Section 2

As, however, we must start somewhere, let us begin with the oldest scriptures of our Aryan race, the Vedas, and then the oldest of the Puranas. Next let us take a glance at Taoism, the most mystical of the creeds of the far East ; then pass to the Avesta, that ancient scripture of the Parsis ; and so on to Egj'pt ; first quot- ing from the Zohar and other kabalistic wTitings which contain the wisdom of the Chaldaeans and a key to the misunderstood scriptures of the Jews. Egypt will lead us to speak of the wisdom of Hermes and the Gnosis of those who are now known generally as Gnostics ; and this will lead to a quotation from Paul and some reference to the Greek and Roman philosophy, and the ancient systems of Orpheus and other
THE WORLD-SOUL. 15
great teachers. Finally we shall find identical ideas among the Scandinavian peoples, and a striking confirmation in Mohammedan Sufiism. All, all without exception, sensed the World- Soul, hymned of it, sought union therewith ; for of what else could they speak ? Only they glorified that which it was in its essence, and did not worship its grossest and most im- permanent manifestation, the surface of five- sense nature. Such an idolatry was reserved to the latter end of the nineteenth century, when human intellect worships the ground its body treads on, the gross body of the World- Soul, and has forgotten whence it came and whither it will return. Our times are an age of the deification of matter and the consequent fall of ideals !
Thus, then, let us first turn to that myste- rious link with the past, the Rig Veda. Who knows whence it came ? Who can tell its origin ? Perchance those who have kept the record since the great Deluge of Atlantis could name its transmitters, and tell of those who withdrew to the " Sacred Island."
Among prayers to the Supreme Principle, the World-Soul, first must come the famous Gayatri,
i6 THE WORLD-MYSTERY.
" the holiest verse in the Vedas," It runs as follows, in what Wilson calls, " Sir William Jones's translation of a paraphrastic interpre- tation."
" Let us adore the supremacy of that Divine Sun, the Godhead, Who illuminates all. Who recreates all, from \\'hom all proceed, to Wliom all must return, \\'hom we invoke to direct our understandings aright in our progress toward His holy seat." (Sir W. Jones' Works, xiii.
3^7-)
This mantra is found in the loth Hymn of
the 4th Ashtaka (Eighth) of the Samhita (Col- lection) of the Rig Veda, not as in the above expanded paraphrase, but in an abbreviated form, for " such is the fear entertained of pro- faning this text, that copyists of the Vedas not unfrequently refrain from transcribing it," says Wilson. {Vishnu Purdna, ii. 251.) " It is the duty of every Brahman to repeat it mentally in his morning and evening devotions," and it is to be suspected that the western world has not yet received the correct text, though Sir William Jones may have got a version nearer the truth than his successors. It is well known that the Brahmans are the proudest and most
THE WORLD-SOUL. 17
exclusive people in the world where the secrets of their religion are concerned, and it is reason- able to suppose that a mantra that pertains to their initiation would not be lightly revealed.
The subtle metaphysical and mystical inter- pretations of this most sacred formula, especi- ally those of the Vedanta School, testify to its sanctity. The number of interpretations also that the words of the mantra lend themselves to are almost innumerable. The phrasing, for instance, can be taken as neuter or masculine and so on.
Perhaps the spirit of the central thought of the oriental religious world may be further explained by another Hymn, translated by Sir William Jones. It reiterates that most stupen-^ dous intuition of the human mind, that feeling of identity with the World-Soul, in a magnifi- cent litany which runs as follows :
" May that Soul of mine, w^hich mounts aloft in my waking hours, as an ethereal spark, and which, even in my slumber, has a like ascent, soaring to a great distance, as an emanation from the light of lights, be united by devout meditation with the Spirit supremely blest, and supremely intelligent !
B
i8 THE WORLD-MYSTERY.
" May that Soul of mine, by an agent similar to which the low-born perform their menial works, and the wise, deeply versed in sciences, duly solemnize their sacrificial rite ; that Soul, which was itself the primal oblation placed within all creatures, be united by devout medi- tation with the Spirit supremely blest, and supremely intelligent !
" May that Soul of mine, which is a ray of perfect wisdom, pure intellect and permanent existence, which is the unextinguishable light fixed within created bodies, without which no good act is performed, be united by devout meditation with the Spirit supremely blest, and supremely intelligent !
" May that Soul of mine, in which, as an immortal essence, may be comprised whatever has past, is present, or will be hereafter ; by which the sacrifice, where seven ministers officiate, is properly solemnized, be united by devout meditation with the Spirit supremely blest, and supremely intelligent !
" May that Soul of mine, into which are inserted, like the spokes of a wheel in the axle of a car, the holy texts of the Vedas ; into which is interwoven all that belongs to created forms.
THE WORLD-SOUL. 19
be united by devout meditation with the Spirit supremely blest, and supremely intelligent !
" May that Soul of mine, which, distributed in other bodies, guides mankind, as a skilful charioteer guides his rapid horses with reins ; that Soul which is fixed in my breast, exempt from old age, and extremely swift in its course, be united, by divine meditation, with the Spirit supremely blest, and supremely intelligent ! " (Sir W. Jones' Works, xiii. 372, 373.)
Such is an instance of the advanced theosophy of the Vedas, in the face of which it is difficult to understand the crude criticisms of the Weber-Miillerite School of materialistic scholar- ship, who would set it all down to the imaginings of a primitive pastoral people. The theosophical student is glad to turn to such a fair estimate as that of Barth, who says :
" Neither in the language nor in the thought of the Rig Veda have I been able to discover that quality of primitive natural simplicity which so many are fain to see in it. The poetry it contains appears to me, on the contrary, to be of a singularly refined character and artificially elaborated, full of allusions and reticences, of pretensions to mysticism and
20 THE WORLD-MYSTERY.
theosophic insight ; and the manner of its expression is such as reminds one more fre- quently of the phraseology in use among certain small groups of initiated than the poetic language of a large community." {The Religions of India, p. xiii.)
Truly so ; and perhaps before long the methods of the Veda may be better understood, and it will be recognized how that the powers of nature and the moral attributes of man are fitter symbols of a divine theogony than personi- fications which include all the vices and pettiness of animal-man.
As H. W. Wallis says {Cosmogony of the Rig Veda, p. 8) :
"The deities oi the Rig F^rfa differ essentially from the Gods of Greek or Scandinavian mythology and of the Mahdbhdrata, in the abstract and almost impersonal nature of their characters. They are little more than factors in the physical and moral order of the world, apart from which none, except perhaps Indra, has a self-interested existence."
To the Greek, Scandinavian and Mahabhara- tan deities, we may add the Pantheons of other nations as well, and also their Indras, Zeuses,
THE WORLD-SOUL. 21
Jehovahs, and the rest, whose " self-interest " is expHcable seeing that they were but the representations of the time-period or manifes- tations of a certain world, for there are crores of Brahmas, Jupiters and Jehovahs in the ideal Kosmos. It is time that the western nations should remember their birth-place. We are not Semites but Aryans, a younger branch of the great Aryan Race, perchance, but still Aryans and not Semites. And being so we should remember the wisdom of our fathers and put aside the crude conceptions of the Semites as to Deity. Jehovah is in his place as the God of a small warlike nomad tribe, but entirely out of place in the Religion of those who profess to be followers of the Christ. It is high time to lay aside such gross anthropomor- phism, which the learned Jews themselves rejected, as their Kabalah and Philo well testify. The curse of Christendom to-day is belief in this "jealous" and "self-interested" Jehovah as the One God, an idea alien to Aryan thought. Direful indeed has been the effect of the " curse " of the " chosen people " on their spoliators. They were robbed of their Scrip- tures, deprived of them by force, and the
22 THE WORLD-MYSTERY.
ravished maiden of the Semites, forced against her will into the arms of the marauding Aryans, has used her " magic arts " against the tribe that holds her prisoner, for to-day she imprisons the minds of those who hold her body captive.
In other words, the western nations, being the youngest of the Aryan family, and lusty only in body, have in their ignorance worshipped the dead letter of that w-hich they have not under- stood, and so debased their minds and characters with a bibliolatry scarce paralleled in the history of the world. Let us hope that this is passed and that the end of the nineteenth century may see the " prodigal son " return " home," and chastened by the experience of his exile, show his real heredity in an activity that his more sluggish elder brother in the East, who has never left home, can never manifest in such abundance, because of his very passivity. The Ar3'ans have an ancestral religion, and every Aryan in the West should see to it that he does not pursue after other Gods.
Of course I speak of the crude exoteric God of the Hebrew populus, and not of the Mystery Deity, the Father, preached to the Jews by the
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Initiate, whom the West calls Jesus of Nazareth. For did he not say that his hearers were " of their father the Devil," for they were " Abra- ham's seed " and " Abraham " was the ruler of this world ? Nor do I mean any disrespect to the Jews of to-day, who are no more the Jews of the Bible, than we are Goths or Vandals, or woad-besmeared Britons. I do not write about, or for, " bodies," I am writing for " minds " and " souls " whose ancestry is divine, and not of the Lord of the Body, call him by what name you will.
How long will the perverse mind of man persist in telling us the fashion in which " God created " the world ; how long will men blas- phemously speak of That which is unutterable, and degrade the majesty of their Divine Souls into the poor imaginings of the animal minds which think in terms of their gross bodies, and of naught else ? More reverently indeed did our ancestors phrase the mystery when they were yet uncontaminated by the mire of their earthly tabernacles, and a huckstering commer- ciahsm and a pseudo-science that gropes, on hands and knees, with eyes fixed on the surface of things, had not dragged the ideals of
\
24 THE WORLD-MYSTERY.
humanity down to the dust. How different are the beginnings of cosmogony as sung of in the Rig Veda ! The passage is famihar to western students in the noble verse of Cole- brooke. The following, however, is another version :
" The non-existent was not, and the existent was not at that time ; there was no air or sky beyond ; what was covering in ? and where ? under shelter of what ? was there water — a deep depth ?
" Death was not nor immortality then, there was no discrimination of night and day : that one thing breathed without a wind of its own self ; apart from it there was nothing else at all beyond.
" Darkness there was, hidden in darkness, in the beginning, everything here was an indiscrimi- nate chaos ; it was void covered with emptiness, all that was ; that one thing was born b}' the power of warmth.
" So in the beginning arose desire, which was the first seed of mind ; the wise found out by thought, searching in the heart, the parentage of the existent in the non-existent.
" Their line was stretched across ; what was
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above ? what was below ? there were generators, there were mighty powers ; svadha, [nature per- haps] below, the presentation of offerings above. "Who knoweth it forsooth? who can an- novnice it here ? whence it was born, whence this creation is ? The gods came by the creating of it [i.e., the one thing) ; who then knoweth whence it is come into being ?
" Whence this creation [lit. emission] is come into being, whether it was ordained or no — He whose eye is over all in the highest heaven, He indeed knoweth it, or may be He knoweth it not." (Wallis, Cosmogony of the Rig Veda, pp. 59, 60. [R. v., X. 129] .)
Even such wooden translation cannot prevent the grandeur of the original occasionally peep- ing through, how much more noble then would be the translation of one who was whole-hearted in his version ?
Notice the last lines. The World-Soul may know, or perchance even it knoweth not. For there are other World-Souls, and as among men most are ignorant of their own genesis so amid the World- Souls, some — the few perchance — may know, the many be ignorant ; none knoweth absolutelv but the One.
26 THE WORLD-MYSTERY.
Passing next to a later Ar3-an Scripture, let us read how the great sect of the Vaishnavas hymn the deity, as written in the Vishnu Pnrdna (I. i.) :
" OM ! glory to Him who dwells in all beings (Vasudeva). Victory be to Thee, Thou heart- pervading one (Pundarikaksha) ; adoration be to Thee, Thou cause of the existence of all things (Vishvabhavana) ; glory be to Thee, Lord of the senses (Hrishikesha), the Supreme Spirit (Mahapurusha), the ancient of birth (Purvaja)."
And later in the same work we read (v. 14- 16, Wilson's Translation) :
" Salutation to Thee, Who art uniform and
manifold, all-pervading. Supreme Spirit, of
inconceivable glory, and \\^ho art simple
existence ! Salutation to Thee, O inscrutable,
Who art Truth, and the essence of oblations !
Salutation to Thee, O Lord, Whose nature is
unknown. Who art beyond Primeval Matter,
Who existest in five forms, ^ as one with the
^ These are given by Wilson (i. 3) as: i. Bhutatman, one with created things, or Pundarikaksha ; 2. Pradhanat- man, one with Crude Nature, or Vishvabhavana ; 3. Indriy- atman, one with the Senses, Hrishikesha ; 4.^Paramatman, Supreme Spirit, or Mahapurusha; and 5. Atman, Living Soul, animating Nature, and existing before it, or Purvaja.
THE WORLD-SOUL. 27
Elements, with the Faculties, with Matter, with the Living Soul, with Supreme Spirit ! Show favour, O Soul of the Universe, essence of all things, perishable or eternal, whether addressed b}' the designation of Brahma, Vishnu, Shiva, or the like. I adore Thee, O God I Parameshvara, Supreme Lord, rather! , Whose nature is indescribable. Whose purposes are inscrutable. Whose name, even, is unknown ; for the attributes of appellation or kind are not applicable to Thee, Who art That, the supreme Brahma [neuter] eternal, unchangeable, un- created [Aja, unborn, rather,] But as the accomplishment of our objects cannot be attained except through some specific form, Thou art termed by us Krishna, Achyuta [the Imperishable] , Ananta [the Endless,] or Vishnu. Thou, unborn (divinity), art all the object of these impersonations ; Thou art the Gods, and all other beings ; Thou art the whole World ; Thou art all. Soul of the Universe, thou art exempt from change ; and there is nothing except Thee in this whole existence. Thou art Brahma [male] , Pashupati [Shiva, ' Lord of (sacred) animals '] , Aryaman, Dhatri, and
28 THE WORLD-MYSTERY.
V'idhatri;* thou art Indra,* Air, Fire, the Regent of the Waters ;' the God of WeaUh,* and Judge of the Dead ;^ and Thou, although but one,
> AryamAn and Dbitri are two of the Twelve Adityas, or Sons of Aditi, the " Mother," which were seven originally, MArttanda, the "rejected" Sun being the eighth. Later they became the Twelve Sun Gods. V'idhitri is the arranger or disposer, the Kosniokrat6r or Demiurge, and is added as a title to Brahml, V'lshvakarman and KAma, the Er6s of the Orphic fragments. As Dr Muir says : " This KAma or Desire, not of sexual enjoyment, but of good in general, is celebrated in a curious hymn of the Atharva Vida : ' KAma was born first [the Orphic Pr6togonos] . Him, i:eitber gods, nor fathers, nor men have equalled Thou art saperioT to these, and for ever great ■."
* The "Zens dwelling in the ^ther" of Homer (Zeit aldifn yaiiM' — Iliad, ii. 412) ; in the .£ther, the abode of the Gods The Pater ^Ether of Virgil.
* V'aruna (Ooaroona), the Regent of the Astral Waters of Space , the Uranus (Oaranos) of the Greeks, who was emascu- lated and dethroned by Cronus (Time; at the instigation of his mother and wife Ga?a lEArth) From the drops of his blood sprang the " r . the early Races, and from the foam i.' ..is limbs in the sea, sprang Venus-Ap:.. -... w.^.^., . ... t , 1&0-195.)