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    "slug": "vol-2-anthropogenesis",
    "name": "Volume II — Anthropogenesis"
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  "chapter": {
    "num": 18,
    "slug": "68-the-races-with-the-third-eye-289",
    "title": "THE RACES WITH THE \"THIRD EYE\" ... 289",
    "of": 49,
    "words": 9316,
    "text": "## THE RACES WITH THE \"THIRD EYE\" ... 289\n\n\nThe Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky, vol 2, pt 1, Third Eye\n\n###### The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky -- Vol.\n2\n\n####### [[Vol. 2, Page]] 289 THE \"THIRD EYE.\"\n\n**T**HE **R**ACES WITH THE \"**T**HIRD\n**E**YE.\"\n\nThe subject is so unusual, the paths pursued so intricate, so\nfull of dangerous pitfalls prepared by adverse theories and criticism,\nthat good reasons have to be given for every step taken. While\nturning the light of the bull's eye called esotericism on almost\nevery inch of the occult grounds travelled over, we have also\nto use its lens to throw into stronger objectivity the regions\nexplored by exact science; this, not only in order to contrast\nthe two, but to defend our position.*\n\nIt may be complained by some that too little is said of the physical,\n*human *side of the extinct races, in this history of their\ngrowth and evolution. Much more might be said assuredly, if simple\nprudence did not make us hesitate at the threshold of every new\nrevelation. That, which finds its possibility and landmarks in\nthe discoveries of modern science, is given; all that of which\nexact knowledge knows nothing and upon which it is unable to speculate\n-- and therefore denies as facts in nature -- is withheld.\n\nBut even such statements as these -- *e.g*., that of all\nthe mammalians, man was the earliest; that it is man who is the\nindirect ancestor of the Ape; and that he was a kind of a Cyclops\nin days of old -- will all be contested, yet, scientists will\nnever be able to prove -- except to their own satisfaction --\nthat *it was not so. *Nor can they admit that the first\ntwo races of men were too ethereal and phantom-like in their constitution,\norganism, and *shape, *even to be called physical men.\nFor, if they do, it will be found that this is one of the reasons\nwhy their relics can never be expected to be exhumed among other\nfossils. Nevertheless all this is maintained. Man was the store-house,\nso to speak, of *all the seeds of life*\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* For suggestiveness, we would recommend a short article in the\n*Theosophist of *August, 1887, \"Esoteric Studies.\"\nIts author expounds therein quite an occult theory, though to\nthe world a new idea: \"the *progress of the Monad *concurring\nwith the *retrogression *of Form\" (666), *i.e*.,\n\"with decrease of the *vis formativa.*\"* *He\nsays, \"Who knows what shape vehicled the Ego in remote *rings*\n(Rounds, or races?) . . . ? May not man's type have been that\nof the *Simiadae *in its variety? Might not the monkey-kingdom\nof Ramayana fame rest on some far-off tradition relating to a\nperiod when that was the common lot, or rather aspect, of man?\"\n. . . and winds up a very clever, though too short, exposition\nof his theory by saying that which every true occultist will endorse:\n\"With physico-ethereal man there must be *involution *of\nsex. As physico-astral man depended on entities of the sub-human\nclass (evolved from animal prototypes) for rebirth, so will physico-ethereal\nman find among the graceful, shapely orders issuing from the *air*-plane,\none or more which will be developed for his successive embodiments\n*when procreated forms are given *-- a process which will\ninclude all mankind only very gradually. The (*pre*?) Adamic\nand post-Adamic races were giants; their ethereal counterparts\nmay possibly be liliputians -- beauteous, luminous, diaphanous\n-- but will assuredly be giants in mind\" (p. 671, art. by\nVisconde de Figaniere, **F.T.S.**).\n\n####### [[Vol. 2, Page]] 290 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\nfor this Round, vegetable and animal alike.* As En-Soph is \"One,\n*notwithstanding the innumerable forms which are in him*\"*\n*(*Zohar,*\" i. 2l*a*)*, *so is man,\non Earth the microcosm of the macrocosm. \"As soon as man\nappeared, everything was complete. . . . for everything is comprised\nin man. He *unites in himself all forms* (*Ibid., iii.\n*48*a*).\" \"The mystery of the *earthly\n*man is after the mystery of the Heavenly Man\" (*ii.\n*76*a*). The human form -- so called, because it is\nthe vehicle (under whatever shape) of the *divine *man\n-- is, as so intuitionally remarked by the author of \"Esoteric\nStudies,\"** the *new type, *at the beginning of every\nRound, \"as man never can be, so he never has been, manifested\nin a shape belonging to the animal kingdom *in esse.*\"*\n*The author proceeds, \"he never formed part of that kingdom.\nDerived, only derived, from the most finished class of the latter,\na new human form must always have been the *new *type of\nthe cycle. The human shape, in one ring (?), as I imagine, becomes\ncast-off clothes in the next; it is then appropriated by the highest\norder in the servant-kingdom below.\"\n\nIf the idea is what we understand it to mean -- for the \"rings\"\nspoken of throw some confusion upon it -- then it is the correct\nesoteric teaching. Having appeared at the very beginning, and\nat the head of sentient and conscious life, man (the astral, or\nthe \"Soul,\" for the Zohar, repeating the archaic teaching,\ndistinctly says that \"the *real *man is the Soul,\nand his material frame no part of him\") -- man became the\nliving and animal **U**NIT, from which the \"cast-off\nclothes\" determined the shape of every life and animal in\nthis Round.***\n\nThus, he \"created\" for ages the insects, reptiles, birds,\nand animals, unconsciously to himself, from his remains and relics\nfrom the Third and the Fourth Rounds. The same idea and teaching\nare as distinctly given in the *Vendidad *of the Mazdeans,\nas they are in the Chaldean and the Mosaic allegory of the Ark,\nall of which are the many national versions of the original legend\ngiven in the Hindu Scriptures. It is found in the allegory of\nVaivasvata Manu and *his *Ark with the Seven Rishis, as\nin that of the Rishis, each of whom is shown the father and\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* It may be objected that this is a contradiction. That, as the\nfirst Root-Race appeared 300,000,000 years after the vegetation\nhad evolved, the seed of vegetable life could not be in the First\nRace. We say it could; for up to man's appearance in this Round,\nthe vegetation was of quite another kind than it is now, and quite\nethereal, this for the simple reason that no grass or plants could\nhave been physical, before there were animal or other organisms\nto breathe out the carbonic acid which vegetation has to imbibe\nfor its development, its nutrition and growth. They are inter-dependent\nin their *physical *and achieved forms.\n\n** \"Visconde de Figaniere, **F.T.S**.\"\n(*The Theosophist, *Aug. 1887, page 676.)\n\n*** It is stated in the Zohar that the \"primordial worlds\"\n(sparks) could not continue because *man* *was not as\nyet. *\"*The human* form contains everything; and\nas it did not as yet exist, the worlds were destroyed.\"\n\n####### [[Vol. 2, Page]] 291 MAZDEAN SYMBOLISM.\n\nprogenitor of specified animals, reptiles, and even monsters (*See\nVishnu* and other *Puranas*)*. *Open the Mazdean\n*Vendidad, *at Fargard ii., at verse 27 (73) and read the\ncommand of Ormazd to Yima, a Spirit of the Earth, who symbolizes\nthe three races, after telling him to build a *vara *(\"an\nenclosure,\" an *argua *or vehicle) . . . .\n\n\"Thither (into the *vara*) thou shalt bring *the\nseeds of men and* *women, *of the greatest, best, and\nfinest kinds on this earth; thither thou shalt bring the seeds\nof every kind of cattle,\" etc., etc.; and v. 28 (74) . .\n. .\"all those seeds shalt thou bring, two of every kind,\n*to be kept inexhaustible there, *so long *as those\nmen shall stay in the vara.*\"* *Those \"men\"\nin the \"Vara\" are the \"Progenitors,\" the heavenly\nmen or Dhyani, the future *Egos *who are commissioned to\ninform mankind. For \"Vara,\" or the \"Ark\" (or\nagain the Vehicle) simply means MAN.* Verse 30 says: . . . . \"thou\nshalt seal up the vara (after filling it up with the seeds), and\nthou shalt make a door and a *window self-shining within,*\"*\n*which is the Soul. And when Yima inquires of Ahura Mazda\nhow he shall manage to make that *vara*, he is answered:\n\"Crush the earth . . . and knead it with thy hands, as the\npotter does when kneading the potter's clay\" (31).\n\nThe Egyptian ram-headed god makes man of clay on a potter's wheel,\nand so in Genesis do the Elohim fashion him out of the same material.\n\nWhen the \"Maker of the material world\" (Ahura Mazda)\nis asked, furthermore, what is to give light \"to the *Vara\n*which Yima made,\" he is told that \"There are *uncreated\n*lights and *created *lights\" and that \"there\"\n(in Airyana Vaego, where *Vara *is built), \"the stars,\nthe moon, and the Sun are only once (a year) seen to rise and\nset\" and a year seems only as a day (and night) a clear reference\nto the \"land of the Gods\" or the (now) polar regions.\nMoreover another hint is contained in this verse: a distinct allusion\nto the \"uncreated lights\" which enlighten man within\n-- his principles. Otherwise, no sense or reason could be found\nin Ahura Mazda's answer (*V.* 40), which is forthwith followed\nby Verse 41 saying that \"Every fortieth year, to every couple\n(hermaphrodite) *two are born, a male and female,\"** *the\nlatter being a distinct echo of the Secret Doctrine, of a Stanza\nwhich says --\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* This is the meaning when the allegory and symbol are opened\nand read by means of the *human *key, or the key to terrestrial\nanthroposophy. This interpretation of the \"ark\" symbolism\ndoes not in the least interfere with its astronomical, or even\ntheogonic keys; nor with any of the other six meanings. Nor does\nit seem less scientific than the modern theories about the origin\nof man. As said, it has seven keys to it, like the rest.\n\n** Vendidad Sadah, See also Bund. **XV**.; and J.\nDarmesteter's translation of the *Vendidad. *\"Sacred\nBooks of the East.\"\n\n####### [[Vol. 2, Page]] 292 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\n\"*At the expiration of every forty *(*annual*)*\nSuns, at the end of every* *fortieth Day, the double one\nbecomes four*;* male and female in one, in the* *first\nand second and the third*. . . . . .\"\n\nWhich is clear, since \"every sun\" meant a whole year,\nthe latter being composed of one day then, as in the arctic circle\nit is now composed of six months. According to the old teaching,\nthe axis of the earth gradually changes its inclination to the\necliptic, and at the period referred to, this inclination was\nsuch that a polar day lasted during the whole period of the earth's\nrevolution about the sun, when a kind of twilight of very short\nduration intervened; after which the polar land resumed its position\ndirectly under the solar rays. This may be contrary to astronomy\nas now taught and understood: but who can say that changes in\nthe motion of the earth, which do not take place now, did not\noccur millions of years back?\n\nReturning once more to the statement that *Vara *meant\nthe MAN of the Fourth Round, as much as the Earth of those days,\nthe moon, and even Noah's ark, if one will so have it -- this\nis again shown in the dialogue between Ahura Mazda and Zarathustra.\nThus when the latter asks --\n\n*V. *42. \"O Maker of the Material World, thou Holy\nOne! Who is he who brought the law of Mazda into the *Vara\n*which Yima made?\"\n\n\"Ahura Mazda answered: 'It was the bird Karshipta, O holy\nZarathustra.' . . . .\"\n\n\"The bird Karshipta dwells in the heavens: were he living\non the earth he would be king of birds. He brought into the var\nof Yima, and recites the Avesta *in the language of birds.*\"*\n*(*Bund. xix and xxiv.*)\n\nThis again is an allegory and a symbol misunderstood by the Orientalists\nonly, who see in this bird \"an incarnation of lightning,\"\nand say its song was \"often thought to be the utterance of\na god and a revelation,\" and what not. Karshipta is the human\nmind-soul, and the deity thereof, symbolized in ancient Magianism\nby a bird, as the Greeks symbolized it by a butterfly. No sooner\nhad Karshipta entered the *Vara *or man, than he understood\nthe law of Mazda, or Divine Wisdom. In the \"Book of Concealed\nMystery\" it is said of the tree, which is the tree of knowledge\nof good and evil: \"In its branches (of the tree) the birds\nlodge and build their nests,\" or *the Souls *and the\nAngels have their place!.* Therefore, with the Kabalists it was\na like symbol. \"Bird\" was a Chaldean, and has become\na Hebrew synonym and symbol for Angel, a Soul, a Spirit, or Deva;\nand the \"Bird's Nest\" was with both Heaven, and is God's\nbosom in the *Zohar. *The perfect Messiah enters Eden \"into\nthat place which is called the Bird's Nest\" (Zohar, ii.,\n8*b*).\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n** See *\"*Kabbalah Unveiled*\"* by S.\nMcGregor Mathers, p. *104.\n\n####### [[Vol. 2, Page]] 293 ANGELS CALLED BIRDS.\n\n\"Like a bird that is flying from its nest, and that is the\nSoul from which the Shekeenah (divine wisdom or grace) does not\nmove away\" (Zohar, iii., 278*a*; Myer's Qabbalah,\n217). \"The Nest of the eternal Bird, the flutter of whose\nwings produces life, is boundless space,\" says the Commentary,\nmeaning Hansa, the bird of Wisdom.\n\nIt is Adam Kadmon who is the (Sephirothal) tree, and it is he\nwho becomes the \"Tree of knowledge of good and evil\"\nesoterically. And that \"tree hath around it seven columns\n(seven pillars) of the world, or *Rectores*\";*\n*the same \"*Progenitors*\" or* *\"*Sephiroth*\"*\n*again \"operating through the respective orders of Angels\nin the spheres of the seven planets,\" etc., one of which\norders begets giants (*Nephilim*) on Earth.\n\nIt was the belief of entire antiquity, Pagan and Christian, that\nthe earliest mankind was a race of giants. Certain excavations\nin America in mounds and in caves, have already yielded in isolated\ncases groups of skeletons of nine and twelve feet high.* These\nbelong to tribes of the early Fifth Race, now degenerated to an\naverage size of between five and six feet. But we can easily believe\nthat the Titans and Cyclopes of old really belonged to the Fourth\n(Atlantean) Race, and that all the subsequent legends and allegories\nfound in the Hindu Puranas and the Greek Hesiod and Homer, were\nbased on the hazy reminiscences of real Titans -- men of a superhuman\ntremendous physical power, which enabled them to defend themselves,\nand hold at bay the gigantic monsters of the Mesozoic and early\nCenozoic times -- and of actual Cyclopes -- three-eyed mortals.\n\nIt has been often remarked by observant writers, that the \"origin\nof nearly every popular myth and legend could be traced invariably\nto a fact in Nature.\"\n\nIn these fantastic creations of an exuberant subjectivism, there\nis always an element of the objective and real. The imagination\nof the masses, disorderly and ill-regulated as it may be, could\nnever have conceived and fabricated *ex nihilo *so many\nmonstrous figures, such a wealth of extraordinary tales, had it\nnot had, to serve it as a central nucleus, those floating reminiscences,\nobscure and vague, which unite the broken links of the chain of\ntime to form with them the mysterious, dream foundation of our\ncollective consciousness.**\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* Darwinian Evolutionists who are so wont to refer to the evidence\nof *reversion to* *type *-- the full meaning of\nwhich, in the case of human monsters, is embraced in the esoteric\nsolution of the embryological problem -- as proof of their arguments,\nwould do well to inquire into those instances of *modern giants\n*who are often 8, 9, and even 11 feet high. Such *reversions\n*are imperfect, yet undeniable reproductions of the original\ntowering man of primeval times.\n\n** See \"*Mythical Monsters,*\"* *by Ch.\nGould, from whose interesting and scientific volume a few passages\nare quoted further on. See in Mr. Sinnett's \"*Occult World,*\"*\n*the description of a cavern in the Himalayas filled with\nrelics of human and animal giant bones.\n\n####### [[Vol. 2, Page]] 294 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\nThe evidence for the Cyclopes -- a race of giants -- will be pointed\nout in forthcoming Sections, in the Cyclopean remnants, so called\nto this day. An indication that, during its evolution and before\nthe final adjustment of the human organism -- which became perfect\nand symmetrical only in the Fifth Race -- the early Fourth Race\nmay have been three-eyed, without having necessarily a third eye\nin the middle of the brow, like the legendary Cyclops, is also\nfurnished by Science.\n\nTo the Occultists who believe that spiritual and psychic *involution*\nproceeds on parallel lines with physical *evolution*;*\n*that the *inner* senses -- innate in the first human\nraces -- atrophied during racial growth and the material development\nof the outer senses; to the student of Esoteric symbology, finally,\nthis statement is no conjecture or possibility, but simply *a\nphase of the law of growth, a proven fact, *in short. They\nunderstand the meaning of this passage in the *Commentaries\n*which says: --\n\n\"*There were four-armed human creatures in those early\ndays of the* *male-females *(hermaphrodites); *with\none head, yet three eyes. They* *could see before them\nand behind them.* A ***K**ALPA* later *(after\nthe separation of the sexes) *men having fallen into matter,\ntheir spiritual vision* *became dim*;* and coordinately\nthe third eye commenced to lose its power.* . . . *When\nthe Fourth *(*Race*)* arrived at its middle age,\nthe inner vision* *had to be awakened, and *acquired\nby artificial stimuli, *the process of* *which was known\nto the old sages.** *. . . *The third eye, likewise, getting*\n*gradually *PETRIFIED*,*** soon disappeared. The double-faced\nbecame the* *one-faced, and the eye was drawn deep into\nthe head and is now buried* *under the hair. During the\nactivity of the inner man *(during trances and spiritual visions)\n*the eye swells and expands. The Arhat sees and feels*\n*it, and regulates his action accordingly*. . . . . . .\n. . . . . . .\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* Viz., the third eye was at the back of the head. The statement\nthat the latest hermaphrodite humanity was \"four-armed,\"\nunriddles probably the mystery of all the representations and\nidols of the exoteric gods of India. On the Acropolis of Argos,\nthere was a [[*Zoanon*]],* *a rudely carved wooden\nstatue (attributed to Daedalus), representing a three-eyed colossus,\nwhich was consecrated to Zeus *Triopas *(three-eyed). The\nhead of the \"god\" has two eyes in its face and one above\non the top of the forehead. It is considered the most archaic\nof all the ancient statues (*Schol. Vatic. ad Eurip. Troad.*\n14).\n\n** The *Inner* *sight *could henceforth be acquired\nonly through training and initiation, save in the cases of \"natural\nand born magicians,\" sensitives and mediums, as they are\ncalled now.\n\n*** This expression \"petrified\" instead of \"ossified\"\nis curious. The \"back eye,\" which is of course the *pineal\ngland, *now so-called, the small pea-like mass of grey nervous\nmatter attached to the back of the third ventricle of the brain,\nis said to almost invariably contain *mineral concretions *and\n*sand*, and \"nothing more.\" (*Vide Infra.*)\n\n####### [[Vol. 2, Page]] 295 OCCULT PHYSIOLOGY.\n\n*The undefiled *Lanoo (disciple, chela) *need fear no\ndanger*;* he who keeps* *himself not in purity *(who\nis not chaste) *will receive no help from the* '*deva\neye.*'* *\"\n\nUnfortunately not. The \"deva-eye\" exists no more for\nthe majority of mankind. The *third eye is dead, *and acts\nno longer; but it has left behind a witness to its existence.\nThis witness is now the PINEAL GLAND. As for the \"four-armed\"\nmen, it is they who become the prototypes of the four-armed Hindu\ngods, as shown in a preceding footnote.\n\nSuch is the mystery of the human eye that, in their vain endeavours\nto explain and account for all the difficulties surrounding its\naction, some scientists have been forced to resort to occult explanations.\nThe development of the *Human eye *gives more support to\nthe occult anthropology than to that of the materialistic physiologists.\n\"The eyes in the human embryo *grow from within without*\"*\n*out of the brain, instead of being part of the skin, as in\nthe insects and cuttlefish. Professor Lankester, thinking the\nbrain a queer place for the eye, and attempting to explain the\nphenomenon on *Darwinian lines, *suggests the curious view\nthat \"our\" earliest vertebrate ancestor was a *transparent\n*creature and hence did not mind where the eye was! And so\nwas man \"a transparent creature\" once upon a time, we\nare taught, hence our theory holds good. But how does the Lankester\nhypothesis square with the Haeckelian view that the vertebrate\neye originated by changes *in the epidermis? *If it started\n*inside, *the theory goes into the waste-basket. This seems\nto be proved by embryology. Moreover, Professor Lankester's extraordinary\nsuggestion -- or shall we say admission? -- is rendered perhaps\nnecessary by evolutionist necessities. Occultism with its teaching\nas to the gradual development of senses \"FROM WITHIN WITHOUT,\"\nfrom astral prototypes, is far more satisfactory: The *third\neye retreated* *inwards *when its course was run --\nanother point in favour of Occultism.\n\nThe allegorical expression of the Hindu mystics when speaking\nof the \"eye of Siva,\" the *Tri-bochana *(\"three-eyed\"),\nthus receives its justification and *raison d*'*etre\n-- the *transference of the pineal gland (once that \"third\neye\") to the forehead, being an exoteric licence. This throws\nalso a light on the mystery -- incomprehensible to some -- of\nthe connection between *abnormal, *or Spiritual Seership,\nand the physiological purity of the Seer. The question is often\nasked, \"Why should celibacy and chastity be a *sine qua\nnon *rule and condition of regular *chelaship, or *the\ndevelopment of psychic and occult powers\" The answer is contained\nin the Commentary. When we learn that the \"third eye\"\nwas once a physiological organ, and that later on, owing to the\ngradual\n\n####### [[Vol. 2, Page]] 296 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\ndisappearance of spirituality and increase of materiality (Spiritual\nnature being extinguished by the physical), it became an atrophied\norgan, as little understood now by physiologists as the spleen\nis -- when we learn this, the connection will become clear. During\nhuman life the greatest impediment in the way of spiritual development,\nand especially to the acquirement of *Yoga *powers, is\nthe activity of our physiological senses. Sexual action being\nclosely connected, by interaction, with the spinal cord and the\ngrey matter of the brain, it is useless to give any longer explanation.\nOf course, the normal and abnormal state of the brain, and the\ndegree of active work in the *medulla oblongata, *reacts\npowerfully on the pineal gland, for, owing to the number of \"centres\"\nin that region, which controls by far the greater majority of\nthe physiological actions of the animal economy, and also owing\nto the close and intimate neighbourhood of the two, there must\nbe exerted a very powerful \"inductive\" action by the\n*medulla *on the pineal gland.\n\nAll this is quite plain to the Occultist, but is very vague in\nthe sight of the general reader. The latter must then be shown\nthe possibility of a three-eyed man in nature, in those periods\nwhen his formation was yet in a comparatively chaotic state. Such\na possibility may be inferred from anatomical and zoological knowledge,\nfirst of all; then it may rest on the assumptions of materialistic\nscience itself.\n\nIt is asserted upon the authority of Science, and upon evidence,\nwhich is not merely a fiction of theoretical speculation this\ntime, that many of the animals -- especially among the lower orders\nof the vertebrata -- have a *third *eye, now atrophied,\nbut necessarily active in its origin.* The Hatteria species, a\nlizard of the order *Lacertilia, *recently discovered in\nNew Zealand (*a part of ancient Lemuria so called, mark*\n*well*)*,* presents this peculiarity in a most extraordinary\nmanner; and not only the *Hatteria punctata, *but the chameleon,\ncertain reptiles, and even fishes. It was thought, at first, that\nit was no more than the prolongation of the brain ending with\na small protuberance, called epiphysis, a little bone separated\nfrom the main bone by a cartilage, and found in every animal.\nBut it was soon found to be more than this. It offered -- as its\ndevelopment and anatomical structure showed -- such an analogy\nwith that of the eye, that it was found impossible to see in it\nany-\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* \"Deeply placed within the head, covered by thick skin and\nmuscles, true eyes that cannot see are found in certain animals,\"\nalso, says Haeckel: \"Vertebrate . . . blind moles and field\nmice, blind snakes and lizards. . . . They shun daylight . . .\ndwelling under the ground. *They were not originally blind\n*but have evolved from ancestors that lived in the light and\nhad well-developed eyes. The atrophied eye beneath the opaque\nskin may be found in these blind beings in every stage of reversion.\"\n(\"*Sense Organs,*\"* Haeckel*.)* *And\nif *two *eyes could become so atrophied in lower animals,\nwhy not one eye -- the pineal gland -- in man, who is but a higher\nanimal in his physical aspect?\n\n####### [[Vol. 2, Page]] 297 THE CYCLOPS, NO MYTH.\n\nthing else. There were and are paleontologists who feel convinced\nto this day that this \"third eye\" has functioned in\nits origin, and they are certainly right. For this is what is\nsaid of the pineal gland in Quain's Anatomy (*Vol. II. ninth\nedit., pp. *830-851. \"*Thalamencephalon*\"\n*Interbrain*)*: -*-\n\n\"It is from this part, constituting at first the whole and\nsubsequently the hinder part of the anterior primary encephalic\nvesicle, that the optic vesicles are developed in the earliest\nperiod, and the fore part is that in connection with which the\ncerebral hemispheres and accompanying parts are formed. The *thalamus\nopticus *of each side is formed by a lateral thickening of\nthe medullary wall, while the interval between, descending towards\nthe base, constitutes the cavity of the third ventricle with its\nprolongation in the infundibulum. The grey commissure afterwards\nstretches across the ventricular cavity. . . . . The hinder part\nof the roof is developed by a peculiar process, to be noticed\nlater, into the pineal gland, which remains united on each side\nby its pedicles to the *thalamus, *and behind these a transverse\nband is formed as posterior commissure.\n\n\"The lamina *terminalis *(*lamina cinerea*) continues\nto close the third ventricle in front, below it the optic commissure\nforms the floor of the ventricle, and further back the infundibulum\ndescends to be united in the *sella turcica *with the tissue\nadjoining the posterior lobe of the pituitary body.\n\n\"The two *optic thalami *formed from the posterior and\nouter part of the anterior vesicle, consist at first of a single\nhollow sac of nervous matter, the cavity of which communicates\non each side in front with that of the commencing cerebral hemispheres,\nand behind with that of the middle cephalic vesicle* (corpora*\n*quadrigemina*).* *Soon, however, by increased deposit\ntaking place in their interior, behind, below, and at the sides,\nthe* thalami* become solid, and at the same time a cleft\nor fissure appears between them above, and penetrates down to\nthe internal cavity, which continues open at the back part opposite\nthe entrance of the Sylvian aqueduct. This cleft or fissure is\nthe *third ventricle. *Behind, the two thalami continue united\nby the *posterior commissure, *which is distinguishable about\nthe end of the third month, and also by the peduncles of the pineal\ngland. . . . .\n\n\"At an early period the *optic tracts *may be recognised\nas hollow prolongations from the outer part of the wall of the\n*thalami *while they are still vesicular. At the fourth month\nthese tracts are distinctly formed. They subsequently are prolonged\nbackwards into connection with the *corpora quadrigemina.*\n\n\"The formation of the pineal gland and pituitary body presents\nsome of the most interesting phenomena which are connected with\nthe development of the *Thalamencephalon.\"*\n\nThe above is specially interesting when it is remembered that,\nwere it not for the development of the hinder part of the cerebral\nhemispheres backwards, the pineal gland would be perfectly visible\non the removal of the parietal bones. It is very interesting also\nto note the obvious connection to be traced between the (originally)\nhollow optic tracts and the eyes anteriorly, the pineal gland\nand its peduncles behind, and all\n\n####### [[Vol. 2, Page]] 298 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\nof these with the optic thalami. So that the recent discoveries\nin connection with the third eye of *Hatteria punctata *have\na very important bearing on the developmental history of the human\nsenses, and on the occult assertions in the text.\n\nIt is well known, (and also regarded as a fiction now, by those\nwho have ceased to believe in the existence of an immortal principle\nin man,) that Descartes saw in the pineal gland the *Seat of\nthe Soul. *Although it is joined to every part of the body,\nhe said, there is one special portion of it in which the Soul\nexercises its functions more specially than in any other. And,\nas neither the heart, nor yet the brain could be that \"special\"\nlocality, he concluded that it was that little gland tied to the\nbrain, yet having an action independent of it, as it could easily\nbe put into a kind of swinging motion \"*by the animal*\n*Spirits* which cross *the cavities of the skull in every\nsense.\"\n\nUnscientific as this may appear in our day of exact learning,\nDescartes was yet far nearer the occult truth than is any Haeckel.\nFor the pineal gland, as shown, is far more connected with Soul\nand Spirit than with the physiological senses of man. Had the\nleading Scientists a glimmer of the *real *processes employed\nby the Evolutionary Impulse, and the winding *cyclic *course\nof this great law, they would *know *instead of conjecturing;\nand feel as certain of the future physical transformations of\nthe human kind by the knowledge of its past forms. Then, would\nthey see the fallacy and all the absurdity of their modern \"blind-force\"\nand mechanical processes of nature; realizing, in consequence\nof such knowledge, that the said pineal gland, for instance, could\nnot but be disabled for *physical *use at this stage of\nour cycle. If the odd \"eye\" in man is now atrophied,\nit is a proof that, as in the lower animal, it has once been active;\nfor nature never creates the smallest, the most insignificant\nform without some definite purpose and use. It was an *active\n*organ, we say, at that stage of evolution when the spiritual\nelement in man reigned supreme over the hardly nascent intellectual\nand psychic elements. And, as the cycle ran down toward that point\nwhen the physiological senses were developed by, and went *pari\npassu *with, the growth and consolidation of the physical\nman, the interminable and complex vicissitudes and tribulations\nof zoological development, that median \"eye\" ended by\natrophying along with the early spiritual and purely psychic characteristics\nin man. The eye is the mirror and also the window of the soul,\nsays popular wisdom,** and *Vox populi Vox Dei.*\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* The \"Nervous Ether\" of Dr. B. W. Richardson, **F.R.S**.\n-- the nerve-aura of occultism. The \"animal spirits\"\n(?) are equivalent to the currents of nerve-auric compound circulation.\n\n** Let us remember that the *First *Race is shown in Occult\nsciences as spiritual within [[Footnote continued on next page]]\n\n####### [[Vol. 2, Page]] 299 THE EVOLUTION OF THE EYE.\n\nIn the beginning, every class and family of living species was\nhermaphrodite and objectively one-eyed. In the animal, whose form\nwas as ethereal (astrally) as that of man, before the bodies of\nboth began to evolve their coats of skin, viz., to evolve from\n*within without *the thick coating of physical substance\nor matter with its internal physiological mechanism -- the third\neye was primarily, as in man, the only seeing organ. The two physical\nfront eyes developed* later on in both brute and man, whose organ\nof physical sight was, at the commencement of the Third Race,\nin the same position as that of some of the blind vertebrata,\nin our day, *i.e*., beneath an opaque skin.** Only the\nstages of the *odd, *or primeval eye, in man and brute,\nare now inverted, as the former has already passed that animal\n*non-rational *stage in the Third Round, and is ahead of\nmere brute creation by a whole plane of consciousness. Therefore,\nwhile the \"Cyclopean\" eye was, and still *is, *in\nman the organ of *spiritual *sight, in the animal it was\nthat of objective vision. And this eye, having performed its function,\nwas replaced, in the course of physical evolution from the simple\nto the complex, by two eyes, and thus was stored and laid aside\nby nature for further use in AEons to come.\n\nThis explains why the pineal gland reached its highest development\nproportionately with the lowest physical development. It is the\nvertebrata in which it is the most prominent and objective, and\nin man it is\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n[[Footnote continued from previous page]] and ethereal without;\nthe *second, *psycho-spiritual mentally, and ethero-physical\nbodily; the *third, *still bereft of intellect in its beginning,\nis astro-physical in its body, and lives an inner life, in which\nthe psycho-spiritual element is in no way interfered with as yet\nby the hardly nascent physiological senses. Its two front eyes\nlook before them without seeing either past or future. But the\n\"third eye\" \"*embraces ETERNITY.*\"\n\n* But in a very different manner to that pictured by Haeckel as\nan \"*evolution by* *natural selection in the struggle\nfor existence*\"* *(\"*Pedigree of Man.*\"*\n*\"*Sense Organs,*\" p. 335). The mere \"thermal\nsensibility of the skin,\" to hypothetical light-waves, is\nabsurdly incompetent to account for the beautiful combination\nof adaptations present in the eye. It has, moreover, been previously\nshown that \"natural Selection\" is a pure myth when credited\nwith the *origination *of variations (*vide infra, Part\nIII., on Darwinian mechanical causation*);* *as the\n\"survival of the fittest\" can only take place after\nuseful variations have sprung up, together with improved organisms.\nWhence came the \"useful variations,\" which developed\nthe eye? Only from \"blind forces . . . without aim, without\ndesign?\" The argument is puerile. The true solution of the\nmystery is to be found in the impersonal Divine Wisdom, in its\n**I**DEATION -- reflected through matter.\n\n** Palaeontology has ascertained that in the animals of the Cenozoic\nage -- the Saurians especially, such as the antediluvian *Labyrinthodon,\n*whose fossil skull exhibits a perforation otherwise inexplicable\n-- the third, or odd eye must have been much developed. Several\nnaturalists, among others E. Korscheldt, feel convinced that whereas,\nnotwithstanding the opaque skin covering it, such an eye in the\nreptiles of the present period can only distinguish light from\ndarkness (as the human eyes do when bound with a handkerchief,\nor even tightly closed), in the now extinct animals that eye functioned\nand was a real organ of vision.\n\n####### [[Vol. 2, Page]] 300 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\nmost carefully hidden and inaccessible, except to the anatomist.\nNo less light is thrown thereby on the future physical, spiritual,\nand intellectual state of mankind, in periods corresponding on\nparallel lines with other past periods, and always on the lines\nof ascending and descending cyclic evolution and development.\nThus, a few centuries before the *Kali yuga -- *the black\nage which began nearly 5,000 years ago -- it was said (paraphrased\ninto comprehensible sentences):\n\n\"*We *(the Fifth Root-Race) *in our first half\n*(of duration) *onward* (on the now ASCENDING arc of\nthe cycle) *are on the mid point of *(or between) *the\nFirst and the Second Races -- falling downward *(*i.e.,\n*the races were then on the descending arc of the cycle).\n. . . . *Calculate for thyself,* Lanoo, *and see.*\"*\n*(Commentary xx.).\n\nCalculating as advised, we find that during that transitional\nperiod -- namely, in the second half of the First Spiritual ethero-astral\nrace -- nascent mankind was devoid of the intellectual brain element.\nAs it was on its *descending *line, and as we are parallel\nto it, on the *ascending, *we are,\n\nEVOLUTION OF ROOT RACES IN THE FOURTH ROUND\n\ntherefore devoid of the Spiritual element, which is now replaced\nby the intellectual. For, remember well, as we are in the *manasa\n*period of our cycle of races, or in the Fifth, we have, therefore,\ncrossed the meridian point of the perfect adjustment of Spirit\nand Matter -- or that equilibrium between brain intellect and\nSpiritual perception. One important point has, however, to be\nborne in mind.\n\n####### [[Vol. 2, Page]] 301 THE ODD EYE IS NOW A GLAND.\n\nWe are only in the Fourth Round, and it is in the Fifth that the\nfull development of *Manas, *as a direct ray from the Universal\nMAHAT -- a ray unimpeded by matter -- will be finally reached.\nNevertheless, as every sub-race and nation have their cycles and\nstages of developmental evolution repeated on a smaller scale,\nit must be the more so in the case of a Root-Race. Our race then\nhas, as a Root-race, crossed the equatorial line and is cycling\nonward on the Spiritual side; but some of our sub-races still\nfind themselves on the shadowy descending arc of their respective\nnational cycles; while others again -- the oldest -- having crossed\ntheir crucial point, which alone decides whether a race, a nation,\nor a tribe will live or perish, are at the apex of spiritual development\nas sub-races.\n\nIt becomes comprehensible now why the \"odd eye\" has\nbeen gradually transformed into a simple gland, after the physical\nFall of those we have agreed to call the \"Lemurians.\"\n\nIt is a curious fact that it is especially in human beings that\nthe cerebral hemispheres and the lateral ventricles have been\ndeveloped, and that the *optic thalami, corpora quadrigemina,\n*and *corpora striata* are the principal parts which\nare developed in the mammalian brain. Moreover it is asserted\nthat the intellect of any man may to some extent be gauged by\nthe development of the central convolutions and the fore part\nof the cerebral hemispheres. It would seem a natural corollary\nthat if the development and increased size of the pineal gland\nmay be considered to be an index of the astral capacities and\nspiritual proclivities of any man, there will be a corresponding\ndevelopment of that part of the cranium, or an increase in the\nsize of the pineal gland at the expense of the hinder part of\nthe cerebral hemispheres. It is a curious speculation which would\nreceive a confirmation in this case. We should see, below and\nbehind, the cerebellum which has been held to be the seat of all\nthe animal proclivities of a human being, and which is allowed\nby science to be the great centre for all the physiologically\nco-ordinated movements of the body, such as walking, eating, etc.,\netc.; in front, the fore-part of the brain -- the cerebral hemispheres\n-- the part especially connected with the development of the intellectual\npowers in man; and in the middle, dominating them both, and especially\nthe animal functions, the developed pineal gland, in connection\nwith the more highly evolved, or spiritual man.\n\nIt must be remembered that these are only physical correspondences;\njust as the ordinary human brain is the registering organ of memory,\nbut not memory itself.\n\nThis is, then, the organ which gave rise to so many legends and\ntraditions, among others to that of man with one head but two\nfaces. These may be found in several Chinese works, besides being\nreferred to in the\n\n####### [[Vol. 2, Page]] 302 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\nChaldean fragments. Apart from the work already cited -- the Shan\nHai King, compiled by King Chia from engravings on nine urns made\n2,255 **B.C**., by the Emperor Yu, they may be found\nin another work, called the \"Bamboo Books,\" and in a\nthird one, the \"Rh Ya\" -- \"initiated according\nto tradition by Chow Kung, uncle of Wu Wang, the first Emperor\nof the Chow Dynasty, **B.C**., 1,122\": -- says\nMr. Ch. Gould in his \"*Mythical Monsters.*\"*\n*The Bamboo Books contain the ancient annals of China, found\n**A.D**. 279 at the opening of the grave of King\nSeang of Wai, who died **B.C**. 295. Both these works\nmention men with two faces on one head -- one in front and one\nbehind (*p*. 27).\n\nNow that which the students of Occultism ought to know is that\nTHE \"THIRD EYE\" IS INDISSOLUBLY CONNECTED WITH **K**ARMA.\nThe tenet is so mysterious that very few have heard of it.\n\nThe \"eye of Siva\" did not become entirely atrophied\nbefore the close of the Fourth Race. When spirituality and all\nthe divine powers and attributes of the deva-man of the Third\nhad been made the hand-maidens of the newly-awakened physiological\nand psychic passions of the physical man, instead of the reverse,\nthe eye lost its powers. But such was the law of Evolution, and\nit was, in strict accuracy, no FALL. The sin was not in using\nthose newly-developed powers, but in *misusing *them; in\nmaking of the tabernacle, designed to contain a god, the fane\nof every *spiritual *iniquity. And if we say \"sin\"\nit is merely that everyone should understand our meaning; as the\nterm *Karma* *would be the right one to use in this case;\nwhile the reader who would feel perplexed at the use of the term\n\"spiritual\" instead of \"physical\" iniquity,\nis reminded of the fact that there can be no physical iniquity.\nThe body is simply the irresponsible organ, the tool of the *psychic,\n*if not of the \"Spiritual man.\" While in the case\nof the Atlanteans, it was precisely the Spiritual being which\nsinned, the Spirit element being still the \"Master\"\nprinciple in man, in those days. Thus it is in those days that\nthe heaviest Karma of the Fifth Race was generated by our Monads.\n\nAs this sentence may again be found puzzling, it is better that\nit should be explained for the benefit of those who are ignorant\nof the theosophical teachings.\n\nQuestions with regard to *Karma *and *re-births *are\nconstantly offered, and a great confusion seems to exist upon\nthis subject. Those who are born and bred in the Christian faith,\nand have been trained in the idea\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* Karma is a word of many meanings, and has a special term for\nalmost every one of its aspects. It means, as a synonym of sin,\nthe performance of some action for the attainment of an object\nof *worldly*, hence* selfish, *desire, which cannot\nfail to be hurtful to somebody else. Karman is action, the Cause;\nand Karma again is \"the law of ethical causation\"; the\n*effect *of an act produced egotistically, when the great\nlaw of harmony depends on altruism.\n\n####### [[Vol. 2, Page]] 303 THE NUMBER OF MONADS IS LIMITED.\n\nthat a new soul is created by God for every newly-born infant,\nare among the most perplexed. They ask whether in such case the\nnumber of incarnating Monads on earth is limited; to which they\nare answered in the affirmative. For, however countless, in our\nconceptions, the number of the incarnating monads -- even if we\ntake into account the fact that ever since the Second Race, when\ntheir respective seven groups were furnished with bodies, several\nbirths and deaths may be allowed for every second of time in the\naeons already passed -- still, there must be a limit. It was stated\nthat Karma-Nemesis, whose bond-maid is Nature, adjusted everything\nin the most harmonious manner; and that, therefore, the fresh\npouring-in, or arrival of new Monads, had ceased as soon as Humanity\nhad reached its full physical development. No fresh Monads have\nincarnated since the middle-point of the Atlanteans. Hence, remembering\nthat, save in the case of young children, and of individuals whose\nlives were violently cut off by some accident, no Spiritual Entity\ncan re-incarnate before a period of many centuries has elapsed,\nsuch gaps alone must show that the number of Monads is necessarily\nfinite and limited. Moreover, a reasonable time must be given\nto other animals for their evolutionary progress.\n\nHence the assertion that many of us are now working off the effects\nof the evil Karmic causes produced by us in Atlantean bodies.\nThe Law of **K**ARMA is inextricably interwoven with\nthat of Re-incarnation.\n\nIt is only the knowledge of the constant re-births of one and\nthe same individuality throughout the life-cycle; the assurance\nthat the same **M**ONADS -- among whom are many Dhyan-Chohans,\nor the \"Gods\" themselves -- have to pass through the\n\"Circle of Necessity,\" rewarded or punished by such\nrebirth for the suffering endured or crimes committed in the former\nlife; that those very Monads, which entered the empty, senseless\nshells, or astral figures of the First Race emanated by the Pitris,\nare the same who are now amongst us -- nay, ourselves, perchance;\nit is only this doctrine, we say, that can explain to us the mysterious\nproblem of Good and Evil, and reconcile man to the terrible and\n*apparent* injustice of life. Nothing but such certainty\ncan quiet our revolted sense of justice. For, when one unacquainted\nwith the noble doctrine looks around him, and observes the inequalities\nof birth and fortune, of intellect and capacities; when one sees\nhonour paid fools and profligates, on whom fortune has heaped\nher favours by mere privilege of birth, and their nearest neighbour,\nwith all his intellect and noble virtues ---far more deserving\nin every way --perishing of want and for lack of sympathy; when\none sees all this and has to turn away, helpless to relieve the\nundeserved suffering, one's ears ringing and heart aching with\nthe cries of\n\n####### [[Vol. 2, Page]] 304 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\npain around him -- that blessed knowledge of Karma alone prevents\nhim from cursing life and men, as well as their supposed Creator.*\n\nOf all the terrible blasphemies and accusations virtually thrown\non their God by the Monotheists, none is greater or more unpardonable\nthan that (almost always) false humility which makes the presumably\n\"pious\" Christian assert, in connection with every evil\nand undeserved blow, that \"such *is the will *of God.\"\n\nDolts and hypocrites! Blasphemers and impious Pharisees, who speak\nin the same breath of the endless merciful love and care of their\nGod and creator for helpless man, and of that God *scourging\nthe good, the* *very best of his creatures, bleeding them\nto death like an insatiable* *Moloch! *Shall we be\nanswered to this, in Congreve's words: --\n\n\"But who shall dare to tax Eternal Justice?\" *Logic\nand simple* *common sense, *we answer: if we are made\nto believe in the \"original Sin,\" in *one *life,\non this Earth only, for every Soul, and in an anthropomorphic\nDeity, who seems to have created some men only for the pleasure\nof condemning them to eternal hell-fire (and this whether they\nare good or bad, says the Predestinarian),** why should not every\nman endowed with reasoning powers condemn in his turn such a villainous\nDeity? Life would become unbearable, if one had to believe in\nthe God created by man's unclean fancy. Luckily he exists only\nin human dogmas, and in the unhealthy imagination of some poets,\nwho believe they have solved the problem by addressing him as\n--\n\n\"Thou great Mysterious Power, who hast *involved*\n\nThe pride of human wisdom, *to confound*\n\nThe *daring scrutiny *and prove *the faith*\n\nOf thy *presuming* creatures! . . . .\"\n\nTruly a robust \"faith\" is required to believe that it\nis \"presumption\" to question the justice of one, who\ncreates helpless little man but to \"perplex\" him, and\nto test a \"faith\" with which that \"Power,\"\nmoreover, may have forgotten, if not neglected, to endow him,\nas happens sometimes.\n\nCompare this blind faith with the philosophical belief, based\non every reasonable evidence and life-experience, in Karma-Nemesis,\nor the Law of Retribution. This Law -- whether Conscious or Uncon-\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* Objectors to the doctrine of Karma should recall the fact that\nit is absolutely *out of the question *to attempt a reply\nto the Pessimists on other data. A firm grasp of the principles\nof Karmic Law knocks away the whole basis of the imposing fabric\nreared by the disciples of Schopenhauer and Von Hartmann.\n\n** The doctrine and theology of Calvinists. \"The purpose\nof God *from eternity* respecting all events\" (which\nbecomes *fatalism *and kills free will, or any attempt\nof exerting it for good). . . . .\" It is the pre-assignment\nor allotment of men to everlasting happiness or misery\" (Catechism).\nA noble and encouraging Doctrine this!\n\n####### [[Vol. 2, Page]] 305 THE LAW OF RETRIBUTION.\n\nscious -- predestines nothing and no one. It exists from and in\nEternity, truly, for it is **E**TERNITY itself; and\nas such, since no act can be co-equal with eternity, it cannot\nbe said to act, for it is ACTION itself. It is not the Wave which\ndrowns a man, but the *personal *action of the wretch,\nwho goes deliberately and places himself under the *impersonal\n*action of the laws that govern the Ocean's motion. Karma\ncreates nothing, nor does it design. It is man who plans and creates\ncauses, and Karmic law adjusts the effects; which adjustment is\nnot an act, but universal harmony, tending ever to resume its\noriginal position, like a bough, which, bent down too forcibly,\nrebounds with corresponding vigour. If it happen to dislocate\nthe arm that tried to bend it out of its natural position, shall\nwe say that it is the bough which broke our arm, or that our own\nfolly has brought us to grief? Karma has never sought to destroy\nintellectual and individual liberty, like the God invented by\nthe Monotheists. It has not involved its decrees in darkness purposely\nto perplex man; nor shall it punish him who dares to scrutinise\nits mysteries. On the contrary, he who unveils through study and\nmeditation its intricate paths, and throws light on those dark\nways, in the windings of which so many men perish owing to their\nignorance of the labyrinth of life, is working for the good of\nhis fellow-men. **K**ARMA is an Absolute and Eternal\nlaw in the World of manifestation; and as there can only be one\nAbsolute, as One eternal ever present Cause, believers in Karma\ncannot be regarded as Atheists or materialists -- still less as\nfatalists:\"\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n* Some theosophists, in order to make Karma more comprehensible\nto the Western mind, as being better acquainted with the Greek\nthan with Aryan philosophy, have made an attempt to translate\nit by *Nemesis. *Had the latter been known to the profane\nin antiquity, as it was understood by the Initiate, this translation\nof the term would be unobjectionable. As it is, it has been too\nmuch anthropomorphised by Greek fancy to permit our using it without\nan elaborate explanation. With the early Greeks, \"from Homer\nto Herodotus, she was no goddess, but a *moral feeling *rather,\"\nsays Decharme; the barrier to evil and immorality. He who transgresses\nit, commits a sacrilege in the eyes of the gods, and is pursued\nby Nemesis. But, with time, that \"feeling\" was deified,\nand its personification became an ever-fatal and punishing goddess.\nTherefore, if we would connect Karma with Nemesis, it has to be\ndone in the triple character of the latter, viz., as Nemesis,\nAdrasteia and Themis. For, while the latter is the goddess of\nUniversal Order and Harmony, who, like Nemesis, is commissioned\nto repress every excess, and keep man within the limits of Nature\nand righteousness under severe penalty, *Adrasteia -- *\"the\ninevitable\" -- represents Nemesis as the immutable effect\nof causes created by man himself. Nemesis, as the daughter of\n*Dike, *is the equitable goddess reserving her wrath for\nthose alone who are maddened with pride, egoism, and impiety.\n(*See Mesomed. Hymn. Nemes., V. 2. Brunck, Analecta II.*\n*p*. 292;* Mythol. de la Grece Antique, p. *304.)\nIn short, while Nemesis is a mythological, exoteric goddess, or\nPower, personified and anthropomorphised in its various aspects,\n*Karma *is a highly philosophical truth, a most divine\nnoble expression of the primitive intuition of man concerning\nDeity. It is a doctrine which explains the origin of Evil, and\n[[Footnote continued on next page]]\n\n####### [[Vol. 2, Page]] 306 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.\n\nfor Karma is one with the Unknowable, of which it is an aspect\nin its effects in the phenomenal world.\n\nIntimately, or rather indissolubly, connected with Karma, then,\nis the law of re-birth, or of the re-incarnation of the same spiritual\nindividuality in a long, almost interminable, series of personalities.\nThe latter are like the various costumes and characters played\nby the same actor, with each of which that actor identifies himself\nand is identified by the public, for the space of a few hours.\nThe *inner, *or real man, who personates those characters,\nknows the whole time that he is Hamlet for the brief space of\na few acts, which represent, however, on the plane of human illusion\nthe whole life of Hamlet. And he knows that he was, the night\nbefore, King Lear, the transformation in his turn of the Othello\nof a still earlier preceding night; but the outer, visible character\nis supposed to be ignorant of the fact. In actual life that ignorance\nis, unfortunately, but too real. Nevertheless, the *permanent\n*individuality is fully aware of the fact, though, through\nthe atrophy of the \"spiritual\" eye in the physical body,\nthat knowledge is unable to impress itself on the consciousness\nof the false personality.\n\nThe possession of a physical *third *eye, we are told,\nwas enjoyed by the men of the Third Root-Race down to nearly the\nmiddle period of Third **S**UB-race of the Fourth\nRoot-Race, when the consolidation and perfection of the human\nframe made it disappear from the outward anatomy of man. Psychically\nand spiritually, however, its mental and visual perceptions lasted\ntill nearly the end of the Fourth Race, when its functions, owing\nto the materiality and depraved condition of mankind, died out\naltogether before the submersion of the bulk of the Atlantean\ncontinent. And now we may return to the Deluges and their many\n\"Noahs.\"\n\nThe student has to bear in mind that there were many such deluges\nas that mentioned in Genesis, and three far more important ones,\nwhich will be mentioned and described in the Section devoted to\nthe subject of pre-historic continents. To avoid erroneous conjectures,\nhowever, with regard to the claim that the esoteric doctrine has\nmuch in it of the legends contained in the Hindu Scriptures; that,\nagain, the chronology of the latter is almost that of the former\n-- only explained and made clear; and that finally the belief\nthat \"Vaivasvata Manu\" -- a generic name indeed! --\nwas the Noah of the Aryans and his prototype, all this, which\nis also the belief of the Occultists, necessitates at this juncture\na new explanation. (*Vide* Part III. * *\"*Submerged\nContinents.*\")\n\n-------\n\n####### [[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------\n\n[[Footnote continued from previous page]] ennobles our conceptions\nof what divine immutable justice ought to be, instead of degrading\nthe unknown and unknowable Deity by making it the whimsical, cruel\ntyrant, which we call Providence.\n\nNext Section\n\nContents",
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