ICC. For instance, the Foiirth Sub-Race of the At 1 antenna was in its Kali Yuga, when

IW7 were destroyed, whereas the Fifth was in iU Satya or KriU Yuga. The Aryan Race is now in ii Kali Vaga. and will continue to be in it for 4^7.000 years longer, while various " Family Races," Uie Semitic. Mamitic, etc., are in their own special cycle*. The forthcoming Sixth Sub-Race— may begin very soon— will be in iia Satya (Golden) Age while we reap the fruit of our iniquity liaarKall Vugm.
RtEtarckggt vili. sAo.
X56
THB SKCRKT DOCTRINK.
place. Again, these figures are not very widely different from tbi given by the Geologists, who place their Glacial Period at 850/ years ago.
The Shaiapatha then tells us that a woman was produced who came to Manu and declared herself his daughter, with tvhom he lived and bega( Ihe offsprittg 0/ Manu, This refers to the physiological transformation of sexes during the Third Root-Race. And the allegor>' is too trans- parently clear to need much explanation. Of course, as alreatly remarked, in the separation of sexes an androg>'ne being was suj^ posed to divide his body into two halves — as in the case of Brahi and Vach, and even of Adam and Eve — and thus the female is> in] certain sense, his daughter, just as he will be her son, "the flesh of [and her] flesh and the bone of his [and her] bone." Let it be al well remembered that not one of our Orientalists has yet learned discern in those "contradictions and amazing nonsense," as .some ci the Purdnas, that a reference to a Yuga may mean a Round, a R( Race, and oiten a sub-race, as well as form a page torn out of pi cosmic Theogony. This double and triple meaning is proved various references to one and the same individual apparently, undl an identical name, while in reality the references are to events divide by entire Kalpas. A good instance is that of IIS. She is first repi sented as one thing and then as another. In the exoteric legem it is said that Manu Vaivasvata, desiring to create sons, instituted sacrifice to Mitra and Varuna; but. through a mistake of the oflSdating Brahman, a daughter only was obtained — Ilfi or Ida. Then, *' through the favour of the two deities," her sex is changed aud she becomes a man, Sudyumna. Then she is again turned into a woman, and so on; the fable adding that Shiva and his consort were pleased that "she should be a male one month and a female another." This has a direct refer- ence to the Third Root- Race, whose men were androgynes. But soi very learned Orientalists* think and have declared that:
I(U is pHmarily food, nourishtncnt, or a libation of inilk; tlience a stream praise, personified as the goddess of speech.
The "profane" are not told, however, the reason why "a libation
milk," or "a stream of praise," should be male and female by tui unless, indeed, there is some "internal evidence" which the Occultis fail to perceive.
HOW OtD IS HUMANITY?
157
in its most mystical meaning, the union of Svayambbuva Manu with i-Shata-RupS, his own daughter — this being the first *'euhemeriza- * of the dual principle of which Vaivasvata Manu and lid are a idary and a third form — stands in cosmic symbolism as the Root-
fc. the Germ from which spring all the Solar Systems, the Worlds,
igtls and the Gods. For, as says Vishnu:
From Unnu all creation, gods, Asuras, mao must be produced;
By him the world must be createtl, that which moves and moveth not
Bnt we may find worse opponents than even the Western Scientists Orientalists. If, on the question of figures, Brahmans may agree our teaching, we are not so sure that some of the orthodox con- ratives may not raise objections to the modes of procreation attri- to their Pitri Devatds. We shall be called upon to produce the from which we quote, and we will invite them to read their own trdrtas a little more carefully and with an eye to the esoteric mean- And then, we repeat again, they will find, under the veil of more or less transparent allegories, ever>' statement made herein corrobo- led by their own works. One or two instances have already been as regards the appearance of the Second Race, which is called **Sweat-bom." This allegor>' is regarded as a fairy-tale, and yet it iccals a psycho-physiological phenomenon, and one of the greatest j-steries of Nature. I But in view of the chronological statements made herein, it is natural
K COULD MEN EXIST 18,000,000 YEARS AGO?
p To this Occultism answers in the affirmative, notwithstanding all ' scientific objectors. Moreover, this duration covers only the Vaivas- vata-Manu Man, i.e., the male and female entit>' already separated into dwtincl sexes. The two and a half Races that preceded that event may have lived 300.000,000 years ago for all that Science can tell. For the geological and physical difiiculties in the way of the theory could not aist for the primeval^ ethereal Man of the Occult Teachings. The rhU issue of the quarrel between the Profane and the Esoteric Sciaiees iipends upon the belief in, and demonstration of the existenee of an Astral B^y withi?i the Physical^ the former independent of the latter. Paul d'-Usier, the Positivist, seems to have proven the fact pretty plainly,* apt to speak of the accumulated testimony of the ages, and that of the
* See /tai/A«iaHmi Humcnity; Tranflaled by H- 8. Olcott. l,ond
158
THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
•modem "Spiritualists" and Mystics. It will be found difficult to rq tliis fact in our age of proofs, tests, and ocular demonstrations.
The Secret Doctrine maintains that, notwithstanding the general cataclysms and disturbances of the Fourth Round of our Globe, which— owing to its being the period of its greatest physical develop- ment, for the Fourth Round is the middle-point of the I,ife Cycle allotted to it — were far more terrible and intense than during any of the three preceding Rounds — the Cycles of its earlier psychic and spiritual life and of its semi-ethereal conditions — Physical Humanity has existed upon it for the last 18,000,000 years.* This period was preceded by 300,000,000 years of the mineral and vegetable develop ment. To this, all those who refuse to accept the theory of a "bone less," purely ethereal, man, will object. Science, which knows only o4 physical organisms, will feel indignant; and materialistic Theology still more so. The former will object on logical and reasonable grounds, based on the preconception that all animate organisms have always existed on the same plane of materiality in all the ages; the latter on a tissue of most absurd fictions. The ridiculous claim usually brought forward by Theologians is based on the virtual assumption that mankind (read Christians) on this Planet have the honour of being the only human beings in the whole Kosmos. who dwell on a Globe, and that they are consequently, the best of their kind.f
The Occultists, who believe firmly in the teachings of the Mother- Philosophy, repel the objections of both Theologians and Scientists. They maintain, on their side, that, even during those periods when there must have been insufferable heat, even at the two poles, with
* Proieaaor Newcomb says the hrat tvulved by contraction would last only 18,000,000 year*, [f^putof jittronomy. 509.) While n tenipcraturr permitting: the existence or water could not be rencfacd emrlier Uian 10,000,000 years a^. iWinchell's World-Life. 3S&.) But Sir William Thonuon saj-a that the whole aire of the Incmstation of the Earth is 80,000.000 years, though, this year, he has ajraia altfivd his opinion and allows ottly ts,ood,ooo years as the a^ of the Sun. As wilt be shown in the Addenda, Ihe divergence of scientific opinions is so great that do reliance can ever be placed upon sewnttfie speculation.
* Thf essay on 7*/ FiuvaUty of Wotlds (i853>— an anonymous work, yet well known to have been the production of Dr. Whewetl~is a good proof of this. No Christian ought to believe in either the plurality of Worlds or the geglog^ical age of the Globe, argues the author ; bccawte, if it is asacrted that this World is only one among the many of its kind, which are all the work of God, as It is itself; that all are the seat of life, all the realm and dwelling of intelligent creatures endowed with will, subject to law and capable of free-will; then, it would be extravagant to think that cmw World should have been the subject of God's favours and lUs special interference, of Hih communications and His fimomai vttit. Can the Earth presunie 10 be conftidered the centre of Uie moral and reliffiooa Universe, be asks, if it has not the slightcwt distinction to rely upon in the phyKlcal Universe f Is it not OS nbaurd to uphold such an assertion (of the plurality of inhabiteil worlds), as it would be to- The above is quoted from memory, yet aimoit U:rtmaUy. The author fiUla to Me Uiat be If bnrstijie 3iis own ooap-bubble with auch a defence.
ADAM-GALATBA.
159
successive floods, upheaval of the valleys and constant shifting of the great waters and seas, none of these circumstances could form an im- pediment to human life and organization, such as is assigned by iheni to early mankind. Neither the heterogeneity of ambient regions, full of deleterious gases, nor the perils of a crust hardly consolidated, could prevent the First and Second Races from making their appearance even during the Carboniferous, or the Silurian Age itself.
Thus the Monads destined to animate future Races were ready for the new transformation. They had passed their phases of "immetaliza- tion," of plant and animal life, from the lowest to the highest, and were waiting for their human, more intelligent form. Yet what could the Plastic Modellers do but follow the laws of evolutionary Nature? Could they, as claimed by the biblical dead-letter, form, '*Lord-God" -like, or as Pygmalion in the Greek allegory, Adam-Galatea out of volcanic dust, and breathe a "Living Soul" into Man? No; because the Soul was already there, latent in its Monad, and needed but a "coating." Pygmalion, who fails to ariimafe his statue^ and Bahak Zivo of the Nazarsean Gnostics, who fails to construct "a human soul in the creature," are, as conceptions, far more philosophical and scientific than Adam, taken in the dead-letter sense, or the biblical Elohim- Crcators. Esoteric Philosophy, which teaches spontaneous generation — after the Shishta and PrajSpati have throwu the seed of life on the Earth — shows the I^ower Angels able to construct physical man only, even with the help of Nature, after having evolved the Ethereal Form out of themselves, and leaving the physical form to evolve gradually from its ethereal, or what would now be called, protoplasmic, model.
This will again be objected to; "spontaneous generation" is an ex- ploded theory, we shall be told. Pasteur's experiments disposed of it twenty years ago, and Professor Tyndall is against it. Well, suppose he is? He ought to know that, should spontaneous generation be indeed proven impossible in our present world-period and actual conditions — which the Occultists deny — still it would be no demonstration that it could not have taken place under dififerent cosmic conditions, not only in the seas of the Laurentian Period, but even on the then convulsed Earth. It would be interesting to know how Science could ever ac- count for the appearance of species and life on Earth, especially of Man, once that she rejects both the biblical teaching? and spontaneous generation. Pasteur's obser\'ations. however, are far from being per- fect or proven. Blanchard and Dr. Lutaud reject their importance.
loo
THE SECRST DOCTRINE.
and, in fact, show that they have none. The question is so far left judice^ as well as the other as to when, at what period, life appeared the Earth? As to the idea that Haeckers Moneron — a pinch of salt! has solved the problem of the origin of life; it is simply absi Those Materialists, who feel inclined to pooh-pooh the iheoo' of ■*' Self-existent," the "Self-born Heavenly Man," represented as Ethereal, Astral Man, must excuse even a tyro in Occultism laughi in his tuni, at some speculations of Modem Thought. After provii most learnedly that the primitive speck of Protoplasm (Moneron)j neither animal nor plant, but both, and that it has no anusiors am* either of these, since it is that Moneron which serves as a point j departure for all orgauized existence, we are finally told that Monera are their own ancestors. This may be very scientific, but it ver>' metaphysical also; too much so, even for the Occultist.
If spontaneous generation has changed its methods now — owi perhaps, to accumulated material on hand — so as to almost escape tection, it was, nevertheless, in full swing in the genesis of terrest life. Even the simple physical form and the evolution of species si how Nature proceeds. The scale-bound, gigantic Saurian, the winj Pterodactyl, the Megalosaurus, and the hundred feet long Iguanodoi the later period, are the transformations of the earliest representatii of the animal kingdom found in the sediments of the primary ej There was a time when all the above enumerated **autediluvii monsters appeared as filamentoid Infusoria without shell or crust, neither ner\'es, muscles, organs nor sex, and reproduced their kind gemmation; as do microscopical animals also, the architects builders of our mountain ranges, agreeably to the teachings of Scien Why not man in this case? Why should he not have followed same law in his growth, /.e*., gradual condensation? Every unpi diced person would prefer to believe that Primeval Humanity had first an Ethereal — or, if so preferred, a huge filamentoid, jelly Form, evolved by Gods or natural "Forces," which grew, condeas throughout millions of ages, and became gigantic in its physical pulse and tendency, until it settled into the huge, physical form of Fourth Race Man — rather than believe him created of the dust of the Earth (literally), or from some unknown anthropoid ancestor.
Nor does our Esoteric theory clash with scientific data, except k^ix first appearance, as Dr. A. Wilson, F.R.S.. says, in a letter to Knowiedgt CDec 23, 1881):
WHAT IS EVOLUTION?
l6i
Kvolution — rather nature, in the light of evolution — ha* only been studied for some twmty-Jive years or so. That is, of course, a mere fractional space in the history of human thought.
And just because of this we do not lose all hope that Materialistic Science will amend its waj'S, and will gradually accept the Esoteric Teachings — if even at first divorced from their (to Science) too meta- physical elements.
Has the last word on the subject of human evolution yet been said? As Professor Huxley says:
Each such answer to the great question [man*& real place in nature], invariably asserted by the followers of its propounder. if not by himself^ to be complete and finals remains in high authority and esteem, it may be for one century, it may be for twenty : but, as invariably. Time proves each reply to have been a mere approxi- mation to the truth— tolerable chiefly on account of the ignorance of those by ivhom^ it was accepted, and wholly intolerable when tested by the larger knowledge of their successors.*
Will this eminent Darwinian admit the possibility of his "Pithecoid Ancestry'* being assignable to the list of "wholly intolerable beliefs," in the "larger knowledge'* of Occultists? But whence the savage? Mere "rising to the civilized state" does not account for the evolution of form.
In the same letter. "The Evolution of Man," Dr. Wilson makes other strange confessions. Thus, he observes, in answer to the queries put to Knowledge, by " G. M.":
**Has evolntion effected any change in man? If so, what change? If not, why not?" . . . If we refuse to admit [as science does] that man was created a perfect being, and then became degraded, there exists only another supposition — that of evolution. If man has arisen from a savage to a civilized state, that surely is evolu- tion. We do not yet know because such knowledge is difficult to acquire^ if the human frame is subject to the same influences as those of lower animals. But there is little doubt tliat elevation from savagery to civilized life means and implies "evolution.'* and that of considerable extent. Mentally, man's evolution cannot be doubted; the ever-widening sphere of thought has sprung from small and rude beginnings, like language itself. But man's ways of life, his power of adaptation to his sur- roundings, and countless other circumstances, have made the facts and course o. his "evolution*' very difficult to trace.
This very difiScully ought to make the Evolutionists more cautious in their affirmations. But why is evolution impossible, if "man was created a perfect being, and then became degraded"? At best it can only apply to the outward^ physical man. As remarked in Isis Unvcilcdy
I
THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
Darwin's evolution begins at the middle point, instead of commencing- for man. as for everything else, from universals. The Aristotle- Baconian method may have its advantages, but it has. undeniably, already demonstrated its defects. Pythagoras and Plato, who pro- ceeded from universals downwards, are now shown more learned, in the light of Modem Science, than was Aristotle. For the latter opposed and denounced the idea of the revolution of the Earth and even of its rotundity, when writing:
Almost All tliow who affinn that they have studied heaven in its untfonnity^ claim that the earth is in the cetitre, but the philosophers of the Italian School. otherwise called the Pythagoreans, teach entirely the contrary.
This, because the Pythagoreans were Initiates, and followed the deductive method. Whereas Aristotle, the father of the inductive system, complained of those who taught that:
The centre of our system was occupied by the sun, and the earth was only a star, which by a rotatory motion around the same centre, produces night and day.*
The same with regard to man. The theory taught in the Secret Doctrine, and now expounded, is the only one. which— without falling into the absurdity of a "miraculous*' man created out of the dust of the earth, or the still greater fallacy of man evolving from a pinch of lime-salt, the ex-protoplasmic Moneron — can account for his appear- ance on Earth.
Analogy is the guiding law in Nature, the only true Ariadne's thread that can lead us, through the inextricable paths of her domain, toward her primal and final mysteries. Nature, as a creative potency, is infinite, and no generation of Physical Scientists can ever boast of ha\ing exhausted the list of her ways and methods, however uniform tlie laws upon which she proceeds. If we can conceive of a ball of '* fire-mist'* — as it rolls through seons of time in the interstellar spaces — becoming gradually a Planet, a self-luminous Globe, to settle into a man-bearing World or Earth, thus having passed from a soft plastic body into a rock-bound Globe; and if we see on it everything evolving from the non-nucleated jelly-speck that becomes the Barcode t of the Moneron, then passes from its protistic stated into the form of an
• Dt Ctrlo, U. 13.
r Orwhal is more ^cncrjtUy known as ProtopLaain. ThU substance received thenameof "Sarcode" Trom Pruf. Uiijarilln Ueaumtui far earlier than its present appellation.
t The Moucra arc Indeed Piotista. They arc neither animaln nor plants, write* Hoeckel: "tlie whole body of the Moueron represents nothius more tbui a unfcle thorouK-hly horao^neous particle or albumea in a finnly sdhesii'e condittou." {Journal 0/ Microacvpicat Scienct, }:ai., 1S69, p. aft.)
ajT** organism without organs.
animal, to grow into a gigantic reptilian monster of the Mesozoic times; then dwindling again into the (comparatively) dwarfish crocodile, now confined solely to tropical regions, and the universally common lizard* — if we can conceive all this, then how can man alone escape the general law? "There were giants on earth in those days" says Genesis, repeat- ing the statement of all the other Eastern Scriptures; and the Titans are founded on an anthropological and physiological fact.
And, as the hard-shelled crustacean was once upon a time a jelly- speck, a "thoroughly homogeneous particle of albumen in a firmly adhesive condition," so was the outward covering of primitive man, his early "coat of skin." pius an immortal spiritual Monad» and a psychic temporary form and body within that shell. The modern, hard, mus- cular man, almost impervious to any climate, was, perhaps, some 25,000,000 years ago, just what the Haeckelian Moneron is, strictly an '•organism without organs," an entirely homogeneous substance with a structureless albumen body within, and a human form only outwardly.
No man of Science has the right, in this century, to find the figures of the Brihmans in the question of chronology preposterous; for their owTi calculations often exceed by far the claims made by Esoteric Science. This may easily be shown.
Helmholtz calculated that the cooling of our Earth from a tempera- ture of 2,000* to 200" Cent, must have occupied a period of no less than 350,000,000 years. Western Science (including Geology) seems generally to allow our Globe an age of about 500,000,000 years alto- gether. Sir William Thomson, however, limits the appearance of the earliest vegetable life to 100,000,000 years ago — a statement respectfully contradicted by the Archaic Records. Speculations, furthermore, vary daily in the domains of Science. Meanwhile, some Geologists are very much opposed to such limitation. Volger calculates:
That the time requisite for the deposit of the strata known to ua must at least liave amounted to 648 millions of years.
Both time and space are infinite and eternal.
The eailh, as a material existence, is indeed infinite: the changes only which it
has undergone can be determined by fiuite periods of time
We must therefore assume that the starry heaven is not merely in space, which no
* Behold the Igauiodon of the Mesozoic age»— the monster lOO feet loDg— now Iransfomied into the ■tnall I(niana Uxard of South America. Popular trnditions about "giAnts" in days of old. and their mention in every mythology, iDcludlnfr that of the BibU, may some day be shown lo be fouaded ou fiKt. la nature, (be lo^c of annloffy alone should make us accept tbc«c traditiont as scientific
t64
THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
istronomcr doubts, but also in time, without beginning or end; that it never created, and is imperishable.*
Czolbe repeats exactly what the Occultists say. But the Ar>*an Occultists, we may be told, knew nothing of these later speculatioDS. As Coleman says:
They were even ignorant of the globular form of our earth.
To this the Vishnu Purdna contains a reply, which has forced certain Orientalists to open their eyes ver>' wide.
The sun is stationed, for all time, in the middle of the day, and over against mid- night, in aU the Dvipas [Continents], Moitrcya. But the rising and the setting of the sun being perpetually opposite to each o^Arr^—and, in the same way, all the car- dinal points, and so the cross-points. Maitreya, people speak of the rising of the sun where they see it; and where the sun disappears, there, tothemy is bis setting. Of the sun, which is always in om and the same places there is neither setting nor rimng; for what is called rising and setting are on/y the seeing and the not seeing the sa]i.t
To this Fitzedward Hall remarks:
The hcliocentricism taught in this passage is remarkable. It is contradicted, however, a Uttic further on. J
Contradicted purposely, because it was a secret temple-teaching. Martin Haug remarked the same teachiug iu another passage. It is useless to calumniate the Ar>'ans any longer.
To return to the chronology of the Geologists and Anthropologists. We are afraid Science has no reasonable grounds on which she could oppose the views of the Occultists in this direction. Except that '^of man, the highest organic being of creation, not a trace was found in the primar>' strata; only in the uppermost, the so-called alluvial layer,'* is all that can be urged, so far. That man was not the last member in the mammalian family, but the first in this Round, is something that Science will be forced to acknowledge one day. A similar view also has already been mooted in France ou very high authority.
That man can be shown to have lived in the Mid- Tertiary Period, and in a geological age 7t*hen there did not yet exist one single specimen of the now known species of ma?nmals, is a statement that Science cannoi deny and which has now been proven by de Quatrcfages,§ But even supposing his existence in the Eocene Period is not yet demonstrated, what period of time has elapsed since the Cretaceous Period? We
* These are the opinioiu of Burmcister sod Ceolbc. See Force and Matter, by !«. B6chiirr, edited by J. K. CoUingwood. F.R.S.L.. p. 6i. i Vishnu Purina, \X. viii ; Pitaedvninl Hall's rendering in Wilson's TmnslatloD, ti. S41. ] Ibid., p. z^s. I Introduction A ti.tude dt4 Kaea ffumainei.
arc aware of the fact that only the boldest Geologists dare place man further back thau the Miocene Age. But how long, we ask. is the duration of those ages and periods since the Mesozoic time? On this, after a good deal of speculation and wrangling. Science is silent, the greatest authorities upon the subject being compelled to answer to the question: "We do not know." This ought to show that the men of Science are no greater authorities in this matter than are the profane. If, according to Professor Huxley, "the time represented by the Coal for- mation alone would be six millions of years,"* how many more millions would be required to cover the time from the Jurassic Period, or the middle of the so-called Reptilian Age — when the Third Race appeared — up to the Miocene, when the bulk of the Fourth Race was submerged?!
The writer is aware that those specialists, whose computations of the ages of the Globe and Man are the most liberal, have always had the shyer majority against them. But this proves very little, since the majority rarely, if ever» turns out to be right in the long run. Harvey stood alone for many years. The advocates for crossing the Atlantic with steamers were in danger of ending their days in a lunatic asylum. Mesmer is classed to this day — in the Encyclopsedias — along with Cagliostro and St. Germain, as a charlatan and impostor. And now that Messrs. Charcot and Richct have vindicated Mcsmer's claims, and that Mesmerism under its new name of "Hypnotism" — a false nose on a very old face — is accepted by Science, it does not streuglhen our respect for that majority, when we see the ease and unconcern with which its members treat of ^'Hypnotism," of "telepathic impacts," and its other phenomena. They speak of it, in short, as if they had be- lieved therein since the days of Solomon, and had not, only a few years ago, called its votaries lunatics and impostors! |
The same revulsion of thought is in store for the long period of years which Esoteric Philosophy claims as the age of sexual and physiological mankind. Therefore even the Stanza which says:
• 9fodem Scienc* and Modern Thought, by S. Laing, p. 3a.
t EMfteric Buddhism, p. ;o.
J The toiDC fntc \f. in ^tore for spirituHliKtic phenomena and aU the other psychological manifesta- tio&t of the tmner mati. Since the days of Hume, whose researches culminnted in a nihilistic IdeBlism, Psycholo^ has frradUBllv shifted its poBlUon to one of crass Matcnali»ia. Hume is re- Kardcd as a Psychologist, and yet he denied i5 priori the poMtbtlity of phenomena in which millions now believe, including many men of Science. TheHylo-Idealista of to-day are rank Annihitationista. Tbe schools of Spencer and Bain are respecllvety po«itivjst and materialist, and not metaphysical at all. It is Piychism and not Psycholosrj' : it reminds onr as little of the Veddntic teaching ait does the pessimism of Schopenhauer and von Hartmann recall the Esoteric Philosophy, tbe heart and soul zl true Buddhism.
i66
THB SECRET DOCTRINE.
" The Mind-born, ike boneless, gaife being to the Will-bom wilh bones;" — adding that this took place in the middle of the Third Race 18,000,000 years ago — has yet a chance of being accepted by future Scientists.
As far as nineteenth century thought is concerned, we shall be told* even by some personal friends who are imbued with an abnormal respect for the shifting conclusions of Science, that such a statement is absurd. How much more improbable will appear our further assertion, viz., that the antiquity of the First Race dates back millions of years beyond this again. For. although the exact figures are withheld — and it is out of the question to refer the incipient evolution of the primeval Divine Races with certainly to either the early Secondary, or the Primary Ages of Geologj'' — one thing is clear, that the figures 18,000,000 of years, which embrace the duration of sexual, physical, man, have to be enormously increased if the whole process of spiritual, astral and physical development is taken into account. Many Geolo- gists, indeed, consider that the duration of the Qualernar>' and Tertiary Ages demands the concession of such an estimate; and it is quite certain that no terrestrial conditions whatever negative the hypothesis of an Eocene man, if evidence for his reality is forthcoming. Oc- cultists, who maintain that the above date carries us far back into the Secondary or "Reptilian" Age, may refer to M, de Quatrefages in support of the possible existence of man in that remote antiquity. But with regard to the earliest Root-Races the case is very different. If the thick agglomeration of vapours, charged with carbonic acid, that escaped from the soil, or was held in suspension in the atmosphere since the commencement of sedimentation, offered a fatal obstacle to the life of human organisms as now known, how, it will be asked, could the primeval men have existed? This consideration is, in reality, out of court. Such terrestrial conditions as were then operative had no touch with the plane on which the evolution of the ethereal astral Races proceeded. Only in relatively recent geological periods, has the spiral course of cyclic law swept mankind into the lowest grade of physical evolution — the plane of gross material causation. In those early ages, astral evolution was alone in progress, and the two planes, the astral and the physical,* though developing on parallel lines, had
* It must be noted that, though the astral and physical plaocB of Matter ran parallel with one another rvni iu the earliest genlog^ioil agea, yet tbcy were not \n the luimr phases of manlfcxtatioa in which they are now. The Earth did uot reach Ita present j^odlf 0/ dtmity UU tfl.ooo.ooo yean ago. Since then both the physical and astral ptanca have become grosoer.
SPONTANEOUS GENERATION.
io7
■» direct point of contact with one another. It is obvious that a ■sdow-like ethereal man is related by virtue of his organization — if pcb it can be called — only to that plane from which the substance of Bs Upadhi is derived.
jThere are things, perhaps, that may have escaped the far-seeing — bt not all-seeing — eyes of our modem Naturalists; yet it is Nature feself who undertakes to furnish the missing links. Agnostic specu- fcive thinkers have to choose between the version given by the Secret Doctrine of the East, and the hopelessly materialistic Darwinian and Biblical accounts of the origin of man; between no soul and no spiritual evolntion, and the Occult doctrine which repudiates "special creation" and the "Evolutionist" anthropogenesis equally.
Again, to take up the question of "spontaneous generation"; life — as Science shows — has not always reigned 'on this terrestrial plane. There was a time when even the Haeckelian Moneron — that simple globule of Protoplasm — had not yet appeared at the bottom of the ^35. Whence came the Impulse yvhxch caused the molecules of Carbon, Nitrogen. Oxygen, etc., to group themselves into the Urschleim of Oken. that organic "Slime," now christened Protoplasm? What were prototypes of the Monera? They, at least, could not have fallen in corites from other Globes already formed. Sir William Thomson's theory to this effect notwithstanding. And even if they had so ; if our Earth got its supply of life-germs from other Planets; or what^ had carried them on to these Planets? Here, again, ess the Occult Teaching is accepted, we are compelled once more to face a miracle — to accept the theory of a personal, anthropomorphic Creator, the attributes and definitions of whom, as formulated by the Vonotheists, clash as much with philosophy and logic, as they degrade the ideal of an infinite Universal Deity, before whose incomprehensible awmi grandeur the highest human intellect feels dwarfed. Let not the modem Philosopher, while arbitrarily placing himself on the highest pianacle of human intellectuality hitherto evolved, show himself spiri- taally and intuitionally so far below the conceptions of even the cncient Greeks, themselves on a far lower level, in these respects, than the Philosophers of Eastern Ar>'an antiquity. Hylozoism, when philo- sophically understood, is the highest aspect of Pantheism, It is the «Jy possible escape from idiotic Atheism based on lethal materiality, Uid the still more idiotic anthropomorphic conceptions of the Mono- Jheists; between which it stands on its own entirely neutral ground.
1
t66
Z>OCTXDIX.
HykHEoasm
abaolnte Dnriiie Tfaoa^t, wlii^ 'wooM prrvade^
nttmbcrkss acttre, creating Forces, or ** Creators," which EmHtia an nunred hjr, and hare their being in, &om, and through, that Dirise Thought; the latter, nevertheless, having no more personal concern in them or M^rV creations, than the Sun has in the sun-flower and its seeds, or in vegetation in general. Snch active "Creators** are known to exist and are believed in, because perceived and sensed by the Inner Man in the Occultist Thus the latter says that an Absolute Ddty. having to be unconditioned and unrelated, cannot be thought of at the same time as an active, creating, one living God, without immediate degradation of the ideal * A Deity that manifests in Space and Time — ^these two being simply the forms of That which is the Absolute All — can be but a fractional part of the whole. And since that "All" cannot be divided in its absoluteness, therefore that sensed Creator (we say Creators) can be at best but the mere aspect thereof. To use the same metaphor — inadequate to express the ftill idea, yet well adapted to the case in hand — these Creators are like the numerous raj's of the solar orb, which remains unconscious of, and tmconcemed in» the work; while its mediating agents, the rays, become the instrumcalllj media every spring — the Manvantaric dawn of the Earth — in fru ing and awakening the dormant vitality inherent in Nature and differentiated matter. This was so well understood in antiquity, even the moderately religious Aristotle remarked that such woi direct creation would be quite unbecoming to God — AvprrrU t# Plato and other philosophers taught the same: deity cannot set its hand to creation — ainovpytiv avavra. This Cudworth calls "Hylozoii As old Zeno is credited by Laertius with having said:
Nature i« a habit moved from itself, according to seminal principles; and containing those several tbinjETs which in determinate times are produced it, and acting agreeably to that from which it was secreted. t
I^t US return to our subject, pausing to think over it. Ind there was vegetable life during those periods that could feed on then deleterious elements; and if there was even animal life wl aquatic organization could be developed, notwithstanding the sup] scarcity of Oxygen, why could there not be human life also, in its
• Tbe conception and definition of the Aboolute by Cardinal Cusa majr ntiafy only Uic Wnttf mind, prisoned, lo unconKiotuly to itself, uid rnlirely dcffmcratrd, by loug^ centuries of Kholutj and theoloKJcal •ophiitry. But thl« "recent philosophy of the Absolute," traced by Sir WilUai Ilamiltoa to Cuh, would oever Mtiafy the more scutely metaphysical miod of the Rind6 Tedlntiii.
t Cndworth'* /ntttUctuat SyMtem, I. jaft.
OCEANS OP CARBOKIC ACID?
Ifi9
JiCipient physical form, zV., in a race of beings adapted for that geo- logical period and its surroundings? Besides, Science confesses that it ^ows nothing of the real length of geological periods.
Bat the chief question before ns is, whether it is quite certain that, from the time of that which is called the Azoic Age, there ever was Jach an atmosphere as that hypothesized by the Naturalists. Not all tlic Physicists agree with this idea. Were the writer anxious to corro- borate the teachings of the Secret Doctrine by exact Science, it would easy to show, on the admission of more than one Physicist, that the osphere has changed little, if at all, since the first condensation of oceans — i.e., since the Laurentian Period, the Pyrolithic Age. Such, any rate, is the opinion of Blanchard, S. Meunier, and even of Bischof the experiments of the last Scientist with basalts have shown. For were we to take the word of the majority of Scientists as to the quantity of deadly gases, and of elements entirely saturated with Carbon and Nitrogen, iu which the vegetable and animal kingdoms are shown to have lived, thriven, and developed, then one would have to come to the curious conclusion that there were, in those days, oceans of liquid carbonic acid, instead of water. With such an element, it becomes doubtful whether the Ganoids, or even the Primitive Trilobites themselves could live in the oceans of the Primarj* Age — let alone iu those of the Silurian, as shown by Blanchard.
The conditions that were necessary for the earliest Race of mankind, however, require no elements, whether simple or compound. That which was stated at the beginning is maintained. The spiritual ethereal Entity which lived in Spaces unknown to Earth, before the first sidereal "jelly-speck" evolved in the Ocean of crude Cosmic Matter — billions and trillions of years before our globular speck in inanity, called Earth, came into being and generated the Moncra in its drops, called oceans — needed no ^'elements." The "Manu with soft bones,'* could well dispense with Calcium Phosphate, as he had no bones, save in a figurative sense. And while even the Monera, how- wer homogeneous their organism, still required physical conditions of Hfc that would help them toward further evolution, the Being which becajne Primitive Man and the "Father of Man," after evolving on pUoes of existence undreamed of by Science, could well remain im- pervious to any state of atmospheric conditions around him. The primitive ancestor, in Brasseur de Bourbourg*s Popol VuA, who — in the Mexican legends — could act and live with equal ease under ground and
IJO
THE SECRBT DOCTRINE.
water as upon the earth, answers only to the Second and early Third Races in our texts. And if the three kingdoms of Nature were so different in pre-diluvian ages, why should not man have been composed of materials and combinations of atoms now entirely unknown to Physical Science? The plants and animals now known, in almost numberless varieties and species, have all developed, according to scientific hypotheses, from primitive and far fewer organic forms. Why should not the same have occurred in the case of man, the ele-; ments, and the rest? As the Commenlar>' says:
Universal Genesis starts from the One, breaks into Three, then Five, and ^nally culminates in Seven, to return into Four, Three, and One.
STANZA VII.
FROM THE SEMI-DIVINE DOWN TO THE FIRST HUMAN RACES.
24. The higher Creators reject in their pride the Forma evolved by the "Sons Yoga," 35. They will not incarnate in the early Egg-born. 26. They select the latecj Androgynes. 27. The first man endowed with mind.
24. The Sons or Wisdom, thk Sons of Night * ready for rebirth, CAMB down. They saw the viLEf forms of the First Third J (a)*
"WK can choose." said the lyORDS, ''WE HAVE WISDOM.*' SOMfi ENTERED THE ChHAYAS. SoME PROJECTED A SpARK. SoME DEFERRED
TILL THE Fourth. § From their own RC;pathey filled || the Kama.^ Those who entered became Arhats. Those who received but a Spark, remained destitute of knowledge;** the Spark burped low (^). The Third remained mind-less. Their JIvAsft were not READY. These were set apart among the Sevkn^J They becamb
NARROW-HEADED. ThE ThIRD WERE READY. "In THESE SHALL WS* DWELL," SAID THE LORDS OF THE FlAME AlfD OP THE DAJUC WzSDOU (/).
* ImiiM from the- llody or Brmhmi wlien it became Night, t intelltctuiLlly vile. t Still MmiiclaH Kucc. ) Race.
\\ inlensified.
fl The vehicle of Desire.
•• Higher knowledKr.
♦' Monads.
%% Primilive huuian spedes.
THK "BLACK FIRE" OF THE "ZOHAR.
171
This Stanza contains, in itself, the whole key to the mysteries of evil, 50-caIIed Fall of the Angels, and the many problems that have izled the brains of the Philosophers from the time that the memory man began. It solves the secret of the subsequent inequalities or intellectual capacity, of birth or social position, and gives a logical ex- ■uiation to the incomprehensible Karmic course throughout the aeons ^icli followed. The best explanation which can be given, in view of tlie difficulties of the subject, will now be attempted. [a) Up to the Fourth Round, and even to the later part of the Third :e in this Round. Man — if the ever-changing forms that clothed the mads during the first three Rounds and the first two and a half Races the present Round can be given that misleading name — is, so far, i!y an animal intellectually. It is ouly iu the present midway Round that he entirely develops in himself the Fourth Principle as a fit vehicle for the Fifth. But Manas will be relatively fully developed only in the following Round, when it will have an opportunity of becoming entirely divine until the end of the Rounds. As Christian Schcettgen says in Horn Hibraicie, etc., the first terrestrial Adam "had only the breath of
(e,'*— Nephesh. bitf not (he livmg Soul. \j>) Here the inferior Races, of which there are still some analogues I— as the Australians, now fast dying out, and some African and reanic tribes — are meant. *'They were not ready" signifies that the Innic development of these Monads had not yet fitted them to occupy [forms of men destined for incarnation in higher intellectual Races. tlhis is explained later on. 0 The Zohar speaks of "Black Fire," which is Absolute I^ight — Wisdom. To those who. prompted by old theological prejudice, may »y: But the Asuras are the rebel Devas, the opponents of the Gods — knee DeWls, and the Spirits of Evil — it is answered: Esoteric Philo- sophy admits neither good nor evil per se, as existing independently in ^'Unre. The cause for both is found, as regards the Kosmos, in the aecessity of contraries or contrasts, and with respect to man, in his luman nature, his ignorance and passions. There are no Devils or the tttterly depraved, as there are no Angels absolutely perfect, though may be Spirits of Light and of Darkness; thus Lucifer — the irit of Intellectual Enlightenment and Freedom of Thought — is iphorically the guiding beacon, which helps man to find his way >ugh the rocks and sand-banks of Life, for Lucifer is the Logos in highest, and the "Adversary" in his lowest aspect — both of which
172
THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
are reflected in our Ego. Lactantius, speaking of the Nature of Christ, makes the Logos, the Word, '*\.\i^ firsl-bom brother of Satan, and the first of all creatures:"*
The Vishnu Purana describes these primeval creatures (Tiryaksrotas) , with crooked digestive canals:
[They were] endowed with inward manifestations, but mutually in ignorance about their kind and naturr.f
The twenty-eight kinds of Badhas, or "imperfections," do not apply, as Wilson thought, to the animals now known, which are speci6ed by him, for they did not exist in those geological periods. This is quite plain from the said work, in which the first created are the "five-fold (immovable) world," minerals and vegetables; then come those fabulous animals, Tiryaksrotas — the monsters of the Abyss, slain by the "Lords," of Stanzas II and III; then the Ordhvasrotas, the happy celestial beings, which feed on ambrosia; and lastly, the Arvaksrolas, human beings — Brahmi's seventh "creation" so-called. But these "creations," including the latter, did not occur on this Globe, wherever else they may have taken place. It is not Brahma who creates things and men on this Earth, but the Chief and Lord of the Prajipatis, the Lords of Being and terrestrial Creation. ''Obeying the command of Brahma," Daksha — the synthesis, or the aggregate, of the Terrestrial Creators and Progenitors, the Pitris included — made superior and inferior (vara and avara) things, "referring to putra" progeny, and "bipeds and quadrttpeds^ and subsequently, by his will [referring to the Sons of Will and Yoga], gave birth to females"! — Le,^ separated the androgynes. Here, again, we have *' bipeds" or men, created before the ''quadrupeds" as in the Esoteric Teachings.
Since, in the exoteric accounts, the Asuras are the first Beings created from the " Body of Night," while the Pitris issue from that of "Twilight"; the "Gods" being placed by Parflshara, in the Vishnu Pu7dna, between the two, aud shown to evolve from the "Body of the Day," it is easy to discover a determined purpose to veil the order of creation. Man is the Arv^ksrota coming from the "Body of the Dawn'M and elsewhere, man is again referred to, when the Creator of the World, Brahmi, is shown "creating fierce beings, who were de- noMinated Bhutas, and eaters of flesh," or as the text has it, "fiends.
* imsi. Div., n. viit; quolrd in Mycr'i Qabhalah, ii6.
t Op. cit., I. v; Wilioa'* Traiw,, FitEcdwnrd HaU'i rcndcrlnsr, i. 71.
t IM.. U. 10.
4
^
THE " ADVBRSARIBS *• OF THE GODS. 173
fnghtful from being monkey-coloured and carnivorous/** Whereas the Rakshasas are generally translated by "evil Spirits" and "enemies of the Gods." which identifies them with the Asuras. In the Rdtfid- 'ana, when Haniuuan is reconnoitring the enemy in Lanki, he finds there Rikshasas, some hideous, '*whilc some were beautiful to look upon,*' and. in the Vishnu Purdna, there is a direct reference to their becoming the Saviours of "Humanity," or of Brahml.
The allegory is very ingenious. Great intellect and too much know- ledge are a two-edged weapon in life, and instruments for evil as well as for good. When combined with selfishness, they will make of the whole of Humanity a footstool for the elevation of him who possesses them, and a means for the attainment of his objects; while, applied to altruistic humanitarian purposes, they may become the means of the salvation of many. At all events, the absence of self-consciousness and intellect will make of man an idiot, a brute in human form. Brahmi is Mahat. the Universal Mind; hence the too selfish among the Rikshasas showing the desire to become possessed of it all — to *' devour*' Mahat. The allegory is transparent.
At any rate. Esoteric Philosophy identifies the pre-Br4hmauical Asuras. Rudras,t Rdkshasas and all the "Adversaries" of the Gods in the allegories, with the Egos, which, by incarnating in the still witless man of the Third Race, made him consciously immortal. They are. then, during the cycle of Incarnations, the true duai Logos — the con- flicting and two-faced Divine Principle in Man. The Commentary that follows, and the next Stanzas may, no doubt, throw more light on this ver>' difficult tenets but the writer does not feel competent to give it put fiilly. Of the succession of Races, however, the Commentary says:
First come the Self-Existent on this Earth. They are the ** Spiritual Lives'* projected by the absolute WiLi, and Law. at the Damn of every Rebirth of the Worlds. These Lives are the divine "Shishta" [the Seed- Afanus, or the Prajdpatis and the Pttris\
From these proceed:
1, The First Race, the ^'Selfbom^ whUh are the [Astral] Shadows 0/ iheir Progenitors. The Body was devoid of all understanding [mind, in- telligence, and wiir]. The Inner Being [the Higher Self or Monad^, though within the earthly frame, was unconnected with it. The link, the Manas, was not there as yet.
• /hid,. \. 83. ^^ ~~ ' ~ ' ■
* Wbom Manu call* "pBlemnl grandfathers*' (iii. 284I. Tlie Rudnu are t&e femi muufestalioiu -of Rudra-Shlva, Ihc "destroying God," and aiio the erand Yogi and Ascetic
THB SBCRKT DOCTRINE.
2. From ike First [Race] emanaled ike Second, called the ^'^ Sweai-bom^^^ and the"' Boneless y This is the Second Root-Race, endowed by the Pre- servers [^Rdkshasas]^ and the Incarnating Gods {the Asuras and R'umdras] with the first primitive and 7veak Spark {^ihe germ of intelligence\ . ,^H
And from these in turn proceeds: ^^
3. The Third Root-Race, the ''Two-fold'* {Androgynes^ The first Races thereof are Shells, till the last is "inhabited'* [i,e., informed^ by ihe Dhy&nts,
* To Rpcak of life wa ttnvjng aritien, and of the human mce an hnvinff oH^nated, in this abtunUy unscumtilfc way, iu the fact of the modern Pedii^ree* of Man, is to court instantoneoui aunihllatkm. The Baoteric Doctrine risks the danger, iicvertbelcM, and even k'*^ ■*> f^r ab to aik the impartia} reader to compare the nlmve hyTKiLheftifi (if it is one) with Ilieckel'ti theory — now faiit becoming axiom with Science— which we quote vrrbotim as fbltows;
" Uow did life, the Uviiig world of org-aiiinms, tirise } Aud, aecondly, the special qocstioo : Uow did] the humou race oripnate ? The first of tbeae two enquiries, that as to the first appearance of living] belnsfl, can only be decided empirically [I I] by proof of the so-called ArchebioaLs. or equlvorsl, generation, or the spontaneous pro4]uction of organisms of the aimptest conceivable kind. Such am] the Monera (Protogenes, Protanircba. Protorayxn. Vampyrcllal, exceedingly wimple mic masses of protoplasm without structure or organization, which take in nutriment and rrpmdmt tkemielvrs by division. Such a Moneron as that priitiordiHl organism ditcovtred by the renowned ! Knglish xoologist Huxley and nnnirfl RnthyhiuA Hceckrlti. nppcam a* n contlnuoui thick protoplai" mic covering at the greatest depths of the ocean, bctureen 3,000 aod :io,ooo feet. // u huw that tht Jtw^\ appeartknu of \uck Monera has not up to the presfni moment betn actually observed: but therr isi nothing IntrinalcRllv improbable tn such an Evolution-" {The /Mijfree of Man, AveUng*s traOK talloo, p. 3j.)
The Bathyhias protoplasm having recently turned out to be no organic substance at nU. there remains little to be said. Nor, after reading this, doe* one need to consume further time In r«Aitin^. the further aaicrtiOD that: "In Ihst caw mau aWo has. beyond a doubt [to the tiiiiid bis like], ariun from the lower Mammalin, npes, tlie earlier simian creatures, the otitl earlier Mat* supinlla, Amphihin, Pifurca, by progressive tranafonnatlons" (p. 56) — all produced by ' natural forces wcrkinx bUndiy^ .... without atm, ttathout design."
The above-quoted passage bears its criticism on its own face. Science Is made to teach that, which, up to the present time, "hat ntver been actually absented." She Is made to deny the phenomoion ott' an intelligent nature and a vital force independent of form and matter, and to find it morr sctentifio | to tench the miraculous pcrforroBnce of "natural forces working blindly without aim 0* design." If' so, then we are leil to thiuk that the phyaico- mechanical forces of the t>rains of certain eminent Scientists are leading them on as blindly to sacrifice logic and common sense on the nltar of mutual admiration. Why should the protoplasmic Moneron producing the first living creature through utf- division be held as a very scientific h>7Jotheais, and an ethereal pre-Uunmn race grneratlng the primeval men in the same fashion be tabooed as unacientific supcntitiou ? Or has Moterialidka obtained a sole monopoly in Sdcnce i
* The R£k>ha*as, regarded in Indian popular theology as Demons, hit called the "Preacivera'* bayond the Him&layas. This double meaning has its origin in a philoaophical allegory, which ia variously reodeied in the Purdnas. It is stated that when Brahml created the Demons, Vakahaa (from yaksh, to eat] and the Rlkshosas. botli of which kinds of Drmoiis, as soon as bom, wished to dcvonr their Creator, " those among them that called out 'Not so: oh ! let him be saved rpreserved])* were named Kikshaus." ( l^ishnu PurAmOt I. v.; Wilaon. i. 82.) The Bkagavata Pii* ig«si; lAirf., /«•. rtV.) rendm the nllcj|[ary difTcrently. "Brahmii transfunned himself into night (or ignorance] invested with a body." Thia the Yokahas and KAkahosas aclxed. exclniming, "I>o not apare It; devour it." Brabmi cried out, " Do not devour me; spare me." This has on inner meaning of course. The " Body of Night " is the darkness of ignorance, and it is the darkness of silence and secrecy. Now the Rlkshasas are shown in almost every case to be Yogis, pious Sldhus and Initiatea, anther unusual occupation for Demons. The meaning then is that while we have power to dispel the darkneas of ignomnce — "devour it"— we have to preserve the sacred truth from profanation. •' Brahmi Is for the Br&hmans alone," says that proud csite. The moral of Ihc fabie is evident
PRIMAt MODBS OP REPRODUCTION.
«7.S
The Second Race, as stated above, being also sexless, evolved out of iself, at its beginning, the Third, Aadrog>'ne Race by an analogous, but already more complicated process. As described in the Commentary^ the very earliest of that Race were:
The ^'^ Sons of Passive Yoga,**^ They isstted/rom the Second Manushyas [Human Race\ and became oviparous. The emanations that came out -of their bodies during the seasons 0/ procreation were ovulary; the small spheroidal nuclei developing into a large soft, egg-like vehicle^ gradually hardetted^ when, after a period of gestation, it broke and the young human animal issued from it unaided^ as the fowls do in our Race.
This must seem to the reader ludicrously absurd. Nevertheless, it is strictly on the lines of evolutionary analogy, which Science perceives in the development of the living animal species. First the moneron- like procreation by "self-division"; then, after a few stages, the oviparous, as in the case of the reptiles, which are followed by the birds; then, finally, the mammals with their ovoviviparous modes of producing their young ones.
If the terra **ovoviviparous" is applied to some fish and reptiles, which hatch their eggs within their bodies, why should it not be ap- plied to female mammalians, including woman? The ovule, in which, after impregnation, the development of the foetus takes place, is an egg.
At all events, this conception is more philosophical than that of Eve with a suddenly created placenta gi\'ing birth to Cain, because of the "apple." when even the marsupial, the earliest of mammals, is not placental yet.
Moreover, the progressive order of the methods of reproduction, as
unveiled by Science, is a brilliant confirmation of Esoteric Ethnology.