  the  judgment  of  the  Soul,  while  the  third  act  begins  with  the  launching  of  that  Soul  into  the  divine  light.

Such  papyri  are  often  forty  feet  long.

The  following  is  extracted  from  general  descriptions.

It  will  show  how  the  moderns  understand  and  interpret  Egyptian  (and  other)  Symbology.

The  papyrus  of  the  priest  Nevo-loo  (or  Nevolen),  at  the  Louvre,  may  be  selected  for  one  case.

First  of  all  there  is  the  bark  carrying  the  coffin,  a  black  chest  containing  the  defunct's  mummy.

His  mother,  Ammenbem-Heb,  and  his  sister,  Hooissanoob,  are  near ;  at  the  head  and  feet  of  the  corpse  stand  Nephtys  and  Isis  clothed  in  red,  and  near  them  a  priest  of  Osiris  clad  in  his  panther's  skin,  his  censer  in  his  right  hand,  and  four  assistants  carrying  the  mummy's  intestines.

The  coffin  is  received  by  the  God  Anubis  (of  the  jackal's  head),  from  the  hands  of  female  weepers.

Then  the  Soul  rises  from  its  mummy  and  the  Khou  (astral  body)  of  the  defunct.

The  former  begins  its  worship  of  the  four  genii  of  the  East,  of  the  sacred  birds,  and  of  Ammon  as  a  ram.

Brought  into  the  "  Palace  of  Truth,"  the  defunct  is  before  his  judges.

While  the  Soul,  a  scarabaeus,  stands  in  the  presence  of  Osiris,  his  astral  Khou  is  at  the  door.

Much  laughter  is  provoked  in  the  West  by  the  invocations  to  various  Deities,  presiding  over  each  of  the  limbs  of  the  mummy,  and  of  the  Jiving  human  body.

Only  judge  :  in  the  papyrus  of  the  mummy  Petamenoph  4 'the  anatomy  becomes  theographical,"  "  astrology  is  applied  to  physiology,"  or  rather  "  to  the  anatomy  of  the  human  body,  the  heart  and  the  soul."  The  defunct's  "  hair  belongs  to  the  Nile,  his  eyes  to  Venus  (Isis),  his  ears  to  Macedo,  the  guardian  of  the  tropics ;  his  nose  to  Anubis,  his  left  temple  to  the  Spirit  dwelling  in  the  sun.

.  .  .  What  a  series  of  intolerable  absurdities  and  ignoble  prayers  ...  to  Osiris,  imploring  him  to  give  the  defunct  in  the  other  world,  geese,  eggs,  pork,  etc."

It  might  have  been  prudent,  perhaps,  to  have  waited  to  ascertain  whether  all  these  terms  of  "  geese,  eggs,  and  pork  "  had  not  some  other  Occult  meaning.

The  Indian  Yogi  who,  in  an  exoteric  work,  is  invited  to  drink  a  certain  intoxicating  liquor  till  he  loses  his  senses,  was  also  regarded  as  a  drunkard  representing  his  sect  and  class,  until  it  was  found  that  the  Esoteric  sense  of  that  "  spirit  "  was  quite  different :  that  it  meant  divine  light,  and  stood  for  the  ambrosia  of  Secret  Wisdom.

The  symbols  of  the  dove  and  the  lamb  which  abound  now  in  Eastern  and  Western  Christian  Churches  may  also  be  exhumed  long  ages  hence,  and  speculated  upon  as  objects  of  present-day  worship.

And  then  some  "  Occidentalism"  in  the  forthcoming  ages  of  high

1  See  Maspero's  Guide  to  the  Bulak  Museum,  among  others

v  De  Mirville  (from  whom  much  of  the  preceding  is  taken),  in  Des  Espr/ts,  Tome  v,  pp   81-5.

EGYPTIAN  MAGIC

Asiatic  civilization  and  learning,  may  write  karmically  upon  the  same  as  follows  :  "  The  ignorant  and  superstitious  Gnostics  and  Agnostics  of  the  sects  of  '  Pope  '  and  '  Calvin  '  (the  two  monster  Gods  of  the  Dynamite-Christian  period)  adored  a  pigeon  and  a  sheep  !  "  There  will  be  portable  handfetishes  in  all  and  every  <ige  for  the  satisfaction  and  reverence  of  the  rabble,  and  the  Gods  of  one  race  will  always  be  degraded  into  devils  by  the  next  one.

The  cycles  revolve  within  the  depths  of  Lethe,  and  Karma  shall  reach  Europe  as  it  has  Asia  and  her  religions.

Nevertheless  :

This  grand  and  dignified  language  [in  the  Book  of  the  Dead],  these  pictures  full  of  majesty,  this  orthodoxy  of  the  whole  evidently  proving  a  very  precise  doctrine  concerning  the  immortality  of  the  soul  and  its  personal  survival,

as  shown  by  De  Rouge  and  the  Abbe  Van  Drival,  have  charmed  some  Orientalists.

The  psychostasy  (or  judgment  of  the  Soul)  is  certainly  a  whole  poem  to  him  who  can  read  it  correctly  and  interpret  the  images  therein.

In  that  picture  we  see  Osiris,  the  horned,  with  his  sceptre  hooked  at  the  end —  the  original  of  the  pastoral  bishop's  crook  or  crosier — the  Soul  hovering  above,  encouraged  by  Tmei,  daughter  of  the  Sun  of  Righteousness  and  Goddess  of  Mercy  and  Justice  ;  Horus  and  Anubis,  weighing  the  deeds  of  the  soul.

One  of  these  papyri  shows  the  Soul  found  guilty  of  gluttony  sentenced  to  be  re-born  on  earth  as  a  hog  ;  forthwith  comes  the  learned  conclusion  of  an  Orientalist,  "  This  is  an  indisputable  proof  of  belief  in  metempsychosis,  of  transmigration  into  an/ma/s,"  etc.

Perchance  the  Occult  law  of  Karma  might  explain  the  sentence  other-  wise.

It  may,  for  all  our  Orientalists  know,  refer  to  the  physiological  vice  in  store  for  the  Soul  when  re-incarnated — a  vice  that  will  lead  that  personality  into  a  thousand  and  one  scrapes  and  misadventures.

Tortures  to  begin  with,  then  metempsychosis  during  3,000  years  as  a  hawk,  an  angel,  a  lotus-flower,  a  heron,  a  stork,  a  swallow,  a  serpent,  and  a  crocodile  •  one  sees  that  the  consolation  of  such  a  progress  was  far  from  being  satisfactory,

argues  de  Mirville,  in  his  work  on  the  Satanic  character  of  the  Gods  of  Egypt.1  Again,  a  simple  suggestion  may  throw  on  this  a  great  light.

Are  the  Orientalists  quite  sure  they  have  read  correctly  the  "  metempsychosis  during  3,000  years  "  ?  The  Occult  Doctrine  teaches  that  Karma  waits  at  the  threshold  of  Devachan  (the  Amenti  of  the  Egyptians)  for  3,000  years  ;  that  then  the  eternal  £90  is  reincarnated  de  novo,  to  be  punished  in  its  new  temporary  personality  for  sins  committed  in  the  preceding  birth,  and  the  suffering  for  which,  in  one  shape  or  another,  will  atone  for  past  misdeeds.

And  the  hawk,

1  Ibid  ,  pp.  84-5.

248  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

the  lotus-flower,  the  heron,  serpent,  or  bird — every  object  in  Nature,  in  short  — had  its  symbolical  and  manifold  meaning  in  ancient  religious  emblems.

The  man  who  all  his  life  acted  hypocritically  and  passed  for  a  good  man,  but  had  been  in  sober  reality  watching  like  a  bird  of  prey  his  chance  to  pounce  upon  his  fellow-creatures,  and  had  deprived  them  of  their  property,  will  be  sentenced  by  Karma  to  bear  the  punishment  for  hypocrisy  and  covetousness  in  a  future  life.

What  will  it  be  ?  Since  every  human  unit  has  ultimately  to  progress  in  its  evolution,  and  since  that  "  man  "  will  be  reborn  at  some  future  time  as  a  good,  sincere,  well-meaning  man,  his  sentence  to  be  rein-  carnated as  a  hawk  may  simply  mean  that  he  will  then  be  regarded  metaphorically  as  such.

That,  notwithstanding  his  real,  good,  intrinsic  qualities,  he  will,  perhaps  during  a  long  life,  be  unjustly  and  falsely  charged  with  and  suspected  of  greed  and  hypocrisy  and  of  secret  exactions,  all  of  which  will  make  him  suffer  more  than  he  can  bear.

The  law  of  retri-  bution can  never  err,  and  yet  how  many  such  innocent  victims  of  false  appearance  and  human  malice  do  we  not  meet  in  this  world  of  in-  cessant illusion,  of  mistake  and  deliberate  wickedness.

We  see  them  every  day,  and  they  may  be  found  within  the  personal  experience  of  each  of  us.  What  Orientalist  can  say  with  any  degree  of  assurance  that  he  has  understood  the  religions  of  old  ?  The  metaphorical  language  of  the  priests  has  never  been  more  than  superficially  revealed,  and  the  hieroglyphics  have  been  very  poorly  mastered  to  this  day.

What  says  Isis   Unveiled  on  this  question  of  Egyptian  rebirth  and  trans-  migration, and  does  it  clash  with  anything  that  we  say  now  ?

It  will  be  observed  that  this  philosophy  of  cycles,  which  was  allegorized  by  the  Egyptian  Hierophants  in  the  "  cycle  of  necessity,"  explains  at  the  same  time  the  allegory  of  the  "  Fall  of  Man  "  According  to  the  Arabian  descriptions,  each  of  the  seven  chambers  of  the  pyramids — those  grandest  of  all  cosmic  symbols — was  known  by  the  name  of  a  planet.

The  peculiar  architecture  of  the  pyramids  shows  in  itself  the  drift  of  the  metaphysical  thought  of  their  builders.

The  apex  is  lost  in  the  clear  blue  sky  of  the  land  of  the  Pharaohs,  and  typifies  the  primordial  point  lost  in  the  unseen  Universe  from  whence  started  the  first  race  of  the  spiritual  prototypes  of  man  Each  mummy  from  the  moment  that  it  was  embalmed  lost  its  physical  individuality  in  one  sense  •  it  symbolized  the  human  race  Placed  in  such  a  way  as  was  best  calculated  to  aid  the  exit  of  the  "  Soul,"  the  latter  had  to  pass  through  the  seven  planetary  chambers  before  it  made  its  exit  through  the  symbolical  apex  Each  chamber  typified,  at  the  same  time,  one  of  the  seven  spheres  [of  our  Chain]  and  one  of  the  seven  higher  types  of  physico-spintual  humanity  alleged  to  be  above  our  own.

Every  3,000  years  the  soul,  representative  of  its  race,  had  to  return  to  its  primal  point  of  departure  before  it  under-  went another  evolution  into  a  more  perfected  spiritual  and  physical  transformation.

1  One  sees  this  difficulty  arise  even  with  a  perfectly  known  language  like  Sanskrit,  the  meaning  of  which  is  far  easier  to  comprehend  than  the  hieratic  writings  of  Egypt  Everyone  knows  how  hopelessly  the  Sanskntists  are  often  puzzled  over  the  real  meaning  and  how  they  fail  in  rendering  the  meaning  correctly  in  their  respective  translations,  in  which  one  Orientalist  contradicts  the  other

EGYPTIAN  MAGIC

We  must  go  deep  indeed  into  the  abstruse  metaphysics  of  Oriental  mysticism  before  we  can  realise  fully  the  infinitude  of  the  subjects  that  were  embraced  at  one  sweep  by  the  majestic  thought  of  its  exponents  '

This  is  all  Magic  when  once  the  details  are  given  ;  and  it  relates  at  the  same  time  to  the  evolution  of  our  seven  Root  Races,  each  with  the  character-  istics of  its  special  guardian  or  "  God,"  and  his  Planet.

The  astral  body  of  each  Initiate,  after  death,  had  to  re-enact  in  its  funeral  mystery  the  drama  of  the  birth  and  death  of  each  Race — the  past  and  the  future — and  pass  through  the  seven  "  planetary  chambers,"  which,  as  said  above,  typified  also  the  seven  spheres  of  our  Chain.

The  mystic  doctrine  of  Eastern  Occultism  teaches  that

"  The  Spiritual  Ego  [not  the  astral  Khou]  has  to  revisit,  before  It  in-  carnates into  a  new  body,  the  scenes  it  left  at  its  last  disincarnation.

It  has  to  see  for  itself  and  take  cognizance  of  all  the  effects  produced  by  the  causes  [the  N/danas]  generated  by  its  actions  in  a  previous  life  ;  that,  seeing,  it  should  recognize  the  justice  of  the  decree,  and  help  the  law  of  Retribution  [/CarmaJ  instead  of  impeding  it."

The  translations  by  Vicomte  de  Rouge  of  several  Egyptian  papyri,  imperfect  as  they  may  be,  give  us  one  advantage  :  they  show  undeniably  the  presence  in  them  of  white,  divine  Magic,  as  well  as  of  Sorcery,  and  the  practice  of  both  throughout  all  the  dynasties.

The  8ook  of  the  Dead,  far  older  than  Genesis  l5  or  any  other  book  of  the  Old  Testament,  shows  it  in  every  line.

It  is  full  of  incessant  prayers  and  exorcisms  against  the  Black  Art.

Therein  Osiris  is  the  conqueror  of  the  "  aerial  demons."  The  worshipper  implores  his  help  against  Matat,  "  from  whose  eye  proceeds  the  invisible  arrow."  This  "  invisible  arrow  "  that  proceeds  from  the  eye  of  the  Sorcerer  (whether  living  or  dead)  and  that  "  circulates  throughout  the  world,"  is  the  evil  eye — cosmic  in  its  origin,  terrestrial  in  its  effects  on  the  microcosmical  plane.

It  is  not  the  Latin  Christians  whom  it  behoves  to  view  this  as  a  super-  stition.

Their  Church  indulges  in  the  same  belief,  and  has  even  a  prayer  against  the  "  arrow  circulating  in  darkness."

The  most  interesting  of  all  those  documents,  however,  is  the  "  Harris  '*  papyrus,  called  in  France  "  le  papyrus  mag/que  de  Chabas,"  as  it  was  first  translated  by  the  latter.

It  is  a  manuscript  written  in  hieratic  characters,  translated,  commented  upon,  and  published  in  1860  by  M.  Chabas,  but

1  Op    at,  I,  pp   296-7.  -  Book  II,  Commentary.

3  Bunsen  and  Champollion  so  declare,  and  Dr  Carpenter  says  that  the  Book  of  the  Dead,  sculp-  tured on  the  oldest  monuments,  with  "  the  very  phrases  we  find  in  the  New  Testament  m  connection  with  the  Day  of  Judgment  .  was  engraved  probably  2,000  years  before  the  time  of  Christ  '  '(See  his  Unvetled,  I,  p  518  )

250  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

purchased  at  Thebes  in  1855  by  Mr.  Harris.

Its  age  is  given  at  between  twenty-  eight  and  thirty  centuries.

We  quote  a  few  extracts  from  these  translations  :  Calendar  of  lucky  and  unlucky  days  :  .  .  He  who  makes  a  bull  work  on  the  20th  of  the  month  of  Pharmuths  will  surely  die  ,  he  who  on  the  24th  day  of  the  same  month  pronounces  the  name  of  Seth  aloud  will  see  trouble  reigning  in  his  house  from  that  day  ;  .  he  who  on  the  5th  day  of  Patchous  leaves  his  house  falls  sick  and  dies.

Exclaims  the  translator,  whose  cultured  instincts  are  revolted  :

If  one  had  not  these  words  under  our  eyes,  one  could  never  believe  in  such  •servitude  at  the  epoch  of  the  Ramessides  J

We  belong  to  the  nineteenth  century  of  the  Christian  era,  and  are  therefore  at  the  height  of  civilization,  and  under  the  benign  sway  and  en-  lightening influence  of  the  Christian  Church,  instead  of  being  subject  to  the  Pagan  Gods  of  old.

Nevertheless  we  personally  know  dozens,  and  have  heard  of  hundreds,  of  educated,  highly-intellectual  persons  who  would  as  soon  think  of  committing  suicide  as  of  starting  on  any  business  on  a  Friday,  of  dining  at  a  table  where  thirteen  sit  down,  or  of  beginning  a  long  journey  on  a  Monday.

Napoleon  the  Great  became  pale  when  he  saw  three  candles  lit  on  a  table.

Moreover,  we  may  gladly  concur  with  De  Mirville  in  this,  at  any  rate,  that  such  "  superstitions  "  are  "  the  outcome  of  observation  and  experience."  If  the  former  had  never  agreed  with  facts,  the  authority  of  the  Calendar,  he  thinks,  would  not  have  lasted  for  a  week.

But  to  resume  :

Genethliacal  influences  The  child  born  on  the  5th  day  of  Paophi  will  be  killed  by  a  bull  ,  on  the  27th  by  a  serpent  Born  on  the  4th  of  the  month  of  Athyar,  he  will  succumb  to  blows.

This  is  a  question  of  horoscopic  predictions  ;  judiciary  astrology  is  firmly  believed  in  in  our  own  age,  and  has  been  proven  to  be  scientifically  possible  by  Kepler.

Of  the  Khous  two  kinds  were  distinguished  :  first,  the  justified  Khous,  i.e.,  those  who  had  been  absolved  from  sin  by  Osiris  when  they  were  brought  before  his  tribunal  ;  these  lived  a  second  life.

Secondly,  there  were  the  guilty  Khous,  "the  Khous  dead  a  second  time  ;"  these  were  the  damned.

Second  death  did  not  annihilate  them,  but  they  were  doomed  to  wander  about  and  to  torture  people.

Their  existence  had  phases  analogous  to  those  of  the  living  man,  a  bond  so  intimate  between  the  dead  and  the  living  that  one  sees  how  the  observation  of  religious  funeral  rites  and  exorcisms  and  prayers  (or  rather  magic  incantations)  should  have  become  necessary.2  Says  one  prayer  :

Do   not   permit  that   the  venom  should  master  his  limbs  [of  the  defunct],  that   he   should   be    pertetrated   by   any   male   dead,   or  any  female  dead  ,  or  that  the  shadow  of  any  spirit  should  haunt  him  (or  her)

1  Des   Espnts,   Tome  v,   p   88.     Just  such  a  calendar  and  horoscope  interdictions  exist  in  India  in  our  day,  as  well  as  in  China  and  all  the  Buddhist  countries

2  See  Des  Esprits,  Tome  in,  pp.  65,  et  seq.

"*  Pap.

Mag.,  p   163.

EGYPTIAN  MAGIC

M.  Chabas  adds  :

These  Khous  were  beings  of  that  kind  to  which  human  beings  belong  after  their  death  ;  they  were  exorcised  in  the  name  of  the  God  Chons  .  The  Manes  then  could  enter  the  bodies  of  the  living,  haunt  and  obsess  them  Formulas  and  talismans,  and  especially  statues  or  divine  figures,  were  used  against  such  formidable  invasions  l  They  were  combated  by  the  help  of  the  divine  power,  the  god  Chons  being  famed  for  such  deliverances.

The  Khou,  in  obeying  the  orders  of  the  god,  none  the  less  pre-  served the  precious  faculty  inherent  in  him  of  accommodating  himself  in  any  other  body  at  will

The  most  frequent  formula  of  exorcism  is  as  follows.

It  is  very  suggestive  :

Men,  gods,  elect,  dead  spirits,  amous,  negroes,  menti-u,  do  not  look  at  this  soul  to  show  cruelty  toward  it.

This  is  addressed  to  all  who  were  acquainted  with  Magic.

"Amulets  and  mystic  names."  This  chapter  is  called  "  very  mysterious,"  and  contains  invocations  to  Penhakahakaherher  and  Uranaokarsankrobite,  and  other  such  easy  names  !  Says  Chabas :

We  have  proofs  that  mystic  names  similar  to  these  were  in  common  use  during  the  stay  of  the  Israelites  in  Egypt.

And  we  may  add  that,  whether  got  from  the  Egyptians  or  the  Hebrews,  these  are  sorcery  names.

The  student  can  consult  the  works  of  Eliphas  Levi,  such  as  his  Gr/mo/re  c/es  Sorc/ers.

In  these  exorcisms  Osiris  is  called  Mamuram-Kahab,  and  is  implored  to  prevent  the  twice-dead  Khou  from  attacking  the  justified  Khou  and  his  next  of  kin,  since  the  accursed  (astral  spook)

Can  take  any  form  he  likes  and  penetrate  at  will  into  any  locality  or  body.

In  studying  Egyptian  papyri,  one  begins  to  find  that  the  subjects  of  the  Pharaohs  were  not  very  much  inclined  to  the  Spiritism  or  Spiritualism  of  their  day.

They  dreaded  the  "  blessed  spirit  "  of  the  dead  more  than  a  Roman  Catholic  dreads  the  devil  !

But  how  uncalled-for  and  unjust  is  the  charge  against  the  Gods  of  Egypt  that  they  are  these  "devils,"  and  against  the  priests  of  exercising  their  magic  powers  with  the  help  of  "  the  fallen  angels,"  may  be  seen  in  more  than  one  papyrus.

For  one  often  finds  in  them  records  of  Sorcerers  sentenced  to  the  death  penalty,  as  though  they  had  been  living  under  the  protection  of  the  holy  Christian  Inquisition.

Here  is  one  case  during  the  reign  of  Ramses  III,  quoted  by  De  Mirville  from  Chabas.

The  first  page  begins  with  these  words  "  From  the  place  where  I  am  to  the  people  of  my  country."  There  is  reason  to  suppose,  as  one  will  see,  that  the  person  who  wrote  this,  in  the  first  personal  pronoun,  is  a  magistrate  making  a  report,  and

1  Ibid,  p

252  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

attesting  it  before  men,  after  an  accustomed  formula,  for  here  is  the  main  part  of  this  accusation.

"This  Hai,  a  bad  man,  was  an  overseer  [or  perhaps  keeper]  of  sheep  :  he  said  •  '  Can  I  have  a  book  that  will  give  me  great  power  ?  '  .  And  a  book  was  given  him  with  the  formulae  of  Ramses-Meri-Amen,  the  great  God,  his  royal  master ;  and  he  succeeded  in  getting  a  divine  power  enabling  him  to  fascinate  men.

He  also  succeeded  in  building  a  place  and  in  finding  a  very  deep  place,  and  produced  men  of  Menh  [magical  homunculi ?]  and  .  .  love-writings  .  .  stealing  them  from  the  Khen  [the  occult  library  of  the  palace]  by  the  hand  of  the  stonemason  Atirma,  .  .  by  forcing  one  of  the  supervisors  to  go  aside,  and  acting  magically  on  the  others.

Then  he  sought  to  read  futurity  by  them  and  succeeded.

All  the  horrors  and  abominations  he  had  conceived  in  his  heart,  he  did  them  really,  he  practised  them  all,  and  other  great  crimes  as  well,  such  as  the  horror  [?]  of  all  the  Gods  and  Goddesses.

Likewise  let  the  prescriptions  great  [severe  ?]  unto  death  be  done  unto  him,  such  as  the  divine  words  order  to  be  done  to  him."  The  accusation  does  not  stop  there,  it  speci-  fies the  crimes.

The  first  line  speaks  of  a  hand  paralysed  by  means  of  the  men  of  Menh,  to  whom  it  is  simply  said,  "  Let  such  an  effect  be  produced,"  and  it  is  produced  Then  come  the  great  afcom/nat/ons,  such  as  deserve  death  .  The  judges  who  had

examined   him   (the   culprit)   reported   saying,    "  Let   him  die  according  to  the  order  of  Pharaoh,  and  according  to  what  is  written  in  the  lines  of  the  divine  language."

M.  Chabas  remarks  •

Documents  of  this  kind  abound,  but  the  task  of  analysing  them  all  cannot  be  attempted  with  the  limited  means  we  possess

Then  there  is  an  inscription  taken  in  the  temple  of  Khous,  the  God  who  had  power  over  the  elementaries,  at  Thebes.

It  was  presented  by  M.  Pnsse  d'Avenne  to  the  Imperial — now  National — Library  of  Paris,  and  was  translated  first  by  Mr.  S.  Birch.

There  is  in  it  a  whole  romance  of  Magic.

It  dates  from  the  day  of  Ramses  XII  a  of  the  twentieth  dynasty;  it  is  from  the  render-  ing of  M.  de  Rouge,  as  quoted  by  De  Mirville,  that  we  now  translate  it.

This  monument  tells  us  that  one  of  the  Ramses  of  the  twentieth  dynasty,  while  collecting  at  Naharam  the  tributes  paid  to  Egypt  by  the  Asiatic  nations,  fell  in  love  with  a  daughter  of  the  chief  of  Bakhten,  one  of  his  tributaries,  married  her  and,  bringing  her  to  Egypt  with  him,  raised  her  to  the  dignity  of  Queen,  under  the  royal  name  of  Ranefrou  Soon  afterwards  the  chief  of  Bakhten  dispatched  a  messenger  to  Ramses,  praying  the  assistance  of  Egyptian  science  for  Bent-Rosh,  a  young  sister  of  the  queen,  attacked  with  illness  in  all  her  limbs.

The  messenger  asked  expressly  that  a  "wise-man"  [an  Initiate — Reh-Het]  should  be  sent.

The  king  gave  orders  that  all  the  hierogrammatists  of  the  palace  and  the  guardians  of  the  secret  books  of  the  Khen  should  be  sent  for,  and  choosing  from  among  them  the  royal  scribe  Thoth-em-Hebi,  an  intelligent  man,  well  versed  in  writing,  charged  him  to  examine  the  sickness.

1  Maimomdes  in  his  Treatise  on  Idolatry  says,  speaking  of  the  Jewish  teraphim  "  They  talked  with  men  "  To  this  day  Christian  Sorcerers  in  Italy,  and  negro  Voodoos  at  New  Orleans  fabricate  small  wax  figures  in  the  likeness  of  their  victims,  and  transpierce  them  with  needles,  the  wound,  as  on  the  teraphim  or  Menh,  being  repercussed  on  the  living,  often  killing  them  Mysterious  deaths  are  still  many,  and  not  all  are  traced  to  the  guilty  hand

•  The  Ramses  of  Lepsius,  who  reigned  some  1300  years  before  our  era

EGYPTIAN  MAGIC

Arrived  at  Bakhten,  Thoth-em-Hebi  found  that  Bent-Rosh  was  possessed  by  a  Khou  (Em-seh-'eru  ker  h'ou),  but  declared  himself  too  weak  to  engage  in  a  struggle  with  him.

Eleven  years,  elapsed,  and  the  young  girl's  state  did  not  improve  The  chief  of  Bakhten  again  sent  his  messenger,  and  on  his  formal  demand  Khons-peiri-Seklerem-  Zam,  one  of  the  divine  forms  of  Chons — God  the  Son  in  the  Theban  Trinity was  dis-  patched to  Bakhten

The  God  [incarnate]  having  saluted  (faesa)  the  patient  she  felt  immediately  relieved,  and  the  Khou  who  was  in  her  manifested  forthwith  his  intention  of  obeying  the  orders  of  the  God.

"  O  great  God,  who  forcest  the  phantom  to  vanish,"  said  the  Khou,  "  I  am  thy  slave  and  I  will  return  whence  I  came  '  "  '

Evidently  Khons-peiri-Seklerem-Zam  was  a  real  Hierophant  of  the  class  named  the  "  Sons  of  God,"  since  he  is  said  to  be  one  of  the  forms  of  the  God  Khons ;  which  means  either  that  he  was  considered  as  an  incarnation  of  that  God — an  Avatara — or  that  he  was  a  full  Initiate.

The  same  text  shows  that  the  temple  to  which  he  belonged  was  one  of  those  to  which  a  School  of  Magic  was  attached.

There  was  a  Khen  in  it,  or  that  portion  of  the  temple  which  was  inaccessible  to  all  but  the  highest  priest,  the  library  or  depository  of  secret  works,  to  the  study  and  care  of  which  special  priests  were  appointed  (those  whom  all  the  Pharaohs  consulted  in  cases  of  great  importance),  and  wherein  they  communicated  with  the  Gods  and  obtained  advice  from  them,  Does  not  Lucian  tell  his  readers  in  his  description  of  the  temple  of  Hierapolis,  of  "Gods  who  manifest  their  presence  independently?3  And  further  on  that  he  once  travelled  with  a  priest  from  Memphis,  who  told  him  he  had  passed  twenty-three  years  in  the  subterranean  crypts  of  his  temple,  receiving  nstructions  on  Magic  from  the  Goddess  Isis  herself.

Again  we  read  that  it  was  by  Mercury  himself  that  the  great  Sesostris  (Ramses  II)  was  instructed  in  the  Sacred  Sciences.

On  which  Jablonsky  remarks  that  we  have  here  the  reason  why  Amun  (Ammon) — whence  he  thinks  our  "Amen"  is  derived —  was  a  real  evocation  to  the  light.

In  the  Papyrus  Anastasi,  which  teems  with  various  formulae  for  the  evocation  of  Gods,  and  with  exorcisms  against  Khous  and  the  elementary  demons,  the  seventh  paragraph  shows  plainly  the  difference  made  between  the  real  Gods,  the  Planetary  Angels,  and  those  shells  of  mortals  which  are  left  behind  in  Kama-loka,  as  though  to  tempt  mankind  and  to  puzzle  it  the  more

1  One   may  judge   how  trustworthy  are  the  translations  of  such  Egyptian  documents  when  the  sentence  is  rendered   in  three  different  ways  by  three  Egyptologists      Roug6  says     "  He  found  her  in  a  state  to  fall  under  the  power  ol  spirits,"  or,  "  with  her  limbs  quite  stiff,"  (?)  another  version  ,  and  Chabas  translates  .   "And  the  Scribe  found  the  Khou  too  wicked  "     Between  her  being  in  possession  of  an  evil  Khou  and  "  with  her  limbs  quite  stiff,"  there  is  a  difference.

2  Des  Espr/ts,  Tome  v,  pp.  247-8.

3  Some  translators  would   have    Lucian  speak  of  the  inhabitants  of  the  city,  but  they  fail  to  show  that  this  view  is  maintainable.

4  Ibid.,  v,  256-7.

254  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

hopelessly  in  its  vain  search  after  the  truth,  outside  the  Occult  Sciences  and  the  veil  of  Initiation.

This  seventh  verse  says  with  regard  to  such  divine  evocations  or  theomantic  consultations  :

One  must  invoke  that  divine  and  great  name  '  only  in  cases  of  absolute  neces-  sity, and  when  one  feels  absolutely  pure  and  irreproachable.

Not  so  in  the  formula  of  black  Magic.

Reuvens,  speaking  of  the  two  rituals  of  Magic  of  the  Anastasi  collection,  remarks  that  they

undeniably  form  the  most  instructive  commentary  upon  the  Egyptian  mysteries  attributed  to  Jamblichus,  and  the  best  pendant  to  that  classical  work,  for  understanding  the  thaumaturgy  of  the  philosophical  sects,  thaumaturgy  based  on  ancient  Egyptian  religion  According  to  Jamblichus,  thaumaturgy  was  exercised  by  the  ministry  of  secondary  genii.

Reuvens  closes  with  a  remark  which  is  very  suggestive  and  is  very  important  to  the  Occultists  who  defend  the  antiquity  and  genuineness  of  their  documents,  for  he  says  :

All  that  he  [Jamblichus]  gives  out  as  theology  we  find  as  history  in  our  papyri

But  then  how  deny  the  authenticity,  the  credibility,  and,  beyond  all,  the  trustworthiness  of  those  classical  writers,  who  all  wrote  about  Magic  and  its  Mysteries  in  a  most  worshipful  spirit  of  admiration  and  reverence  ?  Listen  to  Pindarus,  who  exclaims  :

Happy  he  who  descends  into  the  grave  thus  initiated,  for  he  knows  the  end  of  his  life  and  the  kingdom  >J  given  by  Jupiter

Or  to  Cicero  :

Initiation  not  only  teaches  us  to  feel  happy  in  this  life,  but  also  to  die  with  better  hope  ''

Plato,  Pausanias,  Strabo,  Diodorus  and  dozens  of  others  bring  their  evidence  as  to  the  great  boon  of  Initiation  ;  all  the  great  as  well  as  the  partially-initiated  Adepts  share  the  enthusiasm  of  Cicero

Does  not  Plutarch,  thinking  of  what  he  had  learned  in  his  initiation,  console  him-  self for  the  loss  of  his  wife  ?  Had  he  not  obtained  the  certitude  at  the  Mysteries  of

'  How  can  de  Mirville  see  Satan  in  the  Egyptian  God  of  the  great  divine  Name,  when  he  himself  admits  that  nothing  was  greater  than  the  name  of  the  oracle  of  Dodona,  as  it  was  that  of  the  God  of  the  Jews,  IAO,  or  Jehovah  ?  That  oracle  had  been  brought  by  the  Pelasgians  to  Dodona  more  than  fourteen  centuries  B.C.  and  left  with  the  forefathers  of  the  Hellenes,  and  its  history  is  well  known  and  may  be  read  in  Herodotus.

Jupiter,  who  loved  the  fair  nymph  of  the  ocean,  Dodona,  had  ordered  Pelasgius  to  carry  his  cult  to  Thessaly.

The  name  of  the  God  of  that  oracle  at  the  temple  of  Dodona  was  Zeus  Pelasgicos,  the  Zeuspater  (God  the  Father),  or  as  De  Mirville  explains  ;  "  It  was  the  name  par  excellence,  the  name  that  the  Jews  held  as  the  ineffable,  the  unpronounceable  Name — in  short,  Jaoh-pater,  i.e  ,  '  he  who  was,  who  is,  and  who  will  be,'  otherwise  the  Eternal."  And  the  author  admits  that  Maury  is  right  "  in  discovering  in  the  name  of  the  Vaidic  Indra  the  Biblical  Jehovah."  and  does  not  even  attempt  to  deny  the  etymological  connection  between  the  two  names — "  the  great  and  the  lost  name  with  the  sun  and  the  thunder-bolts."  Strange  confessions,  and  still  stranger  contradictions.

*  Reuvens'  Letter  to  Letronne  on  the  75th  number  of  the  PapyrijAnastas/."  See  Des  E sprits,  Tomev,  p.

•*  The  Eleusinian  Fidds.

4  Fragments,  ix.  5  De  Leg/bus,  II,  iv.

EGYPTIAN  MAGIC

Bacchus  that  "  the  soul  [spirit]  remains  incorruptible,  and  that  there  is  a  hereafter"  ?  .  .  .  Aristophanes  went  even  farther  •  "All  those  who  participated  in  the  Mysteries,"  he  says,  "  led  an  innocent,  calm,  and  holy  life  ,  they  died  looking  for  the  light  of  the  Eleusinian  Fields  [Devachan],  while  the  rest  could  never  expect  anything  but  eternal  darkness  [ignorance  ?]

.  .  .  And  when  one  thinks  about  the  importance  attached  by  the  States  to  the  principle  and  the  correct  celebration  of  the  Mysteries,  to  the  stipulations  made  in  their  treaties  for  the  security  of  their  celebration,  one  sees  to  what  degree  those  Mysteries  had  so  long  occupied  their  first  and  their  last  thought

It  was  the  greatest  among  public  as  well  as  private  preoccupations,  and  this  is  only  natural,  since  according  to  Dollmger,  "  the  Eleusinian  Mysteries  were  viewed  as  the  efflorescence  of  all  the  Greek  religion,  as  the  purest  essence  of  all  its  conceptions  l

Not  only  conspirators  were  refused  admittance  therein,  but  those  who  had  not  denounced  them  ,  traitors,  perjurers,  debauchees,'  .  .  so  that  Porphyry  could  say  that  •  "  Our  soul  has  to  be  at  the  moment  of  death  as  it  was  during  the  Mysteries,  ie  ,  exempt  from  any  blemishes,  passion,  envy,  hatred,  or  anger ' J

Truly,

Magic  was  considered  a  Divine  Science  which  led  to  a  participation  in  the  attri-  butes of  the  Divinity  itself/

Herodotus,  Thales,  Parmenides,  Empedocles,  Orpheus,  Pythagoras,  all  went,  each  in  his  day,  in  search  of  the  wisdom  of  Egypt's  great  Hierophants,  in  the  hope  of  solving  the  problems  of  the  universe.

Says  Philo  •  The  Mysteries  were  known  to  unveil  the  secret  operations  of  Nature.'

The  prodigies  accomplished  by  the  priests  of  theurgic  magic  are  so  well  authen-  ticated, and  the  evidence — if  human  testimony  is  worth  anything  at  all — is  so  over-  whelming that,  rather  than  confess  that  the  pagan  theurgists  far  outnvalled  the  Christians  in  miracles,  Sir  David  Brewster  conceded  to  the  former  the  greatest  pro-  ficiency in  physics  and  everything  that  pertains  to  natural  philosophy.

Science  finds  herself  in  a  very  disagreeable  dilemma.

.

"  Magic,  says  Psellus,  "  formed  the  last  part  of  the  sacerdotal  science  It  in-  vestigated the  nature,  power,  and  quality  of  everything  sublunary ;  of  the  elements  and  their  parts,  of  animals,  of  various  plants  and  their  fruits,  of  stones  and  herbs.

In  short,  it  explored  the  essence  and  power  of  everything  From  hence,  therefore,  it  produced  its  effects.

And  it  formed  statues  [magnetized]  which  procure  health,  and  made  all  various  figures  and  things  [talismans],  which  could  equally  become  the  instruments  of  disease  as  well  as  of  health.

Often,  too,  celestial  fire  is  made  to  appear  through  magic,  and  then  statues  laugh  and  lamps  are  spontaneously  enkindled."  (>

This  assertion  of  Psellus  that  Magic  "  made  statues  which  procure  health,"  is  now  proven  to  the  world  to  be  no  dream,  no  vain  boast  of  a  hallucinated  Theurgist.

As  Reuvens  says,  it  becomes  "  history."  For  it  is  found  in  the

1  Judaism  and  Paganism,  i,  184.  2  Frag,  of  Styg.,  ap.  Stofc  "*  De  Special.

Leg;

4  Oes  Esprrts,  Tome  v,  pp   278-9.  '  Isis  Unveiled,  I,  p.  25  <•  Isis  Unveiled,  I.  pp.  282-3.

256  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Papyrus  Mag/que  of  Harris  and  on  the  votive  stele  just  mentioned.

Both  Chabas  and  De  Rouge  state  that :

On  the  eighteenth  line  of  this  very  mutilated  monument  is  found  the  formula  with  regard  to  the  acquiescence  of  the  God  (Chons)  who  made  his  consent  known  by  ,a  motion  he  imparted  to  his  statue  !

There  was  even  a  dispute  over  it  between  the  two  Orientalists.

While  M.  de  Rouge  wanted  to  translate  the  word  "  Han  "  by  "  favour  "  or  "  grace,"  M.  Chabas  insisted  that  "  Han  "  meant  a  "  movement  "  or  "  a  sign  "  made  by  the  statue.

Excesses  of  power,  abuse  of  knowledge  and  personal  ambition  very  often  led  selfish  and  unscrupulous  Initiates  to  black  Magic,  just  as  the  same  causes  led  to  precisely  the  same  thing  among  Christian  popes  and  cardinals  ;  and  it  was  black  Magic  that  led  finally  to  the  abolition  of  the  Mysteries,  and  not  Christianity,  as  is  often  erroneously  thought.

Read  Mommsen's  Roman  History,  Vol.

i,  and  you  will  find  that  it  was  the  Pagans  themselves  who  put  an  end  to  the  desecration  of  the  Divine  Science.

As  early  as  560  B  C  the  Romans  had  discovered  an  Occult  association,  a  school  of  black  Magic  of  the  most  revolting  kind  ;  it  celebrated  mysteries  brought  from  Etruria,  and  very  soon  the  moral  pestilence  had  spread  all  over  Italy

More  than  seven  thousand  Initiates  were  prosecuted,  and  most  of  them  were  sentenced  to  death.

Later  on,  Titus  Livius  shows  us  another  three  thousand  Initiates  sentenced  during  a  single  year  for  the  crime  of  poisoning.-

And  yet  black  Magic  is  derided  and  denied  '

Paulthier  may  or  may  not  be  too  enthusiastic  in  saying  that  India  appears  to  him  as

The  grand  and  primitive  hearth  of  human  thought,  that  has  ended  by  embrac-  ing the  whole  ancient  world,

but  he  was  right  in  his  idea.

That  primitive  thought  led  to  Occult  knowledge,  which  in  our  Fifth  Race  is  reflected  from  the  earliest  days  of  the  Egyptian  Pharaohs  down  to  our  modern  times.

Hardly  a  hieratic  papyrus  is  exhumed  with  the  tightly  swathed-up  mummies  of  kings  and  high  priests  that  does  not  contain  some  interesting  information  for  the  modern  students  of  Occultism.

All  that  is,  of  course,  derided  Magic,  the  outcome  of  primitive  knowledge  and  of  revelation,  though  it  was  practised  in  such  ungodly  ways  by  the  Atlantean  Sorcerers  that  it  has  since  become  necessary  for  the  subsequent  Race  to  draw  a  thick  veil  over  the  practices  which  were  used  to  obtain  so-  called  magical  effects  on  the  psychic  and  on  the  physical  planes.

In  the

1  Des  Espnts,  Tome  v,  p.  248  -  Ibid  ,  p.  281 .

EGYPTIAN  MAGIC

letter  no  one  in  our  century  will  believe  the  statements,  with  the  exception  of  the  Roman  Catholics,  and  these  will  give  the  acts  a  satanic  origin.

Never-  theless, Magic  is  so  mixed  up  with  the  history  of  the  world,  that  if  the  latter  js  ever  to  be  written  it  has  to  rely  upon  the  discoveries  of  Archaeology,  Egyptology,  and  hieratic  writings  and  inscriptions  ;  if  it  insists  that  they  must  be  free  from  that  "superstition  of  the  ages"  it  will  never  see  the  light.

One  can  well  imagine  the  embarrassing  position  in  which  serious  Egyptologists,  Assyriologists,  savants  and  academicians  find  themselves.

Forced  to  translate  and  interpret  the  old  papyri  and  the  archaic  inscriptions  on  stelae  and  Baby-  lonian cylinders,  they  find  themselves  compelled  from  first  to  last  to  face  the  distasteful,  and  to  them  repulsive,  subject  of  Magic,  with  its  incantations  and  paraphernalia.

Here  they  find  sober  and  grave  narratives  from  the  pens  of  learned  scribes,  made  up  under  the  direct  supervision  of  Chaldean  or  Egyptian  Hierophants,  the  most  learned  among  the  Philosophers  of  antiquity.

These  statements  were  written  at  the  solemn  hour  of  the  death  and  burial  of  Pharaohs,  High  Priests,  and  other  mighty  ones  of  the  land  of  Chemi  ,  their  pur-  pose was  the  introduction  of  the  newly-born,  Osirified  Soul  before  the  awful  tribunal  of  the  "  Great  Judge"  in  the  region  of  Amenti — there  where  a  lie  was  said  to  outweigh  the  greatest  crimes.

Were  the  Scribes  and  Hierophants,  Pharaohs,  and  King-Priests  all  fools  or  frauds  to  have  either  believed  in,  or  tried  to  make  others  believe  in,  such  "cock-and-bull  stories  "  as  are  found  in  the  most  respectable  papyri  ?  Yet  there  is  no  help  for  it.  Corroborated  by  Plato  and  Herodotus,  by  Manetho  and  Syncellus,  as  by  all  the  greatest  and  most  trustworthy  authors  and  philosophers  who  wrote  upon  the  subject,  those  papyri  note  down — as  seriously  as  they  note  any  history,  or  any  fact  so  well  known  and  accepted  as  to  need  no  commentary — whole  royal  dynasties  of  Manes,  to  wit,  of  shadows  and  phantoms  (astral  bodies),  and  such  feats  of  magic  skill  and  such  Occult  phenomena,  that  the  most  credulous  Occultist  of  our  own  times  would  hesitate  to  believe  them  to  be  true.

The  Orientalists  have  found  a  plank  of  salvation,  while  yet  publishing  and  delivering  the  papyri  to  the  criticism  of  literary  Sadducees :  they  generally  call  them  "romances  of  the  days  of  Pharaoh  So-and-So."  The  idea  is  ingenious,  if  not  absolutely  fair.

FF

SECTION

THE  ORIGIN  OF  THE  MYSTERIES

ALL  that  is  explained  in  the  preceding  Sections  and  a  hundredfold  more  was  taught  in  the  Mysteries  from  time  immemorial.

If  the  first  appearance  of  those  institutions  is  a  matter  of  historical  tradition  with  regard  to  some  of  the  later  nations,  their  origin  must  certainly  be  assigned  to  the  time  of  the  Fourth  Root  Race.

The  Mysteries  were  imparted  to  the  elect  of  that  Race  when  the  average  Atlantean  had  begun  to  fall  too  deeply  into  sin  to  be  trusted  with  the  secrets  of  Nature.

Their  establishment  is  attributed  in  the  Secret  Works  to  the  King-Initiates  of  the  divine  dynasties,  when  the  "  Sons  of  God  "  had  gradually  allowed  their  country  to  become  Kukarma-des  (the  land  of  vice).

The  antiquity  of  the  Mysteries  may  be  inferred  from  the  history  of  the  worship  of  Hercules  in  Egypt.

This  Hercules,  according  to  what  the  priests  told  Herodotus,  was  not  Grecian,  for  he  says  :

Of  the  Grecian   Hercules   I   could  in  no  part  of  Egypt  procure  any  knowledge  .  the  name  was  never  borrowed  by   Egypt  from  Greece  .          Hercules,   .       .  as  they  [the   priests]  affirm,   is   one  of  the  twelve  (great  Gods),  who  were  reproduced  from  the  earlier  eight  Gods  17,000  years  before  the  year  of  Amasis.

Hercules  is  of  Indian  origin,  and — his  Biblical  chronology  put  aside —  Colonel  Tod  was  quite  right  in  his  suggestion  that  he  was  Balarama  or  Baladeva.

Now  one  must  read  the  Puranas  with  the  Esoteric  key  in  one's  hand  in  order  to  find  out  how  on  almost  every  page  they  corroborate  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE.

The  ancient  classical  writers  so  well  understood  this  truth-  that  they  unanimously  attributed  to  Asia  the  origin  of  Hercules.

A  section  of  the  Mahabharata  is  devoted  to  the  history  of  the  Hercula,  of  which  race  was  Vyasa  .  .  Diodorus  has  the  same  legend  with  some  variety.

He  says  .  "  Hercules  was  born  amongst  the  Indians  and,  like  the  Greeks,  they  furnish  him  with  a  club  and  lion's  hide."  Both  [Krishna  and  Baladeva]  are  (lords)  of  the  race  (cula)  of  Heri  (Heri-cul-es)  of  which  the  Greeks  might  have  made  the  compound  Hercules  '

The  Occult  Doctrine  explains  that  Hercules  was  the  last  incarnation  of  one  of  the  seven  "  Lords  of  the  Flame,"  as  Krishna's  brother,  Baladeva.

That  1  Tod's  Annals  of  Ra/asthan,  Vol.

i,  pp  32-3.

THE  ORIGIN  OF  THE  MYSTERIES

his  incarnations  occurred  during  the  Third,  Fourth,  and  Fifth  Root  Races,  and  that  his  worship  was  brought  into  Egypt  from  Lanka  and  India  by  the  later  immigrants.

That  he  was  borrowed  by  the  Greeks  from  the  Egyptians  is  certain,  the  more  so  as  the  Greeks  place  his  birth  at  Thebes,  and  only  his  twelve  labours  at  Argos.

Now  we  find  in  the  Vishnu  Parana  a  complete  corroboration  of  the  statement  made  in  the  Secret  Teachings,  of  which  Puranic  allegory  the  following  is  a  short  summary :

Raivata,  a  grandson  of  Sharyati,  Manu's  fourth  son,  finding  no  man-  worthy  of  his  lovely  daughter,  repaired  with  her  to  Brahma's  region  to  consult  the  God  in  this  emergency.

Upon  his  arrival,  Haha,  Huhu,  and  other  Gandharvas  were  singing  before  the  throne,  and  Raivata,  waiting  till  they  had  done,  imagined  that  but  one  Muhurta  (instant)  had  passed,  whereas  long  ages  had  elapsed.

When  they  had  finished  Raivata  prostrated  himself  and  explain-  ed his  perplexity.

Then  Brahma  asked  him  whom  he  wished  for  a  son-in-law,  and  upon  hearing  a  few  personages  named,  the  Father  of  the  World  smiled  and  said :  "Of  those  whom  you  have  named  the  third  and  fourth  generation  [Root  Races]  no  longer  survive,  for  many  successions  of  ages  [Chatur-Yuga,  or  the  four  Yuga  cycles]  have  passed  away  while  you  were  listening  to  our  songsters.

Now  on  earth  the  twenty-eighth  great  age  of  the  present  Manu  is  nearly  finished  and  the  Kali  period  is  at  hand.

You  must  therefore  bestow  this  virgin-gem  upon  some  other  husband.

For  you  are  now  alone."

Then  the  Raja  Raivata  is  told  to  proceed  to  Kushasthali,  his  ancient  capital,  which  was  now  called  Dvaraka,  and  where  reigned  in  his  stead  a  por-  tion of  the  divine  being  (Vishnu)  in  the  person  of  Baladeva,  the  brother  of  Krishna,  regarded  as  the  seventh  incarnation  of  Vishnu  whenever  Krishna  is  taken  as  a  full  divinity.

"  Being  thus  instructed  by  the  Lotus-born  [Brahma],  Raivata  returned  with  his  daughter  to  earth,  where  he  found  the  race  of  men  dwindled  in  stature  [see  what  is  said  in  the  STANZAS  and  Commentaries  of  the  races  of  mankind  gradually  decreasing  in  stature] ;  .  .  .  reduced  in  vigour,  and  enfeebled  in  intellect.

Repairing  to  the  city  of  Kushasthali,  he  found  it  much  altered,"  because,  according  to  the  allegorical  explanation  of  the  commentator,,  ';  Krishna  had  reclaimed  from  the  sea  a  portion  of  the  country,"  which  means  in  plain  language  that  the  continents  had  all  been  changed  meanwhile — and  "had  renovated  the  city" — or  rather  built  a  new  one,  Dvaraka;  for  one  reads  in  the  Bhagavata  Parana l  that  Kushasthali  was  founded  and  built  by  Raivata  within  the  sea ;  and  subsequent  discoveries  showed  that  it  was  the  same,  or  on  the  same  spot,  as  Dvaraka.

Therefore  it  was  on  an  island  before.

1  Opcit,  ix,  iii,  28.

260  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

The  allegory  in  Vishnu  Parana  shows  King  Raivata  giving  his  daughter  to  "the  wielder  of  the  ploughshare  " — or  rather  "  the  plough-bannered  " — Baladeva,  who  "  beholding  the  damsel  of  excessively  lofty  height  .  .  .  shortened  her  with  the  end  of  his  ploughshare,  and  she  became  his  wife."  l

This  is  a  plain  allusion  to  the  Third  and  Fourth  Races- — to  the  Atlantean  giants  and  the  successive  incarnations  of  the  "  Sons  of  the  Flame  "  and  other  orders  of  Dhyan  Chohans  in  the  heroes  and  kings  of  mankind,  down  to  the  Kali  Yuga,  or  Black  Age,  the  beginning  of  which  is  within  historical  times.

Another  coincidence :  Thebes  is  the  city  of  a  hundred  gates,  and  Dvaraka  is  so  called  from  its  many  gateways  or  doors,  from  the  word  "  Dvara,"  "gate-  way." Both  Hercules  and  Baladeva  are  of  a  passionate,  hot  temper,  and  both  are  renowned  for  the  fairness  of  their  white  skins.

There  is  not  the  slightest  doubt  that  Hercules  is  Baladeva  in  Greek  dress.

Arrian  notices  the  great  similarity  between  the  Theban  and  the  Hindu  Hercules,  the  latter  being  worshipped  by  the  Suraseni  who  built  Methorea,  or  Mathura,  Krishna's  birth-  place.

The  same  writer  places  Sandracottus  (Chandragupta,  the  grandfather  of  King  Ashoka,  of  the  clan  of  Morya)  in  the  direct  line  of  the  descendants  of  Baladeva.

There  were  no  Mysteries  in  the  beginning,  we  are  taught.

Knowledge  (Vidya)  was  common  property,  and  it  reigned  universally  throughout  the  Golden  Age  (Satya  Yuga).  As  says  the  Commentary  •

Men  had  not  created  evil  yet  in  those  days  of  bliss  and  purity,  for  they  were  of  God-like  more  than  of  human  nature.

But  when  mankind,  rapidly  increasing  in  numbers,  increased  also  in  variety  of  idiosyncrasies  of  body  and  mind,  then  incarnated  Spirit  showed  its  weak-  ness.

Natural  exaggerations,  and  along  with  these  superstitions,  arose  in  the  less  cultured  and  healthy  minds.

Selfishness  was  born  out  of  desires  and  passions  hitherto  unknown,  and  but  too  often  knowledge  and  power  were  abused,  until  finally  it  became  necessary  to  limit  the  number  of  those  who  knew.

Thus  arose  Initiation.

Every  separate  nation  now  arranged  for  itself  a  religious  system,  accord-  ing to  its  enlightenment  and  spiritual  wants.

Worship  of  mere  form  being  discarded  by  the  wise  men,  these  confined  true  knowledge  to  the  very  few.

The  need  of  veiling  truth  to  protect  it  from  desecration  becoming  more  apparent  with  every  generation,  a  thin  veil  was  used  at  first,  which  had  to  be  gradually  thickened  according  to  the  spread  of  personality  and  selfishness,  and  this  led  to  the  Mysteries.

They  came  to  be  established  in  every  country  and  among  every  people,  while  to  avoid  strife  and  misunderstanding  exoteric  1  Vishnu  Purina,  Wilson's  translation,  Vol.

ui,  pp.  249-54.

THE  ORIGIN  OF  THE  MYSTERIES

beliefs  were  allowed  to  grow  up  in  the  minds  of  the  profane  masses.

Inoffen-  sive and  innocent  in  their  incipient  stage — like  a  historical  event  arranged  in  the  form  of  a  fairy  tale,  adapted  for  and  comprehensible  to  the  child's  mind  — in  those  distant  ages  such  beliefs  could  be  allowed  to  grow  and  make  the  popular  faith  without  any  danger  to  the  more  philosophical  and  abstruse  truths  taught  in  the  sanctuaries.

Logical  and  scientific  observation  of  the  phenom-  ena in  Nature,  which  alone  leads  man  to  the  knowledge  of  eternal  truths —  provided  he  approaches  the  threshold  of  observation  unbiassed  by  preconcep-  tion and  sees  with  his  spiritual  eye  before  he  looks  at  things  in  their  physical  aspect — does  not  lie  within  the  province  of  the  masses.

The  marvels  of  the  One  Spirit  of  Truth,  the  ever-concealed  and  inaccessible  Deity,  can  be  un-  ravelled and  assimilated  only  through  Its  manifestations  by  the  secondary  "  Gods,"  Its  acting  powers.

While  the  One  and  Universal  Cause  has  to  remain  for  ever  in  abscond/to,  Its  manifold  action  may  be  traced  through  the  effects  in  Nature.

The  latter  alone  being  comprehensible  and  manifest  to  average  mankind,  the  Powers  causing  those  effects  were  allowed  to  grow  in  the  imagination  of  the  populace.

Ages  later  in  the  Fifth,  the  Aryan,  Race  some  unscrupulous  priests  began  to  take  advantage  of  the  too-easy  beliefs  of  the  people  in  every  country,  and  finally  raised  those  secondary  Powers  to  the  rank  of  God  and  Gods,  thus  succeeding  in  isolating  them  altogether  from  the  One  Universal  Cause  of  all  causes.

Henceforward  the  knowledge  of  the  primeval  truths  remained  entirely  in  the  hands  of  the  Initiates.

The  Mysteries  had  their  weak  points  and  their  defects,  as  every  institution  welded  with  the  human  element  must  necessarily  have.

Yet  Voltaire  has  characterised  their  benefits  in  a  few  words  :

In  the  chaos  of  popular  superstitions  there  existed  an  institution  which  has  ever  prevented  man  from  falling  into  absolute  brutality  .  it  was  that  of  the  Mysteries

Verily,  as  Ragon  puts  it  of  Masonry  ;

Its  temple  has  Time  for  duration,  the  Universe  for  space  .  .  "  Let  us  divide  that  we  may  rule,"  have  said  the  crafty  ,  "  Let  us  unite  to  resist,"  have  said  the  first  Masons

1  There  were  no  Brahmans  as  a  hereditary  caste  in  days  of  old.

In  those  long-departed  ages  a  man  became  a  Brahman  through  personal  merit  and  Initiation.

Gradually,  however,  despotism  crept  in,  and  the  son  of  a  Brahman  was  created  a  Brahman  by  right  of  protection  first,  then  by  that  of  heredity  The  rights  of  blood  replaced  those  of  real  merit,  and  thus  arose  the  body  of  Brahmans,  which  was  soon  changed  into  a  powerful  caste

*  Des  Initiations  Anctennes  et  Modernes  "The  mysteries,"  says  Ragon,  "  were  the  gift  of  India."  In  this  he  is  mistaken,  for  the  Aryan  race  had  brought  the  mysteries  of  Initiation  from  Atlantis.

Never-  theless he  is  right  in  saying  that  the  mysteries  preceded  all  civilisations,  and  that  by  polishing  the  mind  and  morals  of  the  peoples  they  served  as  a  base  for  all  the  laws— civil,  political,  and  religious.

262  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Or  rather,  the  Initiates  whom  the  Masons  have  never  ceased  to  claim  as  their  primitive  and  direct  Masters.

The  first  and  fundamental  principle  of  moral  strength  and  power  is  association  and  solidarity  of  thought  and  purpose.

"The  Sons  of  Will  and  Yoga  "  united  in  the  beginning  to  resist  the  terrible  and  ever-growing  iniquities  of  the  left-hand  Adepts,  the  Atlanteans.

This  led  to  the  foundation  of  still  more  Secret  Schools,  temples  of  learning,  and  of  Mysteries  inaccessible  to  all  except  after  the  most  terrible  trials  and  probations.

Anything  that  might  be  said  of  the  earliest  Adepts  and  their  divine  Masters  would  be  regarded  as  fiction.

It  is  necessary,  therefore,  if  we  would  know  something  of  the  primitive  Initiates,  to  judge  of  the  tree  by  its  fruits,  to  •examine  the  bearing  and  the  work  of  their  successors  in  the  Fifth  Race  as  reflected  in  the  works  of  the  classic  writers  and  the  great  Philosophers.

How  were  Initiation  and  the  Initiates  regarded  during  some  2,000  years  by  the  Greek  and  Roman  writers  ?  Cicero  informs  his  readers  in  very  clear  terms.

He  says  :

An  Initiate  must  practise  all  the  virtues  in  his  power :  justice,  fidelity,  liberality,  .modesty,  temperance  ;  these  virtues  cause  men  to  forget  the  talents  that  he  may  lack  l

Ragon  says  :

When  the  Egyptian  priests  said  •  "  All  for  the  people,  nothing  through  the  people,"  they  were  right :  in  an  ignorant  nation  truth  must  be  revealed  only  to  trustworthy  persons.

.  .  We  have  seen  in  our  days,  "  all  through  the  people,  nothing  for  the  people,"  a  false  and  dangerous  system  The  real  axiom  ought  to  be  :  "All  for  the  people  and  with  the  people."

But  in  order  to  achieve  this  reform  the  masses  have  to  pass  through  a  dual  transformation :  (a)  to  become  divorced  from  every  element  of  exoteric  superstition  and  priestcraft,  and  (b)  to  become  educated  men,  free  from  every  danger  of  being  enslaved  whether  by  a  man  or  an  idea.

This,  in  view  of  the  preceding,  may  seem  paradoxical.

The  Initiates  were  "priests,"  we  may  be  told — at  any  rate,  all  the  Hindu,  Egyptian,  Chal  dean,  Greek,  Phoenician,  and  other  Hierophants  and  Adepts  were  priests  ii  the  temples,  and  it  was  they  who  invented  their  respective  exoteric  creeds  To  this  the  answer  is  possible  :  "  The  cowl  does  not  make  the  friar."  If  on<  may  believe  tradition  and  the  unanimous  opinion  of  ancient  writers,  added  t<  the  examples  we  have  in  the  "  priests  "  of  India,  the  most  conservative  natioi  in  the  world,  it  becomes  quite  certain  that  the  Egyptian  priests  were  no  mon  priests  in  the  sense  we  give  to  the  word  than  are  the  temple  Brahmans  They  could  never  be  regarded  as  such  if  we  take  as  our  standard  the  Europeai  clergy.

Laurens  observes  very  correctly  that :

The  priests  of  Egypt  were  not,  strictly  speaking,  ministers  of  religion.

The  won  "  priest,"  which  translation  has  been  badly  interpreted,  had  an  acceptation  very  differen

1  De  Off  ,  i.  33.  -  Des  Initiations,  p.  22.

THE  ORIGIN  OF  THE  MYSTERIES

from  the  one  that  is  applied  to  it  among  us.  In  the  language  of  antiquity,  and  espe-  cially m  the  sense  of  the  initiation  of  the  priests  of  ancient  Egypt,  the  word  "  priest  "  is  synonymous  with  that  of  "  philosopher."  .  .  The  institution  of  the  Egyptian  priests  seems  to  have  been  really  a  confederation  of  sages  gathered  to  study  the  art  of  ruling  men,  to  centre  the  domain  of  truth,  modulate  its  propagation,  and  arrest  its  too  danger-  ous dispersion.

The  Egyptian  Priests,  like  the  Brahmans  of  old,  held  the  reins  of  the  governing  powers,  a  system  that  descended  to  them  by  direct  inheritance  from  the  Initiates  of  the  great  Atlantis.

The  pure  cult  of  Nature  in  the  earliest  patriarchal  days — the  word  ••  patriarch  "  applying  in  its  first  original  sense  to  the  Progenitors  of  the  human  race,2  the  Fathers,  Chiefs,  and  Instructors  of  primitive  men — became  the  heirloom  of  those  alone  who  could  discern  the  •noumenon  beneath  the  phenomenon.

Later,  the  Initiates  transmitted  their  knowledge  to  the  human  kings,  as  their  divine  Masters  had  passed  it  to  their  forefathers.

It  was  their  prerogative  and  duty  to  reveal  the  secrets  of  Nature  that  were  useful  to  mankind — the  hidden  virtues  of  plants,  the  art  of  healing  the  sick,  and  of  bringing  about  brotherly  love  and  mutual  help  among  man-  kind.

No  Initiate  was  one  if  he  could  not  heal — aye,  recall  to  life  from  apparent  death  (coma)  those  who,  too  long  neglected,  would  have  indeed  died  during  their  lethargy.

5  Those  who  showed  such  powers  were  forthwith  set  above  the  crowds,  and  were  regarded  as  Kings  and  Initiates.

Gautama  Buddha  was  a  King-Initiate,  a  healer,  and  recalled  to  life  those  who  were  in  the  hands  of  death.

Jesus  and  Apollonius  were  healers,  and  were  both  addressed  as  Kings  by  their  followers.

Had  they  failed  to  raise  those  who  were  to  all  intents  and  purposes  the  dead,  none  of  their  names  would  have  passed  down  to  posterity  ;  for  this  was  the  first  and  crucial  test,  the  certain  sign  that  the  Adept  had  upon  Him  the  invisible  hand  of  a  primordial  divine  Master,  or  was  an  incarnation  of  one  of  the  "  Gods."

The  later  royal  privilege  descended  to  our  Fifth  Race  kings  through  the  kings  of  Egypt.

The  latter  were  all  initiated  into  the  mysteries  of  medicine,  and  they  healed  the  sick,  even  when,  owing  to  the  terrible  trials  and  labours  of  final  Initiation,  they  were  unable  to  become  full  Hierophants.

They  were  healers  by  privilege  and  by  tradition,  and  were  assisted  in  the  healing  art  by  the  Hierophants  of  the  temples,  when  they  themselves  were  ignorant  of  Occult  curative  Science.

So  also  in  far  later  historical  times  we  find  Pyrrhus  curing

1  Essa/s  H/storiques  sur  la  Franc-Maconnene,  pp.  142-

''The  word  "patriarch"  is  composed  of  the  Greek  words  "  Patria  "("  family."  "tribe,"  or  "nation")  and  "  Archos  "  (a  "chief"),  the  paternal  principle  The  Jewish  Patriarchs  who  were  pastors,  passed  their  name  to  the  Christian  Patriarchs ,  yet  they  were  no  priests,  but  were  simply  the  heads  of  their  tribes,  like  the  Indian  Rishis.

3  The  resurrection  of  a  really  dead  body  is  an  impossibility  in  Nature.

264  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

the  sick  by  simply  touching  them  with  his  foot ;  Vespasian  and  Hadrian  needed  only  to  pronounce  a  few  words  taught  to  them  by  their  Hierophants,  in  order  to  restore  sight  to  the  blind  and  health  to  the  cripple.

From  that  time  onward  history  has  recorded  cases  of  the  same  privilege  conferred  on  the  Emperors  and  Kings  of  almost  every  nation.

That  which  is  known  of  the  Priests  of  Egypt  and  of  the  ancient  Brahmans,  corroborated  as  it  is  by  all  the  ancient  classics  and  historical  writers,  gives  us  the  right  to  believe  in  that  which  is  only  traditional  in  the  opinion  of  sceptics.

Whence  the  wonderful  knowledge  of  the  Egyptian  Priests  in  every  department  of  Science,  unless  they  had  it  from  a  still  more  ancient  source  ?  The  famous  "  Four,"  the  seats  of  learning  in  old  Egypt,  are  more  historically  certain  than  the  beginnings  of  modern  England.

It  was  in  the  great  Thebarv  sanctuary  that  Pythagoras  upon  his  arrival  from  India  studied  the  Science  of  Occult  numbers.

Is  was  in  Memphis  that  Orpheus  popularized  his  too-  abtruse  Indian  metaphysics  for  the  use  of  Magna  Grecia  ,  and  thence  Thales,  and  ages  later  Democritus,  obtained  all  they  knew.

It  is  to  Sais  that  all  the  honour  must  be  given  of  the  wonderful  legislation  and  the  art  of  ruling  people,,  imparted  by  its  Priests  to  Lycurgus  and  Solon,  who  will  both  remain  objects  of  admiration  for  generations  to  come.

And  had  Plato  and  Eudoxus  never  gone  to  worship  at  the  shrine  of  Heliopolis,  most  probably  the  one  would  have  never  astonished  future  generations  with  his  ethics,  nor  the  other  with  his  wonderful  knowledge  of  mathematics  "

The  great  modern  writer  on  the  Mysteries  of  Egyptian  Initiation — one,  however,  who  knew  nothing  of  those  in  India — the  late  Ragon,  has  not  exaggerated  in  maintaining  that  •

All  the  notions  possessed  by  Hindustan,  Persia,  Syria,  Arabia,  Chaldea,  Sydonia,  and  the  priests  of  Babylonia,  [on  the  secrets  of  Nature],  was  known  to  the  Egyptian  priests  It  is  thus  Indian  philosophy,  without  mysteries,  which,  having  penetrated  into  Chaldea  and  ancient  Persia,  gave  rise  to  the  doctrine  of  Egyptian  Mysteries  !

The  Mysteries  preceded  the  hieroglyphics.1  They  gave  birth  to  the  latter,  as  permanent  records  were  needed  to  preserve  and  commemorate

en

the  a

virtues  of  good  King  kooert  rrancis  the  nrst,  during  a  short  stay  at  Marseilles  tor  his  son  s  wedding,  touched  and  cured  of  that  disease  upwards  of  500  persons  The  kings  of  England  had  the  same  privilege

2  See  Laurens'  Essais  Htstonques  for  further  information  as  to  the  world-wide,  universal  knowledge  of  the  Egyptian  Priests

•'  Des  Initiations,  p

4  The  word  comes  from  the  Greek   "  hieros      ("  sacred  ")  and  "  glupho  "  ("  I  grave  ")      The  Egyptian  characters  were  sacred  to  the  Gods,  as  the  Indian  Devanagari  is  the  language  of  the  Gods

THE  ORIGIN  OF  THE  MYSTERIES

their  secrets.

It  is  primitive  Philosophy  '  that  has  served  as  the  foundation-  stone  for  modern  Philosophy  ;  only  the  progeny,  while  perpetuating  the  features  of  the  external  body,  has  lost  on  its  way  the  Soul  and  Spirit  of  its  parent.

Initiation,  though  it  contained  neither  rules  and  principles,  nor  any-  special  teaching  of  Science — as  now  understood — was  nevertheless  Science,  and  the  Science  of  sciences.

And  though  devoid  of  dogma,  of  physical  discipline,  and  of  exclusive  ritual,  it  was  yet  the  one  true  Religion — that  of  eternal  truth.

Outwardly  it  was  a  school,  a  college,  wherein  were  taught  sciences,  arts,  ethics,  legislation,  philanthropy,  the  cult  of  the  true  and  real  nature  of  cosmic  phenomena  ;  secretly,  during  the  Mysteries,  practical  proofs  of  the  latter  were  given.

Those  who  could  learn  truth  on  all  things — i.e.,  those  who  could  look  the  great  Isis  in  her  unveiled  face  and  bear  the  awful  majesty  of  the  Goddess — became  Initiates.

But  the  children  of  the  Fifth  Race  had  fallen  too  deeply  into  matter  always  to  do  so  with  impunity.

Those  who  failed  disappeared  from  the  world,  without  leaving  a  trace  behind.

Which  of  the  highest  kings  would  have  dared  to  claim  any  individual,  however  high  his  social  standing,  from  the  stern  priests,  once  that  the  victim  had  crossed  the  threshold  of  their  sacred  Adytum  ?

The  noble  precepts  taught  by  the  Initiates  of  the  early  races  passed  to  India,  Egypt,  and  Greece,  to  China  and  Chaldea,  and  thus  spread  all  over  the  world.

All  that  is  good,  noble,  and  grand  in  human  nature,  every  divine  faculty  and  aspiration,  were  cultured  by  the  Priest-Philosophers  who  sought  to  develop  them  in  their  Initiates.

Their  code  of  ethics,  based  on  altruism,  has  become  universal.

It  is  found  in  Confucius,  the  "  atheist,"  who  taught  that  "  he  who  loves  not  his  brother  has  no  virtue  in  him,"  and  in  the  Old  Testa-  ment precept,  "Thou  shalt  love  thy  neighbour  as  thyself,"  >J  The  greater

1  The  same  author  had  (as  Occultists  have)  a  very  reasonable  objection  to  the  modern  etymology  of  the  word  "  philosophy,"  which  is  interpreted  "  love  of  wisdom,"  and  is  nothing  of  the  kind      The  philosophers  were   scientists,    and   philosophy  was  a  real  science— not  simply  verbiage,  as  it  is  in  our  day      The  term   is  composed   of  two   Greek  words  whose  meaning  is  intended  to  convey  its  secret  sense,   and   ought  to   be   interpreted  as  "  wisdom  of  love."     Now  it  is  in  the  last  word,  "  love,"  that  lies  hidden  the  esoteric   significance     for  "  love  "  does  not  stand  here  as  a  noun,  nor  does  it  mean  "  affection  "  or  "  fondness,"  but  is  the  term  used  for  Eros,  that  primordial  principle  in  divine  creation,  synonymous  with  7TO$O9,   the  abstract  desire   in   Nature  for  procreation,  resulting  in  an  everlasting  series  of  phenomena      It  means  "  divine  love,"  that  universal  element  of  divine  omnipresence  spread  throughout   Nature  and  which   is  at  once  the  chief  cause  and  effect.

The  "  wisdom  of  love  "  (or  "  philosophia,")  meant  attraction  to  and  love  of  everything  hidden  beneath  objective  phenomena  and  the  knowledge  thereof      Philosophy  meant  the  highest  Adeptship — love  of  and  assimilation  with  Deity  In   his   modesty   Pythagoras  even   refused  to  be  called  a  Philosopher  (or  one  who  knows  every  hidden  thing   in  things  visible,  cause  and   effect,    or  absolute  truth),    and  called  himself  simply  a  Sage,  an  aspirant  to  philosophy,   or  to  Wisdom  of  Love — love   in   its  exoteric  meaning  being  as  degraded  by  men  then  as  it  is  now  by  its  purely  terrestrial  application.

2  Lev  ,  xix.

266  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Initiates  became  like  unto  Gods,  and  Socrates,  in  Plato's  Phaedo,  is  represented  as  saying  :

The  Initiates  are  sure  to  come  into  the  company  of  the  Gods.

In  the  same  work  the  great  Athenian  Sage  is  made  to  say  :

It  is  quite  apparent  that  those  who  have  established  the  Mysteries,  or  the  secret  assemblies  of  the  Initiates,  were  no  mean  persons,  but  powerful  genii,  who  from  the  first  ages  had  endeavoured  to  make  us  understand  under  those  enigmas  that  he  who  will  reach  the  invisible  regions  unpunfied  will  be  hurled  into  the  abyss  [the  Eighth  Sphere  of  the  Occult  Doctrine ,  that  is,  he  will  lose  his  personality  for  ever],  while  he  who  will  attain  them  purged  of  the  maculations  of  this  world,  and  accomplished  in  virtues,  will  be  received  in  the  abode  of  the  Gods.

Said  Clemens  Alexandrinus,  referring  to  the  Mysteries :  Here  ends  all  teaching.

One  sees  Nature  and  all  things.

A  Christian  Father  of  the  Church  speaks  then  as  did  the  Pagan  Pre-  textatus,  the  pro-consul  of  Achaia  (fourth  century  AD)  "a  man  of  eminent  virtues,"  who  remarked  that  to  deprive  the  Greeks  of  "the  sacred  Myster-  ies which  bind  in  one  the  whole  of  mankind,"  was  to  render  their  very  lives  worthless  to  them.

Would  the  Mysteries  have  ever  obtained  the  highest  praise  from  the  noblest  men  of  antiquity  had  they  not  been  of  more  than  human  origin  ?  Read  all  that  is  said  of  this  unparalleled  institution,  as  much  by  those  who  had  never  been  initiated,  as  by  the  Initiates  themselves.

Consult  Plato,  Euripides,  Socrates,  Aristophanes,  Pindar,  Plutarch,  Isocrates,  Diodorus,  Cicero,  Epictetus,  Marcus  Aurelius,  not  to  name  dozens  of  other  famous  Sages  and  writers.

That  which  the  Gods  and  Angels  had  revealed,  exoteric  religions,  beginning  with  that  of  Moses,  revelled  and  hid  for  ages  from  the  sight  of  the  world.

Joseph,  the  son  of  Jacob,  was  an  Initiate,  otherwise  he  would  not  have  married  Asenath,  the  daughter  of  Petephre  ("  Potiphar  " — "he  who  belongs  to  Phre,"  the  Sun-  God),  priest  of  Heliopolis  and  governor  of  On.1  Every  truth  revealed  by  Jesus,  and  which  even  the  Jews  and  early  Christians  understood,  was  revelled  by  the  Church  that  pretends  to  serve  Him.

Read  what  Seneca  says,  as  quoted  by  Dr.  Kenealy  :

"  The  world  .  .  being  melted  and  having  re-entered  the  bosom  of  Jupiter  [or  Parabrahman],  this  God  continues  for  some  time  totally  concentred  in  himself  and  remains  concealed,  as  it  were,  wholly  immersed  in  the  contemplation  of  his  own  ideas.

Afterwards  we  see  a  new  world  spring  from  him.

.  .  An  innocent  race  of  men  is  formed."  .  And  again,  speaking  of  a  mundane  dissolution  as  involving  the  destruction  or  death  of  all,  he  [Seneca]  teaches  us  that  when  the  laws  of  Nature  shall  be  buried  in  ruin  and  the  last  day  of  the  world  shall  come,  the  southern  pole  shall  crush,  as  it  falls,  all  the  regions  of  Africa  ;  and  the  north  pole  shall  overwhelm  all  the  countries  beneath  its

1  "On,"  the  "  Sun,"  the  Egyptian  name  of  Heliopolis  (the  "  City  of  the  Sun  ")

THE  ORIGIN  OF  THE  MYSTERIES

axis.

The  affrighted  sun  shall  be  deprived  of  its  light ,  the  palace  of  heaven,  falling  to  decay,  shall  produce  at  once  both  life  and  death,  and  some  kind  of  dissolution  shall  equally  seize  upon  all  the  deities,  who  thus  shall  return  to  their  original  chaos  l

One  might  fancy  oneself  reading  the  Puranic  account  by  Parashara  of  the  great  Pralaya.

It  is  nearly  the  same  thing,  idea  for  idea.

Has  Christianity  nothing  of  the  kind  ?  Let  the  reader  open  any  English  Bible  and  read  chap-  ter iii  of  the  Second  Epistle  of  Peter,  and  he  will  find  there  the  same  ideas.

there  shall  come  in  the  last  days  scoffers,  .  .  saying,  Where  is  the  promise  of  his  coming  ?  for  since  the  fathers  fell  asleep,  all  things  continue  as  they  were  from  the  beginning  of  the  creation.

For  this  they  willingly  are  ignorant  of,  that  by  the  word  of  God  the  heavens  were  of  old,  and  the  earth  standing  out  of  the  water  and  in  the  water :  Whereby  the  world  that  then  was,  being  overflowed  with  water,  perished  :  But  the  heavens  and  the  earth,  which  are  now,  by  the  same  word  are  ...  reserved  unto  fire  ...  in  the  which  the  heavens  shall  pass  away  with  a  great  noise,  and  the  elements  shall  melt  with  fervent  heat,  .  Nevertheless  we,  .  .  look  for  new  heavens  and  a  new  earth.

.  .*

If  the  interpreters  chose  to  see  in  this  a  reference  to  a  creation,  a  deluge,  and  a  promised  coming  of  Christ,  when  they  will  live  in  a  New  Jerusalem  in  heaven,  that  is  no  fault  of  Peter.

What  he  meant  was  the  destruction  of  the  Fifth  Race  and  the  appearance  of  a  new  continent  for  the  Sixth  Race.

The  Druids  understood  the  meaning  of  the  Sun  in  Taurus,  therefore  when  all  the  fires  were  extinguished  on  the  1st  of  November  their  sacred  and  inextinguishable  fire  remained  alone  to  illumine  the  horizon  like  those  of  the  Magi  and  the  modern  Zoroastrian.

And  like  the  early  Fifth  Race  and  the  later  Chaldeans  and  Greeks,  and  again  like  the  Christians  (who  do  it  to  this  day  without  suspecting  the  real  meaning),  they  greeted  the  "  Morning-Star,"  the  beautiful  Venus-Lucifer.3  Strabo  speaks  of  an  island  near  Britannia  where  Ceres  and  Persephone  were  worshipped  with  the  same  rites  as  in  Samothrace,  and  this  was  the  sacred  lerna,  where  a  perpetual  fire  was  lit.

The  Druids  believed  in  the  rebirth  of  man,  not,  as  Lucian  explains,

That  the  same  Spirit  shall  animate  a  new  body,  not  here,  but  in  a  different  world,  but  in  a  series  of  reincarnations  in  this  same  world ;  for  as  Diodorus  says,  they  declared  that  the  souls  of  men  after  a  determinate  period  would  pass  into  other  bodies.

1  Book  of  God,  p.  160  ~  Authorised  version,  vv   3-

3  Hr    Kenealy  quotes,  in  his  Book  of  God  (pp.  162-3),  Vallancey.

who  says     "  I  had  not  been  a  week  landed  in  Ireland  from  Gibraltar,  where  I  had  studied  Hebrew  and  Chalda.c  under  Jews iof  various  countries,  when  I  heard  a  peasant  girl  say  to  a  boor  standing  by  her  '  Feach  an  Maddm  Nag    (  Behold  the  morning  star '),  pointing  to  the  planet  Venus,  the  Maddena  Nag  of  the  Chaldeans

4  There  was  a  t.me  when  the  whole  world,  the  totality  of  mankind,  had  one  religion,  as  they  were  of    "  one  lip  "     "  All   the  religions  of  the  earth  were  at  first  one,  and  emanated  from  one  centre,  says  Faber

268  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

These  tenets  came  to  the  Fifth  Race  Aryans  from  their  ancestors  of  the  Fourth  Race,  the  Atlanteans.

They  piously  preserved  the  teachings,  while  their  parent  Root  Race,  becoming  with  every  generation  more  arrogant,  owing  to  the  acquisition  of  superhuman  powers,  were  gradually  approaching  their  end.

SECTION

THE  TRIAL  OF  THE  SUN  INITIATE

WE  will  begin  with  the  ancient  Mysteries — those  received  from  the  Atlanteans  by  the  primitive  Aryans— whose  mental  and  intellectual  state  Professor  Max  Muller  has  described  with  such  a  masterly  hand,  yet  left  so  incomplete  withal,

He  says  We  have  in  it  [in  the  Rig  Veda]  a  period  of  the  intellectual  life  of  man  to  which  there  is  no  parallel  in  any  other  part  of  the  world  In  the  hymns  of  the  Veda  we  see  man  left  to  himself  to  solve  the  riddle  of  this  world  He  invokes  the

gods  around  him,  he  praises,  he  worships  them  But  still  with  all  these  gods  beneath  him,  and  above  him,  the  early  poet  seems  ill  at  rest  within  himself.

There,  too,  in  his  own  breast,  he  has  discovered  a  power  that  is  never  mute  when  he  prays,  never  absent  when  he  fears  and  trembles  It  seems  to  inspire  his  prayers  and  yet  to  listen  to  them ,  it  seems  to  live  in  him,  and  yet  to  support  him  and  all  around  him  The  only  name  he  can  find  for  this  mysterious  power  is  '  Brahman  ,  "  for  brahman  meant  originally  force,  will,  wish,  and  the  propulsive  power  of  creation  But  this  impersonal  Brahman  too,  as  soon  as  it  is  named,  grows  into  something  strange  and  divine  It  ends  by  being  one  of  many  gods,  one  of  the  great  triad,  worshipped  to  the  present  day  And  still  the  thought  within  him  has  no  real  name ,  that  power  which  is  nothing  but  itself,  which  supports  the  gods,  the  heavens,  and  every  living  being,  floats  before  his  mind,  conceived  but  not  expressed.

At  last  he  calls  it  "  Atman,"  for  atman,  originally  breath  or  spirit,  comes  to  mean  Self  and  Self  alone,  Self,  whether  divine  or  human ;  Self,  whether  creating  or  suffering  ;  Self  whether  One  or  All ,  but  always  Self,  independent  and  free.

"  Who  has  seen  the  first-born  ?  says  the  poet,  "  when  he  who  had  no  bones  (i.e.,  form)  bore  him  that  had  bones?  Where  was  the  life,  the  blood,  the  Self  of  the  world?  Who  went  to  ask  this  from  any  one  who  knew  it?  "  (Rig  Veda,  I,  164,4)  This  idea  of  a  divine  Self  once  expressed,  everything  else  must  acknowledge  its  suprem-  acy ;  "  The  Se/f  is  This,  the  Lord  of  all  things ,  it  is  the  King  of  all  things ,  as  all  the  spokes  of  a  wheel  are  contained  in  the  nave  and  circumference,  all  things  are  contained  in  this  Self ,  all  selves  are  contained  in  this  Se/f."  (Bnhadaranyaka,  II,  v,  15).

This  Self,  the  highest,  the  one,  and  the  universal,  was  symbolized  on  the  plane  of  mortals  by  the  Sun,  its  life-giving  effulgence  being  in  its  turn  the  emblem  of  the  Soul — killing  the  terrestrial  passions  which  have  ever  been  an  impediment  to  the  re-union  of  the  Unit  Self  (the  Spirit)  with  the  All-Self,

1  Chips  from  a  German  Workshop,  vol  i,  pp*  69-

270  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Hence  the  allegorical  mystery,  only  the  broad  features  of  which  may  be  given  here.

It  was  enacted  by  the  "  Sons  of  the  Fire-Mist "  and  of  "  Light."  The  second  Sun  (the  "  second  hypostasis  "  of  Rabbi  Drach)  appeared  as  put  on  his  trial,  Vishvakarman,  the  Hierophant,  cutting  off  seven  of  his  beams,  and  replacing  them  with  a  crown  of  brambles*  when  the  "Sun"  became  Vikartana,  shorn  of  his  beams  or  rays.

After  that,  the  Sun — enacted  by  a  neophyte  ready  to  be  initiated — was  made  to  descend  into  Patala,  the  nether  regions,  on  a  trial  of  Tantalus.

Coming  out  of  it  triumphant,  he  emerged  from  this  region  of  lust  and  iniquity,  to  re-become  Karmasakshin,  witness  of  the  Karma  of  men,1  and  arose  once  more  triumphant  in  all  the  glory  of  his  regeneration,  as  the  Graha-Raja,  King  of  the  Constellations,  and  was  address-  ed as  Gabhastiman,  "  re-possessed  of  his  rays."

The  "  fable  "  in  the  popular  Pantheon  of  India,  founded  upon,  and  born  out  of  the  poetical  mysticism  of  the  Rig-Veda — the  sayings  of  which  were  mostly  all  dramatised  during  the  religious  Mysteries — grew  in  the  course  of  its  exoteric  evolution  into  the  following  allegory.

It  may  be  found  now  in  several  of  the  Puranas  and  in  other  Scriptures.

In  the  Rig-Veda  and  its  Hymns,  Vishvakarman,  a  Mystery-God,  is  the  Logos,  the  Demiourgos,  one  of  the  greatest  Gods,  and  spoken  of  in  two  of  the  hymns  as  the  highest.

He  is  the  Omnificent  (Vishvakarman),  called  the  "  Great  Architect  of  the  Universe,"  the

All    seeing   God,   .   .      the   father,    the   generator,   the  disposer,  who  gives  the  gods  their  names,  and  is  beyond  the  comprehension  of  mortals,

as  is  every  Mystery-God.

Esoterically,  He  is  the  personification  of  the  creative  manifested  Power ;  and  mystically  He  is  the  seventh  principle  in  man,  in  its  collectivity.

For  He  is  the  son  of  Bhuvana,  the  self-created,  luminous  Essence,  and  of  the  virtuous,  chaste  and  lovely  Yoga-Siddha,  the  virgin  Goddess,  whose  name  speaks  for  itself,  since  it  personified  Yoga-power,  the  "  chaste  mother "  that  creates  the  Adepts.

In  the  Rig-Vaidic  Hymns,  Vishvakarman  performs  the  "great  sacrifice,"  i.e.,  sacrifices  himself  for  the  world  ;  or,  as  the  Nirukta  is  made  to  say,  translated  by  Orientalists :

Vishvakarman   first   of  all  offers  up  all  the  world  in  a  sacrifice,  and  then  ends  by  sacrificing  himself

In  the  mystical  representations  of  his  character,  Vishvakarman  is  often  called  Vithoba,  and  is  pictured  as  the  "  Victim,"  the  "  Man-God,"  or  the  Avatara  crucified  in  space.

[Of  the  true  Mysteries,  the  real  Initiations,  nothing  of  course  can  be  said  in  public  ;  they  can  be  known  only  to  those  who  are  able  to  experience

1  SOrya,  the  Sun,  is  the  one  of  the  nine  divinities  that  witness  all  human  actions.

THE  TRIAL  OF  THE  SUN  INITIATE

them.

But  a  few  hints  can  be  given  of  the  great  ceremonial  Mysteries  of  Antiquity,  which  stood  to  the  public  as  the  real  Mysteries,  and  into  which  candidates  were  initiated  with  much  ceremony  and  display  of  Occult  Arts.

Behind  these,  in  silence  and  darkness,  were  the  true  Mysteries,  as  they  have  always  existed  and  continue  to  exist.

In  Egypt,  as  in  Chaldea  and  later  in  Greece,  the  Mysteries  were  celebrated  at  stated  times,  and  the  first  day  was  a  public  holiday,  on  which,  with  much  pomp,  the  candidates  were  escorted  to  the  Great  Pyramid  and  passed  thereinto  out  of  sight.

The  second  day  was  devoted  to  ceremonies  of  purification,  at  the  close  of  which  the  candidate  was  presented  with  a  white  robe  ;  on  the  third  day]1  he  was  tried  and  examined  as  to  his  proficiency  in  Occult  learning.

On  the  fourth  day,  after  another  ceremony  symbolical  of  purification,  he  was  sent  alone  to  pass  through  various  trials,  finally  becoming  entranced  in  a  subterranean  crypt,  in  utter  darkness,  for  two  days  and  two  nights.

In  Egypt,  the  entranced  neophyte  was  placed  in  an  empty  sarcophagus  in  the  Pyramid,  where  the  initiatory  rites  took  place,  in  India  and  Central  Asia,  he  was  bound  on  a  lathe,  and  when  his  body  had  become  like  that  of  one  dead  (entranced),  he  was  carried  into  the  crypt.

Then  the  Hierophant  kept  watch  over  him  "  guiding  the  apparitional  soul  (astral  body)  from  this  world  of  Samsara  (or  delusion)  to  the  nether  kingdoms,  from  which,  if  successful,  he  had  the  right  of  releasing  seven  suffering  souls  "  (Elementaries).  Clothed  with  his  Anandamayakosha,  the  body  of  bliss — the  Srotapanna  remained  there  where  we  have  no  right  to  follow  him,  and  upon  returning — received  the  Word,  with  or  without  the  "  heart's  blood  "  of  the  Hierophant.*

1  [There  is  a  gap  in  H    P    B. 's    MS.,  and  the  paragraph  in  brackets  supplies  what  was  missing  —  A.  B  ]     [See  Additional  Notes  for  this  missing  part,  as  given  in  the  1886  MS  -  Ed  ]

2  In   Isis  Unveiled,  II,    pp.    41-2,    a   portion   of  this  rite  is  referred  to      Speaking  of  the  dogma  of  Atonement,    it   is   traced   to   ancient    "heathendom"    again      We   say     "  This  cornerstone  of  a  church   which    had    believed    herself   built    on    a    firm    rock   for  long  centuries,  is  now  excavated  by  science  and   proved  to   come  from  the  Gnostics.

Professor  Draper  shows  it  as  hardly  known  in  the  days  of  Tertullian,  and  as  having  '  originated  among  the  Gnostic  heretics  '  (see  Conflict  Between  Re-  ligion and  Science,  p.  224).  ...  But  there  are  sufficient  proofs  to  show  that  it  originated  among  them  no   more  than   did   their  anointed  Christos  and  Sophia      The  former  they  modelled  on  the  original  of  the   King   Messiah,   the   male  principle  of  wisdom,   and  the   latter  on  the  third  Sephiroth,  from  the  Chaldean   Kabalah.

and   even  from  the  Hindu   Brahma1   and   Sarasvati,  and  the  Pagan  Dionysius  and  Demeter      And   here  we  are  on  firm   ground,  if  it  were  only  because  it  is  now  proved  that  the  New  Testament   never  appeared  m  its  complete  form,  such  as  we  find  it  now,  till  300  years  after  the  period  of  the  apostles,   and   the  Zohar  and  other   Kabahstic   books  are  found  to  belong  to  the  first  century  before  our  era,  if  not  to  be  far  older  still.

"  The  Gnostics  entertained  many  of  the  Essenean  ideas  ,  and  the  Essenes  had  their  greater  and  minor  Mysteries  at  least  two  centuries  before  our  era.

They  were  the  Isarim  or  Initiates,  the  descendants  of  the  Egyptian  hierophants,  in  whose  country  they  had  been  settled  for  several  centuries  before  they  were  converted  to  Buddhistic  monasticism  by  the  missionaries  of  King  Ashoka,  and  amalgamated  later  with  the  earliest  Christians  ,  and  they  existed,  probably,  before  the  old  Egyptian  temples  were  desecrated  and  ruined  in  the  incessant  invasions  of  Persians,  Greeks,  and  other  conquering  hordes  The  hierophants  had  their  atonement  enacted  in  the  Mystery  of  Initiation  ages  before  the  Gnostics,  or  even  the  Essenes,  had  appeared.

It  was  known  among  hierophants  as  the  Baptism  of

272  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Only  in  truth  the  Hierophant  was  never  killed — neither  in  India  nor  else-  where, the  murder  being  simply  feigned — unless  the  Initiator  had  chosen  the  Initiate  for  his  successor  and  had  decided  to  pass  to  him  the  last  and  supreme  WORD,  after  which  he  had  to  die — only  one  man  in  a  nation  having  the  right  to  know  that  word.

Many  are  these  grand  Initiates  who  have  thus  passed  out  of  the  world's  sight,  disappearing

as  mysteriously  from  the  sight  of  men  as  Moses  from  the  top  of  Mount  Pisgah  (Nebo,  oracular  Wisdom),  after  he  had  laid  his  hands  upon  Joshua,  who  thus  became  "  full  of  the  spirit  of  wisdom/'  /  e.,  initiated.

But  he  died,  he  was  not  killed.

For  killing,  if  really  done,  would  belong  to  black,  not  to  divine  Magic.

It  is  the  transmission  of  light,  rather  than  a  transfer  of  life,  of  life  spiritual  and  divine,  and  it  is  the  shedding  of  Wisdom,  <-not  of  blood.

But  the  uninitiated  inventors  of  theological  Christianity  took  the  allegorical  language  a  la  lettre  ,  and  instituted  a  dogma,  the  crude,  misunder-  stood expression  of  which  horrifies  and  repels  the  spiritual  "  heathen."

All  these  Hierophants  and  Initiates  were  types  of  the  Sun  and  of  the  Creative  Principle  (spiritual  Potency)  as  were  Vishvakarman  and  Vikartana,  from  the  origin  of  the  Mysteries.

Ragon,  the  famous  Mason,  gives  curious  details  and  explanations  with  regard  to  the  Sun  rites.

He  shows  that  the  biblical  Hiram,  the  great  hero  of  Masonry  (the  "  widow's  son  "),  a  type  taken  from  Osiris,  is  the  Sun-God,  the  inventor  of  arts,  and  the  "  architect,"  the  name  ^Hiram  meaning  the  elevated,  a  title  belonging  to  the  Sun.

Every  Occultist  knows  how  closely  related  to  Osiris  and  the  Pyramids  are  the  narratives  in  Kings  concerning  Solomon,  his  Temple  and  its  construction  ;  he  knows  also  that  the  whole  of  the  Masonic  rite  of  Initiation  is  based  upon  the  Biblical  allegory  of  the  construction  of  that  Temple,  Masons  conveniently  forgetting,  or  perhaps  ignoring,  the  fact  that  the  latter  narrative  is  modelled  upon  Egyptian  and  still  earlier  symbolisms.

Ragon  explains  it  by  showing  that  the  three  companions  of  Hiram,  the  "  three  murderers,"  typify  the  three  last  months  of  the  year  ;  and  that  Hiram  stands  for  the  Sun — from  its  summer

'Blood,  and  was  considered  not  as  an  atonement  for  the  '  fall  of  man  '  m  Eden,  but  simply  as  an  expiation  for  the  past,  present,  and  future  sins  of  ignorant,  but  nevertheless  polluted  mankind  The  hierophant  had  the  option  of  either  offering  his  pure  and  sinless  life  as  a  sacrifice  for  his  race  to  the  gods  whom  he  hoped  to  rejoin,  or  an  animal  victim  The  former  depended  entirely  on  their  own  will.

At  the  last  moment  of  the  solemn  '  new  birth,'  the  Initiator  passed  '  the  word  '  to  the  initiated,  and  immediately  after  the  latter  had  a  weapon  placed  in  his  right  hand,  and  was  ordered  to  strike  This  is  the  true  origin  of  the  Christian  dogma  of  atonement  "

As  Ballanche  says,  quoted  by  Ragon  "  Destruction  is  the  great  God  of  the  World,"  justifying  therefore  the  philosophical  conception  of  the  Hindu  Shiva  According  to  this  immutable  and  sacred  law,  the  Initiate  was  compelled  to  kill  the  Initiator  ,  otherwise  initiation  remained  incomplete.

.  .  .  It  is  death  that  generates  life  "  Ortnodox/e  Maconn/que,  p.  104.  All  that,  however,  was  emblematic  and  exoteric.

Weapon  and  killing  must  be  understood  m  their  allegorical  sense.

THE  TRIAL  OF  THE  SUN  INITIATE

solstice    downwards,    when    it   begins   decreasing — the   whole   rite    being   an  astronomical  allegory.

During  the  summer  solstice,  the  Sun  provokes  songs  of  gratitude  from  all  that  breathes  ,  hence  Hiram,  who  represents  it,  can  give  to  whomsoever  has  the  right  to  it,  the  sacred  Word,  that  is  to  say  life  When  the  Sun  descends  to  the  inferior  signs  all  Nature  becomes  mute,  and  Hiram  can  no  longer  give  the  sacred  Word  to  the  com-  panions, who  represent  the  three  inert  months  of  the  year  The  first  companion  strikes  Hiram  feebly  with  a  rule  twenty-four  inches  long,  symbol  of  the  twenty-four  hours  which  make  up  each  diurnal  revolution  :  it  is  the  first  distribution  of  time,  which  after  the  exaltation  of  the  mighty  star,  feebly  assails  his  existence,  giving  him  the  first  blow  The  second  companion  strikes  him  with  an  iron  square,  symbol  of  the  last  season,  figured  by  the  intersections  of  two  right  lines,  which  would  divide  into  four  equal  parts  the  Zodiacal  circle,  whose  centre  symbolises  Hiram's  heart,  where  it  touches  the  point  of  the  four  squares  representing  the  four  seasons  :  second  distribution  of  time,  which  at  that  period  strikes  a  heavier  blow  at  the  solar  existence.

The  third  companion  strikes  him  mortally  on  his  forehead  with  a  heavy  blow  of  his  mallet,  whose  cylindrical  form  symbo-  lizes the  year,  the  ring  or  circle  •  third  distribution  of  time,  the  accomplishment  of  which  deals  the  last  blow  to  the  existence  of  the  expiring  Sun.

From  this  interpretation  it  has  been  inferred  that  Hiram,  a  founder  of  metals,  the  hero  of  the  new  legend  with  the  title  of  architect,  is  Osiris  (the  Sun)  of  modern  initiation  ;  that  Isis,  his  widow,  is  the  Lodge,  the  emblem  of  the  Earth  (/oka  in  Sanskrit,  the  world),  and  that  Horus,  son  of  Osiris  (or  of  light)  and  the  widow's  son,  is  the  free  Mason,  that  is  to  say,  the  Initiate  who  inhabits  the  terrestrial  lodge  (the  child  of  the  Widow  and  of  Light  )  l

And  here  again,  our  friends  the  Jesuits  have  to  be  mentioned,  for  the  above  rite  is  of  their  making.

To  give  one  instance  of  their  success  in  throwing  dust  into  the  eyes  of  ordinary  individuals  to  prevent  their  seeing  the  truths  of  Occultism,  we  will  point  out  what  they  did  in  what  is  now  called  Freemasonry

The  Brotherhood  does  possess  a  considerable  portion  of  the  symbolism,  formulas,  and  ritual  of  Occultism,  handed  down  from  time  immemorial  from  the  primeval  Initiations.

To  render  this  Brotherhood  a  mere  harmless  nega-  tion, the  Jesuits  sent  some  of  their  most  able  emissaries  into  the  Order,  who  first  made  the  simple  brethren  believe  that  the  true  secret  was  lost  with  Hiram  Abiff  ;  and  then  induced  them  to  put  this  belief  into  their  formularies.

They  then  invented  specious  but  spurious  higher  degrees,  pretending  to  give  further  light  upon  this  lost  secret,  to  lead  the  candidate  on  and  amuse  him  with  forms  borrowed  from  the  real  thing  but  containing  no  substance,  and  all  artfully  contrived  to  lead  the  aspiring  Neophyte  to  nowhere.

And  yet  men  of  good  sense  and  abilities,  in  other  respects,  will  meet  at  intervals,  and  with  solemn  face,  zeal  and  earnestness,  go  through  the  mockery  of  revealing  "substituted  secrets  "  instead  of  the  real  thing.

If  the  reader  turns  to  a  very  remarkable  and  very  useful  work  called  The  Royal  Masonic  Cyclopaedia,  Art.

"  Rosicrucianism,"  he  will  find  its  author,

1  Orthodox/e  Magonrnque,  pp   102-4.  FF

274  THE    SECRET  DOCTRINE

a  high  and  learned  Mason,  showing  what  the  Jesuits  have  done  to  destroy  Masonry.

Speaking  of  the  period  when  the  existence  of  this  mysterious  Brotherhood  (of  which  many  pretend  to  know  "  something  "  if  not  a  good  deal,  and  know  in  fact  nothing)  was  first  made  known,  he  says  ;

There  was  a  dread  among  the  great  masses  of  society  in  bygone  days  of  the  unseen — a  dread,  as  recent  events  and  phenomena  show  very  clearly,  not  yet  over-  come in  its  entirety  Hence  students  of  Nature  and  mind  were  forced  into  an  obscurity  not  altogether  unwelcome  .  .  The  Kabalistic  reveries  of  a  Johann  Reuchlin  led  to  the  fiery  action  of  a  Luther,  and  the  patient  labours  of  Trittenheim  produced  the  modern  system  of  diplomatic  cipher  writing  .  .  It  is  very  worthy  of  remark,  that  one  particular  century,  and  that  in  which  the  Rosicrucians  first  showed  themselves,  is  distinguished  in  history  as  the  era  in  which  most  of  these  efforts  at  throwing  off  the  trammels  of  the  past  [Popery  and  Ecclesiasticism]  occurred.

Hence  the  opposition  of  the  losing  party,  and  their  virulence  against  anything  mysterious  or  unknown  They  freely  organised  pseudo-Rosicrucian  and  Masonic  societies  in  return  ;  and  these  societies  were  instructed  to  irregularly  entrap  the  weaker  brethren  of  the  True  and  Invisible  Order,  and  then  triumphantly  betray  anything  they  might  be  so  inconsiderate  as  to  communicate  to  the  superiors  of  these  transitory  and  unmeaning  associations.

Every  wile  was  adopted  by  the  authorities,  fighting  in  self-defence  against  the  progress  of  truth,  to  engage,  by  persuasion,  interest  or  terror,  such  as  might  be  cajoled  into  receiv-  ing the  Pope  as  Master — when  gained,  as  many  converts  to  that  faith  know,  but  dare  not  own,  they  are  treated  with  neglect,  and  left  to  fight  the  battle  of  life  as  best  they  may,  not  even  being  admitted  to  the  knowledge  of  such  miserable  aporrheta  as  the  Romish  faith  considers  itself  entitled  to  withhold

But  if  Masonry  has  been  spoiled,  none  is  able  to  crush  the  real,  invisible  Rosicrucian  and  the  Eastern  Initiate.

The  symbolism  of  Vishvakarman  and  Surya  Vikartana  has  survived,  where  Hiram  Abiff  was  indeed  murdered,  and  we  will  now  return  to  it.  It  is  not  simply  an  astronomical,  but  is  the  most  solemn  rite,  an  inheritance  from  the  Archaic  Mysteries  that  has  crossed  the  ages  and  is  used  to  this  day.

It  typifies  a  whole  drama  of  the  Cycle  of  Life,  of  progressive  incarnations,  and  of  psychic  as  well  as  of  physiological  secrets,  of  which  neither  the  Church  nor  Science  knows  anything,  though  it  is  this  rite  that  has  led  the  former  to  the  greatest  of  its  Christian  Mysteries.

[With    the   omission   of   some   controversial   matter  at  the  end,  this  Section  is  practically  the  same  as  sub-section  5  of  Section  V  of  the  1886  MS. Ed.]

SECTION

THE  MYSTERY   -SUN  OF  INITIATION"

THE  antiquity  of  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE  may  be  better  realised  when  it  is  shown  at  what  point  of  history  its  Mysteries  had  already  been  desecrated,  by  being  made  subservient  to  the  personal  ambition  of  despot-ruler  and  crafty  priest.

These  profoundly  philosophical  and  scientifically  composed  religious  dramas,  in  which  were  enacted  the  grandest  truths  of  the  Occult  or  Spiritual  Universe  and  the  hidden  lore  of  learning,  had  become  subject  to  persecution  long  be-  fore the  days  when  Plato  and  even  Pythagoras  flourished.

Withal,  primal  revelations  given  to  Mankind  have  not  died  with  the  Mysteries ;  they  are  still  preserved  as  heirlooms  for  future  and  more  spiritual  generations.

It  has  been  already  stated  in  /s/s  Unveiled l  that,  so  far  back  as  in  the  days  of  Aristotle,  the  great  Mysteries  had  already  lost  their  primitive  grandeur  and  solemnity.

Their  rites  had  fallen  into  desuetude,  and  they  had  to  a  great  degree  degenerated  into  mere  priestly  speculations  and  had  become  religious  shams.

It  is  useless  to  state  when  they  first  appeared  in  Europe  and  Greece,  since  recognised  history  may  almost  be  said  to  begin  with  Aristotle,  everything  before  him  appearing  to  be  in  an  inextricable  chronologic-  al confusion.

Suffice  it  to  say,  that  in  Egypt  the  Mysteries  had  been  known  since  the  days  of  Menes,  and  that  the  Greeks  received  them  only  when  Orpheus  introduced  them  from  India.

In  an  article  "Was  writing  known  be-  fore Panini?  "  8  it  is  stated  that  the  Pandus  had  acquired  universal  dominion  and  had  taught  the  "sacrificial"  Mysteries  to  other  races  as  far  back  as  3,300  B.C.  Indeed,  when  Orpheus,  the  son  of  Apollo  or  Helios,  received  from  his  father  the  phorminx — the  seven-stringed  lyre,  symbolical  of  the  sevenfold  mystery  of  Initiation — these  Mysteries  were  already  hoary  with  age  in  Centraf

1  Op.  at.,  I,  p.  15.

-  Five  Years  of  Theosophy,  p  258.  A  curious  question  to  start  and  to  deny,  when  it  is  well-known  even  to  the  Orientalists  that,  to  take  but  one  case,  there  is  Yaska,  who  was  a  predecessor  of  Pdnim,  and  his  work  still  exists ;  there  are  seventeen  writers  of  Nirukta  (glossary)  known  to  have  preceded  Yaska.

276  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Asia  and  India.

According  to  Herodotus  it  was  Orpheus  who  brought  them  from  India,  and  Orpheus  is  far  anterior  to  Homer  and  Hesiod.

Thus  even  in  the  days  of  Aristotle  few  were  the  true  Adepts  left  in  Europe  and  even  in  Egypt.

The  heirs  of  those  who  had  been  dispersed  by  the  conquering  swords  of  various  invaders  of  old  Egypt  had  been  dispersed  in  their  turn.

As  5,000  or  9,000  years  earlier  the  stream  of  knowledge  had  been  slowly  running  down  from  the  tablelands  of  Central  Asia  into  India  and  towards  Europe  and  Northern  Africa,  so  about  500  years  B  C  it  had  begun  to  flow  backward  to  its  old  home  and  birthplace.

During  the  two  thousand  subsequent  years  the  knowledge  of  the  existence  of  great  Adepts  nearly  died  out  in  Europe.

Nevertheless,  in  some  secret  places  the  Mysteries  were  still  enacted  in  all  their  primitive  purity.

The  "Sun  of  Righteousness"  still  blazed  high  on  the  midnight  sky ;  and,  while  darkness  was  upon  the  face  of  the  profane  world,  there  was  the  eternal  light  in  the  Adyta  on  the  nights  of  Initiation.

The  true  Mysteries  were  never  made  public.

Eleusinia  and  Agrae  for  the  multitudes :  the  God  EvQovXfj  "  of  the  good  counsel,"  the  great  Orphic  Deity,  for  the  neophyte.

This  mystery  God — mistaken  by  our  Symbologists  for  the  Sun — who  was  He  ?  Everyone  who  has  any  idea  of  the  ancient  Egyptian  exoteric  faith  is  •quite  aware  that  for  the  multitudes  Osiris  was  the  Sun  in  Heaven,  "  the  Heavenly  King,"  Ro-lmphab;  that  by  the  Greeks  the  Sun  was  called  the  "  Eye  of  Jupiter,"  as  for  the  modern  orthodox  Pars?  he  is  "the  Eye  of  Ormuzd  :  "  that  the  Sun,  moreover,  was  addressed  as  the  "All-seeing  God  "  (7roXvo<£0aXfio<?)  as  the  "God  Saviour,"  and  the  "saving  God"  (Ainov  r%  <T(OT7]pia^) .  Read  the  papyrus  of  Papheronmes  at  Berlin,  and  the  stela  as  rendered  by  Mariette  Bey,1  and  see  what  they  say  :

Glory  to  thee,  O  Sun,  divine  child '  .  .  .  thy  rays  carry  life  to  the  pure  and  to  those  ready.

.  .  .  The  Gods  [the  "Sons  of  God  "]  who  approach  thee  tremble  with  delight  and  awe  .  .  Thou  art  the  first  born,  the  Son  of  God,  the  Word/

The  Church  has  now  seized  upon  these  terms  and  sees  presentments  of  the  coming  Christ  in  these  expressions  in  the  initiatory  rites  and  prophetic  utterances  of  the  Pagan  Oracles.

They  are  nothing  of  the  kind,  for  they  were  applied  to  every  worthy  Initiate.

If  the  expressions  that  were  used  in  hieratic  writings  and  glyphs  thousands  of  years  before  our  era  are  now  found  in  the  laudatory  hymns  and  prayers  of  Christian  Churches,  it  is  simply  because  they  have  been  unblushingly  appropriated  by  the  Latin  Christians,  in  the  full  hope

1  La  Mere  d'Apis,  p  47.

2  One  just  initiated  is  called  the  "first-born,"   and  in  India  he  becomes  dwtja,  "twice  born,"  only  after  his  final  and  supreme  Initiation.

Every  Adept  is  a  "  Son  of  God  "  and  a  "  Son  of  Light  "  after  receiving  the   "Word,"  when  he  becomes  the   "Word"   himself,   after  receiving  the  seven  •divine  attributes  or  the  "  lyre  of  Apollo

THE  MYSTERY  "  SUN  OF  INITIATION  "

of  never  being  detected  by  posterity.

Everything  that  could  be  done  had  been  done  to  destroy  the  original  Pagan  manuscripts  and  the  Church  felt  secure.

Christianity  has  undeniably  had  her  great  Seers  and  Prophets,  like  every  other  religion  ;  but  their  claims  are  not  strengthened  by  denying  their  predecessors.

Listen  to  Plato  :

Know  then,  Glaucus,  that  when  I  speak  of  the  production  of  good,  it  is  the  Sun  I  mean.

The  Son  has  a  perfect  analogy  with  his  Father.

lamblichus  calls  the  Sun  "the  image  of  divine  intelligence  or  Wisdom."  Eusebius,  repeating  the  words  of  Philo,  calls  the  rising  Sun  (avaro\rj)  the  chief  Angel,  the  most  ancient,  adding  that  the  Arch-angel  who  is  po/yonymous  (of  many  names)  is  the  Verbum  or  Christ.

The  word  Sol  (Sun)  being  derived  from  solus,  the  One,  or  the  "  He  alone,"  and  its  Greek  name  Helios  meaning  the  "  Most  High,"  the  emblem  becomes  comprehensible.

Nevertheless,  the  Ancients  made  a  difference  between  the  Sun  and  its  prototype.

Socrates  saluted  the  rising  Sun  as  does  a  true  Parsi  or  Zoroastrian  in  our  own  day ;  and  Homer  and  Euripides,  as  Plato  did  after  them  several  times,  mention  the  Jupiter-Logos,  the  "Word"  or  the  Sun.

Nevertheless,  the  Christians  maintain  that  since  the  oracle  consulted  on  the  God  lao  answered  :  "  It  is  the  Sun,"  therefore

The  Jehovah  of  the  Jews  was  well  known  to  the  Pagans  and  Greeks, '  and  "lao  is  our  Jehovah."  The  first  part  of  the  proposition  has  nothing,  it  seems,  to  do  with  the  second  part,  and  least  of  all  can  the  conclusion  be  regarded  as  correct.

But  if  the  Christians  are  so  anxious  to  prove  the  identity.

Occultists  have  nothing  against  it.  Only,  in  such  case,  Jehovah  is  also  Bacchus.

It  is  very  strange  that  the  people  of  civilised  Christendom  should  until  now  hold  on  so  desperately  to  the  skirts  of  the  idolatrous  Jews — Sabeans  and  Sun  worshippers  as  they  were,2  like  the  rabble  of  Chaldea — and  that  they  should  fail  to  see  that  the  later  Jehovah  is  but  a  Jewish  development  of  the  Ja-va,  or  the  lao,  of  the  Phoenicians ;  that  this  name,  in  short,  was  the  secret  name  of  a  Mystery-God,  one  of  the  many  Kabiri.

"  Highest  God  as  He  was  for  one  little  nation,  he  never  was  so  regarded  by  the  Initiates  who  conducted  the  Mysteries ;  for  them  he  was  but  a  Planetary  Spirit  attached  to  the  visible  Sun ;  and  the  visible  Sun  is  only  the  central  Star,  not  the  central  spiritual  Sun.

And  the  angel  of  the  Lord  said  unto  him  [Manoah]  "Why  askest  thou  thus  after  my  name,  seeing  it  is  secret."  !

1  See  Des  Espnts,  Tome  iv,  p.  15.  2 II  Kings,  xxin,  4-14.

3  Judges,  xiii,  18  Samson,  Manoah's  son,  was  an  Initiate  of  that  "  Mystery  "  Lord,  Ja-va  ,  he  was  consecrated  before  his  birth  to  become  a  "  Nazarite  "  (a  chela)  an  Adept.

His  sin  with  Dalilah,  and  the  cropping  of  his  long  hair  that  "  no  razor  was  to  touch  "  shows  how  well  he  kept  his  sacred  vow.

278  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

However  this  may  be,  the  identity  of  the  Jehovah  of  Mount  Sinai  with  the  God  Bacchus  is  hardly  disputable,  and  he  is  surely — as  already  shown  in  Isis  Unveiled — Dionysos.1  Wherever  Bacchus  was  worshipped  there  was  a  tradition  of  Nyssa,2  and  a  cave  where  he  was  reared.

Outside  Greece,  Bacchus  was  the  all-powerful  "  Zagreus,  the  highest  of  Gods,"  in  whose  service  was  Orpheus,  the  founder  of  the  Mysteries.

Now,  unless  it  be  conceded  that  Moses  was  an  initiated  Priest,  an  Adept,  whose  actions  are  all  narrated  allegoric -  ally,  then  it  must  be  admitted  that  he  personally,  together  with  his  hosts  of  Israelites,  worshipped  Bacchus.

And   Moses  built  an  altar,  and  called  the  name  of  it  Jehovah-nissi  [or,  lao-nisi,  or  again  Dionisi]. '

To  strengthen  the  statement  we  have  further  to  remember  that  the  place  where  Osiris,  the  Egyptian  Zagreus  or  Bacchus,  was  born,  was  Mount  Sinai,  which  is  called  by  the  Egyptians  Mount  Nissa.

The  brazen  serpent  was  a  nis,  and  the  month  of  the  Jewish  Passover  is  Nisan.

The  allegory  of  Samson  proves  the  Esotencism  of  the  Bible,  as  also  the  character  of  the  "  Mystery  Gods  "  of  the  Jews.

True.

Movers  gives  a  definition  of  the  Phoenician  idea  of  the  ideal  sunlight  as  a  spiritual  influence  issuing  from  the  highest  God,  lao.

"  the  light  conceivable  only  by  intellect — the  physical  and  spiritual  Principle  of  all  things  ,  out  of  which  the  soul  emanates  "  It  was  the  male  Essence,  or  Wisdom,  while  the  primitive  matter  or  Chaos  was  the  female.

Thus  the  first  two  princi-  ples, co-eternal  and  infinite,  were  already  with  the  primitive  Phoenicians,  spirit  and  matter  But  this  is  the  echo  of  Jewish  thought,  not  the  opinion  of  Pagan  Philosophers.

1  See  his  Unve,led.

II,  p.  526.

2  Beth-San  or  Scythopolis  in  Palestine  had  that  designation  ,  so  had  a  spot  on  Mount  Parnassus  But  Diodorus  declares  that  Nyssa  was  between  Phoenicia  and  Egypt ,  Euripides  states  that  Dionysos  came  to  Greece  from  India  ,  and  Diodorus  adds  his  testimony     "  Osiris  was  brought  up  in  Nyssa,  in  Arabia  the  Happy  ,  he  was  the  son  of  Zeus,  and  was  named  from  his  father  (nominative  Zeus,  genitive  D/os)  and  the  place  Dio-Nysos  " — the  Zeus  or  Jove  of  Nyssa      This  identity  of  name  or  title  is  very  significant.

In  Greece  Dionysos  was  second  only  to  Zeus,  and  Pindar  says     "  So  Father  Zeus  governs  all  things,  and  Bacchus  he  governs  also."

3  Exodus,  xvii,  15.

[This  Section  is  practically  the  same  as  sub-section  4,  Section  V  of  the  1886  MS.  —Ed.]

SECTION

THE  OBJECTS  OF  THE  MYSTERIES

THE  earliest  Mysteries  recorded  in  history  are  those  of  Samothrace.

After  the  distribution  of  pure  Fire,  a  new  life  began.

This  was  the  new  birth  of  the  Initiate,  after  which,  like  the  BrShmans  of  old  in  India,  he  became  a  dwija  — a  "  twice  born,"

Initiated  into  that  which  may  be  rightly  called  the  most  blessed  of  all  Mysteries  .  .  being  ourselves  pure,

says  Plato.

Diodorus  Siculus,  Herodotus,  and  Sanchuniathon  the  Phoenician —  the  oldest  of  Historians — say  that  these  Mysteries  originated  in  the  night  of  time,  thousands  of  years  probably  before  the  historical  period,  lamblichus  informs  us  that  Pythagoras

was  initiated  in  all  the  Mysteries  of  Byblus  and  Tyre,  in  the  sacred  operations  of  the  Syrians,  and  in  the  Mysteries  of  the  Phoenicians '

As  was  said  in  ls»'s  Unveiled  :

When  men  like  Pythagoras,  Plato  and  lamblichus,  renowned  for  their  severe  morality,  took  part  in  the  Mysteries  and  spoke  of  them  with  veneration,  it  ill  behoves  our  modern  critics  to  judge  them  [and  their  Initiates]  upon  their  merely  external  aspect/

Yet  this  is  what  has  been  done  until  now,  especially  by  the  Christian  Fathers.

Clemens  Alexandrinus  stigmatises  the  Mysteries  as  "  indecent  and  diabolical  "  though  his  words,  showing  that  the  Eleusinian  Mysteries  were  identical  with,  and  even,  as  he  would  allege,  borrowed  from,  those  of  the  Jews,  are  quoted  elsewhere  in  this  work.

The  Mysteries  were  composed  of  two  parts,  of  which  the  Lesser  were  performed  at  Agrae,  and  the  Greater  at  Eleusis,  and  Clement  had  been  himself  initiated.

But  the  Katharsis,  or  trials

1  Phaedrus,  Gary's  translation,  p.  326'.

*  Life  of  Pythagoras,  p.  297.  "Since  Pythagoras,"  he  adds,  "  also  spent  two  and  twenty  years  in  the  adyta  of  the  temples  in  Egypt,  associated  with  the  Magians  in  Babylon,  and  was  instructed  by  them  in  their  venerable  knowledge,  it  is  not  at  all  wonderful  that  he  was  skilled  in  Magic  or  Theurgy,  and  was  therefore  able  to  perform  things  which  surpass  merely  human  power,  and  which  appear  to  fee  perfectly  incredible  to  the  vulgar  "  (p  298).

3  See  Vol   I,  287.

280  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

of  purification,  have  ever  been  misunderstood,   lamblichus  explains  the  worst ;  and    his  explanation   ought  to   be  perfectly  satisfactory,  at  any  rate  for  every  unprejudiced  mind.

He  says  .

Exhibitions  of  this  kind  in  the  Mysteries  were  designed  to  free  us  from  licentious  passions,  by  gratifying  the  sight,  and  at  the  same  time  vanquishing  all  evil  thought,  through  the  awful  sanctity  with  which  these  rites  were  accompanied.

Dr.  Warburton  remarks  :

The  wisest  and  best  men  in  the  Pagan  world  are  unanimous  in  this,  that  the  Mysteries  were  instituted  pure,  and  proposed  the  noblest  ends  by  the  worthiest  means.

Although  persons  of  both  sexes  and  all  classes  were  allowed  to  take  part  in  the  Mysteries,  and  a  participation  in  them  was  even  obligatory,  very  few  indeed  attained  the  higher  and  final  Initiation  in  these  celebrated  *ites.

The  gradation  of  the  Mysteries  is  given  us  by  Proclus  in  the  fourth  book  of  his  Theology  of  Plato.

The  perfective  rite  precedes  in  order  the  initiation  Telete,  Muesis,  and  the  ini-  tiation, Epopte/a,  or  the  final  apocalypse  [revelation]

Theon  of  Smyrna,  in  Mathematics,  also  divides  the  mystic  rites  into  five  parts  :

The  first  of  which  is  the  previous  purification ,  for  neither  are  the  Mysteries  communicated  to  all  who  are  willing  to  receive  them  ;  but  there  are  certain  persons  who  are  prevented  by  the  voice  of  the  crier  since  it  is  necessary  that  such  as  are  not  expelled  from  the  Mysteries  should  first  be  refined  by  certain  purifications  but  after  purification  the  reception  of  the  sacred  rites  succeeds  The  third  part  is  deno-  minated epopte/a  or  reception.

And  the  fourth,  which  is  the  end  and  design  of  the  revelation,  is  (the  investiture)  the  binding  of  the  head  and  fixing  of  the  crowns  l  .  .  whether  after  this  he  [the  initiated  person]  becomes  a  torchbearer,  or  an  hierophant  of  the  Mysteries,  or  sustains  some  other  part  of  the  sacerdotal  office.

But  the  fifth,  which  is  produced  from  all  these,  is  friendship  and  interior  communion  with  God.

And  this  was  the  last  and  most  awful  of  all  the  Mysteries.'

The  chief  objects  of  the  Mysteries,  represented  as  diabolical  by  the  Christian  Fathers  and  ridiculed  by  modern  writers,  were  instituted  with  the  highest  and  the  most  moral  purpose  in  view.

There  is  no  need  to  repeat  here  that  which  has  been  already  described  in  Isis  Unveiled*  that  whether  through  temple  Initiation  or  the  private  study  of  Theurgy,  every  student

1  This  expression  must  not  be  understood  simply  literally  ,  for,  as  in  the  initiation  of  certain  Brotherhoods,  it  has  a  secret  meaning  that  we  have  just  explained  ,  it  was  hinted  at  by  Pythagoras,  when  he  describes  his  feelings  after  the  Initiation,  and  says  that  he  was  crowned  by  the  Gods  in  whose  presence  he  had  drunk  "  the  waters  of  life  " — in  the  Hindu  Mysteries  there  was  the  fount  of  life,  and  soma,  the  sacred  drink.

*  Eleusmian  and  Bacchic  Mysteries,  T.  Taylor,  pp.  46-7.  'Vol.

II.  111,

THE  OBJECTS  OF  THE  MYSTERIES

obtained   the  proof  of  the   immortality  of  his    Spirit,    and  the  survival  of  his  Soul.

What  the  last  epopteia  was  is  alluded  to  by  Plato  in  Phaedrus :

Being  initiated  in  those  Mysteries,  which  it  is  lawful  to  call  the  most  blessed  of  all  mysteries  ...  we  were  freed  from  the  molestations  of  evils,  which  otherwise  await  us  in  a  future  period  of  time.

Likewise  in  consequence  of  this  divine  initiation,  we  became  spectators  of  entire,  simple,  immoveable,  and  blessed  visions,  resident  in  a  pure  light  '

This  veiled  confession  shows  that  the  Initiates  enjoyed  Theophany — saw  visions  of  Gods  and  of  real  immortal  Spirits.

As  Taylor  correctly  infers  :

The  most  sublime  part  of  the  epopteia  or  final  revealing,  consisted  in  beholding  the  Gods  [the  high  Planetary  Spirits]  themselves,  invested  with  the  resplendent  light '

The  statement  of  Proclus  upon  the  subject  is  unequivocal  :

In  all  the  Initiations  and  Mysteries,  the  Gods  exhibit  many  forms  of  themselves,  and  appear  in  a  variety  of  shapes  ,  and  sometimes  indeed  a  formless  light  of  themselves  is  held  forth  to  the  view  ,  sometimes  this  light  is  according  to  a  human  form  and  some-  times it  proceeds  into  a  different  shape  '

Again  we  have

Whatever  is  on  earth  is  the  resemblance  and  shadow  of  something  that  is  in  the  sphere,  while  that  resplendent  thing  [the  prototype  of  the  Soul-Spirit]  remaineth  in  unchangeable  condition,  it  is  well  also  with  its  shadow  When  that  resplendent  one  removeth  far  from  its  shadow  life  removeth  [from  the  latter]  to  a  distance  Again  that  light  is  the  shadow  of  something  more  resplendent  than  itself.

Thus  speaks  the  Desat/r,  in  the  Book  of  Shet  (the  prophet  Zirtusht),  thereby  showing  the  identity  of  its  Esoteric  doctrines  with  those  of  the  Greek  Philosophers.

The  second  statement  of  Plato  confirms  the  view  that  the  Mysteries  of  the  Ancients  were  identical  with  the  Initiations  practised  even  now  among  the  Buddhist  and  the  Hindu  Adepts.

The  higher  visions,  the  most  truthful,  were  produced  through  a  regular  discipline  of  gradual  Initiations,  and  the  develop-  ment of  psychical  powers.

In  Europe  and  Egypt  the  Mystae  were  brought  into  close  union  with  those  whom  Proclus  calls  "  mystical  natures,"  "resplen-  dent Gods,"  because,  as  Plato  says:

[We]  were  ourselves  pure  and  immaculate,  being  liberated  from  this  surrounding  vestment,  which  we  denominate  body,  and  to  which  we  are  now  bound  like  an  oyster  to  its  shell/'

As  to  the  East,

The  doctrine  of  planetary  and  terrestrial  Pitns  was  revealed  entirely  in  ancient  India,  as  well  as  now,  only  at  the  last  moment  of  initiation,  and  to  the  adepts  of  superior  degrees ''

1  E/eusmian  and  Bacchic  Mysteries,  p   63  'Op    at,  p.

1  Quoted  by  Taylor,  p    66  . 4  Verses  35-

"'  Phaedrus,  64,  quoted  by  Taylor,  p   64  (1  /sis  Unveiled,  II,  p

282  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

The  word  Pitris  may  now  be  explained  and  something  else  added.

In  India  the  chela  of  the  third  degree  of  Initiation  has  two  Gurus  :  One,  the  living  Adept ,  the  other  the  disembodied  and  glorified  Mahatma,  Who  remains  the  adviser  or  instructor  of  even  the  high  Adepts.

Few  are  the  accepted  chelas  who  even  see  their  living  Master,  their  Guru,  till  the  day  and  hour  of  their  final  and  for  ever  binding  vow.

It  is  this  that  was  meant  in  Isis  Un-  veiled, when  it  was  stated  that  few  of  the  fakirs  (the  word  chela  being  unknown  to  Europe  and  America  in  those  days)  however

pure,  and  honest,  and  self-devoted,  have  yet  ever  seen  the  astral  form  of  a  purely  human  pitar  (an  ancestor  or  father),  otherwise  than  at  the  solemn  moment  of  their  first  and  last  initiation.

It  is  in  the  presence  of  his  instructor,  the  Guru,  and  just  before  the  vatou-fakir  [the  just  initiated  chela]  is  despatched  into  the  world  of  the  living,  with  his  seven-knotted  bamboo  wand  for  all  protection,  that  he  is  suddenly  placed  face  to  face  with  the  unknown  PRESENCE  [of  his  Pitar  or  Father,  the  glorified  invisible  Master,  or  disembodied  Mahatma].  He  sees  it,  and  falls  prostrate  at  the  feet  of  the  evanescent  form,  but  is  not  entrusted  with  the  great  secret  of  its  evocation,  for  it  is  the  supreme  mystery  of  the  holy  syllable.

The  Initiate,  says  Eliphas  Levi,  knows;  therefore,  "he  dares  all  and  keeps  silent."  Says  the  great  French  Kabalist :

You  may  see  him  often  sad,  never  discouraged  or  desperate  ;  often  poor,  never  humbled  or  wretched  ;  often  persecuted,  never  cowed  down  or  vanquished.

For  he  remembers  the  widowhood  and  the  murder  of  Orpheus,  the  exile  and  solitary  death  of  Moses,  the  martyrdom  of  the  prophets,  the  tortures  of  Apollonius,  the  Cross  of  the  Saviour.

He  knows  in  what  forlorn  state  died  Agrippa,  whose  memory  is  slan-  dered to  this  day ;  he  knows  the  trials  that  broke  down  the  great  Paracelsus,  and  all  that  Raymond  Lully  had  to  suffer  before  he  arrived  at  a  bloody  death.

He  remembers  Swedenborg  having  to  feign  insanity,  and  losing  even  his  reason  before  his  knowledge  was  forgiven  to  him ;  St.  Martin,  who  had  to  hide  himself  all  his  life ;  Cagliostro,  who  died  forsaken  in  the  cells  of  the  Inquisition  ; '  Cazotte,  who  perished  on  the  guillotine.

Successor  of  so  many  victims,  he  dares,  nevertheless,  but  under-  stands the  more  the  necessity  to  keep  silent/

Masonry — not  the  political  institution  known  as  the  Scottish  Lodge,  but  real  Masonry,  some  rites  of  which  are  still  preserved  in  the  Grand  Orient  of  France,  and  that  Elias  Ashmole,  a  celebrated  English  Occult  Philosopher  of  the  seventeenth  century,  tried  in  vain  to  remodel,  after  the  manner  of  the  Indian  and  Egyptian  Mysteries — Masonry  rests,  according  to  Ragon,  the  great  authority  upon  the  subject,  upon  three  fundamental  degrees :  the  triple  duty  of  a  Mason  is  to  study  whence  he  comes,  what  he  is,  and  whither  he  goes ;  the  study  that  is,  of  God,  of  himself,  and  of  the  future  transformation.3  Masonic  Initiation  was  modelled  on  that  in  the  lesser  Mysteries.

The  third  degree  was  one  used  in  both  Egypt  and  India  from  time  immemorial,  and  the

1  This  is  false,  and  the  Abbe*  Constant  (£liphas  Levi)  knew  it  was  so.     Why  did  he  promulgate  the  untruth  ?

2  Dogme  de  la  Haute  Magie,  i,  pp.  219-20.  3  Orthodox/e  Mafonn/que,  p.  99.

THE  OBJECTS  OF  THE  MYSTERIES

remembrance  of  it  lingers  to  this  day  in  every  Lodge,  under  the  name  of  the  death  and  resurrection  of  Hiram  Abiff,  the  "  Widow's  Son."  In  Egypt  the  latter  was  called  "Osiris";  in  India  "  Loka-chakshu  "  (Eye  of  the  World),  and  "  Dinakara  "  (day-maker)  or  the  Sun — and  the  rite  itself  was  everywhere  named  the  "gate  of  death."  The  coffin,  or  sarcophagus,  of  Osiris,  killed  by  Typhon,  was  brought  in  and  placed  in  the  middle  of  the  Hall  of  the  Dead,  with  the  Initiates  all  around  it  and  the  candidate  near  by.  The  latter  was  asked  whether  he  had  participated  in  the  murder,  and  notwithstanding  his  denial,  and  after  sundry  and  very  hard  trials,  the  Initiator  feigned  to  strike  him  on  the  head  with  a  hatchet ;  he  was  thrown  down,  swathed  in  bandages  like  a  mummy,  and  wept  over.

Then  came  lightning  and  thunder,  the  supposed  corpse  was  surrounded  with  fire,  and  was  finally  raised.

Ragon  speaks  of  a  rumour  that  charged  the  Emperor  Commodus — when  he  was  at  one  time  enacting  the  part  of  the  Initiator — with  having  played  this  part  in  the  initiatory  drama  so  seriously  that  he  actually  killed  the  postulant  when  dealing  him  the  blow  with  the  hatchet.

This  shows  that  the  lesser  Mysteries  had  not  quite  died  out  in  the  second  century  A  D

The  Mysteries  were  carried  into  South  and  Central  America,  Northern  Mexico  and  Peru  by  the  Atlanteans  in  those  days  when

a  pedestrian  from  the  North  [of  what  was  once  upon  a  time  also  India]  might  have  reached — hardly  wetting  his  feet — the  Alaskan  Peninsula,  through  Manchuria,  across  the  future  Gulf  of  Tartary,  the  Kunle  and  Aleutian  Islands ,  while  another  traveller,  furnished  with  a  canoe  and  starting  from  the  South,  could  have  walked  over  from  Siam,  crossed  the  Polynesian  Islands  and  trudged  into  a  part  of  the  continent  of  South  America.

They  continued  to  exist  down  to  the  day  of  the  Spanish  invaders.

These  destroyed  the  Mexican  and  Peruvian  records,  but  were  prevented  from  laying  their  desecrating  hands  upon  the  many  Pyramids — the  lodges  of  an  ancient  Initiation — whose  ruins  are  scattered  over  Puente  Nacional,  Cholula,  and  Teotihuacan.

The  ruins  of  Palenque,  of  Ococimgo  in  Chiapas,  and  others  in  Central  America  are  known  to  all.

If  the  pyramids  and  temples  of  Guiengola  and  Mitla  ever  betray  their  secrets,  the  present  DOCTRINE  will  then  be  shown  to  have  been  a  forerunner  of  the  grandest  truths  in  Nature.

Meanwhile  they  have  all  a  claim  to  be  called  Mitla,  "the  place  of  sadness"  and  "the  abode  of  the  (desecrated)  dead/

1  Five  Years  of  Jheosophy,  p.  214.

SECTION

TRACES  OF  THE   MYSTERIES

SAYS  The  Royal  Masonic  Cyclopaedia,  art.

"  Sun  :  "

In  all  times,  the  Sun  has  necessarily  played  an  important  part  as  a  symbol,  and  especially  in  Freemasonry.

The  W.M  represents  the  rising  sun,  the  J  W  the  sun  at  the  meridian,  and  the  S.W  the  setting  sun.

In  the  Druidical  rites,  the  Arch-Druid  represented  the  sun,  and  was  aided  by  two  other  officers,  one  representing  the  Moon  in  the  West,  and  the  other  the  Sun  at  the  South  in  its  meridian  It  is  quite  unnecessary  to  enter  into  any  lengthened  discussion  on  this  symbol

It  is  the  more  "  unnecessary  "  since  J.  M.  Ragon  has  discussed  it  very  fully,  as  one  may  find  at  the  end  of  Section  29,  where  part  of  his  explanations  have  been  quoted.

Freemasonry  derived  her  rites  from  the  East,  as  we  have  said.

And  if  it  be  true  to  say  of  the  modern  Rosicrucians  that  "  they  are  invested  with  a  knowledge  of  chaos,  not  perhaps  a  very  desirable  acquisition,"  the  remark  is  still  more  true  when  applied  to  all  the  other  branches  of  Masonry,  since  the  knowledge  of  their  members  about  the  full  signification  of  their  symbols  is  nil  Dozens  of  hypotheses  are  resorted  to,  one  more  unlikely  than  the  other,  as  to  the  "  Round  Towers  "  of  Ireland  ;  one  fact  is  enough  to  show  the  ignorance  of  the  Masons,  namely,  that,  according  to  The  Royal  Masonic  Cyclopaedia,  the  idea  that  they  are  connected  with  Masonic  Initiation  may  be  at  once  dismissed  as  unworthy  of  notice.

The  "  Towers,"  which  are  found  throughout  the  East  in  Asia,  were  connected  with  the  Mystery- Initiations,  namely,  with  the  Vishvakarman  and  the  Vikartana  rites.

The  candidates  for  Initiation  were  placed  in  them  for  three  days  and  three  nights,  wherever  there  was  no  temple  with  a  subterranean  crypt  close  at  hand.

These  round  towers  were  built  for  no  other  purposes.

Discredited  as  are  all  such  monuments  of  Pagan  origin  by  the  Christian  clergy,  who  thus  "  soil  their  own  nest,"  they  are  still  the  living  and  indestructible  relics  of  the  Wisdom  of  old.

Nothing  exists  in  this  objective  and  illusive  world  of  ours  that  cannot  be  made  to  serve  two  purposes — a  good  and  a  bad  one.

Thus  in  later  ages,  the  Initiates  of  the  Left  Path  and  the  anthropomorphists  took  in  hand  most  of  those  venerable

TRACES  OF  THE  MYSTERIES

ruins,  then  silent  and  deserted  %  their  first  wise  inmates,  and  turned  them  indeed  into  phallic  monuments.

But  this  was  a  deliberate,  wilful,  and  vicious  misinterpretation  of  their  real  meaning,  a  deflection  from  their  first  use.

The  Sun — though  ever,  even  for  the  multitudes,  IJLOVOS  ovpavov  #eo?,  "  the  only  and  one  King  and  God  in  Heaven,"  and  the  Evftov\?j,  "  the  God  of  Good  Counsel  "  of  Orpheus — had  in  every  exoteric  popular  religion  a  dual  aspect  which  was  anthropomorphized  by  the  profane.

Thus  the  Sun  was  Osiris- Typhon,  Ormuzd-  Ahriman,  Bel-Jupiter  and  Baal,  the  life-giving  and  the  death  -giving  luminary.

And  thus  one  and  the  same  monolith,  pillar,  pyramid,  tower  or  temple,  origi-  nally built  to  glorify  the  first  principle  or  aspect,  might  become  in  time  an  idol-fane,  or  worse,  a  phallic  emblem  in  its  crude  and  brutal  form.

The  Lingam  of  the  Hindus  has  a  spiritual  and  highly  philosophical  meaning,  while  the  missionaries  see  in  it  but  an  "  indecent  emblem"  ;  it  has  just  the  meaning  which  is  to  be  found  in  all  those  baalim,  chammanim,  and  the  bamoth  with  the  pillars  of  unhewn  stone  of  the  Bible,  set  up  for  the  glorification  of  the  male  Jehovah.

But  this  does  not  alter  the  fact  that  the  pureia  of  the  Greeks,  the  nur-hags  of  Sardinia,  the  teocalli  of  Mexico,  etc.,  were  all  in  the  begin-  ning of  the  same  character  as  the  "  Round  Towers  "  of  Ireland.

They  were  sacred  places  of  Initiation.

In  1877,  the  writer,  quoting  the  authority  and  opinions  of  some  more  eminent  scholars,  ventured  to  assert  that  there  was  a  great  difference  between  the  terms  Cfirestos  and  Christos,  a  difference  having  a  profound  and  Esoteric  meaning.

Also  that  while  Christos  means  "  to  live  "  and  "to  be  born  into  a  new  life,"  Cfirestos,  in  "  Initiation  "  phraseology,  signified  the  death  of  the  inner,  lower,  or  personal  nature  in  man  ;  thus  is  given  the  key  to  the  Brah-  manical  title,  the  twice-born  ;  and  finally,

There  were  Cfirest/ans  long  before  the  era  of  Christianity,  and  the  Essenes  be-  longed to  them  l

For     this      epithets      sufficiently     opprobrious    to  characterize     the     writer

could   hardly   be   found.

And   yet   then   as   well  as   now,  the  author  never

attempted  a   statement  of  such   a   serious  nature  without  showing  as  many

learned  authorities  for  it  as  could  be  mustered.

Thus  on  the  next  page  it  was  said  :

Lepsius  shows  that  the  word  Nofre  means  Chrestos,  "  good,"  and  that  one  of  the  titles  of  Osiris,  "  Onnofre,"  must  be  translated  "the  goodness  of  God  made  mani-  fest." "  The  worship  of  Christ  was  not  universal  at  this  early  date,"  explains  Mackenzie,  "  by  which  I  mean  that  Christolatry  had  not  been  introduced  but  the  worship  of  Chrestos — the  Good  Principle — had  preceded  it  by  many  centuries,  and

1  In  I,  Peter,  n,  3,  Jesus  is  called  "  the  Lord  Chrestos"  [in  the  Greek,  though  not  in  the  Authorised,  Revised  or  Douay  versions].

286  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

even  survived  the  general  adoption  of  ChrisLanity,  as  shown  on  monuments  still  irt  existence  .  .  .  Again,  we  have  an  inscription  which  is  pre-Christian  on  an  epitaphial  tablet  (Spon.

Misc.

Ert/cf.,  Ant.,  x,  xviii,  2).  Ta%«/0e  AapMrcuwv  Ai;<r/Ao<rt€  II^ws  XpTjo-re  Xcupe,  and  de  Rossi  (Roma  Sotteranea,  Tome  i,  tav.

xxi,)  gives  us  another  example  from  the  catacombs — "  £llia  Chreste,  in  Pace.

[>Ellia,  with  Chrestos,  in  peace."]

To-day  the  writer  is  able  to  add  to  all  those  testimonies  the  corrobor-  ation  of  an  erudite  author,  .who  proves  whatever  he  undertakes  to  show  on  the  authority  of  geometrical  demonstration.

There  is  a  most  curious  passage  with  remarks  and  explanations  in  The  Source  of  Measures,  whose  author  has  probably  never  heard  of  the  "  Mystery-God  "  Vishvakarman  of  the  early  Aryans.

Treating  on  the  difference  between  the  terms  Chrest  and  Christ,  he  ends  by  saying  that :

There  were  two  Messiahs  :  one  who  went  down  into  the  pit  for  the  salvation  of  this  world  ;  this  was  the  Sun  shorn  of  his  golden  rays,  and  crowned  with  blackened  ones  (symbolising  this  loss),  as  the  thorns  the  other  was  the  triumphant  Messiah  mounting  up  to  the  summit  of  the  arch  of  heaven,  and  personified  as  the  Lion  of  trie  TV/be  of  Judah.

In  both  instances  he  had  the  cross  ;  once  in  humiliation  and  once  holding  it  in  his  control  as  the  law  of  creation,  He  being  Jehovah.

And  then  the  author  proceeds  to  give  "  the  fact "  that  "  there  were  two  Messiahs,"  etc.,  as  quoted  above.

And  this — leaving  the  divine  and  mystic  character  and  claim  for  Jesus  entirely  independent  of  this  event  of  His  mortal  life — shows  Him,  beyond  any  doubt,  as  an  Initiate  of  the  Egyptian  Mysteries,  where  the  same  rite  of  Death  and  of  spiritual  Resurrection  for  the  neophyte,  or  the  suffering  Chrestos  on  his  trial  and  new  birth  by  Regenera-  tion, was  enacted — for  this  was  a  universally  adopted  rite.

The  "pit"  into  which  the  Eastern  Initiate  was  made  to  descend  was,  as  shown  before,  Patala,  one  of  the  seven  regions  of  the  nether  world,  over  which  ruled  Vasuki,  the  great  "  snake  God."  This  pit,  Patala,  has  in  the  Eastern  Symbolism  precisely  the  same  manifold  meaning  as  is  found  by  Mr.  Ralston  Skinner  in  the  Hebrew  word  sfi/ac  in  its  application  to  the  case  in  hand.

For  it  was  the  synonym  of  Scorpio — Patala's  depths  being  "  im-  pregnated with  the  brightness  of  the  new  Sun  " — represented  by  the  "newly  born  "  into  the  glory  ;  and  Patala  was  and  is  in  a  sense,  "  a  pit,  a  grave,  the  place  of  death,  and  the  door  of  Hades  or  Sheol  " — as,  in  the  partially  exoteric  Initiations  in  India,  the  candidate  had  to  pass  through  the  matrix  of  the  heifer  before  proceeding  to  Patala.

In  its  non -mystic  sense  it  is  the  Antipodes —  America  being  referred  to  in  India  as  Patala.

But  in  its  symbolism  it  meant  all  that,  and  much  more.

The  fact  alone  that  Vasuki,  the  ruling  Deity  of  Patala,  is  represented  in  the  Hindu  Pantheon  as  the  great  Naga  (Serpent) —

i  tsis  Unveiled,  II,  p  323-4.

TRACES  OF  THE  MYSTERIES

who  was  used  by  the  Gods  and  Asuras  as  a  rope  round  the  mountain  Mandara,  at  the  churning  of  the  ocean  for  Amrita,  the  water  of  immortality —  connects  him  directly  with  Initiation.

For  he  is  Shesha  Naga  also,  serving  as  a  couch  for  Vishnu,  and  up-  holding the  seven  worlds;  and  he  is  also  Ananta,  "  the  endless,"  and  the  symbol  of  eternity — hence  the  "  God  of  Secret  Wisdom,"  degraded  by  the  Church  to  the  role  of  the  tempting  Serpent,  of  Satan.

That  what  is  now  said  is  correct  may  be  verified  by  the  evidence  of  even  the  exoteric  rendering  of  the  attributes  of  various  Gods  and  Sages  both  in  the  Hindu  and  the  Buddhist  Pantheons.

Two  instances  will  suffice  to  show  how  little  our  best  and  most  erudite  Orientalists  are  capable  of  dealing  correctly  and  fairly  with  the  symbol-  ism of  Eastern  nations,  while  remaining  ignorant  of  the  corresponding  points  to  be  found  only  in  Occultism  and  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE.

(1)  The     learned     Orientalist     and    Tibetan    traveller,     Professor    Emit  Schlagintweit,   mentions  in   one   of  his  works  on  Tibet,    a  national  legend  to  the  effect  that

Nagarjuna  [a  "  mythological  "  personage  "  without  any  real  existence,"  the  learned  German  scholar  thinks]  received  the  book  Paramartha,  or  according  to  others,  the  book  Avatamsaka,  from  the  Nagas,  fabulous  creatures  of  the  nature  of  serpents,  who  occupy  a  place  among  the  beings  superior  to  man,  and  are  regarded  as  protectors  of  the  law  of  Buddha  To  these  spiritual  beings  Shakyamuni  is  said  to  have  taught  a  more  philosophical  religious  system  than  to  men,  who  were  not  sufficiently  advanced  to  understand  it  at  the  time  of  his  appearance  '

Nor  are  men  sufficiently  advanced  for  it  now  ;  for  "  the  more  philo-  sophical religious  system  "  is  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE,  the  Occult  Eastern  Philos-  ophy, which  is  the  corner-stone  of  all  sciences  rejected  by  the  unwise  builders  even  at  this  day,  and  more  to-day  perhaps  than  ever  before,  in  the  great  conceit  of  our  age.

The  allegory  means  simply  that  Nagarjuna  having  been  initiated  by  the  "Serpents" — the  Adepts,  "the  wise  ones" — and  driven  out  from  India  by  the  Brahmans,  who  dreaded  to  have  their  Mysteries  and  sacerdotal  Science  divulged  (the  real  cause  of  their  hatred  of  Buddhism),  went  away  to  China  and  Tibet,  where  he  initiated  many  into  the  truths  of  the  hidden  Mysteries  taught  by  Gautama  Buddha.

(2)  The  hidden   symbolism  of  Narada — the   great  Rishi  and  the  author  of   some   of   the    Rig-Vaidic   hymns,    who   incarnated    again    later   on  during  Krishna's   time — has   never   been    understood.

Yet,    in   connection  with  the  Occult  Sciences,   Narada,   the  son   of  Brahma,  is  one  of  the  most  prominent  characters  ;   he  is  directly  connected  in  his  first  incarnation  with  the  "  Builders"  — hence  with  the  seven   "  Rectors  "   of  the  Christian  Church,  who  "  helped

1  Buddhism  m  Tibet,  p

288  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

God  in  the  work  of  creation."  This  grand  personification  is  hardly  noticed  by  our  Orientalists,  who  refer  only  to  that  which  he  is  alleged  to  have  said  of  Patala,  namely,  "  that  it  is  a  place  of  sexual  and  sensual  gratifications."  This  is  thought  to  be  amusing,  and  the  reflection  is  suggested  that  Narada,  no  doubt,  "  found  the  place  delightful."  Yet  this  sentence  simply  shows  him  to  have  been  an  Initiate,  connected  directly  with  the  Mysteries,  and  walking,  as  all  the  other  neophytes,  before  and  after  him,  had  to  walk,  in  "  the  pit  among  the  thorns  "  in  the  "  sacrificial  Cnrest  condition,"  as  the  suffering  victim  made  to  descend  thereinto — a  mystery,  truly  !

Narada  is  one  of  the  seven  Rishis,  the  "  mind-born  sons  "  of  Brahma.

The  fact  of  his  having  been  during  his  incarnation  a  high  Initiate — he,  like  Orpheus,  being  the  founder  of  the  Mysteries — is  corroborated,  and  made  evident  by  his  history.

The  Mahabharata  states  that  Narada,  having  frustrated  the  scheme  formed  for  peopling  the  universe,  in  order  to  remain  true  to  his  vow  of  chastity,  was  cursed  by  Daksha,  and  sentenced  to  be  born  once  more.

Again,  when  born  during  Krishna's  time,  he  is  accused  of  calling  his  father  Brahma  "  a  false  teacher,"  because  the  latter  advised  him  to  get  married,  and  he  refused  to  do  so.  This  shows  him  to  have  been  an  Initiate,  going  against  the  orthodox  worship  and  religion.

It  is  curious  to  find  this  Rishi  and  leader  among  the  "  Builders  "  and  the  "  Heavenly  Host  "  as  the  prototype  of  the  Christian  "  leader  "  of  the  same  "  Host  " — the  Archangel  Michael.

Both  are  the  male  "  Virgins,"  and  both  are  the  only  ones  among  their  respective  "  Hosts  "  who  refuse  to  create.

Narada  is  said  to  have  dissuaded  the  Hari-ashvas,  the  five  thousand  sons  of  Daksha,  begotten  by  him  for  the  purpose  of  peopling  the  Earth,  from  producing  offspring.

Since  then  the  Hari-ashvas  have  "  dispersed  themselves  through  the  regions,  and  have  never  returned."  The  Initiates  are,  perhaps,  the  incarnations  of  these  Hari-ashvas  ?

It  was  on  the  seventh  day,  the  third  of  his  ultimate  trial,  that  the  neophyte  arose,  a  regenerated  man,  who,  having  passed  through  his  second  spiritual  birth,  returned  to  earth  a  glorified  and  triumphant  conqueror  of  Death,  a  Hierophant.

An  Eastern  neophyte  in  his  Chrest  condition  may  be  seen  in  a  certain  engraving  in  Moor's  Hindu  Pantheon,  whose  author  mistook  another  form  of  the  crucified  Sun  or  Vishnu,  Vithoba,  for  Krishna,  and  calls  it  "  Krishna  cruci-  fied in  Space."  The  engraving  is  also  given  in  Dr.  Lundy's  Monumental  Christianity,  in  which  work  the  reverend  author  has  collected  as  many  proofs  as  his  ponderous  volume  could  hold  of  "  Christian  symbols  before  Christianity,"  as  he  expresses  it.  Thus  he  shows  us  Krishna  and  Apollo  as  good  shepherds,  .Krishna  holding  the  cruciform  Conch  and  the  Chakra,  and  Krishna  "  crucified

TRACES  OF  THE  MYSTERIES

in   Space,"   as   he  calls  it.      Of  this  figure  it  may  be  truly  said,  as  the  author  says  of  it  himself :

This  representation  I  believe  to  be  anterior  to  Christianity.

...  It  looks  like  a  Christian  crucifix  in  many  respects.

,  .  The  drawing,  the  attitude,  the  nail-marks  in  hands  and  feet,  indicate  a  Christian  origin,  while  the  Parthian  coronet  of  seven  points,  the  absence  of  the  wood  and  of  the  usual  inscription,  and  the  rays  of  glory  above,  would  seem  to  point  to  some  other  than  a  Christian  origin  Can  it  be  the  victim-man,  or  the  priest  and  victim  both  in  one,  of  the  Hindu  Mythology,  who  offered  himself  a  sacrifice  before  the  worlds  were  ?

It  is  surely  so.

Can  it  be  Plato's  Second  God  who  impressed  himself  on  the  universe  in  the  -form  of  the  cross  ?  Or  is  it  his  divine  man,  who  would  be  scourged,  tormented,  fetter-  ed, have  his  eyes  burnt  out ,  and  lastly  would  be  crucified  ?

It  is  all  that  and  much  more  ,  archaic  religious  Philosophy  was  universal,  and  its  Mysteries  are  as  old  as  man.

It  is  the  eternal  symbol  of  the  personified  Sun — astronomically  purified — in  its  mystic  meaning  regenerated,  and  symbolised  by  all  the  Initiates  in  memory  of  a  sinless  Humanity  when  all  were  "  Sons  of  God."  Now,  mankind  has  become  the  "  Son  of  Evil  "  truly.

Does  all  this  take  anything  away  from  the  dignity  of  Christ  as  an  ideal,  or  of  Jesus  as  a  divine  man  ?  Not  at  all.

On  the  contrary,  made  to  stand  alone,  glorified  above  all  other  "  Sons  of  God,"  He  can  only  foment  evil  feelings  in  all  those  many  millioned  nations  who  do  not  believe  in  the  Christian  system,  provoking  their  hatred  and  leading  to  iniquit-  ous wars  and  strifes.

If,  on  the  other  hand,  we  place  Him  among  a  long  series  of  "  Sons  of  God  "  and  Sons  of  divine  Light,  every  man  may  then  be  left  to  choose  for  himself,  among  those  many  ideas,  which  he  will  choose  as  a  God  to  call  to  his  help,  and  worship  on  earth  as  in  Heaven.

Many  among  those  called  "  Saviours  "  were  "  good  shepherds,"  as  was  Krishna  for  one,  and  all  of  them  are  said  to  have  "  crushed  the  serpent's  head  " — in  other  words  to  have  conquered  their  sensual  nature  and  to  have  mastered  divine  and  Occult  Wisdom.

Apollo  killed  Python,  a  fact  which  exonerates  him  from  the  charge  of  being  himself  the  great  Dragon,  Satan  :  Krishna  slew  the  snake  Kalinaga,  the  Black  Serpent ;  and  the  Scandinavian  Thor  bruised  the  head  of  the  symbolical  reptile  with  his  crucifixion  mace.

In  Egypt  every  city  of  importance  was  separated  from  its  burial-place  by  a  sacred  lake.

The  same  ceremony  of  judgment,  as  is  described  in  7he  Book  of  the  Dead — "that  precious  and  mysterious  book  "  (Bunsen) — as  taking  place  in  the  world  of  spirit,  took  place  on  earth  during  the  burial  of  the  mummy.

Forty-two  judges  or  assessors  assembled  on  the  shore  and  judged  the  departed  "  Soul  "  according  to  its  actions  when  in  the  body.

After  that  FF

290  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

the  priests  returned  within  the  sacred  precincts  and  instructed  the  neophytes  upon  the  probable  fate  of  the  Soul,  and  the  solemn  drama  that  was  then  taking  place  in  the  invisible  realm  whither  the  Soul  had  fled.

The  immortality  of  the  Spirit  was  strongly  inculcated  on  the  neophytes  by  the  Al-om-jah —  the  name  of  the  highest  Egyptian  Hierophant.

In  the  Crata  Nepoa — the  priestly  Mysteries  in  Egypt — the  following  are  described  as  four  out  of  the  seven  degrees  of  Initiation.

After  a  preliminary  trial  at  Thebes,  where  the  neophyte  had  to  pass  through  many  probations,  called  the  "  Twelve  Tortures,"  he, was  commanded,  in  order  that  he  might  come  out  triumphant,  to  govern  his  passions  and  never  lose  for  a  moment  the  idea  of  his  inner  God  or  seventh  Principle,  Then,  as  a  symbol  of  the  wanderings  of  the  unpurified  Soul,  he  had  to  ascend  several  ladders  and  wander  in  darkness  in  a  cave  with  many  doors,  all  of  which  were  locked.

Having  overcome  all,  he  received  the  degree  of  Pastophons,  after  which  he  became,  in  the  second  and  third  degrees,  the  Neocoris  and  Melancphoris.

Brought  into  a  vast  subterranean  chamber  ^  thickly  furnished  with  mummies  lying  in  state,  he  was  placed  in  presence  of  the  coffin  which  contained  the  mutilated  body  of  Osiris.

This  was  the  hall  called  the  "  Gates  of  Death,"  whence  the  verse  in  Job

Have  the  gates  of  Death  been  opened  to  thee,  Hast  thou  seen  the  doors  of  the  shadow  of  death  ?

Thus  asks  the  "  Lord,"  the  Hierophant,  the  Al-om-jah,  the  Initiator  of  Job  alluding  to  this  third  degree  of  Initiation.

For  the  Book  of  Job  is  the  poem  of  Initiation  par  excellence.

When  the  neophyte  had  conquered  the  terrors  of  this  trial,  he  was  conducted  to  the  "  Hall  of  Spirits,"  to  be  judged  by  them.

Among  the  rules  in  which  he  was  instructed,  he  was  commanded  :

Never  to  either  desire  or  seek  revenge  ,  to  be  always  ready  to  help  a  brother  in  danger,  even  unto  the  risk  of  his  own  life  ;  to  bury  every  dead  body ,  to  honour  his  parents  above  all ,  to  respect  old  age,  and  protect  those  weaker  than  himself ,  and,  finally,  to  ever  bear  in  mind  the  hour  of  death,  and  that  of  resurrection  in  a  new  and  imperishable  body.

Purity  and  chastity  were  highly  recommended,  and  adultery  was  threaten-  ed with  death.

Thus  the  Egyptian  neophyte  was  made  a  Kristophoros.

In  this  degree  the  mystery-name  of  IAO  was  communicated  to  him.

Let  the  reader  compare  the  above  sublime  precepts  with  the  precepts  of  Buddha,  and  the  noble  commandments  in  the  "  Rule  of  Life  "  for  the  ascetics  of  India,  and  he  will  understand  the  unity  of  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE  everywhere.

TRACES  OF  THE  MYSTERIES

It  is  impossible  to  deny  the  presence  of  a  sexual  element  in  many  religious  symbols,  but  this  fact  is  not  in  the  least  open  to  censure,  once  it  becomes  generally  known  that — in  the  religious  traditions  of  every  country —  man  was  not  born  in  the  first  "  human  "  race  from  father  and  mother.

From  the  bright  "  mind-born  Sons  of  Brahma."  the  Rishis,  and  from  Adam  Kadmon  with  his  Emanations,  the  Sephiroth,  down  to  the  "  parentless,"  the  Anupadaka,  or  the  Dhyani-Buddhas,  from  whom  sprang  the  Bodhisattavas  and  Manushi-  Buddhas,  the  earthly  Initiates — men — the  first  race  of  men  was  with  every  nation  held  as  being  born  without  father  or  mother.

Man,  the  "  Manushi  Buddha,"  the  Manu,  the  "  Enosh,"  son  of  Seth,  or  the  "  Son  of  Man  "  as  he  is  called — is  born  in  the  present  way  only  as  the  consequence,  the  unavoidable  fatality,  of  the  law  of  natural  evolution.

Mankind — having  reached  the  last  limit,  and  that  turning  point  where  its  spiritual  nature  had  to  make  room  for  mere  physical  organisation — had  to  "fall  into  matter"  and  generation.

But  man's  evolution  and  involution  are  cyclic.

He  will  end  as  he  began.

Of  course  to  our  grossly  material  minds  even  the  sublime  symbol-  ism of  Kosmos  conceived  in  the  matrix  of  Space  after  the  divine  Unit  had  entered  into  and  fructified  it  with  Its  holy  fiat,  will  no  doubt  suggest  material-  ity.

Not  so  with  primitive  mankind.

The  initiatory  rite  in  the  Mysteries  of  the  self-sacrificing  Victim  that  dies  a  spiritual  death  to  save  the  world  from  destruction — really  from  depopulation — was  established  during  the  Fourth  Race,  to  commemorate  an  event,  which,  physiologically,  has  now  become  the  Mystery  of  Mysteries  among  the  world-problems.

In  the  Jewish  script  it  is  Cain  and  the  female  Abel  who  are  the  sacrificed  and  sacrificing  couple — both  immolating  themselves  (as  permutations  of  Adam  and  Eve,  or  the  dual  Jehovah)  and  shedding  their  blood  "of  separation  and  union,"  for  the  sake  of  and  to  save  mankind  by  inaugurating  a  new  physiological  race.

Later  still,  when  the  neophyte,  as  already  mentioned,  in  order  to  be  re-born  once  more  into  his  lost  spiritual  state,  had  to  pass  through  the  entrails  (the  womb)  of  a  virgin  heifer l  killed  at  the  moment  of  the  rite,  it  involved  again  a  mystery  and  one  as  great,  for  it  referred  to  the  process  of  birth,  or  rather  the  first  entrance  of  man  on  to  this  earth,  through  Vach — "the  melodious  cow  who  milks  forth  sustenance  and  water" — and  who  is  the  female  Logos.

It  had  also  reference  to  the  same  self-sacrifice  of  the  "  divine  Hermaphrodite  " — of  the  third  Root  Race — the  transformation  of  Humanity  into  truly  physical  men,  after  the  loss  of  spiritual  potency.

When,  the  fruit  of  evil  having  been  tasted  along  with  the  fruit  of  good,  there  was  as  a  result  the  gradual  atrophy

1  The  Aryans  replaced  the  living  cow  by  one  made  of  gold,  silver  or  any  other  metal,  and  the  rite  is  preserved  to  this  day,  when  one  desires  to  become  a  Brahman,  a  twice-born,  in  India.

292  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

of  spirituality  and  a  strengthening  of  the  materiality  in  man,  then  he  was  doomed  to  be  born  thenceforth  through  the  present  process.

This  is  the  Mystery  of  the  Hermaphrodite,  which  the  Ancients  kept  so  secret  and  veiled.

It  was  neither  the  absence  of  moral  feeling,  nor  the  presence  of  gross  sensuality  in  them  that  made  them  imagine  their  Deities  under  a  dual  aspect ;  but  rather  their  knowledge  of  the  mysteries  and  processes  of  primitive  Nature.

The  Science  of  Physiology  was  better  known  to  them  than  it  is  to  us  now.

It  is  in  this  that  lies  buried  the  key  to  the  Symbolism  of  old,  the  true  focus  of  national  thought,  and  the  strange  dual-sexed  images  of  nearly  every  God  and  Goddess  in  both  pagan  and  monotheistic  Pantheons.

Says  Sir  William  Drummond  in  (Ed/pus  Judalcus :

The  truths  of  science  were  the  arcana  of  the  priests  because  these  truths  were  the  foundations  of  religion.

But  why  should  the  missionaries  so  cruelly  twit  the  Vaishnavas  and  Krishna  worshippers  for  the  supposed  grossly  indecent  meaning  of  their  sym-  bols, since  it  is  made  clear  beyond  the  slightest  doubt,  and  by  the  most  unprejudiced  writers,  that  Chrestos  in  the  pit — whether  the  pit  be  taken  as  meaning  the  grave  or  hell — had  likewise  a  sexual  element  in  it,  from  the  very  origin  of  the  symbol.

This  fact  is  no  longer  denied  to-day.

The  "  Brothers  of  the  Rosy  Cross  "  of  the  Middle  Ages  were  as  good  Christians  as  any  to  be  found  in  Europe ;  nevertheless,  all  their  rites  were  based  on  symbols  whose  meaning  was  pre-  eminently phallic  and  sexual.

Their  biographer,  Hargrave  Jennings,  the  best  modern  authority  on  Rosicrucianism,  speaking  of  this  mystic  Brotherhood,  describes  how

the  tortures  and  the  sacrifice  of  Calvary,  the  Passion  of  the  Cross,  were,  in  their  [the  Rose-Croix's]  glorious  blessed  magic  and  triumph,  the'protest  and  appeal.

Protest — by  whom  ?  The  answer  is,  the  protest  of  the  crucified  Rose,  the  greatest  and  the  most  unveiled  of  all  sexual  symbols — the  Yoni  and  Lingam,  the  "  victim  "  and  the  "  murderer,"  the  female  and  male  principles  in  Nature.

Open  the  last  work  of  that  author,  Phallicism,  and  see  in  what  glowing  terms  he  describes  the  sexual  symbolism  in  that  which  is  most  sacred  to  the  Christian  :

The  flowing  blood  streamed  from  the  crown,  or  the  piercing  circlet  of  the  thorns  of  Hell.

The  Rose  is  feminine.

Its  lustrous  carmine  petals  are  guarded  with  thorns.

The  Rose  is  the  most  beautiful  of  flowers.

The  Rose  is  the  Queen  of  God's  Garden  [Mary,  the  Virgin].  It  is  not  the  Rose  alone  which  is  the  magical  idea  (or  truth).  But  it  is  the  "  Crucified  Rose/'  or  the  "  Martyred  Rose  "  (by  the  grand  mystic  Apocalyptic  figure)  which  is  the  talisman,  the  standard,  the  object  of  adoration  of  all  the  '  Sons  of  Wisdom  '  or  of  the  true  Rosicrucians  l

*Op.  at,  p.  141.

TRACES  OF  THE  MYSTERIES

Not  of  all  the  "Sons  of  Wisdom,"  by  any  means,  not  even  of  the  true  Rosicrucian.

For  the  latter  would  never  put  in  such  sickening  relievo,  in  such  a  purely  sensual  and  terrestrial,  not  to  say  animal  light,  the  grandest,  the  noblest  of  Nature's  symbols.

To  the  Rosicrucian  the  "Rose"  was  the  symbol  of  Nature,  of  the  ever  prolific  and  virgin  Earth,  or  Isis,  the  mother  and  nourisher  of  man,  considered  as  feminine  and  represented  as  a  virgin  woman  by  the  Egyptian  Initiates.

Like  every  other  personification  of  Nature  and  the  Earth  she  is  the  sister  and  wife  of  Osiris,  as  the  two  characters  answer  to  the  personified  symbol  of  the  Earth,  both  she  and  the  Sun  being  the  progeny  of  the  same  mysterious  Father,  because  the  Earth  is  fecundated  by  the  Sun — according  to  the  earliest  Mysticism — by  divine  insufflation.

It  was  the  pure  ideal  of  mystic  Nature  that  was  personi-  fied in  the  "World  Virgins,"  the  «•  Celestial  Maidens,"  and  later  on  by  the  human  Virgin,  Mary,  the  Mother  of  the  Saviour,  the  Salvator  Mundi  now  chosen  by  the  Christian  World.

And  it  was  the  character  of  the  Jewish  maiden  that  was  adapted  by  Theology  to  archaic  Symbolism,1  and  not  the  Pagan  symbol  that  was  modelled  for  the  new  occasion.

We  know  through  Herodotus  that  the  Mysteries  were  brought  from  India  by  Orpheus — a  hero  far  anterior  to  both  Homer  and  Hesiod.

Very  litttle  is  really  known  of  him,  and  till  very  lately  Orphic  literature,  and  even  the  Argonauts,  were  attributed  to  Onamacritus,  a  contemporary  of  Pisistratus,  Solon  and  Pythagoras,  who  was  credited  with  their  compilation  in  the  present  form  toward  the  close  of  the  sixth  century  B.C  ,  or  800  years  after  the  time  of  Orpheus.

But  we  are  told  that  in  the  days  of  Pausanias  there  was  a  sacerdotal  family,  who.

like  the  Brahmans  with  the  Vedas,  had  committed  to  memory  all  the  Orphic  Hymns,  and  that  they  were  usually  thus  transmitted  from  one  generation  to  another.

By  placing  Orpheus  so  far  back  as  1200  B  C  ,  official  Science — so  careful  in  her  chronology  to  choose  in  each  case  as  late  a  period  as  possible — admits  that  the  Mysteries,  or  in  other  words  Occultism  dramatised,  belong  to  a  still  earlier  epoch  than  the  Chaldeans  and  Egyptians.

The  downfall  of  the  Mysteries  in  Europe  may  now  be  mentioned.

1  In  Ragon's  Orthodoxie  Maconmque,  p.  105,  note,  we  find  the  following  statement — borrowed  from  Albumazar  the  Arabian,  probably  "The  Virgin  of  the  Magi  and  Chaldeans  The  Chaldean  sphere  [globe]  showed  in  its  heavens  a  newly-born  babe,  called  Christ  and  Jesus  ,  it  was  placed  in  the  arms  of  the  Celestial  Virgin.

It  was  to  this  Virgin  that  Eratosthenes,  the  Alexandrian  Librarian,  born  276  years  before  our  era,  gave  the  name  of  Isis,  mother  of  Horus  "  This  is  only  what  Kircher  gives  (in  (Ed/pus  /Egyptiacus,  in.  5),  quoting  Albumazar  "In  the  first  decan  of  the  Virgin  rises  a  maid,  called  Aderenosa,  that  is  pure,  immaculate  virgin  .  .  sitting  upon  an  embroidered  throne  nursing  a  boy  .;  a  boy,  named  Jesus  .  which  signifies  Issa,  whom  they  also  call  Christ  in  Greek."  (See/s/s  Unveiled,  II,  p.  491.)

SECTION

THE  LAST  OF  THE  MYSTERIES  IN  EUROPE

AS  ^was  predicted  by  the  great  Hermes  in  his  dialogue  with  £sculapius,  the  time  had  indeed  come  when  impious  foreigners  accused  Egypt  of  adoring  monsters,  and  naught  but  the  letters  engraved  in  stone  upon  her  monuments  survived — enigmas  unintelligible  to  posterity.

Her  sacred  Scribes  and  Hiero-  phants  became  wanderers  upon  the  face  of  the  earth.

Those  who  had  remained  in  Egypt  found  themselves  obliged  for  fear  of  a  profanation  of  the  sacred  Mysteries  to  seek  refuge  in  deserts  and  mountains,  to  form  and  estab-  lish secret  societies  and  brotherhoods — such  as  the  Essenes  ;  those  who  had  crossed  the  oceans  to  India  and  even  to  the  (now-called)  New  World,  bound  themselves  by  solemn  oaths  to  keep  silent,  and  to  preserve  secret  their  Sacred  Knowledge  and  Science  ;  thus  these  were  buried  deeper  than  ever  out  of  human  sight.

In  Central  Asia  and  on  the  northern  borderlands  of  India,  the  triumphant  sword  of  Aristotle's  pupil  swept  away  from  his  path  of  conquest  every  vestige  of  a  once  pure  Religion  :  and  its  Adepts  receded  further  and  further  from  that  path  into  the  most  hidden  spots  of  the  globe.

The  cycle  of  *  *  *  *  being  at  its  close,  the  first  hour  for  the  disappearance  of  the  Mysteries  struck  on  the  clock  of  the  Races,  with  the  Macedonian  conqueror.

The  first  strokes  of  its  last  hour  sounded  in  the  year  47  B  C.  Alesia  1  the  famous  city  in  Gaul,  the  Thebes  of  the  Kelts,  so  renowned  for  its  ancient  rites  of  Initiation  and  Mysteries,  was,  as  J.  M.  Ragon  well  describes  it  :

The  ancient  metropolis  and  the  tomb  of  Initiations,  of  the  religion  of  the  Druids  and  of  the  freedom  of  Gaul.

It  was  during  the  first  century  before  our  era  that  the  last  and  supreme  hour  of  the  great  Mysteries  had  struck.

History  shows  the  populations  of  Central  Gaul  revolting  against  the  Roman  yoke.

The  country  was  subject  to

1  Now  called  St.  Reme  (C6te  d'Or)  on  the  two  streams,  the  Ose  and  the  Oseram      Its  fall  is  a  historical  fact  in  Keltic  Gaulish  History.

2  Orthoc/ox/e  Maconnique,  p.  22,

THE  LAST  OF  THE   MYSTERIES  IN  EUROPE

Caesar,  and  the  revolt  was  crushed  ,  the  result  was  the  slaughter  of  the  garri-  son at  Alesia  (or  Alisa),  and  of  all  its  inhabitants,  including  the  Druids,  the  college-priests  and  the  neophytes  ;  after  this  the  whole  city  was  plundered  and  razed  to  the  ground.

Bibractis,  a  city  as  large  and  as  famous,  not  far  from  Alesia,  perished  a  few  years  later  J.  M.  Ragon  describes  her  end  as  follows  :

Bibractis,  the  mother  of  sciences,  the  soul  of  the  early  nations  [in  Europe],  a  town  equally  famous  for  its  sacred  college  of  Druids,  its  civilisation,  its  schools,  in  which  40,000  students  were  taught  philosophy,  literature,  grammar,  jurisprudence,  medicine,  astrology,  occult  sciences,  architecture,  etc  Rival  of  Thebes,  of  Memphis,  of  Athens  and  of  Rome,  it  possessed  an  amphitheatre,  surrounded  with  colossal  statues,  and  accom-  modating 100,000  spectators,  gladiators,  a  capitol,  temples  of  Janus,  Pluto,  Proserpine,  Jupiter,  Apollo,  Minerva,  Cybele,  Venus,  and  Anubis  ;  and  in  the  midst  of  those  sumptuous  edifices  the  Naumachy,  with  its  vast  basin,  an  incredible  construction,  a  gigantic  work  wherein  floated  boats  and  galleys  devoted  to  naval  games  ,  then  a  Champ  de  Mars,  an  aqueduct,  fountains,  public  baths ,  finally  fortifications  and  walls,  the  construction  of  which  dated  from  the  heroic  ages.

Such  was  the  last  city  in  Gaul  wherein  died  for  Europe  the  secrets  of  the  Initiations  of  the  Great  Mysteries,  the  Mysteries  of  Nature,  and  of  her  forgotten  Occult  truths.

The  rolls  and  manuscripts  of  the  famous  Alexandrian  Library  were  burned  and  destroyed  by  the  same  Caesar,"  but  while  History  depre-  cates the  action  of  the  Arab  general,  Amrus,  who  gave  the  final  touch  to  this  act  of  vandalism  perpetrated  by  the  great  conqueror,  it  has  not  a  word  to  say  to  the  latter  for  his  destruction  of  nearly  the  same  amount  of  precious  rolls  in  Alesia,  nor  to  the  destroyer  of  Bibractis.

While  Sacrovir — chief  of  the  Gauls,  who  revolted  against  Roman  despotism  under  Tiberius,  and  was  defeated  by  Silius  in  the  year  21  of  our  era — was  burning  himself  alive  with  his  fellow  conspirators  on  a  funeral  pyre  before  the  gates  of  the  city,  as  Ragon  tells  us,  the  latter  was  sacked  and  plundered,  and  all  her  treasures  of  literature  on  the  Occult  Sciences  perished  by  fire.

The  once  majestic  city,  Bibractis,  has  now  become  Autun,  Ragon  explains.

A  few  monuments  of  glorious  antiquity  are  still  there,  such  as  the  temples  of  Janus  and  of  Cybele,

Ragon  goes  on  :

Aries,  founded  two  thousand  years  before  Christ,  was  sacked  in  270  This  metropolis  of  Gaul,  restored  40  years  later  by  Constantme,  has  preserved  to  this  day  a  few  remains  of  its  ancient  splendour ,  amphitheatre,  capitol,  an  obelisk,  a  block  of  granite  17  metres  high,  a  triumphal  arch,  catacombs,  etc  Thus  ended  Kelto-Gaulic  civilisation  Caesar,  as  a  barbarian  worthy  of  Rome,  had  already  accomplished  the  destruction  of  the  ancient  Mysteries  by  the  sack  of  the  temples  and  their  initiatory

1  Op.  at,  p.  22.

-  The  Christian   mob   in  389  of  our  era  completed  the  work  of  destruction  upon  what  remained  ,  most  of  the  priceless  works  were  saved  for  students  of  Occultism,  but  lost  to  the  world.

296  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

colleges,  and  by  the  massacre  of  the  Initiates  and  the  Druids.

Remained  Rome  ;  but  she  never  had  but  the  lesser  Mysteries,  shadows  of  the  Secret  Sciences.

The  Great  Initiation  was  extinct.'

A  few  further  extracts  may  be  given  from  his  Occult  Masonry,  as  they  bear  directly  upon  our  subject.

However  learned  and  erudite,  some  of  the  chronological  mistakes  of  that  author  are  very  great.

He  says  :

After  deified  man  (Hermes)  came  the  King-Priest  [the  Hierophant].  Menes  was  the  first  legislator  and  the  founder  of  Thebes  of  the  hundred  palaces  He  filled  that  city  with  magnificent  splendour ,  it  is  from  his  day  that  the  sacerdotal  epoch  of  Egypt  dates.

The  priests  reigned,  for  it  is  they  who  made  the  laws  It  is  said  that  there  have  been  three  hundred  and  twenty-nine  [Hierophants]  since  his  time — all  of  whom  have  remained  unknown.

After  that,  genuine  Adepts  having  become  scarce,  the  author  shows  the  Priests  choosing  false  ones  from  the  midst  of  slaves,  whom  they  exhibited,  having  crowned  and  deified  them,  for  the  adoration  of  the  ignorant  masses.

Tired  of  reigning  in  such  a  servile  way,  the  kings  rebelled  and  freed  themselves  Then  came  Sesostris,  the  founder  of  Memphis  (1613,  they  say,  before  our  era).  To  the  sacerdotal  election  to  the  throne  succeeded  that  of  the  warriors.

.  .  Cheops  who  reigned  from  1178  to  1122  built  the  great  Pyramid  which  bears  his  name.

He  is  accused  of  having  persecuted  theocracy  and  closed  the  temples.

This  is  utterly  incorrect,  though  Ragon  repeats  "  History."  The  Pyramid  called  by  the  name  of  Cheops  is  the  Great  Pyramid,  the  building  of  which  even  Baron  Bunsen  assigned  to  5,000  B  C  He  says  in  Egypt's  Place  in  Universal  History  .

The  Origins  of  Egypt  go  back  to  the  ninth  millennium  before  Christ  -'

And  as  the  Mysteries  were  performed  and  the  Initiations  took  place  in  that  Pyramid — for  indeed  it  was  built  for  that  purpose — it  looks  strange  and  an  utter  contradiction  with  known  facts  in  the  history  of  the  Mysteries,  to  suppose  that  Cheops,  if  the  builder  of  that  Pyramid,  ever  turned  against  the  initiated  Priests  and  their  temples.

Moreover,  as  far  as  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE  teaches,  it  was  not  Cheops  who  built  the  Pyramid  of  that  name,  whatever  else  he  might  have  done.

Yet,  it  is  quite  true  that

Owing  to  an  Ethiopian  invasion  and  the  federated  government  of  twelve  chiefs,  royalty  fell  into  the  hands  of  Amasis,  a  man  of  low  birth.

1  Op  cit   p   23    J   M.  Ragon,  a  Belgian  by  birth,  and  a  Mason,  knew  more  about  Occultism  than  any  other  non-initiated  writer      For  fifty  years  he  studied  the  ancient  Mysteries  wherever  he  could  find  accounts  of  them.

In   1805,  he  founded  at  Pans  the  Brotherhood  of  Les  fnnosop/ies,  in  which  Lodge  he  delivered  for  years  lectures  on  Ancient  and  Modern  Initiation  (in  1818  and  again  in  1841),  which  were  published,   but  now  are  lost.

Then  he  became  the  writer-in-chief  of  Hermes,  a  masonic  paper.

His  best  works  were  La  Maconnene  Occulte  and  the  Fa5tes  Initiatiques      After  his  death,  in  1866,  a  number  of  his  MSS.

remained  in  the  possession  of  the  Grand  Orient  of  France.

A  high  Mason  told  the  writer  that  Ragon  had  corresponded  for  years  with  two  Orientalists  in  Syria  and  Egypt,  one  of  whom  is  a  Kopt  gentleman.

2  Op  cit  ,  iv,  p.  462.

THE  LAST  OF  THE  MYSTERIES  IN  EUROPE

This  was  in  570  B.C  ,  and  it  is  Amasis  who  destroyed  priestly  power.

And

thus  perished  that  ancient  theocracy  which  showed  its  crowned  priests  for  so  many  centuries  to  Egypt  and  the  whole  world.

Egypt  had  gathered  the  students  of  all  countries  around  her  Priests  and  Hierophants  before  Alexandria  was  founded.

Ennemoser  asks  :

How  comes  it  that  so  little  has  become  known  of  the  Mysteries  and  of  their  particular  contents,  through  so  many  ages,  and  amongst  so  many  different  times  and  people  ?  The  answer  is  that  it  is  again  owing  to  the  universally  strict  silence  of  the  initiated.

Another  cause  may  be  found  in  the  destruction  and  total  loss  of  all  the  written  memorials  of  the  secret  knowledge  of  the  remotest  antiquity

Numa's  books  described  by  Livy,  consisting  of  natural  philosophy,  were  found  in  his  tomb  ;  but  they  were  not  allowed  to  be  made  known,  lest  they  should  reveal  the  most  secret  mysteries  of  the  state  religion  .  .  The  senate  and  the  tribunes  of  the  people  determined  .  .  that  the  books  themselves  should  be  burned,  which  was  done  l

Cassain  mentions  a  treatise,  well-known  in  the  fourth  and  fifth  centuries,  which  was  accredited  to  Ham,  the  son  of  Noah,  who  in  his  turn  was  reputed  to  have  received  it  from  Jared,  the  fourth  generation  from  Seth,  the  son  of  Adam.

Alchemy  also  was  first  taught  in  Egypt  by  her  learned  Priests,  though  the  first  appearance  of  this  system  is  as  old  as  man.

Many  writers  have  declared  that  Adam  was  the  first  Adept ;  but  that  was  a  blind  and  a  pun  upon  the  name,  which  is  "red  earth"  in  one  of  its  meanings.

The  correct  information — under  its  allegorical  veil — is  found  in  the  sixth  chapter  of  Genesis,  which  speaks  of  the  "Sons  of  God"  who  took  wives  of  the  daughters  of  men,  after  which  they  communicated  to  these  wives  many  a  mystery  and  secret  of  the  phenomenal  world.

The  cradle  of  Alchemy,  says  Olaus  Borrichius,  is  to  be  sought  in  the  most  distant  times.

Democritus  of  Abdera  was  an  Alchemist,  and  a  Hermetic  Philosopher.

Clement  of  Alexandria  wrote  considerably  upon  the  Science,  and  Moses  and  Solomon  are  called  proficients  in  it.  We  are  told  by  W.  Godwin  :

The  first  authentic  record  on  this  subject  is  an  edict  of  Diocletian  about  300  years  A  D  ,  ordering  a  diligent  search  to  be  made  in  Egypt  for  all  the  ancient  books  which  treated  of  the  art  of  making  gold  and  silver,  that  they  might,  without  distinction,  be  consigned  to  the  flames.

The  Alchemy  of  the  Chaldeans  and  the  old  Chinamen  is  not  even  the  parent  of  that  Alchemy  which  revived  among  the  Arabians  many  centuries  later.

There  is  a  spiritual  Alchemy  and  a  physical  transmutation.

The  knowledge  of  both  was  imparted  at  the  Initiations.

1  History  of  Magic,  li,  p.  11.

SECTION

THE  POST-CHRISTIAN  SUCCESSORS  TO  THE  MYSTERIES

THE  Eleusinian  Mysteries  were  no  more.

Yet  it  was  these  which  gave  their  principal  features  to  the  Neo-Platonic  school  of  Ammonius  Saccas,  for  the  Eclectic  System  was  chiefly  characterised  by  its  Theurgy  and  ecstasis.

It  was  lamblichus  who  added  to  it  the  Egyptian  doctrine  of  Theurgy  with  its  practices,  and  Porphyry,  the  Jew,  who  opposed  this  new  element.

The  school,  however,  with  but  few  exceptions,  practised  asceticism  and  contem-  plation, its  mystics  passing  through  a  discipline  as  rigorous  as  that  of  the  Hindu  devotee.

Their  efforts  never  tended  so  much  to  develop  the  success-  ful practice  of  thaumaturgy,  necromancy  or  sorcery — such  as  they  are  now  accused  of — as  to  evolve  the  higher  faculties  of  the  inner  man,  the  Spiritual  Ego.

The  school  held  that  a  number  of  spiritual  beings,  denizens  of  spheres  quite  independent  of  the  earth  and  of  the  human  cycle,  were  mediators  between  the  "Gods"  and  men,  and  even  between  man  and  the  Supreme  Soul.

To  put  it  in  plainer  language,  the  soul  of  man  became,  owing  to  the  help  of  the  Planetary  Spirits,  "  recipient  of  the  soul  of  the  world  "  as  Emerson  puts  it.  Apollonius  of  Tyana  asserted  his  possession  of  such  a  power  in  these  words  (quoted  by  Professor  Wilder  in  his  New  P/aton/sm)  :

I  can  see  the  present  and  the  future  in  a  clear  mirror.

The  sage  [Adept]  need  not  wait  for  the  vapours  of  the  earth  and  the  corruption  of  the  air  to  foresee  plagues  and  fevers ;  he  must  know  them  later  than  God,  but  earlier  than  the  people  The  theoi  or  gods  see  the  future ;  common  men,  the  present ,  sages,  that  which  is  about  to  take  place.

My  peculiar  abstemious  mode  of  living  produces  such  an  acuteness  of  the  senses,  or  creates  some  other  faculty,  so  that  the  greatest  and  most  remarkable  things  may  be  performed.

Professor  A.   Wilder's  comment  thereupon  is  remarkable  :

This  is  what  may  be  termed  spiritual  photography.

The  soul  is  the  camera  in  which  facts  and  events,  future,  past,  and  present,  are  alike  fixed ;  and  the  mind  becomes  conscious  of  them.

Beyond  our  everyday  world  of  limits,  all  is  as  one  day  or  state — the  past  and  future  comprised  in  the  present.

Probably  this  is  the  "great

1  New  Platonism  and  Alchemy,  p    15.

THE  POST-CHRISTIAN  SUCCESSORS  TO  THE  MYSTERIES

day,"  the  "  last  day,"  the  "  day  of  the  Lord,"  of  the  Bible  writers — the  day  into  which  everyone  passes  by  death  or  ecstas/s.  Then  the  soul  is  freed  from  the  constraint  of  the  body,  and  its  nobler  part  is  united  to  higher  nature  and  becomes  partaker  in  the  wisdom  and  foreknowledge  of  the  higher  beings.

How  far  the  system  practised  by  the  Neo-Platonists  was  identical  with  that  of  the  old  and  the  modern  Vedantins  may  be  inferred  from  what  Or.  A.  Wilder  says  of  the  Alexandrian  Theosophists.

The  anterior  idea  of  the  New  Platonists  was  that  of  a  single  Supreme  Essence  .  .  All  the  old  philosophies  contained  the  doctrine  that  0€ol,  theoi,  gods  or  disposers,  angels,  demons,  and  other  spiritual  agencies,  emanated  from  the  Supreme  Being.

Ammonius  accepted  the  doctrine  of  the  Books  of  Hermes,  that  from  the  divine  All  proceeded  the  Divine  Wisdom  or  Amun ;  that  from  Wisdom  proceeded  the  Demiurge  or  Creator ;  and  from  the  Creator,  the  subordinate  spiritual  beings ,  the  world  and  its  peoples  being  the  last.

The  first  is  contained  in  the  second,  the  first  and  second  in  the  third,  and  so  on  through  the  entire  series

This  is  a  perfect  echo  of  the  belief  of  the  Vedantins,  and  it  proceeds  directly  from  the  secret  teachings  of  the  East.

The  same  author  says  :

Akin  to  this  is  the  doctrine  of  the  Jewish  Kabala  which  was  taught  by  the  Pharsi  or  Pharisees,  who  probably  borrowed  it,  as  their  sectarian  designation  would  seem  to  indicate,  from  the  Magians  of  Persia.

It  is  substantially  embodied  in  the  following  synopsis.

The  Divine  Being  is  the  All,  the  source  of  all  existence,  the  Infinite ;  and  He  cannot  be  known.

The  Universe  reveals  Him,  and  subsists  by  Him  At  the  beginning  His  effulgence  went  forth  everywhere  {  Eventually  He  retired  within  Himself  and  so  formed  around  Him  a  vacant  space  Into  this  He  transmitted  His  first  Emanation,  a  Ray,  containing  in  it  the  generative  and  conceptive  power,  and  hence  the  name  IE,  or  Jah.

This  in  its  turn  produced  the  tikkun,  the  pattern  or  idea  of  form  ,  and  in  this  emanation,  which  also  contained  the  male  and  female,  or  generative  and  conceptive  potencies,  were  the  three  primitive  forces  of  Light,  Spirit  and  Life.

This  Tikkun  is  united  to  the  Ray,  or  first  emanation,  and  pervaded  by  it  •  and  by  that  union  is  also  in  per-  petual communication  with  the  infinite  source.

It  is  the  pattern,  the  primitive  man,  the  Adam  Kadmon,  the  macrocosm  of  Pythagoras  and  other  philosophers.

From  it  proceeded  the  Sephiroth.

.  .  From  the  Sephiroth  in  turn  emanated  the  four  worlds,  each  proceeding  out  of  the  one  immediately  above  it,  and  the  lower  one  enveloping  its  superior.

These  worlds  became  less  pure  as  they  descended  in  the  scale,  the  lowest  of  all  being  the  material  world.

This  veiled  enunciation  of  the  Secret  Teaching  will  be  clear  to  our  readers  by  this  time.

These  worlds  are  :

Aziluth  is  peopled  with  the  purest  emanations  [the  First,  almost  spiritual,  Race  of  the  human  beings  that  were  to  inhabit]  the  Fourth  ;  the  second,  Beriah,  by  a  lower  order,  the  servants  of  the  former  [the  second  Race]  ,  the  third,  Jesirah,  by  the  cherubim  and  seraphim,  the  Elohim  and  B'ne  Elohim  ["  Sons  of  Gods  "  or  Elohim,  our  Third  Race]  The  fourth  world,  Asiah,  is  inhabited  by  the  Klipputh,  of  whom  Belial  is  chief  [the  Atlantean  Sorcerers].

1  Loc   cit  2  Op  cit  ,  pp   9,  10.

3  This  Divine  Effulgence  and  Essence  is  the  light  of  the  Logos  ,  only  the  Vedantm  would  not  use  the  pronoun  "  He,"  but  would  say  "  It  "

4 Loc.

cit.,  note,  p.  10.  'Loc.

cit.,  note.

300  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

These  worlds  are  all  the  earthly  duplicates  of  their  heavenly  prototypes,  the  mortal  and  temporary  reflections  and  shadows  of  the  more  durable,  if  not  eternal,  races  dwelling  in  other,  to  us,  invisible  worlds.

The  souls  of  the  men  of  our  Fifth  Race  derive  their  elements  from  these  four  worlds — Root  Races — that  preceded  ours  :  namely,  our  intellect,  Manas,  the  fifth  principle,  our  passions  and  mental  and  corporeal  appetites,  A  conflict  having  arisen,  called  "war  in  heaven/'  among  our  prototypical  worlds,  war  came  to  pass,,  aeons  later,  between  the  Atlanteans l  of  Asiah,  and  those  of  the  third  Root  Race,  the  B'ne  Elohim  or  the  "  Sons  of  God,"2  and  then  evil  and  wickedness  were  intensified.

Mankind  (in  the  last  sub-race  of  the  third  Root  Race)  having

sinned  in  their  first  parent  [a  physiological  allegory,  truly  ']  from  whose  souh  every  human  soul  is  an  emanation,

says  the  Zohar,  men  were  "  exiled  "  into  more  material  bodies  to  expiate  that  sin  and  become  proficient  in  goodness.

To  accomplish  the  cycle  of  necessity,  rather,  explains  the  DOCTRINE ;  to  progress  on  their  task  of  evolution,  from  which  task  none  of  us  can  be  freed,  neither  by  death  nor  suicide,  for  each  of  us  has  to  pass  through  the  "Valley  of  Thorns  "  before  he  emerges  into  the  plains  of  divine  light  and  rest.

And!  thus  men  will  continue  to  be  born  in  new  bodies

till  they  have  become  sufficiently  pure  to  enter  a  higher  form  of  existence

This  means  only  that  Mankind,  from  the  First  down  to  the  last,  or  Seventh  Race,  is  composed  of  one  and  the  same  company  of  actors,  wha  have  descended  from  higher  spheres  to  perform  their  artistic  tour  on  this  our  planet,  Earth.

Starting  as  pure  spirits  on  our  downward  journey  around  the  world  (verily  !)  with  the  knowledge  of  truth — now  feebly  echoed  in  the  Occult  Doctrines — inherent  in  us,  cyclic  law  brings  us  down  to  the  reversed  apex  of  matter,  which  is  lost  down  here  on  earth  and  the  bottom  of  which  we  have  already  struck ;  and  then,  the  same  law  of  spiritual  gravity  will  make  us  slowly  ascend  to  still  higher,  still  purer  spheres  than  those  we  started  from.

Foresight,  prophecy,  oracular  powers !  Illusive  fancies  of  man's  dwarfed  perceptions,  which  see  actual  images  in  reflections  and  shadows,  and  mistake  past  actualities  for  prophetic  images  of  a  future  that  has  no  room  in  Eternity.

Our  macrocosm  and  its  smallest  microcosm,  man,  are  both  repeating  the  same  play  of  universal  and  individual  events  at  each  station,  as  on  every  stage  on  which  Karma  leads  them  to  enact  their  respective  dramas  of  life.

False  prophets  could  have  no  existence  had  there  been  no  true  prophets.

And  so

1  See  Esoteric  Buddhism,  by  A    P.  Smnett,  eighth  edition,  pp.  57-8.

-  See  Isis  Unveiled,  I,  pp.  589-95.  The  "  Sons  of  God  "  and  their  war  with  the  giants  and  magicians.

THE  PpST-CHRISTIAN  SUCCESSORS  TO  THE  MYSTERIES

there  were,  in  all  ages  many  of  both  classes.

Only,  none  of  these  ever  saw  anything  but  that  which  had  already  come  to  pass,  and  had  been  before  prototypically  enacted  in  higher  spheres — if  the  event  foretold  related  to  national  or  public  weal  or  woe — or  in  some  preceding  life,  if  it  concerned  only  an  individual,  for  every  such  event  is  stamped  as  an  indelible  record  of  the  Past  and  Future,  which  are  only,  after  all,  the  ever  Present  in  Eternity.

The  "  worlds  "  and  the  purifications  spoken  of  in  the  Zohar  and  other  Kabalistic  books,  relate  to  our  globe  and  races  no  more  and  no  less  than  they  relate  to  other  globes  and  other  races  that  have  preceded  our  own  in  the  great  cycle.

It  was  such  fundamental  truths  as  these  that  were  performed  in  allegorical  plays  and  images  during  the  Mysteries,  the  last  Act  of  which,  the  Epilogue  for  the  Mystae,  was  the  anastasis  or  "continued  existence,"  as  also  the  "Soul  transformation."

Hence,  the  author  of  New  Platonism  and  Alchemy  shows  us  that  all  such  Eclectic  doctrines  were  strongly  reflected  in  the  Epistles  of  Paul,  and  were

inculcated  more  or  less  among  the  Churches.

Hence,  such  passages  as  these  "  Ye  were  dead  in  errors  and  sins ;  ye  walked  according  to  the  aeon  of  this  world,  according  to  the  arc/ion  that  has  the  domination  of  the  air."  "We  wrestle  not  against  flesh  and  blood,  but  against  the  dominations,  against  potencies,  against  the  lords  of  darkness,  and  against  the  mischievousness  of  spirits  in  the  empyrean  regions  "  But  Paul  was  evidently  hostile  to  the  effort  to  blend  his  gospel  with  the  gnostic  ideas  of  the  Hebrew-Egyptian  school,  as  seems  to  have  been  attempted  at  Ephesus  ;  and  accordingly  wrote  to  Timothy,  his  favourite  disciple,  "  Keep  safe  the  precious  charge  entrusted  to  thee  ;  and  reject  the  new  doctrines  and  the  antagonistic  principles  of  the  gnosis,  falsely  so-called,  of  which  some  have  made  profession  and  gone  astray  from  the  faith."  '

But  as  the  Gnosis  is  the  Science  pertaining  to  our  Higher  Self,  as  blind  faith  is  a  matter  of  temperament  and  emotionalism,  and  as  Paul's  doctrine  was  still  newer  and  his  interpretations  far  more  thickly  veiled,  to  keep  the  inner  truths  hidden  far  away  from  the  Gnostic,  preference  has  been  given  to  the  former  by  every  earnest  seeker  after  truth.

Besides  this,  the  great  Teachers  who  professed  the  so-called  "  false  Gnosis  "  were  very  numerous  in  the  days  of  the  Apostles,  and  were  as  great  as  any  converted  Rabbi  could  be.  If  Porphyry,  the  Jew  Malek,  went  against  Theurgy  on  account  of  old  traditional  recollections,  there  were  other  teachers  who  practised  it.  Plotinus,  lamblichus,  Proclus  were  all  thaumaturgists,  and  the  latter

Elaborated  the  entire  theosophy  and  theurgy  of  his  predecessors  into  a  com-  plete system.

1  Loc.

cit.,  note.

-  Op   at.,  p.  18.

302  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

As  to  Ammonias,

Countenanced  by  Clemens  and  Athenagoras  in  the  Church,  and  by  learned  men-  of  the  Synagogue,  the  Academy,  and  the  Grove,  he  fulfilled  his  labour  by  teaching  a  common  doctrine  for  all.

Thus  it  is  not  Judaism  and  Christianity  that  re-modelled  the  ancient  Pagan  Wisdom,  but  rather  the  latter  that  put  its  heathen  curb,  quietly  and  insensibly,  on  the  new  faith  ;  and  this,  moreover,  was  still  further  influenced  by  the  Eclectic  Theosophical  system,  the  direct  emanation  of  the  Wisdom  Religion.

All  that  is  grand  and  noble  in  Christian  theology  comes  from  Neo-  Platonism.

It  is  now  too  well-known  to  need  much  repetition  that  Ammonius  Saccas,  the  God-taught  (theodidaktos)  and  the  lover  of  the  truth  (philalethes),  in  establishing  his  school,  made  a  direct  attempt  to  benefit  the  world  by  teaching  those  portions  of  the  Secret  Science  that  were  permitted  by  its  direct  guardians  to  be  revealed  in  those  days."  The  modern  movement  of  our  own  Theosophical  Society  was  begun  on  the  same  principles  ;  for  the  Neo-Platonic  school  of  Ammonius  aimed,  as  we  do,  at  the  reconcilement  of  all  sects  and  peoples,  under  the  once  common  faith  of  the  Golden  Age,  trying  to  induce  the  nations  to  lay  aside  their  contentions — in  religious  matters  at  any  rate —  by  proving  to  them  that  their  various  beliefs  are  all  the  more  or  less  legitimate  children  of  one  common  parent,  the  Wisdom  Religion.

Nor  was  the  Eclectic  Theosophical  system — as  some  writers  inspired  by  Rome  would  make  the  world  believe — developed  only  during  the  third  century  of  our  era  ;  but  it  belongs  to  a  much  earlier  age,  as  has  been  shown  by  Diogenes  Laertius.

He  traces  it  to  the  beginning  of  the  dynasty  of  the  Ptolemies  ;  to  the  great  seer  and  prophet,  the  Egyptian  priest  Pot-Amun,  of  the  temple  of  the  God  of  that  name — for  Amun  is  the  God  of  Wisdom.

Unto  that  day  the  communication  between  the  Adepts  of  Upper  India  and  Bactria  and  the  Philosophers  of  the  West  had  never  ceased.

Under  Philadelphus  .  .  .  the  Hellenic  teachers  became  rivals  of  the  College  of  Rabbis  of  Babylon.

The  Buddhistic,  Vedantic  and  Magian  systems  were  expounded  along  with  the  philosophies  of  Greece  .  .  .  Aristobulus,  the  Jew,  declared  that  the  ethics  of  Aristotle  were  derived  from  the  law  of  Moses  (!)  ,  and  Philo,  after  him,  attempt-  ed to  interpret  the  Pentateuch  in  accordance  with  the  doctrines  of  Pythagoras  and  the  Academy.

In  Josephus  it  is  said  that,  in  the  Book  of  the  Genesis,  Moses  wrote  philo-  sophically— that  is,  in  the  figurative  style  ;  and  the  Essenes  of  Carmel  were  reproduced  in  the  Therapeutae  of  Egypt,  who,  in  turn,  were  declared  by  Eusebius  to  be  identical  with  the  Christians,  though  they  actually  existed  long  before  the  Christian  era  Indeed,  in  its  turn,  Christianity  also  was  taught  at  Alexandria,  and  underwent  an  analogous

1  Op.  at,  p.

2  No  orthodox  Christian   has  ever  equalled,  far  less  surpassed,  in  the  practice  of  true  Christ-like  virtues  and  ethics,  or  in  the  beauty  of  his  moral  nature,  Ammonius,  the  Alexandrian  pervert  from  Christianity  (he  was  born  from  Christian  parents).

THE  POST-CHRISTIAN  SUCCESSORS  TO  THE  MYSTERIES

metamorphosis.

Pantaenus,  Athenagoras  and  Clement  were  thoroughly  instructed  in  the  Platonic  philosophy,  and  comprehended  its  essential  unity  with  the  oriental  systems  i

Ammonius,  though  the  son  of  Christian  parents,  was  a  /over  of  the  truth,  a  true  Philaletheian  foremost  of  all.

He  set  his  heart  upon  the  work  of  recon-  ciling the  different  systems  into  a  harmonious  whole,  for  he  had  already  perceived  the  tendency  of  Christianity  to  raise  itself  on  the  hecatomb  which  it  had  constructed  out  of  all  other  creeds  and  faiths.

What  says  history  ?

The  ecclesiastical  historian,  Mosheim,  declares  that

Ammonius,  conceiving  that  not  only  the  philosophers  of  Greece,  but  also  all  those  of  the  different  barbarous  nations,  were  perfectly  in  unison  with  each  other  with  regard  to  every  essential  point,  made  it  his  business  so  to  temper  and  expound  the  tenets,  of  all  these  various  sects,  as  to  make  it  appear  they  had  all  of  them  originated  from  one  and  the  same  source,  and  all  tended  to  one  and  the  same  end  Again,  Mosheim  says-  that  Ammonius  taught  that  the  religion  of  the  multitude  went  hand  in  hand  with  philosophy,  and  with  her  had  shared  the  fate  of  being  by  degrees  corrupted  and  obscured  with  mere  human  conceits,  superstition,  and  lies  ,  that  it  ought,  therefore,  to  be  brought  back  to  its  original  purity  by  purging  it  of  this  dross  and  expounding  it  upon  philosophical  principles  ;  and  that  the  whole  which  Christ  had  in  view  was  to  reinstate  and  restore  to  its  primitive  integrity  the  Wisdom  of  the  Ancients  •

Now  what  was  that  "  Wisdom  of  the  Ancients  "  that  the  Founder  of  Christianity  "  had  in  view  "  ?  The  system  taught  by  Ammonius  in  his  Eclectic  Theosophical  School  was  made  of  the  crumbs  permitted  to  be  gathered  from  the  antediluvian  lore  ;  those  Neo-Platonic  teachings  are  described  in  the  Edinburgh  Encylopaedia  as  follows  :

He  [Ammonius]  adopted  the  doctrines  which  were  received  in  Egypt  concerning  the  Universe  and  the  Deity,  considered  as  constituting  one  great  whole ,  concerning  the  eternity  of  the  world,  the  nature  of  souls,  the  empire  of  Providence  [Karma]  and  the  government  of  the  world  by  demons  [c/a/mons  or  spirits,  archangels]  He  also  established  a  system  of  moral  discipline  which  allowed  the  people  in  general  to  live  according  to  the  laws  of  their  country  and  the  dictates  of  nature  ,  but  required  the  wise  to  exalt  their  minds  by  contemplation,  and  to  mortify  the  body,'  so  that  they  might  be  capable  of  enjoying  the  presence  and  assistance  of  the  demons  [including  their  own  daimon  or  Seventh  Principle]  and  ascending  after  death  to  the  presence  of  the

Supreme  [Soul]  Parent.

In  order  to  reconcile  the  popular  religions,  and  particularly  the  Christian,  with  this  new  system,  he  made  the  whole  history  of  the  heathen  gods  an  allegory,  maintaining  that  they  were  only  celestial  ministers  '  entitled  to  an  inferior  kind  of  worship  ;  and  he  acknowledged  that  Jesus  Christ  was  an  excellent  man  and  the  friend  of  God,  but  alleged  that  it  was  not  his  design  entirely  to  abolish  the  worship  of  demons, '  and  that  his  only  intention  was  to  purify  the  ancient  religion

1  Op   cit,  pp   3,  4  s  Quoted  by  Dr  Wilder,  p

'  "  Mortification  "  is  here  meant  in  the  moral,  not  the  physical  sense  ,  to  restrain  every  lust  and  passion,  and  live  on  the  simplest  diet  possible.

4  This  is  the  Neo-Platonic  teaching  adopted  as  a  doctrine  in  the  Roman  Catholic  Church,  with  its  worship  of  the  Seven  Spirits.

'  The  Church  has  made  of  it  the  worship  of  devils,  "  Daimon  "  is  Spirit,  and  relates  to  our  divine  Spirit,  the  seventh  Principle  and  to  the  Dhyan  Chohans.

Jesus  prohibited  going  to  the  temple  or  church  "as  Pharisees  do"  but  commandea  that  man  should  retire  for  prayer  (communion  with  his  God)  into  a  private  closet  Is  it  Jesus  who  would  have  countenanced,  in  the  face  of  the  starving,  millions,  the  building  of  the  most  gorgeous  churches  ?

304  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

No  more  could  be  declared  except  for  those  Philaletheians  who  were  initiated,  "persons  duly  instructed  and  disciplined"  to  whom  Ammonius  communicated  his  more  important  doctrines,

imposing  on  them  the  obligations  of  secrecy,  as  was  done  before  him  by  2oroaster  and  Pythagoras,  and  in  the  Mysteries  [where  an  oath  was  required  from  the  neophytes  or  catechumens  not  to  divulge  what  they  had  learned].  The  great  Pytha-  goras divided  his  teachings  into  exoteric  and  esoteric.

i

Has  not  Jesus  done  the  same,  since  He  declared  to  His  disciples  that  to  them  it  was  given  to  know  the  mysteries  of  the  kingdom  of  heaven,  whereas  to  the  multitudes  it  was  not  given,  and  therefore  He  spoke  in  parables  which  had  a  two-fold  meaning  ?

Dr.  A.  Wilder  proceeds  :

Thus  Ammonius  found  his  work  ready  to  his  hand  His  deep  spiritual  intuition,  his  extensive  learning,  and  his  familiarity  with  the  Christian  fathers,  Pantaenus,  Clement  and  Athenagoras,  and  with  the  most  erudite  philosophers  of  the  time,  all  fitted  him  for  the  labour  he  performed  so  thoroughly.

.  .  .  The  results  of  his  ministration  are  per-  ceptible at  the  present  day  in  every  country  of  the  Christian  world  ,  every  prominent  system  of  doctrine  now  bearing  the  marks  of  his  plastic  hand  Every  ancient  philosophy  has  had  its  votaries  among  the  moderns  ;  and  even  Judaism,  oldest  of  them  all,  has  taken  upon  itself  changes  which  were  suggested  by  the  "  God-taught  "  Alexandrian  -

The  Neo-Platonic  School  of  Alexandria  founded  by  Ammonius — the  prototype  proposed  for  The  Theosophical  Society — taught  Theurgy  and  Magic,  as  much  as  they  were  taught  in  the  days  of  Pythagoras,  and  by  others  far  earlier  than  his  period.

For  Proclus  says  that  the  doctrines  of  Orpheus,  who  was  an  Indian  and  came  from  India,  were  the  origin  of  the  systems  afterwards  promulgated.

What  Orpheus  delivered  in  hidden  allegories,  Pythagoras  learned  when  he  was  initiated  into  the  Orphic  Mysteries  ,  and  Plato  next  received  a  perfect  knowledge  of  them  from  Orphic  and  Pythagorean  writings.'

The  Philaletheians  had  their  division  into  neophytes  (die/as)  and  Initiates,  or  Masters  ;  and  the  eclectic  system  was  characterised  by  three  distinct  features,  which  are  purely  Vedantic  ;  a  Supreme  Essence,  One  and  Universal ;  the  eternity  and  indivisibility  of  the  human  spirit ;  and  Theurgy,  which  is  Mantricism.

So  also,  as  we  have  seen,  they  had  their  secret  or  Esoteric  teachings  like  any  other  mystic  school.

Nor  were  they  allowed  to  reveal  anything  of  their  secret  tenets,  any  more  than  were  the  Initiates  of  the  Mysteries.

Only  the  penalties  incurred  by  the  revealers  of  the  secrets  of  the  latter  were  far

1  Op.  at,  p.  7  -'Ibid  *  Op.  at.,  p.  18,

THE  POST-CHRISTIAN  SUCCESSORS  TO  THE  MYSTERIES

more  terrible,   and   this  prohibition  has  survived  to  this  day,  not  only  in  India,  but  even  among  the  Jewish  Kabalists  in  Asia.

One  of  the  reasons  for  such  secrecy  may  be  the  undoubtedly  serious  difficulties  and  hardships  of  chelaship,  and  the  dangers  attending  Initiation.

The  modern  candidate  has,  like  his  predecessor  of  old,  either  to  conquer  or  die  ;  when,  which  is  still  worse,  he  does  not  lose  his  reason.

There  is  no  danger  to  him  who  is  true  and  sincere,  and,  especially,  unselfish.

For  he  is  thus  prepared  beforehand  to  meet  any  temptation.

He  who  fully  recognised  the  power  of  his  immortal  spirit,  and  never  doubted  for  one  moment  its  omnipotent  protection,  had  naught  to  fear  But  woe  to  the  candidate  in  whom  the  slightest  physical  fear — sickly  child  of  matter — made  him  lose  sight  and  faith  in  his  own  invulnerability.

He  who  was  not  wholly  confident  of  his  moral  fitness  to  accept  the  burden  of  these  tremendous  secrets  was  doomed  -'

There  were  no  such  dangers  in  Neo-Platonic  Initiations.

The  selfish  and  the  unworthy  failed  in  their  object,  and  in  the  failure  was  the  punishment.

The  chief  aim  was  "reunion  of  the  part  with  the  all."  This  All  was  One,  with  numberless  names.

Whether  called  Du/,  the  "  bright  Lord  of  Heaven  "  by  the  Aryan  ;  /ao,  by  the  Chaldean  and  Kabalist  ;  labe  by  the  Samaritan  ;  the  Tiu  or  Juisco  by  the  Northman  ,  Duw,  by  the  Briton  ;  Zeus,  by  the  Thracian  or  Jupiter  by  the  Roman — it  was  the  Being,  the  Fac/t,  One  and  Supreme/  the  unborn  and  the  inexhaustible  source  of  every  emanation,  the  fountain  of  life  and  light  eternal,  a  Ray  of  which  every  one  of  us  carries  in  him  on  this  earth.

The  knowledge  of  this  Mystery  had  reached  the  Neo-  Platonists  from  India  through  Pythagoras,  and  still  later  through  Apollonius  of  Tyana,  and  the  rules  and  methods  for  producing  ecstasy  had  come  from  the  same  lore  of  the  divine  Vidya,  the  Gnosis.

For  Aryavarta,  the  bright  focus  into  which  had  been  poured  in  the  beginning  of  time  the  flames  of  Divine

1  The  Jalmud  gives  the  story  of  the  four  Tanaim,  who  are  made,  in  allegorical  terms,  to  enter  into  the  garden  of  delight,  i  e  ,  to  be  initiated  into  the  occult  and  final  science

"  According  to  the  teaching  of  our  holy  masters  the  names  of  the  four  who  entered  the  garden  of  delight,  are  Ben  Asai,  Ben  Zoma,  Acher,  and  Rabbi  Aktba  .  .

"  Ben  Asai  looked  and — lost  his  sight

"  Ben  Zoma  looked  and-  lost  his  reason

"Acher  made  depredations  in  the  plantation  "  (mixed  up  the  whole  and  failed)  "  But  Akiba,  who  had  entered  in  peace  came  out  of  it  in  peace  ,  for  the  saint,  whose  name  be  blessed,  had  said,  '  This  old  man  is  worthy  of  serving  us  with  glory  '

"  The  learned  commentators  of  the  Talmud,  the  Rabbis  of  the  synagogue,  explain  that  the  garden  of  delight,  in  which  those  four  personages  are  made  to  enter,  is  but  that  mysterious  science,  the  most  terrible  of  sciences  for  weak  intellects,  which  it  leads  directly  to  insanity,"  says  A  Franck,  in  his  Kabbalah  It  is  not  the  pure  at  heart  and  he  who  studies  but  with  a  view  to  perfecting  himself  and  so  more  easily  acquiring  the  promised  immortality,  who  need  have  any  fear  ,  but  rather  he  who  makes  of  the  science  of  sciences  a  sinful  pretext  for  worldly  motives,  who  should  tremble  The  latter  will  never  understand  the  kabalistic  evocations  of  the  supreme  initiation  —  Isis  Unveiled,  II.  p

2  Is/s  Unveiled,  II,  p    119  {  See  New  Platonism.

p

FF

306  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Wisdom,   had  become  the  centre  from  which  radiated  the  "  tongues  of  fire  "  into  every  portion  of  the  globe.

What  was  Samadhi  but  that

sublime  ecstasy,  in  which  state  things  divine  and  the  mysteries  of  Nature  are  revealed  to  us,

of  which  Porphyry  speaks  ?

The  efflux  from  the  divine  soul  is  imparted  to  the  human  spirit  in  unreserved  abundance,  accomplishing  for  the  soul  a  union  with  the  divine,  and  enabling  it  while  in  the  body  to  be  partaker  of  the  life  which  is  not  in  the  body,

he  explains  elsewhere.

Thus  under  the  title  of  Magic  was  taught  every  Science,  physical  and  metaphysical,  natural  or  deemed  supernatural  by  those  who  are  ignorant  of  the  omnipresence  and  universality  of  Nature.

Divine  Magic  makes  of  man  a  God ,   human  magic  creates  a  new  fiend

We  wrote  in  /si's  Unveiled  :

In  the  oldest  documents  now  in  the  possession  of  the  world — the  Vedas  and  the  older  laws  of  Manu — we  find  many  magical  rites  practised  and  permitted  by  the  Brahmans.1  Tibet,  Japan,  and  China,  teach  in  the  present  age  that  which  was  taught  by  the  oldest  Chaldeans.

The  clergy  of  these  respective  countries  prove  moreover  what  they  teach — namely,  that  the  practice  of  moral  and  physical  purity,  and  of  certain  austerities,  developes  the  vital  soul-power  of  self-illumination.

Affording  to  man  the  control  over  his  own  immortal  spirit,  it  gives  him  truly  magical  powers  over  the  elementary  spirits  inferior  to  himself.

In  the  West  we  find  magic  of  as  high  an  anti-  quity as  in  the  East.

The  Druids  of  Great  Britain  practised  it  in  the  silent  crypts  of  their  deep  caves  ,  and  Pliny  devotes  many  a  chapter  to  the  "  wisdom  "  •'  of  the  leaders  of  the  Celts  The  Semothees — the  Druids  of  the  Gauls — expounded  the  physical  as  well  as  the  spiritual  sciences.

They  taught  the  secrets  of  the  universe,  the  harmonious  progress  of  the  heavenly  bodies,  the  formation  of  the  earth,  and  above  all — the  immortality  of  the  Soul.1  In  their  sacred  groves — natural  academies  built  by  the  hand  of  the  Invisible  Architect — the  initiates  assembled  at  the  still  hour  of  midnight,  to  learn  about  what  man  once  was,  and  what  he  will  be  *  They  needed  no  artificial  illumination,  nor  life-drawing  gas.

to  light  up  their  temples,  for  the  chaste  goddess  of  night  beamed  her  most  silvery  rays  on  their  oak-crowned  heads  ,  and  their  white-robed  sacred  bards  knew  how  to  converse  with  the  solitary  queen  of  the  starry  vault  '

During  the  palmy  days  of  Neo-Platonism  these  Bards  were  no  more,  for  their  cycle  had  run  its  course,  and  the  last  of  the  Druids  had  perished  at  Bibractis  and  Alesia.

But  the  Neo-Platonic  school  was  for  a  long  time  suc-  cessful, powerful  and  prosperous.

Still,  while  adopting  Aryan  Wisdom  in  its  doctrines,  the  school  failed  to  follow  the  wisdom  of  the  Brahmans  in  practice.

It  showed  its  moral  and  intellectual  superiority  too  openly,  caring  too  much  for  the  great  and  powerful  of  this  earth.

While  the  Brahmans  and  their  great

1  See  the  Code  published  by  Sir  William  Jones,  Ch.  ix,  p.

'-  Pliny     Hist.

Nat  ,  xxx,  1  .  Ib.,  xvi.

14  ,  xxv,  9,  etc

1  Pompontus  ascribes  to  them  the  knowledge  of  the  highest  sciences.

4  Caesar,  in,  14.  '  Pliny,  xxx     Isis  Unveiled,  \,  p

THE  POST-CHRISTIAN  SUCCESSORS  TO  THE  MYSTERIES

Yogis — experts  in  matters  of  philosophy,  metaphysics,  astronomy,  morals  and  religion — preserved  their  dignity  under  the  sway  of  the  most  powerful  princes,  remained  aloof  from  the  world  and  would  not  condescend  to  visit  them  or  ask  for  the  slightest  favour,1  the  Emperors  Alexander  Severus,  and  Julian,  and  the  greatest  among  the  aristocracy  of  the  land,  embraced  the  tenets  of  the  Neo-Platonists,  who  mixed  freely  with  the  world.

The  system  flourished  for  several  centuries  and  comprised  within  the  ranks  of  its  followers  the  ablest  and  most  learned  among  the  men  of  the  time  ;  Hypatia,  the  teacher  of  the  Bishop  Synesius,  was  one  of  the  ornaments  of  the  School  until  the  fatal  and  shameful  day  when  she  was  murdered  by  the  Christian  mob  at  the  instigation  of  Bishop  Cyril  of  Alexandria.

The  school  was  finally  removed  to  Athens,  and  closed  by  order  of  the  Emperor  Justinian.

How  accurate  is  Dr.  Wilder's  remark  that :

Modern  writers  have  commented  upon  the  peculiar  views  of  the  Neo-Platonists  upon  these  [metaphysical]  subjects,  seldom  representing  them  correctly,  even  if  this  was  desired  or  intended.

The  few  speculations  on  the  sublunary,  material,  and  spiritual  universes  that  they  did  put  into  writing — Ammonius  never  having  himself  written  a  line,  after  the  wont  of  reformers — could  not  enable  posterity  to  judge  them  rightly,  even  had  not  the  early  Christian  Vandals,  the  later  crusaders,  and  the  fanatics  of  the  Middle  Ages,  destroyed  three  parts  of  that  which  remained  of  the  Alexandrian  Library  and  its  later  schools.

Professor  Draper  shows  that  Cardinal  Ximenes  alone

delivered  to  the  flames  in  the  squares  of  Granada  eighty  thousand  Arabic  manuscripts,  many  of  them  translations  of  classical  authors

In  the  Vatican  Library,  whole  passages  in  the  most  rare  and  precious  treatises  of  the  Ancients  were  found  erased  and  blotted  out,  "  for  the  sake  of  interlining  them  with  absurd  psalmodies  !  "  Moreover  it  is  well  known  that  over  thirty-six  volumes  written  by  Porphyry  were  burnt  and  otherwise  des-  troyed by  the  "  Fathers."  Most  of  the  little  that  is  known  of  the  doctrines  of  the  Eclectics  is  found  in  the  writings  of  Plotmus  and  of  those  same  Church  Fathers.

1  "  The  care  which  they  took  in  educating  youth,  in  familiarizing  it  with  generous  and  virtuous  sentiments,   did  them  peculiar  honour,  and  their  maxims  and  discourses,  as  recorded  by  historians,  prove  that  they  were  expert  in  matters  of  philosophy,  metaphysics,  astronomy,  morality  and  religion,"  says  a  modern 'writer.

"  If  kings  or  princes  desired  the  advice  or  the  blessings  of  the  holy  men,  they  were  either  obliged  to  go  themselves,  or  to  send  messengers.

To  these  men  no  secret  power  of  either  plant  or  mineral  was  unknown.

They  had  fathomed  nature  to  its  depths,  while  psychology  and  physiology  were  to  them  open  books,  and  the  result  was  that  science  that  is  now  termed,  so  super-  ciliously, magic."

2  Op.  at ,  p.  9.

308  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Says  the  author  of  New  Platonism  :

What  Plato  was  to  Socrates,  and  the  Apostle  John  to  the  head  of  the  Christian  faith,  Plotinus  became  to  the  God-taught  Ammonius.

To  Plotinus,  Ongenes,  and  Longmus  we  are  indebted  for  what  is  known  of  the  Philaletheian  system.

They  were  duly  instructed,  initiated  and  entrusted  with  the  interior  doctrines.

This  accounts  marvellously  for  Origen's  calling  people  "  idiots  "  who  believe  in  the  Garden  of  Eden  and  Adam  and  Eve  fables  ;  as  also  for  the  fact  that  so  few  of  the  writings  of  that  Church  Father  have  passed  to  posterity.

Between  the  secrecy  imposed,  the  vows  of  silence  and  that  which  was  maliciously  destroyed  by  every  foul  means,  it  is  indeed  miraculous  that  even  so  much  of  the  Philaletheian  tenets  has  reached  the  world.

lOp   at,  p    11.

SECTION

SYMBOLISM  OF  SUN  AND  STARS

AND  the  Heaven  was  visible  in  Seven  Circles  and  the  planets  appeared  with  all  their  signs,  in  star-form,  and  the  stars  were  divided  and  numbered  with  the  rulers  that  were  in  them  and  their  revolving  course,  through  the  agency  of  the  divine  Spirit '

Here  Spirit  denotes  Pneuma,  collective  Deity,  manifested  in  its  "  Builders,"  or,  as  the  Church  has  it,  "the  seven  Spirits  of  the  Presence,"  the  mediantibus  angelis  of  whom  Thomas  Aquinas  says  that  "  God  never  works  but  through  them."

These  seven  "  rulers"  or  mediating  Angels  were  the  Kabiri  Gods  of  the  Ancients.

This  was  so  evident,  that  it  forced  from  the  Church,  together  with  the  admission  of  the  fact,  an  explanation  and  a  theory,  whose  clumsiness  and  evident  sophistry  are  such  that  it  must  fail  to  impress.

The  world  is  asked  to  believe,  that  while  the  Planetary  Angels  of  the  Church  are  divine  Beings,  the  genuine  "  Seraphim,"  2  these  very  same  angels,  under  identical  names  and  planets,  were  and  are  "  false  " — as  Gods  of  the  ancients.

They  are  no  better  than  pretenders ;  the  cunning  copies  of  the  real  Angels,  produced  beforehand  through  the  craft  and  power  of  Lucifer  and  of  the  fallen  Angels.

Now,  what  are  the  Kabiri  ?

Kabiri,  as  a  name,  is  derived  from  Habir  TJn,  great,  and  also  from  Venus,  this  Goddess  being  called  to  the  present  day  Kabar,  as  is  also  her  star.

The  Kabiri  were  worshipped  at  Hebron,  the  city  of  the  Anakim,  or  anakas  (kings,  princes).  They  are  the  highest  Planetary  Spirits,  the  "greatest  Gods"  and  "the  powerful."  Varro,  following  Orpheus,  calls  these  Gods  evSwarol  [good  forces],  "divine  Powers."  The  word  Kabirim  when  applied  to  men,  and  the  words  Heber,  Gheber  (with  reference  to  Nimrod,  or  the  "  giants  "  of  Genesis,  vi)  and  Kabir,  are  all  derived  from  the  "mysterious  Word" — the  Ineffable

1  Hermes,  iv,  6.

2  From  Sarapfi   Tjrjtt?  "fiery,   burning,"   plural  (see  Isaiah,  vi,  2-6)      They  are  regarded  as  the  personal  attendants  of  the  Almighty,  "  his  messengers,"  angels  or  metatrons      In  Revelation  they  are  the  "  seven  burning  lamps  "  in  attendance  before  the  throne

310  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

and  the  "  Unpronounceable."  Thus  it  is  they  who  represent  tsaba,  the  "  host  of  heaven."  The  Church,  however,  bowing  before  the  angel  Anael  (the  regent  of  Venus),1  connects  the 'planet  Venus  with  Lucifer,  the  chief  of  the  rebels  under  Satan — so  poetically  apostrophized  by  the  prophet  Isaiah  as  "  O  Lucifer,  son  of  the  morning."  2  All  the  Mystery  Gods  were  Kabiri.

As  these  "  seven  lictors  "  relate  directly  to  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE  their  real  status  is  of  the  greatest  importance.

Suidas  defines  the  Kabiri  as  the  Gods  who  command  all  the  other  daemons  (Spirits),  tcafieipovs  Salpovas  [Kabeirous  daimonas].  Macrobius  introduces  them  as

Those  Penates  and  tutelary  deities,  through  whom  we  live  and  learn  and  know  (Saturn,  I,  iii,  ch.  iv).

The  teraphim  through  which  the  Hebrews  consulted  the  oracles  of  the  Urim  and  the  Thummim,  were  the  symbolical  hieroglyphics  of  the  Kabiri.

Nevertheless,  the  good  Fathers  have  made  of  Kabir  the  synonym  of  devil  and  of  daimon  (spirit)  a  demon.

The  Mysteries  of  the  Kabiri  at  Hebron  (Pagan  and  Jewish)  were  presided  over  by  the  seven  Planetary  Gods,  among  the  rest  by  Jupiter  and  Saturn  under  their  mystery  names,  and  they  are  referred  to  as  afto^e/ao-o?  [axiochersos]  and  dgioxepo-a  [axiochersa],  and  by  Euripides  as  afto%/)ea>?  o  0eo5  [the  most  noteworthy  god].  Creuzer,  moreover,  shows  that  whether  in  Phoenicia  or  in  Egypt,  the  Kabiri  were  always  the  seven  planets  as  known  in  antiquity,  who,  together  with  their  Father  the  Sun — referred  to  elsewhere  as  their  "elder  brother" — composed  a  powerful  ogdoad  ; 3  the  eight  superior  powers,  as  TrapeSol  [Paredoi],  or  solar  assessors,  danced  around  him  the  sacred  circular  dance,  the  symbol  of  the  rotation  of  the  planets  around  the  Sun.

Jehovah  and  Saturn,  moreover,  are  one.

It  is  quite  natural,  therefore,  to  find  a  French  writer,  D'Anselme,  applying  the  same  terms  of  afto^ep<ro9  and  afto^e/oo-a  to  Jehovah  and  his  word,  and  they  are  correctly  so  applied.

For  if  the  "  circle  dance  "  pre-  scribed by  the  Amazons  for  the  Mysteries — being  the  "  circle  dance  "  of  the  planets,  and  characterized  as  "  the  motion  of  the  divine  Spirit  carried  on  the

1  Venus  with  the  Chaldeans  and  Egyptians  was  the  wife  of  Proteus,  and  is  regarded  as  the  mother  of  the  Kabiri,  the  sons  of  Phta  or  Emepth — the  divine  light  or  the  Sun.

The  angels  answer  to  the  stars  in  the  following  order.

The  Sun,  the  Moon,  Mars,  Venus,  Mercury,  Jupiter,  and  Saturn  ,  Michael,  Gabriel,  Samael,  Anael,  Raphael,  Zachanel,  and  Orifiel  .  this  is  in  religion  and  Christian  Kabalism  ,  astrologically  and  esoterically  the  places  of  the  "  regents  "  stand  otherwise,  as  also  in  the  Jewish,  or  rather  the  real  Chaldean  Kabalah.

'  Loc.

cit,  xiv,  12.

3  This  is  one  more  proof  that  the  Ancients  knew  of  seven  planets  besides  the  Sun  ;  for  otherwise  which  is  the  eighth  in  such  a  case  ?  The  seventh,  with  two  others,  as  stated,  were  "  mystery  "  planets,  whether  Uranus  or  any  other.

SYMBOLISM  OF  SUN  AND  STARS

-waves  of  the  great  Deep  " — can  now  be  called  "  infernal  "  and  "  lascivious  "  when  performed  by  the  Pagans,  then  the  same  epithets  ought  to  be  applied  to  David's  dance ;  1  and  to  the  dance  of  the  daughters  of  Shiloh,2  and  to  the  leaping  of  the  prophets  of  Baal  ;  '  they  were  all  identical  and  all  belonged  to  Sabean  worship.

King  David's  dance,  during  which  he  uncovered  himself  before  his  maid-servants  in  a  public  thoroughfare,  saying  :

I  will  play  (act  wantonly)  before  the  Lord  fltPP  [Jehovah],  and  I  will  yet  be  more  vile  than  this,

was  certainly  more  reprehensible  than  any  "  circle  dance  "  during  the  Mys-  teries, or  even  than  the  modern  Rasa  Mandala  in  India,4  which  is  the  same  thing.

It  was  David  who  introduced  Jehovistic  worship  into  Judea,  after  sojourning  so  long  among  the  Tyrians  and  Philistines,  where  these  rites  were  common.

David  knew  nothing  of  Moses  ;  and  if  he  introduced  the  Jehovah-worship,  it  was  not  in  its  monotheistic  character,  but  simply  as  that  of  one  of  the  many  (Kabirean)  gods  of  the  neighbouring  nations,  a  tutelary  deity  of  his  own  n7J"P,  to  whom  he  had  given  the  preference--whom  he  had  chosen  among  "  all  other  (Kabiri)  gods,"  '

and  who  was  one  of  the  "  associates,"  Chabir,  of  the  Sun.

The  Shakers  dance  the  "  circle  dance  "  to  this  day  when  turning  round  for  the  Holy  Ghost  to  move  them.

In  India  it  is  Nara-yana  who  is  "  the  mover  on  the  waters  "  ;  and  Narayana  is  Vishnu  in  his  secondary  form,  and  Vishnu  has  Krishna  for  an  Avatara,  in  whose  honour  the  "  circle  dance  "  is  still  enacted  by  the  Nach-  girls  of  the  temples,  he  being  the  Sun-God  and  they  the  planets  as  symbolised  by  the  Gopis.

Let  the  reader  turn  to  the  works  of  De  Mirville,  a  Roman  Catholic  writer,  or  to  Monumental  Christianity,  by  Dr.  Lundy,  a  Protestant  divine,  if  he  wants  to  appreciate  to  any  degree  the  subtlety  and  casuistry  of  their  reasonings.

No  one  ignorant  of  the  occult  versions  can  fail  to  be  impressed  with  the  proofs  brought  forward  to  show  how  cleverly  and  perseveringly  "  Satan  has  worked  for  long  millenniums  to  tempt  a  humanity  "  unblessed  with  an  infallible  Church,  in  order  to  have  himself  recognised  as  the  "  One  living  God,"  and  his  fiends  as  holy  Angels.

The  reader  must  be  patient,  and  study  with  attention  what  the  author  says  on  behalf  of  his  Church.

To  compare  it  the  better

1  II   Sam.,  vi,  20-2.  -  Judges,  xxi,  21,  et  seq,  1  I.  Kings,  xvm,  26.

4  This  dance — the  Rasa  Mandala,  enacted  by  the  Gopis  or  shepherdesses  of  Krishna,  the  Sun-  God,  is  enacted  to  this  day  in  RajputSna  in  India,  and  is  undeniably  the  same  theo-astronomical  and  symbolical  dance  of  the  planets  and  the  Zodiacal  signs,  that  was  danced  thousands  of  years  before  our  era

»  /s/s  Unveiled.

II,  p.  45.

312  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

with  the  version  of  the  Occultists,  a  few  points  may  be  quoted  here  verbatim.

St  Peter  tells  us  •  "  May  the  divine  Lucifer  arise  in  your  hearts  "  '  [Now  the  Sun  is  Christ].  .  "  I  will  send  my  Son  from  the  Sun,"  said  the  Eternal  through  the  voice  of  prophetic  traditions ,  and  prophecy  having  become  history  the  Evangelists  repeated  in  their  turn  .  the  Sun  rising  from  on  high  visited  us.

Now  God  says,  through  Malachi,  that  the  Sun  shall  arise  for  those  who  fear  his  name.

What  Malachi  meant  by  "  the  Sun  of  Righteousness  "  the  Kabalists  alone  can  tell  ;  but  what  the  Greek,  and  even  the  Protestant,  theo-  logians understood  by  the  term  is  of  course  Christ,  referred  to  metaphorically.

Only,  as  the  sentence,  "  I  will  send  my  Son  from  the  Sun,"  is  borrowed  verbatim  from  a  Sibylline  Book,  it  becomes  very  hard  to  understand  how  it  can  be  attributed  to,  or  classed  with  any  prophecy  relating  to  the  Christian  Saviour,  unless,  indeed,  the  latter  is  to  be  identified  with  Apollo.

Virgil,  again,  says,  "  Here  comes  the  Virgin's  and  Apollo's  reign,"  and  Apollo,  or  Apollyon,  is  to  this  day  viewed  as  a  form  of  Satan,  and  is  taken  to  mean  the  Antichrist.

If  the  Sibylline  promise,  "  He  will  send  his  Son  from  the  Sun  "  applies  to  Christ,  then  either  Christ  and  Apollo  are  one — and  then  why  call  the  latter  a  demon  ? — or  the  prophecy  had  nothing  to  do  with  the  Christian-  Saviour,  and,  in  such  a  case,  why  appropriate  it  at  all  ?

But  De  Mirville  goes  further.

He  shows  us  St.  Denys,  the  Areopagite,  affirming  that

The   Sun   is  the  special  signification,   and  the  statue  of  God  '  It  is  by  the

Eastern  door  that  the  glory  of  the  Lord  penetrated  into  the  temples  [of  the  Jews  and  Christians,  that  divine  glory  being  Sun-light.]  .  .  .  "  We  build  our  churches  towards  the  east,"  says  in  his  turn  St.  Ambrose,  "  for  during  the  Mysteries  we  begin  by  renoun-  cing him  who  is  in  the  west."

"  He  who  is  in  the  west "  is  Typhon,  the  Egyptian  god  of  darkness — the  west  having  been  held  by  them  as  the  "  Typhonic  Gate  of  Death."  Thus,

Ml  Epistle,  i.  19  The  English  text  says  "until  the  day-star  arise  in  your  hearts,"  a  trifling  alteration  which  does  not  really  matter — as  Lucifer  is  the  day  as  well  as  the  "  morning  "  star — and  it  is  less  shocking  to  pious  ears.

There  are  a  number  of  such  alterations  in  the  Protestant  Bibles.

3  Again  the  English  translation  changes  the  word  "Sun"  into  "day-spring"  The  Roman  Catholics  are  decidedly  braver  and  more  sincere  than  the  Protestant  theologians  Oes  Espnts,  Tome  iv,  pp.  34-8.

3  Thus  said  the  Egyptians  and  the  Sabeans  in  days  of  old,  the  symbol  of  whose  manifested  gods,  Osiris  and  Bel,  was  the  sun.

But  they  had  a  higher  deity

SYMBOLISM  OF  SUN  AND  STARS

having   borrowed  Osiris  from  the  Egyptians,  the  Church  Fathers  thought  little  of  helping  themselves  to  his  brother  Typhon.

Then  again  :

The  prophet  Baruch  l  speaks  of  the  stars  that  rejoice  in  their  vessels  and  citadels  (Ch  iii )  ;  and  Ecc/es/astes  applies  the  same  terms  to  the  sun,  which  is  said  to  be  "the  admirable  vessel  of  the  most  High,"  and  the  "  citadel  of  the  Lord  "  <pv\a%7)*

In  every  case  there  is  no  doubt  about  the  thing,  for  the  sacred  writer  says,  It  is  a  Spirit  who  rules  the  sun's  course  Hear  what  he  says  (in  Ecc/es.,  i,  5-6),  "  The  sun  also  ariseth—  and  its  spirit  lighting  all  in  its  circular  path  (gyrat  gyrans)  returneth  accord-  ing to  his  circuits  "  !  [See  Douay  ]

De  Mirville  seems  to  quote  from  texts  either  rejected  by  or  unknown  to  Protestants,  in  whose  Bible  there  is  no  forty-third  chapter  of  Ecc/es/astes  ;  nor  is  the  sun  made  to  go  "in  circuits"  in  the  latter,  but  the  wind.

This  is  a  question  to  be  settled  between  the  Roman  and  the  Protestant  Churches.

Our  point  is  the  strong  element  of  Sabeanism  or  Heliolatry  present  in  Christianity.

An  CEcumenical  Council  having  authoritatively  put  a  stop  to  Christian  Astrolatry  by  declaring  that  there  were  no  sidereal  Souls  in  sun,  moon,  or  planets,  St.  Thomas  took  upon  himself  to  settle  the  point  in  dispute.

The  "angelic  doctor"  announced  that  such  expressions  did  not  mean  a  "soul,"  but  only  an  Intelligence,  not  resident  in  the  sun  or  stars,  but  one  that  assisted  them,  "a  guiding  and  directing  intelligence."

Thereupon  the  author,  comforted  by  the  explanation,  quotes  Clement  the  Alexandrian,  and  reminds  the  reader  of  the  opinion  of  that  philosopher,  the  inter-relation  that  exists  "  between  the  seven  branches  of  the  candlestick  — the  seven  stars  of  the  Revelation,"  and  the  sun  •

The  six  branches  (says  Clement)  fixed  to  the  central  candlestick  have  lamps,  but  the  sun  placed  in  the  midst  of  the  wandering  ones  (TrXavrjrwv)  pours  his  beams  on  them  all ,  this  golden  candlestick  hides  one  more  mystery  it  is  the  sign  of  Christ,  not  only  in  shape,  but  because  he  sheds  his  light  through  the  ministry  of  the  seven  spirits  primarily  created,  and  who  are  the  Seven  Eyes  of  the  Lord  '

1  Exiled  from  the  Protestant  Bible  but  left  in  the  Apocrypha  which,  according  to  Article  VI  of  the  Church  of  England,    "  she  doth   read  for  example  of  life  and  instruction  of  manners  "  (?).  but  not  to  establish  any  doctrine

2  Cornelius  a  iapide,  v,

1  Ecc/es/ast/cus,  xlm  The  above  quotations  are  taken  from  Des  Espnts,  chapter  "  On  Christian  and  Jewish  Solar  Theology,"  Tome  iv,  pp.  35-

4  Nevertheless  the  Church  has  preserved  in  her  most  sacred  rites  the  "  star-rites  "  of  the  Pagan  Initiates  In  the  pre-Christian  Mithraic  Mysteries,  the  candidate  who  overcame  successfully  the  "twelve  Tortures"  which  preceded  the  final  Initiation,  received  a  small  round  cake  or  wafer  of  unleavened  bread,  symbolising  in  one  of  its  meanings,  the  solar  disc,  and  known  as  the  manna  (heavenly  bread).  .  .  A  lamb,  or  a  bull  even,  was  killed,  and  with  the  blood  the  candidate  had  to  be  sprinkled,  as  in  the  case  of  the  Emperor  Julian's  initiation  The  seven  rules  or  mysteries  that  are  represented  in  the  Revelation  (Ch  6),  as  the  seven  seals  which  are  opened  m  order  were  then  de-  livered to  the  newly  born

1  See  Stromata,  Bk   v,  ch.  vi,  p.  241.

314  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Therefore,  argues  de  Mirville,  the  principal  planets  are  to  the  seven  primeval  spirits,  according  to  St.  Clement,  that  which  the  candlestick-sun  is  to  Christ  Himself,  namely  —  their  vessels,

Plain  enough,  to  be  sure  ;  though  one  fails  to  see  that  this  explanation  even  helps  the  situation.

The  seven-branched  candelabra  of  the  Israelites,  as  well  as  the  "wanderers  "  of  the  Greeks,  had  a  far  more  natural  meaning,  a  purely  astrological  one  to  begin  with.

In  fact  from  Magi  and  Chaldeans  down  to  the  much-laughed-at  Zadkiel,  every  astrological  work  will  tell  its  reader  that  the  Sun  placed  in  the  midst  of  the  planets,  with  Saturn,  Jupiter  and  Mars  on  one  side,  and  Venus,  Mercury  and  the  Moon  on  the  other,  the  planets'  line  crossing  through  the  whole  Earth,  has  always  meant  what  Hermes  tells  us,  namely,  the  thread  of  destiny,  or  that  whose  action  (influence)  is  called  destiny.1  But  symbol  for  symbol  we  prefer  the  sun  to  a  candlestick.

One  can  understand  how  the  latter  came  to  represent  the  sun  and  planets,  but  no  one  can  admire  the  chosen  symbol.

There  is  poetry  and  grandeur  in  the  sun  when  it  is  made  to  symbolize  the  "  Eye  of  Ormuzd,"  or  of  Osiris,  and  is  regarded  as  the  Vahan  (vehicle)  of  the  highest  Deity.

But  one  must  for  ever  fail  to  perceive  that  any  particular  glory  is  rendered  to  Christ  by  assigning  to  him  the  trunk  of  a  candlestick,2  in  a  Jewish  synagogue,  as  a  mystical  seat  of  honour.

There  are  then  positively  two  suns,  a  sun  adored  and  a  sun  adoring.

The  Apocalypse  proves  it.

The  Word  is  found  in  Ch.  vii,  in  the  angel  who  ascends  with  the  rising  of  the  sun,  having  the  seal  of  the  living  God.

.  .  .  While  commentators  differ  on  the  personality  of  this  angel,  St.  Ambrose  and  many  other  theologians  see  in  him  Christ  himself.

.  .  .  He  is  the  Sun  adored.

But  in  Chap,  xix  we  find  an  angel  standing  in  the  sun,  inviting  all  the  nations  to  gather  to  the  great  supper  of  the  Lamb.

This  time  it  is  literally  and  simply  the  angel  of  the  sun  —  who  cannot  be  mistaken  for  the  "  Word,"  since  the  prophet  distinguishes  him  from  the  Word,  the  King  of  Kings  and  the  Lord  of  Lords.

.  .  The  angel  in  the  sun  seems  to  be  an  adoring  sun.

Who  may  be  the  latter  ?  And  who  else  can  he  be  but  the  Morning  Star,  the  guardian  angel  of  the  Word,  his  ferouer,  or  angel  of  the  face,  as  the  Word  is  the  angel  of  the  Face  (presence)  of  his  Father,  his  principal  attribute  and  strength,  as  his  name  itself  implies  (Mikael),  the  powerful  rector  glorified  by  the  Church,  the  Rector  potens  who  will  fell  the  Antichrist,  the  Vice-Word,  in  short,  who  represents  his  master,  and  seems  to  be  one  with  n/m.'

Yes,  Mikael  is  the  alleged  conqueror  of  Ormuzd,  Osiris,  Apollo,  Krishna,  Mithra,  etc.,  of  all  the  Solar  Gods,  in  short,  known  and  unknown,  now  treated

1  Truly  says  S.  T.  Coleridge  .   "  Instinctively  the  reason  has  always  pointed  out  to  men  the  ultimate  end  of  various  sciences.

.   .     There  is  no  doubt  but  that  astrology  of  some  sort  or  other  will  be  the  last  achievement  of  astronomy  ,  there  must  be  chemical  relations  between  the  planets  .      .  the  differ-  ence of  their  magnitude  compared  with  that  of  their  distances  is  not  explicable  otherwise."     Between  planets  and  our  earth  with  its  mankind,  we  may  add.

2  "  Christ  then,"  the  author  says  (p.  40),  "  is  represented  by  the  trunk  of  the  candlestick."  '  Des  Espo'ts,  Tome  iv,  pp.  41-2.

SYMBOLISM  OF  SUN  AND  STARS

as  demons  and  as  "  Satan."  Nevertheless,  the  "  Conqueror  "  has  not  dis-  dained to  don  the  war-spoils  of  the  vanquished  foes — their  personalities,  attributes,  even  their  names — to  become  the  alter  ego  of  these  demons.

Thus  the  Sun-God  here  is  Honover  or  the  Eternal.

The  prince  is  Ormuzd,  since  he  is  the  first  of  the  seven  Amshaspends  [the  demon  copies  of  the  seven  original  angels]  (caput  angelorum)  ,  the  lamb  (hamal),  the  Shepherd  of  the  Zodiac  and  the  antagonist  of  the  snake.

But  the  Sun  (the  Eye  of  Ormuzd)  has  also  his  rector,  Korshid  or  the  mitraton,  who  is  the  ferouer  of  the  face  of  Ormuzd,  his  Ized,  or  the  morning  star.

The  Mazdeans  had  a  triple  Sun.

.  .  .  For  us  this  Korshid-mitraton  is  the  first  of  the  psychopompian  genii,  and  the  guide  of  the  sun,  the  immolator  of  the  terrestrial  Bull  [or  lamb]  whose  wounds  are  licked  by  the  serpent  [on  the  famous  Mithraic  monument].

St.  Paul,  in  speaking  of  the  rulers  of  this  world,  the  Cosmocratores,  only  said  what  was  said  by  all  the  primitive  Philosophers  of  the  ten  centuries  before  the  Christian  era,  only  he  was  scarcely  understood,  and  was  often  wilfully  misinterpreted.

Damascius  repeats  the  teachings  of  the  Pagan  writers  when  he  explains  that

There  are  seven  series  of  cosmocratores  or  cosmic  forces,  which  are  double  :  the  higher  ones  commissioned  to  support  and  guide  the  superior  world  ;  the  lower  ones,  the  inferior  world  [our  own].

And  he  is  but  saying  what  the  ancients  taught,  lamblichus  gives  this  dogma  of  the  duality  of  all  the  planets  and  celestial  bodies,  of  gods  and  dai-  mons  (spirits).  He  also  divides  the  Archontes  into  two  classes — the  more  and  the  less  spiritual  ;  the  latter  more  connected  with  and  clothed  with  matter,  as  having  a  form,  while  the  former  are  bodiless  (arupa).  But  what  have  Satan  and  his  angels  to  do  with  all  this  ?  Perhaps  only  that  the  identity  of  the  Zoro-  astrian  dogma  with  the  Christian,  and  of  Mithra,  Ormuzd,  and  Ahriman  with  the  Christian  Father,  Son,  and  Devil,  might  be  accounted  for.

And  when  we  say  "  Zoroastrian  dogmas  "  we  mean  the  exoteric  teaching.

How  explain  the  same  relations  between  Mithra  and  Ormuzd  as  those  between  the  Archangel  Mikael  and  Christ  ?

Ahura  Mazda  says  to  holy  Zaratushta  •  "  When  I  created  [emanated]  Mithra  ...  I  created  him  that  he  should  be  invoked  and  adored  equally  with  myself."

For  the  sake  of  necessary  reforms,  the  Zoroastrian  Aryans  transformed  the  Devas,  the  bright  Gods  of  India,  into  devs  or  devils.

It  was  their  Karma  that  in  their  turn  the  Christians  should  vindicate  on  this  point  the  Hindus.

Now  Ormuzd  and  Mithra  have  become  the  devs  of  Christ  and  Mikael,  the  dark  lining  and  aspect  of  the  Saviour  and  Angel,  The  day  of  the  Karma  of  Christian  theology  will  come  in  its  turn.

Already  the  Protestants  have  begun  the  first  chapter  of  the  religion  that  will  seek  to  transform  the  "  Seven  Spirits  "  and  the  host  of  the  Roman  Catholics  into  demons  and  idols.

Every  religion  1  Ibid.,  p.  42.

316  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

has  its  Karma,  as  has  every  individual.

That  which  is  due  to  human  conception  and  is  built  on  the  abasement  of  our  brothers  who  disagree  with  us,  must  have  its  day.

"  There  is  no  religion  higher  than  truth."

The  Zoroastrians,  Mazdeans,  and  Persians  borrowed  their  conceptions  from  India  ;  the  Jews  borrowed  their  theory  of  angels  from  Persia  ;  the  Christians  borrowed  from  the  Jews.

Hence  the  latest  interpretation  by  Christian  theology — to  the  great  dis-  gust of  the  synagogue,  forced  to  share  the  symbolical  candlestick  with  the  hereditary  enemy — that  the  seven-branched  candlestick  represents  the  seven  Churches  of  Asia  and  the  seven  planets  which  are  the  angels  of  those  Churches.

Hence  also,  the  conviction  that  the  Mosaic  Jews,  the  inventors  of  that  symbol  for  their  tabernacle,  were  a  kind  of  Sabeans,  who  blended  their  planets  and  the  spirits  thereof  into  one,  and  called  them — only  far  later — Jehovah.

For  this  we  have  the  testimony  of  Clemens  Alexandrinus,  St.  Hieronymus  and  others.

And  Clement,  as  an  Initiate  of  the  Mysteries — at  which  the  secret  of  the  heliocentric  system  was  taught  several  thousands  of  years  before  Galileo  and  Copernicus — proves  it  by  explaining  that

By  these  various  symbols  connected  with  (sidereal)  phenomena  the  totality  of  all  the  creatures  which  bind  heaven  with  earth,  are  figured  .  .  .  The  candelabrum  represented  the  motion  of  the  seven  luminaries,  describing  their  astral  revolution.

To  the  right  and  the  left  of  that  candelabrum  projected  the  six  branches,  each  of  which  had  its  lamp,  because  the  Sun  placed  as  a  candelabrum  in  the  middle  of  other  planets  distributes  light  to  them  '  ...  As  to  the  cherubs  having  twelve  wings  between  the  two,  they  represent  to  us  the  sensuous  world  in  the  twelve  zodiacal  signs  ~

And  yet,  in  the  face  of  all  this  evidence,  sun,  moon,  planets,  all  are  shown  as  being  demoniacal  before,  and  divine  only  after,  the  appearance  of  Christ,  All  know  the  Orphic  verse :  "It  is  Zeus,  it  is  Adas,  it  is  the  Sun,  it  is  Bac-  chus," these  names  having  been  all  synonymous  for  classic  poets  and  writers.

Thus  for  Democritus  "  Deity  is  but  a  soul  in  an  orbicular  fire,"  and  that  fire  is  the  Son.

For  lamblichus  the  sun  was  "the  image  of  divine  intelligence"  ;  for  Plato  "an  immortal  living  Being."  Hence  the  oracle  of  Claros  when  asked  to  say  who  was  the  Jehovah  of  the  Jews,  answered,  "  It  is  the  Sun."  We  may  add  the  words  in  Psalm,  xix,  4,

In  the  sun  hath  he  placed  a  tabernacle  for  himself*1  ...  his  going  forth  is  from  the  end  of  the  heaven,  and  his  circuit  unto  the  ends  of  it .  and  there  is  nothing  hid  from  the  heat  thereof

1  Notwithstanding  the  above,  written  in  the  earliest  Christian  period  by  the  renegade  Neo-Platonist,  the  Church  persists  to  this  day  in  her  wilful  error  Helpless  against  Galileo,  she  now  tries  to  throw  a  doubt  even  on  the  heliocentric  system  '

y  Stromata,  v,  v»

"*  The  English  Bible  has  "  In  them  (the  Heavens)  hath  he  set  a  tabernacle  for  the  sun,"  which  is  incorrect  and  has  no  sense  in  view  of  the  verse  that  follows,  for  there  are  things  "  hid  from  the  heat  thereof  "  if  the  latter  word  is  to  be  applied  to  the  sun.

SYMBOLISM  OF  SUN  AND  STARS

Jehovah  then  is  the  Sun,  and  thence  also  the  Christ  of  the  Roman  Church.

And  now  the  criticism  of  Dupuis  on  that  verse  becomes  com-  prehensible, as  also  the  despair  of  the  Abbe  Foucher.

"  Nothing  is  more  favourable  to  Sabeanism  than  this  text  of  the  Vulgate  !  "  he  exclaims.

And,  however  disfigured  may  be  the  words  and  sense  in  the  English  authorised  Bible,  the  Vulgate  and  the  Septuagint  both  give  the  correct  text  of  the  ori-  ginal, and  translate  the  latter  :  "  In  the  sun  he  established  his  abode  "  ;  while  the  Vulgate  regards  the  "  heat"  as  coming  direct  from  God  and  not  from  the  sun  alone,  since  it  is  God  who  issues  forth  from,  and  dwells  in  the  sun  and  performs  the  circuit  :  in  sole  posuit  .  .  .  et  ipse  exultavit.

From  these  facts  it  will  be  seen  that  the  Protestants  were  right  in  charging  St.  Justin  with  saying  that

God  has  permitted  us  to  worship  the  sun

And  this,  notwithstanding  the  lame  excuses  that  what  was  really  meant  was  that

God  permitted  himself  to  be  worshipped  in,  or  within,  the  sun,

which  is  all  the  same.

It  will  be  seen  from  the  above,  that  while  the  Pagans  located  in  the  sun  and  planets  only  the  inferior  powers  of  Nature,  the  representative  Spirits,  so  to  say,  of  Apollo,  Bacchus,  Osiris,  and  other  solar  gods,  the  Christians,  in  their  hatred  of  Philosophy,  appropriated  the  sidereal  localities,  and  now  limit  them  to  the  use  of  their  anthropomorphic  deity  and  his  angels — new  transformations  of  the  old,  old  gods.

Something  had  to  be  done  in  order  to  dispose  of  the  ancient  tenants,  so  they  were  disgraced  into  "demons,"  wicked  devils.

[This  Section   contains  the   major  portion   of  the  first  part  of  Section  V,  in  the  1886  MS —Ed.]

SECTION

PAGAN  SIDEREAL  WORSHIP,  OR  ASTROLOGY

THE  Teraphim  of  Abram's  father  Jerah,  the  "  maker  of  images,"  and  the  Kabiri  Gods  are  directly  connected  with  ancient  Sabean  worship  or  Astrolatry.

Kiyun,  or  the  God  Kivan,  worshipped  by  the  Jews  in  the  wilderness,  is  Saturn  and  Shiva,  later  on  called  Jehovah.

Astrology  existed  before  astronomy,  and  Astronomus  was  the  title  of  the  highest  hierophant  in  Egypt.1  One  of  the  names  of  the  Jewish  Jehovah,  "  Sabaoth,"  or  the  "  Lord  of  Hosts  "  (tsabaoth),  belongs  to  the  Chaldean  Sabeans  (or  Tsabaeans),  and  has  for  its  root  the  word  tsab,  meaning  a  "car,"  a  "ship,"  and  "an  army";  Sabaoth  thus  meaning  literally  the  army  of  the  ship,  the  crew,  or  a  naval  host,  the  sky  being  metaphorically  referred  to  as  the  "  upper  ocean  "  in  the  doctrine.

In  his  interesting  volumes,  The  God  of  Moses,  Lacour  explains  that  all  such  words  as

The  celestial  armies  or  the  hosts  of  heaven,  signify  not  only  the  totality  of  the  heavenly  constellations,  but  also  the  Aleim  on  whom  they  are  dependent ,  the  a/e/tzbaout  are  the  forces  or  souls  of  th6  constellations,  the  potencies  that  maintain  and  guide  the  planets  in  this  order  and  procession  ,  .  .  .  the  Jae-va-Tzbaout  signifies  Him,  the  supreme  chief  of  those  celestial  bodies

In  his  collectivity,  as  the  chief  "  Order  of  Spirits,"  not  a  chief  Spirit.

The  Sabeans  having  worshipped  in  the  graven  images  only  the  celestial  hosts — angels  and  gods  whose  habitations  were  the  planets,  never  in  truth  worshipped  the  stars.

For  on  Plato's  authority,  we  know  that  among  the  stars  and  constellations,  the  planets  alone  had  a  right  to  the  title  of  theoi  (Gods),  as  that  name  was  derived  from  the  verb  Oel,  to  run  or  to  circulate.

Seldenus  also  tells  us  that  they  were  likewise  called

0col  fBovXaiOt,  (God-Councillors)  and  pafi&oQopot,  (lictors)  as  they  (the  planets)  were  present  at  the  sun's  consistory,  soils  consistoris  acfstantes.

1  When  the  hieropant  took  his  last  degree,  he  emerged  from  the  sacred  recess  called  Manneras  WBl  •••-•-  -

buried  \

and  was  given  the  golden  Tau,  the  Egyptian  Cross,  which  was  subsequently  placed  on  his  breast,  and  i  with  hm

PAGAN  SIDEREAL  WORSHIP,  OR  ASTROLOGY

Says  the  learned  Kircher :

The  sceptres  the  seven  presiding  angels  were  armed  with,  explain  these  names  of  Rhabdophores  and  lictors  given  to  them

Reduced  to  its  simplest  expression  and  popular  meaning,  this  is  of  course  fetish  worship.

Yet  Esoteric  Astrolatry  was  not  at  all  the  worship  of  idols,  since  under  the  names  of  "Councillors"  and  "Lictors,"  present  at  the  "  Sun's  consistory,"  it  was  not  the  planets  in  their  material  bodies  that  were  meant,  but  their  Regents  or  "Souls"  (Spirits).  If  the  prayer  "Our  Father  in  heaven,"  or  "  Saint"  so-and-so  in  "  Heaven  "  is  not  an  idolatrous  invoca-  tion, then  "Our  Father  in  Mercury,"  or  "Our  Lady  in  Venus,"  "Queen  of  Heaven,"  etc.,  is  no  more  so  ;  for  it  is  precisely  the  same  thing,  the  name  making  no  difference  in  the  act.

The  word  used  in  the  Christian  prayers,  "  in  heaven  "  cannot  mean  anything  abstract,  A  dwelling — whether  of  Gods,  angels  or  Saints  (every  one  of  these  being  anthropomorphic  individualities  and  beings) — must  necessarily  mean  a  locality,  some  defined  spot  in  that  "  heaven"  ,  hence  it  is  quite  immaterial  for  purposes  of  worship  whether  that  spot  be  considered  as  "  heaven  "  in  general,  meaning  nowhere  in  particular,  or  in  the  Sun,  Moon  or  Jupiter.

The  argument  is  futile  that  there  were

Two  deities,  and  two  distinct  hierarchies  or  tsabas  in  heaven,  in  the  ancient  world  as  in  our  modern  times  .  .  .  the  one,  the  living  God  and  his  host,  and  the  other,  Satan,  Lucifer  with  his  councillors  and  lictors,  or  the  fa//en  angels

Our  opponents  say  that  it  is  the  latter  which  Plato  with  the  whole  of  antiquity  worshipped,  and  which  two-thirds  of  humanity  worship  to  this  day.

"  The  whole  question  is  to  know  how  to  discern  between  the  two."

Protestant  Christians  fail  to  find  any  mention  of  angels  in  the  Penta-  teuch, we  may  therefore  leave  them  aside  The  Roman  Catholics  and  the  Kabalists  find  such  mention ;  the  former,  because  they  have-  accepted  Jewish  angelology,  without  suspecting  that  the  "  tsabasan  Hosts"  were  colonists  and  settlers  on  Judean  territory  from  the  lands  of  the  Gentiles  '  the  latter,  because  they  accepted  the  bulk  of  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE,  keeping,  the  kernel  for  themselves  and  leaving  the  husks  to  the  unwary.

Cornelius  a  Lapide  points  out  and  proves  the  meaning  of  the  word  tsaba-  in  the  first  verse  of  Chapter  ii  of  Genesis  ;  and  he  does  so  correctly,  guided,  as  he  probably  was,  by  learned  Kabalists.

The  Protestants  are  certainly  wrong  in  their  contention,  for  angels  are  mentioned  in  the  Pentateuch  under  the  word  tsaba,  which  means  "  hosts  "  of  angels.

In  the  Vulgate  the  word  is  translated  ornatus,  meaning  the  "sidereal  army,"  the  ornament  also  of  the  sky — kabalistically.

The  biblical  scholars  of  the  Protestant  Church,  and  the

320  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

savants   among   the   materialists,  who  failed  to  find  "  angels  "  mentioned  by  Moses,  have  thus  committed  a  serious  error.

For  the  verse  reads  .

Thus  the  heaven  and  the  earth  were  finished  and  all  the  host  of  them,  the   "  host  "   meaning   "  the  army  of  stars  and  angels  "  ,   the  last  two  words  being,   it  seems,  convertible  terms  in  Church  phraseology.

A  Lapide  is  cited  .as  an  authority  for  this  ;   he  says  that

Jsaba  does   not  mean  either  one  or  the  other  but  "  the  one  and  the  other,"  or  both,  siderum  ac  angelorum

If  the  Roman  Catholics  are  right  on  this  point,  so  are  the  Occultists  when  they  claim  that  the  angels  worshipped  in  the  Church  of  Rome  are  none  else  than  their  "  Seven  Planets,"  the  Dhyan  Chohans  of  Buddhistic  Esoteric  Philo-  sophy, or  the  Kumaras,  "  the  mind-born  sons  of  Brahma,"  known  under  the  patronymic  of  Vaidhatra.

The  identity  between  the  Kumaras,  the  Builders  or  cosmic  Dhyan  Chohans,  and  the  Seven  Angels  of  the  Stars,  will  be  found  without  one  single  flaw  if  their  respective  biographies  are  studied,  and  •especially  the  characteristics  of  their  chiefs,  Sanat-Kumara  (Sanat  Sujata),  and  Michael  the  Archangel.

Together  with  the  Kabirim  (Planets),  the  name  of  the  above  in  Chaldea,  they  were  all  "  divine  Powers  "  (Forces).  Fuerot  says  that  the  name  Kabiri  was  used  to  denote  the  seven  sons  of  fT^jy,  meaning  Pater  Sadie,  Cain,  or  Jupiter,  or  again  of  Jehovah.

There  are  seven  Kumaras  — four  exoteric  and  three  secret — the  names  of  the  latter  being  found  in  the  Sankhya  Bhashya,  by  Gaudapadacharya.1  They  are  all  "  Virgin  Gods,"  who  remain  eternally  pure  and  innocent  and  decline  to  create  progeny.

In  their  primitive  aspect,  these  Aryan  seven  "  mind-born  sons  "  of  God  are  not  the  regents  of  the  planets,  but  dwell  far  beyond  the  planetary  region.

But  the  same  mysterious  transference  from  one  character  or  dignity  to  another  is  found  in  the  Christian  Angel-scheme.

The  "  Seven  Spirits  of  the  Presence  "  attend  perpetually  on  God,  and  yet  we  find  them  under  the  same  names  of  Mikael,  Gabriel,  Raphael,  etc.,  as  "  Star-regents  "  or  the  informing  deities  of  the  seven  planets.

Suffice  it  to  say  that  the  Archangel  Michael  is  called  "  the  .invincible  virgin  combatant"  as  he  "refused  to  create,"2  which  would  connect  him  with  both  Sanat  Sujata  and  the  Kumara  who  is  the  God  of  War.

The  above  has  to  be  demonstrated  by  a  few  quotations.

Commenting  upon  St.  John's  "  Seven  Golden  Candlesticks."  Cornelius  a  Lapide  says  :

These  seven  lights  relate  to  the  seven  branches  of  the  candlestick  by  which  were  represented   the  seven  [principal]  planets  in  the  temples  of  Moses  and  Solomon  .   .   .

1  The  three  secret  names  are  "  Sana,  Sanat  Sujata,  and  Kapila  ,  "  while  the  four  exoteric  Gods  are  called,  Sanat  Kumara,  Sananda,  Sanaka  and  Sanatana

-Another  Kumara,  the  "  God  of  War  "  is  called  in  the  Hindu  system  the  "  eternal  celibate  " —  "  the  virgin  warrior  "  He  is  the  Aryan  St  Michael.

PAGAN  SIDEREAL  WORSHIP,  OR  ASTROLOGY

or,   better  still,  to  the  seven  principal  Spirits,  commissioned  to  watch  over  the  salvation  of  men  and  churches

St.  Jerome  says  :

In  truth  the  candlestick  with  the  seven  branches  was  the  type  of  the  world  and  its  planets

St.  Thomas  Aquinas,  the  great  Roman  Catholic  doctor  writes  .

I  do  not  remember  having  ever  met  in  the  works  of  saints  or  philosophers  a  denial  that  the  planets  are  guided  by  spiritual  beings.

...  It  seems  to  me  that  it  may  be  proved  to  demonstration  that  the  celestial  bodies  are  guided  by  some  intelligence,  either  directly  by  God,  or  by  the  mediation  of  angels.

But  the  latter  opinion  seems  to  be  far  more  consonant  with  the  order  of  things  asserted  by  St.  Denys  to  be  without  exception,  that  everything  on  earth  is,  as  a  rule,  governed  by  God  through  intermediary  agencies  l

And  now  let  the  reader  recall  what  the  Pagans  say  of  this.

All  the  classical  authors  and  philosophers  who  have  treated  the  subject  re-  peat, with  Hermes  Trismegistus,  that  the  seven  Rectors — the  planets  in-  cluding the  sun — were  the  associates,  or  the  co-workers,  of  the  Unknown  All  represented  by  the  Derniourgos,  commissioned  to  contain  the  Cosmos  — our  planetary  world — within  seven  circles.

Plutarch  shows  them  re-  presenting "the  circle  of  the  celestial  worlds."  Again,  Denys  of  Thracia  and  the  learned  Clemens  of  Alexandria  both  describe  the  Rectors  as  being  shown  in  the  Egyptian  temples  in  the  shape  of  mysterious  wheels  or  spheres  always  in  motion,  which  made  the  Initiates  affirm  that  the  problem  of  per-  petual motion  had  been  solved  by  the  celestial  wheels  in  the  Initiation  Adyta.2  This  doctrine  of  Hermes  was  that  of  Pythagoras  and  of  Orpheus  before  him.

It  is  called  by  Proclus  "  the  God-given  "  doctrine,  lamblichus  speaks  of  it  with  the  greatest  reverence.

Philostratus  tells  his  readers  that  the  whole  sidereal  court  of  the  Babylonian  heaven  was  represented  in  the  temples,

in  globes  made  df  sapphires  and  supporting  the  golden  images  of  their  respect-  ive gods.

1  We  give  the  original  "  Coelestia  corpora  moveri  a  spiritual)  creature,  a  nemme  Sanctorum  vet  philosophorum,  negatum,  legisse  memmi  (Opusc.

X.  art  tii.)  .  Mihi  autem  videtur,  quod

Demonstrative  probari  posset,  quod  ab  aliquo  mtellectu  corpora  coelestia  moveantur,  vel  a  Deo  immediate,  vet  a  mediantibus  angelis.

Sed  quod  mediantibus  angelis  ea  moveat,  congruit  re  rum  ordine,  quern  Dionysms  mfallibilem  assent,  ut  mfenora  a  Deo  per  Media  secundum  cursum  com-  munem  admimstrentur  "  (Opusc.

II,  art  11),  and  if  so,  and  God  never  meddles  with  the  once-for-ever-  •established  laws  of  Nature,  leaving  it  to  his  administrators,  why  should  their  being  called  Gods  by  the  ' '  heathen  ' '  be  deemed  idolatrous  ?

-  In  one  of  Des  Mousseaux's  volumes  on  Demonology  (Oeuvres  des  Demons  if  we  do  not  mistake  the  statement  of  the  Abb6  Hue)  is  found,  and  the  author  testifies  to  having  heard,  the  following  story  repeatedly  from  the  Abb6  himself.

In  a  lamasery  of  1  ibet,  the  missionary  found  the  following  .

It   is  a  simple  canvas  without  the  slightest  mechanical  apparatus  attached,   as  the  visitor  may

prove  by  examining  it  at  his  leisure.

It  represents  a  moonlit  landscape,  but  the  moon  is  not  at  afl

motionless  and  dead  ,  quite  the  reverse,  for,  according  to  the  Abb6,  one  would  say  that  our  moon  her-

jself,  or  at  least  her  living  double,  lighted  the  picture      Each  phase,  each  aspect,  each  movement  of

FF

322  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

The  temples  of  Persia  were  especially  famous  for  these  representations  If  Cedrenus  can  be  credited

The  Emperor  Heraclius  on  his  entry  into  the  city  of  Bazaeum  was  struck  with  admiration  and  wonder  before  the  immense  machine  fabricated  for  King  Chosroes,  which  represented  the  night-sky  with  the  planets  and  all  their  revolutions,  with  the  angels  presiding  over  them.

It  was  on  such  "  spheres  "  that  Pythagoras  studied  Astronomy  in  the  adyta  arcana  of  the  temples  to  which  he  had  access  And  it  was  there  on  his  Initiation,  that  the  eternal  rotation  of  those  spheres — "  the  mysterious  wheels  "  as  they  are  called  by  Clemens  and  Denys,  and  which  Plutarch  calls  "  world-wheels  " — demonstrated  to  him  the  verity  of  what  had  been  divulged  to  him,  namely,  the  heliocentric  system,  the  great  secret  of  the  Adyta.

All  the  discoveries  of  modern  astronomy,  like  all  the  secrets  that  can  be  revealed  to  it  in  future  ages,  were  contained  in  the  secret  observatories  and  Initiation  Halls  of  the  temples  of  old  India  and  Egypt.

It  is  in  them  that  the  Chaldean  made  his  calculations,  revealing  to  the  world  of  the  profane  no  more  than  it  was  fit  to  receive.

We  may,  and  shall  be  told,  no  doubt,  that  Uranus  was  unknown  to  the  ancients,  and  that  they  were  forced  to  reckon  the  sun  amongst  the  planets  and  as  their  chief.

How  does  anyone  know  ?  Uranus  is  a  modern  name  ;  but  one  thing  is  certain  .  the  ancients  had  a  planet,  "  a  mystery  planet,"  that  they  never  named  and  that  the  highest  Astronomus,  the  Hierophant,  alone  could  "  confabulate  with."  But  this  seventh  planet  was  not  the  sun,  but  the  hidden  Divine  Hierophant,  who  was  said  to  have  a  crown,  and  to  embrace  within  its  wheel  "seventy-seven  smaller  wheels."  In  the  archaic  secret  system  of  the  Hindus,  the  sun  is  the  visible  Logos  "  Surya  "  ,  over  him  there  is  another,  the  divine  or  heavenly  Man — who,  after  having  established  the  system  of  the  world  of  matter  on  the  archetype  of  the  Unseen  Universe,  or  Macrocosm,  conducted  during  the  Mysteries  the  heavenly  Rasa  Mandala  ;  when  he  was  said  :

To  give  with  his  right  foot  the  impulse  to  7yam  or  Bhumi  [Earth]  that  makes  her  rotate  in  a  double  revolution.

our  satellite,  is  repeated  in  her  facsimile,  in  the  movement  and  progress  of  the  moon  in  the  sacred  picture.

"  You  see  this  planet  in  the  painting  ride  as  a  crescent,  or  full,  shine  brightly,  pass  behind  the  clouds,  peep  out  or  set,  in  a  manner  corresponding  in  the  most  extraordinary  way  with  the  real  luminary.

It  is,  m  a  word,  a  most  perfect  and  resplendent  reproduction  of  the  pale  queen  of  the  night,  which  received  the  adoration  of  so  many  people  in  the  days  of  old."  We  know  from  the  most  •reliable  sources  and  numerous  eye-witnesses,  that  such  "  machines  " — not  canvas  paintings — do  exist  in  certain  temples  of  Tibet ,  as  also  the  "  sidereal  wheels  "  representing  the  planets,  and  kept  for  the  same  purposes— astrological  and  magical.

Hue's  statement  was  translated  in  /s/'s  UWe;/ed  (I.  p.  441).  from  Des  Mousseaux's  volume

1  Cedrenus,  p.  338.  Whether  produced  by  clockwork  or  magic  power,  such  machines — whole  celestial  spheres  with  planets  rotating — were  found  m  the  Sanctuaries,  and  some  exist  to  this  day  in  Japan,  in  a  secret  subterranean  temple  of  the  old  Mikados,  as  well  asjn  two  other  places.

PAGAN  SIDEREAL  WORSHIP,  OR  ASTROLOGY

What  says  Hermes  again  ?  When  explaining  Egyptian  Cosmology  he  exclaims :

Listen,  O  my  son  .  .  the  Power  has  also  formed  seven  agents,  who  contain  within  their  circles  the  material  world,  and  whose  action  is  called  destiny  .  When  all  became  subject  to  man,  the  Seven,  willing  to  favour  human  intelligence,  communicated  to  him  their  powers.

But  as  soon  as  man  knew  their  true  essence  and  his  own  nature,  he  desired  to  penetrate  within  and  beyond  the  circles  and  thus  break  their  circum-  ference by  usurping  the  power  of  him  who  has  dominion  over  the  Fire  [Sun]  itself ;  after  which,  having  robbed  one  of  the  Wheels  of  the  Sun  of  the  sacred  fire,  he  fell  into  slavery  '

It  is  not  Prometheus  who  is  meant  here.

Prometheus  is  a  symbol  and  a  personification  of  the  whole  of  mankind  in  relation  to  an  event  which  occurred  during  its  childhood,  so  to  say — the  "  Baptism  by  Fire  "  — which  is  a  mystery  within  the  great  Promethean  Mystery,  one  that  may  be  at  present  mentioned  only  in  its  broad  general  features.

By  reason  of  the  extraordinary  growth  of  human  intellect  and  the  development  in  our  age  of  the  fifth  principle  (Manas)  in  man,  its  rapid  progress  has  paralysed  spiritual  perceptions.

It  is  at  the  expense  of  wisdom  that  intellect  generally  lives,  and  mankind  is  quite  unprepared  in  its  present  condition  to  comprehend  the  awful  drama  of  human  disobedience  to  the  laws  of  Nature  and  the  sub-  sequent Fall,  as  a  result.

It  can  only  be  hinted  at  in  its  place.

1  Champollion's  £gypte  Moderne,  p.  42.

SECTION

THE  SOULS  OF  THE  STARS— UNIVERSAL  HELIOLATRY

IN  order  to  show  that  the  Ancients  have  never  "  mistaken  stars  for  Gods,"  or  Angels  and  the  sun  for  the  highest  Gods  and  God,  but  have  wor-  shipped only  the  Spirit  of  all,  and  have  reverenced  the  minor  Gods  supposed  to  reside  in  the  sun  and  planets — the  difference  between  these  two  worships  has  to  be  pointed  out.

Saturn,  "  the  Father  of  Gods  "  must  not  be  confused  with  his  namesake — the  planet  of  the  same  name  with  its  eight  moons  and  three  rings.

The  two — though  in  one  sense  identical,  as  are,  for  instance,  physical  man  and  his  soul — must  be  separated  in  the  question  of  worship.

This  has  to  be  done  the  more  carefully  in  the  case  of  the  seven  planets  and  their  Spirits,  as  the  whole  formation  of  the  universe  is  attributed  to  them  in  the  Secret  Teachings.

The  same  difference  has  to  be  shown  again  between  the  stars  of  the  Great  Bear,  the  Riksha  and  the  Chitra  Shikhandin,  "  the  bright-crested,"  and  the  Rishis — the  mortal  Sages  who  appeared  on  earth  during  the  Satya  Yuga.

If  all  of  these  have  been  so  far  closely  united  in  the  visions  of  the  seers  of  every  age — the  Bible  seers  included — there  must  have  been  a  reason  for  it.  Nor  need  one  go  back  so  far  as  into  the  periods  of  "  superstition  "  and  "  unscientific  fancies  "  to  find  great  men  in  our  epoch  sharing  in  them.

It  is  well  known  that  Kepler,  the  eminent  astronomer,  in  common  with  many  other  great  men  who  believed  that  the  heavenly  bodies  ruled  favourably  or  adversely  the  fates  of  men  and  nations — fully  credited  besides  this  the  fact  that  all  heavenly  bodies,  even  our  own  earth,  are  endow-  ed with  living  and  thinking  souls.

Le  Couturier's  opinion  is  worthy  of  notice  in  this  relation  :

We  are  too  inclined  to  criticize  unsparingly  everything  concerning  astrology  and  its  ideas  ;  nevertheless  our  criticism,  to  be  one,  ought  at  least  to  know,  lest  it  should  be  proved  aimless,  what  those  ideas  in  truth  are.

And  when,  among  the  men  we  thus  criticize,  we  find  such  names  as  those  of  Regiomontanus,  Tycho  Brahe,  Kepler,  etc.,  there  is  reason  why  we  should  be  careful.

Kepler  was  an  astrologer  by  profession,  and  became  an  astronomer  in  consequence  He  was  earning  his  livelihood  by  genethliac

THE  SOULS  OF  THE  STARS— UNIVERSAL  HELIOLATRY

figures,  which,  indicating  the  state  of  the  heavens  at  the  moment  of  the  birth  of  individuals,  were  a  means  to  which  everyone  resorted  for  horoscopes  That  great  man  was  a  believer  in  the  principles  of  astrology,  without  accepting  all  its  foolish  results  '

But  astrology  is  nevertheless  proclaimed  as  a  sinful  science,  and  together  with  Occultism  is  tabooed  by  the  Churches.

It  is  very  doubtful,  however,  whether  mystic  "  star  worship  "  can  be  so  easily  laughed  down  as  people  imagine — at  any  rate  by  Christians.

The  hosts  of  Angels,  Cherubs  and  Planetary  Archangels  are  identical  with  the  minor  Gods  of  the  Pagans.

As  to  their  "  great  Gods,"  if  Mars  has  been  shown — on  the  admission  of  even  the  enemies  of  the  Pagan  astrologers — to  have  been  regarded  by  the  latter  simply  as  the  personified  strength  of  the  one  highest  impersonal  Deity,  Mercury  being  personified  as  its  omniscience,  Jupiter  as  its  omnipotency,  and  so  on,  then  the  "  superstition  "  of  the  Pagan  has  indeed  become  the  "  relig-  ion "  of  the  masses  of  the  civilized  nations.

For  with  the  latter,  Jehovah  is  the  synthesis  of  the  seven  Elohim,  the  eternal  centre  of  all  those  attributes  and  forces,  the  Alei  of  the  Aleim,  and  the  Adonai  of  the  Adonim.

And  if  with  them  Mars  is  now  called  St.  Michael,  the  "  strength  of  God,"  Mercury  Gabriel,  the  "omniscience  and  fortitude  of  the  Lord,"  and  Raphael  "  the  blessing  or  healing  power  of  God,"  this  is  simply  a  change  of  names,  the  characters  behind  the  masks  remaining  the  same.

The  Dalai-lama's  "  mitre  has  seven  ridges  in  honour  of  the  seven  chief  Dhyani  Buddhas.

In  the  funeral  ritual  of  the  Egyptians  the  defunct  is  made  to  exclaim  :

Salutation   to  you,   O   Princes,  who  stand  in  the  presence  of  Osiris  .  Send

me  the  grace  to  have  my  sins  destroyed,  as  you  have  done  for  the  seven  spirits  who  follow  their  Lord  ! '*

Brahma's  head  is  ornamented  with  seven  rays,  and  he  is  followed  by  the  seven  Rishis,  in  the  seven  Svargas.

China  has  her  seven  Pagodas  ;  the  Greeks  had  their  seven  Cyclops,  seven  Demiourgoi,  and  the  Mystery  Gods,  the  seven  Kabiri,  whose  chief  was  Jupiter-Saturn,  and  with  the  Jews,  Jehovah.

Now  the  latter  Deity  has  become  chief  of  all,  the  highest  and  the  one  God,  and  his  old  place  is  taken  by  Mikael  (Michael).  He  is  the  "  Chief  of  the  Host  "  (tsaba)  ;  the  "  Archistrategus  of  the  Lord's  army  "  ;  the  "  Conqueror  of  the  Devil  " — Victor  diaboli — and  the  "  Archisatrap  of  the  Sacred  Militia,"  he  who  slew  the  "  Great  Dragon."  Astrology  and  Symbology,  having

1  Musee  des  Sciences,  p.  230.

1  [Lama  (Tibetan  bLa-ma)  means  a  superior  One  "  The  title  "  was  originally  restricted  to  heads  of  the  monastery,  and  is  still  strictly  applicable  only  to  abbots  and  the  highest  monks  ,  though  out  of  courtesy  the  title  is  now  given  to  almost  all  Lamaist  monks  and  priests  — Waddell.]

3  Translated  by  the  Vicomte  de  Rougemont.

See  Les  Annales  c/e  Phi/osop/iie  Chretienne,  7th  year,  326  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

unfortunately  no  inducement  to  veil  old  things  with  new  masks,  have  preserv-  ed the  real  name  of  Mikael — "  that  was  Jehovah  " — Mikael  being  the  Angel  of  the  face  of  the  Lord,1  "  the  guardian  of  the  planets,"  and  the  living  image  of  God.

He  represents  the  Deity  in  his  visits  to  earth,  for  as  it  is  well  express-  ed in  Hebrew,  he  is  one  iJNIPQ,  who  is  as  God,  or  who  is  like  unto  God.

It  is  he  who  cast  out  the  serpent.

Mikael,  being  the  regent  of  the  planet  Saturn,  is — Saturn.3  His  mystery-  name  is  Sabbathiel,  because  he  presides  over  the  Jewish  Sabbath,  as  also  over  the  astrological  Saturday.

Once  identified,  the  reputation  of  the  Christian  conqueror  of  the  devil  is  in  still  greater  danger  from  further  identifications.

Biblical  angels  are  called  Malachim,  the  messengers  between  God  (or  rather  the  gods)  and  men.

In  Hebrew  ^NJD,  Malach,  is  also  "  a  King,"  and  Malech  or  Melech  was  likewise  Moloch,  or  again  Saturn,  the  Seb  of  Egypt,  to  whom  Dies  Saturn/,  or  the  Sabbath,  was  dedicated.

The  Sabeans  separated  and  distinguished  the  planet  Saturn  from  its  God  far  more  than  the  Roman  Catholics  do  their  angels  from  their  stars  ;  and  the  Kabalists  make  of  the  Archangel  Mikael  the  patron  of  the  seventh  work  of  magic.

In  theological  symbolism  .  .  .  Jupiter  [the  Sun]  is  the  risen  and  glorious  Saviour,  and  Saturn,  God  the  Father,  or  the  Jehovah  of  Moses.

says  Eliphas  Levi,  who  ought  to  know.

Jehovah  and  the  Saviour,  Saturn  and  Jupiter,  being  thus  one,  and  Mikael  being  called  the  living  image  of  God,  it  does  seem  dangerous  for  the  Church  to  call  Saturn,  Satan — le  dieu  mauvais.

However,  Rome  is  strong  in  casuistry  and  will  get  out  of  this  as  she  got  out  of  every  other  identification,  with  glory  to  herself  and  to  her  own  full  satisfaction.

Nevertheless  all  her  dogmas  and  rituals  seem  like  so  many  pages  torn  out  from  the  history  of  Occultism,  and  then  distorted.

The  extremely  thin  partition  that  separates  the  Kabalistic  and  Chaldean  Theogony  from  the  Roman  Catholic  Angelology  and  Theodicy  is  now  confessed  by  at  least  one  Roman  Catholic  writer.

One  can  hardly  believe  one's  eyes  in  finding  the  following  (the  passages  italicized  by  us  should  be  carefully  noticed) :

One  of  the  most  characteristic  features  of  our  Holy  Scriptures  is  the  calculated  discretion  used  in  the  enunciation  of  the  mysteries  less  directly  useful  to  salvation.

.  .  .  Thus,  beyond  those  "  myriads  of  myriads  "  of  angelic  creatures  just  noticed5  and

1  Isaiah.

Ixin,  9.     "  The  Angel  of  his  presence  "

2  Chapter  xn,  of  Revelation  .  "  There  was  war  in- heaven,  Mikael  and  his  angels  fought  against  the  dragon,"  etc.

(7)  and  the  great  dragon  was  cast  out  (9)

3  He  is  also  the  informing  Spirit  of  the  Sun  and  Jupiter,  and  even  of  Venus.

4  Dogme  et  Rituel,  n,  p.  116.

5  If  enumerated  they  will  be  found  to  be  the  Hindu  "  divisions  "  and  choirs  of  Devas,  and  the  Dhydn  Chohans  of  Esoteric  Buddhism

THE  SOULS  OF  THE  STARS— UNIVERSAL  HELIOLATRY

-all  these  prudently  elementary  divisions,  there  are  certamly  many  others,  whose  very  names  have  not  yet  reached  us.1  "  For,"  excellently  says  St.  John  Chrysostom,  "there  are  doubtless,  (sine  dubio,)  many  other  Virtues  [celestial  beings]  whose  denominations  we  are  yet  far  from  knowing  The  nine  orders  are  not  by  any  means  the  only

populations  in  heaven,  where,  on  the  contrary,  are  to  be  found  numberless  tribes  of  inhabitants  infinitely  varied,  and  of  which  it  would  be  impossible  to  give  the  slightest  idea  through  human  tongue  Paul,  who  had  learned  their  names,  reveals  to  us

their  existence  "     (De  Incomprehensibili  Natura  Dei,  Bk.  IV )

It  would  thus  amount  to  a  gross  mistake  to  see  merely  errors  in  the  Angelology  of  the  Kabalists  and  Gnostics,  so  severely  treated  by  the  Apostle  of  the  Gentiles,  for  his  imposing  censure  reached  only  their  exaggerations  and  vicious  interpretations,  and  still  more,  the  application  of  those  noble  titles  to  the  miserable  personalities  of  demoniac-  al usurpers  *  Often  nothing  so  resemble  each  other  as  the  language  of  the  judges  and  that  of  the  convicts  [of  saints  and  Occultists].  One  has  to  penetrate  deeply  into  this  dual  study  [of  creed  and  profession]  and  what  is  still  better,  to  trust  blindly  to  the  authority  of  the  tribunal  [the  Church  of  Rome,  of  course]  to  enable  oneself  to  seize  precisely  the  point  of  the  error  The  Gnosis  condemned  by  St  Paul  remains,  neverthe-  less, for  him  as  for  Plato  the  supreme  knowledge  of  all  truths,  and  of  the  Being  par  excellence  6  6Vro>9  wv  (Republ  Bk.  VI).  The  Ideas,  types,  dp^at,  of  the  Greek  philos-  opher, the  Intelligences  of  Pythagoras,  the  aeons  or  emanations,  the  occasion  of  so  much  reproach  to  the  first  heretics,  the  Logos  or  Word,  Chief  of  these  Intelligences,  the  Demiurgos,  the  architect  of  the  world  under  his  facer's  direction  [of  the  Pagans],  the  unknown  God,  the  En-soph  or  the  It  of  the  Infinite  [of  the  Kabalists],  the  angelical  periods,*  the  seven  spirits,  the  Depths  of  Ahnman,  the  World's  Rectors,  the  Archontes  of  the  air,  the  God  of  this  world,  the  pleroma  of  the  intelligences,  down  to  Metatron  the  angel  of  the  Jews,  all  this  is  found  word  for  word,  as  so  many  truths,  in  the  works  of  our  greatest  doctors,  and  in  St.  Paul '

If  an  Occultist,  eager  to  charge  the  Church  with  a  numberless  series  of  plagiarisms  were  to  write  the  above,  could  he  have  written  more  strongly?  And  have  we,  or  have  we  not,  the  right,  after  such  a  complete  confession,  to  reverse  the  tables  and  to  say  of  Roman  Catholics  and  others  what  is  said  of  the  Gnostics  and  Occultists.

"They  used  our  expressions  and  rejected  our  doctrines."  For  it  is  not  the  "promoters  of  the  false  Gnosis  " — who  had  all  those  expressions  from  their  archaic  ancestors — who  helped  themselves  to  Christian  expressions,  but  verily  the  Christian  Fathers  and  Theologians,  who  helped  themselves  to  our  nest,  and  have  tried  ever  since  to  soil  it.

The  words  above  quoted  will  explain  much  to  those  who  are  searching  for  truth  and  for  truth  only.

They  will  show  the  origin  of  certain  rites  in  the  Church  inexplicable  hitherto  to  the  simple-minded,  and  will  give  the  reason

1  But  this  fact  has  not  prevented  the  Roman  Church  from  adopting  them  all  the  same,  accepting  them  from  ignorant,  though  perchance  sincere  Church  Fathers,  who  had  borrowed  them  from  Kabalists  — Jews  and  Pagans.

2  To  call  "  usurpers  "  those  who  preceded  the  Christian  Beings  for  whose  benefit  these  same  titles  were  borrowed,  is  carrying  paradoxical  anachronism  a  little  too  far '

'  Or  the  divine  ages,  the  "  days  and  years  of  Brahma,"

4  Des  Espnts,  Tome  n,  pp  325-6  So  we  say  too  And  this  shows  that  it  is  to  the  Kabalists  and  Magicians  that  the  Church  is  indebted  for  her  dogmas  and  names  Paul  never  condemned  real  •Gnosis,  but  the  false  one,  now  accepted  by  the  Church

328  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

why  such  words  as  "Our  Lord  the  Sun  "  were  used  in  prayer  by  Christians  up  to  the  fifth  and  even  sixth  century  of  our  era,  and  embodied  in  the  Liturgy,  until  altered  into  "Our  Lord,  the  God."  Let  us  remember  that  the  early  Christians  painted  Christ  on  the  walls  of  their  subterranean  necropolis,  as  a  shepherd  in  the  guise  of,  and  invested  with  all  the  attributes  of  Apollo,  driving  away  the  wolf,  Fenris,  who  seeks  to  devour  the  Sun  and  his  Satellites.

[With  certain  controversial   parts  omitted  this  Section  is  practically  the  same  as  sub-section  3,  Section  V,  of  the  1886  MS.— Ed.]

SECTION

ASTROLOGY   AND    ASTROLATRY

THE  books  of  Hermes  Trismegistus  contain  the  exoteric  meaning,  still  veiled  for  all  but  the  Occultist,  of  the  Astrology  and  Astrolatry  of  the  Khaldi  [Chaldee].  The  two  subjects  are  closely  connected.

Astrolatry,  or  the  adoration  of  the  heavenly  host,  is  the  natural  result  of  only  half-revealed  Astrology,  whose  Adepts  carefully  concealed  from  the  non-initiated  masses  its  Occult  principles  and  the  wisdom  imparted  to  them  by  the  Regents  of  the  Planets — the  "  Angels."  Hence,  divine  Astrology  for  the  Initiates  ,  superstitious  Astrolatry  for  the  profane.

St.  Justin  asserts  it  :

From  the  first  invention  of  the  hieroglyphics  it  was  not  the  vulgar,  but  the  dis-  tinguished and  select  men  who  became  initiated  in  the  secrecy  of  the  temples  into  the  science  of  every  kind  of  Astrology — even  into  its  most  abject  kind  •  that  Astrology  which  later  on  found  itself  prostituted  in  the  public  thoroughfares

There  was  a  vast  difference  between  the  Sacred  Science  taught  by  Petosiris  and  Necepso — the  first  Astrologers  mentioned  in  the  Egyptian  manuscripts,  believed  to  have  lived  during  the  reign  of  Ramses  II  (Sesostris)1 — and  the  miserable  charlatanry  of  the  quacks  called  Chaldeans,  who  degraded  the  Divine  Knowledge  under  the  last  Emperors  of  Rome.

Indeed,  one  may  fairly  describe  the  two  as  the  "  high  ceremonial  Astrology  "  and  "  astrological  Astrolatry."  The  first  depended  on  the  knowledge  by  the  Initiates  of  those  (to  us)  immaterial  Forces  or  Spiritual  Entities  that  affect  matter  and  guide  it.  Called  by  the  ancient  Philosophers  the  Archontes  and  the  Cosmocratores,  they  were  the  types  or  paradigms  on  the  higher  planes  of  the  lower  and  more  material  beings  on  the  scale  of  evolution,  whom  we  call  Elementals  and  Nature-Spirits,  to  whom  the  Sabeans  bowed  and  whom  they  worshipped,  without  suspecting  the  essential  difference.

Hence  the  latter  kind,  when  not  a  mere  pretence,  degenerated  but  too  often  into  Black  Magic.

It  was  the

1  Sesostris,  or  Pharaoh  Ramses  II,  whose  mummy  was  unswathed  in  1886  by  Maspero  of  the  Bulak  Museum,  and  recognised  as  that  of  the  greatest  king  of  Egypt,  whose  grandson,  Ramses  III,  was  the  last  king  of  an  ancient  kingdom

330  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

favourite  form  of  popular  or  exoteric  Astrology,  entirely  ignorant  of  the  apotelesmatic  principles  of  the  primitive  Science,  the  doctrines  of  which  were  imparted  only  at  Initiation.

Thus,  while  the  real  Hierophants  soared  like  Demi-Gods  to  the  very  summit  of  spiritual  knowledge,  the  ho/  pol/oi  among  the  Sabeans  crouched,  steeped  in  superstition — ten  millenniums  back  as  they  do  now — in  the  cold  and  lethal  shadow  of  the  valleys  of  matter.

Sidereal  influence  is  dual.

There  is  the  physical  and  physiological  influence,  that  of  exotericism  ;  and  the  high  spiritual,  intellectual,  and  moral  influence,  im-  parted by  the  knowledge  of  the  planetary  Gods.

Bailly,  speaking  with  only  an  imperfect  knowledge  of  the  former,  called  Astrology,  so  far  back  as  the  eighteenth  century,  "  The  very  foolish  mother  of  a  very  wise  daughter" —  Astronomy.

On  the  other  hand,  Arago,  a  luminary  of  the  nineteenth  century,  supports  the  reality  of  the  sidereal  influence  of  the  Sun,  Moon  and  Planets.

He  asks  :

Where  do  we  find  lunar  influences  refuted  by  arguments  that  science  would  dare  to  avow  ?

But  even  Bailly,  having,  as  he  thought,  put  down  Astrology  as  publicly  practised,  dares  not  do  the  same  with  the  real  Astrology.

He  says  :

Judiciary  Astrology  was  at  its  origin  the  result  of  a  profound  system,  the  work  of  an  enlightened  nation  that  would  wander  too  far  into  the  mysteries  of  God  and  Nature.

A  Scientist  of  a  more  recent  date,  a  member  of  the  Institute  of  France,  and  a  professor  of  History,  Ph.  Lebas,  discovers  (unconsciously  to  himself)  the  very  root  of  Astrology  in  his  able  article  on  the  subject  in  the  Dictionnaire  Encyclopedique  de  France.

He  well  understands,  he  tells  his  readers,  that  the  adhesion  to  that  Science  of  such  a  number  of  highly  intellectual  men  should  be  in  itself  a  sufficient  motive  for  believing  that  all  Astrology  is  not  folly  :

While  proclaiming  in  politics  the  sovereignty  of  the  people  and  of  public  opinion,  can  we  admit,  as  heretofore,  that  mankind  allowed  itself  to  be  radically  deceived  in  this  only  •  that  an  absolute  and  gross  absurdity  reigned  in  the  minds  of  whole  nations  for  so  many  centuries  without  being  based  on  anything  save — on  one  hand  human  imbecility,  and  on  the  other  charlatanry  ?  How  for  fifty  centuries  and  more  can  most  men  have  been  either  dupes  or  knaves  ?  .  Even  though  we  may  find  it  impossible  to  decide  between  and  separate  the  realities  of  Astrology  from  the  elements  of  invention  and  empty  dreaming  in  it,  .  .  let  us,  nevertheless,  repeat  with  Bossuet  and  all  modern  philosophers,  that  "  nothing  that  has  been  dominant  could  be  absolutely  false."  Is  it  not  true,  at  all  events,  that  there  is  a  physical  reaction  on  one  another  among  the  planets  ?  Is  it  not  again  true,  that  the  planets  have  an  influence  on  the  atmosphere,  and  consequently  at  any  rate  a  mediate  action  on  vegetation  and  animals  ?  Has  not  modern  science  demonstrated  now  these  two  points  beyond  any  doubt  ?  .  Is  it  any  less  true  that  human  liberty  of  action  is  not  absolute :  that  all  is  bound,  that  all  weighs,  planets  as  the  rest,  on  each  individual  will ;  that  Providence  [or  Karma]  acts  on  us  and  directs  men  through  those  relations

ASTROLOGY  AND  ASTROLATRY

that  it  has  established  between  them  and  the  visible  objects  and  the  whole  universe  ?  Astrolatry,  in  its  essence,  is  nothing  but  that ;  we  are  bound  to  recognise  that  an  instinct  superior  to  the  age  they  lived  in  guided  the  efforts  of  the  ancient  Magi  As  to  the  materialism  and  annihilation  of  human  moral  freedom  with  which  Bailly  charges  their  theory  (Astrology),  the  reprobate  has  no  sense  whatever.

All  the  great  astrologers  admitted,  without  one  single  exception,  that  man  could  react  against  the  influence  of  the  stars.

This  principle  is  established  in  the  Ptolemeian  Jetrabiblos,  the  true  astro-  logical Scriptures,  in  chapters  n  and  in  of  Book  i.

Thomas  Aquinas  had  corroborated  Lebas  in  anticipation  ;   he  says  :

The  celestial  bodies  are  the  cause  of  all  that  happens  in  this  sublunary  world,  they  act  jndirectly  on  human  actions  ,  but  not  all  the  effects  produced  by  them  are  unavoidable  a

The  Occultists  and  Theosophists  are  the  first  to  confess  that  there  is  white  and  black  Astrology.

Nevertheless,  Astrology  has  to  be  studied  in  both  aspects  by  those  who  wish  to  become  proficient  in  it ;  and  the  good  or  bad  results  obtained  do  not  depend  upon  the  principles,  which  are  the  same  in  both  kinds,  but  in  the  Astrologer  himself.

Thus  Pythagoras,  who  established  the  whole  Copernican  system  by  the  Books  of  Hermes  2,000  years  before  Galileo's  predecessor  was  born,  found  and  studied  in  them  the  whole  Science  of  divine  Theogony,  of  the  communication  with,  and  the  evocation  of,  the  world's  Rectors — the  Princes  of  the  "  Principalities  "  of  St.  Paul- — the  nativity  of  each  Planet  and  of  the  Universe  itself,  the  formulae  of  incantations  and  the  consecration  of  each  portion  of  the  human  body  to  the  respective  Zodiacal  sign  corresponding  to  it.  All  this  cannot  be  regarded  as  childish  and  absurd  — still  less  "  devilish  " — save  by  those  who  are,  and  wish  to  remain,  tyros  in  the  Philosophy  of  the  Occult  Sciences.

No  true  thinker,  no  one  who  recog-  nises the  presence  of  a  common  bond  between  man  and  Nature,  visible  as  well  as  invisible,  would  see  in  the  old  relics  of  Archaic  Wisdom — such  as  the  Petemenoph  Papyrus,  for  instance — "childish  nonsense  and  absurdity,"  as  many  Academicians  and  Scientists  have  done.

But  upon  finding  in  such  ancient  documents  the  application  of  the  Hermetic  rules  and  laws,  such  as

the  consecration  of  one's  hair  to  the  celestial  Nile ,  of  the  left  temple  to  the  living  Spirit  in  the  sun,  and  of  the  right  one  to  the  spirit  of  Ammon,

he  will  endeavour  to  study  and  comprehend  better  the  "  laws  of  corres-  pondences." Nor  will  he  disbelieve  in  the  antiquity  of  Astrology  on  the  plea  that  some  Orientalists  have  thought  fit  to  declare  that  the  Zodiac  was  not  very  ancient,  being  only  the  invention  of  the  Greeks  of  the  Macedonian  period.

For  this  statement,  besides  having  been  shown  to  be  entirely  erroneous  by  a  number  of  other  reasons,  may  be  entirely  disproved  by  facts  relating  to  the  latest  discoveries  in  Egypt,  and  by  the  more  accurate  readings  of  hieroglyphics

1  Op   cit.,  p   422.  2Summa.

Quest   xv,  Art.

v,  upon  Astrologers,  and  Vol    III,  pp   2-29.

332  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

and  inscriptions  of  the  earliest  dynasties.

The  published  polemics  on  the  con-  tents of  the  so-called  "  Magic"  Papyri  of  the  Anastasi  collection  indicate  the  antiquity  of  the  Zodiac.

As  the  Lettres  a  Lettrone  say  :  The  papyri  discourse  at  length  upon  the  four  bases  or

foundations  of  the  world,  the  identity  of  which  it  is  impossible,  according  to  Champollion,  to  mistake,  as  one  is  forced  to  recognise  in  them  the  Pillars  of  the  World  of  St.  Paul  It  is  they  who  are  invoked  with  the  gods  of  all  the  celestial  zones,  quite  analogous,  once  more,  to  the  Spiritualia  nequitiae  In  caslestibus  of  the  same  Apostle  '

That  invocation  was  made  in  the  proper  terms  ...  of  the  formula,  reproduced  far  too  faithfully  by  lamblichus  for  it  to  be  possible  to  refuse  him  any  longer  the  merit  of  having  transmitted  to  posterity  the  ancient  and  primitive  spirit  of  the  Egyptian.

Astrologers.

As  Letronne  had  tried  to  prove  that  all  the  genuine  Egyptian  Zodiacs  had  been  manufactured  during  the  Roman  period,  the  Sensaos  mummy  is  brought  forward  to  show  that :

All  the  Zodiacal  monuments  in  Egypt  were  chiefly  astronomical.

Royal  tombs  and  funereal  rituals  are  so  many  tables  of  constellations  and  of  their  influences  for  all  the  hours  of  every  month.

Thus  the  genethliac  tables  themselves  prove  that  they  are  far  older  than  the  period  assigned  to  their  origin  ,  all  the  Zodiacs  of  the  sarcophagi  of  later  epochs  being  simple  reminiscences  of  the  Zodiacs  belonging  to  the  mythological  [archaic]  period

Primitive  Astrology  was  as  far  above  modern  judiciary  Astrology,  so-  called,  as  the  guides  (the  Planets  and  Zodiacal  signs)  are  above  the  lamp-  posts.

Berosus  shows  the  sidereal  sovereignty  of  Bel  and  Mylitta  (Sun  and  Moon),  and  only  "  the  twelve  lords  of  the  Zodiacal  Gods,"  the  "  thirty-six  Gods  Counselbrs  "  and  the  "  twenty-four  Stars,  judges  of  this  world,"  which  support  and  guide  the  Universe  (our  solar  system),  watch  over  mortals  and  reveal  to  mankind  its  fate  and  their  own  decrees.

Judiciary  Astrology  as  it  is  now  known,  is  correctly  denominated  by  the  Latin  Church  the

materialistic  and  pantheistic  prophesying  by  the  objective  planet  itself,  independ-  ently of  its  Rector  [the  Mlac  of  the  Jews,  the  ministers  of  the  Eternal  commissioned  by  him  to  announce  his  will  to  mortals] ;  the  ascension  or  conjunction  of  the  planet  at  the  moment  of  the  birth  of  an  individual  deciding  his  fortune  and  the  moment  and  mode  of  his  death.

1  "  The  principalities  and  powers  [born]  in  heavenly  places  "  (Ephes  ,  m,  10)  The  verse,  "  For  though  there  be  that  are  called  gods,  whether  in  heaven  or  on  earth,  as  there  be  gods  many  and  lords  many"  (I.  Corinth  ,  vui,  5),  shows,  at  any  rate,  the  recognition  by  Paul  of  a  plurality  of  "  Gods  "  whom  he  calls  "  daamons  "  ("spirits" — never  devils).  Principalities,  Thrones,  Dominions,  Rectors,  etc  are  all  Jewish  and  Christian  names  for  the  Gods  of  the  ancients — the  Archangels  and  Angels  of  the  former  being  in  every  case  the  Devas  and  the  Dhyan  Chohans  of  the  more  ancient  religions.

-  Answer  by  Reuvens  to  Letronne  with  regard  to  his  mistaken  notions  about  the  Zodiac  of  Dendera.

1  St.  Augustine  (Oe  Gen.,  I,  iii)  and  Delno  (Disquisit.,  Vol.

IV,  chap,  in)  are  quoted  by  De  Mirville,  to  show  that  "the  more  astrologers  speak  the  truth  and  the  better  they  prophesy  it,  the  more  one  has  to  feel  diffident,  seeing  that  their  agreement  with  the  devil  becomes  thereby  the  more  apparent."  The  famous  statement  made  by  Juvenal  (Sat/res,  vi)  to  the  effect  that  "  not  one  single  astrologer

ASTROLOGY  AND  ASTROLATRY

Every  student  of  Occultism  knows  that  the  heavenly  bodies  are  closely  related  during  each  Manvantara  with  the  mankind  of  that  special  cycle  ;  and  there  are  some  who  believe  that  each  great  character  born  during  that  period  has — as  every  other  mortal  has,  only  in  a  far  stronger  degree — his  destiny  outlined  within  his  proper  constellation  or  star,  traced  as  a  self-prophecy,  an  anticipated  autobiography,  by  the  indwelling  Spirit  of  that  particular  star.

The  human  Monad  in  its  first  beginning  is  that  Spirit,  or  the  Soul  of  that  star  (planet)  itself.

As  our  Sun  radiates  its  light  and  beams  on  every  body  in  space  within  the  boundaries  of  its  system,  so  the  Regent  of  every  Planet-star,  the  Parent-monad,  shoots  out  from  itself  the  Monad  of  every  ••  pilgrim  "  Soul  born  under  its  house  within  its  own  group.

The  Regents  are  esoterically  seven,  whether  in  the  Sephiroth,  the  "  Angels  of  the  Presence,"  the  Rishis,  or  the  Amshaspends.

"  The  One  is  no  number  "  is  said  in  all  the  Esoteric  works.

From  the  Kasdim  and  Gazzim  (Astrologers)  the  noble  primitive  science  passed  to  the  Khartumim  Asaphim  (or  Theologians)  and  the  Hakamim  (or  scientists,  the  Magicians  of  the  lower  class),  and  from  these  to  the  Jews  during  their  captivity.

The  Books  of  Moses  had  been  buried  in  oblivion  for  centuries,  and  when  re-discovered  by  Hilkiah  had  lost  their  true  sense  for  the  people  of  Israel.

Primitive  Occult  Astrology  was  on  the  decline  when  Daniel,  the  last  of  the  Jewish  Initiates  of  the  old  school,  became  the  chief  of  the  Magi  and  Astro-  logers of  Chaldea.

In  those  days  even  Egypt,  who  had  her  wisdom  from  the  same  source  as  Babylon,  had  degenerated  from  her  former  grandeur,  and  her  glory  had  begun  to  fade  out.

Still,  the  science  of  old  had  left  her  eternal  imprint  on  the  world,  and  the  seven  great  Primitive  Gods  reigned  for  ever  in  the  Astrology  and  in  the  division  of  time  of  every  nation  upon  the  face  of  the  earth.

The  names  of  the  days  of  our  (Christian)  week  are  those  of  the  Gods  of  the  Chaldeans,  who  translated  them  from  those  of  the  Aryans  ;  the  uniform-  ity of  these  antediluvian  names  in  every  nation,  from  the  Goths  back  to  the  Indians,  would  remain  inexplicable,  as  Sir  W.  Jones  thought,  had  not  the  riddle  been  explained  to  us  by  the  invitation  made  by  the  Chaldean  oracles,  recorded  by  Porphyry  and  quoted  by  Eusebius  :

To  carry  those  names  first  to  the  Egyptian  and  Phoenician  colonies,  then  to  the  Greeks,  with  the  express  recommendation  that  each  God  should  be  invoked  only  on  that  day  that  had  been  called  by  his  name.

.  .  .

could  be  found  who  did  not  pay  dearly  for  the  help  he  received  from  his  genius  " — no  more  proves  the  latter  to  be  a  devil  than  the  death  of  Socrates  proves  his  daimon  to  have  been  a  native  from  the  nether  world — if  such  there  be.  Such  argument  only  demonstrates  human  stupidity  and  wickedness,  once  reason  is  made  subservient  to  prejudice  and  fanaticism  of  every  sort  "  Most  of  the  great  writers  of  antiquity,  Cicero  and  Tacitus  amonq  them,  believed  in  Astrology  and  the  realization  of  its  pro-  phecies "  ,  and  "  the  penalty  of  death  decreed  nearly  everywhere  against  those  mathematicians  [astrologers]  who  happened  to  predict  falsely,  diminished  neither  their  number  nor  their  tranquillity  of  mind

334  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Thus  Apollo  says  in  those  oracles  •  "  I  must  be  invoked  on  the  day  of  the  sun  ;  Mercury  after  his  directions,  then  Kronos  [Saturn],  then  Venus,  and  do  not  fail  to  call  seven  times  each  of  those  gods."  '

This  is  slightly  erroneous.

Greece  did  not  get  her  astrological  instruc-  tion from  Egypt  or  from  Chaldea,  but  direct  from  Orpheus,  as  Lucian  tells  us.'^  It  was  Orpheus,  as  he  says,  who  imparted  the  Indian  Sciences  to  nearly  all  the  great  monarchs  of  antiquity  ;  and  it  was  they,  the  ancient  kings  favoured  by  the  Planetary  Gods,  who  recorded  the  principles  of  Astrology —  as  did  Ptolemaus,  for  instance.

Thus  Lucian  writes  :

The  Boeotian  Tiresias  acquired  the  greatest  reputation  in  the  art  of  predicting;  futurity.

.  In  those  days  divination  was  not  as  slightly  treated  as  it  is  now  ,  and  nothing  was  ever  undertaken  without  previous  consultation  with  diviners,  whose  oracles  were  all  directed  by  astrology  .  .  At  Delphos  the  virgin  commissioned  to  announce  futurity  was  the  symbol  of  the  Heavenly  Virgin,  and  Our  Lady

On  the  sarcophagus  of  an  Egyptian  Pharaoh,  Nelth,  mother  of  Ra,  the  heifer  \hat  brings  forth  the  Sun,  her  body  spangled  with  stars,  and  wearing  the  solar  and  lunar  discs,  is  equally  referred  to  as  the  "  Heavenly  Virgin  "  and  ••  Our  Lady  of  the  Starry  Vault."

Modern  judiciary  Astrology  in  its  present  form  began  only  during  the  time  of  Diodorus,  as  he  apprises  the  world.3  But  Chaldean  Astrology  was  believed  in  by  most  of  the  great  men  in  History,  such  as  Caesar,  Pliny r  Cicero  — whose  best  friends,  Nigidius  Figulus  and  Lucius  Tarrutius,  were  themselves  Astrologers,  the  former  being  famous  as  a  prophet.

Marcus  Antonius  never  travelled  without  an  Astrologer  recommended  to  him  by  Cleopatra.

Augustus,  when  ascending  the  throne,  had  his  horoscope  drawn  by  Theagenes.

Tiberius  discovered  pretenders  to  his  throne  by  means  of  Astrology  and  divination.

Vitellius  dared  not  exile  the  Chaldeans,  as  they  had  announced  the  day  of  their  banishment  as  that  of  his  death.

Vespasian  consulted  them  daily  ;  Domitian  would  not  move  without  being  advised  by  the  prophets  ;  Adrian  was  a  learned  Astrologer  himself  ;  and  all  of  them,  ending  with  Julian  (called  the  Apostate  because  he  would  not  become  one),  believed  in  and  addressed  their  prayers  to  the  Planetary  "Gods."  The  Emperor  Adrian,  moreover,  "  predicted  from  the  January  calends  up  to  December  31st,  every  event  that  happened  to  him  daily."  Under  the  wisest  emperors  Rome  had  a  School  of  Astrology,  wherein  were  secretly  taught  the  occult  influences  of  the  Sun,  Moon,  and  Saturn.4  Judiciary  Astrology  is  used  to  this  day  by  the  Kabalists  ;  and  Eliphas  Levi,  the  modern  French  Magus,  teaches  its  rudiments  in  his

1  Preparat/o  f  vangelica,  I.  xiv.

s  Ast.,  iv,  p.  60.  3  Hist.,  \,  it

4  All  these  particulars  may  be  found  more  fully  and  far  more  completely  in  Champollion  Figeac's  Igypte.

ASTROLOGY  AND  ASTROLATRY

Dogme  et  Rituel  de  la  Haute  Magie.

But  the  key  to  ceremonial  or  ritualistic  Astrology,  with  the  teraphim  and  the  urim  and  thummim  of  Magic,  is  lost  to  Europe,  hence  our  century  of  Materialism  shrugs  its  shoulders  and  sees  in  Astrology — a  pretender.

Not  all  scientists  scoff  at  it,  however,  and  one  may  rejoice  in  reading  in  the  Musee  c/es  Sciences  the  suggestive  and  fair  remarks  made  by  Le  Couturier,  a  man  of  science  of  no  mean  reputation.

He  thinks  it  curious,  to  notice  that  while  the  bold  speculations  of  Democritus  are  found  vindicated  by  Dalton,

The  reveries  of  the  alchemists  are  also  on  their  way  to  a  certain  rehabilitation  They  receive  renewed  life  from  the  minute  investigations  of  their  successors,  the  chemists  ;  a  very  remarkable  thing  indeed  is  to  see  how  much  modern  discoveries  have  served  to  vindicate,  of  late,  the  theories  of  the  Middle  Ages  from  the  charge  of  absurdity  laid  at  their  door  Thus  if,  as  demonstrated  by  Col  Sabine,  the  direction  of  a  piece  of  steel,  hung  a  few  feet  above  the  soil,  may  be  influenced  by  the  position  of  the  moon,  whose  body  is  at  a  distance  of  240,000  miles  from  our  planet,  who  then  could  accuse  of  extravagance  the  belief  of  the  ancient  astrologers  [or  the  modern,  either]  in  the  influence  of  the  stars  on  human  destiny  *

'Op  at.,  p.

SECTION

CYCLES  AND  AVATARAS

WE  have  already  drawn  attention  to  the  facts  that  the  record  of  the  life  of  a  World-Saviour  is  emblematical,  and  must  be  read  by  its  mystic  meaning,  and  that  the  figures  432  have  a  cosmic  evolutionary  significance.

We  find  these  two  facts  throwing  light  on  the  origin  of  the  exoteric  Christian  religion,  and  clearing  away  much  of  the  obscurity  surrounding  its  beginnings.

For  is  it  •not  clear  that  the  names  and  characters  in  the  Synoptical  Gospels  and  in  that  •of  St.  John  are  not  historical  ?  Is  it  not  evident  that  the  compilers  of  the  life  of  Christ,  desirous  to  show  that  the  birth  of  their  Master  was  a  cosmic,  astro-  nomical, and  divinely-preordained  event,  attempted  to  co-ordinate  the  same  with  the  end  of  the  secret  cycle,  4,320  ?  When  facts  are  collated  this  answers  to  them  as  little  as  does  the  other  cycle  of  "  thirty-three  solar  years,  seven  months,  and  seven  days,"  which  has  also  been  brought  forward  as  supporting  the  same  claim,  the  soli-lunar  cycle  in  which  the  Sun  gains  on  the  Moon  one  solar  year.

The  combination  of  the  three  figures,  4,  3,  2.  with  cyphers  accord-  ing to  the  cycle  and  Manvantara  concerned,  was,  and  is,  pre-eminently  Hindu.

It  will  remain  a  secret  even  though  several  of  its  significant  features  are  revealed.

It  relates,  for  instance,  to  the  Pralaya  of  the  races  in  their  periodic-  al dissolution,  before  which  events  a  special  Avatar  a  has  always  to  descend  and  incarnate  on  earth.

These  figures  were  adopted  by  all  the  older  nations,  such  as  those  of  Egypt  and  Chaldea,  and  before  them  were  current  among  the  Atlanteans.

Evidently  some  of  the  more  learned  among  the  early  Church  Fathers  who  had  dabbled,  whilst  Pagans,  in  temple  secrets,  knew  them  to  relate  to  the  Avataric  or  Messianic  Mystery,  and  tried  to  apply  this  cycle  to  the  birth  of  their  Messiah  ;  they  failed  because  th^  figures  relate  to  the  res-  pective ends  of  the  Root  Races  and  not  to  any  individual.

In  their  badly-  -directed  efforts,  moreover,  an  error  of  five  years  occurred.

Is  it  possible,  if  their  claims  as  to  the  importance  and  universality  of  the  event  were  correct,  that  such  a  vital  mistake  should  have  been  allowed  to  creep  into  a  chrono-  logical computation  preordained  and  traced  in  the  heavens  by  the  finger  of

CYCLES  AND  AVATARAS

God  ?  Again,  what  were  the  Pagan  and  even  Jewish  Initiates  doing,  if  this  claim  as  to  Jesus  be  correct  ?  Could  they,  the  custodians  of  the  key  to  the  secret  cycles  and  Avataras,  the  heirs  of  all  the  Aryan,  Egyptian,  and  Chaldean  wisdom,  have  failed  to  recognise  their  great  "  God-Incarnate,"  one  with  Jehovah,1  their  Saviour  of  the  latter  days,  him  whom  all  the  nations  of  Asia  still  expect  as  their  Kalki  Avatara,  Maitreya  Buddha,  Soshios,  Messiah,  etc.

?

The  simple  secret  is  this  :  There  are  cycles  within  greater  cycles,  which  are  all  contained  in  the  one  Kalpa  of  4,320,000  years.

It  is  at  the  end  of  this  cycle  that  the  Kalki  Avatara  is  expected — the  Avatara  Whose  name  and  characteristics  are  secret,  Who  will  come  forth  from  Shamballa,  the  "  City  of  Gods,"  which  is  in  the  West  for  some  nations,  in  the  East  for  others,  in  the  North  or  South  for  yet  others.

And  this  is  the  reason  why,  from  the  Indian  Rishi  to  Virgil,  and  from  Zoroaster  down  to  the  latest  Sibyl,  all  have,  since  the  beginning  of  the  Fifth  Race,  prophesied,  sung,  and  promised  the  cyclic  return  of  the  Virgin — Virgo,  the  constellation — and  the  birth  of  a  divine  child  who  should  bring  back  to  our  earth  the  Golden  Age.

No  one,  however  fanatical,  would  have  sufficient  hardihood  to  maintain  that  the  Christian  era  has  ever  been  a  return  to  the  Golden  Age — Virgo  having  actually  entered  into  Libra  since  then.

Let  us  trace  as  briefly  as  possible  the  Christian  traditions  to  their  true  origin.

First  of  all,  they  discover  in  a  few  lines  from  Virgil  a  direct  prophecy  of  the  birth  of  Christ.

Yet  it  is  impossible  to  detect  in  this  prophecy  any  feature  of  the  present  age.

It  is  in  the  famous  fourth  Eclogue  in  which,  half  a  cen-  tury before  our  era,  Pollio  is  made  to  ask  the  Muses  of  Sicily  to  sing  to  him  about  greater  events.

The  last  era  of  Cumaean  song  is  now  arrived  and  the  grand  series  of  ages  [that  series  which  recurs  again  and  again  in  the  course  of  our  mundane  revolution]  begins  afresh.

Now  the  Virgin  Astraea  returns,  and  the  reign  of  Saturn  recom-  mences Now  a  new  progeny  descends  from  the  celestial  realms.

Do  thou,  chaste  Lucina,  smile  propitious  to  the  infant  Boy  who  will  bring  to  a  close  the  present  Age  of  Iron,"  and  introduce  throughout  the  whole  world  the  Age  of  Gold  He  shall

share  the  life  of  Gods  and  shall  see  heroes  mingled  in  society  with  Gods,  himself  be  seen  by  them  and  all  the  peaceful  world  .  .  Then  shall  the  herds  no  longer  dread  the  huge  lion,  the  serpent  also  shall  die  :  and  the  poison's  deceptive  plant  shall  perish  Come  then,  dear  child  of  the  Gods,  great  descendant  of  Jupiter  '  .  The  time  is

1  In  the  1,326  places  in  the  New  Testament  where  the  word  "  God  "  is  mentioned  nothing  signifies  that  in  God  are  included  more  beings  than  God  On  the  contrary  in  17  places  God  is  called  the  only  God  The  places  where  the  Father  is  so-called  amount  to  320  In  105  places  God  is  addressed  with  high-sounding  titles  In  90  places  all  prayers  and  thanks  are  addressed  to  the  Father .  350  times  in  the  New  Testament  is  the  Son  declared  to  be  inferior  to  the  Father  ,  83  times  is  Jesus  called  the  "  Son  of  Man  ,  "  70  times  is  he  called  a  man.

In  not  one  single  place  in  the  Bible  is  it  said  that  God  holds  within  him  three  different  Beings  or  Persons,  and  yet  is  one  Being  or  Person  —  Dr  Karl  von  Bergen 's.  Lectures  in  Sweden

-  Kali  Yuga.

the  Black  or  Iron  Age.

FF

338  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE.

near.

See,  the  world  is  shaken  with  its  globe  saluting  thee  .  the  earth,  the  regions  of  the  sea,  and  the  heavens  sublime.

It  is  in  these  few  lines,  called  the  "  Sibylline  prophecy  about  the  coming,  of  Christ/'  that  his  followers  now  see  a  direct  foretelling  of  the  event.

Now  who  will  presume  to  maintain  that  either  at  the  birth  of  Jesus  or  since  the  establishment  of  the  so-called  Christian  religion,  any  portion  of  the  above-  quoted  sentences  can  be  shown  as  prophetic?  Has  the  "  last  age  " — the  Age  of  Iron,  or  Kali  Yuga — closed  since  then  ?  Quite  the  reverse,  since  it  is  shown  to  be  in  full  sway  just  now,  not  only  because  the  Hindus'  use  the  name,  but  by  universal  personal  experience.

Where  is  that  "  new  race  that  has  descended  from  the  celestial  realms"?  Was  it  the  race  that  emerged,  from  Paganism  into  Christianity  ?  Or  is  it  our  present  race,  with  nations  ever-  red-hot  for  fight,  jealous  and  envious,  ready  to  pounce  upon  each  other,  showing  mutual  hatred  that  would  put  to  blush  cats  and  dogs,  ever  lying  and  deceiving  one  another?  Is  it  this  age  of  ours  that  is  the  promised  "  Golden  Age  " — in  which  neither  the  venom  of  the  serpent  nor  of  any  plant  is  any  longer  lethal,  and  in  which  we  are  all  secure  under  the  mild  sway  of  God-  chosen  sovereigns  ?  The  wildest  fancy  of  an  opium-eater  could  hardly  suggest  a  more  inappropriate  description,  if  it  is  to  be  applied  to  our  age  or  to  any  age  since  the  year  one  of  our  era.

What  of  the  mutual  slaughter  of  sects,  of  Christians  by  Pagans,  and  of  Pagans  and  Heretics  by  Christians  ;  the  horrors  of  the  Middle  Ages  and  of  the  Inquisition  ;  Napoleon,  and  since  his  day,  an  "  armed  peace  "  at  best — at  the  worst,  torrents  of  blood,  shed  for  supremacy  over  acres  of  land,  and  a  handful  of  heathen :  millions  of  soldiers  under  arms,  ready  for  battle ;  a  diplomatic  body  playing  at  Cains  and  Judases  ;  and  instead  of  the  "  mild  sway  of  a  divine  sovereign  "  the  univer-  sal, though  unrecognised,  sway  of  Caesarism,  of  "  might  "  in  lieu  of  "right,"  and  the  breeding  therefrom  of  anarchists,  socialists,  petroleuses,  and  destroy-  ers of  every  description  ?

The   Sibylline   prophecy  and  VirgiPs  inspirational  poetry  remain  unfulfilled  in  every  point,  as  we  see.

The  fields  are  yellow  with  soft  ears  of  corn  ,  but  so  they  were  before  our  era  :

The  blushing   grapes  shall   hang  from  the  rude  brambles,  and  dewy  honey  shall  [or  may]  distil  from  the  rugged  oak ,

but  they  have  not  thus  done,  so  far.

We  must  look  for  another  interpretation.

What  is  it  ?  The  Sibylline  Prophetess  spoke,  as  thousands  of  other  Prophets,  and  Seers  have  spoken,  though  even  the  few  such  records  that  have  survived

1  Virgil.

Eclogue,  iv

CYCLES  AND  AVATARAS

are  rejected  by  Christian  and  infidel,  and  their  interpretations  are  only  allowed  and  accepted  among  the  Initiated.

The  Sibyl  alluded  to  cycles  in  general  and  to  the  great  cycle  especially.

Let  us  remember  how  the  Puranas  corroborate  the  above,  among  others  the  Vishnu  Parana  :

When  the  practices  taught  by  the  Vedas.

and  the  institutes  of  law  shall  have  nearly  ceased,  and  the  close  of  the  Kali  Age  [the  "  Iron  Age  "  of  Virgil]  shall  be  nigh,  an  aspect  of  that  divine  Being  who  exists  of  his  own  spiritual  nature  in  the  character  of  Brahma  and  even  is  the  beginning  and  the  end  [Alpha  and  Omega],  .  .  .  shall  descend  upon  earth  :  he  will  be  born  in  the  family  of  Vishnuyashas,  an  eminent  Brahman  of  Shamballah  .  .  endowed  with  the  eight  superhuman  powers.

By  his.

irresistible  might  he  will  destroy  ...  all  whose  minds  are  devoted  to  iniquity.

He  will  then  re-establish  righteousness  upon  earth  ;  and  the  minds  of  those  who  live  at  the  end  of  the  Kali  age  shall  be  awakened,  and  shall  be  as  pellucid  as  crystal.1  The  men  who  are  thus  changed  by  virtue  of  that  peculiar  time  shall  be  as  the  seeds  of  human  beings  [the  Shistha,  the  survivors  of  the  future  cataclysm],  and  shall  give  birth  to  a  race  who  shall  follow  the  laws  of  the  Krita  [or  Satya]  age  [the  age  of  purity,  or  the  "  Golden  Age  "].  For  it  is  said  •  "  When  the  sun  and  moon  and  Tishya  [asterisms]  and  the  planet  Jupiter  are  in  one  mansion  the  Krita  age  [the  Golden]  shall  return.-'

The  astronomical  cycles  of  the  Hindus — those  taught  publicly — have  been  sufficiently  well  understood,  but  the  esoteric  meaning  thereof,  in  its  application  to  transcendental  subjects  connected  with  them,  has  ever  remained  a  dead-letter.

The  number  of  cycles  was  enormous ;  it  ranged  from  the  Maha  Yuga  cycle  of  4,320.000  years  down  to  the  small  septenary  and  quinquen-  nial cycles,  the  latter  being  composed  of  the  five  years  called  respectively  the  Samvatsara,  Parivatsara,  Idvatsara,  Anuvatsara,  and  Vatsara,  each  having  secret  attributes  or  qualities  attached  to  them.

Vriddhagarga  gives  these  in  a  treatise,  now  the  property  of  a  Trans-Himalayan  Matham  (or  temple)  ;  and  describes  the  relation  between  this  quinquennial  and  the  Brihaspati  cycle,  based  on  the  conjunction  of  the  Sun  and  Moon  every  sixtieth  year  :  a  cycle  as  mysterious  — for  national  events  in  general  and  those  of  the  Aryan  Hindu  nation  espe-  cially— as  it  is  important.

1  At  the  close  of  our  Race,  people,  it  is  said,  through  suffering  and  discontent  will  become  more  spiritual.

Clairvoyance  will  become  a  general  faculty      We  shall  be  approaching  the  spiritual  state  of  the  Third  and  Second  Races.

2  Vishnu  Purana,  Wilson,  Vol.

iv,  p.  228.

SECTION

SECRET  CYCLES

THE  former  five-year  cycle  comprehends  sixty  solar-sidereal  months  of  1800  days,  sixty-one  solar  months  (or  1830  days)  ;  sixty-two  lunar  months  (or  1860  lunations),  and  sixty-seven  lunar-asterismal  months  (or  1809  such  days).

In  his  Kala  Sankelita,  Col.

Warren  very  properly  regards  these  years  as  cycles ;  this  they  are,  for  each  year  has  its  own  special  importance  as  having  some  bearing  upon,  and  connection  with,  specified  events  in  individual  horoscopes.

He  writes  that  in  the  cycle  of  sixty  there

are  contained  five  cycles  of  twelve  years,   each   supposed  equal  to  one  year

of  the  planet  (Brihaspati,   or  Jupiter)  ...  I   mention  this  cycle  because   I   found  it

mentioned  in  some  books,  but  I  know  of  no  nation  or  tribe  that  reckons  time  after  that  account.

The  ignorance  is  very  natural,  since  Col.

Warren  could  know  nothing  of  the  secret  cycles  and  their  meanings.

He  adds  :

The  names  of  the  five  cycles  or  Yugas  are  .  .      .  (1)  Samvatsara,  (2)  Parivatsara,  (3)  Idvatsara,  (4)  Anuvatsara,  (5)  Udravatsara.

The  learned  Colonel  might,  however,  have  assured  himself  that  there  were  "other  nations"  which  had  the  same  secret  cycle,  if  he  had  but  re-  membered that  the  Romans  also  had  their  lustrum  of  five  years  (from  the  Hindus  undeniably)  which  represented  the  same  period  if  multiplied  by  12.-  Near  Benares  there  are  still  the  relics  of  all  these  cycle-records,  and  of  astronomical  instruments  cut  out  of  solid  rock,  the  everlasting  records  of  Archaic  Initiation,  called  by  Sir  W.  Jones  (as  suggested  by  the  prudent  Brahmans  who  surrounded  him)  old  "back  records"  or  reckonings.

But  in  Stonehenge  they  exist  to  this  day.

Higgins  says  that  Waltire  found  the  barrows  of  tumuli  surrounding  this  giant-temple  represented  accurately  the  situation  and  magnitude  of  the  fixed  stars,  forming  a  complete  orrery  or  planisphere.

As  Colebrooke  found  out,  it  is  the  cycle  of  the

1  Op   cit.,  p.  212.  -  At  any  rate,  the  temple  secret  meaning  was  the  same

SECRET  CYCLES

Vec/as,  recorded  in  the  Jyotisha,  one  of  the  Vedangas,  a  treatise  on  Astronomy,  which  is  the  basis  of  calculation  for  all  other  cycles,  larger  or  smaller  ; l  and  the  Vec/as  were  written  in  characters,  archaic  though  they  be,  long  after  those  natural  observations,  made  by  the  aid  of  their  gigantic  mathe-  matical and  astronomical  instruments,  had  been  recorded  by  the  men  of  the  Third  Race,  who  had  received  their  instruction  from  the  Dhyan  Chohans.

Maurice  speaks  truly  when  he  observes  that  all  such

circular  stone  monuments  were  intended  as  durable  symbols  of  astronomical  cycles  by  a  race  who,  not  having,  or  for  political  reasons  forbidding,  the  use  of  letters,  had  no  other  permanent  method  of  instructing  their  disciples  or  handing  down  their  knowledge  to  posterity

He  errs  only  in  the  last  idea.

It  was  to  conceal  their  knowledge  from  profane  posterity,  leaving  it  as  an  heirloom  only  to  the  Initiates,  that  such  monuments,  at  once  rock  observatories  and  astronomical  treatises,  were  cut  out.

It  is  no  news  that  as  the  Hindus  divided  the  earth  into  seven  zones,  so  the  more  western  peoples — Chaldeans,  Phoenicians,  and  even  the  Jews,  who  got  their  learning  either  directly  or  indirectly  from  the  Brahmans — made  all  their  secret  and  sacred  numerations  by  6  and  12,  though  using  the  number  7  whenever  this  would  not  lend  itself  to  handling.

Thus  the  numerical  base  of  6,  the  exoteric  figure  given  by  Arya  Bhatta,  was  made  good  use  of.  From  the  first  secret  cycle  of  600 — the  Naros,  transformed  successively  into  60,000  and  60  and  6,  and,  with  other  noughts  added  into  other  secret  cycles — down  to  the  smallest,  an  Archaeologist  and  Mathematician  can  easily  find  it  repeated  in  every  country,  known  to  every  nation.

Hence  the  globe  was  divided  into  60  degrees,  which,  multiplied  by  60,  became  3,600,  the  "  great  year."  Hence  also  the  hour  with  its  60  minutes  of  60  seconds  each.

The  Asiatic  people  count  a  cycle  of  60  years  also,  after  which  comes  the  lucky  seventh  decad,  and  the  Chinese  have  their  small  cycle  of  60  days,  the  Jews  6  days,  the  Greeks  of  6  centuries — the  Naros  again.

The  Babylonians  had  a  great  year  of  3,600,  being  the  Naros  multiplied  by  6.  The  Tartar  cycle  called  Van  was  180  years,  or  three  sixties  ;  this  multi-  plied by  12  times  12^144,  makes  25,920  years,  the  exact  period  of  revolution  of  the  heavens.

India  is  the  birthplace  of  arithmetic  and  mathematics;  as  "Our  Figures,"  in  Chips  from  a  German  Workshpp,  by  Prof.

Max  Muller,  shows  beyond  a  doubt.

As  well  explained  by  Krishna  Shastri  Godbole  in  Jhe  Theosophist :

The  Jews  .  .  .  represented  the  units  (1-9)  by  the  first  nine  letters  of  their  alphabet ;  the  tens  (10-90)  by  the  next  nine  letters ;  the  first  four  hundreds  (100-400)  by

1  Asiatic  Researches,  vol.

vui.

pp.  470,  et  seq.

342  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

the  last  four  letters,  and  the  remaining  ones  (500-900)  by  the  second  forms  of  the  letters  "kSf"  (11th),  "mim"  (13th),  "nun"  (14th),  "  pe  "  (17th),  and  "  sad  "  (18th)  ;  and  they  represented  other  numbers  by  combining  these  letters  according  to  their  value.

.  .  .  The  Jews  of  the  present  period  still  adhere  to  this  practice  of  notation  in  their  Hebrew  books.

The  Greeks  had  a  numerical  system  similar  to  that  used  by  the  Jews,  but  they  carried  it  a  little  farther  by  using  letters  of  the  alphabet  with  a  dash  or  slant-  Jine  behind,  to  represent  thousands  (1000-9000),  tens  of  thousands  (10,000-90,000)  and  one  hundred  of  thousands  (100.000)  the  last,  for  instance,  being  represented  by  "  rho  "  with  <a  dash  behind,  while  "  rho "  singly  represented  100.  The  Romans  represented  all  numerical  values  by  the  combination  (additive  when  the  second  letter  is  of  equal  or  less  value)  of  six  letters  of  their  alphabet ;  I  (  ^  1  ),  V  (  5),  X  (  ---  10),  C  (for  "  centum  "  ^  100),  D  (  -  500),  and  M  ( --  1000)  :  thus  20  --  XX,  15  XV,  and  9  IX.  These  are  called  the  Roman  numerals,  and  are  adopted  by  all  European  nations  when  using  the  Roman  alphabet,  The  Arabs  at  first  followed  their  neighbours,  the  Jews,  in  their  imethod  of  computation,  so  much  so  that  they  called  it  Abjad  from  the  first  four  Hebrew  letters — "alif,"  "beth,"  "  gimel  " — or  rather  "jimel,"  that  is,  "  jim  "  (Arabic  being  •wanting  in  "  g  "),  and  "daleth,"  representing  the  first  four  units.

But  when  in  the  early  part  of  the  Christian  era  they  came  to  India  as  traders,  they  found  the  country  already  using  for  computation  the  decimal  scale  of  notation,  which  they  forthwith  borrowed  literally ;  viz  ,  without  altering  its  method  of  writing  from  left  to  right,  at  variance  with  their  own  mode  of  writing,  which  is  from  right  to  left.

They  introduced  this  system  into  Europe  through  Spain  and  other  European  countries  lying  along  the  coast  of  the  Mediterranean  and  under  their  sway,  during  the  dark  ages  of  European  history.

It  has  thus  become  evident  that  the  Aryas  knew  well  mathematics  or  the  science  of  computation  at  a  time  when  all  other  nations  knew  but  little,  if  anything,  of  it.  It  has  also  been  admitted  that  the  knowledge  of  arithmetic  and  algebra  was  first  introduced  from  the  Hindus  by  the  Arabs,  and  then  taught  by  them  to  the  Western  nations.

This  fact  convincingly  proves  that  the  Aryan  civilisation  is  older  than  that  of  •any  other  nation  in  the  world  ;  and  as  the  Vedas  are  avowedly  proved  the  oldest  work  of  that  civilisation,  a  presumption  is  raised  in  favour  of  their  great  antiquity.

But  while  the  Jewish  nation,  for  instance — regarded  so  long  as  the  first  and  oldest  in  the  order  of  creation — knew  nothing  of  arithmetic  and  remained  utterly  ignorant  of  the  decimal  scale  of  notation,  the  latter  existed  for  ages  in  India  before  the  actual  era.

To  become  certain  of  the  immense  antiquity  of  the  Aryan  Asiatic  nations  and  of  their  astronomical  records  one  has  to  study  more  than  the  Vecfas.

The  secret  meaning  of  the  latter  will  never  be  understood  by  the  present  genera-  tion of  Orientalists ;  and  the  astronomical  works  which  give  openly  the  real  dates  and  prove  the  antiquity  of  both  the  nation  and  its  science,  elude  the  grasp  of  the  collectors  of  ollas  and  old  manuscripts  in  India,  the  reason  being  too  obvious  to  need  explanation.

Yet  there  are  Astronomers  and  Mathema-  ticians to  this  day  in  India,  humble  Shastris  and  Pandits,  unknown  and  lost  in  the  midst  of  that  population  of  phenomenal  memories  and  metaphysical  brains,  who  have  undertaken  the  task  and  have  proved  to  the  satisfaction  of  many  that  the  Vedas  are  the  oldest  works  in  the  world.

One  of  such  is  the  Shastri

1  The  Theosophwt,  August,  1881,  "  Antiquity  of  the  Vedas,  p.  239.

SECRET  CYCLES

just   quoted,    who    published    in    The    Theosoph/st  l    an    able  treatise   proving  astronomically  and  mathematically  that  :

If  ,  .  the  Post-Vaidika  works  alone,  the  Upanishads,  the  Brahmanas,  etc.,  down  to  the  Puranas,  when  examined  critically  carry  us  back  to  20,000  B  C  ,  then  the  time  of  the  composition  of  the  Vedas  themselves  cannot  be  less  than  30,000  B  C.,  in  round  numbers,  a  date  which  we  may  take  at  present  as  the  age  of  that  Book  of  Books  a

And  what  are  his  proofs  ?

Cycles  and  the  evidence  yielded  by  the  asterisms.

Here  are  a  few  extracts  from  his  rather  lengthy  treatise,  selected  to  give  an  idea  of  his  demon-  strations and  bearing  directly  on  the  quinquennial  cycle  spoken  of  just  now.

Those  who  feel  interested  in  the  demonstrations  and  are  advanced  mathemati-  cians can  turn  to  the  article  itself,  "  The  Antiquity  of  the  Vedas,"  3  and  judge  for  themselves.

10  Somakara  in  his  commentary  on  the  Shesha  Jyotisha  quotes  a  passage  from  the  Shatapatha  Brahmana,  which  contains  an  observation  on  the  change  of  the  tropics,  and  which  is  also  found  in  the  Shakhayana  Brahmana,  as  has  been  noticed  by  Prof.

Max  Muller  in  his  preface  to  Rigveda  Samhita  (p  xx,  foot-note,  vol.

iv).  The  passage  is  this  ..."  The  full-moon  night  in  Phalguna  is  the  first  night  of  Samvatsara,  the  first  year  of  the  quinquennial  age."  This  passage  clearly  shows  that  the  quinquennial  age  which,  according  to  the  sixth  verse  of  the  Jyotisha,  begins  on  the  1st  of  Magha  (January-  February),  once  began  on  the  15th  of  Phalguna  (February-  March).  Now  when  the  15th  of  Phalguna  of  the  first  year  called  Samvatsara  of  the  quinquennial  age  begins,  the  moon,  according  to  the  Jyotisha,  is  in  95.,  /  1  x

124      v  1  -'or  fth  of  the  Uttara  Phalguni,  and

14~F  34-

the  sun   in  124th  (  "  T~        ^     or    £th    of     Purva     BhadrapadS.

Hence    the

position  of  the  four  principal  points  on  the  ecliptic  was  then  as  follows  :

The  winter  solstice  in  3°  29'  of  Purva  Bhadrapada.

The  vernal  equinox  in  the  beginning  of  Mrigashirsha.

The  summer  solstice  in  10°  of  Purva  Ph&lguni.

The  autumnal  equinox  in  the  middle  of  Jyeshtha.

The  vernal  equinoctial  point,  we  have  seen,  coincided  with  the  beginning  of  Krittika  in  1421  B.C.  ,  and  from  the  beginning  of  Krittika  to  that  of  Mrigashirsha,  was,  in  consequence,  1421+26§x72  1421-f  1920  3341  B  C  ,  supposing  the  rate  of  precession  to  be  50°  a  year.

When  we  take  the  rate  to  be  3°  20"  in  247  years,  the  time  comes  up  to  1516+19607  34767  B.C.

When  the  winter  solstice  by  its  retrograde  motion  coincided  after  that  with  the  beginning  of  Purva  Bhadrapada,  then  the  commencement  of  the  quinquennial  age  was

1  Aug.,  1881  to  Feb.

1882.  -  Loc.

at.,  Oct.,  p.

J  7he  Theosophist,  Oct.

1881,  p  22.

344  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

changed  from  the  15th  to  the  1st  of  Phalguna  (February-March)  This  change  took  place  240  years  after  the  date  of  the  above  observation,  that  is,  in  3101  B  C.  This  date  is  most  important,  as  from  it  an  era  was  reckoned  in  after  times.

The  commencement  of  the  Kali  or  Kali-Yuga  (derived  from  "  kal/'  "to  reckon  "),  though  said  by  European  scholars  to  be  an  imaginary  date,  becomes  thus  an  astronomical  fact.

INTERCHANGE  OF  KRITTIKA  AND  ASHVINI '

We  thus  see  that  the  asterisms,  twenty-seven  in  number,  were  counted  from  the  Mrtgashirsha  when  the  vernal  equinox  was  in  its  beginning,  and  that  the  practice  of  thus  counting  was  adhered  -to  till  the  vernal  equinox  retrograded  to  the  beginning  of  Krittika,  when  it  became  the  first  of  the  asterisms.

For  then  the  winter  solstice  had  changed,  receding  from  Phalguna  (February-March)  to  Magha  (January- February),  one  complete  lunar  month.

And,  in  like  manner,  the  place  of  Krittika  was  occu-  pied by  Ashvini,  that  is,  the  latter  became  the  first  of  the  asterisms,  heading  all  others,  when  its  beginning  coincided  with  the  vernal  equinoctial  point,  or,  in  other  words,  when  the  winter  solstice  was  in  Pansha  (December-February).  Now  from  the  beginning  of  Krittika  to  that  of  Ashvini  there  are  two  asterisms,  or  26  3°,  and  the  time  the  equinox  takes  to  retrograde  this  distance  at  the  rate  of  1  in  72  years  is  1920  years  ,  and  hence  the  date  at  which  the  vernal  equinox  coincided  with  the  commencement  of  Ashivini  or  with  the  end  of  Revati  is  1920-1421^  499  A.D

BENTLEY'S  OPINION

12.  The  next  and  equally-important  observation  we  have  to  record  here  is  one  discussed  by  Mr.  Bentley  in  his  researches  into  the  Indian  antiquities.

"  The  first  lunar  asterism,"  he  says,  "  in  the  division  of  twenty-eight  was  called  Mula,  that  is  to  say,  the  root  or  origin.

In  the  division  of  twenty-seven  the  first  lunar  asterism  was  called  Jyeshtha,  that  is  to  say,  the  eldest  or  first,  and  consequently  of  the  same  import  as  the  former  "  (w'de  his  Historical  View  of  the  Hindu  Astronomy,  p  4)  From  this  it  be-  comes  manifest  that  the  vernal  equinox  was  once  in  the  beginning  of  Mula,  and  Mula  was  reckoned  the  first  of  the  asterisms  when  they  were  twenty-eight  in  number,  in-  cluding Abhijit.

Now  there  are  fourteen  asterisms,  or  180°,  from  the  beginning  of  Mrigashtrsha  to  that  of  Mula,  and  hence  the  date  at  which  the  vernal  equinox  coincided  with  the  beginning  of  Mula  was  at  least  3341+180x72-  16,301  B  C  The  position  of  the  four  principal  points  on  the  ecliptic  was  then  as  given  below  .

The  winter  solstice  in  the  beginning  of  Uttara  Phalguni  in  the  month  of  Shravana.

The  vernal  equinox  in  the  beginning  of  Mula  in  Karttika

The  summer  solstice  in  the  beginning  of  Purva  Bhadrapada  in  Magha.

The  autumnal  equinox  in  the  beginning  of  Mrigashirsha  in  Vaishakha

1  The  impartial  study  of  Vaidic  and  Post-Vaidic  works  shows  that  the  ancient  Aryans  knew  well  the  precession  of  the  equinoxes,  and  "  that  they  changed  their  position  from  a  certain  asterism  to  two  (occasionally  three)  asterisms  back  whenever  the  precession  amounted  to  two,  properly  speaking,  to  2-4-11/61  asterisms  or  about  29°.  being  the  motion  of  the  sun  in  a  lunar  month,  and  so  caused  the  seasons  to  fall  back  a  complete  lunar  month  It  appears  certain  that  at  the  date  of  Surya

Sfc/dnanta,  Brahma  Siddhanta,  and  other  ancient  treatises  on  astronomy,  the  vernal  equinoctial  point  had  not  actually  reached  the  beginning  of  AshvmT,  but  was  a  few  degrees  east  of  it.  ...  The  astron-  omers of  Europe  change  westward  the  beginning  of  Aries  and  of  all  other  signs  of  the  Zodiac  every  year  by  about  50"  25,  and  thus  make  the  names  of  the  signs  meaningless.

But  these  signs  are  as  much  fixed  as  the  asterisms  themselves,  and  hence  the  Western  astronomers  of  the  present  day  appear  to  us  in  this  respect  less  wary  and  scientific  in  their  observations  than  their  very  ancient  brethren — the  Aryas  "—The  TheosopMst,  Oct  ,  1881,  p  23.

SECRET  CYCLES

A  PROOF  FROM  THE  BHAGAVAD  GlTA

13.  The  Bhagavad  Gita,  as  well  as  the  Bhagavata,  makes  mention  of  an  observa-  tion which  points  to  a  still  more  remote  antiquity  than  the  one  discovered  by  Mr.  Bentley.

The  passages  are  given  in  order  below

"  I    am   the  Margashirsha  [wz  the  first]  among  the  months  and  the  spring,  [viz.

the  first]  among  the  seasons."

This   shows   that   at   one   time   the   first  month  of  spring  was  Margashirsha.

A  season  includes  two  months,  and  the  mention  of  a  month  suggests  the  season

$  u

"  I  am  the  Samvatsara  among  the  years  [which  are  five  in  number]  and  the  spring  among  the  seasons,  and  the  Margashirsha  among  the  months  and  the  Abhijit  among  the  asterisms  [which  are  twenty-eight  in  number]."

This  clearly  points  out  that  at  one  time  in  the  first  year  called  Samvatsara,  of  the  quinquennial  age,  the  Madhu,  that  is,  the  first  month  of  spring,  was  Margashirsha,  and  Abhijit  was  the  first  of  the  asterisms.

It  then  coincided  with  the  vernal  equinoctial  point,  and  thence  from  it  the  asterisms  were  counted.

To  find  the  date  of  this  observation  There  are  three  asterisms  from  the  beginning  of  Mula  to  the  beginning  of  Abhijit,  and  hence  the  date  in  question  is  at  least  16,301  -f-fx  90x72  19.078  or  about  20,000  B.C  The  Samvatsara  at  this  time  began  in  Bhadrapada  the  winter  solstitial  month.

So  far  then  20,000  years  are  mathematically  proven  for  the  antiquity  of  the  Vedas.

And  this  is  simply  exoteric.

Any  mathematician,  provided  he  be  not  blinded  by  preconception  and  prejudice,  can  see  this,  and  an  un-  known but  very  clever  amateur  Astronomer,  S.  A.  Mackey,  has  proved  it  some  sixty  years  back.

His  theory  about  the  Hindu  Yugas  and  their  length  is  curious  —  as  being  so  very  near  the  correct  doctrine.

It  is  said  in  volume  li,  p.  131,  of  Asiatic  Researches  that  "  The  great  ancestor  of  Yudhister  reigned  27,000  years  .  .  at  the  end  of  the  brazen  age  "  In  volume  ix,  p.  364,  we  read  .

"  In   the   beginning  of  the   Call  Yuga,  in  the  reign  of  Yudhister  '     And  Yudhister  .  began  his  reign  immediately  after  the  flood  called  Pralaya."

Here  we  find  three  different  statements  concerning  Yudhister  ...  to  explain  these  seeming  differences  we  must  have  recourse  to  their  books  of  science,  where  we  find  the  heavens  and  the  earth  divided  into  five  parts  of  unequal  dimensions,  by  circles  parallel  to  the  equator.

Attention  to  these  divisions  will  be  found  to  be  of  the  utmost  importance  .  .  as  it  will  be  found  that  from  them  arose  the  division  of  their  Maha-Yuga  into  its  four  component  parts.

Every  astronomer  knows  that  there  is

1  [Cali^-Kah.

and  Yudh.ster^Yudhishthira.]

346  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

a  point  in  the  heavens  called  the  pole,  round  which  the  whole  seems  to  turn  in  twenty-four  hours  ;  and  that  at  ninety  degrees  from  it  they  imagine  a  circle  called  the  equator,  which  divides  the  heavens  and  the  earth  into  two  equal  parts,  the  north  and  the  south.

Between  this  circle  and  the  pole  there  is  another  imaginary  circle  called  the  circle  of  perpetual  apparition  .  between  which  and  the  equator  there  is  a  point  in  the  heavens  called  the  zenith,  through  which  let  another  imaginary  circle  pass,  parallel  to  the  other  two ;  and  then  there  wants  but  the  circle  of  perpetual  occultation  to  complete  the  round  .  No  astronomer  of  Europe  besides  myself  has  ever  applied  them  to  the  development  of  the  Hindu  mysterious  numbers.

We  are  told  in  the  Asiatic  Researches  that  Yudhister  brought  Vicramaditya l  to  reign  in  Cassimere,  which  is  in  the  latitude  of  36  degrees.

And  in  that  latitude  the  circle  of  perpetual  apparition  would  extend  up  to  72  degrees  altitude,  and  from  that  to  the  zenith  there  are  but  18  degrees,  but  from  the  zenith  to  the  equator  in  that  latitude  there  are  36  degrees,  and  from  the  equator  to  the  circle  of  perpetual  occultation  there  are  54  degrees.

Here  we  find  the  semi-circle  of  180  degrees  divided  into  four  parts,  in  the  proportion  of  1,  2,  3,  4,  i.e.,  18,36,  54,  72.  Whether  the  Hindu  astronomers  were  acquainted  with  the  motion  of  the  earth  or  not  is  of  no  consequence,  since  the  appearances  are  the  same  ;  and  if  it  will  give  those  gentlemen  of  tender  consciences  any  pleasure  I  am  willing  to  admit  that  they  imagined  the  heavens  rolled  round  the  earth,  but  they  had  observed  the  stars  in  the  path  of  the  sun  to  move  forward  through  the  equinoctial  points,  at  the  rate  of  fifty-four  seconds  of  a  degree  in  a  year,  which  carried  the  whole  zodiac  round  in  24,000  years  ;  in  which  time  they  also  observed  that  the  angle  of  obliquity  varied,  so  as  to  extend  or  contract  the  width  of  the  tropics  4  degrees  on  each  side,  which  rate  of  motion  would  carry  the  tropics  from  the  equator  to  the  poles  in  540,000  years  :  in  which  time  the  Zodiac  would  have  made  twenty-two  and  a  half  revolutions,  which  are  expressed  by  the  parallel  circles  from  the  equator  to  the  poles  .  .  or  what  amounts  to  the  same  thing,  the  north  pole  of  the  ecliptic  would  have  moved  from  the  north  pole  of  the  earth  to  the  equator.

.  .  .  Thus  the  poles  become  inverted  in  1 ,080,000  years,  which  is  their  Maha  Yuga,  and  which  they  had  divided  into  four  unequal  parts,  in  the  proportions  of  1,  2,  3,  4,  for  the  reasons  mentioned  above  ;  which  are  108,000,  216,000,  324,000,  and  432,000.  Here  we  have  the  most  positive  proofs  that  the  above  numbers  originated  in  ancient  astronomical  observations,  and  consequently  are  not  deserving  of  those  epithets  which  have  been  bestowed  upon  them  by  the  Essayist,  echoing  the  voice  of  Bentley,  Wilford,  Dupuis,  etc.

I  have  now  to  show  that  the  reign  of  Yudhister  for  27,000  years  is  neither  absurd  nor  disgusting,  but  perhaps  the  Essayist  is  not  aware  that  there  were  several  Yudhisters  or  Judhisters  In  volume  ii,  p.  131,  Asiatic  Researches:  "The  great  ancestor  of  Yudhister  reigned  27,000  years  at  the  end  of  the  brazen  or  third  age."  Here  I  must  again  beg  your  attention  to  this  projection.

This  is  a  plane  of  that  machine  which  the  second  gentleman  thought  so  very  clumsy  ;  it  is  that  of  an  oblong  spheroid,  called  by  the  ancients  an  astroscope.

Let  the  longest  axis  represent  the  poles  of  .the  earth,  making  an  angle  of  28  degrees  with  the  horizon  ;  then  will  the  seven  divisions  above  the  horizon  to  the  North  Pole,  the  temple  of  Buddha,  and  the  seven  from  the  North  Pole  to  the  circle  of  perpetual  apparition  represent  the  fourteen  Manvantras,  or  very  long  periods  of  time,  each  of  which,  according  to  the  third  volume  of  Asiatic  Researches,  p.  258  or  259,  was  the  reign  of  a  Menu  [Wanu].  But  Capt.

Wilford,  in  volume  v,  p.  243,  gives  us  the  following  information  :  "The  Egyptians  had  fourteen  dynasties,  and  the  Hindus  had  fourteen  dynasties,  the  rulers  of  which  are  called  Menus."  .  .  .

Who  can  here  mistake  the  fourteen  very  long  periods  of  time  for  those  which  constituted  the  Cali  Yuga  of  Delhi,   or  any  other  place  in  the  latitude  of  28  degrees,  1  [Or  Vikramaditya.]

SECRET  CYCLES

where  the  blank  space  from  the  foot  of  Meru  to  the  seventh  circle  from  the  equator,  constitutes  the  part  passed  over  by  the  tropic  in  the  next  age  ;  which  proportions  differ  considerably  from  those  in  the  latitude  of  36  ;  and  because  the  numbers  in  the  Hindu  books  differ,  Mr  Bentley  asserts  that :  "  This  shows  what  little  dependence  is  to  be  put  in  them."  But,  on  the  contrary,  it  shows  with  what  accuracy  the  Hindus  haj  observed  the  motions  of  the  heavens  in  different  latitudes.

Some  of  the  Hindus  inform  us  that  "  the  earth  has  two  spindles  which  are  sur-  rounded by  seven  tiers  of  heavens  and  hells  at  the  distance  of  one  ra/u  each."  This  needs  but  little  explanation  when  it  is  understood  that  the  seven  divisions  from  the  equator  to  their  zenith  are  called  Rishis  or  Rachas.

But  what  is  most  to  our  present  purpose  to  know  is  that  they  had  given  names  to  each  of  those  divisions  which  the  tropics  passed  over  during  each  revolution  of  the  Zodiac.

In  the  latitude  of  36  degrees  where  the  Pole  or  Meru  was  nine  steps  high  at  Cassimere,  they  were  called  Shastras  ;  in  latitude  28  degrees  at  Delhi,  where  the  Pole  or  Meru  was  seven  steps  high,  they  were  called  Menus  ;  but  in  24  degrees,  at  Cacha,  where  the  Pole  or  Meru  was  but  six  steps  high,  they  were  called  Sacas.

But  in  the  ninth  volume  (Asiatic  Researches)  Yudhister,  the  son  of  Dherma  [Dharma]  or  Justice,  was  the  first  of  the  six  Sacas  ;  the  name  implies  the  end,  and  as  everything  has  two  ends,  Yudhister  is  as  applicable  to  the  first  as  to  the  last.

And  as  the  division  on  the  north  of  the  circle  of  perpetual  apparition  is  the  first  of  the  Cali  Yuga,  supposing  the  tropics  to  be  ascending,  it  was  called  the  division  or  reign  of  Yudhister.

But  the  division  which  immediately  precedes  the  circle  of  perpetual  apparition  is  the  last  of  the  third  or  brazen  age,  and  was  there-  fore called  Yudhister,  and  as  his  reign  preceded  the  reign  of  the  other,  as  the  tropic  ascended  to  the  Pole  or  Meru,  he  was  called  the  father  of  the  other — "  the  great  ancestor  of  Yudhister,  [who]  reigned  twenty-seven  thousand  years,  at  the  end  of  the  brazen  age."  (Vol.

ii,  Asiatic  Researches.)

The  ancient  Hindus  observed  that  the  Zodiac  went  forward  at  about  the  rate  of  fifty-four  seconds  a  year,  and  to  avoid'greater  fractions,  stated  it  at  that,  which  would  make  a  complete  round  in  24,000  years  ;  and  observing  the  angle  of  the  poles  to  vary  nearly  4  degrees  each  round,  stated  the  three  numbers  as  such,  which  would  have  given  forty-five  rounds  of  the  Zodiac  to  half  a  revolution  of  the  poles ;  but  finding  that  forty-  five  rounds  would  not  bring  the  northern  tropic  to  coincide  with  the  circle  of  perpetual  apparition  by  thirty  minutes  of  a  degree,  which  required  the  Zodiac  to  move  one  sign  and  a  half  more,  which  we  all  know  it  could  not  do  in  less  than  3.000  years,  they  were  in  the  case  before  us,  added  to  the  end  of  the  brazen  age  ,  which  lengthens  the  reign  of  that  Yudhister  to  27,000  years  instead  of  24,000,  but,  at  another  time  they  did  not  alter  the  regular  order  of  24,000  years  to  the  reign  of  each  of  these  long-winded  monarchs,  but  rounded  up  the  time  by  allowing  a  regency  to  continue  three  or  four  thousand  years.

In  Volume  ii,  p.  134,  Asiatic  Researches,  we  are  told  that .  "  Paricshit,  [Parikshit]  the  great  nephew  and  successor  of  Yudhister,  is  allowed  without  controversy  to  have  reigned  in  the  interval  between  the  brazen  and  earthen,  or  Cali  Ages,  and  to  have  died  at  the  setting-m  of  the  Caliyug."  Here  we  find  an  interregnum  at  the  end  of  the  brazen  age,  and  before  the  setting-in  of  the  Cali  Yug  .  and  as  there  can  be  but  one  brazen  or  Treta  Yug,  i  e  ,  that  third  age,  in  a  Maha  Yuga  of  1.080,000  years  :  the  reign  of  this  Paricshit  must  have  been  in  the  second  Maha  Yuga,  when  the  pole  had  returned  to  its  original  position,  which  must  have  taken  2,160,000  years  :  and  this  is  what  the  Hindus  call  the  Prajanatha  Yuga.

Analogous  to  this  custom  is  that  of  some  nations  more  modern,  who,  fond  of  even  numbers,  have  made  the  common  year  to  consist  of  twelve  months  of  thirty  days  each,  and  the  five  days  and  odd  measure  have  been  represented  as  the  reign  of  a  little  serpent  biting  his  tail,  and  divided  into  five  parts,  etc.

348  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

But  "  Yudhister  began  his  reign  immediately  after  the  flood  called  Pralaya,"  i.e.,  at  the  end  of  the  Call  Yug  (or  age  of  heat),  when  the  tropic  had  passed  from  the  pole  to  the  other  side  of  the  circle  of  perpetual  apparition,  which  coincides  with  the  northern,  horizon  ,  here  the  tropics  or  summer  solstice  would  be  again  in  the  same  parallel  of  north  deojination,  at  the  commencement  of  their  first  age,  as  he  was  at  the  end  of  their  third  age,  or  Treta  Yug,  called  the  brazen  age.

.  .  .

Enough  has  been  said  to  prove  that  the  Hindu  books  of  science  are  not  disgusting  absurdities,  originated  in  ignorance,  vanity,  and  credulity  ,  but  books  containing  the  most  profound  knowledge  of  astronomy  and  geography.

What,  therefore,  can  induce  those  gentlemen  of  tender  consciences  to  insist  that  Yudhister  was  a  real  mortal  man  I  have  no  guess  unless  it  be  that  they  fear  for  the  fate  of  Jared  and  his  grandfather,  Methuselah  ?*

1  [These  notes  are  very  freely  rendered  portions  of  pp    109-176  of  Mythological  Astronomy  (1826)  by  S.  A  Mackay  (also  Mackey)— Ed  ]

SECTION

THE  DOCTRINE  OF  AVATARAS

A  STRANGE  story — a  legend  rather — is  persistently  current  among  the  disciples  of  some  great  Himalayan  Gurus,  and  even  among  laymen,  to  the  effect  that  Gautama,  the  Prince  of  Kapilavastu,  has  never  left  the  terrestrial  regions,  though  his  body  died  and  was  burnt,  and  its  relics  are  preserved  to  this  day.

There  is  an  oral  tradition  among  the  Chinese  Buddhists,  and  a  written  statement  among  the  secret  books  of  the  Lamaists  of  Tibet,  as  well  as  a  tradition  among  the  Aryans,  that  Gautama  BUDDHA  had  two  doctrines  .  one  for  the  masses  and  His  lay  disciples,  the  other  for  His  "elect,"  the  Arhats.

His  policy  and  after  Him  that  of  His  Arhats  was,  it  appears,  to  refuse  no  one  admission  into  the  ranks  of  candidates  for  Arhatship,  but  never  to  divulge  the  final  mysteries  except  to  those  who  had  proved  themselves,  during  long  years  of  probation,  to  be  worthy  of  Initiation.

These  once  accepted  were  consecrated  and  initiated  without  distinction  of  race,  caste  or  wealth,  as  in  the  case  of  His  western  successor.

It  is  the  Arhats  who  have  set  forth  and  allowed  this  tradition  to  take  root  in  the  people's  mind,  and  it  is  the  basis,  also  of  the  later  dogma  of  Lamaistic  reincarnation  or  the  succession  of  human  Buddhas.

The  little  that  can  be  said  here  upon  the  subject  may  or  may  not  help  to  guide  the  psychic  student  in  the  right  direction.

It  being  left  to  the  option  and  responsibility  of  the  writer  to  tell  the  facts  as  she  personally  understood  them,  the  blame  for  possible  misconceptions  created  must  fall  only  upon  her.

She  has  been  taught  the  doctrine,  but  it  was  left  to  her  sole  intuition — as  it  is  now  left  to  the  sagacity  of  the  reader — to  group  the  mysterious  and  per-  plexing facts  together.

The  incomplete  statements  herein  given  are  fragments  of  what  is  contained  in  certain  secret  volumes,  but  it  is  not  lawful  to  divulge  the  details.

The  esoteric  version  of  the  Mystery  given  in  the  Secret  Volumes  may  be  told  very  briefly.

The  Buddhists  have  always  stoutly  denied  that  their  BUDDHA  was,  as  alleged  by  the  Brahmans,  an  Avatara  of  Vishnu  in  the  same

350  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

sense  as  a  man  is  an  incarnation  of  his  Karmic  ancestor.

They  deny  it  partly,  perhaps,  because  the  esoteric  meaning  of  the  term  "  Maha  Vishnu  "  is  not  known  to  them  in  its  full,  impersonal,  and  general  meaning.

There  is  a  mysterious  Principle  in  Nature  called  "  Maha  Vishnu,"  which  is  not  the  God  of  that  name,  but  a  principle  which  contains  Bija,  the  seed  of  Avatarism  or,  in  other  words,  is  the  potency  and  cause  of  such  divine  incarnations.

All  the  World-Saviours,  the  Bodhisattvas  and  the  Avataras,  are  the  trees  of  salva-  tion grown  out  from  the  one  seed,  the  Bija  or  "  Maha  Vishnu."  Whether  it  be  called  Adi-Buddha  (Primeval  Wisdom)  or  Maha  Vishnu,  it  is  all  the  same.

Understood  esoterically,  Vishnu  is  both  Saguna  and  Nirguna  (with  and  without  attributes).  In  the  first  aspect,  Vishnu  is  the  object  of  exoteric  worship  and  devotion  ;  in  the  second,  as  Nirguna,  he  is  the  culmination  of  the  totality  of  spiritual  wisdom  in  the  Universe — Nirvana,1  in  short — and  has  as  worshippers  all  philosophical  minds.

In  this  esoteric  sense  the  Lord  BUDDHA  was  an  incar-  nation of  Maha  Vishnu.

This  is  from  the  philosophical  and  purely  spiritual  standpoint.

From  the  plane  of  illusion,  however,  as  one  would  say,  or  from  the  terrestrial  standpoint,  those  initiated  know  that  He  was  a  direct  incarnation  of  one  of  the  primeval  "  Seven  Sons  of  Light  "  who  are  to  be  found  in  every  Theogony — the  Dhyan  Chohans  whose  mission  it  is,  from  one  eternity  (aeon)  to  the  other,  to  watch  over  the  spiritual  welfare  of  the  regions  under  their  care.

This  has  been  already  enunciated  in  Esoteric  Buddhism.

One  of  the  greatest  mysteries  of  speculative  and  philosophical  Mysticism  — and  it  is  one  of  the  mysteries  now  to  be  disclosed — is  the  modus  operand!  in  the  degrees  of  such  hypostatic  transferences.

As  a  matter  of  course,  divine  as  well  as  human  incarnations  must  remain  a  closed  book  to  the  theologian  as  much  as  to  the  physiologist,  unless  the  Esoteric  Teachings  be  accepted  and  become  the  religion  of  the  world.

This  Teaching  may  never  be  fully  explained  to  an  unprepared  public  ;  but  one  thing  is  certain  and  may  be  said  now  :  that  between  the  dogma  of  a  newly-created  soul  for  each  new  birth,  and  the  physiological  assumption  of  a  temporary  animal  soul,  there  lies  the  vast  region  of  Occult  teaching a  with  its  logical  and  reasonable  demonstrations,  the  links  of  which  may  all  be  traced  in  logical  and  philosophical  sequence  in  nature.

1  A  great  deal  of  misconception  is  raised  by  a  confusion  of  planes  of  being  and  misuse  of  expres-  sions For  instance,  certain  spiritual  states  have  been  confounded  with  the  Nirvana  of  BUDDHA.

The  Nirvana  of  BUDDHA  is  totally  different  from  any  other  spiritual  state  of  Sam  ad  hi  or  even  the  highest  Theophania  enjoyed  by  lesser  Adepts  After  physical  death  the  kinds  of  spiritual  states  reached  by  Adepts  differ  greatly.

*  This  region  is  the  one  possible  point  of  conciliation  between  the  two  diametrically  opposed  poles  of  religion  and  science,  the  one  with  its  barren  fields  of  dogmas  on  faith,  the  other  over-running  with  empty  hypotheses,  both  overgrown  with  the  weeds  of  error  They  will  never  meet.

The  two  are  at

THE  DOCTRINE  OF  AVATARAS

This  "  Mystery"  is  found,  for  him  who  understands  its  right  meaning,  in  the  dialogue  between  Krishna  and  Arjuna,  in  the  Bhagavad  G/ta,  chapter  iv,  vs.  5-8  Says  the  Avatara  :

Many  births  of  mine  have  passed,  as  also  of  yours,  O  Arjuna  J  All  those  I  know,  but  you  do  not  know  yours,  O  harasser  of  your  enemies.

Although  I  am  unborn,  with  exhaustless  Atma.

and  am  the  Lord  of  all  that  is  ,  yet,  taking  up  the  domination  of  my  nature  I  am  born  by  the  power  of  illusion  '

Whenever,  O  son  of  Bharata,  there  is  decline  of  Dharma  [the  right  law]  and  the  rise  of  Adharma  [the  opposite  of  Dharma]  there  I  manifest  myself

For  the  salvation  of  the  good  and  the  destruction  of  wickedness,  for  the  estab-  lishment of  the  law,  /  am  born  in  every  yuga

Whoever  comprehends  truly  my  divine  birth  and  action,  he,  O  Arjuna,  having-,  abandoned  the  body  does  not  receive  re-birth ,  he  comes  to  me

Thus,  all  the  Avataras  are  one  and  the  same  :  the  Sons  of  their  "  Father,"  in  a  direct  descent  and  line,  the  "  Father,"  or  one  of  the  seven  Flames  becoming,  for  the  time  being,  the  Son,  and  these  two  being  one — in  Eternity.

What  is  the  Father  ?  Is  it  the  absolute  Cause  of  all  ? — the  fathomless  Eternal  ?  No;  most  decidedly.

It  is  Karanatma,  the  "Causal  Soul"  which,  in  its  general  sense,  is  called  by  the  Hindus  fshvara,  the  Lord,  and  by  Christians  "  God,"  the  One  and  Only.

From  the  standpoint  of  unity  it  is  so ;  but  then  the  lowest  of  the  Elemental  could  equally  be  viewed  in  such  case  as  the  "One  and  Only."  Each  human  being  has,  moreover,  his  own  divine  Spirit  or  personal  God.

That  divine  Entity  or  Flame  from  which  Buddhi  emanates  stands  in  the  same  relation  to  man,  though  on  a  lower  plane,  as  the  Dhyani-  Buddha  to  his  human  Buddha.

Hence  monotheism  and  polytheism  are  not  irreconcilable  ;  they  exist  in  Nature.

Truly,  "  for  the  salvation  of  the  good  and  the  destruction  of  wickedness,"  the  personalities  known  as  Gautama,  Shankara,  Jesus  and  a  few  others  were  born  each  m  his  age,  as  declared — "  I  am  born  in  every  Yuga  " — and  they  were  all  born  through  the  same  Power.

There  is  a  great  mystery  in  such  incarnations  and  they  are  outside  and  beyond  the  cycle  of  general  re-births.

Rebirths  may  be  divided  into  three  classes  :  the  divine  incarnations  called  Avataras  ;  those  of  Adepts  who  give  up  Nirvana  for  the  sake  of  helping  on  humanity — the  Nirmanakayas ;  and  the

feud,  at  an  everlasting  warfare  with  each  other,  but  this  does  not  prevent  them  from  uniting  against  Esoteric  Philosophy,  which  for  two  millenniums  has  had  to  fight  against  infallibility  in  both  directions,  or  "  mere  vanity  and  pretence  "  as  Antoninus  defined  it,  and  now  finds  the  materialism  of  Modern  Science  arrayed  against  its  truths

1  Whence  some  of  the  Gnostic  ideas  ?  Cermthus  taught  that  the  world  and  Jehovah  having  fallen  off  from  virtue  and  primitive  dignity  the  Supreme  permitted  one  of  his  glorious  £ons  whose  name  was  the  "  Anointed  "  (Christ)  to  incarnate  in  the  man  Jesus  Basilides  denied  the  reality  of  the  body  of  Jesus,  and  calling  it  an  "  illusion  "  held  that  it  was  Simon  of  Cyrene  who  suffered  on  the  Cross  in  his  stead.

All  such  teachings  are  echoes  of  the  Eastern  Doctrines.

352  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

natural  succession  of  rebirths  for  all — the  common  law.

The  Avatara  is  an  appearance,  one  which  may  be  termed  a  special  illusion  within  the  natural  illusion  that  reigns  on  the  planes  under  the  sway  of  that  power,  Maya  ;  the  Adept  is  re-born  consciously,  at  his  will  and  pleasure  j1  the  units  of  the  common  herd  unconsciously  follow  the  great  law  of  dual  evolution.

What  is  an  Avatara  ?  for  the  term  before  being  used  ought  to  be  well  understood.

It  is  a  descent  of  the  manifested  Deity — whether  under  the  specific  name  of  Shiva,  Vishnu,  or  Adi-Buddha — into  an  illusive  form  of  individuality,  an  appearance  which  to  men  on  this  illusive  plane  is  objective,  but  is  not  so  in  sober  fact.

That  illusive  form,  having  neither  past  nor  future,  because  it  had  neither  previous  incarnation  nor  will  have  subsequent  rebirths,  has  naught  to  do  with  Karma,  which  has  therefore  no  hold  on  it.

Gautama  BUDDHA  was  born  an  Avatara  in  one  sense.

But  this,  in  view  of  unavoidable  objections  on  dogmatic  grounds,  necessitates  explanation.

There  is  a  great  difference  between  an  Avatara  and  a  Jivanmukta  :  one,  as  already  stated,  is  an  illusive  appearance,  Karma-less,  and  having  never  before  incarnated  ;  and  the  other,  the  Jivanmukta,  is  one  who  obtains  Nirvana  by  his  individual  merits.

To  this  expression  again  an  uncompromising,  philosophical  Vedantin  would  object.

He  might  say  that  as  the  condition  of  the  Avatara  and  the  Jivanmukta  are  one  and  the  same  state,  no  amount  of  personal  merit,  in  howsoever  many  incarnations,  can  lead  its  possessor  to  Nirvana.

Nirvana,  he  would  say,  is  actionless ;  how,  then,  can  any  action  lead  to  it  ?  It  is  neither  a  result  nor  a  cause,  but  an  ever-present,  eternal  /s,  as  Nagasena  defined  it.  Hence  it  can  have  no  relation  to,  or  concern  with,  action,  merit,  or  demerit,  since  these  are  subject  to  Karma.

All  this  is  very  true,  but  still  to  our  mind  there  is  an  important  difference  between  the  two.

An  Avatara  is ;  a  Jivanmukta  becomes  one.

If  the  state  of  the  two  is  identical,  not  so  are  the  causes  which  lead  to  it.  An  Avatara  is  a  descent  of  a  God  into  an  illusive  form  ;  a  Jivanmukta,  who  may  have  passed  through  numberless  incarnations  and  may  have  accumulated  merit  in  them,  certainly  does  not  become  a  Nirvani  because  of  that  merit,  but  only  because  of  the  Karma  generated  by  it,  which  leads  and  guides  him  in  the  direction  of  the  Guru  who  will  initiate  him  into  the  mystery  of  Nirvana  and  who  alone  can  help  him  to  reach  this  abode.

The  Shastras  say  that  from  our  works  alone  we  obtain  Moksha,  and  if  we  take  no  pains  there  will  be  no  gain  and  we  shall  be  neither  assisted  nor  bene-  fited by  Deity  [the  Maha-Guru].  Therefore  it  is  maintained  that  Gautama,

1  A  genuine  initiated  Adept  will  retain  his  Adeptship,  though  there  may  be  for  our  world  of  illusion  numberless  incarnations  of  him  The  propelling  power  that  lies  at  the  root  of  a  series  of  such  incar-  nations is  not  Karma,  as  ordinarily  understood,  but  a  still  more  inscrutable  power.

During  the  period  of  his  lives  the  Adept  does  not  lose  his  Adeptship,  though  he  cannot  rise  in  it  to  a  higher  degree.

THE  DOCTRINE  OF  AVATARAS

though  an  Avatara  in  one  sense,  is  a  true  human  Jivanmukta,  owing  his  posi-  tion to  his  personal  merit,  and  thus  more  than  an  Avatara.

It  was  his  personal  merit  that  enabled  him  to  achieve  Nirvana.

Of  the  voluntary  and  conscious  incarnations  of  Adepts  there  are  two  types — those  of  Nirmanakayas,  and  those  undertaken  by  the  probationary  chelas  who  are  on  their  trial.

The  greatest  and  most  puzzling  mystery  of  the  first  type  lies  in  the  fact  that  such  re-birth  in  a  human  body  of  the  personal  Ego  of  some  particular  Adept — when  it  has  been  dwelling  in  the  Mayavi  or  the  Kama  Rupa,  and  remaining  in  the  Kama  Loka — may  happen  even  when  his  "  Higher  Princi-  ples "  are  in  the  state  of  Nirvana.1  Let  it  be  understood  that  the  above  expressions  are  used  for  popular  purposes,  and  therefore  that  what  is  written  does  not  deal  with  this  deep  and  mysterious  question  from  the  highest  plane,  that  of  absolute  spirituality,  nor  again  from  the  highest  philosophical  point  of  view,  comprehensible  but  to  the  very  few.

It  must  not  be  supposed  that  anything  can  go  into  Nirvana  which  is  not  eternally  there  ;  but  human  intellect  in  conceiving  the  Absolute  must  put  It  as  the  highest  term  in  an  indefinite  series.

If  this  be  borne  in  mind  a  great  deal  of  misconception  will  be  avoided.

The  content  of  this  spiritual  evolution  is  the  material  on  various  planes  with  which  the  Nirvani  was  in  contact  prior  to  his  attainment  of  Nirvana.

The  plane  on  which  this  is  true,  being  in  the  series  of  illusive  planes,  is  undoubtedly  not  the  highest.

Those  who  search  for  that  must  go  to  the  right  source  of  study,  the  teachings  of  the  Upanishads,  and  must  go  in  the  right  spirit.

Here  we  attempt  only  to  indicate  the  direction  in  which  the  search  is  to  be  made,  and  in  showing  a  few  of  the  mysterious  Occult  possibilities  we  do  not  bring  our  readers  actually  to  the  goal.

The  ultimate  truth  can  be  communicated  only  from  Guru  to  initiated  pupil.

Having  said  so  much,  the  statement  still  will  and  must  appear  incom-  prehensible, if  not  absurd,  to  many.

Firstly,  to  all  those  who  are  unfamiliar  with  the  doctrine  of  the  manifold  nature  and  various  aspects  of  the  human  Monad  ;  and  secondly  to  those  who  view  the  septenary  division  of  the  human  entity  from  a  too  materialistic  standpoint.

Yet  the  intuitional  Occultist,  who  has  studied  thoroughly  the  mysteries  of  Nirvana — who  knows  it  to  be  identical

1  From  the  so-called  BrahmS  Loka — the  seventh  and  higher  world,  beyond  which  all  is  arupa,  formless,  purely  spiritual — to  the  lowest  world  and  insect,  or  even  to  an  object  such  as  a  leaf,  there  is  perpetual  revolution  of  the  condition  of  existence,  evolution  and  re-birth.

Some  human  beings  attain  states  or  spheres  from  which  there  is  only  a  return  in  a  new  Kalpa  (a  day  of  Brahma)  ,  there  are  other  states  or  spheres  from  which  there  is  only  return  after  100  years  of  Brahma  (Maha-Kalpa,  a  period  covering  311,040,000,000,000  years)  Nirvana,  it  is  said,  is  a  state  from  which  there  is  no  return.

Yet  it  is  maintained  that  there  may  be,  as  exceptional  cases,  re-incarnation  from  that  state  ,  only  such  incarnations  are  illusion,  like  everything  else  on  this  plane,  as  will  be  shown.

FF

354  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

with  Parabrahman,  and  hence  unchangeable,  eternal  and  no  Thing  but  the  Absolute  All — will  seize  the  possibility  of  the  fact.

They  know  that  while  a  Dharmakaya — a  Nirvani  "  without  remains,"  as  our  Orientalists  have  translated  it,  being  absorbed  into  that  Nothingness,  which  is  the  one  real,  because  Absolute,  Consciousness — cannot  be  said  to  return  to  incarnation  on  Earth,  the  Nirvani  being  no  longer  a  he,  a  she,  or  even  an  it,  the  Nirmanakaya — or  he  who  has  obtained  Nirvana  "  with  remains,"  i.e.,  who  is  clothed  in  a  subtle  body,  which  makes  him  impervious  to  all  outward  impressions  and  to  every  mental  feeling,  and  in  whom  the  notion  of  his  Ego  has  not  entirely  ceased —  can  do  so.  Again,  every  Eastern  Occultist  is  aware  of  the  fact  that  there  are  two  kinds  of  Nirmanakayas — the  natural,  and  the  assumed  ;  that  the  former  is  the  name  or  epithet  given  to  the  condition  of  a  high  ascetic,  or  Initiate,  who  has  reached  a  stage  of  bliss  second  only  to  Nirvana  ;  while  the  latter  means  the  self-sacrifice  of  one  who  voluntarily  gives  up  the  absolute  Nirvana,  in  order  to  help  humanity  and  be  still  doing  it  good,  or,  in  other  words,  to  save  his  fellow-creatures  by  guiding  them.

It  may  be  objected  that  the  Dharmakaya,  being  a  Nirvani  or  Jivanmukta,  can  have  no  "  remains  "  left  behind  him  after  death,  for  having  attained  that  state  from  which  no  further  incarnations  are  possible,  there  is  no  need  for  him  of  a  subtle  body,  or  of  the  individual  Ego  that  reincarnates  from  one  birth  to  another^  and  that  therefore  the  latter  disappears  of  logical  necessity  ;  to  this  it  is  answered  :  it  is  so  for  all  exoteric  purposes  and  as  a  general  law.

But  the  case  with  which  we  are  dealing  is  an  exceptional  one,  and  its  realization  lies  within  the  Occult  powers  of  the  high  Initiate,  who,  before  entering  into  the  state  of  Nirvana,  can  cause  his  "  remains  "  (sometimes,  though  not  very  well,  called  »his  Mayavi  Rupa),  to  remain  behind,1  whether  he  is  to  become  a  Nirvani,  or  to  find  himself  in  a  lower  state  of  bliss.

Next,  there  are  cases — rare,  yet  more  frequent  than  one  would  be  disposed  to  expect — which  are  the  voluntary  and  conscious  reincarnations  of  Adepts"  on  their  trial.

Every  man  has  an  Inner,  a  "  Higher  Self,"  and  also  an  Astral  Body.

But  few  are  those  who,  outside  the  higher  degrees  of  Adept-  ship,  can  guide  the  latter,  or  any  of  the  principles  that  animate  it,  when  once

'This  fact  of  the  disappearance  of  the  vehicle  of  Egotism  in  the  fully  developed  Yogi,  who  is  supposed  to  have  reached  NirvSna  on  earth,  years  before  his  corporeal  death,  has  led  to  the  law  in  Manu,  sanctioned  by  millenniums  of  Brahmamcal  authority,  that  such  a  Paramatma  should  be  held  as  absolutely  blameless  and  free  from  sin  or  responsibility,  do  whatever  he  may  (see  last  chapter  of  the  laws  of  Manu).  Indeed,  caste  itself— that  most  despotic,  uncompromising  and  autocratic  tyrant  in  India — can  be  broken  with  impunity  by  the  Yogi,  who  is  above  caste  This  will  give  the  key  ta  our  statements

2  [The  word  "  Adept  "  is  very  loosely  used  by  H.P.B.,  who  often  seems  to  have  implied  by  it  no  more  than  the  possession  of  special  knowledge  of  some  kind.

Here  it  seems  to  mean  first  an  uninitiated  disciple  and  then  an  initiated  one.

— Ed.,  of  1897  edition  ]

THE  DOCTRINE  OF  AVATARAS

death  has  closed  their  short  terrestrial  life.

Yet  such  guidance,  or  their  trans-  ference from  the  dead  to  a  living  body,  is  not  only  possible,  but  is  of  frequent  occurrence,  according  to  Occult  and  Kabalistic  teachings.

The  degrees  of  such  power  of  course  vary  greatly.

To  mention  but  three  :  the  lowest  of  these  degrees  would  allow  an  Adept,  who  has  been  greatly  trammelled  during  life  in  his  study  and  in  the  use  of  his  powers,  to  choose  after  death  another  body  in  which  he  could  go  on  with  his  interrupted  studies,  though  ordinarily  he  would  lose  in  it  every  remembrance  of  his  previous  incarnation.

The  next  degree  permits  him,  in  addition  to  this,  to  transfer  the  memory  of  his  past  life  to  his  new  body ;  while  the  highest  has  hardly  any  limits  in  the  exercise  of  that  wonderful  faculty.

As  an  instance  of  an  Adept  who  enjoyed  the  first  mentioned  power  some  medieval  Kabalists  cite  a  well-known  personage  of  the  fifteenth  century  — Cardinal  de  Cusa  ;  Karma,  due  to  his  wonderful  devotion  to  Esoteric  study  and  the  Kabalah,  led  the  suffering  Adept  to  seek  intellectual  recuperation  and  rest  from  ecclesiastical  tyranny  in  the  body  of  Copernicus.

Se  non  e  vero  e  ben  trovato  [If  it  is  not  true  it  is  cleverly  invented]  ;  and  the  perusal  of  the  lives  of  the  two  men  might  easily  lead  a  believer  in  such  powers  to  a  ready  acceptance  of  the  alleged  fact.

The  reader  having  at  his  command  the  means  to  do  so  is  asked  to  turn  to  the  formidable  folio  in  Latin  of  the  fifteenth  century,  called  De  Docta  Ignorantia,  written  by  the  Cardinal  de  Cusa,  in  which  all  the  theories  and  hypotheses — all  the  ideas — of  Copernicus  are  found  as  the  key-notes  to  the  discoveries  of  the  great  astronomer.1  Who  was  this  extraordinarily  learned  Cardinal  ?  The  son  of  a  poor  boatman,  owing  all  his  career,  his  Cardinal's  hat,  and  the  reverential  awe  rather  than  friendship  of  the  Popes  Eugenius  IV,  Nicholas  V,  and  Pius  II,  to  the  extraordinary  learning  which  seemed  innate  in  him,  since  he  had  studied  nowhere  till  comparatively  late  in

1  About  fifty  years  before  the  birth  of  Copernicus,  de  Cusa  wrote  as  follows  "  Though  the  world  may  not  be  absolutely  infinite,  no  one  can  represent  it  to  himself  as  finite,  since  human  reason  is  in-  capable of  assigning  to  it  any  term.

.  .  For  in  the  same  way  that  our  earth  cannot  be  in  the  centre  of  the  Universe,  as  thought,  no  more  could  the  sphere  of  the  fixed  stars  be  in  it.  Thus  this  world

is  like  a  vast  machine,  having  its  centre  [Deity]  everywhere,  and  its  circumference  nowhere  [macn/na  mundi,  quasi  habens  ubique  centrum,  et  nullibi  circumferentiam]  .  Hence,  the  earth  not  being  in  the  centre,  cannot  therefore  be  motionless  and  though  it  is  far  smaller  than  the  sun,  one  must

not  conclude  for  all  that,  that  she  is  worse  [vilior — more  vile].  .  .  One  cannot  see  whether  its  inhabitants  are  superior  to  those  who  dwell  nearer  to  the  sun,  or  in  other  stars,  as  sidereal  space  cannot  be  deprived  of  inhabitants.

.  .  .  The  earth,  very  likely  [rbrtasse]  one  of  the  smallest  globes,  is  nevertheless  the  cradle  of  intelligent  beings,  most  noble  and  perfect  "  One  cannot  fail  to  agree  with  the  biographer  of  Cardinal  de  Cusa,  who,  having  no  suspicion  of  the  Occult  truth,  and  the  reason  of  such  erudition  in  a  writer  of  the  fourteenth  and  fifteenth  centuries,  simply  marvels  at  such  a  miracu-  lous foreknowledge,  and  attributes  it  to  God,  saying  of  him  that  he  was  a  man  incomparable  in  every  kind  of  philosophy,  by  whom  many  a  theological  mystery  inaccessible  to  the  human  mind  (!),  veiled  and  neglected  for  centuries  (ve/ata  et  neg/ecta)  were  once  more  brought  to  light  "  Pascal  might  have  read  De  Cusa's  works  .  but  whence  could  the  Cardinal  have  borrowed  his  ideas  7  "  asks  Moren.

Evidently  from  Hermes  and  the  works  of  Pythagoras,  even  if  the  mystery  of  his  incarnation  and  re-  incarnation be  dismissed.

356  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

life.

De  Cusa  died  on  11  August  1464,  moreover,  his  best  works  were  written  before  he  was  forced  to  enter  orders — to  escape  persecution.

Nor  did  the  Adept  escape  it.

In  the  voluminous  work  of  the  Cardinal  above-quoted  is  found  a  very  suggestive  sentence,  the  authorship  of  which  has  been  variously  attributed  to  Pascal,  to  Cusa  himself,  and  to  the  Zofiar,  and  which  belongs  by  right  to  the  Books  of  Hermes.

The  world   is  an  infinite  sphere,  whose  centre  is  everywhere  and  whose  circum-  ference is  nowhere.

This  is  changed  by  some  into:  "The  centre  being  nowhere,  and  the  circumference  everywhere,"  a  rather  heretical  idea  for  a  Cardinal,  though  perfectly  orthodox  from  a  Kabalistic  standpoint.

The  theory  of  rebirth  must  be  set  forth  by  Occultists,  and  then  applied  to  special  cases.

The  right  comprehension  of  this  psychic  fact  is  based  upon  a  correct  view  of  that  group  of  celestial  Beings  who  are  universally  called  the  seven  Primeval  Gods  or  Angels — our  Dhyan  Chohans — the  "  Seven  Primeval  Rays  "  or  Powers,  adopted  later  on  by  the  Christian  Religion  as  the  "  Seven  Angels  of  the  Presence."  Arupa,  formless,  at  the  upper  rung  of  the  ladder  of  Being,  materializing  more  and  more  as  they  descend  in  the  scale  of  objectivity  and  form,  ending  in  the  grossest  and  most  imperfect  of  the  Hierarchy,  man — it  is  the  former  purely  spiritual  group  that  is  pointed  out  to  us,  in  our  Occult  teaching,  as  the  nursery  and  fountain-head  of  human  beings.

Therein  germinates  that  consciousness  which  is  the  earliest  manifestation  from  causal  Consciousness — the  Alpha  and  the  Omega  of  divine  being  and  life  for  ever.

And  as  it  proceeds  downward  through  every  phase  of  existence  des-  cending through  man,  through  animal  and  plant,  it  ends  its  descent  only  in  the  mineral.

It  is  represented  by  the  double  triangle — the  most  mysterious  and  the  most  suggestive  of  all  mystic  signs,  for  it  is  a  double  glyph,  embracing  spiritual  and  physical  consciousness  and  life,  the  former  triangle  running  upwards,  and  the  lower  downwards,  both  interlaced,  and  showing  the  various  planes  of  the  twice-seven  modes  of  consciousness,  the  fourteen  spheres  of  existence,  the  Lokas  of  the  Brahmans.

The  reader  may  now  be  able  to  obtain  a  clearer  comprehension  of  the  whole  thing.

He  will  also  see  what  is  meant  by  the  "Watchers,"  there  being  one  placed  as  the  Guardian  or  Regent  over  each  of  the  seven  divisions  or  regions  of  the  earth,  according  to  old  traditions,  as  there  is  one  to  watch  over  and  guide  every  one  of  the  fourteen  worlds  or  Lokas.1  But  it  is  not  with  any

1  This  is  the  secret  meaning  of  the  statements  about  the  Hierarchy  of  PrajSpatis  or  Rishis.

First  seven  are  mentioned,  then  ten,  then  twenty-one,  and  so  on.  They  are  "  Gods  "  and  creators  of  men  — many  of  them  the  "  Lords  of  Beings  "  ;  they  are  the  "  Mind-born  Sons  "  of  Brahma1,  and  then  they

THE  DOCTRINE  OF  AVATARAS

of  these  that  we  are  at  present  concerned,  but  with  the  "  Seven  Breaths,"  so-called,  that  furnish  man  with  his  immortal  Monad  in  his  cyclic  pilgrimage.

The  Commentary  on  the  BOOK  OF  DZYAN  says  :

Descending  on  his  region  first  as  Lord  of  Glory,  the  Flame  (or  Breath),  having  called  into  conscious  being  the  highest  of  the  Emanations  of  that  special  region,  ascends  from  it  again  to  Its  primeval  seat,  whence  It  watches  over  and  guides  Its  countless  Beams  (Monads).  It  chooses  as  Its  Avataras  only  those  who  had  the  Seven  Virtues  in  them  1  in  their  previous  incarnation.

As  for  the  rest,  It  overshadows  each  with  one  of  Its  countless  beams.

...  Vet  even  the  "  beam  "  is  a  part  of  the  Lord  of  Lords.

The  septenary  principle  in  man — who  can  be  regarded  as  dual  only  as  concerns  psychic  manifestation  on  this  gross  earthly  plane — was  known  to  all  antiquity,  and  may  be  found  in  every  ancient  Scripture.

The  Egyptians  knew  and  taught  it,  and  their  division  of  principles  is  in  every  point  a  counterpart  of  the  Aryan  Secret  Teaching.

It  is  thus  given  in  Isis  Unveiled:

„  In  the  Egyptian  notions,  as  in  those  of  all  other  faiths  founded  on  philosophy,  man  was  not  merely  ...  a  union  of  soul  and  body :  he  was  a  trinity  when  Spirit  was  added  to  it.  Besides,  that  doctrine  made  him  consist  of  Kha  (body),  Khaba  (astral  form  or  shadow),  Ka  (animal  soul  or  life-principle),  Ba  (the  higher  soul),  and  Akh  (terrestrial  intelligence)  They  had  also  a  sixth  principle,  named  Sah  (or  mummy),  but  the  functions  of  this  one  commenced  after  the  death  of  the  body.*

The  seventh  principle  being  of  course  the  highest,  uncreated  Spirit  was  generically  called  Osiris,  therefore  every  deceased  person  became  Osirified —  or  an  Osiris — after  death.

But  in  addition  to  reiterating  the  old  ever-present  fact  of  reincarnation  and  Karma — not  as  taught  by  the  Spiritists,  but  as  by  the  most  Ancient  Science  in  the  world — Occultists  must  teach  cyclic  and  evolutionary  reincar-  nation :  that  kind  of  re-birth,  mysterious  and  still  incomprehensible  to  many  who  are  ignorant  of  the  world's  history,  which  was  cautiously  mentioned  in  Isis  Unveiled.

A  general  re-birth  for  every  individual  with  interlude  of  Kama  Loka  and  Devachan,  and  a  cyclic  conscious  reincarnation  with  a  grand  and  divine  object  for  the  few.

Those  great  characters  who  tower  as  giants  in  the  history  of  mankind  like  Siddartha  BUDDHA  and  Jesus  in  the  realm  of  the  spiritual,  and  Alexander  the  Macedonian  and  Napoleon  the  Great  in  the  realm  of  physical  conquests  are  but  the  reflected  images  of  human  types

became  mortal  heroes,  and  are  often  shown  as  of  a  very  sinful  character.

The  Occult  meaning  of  the  Biblical  Patriarchs,  their  genealogy,  and  their  descendants  dividing  among  themselves  the  earth,  is  the  same.

Again,  Jacob's  dream  has  the  same  significance.

'  He  "  of  the  Seven  Virtues  "  is  one  who,  without  the  benefit  of  Initiation,  becomes  as  pure  as  any  Adept  by  the  simple  exertion  of  his  own  merit.

Being  so  holy,  his  body  at  his  next  incarnation  becomes  the  Avatdra  of  his  "  Watcher  "  or  Guardian  Angel,  as  the  Christian  would  put  it.

*  The  title  of  the  highest  DhySn  Chohans.

3  Op.  cit  ,  II.  p.

358  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

which  had  existed — not  ten  thousand  years  before,  as  cautiously  put  for-  ward in  /s/'s  Unveiled,  but  for  millions  of  consecutive  years  from  the  begin-  ning of  the  Manvantara.

For — with  the  exception  of  real  Avataras,  as  above  explained — they  are  the  same  unbroken  Rays  (Monads),  each  respect-  ively of  its  own  special  Parent- Flame — called  Devas,  Dhyan  Chohans,  or  Dhyani-Buddhas,  or  again,  Planetary  Angels,  etc.

— shining  in  asonic  eternity  as  their  prototypes.

It  is  in  their  image  that  some  men  are  born,  and  when  some  specific  humanitarian  object  is  in  view,  the  latter  are  hypostatically  animated  by  their  divine  prototypes  reproduced  again  and  again  by  the  mysterious  Powers  that  control  and  guide  the  destinies  of  our  world.

No  more  could  be  said  at  the  time  when  Isis  Unveiled  (I,  p.  35)  was  written  ;  hence  the  statement  was  limited  to  the  single  remark  that

There  is  no  prominent  character  in  all  the  annals  of  sacred  or  profane  history  whose  prototype  we  cannot  find  in  the  half-fictitious  and  half-real  traditions  of  bygone  religions  and  mythologies.

As  the  star,  glimmering  at  an  immeasurable  distance  above  our  heads,  in  the  boundless  immensity  of  the  sky,  reflects  itself  in  the  smooth  waters  of  a  lake,  so  does  the  imagery  of  men  of  the  antediluvian  ages  reflect  itself  in  the  periods  we  can  embrace  in  a  historical  retrospect.

But  now  that  so  many  publications  have  been  brought  out,  stating  much  of  the  doctrine,  and  several  of  them  giving  many  an  erroneous  view,  this  vague  allusion  may  be  amplified  and  explained.

Not  only  does  this  statement  apply  to  prominent  characters  in  history  in  general,  but  also  to  men  of  genius,  to  every  remarkable  man  of  the  age,  who  soars  beyond  the  common  herd  with  some  abnormally  developed  special  capacity  in  him,  leading  to  the  progress  and  good  of  mankind.

Each  is  a  reincarnation  of  an  individuality  that  has  gone  before  him  with  capacities  in  the  same  line,  bringing  thus  as  a  dowry  to  his  new  form  that  strong  and  easily  re-awakened  capacity  or  quality  which  had  been  fully  developed  in  him  in  his  preceding  birth.

Very  often  they  are  ordinary  mortals,  the  Egos  of  natural  men  in  the  course  of  their  cyclic  development.

But  it  is  with  "  special  cases  "  that  we  are  now  concerned.

Let  us  suppose  that  a  person  during  his  cycle  of  incarnation  is  thus  selected  for  special  purposes — the  vessel  being  sufficiently  clean — by  his  personal  God,  the  Fountain-head  (on  the  plane  of  the  manifested)  of  his  Monad,  who  thus  becomes  his  in-dweller.

That  God,  his  own  prototype  or  "  Father  in  Heaven,"  is,  in  one  sense,  not  only  the  image  in  which  he,  the  spiritual  man,  is  made,  but  in  the  case  we  are  considering,  it  is  that  spiritual,  individual  Ego  himself.

This  is  a  case  of  permanent,  life-long  Theophania.

Let  us  bear  in  mind  that  this  is  neither  Avatarism,  as  it  is  understood  in  ftrahmanical  Philosophy,  nor  is

THE  DOCTRINE  OF  AVATARAS

the  man  thus  selected  a  Jlvanmukta  or  Nirvani,  but  that  it  is  a  wholly  excep-  tional case  in  the  realm  of  Mysticism.

The  man  may  or  may  not  have  been  an  Adept  in  his  previous  lives  ;  he  is  so  far,  and  simply,  an  extremely  pure  and  spiritual  individual — or  one  who  was  all  that  in  his  preceding  birth,  if  the  vessel  thus  selected  is  that  of  a  newly-born  infant.

In  this  case,  after  the  physical  translation  of  such  a  saint  or  Bodhisattva,  his  astral  principles  cannot  be  subjected  to  a  natural  dissolution  like  those  of  any  common  mortal.

They  remain  in  our  sphere  and  within  human  attraction  and  reach  ;  and  thus  it  is  that  not  only  a  Buddha,  a  Shankaracharya,  or  a  Jesus  can  be  said  to  animate  several  persons  at  one  and  the  same  time,  but  even  the  principles  of  a  high  Adept  may  be  animating  the  outward  tabernacles  of  common  mortals.

A  certain  Ray  (principle)  from  Sanat  Kumara  spiritualized  (animated)  Pradyumna,  the  son  of  Krishna  during  the  great  Mahabharata  period,  while  at  the  same  time,  he,  Sanat  Kumara,  gave  spiritual  instruction  to  King  Dhrita-  rashtra.

Moreover,  it  is  to  be  remembered  that  Sanat-Kumara  is  "an  eternal  youth  of  sixteen,"  dwelling  in  Jana  Loka,  his  own  sphere  or  spiritual  state.

Even  in  ordinary  med/um/st/c  life,  so-called,  it  is  pretty  well  ascertained  that  while  the  body  is  acting — even  though  only  mechanically — or  resting  in  one  place,  its  astral  double  may  be  appearing  and  acting  independently  in  another,  and  very  often  distant  place.

This  is  quite  a  common  occurrence  in  mystic  life  and  history,  and  if  this  be  so  with  ecstatics,  Seers  and  Mystics  of  every  description,  why  cannot  the  same  thing  happen  on  a  higher  and  more  spiritually  developed  plane  of  existence  ?  Admit  the  possibility  on  the  lower  psychic  plane,  then  why  not  on  a  higher  plane  ?  In  the  cases  of  higher  Adept-  ship,  when  the  body  is  entirely  at  the  command  of  the  Inner  Man,  when  the  Spiritual  Ego  is  completely  reunited  with  its  seventh  principle  even  during  the  life-time  of  the  personality,  and  the  Astral  Man  or  personal  Ego  has  become  so  purified  that  he  has  gradually  assimilated  all  the  qualities  and  attributes  of  the  middle  nature  (Buddhi  and  Manas  in  their  terrestrial  aspect)  that  personal  Ego  substitutes  itself,  so  to  say,  for  the  spiritual  Higher  Self,  and  is  thence-  forth capable  of  living  an  independent  life  on  earth  ;  when  corporeal  death  takes  place  the  following  mysterious  event  often  happens.

As  a  Dharmakaya,  a  Nirvani  "without  remains"  entirely  free  from  terrestrial  admixture,  the  Spiritual  Ego  cannot  return  to  reincarnate  on  earth.

But  in  such  cases,  it  is  affirmed,  the  personal  Ego  of  even  a  Dharmakaya  can  remain  in  our  sphere  as  a  whole,  and  return  to  incarnation  on  earth  if  need  be.  For  now  it  can  no  longer  be  subject,  like  the  astral  remains  of  any  ordinary  man,  to  gradual  dissolution  in  the  Kama  Loka  (the  limbus  or  purgatory  of  the  Roman  Catholic,  .and  the  "  Summer-land  "  of  the  Spiritualist)  ;  it  cannot  die  a  second  death,

360  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

as  such  disintegration  is  called  by  Proclus.1  It  has  become  too  holy  and  pure,  no  longer  by  reflected  but  its  own  natural  light  and  spirituality,  either  to  sleep,  in  the  unconscious  slumber  of  a  lower  Nirvanic  state,  or  to  be  dissolved  like  any  ordinary  astral  shell  and  disappear  in  its  entirety.

But  in  that  condition  known  as  the  Nirmanakaya  [the  Nirvani  "  with  remains,"]  he  can  still  help  humanity.

"  Let  me  suffer  and  bear  the  sins  of  all  [be  reincarnated  unto  new  misery]  but  let  the  world  be  saved  !  "  was  said  by  Gautama  BUDDHA :  an  exclamation  the  real  meaning  of  which  is  little  understood  now  by  his  followers.

"  If  I  will  that  he  tarry  till  I  come,  what  is  that  to  thee?  "2  asks  the  astral  Jesus  of  Peter.

"  Till  I  come  "  means  "  till  I  am  reincarnated  again  in  a  physical  body.

Yet  the  Christ  of  the  old  crucified  body  could  truly  say  :  "  I  am  with  my  Father  and  one  with  Him,"  which  did  not  prevent  the  astral  from  taking  a  form  again  nor  John  from  tarrying  indeed  till  his  Master  had  come  ;  nor  hinder  John  from  failing  to  recognize  him  when  he  did  come,  or  from  then  opposing  him.

But  in  the  Church  that  remark  generated  the  absurd  idea  of  the  millennium  or  chiliasm,  in  its  physical  sense.

Since  then  the  "  Man  of  Sorrows  "  has  returned  perchance,  more  than  once,  unknown  to,  and  undiscovered  by,  his  blind  followers.

Since  then  also,  this  grand  "  Son  of  God  "  has  been  incessantly  and  most  cruelly  crucified  daily  and  hourly  by  the  Churches  founded  in  his  name.

But  the  Apostles,,  only  half-initiated,  failed  to  tarry  for  their  Master,  and  not  recognizing  him,,  spurned  him  every  time  he  returned.

1  "  After  death,   the  soul  contmueth  in  the  aerial  (astral)  body,  till  it  is  entirely  purified  from  all  angry,   sensual   passions  ,  then  doth  it  put  off  by  a  second  death  [when  arising  to  Devachan]  the  aerial  body  as  it  did  the  earthly  one.

Wherefore  the  ancients  say  that  there  is  a  celestial  body  always  joined  with  the  soul,   which   is  immortal,  luminous  and  star-like  "     It  becomes  natural  then,  that  the  "  aerial  body  "   of  an  Adept  'should  have  no  such  second  dying,  since  it  has  been  cleansed  of  all  its  natural  impurity  before  its  separation  from  the  physical   body      The  high  Initiate  is  a  "  Son  of  the  Resurrection,"  "  being  equal  unto  the  angels,"  and  cannot  die  any  more  (see  Luke,  xx,  36)

2  St    John,  xx.,  22.

3  See  the  extract  made  in  Jhe  Jheosophist,  Nov.

1881,  p.  38,  and  Dec.,  p  75,  from  a  glorious-  novel  by  Dostoievsky — a  fragment  entitled   "The  Great  Inquisitor."     It  is  a  fiction,  naturally,  still  a  sublime  fiction,   of  Christ  returning  in  Spain  during  the  palmy  days  of  the  Inquisition,  and  being  im-  prisoned and  put  to  death  by  the  Inquisitor,  who  fears  lest  Christ  should  ruin  the  work  of  Jesuit  hands.

SECTION

THE  SEVEN  PRINCIPLES

THE  "  Mystery  of  Buddha  "  is  that  of  several  other  Adepts— perhaps  of  many.

The  whole  trouble  is  to  understand  correctly  that  other  mystery  :  that  of  the  real  fact,  so  abstruse  and  transcendental  at  first  sight,  about  the  "  Seven  Principles  "  in  man,  the  reflections  in  man  of  the  seven  powers  in  Nature,  physically,  and  of  the  seven  Hierarchies  of  Being,  intellectually  and  spiritually.

Whether  a  man — material,  ethereal,  and  spiritual — is  for  the  clearer  compre-  hension of  his  (broadly-speaking)  triple  nature,  divided  into  groups  according  to  one  or  another  system,  the  foundation  and  the  apex  of  that  division  will  be  always  the  same.

There  being  only  three  Upadhis  (bases)  in  man,  any  number  of  Koshas  (sheaths)  and  their  aspects  may  be  built  on  these  without  destroying  the  harmony  of  the  whole.

Thus,  while  the  Esoteric  System  accepts  the  septenary  division,  the  Vedantic  classification  gives  five  Koshas,  and  the  Taraka  Raja  Yoga  simplifies  them  into  four — the  three  Upadhis  synthesized  by  the  highest  principle,  Atma.

That  which  has  just  been  stated  will,  of  course,  suggest  the  question  :  "  How  can  a  spiritual  (or  semi-spiritual)  personality  lead  a  triple  or  even  a  dual  life,  shifting  respective  •  Higher  Selves  '  ad  libitum,  and  be  still  the  one  eternal  Monad  in  the  infinity  of  a  Manvantara  ?  "  The  answer  to  this  is  easy  for  the  true  Occultist,  while  for  the  uninitiated  profane  it  must  appear  absurd.

The  "  Seven  Principles  "  are,  of  course,  the  manifestation  of  one  indivisible  Spirit,  but  only  at  the  end  of  the  Manvantara,  and  when  they  come  to  be  re-  united on  the  plane  of  the  One  Reality  does  the  unity  appear ;  during  the  "  Pilgrim's  "  journey  the  reflections  of  that  indivisible  One  Flame,  the  aspects  of  the  one  eternal  Spirit,  have  each  the  power  of  action  on  one  of  the  manifested  planes  of  existence— the  gradual  differentiations  from  the  one  unmanifested  plane — on  that  plane  namely  to  which  it  properly  belongs.

Our  earth  affording  every  Mayavic  condition,  it  follows  that  the  purified  Egotistical  Principle,  the  astral  and  personal  Self  of  an  Adept,  though  forming  in  reality

362  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

one  integral  whole  with  its  Highest  Self  (Atma  and  Buddhi)  may,  nevertheless,  for  purposes  of  universal  mercy  and  benevolence,  so  separate  itself  from  its  divine  Monad  as  to  lead  on  this  plane  of  illusion  and  temporary  being  a  distinct  independent  conscious  life  of  its  own  under  a  borrowed  illusive  shape,  thus  serving  at  one  and  the  same  time  a  double  purpose  :  the  exhaustion  of  its  own  individual  Karma,  and  the  saving  of  millions  of  human  beings  less  favoured  than  itself  from  the  effects  of  mental  blindness.

If  asked  :  "When  the  change  described  as  the  passage  of  a  Buddha  or  a  Jivanmukta  into  Nirvana  takes  place,  where  does  the  original  consciousness  which  animated  the  body  continue  to  reside — in  the  Nirvani  or  in  the  subsequent  reincarna-  tions of  the  letter's  'remains'  (the  Nirmanakaya)  ?  "  the  answer  is  that  imprisoned  consciousness  may  be  a  "certain  knowledge  from  observation  and  experience,"  as  Gibbon  puts  it,  but  disembodied  consciousness  is  not  an  effect,  but  a  cause.

It  is  a  part  of  the  whole,  or  rather  a  Ray  on  the  graduated  scale  of  its  manifested  activity,  of  the  one  all-pervading,  limitless  Flame,  the  reflec-  tions of  which  alone  can  differentiate  ;  and,  as  such,  consciousness  is  ubiquit-  ous, and  can  be  neither  localized  nor  centred  on  or  in  any  particular  subject,  nor  can  it  be  limited.

Its  effects  alone  pertain  to  the  region  of  matter,  for  thought  is  an  energy  that  affects  matter  in  various  ways,  but  consciousness  per  se.  as  understood  and  explained  by  Occult  philosophy,  is  the  highest  quality  of  the  sentient  spiritual  principle  in  us,  the  Divine  Soul  (or  Buddhi)  and  our  Higher  Ego,  and  does  not  belong  to  the  plane  of  materiality.

After  the  death  of  the  physical  man,  if  he  be  an  Initiate,  it  becomes  transformed  from  a  human  quality  into  the  independent  principle  itself ;  the  conscious  Ego  becoming  Consciousness  per  se  without  any  Ego,  in  the  sense  that  the  latter  can  no  longer  be  limited  or  conditioned  by  the  senses,  or  even  by  space  or  time.

Therefore  it  is  capable,  without  separating  itself  from  or  abandoning  its  possessor,  Buddhi,  of  reflecting  itself  at  the  same  time  in  its  astral  man  that  was,  without  being  under  any  necessity  for  localizing  itself.

This  is  shown  at  a  far  lower  stage  in  our  dreams.

For  if  consciousness  can  display  activity  during  our  visions,  and  while  the  body  and  its  material  brain  are  fast  asleep —  and  if  even  during  those  visions  it  is  all  but  ubiquitous — how  much  greater  must  be  its  power  when  entirely  free  from,  and  having  no  more  connection  with,  our  physical  brain.

SECTION

THE  MYSTERY  OF  BUDDHA

NOW  the  mystery  of  Buddha  lies  in  this :  Gautama,  an  incarnation  of  pure  Wisdom,  had  yet  to  learn  in  His  human  body  and  to  be  initiated  into  the  world's  secrets  like  any  other  mortal,  until  the  day  when  He  emerged  from  His  secret  recess  in  the  Himalayas  and  preached  for  the  first  time  in  the  groves  of  Benares.

The  same  with  Jesus  :  from  the  age  of  twelve  to  thirty  years,  when  He  is  found  preaching  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  nothing  is  positively  said  or  known  of  Him.

Gautama  had  sworn  inviolable  secrecy  as  to  the  Esoteric  Doctrines  imparted  to  Him.

In  His  immense  pity  for  the  ignorance — and  as  its  consequence  the  sufferings — of  mankind,  desirous  though  He  was  to  keep  inviolate  His  sacred  vows,  He  failed  to  keep  within  the  prescribed  limits.

While  constructing  His  Exoteric  Philosophy  (the  "  Eye-  Doctrine  ")  on  the  foundations  of  eternal  Truth,  He  failed  to  conceal  certain  dogmas,  and  trespassing  beyond  the  lawful  lines,  caused  those  dogmas  to  be  misunderstood.

In  His  anxiety  to  make  away  with  the  false  Gods,  He  reveal-  ed in  the  "  Seven  Paths  to  Nirvana  "  some  of  the  mysteries  of  the  Seven  Lights  of  the  Arupa  (formless)  World.

A  little  of  the  truth  is  often  worse  than  no  truth  at  all.

Truth  and  fiction  are  like  oil  and  water :  they  will  never  mix

His  new  doctrine,  which  represented  the  outward  dead  body  of  the  Esoteric  Teaching  without  its  vivifying  Soul,  had  disastrous  effects :  it  was  never  correctly  understood,  and  the  doctrine  itself  was  rejected  by  the  Southern  Buddhists.

Immense  philanthropy,  a  boundless  love  and  charity  for  all  creatures,  were  at  the  bottom  of  His  unintentional  mistake ;  but  Karma  little  heeds  intentions,  whether  good  or  bad,  if  they  remain  fruitless.

If  the  14  Good  Law  "  as  preached  resulted  in  the  most  sublime  code  of  ethics  and  the  unparalleled  philosophy  of  things  external  in  the  visible  Kosmos,  it  biassed  and  misguided  immature  minds  into  believing  there  was  nothing  more  under  the

364  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

outward  mantle  of  the  system,  and  its  dead-letter  only  was  accepted.

More-  over, the  new  teaching  unsettled  many  great  minds  which  had  previously  followed  the  orthodox  Brahmanical  lead.

Thus,  fifty  odd  years  after  his  death  "the  great  Teacher "'  having;  refused  full  Dharmakaya  and  Nirvana,  was  pleased,  for  purposes  of  Karma  and  philanthropy,  to  be  reborn.

For  Him  death  had  been  no  death,  but  as  expressed  in  the  "  Elixir  of  Life,"  2  He  changed

a  sudden  plunge  into  darkness  to  a  transition  into  a  brighter  light.

The  shock  of  death  was  broken,  and  like  many  other  Adepts,  He  threw  off  the  mortal  coil  and  left  it  to  be  burnt,  and  its  asjies  to  serve  as  relics,  and  began  interplanetary  life,  clothed  in  His  subtle  body.

He  was  reborn  as  Shankara,  the  greatest  Vedantic  teacher  of  India,  whose  philosophy — based!  as  it  is  entirely  on  the  fundamental  axioms  of  the  eternal  Revelation,  the  Shruti,  or  the  primitive  Wisdom-Religion,  as  Buddha  from  a  different  point  of  view  had  before  based  His — finds  itself  in  the  middle-ground  between  the  too  exuberantly  veiled  metaphysics  of  the  orthodox  Brahmans  and  those  of  Gautama,  which,  stripped  in  their  exoteric  garb  of  every  soul -vivify  ing  hope,  transcendental  aspiration  and  symbol,  appear  in  their  cold  wisdom  like  crystal-  line icicles,  the  skeletons,  of  the  primeval  truths  of  Esoteric  Philosophy.

Was  Shankaracharya  Gautama  the  Buddha,  then,  under  a  new  personal  form  ?  It  may  perhaps  only  puzzle  the  reader  the  more  if  he  be  told  that  there  was  the  "  astral  "  Gautama  inside  the  outward  Shankara,  whose  higher  principle,  or  Atman,  was  nevertheless,  his  own  divine  prototype — the  "  Son  of  Light,"  indeed — the  heavenly,  mind-born  son  of  Aditi.

This  fact  is  again  based  on  that  mysterious  transference  of  the  divine  ex-personality  merged  in  the  impersonal  Individuality — now  in  its  full  trini-  tarian  form  of  the  Monad  as  Atma-Buddhi-Manas — to  a  new  body,  whether  visible  or  subjective.

In  the  first  case  it  is  a  Manushya-Buddha  ;  in  the  second  it  is  a  Nirmanakaya.

The  Buddha  is  in  Nirvana,  it  is  said,  though  this  once  mortal  vehicle — the  subtle  body — of  Gautama  is  still  present  among  the  Initiates  ;  nor  will  it  leave  the  realm  of  conscious  Being  so  long  as  suffer-  ing mankind  needs  its  divine  help — not  to  the  end  of  this  Root  Race,  at  any  rate.

From  time  to  time  He,  the  "  astral  "  Gautama,  associates  Himself,  in  some  most  mysterious — to  us  quite  incomprehensible — manner,  with  Avataras  and  great  saints,  and  works  through  them.

And  several  such  are  named.

1  When  we  say  the  "  great  Teacher,"  we  do  not  mean  Mis  Buddhic  Ego,  but  that  principle  in  Him  which  was  the  vehicle  of  His  personal  or  terrestrial  Ego

2  Five  Years  of  Theosophy,  New  Edition,  p.  3.

THE  MYSTERY  OF  BUDDHA

Thus  it  is  averred  that  Gautama  Buddha  was  reincarnated  in  Shankar-  acharya — that,  as  is  said  in  Esoteric  Buddhism

Shankaracharya  simply  was  Buddha  in  all  respects  in  a  new  body  l

While  the  expression  in  its  mystic  sense  is  true,  the  way  of  putting  it  may  be  misleading  until  explained.

Shankara  was  a  Buddha,  most  assuredly,  but  he  never  was  a  reincarnation  of  the  Buddha,  though  Gautama's  "  Astral  "  Ego — or  rather  his  Bodhisattva — may  have  been  associated  in  some  mysteri-  ous way  with  Shankaracharya.

Yes,  it  was  perhaps  the  Ego,  Gautama,  under  a  new  and  better  adapted  casket — that  of  a  Brahman  of  Southern  India.

But  the  Atman,  the  Higher  Self  that  overshadowed  both,  was  distinct  from  the  Higher  Self  of  the  translated  Buddha,  which  was  now  in  Its  own  sphere  in  Kosmos.

Shankara  was  an  Avatara  in  the  full  sense  of  the  term.

According  to  Sayanacharya,  the  great  commentator  on  the  Vecfas,  he  is  to  be  held  as  an  Avatara,  or  direct  incarnation  of  Shiva — the  Logos,  the  Seventh  Principle  in  Nature — Himself.

In  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE  Shri  Shankaracharya  is  regarded  as  the  abode — for  the  thirty-two  years  of  his  mortal  life — of  a  Flame,  the  highest  of  the  manifested  Spiritual  Beings,  one  of  the  Primordial  Seven  Rays.

And  now  what  is  meant  by  a  "  Bodhisattva  "  ?  Buddhists  of  the  Maha-  yana  mystic  system  teach  that  each  BUDDHA  manifests  Himself  (hypostatically  or  otherwise)  simultaneously  in  three  worlds  of  Being,  namely,  in  the  world  of  Kama  (concupiscence  or  desire — the  sensuous  universe  or  our  earth)  in  the  shape  of  a  man  ;  in  the  world  of  Rupa  (form,  yet  supersensuous)as  a  Bodhi-  sattva ;  and  in  the  highest  Spiritual  World  (that  of  purely  incorporeal  existences)  as  a  Dhyani- Buddha.

The  latter  prevails  eternally  in  space  and  time,  I.e  ,  from  one  Maha-Kalpa  to  the  other — the  synthetic  culmination  of  the  three  being  Adi-Buddha  ~  the  Wisdom-Principle,  which  is  Absolute,  and  therefore  out  of  space  and  time.

Their  inter-relation  is  the  follow-  ing :  The  Dhyani-Buddha,  when  the  world  needs  a  human  Buddha,  "creates  "  through  the  power  of  Dhyana  (meditation,  omnipotent  devotion),  a  mind-born  son — a  Bodhisattva — whose  mission  it  is  after  the  physical  death  of  his  human,  or  Manushya-Buddha,  to  continue  his  work  on  earth  till  the  appearance  of  the  subsequent  Buddha.

The  Esoteric  meaning  of  this  teaching  is  clear.

In  the  case  of  a  simple  mortal,  the  principles  in  him  are

1  Op.  cit.,  p,  175,  fifth  edition  (p.  183,  eighth  ed).

2  It  would  be  useless  to  raise  objections  from  exoteric  works  to  statements  in  this,  which  aims  to  expound,   however  superficially,   the  Esoteric   Teachings  alone      It  is  because  they  are  misled  by  the  exoteric  doctrine  that  Bishop  Bigandet  and  others  aver  that  the  notion  of  a  supreme  eternal  Adi-  Buddha   is  to  be  found  only  in  writings  of  comparatively  recent  date.

What  is  given  here  is  taken  from  the  secret  portions  of  Dus  Kyi  Khorlo  (Kala  Chakra,  in  Sanskrit,  or  the  '  Wheel  of  Time,"  or  duration).

366  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

only  the  more  or  less  bright  reflections  of  the  seven  cosmic,  and  the  seven  celestial  Principles,  the  Hierarchy  of  supersensual  Beings.

In  the  case  of  a  Buddha,  they  are  almost  the  principles  in  esse  themselves.

The  Bodhisattva  replaces  in  him  the  Karana  Shartra,  the  Ego  principle,  and  the  rest  corres-  pondingly ,  and  it  is  in  this  way  that  Esoteric  Philosophy  explains  the  meaning  of*  the  sentence  that  "  by  virtue  of  Dhyana  [or  abstract  meditation]  the  Dhyani-Buddha  [the  Buddha's  Spirit  or  Monad]  creates  a  Bodhisattva,"  or  the  astrally  clothed  Ego  within  the  Manushya-Buddha.

Thus,  while  the  Buddha  merges  back  into  Nirvana  whence  it  proceeded,  the  Bodhisattva  remains  be-  hind to  continue  the  Buddha's  work  upon  earth.

It  is  then  this  Bodhisattva  that  may  have  afforded  the  lower  principles  in  the  apparitional  body  of  Shankaracharya,  the  Avatara.

Now  to  say  that  Buddha,  after  having  reached  Nirvana,  returned  thence  to  reincarnation  in  a  new  body,  would  be  uttering  a  heresy  from  the  Brahmanical,  as  well  as  from  the  Buddhistic  standpoint.

Even  in  the  Maha-  yana  exoteric  School  in  the  teaching  as  to  the  three  "  Buddhic  "  bodies,1  it  is  said  of  the  Dharmakaya — the  ideal  formless  Being — that  once  it  is  taken,  the  Buddha  in  it  abandons  the  world  of  sensuous  perceptions  for  ever,  and  has  not,  nor  can  he  have,  any  more  connection  with  it.  To  say,  as  the  Esoteric  or  Mystic  School  teaches,  that  though  Buddha  is  in  Nirvana  he  has  left  behind  him  the  Nirmanakaya  (the  Bodhisattva)  to  work  after  him,  is  quite  orthodox  and  in  accordance  with  both  the  Esoteric  Mahayana  and  the  Prasanga  Madhyamika  Schools,  the  latter  an  anti-esoteric  and  most  rationalistic  system.

For  in  the  /(a/a  Chakra  Commentary  it  is  shown  that  there  is  :  (1)  Adi-  Buddha,  eternal  and  conditionless  ;  then  come  (2)  Sambhogakaya-Buddhas,  or  Dhyani-Buddhas,  existing  from  (aeonic)  eternity  and  never  disappearing —  the  Causal  Buddhas  so  to  say ;  and  (3)  the  Manushya-Bodhisattvas.

The  relation  between  them  is  determined  by  the  definition  given.

Adi-Buddha  is  Vajradhara,  and  the  Dhyani-Buddhas  are  Vajrasattva ;  yet  though  these  two  are  different  Beings  on  their  respective  planes,  They  are  identical  in  fact,  one  acting  through  the  other,  as  a  Dhyani  through  a  human  Buddha.

One  "Endless  Intelligence";  the  other  only  "Supreme  Intelligence."  It  is  said  of  Phra  Bodhisattva — who  was  subsequently  on  earth  Buddha  Gautama  :

Having  fulfilled  all  the  conditions  for  the  immediate  attainment  of  perfect  Buddhaship,  the  Holy  One  preferred,  from  unlimited  charity  towards  living  beings,  once  more  to  reincarnate  for  the  benefit  of  man

1  The  three  bodies  are  (1)  the  Nirmanakaya  (Pru-lpai-Ku  in  Tibetan)  in  which  the  Bodhisattva  after  entering  by  the  six  Plramitds  the  Path  to  Nirvana,  appears  to  men  in  order  to  teach  them  ,  (2)  Sambhogakaya  (Dzog-pai-Ku),  the  body  of  bliss  impervious  to  all  physical  sensations,  received  by  one  who  has  fulfilled  the  three  conditions  of  moral  perfection  ,  and  (3)  Dharmakaya  (in  Tibetan,  Chos-Ku).  the  Nirvamc  body.

THE  MYSTERY  OF  BUDDHA

The  Nirvana  of  the  Buddhists  is  only  the  threshold  of  Paranirvana,  according  to  the  Esoteric  Teaching  :  while  with  the  Brahmans,  it  is  the  summum  bonum,  that  final  state  from  which  there  is  no  more  return — not  till  the  next  Maha-Kalpa,  at  all  events.

And  even  this  last  view  will  be  opposed  by  some  too  orthodox  and  dogmatic  Philosophers  who  will  not  accept  the  Esoteric  Doctrine.

With  them  Nirvana  is  absolute  nothingness,  in  which  there  is  nothing  and  no  one  :  only  an  unconditioned  All.

To  understand  the  full  characteristics  of  that  Abstract  Principle  one  must  sense  it  intuitionally  and  comprehend  fully  the  "  one  permanent  condition  in  the  Universe,"  which  the  Hindus  define  so  truly  as  :

The  state  of  perfect  unconsiousness  —bare  Chidakasham  (field  of  consciouness)  in  fact

however  paradoxical  it  may  seeem  to  the  profane  reader.

Shankaracharya  was  reputed  to  be  an  Avatara,  an  assertion  the  writer  implicitly  believes  in,  but  which  other  people  are,  of  course,  at  liberty  to  reject.

And  as  such  he  took  the  body  of  a  southern  Indian,  newly-born  Brahman  baby  ;  that  body,  for  reasons  as  important  as  they  are  mysterious  to  us,  is  said  to  have  been  animated  by  Gautama's  astral  personal  remains.

This  divine  Non-Ego  chose  as  its  own  Upadhi  (physical  basis),  the  ethereal,  human  Ego  of  a  great  Sage  in  this  world  of  forms,  as  the  fittest  vehicle  for  Spirit  to  descend  into.

Said  Shankaracharya  •

Parabrahman  is  Karta  [Purusha],  as  there  is  no  other  Adhishthata  ?  and  Parabrah-  man  is  Prakriti,  there  being  no  other  substance  '

Now  what  is  true  of  the  Macrocosmical  is  also  true  of  the  Microcosmical  plane.

It  is  therefore  nearer  the  truth  to  say — when  once  we  accept  such  a  possibility — that  the  "  astral"  Gautama,  or  the  Nirmanakaya,  was  the  Upadhi  of  Shankaracharya's  spirit,  rather  than  that  the  latter  was  a  reincarnation  of  the  former.

When  a  Shankaracharya  has  to  be  born,  naturally  every  one  of  the  principles  in  the  manifested  mortal  man  must  be  the  purest  and  finest  that  exist  on  earth.

Consequently  those  principles  that  were  once  attached  to  Gautama,  who  was  the  direct  great  predecessor  of  Shankara,  were  naturally  attracted  to  him,  the  economy  of  Nature  forbidding  the  re-evolution  of

1  Five  Years  of  Jheosophy,  art    "  Personal  and  Impersonal  God,"  p

-  Adhishthata,  the  active  or  working  agent  in  Prakriti  (or  matter)

J  Vedanta-Sutras,  Adhyaya  [ch.]  I,  PSda  iv,  Shi  23  Commentary  The  passage  is  given  as  follows  in  Thibaut's  translation  (Sacred  Boofcs  of  the  East,  xxxiv,  p  286)  "The  Self  is  thus  the  operative  cause,  because  there  is  no  other  ruling  principle,  and  the  material  cause  because  there  is  no  other  substance  from  which  the  world  could  originate  "

368  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

similar  principles  from  the  crude  state.

But  it  must  be  remembered  that  the  higher  ethereal  principles  are  not,  like  the  lower  more  material  ones,  visible  sometimes  to  man  (as  astral  bodies),  and  they  have  to  be  regarded  in  the  light  of  separate  or  independent  Powers  or  Gods,  rather  than  as  material  objects.

Hence  the  right  way  of  representing  the  truth  would  be  to  say  that  the  various  principles,  the  Bodhisattva,  of  Gautama  Buddha,  which  did  not  go  to  Nirvana,  reunited  to  form  the  middle  principles  of  Shankaracharya,  the  earthly  Entity.

It  is  absolutely  necessary  to  study  the  doctrine  of  the  Buddhas  esoteric  -  .ally  and  understand  the  subtle  differences  between  the  various  planes  of  existence  to  be  able  to  comprehend  correctly  the  above.

Put  more  clearly,  Gautama,  the  human  Buddha,  who  had,  exoterically,  Amitabha  for  his  Bodhi-  sattva and  Avalokiteshvara  for  his  Dhyani- Buddha — the  triad  emanating  directly  from  Adi-Buddha — assimilated  these  by  his  "  Dhyana "  (medita-  tion) and  thus  became  a  Buddha  ("enlightened").  In  another  manner  this  is  the  case  with  all  men  ;  everyone  of  us  has  his  Bodhisattva — the  middle  principle,  if  we  hold  for  a  moment  to  the  trinitarian  division  of  the  septenary  group — and  his  Dhyani-Buddha,  or  Chohan,  the  "  Father  of  the  Son."  Our  -connecting  link  with  the  higher  Hierarchy  of  Celestial  Beings  lies  here  in  a  nutshell,  only  we  are  too  sinful  to  assimilate  them.

Six  centuries  after  the  translation  of  the  human  Buddha  (Gautama)  an-  other Reformer,  as  noble  and  as  loving,  though  less  favoured  by  opportunity,  arose  in  another  part  of  the  world,  among  another  and  a  less  spiritual  race.

There  is  a  great  similarity  between  the  subsequent  opinions  of  the  world  about  the  two  Saviours,  the  Eastern  and  the  Western.

While  millions  became  .converted  to  the  doctrines  of  the  two  Masters,  the  enemies  of  both — sectarian  opponents,  the  most  dangerous  of  all — tore  both  to  shreds  by  insinuating  maliciously-distorted  statements  based  on  Occult  truths,  and  therefore  doubly  dangerous.

While  of  Buddha  it  is  said  by  the  Brahmans  that  He  was  truly  an  AvatSra  of  Vishnu,  but  that  He  had  come  to  tempt  the  Brahmans  from  their  faith,  and  was  therefore  the  evil  aspect  of  the  God  ;  of  Jesus  the  Bardesanian  Gnostics  and  others  asserted  that  He  was  Nebu,  the  false  Messiah,  the

1  In  Five  Years  of  Theosophy  [1910  ed]  (art  "  Shakya  Muni's  Place  in  History,"  p.  234,  note)  it  is  stated  that  one  day  when  our  Lord  sat  in  the  Sattapanni  Saptaparna  Cave  he  compared  man  to  a  Saptaparna  (seven-leaved)  plant

"  Mendicants,"  he  said,  "  there  are  seven  Buddhas  m  every  Buddha,  and  there  are  six  Bhikshus  and  but  one  Buddha  in  each  mendicant.

What  are  the  seven  ?  The  seven  branches  of  complete  knowledge.

What  are  the  six  ?  The  six  organs  of  sense.

What  are  the  five  ?  The  five  elements  of  illusive  being.

And  the  one  which  is  also  ten  ?  He  is  a  true  Buddha  who  develops  in  him  the  ten  forms  of  holiness  and  subjects  them  all  to  the  one  .  .  "  Which  means  that  every  principle  in  the  Buddha  was  the  highest  that  could  be  evolved  on  this  earth  ;  whereas  in  the  case  or  other  men  who  attain  to  Nirvina  this  is  not  necessarily  the  case.

Even  as  a  mere  human  (Manushya)  Buddha,  Gautama  was  a  pattern  for  all  men.

But  his  Arhats  were  not  necessarily  so

THE  MYSTERY  OF  BUDDHA

•destroyer  of  the  old  orthodox  religion.

"  He  is  the  founder  of  a  new  sect  of  Nazars,"  said  other  sectarians.

In  Hebrew  the  word  "  Naba  "  means  "to  speak  by  inspiration,"  (JOJ,  and  "03  is  Nebo,  the  God  of  wisdom).  But  Nebo  is  also  Mercury,  who  is  Budha  in  the  Hindu  monogram  of  planets.

And  this  is  shown  by  the  fact  that  the  Talmudists  hold  that  Jesus  was  inspired  by  the  Genius  (or  Regent)  of  Mercury  confounded  by  Sir  William  Jones  with  Gautama  Buddha.

There  are  many  other  strange  points  of  similarity  between  Gautama  and  Jesus,  which  cannot  be  noticed  here.

If  both  the  Initiates,  aware  of  the  danger  of  furnishing  the  uncultured  masses  with  the  powers  acquired  by  ultimate  knowledge,  left  the  innermost  corner  of  the  sanctuary  in  profound  darkness,  who,  acquainted  with  human  nature,  can  blame  either  of  them  for  this  ?  Yet  although  Gautama,  actuated  by  prudence,  left  the  Esoteric  and  most  dangerous  portions  of  the  Secret  Knowledge  untold,  and  lived  to  the  ripe  old  age  of  eighty  years, — the  Esoteric  Doctrine  says  one  hundred — dying  with  the  certainty  of  having  taught  its  essential  truths,  and  of  having  sown  the  seeds  for  the  conversion  of  one-third  of  the  world,  He  yet  perhaps  revealed  more  than  was  strictly  good  for  posterity.

But  Jesus,  who  had  promised  His  disciples  the  knowledge  which  confers  upon  man  the  power  of  producing  "miracles"  far  greater  than  He  had  ever  produced  Himself,  died,  leaving  but  a  few  faithful  disciples  — men  only  half-way  to  knowledge.

They  had  therefore  to  struggle  with  a  world  to  which  they  could  impart  only  what  they  but  half-knew  them-  selves, and — no  more.

In  later  ages  the  exoteric  followers  of  both  mangled  the  truths  given  out,  often  out  of  recognition.

With  regard  to  the  adherents  of  the  Western  Master,  the  proof  of  this  lies  in  the  very  fact  that  none  of  them  can  now  produce  the  promised  "  miracles."  They  have  to  choose  :  either  it  is  they  who  have  blundered,  or  it  is  their  Master  who  must  stand  arraigned  for  an  empty  promise,  an  uncalled-for  boast.2  Why  such

1  See  fs«s  Unveiled,  II,  p.

3  "  Before  one  becomes  a  Buddha  he  must  be  a  Bodhisattva  ,  before  evolving  into  a  Bodhtsattva  he  must  be  a  Dhyam-Buddha.

.  A  Bodhisattva  is  the  way  and  Path  to  his  Father,  and  thence

to  the  One  Supreme  Essence  "  (Descent  of  Buddhas,  p.  17,  from  Aryasanga).  "  I  am  the  way,  the  truth,  and  the  life  .  no  man  cometh  unto  the  Father  but  by  me  "  (St  John,  xiv,  6)  The  "  way  "  is  not  the  goal.

Nowhere  throughout  the  New  Testament  is  Jesus  found  calling  himself  God,  or  any-  thing higher  than  "  a  son  of  God,"  the  son  of  a  "  Father  "  common  to  all,  synthetically  Paul  never  said  (I.  Tim  in,  16),  "  God  was  manifest  in  the  flesh,"  but  "  He  who  was  manifested  in  the  flesh  "  (Revised  Edition)  While  the  common  herd  among  the  Buddhists — the  Burmese  especially — regard  Jesus  as  an  incarnation  of  Devadatta,  a  relative  who  opposed  the  teachings  of  Buddha,  the  students  of  Esoteric  Philosophy  see  in  the  Nazarene  Sage  a  Bodhisattva  with  the  spirit  of  Buddha  Himself  in  Him.

FF

370  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

a  difference  in  the  destiny  of  the  two  ?  For  the  Occultist  this  enigma  of  the  unequal  favour  of  Karma  or  Providence  is  unriddled  by  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE-

It  is  "  not  lawful"  to  speak  of  such  things  publicly,  as  St.  Paul  tells  us.  One  more  explanation  only  may  be  given  in  reference  to  this  subject.

It  was  said  a  few  pages  back  that  an  Adept  who  thus  sacrifices  himself  to  live,  giving  up  full  Nirvana,  though  he  can  never  lose  the  knowledge  acquired  by  him  in  previous  existences,  yet  can  never  rise  higher  in  such  borrowed  bodies.

Why  ?  Because  he  becomes  simply  the  vehicle  of  a  "  Son  of  Light  "  from  a  still  higher  sphere,  Who  being  Arupa,  has  no  personal  astral  body  of  His  own  fit  for  this  world.

Such  "  Sons  of  Light,"  or  Dhyani-Buddhas,  are  Dharma-  kayas  of  preceding  Manvantaras,  who  have  closed  their  cycles  of  incarnations  in  the  ordinary  sense  and  who,  being  thus  Karma-less,  have  long  ago  dropped  their  individual  Rupas,  and  have  become  identified  with  the  first  Principle.

Hence  the  necessity  of  a  sacrificial  Nirmanakaya,  ready  to  suffer  for  the  mis-  deeds or  mistakes  of  the  new  body  in  its  earth-pilgrimage,  without  any  future  reward  on  the  plane  of  progression  and  rebirth,  since  there  are  no  rebirths  for  him  in  the  ordinary  sense.

The  Higher  Self,  or  Divine  Monad,  is  not  in  such  a  case  attached  to  the  lower  Ego  ,  its  connection  is  only  temporary,  and  in  most  cases  it  acts  through  decrees  of  Karma.

This  is  a  real,  genuine  sacrifice,  the  explanation  of  which  pertains  to  the  highest  Initiation  of  Jnana  (Occult  Knowledge).  It  is  closely  linked,  by  a  direct  evolution  of  Spirit  and  involution  of  Matter,  with  the  primeval  and  great  Sacrifice  at  the  foundation  of  the  manifested  Worlds,  the  gradual  smothering  and  death  of  the  spiritual  in  the  material.

The  seed  "  is  not  quickened  except  it  die."  *  Hence  in  the  Purusha  Sukta  of  the  Rig  Veda,'2  the  mother-fount  and  source  of  all  subse-  quent religions,  it  is  stated  allegorically  that  "the  thousand-headed  Purusha  "  was  slaughtered  at  the  foundation  of  the  World,  that  from  his  remains  the  Universe  might  arise.

This  is  nothing  more  nor  less  than  the  foundation — the  seed,  truly — of  the  later  many-formed  symbol  in  various  religions,  including  Christianity,  of  the  sacrificial  lamb.

For  it  is  a  play  upon  the  words.

"  Aja  "  (Purusha),  "  the  unborn,"  or  eternal  Spirit,  means  also  "  lamb,"  in  Sanskrit.

Spirit  disappears — dies,  metaphorically — the  more  it  gets  involved  in  matter,  and  hence  the  sacrifice  of  the  "  unborn,"  or  the  "  lamb."

Why  the  BUDDHA  chose  to  make  this  sacrifice  will  be  plain  only  to  those  who,  to  the  minute  knowledge  of  His  earthly  life,  add  that  of  a  thorough

1  J    Corinth,  xv,  36  2  Op.  at,,  Mandala  x,  hymn

THE  MYSTERY  OF  BUDDHA  37t

comprehension  of  the  laws  of  Karma.

Such  occurrences,  however,  belong  to  the  most  exceptional  cases.

As  tradition  goes,  the  Brahmans  had  committed  a  heavy  sin  by  persecu-  ting Gautama  BUDDHA  and  His  teachings  instead  of  blending  and  reconciling  them  with  the  tenets  of  pure  Vaidic  Brahmanism,  as  was  done  later  by  Shankaracharya.

Gautama  had  never  gone  against  the  Vedas,  only  against  the  exoteric  growth  of  preconceived  interpretations.

The  Shruti — divine  oral  revelation,  the  outcome  of  which  was  the  Veda — is  eternal.

It  reached  the  ear  of  Gautama  Siddartha  as  it  had  those  of  the  Rishis  who  had  written  it  down.

He  accepted  the  revelation,  while  rejecting  the  later  overgrowth  of  Brahmanical  thought  and  fancy,  and  built  His  doctrines  on  one  and  the  same  basis  of  imperishable  truth.

As  in  the  case  of  His  Western  successor,  Gautama,  the  "  Merciful,"  the  "  Pure,"  and  the  "Just,"  was  the  first  found  in  the  Eastern  Hierarchy  of  historical  Adepts,  if  not  in  the  world-annals  of  divine  mortals,  who  was  moved  by  that  generous  feeling  which  locks  the  whole  of  mankind  within  one  embrace,  with  no  petty  differences  of  race,  birth,  or  caste.

It  was  He  who  first  enunciated  that  grand  and  noble  principle,  and  He  again  who  first  put  it  into  practice.

For  the  sake  of  the  poor  and  the  reviled,  the  outcast  and  the  hapless,  invited  by  Him  to  the  King's  festival  table,  He  had  excluded  those  who  had  hitherto  sat  alone  in  haughty  seclusion  and  selfishness,  believing  that  they  would  be  defiled  by  the  very  shadow  of  the  disinherited  ones  of  the  land — and  these  non-spiritual  Brahmans  turned  against  Him  for  that  preference.

Since  then  such  as  these  have  never  forgiven  the  prince-beggar,  the  son  of  a  king,  who,  forgetting  His  rank  and  station,  had  flung  widely  open  the  doors  of  the  forbidden  sanctuary  to  the  pariah  and  the  man  of  low  estate,  thus  giving  precedence  to  personal  merit  over  hereditary  rank  or  fortune.

The  sin  was  theirs — the  cause  nevertheless  Himself:  hence  the  "Merciful  and  the  Blessed  One"  could  not  go  out  entirely  from  this  world  of  illusion  and  created  causes  without  atoning  for  the  sin  of  all — therefore  of  these  Brahmans  also.

If  "  man  afflicted  by  man  "  found  safe  refuge  with  the  Tathagata,  "  man  afflicting  man  "  had  also  his  share  in  His  self-sacrificing,  all-embracing  and  forgiving  love.

It  is  stated  that  He  desired  to  atone  for  the  sin  of  His  enemies.

Then  only  was  He  willing  to  become  a  full  Dharmakaya,  a  Jivanmukta  "without  remains."

The  close  of  Shankaracharya 's  life  brings  us  face  to  face  with  a  fresh  mystery.

Shankaracharya  retires  to  a  cave  in  the  Himalayas,  permitting  none  of  his  disciples  to  follow  him,  and  disappears  therein  for  ever  from  the  sight  of  the  profane.

Is  he  dead  ?  Tradition  and  popular  belief  answer  in  the  negative,  and  some  of  the  local  Gurus,  if  they  do  not  emphatically  corroborate,

372  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

do  not  deny  the  rumour.

The  truth  with  its  mysterious  details  as  given  in  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE  is  known  but  to  them  ,  it  can  be  given  out  fully  only  to  the  direct  followers  of  the  great  Dravidian  Guru,  and  it  is  for  them  alone  to  reveal  of  it  as  much  as  they  think  fit.

Still  it  is  maintained  that  this  Adept  of  Adepts  lives  to  this  day  in  his  spiritual  entity  as  a  mysterious,  unseen,  yet  overpowering  presence  among  the  Brotherhood  of  Shamballa,  beyond,  far  beyond,  the  snowy-capped  Himalayas.

SECTION

-REINCARNATIONS"  OF  BUDDHA

EVERY  section  in  the  chapter  on  "  De-zhin  Shegs-pa/'1  (Tathagata)  in  the  Commentaries,  represents  one  year  of  that  great  Philosopher's  life,  in  its  dual  aspect  of  public  and  private  teacher,  the  two  being  contrasted  and  comment-  ed upon.

It  shows  the  Sage  reaching  Buddhahood  through  a  long  course  of  study,  meditation,  and  Initiations,  as  any  other  Adept  would  have  to  do,  not  one  rung  of  the  ladder  up  to  the  arduous  "  Path  of  Perfection  "  being  missed.

The  Bodhisattva  became  a  Buddha  and  a  Nirvani  through  personal  effort  and  merit,  after  having  had  to  undergo  all  the  hardships  of  every  other  neophyte — not  by  virtue  of  a  divine  birth,  as  thought  by  some.

It  was  only  the  reaching  of  Nirvana  while  still  living  in  the  body  and  on  this  earth  that  was  due  to  His  having  been  in  previous  births  high  on  the  "  Path  of  DZYAN  "  (knowledge,  wisdom).  Mental  or  intellectual  gifts  and  abstract  knowledge  follow  an  Initiate  in  his  new  birth,  but  he  has  to  acquire  phenomenal  powers  anew,  passing  through  all  the  successive  stages.

He  has  to  acquire  Rin-ch'en-  na-dun  ("the  seven  precious  gifts")2  one  after  the  other.

During  the  period  of  meditation  no  worldly  phenomena  on  the  physical  plane  must  be  allowed  to  enter  into  his  mind  or  cross  his  thoughts.

Zhine-lhagthong  (Sanskrit :  Vipashya,  religious  abstract  meditation)  will  develop  in  him  most  wonderful  faculties  independently  of  himself.

The  four  degrees  of  contemplation,  or  Sam-tan  (Sanskrit :  Dhyana),  once  acquired,  everything

1  Literally.

"  he  who  walks  [or  follows]  in  the  way  [or  path]  of  his  predecessors  "

2  Schmidt,   in  S/anong  Seetsen,   p.  471,   and  Schlagmtweit,  in  Buddhism  in  Tibet,  p   53,  accept  these  precious  things  literally,  enumerating  them  as  "the  wheel,  the  precious  stone,  the  royal  consort,  the  best  treasurer,  the  best  horse,  the  elephant,  the  best  leader  "     After  this  one  can  little  wonder  if  "  besides  a   Dhylni-Buddhi  and  a  DhySni-Bodhisattva  "  each  human  Buddha  is  furnished  with  "  a  female  companion,   a  Shakti  " — when  in  truth  "  Shakti  "  is  simply  the  Soul-power,  the  psychic  energy  of  the  God  as  of  the  Adept.

The   "  royal  consort,"  the  third  of  the  "  seven  precious  gifts,"  very  likely  led  the  learned  Orientalist  into  this  ludicrous  error.

374  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

becomes  easy.

For,  once  that  man  has  entirely  got  rid  of  the  idea  of  individ-  uality, merging  his  Self  in  the  Universal  Self,  becoming,  so  to  say,  the  bar  of  steel  to  which  the  properties  inherent  in  the  loadstone  (Adi  Buddha,  or  Anima  Mundi)  are  imparted,  powers  hitherto  dormant  in  him  are  awakened,  mysteries  in  invisible  Nature  are  unveiled,  and  becoming  a  Thonglam-pa  (a  Seer)  he  becomes  a  Dhyani-Buddha.

Every  Zung  (Dharani,  a  mystic  word  or  mantra)  of  the  Lokottaradharma  (the  highest  world  of  causes)  will  be  known  to  him.

Thus,  after  His  outward  death,  twenty  years  later,  Tathagata  in  His  immense  love  and  "  pitiful  mercy"  for  erring  and  ignorant  humanity,  refused  Paranirvana  l  in  order  that  He  might  continue  to  help  men.

Says  a  Commentary :

Having  reached  the  Path  of  Deliverance  [Thar-Jam]  from  transmigration,  one  cannot  perform  Tulpa  ~  any  longer,  for  to  become  a  Paranirvani  is  to  close  the  circle  of  the  Septenary  Ku-Sum.3  He  has  merged  his  borrowed  Dorjesempa  £ Va/rasattva]  mto  the  Universal  and  become  one  with  it.

Vajradhara,  also  Vajrasattva  (Tibetan :  Dorjechang  and  Dorjedzin,  or  Dorjesempa),  is  the  regent  or  President  of  all  the  Dhyan  Chohans  or  Dhyani  Buddhas,  the  highest,  the  Supreme  Buddha  ;  personal,  yet  never  manifested  objectively;  the  "Supreme  Conqueror,"  the  "Lord  of  all  Mysteries,"  the  44 One  without  Beginning  or  End" — in  short,  the  Logos  of  Buddhism.

For,  as  Vajrasattva.

He  is  simply  the  Tsovo  (Chief)  of  the  Dhyani  Buddhas  or  Dhyan  Chohans,  and  the  Supreme  Intelligence  in  the  Second  World ;  while  as  Vajradhara  (Dorjechang),  He  is  all  that  which  was  enumerated  above.

"  These  two  are  one,  and  yet  two,"  and  over  them  is  "  Chang,  the  Supreme  Unmani-  fested  and  Universal  Wisdom  that  has  no  name."  As  two  in  one  He  (They)  is  the  Power  that  subdued  and  conquered  Evil  from  the  beginning,  allowing  it  to  reign  only  over  willing  subjects  on  earth,  and  having  no  power  over  those  who  despise  and  hate  it.  Esoterically  the  allegory  is  easily  understood  ;  exoterically  Vajradhara  (Vajrasattva)  is  the  God  to  whom  all  the  evil  spirits  swore  that  they  would  not  impede  the  propagation  of  the  Good  Law,

1  A  Bodhisattva  can  reach  Nirvana  and  live,  as  Buddha  did,  and  after  death  he  can  either  refuse  objective  reincarnation  or  accept  and  use  it  at  his  convenience  for  the  benefit  of  mankind  whom  he  can  instruct  in  various  ways  while  he  remains  in  the  Devachanic  regions  within  the  attraction  of  our  earth.

But  having  once  reached  ParanirvSna  or  "  Nirvana  without  remains  " — the  highest  Dharmakaya  condition,  in  which  state  he  remains  entirely  outside  of  every  earthly  condition — he  will  return  no  more  until  the  commencement  of  a  new  Manvantara,  since  he  has  crossed  beyond  the  cycle  of  births.

'-'  Tulpa  [T'ul-Ku  ?]  is  the  voluntary  incarnation  of  an  Adept  into  a  living  body,  whether  of  an  adult,  child,  or  new-born  babe

3  Ku-sum  is  the  triple  form  of  the  Nirvana  state  and  its  respective  duration  in  the  "  cycle  of  Non-  Being  "  The  number  seven  here  refers  to  the  seven  Rounds  of  our  septenary  System

-  REINCARNATIONS  "  OF  BUDDHA

(Buddhism),  and  before  whom  all  the  demons  tremble.

Therefore,  we  say  this  dual  personage  has  the  same  role  assigned  to  it  in  canonical  and  dogmatic  Tibetan  Buddhism  as  have  Jehovah  and  the  Archangel  Mikael,  the  Metatron  of  the  Jewish  Kabalists.

This  is  easily  shown.

Mikael  is  "the  angel  of  the  face  of  God,"  or  he  who  represents  his  Master.

"  My  face  shall  go  with  thee"  (in  English,  "presence"),  before  the  Israelites,  says  God  to  Moses  (Exodus,  xxxiii,  14)  "The  angel  of  my  [his]  presence  "  (Hebrew  :  "  of  my  face  ")  (Isaiah,  Ixiii,  9),  etc.

The  Roman  Catholics  identify  Christ  with  Mikael,  who  is  also  his  ferouer,  or  "face,"  mystically.

This  is  precisely  the  position  of  Vajradhara,  or  Vajrasattva,  in  Northern  Buddhism  For  the  latter,  in  His  Higher  Self  as  Vajradhara  (Dorjechang),  is  never  manifested,  except  to  the  seven  Dhyan  Chohans,  the  primeval  Builders.

Esoterically,  it  is  the  Spirit  of  the  "Seven  "  collectively,  their  seventh  principle,  or  Atman.

Exoterically,  any  amount  of  fables  may  be  found  in  Kala  Chakra,  the  most  important  work  in  the  Gyut  [or  (D)gyu]  division  of  the  Kanjur,  the  division  of  mystic  knowledge  [  (D)gyu].  Dorjechang  (wisdom)  Vajradhara,  is  said  to  live  in  the  second  Arupa  World,  which  connects  him  with  Metatron,  in  the  first  world  of  pure  Spirits,  the  Briatic  world  of  the  Kabalists,  who  call  this  angel  El-Shaddai,  the  Omnipotent  and  Mighty  One.

Metatron  is  in  Greek  $776X09  (Messenger),  or  the  Great  Teacher.

Mikael  fights  Satan,  the  Dragon,  and  conquers  him  and  his  Angels.

Vajrasattva,  who  is  one  with  Vajrapani,  the  Subduer  of  the  Evil  Spirits,  conquers  Rahu,  the  Great  Dragon  who  is  always  trying  to  devour  the  sun  and  moon  (eclipses).  "  War  in  Heaven  "  in  the  Christian  legend  is  based  upon  the  bad  angels  having  discovered  the  secrets  (magical  wisdom)  of  the  good  ones  (Enoch),  and  the  mystery  of  the  "  Tree  of  Life."  Let  anyone  read  simply  the  exoteric  accounts  in  the  Hindu  and  Buddhist  Pantheons — the  latter  version  being  taken  from  the  former — and  he  will  find  both  resting  on  the  same  primeval,  archaic  allegory  from  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE.

In  the  exoteric  texts  (Hindu  and  Buddhist),  the  Gods  churn  the  ocean  to  extract  from  it  the  Water  of  Life — Amrita — or  the  Elixir  of  Knowledge.

In  both  the  Dragon  steals  some  of  this,  and  is  exiled  from  heaven  by  Vishnu,  or  Vajradhara,  or  the  chief  God,  whatever  may  be  his  name.

We  find  the  same  in  the  Book'  of  Enoch,  and  it  is  poetized  in  St.  John's  Revelation.

And  now  the  allegory,  with  all  its  fanciful  ornamentations,  has  become  a  dogma  !

As  will  be  found  mentioned  later,  the  Tibetan  Lamaseries  contain  many  secret  and  semi-secret  volumes,  detailing  the  lives  of  great  Sages.

Many  of  the  statements  in  them  are  purposely  confused,  and  in  others  the  reader  becomes  bewildered,  unless  a  clue  be  given  him,  by  the  use  of  one  name  to  cover  many  individuals  who  follow  the  same  line  of  teaching.

Thus  there  is  a

376  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

succession   of  "  living  Buddhas  "  and  the  name  "  Buddha  "  is  given  to  teacher  after  teacher.

Schlagintweit  writes  :

To  each  human  Buddha  belongs  a  Dhyani-Buddha,  and  a  Dhyani-Bodhisattva,  and  the  unlimited  number  of  the  former  also  involves  an  equally  unlimited  number  of  the  latter.

[But  if  this  be  so — and  the  exoteric  and  semi -exoteric  use  of  the  name  justify  the  statement — the  reader  must  depend  on  his  own  intuition  to  dis-  tinguish between  the  Dhyani  Buddhas  and  the  human  Buddhas,  and  must  not  apply  to  the  great  BUDDHA  of  the  Fifth  Race  all  that  is  ascribed  to  "  the  Buddha  "  in  books  where,  as  said,  blinds  are  constantly  introduced.

In  one  of  these  books  some  strange  and  obscure  statements  are  made  which  the  writer  gives,  as  before,  entirely  on  her  own  responsibility,  since  a  few  may  sense  a  meaning  hidden  under  words  misleading  in  their  surface  meaning.]"  It  is  stated  that  at  the  age  of  thirty-three,  Shankaracharya,  tired  of  his  mortal  body,  "  put  it  off  "  in  the  cave  he  had  entered,  and  that  the  Bodhisattva,  that  served  as  his  lower  personality,  was  freed

with  the  burden  of  a  sin  upon  him  which  he  had  not  committed

At  the  same  time  it  is  added  :

At  whatever  age  one  puts  off  his  outward  body  by  free  will,  at  that  age  will  he  be  made  to  die  a  violent  death  against  his  will  in  his  next  rebirth  — Commentary

Now,  Karma  could  have  no  hold  on  "  Maha  Shankara  "  (as  Shankara  is  called  in  the  secret  work),  as  he  had,  as  Avatara,  no  Ego  of  his  own,  but  a  Bodhisattva — a  willing  sacrificial  victim.

Neither  had  the  latter  any  responsi-  bility for  the  deed,  whether  sinful  or  otherwise.

Therefore  we  do  not  see  the  point,  since  Karma  cannot  act  unjustly.

There  is  some  terrible  mystery  involved  in  all  this  story,  one  that  no  uninitiated  intellect  can  ever  unravel.

Still,  there  it  is,  suggesting  the  natural  query,  "  Who,  then,  was  punished  by  Karma  ?  "  and  leaving  it  to  be  answered.

A  few  centuries  later  Buddha  tried  one  more  incarnation,  it  is  said,  in  *  *  *  *,  and  again,  fifty  years  subsequent  to  the  death  of  this  Adept,  in  one  whose  name  is  given  as  Tiani-Tsang.

No  details,  no  further  information  or  explanation  is  given.

It  is  simply  stated  that  the  last  Buddha  had  to  work  out  the  remains  of  his  Karma,  which  none  of  the  Gods  themselves  can  escape,

1  Buddhism  in  Jtbet,  p.  52.     This  same  generic  use  of  a  name  is  found  among  Hindus  with  that  of  Shankaracharya,  to  take  but  one  instance      All  His  successors  bear  his  name,  but  are  not  reincarna-  tions of  Him      So  with  the  "  Buddhas."

2  [The  words  within  brackets  are  supplied  to  introduce  the  following  statements  that  are  confused  and  contradictory  as  they  stand,  and  which  H.  P.  B.  had  probably  intended  to  elucidate  to  some  slight  extent,  as  they  are  written  two  or  three  times  with  different  sentences  following  them.

The  MS.  is  exceedingly  confused,  and  everything  H.  P.  B.  said  is  here  pieced  together,  the  addition  above  made  being  marked  in  brackets  to  distinguish  it  from  hers.

— A.  B.]

••  REINCARNATIONS  "  OF  BUDDHA

forced  as  he  was  to  bury  still  deeper  certain  mysteries  half  revealed  by  him —  hence  misinterpreted.

The  words  used  would  stand  when  translated.

Born  fifty-two  years  too  early  as  Shramana  Gautama,  the  son  of  King  Zastang  ; 2  then  retiring  fifty-seven  years  too  soon  as  Maha  Shankara,  who  got  tired  of  his  outward  form  This  wilful  act  aroused  and  attracted  King  Karma,  who  killed  the  new  form  of  :  ;  at  thirty-three/  the  age  of  the  body  that  was  put  off.

He  died  in  his  next  (body)  at  thirty-two  and  a  little  over,  and  again  in  his  next  at  eighty — a  Maya,  and  at  one  hundred,  in  reality.

The  Bodhisattva  chose  Tiani-Tsang,1  then  again  the  Sugata  became  Tsong-Kha-pa,  who  became  thus  De-zhin-Shegs-pa  [Tathagata — "  one  who  follows  in  the  way  and  manner  of  his  predecessors  "].  The  Blessed  One  could  do  good  to  his  generation  as  *  "•  :  but  none  to  posterity,  and  so  as  Tiani-Tsang  he  be-  came incarnated  only  for  the  "  remains  "  [of  his  precedent  Karma,  as  we  understand  it]  The  Seven  Ways  and  the  Four  Truths  were  once  more  hidden  out  of  sight  The  Merciful  One  confined  since  then  his  attention  and  fatherly  care  to  the  heart  of  Bodyul,  the  nursery-grounds  of  the  seeds  of  truth.

The  blessed  "  remains  "  since  then  have  overshadowed  and  rested  in  many  a  holy  body  of  human  Bodhisattvas.

No  further  information  is  given,  least  of  all  are  there  any  details  or  explanations  to  be  found  in  the  secret  volume.

All  is  darkness  and  mystery  in  it,  for  it  is  evidently  written  but  for  those  who  are  already  instructed.

Several  flaming  red  asterisks  are  placed  instead  of  names,  and  the  few  facts  given  are  abruptly  broken  off.

The  key  of  the  riddle  is  left  to  the  intuition  of  the  disciple,  unless  the  "  direct  followers  "  of  Gautama  the  Buddha —  "  those  who  are  to  be  denied  by  His  Church  for  the  next  cycle  " — and  of  Shankaracharya,  are  pleased  to  add  more.

The  final  section  gives  a  kind  of  summary  of  the  seventy  sections —  covering  seventy-three  years  of  Buddha's  life  5 — from  which  the  last  paragraph-  is  summarized  as  follows  :

Emerging  from ,  the  most  excellent  seat  of  the  three  secrets  [Sang-Sum],

the  Master  of  incomparable   mercy,   after  having  performed  on  all  the  anchorites  the

rite  of ,  and  each  of  these  having  been  cut  off,'1  perceived  through  [the  power  of]

Hlun-Chub  7  what  was  his  next  duty      The  Most-Illustrious  meditated  and  asked  himself

1  There  are  several  names  marked  simply  by  asterisks  -  King  Suddhodana.

'  Shankara"charya  died  also  at  thirty-two  years  of  age,  or  rather  disappeared  from  the  sight  of  his  disciples,  as  the  legend  goes

4  Does  "Tiani-Tsang  "  stand  for  Apollonius  of  Tyana  ?  This  is  a  simple  surmise  Some  things  in  the  life  of  that  Adept  would  seem  to  tally  with  the  hypothesis— others  to  go  against  it

'  According  to  Esoteric  teaching  Buddha  lived  one  hundred  years  in  reality,  though  having  reached  Nirvana  in  his  eightieth  year  he  was  regarded  as  one  dead  to  the  world  of  the  living  See  article  "  Shakyamum's  Place  in  History  "  in  Five  Years  of  Jheosophy,  p.  230.

0  It  is  a  secret  rite,  pertaining  to  high  Initiation,  and  has  the  same  significance  as  the  one  to  which  Clement  of  Alexandria  alludes  when  he  speaks  of  the  token  of  recognition  being  in  common  with  us,  "  as  by  cutting  off  Christ  "  (Strom.,  ch.  xin).  Schlagmtweit  wonders  what  it  may  be  "  The  typical  re-  presentation of  a  hermit,"  he  says,  "  is  always  that  of  a  man  with  long,  uncut  hair  and  beard  .  .  A  rite  very  often  selected,  though  I  am  unable  to  state  for  what  reason,  is  that  of  Choc!  ('  to  cut '  or  '  to  destroy  ')  the  meaning  of  which  is  anxiously  kept  a  profound  secret  by  the  Lamas  "  (Buddhism  in  Tibet,  p.  163.)

'"  Hlun-Chub  is  the  divining  spirit  in  man,  the  highest  degree  of  seership.

378  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

whether  this  would  help  [the  future]  generations.

What  they  needed  was  the  sight  of  Maya  in  a  body  of  illusion  Which  ?  .  The  great  conqueror  of  pains  and  sorrows  arose  and  proceeded  back  to  his  birthplace.

There  Sugata  was  welcomed  by  the  few,  for  they  did  not  know  Shramana  Gautama  "  Shakya  [the  Mighty]  is  in  Nirvana.

.  .  .  He  has  given  the  Science  to  the  Shuddhas  [Shudra],"  said  they  of  Damze  Yul  [the  country  of  Brahmans  India].  .  .  It  was  for  that,  born  of  pity,  that  the  All-Glorious

One  had  to  retire  to ,  and  then  appear  [karmically]  as  Maha  Shankara  ,  and  out  of

pity  as ,  and  again  as ,  and  again  as  Tsong-Kha-pa.   .         For,  he  who  chooses

m  humiliation  must  go  down,  and  he  who  loves  not  allows  Karma  to  raise  him  !

This  passage  is  confessedly  obscure  and  written  for  the  few.

It  is  not  lawful  to  say  any  more,  for  the  time  has  not  yet  come  when  nations  are  prepared  to  hear  the  whole  truth.

The  old  religions  are  full  of  mysteries,  and  to  demonstrate  some  of  them  would  surely  lead  to  an  explosion  of  hatred,  followed,  perhaps,  by  bloodshed  and  worse.

It  will  be  sufficient  to  know  that  while  Gautama  Buddha  is  merged  in  Nirvana  ever  since  his  death,  Gautama  Shakyamuni  may  have  had  to  reincarnate — this  dual  inner  personality  being  one  of  the  greatest  mysteries  of  Esoteric  psychism.

"  The  seat  of  the  three  secrets  "  refers  to  a  place  inhabited  by  high  Initiates  and  their  disciples.

The  "secrets"  are  the  three  mystic  powers  known  as  Gopi,  Yasodhara,  and  Uptala  '2  Varna,  that  Csomo  de  Kb"ros  mistook  for  Buddha's  three  wives,  as  other  Orientalists  have  mistaken  Shakti  (Yoga  power)  personified  by  a  female  deity  for  His  wife  ;  or  Draupadi — also  a  spiritual  power — for  the  wife  in  common  of  the  five  brothers  Pandava.

1  The  secret  meaning  of  this  sentence  is  that  Karma  exercises  its  sway  over  the  Adept  as  much  as  over  any  other  man,  "Gods"  can  escape  it  as  little  as  simple  mortals  The  Adept  who,  having  reached  the  Path  and  won  His  Dharmakdya — the  Nirvana  from  which  there  is  no  return  until  the  new  grand  Kalpa — prefers  to  use  His  right  of  choosing  a  condition  inferior  to  that  which  belongs  to  Him,  but  that  will  leave  him  free  to  return  whenever  He  thinks  it  advisable  and  under  whatever  personality  He  may  select,  must  be  prepared  to  take  all  the  chances  of  failure — possibly— and  a  lower  condition  than  was  His  lot — for  a  certainty — as  it  is  an  occult  law.

Karma  alone  is  absolute  justice  and  infallible  in  its  selections  He  who  uses  his  rights  with  it  (Karma)  must  bear  the  consequences — if  any  Thus  Buddha's  first  reincarnation  was  produced  by  Karma — and  it  led  Him  higher  than  ever  ,  the  two  following  were  "  out  of  pity  "  and  *  *  *.

*  [Should  read  Utpala  or  Utpalam,  meaning  "  a  blue  lotus,"  varna  means  colour  ]

SECTION

AN  UNPUBLISHED  DISCOURSE  OF  BUDDHA

(IT  is  found  in  the  second  Book  of  Commentaries  and  is  addressed  to  the  Arhats.)

Said  the  All-Merciful :  Blessed  are  ye,  O  Bhikshus,  happy  are  ye  who  have  understood  the  mystery  of  Being  and  Non-Being  explained  in  Bas-pa  [Dharma,  Doctrine],  and  have  given  preference  to  the  latter,  for  ye  are  verily  my  Arhats.

.  .  .  The  elephant,  who  sees  his  form  mirrored  in  the  lake,  looks  at  it,  and  then  goes  away,  taking  it  for  the  real  body  of  another  elephant,  is  wiser  than  the  man  who  beholds  his  face  in  the  stream,  and,  looking  at  it,  says,  "  Here  am  I  ...  I  am  I  ":  for  the  "  I,"  his  Self,  is  not  in  the  world  of  the  twelve  Nidanas  and  mutability,  but  in  that  of  Non-Being,  the  only  world  beyond  the  snares  of  Maya.

.  .  .  That  alone,  which  has  neither  cause  nor  author,  which  is  self -existing,  eternal,  far  beyond  the  reach  of  mutability,  is  the  true  "I"  [Ego],  the  Self  of  the  Universe.

The  Universe  of  Nam-Kha  says :  "  I  am  the  world  of  Sien-Chan  "  ; 1  the  four  illusions  laugh  and  reply,  "Verily  so."  But  the  truly  wise  man  knows  that  neither  man,  nor  the  Universe  that  he  passes  through  like  a  flitting  shadow,  is  any  more  a  real  Universe  than  the  dewdrop  that  reflects  a  spark  of  the  morning  sun  is  that  sun.

.  .  .  There  are  three  things,  Bhikshus,  that  are  everlastingly  the  same,  upon  which  no  vicissitude,  no  modification  can  ever  act :  these  are  the  Law,  Nirvana,  and  Space,2  and  those  three  are  One,  since  the  first  two  are  within  the  last,  and  that  last  one  a  Maya,  so  long  as  man  keeps  within  the  whirlpool  of  sensuous  existences.

One  need  not  have  his  mortal  body  die  to  avoid  the  clutches  of  concupiscence  and  other  passions.

The  Arhat  who  observes  the  seven  hidden  precepts  of  Bas-pa  may  become  Dang-ma  and  Lha.3  He  may

1  The  Universe  of  Brahma  (Sien-Chan  ,  Nam-Kha)  is  Universal  Illusion,  or  our  phenomenal  world.

2  Akdsha      It  is  next  to  impossible  to  render  the  mystic  word  "  Tho-og  "  by  any  other  term  than  "  Space,"  and  yet,  unless  coined  on  purpose,  no  new  appellation  can  render  it  so  well  to  the  mind  of  the  Occultist.

The  term  "  Aditi  "  is  also  translated  "  Space,"  and  there  is  a  world  of  meaning  in  it.

J  Dang-ma,  a  purified  soul,  and  Lha,  a  freed  spirit  within  a  living  body ,  an  Adept  or  Arhat  In  the  popular  opinion  in  Tibet,  a  Lha  is  a  disembodied  spirit,  something  similar  to  the  Burmese  Nat —  only  higher.

380  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

hear  the  "  holy  voice  "of  .  .  .  [Kwan-yin],1  and  find  himself  within  the  quiet  precincts  of  his  Sangharama  •  transferred  into  Amitabha  Buddha.3  Becoming  one  with  Anuttara  Samyak  Sambodhi,4  he  may  pass  through  all  the  six  worlds  of  Being  (Rupaloka)  and  get  into  the  first  three  worlds  of  Arupa.5  ...  He  who  listens  to  my  secret  law,  preached  to  my  select  Arhats,  will  arrive  with  its  help  at  the  knowledge  of  Self,  and  thence  at  perfection.

It  is  due  to  entirely  erroneous  conceptions  of  Eastern  thought  and  to  ignorance  of  the  existence  of  an  Esoteric  key  to  the  outward  Buddhist  phrases  that  E.  Burnouf  and  other  great  scholars  have  inferred  from  such  propositions  — held  also  by  the  Vedantins — as  "my  body  is  not  body  "  and  "myself  is  no  self  of  mine,"  that  Eastern  psychology  was  all  based  upon  non-permanency.

Cousin,  for  instance,  lecturing  upon  the  subject,  brings  the  two  following  pro-  positions to  prove,  on  Burnouf's  authority,  that,  unlike  Brahmanism,  Buddhism  rejects  the  perpetuity  of  the  thinking  principle.

These  are :

1.  Thought  or  Spirit" — for  the  faculty  is  not  distinguished  from  the  subject —  appears  only  with  sensation  and  does  not  survive  it.

2.  The  Spirit  cannot  itself  lay  hold  of  itself,  and  in  directing  attention  to  itself  it  draws  from  it  only  the  conviction  of  its  powerlessness  to  see  itself  otherwise  than  as.  successive  and  transitory.

This  all  refers  to  Spirit  embodied,  not  to  the  freed  Spiritual  Self  on.  whom  Maya  has  no  more  hold.

Spirit  is  no  body;  therefore  have  the  Orientalists  made  of  it  "nobody"  and  nothing.

Hence  they  proclaim  Buddhists  to  be  Nihilists,  and  Vedantins  to  be  the  followers  of  a  creed  in*  which  the  "  Impersonal  [God]  turns  out  on  examination  to  be  a  myth  "  ;  their  goal  is  described  as

The  complete  extinction  of  all  spiritual,  mental,  and  bodily  powers  by  absorption  into  the  Impersonal.

1  Kwan-yin  is  a  synonym,  for  in  the  original  another  term  is  used,  but  the  meaning  is  identical.

It  is  the  divine  voice  of  Self,  or  the  "  Spirit-voice  "  in  man,  and  the  same  as  Vachishvara  (the  "  Voice-  deity  ")  of  the  Brahmanas      In  China,   the  Buddhist  ritualists  have  degraded  its  meaning  by  anthro-  pomorphizing it  into  a  Goddess  of  the  same  name,  with  one  thousand  hands  and  eyes,  and  they  call  it  Kwan-shai-ym-Bodhisat      It  is  the  Buddhist  "  daimon  "-voice  of  Socrates

2  SanghSr^ma  is  the  sanctum  sanctorum  of  an  ascetic,  a  cave  or  any  place  he  chooses  for  his  medi-  tation.

3  Amitabha   Buddha  is  in  this  connection  the  "boundless  light  "  by  which  things  of  the  subjective  world  are  perceived

4  Esotencally,  "  the  unsurpassmgly  merciful  and  enlightened  heart,"  said  of  the  "  Perfect  Ones,"  the  Jlvan-muktas,  collectively.

"'  These  six  worlds— seven  with  us — are  the  worlds  of  Nats  or  Spirits,  with  the  Burmese  Buddhists,  and  the  seven  higher  worlds  of  the  Vedantins

b  Two  things  entirely  distinct  from  each  other.

The  "faculty  is  not  distinguished  from  the  subject '  *  only  on  this  material  plane,  while  [a]  thought  generated  by  our  physical  brain,  one  that  has  never  impressed  itself  at  the  same  time  on  the  spiritual  counterpart,  whether  through  the  atrophy  of  the  latter  or  the  intrinsic  weakness  of  that  thought,  can  never  survive  our  body  ,  this  much  is  sure.

7  Vedanta  Sara,  translated  by  Major  Jacob,  p.

SECTION

NIRVANA-MOKSHA

THE  few  sentences  given  in  the  text  from  one  of  Gautama  Buddha's  secret  teachings  show  how  uncalled  for  is  the  epithet  of  "  Materialist"  when  applied  to  One  Whom  two-thirds  of  those  who  are  looked  upon  as  great  Adepts  and  Occultists  in  Asia  recognize  as  their  Master,  whether  under  the  name  of  Buddha  or  that  of  Shankaracharya.

The  reader  will  remember  the  just-quoted  words  are  what  Buddha  Sang-gyas  (or  Phoj  is  alleged  by  the  Tibetan  Occultists  to  have  taught  :  there  are  three  eternal  things  in  the  Universe — the  Law,  Nirvana,  and  Space.

The  Buddhists  of  the  Southern  Church  claim,  on  the  other  hand,  that  Buddha  held  only  two  things  as  eternal — Akasha  and  Nirvana.

But  Akasha  being  the  same  as  Aditi,1  and  both  being  translated  "Space,"  there  is  no  discrepancy  so  far,  since  Nirvana  as  well  as  Moksha,  is  a  state.

Then  in  both  cases  the  great  Kapilavastu  Sage  unifies  the  two,  as  well  as  the  three,  into  one  eternal  Element,  and  ends  by  saying  that  even  "  that  One  is  a  Maya  "  to  one  who  is  not  a  Dang-ma,  a  perfectly  purified  Soul.

The  whole  question  hangs  upon  materialistic  misconceptions  and  igno-  rance of  Occult  Metaphysics.

To  the  man  of  Science  who  regards  Space  as  simply  a  mental  representation,  a  conception  of  something  existing  pro  forma,  and  having  no  real  being  outside  our  mind,  Space  per  se  is  verily  an  illusion.

He  may  fill  the  boundless  interstellar  Space  with  an  "  imaginary  "  ether,  nevertheless  Space  for  him  is  an  abstraction.

Most  of  the  Metaphysicians  of  Europe  are  as  wide  of  the  mark,  from  the  purely  Occult  standpoint,  of  a  correct  comprehension  of  "  Space,"  as  are  the  Materialists,  though  the  erroneous  conceptions  of  both  of  course  differ  widely.

If,  bearing  in  mind  the  philosophical  views  of  the  Ancients  upon  this  question,  we  compare  them  with  what  is  now  termed  exact  physical  Science,

1  Aditi  is,  according  to  the  Rig  Veda.

"  the  Father  and  Mother  of  all  the  Gods  "  ,  and  AkSsha  is  held  by  Southern  Buddhism  as  the  Root  of  all,  whence  everything  in  the  Universe  came  out,  m  obedi-  ence to  a  law  of  motion  inherent  in  it ;  and  this  is  the  Tibetan  "  Space  "  (Tho-og).

382  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

it  will  be  found  that  the  two  disagree  only  in  inferences  and  names,  and  that  their  postulates  are  the  same  when  reduced  to  their  most  simple  expression.

From  the  beginning  of  the  human  £ons,  from  the  very  dawn  of  Occult  Wisdom,  the  regions  that  the  men  of  Science  fill  with  ether  have  been  explored  by  the  Seers  of  every  age.

That  which  the  world  regards  simply  as  cosmic  Space,  an  abstract  representation,  the  Hindu  Rishi,  the  Chaldean  Magus,  the  Egyptian  Hierophant  held,  each  and  all,  as  the  one  eternal  Root  of  all,  the  playground  of  all  the  Forces  in  Nature.

It  is  the  fountain-head  of  all  terrestrial  life,  and  the  abode  of  those  (to  us)  invisible  swarms  of  existences — of  real  beings,  as  of  the  shadows  only  thereof,  conscious  and  unconscious,  intelligent  and  senseless — that  surround  us  on  all  sides,  that  interpenetrate  the  atoms  of  our  Kosmos,  and  see  us  not,  as  we  do  not  either  see  or  sense  them  through  our  physical  organisms.

For  the  Occultist  "  Space  "  and  "  Universe  "  are  synonyms.

In  Space  there  is  not  Matter,  Force,  nor  Spirit,  but  all  that  and  much  more.

It  is  the  One  Element,  and  that  one  the  Anima  Mundi — Space,  Akasha,  Astral  Light — the  Root  of  Life  which,  in  its  eternal,  ceaseless  motion,  like  the  out-  and  in-breathing  of  one  boundless  ocean,  evolves  but  to  reabsorb  all  that  lives  and  feels  and  thinks  and  has  its  being  in  it.  As  said  of  the  Universe  in  Isis  Unveiled  it  is  :

The  combination  of  a  thousand  elements  and  yet  the  expression  of  a  single  Spirit — a  chaos  to  the  sense,  a  Kosmos  to  the  reason

Such  were  the  views  upon  the  subject  of  all  the  great  ancient  Philos-  ophers, from  Manu  down  to  Pythagoras,  from  Plato  to  Paul.

When  the  dissolution  [Pralaya]  had  arrived  at  its  term  the  great  Being  [Para-  Atma,  or  Para-Purusha],  the  Lord  existing  through  himself,  out  of  whom  and  through  whom  all  things  were,  and  are,  and  will  be,  .  .  resolved  to  emanate  from  his  own  substance  the  various  creatures.

The  mystic  Decad  [of  Pythagoras]  1+2  +  3  +  4  10  is  a  way  of  expressing  this  idea  The  One  is  God  , '  the  Two,  matter  ;  the  Three,  combining  Monad  and  Duad  and  partaking  of  the  nature  of  both,  is  the  phenomenal  world  ,  the  Tetrad,  or  form  of  perfection,  expresses  the  emptiness  of  all ;  and  the  Decad,  or  sum  of  all,  involves  the  entire  cosmos.*

Plato's  "God"  is  the  "Universal  Ideation,"  and  Paul  saying  "Out  of  him,  and  through  him,  and  in  him,  all  things  are,"  had  surely  a  Principle — never  a  Jehovah — in  his  profound  mind.

The  key  to  the  Pythagorean  dogmas  is  the  key  to  every  great  Philosophy.

It  is  the  general

1  Manava-Dharma-Shastra,  i,  6,  7.

2  The  "  God  ''   of  Pythagoras,   the  disciple  of  the  Aryan  Sages,  is  no  personal  God.

Let  it  be  remembered  that  he  taught  as  a  cardinal  tenet  that  there  exists  a  permanent  Principle  of  Unity  beneath  all  forms,  changes,  and  other  phenomena  of  the  Universe.

3  Isis  Unveiled,  I,  p.  xvi.

NIRVANA-MOKSHA  383-

formula  of  unity  in  multiplicity,  the  One  evolving  the  many  and  pervading  the  All.

It  is  the  archaic  doctrine  of  Emanation  in  a  few  words.

Speusippus  and  Xenocrates  held,  like  their  great  master,  Plato,  that  :

The  Anima  Mundi  (or  "  world-soul  ")  was  not  the  Deity,  but  a  manifestation  Those  philosophers  never  conceived  of  the  One  as  an  an/mate  nature  The  original  One  did  not  exist,  as  we  understand  the  term  Not  till  he  (it)  had  united  with  the  many  emanated  existences  (the  Monad  and  Duad),  was  a  being  produced  The  rLfuov  ("  honoured  "),  the  something  manifested,  dwells  in  the  centre  as  in  the  cir-  cumference, but  it  is  only  the  reflection  of  the  Deity — the  World-Soul  In  this  doctrine  we  find  the  spirit  of  Esoteric  Buddhism  '

And  it  is  that  of  Esoteric  Brahminism  and  of  the  Vedantin  Advaitis.

The  two  modern  philosophers,  Schopenhauer  and  von  Hartmann,  teach  the  same  ideas.

The  Occultists  say  that :

The  psychic  and  ectenic  forces,  the  "  ideo-motor  "  and  "  electro-biological  powers,"  "  latent  thought,"  and  even  "  unconscious  cerebration  "  theories  can  be  condensed  in  two  words  the  Kabalistic  ASTRAL  LIGHT  •

Schopenhauer  only  synthesized  all  this  by  calling  it  Will,  and  contradicted  the  men  of  Science  in  their  materialistic  views,  as  von  Hartmann  did  later  on.  The  author  of  the  Philosophy  of  the  Unconscious  calls  their  views  "  an  in-  stinctual prejudice."

Furthermore,  he  demonstrates  that  no  experimenter  can  have  anything  to  do  with  matter  properly  so  termed,  but  only  with  the  forces  into  which  he  divides  it  The  visible  effects  of  matter  are  but  the  effects  of  force  He  concludes  thereby  that  that  which  is  now  called  matter  is  nothing  but  the  aggregation  of  atomic  forces,  to  express  which  the  word  "  matter  "  is  used  ,  outside  of  that,  for  science,  matter  is  but  a  word  void  of  sense  '

As  much,  it  is  to  be  feared,  as  those  other  terms  with  which  we  are  now  concerned,  "Space,"  "Nirvana,"  and  so  on.

The  bold  theories  and  opinions  expressed  in  Schopenhauer's  works  differ  widely  from  those  of  the  majority  of  our  orthodox  scientists  '  "  In  reality,'  remarks  this  daring  speculator,  "  there  is  neither  matter  nor  spirit  The  tendency  to  gravitation  in  a  stone  is  as  unexplainable  as  thought  in  the  human  brain  .  .  If  matter  can — no  one  knows  why — fall  to  the  ground,  then  it  can  also — no  one  knows  why — think  .  As  soon,  even  in  mechanics,  as  we  trespass  beyond  the  purely  mathematical,  as  soon  as  we  reach  the  inscrutable  adhesion,  gravitation,  and  so  on  we  are  faced  by  phenomena  which  are  to  our  senses  as  mysterious  as  the  WILL  and  THOUGHT  in  man  we  find  ourselves  facing  the  incomprehensible,  for  such  is  every  force  in  nature  Where  is,  then,  that  matter  which  you  all  pretend  to  know  so  well,  and  from  which-  -being  so  familiar  with  it — you  draw  all  your  conclusions  and  explanations,  and  attribute  to  it  all  things  ?  .  That,  which  can  be  fully  realized  by  our  reason  and  senses,  is  but  the  superficial  ,  they  can  never  reach  the  true  inner  substance  of  things  Such  was  the  opinion  of  Kant  If  you  consider  that  there  is  in  a  human  head  some  sort  of  a  spirit,  then  you  are  obliged

1  /sis  Unveiled,  I,  xvni.

•  Ibid.,  I,  p   58  •'  Ibid  ,  I,  p

'  While    they    are   to  a   great  extent  identical  with  those  of  Esoteric  Budhism,  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE  of  the  East

384  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

to  concede  the  same  to  a  stone  If  your  dead  and  utterly  passive  matter  can  manifest  a  tendency  toward  gravitation  or,  like  electricity,  attract  and  repel  and  send  out  sparks,  then  as  well  as  the  brain  it  can  also  think  In  short,  every  particle  of  the  so-called  spirit  we  can  replace  with  an  equivalent  of  matter,  and  every  particle  of  matter  replace  with  spirit.

.  .  .  Thus,  it  is  not  the  Christian  division  of  all  things  into  matter  and  spirit  that  can  ever  be  found  philosophically  exact ;  but  only  if  we  divide  them  into  will  and  manifestation,  which  form  of  division  has  naught  to  do  with  the  former,  for  it  spiritual-  izes everything  :  all  that  which  is  in  the  first  instance  real  and  objective — body  and  matter — it  transforms  into  a  representation,  and  every  manifestation  into  will."  '

The  matter  of  science  may  be  for  all  objective  purposes  a  "  dead  and  utterly-passive  matter  "  ;  to  the  Occultist  not  an  atom  of  it  can  be  dead —  "  Life  is  ever  present  in  it."  We  send  the  reader  who  would  know  more  about  it  to  our  article,  "Transmigration  of  Life-Atoms.'"2  What  we  are  now  concerned  with  is  the  doctrine  of  Nirvana.

A  "  system  of  atheism  "  it  may  be  justly  called,  since  it  recognizes  neither  God  nor  Gods — least  of  all  a  Creator,  as  it  entirely  rejects  creation.

The  Fecit  ex  nihilo  is  as  incomprehensible  to  the  Occult  metaphysical  Scientist  as  it  is  to  the  scientific  Materialist.

It  is  at  this  point  that  all  agreement  stops  .between  the  two.

But  if  such  be  the  sin  of  the  Buddhist  and  Brahman  Occultist,  then  Pantheists  and  Atheists,  and  also  theistical  Jews — the  Kabalists  — must  also  plead  "  guilty  "  to  it ;  yet  no  one  would  ever  think  of  calling  the  Hebrews  of  the  Kabalah  "  Atheists."  Except  the  Talmudistic  and  Christian  exoteric  systems  there  never  was  a  religious  Philosophy,  whether  in  the  ancient  or  modern  world,  but  rejected  a  priori  the  ex  nihilo  hypothesis,  simply  because  Matter  was  always  co-eternalized  with  Spirit.

Nirvana,  as  well  as  the  Moksha  of  the  Vedantins,  is  regarded  by  most  of  the  Orientalists  as  a  synonym  of  annihilation  ;  yet  no  more  glaring  injustice  •could  be  done,  and  this  capital  error  must  be  pointed  out  and  disproved.

On  this  most  important  tenet  of  the  Brahmo-Buddhistic  system — the  Alpha  and  the  Omega  of  "  Being  "  or  "  Non-Being  " — rests  the  whole  edifice  of  Occult  Metaphysics.

Now  the  rectification  of  the  great  error  concerning  Nirvana  may  be  very  easily  accomplished  with  relation  to  the  philosophically  inclined,  to  those  who,

In  the  glass  of  things  temporal  see  the  image  of  things  spiritual.

On  the  other  hand,  to  that  reader  who  could  never  soar  beyond  the  details  of  tangible  material  form,  our  explanation  will  appear  meaningless.

He  may  comprehend  and  even  accept  the  logical  inferences  from  the  reasons  given — the  true  spirit  will  ever  escape  his  intuitions.

The  word  "  nihil  "  having  been  misconceived  from  the  first,  it  is  continually  used  as  a  sledge-hammer  in

1  Parerga,  u.  pp,  111,  112  ,  quoted  in  /sis  Unveiled  \,  p.

-  Five  Years  of  Trieosopfiy,  pp,  338,  et  seq.

[in  the  1910  edition].

NIRVANA-MOKSHA

the  matter  of  Esoteric  Philosophy.

Nevertheless  it  is  the  duty  of  the  Occultist  to  try  and  explain  it.

Nirvana  and  Moksha,  then,  as  said  before,  have  their  being  in  non-being,  if  such  a  paradox  be  permitted  to  illustrate  the  meaning  the  better.

Nirvana,  as  some  illustrious  Orientalists  have  attempted  to  prove,  does  mean  the  "  blowing-out  "*  of  all  sentient  existence.

It  is  like  the  flame  of  a  candle  burnt  out  to  its  last  atom,  and  then  suddenly  extinguished.

Quite  so.  Never-  theless, as  the  old  Arhat  Nagasena  affirmed  before  the  king  who  taunted  him  :  "Nirvana  is" — and  Nirvana  is  eternal.

But  the  Orientalists  deny  this,  and  say  it  is  not  so.  In  their  opinion  Nirvana  is  not  a  re-absorption  in  the  Univer-  sal Force,  not  eternal  bliss  and  rest,  but  it  means  literally  "  the  blowing-out,  the  extinction,  complete  annihilation,  and  not  absorption."  The  Lankavatara  quoted  in  support  of  their  arguments  by  some  Sanskritists,  and  which  gives  the  different  interpretations  of  Nirvana  by  the  Tirthika  Brahmans,  is  no  autho-  rity to  one  who  goes  to  primeval  sources  for  information,  namely,  to  the  Buddha  who  taught  the  doctrine.

As  well  quote  the  Charvaka  Materialists  in  their  support.

If  we  bring  as  an  argument  the  sacred  Jaina  books,  wherein  the  dying  Gautama  Buddha  is  thus  addressed  ;  "  Arise  into  Nirvi  [Nirvana]  from  this  decrepit  body  into  which  thou  hast  been  sent.

.  .  .  Ascend  into  thy  former  abode,  O  blessed  Avatara  "  ;  and  if  we  add  that  this  seems  to  us  the  very  opposite  of  nihilism,  we  may  be  told  that  so  far  it  may  only  prove  a  contradic-  tion, one  more  discrepancy  in  the  Buddhist  faith.

If  again  we  remind  the  reader  that  since  Gautama  is  believed  to  appear  occasionally,  re-descending  from  his  "  former  abode  "  for  the  good  of  humanity  and  His  faithful  congrega-  tion, thus  making  it  incontestable  that  Buddhism  does  not  teach  final  annihilation,  we  shall  be  referred  to  authorities  to  whom  such  teaching  is  ascribed.

And  let  us  say  at  once  :  Men  are  no  authority  for  us  in  questions  of  conscience,  nor  ought  they  to  be  for  anyone  else.

If  anyone  holds  to  Buddha's  Philosophy,  let  him  do  and  say  as  Buddha  did  and  said  ;  if  a  man  calls  himself  a  Christian,  let  him  follow  the  commandments  of  Christ — not  the  interpretations  of  His  many  dissenting  priests  and  sects.

In  A  Buddhist  Catechism  the  question  is  asked  :  Are  there  any  dogmas  in  Buddhism  which  we  are  required  to  accept  on  faith  ?

1  Prof.

Max  Muller,  in  a  letter  to  The  Times  (April,  1857),  maintained  most  vehemently  that  Nirvana  meant  annihilation  in  the  fullest  sense  of  the  word.

(Chips  from  a  German  Workshop,  i,  284  )  But  in  1869,  in  a  lecture  before  the  General  Meeting  of  the  Association  of  German  Philologists  at  Kiel,  "  he  distinctly  declares  his  belief  that  the  Nihilism  attributed  to  Buddha's  teaching  forms  no  part  of  his  doctrine,  and  that  it  is  wholly  wrong  to  suppose  that  NirvSna  means  annihilation  "  (Trubner's  Amer,  and  Oriental  Lit.

Rec.,  Oct.

16th,  1869.)  FF

386  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

A.  No.  We  are  earnestly  enjoined  to  accept  nothing  whatever  on  faith,  whether  it  be  written  in  books,  handed  down  from  our  ancestors,  or  taught  by  sages.

Our  Lord  Buddha  has  said  that  we  must  not  believe  in  a  thing  said  merely  because  it  /s  said ;  nor  in  traditions  because  they  have  been  handed  down  from  antiquity  ;  nor  rumours,  as  such  ;  nor  writings  by  sages,  because  sages  wrote  them  •  nor  fancies  that  we  may  suspect  to  have  been  inspired  in  us  by  a  Deva  (that  is,  in  presumed  spiritual  inspiration)  ,  nor  from  inferences  drawn  from  some  haphazard  assumption  we  may  have  made  ,  nor  because  of  what  seems  an  analogical  necessity  ,  nor  on  the  mere  authority  of  our  teachers  or  masters.

But  we  are  to  believe  when  the  writing,  doctrine,  or  saying  is  corroborated  by  our  own  reason  and  consciousness.

"  For  this,"  says  he  in  concluding,  "  I  taught  you — not  to  believe  merely  because  you  have  heard,  but  when  you  believed  of  your  consciousness,  then  to  act  accordingly  and  abundantly  "  '

That  Nirvana,  or  rather,  that  state  in  which  we  are  in  Nirvana,  is  quite  the  reverse  of  annihilation  is  suggested  to  us  by  our  "  reason  and  conscious-  ness," and  that  is  sufficient  for  us  personally.

At  the  same  time,  this  fact  being  inadequate  and  very  ill-adapted  for  the  general  reader,  something  more  efficient  may  be  added.

Without  resorting  to  sources  unsympathetic  to  Occultism,  the  Kabalah  furnishes  us  with  the  most  luminous  and  clear  proofs  that  the  term  "  nihil  "  in  the  minds  of  the  Ancient  Philosophers  had  a  meaning  quite  different  from  that  it  has  now  received  at  the  hands  of  Materialists.

It  means  certainly  "  nothing  "  — or  "  no-thing."  F.  Kircher,  in  his  work  on  the  Kabalah  and  the  Egyptian  Mysteries2  explains  the  term  admirably.

He  tells  his  readers  that  in  the  Zonar  the  first  of  the  Sephiroth  3  has  a  name  the  significance  of  which  is  "  the  Infinite,"  but  which  was  translated  indifferently  by  the  Kabalists  as  "  Ens  "  and  "  Non-Ens  "  ("  Being  "  and  "  Non-Being  ")  ;  a  Being,  inasmuch  as  it  is  the  root  and  source  of  all  other  beings  ;  Non-Being  because  Ain  Soph —  the  Boundless  and  the  Causeless,  the  Unconscious  and  the  Passive  Principle —  resembles  nought  else  in  the  Universe.

The  author  adds  :  This  is  the  reason  why  St.  Denys  did  not  hesitate  to  call  it  Nihil

"  Nihil  "  therefore  stands — even  with  some  Christian  theologians  and  thinkers,  especially  with  the  earlier  ones  who  lived  but  a  few  removes  from  the  profound  Philosophy  of  the  initiated  Pagans — as  a  synonym  for  the  impersonal,  divine  Principle,  the  Infinite  All,  which  is  no  Being  or  thing — the  En  or  Ain  Soph,  the  Parabrahman  of  the  Vedanta.

Now  St.  Denys  was  a  pupil  of  St.  Paul — an  Initiate — and  this  fact  makes  everything  clear.

1  See  the  Kalama  Sutta  of  the  Anguttara  Nikayo,  as  quoted  in  A  Buddhist  Catechism,  by  H.  S  Olcott,  first  President  of  the  Theosophical  Society  [1875-1907],  pp  32,

J  ddipws  /Egypt.

II,  i,  p

';  Sephir,  or  Aditi  (mystic  Space).  The  Sephiroth,  be  it  understood,  are  identical  with  the  Hindu  Prajapatis,  the  Dhyan  Chohans  of  Esoteric  Buddhism,  the  Zoroastrian  Amshaspends,  and  finally  with  the  Elohim — the  "  Seven  Angels  of  the  Presence  "  of  the  Roman  Catholic  Church.

NIRVANA-MOKSHA

The  "  Nihil  "  is  in  esse  the  Absolute  Deity  itself,  the  hidden  Power  or  Omnipresence  degraded  by  Monotheism  into  an  anthropomorphic  Being,  with  all  the  passions  of  a  mortal  on  a  graYid  scale.

Union  with  That  is  not  annihilation  in  the  sense  understood  in  Europe.1  In  the  East  annihilation  in  Nirvana  refers  but  to  matter  :  that  of  the  visible  as  well  as  the  invisible  body,  for  the  astral  body,  the  personal  double,  is  still  matter,  however  sublimated.

Buddha  taught  that  the  primitive  Substance  is  eternal  and  unchangeable.

Its  vehicle  is  the  pure,  luminous  ether,  the  boundless,  infinite  Space,

not  a  void  resulting  from  the  absence  of  forms,  but  on  the  contrary,  the  founda-  tion of  all  forms  .  .  .  [This]  denotes  it  to  be  the  creation  of  Maya,  all  the  works  of  which  are  as  nothing  before  the  uncreated  Form  [Spirit],  in  whose  profound  and  sacred  depths  all  motion  must  cease  for  ever.

Motion  here  refers  only  to  illusive  objects,  to  their  change  as  opposed  to  perpetuity,  rest — perpetual  motion  being  the  Eternal  Law,  the  ceaseless  Breath  of  the  Absolute.

The  mastery  of  Buddhistic  dogmas  can  be  attained  only  according  to  the  Platonic  method  :  from  universals  to  particulars.

The  key  to  it  lies  in  the  refined  and  mystical  tenets  of  spiritual  influx  and  divine  life.

Saith  Buddha  :

Whosoever  is  unacquainted  with  my  Law,8  and  dies  in  that  state,  must  return  to  earth  until  he  becomes  a  perfect  Samano  [ascetic].  To  achieve  this  object  he  must  destroy  within  himself  the  trinity  of  Maya.4  He  must  extinguish  his  passions,  unite  and  identify  himself  with  the  Law  [the  teaching  of  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE],  and  comprehend  the  philosophy  of  annihilation.

No,  it  is  not  in  the  dead-letter  of  Buddhistical  literature  that  scholars  may  ever  hope  to  find  the  true  solution  of  its  metaphysical  subtleties.

Alone  in  all  antiquity  the  Pythagoreans  understood  them  perfectly,  and  it  is  on  the  (to  the  average  Orientalist  and  the  Materialist)  incomprehensible  abstractions  of  Buddhism  that  Pythagoras  grounded  the  principal  tenets  of  his  Philosophy.

Annihilation  means  with  the  Buddhistical  Philosophy  only  a  dispersion  of  matter,  in  whatever  form  or  semblance  of  form  it  may  be,  for  everything  that  bears  a  shape  was  created,  and  thus  must  sooner  or  later  perish,  i.e.,  change

1  According  to  the   Eastern   idea,  the  All  comes  out  from  the  One,  and  returns  to  it  again.

Absolute  annihilation   is  simply  unthinkable.

Nor  can  eternal  Matter  be  annihilated      Form  may  be  annihilated     co-relations   may  change      That   is  all      There  can  be  no  such  thing  as  annihilation — in  the  European  sense — in  the  Universe

2  /s/s  Unveiled,  I,  p

3  The   Secret  Law,   the   "  Doctrine  of  the   Heart,"  so  called  in  contrast  to  the  "  Doctrine  of  the  Eye,"  or  exoteric  Buddhism

4  "  Illusive  matter  in  its  triple  manifestation  in  the  earthly,  and  the  astral  or  fontal  Soul  (the  body),  and  the  Platonian  dual  Soul— the  rational  and  the  irrational  one."

*  /s/s  Unveiled,  I,  p.

388  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

that  shape  ;  therefore,  as  something  temporal,  though  seeming  to  be  per-  manent, it  is  but  an  illusion,  Maya  ;  for  as  eternity  has  neither  beginning  nor  end,  the  more  or  less  prolonged  duration  of  some  particular  form  passes,  as  it  were,  like  an  instantaneous  flash  of  lightning.

Before  we  have  the  time  to  realize  that  we  have  seen  it,  it  is  gone  and  passed  for  ever ;  hence  even  our  astral  bodies,  pure  ether,  are  but  illusions  of  matter  so  long  as  they  retain  their  terrestrial  outline.

The  latter  changes,  says  the  Buddhist,  according  to  the  merits  or  demerits  of  the  person  during  his  lifetime,  and  this  is  metem-  psychosis.

When  the  spiritual  Entity  breaks  loose  for  ever  from  every  particle  of  matter,  then  only  it  enters  upon  the  eternal  and  unchangeable  Nirvana.

He  exists  in  Spirit,  in  nothing  ;  as  a  form,  a  shape,  a  semblance,  he  is  completely  annihilated,  and  thus  will  die  no  more,  for  Spirit  alone  is  no  Maya,  but  the  only  Reality  in  an  illusionary  universe  of  ever-passing  forms.

It  is  upon  this  Buddhist  doctrine  that  the  Pythagoreans  grounded  the  principal  tenets  of  their  philosophy.

"  Can  that  spirit  which  gives  life  and  motion,  and  partakes  of  the  nature  of  light,  be  reduced  to  nonentity?"  they  ask.

"Can  that  sensitive  spirit  in  brutes  which  exercises  memory,  one  of  the  rational  faculties,  die  and  become  nothing?"  And  Whitelock  Bulstrode  in  his  able  defence  of  Pythagoras  expounds  this  doctrine  by  adding :

"  If  you  say  they  (the  brutes)  breathe  their  spirits  into  the  air,  and  there  vanish,  that  is  all  that  I  contend  for.

The  air  indeed  is  the  proper  place  to  receive  them,  being  according  to  Laertius  full  of  souls ;  and  according  to  Epicurus  full  of  atoms,  the  prin-  ciples of  all  things ;  for  even  this  place  wherein  we  walk  and  birds  fly  has  so  much  of  a  spiritual  nature  that  it  is  invisible,  and  therefore  may  well  be  the  receiver  of  forms,  since  the  forms  of  all  bodies  are  so ;  we  can  only  see  and  hear  its  effects ;  the  air  itself  is  too  fine  and  above  the  capacity  of  the  age.

What  then  is  the  ether  in  the  region  above,  and  what  are  the  influences  of  forms  that  descend  from  thence  ?  "  The  spirits  of  creatures,  the  Pythagoreans  hold,  who  are  emanations  of  the  most  sublimated  portions  of  ether — emanations,  BREATHS,  but,  not  forms.

Ether  is  corruptible — all  philosophers  agree  in  that; — and  what  is  incorruptible  is  so  far  from  being  annihilated  when  it  gets  rid  of  the  form  that  it  lays  a  good  claim  to  IMMORTALITY.

"  But  what  is  that  which  has  no  body,  no  form  ;  which  is  imponderable,  invisible,  and  indivisible — that  which  exists,  and  yet  is  not  ?  "  ask  the  Buddhists.

"  It  is  Nirvana,"  is  the  answer.

It  is  NO-THING,  not  a  region,  but  rather  a  state.

'  his  Unveiled,  \,  p.  290.

SECTION

THE  SECRET  BOOKS  OF  •<  LAM-RIN  "  AND  DZYAN

THE  BOOK  OF  DZYAN — from  the  Sanskrit  word  "  Dhyan  "  (mystic  meditation)  — is  the  first  volume  of  the  Commentaries  upon  the  seven  secret  folios  of  Kiu-te,  and  a  Glossary  of  the  public  works  of  the  same  name.

Thirty-five  volumes  of  Kiu-te  for  exoteric  purposes  and  the  use  of  the  laymen  may  be  found  in  the  possession  of  the  Tibetan  Gelugpa  Lamas,  in  the  library  of  any  monastery  ;  and  also  fourteen  books  of  Commentaries  and  Annotations  on  the  same  by  the  initiated  Teachers.

Strictly  speaking,  those  thirty-five  books  ought  to  be  termed  "  The  Popularised  Version  "  of  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE,  full  of  myths,  blinds  and  errors  ;  the  fourteen  volumes  of  Commentaries,  on  the  other  hand — with  their  trans-  lations, annotations,  and  an  ample  glossary  of  Occult  terms,  worked  out  from  one  small  archaic  folio,  the  BOOK  OF  THE  SECRET  WISDOM  OF  THE  WORLD  l — contain  a  digest  of  all  the  Occult  Sciences.

These,  it  appears,  are  kept  secret  and  apart,  in  the  charge  of  the  Teshu  Lama  of  Tji-gad-je  [Shigatze].  The  Books  of  Kiu-te  are  comparatively  modern,  having  been  edited  within  the  last  millennium,  whereas,  the  earliest  volumes  of  the  Commentaries  are  of  untold  antiquity,  some  fragments  of  the  original  cylinders  having  been  preserved.

With  the  exception  that  they  explain  and  correct  some  of  the  too  fabulous,  and  to  every  appearance,  grossly-exaggerated  accounts  in  the  Books  of  Kiu-  te  ~ — properly  so-called — the  Commentaries  have  little  to  do  with  these.

1  It  is  from  the  texts  of  all  these  works  that  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE  has  been  given     The  original  matter  would   not  make  a   small   pamphlet,    but  the  explanations  and  notes  from  the  Commentaries  and  Glossaries  might  be  worked  into  ten  volumes  as  large  as  I  sis  Unveiled.

2  The   monk   Delia   Penna  makes  considerable  fun  in  his  Memoirs  (see  Markham's  Tibet,  p   309  et  sea  )  of  certain  statements  in  the  Books  of  Kiu-te.     He  brings  to  the  notice  of  the  Christian  public  "the   great   mountain    160,000   leagues   high"    (a   Tibetan   league  consisting   of  five  miles)  in  the  Himalayan  Range.

"  According  to  their  law,"  he  says,  "  in  the  west  of  this  world  there  is  an  eternal  world          .     .     a  paradise,   and  in  it  a  Saint  called  Ho  pahme,  which  means  saint  of  splendour  and  infinite   light.

This  saint  has  many  disciples  who  are  all  Chang-chub,"  which  means,  he  adds  in  a  footnote,  "  the  Spirits  of  those  who,  on  account  of  their  perfection,  do  not  care  to  become  saints,  and  train   and    instruct  the   bodies   of  the   reborn    llmas  ...  so  that  they  may  help  the  living.

..."  Which   means  that  the  presumably  "dead"  Yang-Chhub  (not  "  Chang-chub  ")  are  simply  living  Bodhisattvas,    some   of  those   known   as   Bhante   ("  the   Brothers").     As  to  the  mountain  160,000  leagues  high,"  the  Commentary  which  gives  the  key  to  such  statements  explains  that  according  to  the  code  used  by  the  writers,  "to  the  west  of  the  '  Snowy  Mountain  '  160  leagues  [the  cyphers  being

390  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

They  stand  in  relation  to  them  as  the  Chaldeo-Jewish  Kabalah  stands  to  the  Mosaic  Books.

In  the  work  known  as  the  Avatumsaka  Sutra,  in  section  :  "  The  Supreme  Atman  [Soul]  as  manifested  in  the  character  of  the  Arhats  and  Pratyeka  Buddhas,"  it  is  stated  that :

Because  from  the  beginning  all  sentient  creatures  have  confused  the  truth  and  embraced  the  false,  therefore  there  came  into  existence  a  hidden  knowledge  called  Alaya  Vijnan.

"  Who  is  in  possession  of  the  true  knowledge  ?  "  is  asked.

"  The  great  Teachers  of  the  Snowy  Mountain,"  is  the  response.

These  "  great  Teachers  "  have  been  known  to  live  in  the  "  Snowy  Range  "  of  the  Himalayas  for  countless  ages.

To  deny  in  the  face  of  millions  of  Hindus  the  existence  of  their  great  Gurus,  living  in  the  Ashrams  scattered  all  over  the  Trans-  or  the  Gs-Himalayan  slopes  is  to  make  oneself  ridiculous  in  their  eyes.

When  the  Buddhist  Saviour  appeared  in  India,  their  Ashrams —  for  it  is  rarely  that  these  great  Men  are  found  in  Lamaseries,  unless  on  a  short  visit — were  on  the  spots  they  now  occupy,  and  that  even  before  the  Brahmans  themselves  came  from  Central  Asia  to  settle  on  the  Indus.

And  before  that  more  than  one  Aryan  Dvija  of  fame  and  historical  renown  had  sat  at  their  feet,  learning  that  which  culminated  later  on  in  one  or  another  of  the  great  philosophical  schools.

Most  of  these  Himalayan  Bhante  were  Aryan  Brahmans  and  ascetics.

No  student,  unless  very  advanced,  would  be  benefited  by  the  perusal  of  those  exoteric  volumes.1  They  must  be  read  with  a  key  to  their  meaning,  and  that  key  can  only  be  found  in  the  Commentaries.

Moreover  there  are  some  comparatively  modern  works  that  are  positively  injurious  so  far  as  a  fair  comprehension  of  even  exoteric  Buddhism  is  concerned.

Such  are  the  Buddhist  Cosmos,  by  Bonze  Jin-ch'on  of  Pekin  ;  the  Sfi/ng-Tau-k/  (or  Trie  Records  of  the  Enlightenment  of  Tathagata),  by  Wang  Puk — seventh  century ;  Hisai  Sutra  (or  Book  of  Creation),  and  some  others.

a  blind]  from  a  certain  spot  and  by  a  direct  road,  is  the  Bhante  Yul  [the  country  or  '  Seat  of  the  Brothers  '],  the  residence  of  Maha-Chohan  .  ."  etc  This  is  the  real  meaning.

The  "  Ho  pahme  "  of  Delia  Penna  is— the  Maha-Chohan,  the  Chief.

1  In   some   MSS.

notes   before  us,  written  by  Gelung  (priest)  Thango-pa  Chhe-go-mo,  it  is  said  "  The  few  Roman  Catholic  missionaries  who  have  visited  our  land  (under  protest)  in  the  last  century  and    have    repaid    our    hospitality    by  turning  our  sacred  literature  into  ridicule,  have  shown  little  dis-  cretion   and    still    less    knowledge.

It   is   true   that   the   Sacred  Canon  of  the  Tibetans,  the  Kah-gyur

[Kanjur]  and  Bstan-hgyur  [Tanjur],  comprises  1707  distinct  works— 1083  public  and  624  secret  volumes,  the  former  being  composed  of  350  and  the  latter  of  77  volumes  folio.

May  we  humbly  invite  the  good  missionaries,  however,  to  tell  us  when  they  ever  succeeded  in  getting  a  glimpse  of  the  last-named  secret  folios  ?  Had  they  even  by  chance  seen  them  I  can  assure  the  Western  Pandits  that  these  manuscripts  and  folios  could  never  be  understood  even  by  a  born  Tibetan  without  a  key  (a)  to  their  peculiar  characters,  and  (b)  to  their  hidden  meaning.

In  our  system  every  description  of  locality  is  figurative,  every  name  and  word  purposely  veiled  .  and  one  has  first  to  study  the  mode  of  decipher-  ing and  then  to  learn  the  equivalent  secret  terms  and  symbols  for  nearly  every  word  of  the  religious  language.

The  Egyptian  enchorial  or  hieratic  system  is  child's  play  to  our  sacerdotal  puzzles."

SECTION

AMITA  BUDDHA  KWAN-SHAI-YIN,  AND  KWANYIN.— WHAT

THE  -BOOK  OF  DZYAN  "  AND  THE  LAMASERIES

OF  TSONG-KHA-PA  SAY

AS  a  supplement  to  the  Commentaries  there  are  many  secret  folios  on  the  lives  of  the  Buddhas  and  Bodhisattvas,  and  among  these  there  is  one  on  Prince  Gautama  and  another  on  His  reincarnation  in  Tsong-Kha-pa.  This  great  Tibetan  Reformer  of  the  fourteenth  century,  said  to  be  a  direct  incarna-  tion of  Amita  Buddha,  is  the  founder  of  the  secret  School  near  Tji-gad-je,  [Shigatze]  attached  to  the  private  retreat  of  the  Teshu  Lama.

It  is  with  Him  that  began  the  regular  system  of  Lamaistic  incarnations  of  Buddhas  (Sang-  gyas),  or  of  Shakya-Thub-pa  (Shakyamuni).  Amida  or  Amita  Buddha  is  called  by  the  author  of  Chinese  Buddhism,  a  mythical  being.

He  speaks  of

Amida  Buddha  (A-mi-to  Fo)  a  fabulous  personage,  worshipped  assiduously — like  Kwan-ym — by  the   Northern   Buddhists,   but   unknown   in    Siam,  Burmah,  and  Ceylon  l

Very  likely.

Yet  Amida  Buddha  is  not  a  "fabulous"  personage,  since  (a)  "Amida"  is  the  Senzar  form  of  "Adi";  "Adi-Buddhi"  and  "  Adi-  Buddha," 2  as  already  shown,  existed  ages  ago  as  a  Sanskrit  term  for  "Primeval  Soul"  and  "Wisdom",  and  (fa)  the  name  was  applied  to  Gautama  Shakyamuni,  the  last  Buddha  in  India,  from  the  seventh  century,  when  Buddhism  was  introduced  into  Tibet.

"Amitabha"  (in  Chinese,  "  Wu-  liang-sheu  ")  means  literally  "  Boundless  Age,"  a  synonym  of  "En,"  or  "  Ain-  Soph,"  the  "Ancient  of  Days,"  and  is  an  epithet  that  connects  Him  directly  with  the  Boundless  Adi-Buddhi  (primeval  and  Universal  Soul)  of  the  Hindus,  as  well  as  with  the  Anima  Mundi  of  all  the  ancient  nations  of  Europe  and  the  Boundless  and  Infinite  of  the  Kabalists.

If  Amitabha  be  a  fiction  of  the  Tibet-  ans, or  a  new  form  of  Wu-liang-sheu,  "a  fabulous  personage,"  as  the

1  See  Edkms'  Chinese  Buddhism,  p

*  "  Buddhi  "    is   a   Sanskrit  term  for   "discrimination"  or    intellect   (the  sixth  principle),  and  "  Budha  "  is  "  wise,"  "wisdom,"  and  also  the  planet  Mercury

392  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

author-compiler  of  Chinese  Buddhism  tells  his  readers,  then  the  "fable"  must  be  a  very  ancient  one.

For  on  another  page  he  says  himself  that  the  addition  to  the  canon  of  the  books  containing  the

legends   of  Kwan-ym   and   of  the  Western   heaven  with  its  Buddha,  Amitabha^  was  also  previous  to  the  Council  of  Kashmere,  a  little  before  the  beginning  of  our  era,

and  he  places

the   origin    of  the  primitive  Buddhist  books  which  are  common  to  the  Northern  and  Southern  Buddhists  before  246  B.C

Since  Tibetans  accepted  Buddhism  only  in  the  seventh  century  A.D.,  how  comes  it  that  they  are  charged  with  inventing  Amita- Buddha  ?  Besides  which,  in  Tibet,  Amitabha  is  called  Od-pag-med,  which  shows  that  it  is  not  the  name  but  the  abstract  idea  that  was  first  accepted  of  an  unknown,  invisible,  and  Impersonal  Power — taken,  moreover,  from  the  Hindu  "  Adi-Buddhi,"  and  not  from  the  Chinese  "Amitabha."2  There  is  a  great  difference  between  the  popular  Od-pag-med  (Amitabha)  who  sits  enthroned  in  Devachan  (Sukhavat?),  according  to  the  Man/  Kafi-'faum  Scriptures — the  oldest  historical  work  in  Tibet —  and  the  philosophical  abstraction  called  Amida  Buddha,  the  name  being  passed  now  to  the  earthly  Buddha,  Gautama.

1  This  curious  contradiction  may  be  found  in  Chinese  Buddhism,  pp  171,273.  The  reverend  author  assures  his  readers  that  "to  the  philosophic  Buddhists  .  .  .  Amitabha,  (Yo-sh!  Fo),  and  the  others  are  nothing  but  the  signs  of  ideas"  (p.  236).  Very  true.

But  so  should  be  all  other  deific  names,  such  as  Jehovah,  Allah,  etc.,  and  if  they  are  not  simply  "  signs  of  ideas  "  this  would  only  show  that  minds  that  receive  them  otherwise  are  not  "  philosophic  "  ,  it  would  not  at  all  afford  serious  proof  that  there  are  personal,  living  Gods  of  these  names  in  reality.

8  The  Chinese  Amitabha  (Wu-liang-sheu)  and  the  Tibetan  Amitabha  (Od-pag-med)  have  now  be-  come personal  Gods,  ruling  over  and  living  in  the  celestial  region  of  SukhSvati,  or  Tushita  (Tibetan  Devachan);    while   Adi-Buddhi,    of  the   philosophic   Hindu,    and   Amita    Buddha   of  the  philosophic  Chinaman  and  Tibetan,  are  names  for  universal,  primeval  ideas.

SECTION

TSONG-KHA-PA.— LOHANS  IN  CHINA

IN  an  article,  "  Reincarnations  in  Tibet/'  everything  that  could  be  said  about  Tsong-Kha-pa  was  published.1  It  was  stated  that  this  reformer  was  not,  as  is  alleged  by  Pars?  scholars,  an  incarnation  of  one  of  the  celestial  Dhyanis,  or  the  five  heavenly  Buddhas,  said  to  have  been  created  by  Shakyamuni  after  he  had  risen  to  Nirvana,  but  that  he  was  an  incarnation  of  Amita  Buddha  Himself.

The  records  preserved  in  the  Gon-pa,  the  chief  Lamasery  of  Tda-shi-Hlumpo,  [Tashi-hlunpo]  show  that  Sang-gyas  left  the  regions  of  the  "  Western  Paradise  "  to  incarnate  Himself  in  Tsong-Kha-pa,  in  consequence  of  the  great  degradation  into  which  His  secret  doctrines  had  fallen.

Whenever  made  too  public,  the  Good  Law  of  Cheu  [magical  powers]  fell  in-  variably into  sorcery  or  "  black  magic  "  The  Dvijas,  the  Hoshang  [Chinese  monks]  and  the  Lamas  could  alone  be  entrusted  safely  with  the  formulae

Until  the  Tsong-Kha-pa  period  there  had  been  no  Sang-gyas  (Buddha)  incarnations  in  Tibet.

Tsong-Kha-pa  gave  the  signs  whereby  the  presence  of  one  of  the  twenty-five  Bodhisattvas 2  or  of  the  Celestial  Buddhas  (Dhyan  Chohans)  in  a  human  body  might  be  recognized,  and  He  strictly  forbade  necromancy.

This  led  to  a  split  amongst  the  Lamas,  and  the  malcontents  allied  themselves  with  the  aboriginal  Bbns  against  the  reformed  Lamaism.

Even  now  they  form  a  powerful  sect,  practising  the  most  disgusting  rites  all  over  Sikkhim,  Bhutan,  Nepal,  and  even  on  the  borderlands  of  Tibet.

It  was  worse  then.

With  the  permission  of  the  Tda-shu  or  Teshu  Lama,}  some  hundred  Lohans  (Arhats),  to

1  See  The  Theosophist,  March,  1882.  p

3  The  intimate  relation  of  the  twenty-five  Buddhas  (Bodhisattvas)  with  the  twenty-five  Tattvas  (the  Conditioned  or  Limited)  of  the  Hindus  is  interesting.

;l  It  is  curious  to  note  the  great  importance  given  by  European  Orientalists  to  the  Dalai  Lamas  of  Lhassa,  and  their  utter  ignorance  as  to  the  Tda-shu  (or  Teshu)  Lamas,  while  it  is  the  latter  who  began  the  hierarchical  series  of  Buddha-incarnations,  and  are  de  facto  the  "  popes  "  in  Tibet ,  the  Dalai  LAmas  are  the  creations  of  Nabang-lob-Sang,  the  Tda-shu  Lama,  who  was  Himself  the  sixth  incarnation  of  Amita,  through  Tseng  Kha-pa,  though  very  few  seem  to  be  aware  of  that  fact

394  THE    SECRET  DOCTRINE

avert  strife,  went  to  settle  in  China  in  the  famous  monastery  near  Tien-t'-ai,  where  they  soon  became  subjects  for  legendary  lore,  and  continue  to  be  so  to  this  day.

They  had  been  already  preceded  by  other  Lohans,  [arhan,  arhat]

the  world-famous  disciples  of  Tathagata,  called  the  "  sweet-voiced  "  on  account  of  their  ability  to  chant  the  Mantras  with  magical  effect  !

The  first  ones  came  from  Kashmir  in  the  year  3,000  of  Kali  Yuga  (about  a  century  before  the  Christian  era),2  while  the  last  ones  arrived  at  the  end  of  the  fourteenth  century,  1,500  years  later ;  and,  finding  no  room  for  themselves  at  the  lamasery  of  Yihigching,  they  built  for  their  own  use  the  largest  monas-  tery of  all  on  the  sacred  island  of  P'u-to  (Buddha,  or  Put,  in  Chinese),  in  the  province  of  Chusan.

There  the  Good  Law,  the  "  Doctrine  of  the  Heart,"  flourished  for  several  centuries.

But  when  the  island  was  desecrated  by  a

mass  of  Western  foreigners,  the  chief  Lohans  left  for  the  mountains  of •.

In  the  Pagoda  of  Pi-yun-si,  near  Pekin,  one  can  still  see  the  "  hall  of  the  Five-  hundred  Lohans."  There  the  statues  of  the  first-comers  are  arranged  below,  while  one  solitary  Lohan  is  placed  quite  under  the  roof  of  the  building,  which  seem  to  have  been  built  in  commemoration  of  their  visit/

The  works  of  the  Orientalists  are  full  of  the  direct  landmarks  of  Arhats  (Adepts),  possessed  of  thaumaturgic  powers,  but  these  are  spoken  of — when-  ever the  subject  cannot  be  avoided — with  unconcealed  scorn.

Whether  innocently  ignorant  of,  or  purposely  ignoring,  the  importance  of  the  Occult  element  and  symbology  in  the  various  Religions  they  undertake  to  explain,  short  work  is  generally  made  of  such  passages,  and  they  are  left  untranslated.

In  simple  justice,  however,  it  should  be  allowed  that  much  as  all  such  miracles  may  have  been  exaggerated  by  popular  reverence  and  fancy,  they  are  neither  less  credible  nor  less  attested  in  "  heathen  "  annals  than  are  those  of  the

1  The  chanting  of  a  Mantra  is  not  a  prayer,  but  rather  a  magical  sentence  in  which  the  law  of  Occult  causation  connects  itself  with,  and  depends  on,  the  will  and  acts  of  its  singer.

It  is  a  succes-  sion of  Sanskrit  sounds,  and  when  its  string  of  words  and  sentences  is  pronounced  according  to  the  magical  formulae  in  the  Atharva  Veda,  but  understood  by  the  few,  some  Mantras  produce  an  instan-  taneous and  very  wonderful  effect  In  its  esoteric  sense  it  contains  the  Vach  (the  "  mystic  speech  "),  which  resides  in  the  Mantra,  or  rather  in  its  sounds,  since  it  is  according  to  the  vibrations,  one  way  or  the  other,  of  ether  that  the  effect  is  produced  The  "sweet  singers "  were  called  by  that  name  because  they  were  experts  in  Mantras  Hence  the  legend  in  China  that  the  singing  and  melody  of  the  Lohans  are  heard  at  dawn  by  the  priests  from  their  cells  in  the  monastery  of  Fang-Kwang.

(See  Biography  of  Chi-K'ai  in  T'ien-t'ai-han-chi.)  [See  Chinese  Buddhism,  p.  177  ]

a  The  celebrated  Lohan,  Midhyantika,  who  converted  the  king  and  whole  country  of  Kashmir  to  Buddhism,  sent  a  body  of  Lohans  to  preach  the  Good  Law.

He  was  the  sculptor  who  raised  to  Buddha  the  famous  statue  one  hundred  feet  high,  which  Hiuen-Tsang  saw  at  Dardu,  to  the  north  of  the  Punjab.

As  the  same  Chinese  traveller  mentions  a  temple  ten  h  from  Peshawar — 350  feet  round  and  850  feet  high— which  was  at  his  time  (A.D.  550)  already  850  years  old,  Koeppen  thinks  that  so  far  back  as  292  B.C.  Buddhism  was  the  prevalent  religion  in  the  Punjab.

3  See  Chinese  Buddhism,  p.  254,  and  generally  on  Buddhism  in  China.

TSONG-KHA-PA.— LOHANS  IN  CHINA

numerous  Christian  Saints  in  the  church  chronicles.

Both  have  an  equal  right  to  a  place  in  their  respective  histories.

If,  after  the  beginning  of  persecution  against  Buddhism,  the  Arhats  were  no  more  heard  of  in  India,  it  was  because,  their  vows  prohibiting  retaliation,  they  had  to  leave  the  country  and  seek  solitude  and  security  in  China,  Tibet  Japan,  and  elsewhere.

The  sacerdotal  powers  of  the  Brahmanas  being  at  that  time  unlimited,  the  Simons  and  Appolloniuses  of  Buddhism  had  as  much  chance  of  recognition  and  appreciation  by  the  Brahmanical  Irenaeuses  and  Tertullians  as  had  their  successors  in  the  Judean  and  Roman  worlds.

It  was  a  historical  rehearsal  of  the  dramas  that  were  enacted  centuries  later  in  Christendom.

As  in  the  case  of  the  so-called  "  Heresiarchs  "  of  Christianity,  it  was  not  for  rejecting  the  Vedas  or  the  sacred  Syllable  that  the  Buddhist  Arhats  were  persecuted,  but  for  understanding  too  well  the  secret  meaning  of  both.

It  was  simply  because  their  knowledge  was  regarded  as  dangerous  and  their  presence  in  India  unwelcome,  that  they  had  to  emigrate.

Nor  were  there  a  smaller  number  of  Initiates  among  the  Brahmans  themselves.

Even  to-day  one  meets  most  wonderfully-gifted  Saddhus  and  Yogis,  obliged  to  keep  themselves  unnoticed  and  in  the  shadow,  not  only  owing  to  the  absolute  secrecy  imposed  upon  them  at  their  Initiation,  but  also  for  fear  of  the  Anglo-Indian  tribunals  and  courts  of  law,  wherein  judges  are  determined  to  regard  as  charlatanry,  imposition,  and  fraud,  the  exhibition  of,  or  claim  to,  any  abnormal  powers,  and  one  may  judge  of  the  past  by  the  present.

Centuries  after  our  era  the  Initiates  of  the  inner  temples  and  the  Mathams  (monastic  communities)  chose  a  superior  council,  presided  over  by  an  all-powerful  Brahm-Atma,  the  Supreme  Chief  of  all  those  Mahatmas.

This  pontificate  could  be  exercised  only  by  a  Brahman  who  had  reached  a  certain  age,  and  he  it  was  who  was  the  sole  guardian  of  the  mystic  formula,  and  he  was  rthe  Hierophant  who  create^!  great  Adepts.

He  alone  could  explain  the  meaning  of  the  sacred  word,  AUM,  and  of  all  the  religious  symbols  and  rites.

And  whosoever  among  those  Initiates  of  the  Supreme  Degree  revealed  to  a  profane  a  single  one  of  the  truths,  even  the  smallest  of  the  secrets  entrusted  to  him,  had  to  die  :  and  he  who  received  the  confidence  was  put  to  death.

But  there  existed,  and  still  exists  to  this  day,  a  Word  far  surpassing  the  mysterious  monosyllable,  and  which  renders  him  who  comes  into  possession  of  its  key  nearly  the  equal  of  Brahman.

The  Brahmatmas  alone  possess  this  key,  and  we  know  that  to  this  day  there  are  two  great  Initiates  in  Southern  India  who  possess  it.  It  can  be  passed  only  at  death,  for  it  is  the  "  Lost  Word."  No  torture,  no  human  power,  could  force  its  disclosure  by  a  Brah-  man who  knows  it ;  and  it  is  well  guarded  irt  Tibet.

396  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Yet  this  secrecy  and  this  profound  mystery  are  indeed  dishearten-  ing, since  they  alone — the  Initiates  of  India  and  Tibet — could  thorough-  ly dissipate  the  thick  mists  hanging  over  the  history  of  Occultism,  and  force  its  claims  to  be  recognized.

The  Delphic  injunction,  "  Know  thyself,"  seems  for  the  few  in  this  age.

But  the  fault  ought  not  to  be  laid  at  the  door  of  the  Adepts,  who  have  done  all  that  could  be  done,  and  have  gone  as  far  as  Their  rules  permitted,  to  open  the  eyes  of  the  world.

Only  while  the  European  shrinks  from  public  obloquy  and  the  ridicule  unsparingly  thrown  on*  Occultists,  the  Asiatic  is  being  discouraged  by  his  own  Pandits.

These  profess  to  labour  under  the  gloomy  impression  that  no  Bija  Vidya,  no  Arhatship  (Adeptship),  is  possible  during  the  Kali  Yuga  (the  "  Black  Age  ")  we  are  now  passing  through.

Even  the  Buddhists  are  taught  that  the  Lord  Buddha  is  alleged  to  have  prophesied  that  the  power  would  die  out  in  "  one  millennium  after  His  death."  But  this  is  an  entire  mistake.

In  the  Digha  Nikaya  the  Buddha  says :

Hear,   Subhadra ;  The  world  will  never  be  without  Rahats,  if  the  ascetics  in  my  congregations  well  and  truly  keep  my  precepts.

A  similar  contradiction  of  the  view  brought  forward  by  the  Brahmans  is  made  by  Krishna  in  the  Bhagavad  G/ta,  and  there  is  further  the  actual  appear-  ance of  many  Saddhus  and  miracle-workers  in  the  past,  and  even  in  the  present  age.

The  same  holds  good  for  China  and  Tibet.

Among  the  command-  ments of  Tsong-Kha-pa  there  is  one  that  enjoins  the  Rahats  (Arhats)  to  make  an  attempt  to  enlighten  the  world,  including  the  "  white  barbarians,"  every  century,  at  a  certain  specified  period  of  the  cycle.

Up  to  the  present  day  none  of  these  attempts  has  been  very  successful.

Failure  has  followed  failure.

Have  we  to  explain  the  fact  by  the  light  of  a  certain  prophecy  ?  It  is  said  that  up  to  the  time  when  Pban-chhen-rin-po-chhe  (the  Great  Jewel  of  Wisdom) '  condescends  to  be  reborn  in  the  land  of  tl\e  P'helings  (Westerners),  and  ap-  pearing as  the  Spiritual  Conqueror  (Chom-den-da),  destroys  the  errors  and  ignorance  of  the  ages,  it  will  be  of  little  use  to  try  to  uproot  the  misconceptions  of  P'heling-pa  (Europe)  :  her  sons  will  listen  to  no  one.

Another  prophecy  declares  that  the  SECRET  DOCTRINE  shall  remain  in  all  its  purity  in  Bhod-yul  (Tibet),  only  to  the  day  that  it  is  kept  free  from  foreign  invasion.

The  very  visits  of  Western  natives,  however  friendly,  would  be  baneful  to  the  Tibetar*  populations.

This  is  the  true  key  to  Tibetan  exclusiveness.

1  Or,  Pan-ch'en  Rin-po-ch'e.     A  title  of  the  Tda-shu-Hlum-po  Lama.

[Tashi-hlunpo]

SECTION

A  FEW  MORE  MISCONCEPTIONS  CORRECTED

NOTWITHSTANDING  widespread  misconceptions  and  errors — often  most  amusing  to  one  who  has  a  certain  knowledge  of  the  true  doctrines — about  Buddhism  generally,  and  especially  about  Buddhism  in  Tibet,  all  the  Oriental-  ists agree  that  the  Buddha's  foremost  aim  was  to  lead  human  beings  to  salvation  by  teaching  them  to  practise  the  greatest  purity  and  virtue,  and  by  detaching  them  from  the  service  of  this  illusionary  world,  and  the  love  of  one's  still  more  illusionary — because  so  evanescent  and  unreal — body  and  physical  self.

And  what  is  the  good  of  a  virtuous  life,  full  of  privations  and  suffering,  if  the  only  result  of  it  is  to  be  annihilation  at  the  end?  If  even  the  attainment  of  that  supreme  perfection  which  leads  the  Initiate  to  remember  the  whole  series  of  his  past  lives,  and  to  foresee  that  of  the  future  ones,  by  the  full  development  of  that  inner,  divine  eye  in  him,  and  to  acquire  the  knowledge  that  unfolds  the  causes  *  of  the  ever-recurring  cycles  of  existence,  brings  him  finally  to  non-being,  and  nothing  more — then  the  whole  system  is  idiotic,  and  Epicureanism  is  far  more  philosophical  than  such  Buddhism.

He  who  is  unable  to  comprehend  the  subtle,  and  yet  so  potent,  difference  between  existence  in  a  material  or  physical  state  and  a  purely  spiritual  exist-  ence— Spirit  or  "  Soul-life  " — will  never  appreciate  at  their  full  value  the  grand  teachings  of  the  Buddha,  even  in  their  exoteric  form.

Individual  or  personal  existence  is  the  cause  of  pains  and  sorrows ;  collective  and  impersonal  life-eternal  is  full  of  divine  bliss  and  joy  for  ever,  with  neither  causes  nor  effects  to  darken  its  light.

And  the  hope  for  such  a  life-eternal  is  the  keynote  of  the  whole  of  Buddhism.

If  we  are  told  that  impersonal  existence  is  no  existence  at  all,  but  amounts  to  annihilation,  as  was  maintained  by  some  French  reincarnationists,  then  we  would  ask  :  What  difference  can  it  make  in  the  spiritual  perceptions  of  an  Ego,  whether  he  enter  Nirvana  loaded

1  The  twelve   Nidanas  called  in  Tibetan  Tm-brel  Chug-nyi,  which  are  based   upon  the  M  Four  Truths."

398  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

with  the  recollections  only  of  his  own  personal  lives — tens  of  thousands  according  to  the  modern  reincarnation ists — or  whether,  merged  entirely  irv  the  parabrahmic  state  it  becomes  one  with  the  All,  with  the  absolute  know-  ledge and  the  absolute  feeling  of  representing  collective  humanities  ?  Once  that  an  Ego  lives  only  ten  distinct  individual  lives  he  must  necessarily  lose  his  one  self,  and  become  mixed  up — merged,  so  to  say — with  these  ten  selves.

It  really  seems  that  so  long  as  this  great  mystery  remains  a  dead-letter  to  the  world  of  Western  thinkers,  and  especially  to  the  Orientalists,  the  less  the  latter  undertake  to  explain  it  the  better  for  Truth.

Of  all  the  existing  religious  Philosophies,  Buddhism  is  the  least  under-  stood.

The  Lassens,  Webers,  Wassiliefs,  the  Burnoufs  and  Juliens,  and  even,  such  "  eye-witnesses  "  of  Tibetan  Buddhism  as  Csoma  de  Koros  and  the  Schlagintweits,  have  hitherto  only  added  perplexity  to  confusion.

None  of  these  has  ever  received  his  information  from  a  genuine  Gelugpa  source  :  all  have  judged  Buddhism  from  the  bits  of  knowledge  picked  up  at  Tibetan  frontier  lamaseries,  in  countries  thickly  populated  by  Bhutanese  and  Lepchas,  Bons,  and  red-capped  Dugpas,  along  the  line  of  the  Himalayas.

Hundreds  of  volumes  purchased  from  Burats,  Shamans,  and  Chinese  Buddhists,  have  been  read  and  translated,  glossed  and  misinterpreted  according  to  invariable  custom.

Esoteric  Schools  would  cease  to  be  worthy  of  their  name  were  their  literature  and  doctrines  to  become  the  property  of  even  their  profane  co-religionists —  still  less  of  the  Western  public.

This  is  simple  common-sense  and  logic.

Nevertheless  this  is  a  fact  which  our  Orientalists  have  ever  refused  to  recog-  nize :  hence  they  have  gone  on,  gravely  discussing  the  relative  merits  and  absurdities  of  idols,  "  soothsaying  tables,"  and  "  magical  figures  of  Phurbu  "  l  on  the  "  square  tortoise."  Nona  of  these  have  anything  to  do  with  the  real  philosophical  Buddhism  of  the  Gelugpa,  or  even  of  the  most  educated  among  the  Sakyapa  and  Kadampa  sects.

All  such  "  plates  "  and  sacrificial  tables,  Chinsreg  [burnt  offering],  magical  circles,  etc.,  were  avowedly  got  from  Sikkhim,  Bhutan,  and  Eastern  Tibet,  from  Bons  and  Dugpas.

Nevertheless,  these  are  given  as  characteristics  of  Tibetan  Buddhism  !  It  would  be  as  fair  to  judge  the  unread  Philosophy  of  Bishop  Berkeley  after  studying  Christianity  in  the  clown-worship  of  Neapolitan  lazzaroni,  dancing  a  mystic  jig  before  the  idol  of  St.  Pip,  or  carrying  the  ex-voto  in  wax  of  the  phallus  of  SS.  Cosmo  and  Domiano.

at  Tsernie.

It  is  quite  true  that  the  primitive  Shravakas  (listeners  or  hearers)  and  the  Shramanas  (the  "  thought-restrainers  "  and  the  "  pure  ")  have  degenerated,

1  [Phurbu,   or  P'urbu,   means  "  thunderbolt-dagger."      See  The  Buddhism  of  Tibet,  or  Lamaism  by  L  Austme  Waddell,  M.B.,  pp.  340-1.]

A  FEW  MORE  MISCONCEPTIONS  CORRECTED

and  that  many  Buddhist  sects  have  fallen  into  mere  dogmatism  and  ritualism.

Like  every  other  Esoteric,  half-suppressed  teaching,  the  words  of  the  Buddha  convey  a  double  meaning,  and  every  sect  has  gradually  come  to  claim  to  be  the  only  one  knowing  the  correct  meaning,  and  thus  to  assume  supremacy  over  the  rest.

Schism  has  crept  in,  and  has  fastened,  like  a  hideous  cancer,  on  the  fair  body  of  early  Buddhism.

Nagarjuna's  Mahayana  ("  Great  Vehicle  ")  School  was  opposed  by  the  Hinayana  (or  "  Little  Vehicle  ")  System,  and  even  the  Yogacharya  of  Aryasanga  became  disfigured  by  the  yearly  pilgrimage  from  India  to  the  shores  of  Mansarovara,  of  hosts  of  vagabonds  with  matted  locks  who  play  at  being  Yogis  and  Fakirs,  preferring  this  to  work.

An  affected  detestation  of  the  world,  and  the  tedious  and  useless  practice  of  the  counting  of  inhalations  and  exhalations  as  a  means  to  produce  absolute  tranquillity  of  mind  or  meditation,  have  brought  this  school  within  the  region  of  Hatha  Yoga,  and  have  made  it  heir  to  the  Brahmanical  Tirthikas.

And  though  its  Srotapatti,  its  Sakridagamin,  Anagamin,  and  Arhats,1  bear  the  same  names  in  almost  every  school,  yet  the  doctrines  of  each  differ  greatly,  and  none  of  these  is  likely  to  gain  real  Abhijnas  (the  supernatural  abnormal  five  powers)

One  of  the  chief  mistakes  of  the  Orientalists  when  judging  on  "  internal  (?)  evidence,"  as  they  express  it,  was  that  they  assumed  that  the  Pratyeka  Buddhas,  the  Bodhisattvas,  and  the  "  Perfect  "  Buddhas  were  a  later  develop-  ment of  Buddhism.

For  on  these  three  chief  degrees  are  based  the  seven  and,  twelve  degrees  of  the  Hierarchy  of  Adeptship.

The  first  are  those  who  have  attained  the  Bodhi  (wisdom)  of  the  Buddhas,  but  do  not  become  Teachers.2  The  human  Bodhisattvas  are  candidates,  so  to  say,  for  perfect  Buddhaship  (in  Kalpas  to  come),  and  with  the  option  of  using  their  powers  now  if  need  be.  "  Perfect  "  Buddhas  are  simply  "  perfect  "  Initiates.

All  these  are  men,  and  not  disem-  bodied Beings,  as  is  given  out  in  the  Hinayana  exoteric  books.

Their  correct  character  may  be  found  only  in  the  secret  volumes  of  Lugrub  or  Nagarjuna,  the  founder  of  the  Mahayana  system,  who  is  said  to  have  been  initiated  by  the  Nagas  (fabulous  "  Serpents,"  the  veiled  name  for  an  Initiate  or  Mahatma).  The  fabled  report  found  in  Chinese  records  that  Nagarjuna  considered  his

1  The  Srotapatti  is  one  who  has  attained  the  first  Path  of  comprehension  in  the  real  and  the  un-  real ,  the  Saknddgdmm  is  the  candidate  for  one  of  the  higher  Initiations     "  one  who  is  to  receive  birth  once  more  ;  "    the  AnSgSmin  is  he  who  has  attained  the  "  third  Path,"  or  literally,  "  he  who  will  not  be   reborn  again  "   unless  he  so  wishes  it.  having  the  option  of  being  reborn  in  any  of  the  "  worlds  of  the  Gods,"   or  of  remaining  in  Devachan,  or  of  choosing  an  earthly  body  with  a  philanthropic  object  An  Arhat  is  one  who  has  reached  the  highest  Path  ,  he  may  merge  into  Nirvana  at  will,  while  nere  on  earth

2  [The  Pratyeka  Buddha  stands  on  the  level  of  the  Buddha,  but  His  work  for  the  world  has  nothing  to  do  with  its  teaching,  and  His  office  has  always  been  surrounded  with  mystery      The  preposterous  view  that  He,  at  such  superhuman  height  of  power,  wisdom  and  love  could  be  selfish,  is  found  in  the  exoteric  books,   though  it  is  hard  to  see  how  it  can  have  arisen      H    P   B   charged  me  to  correct  the  mistake,  as  she  had,  in  a  careless  moment,  copied  such  a  statement  elsewhere  —A.  B  ]

400  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

doctrine  to  be  in  opposition  to  that  of  Gautama  Buddha,  until  he  discovered  from  the  Nagas  that  it  was  precisely  the  doctrine  that  had  been  secretly  taught  by  Shakyamuni  Himself,  is  an  allegory,  and  is  based  upon  the  reconcilia-  tion between  the  old  Brahmanical  secret  Schools  in  the  Himalayas  and  Gauta-  ma's Esoteric  teachings,  both  parties  having  at  first  objected  to  the  rival  schools  of  the  other.

The  former,  the  parent  of  all  others,  had  been  estab-  lished beyond  the  Himalayas  for  ages  before  the  appearance  of  Shakyamuni.

Gautama  was  a  pupil  of  this ;  and  it  was  with  them,  those  Indian  Sages,  that  He  had  learned  the  truths  of  the  Shunyata,  the  emptiness  and  impermanence  of  every  terrestrial,  evanescent  thing,  and  the  mysteries  of  Prajna  Paramita,  or  "  knowledge  across  the  River,"  which  finally  lands  the  "  Perfect  One  "  in  the  regions  of  the  One  Reality.

But  His  Arhats  were  not  Himself.

Some  of  them  were  ambitious,  and  they  modified  certain  teachings  after  the  great  councils,  and  it  is  on  account  of  these  "  heretics"  that  the  Mother-School  at  first  refused  to  allow  them  to  blend  their  schools,  when  persecution  began  driving  away  the  Esoteric  Brotherhood  from  India.

But  when  finally  most  of  them  submitted  to  the  guidance  and  control  of  the  chief  Ashramas,  then  the  Yogacharya  of  Aryasanga  was  merged  into  the  oldest  Lodge.

For  it  is  there  from  time  immemorial  that  has  lain  concealed  the  final  hope  and  light  of  the  world,  the  salvation  of  mankind.

Many  are  the  names  of  that  School  and  land,  the  name  of  the  latter  being  now  regarded  by  the  Orientalists  as  the  mythic  name  of  a  fabulous  country.

It  is  from  this  mysterious  land,  nevertheless,  that  the  Hindu  expects  his  Kalki  Avatara,  the  Buddhist  his  Maitreya,  the  Pars!  his  Soshios,  and  the  Jew  his  Messiah,  and  so  would  the  Christian  expect  thence  his  Christ  — if  he  only  knew  of  it.

There,  and  there  alone,  reigns  Paranishpanna  (Yong-Grub),  the  absolutely  perfect  comprehension  of  Being  and  Non-Being,  the  changeless  true  Existence  in  Spirit,  even  while  the  latter  is  seemingly  still  in  the  body,  every  inhabitant  thereof  being  a  Non-Ego  because  he  has  become  the  Perfect  Ego.

Their  voidness  is  "  self -existent  and  perfect" — if  there  were  profane  eyes  to  sense  and  perceive  it — because  it  has  become  absolute  ;  the  unreal  being  trans-  formed into  conditionless  Reality,  and  the  realities  of  this,  our  world,  having  vanished  in  their  own  nature  into  thin  (non -existing)  air.

The  "  absolute  Truth  "  (Dondam-pay-den-pa  ;  Sanskrit :  Paramarthasatya),  having  conquered  "  relative  truth  "  (Kunza-bchi-den-pa  ;  Sanskrit :  Samvritisatya),  the  inhabit-  ants of  the  mysterious  region  are  thus  supposed  to  have  reached  the  state  called  in  mystic  phraseology  Svasamvedana  ("  self-analyzing  reflection  ")  and  Paramartha,  or  that  absolute  consciousness  of  the  personal  merged  into  the  impersonal  Ego,  which  is  above  all,  hence  above  illusion  in  every  sense.

Its

A  FEW  MORE  MISCONCEPTIONS  CORRECTED

•"  Perfect  "  Buddhas  and  Bodhisattvas  may  be  on  every  nimble  Buddhist  tongue  as  celestial — therefore  unreachable  Beings,  while  these  names  may  suggest  and  say  nothing  to  the  dull  perceptions  of  the  European  profane.

What  matters  it  to  Those  who,  being  in  this  world,  yet  live  outside  and  far  beyond  our  illusive  earth  !  Above  Them  there  is  but  one  class  of  Nirvanis,  namely,  the  Chos-ku  (Dharmakaya),  or  the  Nirvanis  "  without  remains  " — the  pure  Arupa,  the  formless  Breaths.

Thence  emerge  occasionally  the  Bodhisattvas  in  their  Prul-pa-ku  (or  Nirmanakaya)  body  and,  assuming  an  ordinary  appearance,  they  teach  men.

There  are  conscious,  as  well  as  unconscious,  incarnations.

Most  of  the  doctrines  contained  in  the  Yogacharya,  or  Mahayana  systems  are  Esoteric,  like  the  rest.

One  day  the  profane  Hindu  and  Buddhist  may  begin  to  pick  the  B/6/e  to  pieces,  taking  it  literally.

Education  is  fast  spreading  in  Asia,  and  already  there  have  been  made  some  attempts  in  this  direction,  so  that  the  tables  may  then  be  cruelly  turned  on  the  Christians.

Whatever  conclusions  the  two  may  arrive  at,  they  will  never  be  half  as  absurd  and  unjust  as  some  of  the  theories  launched  by  Christians  against  their  respective  Philos-  ophies.

Thus,  according  to  Spence  Hardy,  at  death  the  Arhat  enters  Nirvana  :

That  is,  he  ceases  to  exist.

And,  agreeably  to  Major  Jacob,  the  Jivanmukta,  absorbed  into  Brahma,  enters  upon  an  unconscious  and  stonelike  existence.

Shankaracharya  is  shown  as  saying  in  his  prolegomena  to  the  Shvetash-  vatara  :

Gnosis,   once   arisen,  requires  nothing  farther  for  the  realization  of  its  result     it  needs  subsidia  only  that  it  may  arise

The  Theosophist,  it  has  been  argued,  as  long  as  he  lives,  may  do  good  .and  evil  as  he  chooses,  and  incur  no  stain,  such  is  the  efficacy  of  gnosis.

And  it  is  further  alleged  that  the  doctrine  of  Nirvana  lends  itself  to  immoral  inferences,  and  that  the  Quietists  of  all  ages  have  been  taxed  with  immorality.

1  It  is  an  erroneous  idea  which  makes  the  Orientalists  take  literally  the  teaching  of  the  Mahayana  School   about  the  three  different  kinds  of  bodies,  namely,  the  Prul-pa-ku,  the  Longehod-dzocpaig-ku,  [or  long-sku]  and  the  Chos-ku,    as  all  pertaining  to  the  Nirvanic  condition      There  are  two  kinds  of  Nirvana    the  earthly,  and  that  of  the  purely  disembodied  Spirits.

These  three  "  bodies  "  are  the  three  envelopes — all  more  or    less  physical — which   are   at  the  disposal  of  the  Adept  who  has  entered  and  crossed  the  six  Paramitas,   or  "  Paths  "  of  Buddha.

Once  He  enters  upon  the  seventh,  He  can  return  no  more  to  earth.

See  Csoma  de  Koros,  Jour.

As   Soc  ,  Beng  ,  vn,  142  ,  and  Schott,  Buddhtsmus,  p.  9,  \who  give  it  otherwise.

2  Vec/anta  Sara,  translated  by  Major  Jacob,  p    119  '/bid.,  p.  122.

FF

402  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

According  to  Wassilief  l  and  Csoma  de  KbYbs,2  the  Prasanga  School  adopted  a  peculiar  mode  of

Deducing  the  absurdity  and  erroneousness  of  every  esoteric  opinion.

[These  in]  correct  interpretations  of  Buddhist  Philosophy  are  crowned  by  that  gloss  on  a  thesis  from  the  Prasanga  School,  that

Even  an  Arhat  goes  to  hell  in  case  he  doubt  anything,

thus  making  of  the  most  free-thinking  religion  in  the  world  a  blind-faith  system.

The  "  threat  "  refers  simply  to  the  well-known  law  that  even  an  Initiate  may  fail,  and  thus  have  his  object  utterly  ruined,  if  he  doubt  for  one  moment  the  efficacy  of  his  psychic  powers — the  alphabet  of  Occultism,  as  every  Kabalist  well  knows.

The  Tibetan  sect  of  the  Ngo-vo-nyid-med  par  Mraba  ("  they  who  deny  existence,"  or  "  regard  nature  as  Maya  ")5  can  never  be  contrasted  for  one-  moment  with  some  of  the  nihilistic  or  materialistic  schools  of  India,  such  as  the  Charvaka.

They  are  pure  Vedantins — if  anything — in  their  views.

And  if  the  Yogacharyas  may  be  compared  with,  or  called  the  Tibetan  Vishishtadvaitis,  the  Prasanga  School  is  surely  the  Advaita  Philosophy  of  the  land.

It  was  divided  into  two  :  one  was  originally  founded  by  Bhavaviveka,  the  Svatantrika  Madhyamika  School,  and  the  other  by  Buddhapalita  ,  both  have  their  exoteric  and  esoteric  divisions.

It  is  necessary  to  belong  to  the  latter  to  know  any-  thing of  the  esoteric  doctrines  of  that  sect,  the  most  metaphysical  and  philo-  sophical of  all.

Chandraktrti  (Dava  Dagpa)  wrote  his  commentaries  on  the  Prasanga  doctrines  and  taught  publicly  ,  and  he  expressly  states  that  there  are  two  ways  of  entering  the  "  Path  "  to  Nirvana.

Any  virtuous  man  can  reach  by  Naljorngonsum  ("  meditation  by  self-perception  "),  the  intuitive  comprehension  of  the  four  Truths,  without  either  belonging  to  a  monastic  order  or  having  been  initiated.

In  this  case  it  was  considered  as  a  heresy  to  maintain  that  the  visions  which  may  arise  in  consequence  of  such  meditation,  or  Vishna  (internal  knowledge),  are  not  susceptible  of  errors  (Namtog  or  false  visions),  for  they  are.

Alaya  alone  having  an  absolute  and  eternal  existence  can  alone  have  absolute  knowledge  ;  and  even  the  Initiate,  in  his  Nirmanakaya  b

1  Der  Buddhismus,  pp  327.  357,  et  seq.,  quoted  by  Schlagmtweit  2  Buddhism  in  Jibet,  p

J  Jour  of  As.  Soc.,  Bengal,  vn,  p.  144,  quoted  as  above  4  Buddhism  in  Tibet,  p.  44.

•''  They  maintain  also  the  existence  of  One  Absolute  pure  Nature,  Parabrahman  ,  the  illusion  of

everything  outside  of  it ,  the  leading  of  the  individual  Soul — a  Ray  of  the  "  Universal  "—into  the  true

nature  of  existence  and  things  by  Yoga  alone.

"Nirmanakaya  (also  Nirvanakaya.

vulg,)  is  the  body  or  Self  "  with  remains,"  or  the  influence  of  terrestrial  attributes,  however  spiritualized,  clinging  yet  to  that  Self.

An  Initiate  in  Dharmakdya,  or  in  NirvSna  "without  remains,"  is  the  Jlvanmukta,  the  Perfect  Initiate,  who  separates  his  Higher  Self  entirely  from  his  body  during  Samadhi.

[It  will  be  noticed  that  these  two  words  are  here  used  in  a  sense  other  than  that  previously  given.— A. B.]  [Some  students  question  this,  see  ante  pp.  366,  400-1  .J

A  FEW  MORE  MISCONCEPTIONS  CORRECTED

body  may  commit  an  occasional  mistake  in  accepting  the  false  for  the  true  ir>  his  explorations  of  the  "  Causeless  "  World.

The  Dharmakaya  Bodhisattva  is  alone  infallible,  when  in  real  Samadhi.

Alaya,  or  Nying-po,  being  the  root  and  basis  of  all,  invisible  and  incomprehensible  to  human  eye  and  intellect,  it  can  reflect  only  its  reflection — not  Itself.

Thus  that  reflection  will  be  mirrored  like  the  moon  in  tranquil  and  clear  water  only  in  the  passionless  Dharmakaya  intellect,  and  will  be  distorted  by  the  flitting  image  of  everything  perceived  in  a  mind  that  is  itself  liable  to  be  disturbed.

In  short,  this  doctrine  is  that  of  the  Raja  Yoga  in  its  practice  of  the  two  kinds  of  the  Samadhi  state  ;  one  of  the  "  Paths  "  leading  to  the  sphere  of  bliss  (Sukhavat?  or  Devachan),  where  man  enjoys  perfect,  unalloyed  happiness,  but  is  yet  still  connected  with  personal  existence  ;  and  the  other  the  Path  that  leads  to  entire  emancipation  from  the  worlds  of  illusion,  self,  and  unreality.

The  first  one  is  open  to  all  and  is  reached  by  merit  simply  ;  the  second — a  hundredfold  more  rapid — is  reached  through  knowledge  (Initiation).  Thus  the  followers  of  the  Prasanga  School  are  nearer  to  Esoteric  Buddhism  than  are  the  Yogacharyas  ;  for  their  views  are  those  of  the  most  secret  Schools,  and  only  the  echo  of  these  doctrines  is  heard  in  the  Yamyangshapda  and  other  works  in  public  circulation  and  use.

For  instance,  the  unreality  of  two  out  of  the  three  divisions  of  times  is  given  in  public  works,  namely  (a)  that  there  is  neither  past  nor  future,  both  of  these  divisions  being  correlative  to  the  present ;  and  (b)  that  the  reality  of  things  can  never  be  sensed  or  perceived  except  by  him  who  has  obtained  the  Dharmakaya  body  ;  here  again  is  a  difficulty,  since  this  body  "  without  remains  "  carries  the  Initiate  to  full  Paranirvana,  if  we  accept  the  exoteric  explanation  verbally,  and  can  therefore  neither  sense  nor  perceive.

But  evidently  our  Orientalists  do  not  feel  the  caveat  in  such  incongruities,  and  they  proceed  to  speculate  without  pausing  to  reflect  over  it.  Literature  on  Mysticism  being  enormous,  and  Russia,  owing  to  the  free  intercourse  with  the  Burats,  Shamans,  and  Mongolians,  having  alone  purchased  whole  libraries  on  Tibet,  scholars  ought  to  know  better  by  this  time.

It  suffices  to  read,  however,  what  Csoma  wrote  on  the  origin  of  the  Kala  Chakra  System,  l  or  Wassilief  on  Buddhism,  to  make  one  give  up  every  hope  of  seeing  them  go  below  the  rind  of  the  "  forbidden  fruit."  When  Schlagintweit  is  found  saying  that  Tibetan  Mysticism  is  not  Yoga —

That  abstract  devotion  by  which  supernatural  powers  are  acquired,

1  The  "  Sacred  "  Books  of  Dus-Kyi  Khorlo  ("  Time  Circle  ")      See  Jour.

As,  Soc.,  ...  57      These  works  were  abandoned  to  the  Sikkhim  Dugpas,  from  the  time  of  Tsong-Kha-pa's  reform.

2  Glossary  of  Judicial  and  Revenue  Terms,  art.

"  Yoga,"  quoted  in  Buddhism  in  Tibet,  p.  47.

404  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

as  Yoga  is  defined  by  Wilson,  but  that  it  is  closely  related  to  Siberian  Shamanism,  and  is  "  almost  identical  with  the  Tantrika  ritual  "  ;  and  that  the  Tibetan  Zung  is  the  "  Dharanh,"  and  the  Gyut  only  the  Tantras — pre-  Christian  Tantra  being  judged  by  the  ritual  of  the  modern  Tantrikas — one  seems  almost  justified  in  suspecting  our  materialistic  Orientalists  of  acting  as  the  best  friends  and  allies  of  the  missionaries.

Whatever  is  not  known  to  our  geographers  seems  to  be  a  non-existent  locality.

Thus  :

Mysticism  is  reported  to  have  originated  in  the  fabulous  country,  Sambhala.

.  .  .  Csoma,  from  careful  investigations,  places  this  [fabulous  ?]  country  beyond  the  Sir  Daria  [Yaxartes]  between  45°  and  50°  north  latitude.

It  was  first  known  in  India  in  the  year  965  A.D  ,  and  was  introduced  .  into  Tibet  from  India,  via  Kashmir,  in  the  year  1025  AD.

"  It  "  meaning  the  "  Dus-kyi  Khorlo,"  or  Tibetan  Mysticism.

A  system  as  old  as  man,  known  in  India  and  practised  before  Europe  had  become  a  continent,  "was  first  known,"  we  are  told,  only  nine  or  ten  centuries  ago  !  The  text  of  its  books  in  its  present  form  may  have  "  originated  "  even  later,  for  there  are  numerous  such  texts  that  have  been  tampered  with  by  sects  to  suit  the  fancies  of  each.

But  who  has  read  the  original  book  on  Dus-Kyi  Khorlo,  re-written  by  Tsong-Kha-pa,  with  his  Commentaries?  Considering  that  this  grand  Reformer  burnt  every  book  on  Sorcery  on  which  he  could  lay  his  hands  in  1387,  and  that  he  has  left  a  whole  library  of  his  own  works — not  a  tenth  part  of  which  has  ever  been  made  known — such  statements  as  those  above-quoted  are,  to  say  the  least,  premature.

The  idea  is  also  cherished —  from  a  happy  hypothesis  offered  by  Abbe  Hue — that  Tsong-Kha-pa  derived  his  wisdom  and  acquired  his  extraordinary  powers  from  his  intercourse  with  a  stranger  from  the  West,  "  remarkable  for  a  long  nose."  This  stranger  is  believed  by  the  good  Abbe  "  to  have  been  a  European  missionary  "  ;  hence  the  remarkable  resemblance  of  the  religious  ritual  in  Tibet  to  the  Roman  Catholic  service.

The  sanguine  "  Lama  of  Jehovah  "  does  not  say,  however,  who  were  the  five  foreigners  who  appeared  in  Tibet  in  the  year  371  of  our  era,  to  disappear  as  suddenly  and  mysteriously  as  they  came,  after  leaving  with  King  Thothori-Nyang-tsan  instructions  how  to  use  certain  things  in  a  casket  that  "  had  fallen  from  heaven  "  in  his  presence  precisely  forty  years  before,  or  in  the  year  A.D

There  is  generally  a  hopeless  confusion  about  Eastern  dates  among  European  scholars,  but  nowhere  is  this  so  great  as  in  the  case  of  Tibetan

1  Buddhism  in  ftbet,  pp   47,

2  Buddhism  m   Tibet,  pp.  63,  64.     The  objects  found  in  the  casket,  as  enumerated  in  the  exoteric  legend,  are  of  course  symbolical,     They  may  be  found  mentioned  in  the  Kan/ur      They  were  said  to  be:   (1)  two  hands  joined,   (2)  a  miniature  Choten  (Stupa,  or  reliquary) ,  (3)  a  talisman  with  "  Om  mam  padme  hum  "  inscribed  on  it ,  (4)  a  religious  book,  Zamatog  ("  a  constructed  vehicle  ").

A  FEW  MORE  MISCONCEPTIONS  CORRECTED

Buddhism.

Thus,  while  some,  correctly  enough,  accept  the  seventh  century  as  the  date  of  the  introduction  of  Buddhism,  there  are  others — such  as  Lassen  and  Koeppen,  for  instance — who  show  on  good  authority,  the  one,  the  construction  of  a  Buddhist  monastery  on  the  slopes  of  the  Kailas  Range  so  far  back  as  the  year  137  B.C.,1  and  the  other,  Buddhism  established  in  and  north  of  the  Punjab,  as  early  as  the  year  292  B  C.  The  difference  though  trifling —  only  just  one  thousand  years — is  nevertheless  puzzling.

But  even  this  is  easily  explained  on  Esoteric  grounds.

Buddhism — the  veiled  Esotericism  of  Buddha  — was  established  and  took  root  in  the  seventh  century  of  the  Christian  era  ;  while  true  Esoteric  Buddhism,  or  the  kernel,  the  very  spirit  of  Tathagata's  doctrines,  was  brought  to  the  place  of  its  birth,  the  cradle  of  humanity,  by  the  chosen  Arhats  of  Buddha,  who  were  sent  to  find  for  it  a  secure  refuge,  as

The  Sage  had  perceived  the  dangers  ever  since  he  had  entered  upon  Thonglam  ("  the  Path  of  seeing,"  or  clairvoyance)

Amidst  populations  deeply  steeped  in  Sorcery  the  attempt  proved  a  failure;  and  it  was  not  until  the  School  of  the  "Doctrine  of  the  Heart  "  had  merged  with  its  predecessor,  established  ages  earlier  on  the  slope  facing  Western  Tibet,  that  Buddhism  was  finally  engrafted,  with  its  two  distinct  Schools — the  Esoteric  and  the  exoteric  divisions — in  the  land  of  the  Bb'n-pa.

1  Ind  Alterthumskunde,  n,  1072.

SECTION

THE  ••  DOCTRINE  OF  THE  EYE  "  AND  THE  -  DOCTRINE  OF  THE  HEART/'  OR  THE  -HEART'S  SEAL"

PROF.

ALBRECHT  WEBER  was  right  when   he   declared  that  the  Northern  Buddhists

alone  possess  these  [Buddhist]  Scriptures  complete

For,  while  the  Southern  Buddhists  have  no  idea  of  the  existence  of  an  Esoteric  Doctrine — enshrined  like  a  pearl  within  the  shell  of  every  religion —  the  Chinese  and  the  Tibetans  have  preserved  numerous  records  of  the  fact.

Degenerate,  fallen  as  is  now  the  Doctrine  publicly  preached  by  Gautama,  it  is  yet  preserved  in  those  monasteries  in  China  that  are  placed  beyond  the  reach  of  visitors.

And  though  for  over  two  millennia  every  new  "  reformer,"  taking  something  out  of  the  original  has  replaced  it  by  some  speculation  of  his  own,  truth  still  lingers  even  now  among  the  masses.

But  it  is  only  in  the  Trans-Himalayan  fastnesses — loosely  called  Tibet — in  the  most  inaccessible  spots  of  desert  and  mountain,  that  the  Esoteric  "  Good  Law  " — the  "  Heart's  Seal  " — lives  to  the  present  day  in  all  its  pristine  purity.

Was  Emanuel  Swedenborg  wrong  when  he  remarked  of  the  forgotten,  long -lost  Word  :

Seek  for  it  in  China ;  peradventure  you  may  find  it  in  Great  Tartary.

He  had  obtained  this  information,  he  tells  his  readers,  from  certain  "  Spirits,"  who  told  him  that  they  performed  their  worship  according  to  this  (lost)  ancient  Word.

On  this  it  was  remarked  in  Isis  Unveiled  that

other  students  of  Occult  sciences  had  more  than  the  word  of  "  spirits  "  to  rely  upon  in  this  special  case :  they  have  seen  the  books

that  contain  the  "  Word.'"  A  Perchance  the  names  of  those  "  Spirits  "  who  visited  the  great  Swedish  Theosophist  were  Eastern.

The  word  of  a  man  of  such  undeniable  and  recognised  integrity,  of  one  whose  learning  in  Mathe-  matics, Astronomy,  the  natural  Sciences  and  Philosophy  was  far  in  advance  of  1  Op.  cit.,  II,  p.  470.

DOCTRINES  OF  THE  «•  EYE  "  AND  OF  THE  "  HEART  "

his  age,  cannot  be  trifled  with  or  rejected  as  unceremoniously  as  if  it  were  the  statement  of  a  modern  Theosophist ;  further,  he  claimed  to  pass  at  will  into  that  state  when  the  Inner  Self  frees  itself  entirely  from  every  physical  sense,  and  lives  and  breathes  in  a  world  where  every  secret  of  Nature  is  an  open  book  to  the  Soul-eye.1  Unfortunately,  two-thirds  of  his  public  writings  are  also  allegorical  in  one  sense  ;  and,  as  they  have  been  accepted  literally,  criticism  has  not  spared  the  great  Swedish  Seer  any  more  than  other  Seers.

Having  taken  a  panoramic  view  of  the  hidden  Sciences  and  Magic  with  their  Adepts  in  Europe,  Eastern  Initiates  must  now  be  mentioned.

If  the  presence  of  Esotericism  in  the  Sacred  Scriptures  of  the  West  only  now  begins  to  be  suspected,  after  nearly  two  thousand  years  of  blind  faith  in  their  verbatim  wisdom,  the  same  may  well  be  granted  as  to  the  Sacred  Books  of  the  East.

Therefore  neither  the  Indian  nor  the  Buddhist  system  can  be  understood  without  a  key,  nor  can  the  study  of  comparative  Religion  become  a  "  Science  "  until  the  symbols  of  every  Religion  yield  their  final  secrets.

At  the  best  such  a  study  will  remain  a  loss  of  time,  a  playing  at  hide-and-seek.

On  the  authority  of  a  Japanese  Encyc/opaed/a,  Remusat  shows  the  Buddha,  before  His  death,  committing  the  secrets  of  His  system  to  His  disciple,  Kashyapa,  to  whom  alone  was  entrusted  the  sacred  keeping  of  the  Esoteric  interpretation.

It  is  called  in  China  Cheng-fa-yen-tsang  ("  the  Mystery  of  the  Eye  of  the  Good  Doctrine  ").  To  any  student  of  Buddhist  Esotericism  the  term,  "  the  Mystery  of  the  Eye,"  would  show  the  absence  of  any  Esotericism.

Had  the  word  "  Heart  "  stood  in  its  place,  then  it  would  have  meant  what  it  now  only  professes  to  convey.

The  "  Eye  Doctrine  "  means  dogma  and  dead-letter  form,  church  ritualism  intended  for  those  who  are  content  with  exoteric  formulae.

The  "  Heart  Doctrine,"  or  the  "  Heart's  Seal  "  (the  Sin  Yin),  is  the  only  real  one.

This  may  be  found  corroborated  by  Hiuen  Tsang.

In  his  translation  of  Ma/7a-Pra/na-Param/ta  (7a-por)-/e-/c/ng),  in  one  hundred  and  twenty  volumes,  it  is  stated  that  it  was  Buddha's  "  favourite  disciple  Ananda,"  who,  after  his  great  Master  had  gone  into  Nirvana,  was  commission-  ed by  Kashyapa  to  promulgate  "the  Eye  of  the  Doctrine,"  the  "  Heart  "  of  the  Law  having  been  left  with  the  Arhats  alone.

The  essential  difference  that  exists  between  the  two — the  "  Eye  "  and  the  "  Heart,"  or  the  outward  form  and  the  hidden  meaning,  the  cold  metaphysics  and  the  Divine  Wisdom — is  clearly  demonstrated  in  several  volumes  on  "  Chinese  Buddhism,"  written  by  sundry  missionaries.

Having

1  Unless  one  obtains  exact  information  and  the  right  method,  one's  visions,  however  correct  and  true  in  Soul-life,  will  ever  fail  to  get  photographed  in  our  human  memory,  and  certain  cells  of  the  brain  are  sure  to  play  havoc  with  our  remembrances.

408  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

lived  for  years  in  China,  they  still  know  no  more  than  they  have  learned  from  pretentious  schools  calling  themselves  esoteric,  yet  freely  supplying  the  open  enemies  of  their  faith  with  professedly  ancient  manuscripts  and  esoteric  works  !  This  ludicrous  contradiction  between  profession  and  practice  has  never,  as  it  seems,  struck  any  of  the  western  and  reverend  historians  of  other  peoples'  secret  tenets.

Thus  many  esoteric  schools  are  mentioned  in  Chinese  Buddhism  by  the  Rev.

Joseph  Edkins,  who  believes  quite  sincerely  that  he  has  made  "  a  minute  examination  "  of  the  secret  tenets  of  Buddhists  whose  works  "  were  until  lately  inaccessible  in  their  original  form."  It  really  will  not  be  saying  too  much  to  state  at  once  that  the  genuine  Esoteric  literature  is  "  inaccessible  "  to  this  day,  and  that  the  respectable  gentleman  who  was  inspired  to  state  that

.    it  does   not   appear  that  there  was  any  secret  doctrine  which  those  who-  knew  it  would  not  divulge,

made  a  great  mistake  if  he  ever  believed  in  what  he  says  on  page  161  of  his  work.

Let  him  know  at  once  that  all  those  "  Yu-luh  ("  Records  of  the  Sayings  ")  of  celebrated  teachers  "  are  simply  blinds,  as  complete — if  not  more  so — than  those  in  the  Puranas  of  the  Brahmans.

It  is  useless  to  enu-  merate an  endless  string  of  the  finest  Oriental  scholars  or  to  bring  forward  the  researches  of  Remusat,  Burnouf,  Koeppen,  St.  Hilaire,  and  St.  Julien,  who  are  credited  with  having  exposed  to  view  the  ancient  Hindu  world,  by  reveal-  ing the  sacred  and  secret  books  of  Buddhism  :  the  world  that  they  reveal  has  never  been  veiled.

The  mistakes  of  all  the  Orientalists  may  be  judged  by  the  mistake  of  one  of  the  most  popular,  if  not  the  greatest  among  them  all —  Prof.

Max  Muller.

It  is  made  with  reference  to  what  he  laughingly  trans-  lates as  the  "God  Who"  (Ka).

The  authors  of  the  Brahmanas  had  so  completely  broken  with  the  past,  that,  forgetful  of  the  poetical  character  of  the  hymns  and  the  yearning  of  the  poets  after  the  Unknown  God,  they  exalted  the  interrogative  pronoun  itself  into  a  deity,  and  acknowledged  God  Ka  (or  Who ?)  .  Wherever  interrogative  verses  occur  the  author  states  that  Ka  is  Prajapati,  or  the  Lord  of  Creatures.

Nor  did  they  stop  here.

Some  of  the  hymns  in  which  the  interrogative  pronoun  occurred  were  called  Kadvat,  /  e.,  having  Kad  or  Quid.

But  soon  a  new  adjective  was  formed,  and  not  only  the  hymns  but  the  sacrifice  also  offered  to  the  god  were  called  Kaya,  or  "  Who  "-ish.

.  .  At  the  time  of  Panmi  this  word  acquired  such  legitimacy  as  to  call  for  a  separate  rule  explaining  its  formation.

The  Commentator  here  explains  Ka  by  Brahman.

Had  the  commentator  explained  It  even  by  Parabrahman  he  would  have  been  still  more  in  the  right  than  he  was  by  rendering  It  as  "  Brahman."  One  fails  to  see  why  the  secret  and  the  sacred  Mystery-Name  of  the  highest,  sexless,  formless  Spirit,  the  Absolute, — Whom  no  one  would  have  dared  to  classify  with  the  rest  of  the  manifested  Deities,  or  even  to  name  during  the

DOCTRINES  OF  THE  «  EYE  "  AND  OF  THE  -  HEART  "

primitive  nomenclature  of  the  symbolical  Pantheon,  should  not  be  expressed  by  an  interrogative  pronoun.

Is  it  those  who  belong  to  the  most  anthro-  pomorphic Religion  in  the  world  who  have  a  right  to  take  ancient  Philosophers  to  task  for  even  an  exaggerated  religious  awe  and  veneration  ?

But  we  are  now  concerned  with  Buddhism.

Its  Esotericism  and  oral  instruction,  which  is  written  down  and  preserved  in  single  copies  by  the  high-  est chiefs  in  genuine  Esoteric  Schools,  is  shown  by  the  author  San-Kian-yi-su.  Contrasting  Bodhidharma  with  Buddha,  he  exclaims  :

"  Julai  "  (Tathagata)  taught  great  truths  and  the  causes  of  things  He  became  the  instructor  of  men  and  Devas  He  saved  multitudes,  and  spoke  the  contents  of  more  than  five  hundred  works  Hence  arose  the  Kiau-men,  or  exoteric  branch  of  the  system,  and  it  was  believed  to  be. the  tradition  of  the  words  of  Buddha  Bodhi-  dharma brought  from  the  Western  heaven  [Shamballa]  the  "  seal  of  truth  "  (true  seal)  and  opened  the  fountain  of  contemplation  in  the  East  He  pointed  directly  to  Buddha's  heart  and  nature,  swept  away  the  parasitic  and  alien  growth  of  book-  instruction,  and  thus  established  the  Jsung-men,  or  esoteric  branch  of  the  system  containing  the  tradition  of  the  heart  of  Buddha  .  .  '

A  few  remarks  made  by  the  author  of  Chinese  Buddhism  throw  a  flood  of  light  on  the  universal  misconceptions  of  the  Orientalists  in  general,  and  of  the  missionaries  in  the  "  lands  of  the  Gentiles  "  in  particular.

They  appeal  very  forcibly  to  the  intuition  of  Theosophists — more  particularly  of  those  in*  India.

The  sentences  to  be  noticed  are  italicized.

The  common  [Chinese]  word  for  the  esoteric  schools  is  dan,  the  Sanskrit  Dhyana.

.  .  Orthodox  Buddhism  has  in  China  slowly  but  steadily  become  heterodox  The  Buddhism  of  books  and  ancient  traditions  has  become  the  Buddhism  of  mystic  contemplation.

.  .  .  The  history  of  ancient  schools  springing  up  long  ago  in  the  Buddhist  communities  of  India  can  now  be  only  very  partially  recovered  Possibly  some  light  may  be  thrown  back  by  China  upon  the  religious  history  of  the  country  from  which  Buddhism  came  '"  In  no  part  of  the  story  is  aid  to  the  recovery  of  the  lost  knowledge  more  likely  to  be  found  than  in  the  accounts  of  the  patriarchs,  the  line  of  whom  was  completed  by  Bodhidharma  In  seeking  the  best  explanation  of  the  Chinese  and  Japanese  narrative  of  the  patriarchs,  and  the  seven  Buddhas  terminat-  ing in  Gautama,  or  Shakyamuni,  it  is  important  to  know  the  Jain  traditions  as  they  were  early  in  the  sixth  century  of  our  era,  when  the  Patriarch  Bodhidharma  removed  to  China  .  .

In  tracing  the  rise  of  the  various  schools  of  esoteric  Buddhism  it  must  be  kept  in  mind  that  a  principle  somewhat  similar  to  the  dogma  of  apostolical  succession  belongs  to  them  all.

They  all  profess  to  derive  their  doctrines  through  a  succession

1  Chinese  Buddhism,  p.  158.     The  Rev    Joseph  Edkins  either  ignores,  or — which  is  more  probable  — is  utterly  ignorant  of  the   real   existence  of  such  Schools,  and  judges  by  the  Chinese  travesties  of  these,  calling  such  Esotericism  "  heterodox  Buddhism  "     And  so  it  is,  in  one  sense

2  That  country— India— has  lost  the  records  of  such  Schools  and  their  teachings  only  so  far  as  the  general  public,  and  especially  the'  mappreciative  Western  Orientalists,  are  concerned      It  has  pre-  served them   in  full  in  some  Mathams  (refuges  for  mystic  contemplation)      But  it  may  perhaps  be  better  to  seek  them  with,   and  from,  their  rightful  owners,   the  so-called  "  mythical  "  Adepts,  or  Mahatmas

410  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

of  teachers,  each  instructed  personally  by  his  predecessor,  till  the  time  ot  Bodhidharma,  and  so  further  up  in  the  series  to  Shaky amuni  himself  and  the  earlier  Buddhas.

It  is  complained  further  on,  and  is  mentioned  as  a  falling  away  from  strict  orthodox  Buddhism,  that  the  Lamas  of  Tibet  are  received  in  Pekin  with  the  utmost  respect  by  the  Emperor.

The  following  passages,  taken  from  different  parts  of  the  book  summarise  Mr.  Edkins'  views  :

Hermits  are  not  uncommonly  met  with  in  the  vicinity  of  large  Buddhist  temples,  .  .  .  their  hair  being  allowed  to  grow  unshorn.

.  .  .  The  doctrine  of  metem-  psychosis is  rejected.

Buddhism  is  one  form  of  Pantheism  on  the  ground  that  the  doctrine  of  metempsychosis  makes  all  nature  instinct  with  life,  and  that  that  life  is  the  Deity  assuming  different  forms  of  personality,  that  Deity  not  being  a  self-conscious,  free-acting  Self-Cause,  but  an  all-pervading  Spirit  The  esoteric  Buddhists  of  China,  keeping  rigidly  to  their  one  doctrine/'  say  nothing  of  the  metempsychosis,  .  .  or  any  other  of  the  more  material  parts  of  the  Buddhist  system.

.  .  .  The  Western  paradise  promised  to  the  worshippers  of  Amida  Buddha  is  ...  incon-  sistent with  the  doctrine  of  Nirvana  [?],'  .  .  .  It  promises  immortality  instead  of  annihi-  lation.

The  great  antiquity  of  this  School  is  evident  from  the  early  date  of  the  transla-  tion of  the  Amida  Sutra,  which  came  from  the  hands  of  Kumarajtva,  and  the  Wu-liang-  sheu-King,  dating  from  the  Han  dynasty.

Its  extent  of  influence  is  seen  in  the  attachment  o.f  the  Tibetans  and  Moguls  to  the  worship  of  this  Buddha,  and  in  the  fact  that  the  name  of  this  fictitious  personage  [?]  is  more  commonly  heard  in  China  than  that  of  the  historical  Shakyamuni.

We  fear  the  learned  writer  is  on  a  false  track  as  to  Nirvana  and  Amita  Buddha.

However,  here  we  have  the  evidence  of  a  missionary  to  show  that  there  are  several  schools  of  Esoteric  Buddhism  in  the  Celestial  Empire.

When  the  misuse  of  dogmatical  orthodox  Buddhist  Scriptures  had  reached  its  climax,  and  the  true  spirit  of  the  Buddha's  philosophy  was  nearly  lost,  several  reformers  appeared  from  India,  who  established  an  oral  teaching.

Such  were  Bodhidharma  and  Nagarjuna,  the  authors  of  the  most  important  works  of  the  contemplative  School  in  China  during  the  first  centuries  of  our  era.

It  is  known,  moreover,  as  is  said  in  Chinese  Buddhism,  that  Bodhidharma  became  the  chief  founder  of  the  Esoteric  Schools,  which  were  divided  into  five

1  Chinese  Buddhism,  pp    155-9.

2  They  certainly  reject  most  emphatically  the   popular  theory  of  the  transmigration  of  human  entities  or  Souls  into  animals,    but  not  the  evolution  of  men  from  animals — so  far,  at  least,  as  their  lower  principles  are  concerned.

'*  It  is  quite  consistent,  on  the  contrary,  when  explained  in  the  light  of  the  Esoteric  Doctrine.

The  "  Western  paradise,"  or  Western  heaven,  is  no  fiction  located  in  transcendental  space  It  is  a  bona-  fide  locality  in  the  mountains,  or,  to  be  more  correct,  one  encircled  in  a  desert  within  mountains.

Hence  it  is  assigned  for  the  residence  of  those  students  of  Esoteric  Wisdom — disciples  of  Buddha —  who  have  attained  the  rank  of  Lohans  and  An&gamms  (Adepts)  It  is  called  "  Western  "  simply  from  geographical  considerations  ;  and  "the  great  iron  mountain  girdle"  that  surrounds  the  Avitchi,  and  the  seven  Lokas  that  encircle  the  "  Western  paradise  "  are  a  very  exact  representation  of  well-known  localities  and  things  to  the  Eastern  student  of  Occultism.

DOCTRINES  OF  THE  "EYE"  AND  OF  THE  "HEART"

principal  branches.

The  data  given  are  correct  enough,  but  every  conclusion,  without  one  single  exception,    is  wrong.

It  was  said  in  I  sis  Unveiled 1  that —

Buddha  teaches  the  doctrine  of  a  new  birth  as  plainly  as  Jesus  does.

Desiring  to  break  with  the  ancient  Mysteries,  to  which  it  was  impossible  to  admit  the  ignorant  masses,  the  Hindu  reformer,  though  generally  silent  upon  more  than  one  secret  dogma,  clearly  states  his  thought  in  several  passages.

Thus,  he  says  '  Some  people  are  bom  again  ;  evil-doers  go  to  hell  [Avitchi]  ;  righteous  people  go  to  heaven  [Devachan] ;  those  who  are  free  from  all  worldly  desires  enter  Nirvana '  (Precepts  of  the  Dhamma-  pada,  v,  126).  Elsewhere  Buddha  states  that  "  it  is  better  to  believe  in  a  future  life,  in  which  happiness  or  misery  can  be  felt  for  if  the  heart  believes  therein  it  will  abandon  sin  and  act  virtuously ;  and  even  if  there  is  no  resurrection  [rebirth],  such  a  life  will  bring  a  good  name  and  the  reward  of  men  But  those  who  believe  in  extinction  at  death  will  not  fail  to  commit  any  sin  that  they  may  choose,  because  of  their  disbelief  in  a  future."  (See  Wheel  of  the  Law).

How  is  immortality,  then,  "inconsistent  with  the  doctrine  of  Nirvana?"  The  above  are  only  a  few  of  Buddha's  openly-expressed  thoughts  to  his  chosen  Arhats  ;  the  great  Saint  said  much  more.

As  a  comment  upon  the  mis-  taken views  held  in  our  century  by  the  Orientalists,  "  who  vainly  try  to  fathom  Tathagata's  thoughts,"  and  those  of  Brahmans,  "who  repudiate  the  great  Teacher  to  this  day,"  here  are  some  original  thoughts  expressed  in  relation  to  the  Buddha  and  the  study  of  the  Secret  Sciences.

They  are  from  a  work  written  in  Chinese  by  a  Tibetan,  and  published  in  the  monastery  of  Tien-tai  for  circulation  among  the  Buddhists

who  live  in  foreign  lands,  and  are  in  danger  of  being  spoiled  by  missionaries,  as  the  author  truly  says,  every  convert  being  not  only  "spoiled  "  for  his  own  creed,    but  being   also  a  sorry  acquisition  for  Christianity.

A  translation  of  a  few    passages,    kindly    made    from    that   work  for    the    present  volumes,   is  now  given.

No  profane  ears  having  heard  the  mighty  Chau-yan  [secret  and  enlightening  precepts]  of  Vu-vei-Tchen-jen  [Buddha  within  Buddha],2  of  our  beloved  Lord  and  Bodhisattva,  how  can  one  tell  what  his  thoughts  really  were ?  The  holy  Sang-gyas-  Panchhen 3  never  offered  an  insight  into  the  One  Reality  to  the  unreformed  [uninitiated]  Bhikkus  Few  are  those  even  among  the  Tu-fon  [Tibetans]  who  knew  it ;  as  for  the  Tsung-men  4  Schools,  they  are  going  with  every  day  more  down  hill.

.  .  Not  even  the  Fa-siong-Tsung1'  can  give  one  the  wisdom  taught  in  real  Naljor-chod-pa  [Sanskrit , "  Yogacharya]  ,  .  it  is  all  "  Eye  "  Doctrine,  and  no  more.

The  loss  of  a  restraining

1  Vol.

II,  p.  566.

2  The  word  is  translated  by  the  Orientalists   "true   man  without  a  position,"  (?)  which  is  very  misleading.

It  simply  means  tne  true  inner  man,   or  Ego,  "  Buddha  within  Buddha  "  meaning  that  there  was  a  Gautama  inwardly  as  well  as  outwardly.

3  One  of  the  titles  of  Gautama  Buddha  in  Tibet.

4  The  "  Esoteric"  Schools,  or  sects,  of  which  there  are  many  in  China.

5  A  school   of   contemplation   founded   by    Hiuen-Tsang,   the  traveller,  nearly  extinct      Fa-siong-  Tsung  means  "  the  School  that  unveils  the  inner  nature  of  things."

"  Esoteric,  or  hidden,  teaching  of  Yoga  (Chinese  •  Yo-ga-mi-kiau).

412  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

guidance  is  felt,  since  the  Tch'-an-si  [teachers]  of  inward  meditation  [self-contempla-  tion or  Tchung-kwan]  have  become  rare,  and  the  Good  Law  is  replaced  by  idol-worship  [Siang-kyan].  It  is  of  this  [idol-  or  image-worship]  that  the  Barbarians  [Western  people]  have  heard,  and  know  nothing  of  Bas-pa-Dharma  [the  secret  Dharma  or  doctrine]  Why  has  truth  to  hide  like  a  tortoise  within  its  shell  ?  Because  it  is  now  found  to  have  become  like  the  Lama's  tonsure  knife,1  a  weapon  too  dangerous  to  use  even  for  the  Lanoo.

Therefore  no  one  can  be  entrusted  with  the  knowledge  [Secret  Science]  before  his  time  The  Chagna-Thog-mad  have  become  rare,  and  the  best  have  retired  to  Tushita  the  Blessed  J

Further  on,  a  man  seeking  to  master  the  mysteries  of  Esotericism  before  he  had  been  declared  by  the  initiated  Tch'-an-si  (teachers)  to  be  ready  to  receive  them,  is  likened  to

one  who  would,  without  a  lantern  and  on  a  dark  night,  proceed  to  a  place  full  of  scorpions,  determined  to  feel  on  the  ground  for  a  needle  his  neighbour  has  dropped

Again  :

He  who  would  acquire  the  Sacred  Knowledge  should,  before  he  goes  any  farther  "  trim  his  lamp  of  inner  understanding,"  and  then  "  with  the  help  of  such  good-  light  "  use  his  meritorious  actions  as  a  dust-cloth  to  remove  every  impurity  from  his  mystic  mirror/1  so  that  he  should  be  enabled  to  see  in  its  lustre  the  faithful  reflection  of  Self.

.  .  .  First,  this ;  then  Tong-pa-nya,4  lastly  ;  Samma  Sambuddha.

'

In  Chinese  Buddhism  a  corroboration  of  these  statements  is  to  be  found  in  the  aphorisms  of  Lin-tsi  :

Within  the  body  which  admits  sensations,  acquires  knowledge,  thinks,  and  acts,  there  is  the  "True  man  without  a  position,"  Wu-\ve/-cfien-/en  He  makes  himself

1  The  "  tonsure  knife  "  is  made  of  meteoric  iron,  and  is  used  for  the  purpose  of  cutting  off  the  "vow-lock,"  or  hair  from  the  novice's  head  during  his  first  ordination  It  has  a  double-edged  blade,  is  sharp  as  a  razor,  and  lies  concealed  within  a  hollow  handle  of  horn.

By  touching  a  spring  the  blade  jerks  out  like  a  flash  of  lightning,  and  recedes  back  with  the  same  rapidity  A  great  dexterity  is  required  in  using  it  without  wounding  the  head  of  the  young  Gelung  and  Gelung-ma  (candidates  to  become  priests  and  nuns)  during  the  preliminary  rites,  which  are  public

'J  Chagpa-Thog-mad  is  the  Tibetan  name  of  Aryasanga,  the  founder  of  the  Yogacharya  or  Naljorchodpa  School.

This  Sage  and  Initiate  is  said  to  have  been  taught  "  Wisdom  "  by  Maitreya  Buddha  Himself,  the  Buddha  of  the  Sixth  Race,  at  Tushita  (a  celestial  region  presided  over  by  Him),  and  as  having  received  from  Him  the  five  books  of  Champaitehos-nga  The  SECRET  DOCTRINE  teaches,  however,  that  he  came  from  Dejung,  or  Shambhalla,  called  the  "  source  of  happiness  "  ("  wisdom-  acquired  ")  and  declared  by  some  Orientalists  to  be  a  "  fabulous  "  place.

J  It  may  not  be,  perhaps,  amiss  to  remind  the  reader  of  the  fact  that  the  "  mirror "  was  a  part  of  the  symbolism  of  the  Thesmophona,  a  portion  of  the  Eleusmian  Mysteries ,  and  that  it  was  used  in  the  search  for  Atmu,  the  "  Hidden  One,"  or  "Self  "  In  his  excellent  paper  on  the  above-named  mysteries,  Dr.  Alexander  Wilder  of  New  York  says :  "  Despite  the  assertion  of  Herodotus  and  others  that  the  Bacchic  Mysteries  were  Egyptian,  there  exists  strong  probability  that  they  came  originally  from  India,  and  were  Shaivitic  or  Buddhistical.

Kore-Persep-honeia  was  but  the  goddess  Parasu-pani,  or  BhavSni,  and  Zagreus  is  from  Chakara,  a  country  extending  from  ocean  to  ocean.

If  this  is  a  Turanian  story  we  can  easily  recognise  the  '  horns '  as  the  crescent  worn  by  LSma-priests,  and  assume  the  whole  legend  [the  fable  of  Dionysus-Zagreus]  to  be  based  on  Lama-succession  and  transmigration  The  whole  story  or  Orpheus  .  has  a  Hindu  ring  all  through  "  The  tale  of  "  Lama-

succession  and  transmigration"  did  not  originate  with  the  Lamas,  who  date  themselves  only  so  far  back  as  the  seventh  century,  but  with  the  Chaldeans  and  the  Brdhmans,  still  earlier

4  The  state  of  absolute  freedom  from  any  sin  or  desire.

•"'  The  state  during  which  an  Adept  sees  the  long  series  of  his  past  births,  and  lives  through  all  his  previous  incarnations  in  this  and  the  other  worlds.

(See  the  admirable  description  in  the  Light  of  As/a,  Bk.  VI  )

DOCTRINES  OF  THE  "  EYE  "-AND  OF  THE  -  HEART  "

clearly  visible  ;  not  the  thinnest  separating  film  hides  him.

Why  do  you  not  recognise  him ?  ...  If  the  mind  does  not  come  to  conscious  existence,  there  is  deliverance  everywhere  .  What  is  Buddha  ?  Ans.

A  mind  pure,  and  at  rest  What  is  the  law?  Ans.

A  mind  clear  and  enlightened  What  is  Jau  ?  Ans.

In  every  place  absence  of  impediments  and  pure  enlightenment  These  three  are  one  '

The  reverend  author  of  Chinese  Buddhism  makes  merry  over  the  sym-  bolism of  Buddhist  discipline.

Yet  the  self-inflicted  "  slaps  on  the  cheek  "  and  "  blows  under  the  ribs  "  find  their  pendants  in  the  mortifications  of  the  body  and  self-flagellation — "  the  discipline  of  the  scourge  " — of  the  Christian  monks,  from  the  first  centuries  of  Christianity  down  to  our  own  day.

But  then  the  said  author  is  a  Protestant,  who  substitutes  for  mortification  and  discipline —  good  living  and  comfort.

The  sentence  in  the  Lin-tsi :

The  "  true  man  without  a  position,"  Wu-we/-cr)en-/en,  is  wrapped  in  a  prickly  shell  like  the  chestnut  He  cannot  be  approached.

This  is  Buddha,  the  Buddha  within  you

is  laughed  at.      Truly  :

An  infant  cannot  understand  the  seven  enigmas  '

i  Ch.  VII.

pp    163-4  -  Ibid  ,  p.

SOME  PAPERS   ON    THE    BEARING  OF   OCCULT   PHILOSOPHY   ON   LIFE

NOTE

PAPERS  1,2,3  of  the  following  were  written  by  H.P.B.  and  were  circulated  privately  during  her  lifetime,  but  they  were  written  with  the  idea  that  they  would  be  published  after  a  time.

They  are  papers  intended  for  students  rather  than  for  the  ordinary  reader,  and  will  repay  careful  study  and  thought.

The  "  Notes  of  some  Oral  Teaching  "  were  written  down  by  some  of  her  pupils  and  were  partially  corrected  by  her,  but  no  attempt  has  been  made  to  relieve  them  of  their  fragmentary  character.

She  had  intended  to  make  them  the  basis  for  written  papers  similar  to  the  first  three,  but  her  failing  health  rendered  this  impossible,  and  they  are  published  with  her  consent,  the  time  for  restricting  them  to  a  limited  circle  having  expired.

1897  ANNIE  BESANT

PAPER

A   WARNING

THERE  is  a  strange  law  in  Occultism  which  has  been  ascertained  and  proven  by  thousands  of  years  of  experience ,  nor  has  it  failed  to  demonstrate  itself,  almost  in  every  case,  during  the  years  that  the  Theosophical  Society  has  been  in  existence.

As  soon  as  anyone  pledges  himself  as  a  "  Probationer,"  certain  Occult  effects  ensue.

Of  these  the  first  is  the  throwing  outward  of  every-  thing latent  in  the  nature  of  the  man  ;  his  faults,  habits,  qualities  or  subdued  desires,  whether  good,  bad  or  indifferent.

For  instance,  if  a  man  be  vain  or  a  sensualist,  or  ambitious,  whether  by  atavism  or  by  karmic  heirloom,  those  vices  are  sure  to  break  out,  even  if  he  has  hitherto  successfully  concealed  and  repressed  them.

They  will  come  to  the  front  irrepressibly,  and  he  will  have  to  fight  a  hundred  times  harder  than  before,  until  he  kills  all  such  tendencies  in  himself.

On  the  other  hand,  if  he  be  good,  generous,  chaste  and  abstemious,  or  has  any  virtue  hitherto  latent  and  concealed  in  him,  it  will  work  its  way  out  as  irrepressibly  as  the  rest.

Thus  a  civilized  man  who  hates  to  be  considered  a  saint,  and  therefore  assumes  a  mask,  will  not  be  able  to  conceal  his  true  .nature,  whether  base  or  noble.

THIS  IS  AN  IMMUTABLE  LAW  IN  THE  DOMAIN  OF  THE  OCCULT.

Its  action  is  the  more  marked,  the  more  earnest  and  sincere  the  desire  of  the  candidate,  and  the  more  deeply  he  has  felt  the  reality  and  importance  of  his  pledge.

The  ancient  occult  axiom,  "  Know  Thyself,"  must  be  familiar  to  every  student ;  but  few  if  any  have  apprehended  the  real  meaning  of  this  wise  exhor-  tation of  the  Delphic  Oracle.

You  all  know  your  earthly  pedigree,  but  who  of  you  has  ever  traced  all  the  links  of  heredity,  astral,  psychic  and  spiritual,  which

FF

418  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

go  to  make  you  what  you  are  ?  Many  have  written  and  expressed  their  desire  to  unite  themselves  with  their  Higher  Ego,  yet  none  seem  to  know  the  indis-  soluble link  connecting  their  "  Higher  Egos  "  with  the  One  Universal  SELF.

For  all  purposes  of  Occultism,  whether  practical  or  purely  metaphysical,  such  knowledge  is  absolutely  requisite.

It  is  proposed,  therefore,  to  begin  these  papers  by  showing  this  connection  in  all  directions  with  the  worlds  :  Absolute,  Archetypal,  Spiritual,  Manasic,  Psychic,  Astral,  and  Elemental.

Before,  however,  we  can  touch  upon  the  higher  worlds — Archetypal,  Spiritual  and  Manasic — we  must  master  the  relations  of  the  seventh,  the  terrestrial  world,  the  lower  Prakriti,  or  Malkuth  as  in  the  Kabalah,  to  the  worlds  or  planes  which  immediately  follow  it.

OM

"OM."  says  the  Aryan  Adept,  the  son  of  the  Fifth  Race,  who  with  this  syllable  begins  and  ends  his  salutation  to  the  human  being,  his  conjuration  of,  or  appeal  to,  non-human  PRESENCES

"OM-MANI."  murmurs  the  Turanian  Adept,  the  descendant  of  the  Fourth  Race;  and  after  pausing  he  adds,  "PADME-HUM"

This  famous  invocation  is  very  erroneously  translated  by  the  Orientalists  as  meaning,  "Oh  the  Jewel  in  the  Lotus."  For  although,  literally,  OM  is  a  syllable  sacred  to  the  Deity,  PADME  means  "in  the  Lotus,"  and  MANI  is  any  precious  stone,  still  neither  the  words  themselves,  nor  their  symbolical  mean-  ing, are  thus  really  correctly  rendered.

In  this,  the  most  sacred  of  all  Eastern  formulas,  not  only  has  every  syllable  a  secret  potency  producing  a  definite  result,  but  the  whole  invocation  has  seven  different  meanings  and  can  produce  seven  distinct  results,  each  of  which  may  differ  from  the  others.

The  seven  meanings  and  the  seven  results  depend  upon  the  intonation  which  is  given  to  the  whole  formula  and  to  each  of  its  syllables ;  and  even  the  numerical  value  of  the  letters  is  added  to  or  diminished  according  as  such  or  another  rhythm  is  made  use  of.  Let  the  student  remember  that  number  underlies  form,  and  number  guides  sound.

Number  lies  at  the  root  of  the  manifested  Universe  .  numbers  and  harmonious  proportions  guide  the  first  differentiations  of  homogeneous  substance  into  heterogeneous  elements ;  and  number  and  numbers  set  limits  to  the  formative  hand  of  Nature.

Know  the  corresponding  numbers  of  the  fundamental  principle  of  every  element  and  its  sub-elements,  learn  their  interaction  and  behaviour  on  the  occult  side  of  manifesting  Nature,  and  the  law  of  correspondences  will  lead  you  to  the  discovery  of  the  greatest  mysteries  of  macrocosmical  life.

PAPER

But  to  arrive  at  the  macrocosmical,  you  must  begin  by  the  microcosmical,  i.e.,  you  must  study  MAN,  the  microcosm — in  this  case  as  physical  science  does  — inductively,  proceeding  from  particulars  to  universals.

At  the  same  time,  however,  since  a  key-note  is  required  to  analyze  and  comprehend  any  com-  bination of  differentiations  of  sound,  we  must  never  lose  sight  of  the  Platonic  method,  which  starts  with  one  general  view  of  all,  and  descends  from  the  universal  to  the  individual.

This  is  the  method  adopted  in  Mathematics — the  only  exact  science  that  exists  in  our  day.

Let  us  study  Man,  therefore  ;  but  if  we  separate  him  for  one  moment  from  the  Universal  Whole,  or  view  him  in  isolation,  from  a  single  aspect,  apart  from  the  "Heavenly  Man" — the  Universe  symbolized  by  Adam  Kadmon  or  his  equivalents  in  every  Philosophy — we  shall  either  land  in  Black  Magic  or  fail  most  ingloriously  in  our  attempt.

Thus  the  mystic  sentence,  "  Om  Man;  Padme  Hum,"  when  rightly  under-  stood, instead  of  being  composed  of  the  almost  meaningless  words,  "  Oh  the  Jewel  in  the  Lotus,"  contains  a  reference  to  this  indissoluble  union  between.

Man  and  the  Universe,  rendered  in  seven  different  ways,  and  having  the  capability  of  seven  different  applications  to  as  many  planes  of  thought  and  action.

From  whatever  aspect  we  examine  it,  it  means:  "I  am  that  I  am  ";  "  I  am  in  thee  and  thou  art  in  me."  In  this  conjunction  and  close  union  the  good  and  pure  man  becomes  a  God.

Whether  consciously  or  unconsciously,  he  will  bring  about,  or  innocently  cause  to  happen,  unavoidable  results.

In  the  first  case,  if  an  Initiate  (of  course  an  Adept  of  the  Right-hand  Path  alone  is  meant),  he  can  guide  a  beneficent  or  a  protecting  current,  and  thus  benefit  and  protect  individuals  and  even  whole  nations.

In  the  second  case,  although  quite  unaware  of  what  he  is  doing,  the  good  man  becomes  a  shield  to  whom-  soever he  is  with.

Such  is  the  fact ;  but  its  how  and  why  have  to  be  explained,  and  this  can  be  done  only  when  the  actual  presence  and  potency  of  numbers  in  sounds,  and  hence  in  words  and  letters,  have  been  rendered  clear.

The  formula,  "  Om  Man/  Padme  Hum,"  has  been  chosen  as  an  illustration  on  account  of  its  almost  infinite  potency  in  the  mouth  of  an  Adept,  and  of  its  potentiality  when  pronounced  by  any  man.

Be  careful,  all  you  who  read  this  :  do  not  use  these  words  in  vain,  or  when  in  anger,  lest  you  become  yourself  the  first  sacrificial  victim,  or,  what  is  worse,  endanger  those  whom  you  love.

The  profane  Orientalist,  who  all  his  life  skims  mere  externals,  will  tell  you  flippantly,  and  laughing  at  the  superstition,  that  in  Tibet  this  sentence  is

420  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

the  most  powerful  six-syllabled  incantation  and  is  said  to  have  been  delivered  to  the  nations  of  Central  Asia  by  Padmapani,  the  Tibetan  Chrenresi.

But  who  is  Padmapani,  in  reality  ?  Each  of  us  must  recognize  him  for  himself,  whenever  he  is  ready.

Each  of  us  has  within  himself  the  "  Jewel  in  the  Lotus,"  call  it  Padmapani,  Krishna,  Buddha,  Christ,  or  whatever  name  we  may  give  to  our  Divine  Self.

The  exoteric  story  runs  thus :

The  supreme  Buddha,  or  Amitabha,  they  say,  at  the  hour  of  the  creation  of  man,  caused  a  rosy  ray  of  light  to  issue  from  his  right  eye.

The  ray  emitted  a  sound  and  became  Padmapani  Bodhisattva.

Then  the  Deity  allowed  to  stream  forth  from  his  left  eye  a  blue  ray  of  light,  which,  becoming  incarnate  in  the  two  virgins  Dolma,  acquired  the  power  to  enlighten  the  minds  of  living  beings.

Amitabha  then  called  the  combination,  which  forthwith  took  up  its  abode  in  man,  "  Om  Man/  Padme  Hum,"  "  I  am  the  Jewel  in  the  Lotus  and  in  it  I  will  remain."  Then  Padmapani,  "  the  One  in  the  Lotus  "  vowed  never  to  cease  working  until  he  had  made  Humanity  feel  his  presence  in  itself  and  had  thus  saved  it  from  the  misery  of  rebirth.

He  vowed  to  perform  the  feat  before  the  end  of  the  Kalpa,  adding  that,  in  case  of  failure,  he  wished  that  his  head  should  split  into  numberless  fragments.

The  Kalpa  closed  ;  but  Humanity  felt  him  not  within  its  cold,  evil  heart.

Then  Padmapani 's  head  split  and  was  shattered  into  a  thousand  fragments.

Moved  with  compassion,  the  Deity  re-formed  the  pieces  into  ten  heads,  three  white,  and  seven  of  various  colours.

And  since  that  day  man  has  become  a  perfect  number,  or  TEN.

In  this  allegory  the  potency  of  SOUND,  COLOUR,  and  NUMBER  is  so  ingen-  iously introduced  as  to   veil   the   real    Esoteric  meaning.

To  the  outsider  it  reads   like  one   of  the  many    meaningless   fairy-tales   of   creation  ;   but    it    is  pregnant    with    spiritual    and    divine,    physical    and  magical  meaning.

From  Amitabha — no  colour,   or  the   white  glory — are  born  the  seven  differentiated  colours   of  the    prism.

These    each    emit   a  correspond-  ing  sound,   forming   the,  seven   of  the  musical  scale.

As  Geometry,   among  the  Mathematical  Sciences,   is  specially  related  to  Architecture,  and  also  (proceeding  to  Universals)  to   Cosmogony,  so  the  ten  Jods  of  the  Pythagorean  Tetrad,  or   Tetraktys,   being  made   to   symbolize   the  Macrocosm,  the   Microcosm,    or   man,    its   image,    had   also  to  be  divided  into  ten  points.

For  this  Nature  herself  has  provided,  as  will  be  seen.

But  before   this  statement   can   be  proved  and  the  perfect  correspond-  ences   between    the   Macrocosm  and  the   Microcosm   demonstrated,   a  few  words  of  explanation  are  necessary.

1  See  Vol.

3,  pp     185-6.

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To  the  learner  who  would  study  the  Esoteric  Sciences  with  their  double  object :  (a)  of  proving  Man  to  be  identical  in  spiritual  and  physical  essence  with  both  the  Absolute  Principle  and  with  God  in  Nature  ;  and  (b)  of  demon-  strating the  presence  in  him  of  the  same  potential  powers  as  exist  in  the  creative  forces  in  Nature — to  such  a  one  a  perfect  knowledge  of  the  corres-  pondences between  Colours,  Sounds,  and  Numbers  is  the  first  requisite.

As  already  said,  the  sacred  formula  of  the  far  East,  "  Om  Man/  Pacfme  Hum,"  is  the  one  best  calculated  to  make  these  correspondential  qualities  and  func-  tions clear  to  the  learner.

In  the  allegory  of  Padmapani,  the  Jewel  (or  Spiritual  Ego)  in  the  Lotus,  or  the  symbol  of  androgynous  man,  the  numbers  3,  4.  7,  10,  as  synthesizing  the  Unit,  Man,  are  prominent,  as  I  have  already  said.

It  is  on  the  thorough  knowledge  and  comprehension  of  the  meaning  and  potency  of  these  numbers,  in  their  various  and  multiform  combinations,  and  in  their  mutual  correspon-  dence with  sounds  or  words,  and  colours  or  rates  of  motion  (represented  in  physical  science  by  vibrations),  that  the  progress  of  a  student  in  Occultism  depends.

Therefore  we  must  begin  with  the  first,  initial  word,  OM,  or  AUM.

OM  is  a  "  blind."  The  sentence  "  Om  Man/  Pac/me  Hum  "  is  not  a  six-  but  a  seven-syllabled  phrase,  as  the  first  syllable  is  double  in  its  right  pronuncia-  tion, and  triple  in  its  essence,  A-UM.  It  represents  the  for  ever  concealed  primeval  triune  differentiation,  not  from  but  in  ONE  Absolute,  and  is  therefore  symbolized  by  the  4,  or  the  Tetraktys,  in  the  metaphysical  world.

It  is  the  Unit-ray,  or  Atman.

It  is  the  Atman,  this  highest  Spirit  in  man,  which,  in  conjunction  with  Buddhi  and  Manas,  is  called  the  upper  Triad,  or  Trinity.

This  Triad  with  its  four  lower  human  principles,  is,  moreover,  enveloped  with  an  auric  atmos-  phere, like  the  yolk  of  an  egg  (the  future  embryo)  by  the  albumen  and  shell.

This,  to  the  perceptions  of  higher  Beings  from  other  planes,  makes  of  each  individuality  an  oval  sphere  of  more  or  less  radiancy.

To  show  the  student  the  perfect  correspondence  between  the  birth  of  Kosmos,  a  World,  a  Planetary  Being,  or  a  Child  of  Sin  and  Earth,  a  more  definite  and  clear  description  must  be  given.

Those  acquainted  with  Physiol-  ogy will  understand  it  better  than  others.

Who,  having  read  say  the  Vishnu  or  other  Purana,  is  not  familiar  with  the  exoteric  allegory  of  the  birth  of  Brahma  (male-female)  in  the  Egg  of  the  World,  Hiranyagarbha,  surrounded  by  its  seven  zones,  or  rather  planes,  which  in  the  world  of  form  and  matter  become  seven  and  fourteen  Lokas  ;  the  numbers  seven  and  fourteen  re- appearing  as  occasion  requires.

422  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Without  giving  out  the  secret  analysis,  the  Hindus  have  from  time  im-  memorial compared  the  matrix  of  the  Universe,  and  also  the  solar  matrix,  to  the  female  uterus.

It  is  written  of  the  former  ;  "Its  womb  is  vast  as  the  Meru,"  and

the  future  mighty  oceans  lay  asleep  in   the  waters  that  filled  its  cavities,  the  continents,  seas  and  mountains,  the  stars,  planets,  the  gods,  demons  and  mankind.

The  whole  resembled,  in  its  inner  and  outer  coverings,  the  cocoanut  filled  interiorly  with  pulp,  and  covered  externally  with  husk  and  rind.

"  Vast  as  Meru,"  say  the  texts.

Meru  was  its  amnion,  and  the  other  mountains  were  its  chorion,  adds  a  verse  in  Vishnu  Parana.

In  the  same  way  is  man  born  in  his  mother's  womb.

As  Brahma  is  surrounded,  in  exoteric  traditions,  by  seven  layers  within  and  seven  without  the  Mundane  Egg,  so  is  the  embryo  (the  first  or  the  seventh  layer,  according  to  the  end  from  which  we  begin  to  count).  Thus,  just  as  Esotericism  in  its  Cosmogony  enumerates  seven  inner  and  seven  outer  layers,  so  Physiology  notes  the  contents  of  the  uterus  as  seven  also,  although  it  is  completely  ignorant  of  this  being  a  copy  of  what  takes  place  in  the  Universal  Matrix.

These  contents  are  :

1.      Embryo.

2.    Amniotic   Fluid,  immediately  surrounding  the  Embryo.

3.  Amnion,   a   membrane  derived  from  the  Foetus,  which  contains  the  fluid.

4.  Umbilical     Vesicle,    which    serves   to   convey   nourishment   originally    to  the   Embryo   and   to   nourish  it.     5.  Allantois,   a  protrusion  from  the  Embryo  in   the   form    of   a   closed   bag,   which   spreads   itself   between   3   and  7,   in  the  midst  of  6,  and  which,  after  being  specialized  into  the  Placenta,  serves  to  conduct   nourishment   to   the    Embryo.

6.    Interspace   between  3  and  7  (the  Amnion  and  Chorion),  filled  with  an  albuminous  fluid.

7.  Chorion,  or  outer  layer.

Now,  each  of  these  seven  contents  severally  corresponds  with,  and  is  formed  after,  an  antetype,  one  on  each  of  the  seven  planes  of  being,  with  which  in  their  turn  correspond  the  seven  states  of  Matter  and  all  other  forces,  sensational  or  functional,  in  Nature.

The  following  is  a  bird's-eye  view  of  the  seven  correspondential  contents  of  the  wombs  of  Nature  and  of  Woman.

We  may  contrast  them  thus  :

COSMIC  PROCESS  HUMAN  PROCESS

(UPPER  POLE)  (LOWER  POLE)

1,     The  mathematical  Point,  called          1.     The  terrestrial   Embryo,   which  the   "  Cosmic  Seed,"  the  Monad  of     contains  in  it  the  future  man  with  all

1  Wilson's  translation,  as  amended  by  Fitzedward  Hall,  Vol.

i,  p.  40.

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Leibnitz  ;  which  contains  the  whole  Universe,  as  the  acorn  the  oak.

This  is  the  first  bubble  on  the  surface  of  boundless  homogeneous  Substance,  or  Space,  the  bubble  of  differentia-  tion in  its  incipient  stage.

It  is  the  beginning  of  the  Orphic  or  Brahma's  Egg.

It  corresponds  in  Astrology  and  Astronomy  to  the  Sun.

2       The  vis   vitae  of  our  solar  sys-  tem exudes  from  the  Sun.

a.  It    is  called,   when    referred   to  the  higher  planes,  Akasha.

b.  It  proceeds  from  the  ten  "  divin-  ities,"  the   ten    numbers    of  the  Sun,  which  is  itself  the  "  Perfect  Number."  These  are  called  Dish — in  reality  Space  — the  forces   spread  in  Space,  three  of  which   are  contained  in  the  Sun's  Atman,     or     seventh    principle,    and  seven  are  the  rays  shot  out  by  the  Sun.

3  The  Ether  of  Space,  which,  in  its  external  aspect,  is  the  plastic  crust  which  is  supposed  to  envelope  the  Sun.

On  the  higher  plane  it  is  the  whole  Universe,  as  the  third  differen-  tiation of  evolving  Substance,  Mula-  vital  aura,  prakriti  becoming  Prakriti.

his  potentialities.

In  the  series  of  principles  of  the  human  system  it  is  the  Atman,  or  the  super-spiritual  principle,  just  as  in  the  physical  Solar  System  it  is  the  Sun.

2.  The  Amniotic  Fluid  exudes  from  the  Embryo.

a.  It  is  called,  on  the  plane  of  matter,  Prana.

fa.  It  proceeds,  taking  its  source  in  the  universal  One  Life,  from  the  heart  of  man  and  Buddhi,  over  which  the  Seven  Solar  Rays  (Gods)  preside.

3  The  Amnion,  the  membrane  containing  the  Amniotic  Fluid  and  enveloping  the  Embryo.

After  the  birth  of  man  it  becomes  the  third  layer,  so  to  say,  of  his  magneto-

a.  It  corresponds  mystically  to  the  manifested  Mahat,  or  the  Intellect  or  Soul  of  the  World.

a.  Manas,  the  third  principle  (counting  from  above),  or  the  Human  Soul  in  Man.

4.  The  sidereal  contents  of  Ether,  the  substantial  parts  of  it,  unknown  to  Modern  Science,  represented  :

1  Prana  is  in  reality  the  universal  Life  Principle.

4.  Umbilical  Vesicle,  serving,  as  Science  teaches,  to  nourish  the  Em-  bryo originally,  but,  as  Occult  Science

THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

avers,  to  carry  to  the  Foetus  by  osmosis  the  cosmic  influences  extra-  neous to  the  mother.

a.      In   Occult   and    Kabalistic  My-  steries, by  Elemental.

b.  In  physical  Astronomy,  by  meteors,  comets,  and  all  kinds  of  casual  and  phenomenal  cosmic  bodies.

5.  Life  currents  in  Ether,    having  their   origin   in   the   Sun  :   the  canals  through   which   the    vital  principle  of  that  Ether   (the  blood  of  the  Cosmic  Body)  passes  to  nourish  everything  on  the   Earth  and  on  the  other  Planets  .  from    the    minerals,    which   are   thus  made  to  grow  and  become  specialized,  from  the  plants,   which  are  thus  fed,  to   animal  and   man,   to  whom  life  is  thus  imparted.

6.  The  double  radiation,    psychic  and  physical,  which  radiates  from  the  Cosmic  Seed  and  expands  around  the  whole  Kosmos,  as  well  as  around  the  Solar   System   and  every  Planet.

In  Occultism  it  is  called  the  upper  divine,  and  the  lower  material,  Astral  Light.

7  The  outer  Crust  of  every  sidereal  body,  the  Shell  of  the  Mundane  Egg,  or  the  sphere  of  our  Solar  System,  of  our  Earth,  and  of  every  man  and  animal.

In  sidereal  space,  Ether

a.  In   the   grown   man  these  be-  come   the    feeders    of    Kama,    over  which  they  preside.

b.  In   the    physical    man,  his  pas-  sions and  emotions,  the  moral  meteors  and  comets  of  human  nature.

5  The  Allantois,  a  protrusion  from  the  Embryo,  which  spreads  itself  be-  tween the  Amnion  and  Chorion  ;  it  is  supposed  to  conduct  the  nourishment  from  the  mother  to  the  Embryo.

It  corresponds  to  the  life-principle,  Prana  or  Jiva.

6.  The  Allantois  is  divided  into  two  layers.

The  interspace  between  the  Amnion  and  the  Chorion  contains  the  Allantois  and  also  an  albuminous  fluid.

7  The  Chorion,  or  the  Zona  Pel-  lucida,  the  globular  object  called  Blastodermic  Vesicle,  the  outer  and  the  inner  layers  of  the  membrane  of  which  go  to  form  the  physical

1  All  the  uterine  contents,  having  a  direct  spiritual  connection  with  their  cosmic  antetypes,  are,  on  the  physical  plane,  potent  objects  in  Black  Magic,  and  are  therefore  considered  unclean.

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proper  ;   on  the  terrestrial  plane,  Air,      man.

The  outer,  or  ectoderm,  forms  which  again  is  built  in  seven  layers.

his   epidermis  ;    the    inner,   or  endo-

derm,  his  muscles,  bones,  etc.

Man's  skin,  again,  is  composed  of  seven  layers.

»

a.      The  primordial  potential  world-          a.     The  "  primitive  "  becomes  the  stuff   becomes   (for   the  Manvantanc     "  permanent  "  Chorion.

period)  the  permanent  globe  or  globes.

Even  in  the  evolution  of  the  Races  we  see  the  same  order  as  in  Nature  and  Man.1  Placental  animal-man  became  such  only  after  the  separation  of  sexes  in  the  Third  Root  Race.

In  the  physiological  evolution,  the  placenta  is  fully  formed  and  functional  only  after  the  third  month  of  uterine  life.

Let  us  put  aside  such  human  conceptions  as  a  personal  God,  and  hold  to  the  purely  divine,  to  that  which  underlies  all  and  everything  in  boundless  Nature.

It  is  called  by  its  Sanskrit  Esoteric  name  in  the  Vedas,  TAT  (or  THAT),  a  term  for  the  unknowable  Rootless  Root.

If  we  do  so,  we  may  answer  these  seven  questions  of  the  Esoteric  Catechism  thus  :

(1)  Q. — What  is  the  Eternal  Absolute  ?  A. — THAT.

(2)  Q. — How  came  Kosmos  into  being  ?  A. — Through  THAT.

(3)  Q. — How,  or  what  will  it  be  when  it  falls  back  into  Pralaya  ?  A. — In  THAT.

(4)  Q. — Whence  all   the  animate,  and  suppositionally,  the  "  inanimate  "

nature  ?  A. — From  THAT.

(5)  Q. — What   is  the   Substance   and    Essence   of   which  the  Universe  is

formed  ?  A. — THAT.

(6)  Q. — Into  what  has  it  been  and  will  be  again  and  again  resolved  ?  A. — Into  THAT.

(7)  Q. — Is  THAT  then   both   the  instrumental   and  material  cause  of  the

Universe  ?

A. — What  else  is  it  or  can  it  be  than  THAT  ?

As  the  Universe,  the  Macrocosm  and  the  Microcosm,"  are  ten,  why  should  we  divide  Man  into  seven  "  principles  "  ?  This  is  the  reason  why  the  perfect

1  See  Vol.

3,  Part  1  2  The  Solar  System  or  the  Earth,  as  the  case  may  be

426  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

number  ten  is  divided  into  two  :  in  their  completeness,  i.e.,  super-spiritually  and  physically,  the  forces  are  TEN  :  to  wit,  three  on  the  subjective  and  incon-  ceivable, and  seven  on  the  objective  plane.

Bear  in  mind  that  I  am  now  giving  you  the  description  of  the  two  opposite  poles :  (a)  the  primordial  Triangle,  which,  as  soon  as  it  has  reflected  itself  in  the  "  Heavenly  Man,"  the  highest.

of  the  lower  seven — disappears,  returning  into  "  Silence  and  Dark-  ness "  ;  and  (b)  the  astral  paradigmatic  man,  whose  Monad  (Atma)  is  also  represented  by  a  triangle,  as  it  has  to  become  a  ternary  in  conscious  Deva-  chanic  interludes.

The  purely  terrestrial  man  being  reflected  in  the  universe  of  Matter,  so  to  say,  upside  down,  the  upper  Triangle,  wherein  the  creative  ideation  and  the  subjective  potentiality  of  the  formative  faculty  resides,  is  shifted  in  the  man  of  clay  below  the  seven.

Thus  three  of  the  ten,  containing  in  the  archetypal  world  only  ideative  and  paradigmatical  potentiality,  i.e.,  existing  in  possibility,  not  in  action,  are  in  fact  one.

The  potency  of  formative  creation  resides  in  the  Logos,  the  synthesis  of  the  seven  Forces  or  Rays,  which  be-  comes forthwith  the  Quaternary,  the  sacred  Tetraktys.

This  process  is  repeated  in  man,  in  whom  the  lower  physical  triangle  becomes,  in  conjunction  with  the  female  One,  the  male-female  creator,  or  generator.

The  same  on  a  still  lower  plane  in  the  animal  world.

A  mystery  above,  a  mystery  below,  truly.

This  is  how  the  upper  and  highest,  and  the  lower  and  most  animal  stand  in  mutual  relation.

DIAGRAM  I

In  this  diagram,  we  see  that  physical  man  (or  his  body)  does  not  share  in  the  direct  pure  waves  of  the  divine  Essence  which  flows  from  the  One  in  Three,  the  Unmanifested,  through  the  Manifested  Logos  (the  upper  face  in  the  diagram).  Purusha,  the  primeval  Spirit,  touches  the  human  head  and  stops  there.

But  the  Spiritual  Man  (the  synthesis  of  the  seven  principles)  is  directly  connected  with  it.  And  here  a  few  words  ought  to  be  said  about  the  usual  exoteric  enumeration  of  the  principles.

At  first  an  approximate  division  only  was  made  and  given  out.

Esoteric  Buddhism  begins  with  Atma,  the  seventh,  and  ends  with  the  Physical  Body,  the  first.

Now  neither  Atma,  which  is  no  individual  "  principle,"  but  a  radiation  from  and  one  with  the  Unmanifested  Logos  ;  or  the  Body,  which  is  the  material  rind,  or  shell,  of  the  Spiritual  Man,  can  be,  in  strict  truth,  referred  to  as  '•  Principles."  Moreover,  the  chief  "  principle  "  of  all,  one  not  even  mentioned  heretofore,  is  the  "  Luminous  Egg  "  (Hiranyagarbha),  or  the  invisible  magnetic  sphere  in  which

DIAGRAM  I

1st.— Macrocosm  and  Its  3,  7,  or  1O  Centres  of  Creative  Forces  A

A.  Sexless,  Unmanifested  Logos

B.  Potential  Wisdom

C.  Universal  Ideation

a.  Creative  Logos

b.  Eternal  Substance

c.  Spirit

The    Spiritual   Forces  acting  in  Matter

/(  ©Psychic (e)

bl''    !       \       y

;(  ©  Astral©     \

A.  B.  C.  The  Unknowable

a.  b.  c.  This  is  Pradhana,  un-  differentiated  matter  in  Sankhya  philosophy,  or  Good,  Evil  and  Chaotic  Darkness  (Sattva,  Rajas,  and  Tamas),  neutralizing  each  other.

When  differentiat-  ed, they  become  the  Seven  Creative  Potencies :  Spirit,  Substance  and  Fire  stimula-  ting Matter  to  form  itself.

2nd.— Microcosm  (the  Inner  Man)  and  His  3,  7,  or  1O  Centres  of  Potential  Forces

(ATM AN,  although  exoterically  reckoned  as  the  seventh  principle,  is  no  indi-  vidual principle  at  all,  and  belongs  to  the  Universal  Soul  ;  7  is  the  AURIC  EGG,  the  Magnetic  Sphere  round  every  human  and  animal  being.)

1.  BUDDHI.

the  vehicle  of  ATMA.

2.  MANAS,        the      vehicle      of

BUDDHI.

3.  LOWER     MANAS  (the  Upper

and  Lower  MANAS  are  two  aspects  of  one  and  the  same  principle)  and

4.  K&MA  RuPA,  its  vehicle

5.  PRANA,  Life  and

6-  LINGA  SHARFRA,  its  vehicle

'7,

I.  ll,  ill.

are  the  Three  Hypo-  stases  of  ATMAN.

its  contact  with  Nature  and  Man  being  the  Fourth,  making  it  a  Quaternary,  or  Tetraktys,  the  Higher  Self

1  2.  3.  4.  5.  6.  These  six  prin-  ciples, acting  on  four  dif-  ferent planes,  and  having  their  AURIC  ENVELOPE  on  the  seventh  (vide  infra),  are  those  used  by  the  Adepts  of  the  Right-Hand,  or  White  Magicians.

1  The  Physical  Body  is  no  principle  ;  it  is  entirely  ignored,  being  used  only  in  Black  Magic.

3rd. — Microcosm  (the  Physical  Man)  and  His  1Q ^Orifices,  or  centres  of  Action

1.    (BUDDHI)  Right  Eye

3-    (LOWER  MANAS)  Right  Ear

5.   (LIFE  PRINCIPLE)  Right  Nostril

7.   The   Organ  of  the   CREATIVE  LOGOS,  the  Mouth

innection    with    the     Higher

8.  9.  10.

direct     --

Atmic  Triad  and  (creative,  preservative  and  destruc-  tive, or  rather  regenerative),  the  abuse  of  the  corresponding  functions  is  the  most  terrible  of  Karmic  Sins —  the  Sin  against  the  Holy  Ghost  with  the  Christians.

2.    (MANAS)  Left  Eye  4.    (KAMA  RUPA)  Left  Ear

6.  (LIFE  VEHICLE)  Left  Nostril

7.  The    Paradigm    of    the    10th  (creative)      orifice       in      the  Lower  Triad

These  Physical  Organs  are  used  only  by  Dugpas  in  Black  Magic

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every  man  is  enveloped.1  It  is  the  direct  emanation  :  (a)  from  the  Atmic  Ray  in  its  triple  aspect  of  Creator,  Preserver  and  Destroyer  (Regenerator)  ;  and  (b)  from  Buddhi-Manas.

The  seventh  aspect  of  this  individual  Aura  is  the  faculty  of  assuming  the  form  of  its  body  and  becoming  the  "  Radiant,"  the  Luminous  Augoeides.

It  is  this,  strictly  speaking,  which  at  times  becomes  the  form  called  Mayavi  Rupa.

Therefore,  as  explained  in  the  second  face  of  the  diagram  (the  astral  man),  the  Spiritual  Man  consists  of  only  five  principles,  as  taught  by  the  Vedantins,"  who  substitute,  tacitly,  for  the  physical  this  sixth,  or  Auric,  Body,  and  merge  the  dual  Manas  (the  dual  mind,  or  consciousness)  into  one.

Thus  they  speak  of  five  Koshas  (sheaths  or  principles),  and  call  Atma  the  sixth  yet  no  "  principle."  This  is  the  secret  of  the  late  Subba  Row's  criticism  of  the  division  in  Esoteric  Buddhism.

But  let  the  student  now  learn  the  true  Esoteric  enumeration.

The  reason  why  public  mention  of  the  Auric  Body  was  not  permitted  was  on  account  of  its  being  so  sacred.

It  is  this  Body  which,  at  death,  assimilates  the  essence  of  Buddhi  and  Manas  and  becomes  the  vehicle  of  these  spiritual  principles,  which  are  not  objective,  and  then,  with  the  full  radiation  of  Atma  upon  it  ascends  as  Manas-Taijasi  into  the  Devachanic  state.

Therefore  is  it  called  by  many  names.

It  is  the  Sutratma,  the  silver  "  thread  "  which  "  incar-  nates "  from  the  beginning  of  Manvantara  to  the  end,  stringing  upon  itself  the  pearls  of  human  existence,  in  other  words,  the  spiritual  aroma  of  every  personality  it  follows  through  the  pilgrimage  of  life.3  It  is  also  the  material  from  which  the  Adept  forms  his  Astral  Bodies,  from  the  Augoeides  and  the  Mayavi  Rupa  downwards.

After  the  death  of  man,  when  its  most  ethereal  particles  have  drawn  into  themselves  the  spiritual  principles  of  Buddhi  and  the  Upper  Manas,  and  are  illuminated  with  the  radiance  of  Atma,  the  Auric  Body  remains  either  in  the  Devachanic  state  of  consciousness,  or,  in  the  case  of  a  full  Adept,  prefers  the  state  of  a  Nirmanakaya,  that  is,  one  who  has  so  puri-  fied his  whole  system  that  he  is  above  even  the  divine  illusion  of  a  Devachani.

Such  an  Adept  remains  in  the  astral  (invisible)  plane  connected  with  our  earth,  and  henceforth  moves  and  lives  in  the  possession  of  all  his  principles  except  the  Kama  Rupa  and  Physical  Body.

In  the  case  of  the  Devachani,  the  Linga  Sharira — the  alter  ego  of  the  body,  which  during  life  is  within  the  physical  envelope  while  the  radiant  aura  is  without — strengthened  by  the  material  particles  which  this  aura  leaves  behind,  remains  close  to  the  dead  body  and

1  So  are  the  animals,  the  plants,  and  even  the  minerals      Reichenbach  never  understood  what  he  learned  through   his  sensitives  and   clairvoyants.

It  is  the  odic,  or  rather  the  auric  or  magnetic  fluid  which  emanates  from  man,  but  it  is  also  something  more.

2  See  Vol    1 ,  pp.  211-2,  for  the  Vedfintic  exoteric  enumeration.

JSee  Lucifer,  January,  1889,  p.  408,  "  Dialogue  upon  the  Mysteries  of  After-Life  "

428  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

outside  it,  and  soon  fades  away.

In  the  case  of  the  full  Adept,  the  body  alone  becomes  subject  to  dissolution,  while  the  centre  of  that  force  which  was  the  seat  of  desires  and  passions,  disappears  with  its  cause — the  animal  body.

But  during  the  life  of  the  latter  all  these  centres  are  more  or  less  active  and  in  constant  correspondence  with  their  prototypes,  the  cosmic  centres,  and  their  microcosms,  the  principles.

It  is  only  through  these  cosmic  and  spiritual  centres  that  the  physical  centres  (the  upper  seven  orifices  and  the  lower  triad)  can  benefit  by  their  Occult  interaction,  for  these  orifices,  or  openings,  are  channels  conducting  into  the  body  the  influences  that  the  will  of  man  attracts  and  uses,  viz.,  the  cosmic  forces.

This  will  has,  of  course,  to  act  primarily  through  the  spiritual  principles.

To  make  this  clearer,  let  us  take  an  example.

In  order  to  stop  pain,  let  us  say  in  the  right  eye,  you  have  to  attract  to  it  the  potent  magnetism  from  that  cosmic  principle  which  corresponds  to  this  eye  and  also  to  Buddhi.

Create,  by  a  powerful  will  effort,  an  imaginary  line  of  communication  between  the  right  eye  and  Buddhi,  locating  the  latter  as  a  centre  in  the  same  part  of  the  head.

This  line,  though  you  may  call  it  "  imaginary,"  is,  once  you  succeed  in  seeing  it  with  your  mental  eye  and  give  it  a  shape  and  colour,  in  truth  as  good  as  real.

A  rope  in  a  dream  ;s  not  and  yet  is.  Moreover,  according  to  the  prismatic  colour  with  which  you  endow  your  line,  so  will  the  influence  act.

Now  Buddhi  and  Mercury  correspond  with  each  other,  and  both  are  yellow,  or  radiant  and  golden  coloured.

In  the  human  system,  the  right  eye  corres-  ponds with  Buddhi  and  Mercury  ;  and  the  left  with  Manas  and  Venus  or  Lucifer.

Thus,  if  your  line  is  golden  or  silvery,  it  will  stop  the  pain  ;  if  red,  it  will  increase  it,  for  red  is  the  colour  of  Kama  and  corresponds  with  Mars.

Mental  or  Christian  Scientists  have  stumbled  upon  the  effects  without  under-  standing the  causes.

Having  found  by  chance  the  secret  of  producing  such  results  owing  to  mental  abstraction,  they  attribute  them  to  their  union  with  God  (whether  a  personal  or  impersonal  God  they  know  best),  whereas  it  is  simply  the  effect  of  one  or  another  principle.

However  it  may  be,  they  are  on  the  path  of  discovery,  although  they  must  remain  wandering  for  a  long  time  to  come.

Let  not  Esoteric  students  commit  the  same  mistake.

It  has  often  been  explained  that  neither  the  cosmic  planes  of  substance  nor  even  the  human  principles — with  the  exception  of  the  lowest  material  plane  or  world  and  the  physical  body,  which,  as  has  been  said,  are  no  "  principles," — can  be  located  or  thought  of  as  being  in  Space  and  Time.

As  the  former  are  seven  in  ONE,  so  are  we  seven  in  ONE — that  same  absolute  Soul  of  the  World,  which  is  both  Matter  and  non-Matter,  Spirit  and  non-Spirit,  Being  and  non-Being,

PAPER

Impress  yourselves  well  with  this  idea,  all  those  of  you  who  would  study  the  mysteries  of  SELF.

Remember  that  with  our  physical  senses  alone  at  our  command,  none  of  us  can  hope  to  reach  beyond  gross  Matter.

We  can  do  so  only  through  one  or  another  of  our  seven  spiritual  senses,  either  by  training,  or  if  one  is  a  born  Seer.

Yet  even  a  clairvoyant  possessed  of  such  faculties,  if  not  an  Adept,  no  matter  how  honest  and  sincere  he  may  be,  will,  through  his  ignorance  of  the  truths  of  Occult  Science,  be  led  by  the  visions  he  sees  in  the  Astral  Light  only  to  mistake  for  God  or  Angels  the  denizens  of  those  spheres  of  which  he  may  occasionally  catch  a  glimpse,  as  witness  Swedenborg  and  others.

These  seven  senses  of  ours  correspond  with  every  other  septenate  in  nature  and  in  ourselves.

Physically,  though  invisibly,  the  human  Auric  Envel-  ope (the  amnion  of  the  physical  man  in  every  age  of  life)  has  seven  layers,  just  as  Cosmic  Space  and  our  physical  epidermis  have.

It  is  this  Aura  which,  according  to  our  mental  and  physical  state  of  purity  or  impurity,  either  opens  for  us  vistas  into  other  worlds,  or  shuts  us  out  altogether  from  anything  but  this  three-dimensional  world  of  Matter.

Each  of  our  seven  physical  senses  (two  of  which  are  still  unknown  to  pro-  fane Science),  and  also  of  our  seven  states  of  consciousness — viz.

:  (1)  waking  ;  (2)  waking-dreaming  ;  (3)  natural  sleeping ;  (4)  induced  or  trance-sleep  ,  (5)  psychic  ;  (6)  super-psychic  ;  (?)  and  purely  spiritual — corresponds  with  one  of  the  seven  Cosmic  Planes,  develops  and  uses  one  of  the  seven  super-  senses,  and  is  connected  directly,  in  its  use  on  the  terrestro-spiritual  plane,  with  the  cosmic  and  divine  centre  of  force  that  gave  it  birth,  and  which  is  its  direct  creator.

Each  is  also  connected  with,  and  under  the  direct  influence  of,  one  of  the  seven  sacred  Planets.1  These  belonged  to  the  Lesser  Mysteries,  whose  followers  were  called  Mystai  (the  veiled),  seeing  that  they  were  allowed  to  perceive  things  only  through  a  mist,  as  it  were  "  with  the  eyes  closed  "  ;  while  the  Initiates  or  "  Seers  "  of  the  Greater  Mysteries  were  called  Epoptai  (those  who  see  things  unveiled).  It  was  the  latter  only  who  were  taught  the  true  mysteries  of  the  Zodiac  and  the  relations  and  correspondences  between  its  twelve  signs  (two  secret)  and  the  ten  human  orifices.

The  latter  are  now  of  course  ten  in  the  female,  and  only  nine  in  the  male ;  but  this  is  merely  an  external  difference.

In  the  third  volume  of  this  work  it  is  stated  that  till  the  end  of  the  Third  Root  Race  (when  androgynous  man  separated  into  male  and  female)  the  ten  orifices  existed  in  the  hermaphrodite,  first  potentially,  then  functionally.

1  See  Vol.

2,  pp.  296-9.

430  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

The  evolution  of  the  human  embryo  shows  this.

For  instance,  the  only  opening  formed  at  first  is  the  buccal  cavity,  "a  cloaca  communicating  with  the  anterior  extremity  of  the  intestine."  This  becomes  later  the  mouth  and  the  posterior  orifice :  the  Logos  differentiating  and  emanating  gross  matter  on  the  lower  plane,  in  Occult  parlance.

The  difficulty  which  some  students  will  experience  in  reconciling  the  correspondences  between  the  Zodiac  and  the  orifices  can  be  easily  explained.

Magic  is  coeval  with  the  Third  Root  Race,  which  began  by  creating  through  Kriyashakti  and  ended  by  generating  its  species  in  the  present  way.1  Woman,  being  left  with  the  full  or  perfect  cosmic  number  10  (the  divine  number  of  Jehovah),  was  deemed  higher  and  more  spiritual  than  man.

In  Egypt,  in  days  of  old,  the  marriage  service  contained  an  article  that  the  woman  should  be  the  "  lady  of  the  lord,"  and  real  lord  over  him,  the  husband  pledging  himself  to  be  "obedient  to  his  wife"  for  the  production  of  alchemical  results  such  as  the  Elixir  of  Life  and  the  Philosopher's  Stone,  for  the  spiritual  help  of  the  woman  was  needed  by  the  male  Alchemist.

But  woe  to  the  Alchemist  who  should  take  this  in  the  dead-letter  sense  of  physical  union.

Such  sacrilege  would  become  Black  Magic  and  be  followed  by  certain  failure.

The  true  Alchemist  of  old  took  aged  women  to  help  him,  carefully  avoiding  the  young  ones  ;  and  if  any  of  them  happened  to  be  married  they  treated  their  wives  for  months  both  before  and  during  their  operations  as  sisters.

The  error  of  crediting  the  Ancients  with  knowing  only  ten  of  the  zodiacal  signs  is  explained  in  Isis  Unveiled.'  The  Ancients  did  know  of  twelve,  but  viewed  these  signs  differently  from  ourselves.

They  took  neither  Virgo  nor  Scorpio  singly  into  consideration,  but  regarded  them  as  two  in  one,  since  they  were  made  to  refer  directly  and  symbolically  to  the  primeval  dual  man  and  his  separation  into  sexes.

During  the  reformation  of  the  Zodiac,  Libra  was  added  as  the  twelfth  sign,  though  it  is  simply  an  equilibrating  sign,  at  the  turning  point — the  mystery  of  separated  man.

Let  the  student  learn  all  this  well.

Meanwhile  we  have  to  recapitulate  what  has  been  said.

(1)  Each  human  being  is  an  incarnation  of  his  God,  in  other  words,  one  with  his  "  Father  in  Heaven,"  just  as  Jesus,  an  Initiate,  is  made  to  say.

As  many  men  on  earth,  so  many  Gods  in  Heaven  ;  and  yet  these  Gods  are  in  reality  ONE,  for  at  the  end  of  every  period  of  activity,  they  are  withdrawn,  like  the  rays  of  the  setting  sun,  into  the  Parent  Luminary,  the  Non-Manifested  Logos,  which  in  its  turn  is  merged  into  the  One  Absolute.

Shall  we  call  these  "Fathers"  of  ours,  whether  individually  or  collectively,  and  under  any

1  See  Vol.

1 ,  p.  255,  et  seq.,  and  3  and  4  passim.

-  Op.  at.,  II.  pp.  456,  461 ,  465  et  seq.

PAPER

circumstances,  our  personal  God  ?  Occultism  answers,  Never.

All  that  art  average  man  can  know  of  his  "  Father  "  is  what  he  knows  of  himself,  through  and  within  himself.

The  Soul  of  his  "  Heavenly  Father  "  is  incarnated  in  him.

This  Soul  is  himself,  if  he  be  successful  in  assimilating  the  Divine  Individuality  while  in  his  physical,  animal  shell.

As  to  the  Spirit  thereof,  as  well  expect  to  be  heard  by  the  Absolute.

Our  prayers  and  supplications  are  vain,  unless  to  potential  words  we  add  potent  acts,  and  make  the  Aura  which  surrounds  each  one  of  us  so  pure  and  divine  that  the  God  within  us  may  act  outwardly,  or  in  other  words,  become  as  it  were  an  extraneous  Potency.

Thus  have  initiates.

Saints,  and  very  holy  and  pure  men  been  enabled  to  help  others  as  well  as  themselves  in  the  hour  of  need,  and  produce  what  are  foolishly  called  "  miracles,"  each  by  the  help  and  with  the  aid  of  the  God  within  himself,  which  he  alone  has  enabled  to  act  on  the  outward  plane.

(2)  The   word   AUM   or  OM,   which   corresponds  to  the  upper  Triangle,  if  pronounced  by  a  very  holy  and  pure  man,  will  draw  out,  or  awaken,  not  only  the  less  exalted  Potencies  residing  in  the  planetary  spaces  and  elements,  but  even  his   Higher   Self,    or   the  "  Father  "  within  him.

Pronounced  by  an  averagely  good     man,     in    the    correct   way,    it   will    help   to    strengthen    him    morally,  especially  if  between  two  "  AUMS  "  he  meditates  intently  upon  the  AUM  within  him,   concentrating  all  his  attention  upon  the  ineffable  glory.

But  woe  to  the  man    who    pronounces    it   after  the  commission  of  some  far-reaching  sin  :   he  will   only   thereby   attract   to   his  own  impure  photosphere  invisible  Presences  and  Forces  which  could  not  otherwise  break  through  the  Divine  Envelope.

AUM  is  the  original  of  Amen.

Now,  Amen  is  not  a  Hebrew  term,  but,  like  the  word  Halleluiah,  was  borrowed  by  the  Jews  and  Greeks  from  the  Chaldees.

The  latter  word  is  often  found  repeated  in  certain  magical  inscriptions  upon  cups  and  urns  among  the  Babylonian  and  Ninevean  relics.

Amen  does  not  mean  "so  be  it,"  or  "  verily,"  but  signified  in  hoary  antiquity  almost  the  same  as  AUM.

The  Jewish  Tanaim  (Initiates)  used  it,  for  the  same  reason  as  the  Aryan  Adepts  use  AUM,  and  with  a  like  success,  the  numerical  value  of  AMeN  in  Hebrew  letters  being  91,  the  same  as  the  full  value  of  YHVH,1  26,  and  ADoNaY,  65,  or  91.  Both  words  mean  the  affirmation  of  the  being,  or  existence,  of  the  sexless  "  Lord  "  within  us.

(3)  Esoteric    Science    teaches    that    every    sound    in    the   visible  world  awakens  its  corresponding  sound  in  the  invisible  realms,  and  arouses  to  action  some   force  or  other   on  the  Occult  side  of  Nature.

Moreover,  every  sound  corresponds  to  a  colour  and  a  number  (a  potency  spiritual,  psychic  or  physical)

1  Jod-Hevah,  or  male-female  on  the  terrestrial  plane,  as  invented  by  the  Jews,  and  now  made  out  to  mean  Jehovah  ;  but  signifying  in  reality  and  literally,  "  giving  being  "  and  "  receiving  life  "

432  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINI

and  to  a  sensation  on  some  plane.

All  these  find  an  echo  in  every  one  c  the  so-far  developed  elements,  and  even  on  the  terrestrial  plane,  in  the  Live  that  swarm  in  the  terrene  atmosphere,  thus  prompting  them  to  action.

Thus  a  prayer,  unless  pronounced  mentally  and  addressed  to  one'  "Father"  in  the  silence  and  solitude  of  one's  "closet,"  must  have  mor  frequently  disastrous  than  beneficial  results,  seeing  that  the  masses  are  entirel  ignorant  of  the  potent  effects  which  they  thus  produce.

To  produce  goo  effects,  the  prayer  must  be  uttered  by  "  one  who  knows  how  to  make  him  self  heard  in  silence,"  when  it  is  no  longer  a  prayer,  but  becomes  a  corr  -mand.

Why  is  Jesus  shown  to  have  forbidden  his  hearers  to  go  to  the  publi  synagogues  ?  Surely  every  praying  man  was  not  a  hypocrite  and  a  liar,  nor  Pharisee  who  loved  to  be  seen  praying  by  people !  He  had  a  motive,  w  must  suppose  :  the  same  motive  which  prompts  the  experienced  Occultist  t  prevent  his  pupils  from  going  into  crowded  places  now  as  then,  from  enterin  churches,  seance  rooms,  etc.,  unless  they  are  in  sympathy  with  the  crowc

There  is  one  piece  of  advice  to  be  given  to  beginners,  who  cannot  hel  going  into  crowds — one  which  may  appear  superstitious,  but  which  in  th  •absence  of  Occult  knowledge  will  be  found  efficacious.

As  well  known  t  good  Astrologers,  the  days  of  the  week  are  not  in  the  order  of  those  plane  whose  names  they  bear.

The  fact  is  that  the  ancient  Hindus  and  Egyptiar  divided  the  day  into  four  parts,  each  day  being  under  the  protection  (<  ascertained  by  practical  magic)  of  a  planet ;  and  every  day,  as  correct  asserted  by  Dion  Cassius,  received  the  name  of  the  planet  which  ruled  an  protected  its  first  portion.

Let  the  student  protect  himself  from  the  "  Powei  of  the  Air  "  (Elemental)  which  throng  public  places,  by  wearing  either  ring  containing  some  jewel  of  the  colour  of  the  presiding  planet,  or  else  c  the  metal  sacred  to  it.  But  the  best  protection  is  a  clear  conscience  and  firm  desire  to  benefit  Humanity.

THE  PLANETS,  THE  DAYS  OF  THE  WEEK  AND  THEIR  CORRESPONDS  COLOURS  AND  METALS

In  the  accompanying  diagram  the  days  of  the  week  do  not  stand  their  usual  order,  though  they  are  placed  in  their  correct  sequence  <  determined  by  the  order  of  the  colours  in  the  solar  spectrum  and  the  corre  spending  colours  of  their  ruling  planets.

The  fault  of  the  confusion  in  th  order  of  the  days  revealed  by  this  comparison  lies  at  the  door  of  the  ear  •Christians.

Adopting  from  the  Jews  their  lunar  months,  they  tried  to  blen

DIAGRAM    II

These  Correspondences  are  from  the  Objective,  Terrestrial  Plane.

ATMAN  is  no  Number,  and  corresponds  to  no  visible  Planet,  for  it  proceeds  from  the  Spiritual  Sun ;  nor  does

ATMA

it  bear  any  relation  either  to  Sound,  Colour,  or  the  rest,  for  it  includes  them

As  the  Human  Principles  have  no  Numbers  per  se,  but  on|y  correspond  to  Numbers,  Sounds,  Colours,  etc.,  they  are  not  enu-  merated here  in  the  order  used  for  exoteric  purposes.

NUMBERS

MEJALS                        PLANEJS

THE  HUMAN              DAYS  OF  7HE  PRINCIPLES    I           WEEK

COLOURS

SOUND  "MUSICATsCALr

1  AND

IRON

MARS

KAMA  ROPA               TUESDAY

1.  RED

Sanskrit

Italian

Physical  Man's  Key-note

The  Planet  of  Generation

The  vehicle  or  seat

Dies  M  arils,  or

Gamut

Gamut

of    the   Animal    In-

Tiw

stincts  and  Passions

SA

DO

GOLD

THE  SUN

PRANA  OR  JlVA

SUNDAY

2.  ORANGE

Rl

RE

Life  Spiritual  and  Life  Physical

The  Giver  of  Life  physic-

Life

Dies    Soils,    or

ally.

Spiritually   and  eso-

Sun

terically  the  substitute  for

the  inter-Mercurial  Planet,

a  sacred  and  secret  planet

with  the  ancients

j

MERCURY

MERCURY

BUDDHI

WEDNESDAY

3.  YELLOW

GA

Ml

Because   BUDDHI    is  (so  to

Mixes  with  Sul-

The  Messenger   and  the

Spiritual   Soul,  or

Dies  Mercur/f,  or

speak)     between     ATMA    and

phur,  as  BUDDHI

Interpreter  of  the  Gods

Atmic  Ray  ;  vehicle

Woden.

Day  of

MANAS,    and   forms    with   the

is  mixed  with  the

of  Atma

Buddha     in     the

seventh,  or  AURIC  ENVELOPE,

Flame    of    Spirit

South,       and     of

the  Devachanic  Triad

(See    Alchemical

Woden      in    the

Definitions)

North  —  Gods     of

Wisdom.

LEAD

SATURN

KAMA  MANAS

SATURDAY

4.  GREEN

MA

FA

The    middle     principle  —  be-

The Lower  Mind,

Dies  Saturn/,  or

tween  the  purely  material  and

or  Animal  Soul

Saturn

purely     spiritual    triads.

The

conscious  part  of  animal  man.

TIN

JUPITER

AURIC  ENVELOPE

THURSDAY

5.  BLUE

PA

SOL

Dies    Jovis.

or

Thor

COPPER

VENUS

MANAS

FRIDAY

6.  INDIGO

DA

LA

When    alloyed  becomes    Bronze

The    Morning    and    the  Evening  Star

The  Higher  Mind,  of  Human  Soul

Dies  Veneris,  or  Frige

OR  DARK  BLUE

(the   dual  princi-

pie)

SILVER

THE  MOON

LINGA  SHARlRA

MONDAY

7.  VIOLET

Nl

SI

Contains   in  itself  the  reflec-

The Parent  of  the  Earth

The  Astral  Double

Dies  Lunae,  or

tion  of  Septenary  Man

of  Man  ;  the  Parent

Moon

of  the  Physical  Man

PAPER

them  with  the  solar  planets,  and  so  made  a  mess  of  it ;  for  the  order  of  the  days  of  the  week  as  it  now  stands  does  not  follow  the  order  of  the  planets.

Now,  the  Ancients  arranged  the  planets  in  the  following  order :  Moon,  Mercury,  Venus,  Sun,  Mars,  Jupiter,  Saturn,  counting  the  Sun  as  a  planet  for  exoteric  purposes.

Again,  the  Egyptians  and  Indians,  the  two  oldest  nations,  divided  their  day  into  four  parts,  each  of  which  was  under  the  protection  and  rule  of  a  planet.

Jn  course  of  time  each  day  came  to  be  called  by  the  name  of  that  planet  which  ruled  its  first  portion — the  morning.

Now,  when  they  arranged  their  week,  the  Chris-  tians proceeded  as  follows  :  they  wanted  to  make  the  day  of  the  Sun,  or  Sunday,  the  seventh,  so  they  named  the  days  of  the  week  by  taking  every  fourth  planet  in  turn;  e.g.,  beginning  with  the  Moon  (Monday),  they  counted  thus :  Moon,  Mercury,  Venus,  Sun,  Mars  ;  thus  Tuesday,  the  day  whose  first  portion  was  ruled  by  Mars,  became  the  second  day  of  the  week  ;  and  so  on.  It  should  be  remembered  also  that  the  Moon,  like  the  Sun,  is  a  substitute  for  a  secret  planet.

The  present  division  of  the  solar  year  was  made  several  centuries  later  than  the  beginning  of  our  era  ;  and  our  week  is  not  that  of  the  Ancients  and  the  Occultists.

The  septenary  division  of  the  four  parts  of  the  lunar  phases  is  as  old  as  the  world,  and  originated  with  the  people  who  reckoned  time  by  the  lunar  months.

The  Hebrews  never  used  it,  for  they  counted  only  the  seventh  day,  the  Sabbath,  though  the  second  chapter  of  Genesis  seems  to  speak  of  it.  Till  the  days  of  the  Caesars  there  is  no  trace  of  a  week  of  seven  days  among  any  nation  save  the  Hindus.

From  India  it  passed  to  the  Arabs,  and  reached  Europe  with  Christianity.

The  Roman  week  consisted  of  eight  days,  and  the  Athenian  often.1  Thus  one  of  the  numberless  contradictions  and  fallacies  of  Christendom  is  the  adoption  of  the  Indian  septenary  week  of  the  lunar  reckoning,  and  the  preservation  at  the  same  time  of  the  mythologic-  al names  of  the  planets.

Nor  do  modern  Astrologers  give  the  correspondences  of  the  days  and  planets  and  their  colours  correctly ;  and  while  Occultists  can  give  good  reason  for  every  detail  of  their  own  tables  of  colours,  etc.,  it  is  doubtful  whether  the  Astrologers  can  do  the  same.

To  close  this  first  Paper,  let  me  say  that  the  readers  must  in  all  necessity  be  separated  into  two  broad  divisions  :  those  who  have  not  quite  rid  themselves  of  the  usual  sceptical  doubts,  but  who  long  to  ascertain  how  much

1  See  Notice  sur  /e  Calendner,  J.  H.  Ragon.

FF

434  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

truth  there  may  be  in  the  claims  of  the  Occultists  ;  and  those  others  who,  having  freed  themselves  from  the  trammels  of  Materialism  and  Relativity,  feel  that  true  and  real  bliss  must  be  sought  only  in  the  knowledge  and  personal  experience  of  that  which  the  Hindu  Philosopher  calls  the  Brahmavidya,  and  the  Buddhist  Arhat  the  realization  of  Adibuddha,  the  primeval  Wisdom.

Let  the  former  pick  out  and  study  from  these  Papers  only  those  explanations  of  the  phenomena  ot  life  which  profane  Science  is  unable  to  give  them.

Even  with  such  limitations,  they  will  find  by  the  end  of  a  year  or  two  that  they  will  have  learned  more  than  all  their  Universities  and  Colleges  can  teach  them.

As  to  the  sincere  believers,  they  will  be  rewarded  by  seeing  their  faith  transformed  into  knowledge.

True  knowledge  is  of  Spirit  and  in  Spirit  alone,  and  cannot  be  acquired  in  any  other  way  except  through  the  region  of  the  higher  mind,  the  only  plane  from  which  we  can  penetrate  the  depths  of  the  all-pervading  Absoluteness.

He  who  carries  out  only  those  laws  establish-  ed by  human  minds,  who  lives  that  life  which  is  prescribed  by  the  code  of  mortals  and  their  fallible  legislation,  chooses  as  his  guiding  star  a  beacon  which  shines  on  the  ocean  of  Maya,  or  of  temporary  delusions,  and  lasts  for  but  one  incarnation.

These  laws  are  necessary  for  the  life  and  welfare  of  physical  man  alone.

He  has  chosen  a  pilot  who  directs  him  through  the-  shoals  of  one  existence,  a  master  who  parts  with  him,  however,  on  the  thresh-  old of  death.

How  much  happier  that  man  who,  while  strictly  performing  on  the  temporary  objective  plane  the  duties  of  daily  life,  carrying  out  each  and  every  law  of  his  country,  and  rendering,  in  short,  to  Caesar  what  is  Caesar's,  leads  in  reality  a  spiritual  and  permanent  existence,  a  life  with  no  breaks  of  continuity,  no  gaps,  no  interludes,  not  even  during  those  periods  which  are  the  halting-places  of  the  long  pilgrimage  of  purely  spiritual  life.

All  the  phenomena  of  the  lower  human  mind  disappear  like  the  curtain  of  a  proscenium,  allowing  him  to  live  in  the  region  beyond  it,  the  plane  of  the  noumenal,  the  one  reality.

If  man  by  suppressing,  if  not  destroying,  his  selfishness  and  personality,  only  succeeds  in  knowing  himself  as  he  is  behind,  the  veil  of  Physical  Maya,  he  will  soon  stand  beyond  all  pain,  all  misery,  and  beyond  all  the  wear  and  tear  of  change,  which  is  the  chief  originator  of  pain.

Such  a  man  will  be  physically  of  Matter,  he  will  move  surrounded  by  Matter,  and  yet  he  will  live  beyond  and  outside  it.  His  body  will  be  subject  to  change,  but  he  himself  will  be  entirely  without  it,  and  will  experience  ever-  lasting life  even  while  in  temporary  bodies  of  short  duration.

All  this  may  be  achieved  by  the  development  of  unselfish  universal  love  of  Humanity,  and  the  suppression  of  personality,  or  selfishness,  which  is  the  cause  of  all  sin,  and.

consequently  of  all  human  sorrow.

PAPER

AN    EXPLANATION

IN  view  of  the  abstruse  nature  of  the  subject  dealt  with,  the  present  Paper  will  begin  with  an  explanation  of  some  points  which  remained  obscure  ir>  the  preceding  one,  as  well  as  of  some  statements  in  which  there  was  an  appearance  of  contradiction.

Astrologers,  of  whom  there  are  many  among  the  Esotericists,  are  likely  to  be  puzzled  by  some  statements  distinctly  contradicting  their  teachings  ;  whilst  those  who  know  nothing  of  the  subject  may  perhaps  find  themselves  opposed  at  the  outset  by  those  who  have  studied  the  exoteric  systems  of  the  Kabalah  and  Astrology.

For  let  it  be  distinctly  known,  nothing  of  that  which  is  printed  broadcast,  and  available  to  every  student  in  public  libraries  or  museums,  is  really  Esoteric,  but  is  either  mixed  with  deliberate  "  blinds,"  or  cannot  be  understood  and  studied  with  profit  without  a  complete  glossary  of  Occult  terms.

The  following  teachings  and  explanations,  therefore,  may  be  useful  to  the  student  in  assisting  him  to  formulate  the  teaching  given  in  the  preceding  Paper.

In  Diagram  1  it  will  be  observed  that  the  3,  7,  and  10  centres  are  res-  pectively as  follows  :

(a)  The  3  pertain  to  the  spiritual  world  of  the  Absolute,  and  therefore  to  the  three  higher  principles  in  Man.

(b)  The  7  belong  to  the   spiritual,   psychic,   and  physical   worlds  and  to  the   body  of  man.

Physics,  metaphysics  and  hyper-physics  are  the  triad  that  symbolizes  man  on  this  plane.

(c)  The  10,    or  the  sum  total   of  these,    is  the  Universe  as  a  whole,  in  all  its  aspects,  and  also  its  Microcosm — Man,  with  his  ten  orifices.

436  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Laying  aside,  for  the  moment,  the  Higher  Decad  (Kosmos)  and  the  Lower  Decad  (Man),  the  first  three  numbers  of  the  separate  sevens  have  a  direct  reference  to  the  Spirit,  Soul,  and  Auric  Envelope  of  the  human  being,  as  well  as  to  the  higher  supersensual  world.

The  lower  four,  or  the  four  aspects,  belong  to  Man  also,  as  well  as  to  the  Universal  Kosmos,  the  whole  being  synthesized  by  the  Absolute.

If  these  three  discrete  or  distributive  degrees  of  Being  be  conceived,  according  to  the  Symbology  of  all  the  Eastern  Religions,  as  contained  in  one  Ovum,  or  EGG,  the  name  of  the  EGG  will  be  Svabhavat,  or  the  ALL-BEING  on  the  manifested  plane.

This  Universe  has,  in  truth,  neither  centre  nor  periphery  ;  but  in  the  individual  and  finite  mind  of  man  it  has  such  a  definition,  the  natural  consequence  of  the  limitations  of  human  thought.

In  Diagram  II,  as  already  stated  therein,  no  notice  need  be  taken  of  the  numbers  used  in  the  left-hand  column,  as  these  refer  only  to  the  Hierarchies  of  the  Colours  and  Sounds  on  the  metaphysical  plane,  and  are  not  the  characteristic  numbers  of  the  human  principles  or  of  the  planets.

The  human  principles  elude  enumeration,  because  each  man  differs  from  every  other,  just  as  no  two  blades  of  grass  on  the  whole  earth  are  absolutely  alike.

Numbering  is  here  a  question  of  spiritual  progress  and  the  natural  predominance  of  one  principle  over  another.

With  one  man  it  may  be  Buddhi  that  stands  as  number  one  ;  with  another,  if  he  be  a  bestial  sensualist,  the  Lower  Manas.

With  one  the  physical  body,  or  perhaps  Prana,  the  life  principle,  will  be  on  the  first  and  highest  plane,  as  would  be  the  case  in  an  extremely  healthy  man,  full  of  vitality ;  with  another  it  may  come  as  the  sixth  or  even  seventh  downward.

Again,  the  colours  and  metals  corresponding  to  the  planets  and  human  principles,  as  will  be  observed,  are  not  those  known  exoterically  to  modern  Astrologers  and  Western  Occultists.

Let  us  see  whence  the  modern  Astrologer  got  his  notions  about  the  correspondence  of  planets,  metals  and  colours.

And  here  we  are  reminded  of  the  modern  Orientalist,  who,  judging  by  appearances  credits  the  ancient  Akkadians  (and  also  the  Chaldeans,  Hindus  and  Egyptians)  with  the  crude  notion  that  the  Universe,  and  in  like  manner  the  earth,  was  like  an  inverted,  bell-shaped  bowl  !  This  he  demonstrates  by  pointing  to  the  symbolical  re-  presentations of  some  Akkadian  inscriptions  and  to  the  Assyrian  carvings.

It  is,  however,  no  place  here  to  explain  how  mistaken  is  the  Assyriologist,  for  all  such  representations  are  simply  symbolical  of  the  Khargakkurra,  the  World-  Mountain,  or  Meru,  and  relate  only  to  the  North  Pole,  the  Land  of  the  Gods.

1  See  Vol.

3,  p.  356  and  Vol.

1,  p.  186,  et  seq,

PAPER

Now,   the  Assyrians  arranged  their  exoteric  teaching    about  the  planets  and  their  correspondences  as  follows :

Numbers

Planets

Metals

Co/ours

Solar  Days  of  Week

Saturn

Lead

Black

Saturday   (Whence  Sabbath,  in  honour  of  Jehovah)

Jupiter  Mars

Tin  Iron

White,  but  as  often  Purple  or  Orange

Red

Thursday  Tuesday

<

Sun

Gold

Yellow-golden

Sunday

Venus

Copper

Green  or  Yellow

Friday

Mercury

Quicksilver

Blue

Wednesday

Moon

Silver

Silver-white

Monday

This  is  the  arrangement  now  adopted  by  Christian  Astrologers,  with  the  exception  of  the  order  of  the  days  of  the  week,  of  which,  by  associating  the  solar  planetary  names  with  the  lunar  weeks,  they  have  made  a  sore  mess,  as  has  been  already  shown  in  Paper  1 .  This  is  the  Ptolemaic  geocentric  system,  which  represents  the  Universe  as  in  the  following  diagram,  showing  our  Earth  in  the  centre  of  the  Universe,  and  the  Sun  a  Planet,  the  fourth  in  number  •

Saturn

FIRMAMENT

438  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

And  if  the  Christian  chronology  and  order  of  the  days  of  the  week  are  being  daily  denounced  as  being  based  on  an  entirely  wrong  astronomical  foundation,  it  is  high  time  to  begin  a  reform  also  in  Astrology  built  on  such  lines,  and  coming  to  us  entirely  from  the  Chaldean  and  Assyrian  exoteric  mob.

But  the  correspondences  given  in  these  Papers  are  purely  Esoteric.

For  this  reason  it  follows  that  when  the  Planets  of  the  Solar  System  are  named  or  symbolized  (as  in  Diagram  II)  it  must  not  be  supposed  that  the  plan-  etary bodies  themselves  are  referred  to,  except  as  types  on  a  purely  physical  plane  of  the  septenary  nature  of  the  psychic  and  spiritual  worlds.

A  material  planet  can  correspond  only  to  a  material  something.

Thus  when  Mercury  is  said  to  correspond  to  the  right  eye,  it  does  not  mean  that  the  objective  planet  has  any  influence  on  the  right  optic  organ,  but  that  both  stand  rather  as  corresponding  mystically  through  Buddhi.

Man  derives  his  Spiritual  Soul  {Buddhi)  from  the  essence  of  the  Manasa  Putra,  the  Sons  of  Wisdom,  who  are  the  Divine  Beings  (or  Angels)  ruling  and  presiding  over  the  planet  Mercury.

In  the  same  way  Venus,  Manas  and  the  left  eye  are  set  down  as  cor-  respondences.

Exoterically,  there  is,  in  reality,  no  such  association  of  physical  eyes  and  physical  planets ;  but  Esoterically  there  is  ;  for  the  right  eye  is  the  "  Eye  of  Wisdom,"  i.e.,  it  corresponds  magnetically  with  that  Occult  centre  in  the  brain  which  we  call  the  «•  Third  Eye  "  ; l  while  the  left  corresponds  with  the  intellectual  brain,  or  those  cells  which  are  the  organ  on  the  physical  plane  of  the  thinking  faculty.

The  kabalistic  triangle  of  Kether,  Chokmah  and  Binah  shows  this.

Chokmah  and  Binah,  or  Wisdom  and  Intelligence,  the  Father  and  Mother,  or,  again,  the  Father  and  Son,  are  on  the  same  plane  and  re-act  mutually  on  one  another.

When  the  individual  consciousness  is  turned  inward,  a  conjunction  of  Manas  and  Buddhi  takes  place.

In  the  spiritually  regenerated  man  this  conjunction  is  permanent,  the  Higher  Manas  clinging  to  Buddhi  beyond  the  threshold  of  Devachan,  and  the  Soul,  or  rather  the  Spirit,  which  should  not  be  confounded  with  Atma,  the  Super-Spirit,  is  then  said  to  have  the  "  Single  Eye."  Esoterically,  in  other  words,  the  "Third  Eye"  is  active.

Now  Mercury  is  called  Hermes,  and  Venus,  Aphrodite,  and  thus  their  conjunction  in  man  on  the  psycho-physical  plane  gives  him  the  name  of  the  Hermaphro-  dite, or  Androgyne.

The  absolutely  Spiritual  Man  is,  however  entirely  dis-  connected from  sex.

The  Spiritual  Man  corresponds  directly  with  the  higher  "  coloured  circles,"  the  Divine  Prism  which  emanates  from  the  One  Infinite

1  See  Vol.

3,  The  Races  with  the  "Third  Eye  "  p.  290,  et  seq.

PAPER

White  Circle ;  while  physical  man  emanates  from  the  Sephiroth,  which  are  the  Voices  or  Sounds  of  Eastern  Philosophy.

And  these  "  Voices "  are  lower  than  the  "  Colours,"  for  they  are  the  seven  lower  Sephiroth,  or  the  objective  Sounds,  seen,  not  heard,  as  the  Zohar  shows,1  and  even  the  Old  Testament  also.

For,  when  properly  translated,  verse  18  of  chapter  xx  Exodus  would  read:  "And  the  people  saw  the  Voices"  (or  Sounds,  not  the  "  thunderings  "  as  now  translated);  and  these  Voices,  or  Sounds,  are  the  Sephiroth.

In  the  same  way  the  right  and  left  nostrils,  into  which  is  breathed  the  "Breath  of  Lives"1  are  here  said  to  correspond  with  Sun  and  Moon,  as  Brahma-Prajapati  and  Vach,  or  Osiris  and  Isis,  are  the  parents  of  the  natural  life.

This  Quaternary,  viz.

:  the  two  eyes  and  two  nostrils,  Mercury  and  Venus,  Sun  and  Moon,  constitutes  the  Kabalistic  Guardian-Angels  of  the  Four  Corners  of  the  Earth.

It  is  the  same  in  the  Eastern  Esoteric  Philosophy,  which,  how-  ever, adds  that  the  Sun  is  not  a  planet,  but  the  central  star  of  our  system,  and  the  Moon  a  dead  planet,  from  which  all  the  principles  are  gone,  both  being  substitutes,  the  one  for  an  invisible  inter- Mercurial  planet,  and  the  other  for  a  planet  which  seems  to  have  now  altogether  disappeared  from  view.

These  are  the  Four  Maharajahs,4  the  "  Four  Holy  Ones  "  connected  with  Karma  and  Humanity,  Kosmos  and  Man,  in  all  their  aspects.

They  are  :  the  Sun,  or  its  substitute  Michael ;  Moon,  or  substitute  Gabriel  ;  Mercury,  Raphael ;  and  Venus,  Uriel.

It  need  hardly  be  said  here  again  that  the  planetary  bodies  themselves,  being  only  physical  symbols,  are  not  often  referred  to  in  the  Esoteric  System,  but,  as  a  rule,  their  cosmic,  psychic,  physical  and  spiritual  forces  are  symbolized  under  these  names.

In  short,  it  is  the  seven  physical  planets  which  are  the  lower  Sephiroth  of  the  Kaba/ar),  and  our  triple  physical  Sun  whose  reflection  only  we  see,  which  is  symbolized,  or  rather  personified,  by  the  Upper  Triad,  or  Sephirothal  Crown.

Then,  again,  it  will  be  well  to  point  out  that  the  numbers  attached  to  the  psychic  principles  in  Diagram  I  appear  the  reverse  of  those  in  exoteric  writ-  ings.

This  is  because  numbers  in  this  connection  are  purely  arbitrary,  changing  with  every  school.

Some  schools  count  three,  some  four,  some  six,  and  others  seven,  as  do  all  the  Buddhist  Esotericists.

As  said  before,0  the  Esoteric  School  has  been  divided  into  two  departments  since  the  fourteenth  century,

1  Op.  cit.,  ii,  81,  6  *  See  Franck's  Die  Kabbala,  p.  152,  et  seq

3  Genesis,  n,  7.  4  See  Vol.

1,  p.  181.

'  We  may  refer  for  confirmation  to  Ongen's  works,  who  says  that  "  the  seven  ruling  daimons  "  (genii  or  planetary  rulers)  are  Michael,  the  Sun  (the  lion-like) ,  the  second  in  order,  the  Bull,  Jupiter  or  Suriel,  etc.

,  and  all  these,  the  "  Seven  of  the  Presence,"  are  the  Sephiroth.

The  Sephirothal  Tree  Js  the  Tree  of  the  Divine  Planets  as  given  by  Porphyry,  or  Porphyry's  Tree,  as  it  is  usually  called

Mnte,  Vol.

1,  p.  181.

440  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

one  for  the  inner  Lanoos,  or  higher  Chelas,  the  other  for  the  outer  circle,  or  lay  Chelas.

Mr.  Sinnett  was  distinctly  told  in  the  letters  he  received  from  one  of  the  Gurus  that  he  could  not  be  taught  the  real  Esoteric  Doctrine  given,  out  only  to  the  pledged  disciples  of  the  Inner  Circle.1  The  numbers  and  principles  do  not  go  in  regular  sequence,  like  the  skins  of  an  onion,  but  the  student  must  work  out  for  himself  the  number  appropriate  to  each  of  his-  principles,  when  the  time  comes  for  him  to  enter  upon  practical  study.

The  above  will  suggest  to  the  student  the  necessity  of  knowing  the  principles  by  their  names  and  their  appropriate  faculties  apart  from  any  system  of  enumer-  ation, or  by  association  with  their  corresponding  centres  of  actions,  colours,  sounds,  etc.,  until  these  become  inseparable.

The  old  and  familiar  mode  of  reckoning  the  principles,  given  in  The  Theo-  sopfi/st  and  Esoteric  Buddhism,  leads  to  another  apparently  perplexing  con-  tradiction, though  it  is  really  none  at  all.

The  principles  numbered  3  and  2,  viz.

:  Linga  Sharlra  and  Prana,  or  Jiva,  stand  in  the  reverse  order  to  that  given  in  Diagram  I.  A  moment's  consideration  will  suffice  to  explain  the  apparent  discrepancy  between  the  exoteric  enumeration,  and  the  Esoteric  order  given  in  Diagram  I.  For  in  Diagram  I  the  Linga  Sharira  is  defined  as  the  vehicle  of  Prana,  or  Jiva,  the  life  principle,  and  as  such  must  of  necessity  be  inferior  to  Prana,  not  superior  as  the  exoteric  enumeration  would  suggest.

The  principles  do  not  stand  one  above  the  other,  and  thus  cannot  be  taken  in  numerical  sequence ;  their  order  depends  upon  the  superiority  and  predomin-  ance of  one  or  another  principle,  and  therefore  differs  in  every  man.

The  Linga  Sharira  is  the  double,  or  protoplasmic  antetype  of  the  body,  which  is  its  image.

It  is  in  this  sense  that  it  is  called  in  Diagram  II  the  parent  of  the  physical  body,  i.e.,  the  mother  by  conception  of  Prana,  the  father.

This  idea  is  conveyed  in  the  Egyptian  mythology  by  the  birth  of  Horus,  the  child  of  Osiris  and  Isis,  although,  like  all  sacred  Mythoi,  this  has  both  a  three-  fold spiritual,  and  a  sevenfold  psycho-physical  application.

To  close  the  subject,  Prana,  the  life  principle,  can,  in  sober  truth,  have  no  number,  as  it  pervades  every  other  principle,  or  the  human  total.

Each  number  of  the  seven  would  thus  be  naturally  applicable  to  Prana -Jiva  exoterically  as  it  is  to  the  Auric  Body  Esoterically.

As  Pythagoras  showed,  Kosmos  was  produced  not  through  or  by  number,  but  geometrically,  i.e.,  following  the  proportions  of  numbers.

To   those   who  are   unacquainted   with   the  exoteric  astrological  natures  ascribed   in   practice  to  the  planetary  bodies,  it  may  be  useful  if  we  set  them

1  [See  The  Mahatma  Letters  to  A    P  Sinnett,  p.  494.]

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down  here  after  the  manner  of  Diagram  II,  in  relation  to  their  dominion  over  the  human  body,  colours,  metals,  etc.,  and  explain  at  the  same  time  why  genuine  Esoteric  Philosophy  differs  from  the  astrological  claims.

Planets

Days

Metals

Parts  of  the  Body

Colours

Saturn

Saturday

Lead

Right  Ear,  Knees  and  Bony  System

Black  l

Jupiter

Thursday

Tin

Left  Ear,  Thighs,  Feet  and  Arterial  System

Purple  -

Mars

Tuesday

Iron

Forehead  and  Nose,  the  Skull,  Sex-function  and  Muscular  System

Red

Sun

Sunday

Gold

Right  Eye,  Heart  and  Vital  Centres

Orange

Venus

Friday

Copper

Chin  and  Cheeks,  Neck  and  Reins  and  the  Venous  System

Yellow

Mercury

Wednesday

Quicksilver

Mouth,  Hands,  Abdominal  Viscera  and  Nervous  System

Dove   or  Cream  '

Moon

Monday

Silver

Breasts,  Left  Eye,  the  Fluidic  System.

Saliva,  Lymph,  etc

White  ''

1  Esotencally,  green,  there  being  no  black  in  the  prismatic  ray

2  Esotencally,   light  blue.

As  a   pigment,  purple  is  a  compound  of  red  and  blue,  and  in  Eastern  Occultism   blue  is  the  spiritual  essence  of  the  colour  purple,  while  red  is  its  material  basis     In  reality,  Occultism    makes  Jupiter  blue  because   he   is  the   son  of  Saturn,  which  is  green,  and  light  blue  as  a  prismatic   colour   contains   a   great  deal    of   green      Again,   the  Auric  Body  will  contain  much  of  the  colour  of  the  Lower  Manas  if  the  man  is  a  material  sensualist,  just  as  it  will  contain  much  of  the  darker  hue  if  the  Higher  Manas  has  preponderance  over  the  Lower

4  Esotencally,  the  Sun  cannot  correspond  with  the  eye,  nose,  or  any  other  organ,  since,  as  explain-  ed, it  is  no  planet,  but  a  central  star  It  was  adopted  as  a  planet  by  the  post-Christian  Astrologers,  who  had  never  been  initiated  Moreover,  the  true  colour  of  the  Sun  is  blue,  but  it  appears  yellow  only  owing  to  the  effect  of  the  absorption  of  vapours  (chiefly  metallic)  by  its  atmosphere.

All  is  Ma"ya  on  our  Earth

4  Esotencally,  indigo,  or  dark  blue,  which  is  the  complement  of  yellow  in  the  prism  Yellow  is  a  simple  or  primitive  colour  Manas  being  dual  in  its  nature — as  is  its  sidereal  symbol,  the  planet  Venus,  which  is  both  the  morning  and  evening  star— the  difference  between  the  higher  and  the  lower  principles  of  Manas,  whose  essence  is  derived  from  the  Hierarchy  ruling  Venus,  is  denoted  by  the  dark  blue  and  green  Green,  the  Lower  Manas,  resembles  the  colour  of  the  solar  spectrum  which  appears  between  the  yellow  and  the  dark  blue,  the  Higher  Spiritual  Manas.

Indigo  is  the  intensified  colour  of  the  heaven  or  sky,  to  denote  the  upward  tendency  of  Manas  toward  Buddhi,  or  the  heavenly  Spiritual  Soul  This  colour  is  obtained  from  the  indiqofera  tinctona,  a  plant  of  the  highest  occult  properties  in  India,  much  used  in  White  Magic,  and  occultly  connected  with  copper.

This  is  shown  by  the  indigo  assum-  ing a  copper  lustre,  especially  when  rubbed  on  any  hard  substance  Another  property  of  the  dye  is  that  it  is  insoluble  in  water  and  even  in  ether,  being  lighter  in  weight  than  any  known  liquid.

No  symbol  has  ever  been  adopted  in  the  East  without  being  based  upon  a  logical  and  demonstrable-  reason  Therefore  Eastern  Symbologists,  from  the  earliest  ages,  have  connected  the  spiritual  and  the  animal  minds  of  man,  the  one  with  dark  blue  (Newton's  indigo),  or  true  blue,  free  from  green  ,  and  the  other  with  pure  green

•"'  Esotencally,  yellow,  because  the  colour  of  the  Sun  is  orange,  and  Mercury  now  stands  next  to-  the  Sun  in  distance,  as  it  does  in  colour.

The  planet  for  which  the  sun  is  a  substitute  was  still  nearer

442  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Thus  it  will  be  seen  that  the  influence  of  the  solar  system  in  the  exoteric  kabalistic  Astrology  is  by  this  method  distributed  over  the  entire  human  body,  the  primary  metals,  and  the  gradations  of  colour  from  black  to  white ;  but  that  Esotericism  recognizes  neither  black  nor  white  as  colours,  because  it  holds  religiously  to  the  seven  solar  or  natural  colours  of  the  prism.

Black  and  white  are  artificial  tints.

They  belong  to  the  Earth,  and  are  only  perceived  by  virtue  of  the  special  construction  of  our  physical  organs.

White  is  the  absence  of  all  colours,  and  therefore  no  colour ;  black  is  simply  the  absence  of  light,  and  therefore  the  negative  aspect  of  white.

The  seven  prismatic  colours  are  direct  emanations  from  the  Seven  Hierarchies  of  Being,  each  of  which  has  a  direct  bearing  upon  and  relation  to  one  of  the  human  principles,  since  each  of  these  Hierarchies  is,  in  fact,  the  creator  and  source  of  the  corresponding  human  principle.

Each  prismatic  colour  is  called  in  Occultism  the  "  Father  of  the  Sound  "  which  corresponds  to  it ;  Sound  being  the  Word,  or  the  Logos,  of  its  Father-Thought.

This  is  the  reason  why  sen-  sitives connect  every  colour  with  a  definite  sound,  a  fact  well  recognized  in  Modern  Science  (e.g.,  Francis  Galton's  Human  Faculty).  But  black  and  white  are  entirely  negative  colours,  and  have  no  representatives  in  the  world  of  subjective  being.

Kabalistic  Astrology  says  that  the  dominion  of  the  planetary  bodies  in  the  human  brain  also  is  defined  thus :  there  are  seven  primary  groups  of  faculties,  six  of  which  function  through  the  cerebrum,  and  the  seventh  through  the  cerebellum.

This  is  perfectly  correct  Esoterically.

But  when  it  is  further  said  that :  Saturn  governs  the  devotional  faculties,  Mercury,  the  intellectual  ;  Jupiter,  the  sympathetic  ;  the  Sun,  the  governing  faculties ;  Mars,  the  selfish  ;  Venus,  the  tenacious  ;  and  the  Moon,  the  instincts  ; — we  say  that  the  expla-  nation is  incomplete  and  even  misleading.

For,  in  the  first  place,  the  physical  planets  can  rule  only  the  physical  body  and  the  purely  physical  functions.

All  the  mental,  emotional,  psychic  and  spiritual  faculties,  are  influenced  by  the

the    Sun  than  Mercury  now  is,  and  was  one  of  the  most  secret  and  highest  planets      It  is  said  to  have  become  invisible  at  the  close  of  the  Third  Race.

';  Esoterically,  violet,  because,  perhaps,  violet  is  the  colour  assumed  by  a  ray  of  sunlight  when  transmitted  through  a  very  thin  plate  of  silver,  and  also  because  the  Moon  shines  upon  the  earth  with  light  borrowed  from  the  Sun,  as  the  human  body  shines  with  qualifications  borrowed  from  its  double  — the  aerial  man.

As  the  astral  shadow  starts  the  series  of  principles  m  man,  on  the  terrestrial  plane,  up  to  the  lower,  animal  Manas,  so  the  violet  ray  starts  the  series  of  prismatic  colours,  from  its  end  up  to  green,  both  being,  the  one  as  a  principle  and  the  other  as  a  colour,  the  most  refrangible  of  all  the  principles  and  colours.

Besides  which,  there  is  the  same  great  Occult  mystery  attached  to  all  these  correspondences,  both  celestial  and  terrestrial  bodies,  colours  and  sounds.

In  clearer  words  there  exists  the  same  law  of  relation  between  the  Moon  and  the  Earth,  the  astral  and  the  living  body  of  man,  as  between  the  violet  end  of  the  prismatic  spectrum  and  the  indigo  and  the  blue.

But  of  this  more  anon.

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Occult  properties  of  the  scale  of  causes  which  emanate  from  the  Hierarchies  of  the  Spiritual  Rulers  of  the  planets,  and  not  by  the  planets  themselves.

This  scale,  as  given  in  Diagram  II,  leads  the  student  to  perceive  in  the  follow-  ing order :  1 .  colour ;  2.  sound  ;  3.  the  sound  materializes  into  the  spirit  of  the  metals,  i.e.,  the  metallic  Elementals;  4.  these  materialize  again  into  the  physical  metals ;  5.  then  the  harmonial  and  vibratory  radiant  essence  passes  into  the  plants,  giving  them  colour  and  smell,  both  of  which  "properties"  depend  upon  the  rate  of  vibration  of  this  energy  per  unit  of  time  ;  6.  from  plants  it  passes  into  the  animals  ;  7.  and  finally  culminates  in  the  "principles"  of  man.

Thus  we  see  the  Divine  Essence  of  our  Progenitors  in  Heaven  circling  through  seven  stages ;  Spirit  becoming  Matter,  and  Matter  returning  to  Spirit.

As  there  is  sound  in  Nature  which  is  inaudible,  so  there  is  colour  which  is  in-  visible, but  which  can  be  heard.

The  creative  force,  at  work  in  its  incessant  task  of  transformation,  produces  colour,  sound  and  numbers,  in  the  shape  of  rates  of  vibration  which  compound  and  dissociate  the  atoms  and  molecules.

Though  invisible  and  inaudible  to  us  in  detail,  yet  the  synthesis  of  the  whole  becomes  audible  to  us  on  the  material  plane.

It  is  that  which  the  Chinese  call  the  "Great  Tone,"  or  Kung.

It  is,  even  by  scientific  confession,  the  actual  tonic  of  Nature,  held  by  musicians  to  be  the  middle  Fa  on  the  key-  board of  a  piano.

We  hear  it  distinctly  in  the  voice  of  Nature,  in  the  roaring  of  ocean,  in  the  sound  of  the  foliage  of  a  great  forest,  in  the  distant  roar  of  a  great  city,  in  the  wind,  the  tempest  and  the  storm  ;  in  short,  in  everything  in  Nature  which  has  a  voice  or  produces  sound.

To  the  hearing  of  all  who  hearken,  it  culminates  in  a  single  definite  tone  of  an  unappreciable  pitch,  which,  as  said,  is  the  F,  or  Fa,  of  the  diatonic  scale.

From  these  particulars,  that  wherein  lies  the  difference  between  the  exoteric  and  the  Esoteric  nomenclature  and  symbolism  will  be  evident  to  the  student  of  Occultism.

In  short,  kabalistic  Astrology,  as  practised  in  Europe,  is  the  semi-esoteric  Secret  Science,  adapted  for  the  outer  and  not  for  the  inner  circle.

It  is,  further-  more, often  left  incomplete  and  not  infrequently  distorted  to  conceal  the  real  truth.

While  it  symbolizes  and  adapts  its  correspondences  on  the  mere  appearances  of  things,  Esoteric  Philosophy,  which  concerns  itself  pre-eminently  with  the  essence  of  things,  accepts  only  such  symbols  as  cover  the  whole  ground,  i.e.,  such  symbols  as  yield  a  spiritual  as  well  as  a  psychic  and  physical  meaning.

Yet  even  Western  Astrology  has  done  excellent  work,  for  it  has  helped  to  carry  the  knowledge  of  the  existence  of  a  Secret  Wisdom  through-  out the  dangers  of  the  Medieval  Ages  and  their  dark  bigotry  up  to  the  present  day,  when  all  danger  has  disappeared.

444  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

The  order  of  the  planets  in  exoteric  practice  is  that  defined  by  their  geocentric  radii,  or  the  distance  of  their  several  orbits  from  the  Earth  as  a  centre,  viz.,  Saturn,  Jupiter,  Mars,  Sun,  Venus,  Mercury  and  Moon.

In  the  first  three  of  these  we  find  symbolized  the  celestial  Triad  of  supreme  power  in  the  physical,  manifested  universe,  or  Brahma,  Vishnu  and  Shiva  ;  while  in  the  last  four  we  recognize  the  symbols  of  the  terrestrial  quaternary  ruling  over  all  natural  and  physical  revolutions  of  the  seasons,  quarters  of  the  day,  points  of  the  compass,  and  elements.

Thus  :

Spring  Summer  Autumn  Winter

Morning  Noon  Evening  Night

Youth  Adolescence  Manhood  Age

Fire  Air  Water  Earth

East  South  West  North

But  Esoteric  Science  is  not  content  with  analogies  on  the  purely  objective  plane  of  the  physical  senses,  and  therefore  it  is  absolutely  necessary  to  pre-  face further  teachings  in  this  direction  with  a  clear  explanation  of  the  real  meaning  of  the  word  Magic.

WHAT  MAGIC  IS,  IN  REALITY

Esoteric  Science  is,  above  all,  the  knowledge  of  our  relations  with,  and  in  Divine  Magic,1  inseparableness  from  our  divine  Selves — the  latter  meaning  something  else  besides  our  own  higher  Spirit.

Thus,  before  proceeding  to  exemplify  and  explain  these  relations,  it  may  perhaps  be  useful  to  give  the  student  a  correct  idea  of  the  full  meaning  of  this  most  misunderstood  word  "  Magic."  Many  are  those  willing  and  eager  to  study  Occultism,  but  very  few  have  even  an  approximate  idea  of  the  Science  itself.

Now,  very  few  of  our  American  and  European  students  can  derive  benefit  from  Sanskrit  works  or  even  their  translations,  as  these  translations  are,  for  the  most  part,  merely  blinds  to  the  uninitiated.

I  therefore  propose  to  offer  to  their  attention  demonstrations  of  the  aforesaid,  drawn  from  Neo-Platonic  works.

These  are  accessible  in  translation  ;  and  in  order  to  throw  light  on  that  which  has  hitherto  been  full  of  darkness,  it  will  suffice  to  point  to  a  certain  key  in  them.

Thus  the  Gnosis,  both  pre-Christian  and  post-Christian  will  serve  our  purpose  admirably.

There  are  millions  of  Christians  who  know  the  name  of  Simon  Magus,  and  the  little  that  is  told  about  him  in  the  Acts  ;  but  very  few  who  have  even

1  Magic,  Mag/a,  means,  in  its  spiritual,  secret  sense,  the  "  Great  Life,"  or  divine  life  in  spirit.

The  root  is  magh,  as  seen  in  the  Sanskrit  mahat.

Zend  maz,  Greek  megas  and  Latin  magnus,  all  signifying  "  great.

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heard  of  the  many  motley,  fantastic  and  contradictory  details  which  tradition  records  about  his  life.

The  story  of  his  claims  and  his  death  is  to  be  found  only  in  the  prejudiced,  half-fantastic  records  in  the  works  of  the  Church  Fathers,  such  as  Irenaeus,  Epiphanius  and  St.  Justin,  and  especially  in  the  anonymous  Philosophumena.

Yet  he  is  a  historical  character,  and  the  appella-  tion of  "  Magus  "  was  given  to  him  and  was  accepted  by  all  his  contempo-  raries, including  the  heads  of  the  Christian  Church,  as  a  qualification  indicating  the  miraculous  powers  he  possessed,  and  irrespective  of  whether  he  was  regarded  as  a  white  (divine)  or  a  black  (infernal)  Magician.

In  this  respect,  opinion  has  always  been  made  subservient  to  the  Gentile  or  Christian  proclivities  of  his  chronicler.

It  is  in  his  system  and  in  that  of  Menander,  his  pupil  and  successor,  that  we  find  what  the  term  "  Magic  "  meant  for  Initiates  in  those  days.

Simon,  as  all  the  other  Gnostics,  taught  that  our  world  was  created  by  the  lower  angels,  whom  he  called  £ons.

He  mentions  only  three  degrees  of  such,  because  it  was  and  is  useless,  as  we  have  before  explained,  to  teach  anything  about  the  four  higher  ones,  and  he  therefore  begins  at  the  plane  of  globes  A  and  G.  His  system  is  as  near  to  Occult  Truth  as  any,  so  that  we  may  examine  it,  as  well  as  his  own  and  Menander's  claims  about  "  Magic,"  to  find  out  what  they  meant  by  the  term.

Now,  for  Simon,  the  summit  of  all  manifested  creation  was  Fire.

It  was,  with  him  as  with  us,  the  Universal  Principle,  the  Infinite  Potency,  born  from  the  concealed  Potentiality.

This  Fire  was  the  primeval  cause  of  the  manifested  world  of  being,  and  was  dual,  having  a  manifested  and  a  concealed,  or  secret,  side.

The   secret   side   of  the  Fire  is  concealed  in  its  evident  [or  objective]  side,  and  the  objective  is  produced  from  the  secret  side,

he  writes,  which  amounts  to  saying  that  the  visible  is  ever  present  in  the  invisible,  and  the  invisible  in  the  visible.

This  was  but  a  new  form  of  stating  Plato's  idea  of  the  Intelligible  (Noeton)  and  the  Sensible  (Aistheton),  and  Aristotle's  teaching  on  the  Potency  (Dunam/s)  and  the  Act  (Energe/a).  For  Simon,  all  that  can  be  thought  of,  all  that  can  be  acted  upon,  was  perfect  intelligence.

Fire  contained  all.

And  thus  all  the  parts  of  that  Fire,  being  endowed  with  intelligence  and  reason,  were  susceptible  of  development  by  extension  and  emanation.

This  is  our  teaching  of  the  Manifested  Logos,  and  these  parts  in  their  primordial  emanation  are  our  Dhyan  Chohans,  the  "  Sons  of  Flame  and  Fire,"  or  higher  £ons.

This  "  Fire  "  is  the  symbol  of  the  active  <and  living  side  of  Divine  Nature.

Behind  it  lay  "  infinite  Potentiality  in

1  Philosophumena,  vi,

446  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Potentiality,"   which   Simon   named    "  that    which   has  stood,    stands   and  will  stand/'  or  permanent  stability  and  personified  immutability.

From  the  Potency  of  Thought,  Divine  Ideation  thus  passed  to  Action,  Hence  the  series  of  primordial  emanations  through  Thought  begetting  the  Act,  the  objective  side  of  Fire  being  the  Mother,  the  sacred  side  of  it  being  the  Father.

Simon  called  these  emanations  Syzygies  (a  united  pair,  or  couple),,  for  they  emanated  two-by-two,  one  as  an  active,  and  the  other  as  a  passive  £on.  Three  couples  thus  emanated  (or  six  in  all,  the  Fire  being  the  seventh),  to  which  Simon  gave  the  following  names  :  "  Mind  and  Thought ;  Voice  and  Name  ;  Reason  and  Reflection,"1  the  first  in  each  pair  being  male,  the  last  female.

From  these  primordial  six  emanated  the  six  /Eons  of  the  Middle  World.

Let  us  see  what  Simon  himself  says  :

Each  of  these  six  primitive  beings  contained  the  entire  infinite  Potency  [of  its  parent] ;  but  it  was  there  only  in  Potency,  and  not  in  Act.

That  Potency  had  to  be  called  forth  [or  conformed]  through  an  image,  in  order  that  it  should  manifest  in  all  its  essence,  virtue,  grandeur  and  effects ;  for  only  then  could  the  emanated  Potency  become  similar  to  its  parent,  the  eternal  and  infinite  Potency.

If,  on  the  contrary,  it  remained  simply  potentially  in  the  six  Potencies  and  failed  to  be  conformed  through  arv  image,  then  the  Potency  would  not  pass  into  action,  but  would  get  lost.

in  clearer  terms,  it  would  become  atrophied,  as  the  modern  expression  goes.

Now,  what  do  these  words  mean  if  not  that,  to  be  equal  in  all  things  to  the  Infinite  Potency,  the  £ons  had  to  imitate  it  in  its  action,  and  become  themselves,  in  their  turn,  emanative  Principles,  as  was  their  Parent,  giving  life  to  new  beings,  and  becoming  Potencies  in  actu  themselves  ?  To  produce  emanations,  or  to  have  acquired  the  gift  of  Kriyashakti,3  is  the  direct  result  of  that  power,  an  effect  which  depends  on  our  own  action.

That  power,  then,  is  inherent  in  man,  as  it  is  in  the  primordial  /Eons  and  even  in  the  secondary  Emanations,  by  the  very  fact  of  their  and  our  descent  from  the  One  Primor-  dial Principle,  the  Infinite  Power,  or  Potency.

Thus  we  find  in  the  system  of  Simon  Magus  that  the  first  six  £ons,  synthesized  by  the  seventh,  the  Parent  Potency,  passed  into  Act,  and  emanated,  in  their  turn,  six  secondary  >Eons,  which  were  each  synthesized  by  their  respective  Parents.

In  the  Philosophu-  mena  we  read  that  Simon  compared  the  >£ons  to  the  "  Tree  of  Life."  Said  Simon  in  the  Revelation  :

It  is  written  that  there  are  two  ramifications  of  the  universal  £ons,  having  neither  beginning  nor  end,  issued  both  from  the  same  Root,  the  invisible  and  incomprehensible  Potentiality,  Sige  [Silence].  One  of  these  [series  of  /Eons]  appears  from  above.

This

1  Nous.

Epinoia  ;  Phone,  Onoma ;  Logismos,  Enthumesis.

7  Philosophumena,  vi,  12.  3  See  above,  sub  voce,

4  The  Great  Revelation  (He  Megale  Apophasis),  of  which  Simon  himself  is  supposed  to  have  been  the  author.

PAPER

is  the  Great  Potency,  Universal  Mind  [or  Divine  Ideation,  the  Mahat  of  the  Hindus] ;  it  orders  all  things  and  is  male.

The  other  is  from  below,  for  it  is  the  Great  [manifested}  Thought,  the  female  /Con,  generating  all  things.

These  [two  kinds  of  Aons]  corres-  ponding l  with  each  other,  have  conjunction  and  manifest  the  middle  distance  [the  intermediate  sphere,  or  plane],  the  incomprehensible  Air  which  has  neither  beginning,  nor  end/

This  female  "Air  "  is  our  Ether,  or  the  kabalistic  Astral  Light.

It  is,  then,  the  Second  World  of  Simon,  born  of  Fire,  the  principle  of  everything.

We  call  it  the  ONE  LIFE,  the  Intelligent,  Divine  Flame,  omnipresent  and  infinite.

In-  Simon's  system  this  Second  World  was  ruled  by  a  Being,  or  Potency,  both-  male  and  female,  or  active  and  passive,  good  and  bad.

This  Parent-Being,  like  the  primordial  infinite  Potency,  is  also  called  "  that  which  has  stood,  stands  and  will  stand,"  so  long  as  the  manifested  Kosmos  shall  last.

When  it  emanated  in  actu  and  became  like  unto  its  own  Parent,  it  was  not  dual  or  androgyne.

It  is  the  Thought  (Sige)  that  emanated  from  it  which  became  as  itself  (the  Parent),  having  become  like  unto  its  image  (or  antetype)  ;  the  second  had  now  become  in  its  turn  the  first  (on  its  own  plane  or  sphere).  As  Simon  has  it  :

It  [the  Parent  or  Father]  was  one  For  having  it  [the  Thought]  in  itself,  it  was  alone.

It  was  not,  however,  first,  though  it  was  pre-existing  ;  but  manifesting  itself  to  itself  from  itself,  it  became  the  second  (or  dual).  Nor  was  it  called  Father  before  it  [the  Thought]  gave  it  that  name  As,  therefore,  itself  developing  itself  by  itself,  mani-  fested to  itself  its  own  Thought,  so  also  the  Thought  being  manifested  did  not  act,  but  seeing  the  Father  hid  it  in  itself,  that  is  (hid)  that  Potency  (in  itself)  And  the  Potency  [Dumam/s,  viz.

:  Nous]  and  Thought  [Ep/no/a]  are  male-female.

Whence  they  corre-  spond with  one  another — for  Potency  in  no  way  differs  from  Thought — being  one.

So  from  the  things  above  is  found  Potency,  and  from  those  below,  Thought.

It  comes  to-  pass,  therefore,  that  that  which  is  manifested  from  them,  although  being  one,  yet  is  found  to  be  twofold,  the  androgyne  having  the  female  in  itself.

So  is  Mind  in  Thought  things  inseparable  from  each  other  which  though  being  one  are  yet  found  dual.'

He  [Simon]  calls  the  first  Syzygy  of  the  six  Potencies  and  of  the  seventh,  which  is  with  it,  Nous  and  Epinoia,  Heaven  and  Earth  :  the  male  looks  down  from  on  high  and  takes  thought  for  his  Syzygy  [or  spouse],  for  the  Earth  below  receives  those  intellectual  fruits  which  are  brought  down  from  Heaven  and  are  cognate  to  the  Earth.

Simon's  Third  World  with  its  third  series  of  six  £ons  and  the  seventh,  the  Parent,  is  emanated  in  the  same  way.

It  is  this  same  note  which  runs  through  every  Gnostic  system — gradual  development  downward  into  Matter  by  simili-  tude ;  and  it  is  a  law  which  is  to  be  traced  down  to  primordial  Occultism,  or  Magic.

With  the  Gnostics,  as  with  us,  this  seventh  Potency,  synthesizing  all,  is  the  Spirit  brooding  over  the  dark  waters  of  undifferentiated  Space,  Narayana,  or  Vishnu,  in  India  ;  the  Holy  Ghost  in  Christianity.

But  while  in  the  latter  the  conception  is  conditioned  and  dwarfed  by  limitations  necessitating

1  Literally,  standing  opposite  each  other  in  rows  or  pairs.

-  Philosophumena,  vi,

JOp.

at,  vi,  18.  4Op   cit  .  i,  13,

-448  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

.faith  and  grace,  Eastern  Philosophy  shows  it  pervading  every  atom,  conscious  or  unconscious.

Irenaeus  supplements  the  information  on  the  further  develop-  ment of  these  six  >£ons.

We  learn  from  him  that  Thought,  having  separated  Jtself  from  its  parent,  and  knowing  through  its  identity  of  Essence  with  the  latter  what  it  had  to  know,  proceeded  on  the  second  or  intermediate  plane,  or  rather  World  (each  of  such  Worlds  consisting  of  two  planes,  the  superior  and  inferior,  male  and  female,  the  latter  assuming  finally  both  Potencies  and  becoming  androgyne),  to  create  inferior  Hierarchies,  Angels  and  Powers,  Dominions  and  Hosts,  of  every  description,  which  in  their  turn  created,  or  •rather  emanated  out  of  their  own  Essence,  our  world  with  its  men  and  beings,  over  which  they  watch.

It  thus  follows  that  every  rational  being — called  Man  on  Earth — is  of  the

.  same   essence   and  possesses  potentially  all  the  attributes  of  the  higher  >£ons,

the   primordial  Seven.

It  is  for  him  to  develop,  "  with  the  image  before  him

.  of   the    highest,"    by    imitation   in  actu,  the  Potency  with  which  the  highest  of

his    Parents,    or    Fathers,    is    endowed.

Here    we    may    again    quote   with

advantage  from  the  Philosophumena  :

So  then,  according  to  Simon,  this  blissful  and  imperishable  [principle]  is  con-  cealed in  everything  in  potency,  not  in  act.

This  is  "  that  which  has  stood,  stands  and  will  stand,"  viz.,  that  which  has  stood  above  in  ingenerable  Potency  ;  that  which  stands  below  in  the  stream  of  the  waters  generated  in  an  image  ,  that  which  will  stand  above,  beside  the  blissful  infinite  Potency,  if  it  makes  itself  like  unto  this  image.

For  three,  he  says,  are  they  that  stand,  and  without  these  three  4Eons  of  stability,  there  is  no  adorn-  ment of  the  generable  which,  according  to  them  [the  Simonians],  is  borne  on  the  water,  and  being  moulded  according  to  the  similitude  is  a  perfect  and  celestial  (£on),  in  no  manner  of  thinking  inferior  to  the  ingenerable  Potency.

Thus  they  say  "I  and  thou  [are]  one  ,  before  me  [wast]  thou  ;  that  which  is  after  thee  [is]  I."  This,  he  says,  is  the  Potency,  divided  into  above  and  below,  generating  itself,  nourishing  itself,  seeking  itself,  finding  itself  ,  its  own  mother,  father,  brother,  spouse,  daughter  and  son,  one,  for  it  is  fthe  Root  of  all.

Thus  of  this  triple  £on,  we  learn  the  first  exists  as  "  that  which  has  stood,  stands  and  will  stand,"  or  the  uncreate  Power,  Atman  ;  the  second  is  .generated  in  the  dark  waters  of  Space  (Chaos,  or  undifferentiated  Substance,  ,our  Buddhi),  from  or  through  the  image  of  the  former  reflected  in  those  waters,  the  image  of  Him,  or  It,  which  moves  on  them  ;  the  third  World  (or,  in  man,  Manas)  will  be  endowed  with  every  power  of  that  eternal  and  omni  present  Image  if  it  but  assimilates  it  to  itself.

For,

all  that  is  eternal,  pure  and  incorruptible  is  concealed  in  everything  that  is,  if  only  potentially,  not  actually.

And

everything  is  that  image,   provided  the   lower  image  (man)  ascends  to  that  highest  Source  and  Root  in  Spirit  and  Thought

1  Op.  cit  ,  vi,  17.

PAPER

Matter  as  Substance  is  eternal  and  has  never  been  created.

Therefore  Simon  Magus,  with  all  the  great  Gnostic  Teachers  and  Eastern  Philosophers,  never  speaks  of  its  beginning.

"  Eternal  Matter  "  receives  its  various  forms  in  the  lower  >Eon  from  the  Creative  Angels,  or  Builders,  as  we  call  them.

Why,  then,  should  not  Man,  the  direct  heir  of  the  highest  £on,  do  the  same,  by  the  potency  of  his  thought,  which  is  born  from  Spirit  ?  This  is  Knyashakti,  the  power  of  producing  forms  on  the  objective  plane  through  the  potency  of  •  Ideation  and  Will,  from  invisible,  indestructible  Matter.

Truly  says  Jeremiah,  l  quoting  the  "  Word  of  the  Lord  "  :

Before   I  formed  thee   in  the  belly  I  knew  thee  ;  and  before  thou  earnest  forth  out  of  the  womb  I  sanctified  thee,

for  Jeremiah  stands  here  for  Man  when  he  was  yet  an  /Eon,  or  Divine  Man,  both  with  Simon  Magus  and  Eastern  Philosophy.

The  first  three  chapters  of  Genesis  are  as  Occult  as  that  which  is  given  in  Paper  1 .  For  the  terrestrial  Paradise  is  the  Womb,  says  Simon,2  Eden  the  region  surrounding  it.  The  river  which  went  out  of  Eden  to  water  the  garden  is  the  Umbilical  Cord  ;  this  cord  is  divided  into  four  Heads,  the  streams  that  flowed  out  of  it,  the  four  canals  which  serve  to  carry  nutrition  to  the  Foetus,  i.e.,  the  two  arteries  and  the  two  veins  which  are  the  channels  for  the  blood  and  convey  the  breathing  air,  the  unborn  child,  according  to  Simon,  being  entirely  enveloped  by  the  Amnion,  fed  through  the  Umbilical  Cord  and  given  vital  air  through  the  Aorta.

The  above  is  given  for  the  elucidation  of  that  which  is  to  follow.

The  disciples  of  Simon  Magus  were  numerous,  and  were  instructed  by  him  in  Magic.

They  made  use  of  so-called  "  exorcisms "  (as  in  the  New  Testament),  incantations,  philtres ;  believed  in  dreams  and  visions,  and  produced  them  at  will ;  and  finally  forced  the  lower  orders  of  spirits  to  obey  them.

Simon  .Magus  was  called  "the  Great  Power  of  God,"  literally  "the  Potency  of  the  Deity  which  is  called  Great."  That  which  was  then  termed  Magic  we  now  -call  Theosophia,  or  Divine  Wisdom,  Power  and  Knowledge.

1  Op.  at.,  i,  5.  •  Philosophumena,  vi.

1  At  first  there  are  the  omphalo-mesenteric  vessels,  two  arteries  and  two  veins,  but  these  after-  wards totally  disappear,  as  does  the  "vascular  area"  on  the  Umbilical  Vesicle,  from  which  they  proceed  As  regards  the  "  Umbilical  Vessels  "  proper,  the  Umbilical  Cord  ultimately  has  entwined  around  it  from  right  to  left  the  one  Umbilical  Vein  which  takes  the  oxygenated  blood  from  the  mother  to  the  Foetus,  and  two  Hypogastric  or  Umbilical  Arteries  which  take  the  used-up  blood  from  the  Foetus  to  the  Placenta,  the  contents  of  the  vessels  being  the  reverse  of  that  which  prevails  after  birth  Thus  Science  corroborates  the  wisdom  and  knowledge  of  ancient  Occultism,  for  in  the  days  of  Simon  Magus  no  man,  unless  an  Initiate,  knew  anything  about  the  circulation  of  the  blood  or  about  Physi-  ology.

While  this  Paper  was  being  printed,  I  received  two  small  pamphlets  from  Dr.  Jerome  A.  Anderson,  which  were  printed  in  1884  and  1888,  and  in  which  is  to  be  found  the  scientific  demon-  stration of  the  foetal  nutrition  as  advanced  in  Paper  1  Briefly,  the  Foetus  is  nourished  by  osmosis  .from  the  Amniotic  Fluid  and  respires  by  means  of  the  Placenta.

Science  knows  little  or  nothing  about  the  Amniotic  Fluid  and  its  uses.

If  any  one  cares  to  follow  up  this  question,  I  would  recommend  Dr.  Anderson's  Remarks  on  the  Nutrition  ol  the  Foetus  (Wood  &  Co  ,  New  York.)  FF

450  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

His  direct  disciple,  Menander,  was  also  a  great  Magician.

Says  Irenaeus,  among  other  writers :

the  successor  of  Simon  was  Menander,  a  Samaritan  by  birth,  who  reached  the  highest  summits  in  the  Science  of  Magic.

Thus  both  master  and  pupil  are  shown  as  having  attained  the  highest  powers  in  the  art  of  enchantments,  powers  which  can  be  obtained  only  through  "  the  help  of  the  Devil,"  as  Christians  claim  ;  and  yet  their  "  works  "  were  identical  with  those  spoken  of  in  the  New  Testament,  wherein  such  phenomenal  results  are  called  divine  miracles,  and  are,  therefore,  believed  in  and  accepted  as  coming  from  and  through  God.

But  the  question  is,  have  these  so-called  "miracles"  of  the  "Christ"  and  the  Apostles  ever  been  explained  any  more  than  the  magical  achievements  of  so-called  Sorcerers  and  Magicians?  I  say,  never.

We  Occultists  do  not  believe  in  supernatural  phenomena,  and  the  Masters  laugh  at  the  word  "  miracle."  Let  us  see,  then,  what  is  really  the  sense  of  the  word  Magic.

The  source  and  basis  of  it  lie  in  Spirit  and  Thought,  whether  on  the  purely  divine  or  the  terrestrial  plane.

Those  who  know  the  history  of  Simon  have  the  two  versions  before  them,  that  of  White  and  of  Black  Magic,  at  their  option,  in  the  much  talked  of  union  of  Simon  with  Helena,  whom  he  called  his  Epinoia  (Thought).  Those  who,  like  the  Christians,  had  to  discredit  a  dangerous  rival,  talk  of  Helena  as  being  a  beautiful  and  actual  woman,  whom  Simon  had  met  in  a  house  of  ill-fame  at  Tyre,  and  who  was,  according  to  those  who  wrote  his  life,  the  reincarnation  of  Helen  of  Troy.

How,  then,  was  she  "Divine  Thought"?  The  lower  angels,  Simon  is  made  to  say  in  Philosophu-  mena,  or  the  third  >€ons,  being  so  material,  had  more  badness  in  them  than  all  the  others.

Poor  man,  created  or  emanated  from  them,  had  the  vice  of  his  origin.

What  was  it  ?  Only  this  :  when  the  third  £ons  possessed  them-  selves, in  their  turn,  of  the  Divine  Thought  through  the  transmission  into  them  of  Fire,  instead  of  making  of  man  a  complete  being,  according  to  the  univer-  sal plan,  they  at  first  detained  from  him  that  Divine  Spark  (Thought,  on  Earth.

Manas) ;  and  that  was  the  cause  and  origin  of  senseless  man's  committing  the  original  sin  as  the  angels  had  committed  it  aeons  before  by  refusing  to  create.1  Finally,  after  detaining  Epinoia  prisoner  amongst  them  and  having  subjected  the  Divine  Thought  to  every  kind  of  insult  and  desecration,  they  ended  by  shutting  it  into  the  already  defiled  body  of  man.

After  this,  as  interpreted  by  the  enemies  of  Simon,  she  passed  from  one  female  body  into  another  through  ages  and  races,  until  Simon  found  and  recognized  her  in  the  form  of  Helena,  the  "  prostitute,"  the  "  lost  sheep  "  of  the  parable.

Simon  is  made

'  Supra.

Vol   3.

PAPER

to  represent  himself  as  the  Saviour  descended  on  Earth  to  rescue  this  "  lamb  ",  and  those  men  in  whom  Epinoia  is  still  under  the  dominion  of  the  lower  angels.

The  greatest  magical  feats  are  thus  attributed  to  Simon  through  his  sexual  union  with  Helena,  hence  Black  Magic.

Indeed,  the  chief  rites  of  this  kind  of  Magic  are  based  on  such  disgusting  literal  interpretation  of  noble  myths,  one  of  the  noblest  of  which  was  thus  invented  by  Simon  as  a  symbolic-  al mark  of  his  own  teaching.

Those  who  understood  it  correctly  knew  what  was  meant  by  "  Helena."  It  was  the  marriage  of  Nous  (Atma-Buddhi)  with  Manas,  the  union  through  which  Will  and  Thought  become  one  and  are  endowed  with  divine  powers.

For  Atman  in  man,  being  of  an  unalloyed  essence,  the  primordial  Divine  Fire  (or  the  eternal  and  universal  "that  which  has  stood,  stands  and  will  stand"),  is  of  all  the  planes;  and  Buddhi  is  its  vehicle  or  Thought,  generated  by  and  generating  the  "  Father"  in  her  turn,  and  also  Will.

She  is  "that  which  has  stood,  stands  and  will  stand,"  thus  becoming,  in  conjunction  with  Manas,  male-female,  in  this  sphere  only.

Hence,  when  Simon  spoke  of  himself  as  the  Father  and  the  Son  and  the  Holy  Ghost,  and  of  Helena  as  his  Epinoia,  Divine  Thought,  he  meant  the  marriage  of  his  Buddhi  with  Manas.

Helena  was  the  Shakti  of  the  inner  man,  the  female  potency.

Now,  what  says  Menander  ?  The  lower  angels,  he  taught,  were  the  emanations  of  Ennoia  (Designing  Thought).  It  was  Ennoia  who  taught  the  Science  of  Magic  and  imparted  it  to  him,  together  with  the  art  of  conquering  the  crea^ve  angels  of  the  lower  world.

The  latter  stand  for  the  passions  of  our  lower  nature.

His  pupils,  after  receiving  baptism  from  him  (i.e.,  after  Initiation),  were  said  to  "resurrect  from  the  dead  "  and,  "  growing  no  older,"  became  "immortal."1  This  "resurrection"  promised  by  Menander  meant,  of  course,  simply  the  passage  from  the  darkness  of  ignorance  into  the  light  of  truth,  the  awakening  of  man's  immortal  Spirit  to  inner  and  eternal  life.

This  is  the  Science  of  the  Raja  Yogis — Magic.

Every  person  who  has  read  Neo-Platonic  Philosophy  knows  how  its  chief  Adepts,  such  as  Plotinus,  and  especially  Porphyry,  fought  against  phenomenal  Theurgy.

But,  beyond  all  of  them,  lamblichus,  the  author  of  the  De  Mysteri/s,  lifts  high  the  veil  from  the  real  term  Theurgy,  and  shows  us  therein  the  true  Divine  Science  of  Raja  Yoga.

Magic,  he  says,  is  a  lofty  and  sublime  Science,  Divine,  and  exalted  above  all  others.

It  is  the  great  remedy  for  all.

...  It  neither  takes  its  source  in,  nor  is  it  limited  to,  the  body  or  its  passions,  to  the  human  compound  or  its  constitution  ,  but  all  is  derived  by  it  from  our  upper  Gods,

1  See  Eusebius,  Hist.

Eccles..  lib.

in',  cap.

26.

452  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

our  divine  Egos,  which  run  like  a  silver  thread  from  the  Spark  in  us  up  to  the  primeval  divine  Fire.

lamblichus  execrates  physical  phenomena,  produced,  as  he  says,  by  the  bad  demons  who  deceive  men  (the  spooks  of  the  seance  room),  as  vehe-  mently as  he  exalts  Divine  Theurgy.

But  to  exercise  the  latter,  he  teaches,  the  Theurgist  must  imperatively  be  "a  man  of  high  morality  and  a  chaste  Soul."  The  other  kind  of  Magic  is  used  only  by  impure,  selfish  men,  and  has  nothing  of  the  Divine  in  it.  No  real  Vates  would  ever  consent  to  find  in  its  communications  anything  coming  from  our  higher  Gods.

Thus  one  (Theurgy)  is  the  knowledge  of  our  Father  (the  Higher  Self)  ;  the  other,  subjection  to  our  lower  nature.

One  requires  holiness  of  the  Soul,  a  holiness  which  rejects  and  excludes  everything  corporeal ;  the  other,  the  desecration  of  it  (the  Soul).  One  is  the  union  with  the  Gods  (with  one's  God),  the  source  of  all  Good  ;  the  other  intercourse  with  demons  (Elementals),  which,  unless  we  subject  them,  will  subject  us,  and  lead  us  step  by  step  to  moral  ruin  (mediumship).  In  short  :

Theurgy  unites  us  most  strongly  to  divine  nature  This  nature  begets  itself  through  itself,  moves  through  its  own  powers,  supports  all,  and  is  intelligent.

Being  the  ornament  of  the  Universe,  it  invites  us  to  intelligible  truth,  to  perfection  and  imparting  perfection  to  others.

It  unites  us  so  intimately  to  all  the  creative  actions  of  the  Gods,  according  to  the  capacity  of  each  of  us,  that  the  soul  having  accomplished  the  sacred  rites  is  consolidated  in  their  [the  Gods']  actions  and  intelli-  gences, until  it  launches  itself  into  and  is  absorbed  by  the  primordial  divine  essence.

This  is  the  object  of  the  sacred  Initiations  of  the  Egyptians.

Now,  lamblichus  shows  us  how  this  union  of  our  Higher  Soul  with  the  Universal  Soul,  with  the  Gods,  is  to  be  effected.

He  speaks  of  Manteia,  which  is  Samadhi,  the  highest  trance.3  He  speaks  also  of  dream  which  is  divine  vision,  when  man  re-becomes  again  a  God.

By  Theurgy,  or  Raja  Yoga,  a  man  arrives  at :  1.  Prophetic  Discernment  through  our  God  (the  respective  Higher  Ego  of  each  of  us)  revealing  to  us  the  truths  of  the  plane  on  which  we  happen  to  be  acting  ;  2.  Ecstasy  and  Illumination  ;  3.  Action  in  Spirit  (in  Astral  Body  or  through  Will)  ;  4.  and  Domination  over  the  minor  senseless  demons  (Elementals)  by  the  very  nature  of  our  purified  Egos.

But  this  demands  the  complete  purification  of  the  latter.

And  this  is  called  by  him  Magic,  through  initiation  into  Theurgy.

But  Theurgy  has  to  be  preceded  by  a  training  of  our  senses  and  the  knowledge  of  the  human  Self  in  relation  to  the  Divine  SELF.

So  long  as  man  has  not  thoroughly  mastered  this  preliminary  study,  it  is  idle  to  anthropomorphize  the  formless.

By  "  formless  "  I  mean  the  higher  and  the  lower  Gods,  the  supermundane  as  well  as  mundane  Spirits,  or  Beings,  which  to  beginners

1  De  Mysteriis,  p.  100,  lines  10  to  19,  p.  109.  fol.

1.

?  Ibid.,  p.  290,  lines  15  to  18,  et  seq.,  caps.

v.  and  vii,  •*  Ibid.,  p.  100.  sec.

in,  cap.

in.

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can 'be  revealed  only  in  Colours  and  Sounds.

For  none  but  a  high  Adept  can  perceive  a  "  God  "  in  its  true  transcendental  form,  which  to  the  untrained  intellect,  t  to  the  Chela,  will  be  visible  only  by  its  Aura.

The  visions  of  full  figures  casually  perceived  by  sensitives  and  mediums  belong  to  one  or  another  of  the  only  three  categories  they  can  see  :  (a)  Astrals  of  living  men  ;  (b)  Nirmanakayas  (Adepts,  good  or  bad,  whose  bodies  are  dead,  but  who  have  learned  to  live  in  the  invisible  space  in  their  ethereal  personalities)  ;  and  (c)  Spooks,  Elementaries  and  Elementals  masquerading  in  shapes  borrowed  from  the  Astral  Light  in  general,  or  from  figures  in  the  "  mind's  eye  "  of  the  audience,  or  of  the  medium,  which  are  immediately  reflected  in  their  respective  Auras.

Having  read  the  foregoing,  students  will  now  better  comprehend  the  necessity  of  first  studying  the  correspondences  between  our  "  principles  "  — which  are  but  the  various  aspects  of  the  triune  (spiritual  and  physical)  man  — and  our  Paradigm,  the  direct  roots  of  these  in  the  Universe.

In  view  of  this,  we  must  resume  our  teaching  about  the  Hierarchies  directly  connected  and  for  ever  linked  with  man.

Enough  has  been  said  to  show  that  while  for  the  Orientalists  and  profane  masses  the  sentence,  "  Om  Man;  Pad/Tie  Hum,"  means  simply  "  Oh  the  Jewel  in  the  Lotus,"  Esoterically  it  signifies  "Oh  my  God  within  me."  Yes ;  there  is  a  God  in  each  human  being,  for  man  was,  and  will  re-become,  God.

The  sentence  points  to  the  indissoluble  union  between  Man  and  the  Universe.

For  the  Lotus  is  the  universal  symbol  of  Kosmos  as  the  absolute  totality,  and  the  Jewel  is  Spiritual  Man,  or  God.

In  the  preceding  Paper,  the  correspondences  between  Colours,  Sounds,  and  "  Principles  "  were  given  ;  and  those  who  have  read  our  third  and  fourth  Volumes  will  remember  that  these  seven  principles  are  derived  from  the  seven  great  Hierarchies  of  Angels,  or  Dhyan  Chohans,  which  are,  irv  their  turn,  associated  with  Colours  and  Sounds,  and  form  collectively  the  Manifested  Logos.

In  the  eternal  music  of  the  spheres  we  find  the  perfect  scale  correspon-  ding to  the  colours,  and  in  the  number,  determined  by  the  vibrations  of  colour  and  sound,  which  "  underlies  every  form  and  guides  every  sound,"  we  find  the  summing-up  of  the  Manifested  Universe.

We  may  illustrate  these  correspondences  by  showing  the  relation  of  colour  and  sound  to  the  geometrical  figures  which  [  express  the  progressive  stages  in  the  manifestation  of  Kosmos.

1  See  supra,  Vol.

1.  p.  72  ;   Vol.

1,  p.  44.  et  seq.

,  Vol.

3,  p.  48,  et  seq.,  and  Vol.

4,  p.  163,  et  seq.


But  the  student  will  certainly  be  liable  to  confusion  if,  in  studying  the  Diagrams,  he  does  not  remember  two  things  :  (1)  That,  our  plane  being  a  plane  of  reflection,  and  therefore  illusionary,  the  various  notations  ar&  reversed  and  must  be  counted  from  below  upwards.

The  musical  scale  begins  from  below  upwards,  commencing  with  the  deep  Do  and  ending  with  the  far  more  acute  Si.  (2)  That  Kama  Rupa  (corresponding  to  Do  in  the  musical  scale),  containing  as  it  does  all  potentialities  of  Matter,  is  necessarily  the  starting-  point  on  our  plane.

Further,  it  commences  the  notation  on  every  plane,  as  corresponding  to  the  "  matter  "  of  that  plane.

Again,  the  student  must  also  remember  that  these  notes  have  to  be  arranged  in  a  circle,  thus  showing  how  Fa  is  the  middle  note  of  Nature.

In  short,  musical  notes,  or  Sounds,  Colours  and  Numbers  proceed  from  one  to  seven,  and  not  from  seven  to  one  as  erroneously  shown  in  the  spectrum  of  the  prismatic  colours,  in  which  Red  is  counted  first  :  a  fact  which  necessitated  my  putting  the  principles  and  the  days  of  the  week  at  random  in  Diagram  II.  The  musical  scale  and  colours,  according  to  the  number  of  vibrations,  proceed  from  the  world  of  gross  Matter  to  that  of  Spirit  thus  :

Principles

Co/ours

Notes

Numbers

States  of  Matter

Chhay*.  Shadow  or  Double

Violet

Si

Ether

Higher  Manas,  Spiritual  Intelligence

Indigo

La

Critical    State,    called    Air    in  Occultism

Auric  Envelope

Blue

Sol

Steam  or  Vapour

Lower  Manas,  or  Animal  Soul

Green

Fa

Critical  State

Buddhi,  or  Spiritual  Soul

Yellow

M.

Water

Prana,  or  Life  Principle

Orange

Re

Critical  State

Kama  Rupa,  the  Seat  of  Animal  Life

Red

Do

Ice

Here  again  the  student  is  asked  to  dismiss  from  his  mind  any  corre-  spondence between  "  principles  "  and  numbers,  for  reasons  already  given.

The  Esoteric  enumeration  cannot  be  made  to  correspond  with  the  conventional  exoteric.

The  one  is  the  reality,  the  other  is  classified  according  to  illusive

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appearances.

The   human   principles,   as   given    in    Esoteric  Buddhism,  were  tabulated  for  beginners,  so  as  not  to  confuse  their  minds.

It  was  half  a  blind.

COLOURS,  SOUNDS  AND  FORMS

To  proceed  :

The  Point  in  the  Circle  is  the  Unmanifested  Logos,  corresponding  to  Absolute  Life  and  Absolute  Sound.

The  first  geometrical  figure  after  the  Circle  or  the  Spheroid  is  the  Triangle.

It  corresponds  to  Motion,  Colour  and  Sound.

Thus  the  Point  in  the  Triangle  represents  the  Second  Logos,  "  Father-Mother,"  or  the  White  Ray  which  is  no  colour,  since  it  contains  potentially  all  colours.

It  is  shown  radiating  from  the  Unmanifested  Logos,  or  the  Unspoken  Word.

Around  the  first  Triangle  is  formed  on  the  plane  of  Primordial  Substance  in  this  order  (reversed  as  to  our  plane)  :

PLANE  OF  MANIFESTED

OR  DIFFERENTIATED

MATTER

A

Violet  (a)  Si

B  (Orange)  Red  (a)  Do

Indigo

W

La

Yellow

w

Mi

Green  (d)  Fa

Blue

(<>  Sol

Red

(9)  Do

(Yellow)  Orange

Orange  (i)  Re

Violet  (g)  Si

1  The  Master-Key  or  Tonic  of  Manifested  Nature

456  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

a.  The  Astral  Double  of  Nature,  or  the  Paradigm  of  all  Forms.

b.  Divine  Ideation,  or  Universal  Mind.

c.  The   Synthesis  of  Occult  Nature,  the  Egg  of  Brahma,  containing  all  and  radiating  all.

d.  Animal  or   Material   Soul  of  Nature,  source  of  animal  and  vegetable  intelligence  and  instinct.

e.  The  aggregate  of  Dhyan  Chohanic  Intelligences,  Fohat.

f.  Life  Principle  in  Nature.

g.  The  Life  Procreating  Principle  in  Nature.

That  which,  on  the  spirituaf  plane,  corresponds  to  sexual  affinity  on  the  lower.

Mirrored  on  the  plane  of  Gross  Nature,  the  World  of  Reality  is  reversed,  and  becomes  on  Earth  and  our  plane  •

B

a.  Red   is  the  colour  of  manifested  dual,  or  male  and  female.

In  man  it  is  shown  in  its  lowest  animal  form.

b.  Orange  is  the  colour  of  the  robes  of  the  Yogis  and  Buddhist  Priests,  the  colour  of  the  Sun  and  Spiritual  Vitality,  also  of  the  Vital  Principle.

c.  Yellow  or  radiant  Golden  is  the  colour  of  the  Spiritual,  Divine  Ray  in  every  atom  ;   in  man  of  Buddhi.

d.  Green  and  Red  are,  so  to  speak,  interchangeable  colours,  for  Green  absorbs  the  Red,  as  being  threefold  stronger  in  its  vibrations  than  the  latter ;  and   Green    is   the   complementary   colour   of   extreme    Red.

This   is   why  the     Lower      Manas     and    Kama    Rupa    are    respectively    shown    as    Green  and  Red.

e.  The  Astral  Plane,  or  Auric  Envelope  in  Nature  and  Man.

/.      The  Mind  or  rational  element  in  Man  and  Nature.

g.  The  most  ethereal  counterpart  of  the  Body  of  man,  the  opposite  pole,  standing  in  point  of  vibration  and  sensitiveness  as  the  Violet  stands  to  the  Red.

The  above  is  on  the  manifested  plane  ,  after  which  we  get  the  seven  and  the  Manifested  Prism,  or  Man  on  Earth.

With  the  latter,  the  Black  Magician  alone  is  concerned.

In  Kosmos,  the  gradations  and  correlations  of  Colours  and  Sounds,  and  therefore  of  Numbers  are  infinite.

This  is  suspected  even  in  Physics,  for  it  is  ascertained  that  there  exist  slower  vibrations  than  those  of  the  Red,  the

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slowest  perceptible  to  us,  and  far  more  rapid  vibrations  than  those  of  the  Violet,  the  most  rapid  that  our  senses  can  perceive.

But  on  Earth,  in  our  physical  world,  the  range  of  perceptible  vibrations  is  limited.

Our  physical  senses  cannot  take  cognizance  of  vibrations  above  and  below  the  septenary  and  limited  gradations  of  the  prismatic  colours,  for  such  vibrations  are  incap-  able of  causing  in  us  the  sensation  of  colour  or  sound.

It  will  always  be  the  graduated  septenary  and  no  more,  unless  we  learn  to  paralyze  our  Quaternary  and  discern  both  the  superior  and  inferior  vibrations  with  our  spiritual  senses  seated  in  the  upper  Triangle.

Now,  on  this  plane  of  illusion,  there  are  three  fundamental  colours,  as  demonstrated  by  Physical  Science,  Red,  Blue  and  Yellow  (or  rather  Orange-  Yellow).  Expressed  in  terms  of  the  human  principles  they  are  :  (1)  Kama  Rupa,  the  seat  of  the  animal  sensations,  welded  to,  and  serving  as  a  vehicle  for  the  Animal  Soul  or  Lower  Manas  (Red  and  Green,  as  said,  being  inter-  changeable) ;  (2)  Auric  Envelope,  or  the  essence  of  man  ;  and  (3)  Prana,  or  Life  Principle.

But  if  from  the  realm  of  illusion,  or  the  living  man  as  he  is  on  our  Earth,  subject  to  his  sensuous  perceptions  only,  we  pass  to  that  of  semi-  illusion,  and  observe  the  natural  colours  themselves,  or  those  of  the  principles,,  that  is,  if  we  try  to  find  out  which  are  those  that  in  the  perfect  man  absorb  all  others,  we  shall  find  that  the  colours  correspond  and  become  complemen-  tary in  the  following  way

*  '  Violet

1  Red  ...  .                  ..  .  .  Green

2  Orange  ...  .                  .  ..  Blue

3  Yellow              .  ...                 .  .  ...  Indigo

Violet

A  faint  violet,  mist-like  form  represents  the  Astral  Man  within  an  oviform  bluish  circle,  over  which  radiate  in  ceaseless  vibrations  the  prismatic  colours.

That  colour  is  predominant,  of  which  the  corresponding  principle  is  the  most  active  generally,  or  at  the  particular  moment  when  the  clairvoyant  perceives  it.  Such  man  appears  during  his  waking  states  ,  and  it  is  by  the  predomi-  nance of  this  or  that  colour,  and  by  the  intensity  of  its  vibrations,  that  a  clair-  voyant, if  he  be  acquainted  with  correspondences,  can  judge  of  the  inner  state  or  character  of  a  person,  for  the  latter  is  an  open  book  to  every  practical  Occultist.

In  the  trance  state  the  Aura  changes  entirely,  the  seven  prismatic  colours  being  no  longer  discernible.

In  sleep  also  they  are  not  all  "  at  home."  For  those  which  belong  to  the  spiritual  elements  in  the  man,  viz.,  Yellow,  Buddhi  ;  Indigo,  Higher  Manas  ;  and  the  Blue  of  the  Auric  Envelope  will  be  either  hardly  discernible,  or  altogether  missing.

The  Spiritual  Man  is  free  during  sleep,  and though  his  physical  memory  may  not  become  aware  of  it,  lives,  robed  in  his  highest  essence,  in  realms  on  other  planes,  in  realms  which  are  the  land  of  reality,  called  dreams  on  our  plane  of  illusion.


A  good  clairvoyant,  moreover,  if  he  had  an  opportunity  of  seeing  a  Yogi  in  the  trance  state  and  a  mesmerized  subject,  side  by  side,  would  learn  an  important  lesson  in  Occultism.

He  would  learn  to  know  the  difference  be-  tween self-induced  trance  and  a  hypnotic  state  resulting  from  extraneous  influence.

In  the  Yogi,  the  "  principles  "  of  the  lower  Quaternary  disappear  entirely.

Neither  Red,  Green,  Red-Violet  nor  the  Auric  Blue  of  the  Body  are  to  be  seen  ;  nothing  but  hardly  perceptible  vibrations  of  the  golden-hued  Prana  Principle  and  a  violet  flame  streaked  with  gold  rushing  upwards  from  the  head,  in  the  region  where  the  Third  Eye  rests,  and  culminating  in  a  point.

If  the  student  remembers  that  the  true  Violet,  or  the  extreme  end  of  the  spectrum,  is  no  compound  colour  of  Red  and  Blue,  but  a  homogeneous  colour  with  vibrations  seven  times  more  rapid  than  those  of  the  Red,1  and  that  the  golden  hue  is  the  essence  of  the  three  yellow  hues  from  Orange  Red  to  Yellow-Orange  and  Yellow,  he  will  understand  the  reason  why  :  he  lives  in  his  own  Auric  Body,  now  become  the  vehicle  of  Buddhi-Manas.

On  the  other  hand,  in  a  subject  in  an  artifically  produced  hypnotic  or  mesmeric  trance,  an  effect  of  unconscious  when  not  of  conscious  Black  Magic,  unless  produced  by  a  high  Adept,  the  whole  set  of  the  principles  will  be  present,  with  the  Higher  Manas  paralyzed,  Buddhi  severed  from  it  through  that  paralysis,  and  the  red-  violet  Astral  Body  entirely  subjected  to  the  Lower  Manas  and  Kama  Rupa  (the  green  and  red  animal  monsters  in  us).

One  who  comprehends  well  the  above  explanations  will  readily  see  how  i  mportant  it  is  for  every  student,  whether  he  is  striving  for  practical  Occult

1  Colours

Wave-Lengths  in  Milli-  metres

Number  of  Vibrations  in  Jnllions

Violet  —  extreme

Violet

Violet-Indigo

Indigo

Indigo-Blue

Blue

Blue-Green

Green

Green-Yellow

Yellow

Yellow-Orange  Orange

Orange-Red

Red

Red-extreme

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powers  or  only  for  the  purely  psychic  and  spiritual  gifts  of  clairvoyance  and  metaphysical  knowledge,  to  master  thoroughly  the  right  correspondences  between  the  human,  or  nature  principles,  and  those  of  Kosmos.

It  is  ignor-  ance which  leads  materialistic  Science  to  deny  the  inner  man  and  his  Divine  powers  ;  knowledge  and  personal  experience  that  allow  the  Occultist  to  affirm  that  such  powers  are  as  natural  to  man  as  swimming  to  fishes.

It  is  like  a  Laplander,  in  all  sincerity,  denying  the  possibility  of  the  catgut,  strung  loosely  on  the  sounding-board  of  a  violin  producing  comprehensive  sounds  or  melody.

Our  principles  are  the  Seven-Stringed  Lyre  of  Apollo,  truly.

In  this  our  age,  when  oblivion  has  shrouded  ancient  knowledge,  men's  faculties  are  no  better  than  the  loose  strings  of  the  violin  to  the  Laplander.

But  the  Occultist  who  knows  how  to  tighten  them  and  tune  his  violin  in  harmony  with  the  vibrations  of  colour  and  sound,  will  extract  divine  harmony  from  them.

The  combination  of  these  powers  and  the  attuning  of  the  Microcosm  and  the  Macrocosm  will  give  the  geometrical  equivalent  of  the  invocation  "  Om  Man/  Pad  me  Hum."

This  was  why  the  previous  knowledge  of  music  and  geometry  was  oblig-  atory in  the  School  of  Pythagoras.

THE  ROOTS  OF  COLOUR  AND    SOUND

Further,  each  of  the  Primordial  Seven,  the  first  Seven  Rays  forming  the  Manifested  Logos,  is  again  sevenfold.

Thus,  as  the  seven  colours  of  the  solar  spectrum  correspond  to  the  seven  Rays,  or  Hierarchies,  so  each  of  these  latter  has  again  its  seven  divisions  corresponding  to  the  same  series  of  colours.

But  in  this  case  one  colour,  viz.,  that  which  characterizes  the  particular  Hierarchy  as  a  whole,  is  predominant  and  more  intense  than  the  others.

These  Hierarchies  can  only  be  symbolized  as  concentric  circles  of  pris-  matic colours ;  each  Hierarchy  being  represented  by  a  series  of  seven  concentric  circles,  each  circle  representing  one  of  the  prismatic  colours  in  their  natural  order.

But  in  each  of  these  "  wheels  "  one  circle  will  be  brighter  and  more  vivid  in  colour  than  the  rest,  and  the  wheel  will  have  a  surrounding  Aura  (a  fringe,  as  the  physicists  call  it)  of  that  colour.

This  colour  will  be  the  characteristic  colour  of  that  Hierarchy  as  a  whole.

Each  of  these  Hierarchies

460  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

furnishes  the  essence  (the  Sou!)  and  is  the  "  Builder  "  of  one  of  the  sever*  kingdoms  of  Nature  which  are  the  three  elemental  kingdoms,  the  mineral,  the  vegetable,  the  animal,  and  the  kingdom  of  spiritual  man.1  Moreover,  each  Hierarchy  furnishes  the  Aura  of  one  of  the  seven  principles  in  man  with  its  specific  colour.

Further,  as  each  of  these  Hierarchies  is  the  Ruler  of  one  of  the  Sacred  Planets,  it  will  easily  be  understood  how  Astrology  came  into  existence,  and  that  real  Astrology  has  a  strictly  scientific  basis.

The  symbol  adopted  in  the  Eastern  School  to  represent  the  Seven*  Hierarchies  of  creative  Powers  is  a  wheel  of  seven  concentric  circles,  each  circle  being  coloured  with  one  of  the  seven  colours  ;  call  them  Angels,  if  you  will,  or  Planetary  Spirits,  or,  again,  the  Seven  Rulers  of  the  Seven  Sacred  Planets  of  our  system,  as  in  our  present  case.

At  all  events,  the  concentric  circles  stand  as  symbols  for  Ezekiel's  Wheels  with  some  Western  Occultists  and  Kabalists,  and  for  the  "  Builders  "  or  Prajapati  with  us.

DIAGRAM    III

The  student  should  carefully  examine  the  following  Diagram.

Thus  the  Linga  Sharira  is  derived  from  the  Violet  sub-ray  of  the  Violet  Hierarchy  ;  the  Higher  Manas  is  similarly  derived  from  the  Indigo  sub-ray  of  the  Indigo  Hierarchy,  and  so  on.  Every  man  being  born  under  a  certain  planet,  there  will  always  be  a  predominance  of  that  planet's  colour  in  him,  because  that  "  principle  "  will  rule  in  him  which  has  its  origin  in  the  Hierarchy  in  question.

There  will  also  be  a  certain  amount  of  the  colour  derived  from  the  other  planets  present  in  his  Aura,  but  that  of  the  ruling  planet  will  be  strongest.

Now  a  person  in  whom,  say,  the  Mercury  principle  is  predominant,  will,  by  acting  upon  the  Mercury  principle  in  another  person  born  under  a  different  planet,  be  able  to  get  him  entirely  under  his  control.

For  the  stronger  Mercury  principle  in  him  will  overpower  the  weaker  Mercurial  element  in  the  other.

But  he  will  have  little  power  over  persons  born  under  the  same  planet  as  himself.

This  is  the  key  to  the  Occult  Sciences  of  Magnetism  and  Hypnotism.

The  student  will  understand  that  the  Orders  and  Hierarchies  are  here  named  after  their  corresponding  colours,  so  as  to  avoid  using  numerals,  which

1  See  Five  Years  of  Theosophy,  pp.  273  to  278.     (1885  ed.  ;  pp    175-8,  revised  ed.,  1894.)

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DIAGRAM  m

Violet  Lmga  Shanra

Indigo  Higher  Manas

Blue  Auric  Egg

would  be  confusing  in  connection  with  the  human  principles,  no   proper  numbers  of  their  own.

The  real  Occult  names  of   these   Hierarchies  cannot  now  be  given.

The  student  must,  however  remember  that  the  colours  which  we  see  with  our  physic-  al eyes  are  not  the  true  colours  of  Occult  Nature,  but  are  merely  the  effects  pro-  duced on  the  mechanism  of  our  physical  organs  by  certain  rates  of  vibration.

For  in-  stance, Clerk  Maxwell  has  demonstrated  that  the  retinal  effects  of  any  colour  may  be  •imitated  by  properly  combin-  ing three  other  colours.

It  follows,  therefore,  that  our  retina  has^only  three  distinct  colour  sensations,  and  we  therefore  do  not  perceive  the  seven  colours  which  really  exist,  but  only  their  "  imita-  tions," so  to  speak,  in  our  physical  organism.

Thus,  for  instance,  the  Orange-Red  of  the  first  "  Tri-  angle "  is  not  a  combination  of  Orange  and  Red,  but  the  true  "spiritual  "  Red,  if  the  term  may  be  allowed,  while  the  Red  (blood-red)  of  the  spectrum  is  the  colour  of  Kama,  animal  desire,  and  is  inseparable  from  the  material  plane.

as  the  latter  have

Green  Lower  Manas

Yellow  Buddhi

Orange  Prana

Red  Kama  Rupa

\

VIOLET

I

O

§  O

Indigo

Blue

Green

Yellow

Orange

Red

Violet

INDIGO

Blue

Green

Yellow

Orange

Red

Violet

Indigo

BLUE

Green

Yellow

Orange

Red

Violet

Indigo

Blue

GREEN

Yellow

Orange

Red

Violet

Indigo

Blue

Green

YELLOW

Orange

Red

Violet

Indigo

Blue

Green

Yellow

ORANGE

Red

Violet

Indigo

Blue

Green

Yellow

Orange

RED

O

462  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

THE  UNITY  OF  DEITY

Esotericism,  pure  and  simple,  speaks  of  no  personal  God  ;  therefore  are  we  considered  as  Atheists.

But,  in  reality,  Occult  Philosophy,  as  a  whole,  is  based  absolutely  on  the  ubiquitous  presence  of  God,  the  Absolute  Deity  ;  and  if  IT  Itself  is  not  speculated  upon,  as  being  too  sacred  and  yet  incompre-  hensible as  a  Unit  to  the  finite  intellect,  yet  the  entire  Philosophy  is  based  upon  Its  Divine  Powers  as  being  the  Source  of  all  that  breathes  and  lives  and  has  existence.

In  every  ancient  Religion  the  ONE  was  demonstrated  by  the  many.

In  Egypt  and  India,  in  Chaldea  and  Phoenicia,  and  finally  in  Greece,  the  ideas  about  Deity  were  expressed  by  multiples  of  three,  five  and  seven  ;  and  also  by  eight,  nine  and  twelve  great  Gods,  which  symbolized  the  powers  and  properties  of  the  One  and  Only  Deity.

This  was  related  to  that  infinite  subdivision  by  irregular  and  odd  numbers  to  which  the  metaphysics  of  these  nations  subjected  their  ONE  DIVINITY.

Thus  constituted,  the  cycle  of  the  Gods  had  all  the  qualities  and  attributes  of  the  ONE  SUPREME  AND  UNKNOWABLE  ;  for  in  this  collection  of  divine  Personalities,  or  rather  of  Symbols  personified,  clwells  the  ONE  GOD,  the  GOD  ONE,  that  God  which,  in  India,  is  said  to  have  no  Second.

O  God  Ani  [the  Spiritual  Sun],  thou  residest  in  the  agglomeration  of  thy  divine  personages.

These  words  show  the  belief  of  the  ancients  that  all  manifestation  proceeds  from  one  and  the  same  Source,  all  emanating  from  the  one  identical  Principle  which  can  never  be  completely  developed  except  in  and  through  the  collective  and  entire  aggregate  of  Its  emanations.

The  Pleroma  of  Valentinus  is  absolutely  the  Space  of  Occult  Philos-  ophy ;  for  Pleroma  means  the  "  Fullness,"  the  superior  regions.

It  is  the  sum  total  of  all  the  Divine  manifestations  and  emanations,  expressing  the  plenum  or  totality  of  the  rays  proceeding  from  the  ONE,  differentiating  on  all  the  planes,  and  transforming  themselves  into  Divine  Powers,  called  Angels  and  Planetary  Spirits  in  the  Philosophy  of  every  nation.

The  Gnostic  >Cons  and  Powers  of  the  Pleroma  are  made  to  speak  as  the  Devas  and  Siddhas  of  the  Puranas.

The  Epinoia,  the  first  female  manifestation  of  God,  the  "  Prin-  ciple "  of  Simon  Magus  and  Saturninus,  holds  the  same  language  as  the  Logos  of  Basilides  ;  and  each  of  these  is  traced  to  the  purely  esoteric  Aletheia,  the  TRUTH  of  the  Mysteries.

All  of  them,  we  are  taught,  repeat  at  different  times  and  in  different  languages  the  magnificent  hymn  of  the  Egyptian  papyrus,  thousands  of  years  old  :

The  Gods  adore  thee,  they  greet  thee,  O  Thou,  the  One  Dark  Truth.

1  Apud  Grebaut  Papyrus  Orbiney,  p.  101.

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And  addressing  Ra,  they  add  :

The  Gods  bow  before  thy  Majesty,  by  exalting  the  Souls  of  that  which  produces  them  .  .  .  and  say  to  thee,  Peace  to  all  emanations  from  the  Unconscious  Father  of  the  Conscious  Fathers  of  the  Gods  .  .  .  Thou  producer  of  beings,  we  adore  the  souls  which  emanate  from  thee.

Thou  begettest  us,  O  thou  Unknown,  and  we  greet  thee  in  worshipping  each  God-Soul  which  descendeth  from  thee  and  liveth  in  us.

This  is  the  source  of  the  assertion :  Know  ye  not  that  ye  are  Gods  and  the  temple  of  God.

This  is  shown  in  the  "  Roots  of  Ritualism  in  Church  and  Masonry,"  in  Lucifer  for  March,  1889.  Truly  then,  as  said  seventeen  centuries  ago,  "  Man  cannot  possess  Truth  (Aletheia)  except  he  participate  in  the  Gnosis."  So  we  may  say  now  :  No  man  can  know  the  Truth  unless  he  studies  the  secrets  of  the  Pleroma  of  Occultism  ;  and  these  secrets  are  all  in  the  Theogony  of  the  ancient  Wisdom-Religion,  which  is  the  Aletheia  of  Occult  Science.

1  I  Corinthians,  iii,  16.

PAPER

A  WORD  CONCERNING  THE  EARLIER  PAPERS

AS  many  have  written  and  almost  complained  to  me  that  they  could  -find  no  practical  clear  application  of  certain  diagrams  appended  to  the  first  two  Papers,  and  others  have  spoken  of  their  abstruseness,  a  short  expla-  nation is  necessary.

The  reason  of  this  difficulty  in  most  cases  has  been  that  the  point  of  view  taken  was  erroneous  ;  the  purely  abstract  and  metaphysical  was  mistaken  for,  and  confused  with,  the  concrete  and  the  physical.

Let  us  take  for  example  the  diagrams  on  page  455  (Paper  2),  and  say  that  these  are  entirely  macrocosmic  and  ideal.

It  must  be  remembered  that  the  study  of  Occultism  proceeds  from  Universals  to  Particulars  and  not  the  reverse  way,  ,as  accepted  by  Science.

As  Plato  was  an  Initiate,  he  very  naturally  used  the  former  method,  while  Aristotle,  never  having  been  initiated,  scoffed  at  his  master,  and,  elaborating  a  system  of  his  own,  left  it  as  an  heirloom  to  be  adopted  and  improved  by  Bacon.

Of  a  truth  the  aphorism  of  Hermetic  Wisdom,  "  As  above,  so  below,"  applies  to  all  Esoteric  instruction  ;  but  we  must  begin  with  the  above  ;  we  must  learn  the  formula  before  we  can  sum  the  series

The  two  figures,  therefore,  are  not  meant  to  represent  any  two  parti-  cular planes,  but  are  the  abstraction  of  a  pair  of  planes,  explanatory  of  the  law  of  reflection,  just  as  the  Lower  Manas  is  a  reflection  of  the  Higher.

They  must  therefore  be  taken  in  the  highest  metaphysical  sense.

The  diagrams  are  only  intended  to  familiarize  students  with  the  lead-  ing ideas  of  Occult  correspondences,  the  very  genius  of  metaphysical,  •or  macrocosmic  and  spiritual  Occultism  forbidding  the  use  of  figures  •or  even  symbols  further  than  as  temporary  aids.

Once  define  an  idea  in  words,  and  it  loses  its  reality  ;  once  figure  a  metaphysical  idea,  and  you  materialize  its  spirit.

Figures  must  be  used  only  as  ladders  to  scale  the

PAPER

battlements,    ladders   to   be   disregarded   when  once  the  foot  is  set  upon  the  rampart.

Let  students,  therefore,  be  very  careful  to  spiritualize  the  Papers  and  avoid  materializing  them ;  let  them  always  try  to  find  the  highest  mean-  ing possible,  confident  that  in  proportion  as  they  approach  the  material  and  visible  in  their  speculations  on  the  Papers,  so  far  are  they  from  the  right  understanding  of  them.

This  is  especially  the  case  with  these  first  Instructions  and  Diagrams,  for  as  in  all  true  arts,  so  in  Occultism,  we  must  first  learn  the  theory  before  we  are  taught  the  practice.

CONCERNING  SECRECY

Students  ask :  Why  such  secrecy  about  the  details  of  a  doctrine  the  body  of  which  has  been  publicly  revealed,  as  in  Esoteric  Buddhism  and  The  Secret  Doctrine  ?

To  this  Occultism  would  reply :  for  two  reasons  :

a.  The  whole  truth  is  too  sacred  to  be  given  out  promiscuously,

b.  The   knowledge   of   all  the    details   and    missing    links   in  the  exoteric  teachings  is  too  dangerous  in  profane  hands.

The  truths  revealed  to  man  by  the  "  Planetary  Spirits " — the  highest  Kumaras,  those  who  incarnate  no  longer  in  the  Universe  during  this  Mahaman-  vantara — who  will  appear  on  earth  as  Avataras  only  at  the  beginning  of  every  new  human  Race,  and  at  the  junctions  or  close  of  the  two  ends  of  the  small  and  great  cycles — in  time,  as  man  became  more  animalized,  were  made  to  fade  away  from  his  memory.

Yet,  though  these  Teachers  remain  with  man  •no  longer  than  the  time  required  to  impress  upon  the  plastic  minds  of  child-  •humanity  the  eternal  verities  they  teach,  Their  Spirit  remains  vivid  though  latent  in  mankind.

And  the  full  knowledge  of  the  primitive  revelation  has  remained  always  with  a  few  elect,  and  has  been  transmitted  from  that  time  up  to  the  present,  from  one  generation  of  Adepts  to  another.

As  the  Teachers  say  in  the  Occult  Primer :

"  7 his  is  done  so  as  to  warrant  them  [the  eternal  truths]  from  being  lost  or  entirely  forgotten  in  ages  hereaher  by  the  forthcoming  generations."

The  mission  of  the  Planetary  Spirit  is  but  to  strike  the  KEY-NOTE  OF  TRUTH.

When  once  He  has  directed  the  vibration  of  the  latter  to  run  its  course  uninterruptedly  along  the  concatenation  of  the  race  to  the  end  of  the  cycle,  He  disappears  from  our  earth  until  the  following  Planetary  Manvantara.1  The  .mission  of  any  teacher  of  Esoteric  truths,  whether  he  stands  at  the  top  or  the

1  See  The  Mahatma  Letters  to  A.  P.  S/nnett.

p.  41.  FF

466  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

foot  of  the  ladder  of  knowledge,  is  precisely  the  same ;  as  above,  so  below.

I  have  only  orders  to  strike  the  key-note  of  the  various  Esoteric  truths  among  the  learners  as  a  body.

Those  units  among  you  who  will  have  raised  them-  selves on  the  "  Path  "  over  their  fellow-students,  in  their  Esoteric  sphere,  will,  as  the  "  Elect "  spoken  of  did  and  do  in  the  Parent  Brotherhoods,  receive  the  last  explanatory  details  and  the  ultimate  key  to  what  they  learn.

No  one,  however,  can  hope  to  gain  this  privilege  before  the  MASTERS — not  my  humble  self — find  him  or  her  worthy.

If  you  wish  to  know  the  real  raison  d'etre  for  this  policy,  I  now  give  it  to  you.

No  use  my  repeating  and  explaining  what  all  of  you  know  as  well  as  myself ;  at  the  very  beginning,  events  have  shown  that  no  caution  can  be  dispensed  with.

Of  our  body  of  several  hundred  men  and  women,  many  did  not  seem  to  realize  either  the  awful  sacredness  of  the  pledge  (which  some  took  at  the  end  of  their  pen),  or  the  fact  that  their  personality  has  to  be  entirely  disregarded,  when  brought  face  to  face  with  their  HIGHER  SELF  ;  or  that  all  their  words  and  professions  went  for  naught  unless  corroborated  by  actions.

This  was  human  nature,  and  no  more  ;  therefore  it  was  passed  leniently  by,  and  a  new  lease  accorded  by  the  MASTER.

But  apart  from  this  there  is  a  danger  lurking  in  the  nature  of  the  present  cycle  itself.

Civilized  humanity,  however  carefully  guarded  by  its  invisible  Watchers,  the  Nirmana-  kayas,  who  watch  over  our  respective  races  and  nations,  is  yet,  owing  to  its  collective  Karma,  terribly  under  the  sway  of  the  traditional  opposers  of  the.

Nirmanakayas — the  "  Brothers  of  the  Shadow,"  embodied  and  disembodied  ,  and  this,  as  has  already  been  told  you,  will  last  to  the  end  of  the  first  Kali  Yuga  cycle  (1897),  and  a  few  years  beyond,  as  the  smaller  dark  cycle  happens,  to  overlap  the  great  one.

Thus,  notwithstanding  ail  precautions,  terrible  secrets  are  often  revealed  to  entirely  unworthy  persons  by  the  efforts  of  the  "  Dark  Brothers"  and  their  working  on  human  brains.

This  is  entirely  owing  to  the  simple  fact  that  in  certain  privileged  organisms,  vibrations  of  the  primitive  truth  put  in  motion  by  the  Planetary  Beings  are  set  up,  in  what  Western  philosophy  would  term  innate  ideas,  and  Occultism  "  flashes  of  genius."  :  Some  such  idea  based  on  eternal  truth  is  awakened,  and  all  that  the  watchful  Powers  can  do  is  to  prevent  its  entire  revelation.

Everything  in  this  Universe  of  differentiated  matter  has  its  two  aspects,  the  light  and  the  dark  side,  and  these  two  attributes,  applied  practically,  lead,  the  one  to  use,  the  other  to  abuse.

Every  man  may  become  a  Botanist  without  apparent  danger  to  his  fellow-creatures  ;  and  many  a  Chemist  who  has  mastered  the  science  of  essences  knows  that  every  one  of  1  See  "  Genius,"  Lucifer,  Nov  ,  1889,  p  227.

PAPER

them  can  both  heal  and  kill.

Not  an  ingredient,  not  a  poison,  but  can  be  used  for  both  purposes — aye,  from  harmless  wax  to  deadly  prussic  acid,  from  the  saliva  of  an  infant  to  that  of  the  cobra  di  capella.

This  every  tyro  in  medicine  knows — theoretically,  at  any  rate.

But  where  is  the  learned  Chemist  in  our  day  who  has  been  permitted  to  discover  the  "  night  side  "  of  an  attribute  of  any  substance  in  the  three  kingdoms  of  Science,  let  alone  in  the  seven  of  the  Occultists  ?  Who  of  them  has  penetrated  into  its  Arcana,  into  the  innermost  Essence  of  things  and  its  primary  correlations  ?  Yet  it  is  this  knowledge  alone  which  makes  of  an  Occultist  a  genuine  practical  Initiate,  whether  he  turn  out  a  Brother  of  Light  or  a  Brother  of  Darkness.

The  essence  of  that  subtle,  traceless  poison,  the  most  potent  in  nature,  which  entered  into  the  composition  of  the  so-called  Medici  and  Borgia  poisons,  if  used  with  discrimination  by  one  well  versed  in  the  septenary  degrees  of  its  potentiality  on  each  of  the  planes  accessible  to  man  on  earth — could  heal  or  kill  every  man  in  the  world  ;  the  result  depending,  of  course,  on  whether  the  operator  was  a  Brother  of  the  Light  or  a  Brother  of  the  Shadow.

The  former  is  prevented  from  doing  the  good  he  might,  by  racial,  national,  and  individual  Karma  ;  the  second  is  impeded  in  his  fiendish  work  by  the  joint  efforts  of  the  human  "  Stones  "  of  the  ••  Guardian  Wall."  '

It  is  incorrect  to  think  that  there  exists  any  special  "  powder  of  pro-  jection^' or  "philosopher's  stone,"  or  "elixir  of  life."  The  latter  lurks  in  every  flower,  in  every  stone  and  mineral  throughout  the  globe.

It  is  the  ultimate  essence  of  everything  on  its  way  to  higher  and  higher  evolution.

As  there  is  no  good  or  evil  per  se,  so  there  is  neither  "  elixir  of  life  "  nor  "  elixir  of  death,"  nor  poison,  per  se,  but  all  this  is  contained  in  one  and  the  same  universal  Essence,  this  or  the  other  effect,  or  result,  depending  on  the  degree  of  its  differentiation  and  its  various  correlations.

The  light  side  of  it  produces  life,  health,  bliss,  divine  peace,  etc.

;  the  dark  side  brings  death,  disease,  sorrow  and  strife.

This  is  proven  by  the  knowledge  of  the  nature  of  the  most  violent  poisons  ;  of  some  of  them  even  a  large  quantity  will  produce  no  evil  effect  on  the  organism,  whereas  a  grain  of  the  same  poison  kills  with  the  rapidity  of  lightning  ;  while  the  same  grain,  again,  altered  by  a  certain  combination,  though  its  quantity  remains  almost  identical,  will  heal.

The  num-  ber of  the  degrees  of  its  differentiation  is  septenary,  as  are  the  planes  of  its  action,  each  degree  being  either  beneficent  or  maleficent  in  its  effects,  according  to  the  system  into  which  it  is  introduced.

He  who  is  skilled  in  these  degrees  is  on  the  high  road  to  practical  Adeptship  ;  he  who  acts  at  haphazard  — as  do  the  enormous  majority  of  the  "  Mind  Curers,"  whether  "  Mental  "

1  See  Voice  of  the  Silence,  pp.  68  and  94,  art.

28,  Glossary.

468  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

or  "  Christian  Scientists  " — is  likely  to  rue  the  effects  on  himself  as  well  as  on  others.

Put  on  the  track  by  the  example  of  the  Indian  Yogis,  and  of  their  broadly  but  incorrectly  outlined  practices,  which  they  have  only  read  about,  but  have  had  no  opportunity  to  study — these  new  sects  have  rushed  head-  long and  guideless  into  the  practice  of  denying  and  affirrhing.

Thus  they  have  done  more  harm  than  good.

Those  who  are  successful  owe  it  to  their  innate  magnetic  and  healing  powers,  which  very  often  counteract  that  which  would  otherwise  be  conducive  to  much  evil.

Beware,  I  say  ;  Satan  and  the  Archangel  are  more  than  twins  ;  they  are  one  body  and  one  mind — Deus  est  Demon

IS  THE  PRACTICE  OF  CONCENTRATION  BENEFICENT?

Such  is  another  question  often  asked.

I  answer  :  Genuine  concentration  and  meditation,  conscious  and  cautious,  upon  one's  lower  self  in  the  light  of  the  inner  divine  man  and  the  Plramitas,  is  an  excellent  thing.

But  to  "  sit  for  Yoga,"  with  only  a  superficial  and  often  distorted  knowledge  of  the  real  practice,  is  almost  invariably  fatal  ;  for  ten  to  one  the  student  will  either  develop  mediumistic  powers  in  himself,  or  lose  time  and  get  disgusted  both  with  practice  and  theory.

Before  one  rushes  into  such  a  dangerous  experi-  ment, and  seeks  to  go  beyond  a  minute  examination  of  one's  lower  self  and  its  walk  in  life,  or  that  which  is  called  in  our  phraseology,  "  The  Chela's  Daily  Life  Ledger,"  he  would  do  well  to  learn  at  least  the  difference  between  the  two  aspects  of  "  Magic,"  the  White  or  Divine,  and  the  Black  or  Devilish,  and  assure  himself  that  by  "  sitting  for  Yoga,"  with  no  experience,  as  well  as  with  no  guide  to  show  him  the  dangers,  he  does  not  daily  and  hourly  cross  the  boundaries  of  the  Divine  to  fall  into  the  Satanic.

Nevertheless,  the  way  to  learn  the  difference  is  very  easy ;  one  has  only  to  remember  that  no  Eso-  ter/c  truth  entirely  unveiled  will  ever  be  given  in  public  print,  in  book  or  magazine.

I  ask  students  to  turn  to  The  Theosophist  of  November,  1887.  On  page  98  they  will  find  the  beginning  of  an  excellent  article  by  Mr.  Rama  Prasad  on  "  Nature's  Finer  Forces."1  The  value  of  this  work  is  not  so  much

1  The  references  to  "Nature's  Finer  Forces  "  which  follow,  have  respect  to  the  eight  articles  which  appeared  in  the  pages  of  Jhe  Theosophist  [1887-8]  and  not  to  the  fifteen  essays  and  the  transla-  tion of  a  chapter  of  the  Shivagama  which  are  contained  in  the  book  called  Nature's  Finer  Forces.

The  Shivagama  in  its  details  is  purely  Tfintric,  and  nothing  but  harm  can  result  from  any  practical  following  of  its  precepts  I  would  most  strongly  dissuade  any  student  from  attempting  any  of  these  Hatha  Yoga  practices,  for  he  will  either  ruin  himself  entirely,  or  throw  himself  so  far  back  that  it  will  be  almost  impossible  to  regain  the  lost  ground  in  this  incarnation.

The  translation  referred  to  has  been  considerably  expurgated,  and  even  now  is  hardly  fit  for  publication.

It  recommends  Black  Magic  of  the  worst  kind,  and  is  the  very  antipodes  of  spiritual  Raja  Yoga.

Beware,  )  say.

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in  its  literary  merit,  though  it  gained  its  author  the  gold  medal  of  The  Jheosophist,  as  in  its  exposition  of  tenets  hitherto  concealed  in  a  rare  and  ancient  Sanskrit  work  on  Occultism.

But  Mr.  Rama  Prasad  is  not  an  Occultist,  only  an  excellent  Sanskrit  scholar,  a  university  graduate  and  a  man  of  remark-  able intelligence.

His  essays  are  almost  entirely  based  on  Tantra  works,  which,  if  read  indiscriminately  by  a  tyro  in  Occultism,  will  lead  to  the  practice  of  most  unmitigated  Black  Magic.

Now,  since  the  difference  of  primary  importance  between  Black  and  White  Magic  is  the  object  with  which  it  is  practised,  and  that  of  secondary  importance  the  nature  of  the  agents  used  for  the  production  of  phenomenal  results,  the  line  of  demarcation  between  the  two  is  very — very  thin.

The  danger  is  lessened  only  by  the  fact  that  every  Occult  book,  so-  called,  is  Occult  only  in  a  certain  sense  :  that  is,  the  text  is  Occult  merely  by  reason  of  its  blinds.

The  symbolism  has  to  be  thoroughly  understood  before  the  reader  can  get  at  the  correct  sense  of  the  teaching.

Moreover,  it  is  never  complete,  its  several  portions  each  being  under  a  different  title,  and  each  containing  a  portion  of  some  other  work  ;  so  that  without  a  key  to  these  no  such  work  divulges  the  whole  truth.

Even  the  famous  Shivagama,  on  which  Nature's  Finer  Forces  is  based,  "  is  nowhere  to  be  found  in  complete  form,"  as  the  author  tells  us.  Thus,  like  all  others,  it  treats  of  only  five  Tattvas  instead  of  the  seven  as  in  Esoteric  teachings.

Now,  the  Tattvas  being  simply  the  substratum  of  the  seven  forces  of  Nature,  ftow  can  this  be  ?  There  are  seven  forms  of  Prakriti,  as  Kapila's  Sankhya,  the  Vishnu  Purana,  and  other  works  teach.

Prakriti  is  Nature,  Matter  (primordial  and  elemental)  ;  therefore  logic  demands  that  the  Tattvas  also  should  be  seven.

For  whether  Tattvas  mean,  as  Occultism  teaches,  "  forces  of  Nature,"  or,  as  the  learned  Rama  Prasad  explains,  "the  substance  out  of  which  the  universe  is  formed  "  and  "  the  power  by  which  it  is  sustained,"  it  is  all  one  ;  they  are  Force,  Purusha,  and  Matter,  Prakriti.

And  if  the  forms,  or  rather  planes,  of  the  latter  are  seven,  then  its  forces  must  be  seven  also.

Ir*  other  words,  the  degrees  of  the  solidity  of  matter  and  the  degrees  of  the  power  that  ensouls  it  must  go  hand  in  hand.

The   Universe  is  made  out  of  the  Tattva,  it  is  sustained  by  the  Tattva,  and  it  dis-  appears into  the  Tattva,

says  Shiva,  as  quoted  from  the  Shivagama  in  Nature's  Finer  Forces.

This  settles  the  question  ;  if  Prakriti  is  septenary,  then  the  Tattvas  must  be  seven,  for,  as  said,  they  are  both  Substance  and  Force,  or  atomic  Matter  and  the  Spirit  that  ensouls  it.

1  ["  The  universe  came  out  of  Tattva  (or  the  Tattvas) ;  it  goes  on  by  the  instrumentality  of  the  Tattvas ;  it  disappears  into  the  Tattvas ;  by  the  Tattvas  is  known  the  nature  of  the  Universe  "  Nature's  Finer  Forces,  p.  186,  3rd  ed  ]

470  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

This  is  explained  here  to  enable  the  student  to  read  between  the  lines  of  the  so-called  Occult  articles  on  Sanskrit  Philosophy,  by  which  they  must  not  be  misled.

The  doctrine  of  the  seven  Tattvas  (the  principles  of  the  Universe  and  also  of  man)  was  held  in  great  sacredness  and  therefore  secrecy,  in  days  of  old,  by  the  Brahmans,  who  have  now  almost  forgotten  the  teaching.

Yet  it  is  taught  to  this  day  in  the  Schools  beyond  the  Himalayan  Range,  though  now  hardly  remembered  or  heard  of  in  India  except  through  rare  Initiates.

The  policy  has,  however,  been  changed  gradually  ;  Cheias  began  to  be  taught  the  broad  outlines  of  it,  and  at  the  advent  of  the  T.  S.  in  India  in  1879,  I  was  ordered  to  teach  it  in  its  exoteric  form  to  one  or  two.

I  now  give  it  out  Esoterically.

Knowing  that  some  students  try  to  follow  a  system  of  Yoga  in  their  own  fashion,  guided  only  by  the  rare  hints  they  find  in  Theosophical  books  and  magazines,  which  must  naturally  be  incomplete,  I  chose  one  of  the  best  expositions  upon  ancient  Occult  works,  Nature's  Finer  Forces,  in  order  to  point  out  how  very  easily  one  can  be  misled  by  their  blinds.

The  author  seems  to  have  been  himself  deceived.

The  Tantras  read  Esoterically  are  as  full  of  wisdom  as  the  noblest  Occult  works.

Studied  with-  out a  guide  and  applied  to  practice,  they  may  lead  to  the  production  of  various  phenomenal  results,  on  the  moral  and  physiological  planes.

But  let  anyone  accept  their  dead-letter  rules  and  practices,  let  him  try  with  some  selfish  motive  in  view  to  carry  out  the  rites  prescribed  therein,  and — he  is  lost.

Followed  with  pure  heart  and  unselfish  devotion  merely  for  the  sake  of  experiment,  either  no  results  will  follow,  or  such  as  can  only  throw  back  the  performer.

But  woe  to  the  selfish  man  who  seeks  to  develop  Occult  powers  only  to  attain  earthly  benefits  or  revenge,  or  to  satisfy  his  ambition  ;  the  separation  of  the  Higher  from  the  Lower  Principles  and  the  severing  of  Buddhi-Manas  from  the  Tantrist's  personality  will  speedily  follow,  the  terrible  Karmic  results  to  the  dabbler  in  Magic.

In  the  East,  in  India  and  China,  soulless  men  and  women  are  as  frequently  met  with  as  in  the  West,  though  vice  is,  in  truth,  far  less  develop-  ed there  than  it  is  here.

It  is  Black  Magic  and  oblivion  of  their  ancestral  wisdom  that  lead  them  thereunto.

But  of  this  I  will  speak  later,  now  merely  adding  :  you  have  to  be  warned  and  know  the  danger.

Meanwhile,  in  view  of  what  follows,  the  real  Occult  division  of  the  Principles  in  their  correspondences  with  the  Tattvas  and  other  minor  forces  has  to  be  well  studied.

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ABOUT  "PRINCIPLES"  AND  "ASPECTS"

Speaking  metaphysically  and  philosophically,  on  strict  Esoteric  lines,  man-  as  a  complete  unit  is  composed  of  Four  basic  Principles  and  their  Three  Aspects  on  this  earth.

In  the  semi-esoteric  teachings,  these  Four  and  Three  have  been  called  Seven  Principles,  to  facilitate  the  comprehension  of  the  masses.

THE  ETERNAL  BASIC  PRINCIPLES

1.  Atma,   or  Jiva,  "  the  One  Life,"  which    permeates   the    Monadic   Jrio.

(One  in  three  and  three  in  One.)

2.  Auric    Envelope ;    because     the  substratum  of  the  Aura  around  man  is  the   universally  diffused  primordial  and  pure  Akasha,  the  first  film  on  the  boundless   and    shoreless  expanse  of  Jiva,  the  immutable  Root  of  all.

TRANSITORY   ASPECTS   PRODUCED  BY   THE  PRINCIPLES

1.  Prana,  the   Breath    of   Life,  the  same  as  Nephesh.

At  'the  death  of  a     living     being,    Prana    re-becomes  Jiva.

2.  Linga  Sharira,  the  Astral   Form,  the   transitory  emanation  of  the  Auric  Egg.

This  form  precedes  the  forma-  tion   of    the    living    Body,    and  after  death    clings    to    it,    dissipating    only  with    the    disappearance    of    its    last  atom  (the  skeleton  excepted).

3.  Lower  Manas,  the  Animal  Soul,  the    reflection     or    shadow    of   the  Buddhi-Manas,      having     the     poten-  tialities    of     both,     but     conquered  generally    by   its   association  with  the  Kama  elements.

3.  Buddhi ;    for     Buddhi    is   a   ray  of  the  Universal  Spiritual  Soul  (ALAYA).

4.  Manas   (the    Higher   Ego)  ;    for  it    proceeds    from    Mahat,    the    first  product   or    emanation    of   Pradhana,  which     contains    potentially    all     the  Gunas    (attributes).     Mahat    is   Cos-  mic  Intelligence,   called   the   "  Great  Principle."'

As  the  lower  man  is  the  combined  product  of  two  aspects — physically,  of  his  Astral  Form,  and  psycho-physiologically  of  Kama-Manas — he  is  not  looked  upon  even  as  an  aspect,  but  as  an  illusion.

1  Remember  that  our  re-incarnating  Egos  are  called  the  MSnasaputras,  "  Sons  of  Manas  '  (or  Mahat),  Intelligence,  Wisdom.

•  Prana,  on  earth  at  any  rate,  is  thus  but  a  mode  of  life,  a  constant  cyclic  motion  from  within  out-  wardly and  back  again,  an  out-breathing  and  in-breathing  of  the  ONE  LIFE,  or  Jiva,  the  synonym  of  the  Absolute  and  Unknowable  Deity.

PrSna  is  not -absolute  life,  or  Jiva,  but  its  aspect  in  a  world  of  delusion.

In  The  Theosophist,  May,  1888,  p  478,  Pr&na  is  said  to  be  "  one  stage  finer  than  the  gross  matter  of  earth.

472  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

The  Auric  Egg,  on  account  of  its  nature  and  manifold  functions,  has  to  be  well  studied.

As  Hiranyagarbha,  the  Golden  Womb  or  Egg,  contains  Brahma,  the  collective  symbol  of  the  Seven  Universal  Forces,  so  the  Auric  Egg  contains,  and  is  directly  related  to,  both  the  divine  and  the  physical  man.

In  its  essence,  as  said,  it  is  eternal  ;  in  its  constant  correlations  and  trans-  formations, during  the  reincarnating  progress  of  the  Ego  on  this  earth,  it  is  a  kind  of  perpetual  motion  machine.

As  given  out  in  our  third  volume,  the  Egos  or  Kumaras,  incarnating  in  man,  at  the  end  of  the  Third  Root  Race,  are  not  human  Egos  of  this  earth  or  plane,  but  become  such  only  from  the  moment  they  ensoul  the  Animal  Man,  thus  endowing  him  with  his  Higher  Mind.

Each  is  a  "  Breath  "  or  Principle,  called  the  Human  Soul,  or  Manas,  the  Mind.

As  the  Teachings  say  :

"  Each  is  a  pillar  of  light  Having  chosen  its  vehicle,  it  expanded,  sur-  rounding with  an  Akashic  Aura  the  human  animal,  while  the  Divine  (Manas/c)  Principle  settled  within  that  human  form."

Ancient  Wisdom  teaches  us,  moreover,  that  from  this  first  incarnation,  the  Lunar  Pitris,  who  had  made  men  out  of  their  Chhayas  or  Shadows,  are  absorbed  by  this  Auric  Essence,  and  a  distinct  Astral  Form  is  now  produced  for  each  forthcoming  personality  of  the  reincarnating  series  of  each  Ego.

Thus  the  Auric  Egg,  reflecting  all  the  thoughts,  words  and  deeds  of  man,  is  :

a.     The  preserver  of  every  Karmic  record.

6,  The  storehouse  of  all  the  good  and  evil  powers  of  man,  receiving  and  giving  out  at  his  will — nay,  at  his  very  thought — every  potentiality,  which  becomes,  then  and  there,  an  acting  potency :  this  Aura  is  the  mirror  in  which  sensitives  and  clairvoyants  sense  and  perceive  the  real  man,  and  see  him  as  he  is,  not  as  he  appears.

c.  As  it  furnishes  man  with  his  Astral  Form,  around  which  the  physical  entity  models  itself,  first  as  a  foetus,  then  as  a  child  and  man,  the  astral  grow-  ing apace  with  the  human  being,  so  it  furnishes  him  during  life,  if  an  Adept,  with  his  Mayavi  Rupa,  or  Illusion  Body,  which  is  not  his  V/ta/-Astral  Body ;  and  after  death,  with  his  Devachanic  Entity  and  Kama  Rupa,  or  Body  of  Desire  (the  Spook).

In  the  case  of  the  Devachanic  Entity,  the  Ego,  in  order  to  be  able  to  go  into  a  state  of  bliss,  as  the  "  I  "  of  its  immediately  preceding  incarnation,  has  to  be  clothed  (metaphorically  speaking)  with  the  spiritual  elements  of  the

1  It  is  erroneous  to  call  the  fourth  human  principle  "  Kdma  Rupa."  It  is  no  Rupa  or  form  at  alt  until  after  death,  but  stands  for  the  K&mic  elements  in  man,  his  animal  desires  and  passions,  such  as.  anger,  lust,  envy,  revenge,  etc.,  the  progeny  of  selfishness  and  matter.

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ideas,  aspirations  and  thoughts  of  the  now  disembodied  personality ;  other-  wise what  is  it  that  enjoys  bliss  and  reward  ?  Surely  not  the  impersonal  Ego,  the  Divine  Individuality.

Therefore  it  must  be  the  good  Karmic  records  of  the  deceased,  impressed  upon  the  Auric  Substance,  which  furnish  the  Human  Soul  with  just  enough  of  the  spiritual  elements  of  the  ex-personality,  to  enable  it  to  still  believe  itself  that  body  from  which  it  has  just  been  severed,  and  to  receive  its  fruition,  during  a  more  or  less  prolonged  period  of  "  spiritual  gesta-  tion." For  Devachan  is  a  "spiritual  gestation"  within  an  ideal  matrix  state,  a  birth  of  the  Ego  into  the  world  of  effects,  which  ideal,  subjective  birth  precedes  its  next  terrestrial  birth,  the  latter  being  determined  by  its  bad  Karma,  into  the  world  of  causes.

In  the  case  of  the  Spook,  the  Kama  Rupa  is  furnished  from  the  animal  dregs  of  the  Auric  Envelope,  with  its  daily  Karmic  record  of  animal  life,  so  full  of  animal  desires  and  selfish  aspirations.'

Now  the  Linga  Sharira  remains  with  the  Physical  Body,  and  fades  out  along  with  it.  An  astral  entity  then  has  to  be  created,  a  new  Linga  Sharira  provided,  to  become  the  bearer  of  all  the  past  Tanhas  and  future  Karma.

How  is  this  accomplished?  The  mediumistic  Spook,  the  "  departed  angel,"  fades  out  and  vanishes  also  in  its  turn 3  as  an  entity  or  full  image  of  the  person-  ality that  was,  and  leaves  in  the  Kamalokic  world  of  effects  only  the  record  of  its  misdeeds  and  sinful  thoughts  and  acts,  known  in  the  phraseology  of  Occultists  as  Tanhic  or  human  Elementals.

Entering  into  the  composition  of  the  Astral  Form  of  the  new  body,  into  which  the  Ego,  upon  its  quitting  the  Devachanic  state,  is  to  enter  according  to  Karmic  decree,  the  Elementals  form  that  new  astral  entity  which  is  born  within  the  Auric  Envelope,  and  of  which  it  is  often  said  :

Karma,  with  its  army  of  Skandhas,  waits  at  the  threshold  of  Devachan.

For  no  sooner  is  the  Devachanic  state  of  reward  ended,  than  the  Ego  is  indissolubly  united  with  (or  rather  follows  in  the  track  of)  the  new  Astral  Form.

1  Here  the  world  of  effects  is  the  Devachanic  state,  and  the  world  of  causes,  earth  life.

2  It  is  this   K3ma  Rupa  alone  that  can  materialize  in  mediumistic  stances,  which  occasionally  happens  when  it  is  not  the  Astral   Double  or  Linga  Sharira,  of  the  medium  himself  which  appears  How,  then,  can  this  bundle  of  passions  and  terrestrial  lusts,  resurrected  by,  and  gaming  consciousness  only  through  the  organism  of  the  medium,  be  accepted  as  a  "  departed  angel  "  of  the  Spirit  of  a  once  human  body?  As  well  say  of  the  microbic  pest  which  fastens  on  a  person,  that  it  is  a  sweet  depart-  ed angei.

3  This  is  accomplished  in  more  or  less  time,  according  to  the  degree  in  which  the  personality  (whose  dregs  it  now  is)  was  spiritual  or  material.

If  spirituality  prevailed,  then  the  Larva,  or  Spook,  will  fade  out  very  soon  ;  but  if  the  personality  was  very  materialistic,  the  K£ma  Rupa  may  last  for  centuries  and — in  some,  though  very  exceptional  cases — even  survive  with  the  help  of  some  of  its  scattered  Skandhas,  which  are  all  transformed  in  time  into  Elementals.

See  the  Key  to  Theosophy,  pp.  141  et  seq.,  in  which  work  it  was  impossible  to  go  into  details,  but  where  the  Skandhas  are  spoken  of  as.  the  germs  of  Karmic  effect.

4  Key  to  fheosophy,  p

474  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Both  are  Karmically  propelled  towards  the  family  or  woman  from  whom  is  to  be  born  the  animal  child  chosen  by  Karma  to  become  the  vehicle  of  the  Ego  which  has  just  awakened  from  the  Devachanic  state.

Then  the  new  Astral  Form,  composed  partly  of  the  pure  Akashic  Essence  of  the  Auric  Egg,  and  partly  of  the  terrestrial  elements  of  the  punishable  sins  and  misdeeds  of  the  last  personality,  is  drawn  into  the  woman.

Once  there,  Nature  models  the  fcetus  of  flesh  around  the  Astral,  out  of  the  growing  materials  of  the  male  seed  in  the  female  soil.

Thus  grows  out  of  the  essence  of  a  decayed  seed  the  fruit  or  eidolon  of  the  dead  seed,  the  physical  fruit  producing  in  its  turn  within  itself  another,  and  other  seeds  for  future  plants.

And  now  we  may  return  to  the  Tattvas,  and  see  what  they  mean  in  nature  and  man,  showing  thereby  the  great  danger  of  indulging  in  fancy,  amateur  Yoga,  without  knowing  what  we  are  about.

THE  TATTVIC  CORRELATIONS  AND  MEANING    •

In  Nature,  then,  we  find  seven  Forces,  or  seven  Centres  of  Force,  and  everything  seems  to  respond  to  that  number,  as  for  instance,  the  septenary  scale  in  music,  or  Sounds,  and  the  septenary  spectrum  in  Colours.

I  have  not  exhausted  its  nomenclature  and  proofs  in  the  earlier  volumes,  yet  enough  is  given  to  show  every  thinker  that  the  facts  adduced  are  no  coincidences,  but  very  weighty  testimony.

There  are  several  reasons  why  only  five  Tattvas  are  given  in  the  Hindu  systems.

One  of  these  I  have  already  mentioned  ;  another  is  that  owing  to  our  having  reached  only  the  Fifth  Race,  and  being  (so  far  as  Science  is  able  to  ascertain)  endowed  with  only  five  senses,  the  two  remaining  senses  that  are  still  latent  in  man  can  have  their  existence  proven  only  on  phenomenal  evidence  which  to  the  Materialist  is  no  evidence  at  all.

The  five  physical  senses  are  made  to  correspond  with  the  five  lower  Tattvas ;  the  two  yet  un-  developed senses  in  man,  and  the  two  forces,  or  Tattvas,  forgotten  by  Brah-  mans  and  still  unrecognized  by  Science,  being  so  subjective  and  the  highest  of  them  so  sacred,  that  they  can  only  be  recognized  by,  and  known  through,  the  highest  Occult  Sciences.

It  is  easy  to  see  that  these  two  Tattvas  and  the  two  senses  (the  sixth  and  the  seventh)  correspond  to  the  two  highest  human  principles,  Buddhi  and  the  Auric  Envelope,  impregnated  with  the  light  of  Atma.

Unless  we  open  in  ourselves,  by  Occult  training,  the  sixth  and  seventh  senses,  we  can  never  comprehend  correctly  their  corresponding  types.

Thus  the  statement  in  Nature's  Finer  Forces  that,  in  the  Tattvic  scale,  the  highest  Tattva

PAPER

of  all  is  Akasha,1  (followed  by  [only]  four,  each  of  which  becomes  grosser  than  its  predecessor),  if  made  from  the  Esoteric  standpoint,  is  erroneous.

For  once  Akasha,  an  almost  homogeneous  and  certainly  universal  principle,  is  translated  Ether,  then  Akasha  is  dwarfed  and  limited  to  our  visible  Universe,  for  assuredly  it  is  not  the  Ether  of  Space.

Ether,  whatever  Modern  Science  makes  of  it,  is  differentiated  Substance  :  Akasha,  having  no  attributes  save  one — SOUND,  of  which  it  is  the  substratum — is  no  subtance  even  exoterically  and  in  the  minds  of  some  Orientalists,2  but  rather  Chaos,  or  the  Great  Spatial  Void/  Esoterically,  Akasha  alone  is  Divine  Space,  and  becomes  Ether  only  on  the  lowest  and  last  plane,  or  our  visible  Universe  and  Earth.

In  this  case  the  blind  is  in  the  word  "attribute,"  which  is  said  to  be  Sound.

But  Sound  is  no  attribute  of  Akasha,  but  its  primary  correlation,  its  primordial  manifestation,  the  LOGOS,  or  Divine  Ideation  made  WORD,  and  that  "WORD"  made  "Flesh."  Sound  may  be  considered  an  "  attribute  "  of  Akasha  only  on  the  condition  of  anthropomorphizing  the  latter.

It  is  not  a  characteristic  of  it,  though  it  is  certainly  as  innate  in  it  as  the  idea  "I  am  /  "  is  innate  in  our  thoughts.

Occultism  teaches  that  Akasha  contains  and  includes  the  seven  Centres  of  Force,  therefore  the  six  Tattvas,  of  which  it  is  the  seventh,  or  rather  their  synthesis.

But  if  Akasha  be  taken,  as  we  believe  it  is  in  this  case,  to  re-  present only  the  exoteric  idea,  then  the  author  is  right ;  because,  seeing  that  Akasha  is*  universally  omnipresent,  following  the  Puranic  limitation,  for  the  better  comprehension  of  our  finite  intellects,  he  places  its  commencement  only  beyond  the  four  planes  of  our  Earth  Chain,4  the  two  higher  Tattvas  being  as  concealed  to  the  average  mortal  as  the  sixth  and  seventh  senses  are  to  the  materialistic  mind.

Therefore,  while  Sanskrit  and  Hindu  Philosophy  generally  speak  of  five  Tattvas  only,  Occultists  name  seven,  thus  making  them  correspond  with  every  septenary  in  Nature.

The  Tattvas  stand  in  the  same  order  as  the  seven  macro-  and  micro-cosmic  Forces:  and  as  taught  in  Esotericism,  are  as  follows :

1.  ADI  TATTVA,  the  primordial  universal  Force,  issuing  at  the  beginning  of  manifestation,  or  of  the  "  creative  "  period,  from  the  eternal  immutable  SAT,  the  substratum  of  ALL.

It  corresponds  with  the  Auric  Envelope  or  Brahma's

1  Following  Shivagama,  the  said  author  enumerates  the  correspondences  in  this  wise  ;  AkSsha.

Ether,  \%u,  Gas ,  Tejas,  Heat ,  Apas,  Liquid,  and  Prithivi,  Solid.

3  See  Fitzedward  Hall's  notes  on  the  Vishnu  Purana

3  The  pair  which  we  refer  to  as  the  One  Life,  the  Root  of  All,  and  AkSsha  in  its  pre-differentiatmg  period  answers  to  the  Brahma  (neuter)  and  Aditi  of  some  Hmdus,  and  stands  in  the  same  relation  as  the  Parabrahman  and  Mulaprafcriti  of  the  Veddntms.

4  See  ante,  Vol    1,  p.  249,  Diagram  III.

476  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Egg,  which  surrounds  every  globe,  as  well  as  every  man,  animal  and  thing.

It  is  the  vehicle  containing  potentially  everything — Spirit  and  Substance,  Force  and  Matter.

Adi  Tattva,  in  Esoteric  Cosmogony,  is  the  Force  which  we  refer  to  as  proceeding  from  the  First  or  Unmanifested  LOGOS.

2.  ANUPADAKA  TATTVA,1  the  first  differentiation  on   the  plane  of  being —  the  first  being  an   ideal  one — or  that  which  is  born  by  transformation  from  something   higher   than   itself.

With  the  Occultists,  this  Force  proceeds  from  the  Second  LOGOS.

3.  AKASHA  TATTVA,   this  is  the  point  from  which  all  exoteric  Philosophies  and   Religions  start.

Akasha  Tattva  is  explained   in  them  as  Etheric  Force,  Ether.

Hence  Jupiter,  the   "highest"   God,  was  named  after  Pater  >£ther;  Indra,   once  the  highest  God  in  India,  is  the  etheric  or  heavenly  expanse,  and  so    with    Uranus,   etc.

The  Christian   biblical   God,   also,   is   spoken   of  as  the   Holy   Ghost,    Pneuma,   rarefied   wind  or  air.

This  the  Occultists  call  the  Force   of  the   Third  LOGOS,    the   Creative    Force   in   the   already  Manifested  Universe.

4.  VAYU  TATTVA,  the  aerial  plane  where  substance  is  gaseous.

5.  TAIJAS  TATTVA,  the  plane  of  our  atmosphere,  from  te/as  luminous.

6.  APAS  TATTVA,  watery  or  liquid  substance  or  force.

7.  PRITHIV!  TATTVA,   solid   earthly  substance,  the  terrestrial  spirit  or  force,  the  lowest  of  all.

All  these  correspond  to  our  Principles,  and  to  the  seven  senses  and  forces  in  man.

According  to  the  Tattva  or  Force  generated  or  induced  ir*  us,  so  will  our  bodies  act.

Now,  what  I  have  to  say  here  is  addressed  especially  to  those  members  who  are  anxious  to  develop  powers  by  "sitting  for  Yoga."  You  have  seen,  from  what  has  been  already  said,  that  in  the  development  of  Raja  Yoga,  no  extant  works  made  public  are  of  the  least  good ;  they  can  at  best  give  inklings  of  Hatha  Yoga,  something  that  may  develop  mediumship  at  best,  and  in  the  worst  case — consumption.

If  those  who  practise  "  meditation,"  and  try  to  learn  "the  Science  of  Breath,"  will  read  attentively  Nature's  Finer  Forces,  they  will  find  that  it  is  by  utilizing  the  five  Tattvas  only  that  this  dangerous  science  is  acquired.

For  in  the  exoteric  Yoga  Philosophy,  and  the  Hatha

1  AnupSdaka,  Opapatika  in  Pali,  means  the  "  parentless,"  born  without  father  or  mother,  from  itself,  as  a  transformation,  e.g.,  the  God  Brahmd  sprung  from  the  Lotus  (the  symbol  of  the  Universe)  that  grows  from  Vishnu's  navel,  Vishnu  typifiymg  eternal  and  limitless  Space,  and  Brahm£  the  Universe  and  LOGOS  ,  the  mythical  Buddha  is  also  born  from  a  Lotus.

PAPER

Yoga  practice,  Akasha  Tattva  is  placed  in  the  head  (or  physical  brain)  of  man  ;  Tejas  Tattva  in  the  shoulders  ;  Vayu  Tattva  in  the  navel  (the  seat  of  all  the  phallic  Gods,  "  creators "  of  the  universe  and  man);  Apas  Tattva  in  the  knees ;  and  Prithivi  Tattva  in  the  feet.

Hence  the  two  higher  Tattvas  and  their  correspondences  are  ignored  and  excluded  ;  and  as  these  are  the  chief  factors  in  Raja  Yoga,  no  spiritual  or  intellectual  phenomena  of  a  high  nature  can  take  place.

The  best  results  obtainable  will  be  physical  phenomena  and  no  more.

As  the  "  Five  Breaths,"  or  rather  the  five  states  of  the  human  breath,  in  Hatha  Yoga  correspond  to  the  above  terrestrial  planes  and  colours,  what  spiritual  results  can  be  obtained  ?  On  the  contrary,  they  are  the  very  reverse  of  the  plane  of  Spirit,  or  the  higher  macrocosmic  plane,  reflected  as  they  are  upside  down,  in  the  Astral  Light.

This  is  proven  in  the  Tantra  work,  Shivagama,  itself.

Let  us  compare.

First  of  all,  remember  that  the  Septenary  of  visible  and  also  invisible  Nature  is  said  in  Occultism  to  consist  of  the  three  (and  four)  Fires,  which  grow  into  the  forty-nine  Fires.

This  shows  that  as  the  Macrocosm  is  divided  into  seven  great  planes  of  various  differentiations  of  Substance — from  the  spiritual  or  subjective,  to  the  fully  objective  or  material,  from  Akasha  down  to  the  sin-laden  atmosphere  of  our  earth — so,  in  its  turn,  each  of  these  great  planes  has  three*  aspects,  based  on  four  Principles,  as  already  shown  above.

This  seems  to  be  quite  natural,  as  even  modern  Science  has  her  three  states  of  matter  and  what  are  generally  called  the  "  critical  "  or  intermediate  states  between  the  solid,  the  fluidic,  and  the  gaseous.

Now,  the  Astral  Light  is  not  a  universally  diffused  stuff,  but  pertains  only  to  our  earth  and  all  other  bodies  of  the  system  on  the  same  plane  of  matter  with  it.  Our  Astral  Light  is,  so  to  speak,  the  Linga  Sharira  of  our  earth ;  only  instead  of  being  its  primordial  prototype,  as  in  the  case  of  our  Chhaya,  or  Double,  it  is  the  reverse.

Human  and  animal  bodies  grow  and  develop  on  the  model  of  their  antetypal  Doubles  ;  whereas  the  Astral  Light  is  born  from  the  terrene  emanations,  grows  and  develops  after  its  prototypal  parent,  and  in  its  treacherous  waves  everything  from  the  upper  planes  and  from  the  lower  solid  plane,  the  earth,  both  ways,  is  reflected  reversed.

Hence  the  confusion  of  its  colours  and  sounds  in  the  clairvoyance  and  clairaudience  of  the  sensitive  who  trusts  to  its  records,  be  that  sensitive  a  Hatha  Yogi  or  a  medium.

The  following  parallel  between  the  Esoteric  and  the  Tantra  Tables  of  the  Tattvas  in  relation  to  Sounds  and  Colours  shows  this  very  clearly  : •1.


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PAPER

Such,  then,  is  the  Occult  Science  on  which  the  modern  Ascetics  and  Yogis  of  India  base  their  Soul  development  and  powers.

They  are  known -as  the  Hatha  Yogis.

Now,  the  science  of  Hatha  Yoga  rests  upon  the  "  suppres-  sion of  breath,"  or  Pranayama,  to  which  exercise  our  Masters  are  unanimously  opposed.

For  what  is  Pranayama?  Literally  translated,  it  means  the  "death  of  (vital)  breath."  Prana,  as  said,  is  not  Jiva,  the  eternal  fount  of  life  immor-  tal ;  nor  is  it  connected  in  any  way  with  Pranava,  as  some  think,  for  Pranava  is  a  synonym  of  AUM  in  a  mystic  sense.

As  much  as  has  ever  been  taught  publicly  and  clearly  about  it  is  to  be  found  in  Nature's  Finer  Forces.

If  such  directions,  however,  are  followed,  they  can  only  lead  to  Black  Magic  and  mediumship.

Several  impatient  Chelas,  whom  we  knew  personally  in  India,  went  in  for  the  practice  of  Hatha  Yoga,  notwithstanding  our  warnings.

Of  these,  two  developed  consumption,  of  which  one  died  ;  others  became  almost  idiotic  ;  another  committed  suicide  ;  and  one  developed  into  a  regular  Tantrika,  a  Black  Magician,  but  his  career,  fortunately  for  himself,  was  cut  short  by  death.

The  science  of  the  Five  Breaths,  the  moist,  the  fiery,  the  airy,  etc.,  has-  a  twofold  significance  and  two  applications.

The  Tantrikas  take  it  literally,  as  relating  to  the  regulation  of  the  vital,  lung  breath,  whereas  the  ancient  Raja  Yogis  understood  it  as  referring  to  the  mental  or  "will  "  breath,  which  alone  leads  to  the  highest  clairvoyant  powers,  to  the  function  of  the  Third  Eye,  and  the  acquisition  of  the  true  Raja  Yoga  Occult  powers.

The  difference  between  the  two  is  enormous.

The  former,  as  shown,  use  the  five  lower  Tattvas ;  the  latter  begin  by  using  the  three  higher  alone,  for  mental  and  will  development,  and  the  rest  only  when  they  have  completely  mastered  the  three ;  hence  they  use  only  one  (Akasha  Tattva)  out  of  the  Tantric  five.

As  well  said  in  the  above  stated  work,  "Tattvas  are  the  modifications  of  Svara,"  Now,  the  Svara  is  the  root  of  all  sound,  the  substratum  of  the  Pythagorean  music  of  the  spheres,  Svara  being  that  which  is  beyond  Spirit,  in  the  modern  acceptation  of  the  word,  the  Spirit  within  Spirit,  or  as  very  properly  translated,  the  "cur-  rent of  the  life-wave,"  the  emanation  of  the  One  Life.

The  Great  Breath  spoken  of  in  our  first  volume  is  ATM  A,  the  etymology  of  which  is  "  eternal  mot/on."  Now  while  the  ascetic  Chela  of  our  school,  for  his  mental  develop-  ment, '  follows  carefully  the  process  of  the  evolution  of  the  Universe,  that  is,  proceeds  from  universal  to  particulars,  the  Hatha  Yogi  reverses  the  conditions  and  begins  by  sitting  for  the  suppression  of  his  (vital)  breath.

And  if,  as  Hindu  philosophy  teaches,  at  the  beginning  of  kosmic  evolu-  tion," "  Svara  threw  itself  into  the  form  of  Akasha,"  and  thence  succes-  sively into  the  forms  of  Vayu  (air),  Agni  (fire),  Apas  (water),  and  Prithivi.

480  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

{solid  matter),1  then  it  stands  to  reason  that  we  have  to  begin  by  the  higher  supersensuous  Tattvas.

The  Raja  Yogi  does  not  descend  on  the  planes  of  substance  beyond  Sukshma  (subtle  matter),  while  the  Hatha  Yogi  develops  and  uses  his  powers  only  on  the  material  plane.

Some  Tantrikas  locate  the  three  Nadis,  Sushumna,  Ida  and  Pingala,  in  the  medulla  oblongata,  the  central  Jine  of  which  they  call  Sushumna,  and  the  right  and  left  divisions,  Pingala  and  Ida",  and  also  in  the  heart,  to  the  divisions  of  which  they  apply  the  same  names.

The  Trans-Himalayan  school  of  the  ancient  Indian  Raja  Yogis,  with  which  the  modern  Yogis  of  India  have  little  to  do,  locates  Sushumna,  the  chief  seat  of  these  three  Nadis,  in  the  central  tube  of  the  spinal  cord,  and  Ida  and  Pingala  on  its  left  and  right  sides.

Sushumna  is  the  Brahmadanda.

It  is  that  canal  (of  the  spinal  cord),  of  the  use  of  which  Physiology  knows  no  more  than  it  does  of  the  spleen  and  the  pineal  gland.

Ida  and  Pingala  are  simply  the  sharps  and  flats  of  that  Fa  of  human  nature,  the  keynote  and  the  middle  key  in  the  scale  of  the  septenary  harmony  of  the  Principles,  which,  when  struck  in  a  proper  way,  awakens  the  sentries  on  either  side,  the  spiritual  Manas  and  the  physical  Kama,  and  subdues  the  lower  through  the  higher.

But  this  effect  has  to  be  produced  by  the  exercise  of  will-power,  not  through  the  scientific  or  trained  suppression  of  the  breath.

Take  a  transverse  section  of  the  spinal  region,  and  you  will  find  sections  across  three  columns,  one  of  which  columns  transmits  the  volitional  orders,  and  a  second  a  life  current  of  Jlva — not  of  Prana,  which  animates  the  body  of  man — during  what  is  called  Samadhi  and  like  states.

He  who  has  studied  both  systems,  the  Hatha  and  the  Raja  Yoga,  finds  an  enormous  difference  between  the  two :  one  is  purely  psycho-physiological,  the  other  purely  psycho-spiritual.

The  Tantrists  do  not  seem  to  go  higher  than  the  six  visible  and  known  plexuses,  with  each  of  which  they  connect  the  Tattvas  ;  and  the  great  stress  they  lay  on  the  chief  of  these,  the  Muladhara  Chakra  (the  sacral  plexus),  shows  the  material  and  selfish  bent  of  their  efforts  towards  the  acquisition  of  powers.

Their  five  Breaths  and  five  Tattvas  are  chiefly  concerned  with  the  prostatic,  epigastric,  cardiac,  and  laryngeal  plexuses.

Almost  ignoring  the  Ajna,  they  are  positively  ignorant  of  the  synthesizing  laryngeal  plexus.

But  with  the  followers  of  the  old  school  it  is  different.

We  begin  with  the  mastery  of  that  organ  which  is  situated  at  the  base  of  the  brain,  in  the  pharynx,  and  called  by  Western  Anatomists  the  Pituitary  Body-  in  the  series  of  the  objective  cranial  organs,  corresponding  to  the  subjective  Tattvic  principles,  it  stands  to  the  Third  Eye  (Pineal  Gland)  as  Manas  stands  to  Buddhi  ;  the  arousing  and  awakening  of  the  Third  Eye  must  be  performed  by

1  See  The  Jheosophist,  February,  1888,  p.  276.

PAPER

that  vascular  organ-,  that  insignificant  little  body,  of  which,  once  again,  Physiology  knows  nothing  at  all.

The  one  is  the  Energizer  of  Will,  the  other  that  of  Clairvoyant  Perception.

Those  who  are  Physicians,  Physiologists,  Anatomists,  etc.,  will  under-  stand me  better  than  the  rest  in  the  following  explanation.

Now,  as  to  the  functions  of  the  Pineal  Gland,  or  Conarium,  and  of  the  Pituitary  Body,  we  "find  no  explanations  vouchsafed  by  the  standard  authorities.

Indeed,  on  looking  through  the  works  of  the  greatest  specialists,  it  is  curious  to  observe  how  much  confused  ignorance  on  the  human  vital  economy,  physiological  as  well  as  psychological,  is  openly  confessed.

The  following  is  all  that  can  be  gleaned  from  the  authorities  upon  these  two  important  organs.

1.  The   Pineal  Gland,  or   Conarium,   is  a  rounded,    oblong  body,  from  three  to  four  lines  long,   of  a   deep   reddish  grey,  connected  with  the  pos-  terior  part  of  the  third  ventricle  of  the  brain.

It  is  attached  at  its  base  by  two   thin    medullary    cords,    which    diverge    forward    to    the    Optic  Thalami.

Remember   that   the   latter   are   found    by   the    best   Physiologists  to  be  the  organs    of    reception   and   condensation   of  the    most  sensitive  and  sensorial  incitations   from  the  periphery  of  the  body  (according  to  Occultism,  from  the  periphery  of   the  Auric   Egg,    which   is   our  point  of  communication  with  the  higher,   universal   planes.)     We  are  further   told  that  the  two  bands  of  the  Optic  Thalami,   which  are  inflected  to  meet  each  other,  unite  on  the  median  line,  where  they  become  the  two  peduncles  of  the  Pineal  Gland.

2.  The    Pituitary   Body,    or    Hypophysis   Cerebri,    is   a    small   and   hard  organ,   about   six   lines  broad,   three   long  and  three    high.

It    is   formed  of  an   anterior  bean-shaped,   and   of   a    posterior   and    more    rounded  lobe,  which     are     uniformly    united.

Its    component    parts,    we    are    told,    are  almost    identical    with    those    of    the    Pineal    Gland ;  yet    not    the    slightest  •connection   can    be   traced    between   the   two   centres.

To  this,    however,  Occultists  take  exception  ;  they  know  that  there  is  a  connection,  and  this  even  anatomically   and    physically.

Dissectors,    on   the   other   hand,    have  to  deal  with   corpses  ;  and,   as  they  themselves  admit,  brain-matter,  of  all  tissues  and  organs,   collapses  and  changes  form  the  soonest — in  fact,  a  few  minutes  after  death.

When,   then,    the   pulsating    life  which    expanded   the   mass   of  the  brain,   filled   all   its  cavities  and  energized  all  its  organs,  vanishes,  the  cerebral  mass  shrinks   into  a  sort  of  pasty  condition,  and  once  open  passages  become  closed.

But  the  contraction   and  even   interblending  of  parts  in  this  process  ,pf  shrinking,   and   the   subsequent  pasty  state  of  the  brain,  do  not  imply  that  there  is  no  connection  between  these  two  organs  before  death.

In  point  of  fact,  as  Professor  Owen  has  shown,   a   connection  as  objective  as  a  groove

j,         FF

482  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

and  tube  exists  in  the  crania  of  the  human  foetus  and  of  certain  fishes.

When  a  man  is  in  his  normal  condition,  an  Adept  can  see  the  golden  Aura  pulsating  in  both  the  centres,  like  the  pulsation  of  the  heart,  which  never  ceases  throughout  life.

This  motion,  however,  under  the  abnormal  condition  of  effort  to  develop  clairvoyant  faculties,  becomes  intensified,  and  the  Aura  takes  on  a  stronger  vibratory  or  swinging  action.

The  arc  of  the  pulsation  of  the  Pituitary  Body  mounts  upward,  more  and  more,  until,  just  as  when  the.

electric  current  strikes  some  solid  object,  the  current  finally  strikes  the  Pineal  Gland,  and  the  dormant  organ  is  awakened  and  set  all  glowing  with  the  pure  Akashic  Fire.

This  is  the  psycho-physiological  illustration  of  two  organs  on  the  physical  plane,  which  are,  respectively,  the  concrete  symbols  of  the  metaphys-  ical concepts  called  Manas  and  Buddhi.

The  latter,  in  order  to  become  conscious  on  this  plane,  needs  the  more  differentiate  fire  of  Manas  ;  but  once-  the  sixth  sense  has  awakened  the  seventh,  the  light  which  radiates  from  this,  seventh  sense  illumines  the  fields  of  infinitude.

For  a  brief  space  of  time  man  becomes  omniscient ;  the  Past  and  the  Future,  Space  and  Time,  disap-  pear and  become  for  him  the  Present.

If  an  Adept,  he  will  store  the  know-  ledge he  thus  gains  in  his  physical  memory,  and  nothing,  save  the  crime  of  indulging  in  Black  Magic,  can  obliterate  the  remembrance  of  it.  If  only  a  Chela,  portions  alone  of  the  whole  truth  will  impress  themselves  on  his*  memory,  and  he  will  have  to  repeat  the  process  for  years,  never  allowing  one  speck  of  impurity  to  stain  him  mentally  or  physically,  before  he  becomes  a  fully  initiated  Adept.

It  may  seem  strange,  almost  incomprehensible,  that  the  chief  success  of  Gupta  Vidya,  or  Occult  Knowledge,  should  depend  upon  such  flashes  of  clairvoyance,  and  that  the  latter  should  depend  in  man  on  two  such  insignific-  ant excrescences  in  his  cranial  cavity,  "two  horny  warts  covered  with  grey  sand  (acervulus  cerebri),"  as  expressed  by  Bichat  in  his  Anatomie  Descriptive ;  yet  so  it  is.  But  this  sand  is  not  to  be  despised  ;  nay,  in  truth,  it  is  only  this  landmark  of  the  internal,  independent  activity  of  the  Conarium  that  prevents-  Physiologists  from  classifying  it  with  the  absolutely  useless  atrophied  organs,  the  relics  of  a  previous  and  now  utterly  changed  anatomy  of  man  during  some-  period  of  his  unknown  evolution.

This  "  sand  "  is  very  mysterious,  and  baffles  the  inquiry  of  every  Materialist.

In  the  cavity  on  the  anterior  surface  of  this  gland,  in  young  persons,  and  in  its  substance,  in  people  of  advanced  years,  is  found

a   yellowish    substance,    semi-transparent,    brilliant  and   hard,  the  diameter  of.  which  does  not  exceed  half  a  line.

Such  is  the  acervulus  cerebri.

1  Soemmerrmg,  De  Acervulo  Cerebri,  vol.

n.  p.  322.

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This  brilliant  "sand"  is  the  concretion  of  the  gland  itself,  so  say  the  Physiologists.

Perhaps  not,  we  answer.

The  Pineal  Gland  is  that  which  the  Eastern  Occultist  calls  Devaksha,  the  "  Divine  Eye."  To  this  day,  it  is  the  chief  organ  of  spirituality  in  the  human  brain,  the  seat  of  genius,  the  magical  Sesame  uttered  by  the  purified  will  of  the  Mystic,  which  opens  all  the  avenues  of  truth  for  him  who  knows  how  to  use  it.  The  Esoteric  Science  teaches  that  Manas,  the  Mind  Ego,  does  not  accomplish  its  full  union  with  the  child  be-  fore he  is  six  or  seven  years  of  age,  before  which  period,  even  according  to  the  canon  of  the  Church  and  Law,  no  child  is  deemed  responsible.1  Manas  be-  comes a  prisoner,  one  with  the  body,  only  at  that  age.

Now  a  strange  thing  was  observed  in  several  thousand  cases  by  the  famous  German  anatomist,  Wengel.

With  a  few  extremely  rare  exceptions,  this  "sand,"  or  golden-coloured  con-  cretion, is  found  only  in  subjects  after  the  completion  of  their  seventh  year.

In  the  case  of  fools  these  calculi  are  very  few  ;  in  congenital  idiots  they  are  com-  pletely absent.

Morgagni,2  Grading  3  and  Gum  *  were  wise  men  in  their  genera-  tion, and  are  wise  men  to-day,  since  they  are  the  only  Physiologists,  so  far,  who  connect  the  calculi  with  mind.

For,  sum  up  the  facts,  that  they  are  absent  in  young  children,  in  very  old  people,  and  in  idiots,  and  the  unavoid-  able conclusion  will  be  that  they  must  be  connected  with  mind.

Now  since  every  mineral,  vegetable  and  other  atom  is  only  a  concretion  of  crystallized  Spirit,  or  Akasha,  the  Universal  Soul,  why,  asks  Occultism,  should  the  fact  that  these  concretions  of  the  Pineal  Gland,  are,  upon  analysis,  found  to  be  composed  of  animal  matter,  phosphate  of  lime  and  carbonate,  serve  as  an  objection  to  the  statement  that  they  are  the  result  of  the  work  of  mental  electricity  upon  surrounding  matter  ?

Our  seven  Chakras  are  all  situated  in  the  head,  and  it  is  these  Master  Chakras  which  govern  and  rule  the  seven  (for  there  are  seven)  principal  plexuses  in  the  body,  besides  the  forty-two  minor  ones  to  which  Physiology  refuses  that  name.

The  fact  that  no  microscope  can  detect  such  centres  on  the  objective  plane  goes  for  nothing  ;  no  microscope  has  ever  yet  detected,  nor  ever  will,  the  difference  between  the  motor  and  sensory  nerve-tubes,  the  conductors  of  all  our  bodily  and  psychic  sensations  ;  and  yet  logic  alone  would  show  that  such  difference  exists.

And  if  the  term  plexus,  in  this  application,  does  not  represent  to  the  Western  mind  the  idea  conveyed  by  the  term  of  the  Anatomist,  then  call  them  Chakras  or  Padmas,  or  the  Wheels,  the  Lotus  Heart  and  Petals.

Remember  that  Physiology,  imperfect  as  it  is,-  shows

1  In  the  Greek  Eastern  Church  no  child  is  allowed  to  go  to  confession  before  the  age  of  seven,  after  which  he  is  considered  to  have  reached  the  age  of  reason.

2  De  Caus.

£p.,  vol.

xii.

3  Advers.

Med.,  li,  p.  322.  4  De  Lapillis  Glandulm  Pinealis  in  Qu/nque  Ment.

Alien.,  1753.

484  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

septenary  groups  all  over  the  exterior  and  interior  of  the  body ;  the  seven  head  orifices,  the  seven  "organs"  at  the  base  of  the  brain,  the  seven  plexuses,  the  pharyngeal,  laryngeal,  cavernous,  cardiac,  epigastric,  prostatic,  and  sacral,  etc.

When  the  time  comes,  advanced  students  will  be  given  the  minute  details  about  the  Master  Chakras  and  taught  the  use  of  them  ;  till  then,  less  difficult  subjects  have  to  be  learned.

If  asked  whether  the  seven  plexuses,  or  Tattvic  centres  of  action,  are  the  centres  where  the  seven  Rays  of  the  Logos  vibrate,  I  answer  in  the  affirmative,  simply  remarking  that  the  rays  of  the  Logos  vibrate  in  every  atom,  for  the  matter  of  that.

In  these  Volumes  it  is  almost  revealed  that  the  "  Sons  of  Fohat  "  are  the  personified  Forces  known  in  a  general  way  as  Motion,  Sound,  Heat,  Light,  Cohesion,  Electricity  or  Electric  Fluid,  and  Nerve-Force  or  Magnetism.

This  truth,  however,  cannot  teach  the  student  to  attune  and  moderate  the  Kunda-  lini  of  the  cosmic  plane  with  the  vital  Kundalinl,  the  Electric  Fluid  with  the  Nerve-Force,  and  unless  he  does  so,  he  is  sure  to  kill  himself ;  for  the  one  travels  at  the  rate  of  about  90  feet,  and  the  other  at  the  rate  of  115,000  leagues  a  second.

The  seven  Shaktis  respectively  called  Para  Shakti,  Jnana  Shakti,  etc.,  are  synonymous  with  the  "Sons  of  Fohat,"  for  they  are  their  female  aspects.

At  the  present  stage,  however,  as  their  names  would  only  be  con-  fusing to  the  Western  student,  it  is  better  to  remember  the  English  equiv-  alents as  translated  above.

As  each  Force  is  septenary,  their  sum  is,  of  course,  forty-nine.

The  question  now  mooted  in  Science,  whether  a  sound  is  capable  of  calling  forth  impressions  of  light  and  colour  in  addition  to  its  natural  sound  impressions,  has  been  answered  by  Occult  Science  ages  ago.

Every  impulse  or  vibration  of  a  physical  object  producing  a  certain  vibration  of  the  air,  that  is,  causing  the  collision  of  physical  particles,  the  sound  of  which  is  capable  of  affecting  the  ear,  produces  at  the  same  time  a  corresponding  flash  of  light,  which  will  assume  some  particular  colour.

For,  in  the  realm  of  hidden  Forces,  an  audible  sound  is  but  a  subjective  colour  ;  and  a  perceptible  colour,  but  an  inaudible  sound ;  both  proceed  from  the  same  potential  substance,  which  Physicists  used  to  call  ether,  and  now  refer  to  under  various  other  names ;  but  which  we  call  plastic,  though  invisible  SPACE  This  may  appear  a  paradox-  ical hypothesis,  but  facts  are  there  to  prove  it.  Complete  deafness,  for  instance,  does  not  preclude  the  possibility  of  discerning  sounds  ;  medical  science  has  several  cases  on  record  which  prove  that  these  sounds  are  received  by,  and  conveyed  to,  the  patient's  organ  of  sight,  through  the  mind,  under  the  form  of  chromatic  impressions.

The  very  fact  that  the  intermediate  tones  of

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the  chromatic  musical  scale  were  formerly  written  in  colours  shows  an  uncon-  scious reminiscence  of  the  ancient  Occult  teaching  that  colour  and  sound  are  two  out  of  the  seven  correlative  aspects,  on  our  plane,  of  one  and  the  same  thing,  viz.,  Nature's  first  differentiated  Substance.

Here  is  an  example  of  the  relation  of  colour  to  vibration  well  worthy  of  the  attention  of  Occultists.

Not  only  Adepts  and  advanced  Chelas,  but  also  the  lower  order  of  Psychics,  such  as  clairvoyants  and  psychometrists,  can  per-  ceive a  psychic  Aura  of  various  colours  around  every  individual,  corresponding  to  the  temperament  of  the  person  within  it.  In  other  words,  the  mysterious  records  within  the  Auric  Egg  are  not  the  heirloom  of  trained  Adepts  aloner  but  sometimes  also  of  natural  psychics.

Every  human  passion,  every  thought  and  quality,  is  indicated  in  this  Aura  by  corresponding  colours  and  shades  of  colour,  and  certain  of  these  are  sensed  and  felt  rather  than  perceived.

The  best  of  such  psychics,  as  shown  by  Galton,  can  also  perceive  colours  produced  by  the  vibrations  of  musical  instruments,  every  note  suggesting  a  different  colour.

As  a  string  vibrates  and  gives  forth  an  audible  note,  so  the  nerves  of  the  human  body  vibrate  and  thrill  in  correspondence  with  various  emotions  under  the  general  impulse  of  the  circulating  vitality  of  Prana,  thus  producing  undulations  in  the  psychic  Aura  of  the  person  which  result  in  chromatic  effects.

The  human  nervous  system  as  a  whole,  then,  may  be  regarded  as  an  ^olian  Harp,  responding  to  the  impact  of  the  vital  force,  which  is  no  abstrac-  tion, but  a  dynamic  reality,  and  manifests  the  subtlest  shades  of  the  individual  character  in  cfclour  phenomena.

If  these  nerve  vibrations  are  made  intense  enough  and  brought  into  vibratory  relation  with  an  astral  element,  the  result  is — sound.

How,  then,  can  anyone  doubt  the  relation  between  the  micro-  cosmic  and  macrocosmic  forces  ?

And  now  that  I  have  shown  that  the  Tantric  works  as  explained  by  Rama  Prasad,  and  other  Yoga  treatises  of  the  same  character  which  have  appeared  from  time  to  time  in  Theosophical  journals — for  note  well  that  those  of  true  Raja  Yoga  are  never  published — tend  to  Black  Magic  and  are  most  dangerous  to  take  for  guides  in  self -training,  I  hope  that  students  will  be  on  their  guard.

For,  considering  that  no  two  authorities  up  to  the  present  day  agree  as  to  the  real  location  of  the  Chakras  and  Padmas  in  the  body,  and,  seeing  that  the  colours  of  the  Tattvas  as  given  are  reversed,  e.g.  :

(a)  Akasha  is  made  black  or  colourless,  whereas  corresponding  to  Manas,  it  is  indigo  ;

(6)  Vayu  is  made  blue,  whereas,  corresponding  to  the  Lower  Manas,  it  is  green  ;

486  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

(c)  Apas  is  made  white,  whereas,  corresponding  to  the  Astral  Body,  it  is  violet,  with  a  silver,  moonlike  white  substratum  ;

Tejas,  red,  is  the  only  colour  given  correctly — from  such  considerations,  I  say,  it  is  easy  to  see  that  these  disagreements  are  dangerous  blinds.

Further,  the  practice  of  the  Five  Breaths  results  in  deadly  injury,  both  physiologically  and  psychically,  as  already  shown.

It  is  indeed  that  which  it  is  called,  Pranaylma,  or  the  death  of  the  breath,  for  it  results,  for  the  practiser,  in  death — in  moral  death  always,  and  in  physical  death  very  frequently.

ON  EXOTERIC  "BLINDS"  AND  -THE  DEATH  OF  THE  SOUL"

As  a  corollary  to  this,  and  before  going  into  still  more  abstruse  teachings,  I  must  redeem  the  promise  already  given.

I  have  to  illustrate  by  tenets  you  already  know,  the  awful  doctrine  of  personal  annihilation.

Banish  from  your  minds  all  that  you  have  hitherto  read  in  such  works  as  Esoteric  Buddhism,  and  thought  you  understood,  of  such  hypotheses  as  the  eighth  sphere  and  the  moon,  and  that  man  shares  a  common  ancestor  with  the  ape.

Even  the  details  occasionally  given  out  by  myself  in  Jhe  Theosophist  and  Lucifer  were  nothing  like  the  whole  truth,  but  only  broad  general  ideas,  hardly  touched  upon  in  their  details.

Certain  passages,  however,  give  out  hints,  especially  my  foot-notes  on  articles  translated  from  Eliphas  Levi's  Letters  on  Magic.

Nevertheless,  personal  immortality  is  conditional,  for  there  are  such  things  as  "  soulless  men,"  a  teaching  barely  mentioned,  although  it  is  spoken  of  even  in  Isis  Unveiled 2  and  there  is  an  Avttchi,  rightly  called  Hell,  though  it  has  no  connection  with,  or  similitude  to,  the  good  Christian's  Hell,  either  geographically  or  psychically.

The  truth  known  to  Occultists  and  Adepts  in  every  age  could  not  be  given  out  to  a  promiscuous  public  ;  hence,  though  almost  every  mystery  of  Occult  Philosophy  lies  half  concealed  in  Isis  and  the  four  earlier  Volumes  of  the  present  work,  I  had  no  right  to  amplify  or  correct  the  details  of  others.

Readers  may  now  compare  those  six  Volumes  and  such  books  as  Esoteric  Buddhism  with  the  diagrams  and  explanations  in  these  Papers,  and  see  for  themselves.

Paramatma,  the  Spiritual  Sun,  may  be  thought  of  as  outside  the  human  Auric  Egg,  as  it  is  also  outside  the  Macrocosmic  or  Brahma's  Egg.

Why  ?  Because,  though  every  particle  and  atom  are,  so  to  speak,  cemented  with  and

1  See  "  Stray  Thoughts  on  Death  and  Satan  "  in  Jhe  Theosophist,  Oct,  1881  ,  also  "  Fragments  of  Occult  Truth,"  vols.

iti  and  iv.

2  Op.  cit ,  II.  pp.  388,  et  seq.

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'soaked  through  by  this  Paramatmic  essence,  yet  it  is  wrong  to  call  it  a  41  human  "  or  even  a  "  universal  "  Principle,  for  the  term  is  very  likely  to  give  rise  to  naught  but  an  erroneous  idea  of  the  philosophical  and  purely  metaphysical  concept.;  it  is  not  a  Principle,  but  the  cause  of  every  Principle,  the  latter  term  being  applied  by  Occultists  only  to  its  shadow — the  Universal  Spirit  that  ensouls  the  boundless  Kosmos  whether  within  or  beyond  Space  and  Time.

Buddhi  serves  as  a  vehicle  for  that  Paramatmic  shadow.

This  Buddhi  is  universal,  and  so  also  is  the  human  Atma.

Within  the  Auric  Egg  is  the  macrocosmic  pentacle  of  LIFE,  Prana,  containing  within  itself  the  pentagram  which  represents  man.

The  universal  pentacle  must  be  pictured  with  its  point  soaring  upwards,  the  sign  of  White  Magic — in  the  human  pentacle  it  is  the  low.er  limbs  which  are  upward,  forming  the  "  Horns  of  Satan,"  as  the  Chris-  tian Kabbalists  call  them.

This  is  the  symbol  of  Matter,  that  of  the  personal  man,  and  the  recognized  pentacle  of  the  Black  Magician.

For  this  reversed  pentacle  does  not  stand  only  for  Kama,  the  fourth  Principle  exoterically,  but  it  also  represents  physical  man,  the  animal  of  flesh  with  its  desires  and  passions.

Now,  mark  well,  in  order  to  understand  that  which  follows,  that  Manas  may  be  pictured  as  an  upper  triangle  connected  with  the  lower  Manas  by  a  thin  line  which  binds  the  two  together.

This  is  the  Antahkarana,  that  path  or  bridge  of  communication  which  serves  as  a  link  between  the  personal  being  whose  physical  brain  is  under  the  sway  of  the  lower  animal  mind,  and  the  reincarnating  Individuality,  the  spiritual  Ego,  Manas,  Manu,  the  "  Divine  Man."  This  thinking  Manu  alone  is  that  which  reincarnates.

In  truth  and  in  nature,  the  two  Minds,  the  spiritual  and  the  physical  or  animal,  are  one,  but  separate  into  two  at  reincarnation.

For  while  that  portion  of  the  Divine  which  goes  to  animate  the  personality,  consciously  separating  itself,  like  a  dense  but  pure  •shadow,  from  the  Divine  Ego,1  wedges  itself  into  the  brain  and  senses 2  of

1  The  essence  of  the  Divine  Ego  is  "  pure  flame,"  an  entity  to  which  nothing  can  be  added  and  from  which  nothing  can  be  taken  ,  it  cannot,  therefore,  be  diminished  even  by  countless  numbers  of  lower  mmds,  detached  from  it  like  flames  from  a  flame.

This  is  in  answer  to  an  objection  by  an  Esotericist  who  asked  whence  was  that  inexhaustible  essence  of  one  and  the  same  Individuality  which  was  called  upon  to  furnish  a  human  intellect  for  every  new  personality  in  which  it  is  incarnated.

s  The  brain,  or  thinking  machinery,  is  not  only  in  the  head,  but,  as  every  physiologist  who  is  not  quite  a  materialist  will  tell  you,  every  organ  in  man,  heart,  liver,  lungs,  etc.,  down  to  every  nerve  and  muscle,  has,  so  to  speak,  its  own  distinct  brain  or  thinking  apparatus.

As  our  brain  has  naught  to  do  in  the  guidance  of  the  collective  and  individual  work  of  every  organ  in  us,  what  is  that  which  guides  each  so  unerringly  in  its  incessant  functions  ;  that  makes  these  struggle,  and  that  too  with  disease,  throw  it  off  and  act,  each  of  them,  even  to  the  smallest,  not  in  a  clock-work  manner,  as  alleged  by  some  materialists  (for,  at  the  slightest  disturbance  or  breakage  the  clock  stops),  but  as  an  entity  endowed  with  instinct  ?  To  say  it  is  Nature  is  to  say  nothing,  if  it  is  not  the  enunciation  of  a  -fallacy  ;  for  Nature  after  all  is  but  a  name  for  these  very  same  functions,  the  sum  of  the  qualities  end  attributes,  physical,  mental,  etc.,  in  the  universe  and  man,  the  total  of  agencies  and  forces  guided  by  intelligent  laws.

488  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

the  foetus,  at  the  completion  of  its  seventh  month,  the  Higher  Manas,  does  not  unite  itself  with  the  child  before  the  completion  of  the  first  seven  years  of  its  life.

This  detached  essence,  or  rather  the  reflection  or  shadow  of  the  Higher  Manas,  becomes,  as  the  child  grows,  a  distinct  thinking  Principle  in  man,  its  chief  agent  being  the  physical  brain.

No  wonder  the  Materialists,  who  perceive  only  this  "  rational  soul,"  or  mind,  will  not  disconnect  it  with  the  brain  and  matter.

But  Occult  Philosophy  has  ages  ago  solved  the  prob-  lem of  mind,  and  discovered  the  duality  of  Manas.

The  Divine  Ego  tends  with  its  point  upwards  towards  Buddhi,  and  the  human  Ego  gravitates  down-  wards, immersed  in  Matter,  connected  with  its  higher,  subjective  half  only  by  the  Antahkarana.

As  its  derivation  suggests,  this  is  the  only  connecting  link  during  life  between  the  two  minds — the  higher  consciousness  of  the  Ego  and  the  human  intelligence  of  the  lower  mind.

To  understand  this  abstruse  metaphysical  doctrine  fully  and  correctly,  one  has  to  be  throughly  impressed  with  an  idea,  which  I  have  in  vain  endeav-  oured to  impart  to  Theosophists  at  large,  namely,  the  great  axiomatic  truth  that  the  only  eternal  and  living  Reality  is  that  which  the  Hindus  call  Paramatma  and  Parabrahman.

This  is  the  one  ever-existing  Root  Essence,  immutable  and  unknowable  to  our  physical  senses,  but  manifest  and  clearly  perceptible  to  our  spiritual  natures.

Once  imbued  with  that  basic  idea  and  the  further  conception  that  if  It  is  omnipresent,  universal  and  eternah  like  abstract  Space  itself,  we  must  have  emanated  from  It  and  we  must,  some  day,  return  into  It,  and  all  the  rest  becomes  easy.

If  so,  then  it  stands  to  reason  that  life  and  death,  good  and  evil,  past  and  future,  are  ail  empty  words,  or  at  best,  figures  of  speech.

If  the  object-  ive Universe  itself  is  but  a  passing  illusion  on  account  of  its  beginning  and  finitude,  then  both  life  and  death  must  also  be  aspects  and  illusions.

They  are  changes  of  state,  in  fact,  and  no  more.

Real  life  is  in  the  spiritual  con-  sciousness of  that  life,  in  a  conscious  existence  in  Spirit,  not  Matter  ;  and  real  death  is  the  limited  perception  of  life,  the  impossibility  of  sensing  cpnscious  or  even  individual  existence  outside  of  form,  or  at  least,  of  some  form  of  Matter.

Those  who  sincerely  reject  the  possibility  of  conscious  life  divorced  from  Matter  and  bra  in -substance  are  dead  units.

The  words  of  Paul,  an,  Initiate,  become  comprehensible.

"  Ye  are  dead,  and  your  life  is  hid  with  Christ  in  God  ;  "  1  which  is  to  say  :  Ye  are  personally  dead  matter,  uncon-  scious of  its  own  spiritual  essence,  and  your  real  life  is  hid  with  your  Divine  Ego  (Christos)  in,  or  merged  with,  God  (AtmS)  ;  now  has  it  departed  from  you,  ye  soulless  people.

Speaking  on  Esoteric  lines,  every  irrevocably

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materialistic  person  is  a  dead  Man,  a  living  automaton,  in  spite  of  his  being  endow-  ed with  great  brain  power.

Listen  to  what  Aryasanga  says,  stating  the  same  fact  :

That  which  is  neither  Spirit  nor  Matter,  neither  Light  nor  Darkness,  but  is  verily  the  container  and  root  of  these,  that  thou  art  The  root  projects  at  every  Dawn  its  shadow  on  ITSELF,  and  that  shadow  thou  callest  Light  and  Life,  O  poor  dead  Form  (This)  Life-Light  streameth  downward  through  the  stairway  of  the  seven  worlds,  the  stairs  of  which  each  step  become  denser  and  darker.

It  is  of  this  seven-times-seven  scale  that  thou  art  the  faithful  climber  and  mirror,  O  little  man  '  Thou  art  this,  but  thou  knowest  it  not.

This  is  the  first  lesson  to  learn.

The  second  is  to  study  well  the  Princi-  ples of  both  the  Kosmos  and  ourselves,  dividing  the  group  into  the  permanent  and  the  impermanent,  the  higher  and  immortal  and  the  lower  and  mortal,  for  thus  only  can  we  master  and  guide,  first  the  lower  cosmic  and  personal,  then  the  higher  cosmic  and  impersonal.

Once  we  can  do  that  we  have  secured  our  immortality.

But  some  may  say  :  "  How  few  are  those  who  can  do  so.  All  such  are  great  Adepts,  and  none  can  reach  such  Adeptship  in  one  short  life."  Agreed  ;  but  there  is  an  alternative.

"  If  the  Sun  thou  canst  not  be,  then  be  the  humble  Planet,"  says  the  Book  of  the  Golden  Precepts.

And  if  even  that  is  beyond  our  reach,  then  let  us  at  least  endeavour  to  keep  within  the  ray  of  some  lesser  star,  so  that  its  silvery  light  may  penetrate  the  murky  darkness,  through  which  the  stony  patr;  of  life  trends  onward  ;  for  without  this  divine  radiance  we  risk  losing  more  than  we  imagine.

With  regard,  then,  to  "  soulless  "  men,  and  the  "  second  death  "  of  the  "  Soul,"  mentioned  in  the  second  volume  of  /sis  Unve//ed,  you  will  there  find  that  I  have  spoken  of  such  soulless  people,  and  even  of  Avitchi,  though  I  leave  the  latter  unnamed.

Read  from  the  last  paragraph  on  page  367  to  the  end  of  the  first  paragraph  on  page  370,  and  then  collate  what  is  there  said  with  what  I  have  now  to  say.

The  higher  triad,  Atma-Buddhi-Manas,  may  be  recognized  from  the  first  lines  of  the  quotation  from  the  Egyptian  papyrus.

In  the  Ritual,  now  the  Book  of  the  Dead,  the  purified  Soul,  the  dual  Manas,  appears  as  "  the  victim  of  the  dark  influence  of  the  Dragon  Apophis,"  the  physical  personality  of  Kamarupic  man,  with  his  passions.

"  If  it  has  attained  the  final  knowledge  of  the  heavenly  and  infernal  Mysteries,  the  Gnosis  " — the  divine  and  the  terres-  trial Mysteries,  of  White  and  Black  Magic — then  the  defunct  personality  "  will  triumph  over  its  enemy  " — death.

This  alludes  to  the  case  of  a  complete  re-  union, at  the  end  of  earth  life,  of  the  lower  Manas,  full  of  "  the  harvest  of  life,"  with  its  Ego.

But  if  Apophis  conquers  the  Soul,  then  it  "  cannot  escape  a  second  death."

490  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

These  few  lines  from  a  papyrus,  many  thousands  of  years  old,  contain  a  whole  revelation,  known,  in  those  days,  only  to  the  Hierophants  and  the  Jnitiates.

The  "  harvest  of  life  "  consists  of  the  finest  spiritual  thoughts,  of  the  memory  of  the  noblest  and  most  unselfish  deeds  of  the  personality,  and  the  constant  presence  during  its  bliss  after  death  of  all  those  it  foved  with  divine,  spiritual  devotion.1  Remember  the  teaching  :  The  Human  Soul,  lower  Manas,  is  the  only  and  direct  mediator  between  the  personality  and  the  Divine  Ego.

That  which  goes  to  make  up  on  this  earth  the  personality  miscalled  individual-  ity by  the  majority,  is  the  sum  of  all  its  mental,  physical,  and  spiritual  char-  acteristics, which,  being  impressed  on  the  human  Soul,  produces  the  man.

Now,  of  all  these  characteristics  it  is  the  purified  thoughts  alone  which  can  be  impressed  on  the  higher,  immortal  Ego,  This  is  done  by  the  Human  Soul  merging  again,  in  its  essence,  into  its  parent  source,  commingling  with  its  Divine  Ego  during  life,  and  re-uniting  itself  entirely  with  it  after  the  death  of  the  physical  man.

Therefore,  unless  Kama-Manas  transmits  to  Buddhi-Manas  such  personal  ideations,  and  such  consciousness  of  its  "  I  "  as  can  be  assimi-  lated by  the  Divine  Ego,  nothing  of  that  "  I  "  or  personality  can  survive  in  the  Eternal.

Only  that  which  is  worthy  of  the  immortal  God  within  us,  and  iden-  tical in  its  nature  with  the  divine  quintessence,  can  survive  ;  for  in  this  case  it  is  its  own,  the  Divine  Ego's,  "  shadows  "  or  emanations  which  ascend  to  it  and  are  indrawn  by  it  into  itself  again,  to  become  once  more  part  of  its  own  Essence.

No  noble  thought,  no  grand  aspiration,  desire,  or  divine  immortal  love,  can  come  into  the  brain  of  the  man  of  clay  and  settle  there,  except  as  a  direct  emanation  from  the  Higher  to,  and  through,  the  lower  Ego  ;  all  the  rest,  intellectual  as  it  may  seem,  proceeds  from  the  "  shadow,"  the  lower  mind,  in  its  association  and  commingling  with  Kama,  and  passes  away  and  disappears  for  ever.

But  the  mental  and  spiritual  ideations  of  the  personal  44  I  "  return  to  it,  as  parts  of  the  Ego's  Essence,  and  can  never  fade  out.

Thus  of  the  personality  that  was,  only  its  spiritual  experiences,  the  memory  of  all  that  is  good  and  noble,  with  the  consciousness  of  its  "  I"  blended  with  that  of  all  the  other  personal  "  I's  "  that  preceded  it,  survive  and  become  immortal.

There  is  no  distinct  or  separate  immortality  for  the  men  of  earth  outside  of  the  Ego  which  informed  them.

That  Higher  Ego  is  the  sole  bearer  of  all  its  alter  egos  on  earth  and  their  sole  representative  in  the  mental  state  called  Devachan.

As  the  last  embodied  personality,  however,  has  a  right  to  its  own  special  state  of  bliss,  unalloyed  and  free  from  the  memories  of  all  others,  it  is  the  last  lite  only  which  Is  fully  and  realistically  vivid.

Devachan  is  often  compared  to  the  happiest  day  in  a  series  of  many  thousands  of  other

1  See  Key  to  Jheosopfy,  pp.  147,  148,  et  seq.

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"days"  in  the  life  of  a  person.

The  intensity  of  its  happiness  makes  the  man  entirely  forget  all  others,  his  past  becoming /obliterated.

This  is  what  we  call  the  Devachanic  state,  the  reward  of  the  personality,  and  it  is  on  this  old  teaching  that  the  hazy  Christian  notion  of  Paradise  was  built,  borrowed  with  many  other  things  from  the  Egyptian  Mysteries,  wherein  the  doctrine  was  enacted.

And  this  is  the  meaning  of  the  passage  quoted  in  Isis.

The  Soul  has  triumphed  over  Apophis,  the  Dragon  of  Flesh.

Hence-  forth, the  personality  will  live  in  eternity,  in  its  highest  and  noblest  elements,  the  memory  of  its  past  deeds,  while  the  "  characteristics  "  of  the  "  Dragon  "  will  be  fading  out  in  Kama  Loka.

If  the  question  be  asked,  "  How  live  in  eternity,  when  Devachan  lasts  but  from  1,000  to  2,000  years  ?  "  the  answer  is  :  "  In  the  same  way  as  the  recollection  of  each  day  which  is  worth  remember-  ing lives  in  the  memory  of  each  one  of  us."  For  the  sake  of  an  example,  the  days  passed  in  one  personal  life  may  be  taken  as  an  illustration  of  each  personal  life,  and  this  or  that  person  may  stand  for  the  Divine  Ego.

To  obtain  the  key  which  will  open  the  door  of  many  a  psychological  mystery  it  is  sufficient  to  understand  and  remember  that  which  precedes  and  that  which  follows.

Many  a  Spiritualist  has  felt  terribly  indignant  on  being  told  that  personal  immortality  was  conditional ;  and  yet  such  is  the  philo-  sophical and  logical  fact.

Much  has  been  said  already  on  the  subject,  but  no  one  to  this  day  seems  to  have  fully  understood  the  doctrine.

Moreover,  it  is  not  enough  to  know  that  such  a  fact  is  said  to  exist.

An  Occultist,  or  he  who  would  become  one,  must  know  why  it  is  so ;  for  having  learned  and  comprehended  the  raison  d'etre,  it  becomes  easier  to  set  others  right  in  their  erroneous  speculations,  and,  most  important  of  all,  it  affords  one  an  opportu-  nity, without  saying  too  much,  to  teach  other  people  to  avoid  a  calamity  which,  sad  to  say,  occurs  in  our  age  almost  daily.

This  calamity  will  now  be  explained  at  length.

One  must  know  little  indeed  of  the  Eastern  modes  of  expression  to  fail  to  see  in  the  passage  quoted  from  the  Book  of  the  Dead,  and  the  pages  of  ta/s,  (a)  an  allegory  for  the  uninitiated,  containing  our  Esoteric  teaching  ;  and  (fa)  that  the  two  terms  "  second  death  "  and  "  Soul  "  are,  in  one  sense,  blinds.

"  Soul  "  refers  indifferently  to  Buddhi-Manas  and  Kama-Manas.

As  to  the  term  "  second  death,"  the  qualification  "  second  "  applies  to  several  deaths  which  have  to  be  undergone  by  the  "  Principles"  during  their  incarna-  tion, Occultists  alone  understanding  fully  the  sense  in  which  such  a  statement  is  made.

For  we  have  t.the  death  of  the  Body  ;  2.  the  death  of  the  Animal  Soul  in  Kama  Loka  ;  3.  the  death  of  the  Astral  Linga  Sharlra,  following  that  of  the  Body ;  4.  the  metaphysical  death  of  the  Higher  Ego,  the  immortal,  every

492  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

time  it  "falls  into  matter,"  or  incarnates  in  a  new  personality.

The  Animal  Soul,  or  lower  Manas,  that  shadow  of  the  Divine  Ego  which  separates  from  it  to  inform  the  personality,  cannot  by  any  possible  means  escape  death  in  Kama  Loka,  at  any  rate  that  portion  of  this  reflection  which  remains  as  a  terrestrial  residue  and  cannot  be  impressed  on  the  Ego.

Thus  the  chief  and  most  important  secret  with  regard  to  that  "  second  death,"  in  the  Esoteric  teaching,  was  and  is  to  this  day  the  terrible  possibility  of  the  death  of  the  Soul,  that  is,  its  severance  from  the  Ego  on  earth  during  a  person's  lifetime.

This  is  a  real  death  (though  with  chances  of  resurrection),  which  shows  no  traces  in  a  per-  son and  yet  leaves  him  morally  a  living  corpse.

It  is  difficult  to  see  why  this  teaching  should  have  been  preserved  until  now  with  such  secrecy,  when,  by  spreading  it  among  people,  at  any  rate  among  those  who  believe  in  reincar-  nation, so  much  good  might  be  done.

But  so  it  was,  and  I  had  no  right  to  question  the  wisdom  of  the  prohibition,  but  have  given  it  hitherto,  as  it  was  given  to  myself,  under  pledge  not  to  reveal  it  to  the  world  at  large.

But  now  I  have  permission  to  give  it  to  all,  revealing  its  tenets  first  to  the  Esoteri-  cists,  and  then  when  they  have  assimilated  them  thoroughly  it  will  be  their  duty  to  teach  others  this  special  tenet  of  the  "  second  death,"  and  warn  all  the  Theosophists  of  its  dangers.

To  make  the  teaching  clearer,  I  shall  seemingly  have  to  go  over  old  ground  ;  in  reality,  however,  it  is  given  out  with  new  light  and  new  details.

I  have  tried  to  hint  at  it  in  The  Jheosophist  as  I  have  done  in  Isis,  but  have  failed  to  make  myself  understood.

I  will  now  explain  it,  point  by  point.

THE  PHILOSOPHICAL  RATIONALE  OF  THE  TENET

1.  Imagine,  for  illustration's  sake,  the  one  homogeneous,  absolute  and  omnipresent  Essence,  above  the  upper  step  of  the  "  stair  of  the  seven  planes  of  worlds,"  ready  to  start  on  its  evolutionary  journey.

As  its  correlating  reflection  gradually  descends,  it  differentiates  and  transforms  into  subjective,  and  finally  into  objective  matter.

Let  us  call  it  at  its  north  pole  Absolute  Light ;  at  its  south  pole,  which  to  us  would  be  the  fourth  or  middle  step,  or  plane,  counting  either  way,  we  know  it  Esoterically  as  the  One  and  Universal  Life.

Now  mark  the  difference.

Above,  LIGHT  ;  below,  Life.

The  former  is  ever  immutable,  the  latter  manifests  under  the  aspects  of  countless  differ-  entiations.

According  to  the  Occult  law,  all  potentialities  included  in  the  higher  become  differentiated  reflections  in  the  lower ;  and  according  to  the  same  law,  nothing  which  is  differentiated  can  be  blended  with  the  homogeneous.

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Again,  nothing  can  endure  of  that  which  lives  and  breathes  and  has  its  being  in  the  seething  waves  of  the  world,  or  plane  of  differentiation.

Thus  Buddhi  and  Manas  being  both  primordial  rays  of  the  One  Flame,  the  former  the  vehicle,  the  upadhi  or  vahana,  of  the  one  eternal  Essence,  the  latter  the  vehicle  of  Mahat  or  Divine  Ideation  (Maha-Buddhi  in  the  Puranas),  the  Universal  Intelligent  Soul — neither  of  them,  as  such,  can  become  extinct  or  be  annihilated,  either  in  essence  or  consciousness.

But  the  physical  personality  with  its  Linga  Sharira,  and  the  animal  soul,  with  its  Kama,1  can  and  do  become  so.  They  are  born  in  the  realm  of  illusion,  and  must  vanish  like  a  fleecy  cloud  from  the  blue  and  eternal  sky.

He  who  has  read  these  Volumes  with  any  degree  of  attention,  must  know  the  origin  of  the  human  Egos,  called  Monads,  generically,  and  what  they  were  before  they  were  forced  to  incarnate  in  the  human  animal.

The  divine  beings  whom  Karma  led  to  act  in  the  drama  of  Manvantaric  life,  are  entities  from  higher  and  earlier  worlds  and  planets,  whose  Karma  had  not  been  exhausted  when  their  world  went  into  Pralaya.

Such  is  the  teaching  ;  but  whether  it  is  so  or  not,  the  Higher  Egos  are — as  compared  to  such  forms  of  transitory,  terrestrial  mud  as  ourselves — Divine  Beings,  Gods,  immortal  throughout  the  Mahamanvantara,  or  the  311,040,000,000,000  years  during  which  the  Age  of  Brahma  lasts.

And  as  the  Divine  Egos,  in  order  to  re-become  the  One  ^Essence,  or  be  indrawn  again  into  the  AUM,  have  to  purify  them-  selves in  the  fire  of  suffering  and  individual  experience,  so  also  have  the  terrestrial  Egos,  the  personalities,  to  do  likewise,  if  they  would  partake  of  the  immortality  of  the  Higher  Egos.

This  they  can  achieve  by  crushing  in  them-  selves all  that  benefits  only  the  lower  personal  nature  of  their  '•  selves  "  and  by  aspiring  to  transfuse  their  thinking  Kamic  Principle  into  that  of  the  Higher  Ego.

We  (/.e.,  our  personalities)  become  immortal  by  the  mere  fact  of  our  thinking  moral  nature  being  grafted  on  our  Divine  Triune  Monad,  Atma-  Buddhi-Manas,  the  three  in  one  and  one  in  three  (aspects).  For  the  Monad  manifested  on  earth  by  the  incarnating  Ego  is  that  which  is  called  the  Tree  of  Life  Eternal,  that  can  only  be  approached  by  eating  the  fruit  of  knowledge,  the  Knowledge  of  Good  and  Evil,  or  of  GNOSIS,  Divine  Wisdom.

In  the  Esoteric  teachings,  this  Ego  is  the  fifth  Principle  in  man.

But  the

tudent  who   has  read  and  understood  the  first  two  Papers,  knows  something

more.

He  is  aware  that  the  seventh  is  not  a  human,  but  a  universal  Principle

in  which   man  participates  ;  but  so  does  equally  every  physical  and  subjective

atom,   and  also  every  blade  of  grass  and  everything  that  lives  or  is  in  Space,

1  Kama  Rupa,   the  vehicle  of  the  lower  Manas,  is  said  to  dwell  in  the  physical  brain,  in  the  five  physical  senses  and  in  all  the  sense-organs  of  the  physical  body.

494  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

whether  it  be  sensible  of  it  or  not.

He  knows,  moreover,  that  if  man  is  more  closely  connected  with  it,  and  assimilates  it  with  a  hundredfold  more  power,  it  is  simply  because  he  is  endowed  with  the  highest  consciousness  on  this  earth  ;  that  man,  in  short,  may  become  a  Spirit,  a  Deva,  or  a  God,  in  his  next  transformation,  whereas  neither  a  stone  nor  a  vegetable,  nor  an  animal,  can  do  so  before  they  become  men  in  their  proper  turn.

2.  Now  what  are  the  functions  of  Buddhi  ?  On  this  plane  it  has  none,  unless  it  is  united  with  Manas,  the  conscious  Ego.

Buddhi  stands  to  the  divine  Root   Essence   in   the   same  relation  as   Mulaprakriti  to   Parabrahman,  in  the  Vedanta   School  ;    or  as  Alaya  the  Universal  Soul  to  the  One  Eternal  Spirit,  or  that  which    is  beyond    Spirit.

It  is  its  human  vehicle,  one  remove  from  that  Absolute,  which  can  have  no  relation  whatever  to  the  finite  and  the  conditioned.

3.  What,   again,   is   Manas  and  its  functions  ?   In  its  purely  metaphysical  aspect,   Manas,   though  one   remove  on  the  downward  plane  from  Buddhi,  is.  still  so  immeasurably   higher  than  the  physical  man,  that  it  cannot  enter  into-  direct  relation  with  the   personality,   except  through  its  reflection,  the  lower  mind.

Manas  is   Spiritual  Self-Consciousness  in  itself,  and  Divine  Conscious-  ness  when    united    with    Buddhi,    which    is    the    true   "  producer  "    of  that  "  production  "    (vikara,    or    Self- Consciousness),    through    Mahat.

Buddhi-  Manas,   therefore,    is   entirely   unfit   to   manifest   during   its  periodical   incar-  nations,    except    through    the    human    mind    or    lower    Manas.

Both    are  linked    together    and    are    inseparable,    and    can    have   as   little   to  do   with  the    lower    Tanmatras,1    or    rudimentary    atoms,    as  the   homogeneous  with  the    heterogeneous.

It    is,    therefore,    the    task    of    the    lower    Manas,    or  thinking    personality,    if   it   would  blend    itself   with    its  God,  the  Divine  Ego,  to   dissipate   and   paralyze   the  Tanmatras,  or  properties  of  the  material  form.

Therefore,    Manas   is   shown   double,   as   the   Ego   and    Mind   of  Man.

It  is  Kama-Manas,   or   the  lower  Ego,  which,  deluded  into  a  notion  of  independent  existence,   as  the   "  producer  "    in   its  turn   and   the   sovereign   of  the  five  Tanmatras,  becomes   Ego-ism,  the  selfish  Self,  in  which  case  it  has  to  be  con-  sidered  as   Mahabhutic   and  finite,    in   the   sense  of  its  being  connected  with  Ahamkara,  the  personal  "  I -creating  "  faculty.

Hence  Manas  [has  to  be  regarded  as]  ...  eternal  and  non-eternal ;  eternal  in>  its  atomic  nature  (paramanu  rupa),  as  eternal  substance  (dravya),  finite  (ka"rya  rupa)  when  linked  as  a  duad  with  Kama  (animal  desire  or  human  egoistic  volition),  a  lower  production  [in  short]. -

1  Tanmitra  means  subtle  and  rudimentary  form,  the  gross  type  of  the  finer  element.

The  five  Tanmatras   are  really  the  characteristic  properties  or  qualities  of  matter  and  of  all  the  elements  ;  the  real  spirit  of  the  word  is  "something"   or  "  merely  transcendental,"  in  the  sense  of  properties  or  qualities.

2  See  The  Theosophist,  August,  1883,  p.  268,  "The  Real  and  the  Unreal."

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While,  therefore,  the  INDIVIDUAL  EGO,  owing  to  its  essence  and  nature,  is  immortal  throughout  eternity,  with  a  form  (rupa),  which  prevails  during  the  whole  life  cycles  of  the  Fourth  Round,  its  Sos/e,  or  resemblance,  the  personal,  Ego,  has  to  win  its  immortality.

(4)  Antahkarana  is  the  name  of  that  imaginary  bridge,  the  path  which,  lies  between  the  Divine  and  the  human  Egos,  for  they  are  Egos,  during,  human  life,  to  rebecome  one  Ego  in  Devachan  or  Nirvana.

This  may  seem,  difficult  to  understand,  but  in  reality,  with  the  help  of  a  familiar,  though,  fanciful  illustration,  it  becomes  quite  simple.

Let  us  figure  to  ourselves  a.  bright  lamp  in  the  middle  of  a  room,  casting  its  light  upon  the  wall.

Let  the  lamp  represent  the  Divine  Ego,  and  the  light  thrown  on  the  wall  the  lower  Manas,  and  let  the  wall  stand  for  the  body.

That  portion  of  the  atmosphere  which  transmits  the  ray  from  the  lamp  to  the  wall,  will  then  represent  the  Antahkarana.

We  must  further  suppose  that  the  light  thus  cast  is  endowed*  with  reason  and  intelligence,  and  possesses,  moreover,  the  faculty  of  dissipat-  ing all  the  evil  shadows  which  pass  across  the  wall,  and  of  attracting  all  brightnesses  to  itself,  receiving  their  indelible  impressions.

Now,  it  is  in  the  power  of  the  human  Ego  to  chase  away  the  shadows,  or  sins,  and  multiply  the  brightnesses,  or  good  deeds,  which  make  these  impressions,  and  thus,  through  Antahkarana,  ensure  its  own  permanent  connection,  and  its  final  re-  union, with^  the  Divine  Ego.

Remember  that  the  latter  cannot  take  place  while  there  remains  a  single  taint  of  the  terrestrial,  or  of  matter,  in  the  purity  of  that  light.

On  the  other  hand,  the  connection  cannot  be  entirely  ruptured,  and  final  re-union  prevented,  so  long  as  there  remains  one  spiritual  deed,  or  potentiality  to  serve  as  a  thread  of  union  ;  but  the  moment  this  last  spark  is  extinguished,  and  the  last  potentiality  exhausted,  then  comes  the  severance.

In  an  Eastern  parable,  the  Divine  Ego  is  likened  to  the  Master  who  sends  out.

his  labourers  to  till  the  ground  and  to  gather  in  the  harvest,  -and  who  is  content  to  keep  the  field  so  long  as  it  can  yield  even  the  smallest  return.

But  when  the  ground  becomes  absolutely  sterile  not  only  is  it  abandoned,  but  the  labourer  also  (the  lower  Manas)  perishes.

On  the  other  hand,  however,  still  using  our  simile,  when  the  light  thrown  on  the  wall,  or  the  rational  human  Ego,  reaches  the  point  of  actuaii  spiritual  exhaustion,  the  Antahkarana  disappears,  no  more  light  is  transmitted,  and  the  lamp  becomes  non-existent  to  the  ray.

The  light  which  has  been  absorbed  gradually  disappears  and  "  Soul  eclipse  "  occurs  ;  the  being  lives  on  earth  and  then  passes  into  Kama  Loka  as  a  mere  surviving  congeries  of  material  qualities  ;  it  can  never  pass  onwards  towards  Devachan,  but  is  reborn  immediately,  a  human  animal  and  scourge.

496  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

This  simile,  however  fantastic,  will  help  us  to  seize  the  correct  idea.

Save  through  the  blending  of  the  moral  nature  with  the  Divine  Ego,  there  is  no  immortality  for  the  personal  Ego.

It  is  only  the  most  spiritual  emanations  of  the  personal  Human  Soul  which  survive.

Having,  during  a  lifetime,  been  imbued  with  the  notion  and  feeling  of  the  "  I  am  I  "  of  its  personality,  the  Human  Soul,  the  bearer  of  the  very  essence  of  the  Karmic  deeds  of  the  physical  man,  becomes,  after  the  death  of  the  latter,  part  and  parcel  of  the  Divine  Flame,  the  Ego.

It  becomes  immortal  through  the  mere  fact  that  it  is  now  strongly  grafted  on  the  Monad,  which  is  the  "  Tree  of  Life  Eternal."

And  now  we  must  speak  of  the  tenet  of  the  "  second  death."  What  happens  to  the  Kamic  Human  Soul,  which  is  always  that  of  a  debased  and  wicked  man  or  of  a  soulless  person  ?  This  mystery  will  now  be  explained.

The  personal  Soul  in  this  case,  viz.,  in  that  of  one  who  has  never  had  a  thought  not  concerned  with  the  animal  self,  having  nothing  to  transmit  to  the  Higher,  or  to  add  to  the  sum  of  the  experiences  gleaned  from  past  incar-  nations which  its  memory  is  to  preserve  throughout  eternity — this  personal  Soul  becomes  separated  from  the  Ego.

It  can  graft  nothing  of  self  on  that  eternal  trunk  whose  sap  throws  out  millions  of  personalities,  like  leaves  from  its  branches,  leaves  which  wither,  die  and  fall  at  the  end  of  their  season.

These  personalities  bud,  blossom  forth  and  expire,  some  without  leaving  a  trace  behind,  others  after  commingling  their  own  life  with  that  of  the  parent  stem.

It  is  the  Souls  of  the  former  class  that  are  doomed  to  annihilation,  or  Avltchi,  a  state  so  badly  understood,  and  still  worse  described  by  some  Theosophical  writers,  but  which  is  not  only  located  on  our  earth,  but  is  in  fact  this  very  earth  itself.

.

Thus  we  see  that  Antahkarana  has  been  destroyed  before  the  lower  man  has  had  an  opportunity  of  assimilating  the  Higher  and  becoming  at  one  with  it  ;  and  therefore  the  Kamic  "  Soul  "  becomes  a  separate  entity,  to  live  henceforth,  for  a  short  or  long  period  according  to  its  Karma,  as  a  "  soulless"  creature.

But  before  I  elaborate  this  question,  I  must  explain  more  clearly  the  meaning  and  functions  of  the  Antahkarana.

As  already  said,  it  may  be  represented  as  a  narrow  bridge  connecting  the  Higher  and  the  lower  Manas.

Jf  you  look  at  the  Glossary  of  the  Voice  of  the  Silence,  pp.  88  and  89,  you  will  find  that  it  is  a  projection  of  the  lower  Manas,  or,  rather,  the  link  between  the  latter  and  the  Higher  Ego,  or,  between  the  Human  and  the  Divine  or  Spiritual.

At  death  it  is  destroyed  as  a  path,  or  medium  of  communication,  and  its  remains  survive  as  Kama  Rupa,

1  As  the  author  of  Esoteric  Buddhism  and  the  Occult  World  called  Manas  the  Human  Soul,  and  Buddhi  the  Spiritual  Soul,  I  have  left  these  terms  unchanged  in  the  Voice,  seeing  that  it  was  a  book  intended  for  the  public.

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the  "  shell."  It  is  this  which  the  Spiritualists  see  sometimes  appearing  in  the  seance  rooms  as  materialized  "  forms,"  which  they  foolishly  mistake  for  the  "  Spirits  of  the  Departed."  *  So  far  is  this  from  being  the  case,  that  in  dreams,  though  Antahkarana  is  there,  the  personality  is  only  half  awake ;  therefore,  Antahkarana  is  said  to  be  drunk  or  insane  during  our  normal  sleeping  state.

If  such  is  the  case  during  the  periodical  death,  or  sleep,  of  the-  living  body,  one  may  judge  what  the  consciousness  of  Antahkarana  is  like  when  it  has  been  transformed  after  the  "  eternal  sleep  "  into  Kama  Rupa.

But  to  return.

In  order  not  to  confuse  the  mind  of  the  Western  student  with  the  abstruse  difficulties  of  Indian  metaphysics,  let  him  view  the  lower  Manas,  or  Mind,  as  the  personal  Ego  during  the  waking  state,  and  as  Antahkarana  only  during  those  moments  when  it  aspires  towards  its  Higher  Ego,  and  thus  becomes  the  medium  of  communication  between  the  two.

It  is  for  this  reason  that  it  is  called  the  "  Path."  Now,  when  a  limb  or  organ  belonging  to  the  physical  organism  is  left  in  disuse,  -it  becomes  weak  and  finally  atrophies.

So  also  is  it  with  mental  faculties  ;  and  hence  the  atrophy  of  the  lower  mind-function,  called  Antahkarana,  becomes  comprehensible  in  both  completely  materialistic  and  depraved  natures.

According  to  Esoteric  Philosophy,  however,  the  teaching  is  as  follows :  Seeing  that  the  faculty  and  function  of  Antahkarana  is  as  necessary  as  the  medium  of  the  ear  for  hearing,  or  that  of  the  eye  for  seeing  ;  then  so  long  as  the  feeling  of  Ahamkara,  that  is,  of  the  personal  "  I  "  or  selfishness,  is  not  entirely  crushed  out  in  a  man,  and  the  lower  mind  not  entirely  merged  into  and  become  one  with  the  Higher  Buddhi-Manas,  it  stands  to  reason  that  to  destroy  Antahkarana  is  like  destroying  a  bridge  over  an  impassable  chasm  ;  the  traveller  can  never  reach  the  goal  on  the  other  shore.

And  here  lies  the  difference  between  the  exoteric  and  the  Esoteric  teaching.

The  former  makes  the  Vedanta  state  that  so  long  as  Mind  (the  lower)  clings  through  Antahkarana  to  Spirit  (Buddhi-Manas)  it  is  impossible  for  it  to  acquire  true  Spiritual  Wisdom,  Jnyana,  and  that  this  can  only  be  attained  by  seek-  ing to  come  en  rapport  with  the  Universal  Soul  (Atma) ;  that,  in  fact,  it  is  by  ignoring  the  Higher  Mind  altogether  that  one  reaches  Raja  Yoga.

We  say  it  is  not  so.  No  single  rung  of  the  ladder  leading  to  knowledge  can  be  skipped.

No  personality  can  ever  reach  or  bring  itself  into  communication  with  Atma,  except  through  Buddhi-Manas ;  to  try  to

1  In  the  exoteric  teachings  of  Raja   Yoga,   Antahkarana   is  called  the  inner  organ  of  perception  and  is  divided  into  four   parts,  the  (lower)  Manas,   Buddhi  (reason)  Ahamkfira  (personality),   and  Chitta  (thinking  faculty).     It  also,  together  with  several  other  organs,  forms  a  part  of  Jtva.

Soul,  called  also    Lingadeha      Esotericists.

however,  must  not  be  misled  by  this  popular  version  FF

498  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

become  a  Jivanmukta  or  a  Mahatma,  before  one  has  become  an  Adept  or  even  a  Narjoi  (a  sinless  man)  is  like  trying  to  reach  Ceylon  from  India  without  crossing  the  sea.

Therefore  we  are  told  that  if  we  destroy  Antahkarana  before  the  personal  is  absolutely  under  the  con-  trol of  the  impersonal  Ego,  we  risk  to  lose  the  latter  and  be  severed  for  ever  from  it,  unless  indeed  we  hasten  to  re-establish  the  communication  by  a»  supreme  and  final  effort.

It  is  only  when  we  are  indissolubly  linked  with  the  essence  of  the  Divine  Mind,  that  we  have  to  destroy  Antahkarana.

Like  as  a  solitary  warrior  pursued  by  an  army,  seeks  refuge  in  a  stronghold ;  to  cut  himself  off  from  the  enemy,  he  first  destroys  the  drawbridge,  and  then  only  com-  mences to  destroy  the  pursuer ;  so  must  the  Srotapatti  act  before  he  slays  Antah-  karana

Or  as  an  Occult  axiom  has  it :

Tfie  Unit  becomes  Three,  and  Three  generate  Four,  It  is  for  the  latter  [the  Quaternary]  to  re-become  Three,  and  for  the  Divine  Three  to  expand  into  the  Absolute  One.

Monads,  which  become  Duads  on  the  differentiated  plane,  to  develop  into  Triads  during  the  cycle  of  incarnations,  even  when  incarnated  know  neither  space  nor  time,  but  are  diffused  through  the  lower  Principles  of  the  Quaternary,  being  omnipresent  and  omniscient  in  their  nature.

But  this  omniscience  is  innate,  and  can  manifest  its  reflected  light  only  through  that  which  is  at  least  semi -terrestrial  or  material ;  even  as  the  physical  brain  which,  in  its  turn,  is  the  vehicle  of  the  lower  Manas  enthroned  in  Kama  Rupa.

And  it  is  this  which,  is  gradually  annihilated  in  cases  of  "  second  death."

But  such  annihilation — which  is  in  reality  the  absence  of  the  slightest  trace  of  the  doomed  Soul  from  the  eternal  MEMORY,  and  therefore  signifies  annihilation  in  eternity — does  not  mean  simply  discontinuation  of  human  life  on  earth,  for  earth  is  Avitchi,  and  the  worst  Avitchi  possible.

Expelled  for  ever  from  the  consciousness  of  the  Individuality,  the  reincarnating  Ego,  the  physical  atoms  and  psychic  vibrations  of  the  now  separate  personality  are  immediately  reincarnated  on  the  same  earth,  only  in  a  lower  and  still  more  abject  creature,  a  human  being  only  in  form,  doomed  to  Karmic  torments  during  the  whole  of  its  new  life.

Moreover,  if  it  persists  in  its  criminal  or  debauched  course,  it  will  suffer  a  long  series  of  immediate  reincarnations.

Here  two  questions  present  themselves  :  1 .  What  becomes  of  the  Higher  Ego  in  such  cases  ?  2.  What  kind  of  an  animal  is  a  human  creature  born  soulless  ?

Before  answering  these  two  very  natural  queries,  I  have  to  draw  the  attention  of  all  of  you  who  are  born  in  Christian  countries  to  the  fact  that  the

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romance  of  the  vicarious  atonement  and  the  mission  of  Jesus,  as  it  now  stands,  was  drawn  or  borrowed  by  some  too  liberal  Initiates  from  the  mysterious  and  weird  tenet  of  the  earthly  experience  of  the  reincarnating  Ego.

The  latter  is  indeed  the  sacrificial  victim  of,  and  through,  its  own  Karma  in  previous  Man-  vantaras,  which  takes  upon  itself  voluntarily  the  duty  of  saving  what  would  be  otherwise  soulless  men  or  personalities.

Eastern  truth  is  thus  more  philosophic-  al and  logical  than  Western  fiction.

The  Christos,  or  Buddhi-Manas  of  each  man  is  not  quite  an  innocent  and  sinless  God,  though  in  one  sense  it  is  the  "Father,"  being  of  the  same  essence  with  the  Universal  Spirit,  and  at  the  same  time  the  "Son,"  for  Manas  is  the  second  remove  from  the  "  Father."  By  incarnation  the  Divine  Son  makes  itself  responsible  for  the  sins  of  all  the  personalities  which  it  will  inform.

This  it  can  do  only  through  its  proxy  or  reflection,  the  lower  Manas.

The  only  case  in  which  the  Divine  Ego  can  escape  individual  penalty  and  responsibility  as  a  guiding  Principle,  is  when  it  has  to  break  off  from  the  personality,  because  matter,  with  its  psychic  and  astral  vibrations,  is  then,  by  the  very  intensity  of  its  combinations,  placed  beyond  the  control  of  the  Ego.

Apophis,  the  Dragon,  having  become  the  conqueror,  the  reincarnating  Manas,  separating  itself  gradually  from  its  tabernacle,  breaks  finally  asunder  from  the  psycho-animal  Soul.

Thus,  in  answer  to  the  first  question,  I  say :

1 .  The   Divine    Ego   does  one  of  two  things  :  either  (a)  it  recommences  immediately  under  its  own  Karmic  impulses  a  fresh  series  of  incarnations ;  or  (b)  it  seeks  and  finds  refuge  in  the  bosom  of  the  Mother,  Alaya,  the  Universal  Soul,    of    which    the    Manvantaric    aspect    is    Mahat.

Freed   from   the  life-  mpressions   of   the   personality,    it   merges  into  a  kind  of  Nirvanic  interlude,  wherein  there  can  be  nothing  but  the  eternal  Present,  which  absorbs  the  Past  and    Future.

Bereft   of  the    "labourer,"    both   field  and  harvest  now  being  lost,    the    Master,    in    the    infinitude   of   his   thought,   naturally  preserves  no  recollection    of  the   finite   and   evanescent   illusion   which   had   been  his  last  personality.

And  then,  indeed,  is  the  latter  annihilated.

2.  The    future    of    the    lower    Manas    is    more   terrible,   and   still  more  terrible  to   humanity   than   to   the   now  animal  man.

It  sometimes  happens  that  after  the  separation  the  exhausted  Soul,  now  become  supremely  animal,  fades    out    in    Kama    Loka,  as  do  all   other  animal  souls.

But  seeing  that  the  more  material  is  the  human  mind,  the  longer  it  lasts,  even  in  the  inter-  mediate   stage,     it    frequently    happens    that     after    the     present    life    of  the    soulless     man    is    ended,     he    is    again    and    again    reincarnated    into  new    personalities,     each   one  more    abject  than  the  other.

The    impulse  of     animal    life     is    too     strong ;     it     cannot    wear    itself    out    in    one    or

500  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

two  lives  only.

In  rarer  cases,  however,  when  the  lower  Manas  is  doomed  to  exhaust  itself  by  starvation  ;  when  there  is  no  longer  hope  that  even  a  rem-  nant of  a  lower  light  will,  owing  to  favourable  conditions — say,  even  a  short  period  of  spiritual  aspiration  and  repentance — attract  back  to  itself  its  Parent  Ego,  and  Karma  leads  the  Higher  Ego  back  to  new  incarnations,  then  some-  thing far  more  dreadful  may  happen.

The  Kama-Manasic  spook  may  become  that  which  is  called  in  Occultism  the  "  Dweller  on  the  Threshold."  This  Dweller  is  not  like  that  which  is  described  so  graphically  in  lanoni,  but  an  actual  fact  in  Nature  and  not  a  fiction  in  romance,  however  beautiful  the  latter  may  be.  Bulwer,  however,  must  have  got  the  idea  from  some  Eastern  Initiate.

This  Dweller,  led  by  affinity  and  attraction,  forces  itself  into  the  astral  current,  and  through  the  Auric  Envelope,  of  the  new  tabernacle  inhabited  by  the  Parent  Ego,  and  declares  war  to  the  lower  light  which  has  replaced  it.  This,  of  course,  can  only  happen  in  the  case  of  the  moral  weakness  of  the  personality  so  obsessed.

No  one  strong  in  virtue,  and  righteous  in  his  walk  of  life,  can  risk  or  dread  any  such  thing  ;  but  only  those  depraved  in  heart.

Robert  Louis  Stevenson  had  a  glimpse  of  a  true  vision  indeed  when  he  wrote  his  Strange  Case  of  Dr.  Jekyll  and  Mr.  Hyde.

His  story  is  a  true  allegory.

Every  Chela  will  recognise  in  it  a  substratum  of  truth,  and  in  Mr.  Hyde  a  Dweller,  an  obsessor  of  the  personality,  the  tabernacle  of  the  Parent  Spirit.

"  This  is  a  nightmare  tale  !  "  I  was  often  told  by  one,  now  no  more  in  our  ranks,  who  had  a  most  pronounced  "  Dweller,"  a  "  Mr.  Hyde/'  as  an  almost  constant  companion.

"  How  can  such  a  process  take  place  without  one's  knowledge  ?  "  It  can  and  does  so  happen,  and  I  have  almost  described  it  once  before  in  The  Jheosophist.

The  Soul,  the  lower  Mind,  becomes  as  a  half  animal  principle  almost  paralyzed  with  daily  vice,  and  grows  gradually  unconscious  of  its  subjective  half,  the  Lord,  one  of  the  mighty  Host ,  [and]  in  proportion  to  the  rapid  sensuous  development  of  the  brain  and  nerves,  sooner  or  later  it  (the  personal  Soul)  finally  loses  sight  of  its  divine  mission  on  earth.

Truly,

Like  the  vampire,  the  brain  feeds  and  lives  and  grows  in  strength  at  the  expense  of  its  spiritual  parent  .  .  .  and  the  personal  half-unconscious  Soul  becomes  senseless,  beyond  hope  of  redemption.

It  is  powerless  to  discern  the  voice  of  its  God.

It  aims  but  at  the  development  and  fuller  comprehension  of  natural,  earthly  life  ;  and  thus  can  discover  but  the  mysteries  of  physical  nature.

...  It  begins  by  becoming  virtually  dead,  during  the  life  of  the  body  ;  and  ends  by  dying  completely — that  is,  by  being  annihilated  as  a  complete  immortal  Soul.

Such  a  catastrophe  may  often  happen  long  years  before  one's  physical  death  .  "  We  elbow  soulless  men  and  women  at  every  step  in  life."  And  when  death  arrives  .  .  there  is  no  more  a  Soul  (the  reincarnating  Spiritual  Ego)  to  liberate  .  .  .  for  it  has  fled  years  before.

PAPER

Result :  Bereft  of  its  guiding  Principles,  but  strengthened  by  the  material  elements,  Kama-Manas,  from  being  a  "  derived  light "  now  becomes  an  independent  Entity.

After  thus  suffering  itself  to  sink  lower  and  lower  on  the  animal  plane,  when  the  hour  strikes  for  its  earthly  body  to  die,  one  of  two  things  happens  :  either  Kama-Manas  is  immediately  reborn  in  Myalba,  the  state  of  Avitchi  on  earth,1  or,  if  it  become  too  strong  in  evil — "  immortal  in  Satan  "  is  the  Occult  expression — it  is  sometimes  allowed,  for  Karmic  purposes,  to  remain  in  an  active  state  of  Avitchi  in  the  terrestrial  Aura.

Then  through  despair  and  loss  of  all  hope  it  becomes  like  the  mythical  "  devil  "  in  its  endless  wickedness  ;  it  continues  in  its  elements,  which  are  imbued  through  and  through  with  the  essence  of  Matter ;  for  evil  is  coeval  with  Matter  rent  asunder  from  Spirit.

And  when  its  Higher  Ego  has  once  more  reincarnated,  evolving  a  new  reflection,  or  Kama-Manas,  the  doomed  lower  Ego,  like  a  Frankenstein's  monster,  will  ever  feel  attracted  to  its  Father,  who  repudiates  his  son,  and  will  become  a  regular  "  Dweller  on  the  Threshold  "  of  terrestrial  life.

I  gave  the  outlines  of  the  Occult  doctrine  in  The  Theosophist  of  October,  1881,  and  November,  1882,  but  could  not  go  into  details,  and  therefore  got  very  much  embarrassed  when  called  upon  to  explain.

Yet  I  have  written  there  plainly  enough  about  "  useless  drones,"  those  who  refuse  to  become  co-workers  with  Nature  and  who  perish  by  millions  during  the  Manvantaric  life-cycle  ;  those,  as  ]n  the  case  in  hand,  who  prefer  to  be  ever  suffering  in  Avttchi  under  Karmic  law  rather  than  give  up  their  lives  "  in  evil,"  and  finally,  those  who  are  co-workers  with  Nature  for  destruction.

These  are  thoroughly  wicked  and  depraved  men,  but  yet  as  highly  intellectual  and  acutely  spiritual  for  evil,  as  those  who  are  spiritual  for  good.

The  (lower)   Egos   of  these  may  escape  the  law  of  final  destruction  or  annihila-  tion for  ages  to  come.

Thus  we  find  two  kinds  of  soulless  beings  on  earth  :  those  who  have  lost  their  Higher  Ego  in  the  present  incarnation,  and  those  who  are  born  soulless,  having  been  severed  from  their  Spiritual  Soul  in  the  preceding  birth.

The  former  are  candidates  for  Avitchi  ;  the  latter  are  "  Mr.  Hydes,"  whether  in  or  out  of  human  bodies,  whether  incarnated  or  hanging  about  as  invisible  though  potent  ghouls.

In  such  men,  cunning  develops  to  an  enormous  degree,  and  no  one  except  those  who  are  familiar  with  the  doctrine  would  suspect  them  of  being  soulless,  for  neither  Religion  nor  Science  has  the  least  suspicion  that  such  facts  actually  exist  in  Nature.

1  The  Earth,  or  earth-life  rather,  is  the  only  Avitchi  (Hell)  that  exists  for  the  men  of  our  humanity  on  this  globe  Avitchi  is  a  state,  not  a  locality,  a  counterpart  of  Devachan  Such  a  state  follows  the  Soul  wherever  it  goes,  whether  into  KAma  Loka,  as  a  semi-conscious  Spook,  or  into  a  human  body,  when  reborn  to  suffer  Avitchi.

Our  Philosophy  recognizes  no  other  Hell.

502  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

There  is,  however,  still  hope  for  a  person  who  has  lost  his  Higher  Soul  through  his  vices,  while  he  is  yet  in  the  body.

He  may  be  still  redeemed  and  made  to  turn  on  his  material  nature.

For  either  an  intense  feeling  of  repent-  ance, or  one  single  earnest  appeal  to  the  Ego  that  has  fled,  or  best  of  all,  an  active  effort  to  amend  one's  ways,  may  bring  the  Higher  Ego  back  again.

The  thread  of  connection  is  not  altogether  broken,  though  the  Ego  is  now  beyond  forcible  reach,  for  "  Antahkarana  is  destroyed,"  and  the  personal  Entity  has  one  foot  already  in  Myalba  ;'  yet  it  is  not  entirely  beyond  hearing  a  strong  spiritual  appeal.

There  is  another  statement  made  in  /sis  Unveiled  '2  on  this  subject.

It  is  said  that  this  terrible  death  may  be  sometimes  avoided  by  the  knowledge  of  the  mysterious  NAME,  the  "  WORD."  J  What  this  "  WORD,"  which  is  not  a  "  Word  "  but  a  Sound,  is,  you  all  know.

Its  potency  lies  in  the  rhythm  or  the  accent.

This  means  simply  that  even  a  bad  person  may,  by  the  study  of  the  Sacred  Science,  be  redeemed  and  stopped  on  the  path  of  destruction.

But  unless  he  is  in  thorough  union  with  his  Higher  Ego,  he  may  repeat  it,  parrot-like,  ten  thousand  times  a  day,  and  the  "  Word  "  will  not  help  him.

On  the  contrary,  if  not  entirely  at  one  with  his  Higher  Triad,  it  may  produce  quite  the  reverse  of  a  beneficent  effect,  the  Brothers  of  the  Shadow  using  it  very  often  for  malicious  objects ;  in  which  case  it  awakens  and  stirs  up  naught  but  the  evil,  material  elements  of  Nature.

But  if  one's  nature  is  good,  and  sincerely  strives  towards  the  HIGHER  SELF,  which  is  that  Aum,  through  one's  Higher  Ego,  which  is  its  third  letter,  and  Buddhi  the  second,  there  is  no  attack  of  the  Dragon  Apophis  which  it  will  not  repel.

From  those  to  whom  much  is  given  much  is  expected.

He  who  knocks  at  the  door  of  the  Sanctuary  in  full  knowledge  of  its  sacredness,  and  after  obtaining  admission,  departs  from  the  threshold,  or  turns  round  and  says,  "  Oh,  there's  nothing  in  it !  "  and  thus  loses  his  chance  of  learning  the  whole  truth — can  but  await  his  Karma.

Such  are  then  the  Esoteric  explanations  of  that  which  has  perplexed  so  many  who  have  found  what  they  thought  contradictions  in  various  Theosophic-  •al  writings,  including  "  Fragments  of  Occult  Truth,"  in  Vols.

iii  and  iv  of  Jhe  Jheosophist,  etc.

Before  finally  dismissing  the  subject,  I  must  add  a  caution,  which  pray  keep  well  in  mind.

It  will  be  very  natural  for  those  of  you  who  are  Esotericists  to  hope  that  none  of  you  belong  so  far  to  the  soulless  portion  of  mankind,  and  that  you  can  feel  quite  easy  about  Avitchi,  even  as

1  See  Vo/ce  of  the  Silence,  p.  97.  2  Loc.

cit.

3  Read  the  last  footnote  on  p.  368,  Vol.

II  of  /sis  Unveiled,  and  you  will  see  that  even  profane  Egyptologists  and  men  who,  like  Bunsen,  were  ignorant  of  Initiation,  were  struck  by  their  own  discoveries  when  they  found  the  "  Word  "  mentioned  in  old  papyri.

PAPER

the  good  citizen  is  about  the  penal  laws.

Though  not,  perhaps,  exactly  on  the  Path  as  yet,  you  are  skirting  its  border,  and  many  of  you  in  the  right  direction.

Between  such  venal  faults  as  are  inevitable  under  our  social  environment,  and  the  blasting  wickedness  described  in  the  Editor's  note  on  Eliphas  Levi's  "  Satan,"  1  there  is  an  abyss.

If  not  become  "  immortal  in  good  by  identification  with  (our)  God,"  or  AUM,  Atma-Buddhi-Manas,  we  have  surely  not  made  ourselves  "  immortal  in  evil  "  by  coalescing  with  Satan,  the  lower  Self.

You  forget,  however,  that  everything  must  have  a  beginning  ;  that  the  first  step  on  a  slippery  mountain  slope  is  the  necessary  antecedent  to  one's  falling  precipitately  to  the  bottom  and  into  the  arms  of  death.

Be  it  far  from  me  the  suspicion  that  any  of  the  Esoteric  students  have  reached  to  any  considerable  point  down  the  plane  of  spiritual  descent.

All  the  same  I  warn  you  to  avoid  taking  the  first  step.

You  may  not  reach  the  bottom  in  this  life  or  the  next,  but  you  may  now  generate  causes  which  will  insure  your  spiritual  destruction  in  your  third,  fourth,  fifth,  or  even  some  subsequent  birth.

In  the  great  Indian  epic  you  may  read  how  a  mother  whose  whole  family  of  warrior  sons  were  slaughtered  in  battle,  complained  to  Krishna  that  though  she  had  the  spiritual  vision  to  enable  her  to  look  back  fifty  incarnations,  yet  she  could  see  no  sin  of  hers  that  could  have  begotten  so  dreadful  a  Karma  ;  and  Krishna  answered  her:  "If  thou  could'st  look  back  to  thy  fifty-first  anterior  fcvrth,  as  I  can,  thou  would 'st  see  thyself  killing  in  wanton  cruelty  the  same  number  of  ants  as  that  of  the  sons  thou  hast  now  lost  "  This,  of  course,  is  only  a  poetical  exaggeration  ;  yet  it  is  a  striking  image  to  show  how  great  results  come  from  apparently  trifling  causes.

Good  and  evil  are  relative,  and  are  intensified  or  lessened  according  to  the  conditions  by  which  man  is  surrounded.

One  who  belongs  to  that  which  we  call  the  "  useless  portion  of  mankind,"  that  is  to  say,  the  lay  majority,  is  in  many  cases  irresponsible.

Crimes  committed  in  Avidya,  or  ignorance,  involve  physical  but  not  moral  responsibilities  or  Karma.

Take,  for  example,  the  case  of  idiots,  children,  savages,  and  people  who  know  no  better.

But  the  case  of  each  who  is  pledged  to  the  HIGHER  SELF  is  quite  another  matter.

You  cannot  invoke  this  Divine  Witness  with  impunity,  and  once  that  you  have  put  yourselves  under  its  tutelage,  you  have  asked  the  Radiant  Light  to  shine  and  search  through  all  the  dark  corners  of  your  being  ;  consciously  you  have  invoked  the  Divine  Justice  of  Karma  to  take  note  of  your  motive,  to  scrutinize  your  actions,  and  to  enter  up  all  in  your  account.

The  step  is  irrevocable  as  that  of  the  infant  taking  birth.

Never  again  can  you  force  yourselves  back  ,into  the  matrix  of  Avidya  and  irresponsibility.

Though  you  flee  to  the

1  See  The  Theosoph/st,  October,  1881,  pp.  14,  et  seq.

504  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

uttermost  parts  of  the  earth,  and  hide  yourselves  from  the  sight  of  men,  or  seek  oblivion  in  the  tumult  of  the  social  whirl,  that  Light  will  find  you  out  and  lighten  your  every  thought,  word  and  deed.

All  H.  P.  B.  can  do  is  to  send  to  each  earnest  one  among  you  a  most  sincerely  fraternal  sympathy  and  hope  for  a  good  outcome  to  your  endeavours  Nevertheless,  be  not  discouraged,,  but  try,  ever  keep  trying  ;*  twenty  failures  are  not  irremediable  if  followed  by  as  many  undaunted  struggles  upward.

Is  it  not  so  that  mountains  are  climbed  ?  And  know  further,  that  if  Karma  relentlessly  records  in  the  Esotericist's,  account  bad  deeds  that  in  the  ignorant  would  be  overlooked,  yet,  equally  true  is  it  that  each  of  his  good  deeds  is,  by  reason  of  his  association  with  the.

Higher  Self,  a  hundredfold  intensified  as  a  potentiality  for  good.

Finally,  keep  ever  in  mind  the  consciousness  that  though  you  see  no  Master  by  your  bedside,  nor  hear  one  audible  whisper  in  the  silence  of  the  still  night,  yet  the  Holy  Power  is  about  you,  the  Holy  Light  is  shining  into  your  hour  of  spiritual  need  and  aspirations,  and  it  will  be  no  fault  of  the  MASTERS,  or  of  their  humble  mouthpiece  and  servant,  if  through  perversity  or  moral  feeble*  ness  some  of  you  cut  yourselves  off  from  these  higher  potencies,  and  step  upon  the  declivity  that  leads  to  Avitchi.

1  Read  pp.  40  and  63  in  the  Voice  of  the  Silence

APPENDIX

NOTES    ON    PAPERS    I,    2    AND

PAGE

STUDENTS  in  the  west  have  little  or  no  idea  of  the  forces  that  lie  latent  ir>  Sound,  the  Akashic  vibrations  that  may  be  set  up  by  those  who  understand  how  to  pronounce  certain  words.

The  Om,  or  the  "  Om  man/  padme  hum  "*  are  in  spiritual  affinity  with  cosmic  forces,  but  without  a  knowledge  of  the  natural  arrangement,  or  of  the  order  in  which  the  syllables  stand,  very  little  can  be  achieved,  "  Om  "  is,  of  course,  Aum,  that  may  be  pronounced  as  two,  three  or  seven  syllables,  setting  up  different  vibrations.

Now  letters,  as  vocal  sounds,  cannot  fail  to  correspond  with  musical  notes,  and  therefore  with  numbers  and  colours  ;  hence  also  with  Forces  and  Tattvas.

He  who  remembers  that  the  Universe  is  built  up  from  the  Tattvas  will  readily  understand  something  of  the  power  that  may  be  exercised  by  vocal  sounds.

Every  letter  in  the  alphabet,  whether  divided  into  three,  four,  or  seven  septenaries,  or  forty-nine  letters,  has  its  own  colour,  or  shade  of  colour.

He  who  has  learnt  the  colours  of  the  alphabetical  letters,  and  the  corresponding  numbers  of  the  seven,  and  the  forty-nine  colours  and  shades  on  the  scale  of  planes  and  forces,  and  knows  their  respective  order  in  the  seven  planes,  will  easily  master  the  art  of  bringing  them  into  affinity  or  interplay.

But  here  a  difficulty  arises.

The  Senzar  and  Sanskrit  alphabets,  and  other  Occult  tongues,  besides  other  potencies,  have  a  number,  colour,  and  distinct  syllable  for  every  letter,  and  so  had  also  the  old  Mosaic  Hebrew.

But  how  many  students  know  any  of  these  tongues  ?  When  the  time  comes,  therefore,  it  must  suffice  to  teach  the  students  the  numbers  and  colours  attached  to  the  Latin  letters  only  (as  pronounced  in  Latin,  not  as  in  Anglo-  Saxon,  Scotch,  or  Irish).  This,  however,  would  be  at  present  premature.

The  colour  and  number  of  not  only  the  planets  but  also  the  zodiacal  constellations  corresponding  to  every  letter  of  the  alphabet,  are  necessary  to make  any  special  syllable,  and  even  letter,  operative.1  Therefore,  if  a  student  would  make  Buddhi  operative,  for  instance,  he  would  have  to  intone  the  first  words  of  the  Mantra  on  the  note  mi.  But  he  would  have  still  further  to  accentuate  the  mi,  and  produce  mentally  the  yellow  colour  corresponding  to  this  sound  and  note,  on  every  letter  M  in  "  Om  man/  padme  hum  "  ;  this,  not  because  the  note  bears  the  same  name  in  the  vernacular,  Sanskrit,  or  even  the  Senzar,  for  it  does  not — but  because  the  letter  M  follows  the  first  letter,  and  is  in  this  sacred  formula  also  the  seventh  and  the  fourth.


As  Buddhi  it  is  second ;  as  Buddhi-Manas  it  is  the  second  and  third  combined.

H.  P.  B.

PAGE  420s

The  Pythagorean  Four,  or  Tetraktys,  was  the  symbol  of  the  Kosmos,  as  containing  within  itself,  the  point,  the  line,  the  superficies,  the  solid  ;  in  other  words,  the  essentials  of  all  forms.

Its  mystical  representation  is  the  point  within  the  triangle.

The  Decad  or  perfect  number  is  contained  in  the  Four ;  thus,

14-2-1-34-4     10.

PAGE

SUNDAY

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FRIDAY

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Third  Quarter

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PAGE

The   difficult  passage:    "Bear  in   mind  ...   a   mystery   below  truly,"3  may   become   a    little   more   clear  to  the  student   if  slightly  amplified.

The

1  See  Voice  of  the  Silence,  p.  viu.

a  The  following  notes  were  contributed  by  students  and  approved  by  H.P.B.

3  See  page  426.

NOTES  ON  PAPERS   1,  2  AND

41  primordial  Triangle"  is  the  Second  Logos,  which  reflects  itself  as  a  Triangle  in  the  Third  Logos,  or  Heavenly  Man,  and  then  disappears.

The  Third  Logos,  containing  the  "  potency  of  formative  creation,"  develops  the  Tetraktys  from  the  Triangle,  and  so  becomes  the  Seven,  the  Creative  Force,  making  a  Decad  with  the  primordial  Triangle  which  originated  it.  When  this  heavenly  Triangle  and  Tetraktys  are  reflected  in  the  Universe  of  Matter,  as  the  astral  para-  digmatic man,  they  are  reversed,  and  the  Triangle,  or  formative  potency,  is  thrown  below  the  Quaternary,  with  its  apex  pointing  downwards :  the  Monad  of  this  astral  paradigmatic  man  is  itself  a  Triangle,  bearing  to  the  Quaternary  and  Triangle  the  relation  borne  by  the  primordial  Triangle  to  the  Heavenly  Man.

Hence  the  phrase,  "  the  upper  Triangle  ...  is  shifted  in  the  man  of  clay  below  the  seven."  Here  again  the  Point  tracing  the  Triangle,  the  Monad  becoming  the  Ternary,  with  the  Quaternary  and  the  lower  creative  triangle,  make  up  the  Decad,  the  perfect  number.

"  As  above,  so  below."

The  student  will  do  well  to  relate  the  knowledge  here  acquired  to  that  given  on  p  455.  Here  the  upper  Triangle  is  given  as  Violet,  Indigo,  Blue,  associating  Violet  as  the  paradigm  of  all  forms  with  Indigo  as  Mahat,  and  blue  as  the  Atmic  Aura.

In  the  Quaternary,  Yellow,  as  substance,  is  associated  with  Yellow-Orange,  Life,  and  Red-Orange,  the  creative  potency.

Green  is  the  plane  between.

The  kiext  stage  is  not  explained.

Green  passes  upwards  to  Violet,  Indigo,  Blue,  the  Triangle  opening  out  to  receive  it,  and  so  forming  the  square,  Violet,  Indigo,  Blue,  Green.

This  leaves  the  Red-Orange,  Yellow-Orange,  and  Yellow,  and  these,  having  thus  lost  their  fourth  member,  can  only  form  3  triangle.

This  triangle  revolves,  to  point  downwards  for  the  descent  into  matter,  and  "  mirrored  on  the  plane  of  gross  nature,  it  is  reversed,"  and  appears  as  in  the  following  diagram :

Monad  A      Second  Logos

The  10    •'  I  /\     Third  Logos,  or  Heavenly  Man

|  i  r~J     The  Triangle  becoming  the  Quater-

(  nary  and  then  the  Septenary  l

/  (Monad   A      Astral  Paradigmatic  Man

I    T,          ]  The  10    -j    lhe7   j  n

(  ^7     Creative    Triangle    thrown    below

the  Seven

In  the  perfect  man  the  Red  will  be  absorbed  by  the  Green  ;  Yellow  will  become   one   with   Indigo  ;  Yellow-Orange   will   be  absorbed  in  Blue ;  Violet  1  See  Vol.

1,  pp.  128-9,  134.


will  remain  outside  the  True  Man,  though  connected  with  him.

Or,  to  trans-  late the  colours  :  Kama  will  be  absorbed  in  the  Lower  Manas  ;  Buddhi  will  become  one  with  Manas  ;  Prana  will  be  absorbed  in  the  Auric  Egg  ;  the  physical  body  remains,  connected,  but  outside  the  real  life.

A.  B.  PAGE

To  the  five  senses  at  present  the  property  of  mankind  two/ more  on  this  globe  are  to  be  added.

The  sixth  sense  is  the  psychic  sense  of  colour.

The  seventh  is  that  of  spiritual  sound.

In  the  second  paper,  the  corrected  rates  of  vibration  for  the  seven  primary  colours  and  their  modulations  are  given.

Inspecting  these,  it  appears  that  each  colour  differs  from  the  proceed-  ing one  by  a  step  of  42,  or  6  x  7.

462  Red  504  Orange  546  Yellow  588  Green  630  Blue  672  Indigo  714V.olet  756  Red

4-42  504  +  42  546  -1-42-588  +42- -630  +42-6721"  +  42-714  +

Third  Octave  of  psychic  colour  perceptions

Second  octave

Carrying  the  process  backward,  and  subtracting  42,  we  find  that  the  first  or  ground  colour  is  green,  for  this  globe.

— Green     \

84hd?go     f      ^'semi-octave  126  Violet     >  168  Red  210  Orange  252  Yellow  294  Green  336  Blue  378  Indigo  420  Violet  462  Red

The  second  and  fourth  octaves  would  be  heat  and  actinic  rays,  and  are  invisible  to  our  present  perception.

The  seventh  sense  is  that  of  spiritual  sound  ;  and,  since  the  vibrations  of  the  sixth  progress  by  steps  of  6  x  7,  those  of  the  seventh  progress  by  steps  of  7  x  7.  This  is  their  table  :

First  semi-octave

Second  Octave

—  Fa       ...     Green  Sound     \

49  Sol     ...     Blue

[

98  La      ...     Indigo

147  Si       ...     Violet

;

196  Do     .

Red  Soun

d

245  Re     .  294  M.     .

Orange  Yellow

343  Fa     .

Green

392  Sol    .

Blue

441  La     .

Indigo

490  Si      .

Violet

539  Do     .

Red

Etc.,  etc.

NOTES  ON  PAPERS  1,  2  AND

The  fifth  sense  is  in  our  possession  :  it  is  possibly  that  of  geometrical  form,  and  its  steps  of  progression  would  be  5  x  7,  or  35.

The  fourth  sense  is  that  of  physical  hearing,  music,  and  its  progressions  are  28,  or  4x7.  The  truth  of  this  is  demonstrated  by  the  fact  that  it  is  in  accord  with  the  theories  of  Science  as  to  the  vibrations  of  musical  notes.

Our  scale  is  as  follows  :

— ,  28,  56,  84,  112,  140,  168,  196,  224,  252.  280,  308,  336,  364,  392,  420.  448,  476,  504  532  560,  588,  616,  644,  672,  700.

According  to  musical  science,  the  notes  C,  E.  G,  are  as  4,  5,  6,  in  their  ratios  of  vibrations.

The  same  ratio  obtains  between  the  notes  of  the  triplet  G,  B,  D,  and  F.  A,  C  This  gives  the  scale,  and  reducing  the  vibrations  to  C  as  1,  the  ratios  of  the  seven  notes  to  C  are

9/8  D

5/4  E

4/

3/2  G

5/3,  A

15/

Reducing  these  to  whole  numbers,  we  get  for  one  octave  :

C'

C"

By  a  similar  calculation  we  can  put  an  octave  below  C'.  and  above  C"  Writing  these  three  octaves  in  line,  and  multiplying  by  seven  we  obtain  a  nearly  exact  correspondence  with  our  table  of  vibration  for  the  fourth  sense.

MUSICAL  TABLE

FOURTH  ScNSE

SCALE  RATIO

PRODUCT

X

28  E

X

56  F

X

84  G)

X

112  A

X

140  Bj

X

168  Cv

X

189  D

X

210)  E

X

224   Fv-

X

252  G

X

280  A|

X

315   B'

X

336  C,

X

378  D|

X

420  E

X

448  F

72  x  7  504  G

80  x  7  560  A

90  x  7  630  B

96  x  7  -   672  C

H.  C  [Dr.  H.  A.  W.  Coryn]

NOTES  ON  SOME  ORAL  TEACHINGS

THE  THREE  VITAL  AIRS

IT  is  the  pure  Akasha  that  passes  up  Sushumna  :  its  two  aspects  flow  in  Ida  and  Pingala.

These  are  the  three  vital  airs,  and  are  symbolized  by  the  Brahmanical  thread.

They  are  ruled  by  the  Will.

Will  and  Desire  are  the  higher  and  lower  aspects  of  one  and  the  same  thing.

Hence  the  importance  of  the  purity  of  the  canals ;  for  if  they  soil  the  vital  airs  energized  by  the  Will,  Black  Magic  results.

This  is  why  all  sexual  intercourse  is  forbidden  in  practical  Occultism.

From  Sushumna,  Ida  and  Pingala  a  circulation  is  set  up,  and  from  the  central  canal  passes  into  the  whole  body.

(Man  is  a  tree ;  he  has  in  him  the  macrocosm  and  the  microcosm.

Hence  the  trees  used  as  symbols ;  the  Dhyan-Chohanic  body  is  thus  figured.)

THE  AURIC  EGG

The  Auric  Egg  is  formed  in  curves,  which  may  be  conceived  from  the  curves  formed  by  sand  on  a  vibrating  metal  disk.

Each  atom,  as  each  body,  has  its  Auric  Egg,  each  centre  forming  its  own.

This  Auric  Egg,  with  the  appropriate  materials  thrown  into  it,  is  a  defence ;  no  wild  animal,  however  ferocious,  will  approach  the  Yogi  thus  guarded  :  it  flings  back  from  its  surface  all  malign  influences.

No  Will  power  is  manifested  through  the  Auric  Egg.

Q.  What  is  the  connection  between  the  circulation  of  the  vital  airs  and  the  power  of  the  Yogi  to  make  his  Auric  Egg  a  defence  against  aggression  ?

A.  It  is  impossible  to  answer  this  question.

The  knowledge  is  the  last  word  of  Magic.

It  is  connected  with  Kundalinl,  that  can  as  easily  destroy  as  preserve.

The  ignorant  tyro  might  kill  himself.

Q.  Is  the  Auric  Egg  of  a  child  a  differentiation  of  Akasha,  into  which  may  be  thrown  by  the  Adept  the  materials  he  needs  for  special  purposes — e.g.,  the  Mayav/  Rupa  ?


[The  question  was  somewhat  obscurely  worded.

Evidently  what  the  questioner  wanted  to  know  was  if  the  Auric  Egg  was  a  differentiation  of  Akasha,  into  which,  as  the  child  became  a  man,  he  might,  if  an  Adept,  weave  the  materials  needed  for  special  purposes,  etc.]

A.  Taking  the  question  in  the  sense  of  an  Adept  putting  something  into  or  acting  on  the  Auric  Egg  of  a  child,  then  this  could  not  be  done,  as  the  Auric  Egg  is  Karmic,  and  not  even  an  Adept  must  interfere  with  such  Karmic  record.

If  the  Adept  were  to  put  anything  into  the  Auric  Egg  of  another,  for  which  the  person  is  not  responsible,  or  which  does  not  come  from  the  Higher  Self  of  that  personality,  how  could  Karmic  justice  be  maintained  ?

The  Adept  can  draw  into  his  own  Auric  Egg  from  his  planet,  or  even  from  that  of  the  globe  or  of  the  universe,  according  to  his  degree.

This  envelope  is  the  receptacle  of  all  Karmic  causes,  and  photographs  all  things  like  a  sensitive  plate.

The  child  has  a  very  small  Auric  Egg  which  is  in  colour  almost  pure  white.

At  birth  the  Auric  Egg  consists  of  almost  pure  Akasha  plus  the  Tanhas,  which,  until  the  seventh  year,  remain  potential  or  in  latency.

The  Auric  Egg  of  an  idiot  cannot  be  said  to  be  human,  that  is,  it  is  not  tinged  with  Manas.

It  is  Akashic  vibrations  rather  than  an  Auric  Egg — the  material  envelope,  such  as  that  of  the  plant,  the  mineral  or  other  object.

The  Auric  Egg  is  the  transmitter  from  the  periodical  lives  to  the  Life  eternal,  /.e.,  from  Prana  to  Jiva.

It  disappears,  but  remains.

The  reason  why  the  confession  of  the  Roman  Catholic  and  Greek  Churches  is  so  great  a  sin  is  because  the  confessor  interferes  with  the  Auric  Egg  of  the  penitent  by  means  of  his  will  power,  engrafting  artificially  emana-  tions from  his  own  Auric  Egg  and  casting  seeds  for  germination  into  the  Auric  Egg  of  his  subject.

It  is  on  the  same  lines  as  hypnotic  suggestion.

The  above  remarks  apply  equally  to  Hypnotism,  although  the  latter  is  c  psycho- physical  force,  and  it  is  this  which  constitutes  one  of  its  many  seriouj  dangers.

At  the  same  time  "  a  good  thing  may  pass  through  dirty  channels,'  as  in  the  case  of  the  breaking  by  suggestion  of  the  alcohol  or  opium  habit  Mesmerism  may  be  used  by  the  Occultist  to  remove  evil  habits,  if  the  intention  be  perfectly  pure ;  as  on  the  higher  plane  intention  is  everything,  and  good  intention  must  work  for  good.

Q.  Is  the  Auric  Egg  the  expansion  of  the  "  Pillar  of  Light,''  the  Manasic  Principle,  and  so  not  surrounding  the  child  till  its  seventh  year  ?'

A.  It  is  the  Auric  Egg.

The  Auric  Egg  is  quite  pure  at  birth,  but  it  is,  a  question  whether  the  higher  or  lower  Manas  will  colour  it  at  the  seventh  year.

The  Manasic  expansion  is  pure  Akasha.

The  ray  of  Manas  is  let  down.

512  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

into  the  vortex  of  the  lower  Principles,  and  being  discoloured,  and  so  limited  by  the  Kamic  Tanhas  and  by  the  defects  of  the  bodily  organism,  forms  the  personality.

Hereditary  Karma  can  reach  the  child  before  the  seventh  year,  but  no  individual  Karma  can  come  into  play  till  the  descent  of  the  Manas.

The  Auric   Egg  is  to  the  Man  As     ,,   Astral  Light        ,,        Earth  ,,     ,,   Ether  ,,        Astral  Light

„      „   Akasha  ,,        Ether

The  critical  states  are  left  out  in  the  enumeration.

They  are  the  Laya  Centres,  or  missing  links  in  our  consciousness,  and  separate  these  four  planes  from  one  another.

THE  DWELLER

The  '•  Dweller  on  the  Threshold  "  is  found  in  two  cases  :  £a)  In  the  case  of  the  separation  of  the  Triangle  from  the  Quaternary  ,  (b)  When  KSmic  desires  and  passions  are  so  intense  that  the  Kama  Rupa  persists  in  Kama  Loka  beyond  the  Devachanic  period  of  the  Ego,  and  thus  survives  the  reincarnation  of  the  Devachanic  Entity  (e.g.,  when  reincarnation  occurs  within  two  hundred  •or  three  hundred  years).  The  "  Dweller  "  being  drawn  by  affinity  towards  the  Reincarnating  Ego  to  whom  it  had  belonged,  and  being  unable  to  reach  it,  fastens  on  the  Kama  of  the  new  personality,  and  becomes  the  Dweller  on  the  Threshold,  strengthening  the  Kamic  element  and  thus  lending  it  a  danger-  ous potency.

Some  become  mad  from  this  cause.

INTELLECT

The  white  Adept  is  not  always  at  first  of  powerful  intellect.

In  fact,  H.  P.  B  had  known  Adepts  whose  intellectual  powers  were  originally  below  the  average.

It  is  the  Adept's  purity,  his  equal  love  to  all,  his  working  with  Nature,  with  Karma,  with  his  "  Inner  God,"  that  give  him  his  power.

Intellect  by  itself  alone  will  make  the  Black  Magician.

For  intellect  alone  is  accom-  panied with  pride  and  selfishness  :  it  is  the  intellectual  plus  the  spiritual  that  raises  man.

For  spirituality  prevents  pride  and  vanity.

Metaphysics  are  the  domain  of  the  Higher  Manas  ;  whereas  Physics  are  that  of  Kama-Manas,  which  does  the  thinking  in  Physical  Science  and  on  material  things.

Kama-Manas,  like  every  other  Principle,  is  of  seven  degrees.

The  Mathematician  without  spirituality,  however  great  he  may  be,  will  not  .reach  Metaphysics  ;  but  the  Metaphysician  will  master  the  highest  conceptions of  Mathematics,  and  will  apply  them,  without  learning  the  latter.


To  a  born  Metaphysician  the  Psychic  Plane  will  not  be  of  much  account :  he  will  see  its  errors  immediately  he  enters  it,  inasmuch  as  it  is  not  the  thing  he  seeks.

With  •respect  to  Music  and  other  Arts,  they  are  the  children  of  either  the  Manasic  or  Kama-Manasic  Principle,  proportionately  as  Soul  or  technicality  pre-  dominates.

KARMA

After  each  incarnation,  when  the  Manasic  Ray  returns  to  its  Father,  the  Ego,  some  of  its  atoms  remain  behind  and  scatter.

These  Manasic  atoms,  Tanhic  and  other  "  causes,"  being  of  the  same  nature  as  the  Manas,  are  attracted  to  it  by  strong  bonds  of  affinity,  and  on  the  reincarnation  of  the  Ego  -are  unerringly  attracted  to  it  and  constitute  its  Karma.

Until  these  are  all  gathered  up,  the  individuality  is  not  free  from  rebirth.

The  Higher  Manas  is  responsible  for  the  Ray  it  sends  forth.

If  the  Ray  be  not  soiled,  no  bad  Karma  is  generated.

THE  TURIYA  STATE

You  should  bear  in  mind  that,  in1  becoming  Karma-less,  gbod  l^arma,  as  well  as  bad,  has  to  be  gotten  rid '  of,  and  that  NidSnasi,  started  towards  the  acquisition  of  good  Karma,  are  as  binding  as  those  induced  ih  the  other1  direction.

For  both  are  Karma.

Yogis  cannot  attain  the  Turiya  state  unless  the  Triangle  ts  separated  from  the  Quaternary.

MAHAT

Mahat  is  the  manifested  universal  Parabrahmic  Mind  (for  one  Manvan-  tara)  on  the  Third  Plane  [of  Kosmos].  It  is  the  Law  whereby  the  Light  falls  from  plane  to  plane  and  differentiates.

The  Manasaputras  are  its  •emanations.

Man  alone  is  capable  of  conceiving  the  Universe  on  this  plane  of  existence.

Existence   is  ;    but  when   the   entity  does  not  feel  it,  for  that  entity  it  is  oot.

The  pain  of  an  operation  exists,  though  the  patient  does  not  feel  it,  and  for  the  patient  it  is  not.

FF

514  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

HOW  TO  ADVANCE

Q.      What  is  the  correct  pronunciation  of  AUM?

A.  It  should  first  be  practised  physically,  always  at  the  same  pitch,  which  must  be  discovered  in  the  same  way  as  the  particular  colour  of  the  student  is  found,  for  each  has  his  own  tone.

AUM  consists  of  two  vowels  and  one  semi-vowel,  which  latter  must  be  prolonged.

Just  as  Nature  has  its  Fa,  so  each  man  has  his :  man  being  differentiated  from  Nature.

The  body  may  be  compared  to  an  instrument  and  the  Ego  to  the  player.

You  begin  by  producing  effects  on  yourself  ;  then  little  by  little  you  learn  to  play  on  the  Tattvas  and  Principles  ;  learn  first  the  notes,  then  the  chords,  then  the  melodies.

Once  the  student  is  master  of  every  chord,  he  may  begin  to  be  a  co-worker  with  Nature  and  for  others  He  may  then,  by  the  experience  he  has  gained  of  his  own  nature,  and  by  the  knowledge  of  the  chords,  strike  such  as  will  be  beneficial  in  another,  and  so  will  serve  as  a  keynote  for  beneficial  results.

Try  to  have  a  clear  representation  of  the  geometrical  triangle  on  every  plane,  the  conception  gradually  growing  more  metaphysical,  and  ending  with  the  subjective  Triangle,  Atma'-Buddhi-Manas,  It  is  only  by  the  knowledge  of  this  Triangle  under  all  forms  that  you  can  succeed,  e.g.,  in  enclosing  the  past  and  the  future  in  the  present.

Remember  that  you  have  to  merge  the  Quaternary  in  the  Triangle.

The  Lower  Manas  is  drawn  upwards,  with  the  Kama,  Prana  and  Linga,  leaving  only  the  physical  body  behind,  the  lower  reinforcing  the  higher.

Advance  may  be  made  in  Occultism  even  in  Devachan,  if  the  Mind  and  Soul  be  set  thereon  during  life ;  but  it  is  only  as  in  a  dream,  and  the  know-  ledge will  fade  away  as  memory  of  a  dream  fades,  unless  it  be  kept  alive  by  conscious  study.

FEAR  AND  HATRED

Fear  and  hatred  are  essentially  one  and  the  same.

He  who  fears  nothing  will  never  hate,  and  he  who  hates  nothing  will  never  fear.

THE  TRIANGLE

Q  What  is  the  meaning  of  the  phrase  :  "  Form  a  clear  image  of  the  Triangle  on  every  plane;"  e.g.,  on  the  Astral  Plane,  what  should  one  think  of  as  the  Triangle  ?


?

A.  [H.  P.  B.  asked  whether  the  question  signified  the  meaning  of  the  Triangle  or  the  way  to  represent  the  Triangle  on  the  "  screen  of  light."  The  questioner  explaining  that  the  latter  was  the  meaning,  H.  P.  B.  said  that]  it  was  only  in  the  Turiya  state,  the  fourth  of  the  seven  steps  of  Raja  Yoga  that  the  Yogi  can  represent  to  himself  that  which  is  abstract.

Below  this  state,  the  perceptive  power,  being  conditioned,  must  have  some  form  to  contemplate  ;  it  cannot  represent  to  itself  the  Arupa.

In  the  Turiya  state  the  Triangle  is  in  yourself  and  is  felt.

Below  the  Turiya  state  there  must  be  a  symbol  to  repre-  sent Atma-Buddhi-Manas.

It  is  not  a  mere  geometrical  Triangle,  but  the  Triad  imaged,  to  make  thought  possible.

Of  this  Triad,  we  can  make  some  kind  of  representation  of  Manas,  however  indistinct ;  while  of  Atma  no  image  can  be  formed.

We  must  try  to  represent  the  Triangle  to  ourselves  on  higher  and  higher  planes.

We  must  figure  Manas  as  overshadowed  by  Buddhi,  and  immersed  in  Atma.

Only  Manas,  the  Higher  Ego,  can  be  repre-  sented ;  we  may  think  of  it  as  the  Augoeides,  the  radiant  figure  in  Zanoni.

A  very  good  Psychic  might  see  this.

PSYCHIC  VISION

Psychic  vision,  however,  is  not  to  be  desired,  since  Psyche  is  earthly  and  evil.

More  and  more  as  Science  advances,  the  psychic  will  be  reached  and  understood  ;  Psych  ism  has  in  it  nothing  that  is  spiritual.

Science  is  right  on  its  own  plane,  from  its  own  standpoint.

The  law  of  the  Conservation  of  Energy  implies  that  psychic  motion  is  generated  by  motion.

Psychic  motion  being  only  motion  on  the  Psychic  Plane,  a  material  plane,  the  Psychologist  is  right  who  sees  in  it  nothing  beyond  matter.

Animals  have  no  Spirit,  but  they  have  psychic  vision,  and  are  sensitive  to  psychic  conditions ;  observe  how  these  react  on  their  health,  their  bodily  state.

Motion  is  the  abstract  Deity ;  on  the  highest  plane  it  is  Arupa,  absolute  ;  but  on  the  lowest  it  is  merely  mechanical.

Psychic  action  is  within  the  sphere  of  physical  motion.

Ere  psychic  action  can  be  developed  in  the  brain  and  nerves,  there  must  be  adequate  action  which  generates  it  on  the  Physical  Plane.

The  paralyzed  animal  that  cannot  generate  action  in  the  physical  body,  cannot  think.

Psychics  merely  see  on  a  plane  of  different  material  density ;  the  spiritual  glimpses  sometimes  obtained  by  them  come  from  a  plane  beyond.

A  Psychic's  vision  is  that  of  one  coming,  as  it  were,  into  a  lighted  room,  and  seeing  everything  there  by  an  artificial  light :  when  the  light  is  extinguished,  vision  is  lost.

Spiritual  vision  sees  by  the  light  within,  the  light  hidden  beneath  the  bushel  of  the  body,  by  which  we  can  see  clearly  and  independently  of  all

516  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

outside.

The  Psychic  seeing  by  an  external  light,  the  vision  is  coloured  by  the  nature  of  that  light.

X.  saying  that  she  felt  as  though  she  saw  on  three  planes,  H.  P.  B.  answered  that  each  plane  was  sevenfold,  the  Astral  as  every  other.

She  gave  as  an  example  on  the  Physical  Plane  the  vision  of  a  table  with  the  sense  of  sight ;  seeing  it  still,  with  the  eyes  closed,  by  retinal  impression  ;  the  image  of  it  conserved  in  the  brain  ;  it  can  be  recalled  by  memory ;  it  can  be  seen  in  dream ;  or  as  an  aggregate  of  atoms ;  or  as  disintegrated.

All  these  are  on  the  Physical  Plane.

Then  we  can  begin  again  on  the  Astral  Plane,  and  obtain  another  septenary.

This  hint  should  be  followed  and  worked  out.

TRIANGLE  AND  QUATERNARY

Q.  Why  is  the  violet,  the  colour  of  the  Linga  Sharira,  placed  at  the  apex  of  the  /\,  when  the  Macrocosm  is  figured  as  /\,  thus  throwing  the  yellow,  Buddhi,  into  the  lower  Quaternary  ?  Q

A.  It  is  wrong  to  speak  of  the  "  lower  Quaternary  "  in  the  Macrocosm.

It  is  the  Tetraktys,  the  highest,  the  most  sacred  of  all  symbols.

There  comes  &a  moment  when,  in  the  highest  meditation,  the  Lower  Manas  is  withdrawn  into  the  Triad,  which  thus  becomes  the  Quaternary,  the  Tetraktys  of  Pytha-  goras, leaving  what  was  the  Quaternary  as  the  lower  Triad,  which  is  then  reversed.

The  Triad  is  reflected  in  the  Lower  Manas.

The  Higher  Manas  cannot  reflect  itself,  but  when  the  Green  passes  upward  it  becomes  a  mirror  for  the  Higher ;  it  is  then  no  more  Green,  having  passed  from  its  associations.

The  Psyche  then  becomes  spiritual,  the  Ternary  is  reflected  in  the  Fourth,  and  the  Tetraktys  is  formed.

So  long  as  you  are  not  dead,  there  must  be  some-  thing to  reflect  the  Higher  Triad ;  for  there  must  be  something  to  bring  back  to  the  waking  consciousness  the  experiences  passed  through  on  the  higher  plane.

The  Lower  Manas  is  as  a  tablet  which  retains  the  impressions  made  on  it  during  trance.

The  Turiya  state  is  entered  on  the  Fourth  Path  ;  it  is  figured  in  the  diagram  on  p.  455  in  the  Second  Paper.

Q.  What  fs  the  meaning  of  a  triangle  formed  of  lines  of  light  appearing  jn  the  midst  of  intense  vibrating  blue  ?

A.  Seeing  the  Triangle  outside  is  nothing  ;  it  is  merely  a  reflection  of  the  Triad  on  the  Auric  Envelope,  and  proves  that  the  seer  is  outside  the  Triangle.

It  should  be  seen  in  quite  another  way.

You  must  endeavour  to  merge  yourself  in  it,  to  assimilate  yourself  with  it.  You  are  merely  seeing things  in  the  Astral.


"  When  the  Third  Eye  is  opened  in  any  one  of  you,  you  will  have  something  very  different  to  tell  me."

Q.  With  reference  to  the  "  P///ar  of  Light  "  in  a  previous  question,  is  the  Auric  Envelope  the  Higher  Ego,  and  does  it  corresppnd  to  the  Ring  Pass-Not  ?

[This  question  was  not  answered,  as  going  too  far.

The  Ring  Pass-Not  is  at  the  circumference  of  the  manifested  Universe.]

NIDANAS

Q.  The  root  of  the  Nidanas  is  Avidya.

How  does  this  differ  from  Maya  ?  How  many  Nidanas  are  -there  Esoterically  ?

A.  Again  too  much  is  asked.

The  Nidanas,  the  concatenations  of  causes  and  effects  (not  in  the  sense  of  the  Orientalists),  are  not  caused  by  ignorance.

They  are  produced  by  Dhyan  Chohans  and  Devas,  who  certainly  cannot  be  said  to  act  in  ignorance.

We  produce  Nidanas  in  ignorance.

Each  cause  started  on  the  Physical  Plane  sets  up  action  on  every  plane  to  all  eter-  nity.

They  are  eternal  effects  reflected  from  plane  to  plane  on  to  the  "  screen  of  eternity."

MANAS

Q.  What  is  the  septenary  classification  of  Manas?  There  are  seven  degrees  of  the  Lower  Manas,  and  presumably  there  are  seven  degrees  of  the  Higher.

Are  there  then  fourteen  degrees  of  Manas,  or  is  Manas,  taken  as  a  whole,  divided  into  forty-nine  Manasic  fires  ?

A.  Certainly  there  are  fourteen,  but  you  want  to  run  before  you  can  walk.

First  learn  the  three,  and  then  go  on  to  the  forty-nine.

There  are  three  Sons  of  Agni ;  they  become  seven,  and  then  evolve  to  the  forty-nine.

But  you  are  still  ignorant  how  to  produce  the  three.

Learn  first  how  to  pro-  duce the  "  Sacred  Fire,"  spoken  of  in  the  Puranas.

The  forty-nine  fires  are  all  states  of  Kundalini,  to  be  produced  in  ourselves  by  the  friction  of  the  Triad.

First  learn  the  septenary  of  the  body,  and  then  that  of  each  Principle.

But  first  of  all  learn  the  first  Triad  (the  three  vital  airs).

THE  SPINAL  CORD

Q.  What  is  the  sympathetic  nerve  and  its  function  in  Occultism  ?  It  is  found  only  after  a  certain  stage  of  animal  evolution,  and  would  seem  to  be  evolving  in  complexity  towards  a  second  spinal  cord.

518  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

A.  At  the  end  of  the  next  Round,  Humanity  will  again  become  male-  female,  and  then  there  will  be  two  spinal  cords.

In  the  Seventh  Race  the  two  will  merge  into  the  one.

The  evolution  corresponds  to  the  Races,  and  with  the  evolution  of  the  Races  the  sympathetic  develops  into  a  true  spinal  cord.

We  are  returning  up  the  arc  only  with  self-consciousness  added.

The  Sixth  Race  will  correspond  to  the  "  pudding  bags,"  but  will  have  the  perfec-  tion of  form  with  the  highest  intelligence  and  spirituality.

Anatomists  are  beginning  to  find  new  ramifications  and  new  modifications  in  the  human  body.

They  are  in  error  on  many  points,  e.g.,  as  to  the  spleen,  which  they  call  the  manufactory  of  white  blood  corpuscles,  but  which  is  really  the  vehicle  of  the  Linga  Sharira.

Occultists  know  each  minute  portion  of  the  heart,  and  have  a  name  for  each.

They  call  them  by  the  names  of  the  Gods,  as  Brahma's  Hall,  Vishnu's  Hall,  etc.

They  correspond  with  parts  of  the  brain.

The  very  atoms  of  the  body  are  the  thirty-three  crores  of  Gods.

The  sympathetic  nerve  is  played  on  by  the  Tantrikas,  who  call  it  Shiva's  Vina.

PRANA

Q.      What  is  the  relation  of  man  to  Prana — the  periodical  life  ?

A.  Jiva  becomes  Prana  only  when  the  child  is  born  and  begins  to  breathe.

It  is  the  breath  of  life,  Nephesh.

There  is  no  Prana  on  the  Astral  Plane.

ANTAHKARANA

Q.  The  Antahkarana  is  the  link  between  the  Higher  and  the  Lower  Egos ;  does  it  correspond  to  the  umbilical  cord  in  projection  ?

A.  No;  the  umbilical  cord  joining  the  astral  to  the  physical  body  is  a  real  thing.

Antahkarana  is  imaginary,  a  figure  of  speech,  and  is  only  the  bridging  over  from  the  Higher  to  the  Lower  Manas.

Antahkarana  only  exists  when  you  commence  to  "  throw  your  thought  upwards  and  downwards."  The  Mayavi  Rupa,  or  Manasic  body,  has  no  material  connection  with  the  physical  body,  no  umbilical  cord.

It  is  spiritual  and  ethereal,  and  passes  everywhere  without  let  or  hindrance.

It'  entirely  differs  from  the  astral  body,  which,  if  injured,  acts  by  repercussion  on  the  physical  body.

The  Devachanic  entity,  even  previous  to  birth,  can  be  affected  by  the  Skandhas,  but  these  have  nothing  to  do  with  the  Antahkarana.

It  is  affected,  e.g.,  by  the  desire  for  reincarnation.


Q.  We  are  told  in  The  Voice  of  the  Silence  that  we  have  to  become  "  the  path  itself."  and  in  another  passage  that  Antahkarana  is  that  path.

Does  this  mean  anything  more  than  that  we  have  to  bridge  over  the  gap  between  the  consciousness  ot  the  Lower  and  the  Higher  Egos  ?

A.     That  is  all.

Q.  We  are  told  that  there  are  seven  portals  on  the  Path  :  is  there  then  a  sevenfold  division  of  Antahkarana  ?  Also,  is  Antahkarana  the  battle-field  ?

A.  It  is  the  battlefield.

There  are  seven  divisions  in  the  Antahkarana.

As  you  pass  from  each  to  the  next  you  approach  the  Higher  Manas.

When  you  have  bridged  the  fourth  you  may  consider  yourself  fortunate.

MISCELLANEOUS

Q.  We  are  told  that  AUM  "  should  be  practised  physically."  Does  this  mean  that,  colour  being  more  differentiated  than  sound,  it  is  only  through  the  -colours  that  we  shall  get  at  the  real  sound  of  each  of  us  ?  and  that  AUM  can  <only  have  its  Spiritual  and  Occult  signification  when  turned  to  the  Atma-  Buddhi-Manas  of  each  person  ?

A.  AUM  means  good  action,  not  merely  lip-sound.

You  must  say  it  in  deeds.

Q.  With  reference  to  the  A.  is  not  the  Atma-Buddhi-Manas  different  .for  each  entity,  according  to  the  plane  on  which  he  is  ?

A.  Each  Principle  is  on  a  different  plane.

The  Chela  must  rise  to  one  after  the  other,  assimilating  each,  until  the  three  are  one.

This  is  the  real  root  of  the  Trinity.

Q.  In  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE  we  are  told  that  Akasha  is  the  same  as  Pradhana.

Akasha  is  the  Auric  Egg  of  the  earth,  and  yet  Akasha  is  Mahat.

What  then  is  the  relation  of  Manas  to  the  Auric  Egg  ?

A.  Mulaprakriti  is  the  same  as  Akasha  (seven  degrees).  Mahat  is  the  positive  aspect  of  Akasha,  and  is  the  Manas  of  the  Kosmic  Body,  Mahat  is  1o  Akasha  as  Manas  is  to  Buddhi,  and  Pradhana  is  but  another  name  for  .Mulaprakriti.

The  Auric  Egg  is  Akasha  and  has  seven  degrees.

Being  pure  abstract  substance,  it  reflects  abstract  ideas,  but  also  reflects  lower  concrete  things.

The  Third  Logos  and  Mahat  are  one,  and  are  the  same  as  the  Universal  Mind,  Alaya.

The  Tetraktys  is  the  Chatur  Vidya,  or  the  fourfold  knowledge  in  one,  ithe  four-faced  Brahma.

520  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

NADIS

Q.  Have  the  Nadis  any  fixed  relationship  to  the  vertebras  ?  can  they  be*  located  opposite  to  or  between  any  vertebras  ?  can  they  be  regarded  as  occupying  each  a  given  and  fixed  extent  in  the  cord  ?  Do  they  correspond  to  the  divisions  of  the  cord  known  to  Anatomists  ?

A.  H.  P.  B.  believed  that  the  Nadis  corresponded  to  regions  of  the  spinal  cord  known  to  Anatomists.

There  are  thus  six  or  seven  Nadis  or  plexuses  along  the  spinal  cord.

The  term,  however,  is  not  technical  but  general,  and  applies  to  any  knot,  centre,  ganglion,  etc.

The  sacred  Nadis  are  those  which  run  along  or  above  Sushumna.

Six  are  known  to  Science,  and  one  (near  the  atlas)  unknown.

Even  the  Taraka  Raja  Yogis  speak  only  of  six,  and  will  not  mention  the  sacred  seventh.

Ida  and  Pingala*  play  along  the  curved  wall  of  the  cord  in  which  is  Sushumna\  They  are  semi-material,  positive  and  negative,  sun  and  moon,  and  start  into  action  the  free  and  spiritual  current  of  Sushumna.

They  have  distinct  paths  of  their  own,  otherwise  they  would  radiate  all  over  the  body.

By  concentration  on  Ida  and  Pingala  is  generated  the  "  sacred  fire."

Another  name  for  Shiva's  Vina  (sympathetic  system)  is  Kali's  Vina.

The  sympathetic  cords  and  Ida  and  Pingala  start  from  a  sacred  spot  above  the  medulla  oblongata,  called  Triveni.

This  is  one  of  the  sacred  centres,  another  of  which  is  Brahmarandra,  which  is,  if  you  like,  the  grey  matter  of  the  brain.

It  is  also  the  anterior  fontanelle  in  the  new-  born child.

The  spinal  column  is  called  Brahmadanda,  the  stick  of  Brahma.

This  is  again  symbolized  by  the  bamboo  rod  carried  by  Ascetics.

The  Yogis  on  the  other  sides  of  the  Himalayas  who  assemble  regularly  at  Lake  Mansarovara,  carry  a  triple  knotted  bamboo  stick,  and  are  called  Tridandins.

This  has  the  same  signification  as  the  Brahman ical  cord,  which  has  many  other  meanings  besides  the  three  vital  airs  :  e.g.,  it  symbolizes  the  three  initiations  of  a  Brahman,  taking  place  .  (a)  at  birth,  when  he  receives  his  mystery  name  from  the  family  Astrologer,  who  is  supposed  to  have  received  it  from  the  Devas  (he  is  also  thus  said  to  be  initiated  by  the  Devas)  ;  a  Hindu  will  sooner  die  than  reveal  this  name  ;  (b)  at  seven,  when  he  receives  the  cord  ;  and  (c)  at  eleven  or  twelve,  when  he  is  initiated  into  his  caste.

Q.  If  it  is  right  to  study  the  body  and  its  organs,  with  their  correspond-  ences, will  you  give  the  main  outline  of  these  in  connection  with  the  Nadis,  and  with  the  diagram  of  the  orifices  ?


A.      The  Spleen  corresponds  to  the  Linga  Sharira

,,    Liver  „  ,,    Kama

„    Heart  ,,  „    Prana

,,    Corpora-quadrigemina     „  ,,    Kama-Manas

,,    Pituitary  body  ,,  ,,    Manas-Antahkarana

,,    Pineal  gland  ,,  ,,    Manas

until   it  is   touched   by   the   vibrating   light  of  Kundalinf,  which  proceeds  from  Buddhi,  when  it  becomes  Buddhi-Manas.

The  pineal  gland  corresponds  with  Divine  Thought.

The  pituitary  body  is  the  organ  of  the  Psychic  Plane.

Psychic  vision  is  caused  by  the  molecular  motion  of  this  body,  which  is  directly  co'nnected  with  the  optic  nerve,  and  thus  affects  the  sight  and  gives  rise  to  hallucinations.

Its  motion  may  readily  cause  flashes  of  light,  such  as  may  be  obtained  by  pressing  the  eyeballs.

Drunkenness  and  fever  produce  illusions  of  sight  and  hearing  by  the  action  of  the  pituitary  body.

This  body  is  sometimes  so  affected  by  drunkenness  that  it  is  paralyzed.

If  an  influence  on  the  optic  nerve  is  thus  produced  and  the  current  thus  reversed,  the  colour  will  probably  be  comple-  mentary.

SEVENS

Q.  If  the  physical  body  is  no  part  of  the  real  human  septenary,  is  the  physical  material  world  one  of  the  seven  planes  of  the  Kosmic  septenary  ?

A.  It  is.  The  body  is  not  a  Principle  in  Esoteric  parlance,  because  the  body  and  the  Linga  are  both  on  the  same  plane  ;  then  the  Auric  Egg  makes  the  seventh.

The  body  is  an  Upadhi  rather  than  a  Principle.

The  earth  and  its  astral  light  are  as  closely  related  to  each  other  as  the  body  and  its  Linga,  the  earth  being  the  Upadhi.

Our  plane  in  its  lowest  division  is  the  earth,  ir>  its  highest  the  astral.

The  terrestrial  astral  light  should  of  course  not  be  confounded  with  the  universal  Astral  Light.

Q.  A  physical  object  was  spoken  of  as  a  septenary  on  the  physical  plane,  inasmuch  as  we  could:  1.  directly  contact  it ;  2.  retinally  reproduce  it ;  3.  remember  it ;  4.  dream  of  it ;  5,  view  it  atomically ;  6.  view  it  disinte-  grated ;  7. — What  is  the  seventh  ?

These  are  seven  ways  in  which  we  view  it :  the  septenary  is  our  way  of  seeing  one  thing.

Is  it  objectively  septenary  ?

522  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

A.  The  seventh  bridges  across  from  one  plane  to  another.

The  last  is  the  idea,  the  privation  of  matter,  and  carries  you  to  the  next  plane.

The  highest  of  one  plane  touches  the  lowest  of  the  next.

Seven  is  a  factor  in  nature,  as  in  colours  and  sounds.

There  are  seven  degrees  in  the  same  piece  of  wood,  each  perceived  by  one  of  the  seven  senses.

In  wood  the  smell  is  the  most  material  degree,  while  in  other  substances  it  may  be  the  sixth.

Substances  are  septenary  apart  from  the  consciousness  of  the  viewer.

The  psychometer,  seeing  a  morsel,  say  of  a  table,  a  thousand  years  hence,  would  see  the  whole  ;  for  every  atom  reflects  the  whole  body  to  which  it  belongs,  just  as  with  the  Monads  of  Leibnitz.

After  the  seven  material  subdivisions  are  the  seven  divisions  of  the  Astral,  which  is  its  second  Principle.

The  disintegrated  matter — the  highest  of  the  material  subdivisions — is  the  privation  of  the  idea  of  it — the  fourth.

The  number  fourteen  is  the  first  step  between  seven  and  forty-nine,  *  Each  septenary  is  really  a  fourteen,  because  each  of  the  seven  has  its  two  aspects.

Thus  fourteen  signifies  the  inter-relation  of  two  planes  in  its  turn.

The  septenary  is  to  be  clearly  traced  in  the  lunar  months,  fevers,  gestations,  etc.

On  it  is  based  the  week  of  the  Jews  and  the  septenary  Hierarchies  of  the  Lord  of  Hosts.

SOUNDS

Q.  Sound  Is  an  attribute  of  Akasha  ;  but  we  cannot  cognize  anything  on  the  Akashic  plane ;  on  what  plane  then  do  we  recognize  sound  ?  On  what  plane  is  sound  produced  by  the  physical  contact  of  bodies  ?  Is  there  sound  on  seven  planes,  and  is  the  physical  plane  one  of  them  ?

A.  The  physical  plane  is  one  of  them.

You  cannot  see  Akasha,  but  you  can  sense  it  from  the  Fourth  Path.

You  may  not  be  fully  conscious  of  it,  and  yet  you  may  sense  it.  Akasha  is  at  the  root  of  the  manifestation  of  all  sounds,  Sound  is  the  expression  and  manifestation  of  that  which  is  behind  it,  and  which  is  the  parent  of  many  correlations.

All  Nature  is  a  sounding-board  ;  or  rather  Akasha  is  the  sounding-board  of  Nature.

It  is  the  Deity,  the  one  Life,  the  one  Existence.

(Hearing  is  the  vibration  of  molecular  particles  ;  the  order  is  seen  in  the  sentence,  "  The  disciple  feels,  hears,  sees.")

Sound  can  have  no  end.

H.  P.  B.  remarked  with  regard  to  a  tap  made  by  a  pencil  on  the  table  :  "By  this  time  it  has  affected  the  whole  universe.

The  particle  which  has  had  its  wear  and  tear  destroys  something  which  passes into  something  else.


It  is  eternal  in  the  Nidanas  it  produces."  A  sound,  if  not  previously  produced  on  the  Astral  Plane,  and  before  that  on  the  Akashic,  could  not  be  produced  at  all.

Akasha  is  the  bridge  between  nerve  cells  and  mental  powers.

Q.  "  Colours  are  psychic,  and  sounds  are  spiritual."  What,  assuming  that  these  are  vibrations,  is  the  successive  order  (these  corresponding  to  sight  and  hearing)  of  the  other  senses  ?

A.  This  phrase  was  not  to  be  taken  out  of  its  context,  otherwise  con-  fusion would  arise.

All  are  on  all  planes.

The  First  Race  had  touch  all  over  like  a  sounding  board  ,  this  touch  differentiated  into  the  other  senses,  which  developed  with  the  Races.

The  "  sense  "  of  the  First  Race  was  that  of  touch,  meaning  the  power  of  their  atoms  to  vibrate  in  unison  with  external  atoms.

The  "  touch  "  would  be  almost  the  same  as  sympathy.

The  senses  were  on  a  different  plane  with  each  Race  ;  e.g.,  the  Fourth  Race  had  very  much  more  developed  senses  than  ourselves,  but  on  another  plane.

It  was  also  a  very  material  Race.

The  sixth  and  seventh  senses  will  merge  into  the  Akashic  Sound.

"  It  depends  to  what  degree  of  matter  the  sense  of  touch  relates  itself  as  to  what  we  call  it."

PRANA

Q.  Is  Prana  the  production  of  the  countless  "  lives  "  of  the  human  body,  and  therefore,  to  some  extent,  of  the  congeries  of  the  cells  of  atoms  of  the  body  ?

A.  No  ;  Prana  is  the  parent  of  the  "  lives."  As  an  example,  a  sponge  may  be  immersed  in  an  ocean.

The  water  in  the  sponge's  interior  may  be  compared  to  Prana  ;  outside  is  Jlva.

Prana  is  the  motor-principle  in  life.

The  41  lives  "  leave  Prana  ;  Prana  does  not  leave  them.

Take  out  the  sponge  from  the  water,  and  it  becomes  dry,  thus  symbolizing  death.

Every  principle  is  a  differentiation  of  Jlva,  but  the  life-motion  in  each  is  Prana,  the  "  breath  of  Jife."  Kama  depends  on  Prana,  without  which  there  would  be  no  Kama.

Prana  wakes  the  Kamic  germs  to  life  ;  it  makes  all  desires  vital  and  living.

THE  SECOND  SPINAL  CORD  .

Q.  With  reference  to  the  answer  to  the  question  on  the  second  cord,  what  is  it  that  will  become  a  second  spinal  cord  in  the  Sixth  Race  ?  Will  Ida  and  Pingala  have  separate  physical  ducts  ?


A.  It  is  the  sympathetic  cords  which  will  grow  together  and  form  another  spinal  cord.

Ida  and  Pingala  will  be  joined  with  Sushumna,  and  they  will  become  one.

Ida  is  on  the  left  side  of  the  cord,  and  Pingala  on  the  right.

INITIATES

Pythagoras  was  an  Initiate,  one  of  the  grandest  of  Scientists.

His  disciple,  Archytas,  was  marvellously  apt  in  applied  Science.

Plato  and  Euclid  were  Initiates,  but  not  Socrates.

No  real  Initiates  were  married.

Euclid  learned  his  Geometry  in  the  Mysteries.

Modern  men  of  Science  only  rediscover  the  old  truths.

KOSMIC  CONSCIOUSNESS

H.  P.  B.  proceeded  to  explain  Kosmic  Consciousness,  which  is,  like  all  else,  on  seven  planes,  of  which  three  are  inconceivable,  and  four  are  cogniz-  able by  the  highest  Adept.

She  sketched  the  planes  as  in  the  following  diagram.

Manas-Ego

Kama-Manas  or  Higher  Psychic

Prime-Kama  or  Lower  Psychic

Astral

Prakritic  or  Terrestrial

Taking  the  lowest  only,  the  Terrestrial  (it  was  afterwards  decided  to  calf  this  plane  Prakritic),  it  is  divisible  into  seven  planes,  and  these  again  into  seven,  making  the  forty-nine.


TERRESTRIAL

She  then  took  the   lowest  plane  of  Prakriti,  or  the  true  Terrestrial,  and  divided  it  as  follows  :

True  terrestrial  planes,  or  7th  Prakntic

j

Para-Ego  or  Atmic

Inner-Ego  or  Buddhic  Ego-Manas

Kama-Manas  or  Lower  Manas  Pranic  Kama  or  Psychic  Astral  |     Objective

Its   objective   or   sensuous   plane    is   that   which   is   sensed   by   the  five*  physical  senses.

On  its  second  plane  things  are  reversed.

Its  third   plane   is  psychic  :    here   is  the  instinct  which  prevents  a  kitten  going  into  the  water  and  getting  drowned.

The    following    table    of    the    terrestrial,    objective    consciousness    was  given  :

1.  Sensuous

2.  Instinctual

3.  Physiological-emotional

4.  Passional

5.  Mental

6.  Spiritual

7.  x ASTRAL


The  three  lower  Prakntic  are  related  to  the  three  lower  of  the  Astral  Plane  immediately  succeeding.

Astral  Buddhi  Astral  Manas

Astral  Kama-Manas

Astral  Psychic,  or  Pramc

Astral  Astral

i                              1  I

Astral  Objective

With  regard  to  the  first  division  of  the  second  plane,  H.  P.  B.  reminded  her  pupils  that  all  seen  on  it  must  be  reversed  in  translating  it,  e.g.,  with  numbers  which  appeared  backwards.

The  Astral  Objective  corresponds  in  everything  to  the  Terrestrial  Objective.

The  second  division  corresponds  to  the  second  of  the  lower  plane,  but  the  objects  are  of  extreme  tenuity,  an  astralized  Astral.

This  plane  is  the  limit  of  the  ordinary  medium,  beyond  which  he  cannot  go.  A  non-mediumistic  person  to  reach  it  must  be  asleep  or  in  a  trance,  or  under  the  influence  of  laughing-gas  ;  or  in  ordinary  delirium  people  pass  on  to  this  plane.

The  third,  the  Pranic,  is  of  an  intensely  vivid  nature.

Extreme  delirium  carries  the  patient  to  this  plane.

In  delirium  tremens  the  sufferer  passes  to  this  and  to  the  one  above  it.  Lunatics  are  often  conscious  on  this  plane,  where  they  see  terrible  visions.

It  runs  into  the  Fourth  division,  the  worst  of  the  astral  planes,  Kamic  and  terrible.

Hence  come  the  images  that  tempt ;  images  of  drunkards  in  Kama  Loka  impelling  others  to  drink ;  images  of  all  vices  inoculating  men  with  the  desire  to  commit  crimes.

The  weak  imitate  these  images  in  a  kind  of  monkeyish  fashion,  so  falling  beneath  their  influence.

This  is  also  the  cause  of  epidemics  of  vices,  and  cycles  of  disaster,  of  accidents  of  all  kinds  coming  in  groups.

Extreme  delirium  tremens  is  on  this  plane.


The  fifth  division  is  that  of  premonitions  in  dreams,  of  reflections  from  the  lower  mentality,  glimpses  into  the  past  and  future,  the  plane  of  things  mental  and  not  spiritual.

The  mesmerized  clairvoyant  can  reach  this  plane,  and  even,  if  good,  may  go  higher.

The  sixth  is  the  plane  from  which  come  all  beautiful  inspirations  of  art,  poetry,  and  music  ;  high  types  of  dreams,  flashes  of  genius.

Here  we  have  glimpses  of  past  incarnations,  without  being  able  to  locate  or  analyze  them.

We  are  on  the  seventh  plane  at  the  moment  of  death  or  in  exceptional  visions.

The  drowning  man  is  here  when  he  remembers  his  past  life.

The  memory  of  events  of  this  plane  must  be  centred  in  the  heart,  "  the  seat  of  Buddha."  There  it  will  remain,  but  impressions  from  this  plane  are  not  made  on  the  physical  brain.

4th  Kosmic  Plane

Fohat

Kosmic  K^ma-Manas

3rd  Kosmic  Plane  Kosmic  Life

Jiva-Fohat       Pranic  Kama

2nd  Kosmic  Plane

Kosmic  Astral

1st  Kosmic  Plane

Prakritic

Kosmic  Body-

fin  this  diagram  all  the  Kosmic  Planes  should  be  figured  as  of  one  size— the  size  given  to  the  lowest  plane,  Praknti.

Further,  within  the  circle  all  the  Prakritic  Planes  should  be  of  one  size— that  given  to  the  first,  or  lowest.

To  do  this  would  make  so  large  a  diagram  that  the  planes  are  compressed.— ED.,  of  1897  edition.] GENERAL  NOTES


The  two  planes  above  dealt  with  are  the  only  two  used  in  the  Hatha  Yoga.

Prana  and  the  Auric  Envelope  are  essentially  the  same,  and  again,  as  Jiva,  it  is  the  same  as  the  Universal  Deity.

This,  in  its  Fifth  Principle,  is  Mahat,  in  its  Sixth  Alaya.

(The  Universal  Life  is  also  seven-principled.)  Mahat  is  the  highest  Entity  in  Kosmos  ;  beyond  this  is  no  diviner  Entity  ;  it  is  of  subtlest  matter,  Sukshma.

In  us  this  is  Manas,  and  the  very  Logoi  are  less  high,  not  having  gained  experience.

The  Manasic  Entity  will  not  be  destroyed,  even  at  the  end  of  the  Mahamanvantara,  when  all  the  Gods  are  .absorbed,  but  will  re-emerge  from  Parabrahmic  latency.

Consciousness  is  the  Kosmic  seed  of  superkosmic  omniscience.

It  has  the  potentiality  of  budding  into  the  Divine  Consciousness.

Rude  physical  health  is  a  drawback  to  seership.

This  was  the  case  with  Swedenborg.

Fohat  is  everywhere  :  it  runs  like  a  thread  through  all,  and  has  its  own  seven  divisions.

z:

LU

Fohat

Kama-Manas   -A

o

Jiva

Kama-Pranal  ^

Astral

Linga

Prakrit!     Body

\  KOSMIC  PLANES  AS  SIX  WITH  AURIC  EGG  AS  SEVENTH

In  the  Kosmic  Auric  Envelope  is  all  the  Karma  of4 the  manifesting  'Universe.

This  is  the  Hiranyagarbha.

Jiva  is  everywhere,  and  so  with  the  •other  Principles.

.NOTES  ON  SOME  ORAL  TEACHINGS

6th,  or  Alayic-Prakritic

2nd,  or  Astral  ,1st,  or  Object^

o

The  above  diagram  represents  the  type  of  all  the  Solar  Systems.

Mahat,    single   before   informing   the   Universe,    differentiates   when    in-  forming it,  as  does  Manas  in  man.

Mahat  as  Divine  Ideation  Fohat

Kosmic  Substance  Manas

Antahlcarana

Lower  Manas

5.    Manas        \  AHigherEgoX

4.  Kama/      \  -Manas    \"  Lower  Manas

3.

Kama-Prana

r

\

2.    Astral

1.    Objective

1  The  Fourth  Globe  of  every  Planetary  Chain.

FF

530  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Taking  this  figure  to  represent  the  human  Principles  and  planes  of  consciousness,  then

7.  6.  5  represent  respectively,  Shiva,  Vishnu,  Brahma,  Brahma  being  the  lowest.

Shiva  is  the  four-faced  Brahma  ;  the  Creator,  Preserver,  Destroyer,  and  Regenerator.

Between  5  and  4  comes  the  Antahkarana.

The  A  represents  the  Christos,  the  Sacrificial  Victim  crucified  between  the  thieves  :  this  is  the  double-faced  entity.

The  Vedantins  make  this  a  quaternary  for  a  blind  ;  Antahkarana,  Chit,  Buddhi,  and  Manas.

MANVANTARIC  ASPECT    OF  PARABRAHMAN  AND  MULAPRAKRITI

Attributes,  Mayavi  Rupas,  etc

N.B  — The  number  of  Rays  is  arbitrary  and  without  significance

Perceptive  life  begins  with  the  Astral  :  it  is  not  our  physical  atoms  whicb  see,  etc.

Consciousness  proper  begins  between  Kama  and  Manas.

Atma-Buddhi  acts  more  in  the  atoms  of  the  body,  in  the  bacilli,  microbes,  etc.,  than  in  Man  himself

OBJECTIVE  CONSCIOUSNESS

Sensuous  objective  consciousness  includes  all  that  pertains  to  the  five  physical  senses  in  man,  and  rules  in  animals,  birds,  fishes  and  some  insects.


Here   are   the    "  Lives  "  ;  their   consciousness    is  in  Atma-Buddhi  ;  these  are  entirely  without  Manas.

ASTRAL  CONSCIOUSNESS

That  of  some  plants  (e.g.,  sensitive),  of  ants,  spiders,  and  some  night-  flies  (Indian),  but  not  of  bees.

The  vertebrate  animals  in  general  are  without  this  consciousness,  but  the  placenta!  Mammals  have  all  the  potentialities  of  human  consciousness,  though  at  present,  of  course,  dormant.

Idiots  are  on  this  plane.

The  common  expression  "  he  has  lost  his  mind  "  is  an  Occult  truth.

For  when  through  fright  or  other  cause  the  lower  mind  becomes  paralyzed,  then  the  consciousness  is  on  the  Astral  Plane.

The  study  of  lunacy  will  throw  much  light  on  these  points.

This  may  be  called  the  "  nerve  plane."  It  is  cognized  by  our  "  nervous  centres  "  of  which  Physiology  knows  nothing,  e.g.,  the  clairvoyant  reading  with  the  eyes  ban-  daged, reading  with  the  tips  of  the  fingers,  the  pit  of  the  stomach,  etc.

This  sense  is  greatly  developed  in  the  deaf  and  dumb.

KAMA-PRANIC  CONSCIOUSNESS

The  general  life -consciousness  which  belongs  to  all  the  objective  world,  even  to  the  stones  ;  for  if  stones  were  not  living  they  could  not  decay,  emit  a  spark,  etc.

Affinity  between  chemical  elements  is  a  manifestation  of  this  Kamic  consciousness.

KAMA-MANASIC  CONSCIOUSNESS

The  instinctual  consciousness  of  animals  and  idiots  in  its  lowest  degrees,  the  planes  of  sensation  :  in  man  these  are  rationalized,  e.g.,  a  dog  shut  in  a  room  has  the  instinct  to  get  out,  but  cannot  because  its  instinct  is  not  suffi-  ciently rationalized  to  take  the  necessary  means  ;  whereas  a  man  at  once  takes  in  the  situation  and  extricates  himself.

The  highest  degree  of  this  Kama-  M^nasic  consciousness  is  the  psychic.

Thus  there  are  seven  degrees  from  the  instinctual  animal  to  the  rationalized  instinctual  and  psychic.

MANASIC  CONSCIOUSNESS  From  this  plane  Manas  stretches  upwards  to  Mahat.

532  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

BUDDHIC  CONSCIOUSNESS

The  plane  of  Buddhi  and  the  Auric  Envelope.

From  here  it  goes  to  the  Father  in  heaven,  Atma,  and  reflects  all  that  is  in  the  Auric  Envelope.

Five  and  six  therefore  cover  planes  from  the  psychic  to  the  divine.

MISCELLANEOUS

Reason  is  a  thing  that  oscillates  between  right  and  wrong.

But  Intelligence — Intuition — is  higher,  it  is  the  clear  vision.

To  get  rid  of  Kama  we  must  crush  out  all  our  material  instincts — "  crush  out  matter."  The  flesh  is  a  thing  of  habit;  it  will  repeat  mechanically  a  good  impulse  as  well  as  a  bad  one.

It  is  not  the  flesh  which  is  always  the  tempter ;  in  nine  cases  out  of  ten  it  is  the  Lower  Manas,  which,  by  its  images,  leads  the  flesh  into  temptation.

The  highest  Adept  begins  his  Samadhi  on  the  Fourth  Solar  Plane,  but  cannot  go  outside  the  Solar  System.

When  he  begins  Samadhi  he  is  on  a  par  with  some  of  the  Dhyan  Chohans,  but  he  transcends  them  as  he  rises  to  the  seventh  plane  (Nirvana).

The  Silent  Watcher  is  on  the  Fourth  Kosmic  Plane.

The  higher  Mind  directs  the  Will :   the  lower  turns  it  into  selfish  Desire.

The  head  should  not  be  covered  in  meditation.

It  is  covered  in  Samadhi.

The  Dhyan  Chohans  are  passionless,  pure  and  mindless.

They  have  no  struggle,  no  passions  to  crush.

The  Dhyan  Chohans  are  made  to  pass  through  the  School  of  Life.

"God  goes  to  School."

The  best  of  us  in  the  future  will  be  Manasaputras ;  the  lowest  will  be  Pitris.

We  are  seven  intellectual  Hierarchies  here.

This  earth  becomes  the  moon  of  the  next  earth.

The  "  Pitris"  are  the  Astral  overshadowed  by  Atma-Buddhi,  falling  into  matter.

The  "Pudding-bags"  had  Life  and  Atma-Buddhi,  but  no  Manas.

They  were  therefore  senseless.

The  reason  for  all  evolution  is  the  gaining  of  -experience.

In  the  Fifth  Round  all  of  us  will  play  the  part  of  Pitris.

We  shall  have  to  go  and  shoot  out  our  Chhayas  into  another  humanity,  and  remain  until  that  humanity  is  perfected.

The  Pitris  have  finished  their  office  in  this  Round  and  have  gone  into  Nirvana  ;  but  they  will  return  to  do  the  same  office  up  to  the  middle  point  of  the  Fifth  Round.

The  Fourth  or  Kamic  Hierarchy  of  the  Pitris  becomes  the  "man  of  flesh."

The  astral  body  is  first  in  the  womb ;  then  comes  the  germ  that  fructifies  it.  It  is  then  clothed  with  matter,  as  were  the  Pitris.


The  Chhaya  is  really  the  lower  Manas,  the  shadow  of  the  higher  Mind.

This  Chhaya  makes  the  Mayavi  Rupa.

The  Ray  clothes  itself  in  the  highest  degree  of  the  Astral  Plane.

The  Mayavi  Rupa  is  composed  of  the  astral  body  as  Upadhi,  the  guiding  intelligence  from  the  heart,  the  attributes  and  qualities  from  the  Auric  Envelope.

The  Auric  Envelope  takes  up  the  light  of  Atma,  and  overshadows  the  coronal,  circling  round  the  head.

The  Auric  Fluid  is  a  combination  of  the  Life  and  Will  principles,  the  life  and  the  will  being  one  and  the  same  in  Kosmos.

It  emanates  from  the  eyes  and  hands,  when  directed  by  the  will  of  the  operator.

The  Auric  Light  surrounds  all  bodies :  it  is  the  "  aura  "  emanating  from  them,  whether  they  be  animal,  vegetable,  or  mineral.

It  is  the  light,  e.g.,  seen  round  magnets.

Atma-Buddhi-Manas  in  man  corresponds  to  the  three  Logo!  in  Kosmos.

They  not  only  correspond,  but  each  is  the  radiation  from  Kosmos  to  Microcosmos.

The  third  Logos,  Mahat,  becomes  Manas  in  man,  Manas  being  only  Mahat  individualized,  as  the  sun-rays  are  individualized  in  bodies  that  absorb  them.

*Jhe  sun-rays  give  life,  they  fertilize  what  is  already  there,  and  the  individual  is  formed.

Mahat,  so  to  say,  fertilizes,  and  Manas  is  the  result.

Buddhi-Manas  is  the  Kshetrajna.

There  are  seven  planes  of  Mahat,  as  of  all  else.

THE  HUMAN  PRINCIPLES

Here  H.  P.  B.  drew  two  diagrams,  illustrating  different  ways  of  repre-  senting the  human  principles.

In  the  first : the  two  lower  are  disregarded ;  they  go  out,  disintegrate,  are  of  no  account.


Remain  five,  under  the  radiation  of  Atma.

In  the  second  :

Auric  Egg

Manas

~+  Quaternary

the  lower  Quaternary  is  regarded  as  mere  matter,  objective  illusion,  and  there  remain  Manas  and  the  Auric  Egg,  the  higher  Principles  being  reflected  in  the  Auric  Egg.

In  all  these  systems  remember  the  main  principle,  the  descent  and  re-ascent  of  the  Spirit,  in  man  as  in  Kosmos.

The  Spirit  is  drawn  down-  wards as  by  spiritual  gravitation.

Seeking  further  for  the  cause  of  this,  the  students  were  checked,  H.  P.  B.  giving  only  a  suggestion  on  the  three  Logoi  :

1.  Potentiality  of  Mind  (Absolute  Thought).

2.  Thought  in  Germ.

3.  Ideation  in  Activity.

NOTES

Protective  variation,  e.g.,  identity  of  colouring  of  insects  and  of  that  on  which  they  feed,  was  explained  to  be  the  work  of  Nature  Elementals.

Form  is  on  different  planes,  and  the  forms  of  one  plane  may  be  form-  less to  dwellers  on  another.

The  Kosmocratores  build  on  planes  in  the  Divine  Mind,  visible  to  them  though  not  to  us.  The  principle  of  limitation — prindpium  individuationis — is  Form  :  this  principle  is  Divine  Law  manifested  in  Kosmic  Matter,  which,  in  its  essence,  is  limitless.

The  Auric  Egg  is  the  limit  of  man  as  Hiranyagarbha  of  the  Kosmos.


The  first  step  towards  the  accomplishment  of  Kriyashakti  is  the  use  of  the  'Imagination .  To  imagine  a  thing  is  firmly  to  create  a  model  of  what  you  desire,  perfect  in  all  its  details.

The  Will  is  then  brought  into  action,  and  the  form  is  thereby  transferred  to  the  objective  world.

This  is  creation  by  Kriyashakti.

SUNS    AND    PLANETS

A  comet  partially  cools  and  settles  down  as  a  sun.

It  then  gradually  attracts  round  it  planets  that  are  as  yet  unattached  to  any  centre,  and  thus,  in  millions  of  years,  a  Solar  System  is  formed.

The  worn-out  planet  becomes  a  moon  to  the  planet  of  another  system.

The  sun  we  see  is  a  reflection  of  the  true  Sun  :  this  reflection,  as  an  outward  concrete  thing,  is  a  Kama-Rupa,  all  the  suns  forming  the  Kama-Rupa  of  Kosmos.

To  its  own  system  the  sun  is  Buddhi,  as  being  the  reflection  and  vehicle  of  the  true  Sun,  which  is  Atma,  invisible  on  this  plane.

All  the  Fohatic  forces — electricity,  etc.

— are  in  this  reflection.

THE  MOON

At  the  beginning  of  the  evolution  of  our  globe,  the  moon  was  much  nearer  to  the  earth,  and  larger  than  it  is  now.

It  has  retreated  from  us,  and  shrunk  much  in  size.

(The  moon  gave  ail  her  Principles  to  the  earth,  while  the  Pitris  gave  only  their  Chhayas  to  man.)

The  influences  of  the  moon  are  wholly  psycho-physiological.

It  is  dead,  sending  out  injurious  emanations  like  a  corpse.

It  vampirizes  the  earth  and  its  inhabitants,  so  that  any  one  sleeping  in  its  rays  suffers,  losing  some  of  his  life-force.

A  white  cloth  is  a  protection,  the  rays  not  passing  through  it,  and  the  head  especially  should  be  thus  guarded.

It  has  most  power  when  it  is  full.

It  throws  off  particles  which  we  absorb,  and  is  gradually  disintegrating.

Where  there  is  snow  the  moon  looks  like  a  corpse,  being  unable,  through  the  white  snow,  to  vampirize  effectually.

Hence  snow-covered  mountains  are  free  from  its  bad  influences.

The  moon  is  phosphorescent.

The  Rakshakas  of  Lanka  and  the  Atlanteans  are  said  to  have  subjected  the  moon.

The  Thessalians  learned  from  them  their  Magic.

Esoterically,  the  moon  is  the  symbol  of  the  Lower  Manas  ;  it  is  also  the  symbol  of  the  Astral.

Plants  which  under  the  sun's  rays  are  beneficent  are  maleficent  under  those  of  the  moon.

Herbs  containing  poisons  are  most  active  when  gathered  under  the  moon's  rays.

536  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

A  new  moon  will  appear  during  the  Seventh  Round,  and  our  moon  will  finally  disintegrate  and  disappear.

There  is  now  a  planet,  the  "  Mystery  Planet,"  behind  the  moon,  and  it  is  gradually  dying.

Finally  the  time  will-  come  for  it  to  send  its  Principles  to  a  new  Laya  Centre,  and  there  a  new  planet  will  form,  to  belong  to  another  Solar  System,  the  present  Mystery  Planet  then  functioning  as  moon  to  that  new  globe.

This  moon  will  have  nothing  to  do  with  our  earth,  though  it  will  come  within  our  range  of  vision.

THE  SOLAR  SYSTEM

All  the  visible  planets  placed  in  our  Solar  System  by  Astronomers  belong  to  it,  except  Neptune.

There  are  also  some  others  not  known  to  Science,  belonging  to  it,  and  "  all  moons  which  are  not  yet  visible  for  next  things."

The  planets  only  move  in  our  consciousness.

The  Rulers  of  the  seven  Secret  Planets  have  no  influence  on  this  earth,  as  this  earth  has  on  other  planets.

It  is  the  sun  and  moon  which  really  have  not  only  a  mental,  but  also  a  physical  effect.

The  effect  of  the  sun  on  humanity  is  connected  with  Kama-Prana,  with  the  most  physical  Kamic  elements  in  us  ;  it  is  the  vital  principle  which  helps  growth.

The  effect  of  the  moon  is  chiefly  Kama-  Manasic  or  psycho-physiological  ;  it  acts  on  the  psychological  brain,  on  the  brain-mind.

PRECIOUS  STONES

In  answer  to  a  question,  H.P.  B.  said  that  the  diamond  and  the  ruby  were  under  the  sun,  the  sapphire  under  the  moon — "  but  what  does  it  matter  to  you  ?  "

TIME

When  once  out  of  the  body,  and  not  subject  to  the  habit  of  conscious-  ness formed  by  others,  time  does  not  exist.

Cycles  and  epochs  depend  on  consciousness  :  we  are  not  here  for  the  first  time  ;  the  cycles  return  because  we  come  back  into  conscious  existence.

Cycles  are  measured  by  the  consciousness  of  humanity  and  not  by  Nature.

It  is  because  we  are  the  same  people  as  in  past  epochs  that  these  events  occur  to  us.


DEATH

The  Hindus  look  upon  death  as  impure,  owing  to  the  disintegration  of  the  body  and  the  passing  from  one  plane  to  another.

"  I  believe  in  trans-  formation, not  in  death."

ATOMS

The  Atom  is  the  Soul  of  the  molecule  It  is  the  six  Principles,  and  the  molecule  is  the  body  thereof.

The  Atom  is  the  Atman  of  the  objective  Kosmos,  i.e.,  it  is  on  the  seventh  plane  of  the  lowest  Prakriti.

TERMS

H.  P.  B  began  by  saying  that  students  ought  to  know  the  correct  mean-  ing of  the  Sanskrit  terms  used  in  Occultism,  and  should  learn  the  Occult  Symbology.

To  begin  with  one  had  better  learn  the  correct  Esoteric  classifica-  tion and  names  of  the  fourteen  (7  x  2)  and  seven  (Sapta)  Lokas  found  in  the  exoteric  texts.

These  are  given  there  in  a  very  confused  manner,  and  are  full  of  "  blinds."  To  illustrate  this  three  classifications  are  given  below.

LOKAS

1      The  general  exoteric,  orthodox  and  tantric  category  :

Bhur-loka

Bhuvar-loka

Svar-loka

Mahar-loka  The  second  seven  are  reflected.

Janar-loka

Tapar-loka

Satya-loka  2.     The  Sankhya  category,  and  that  of  some  Vedantins  :

Brahma-loka

Pitri-loka

Soma-loka

Indra-loka

Gandharva-loka

Rakshasa-loka

Yaksha-loka

And  an  eighth

538  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

3      The  Vedantic,  the  nearest  approach  to  the  Esoteric  :  Atala  Vitala  Sutala

Talatala  (or  Karatala)  Rasatala  Mahatala  Patala

Each  and  all  correspond  Esoterically  to  the  Kosmic  or  Dhyan  Chohanic  Hierarchies,   and  to  the  human  States  of  Consciousness  and  their  subdivisions  (forty-nine).     To   appreciate   this   the   meanings   of  the   terms   used    in  the  Vedantic  classification  must  be  first  understood.

Tala  means  place.

Atala  means  no  place.

Vitala  means   some   change   for  the  better  :  i.e.,  better  for  matter

in  that  more  matter  enters  into  it,  or,  in  other  words,  it  becomes  more  differentiated.

This  is  an  ancient  Occult  term.

Sutala  means  good,  excellent,  place.

Karatala        means  something  that  can  be  grasped  or  touched  (from  kara,  a    hand)  :    i.e.,    the   state   in  which  matter  becomes  tangible.

Rasatala        means  place  of  taste  ;  a  place  you  can  sense  with  one  of  the

organs  of  sense.

Mahatala  means  exotericaily  "  great  place  "  ;  but,  Esoterically,  a  place  including  all  others  subjectively,  and  potentially  including  all  that  precedes  it.

Patala  means  something    under   the   feet    (from    pada,    foot),  the

upadhi  or  basis,  of  anything  the  antipodes,  America,  etc.

Each   of  the   Lokas,    places,  worlds,  states,  etc.,  corresponds  with  and  is

transformed  into  five  (exotericaily)  and  seven  (Esoterically)  states  or  Tattvas,

for  which  there  are   no  definite  names.

These  in  the   main  divisions  cited

below  make  up  the  forty-nine  Fires  :

5  and  7  Tanmatras,  outer  and  inner  senses.

5  and  7  Bhutas,  or  elements.

5  and   7  Jnyanendryas,  or  organs  of  sensation.

5  and  7  Karmendryas,  or  organs  of  action.

These   correspond   in   general   to   States   of  Consciousness,  to  the  Hier-  archies of   Dhyan   Chohans,   to  the   Tattvas,   etc.

These  Tattvas  transform

NOTES  ON  SOME  ORAL  TEACHINGS          ,

themselves  into  the  whole  Universe.

The  fourteen  Lokas  are  made  of  seven  with  seven  reflections  :  above,  below ;  within,  without ;  subjective,  objective  ;  pure,  impure  ;  positive,  negative  ;  etc.

EXPLANATION  OF  THE  STATES  OF  CONSCIOUSNESS  CORRESPONDING    TO    THE    VEDANTIC    CLASSIFICATION    OF    LOKAS

7.  Atala.

The  Atmic  or  Auric  state  or  locality  :  it  emanates  directly  from  ABSOLUTENESS,  and  is  the  first  something  in  the  Universe.

Its  correspond-  ence is  the  Hierarchy  of  non-substantial  primordial  Beings,  in  a  place  which  is  no  place  (for  us),  a  state  which  is  no  state.

This  Hierarchy  contains  the  primordial  plane,  ail  that  was,  is,  and  will  be,  from  the  beginning  to  the  end  of  the  Mahamanvantara  ;  all  is  there.

This  statement  should  not,  however,  be  taken  to  imply  Kismet :  the  latter  is  contrary  to  all  the  teachings  of  Occultism.

Here  are  the  Hierarchies  of  the  Dhyani  Buddhas.

Their  state  is  that  of  Parasamadhi,  of  the  Dharmakaya  ;  a  state  where  no  progress  is  possible.

The  entities  there  may  be  said  to  be  crystallized  in  purity,  in  homo-  geneity.

6.  Vitala.

Here  are  the  Hierarchies  of  the  celestial  Buddhas,  or  Bodhisattvas,  who  are  said  to  emanate  from  the  seven  Dhyani  Buddhas.

It  is  related  on  earth  to  Samadhi,  to  the  Buddhic  consciousness  in  man.

No  Adept,  save  one,  can  be  higher  than  this  and  live  ;  if  he  passes  into  the  Atmic  or  Dharmakaya  state  (Alaya)  he  can  return  to  earth  no  more.

These  two  states  are  purely  hyper-metaphysical.

5.  Sutala.

A  differential  state  corresponding  on  earth  with  the  Higher  Manas,  and  therefore  with  Shabda  (Sound),  the  Logos,  our  Higher  Ego  ;  and  also  to  the  Manushi  Buddha  state,  like  that  of  Gautama,  on  earth.

This  is  the  third  stage  of  Samadhi  (which  is  septenary).  Here  belong  the  Hierarchies  of  the  Kumaras — the  Agnishvattas,  etc.

4.  Karatala  corresponds  with  Sparsha  (touch)  and  to  the  Hierarchies  of  ethereal,  semi-objective  Dhyan  Chohans  of  the  astral  matter  of  the  Manasa-  Manas,  or  the  pure  ray  of  Manas,  that  is  the  Lower  Manas  before  it  is  mixed  with  Kama  (as  in  the  young  child).  They  are  called  Sparsha  Devas,  the  Devas  endowed  with  touch.

These  Hierarchies  of  Devas  are  progressive  :  the  first  have  one  sense ;  the  second  two  ;  and  so  on  to  seven :  each  containing  all  the  senses  potentially,  but  not  yet  developed.

Sparsha  would  be  rendered  better  by  affinity,  contact.

540  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

3.  Rasatala,   or   Rupatala  :  corresponds  to  the  Hierarchies  of  Rupa  or  Sight  Devas,  possessed  of  three  senses,  sight,  hearing,  and  touch.

These  are  the  Kama-Manasic  entities,  and  the  higher  Elementals.

With  the  Rosicrucians  they  were  the  Sylphs  and  Undines.

It  corresponds  on  earth  with  an  artificial  state    of    consciousness,    such    as    that    produced    by    hypnotism    and  drugs  (morphia,  etc.).

2.  Mafiata/a.     Corresponds  to  the  Hierarchies  of  Rasa  or  Taste  Devas,  and    includes   a   state   of  consciousness  embracing   the   lower  five  senses  and  emanations   of  life  and   being.

It  corresponds  to  Kama   and  Prana  in  man,  and  to  Salamanders  and  Gnomes  in  nature.

1.  Pata/a.     Corresponds     to    the     Hierarchies    of    Gandha    or    Smell  Devas,    the    underworld    or    antipodes :     Myalba.

The    sphere    of    irrational  animals,   having   no  feeling   save  that  of  self-preservation  and  gratification  of  the  senses  :   also   of  intensely  selfish  human  beings,  waking  or  sleeping.

This  is  why  Narada  is  said  to  have  visited  Ratal  a  when  he  was  cursed  to  be  reborn.

He   reported   that  life  there  was  very  pleasant  for  those  "  who  had  never  left  their    birth-place "  ;    they   were  very  happy.

It   is  the   earthly   state,    and  corresponds  with  the  sense  of  smell.

Here  are  also  animal  Dugpas,  Elementals  of  animals,  and  Nature  Spirits.

FURTHER  EXPLANATIONS  OF  THE  SAME  CLASSIFICATIONS

7.  Auric,  Atmic,  Alayic,  sense  or  state.

One  of  full  potentiality,  but  not  of  activity.

6.  Buddhic ;  the  sense  of  being  one  with  the  universe ;  the  impossibility  of  imagining  oneself  apart  from  it.

(It  was  asked  why  the  term  Alayic  was  here  given  to  the  Atmic  and  not  to  the  Buddhic  state.

Ans.

These  classifications  are  not  hard  and  fast  divis-  ions.

A  term  may  change  places  according  as  the  classification  is  exoteric.

Esoteric  or  practical.

For  students  the  effort  should  be  to  bring  all  things  down  to  states  of  consciousness.

Buddhi  is  really  one  and  indivisible.

It  is  a  feeling  within,  absolutely  inexpressible  in  words.

All  cataloguing  is  useless  to  explain  it.)

5.      Shabdic,  sense  of  hearing.

4.  Sparshic,  sense  of  touch.

3.  Rupic,   the   state  of  feeling  oneself  a  body  and  perceiving  it  (rupa—

form).

2.  Rasic,  sense  of  taste.

1.     Gandhic,  sense  of  smell.


All  the  Kosmic  and  anthropic  states  and  senses  correspond  with  our  organs  of  sensation,  Jnyanendryas,  rudimentary  organs  for  receiving  knowledge  through  direct  contact,  sight,  etc.

These  are  the  faculties  of  Sharira,  through  Netra  (eyes),  nose,  speech,  etc.,  and  also  with  the  organs  of  action,  Karmen-  dryas,  hands,  feet,  etc.

Exoterically,  there  are  five  sets  of  five,  giving  twenty-five.

Of  these  twenty  are  facultative  and  five  Buddhic.

Exoterically  Buddhi  is  said  to  perceive ;  Esoterically  it  reaches  perception  only  through  the  Higher  Manas.

Each  of  these  twenty  is  both  positive  and  negative,  thus  making  forty  in  all.

There  are  two  subjective  states  answering  to  each  of  the  four  sets  of  five,  hence  eight  in  all.

These  being  subjective  cannot  be  doubled.

Thus  we  have  40 -f  8  ^  48  "cognitions  of  Buddhi."  These  with  Maya,  which  includes  them  all,  make  49.  (Once  that  you  have  reached  the  cognition  of  Maya,  you  are  an  Adept.)

TABLE

5  +  5  Tanmatras  2  subjective

5  +  5  Bhutas

5  +  5  Jnyanendryas

5  -f  5  Karmendryas

20+

20  +  20  +  8  +  Maya

THE  LOKAS

In  their  exoteric  blinds  the  Brahmans  count  fourteen  Lokas  (earth  includ-  ed), of  which  seven  are  objective,  though  not  apparent,  and  seven  subjective,  yet  fully  demonstrable  to  the  Inner  Man.

There  are  seven  Divine  Lokas  and  seven  infernal  (terrestrial)  Lokas.

SEVEN  DIVINE  LOKAS  SEVEN  INFERNAL  (TERRESTRIAL)

LOKAS

1.  Bhurloka  (the  earth).  1.   Patala  (our  earth)

2.  Bhuvarloka    (between  the  earth     2.   Mahatala

and  the  sun  [Munis]).

3.  Svarloka   (between  the  sun  and     3.   Rasatala

the  Pole  Star  [Yogis]).

542  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

4.  Maharloka    (between   the  earth     4.  Talatala  (or  Karatala)

and  the  utmost  limit  of  the  Solar  System).

5.  Janarloka     (beyond    the    Solar     5.   Sutala

System,  the  abode  of  the  Kumaras  who  do  not  belong  to  this  plane).

6.  Taparloka   (still  beyond  the  Ma-     6.  Vitala

hatmic  region,  the  dwelling  of  the  Vairaja  deities).

7.  Satyaloka    (the    abode    of    the     7.   Atala

Nirvanis).

These  the  Brahmans  read  from  the  bottom.

Now  all  these  fourteen  are  planes  from  without  within,  and  (the  seven  Divine)  States  of  Consciousness  through  which  man  can  pass — and  must  passr  once  he  is  determined  to  go  through  the  seven  paths  and  portals  of  Dhyani ;  one  need  not  be  disembodied  for  this,  and  all  this  is  reached  on  earth,  and  in  one  or  many  of  the  incarnations.

See  the  order  :  the  four  lower  ones  (1,  2,  3,  4),  are  re/pa  ;  i.e.,  they  are  performed  by  the  Inner  Man  with  the  full  concurrence  of  the  diviner  portions,  or  elements,  of  the  Lower  Ma/ias,  and  consciously  by  the  personal  man.

The  three  higher  states  cannot  be  reached  and  remembered  by  the  latter,  unless  he  is  a  fully  initiated  Adept.

A  Hatha  Yogi  will  never  pass  beyond  the  Maharloka,  psychically,  and  the  Talatala  (double  or  dual  place),  physico-  mentally.

To  become  a  Raja  Yogi,  one  has  to  ascend  up  to  the  seventh  portal,  the  Satyaloka.

For  such,  the  Master  Yogis  tell  us,  is  the  fruition  of  Yajna,  or  sacrifice.

When  the  Bhur,  Bhuvar  and  Svarga  (states)  are  once  passed,  and  the  Yogi's  consciousness  centred  in  Maharloka,  it  is  in  the  last  plane  and  state  between  entire  identification  of  the  Personal  and  the  Higher  Manas.

One  thing  to  remember  :  while  the  infernal  (or  terrestrial)  states  are  also  the  seven  divisions  of  the  earth,  for  planes  and  states,  as  much  as  they  are  Kosmic  divisions,  the  divine  Saptaloka  are  purely  subjective,  and  begin  with  the  psychic  Astral  Light  plane,  ending  with  the  Satya  or  Jtvanmukta  state.

These  fourteen  Lokas,  or  spheres,  form  the  extent  of  the  whole  Brahmlnda  (world).  The  four  lower  are  transitory,  with  all  their  dwellers,  and  the  three  higher

J  All  these  "spaces"  denote  the  special  magnetic  currents,  the  planes  of  substance,  and  the  degrees  of  approach  that  the  consciousness  of  the  Yogi,  or  Chela,  performs  towards  assimilation  with  the  inhabitants  of  the  Lokas,

DIAGRAM    V

ELEMENTS

DIVINE  LOKAS,  OR  STATES

INFERNAL  (TERRES-  TRIAL) TALAS,  OR  STATES

PLANES  OF  CORRESPOND-  ING HIERARCHIES

PRINCIPLES

SENSES

COLOURS

CONSCIOUSNESS

ORGANS  OF  SENSATION

ORGANS  OF  ACTION

SPIRITUAL  CORRESPOND-  ING ORGANS  AND  SEATS  OF  SENSATION

Bhutas

ROpa

Tanmatras

Jnyanendriyas

Karmendriyas

1.    Earth

1.    Bhurhka.

Thehabi-

1.    Patala.

Man's

1.    Abode  of  men,  animals,

1.    Body

1.    Gandha

1.    Blue

1  .    Through   ob-

1.   Nose

1.    Upastha

eyebrows.

Highly    devel-

Bhumi

tat  of  thinking  and  good

animal    gross    body

state  of  infancy.

At  one  pole,

(Smell)

jective       percep-

Organ     of     gener-

oped    in      some    animals,

Prithivi

men.

Psychic  State.

and  the  personality

innocence  :     at    the    other,

tions  :   smell.

ation.

as  dogs  and  others.

dwell  here.

instinctual  selfishness.

2.    Water

2.    Bhuvarloka.

State

2.  Mahata'a.  Abode

2.     Region    of    the    Astra

2.    Astral

2.    Rasa

2.    Violet

2.    Through     in-

2.   Tongue

2.    Pan/-

2.   Spleen  and  Liver  :  the

Apas

in  which  the  man  thinks

of  man's  astral,  shad-

Light   and    of    Kama    Loka.

Image

(Taste)

stinctual     percep-

Hands

former      more     spiritual  ;

more  of  his  inner  condi-

ow    of     the    gross

Abode  of  elementals,  nature

tions  :  taste.

the  latter  on  the  material

tion  than  of  his  persona-

body, which  shadow

spirits,.      elementaries.

At

plane.

Spleen  corresponds

lity.

His   Astral    passes

takes   up   the  char-

the    other     end     the     Rupa

with    little    finger    of    left

into  this  sphere,  and  so

acteristics     of     this

Devas,  the  guardians  of  the

hand  ;    liver   with   that   of

does  its  substance.

High-

sphere.

animal      world.

Plane      of

right.

er  Psychic  State.

instinct.

3.    Air

3.    Svarloka.

State

3.  Rasata/a.  Where

3.  Devachanic  state.

Abode

3.    Kama

3.    Rupa

3.    Red

3.  Through  mag-

3.   Eyes

3.    Pada

3.  Stomach:  corresponds

Vayu

when  the  Yogi  has  lost

the  Kama  longs  for

or    plane    of    bliss    and    un-

(Sight)

netic  perceptions:

Feet

with   spine,    and   the   little

all    tastes    and    started

the  taste  (Rasa)  of

reasoned  happiness,  of  pure

sight.

toes  on  both  feet.

towards  Reunion.

Holy

everything.

aspiration     and     realization,

State.

of    Kama-Manas,    of    higher

elementals.

4.    Fire

4.    Maharloka.

Where

4.   7a/ata/a.  Where

4.     Plane    where    Maya    is

4.    Lower

4.    Sparsria

4.    Green

4.    Through  psy-

4.   Body

4.    Payu

4.    The  Region  of  the  Um-

Agni

the  Lower  Manas  has  lost

the     Lower     Manas

giving    way    and    becoming

Manas

(Touch)

cho-physiologi-

(Skin)

Organ  of  evacuation,

bilical   Cord:    corresponds

Tejas

all  Kamic  affinity.

Super-

clings  to  the  sentient

weak.

Abode  of  the  holiest

cal     perceptions  :

excretion

with  Payu  for  ejecting  for-

holy State.

and    objective  life  ;

among  the  Rupa  Devas.

The

touch,  contact.

eign  magnetism.

is  Kamic.

sphere     of    compassion     at

one  end,  and  that  of  intense

selfishness  at  the  other.

Bhutas

-t  Rupa

elementary

5.    Janarloka.

Manas  is

5.    Suta/a.     Manas

5.    Abode  of  the  Kumaras,

Arupa

5.    Shabda

5.    Indigo

5.  Through  pure-

5.   Ears

5.    Vak

5.    Heart  (spiritual)

Substances

entirely  freed  from  Ka-

becomes in  it  entire-

the Sons  of  Mahat,  or  Brah-

,    *-—  —  ,

(Hearing)

ly  mental  percep-

Organ of  speech

Throat  (physical)

..  '     —  ..

ma,    and   becomes  one

ly  the  slave  of  Kama,

ma.      Omniscience     regard-

5.   Higher

tions.

.-.,.-

with  the  Ego.

KumSra

and   at  one  with  the

ing   all   that   belongs  to  the

Manas

Karmendriyas

5.    Ether

State.

animal  man.

realm  of  MayS  and  is  under

its  sway.

6.    Divine

6.    Taparaloka.

Even  if

6.    Vitala.

When

6.    Plane    of    the   eternal,

6.    Buddhi

6.    Spiritual

6.    Yellow

6.    Through  soul

6.    Astral

6.    Soul

6.    Pineal  Gland

Flame       >

it  is  again  re-born,  it  has

this  is  reached,  the

inconsumable    substance,   of

Understand-

perceptions.

Body     and

now    become    invulner-

Higher   breaks    off

divine    fire.

Abode   of   the

ing

Heart

able,  inconsumable.

In-

entirely    from     the

Vairajas,   the  Pitri   Devas  of

(Jnyana)

nate  Christos  State.

Lower.

The  chord  is

the  Sun.

snapped.

7.  Akasha,

7.    Satyaloka.

In   this

7.   Atala.

Man  dies

7.    Plane  of  the  consumma-

7.    Atmic

7.  The  High-

7.   Entire

7.    Spiritual,

7.  The  Light

7.    Spirit

7.    The   Akasha   that   fills

—    ,.  •

state   the   Yogi   reaches

but    to    be   directly

tum    est   in   the    manifested

Aura

er    Synthetic

prismatic

through  the  auric

of  Kundalini

the    skull,    and    for   which

Elementary

the     highest     Samadhi.

reborn.

No    place

universe  :  the  Noumenal.

Sense,  embra-

septenary ;

synthetical       per-

all   the    contents    of   the

Substances

He  is  at  the  threshold  of

means  no  Devachan.

cing  all

when  auric

ceptions

latter,  brain,  glands,  etc.,

the  great  choice.

Spiritual  death,  an-

-    r  •

r  _-

Blue

s  r  *

are  non-existent.

nihilation.

Arupa

Tanmatras

JnySnendriyas eternal;  i.e.,  the  former  states,  planes  and  subjects,  to  these,  last  only  a  Day  of  Brahma,  changing  with  every  Kalpa  .  the  latter  endure  for  an  Age  of  Brahma.


In  Diagram  V  only  Body,  Astral,  Kama,  Lower  Manas,  Higher  Manas,  Buddhi  and  Auric  Atma  are  given.

Life  is  a  Universal  Kosmic  principle,  and  no  more  than  Atman  does  it  belong  to  individuals.

In  answer  to  questions  on  the  diagram,  H.  P.  B.  said  that  Touch  and1  Taste  have  no  order.

Elements  have  a  regular  order,  but  Fire  pervades  them  all.

Every  sense  pervades  every  other.

There  is  no  universal  order,  that  being  first  in  each  which  is  most  developed.

Students  must  learn  the  correspondences :  then  concentrate  on  the  organs  and  so  reach  their  corresponding  states  of  consciousness.

Take  them  in  order  beginning  with  the  lowest,  and  working  steadily  upwards.

A  medium  might  irregularly  catch  glimpses  of  higher,  but  would  not  thus  gain  orderly  development.

The  greatest  phenomena  are  produced  by  touching  and  centering  the  attention  upon  the  little  finger.

The  Lokas  and  Talas  are  reflections  the  one  of  the  other.

So  also  are  the  Hierarchies  in  each,  in  pairs  of  opposites,  at  the  two  poles  of  the  sphere.

Everywhere  are  such  opposites :  good  and  evil,  light  and  darkness,  male  and  female.

H.  P.  B.  could  not  say  why  blue  was  the  colour  of  the  earth.

Blue  is  a*  colour  by  itself,  a  primary.

Indigo  is  a  colour,  not  a  shade  of  blue,  so  is  violet.

The  Vairajas  belong  to,  are  the  fiery  Egos  of,  other  Manvantaras.

They  have  already  been  purified  in  the  fire  of  passions.

It  is  they  who  refused  to  create.

They  have  reached  the  Seventh  Portal,  and  have  refused  Nirvana,  remaining  for  succeeding  Manvantaras.

The  seven  steps  of  Antahkarana  correspond  with  the  Lokas.

Samadhi  is  the  highest  state  on  earth  that  can  be  reached  in  the  body.

Beyond  that  the  Initiate  must  have  become  a  Nirmanakaya.

Purity  of  mind  is  of  greater  importance  than  purity  of  body.

If  the  Upadhi  be  not  perfectly  pure,  it  cannot  preserve  recollections  coming  from  a  higher  state.

An  act  may  be  performed  to  which  little  or  no  attention  is  paid,  and  it  is  of  comparatively  small  importance.

But  if  thought  of,  dwelt  on  in  the  mind,  the  effect  is  a  thousand  times  greater.

The  thoughts  must  be  kept  pure.

Remember  that  Kama,  while  having  bad  passions  and  emotions,  helps  you  to  evolve  by  giving  also  the  desire  and  impulse  necessary  for  rising.

The  flesh,  the  body,  the  human  being  in  his  material  part,  is,  on  this-  plane,  the  most  difficult  thing  to  subject.

The  highest  Adept,  put  into  a  new-

544  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

body,  has  to  struggle  against  it  and  subdue  it,  and  finds  its  subjugation  difficult.

The  Liver  is  the  General,  the  Spleen  is  the  Aide-de-Camp.

All  that  the  Liver  does  not  accomplish  is  taken  up  and  completed  by  the  Spleen.

H.  P.  B.  was  asked  whether  each  person  must  pass  through  the  fourteen  states,  and  answered  that  the  Lokas  and  Talas  represented  planes  on  this  earth,  through  some  of  which  all  must  pass,  and  through  all  of  which  the  disciple  must  pass,  on  his  way  to  Adeptship.

Everyone  passes  through  the  lower  Lokas,  but  not  necessarily  through  the  corresponding  Talas.

There  are  two  poles  in  everything  :  seven  states  in  every  state.

Vitala  represents  a  sublime  as  well  as  an  infernal  state.

That  state  which  for  the  mortal  is  a  complete  separation  of  the  Ego  from  the  personality  is  for  •a  Buddha  a  mere  temporary  separation.

For  the  Buddha  it  is  a  Kosmic  state.

The  Brahmans  and  Buddhists  regard  the  Talas  as  hells,  but  in  reality  the  term  is  figurative.

We  are  in  hell  whenever  we  are  in  misery,  suffer  mis-  fortune and  so  on.

FORMS  IN  THE  ASTRAL  LIGHT

The  Elemental  in  the  Astral  light  are  reflections.

Everything  on  earth  is  reflected  there.

It  is  from  these  that  photographs  are  sometimes  obtained  through  mediums.

The  mediums  unconsciously  produce  them  as  forms.

The  Adepts  produce  them  consciously  through  Kriyashakti,  bringing  them  down  by  a  process  that  may  be  compared  to  the  focussing  of  rays  of  light  by  a  burn-  ing glass.

STATES  OF  CONSCIOUSNESS

Bhurloka  is  the  waking  state  in  which  we  normally  live  ;  it  is  the  state  in  which  animals  also  are,  when  they  sense  food,  a  danger,  etc.

To  be  in  Svarloka  is  to  be  completely  abstracted  on  this  plane,  leaving  only  instinct  to  work,  so  that  on  the  material  plane  you  would  behave  as  an  animal.

Yogis  are  known  who  have  become  crystallized  in  this  state,  and  then  they  must  be  nourished  by  others.

A  Yogi  near  Allahabad  had  been  for  fifty-three  years  sitting  on  a  stone ;  his  Chelas  plunge  him  into  the  river  every  night  and  then  replace  him.

During  the  day  his  consciousness  returns  to  Bhurloka,  and  he  talks  and  teaches.

A  Yogi  was  found  on  an  island  near  Calcutta  round  whose  limbs  the  roots  of  trees  had  grown.

He  was  cut  out,  and  in  the  endeavour  to  awaken  him  so  many  outrages  were  inflicted  on  him  that  he  died.

Q.      Is  it  possible  to  be  in  more  than  one  state  of  consciousness  at  once  ?

MOTES  ON  SOME  ORAL  TEACHINGS

A.  The  consciousness  cannot  be  entirely  on  two  planes  at  once.

The  higher  and  lower  states  are  not  wholly  incompatible,  but  if  you  are  on  the  higher  you  will  wool-gather  on  the  lower.

In  order  to  remember  the  higher  state  on  returning  to  the  lower,  the  memory  must  be  carried  upwards  to  the  higher.

An  Adept  may  apparently  enjoy  a  dual  consciousness ;  when  he  desires  not  to  see  he  can  abstract  himself :  he  may  be  in  a  higher  state  and  yet  return  answers  to  questions  addressed  to  him.

But  in  this  case  he  will  momentarily  return  to  the  material  plane,  shooting  up  again  to  the  higher  plane.

This  is  his  only  salvation  in  adverse  conditions.

The  lower  you  go  in  the  Talas  the  more  intellectual  you  become  and  the  less  spiritual.

You  may  be  a  morally  good  man  but  not  spiritual.

Intellect  may  remain  very  closely  related  to  Kama.

A  man  may  be  in  a  Loka  and  visit  one  and  all  the  Talas,  his  condition  depending  on  the  Loka  to  which  he  belongs.

Thus  a  man  in  Bhurloka  only  may  pass  into  the  Talas  and  go  to  the  •devil.

If  he  dwells  in  Bhuvarioka  he  cannot  become  as  bad.

If  he  has  reached  the  Satya  state  he  can  go  into  any  Tala  without  danger  ;  buoyed  up  by  his  own  purity  he  can  never  be  engulfed.

The  Talas  are  brain  intellect  states,  while  the  Lokas — or  more  accurately  the  three  higher — are  spiritual.

Manas  absorbs  the  light  of  Buddhi.

Buddhi  is  Arupa,  and  can  absorb  nothing.

When  the  Ego  takes  all  the  light  of  Buddhi,  it  takes  that  of  Atma,  Buddhi  being  the  vehicle,  and  thus  the  three  become  one.

This  done,  the  tull  Adept  is  one  spiritually,  but  has  a  body.

The  fourfold  Path  is  finished  -and  he  is  one.

The  Masters'  bodies  are,  as  far  as  they  are  concerned,  jllusionary,  and  hence  do  not  grow  old,  become  wrinkled,  etc.

The  student,  who  is  not  naturally  psychic,  should  fix  the  fourfold  con-  sciousness in  a  higher  plane  and  nail  it  there.

Let  him  make  a  bundle  of  the  four  lower  and  pin  them  to  a  higher  state.

He  should  centre  on  this  higher,  trying  not  to  permit  the  body  and  intellect  to  draw  him  down  and  carry  him  away.

Play  ducks  and  drakes  with  the  body,  eating,  drinking  and  sleeping,  .but  living  always  on  the  ideal.

MOTHER-LOVE

Mother -love  is  an  instinct,  the  same  in  the  human  being  and  in  the  animal,  and  often  stronger  in  the  latter.

The  continuance  of  this  love  in  human  beings  is  due  to  association,  to  blood  magnetism  and  to  psychic  affinity.

Families  are  sometimes  formed  of  those  who  have  lived  together  before,  but  often  not.

The  causes  at  work  are  very  complex  and  have  to  be  balanced.

Sometimes  when  a  child  with  very  bad  Karma  is  to  be  born,  FF

546  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

parents  of  a  callous  type  are  chosen,  or  they  may  die  before  the  Karmic  results  appear,  Or  the  suffering  through  the  child  may  be  their  own  Karma.

Mother-love  as  an  instinct  is  between  Rasatala  and  Talatala.

The  Lipikas  keep  man's  Karmic  record,  and  impress  it  on  the  Astral  Light.

Vacillating  people  pass  from  one  state  of  consciousness  to  another.

Thought  arises  before  desire.

The  thought  acts  on  the  brain,  the  brain  on  the  organ,  and  then  desire  awakes.

It  is  not  the  outer  stimulus  that  arouses  the  organ.

Thought  therefore  must  be  slain  ere  desire  can  be  extinguished.

The  student  must  guard  his  thoughts.

Five  minutes'  thought  may  undo  the  work  of  five  years  ;  and  though  the  five  years'  work  will  be  run  through  more  rapidly  the  second  time,  yet  time  is  lost.

CONSCIOUSNESS

H.  P.  B.  began  by  challenging  the  views  of  consciousness  in  the  West,  commenting  on  the  lack  of  definition  in  the  leading  Philosophies.

No  distinction  was  made  between  consciousness  and  self-consciousness,  and  yet  in  this  lay  the  difference  between  man  and  the  animal.

The  animal  was  conscious  only,  not  self-conscious  ;  the  animal  does  not  know  the  Ego  as  Subject,  as  does  man.

There  is  therefore  an  enormous  difference  between  the  con-  sciousness of  the  bird,  the  insect,  the  beast,  and  that  of  man.

But  the  full  consciousness  of  man  is  self -consciousness — that  which  makes  us  say,  "  /  do  that."  If  there  is  a  pleasure  it  must  be  traced  to  some  one  experiencing  it.  Now  the  difference  between  the  consciousness  of  man  and  of  animals  is  that  while  there  is  a  Self  in  the  animal,  the  animal  is  not  conscious  of  the  Self.

Spencer  reasons  on  consciousness,  but  when  he  comes  to  a  gap  he  merely  jumps  over  it.  So  again  Hume,  when  he  says  that  on  introspection  he  sees  merely  feelings  and  can  never  find  any  "I,"  forgets  that  without  an  "  I  "  no  seeing  or  feelings  would  be  possible.

What  is  it  that  studies  the  feelings?  The  animal  is  not  conscious  of  the  feeling  "  I  am  I."  It  has  instinct,  but  instinct  is  not  self-consciousness.

Self-consciousness  is  an  attribute  of  the  mind,  not  of  the  soul,  the  an/ma,  whence  the  very  name  animal  is  taken.

Humanity  had  no  self -consciousness  until  the  coming  of  the  Manasaputras  in  the  Third  Race.

Consciousness,  brain-consciousness,  is  the  field  of  the  light  of  the  Ego,  of  the  Auric  Egg,  of  the  Higher  Manas.

The  cells  of  the  leg  are  conscious,  but  they  are  the  slaves  of  the  idea  ;  they  are  not  self-conscious,  they  cannot  originate  an  idea,  although  when  they  are  tired  they  can  convey  to  the  brain  an  uneasy  sensation,  and  so  give  rise  to  the  idea  of  fatigue.

Instinct  is  the  lower  state  of  consciousness.

Man  has, consciousness  running  through  the  four  lower  keys  of  his  septenary  conscious-  ness ;  there  are  seven  scales  of  consciousness  in  his  consciousness,  which  is  none  the  less  essentially  and  pre-eminently  one,  a  unit.


There  are  millions  and  millions  of  states  of  consciousness,  as  there  are  millions  and  millions  of  leaves  ;  but  as  you  cannot  find  two  leaves  alike,  so  you  cannot  find  two  states  of  consciousness  alike  ;  a  state  is  never  exactly  repeated.

Is  memory  a  thing  born  in  us  that  it  can  give  birth  to  the  Ego  ?  Know-  ledge, feeling,  volition,  are  colleagues  of  the  mind,  not  faculties  of  it.  Memory  is  an  artificial  thing,  an  adjunct  of  relativeness  ;  it  can  be  sharpened  or  left  dull,  and  it  depends  on  the  condition  of  the  brain-cells  which  store  all  impressions  ;  knowledge,  feeling,  volition,  cannot  be  correlated,  do  what  you  will.

They  are  not  produced  from  each  other,  nor  produced  from  mind,  but  are  principles,  colleagues.

You  cannot  have  knowledge  without  memory,  for  memory  stores  all  things,  garnishing  and  furnishing.

If  you  teach  a  child  nothing,  it  will  know  nothing.

Brain-consciousness  depends  on  the  intensity  of  the  light  shed  by  the  Higher  Manas  on  the  Lower,  and  the  extent  of  affinity  between  the  brain  and  this  light.

Brain-mind  is  conditioned  by  the  responsiveness  of  the  brain  to  this  light ;  it  is  the  field  of  consciousness  of  the  Manas.

The  animal  has  the  Monad  and  the  Manas  latent,  but  its  brain  cannot  respond.

All  potentialities  are  there,  but  are  dormant.

There  are  certain  accepted  errors  in  the  West  which  vitiate  all  their  theories.

How  many  impressions  can  a  man  receive  simultaneously  into  his  con-  sciousness and  record  ?  The  Westerns  say  one  :  Occultists  say  normally  seven,  and  abnormally  fourteen,  seventeen,  nineteen,  twenty-one,  up  to  forty-nine,  impressions  can  be  simultaneously  received.

Occultism  teaches  that  the  consciousness  always  receives  a  sevenfold  impression  and  stores  it  in  the  memory.

You  can  prove  it  by  striking  at  once  the  seven  notes  of  the  musical  scale  :  the  seven  sounds  reach  the  consciousness  simultaneously,  but  the  untrained  ear  can  only  recognize  them  one  after  another,  and  if  you  choose  you  can  measure  the  intervals.

The  trained  ear  will  hear  the  seven  notes  at  once,  simultaneously.

And  experiment  has  shown  that  in  two  or  three  weeks  a  man  may  be  trained  to  receive  seventeen  or  eighteen  impressions  of  colour,  the  intervals  decreasing  with  practice.

Memory  is  acquired  for  this  life,  and  can  be  expanded.

Genius  is  the  greatest  responsiveness  of  the  brain  and  brain-memory  to  the  Higher  Manas.

Impressions  on  any  sense  are  stored  in  the  memory.

Before  a  physical  sense  is  developed  there  is  a  mental  feeling  which  proceeds  to  become  a  physical  sense.

Fishes  who  are  blind,  living  in  the  deep  sea,  or  subterranean  waters,  if  they  are  put  into  a  pond  will  in  a  few

548  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

generations  develop  eyes.

But  in  their  previous  state  there  is  a  sense  of  seeing,  though  no  physical  sight  ;  how  else  should  they  in  the  darkness  find  their  way,  avoid  dangers,  etc.

?  The  mind  will  take  in  and  store  all  kinds  of  things  mechanically  and  unconsciously,  and  will  throw  them  into  the  memory  as  unconscious  perceptions.

If  the  attention  is  greatly  engrossed  in  any  way,  the  sense  perception  of  any  injury  is  not  felt  at  the  time,  but  later  the  suffer-  ing enters  into  consciousness.

So,  returning  to  our  example  of  the  seven  notes  struck  simultaneously,  we  have  one  impression,  but  the  ear  is  affected  in  succes-  sion by  the  notes  one  after  another,  so  that  they  are  stored  in  the  brain-mind  in  order,  for  the  untrained  consciousness  cannot  register  them  simultaneously.

All  depends  on  training  and  on  attention.

Thus  the  transference  of  a  sensa-  tion passing  from  any  organ  to  the  consciousness  is  almost  simultaneous  if  your  attention  is  fixed  on  it,  but  if  any  noise  distracts  your  attention,  then  it  will  take  a  fraction  more  of  a  second  before  it  reaches  your  consciousness.

The  Occultist  should  train  himself  to  receive  and  transmit  along  the  line  of  the  seven  scales  of  his  consciousness  every  impression,  or  impressions,  simulta-  neously.

He  who  reduces  the  intervals  of  physical  time  the  most  has  made  the  most  progress.

CONSCIOUSNESS,    ITS   SEVEN    SCALES

There  are   seven  scales  or  shades  of  consciousness,  of  the  Unit ;  e.g.,  in  a  moment  of  pleasure  or  pain  ;  four  lower  and  three  higher.

1.  Physical  sense-perception  :  Perception    of    the    cell     (if    para-

lyzed, the   sense  is   there,  though  you  do  not  feel  it).

2.  Self  perception  or  apperception  :  i.e.,  self-perception  of  cell.

3.  Psychic  apperception  :  Of     astral     double,    dbppelganger,

carrying  it  higher  to  the

4    Vital  perception  :  Physical  feeling,   sensations  of  plea-

sure and  pain,  of  quality.

These   are   the   four   lower   scales,   and    belong   to   the    psycho-physio-  logical man.

5.  Manasic  self-perception  :  Manasic  discernment  of  the  Lower

Manas  :

6.  Will  perception  :  Volitional  perception,   the  voluntary

taking   in  of  an  idea  ;  you  can  re-  gard or  disregard  physical  pain.


7  Spiritual,  entirely  conscious  Because  it  reaches  the  Higher,  self-

apperception  :  conscious  Manas.

[Apperception  means  self-perception,  conscious  action,  not  as  with  Leibnitz,  but  when  attention  is  fixed  on  the  perception.]

You  can  take  these  on  any  planes  :  e.g.,  bad  news  passes  through  the  four  lower  stages  before  coming  to  the  heart.

Or  take  Sound  :

1 .  It  strikes  the  ear.

2.  Self -perception  of  the  ear.

3.  On  the  psychic  or  mental,

which  carries  it  to

4.  Vital  (harsh,  soft ;   strong,  weak  ;   etc.).

THE    EGO

One  of  the  best  proofs  that  there  is  an  Ego,  a  true  Field  of  Conscious-  ness, is  the  fact  already  mentioned,  that  a  state  of  consciousness  is  never  exactly  reproduced,  though  you  should  live  a  hundred  years,  and  pass  through  milliards  and  milliards.

In  an  active  day,  how  many  states  and  substates  there  are  :  it  would  be  impossible  to  have  cells  enough  for  all.

This  will  help  you  to  understand  why  some  mental  states  and  abstract  things  follow  the  Ego  into  Devachan,  and  why  others  merely  scatter  in  space.

That  which  touches  the  Entity  has  an  affinity  for  it,  as  a  noble  action  is  immortal  and  goes  with  it  into  Devachan,  forming  part  and  parcel  of  the  biography  of  the  personality  which  is  disintegrating.

A  lofty  emotion  runs  through  the  seven  stages,  and  touches  the  Ego,  the  mind  that  plays  its  tunes  in  the  mind-cells.

We  can  analyze  the  work  of  consciousness  and  describe  it ;  but  we  cannot  define  consciousness  unless  we  postulate  a  Subject.

BHORLOKA

The  Bhurloka  begins  with  the  Lower  Manas.

Animals  do  not  feel  as  do  men.

The  dog  thinks  more  of  his  master  being  angry  than  of  the  actual  pain  of  the  lash.

The  animal  does  not  suffer  in  memory  and  in  imagination,  feeling  past  and  future  as  well  as  actual  present  pain.

PINEAL  GLAND

The  special  physical  organ  of  perception  is  the  brain,  and  perception  is  located  in  the  aura  of  the  pineal  gland.

This  aura  answers  in  vibrations  to

550  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

any  impressions,  but  it  can  only  be  sensed,  not  perceived,  in  the  living  man.

During  the  process  of  thought  manifesting  in  consciousness,  a  constant  vibra-  tion occurs  in  the  light  of  this  aura,  and  a  clairvoyant  looking  at  the  brain  of  a  living  man  may  almost  count,  see  with  the  spiritual  eye,  the  seven  scales,  the  seven  shades  of  light,  passing  from  the  dullest  to  the  brightest.

You  touch  your  hand  ;  before  you  touch  it  the  vibration  is  already  in  the  aura  of  the  pineal  gland,  and  has  its  own  shade  of  colour.

It  is  this  aura  which  causes  the  wear  and  tear  of  the  organ,  by  the  vibrations  it  sets  up.  The  brain,  set  vibrat-  ing, conveys  the  vibrations  to  the  spinal  cord,  and  so  to  the  rest  of  the  body.

Happiness  as  well  as  sorrow  sets  up  these  strong  vibrations,  and  so  wears  out  the  body.

Powerful  vibrations  of  joy  or  sorrow  may  thus  kill.

THE  HEART

The  septenary  disturbance  and  play  of  light  around  the  pineal  gland  are  reflected  in  the  heart,  or  rather  the  aura  of  the  heart,  which  vibrates  and  illumines  the  seven  brains  of  the  heart,  just  as  does  the  aura  round  the  pineal  gland.

This  is  the  exoterically  four-  but  Esoterically  seven-leaved  lotus,  the  Saptaparna,  the  cave  of  Buddha,  with  its  seven  compartments.

ASTRAL  AND  EGO

There  is  a  difference  between  the  nature  and  the  essence  of  the  Astral  Body  and  the  Ego.

The  Astral  Body  is  molecular,  however  etherealized  it  may  be  :  the  Ego  is  atomic,  spiritual.

The  Atoms  are  spiritual,  and  are  for  ever  invisible  on  this  plane  ;  molecules  form  around  them,  they  remaining  as  the  higher  invisible  principles  of  the  molecules.

The  eyes  are  the  most  Occult  of  our  senses  :  close  them  and  you  pass  to  the  mental  plane.

Stop  all  the  senses  and  you  are  entirely  on  another  plane.

INDIVIDUALITY

If  twelve  people  are  smoking  together,  the  smoke  of  their  cigarettes  may  mingle,  but  the  molecules  of  the  smoke  from  each  have  an  affinity  with  each  other,  and  they  remain  distinct  for  ever  and  ever,  qo  matter  how  the  the  whole  mass  may  interblend.

So  a  drop  of  water,  though  it  fall  into  the  ocean  retains  its  individuality.

It  has  become  a  drop  with  a  life  of  its  own,  like  a  man,  and  cannot  be  annihilated.

Any  group  of  people  would  appear  as  a  group  in  the  Astral  Light,  but  would  not  be  permanent ;  but  a  group

MOTES  ON  SOME  ORAL  TEACHINGS

•meeting  to  study  Occultism  would  cohere,  and  the  impression  would  be  more  permanent.

The  higher  and  the  more  spiritual  the  affinity,  the  more  permanent  the  cohesion.

LOWER  MANAS

The  Lower  Manas  is  an  emanation  from  the  Higher  Manas,  and  is  of  the  same  nature  as  the  Higher.

This  nature  can  make  no  impression  on  this  plane,  nor  receive  any  :  an  Archangel,  having  no  experience,  would  be  senseless  on  this  plane,  and  could  neither  give  nor  receive  impressions.

So  the  Lower  Manas  clothes  itself  with  the  essence  of  the  Astral  Light ;  this  astral  envelope  shuts  it  out  from  its  Parent,  except  through  the  Antahkarana  which  is  its  only  salvation.

Break  this  and  you  become  an  animal.

KAMA

Kama  is  life,  it  is  the  essence  of  the  blood.

When  this  leaves  the  blood  the  latter  congeals.

Prana  is  universal  on  this  plane  ;  it  is  in  us  the  vital  principle,  Pranic,  rather  than  Prana.

SELF-HOOD

Qualities  determine  the  properties  of  "  Self -hood."  As,  for  instance,  two  wolves  placed  in  the  same  environment  would  probably  not  act  differently.

The  field  of  the  consciousness  of  the  Higher  Ego  is  never  reflected  in  the  Astral  Light.

The  Auric  Envelope  receives  the  impressions  of  both  the  Higher  and  the  Lower  Manas,  and  it  is  the  latter  impressions  that  are  also  reflected  in  the  Astral  Light.

Whereas  the  essence  of  all  things  spiritual,  all  that  which  reaches,  or  is  not  rejected  by,  the  Higher  Ego  is  not  reflected  in  the  Astral  Light,  because  it  is  on  too  low  a  plane.

But  during  the  life  of  a  man,  this  essence,  with  a  view  to  Karmic  ends,  is  impressed  on  the  Auric  Envelope,  and  after  death  and  the  separation  of  the  Principles  is  united  with  the  Universal  Mind  (that  is  to  say,  those  "  impressions  "  which  are  superior  to  «ven  the  Devachanic  Plane),  to  await  there  Karmically  until  the  day  when  the  Ego  is  to  be  reincarnated.

[There  are  thus  three  sets  of  impressions,  which  we  may  call  the  Kamic,  Devachanic  and  Manasic.]  For  the  entities,  no  matter  how  high,  must  have  their  Karmic  rewards  and  punishments  on  earth.

These  spiritual  impressions  are  made  more  or  less  on  the  brain,  otherwise  the  Lower  £go  would  not  be  responsible.

There  are  some  impressions,  however,  received

552  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

through    the  brain,  which  are  not  of  our  previous  experience.

In  the  case  of  the  Adept  the  brain  is  trained  to  retain  these  impressions.

The  Reincarnating  Ray  may,  for  convenience,  be  separated  into  two  aspects  :  the  lower  Kamic  Ego  is  scattered  in  Kama  Loka  ;  the  Manasic  part  accomplishes  its  cycle  and  returns  to  the  Higher  Ego.

It  is,  in  reality,  this  Higher  Ego  which  is,  so  to  speak,  punished,  which  suffers.

This  is  the  true  crucifixion  of  the  Christos — the  most  abstruse  but  yet  the  most  important  mystery  of  Occultism  ;  all  the  cycle  of  our  lives  hangs  on  it.  It  is  indeed  the  Higher  Ego  that  is  the  sufferer  ;  for  remember  that  the  abstract  consciousness  of  the  higher  personal  consciousness  will  remain  impressed  on  the  Ego,  since  it  must  be  part  and  parcel  of  its  eternity.

All  our  grandest  impressions  are  impressed  on  the  Higher  Ego,  because  they  are  of  the  same  nature  as  itself.

Patriotism  and  great  actions  in  national  service  are  not  altogether  good,  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  highest.

To  benefit  a  portion  of  humanity  is  good  ;  but  to  do  so  at  the  expense  of  the  rest  is  bad.

Therefore,  in  patriot-  ism, etc.,  the  venom  is  present  with  the  good  For  though  the  inner  essence  of  the  Higher  Ego  is  unsoilable,  the  outer  garment  may  be  soiled.

Thus  both  the  bad  and  the  good  of  such  thoughts  and  actions  are  impressed  on  the  Auric  Envelope  and  the  Karma  of  the  bad  is  taken  up  by  the  higher  Ego,  though  it  is  perfectly  guiltless  of  it.  Thus  both  sets  of  impressions,  after  death,  scatter  in  the  Universal  Mind,  and  at  reincarnation  the  Ego  sends  out  a  Ray  which  is  itself,  into  a  new  personality,  and  there  suffers.

It  suffers  in  Self-consciousness  that  it  has  created  by  its  own  accumulated  experiences.

Every  one  of  our  Egos  has  the  Karma  of  past  Manvantaras  behind.

There  are  seven  Hierarchies  of  Egos,  some  of  which,  e.g.,  in  inferior  tribes,  may  be  said  to  be  only  just  beginning  the  present  cycle.

The  Ego  starts  with  Divine  Consciousness  ;  no  past,  no  future,  no  separation.

It  is  long  before  realizing  that  it  is  itself.

Only  after  many  births  does  it  begin  to  discern,  by  this  collectivity  of  experience,  that  it  is  individual.

At  the  end  of  its  cycle  of  reincarnation  it  is  still  the  same  Divine  Consciousness,  but  it  has  now  become  individualized  Self -consciousness.

The  feeling  of  responsibility  is  inspired  by  the  presence  of  the  Light  of  the  Higher  Ego.

As  the  Ego  in  its  cycle  of  re-birth  becomes  more  and  more  individualized,  it  learns  more  and  more  by  suffering  to  recognize  its  own  responsibility,  by  which  it  finally  gains  Self-consciousness,  the  consciousness  of  ail  the  Egos  of  the  whole  Universe.

Absolute  Being,  to  have  the  idea  or  sensation  of  all  this,  must  pass  through  all  experience  individually,  not  univer-  sally, so  that  when  it  returns  it  should  be  of  the  same  omniscience  as  the  Universal  Mind  plus  the  memory  of  all  that  it  has  passed  through.


At  the  Day  "  Be  with  us  "  every  Ego  has  to  remember  all  the  cycles  of  its  past  reincarnations  for  Manvantaras.

The  Ego  comes  in  contact  with  this  earth,  all  seven  Principles  become  one,  it  sees  all  that  it  has  done  therein.

It  sees  the  stream  of  its  past  reincarnations  by  a  certain  divine  light,  it  sees  all  humanity  at  once,  but  still  there  is  ever,  as  it  were,  a  stream  which  is  always  the  "I."

We  should  therefore  always  endeavour  to  accentuate  our  responsibility.

The  Higher  Ego  is,  as  it  were,  a  globe  of  pure  divine  light,  a  Unit  from  a  higher  plane,  on  which  is  no  differentiation.

Descending  to  a  plane  of  differentiation  it  emanates  a  Ray,  which  it  can  only  manifest  through  the  personality  which  is  already  differentiated.

A  portion  of  this  Ray,  the  Lower  Manas,  during  life,  may  so  crystallize  itself  and  become  one  with  Kama  that  it  will  remain  assimilated  with  Matter.

That  portion  which  retains  its  purity  forms  Antahkarana.

The  whole  fate  of  an  incarnation  depends  on  whether  Antahkarana  will  be  able  to  restrain  the  Kama-Manas  or  not.

After  death  the  higher  light  (Antahkarana)  which  bears  the  impressions  and  memory  of  all  good  and  noble  aspirations,  assimilates  itself  with  the  Higher  Ego,  the  bad  is  dissociated  in  space,  and  comes  back  as  bad  Karma  awaiting  the  personality.

The  feeling  of  responsibility  is  the  beginning  of  Wisdom,  a  proof  that  Ahamkara  is  beginning  to  fade  out,  the  beginning  of  losing  the  sense  of  separateness.

KAMA  ROPA

The  Kama  Rupa  eventually  breaks  up  and  goes  into  animals.

All  red-  blooded  animals  come  from  man.

The  cold-blooded  are  from  the  matter  of  the  past.

The  blood  is  the  Kama  Rupa.

The  white  corpuscles  are  the  scavengers,  "  devourers  "  ;  they  are  oozed  out  of  the  Astral  through  the  spleen,  and  are  of  the  same  essence  as  the  Astral.

They  are  the  sweat-born  of  the  Chhaya.

Kama  is  everywhere  in  the  body.

The  red  cells  are  drops  of  electrical  fluid,  the  perspiration  of  all  the  organs  oozed  out  from  every  cell.

They  are  the  progeny  of  the  Fohatic  Principle.

HEART

There  are  seven  brains  in  the  heart,  the  Upadhis  and  symbols  of  the  seven  Hierarchies.

554  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

THE  FIRES

The  fires  are  always  playing  round  the  pineal  gland,  but  when  Kundalini  illuminates  them  for  a  brief  instant  the  whole  universe  is  seen.

Even  in  deep  sleep  the  Third  Eye  opens.

This  is  good  for  Manas,  who  profits  by  it,  though  we  ourselves  do  not  remember.

PERCEPTION

In  answer  to  a  question  on  the  seven  stages  of  perception,  H.  P.  B.  said  that  thought  should  be  centred  on  the  highest,  the  seventh,  and  then  an  attempt  to  transcend  this  will  prove  that  it  is  impossible  to  go  beyond  it  on  this  plane.

There  is  nothing  in  the  brain  to  carry  the  thinker  on,  and  if  thought  is  to  rise  yet  further  it  must  be  thought  without  a  brain.

Let  the  eyes  be  closed,  the  will  set  not  to  let  the  brain  work,  and  then  the  point  may  be  transcended  and  the  student  will  pass  to  the  next  plane.

All  the  seven  stages  of  perception  come  before  Antahkarana  ;  if  you  can  pass  beyond  them  you  are  on  the  Manasic  Plane.

Try  to  imagine  something  which  transcends  your  power  of  thought,  say,  the  nature  of  the  Dhyan  Chohans.

Then  make  the  brain  passive,  and  pass  beyond  ;  you  will  see  a  white  radiant  light,  like  silver,  but  opalescent  as  mother  of  pearl ;  then  waves  of  colour  will  pass  over  it,  beginning  in  the  tenderest  violet,  and  through  bronze  shades  of  green  to  indigo  with  metallic  lustre,  and  that  colour  will  remain.

If  you  see  this  you  are  on  another  plane.

You  should  pass  through  seven  stages.

When  a  colour  comes,  glance  at  it,  and  if  it  is  not  good  reject  it.  Let  your  attention  be  arrested  only  on  the  green,  indigo  and  yellow.

These  are  good  colours.

The  eyes  being  connected  with  the  brain,  the  colour  you  see  most  easily  will  be  the  colour  of  the  personality.

If  you  see  red,  it  is  merely  physiological,  and  is  to  be  disregarded.

Green-bronze  is  the  Lower  Manas,  yellow-bronze  the  Antahkarana,  indigo-bronze  is  Manas.

These  are  to  be  observed,  and  when  the  yellow-bronze  merges  into  the  indigo  you  are  on  the  Manasic  Plane.

On  the  Manasic  Plane  you  see  the  Noumena,  the  essence  of  pheno-  mena.

You  do  not  see  people  or  other  consciousnesses,  but  have  enough  to  do  to  keep  your  own.

The  trained  Seer  can  see  Noumena  always.

The  Adept  sees  the  Noumena  on  this  plane,  the  reality  of  things,  so  cannot  be  deceived.

In  meditation  the  beginner  may  waver  backwards  and  forwards  between  two  planes.

You  hear  the  ticking  of  a  clock  on  this  plane,  then  on  the  astral — the  soul  of  the  ticking.


When  clocks  are  stopped  here  the  ticking  goes  on  on  higher  planes,  in  the  astral,  and  then  in  the  ether,  until  the  last  bit  of  the  clock  is  gone.

It  is  the  same  as  with  a  dead  body,  which  sends  out  emanations  until  the  last  molecule  is  disintegrated.

There  is  no  time  in  meditation,  because  there  is  no  succession  of  states  of  consciousness  on  this  plane.

Violet  is  the  colour  of  the  Astral.

You  begin  with  it,  but  should  not  stay  in  it ;  try  to  pass  on.  When  you  see  a  sheet  of  violet,  you  are  beginning  unconsciously  to  form  a  Mayavi  Rupa.

Fix  your  attention,  and  if  you  go  away  keep  your  consciousness  firmly  to  the  Mayavic  Body  ;  do  not  lose  sight  of  it,  hold  on  like  grim  death.

CONSCIOUSNESS

The  consciousness  which  is  merely  the  animal  consciousness  is  made  up  •of  the  consciousness  of  all  the  cells  in  the  body  except  those  of  the  heart.

The  heart  is  the  king,  the  most  important  organ  in  the  body  of  man.

Even  if  the  head  be  severed  from  the  body,  the  heart  will  continue  to  beat  for  thirty  minutes.

It  will  beat  for  some  hours  if  wrapped  in  cotton  wool  and  put  in  a  warm  place.

The  spot  in  the  heart  which  is  the  last  of  all  to  die  is  the  seat  of  life,  the  centre  of  all,  Brahma,  the  first  spot  that  lives  in  the  foetus  and  the  last  that  dies.

When  a  Yogi  is  buried  in  a  trance  it  is  this  spot  that  lives,  though  the  rest  of  the  body  be  dead,  and  as  long  as  this  is  alive  the  Yogi  can  be  resurrected.

This  spot  contains  potentially  mind,  life,  energy,  and  will.

During  life  it  radiates  prismatic  colours,  fiery  and  opalescent.

The  heart  is  the  centre  of  spiritual  consciousness,  as  the  brain  is  the  centre  of  intellectual.

But  this  consciousness  cannot  be  guided  by  a  person,  nor  its  energy  directed  by  him  until  he  is  at  one  with  Buddhi-Manas  ;  until  then  it  guides  him — if  it  can.

Hence  the  pangs  of  remorse,  the  prickings  of  conscience  ;  they  come  from  the  heart,  not  the  head.

In  the  heart  is  the  only  manifested  God,  the  other  two  are  invisible,  and  it  is  this  which  represents  the  Triad,  Atma-Buddhi-Manas.

In  reply  to  a  question  whether  the  consciousness  might  not  be  concen-  trated in  the  heart,  and  so  the  promptings  of  the  Spirit  caught,  H.  P.  B.  said  that  any  one  who  could  thus  concentrate  would  be  at  one  with  Manas,  would  have  united  Kama-Manas  to  the  Higher  Manas.

The  Higher  Manas  could  not  directly  guide  man,  it  could  only  act  through  the  Lower  Manas.

There  are  three  principal  centres  in  man,  Heart,  Head,  and  Navel  :  any  two  of  which  may  be  -|-  or  —  to  each  other,  according  to  the  relative  predominance  of  the  centres.

556  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

The  heart  represents  the  Higher  Triad  ;  the  liver  and  spleen  represent  the  Quaternary.

The  solar  plexus  is  the  brain  of  the  stomach.

H.  P.  B.  was  asked  if  the  three  centres  above-named  would  represent  the  Christos,  crucified  between  two  thieves  ;  she  said  it  might  serve  as  an  analogy,  but  these  figures  must  not  be  over-driven.

It  must  never  be  for-  gotten that  the  Lower  Manas  is  the  same  in  its  essence  as  the  Higher,  and  may  become  one  with  it  by  rejecting  Kamic  impulses.

The  crucifixion  of  the  Christos  represents  the  self-sacrifice  of  the  Higher  Manas,  the  Father  that  sends  his  only  begotten  Son  into  the  world  to  take  upon  him  our  sins  :  the  Christ-myth  came  from  the  Mysteries.

So  also  did  the  life  of  Apollonius  of  Tyana  ;  this  was  suppressed  by  the  Fathers  of  the  Church  because  of  its.

striking  similarity  to  the  life  of  Christ.

The  psycho-intellectual  man  is  all  in  the  head  with  its  seven  gateways  ;  the  spiritual  man  is  in  the  heart.

The  convolutions  are  formed  by  thought.

The  third  ventricle  in  life  is  filled  with  light,  and  not  with  a  liquid  as  after  death.

There  are  seven  cavities  in  the  brain  which  are  quite  empty  during  life,  and  it  is  in  these  that  visions  must  be  reflected  if  they  are  to  remain  in  the  memory.

These  centres  are,  in  Occultism,  called  the  seven  harmonies,  the  scale  of  the  divine  harmonies.

They  are  filled  with  Akasha,  each  with  its  own.

colour,  according  to  the  state  of  consciousness  in  which  you  are.

The  sixth  is  the  pineal  gland,  which  is  hollow  and  empty  during  life  :  the  seventh  is  the  whole  ;  the  fifth  is  the  third  ventricle  :  the  fourth  the  pituitary  body.

When  Manas  is  united  to  Atma-Buddhi,  or  when  Atma-Buddhi  is  centred  in  Manas,  it  acts  in  the  three  higher  cavities,  radiating,  sending  forth  a  halo  of  light,  and  this  is  visible  in  the  case  of  a  very  holy  person.

The  cerebellum  is  the  centre,  the  storehouse,  of  all  the  forces  ;  it  is  the  Kama  of  the  head.

The  pineal  gland  corresponds  to  the  uterus  ;  its  peduncles  to  the  Fallopian  tubes.

The  pituitary  body  is  only  its  servant,  its  torch-bearer,  like  the  servants  bearing  lights  that  used  to  run  before  the  carriage  of  a  princess.

Man  is  thus  androgyne  so  far  as  his  head  is  concerned.

Man  contains  in  himself  every  element  that  is  found  in  the  Universe.

There  is  nothing  in  the  Macrocosm  that  is  not  in  the  Microcosm.

The  pineal  gland,  as  was  said,  is  quite  empty  during  life  ;  the  pituitary  contains  various  essences.

The  granules  in  the  pineal  gland  are  precipitated  after  death  within  the  cavity.

The  cerebellum  furnishes  the  materials  for  ideation  ;  the  frontal  lobes  of  the  cerebrum  are  the  finishers  and  polishers  of  the  materials,  but  they  cannot  create  of  themselves.


Clairvoyant  perception  is  the  consciousness  of  touch  ;  thus  reading  letters,  psychometrizing  substances,  etc.,  may  be  done  at  the  pit  of  the  stomach.

Every  sense  has  its  consciousness,  and  you  can  have  consciousness  through  every  sense.

There  may  be  consciousness  on  the  plane  of  sight,  though  the  brain  be  paralyzed  ;  the  eyes  of  a  paralyzed  person  will  show  terror.

So  with  the  sense  of  hearing.

Those  who  are  physically  blind,  deaf  or  dumb,  are  still  possessed  of  the  psychic  counterparts  of  these  senses.

WILL  AND  DESIRE

Eros  in  man  is  the  will  of  the  genius  to  create  great  pictures,  great  music,  things  that  will  live  and  serve  the  race.

It  has  nothing  in  common  with  the  animal  desire  to  create.

Will  is  of  the  Higher  Manas.

It  is  the  universal  harmonious  tendency  acting  by  the  Higher  Manas.

Desire  is  the  outcome  of  separateness,  aiming  at  the  satisfaction  of  Self  in  Matter.

The  path  opened  between  the  Higher  Ego  and  the  Lower  enables  the  Ego  to  act  on  the  personal  self.

CONVERSION

It  is  not  true  that  a  man  powerful  in  evil  can  suddenly  be  converted  and  become  as  powerful  for  good.

His  vehicle  is  too  defiled,  and  he  can  at  best  but  neutralize  the  evil,  balancing  up  the  bad  Karmic  causes  he  has  set  in  motion,  at  any  rate  for  this  incarnation.

You  cannot  take  a  herring  barrel  and  use  it  for  attar  of  roses  :  the  wood  is  too  soaked  through  with  the  drippings.

When  evil  impulses  and  tendencies  have  become  im-  pressed on  the  physical  nature,  they  cannot  at  once  be  reversed.

The  molecules  of  the  body  have  been  set  in  a  Kamic  direction,  and  though  they  have  sufficient  intelligence  to  discern  between  things  on  their  own  plane,  i.e.,  to  avoid  things  harmful  to  themselves,  they  cannot  understand  a  change  of  direction,  the  impulse  to  which  is  from  another  plane.

If  they  are  forced  too  violently,  disease,  madness  or  death  will  result.

ORIGINS

Absolute  eternal  motion,  Parabrahman,  which  is  nothing  and  everything,  motion  inconceivably  rapid,  in  this  motion  throws  off  a  film,  which  is  Energy,

558  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Eros.

It  thus  transforms  itself  to  Mulaprakriti,  primordial  Substance  which  is  still  Energy.

This  Energy,  still  transforming  itself  in  its  ceaseless  and  in-  conceivable motion,  becomes  the  Atom,  or  rather  the  germ  of  the  Atom,  and  then  it  is  on  the  Third  Plane.

Our  Manas  is  a  Ray  from  the  World-Soul  and  is  withdrawn  at  Pralaya  ;  "  it  is  perhaps  the  Lower  Manas  of  Parabrahman,"  that  is,  of  the  Parabrahman  of  the  manifested  Universe.

The  first  film  is  Energy,  or  motion  on  the  manifested  plane  ;  Alaya  is  the  Third  Logos,  Maha-Buddhi,  Mahat.

We  always  begin  on  the  Third  Plane  ;  beyond  that  all  is  inconceivable.

Atma  is  focussed  in  Buddhi,  but  is  embodied  only  in  Manas,  these  being  the  Spirit,  Soul  and  Body  of  the  Universe.

DREAMS

We  may  have  evil  experiences  in  dreams  as  well  as  good.

We  should,  therefore,  train  ourselves  so  as  to  awaken  directly  we  tend  to  do  wrong.

The  Lower  Manas  is  asleep  in  sense-dreams,  the  animal  consciousness  being  then  guided  towards  the  Astral  Light  by  Kama  ;  the  tendency  of  such  sense-dreams  is  always  towards  the  animal.

If  we  could  remember  our  dreams  in  deep  sleep,  then  we  should  be  able  to  remember  all  our  past  incarnations.

NIDANAS

There  are  twelve  Nidanas,  exoteric  and  Esoteric,  the  fundamental  doctrine  of  Buddhism.

So  also  there  are  twelve  exoteric  Buddhist  Suttas  called  Nidanas,  each  giving  one  Nidana.

The  Nidanas  have  a  dual  meaning.

They  are  :

1.  The   twelve   causes  of  sentient   existence,  through  the  twelve  links  of  subjective   with   objective   Nature,   or   between  the   subjective  and  objective  Natures.

2.  A  concatenation  of  causes  and  effects.

Every  cause  produces  an  effect,  and  this  effect  becomes  in  its  turn  a  cause.

Each  of  these  has  as  Upadhi  (basis),  one  of  the  subdivisions  of  one  of  the  Nidanas,  and  also  an  effect  or  consequence.

Both  bases  and  effects  belong  to  one  or  another  Nidana,  each  having  from  three  to  seventeen,  eighteen  and  twenty-one  sub-divisions.


The  names  of  the  twelve  Nidanas  are  :

1.  Jaramarana  7.  Sparsha

2.  Jati  8.  Chadayatana

3.  Bhava  9.  Namarupa

4.  Upadana  10.  Vijnana

5.  Trishna  11.  Samskara

6.  Vedana  12.  Avidya  l

1.  JARAMARANA,    lit.

death  in  consequence  of  decrepitude.

Notice  that  death  and   not  life  comes  as  the  first  of  the  Nidanas.

This  is  the  first  funda-  mental in  Buddhist  Philosophy  ;  every  Atom,  at  every  moment,  as  soon  as  it  is  born  begins  dying.

The  five  Skandhas  are  founded  on  it ;  they  are  its  effects  or  product.

Moreover,  in  its  turn,  it  is  based  on  the  five  Skandhas.

They  are  mutual  things,  one  gives  to  the  other.

2.  JATI,  lit.

Birth.

That  is  to  say,  Birth  according  to  one  of  the  four  modes  of  Chaturyoni  (the  four  wombs),  viz.

:

i.  Through  the  womb,  like  Mammalia,  ii.   Through  Eggs.

iii.

Ethereal  or  liquid  Germs — fish  spawn,  pollen,  insects,  etc.

iv.  Anupadaka — Nirmlnak^yas,  Gods,  etc.

That   is  to  say  that  birth  takes  place  by  one  of  these  modes.

You  must  be   born  in   one  of  the  six  objective  modes  of  existence,  or  in  the  seventh  which  is  subjective.

These  four  are  within  six  modes  of  existence,  viz.

:  Exoterically  : —

i.   Devas  ;  ii.    Men  ;   iii.

Asuras  ;   iv.   Men   in   Hell  ;  v.  Pretas,  devouring  demons  on  earth  ;  vi.  animals.

Esoterically  : —

i.  Higher  Gods  ;  ii.  Devas  or  Pitris  (all  classes)  ;  iii.

Nirmanakayas  ;  iv.  Bodhisattvas  ;  v.  Men  in  Myalba  ;  vi.  Kama  Rupic  existences,  whether  of  men  or  animals,  in  Kama  Loka  or  the  Astral  Light ;  vii.

Elementals  (Subjective  Existences).

3.  BHAVA^Karmic  existence,   not  life  existence,   but  as   a  moral  agent  which  determines   where  you  will  be  born,  i.e.,  in  which  of  the  Triloka,  Bhur,  Bhuvar  or  Svar  (seven  Lokas  in  reality).

The  cause  or  Nidana  of  Bhava  is  Upadana,  that  is,  the  clinging  to  exis-  tence, that  which  makes  us  desire  life  in  whatever  form.

1  [If  the  Nidanas  are  read  the  reverse  fray,  i.e.,  from  12  to  1.  they  give  the  evolutionary  order.—  Ed.,  of  the  1897  edition.]  [See Glossary.

Vol.

vi,  for  further  meanings  of  these  words.]

560  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Its  effect  is  Jati  in  one  or  another  of  the  Triloka  and  under  whatever  conditions.

Nidanas  are  the  detailed  expression  of  the  law  of  Karma  under  twelve  aspects  ;  or  we  might  say  the  law  of  Karma  under  twelve  Nidanic  aspects.

SKANDHAS

Skandhas  are  the  germs  of  life  on  all  the  seven  planes  of  Being,  and  make  up  the  totality  of  the  subjective  and  objective  man.

Every  vibration  we  have  made  is  a  Skandha.

The  Skandhas  are  closely  united  to  the  pictures  in  the  Astral  Light,  which  is  the  medium  of  impressions,  and  the  Skandhas,  or  vibrations,  connected  with  subjective  or  objective  man,  are  the  links  which  attract  the  Reincarnating  Ego,  the  germs  left  behind  when  it  went  into  Devachan  which  have  to  be  picked  up  again  and  exhausted  by  a  new  personal-  ity.

The  exoteric  Skandhas  have  to  do  with  the  physical  atoms  and  vibrations,  or  objective  man  ;  the  Esoteric  with  the  internal  and  subjective  man.

A  mental  change,  or  a  glimpse  of  spiritual  truth,  may  make  a  man  suddenly  change  to  the  truth  even  at  his  death,  thus  creating  good  Skandhas  for  the  next  life.

The  last  acts  or  thoughts  of  a  man  have  an  enormous  effect  upon  his  future  life,  but  he  would  still  have  to  suffer  for  his  misdeeds,  and  this  is  the  basis  of  the  idea  of  a  death-bed  repentance.

But  the  Karmic  effects  of  the  past  life  must  follow,  for  the  man  in  his  next  birth  must  pick  up  the  Skandhas  or  vibratory  impressions  that  he  left  in  the  Astral  Light,  since  nothing  comes  from  nothing  in  Occultism,  and  there  must  be  a  link  between  the  lives.

New  Skandhas  are  born  from  their  old  parents.

It  is  wrong  to  speak  of  Tanhas  in  the  plural  ;  there  is  only  one  Tanha,  the  desire  to  live.

This  develops  into  a  multitude  or  one  might  say  a  con-  geries of  ideas.

The  Skandhas  are  Karmic  and  non-Karmic.

Skandhas  may  produce  Elemental*  by  unconscious  Kriyashakti.

Every  Elemental  that  is  thrown  out  by  man  must  return  to  him  sooner  or  later,  since  it  is  his  own  vibration.

They  thus  become  his  Frankenstein.

Elementals  are  simply  effects  producing  effects.

They  are  disembodied  thoughts,  good  and  bad.

They  remain  crystallized  in  the  Astral  Light  and  are  attracted  by  affinity  and  -galvanized  back  into  life  again,  when  their  originator  returns  to  earth-life.

You  can  paralyze  them  by  reverse  effects.

Elementals  are  caught  like  a  disease  and  hence  are  dangerous  to  ourselves  and  to  others.

This  is  why  it  is  dangerous  to  influence  others.

The  Elementals  which  live  after  your  death  are  those  which  you  implant  in  others  :  the  rest  remain  latent  till  you  are  reincarnated,  when  they  come  to  life  in  you.

"  Thus,"  H.  P.  B.  said,  "  if

MOTES  ON  SOME  ORAL  TEACHINGS

you  are  badly  taught  by  me  or  incited  thereby  to  do  something  wrong,  you  would  go  on  after  my  death  and  sin  through  me,  but  I  should  have  to  bear  the  Karma.

Calvin,  for  instance,  will  have  to  suffer  for  all  the  wrong  teaching  he  has  given,  though  he  gave  it  with  good  intentions.

The  worst  *  *  *  *  does  is  to  arrest  the  progress  of  truth.

Even  Buddha  made  mistakes.

He  applied  his  teaching  to  people  who  were  not  ready  ,  and  this  has  produced  Nidanas."

SUBTLE    BODIES

When  a  man  visits  another  in  his  Astral  Body,  it  is  the  Lmga  Sharira  which  goes,  but  this  cannot  happen  at  any  great  distance.

When  a  man  .thinks  of  another  at  a  distance  very  intently,  he  sometimes  appears  to  that  .person.

In  this  case  it  is  the  Mayavi  Rupa,  which  is  created  by  unconscious  'Kriyashakti,  and  the  man  himself  is  not  conscious  of  appearing.

If  he  were,  and  projected  his  Mayavi  Rupa  consciously,  he  would  be  an  Adept.1  No  two  persons  can  be  simultaneously  conscious  of  one  another's  presence,  unless  one  be  an  Adept.

Dugpas  use  the  Mayavi  Rupa  and  sorcerers  also.

Dugpas  work  on  the  Linga  Sharira  of  other  people.

The  Linga  Sharira  in  the  spleen  is  the  perfect  picture  of  the  man,  ,and  is  good  or  bad,  according  to  his  own  nature.

The  Astral  Body  is  the  subjective  image  of  the  man  which  is  to  be,  the  first  germ  in  the  matrix,  the  model  of  the  physical  body  in  which  the  child  is  formed  and  developed.

The  Linga  Sharira  may  be  hurt  by  a  sharp  instrument,  and  would  not  face  a  sword  or  bayonet,  although  it  would  easily  pass  through  a  table  or  .other  piece  of  furniture.

Nothing  however  can  hurt  the  Mayavi  Rupa  or  thought-body,  since  it  is  purely  subjective.

When  swords  are  struck  at  shades,  it  is  the  sword  itself,  not  its  Linga  Sharira  or  Astral  that  cuts.

Sharp  instruments  alone  can  penetrate  Astrals,  e.g.,  under  water,  a  blow  will  not  affect  you,  but  a  cut  will.

The  projection  of  the  Astral  Body  should  not  be  attempted,  but  the  •power  of  Kriyashakti  should  be  exercised  in  the  projection  of  the  Mayavi  .Rupa.

1  [i.e.,  an  initiate,  the  word  Adept  being  used  by  H.  P.  B.  to  cover  all  grades  of  Initiation.

As  .above  seen,  she  used  the  words  Mayavi  ROpa  in  more  than,  one  sense— Ed.,  of  the  1897  edition.]  FF

562  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

FIRE

Fire  is  not  an  Element  but  a  divine  thing.

The  physical  flame  is  the  objective  vehicle  of  the  highest  Spirit.

The  Fire  Elementals  are  the  highest.

Everything  in  this  world  has  its  Aura  and  its  Spirit.

The  flame  you  apply  to  the  candle  has  nothing  to  do  with  the  candle  itself.

The  Aura  of  the  object  comes  into  conjunction  with  the  lowest  part  of  the  other.

Granite  cannot  burn  because  its  Aura  is  Fire.

Fire  Elementals  have  no  consciousness  on  this  plane,  they  are  too  high,  reflecting  the  divinity  of  their  own  source.

Other  Elementals  have  consciousness  on  this  plane  as  they  reflect  man  and  his  nature.

There  is  a  very  great  difference  between  the  mineral  and  vegetable  kingdoms.

The  wick  of  the  lamp,  for  instance,  is  negative.

It  is  made  positive  by  fire,  the  oil  being  the  medium.

£ther  is  Fire.

The  lowest  part  of  £ther  is  the  flame  which  you  see.

Fire  is  Divinity  in  its  subjective  presence  throughout  the  universe.

Under  other  conditions,  this  Universal  Fire  manifests  as  water,  air  and  earth.

It  is  the  one  Element  in  our  visible  Universe  which  is  the  Kriyashakti  of  all  forms  of  life.

It  is  that  which  gives  light,  heat,  death,  life,  etc.

It  is  even  the  blood.

In  all  its  various  manifestations  it  is  essentially  one.

4  It  is  the  "  seven  Cosmocratores."

Evidences  of  the  esteem  in  which  Fire  was  held  are  to  be  found  in  the  Old  Testament.

The  Pillar  of  Fire,  the  Burning  Bush,  the  Shining  Face  of  Moses — all  Fire.

Fire  is  like  a  looking-glass  in  its  nature,  and  reflects  the  beams  of  the  first  order  of  subjective  manifestions  which  are  supposed  to  be  thrown  on  to  the  screen  of  the  first  outlines  of  the  created  universe  ;  in  their  lower  aspect  these  are  the  creations  of  Fire.

Fire  in  the  grossest  aspect  of  its  essence  is  the  first  form  and  reflects  the  lower  forms  of  the  first  subjective  beings  which  are  in  the  universe.

The  first  divine  chaotic  thoughts  are  the  Fire  Elementals.

When  on  earth  they  take  form  and  come  flitting  in  the  flame  in  the  form  of  the  Salamanders  or  lower  Fire  Elementals.

In  the  air  you  have  millions  of  living  and  conscious  beings,  besides  our  thoughts  which  they  catch  up.  The  Fire  Elementals  are  related  to  the  sense  of  sight  and  absorb  the  Elementals  of  all  the  other  senses.

Thus  through  sight  you  can  have  the  consciousness  of  feeling,  hearing,  tasting,  etc.,  since  all  are  included  in  the  sense  of  sight.

HINTS  ON  THE  FUTURE

As  time  passes  on  there  will  be  more  and  more  ether  in  the  air.

When  ether  fills  the  air,  then  will  be  born  children  without  fathers.

In  Virginia  there

MOTES  ON  SOME  ORAL  TEACHINGS

s  an  apple  tree  of  a  special  kind.

It  does  not  blossom  but  bears  fruit  from  a  dnd  of  berry  without  any  seeds.

This  will  gradually  extend  to  animals  and  hen  to  men.

Women  will  bear  children  without  impregnation,  and  in  the  Seventh  Round  there  will  appear  men  who  can  reproduce  themselves.

In  the  Seventh  Race  of  the  Fourth  Round,  men  will  change  their  skins  every  year  and  will  have  new  toe  and  finger  nails.

People  will  become  more/  psychic,  :hen  spiritual.

Last  of  all  in  the  Seventh  Round,  Buddhas  will  be  born  with-  out sin.

The  Fourth  Round  is  the  longest  in  the  Kali  Yuga,  then  the  Fifth,  :hen  the  Sixth,  and  the  Seventh  Round  will  be  very  short.

THE  EGOS

In  explaining  the  relations  of  the  Higher  and  Lower  Ego,  Devachan,  and  the  "  Death  of  the  Soul,"  the  following  figure  was  drawn  :

LJML  /     \  HJt

On  the  separation  of  the  Principles  at  death  the  Higher  Ego  may  be  >aid  to  go  to  Devachan  by  reason  of  the  experiences  of  the  Lower.

The  Higher  Ego  in  its  own  plane  is  the  Kumara.

The  Lower  Quaternary  dissolves ;  the  body  rots,  the  Linga  Sharira  Fades  out.

At   reincarnation  the   Higher   Ego   shoots   out  a   Ray,  the  Lower  Ego.

Its  energies  are  upward  and  downward.

The  upward  tendencies  become  its  Devachanic  experiences;  the  lower  are  Kamic.

The  Higher  Manas  stands  to  Buddhi  as  the  Lower  Manas  to  the  Higher.

As  to  the  question  of  responsibility,  it  may  be  understood  by  an  example.

If  you  take  the  form  of  Jack  the  Ripper,  you  must  suffer  for  its  misdeeds,  for  the  law  will  punish  the  murderer  and  hold  him  responsible.

You  are  the  sacrificial  victim.

In  the  same  way  the  Higher  Ego  is  the  Christos,  the  sacri-  ficial victim  for  the  Lower  Manas.

The  Ego  takes  the  responsibility  of  every  body  it  informs.

You  borrow  some  money  to  lend  it  to  another ;  the  other  runs  away,  but  it  is  you  who  are  responsible.

The  mission  of  the  Higher  Ego  is  to  shoot  out  a  Ray  to  be  a  Soul  in  a  child.

564  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

Thus  the  Ego  incarnates  in  a  thousand  bodies,  taking  upon  itself  the  sins  and  responsibilities  of  each  body.

At  every  incarnation  a  new  Ray  is  emitted,  and  yet  it  is  the  same  Ray  in  essence,  the  same  in  you  and  me  and  every  one.

The  dross  of  the  incarnation  disintegrates,  the  good  goes  to  Devachan.

The  Flame  is  eternal.

From  the  Flame  of  the  Higher  Ego,  the  Lower  is  lighted,  and  from  this  a  lower  vehicle,  and  so  on,

And  yet  the  Lower  Manas  is  such  as  it  makes  itself.

It  is  possible  for  it  to  act  differently  in  like  conditions,  for  it  has  reason  and  self-conscious  knowledge  of  right  and  wrong,  and  good  and  evil,  given  to  it.  It  is  in  fact  endowed  with  all  the  attributes  of  the  Divine  Soul.

In  this  the  Ray  is  the  Higher  Manas,  the  speck  of  responsibility  on  earth.

The  part  of  the  essence  is  the  essence,  but  while  it  is  out  of  itself,  so  to  say,  it  can  get  soiled  and  polluted.

The  Ray  can  be  manifested  on  this  earth  because  it  can  send  forth  its  Mayavi  Rupa.

But  the  Higher  cannot,  so  it  has  to  send  forth  a  Ray.

We  may  look  upon  the  Higher  Ego  as  the  Sun,  and  the  personal  Manases  as  its  Rays.

If  we  take  away  the  surrounding  air  and  light,  the  Ray  may  be  said  to  return  to  the  Sun,  so  with  the  Lower  Manas  and  Lower  Quaternary.

The  Higher  Ego  can  only  manifest  through  its  attributes.

In  cases  of  sudden  death,  the  Lower  Manas  no  more  disappears  than  does  the  Kama  Rupa  after  death.

After  the  severance  the  Ray  may  be  said  to  snap  or  be  dropped.

After  death  such  a  man  cannot  go  to  Devachan,  nor  yet  remain  in  Kama  Loka  ;  his  fate  is  to  reincarnate  immediately.

Such  an  entity  is  then  an  animal  Soul  plus  the  intelli-  gence of  the  severed  Ray.

The  manifestation  of  this  intelligence  in  the  next  birth  will  depend  entirely  on  the  physical  formation  of  the  brain  and  on  education.

Such  a  soul  may  be  re-united  with  its  Higher  Ego  in  the  next  birth,  if  the  environment  is  such  as  to  give  it  a  chance  of  aspiration  (this  is  the  "  grace  "  of  the  Christians)  ;  or  it  may  go  on  for  two  or  three  incarnations,  the  Ray  becoming  weaker  and  weaker,  and  gradually  dissipating,  until  it  is  born  a  congenital  idiot  and  then  finally  dissipated  in  lower  forms.

There  are  enormous  mysteries  connected  with  the  Lower  Manas.

With  regard  to  some  intellectual  giants,  they  are  in  somewhat  the  same  condition  as  smaller  men,  for  their  Higher  Ego  is  paralyzed,  that  is  to  say,  their  spiritual  nature  is  atrophied.

The  Manas  can  pass  its  essence  to  several  vehicles,  e.g.,  the  Mayavi  Rupa,  etc.,  and  even  to  Elemental*  which  it  can  ensoul,  as  the  Rosicrucians  taught.


The  Mayavi  Rupa  may  be  sometimes  so  vitalized  that  it  goes  on  to  another  plane  and  unites  with  the  beings  of  that  plane  and  so  ensouls  them.

People  who  bestow  great  affection  upon  animal  pets  are  ensouling  them  to  a  certain  extent,  and  such  animal  Souls  progress  very  rapidly  ;  in  return  such  persons  get  back  the  animal  vitality  and  magnetism.

It  is,  however,  against  Nature  thus  to  accentuate  animal  evolution,  and  on  the  whole  is  bad.

MONADIC  EVOLUTION

The  Kumaras  do  not  direct  the  evolution  of  the  Lunar  Pitris.

To  understand  the  latter,  we  might  take  the  analogy  of  the  blood.

The  blood  may  be  compared  to  the  universal  Life  Principle,  the  corpuscles  to  the  Monads.

The  different  kinds  of  corpuscles  are  the  same  as  the  various  classes  of  Monads  and  various  kingdoms,  not,  however,  because  of  their  essence  being  different,  but  because  of  the  environment  in  which  they  are.

The  Chhaya  is  the  permanent  seed,  and  Weissmann  in  his  hered-  itary germ  theory  is  very  near  truth.

H.  P.  B.  was  asked  whether  there  was  one  Ego  to  one  permanent  Chhaya  seed,  oversouling  it  in  a  series  of  incarnations  ;  her  answer  was  :  "  No,  it  is  Heaven  and  Earth  kissing  each  other."

The  animal  Souls  are  in  temporary  forms  and  shells  in  which  they  gain  experience,  and  in  which  they  prepare  materials  for  higher  evolution.

Until  the  age  of  seven  the  astral  atavic  germ  forms  and  moulds  the  body ;  after  that  the  body  forms  the  Astral.

The  Astral  and  the  Mind  mutually  react  on  each  other.

The  meaning  of  the  passage  in  the  Upanishads,  where  it  says  that  the  Gods  feed  on  men,  is  that  the  Higher  Ego  obtains  its  earth  experience  through  the  Lower.

ASTRAL  BODY

»

The  Astral  can  get  out  unconsciously  to  the  person  and  wander  about.

The  Chhaya  is  the  same  as  the  Astral  Body.

The  germ  or  life  essence  of  it  is  in  the  spleen.

"  The  Chhaya  is  coiled  up  in  the  spleen."  It  is  from  this  that  the  Astral  is  formed ;  it  evolves  in  a  shadowy  curling  or  gyrating  essence  like  smoke,  gradually  taking  form  as  it  grows.

But  it  is  not  projected  from  the  physical,  atom  for  atom.

This  latter  intermolecular  form  is  the  Kama  Rupa.

At  death  every  cell  and  molecule  gives  out  its  essence,  and  from  it  is  formed  the  Astral  of  the  Kama  Rupa  ;  but  this  can  never  come  out  during  life.

566  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

The  Chhaya  in  order  to  become  visible  draws  upon  the  surrounding  atmosphere,  attracting  the  atoms  to  itself ;  the  Linga  Sharira  could  not  form  in  vacuo.

The  fact  of  the  Astral  Body  accounts  for  the  Arabian  and  Eastern  tales  of  Djins  and  bottle  imps,  etc.

In  spiritualistic  phenomena,  the  resemblance  to  deceased  persons  is  mostly  caused  by  the  imagination.

The  clothing  of  such  phantoms  is  formed  from  the  living  atoms  of  the  medium,  and  is  no  real  clothing,  and  has  nothing  to  do  with  the  clothing  of  the  medium.

"AH  the  clothing  of  a  materialization  has  been  paid  for."

The  Astral  supports  life ;  it  is  the  reservoir  or  sponge  of  life,  gathering  ft  up  from  all  the  natural  kingdoms  around,  and  is  the  intermediary  between  the  kingdoms  of  Pranic  and  physical  life.

Life  cannot  come  immediately  from  the  subjective  to  the  objective,  for  Nature  goes  gradually  through  each  sphere.

Therefore  the  Linga  Sharira  is  the  intermediary  between  Prana  and  our  physical  body,  and  pumps  in  the  life.

The  spleen  is  consequently  a  very  delicate  organ,  but  the  physical  spleen  is  only  a  cover  for  the  real  spleen.

Now  Life  is  in  reality  Divinity,-  Parabrahman.

But  in  order  to  manifest  on  the  Physical  Plane  it  must  be  assimilated  ;  and  as  the  purely  physical  is  too  gross,  it  must  have  a  medium,  viz.,  the  Astral.

Astral  matter  is  not  homogeneous,  and  the  Astral  Light  is  nothing  but  the  shadow  of  the  real  Divine  Light ;  it  is  however  not  molecular.

Those  (Kamarupic)  entities  which  are  below  the  Devachanic  Plane  are  in  Kama  Loka  and  only  possess  intelligence  like  monkeys.

There  are  no  entities  in  the  four  lower  kingdoms  possessing  intelligence  which  can  communicate  with  men,  but  the  Elementals  have  instincts  like  animals.

It  is,  however,  possible  for  the  Sylphs  (the  Air  Elementals,  the  wickedest  things  in  the  world)  to  communicate,  but  they  require  to  be  propitiated.

Spooks  (KamarOpic  entities)  oan  only  give  the  information  they  see  immediately  before  them.

They  see  things  in  the  Aura  of  people,  although  the  people  may  not  be  aware  of  them  themselves.

Earth-bound  spirits  are  Kamalokic  entities  that  have  been  so  materialistic  that  they  cannot  be  dissolved  for  a  long  time.

They  have  only  a  glimmering  of  consciousness  and  do  not  know  why  they  are  held,  some  sleep,  some  pre-  serve a  glimmering  of  consciousness  and  suffer  torture.

In  the  case  of  people  who  have  very  little  Devachan,  the  greater  part  of  the  consciousness  remains  in  Kama  Loka,  and  may  last  far  beyond  the  normal  period  of  one  hundred  and  fifty  years  and  remain  over  until  the  next reincarnation  of  the  Spirit.


This  then  becomes  the  Dweller  on  the  Threshold  -and  fights  with  the  new  Astral.

The  acme  of  Kama  is  the  sexual  instinct,  e.g.,  idiots  have  such  desires  and  also  food  appetites,  etc.,  and  nothing  else.

Devachan  is  a  state  on  a  plane  of  spiritual  consciousness ,  Kama  Loka  is  a  place  of  physical  consciousness.

It  is  the  shadow  of  the  animal  world  and  that  of  instinctual  feelings.

When  the  consciousness  thinks  of  spiritual  things,  it  is  on  a  spiritual  plane.

If  one's  thoughts  are  of  nature,  flowers,  etc,  then  the  consciousness  is  on  the  material  plane.

But  if  thoughts  are  about  eating,  drinking,  etc.,  and  the  passions,  then  the  consciousness  is  in  the  Kamalokic  plane,  which  is  the  plane  of  animal  .instincts  pure  and  simple.

t  W.  \  THERE  IS  NO  RELIGION  HIGHER  THAN  TRUTH

ADDITIONAL  NOTES

Of  (fie  true  Mysteries,  the  real  Initiations,     p.

Dr.  Annie  Besant  had  only  H  P.  Blavatsky's  later  MSS  ,  which  were  much'  altered  by  Madame  Blavatsky  herself,  as  compared  with  the  1886  MS  As  was  pointed  out  in  "  How  The  Secret  Doctrine  was  Written  "  (see  Vol  1),  this  1886  MS  was  "  dis-  covered "  by  Mr.  Jmarajadasa  in  1921  In  this  MS  the  "  gap  "  is  filled  in  as  follows :

"  In  the  secret  work  upon  the  Mysteries  and  rites  of  Initiation,  in  which  very  rough  but  correct  points  are  given  in  the  sacramental  postures  and  trials  to  which  the  postulant  was  subjected— together  with  the  test,  the  following  details  are  found  (1)  The  neophyte  representing  the  Sun  as  Sahasra-kirana — "  he  of  the  thousand  rays  " — is.  shown  kneeling  before  the  Hierophant.

The  latter  is  in  the  act  of  cutting  off  seven  locks  of  the  Neophyte's  long  hair,1  and,  in  the  following  (2)  illustration,  the  postulant's  bright  crown  of  golden  beams  is  thrown  off  and  replaced  by  a  wreath  of  sharp  ligneous  spines,  symbolising  the  loss."  This  was  enacted  in  India  In  trans-Himalayan  regions  it  was  the  same.

In  order  to  become  a  "  Perfect  "  one  the  Sakndagamin  ("  he  who  will  receive  new  birth  ",  lit.)  had,  among  other  trials  to  descend  into  Patala,  the  "  nether  world,"  after  which  process  only,  he  could  hope  to  become  an  Anagamm — "  one  who  will  be  reborn  no  more."  The  full  Initiate  had  the  option  of  either  entering  this  (second)  Path  by  appearing  at  will  in  the  world  of  men  under  a  human  form,  or  he  could  choose  to  first  rest  in  the  World  of  Cods  (the  Devachan  of  the  Initiate),  and  then  only  to  be  reborn  on  this  our  earth.

Thus  the  next  stage  shows  the  Postulant  preparing  for  this,  journey, — (3)

1  See  Judges,  ch   xvi,  19,  where  Samson,  also  a  symbolic  personification  of  the  Sun,  as  Hercules,  [also]  speaks  of  hair  which,  if  cut  off,  will  deprive  him  of  his  strength,  of  "  seven  green  withs,"  etc.

2  No  need  of  explaining  that  Sanjna,  pure  spiritual  conscience  [consciousness  ?]  is  the  inner  per-  ception of  the  Neophyte  for  Chela)  and  Initiate  ,  the  scorching  of  it  by  the  most  ardent  beams  of  the  Sun  being  symbolical  of  the  terrestial  passions.

Hence  the  seven  locks  symbolical  of  the  seven  cardi-  nal  sins.

As  to  the  seven  cardinal  virtues,   in  order  to  be  regained  by  the  Sakriddg2mm  (the  candi-  date "  for  new  birth  "),  they  could  be  attained  by  him  only  through  severe  trials  and  suffering.

ADDITIONAL  NOTES  569'

Every  kind  of  temptation,  (we  have  no  right  to  enumerate  these  or  speak  of  them)  was  being  placed  in  his  way.

If  he  came  out  victorious  from  these,  then  one  more  Initiation  was  proceeded  with  ,  if  he  fell  —  it  was  delayed,  and  often  entirely  lost  for  him.

These  rules  lasted  seven  days.

During  the  first  three,  as  said,  he  was  tried  and  examined  as  to  his  proficiency  in  Occult  learning.

On  the  fourth  day  —  (4)  he  was  tied,  extended  full  length,  and  with  his  arms  stretched  out  on  a  wooden  lathe,  symbolical  of  purification,  his  impurities  having  to  be  smoothed  off,  like  a  piece  of  rough,  unfashioned  wood.

After  this  he  was  left  alone  in  a  subterranean  crypt,  in  utter  darkness,  for  two  days  and  two  nights.

.  .

Samvatsara,  etc.

(5  year  cycles),  p.

There  was  a  method  of  reckoning  years  in  cycles  of  five  and  sometimes  six  years,  and  they  are  named  in  this  order  for  the  purpose  of  intercalation.

Sayana,  in  his  commentary  on  the  Jaittiriya  Brahmana  (3.  10.  4),  says  that,  in  the  cycle  of  60  Samvatsaras,  Prabhava,  Vibhava,  etc.,  every  five  years  are  called  respectively  by  these  names.

For  example  :  the  1st  Prabhava,  is  Samvatsara  ;  2nd,  Vibhava,  is  Parivatsara  ;  3rd,  Shukla,  is  Idavatsara  ,  4th,  Pramoda,  is  Iduvatsara  ,  5th,  Prajapati,  is  Idvatsara.

He  adds  that  Vatsara  (a  year)  is  a  common  name  for  all  five.

See  also  p.

The  Sacred  Canon  of  the  Tibetans  .   .  .  "p.  390,  footnote.

This  Sacred  Canon  is  contained  in  two  works,  the  Kanjur  and  the  7an/ur  The-  Kanjur,  the  great  code  ("  The  Translated  Commandment,"  from  Sanskrit)  is  the  Canon,  of  which  the  Prajna-Paramita  forms  the  chief  portion  of  the  third  division  ;  the  Janjur  is  the  Commentary  on  the  Kan/ur,  which  consists  of  108  volumes  of  about  1000  pages  each,  comprising  1083  distinct  words.

A  number  of  spellings  is  given  for  these  two  titles  :  Kan/ur  has  Bhah-hgyur,  Kah-gyur,  Kah-gyur,  Kang-gyur  ,  Tanjur  has  Bstan-gyur.

Tan-gyur,  etc.

(the  supernatural  abnormal  five  powers),  p.

These  are  :  1  Taking  any  form  at  will  ,  2  Hearing  to  any  distance  ,  3.  Seeing  to  any  distance  ;  4.  Penetrating  men's  thoughts  ;  5.  Knowing  their  state  and.

antecedents.

Pra/na  Paramita,  p.  400.

The  Pra/na  Paramita  consists  of  discourses  which  Nagarjuna  attributed  to  the  Buddha  Shakyamuni,  though  another  account  attributes  them  to  Maha  Kashyapa,  the  Buddha's  disciple.

There  are  Six  Paramitas  —  boundless  virtues  :  1.  Prajna,  the  doctrine  of  no  dis-  tinction between  SangsSra  and  Nirvana  —  for  the  Absolute  is  the  source  and  support  of  phenomena  ;  2.  Dana,  Boundless  Chanty  ;  3.  Shila,  Boundless  Morality  ;  4.  Kshanti,  Boundless  Patience  ,  5.  Virya,  Boundless  Industry  ;  6.  Dhyana,  Boundless  Meditation.

See  also  The  Voice  of  the  Silence.

570  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

The  fabulous  country,  Sambhala  [Shamballah,  Shamballa],  p.  404.

"  This  city  is  in  the  Gobi  Desert.

Its  outskirts  have  been  partially  uncovered  by  an  American  expedition.

But  I  do  not  think  they  will  find  the  White  Island,  with  its  great  white  marble  Temple  where  abide  '  The  Four.'  It  is  there  the  great  gathering  takes  place  every  seven  years  that  H  P.B.  speaks  of  in  his  Unveiled  and  which  I  have  attended."  Dr.  Annie  Besant  in  The  Jheosophist,  November,  1929,  p.  151.

The  Edinburgh  Review,  October  1890,  quotes  a  Tibetan  work  called  A  Guide  for  the  Journey  to  Shamballa,  in  which  book  Shamballa  is  described  as  "  a  supernal  city  supposed  to  exist  on  the  borders  of  Mongolia,  and  every  Mongol  pilgrim  visiting  Lha-SS  prays  the  great  Deities  and  the  living  celebrities  of  the  place  to  grant  that,  in  his  next  birth,  he  may  be  reborn  in  the  blessed  groves  of  Shamballa."

Schlagmtweit,  in  Buddhism  in  Jibet,  writes  (page  32)  "  Csoma  [de  Kords],  after  careful  researches,  put  this  country  Shambhala,  (Tib.

Dejoung)  beyond  the  Sir  Deriau  (Yaxartes  River)  between  45°  and  50°  N.  F.  L.  Woodward  in  Jhe  Jheosophist,  June  1923,  p.  328,  comments  on  this  that :  110°  E  and  45°  N  is  the  exact  centre  of  the  Gobi  or  Shamo  desert,  still  a  blank  on  our  maps.

He  adds  that  according  to  the  Puranas,  the  Shamballa  Island  is  surrounded  by  a  sea  of  wine,  and  stands  in  the  Shalmali  (Skt.)  or  Simbali  (Pali)  Grove  in  the  heaven  of  the  33  gods.

In  the  middle  of  a  lake  there  is  a  palace,  to  reach  which  one  needs  the  help  of  magic,  the  power  of  riding  the  akasa,  of  riding  on  the  "  golden  bird."

See  also  Jhe  National  Geographic  Magazine  (America),  for  June  1933,  in  which  Roy  Chapman  Andrews  describes  his  "  Explorations  in  the  Gobi  Desert,"  as  a  gravel,  not  a  sandy  plain,  except  in  parts.

He  confirms  the  antiquity  of  giant  forms  of  life  which  existed  there  over  95,000,000  years  ago,  and  found  the  remains  which  indicate  very  ancient  civilizations  of  over  20,000  years  ago,  when  millions  of  "  mystery  people  "  roamed  the  desert  where  only  thousands  of  Mongol  nomads  roam  to-day.

Lamas,  Lamaism,  Bons,  pp.  393,  412.

There  were  two  contributory  streams  in  Tibetan  pre-Primitive  Lamaism  :  1.  The  Tibetan  Bon — usually  described  as  animistic,  devil-dancing  or  Shamanist  religion  ;  and  2.  The  Indian  Mahayana  and  Tantra  Buddhism.

The  founder  of  Lamaism  proper  is  con-  sidered to  have  been  Padma-Sambhava,  a  member  of  the  popular  Tantnc  Yogacharya  school  in  the  great  Buddhist  College  at  Nalanda,  and  famed  for  his  knowledge  of  Occult  Science.

He  was  invited  to  Tibet  in  747,  and  started  the  Kah-dam-pa  sect —  "those  bound  by  the  orders  (commandments)."  He  expounded  the  Bardo  Thodol  and  is  therefore  the  Great  Guru  for  all  who  follow  the  Bardo,  the  great  doctrine  of  liberation  by  hearing  and  seeing.

The  next  great  reformer  along  this  line  was  Atisha,  of  the  royal  family  of  Gaur,  Bengal,  and  a  professor  in  the  Vikramasila  Monastery  in  Magadha.

He  visited  Tibet  in  1038  and  started  Reformed  Ldmaism  in  the  Kah-dam-pa  stream.

In  1407  Tsong-kha-pa  added  to  it  a  less  ascetic  and  more  highly  ritualistic

ADDITIONAL  NOTES

tendency  under  the  name  of  Ge-lug-pa,  "  The  Virtuous  Style."  This  combined  stream  is  known  as  the  Reformed  School  and  is  the  dominant  sect  in  Tibet,  the  hierarchical  (since  1640),  and  is  the  Established  Church  of  Lamaism,  but  now  somewhat  degene-  rated.

The  other  great  line  of  development  grew,  in  the  latter  half  of  the  eleventh  •century,  out  of  the  teachings  of  Atisha  as  modified  by  Marpa  and  his  disciple,  Milarespa  (Milarepa) — the  best  loved  saint  in  Tibet.

This  is  known  as  the  Kar-gyut-pa  "  follower  of  the  successive  orders"  sect,  and  ranks  among  the  Semi-reformed  Churches,  of  which  the  others,  growing  out  of  it,  are  the  Kar-ma-pa  ;  the  Dipunka  ,  Talunpa,  Upper  Dukpa  (Dugpa)  Middle  and  Southern  Dukpa ,  and  Lower  Dukpa  (meaning  "  cloud-  voice,"  thunder  being  regarded  as  the  dragon's  roar).  Another  semi-reformed  Sect  was  the  Sa-kya-pa,  growing  about  1427,  out  of  the  strong  stream  of  Primitive  Lamaism,  from  which  branched  off  the  Nor-pa,  and  a  still  expanding  group  influenced  by  Taranatha  (born,  1573)  and  called  generally  the  Jonan-pa  Sect.

The  other  stream  of  Primitive  Lamaism  became  known,  H)62,  as  Ninmapa,  "  the  old  School,"  the  wholly  unreformed  section  strongly  tinged  with  Bon,  or  pre-Buddhist  practices.

These  are  the  real  "  Red-hat "  sect  of  Lamas,  not  the  Dug-pas.

Parallel  with  it  from  about  1450.  six  other  groups,  all  of  them  being  classified  as  the  Old,  or  Unreformed  School,  Ninma-pa.

Bon-pas  are  called  "  Black-caps",  the  followers  of  Tson-kha-pa,  "  Yellow-caps";  and  the  earlier  followers  of  Atisha,  wear  "  Red-hats  ".  (See  Lamaism.

by  L.  A.  Waddell,  and  the  books  by  W.  Y.  Evans-Wentz,  etc.)

Light  Tables,  pp.  458  and  508-9.

It  must  be  realised  that  there  is  not  a  definite  single  wave-length  (or  frequency),  for  a  definite  colour,  but  that  there  is  a  series  of  waves  forming  a  band  of  colours.

Each  passes  into  the  next  colour  and  there  is  no  hard  and  fast  dividing  line.

The  following  are  the  approximate  wave-lengths  and  frequencies  for  the  colours  (visible  Jight).  They  are  taken  from  Physical  and  Chemical  Constants  by  G.  W  C.  Kaye  and  T.  H.  Laby.

Visible  light  extends  for  most  people,  from  about  375  X  10  u  vibrations  per  second  to  750  X  1012  vibrations  per  second.

This  constitutes  one  octave.

The  range  varies  with  different  people  and  very  often  no  distinction  is  made  between  blue  and  indigo,  since  only  certain  people  can  distinguish  a  band  of  a  different  "  shade  '  between  blue  and  violet.

The  figures  given  here  compare  fairly  well  with  the  table  on  p.  458  but  the  "  corrected  "  table  on  p.  508  seems  to  be  arbitrary.

The  Encyclopaedia  Brittanica  •gives  only  the  approximate  values.

Scientifically,  we  speak  of  a  definite  line,  e.g.,  the  D  line  in  the  Sodium  spectrum.


Modern   Frequencies,    (Velocity  wave  length)  :

Extreme  Violet

833.3  x  10W  vibrations  per  sec.

759    (trillions)

Indigo

682      X

668?

End  of  Violet

6593  X  10'-

654  ?

,.      .,  Blue

6098  X

„  Green

545.4  x

..      ,.  Yellow

510.2  X  10l-

,.     ,.  Orange

4637  x  10"

Extreme  Red

3896  x  101-

The  extreme  Red  may  be  a  little  further  for  some  eyes.

One  trillion  equals  10".

Above  the  visible  light  we  have  some  20  octaves  of  waves  smaller  than  the  violet.

These  are  divided  into  ultra  violet,  X,  and  Cosmic  rays

Below  the  visible  red  are  30  octaves  first  heat ;  then  Hertzian  waves  that  are  used  in  wireless.

(See  table  given  in  Saunder's  Light).

All  the  portion  of  the  note  on  p.  508  and  on  p.  509  is  inaccurate  from  a  scientific  point  of  view.

For  instance,  the  writer  allows  only  one  and  a  half  octaves  below  the  red,  and  seems  generally  to  be  arbitrary.

The  Fourth  Sense — Music,  p.  508.

Here  the  writer,  (H.  C),  jumps  to  another  series.

It  should  always  be  remem*  bered  that  light  is  an  electro-magnetic  vibration  in  space,  while  sound  is  a  movement  of  matter,  air,  etc.

Sir  James  Jeans  in  Science  and  Music  gives  a  table  for  the  notes  of  the  musical  scale  as  now  used.

The  number  of  vibrations  for  a  given  note  depends  on  the  pitch  selected  and  used  as  a  standard.

This  varies  in  different  countries,  and  on  different  pianos.

In  England  the  standard  one  is  used  in  which  C" — the  C  above  middle  C  on  the  piano — is  equal  to  512  vibrations  per  second.

In  this  case  the  scale  becomes  •

C"  48  approximately.

is   correct  for  the  ratio,  but  he  then  apparently  multiplies  this  series.

C'  Ratio :

So  far   H.  C.  by  2  and  obtains

C'  D

E

F

G

A

B  D  E  F  G  A  B  C"

He  then  multiplies  by  7  and  gets

The  actual  pitch  of  this  octave  would  be  one  beginning  between  E  and  F  on  our  piano,  i.e.,  Do'  which  equals  a  i  tone  between  E  and  F.  This  scale  would  not  coincide  with  any  scale  of  notes  used  in  this  country.

There  does  not  appear  to  be  any  valid  reason  for  using  this  octave  more  than  any  other  as  the  one  specially  correspond-  ing to  music  or  physical  hearing.

ADDITIONAL  NOTES

This  note  has  been  supplied  by  Miss  Elizabeth  Preston,  M.  Sc.,  who  thinks  that  the  whole  note  by  H.  C  should  be  omitted.

Also  that  the  table  on  p.  509  is  of  no  special  value,  as  it  is  only  approximate  at  best  and  does  not  state  clearly  the  limits  to  which  it  applies.

COLOUR-TONE,  p.  508-9  (TRILLIONS  OF  VIBRATIONS  PER  CENTIMETER  PER  SECOND)

Number  of  vibrations  based  on  a  comparative  study  of  the  Abney,  Listing,     Rood     and    Helmholtz  tables.


Mathematical  Correlation  by  doub-  ling octaves  from  Sound  "  C's  "  into  the  Colour  Octave.

Red  (barely  visible)                399  through  Scarlet  to

Sa  or  Do     Red  (C?)  (411  approx)

D=399  (barely  visible  Red)  Off  Efr      422  (Crimson)  E-  447            (Scarlet)

Junction  Red-Orange               483  Orange                               483-

*RiorRe     Orange  (Flaming)  (D  ?)  (460  approx.)

F--472             (Flame-Orange)  FJJ  Gb      503  (Orange-Yellow)

Yellow                                506-

Ga  or  M.-  Yellow  (E?)  (518  approx.)

Golden  Green-through  Green                   520-

Ma  or  Fa  --Green  (F  ?)  (549  approx.)

G-  532            (Golden-Green)  Gtf  Ab      566  (Green)

Blue  Green                       584-600  Light  Blue  to  Blue             600-647  Ultramarine-Indigo            647-680  Junction  Indigo-Violet

Pa  or  Sol-    Light  Blue  (G?)  (618  approx.)

Dha  or  La     Indigo  (A  ?)  (660-694  approx.)

A  -600            (Light  Blue)  AJf  Bb      636  (Blue)  B     674            (Indigo)

Violet                               680    to  Visibility  end              760  ?

1  Ni  or  Ti     Violet  (B?)  (731  approx.

to  770)

C     357  (Below  or  Infra-Red)  also  714orV.olet-lndigo

Cfl  Db      378    (Below-Red)    756  Violet   Cerise  (approach-  ing Ultra  or  Above-Violet)

1  The  Secret  Doctrine  scheme  is  perfectly  possible,  following  out  the  proportionate  ratios  of  these  tones  in  the  western  Major  Scale  (Dhirashankarabharanam  Riga)  Since  the  sol-fa  syllables  were  given,  the  presumption  is  that  this  Raga  or  Scale  is  indicated.

If  exact  ratios  are  followed  the  Orange  will  be  Scarlet  or  Flame  tinged  and  the  Violet  will  be  rose  touched,  tending  into  the  Ultra-Violet  invisibility.

The  tempered  scale  changes  slightly  most  of  the  tones,  throwing  the  Indigo  towards  Violet,  and  the  Violet  back  into  visibility

574  THE  SECRET  DOCTRINE

H.  P.  B.  in  a  Third  Volume  chart,  Diagram  II,  links  Do  or  Sa  with  red,  and  animal  instincts  and  passions,  stating  that  this  is  "  physical  man's  keynote."  Whether  she  meant  this  to  be  linked  with  the  definite  pitch  "  C"  is  a  question,  as  both  Do  and  Sa  are  movable  over  a  wide  area,  it  is  interesting  to  note  the  remarkable  closeness  of  the  mathematical  correlation  to  the  tones  as  given  in  The  Secret  Doctrine.

The  slight  difference  (only  1-1/4  tone)  is  either  (1)  because  she  possibly  did  not  mean  "C"  for  Do  or  Sa,  as  above  indicated  ,  or  (2)  perhaps  the  Spectrum  itself  is  evolving  and  colours  and  tones  have  yet  to  achieve  their  rightful  places  and  relations  one  to  the  other.

Note  by  Mrs.

Adeltha  Peterson.

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Kegan  Paul,  Trench,  Trubner  &  Co  Ltd

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John  Hogg.

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Through  the  Gates  of  Gold  :  A  Fragment  of  Thought  Anonymous.

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Vedanta  Sutras,  trans  George  Thibaut.

Sacred  Books  of  the  East  Series.

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H.  H.  Wilson,  M  A  .  F.R  S.  Edited  by  Fitzedward  Hall.

London  Trubner  &  Co.  1864-1870  5  Vols

Voice  of  the  Silence  The,  Trans,  and  annotated  by  "  H.  P.  B  "  London.

The  Theosophi-  cal Publishing  Co.  Ltd

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Practical  Occultism,  H.  P   Blavatsky      London.

Theosophical  Publishing  Society.

1912  Key  to  Theosophy,   The,  H.  P.  Blavatsky.

London.

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1920.     3rd  Ed.  Theosophical  Glossary,    The,  H   P.  Blavatsky     London    Theosophical  Publishing  Society

1892.  Modern    Panarion,     A,       A     collection     of     Fugitive     Fragments    from    the    pen    of

H.  P.  Blavatsky.

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1895.  Introduction  to  Yoga,  An,  Annie  Besant.

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1927.     Fourth  Ed.  Gnosis  or  Ancient  Wisdom  in  the  Christian  Scriptures,  The,  or  The  Wisdom  in  a  Mystery,

William  Kingsland.

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George  Allen  and  Unwin,     1937.  Esoteric  Basis  of  Christianity,  The,  William  Kingsland.

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Longmans,  Green  &  Co.  Handbook   of  Physiology  and  Biochemistry,   W.  D    Halliburton,  and  R.TS.  Me  Dowall.

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Appleton-Century

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Theosophical  Society  in  England.

1931.

Yoga  and  Western  Psychology,  Geraldine  Coster.

London.

Oxford  University  Press.

1934.  Psychology  and  Morals,  J.  A.  Hadfield,  M.A   (Oxon.)  M.B.,  Ch.  B.  (Edin  )   Methuen  &  Co.

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London    Luzac  &  Co.   1916    2  Vols.

Man's  Latent  Powers,  Phoebe  Payne.

London.

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1938  Chakras,  The,  Charles  W.  Leadbeater.

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1927.  From   Man  to   Superman :  A  Practice  in  Symbolic  Yoga,  George  S.  Arundale    Madras.

The  Theosophical  Publishing  House.

1939.  .Kundalini,    An    Occult   Experience,   George   S    Arundale.

Madras     The   Theosophical

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1938.  .Secret   of  the  Go/den  Flower,  The,  A  Treatise  of  Chinese  Yoga,  trans   Richard  Wilhelm.

Commentary  by  C  G.  Jung.

London.

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1932.  .Serpent  Power,   The,   being  the  Shat-chakra-nirupana  and  Paduka-Panchaka.

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Luzac  &  Co      1919.  Thr/ce-Greatest  Hermes,  G.R.S.  Mead,  M  A  ,  London     Theosophical  Publishing  Society.

1906.     3  Vols.

Sepher  Yetzireh,  Trans,  from  the  Hebrew  by  Wm.  Wynn  Westcott,  M.B.  2nd  ed.  London.

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1894.  The  Desatir,  (The  Book  of  God).  Mulla  Firuz  Bin  Kaus.

Privately  printed.

Bombay.

1818-

ERRATA

Page

31          line

1  26     Footnote

152         line

1  60     Footnote

183          line

213     Footnote

239          line

For  back  bone     read     backbone.

,,    4  (reference  to  footnote)     read     l.  ,,    Contra      Haereses,     1,     xviii,     1-4,

read     4  Contra  Haereses,  1 ,   xviii,

1-4.

,,    Dvija      read     Dwija.

,,    Nachunweis     read     Nachweis.

,,    Seventy      long,         read        Seventy,

long.

,,    actual     read     actual.

,,    Council     read     Council.

„    Secret     read     Secret.

,,    ]  (reference  to  footnote)     read  ,,    nstructions     read     instructions.

,,    Moses,     read     Moses,  ,,    Flames      read     Flames,  ,,    seem     read     seems.

,,    particies     read     particles.

,,    Venus.

Aphrodite       read       Venus

Aphrodite.

,,    in     read     In.  „    omni     read     omni-.  ,,    tudent     read     student.

,,    mpressions     read     impressions.