Some years ago we remarked that:
The Esoteric Doctrine may well be called ... the “Thread
Doctrine,” since, like Sûtrâtmâ [in the Vedânta Philosophy](1050),
it passes through and strings together all the ancient
philosophical religious systems, and ... reconciles and explains
them.(1051)
We now say it does more. It not only reconciles the various and apparently
conflicting systems, but it checks the discoveries of modern exact
Science, showing some of them to be necessarily correct, since they are
found corroborated in the Ancient Records. All this will, no doubt, be
regarded as terribly impertinent and disrespectful, a veritable crime of
_lèse‐science_; nevertheless, it is a fact.
Science is, undeniably, ultra‐materialistic in our days; but it finds, in
one sense, its justification. Nature behaving ever esoterically _in actu_,
and being, as the Kabalists say, _in abscondito_, can only be judged by
the profane through her appearance, and that appearance is always
deceitful on the physical plane. On the other hand, the Naturalists refuse
to blend Physics with Metaphysics, the Body with its informing Soul and
Spirit. They prefer to ignore the latter. This is a matter of choice with
some, while the minority very sensibly strive to enlarge the domain of
Physical Science by trespassing on the forbidden grounds of Metaphysics,
so distasteful to some Materialists. These Scientists are wise in their
generation. For all their wonderful discoveries will go for nothing, and
remain for ever _headless_ bodies, unless they lift the veil of Matter and
strain their eyes to see _beyond_. Now that they have studied Nature in
the length, breadth, and thickness of her physical frame, it is time to
remove the skeleton to the second plane, and search within the unknown
depths for the living and real entity, for its _sub_‐stance—the noumenon
of evanescent Matter.
It is only by acting along such lines that some truths, now called
“exploded superstitions,” will be discovered to be facts, and the relics
of ancient knowledge and wisdom.
One of such “degrading” beliefs—degrading in the opinion of the all‐
denying Sceptic—is found in the idea that Kosmos, besides its objective
planetary inhabitants, its humanities in other inhabited worlds, is full
of invisible, intelligent _Existences_. The so‐called Arch‐Angels, Angels
and Spirits, of the West, copies of their prototypes, the Dhyân Chohans,
the Devas and Pitris, of the East, are not real Beings, but fictions. On
this point materialistic Science is inexorable. To support its position,
it upsets its own axiomatic law of uniformity and of continuity in the
laws of Nature, and all the logical sequence of analogies in the evolution
of Being. The masses of the profane are asked, and are made to believe
that the accumulated testimony of History—which shows even the “Atheists”
of old, such men as Epicurus and Democritus, as believers in _Gods_—is
false; and that Philosophers like Socrates and Plato, asserting such
existences, were mistaken enthusiasts and fools. If we hold our opinions
merely on historical grounds, on the authority of legions of the most
eminent Sages, Neo‐Platonists, and Mystics in all ages, from Pythagoras
down to the eminent Scientists and Professors of the present century, who,
if they reject “Gods,” believe in “Spirits,” are we to consider such
authorities to be as weak‐minded and foolish as any Roman Catholic
peasant, who believes in and prays to his once human Saint, or the
Archangel St. Michael? But is there no difference between the belief of
the peasant and that of the Western heirs of the Rosicrucians and
Alchemists of the Middle Ages? Is it the Van Helmonts, the Khunraths, the
Paracelsuses and Agrippas, from Roger Bacon down to St. Germain, who were
all blind enthusiasts, hysteriacs or cheats, or is it the handful of
modern Sceptics—the “leaders of thought”—who are struck with the cecity of
negation? The latter is the case, we opine. It would indeed be a
_miracle_, quite an abnormal fact in the realm of probabilities and logic,
were that handful of negators to be the sole custodians of _truth_, while
the million‐strong hosts of believers in Gods, Angels, and Spirits—in
Europe and America alone—namely, Greek and Latin Christians, Theosophists,
Spiritualists, Mystics, etc., should be no better than deluded fanatics
and hallucinated mediums, and often no higher than the victims of
deceivers and impostors! However varying in their external presentations
and dogmas, beliefs in the Hosts of invisible Intelligences of various
grades have all the same foundation. Truth and error are mixed in all. The
exact extent, depth, breadth, and length of the mysteries of Nature are to
be found only in Eastern Esoteric Science. So vast and so profound are
these that scarcely even a few, a very few of the highest Initiates—those
_whose very existence is known but to a small number of Adepts_—are
capable of assimilating the knowledge. Yet it is all there, and one by one
facts and processes in Nature’s workshops are permitted to find their way
into exact Science, while mysterious help is given to rare individuals in
unravelling its arcana. It is at the close of great Cycles, in connection
with racial development, that such events generally take place. We are at
the very close of the cycle of 5,000 years of the present Âryan Kali Yuga;
and between this time and 1897 there will be a large rent made in the Veil
of Nature, and materialistic Science will receive a death‐blow.
Without throwing any discredit upon time‐honoured beliefs, in any
direction, we are forced to draw a marked line between blind faith,
evolved by theologies, and knowledge due to the independent researches of
long generations of Adepts; between, in short, faith and Philosophy. There
have been, in all ages, undeniably learned and good men who, having been
reared in sectarian beliefs, died in their crystallized convictions. For
Protestants, the garden of Eden is the primeval point of departure in the
drama of Humanity, and the solemn tragedy on the summit of Calvary is the
prelude to the hoped‐for Millennium. For Roman Catholics, Satan is at the
foundation of Kosmos, Christ in its centre, and Antichrist at its apex.
For both, the Hierarchy of Being begins and ends within the narrow frames
of their respective theologies: one self‐created _personal_ God, and an
empyrean ringing with the Hallelujas of _created_ Angels; the rest,
_false_ Gods, Satan and fiends.
Theo‐Philosophy proceeds on broader lines. From the very beginning of
æons—in time and space in our Round and Globe—the mysteries of Nature (at
any rate, those which it is lawful for our Races to know) were recorded by
the pupils of those same, now invisible, “Heavenly Men,” in geometrical
figures and symbols. The keys thereto passed from one generation of “Wise
Men” to another. Some of the symbols thus passed from the East to the
West, brought from the Orient by Pythagoras, who was not the inventor of
his famous “Triangle.” The latter figure, along with the square and
circle, are more eloquent and scientific descriptions of the order of the
evolution of the Universe, spiritual and psychic, as well as physical,
than volumes of descriptive Cosmogonies and revealed “Geneses.” The ten
Points inscribed within that “Pythagorean Triangle” are worth all the
theogonies and angelologies ever emanated from the theological brain. For
he who interprets these seventeen points (the seven Mathematical Points
hidden)—on their very face, and in the order given—will find in them the
uninterrupted series of the genealogies from the first Heavenly to
Terrestrial Man. And, as they give the order of Beings, so they reveal the
order in which were evolved the Kosmos, our Earth, and the primordial
Elements by which the latter was generated. Begotten in the invisible
“Depths,” and in the Womb of the same “Mother” as its fellow‐globes—he who
masters the mysteries of our own Earth will have mastered those of all
others.
Whatever ignorance, pride or fanaticism may suggest to the contrary,
Esoteric Cosmology can be shown to be inseparably connected with both
Philosophy and Modern Science. The Gods and Monads of the Ancients—from
Pythagoras down to Leibnitz—and the Atoms of the present materialistic
schools (as borrowed by them from the theories of the old Greek Atomists)
are only a compound unit, or a graduated unity like the human frame, which
begins with body and ends with Spirit. In the Occult Sciences they can be
studied separately, but they can never be mastered unless they are viewed
in their mutual correlations during their life‐cycle, and as a Universal
Unity during Pralayas.
La Pluche shows sincerity, but gives a poor idea of his philosophical
capacities, when declaring his personal views on the Monad or the
Mathematical Point. He says:
A point is enough to put all the schools in the world in a
combustion. But what need has man to know that point, since the
creation of such a small being is beyond his power? _À fortiori_,
philosophy acts against probability when, from that point which
absorbs and disconcerts all her meditations, she presumes to pass
on to the generation of the world.
Philosophy, however, could never have formed its conception of a logical,
universal, and absolute Deity, if it had had no Mathematical Point within
the Circle upon which to base its speculations. It is only the manifested
Point, lost to our senses after its pregenetic appearance in the
infinitude and incognizability of the Circle, that makes a reconciliation
between Philosophy and Theology possible—on condition that the latter
should abandon its crude materialistic dogmas. And it is because Christian
theology has so unwisely rejected the Pythagorean Monad and geometrical
figures, that it has evolved its self‐created human and personal God, the
monstrous Head whence flow in two streams the dogmas of Salvation and
Damnation. This is so true, that even those clergymen who are Masons, and
who would be Philosophers, have, in their arbitrary interpretations,
fathered upon the Ancient Sages the queer idea that:
The Monad represented [with them] the throne of the Omnipotent
Deity, placed in the centre of the empyrean to indicate
T.G.A.O.T.U. [_read_ the “Great Architect of the Universe”].(1052)
A curious explanation this, more Masonic than strictly Pythagorean.
Nor did the “Hierogram within a Circle, or equilateral Triangle,” ever
mean “the exemplification of the unity of the divine Essence”; for this
was exemplified by the plane of the boundless Circle. What it really meant
was the triune coëqual Nature of the first differentiated Substance, or
the con‐substantiality of the (manifested) Spirit, Matter and the
Universe—their “Son”—which proceeds from the Point, the real, Esoteric
Logos, or Pythagorean Monad. For the Greek Monas signifies “Unity” in its
primary sense. Those unable to seize the difference between the Monad—the
Universal Unit—and the Monads or the manifested Unity, as also between the
ever‐hidden and the revealed Logos, or the Word, ought never to meddle
with Philosophy, let alone with the Esoteric Sciences. It is needless to
remind the educated reader of Kant’s Thesis to demonstrate his second
Antinomy.(1053) Those who have read and understood it will see clearly the
line we draw between the _absolutely ideal_ Universe and the invisible
though manifested Kosmos. Our Gods and Monads are not the Elements of
extension itself, but only those of the invisible Reality which is the
basis of the manifested Kosmos. Neither Esoteric Philosophy, nor Kant, to
say nothing of Leibnitz, would ever admit that extension can be composed
of simple or unextended parts. But theologian‐philosophers will not grasp
this. The Circle and the Point—the latter retiring into and merging with
the former, after having emanated the first three Points and connected
them with lines, thus forming the first noumenal basis of the Second
Triangle in the Manifested World—have ever been an insuperable obstacle to
theological flights into dogmatic empyreans. On the authority of this
Archaic Symbol, a male, personal God, the Creator and Father of all,
becomes a third‐rate emanation, the Sephira standing fourth in descent,
and on the left hand of Ain Suph, in the Kabalistic Tree of Life. Hence,
the Monad is degraded into a Vehicle—a “Throne”!
The Monad—the emanation and reflection only of the Point, or Logos, in the
phenomenal World—becomes, as the apex of the manifested equilateral
Triangle, the “Father.” The left side or line is the Duad, the “Mother,”
regarded as the evil, counteracting principle;(1054) the right side
represents the “Son,” “his Mother’s Husband” in _every_ Cosmogony, as
being one with the apex; the base line is the universal plane of
productive Nature, unifying on the phenomenal plane Father‐Mother‐Son, as
these were unified in the apex, in the supersensuous World.(1055) By
mystic transmutation they became the Quaternary—the Triangle became the
Tetraktys.
This transcendental application of geometry to cosmic and divine
theogony—the Alpha and the Omega of mystical conception—was dwarfed after
Pythagoras by Aristotle. By omitting the Point and the Circle, and taking
no account of the apex, he reduced the metaphysical value of the idea, and
thus limited the doctrine of magnitude to a simple Triad—the _line_, the
_surface_, and the _body_. His modern heirs, who play at Idealism, have
interpreted these three geometrical figures as Space, Force, and
Matter—“the potencies of an interacting Unity.” Materialistic Science,
perceiving but the base line of the _manifested_ Triangle—the plane of
Matter—translates it practically as (Father)‐_Matter_, (Mother)‐_Matter_,
and (Son)‐_Matter_, and theoretically as Matter, Force, and Correlation.
But to the average Physicist, as remarked by a Kabalist:
Space, and Force, and Matter, are what signs in Algebra are to the
Mathematician, merely conventional symbols, or Force as Force, and
Matter as Matter, are as absolutely unknowable as is the assumed
empty space in which they are held to interact.(1056)
Symbols represent abstractions, and on these
The physicist bases reasoned hypotheses of the origin of things
... he sees three needs in what he terms creation: A place wherein
to create. A medium by which to create. A material from which to
create. And in giving a logical expression to this hypothesis
through the terms space, force, matter, he believes he has proved
the existence of that which each of these represents as he
conceives it to be.(1057)
The Physicist who regards Space merely as a representation of our mind, or
extension unrelated to things in it, which Locke defined as capable of
neither resistance nor motion; the paradoxical Materialist, who would have
a _void_ there, where he can see no Matter, would reject with the utmost
contempt the proposition that Space is
A substantial though [apparently an absolutely] unknowable living
Entity.(1058)
Such is, nevertheless, the Kabalistic teaching, and it is that of Archaic
Philosophy. Space is the _real_ World, while our world is an artificial
one. It is the One Unity throughout its infinitude: in its bottomless
depths as on its illusive surface; a surface studded with countless
phenomenal Universes, Systems and mirage‐like Worlds. Nevertheless, to the
Eastern Occultist, who is an objective Idealist at bottom, in the _real_
World, which is a Unity of Forces, there is “a connection of all Matter in
the Plenum,” as Leibnitz would say. This is symbolized in the Pythagorean
Triangle.
It consists of Ten Points inscribed pyramid‐like (from one to four) within
its three sides, and it symbolizes the Universe in the famous Pythagorean
Decad. The upper single point is a Monad, and represents a Unit‐Point,
which is _the_ Unity whence all proceeds. All is of the same essence with
it. While the ten points within the equilateral Triangle represent the
phenomenal world, the three sides enclosing the pyramid of points are the
barriers of _noumenal_ Matter, or Substance, that separate it from the
world of Thought.
Pythagoras considered a _point_ to correspond in proportion to
unity; a _line_ to 2; a _superfice_ to 3; a _solid_ to 4; and he
defined a point as a monad having position, and the beginning of
all things; a line was thought to correspond with duality, because
it was produced by the first motion from indivisible nature, and
formed the junction of two points. A superfice was compared to the
number three because it is the first of all causes that are found
in figures; for a circle, which is the principal of all round
figures, comprises a triad, in centre—space—circumference. But a
triangle, which is the first of all rectilineal figures, is
included in a ternary, and receives its form according to that
number; and was considered by the Pythagoreans to be the author of
all sublunary things. The four points at the base of the
Pythagorean triangle correspond with a solid or cube, which
combines the principles of length, breadth, and thickness, for no
solid can have less than four extreme boundary points.(1059)
It is argued that “the human mind cannot conceive an indivisible unit
short of the annihilation of the idea with its subject.” This is an error,
as the Pythagoreans have proved, and a number of Seers before them,
although there is a special training needed for the conception, and
although the profane mind can hardly grasp it. But there are such things
as “_Meta‐mathematics_” and “_Meta‐geometry_.” Even Mathematics pure and
simple proceed from the universal to the particular, from the mathematical
indivisible point to solid figures. The teaching originated in India, and
was taught in Europe by Pythagoras, who, throwing a veil over the Circle
and the Point—which no living man can define except as incomprehensible
abstractions—laid the origin of the differentiated cosmic Matter in the
base of the Triangle. Thus the latter became the earliest of geometrical
figures. The author of _New Aspects of Life_, dealing with the Kabalistic
Mysteries, objects to the objectivization, so to speak, of the Pythagorean
conception and the use of the equilateral triangle, and calls it a
“misnomer.” His argument that a solid equilateral body—
One whose base, as well as each of its sides, form equal
triangles—must have four co‐equal sides or surfaces, while a
triangular plane will as necessarily possess five,(1060)
—demonstrates on the contrary the grandeur of the conception in all its
Esoteric application to the idea of the _pregenesis_, and the genesis of
Kosmos. Granted, that an ideal Triangle, depicted by mathematical,
imaginary lines,
Can have no sides at all, being simply a phantom of the mind to
which, if sides be imputed, these must be the sides of the object
it constructively represents.(1061)
But in such case most of the scientific hypotheses are no better than
“phantoms of the mind”; they are unverifiable, except on inference, and
have been adopted merely to answer scientific necessities. Furthermore,
the ideal Triangle—“as the abstract idea of a triangular body, and,
therefore, as the type of an abstract idea”—accomplished and carried out
to perfection the double symbolism intended. As an emblem applicable to
the objective idea, the simple triangle became a solid. When repeated in
stone, facing the four cardinal points, it assumed the shape of the
Pyramid—the symbol of the phenomenal merging into the noumenal Universe of
thought, at the apex of the four triangles; and, as an “imaginary figure
constructed of three mathematical lines,” it symbolized the subjective
spheres—these lines “enclosing a mathematical space—which is equal to
nothing enclosing nothing.” And this because, to the senses and the
untrained consciousness of the Profane and the Scientist, everything
beyond the line of differentiated Matter—_i.e._, outside of, and beyond
the realm of even the most Spiritual _Substance_—has to remain for ever
_equal to nothing_. It is the Ain Suph—the _No Thing_.
Yet these “phantoms of the mind” are in truth no greater abstractions than
the abstract ideas in general as to evolution and physical
development—_e.g._, Gravity, Matter, Force, etc.—on which the exact
Sciences are based. Our most eminent Chemists and Physicists are earnestly
pursuing the not hopeless attempt of finally tracing to its hiding‐place
the Protyle, or the basic line of the Pythagorean Triangle. The latter is,
as we have said, the grandest conception imaginable, for it symbolizes
both the ideal and the visible universes.(1062) For if
_The possible unit is only a possibility as an actuality of
nature, as an individual of any kind_, [and as] every individual
natural object is capable of division, and by division loses its
unity, or ceases to be a unit,(1063)
this is true only of the realm of exact Science in a world as deceptive as
it is illusive. In the realm of Esoteric Science the Unit divided _ad
infinitum_, instead of losing its unity, approaches with every division
the planes of the only eternal REALITY. The eye of the Seer can follow it
and behold it in all its pregenetic glory. This same idea of the reality
of the subjective, and the unreality of the objective Universe, is found
at the bottom of the Pythagorean and Platonic Teachings—limited to the
Elect alone; for Porphyry, speaking of the Monad and the Duad, says that
the former only was considered substantial and real, “that most simple
Being, the cause of all unity and the measure of all things.”
But the Duad, although the origin of Evil, or Matter—hence _unreal_ in
Philosophy—is still Substance during Manvantara, and is often called the
Third Monad, in Occultism, and the connecting line as between two Points,
or Numbers, which proceeded from THAT, “which was before all Numbers,” as
expressed by Rabbi Barahiel. And from this Duad proceeded all the
Scintillas of the three Upper and the four Lower Worlds or Planes—which
are in constant interaction and correspondence. This is a teaching which
the Kabalah has in common with Eastern Occultism. For in the Occult
Philosophy there is the “ONE Cause” and the “Primal Cause,” the latter
thus becoming, paradoxically, the Second, as is clearly expressed by the
author of the _Qabbalah, from the Philosophical Writings of Ibn Gabirol_,
who says:
In the treatment of the Primal Cause, two things must be
considered, the Primal Cause _per se_, and the relation and
connection of the Primal Cause with the visible and unseen
universe.(1064)
Thus he shows the early Hebrews, as the later Arabians, following in the
steps of the Oriental Philosophy, such as the Chaldean, Persian, Hindû,
etc. Their Primal Cause was designated at first,
By the triadic שדי Shaddaï, the [triune] Almighty, subsequently by
the Tetragrammaton, יהוה, YHVH symbol of the Past, Present, and
Future,(1065)
and, let us add, of the eternal IS, or the I AM. Moreover, in the Kabalah
the name YHVH (or Jehovah) expresses a He and a She, male and female, two
in one, or Chokmah and Binah, and his, or rather their Shekinah or
synthesizing Spirit (or Grace), which again makes of the Duad a Triad.
This is demonstrated in the Jewish Liturgy for Pentecost, and the prayer:
“In the name of Unity, of the Holy and Blessed Hû [He], and His
She’keenah, the Hidden and Concealed Hû, blessed be YHVH [the
Quaternary] for ever.” Hû is said to be masculine and YaH
feminine, together they make the יהוה אחד _i.e._, one YHVH. One,
but of a male‐female nature. The She’keenah is always considered
in the Qabbalah as feminine.(1066)
And so it is considered in the exoteric _Purânas_, for Shekinah is no more
than Shakti—the female double of any God—in such case. And so it was with
the early Christians, whose Holy Spirit was feminine, as Sophia was with
the Gnostics. But in the transcendental Chaldean Kabalah, or _Book of
Numbers_, Shekinah is sexless, and the purest abstraction, a state, like
Nirvâna, neither subject nor object, nor anything except an absolute
PRESENCE.
Thus it is only in the anthropomorphized systems—such as the Kabalah has
now for the most part become—that Shekinah‐Shakti is feminine. As such she
becomes the Duad of Pythagoras, the two straight lines which can form no
geometrical figure and are the symbol of Matter. Out of this Duad, when
united in the basic line of the Triangle on the lower plane (the upper
Triangle of the Sephirothal Tree), emerge the Elohim, or Deity in Cosmic
Nature, with the true Kabalists the _lowest_ designation, translated in
the _Bible_ “God.”(1067) Out of these (the Elohim) issue the Scintillas.
The Scintillas are the “Souls,” and these Souls appear in the three‐fold
form of Monads (Units), Atoms and Gods—according to our Teaching. As says
the _Esoteric Catechism_:
_Every Atom becomes a visible complex unit_ [a molecule], _and once
attracted into the sphere of terrestrial activity, the Monadic Essence,
passing through the mineral, vegetable, and animal kingdoms, becomes man_.
Again:
_God, Monad, and Atom are the correspondences of Spirit, Mind, and Body_
[Âtmâ, Manas, and Sthûla Sharîra] _in man_.
In their septenary aggregation they are the “Heavenly Man,” in the
Kabalistic sense; thus, terrestrial man is the provisional reflection of
the Heavenly. Once again:
_The Monads_ [Jîvas] _are the Souls of the Atoms; both are the fabric in
which the Chohans_ [Dhyânîs, Gods] _clothe themselves when a form is
needed_.
This relates to cosmic and sub‐planetary Monads, not to the super‐cosmic
Monads, the Pythagorean Monad, as it is called, in its synthetic
character, by the Pantheistical Peripatetics. The Monads of the present
dissertation are treated, from the standpoint of their individuality, as
_Atomic Souls_, before these Atoms descend into pure terrestrial form. For
this descent into _concrete_ Matter marks the medial point of their own
individual pilgrimage. Here, losing in the mineral kingdom their
individuality, they begin to ascend through the seven states of
terrestrial evolution to that point where a correspondence is firmly
established between the human and Deva (divine) consciousness. At present,
however, we are not concerned with their terrestrial metamorphoses and
tribulations, but with their life and behaviour in Space, on planes
wherein the eye of the most intuitional Chemist and Physicist cannot reach
them—unless, indeed, he develops in himself highly clairvoyant faculties.
It is well known that Leibnitz came very near the truth several times, but
he defined Monadic Evolution incorrectly, a thing not to be wondered at,
since he was not an Initiate, nor even a Mystic, but only a very
intuitional Philosopher. Yet no Psycho‐physicist ever came nearer than has
he to the Esoteric general outline of evolution. This evolution—viewed
from its several standpoints, _i.e._, as the _Universal_ and the
_Individualized_ Monad, and the chief aspects of the Evolving Energy after
differentiation, the purely Spiritual, the Intellectual, the Psychic and
the Physical—may be thus formulated as an invariable law: a descent of
Spirit into Matter, equivalent to an ascent in physical evolution; a
reäscent from the depths of materiality towards its _status quo ante_,
with a corresponding dissipation of concrete form and substance up to the
Laya‐state, or what Science calls the “zero‐point,” and beyond.
These states—once the spirit of Esoteric Philosophy is grasped—become
absolutely necessary from simple logical and analogical considerations.
Physical Science having now ascertained, through its department of
Chemistry, the invariable law of this evolution of Atoms—from their
“protylean” state down to that of a physical and then a chemical particle,
or molecule—cannot well reject these states as a general law. And once it
is forced by its enemies—Metaphysics and Psychology(1068)—out of its
alleged impregnable strongholds, it will find it more difficult than it
now appears to refuse room in the Spaces of SPACE to Planetary Spirits
(Gods), Elementals, and even the Elementary Spooks or Ghosts, and others.
Already Figuier and Paul D’Assier, two Positivists and Materialists, have
succumbed before this logical necessity. Other and still greater
Scientists will follow in that intellectual “Fall.” They will be driven
out of their position not by spiritual, theosophical, or any other
physical or even mental phenomena, but simply by the enormous _gaps_ and
_chasms_ that open daily and will still be opening before them, as one
discovery follows the other, until they are finally knocked off their feet
by the ninth wave of simple common sense.
We may take as an example, Mr. W. Crookes’ latest discovery of what he has
named Protyle. In the _Notes on the Bhagavad Gîtâ_, by one of the best
metaphysicians and Vedântic scholars in India, the lecturer, referring
cautiously to “things Occult” in that great Indian Esoteric work, makes a
remark as suggestive as it is strictly correct. He says:
Into the details of the evolution of the solar system itself, it
is not necessary for me to enter. You may gather some idea _as to
the way_ in which the various elements start into existence from
these three principles into which Mûlaprakriti [the Pythagorean
Triangle] is differentiated, by examining the lecture delivered by
Professor Crookes a short time ago upon the so‐called elements of
modern chemistry. This lecture will give you some idea of the way
in which these so‐called elements spring from Vishvânara,(1069)
the most objective of these three principles, which seems to stand
in the place of the _protyle_ mentioned in that lecture. Except in
a few particulars, this lecture seems to give the outlines of the
theory of physical evolution on the plane of Vishvânara, and is,
so far as I know, the nearest approach made by modern
investigators to the real occult theory on the subject.(1070)
These words will be reëchoed and approved by every Eastern Occultist. Much
from the lectures by Mr. Crookes has already been quoted in Section XI. A
second lecture has been delivered by him, as remarkable as the first, on
the “Genesis of the Elements,”(1071) and also a third one. Here we have
almost a corroboration of the teachings of Esoteric Philosophy concerning
the mode of primeval evolution. It is, indeed, as near an approach, made
by a great scholar and specialist in Chemistry,(1072) to the Secret
Doctrine, as could be made apart from the application of the Monads and
Atoms to the dogmas of pure transcendental Metaphysics, and their
connection and correlation with “Gods and intelligent conscious Monads.”
But Chemistry is now on its ascending plane, thanks to one of its highest
European representatives. It is impossible for it to go back to that day
when Materialism regarded its _sub_‐elements as absolutely simple and
homogeneous bodies, which it had raised, in its blindness, to the rank of
Elements. The mask has been snatched off by too clever a hand for there to
be any fear of a new disguise. And after years of pseudology, of bastard
molecules parading under the name of Elements, behind and beyond which
there could be nought but void, a great professor of Chemistry asks once
more:
What are these elements, whence do they come, what is their
signification?... These elements perplex us in our researches,
baffle us in our speculations, and haunt us in our very dreams.
They stretch like an unknown sea before us—mocking, mystifying,
and murmuring strange revelations and possibilities.(1073)
Those who are heirs to primeval revelations have taught these
“possibilities” in every century, but have never found a fair hearing. The
truths inspired into Kepler, Leibnitz, Gassendi, Swedenborg, etc., were
ever alloyed with their own speculations in one or another predetermined
direction—hence were distorted. But now one of the great truths has dawned
upon an eminent professor of exact Modern Science, and he fearlessly
proclaims as a fundamental axiom that Science has not made itself
acquainted, so far, with real simple Elements. For Mr. Crookes tells his
audience:
If I venture to say that our commonly received elements are not
simple and primordial, that they have _not_ arisen by chance or
have _not_ been created in a desultory and mechanical manner, but
have been evolved from simpler matters—or perhaps, indeed, from
one sole kind of matter—I do but give formal utterance to an idea
which has been, so to speak, for some time “in the air” of
science. Chemists, physicists, philosophers of the highest merit,
declare explicitly their belief that the seventy (or thereabouts)
elements of our text‐books are not the pillars of Hercules which
we must never hope to pass.... Philosophers in the present as in
the past—men who certainly have not worked in the laboratory—have
reached the same view from another side. Thus Mr. Herbert Spencer
records his conviction that “the chemical atoms are produced from
the true or physical atoms by processes of evolution under
conditions which chemistry has not yet been able to produce.”...
And the poet has forestalled the philosopher. Milton (_Paradise
Lost_, Book V.) makes the Archangel Raphael say to Adam instinct
with the evolutionary idea, that the Almighty had created
... “One first matter, all
Indued with various forms, various degrees
Of substance.”
Nevertheless, the idea would have remained crystallized “in the air of
Science,” and would not have descended into the thick atmosphere of
Materialism and profane mortals for years to come, perhaps, had not Mr.
Crookes bravely and fearlessly reduced it to its simple constituents, and
thus publicly forced it on scientific notice. Says Plutarch:
An idea is a Being incorporeal, which has no subsistence by
itself, but gives figure and form unto shapeless matter, and
becomes the cause of the manifestation.(1074)
The revolution produced in old Chemistry by Avogadro was the first page in
the volume of “New Chemistry.” Mr. Crookes has now turned the second page,
and is boldly pointing _to what may be the last_. For Protyle once
accepted and recognized—as invisible Ether was, both being logical and
scientific necessities—Chemistry will have virtually ceased to live: it
will reäppear in its reïncarnation as—“New Alchemy,” or “Meta‐chemistry.”
The discoverer of radiant matter will have vindicated in time the Archaic
Âryan works on Occultism, and even the _Vedas_ and _Purânas_. For what are
the manifested “Mother,” the “Father‐Son‐Husband” (Aditi and Daksha, a
form of Brahmâ, as Creators), and the “Son”—the three “First‐born”—but
simply Hydrogen, Oxygen, and that which in its terrestrial manifestation
is called Nitrogen. Even the exoteric descriptions of the “First‐born”
Triad give all the characteristics of these three “gases.” Priestley, the
“discoverer” of Oxygen, or of that which was known in the highest
antiquity!
Yet all the ancient, mediæval, and modern Poets and Philosophers have been
anticipated even in the exoteric Hindû books as to the Elemental Vortices
inaugurated by the Universal Mind—Descartes’ “Plenum” of Matter
differentiated into particles; Leibnitz’s “ethereal fluid”; and Kant’s
“primitive fluid” dissolved into its elements; Kepler’s solar vortex and
systemic vortices; in short, through Anaxagoras, down to Galileo,
Torricelli, and Swedenborg, and after them to the latest speculations by
European Mystics—all this is found in the Hindû Hymns, or Mantras, to the
“Gods, Monads and Atoms,” in their Fulness, for they are inseparable. In
Esoteric Teachings, the most transcendental conceptions of the Universe
and its mysteries, as also the most seemingly materialistic speculations,
are found reconciled, because these Sciences embrace the whole scope of
evolution from Spirit to Matter. As declared by an American Theosophist:
The Monads [of Leibnitz] may from one point of view be called
_force_, from another _matter_. To Occult Science, _force_ and
_matter_ are only two sides of the same substance.(1075)
Let the reader remember these “Monads” of Leibnitz, every one of which is
a living mirror of the Universe, every Monad reflecting every other, and
compare this view and definition with certain Sanskrit Shlokas translated
by Sir William Jones, in which it is said that the creative source of the
Divine Mind,
Hidden in a veil of thick darkness, formed mirrors of the atoms of
the world, and cast reflection from its own face on every atom.
When, therefore, Mr. Crookes declares that:
If we can show how the so‐called chemical elements might have been
generated we shall be able to fill up a formidable gap in our
knowledge of the universe,
the answer is ready. The theoretical knowledge is contained in the
Esoteric meaning of every Hindû cosmogony in the _Purânas_; the practical
demonstration thereof—is in the hands of those who will not be recognized
in _this_ century, save by the very few. The scientific possibilities of
various discoveries, that must inexorably lead exact Science into the
acceptation of Eastern Occult views, which contain all the requisite
material for the filling of those “gaps,” are, so far, at the mercy of
Modern Materialism. It is only by working in the direction taken by Mr.
William Crookes that there is any hope for the recognition of a few,
hitherto Occult, truths.
Meanwhile, any one thirsting to have a glimpse at a practical diagram of
the evolution of primordial Matter—which, separating and differentiating
under the impulse of cyclic law, divides itself on a general view into a
septenary gradation of _Substance_—can do no better than examine the
plates attached to Mr. Crookes’ lecture, _Genesis of the Elements_, and
ponder well over some passages of the text. In one place he says:
Our notions of a chemical element have expanded. Hitherto the
molecule has been regarded as an aggregate of two or more atoms,
and no account has been taken of the architectural design on which
these atoms have been joined. We may consider that the structure
of a chemical element is more complicated than has hitherto been
supposed. Between the molecules we are accustomed to deal with in
chemical reactions and ultimate atoms as first created, come
smaller molecules or aggregates of physical atoms; these sub‐
molecules differ one from the other, according to the position
they occupy in the yttrium edifice.
Perhaps this hypothesis can be simplified if we imagine yttrium to
be represented by a five‐shilling piece. By chemical fractionation
I have divided it into five separate shillings, and find that
these shillings are not counterparts, but like the carbon atoms in
the benzol ring, have the impress of their position, 1, 2, 3, 4,
5, stamped on them.... If I throw my shillings into the melting‐
pot or dissolve them chemically, the mint stamp disappears and
they all turn out to be silver.(1076)
This will be the case with all the Atoms and molecules when they have
separated from their compound forms and bodies—when Pralaya sets in.
Reverse the case, and imagine the dawn of a new Manvantara. The pure
“silver” of the absorbed material will once more separate into SUBSTANCE,
which will generate “Divine Essences” whose “Principles”(1077) are the
Primary Elements, the Sub‐elements, the Physical Energies, and subjective
and objective Matter; or, as these are epitomized—GODS, MONADS, and ATOMS.
If leaving for one moment the metaphysical or transcendental side of the
question—dropping out of the present consideration the supersensuous and
intelligent Beings and Entities believed in by the Kabalists and
Christians—we turn to the theory of atomic evolution, the Occult Teachings
are still found corroborated by exact Science and its confessions, so far,
at least, as regards the supposed “simple” Elements, now suddenly degraded
into poor and distant relatives, not even second cousins to the latter.
For we are told by Mr. Crookes that:
Hitherto, it has been considered that if the atomic weight of a
metal, determined by different observers, setting out from
different compounds, was always found to be constant ... then such
metal must rightly take rank among the simple or elementary
bodies. We learn ... that this is no longer the case. Again, we
have here wheels within wheels. Gadolinium is not an element but a
compound. ... We have shown that yttrium is a complex of five or
more new constituents. And who shall venture to gainsay that each
of these constituents, if attacked in some different manner, and
if the result were submitted to a test more delicate and searching
than the radiant‐matter test, might not be still further
divisible? Where, then, is the actual ultimate element? As we
advance it recedes like the tantalizing mirage lakes and groves
seen by the tired and thirsty traveller in the desert. Are we in
our quest for truth to be thus deluded and baulked? The very idea
of an element, as something absolutely primary and ultimate, seems
to be growing less and less distinct.(1078)
In _Isis Unveiled_, we said:
This mystery of first creation, which was ever the despair of
Science, is unfathomable unless we accept the doctrine of Hermes.
Could he [Darwin] remove his quest from the visible universe into
the invisible, he might find himself on the right path. But then,
he would be following in the footsteps of the Hermetists.(1079)
Our prophecy begins to assert itself.
But between Hermes and Huxley there is a middle course and point. Let the
men of Science only throw a bridge half‐way, and think seriously over the
theories of Leibnitz. We have shown _our_ theories with regard to the
evolution of Atoms—their last formation into compound chemical molecules
being produced within our terrestrial workshops in the Earth’s atmosphere
and not elsewhere—as strangely agreeing with the evolution of Atoms shown
on Mr. Crookes’ plates. Several times already it has been stated in this
volume that Mârttânda, the Sun, had evolved and aggregated, together with
his seven smaller Brothers, from his Mother Aditi’s bosom, that bosom
being Prima _Mater_‐ia—the lecturer’s primordial Protyle. Esoteric
Doctrines teach the existence of
An antecedent form of energy having periodic cycles of ebb and
swell, rest and activity.(1080)
And behold a great scholar in Science now asking the world to accept this
as one of his postulates! We have shown the “Mother,” fiery and hot,
becoming gradually cool and radiant, and this same Scientist claims as his
second postulate—a _scientific necessity_, it would seem—
An internal action, akin to cooling, operating slowly in the
protyle.
Occult Science teaches that the “Mother” lies stretched in Infinity,
during Pralaya, as the great Deep, the “_dry_ Waters of Space,” according
to the quaint expression in the _Catechism_, and becomes _wet_ only after
the separation and the moving over its face of Nârâyana, the
_Spirit which is invisible Flame, which never burns, but sets on fire all
that it touches, and gives it life and generation._(1081)
And now Science tells us that “the first‐born element ... most nearly
allied to protyle” would be “_hydrogen_ ... which for some time would be
the only existing form of matter” in the Universe. What says _Old_
Science? It answers: Just so; but we would call Hydrogen (and Oxygen),
which—in the pre‐geological and even pre‐genetic ages—instils the fire of
life into the “Mother” by incubation, the _spirit_, the _noumenon_, of
that which becomes in its grossest form Oxygen and Hydrogen and Nitrogen
on Earth—Nitrogen being of no divine origin, but merely an earth‐born
cement for uniting other gases and fluids, and serving as a sponge to
carry in itself the Breath of Life, pure air.(1082) Before these gases and
fluids become what they are in _our_ atmosphere, they are interstellar
Ether; still earlier and on a _deeper_ plane—something else, and so on _in
infinitum_. The eminent and learned gentleman must pardon an Occultist for
quoting him at such length; but such is the penalty of a Fellow of the
Royal Society who approaches so near the precincts of the Sacred Adytum of
Occult Mysteries as virtually to overstep the forbidden boundaries.
But it is time to leave Modern Physical Science and turn to the
psychological and metaphysical side of the question. We would only remark
that to the “two very reasonable postulates” required by the eminent
lecturer, “to get a glimpse of some few of the secrets so darkly hidden”
behind “the door of the Unknown,” a third should be added(1083)—lest no
battering at it should avail; the postulate that Leibnitz stood on a firm
groundwork of fact and truth in his speculations. The admirable and
thoughtful synopsis of these speculations—as given by John Theodore Mertz
in his “Leibnitz”—shows how nearly he has brushed the hidden secrets of
Esoteric Theogony in his _Monadologie_. And yet this philosopher has
hardly risen in his speculations above the first planes, the lower
principles of the Cosmic Great Body. His theory soars to no loftier
heights than those of the _manifested_ life, self‐consciousness and
intelligence, leaving the regions of the earlier post‐genetic mysteries
untouched, as his ethereal fluid is post‐planetary.
But this third postulate will hardly be accepted by the modern men of
Science; and, like Descartes, they will prefer keeping to the properties
of external things, which, like extension, are incapable of explaining the
phenomenon of motion, rather than accept the latter as an independent
Force. They will never become anti‐Cartesian in this generation; nor will
they admit that:
This property of inertia is not a purely geometrical property;
that it points to the existence of something in external bodies
which is not extension merely.
This is Leibnitz’s idea as analyzed by Mertz, who adds that he called this
“something” Force, and maintained that external things were endowed with
Force, and that in order to be the bearers of this Force they must have a
Substance, for they are not lifeless and inert masses, but the centres and
bearers of Form—a purely Esoteric claim, since Force was with Leibnitz an
_active_ principle—the division between Mind and Matter disappearing by
this conclusion.
The mathematical and dynamical enquiries of Leibnitz would not
have led to the same result in the mind of a purely scientific
enquirer. But Leibnitz was not a scientific man in the modern
sense of the word. Had he been so, he might have worked out the
conception of energy, defined mathematically the ideas of force
and mechanical work, and arrived at the conclusion that even for
purely scientific purposes it is desirable to look upon force, not
as a primary quantity, but as a quantity derived from some other
value.
But, luckily for truth:
Leibnitz was a philosopher; and as such he had certain primary
principles, which biassed him in favour of certain conclusions,
and his discovery that external things were substances endowed
with force was at once used for the purpose of applying these
principles. One of these principles was the law of continuity, the
conviction that all the world was connected, that there were no
gaps and chasms which could not be bridged over. The contrast of
extended thinking substances was unbearable to him. The definition
of the extended substances had already become untenable: it was
natural that a similar enquiry was made into the definition of
mind, the thinking substance.
The divisions made by Leibnitz, however incomplete and faulty from the
standpoint of Occultism, show a spirit of metaphysical intuition to which
no man of Science, not Descartes, not even Kant, has ever reached. With
him there existed ever an infinite gradation of thought. Only a small
portion of the contents of our thoughts, he said, rises into the clearness
of apperception, “into the light of perfect consciousness.” Many remain in
a confused or obscure state, in the state of “perceptions”; but they are
there. Descartes denied soul to the animal. Leibnitz, as do the
Occultists, endowed “the whole creation with mental life, this being,
according to him, capable of infinite gradations.” And this, as Mertz
justly observes:
At once widened the realm of mental life, destroying the contrast
of _animate_ and _inanimate matter_; it did yet more—it reäcted on
the conception of matter, of the extended substance. For it became
evident that external or material things presented the property of
extension to our senses only, not to our thinking faculties. The
mathematician, in order to calculate geometrical figures, had been
obliged to divide them into an infinite number of infinitely small
parts, and the physicist saw no limit to the divisibility of
matter into atoms. The bulk through which external things seemed
to fill space was a property which they acquired only through the
coarseness of our senses.... Leibnitz followed these arguments to
some extent, but he could not rest content in assuming that matter
was composed of a finite number of very small parts. His
mathematical mind forced him to carry out the argument _in
infinitum_. And what became of the atoms then? They lost their
extension and they retained only their property of resistance;
they were the centres of force. They were reduced to mathematical
points.... But if their extension in space was nothing, _so much
fuller was their inner life_. Assuming that inner existence, such
as that of the human mind, is a new dimension, not a geometrical
but a metaphysical dimension, ... having reduced the geometrical
extension of the atoms to nothing, Leibnitz endowed them with an
infinite extension in the direction of their metaphysical
dimension. After having lost sight of them in the world of space,
the mind has, as it were, to dive into a metaphysical world to
find and grasp the real essence of what appears in space merely as
a mathematical point.... As a cone stands on its point, or a
perpendicular straight line cuts a horizontal plane only in one
mathematical point, but may extend infinitely in height and depth,
so the essences of _things real_ have only a punctual existence in
this physical world of space; but have an infinite depth of inner
life in the metaphysical world of thought.(1084)
This is the spirit, the very root of Occult doctrine and thought. The
“Spirit‐Matter” and “Matter‐Spirit” extend infinitely _in depth_, and like
the “essence of things” of Leibnitz, our essence of _things real_ is at
the _seventh depth_; while the _unreal_ and gross matter of Science and
the external world, is at the lowest extreme of our perceptive senses. The
Occultist knows the worth or worthlessness of the latter.
The student must now be shown the fundamental distinction between the
system of Leibnitz(1085) and that of Occult Philosophy, on the question of
the Monads, and this may be done with his _Monadologie_ before us. It may
be correctly stated that were Leibnitz’ and Spinoza’s systems reconciled,
the essence and spirit of Esoteric Philosophy would be made to appear.
From the shock of the two—as opposed to the Cartesian system—emerge the
truths of the Archaic Doctrine. Both oppose the Metaphysics of Descartes.
His idea of the contrast of two Substances—Extension and Thought—radically
differing from each other and mutually irreducible, is too arbitrary and
too un‐philosophical for them. Thus Leibnitz made of the two Cartesian
Substances two attributes of one universal Unity, in which he saw God.
Spinoza recognized but one universal indivisible Substance, an absolute
ALL, like Parabrahman. Leibnitz, on the contrary, perceived the existence
of a plurality of Substances. There was but One for Spinoza; for Leibnitz
an infinitude of Beings, _from_, and _in_, the One. Hence, though both
admitted but _One Real Entity_, while Spinoza made it impersonal and
indivisible, Leibnitz divided his personal Deity into a number of divine
and semi‐divine Beings. Spinoza was a _subjective_, Leibnitz an
_objective_ Pantheist, yet both were great Philosophers in their intuitive
perceptions.
Now, if these two teachings were blended together and each corrected by
the other—and foremost of all the One Reality weeded of its
personality—there would remain as sum total a true spirit of Esoteric
Philosophy in them; the impersonal, attributeless, absolute Divine
Essence, which is no “being” but the root of all Being. Draw a deep line
in your thought between that ever‐incognizable Essence, and the as
invisible, yet comprehensible Presence, Mûlaprakriti or Shekinah, _from
beyond_ and _through which_ vibrates the Sound of the Verbum, and from
which evolve the numberless Hierarchies of intelligent Egos, of conscious
as of semi‐conscious, “apperceptive” and “perceptive” Beings, whose
Essence is spiritual Force, whose Substance is the Elements, and whose
Bodies (when needed) are the Atoms—and our Doctrine is there. For, says
Leibnitz:
The primitive element of every material body being force, which
has none of the characteristics of [objective] matter—it can be
conceived but can never be the object of any imaginative
representation.
That which was for him the primordial and ultimate element in everybody
and object was thus not the material atoms, or molecules, necessarily more
or less extended, as those of Epicurus and Gassendi, but, as Mertz shows,
immaterial and metaphysical Atoms, “mathematical points,” or _real
souls_—as explained by Henri Lachelier (Professeur Agrégé de Philosophie),
his French biographer.
That which exists outside of us in an absolute manner, are Souls
whose essence is force.(1086)
Thus, _reality_ in the manifested world is composed of a _unity of units_,
so to say, immaterial—from our standpoint—and infinite. These Leibnitz
calls Monads, Eastern Philosophy Jîvas, while Occultism, with the
Kabalists and all the Christians, gives them a variety of names. With us,
as with Leibnitz, they are “the expression of the universe,”(1087) and
every physical point is but the phenomenal expression of the noumenal,
metaphysical Point. His distinction between “perception” and
“apperception” is the philosophical though dim expression of the Esoteric
Teachings. His “reduced universes,” of which “there are as many as there
are Monads”—is the chaotic representation of our Septenary System with its
divisions and sub‐divisions.
As to the relation his Monads bear to our Dhyân Chohans, Cosmic Spirits,
Devas, and Elementals, we may reproduce briefly the opinion of a learned
and thoughtful Theosophist, Mr. C. H. A. Bjerregaard, on the subject. In
an excellent paper, “On the Elementals, the Elementary Spirits, and the
Relationship between Them and Human Beings,” read by him before the Âryan
Theosophical Society of New York, Mr. Bjerregaard thus distinctly
formulates his opinion:
To Spinoza, substance is dead and inactive, but to Leibnitz’s
penetrating powers of mind everything is living activity and
active energy. In holding this view, he comes infinitely nearer
the Orient than any other thinker of his day, or after him. His
discovery that _an active energy forms the essence of substance_
is a principle that places him in direct relationship to the Seers
of the East.(1088)
And the lecturer proceeds to show that to Leibnitz Atoms and Elements are
_Centres of Force_, or rather “spiritual beings whose very nature it is to
act,” for the
Elementary particles are vital forces, not acting mechanically,
but from an internal principle. They are incorporeal spiritual
units [“substantial,” however, but not “immaterial” in our sense]
inaccessible to all change from without ... [and] indestructible
by any external force. Leibnitz’ monads differ from atoms in the
following particulars, which are very important for us to
remember, otherwise we shall not be able to see the difference
between Elementals and mere matter. Atoms are not distinguished
from each other, they are qualitatively alike; but one monad
differs from every other monad qualitatively; and every one is a
peculiar world to itself. Not so with the atoms; they are
absolutely alike quantitatively and qualitatively, and possess no
individuality of their own.(1089) Again, the atoms [molecules,
rather] of materialistic philosophy can be considered as extended
and divisible, while the monads are mere “metaphysical points” and
indivisible. Finally, and this is a point where these monads of
Leibnitz closely resemble the Elementals of mystic philosophy,
these monads are representative beings. Every monad reflects every
other. Every monad is a living mirror of the Universe within its
own sphere. And mark this, for upon it depends the power possessed
by these monads, and upon it depends the work they can do for us;
in mirroring the world, the monads are not mere passive reflective
agents, but _spontaneously self active_; they produce the images
spontaneously, as the soul does a dream. In every monad,
therefore, the adept may read everything, even the future. Every
monad—or Elemental—is a looking‐glass that can speak.
It is at this point that Leibnitz’s philosophy breaks down. There is no
provision made, nor any distinction established, between the “Elemental”
Monad and that of a high Planetary Spirit, or even the Human Monad or
Soul. He even goes so far as to sometimes doubt whether
God has ever made anything but monads or substances without
extension.(1090)
He draws a distinction between Monads and Atoms,(1091) because, as he
repeatedly states:
Bodies with all their qualities are only phenomenal, like the
rainbow. _Corpora omnia cum omnibus qualitatibus suis non sunt
aliud quam phenomena bene fundata, ut Iris._(1092)
But soon after he finds a provision for this in a substantial
correspondence, a certain metaphysical bond between the Monads—_vinculum
substantiale_. Esoteric Philosophy, teaching an _objective_
Idealism—though it regards the objective Universe and all in it as Mâyâ,
Temporary Illusion—draws a practical distinction between Collective
Illusion, Mahâmâyâ, from the purely metaphysical standpoint, and the
objective relations in it between various conscious Egos so long as this
Illusion lasts. The Adept, therefore, _may_ read the future in an
Elemental Monad, but he has to draw together for this object a great
number of them, as each Monad represents only a portion of the Kingdom it
belongs to.
It is not in the object, but in the modification of the cognition
of the object that the monads are limited. They all tend
(confusedly) to the infinite, to the whole, but they are limited
and distinguished by the degrees of distinctness in their
perception.(1093)
And as Leibnitz explains:
All the portions of the universe are distinctly represented in the
monads, but some are reflected in one monad, some in another.
A number of Monads could represent simultaneously the thoughts of the two
million inhabitants of Paris.
But what say the Occult Sciences to this, and what do they add?
They say that what is called collectively Monads by Leibnitz—roughly
viewed, and leaving every subdivision out of calculation, for the
present—may be separated into three distinct Hosts,(1094) which, counted
from the highest planes, are, firstly, “Gods,” or conscious, spiritual
Egos; the intelligent Architects, who work after the plan in the Divine
Mind. Then come the Elementals, or “Monads,” who form collectively and
unconsciously the grand Universal Mirrors of everything connected with
their respective realms. Lastly, the “Atoms,” or material molecules, which
are informed in their turn by their “perceptive” Monads, just as every
cell in a human body is so informed. There are shoals of such _informed_
Atoms which, in their turn, inform the molecules; an infinitude of Monads,
or Elementals proper, and countless spiritual Forces—Monadless, for they
are pure incorporealities,(1095) except under certain laws, when they
assume a form—not _necessarily_ human. Whence the substance that clothes
them—the apparent organism they evolve around their centres? The Formless
(Arûpa) Radiations, existing in the harmony of Universal Will, and being
what we term the collective or the aggregate of Cosmic Will on the plane
of the subjective Universe, unite together an infinitude of Monads—each
the mirror of its own Universe—and thus individualize for the time being
an independent Mind, omniscient and universal; and by the same process of
magnetic aggregation they create for themselves objective, visible bodies,
out of the interstellar Atoms. For Atoms and Monads, associated or
dissociated, simple or complex, are, from the moment of the first
differentiation, but the “principles,” corporeal, psychic and spiritual,
of the “Gods”—themselves the Radiations of Primordial Nature. Thus, to the
eye of the Seer, the higher Planetary Powers appear under two aspects: the
subjective—as _influences_, and the objective—as mystic _forms_, which,
under Karmic law, become a _Presence_, Spirit and Matter being One, as
repeatedly stated. Spirit is Matter _on the seventh plane_; Matter is
Spirit at the lowest point of its cyclic activity; and both are—Mâyâ.
Atoms are called Vibrations in Occultism; also Sound—collectively. This
does not interfere with Mr. Tyndall’s scientific discovery. He traced, on
the lower rung of the ladder of monadic being, the whole course of the
_atmospheric_ Vibrations—and this constitutes the _objective_ part of the
process in Nature. He has traced and recorded the rapidity of their motion
and transmission; the force of their impact; their setting up vibrations
in the tympanum and their transmission of these to the otoliths, etc.,
till the vibration of the auditory nerve commences—and a new phenomenon
now takes place: the _subjective_ side of the process or the _sensation_
of sound. Does he perceive or see it? No; for his specialty is to discover
the behaviour of Matter. But why should not a Psychic see it, a spiritual
Seer, whose inner Eye is opened, one who can see through the veil of
Matter? The waves and undulations of Science are all produced by Atoms
propelling their molecules into activity _from within_. Atoms fill the
immensity of Space, and by their continuous vibration _are_ that MOTION
which keeps the wheels of Life perpetually going. It is that inner work
that produces the natural phenomenon called the correlation of Forces.
Only, at the origin of every such “Force,” there stands the _conscious_
guiding Noumenon thereof—Angel or God, Spirit or Demon, ruling powers, yet
the same.
As described by Seers—those who can see the motion of the interstellar
shoals, and follow them clairvoyantly in their evolution—they are
dazzling, like specks of virgin snow in radiant sunlight. Their velocity
is swifter than thought, quicker than any mortal physical eye can follow,
and, as well as can be judged from the tremendous rapidity of their
course, the motion is circular. Standing on an open plain, on a mountain
summit especially, and gazing into the vast vault above and the spatial
infinitudes around, the whole atmosphere seems ablaze with them, the air
soaked through with these dazzling coruscations. At times, the intensity
of their motion produces flashes like the Northern Lights in the Aurora
Borealis. The sight is so marvellous, that, as the Seer gazes into this
inner world, and feels the scintillating points shoot past him, he is
filled with awe at the thought of other, still greater mysteries, that lie
beyond, and within, this radiant ocean.
However imperfect and incomplete this explanation on “Gods, Monads and
Atoms,” it is hoped that some students and Theosophists, at least, will
feel that there may indeed be a close relation between Materialistic
Science and Occultism, which is the complement and missing soul of the
former.