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    "slug": "vol-1-cosmogenesis",
    "name": "Volume I — Cosmogenesis"
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  "chapter": {
    "num": 9,
    "slug": "11-stanza-vi----our-world-its-growth-and-development-136",
    "title": "STANZA VI. -- OUR WORLD, ITS GROWTH AND DEVELOPMENT ... 136",
    "of": 48,
    "words": 7134,
    "text": "## STANZA VI. -- OUR WORLD, ITS GROWTH AND DEVELOPMENT ... 136\n\n\nThe Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, Vol 1, bk1, sec 6\n\n###### The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky -- Vol. 1\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 136 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\n##### STANZA VI.\n\n1. **B**Y THE POWER OF THE **M**OTHER\nOF **M**ERCY AND **K**NOWLEDGE (*a*),\n**K**WAN-**Y**IN,* THE \"**T**RIPLE\"\nOF **K**WAN-**S**HAI-**Y**IN,\nRESIDING IN **K**WAN-**Y**IN-**T**IEN\n(*b*), **F**OHAT, THE BREATH OF THEIR PROGENY,\nTHE **S**ON OF THE **S**ONS, HAVING\nCALLED FORTH FROM THE LOWER ABYSS (*chaos*)* *THE\nILLUSIVE FORM OF **S**IEN-**T**CHAN\n(*our Universe*)* *AND THE SEVEN ELEMENTS: --\n\n(*a*.) The Mother of Mercy and Knowledge is called \"the\ntriple\" of Kwan-Shai-Yin because in her correlations, metaphysical\nand cosmical, she is the \"Mother, the Wife and the Daughter\"\nof the *Logos*,* *just as in the later theological\ntranslations she became \"the Father, Son and (the female)\nHoly Ghost\" -- the* Sakti *or Energy -- the Essence\nof the three. Thus in the Esotericism of the Vedantins, *Daiviprakriti*,\nthe* *Light manifested through Eswara, the *Logos,**\n*is at one and the same time the Mother and also the Daughter\nof the Logos or Verbum of Parabrahmam; while in that of the trans-Himalayan\nteachings it is -- in the hierarchy of allegorical and metaphysical\ntheogony -- \"the **M**OTHER\" or abstract,\nideal matter, Mulaprakriti, the Root of Nature; -- from the metaphysical\nstandpoint, a correlation of Adi-Bhuta, manifested in the Logos,\nAvalokiteshwara; -- and from the purely occult and\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* This stanza is translated from the Chinese text, and the names,\nas the equivalents of the original terms, are preserved. The real\nesoteric nomenclature cannot be given, as it would only confuse\nthe reader. The Brahmanical doctrine has no equivalent to these.\nVach seems, in many an aspect, to approach the Chinese Kwan-yin,\nbut there is no regular worship of Vach under this name in India,\nas there is of Kwan-Yin in China. No exoteric religious system\nhas ever adopted a female Creator, and thus woman was regarded\nand treated, from the first dawn of popular religions, as inferior\nto man. It is only in China and Egypt that Kwan-Yin and Isis were\nplaced on a par with the male gods. Esotericism ignores both sexes.\nIts highest Deity is sexless as it is formless, neither Father\nnor Mother; and its first manifested beings, celestial and terrestrial\nalike, become only gradually androgynous and finally separate\ninto distinct sexes.\n\n** The \"Theosophist\" of February, 1887, p. 305, first\nlecture on the Bhagavadgita.\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 137 THE MYSTERY OF THE FEMALE LOGOS.\n\nCosmical, Fohat,* the \"Son of the Son,\" the androgynous\nenergy resulting from this \"Light of the Logos,\" and\nwhich manifests in the plane of the objective Universe as the\nhidden, as much as the revealed, Electricity -- which is **L**IFE.\n\n(*b*)* Kwan-Yin-Tien *means the \"melodious\nheaven of Sound,\" the abode of Kwan-Yin, or the \"*Divine\nVoice*\"* *literally. This \"Voice\" is\na synonym of the *Verbum *or the Word: \"Speech,\"\nas the expression of thought. Thus may be traced the connection\nwith, and even the origin of the Hebrew *Bath-Kol*,*\n*the \"daughter of the Divine Voice,\" or *Verbum,\n*or the male and female Logos, the \"Heavenly Man\"\nor Adam Kadmon, who is at the same time Sephira. The latter was\nsurely anticipated by the Hindu Vach, the goddess of Speech, or\nof the Word. For Vach -- the daughter and the female portion,\nas is stated, of Brahma, one \"generated by the gods\"\n-- is, in company with Kwan-Yin, with Isis (also the *daughter*,\nwife and *sister *of Osiris) and other goddesses, the female\n*Logos, *so to speak, the goddess of the *active *forces\nin Nature, the Word, Voice or Sound, and Speech. If Kwan-Yin is\nthe \"melodious Voice,\" so is Vach; \"the melodious\ncow who milked forth sustenance and water\" (the female principle)\n-- \"who yields us nourishment and sustenance,\" as Mother-Nature.\nShe is associated in the work of creation with the Prajapati.\nShe is male and female *ad libitum*, as* *Eve is\nwith Adam. And she is a form of Aditi -- the principle higher\nthan *Ether* -- in Akasa, the synthesis of all the forces\nin Nature; thus Vach and Kwan-Yin are both the magic potency of\nOccult sound in Nature and Ether -- which \"Voice\" calls\nforth Sien-Tchan, the illusive form of the Universe out of Chaos\nand the Seven Elements.\n\nThus in Manu Brahma (the *Logos *also) is shown dividing\nhis body into two parts, male and female, and creating in the\nlatter, who is Vach, Viraj, who is himself, or Brahma again --\nit is in this way a learned Vedantin Occultist speaks of that\n\"goddess,\" explaining the reason why Eswara (or Brahma)\nis called *Verbum *or* Logos*;* *why in fact\nit is called Sabda Brahmam: --\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* Says the lecturer on p. 306: \"Evolution is commenced by\nthe intellectual energy of the *Logos*, not merely on account\nof the potentialities locked up in *Mulaprakriti. *This\nlight of the Logos is the link . . . between objective matter\nand the subjective thought of *Eswara *(or Logos). It is\ncalled in several Buddhist books *Fohat. *It is the one\ninstrument with which the *Logos *works.\"\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 138 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\n\"The explanation I am going to give you will appear thoroughly\nmystical; but if mystical, it has a tremendous significance when\nproperly understood. Our old writers said that *Vach *is\nof four kinds (see Rig Veda and the Upanishads). *Vaikhari-Vach\n*is what we utter. Every kind of *Vaikhari-Vach *exists\nin its *Madhyama*,* *further in its *Pasyanti*,*\n*and ultimately in its *Para *form.* The reason why\nthis Pranava is called Vach is this, that the four principles\nof the great Kosmos correspond to these four forms of *Vach.\n*Now the whole manifested solar System exists in its *Sukshma\n*form in the light or energy of the *Logos*, because\nits energy is caught up and transferred to Cosmic matter. . .\n. The whole Kosmos in its objective form is *Vaikhari-Vach*,\nthe light of the *Logos *is the *Madhyama *form,\nand the Logos itself the *Pasyanti *form, and Parabrahm\nthe *Para *form or aspect of that Vach. It is by the light\nof this explanation that we must try to understand certain statements\nmade by various philosophers to the effect that the manifested\nKosmos is the *Verbum *manifested as Kosmos\" (see\nLecture on the Bhagavadgita, referred to above).\n\n-------\n\n##### STANZA VI. -- (Continued.)\n\n2. **T**HE **S**WIFT AND THE **R**ADIANT\n**O**NE PRODUCES THE SEVEN *Layu*** (*a*)\nCENTRES, AGAINST WHICH NONE WILL PREVAIL TO THE GREAT DAY \"**B**E\nWITH US\" -- AND SEATS THE UNIVERSE ON THESE ETERNAL FOUNDATIONS,\nSURROUNDING **S**IEN-**T**CHAN WITH\nTHE **E**LEMENTARY **G**ERMS (*b*).\n\n(*a.*) The seven *Layu *centres are the seven Zero\npoints, using the term Zero in the same sense that Chemists do,\nto indicate a point at which, in Esotericism, the scale of reckoning\nof differentiation begins. From the Centres -- beyond which Esoteric\nphilosophy allows us to perceive the dim metaphysical outlines\nof the \"Seven Sons\" of Life and Light, the Seven Logoi\nof the Hermetic and all other philosophers -- begins\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n** Madhya *is said of something whose commencement and\nend are unknown, and Para means infinite. These expressions all\nrelate to infinitude and to division of time.\n\n** From the Sanskrit *Laya*, the point of matter where\nevery differentiation has ceased.\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 139 FROM NO-NUMBER TO NUMBER SEVEN.\n\nthe differentiation of the elements which enter into the constitution\nof our Solar System. It has often been asked what was the exact\ndefinition of Fohat and his powers and functions, as he seems\nto exercise those of a Personal God as understood in the popular\nreligions. The answer has just been given in the comment on Stanza\nV. As well said in the Bhagavadgita Lectures, \"The whole\nKosmos must necessarily exist in the One Source of energy from\nwhich this light (*Fohat*)* *emanates.\" Whether\nwe count the principles in Kosmos and man as seven or only as\nfour, the forces of, and in, physical Nature are Seven; and it\nis stated by the same authority that \"*Pragna*,*\n*or the capacity of perception, exists in seven different\naspects corresponding to the seven conditions of matter\"\n(*Personal and impersonal God*)*. *For, \"just\nas a human being is composed of seven principles, differentiated\nmatter in the Solar System exists in seven different conditions\"\n(*ibid*)*. *So does Fohat.* He is One and Seven,\nand on the Cosmic plane is behind all such manifestations as light,\nheat, sound, adhesion, etc., etc., and is the \"spirit\"\nof **E**LECTRICITY, which is the **L**IFE\nof the Universe. As an abstraction, we call it the **O**NE\n**L**IFE; as an objective and evident Reality, we\nspeak of a septenary scale of manifestation, which begins at the\nupper rung with the One Unknowable **C**AUSALITY,\nand ends as Omnipresent Mind and Life immanent in every atom of\nMatter. Thus, while science speaks of its evolution through brute\nmatter, blind force, and senseless motion, the Occultists point\nto *intelligent ***L**AW and *sentient\n***L**IFE, and add that Fohat is the guiding\nSpirit of all this. Yet he is no personal god at all, but the\nemanation of those other Powers behind him whom the Christians\ncall the \"Messengers\" of their God (who is in reality\nonly the Elohim, or rather one of the Seven Creators called Elohim),\nand we, the \"Messenger of the primordial Sons of Life and\nLight.\"\n\n(*b.*)* *The \"Elementary Germs\" with which\nhe fills Sien-Tchan (the \"Universe\") from Tien-Sin (the\n\"Heaven of Mind,\" literally, or that which is absolute)\nare the Atoms of Science and the Monads of Leibnitz.\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* \"Fohat\" has several meanings. (See Stanza V., Commentary\n*et infra*)*. *He is called the \"Builder of\nthe Builders,\" the Force that he personifies having formed\nour Septenary chain.\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 140 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\n##### STANZA VI. -- Continued.\n\n3. **O**F THE SEVEN (*elements*) --* *FIRST\nONE MANIFESTED, SIX CONCEALED; TWO MANIFESTED -- FIVE CONCEALED;\nTHREE MANIFESTED -- FOUR CONCEALED; FOUR PRODUCED -- THREE HIDDEN;\nFOUR AND ONE TSAN* *(*fraction*)* *REVEALED\n-- TWO AND ONE HALF CONCEALED; SIX TO BE MANIFESTED -- ONE LAID\nASIDE (*a*). LASTLY, SEVEN SMALL WHEELS REVOLVING; ONE\nGIVING BIRTH TO THE OTHER (*b*).\n\n(*a.*) Although these Stanzas refer to the whole Universe\nafter a Mahapralaya (universal destruction), yet this sentence,\nas any student of Occultism may see, refers also by analogy to\nthe evolution and final formation of the primitive (though compound)\nSeven Elements on our Earth. Of these, four elements are now fully\nmanifested, while the fifth -- Ether -- is only partially so,\nas we are hardly in the second half of the Fourth Round, and consequently\nthe fifth Element will manifest fully only in the Fifth Round.\nThe Worlds, including our own, were of course, as germs, primarily\nevolved from the ONE Element in its second stage (\"Father-Mother,\"\nthe differentiated World's Soul, not what is termed the \"Over-Soul\"\nby Emerson), whether we call it, with modern Science, Cosmic dust\nand Fire Mist, or with Occultism -- Akasa, Jivatma, divine Astral\nLight, or the \"Soul of the World.\" But this first stage\nof Evolution was in due course of time followed by the next. No\nworld, as no heavenly body, could be constructed on the objective\nplane, had not the Elements been sufficiently differentiated already\nfrom their primeval *Ilus*, resting in *Laya. *The\nlatter term is a synonym of Nirvana. It is, in fact, the Nirvanic\ndissociation of all substances, merged after a life-cycle into\nthe latency of their primary conditions. It is the luminous but\nbodiless shadow of the matter *that was*,* *the\nrealm of negativeness -- wherein lie latent during their period\nof rest the active Forces of the Universe. Now, speaking of Elements,\nit is made the standing reproach of the Ancients, that they \"supposed\ntheir Elements simple and undecomposable.\"* Once more this\nis an unwarrantable state-\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* The shades of our pre-historical ancestors might return the\ncompliment to modern physicists, now that new discoveries in chemistry\nhave led Mr. Crookes, **F.R.S**., to admit that Science\nis yet a thousand leagues from the knowledge of the compound nature\nof the simplest molecule. From him we learn that such a thing\nas a really simple [[Footnote continued on next page]]\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 141 WERE THE ANCIENTS IGNORANT OF THE PHYSICAL\nSCIENCES?\n\nment; as, at any rate, their initiated philosophers can hardly\ncome under such an imputation, since it is they who have invented\nallegories and religious myths from the beginning. Had they been\nignorant of the Heterogeneity of their Elements they would have\nhad no personifications of Fire, Air, Water, Earth, and AEther;\ntheir Cosmic gods and goddesses would never have been blessed\nwith such posterity, with so many sons and daughters, elements\nborn *from *and* within each respective Element*.\nAlchemy and occult phenomena would have been a delusion and a\nsnare, even in theory, had the Ancients been ignorant of the potentialities\nand correlative functions and attributes of every element that\nenters into the composition of Air, Water, Earth, and even *Fire*\n--* *the latter a terra incognita to this day to modern\nScience, which is obliged to call it Motion, evolution of light\nand heat, state of ignition, -- defining it by its outward aspects\nin short, and remaining ignorant of its nature. But that which\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n[[Footnote continued from previous page]] molecule entirely homogeneous\nis *terra incognita *in chemistry. \"Where are we to\ndraw the line?\" he asks; \"is there no way out of this\nperplexity? Must we either make the elementary examinations so\nstiff that only 60 or 70 candidates can pass, or must we open\nthe examination doors so wide that the number of admissions is\nlimited only by the number of applicants?\" And then the learned\ngentleman gives striking instances. He says: \"Take the case\nof yttrium. It has its definite atomic weight, it behaved in every\nrespect as a simple body, an element, to which we might indeed\nadd, but from which we could not take away. Yet this yttrium,\nthis supposed homogeneous whole, on being submitted to a certain\nmethod of fractionation, is resolved into portions not absolutely\nidentical among themselves, and exhibiting a gradation of properties.\nOr take the case of didymium. Here was a body betraying all the\nrecognised characters of an element. It had been separated with\nmuch difficulty from other bodies which approximated closely to\nit in their properties, and during this crucial process it had\nundergone very severe treatment and very close scrutiny. But then\ncame another chemist, who, treating this assumed homogeneous body\nby a peculiar process of fractionation, resolved it into the two\nbodies praseodymium and neodymium, between which certain distinctions\nare perceptible. Further, we even now have no certainty that neodymium\nand praseodymium are simple bodies. On the contrary, they likewise\nexhibit symptoms of splitting up. Now, if one supposed element\non proper treatment is thus found to comprise dissimilar molecules,\nwe are surely warranted in asking whether similar results might\nnot be obtained in other elements, perhaps in all elements, if\ntreated in the right way. We may even ask where the process of\nsorting-out is to stop -- a process which of course pre-supposes\nvariations between the individual molecules of each species. And\nin these successive separations we naturally find bodies approaching\nmore and more closely to each other.\" (Presidential address\nbefore the Royal Society of Chemists, March, 1888.)\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 142 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\nmodern Science seems to fail to perceive is that, differentiated\nas may have been those simple chemical atoms -- which archaic\nphilosophy called \"the creators of their respective Parents,\"\nfathers, brothers, husbands of their mothers, and those mothers\nthe daughters of their own sons, like Aditi and Daksha, for example\n-- differentiated as these elements were in the beginning, still,\nthey were not the compound bodies known to science, as they are\nnow. Neither Water, Air, Earth (synonym for solids generally)\nexisted in their present form, representing the three states of\nmatter alone recognised by Science; for all these are the productions\nalready recombined by the atmospheres of globes completely formed\n-- even to fire -- so that in the first periods of the earth's\nformation they were something quite *sui generis. *Now\nthat the conditions and laws ruling our solar system are fully\ndeveloped; and that the atmosphere of our earth, as of every other\nglobe, has become, so to say, a crucible of its own, Occult Science\nteaches that there is a perpetual exchange taking place in space\nof molecules, or of atoms rather, correlating, and thus changing\ntheir combining equivalents on every planet. Some men of Science,\nand those among the greatest physicists and chemists, begin to\nsuspect this fact, which has been known for ages to the Occultists.\nThe spectroscope only shows the probable similarity (on external\nevidence) of terrestrial and sidereal substance; it is unable\nto go any farther, or to show whether atoms gravitate towards\none another in the same way and under the same conditions as they\nare supposed to do on our planet, physically and chemically. The\nscale of temperature, from the highest degree to the lowest that\ncan be conceived of, may be imagined to be one and the same in\nand for the whole Universe; nevertheless, its properties, other\nthan those of dissociation and reassociation, differ on every\nplanet; and thus atoms enter into new forms of existence, undreamt\nof, and incognizable to, physical Science. As already expressed\nin \"Five Years of Theosophy,\" the essence of Cometary\nmatter, for instance, \"is totally different from any of the\nchemical or physical characteristics with which the greatest chemists\nand physicists of the earth are acquainted\" (p. 242). And\neven that matter, during rapid passage through our atmosphere,\nundergoes a certain change in its nature. Thus not alone the elements\nof our planets, but even those of all its sisters in the Solar\nSystem, differ as widely from each other in their combinations,\nas from the Cosmic elements beyond our\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 143 THE SLEEP OF THE ETERNAL MOTHER.\n\nSolar limits.* Therefore, they cannot be taken as a standard for\ncomparison with the same in other worlds.** Enshrined in their\nvirgin, pristine state within the bosom of the Eternal Mother,\nevery atom born beyond the threshold of her realm is doomed to\nincessant differentiation. \"The Mother sleeps, yet is ever\nbreathing.\" And every breath sends out into the plane of\nmanifestation her Protean products, which, carried on by the wave\nof the efflux, are scattered by Fohat, and driven toward and beyond\nthis or another planetary atmosphere. Once caught by the latter,\nthe atom is lost; its pristine purity is gone for ever, unless\nFate dissociates it by leading it to \"a current of EFFLUX\"\n(an occult term meaning quite a different process from that which\nthe ordinary term implies); when it may be carried once more to\nthe borderland where it had perished, and taking its flight, not\ninto Space *above *but into Space *within*,*\n*it will be brought under a state of differential equilibrium\nand happily re-absorbed. Were a truly learned Occultist-alchemist\nto write the \"Life and Adventures of an Atom\" he would\nsecure thereby the eternal scorn of the modern chemist, perchance\nalso his subsequent\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* This is again corroborated by the same man of science in the\nsame lecture, who quotes Clerk Maxwell, saying \"that the\nelements are not absolutely homogeneous.\" He writes: \"It\nis difficult to conceive of selection and elimination of intermediate\nvarieties, for where can these eliminated molecules have gone\nto, if, as we have reason to believe, the hydrogen, &c. of\nthe fixed stars is composed of molecules identical in all respects\nwith our own.\" And he adds: \"In the first place we may\ncall in question this absolute molecular identity, since we have\nhitherto had no means for coming to a conclusion save the means\nfurnished by the spectroscope, while it is admitted that, for\naccurately comparing and discriminating the spectra of two bodies,\nthey should be examined under identical states of temperature,\npressure, and all other physical conditions. We have certainly\nseen, in the spectrum of the sun, rays which we have not been\nable to identify.\"\n\n** \"Each world has its Fohat, who is omnipresent in his own\nsphere of action. But there are as many Fohats as there are worlds,\neach varying in power and degree of manifestations. The individual\nFohats make one Universal, Collective Fohat -- the aspect-Entity\nof the one absolute Non-Entity, which is absolute Be-Ness, 'SAT.'\n\"Millions and billions of worlds are produced at every Manvantara\"\n-- it is said. Therefore there must be many Fohats, whom we consider\nas conscious and *intelligent *Forces. This, no doubt,\nto the disgust of scientific minds. Nevertheless the Occultists,\nwho have good reasons for it, consider all the forces of Nature\nas veritable, though supersensuous, states of Matter; and as possible\nobjects of perception to Beings endowed with the requisite senses.\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 144 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\ngratitude.* However it may be, \"*The Breath of the Father-Mother\nissues cold and radiant and gets hot and corrupt*, *to\ncool once more, and be purified in the eternal bosom of inner\nSpace*,\"* *says the Commentary. Man absorbs cold\npure air on the mountain-top, and throws it out impure, hot and\ntransformed. Thus -- the higher atmosphere being the mouth, and\nthe lower one the lungs of every globe -- the man of our planet\nbreathes only the refuse of \"Mother\"; therefore, \"he\nis doomed to die on it.\"**\n\n(*b*)* *The process referred to as \"the small\nwheels giving birth, one to the other,\" takes place in the\nsixth region from above, and on the plane of the most material\nworld of all in the manifested Kosmos -- our terrestrial plane.\nThese \"Seven Wheels\" are our planetary chain (see Commentary\nNos. 5 and 6). By \"Wheels\" the various spheres and centres\nof forces are generally meant; but in this case they refer to\nour septenary ring.\n\n-------\n\n##### STANZA VI. -- Continued.\n\n4. **H**E BUILDS THEM IN THE LIKENESS OF OLDER **W**HEELS\n(*worlds*),* *PLACING THEM ON THE IMPERISHABLE CENTRES\n(*a*).\n\n**H**OW DOES **F**OHAT BUILD THEM? **H**E\nCOLLECTS THE FIERY DUST. **H**E MAKES BALLS OF FIRE,\nRUNS THROUGH THEM AND ROUND THEM, INFUSING LIFE THEREINTO; THEN\nSETS THEM INTO MOTION, SOME ONE, SOME THE OTHER WAY. **T**HEY\nARE COLD -- HE MAKES THEM HOT. **T**HEY ARE DRY --\nHE MAKES THEM MOIST. **T**HEY SHINE -- HE FANS AND\nCOOLS THEM (*b*).\n\n**T**HUS ACTS **F**OHAT FROM ONE *Twilight\n*TO THE OTHER DURING **S**EVEN **E**TERNITIES.***\n\n(*a*) The Worlds are built \"in the likeness of older\nWheels\" -- *i.e.*, those that existed in preceding\nManvantaras and went into Pralaya,\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* Indeed, if such an imaginary Chemist happened to be intuitional,\nand would for a moment step out of the habitual groove of strictly\n\"Exact Science,\" as the Alchemists of old did, he might\nbe repaid for his audacity.\n\n** He who would allotropise sluggish oxygen into *Ozone*\nto a measure of alchemical activity, reducing it to its pure essence\n(for which there are means), would discover thereby a substitute\nfor an \"Elixir of Life\" and prepare it for practical\nuse.\n\n*** A period of 311,040,000,000,000 years, according to Brahminical\ncalculations.\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 145 THE COSMIC PLANE, AN ILLUSION.\n\nbecause the **L**AW for the birth, growth, and decay\nof everything in Kosmos, from the Sun to the glow-worm in the\ngrass, is **O**NE. It is an everlasting work of perfection\nwith every new appearance, but the Substance-Matter and Forces\nare all one and the same. But this **L**AW acts on\nevery planet through minor and varying laws. The \"imperishable\nLaya Centres\" have a great importance, and their meaning\nmust be fully understood if we would have a clear conception of\nthe Archaic Cosmogony, whose theories have now passed into Occultism.\nAt present, one thing may be stated. The worlds are built neither\n*upon*, nor* over*, nor* in* the* Laya *centres,\nthe zero-point being a condition, not any mathematical point.\n\n(*b*) Bear in mind that Fohat, the constructive Force of\nCosmic Electricity, is said, metaphorically, to have sprung like\nRudra from Brahma \"from the brain of the Father and the bosom\nof the Mother,\" and then to have metamorphosed himself into\na male and a female, *i.e.*, polarity, into positive and\nnegative electricity. He has *seven sons *who are *his\nbrothers; *and Fohat is forced to be born time after time\nwhenever any two of his son-brothers indulge *in too close\ncontact* -- whether an embrace or a fight. To avoid this,\nhe binds together and unites those of unlike nature and separates\nthose of similar temperaments. This, of course, relates, as any\none can see, to electricity generated by friction and to the law\ninvolving attraction between two objects of unlike, and repulsion\nbetween those of like polarity. The Seven \"Sons-brothers,\"\nhowever, represent and personify the seven forms of Cosmic magnetism\ncalled in *practical Occultism *the \"Seven Radicals,\"\nwhose co-operative and active progeny are, among other energies,\nElectricity, Magnetism, Sound, Light, Heat, Cohesion, etc. Occult\nScience defines all these as Super-sensuous effects in their hidden\nbehaviour, and as objective phenomena in the world of senses;\nthe former requiring abnormal faculties to perceive them -- the\nlatter, our ordinary physical senses. They all pertain to, and\nare the emanations of, still more supersensuous spiritual qualities,\nnot personated by, but belonging to, real and conscious CAUSES.\nTo attempt a description of such ENTITIES would be worse than\nuseless. The reader must bear in mind that, according to our teaching\nwhich regards this phenomenal Universe as a great *Illusion*,*\n*the nearer a body is to the **U**NKNOWN **S**UBSTANCE,\nthe more it approaches *reality*,* *as being removed\nthe farther\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 146 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\nfrom this world of *Maya. *Therefore, though the molecular\nconstitution of their bodies is not deducible from their manifestations\non this plane of consciousness, they nevertheless (from the standpoint\nof the adept Occultist) possess a distinctive objective if not\nmaterial structure, in the relatively noumenal -- as opposed to\nthe phenomenal -- Universe. Men of science may term them Force\nor Forces generated by matter, or \"modes of its motion,\"\nif they will; Occultism sees in the effects \"Elemental\"\n(forces), and, in the direct causes producing them, intelligent\n**D**IVINE Workmen. The intimate connection of those\nElementals (guided by the unerring hand of the Rulers) -- their\ncorrelation we might call it -- with the elements of pure Matter,\nresults in our terrestrial phenomena, such as light, heat, magnetism,\netc., etc. Of course we shall never agree with the American Substantialists*\nwho call every Force and Energy -- whether Light, Heat, Electricity\nor Cohesion -- an \"Entity\"; for this would be equivalent\nto calling the noise produced by the rolling of the wheels of\na vehicle an *Entity* --* *thus confusing and identifying\nthat \"noise\" with the driver *outside*, and the\nguiding Master Intelligence *within *the vehicle. But we\ncertainly give that name to the \"drivers\" and to these\nguiding Intelligences -- the ruling Dhyan Chohans, as shown. The\n\"Elementals,\" the Nature-Forces, are the acting, though\ninvisible, or rather imperceptible, secondary Causes and in themselves\nthe effects of primary Causes behind the Veil of all terrestrial\nphenomena. Electricity, light, heat, etc., have been aptly termed\nthe \"Ghost or Shadow of Matter in Motion,\" *i.e.*,\nsupersensuous states of matter whose effects only we are able\nto cognize. To expand, then, the simile given above. The sensation\nof light is like the sound of the rolling wheels -- a purely phenomenal\neffect, having no existence outside the observer; the proximate\nexciting cause of the sensation is comparable to the driver --\na supersensuous state of matter in motion, a Nature-Force or Elemental.\nBut, behind even this, stand -- just as the owner of the carriage\ndirects the driver from within -- the higher and *noumenal\n*causes, the *Intelligences *from whose essence radiate\nthese States of \"*Mother*,\"* *generating\nthe countless milliards of Elementals or psychic Nature-Spirits,\njust as every drop of water generates its physical\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* See \"Scientific Arena,\" a monthly Journal devoted\nto current philosophical teaching and its bearing upon the religious\nthought of the Age. New York: A. Wilford Hall, Ph.D., LL.D., Editor.\n(1886, July, August, and September.)\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 147 PRIMORDIAL SUBSTANCE, A REALITY.\n\ninfinitesimal Infusoria. (See \"Gods, Monads, and Atoms,\"\nin Part III.) It is Fohat who guides the transfer of the principles\nfrom one planet to the other, from one star to another -- child-star.\nWhen a planet dies, its informing principles are transferred to\na *laya *or sleeping centre, with potential but latent\nenergy in it, which is thus awakened into life and begins to form\nitself into a new sidereal body. (*Vide infra*,* *\"A\nFew Theosophical Misconceptions, etc.\")\n\nIt is most remarkable that, while honestly confessing their entire\nignorance of the true Nature of even terrestrial matter -- primordial\nsubstance being regarded more as a dream than as a sober reality\n-- the physicists should set themselves up as judges, nevertheless,\nof that matter, and claim to know what it is able and is not able\nto do, in various combinations. Scientists know it (matter) hardly\nskin-deep, and yet they will dogmatise. It is \"a mode of\nmotion\" and nothing else. But the *force *that is\ninherent in a living person's breath, when blowing a speck of\ndust from the table, is also, and undeniably, \"a mode of\nmotion\"; and it is as undeniably not a quality of the matter,\nor the particles of that speck, and it emanates from the living\nand thinking Entity that breathed, whether the impulse originated\nconsciously or unconsciously. Indeed, to endow matter -- something\nof which nothing is known so far -- with an inherent quality called\nForce, of the nature of which still less is known, is to create\na far more serious difficulty than that which lies in the acceptation\nof the intervention of our \"Nature-Spirits\" in every\nnatural phenomenon.\n\nThe Occultists, who do not say -- if they would express themselves\ncorrectly -- that *matter*, but only the *substance\n*or* essence *of matter, is indestructible and eternal,\n(*i.e.*, the Root of all, *Mulaprakriti*)*: *assert\nthat all the so-called Forces of Nature, Electricity, Magnetism,\nLight, Heat, etc., etc., far from being modes of motion of material\nparticles, are *in esse*,* i.e.*,* *in their\nultimate constitution, the differentiated aspects of that Universal\nMotion which is discussed and explained in the first pages of\nthis volume (*See Proem*)*. *When Fohat is said\nto produce \"Seven Laya Centres,\" it means that for formative\nor creative purposes, the **G**REAT **L**AW\n(Theists may call it God) stops, or rather modifies its perpetual\nmotion on seven invisible points within the area of the manifested\nUniverse. \"*The great Breath digs through Space seven\nholes into Laya to cause them to circumgyrate during Manvantara*\"*\n*(Occult Catechism). We\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 148 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\nhave said that Laya is what Science may call the Zero-point or\nline; the realm of absolute negativeness, or the one real absolute\nForce, the NOUMENON of the Seventh State of that which we ignorantly\ncall and recognise as \"Force\"; or again the Noumenon\nof Undifferentiated Cosmic Substance which is itself an unreachable\nand unknowable object to finite perception; the root and basis\nof all states of objectivity and subjectivity too; the neutral\naxis, not one of the many aspects, but its centre. It may serve\nto elucidate the meaning if we attempt to imagine a neutral centre\n-- the dream of those who would discover perpetual motion. A \"neutral\ncentre\" is, in one aspect, the limiting point of any given\nset of senses. Thus, imagine two consecutive planes of matter\nas already formed; each of these corresponding to an appropriate\nset of perceptive organs. We are forced to admit that between\nthese two planes of matter an incessant circulation takes place;\nand if we follow the atoms and molecules of (say) the lower in\ntheir transformation upwards, these will come to a point where\nthey pass altogether beyond the range of the faculties we are\nusing on the lower plane. In fact, to us the matter of the lower\nplane there vanishes from our perception into nothing -- or rather\nit passes on to the higher plane, and the state of matter corresponding\nto such a point of transition must certainly possess special and\nnot readily discoverable properties. Such \"Seven Neutral\nCentres,\"* then, are produced by Fohat, who, when, as Milton\nhas it --\n\n\"Fair foundations (are) laid whereon to build . . .\"\n\nquickens matter into activity and evolution.\n\nThe* Primordial Atom *(*anu*)* *cannot be\nmultiplied either in its pregenetic state, or its primogeneity;\ntherefore it is called \"SUM TOTAL,\" figuratively, of\ncourse, as that \"SUM TOTAL\" is boundless. (See Addendum\nto this Book.) That which is the abyss of nothingness to the physicist,\nwho knows only the world of visible causes and effects, is the\nboundless Space of the Divine *Plenum *to the Occultist.\nAmong many other objections to the doctrine of an endless evolution\nand re-involution (or re-absorption) of the Kosmos, a process\nwhich, according to the Brahminical and Esoteric Doctrine, is\nwithout a beginning or an end, the Occultist is told that it cannot\nbe, since \"by all the admissions of\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* Such, we believe, is the name applied by Mr. Keely, of Philadelphia,\nthe inventor of the famous \"Motor\" -- destined, as his\nadmirers have hoped, to revolutionise the motor power of the world\n-- to what he again calls the \"Etheric Centres.\"\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 149 THE MOON IS NOT DEAD, BUT ONLY SLEEPETH.\n\nmodern scientific philosophy it is a necessity of Nature to run\ndown.\" If the tendency of Nature \"to run down\"\nis to be considered so forcible an objection to Occult Cosmogony,\n\"How,\" we may ask, \"do your Positivists and Free-thinkers\nand Scientists account for the phalanx around us of active stellar\nsystems?\" They had eternity to \"run down\" in; why,\nthen, is not the Kosmos a huge inert mass? Even the moon is only\nhypothetically believed to be a dead planet, \"run down,\"\nand astronomy does not seem to be acquainted with many such dead\nplanets.* The query is unanswerable. But apart from this it must\nbe noted that the idea of the amount of \"transformable energy\"\nin our little system coming to an end is based purely on the fallacious\nconception of a \"white-hot, incandescent Sun\" perpetually\nradiating away his heat without compensation into Space. To this\nwe reply that nature runs down and disappears from the objective\nplane, only to re-emerge after a time of rest out of the subjective\nand to reascend once more. Our Kosmos and Nature will run down\nonly to reappear on a more perfect plane after every **P**RALAYA.\nThe *matter *of the Eastern philosophers is not the \"matter\"\nand Nature of the Western metaphysicians. For what is Matter?\nAnd above all, what is our scientific philosophy but that which\nwas so justly and so politely defined by Kant as \"the Science\nof the *limits *to our Knowledge\"? Where have the\nmany attempts made by Science to bind, to connect, and define\nall the phenomena of organic life by mere physical and chemical\nmanifestations, brought it to? To speculation generally -- mere\nsoap-bubbles, that burst one after the other before the men of\nScience were permitted to discover real facts. All this would\nhave been avoided, and the progress of knowledge would have proceeded\nwith gigantic strides, had only Science and its philosophy abstained\nfrom accepting hypotheses on the mere one-sided Knowledge of *their*\nMatter.**\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* The moon is *dead *only so far as regards her *inner*\n\"principles\" -- *i.e.*,* psychically *and\n*spiritually*,* *however absurd the statement may\nseem. Physically, she is only as a semi-paralysed body may be.\nShe is aptly referred to in Occultism as the \"insane mother,\"\nthe great sidereal lunatic.\n\n** The instance of Uranus and Neptune, whose satellites, four\nand one respectively, revolved, it was thought, in their orbits\nfrom East to West, whereas all the other satellites rotate from\nWest to East, is a very good one, as showing how unreliable are\nall *a priori *speculations even when based on the strictest\nmathematical analysis. The famous hypothesis of the formation\nof our Solar System out of the nebulous rings, put [[Footnote\ncontinued on next page]]\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 150 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\nIf no physical intellect is capable of counting the grains of\nsand covering a few miles of sea-shore; or to fathom the ultimate\nnature and essence of those grains, palpable and visible on the\npalm of the naturalist, how can any materialist limit the laws\nchanging the conditions and being of the atoms in primordial chaos,\nor know anything certain about the capabilities and potency of\ntheir atoms and molecules before and after their formation into\nworlds? These changeless and eternal molecules -- far thicker\nin space than the grains on the ocean shore -- may differ in their\nconstitution along the line of their planes of existence, as the\nsoul-substance differs from its vehicle, the body. Each atom has\nseven planes of being or existence, we are taught; and each plane\nis governed by its specific laws of evolution and absorption.\nIgnorant of any, even approximate, chronological data from which\nto start in attempting to decide the age of our planet or the\norigin of the solar system, astronomers, geologists, and physicists\nare drifting with each new hypothesis farther and farther away\nfrom the shores of fact into the fathomless depths of speculative\nontology.* The Law of Analogy in the plan of structure between\nthe trans-Solar systems and the intra-Solar planets, does not\nnecessarily bear upon the finite conditions to which every visible\nbody is subject, in this our plane of being. In Occult Science\nthis law is the first and most important key to Cosmic physics;\nbut it has to be studied in its minutest details and, \"to\nbe\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n[[Footnote continued from previous page]] forward by Kant and\nLaplace, was chiefly based on the above fact that all the planets\nrevolved in the same direction. It is on this fact, mathematically\ndemonstrated during the time of Laplace, that this great astronomer,\ncalculating on the theory of probabilities, offered to bet three\nmilliards to one that the next planet discovered would have in\nits system the same peculiarity of motion Eastward. The immutable\nlaws of scientific mathematics got \"worsted by further experiments\nand observations,\" it was said. This idea of Laplace's mistake\nprevails generally to this day; but some astronomers have finally\nsucceeded in demonstrating (?) that the mistake had been in accepting\nLaplace's assertion for a mistake; and steps to correct it without\nattracting general attention to the bevue are now being taken.\nMany such unpleasant surprises are in store for hypotheses of\neven a purely physical character. What further disillusions, then,\nmay there not be in questions of a transcendental, Occult Nature?\nAt any rate, Occultism teaches that the so-called \"reverse\nrotation\" is a fact.\n\n* The Occultists, having most perfect faith in their own exact\nrecords, astronomical and mathematical, calculate the age of Humanity,\nand assert that the latter (as separate sexes) has existed in\nthis Round just 18,618,727 years, as the Brahmanical teachings\nand even some Hindu calendars declare.\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 151 NATURE CAN NEVER CEASE.\n\nturned seven times,\" before one comes to understand it. Occult\nphilosophy is the only science that can teach it. How, then, can\nanyone hang the truth or the untruth of the Occultist's proposition\nthat \"the Kosmos is eternal in its unconditioned collectivity,\nand finite but in its conditioned manifestations\" on this\none-sided physical enunciation that \"it is a necessity of\nNature to run down?\"\n\n---------------------\n\nWith these verses -- the 4th Sloka of Stanza VI. -- ends that\nportion of the Stanzas which relates to the Universal Cosmogony\nafter the last Mahapralaya or Universal destruction, which, when\nit comes, sweeps out of Space every differentiated thing, Gods\nas atoms, like so many dry leaves. From this verse onwards, the\nStanzas are concerned only with our Solar System in general, with\nthe planetary chains therein, inferentially, and with the history\nof our globe (the 4th and its chain) especially. All the Stanzas\nand verses which follow in this Book I. refer only to the evolution\nof, and on, our Earth. With regard to the latter, a strange tenet\n-- strange from the modern scientific stand-point only, of course\n-- is held, which ought to be made known.\n\nBut before entirely new and rather startling theories are presented\nto the reader, they must be prefaced by a few words of explanation.\nThis is absolutely necessary, as these theories clash not only\nwith modern science, but contradict, on certain points, earlier\nstatements made by other Theosophists, who claim to base their\nexplanations and renderings of these teachings on the same authority\nas we do.*\n\nThis may give rise to the idea that there is a decided contradiction\nbetween the expounders of the same doctrine; whereas the difference,\nin reality, arises from the incompleteness of the information\ngiven to earlier writers, who thus drew some erroneous conclusions\nand indulged in premature speculations, in their endeavour to\npresent a complete system to the public. Thus the reader, who\nis already a student of Theosophy, must not be surprised to find\nin these pages the rectification of certain statements made in\nvarious Theosophical works, and also the explanation of certain\npoints which have remained obscure, because they were necessarily\nleft incomplete. Many are the questions upon which even the author\nof \"Esoteric Buddhism\" (the best and\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* \"Esoteric Buddhism\" and \"Man.\"\n\n####### [[Vol. 1, Page]] 152 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\nmost accurate of all such works) has not touched. On the other\nhand, even he has introduced several mistaken notions which must\nnow be presented in their true mystic light, as far as the present\nwriter is capable of doing so.\n\nLet us then make a short break between the Slokas just explained\nand those which follow, for the Cosmic periods which separate\nthem are of immense duration. This will afford us ample time to\ntake a bird's eye view of some points pertaining to the Secret\nDoctrine, which have been presented to the public under a more\nor less uncertain and sometimes mistaken light.\n\n-------\n\n[[This page continued in next section]]\n\nNext Section\n\nContents",
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