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    "slug": "03-introduction-xvii",
    "title": "INTRODUCTION ... xvii.",
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    "text": "## INTRODUCTION ... xvii.\n\n\nThe Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, Introductory (vol 1)\n\n###### The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky -- Vol. 1\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page xvii]]\n\n#### INTRODUCTORY.\n\n-------\n\n\"Gently to hear, kindly to judge.\"\n\n-- **S**HAKESPEARE.\n\n**S**INCE the appearance of Theosophical literature\nin England, it has become customary to call its teachings \"Esoteric\nBuddhism.\" And, having become a habit -- as an old proverb\nbased on daily experience has it -- \"Error runs down an inclined\nplane, while Truth has to laboriously climb its way up hill.\"\n\nOld truisms are often the wisest. The human mind can hardly remain\nentirely free from bias, and decisive opinions are often formed\nbefore a thorough examination of a subject from all its aspects\nhas been made. This is said with reference to the prevailing double\nmistake (*a*) of limiting Theosophy to Buddhism: and (*b*)\nof confounding the tenets of the religious philosophy preached\nby Gautama, the Buddha, with the doctrines broadly outlined in\n\"Esoteric Buddhism.\" Any thing more erroneous than this\ncould be hardly imagined. It has enabled our enemies to find an\neffective weapon against theosophy; because, as an eminent Pali\nscholar very pointedly expressed it, there was in the volume named\n\"neither esotericism nor Buddhism.\" The esoteric truths,\npresented in Mr. Sinnett's work, had ceased to be esoteric from\nthe moment they were made public; nor did it contain the religion\nof Buddha, but simply a few tenets from a hitherto hidden teaching\nwhich are now supplemented by many more, enlarged and explained\nin the present volumes. But even the latter, though giving out\nmany fundamental tenets *from the ***S**ECRET\n**D**OCTRINE *of the East, *raise but a small\ncorner of the dark veil. For no one, not even the greatest living\nadept, would be permitted to, or could -- even if he would --\ngive out promiscuously, to a mocking, unbelieving world, that\nwhich has been so effectually concealed from it for long aeons\nand ages.\n\n\"Esoteric Buddhism\" was an excellent work with a very\nunfortunate\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xviii INTRODUCTORY.\n\ntitle, though it meant no more than does the title of this work,\nthe \"**S**ECRET **D**OCTRINE.\"\nIt proved unfortunate, because people are always in the habit\nof judging things by their appearance, rather than their meaning;\nand because the error has now become so universal, that even most\nof the Fellows of the Theosophical Society have fallen victims\nto the same misconception. From the first, however, protests were\nraised by Brahmins and others against the title; and, in justice\nto myself, I must add that \"Esoteric Buddhism\" was presented\nto me as a completed volume, and that I was entirely unaware of\nthe manner in which the author intended to spell the word \"Budh-ism.\"\n\nThis has to be laid directly at the door of those who, having\nbeen the first to bring the subject under public notice, neglected\nto point out the difference between \"Buddhism\" -- the\nreligious system of ethics preached by the Lord Gautama, and named\nafter his title of Buddha, \"the Enlightened\" -- and\n*Budha, *\"Wisdom,\" or knowledge (*Vidya*),\nthe* *faculty of cognizing, from the Sanskrit root \"Budh,\"\n*to know. *We theosophists of India are ourselves the real\nculprits, although, at the time, we did our best to correct the\nmistake. (See *Theosophist, *June, 1883.) To avoid this\ndeplorable misnomer was easy; the spelling of the word had only\nto be altered, and by common consent both pronounced and written\n\"Budhism,\" instead of \"Buddhism.\" Nor is the\nlatter term correctly spelt and pronounced, as it ought to be\ncalled, in English, Buddhaism, and its votaries \"Buddhaists.\"\n\nThis explanation is absolutely necessary at the beginning of a\nwork like this one. The \"Wisdom Religion\" is the inheritance\nof all the nations, the world over, though the statement was made\nin \"Esoteric Buddhism\" (*Preface *to the original\nEdition) that \"two years ago (*i.e.* 1883), neither\nI *nor any other European living*,* *knew the alphabet\nof the Science, here for the first time put into a scientific\nshape,\" etc. This error must have crept in through inadvertence.\nFor the present writer knew all that which is \"divulged\"\nin \"Esoteric Buddhism\" -- and much more -- *many\nyears *before it became her duty (in 1880) to impart a small\nportion of the Secret Doctrine to two *European *gentlemen,\none of whom was the author of \"Esoteric Buddhism\"; and\nsurely the present writer has the undoubted, though to her, rather\nequivocal, privilege of being a European, by birth and education.\nMoreover, a considerable part of the philosophy\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xix INTRODUCTORY.\n\nexpounded by Mr. Sinnett was taught in America, even before *Isis\nUnveiled *was published, to two Europeans and to my colleague,\nColonel H. S. Olcott. Of the three teachers the latter gentleman\nhas had, the first was a Hungarian Initiate, the second an Egyptian,\nthe third a Hindu. As permitted, Colonel Olcott has given out\nsome of this teaching in various ways; if the other two have not,\nit has been simply because they were not allowed: their time for\npublic work having not yet come. But for others it has, and the\nappearance of Mr. Sinnett's several interesting books is a visible\nproof of the fact. It is above everything important to keep in\nmind that no theosophical book acquires the least additional value\nfrom pretended authority.\n\nIn etymology *Adi*, and* Adhi* Budha, the *one\n*(or the First) and \"Supreme Wisdom\" is a term used\nby Aryasanga in his Secret treatises, and now by all the mystic\nNorthern Buddhists. It is a Sanskrit term, and an appellation\ngiven by the earliest Aryans to the Unknown deity; the word \"Brahma\"\nnot being found in the Vedas and the early works. It means the\nabsolute Wisdom, and \"Adi-bhuta\" is translated \"the\nprimeval uncreated cause of all\" by Fitzedward Hall. AEons\nof untold duration must have elapsed, before the epithet of Buddha\nwas so humanized, so to speak, as to allow of the term being applied\nto mortals and finally appropriated to one whose unparalleled\nvirtues and knowledge caused him to receive the title of the \"Buddha\nof Wisdom unmoved.\" *Bodha *means the innate possession\nof divine intellect or \"understanding\"; \"Buddha,\"\nthe acquirement of it by personal efforts and merit; while *Buddhi\n*is the faculty of cognizing the channel through which divine\nknowledge reaches the \"Ego,\" the discernment of good\nand evil, \"divine conscience\" also; and \"Spiritual\nSoul,\" which is the vehicle of *Atma. *\"When*\nBuddhi *absorbs our **E**GOtism (destroys it)\nwith all its *Vikaras, *Avalokiteshvara becomes manifested\nto us, and Nirvana, or *Mukti, *is reached,\" \"Mukti\"\nbeing the same as Nirvana, *i.e.*, freedom from the trammels\nof \"Maya\" or *illusion. *\"Bodhi\" is\nlikewise the name of a particular state of trance condition, called*\nSamadhi, *during which the subject reaches the culmination\nof spiritual knowledge.\n\nUnwise are those who, in their blind and, in our age, untimely\nhatred of Buddhism, and, by re-action, of \"Budhism,\"\ndeny its esoteric teachings (which are those also of the Brahmins),\nsimply because the name\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xx INTRODUCTORY.\n\nsuggests what to them, as Monotheists, are noxious doctrines.\n*Unwise *is the correct term to use in their case. For\nthe Esoteric philosophy is alone calculated to withstand, in this\nage of crass and illogical materialism, the repeated attacks on\nall and everything man holds most dear and sacred, in his inner\nspiritual life. The true philosopher, the student of the Esoteric\nWisdom, entirely loses sight of personalities, dogmatic beliefs\nand special religions. Moreover, Esoteric philosophy reconciles\nall religions, strips every one of its outward, human garments,\nand shows the root of each to be identical with that of every\nother great religion. It proves the necessity of an absolute Divine\nPrinciple in nature. It denies Deity no more than it does the\nSun. Esoteric philosophy has never rejected God in Nature, nor\nDeity as the absolute and abstract *Ens. *It only refuses\nto accept any of the gods of the so-called monotheistic religions,\ngods created by man in his own image and likeness, a blasphemous\nand sorry caricature of the Ever Unknowable. Furthermore, the\nrecords we mean to place before the reader embrace the esoteric\ntenets of the whole world since the beginning of our humanity,\nand Buddhistic occultism occupies therein only its legitimate\nplace, and no more. Indeed, the secret portions of the \"*Dan*\"*\nor Jan-na*\"** *(\"*Dhyan*\")*\n*of Gautama's metaphysics -- grand as they appear to one unacquainted\nwith the tenets of the Wisdom Religion of antiquity -- are but\na very small portion of the whole. The Hindu Reformer limited\nhis public teachings to the purely moral and physiological aspect\nof the Wisdom Religion, to Ethics and MAN alone. Things \"unseen\nand incorporeal,\" the mystery of Being outside our terrestrial\nsphere, the great Teacher left entirely untouched in his public\nlectures, reserving the hidden Truths for a select circle of his\nArhats. The latter received their Initiation at the famous Saptaparna\ncave (the *Sattapanni *of Mahavansa) near Mount Baibhar\n(the Webhara of the Pali MSS.). This cave was in Rajagriha, the\nancient capital of Mogadha, and was the *Cheta *cave of\nFa-hian, as rightly suspected by some archaeologists.**\n\nTime and human imagination made short work of the purity and philo-\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n** Dan*, now become in modern Chinese and Tibetan phonetics\n*ch*'*an*, is the general term for the esoteric\nschools, and their literature. In the old books, the word Janna\nis defined as \"to reform one's self by meditation and knowledge,\"\na second *inner *birth. Hence Dzan, *Djan* phonetically,\nthe \"Book of *Dzyan*.\"\n\n** Mr. Beglor, the chief engineer at Buddhagaya, and a distinguished\narchaeologist, was the first, we believe, to discover it.\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xxi INTRODUCTORY.\n\nsophy of these teachings, once that they were transplanted from\nthe secret and sacred circle of the Arhats, during the course\nof their work of proselytism, into a soil less prepared for metaphysical\nconceptions than India; *i.e.*, once they were transferred\ninto China, Japan, Siam, and Burmah. How the pristine purity of\nthese grand revelations was dealt with may be seen in studying\nsome of the so-called \"esoteric\" Buddhist schools of\nantiquity in their modern garb, not only in China and other Buddhist\ncountries in general, but even in not a few schools in Thibet,\nleft to the care of uninitiated Lamas and Mongolian innovators.\n\nThus the reader is asked to bear in mind the very important difference\nbetween *orthodox *Buddhism -- *i.e.*, the public\nteachings of Gautama the Buddha, and his esoteric *Budhism.\n*His Secret Doctrine, however, differed in no wise from that\nof the initiated Brahmins of his day. The Buddha was a child of\nthe Aryan soil; a born Hindu, a Kshatrya and a disciple of the\n\"twice born\" (the initiated Brahmins) or Dwijas. His\nteachings, therefore, could not be different from their doctrines,\nfor the whole Buddhist reform merely consisted in giving out a\nportion of that which had been kept secret from every man outside\nof the \"enchanted\" circle of Temple-Initiates and ascetics.\nUnable to teach *all *that had been imparted to him -- owing\nto his pledges -- though he taught a philosophy built upon the\nground-work of the true esoteric knowledge, the Buddha gave to\nthe world only its *outward *material body and kept its\n*soul *for his Elect. (See also Volume II.) Many Chinese\nscholars among Orientalists have heard of the \"Soul Doctrine.\"\nNone seem to have understood its real meaning and importance.\n\nThat doctrine was preserved secretly -- too secretly, perhaps\n-- within the sanctuary. The mystery that shrouded its chief dogma\nand aspirations -- Nirvana -- has so tried and irritated the curiosity\nof those scholars who have studied it, that, unable to solve it\nlogically and satisfactorily by untying the Gordian knot, they\ncut it through, by declaring that Nirvana meant *absolute annihilation.*\n\nToward the end of the first quarter of this century, a distinct\nclass of literature appeared in the world, which became with every\nyear more defined in its tendency. Being based, *soi-disant,\n*on the scholarly researches of Sanskritists and Orientalists\nin general, it was held scientific. Hindu, Egyptian, and other\nancient religions, myths, and emblems were made to yield anything\nthe symbologist wanted them to\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xxii INTRODUCTORY.\n\nyield, thus often giving out the rude *outward *form in\nplace of the *inner *meaning. Works, most remarkable for\ntheir ingenious deductions and speculations, in *circulo vicioso,\n*foregone conclusions generally changing places with premisses\nas in the syllogisms of more than one Sanskrit and Pali scholar,\nappeared rapidly in succession, over-flooding the libraries with\ndissertations rather on phallic and sexual worship than on real\nsymbology, and each contradicting the other.\n\nThis is the true reason, perhaps, why the outline of a few fundamental\ntruths from the Secret Doctrine of the Archaic ages is now permitted\nto see the light, after long millenniums of the most profound\nsilence and secrecy. I say \"a *few *truths,\"\nadvisedly, because that which must remain unsaid could not be\ncontained in a hundred such volumes, nor could it be imparted\nto the present generation of Sadducees. But, even the little that\nis now given is better than complete silence upon those vital\ntruths. The world of to-day, in its mad career towards the unknown\n-- which it is too ready to confound with the unknowable, whenever\nthe problem eludes the grasp of the physicist -- is rapidly progressing\non the reverse, material plane of spirituality. It has now become\na vast arena -- a true valley of discord and of eternal strife\n-- a necropolis, wherein lie buried the highest and the most holy\naspirations of our Spirit-Soul. That soul becomes with every new\ngeneration more paralyzed and atrophied. The \"amiable infidels\nand accomplished profligates\" of Society, spoken of by Greeley,\ncare little for the revival of the *dead *sciences of the\npast; but there is a fair minority of earnest students who are\nentitled to learn the few truths that may be given to them now;\nand *now* much more than ten years ago, when \"Isis Unveiled,\"\nor even the later attempts to explain the mysteries of esoteric\nscience, were published.\n\nOne of the greatest, and, withal, the most serious objection to\nthe correctness and reliability of the whole work will be the\npreliminary **S**TANZAS: \"How can the statements\ncontained in them be verified?\" True, if a great portion\nof the Sanskrit, Chinese, and Mongolian works quoted in the present\nvolumes are known to some Orientalists, the chief work -- that\none from which the Stanzas are given -- is not in the possession\nof European Libraries. The Book of Dzyan (or \"Dzan\")\nis utterly unknown to our Philologists, or at any rate was never\nheard of by them under its present name. This is, of course, a\ngreat drawback\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xxiii INTRODUCTORY.\n\nto those who follow the methods of research prescribed by official\nScience; but to the students of Occultism, and to every genuine\nOccultist, this will be of little moment. The main body of the\nDoctrines given is found scattered throughout hundreds and thousands\nof Sanskrit **MSS**., some already translated --\ndisfigured in their interpretations, as usual, -- others still\nawaiting their turn. Every scholar, therefore, has an opportunity\nof verifying the statements herein made, and of checking most\nof the quotations. A few new facts (*new* to the profane\nOrientalist, only) and passages quoted from the Commentaries will\nbe found difficult to trace. Several of the teachings, also, have\nhitherto been transmitted orally: yet even those are in every\ninstance hinted at in the almost countless volumes of Brahminical,\nChinese and Tibetan temple-literature.\n\nHowever it may be, and whatsoever is in store for the writer through\nmalevolent criticism, one fact is quite certain. The members of\nseveral esoteric schools -- the seat of which is beyond the Himalayas,\nand whose ramifications may be found in China, Japan, India, Tibet,\nand even in Syria, besides South America -- claim to have in their\npossession the *sum total *of sacred and philosophical\nworks in **MSS**. and type: all the works, in fact,\nthat have ever been written, in whatever language or characters,\nsince the art of writing began; from the ideographic hieroglyphs\ndown to the alphabet of Cadmus and the Devanagari.\n\nIt has been claimed in all ages that ever since the destruction\nof the Alexandrian Library (see *Isis Unveiled, *Vol. II.,\np. 27), every work of a character that might have led the profane\nto the ultimate discovery and comprehension of some of the mysteries\nof the Secret Science, was, owing to the combined efforts of the\nmembers of the Brotherhoods, diligently searched for. It is added,\nmoreover, by those who know, that once found, save three copies\nleft and stored safely away, such works were all destroyed. In\nIndia, the last of the precious manuscripts were secured and hidden\nduring the reign of the Emperor Akbar.*\n\nIt is maintained, furthermore, that every sacred book of that\nkind, whose text was not sufficiently veiled in symbolism, or\nwhich had any\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* Prof. Max Muller shows that no bribes or threats of Akbar could\nextort from the Brahmans the original text of the Veda; and boasts\nthat European Orientalists have it (*Lecture on the *\"*Science\nof Religion,*\"* *p. 23). Whether Europe has the\n*complete text *is very doubtful, and the future may have\nvery disagreeable surprises in store for the Orientalists.\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xxiv INTRODUCTORY.\n\ndirect references to the ancient mysteries, after having been\ncarefully copied in cryptographic characters, such as to defy\nthe art of the best and cleverest palaeographer, was also destroyed\nto the last copy. During Akbar's reign, some fanatical courtiers,\ndispleased at the Emperor's sinful prying into the religions of\nthe infidels, themselves helped the Brahmans to conceal their\n**MSS.** Such was Badaoni, who had an *undisguised\nhorror *for Akbar's mania for idolatrous religions.*\n\nMoreover in all the large and wealthy lamasaries, there are subterranean\ncrypts and *cave-libraries, *cut in the rock, whenever\nthe *gonpa *and the *lhakhang *are situated in the\nmountains. Beyond the Western Tsay-dam, in the solitary passes\nof *Kuen-lun** *there are several such hiding places. Along\nthe ridge of Altyn-Toga, whose soil no European foot has ever\ntrodden so far, there exists a certain hamlet, lost in a deep\ngorge. It is a small cluster of houses, a hamlet rather than a\nmonastery, with a poor-looking temple in it, with one old lama,\na hermit, living near by to watch it. Pilgrims say that the subterranean\ngalleries and halls under it contain a collection of books, the\nnumber of which, according to the accounts given, is too large\nto find room even in the British Museum.***\n\nAll this is very likely to provoke a smile of doubt. But then,\nbefore\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* Badaoni wrote in his *Muntakhab at Tawarikh: *\"His\nMajesty relished inquiries into the sects of these infidels (who\ncannot be counted, so numerous they are, and who have no end of\n*revealed books*) . . . As they (the Sramana and Brahmins)\nsurpass other learned men in their treatises on morals, on physical\nand religious sciences, and reach a high degree *in their knowledge\nof the future*,* *in spiritual power, and human perfection,\nthey brought proofs based on reason and testimony, and inculcated\ntheir doctrines so firmly that no man could now raise a doubt\nin his Majesty even if mountains were to crumble to dust, or the\nheavens were to tear asunder.\" This work \"was kept secret,\nand was not published till the reign of Jahangir.\" (Ain i\nAkbari, translated by Dr. Blochmann, p. 104, note.)\n\n** Karakorum mountains, Western Tibet.\n\n*** According to the same tradition the now desolate regions of\nthe waterless land of Tarim -- a true wilderness in the heart\nof Turkestan -- were in the days of old covered with flourishing\nand wealthy cities. At present, hardly a few verdant oases relieve\nits dead solitude. One such, sprung on the sepulchre of a vast\ncity swallowed by and buried under the sandy soil of the desert,\nbelongs to no one, but is often visited by Mongolians and Buddhists.\nThe same tradition speaks of immense subterranean abodes, of large\ncorridors filled with tiles and cylinders. It may be an idle rumour,\nand it may be an actual fact.\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xxv INTRODUCTORY.\n\nthe reader rejects the truthfulness of the reports, let him pause\nand reflect over the following well known facts. The collective\nresearches of the Orientalists, and especially the labours of\nlate years of the students of comparative Philology and the Science\nof Religions have led them to ascertain as follows: An immense,\nincalculable number of **MSS**., and even printed\nworks *known to have existed*,* are now to be found\nno more. *They have disappeared without leaving the slightest\ntrace behind them. Were they works of no importance they might,\nin the natural course of time, have been left to perish, and their\nvery names would have been obliterated from human memory. But\nit is not so; for, as now ascertained, most of them contained\nthe true keys to works still extant, and *entirely incomprehensible,\n*for the greater portion of their readers, *without those\nadditional volumes of Commentaries and explanations. *Such\nare, for instance, the works of Lao-tse, the predecessor of Confucius.*\n\nHe is said to have written 930 books on Ethics and religions,\nand *seventy *on magic, *one thousand in all. *His\ngreat work, however, the *heart *of his doctrine, the \"Tao-te-King,\"\nor the sacred scriptures of the *Taosse, *has in it, as\nStanislas Julien shows, only \"about 5,000 words\" (*Tao-te-King,\n*p. xxvii.), hardly a dozen of pages, yet Professor Max Muller\nfinds that \"the text is unintelligible without commentaries,\nso that Mr. Julien had to consult more than sixty commentators\nfor the purpose of his translation,\" the earliest going back\nas far as the year 163 **B.C**., *not earlier,\n*as we see. During the four centuries and a half that preceded\nthis *earliest *of the commentators there was ample time\nto veil the true Lao-tse doctrine from all but his initiated priests.\nThe Japanese, among whom are now to be found the most learned\nof the priests and followers of Lao-tse, simply laugh at the blunders\nand hypotheses of the European Chinese scholars; and tradition\naffirms that the commentaries to which our Western Sinologues\nhave access are not the *real occult *records, but intentional\nveils, and that the true commentaries, as well as almost all the\ntexts, have long since *disappeared *from the eyes of the\nprofane.\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* \"If we turn to China, we find that the religion of Confucius\nis founded on the Five *King *and the Four *Shu*-books,\nin themselves of considerable extent and surrounded by voluminous\nCommentaries, without which even the most learned scholars would\nnot venture to fathom *the depth of their sacred canon.*\"\n(*Lectures on the *\"*Science of Religion,*\"*\n*p. 185. Max Muller.) But they have not fathomed it -- and\nthis is the complaint of the Confucianists, as a very learned\nmember of that body, in Paris, complained in 1881.\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xxvi INTRODUCTORY.\n\nIf one turns to the ancient literature of the Semitic religions,\nto the Chaldean Scriptures, the elder sister and instructress,\nif not the fountain-head of the Mosaic Bible, the basis and starting-point\nof Christianity, what do the scholars find? To perpetuate the\nmemory of the ancient religions of Babylon; to record the vast\ncycle of astronomical observations of the Chaldean Magi; to justify\nthe tradition of their splendid and eminently occult literature,\nwhat now remains? -- only a few fragments, *said to be by *Berosus.\n\nThese, however, are almost valueless, even as a clue to the character\nof what has disappeared. For they passed through the hands of\nhis Reverence the Bishop of Caesarea -- that self-constituted\ncensor and editor of the sacred records of other men's religions\n-- and they doubtless bear to this day the mark of his eminently\nveracious and trustworthy hand. For what is the history of this\ntreatise on the once grand religion of Babylon?\n\nWritten in Greek by Berosus, a priest of the temple of Belus,\nfor Alexander the Great, from the astronomical and chronological\nrecords preserved by the priests of that temple, and covering\na period of 200,000 years, it is now lost. In the first century\n**B.C**. Alexander Polyhistor made a series of extracts\nfrom it -- *also lost. *Eusebius used these extracts in\nwriting his *Chronicon* (270-340 **A.D**.).\nThe points of resemblance -- almost of identity -- between the\nJewish and the Chaldean Scriptures,* made the latter most dangerous\nto Eusebius, in his *role* of defender and champion of\nthe new faith which had adopted the Jewish Scriptures, and with\nthem an absurd chronology. It is pretty certain that Eusebius\ndid not spare the Egyptian Synchronistic tables of Manetho --\nso much so that Bunsen** charges him with mutilating history most\nunscrupulously. And Socrates, a historian of the fifth century,\nand Syncellus, vice-patriarch of Constantinople (eighth century),\nboth denounce him as the most daring and desperate forger.\n\nIs it likely, then, that he dealt more tenderly with the Chaldean\nrecords, which were already menacing the new religion, so rashly\naccepted?\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* Found out and proven only now, through the discoveries made\nby George Smith (*vide *his \"Chaldean account of Genesis\"),\nand which, thanks to this Armenian forger, have misled all the\n*civilized nations *for over 1,500 years into accepting\nJewish derivations *for direct Divine Revelation!*\n\n** Bunsen's \"*Egypt*'*s Place in History,*\"*\n*vol. i. p. 200\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xxvii INTRODUCTORY.\n\nSo that, with the exception of these more than doubtful fragments,\nthe entire Chaldean sacred literature has disappeared from the\neyes of the profane as completely as the lost Atlantis. A few\nfacts that were contained in the Berosian History are given in\nPart II. of Vol. II., and may throw a great light on the true\norigin of the Fallen Angels, personified by Bel and the Dragon.\n\nTurning now to the oldest Aryan literature, the Rig-Veda, the\nstudent will find, following strictly in this the data furnished\nby the said Orientalists themselves, that, although the Rig-Veda\ncontains only \"about 10,580 verses, or 1,028 hymns,\"\nin spite of the Brahmanas and the mass of glosses and commentaries,\nit is not understood correctly to this day. Why is this so? Evidently\nbecause the Brahmanas, \"the scholastic and oldest treatises\non the primitive hymns,\" *themselves require a key, *which\nthe Orientalists have failed to secure.\n\nWhat do the scholars say of Buddhist literature? Have they got\nit in its completeness? Assuredly not. Notwithstanding the 325\nvolumes of the *Kanjur *and the *Tanjur *of the\nNorthern Buddhists, each volume we are told, \"weighing from\nfour to five pounds,\" nothing, in truth, is known of Lamaism.\nYet, the sacred canon of the Southern Church is said to contain\n29,368,000 letters in the Saddharma alankara,* or, exclusive of\ntreatises and commentaries, \"five or six times the amount\nof the matter contained in the Bible,\" the latter, in the\nwords of Professor Max Muller, rejoicing only in 3,567,180 letters.\nNotwithstanding, then, these \"325 volumes\" (*in reality\n*there are 333,* Kanjur *comprising 108, and *Tanjur\n*225 volumes), \"the translators, instead of supplying\nus with correct versions, have interwoven them *with their\nown commentaries*,* *for the purpose of justifying\nthe dogmas of their several schools.\"** Moreover, \"according\nto a tradition preserved by the Buddhist schools, both of the\nSouth and of the North, the sacred Buddhist Canon comprised originally\n80,000 or 84,000 tracts, *but most of them were lost*,\nso that there remained but 6,000,\" the professor tells his\naudiences. \"Lost\" as usual for Europeans. But who can\nbe quite sure that they are likewise lost for Buddhists and Brahmins?\n\nConsidering the sacredness for the Buddhists of every line written\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* Spence Hardy, \"*The Legends and Theories of the Buddhists,*\"*\n*p. 66.\n\n*** *\"*Buddhism in Tibet,*\"* *p.\n78.\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xxviii INTRODUCTORY.\n\nupon Buddha or his \"Good Law,\" the loss of nearly 76,000\n*tracts *does* *seem miraculous. Had it been *vice\nversa, *every one acquainted with the natural course of events\nwould subscribe to the statement that, of these 76,000, five or\nsix thousand treatises *might have been *destroyed during\nthe persecutions in, and emigrations from, India. But as it is\nwell ascertained that Buddhist Arhats began their religious exodus,\nfor the purpose of propagating the new faith beyond Kashmir and\nthe Himalayas, as early as the year 300 before our era,* and reached\nChina in the year 61 **A.D**.** when Kashyapa, at\nthe invitation of the Emperor Ming-ti, went there to acquaint\nthe \"Son of Heaven\" with the tenets of Buddhism, it\ndoes seem strange to hear the Orientalists speaking of such a\nloss as though it were really possible. They do not seem to allow\nfor one moment the possibility that the texts may be *lost\n*only for West and *for themselves*;* *or, that\nthe Asiatic people should have the unparalleled boldness to keep\ntheir most sacred records out of the reach of foreigners, thus\nrefusing to deliver them to the profanation and misuse of races\neven so \"vastly superior\" to themselves.\n\nOwing to the expressed regrets and numerous confessions of almost\nevery one of the Orientalists (See Max Muller's *Lectures *for\nexample) the public may feel sufficiently sure (*a*) that\nthe students of ancient religions have indeed very few data upon\nwhich to build such final conclusions as they generally do about\nthe old religions, and (*b*) that such lack of data does\nnot prevent them in the least from dogmatising. One would imagine\nthat, thanks to the numerous records of the Egyptian theogony\nand mysteries preserved in the classics, and in a number of ancient\nwriters, the rites and dogmas of Pharaonic Egypt ought to be well\nunderstood at least; better, at any rate, than the too abstruse\nphilosophies and Pantheism of India, of whose religion and language\nEurope had hardly any idea before the beginning of the present\ncentury. Along the Nile and on the face of the whole country,\nthere stand to this hour, exhumed yearly and daily, fresh relics\nwhich eloquently tell their own history. Still it is not so. The\nlearned Oxford philologist himself confesses the truth by saying\nthat \"Though . . . we see still standing the Pyramids, and\nthe ruins of temples and labyrinths, their walls\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* Lassen, (\"Ind. Althersumkunde\" Vol. II, p. 1,072)\nshows a Buddhist monastery erected in the Kailas range in 137\n**B.C**.; and General Cunningham, earlier than that.\n\n** Reverend T. Edkins, \"*Chinese Buddhism.*\"\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xxix INTRODUCTORY.\n\ncovered with hieroglyphic inscriptions, and with the strange pictures\nof gods and goddesses. . . . . . . . On rolls of papyrus, which\nseem to defy the ravages of time, we have even fragments of what\nmay be called the sacred books of the Egyptians; yet, though much\nhas been deciphered in the ancient records of that mysterious\nrace, the mainspring of the religion of Egypt and the original\nintention of its ceremonial worship *are **far from being\nfully *disclosed to us.\"* Here again the mysterious hieroglyphic\ndocuments remain, but the keys by which alone they become intelligible\nhave disappeared.\n\nNevertheless, having found that \"there is a natural connection\nbetween language and religion\"; and, secondly, that there\nwas a *common *Aryan religion before the separation of\nthe Aryan race; a *common *Semitic religion before the\nseparation of the Semitic race; and a *common *Turanian\nreligion before the separation of the Chinese and the other tribes\nbelonging to the Turanian class; having, in fact, only discovered\n\"three ancient centres of religion\" and \"three\ncentres of language,\" and though as entirely ignorant of\nthose primitive religions and languages, as of their origin, the\nprofessor does not hesitate to declare \"that a truly *historical\nbasis *for a scientific treatment of those principal religions\nof the world has been gained!\"\n\nA \"scientific treatment\" of a subject is no guarantee\nfor its \"historical basis\"; and with such scarcity of\ndata on hand, no philologist, even among the most eminent, is\njustified in giving out his own conclusions for* historical\n*facts*. *No doubt, the eminent Orientalist has proved\nthoroughly to the world's satisfaction, that according to Grimm's\nlaw of phonetic rules, Odin and Buddha are two different personages,\nquite distinct from each other, and he has shown it *scientifically.\n*When, however, he takes the opportunity of saying in the\nsame breath that Odin \"was worshipped as the supreme deity\n*during a period long anterior to the age of the Veda *and\nof Homer\" (*Compar. Theol., *p. 318), he has not the\nslightest \"*historical *basis\" for it. He makes\n*history *and* fact* subservient to his\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* So little acquainted are our greatest Egyptologists with the\nfunerary rites of the Egyptians and the outward marks of the difference\nof sexes made on the mummies, that it has led to the most ludicrous\nmistakes. Only a year or two since, one of that kind was discovered\nat Boulaq, Cairo. The mummy of what had been considered the wife\nof an unimportant Pharaoh, has turned out, thanks to an inscription\nfound on an amulet hung on his neck, to be that of Sesostris --\nthe greatest King of Egypt!\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xxx INTRODUCTORY.\n\nown conclusions, which may be very \"scientific,\" in\nthe sight of Oriental scholars, but yet very wide of the mark\nof actual truth. The conflicting views on the subject of chronology,\nin the case of the Vedas, of the various eminent philologists\nand Orientalists, from Martin Haug down to Mr. Max Muller himself,\nare an evident proof that the statement has no *historical\n*basis to stand upon, \"internal evidence\" being\nvery often a jack-o'lantern, instead of a safe beacon to follow.\nNor has the Science of modern Comparative Mythology any better\nproof to show, that those learned writers, who have insisted for\nthe last century or so that there must have been \"fragments\nof a primeval revelation, granted to the ancestors of the whole\nrace of mankind . . . . preserved in the temples of Greece and\nItaly,\" were entirely wrong. For this is what all the Eastern\nInitiates and Pundits have been proclaiming to the world from\ntime to time. While a prominent Cinghalese priest assured the\nwriter that it was well known that the most important Buddhist\ntracts belonging to the sacred canon were stored away in *countries\nand places inaccessible to the European pundits*, the late\nSwami Dayanand Sarasvati, the greatest Sanskritist of his day\nin India, assured some members of the Theosophical Society of\nthe same fact with regard to ancient Brahmanical works. When told\nthat Professor Max Muller had declared to the audiences of his\n\"Lectures\" that the theory . . . . \"that *there\nwas a primeval preternatural revelation *granted to the fathers\nof the human race, finds but few supporters at present,\"\n-- the holy and learned man laughed. His answer was suggestive.\n\"If Mr. *Moksh Mooller*, as* *he pronounced\nthe name, were a Brahmin, and came with me, I might take him to\na *gupta *cave (a secret crypt) near Okhee Math, in the\nHimalayas, where he would soon find out that what crossed the\n*Kalapani *(the black waters of the ocean) from India to\nEurope were only the *bits of rejected copies of some passages\nfrom our sacred books. *There *was *a \"primeval\nrevelation,\" and it still exists; nor will it ever be lost\nto the world, but will reappear; though the Mlechchhas will of\ncourse have to wait.\"\n\nQuestioned further on this point, he would say no more. This was\nat Meerut, in 1880.\n\nNo doubt the mystification played, in the last century at Calcutta,\nby the Brahmins upon Colonel Wilford and Sir William Jones was\na cruel one. But it had been well deserved, and no one was more\nto be blamed\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xxxi INTRODUCTORY.\n\nin that affair than the Missionaries and Colonel Wilford themselves.\nThe former, on the testimony of Sir William Jones himself (see\nAsiat. Res., Vol. I., p. 272), were silly enough to maintain that\n\"the Hindus were even now almost Christians, because their\nBrahma, Vishnu and Mahesa were no other than the Christian trinity.\"*\nIt was a good lesson. It made the Oriental scholars doubly cautious;\nbut perchance it has also made some of them too shy, and caused,\nin its reaction, the pendulum of foregone conclusions to swing\ntoo much the other way. For \"that first supply on the Brahmanical\nmarket,\" made for Colonel Wilford, has now created an evident\nnecessity and desire in the Orientalists to declare nearly every\narchaic Sanskrit manuscript so modern as to give to the missionaries\nfull justification for availing themselves of the opportunity.\nThat they do so and to the full extent of their mental powers,\nis shown by the absurd attempts of late to prove that the whole\nPuranic story about Chrishna was *plagiarized by the Brahmins\nfrom the Bible! *But the facts cited by the Oxford Professor\nin his Lectures on the \"*Science of Religion*,\"*\n*concerning the now famous interpolations, for the benefit,\nand later on to the sorrow, of Col. Wilford, do not at all interfere\nwith the conclusions to which one who studies the Secret Doctrine\nmust unavoidably come. For, if the results show that neither the\n*New *nor even the *Old* Testament borrowed anything\nfrom the more ancient religion of the Brahmans and Buddhists,\nit does not follow that the Jews have not borrowed all they knew\nfrom the Chaldean records, the latter being mutilated later on\nby Eusebius. As to the Chaldeans, they assuredly got their primitive\nlearning from the Brahmans, for Rawlinson shows an undeniably\nVedic influence in the early mythology of Babylon; and Col. Vans\nKennedy has long since justly declared that Babylonia was, from\nher origin, the seat of Sanskrit and Brahman learning. But all\nsuch proofs must lose their value, in the presence of the latest\ntheory worked out by Prof. Max Muller. What it is everyone knows.\nThe code of phonetic laws has now become a universal solvent for\nevery identification and \"connection\" between\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* See Max Muller's \"Introduction to the Science of Religion.\"\nLecture *On **False Analogies in comparative Theology,\n*pp. 288 and 296 *et seq. *This relates to the clever\nforgery (on leaves inserted in old Puranic **MSS**.),\nin correct and archaic Sanskrit, of all that the Pundits of Col.\nWilford had heard from him about Adam and Abraham, Noah and his\nthree sons, etc., etc\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xxxii INTRODUCTORY.\n\nthe gods of many nations. Thus, though the Mother of Mercury (Budha,\nThot-Hermes, etc.), was Maia, the mother of Buddha (Gautama),\nalso Maya, and the mother of Jesus, likewise Maya (illusion, for\nMary is *Mare, *the Sea, the great illusion symbolically)\n-- yet these three characters have no connection, nor can they\nhave any, since Bopp, has \"laid down his code of phonetic\nlaws.\"\n\nIn their efforts to collect together the many skeins of unwritten\nhistory, it is a bold step for our Orientalists to take, to deny,\n*a priori, *everything that does not dovetail with their\nspecial conclusions. Thus, while new discoveries are daily made\nof great arts and sciences having existed far back in the night\nof time, even the knowledge of writing is refused to some of the\nmost ancient nations, and they are credited with barbarism instead\nof culture. Yet the traces of an immense civilization, even in\nCentral Asia, are still to be found. This civilization is undeniably\n*prehistoric. *And how can there be civilization without\na literature, in some form, without annals or chronicles? Common\nsense alone ought to supplement the broken links in the history\nof departed nations. The gigantic, unbroken wall of the mountains\nthat hem in the whole table-land of Tibet, from the upper course\nof the river Khuan-Khe down to the Kara-Korum hills, witnessed\na civilization during millenniums of years, and would have strange\nsecrets to tell mankind. The Eastern and Central portions of those\nregions -- the Nan-Schayn and the Altyne-taga -- were once upon\na time covered with cities that could well vie with Babylon. A\nwhole geological period has swept over the land, since those cities\nbreathed their last, as the mounds of shifting sand, and the sterile\nand now dead soil of the immense central plains of the basin of\nTarim testify. The borderlands alone are superficially known to\nthe traveller. Within those table-lands of sand there is water,\nand fresh oases are found blooming there, wherein no European\nfoot has ever yet ventured, or trodden the now treacherous soil.\nAmong these verdant oases there are some which are entirely inaccessible\neven to the native profane traveller. Hurricanes may \"tear\nup the sands and sweep whole plains away,\" they are powerless\nto destroy that which is beyond their reach. Built deep in the\nbowels of the earth, the subterranean stores are secure; and as\ntheir entrances are concealed in such oases, there is little fear\nthat any one should discover them, even should several armies\ninvade the sandy wastes where --\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xxxiii INTRODUCTORY.\n\n\"Not a pool, not a bush, not a house is seen,\n\nAnd the mountain-range forms a rugged screen\n\nRound the parch'd flats of the dry, dry desert. . . . .\"\n\nBut there is no need to send the reader across the desert, when\nthe same proofs of ancient civilization are found even in comparatively\npopulated regions of the same country. The oasis of Tchertchen,\nfor instance, situated about 4,000 feet above the level of the\nriver Tchertchen-D'arya, is surrounded with the ruins of archaic\ntowns and cities in every direction. There, some 3,000 human beings\nrepresent the relics of about a hundred extinct nations and races\n-- the very names of which are now unknown to our ethnologists.\nAn anthropologist would feel more than embarrassed to class, divide\nand subdivide them; the more so, as the respective descendants\nof all these *antediluvian *races and tribes know as little\nof their own forefathers themselves, as if they had fallen from\nthe moon. When questioned about their origin, they reply that\nthey know not whence their fathers had come, but had heard that\ntheir *first *(or earliest) men were ruled by the great\ngenii of these deserts. This may be put down to ignorance and\nsuperstition, yet in view of the teachings of the Secret Doctrine,\nthe answer may be based upon primeval tradition. Alone, the tribe\nof Khoorassan claims to have come from what is now known as Afghanistan,\nlong before the days of Alexander, and brings legendary lore to\nthat effect as corroboration. The Russian traveller, Colonel (now\nGeneral) Prjevalsky, found quite close to the oasis of Tchertchen,\nthe ruins of two enormous cities, the oldest of which was, according\nto local tradition, ruined 3,000 years ago by a hero and giant;\nand the other by the Mongolians in the tenth century of our era.\n\"The emplacement of the two cities is now covered, owing\nto shifting sands and the desert wind, with strange and heterogeneous\nrelics; with broken china and kitchen utensils and human bones.\nThe natives often find copper and gold coins, melted silver, ingots,\ndiamonds, and turquoises, and what is the most remarkable -- broken\nglass. . . . .\" \"Coffins of some undecaying wood, or\nmaterial, also, within which beautifully preserved embalmed bodies\nare found. . . . . The male mummies are all extremely tall powerfully\nbuilt men with long waving hair. . . . . A vault was found with\ntwelve dead men *sitting *in it. Another time, in a separate\ncoffin, a young girl was discovered by us. Her eyes were closed\nwith golden discs, and the jaws held firm by a golden circlet\nrunning from under the chin across the top of the head. Clad in\na narrow\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xxxiv INTRODUCTORY.\n\nwoollen garment, her bosom was covered with golden stars, the\nfeet being left naked.\" (From a lecture by N. M. Prjevalsky.)\nTo this, the famous traveller adds that all along their way on\nthe river Tchertchen they heard legends about twenty-three towns\nburied ages ago by the shifting sands of the deserts. The same\ntradition exists on the Lob-nor and in the oasis of Kerya.\n\nThe traces of such civilization, and these and like traditions,\ngive us the right to credit other legendary lore warranted by\nwell educated and learned natives of India and Mongolia, when\nthey speak of immense libraries reclaimed from the sand, together\nwith various reliques of ancient **MAGIC** lore,\nwhich have all been safely stowed away.\n\nTo recapitulate. The Secret Doctrine was the universally diffused\nreligion of the ancient and prehistoric world. Proofs of its diffusion,\nauthentic records of its history, a complete chain of documents,\nshowing its character and presence in every land, together with\nthe teaching of all its great adepts, exist to this day in the\nsecret crypts of libraries belonging to the Occult Fraternity.\n\nThis statement is rendered more credible by a consideration of\nthe following facts: the tradition of the thousands of ancient\nparchments saved when the Alexandrian library was destroyed; the\nthousands of Sanskrit works which disappeared in India in the\nreign of Akbar; the universal tradition in China and Japan that\nthe true old texts with the commentaries, which alone make them\ncomprehensible -- amounting to many thousands of volumes -- have\nlong passed out of the reach of profane hands; the disappearance\nof the vast sacred and occult literature of Babylon; the loss\nof those keys which alone could solve the thousand riddles of\nthe Egyptian hieroglyphic records; the tradition in India that\nthe real secret commentaries which alone make the Veda intelligible,\nthough no longer visible to profane eyes, still remain for the\ninitiate, hidden in secret caves and crypts; and an identical\nbelief among the Buddhists, with regard to their secret books.\n\nThe Occultists assert that all these exist, safe from Western\nspoliating hands, to re-appear in some more enlightened age, for\nwhich in the words of the late Swami Dayanand Sarasvati, \"the\nMlechchhas (outcasts, savages, those beyond the pale of Aryan\ncivilization) will have to wait.\"\n\nFor it is not the fault of the initiates that these documents\nare now \"lost\" to the profane; nor was their policy\ndictated by selfishness, or\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xxxv INTRODUCTORY.\n\nany desire to monopolise the life-giving sacred lore. There were\nportions of the Secret Science that for incalculable ages had\nto remain concealed from the profane gaze. But this was because\nto impart to the unprepared multitude secrets of such tremendous\nimportance, was equivalent to giving a child a lighted candle\nin a powder magazine.\n\nThe answer to a question which has frequently arisen in the minds\nof students, when meeting with statements such as this, may be\noutlined here.\n\n\"We can understand,\" they say, \"the necessity for\nconcealing from the herd such secrets as the Vril, or the rock-destroying\nforce, discovered by J. W. Keely, of Philadelphia, but we cannot\nunderstand how any danger could arise from the revelation of such\na purely philosophic doctrine, as, *e.g*., the evolution\nof the planetary chains.\"\n\nThe danger was this: Doctrines such as the planetary chain, or\nthe seven races, at once give a clue to the seven-fold nature\nof man, for each principle is correlated to a plane, a planet,\nand a race; and the human principles are, on every plane, correlated\nto seven-fold occult forces -- those of the higher planes being\nof tremendous power. So that any septenary division at once gives\na clue to tremendous occult powers, the abuse of which would cause\nincalculable evil to humanity. A clue, which is, perhaps, no clue\nto the present generation -- especially the Westerns -- protected\nas they are by their very blindness and ignorant materialistic\ndisbelief in the occult; but a clue which would, nevertheless,\nhave been very real in the early centuries of the Christian era,\nto people fully convinced of the reality of occultism, and entering\na cycle of degradation, which made them rife for abuse of occult\npowers and sorcery of the worst description.\n\nThe documents were concealed, it is true, but the knowledge itself\nand its actual existence had never been made a secret of by the\nHierophants of the Temple, wherein **M**YSTERIES\nhave ever been made a discipline and stimulus to virtue. This\nis very old news, and was repeatedly made known by the great adepts,\nfrom Pythagoras and Plato down to the Neoplatonists. It was the\nnew religion of the Nazarenes that wrought a change for the worse\n-- in the policy of centuries.\n\nMoreover, there is a well-known fact, a very curious one, corroborated\nto the writer by a reverend gentleman attached for years to a\nRussian Embassy -- namely, that there are several documents in\nthe St. Peters-\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xxxvi INTRODUCTORY.\n\nburg Imperial Libraries to show that, even so late as during the\ndays when Freemasonry, and Secret Societies of Mystics flourished\nunimpeded in Russia, *i.e.*, at the end of the last and\nthe beginning of the present century, more than one Russian Mystic\ntravelled to Tibet *via* the Ural mountains in search of\nknowledge and initiation *in the unknown crypts of Central\nAsia. *And more than one returned years later, with a rich\nstore of such information as could never have been given him anywhere\nin Europe. Several cases could be cited, and well-known names\nbrought forward, but for the fact that such publicity might annoy\nthe surviving relatives of the said late Initiates. Let any one\nlook over the Annals and History of Freemasonry in the archives\nof the Russian metropolis, and he will assure himself of the fact\nstated.\n\nThis is a corroboration of that which has been stated many times\nbefore, and, unfortunately, too indiscreetly. Instead of benefiting\nhumanity, the virulent charges of deliberate invention and imposture\nwith a purpose thrown at those who asserted but a truthful, if\neven a little known fact, have only generated bad Karma for the\nslanderers. But now the mischief is done, and truth should no\nlonger be denied, whatever the consequences. Is it a new religion,\nwe are asked? By no means; it is not a *religion, *nor\nis its philosophy *new*; for, as already stated, it is as\nold as thinking man. Its tenets are not now published for the\nfirst time, but have been cautiously given out to, and taught\nby, more than one European Initiate -- especially by the late\nRagon.\n\nMore than one great scholar has stated that there never was a\nreligious founder, whether Aryan, Semitic or Turanian, who had\n*invented *a new religion, or revealed a new truth. These\nfounders were all *transmitters, *not original teachers.\nThey were the authors of new forms and interpretations, while\nthe truths upon which the latter were based were as old as mankind.\nSelecting one or more of those grand verities -- actualities visible\nonly to the eye of the real Sage and Seer -- out of the many orally\nrevealed to man in the beginning, preserved and perpetuated in\nthe *adyta *of the temples through initiation, during the\n**M**YSTERIES and by personal transmission -- they\nrevealed these truths to the masses. Thus every nation received\nin its turn some of the said truths, under the veil of its own\nlocal and special symbolism; which, as time went on, developed\ninto a more or less philosophical cultus, a Pantheon in mythical\ndisguise. Therefore is Confucius, a very ancient\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xxxvii INTRODUCTORY.\n\nlegislator in historical chronology, though a very modern Sage\nin the World's History, shown by Dr. Legge* -- who calls him \"emphatically\n*a transmitter, *not a maker\" -- as saying: \"I\nonly hand on: I cannot create new things. I believe in the ancients\nand therefore I love them.\"** (Quoted in \"Science of\nReligions\" by Max Muller.)\n\nThe writer loves them too, and therefore believes in the ancients,\nand the modern heirs to their Wisdom. And believing in both, she\nnow transmits that which she has received and learnt herself to\nall those who will accept it. As to those who may reject her testimony,\n-- *i.e.*, the great majority -- she will bear them no\nmalice, for they will be as right in their way in denying, as\nshe is right in hers in affirming, since they look at **TRUTH**\nfrom two entirely different stand-points. Agreeably with the rules\nof critical scholarship, the Orientalist has to reject *a priori\n*whatever evidence he cannot fully verify for himself. And\nhow can a Western scholar accept on hearsay that which he knows\nnothing about? Indeed, that which is given in these volumes is\nselected from *oral, *as much as from written teachings.\nThis first instalment of the esoteric doctrines is based upon\nStanzas, which are the records of a people unknown to ethnology;\nit is claimed that they are written in a tongue absent from the\nnomenclature of languages and dialects with which philology is\nacquainted; they are said to emanate from a source (Occultism)\nrepudiated by science; and, finally, they are offered through\nan agency, incessantly discredited before the world by all those\nwho hate unwelcome truths, or have some special hobby of their\nown to defend. Therefore, the rejection of these teachings may\nbe expected, and must be accepted beforehand. No one styling himself\na \"scholar,\" in whatever department of exact science,\nwill be permitted to regard these teachings seriously. They will\nbe derided and rejected *a priori *in this century; but\nonly in this one. For in the twentieth century of our era scholars\nwill begin to recognize that the *Secret Doctrine *has\nneither been invented nor exaggerated, but, on the contrary, simply\noutlined; and finally, that its teachings antedate the Vedas.***\nHave not the latter been derided, rejected, and\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* Lun Yu (§ I a) Schott. \"Chinesische Literatur,\"\np. 7.\n\n** \"Life of Confucius,\" p. 96.\n\n*** This is no pretension to *prophecy, *but simply a statement\nbased on the knowledge of facts. Every century an attempt is being\nmade to show the world that Occultism [[Footnote continued on\nnext page]]\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xxxviii INTRODUCTORY.\n\ncalled \"a modern forgery\" even so recently as fifty\nyears ago? Was not Sanskrit proclaimed at one time the progeny\nof, and a dialect derived from, the Greek, according to Lempriere\nand other scholars? About 1820, Prof. Max Muller tells us, the\nsacred books of the Brahmans, of the Magians, and of the Buddhists,\n\"were all but unknown, their very existence was doubted,\nand there was not a single scholar who could have translated a\nline of the Veda . . . of the Zend Avesta, or . . . of the Buddhist\nTripitaka, and now the Vedas are proved to be the work of the\nhighest antiquity whose 'preservation amounts almost to a marvel'\n(Lecture on the Vedas).\n\nThe same will be said of the Secret Archaic Doctrine, when proofs\nare given of its undeniable existence and records. But it will\ntake centuries before much more is given from it. Speaking of\nthe keys to the Zodiacal mysteries as being almost lost to the\nworld, it was remarked by the writer in \"Isis Unveiled\"\nsome ten years ago that: \"The said key must be turned *seven\n*times before the whole system is divulged. We will give it\nbut *one *turn, and thereby allow the profane one glimpse\ninto the mystery. Happy he, who understands the whole!\"\n\nThe same may be said of the whole Esoteric system. One turn of\nthe key, and no more, was given in \"Isis.\" Much more\nis explained in these volumes. In those days the writer hardly\nknew the language in which the work was written, and the disclosure\nof many things, freely spoken about now, was forbidden. In Century\nthe Twentieth some disciple more informed, and far better fitted,\nmay be sent by the Masters of Wisdom to give final and irrefutable\nproofs that there exists a Science called* Gupta-Vidya; *and\nthat, like the once-mysterious sources of the Nile, the source\nof all religions and philosophies now known to the world has been\nfor many ages forgotten and lost to men, but is at last found.\n\nSuch a work as this has to be introduced with no simple *Preface,\n*but with a volume rather; one that would give *facts,\n*not mere disquisitions, since the **S**ECRET\n**D**OCTRINE is not a treatise, or a series of vague\ntheories, but contains all that can be given out to the world\nin this century.\n\nIt would be worse than useless to publish in these pages even\nthose\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n[[Footnote continued from previous page]] is no vain superstition.\nOnce the door permitted to be kept a little ajar, it will be opened\nwider with every new century. The times are ripe for a more serious\nknowledge than hitherto permitted, though still very limited,\nso far.\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xxxix INTRODUCTORY.\n\nportions of the esoteric teachings that have now escaped from\nconfinement, unless the genuineness and authenticity -- at any\nrate, the *probability* -- of the existence of such teachings\nwas first established. Such statements as will now be made, have\nto be shown warranted by various authorities: those of ancient\nphilosophers, classics and even certain learned Church Fathers,\nsome of whom knew these doctrines because they had studied them,\nhad seen and read works written upon them; and some of whom had\neven been personally initiated into the ancient Mysteries, during\nthe performance of which the arcane doctrines were allegorically\nenacted. The writer will have to give historical and trustworthy\nnames, and to cite well-known authors, ancient and modern, of\nrecognized ability, good judgment, and truthfulness, as also to\nname some of the famous proficients in the secret arts and science,\nalong with the mysteries of the latter, as they are divulged,\nor, rather, *partially *presented before the public in\ntheir strange archaic form.\n\nHow is this to be done? What is the best way for achieving such\nan object? was the ever-recurring question. To make our plan clearer,\nan illustration may be attempted. When a tourist coming from a\nwell-explored country, suddenly reaches the borderland of a *terra\nincognita, *hedged in, and shut out from view by a formidable\nbarrier of impassable rocks, he may still refuse to acknowledge\nhimself baffled in his exploratory plans. Ingress beyond is forbidden.\nBut, if he cannot visit the mysterious region personally, he may\nstill find a means of examining it from as short a distance as\ncan be arrived at. Helped by his knowledge of landscapes left\nbehind him, he can get a general and pretty correct idea of the\ntransmural view, if he will only climb to the loftiest summit\nof the altitudes in front of him. Once there, he can gaze at it,\nat his leisure, comparing that which he dimly perceives with that\nwhich he has just left below, now that he is, thanks to his efforts,\nbeyond the line of the mists and the cloud-capped cliffs.\n\nSuch a point of preliminary observation, for those who would like\nto get a more correct understanding of the mysteries of the pre-archaic\nperiods given in the texts, cannot be offered to them in these\ntwo volumes. But if the reader has patience, and would glance\nat the present state of beliefs and creeds in Europe, compare\nand check it with what is known to history of the ages directly\npreceding and\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xl INTRODUCTORY.\n\nfollowing the Christian era, then he will find all this in Volume\nIII. of this work.\n\nIn that volume a brief recapitulation will be made of all the\nprincipal adepts known to history, and the downfall of the mysteries\nwill be described; after which began the disappearance and final\nand systematic elimination from the memory of men of the real\nnature of initiation and the Sacred Science. From that time its\nteachings became Occult, and Magic sailed but too often under\nthe venerable but frequently misleading name of Hermetic philosophy.\nAs real Occultism had been prevalent among the Mystics during\nthe centuries that preceded our era, so Magic, or rather Sorcery,\nwith its Occult Arts, followed the beginning of Christianity.\n\nHowever great and zealous the fanatical efforts, during those\nearly centuries, to obliterate every trace of the mental and intellectual\nlabour of the Pagans, it was a failure; but the same spirit of\nthe dark demon of bigotry and intolerance has perverted systematically\nand ever since, every bright page written in the pre-Christian\nperiods. Even in her uncertain records, history has preserved\nenough of that which has survived to throw an impartial light\nupon the whole. Let, then, the reader tarry a little while with\nthe writer, on the spot of observation selected. He is asked to\ngive all his attention to that millennium which divided the pre-Christian\nand the *post*-Christian periods, by the year **O**NE\nof the Nativity. This event -- whether historically correct or\nnot -- has nevertheless been made to serve as a first signal for\nthe erection of manifold bulwarks against any possible return\nof, or even a glimpse into, the hated religions of the Past; hated\nand *dreaded -- *because throwing such a vivid light on\nthe new and intentionally veiled interpretation of what is now\nknown as the \"New Dispensation.\"\n\nHowever superhuman the efforts of the early Christian fathers\nto obliterate the Secret Doctrine from the very memory of man,\nthey all failed. Truth can never be killed; hence the failure\nto sweep away entirely from the face of the earth every vestige\nof that ancient Wisdom, and to shackle and gag every witness who\ntestified to it. Let one only think of the thousands, and perhaps\nmillions, of **MSS**. burnt; of monuments, with their\ntoo indiscreet inscriptions and pictorial symbols, pulverised\nto dust; of the bands of early hermits and ascetics roaming about\namong the ruined cities of Upper and Lower Egypt, in desert and\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xli INTRODUCTORY.\n\nmountain, valleys and highlands, seeking for and eager to destroy\nevery obelisk and pillar, scroll or parchment they could lay their\nhands on, if it only bore the symbol of the *tau, *or any\nother sign borrowed and appropriated by the new faith; and he\nwill then see plainly how it is that so little has remained of\nthe records of the Past. Verily, the fiendish spirits of fanaticism,\nof early and mediaeval Christianity and of Islam, have from the\nfirst loved to dwell in darkness and ignorance; and both have\nmade\n\n\"-------------- the sun like blood, the earth a tomb,\n\nThe tomb a hell, and hell itself a murkier gloom!\"\n\nBoth creeds have won their proselytes at the point of the sword;\nboth have built their churches on *heaven-kissing hecatombs\nof human victims. *Over the gateway of Century I. of our era,\nthe ominous words \"the **K**ARMA OF **I**SRAEL,\"\nfatally glowed. Over the portals of our own, the future seer may\ndiscern other words, that will point to the Karma for cunningly\nmade-up **H**ISTORY, for events purposely perverted,\nand for great characters slandered by posterity, mangled out of\nrecognition, between the two cars of Jagannatha -- Bigotry and\nMaterialism; one accepting too much, the other denying all. Wise\nis he who holds to the golden mid-point, who believes in the eternal\njustice of things. Says Faigi Diwan, the \"witness to the\nwonderful speeches of a free-thinker who belongs to a thousand\nsects\": \"In the assembly of the day of resurrection,\nwhen past things shall be forgiven, the sins of the Ka'bah will\nbe forgiven for the sake of the dust of Christian churches.\"\nTo this, Professor Max Muller replies: \"The sins of Islam\nare *as worthless as the dust of Christianity. On the day of\nresurrection both Muhammadans and Christians will see the vanity\nof their religious doctrines. *Men fight about religion on\nearth -- in heaven they shall find out that there is only one\ntrue religion -- the worship of God's **S**PIRIT.\"*\n\nIn other words -- \"**T**HERE IS NO RELIGION\n(OR LAW) HIGHER THAN TRUTH\" -- \"**SATYAT NASTI\nPARO DHARMAH**\" -- the motto of the Maharajah of Benares,\nadopted by the Theosophical Society.\n\nAs already said in the *Preface, *the Secret Doctrine is\nnot a version of \"Isis Unveiled\" -- as originally intended.\nIt is a volume explanatory of\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* \"Lectures on the Science of Religion,\" by F. Max Muller,\np. 257.\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xlii INTRODUCTORY.\n\nit rather, and, though entirely independent of the earlier work,\nan indispensable corollary to it. Much of what was in Isis could\nhardly be understood by theosophists in those days. The Secret\nDoctrine will now throw light on many a problem left unsolved\nin the first work, especially on the opening pages, which have\nnever been understood.\n\nConcerned simply with the philosophies within our historical times\nand the respective symbolism of the fallen nations, only a hurried\nglance could be thrown at the panorama of Occultism in the two\nvolumes of Isis. In the present work, detailed Cosmogony and the\nevolution of the four races that preceded our Fifth race Humanity\nare given, and now two large volumes explain that which was stated\non the first page of **I**SIS **U**NVEILED\nalone, and in a few allusions scattered hither and thither throughout\nthat work. Nor could the vast catalogue of the Archaic Sciences\nbe attempted in the present volumes, before we have disposed of\nsuch tremendous problems as Cosmic and Planetary Evolution, and\nthe gradual development of the mysterious Humanities and races\nthat preceded our \"Adamic\" Humanity. Therefore, the\npresent attempt to elucidate some mysteries of the Esoteric philosophy\nhas, in truth, nothing to do with the earlier work. As an instance,\nthe writer must be allowed to illustrate what is said.\n\nVolume I. of \"Isis\" begins with a reference to \"an\nold book\" --\n\n\"So very old that our modern antiquarians might ponder over\nits pages an indefinite time, and still not quite agree as to\nthe nature of the fabric upon which it is written. It is the only\noriginal copy now in existence. The most ancient Hebrew document\non occult learning -- the* Siphrah Dzeniouta* --* *was\ncompiled from it, and that at a time when the former was already\nconsidered in the light of a literary relic. One of its illustrations\nrepresents the Divine Essence emanating from **A**DAM*\nlike a luminous arc proceeding to form a circle; and then, having\nattained the highest point of its circumference, the ineffable\nglory bends back again, and returns to earth, bringing a higher\ntype of humanity in its vortex. As it approaches nearer and nearer\nto our planet, the Emanation becomes more and more shadowy, until\nupon touching the ground it is as black as night.\"\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* The name is used in the sense of the Greek word [[*anthropos*]].\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xliii INTRODUCTORY.\n\nThe \"very old Book\" is the original work from which\nthe many volumes of *Kiu-ti *were compiled. Not only this\nlatter and the *Siphrah Dzeniouta *but even the *Sepher\nJezirah,* *the work attributed by the Hebrew Kabalists to\ntheir Patriarch Abraham (!), the book of *Shu-king, *China's\nprimitive Bible, the sacred volumes of the Egyptian Thoth-Hermes,\nthe Puranas in India, and the Chaldean *Book of Numbers *and*\n*the* Pentateuch *itself, are all derived from that\none small parent volume. Tradition says, that it was taken down\nin *Senzar, *the secret sacerdotal tongue, from the words\nof the Divine Beings, who dictated it to the sons of Light, in\nCentral Asia, at the very beginning of the 5th (our) race; for\nthere was a time when its language (the *Sen-zar*)*\n*was known to the Initiates of every nation, when the forefathers\nof the Toltec understood it as easily as the inhabitants of the\nlost Atlantis, who inherited it, in their turn, from the sages\nof the 3rd Race, the *Manushis, *who learnt it direct from\nthe *Devas *of the 2nd and 1st Races. The \"illustration\"\nspoken of in \"Isis\" relates to the evolution of these\nRaces and of our 4th and 5th Race Humanity in the Vaivasvata Manvantara\nor \"Round\"; each Round being composed of the Yugas of\nthe seven periods of Humanity; four of which are now passed in\n*our *life cycle, the middle point of the 5th being nearly\nreached. The illustration is symbolical, as every one can well\nunderstand, and covers the ground from the beginning. The old\nbook, having described Cosmic Evolution and explained the origin\nof everything on earth, including physical man, after giving the\ntrue history of the races from the *First *down to the\nFifth (our) race, goes no further. It stops short at the beginning\nof the *Kali Yuga *just 4989 years ago at the death of\nKrishna, the bright \"Sun-god,\" the once living hero\nand reformer.\n\nBut there exists another book. None of its possessors regard it\nas very ancient, as it was born with, and is only as old as the\nBlack Age,\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* Rabbi Jehoshua Ben Chananea, who died about **A.D**.\n72, openly declared that he had performed \"miracles\"\nby means of the *Book of Sepher Jezireh, *and challenged\nevery sceptic. Franck, quoting from the Babylonian Talmud, names\ntwo other thaumaturgists, Rabbis Chanina and Oshoi. (See \"*Jerusalem\nTalmud, Sanhedrin,\" *c. 7, etc.; and \"*Franck,*\"*\npp. *55, 56.) Many of the Mediaeval Occultists, Alchemists,\nand Kabalists claimed the same; and even the late modern *Magus,\n*Eliphas Levi, publicly asserts it in print in his books on\nMagic.\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xliv INTRODUCTORY.\n\nnamely, about 5,000 years. In about nine years hence, the first\ncycle of the first five millenniums, that began with the great\ncycle of the Kali-Yuga, will end. And then the last prophecy contained\nin that book (the first volume of the prophetic record for the\nBlack Age) will be accomplished. We have not long to wait, and\nmany of us will witness the Dawn of the New Cycle, at the end\nof which not a few accounts will be settled and squared between\nthe races. Volume II. of the Prophecies is nearly ready, having\nbeen in preparation since the time of Buddha's grand successor,\nSankaracharya.\n\nOne more important point must be noticed, one that stands foremost\nin the series of proofs given of the existence of one primeval,\nuniversal Wisdom -- at any rate for the Christian Kabalists and\nstudents. The teachings were, at least, partially known to several\nof the Fathers of the Church. It is maintained, on purely historical\ngrounds, that Origen, Synesius, and even Clemens Alexandrinus,\nhad been themselves initiated into the mysteries before adding\nto the Neo-Platonism of the Alexandrian school, that of the Gnostics,\nunder the Christian veil. More than this, some of the doctrines\nof the Secret schools -- though by no means all -- were preserved\nin the Vatican, and have since become part and parcel of the mysteries,\nin the shape of disfigured additions made to the original Christian\nprogramme by the Latin Church. Such is the now materialised dogma\nof the Immaculate Conception. This accounts for the great persecutions\nset on foot by the Roman Catholic Church against Occultism, Masonry,\nand *heterodox *mysticism generally.\n\nThe days of Constantine were the last turning-point in history,\nthe period of the Supreme struggle that ended in the Western world\nthrottling the old religions in favour of the new one, built on\ntheir bodies. From thence the vista into the far distant Past,\nbeyond the \"Deluge\" and the Garden of Eden, began to\nbe forcibly and relentlessly closed by every fair and unfair means\nagainst the indiscreet gaze of posterity. Every issue was blocked\nup, every record that hands could be laid upon, destroyed. Yet\nthere remains enough, even among such mutilated records, to warrant\nus in saying that there is in them every possible evidence of\nthe actual existence of a Parent Doctrine. Fragments have survived\ngeological and political cataclysms to tell the story; and every\nsurvival shows evidence that the now *Secret *Wisdom was\nonce the\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xlv INTRODUCTORY.\n\none fountain head, the ever-flowing perennial source, at which\nwere fed all its streamlets -- the later religions of all nations\n-- from the first down to the last. This period, beginning with\nBuddha and Pythagoras at the one end and the Neo-Platonists and\nGnostics at the other, is the only focus left in History wherein\nconverge for the last time the bright rays of light streaming\nfrom the aeons of time gone by, unobscured by the hand of bigotry\nand fanaticism.\n\nThis accounts for the necessity under which the writer has laboured\nto be ever explaining the facts given from the hoariest Past by\nevidence gathered from the historical period. No other means was\nat hand, at the risk even of being once more charged with a lack\nof method and system. The public must be made acquainted with\nthe efforts of many World-adepts, of initiated poets, writers,\nand classics of every age, to preserve in the records of Humanity\nthe Knowledge of the existence, at least, of such a philosophy,\nif not actually of its tenets. The Initiates of 1888 would indeed\nremain incomprehensible and ever a seemingly impossible myth,\nwere not like Initiates shown to have lived in every other age\nof history. This could be done only by naming Chapter and Verse\nwhere may be found mention of these great characters, who were\npreceded and followed by a long and interminable line of other\nfamous Antediluvian and Post-diluvian Masters in the arts. Thus\nonly could be shown, on semi-traditional and semi-historical authority,\nthat knowledge of the Occult and the powers it confers on man,\nare not altogether fictions, but that they are as old as the world\nitself.\n\nTo my judges, past and future, therefore -- whether they are serious\nliterary critics, or those howling dervishes in literature who\njudge a book according to the popularity or unpopularity of the\nauthor's name, who, hardly glancing at its contents, fasten like\nlethal *bacilli *on the weakest points of the body -- I\nhave nothing to say. Nor shall I condescend to notice those crack-brained\nslanderers -- fortunately very few in number -- who, hoping to\nattract public attention by throwing discredit on every writer\nwhose name is better known than their own, foam and bark at their\nvery shadows. These, having first maintained for years that the\ndoctrines taught in the *Theosophist, *and which culminated\nin \"Esoteric Buddhism,\" *had been all invented by\nthe present writer*, have finally turned round, and denounced\n\"Isis Unveiled\" and the rest as a plagiarism from Eliphas\nLevi (!), Paracelsus (!!), and, *mirabile*\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xlvi INTRODUCTORY.\n\n*dictu, *Buddhism and Brahmanism (!!!) As well charge Renan\nwith having stolen his *Vie de Jesus *from the Gospels,\nand Max Muller his \"Sacred Books of the East\" or his\n\"Chips\" from the philosophies of the Brahmins and Gautama,\nthe Buddha. But to the public in general and the readers of the\n\"Secret Doctrine\" I may repeat what I have stated all\nalong, and which I now clothe in the words of Montaigne: Gentlemen,\n\"**I** HAVE HERE MADE ONLY A NOSEGAY OF CULLED\nFLOWERS, AND HAVE BROUGHT NOTHING OF MY OWN BUT THE STRING THAT\nTIES THEM.\"\n\nPull the \"string\" to pieces and cut it up in shreds,\nif you will. As for the nosegay of FACTS -- you will never be\nable to make away with these. You can only ignore them, and no\nmore.\n\nWe may close with a parting word concerning this Volume I. In\nan **I**NTRODUCTION prefacing a Part dealing chiefly\nwith Cosmogony, certain subjects brought forward might be deemed\nout of place, but one more consideration added to those already\ngiven have led me to touch upon them. Every reader will inevitably\njudge the statements made from the stand-point of his own knowledge,\nexperience, and consciousness, based on what he has already learnt.\nThis fact the writer is constantly obliged to bear in mind: hence,\nalso the frequent references in this first Book to matters which,\nproperly speaking, belong to a later part of the work, but which\ncould not be passed by in silence, lest the reader should look\ndown on this work as a fairy tale indeed -- a fiction of some\nmodern brain.\n\nThus, the *Past *shall help to realise the **P**RESENT,\nand the latter to better appreciate the **P**AST.\nThe errors of the day must be explained and swept away, yet it\nis more than probable -- and in the present case it amounts to\ncertitude -- that once more the testimony of long ages and of\nhistory will fail to impress anyone but the very intuitional --\nwhich is equal to saying the very few. But in this as in all like\ncases, the *true *and the *faithful *may console\nthemselves by presenting the sceptical modern Sadducee with the\nmathematical proof and memorial of his obdurate obstinacy and\nbigotry. There still exists somewhere in the archives of the French\nAcademy, the famous law of probabilities worked out by an algebraical\nprocess for the benefit of sceptics by certain mathematicians.\nIt runs thus: If two persons give their evidence to\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] xlvii INTRODUCTORY.\n\na fact, and thus impart to it each of them 5/6 of certitude; that\nfact will have then 35/36 of certitude; *i.e.*, its probability\nwill bear to its improbability the ratio of 35 to 1. If three\nsuch evidences are joined together the certitude will become 215/216.\nThe agreement of ten persons giving each 1/2 of certitude will\nproduce 1023/1024 , etc., etc. The Occultist may remain satisfied,\nand care for no more.\n\nNext Section\n\nContents",
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