Annie Besant
Study in Consciousness
By
Annie Besant
A Contribution to the Science of Psychology
First Published 1915
Return to Annie Besant
Selection
FOREWORD.
THIS book is
intended as an aid to student in their study of the growth and development of
consciousness, offering hints and suggestions which may prove serviceable to
them. It does not pretend to be a complete exposition, but rather, as its
sub-title states, a contribution to the science of Psychology. Far ampler materials
than are within my reach are necessary for any complete exposition of the
far-reaching science which deals with the unfolding of consciousness. These
materials are slowly accumulating in the hands of earnest and painstaking
students, but no effort has yet been made to arrange and systematise them into
a co-ordinated whole. In this little volume I have only arranged a small part
of this material, in the hope that it may be useful now to some of the toilers
in the great field of the Evolution of Consciousness, and may serve, in the
future, as a stone in the complete building. It will need a great architect to
plan that temple of knowledge, and skilful master masons to direct the
building; enough, for the moment, to do the apprentice task, and prepare the
rough stones for the use of the more expert workmen.
ANNIE BESANT
PART I
CONSCIOUSNESS
Introduction
Origins
Origination of Monads
CHAPTER I.
THE PREPARATION OF THE FIELD.
1. The Formation of the Atom
2. Spirit-Matter
3. The Sub-Planes
4. The Five Planes
CHAPTER II.
CONSCIOUSNESS.
1. The Meaning of the Word
2. The Monads
CHAPTER III.
THE PEOPLING OF THE FIELD.
1. The Coming
2. The Weaving
3. The Seven Streams
4. The Shining Ones
CHAPTER IV.
THE PERMANENT ATOM.
1. The Attaching of the Atoms
2. The Web of Life
3. The Choosing of the Permanent Atoms
4. The Use of the Permanent Atom
5. Monadic Action on the Permanent Atoms
CHAPTER V.
GROUP-SOULS.
1. The Meaning of the Term
2. The Division of the Group-Soul
CHAPTER VI.
UNITY OF CONSCIOUSNESS.
1. Consciousness a Unit
2. The Unity of Physical Consciousness
3. The Meaning of Physical Consciousness
CHAPTER VII.
THE MECHANISM OF CONSCIOUSNESS.
1. The Development of the Mechanism
2. The Astral or Desire Body
3. Correspondence in Root-Races
CHAPTER VIII.
FIRST HUMAN STEPS.
1. The Third Life-Wave
2. Human Development
3. Incongruous Souls and Bodies
4. Dawn of Consciousness on the Astral
Plane
CHAPTER IX.
CONSCIOUSNESS AND SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS.
1. Consciousness
2. Self-Consciousness
3. Real and Unreal
CHAPTER X.
HUMAN STATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS.
1. The Sub-Consciousness
2. The Waking Consciousness
3. The Super-Physical Consciousness
CHAPTER XI.
THE MONAD AT WORK.
1. Building his Vehicles
2. An Evolving Man
3. The Pituitary Body and Pineal Gland
4. The Paths of Consciousness
CHAPTER XII.
THE NATURE OF MEMORY.
1. The Great Self and the Little Selves
2. Changes in the Vehicles and in
Consciousness
3. Memories
4. What is Memory
5. Remembering and Forgetting
6. Attention
7. The One Consciousness
PART II
WILL, DESIRE AND EMOTION
CHAPTER I.
THE WILL TO LIVE
CHAPTER II.
DESIRE
1. The Nature of Desire
2. The Awakening of Desire
3. The Relation of Desire to Thought
4. Desire, Thought, Action
5. The Binding Nature of Desire
6. The Breaking of the Bonds
CHAPTER III.
DESIRE (Continued)
1. The Vehicle of Desire
2. The Conflict of Desire and Thought
3. The Value of an Ideal
4. The Purification of Desire
CHAPTER IV.
EMOTION
1. The Birth of Emotion
2. The Play of Emotion in the Family
3. The Birth of Virtues
4. Right and Wrong
5. Virtue and Bliss
6. The Transmutation of the Emotions into
Virtues and Vices
7. Application of the Theory to Conduct
8. The Uses of Emotion
CHAPTER V.
EMOTION (Continued)
1. The Training of Emotion
2. The Distorting Force of Emotion
3. Methods of Ruling the Emotions
4. The Using of Emotion
5. The Value of Emotion in Evolution
CHAPTER VI.
THE WILL
1. The Will winning its Freedom
2. Why so much Struggle
3. The Power of the Will
4. White and Black Magic
5. Entering into Peace
INTRODUCTION.
THE subject
of the unfolding of consciousness in the beings whose field of evolution is a
solar system is one of considerable difficulty; none of us may at present hope to
do more than master a small portion of its complexity, but it may be possible
to study it in such fashion as may fill up some of the gaps in our thinking,
and as may yield us a fairly clear outline to guide our future work.
We cannot,
however, trace this outline in any way satisfactory to the intelligence,
without considering first our solar system as a whole, and endeavouring to
grasp some idea, however vague that idea may be, of "the beginnings"
in such a system.
1. ORIGINS.
We have
learned that the matter in a solar system exists in seven great modifications,
[1] or planes; on three of these, the physical, emotional (astral), and mental
- often spoken of as "the three worlds", the well-known Triloki, or
Tribhuvanam, of the Hindu cosmogony - is
proceeding the normal evolution of humanity. On the next two planes, the
spiritual - those of wisdom and power, the buddhic and the atmic - goes on the
specific evolution of the Initiate, after the first of the Great Initiations.
These five planes form the field of the evolution of consciousness, until the
human merges in the divine. The two planes beyond the five represent the sphere
of divine activity, encircling and enveloping all, out of which pour forth all
the divine energies which vivify and sustain the whole system. They are at
present entirely beyond our knowledge, and the few hints that have been given
regarding them probably convey as much information as our limited capacity is
able to grasp. We are taught that they are the planes of divine Consciousness,
wherein the LOGOS, or the divine Trinity of Logoi, is manifested, and wherefrom
He shines forth as the Creator, the Preserver, the [2] Dissolver, evolving a
universe, maintaining it during its life-period, withdrawing it into Himself at
its ending. We have been given the names of these two planes: the lower is the
Anupadaka, that wherein "no vehicle has yet been formed";[1] the
higher is the Adi, "the first", the foundation of a universe, its
support and the fount of its life. We have thus the seven planes of a universe,
a solar system, which, as we see by this brief description, may be regarded as
making up three groups:
[3]
The two
highest planes may be conceived of as existing before the solar system is
formed, and we may imagine the highest, the Adi, as consisting of so much of
the matter of space - symbolised by points - as the LOGOS has marked out to
form the material basis of the system. He is about to produce. As a workman
chooses out the material he is going to shape into his product, so does the
LOGOS choose the material and the place for His universe. Similarly we may
imagine the Anupadaka - symbolised by lines - as consisting of this same
matter, modified by His individual life, coloured, to use a significant
metaphor, by His all-ensouling Consciousness, and thus differing in some way
from the corresponding plane in another solar system. We are told that the
supreme facts of this preparatory work may be further imaged forth in symbols;
of these we are given two [4] sets, one of which images the triple
manifestation of the Logic Consciousness, the other the triple change in
matter corresponding to the triple Life - the life and form aspects of the
three Logoi. We may place them side by side, as simultaneous happenings:
We have here,
under Life, the primeval Point in the centre of the Circle, the LOGOS as One
within the self-imposed encircling sphere of subtlest matter, in which He has
enclosed Himself for the purpose of manifestation, of shining forth from the
Darkness. At once the question arises: Why three Logoi? Though we touch here on
the deepest question of metaphysics, to expound which even inadequately
requires a volume, we must indicate the answer, to be wrought out by close
thinking. In the analysis of all that exists, we come to the great
generalisation:
"All is
separable into 'I' and 'Not I', the 'SELF' and the 'Not-Self'. Every separate
thing is summed up under one or other of the headings, SELF or Not-Self. There
is nothing which cannot be placed under one of them. SELF is Life,
Consciousness; Not-Self is Matter, Form." Here, then, we have a duality.
But the Twain are not two separate things isolated and unrelated; there is a
continual Relation between them, a continual approach and withdrawal; an
identification and a repudiation; this inter-play shows itself as the
ever-changing universe. Thus we have a Trinity, not a Duality - the SELF, the
Not-Self, and the Relation between them. All is here summed up, all things and
all relations, actual and possible, and hence Three, neither more nor less, is
the foundation of all universes in their totality, and of each universe in
particular.[2] This fundamental fact imposes on a Locos a triplicity of
manifestation in [6] a solar system, and hence the One, the Point, going forth
in three directions to the circumference of the Circle of Matter and returning
on Itself, manifests a different aspect at each place of contact with the
Circle-the three fundamental expressions of Consciousness: or Will, Wisdom, and
Activity - the divine Triad or Trinity.[3] For the Universal SELF, the
Pratyag-atma, the "Inner-Self", thinking of the Not-Self, identifies Himself with it,
thereby sharing with it His Being; this is the divine Activity, Sat, Existence
lent to the Non-existent, the Universal Mind. The SELF, realising Himself, is
Wisdom, Chit, the principle of preservation. The SELF, withdrawing Himself from
the Not-Self, in His own pure nature, is Bliss, Ananda, free from form. Every
LOGOS of a universe repeats this universal SELF-Consciousness: in His
Activity, He is the creative Mind, Kriya - corresponding to the universal Sat -
the Brahma of the Hindu, the Holy Spirit of the Christian, the Chochmah of the
Kabbalist. In His Wisdom, He is the preserving ordering Reason, Jnana -
corresponding to the universal Chit - the Vishnu of the Hindu, the Son of the
Christian, the Binah of the Kabbalist. In His Bliss, He is the Dissolver of
forms, the Will, Ichchha - corresponding to the universal Ananda - the Shiva
of the Hindu, the Father of the Christian, the Kepher of the Kabbalist. Thus
appear in every universe the three Logoi, the three Beings who create, preserve,
and destroy Their universe, each showing forth predominantly in His function in the universe one ruling Aspect,
to which the other two are subordinate, though of course ever-present. Hence
every manifested GOD is spoken of as a Trinity. The joining of these three
Aspects, or phases of manifestation, at their outer points of contact with the
[8] circle, gives the basic Triangle of contact with Matter, which, with the
three Triangles made with the lines traced by the Point, thus yields the divine
Tetractys, sometimes called the Kosmic Quaternary, the three divine Aspects in
contact with Matter, ready to create. These, in their totality, are the Oversoul[4]
of the kosmos that is to be.
Under Form we
may first glance at the effects of these Aspects as responded to from the side
of Matter. These are not, of course, due to the LOGOS of a system, but are the
correspondences in universal Matter with the Aspects of the universal SELF. The
Aspect of Bliss, or Will, imposes on Matter the quality of Inertia - Tamas, the
power of resistance, stability, quietude. The Aspect of Activity gives to
Matter its responsiveness to action - Rajas, mobility. The Aspect of Wisdom
gives it Rhythm - Satva, vibration, harmony. It is by the aid of Matter thus
prepared that the Aspects of Logic Consciousness manifest themselves as Beings.
[9]
The LOGOS -
not yet a first, since there is yet no second - is seen as a Point irradiating a sphere of Matter, drawn round
Him as the field of the future universe, flashing with unimaginable splendour,
a true Mountain of Light, as Manu has it, but Light invisible save on the
spiritual planes. This great sphere has been spoken of as primary Substance: it
is the SELF-conditioned LOGOS, inseparate at every point with the Matter He has
appropriated for His universe, ere He draws Himself a little apart from it in
the second manifestation; it is the sphere of SELF-conditioning Will, which is
to lead to the creative Activity: "I am This," when the
"This," the Not-Self, is cognised. The Point, speaking symbolically -
in order to make the suggestion of Form as seen from the side of appearances vibrates
between centre and circumference, thus making the Line which marks the drawing
apart of Spirit and Matter[5], [10] rendering cognition possible, and thus
generating the Form for the second Aspect, the Being we call the Second Logos,
symbolically the Line, or Diameter of the Circle. It is said of this in mystic
phrase: "Thou art My Son; this day have I begotten Thee"[6]; this
relation of Father and Son within the unity of the Divine Existence, of the
first and Second Logoi, belongs, of course, to the Day of Manifestation, the
life-period of a universe. It is this begetting of the Son, this appearance of
the Second Logos, the Wisdom, which is marked in the world of Form by the
differentiation, the drawing apart, of Spirit and Matter, the two poles between
which is spun the web of a universe; the separation, as it were, of the neutral
inactive Electricity - which may symbolise the First Logos - into the dual form
of positive and negative - symbolising the Second - thus making the unmanifest
manifest. This separation [11] within the First Logos is vividly imaged for us
in the preparation for cell-multiplication that we may study on the physical
plane, wherein we see the processes that lead up to the appearance of a
dividing wall, whereby the one cell becomes two. For all that happens down here
is but the reflexion in gross matter of the happenings on higher planes, and we
may often find a crutch for our halting imagination in our studies of physical
development. "As above, so below." The physical is the reflexion of
the spiritual.
Then the
Point, with Line revolving with it, vibrates at right angles to the former
vibration, and thus is formed the Cross, still within the Circle, the Cross
which thus "proceedeth from the Father and the Son," the symbol of
the Third Logos, the Creative Mind, the divine Activity now ready to manifest
as Creator. Then He manifests Himself as the Active Cross, or Svastika, the
first of the Logoi to manifest outside the two highest planes, though the third
stage of the divine Unfolding. [12]
But before
considering the creative Activity of the Third Logos, we must note the
origination of the Monads, or Units of Consciousness, for whose evolution in
matter the field of a universe is to be prepared. We shall return to their
fuller consideration in Chapter II. The myriads of such Units who are to be
developed in that coming universe are generated within the divine Life, as
germ-cells in organisms, before the field for their evolution is formed. Of
this forthgiving it is written: "THAT willed: I shall multiply and be
born"[7]; and the Many arise in the One by that act of Will. [13] Will has
its two aspects of attraction and repulsion, of in-breathing and out-breathing,
and when the repulsion-aspect energises there is separation, driving apart.
This
multiplication within the One by the action of Will marks the place of origin -
the first Logos, the undivided Lord, the Eternal Father. These are the sparks
of the Supreme Fire, the "divine Fragments"[8], named generally
"Monads". A Monad is a fragment of the divine Life, separated off as
an individual entity by rarest film of matter, matter so rare that, while it
gives a separate form to each, it offers no obstacle to the free
inter-communication of a life thus incased with the surrounding similar lives.
The life of the Monads is thus of the First Logos, and is therefore of triple
aspect, Consciousness existing as Will, Wisdom, and Activity; this life takes
form on the plane of divine Manifestation, the second, or Anupadaka, Sons of the Father even as is the Second
Logos, but younger Sons, with [14] none of their divine powers capable of
acting in matter denser than that of their own planes; while He, with ages of evolution behind Him, stands ready to
exercise His divine powers, "the First-born among many brethren"[9].
Fitly they dwell on the Anupadaka plane, the roots of their life in the Adi, as
yet without vehicles in which they can express themselves, awaiting the day of
"manifestation of the Sons of God"[10]. There they remain while the
Third Logos begins the external work of manifestation, the shaping of the
objective universe. He is going to put forth His life into matter, to fashion
it into the materials fitted for the building of the vehicles which the Monads
need for their evolution. But he will not be merged in His work; for, vast as
that work seems to us, to Him it is but a little thing: "Having pervaded
this whole universe with a portion of Myself, I remain"[11]." That
marvellous Individuality is not lost, and only a portion [15] thereof suffices
for the life of a kosmos. The LOGOS, the Oversoul, remains, the God of His
universe. [16]
STUDY IN
CONSCIOUSNESS.
CHAPTER I.
THE
PREPARATION OF THE FIELD.
1. THE
FORMATION OF THE ATOM.
THE Third
Logos, the Universal Mind, begins His creative Activity by working on the
matter drawn in from the infinite space on every side for the building of our
solar system. This matter exists in space in forms incognisable by us, but is
apparently already shaped to the needs of vaster systems. For we have been told by H. P. Blavatsky that the atomic
sub-planes of our planes make up the first, or lowest, kosmic plane. If we
think of the atoms of that kosmic plane as symbolised by [17] a musical note.
Our atoms, as formed by the Third Logos, may perhaps be symbolised by the
overtones in such a note. What seems clear is that they are in close relation
to the "atoms of space", correspond with them, but are not, in their
present form, identical with them. But the seven types of matter, that become
our "atoms", are indicated in the matter drawn from space to form the
solar system, and are ultimately reducible again to them. H. P. Blavatsky hints
at the repeated seven-fold division into atoms of lower and lower grade, when
she writes: "The One Kosmic Atom becomes seven atoms on the plane of
matter, and each is transformed into a centre of energy. That same atom becomes
seven rays on the plane of spirit ... separate till the end of the kalpa and
yet in close embrace".[12]
Outside the
limits of a universe this matter is in a very peculiar state; the three
qualities of matter, inertia, mobility, and rhythm[13], are balanced against
each [18] other, and are in a state of equilibrium. They might be thought of as
existing as a closed circle, quiescent. In fact, in some ancient books, matter
in its totality is described in this state as inertia. It is also spoken of as
virgin; it is the celestial Virgin Mary, the ocean of virgin matter, that is to
become the Mother by the action of the Third Logos. The beginning of creative
Activity is the breaking of that closed circle, throwing the qualities out of
stable into unstable equilibrium. Life is motion, and the life of the Solar
LOGOS - His Breath, as it is poetically called - touching this quiescent
matter, threw the qualities into a condition of unstable equilibrium, and
therefore of continual motion in relation to each other. During the life-period
of a universe matter is ever in a condition of incessant internal motion. H. P.
Blavatsky says: "Fohat hardens and scatters the seven Brothers .
electrifies into life and separates primordial stuff, or pregenetic matter,
into atoms"[14].
The formation
of the atom has three [19] stages. First, the fixing of the limit within which
the ensouling life - the Life of the Logos in the atom - shall vibrate; this
limiting and fixing of the wave-length of the vibration is technically called
"the divine measure"[15]; this gives to the atoms of a plane their
distinctive peculiarity. Secondly, the Logos marks out, according to this
divine measure, the lines which determine the shape of the atom, the
fundamental axes of growth, the angular relation of these, which determines the
form, being that of the corresponding kosmic atom[16]; the nearest analogy to
these are the axes of crystals. Thirdly, by the measure of the vibration and
the angular relation of the axes of growth with each other, the size and form
of the surface, which we may call the surface or wall of the atom, is
determined. Thus in every atom we have the measure of its ensouling life, its
axes of growth, and its enclosing surface or wall. [20]
Of such atoms
the Third Logos creates five different kinds, the five different
"measures" implying five different vibrations, and each kind forms
the basic material of a plane; each plane, however various the objects in it,
has its own fundamental type of atom, into which any of its objects may
ultimately be reduced.
2.
SPIRIT-MATTER.
The epithet,
spirit-matter, will perhaps be better appreciated if we pause for a moment on
the method of the formation of the atoms of the successive planes. For each
system the matter of space around it is its Root of Matter, Mulaprakriti, as
the Hindus graphically call it. The matter of each system has that surrounding
matter for its root, or base, and its own special matter grows out of, is
developed from, that. The LOGOS, the Oversoul, of the system, drawing round
Himself the necessary matter from space, ensouls it with His own life, and this
life within this [21] subtle matter, this Mulaprakriti, is the Atma, the SELF,
the Spirit, in every particle. Fohat, the energy of the Locos, says H. P. B.,
"digs holes in space", and no description could be finer and truer.
That whirling energy forms innumerable vortices, each shaped by the divine
energy and the axes of growth, and each shelled with the matter of space, Atma
in a shell of Mulaprakriti, spirit in a shell of matter, the "atoms"
of the Adi, or highest plane, the first. Some of these remain as
"atoms"; others join together and form "molecules";
"molecules" join together and make more complex molecular combinations;
and so on till six sub-planes below the atomic are formed. [This by analogy
with what may be observed below, since these highest planes are incognisable.]
Now comes the forming of the atoms of the second plane. Their measure and axes
of growth being fixed as above described by the Third Logos, some of the atoms
of the adi, or first, pane draw round themselves a shell of the combinations of
their own lowest sub-plane; the Spirit plus its original shell of [22] kosmic
matter (Mulaprakriti), or the atom of the first plane, is the spirit of the
second plane, and permeates the new shell, formed out of the lowest-grade
combinations of itself. These shells, thus ensouled, are the atoms of the
anupadaka, or second, plane. By the ever more complicated aggregations of these
the remaining six sub-planes are brought into being. Some of the atoms of the
anupadaka plane, in like manner, become clothed with the aggregations of their
own lowest sub-plane, and thus become the atmic atoms, the Spirit now being
clothed with two shells, inside its atomic wall of aggregations of the lowest
sub-plane of the anupadaka, and the original Spirit, or Life, plus its two
shells, being called the spirit of the atmic plane, while the wall of its atom
is regarded as the matter. This atom, ensheathed once more in the aggregations
of the lowest atmic sub-plane, becomes the atom of the buddhic plane, Spirit on
the buddhic plane having thus three enclosing films within its atomic shell of
lowest atmic aggregations. On the mental plane the Spirit has a fourfold sheath
within the [23] atomic wall, on the astral plane a fivefold, and on the
physical a sixfold, with the atomic wall in each case in addition. But the
Spirit plus all its sheaths save the outermost is ever regarded as Spirit, and
the outermost sheath only as form or body. It is this involution of Spirit
which makes evolution possible, and complicated as the description may sound,
the principle is simple and can be easily grasped. Truly, then, may we speak of
"spirit-matter" everywhere.
3. THE
SUB-PLANES.
Now the
ultimate atoms of the physical plane are not the "atoms" of the
modern chemist; the ultimate atoms are aggregated
into successive typical groups, forming "states of matter", and the
chemical atom may be in the fifth, sixth, or seventh of these states, a gas, a
liquid, or a solid. Familiar are the
gaseous, the liquid, and the solid states of matter, or, as they are often
called, the gaseous, liquid, and solid sub-planes; [24] and above the gaseous
are four less familiar conditions, the three etheric states of matter, or
sub-planes, and the true atomic. These true atoms are aggregated into groups,
which then act as units, and these groups are called molecules; the atoms in a
molecule are held together by magnetic attraction, and the molecules on each
sub-plane are arranged geometrically in relation to each other on axes
identical with the axes of growth of the atom of the corresponding plane. By
these successive aggregations of atoms into molecules, and of simpler into more
complex molecules, the sub-planes of
each plane are formed under the directive Activity of the Third Logos, until
the field of evolution, consisting of five planes, each showing seven
sub-planes - the first and second planes being beyond this field - is
completed. But it must not be supposed that these seven sub-planes, as formed
by the Third Logos, are at all identical with those which are now existing.
Taking the physical plane as an illustration, they bear something of the same
[25] relation to the present sub-planes as that which the chemist calls
proto-hydrogen bears to the chemical element said to be built up out of it. The
present conditions were not brought about by the work of the Third Logos only,
in whom Activity predominates; the more strongly attractive or cohesive
energies of the Second Logos, who is Wisdom and therefore Love, were needed for
the further integrations.
It is important
to remember that the planes are interpenetrating, and that corresponding sub-planes are directly related
to each other, and are not really separated from each other by intervening
layers of denser matter. Thus we must not think of the atomic sub-planes as
being separated from each other by six sub-planes of generally increasing
density, but as being in immediate connexion with each other. We may figure
this in a diagram as follows: [26]
It must be
understood that this is a diagram, not a picture i.e., it represents relations, not material
facts-the relations existing between the planes by virtue of their
intermingling, and not forty-nine separate bricks placed in seven rows, one an
the top of another.
Now this
relation is a most important one, for it implies that life can pass from [27]
plane to plane by the short road of the communicating atomic sub-planes, and
need not necessarily circle round through the six molecular sub-planes before
it can reach the next atomic sub-plane to continue its descent. As a matter of
fact we shall find presently that life-streams from the Monad do follow this
atomic road in their descent to the physical plane. If we now consider a
physical atom, looking at it as a whole, we see a vortex of life, the life of
the Third Logos, whirling with inconceivable rapidity. By the attraction
between these whirling vortices, molecules are built up, and the plane with its
sub-planes formed. But at the limiting surface of this whirling vortex are the
spirillae, whirling currents, each at right angles to the one within it and the
one without it. These whirling currents are made by the life of the Monad, not
by the life of the Third Logos, and are not present at the early stage we are
considering; they develop one after another into full activity in the course of
evolution, normally one in each Round; their rudiments are indeed completed by
the Fourth [28] Round by the action of the Second Logos, but the life-stream of
the Monad circulates in only four of them, the other three being but faintly
indicated. The atoms of the higher planes are formed on the same general plan,
as regards the Logic central vortex and its enclosing currents, but all details
are at present lacking to us. Many of the practices of yoga are directed to
bring about the more rapid evolution of the atoms by quickening this spirillae vivifying
work of the Monad upon it. As these currents of the monadic life are added to
the Logic vortex, the note of life grows richer and richer in its quality. We
may compare the central vortex to the fundamental note, the whirling encircling
currents to the overtones; the addition of each overtone means an added
richness to the note. New forces, new beauties, are thus ever added to the
seven-fold chord of life.
4. THE FIVE
PLANES.
The different
responses which the matter of the planes will later give under [29] the impulse
of consciousness depend on the work of the Third Logos, on the
"measure" by which He limits the atom. The atom of each plane has its
own measure, as we have seen, and this limits its power of response, its
vibratory action, and gives it its specific character. As the eye is so
constituted that it is able to respond to vibrations of ether within a certain
range, so is each type of atom, by its constitution, able to respond to
vibrations within a certain range. One plane is called the plane made of
"mind-stuff", because the "measure" of its atoms makes
their dominant response that which answers to a certain range of the vibrations
of the Knowledge Aspect of the LOGOS, as modified by the Creative Activity.[17]
Another is called the plane of "desire-stuff", because the
"measure" of its atoms makes their dominant response that which
answers to a certain range of the vibrations of the Will[18] Aspect of the
LOGOS. Each type of atom has thus its own peculiar [30] power of response,
determined by its own measure of vibration. In each atom lie involved
numberless possibilities of response to the three aspects of consciousness,
and these possibilities within the atom will be brought out of the atom as
powers in the course of evolution. But the capacity of the matter to respond,
and the nature of the response, these are determined by the original action of
the triple Self on it, and by the measure imposed on the atoms by the Third
Logos; He, out of the infinite capacity of His own multitude of vibratory
powers, gives a certain portion to the matter of a particular system in a
particular cycle of evolution. This capacity is stamped on matter by the Third
Logos, and is ever maintained in matter by His life infolded in the atom. Thus
is formed the fivefold field of evolution in which consciousness is to develop.
This work of
the Third Logos is usually spoken of as the First Life Wave. [31]
CHAPTER II.
CONSCIOUSNESS.
1. THE
MEANING OF THE WORD.
LET us now
consider what we mean by consciousness, and see if this consideration will
build for us the much longed -for "bridge", which is the despair of
modern thought, between consciousness and matter, will span for us the
"gulf" alleged to exist for ever between them.
To begin with
a definition of terms consciousness and life are identical, two names for one
thing as regarded from within and from without. There is no life without
consciousness; there is no consciousness without life. When we vaguely separate
them in thought and analyse what we have done, we find that we have called
consciousness turned inward by the name of life, and life [32] turned outwards
by the name of consciousness. When our attention is fixed on unity we say
life; when it is fixed upon multiplicity we say consciousness; and we forget
that the multiplicity is due to, is the essence of, matter, the reflecting
surface in which the One becomes the Many. When it is said that life is
"more or less conscious", it is not the abstraction life that is
thought of, but "a living thing" more or less aware of its
surroundings. The more or less awareness depends on the thickness, the density,
of the enwrapping veil which makes it a living thing, separate from its
fellows. Annihilate in thought that veil and you annihilate in thought also
life, and are in THAT into which all opposites are resolved, the ALL.
This leads us
to our next point: the existence of consciousness implies a separation into
two aspects of the fundamental all-underlying UNITY. The modern name of
consciousness, "awareness", equally implies this. For you cannot hang
up awareness in the void; awareness [33] implies something of which it is
aware, a duality at the least. Otherwise it exists not. In the highest
abstraction of consciousness, of awareness, this duality is implied;
consciousness ceases if the sense of limitation be withdrawn, is dependent on
limitation for existence. Awareness is essentially awareness of limitation, and
only secondarily awareness of others. Awareness of others comes into being with
what we call Self-consciousness, Self-awareness. This abstract Twain-in-One,
consciousness - limitation, spirit - matter, life - form, are ever
inseparable, they appear and disappear together; they exist only in relation
to each other; they resolve into a necessarily unmanifest Unity, the supreme
synthesis.
"As
above, so below." Again let the "below" help us; let us look at
consciousness as it appears when considered from the side of form, as we see
it in a universe of conscious things. Electricity manifests only as positive
and negative; when these neutralise each other, electricity vanishes. In all
things electricity [34] exists, neutral, unmanifest; from all things it can
appear, but not as positive only, or as negative only; always as balancing
amounts of both, over against each other, and these ever tending to re-enter
together into apparent nothingness, which is not nothingness but the source
equally of both.
But if this
be so, what becomes of the "gulf "? what need of the
"bridge"? Consciousness and matter affect each other because they are
the two constituents of one whole, both appearing as they draw apart, both
disappearing as they unite, and as they draw apart a relation exists ever
between them.[19] There is no such thing as a conscious unit which does not
consist of this inseparate duality, a magnet with two poles ever in relation to
each other. We think of a separate something we call consciousness, and ask
how it works on another [35] separate something we call matter. There are no
such two separate somethings, but only two drawn-apart but inseparate aspects
of THAT which, without both, is unmanifest, which cannot manifest in the one or
the other alone, and is equally in both. There are no fronts without backs, no
aboves without belows, no outsides without insides, no spirit without matter.
They affect each other because inseparable parts of a unity, manifesting as a
duality in space and time. The "gulf" appears when we think of a
"spirit" wholly immaterial, and a "body" wholly material -
i.e., of two things neither of which exists. There is no spirit which is not
matter-enveloped: there is no matter which is not spirit-ensouled. The highest
separated Self has its film of matter, and though such a Self is called "a
spirit" because the consciousness aspect is so predominant, none the less
is it true that it has its vibrating sheath
of matter, and that from this sheath all impulses come forth, which
affect all other denser material sheaths in succession. To say this is not to
materialise consciousness, [36] but only to recognise the fact that the two
primary opposites, consciousness and matter, are straitly bound together, are
never apart, not even in the highest Being. Matter is limitation, and without
limitation consciousness is not. So far from materialising consciousness, it
puts it as a concept in sharp antithesis to matter, but it recognises the fact
that in an entity the one is not found without the other. The densest matter,
the physical, has its core of consciousness; the gas, the stone, the metal, is
living, conscious, aware. Thus oxygen becomes aware of hydrogen at a certain
temperature, and rushes into combination with it.
Let us now
look out of consciousness from within, and see the meaning of the phrase:
"Matter is limitation". Consciousness is the one Reality, in the
fullest sense of that much-used phrase; it follows from this that any reality
found anywhere is drawn from consciousness. Hence, everything which is thought,
is. That consciousness in which everything is, everything literally,
"possible" as well as "actual" - actual being that which is
[37] thought of as existent by a separated consciousness in time and space, and
possible all that which is not so being thought of at any period in time and
any point in space - we call Absolute Consciousness. It is the ALL, the
ETERNAL, the INFINITE, the CHANGELESS. Consciousness, thinking time and space,
and of all forms as existing in them in succession and in places, is the
Universal Consciousness, the ONE, called by the Hindu the Saguna BRAHMAN - the
ETERNAL with attributes - the
PRATYAG-ATMA - the INNER SELF; - by the
Christian, God; by the Parsi, HORMUZD;
by the Mussulman, ALLAH. Consciousness dealing with a definite time, however
long or short, with a definite space, however vast or restricted, is
individual, that of a concrete Being, a Lord of many universes, or some universes,
or a universe, or of any so-called portion of a universe, his portion and to
him therefore a universe - these terms varying
as to extent with the power of the consciousness; so much of the
universal thought as a separate consciousness can completely think, i.e., on
which he can [38] impose his own reality, can think of as existing like
himself, is his universe. To each universe, the Being who is its Lord gives a
share of his own indefeasible Reality; but is ever himself limited and
controlled by the thought of his superior, the Lord of the universe in which he
exists as a form. Thus we, who are human beings, existing in a solar system,
are surrounded by innumerable forms which are the thought-forms of the LORD of
our system, our ISHVARA, or RULER; the "divine measure" and the
"axes of growth", thought by the Third Logos, govern the forms of our
atoms, and the surface thought of by Him as the limit of the atom and
resistant, offers resistance to all similar atoms. Thus we receive our matter,
and cannot alter it, save by the
employment of methods also made by His thought; only so long as His
thought continues can the atoms, with all composed of them, continue to exist,
since they have no Reality save that given by His thought. So long as He
retains them as His body by declaring: "I am this; these atoms are My
body; they share My life"; so [39] long they will impose themselves as
real on all the beings in this solar system, whose consciousnesses are clothed
in similar garments. When at the end of the Day of Manifestation He declares:
"I am not this; these atoms are no longer My body; they no longer share My
life"; then shall they vanish as the dream they are, and only that shall
remain which is the thought-form of the Monarch of a vaster system.
Thus, as Spirits,
we are inherently, indefensibly divine, with all the splendour and freedom
implied in that word. But we are clothed in matter which is not ours, which is
the thought-forms of the RULER of our system - controlled again by the RULERS
of vaster systems in which ours is included - and we are only slowly learning
to master and use it. When we realise our oneness with our RULER, then the
matter shall have no longer power over us, and we shall see it as the unreality
it is, dependent on His will, which then we shall know as also ours. Then we
can "play" with it, as we cannot while it blinds us with its borrowed
Reality. [40]
Looking thus
out of consciousness from within, we see even more plainly than we saw looking at it from the world of forms,
that there is no "gulf", and no need for a "bridge".
Consciousness changes, and each change appears in the matter surrounding it as
a vibration, because the LOGOS has thought vibrations of matter as the
invariable concomitant of changes in consciousness; and as the matter is but
the resultant of consciousness and its
attributes are imposed upon it by active
thought, any change in the Logic Consciousness would change the
attributes of the matter of the system,
and any change in a consciousness derived from Him shows itself in that matter
as a change; this change in matter is a vibration, a rhythmical movement within the limits set by
Him for the mobility of masses of matter in that relation. "Change in consciousness
and vibration of the matter limiting it" is a "pair", imposed by
the thought of the Locos on all embodied consciousnesses in His universe.
That such a constant relation exists is
shown by the fact that a vibration in a material [41] sheath accompanying a
change in the ensouling consciousness, and causing a similar vibration in the
sheath ensouled by another consciousness, is found to be accompanied by a
change in that second consciousness similar to the change in the first.
In matter far
subtler than the physical - as mind-stuff - the creative power of
consciousness is more readily seen than in the dense material of the physical
plane. Matter becomes dense or rare, and changes its combinations and forms,
according to the thoughts of a consciousness active therein. While the
fundamental atoms - due to the Logic thought - remain unchanged, they can be
combined or dissociated at will. Such experiences open the mind to the
metaphysical conception of matter, and enable it to realise at once the
borrowed reality and the nonentity of matter.
A word of warning
may be useful with regard to the often repeated phrases of "Consciousness
in a body", "Consciousness ensouling a body", and the like. The
student is a little apt to figure consciousness [42] as a kind of rarefied gas
enclosed in a material receptacle, a kind of bottle. If he will think carefully
he will realise that the resistant surface of the body is but a Logic
thought-form, and it is there because thought there. Consciousness appears as
conscious entities, because the LOGOS thinks such separations, thinks the
enclosing walls, makes such thought limitations. And these thoughts of the
LOGOS are due to His unity with the Universal SELF, and are but a repetition
within the area of a particular universe of the Will to multiply.
A careful
dwelling in mind on the distinctions above traced between Absolute
Consciousness, Universal Consciousness, and Individual Consciousness, will
prevent the student from asking the question so often heard: Why is there any
universe? Why does All-Consciousness limit itself? Why should the Perfect
become the imperfect, All-Power become the powerless, God become the mineral,
the brute, the man? In this form the question is unanswerable, for it is
founded on false premises. The Perfect is the All, the Totality, the Sum of Being.
Within [43] its infinity, as above said, is everything contained, every
potentiality, as well as actuality, of existence. All that has been, is, will
be, can be, ever is in that Fulness, that ETERNAL. Only Itself knows Itself in
its infinite unimaginable wealth of Being. Because it contains all pairs of
opposites, and each pair, in affirming itself, to the eye of reason annihilates
itself and vanishes, It seems a Void. But endless universes arising in It
proclaim It a Plenum. This Perfect never becomes the imperfect; it becomes
nothing; It as all Spirit and Matter, Strength and Weakness, Knowledge and
Ignorance, Peace and Strife, Bliss and Pain, Power and Impotence; the
innumerable opposites of manifestation merge into each other and vanish in
non-manifestation. The All includes manifestation and non-manifestation, the
diastole and systole of the Heart which is Being. The one no more requires
explanation than the other; the one cannot be without the other. The puzzle
arises because men assert separately one of the inseparate pair of opposites -
Spirit, Strength, Knowledge, [44] Peace, Bliss, Power - and then ask: "Why
should these become their opposites?" They do not. No attribute exists
without its opposite; a pair only can manifest; every front has a back, spirit
and matter arise together; it is not that spirit exists, and then miraculously
produces matter to limit and blind itself, but that spirit and matter arise in
the ETERNAL simultaneously as a mode of Its Being, a form of Self-expression of
the All, Pratyagatma and Mulaprakriti, expressing in time and space the
Timeless and Spaceless.
2. THE
MONADS.
We have seen
that by the action of the Third Logos a five-fold field has been provided for
the development of Units of Consciousness, and that a Unit of Consciousness is
a fragment, a portion of the Universal Consciousness, thought into separation
as an individual entity veiled in matter, a Unit of the substance of the First
Logos, to be sent forth on the second plane as a separate Being. [45] Such
Units are called technically Monads. These are the Sons, abiding from everlasting,
from the beginning of a creative age, in the Bosom of the Father, who have not
yet been "made perfect through
sufferings";[20] each of them is truly "equal to the Father as
touching his Godhead, but inferior to the Father as touching his
manhood"[21], and each of them is to go forth into matter in order to
render all things subject to himself[22]; he is to be "sown in
weakness" that he may be "raised in power"[23]; from a static
Logos enfolding all divine potentialities, he is to become a dynamic Logos
unfolding all divine powers; omniscient, omnipresent, on his own second plane,
but unconscious, "senseless", on all the others,[24] he is to veil
his glory in matter that blinds him, in order that he may become omniscient,
omnipresent, on all planes, able to answer to all divine vibrations in the
universe instead of to those on the highest only. [46]
The meaning
of this feeble description of a great truth may be glimpsed by the student by a
consideration of the facts of embryonic life and birth. When an Ego is
re-incarnating, he broods over the human mother in whom his future body is a
building, the vehicle he will one day inhabit. That body is slowly built up of
the substance of the mother, and the Ego can do little as to its shaping: it is
an embryo, unconscious of its future, dimly
conscious only of the flow of the maternal life, impressed by maternal
hopes and fears, thoughts and desires; nothing from the Ego affects it, save a
feeble influence coming through the permanent physical atom, and it does not
share, because it cannot answer to, the wide-reaching thoughts, the aspiring
emotions of the Ego, as expressed by him in his causal body. That embryo must
develop, must gradually assume a human form, must enter on an independent life,
separate from that of his mother, must pass through seven years - as men count
time - of such independent life, ere the Ego can fully ensoul it. But during
that slow evolution, with [47] its infantile helplessness, its childish
follies, pleasures and pains, the Ego to whom it belongs is carrying on his own
wider, richer, life, and is gradually coming into nearer and nearer touch with
this body, in which alone he can work in the physical world, his touch being
manifested as the growth of the brain-consciousness.
The condition
of the Monad in relation to the evolution of his consciousness in a universe
resembles that of the Ego in relation to his new physical body. His own world
is that of the second, the anupadaka, plane, and there he is fully conscious
with the all-embracing SELF-consciousness of his world, but not at first of
selves, among whom he is separate, of "others". Let us try to see the
stages through which he passes. He is first a spark in a flame: "I sense
one Flame, O Gurudeva; I see countless undetached sparks shining in
it"[25]. The Flame is the First Logos, the undetached sparks the Monads.
His Will to manifest is also theirs, for they are the germ-cells in His [48] body,
that will presently have a separate life in His coming universe. Moved by this
Will, the sparks share the change called "the begetting of the Son",
and pass into the Second Logos and dwell in Him. Then, with the
"proceeding" of the Third, there comes to them from Him the
"spiritual individuality", that H. P. Blavatsky speaks of, the
dawning separateness. But still there is no sense of "others", needed
to re-act as the sense of "I". The three aspects of consciousness,
theirs as sharing the Logic life, are still, to use a figure of speech,
"turned inwards", playing on each other, asleep, unaware of a
"without", sharing the all-SELF-consciousness. The great Beings,
called the Creative Orders,[26] arouse them to "outer" life; Will,
Wisdom, Activity awake to awareness of the "without"; a dim sense of
"others" arises, so far as "others" may be in a world where
all "'forms' intermingle and interpenetrate," and each becomes
"an individual Dhyan Chohan, distinct from others".[27] [49] At the
first stage, spoken of above, when the Monads are, in the fullest sense[28] of
the term, undetached, as "germ-cells in His body", the Will, Wisdom,
and Activity in them are latent, not potent. His Will to manifest is also their
will, but theirs unconsciously; He, Self-conscious, knows His object and His
path; they, not yet Self-conscious, have in them, as parts of His body, the
moving energy of His Will, which will presently be their own individual Will
to Live, and which impels them into the conditions wherein a separate-Self-conscious,
instead of an all-Self-conscious, life is possible. This leads them to the
second stage in the life of the Second Logos, and to the Third. Then,
comparatively separate, the awakening by the Creative Orders brings with it the
"dim sense of 'others'" and of "I", and with this a thrill
of longing for a more clearly-defined sense of "I" and of
"others"; and this is the "individual Will to Live", and
this leads them forth [50] into the denser worlds, wherein such sharper
definition alone becomes possible.
It is
important to understand that the evolution of the individual "I" is a
Self-chosen activity. We are here because we Will to Live; "none else
compels". This aspect of consciousness, the Will, is dealt with in later
chapters of this book, and here we need only emphasise the fact that the Monads
are Self-moved, Self-determined, in their entry into the lower planes of
matter, the field of manifestation, the five-fold universe. To their vehicles
in it, they remain as the Ego to his physical body, with their radiant divine
life in loftier spheres, but brooding over their lower vehicles and manifesting
more and more in them as they become more plastic. H. P. Blavatsky speaks of
this, as the "Monad is cycling on downwards into matter".[29]
Everywhere in
nature we see this same striving after fuller manifestation of life, this
constant Will to Live. The seed, buried in the ground, pushes its growing [51]
point upwards to the light. The bud fettered in its sheathing calyx bursts its
prison and expands in the sunshine. The chick within the egg splits its
confining shell in twain. Everywhere life seeks expression, powers press to
exercise themselves. See the painter, the sculptor, the poet, with creative
genius struggling within him; to create yields the subtlest pleasure, the
keenest savour of exquisite delight. Therein is but another instance of the
omnipresent nature of life, whether in the LOGOS, the genius, or in the
ephemeral creature of a day; all joy in the bliss of living, and feel most
alive when they multiply themselves by creation. To feel life expressing
itself, flowing forth, expanding, increasing, this is at once the result of
the Will to Live, and its fruition in the Bliss of living.
Some of the
Monads, willing to live through the toils of the five-fold universe, in order
to master matter and in turn to create a universe therein, enter into it to
become a developed God therein, a Tree of Life, another Fount of Being. The
shaping of a universe is the Day of [52] Forth-going; living is becoming; life
knows itself by change. Those who will not to become masters of matter,
creators, remain in their static bliss, excluded from the five-fold universe,
unconscious of its activities. For it must be remembered that all the seven
planes are interpenetrating, and that Consciousness on any plane means the
power of answering to the vibrations of that particular plane. Just as a man
may be conscious on the physical plane because his physical body is organised
to receive and transmit to him its vibrations, but be totally unconscious of
the higher planes though their vibrations are playing on him, because he has
not yet organised sufficiently his higher bodies to receive and transmit to him
their vibrations; so is the Monad, the Unit of Consciousness, able to be conscious
on the second plane, but totally unconscious on the lower five.
He will
evolve his consciousness on these by taking from each plane some of its matter,
veiling himself in this matter and forming it into a sheath by which he can
come into contact with [53] that plane, gradually organising this sheath of
matter into a body capable of functioning on its own plane as an expression of
himself, receiving vibrations from the plane and transmitting them to him,
receiving vibrations from him and transmitting them to the plane. As he veils
himself in the matter of each successive plane he shuts away some of his
consciousness, that of it which is too subtle for receiving or setting up
vibrations in the matter of that plane. He has within him seven typical vibratory
powers - each capable of producing an indefinite number of sub-vibrations of
its own type - and these are shut off one by one as he endues veil after veil
of grosser matter. The powers in consciousness of expressing itself in certain
typical ways - using the word power in the mathematical sense, consciousness
"to the third", consciousness "to the fourth", etc.- are
seen in matter as what we call dimensions. The physical power of consciousness
has its expression in "three-dimensional matter", while the astral,
mental, and other powers of [54] consciousness need for their expression other
dimensions of matter.
Speaking thus
of Monads, we may feel as if we were dealing with something far away. Yet is
the Monad very near to us, our SELF, the very root of our being, the innermost
source of our life, the one Reality. Hidden, unmanifest, wrapt in silence and
darkness is our Self, but our consciousness is the limited manifestation of
that Self, the manifested God in the kosmos of our bodies, which are His garments.
As the Unmanifest is partially manifest in the LOGOS, as Divine Consciousness,
and in the universe as the Body of the LOGOS[30], so is our unmanifest Self
partially manifest in our consciousness, as the Logos of our individual system, and in our body as the kosmos which
clothes the consciousness. As above, so below.
This hidden
SELF it is which is called the Monad, being verily the One. It is this which
gives the subtle sense of unity [55] that ever persists in us amid all changes;
the sense of identity has here its source, for this is the ETERNAL in us. The
three out-streaming rays which come from the Monad - to be dealt with presently
- are his three aspects, or modes of being, or hypostases, reproducing the
Logoi of a universe, the Will, Wisdom, and Activity which are the three
essential expressions of embodied consciousness, the familiar Atma-Buddhi-Manas
of the Theosophist.
This
consciousness ever works as a unit on the various planes, but shows out its
triplicity on each. When we study consciousness working on the mental plane,
we see Will appearing as choice, Wisdom as discrimination, Activity as
cognition. On the astral plane we see Will appearing as desire, Wisdom as love,
Activity as sensation. On the physical plane, Will has for its instruments the
motor organs (karmendriyas), Wisdom the cerebral hemispheres, Activity the
organs of sense (jnanendriyas).[31] [56]
The full
manifestation of these three aspects of consciousness in their highest forms
takes place in man in the same order as the manifestation of the triple LOGOS
in the universe. The third aspect, Activity, revealed as the creative mind, as
the gatherer of knowledge, is the first to perfect its vehicles, and show forth
its full energies. The second aspect, Wisdom, revealed as the Pure and
Compassionate Reason, is the second to shine forth, the
CHAPTER III.
THE PEOPLING
OF THE FIELD.
1. THE COMING
WHEN the
five-fold field is ready, when the five planes, each with its seven sub-planes,
are completed, so far as their primary constitution is concerned, then begins
the activity of the Second Logos, the Builder and Preserver of forms. His
activity is spoken of as the Second Life Wave, the pouring out of Wisdom and
Love - the Wisdom, the directing force, needed for the organisation and
evolution of forms, the Love, the attractive force, needed for holding them together as stable
though complex wholes. When this great stream of Logic life pours forth into
the five-fold field of manifestation, it brings with it into activity the
Monads, the Units of Consciousness, ready to begin their [58] work of
evolution, to clothe themselves in matter.
Yet the
phrase that the Monads go forth is somewhat inaccurate; that they shine forth,
send out their rays of life, would be truer. For they remain ever "in the
bosom of the Father", while their life-rays stream out into the ocean of
matter, and therein appropriate the materials needed for their energising in
the universe. The matter must be appropriated, rendered plastic, shaped into
fitting vehicles.
H. P.
Blavatsky has described their forth-shining in graphic allegorical terms, using
a symbolism more expressive than literal-meaning words: "The primordial
triangle, which - as soon as it has reflected itself in the 'Heavenly Man', the
highest of the lower seven - disappears, returning into 'Silence and Darkness';
and the astral paradigmatic man, whose Monad (Atma) is also represented by a
triangle, as it has to become a ternary in conscious devachanic
interludes"[32]. The primordial triangle, or the three-faced Monad of Will,
[59] Wisdom, and Activity, "reflects itself" in the "Heavenly
Man", as Atma-Buddhi Manas, and then "returns into Silence and
Darkness". Atma - often spoken of as the Monad of the lower, or astral man
- has to become a ternary, a triple-faced unit, by assimilating Buddhi and
Manas. The word "reflexion" demands explanation here. Speaking
generally, the term reflexion is used when a force manifested on a higher plane
shows itself again on a lower plane, and is conditioned by a grosser kind of matter
in that lower manifestation, so that some of the effective energy of the force
is lost, and it shows itself in a feebler form. As now used in a special
instance, it means that a stream of the life of the Monad pours forth, taking
as the vessel to contain it an atom from each of the three higher planes of the
five-fold field -the third, the fourth, and the fifth - thus producing the
"Heavenly Man", the "Living Ruler, Immortal", the Pilgrim
who is to evolve, for whose evolution the system was brought into being.
"As the
mighty vibrations of the Sun throw matter into the vibrations we call [60] his
rays (which express his heat, electricity, and other energies), so does the
Monad cause the atomic matter of the atmic, buddhic, and manasic planes -
surrounding him as the ether of space surrounds the Sun - to vibrate, and thus
makes to himself a Ray, triple like his own three-fold nature. In this he is
aided by Devas from a previous universe who have passed through a similar
experience before; these guide the vibratory wave from the Will aspect to the
atmic atom, and the atmic atom, vibrating to the Will-aspect, is called Atma;
they guide the vibratory wave from the
Wisdom-aspect to the buddhic atom, and the buddhic atom, vibrating to the
Wisdom-aspect, is called Buddhi; also they guide the vibratory wave from the
Activity-aspect to the manasic atom, and the manasic atom, vibrating to the
Activity-aspect, is called Manas. Thus Atma-Buddhi-Manas, the Monad in the
world of manifestation, is formed, the Ray of the Monad, beyond the five-fold
universe. Here is the mystery of the Watcher, the Spectator, the action-less
Atma, who abides ever in his triple [61] nature on his own plane, and lives in
the world of men by his Ray, which animates his shadows, the fleeting lives on
earth. . The shadows do the work on the lower planes, and are moved by the
Monad through his Image or Ray; at first so feebly that his influence is
well-nigh imperceptible, later with ever-increasing power."[33]
Atma-Buddhi-Manas
is the Heavenly Man, the Spiritual Man, and he is the expression of the Monad,
whose reflected aspect of Will is Atma, whose reflected aspect of Wisdom is
Buddhi, whose reflected aspect of Activity is Manas. Hence we may regard the
human Atma as the Will-aspect of the Monad, ensouling an akashic atom; the
human Buddhi as the Wisdom-aspect of the Monad, ensouling an air (divine flame)
atom; the human Manas as the Activity-aspect of the Monad, ensouling a fiery
atom. Thus in Atma-Buddhi-Manas, the
spiritual Triad, or the Heavenly [62] Man, we have the three aspects, or
energies, of the Monad, embodied in atomic matter, and this is the
"Spirit" in man, the Jivatma or Life-Self, the separated Self.[34] It is the germinal
Spirit, and in its third aspect the "baby Ego". It is identical in
nature with the Monad, is the Monad, but is lessened in force and activity by
the veils of matter round it. This lessening of power must not blind us to the
identity of nature. We must ever remember that the human consciousness is a
unit, and that though its manifestations vary, these variations are only due to
the predominance of one or other of its aspects and to the relative density of
the materials in which an aspect is working. Its manifestations, thus
conditioned, vary, but it is itself ever one.
Such part,
then, of the consciousness of the Monad as can express itself in a fivefold
universe enters at first thus into the higher matter of this universe,
embodying itself in an atom of each of the three [63] higher planes; having
thus shone forth and appropriated these atoms for his own use, the Monad has
begun his work; in his own subtle nature
he cannot as yet descend below the anupadaka plane, and he is therefore said to
be in "Silence and Darkness",
unmanifest; but he lives and works in and by means of these appropriated
atoms, which form the garment of his life on the planes nearest to his own. We
may figure this action thus:
[64]
This
spiritual Triad, as it is often called, Atma-Buddi-Manas, the Jivatma, is
described as a seed, a germ, of divine Life, containing the potentialities of
its own heavenly Father, its Monad, to be unfolded into powers in the course of
evolution. This is the "manhood" of the divine Son of the First
Logos, animated by the "Godhead", the Monad - a mystery truly, but
one which is repeated in many forms around us.
And now the
nature, which was free in the subtle matter of his own plane, becomes bound by
the denser matter, and his powers of consciousness cannot as yet function in
this blinding veil. He is therein as a mere germ, an embryo, powerless,
senseless, helpless, while the Monad on his own plane is strong, conscious,
capable, so far as his internal life is concerned; the one is the Monad in
Eternity, the other is the Monad in time and space; the content of the Monad
eternal is to become the extent of the Monad temporal and spatial. This at
present embryonic life will evolve into a complex being, the expression of the
[65] Monad on each plane of the universe. All-powerful internally on his own
subtle plane, he is at first powerless, fettered, helpless, when enwrapped
externally in denser matter, unable to receive through it, or to give out
through it, vibrations. But he will gradually master the matter that at first
enslaves him; slowly, surely, he will mould it for Self-expression; he is aided
and watched over by the all-sustaining and preserving Second Logos, until he
can live in it fully as he lives above, and become in his turn a creative Logos
and bring forth out of himself a universe. The power of creating a universe is
only gained, according to THE WISDOM, by involving within the Self all that is
later to be put forth. A Logos does not create out of nothing, but evolves all
from Himself; and from the experiences we are now passing through, we are
gathering the materials out of which we may build a system in the future.
But this
spiritual Triad, this Jivatma, which is the Monad in the five-fold universe,
cannot himself commence at [66] once any separate self-directed activity. He
cannot gather round himself any aggregations of matter as yet, but can only
abide in his atomic vesture. The life of the Second Logos is to him as its
mother's womb to the embryo, and within this the building begins. We may, in
very truth, regard this stage of evolution, in which the Logos shapes,
nourishes, and develops the germinating life, as being, for the Heavenly Man,
or truly the Heavenly Embryo, a period corresponding to the ante-natal life of
a human being, during which he is slowly obtaining a body, which is nourished
meanwhile by the life-currents of the mother and formed out of her substance.
Thus also with the Jivatma, enclosing the life of the Monad; he must await the
building of his body on the lower planes, and he cannot emerge from this
ante-natal life and be "born", until there is a body builded on the
lower planes. The "birth" takes place at the formation of the causal
body, when the Heavenly Man is manifested as an infant Ego, a true
Individuality, dwelling in a body on the physical plane. A little [67] careful
thought will show how close is the analogy between the evolution of the Pilgrim
and that of each successive rebirth; in the latter case the Jivatma awaits the
formation of the physical body which is building as his habitation; in the
former the spiritual Triads, as a Collectivity, await the, building of the
systemic Quaternary. Until the vehicle on the lowest plane is ready, all is a
preparation for evolution, rather than evolution itself - it is often termed
involution. The evolution of the consciousness must begin by contacts received
by its outermost vehicle; that is, it must begin on the physical plane. It can
only become aware of an outside by impacts on its own outside; until then it
dreams within itself, as the faint inner thrillings ever outwelling from the
Monad cause slight outward-tending
pressures in the Jivatma, like a spring of water beneath the earth, seeking are
outlet.
2. THE
WEAVING.
Meanwhile the
preparation for the awakening, the giving of qualities to [68] matter, that
which may be likened to the formation of the tissues of the future body, is
done by the life-power of the Second Logos - the second life-wave, rolling
through plane after plane, imparting its own qualities to that seven-fold proto-matter.
The life-wave, as said above, carries the Jivatmas with it as far as the atomic
sub-plane of the fifth plane, the plane of Fire, of individualised creative
power, of mind. Here they each have already an atom, the manasic, or mental
veil of the Monad, the Logos flooding these and the remaining atoms of the
plane with His life. All these atoms, forming the whole atomic sub-plane,
whether free or attached to Jivatmas, may rightly be termed Monadic Essence;
but as in the course of evolution, presently to be explained, differences arise
between the attached and the non-attached atoms, the term Monadic Essence is
usually employed for the non-attached, while the attached are called, for
reasons which will appear, "permanent atoms". We may define Monadic
Essence then as atomic matter ensouled by the life of the [69] Second Logos. It
is His clothing for the vivifying and holding together of forms; He is clad in
atomic matter. His own life as Logos, separate from the life of
Atma-Buddhi-Manas in the man, separate from any lives on the plane - though
He supports, permeates, and includes
them all - is clothed only in atomic matter, and it is this which is connoted
by the term of Monadic Essence. The matter of that plane, already by the nature of its atoms[35]
capable of responding by vibrations to active thought-changes, is thrown by the
second life-wave into combinations fit to express thoughts - abstract thoughts
in the subtler matter, concrete thoughts in the coarser. The combinations of
the second and third higher sub-planes constitute the
The second
life-wave then rolls on into the sixth plane, the plane of Water, or
individualised sensation, of desire. The before-mentioned Devas link the
Jivatma - attached, or permanent, units of the fifth plane to a corresponding
number of atoms on the sixth plane, and the Second Logos floods these and the
remaining atoms with His own life - these atoms thus becoming Monadic Essence as
explained above. The life-wave passes onwards, forming on each sub-plane the
combinations fit to express sensations. These combinations constitute the
Elemental
Essence is thus seen to consist of aggregations of matter on each of the six
non-atomic sub-planes of the mental and desire planes, aggregations which do
not themselves serve as forms for any entity to inhabit, but as the [71]
materials out of which such forms may be built.
The life-wave
then rolls on into the seventh plane, the plane of Earth, of individualised
activities, of actions. As before the Jivatma-attached, or permanent, atoms of
the sixth plane are linked to a corresponding number on the seventh plane, and
the Second Logos floods these and the remaining atoms with His own life - all
these atoms thus becoming Monadic Essence. The life-wave again passes onwards,
forming on each sub-plane combinations fitted to constitute physical bodies,
the future chemical elements, as they are called on the three lower sub-planes.
Looking at
this work of the second life wave as a whole, we see that its downward sweep
is concerned with what may fairly be called the making of primary tissues, out
of which hereafter subtle and dense bodies are to be formed. Well has it been
called in some ancient scriptures a "weaving", for such it literally
is. The materials prepared by the Third Logos are woven by the Second Logos
into threads [72] and into cloths of which future garments the subtle and
dense bodies - will be made. As a man may take separate threads of flax,
cotton, silk-themselves combinations of a simpler kind - and weave these into
linens, into cotton or silk cloth, these cloths in turn to be shaped into
garments by cutting and stitching, so does the second Logos weave the matter-threads,
weave these again into tissues, and then shape them into forms. He is the
Eternal Weaver, while we might think of the Third Logos as the Eternal Chemist.
The latter works in nature as in a laboratory, the former as in a manufactory.
These similes, materialistic as they are, are not to be despised, for they are
crutches to aid our limping attempts to understand.
This
"weaving" gives to matter its characteristics, as the characteristics
of the thread differ from those of the raw material, as the characteristics of
the cloth differ from those of the threads. The Logos weaves the two kinds of
cloth of manasic matter, of mind-stuff, and out of these will be made later the
causal and the mental [73] bodies. He weaves the cloth of astral matter, of
desire-stuff, and out of this will be made later the desire body. That is to
say, that the combinations of matter formed and held together by the second
life-wave have the characteristics which will act on the Monad when he comes
into touch with others, and will enable him to act on them. So will he be able
to receive all kinds of vibrations, mental, sensory, etc. The characteristics
depend on the nature of the aggregations. There are seven great types, fixed by
the nature of the atom, and within these innumerable sub-types. All this goes
to the making of the materials of the mechanism of consciousness, which will
be conditioned by all these textures, colourings, densities.
In this
downward sweep of the life-wave through the fifth, sixth, and seventh planes,
downward till the densest matter is reached, and the wave turns at that point
to begin its sweep upwards, we must think, then, of its work as that of forming
combinations which show qualities, and so we sometimes speak of this work as
the giving of qualities. In the upward sweep we shall [74] find that bodies are
built out of the matter thus prepared. But before we study the shaping of
these, we must consider the seven-fold division of this life-wave in its
descent, and the coming forth of the "Shining Ones", the
"Devas", the "Angels", the "Elementals", that belong
also to this downward sweep. These are the "Minor Gods" of whom Plato
speaks, from whom man derives his perishable bodies.
3. THE SEVEN
STREAMS.
The question
is constantly asked: Why this continual play by Theosophists upon the number
seven? We speak of it as the "root-number of our system", and there
is one obvious reason why this number should play an active part in the
grouping of things, since we are concerned with the triplicities previously
mentioned and explained. A triad naturally produces a septenate by its own internal
relations, since its three factors can group themselves in seven ways and no
more. We have spoken of [75] matter, outside the limits of a universe, as
having the three qualities of matter - inertia, mobility, and rhythm - in a
state of equilibrium. When the life of the Logos causes motion, we have at once
the possibility of seven groups, for in any given atom, or group of atoms, one
or other of these qualities may be more strongly energised than the others, and
thus a predominant quality will be shown forth. We may thus have three groups,
in one of which inertia will predominate, in mobility, in a third rhythm. Each
of these, again, subdivides, according to the predominance in it of one or
other of the remaining two qualities: thus in one of the two inertia groups,
mobility may predominate over rhythm, and in the other rhythm over mobility,
and so with the other two groups of mobility and rhythm. Hence arise the
well-known types, classified according to the predominant quality, usually
designated by their Samskrit terms, satvic, rajasic, and tamasic, rhythmical,
mobile, and inert, and we have satvic, rajasic, and tamasic foods, [76]
animals, men, etc.. And we obtain seven groups in all: six subdivisions of the
three, and a seventh in which the three qualities are equally active. [The
varieties of type are simply intended to mark in each triad the relative
energies of the qualities.]
The Life of
the Logos, which is to flow into this matter, itself manifests in seven
streams, or rays.
These arise
similarly out of the three Aspects of Consciousness present in Him, as in all
consciousnesses, since all are manifestations of the Universal SELF. These are
Bliss, or Ichchha, Will; Cognition, or Jnanam, Wisdom; [77] Existence, or
Kriya, Activity. So we have the seven streams or rays, of Logic life:
All things
may be regarded as grouped under these seven headings, the seven streams of
Logic life composing the second life-wave, and we may think of it as flowing
through the planes, descending through them; so that, if we draw the planes
horizontally, the life-wave would sweep vertically downwards through them.
Moreover in each stream there will be
seven primary sub-divisions, according to the type of matter concerned,
and within these secondary sub-divisions, according to the proportions of the
qualities within each type, and so on and on in [78] innumerable variations.
Into these we need not enter. It is enough to notice the seven types of matter
and the seven types of consciousnesses. The seven streams of Logic life show
out as the seven types of consciousnesses, and within each of these the seven
types of matter-combinations are found. There are to be seen seven distinct
types in each of the three Elemental Kingdoms and on the physical plane. Mme.
Blavatsky, in The Secret Doctrine, dealing with man, quotes from the stanzas of
the Book of Dzyan, the fact that there were: "Seven of Them [Creators]
each on His lot", forming the seven types of men, and these subdivided: "Seven times seven shadows
of future men were born"[36]. Here is the root of the differing
temperaments of men.
4. THE
SHINING ONES.
We have now
to consider another result of the downward-sweeping Life-Wave. We have seen
that it gives qualities to [79] aggregations of matter on the fifth and sixth
planes, and that we have in the First Elemental Kingdom materials ready to
clothe abstract thoughts; in the Second Elemental Kingdom materials ready to
clothe concrete thoughts; in the Third Elemental
Kingdom materials ready to clothe desires. But in addition to imparting
qualities to aggregations of matter, the Second Logos gives forth, during this
stage of His descent, evolved beings, at various stages of development, who
form the normal and typical inhabitants of these three kingdoms. These beings
have been brought over by the Logos from a preceding evolution, and are sent
forth from the treasure-house of His life, to inhabit the plane for which their
development fits them; and to cooperate with Him, and later with man, in the working-out
of His scheme of evolution. They have received various names in the various
religions, but all religions recognise the fact of their existence and of their
work. The Samskrit name Devas - the Shining Ones - is the most general, and
aptly describes the most marked characteristic of their [80] appearance, a
brilliant luminous radiance.[37] The Hebrew, Christian, and Muhammadan
religions call them Archangels and Angels. The Theosophist - to avoid sectarian
connotations - names them, after their habitat, Elementals; and this title has
the further advantage that it reminds the student of their connection with the
five "Elements" of the ancient world: Ether, Air, Fire, Water, and
Earth. For there are similar beings of a higher type on the atmic and buddhic
planes, as well as the Fire and Water Elementals of the mental and desire
planes, and the ethereal Elementals of the physical. These beings have bodies
formed out of the elemental essence of the kingdom to which they belong,
flashing many-hued bodies, changing form at the will of the indwelling entity.
They form a vast host, ever actively at work, labouring at the elemental
essence to improve its [81] quality, taking it to form their own bodies,
throwing it off and taking other portions of it, to render it more responsive;
they are also constantly busied in the shaping of forms, in aiding human Egos
on the way to re-incarnation in building their new bodies, bringing materials
of the needed kind and helping in its arrangements. The less advanced the Ego the
greater the directive work of the Deva; with animals they do almost all the
work, and practically all with vegetables and minerals. They are the active
agents in the work of the Logos, carrying out all the details of His
world-plan, and aiding the countless evolving lives to find the materials they
need for their clothing. All antiquity recognised the indispensable work they
do in the worlds, and
At the stage
we are considering, however, all this work, except that of the improvement of
the elemental essence, lay in the far future, but the Shining Ones laboured
diligently at that improvement.
There was
thus a vast work of preparation accomplished before anything in the way of
physical forms, such as we should recognise, could appear; a vast labour at the
Form side of things before embodied consciousnesses, save that of the Logos and
His Shining Ones, could do anything at all. That which was to be human
consciousness at this point was a seed, sown on the higher planes, unconscious
of all without it. Under the impelling warmth of the Logic life, it sends out
[83] a tiny rootlet downwards, which pushes its way into the lower planes,
blindly, unconsciously, and this rootlet must form cur next object of study.
[84]
CHAPTER I V.
THE PERMANENT
ATOM.
1. THE
ATTACHING OF THE ATOMS.
LET us
consider the spiritual Triad, the tri-atomic Atma-Buddhi-Manas, the Jivatma,
the seed of consciousness, within which the warmth of the stream of Logic life,
which surrounds it, is causing faint thrillings of responsive life. These are internal
thrillings, preparatory to external activities. After long preparation, a tiny
thread, like a minute rootlet, appears, proceeding from the tri-atomic molecule
ensheathing consciousness, a golden-coloured thread of life sheathed in buddhic
matter; countless such threads appear from the countless Jivatmas, waving
vaguely at first in the seven great streams of life, and then becoming anchored
- if the expression may be [85] permitted - by attachment to a single molecule
or unit, on the fourth mental sub-plane. This anchoring - like the previous one
to the three higher atoms, and like the later ones to the astral and physical
atoms - is brought about by the action of the Shining Ones. Round this attached
unit gather temporary aggregations of elemental essence of the
This whole
process is repeated, when the
Once more is
the process repeated, when the great wave has travelled onwards into the
physical plane. The tiny thread of [88] buddhic-ensheathed life, with its
attached mental and desire units, pushes outwards once more, and annexes a
physical atom, adding this to itself as its stable centre on the physical
plane. Round this gather ethereal molecules, but the heavier physical matter is
more coherent than the subtler matter of the higher planes, and a much longer
term of life may be observed. Then - as are formed the ethereal types of the
proto-metals, and later proto-metals, metals, non-metallic elements, and
minerals - the Shining Ones of the Ethereal Physical Kingdom submerge these
attached atoms in their sheaths of ether into the one of the seven ethereal
types to which they respectively belong, and they begin their long physical
evolution. Before we can follow this further we must consider Group-Souls,
which on the atomic sub-plane receive their third enveloping layer. But it
will be well to pause for a while on the nature and the function of these
permanent atoms, the tri-units, or triads, which are as a reflexion on the
lower planes of the spiritual Triads on the higher, and each of which is
attached to [89] a spiritual Triad, its Jivatma. Each triad consists of a
physical atom, an astral atom, and a mental unit, permanently attached by a
thread of buddhic matter to a spiritual Triad. That thread has sometimes been
called the Sutratma, the Thread-Self, because the permanent particles are
threaded on it as "beads on a string".[39]
We may again
resort to a diagram, showing the relation.
[90]
2. THE WEB OF
LIFE.
It has been
said that the connexion with the spiritual Triad is through buddhic matter, and
this is indicated in the diagram by the dotted line which connects the atoms
coming down from the line in the buddhic plane, and not from the manasic atom.
It is of buddhic matter that is spun the marvellous web of life which supports
and vivifies all our bodies. If the bodies be looked at with buddhic vision,
they all disappear, and in their places is seen a shimmering golden web of
inconceivable fineness and delicate beauty, a tracery of all their parts, in a
network with minute meshes. This is formed of buddhic matter, and within these
meshes the coarser atoms are built together. Closer inspection shows that the
whole network is formed of a single thread, which is a prolongation of the
Sutratma. During the antenatal life of the babe, this thread grows out from the
permanent physical atom and branches out in every direction, this growth
continuing until the physical body is full grown; during physical life the
prana, the life-[91]breath, plays ever along it, following all its branches
and meshes; at death it is withdrawn, leaving the particles of the body to
scatter; it may be watched, slowly disentangling itself from the dense physical
matter, the life-breath accompanying it, and drawing itself together in the
heart round the permanent atom; as it withdraws, the deserted limbs grow cold
- its absence makes the "death-chill"; the golden-violet flame of the
life-breath is seen shining around it in the heart, and the flame, and the
golden life-web, and the permanent atom
rise along the secondary Sushumna-nadi[40] to the head, into the third
ventricle of the brain; the eyes glaze, as the life-web draws itself away, and
the whole of it is collected round the permanent atom in the third ventricle;
then the whole rises slowly to the point of
junction of the parietal and occipital sutures, and leaves the physical
body - [92] dead. It thus surrounds the permanent atom like a golden shell -
recalling the closely woven cocoon of the silk-worm - to remain enshrouding it
till the building of a new physical body again demands its unfolding. The same
procedure is followed with the astral and mental particles, so that, when these
bodies have disintegrated, the lower triad may be seen as a brilliantly
scintillating nucleus within the causal body, an appearance which had been
noted, long ere closer observation revealed its significance.
3. THE
CHOOSING OF THE PERMANENT ATOMS.
Let us return
to the original appropriation by the Monad of the permanent atoms of the three
higher planes, and seek to understand something of their use, of the object of
their appropriation; the same principles apply to the permanent atoms of each
plane.
In the first
place, it will be remembered that the matter of each plane shows out seven main
types, varying according to the dominance of one or other of the [93] three
great attributes of matter: inertia, mobility, and rhythm. Hence the permanent
atoms may be chosen out of any one of these types, but it appears that, by a
single Monad, they are all chosen out of the same type. It appears, further,
that while the actual attachment of the permanent atoms to the life-thread on
the three higher planes is the work of the Hierarchies before spoken of, the
choice which directs the appropriation is made by the Monad himself. He himself
belongs to one or other of the seven groups of Life already spoken of; at the
head of each of these groups stands a Planetary Logos, who "colours"
the whole, and the Monads are grouped by these colourings, each "being
coloured by his 'Father-Star'".[41] This is the first great determining
characteristic of each of us, our fundamental "colour", or
"key-note", or "temperament". The Monad may choose to use
his new pilgrimage for the strengthening and increasing of this special
characteristic; if so, the Hierarchies will attach to his life-thread atoms
belonging [94] to the group in matter corresponding to his life-group. This
choice would result in the secondary "colour", or "keynote",
or "temperament", emphasising and strengthening the first, and, in
the later evolution, the powers and the weaknesses of that doubled temperament
would show themselves with great force. Or, the Monad may choose to use his new
pilgrimage for the unfolding of another aspect of his nature; then the
Hierarchies will attach to his life-thread atoms belonging to the material
group corresponding to another life-group, that in which the aspect he wills to
develop is predominant. This choice would result in the secondary
"colour", or "key-note", or "temperament",
modifying the first, with corresponding results in the later evolution. This
latter choice is obviously by far the more frequent, and it tends to a greater
complexity of character, especially in the final stages of human evolution,
when the influence of the Monad makes itself felt more strongly.
As said
above, it appears that all the permanent atoms are taken from the same [95]
material group, so that those of the lower triad correspond with those of the
higher; but on the lower planes the influence of these atoms in determining the
type of materials used in the bodies of which they are the generating centres -
the question to which we must now turn our attention - is very much limited and
interfered with by other causes. On the higher planes the bodies are relatively
permanent, when once found, and reproduce definitely the keynote of their
permanent atoms, however enriched that note may be by overtones, ever
increasing in subtlety of harmony. But on the lower planes, while the keynote
of the permanent atoms will be the same, various other causes come in to
determine the choice of materials for the bodies, as will be better seen
presently.
4. THE USE OF
THE PERMANENT ATOMS.
To put this
use into a phrase: The use of the permanent atoms is to preserve within
themselves, as vibratory powers, the results of all the experiences through
[96] which they have passed. It will perhaps be best to take the physical atom
as an illustration, since this is susceptible of easier explanation than those
on higher planes.
A physical
impact of any kind will cause vibrations corresponding to its own in the
physical body it contacts; these may be local or general, according to the
nature and force of the impact. But whether local or general, they will reach
the permanent physical atom, transmitted by the web of life in all cases, and
in violent impacts by mere concussion also. This vibration, forced on the atom
from outside, becomes a vibratory power in the atom - a tendency therein to
repeat the vibration. Through the whole life of the body, innumerable impacts
strike it; not one but leaves its mark on the permanent atom; rot one but
leaves it with a new possibility of vibration. All the results of physical
experiences remain stored up in this permanent atom, as powers of vibrating. At
the end of a physical life, this permanent atom has thus stored up innumerable
vibratory powers; that is, has [97] learned to respond in countless ways to the
external world, to reproduce in itself the vibrations imposed upon it by
surrounding objects. The physical body disintegrates at death; its particles
scatter, all carrying with them the result of the experiences through which
they have passed - as indeed all particles of our bodies are ever doing day by
day, in their ceaseless dyings out of one body and ceaseless birthings into
another. But the physical permanent atom remains; it is the only atom that has
passed through all the experiences of the ever-changing conglomerations we call
our body, and it has acquired all the results of all those experiences. Wrapped
in its golden cocoon, it sleeps through the long years during which the Jivatma
that owns it is living through other experiences in other worlds. By these it
remains unaffected, being incapable of responding to them, and it sleeps
through its long night in undisturbed repose.[42]
When the time
for reincarnation comes, [98] and the presence of the permanent atom renders
possible the fertilisation of the ovum from which the new body is to grow,[43]
its keynote sounds out, and is one of the forces which guide the ethereal
builder, the elemental charged with the building of the physical body, to
choose the materials suitable for his work, for he can use none that cannot be
to some extent attuned to the permanent atom. But it is only one of the forces;
the karma of past lives, mental, emotional, and in relation to others, demands
materials capable of the most varied expressions; out of that karma, the Lords
of Karma have chosen such as is congruous, i.e., such as can be expressed
through a body of a particular material
group; this congruous mass of karma determines the material group, over-riding
the permanent atom, and out of that group are chosen by the elemental such materials
as can vibrate in [99] harmony with the permanent atom, or in discords not
disruptive in their violence. Hence, as said, the permanent atom is only one of
the forces in determining the third "colour", or "keynote",
or "temperament", which characterises each of us. According to this
temperament will be the time of the birth of the body; it must be born into the
world at a time when the physical planetary influences are suitable to its
third temperament, and it thus is born "under its" astrological
"Star". Needless to say, it is not the Star that imposes the
temperament, but the temperament that fixes the epoch of birth under that
Star. But herein lies the explanation of the correspondences between Stars -
Star-Angels, that is to say - and characters, and the usefulness for
educational purposes of a skilfully and carefully drawn horoscope, as a guide
to the personal temperament of a child.
That such
complicated results, capable of impressing their peculiarities on surrounding
matter, can exist in such minute space as an atom may, indeed, appear
inconceivable - yet so it is. And it is [100] worthy notice that ordinary
science countenances a similar idea, since the infinitesimal biophors in the
germinal cell of Weismann are supposed to thus carry on to the offspring the
characteristics of his line of progenitors. While the one brings to the body
its physical peculiarities from its ancestors, the other supplies those which
have been acquired by the evolving man during his own evolution. H. P.
Blavatsky has put this very clearly:
"The
German embryologist-philosopher - stepping over the heads of the Greek
Hippocrates and Aristotle, right back into the teachings of the old Aryans -
shows one infinitesimal cell, out of millions of others at work in the formation
of an organism, alone and unaided determining, by means of constant
segmentation and multiplication, the correct image of the future man, or
animal, in its physical, mental, and psychic characteristics.
Complete the
physical plasm, mentioned above, the 'germinal cell' of man with all its
material potentialities, with the 'spiritual plasm' so to say, or the fluid
that contains the five lower principles of [101] the six-principled Dhyani -
and you have the secret, if you are spiritual enough to understand
it."[44]
A little
study of physical heredity in the light of Weismann's teachings will be
sufficient to convince the student of the possibilities of such a body as the
permanent atom. A man reproduces the features of a long-past ancestor, shows
out a physical peculiarity that characterised a forbear several centuries ago.
We can trace the Stuart nose through a long series of portraits, and
innumerable cases of such resemblances can be found. Why then should there be
anything extraordinary in the idea that an atom should gather within itself not
biophors, as in the germinal cell, but tendencies to repeat innumerable
vibrations already practised. No spatial difficulty arises, any more than in
the case of a string, from which numerous notes can be drawn by bowing it at
different points, each note containing numerous overtones. We must not think of
the minute space of an atom as crowded with innumerable vibrating bodies, but
of a [102] limited number of bodies, each capable of setting up innumerable
vibrations.
Truly,
however, even the spatial difficulty is illusory, for there are no limits to
the minute any more than to the great. Modern science now sees in the atom a
system of revolving worlds, each world in its own orbit, the whole resembling a
solar system. The master of illusion, Space, like his brother master, Time,
cannot here daunt us. There is no limit of the possibilities of sub-division
in thought, and hence none in the thought-expression we call matter.
The normal
number of spirillae at work in the permanent atoms in this Round is four; as in
the ordinary unattached atoms of matter in general at this stage of evolution.
But let us take the permanent atom in the body of a very highly evolved man, a
man far in advance of his fellows. In such a case we may find the permanent
atom showing five spirillae at work, and may seek to learn the bearing of this
fact on the general materials of his body. In ante-natal life, the presence of
this five-spirillae-permanent-atom would have [103] caused the building
elemental to select among his materials any similar atoms that were available.
For the most part, he would be reduced to the use of any he could find, which
had been in temporary connexion with any body the centre of which was a
five-spirillae-permanent-atom. Its presence would have tended to arouse in
them a corresponding activity, especially - perhaps only - if they had formed
part of the brain or nerves of the highly developed tenant of the body. The
fifth spirilla would have become more or less active in them, and although it
would have dropped back into inactivity
after leaving such a body, its temporary activity would have predisposed it to
respond more readily in the future to the current of monadic life. Such atoms,
then, would be secured by the elemental for his work, as far as possible. He
would also, should opportunity serve, appropriate from the paternal or maternal
bodies, if they were of a high order, any such atoms as he could secure, and
build them into his charge. After birth, and throughout life, such a body would
attract to itself any [104] similar atoms which came within its magnetic
field. Such a body, in the company of highly evolved persons, would profit to
an exceptional degree by the propinquity, appropriating any five-spirillae-atoms
which were present in the shower of particles flung off from their bodies, and
thus gaining physically, as well as mentally and morally, from their company.
The permanent
astral atom bears exactly the same relation to the astral body as that borne by
the physical permanent atom to the physical body. At the end of the life in
kamaloka - purgatory - the golden life-web withdraws from the astral body,
leaving it to disintegrate, as its physical comrade had previously done, and
enwraps the astral permanent atom for its long sleep. A similar relation is
borne to the mental body by the permanent mental particle during physical,
astral, and mental life; during the early stages of human evolution little
improvement is made in the mental permanent unit by the brief devachanic lives,
not only on account of their brevity, but because the feeble thought-forms
produced by the [105] undeveloped intelligence affect very slightly the
permanent unit. But when thought-power is more highly evolved, the devachanic
life is a time of great improvement, and innumerable vibratory energies are
stored up, and show their value when the time arrives for the building of a new
mental body for the next cycle of reincarnation. At the close of the mental
life in devachan, the golden web withdraws from the mental body, leaving it
also to disintegrate, while it enwraps the mental particle; and the lower
triad of permanent atoms alone remains as the representative of the three lower
bodies. These are stored up, as before said, as a radiant nucleus-like particle
within the causal body. They are thus all that remains to the Ego of his bodies
in the lower worlds, when that cycle of experience is completed, as they were
his means of communication with the lower planes during the life of those
bodies.
When comes
the period for re-birth, a thrill of life from the Ego arouses the mental unit;
the life-web begins to unfold again, and, the vibrating unit acts as a [106]
magnet, drawing towards itself materials with vibratory powers resembling, or
accordant with, its own. The Shining Ones of the Second Elemental Kingdom bring
such materials within its reach; in the earlier stages of evolution they shape
the matter into a loose cloud around the permanent unit, but as evolution goes
on the Ego exercises over the shaping an ever-increasing influence. When the
mental body is partially formed, the life-thrill awakens the astral atom, and
the same procedure is followed. Finally the life-touch reaches the physical
atom, and it acts in the way already described on pp. 98-100.
A questioner
sometimes asks: How can these permanent atoms be stored up within the causal
body, without losing their physical, astral, and mental natures, since the
causal body exists on a higher plane, where the physical, as physical, cannot
be? Such a querent is forgetting, for a moment, that all the planes are interpenetrating,
and that it is no more difficult for the causal body to encircle the triad of
the lower planes, than for it to encircle the [107] hundreds of millions of
atoms that form the mental, astral, and physical bodies belonging to it during
a period of earth-life. The triad forms a minute particle within the causal
body; each constituent part of it belongs to its own plane, but, as the planes
have meeting points everywhere, no difficulty arises in the necessary
juxtaposition. We are all on all planes at all times.
5. MONADIC
ACTION ON THE PERMANENT ATOMS.
We may here
enquire: Is there anything that can be properly termed monadic action - the
action of the Monad on the anupadaka plane - on the permanent atom. Of direct
action there is none, nor can there be until the germinal spiritual Triad has
reached a high stage of evolution; indirect action, that is action on the
spiritual Triad, which in turn acts on the lower, there is continually. But for
all practical purposes we may consider it as the action of the spiritual Triad,
which, as we have seen, is the Monad veiled [108] in matter denser than that of
his native plane.
The spiritual
Triad is drawing most of his energy, and all the directive capacity of that
energy, from the Second Logos, bathed as he is in that stream of Life. What may
be called his own special activity does not concern itself with all the shaping
and building activity of the Second Life-Wave, but is directed to the evolution
of the atom itself, in association with the Third Logos. This energy from the
spiritual Triad confines itself to the atomic sub-planes, and, until the fourth
Round, appears to spend itself chiefly on the permanent atoms. It is directed
first to the shaping and then to the vivifying of the spirillae which form the
wall of the atom. The vortex, which is the atom, is the life of the Third
Logos; but the wall of the spirillae is gradually formed on the external
surface of this vortex during the descent of the Second Logos, not vivified by
Him, but faintly traced out over the surface of this revolving vortex of life.
They remain - so far as the Second Logos is concerned - merely as these [109]
filmy unused channels, but presently, as the life of the Monad flows down, it
plays into the first of these channels, vivifying that channel and turning it
into a working part of the atom. This goes on through the successive Rounds,
and by the time we reach the fourth Round we have four distinct streams of life
from each Monad, circulating through four sets of spirillae in his own
permanent atoms. Now as the Monad works in the permanent atom, and it is put
forward as the nucleus of a body, he begins to work similarly in the atoms that
are drawn round that permanent atom, and vivifies in turn their spirillae; but
that is temporary vivification, and not continuous as in the case of the
permanent atom. He thus brings into activity these faint shadowy films, formed
by the Second Life-Wave, and, when the life of the body is broken up, the atoms
thus stimulated return to the great mass of atomic matter, improved and worked
upon by the life which, during their connexion with the permanent atom, has
been vivifying them. The channels, being thus [110] developed, are more
capable of easily receiving another such life-stream, as they enter another
body, and therein come into relation with a permanent atom belonging to some
other Monad. Thus this work continually goes on, on the physical and astral
planes, and in the particle of mental matter on the mental plane, improving the
materials with which the Monads are permanently or temporarily connected, and
this evolution of atoms is constantly going on under the influence of the
Monads. The permanent atoms evolve more rapidly, because of their continuity of
connexion with the Monad, while the others profit by their repeated temporary
association with the permanent atoms.
During the
first Round of the terrene Chain, the first set of spirillae of the physical
plane atoms becomes thus vivified by the life of the Monad flowing through the
spiritual Triad. This is the set of spirillae used by the pranic, or life-breath,
currents affecting the dense part of the physical body. Similarly in the second
Round the second set of spirillae becomes active, and herein play [111] the
pranic currents connected with the etheric double. During these two Rounds
nothing can be found, in connexion with any form, that can be called sensations
of pleasure and pain. During the third Round, the third set of spirillae
becomes vivified, and here first appears what is called sensibility; for,
through these spirillae, kamic or desire energy can affect the physical body,
the kamic prana can play in them, and thus bring the physical into direct
communication with the astral. During the fourth Round, the fourth set of
spirillae becomes vivified, and the kama-manasic prana plays in them, and makes
them fit to be used for the building of a brain which is to act as the
instrument for thought.
When a person
passes out of the normal, and takes up the abnormal human evolution involved in
preparing for and entering the Path which lies beyond normal evolution, he has
then, in connexion with his permanent atoms, a task of exceeding difficulty. He
must vivify more sets of spirillae than are vivified in the humanity of his
time. [112] Four sets are already at his service, as a fourth Round man. He
begins to vivify a fifth, and thus to bring into manifestation the fifth Round
atom while still working in a fourth Round body. It is to this that allusion is
made in some early theosophical books, in which "Fifth Rounders" and
"Sixth Rounders" are spoken of as appearing in our present humanity.
Those thus designated have evolved the fifth and sixth set of spirillae in
their permanent atoms, thus obtaining a better instrument for the use of their
highly developed consciousness. The change is brought about by certain yoga
practices in the use of which great caution is required, lest injury should be
inflicted on the brain in which this work is being carried on, and further
progress along that particular line stopped during the present incarnation.
[113]
CHAPTER V.
GROUP-SOULS.
1. THE
MEANING OF THE TERM.
SPEAKING
generally, a Group-Soul is a collection of permanent triads, in a triple
envelope of monadic essence. This description is true of all Group-Souls
functioning on the physical plane, but gives no idea of the extreme complexity
of the subject of Group-Souls. For they divide and sub-divide constantly, the
contents of each division and sub-division decreasing in number, as evolution
goes on, until at last a "Group-Soul" encloses but a single triad, to
which it may continue for many births to discharge the protective and nutrient
functions of a Group-Soul, while no longer technically describable as one, the
"Group" having separated off into its constituent parts. [114]
Seven
Group-Souls are to be seen, functioning on the physical plane, before any forms
appear. They first show themselves as vague, filmy forms, one in each stream
of the Second Life-Wave, on the mental plane, becoming more clearly outlined
on the astral plane, and yet more so on the physical. They float in the great
ocean of matter as balloons might float in the sea. Observing them more
closely, we see three separate layers of matter, forming an envelope, which
contains innumerable triads. Before any inmineralisation has taken place, no
golden life-web is, of course, visible around these; only the radiant golden
threads which connect them with their parent Jivatmas are to be seen, shining
with that strange lustre which belongs to their birth-plane. The innermost of
these three layers consists of physical monadic essence; that is, the layer is
composed of atoms of the physical plane, ensouled with the life of the Second
Logos. At first sight, these innermost layers appear to be identical in the
seven Group-Souls; but closer observation reveals that each layer is formed of
atoms [115] from only one of the seven Matter-groups before described. Each
Group-Soul, therefore, differs in material constitution from all the rest, and
the contained triads in each belong to the same matter-group. The second layer
of the Group-Soul envelope is composed of astral monadic essence, belonging to
the same matter-group as the first; and the third of units of the fourth
sub-plane of mental matter of the same type. This triple envelope is the
protector and nourisher of the triads contained within it, veritable embryos,
incapable, as yet, of separate independent activity.
The seven
Group-Souls soon multiply, division going on continually with the
multiplication of distinct sub-types, as the immediate forerunners of the
chemical elements appear, to be followed by the elements themselves, and the
minerals formed from them. The laws of space, for instance - apart from the
specialisation of the contents of the Group-Soul, the permanent triads - may
lead to a division of it.
Thus a vein
of gold in Australia may [116] lead to the inmineralisation of many such triads
within a single envelope, while the laying down of another vein in a distant
place, say the Rocky Mountains, may lead to the division of this envelope, and
the transfer of part of its contents to America in their own envelope. But the
more important causes which bring about sub-divisions will be explained in the
course of our study. The Group-Soul and its contents divide by fission, like
an ordinary cell - one becomes two, two four, and so on. All the triads have to
pass through the mineral kingdom, the place in which matter reaches its
grossest form, and the place where the great wave reaches the limit of its
descent, and turns to begin its upward climbing. Here it is that physical
consciousness must awaken; life must now turn definitely outwards, and
recognise contacts with other lives in an external world.
Now the
evolution of each being in these early stages depends chiefly on the cherishing
life of the Logos, and partly on the co-operating guidance of the Shining Ones,
and partly on its own [117] blind pressure against the limits of its enclosing
form. I have compared the evolution through the mineral, vegetable, and animal
kingdoms to an ante-natal period, and the resemblance is exact. As the child is
nourished by the life-streams of the mother, so does the protective envelope
of the Group-Soul nourish the lives within it, receiving and distributing the
experiences gathered in. The circulating life is the life of the parent; the
young plants, the young animals, the young human beings, are not ready for
independent life as yet, but must draw nourishment from the parent. And so
these germinating lives in the mineral kingdom are nourished by the
Group-Souls, by the envelopes of monadic essence, thrilling with Logic life. A
very fair picture of this stage may be seen in the carpel of a plant, in which
the ovules gradually appear, becoming more and more independent.
For the sake
of a clear conception, we may glance rapidly forward over the changes through
which the Group-Soul passes, as its contents evolve, before going [118] into
details. During the mineral evolution, the habitat of the Group-Soul may be
said to be that of its densest envelope, the physical; its most active working
is on the physical plane. As its contents pass onwards into the vegetable
kingdom, and ascend through it, the physical envelope slowly disappears - as
though absorbed by the contents for the strengthening of their own etheric
bodies - and its activity is transferred to the astral plane, to the nourishing
of the astral bodies of the contained triads. As these develop yet further and
pass into the animal kingdom, the astral envelope is similarly absorbed, and
the activity of the Group-Soul is transferred to the mental plane, and it nourishes
the inchoate mental bodies and shapes them gradually into less vagueness of
outline. When the Group-Soul contains but a single triad, and has nourished
this into readiness for the reception of the third outpouring, what is left of
it disintegrates into matter of the third sub-plane, and becomes a constituent
part of the causal body formed by the downpouring from above meeting the
upward-drawn column [119] from below - to use the graphic waterspout simile.
Then is the re-incarnating Ego born into independent manifestation; the guarded
ante-natal life is over.
2. THE
DIVISION OF THE GROUP-SOUL.
It is on the
physical plane that consciousness must first evolve into Self-consciousness,
must become aware of an external world that makes impacts upon it, and must
learn to refer those impacts to an external world, and to realise as its own
the changes which it undergoes in consequence of those impacts. By prolonged
experiences it will learn to identify with itself the feeling of pleasure or
pain that follows the impact, and to regard as not itself that which touches
its external surface. It will thus make its first rough distinction of
"Not-I" and "I". As experience increases, the "I"
will retreat ever inwards, and one veil of matter after another will be
relegated outwards as belonging to the "Not-I"; but while its
connotations change, this fundamental distinction [120] between subject and
object will ever remain. "I" is the willing, thinking, acting
consciousness; while the "Not-I" is all as to which it wills, about
which it thinks, and on which it acts. We shall have to consider later the way
in which consciousness becomes Self-consciousness, but at present we are
concerned only with its expression in forms, and the part played by the forms.
This consciousness
awakens on the physical plane, and its expression is the permanent atom. In
this it lies sleeping: "It sleeps in the mineral"; and therein some
awakening into lighter slumber must take place, so that it may be roused out of
this deep dreamless sleep, and become sufficiently active to pass on into the
next stage: "It dreams in the vegetable".
Now the
Second Logos, acting in the envelope of the Group-Souls, energises the
permanent physical atoms and, by the mediation of the Shining Ones, as we have
seen, plunges them into the various conditions offered by the mineral kingdom,
where each attaches to itself many mineral particles. At once here we see a
large [121] variety of possible impacts, leading to a variety of experiences,
and so presently to lines of cleavage in a Group-Soul. Some will be whirled
high in air, to fall in torrents of burning lava; some will be exposed to
arctic cold, others to tropic heat; some will be crushed and sheathed in molten
metal in the bowels of the earth; some will be in the sand tossed roughly by
rushing billows. Infinite variety of external impacts will shake and strike and
burn and freeze, and in vague answers of sympathetic vibrations will the
deep-slumbering consciousness respond. When any permanent atom has reached a
certain responsiveness, or when a mineral form, i.e., the particles to which a
permanent atom has attached itself, is broken up, the Group-Soul draws that
atom from its encasement. All the experiences acquired by that atom - and that
means the vibrations it has been forced to execute - remain as powers of
vibrating in particular ways, or as "vibratory powers". That is the
outcome of its life in a form. The permanent atom, losing its embodiment and
remaining for a while naked, as it [122] were, in its Group-Soul, and
continuing to repeat these vibrations, to go over within itself its
life-experiences, sets up pulses which run through the envelope of the
Group-Soul and are thus conveyed to other permanent atoms; thus each affects
and helps all the others while remaining itself. The permanent atoms which have
had experiences similar in character will be more strongly affected by each
other than will be those whose experiences have been very different, and thus
there will be a certain segregation going on within the Group-Soul, and
presently a filmy separating wall will
grow inwards from the envelope, and divide these segregated groups from each
other; and so there will be an ever-increasing number of Group-Souls with
contents showing an ever-increasing distinction of consciousness, while
sharing fundamental characteristics.
Now the
responses of consciousness to external stimuli in the mineral kingdom are far
greater than many quite realise, and some of them are of a nature which shows
that there is a dawning of consciousness also in the astral permanent atom.
[123] For chemical elements exhibit distinct mutual attractions, and chemical
marital relationships are continually disorganised by the intrusion of couples,
one or other of which has a stronger affinity for one of the partners in the
earlier marriage than the original mate. Thus a hitherto mutually faithful
couple, forming a silver salt, will suddenly prove faithless to each other if
another couple, hydro-chloric acid, enters their peaceful household; and the
silver will pounce upon the chlorine and take her to wife, preferring her to
his former mate, and set up a new household as silver chloride, leaving the
deserted hydrogen to mate with his own forsaken partner. Wherever these active interchanges go on
there is a slight stir in the astral atom, in consequence of the violent
physical vibrations set up by the violent wrenching apart, and formation, of
intimate ties, and vague internal thrillings appear. The astral must be roused
from the physical, and consciousness on the physical plane will long take the
lead in evolution. Still, a little cloud of astral matter is drawn round the
permanent astral atom by these [124] slight thrillings, but it is very loosely
held, and seems to be quite unorganised. There does not seem to be any
vibration in the mental atom at this stage.
After ages of
experience in the mineral kingdom, some of the permanent atoms will be ready to
pass into the vegetable kingdom, and will be distributed by the agency of the
Shining Ones over the vegetable world. It is not to be supposed that every
blade of grass, every plant, has a permanent atom within it, evolving to
humanity during the life of this system. Just as in the mineral kingdom, so
here; the vegetable kingdom forms the field of evolution for these permanent
atoms, and the Shining Ones guide them to habitat after habitat, so that they
may experience the vibrations that affect the vegetable world, and again store
up these as vibratory powers in the same fashion as before. The principles of
interchange and of consequent segregation work out as before, and the
Group-Souls in each stream of evolution become more numerous, and more
different in their leading characteristics. [125]
At our
present stage of knowledge, the laws according to which permanent atoms in a
Group-Soul are plunged into the kingdoms of nature are by no means clear. Many
things seem to indicate that the evolution of the mineral, vegetable, and the
lowest part of the animal kingdom belong more to the evolution of the earth
itself than to that of the Jivatmas representing the Monads who are evolving
within the Solar System, and who come, in due course, to this earth to pursue
their own evolution by utilising the conditions it affords. Grass and small
plants of every kind seem to be related to the earth as a man's hairs are
related to his body, and not to be connected with the Monads, represented by
Jivatmas in our five-fold universe. The life in them, holding them together as
forms, appears to be that of the Second Logos, and the life in the atoms and
molecules composing them to be that of the Third Logos, appropriated and
modified by the Planetary Logos of our system of Chains, and further
appropriated and modified by the Spirit of the Earth - [126] an entity wrapped
in great obscurity. These kingdoms offer a field for the evolution of the
Jivatmas truly, but do not exist, apparently, wholly for this purpose. We find
permanent atoms scattered through the mineral and vegetable kingdoms, but are
unable to pierce to the reasons which govern their distribution. A permanent
atom may be found in a pearl, in a ruby, in a diamond; many may be found
scattered through veins or ore, and so on. On the other hand much mineral does
not seem to contain any. So with short-lived plants. But in plants of long
continuance, such as trees, permanent atoms are constantly found. But here
again, the life of the tree seems to be more closely related to the Deva
evolution than to the evolution of the consciousness to which the permanent
atom is attached. It is rather as though advantage were taken of the evolution
of life and consciousness in the tree for the benefit of the permanent atom; it
seems to live there more as a parasite, profiting by the more highly evolved
life in which it is bathed. The fact is that our [127] knowledge on these
points is extremely fragmentary so far.
There is more
activity perceptible in the astral permanent atom during the course of the
accumulation of vegetable experiences by the physical, and it attracts round
itself astral matter which is arranged by the Shining Ones in a rather more
definite way. In the long life of a forest tree, the growing aggregation of
astral matter develops itself in all directions as the astral form of the tree,
and the consciousness attached to the permanent atoms shares, to some extent,
that of its surroundings, experiencing through that astral form the vibrations
causing massive pleasure and discomfort, these vibrations being the result of
those set up in the physical tree by sunshine and storm, wind and rain, cold
and heat. With the perishing of such a tree, the permanent astral atom retreats
to its Group-Soul, now established on the astral plane, with a rich store of
experiences, shared in the manner before described.
Further, as
the consciousness becomes more responsive in the astral, it sends little [128]
thrills downwards to the physical plane, and these give rise to feelings felt
as though in the physical, but really derived from the astral. Where there has
been a long separate life, as in a tree, the permanent mental unit will also
begin to attract round itself a little cloud of mental matter, and on this the
recurrence of seasons will slowly impress itself as a faint memory, which
becomes inevitably a faint anticipation.[45]
At last some
of the permanent physical atoms are ready to pass on into the animal kingdom,
and once more the agency of the Shining Ones guides them into animal forms.
During the later stages of their evolution in the vegetable world, it appears
to be the rule that each triad - physical and astral atoms and mental unit -
shall have a prolonged experience in a single form, so that some thrills of
mental life may be experienced, and the triad may thus be prepared to profit by
the wandering life of the animal. But it also appears that in some cases the
passage into the animal [129] kingdom is made at an earlier stage, and that the
first thrill in the mental unit occurs in some of the stationary forms of
animal life, and in very lowly animal organisms.
In the lowest
types of animals conditions similar to those described as existing in the
mineral and vegetable kingdoms also appear to prevail. Microbes, amaebae,
hydrae, etc., etc., only show a permanent atom as a visitor, now and again, and
obviously in no way depend upon it for life and growth, nor do they break up
when the permanent atom is withdrawn. They are hosts, not bodies formed around
a permanent atom. And it is noteworthy that, at this stage, the golden life-web
in no way represents the organisation of
the host's body, but merely acts as rootlets act in the soil, attaching
particles of soil to themselves and sucking therefrom nourishment. The
permanent atoms in the animal kingdom have received and stored up many
experiences, before they are used by the Shining Ones as centres round which
forms are to be built.
Needless to
say that in the animal [130] kingdom, the permanent atoms receive far more
varied vibrations than in the lower kingdoms, and consequently differentiate
more quickly, the number of triads in the Group-Souls diminishing rapidly as
this differentiation proceeds, and the multiplication of Group-Souls therefore
going on with increasing rapidity. As the period of individuality approaches,
each separate triad becomes possessed of its own envelope, obtained from the
Group-Soul, and takes on successive embodiments as a separate entity, though
still within the enveloping case of protecting and nourishing monadic essence.
Large numbers
of the higher animals in a state of domestication have reached this stage, and
have really become separate re-incarnating entities, although not as yet
possessing a causal body - the mark of what is usually called
individualisation. The envelope derived
from the Group-Soul serves the purpose of a causal body, but consists
only of the third layer, as previously indicated, and is therefore composed of
molecules derived from the fourth grade of mental [131] matter, that which
corresponds to the coarsest ether of the physical plane. Following the analogy of human ante-natal
life, we see that this stage corresponds with its last two months. A
seven-months' babe may be born and may survive, but it will be stronger,
healthier, more vigorous, if it profits for yet another two months by its
mother's shielding and nourishing life. So is it better for the normal
development of the Ego that it should not too hastily burst the envelope of the
Group-Soul, but should still absorb life through it, and strengthen from its
constituents the finest part of its own mental body. When that body has reached
its limit of growth under these shielded conditions, the envelope disintegrates
into the finer molecules of the sub-plane above it, and becomes, as above said,
part of the causal body.
It is the
knowledge of these facts that has sometimes caused occultists to warn people
who are very fond of animals not to be exaggerated in their affection, nor to
show it in unwise ways. [132] The growth of the animal may be unhealthily
forced, and its birth into individuality be hastened out of due time. Man, in
order to fill rightly his place in the world, should seek to understand nature
and work with her laws, quickening indeed their action by the co-operation of
his intelligence, but not quickening it to the point whereat growth is made
unhealthy and its product frail and "out of season". It is true that
the Lord of Life seeks human co-operation in the working out of evolution, but
the co-operation should follow the lines which His Wisdom has laid down. [133]
CHAPTER VI.
UNITY OF
CONSCIOUSNESS.
1.
CONSCIOUSNESS A UNIT.
IN studying
the very varied manifestations of consciousness, we are apt to forget two
important facts: first, that the
consciousness of each man is a Unit, however separate and different from each
other its manifestations may appear to be; secondly, that all these Units themselves are parts of the consciousness of
the Locos, and therefore re-act similarly under similar conditions. We cannot
too often remind ourselves that consciousness is one; that all apparently
separate consciousnesses are truly one, as one sea might pour through many
holes in an embankment. That sea-water might issue from the holes differently
coloured, if the embankment were composed of [134] differently coloured earths;
but it would all be the same sea-water;
analysed, it would all show the presence of the same characteristic salts. So
are all consciousnesses from the same ocean of consciousness, and have many
essential identities. Enveiled in the same kind of matter, they will act in the
same kind of way, and reveal their fundamental identity of nature.
The
individual consciousness appears to be a complexity instead of a unity, when
its manifestations are concerned, and modern psychology speaks of dual and
treble and multiplex personality, losing sight of the fundamental unity among
the confusion of the manifold. Yet truly is our consciousness a Unit, and the
variety is due to the materials in which it is working.
The ordinary
waking-consciousness of a man is the consciousness working through the physical
brain at a certain rate imposed by it, conditioned by all the conditions of
that brain, limited by all its limitations, baulked by the varying obstructions
it offers, checked by a clot [135] of blood, silenced by the decay of tissue.
At every moment the brain hinders its manifestations, while at the same time it
is, on the physical plane, its only enabling instrument of manifestation.
When the
consciousness, turning its attention away from the external physical world,
ignores the denser part of the physical brain, and uses only the etheric
portions thereof, its manifestations at once change in character. The creative
imagination disports itself in etheric matter, and drawing on its accumulated
contents, obtained from the external world by its denser servant, it arranges
them, dissociates, and recombines them after its own fancies, and creates the
lower worlds of dream.
When it casts
aside for a while its ethereal garment, turning its attention away completely
from the physical world, and shedding its fetters of physical matter, it roams
through the astral world at will, or drifts through it unconsciously, turning
all its attention to its own contents, receiving many impacts from that astral
world, which it ignores or accepts according to its stage [136] of evolution,
or its humour of the moment. If it should manifest itself to an outside
observer - as may happen in trance-conditions - it shows powers so superior to
those it manifested when imprisoned in the physical brain, that such an
observer, judging only by physical experiences, may well regard it as a
different consciousness.
Still more is
this the case when, the astral body being thrown into trance, the Bird of
Heaven shows itself soaring into loftier regions, and its splendid flight so
enchants the observer that he deems it a new being, and no longer the same
entity as crawled in the physical world. Yet truly is it ever one and the same;
the differences are in the materials with which it is connected, and through
which it works, and not in itself.
As to the
second important fact stated above, man is not yet sufficiently developed to
appreciate any evidence as to the unity of consciousness in its workings above
the physical plane, but its unity on the physical plane is being demonstrated.
[137]
2. UNITY OF
PHYSICAL CONSCIOUSNESS.
Amid the
immense varieties of the mineral, vegetable, animal, and human kingdoms, the
underlying unity of physical consciousness has been lost sight of, and broad
lines of cleavage have been set up which
do not, in reality, exist. Life has been wholly denied to the mineral, grudged
to the vegetable, and H. P. Blavatsky was ridiculed when she declared that one Life,
one Consciousness vivified and informed all.
"With
every day, the identity between the animal and the physical man, between the
plant and man, and even between the reptile and its nest, the rock, and man, is
more and more clearly shown, the physical and chemical constituents of all
being found to be identical. Chemical Science may well say that there is no
difference between the matter which composes the ox, and that which forms man.
But the occult doctrine is far more explicit. It says: Not only the chemical
compounds are the same, but the same infinitesimal invisible Lives compose the
atoms of the [138] bodies of the mountain and the daisy, of man and the ant, of
the elephant and of the tree which shelters it from the sun. Each particle -
whether you call it organic or inorganic - is a Life."[46]
If this be
true, it should be possible to obtain from such living minerals, vegetables,
animals, and men, evidence of an identity of life, of sentiency, of response to
stimuli; and while we may freely admit that we should expect to find gradations
of sentiency, that as we ascend the ladder of life we should expect the
manifestations to become fuller and more complex, yet some definite
manifestations of sentiency should be found in all who share one life. The evidence
for this was lacking when H. P. Blavatsky wrote; it is available now; and it is
from an eastern scientist, whose rare ability has ensured his welcome in the
West, that the evidence appropriately comes.
Professor
Jagadish Chandra Bose, M.A., D.Sc., of Calcutta, has definitely proved that
so-called "inorganic matter" is responsive to stimulus, and that the
[139] response is identical from metals, vegetables, animals, and - so far as
experiment can be made - man.
He arranged
apparatus to measure the stimulus applied, and to show in curves, traced on a
revolving cylinder, the response from the body receiving the stimulus. He then
compared the curves obtained in tin and in other metals with those obtained
from muscle, and found that the curves from tin were identical with those from
muscle, and that other metals gave curves of like nature but varied in the
period of recovery.
[140]
(a) SERIES OF
ELECTRIC RESPONSES TO SUCCESSIVE MECHANICAL STIMULI AT INTERVALS OF HALF A
MINUTE, IN TIN. (b) MECHANICAL RESPONSES IN MUSCLE.
Tetanus, both
complete and incomplete, due to repeated shocks, was caused, and similar
results accrued, in mineral as in muscle.
EFFECTS
ANALOGOUS TO (a) INCOMPLETE AND (b) COMPLETE TETANUS IN TIN. (a') INCOMPLETE
AND (b') COMPLETE TETANUS IN MUSCLE.
Fatigue was
shown by metals, least of all by tin. Chemical re-agents, such as drugs,
produced similar results on metals with those known to result with animals -
[141] exciting, depressing, and deadly. (By deadly is meant resulting in the
destruction of the power of response.)
A poison will
kill a metal, inducing a condition of immobility, so that no response is
obtainable. If the poisoned metal be taken in time, an antidote may save its
life.
(a) NORMAL
R&SPONSE; (b) EFFECT ON POISON; (c) REVIVAL BY ANTIDOTE.
A stimulant
will increase response, and as large and small doses of a drug have been found
to kill and stimulate respectively, so have they been found to act on metals.
"Among such phenomena," asks Professor Bose, "how can we draw a
line of demarcation and say: Here the physical process ends, and there the
physiological begins? No such barriers exist."[47] [142]
Professor
Bose has carried on a similar series of experiments on plants, and has obtained
similar results. A fresh piece of cabbage stalk, a fresh leaf, or other vegetable
body, can be stimulated and will show similar curves; it can be fatigued,
excited, depressed, poisoned. There is something rather pathetic in seeing the
way in which the tiny spot of light, which records the pulses in the plant,
travels, in ever weaker and weaker curves, when the plant is under the influence of poison, falls
into a final despairing straight line, and - stops. The plant is dead. One
feels as though a murder had been committed - as indeed it has.[48]
These
admirable series of experiment have established, on a definite basis of
physical facts, the teaching of occult science on the universality of life.
Mr. Marcus
Reed has made microscopical observations which show the [143] presence of
consciousness in the vegetable kingdom. He has observed symptoms as of fright
when tissue is injured, and further he has seen that male and female cells,
floating in the sap, become aware of each other's presence without contact; the
circulation quickens, and they put out processes towards each other.[49]
More than
three years after the publication of Professor Bose's experiments, some
interesting confirmation of his observations arose in the course of M. Jean
Becquerel's study of the N-rays, communicated by him to the Paris Academy of
Sciences. Animals under chloroform cease to emit these rays, and they are never
emitted by a corpse. Flowers normally emit them, but under chloroform the
emanation ceases. Metals also emit them, and under chloroform the emanation
again ceases. Thus animals, flowers, and metals alike give out these rays, and
alike cease to emanate them under the action of chloroform.[50] [144]
3. THE
MEANING OF PHYSICAL CONSCIOUSNESS.
The term
"physical consciousness" is used in two distinct senses, and it may
be useful to pause a moment, in order to define these. It is often used to
indicate what is above termed "ordinary waking-consciousness", i.e.,
the consciousness of the man, of the Jivatma -or, if the phrase be preferred,
of the Monad working through the Jivatma, and the lower triad of permanent
atoms. It is also used in the sense in which it is used here, as consciousness
working in physical matter, receiving and responding to physical impacts,
unconcerned with any transmission of impulses onward to the higher planes, or
with any impulses sent to the physical body from those planes.
In this more
restricted and accurate sense, it would include (a) any out-thrillings from
the atoms and molecules ensouled by the life of the Third Logos; (b) any [145]
similar out-thrillings from organised forms ensouled by the life of the Second
Logos; and (c) any similar out-thrillings from the life of the Monad,
proceeding from the permanent atoms, in which the spirillae are not directly
concerned. When the spirillae are active, the "ordinary wakingconsciousness"
is affected. For instance ammonia sniffed up by the nose shows two results;
there is a rapid secretion; that is the response of the cells in the olfactory
tract; there is also a "smell"; that is the result of a vibration
running up to the sense-centres in the astral body, and there recognised in
consciousness; the change in consciousness affects the first set of spirillae
in the atoms of the olfactory tract, and thus reaches the
"waking-consciousness" - consciousness working in the physical brain.
It is only through the spirillae that changes in consciousness on the higher
planes bring about changes in the "waking-consciousness".
It must be
remembered that as the Solar System is a field for the evolution of all the
developing consciousnesses [146] within it, so are there smaller areas within
it, serving as smaller fields. Man is the microcosm of the universe, and his
body serves as a field of evolution for myriads of consciousnesses less evolved
than his own. Thus the three activities mentioned above under (a), (b), and (c)
are all present in his body, and all enter into the physical consciousness
working therein; that in which the atomic spirillae are concerned does not
enter it; that belongs to the consciousness of the Jivatma. The workings of
physical consciousness do not now directly affect the
"waking-consciousness" in the higher animals or in man. They affected
it in the earlier part of the embryonic life in the Group-Soul, while the
consciousness of the Second Logos was "mothering" the dawning
consciousnesses derived from it. But physical consciousness has now sunk below
the "threshold of consciousness", while showing itself as "the
memory of the cell", as the selective action in glands and papillae, and
generally in the carrying on of functions necessary for the support [147] of
bodies. It is the lowest activity of consciousness, and as consciousness functions
more and more actively on the higher plane, its lowest workings no longer
attract its attention, and they become what we call automatic.
Now it is
physical consciousness that is appealed to in Professor Bose's experiments,
and it is the response of this consciousness in the tin and in the animal that
is the same, and is shown in the pulse indicated by the curves; the animal will
feel the stimulus while the tin will not - that is the result of the
additional working of the consciousness in astral matter.
We may thus
allege that consciousness, working in physical matter, responds to various
kinds of stimulation, and that the response is the same, whether it be obtained
from mineral, vegetable, or animal. The consciousness shows the same
characteristic workings, is the same. The differences which, as already said,
we observe as we ascend, lie in the improvement of the physical apparatus, an
apparatus which enables astral and mental - not physical - activities of
consciousness [148] to manifest themselves on the physical plane. Men and
animals feel and think better than minerals and vegetables, because their more
highly evolved consciousness has shaped for itself on the physical plane this
much improved apparatus; but even so, our bodies answer as the lower bodies
answer to the same stimuli, and this purely physical consciousness is the same
in all.
Now in the
mineral, the astral matter connected with the permanent astral atom is so
little active, and consciousness is sleeping so deeply therein, that there is
no perceptible working from the astral to the physical. In the higher plants
there seems to be a sort of forth-shadowing of a nervous system, but it is too
little developed and organised to serve anything but the simplest purposes.
The added activity on the astral plane improves the astral sheath in connexion
with the plant, and the vibrations of the astral sheath affect the etheric
portion of the plant, and thus its denser matter. Hence the forth-shadowing of
a nervous system above alluded to. [149]
When we come
to the animal stage, the much greater activity of the consciousness on the
astral plane causes more powerful vibrations, which pass to the etheric double
of the animal, and by the etheric vibrations thus caused, the nervous system is
builded. The shaping of it is due to the Logos through the Group-Soul, and to
the active assistance of the Shining Ones of the Third Elemental Kingdom,
directing the work of the ethereal Nature-Spirits. But the impulse comes from
the consciousness on the astral plane working in the permanent atom and the
sheath of astral matter attracted by it, roused to activity by the Group-Soul.
As the first very simple apparatus is formed, more delicate impacts from
without can be perceived, and these impacts also help in thy evolution. Action
and reaction succeed each other, and the mechanism continually improves in
receptive and transmitting ability.
Consciousness
does not do much building on the astral plane at this stage, and works there in
an unorganised sheath; the organising is done on the [150] physical plane by
the efforts of consciousness to express itself - dim and vaguely groping as
these efforts are - aided and directed by the Group-Soul and the Shining Ones.
This work has to be completed to a great extent before the Third Life-Wave
pours down, for animal man has evolved, with his brain and nervous systems,
before that great outpouring comes which gives the Jivatma a working body, and
makes possible the higher evolution of man. [151]
CHAPTER VII.
THE MECHANISM
OF CONSCIOUSNESS.
1. THE
DEVELOPMENT OF THE MECHANISM.
IN a very
real sense the whole of the bodies of man form the mechanism of consciousness,
as organs for willing, thinking, and acting; but the nervous apparatus may be
called its special mechanism, as that whereby, in the physical body, it
controls and directs all. Every cell in
the body is composed of myriads of tiny lives, each with its own germinal
consciousness;[51] each cell has its [152] own dawning consciousness, controlling
and organising these; but the central ruling consciousness which uses the whole
body controls and organises it, in turn, and the mechanism in which it
functions for this purpose is the nervous.
This nervous
mechanism is the outcome of astral impulses, and consciousness must be active
on the astral plane before it can be constructed. Impulses set up by the
consciousness - willing to experience and vaguely endeavouring to give effect
to this Will -cause vibrations in etheric matter, and these vibrations, by the
very nature of the matter[52], become electric, magnetic, heat, and other
energies. These are the masons which work under the impulse of the
master-builder, Consciousness. The impulse is from him; the execution is by
them. The directive intelligence, which as yet he cannot furnish, is supplied
by the Logic life in the Group-Soul, and by the [153] Nature-Spirits working
under the guidance, as already said, of the Shining Ones of the Third Elemental
Kingdom.
We have then
to understand that nervous matter is built up on the physical plane under
impulses from the astral, the directly constructive forces being indeed
physical, but the guidance and the setting in motion of them being astral,
i.e., proceeding from consciousness active on the astral plane. The
life-energy, the prana, which flows in rosy waves, pulsing along the etheric
matter in all nerves, not in their medullary sheaths but in their substance,
comes down immediately from the astral plane; it is drawn from the great
reservoir of life, the LOGOS, and is specialised on the astral plane and sent
down thence into the nervous system, blending there with the magnetic, electrical,
and other currents which form the purely
physical prana, drawn from the same reservoir, but through the Sun, His
physical body; close examination shows that the constituents of the prana of
the mineral kingdom are fewer and less complex in arrangement than those of the
[154] prana in the higher vegetable kingdom, and this again less so than that
in the animal and human, and this difference is due to the fact that the astral
prana mingles in the latter and not in the former - to any perceptible degree,
at least. After the formation of the causal body, this complexity of the prana
circulating in the nervous systems of the physical body much increases, and it
appears to become yet more enriched in the progress of human evolution. For as
the consciousness becomes active on the mental plane, the prana of that plane
mingles also with the lower, and so on as the activity of consciousness is
carried on in higher regions.
We may pause
a moment on this word "prana", that I have translated as "life-energy".
Pran is a Samskrit root, meaning to breathe, to live, to blow, made up of an,
to breathe, move, live, and hence the Spirit, joined with the prefix pra,
forth. Thus pra-an, pran, means to breathe forth, and life-breath, or
life-energy, is the nearest English equivalent to the Samskrit term. As [155]
according to Hindu thought there is but one Life, one Consciousness,
everywhere, the word Prana has been used for the Supreme Self, the
all-sustaining Breath. It is the forth-giving energy of the One; for us, the
Life of the LOGOS. Hence that Life on every plane may be spoken of as the Prana
of the plane; it becomes the life-breath in every creature. On the physical plane it is energy, appearing in
many forms, electricity, heat, light, magnetism, etc., transmutable into each
other, because fundamentally one; on other planes we have no names whereby to
designate it, but the idea is definite enough. Appropriated by a being, it is
prana in the narrower sense in which it is generally used in theosophical
literature, the individual's life-breath. It is the vital energy, the vital
force, of which all other energies, chemical, electrical, and the rest, are
merely derivatives and fractional parts; and it is a little quaint for the
occultist when he hears scientific men talking glibly of chemical or electrical
energy, and denouncing their parent, vital energy, as an "exploded [156]
superstition". These partial manifestations of vital energy are merely due
to the arrangements of matter in which it plays, cutting off one or another of
its characteristics, or perhaps all of them save one, as blue glass will shut
off all the rays except the blue ones, and red all except the red.
In The Secret
Doctrine H. P. Blavatsky speaks of the relation of prana to the nervous system.
She quotes, and partly endorses, partly corrects, the view of "nervous
ether", put forward by Dr. B. W. Richardson; the Sun-force is "the
primal cause of all life on earth"[53], and the Sun is "the
store-house of vital force, which is the noumenon of electricity"[54]. The
"'nervous ether' is the lowest principle of the Primordial Essence which
is Life. It is animal vitality diffused in all Nature, and acting according to
the conditions it finds for its activity. It is not an 'animal product'; but
the living animal, the living flower and plant, are its products"[55].
On the
physical plane this prana, this [157] life-force, builds up all minerals, and
is the controlling agent in the chemico-physiological changes in protoplasm,
which lead to differentiation and the building of the various tissues of the
bodies of plants, animals, and men. They show its presence by the power of
responding to stimuli, but for a time this power is not accompanied by distinct
sentiency; consciousness has not unfolded enough to feel pleasure and pain.
When the
current of prana from the astral plane, with its attribute of sentiency, blends
with that of the prana of the physical plane, it begins the building of a new
arrangement of matter - the nervous. This, nervous arrangement is fundamentally
a cell, details as to which can be
studied in any modern text-book dealing with the subject[56], and the
development consists of internal changes and of outgrowths of the matter of the
cell, these outgrowths becoming sheathed [158] in medullary matter and then
appearing a threads or fibres. Every nervous system, however elaborate,
consists of cells and their outgrowths, these outgrowths becoming more
numerous, and forming ever multiplying connexions between the cells, as
consciousness demands, for its expression, a more and more elaborated nervous
system. This fundamental simplicity at the root of such complexity of details
is found even in man, the possessor of the most highly evolved nervous
organisation. The many millions of neural ganglia[57] in the brain and body are
all produced by the end of the third month of ante-natal life, and their
development consists in expansion, and the outgrowth of their substance into
fibres. This development in later life results from the activity of thought; as
a man thinks strenuously and continuously, the thought-vibrations cause
chemical activity, and the dendrons[58] shoot out from the [159] cells, making
connexions and cross-connexions in every direction, literal pathways along
which prana pulsates - prana which is now composed of factors from the
physical, astral and mental planes - and thought-vibrations travel.
Returning
from this digression into the human kingdom, let us see how the building of the
nervous system, by vibratory impulses from the astral, begins and is carried
on. We find a minute group of nerve cells and tiny processes connecting them.
This is formed by the action of a centre which has previously appeared in the
astral body - of which something will presently be said - an aggregation of
astral matter arranged to form a centre for receiving and responding to
impulses from outside. From that astral centre vibrations pass into the etheric
body, causing little etheric whirlpools which draw into themselves particles
of denser physical matter, forming at last a nerve cell, and groups of nerve
cells. These physical centres, receiving vibrations from the outer world, send
impulses back to the astral centres, increasing their vibrations; thus the
[160] physical and the astral centres act and re-act on each other, and each
becomes more complicated and more effective. As we pass up the animal kingdom,
we find the physical nervous system constantly improving, and becoming a more
and more dominant factor in the body, and this first-formed system becomes, in
the vertebrates, the sympathetic system, controlling and energising the vital
organs - the heart, the lungs, the digestive tract; beside it slowly develops
the cerebro-spinal system, closely connected in its lower workings with the
sympathetic, and becoming gradually more and more dominant, while it also
becomes in its most important development the normal organ for the expression
of the "waking consciousness". This cerebro-spinal system is built up
by impulses originating in the mental, not in the astral plane, and is only
indirectly related to the astral through the sympathetic system, built up from
the astral. We shall see later the bearing of this on the astral sensitiveness
of animals, and lowly-developed human beings, the disappearance, of this
sensitiveness with the [161] development of intellect, and its reappearance in
the higher human evolution.
The permanent
atoms form the imperfect but only direct channel between the consciousness
manifesting as the spiritual Triad and the forms he is connected with. In the
case of the higher animals these atoms are exceedingly active, and in the brief
time between the physical lives considerable changes occur in these. As
evolution goes on the increasing flow of life from the Group-Soul and through
the permanent atom, as well as the increasing complexity of the physical
apparatus, rapidly augment the sensitiveness of the animal. There is
comparatively little sensitiveness in the lower animal lives, and little in
fishes, despite their cerebrospinal system. As evolution proceeds, the
sense-centres continue to develop in the astral sheath, and in the higher
animal these are well organised and the senses are acute. But with this
acuteness there is brevity of sensations, and except with the highest animals
little of the mental element mingles to lend increased and longer continued
sensitiveness to sensation. [162]
2. THE ASTRAL
OR DESIRE BODY.
The evolution
of the astral body must be studied in relation to the physical, for while it
plays the part of a creator on the physical plane, as we have seen, its own
further development largely depends on the impulses received through the very
organism it has created. It does not, for a long time, enjoy an independent
life of its own on its own plane, and the organisation of the astral body in
relation to the physical is quite a different matter, and much earlier in time,
than its organisation in relation to the astral world. In the East they speak
of the astral and mental vehicles of consciousness, when acting in relation to
the physical, as koshas, or sheaths, and use the term sharira, or body, for a
form capable of independent action in the visible and invisible worlds. This
distinction may serve us here.
The astral
sheath of the mineral is a mere cloud of appropriated astral matter, and does
not show any perceptible signs of organisation. The same is the case with most
vegetables, but in some there [163] seem to be certain indications of aggregations
and lines, which, in the light of later evolution, appear to be the dawn of
incipient organisation; and in some old
forest trees distinct aggregations of astral matter are visible at
certain points. In animals these aggregations become clearly marked and
definite, forming centres in the astral sheath of a permanent and specialised
kind.
These
aggregations in the astral sheath are the beginnings of the centres which will
build up the necessary organs in the physical body, and are not the often-named
chakras, or wheels, which belong to the organisation of the astral body itself,
and fit it for functioning on its own plane in connexion with the mental
sheath, as the lower type of the eastern sukshma sharira, or subtle body. The
astral chakras are connected with the astral senses, so that a person in whom
they are developed can see, hear, etc., on the astral plane; they lie far ahead
of the point in evolution that we are considering, a point at which the perceptive
powers of consciousness have not yet any organ, even on the physical plane.
[164]
As these
aggregations in the astral sheath appear, the impulses of consciousness on the
astral plane, guided as before explained, play on the etheric double, forming the
etheric whirlpools already mentioned, and corresponding centres thus arise in
the astral sheath and physical body, the sympathetic system being thus built
up. This system always remains thus directly connected with the astral centres,
even after the cerebro-spinal system is evolved. But from the aggregations in
the fore-part or the astral sheath, ten important centres are formed, which
become connected with the brain through the sympathetic system, and gradually
become the dominant organs for the activities of the physical, or
waking-consciousness - that is, for that part of the consciousness which functions
normally through the cerebro-spinal system. Five out of the ten serve to
receive special impressions from the outside world, and are the centres through
which consciousness uses its perceptive powers; they are called in Samskrit,
Jnanendriyas, literally "knowledge-senses", [165] i.e., senses, or
sense-centres, by which knowledge is obtained. These set up, in the way before
explained, five distinct etheric whirlpools, and thus construct five centres in
the physical brain; these, in turn, severally shape and remain connected with
their appropriate sense-organs. Thus arise the five sense-organs: the eyes,
ears, tongue, nose, skin, specialised to receive impressions from the outer
world, corresponding to the five perceptive powers of seeing, hearing, tasting,
smelling, feeling. These are specialised ways in the lower worlds by which part
of the perceptive ability of consciousness, its power of receiving external
contacts, is exercised. They belong to the lower worlds and to the grosser
forms of matter which shut consciousness in, and prevent it, thus enwrapped,
from knowing other lives; they are openings in this dense veil of matter,
permitting vibrations to enter in and reach the shrouded consciousness.
The remaining
five of these ten astral centres serve to convey vibrations from consciousness
to the outer word; they [166] are the avenues outwards, as the knowledge-senses
are the avenues inwards; they are named Karmendriyas, literally action-senses,
senses or sense-centres which cause action. These develop like the others,
forming etheric whirlpools, which make the motor-centres in the physical brain;
these, again, severally shape and remain connected with their appropriate
motor-organs, hands, feet, larynx, and organs of generation and excretion.
We have now
an organised astral sheath, and the continual action and re-action between this
and the physical body improve both, and these together act on the consciousness
and it re-acts on them, both again gaining by this mutual interaction. And as
we have already seen, these blind impulses of consciousness are guided in their
play upon matter by the Logic life in the Group-Soul and by the Nature-Spirits.
Always it is life, consciousness, seeking to realise itself in matter, and
matter responding in virtue of its own inherent qualities, vitalised by the
action of the Third Logos. [167]
3.
CORRESPONDENCE IN ROOT-RACES.
A similar
succession in the present, the fourth, Round marks the evolution of the kingdoms of Nature, the main characteristics
of the previous Rounds being, as it were, repeated in the Root-Races, just as
the history of evolution wrought out during long ages is repeated during the
embryonic life of each new body. During the existence of the first two human
Races there were conditions of temperature which would render sensibility
destructive of any life-manifestation, and those Races show no sensibility to
pleasure and pain on the physical plane. In the third Race there is sensibility
to violent impacts, causing coarse pleasures and pains, but only some of the
senses are evolved, those of hearing, touch, and sight, and these but to a
low stage, as we shall presently see.
Now in the
first two Races there are visible the beginnings of aggregations in the astral
matter of the sheaths, arid if these could connect themselves with appropriate
physical matter there would be in the physical consciousness sensations [168]
of pleasure and pain. But the appropriate connexions are lacking. The first
Race shows a feeble sense of hearing, the second a vague response to impacts,
the dawning sense of touch.
The spiritual
Triad, at this stage or evolution, is so insensitive to vibrations from
external matter that it is only when he receives the tremendous vibrations
caused by impacts on the physical plane that he begins slowly to respond. Everything
begins for him on the physical plane. He does not respond directly, but
indirectly, through the mediation of the Logic life, and only as the primary
physical apparatus is built up do the subtler impulses come through with
sufficient force to cause pleasure and pain. The violent vibrations from the
physical plane cause corresponding vibration on the astral, and he becomes
dimly conscious of sensation. [169]
CHAPTER VIII.
FIRST HUMAN
STEPS.
1. THE THIRD
LIFE-WAVE.
THE middle of
the Third Root-Race had been reached; the nervous apparatus of animal man had been built up to a point at
which it needed for its further improvement the more direct flow of thought
from the spiritual Triad to which it was attached; the Group-Soul had completed
its work for these, the higher products of evolution, as the medium by which
the life of the Second Logos protected and nourished His infant children; it
was now to form the foundation of the causal body, the vessel into which the
down-pouring life was, to be received; the term of the ante-natal life of the
Monad was touched, and the time was ripe for his birth into the [170] lower
world. The mother-life of the Logos had built for him the bodies in which he
could now live as a separate entity in the world of forms, and he was to come
into direct possession of his bodies and take up his human evolution.
We have seen
that the Monads derive their being from the First Logos, and dwell on the
anupadaka, the second, plane during the ages over which we have glanced. We
have also seen that they appropriated to themselves with the help of different
agents the three permanent atoms that represent them as Jivatmas on the third,
fourth, and fifth planes, and also those which form the lower triad on the
fifth, sixth, and seventh. All the communication of the Monad with the planes
below his own has been through the Sutratma, the life-thread, on which the
atoms are strung, that life-thread - of second plane matter - passing from the
atmic atom to the buddhic, from the buddhic to the manasic, and from the
manasic re-entering the atmic, thus making the "Triangle of Light" on
the higher planes. We have seen further [171] that from the line of this
Triangle on the buddhic plane comes forth a thread, the Sutratma of the lower
planes, on which the lower triad is strung.
The time has
now come for a fuller communication than is represented by this delicate thread
in its original form, and it, as it were, widens out. This is but a clumsy way
of picturing the fact that the Ray from the Monad glows and increases, assuming
more the form of a funnel: "The thread between the Silent Watcher and his
shadow becomes stronger an radiant"[59]. This downflow of monadic life is
accompanied by much increased flow between the buddhic and manasic permanent
atoms, and the latter seems to awaken, sending out thrills in every direction.
Other manasic atoms and molecules gather round it, and a whirling vortex is
seen on the three upper sub-planes of the mental plane. A similar whirling
motion is seen in the cloudy mass surrounding the attached mental unit below,
enveloped in the remaining layer of the Group-Soul, as already described. The
layer is torn [172] asunder, and caught up into the vortex above, where it is
disintegrated, and the causal body is formed, a delicate filmy envelope, as the
whirlpool subsides. This downflow of life, resulting in the formation of the
causal body, is called the Third Life-Wave, and is properly ascribed to the
First Logos, since the Monads came forth from Him and represent His triune
life.
The causal
body once formed, the spiritual Triad has a permanent vehicle for further
evolution, and when Consciousness becomes able to function freely in this
vehicle, the Triad will be able to control and direct, far more effectively
than ever before, the evolution of the lower vehicles.
The earlier
efforts to control are not, however, of a very intelligent description, any
more than the first movements of the body of the infant show they are directed
by any intelligence, although we know that an intelligence is connected with
it. The Monad is now, in a very real sense, born on the physical plane, but
still he must be regarded as a babe there, and must pass through an immense
period of time before [173] his power over the physical body will be anything
but infantile.
2. HUMAN
DEVELOPMENT.
And this is
clearly seen if we look at man as he was in his early days. Those long-perished
Lemurians - if we except those entities who had already developed consciousness
to a considerable extent, and who took birth in the clumsy Lemurian bodies in
order to lead human evolution - were very poorly developed as to their sense
organs; those of smell and taste were
not developed, but were only in process of building. Their sensitiveness to
pleasure and pain was slight.
In the
Atlanteans the senses were much more active; sight was very keen and hearing
was acute; taste was more developed than among the Lemurians, but was still not
highly evolved; coarse and rank foods were found perfectly tolerable and even
agreeable, and very highly-flavoured articles of diet, such as decaying meat,
were preferred to more delicate viands, which were considered [174] tasteless.
The body was not very sensitive to injuries, and severe wounds did not cause
much pain, nor were followed by prostration - even extensive lacerations
failing to incapacitate the sufferer - and healing very quickly. The remnants
of the Lemurian Race now existing, as well as the widely spread Atlantean,
still show a relative insensitiveness to pain, and undergo, with very partial
disablement, lacerations that would utterly prostrate a fifth Race man. A North
American Indian has been reported as fighting on after the side of the thigh had been slashed
away, and taking the field again after twelve or fifteen hours. This characteristic
of the fourth Race body enables a savage to bear with composure, and to recover
from, tortures that would prostrate a fifth Race man from nervous shock.
These
differences derive largely from the varying developments of the permanent
atom, the nucleus of the physical body. There is, in the fifth Root-Race, a
fuller stream of life pouring down, causing the greater internal development of
the permanent atom, and increasing as [175] that development proceeds. As
evolution goes on, there is an increasing complexity of vibratory powers in the
physical permanent atom, a similar increase in the astral atom, and again in
the mental unit. As birth follows birth, and these permanent nuclei are put out
on each plane to gather round them the new mental, astral and physical
encasements, the more highly developed permanent atoms draw round them the more
highly developed atoms on the planes to which they belong, and thus build up a
better nervous apparatus through which the ever-increasing stream of consciousness
can flow. In this way is built up the delicately organised nervous apparatus of
the fifth Race man.
In the fifth
Race man the internal differentiation of the nervous cells is much increased,
and the intercommunications are much more numerous. Speaking generally, the
consciousness of the fifth Race man is working on the astral plane, and is
withdrawn from the physical body except so far as the cerebro-spinal nervous
system is concerned. The control of the vital organs of the body is left to the
[176] sympathetic system, trained through long ages to perform this work, and
now kept going by impulses from the astral centres other than the ten, without
deliberate attention from the otherwise occupied consciousness, although of
course sustained by it. It is, however, as we shall presently see, quite
possible to draw the attention of consciousness again to this part of its
mechanism, and to reassume intelligent control of it. In the more highly
evolved members of the fifth Race, the main impulses of consciousness are sent
down from the lower mental world; and work down through the astral to the
physical, and there stimulate the physical nervous activity. This is the keen,
subtle, intelligent consciousness, moved by ideas more than by sensations, and
showing itself more actively in the mental and emotional brain-centres than in
those concerned with sensory and motor phenomena.
The
sense-organs of the fifth Race body are less active and acute than those of the
highest fourth Race in responding to purely physical impacts. The eye, the
[177] ear, the touch do not respond to vibrations which would affect the
fourth Race sense-organs. It is significant, also, that these organs are at
their keenest in early childhood, and diminish in sensitiveness from about the
sixth year onward. On the other hand, while less acute in receiving pure
sense-impacts, they become more sensitive to sensations intermingled with
emotions, and delicacies of colour and of sound, whether of nature or of art,
appeal to them more effectively. The higher and more intricate organisation of
the sense-centres in the brain and in the astral body seems to bring about
increased sensitiveness to beauty of colour, form, and sound, but diminished
response to the sensations in which the emotions play no part.
The fifth
Race body is also far more sensitive to shock than are the bodies of the fourth
and third Races, being more dependent upon consciousness for its upkeep. A
nervous shock is far more keenly felt, and entails far greater prostration. A
severe mutilation is no longer a question merely of lacerated muscle, of [178]
torn tissues, but of dangerous nervous shock; the highly organised nervous
system carries the message of distress to the brain centres, and it is sent on
from them to the astral body, disturbing and upsetting the astral
consciousness. This is followed by disturbance on the mental plane; imagination
is aroused, memory stimulates anticipation, and the rush of mental impulses
intensifies and prolongs sensations. These again stimulate and excite the
nervous system, and its undue excitation acts on the vital organs, causing
organic disturbance; hence depression of vitality and slow recovery.
So also in
the highly evolved fifth Race body, mental conditions largely rule the physical, and intense anxiety, mental
suffering, and worry, producing nervous tension, readily disturb organic
processes and bring about weakness or disease. Hence mental strength and
serenity directly promote physical health, and when the consciousness is
definitely established on the astral or the mental plane, emotional and mental
disturbance are far more productive of ill-health than [179] any privations
inflicted on the physical body. The evolved fifth Race man lives physically
literally in his nervous system.
2.
INCONGRUOUS SOULS AND BODIES.
But we should
here notice a significant fact, bearing on the all-important question of the
relation of the nervous organisation to consciousness. When a human consciousness
has not yet grown beyond the later Lemurian or earlier Atlantean type, but is
born into a fifth Race body, it presents a curious and interesting study. (The
reasons for such a birth cannot here be enlarged upon; briefly, as the more advanced nations annex
the lands occupied by little evolved
tribes, and kill them off either directly or indirectly, the people thus
summarily evicted from their bodies have
to find new habitats; the suitable savage conditions are becoming rarer and rarer, under the ever-expanding
flood of higher races, and they have to take birth under the lowest available
conditions, such as the slums of large cities, in families of criminal types.
They [180] are drawn to the conquering nation by karmic necessity.) Such
persons incarnate in fifth Race bodies of the worst available material. They
then show out in these fifth Race bodies the qualities that belong to the
earlier fourth or the third; and though they have the physical outer nervous
organisation, they have not the internal differentiation in the nervous matter
that only comes with the play on physical matter of energies coming from the astral and mental worlds. We observe in
them the non-responsiveness to impressions from outside, unless the
impressions are of a violent order, that marks the low grade of development of
the individual consciousness. We notice the falling back into inertia when a
violent physical stimulus is absent; the recurrent craving for such violent
stimulus when roused by physical necessities; the stirring into faint mental
activity under vehement impact on the sense-organs, and the blankness when the
sense-organs are at rest; the complete absence of any response to a thought or
a high emotion - not a rejection but an un-consciousness of it. Excitement or
violence [181] in such a person is caused as a rule by something outside - by
something coming before him physically which his dawning mind connects with the
possibility of gratifying some passion which he remembers, and desires again
to feel. Such a person may not be intent on robbery or murder at all, but may
be stimulated into either or both by the
mere sight of a well-dressed passer-by who seems likely to have money - money,
that means gratification by food, drink, or sex. The stimulus to attack the
passer-by is at once given, and will be followed at once by action, unless
checked by a physical and obvious danger, such as the sight of a policeman. It
is the embodied physical temptation which arouses the idea of committing the
crime; a man who plans a crime beforehand is more highly developed; the mere
savage commits a crime on the impulse of the moment, unless faced by another
physical embodiment, that of a force which he fears. And when the crime is
committed, he is impervious to all appeals to shame or remorse; he is
susceptible only to terror.
These remarks
do not, of course, apply [182] to the intelligent criminal, but only to the
congenital brutal and obtuse type, the third or fourth Race savage in a fifth
Race body.
As the truths
of the Ancient Wisdom more and more colour modern thought, they will
inevitably, among other things, modify the treatment of the criminal. Such
criminals as are here spoken of will not be punished brutally, but will be kept
permanently under strict discipline; and will be, as far as is practicable,
aided to progress more quickly than would have been possible under the
conditions of savage life. But the further consideration of this would lead us
too far from our main study, and we must now return to the workings of
consciousness on the astral plane, as they show themselves in the higher
animals and in the lower human types.
4. DAWN OF
CONSCIOUSNESS ON THE ASTRAL PLANE.
We have seen
that astral organisation precedes and shapes the physical nervous [183] system,
and we have now to consider how this must affect the workings of consciousness.
We should expect to find that consciousness on the astral plane will become
aware of impacts on its astral sheath in a vague and un-precise way, just as,
in the minerals and the plants and the lowest animals, it became aware of
impacts on its physical body. This awareness of astral impacts will long
precede any definite organisation in the astral sheath, the bridge between the
mental and the physical, that will gradually evolve it into an astral body, the
independent vehicle of consciousness on the astral plane. And, as we have seen,
the first organisation in the astral sheath is a response to impacts received
through the physical body, and is related to the physical body in its
evolution. This organisation has nothing to do directly with the reception,
co-ordination, and understanding of astral impacts, but is engaged in being
acted upon by, and re-acting on, the physical nervous system. Consciousness
everywhere precedes Self-consciousness and the evolution of [184] consciousness
on the astral plane proceeds contemporaneously with the evolution of
Self-consciousnesss - to be dealt with presently - on the physical.
The impacts
on the astral sheath from the astral plane produce vibratory waves over the
whole astral sheath, and the ensheathed consciousness gradually becomes dimly
aware of these surgings, without relating them to any external cause. It is
groping after the much more violent physical impacts, and such power of
attention as it has evolved is turned on them. The aggregations of astral
matter, connected with the physical nervous systems, naturally share in the
general surgings of the astral sheath, and the vibrations caused by these
surgings mingle with those coming from
the physical body, and affect also the vibrations sent down to it by the
consciousness through these aggregations. Thus a connexion is established
between astral impacts and the sympathetic system, and they play a
considerable part in its evolution. As the consciousness working in the
physical body begins slowly to recognise an external world, [185] these impacts
from the astral - gradually classified under the five senses as are the impacts
from the physical - mingle with those from the physical plane and are not
distinguished as being different from them in origin. This recognition is the
lower clairvoyance, that which precedes the great evolution of mind. So long as
the sympathetic system is acting as the dominant apparatus of consciousness, so
long will the origin, astral or physical, of impacts remain as the same to consciousness.
Even the higher animals - in whom the cerebro-spinal system is well developed,
but in whom it is not yet, save in its sense-centres, the chief mechanism of
consciousness - fail to distinguish between physical and astral sights, sounds,
etc. A horse will leap over an astral body as though it were a physical one; a
cat will rub herself against the legs of an astral figure; a dog will growl at
a similar appearance. In the dog and the horse there is the dawning of an uneasy
sense of some difference, shown by the fear of such appearances often
manifested by the dog, and by the timidity of the horse. [186] The nervousness
of the horse - despite which he can be trained to face the dangers of a
battle-field, and even, as with Arab mares, learn to pick up and carry away his
fallen rider through all the alarming surroundings - seems chiefly due to his
confusion and bewilderment as to his environment, and his inability to
distinguish between what later he will learnedly call "objective
realities", against which he can injure his body, and
"delusions", or "hallucinations", through which his body
can pass unscathed. To him they are all "real", and the difference of
their behaviour alarms him; in the case of an exceptionally intelligent
horse the nervousness is often greater,
as he evolves a dawning sense of difference in the phenomena themselves, and
this at first, not being understood, is yet more disquieting.
The savage,
living more in the cerebro-spinal system, distinguishes between the physical
and the astral phenomena, though the latter to him are as "real" as
the physical: he relates them to another world, to which he relegates [187] all
things that do not behave in the way he considers normal. He does not know that,
with regard to these, he is conscious through the sympathetic and not through
the cerebro-spinal system; he is conscious of them - that is all. The Lemurians
and early Atlanteans were almost more conscious astrally than they were
physically. Astral impacts, throwing the whole astral sheath into waves, came
through the sense-centres of the astral to the sympathetic centres in the
physical body, and they were vividly aware of them. Their lives were dominated
by sensations and passions more than by intellect, and the special apparatus of
the astral sheath, the sympathetic system, was then the dominant mechanism of
consciousness.
As the
cerebro-spinal system became elaborated, and more and more assumed its peculiar
position as the chief apparatus of consciousness on the physical plane, the
attention of consciousness was fixed more and more on the external physical
world, and its aspect of activity, as the concrete mind, was brought into
greater [188] and greater prominence. The sympathetic system became
subordinate, and its indications were less and less regarded, submerged under
the flood of the coarser and heavier physical impacts from without. Hence a
lessening of astral consciousness and an increase of intelligence, though there
still remains in almost every one a vague sense of non-understood impressions
received from time to time.
At the
present stage of evolution this lower form of clairvoyance is still found among
human beings, but in persons of very limited intellect; they have little idea
as to its rationale, and little control over its exercise. Attempts to increase
it are apt to cause nervous disturbances of a very refractory kind, and these
attempts are against the law of evolution, which works ever forward towards a
higher end, and does not move backwards. As the law cannot be changed, attempts
to work against it only cause disturbance and disease. We cannot revert to the
condition in which the sympathetic system was dominant, save at the cost of
health, and of the higher intellectual evolution. [189] Hence the serious
danger of following many of the directions now published broadcast, to meditate
on the solar plexus, and other sympathetic centres.
The
practices, a few of which have come over to the West, are systematised into
Hatha Yoga in India. Control over the involuntary muscles is regained, so that
a man can reverse peristaltic action, inhibit the beating of the heart, vomit
at will, and so on. Much time and trouble must be wasted ere the performance
of such feats becomes possible, and at the end the man has only brought back to
the control of the will muscles which have long since been handed over by it to
the sympathetic system. As that handing-over was done by a gradual turning away
of attention, so is it by a concentration of attention on the parts concerned
that the earlier achievement is reversed. As such performances impose upon the
ignorant, who regard them as evidences of spiritual greatness, they are often
practised by men who desire power, and are unable to obtain it in a more
legitimate way. Moreover, [190] they are the easiest form of Hatha Yoga; and
are more easily cultivated, and cost far less suffering, than holding an arm
extended till it withers, or lying on a bed of spikes.
When the
cerebro-spinal system is thrown temporarily into abeyance, the impulses from
the astral sheath through the sympathetic system make themselves felt in
consciousness. Hence "lucidity" in trance, self-induced or imposed,
the power of reading in the astral by the use of crystals, and other similar devices.
The partial or complete suspension of the action of consciousness in the higher
vehicle causes it to direct attention on the lower.
It may be
well to add here, to prevent misconception, that the higher clairvoyance
follows, instead of preceding, the growth of mind, and cannot appear until the
organisation of the astral body, in contradistinction to the astral sheath,
has been carried to a considerable height. When this is effected by the play of
intellect and the perfecting of the physical intellectual apparatus, then the
true astral senses [191] before mentioned, called the chakras, or wheels, from
their whirling appearance, are gradually evolved. These develop on the astral
plane, as astral senses and organs, and are built and controlled from the
mental plane, as were the brain-centres from the astral. Consciousness is then
working on the mental plane and building its astral mechanism, as before it
worked on the astral plane, building its physical mechanism. But now it works
with far greater power and greater understanding, having unfolded so many of
its powers. Further, it shapes centres in the physical body from the
sympathetic and cerebrospinal systems, to act as physical plane apparatus for
bringing into the brain-consciousness the vibrations from the higher planes.
As these centres are vivified, knowledge is "brought through", i.e.,
is available for the use of consciousness working in the physical nervous
system. This, as said, is the higher clairvoyance, the intelligent and
self-directed exercise of the powers of consciousness in the astral body.
In this
upward-climbing, then, the [192] powers of consciousness are awakened on the
physical plane, and are then severally awakened on the astral and the mental.
The astral and mental sheaths must be highly evolved ere they can be farther
developed into the subtle body, acting independently on the higher planes, and
then building for itself the necessary apparatus for the exercise of these
higher powers in the physical world. And even here when the apparatus is ready,
built by pure thought and pure desire, it must be vivified on the physical
plane by the fire of Kundalini, aroused and directed by the consciousness
working in the physical brain. [193]
CHAPTER IX.
CONSCIOUSNESS
AND SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS.
1.
CONSCIOUSNESS.
For an
immense period of time - throughout the later vegetable and the animal
evolution, and throughout the evolution of normal humanity up to the present
time - the astral, or desire, sheath is, as we have seen, subordinate to the
physical, so far as the workings of consciousness are concerned. We have now
to trace the unfolding of the consciousness, of the life becoming aware of its
surroundings. While the nervous system is truly said to be created from the
astral plane, it is none the less created for the expression of consciousness
on the physical plane, and for its effective working thereon. It is there that
consciousness is first to become Self-consciousness. [194]
When the
vibrations of the outer world play on the physical sheath of the infolded infant Self, the Jivatma, the Ray of the
Monad, they at first cause responsive thrills within that Self, a dawning consciousness
within itself, a feeling, unrelated by that Self to anything outside, though
caused by impacts from outside. It is a change outside the enveloping film of
the Self, clothed in sheaths of denser matter, which outside change causes a
change within that envelope, and this change causes an act of consciousness -
consciousness of change, of a changed condition. It may be an attraction, a
drawing towards, exerted by an external object over the sheaths, reaching to
the envelope of the Self, causing a slight expansion in the envelope, following
an expansion in the sheaths, towards the attractive object; and this expansion
is a change of condition, and causes a feeling, an act of consciousness. Or it
may be a repulsion, a driving away, again exerted by an external object against
the sheaths, reaching to the envelope of the Self, causing a slight shrinking in
the envelope, following the shrinking [195] away of the sheaths from the
repellent object; and this shrinking is also a change of condition, and causes
a corresponding change in consciousness.
When we
examine the conditions of the enveloping sheaths under an attraction and a
repulsion, we find they are entirely different. When the impact of an external
object causes a rhythmical vibration in these envelopes - that is, when their
materials are made to arrange themselves in undulating regular lines of rarefaction
and densification - this arrangement of the enclosing matter permits an
interchange of life between the two objects that have come into contact, and in
proportion to the correspondence of the rarefactions and densifications in the
two is the fulness of the interchange. This interchange, this partial union of
two separated Lives through the separating sheaths of matter, is
"pleasure", and the going out of the Lives towards each other is
"attraction"; however complicated pleasure may become, herein lies
its essence; it is a sense of "moreness", of increased, expanded
life. The more fully developed the Life, the [196] greater the pleasure in the
realisation of this moreness, in the expansion into the other Life, and each of
the Lives thus uniting gains the moreness by union with the other. As
rhythmical vibrations and corresponding rarefactions and densifications make
this interchange of life possible, it is truly said that "harmonious
vibrations are pleasurable". When, on the contrary, the impact of an
external object causes a jangle of vibrations in the envelopes of the impacted
object - that is, when the materials are made to arrange themselves
irregularly, moving in conflicting directions, striking themselves against each
other - the contained Life is shut in, isolated, its normal out-flowing rays
are checked, intercepted, even turned back on themselves. This check to normal
action is "pain", increasing with the energy of the in-driving, and
the result of the driving-in process is "repulsion". Here, also, the
more fully developed the Life, the greater the pain in this violent reversal of
its normal action, and in the sense of frustration that accompanies the
reversal. Hence, again, "inharmonious vibrations are [197] painful".
Be it observed that this is true of all the sheaths, although the astral sheath
becomes specialised as the recipient of the class of sensations later called
pleasurable and painful. Constantly, in the course of evolution, a general
life-function thus becomes specialised, and a particular organ is normally used
for its exercise. The astral body being the vehicle of desires, the need for
its special susceptibility to pleasure and pain is obvious.
To return
from this brief digression into the state of the envelopes to the germ of consciousness itself; we shall find it
important to notice that there is herein no "awareness" of an
external object, no such awareness as is ordinarily conveyed by the use of the
word. Consciousness, as yet, knows nothing of an outer and an inner, of an
object and a subject; the divine germ is now becoming conscious. It becomes
consciousness with this change of conditions, with this movement in the
sheaths, this expanding and contracting, for consciousness exists only in, and
by, change. Here, then, for the separated divine germ is the birth of
consciousness; [198] it is born of change, of motion; where and when this first
change occurs, there, consciousness, for that separated germ, is born.
The mere
clothing of this germ with successive envelopes of matter on successive planes
gives rise to these first vague changes within the germ that are the birthing
of consciousness; and none of us may count the ages which roll on as these
changes become more defined, and as the envelopes become more definitely shaped
by the ceaseless impacts from without, and the no less ceaseless responsive
thrillings from within. The state of consciousness at this stage can only be
described as one of "feeling", feeling becoming slowly more and more
definite, and assuming two phases, pleasure and pain - pleasure with expansion, pain with contraction. And, be it
noted, this primary state of consciousness does not manifest the three
well-known aspects of Will, Wisdom, and Activity, even in the most germinal
stage; "feeling" precedes these, and belongs to consciousness as a
whole, though in later stages of evolution it shows itself so much in connexion
with the Will-Desire aspect [199] as to become almost identified with it; in
the plural, as feelings, indeed, it belongs to that aspect, which is the first
to arise as a differentiation within consciousness.
As the states
of pleasure and pain become more definitely established in consciousness, they
give rise to the three aspects: with the fading away of pleasure there is a
continuance of the attraction in consciousness, a memory, and this becomes a
dim groping after it, a vague following of the vanishing feeling, a movement - too
indefinite to be called an effort - to hold it, to retain it; similarly with
the fading away of pain there is a continuance
of the repulsion in consciousness, again a memory, and this becomes an
equally vague movement to push it away.
These states give birth to: Memory of past pleasure and pain, indicating the
germination o the Thought-aspect; longing to experience again pleasure, or
avoid pain, the germination of the Desire-aspect; this stimulating a movement,
the germination of the Activity-aspect. Thus Consciousness is differentiated
into its three aspects from its primary unity of Feeling, repeating [200] in
miniature the kosmic process in which the triple Divinity ever arises from the
One Existence. The Hermetic axiom is here, as always, exemplified: "As
above, so below".
2.
SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS.
Desire, thus
germinated, gropes after pleasure, not, as yet, after the pleasure giving
object; for consciousness is as yet limited within its own kingdom, is
conscious only in the within, is conscious only of changes in that within. It
has not yet turned its attention outwards, is not yet conscious even that there
is an outwards. Meanwhile that outwards of which it is not aware is continually
hammering at its vehicles, and most vehemently at its physical vehicle, the
vehicle most easily affected from outside, and with most difficulty from
within. Gradually the persistent and violent shocks from outside draw its
attention in their direction; their irregularity, their unexpectedness, their
constant assaults, their unrelatedness to its slow, groping [201] movements,
their unexplained appearances and disappearances, are in opposition to its dim
sense of regularity, continuity, of being always there, of slow surges of
change rising and falling within what is not yet to it "himself";
there is a consciousness of difference, and this grows into a sense of a
something that remains within a changing hurly-burly, a sense of a
"within" and a "without", or, to speak more accurately, of
a "without" and a
"within", since it is the hammering outside that causes the
difference of "without" and "within" to arise in consciousness.
"Without" comes first, if only by a fraction of time, because its
recognition alone makes possible and inevitable the recognition of
"within". So long as there is nothing else, we cannot speak of
"within"; it is everything. But when "without" forces
itself on consciousness, "within" rises up as its inevitable
opposite. This sense of a "without" arises necessarily at the points
of contact between the continuing consciousness and the changing hurly-burly;
that is, in its physical vehicle, its physical [202] body. Herein is slowly
established the awareness of "others", and with the establishment of
this "others" comes the establishment also of "I", over
against them. He becomes conscious of things outside instead of being conscious
only of changes, and then he comes to know that the changes are in
"himself", and that the things are outside himself. Self-consciousness
is born.
This process
of perceiving objects is a complex one. It must be remembered that objects
contact the body in various ways, and the body receives some of their
vibrations by the parts differentiated to receive such vibrations. The eye, the
ear, the skin, the tongue, the nose, receive various vibratory waves, and
certain cells in the organs affected vibrate similarly in response. The waves
set up pass to the sense-centres in the brain, and thence to the
knowledge-senses in the astral sheath; there the changes in consciousness take
place which correspond with them, as explained in Chapter II., and they are
sent on as these changes, the sensations of colour, [203] outline, sound,
form, taste, smell, etc., still as separate sensations, to consciousness
working in the mental sheath, and are there combined by it into a single image,
unified into a single perception of an object. This blending of the various
streams into one, this synthesis of sensations, is a specialty of the mind.
Hence, in Indian psychology, the mind is often called "the sixth
sense", "the senses, of which mind is the sixth".[60] When we
consider the five organs of action in relation to the mind, we find a
reverse process going on; the mind
pictures a certain act as a whole, and thereby brings about a corresponding set
of vibrations in the mental sheath; these vibrations are reproduced in the
motor senses in the astral sheath; they break it up, analyse it into its
constituent parts, and these are accompanied with vibrations in the matter of
the motor centres; these, in turn, are
repeated in the motor centres in the brain as separate waves; the motor
centres distribute these waves through the nervous system to the various
muscles that [204] must co-operate to produce the action. Regarded in this
double relation the mind becomes the eleventh sense, "the ten senses and
the one"[61].
3. REAL AND
UNREAL.
With the
change of consciousness into Self-consciousness comes the recognition of a
difference which later, in the more evolved Self-consciousness, becomes the
difference between the objective or "real" - in the ordinary western
sense of the word - and the subjective or "unreal", and
"imaginary". To the jelly-fish, the sea anemone, the hydra, waves
and currents, sunshine and blast, food and sand touching the periphery or the
tentacles, are not "real", are registered only as changes in
consciousness, as in truth they are also to the body of the human infant; I say
registered, not recognised, since no mental observation, analysis, and judgment
are possible in the lower stages of evolution. These creatures are not yet
sufficiently conscious of "others", to be conscious of [205]
"themselves"; and they only feel changes as occurring within the
circle of their own ill-defined consciousness. The external world grows into
"reality" as the consciousness, separating itself from it, realises
its own separateness, changes from a vague "am" into a definite
"I am".
As this
self-conscious "I" gradually gains in clearness of
self-identification, of separateness, and distinguishes between changes within
himself and the impact of external objects, he is ready to take the next step
of relating the changes within himself to the varying impacts from outside.
Then follows the development of Desire for pleasure into definite desires for
pleasure-giving objects, followed by
thoughts as to how to obtain them ;
these lead to efforts to move after them when in sight, to search for them when
absent, and the consequent slow
evolution of the outer vehicle into a body well-organised for movement, for
pursuit, for capture. The desire for the absent, the search, the success or
failure, all impress on the developing consciousness the difference [206]
between his desires and thoughts, of which he is, or can be, always conscious,
and the external objects which come and go without any reference to himself;
and with disconcerting irrelevance to his feelings. He distinguishes these as
"real", as having an existence which he does not control, and which
affects him without any regard to his likings or objections. And this sense of
"reality" is first established in the physical world, as being the one
in which these contacts between the "others" and the "I"
are first recognised by consciousness. Self-consciousness begins its evolution
in and through the physical body, and has its earliest centre in the brain.
The normal
man, at the present stage of evolution, still identifies himself with this
brain-centre of Self-consciousness, and is hence restricted to the waking
consciousness, or consciousness working in the cerebro-spinal system, knowing
himself as "I", distinctly and consecutively, only on the physical
plane, that is, in the waking state. On this plane he is definitely
self-conscious, distinguishing [207] between himself and the outer world,
between his own thoughts and outside appearances, without hesitation; hence on
this plane, and on this plane only, external things are to him
"real", "objective", "outside himself".
On other
planes, the astral and the mental, he is, as yet, conscious but not
self-conscious; he recognises changes within himself, but does not yet distinguish
between the self-initiated changes and those caused by impacts from without on
his astral and mental vehicles. To him they are all alike changes within
himself. Hence all phenomena of consciousness occurring on super-physical
planes - planes on which Self-consciousness is not yet definitely established
- the normal, average man calls "unreal", "subjective",
"inside himself", just as the jellyfish, if he were a philosopher,
would designate the phenomena of the physical plane. He regards astral or
mental phenomena as the result of his "imagination", i.e., as forms
of his own creating, and not as the results of impacts upon his astral or
mental vehicle from external worlds, subtler [208] indeed, but as
"real" and "objective" as the external physical world. That
is, he is not yet sufficiently evolved to have reached self-realisation on
those planes, and thus to have become capable of objectivising there the
external worlds. He is only conscious there of the changes in himself, the
changes in consciousness, and the external world is consequently to him merely
the play of his own desires and thoughts. He is, in fact, an infant on the
astral and mental planes. [209]
CHAPTER X.
HUMAN STATES
OF CONSCIOUSNESS.[62]
1. THE
SUB-CONSCIOUSNESS.
WE have
already noticed the fact that many activities of consciousness, once purposive,
have become automatic, and have gradually sunk below the "threshold of
consciousness". The processes which maintain the life of the body - such
as the beating of the heart, the expansion and contraction of the heart, the
processes of digestion, etc. - have all fallen into a region of consciousness
on which the attention of consciousness is not fixed. And there are innumerable phenomena, not
directly connected with the [210] maintenance of bodily life, which also
inhabit this dim region. The sympathetic system is a storehouse of traces left
by long-past events - events not belonging to our present life at all, but
events that passed hundreds of centuries
ago, that occurred in long-past lives, when the Jivatma which is our Self was abiding in savage human
bodies, and even in the bodies of animals. Many a causeless terror, many a
midnight panic, many a surge of furious anger, many an impulse of vindictive
cruelty, many a rush of passionate revenge, is flung up from the depths of that
dark sea of the sub-conscious which rolls within us, concealing many a wreck,
many a skeleton of our past. Handed down by the astral consciousness of the
time to its physical instrument for putting
into action, the ever-sensitive plate of the permanent atom has caught and
photographed them, and has registered them in the recesses of the nervous
system, life after life. The consciousness is off guard; or a strong vibration
from another strikes us; or some event reproduces circumstances that start
vibrations that arouse; in one way or [211] another, the slumbering
possibilities are awakened, and hurling itself upwards into the light of day
comes the long-buried passion. There too hide the instincts which oft overpower
reason, instincts that were once life-preserving efforts, or the results of
experiences in which our body of the time perished, and the soul registered
the result for future guidance. Instincts of love for the opposite sex, outcome
of innumerable unions. Instincts of paternal and maternal love, poured out in
many generations. Instincts of self-defence, developed in countless battles.
Instincts of taking undue advantage, offspring of numberless cheatings and
intrigues. And yet again there lurk there many vibrations that belong to
events, and feelings, and desires, and thoughts of our present life,
experienced and forgotten, but lying near the surface, ready for upcall. Time
would fail to enumerate the contents of this relic-chamber of an immemorial
past, containing old bones fit only for the dust-bin, side by side with
interesting fragments of earlier days, with tools still useful for our [212]
present needs. Over the door of the relic-chamber is written: "Fragments
of the Past". For the sub-consciousness belongs to the Past, as the
waking-consciousness to the Present, as the super-consciousness to the
Future.
Another part
of the sub-conscious in us is composed of the contents of all the
consciousnesses that use our bodies as fields of evolution - atoms, molecules,
cells of many grades. Some of the queer spectres and dainty figures that arise
from the sub-conscious in us do not belong to us at all, but are the dim
gropings, and foolish fears, and pretty fancies, of the Units of consciousness
at a lower stage of evolution than our own, that are our guests, inhabiting our
body as a lodging-house.
In this part
of the sub-conscious go on the wars, waged by one set of creatures in our blood
against another set, which do not enter our consciousness, save when their
results appear as diseases.
Human
sub-consciousness, working on the physical plane, is thus composed of very
varied elements, and it is necessary [213] thus to analyse and to understand
it, in order to distinguish its workings from those of the true human
super-consciousness, which resembles the instincts in its sudden irruptions
into consciousness, but differs entirely from them in its nature and place in
evolution, belonging to the future while they belong to the past. These two
differ as atrophied vestigial organs, recording the history of the past,
differ from germinal rudimentary organs, indicating the progress of the future.
We have also
seen that consciousness, working on the astral plane, built up and is still
building the nervous system for its instrument on the physical plane; but this
also does not form part of what is called the normal waking consciousness at
this stage of evolution. In the average man, consciousness, working on the
mental plane, is now building up and organising the astral body as its
instrument in the future on the astral plane; but this again does not form part
of the waking-consciousness. What then is the human waking-consciousness?
[214]
2. THE WAKING
CONSCIOUSNESS.
The
waking-consciousness is consciousness working on the mental plane and on the
astral, using mental and astral matter as its vehicle, seated in the physical
brain as Self-consciousness[63], and using that brain with its connected
nervous system as its instrument for willing, knowing, and acting on the
physical plane. In waking-consciousness the brain is always active, always
vibrating; its activity may be stimulated as a transmitting organ from outside through the senses, or it may be
stimulated by the consciousness from the inner planes; but it is ceaselessly
active, responding to the without and the within. In the average man, the brain
is the only part in which consciousness has definitely become
Self-consciousness, the only part in which he feels himself as "I",
and asserts himself [215] as a separate individual unit. In all the rest of him
consciousness is still vaguely groping about, answering to external impacts but
not yet defining them, conscious as to changes in its own conditions, but not
yet conscious of "others" and "myself". In the more
advanced members of the human family, consciousness, working on the astral and
mental planes, is very rich and active, but its attention is not yet turned outwards
to the astral and mental worlds in which it is living, and its activities find
their outer expression in Self-consciousness on the physical plane, to which
all the outer attention in consciousness is turned, and into which is poured as
much of the higher workings as it is capable of receiving. From time to time,
powerful impacts on the astral or mental plane create so violent a vibration in
consciousness, that a wave of thought or emotion surges outwards into the
waking consciousness and throws it into such furious motion, that its normal
activities are swept away, submerged, and the man is hurried into action which
is not directed or [216] controlled by Self-consciousness. We shall consider
this further when we come to the super-physical consciousness.
Waking-consciousness
may then be defined as that part of the total consciousness which is
functioning in the brain and nervous system, and which is definitely
Self-conscious. We may conceive of consciousness as symbolised by a great
light, which shines through a glass globe inserted in a ceiling, illuminating the
room below, while the light itself fills the room above, and sheds its radiance
freely in every direction. Consciousness is as a great egg of light, of which
only one end is inserted into the brain, and that end is the
waking-consciousness. As consciousness becomes Self-consciousness on the
astral plane, and the brain develops sufficiently to answer to its vibrations,
astral consciousness will become part of the waking-consciousness. Later still,
when consciousness becomes Self-consciousness on the mental plane, and the
brain develops sufficiently to answer to its vibrations, the
waking-consciousness will include mental consciousness. And [217] so on, until
all the consciousness on our five planes has evolved to waking-consciousness.
This
enlarging of waking-consciousness is accompanied with development in the atoms
of the brain, as well as with the development of certain organs in the brain,
and of the connexions between cells. For the inclusion of the astral Self-consciousness,
it is necessary that the pituitary body should be evolved beyond its present
condition, and that the fourth set of spirillae in the atoms should be
perfected. For the inclusion of the mental, the pineal gland must be rendered
active, and the fifth set of spirillae brought into thorough working order. So
long as these physical development remain unaccomplished, Self-consciousness
may be evolved on the astral and mental planes, but it remains super-consciousness
and its workings do not express themselves through the brain, and thus become
part of the waking-consciousness.
Waking-consciousness
is limited and conditioned by the brain so long as a man [218] possesses a
physical body, and any injury to the brain, any lesion, any disturbance, at
once interferes with its manifestation. However highly developed may be a man's
consciousness, he is limited by his brain so far as its manifestations on the
physical plane are concerned, and if that brain be ill-formed or ill-developed,
his waking-consciousness will be poor and restricted.
With the loss
of the physical body, the connotation of waking-consciousness changes, and that
which is here said of the physical conditions is transferred to the astral. We
may therefore enlarge our original definition to the general statement:
waking-consciousness is that part of the total consciousness which is working
through its outermost vehicle, that is, which is manifesting on the lowest
plane then touched by that consciousness.
In the
earlier stages of human evolution, there is little activity in consciousness on
the inner planes except as stimulated from the outer; but as Self-consciousness
grows more vivid on the physical plane, it enriches with ever-increasing
rapidity the [219] content of consciousness on the inner; consciousness,
working upon its content, rapidly evolves, until its internal powers far
outstrip the possibilities of their manifestation through the brain, and the
latter becomes a limitation and a
hindrance instead of feeder and a stimulator. Then the pressure of consciousness
on its physical instrument becomes at times perilously great, causing a nervous
tension which endangers the equilibrium of the brain, unable to adapt itself
with sufficient rapidity to the powerful waves beating upon it. Hence the truth
of the saying "Great wits to madness near allied". Only the highly
and delicately organised brain can enable the "great wits" to
manifest themselves on the physical plane; but such a brain is the one most
easily thrown off its balance by the strong waves of these same "great
wits", and this is "madness". Madness - the incapacity of the
brain to respond regularly to vibrations - may indeed be due to lack or arrest
of development, lack or arrest of brain organisation, and such madness is not
allied to "great wits"; but it is a [220] significant and pregnant
fact that a brain in advance of normal evolution, developing new and delicately
balanced combinations for the enriched expression of consciousness on the
physical plane, is the brain of all others that may most easily be disabled by
the throwing out of gear of some part of its mechanism not yet sufficiently
established to resist a strain. To this again we must return in considering the
super-physical consciousness.
3. THE
SUPER-PHYSICAL CONSCIOUSNESS.
Psychologists
in the West have lately betaken themselves to the study of states of
consciousness other than the waking; these are variously designated as
"abnormal", "sub-conscious", "inconscient", and
often as "dream-consciousness" - because the dream is the most
generally recognised and universal form of other-consciousness. At first there
was a tendency to regard these states as the result of disordered brain
conditions, and this view is still largely held; but the more advanced
psychologists are out-growing this narrow [221] idea, and are beginning to
study such states as definite manifestations of consciousness under conditions
not yet understood, but not necessarily disorderly; some definitely recognise
a "larger consciousness", a part only of which can find expression
in the brain as at present evolved. In the East, this state of other
consciousness has for long ages been regarded as higher than the waking state,
as that of the consciousness set free from the narrow limits of the physical
brain, and acting in a subtler and more plastic and congenial medium. Dream has
been regarded as one phase of this superphysical activity, and as a touch with
higher worlds; and means have been taken to arouse Self-consciousness in the
dream-world, to set Self-consciousness, clothed in its higher vestures, free
from the physical body at will; so that, instead of the vague and confused
answers to impacts from higher worlds in undeveloped dream states,
Self-consciousness may be established therein with clear and definite vision.
To effect this, Self-consciousness in its higher vehicles must be at first
[222] removed from the physical body and made active on the astral plane; for
until it knows itself out of the dense body, it cannot separate out in the
"dream", the extra-physical experiences from the chaotic fragments of
physical experiences mixed up with them in the brain. As clear water poured
into a muddy bucket becomes mixed up with the mud, so does an astral
experience, poured down into a brain full of fragments of past physical
happenings, become blurred, confused, incongruous[64]. Eastern psychology hence
sought after methods of separating the Self-consciousness from its physical
vehicle, and it is interesting to observe that these methods, wholly different
as they are from those used in the West, and directed to the intensifying of
consciousness, reduce the body to the same state of quiescence as that induced
by physical methods in the West, when the western psychologist betakes himself
to the study of other-consciousness.
Super-consciousness
includes the whole [223] of the consciousness above the waking-consciousness;
that is, all on the higher planes that does not express itself on the physical
plane as Self-consciousness working through the brain. It is therefore a great
complexity, and covers a large number of phenomena. Dream, as said, is part of
it; so are all the workings of the astral consciousness asserting themselves as
premonitions, warnings, visions of happenings distant in space or time, vague
touches from other worlds, sudden intuitions as regards character or events;
also all the workings of the mental consciousness, lower or higher, that
appear as intuitive grasp of truths, sudden insight into causal connexions,
inspirations - mental or moral - flashes of genius, visions of high artistic
beauty, etc., etc. These irruptions of the super-consciousness into the
physical plane have the character of unexpectedness, of conviction, of
imperious authority, of lack of apparent cause. They are unrelated, or only
indirectly related, to the contents of the waking-consciousness, and do not
justify themselves to it, but simply impose themselves on it. [224]
To bring the
super-consciousness into manifestation on the physical plane, it is necessary -
in the early stages - to reduce the brain to inactivity, to render the
sense-organs unresponsive to physical impacts, and, by expelling the conscious
entity from the body, reduce that body to the state called trance. Trance is
but the sleep-state, artificially or abnormally induced; whether produced by
mesmeric, hypnotic, medicinal, or other means, the result is the same, so far
as the physical body is concerned. But the result on the other planes will
depend entirely on the evolution of consciousness on those planes, and a highly
evolved consciousness would not permit the use of hypnotic or medicinal means -
unless, perhaps, of an anaesthetic for an operation - though such a one might
allow, under exceptional circumstances, the use of mesmerism in producing the
trance state. Trance may also be produced by action from the higher planes, as
by intense concentration of thought, or by rapt contemplation of an object of
devotion, inducing exstasy. These are the means [225] used from time immemorial
by the Raja Yogis of the East, and the exstasy of the Saint in the West is
produced by this rapt contemplation; the trance is indistinguishable from that
produced by the means above referred to in the Salpetriere and elsewhere. The
Hatha Yogis also reach this same trance condition, but by means much resembling
the last named, - by staring at a black spot on a white ground, at the point of
the nose, and other similar practices.
But when
other than physical vision and physical tests are used, how great is the
difference between the super-physical conditions of consciousness in the
hypnotised subject and in the Yogi. H. P. Blavatsky has well described this
difference: "In the trance state the Aura changes entirely, the seven
prismatic colours being no longer discernible. In sleep also they are not all
'at home'. For those which belong to the spiritual elements in the man, viz.,
yellow, Buddhi; indigo, Higher Manas; and the blue of the Auric Envelope, will
be either hardly discernible or altogether missing. The Spiritual Man is free
during sleep, [226] and though his physical memory may not become aware of it,
lives, robed in his highest essence, in realms on other planes, in realms which
are the land of reality, called dreams on our plane of illusion. A good
clairvoyant, moreover, if he had an opportunity of seeing a Yogi in the trance
state and a mesmerised subject side by side, would learn an important lesson in
Occultism. He would learn to know the difference between self-induced trance
and a hypnotic state resulting from extraneous influence In the Yogi, the
'principles' of the lower quaternary disappear entirely. Neither red, green,
red-violet, nor the auric blue of the body are to be seen; nothing but hardly
perceptible vibrations of the golden-hued Prana principle, and a violet flame
streaked with gold rushing upwards from the head, in the region where the Third
Eye rests, and culminating in a point. If the student remembers that the true
violet, or the extreme end of the spectrum, is no compound colour of red and
blue, but a homogeneous colour with vibrations seven times more rapid than
those of the red, and that the golden [227] hue is the essence of the three
yellow lines from orange-red to yellow-orange and yellow, he will understand
the reason why; he [the Yogi] lives in his own Auric Body, now become the
vehicle of Buddhi-Manas. On the other hand, in a subject in an artificially
produced hypnotic or mesmeric trance, an effect of unconscious when not of
conscious Black Magic, unless produced by a high Adept, the whole set of the
principles will be present, with the Higher Manas paralysed, Buddhi severed
from it through that paralysis, and the red-violet Astral Body entirely
subjected to the Lower Manas and Kama Rupa"[65].
This
difference in the appearance of the entranced person, as seen by the clear-seeing
eye, is connected with a difference of immense importance in the after outcome
of the trance. The Yogi, who thus leaves the body, leaves it in full Self-consciousness,
visits the higher worlds in full possession of his faculties, and, on returning
to the dense body, imprints on the evolved brain the memory of his experiences.
The little evolved person, [228] entranced, "loses consciousness";
when his Self-consciousness is not developed on the higher planes, his awareness
is not there turned outwards; he is practically as much asleep there, in the
astral and mental worlds, as he is in the physical plane, and on awaking from
the trance he knows nothing of what has occurred during its continuance, either
here or elsewhere.
If, however,
the subject be sufficiently evolved, as most people are at this stage of
evolution, to be Self-conscious on the astral plane, then others may be
profited by questioning him while entranced. For in the artificially induced
trance state, wherein the brain is cut off from the normal action and reaction
between itself and its environment, it becomes an instrument, however
inadequate, of the super-physical consciousness. Isolated from its physical
environment, rendered incapable of responding to its accustomed stimuli from
outside, cut off from its lower attachments while remaining united to its
higher, it continues to answer to the impacts from above, and can do this the
[229] more effectively since none of its energies are running out into the physical
plane. This is the essence of the trance state. In the forcible closure of the
avenues of the senses, through which its forces pour out into the external
world, these forces remain available as servants of the superphysical
consciousness. In the silence thus imposed on the physical plane, the voices of
the other planes can make themselves heard.
In the
hypnotic trance, a quickening of the mental faculties is observed: memory is
found to embrace a far larger area, for the faint pulsings left by far-off
events become audible when the stronger pulsings from the recent are
temporarily stilled; people forgotten in the waking state are remembered in
the trance; languages known in childhood, but since lost, reappear; trivial
events re-arise. Sometimes the perceptive powers range over a larger area;
distant occurrences are seen, vision pierces through physical barriers, far-off
speech becomes audible. Fragments of other planes are also occasionally
glimpsed, much mixed up with the thought-forms [230] of waking hours. A whole
literature exists on this subject, and can be studied by the investigator.
It has also
been found that the results of deeper trance are not identical with those of
the more superficial. As the trance deepens, higher strata of the super-physical
consciousness manifest themselves in the brain. The famous case of Leonie I.,
II. and III. is well-known; and it should be observed that Leonie I. knew
nothing of Leonie II. and III.; that Leonie II. knew Leonie I. but did not know
Leonie III.; that Leonie III. knew both Leonie I. and II. That is, the higher knows the lower, while
the lower does not know the higher - a most pregnant fact.
In the
mesmeric trance, the higher phenomena are more easily obtained than in the
hypnotic, and, in this, very clear statements may be had of the phenomena of
the astral and even of the mental plane - where the "subject" is
well-developed - and sometimes glimpses are gained of past lives.
When we see
that the exclusion of [231] the physical plane is the condition for these
manifestations of the super-physical consciousness, we begin to understand the
rationale of the methods of Yoga, practised in the East. When the methods are
physical, as in Hatha Yoga, the ordinary hypnotic trance is most often
obtained, and the subject, on re-awakening, remembers nothing of his
experiences. The method of the Raja Yoga, in which the consciousness is
withdrawn from the brain by intense concentration, leads the student to
continuity of consciousness on the successive planes, and he remembers his
super-physical experiences on his return to the waking state. Both in the West
and in the East, the same cessation of waking-consciousness is aimed at, in
order to obtain traces of the super-physical consciousness, or as the western
psychologist would say, from the unconscious in man. The eastern method,
however, with thousands of years of experience behind it, yields results
incomparably greater in the realms of the super-physical consciousness, and
establishes, on the sure basis of reiterated [232] experiences, the
independence of consciousness as regards its physical vehicle.
The exstasy
and the visions of Saints, in all ages and in all creeds, afford another
example of the irruptions from the "unconscious". In these, prolonged
and absorbing prayer, or contemplation, is the means for producing the
necessary brain-condition. The avenues of the senses become closed by the
intensity of the inner concentration, and the same state is reached
spasmodically and involuntarily which the practiser of Raja Yoga seeks
deliberately to attain. Hence we find that devotees of all faiths ascribe their
visions to the favour of the Deity worshipped, and not to the fact that they
have produced in themselves a passive brain-condition, which enables the super-physical
consciousness to imprint on that brain the sights and sounds of the higher
worlds.
Prof. William
James, in his Varieties of Religious Experience, points out that some of the
most striking of these irruptions from the "unconscious" are cases of
"sudden conversions", in which [233] a sudden thought, or vision, or
voice, has changed at once and completely the whole course of a man's waking
life. He rightly argues that a force, sufficiently powerful to produce such
effects, cannot be lightly waved aside, or contemptuously ignored, by any
serious student of human consciousness. This whole class of psychical phenomena
demands careful and scientific study, and promises a rich harvest of results,
as to the super-physical consciousness, to repay the serious investigator.
As against
this view, however, it is urged that these facts are observed in connexion with
morbid nervous states, and that the subjects are hysterical, over-excited
persons, whose experiences are vitiated by their condition. In the first place,
this is not always true; the eastern Raja Yogis are persons distinguished for
their calmness and serenity, and some of the cases of conversion have been
those of worldly and capable men. Let it be granted, however, that in the
majority of cases the nervous condition is morbid, and the brain [234]
overstrained, what then? The normal brain is admittedly evolved to the point of
responding to the vibrations of the physical world, and of transmitting these
upwards, and of transmitting downwards mental and astral vibrations connected
with these, from the higher vehicles. It is not yet evolved to the point of
receiving without disturbance very violent vibrations from the higher planes,
nor of responding at all to the vibrations set up in the subtler vehicles by
the external phenomena of their own planes. Very violent emotions of joy, pain,
grief, terror, often prove too much for the normal brain, causing severe
headache, hysteria, and even nervous collapse. It is, therefore, no wonder that
the very violent emotion which causes what is called a conversion should often
be accompanied by similar nervous distress. The important point is, that when
the nervous upset has passed, the effect - the changed attitude towards life -
remains. The nervous disturbance is due to the inadequacy of the physical brain
to bear the violent and rapid vibrations dashing down upon it; the [235]
permanently changed attitude is due to the steady pressure of the
super-physical consciousness, continuously exerted. Where the super-physical
consciousness is not sufficiently developed to exert this continuous pressure,
the converted person "falls from grace" as the surge of emotion ebbs
away.
In cases of
visions, and like phenomena, we have already seen that they may occur when a
form of trance has been produced. But without this, such phenomena may occur,
in cases where the brain is in a state of tension, either from some temporary
cause, or from the fact that its evolution has gone beyond the normal. Strong
emotion may increase the nervous tension to the point where response to direct
astral vibrations becomes possible, and thus an astral happening becomes
visible or audible. The reaction from the strain will probably show itself as
nervous disturbance. When the brain is more highly evolved than the ordinary
brain, has become more complicated and
more sensitive, astral happenings may be felt constantly, and this strain may
well be [236] somewhat greater than the nervous system is quite fitted to bear,
in addition to bearing the ordinary wear and tear of modern civilisation.
Hence, again, hysteria and other forms of nervous distress are likely to
accompany the visions.
But these
facts do not take away from the importance of the experiences, as facts in
consciousness. Rather, perhaps, do they increase their importance, as showing
the way in which evolution works in the action of the environment on an
organism. The reiterated impacts of external forces stimulate the growing
organism, and very often temporarily overstrain it; but the very strain forces
forward its evolution. The crest of the evolutionary wave must always consist
of abnormal organisms; the steady, normal, safe, average organisms follow on
behind; they are most respectable, but perhaps not so interesting as the
pioneers, and most certainly not so instructive as regards the future. As a
matter of fact, the forces of the astral plane are constantly playing
vigorously on the human brain, in order that it may develop as a fuller [237]
vehicle of consciousness, and a sensitive brain, in the transitional state, is
apt to be thereby thrown a little out of gear with the world of its past. It is
probable that a good many activities to
which thought is at present directed will, in the future, be carried on automatically,
and will gradually sink below the threshold of the waking consciousness, as
have done various functions, once performed
purposively.
As these
changes go on, the subtler vibrations must inevitably show themselves in an
increasing number in the most delicately equilibrated brains, those which are
not normal, inasmuch as these - on the crest of evolution - will be those most
capable of responding. Dr. Maudsley writes: "What right have we to believe
Nature under any obligation to do her work by means of complete minds only? She
may find an incomplete mind a more suitable instrument for a particular purpose"[66].
And Prof. James himself remarks: "If there were such a thing as
inspiration [238] from a higher realm, it might well be that the neurotic
temperament would furnish the chief condition of the requisite receptivity"[67].
When we once
recognise that forces subtler than the physical must necessitate for their
expression a more refined vehicle than the brain organised for the reception of
the physical, we shall cease to be troubled or distressed when we find that the
super-physical forces often find their readiest expression through brains that
are more or less out of gear with the physical plane. And we shall understand
that the abnormal physical symptoms accompanying their manifestations in no way
derogate from the value of these energies, nor from the importance of the part
they will play in the future of humanity. At the same time the wish must
naturally arise to find out some method whereby these forces may be enabled to
manifest themselves without risking the destruction of their physical
instrument.
This way has
been found in the East in the practice of Raja Yoga, whereby the [239] safe
exercise of the higher consciousness is sought by intense concentration. This
concentration, in itself, develops the brain as an instrument for the subtler
forces, working in the brain-cells in the manner already described in connexion
with thought.[68] Moreover, it slowly opens up the set of spirillae of the
atom, next in order to those now in activity, and thus adds a new organ for the
higher functioning. This process is necessarily a slow one, but it is the only
safe way of development; and, if its slowness be resented, it may be suggested
as a reason for patience that the student is endeavouring to ante-date the
atomic development of the next Round, and he can hardly expect to accomplish
this with rapidity. It is, however, this slowness of the Raja Yogic practices
which renders them somewhat unacceptable to the hurrying West; and yet there is
no other way to secure a balanced development. The choice lies between this
and the morbid nervous disturbances which accompany the irruptions of the super-[240]physical
consciousness into an unprepared vehicle. We cannot transcend the laws of
Nature; we can only try to understand, and then to utilise them. [241]
CHAPTER XI.
THE MONAD AT
WORK.
1. BUILDING
HIS VEHICLES.
LET us now
consider the work of the Monad in the shaping of his vehicles, when he has, as
his representatives - as himself on the third, fourth, and fifth planes -
Atma-Buddhi-Manas, with the causal body as the receptacle, the treasure-house,
of the experiences of each incarnation.
At the close
of each period of life, that is to say, at the end of each devachanic
existence, he must stimulate into renewed activity the three successive nuclei
of the bodies he is to wear during his next life-period. First, he arouses the
mental nucleus. This arousing consists in increasing the flow of life through
the spirillae. It will be remembered that when the permanent units "went
to [242] sleep", the normal flow of life in the spirillae lessened, and,
during the whole period of repose, this flow is small and slow.[69] When the
time for reincarnation arrives, this flow is increased, the spirillae thrill
with life, and the permanent units, one after another, behave as magnets,
attracting round themselves appropriate matter. Thus when the mental unit is
stimulated, it begins to vibrate strongly, according to the vibratory powers -
the results of past experiences - stored up therein, drawing towards and
arranging round itself appropriate matter from the mental plane. Just as a bar
of soft iron becomes a magnet when a
current is sent through a wire encircling it, and as matter within its magnetic
field will at once arrange itself round that magnet, so is it with the
permanent mental unit. When the life-current encircles it, it becomes a magnet,
and matter within the field of its forces arranges itself round it and forms a
new mental body. The matter attracted will be according to the complexity of
the permanent unit. Not only will finer or [244] coarser matter be attracted,
but the matter must also vary in the development of the atoms which enter into
the formation of its aggregations. The molecules attracted will be composed of
atoms the vibratory energies of which are identical with, or approach nearly
to, or are in tune with, those of the attracting unit. Hence, according to the
stage of evolution reached by the man, will be the development of the matter
of his new mental vehicle. In this way, incarnation after incarnation, a
suitable mental body is built up.
Exactly the
same process is repeated on the astral plane in the building of the new astral
body. The astral nucleus - the astral permanent atom - is similarly vivified,
and acts in a similar way.
The man is
thus clothed with new mental and astral bodies which express his stage of
evolution, and enable whatever powers and faculties he possesses to express
themselves duly in their own worlds.
But when we
come to the shaping of the body on the physical plane a new [245] element
appears. So far as the Monad is concerned, the work is the same. He vivifies
the physical nucleus - the physical permanent atom - and it acts as a magnet
like its fellows. But now it is as though a man interfered with the attraction
and arrangement of matter within a magnetic field; the Elemental, charged with
the duty of shaping the etheric double after the model given by the Lords of
Karma, steps in and takes control of the work. The materials; indeed, may be
gathered together, as a workman might carry bricks for the building of a house,
but the builder takes the bricks, accepts or rejects, and sets them according
to the plan of the architect.
The question
arises: Why this difference? Why, on reaching the physical plane, where we
might expect a repetition of the previous processes, should an alien power take
the control of the building out of the hands of the owner of the house? The
answer lies in the working of the law of karma. On the higher planes, the
sheaths express as much of the man as is developed, and he is not there working
[245] out the results of his past relations with others. Each centre of
Consciousness, on those planes, is working within its own circle; its energies
are directed towards its own vehicles, and only so much of them as is finally
expressed through the physical vehicle acts directly upon others. These
relations with others complicate his karma on the physical plane, and the
particular physical form that he wears during a particular life - period must
be suitable for the working out of this complicated karma. Hence the need for
the adjusting interference of the Lords of Karma. Were he at a point of
evolution at which he entered into similarly direct relations with others on
other planes, similar limitations of his power to shape his vehicles on those
planes would appear. In the sphere of his external activities, whatever it may
be, these limitations must present themselves.
Hence the
shaping of the physical body is done by an authority higher than his own; he
must accept the conditions of race, nation, family, circumstances, demanded by
his past activities. This [246] limiting action of karma necessitates the
building of a vehicle which is but a
partial expression of the working consciousness - partial, not only
because of the shutting off of power by the coarseness of the material itself,
but also because of the external limitations above referred to. Much of his
consciousness, even though ready for expression on the physical plane, may thus
be excluded, and only a small part of it may appear on the physical plane as
waking-consciousness.
The next
point in connexion with this building that we must consider is the special work
of organising the vehicles as expressions of consciousness, leaving apart the
general building by desire and thought, with which we are so familiar. We are
concerned here with details, rather than with broad outlines.
We know that
while qualities are imparted to matter during the descent of the Second Logos,
the arrangement of these specialised materials into relatively permanent forms
belongs to His ascent. When the Monad, through his reflexion [247] as the
Spiritual Man, assumes some directive power over his vehicles, he finds himself
in possession of a form in which the sympathetic nervous system is playing a
very large part, and in which the cerebro-spinal has not yet assumed
predominance. He will have to work up a number of connecting links between this
sympathetic system which he inherits and the centres which he must organise in
his astral body, for his future independent functioning therein. But before any
independent functioning in any higher vehicle is possible, it is necessary to
carry it to a fairly high point as a
transmitting vehicle, that is a vehicle
through which he works down to his body on the physical plane. We must
distinguish between the primary work of the organisation of the mental and
astral vehicles that fits them to be transmitters of part of the consciousness
of the Spiritual Man, and the later work of developing these same vehicles into
independent bodies, in which the Spiritual Man will be able to function on
their respective planes. Hence there are two [248] tasks to be performed: first
the organisation of the mental and astral vehicles as transmitters of
consciousness to the physical body; secondly, the organisation of these
vehicles into independent bodies, in which consciousness can function without
the help of the physical body.
The astral
and mental vehicles, then, must be organised in order that the Spiritual Man
may use the physical brain and nervous system as his organ of consciousness on
the physical plane. The impulse to such use comes from the physical world by
impacts upon the various nerve-ends, causing waves of nervous energy to pass
along the fibres to the brain: these waves pass from the dense brain to the
etheric, thence to the astral, thence to the mental vehicle, arousing a
response from the consciousness in the causal body on the mental plane. That
consciousness, thus roused by impacts from without, gives rise to vibrations,
which flow down in answer from the causal body to the mental, from the mental
to the astral, from the astral to the etheric and dense physical; [249] the
waves set up electric currents in the etheric brain, and these act on the dense
matter of the nervous cells.
All these
vibratory actions gradually organise the first inchoate clouds of astral and
mental matter into vehicles which serve as effective fields for these constant
actions and reactions. This process goes on during hundreds of births, started,
as we have seen, from below, but gradually coming more and more under the
control of the Spiritual Man; he begins to direct his activities by his
memories of past sensations, and starts each activity under the impulse of
these memories stimulated by desire. As the process continues, more and more
forcible direction comes from within, and less and less directive power is
exercised by the attractions and repulsions of external objects, and thus the
control of the building up of the vehicles is largely withdrawn from the
without and is centred in the within.
As the
vehicle becomes more organised, certain aggregations of matter appear within
it, at first cloudy and vague, then [250] more and more definitely outlined.
These are the future chakras, or wheels, the sense-centres of the astral body,
as distinguished from the astral sense-centres connected with the sense-organs
and centres of the physical body.[70] But nothing is done to vivify these
slowly growing centres for immense periods of time, and the connexion of them
with the physical body is often delayed, even after they are functioning on the
astral plane; for this connexion can only be made from the physical vehicle,
wherein the fiery force of Kundalini resides. Before Kundalini can reach them,
so that they can pass their observations on to the physical body, they must be
linked to the sympathetic nervous system, the large ganglionic cells in that
system being the points of contact. When these links are made, the fiery
current can flow through, and observations of astral events can be transmitted
fully to the physical brain. While they can only be thus linked with the
physical vehicle, the building of them as centres and the gradual organisation
[251] of them into wheels, can be begun from any vehicle, and will be begun in
any individual from that vehicle which represents the special type of
temperament to which he belongs. According as a man belongs to one typical
temperament or another, so will be the place of the greatest activity in the
building up of all the vehicles, in the gradual making of them into effective
instruments of consciousness to be expressed on the physical plane. This centre
of activity may be in the physical, astral, lower, or higher mental body. In
any of these, or even higher still, according to the temperamental type, this
centre will be found in the principle which marks out the temperamental type,
and from that it works "upwards" or "downwards", shaping
the vehicles so as to make them suitable
for the expression of that temperament.
2. AN
EVOLVING MAN.
A special
case may be taken to facilitate the understanding of this process - a [252]
temperament in which the concrete mind predominates. We will trace the
Spiritual Man through the third, fourth, and fifth Root Races. When we look at
him at work in the third Race, we find him very infantile mentally, even though
the mind is the predominant note of his type. The surging life around him, that
he can neither understand nor master, works strongly upon him from outside, and
powerfully affects his astral vehicle. This astral vehicle will be retentive of
impressions, in consequence of the temperament, and the desires will stimulate
the infantile mind to efforts directed to their satisfaction. His physical
constitution differs from that of the fifth Race man; the sympathetic system is
still dominant, and the cerebro-spinal system subordinate, but parts of the
sympathetic system are beginning to lose much of their effectiveness as
instruments of consciousness, belonging, as such instruments, to the stage
below the human. There are two bodies in the brain especially connected with
the sympathetic system in their inception, although now forming part of [253]
the cerebro-spinal - the pineal gland and the pituitary body. They illustrate
the way in which a part of the body may function in one manner at an early
stage, may then lose its special use and function little, if at all, and at a
later stage of evolution may again be stimulated by a higher kind of life,
which will give it a new use and function at a higher stage of evolution.
The
development of these bodies belongs to the invertebrate rather than to the
vertebrate kingdom, and the "third eye" is spoken of by biologists as
the "invertebrate eye". It is, however, still found, as an eye among
vertebrates, for a snake was lately found in Australia which showed on the top
of the head a peculiar arrangement of semitransparent scales; when these were
cut away a complete eye was found underneath - an eye complete in its parts
although not functioning. That third eye was functioning among the Lemurians in
the vague and general way characteristic of the lower stages of evolution, and
specially characteristic of the sympathetic [254] system. As our man advanced
from the Lemurian into the Atlantean Race, the third eye ceased to function,
the brain developed round it, and it became the appendage now called the pineal
gland. As a Lemurian, he had been psychic, the sympathetic system being largely
affected by the surgings of the undeveloped astral body. As an Atlantean, he
gradually lost his psychic powers, as the sympathetic system became subordinate
and the cerebro-spinal grew stronger.
The growth of
the cerebro-spinal system would be more rapid in this Atlantean than in those
of other temperaments, because the main activity would be in the concrete mind,
and would thus stimulate and fashion it; the astral body would lose its
predominance sooner, and would become more rapidly a transmitter of mental
impulses to the brain. Hence, when our man passed on into the fifth Race, he
would be peculiarly ready to take advantage of its characteristics; he would
build a large and well-proportioned brain; he would utilise, his astral chiefly
[255] as a transmitter, and would build his chakras from the mental plane.
3. THE
PITUITARY BODY AND PINEAL GLAND.
To return to
the second of the two bodies mentioned above - the pituitary body. This is
regarded as developed from a primeval mouth, in direct continuity with the
alimentary canal of the invertebrates. It ceased to function as a mouth in the
vertebrates, and became a rudimentary organ; but it has retained a peculiar
function in connexion with the growth of the body. It is active during the
normal period of physical growth, and the more actively it functions, the
greater the growth of the body. In giants it has been found that this organ is
peculiarly active. Moreover, the pituitary body sometimes again begins to
function in later life, when the bony framework of the body is set, and then
causes abnormal and monstrous growth at the free points of the body, hands,
feet, nose, etc., giving rise to disfigurement of a most distressing kind.
[256]
As the
cerebro-spinal system became dominant, the earlier function of these two bodies
disappeared; but these organs have a future as well as a past. The past was
connected with the sympathetic system; the future is connected with the cerebrospinal
system. As evolution goes on, and the chakras in the astral body are vivified,
the pituitary body becomes the physical organ for astral, and later, for mental
clairvoyance. Where too great a strain is made upon the astral faculty of
sight, while in the physical body, inflammation of the pituitary body sometimes
results. This organ is the one through which the knowledge gained by astral
vision is transmitted to the brain; and it is also used in vivifying the
points of contact between the sympathetic system and the astral body, whereby a
continuity of consciousness is
established between the astral and physical planes.
The pineal
gland becomes connected with one of the chakras in the astral body, and through
that with the mental body, and serves as a physical organ for the transmission
of thought from one brain [257] to another. In thought transmission the thought
may be flashed from mind to mind, mental matter being used as the medium for
transmission; or it may be sent down to the physical brain, and by means of the
pineal gland may be sent, via the physical ether, to the pineal gland in
another brain, and thus to the receiving consciousness.
While the
centre of activity lies in the dominant principle of the man, the connexion of
the chakras with the physical body must be made, as said, from the physical
plane. The object of this connexion is not to make the astral vehicle a more
efficient transmitter to the physical body of the energies of the Spiritual
Man, but to enable the astral vehicle to be in full touch with the physical.
There may be different centres of activity for the building up of transmitting
vehicles, but it is necessary to start from the physical plane in order to
bring the results of the activities of bodies functioning on other planes
within the waking-consciousness. Hence the high importance of physical purity
in diet and other matters. [258]
People often
ask: How does knowledge gained on higher planes reach the brain, and why is it
not accompanied by a memory of the circumstances under which it was acquired?
Anyone who practises meditation regularly knows that much knowledge that he has
not gained by study on the physical plane appears in the brain. Whence comes
it? It comes from the astral or mental plane, where it was acquired, and
reaches the brain in the ordinary way above described; the consciousness has
assimilated it on the mental plane directly, or it has reached it from the
astral, and sends down thought-waves as usual. It may have been communicated by
some entity on the higher plane, who has acted directly on the mental body. But
the circumstances of the communication may not be remembered, for one of two
reasons, or for both. Most people are not what is technically called
"awake" on the astral and mental planes; that is their faculties are
turned inwards, are occupied with mental processes and emotions, and are not
engaged in the observation of the external phenomena of, those planes. [259]
They may be very receptive, and their astral and mental bodies may easily be
thrown into vibration, and the vibrations convey the knowledge which is thus
given, but their attention is not turned to the person making the
communication. As evolution goes on, people become more and more receptive on
the astral and mental planes, but do not therefore become aware of their
surroundings.
The other
reason for the lack of memory is the absence of the connecting links with the
sympathetic system before mentioned. A person may be "awake" on the
astral plane and functioning actively thereon, and he may be vividly conscious
of his surroundings. But if the connecting links between the astral and
physical systems have not been made, or are not vivified, there is a break in
consciousness. However vivid may be the consciousness on the astral plane, it
cannot, until these links are functioning, bring through and impress on the
physical brain the memory of astral experiences. In addition to these links, there
must be the active functioning of the pituitary body, [260] which focusses the
astral vibrations much as a burning glass focusses the rays of the sun. A
number of the astral vibrations are drawn together and made to fall on a
particular point, and vibrations being thus set up in dense physical matter,
the further propagation of these is easy. All this is necessary for
"remembering".
4. THE PATHS
OF CONSCIOUSNESS.
The question
arises: Does consciousness always travel along the same path to reach its
physical vehicle? Transits, we know, are sometimes made directly through the
atomic sub-planes from plane to plane, and sometimes by passing through each
sub-plane from the seventh to the first before reaching the atomic sub-plane
next below. Which of these paths does
consciousness follow In its normal
working, in the ordinary process of thinking, the wave comes steadily down
through each successive sub-plane, from the mental through the seven astral
sub-planes to the physical etheric, and so to the dense nervous matter. This
wave sets up electrical [261] currents in the etheric matter, and these affect
the protoplasm of the grey cells. But when the peculiar flashes of consciousness
occur, as in flashes of genius, or as in sudden illuminative ideas which flash
into the mind - such a flash as comes to the scientific man when out of a great
mass of facts there suddenly springs forth the unifying underlying law - then
the consciousness pours downward through the atomic sub-planes only, and thus
reaches the brain. This is the illuminative idea which justifies itself by its
mere appearance, like the sunlight, and does not gain in compelling power by
any process of reasoning. Thus reasoning comes to the brain by the successive
sub-planes; authoritative illumination by the atomic sub-planes only. [262]
CHAPTER XII.
THE NATURE OF
MEMORY.
1. THE GREAT
SELF AND THE LITTLE SELVES.
WHAT is
memory? and how does it work? by what means do we recover the past, whether near or remote? For, after all,
whether the past be near or remote, belonging to this or to any anterior life,
the means which govern its recovery must be similar, and we require a theory
which will include all cases of memory, and at the same time will enable us to
understand each particular case.
The first
step towards obtaining a definite and intelligible theory is a comprehension
of our own composition, of the Self with its sheaths, and their interrelation;
and we may here briefly restate the main facts in the foregoing chapters [263]
which directly bear on the problem of Memory. We must bear constantly in mind
the facts that our consciousness is a unit, and that this unit of consciousness
works through various sheaths, which impose upon it a false appearance of multiplicity.
The innermost, or most tenuous, of these sheaths is inseparable from the unit
of consciousness; in fact, it is this sheath which makes it a unit. This unit
is the Monad, dwelling on the anupadaka plane; but for all practical purposes
we may take it as the familiar Inner Man, the Tri-Atom, Atma-Buddhi-Manas,
thought of as apart from the atmic, buddhic, and manasic sheaths. This unit of
consciousness manifests through, abides in, sheaths belonging to the five
planes of its activity, and we call it the Self working in its sheaths.
We must
think, then, of a conscious Self dwelling in vehicles that vibrate. The
vibrations of these vehicles correspond, on the side of matter, with the
changes in consciousness on the side of the Self. We cannot accurately speak of
vibrations of consciousness, because [264] vibrations can only belong to the
material side of things, the form side, and only loosely can we speak of a
vibrating consciousness. We have changes in consciousness corresponding with
vibrations in sheaths.
The question
of the vehicles, or bodies, in which consciousness, the Self, is working, is
all-important as regards Memory. The whole process of recovering more or less
remote events is a question of picturing them in the particular sheath - of
shaping part of the matter of the sheath into their likeness - in which
consciousness is working at the time. In the Self, as a fragment of the
Universal Self - which for our purpose we can take to be the LOGOS, although in
verity the LOGOS is but a portion of the Universal Self - is present
everything; for in the Universal Self is present all which has taken place, is
taking place, and will take place in the universe; all this, and an illimitable
more, is present in the Universal Consciousness. Let us think only of a
universe and its LOGOS. We speak of Him as omnipresent and omniscient. Now,
fundamentally, that [265] omnipresence and omniscience are in the
individualised Self, as being one with the LOGOS, but - we must put in here a
but - with a difference; the difference consisting in this, that while in the
separated Self as Self, apart from all vehicles, that omnipresence and
omniscience reside by virtue of his unity with the One Self, the vehicles in
which he dwells have not yet learned to vibrate in answer to his changes of consciousness,
as he turns his attention to one or another part of his contents. Hence we say
that all exists in him potentially, and not as in the LOGOS actually: all
the changes which go on in the
consciousness of the LOGOS are reproducible in this separated Self, which is an
indivisible part of His life, but the vehicles are not yet ready as media of
manifestation. Because of the separation of form, because of this closing in of
the separate, or individualised, Self,
these possibilities which are within it as part of the Universal Self are
latent, not manifest, are possibilities, not actualities. As in every atom
which goes to the making up of a vehicle, there are illimitable possibilities
of vibration, so in every [266] separated Self there are illimitable possibilities
of changes of consciousness.
We do not
find in the atom, at the beginning of a solar system, an illimitable variety of
vibrations; but we learn that it possesses a capacity to acquire an illimitable
variety of vibrations; it acquires these in the course of its evolution, as it
responds continually to vibrations playing
upon its surface; at the end of a solar system, an immense number of the
atoms in it have reached the stage of evolution in which they can vibrate in
answer to any vibration touching them
that arises within the system; then, for that system, these atoms are said to
be perfected. The same thing is true for the separated, or individualised,
Selves. All the changes taking place in the consciousness of the LOGOS which
are represented in that universe, and take shape as forms in that universe, all
these are also within the perfected consciousnesses in that universe, and any
of these changes can be reproduced in any one of them. Here is Memory: the
reappearance, the reincarnation in matter, of anything that has been within
that [267] universe, and therefore ever is, in the consciousness of its LOGOS,
and in the consciousnesses which are parts of His consciousness. Although we
think of the Self as separate as regards all other Selves, we must ever
remember it is inseparate as regards the ONE SELF the LOGOS. His life is not
shut out from any part of His universe, and in Him we live and move and have
our being, open ever to Him, filled with His life.
As the self
puts on vehicle after vehicle of matter, its powers of gaining knowledge become, with each additional vehicle, more
circumscribed but also more definite. Arrived on the physical plane, consciousness
is narrowed down to the experiences which can be received through the physical
body, and chiefly through those openings which we call the sense-organs; these
are avenues through which knowledge can reach the imprisoned Self, though we
often speak of them as shutting out knowledge when we think of the capacities
of the subtler vehicles. The physical body renders perception definitive and
clear much as a screen [268] with a minute hole in it allows a picture of the
outside world to appear on a wall that would otherwise show a blank surface;
rays of light are truly shut off from the wall, but, by that very shutting off,
those allowed to enter form a clearly defined picture.
2. CHANGES IN
THE VEHICLES AND IN CONSCIOUSNESS.
Let us now
see what happens as regards the physical vehicle in the reception of an
impression and in the subsequent recall of that impression, i.e., in the memory
of it.
A vibration
from outside strikes on an organ of sense, and is transmitted to the
appropriate centre in the brain. A group of cells in the brain vibrates, and that
vibration leaves the cells in a state somewhat different from the one in which
they were previous to its reception, The trace of that response is a
possibility for the group of cells; it has once vibrated in a particular way,
and it retains for the rest of its existence as a group of cells the [269]
possibility of again vibrating in that same way without again receiving a
stimulus from the outside world. Each repetition of an identical vibration
strengthens this possibility, each leaving its own trace, but many such
repetitions will be required to establish a self-initiated repetition; the
cells come nearer to this possibility of a self-initiated vibration by each
repetition compelled from outside. But this vibration has not stopped with the
physical cells; it has been transmitted inwards to the corresponding cell, or
group of cells, in the subtler vehicles, and has ultimately produced a change
in consciousness. This change, in its turn, re-acts on the cells, and a
repetition of the vibrations is initiated from within by the change in
consciousness, and this repetition is a memory of the object which started the
series of vibrations. The response of the cells to the vibration from outside,
a response compelled by the laws of the physical universe, gives to the cells
the power of responding to a similar impulse, though feebler, coming from
within. A little power is exhausted in each moving [270] of matter in a new
vehicle, and hence a gradual diminution of the energy in the vibration. Less
and less is exhausted as the cells repeat similar vibrations in response to new
impacts from without, the cells answering more readily with each repetition.
Therein lies
the value of the "without"; it wakes up in the matter, more easily
than by any other way, the possibility of response, being more closely akin to
the vehicles than the "within".
The change
caused in consciousness, also, leaves the consciousness more ready to repeat
that change than it was first to yield it, and each such change brings the
consciousness nearer to the power to initiate a similar change. Looking back
into the dawnings of consciousness, we see that the imprisoned Selves go
through innumerable experiences before a Self-initiated change in
consciousness occurs; but bearing this in mind, as a fact, we can leave these
early stages, and study the workings of consciousness at a more advanced point.
We must also remember that every impact, reaching the innermost [271] sheath,
and giving rise to a change in consciousness, is followed by a reaction, the
change in consciousness causing a new series of vibrations from within outwards;
there is the going inwards to the Self, followed by the rippling outwards from
the Self, the first due to the object, and giving rise to what we call a perception,
and the second due to the reaction of the Self, causing what we call a memory.
A number of
sense-impressions, coming through sight, hearing, touch, taste, and smell run
up from the physical vehicle through the astral to the mental. There they are
coordinated into a complex unity, as a musical chord is composed of many notes.
This is the special work of the mental body: it receives many streams and
synthesises them into one; it builds many impressions into a perception, a
thought, a complex unity.
3. MEMORIES.
Let us try to catch this complex thing, after it has gone inwards and has caused a c