by admin » Wed Jan 02, 2019 3:50 am
LECTURE VI.
I SAID in a former lecture that the whole science of Occultism is built on the recognition of the reality (or permanence) of the noumenon and the illusory (or transitory) character of the phenomenon. Physical science occupies itself wholly with phenomena, and relegates noumena to the region of the unknowable. This is, however, only an intermediate phase of thought. For the last three hundred years, modern science has been developing and consolidating its body of phenomenal facts, and has at length arrived at a point which will necessitate a new departure in its methods; the conclusion, viz., that force is the homogeneous basis of the material universe.
The intellectual evolution, indicated by the great scientific progress of the Post Reformation era, is the result of a spiritual involutionary process which began with Augustine and ended with Calvin. For a period of intellectual renaissance is always accompanied by a spiritual decadence. It would lead me far beyond the limits assigned to this lecture if I were to endeavour to account for this. Suffice it to say that it is connected with the Mystery of Birth and Death, — one of the Seven Great Mysteries [ i] called the ''Unutterable'' seeing that they cannot be explained in words, but necessitate the employment of a symbolical system the nature of which I am not at liberty to explain.
The spiritual involution which culminated in the worship of Force under the name of the Almighty, gave birth to inductive reasoning and inaugurated a period of intellectual evolution whose cycle is nearly completed. Determinism in theology and materialism in science have a similar origin on the plane of spirit. But a new era has begun to dawn. Neither science nor theology can rest in a reductio ad absurdum. The irresistible logic of Calvin was not proof against the revolt of the moral sense, and the clearest demonstration by physiologists that mental states and moral affinities have their chemical equivalents will never persuade men to believe that "the brain secretes thought as the liver secretes bile.'' [ii] This is beginning to be pretty generally recognized, and accordingly, some of our scientific men are experimenting with a view to ascertain the relations which electrical conditions, set up in the human body by the action of will, bear towards similar conditions in inorganic substances. From this it is an easy step to cosmic ideation. The mystery of force will be solved when we learn to regard it as the intermediate condition between the subjective volition and the objective act. The unmanifested idea becomes manifest in the objective phenomenon through the medium of force, which may be defined, therefore, as the passage between the noumenon and the phenomenon, or the noumenon in process of manifestation. As force cannot be conceived apart from matter, or will apart from intelligence, it follows that the material universe has its origin in cosmic ideation. The recognition of this principle is tantamount to an acknowledgement of the reality or permanence of the noumenon, and when this idea has received its imprimatur at the hands of our scientists, the conflict between religion and science will come to an end, for they will have a common foundation in Sacramentalism. The Universe is, in truth, the outward and visible sign of a conflict between two eternal principles, — Light and Love, in which the noumena of all phenomena have their origin. The principles are eternal, but their conflict is temporary, hence "the fashion of this world passeth away," its archetypal forms being themselves subject to change. Evolution in the physical Universe is the sacramental expression of cosmic progress in wisdom, and beauty the sacramental index of its conformity to the Divine Ideal. But behind it lies a mysterious Involution of the Divine Nature which found its ultimate expression in obedience unto death, — even the Death of the Cross. And both were necessary in order that the Divine Love should become fully manifested; for duality is an essential element of manifestation. This is the fourth of the Seven Great Mysteries, the "Mystery of Birth and Death." I feel myself somewhat at a disadvantage in dealing with this subject, for while nothing is further from my wishes than to profane the higher mysteries, it is absolutely necessary to correct certain false notions in regard to the relations between God and man for which the teachings of Madame Blavatsky are responsible. For example, nearly everyone who accepts the cosmogony of the Theosophical Society has formed a mental picture of six globes, of a more or less gaseous consistency, which are the companion planets of the earth, and revolve round the sun, in the same way as the visible planets, at a distance of so many miles from it and from each other. Now this is entirely wrong. No globes answering to such a description exist, at least, as having any connection with the earth. The fact is the seven planets are separated from the earth and from each other, not by miles, but by intermolecular constitution. Viewed from the stand-point of the highest consciousness in nature, or cosmic ideation, a visible planet, — our earth for instance, — is the concrete expression of the fourth stage of the Divine Idea (which is complete in seven stages) or the mineral kingdom. It contains potentially the three higher kingdoms — and accordingly, they manifest, in connexion with it, under its own molecular law of crystallization. But the forces which held together globe "c" or the world of archetypal forms, were much weaker than on this earth, the mineral idea, so to speak having only arrived at its third stage. Plants, animals and men existed on it only in their ethereal forms. Similarly on globe "e", which, on the fifth "round," is the expression of the fifth stage of the Divine Idea, the mineral kingdom will enter on its period of pralaya, and the law of crystallization will give place to the bio- logical law of selection when man arrives on it for the fifth time. As, in globe "d" the mineral idea becomes manifest on the fourth plane of consciousness, or phenomenal space (this being the fourth " round so the plant idea will attain to the same development on globe "e" in the fifth " round." In other words, man will then have entered on a period in which the recognition of his solidarity, or what is called our "common humanity," will not depend on community of flesh and blood but on community of will. He will exist on an altogether higher plane of consciousness, in which the illusion that the good of the individual can, by any possibility, be separated from the good of the whole will have no place. Man will have subjected to the law of his own being what I have called the plant idea, or the law of organic life, as, in this world, he has subjected the mineral idea, or the law of chemical affinity, which constitutes our present bond of union with each other, — our "common flesh and blood." And this community of will, consequent on the perfect development of the fifth principle in man, will be brought about by his incorporation into the sixth principle of the cosmos (Maha Buddhi) or the Christ principle. The words of S. Paul "Not I but Christ which is in me" will then express the highest form of mental activity, or the Divine Reason manifesting through the human reason. [iii]
This digression from the subject immediately before us was necessary to clear our minds from the false notion that there is any break of continuity in man's evolution, such as the idea of a journey to another planet would imply. He does not, when he has completed his evolution on this earth, fly off into interplanetary space, as Mr. Sinnett suggests in "Esoteric Buddhism," and arrive at globe "e." He grows away from globe "d" and into globe "e.," in the same way that he grew away from the archetypal world into that of actual form. Indeed, it would be more correct to say that the earth leaves man than that man leaves the earth; for when the fifth stage of the Divine Idea is reached, the fourth ceases to manifest, and the commencement of the fifth "round" is the first stage of "obscuration" or "planetay pralaya" of globe "d."
Thus it is that the idea of man being on the earth and confined to it only holds good of his lower nature, or body of illusion. The terms higher and lower have no real (that is eternal) significance. The double vortex is a manifestation in time, or the plane of illusion, and is the result of cyclic aberration on the plane of spirit.
Having disposed of this fundamental error, let us endeavour to ascertain the true meaning of the ac- count of man's creation and fall which, in the book of Genesis, is presented in the form of an allegory of so dramatic a character that it has been taken by the ignorant for a record of literal facts, with disastrous results both to religion and morality. Even where its allegorical character has been admitted, it has been grievously misinterpreted. The story of the forbidden fruit is a parable of the evolution of the human reason, and, unless we are prepared to assert that reason is in itself a bad thing, we shall do well to dismiss from our minds all poetic fictions in which the "Fall" is represented as a punishment for sin, and regard the whole story in an entirely different light.
It is not generally known that between the events described in the first and second chapters of Genesis there is an enormous interval of time: — the Elohistic Sabbath, or return of the emanations to their static condition of unmanifested latency, each being received back into the Logos in the culmination of its period. The second chapter opens with the period of Jahve-Elohim, Lord of form, and ruler of the night which preceded the present Elohistic day, over which the Sun of Righteousness presides. An Elohistic day corresponds to what the Theosophists call a "Round" period, and this is the fourth in the new series. Jahve was, therefore, the reflection of the Divine Love on the plane of illusion. It was he who formed man out of the dust of the earth, and breathed into him the Nephesh," or "animal soul." The purpose of this was twofold: (1) that the nascent personality might be held in equilibrium, and preserved from absorption into the Eighth Sphere, and (2) as a preparation for his future destiny of dominion over the lower kingdoms of nature; that, through him, the universe may evolve until it becomes the perfect expression of the Divine Love. This will be better understood if we avoid the error of a time connexion between the first and second chapters of Genesis. For the first chapter embraces the whole cosmic manvantara, — the Divine Idea, from its primal differentiation in the region of the Absolute to its fullest expansion in time, or the sixth Day when God saw everything that he had made and behold it was very good," or more correctly, the "best" (v. 31). The first chapter of Genesis is the history of the cosmos past, present, and future, on the plane of spirit, which is now expanding into objectivity, and this expansion is a reflexion of the spiritual reality. Accordingly, in the second chapter, we find the order reversed. Jahve is represented as forming Adam first, and afterwards the brute creation, bringing them to him " to see what he would call them " (v. 19) and, finally, the sex principle (symbolised in the first chapter as the division of the upper and lower waters) evolves into objectivity. This is the third Round " period of humanity, or the third Elohistic day, from one point of view, but it also corresponds to the minor cycle in the planetary manvantara, or the third root-race which is a microcosmic copy of it, for humanity, in the first three root-races of this "Round," repeats the process by which it evolved in the first three rounds."
I have said that the progressed entities of the former cycle (the cycle of Divine Wisdom) complete their evolution, in the new period, under the law of acceleration, by incarnating in the monads who had received the breath of life (or "animal soul") from Jahve Elohim the Lord of Form, and representative of that stage of the Divine Love which, being the fourth in the series, was subject to the law of retardation. These Monads are known in India as the Seven Pitris, or Enlighteners, and are the lords of human wisdom. But though they were incarnations of the Powers of Darkness, it would be an abuse of words to call them evil, for to them man owes speech and the power to reason. By virtue of their sixth principle, which they had developed in their own cosmic manvantara, they were in a position to control the fifth principle in their new condition, and awaken the dormant faculty of reasoning in their adopted brethren.
Now the first material race (the third root race of this "round") were in a very real sense the first men, for, though the ethereal races who preceded them had developed will, the spiritual forces (which, manifesting vortically downwards towards the next, or human, plane of consciousness, were the immediate or efficient causes of man's will) were themselves radiations from the Unconditioned Cause — the Divine Will. Man was a mere image or reflexion of God, and his will an illusion, a shadow of the Divine Will projected in Maya. Not until the fourth " round," was the human personality, so to speak, born, or detached from the life of its parents the Elohim. Man, to have an independent existence, must be self-centred, or free to originate his own actions, and it is evident that this could not be if the evolution of his reason had proceeded on the same lines. Hence the necessity for a re-adjustment whereby his personality, or fifth principle, might become itself a controlling impulse. The mystery of free-will is, in truth, the mystery of human personality, and this, as we have seen, has its source in the Divine Love, which requires an object in order that it may become manifest. We can only conceive of will as the dynamic effect of personality manifesting objectively. In itself it has no existence, for it is neither subject nor object but a middle category necessitated by the laws of thought. In all finite personalities the will is the centre of gravity, — a mathematical point. In God, the Infinite Personality, there is no centre, or rather the centre is everywhere, for in Him subjective and objective are One, and, in manifestation, both comprehend all that is. It is easy to see, therefore, that the projection of will in Maya must be accompanied by a projection of mayavic personality in order that it may become manifest, or present an objective side. The centre must be located; hence the apparent opposition between the will of man and the Will of God. As the Will of God is the centre from which force radiates, passing in turn through every plane of consciousness, this apparent opposition will disappear when the personality, or fifth principle, of man shall be sufficiently developed to obtain full control over the forces which have thrown into objectivity his lower principles, and which have resulted in the anomaly of the double vortex, — an anomaly because its centre resides in the fourth, or illusory, principle corresponding to the fourth, or mayavic, stage of the Divine Idea concerning him.
Our investigations have therefore led us to this point; that man, as he is at present constituted, is the resultant of two vortices manifesting dynamically on the plane of illusion, and proceeding originally from two separate streams of tendency, the one representing Divine Love, and the other, the Divine Wisdom, which, meeting on the plane of human consciousness, coalesce into an objective personality, imperfect as a reflexion of the Divine Personality, inasmuch as its centre is located in maya. This imperfection is due to a disturbance of the medium through which it manifests and is the temporary result of the impact of the two vortices, as the reflexion of a light in water is duplicated when the surface is disturbed.
It is desirable here to anticipate an objection which may be raised to this illustration. Why, it may be said, should the term "maya" be applied to the fourth stage of the Evolutionary series in the macrocosm when it may be predicated equally of the whole series? The answer is to be found in the etymology of the word. It is a contraction of "maha-aya." "Ya" signifies being, "a" is the privative particle and "maha" is "great." "Maya" therefore signifies "the Great Is Not." But the term "great" is relative, and applies to the objective universe on each plane of consciousness. We may therefore speak of maya in its fourth degree which is the Universe of form, or all that pertains to three-dimensional space and is limited by time. It is in this sense that I use the word for our present illustration.
But though, from a metaphysical point of view, we may regard the objective universe as mayavic, yet it has for us a real existence, inasmuch as our human personality is still within the sphere of its attraction. The first step towards the recognition of its true character, as essentially illusory, will be taken when man shall have sufficiently developed his fifth principle to enable him to overcome this attraction, — in other words, when the centrifugal force of his lower nature shall become subject to the centripetal force of his higher nature. At present they are in equilibrio in the average man for all practical purposes, though, in comparing individuals, we may observe a slight preponderance one way or the other. When the centripetal preponderance is very marked the individual is regarded by the majority as a visionary enthusiast or a dangerous fanatic. When, on the other hand, the animal nature is not under proper control the human beast must be caged in the interests of society. [iv] Until the divine reflexion has recovered from the shock produced in its medium by the impact of the two vortices, man must continue to manifest as a double vortex with a centre of its own. But it is easy to see that this condition cannot be otherwise than temporary. The law of acceleration which enabled the Powers of Darkness to traverse successfully the manifestation of the Divine Love on the plane of illusion, by opposing to it their own more rapid vortex, must necessarily give place to the law of retardation in the new figure thus thrown into objectivity. Having exhausted itself in the centrifugal impulse which gave birth to the Eighth Sphere, and, in the mineral kingdom, was the cause of the moon becoming a satellite of the earth [v], the tendency of the vortex is to return to its static condition of latency, which tendency manifests dynamically in the attraction of the Eighth Sphere. On the other hand, the Dhyanis, proceeding from the Elohim of Light, who descended into matter, under the cyclic law of retardation, began to ascend immediately afterwards. The law of acceleration then asserted itself, and by the time that the fourth root race had reached the apex of its development, was sufficiently powerful to successfully resist the attraction of the Eighth Sphere, and preserve the double vortex from absorption into it This is one aspect of the law of cataclysms, referred to in "Esoteric Buddhism," which are as periodic as the swing of a pendulum. They occur at the end of every " root race " because the Principalities (or angels of periods) of the succeeding one are then evolving at their minimum rate, having completed one-half of their minor cycle. — At such times, the centripetal resistance to the attraction of the Eighth Sphere is at its weakest. These periods coincide with the precession of the equinoxes, the last was the end of the glacial epoch in the northern hemisphere, and is preserved in the memory of a universal flood in the traditions of all nations. But it is with the preceding cataclysm in the third root race that we are now concerned; called by theologians the "Fall," and by the occultists, the "Descent into Matter." It is symbolised in the book of Genesis as expulsion from Paradise, — (rest, or spiritual equilibrium) and the curse pronounced on the earth for man's sake was not the arbitrary decree of an offended Deity, but the natural and inevitable result of the shock, caused by the impact of the vortices, which brought all lower forms of life within the attraction of the Eighth Sphere, and, consequently, under lunar influences. It was coincident with the evolution of sex; hence it is often called the "Fall into generation," the phenomena of gestation and parturition being intimately connected with lunar phases and following the course of lunar cycles. The races which preceded what Madame Blavatsky calls the "Lemuro-Atlanteans" were differently constituted from later man, and reproduced themselves by a law analogous to that which governs the production of materialized forms in the "spirit-circle," with this important difference, — that the form was permanent, or, at least, persistent.
With the fall into generation man became subject to the law of heredity, and this is the foundation of the much misunderstood doctrine of "original sin" which, according to its popular interpretation, is a monstrous libel on the Divine Being. Had man not fallen into generation, the Divine Purpose concerning him would not have been fulfilled. On the one hand, the double vortex would have been absorbed in the Eighth Sphere, or on the other, the principalities of Light would have infused into him a portion of their own spiritual essence and caused him to evolve rapidly, under the law of acceleration, out of materiality into a state of pure and self-dependent spiritual existence. In the one case his material, and in the other, his spiritual personality would have been destroyed. But the principalities of Light, perfect and blessed emanations of the Divine Wisdom, recognized in the Divine Love a Purpose above and beyond anything that the highest wisdom could attain to. It was no less than the redemption of the body by sacrifice, and before this Mystery, they cast their crowns of wisdom at the feet of the Mystic Lamb, and veiled their faces in adoration. They might have redeemed man's soul, they could not redeem his body. Accordingly, they submitted to the law of their cycle, and became angels of periods, each period being a progressive manifestation of the Divine Love which was to prepare the way for its perfect manifestation in the Word made Flesh.
Now the period of the Jewish dispensation, or that ruled over by the principalities proceeding from Jahve, lord of form, was essentially the period of generation. It had for its object the consolidation of humanity on the basis of that sympathetic relation which we call "natural affection," in order that, through it, man might rise to the conception of the Divine Fatherhood. Accordingly, the solidarity of the human race found its natural expression in that community of feeling in which we recognize our essential brotherhood, and also in the law of inherited tendencies by which the equilibrium of the double vortex is preserved. Against this law the principalities of Darkness, under the guidance of Lucifer (prince of this world), have opposed their most powerful forces, but, as we shall see, with only partial success. It is generally supposed that Satan is the enemy of spirituality in man; that he delights in his degradation, and views with diabolical (?) satisfaction the development of his lower nature and all its evil consequences. The wide, and almost universal, prevalence of this mediaeval superstition only makes it all the more necessary to protest against it as a grotesque error. As well might we say that the object at which Napoleon aimed was the slaughter of as many French soldiers as possible. It is related of Napoleon that he wept bitterly when, on the night succeeding the battle of Austerlitz, he rode over the field and viewed the dead and dying, — and it would probably be much nearer the truth to say that the degradation and suffering of mankind, for which the adversary of God is responsible, so far from affording him any satisfaction, afflicts him with a sense of failure and deepens his despair of ultimate victory.
Let us examine this "diabolical" delusion in the light of revelation and common sense. How can any rational being delight in evil for its own sake? Such delight is the negation of rationality, and the nearest approach to such a conception is the homicidal maniac. It is admitted that Satan is not only a rational being, but an intelligence of a far higher order than our own. To suppose, therefore, that his chief characteristic is insensate ferocity is surely absurd. Without, of course, pressing the analogy, if we were compelled to choose between Napoleon the Great and the Whitechapel murderer as a representative of the usurping Prince of this world, nobody who reflects for a moment would hesitate, not even those who call the latter a "fiend in human shape."
If we turn to revelation what do we find? S. Peter, it is true, compares him to a "roaring lion seeking whom he may devour," or in other words, whose nature he may assimilate to his own. He is also called the "father of lies," or illusions, for it was through his instrumentality that man's personality came under the dominion of maya. Everywhere else he is the symbol of pure cold intellect. In the book of Job, the oldest extant dramatic allegory, he is represented as the author of the cynical assertion that love is only a form of self-interest, and we are left to imagine his astonishment at the words of Job — "Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him." In the genetic allegory he is symbolised as the serpent, — everywhere the emblem of wisdom, — and enlightenment was the immediate consequence of eating the forbidden fruit. He is, in fact, Lucifer the light-bearer, and to him man owes the faculty of intellectual discrimination, or the knowledge of good and evil under illusory conditions. [vi] He is the manifestation, in time, of the fifth, or intellectual, principle of the cosmos, and in virtue of this limitation, is incapable of conceiving any higher good than wisdom. We must be careful, however, to distinguish between the seven cosmic principles and their microcosmic manifestations, each of which is a complete sub-series. Thus, Lucifer is a fully-developed septenary being, representing the fifth principle of the Universe, or cosmic ideation, and striving to attain to omnipotence through control of the fourth (maha maya). Now this is not spiritual evolution, or life, as, at first sight, it might appear, but involution, or the spiritual principle of death. This is exceedingly difficult to explain, but it must be remembered that evolution is progress in time, and is the reflexion in maya of a spiritual reality which is not so conditioned. Lucifer is not the fifth cosmic principle itself, but its efflorescence in time. He is the seed of the fifth human principle, and .germination is an involutionary process as regards the seed itself, (except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die it bringeth forth no fruit) though evolutionary as regards the nascent plant. This view is quite in accordance with our original position that evil has no real (i.e., eternal) existence, but is an imperfect, or lower, goodness.
What, then, was the design which the author of evil on this planet set himself to accomplish? It was no less than the elevation of man to his own spiritual level, in order that, through him, the cosmos might become the perfect expression of pure intellect. It was a magnificent ideal worthy of a son of light, but it was doomed to failure. A yet higher glory was in store for man. He was destined for adoption, that, becoming a partaker of the Divine Nature, the Universe, through him, might evolve into the perfect expression of Love, or God Himself. Accordingly, the light-bearer found himself confronted with a law of inertia sufficiently powerful to resist even his mighty will. His labours resemble those of Sisyphus. Having united his fate with man, his future is bound up with man's intellectual progress, and this is subject to a rhythmical cyclic and sub-cyclic ebb and flow, consequent on the periodic law of acceleration and retardation. It baffles his utmost efforts, and is the cause of that strange oscillation between the positive and negative poles of spiritual wisdom which, reflected in maya, is the conflict of good and evil. But this antagonism is essential to the perfect revelation of the Divine Nature, or in other words, the omnipotence of Love. That God is Love is no oriental metaphor, but a plain literal statement containing the key to all mysteries. The existence of evil, it is often said, is a proof that either the goodness or the power of God is limited. We refuse to impale ourselves on either horns of the dilemma. The existence of evil is a proof that God is not Will or Wisdom but Love. If the omnipotence of God were displayed in His Will, there could be no freedom, and, consequently, no personality for the creature. If wisdom were the highest good, an immeasurable chasm would for ever have separated the creature from the Creator — for the most exalted spiritual condition is only a form of life, excluding of necessity all lower forms, and proceeding from the Lord and Giver of all life. [vii]
But God has chosen to reveal Himself as Love, hence the necessity of freedom on the part or man to choose between good and evil, for, were he not free, he would be incapable of reciprocating that love.
Here, however, we are met by a difficulty. All material effects have their origin in spiritual causes, and we have seen that positive evil on the material plane is the result of cyclic aberration on the plane of spirit, consequent on the impact of two vortical streams of tendency, producing a disturbance in the medium through which the human consciousness manifests objectively. Thus it is that the fifth principle, or seat of human personality, is subject to a periodic cyclic and subcyclic law of attraction toward the fourth or "body of desire" which, owing to its own imperfect development, it is incapable of fully controlling. But the question arises, — if this attraction towards the lower nature or "body of desire" is the cause of suffering and death must it not be considered as in itself an evil condition? By no means; for it produces also pleasure and life, which we can only know by their opposites, and secondly, pleasure and pain are only finite correlatives of the eternal principles of good and evil. It is against this law of inertia in the double vortex that the adversary of God and man rebels. In vain does he attempt to detach the fifth principle from the body of desire, and assimilate it to the fifth principle of the cosmos to which he himself belongs. The fall into generation has preserved the equilibrium between the fourth and the eighth sphere, and the orderly cyclic path of man's intellectual evolution. It is the human law of gravity, and corresponds to the centripetal force by which the planet holds its satellite in subjection. We may regard it in two aspects; as the cause of "original sin," and the effect of the Divine Love.
Now original sin, as I have said, is neither more nor less than the " law of heredity." However much we may dislike it, the fact remains that man has an animal nature, with passions and instincts that link him on one side of his being with the brutes that perish. He is also conscious that he occupies an anomalous position in the Universe, for while the gratifications of sense afford entire satisfaction to the brute creation, they can never, refine them as he may, constitute happiness for him. At the same time they are a hindrance to the development of his higher nature, so that, regarded simply from an intellectual point of view, they are an intolerable nuisance. The pursuit of knowledge is checked by continual temptations, more or less alluring, to forsake a path so beset with thorns and "gather rosebuds while we may" and the distant view is bounded by the horizon of death.
Until we know the meaning of life, the question will ever obtrude itself whether, after all, it be worth living. Now all religions profess to solve this problem, and the religion of a nation or race is a fair index of its intellectual and spiritual development. Wherever a purely Aryan, or a purely Semitic, type prevails, both show a strong tendency to degenerate. An example of the former may be observed in India where the intellectual element has degenerated into the grossest superstition and nature-worship, and of the latter, in Mahommedan countries, where the spiritual monotheistic element has become the crudest anthropomorphism. And, in Christian countries, where either element has unduly prevailed, and overlaid or corrupted the Catholic faith, there, on the one hand, flourish devotional puerilities, or, on the other, a peculiarly repulsive form of Protestantism which is the death of true spirituality. It is the Nemesis of all false or defective systems of religion that they fail most signally in the very purpose for which they were instituted, — that of elevating humanity, and the reason is that they are one and all based on the fundamentally unsound proposition that the body is, not the servant, but the enemy of the soul.
This error has its source in ignorance of the fact that man was created, not for himself, but for the glory of God, and we shall endeavour to trace it to its fountainhead.
We have now arrived at a point from which we can view without prejudice the spiritual antagonism which is the Origin of Evil. It is a negative principle. Absolute evil is nothing, absolute good is God or Love. All that is, is more or less good compared with non- being, and more or less evil compared with God; and the spiritual activities of Lucifer are of the nature of a lower good in conflict with a higher. In order to understand it we must take into consideration two very important facts (1) that the element of will, essential to the idea of conflict which, on the plane of human consciousness, is of the nature of a Cause, on the plane of spiritual consciousness, is of the nature of an Effect. In other words, where the one ends the other begins. And (2) we must remember that the Fall of the Angels was a fall from heavenly to earthly wisdom. It was spiritual death, and as death is always followed by birth, their fall was the re-birth of intelligence on the plane of human consciousness. All forms of material activity have their origin on the plane of spirit, and all forms of spiritual activity may be divided into synthetic, or constructive, and analytic, or destructive. Both have their place in the economy of the Universe, and neither are, in themselves, good or evil, high or low.
Now the spiritual activities of Jahve are synthetic or formative. His period (the period of Jehovah-Michael) is the time connexion between the Father and Mother principles in Nature, and it culminated in the manifestation of the Word made Flesh. He is the "Lord of Sabaoth" or the Dhyan Chohanic hosts of Light who are on the descending arc of their cycle, and preside over what are called "natural forces" Individually will-less, they represent collectively the Divine Will and the harmony of their diverse operations constitutes the Divine Providence. The Captain of these hosts is Michael (Heb. "like unto God) and he is represented in the book of "Revelations" as prevailing against the Dragon, that ancient symbol of wisdom, and casting him out of heaven, not into a mythical hell, but into the earth, and his angels with him. Henceforward "their place was found no more in heaven," and the angels of light became angels of darkness, groping in Maya — the great abyss, or bottomless pit. The light that was in them became the property of man. It raised him from a mere automaton into a reasonable creature, capable of reciprocating the Divine Love, and of intelligent co-operation with the Divine Purpose concerning him.
Thus we see that the "Fall" of the Angels was overruled for man's benefit, and that, while it may be truly said to be the origin of evil, it was not in itself evil, but part of a grand scheme whereby man, by attaining to self-consciousness through experience, might become worthy of adoption, and, partaking of the Divine Nature, manifest in person the Omnipotence of Love. [viii] Let us remember that evil is nothing but failure of adaptation to environment, and that the Love of God is the environment of Being on every plane of consciousness. We can only, as Hegel points out, conceive of being as becomings and for this cause the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain (the pangs of imperfection, — a necessary element in time manifestation) waiting for the adoption.
The story of the "Fall" in the book of Genesis is an allegorical presentment of a conflict which, originating on the plane of spirit, and issuing through the gates of Maya, entered the plane of human consciousness, and gave birth to the Mayavic opposition between the will of man and the Will of God. The symbol of the conflict is the double vortex with its equilibrated centre between the Fourth and the Eighth Sphere and we can thus see that, while evil arises from the human will, the freedom which renders it possible can in no real sense be regarded as its cause. We are, therefore, in a better position to understand the nature of the conflict whose issues regulate every department of human activity in the mass and determine the course of human history, inasmuch as it secures for each individual that freedom of will which enables him to co-operate with the Powers of either light or darkness, and, to a greater or less degree, hasten or retard the fulfilment of the Divine Purpose. In a very real sense, therefore, we may be said to wrestle with Principalities and Powers, and the Rulers of the darkness of this world ([x]) and spiritual wickedness in the celestial region (Eph. vi. 12), for it is only through and by means of the human will that these can manifest on the plane of human consciousness.
From these facts we may deduce the following conclusions (i) that the Fall of the Angels was not caused by their "rebellious will," but that the rebellious will of man had its origin in the imperfect control which the new-born intelligence exercised over his lower nature, and (2) that the spiritual conditions under which the higher and lower nature respectively developed were mutually antagonistic; the one deriving its vitality from the synthetic, or formative, activity on the plane of spirit, and the other resulting from discriminatory, or analytic, spiritual activity.
This being premised, we have now to consider the part played by the reason in bringing about the disorganisation of human activity which is the cause of evil n the world. It must not be forgotten that the intellectual faculty is essentially analytic^ and that the power of synthesis belongs to the sixth principle. And here it is necessary to correct an error into which many Theosophists have fallen. They have taken it for granted that the power to reason resides wholly in the fifth principle because it is the vehicle of the human, as distinguished from the animal, personality. The mistake has probably arisen from the very materialistic view of the seven principles set forth in "Esoteric Buddhism" in which each one is treated of separately as if it were an independent entity. [ix] Now while it is true that the power to discriminate, resides in the fifth principle, and is accordingly possessed, in a greater or less degree, by the brute creation, whose fourth principle, or body of desire is thereby controlled; the power to reason, which involves synthetisation of disconnected concepts has its origin in the embryotic sixth principle. As the lower animals would be mere automata without the faculty of discrimination, so would man be wholly destitute of responsibility towards God and his fellow-man, were he incapable of synthetising to some degree his relations towards them.
Now the sixth principle in man corresponds to the sixth principle of the Cosmos or the Divine Wisdom, "Who for us men and for our Salvation" entered the great Abyss of Maya and in process of time, manifested in the Flesh and was born of a pure Virgin. He was made manifest in order that he might "destroy the works of the Devil" or the Elohim of Darkness, who are, collectively, the fifth cosmic principle, and whose efflorescence in time is Satan the Adversary.
Without entering into further details, we may take our stand on the broad principle that the Divine Love, which operates on every plane of human consciousness as the Vivifier and Sustainer, is opposed by the involutionary forces which originate in the spiritual activities of a being who was formerly a Son of Light but who has been plunged into the Abyss of Maya.
Satan is, therefore, on the material plane, the author of disease and physical death, of falsehood on the intellectual plane, and on the plane of spirit, selfishness, or the negation of Love. For all that, he is a minister of God, fulfilling the Divine Purpose by this very opposition, without which the omnipotence of Love could not become manifest. To him Love is a consuming fire, and the Divine Wisdom a great horror of darkness. He and his legions are fighting for their lives and have intrenched themselves in the human personality, as in a fortress, from whence Love and Love only can drive them.
We see, therefore, that it was Love which drove man from Paradise to the earth, and called into existence free-will by attaching his fourth principle, or body of desire, to the earth by a bond sufficiently strong to balance the centrifugal impetus. Up to the time when he began to develope intelligence, the action of man's will had been purely automatic, the plane of its energies, so to speak, coinciding with the axis of the original vortex. But in the newly-objectivised double vortex, the lower nature required to be consolidated in order to preserve it from absorption into the Eighth Sphere. Free-will in man may therefore be defined as the point of equilibrium between his fifth, or intellectual principle, and his fourth, or body of desire. Man thus became a responsible being with faculties capable of adapting themselves to the law of Love which called him into existence. He is the seed of the Divine Love fructifying in the womb of Maya the great Abyss, or the Illusion of the Is-not made pregnant by the Divine Love. This is the Mystery of mysteries which no wisdom of the creature can ever fathom, but which was revealed (though "as in a glass darkly") when the Word became Flesh and dwelt among us. He took on Himself a body that He might redeem our bodies by grafting them with His own in order that the Universe might become the perfect expression of the Divine Love.
On the question of Sacramentalism I can touch but briefly. It is the assertion of the principle that matter is the vehicle of spirit, and its recognition is an intellectual necessity if we are to make any further progress towards comprehension of the natural order. The Sacraments are seven in number, — Baptism, Confirmation, Eucharist, Matrimony, Penance, Order and Extreme Unction. They are the evolutionary equivalents of the sevenfold involutionary spiritual energy which in the natural order, cause the phenomena of Birth, Strength, Nutrition, Generation, Recuperation, Speech and Transmutation. Conversely, they stand to man's lower nature in the relation of Death to Sin, Weakness to the Flesh, Absorption in the Higher, Self-Surrender, Mortification, Obedience and Adaptation. The dynamic effects, therefore (if we may use the expression), of the Christian Sacraments are involutionary as regards the lower and evolutionary in respect to the higher nature of man. If we apply this idea to the symbol of the double vortex, we shall recognize in the Sacraments the appointed means whereby the opposing forces will ultimately range themselves around their true centre, — the personality (the fifth or human principle) and the attraction of the Eighth Sphere be neutralized. The spheroidal vortices will then coalesce and become one, first as an elliptical spheroid and afterwards as a true sphere capable of indefinite expansion.
Sacramentalism is the assertion of a principle which has its analogy in nature in every case where a lower type of life is succeeded by a higher one. As F. D. Maurice points out, "it assumes Christ to be the Lord, it assumes that men are created in Him, — that this is the constitution of our race; that therefore all attempts of men to resolve themselves into separate units are contradictory and abortive." [x]
In bringing this course of lectures to an end I may say that it has been my endeavour to supply materials whereby the true gnosis may be distinguished from the "oppositions of science falsely so called." The agnosticism which is the characteristic of modern thought is an indication that the times are ripe for imparting truths which, twenty years ago, would have been as seed falling on the wayside. The remedy for evils which spring from ignorance is knowledge, but until the ignorance is confessed, the remedy cannot be applied. So long as men were satisfied with mechanical authority in religion; so long as it was considered scientific to call the unknown the Unknowable; in other words, while men preferred darkness to light nothing could be done. But we have lately witnessed a reaction from agnosticism and a revival of gnosticism in one of its most dangerous forms. It is, therefore, of the highest importance that we should learn to distinguish the truths to which it bears witness from the falsehoods with which they have been artfully blended.
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Notes:
i. 1. Abyss. 2. Number. 3. Affinity. 4. Birth and Death. 5. Evil. 6. The Word. 7. Godliness.
ii. Attributed to the late W. K. Clifford.
iii. I have adopted throughout the phraseology of Madame Blavatsky, and spoken of "globes," "round" periods, etc. for the sake of convenience, but it is necessary to caution the reader against a too literal interpretation of these terms. They must not be regarded as otherwise than symbolical of the various stages of cosmic evolution.
iv. The reader must be careful to distinguish between the real centre which resides in the fifth principle and the mayavic centre of the fourth which we call will.
v. The relations of the earth and the moon correspond, in the macrocosm, to the double vortex which is the symbol of the higher and lower nature in man. The correspondence is so precise that the author regrets his inability (for reasons which will be obvious to every initiate) to illustrate it in detail.
vi. The definition of good as the "greatest happiness of the greatest number" is purely Satanic in its implied assumption that evil is the happiness of the fewer, and, consequently, that evil and happiness are capable of being connoted. That such a definition should pass muster in a "Christian" nation shews how immeasurably inferior, as a philosophical system, is modern Christianity to the "heathen" philosophy of Plato. It must be apparent to every reader of the Protagoras that good and pleasure, evil and pain, are not interchangeable values, and must be weighed, so to speak in different scales. The perception of harmony and discord, which has its foundation in the eternal principle of number, or infinity manifesting through progress, is alone capable of furnishing a standard of value to which good and evil may be referred. For the spiritual degradation which hinders man from disconnecting good with pleasure and evil with pain, Lucifer is responsible, but this is the result of his opposition and not the motive which induced him to traverse the Divine Purpose.
vii. If we regard all forms of life as rays proceeding from the One Centre, God the Father, the energizing Influence is the Lord and Giver of life, the Holy Ghost, — and its Perfect Expression, the Son "begotten of His Father before all worlds," — "Light of light" or the Divine Wisdom, the highest form of life. But, as the line revolving on its axis produces the circle, so does the circle produce the Sphere, the Divine Wisdom coming into relation with life at every point. He is thus God of God or the Perfect Expression of the Divine Love in its outward manifestation, and "by Him were all things made."
viii. Love cannot be fully manifested towards the perfect.
ix. Mr. Mohini M. Chatterjee, a Hindu Theosophist, has characterised this treatment as responsible for the doctrine that man is like "a very complicated onion from which coat after coat may be peeled until nothing is left." See "Man: Fragments of forgotten history." By Two Chelas.
x. The Kingdom of Christ. Vol. I. p. 326.