The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

Report of Sessions of the Katherine Tingley Memorial Group

Edited by ARTHUR L. CONGER

First Edition copyright © 1948; Second Edition and Revised Edition copyright © 1997 by Theosophical University Press. Electronic version ISBN 978-1-55700-094-1. All rights reserved. This edition may be downloaded free of charge for personal use. Except for brief excerpts, no part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted for commercial or other use in any form without the prior permission of Theosophical University Press. For ease of searching, words are not accented in this version.

NOTE: Changes to this second edition consist entirely of modernizing capitalization and punctuation.

CONTENTS

Quick Links to Contents of Volumes | 2 | 3 |

Preface

Volume 1

KTMG Papers: One (Meeting of November 27, 1929) ( 46K)

Supplement : The Planet Saturn — Death of the Sun — Dual Evolution: Dawn of Godhood —

Twofold Influence of Saturn — The Monad: a Composite Entity — The Peace of Death —

Initiation is Self-Conferred ( 45K)

KTMG Papers: Two (Meeting of December 11, 1929) ( 61K)

Supplement : Who are the Gods? — New Installment of Teaching — Parent Stars — Root-Races

— Negroes — Races, Principles — Buddhas — Planets — Gateways of Death — Brahmarandhra

— Judge Not — Moment of Choice — Beauty: Physical and Spiritual ( 52K)

KTMG Papers: Three (Meeting of December 25, 1929) ( 50K)

Supplement: Masters — Egos Awaiting Reincarnation — Refrain from Judging — The Pleiades

— Temptations of Chelaship — Preparation Before Sleep — Four Sacred Seasons — The Tribunal of the Higher Self — K.T.'s Work ( 21K)

KTMG Papers: Four (Meeting of January 8, 1930) ( 46K)

Supplement : The Buddhas — Conception and Birth — More About the Buddhas — The K.T.M.G. Teachings — The Three Kayas — The Gods Cast No Shadows — The Esoteric Becomes Exoteric — Charge, Pledge — Fidelity: Unity of Spirit — Pratyeka and compassion Buddhas — Dharmakaya, Sambhogakaya, Nirmanakaya — Eclipses — Spiritual Selfishness ( 53K)

KTMG Papers: Five (Meeting of January 22, 1930) ( 77K)

KTMG Papers: Six (Meeting of February 12, 1930) ( 71K)

KTMG Papers: Seven (Meeting of February 26, 1930) ( 74K)

KTMG Papers: Eight (Meeting of March 12, 1930) ( 80K)

KTMG Papers: Nine (Meeting of March 26, 1930) ( 65K)

KTMG Papers: Ten (Meeting of April 9, 1930) ( 65K)

Volume 2

KTMG Papers: Eleven (Meeting of April 23, 1930) ( 71K)

KTMG Papers: Twelve (Meeting of May 14, 1930) ( 67K)

KTMG Papers: Thirteen (May 28, 1930) ( 56K)

KTMG Papers: Fourteen (Meeting of June 11, 1930) ( 68K)

KTMG Papers: Fifteen (Meeting of June 25, 1930) ( 60K)

KTMG Papers: Sixteen (Meeting of July 9, 1930) ( 43K)

KTMG Papers: Seventeen (Meeting of July 23, 1930) ( 19K)

KTMG Papers: Eighteen (Meeting of August 12, 1930) ( 67K)

KTMG Papers: Nineteen (Meeting of August 26, 1930) ( 78K)

KTMG Papers: Twenty (Meeting of September 9, 1930) ( 50K)

KTMG Papers: Twenty-One (Meeting of October 14, 1930) ( 50K)

KTMG Papers: Twenty-Two (Meeting of October 28, 1930) ( 60K)

KTMG Papers: Twenty-Three (Meeting of November 11, 1930) ( 66K)

KTMG Papers: Twenty-Four (Meeting of November 25, 1930) ( 46K)

KTMG Papers: Twenty-Five (Meeting of December 9, 1930) ( 61K)

KTMG Papers: Twenty-Six (Meeting of January 27, 1931) ( 56K)

Volume 3

KTMG Papers: Twenty-Seven (Meeting of February 10, 1931) ( 52K)

KTMG Papers: Twenty-Eight (Meeting of February 24, 1931) ( 59K)

Supplement : The Solar Initiation — Elementals — Animal Monads ( 23K)

KTMG Papers: Twenty-Nine (Meeting of March 17, 1931) ( 52K)

KTMG Papers: Thirty (Meeting of April 14, 1931) ( 46K)

Supplement: Devachan and Nirvana — Free Will ( 11K)

KTMG Papers: Thirty-One (Meeting of May 12, 1931) ( 56K)

Supplement: From Boundless Space Universes Come Into Being — Man Is a Hierarchy —

Atomic to Galactic Consciousness — Dhyan-Chohanic "Failures" — Relation of Teacher to Pupil Analogous to Manasaputric Inflaming — Devachan and Nirvana ( 26K)

KTMG Papers: Thirty-Two (Meeting of February 28, 1932) ( 52K)

Supplement: Ten Families of Monads — Life-waves and Sishtas — Why Animals Suffer —

Sishtas Open the Drama of Human Life — The Cycling Life-Waves ( 50K)

KTMG Papers: Thirty-Three (Meeting of May 5, 1932) ( 70K)

Supplement: The Cross of Initiation — The Mystic Rose — So Many Men, So Many Devachans

— 777 Lives — Quality Incarnations — Imbodiments on Ascending Arc — Principles and Rounds — Septenary Elements Universal — Atmic Consciousness — Lost Souls and "Failures"

— Soul-Loss: A Dual Tragedy ( 73K)

KTMG Papers: Thirty-Four (Answers to Correspondence) ( 76K)

Supplement: Monadic Classes — Reimbodying Not Reincarnating Monad — The First Round —

Children-Monads — Animals, Men, Gods — After Death: A Dream-Consciousness — White and Black Magicians — Adepts Enter Kama-loka and Underworld — Time Periods and Life-waves —

Nirvana: Buddhas, Avichi-Nirvana: Lost Souls — The Nature of Buddha — Mukti-and Avichi-Nirvana — Manasaputras — Three Classes of Manases — Avataras Function as Manasaputras —

Manus, Prajapatis, Sishtas — Three Panoramic Visions ( 67K)

KTMG Papers: Thirty-Five (Answers to Correspondence) ( 35K)

Supplement: Heart Illumines the Brain ( 5K)

KTMG Papers: Thirty-Six (Meeting of September 26, 1933) ( 59K)

Supplement: Past, Present, Future — Encapsulation — Astral Light, Anima Mundi, Akasa —

AfterDeath Consciousness — Transcend Humanity for Divinity — Fifth Race Delayed — Fifth Round Time of Choice — Rounds: Inner and Outer — Pratyekas Become Avataras in New Chain

— Bodhisattvahood ( 59K)

Conclusion

PREFACE (to Volume 1)

Shortly after assuming the Leadership of the Theosophical Society on July 11, 1929, Dr. G. de Purucker formed the Katherine Tingley Memorial Group in commemoration of the lifework of his predecessor, Katherine Tingley.

For thirteen years this group, composed of members of the Esoteric School, held regular meetings at the International Headquarters — formerly located at Point Loma, but in June 1942, removed by Dr. de Purucker to Covina, California. During this period stenographic reports of these sessions were privately printed and distributed to the group, whose membership had extended throughout the United States, Europe and Asia.

Unless specifically stated, as in the case of the few KTMG meetings held in Europe while G. de P. was on lecture tours, it is to be understood that the meetings were held at the international headquarters.

The time has come when that which has "been kept secret from the foundation of the world" should be made public. Authorized now to do this, I but fulfill G. de P.'s prophecy when he said: I can see very clearly that the time will probably come when what we now call esoteric we shall publish broadcast, because the time will have come to do so. But that does not mean, if you please, Companions, that any one of you is entitled to break his oath of secrecy. It is not for me to say when. It is for Those who know more than any one of us here. But I can feel that it is coming. —

Meeting of May 26, 1942, pp. 177-8.

Especial thanks are given to the members of the committee who have worked daily with me for the past several months. They are Mary W. Peyton, Martha R. Franklin, A. Studley Hart, Hazel Minot, Grace Frances Knoche, and James A. Long. Because of their close association at the Headquarters with the KTMG activities since their inception, Mrs. Minot and Miss Knoche contributed valuable aid in the preparation of the manuscript.

The present volume comprises papers One to Ten, plus additional material given by G. de P. while the Headquarters Group was studying Papers One to Four. These supplements will be of interest, not only for the richer light thrown on the subjects handled by G. de P. during the early years of his teaching, but also because they have not hitherto been circulated outside the Headquarters Group. Volumes Two and Three, to be printed subsequently, will complete the series of 36 papers plus supplements, with index in the third volume.

This has been a labor of fidelity and love, and it is my belief that the earnest student whose resolve equals his aspiration will find in these Dialogues between teacher and pupil that path leading him to the "terrace of enlightenment."

A. L. CONGER. International Theosophical Headquarters,

Covina, California,

January 15, 1948.

Conclusion

September 26, 1933

Consummatum Est

Companions, I have on a few occasions received word from members of the ES and from a few members of the KTMG throughout the world, asking for directions in training. The phrase ran in substance in one communication: "Dear G. de P., cannot you give us some esoteric training in the ES and the KTMG so that we can live by it? The teachings themselves are beautiful and helpful, but I would like to know a few rules showing me how to live."

Companions, you know me well enough to realize that I would not say an unkind word about anyone, yet I will tell you frankly that I was hurt, and have been hurt, when receiving these communications, which although not numerous yet do reach me from time to time. They have amounted all told to about ten, possibly twelve; and I will now tell you why I have been somewhat distressed. What these dear people were really after was instructions in what they thought was yoga training. What they really craved was hatha yoga exercises. They wanted instructions as to concentrating the mind at certain hours, and to be shown the best way of doing it, and to be told what positions the body should take, and to be given astrological instructions as to concentrating in the proper planetary positions, and so forth.

Now I will tell you something really important, and I ask your most earnest attention. Your pledge, if you will only live it, and not merely talk about it, will be all the training that your mind and heart and imagination can possibly understand and follow. "Live the life and you will know the doctrine." Live the life and you will achieve masterhood. The whole effort in our ES today is exactly the same as what it was in HPB's Esoteric School, for hers and ours are one and have always been the same. The ES is a distinct school of training in chelaship and is an attempt to develop our students so that by living the life they may grow inwardly, so that they may develop their spiritual and intellectual and psychical faculties and powers. I will tell you frankly and once and for all that you will never develop these powers by any yoga practices whatsoever — never! It simply cannot be done. It is a running after will-o'-the-wisps of faulty imagination. This is my only objection, as it was KT's, to these itinerant yogis from the East traveling around and teaching yoga — usually for a price. The doctrines of the Vedanta that they teach are usually beautiful as doctrines; and if they are the teachings of the genuine Vedanta these teachings are unquestionably fine. If they are of the genuine Vedanta of the adwaita cycle, they are mostly our own doctrines; but these doctrines by themselves and without the esoteric keys that are given in the ES do not emphasize the need of ethical living, of noble thinking translated

into noble action. And I will tell you that if you follow the pledge which HPB gave to us, and which we now have, you will have all the yoga exercise that you can possibly manage to take care of. Certain ones of the higher yoga exercises are good and are occasionally followed by our Masters' own chelas for specific and particular reasons; but usually, if not always, they are followed in the cases of less advanced chelas whose lower principles are so strong that they need particular subjugation.

There is no true school of occultism outside our Masters' own circles which is known to me, except our own; and we in the ES follow the age-old precepts of the Masters of wisdom and compassion, as they have been handed down to us from immemorial time: live nobly, think nobly, feel nobly, do your duty to all at all times and in all places, and by all men. Speak the truth, fear naught, stand up for others when they are unjustly attacked; never add your voice to the burden of condemnation of others. Rules like these are the rules that our chelas follow; and I tell you truly that you will have your hands full and your mind full and your heart full in following them. And, in addition, if you wish to undertake another aspect of the chela training, one which is the invariable practice in our own School, then follow the teaching of the ten paramitas of Buddhism, which are always followed in the true schools of esoteric training, and which we attempt to follow in our ES. The paramitas are ten, sometimes they are enumerated as seven, sometimes as six. The six are the easier; the seven are a little more difficult; and the ten are for those who intend to devote all their life, and the next life perhaps, and possibly the next life after that, to that resigning of the lower self to the higher in service to the world.

There, in these rules, is the whole path of achievement. The Masters have no other training than what I have told you, and it is the same that their chelas invariably follow; only the Masters follow this training more grandly, and on a scale which is wider, and with reaches which are much more extended than their chelas can comprehend. I might say without feeling that I am wandering into hyperbole, that the very gods follow the same thing, inasmuch as they live for the universe; and I trust that the day will never come when our School will see the introduction of hatha yoga practices of any kind! Should it so happen, it will mean that our School has broken the link and is on the way to mere quasi-secret, sectarian degeneration.

Please close the meeting.

[The sounding of the gong. Silence.]

Contents

Theosophical Society Homepage

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG PAPERS: ONE

The chief object of the T. S. is not so much to gratify individual aspirations as to serve our fellow men. — The Mahatma Letters

Meeting of November 27, 1929

G. de P. — You understand of course, Companions, that when this Katherine Tingley Memorial Group was first formed, it was a child of my heart in memory, in commemoration, of the lifework of our blessed KT, the greatest esotericist of the three leaders and teachers who have preceded me — a greater esotericist than HPB, a greater esotericist than Mr. Judge. This Group began in a small way, and now the Group has become large.

Seeds of the noblest trees are usually small. My hope was that from this one seeding originally in your Point Loma joint Club-work, would grow a spiritual tree, whose branches would overspread the earth; and this is coming.

I have decided therefore to have a stenographic record made of these meetings, beginning with this evening, for the purpose of enabling Katherine Tingley Memorial Groups which are in process of formation in other parts of the world to receive these teachings, and thus be associated with us in thought.

This KT Memorial Group will grow to be the greatest men-catching net, I believe, that the world has seen in historic times. Spread your mystic nets! Cast them on the waters of life! It is a great and holy duty that we are involved in.

Now, Companions, has anyone any questions to ask?

Student — When a person becomes a student of the ES [Esoteric Section], is it permissible for him to accept the OH [Outer Head] as his teacher in some respects, and disregard him in other respects?

To make my meaning clearer: can one accept from the teacher all he is entitled to have on deep but abstract lines, but when it comes to practical, everyday affairs, set aside, disregard, or criticize the teacher for his decisions, judgments, or acts?

I am asking this not as a question of abstract interest, but because I know, of my own personal knowledge, that one or two members criticize the teacher for acts which he does which they do not approve of.

G. de P. — I will say this: in entering the ES you take a pledge which it is supposed, as beings of adult years and of sound mind and of loyal heart, you had considered and understood before you pledged yourself. You cannot take a pledge and withdraw from it without incurring very serious responsibility. If anyone chooses to straddle, the ES is not the place for his straddling antics. He should stay in or go out. I am telling you truth, the archaic laws.

I do not want to know who this person is. What disturbs me, however, is the principle of the thing. So far as any member of the ES — and of this Katherine Tingley Memorial Group perhaps in particular, on account of the heart-atmosphere that surrounds its ideals and works — is concerned, all he needs to think of in connection with the OH is to obey, without cavil, without delay, any orders emanating from the OH in everything that concerns his ES or theosophical work. That is what the pledge recites. In things outside of all of this presumably he will act as a theosophist should act, and also presumably as a member of the ES should act; but he is not pledged to obedience in anything outside of his ES work and TS work.

Of course I understand Occidental human nature very well; I have been in this physical body a number of years, and I have learned to my cost and sorrow to know just what these Occidental ideals of personal liberty are worth — and not worth. I don't think they are worth much; but you may have a different opinion, and you are entitled to hold it. If you will consider that all the rules of the ES are based on ages of experience of human nature and of human life, you may understand the reason for the fact that the higher you go in the ES

degrees, the more rigid and exacting become the rules, become the regulations, until finally (I can say this as a warning to you) in the highest degrees you become an absolutely willing, joyful, and devoted instrument of the Law.

The whole effort of the ES training is towards forgetfulness of self, for the universe. The training in these lower degrees is relatively easy. There is, on the part of the Teachers, much toleration and patience with human mistakes and failings and misunderstandings; but it is my duty to tell you, if you go on successfully, what you will meet with — and it ought to arouse joy in your hearts. Upon this ground of natural fact is based the statement that the mahatmas are the servants of the Law. You have heard in romances of the statement,

"the slaves of love." The idea in both cases is the same; and in fact the gods are the slaves of cosmic love.

Now, so far as criticizing the OH is concerned, I have no objection to that. I certainly don't object in the slightest. To me it is a matter of perfect indifference; but it becomes a serious matter to me to see that, if this report be true, it shows a most unfortunate misunderstanding of duty.

There is no violation of our rule in criticizing and disregarding and setting aside and judging as much as you please, in all matters that don't concern the ES. Nevertheless, I will ask you if you admire the straddling attitude, if you think it is a beautiful attitude, either mentally or physically, and if you can admire a person who can come into these ES meetings and have his heart full of devotion for the Masters' truth and the Masters' representative and expecting to gain wisdom and knowledge from him — otherwise, why come? —

and then when he is outside, criticize, disregard, set aside, and judge of what his teacher does in his capacity as Leader? I ask you what kind of a man or woman will do that? Is this explanation clear to you, and do you think it sufficient?

Many Voices — Yes!

G. de P. — Does anyone object to it?

Many Voices — No!

G. de P. — Please speak. Remember that in our ES meetings we meet heart to heart; and I will admire the courage of the one who can rise and honestly express his or her opinion. I will be back of him, stand by his side in commendation. Has anyone anything to say?

Student — To me it seems that when one becomes an ES member, there is nothing that takes place on the Hill [Point Loma TS Headquarters] that is really outside of the ES work; and if we held this in heart and bore it in mind, there is no action that could be considered as outside of our work, and it should be held sacred accordingly.

G. de P. — That is very beautiful; and it is not a criticism or a disregard or anything of that sort.

Student — May I say a word? I was going to say that I think that in this case it is the same as with other rules: the people who really have the rule at heart do not have these difficulties. If there is anyone who wants a rule interpreted exactly and to know just when he may transgress it, and what are the exceptions, it is a sign that he does not really believe in the rule. Suppose that there were a rule of silence, and I was most anxious to keep silence. I could then be trusted never to break that rule except when it was absolutely necessary; but if I feel the rule of silence to be irksome, then I shall go about asking when I may break it. I think that the same thing applies here. I think that it is a question of verbal understanding rather a real understanding of the heart.

G. de P. — Very good. I think both of you have spoken admirably.

Student — I think that the person referred to as criticizing, etc., whoever it may be, seems to have quite clear in his or her mind that so and so refers to the esoteric work of the Teacher and so and so does not, and therefore the latter can be criticized. What right can that person have to judge in this way? Isn't it possible that an action done by the teacher is profoundly esoteric and appears to this particular person as something quite secondary and therefore capable of being criticized?

G. de P. — That is true. Now, I think that we can go on to the next question, unless someone has it on his or her heart to speak in a contrary way.

Student — I would like to say something, but it is not in a contrary way. As far as I understand the question as it was read, it was not the teacher's acts which were being criticized; but this ES member's trust in the teacher was so small, that he (or she) readily believed a report concerning the teacher's acts, which came to him (or her) from a non-ES member, instead of either having sufficient trust in his teacher to know that the report was false, or going to the teacher to ask for an explanation.

Student — When we know of such happenings among our own body, are we failing in our duty to the teacher by submitting to the presence of such members among us?

G. de P. — Well, forgive me for saying so; frankly I do not think it is a failure. There are so many things involved here. I do not think that it is the duty of one member of the ES to criticize, to judge, another ES

companion. The only way to do is to report it to the teacher. That lovely word "report"! And yet it is your duty on this ground: every man and woman belonging to the ES forms one of an association, not of dilettanti come together for brain-mind study of more or less interesting things, with individual interests following in many and diverse and divers directions; but all come together as students of the ancient wisdom, also as students of each other's hearts.

I should say that the only thing to do is to report the matter to your Outer Head and then drop it; say no more; treat the Companion, if you know him or her, with the same kindly consideration and thought as before. It is not the business of any other member to judge of what a fellow member does. You will be committing the same fault that you deprecate and condemn. Do you see the point?

Many Voices — Yes!

Student — This question is one of quite a different type. Do I understand correctly that the soul which filled the body of the one whom we have learned to know as Mr. Judge, was at the same time filling the body of the Raja? If this is so, how could it happen that this soul could be attracted to the two bodies at the same time?

Also, I understand that the Raja died before Mr. Judge did. Was this not a relief to Mr. Judge? And why was it not a chance for his poor, tired, and sick body to pick up a bit? Please tell us more about this.

G. de P. — Well, as a matter of fact, Companions, a spiritual force-energy such as the monadic essence in any one of us, is like a sun and is therefore frequently spoken of as the spiritual sun. Its rays, its energies, its forces, its powers, can manifest themselves actually in several bodies at the same time. That is a fact, just as the sun sends out its energies, its life powers, its vital forces, into all directions of space and continues to do so unceasingly through aeons.

Now, I do not like to say much about Mr. Judge's case, for the reason that there is a mystery there, to which Mr. Judge himself has but faintly alluded. But the mere passing, the dying, of the Hindu prince called the Raja would not necessarily at all increase or better the state of health which Mr. Judge himself had, because that was another body entirely. A ray of sunlight failing upon you might comfort you with its warmth and light and in other ways be pleasing to you and helpful; but another ray of sunlight, another ray of light, from the same luminary, might have a very different effect upon one who is lying on a sick bed. That is what I mean.

Mr. Judge's weak body was a case of karmic consequences, and these consequences were allowed to work out in that way. It was better so than to dam them back until some later date, when even more would be required from the then body than was required from Mr. Judge in this last life.

I think that is all I would care to say about this question. The phrase "attracted to two bodies at the same time"

— well, the attraction to a body is something which is experienced by the human ego alone and not by the monadic essence. Its action is rather one of choice and of compassion. It is not attracted to material existence at all; but the contrary.

Has anyone any other question to ask, not on this matter, unless you wish to, but on some other?

Student — Professor, what are the rings of Saturn; and did any other planets have rings at any time of their evolution?

G. de P. — You have asked a very interesting and very recondite question. The rings of Saturn are a resultant of the evolution of the planetary nebula, later of the comet which became the planet we now call by the name of Saturn.

Furthermore, these rings are very closely involved with the circulations of the cosmos. They are "stepping-stones" for entities imbodying themselves on the planet. Is there not an electrical expression "to step down"?

Well, then, these rings serve as "steppers-down," modifying or changing the psychomagnetic energies of the entities which are approaching the planet Saturn for imbodiment there; and they serve likewise for "steppers-up," if I may coin this term, for disembodied entities leaving Saturn. Physically they are, as just pointed out, the remnants of the planetary nebula and of the later comet which Saturn once was.

Other planets have similar rings about them, but they are not visible to our physical eyes. And, as a matter of fact, every planet, visible or invisible, in our solar family, is surrounded by a veil. The Teachers have spoken of this veil as a "continent" of meteoric matter existing for each one of the planets. This veil or continent of meteoric substance serves a number of purposes outside of the physical one. It is a protection. It is also a veil against the titanic vital forces of the sun. You will understand these ideas better, perhaps, if you realize that the sun is not a body on fire, but is the heart of our system and is in itself a focus of titanic electric and magnetic energies, on account of which, if the planets were not protected, they would literally be consumed.

Has anyone any other questions to ask?

Student — HPB, or the Master, in one letter speaks of the rings of Saturn, and calls Saturn a half-frank planet, meaning, I think, half-revealing something. She says nothing more. But that is in reference to the lokas and the talas; and many students have puzzled over the question of the spheres around the earth: whether those spheres around the earth are real spheres increasing in rarefaction the farther from the planet they are; and we might call them kama-loka or by other names, gradually growing more and more spiritual the farther they are from the earth. There are many hints in some of our literature, particularly in the esoteric literature, that there are degrees of distance in these lokas and talas. Master says in one place, that if you go up from eighteen to twenty thousand feet, the pure atmosphere permits certain things to be done up there that cannot be done below; and I have a feeling from reading several passages in our literature, that the earth is surrounded by rings — I don't mean physical, but rings of different grades of spirituality. Would that have any relation with this matter?

G. de P. — Is the question whether the earth is surrounded by rings or not? You have not specified your question.

Student — I was thinking more of spheres, coats like an onion's, or like kama-loka, ascending into higher states of devachanic consciousness. Are those spheres really far away from the earth or is that only an abstraction? Are they an abstract idea? Are they intermingled with the physical earth, or do the more and more spiritual spheres extend at greater distances from the earth?

G. de P. — By the spheres, do you mean the globes of the planetary chain?

Student — I meant the states that we call kama-loka and the seven degrees of devachan, and such things.

G. de P. — I think that your confusion, if such it may be called, Brother ------, arises out of the fact that there is a mixing of ideas regarding the lokas and the talas with the purely physical atmosphere surrounding the earth. Every planet is surrounded, as the sun is, with its own atmospheres, its auras of different degrees of density. Its atmospheres, physically speaking, extend from the physical aura, the atmosphere which we breathe, to an etheric atmosphere; and these atmospheres represent, physically speaking, the auric egg of the earth, which exists in increasing degrees of ethereality as the distance from the center of the earth increases.

In other words, they are the more material the closer they are to the earth; the farther they are from the earth the more ethereal they are.

Now, the lokas and the talas of which you have spoken, do not refer, except in the case of one of them, to material substance at all. The lokas and the talas are the realms, planes, spheres, kingdoms — call them what you like — of substance, which fill the solar system; and they range all the way from the material earth and indeed from beneath the physical earth, which latter are the talas, to higher states or conditions, etherealizing themselves as they pass the earth into the lokas progressively higher and most high. Both lokas and talas interpenetrate the earth. There is a system of seven lokas and seven talas for every globe of the planetary chain.

The planet Saturn has been spoken of as the only half-frank planet because, paradoxically, it is one of the most material planets in our solar system, although physically it is the most ethereal — the most material from the standpoint of psychic and soul substance, and the most ethereal from the standpoint of mere physical matter. Do you follow the idea? You have touched upon an exceedingly intricate and profound subject of thought.

I will tell you something more about the rings of Saturn. Saturn is very closely connected with the earth, historically and also psychologically, and in this fourth round it is the planet astrologically governing our earth — in this fourth round. The consequence is that our fourth round bodies have fourth round senses capable of sensing, that is to say receiving, sensory impressions from the planet most nearly connected with it and governing it in this round. That is why we see the so-called rings around the planet Saturn.

Let me explain what is meant by the outer rounds as contrasted with the inner rounds. Do you know what the inner rounds are? The inner rounds are the passing of the life-wave from globe to globe of a planetary chain.

The earth planetary chain is an instance, which is, as you know, composed of seven globes, the lowest being on our physical plane, the earth. Such are the inner rounds. These particular circulations — the technical term

— are the passing of the life-wave and of the individual human souls from globe to globe of this planetary chain. These are the inner rounds. There are seven such rounds.

The outer rounds are the passing or circulations of these hosts of entities, of which hosts the human host is one, from one planetary chain to another planetary chain — in other words, from one planet to another planet; and there are seven of these outer rounds. The Teacher Morya and the Master Kuthumi in writing to Mr.

Sinnett and to Mr. Alan Hume in the early days in India concerning these matters, had great difficulty in conveying their meaning to these two men, precisely because neither Mr. Sinnett nor Mr. Hume could understand the difference between these two kinds of rounds; hence much confusion was caused and still remains in the minds of theosophical students, about the globes and the rounds. Mrs. Annie Besant even to this day has not understood the difference between the two kinds of rounds, hence she has confused the outer rounds with the inner rounds. You older students may remember a passage in The Secret Doctrine where HPB

speaks of the fact that the life-wave does not come to the Earth from the planet Mars, and then leave the Earth for the planet Mercury.

You are all acquainted with that passage of theosophical history. There was a deplorable confusion between the outer rounds and the inner rounds. How could HPB explain in public the difference between these two things — both belonging to esoteric matters? She was sworn to silence. She could not say that there was no truth in Sinnett's misunderstanding, because he had in fact been told some detail, some fact, about the outer rounds, which he had misunderstood. He had also been told many details and facts about the inner rounds of our own planetary chain; but not having been given the key, he confused the outer with the inner rounds. So HPB had to do the best she could in briefly explaining the matter in The Secret Doctrine. And it was a masterly explanation as far as it went. The subject is too intricate to understand without very careful preparatory study. Are there any other questions this evening?

Student — In meeting the problems that arise in a student's inner life of late, I find the presence of Katherine Tingley very markedly; and I wondered whether that could be explained somewhat, since it seems odd as she is not now the OH.

G. de P. — Easily explained, dear Brother. She is here. All the best of Katherine Tingley is here and is still watching over the work. The monadic essence has not gone away. It is here; and that accounts for her

"presence" with us, that so many of the Companions have spoken of. In fact, I have received communications

from a number of our fellows on the Hill, saying that Katherine Tingley seems nearer to us today than when she was with us in the body, that they felt her presence more clearly, more strongly, since her passing, than when she was here in the physical body. And naturally it is so, because the physical body cripples, hides, the spiritual part. The human part at the present moment is in devachan; but the stay there will be very short, simply a rest. The monadic essence is here and there also. Do you understand the idea? Are there any other questions?

Student — I have one. But it goes back a little to the former subject that we were talking about — the planets. The Voice of the Silence says:

"Behold Migmar, as in his crimson veils his 'Eye' sweeps over slumbering Earth. Behold the fiery aura of the 'Hand' of Lhagpa extended in protecting love over the heads of his ascetics. Both are now servants to Nyima left in his absence silent watchers in the night. Yet both in Kalpas past were bright Nyimas, and may in future 'Days' again become two Suns. Such are the falls and rises of the Karmic Law in nature."

In the footnote it says that Migmar is the planet Mars, and the "Hand" of Lhagpa is Mercury, and Nyima is the Sun. It has always remained a sort of new idea to me that a planet could ever have been formerly a sun, and how could it have fallen from that high estate?

G. de P. — Here again we are touching upon the frontiers of forbidden things. You are touching upon astrology — real astrology, the science of the souls of the stars. Astronomy, as you will remember, means merely the science of the physical composition and of the movements of the stars and planets, whereas astrology means the science of the things themselves, the science of the souls of the stars.

What is a sun? A sun is an entity, the body of a god. Its body is composed of solar atoms. These atoms are of various sizes and of various capacities, and exist in various degrees of evolution, just as do the atoms of a human body. When the human body dies, it is either burnt or it decays or it is broken up in some other way.

The atoms then pursue their transmigrations, their peregrinations, through the various kingdoms of nature as these kingdoms exist in the solar system. These atoms are also of various evolutionary degrees of advancement — high, low, and intermediate.

Similar are the atoms which compose the physical body of the sun. When the sun at the end of the solar manvantara reaches its time to go into pralaya, it dies. It is ensouled by a being, a quasi-divine entity. At the instant of the beginning of the solar pralaya the body of the sun vanishes like that [snaps fingers] and it is gone; the reason being that the inner controlling life and entity is withdrawn. Like the last throb of the heart in a human body, so is the golden cord snapped; and there being nothing remaining in the body of the sun to hold its atoms in coherent form, they are immediately dissipated, and thus the sun vanishes instantly, quicker than the wink of an eye. The sun was, and is now gone; but the atoms composing it, of many kinds, of many degrees of development, immediately begin their peregrinations through the kingdoms of cosmic space.

Now, some of these atoms are just ready to begin a life of their own, so to say, more or less away from the rigid control of the ensouling entity that is the god of the sun. These particular atoms, this class of atoms, I say, wander through space for aeons and aeons and aeons, until the time again strikes for the soul of the sun that was, the god of it in other words, to reimbody itself, to form thus a new solar system. Then these atom-entities are reattracted, are attracted back, to the magnetic center which this reimbodying sun forms or makes, and are drawn to this center from the deeps of interstellar space.

Such an atom — one of the kind I have spoken of as ready to pursue its own life-path — or aggregate of atoms first appears in the spacial deeps as a nebula. It is beginning then its descent into materialized existence or body. This nebula takes on various forms and finally begins to whirl and so continues until it becomes more or less materialized or compacted. It gathers to itself atoms of similar type of a lower degree, which strengthen the material character of its body. It then begins to wander and becomes a comet. It is attracted magnetically, electromagnetically, psychomagnetically, spiritually, to the center where the reimbodied or reimbodying sun is; and as the aeons pass, this comet settles from an erratic orbit around this sun, this new sun — the old sun that was which is now a sun again — until finally the comet acquires an elliptic orbit like a

planet. It is now settled for life around the new sun, its former parent, of which it formerly was a part of the body; and thus settles in life as a planet.

Such was the history of our present planets — our Earth for instance, Jupiter, Mars, Saturn, Mercury, Venus.

All planets begin naturally in an ethereal state.

When I say begin, I mean that a planet begins its planetary life in an exceedingly ethereal state, grows a little more material as it pursues its downward path into matter, until it attains the consistency, let us say, of the planet Saturn, the most ethereal of the planets in our present solar system. It continues its degree of materialization, until it becomes like Jupiter — somewhat less ethereal. The materializing process continues of course through ages. Meanwhile it is pursuing its elliptic course around the Sun, and finally it becomes as material as the planet Mars. Its materializing increases until it becomes heavy and rocky like our Earth. Our Earth will continue to grow more material in one sense until it becomes like Venus, which is more material in one sense than our Earth; but thereby hangs another story too. It will continue its materializing process until it becomes as material as and even more material in time than the planet Mercury, which is still more material, physically speaking, than our Earth is.

Paradoxically, the Earth, on the other hand, grows more refined, and, in a sense, more ethereal, after it has passed the middle point of its fourth round, which it actually already has passed.

When the lowest point of the seven planetary rounds of any planetary chain is reached, then the dematerializing process begins; and this dematerializing or etherealizing process continues until the planet whose history we have been tracing, reaches a certain stage of ethereality somewhat similar to that which it had when it was first attracted back to its old parent-sun, which was the new sun, as already described. Then the planet enters into its pralaya; and that is the end of the seven rounds — the seven planetary rounds.

But in future aeons, the general mass of egos, atoms, monads, lives — give them any name you like — which in their vast aggregate compose a planet, our earth for instance, shall all have reached a high degree of evolutionary spirituality; and then this planet, thus spiritualized, shall in its next imbodiment begin to be a sun; giving forth, too, in the far distant future, its own planetary children, just as our own present planets came from our own parent-sun in aeons past. Thus every entity in the universe follows the same evolutionary course, analogically speaking, that every other entity follows. It is the same evolutionary progress from a sun-atom to a planet; and then from a planet this atom itself becomes a sun.

Furthermore, you and I are incarnate monads; and it is the destiny of each one of us as a monadic essence, but not as men, not as bodies, not as human beings, but as a monadic essence, to become a sun. And the atoms of which our bodies are now composed will then be the hosts of lives forming the family attending on the sun.

The most advanced and progressed of these atoms composing our bodies and our intermediate natures also will be planets.

Do you see the majestic outline of the thought? Can you follow it? Can you see the intricacies and complications of it? And how difficult it is to explain it! Do you see also the necessity of keeping these teachings private, because they never would be understood by the public, but would be simply ridiculed and abused and misused. People would unjustifiably make money out of the teachings, not for the Masters' Work, not for the work of human liberation, but for private profit and gain. Are there any more questions, Companions?

Student — Venus, we are told in the Instructions, in several places, is in its seventh round, and of course is therefore presumably very high in degree, which is very interesting in relation to its density; even the astronomers seem to know that Venus is becoming luminous, and they have seen its dark side luminous on several occasions. I have had the very good luck to see that once, which is a very unusually fortunate thing.

Would that have anything to do with its being in its seventh round? Is it really becoming luminous in that way?

G. de P. — Yes; this matter is partly the matter to which I referred anon, when I said: "Thereby hangs another tale." Please do not confuse the physical planet Venus with the Venerean or Venus planetary chain. I was speaking of the planetary chain when I spoke of the planets. You are referring merely to the physical planet.

Now, each planetary chain in any solar manvantara, that is, a manvantara of a solar system, has seven existences, seven planetary manvantaras. The beginning of such a planetary manvantara is ethereal; and the physical body, when it reaches its coarsest or most material point in this first planetary manvantara, is very ethereal. But when such a planetary chain has reached its fourth existence or planetary manvantara or fourth series of seven rounds, it has reached its most material form.

Now, Venus has reached that. That is why it is more material physically than the Earth is. Do you see again another complication? For instance, why is Saturn intrinsically a more material planet than Earth, which Saturn actually is; and yet is much more ethereal? Simply because it is in one of its manvantaric existences previous to its fourth manvantaric existence, the most material. The Earth intrinsically is a more spiritual planetary chain than the Saturnian chain is.

You remember, Companions, what the old Hebrew poet said: There are wheels within wheels. Here you have an instance: truth within truth. And it is these complications of one truth within another truth, which make our esoteric studies so difficult to understand. But really they are very simple. If you follow the key of analogical reasoning you will always come out right. It is the master key to understanding everything; and the reason is, as I have often tried to point out in the Temple, that there is one underlying, fundamental law, one underlying fundamental, all-permeant life, in the boundless universe; and consequently every atom of that life, whether in a home-universe or in our solar system, or in a sun or in a planet, as the case may be, is infilled with the same fundamental law. That is the root of the teaching of analogy: that what one goes through all go through ultimately. Is this thought clear? If it is not, you may ask questions about it.

Student — May I ask: of course we understand that each of these globes and the sun is infilled with a being, a god; is this god running, metaphorically speaking, like a thread through all seven globes of each chain, or is it individually going from one to the other of the seven globes of a chain?

G. de P. — It is like the monadic essence in a human being. It permeates all and every atom of the human being. But, as the human being consists of body, and soul, and mind, and spiritual soul, and spirit, and monad, and the divine spark, all in various stages or degrees of ethereality, just so it is with the god, who is in and back of and beyond and above the sun, according to the way you look at it. The physical sun is its body as this is my body. But as it is a god's body, its physical body is energy, force, substance-energy, light. Is the thought clear?

Student — It does not have to decay?

G. de P. — Indeed it does. The sun has its own period, has its own term. Even a spiritual body has its terms and reaches its end. It must be so. Everything that is composite, whether it be spiritually composite or materially composite, is an aggregate. That is a fundamental thought, and do not forget it. Every aggregate is a composite thing. I will tell you a secret: that our very monads, which to us are homogeneous, and everlasting, actually are groups of monadic lives. I cannot tell you more, except to point out that the universal consciousness streams through all. Is there another question?

Student — Is there any truth in the pronouncements of Einstein concerning the curvature of space? I am referring especially to his words to the effect that he believes, and thinks he can demonstrate it mathematically, that a ray of light by traveling some 500 million years, will come back to its place of origin.

Is there any truth in it?

G. de P. — I think there is. The so-called curvature of space is Einstein's mathematical way of expressing an archaic conception, which Plato puts as follows: the most perfect form in the universe is the circular form.

Consequently divinity is circular in form, as much as the sun or the planets or the dome of space; and consequently any energy inhering in, and a part of any entity, must of necessity, if it pursues a course for a long enough time, return to its starting point, because it rounds the circle. And this actual truth, which Einstein thus has adumbrated in mathematical words, is at the basis, the natural basis, of what is called the law of cycles, the law of circulating; that we return to the point from which we set out, ultimately. We return

"to God, who is our home," for the progress of a monad, which is a body of light, pursues (to adopt the Einsteinian phrase) a curved path in spiritual space. The conception appears to be fundamentally the same.

Student — I understand from The Secret Doctrine that the planets Uranus and Neptune do not properly belong to us, but were "loaned" to us, as it were. Could you give any more information on that?

G. de P. — Yes; they are captures. Uranus is karmically connected with the solar system, just the same; whereas Neptune is not. The modern chemists have evolved a very interesting theory about the disintegration of the atom in connection with the atomic structure: that an atom becomes stable or unstable, according to the electron which it may lose or capture. How they caught this true idea is one of the exceedingly interesting mysteries of human psychology. The idea was in the air. Doubtless the thought currents emanating from Sambhala, our spiritual home, the home of the great teachers, must be permeating the world in greater intensity than perhaps we realize. Neptune is a capture; and it changed (considering our solar system as a cosmic atom) — it changed (to use human terms, chemical terms) the electromagnetic polarity of our solar system. Do you understand what I mean? The time will come when Neptune will again be lost; and very strange things will happen in the solar system when that takes place.

There are many more planets in the solar system than the eight or nine that the astronomers count; many, many more. Most of them are invisible; and five of the eight which we see and call the planets of the solar system are our sister-planets: these are the planets which are intimately connected by karmic bonds with our earth, and are the planets which are concerned or involved in the outer rounds, of which I have spoken. The time will come when we shall have so evolved, together with our own planet earth, that we shall see many more planets in our solar system. There actually are scores of planets, indeed hundreds, each one a planetary chain, each one a child of the former sun, but a brother of the present sun — brothers because they came into being from the same origin in the womb of space and collected together at the present time, and formed our solar system.

It is growing late. I can answer one or two more questions of whatever type you like — of an ethical or spiritual type, perhaps.

Student — There is a rock-cut inscription that reads: "Shining Venus trembles afar, earth's higher self, and with but one finger touches us." Would it be possible for you to say something about the truths which lie behind this figure?

G. de P. — Venus is perhaps more intimately connected with our Earth than any other one of the planets; and for this reason: that it is the planet from which we last came on the outer round; and is, in view of its own evolutionary development, closely connected with the development of our own manasic body, manasic portion. It touches us "with but one finger," meaning the finger of its own characteristic. "Touches us with but one finger" is a figure of speech.

On the outer round the planet immediately preceding ours, I mean the planet from which we came before we came to Earth on the outer round — I am not here referring to the inner rounds — was the planet Venus; and the planet to which we shall next go on the outer round is the planet Mercury. All this refers to the circulations of the outer rounds. Please do not confuse them with the inner rounds, which do not appertain to one planetary chain alone, but every planetary chain has its own inner rounds along the seven globes belonging to (or forming) its planetary chain.

Now, Companions, before we close I ask you to carry away with you one thought, which has already been mentioned this evening: and that is the fact that Katherine Tingley is actually more with us now than when she was here in the body. Her monadic essence is brooding over our work and over us in particular. Her spiritual being is mothering, if I may use that human expression, our efforts at the present time; and this is the reason why those who are sensitive among us feel the presence of that fiery soul whom we knew in the body as Katherine Tingley — feel it or her more intimately than we did when she was here physically. This is not a metaphor; it is a fact, an unveiled fact.

I have tried to state in human words a most difficult thing, and to state it correctly and briefly. I mean that the monadic essence, instead of pursuing its course among the stars or instead of being gathered into Sambhala, into the home of the greatest of the teachers, is still infusing energy, its spiritual vitality, into our own vitality, into our own thought-life, and doing this deliberately.

Please understand, it is not Katherine Tingley the woman who is doing this — that was a mere physical apparatus; but the monadic essence, the fiery spirit, the queenly soul, whose manifestations in the physical presence were called Katherine Tingley, is with us. For how long, I do not know. It is not for me to say. I can guess. I can think. I can have my opinions about it; but I don't know. I believe it will be for quite a long time.

Student — Is her life, then, similar to that of a nirmanakaya?

G. de P. — No, a nirmanakaya is quite a different thing. The nirmanakaya is a great initiate, a Master, a Mahatma, who remains to work for mankind with every one of his principles present except the physical body. I was speaking of the monadic essence, of the spiritual part, which, please remember, is energy-substance directed by consciousness and will inherent in the energy. If you will take the time to think over what you mean by the words you use, you may get some conception of what the two words monadic essence signify.

Figure to yourself the sun, if you like, continually sending forth streams of light and energy and everything that is noble, great, high, sublime. Why, I feel Katherine Tingley very near me sometimes: I feel her all the time, as a matter of fact. I cannot go from one room to another in the house here without feeling her presence; I cannot sit in a chair without feeling the same; I cannot go into her own room or into my own office, without sometimes having an almost uncanny feeling that she is there — the natural human reaction to a spiritual presence. I am sensitive to this because I know.

You see, one who does not know anything about it, who has never heard of it, at the utmost would probably say, "Well, how queer! I feel just as if Katherine Tingley were here." It would mean to him nothing more than that. But once you have been told of the fact, it helps to sensitize you, to make you still more sensitive. You become cognizant of little things that happen, which would have passed unnoticed had you not been told.

What is the reason why her chair remains in its place in the Temple? Simply from a feeling of reverence I have not been able to make up my heart to have it moved. She is so truly present. This is a human feeling, I admit; but I think it is a beautiful one. I have no doubt that others feel as I do; that not one of us yet would like to see her chair removed or put aside. Is it not so?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — Now, Companions, I think we will have to close. The hour has struck. Good night, all.

Meeting 1 Supplement

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

Supplement to KTMG Papers: One

The Planet Saturn | Death of the Sun | Dual Evolution: Dawn of Godhood | Twofold Influence of

Saturn | The Monad: a Composite Entity | The Peace of Death | Initiation is Self-Conferred

August 27, 1940

The Planet Saturn

G. de P. — With reference to the planet Saturn, the statement is made that, physically speaking, it is the most ethereal known in the solar system, but that spiritually it is one of the least high. Now Saturn is an extremely interesting planet from more aspects than one: and merely to enter a caveat lest my inclusive remark in the pamphlet be taken too literally, I desire here to say that Saturn likewise from another standpoint, mainly connected with peregrinations of entities, functions as one of the most spiritual planets in the solar system. It seems like a contradiction. Actually it is a paradox. To speak of it as one of the most material merely means that it is one of the least evolved spiritually; yet it too has its high spiritual phase, aspect, or portion, and it is through this spiritual phase or portion that its spiritual functions in the solar system operate.

Death of the Sun

It is necessary to try to have a completely comprehensive grasp of facts. Thus, a planet like the moon is a grossly physical body, its physical portions being on the lowest cosmic plane, prithivi, our own present plane

— therefore on the sixth and seventh subplanes of that plane counting downwards, or the first and second subplanes of prithivi counting upwards, just like our own physical bodies. Whereas the sun, that is that portion of the sun which with our physical eyes we receive sensory impressions of, is also on the plane of prithivi, but on the first and second subplanes thereof counting downwards; or on the two highest planes if you count upwards, the 6th and 7th.

Now then, when a grossly physical body dies, such as our physical bodies, or even more so the grossly physical body of a planet on this plane, it takes a long, long, long time for such a grossly physical corpse to disintegrate into its component atoms. Whereas the sun, composed of atoms on a much higher series of subplanes, has its disintegration proceed much faster when its death ensues.

You have an analogy in the human being. At the present time it takes a number of years for the physical body to disintegrate if buried, if its disintegration is not hastened in cremation. If left to itself it may take from seven to ten, or even many more years perhaps, for the gross physical body to fall apart in its component constituents, call them atoms if you wish. Even the bones may remain for centuries before they finally fall apart.

Just so is it with the physical body of the planet. Of course our moon is the kama-rupa of the moon that was, as the sthula-sarira or body of the moon decayed into its physical atoms aeons past. But when we humans were in our second race or even the beginning of the third root-race and were ethereal, when our bodies died subsequent decay, dissolution, or disintegration was very quick. Do you see what I mean?

A jellyfish, for example, does not take nearly the time to disintegrate that a human physical body does, or the body of a beast. It is so much more gelatinous, semi-astral.

That is the reason for the specific statement made by the Master that when the sun's term is reached, when a sun — at least a sun like our sun because there are various kinds of suns, and you see how careful one has to be in these things — when our sun or all suns of its class of ethereality dies, at its instant of death like the wink of an eye, like the passing of a shadow across the wall, the sun has passed on; in a higher sense has disappeared. But it nevertheless leaves behind it for a while its ethereally luminous garments. Of those garments the outermost luminous veil is what we see with our physical eyes; and although this luminous garment is really a body of light, it still is much more ethereal than what the hid or invisible grossest body of

the sun was or is. Then this body or garment of light decays — I cannot say how long in human years, it may be 100 or 1,000 or 10,000, but as compared with a gross physical body like our earth or the moon that was, or Jupiter or Mars, the time of decay of its luminous garment is extremely short, almost instantaneous.

What happens? Actually at the moment of the sun's death, one of the most wonderful and majestic things in the course of the life history of a solar system takes place. There is a perfect outburst and outrushing, an explosion if you wish, of solar light filling what is the whole solar system with an incredible splendor. How long does it take? As fast as light can travel, and as fast as the slower moving grosser attributes of the sun composing this body will take to fill the confines of the solar system. The light travels faster, and these ethereal atoms travel more slowly. But if we were stationed, let us say, on some outlying sun, even in our galaxy, or on some planet, especially around such a sun in our galaxy, and could witness the majestic funeral pyre or death of our sun or our solar system, we should see it as a most wonderful flash, taking perhaps an hour, or one of our days, or a week, filling the confines of our solar system with splendor and then slowly dying down. The less spiritual the atoms of the luminous stuff are, the longer they take in the glowing, for the more greatly physical or material life force is there. The more spiritual atoms vanish like a flash. The sun is gone, but its luminous garment may take in our human years quite a period of time before utterly vanishing.

This merely means that our solar system then, and spacially even beyond it, is simply filled with countless sun-particles, not of the sun itself which is a spiritual entity, but of its luminous garments — millions and billions and trillions and quadrillions of particles, call them atoms if you wish. It is a most convenient term when you are stumped to find the proper word, and it is a proper term to use too. And these atoms which thus slowly die out, and whose coherence is slowly destroyed, begin their peregrinations throughout the galaxy, to be reassembled at the time when our sun will reimbody itself.

Thus you see how a statement which is perfectly true, but which is not a complete statement because it is not possible or correct or right to make a complete statement, could later be seized upon by one who did not know the rules of communication, and as the Master often pointed out almost in exasperation, held up as instances of contradiction.

The sun, or rather its solar vehicle or body, disintegrates so rapidly because it is in evolutionary status a spiritual entity. I repeat: when its last pulse-beat has taken place, the sun has gone. Its luminous garments remain for a while. When a man dies, his death is equally instantaneous. With the last pulse of the heart, the last flash of consciousness in the brain, the true man is gone again like a flash; though the body still remains warm, and the magnetic link with the brain is still there, and the brain, still momentarily psychically connected with the departed ego, runs through its panoramic view of the last life for a brief — how long depending upon the man — moment, it may be an hour or two, or more. Then there remains the heavy physical body which if buried will take years to disintegrate. But when we had bodies of light, when we cast them off, their disintegration was a matter as we now say of a few hours. Then, all body had vanished.

September 24, 1940

Dual Evolution: Dawn of Godhood

I am searching for language which is not easy to find. The language I seek must give ideas, lead to a comprehension of extremely subtile facts in nature, which facts are utterly unknown in the Occident, and to which our brain-minds are insensitive, or rather which our brain-minds do not cognize; no more so than do our eyes cognize the wonders of the ultraviolet part of the solar spectrum, nor again those of the infrared.

Now then, I am going to tell you something as best I can or may which really does not belong to this degree, and yet I sense an appeal, and I think you are entitled to receive this help. It will remain with yourselves to take it because understanding it, or to reject it because it is incomprehensible to you, or does not appeal to you.

First, I would say there is no reason why any exception whatsoever should be made with regard to the earth.

The earth is but one of the planetary family and follows all the laws, mutatis mutandis, that all other planets follow as regards concreting, or materializing, etherealizing, etc.

Now here is what I am desirous of stating, and bear with me, I beg of you, because I am hunting for words.

With regard to the matter of density or grossness and materiality, these words should not be taken always as synonyms. Materiality is by no means the grossest principle, or rather matter is not; and this has been stated over and over again not only by myself, but by HPB. It is the fourth principle that is the grossest; but when you try to interchange grossness and density, you forget that grossness and density on this plane may often be the same, but they are not the same always on different planes.

Thus, the fourth round, the fourth planet, the fourth root-race, combine to make the maximum of grossness in evolution, because kamic. From three directions as it were, kama converges in three different ways, in the round, in the globe, in the race; and the fourth subrace of the fourth root-race on the fourth round on the fourth globe caps or is the climax of grossness.

Now here in this instance, it is my considered view, grossness and density may be used as synonyms or equivalents. It so happens that the meanings here conjoin to signify the same thing. When you use the word material or materiality in the strictly occult sense, this condition or phase will not be reached until the seventh round, which nevertheless will be far more ethereal than gross.

All evolution begins at the top, reaches its fourth phase or stage on the downward arc, then begins to rise out of the grossness and density thereafter, towards immaterialization, which is the word used and a wrong word, at any rate towards re-spiritualization. Matter becomes more spiritualized, and by the fact that spiritual powers of matter or prakriti serially appear. The first races were not as evolved as the later races; nor is the fifth race as evolved as shall be the sixth and seventh. The first races were much more spiritual than the third or the fourth, or than is the fifth, but will not be more spiritual than will be the sixth and the seventh.

I will now give you an analogy. Consider the seven principles of man from atman to physical body. Evolution begins at the beginning with a stir, so to speak, with motion in atman. Evolution casts a veil around the atmic monad, which veil we call buddhi. The principles of buddhi unfold and give birth to manas. Its inherent or intrinsic properties in their turn unfold and give rise to kama. All these of course were all latent in atman, but not manifested. We have at this point reached the grossest, most dense, phase of all evolution. We then pass on down to what is popularly called, because it really is a fall, to the pranas, the linga-sarira and the material or physical body.

Now, why is it that the fourth is the most dense of all, whether of races, globe or chain, or human being?

Because it has the kama principle most strongly operative, whose characteristic is desire, spiritual and gross; and desire involves intense attraction, and the lifeatoms during the fourth phase are always densely compacted because they are hungry for each other, which causes them to condense, to concrete.

Thus the first race was very ethereal, but not at all highly evolved. Its child, the second race, was less ethereal and somewhat more evolved. The third race was still less ethereal, but somewhat more evolved. Likewise so the fourth. The fifth race is more ethereal than the fourth, because beginning the ascending arc, but more evolved than the fourth in intellect. The sixth will be still more ethereal than the fifth, but more spiritual than intellectual, because though intellect will be still more evolved than during the fifth, it will be topped by the buddhi principle. And finally, the seventh race will round out the evolution in what might be called a physical body which then no longer will be a dense flesh body because of its proximity to the fourth, but will be a body of light — very much less gross and dense than would be a body of gross fourth race flesh, for instance.

I am trying to explain why you should not confuse matter properly used, or prakriti, with inherent grossness.

This has its application also in the moral sphere of man's life, and in the intellectual sphere. The grossest portions of man's thinking and feeling are not in his pranas nor his linga-sarira nor in his body. They are in his image-building brain-mind and in his desires and emotions; in other words, in the kama and the kama-manas.

Thus sin is not of the flesh, of the body, which is a mistake of religionists always. The sin of wrong action is in the kama-manasic part of our nature, not yet even fully developed during this fourth round. Thus you see the human races during races first, second, and third, were more spiritual, less mental, less gross, than the fourth. The fifth, sixth, and seventh will be less gross because becoming steadily more ethereal on account of ascending slowly the upward arc; yet they will be approaching the seventh principle, the sthula-sarira.

I will put the whole truth in another fashion, still hunting words to clothe these thoughts. Perfect evolution means perfect completion. Every entity or monadic entity is septenary on all the seven principles according to the plane the monad is living on. But that monad is not a completed entity, a perfected entity, until every one of the seven principles has reached its seventh degree or highest of evolution. Thus race one, although living in what we may call a portion of the atman of the constitution, was a very imperfectly evolved entity. Then root-race number two evolved, in addition to that portion of the atman belonging to the first race, a certain aspect of the buddhi, and therefore was somewhat more complete in evolution than was root-race number one. Race number three carried the evolution still farther on. Mind began to come, to function. The fourth race likewise.

It is not enough for a man to have a phase of the atman, a phase of the buddhi, and a phase of the manas, if he be without desire, without yearnings, and without aspiration and without feeling. Kama must come forth.

Then the ascent begins. Mind proper begins to take the place, but in the new sense on the ascending arc, through what we may call the pranas becoming impregnate with mental power working to refine the linga-and the sthula-sariras. And so the process continues to completion through the fifth, sixth, and seventh or last race on this round, and on a larger scale during the first, second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh rounds of our globe and of our chain.

Thus in the seventh round you have a fully complete man, and therefore a god-man. Every principle is fully perfected — not as we are now, relatively fourth roundly perfected in our four higher principles and involved in our three lower principles; but relatively perfected in all seven principles, and therefore a complete human being. You now see, I hope, what is meant when it is stated that the grossest, called most material principle —

a wrong usage of the word material — but the most gross principle is the fourth. The most gross phase of evolution is the fourth. The grossest phase in the human moral and emotional sense is the fourth.

Apply this explanation, which I have never dared to utter so clearly before, to the planets. You will thus see why Venus is in its seventh round, and though more material or prakritic than our earth is nevertheless more ethereal in the other sense as she is in her seventh round. She is in the ethereal part of prithivi, in the spiritual part of the prithivi, although prithivi is the lowest of the prakritis. Very simple, but extraordinary to those who have not the key. Thus the seventh race man will be living, as far as the fourth round limitations will permit it, when the seventh race is ended, in the seventh phase of all his principles in so far as the fourth round will allow it.

In the seventh round before our earth dies, men will no longer be humans or men, but dhyani-chohans, god-men, glorious buddhas. Living in the topmost principle of the prithivi of the seventh globe, the topmost globe according to the septenary system, and in the seventh phase of their own principles, they will have bodies of light. Everything will be at its topmost notch — "tops." But mark you, this perfection is reached after running through all principles, perfecting each one, giving each one its proper place of and in perfection, and ending, using the human seven principles as an analogy, with the physical body.

Consider the sun: I will utter a strange paradox. It is incomparably grosser than our earth is. Yet it is the dwelling of a god. It must have this grossness to rule its kingdom which contains planes of beings and spheres incomparably grosser than our earth. The sun's body is what our eyes see or think they see; at any rate what our eyes sense. It is matter in the sixth and seventh degrees of prithivi counting upwards, in the buddhi and atman of prithivi. But what the astronomers see, and what our eyes really see, is possibly the third, more closely the fourth and fifth counting upwards, what we may call the kama and the manas; in other words, the cloak or veil surrounding that golden sun which to our physical eyes is utterly invisible, as invisible as empty space, yet an inexpressibly glorious mass or ball or auric egg — call it what you wish — of simply incomprehensibly immense spiritual and intellectual as well as vital force. All that we see of the sun is its lower garments, the play of its vitality working in the fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh counting upwards of prithivi. And I mention the fourth and the fifth, the two lower spoken of because what the astronomers see through the telescope is actually the condensed or concrete, and therefore slightly visible, parts of the prithivi of the sun's body. Do I make my meaning clear? The sun actually we do not see. What we see is a reflection. I don't mean a reflection from something far off in a different part of space. I mean we see the body of the sun which is a reflection of its soul within the sun, just as a man's physical body is a reflection or projection of his soul. Do you catch the thought?

Thus then, evolution proceeds from the topmost, from principle one to principle seven, continuously. To call it a straight line would give you a wrong picture. You would immediately think of a straight line on a blackboard, a straightway evolutionary run or course or rise. Every principle in its turn is brought forth and evolved, beginning with the highest and ending with the lowest. At the culmination man has become a fully complete entity, because every principle then has reached its highest or seventh stage or substage of unfolding growth, of evolution. Man then is a god. His so-called sthula-sarira — which then will be a misnomer, only called so because of our present fourth round bodies — but his seventh principle or outermost clothing, his body, would be practically a light which to our present eyes would be almost blinding. It would be prithivi in its first or highest phase. I am only now for the instant speaking of the body, the body of light, body of radiation.

Take the case of the planets upon which I touched a moment ago. The reason why Saturn is the most ethereal, even more ethereal than Uranus, the most ethereal of the planets of the solar system, is because, of the ancient seven sacred planets it is the least close to the sun, in a sense then the youngest. As the planets considered as individuals grow older, they approach the sun. Coincidently their prakritis evolve more strongly, partly to protect them against the sun which otherwise would simply annihilate them, and partly because such is evolution's course. Both comprise the way of procedure. Thus Venus is grosser and more prakritic and more material in the proper sense than is earth, Mercury than is Venus. Yet Mercury, corresponding to our principles, is buddhi. Venus is higher manas. Our Earth is kama-manas. Mars is kama, strange paradox, following of course in this instance the line of the human principles.

I will add one more thought, Companions, and I ask you to try to understand this. I do not think I have ever spoken as plainly as this before, because I have felt that I would be wrongly understood, and I am carrying load enough as it is without having the karma of misleading my brothers. The sun we are protected against.

There is an old Hindu saying, never understood in the West, and yet full of occult wisdom, that the gods live on men. The sun would annihilate us as a planet, as planets, not deliberately but as automatically as fire burns, as goodness refines a man, as automatically as that morals are based on the principles of harmony in the universe. It could not be otherwise. But we are protected by our own earth's auric egg, and by the various auric eggs of the other planets, each one having its own auric egg. This is an akasic veil which not even a sun can penetrate, provided that the planets keep their distance, which they do. It is not the god in the sun which will be the great devourer. It will be the automatic action of nature, like the bite of an asp, or the burning of a caustic, or the goodness which raises and saves. And furthermore each planet, our earth included, is surrounded by a perfect — the Master calls it a continent — a perfect shell of cosmic stuff, cosmic dust, meteorites, astral stuff, all which protects us against the fearful force of the sun. I say fearful because we would simply vanish, the planets in the entire solar system would vanish like a puff of smoke, if they were not protected.

Now this continent above our heads and surrounding the earth actually is attracted karmically by the earth's auric egg. All these things that are attracted have been parts of its former bodies in other earth imbodiments.

The moon is not alone the holder of all the former earth-stuff. A certain amount of karmic stuff, of lifeatoms, is also attracted by the immense magnetism of this continent over our heads. It is a continent. It is scores and scores and scores of miles thick. I believe myself that it partly accounts for what we call the blueness of the atmosphere on a clear day, and for the sun's rays reaching us in the beneficent godlike way in which Father Sun does touch his children with his light and aid. This meteoric continent or veil surrounding the earth like a shell is likewise the cause of our climatic and meteorological disturbances. Storms of all kinds, windstorms, electric storms, rainstorms, snowstorms, the heat of summer and the cold of winter, are very largely brought about by interaction between this continent over our heads and the earth's own electrovital magnetism working up and against it and against this meteoric shell surrounding our earth. What is called the earth's heat does not come from the sun, at least a small portion only comes from the sun, and that not in the direct form of heat, but rather as radiation, which when reaching our earth immediately begins to act electrically and magnetically, electromagnetically, electrovitally, to stir up things on the earth. The reason that the sunrays warm us and feel grateful in the cold winter and oppressive in summer, is because on passing through the air and on our skins they are like a current of electricity. Electricity is not hot, nor is it cold, but it starts vibratory activity in whatever it touches or passes through, and this to our senses we feel as heat, warmth, light, comfort; or if it be summertime oppressive heat from which many people die.

Another thought, Companions: all entities in the solar system, Father Sun and all his family of planets, visible and invisible, are essentially divinities. Their essential inner desire and hope and yearnings are for harmony, self-forgetfulness for the common good. And notice that were any planet — this may sound a little funny or quaint, but it will illustrate my point — were any planet to become wicked in the sun's kingdom, in other words self-sufficient and self-assertive, egoistic in other words, and attempt to refuse to obey the harmonious laws of the solar kingdom whereby all things are held in harmony and peace and for the common good, that planet would be instantly broken in its career. The power of the sun, if the obstreperousness became too great, would simply annihilate it. It would at the worst vanish. Reimbody itself to be sure, because the monad of a planet is just as high as the monad of a sun. But so far as the planet's vehicles are concerned, its gross body, its material body, its vital force, and its linga-sarira or its astral light, would be simply annihilated; for nothing which is below the third principle from the top can safely approach or oppose the sun. Even a dhyani-chohan cannot approach the sun in any body lower than its manasic body. Call it the mayavi-rupa if you wish. It is so in man. Only this would be sufficiently spiritual, sufficiently powerful, not to neutralize or fight the sun, but to become one with it, and therefore safe. Do you understand that?

Nature never punishes any of her children who live with her and work with her and help her, for these she regards as collaborators in the cosmic labor, in the cosmic work; and as HPB so beautifully phrases it in The Voice of the Silence, work on with nature, for then she will regard thee as one of her own masters and herself will make obeisance. There is the thought. And why? It is not that the monad of nature bows down humbly before your monad. It means that your monad recognizes its oneness with nature, and all the lower forms of nature recognize the mastery, the mastery of your monad, cooperating with nature's own monad.

But do not ever make the mistake, Companions, after listening to talk of this kind that I have been trying to give to you, do not ever make the mistake and fancy that any human being is sufficiently wise to condemn nature. If you were a dhyani-chohan or a buddha, that might be a different thing. Do not ever make the mistake of saying that you have a right to judge someone else in the way not only individuals but nations do.

You will be all wrong. The sooner the law of brotherhood and of impartial justice and right at any cost is understood, the sooner earth will be the heaven that it ought to be even today. Men always find excuses to allow themselves to follow their pet hobbies or foibles. For there is hypocrisy in all of us. It springs from our kama or desire, from egoism. "We are superior to the others. We have a right to take the lives of others"; and how wrong the whole system is, is shown by the fact that it is actually recognized in our systems of modern jurisprudence that twelve men, here following the English system which was adopted in this country, know enough to take the life of another human being. Of course, on the other hand, organized society must protect itself against evil or selfishness; and the wisest nations, the most civilized and the kindliest, are those which are slowly instituting the abolition of the death penalty, and allowing no distortion of the principle here enunciated to blind their eyes to the higher laws of social morality. We theosophists ought to face facts.

Society has to protect itself; and the wisest of peoples are meeting such problems as those presented by evildoers by imprisonment, not the imprisonment of angry revenge, no matter how horrible the crime may have been, but the imprisonment of restraint and education; and this is indeed human because it is so utterly humane.

The old Mosaic doctrine of an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth tells us what utterly impartial nature does.

It does not mean that that is a copy for man to follow, because as I have tried to point out on a number of occasions, man is higher than the nature he sees around him, for what he sees around him is the lowest principles of inner nature. We men are already beginning to live in the lower part of our monad, in the manasic parts, and therefore are much higher than the external nature around us. We have evolved conscience, fellow-feeling, a sense of justice, kindliness, and these are growing in us. Why? And I now return to the beginning, the cycle is re-entering its commencement: because the evolution of man has reached the point where the lower principles are beginning to vibrate in harmony with the upper. The fourth or middle principle has been passed. The pranas now are beginning to feel the higher vibrational frequencies in the human constitution, and are beginning to permeate the linga-sarira and the body, so that even the brain now is becoming permeable to the inner light.

It is a comforting reflection to remember that long ahead as it may be, already the first glimpses of the coming dawn are reaching us, the first rays of the aurora of the new day. Godhood is before us, and the blessings that accompany it, when men will be Buddhas and Christs.

------

November 26, 1940

Twofold Influence of Saturn

Every one of the globes of our chain is — not exactly formed, at least not physically builded if you think the word formed implies that — but influenced in its construction, or influenced so far as its construction went, solely by dominating currents from Saturn, or by influences from the other globes of the other sacred planetary chains. My meaning is this: that every globe of the planetary chain is under the supervision rather than the guidance of an astral spiritual influence or power of one of the other sacred planetary chains. In addition to Saturn, our globe D is, has been, and will be under, not so much the formative influence but the affecting influence of a dead planet — not so much directing but impulsing upon us. Do I make my meaning clear? As when you do not guide a person, but your influence around him has a strong effect upon him, even though he makes up his mind himself which way to follow.

The moon is this dead planet which has greatly influenced our globe; and in all the ancient religious philosophies or religions which knew these esoteric teachings, you will find the same references about the moon and about the influences of other planetary chains on ours. As for instance, Judaism has always proudly claimed that its own particular tribal divinity is Jehovah, who is the Saturn influence, or the Saturn divinity or god. And thereby hangeth a long, long, tale of confused occultism and of exoteric speculation, and into all this I do not care to enter.

The influence of Saturn is not all evil. It may be evil, it may be good. Every one of the sacred planets has influences of many kinds, running the entire scale of the seven principles, so that Saturn has a divine influence, a spiritual, an intellectual, a psychical, an astral, and a physical. But all these influences are Saturn influences, stamped with the Saturn swabhava, the Saturn magnetism so to speak; and consequently a Saturn influence like a Jovian influence, a Jupiter influence, or a Mars influence, or Venus, may be good or bad, depending upon the individual and the time upon which it impinges. The Jews had been under the Saturn influence under the Mosaic dispensation, not a very high influence, although it had its high aspect, and there is a paradox right there. The effort of Jesus the Avatara who came amongst them — "My message is to the lost sheep of the house of Israel" — was to try to lead them out to a new age, beginning from the Saturn influence into a new influence. That is why he is represented mystically by the early primitive Christians, not the later theologians, as coming into Jerusalem riding on an ass, thereby showing his domination of the symbol of Saturn, and on the foal of an ass. (Cf. The Esoteric Tradition, 3rd & rev. ed., p. 607 et seq. ) So much was this fact recognized that when Antiochus Epiphanes is said to have entered the Holy of Holies, which was strictly forbidden to anyone excepting the Jewish high priest, legend goes that what he saw there was something forbidden by Jewish law — that is, a figure sculptured or carven, what the Jews call an idol.

The legend states that what he saw in the Holy of Holies in the temple was the figure of a golden ass, emblem of Saturn. Just as when the Egyptians employed the cow's head or bull's head, they merely meant the Moon; or when the Greeks used the emblems of a horse or horses, they meant the Sun, and so forth.

The Golden Age of Saturn is a Latin and Greek story, which does not belong to the Jewish cycle of teaching.

The Greeks, and the Romans who borrowed from the Greeks, spoke of the original Kronian age, the age of Kronos or Saturn as one of innocence, and this has reference to typically esoteric teaching even concerning the planets; because in the peregrination of the monads, Saturn opens the peregrination before the Sun is reached, and closes it after the Sun is left behind. To the Greek mind, the Golden Age of Saturn meant the age of innocence, the beginning of life, like the golden age of a human life which is a happy childhood, no anxieties, no worries, no sorrows, no griefs, because the mind is not yet developed in the child to understand these, and grow enlarged and magnified by them; for all sorrows greatly help us if we take them aright. They are all karmic. But the child does not know this. Its little sorrows are beginning to open its mind.

That is what the Greeks meant by the Saturnian age, the childhood of the race, Saturn in Greek mythology being one of the very first in time and space of the divine beings after whom came Jupiter — trouble, or rather mind if you wish, came into the world, but understanding consciousness, understanding happiness and sorrow, grief and joy, the knowledge of right and wrong, the perplexities afflicting us when we try to walk the

path beautiful. We need mind today, including our conscience and our consciousness. But the Greeks and Romans also said that in the future we shall again close the cycle by re-ascending to Saturn on our evolutionary peregrinations, and close this grand cycle of evolution no longer as innocent children, but as demigods, or indeed gods. There is a great deal more that could be said, but remember that the Greek and Latin stories of the Saturn cycle belong to their racial characteristic and need of occult teaching and thought.

The Jews would have understood this perfectly, only they did not happen to adopt that line of thought.

Jehovah to them was the Saturn tribal or national or racial god; and the philosophers among the Jews always essayed to ascend in their thoughts and minds to the spiritual regions of Saturn, the Saturnian calm, reflective contemplating wisdom, of which Saturn in its highest aspects is an emblem; rather than the slow, cold, heavy, concrete aspects of Saturn. These same qualities are recognized in astrology.

The Monad — a Composite Entity

It is a proof again of the old rule that one should not advance too rapidly. The line is the line of karmic destiny. Now make out of that what you can. Furthermore, consider the monad as unitary. It is a spiritual unit.

Yet even the spiritual monad is actually a composite entity. It is the cosmic seed out of which the tree of cosmic life grows, its roots upwards; its branches, branchlets, twigs, leaves, fruits, below. Eventually out of such a seed come all the issues of cosmic life, and if there were but one infinitely homogeneous essence in the monad, there could not be this dispersing into the manifold, incredibly numerous, innumerable planes, beings, hierarchies of the manifested universe. The very fact that heterogeneity issues from what we call homogeneity shows that heterogeneity with all its innumerable branches was locked up in the homogeneous monadic essence, streaming through that homogeneous monadic essence as the life stream of a tree issues forth from the apparently, and to us actually, homogeneous seed. Do I make my meaning clear? Therefore back even of the spiritual monad there lies an infinity of cosmic destinies, so that every line issuing forth from the monad follows its own karmic predestined course, and thus runs down from the spiritual through all the intervening planes and hierarchies to attain its tip or ending, so to speak, when the unrolling emanational unfolding or evolving process reaches its term or end.

Thus then, the monad to us is homogeneous. All issues forth from it, all again will be reabsorbed or withdrawn back into it when pralaya opens. But all these different individualities must have been lying latent there in order that they might issue forth therefrom. Therefore it shows us that the monad is not merely a channel, a laya-center, through which streams — and thereafter branches out into the infinitely multiplying fashion of manifested life — whatever there is of manifested life, but that the monad itself is an entity.

Consider your own spiritual monad: you are unfolded in all your six principles beneath it, from it. Consider what these six principles have unfolded into: a microcosm. Yet when a monad, this monad, your monad or mine, was formerly in its nirvana, it was to us completely homogeneous. Everything was withdrawn, indrawn, updrawn, back into it. All therefore returns to the bosom of the monad — a thought which you will also find in the Jewish thinking and in the Christian system adopted from it — sleeping in the bosom of Brahma.

The Peace of Death

I have often thought, Companions, that the expression of ineffable peace and a joy which is too spiritual almost to be perceived on the faces of the dying, and yet it is perceived, is because the brain reflects some feeble glimmers of what the inner self is experiencing at death, and the brain reacts upon the nerves and the muscles. The inner peace shines out, however faintly, on the faces of those who are passing out. Everyone who has been at the side of those who die has seen this, everyone with the perceiving eye. It has often been spoken of. There is a moment just at death when the panorama takes place and equivalently the higher part of the nature rushes to meet its own spiritual prototype, its own self, above, higher; and all along the stream of consciousness, this ananda as the Sanskritists say, this bliss, is shed down even into the brain.

In a smaller degree the same thing takes place in dreamless sleep, in sushupti as they call it. It is actually to the brain unconsciousness, because the brain cannot catch the vibrations, it is too coarse and dull, too gross.

Therefore the brain is unconscious, and we who live in the brain so much are therefore also unconscious.

But to the inner nature what is to us unconsciousness is the most intense consciousness — there is a paradox again. And that to me is one of the best things about sleep. Outside of its refreshing the body, allowing it to recuperate from the ordinary muscular, intense molecular strain of the day, the inner nature has a few fugitive moments, as it seems to it, of the most perfect happiness, wisdom, vision, rest, rest in the sense of spiritual activity. And there is another paradox.

Initiation is Self-Conferred

When one has gone ahead to the point where he is ready to receive more, he will know it himself. Otherwise he is not ready to receive it. Now that may sound a little cruel, and a little paradoxical. But what will you?

Would you attempt to teach the higher mathematics to the unformed mind of a child? I don't wish to be uncomplimentary. I know there are many here who know along their own certain lines a dozen times more than I do along those lines. I am talking of general principles. Now the child must first learn the basis of things, his mind must expand. Then when he finds he has developed a love for mathematics, he himself will be teaching himself as all children do, as we all do ourselves in occultism. Initiation is always self-conferred, and all the teacher does is to point the way, and the pitfalls, and give the warnings and sometimes to give the magic touch of that which will free the stumbling block in the mind of the querent.

Now I can tell when any one of the companions is ready to go farther on, not only by what they say, but sometimes by what they do not say. Simple. I know in my life I have half a dozen times had to wait years and struggle to reach a certain point. Then when I reached there, I knew from the inward burst of illumination that I was ready to receive, and I received.

In initiation it is absolutely necessary that the neophyte receive no protection. He must prove his worth. He is warned, warned of the terrible danger he is going into. But he is not allowed to try unless there is a chance, and a good chance, and then he is freed, and he leaves, he goes. His body is watched over, is protected; in every way possible he is taught, he is coached, he is instructed, he is warned, he is examined and re-examined in every way, help given to him as far as can be; but when the actual test comes, who can understand but the understander? Who can fail but the failer?

The teacher cannot go through the initiation for the neophyte, he must do it himself. He must prove his worth; and it would be utterly monstrous and wrong if it were otherwise. The whole system of occult thought and teaching and initiation would be just a fraud, a fake. Neophytes realize the danger too. And anyone who knows will understand the prayer of Jesus in Gethsemane when he prayed to his Father in Heaven, his higher self, or rather his spiritual self within him, the god within him, "O Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me. Nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt." That tells a lot, just those words.

Meeting 2

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Two

Meeting of December 11, 1929

G. de P. — A request has come to me from some of the Companions here, to the effect that the usual Wednesday KT Memorial Group meeting be not omitted, although the day is Christmas. I was asked what I thought, and I suggested that in a case like this the majority vote as usual should prevail. I want you to understand, however, that these groups in theory should not be held in portions. These meetings should not be held with some members absent and some members attending. If the attendance is not full, as a rule no meeting should be held at all. I will say no more than that. The matter is for you to decide. I suggest that you vote on the motion as it has been put.

Student — I move that we hold our regular KT Memorial Group meeting two weeks from tonight.

[The motion being duly seconded was carried unanimously except for one dissenting voice.]

G. de P. — Well, Companions, I am now ready to answer questions this evening.

Student — Were the gods and goddesses of mythology, for instance the Greek and Scandinavian, the early divine instructors of men, or did they represent the higher orders of the fairy kingdoms?

G. de P. — Both, really. The word fairies, Companions, is a very general term, signifying beings of widely varying degrees of evolutionary status — some very far advanced, some much less far. It is an European word and is usually used in the European sense of that word. The gods at one end of the scale could be called the fairies of divinity, the divine fairies; and the elementals at the bottom of the scale could be called the elemental fairies — beings beginning their progress. The gods also were the original instructors of humanity.

But do not imagine for a moment that their instructions have ceased. They are still instructing fit and ready recipients of their communications. They are instructing all the time, and in a sense are the instructors of all beneath them in evolutionary grade.

The ordinary mythological presentations of the gods do not properly present or represent them as they are.

Mythologies are fairytales, tales told about the gods, giving some outline of the truth to uninstructed minds in order to induce the spirit of reverence and holy awe. But in the esoteric schools was always taught the truth concerning the divine beings.

Now, in saying that the gods still instruct all beings below them, I must add that this is done in two ways: first, in a general way, by the influence flowing forth from them on the various planes of their own being.

Their seven principles, to put the matter in actual, pictorial form emanate influences: each one of the seven principles of the gods, that is to say of each god, emanating its own especial or characteristic influence; and these emanations flow through the seven kingdoms of nature and actually are the laws or work out as, manifest themselves as, the controlling influences which men call laws, in the cosmos.

If you can rise in your mind, consciously of course, to the higher planes of the cosmic reaches, you come into direct touch with the higher influences or emanations from the divine beings, and, as it were, drink at those Pierean springs; for in these greater beings called gods we live and move and have our being. That is the general way in which the gods, by their very existence, raise, guide, lead, instruct, and inspire.

The second way by which they instruct is a very restricted one and is limited solely to those — may I say supermen, quasi-divine men — who through initiation are put into direct, individual communication with the lower ranges of the gods — the lower gods, in other words. Remember that the gods themselves in former manvantaras were men, as we are men now; and in future manvantaras we in our turn shall be gods; and our gods shall then be supergods, beings higher than gods. And in those future manvantaras, when we shall have evolved consciously into our already inherent and innate godhood, we shall in our turn be the inspirers, instructors, stimulators, and guides of all those beings who, at the present time, are trailing behind us and

existing as the creatures, as the beings, the entities, of the lower kingdoms of nature, so called — the beast kingdom, the vegetable kingdom, the mineral kingdom, and the three kingdoms of the elementals.

Understand here also, please, that in speaking of the beings of these kingdoms as trailing after man in all their multitudinous hosts, I do not refer to the forms, the bodies, but to the monads in each and every case. For instance, the monads of the vegetable kingdom form the vegetable kingdom, and it is these monads which evolve. A tree does not evolve, a rose does not evolve, it is the monad and the monads composing any entity which evolve and take on these varying and impermanent forms. Do you understand the difference? It is not the form which evolves. The form is a transitory phenomenon, an evolutionary event in the evolutionary history of the monadic essence. Is the answer clear?

Student — Thank you, Professor, very much. If I may ask one more special question? Once in a while in speaking about the Scandinavian mythology, we have wondered if Odin or Wotan was one of the early instructors of the Aryan races.

G. de P. — Yes. Odin or Wotan were names merely given to a certain representative divine character. The same character is known by other names in other races of men. It does not mean that Odin and Wotan or by whatever other name you call this divine character, was a different being from the same character known by other names in other times among other races of men.

There was a Greek called Euhemerus, who lived about three hundred years before the Christian Era. He taught that the gods of the mythologies of the nations were in archaic ages, merely men, but great men, supermen; and that there were no gods as such radically distinctive from human beings, from men. His doctrine, stated as a bald fact, is true. But it has been grossly misunderstood and misconstrued, even by the ancient Greeks. He did not mean that there were no divine beings in the universe. He taught a doctrine of the Mysteries that all divine beings at one time, in former manvantaras, were men who passed through the human stage on their evolutionary course, who passed through the portals of humanity before they entered the portals of divinity. He was called by some orthodox Greeks, who held the orthodox mythology of the time, an atheist, a term which then carried less opprobrium with it than it does today. It meant merely one who did not accept the popular conception of the gods of the time, and therefore who did not believe in those popular mythological conceptions.

But you will notice that in all the fragments of history that we have of Euhemerus and of his teachings, we have not one word showing that he was ever prosecuted for impiety; which shows that the authorities, political and religious, of the time knew that he was giving a teaching of the Mysteries; for so cleverly did he clothe and disguise it that no uninitiated person would know it as a mystery-teaching taught to mankind.

The actual reason why Socrates died was because he taught some teachings of the Mysteries quite openly without clothing them in the garments of metaphor and in figures of speech; and thereby he violated one of the fundamental rules of the mystery-teachings: "Ye shall receive as others have received; ye may give only as ye have received." The rule was rigid and applies even today. Socrates was not an initiate in the Mysteries of Greece. He was a great and good man, and through his own innate spiritual powers caught these truths, as it were, from the thought-atmosphere of the planet. He must have known (a man of his capacity) that he was doing wrong; but he had given no oath to bind him. Technically he was guiltless. At the trial his judges did everything in their power to save him; but he would not save himself.

It is the same story of Jesus over again. You know even in the legends of the trial of Jesus before Pilate, that the story shows plainly that Pilate did his best to save Jesus and Jesus refused to save himself.

Now, of course, my reference to Jesus would not at all militate against or change the fact of what I have before stated, that the entire Gospel record is a mystery-tale. It does not militate against that, because the mystery-tale was told in accordance with the customs of the people of the time. Is there any other question?

Student — I have several questions on this one subject: KT used to tell us that in singing or doing any public work, it was better to clasp the hands; and as I understood her explanation, she said that if the hands were left loosely hanging at the sides, energies would leave the body through the finger tips; but if the hands were clasped, one kept the currents of energy in. I always felt that there was a more esoteric reason for this which

KT could not tell us at the time. One question is: are the finger tips more open for the outflowing of prana than other parts of the physical organism?

G. de P. — Not more so, but very much so. The hands hanging loose at the sides allow pranic emanations (I use your term) to escape. Held with the tips of the fingers touching each other, or clasped, there is established a natural flow, electromagnetic you may call it, if you care to give it a modern term which no scientist understands. Holding the fingers thus there is established a natural vital circuit within the body.

But the eyes, for instance, are even more powerful emanators of the vital fluid than are the hands, and the fluid is thus more easily guided. I have seen the eyes of human beings from which at times verily there were shooting forth rays of vital force; and the force of the vital essence flowing forth from the eyes is of somewhat higher type than that which flows from the hands. I may say that every organ of the body emanates its own characteristic type of vitality: the eyes, the mouth, from the heart, from the solar plexus, from the hands, the feet, each individual finger, the ears in much less degree, yes and the very hair; each individual hair is a channel for the outflowing of pranic substance.

On this fact reposes one of the most mysterious teachings of the Mysteries, to the effect that at death the vital entity (not the spiritual entity) leaves the body by various channels. At the instant of death, when the golden cord is snapped, the vital entity leaves the body from the eyes, from the top of the head, which is the higher part of the vital energy; from the nose, from the mouth, from the heart, from the solar plexus, from the two openings of the body which are below the solar plexus; and in a small degree from each individual finger or toe, and from each individual hair or down. So that your question, you see, touches a wide field of fact.

Student — May I ask one more question? I have often seen pictures of seated Egyptian statues in which the palms of the hands were laid upon the knees; and I know from experience that that position is very calming to the nervous system. I suppose that there is some esoteric reason connected with that sculptured position.

G. de P. — There is; and the reason is practically the same as what I have already told you, but in addition there are certain religious reasons. And in the various statues of the Buddha you will find different positions given to hands and feet. These, when pertaining to the hands in especial, are technically called in Sanskrit mudras, and are all dependent upon the natural circuit of the electromagnetic vital fluids through the body.

One open hand laid over the other open hand is a favorite pose of the buddhas; it is a very calming and soothing position — the hands laid quietly in the lap with the palms upon the crossing of the feet. It is very difficult for Europeans today to cross their legs and feet in that way — Europeans are not accustomed to do it

— but with practice it is very beneficial in that it induces calmness of mind and bodily quiet.

Student — I have noticed that each one of the Leaders has had a photograph taken with the hand resting against the face. I wondered if there was any significance in that.

G. de P. — I don't think so. I think it was just a natural pose. I think most people do it; I know I do it constantly. I remember Brother -----, when he took my photograph, told me to rest my head on my hand, with the idea, I suppose, that I looked a little better in that way.

Student — Professor, it is said in The Secret Doctrine that the star under whose influence one is born remains with us throughout an entire manvantara. Does star here refer to any star, or is it restricted to the planets? The genii of these stars are spoken of as being our guiding or guardian angels, and also as the fathers of fire. . . .

G. de P. — You are asking two questions at once. I will try to answer your first question first; and then you can ask the other one afterwards.

Student — The first question: does the statement I speak of refer to the planets alone or does it apply to any stars in the universe?

G. de P. — Your question is a very deep one. Generally speaking, the reference in The Secret Doctrine is to any celestial body whatsoever, particularly to the planets. As regards the stellar host, the reference is rather to the constellations — the true constellations, not others. There are two stars in particular made mention of, the spiritual star and the astrological star, but the reference could be also to planets. I mean this: regarding the two

stars spoken of, one is his spiritual parent, and the other star by astrological sympathy is the controlling influence at the time of birth.

Please remember — and I cannot say any more in answer to the question at present — that when stars and planets are spoken of as influencing human beings, the physical celestial body is rarely or never meant. The reference is always to the spiritual vitality of the star or planet, the genius (to use the Latin word), the over-dwelling divinity, the indwelling divinity, the inspiring divinity, of that particular celestial body, whether planet or star or constellation. What is your next question?

Student — Has the genius of that particular star any direct connection with our spiritual selves; and if so, how did it get it?

G. de P. — The connection is the most intimate possible. It is your parent; and furthermore, it is you yourself.

You are a spark of that starry flame in your inmost being. Just allow your thought to dwell on that statement.

You never get such direct connection, because you always are it, always have been it, and always will be it.

You and that star are linked for eternity, backwards and forwards. I am now talking of the spiritual, not the astrological star, which latter governs, as the saying goes, your destiny at the moment of birth. You spoke of the spiritual star, I think.

Student — Would that be an explanation of the Roman belief that great people when they died became stars?

G. de P. — Exactly. That is the exact meaning of the Roman belief. And when the Roman Emperors died and were apotheosized, to use a Greek expression, the original idea was simply that the spiritual part of the emperor, as also of any other human being as a matter of fact, returned instantly, quicker than thought, to its parent-star.

I have told you before, Companions, on many occasions, that the mysteries connected with death are numerous and so sublime that reference to them is almost forbidden except in the higher degrees, simply for the reason that unless you are trained to understand them, you are certain to misunderstand them. Is the answer to the question now clear?

Student — I always understood that the number five had a special connection in esoteric philosophy with the manasic element or principle of evolution; and, on the other hand, if I understand rightly, the evolution of a race, of a root-race, begins about the middle period of the evolution of the preceding race. Now putting those two things together, does it mean, for instance, that the fifth root-race, the present, which is destined to attain to a considerably high state of evolution of the manasic element, originated or sprang forth, so to say, from the fifth subrace of the fourth root-race?

G. de P. — Your question is a difficult one. What do you mean by the length of a race? It is true that every succeeding race originates at about the middle period of the parent-race, as time is counted; but as every root-race carries a quality of its own, which is its own characteristic, its lifespan is longest when that characteristic in its own evolution arrives for manifestation. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — Furthermore, the sixth root-race will originate in the sixth period of the evolution of our fifth root-race. For instance, ours is the fifth root-race. Its longest period of time will be passed in its fifth stage; in the fourth root-race the longest period of the seven subperiods of its lifespan was the fourth subperiod; in the third root-race, the longest subperiod of its complete lifespan was the third subperiod; but in the fourth subperiod, originated the roots of the following fourth race. So the reference to the middle point of a race as giving birth to the next race, referred to time, not necessarily to the seven principles of the race or the seven periods considered as a category. The statement did not refer to anything so mechanical as this last. Is my answer clear to you?

Student — It is perfectly clear, only there is something else I would like to ask in that connection. In the well-known fact of the Jews calling themselves the "chosen people," does it have an esoteric meaning to the effect that their lineage may be traced to that particular subrace of the preceding race, which was chosen as

the germ for the evolution of the fifth race?

G. de P. — No, not at all. Every race in antiquity has considered itself, and rightly so, as the "chosen people"

of its own particular planetary instructor or guide, Saturn in the case of the Hebrews, Venus in the case of the Romans, and so forth. Every race is the "chosen people" in that sense. Only the stiff-necked temperament of the Hebrews, concerning which their own prophets so loudly complained, laid particular and very especial emphasis on the fact that they were the "chosen people."

There is also a good deal of the same feeling in the United States of America today, or used to be, to the effect that the Americans are the "chosen people." It is so with every people. It is called in modern times the nationalistic spirit; and as a spirit it has its own minor virtues. But there are few things, I really believe, Companions, which militate so strongly against the feeling of human brotherhood as does this spirit of aggressive nationalism. It is the duty of every man to love his country, to obey its laws, to be proud of its virtues, and of the noble achievements, the noble achievements, of its past; but to carry that very natural and proper feeling to the length of believing that other peoples are inferior is all wrong, because it is not true.

Student — Many years ago I had opportunity on various occasions to walk through a botanical garden, and every plant and every tree had a name attached to it; and the effect of seeing those names was often (they were of course mostly Latin names, which perhaps meant that the tree had broad leaves, or narrow leaves, or just was a Latin rendering of the name of the botanist who catalogued it) — I say that the effect of seeing those names so often was nauseating; and it often occurred to me that surely a tree or a plant or anything in fact, even a human being, had a real name, the esoteric name. Is there anything in that?

G. de P. — There certainly is. The same thought was in the mind of the writer of the Christian New Testament — in the Apocalypse, I think the case occurs (it has been so long since I have looked into the Christian Scriptures, that I may be wrong) But this Christian writing says that "His name shall be written upon his forehead" or words to that effect, which is the exact meaning of the thought that you have been trying to express. The naked character or individuality has its own "name" on the cosmic records; not a name in human words, but that vital-astral characteristic which distinguishes the being from other things, just as names with us poor human beings distinguish one thing from another thing. Every tree, every metal, every human being, indeed everything, has its own characteristic, its own individuality, and therefore its own

"name."

Student — Is that swabhavat?

G. de P. — No; and yet it is in a way. Swabhavat is a term which is restricted solely to the cosmic principle which is really the higher realms of akasa. Swabhavat means self-becoming — that which is eternally becoming out of the fountains of its own self. So you see that it has a certain reference to the characteristic or vital-spiritual "name" which I spoke of in answering the previous question. You are right in the reference, but the term is badly applied.

Student — Pardon me, I have two questions, Professor. They are short. One is something that has puzzled me ever since I have known of theosophy, and it is: why some are attracted to this movement and others, who seem to have every qualification and to be very similar in every way, are not attracted at all. Has anything you have told us about the star to do with it? This movement must be under a guiding star, and the Leaders and those who are not attracted are under different stars, or something of that kind?

G. de P. — Well, I could hardly say that because every individual entity, every human being, is under a different star. No, I do not think it goes as deeply as that; I think it is rather the effect of karmic evolution.

Some beings are simply more advanced than others; their higher nature is more evolved; they feel more deeply; they have the vision; they see more readily what things are; they have hungered for truth so long that when they hear of theosophy they are instantly and instinctively attracted to it. There is a community of thought, you see. I do not think it has to do with so profound or radical a link as the star.

Student — Thank you. I have one other question, which links with others that have been asked. You have referred twice to Saturn, the Saturn of the Jews. But as you were speaking of mythology, I thought of what has puzzled me very much: what was the golden age of Saturn and Rhea? I never could get its relation to the

Greek Olympian Age; and I was wondering whether it was one of the minor golden ages? Could you tell us anything more about it? Is that Saturn the same as the Saturn of the Jews?

G. de P. — The reference to a golden age has had two meanings in the Greek mythology: the exoteric, meaning the time when the human race was innocent, in its youth, like a child, without real responsibility —

not an elevated position at all, not one to be sought for by evolved human beings knowing the glories as well as the heavy duties of responsibility; but just as a child is innocent, no matter what it does, because the will and the understanding are not developed.

So the early races of mankind passed through what the Greeks termed a Saturnian age, an age of innocence, of a lack of intellectual understanding, but an age when there was more or less of peace and happiness, such as a child has. I do not admire a child because it is undeveloped. A child amuses me, often makes a strong appeal to my pity, to my compassion, to my sympathy, as a human being; but I do not find a child an admirable thing. It is not an example or a model to follow. It is in its Saturnian age of growth. It is innocent. It has no responsibility; it has no worries; nothing is exacted from it. It does not realize even that there are such things, or at least but vaguely. It lives from day to day. Everything is cared for, so far as it is concerned.

But while this was the popular or mythological meaning of the Age of Saturn among the Greeks, in the Mysteries the Age of Saturn referred to the distant future, paradoxically, for exactly the same reason which I mentioned a while ago, to an age of the far distant future when the time of gold, as it was called, the golden age, shall come, shall come again; when, instead of being half evolved, as we are now, we shall be fully evolved; instead of being halfway responsible, halfway irresponsible, we shall be fully responsible, having coordinated powers and faculties.

These teachings of the Mysteries referred to a Saturnian or Golden Age of the future when peace shall reign on earth, when men shall be wise, pitiful, knowing, helpful to each other, recognizing their kinship with the gods; and it will be the last age before the race disappears from off this planet.

Does my answer at all meet the idea that you have in your mind? I will try again if you wish to ask your question again in a somewhat different form.

Student — Thank you, Professor; there is only one point: is the Saturn of Italian mythology the same as the Saturn of the Jews?

G. de P. — Yes, but viewed in a very different way. Every planet has two sides, a spiritual side and a material side. In the Greek and Latin mythology it was the spiritual side of Saturn which was referred to. Now the Jews, the Hebrews, knew about the spiritual side also; but during the history of the Hebrew people, as it so happened, unfortunately for them, it was the material aspect of Saturn which filtered out from the mystery-teachings and became a dominant idea, a dominant national idea. It was a misfortune; it might have been the other way. But it was their karman. There have been highly spiritual men among the Hebrews, the Jews, just as there have been among all peoples — great men, great initiates, masters of wisdom; but, as their own prophets have told us, as a generality the people have been rather materialistic. It has been the tendency of that people. But they are not the only ones who are materialistic, and don't forget it! Does that answer your question?

Student — Absolutely, thank you.

Student — In regard to the question of buddhas among the Oriental people, particularly those peoples who have kept more closely to the teachings of Buddhism: as I understand it they have different classes or different groups of buddhas, represented by different figures; each figure has a different name. Sometimes there are just slight differences.

G. de P. — What do you mean by figures — statues?

Student — Yes, I am thinking particularly of the one that they call the bodhisattva which, whenever it is mentioned or referred to, always seems to receive a little more reverence, and as if there were something more in it. It is something that one catches more in the feel of the way in which they show their reverence to

it. Is it because this particular one is more advanced or is there anything else connected with it?

G. de P. — Here again is a profound question, which opens up the very foundations of Buddhism. Let me tell you something: you are not referring to statues or sculptures. Bodhisattva is a title, just as buddha is. Buddha means "the awakened." Bodhisattva means "the essence of the buddha," or buddha-principle, — bodhi (wisdom), sattva (the essence of a thing). The buddha is the next stage higher or after the bodhisattva; but the bodhisattva, to the popular human heart, has always possessed in the Orient a greater appeal than the buddha, for this reason: to a child its parent is always dearer than some other human being, although the child may know that that other human being is greater and grander than its own parent. And it is therefore for this reason, because while the buddhas are the very incarnation of wisdom and love, the bodhisattvas are more human. They work among men, just as the buddhas do, and there are more of the bodhisattvas than there are of the buddhas.

You begin to get the idea now perhaps: the bodhisattvas are more human; they are more with us; they are more like average men. The buddhas are so far evolved that to a certain extent the average human heart senses them as a little too high. It is a wrong view to take, but that is the natural reaction of the human heart.

The perfect incarnation of wisdom and love which the buddha is, is a sublimely beautiful event, but the average human being feels perhaps that such a stage is just a little too lofty for him. The average human heart craves something of a more human type, something not quite so far advanced; and therein lies the root of the reason, for the Bodhisattvas, so far as the multitude are concerned, seem rather nearer to mankind than do the buddhas. Actually the fact is not so, but such is the human feeling.

But therefore do not misunderstand these remarks. To men the bodhisattvas are human beings of a splendid type. They are great, grand, evolved men. By taking one step more, they become buddhas. The bodhisattvas also are incarnations of wisdom and compassion, but not so completely so as are the buddhas. There is more about this matter that it would take too long to explain here. This matter is one of the most beautiful mysteries of Buddhism and indeed of our own teachings, for our own teaching in that respect is identic.

For instance, I may make it a little clearer by telling you that the two Masters of wisdom and compassion at the head of our own Order, who started the Theosophical Society and who are known under the initials of M

and KH, are bodhisattvas; neither is a buddha.

There are also grades of bodhisattvas. This word is a title; it is a word like king, or savior. Well, there are various kinds of kings and saviors — autocratic kings, constitutional kings, figurehead kings — kings in title that is.

Do you understand now the general drift of the idea? If you do not, please put your question again in a little different form; because, Companions, let me tell you something to which I have often before alluded: you will get an answer always closely corresponding to your question. I repeat this, because it is important. It is a law of our Order. I have no right to tell you, when answering a question, more than you have asked for. Now, try again.

Student — The part you have spoken of is quite clear; but I would like to ask one further question: are these various classes of buddhas different degrees of initiation?

G. de P. — Yes, in one sense that is about true. But actual growth, evolutionary growth in one sense may be called a slow initiation, whereas all initiation in our higher orders is merely a stimulated or quickened evolution. Do you understand, Companions? So consequently the buddhas, while products of human evolution, nevertheless must go through the regular initiatory procedure, which is a quickening of evolution, as I have already said. Is this point clear?

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — Is it indeed? If it is not, please try again.

Student — Yes, that gives me a great deal more to think about.

G. de P. — That is right. That is a good answer.

Student — Was Gautama the Buddha higher than our Masters?

G. de P. — Much higher. He was one of the buddhas of the fifth race and therefore much higher. In fact, if I could tell you all the mystery concerning the Buddha, you would understand why HPB openly called herself a Buddhist and why she permitted the use of the term "Esoteric Buddhism" in the beginning of the days of the Society. Gautama is one of the two great buddha-incarnations belonging to our fifth race. There are many Masters of Wisdom, but only two buddhas in a root-race.

Student — G. de P. . . .

G. de P. — I just want to add that the Buddha — and in this particular case I am referring to Gautama the Buddha — is constantly referred to in our own higher degrees as the Maha-chohan, the Great Lord; and it is he who furnishes the psychic material for the various avataric incarnations that have taken place and will take place during our present fifth root-race. Is that clear?

Student — So many wonderful subjects have come up tonight. It brings hundreds of questions to my mind. I would like to go back to one point that was treated some time ago with respect to the name, the mystic name.

Is there not a mystic number too? We are told that we have a number and a geometrical figure as well. I think that there is something about that in our esoteric teachings.

G. de P. — The mystical number refers to an astrological idea connected with a spiritual star. It is not so much a numerical character — not at all that, as a matter of fact; but this number refers rather to quality than to quantity, if you follow me, for it is very difficult indeed to explain. Every man taken as a unit has a certain numerical vibrational rate which you may call his number, if you like; and I have heard vulgar-minded men and boys in speaking to each other sometimes say: "Well, I have got your number." Now that statement is true, for they understood the other man; they got his vibrational rate. They did not know what it was or how to set it down on paper; but the instinct of graphic speech expressed itself in that form.

Student — Can you give us any further light on the esoteric meaning of the mystical word 'Om'?

G. de P. — It is curious how this question keeps coming to the fore. Om means nothing at all outside of what you put into it. The Hebrews had a corresponding term Amen, which means nothing at all outside of what you put into it. Om is written with two characters in the Sanskrit tongue; and the Hindus in their orthodox religions (and there are many in Hindustan), that is, the various sects of Brahmanism, etc., have made of this word Om almost a divine particle of speech, or rather have clothed this mystical word Om almost with the attributes of divinity; and its history is very closely similar to what Christians of the Roman Catholic persuasion of the Middle Ages made of the sign of the cross — they ascribed to it all kinds of mystical and magical powers. In fact it is a superstition. And so is the orthodox Hindu feeling with regard to the excessive power they commonly ascribe to this word Om.

I remember reading a story called Dracula, a horrible story of a vampire, which some of you must have read, written by a Roman Catholic. Of course he ascribed all kinds of magical power to the cross, saying that the vampire was laid or overcome or prevented from attacking his victims, by making the sign of the cross on his victim, or something of the sort. All that is indeed superstition.

Om is indeed a sacred word, simply on account of the effect that the combination of the O and the M sound has, when properly recited with understanding soul behind it; for it soothes, calms, refines the auric egg surrounding each human being, therefore making the mind more easily receptive of the vital essences of the higher part of the inner constitution. That is really all there is to it. It has also a number of meanings. It sometimes was used in olden days in India as a word signifying assent or consent, much like the English word yes. A person would ask a question of a fellow; the fellow would answer Om — "yes," "certainly," "just so."

It has quite a history, this word. But, as I say, I am quite surprised how it keeps coming to the fore, in the way of questions about it.

Student — HPB says in her Instructions that every pronouncement of the Word breaks, destroys, a veil

between the lower and the higher self, or something like that.

G. de P. — Yes, if pronounced aright, but not necessarily this word. Any word which would arouse equivalently refined and soothing vibrations could be pronounced and have precisely the same effect. There is nothing magical about the word 'Om' in itself. It is simply a combination of a vowel and a sounding m. It is not a magical thing. The gods did not create it. It is a human invention — "O-M." It is, however, often used for magical purposes. Sanskritists call it a mantram. In Tibet you will find that the Tibetans, highly religious people as they are, go around morning, noon, and night, muttering "Om mani padme hum," which means

"Om, the jewel in the lotus, Om." The Tibetan may be doing all kinds of sin, but by habit and custom he is muttering this mantram more or less all day long. The mere muttering of it does him no earthly good. There is no will behind it. There is no understanding. I could sit here and you could sit there and we could mutter together Om until the crack of doom, and it would not do us a bit of good. But uttered by one who knows how to pronounce it, whose heart is pure, whose will is in it, who knows how to use it to calm and soothe the aura surrounding him, then that particular combination of vowel sounds is powerful. That is all there is to it.

Student — There have to be two sides in order to play a game; and we are also told that we have to go through all suffering and experience. I wanted to ask you: is it a necessity for the individual soul some time in its evolution to go through the unspeakable experience of a black magician, or is it not necessary?

G. de P. — Not necessary. But, alas! many humans do.

Student — I was going to ask you if the description that Mr. Judge gave of the word Om in Yoga Aphorisms refers to any combination of vowels and consonants such as O and M, as he says that it represents Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva, I think it was.

G. de P. — I do not remember it. But evidently Mr. Judge, who was a reincarnation of a Hindu yogi, must have had some Hindu idea in his mind at the time.

Student — I thought it was so important once that I learned the whole thing; so I was just wondering if it was merely some combination of vowels that it was good to have put together.

G. de P. — Om is a particularly good combination. It is a human invention, but a particularly good combination; and if uttered by one with a pure heart, with a kindly spirit, who is trying to throw himself into a devotional state of mind, it is much better than other words on account of the vibrations that it evokes. For instance, if I were to mutter to myself, "Cheap, cheap, cheap," that repetition is not a particularly religion-inducing combination of sounds. That is all there is to it. Again, if say, "Cluck, cluck, cluck, cluck," that would cause another state of feeling, you see.

Student — I would like to ask if our English expression in answering a question, "Umph," has anything to do with Om?

G. de P. — I believe it originated in exactly the same way as did 'Om.' There seems to be something about the m, which appears to give consent, to give assent, to a thing. I think in the old Sanskrit it took the form of Om, and in your English and American custom people usually say umph. I think so, at least. In England it often implies doubt when a man asks you a question and you say umph.

Student — Is not that rather a question of the intonation one puts behind the word?

G. de P. — I think so. But the idea is the same.

Student — I have been very much interested lately in the differences of human beings' faces — the left side and the right side; and I have noticed in taking up many photographs in a magazine and covering one side of the face and looking at the other, that one side seems like a different individual from the other. I wondered if you would say something about it. Does one side express the higher self and the other side the lower self?

G. de P. — There is indeed a great difference between the two sides of the face. Anyone can easily prove this for himself by doing as this companion has said that she has done. But there is more than that in it. Why

should the two sides of the face differ from each other? It is because it is a remnant of the former hermaphroditic condition of the human race. I don't think that the ladies here would like to have me say that the feminine portion of humanity is the lower side, for perhaps it is the higher side (they would not object to that statement!); but from the time when the human race was androgynous these two qualities, the masculine and the feminine or, to put it otherwise, the positive and the negative, or vice versa, just as you please, have endured more or less in the physical body, and actually this is the cause of what is called by biologists the bilateral symmetry of the human body — a right arm and a left arm, a right leg and a left leg, a right nostril and a left nostril, right hand and left hand, right ear and left ear, and so forth.

The time is coming when our bodies will not be shaped as they are at present, as formerly they were not shaped as they are at present. As the race evolves, new senses will come into play; old senses will take on a more general and diffuse character, and our very faces will change. Many mysterious things are coming in the future.

Would you like to think of your distant descendants as being bald, as having one eye, a very shrunken nose, with two backbones, and no sex? I could recite a number of other things. They will be beautiful creatures. To us they would seem horrible. But I can assure you that if the later third root-race people, as they did in some cases, could have looked forward into futurity and seen us, shriveled little dwarfs, they would have said:

"What horrible monstrosities!" Beauty to us humans is largely dependent on custom. What is harmonious when a certain custom prevails is called beauty; for harmony and beauty are one; and beauty is recognition of harmony. That is where the sense of beauty lies.

Student — In one of Mr. Judge's mystical tales he makes the statement — it is the wonder-tale, one of the last he wrote — that those strange forms, those strange delineations, that we find in the Egyptian art, of the gods with the bird head, the ibis head, and the jackal head with the wings of the bull, and so forth, were really depicting what the priestesses of the old temple saw; that they saw these forms in the astral light. Well, then, why do not we have them in the art of other nations? How did it happen that priestesses in other nations did not seem to have seen them — at least, had not depicted them in any other land that I know of?

G. de P. — There are equivalent things in other lands.

Student — Then I suppose the astral light was diffused and what one nation saw is open to all.

G. de P. — Every nation is an assemblage of reincarnated egos with a more or less similar psychological type or bent of character. They are drawn together because they attract each other. This being so, every nation living in a certain part of the earth's surface, in a certain climate giving birth to certain beasts and plants, and so forth, sees in the astral light the beings which collect around such places, because it is these astral beings which produce the physical. If such an Egyptian seer had gone to a northern climate or had gone to India or China, had he been a true seer, he would have seen the astral originants of what produces the outward physical manifestations in these other places. Do you understand?

Student — I do. Now this other question. Every one of those here has probably read Etidorhpa. Has it any value?

G. de P. — I have not read the book. I have seen the pictures in the book. I do not know that it has any particular value. I think it was largely a work of imagination.

Student — Thank you.

Student — You said some moments ago that Gautama the Buddha was one of the two maha-chohans, I believe you said, of the fifth root-race. Can you tell us who the other was, or has he not come yet?

G. de P. — The Buddha Gautama is sometimes called the seventh buddha. Now you can make your own calculations. I am going to mix you up in confusion. The first race had two, and the second race had two, the third race had two; these make six; the fourth race had two; they make eight; and yet he is the seventh.

Student — I feel worse off than before.

G. de P. — I am awfully sorry; but this is a question that I cannot answer here.

Student — In regard to the question about having to experience all suffering: HPB says somewhere that it is possible to cross suffering on stilts, as it were, and that it is not necessary to wade through the mire; and I was wondering if this expression of experiencing all suffering means that it is not necessary that one should actually go through the material experiences, if one had the sympathy to understand them.

G. de P. — Just so. There are many, many experiences in human life that it is not necessary for one to go through. You can understand them and learn the lessons from them, if you simply use your eyes and the sympathetic understanding of the heart; and this is a particularly good thing to have clearly understood because I have known of more than a few instances in the Society of members who have told me: "I know that I have never had such and such an experience. Theosophy teaches that you must learn through experience; and how can I learn about a thing which I have never experienced? Therefore it is my duty to do these things, although I know they are wrong." You see the immoral suggestion. It is most emphatically not your duty to do a wrong thing; it is your duty not to do it.

And look further at this: we are in the fifth race, about the middle period of the fifth race; and for aeons we have been incarnating and reincarnating, time and time and time again. We already have been in the mire many times. We have gone through experiences of all kinds, and the soul needs no more dirtying in order to help it to cast off the dirt it has at present encrusted upon it, to use a figure of speech. We do not need to go and wallow in the mire like pigs. We have been there too often already. Our duty is to raise ourselves out of it. We have been through it too often as it is. Let us cross any future mires, as you say, on stilts, on the stilts of the imagination, on the stilts of the understanding heart, and cease dwelling on them in thought as quickly as possible.

Student — I gathered from what was said at the last meeting that the last planet we were on was Venus. Then where does the Moon come in? We are supposed to come from the Moon.

G. de P. — Well, I was referring to the outer rounds when I spoke of the planet Venus. The Moon, of course, is the parent of the Earth. You see, I have explained that there are two kinds of rounds: the outer rounds and the inner rounds. The outer rounds are they which the life-hosts follow in passing from one solar planet —

from one planet of the solar family to another planet of the solar family, such as from Venus to Earth, from Earth to Mercury, or from Jupiter to Venus, or again from Mercury to Mars. These are the outer rounds. There are wonderful mysteries connected with this.

The inner rounds are the rounds pursued by the life-hosts in passing from globe to globe of any one planetary chain, such as the Earth's planetary chain with its seven globes, such as the Venus planetary chain with its seven globes, or the Mars planetary chain with its seven globes, and so forth.

When I spoke of Venus I was speaking of the outer rounds at that time. And it is just on this point that Mrs.

Besant's non-understanding of the difference between the outer and the inner rounds made her make the mistake that she did in saying that we came to Earth from the planet Mars.

Student — I would like to ask: as we are under the lunar influences, and these are the results of the karma we created while inhabiting the moon, when we shall have left the earth will the earth be as the moon? Will our karma exert maleficent and beneficent influences, or shall we by the time we have reached the last stage on this earth have been able to neutralize the evil currents of karma?

G. de P. — No. Our earth will be the moon of the future planet and will possess the same down-dragging influence upon the future planet that our moon exercises upon us. But we humans as a host, as a host of life-entities, as the life-host, will by that time have become dhyan-chohans or gods. Do you understand? These degrading or evil earth influences will work upon the humanity of the planet-to-be, the child of our planet; and the entities at the present time, manifesting as our beasts and the higher parts of our vegetable kingdom, will be the humanity of the planet-to-be. Do you understand? Is the answer clear?

Student — Yes; but I should think that we ought to be responsible for the karman we have created. It seems

that we get out of it if we become dhyan-chohans, and the beasts get our bad karma. Do you see what I mean?

G. de P. — We shall be held accountable to the uttermost grain in the balance. We shall be chained as dhyan-chohans to the future planet, and it will be our duty to guide, instruct, and lead. In a sense we shall then be vampirized, our vital forces will in a certain degree be sapped. We shall be held to the new planet by karmic bonds; and we cannot progress higher until we have carried along with us these others now trailing behind, and which others are to be the future humanity of that planet. That is where we shall make the karmic payment; just as our own present gods are the dhyan-chohans, the higher humanity, of the lunar chain that was. Is that clear?

Student — Very clear, thank you.

Student — Is there any definite place or spot or organ in the human anatomy through which the inner man goes in and out on waking and falling asleep?

G. de P. — Yes.

Student — I would like to have some further explanation on the subject with especial reference to someone who finds himself rather often wide awake in every way, in every respect, except the physical body, and experiences considerable difficulty in entering into it?

G. de P. — Yes, there is such a path. In fact, the vital energy can leave the body, as it regularly does, only along a channel, a path; otherwise the electromagnetic forces would chain it within the body. But this is a point on which information is regularly refused by the teachers, because if given to all and sundry it would be abused. People would hurt themselves, might even kill themselves, in experimenting, in trying to find out.

But I can tell you this. I can give you a hint, at least, and I think that in your particular case it will be helpful.

The conscious being leaves the body — which is not the model-body, not the astral body or the linga-sarira

— along the brahmarandhra through the skull. That is its channel, its path. But that does not tell you anything in particular, because I do not think that you know what the brahmarandhra really is. Does the answer satisfy you?

Student — There is a hint in it. I think I get it, but it is not as complete as I thought it would be.

Student — You spoke tonight and have spoken many other times about the glorious destiny of the human host; and I have read — I think it was in one of the Theosophical Manuals — that although we have passed the lowest point in our rounds, we still have the final battle to fight between the powers of light and darkness.

That seems to imply that there is a certain amount of risk or that the destiny of the human race still is in the balance, that there is some chance, perhaps, of the human host as a body, as a group, not winning final victory in this manvantara.

G. de P. — No, do not put it in that way. The lowest point of the fourth round has been passed. We have passed the middle point of the fourth round. The middle point of the fourth round is the lowest point. But we have not yet definitely made our final choice, which will come in the fifth round — the self-conscious choice, the choice of the intellect. Millions and millions of the human host will not make that choice successfully; but other millions and millions will; in fact, the majority will. And that is what is meant when the Teachers have spoken of the final choice as not yet having been made. It will come in the next round. Does that answer the question?

Student — Yes, I thank you.

G. de P. — It is necessary for every human being by his life and conduct so to act, that when the final choice comes, he can carry on into the future. It is no laughing matter; it is a very real thing. You cannot begin too soon.

Student — Going back to the subject of sleep that we discussed a moment ago: why is it that some of us dream that we are in an assemblage, perhaps, and with great will power we make ourselves rise to the top of a

room and float over them, and then will ourselves down again. I have dreamed this, and have spoken to others about it and have found that they have dreamed the same thing. It takes great will power to do that. I have an idea what it is.

G. de P. — That sensation is produced by a reflex action of the movement of the vital entity as it leaves the body. The nervous system, the nervous apparatus, is then not quite asleep. It is just enough awake, so to say, to translate the reflex action of this movement into consciousness. Do you get the idea? If you do not, please ask me again.

Student — I have not got the idea yet.

G. de P. — Well, when the body is asleep, the nervous system is asleep. That is what makes the body sleep.

But before the nervous system is completely asleep, the vital energy begins to leave the body. And if the nervous system is still sufficiently awake to function in a small degree in the normal way, it catches this movement of the vital entity along its own fibers, and thus you have the sensation of rising and of going upward or of going down, and you feel yourself also willing. Do you get the thought? In the normal case the nervous system is so well asleep that it is duly stupefied. It does not hold the impression of the moving entity.

Also it must be remembered that some of these dreams of flying are real dreams.

Student — There were two questions that I feel like asking, but this is the more important: you said a little while ago that the buddha was higher than the bodhisattva. Now, is the buddha higher than the bodhisattva because the bodhisattva has not traveled so high, or because the bodhisattva has renounced nirvana; renounced instead of entering nirvana?

G de P. — No, the buddha is the highest stage following the bodhisattva stage. The buddha is actually in a higher state. It is a farther degree of evolutionary development than is the bodhisattva state. Is that clear?

Student — Yes, thank you. I just wanted to be sure that it was normal progress and not actual renunciation.

G. de P. — Renunciation, yes, in both cases; but the renunciation has nothing to do with the evolutionary progress except this: that unless an entity is far advanced it cannot make this renunciation. The buddha makes the same renunciation that the bodhisattva does, that is to say, he renounces nirvana; but the buddha's renunciation is a larger and greater one. You are confusing two things, I think. The buddha is farther along the path and has the greater renunciation to make. The bodhisattva comes just before the buddha in evolutionary development, and consequently the renunciation is not so great.

Student — What I have to say is not in the nature of a question but in the nature of a statement. I am sure that none of us wants to see this evening draw to a close; but as this session has continued for more than two hours, I think that we shall have to consider the teacher's time.

Student — I would like to ask a question regarding the position of the hand. Is it a sign of negativity when you hold the thumb inside the closed hand, or the sign of a weak character?

G. de P. — I think the common feeling that the thumb held within the closed fingers is a sign of imperfectly developed will is correct. The thumb is the most prehensile digit of the hand, is the most used when determination to do something has been taken. Consequently if it seek shelter or hide itself, it shows that the determination is more or less weak; the will, in short, is more or less weak.

I would not like to make a very definite statement, because perhaps some companion's feelings might be hurt.

He might say: "I regularly keep my thumb inside my fingers." But I think on the whole the statement is correct. The common idea is a true one. On the other hand, if we see a human being going along with his thumbs sticking out from his hands, it is rather an unpleasant thing to see. It denotes an aggressive, selfish, egoistic, kind of person. The position of the thumb should be easy and normal.

Now, Companions, I think we will close for tonight. We have had an interesting session. I bid you all good night.

Meeting 2 Supplement

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

Supplement to KTMG Papers: Two

Who are the Gods? | New Installment of Teaching | Parent Stars | Root-Races | Negroes | Races,

Principles | |Buddhas | Planets | Gateways of Death | Brahmarandhra | Judge Not | Moment of

Choice | |Beauty: Physical and Spiritual |

January 28, 1941

Who Are the Gods?

G. de P. — Now we come to the matter of the gods. Who are the gods? We use this catchword as a substitute for many different words employed by HPB. She sometimes calls them Breaths, other times cosmic spirits; other times dhyani-chohans, a word which will take in all the range of dhyani-chohans, not merely the three dhyani-chohanic kingdoms above the human kingdom, reckoned as three because they belong to our chain, but I mean all those other still higher dhyani-chohanic hierarchies outside of these three belonging to our own chain and higher than man. They are in fact the evolved or fully developed monads from previous cosmic manvantaras, in whose jiva or jivas, in whose life, we live and move and have our being; just as the entities, the monads of the cells of my body or of yours, for the time being live in me, and in me they move and live and have their being. I am to them a god.

The demigods, so far as we of this chain are concerned, are the intermediate one of the three dhyan-chohanic kingdoms just above us. The dhyan-chohanic kingdom just above us, the third or lowest of the dhyan-chohanic kingdoms of this chain, is the next step upward above humanity. The mahatmas are just entering it.

The higher mahatmas belong to this lowest of the dhyan-chohanic kingdoms; the demigods are the intermediate of these three kingdoms; the fully evolved or cosmic buddhas are the highest of the three kingdoms above us on our chain. Then of course as stated there are the cosmic spirits or the dhyan-chohans of the general solar system. The solar logoi are highly evolved dhyan-chohans. But there are also dhyan-chohans or Ah-hi or Breaths or cosmic spirits of galactic magnitude, still higher ranges.

So therefore when we say gods, it is a general term implying all these ranges of cosmic spirits above man, beginning with the lowest of the three dhyan-chohanic kingdoms on our own globe, or chain rather, and ascending upwards through the solar system into the galaxy and even beyond; only those beyond I always speak of as supergods, superdivine.

Thus the demigods are the intermediate dhyan-chohans of our own chain just above man. The Masters and greatest mahatmas are the lowest of these three dhyan-chohanic kingdoms just above man. The highest of these three dhyan-chohanic kingdoms just above man, in other words those belonging to our own chain, are the fully evolved buddhas of our chain, but these must not be confused with the manushya buddhas or human buddhas.

We have lost the feeling that the gods are always with us, that we walk in their presence. We have lost that.

But do not confuse that loss, which is a loss of a very beautiful and holy feeling of the presence of divinities around us — do not confuse that with what is implied with the phrase, personal God. This last has one restricted meaning only. A god like that of the Jews, or of the Christians, or of some other sects even in the Orient, who make a divinity in the pattern or image of an imperfect man — "God waxed wroth" and "smelled the sweet savor of the burnt sacrifices;" "the anger of God swelled;" "God spoke unto Moses," and said things like these!!! — all that is wrong, irreligious, and leads away from the grand simple truths of nature.

Nothing is so holy to us human beings as to feel the divine presences around us and with us, helping us and guiding us. I think every theosophist should pray in his heart — not the open prayer, although it is not the words, it is the attitude; not a piacular or petitionary prayer, whether spoken or unspoken; but the prayer of the theosophist — "O god within me, thy child, make me to feel thy presence with me always. Let me be conscious that thou art with me and guiding me. Not my will, but thine always be done." Do you see, prayers of that kind, a prayer of reverence, the raising of the human heart not only in aspiration towards what is above

itself, but in the true sense of the word worthship, worship, feeling the presence not only of cosmic divinity, but of the divinities around us, feeling the companionship of the gods around us and in our own soul — this kind of prayer, this feeling in the heart, and the raising of the heart out of the little petty personality upwards to the divinity within, and recognizing the other divinities around us and even in our fellow human beings —

is true reverence and prayer.

When I was a child there were many reasons why I used to feel unhappy and bound in, and I would go out into the garden and lay my ear against a tree, and then in a little while I could feel the pulsing, actually sense it, not physically as a touch, but inwardly sense the pulsing of the dryad, to use a Greek term, in that tree. I would go and lie down by a little brook that used to run through my father's property and look at the water and commune with the naiads. I sensed the spirits of nature around, and I came to see that some of them were exquisitely beautiful, and others less evolved were awful — the undeveloped nature spirits, what the Tibetans call lhamayin as contrasted with the lhas. The medieval Fire-Philosophers who called themselves Rosicrucians at one time — I do not mean the modern Rosicrucians — used to refer to these as the inhabitants of the elements of nature. They are the same as the old nature spirits of the ancients, and their spiritual sources were the same as the gods of the ancients, the devas of the Hindus, or the dhyani-chohans of the Tibetans. And as I grew older I began to recognize that the nature spirits of my boyhood were not the highest, as my boyish growing mind once thought they were. I used to go out and commune with nature, especially at night — and oh, the revelations I used to get sometimes as I sat in the garden alone, or lay on the grass, or walked, strolled around and looked up at the stars; the sense of infinite oneness of everything, and that I was a part of it, infinitesimal and yet coequal with cosmic immensity. You remember how familiar that thought is in the Brahmanic teaching of the Vedanta, that Brahman is smaller than the smallest, greater than the most great, and is both. Even to this day, although I am so occupied now with many exoteric things that my brain has scarcely any time to turn to these things that I love, even now there are moments when I can retire into myself and commune with the gods. It is the most wonderful experience a man can have. It is worth one's self-dedication, and it keeps one balanced and sane in a world temporarily crazy.

-------

February 25, 1941

New Installment of Teaching

Why is it that the floodgates, of what is to the modern world new esoteric information, are open? Why were they first opened by HPB, and why has the flood of teaching of occult information continued up to the present time? It is the esoteric rule; and so rigidly was this rule held that in ancient times infringement or breaking of this rule was punished either by severe discipline, or even in degenerate times by death. Originally the death was occult death: deprivation of teaching, and deprivation of association with the teacher. That law finally became construed among the ancients closest to our time as calling for death of the body, which was a typical Atlantean perversion of true occult teaching and was a crime. At any rate, it showed how strongly and earnestly the ancients of all time held to the rule of occult silence.

With the downfall of the Roman Empire in the west, a new cosmic cycle began, affecting the earth also. The restriction of civilization to separate parts of the earth came to an end. There followed the Dark Ages as the preparation, the embryonic time, for a new birth. The discovery of the new worlds, the immense increase in scientific knowledge, the gradual and increasing collapse of exoteric religious feeling, the wanderings of philosophers searching for truth: all were symptoms or phenomena of the opening of a new age. We can call it, if we like, the beginning of a Messianic cycle, which is practically equivalent to one-twelfth of the precessional cycle, some 2160 years. This called for very strenuous action on the part of the Guardians of the ancient wisdom to give new light to mankind, to guide it through the opening of the new age until the new psychology became established and was able to take care of itself. New keys were needed in order that old truths, cosmic truths, should once more be taught as guides to mankind. The old had passed away, because it had lost its grip on men's hearts and minds, because it had become sterile, crystallized. The opening of a new age is always a dangerous time for mankind, and the same may be applied whether the new age be on the small scale of a single nation as in the ancient days, or on a mundane scale as has been the case since the downfall of the Roman Empire.

I will not now go into the question of just what cycle is opening and what is closing. That would take us far afield, fascinating though indeed it is. Let us take it for granted that the fact is as stated. This accounts for the opening of the floodgates. A new or rather an old teaching was to be presented anew, in new cloaks, new garments, fitted to the understanding of the minds of mankind, of men entering this new age. You see then, Companions, how it came about that the ancient rule of secrecy was in no wise abandoned; but a new installment of the wisdom, which is the heritage of men was given because men needed it. Old knowledge had been forgotten. A new installment of the same knowledge in new guises, new cloaks, new presentations, understandable by the psychology of the modern mind, was required. It began and has continued. One of these days the gates will close. The installment then will have been given. And for the time being the keynotes for the new age will be sufficient to ring down the succeeding cycles, until in the course of human history a new installment for a then new age will again be called for.

-------

March 25, 1941

Parent Stars

One idea expressed here tonight is erroneous, to wit that there is one star of which we are all children. This last thought is correct only when we limit ourselves to a solar system, ours as an instance. But the reference in the Instruction which is the same as the reference in The Secret Doctrine points to a different line of thought.

The meaning is this: so many stars in heaven or in the celestial vault, so many men on earth. Not one star being the parent of all the men on earth, but that every human being on our earth has his spiritual parent, otherwise his spiritual or rather divine self, in some one or other of the uncounted hosts of stars around us and scattered through the galaxy. This does not mean that throughout infinity I or you, for instance, may be or are the only offspring, I of my star, you of yours. Every star emanates a myriad hierarchical host of children, offspring. These offspring are scattered through the galaxy, and may be or may not be imbodied on planets in our own or in other solar systems; so that my star, my spiritual parent, and also my divine self, the flame from which I am emanated as a wandering pilgrim-spark, has other pilgrim-sparks as other rays from that star of mine scattered over the galaxy.

However, in any one solar system, the sun of that solar system, for various reasons is the parent by transmission, like a human parent, of all the monads in his kingdom. A sun is a star. A star is a sun. Our sun in our solar system is our parent because we came through the sun to take imbodiment on Earth, on Jupiter, Venus, Mars, or any other one of the planets. Yet through all our peregrinations, as hosts of wandering pilgrim-monads, each one such monad nevertheless has some one particular star as his own parent or highest self. Yet that one particular star is the parent of a myriad host of other beings besides man here on earth, higher or lower than or similar to me, to you, imbodied or non-imbodied elsewhere on different solar systems in the galaxy — with perhaps other souls from that same star imbodied here on earth or elsewhere on other earths in other solar systems through the galaxy.

A star, any star, anywhere in the galaxy, emanates or scatters its seeds of life, its children, emanating or flowing forth from itself, throws them with lavish hand over the galactic fields of life. Some fall in one solar system drawn together by karmic affinity, a closer affinity than others who group themselves by karmic affinity in some other system; yet all originally emanate from one star, and therefore all claim that one star as their parent and highest parent-self.

Now all stars are doing this, so that on earth we human beings can claim, I my star, you your star. Perhaps it is the same as my star. Much more likely it is some other star. Yet all these pass through, in any solar system, one star which is the king or sun in his own solar kingdom during the circulations of the cosmos, and which the rivers of lives follow when taking imbodiment or throwing off imbodiment.

Nature being ruled throughout analogically, there being one fundamental law and process throughout all the galaxy, even men copy their father in heaven, their parent-star, for we too in our own small way copy what our star-parent did in producing us. We produce lifeatoms, thoughts, elementals, elementary lives; and these unconsciously look up to us as their parent. Some of these entities we produce like physical or human parents do their children. They merely pass through us. But others of these lifeatoms or monads, baby monads if you

wish on this cosmic plane, really are produced from our own spiritual essence. Therefore they are parts of us,

"chips off the old block."

Root-Races

This question, I confess, I have sidestepped in the past to a certain degree because it is so difficult of explanation. It is like time periods. If you have not had a certain number of years of study, honest-to-goodness meditation and thoughtful thinking about these things, a student will simply not get the idea at all.

He is almost certain to go wrong, and I don't want to mislead people, and yet I am asked questions. That makes it my duty to give some kind of an answer. HPB was in exactly the same situation. I can just see her in my mind's eye swearing, knowing she must say something, it must be true, it must not mislead, and she is haunted by the constant fear that almost certainly whatever she says will mislead because the minds of untaught students have not been trained to take in the technical things. Therefore I will say this: Every root-race in its middle point begins to sow the seeds of the next succeeding root-race in its fourth main subrace. But these are the seeds. Can you say the race then began? In one sense you can, because the seeds are sown. The egos are there and begin to aggregate by sympathy, by instinct. After a while they even begin to reincarnate in certain places together, drawn together. Yet each — understand this if you can, I dare not say any more — and yet each root-race, although it sows its seeds of the next root-race in its own main fourth subrace, which is its middle point, yet I repeat that next or succeeding root-race actually does not begin to appear as a race sui generis until about the fourth subrace of the same number as the number of the race which follows it. Do you understand that? For instance, we in our fifth root-race will sow the seeds of the sixth root-race, and are doing it now because we are in the fourth main subrace, I mean the great big subrace of our root-race. Yet the succeeding sixth root-race will not actually be a race sui generis until we, the fifth root-race, have reached our sixth subrace. Then the seeds sown at its middle point, our middle point, will begin to show stem and blade; no longer seeds, they will begin to be plants, and from that moment the succeeding root-race will begin to appear and aggregate rapidly.

Thus during the fourth root-race the seeds of the fifth root-race were sown during the fourth great subrace.

But those seeds did not actually collect together and begin to be the beginnings of a race sui generis until the fourth sub-subrace of the fifth subrace of the fourth root-race.

Take the sixth root-race: it will begin to sow the seeds of the seventh and last root-race on this globe during this round during the fourth subrace of the sixth root-race. The seeds will then begin to appear of the seventh root-race, but that seventh root-race will not actually be collected together as the beginnings of a race sui generis, the seventh root-race, until the sixth root-race has reached its seventh main subrace, the last subrace of the sixth.

So there you have the paradox solved if you can understand it. I am not sure that I myself understand all details. I know how the rule works, but sometimes I myself grow simply entangled in the wheels within wheels which have to be kept so clearly separate in the mind, if even the thinker himself is to retain a clear picture. I hope I have succeeded, Companions. It is something to think about. I know what I have told you is correct, but I am not sure that I myself have been enabled to give to the words I have just uttered the fire of understanding which I want to put into them so as to touch the flaming point of intuition in your minds.

We are seeds of the next root-race, and in The Secret Doctrine HPB says in one page which has been quoted a hundred times by different people, and always quoted with the wrong understanding of it, that in America are already beginning to appear the seeds of the next race. I do not remember at the moment whether she says subrace or race, I think she just says race. And that is obvious, because that is what I have just stated, because we of the fifth are about the middle point of our own main fourth subrace, the producing time for seeds, the generating race of that time so far as the next root-race is concerned. The seeds are sown. Then they lie in the womb of the succeeding subrace or subraces until the time comes for them to grow luxuriantly in the proper subrace, which time will thus be the proper bearing or birth of the new or succeeding root-race to come. The child then is born.

Do not forget this, Companions: if we say that the fourth root-race, for example, was between eight or nine

million years long, that is to say what can be called the fourth root-race lived that time from its beginning to its end, do not forget that it is a race sui generis and alone for only about half that time, say four or five million years, at which time it sows the seeds of the next race to come. Those seeds and the mother-race, the fourth race in the example we have chosen, live side by side until the fourth race dies out and the succeeding or fifth race occupies the place that its parents had, or assumes its position as the heirs of the earth. This is one of the reasons why root-races have sometimes been said to have a time period of four or four and one-half million years, and at other times of eight or nine million years. The former is counting the beginning of the race when it first became a race sui generis up to the time when the new root-race first put in an appearance.

The latter, between eight and nine million years, refers to the mother-race from its first appearance to its dying out. Thus we have Atlanteans, or remnants of Atlanteans, even amongst us today. Many of the tribes in the Pacific Ocean are Atlanteans with Atlantean-Lemurians still amongst them. But they are all dying out, and now dying out rapidly.

The Chinese originally were the seventh and last sub-subrace of the seventh subrace of the fourth root-race.

But they have today become so thoroughly amalgamated with our fifth root-race that they really belong to us, although they can trace their origins right back to the last sub-subrace of the highest Atlanteans.

So the races overlap. From the fourth subrace of any root-race the next root-race begins as seeds, then the two races begin to overlap, and the overlapping continues until the mother-race decays and dies out. The new race becomes the heirs of the earth in its turn, and will be a race sui generis and dominant, reaching its heyday of material perfection, civilization, and progress during its great fourth subrace. Then it will begin to produce the seed of the next root-race to come, which in its turn will pass from the seed state to the plant state to the full grown. Meanwhile the mother-race will gradually fall into old age and decay and finally die, the egos passing over into the daughter-race; except that during the mother-race's last period some of the bodies may still serve as habitats for delayed egos, savage or barbarian egos, which in their turn are dying out but have force enough to keep the bodies of the mother-race running on for a while. You have evidences all around you: the Black Fellows of Australia, the Andaman Islanders around India, the Veddahs of Ceylon, the Hottentots of Africa, and some of the lowest of the tribes in Oceania. Many of them are very degenerate. They are all slowly dying out. The only way to stop the dying out of some of these races is intermarriage, miscegenation with higher races. Other egos of a stronger type then come in and keep the physical vehicles going on for a while. We have a case like that with a mixture of European blood with the Hawaiian Islanders, for instance, or the Samoans, or Fijians, or so forth.

I do not often make the following statement because it sounds egoistic, bombastic, as if we theosophists, although decrying spiritual arrogance in others, were becoming infected by it ourselves, and we must avoid that. Yet as a matter of fact, it is an absolute truth that the theosophists are the foremost seeds, if I can so express it, of the races to come, the seeds of the sixth root-race. Others in the world there are who have not yet become theosophists for various reasons which may be karmic — it may be a temporary mental and spiritual veil, their eyes are not yet sufficiently open — who are just as ready as we are. But we are the type during fifth root-race times of what the first great subrace of the sixth root-race will be, only we ourselves as time passes will become more refined and more evolved to become the actual pioneers of the sixth root-race.

Do you see what I mean? We are still in only the fourth great subrace of the fifth; so while we still belong to the fifth, we are the seeds of the sixth, especially theosophists. We lead the van.

Now that is the plain truth. But as I have just stated, I don't like to talk this way. The public hearing it would say: Why look at those chaps out there, they arrogate to themselves the position of the leaders of mankind; and it is not true, that is not our idea. But the fact contained in the statement is true; and it was to guide us, these struggling young pioneers of the sixth root-race, that mainly the Theosophical Society was founded: to give us help and guidance by the teachings, to keep our feet on the right path. But this does not mean that we theosophists, those who have joined the TS, are the only seeds. I have just told you that there are literally millions of others in the world who have not awakened to the fact that what they would most dearly love in the world is to be theosophists. So therefore I say to our theosophists all the time: do everything you can to bring others into the work, into the TS. Give them the chance that you have got, and have awakened to appreciate. It is a duty.

Negroes

The Negroes are the one human stock or family which at the present time is not lower than the so-called White Race, but has a racial future, though at the present period it is in its infancy. On the other hand there are degenerate races, dying out races, such as the Veddahs.

The Negroes are descendants of Atlanteans as we are, but they are behind us in evolutionary time because we outran them. At the present they are beginning to advance. In general strength of understanding and will power, with many notable exceptions amongst them of course, at the present time they are not quite our equals, but this is simply because they are younger.

It is the destiny of the Negroes to be a coming race. They are a young race, not a degenerate dying-out race, and they show this by their capacity even to live with the white man and not be completely submerged by him. They can stand the strain. The Negroes are deeply to be pitied, for the unfortunate part of it is that they are in the position of a younger childlike race domineered over by a stronger, more advanced race, which does not fully realize the moral obligations it has towards these younger children of humanity. It is perfectly true that they are at a disadvantage with the white.

But spiritually they are certainly our equals. They are monads just as we are. But from the racial standpoint they are younger than we, less evolved than we, more childlike than we are. They are learning from us, but they are learning with incredible rapidity, incredible rapidity. In about 100,000 years from now they will have then become no longer a purely Negro race, because they will have mixed with all the other strong races of the earth. The Negro element as we know it will practically have disappeared, and they will be a brown-skinned race, or a tawny-skinned race, and by that time will be one of the strong races of the earth because they are advancing rapidly.

Now that is the whole truth with regard to the Negroes. Theosophists whose hearts have been opened should realize the responsibility they hold towards our younger brothers. On the other hand, it is just as ridiculous to put the Negro on a pedestal and to make a sort of demigod of him, since that is as wrong as it is to consider that he is innately or characteristically an inferior. Do you see what I mean? Both attitudes are wrong. He is younger, less evolved, has to grow to where we are; is not at present the white man's intellectual equal because he has not grown to it yet — not from lack of intellectual capacity, but from lack of racial habit. He is coming up fast. I hope I have made this clear. Furthermore, even among the Negroes there are important racial distinctions, because there are racial differences, such as are so marked, for instance, between the Zulu and the Negro of the Guinea Coast.

The time is coming, karma is taking care of it, when the Negroes will be absorbed by the presently stronger streams, and they will add a certain freshness and characteristic swabhava of their own to the resultant stream of human life.

In some South American countries, for instance, the millions of Negroes, descendants of those brought over from Africa during the last 300 years or so, are being absorbed rapidly. They are intermarrying everywhere.

These South American peoples are remarkably alert to the forces and principles of civilization, and are advancing very rapidly in high culture. South American cities are as well governed, if not better governed, than some of our cities are; have beautiful buildings, magnificent streets, all modern improvements, and their inhabitants are devoted to science and education. It is an experience well worth while to travel in these South American countries and to see the progress that they are making.

Many of the Asiatic races have been mixed also, but with other human stocks, mainly between what it is customary for Europeans to call the Mongoloid and Aryanoid or Aryan. The Chinese are heavily mixed; the Japanese are heavily mixed, so are the Malays. The Indians of the Indian Peninsula, despite the almost prohibitive religious and other restrictions of intermarriage amongst the different races or castes, are slowly beginning to mix too. There is the fact, and we have to accept it. And the time is coming when I doubt if there will be what we could call a single pure white in the whole world. It may be scores of thousands of years yet, but it is coming, fatefully coming. Even today what we call the white race, which is really a pink race, is mixed. You take the Northern German or the Scandinavian or the English, with their tow-colored hair and forgetmenot eyes and pink skin, and compare these with the brown skin or dark skin of the Latin or the Greek. They are obviously racially akin, and yet marked by salient distinctions — all of which shows

intermixtures of human stocks in the past.

-------

April 29, 1941

Races, Principles

Just follow the law of analogy: what happens as amongst the different planetary chains, in a smaller magnitude or in a smaller degree happens on every globe of a planetary chain, and in and on and during every race of a globe of a planetary chain.

There is a difference, in fact there are striking differences, between the downward arcs and the ascending arcs, and these differences must be carefully watched and taken into account. Nevertheless, the same fundamental general rule applies regarding the seeding and the flowering of the races, whether on the descending, whether on the ascending, arcs. Thus, races one, two, and the last part of the third, were astral or semi-astral. Race the first was distinctly astral without any physical body. Race the second was astral, but coarsening into the ethereal-physical. The beginning of race the third carried on that process, but the end of race the third was physical, the race then being divided into sharply distinct individuals, because of the advent or incarnation of the manasaputras sharply dividing the individuals thereafter, and "thereafter" meaning all subsequent root-races to the seventh, and for the rest of the rounds of the chain.

Race the first on this round on this earth being astral knew no death, as we understand death. It however knew a time of limits. If it had not, it had been immortal and undying, and there would have been but one race through all the rounds on all the globes. Race first did not die. It melted into or became race the second. As the beautiful old archaic phrase has it, the old waters became the new waters; the old mixed with the new.

Notice the choice of words here. It shows that it was one stream, the first becoming the second, and yet they mixed; which shows that the second, however much it was alike unto the first, nevertheless because of distinctions, was something other than the first. Do you catch the thought?

Race the second did not know death in its first parts. Towards its end its individuals, not yet manasized or manasaputrized, fell asleep as it were and faded out. It was the beginnings of what we now know as death of individuals. Race the third began to know death even in its beginning, because the harbingers of the manasaputras were already entering doing their magnificent work; but because this magnificent work so strongly individualized units, death entered. Strange paradox. Thus the first race melted into the second race, and the melting began about the middle point of the first. Remember that. It is most interesting. Race the second slipped along or evolved along its own pathways until it passed away, after having given birth by budding and similar things to race the third, which began to be hermaphroditic or androgynous. In other words, separation was already beginning to show itself; and towards the end of the third race, men and women as we now know them, sharply contrasted individuals of opposite polarities, were the norm or the rule. Transfer by analogical reasoning these processes to the preceding rounds, and you will have a clear picture of what rounds one, two, and three were, at least an outline clearer in defined details perhaps than you have had before.

Now in the succeeding rounds, mind will be manifested in all globes, and in all races on all globes, whether on the descending, whether on the ascending, arc, because we have passed the midpoint of the entire manvantara of this globe's imbodiment. And the next round is the fifth, the manasic round, which means that manasic qualities, mind, will characterize that round throughout as its swabhava.

Going back in time: there was mind even in root-races one, two, and three, on our present globe during this fourth round, mind as it were diffuse, mind not individualized; yet the highest individuals in each of these three races were already manasaputrized, or perhaps better stated bringing manasaputric intelligence over from the previous manvantara, and therefore leading the "mindless" of the present manvantara. These were the demigods that history and mythology amongst all peoples of the world refer to.

With reference to diffuse mind, even a little child, not yet manasaputrized by its own incarnating ego, even after its birth has what we might call diffuse mind. We often speak of it as instinct, intuition almost. Do you

follow my reasoning? As we often say rather poorly, nature seems to care for the child to a certain extent. It has not self-controlled, self-directed, intellectual activity as the adult has learned to have, or has trained himself to have by taking thought unto things. But the child's mind is diffuse intellectually. Nature gives it mind, as it were; but as the months pass and the years pass, the child's ego, its manasaputra, begins to imbody and to stimulate and enlighten the diffuse mind, if you follow me; just as the manasaputras brought mind, or enlightened mind, or stimulated the vegetative or diffuse minds, of the 3rd race entities. The same process takes place in the small with every child that is born as it grows from diffuse to intellectualized self-willed mind of the boy and of the adult.

------

June 24, 1941

Buddhas

Just let me point out that if you count two racial or manushya buddhas to a root-race, the first four would make eight, and as we have had one buddha in the fifth root-race, Buddha Gautama would be the ninth. Now how do you explain this?

Well, I have given you one key to it in the statement that Gautama the Buddha is the seventh. One of the companions got the proper answer really, in gist at least, in stating that there are buddhas opening rounds as well as buddhas opening races. Thus if you calculate that we are in the fourth round, the seventh buddha will be the first buddha of every root-race — or his tulku or representative, to use a Tibetan term, will be such —

therefore Gautama the Buddha is the seventh in that sense of the word. I don't know whether you follow me.

There is a buddha at the beginning of a round and one at the end. They are sometimes called the manus. But we can temporarily put out of our consciousness the round-buddhas, and consider only the racial buddhas as individuals apart from their imbodying the round-buddha influence.

Every race has its two buddhas. Now the first race had its two buddhas, or what, considering the very peculiar circumstances then prevailing, could be classified as an opening buddha and a closing buddha. The mere fact that from the evolutionary standpoint the human stock at that time was not yet self-conscious, in our sense of the word, does not alter the fact that the first race opened with its divine instructor or buddha and closed with one. You see that, don't you?

------

July 29, 1941

Planets

It takes all the planets and the sun and all the moons with their astral influences to form the karmic molds of any one planet. In other words, all things cooperate to produce any one entity. Thus a man is the product, not only of his own driving spiritual ego, the motor behind his entire series of reimbodiments, but he is in very truth the offspring, the child, of universal nature. And now I will try to explain one of the most carefully guarded of the mysteries. I have felt oftentimes I should say something, and yet I have been always hesitant. I have felt that I was walking as it were on a razor's edge.

You remember the Master KH in The Mahatma Letters to A. P. Sinnett speaks of what he calls a continent above our heads as he expresses it — simple, graphic language said to spiritual children in an attempt to give them a hint, which alas, they did not take or understand. HPB in her own letters to A. P. Sinnett speaks of Saturn and his rings, and uses a very open statement (really anyone who runs can read it) that Saturn is the only half-frank planet of our solar system. Look at this open door: the only half-frank planet. We may deduce immediately that it is the only planet of our solar system which on this plane, let us call it the plane of visibility to our eyes, shows a portion of the meteoric continent, as the Master describes it rather oddly, surrounding Saturn. I will go this far. Every planet in the solar system is surrounded with such a meteoric continent or shell or container. The word continent here is most graphic. It does not mean a landmass as the

word is used in human geography. It is a noun used in the distinct Latin sense, to contain, to hold, to inclose

— hence the meteoric continent the Master speaks of is the containing meteoric shell surrounding the earth, especially thick in the region of its equator. Saturn shows us this equatorial meteoric continental thickening, and we call it Saturn's rings. Now have you got something from that!

*

Venus had its moon, but the Venus moon disintegrated aeons agone into cosmic dust. I think if astronomers imagine that they catch glimpses of a moon in the neighborhood of Venus, as I have heard it suggested by one of the members of this group, it may be due to some other cause, and I prefer not even to speculate here what that cause may be. I can give you a hint. It was after the fourth round of Venus that the moon of Venus disappeared. Our real moon will disappear in the sixth or seventh round, but the Venus moon disappeared after its fourth round.

Astronomy calls any attendant celestial body orbiting around another planet a moon. Theosophists restrict the word moon solely to the lunar parent of any planet in our solar system; and other attendants around the planet we call satellites. Call them captures, if you will. Jupiter, for instance, has one moon, and a number of satellites or captures, as have several of the other planets. So for the time being may we not say that this body seen by certain astronomers, even as far back as about the middle of and towards the end of the 18th century, is a satellite, and not the true moon of Venus? I may be wrong, but I do not think it was an asteroid, I believe it was a satellite or capture.

There are invisible planets in the solar system which of course had lunar parents, moon parents, but whose moons had disintegrated before the reimbodiment of their life principles as the child of themselves, the new invisible body. But those planets which are sunken more grossly in matter, like our earth, and very many of the visible-to-us planets of our solar system, are so gross as yet, so slightly etherealized, that very many of them — I won't say all of the visible planets — have actual lunar dwellers on the threshold. Yet even here we must draw distinctions, but absolutely and perfectly along the lines of the doctrine. Venus I have already stated had a dweller on the threshold, but it disintegrated into cosmic ether or dust at the end of the Venus fourth round; but we are lower than Venus in our own evolution, and our moon won't finally leave us entirely, or in other words be disintegrated into the blue ether of space, until we end our sixth round; perhaps even into the seventh round. The reason is that we are more grossly material than Venus is. Venus is more grossly material than are those spiritual planets which because they are spiritual are invisible to us. Yet they are just as real in the solar system as is our earth.

Now then, taking our own earth, our own globe as an example, it is in a sense the planetary spirit, the monad of the planet, which in its own evolutionary journey is now passing through this low phase of its evolutionary pilgrimage. Therefore to a certain extent it is the monad of our earth whose karma it is. But it is evolving upwards. Yet we, the children of earth, are attracted as monads to those places in cosmic space or in our solar system, in our case to those monads or planetary chains with which we have evolutionary affinities and sympathy. Therefore we contribute out of our own ignorance — like the monad of our own globe is more or less sunken in matter as compared with higher, more highly evolved entities — we contribute our quota, our part, or portion, to the cosmic karmic heritage, and therefore must suffer under the common karmic retribution of the future. Have I made my thought clear?

Gateways of Death

Every opening in the physical body whatsoever is one of the channels of evacuation of the pranas at death, from the fundament through every opening upwards to the top of the skull — where there is no physical opening, but astrally there is. The higher portions of the sevenfold entity leave the body at death by the higher openings in the body, and the lower parts of the human constitution evacuate the body at death by the lower openings, every one of them, even the navel.

I think we have had enough of this. I am not certain that questions of this kind are wholesome to us students.

It is too bad to distract the attention to physical things, and lead our minds away from the grandly beautiful things in which we should become strong first.

Brahmarandhra

You can call the brahmarandhra the road of Brahma, the channel of Brahma, out of which the ray (not the monad, because the monad does not come in and sit inside the body), but its ray inspirits those chakras or organs in the body which are its particular vehicle, especially the heart; and this ray never descends to the lower orifices of the body. It always is upward rising, and at death rises along through the spinal column into the brain, flashes through the Sahasrara or the highest chakra if you wish, and as we rather graphically say, but not properly, passes out through the top of the skull, which merely means that the ray rises like an aura from and through the head.

Judge Not

Be charitable and gentle to those who may stumble on the path. You don't know what karmic impulses may at any moment have brought about a thought or an action. Therefore judge not, because judging in these cases is a sign of weakness in yourself, who can't see the good in the one who has stumbled. Rather understand, and extend the hand of compassion and brotherly love. Look to the future. Your own feet may stumble on the path some day, and oh, how dear to you then will be the helping hand.

Moment of Choice

You know there is in the world a certain type of mind which seems to feel that the noblest is beyond human compassing. It is the doctrine of spiritual defeatism, and I am not here referring to any mundane facts at the present time, but I am referring to a feeling among hundreds of thousands, and perhaps millions, that it is practically impossible for man to live ever his highest and best, and consequently they seek justification for lapses.

Our experiences from now onwards — and it has been so really in our days in the past — but in our present life, our experiences to which we should set our eyes are in the future on the upward path. We have passed the middle point of the fourth round, the most important moment of choice (excepting one which comes in the fifth round) of the entire chain-manvantara. Now if we as human souls can climb upwards, looking to the future and forgetting the past, we shall pass that moment of choice coming to us in the fifth round, and do it with safety. If we have our eyes turned downwards, or towards the past, and imagine that we can't, when inwardly we know we can and should, we shall not make the grade during the fifth round. Do try to remember that.

One of the marks of the chela is to dare.

------

August 26, 1941

Beauty: Physical and Spiritual

It has been my own experience born from observation (I doubt not it has been the experience of those who are observing amongst you) that merely physical beauty is often — I won't say always — but often the result of sheer stupidity; whereas the beauty of soul often brings about a body which we call ugly, unsymmetrical, precisely because the soul's energy and power often mean victory after inner conflict, harmony and peace after storm, and the body feels the result of the storm and therefore is often unshapely. It is precisely because of this convergence of cause and effect that the inner soul is benefited by the battle, but the body is often apparently scarred and worn — although in time even the body will follow the inner soul's harmony.

Thus we see here the reason why often a beautiful soul has an unbeautiful body, for the body has not yet adjusted itself to the soul's beauty and copied it. But as time goes on, the atoms of that body will follow the inner urge and shapely impulses of the human soul at peace; and the higher soul beauty will shine through. In the eyes of such a one, in the manner, in the dignity that clothes him or her, you can read self-conquest, richness of experience, and an inner beauty of harmony which is incomparable, has no peer.

The stupidity which merely brings about physical beauty is such because then the forces of nature work unhindered from any inner tempest or storm. They are automatic in their action and follow the latent beauty of nature's harmonious laws, but without the still higher beauty of the soul and the spirit. Thus we see often in feckless and unevolved people, a beauty apparently at times without flaw, but which physical beauty nevertheless is usually soulless and uninspired, for there is no fire or spiritual illumination of the soul behind it to raise the natural physical beauty as harmony into higher and nobler things. Such merely physically beautiful people often lack character most notably.

Now in time to come, in future aeons, when evolution shall have done its magic work, all the human race will possess beauty both of soul and of body, for the inner and the outer will be at one, and functioning sympathetically and harmoniously, guided by the spirit which is the very seed of harmony, and harmony is beauty.

The consequence of things as they now are in our imperfectly evolved condition, I repeat, is that physical beauty merely and by itself is absolutely no assurance that the soul within is beautiful. The stupidity and good health of merely very good looking people — they are like beautiful animals, practically; not absolutely, because they are human. But there is no richness of life there, or very little of it. If there were, the very richness of life would mold the features into what I have often called the irregularity of soul strength.

When a man or a woman has fully attained, beauty without parallel returns even to the physical beauty, for then there is the absolute harmony of the higher entity inside shining through the body, and molding it into lines of beauty, into shapeliness, and all the things that go with that higher beauty. For instance, it is said of Gautama the Buddha that he was like a god in his body, a man of unparalleled manly beauty. Why? Because he had attained the inner harmony, and harmony is beauty, just as the physical body will automatically become beautiful when you are too stupid to disturb it. But who would want that kind of beauty: to be but a shapely shell?

The Buddha and Nirvana

There can be no buddha unless the appropriate entity enters nirvana. There are the buddhas of renunciation whom we call the Buddhas of compassion. All the bodhisattvas renounce nirvana, at least that part of nirvana into which they could enter as a condition or state of the spirit. Yet the fact remains that nirvana is dharmakaya, and one cannot enter buddhahood unless dharmakaya be attained.

You will have this paradox explained if you consider the life of the last buddha of history, the Buddha Gautama. Consider the sevenfold principles or character of this very lofty man, grand man indeed. At a certain stage his spiritual soul entered the nirvana. From that moment Gautama was buddha. The past participle passive of this Sanskrit verb budh shows it. The human soul or apparatus left behind was the Bodhisattva Gautama who thereafter continued to teach until the physical death of Gautama's body in the latter's 100th year.

Thus you have in the life story of that wondrous man the explanation of the mystery. There was the chela or neophyte Siddhartha, becoming after his youth a bodhisattva, thus opening the channel for the spiritual soul to manifest through him at buddhahood. The spiritual soul then entered dharmakaya, the bodhisattva continued in the body to live 20 more years (buddhahood having been attained during Gautama's 80th year) and to teach. Then the bodhisattva retired to its own place which happened to be assuming nirmanakaya, or the vesture of nirvana, and then the body died.

Meeting 2

Meeting 3

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Three

Meeting of December 25, 1929

G. de P. — Will the meeting please come to order. Has anyone any question to ask?

Student — May I ask if it is correct that at the time when Madame Blavatsky started her work there were only two Masters of the Lodge who thought the world was in such a state that it would be possible to revivify the spiritual forces in men's lives?

G. de P. — That is what has been reported on very reliable authority. I myself believe it to be true. Not that the other teachers disbelieved in the possibility; but due to karmic law only two teachers were able at the time to offer their services and work. And, as a matter of fact, I have heard it stated that the Chohan, the Chief, did not oppose it, but had grave doubts of the ancient wisdom in its esoteric parts receiving any welcome at all in the Occident at the present time. Of course, the Occident has always been hungry for wonders, for signs, for

"miraculous" occurrences, and all that kind of thing; but such hunger is almost a sure sign of a lack of spiritual insight, and it is one of the greatest difficulties that my predecessors have had — to keep the esoteric work clean from that kind of thing and directly in line and accord with the principles and rules of the Oriental School.

Now, I think, due to Katherine Tingley's training of her pupils in esoteric principles — without the actual enunciation of esoteric rules so much, but by training — we have come to the point where the rules and ideals of the Oriental School can find safe lodgment in the hearts and minds of men and women in the Occident.

Does that answer your question?

Student — Yes. May I ask another question? Has there been any time since Madame Blavatsky began her work, when the Masters have withdrawn?

G. de P. — No. And furthermore, I will add as a rider to the simple negative answer to your question, that instead of two, I now know of five who are interested and working in this present spiritual departure, in this present esoteric work: the two who originally by karmic law were the ones to begin and commonly known under the initials M and KH; and of the other three, one is a man who was a chela of KH when H. P.

Blavatsky was alive and was known by the initials JK, signifying Jual Khul. The other two it is not needful to mention at all as regards names. One is a young man and the other is a very, very old man and a mysterious character. I know very little about him, but I have a feeling, however, that he stands the highest of them all.

He is a very small man and very old. I think that I have spoken of him before as a man whose eyes impress one more than anything else. They are little black eyes that seem to be focuses of light when he looks directly at one. As I have said, he is very old, his skin is shriveled like the cover of an old book.

Are there any other questions, please?

Student — If I am not mistaken, Mr. Judge has said somewhere that most important work is going on outside the Theosophical Society. Now, if it would be permissible, it would certainly be interesting to know if that work is of an esoteric character as well as of a character which consists more in impressing men's minds without their knowledge — a kind of unconscious guidance — with what they have to do for the betterment of mankind and the advancement of some great cause.

G. de P. — Yes, such work is going on — has been going on for ages, and will continue for ages, in season and out of season; but it is merely the general and regular work of the great ones. Please mark you, there is but one line of authentic specific esoteric teaching, and that one line is in the Oriental School to which we belong. It is the only direct agency in the world for transmitting direct, specific instruction in the teachings of the esoteric part of the ancient wisdom-religion of humanity. The other general work, however, has been going on for ages and will so continue; but it also is a secret, esoteric work, done behind the veil of invisibility, and is work in a general way touching mankind as a whole. Do you understand what I mean?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — In other words, there are not two esoteric schools such as this of ours. This one alone exists, so far as the world is concerned. Each teacher, each mahatma, has his own school, has his own pupils, but that is something apart again, since his pupils are his own particular family circle of chosen ones. They all work together in the general work for mankind; and this general work may be done anywhere — in the churches, impressing individuals, in the councils of state, wherever there is a possible chance to infiltrate light and wisdom and the doctrines of love and forgiveness into men's minds and hearts. But as a school of esoteric training among men, there is but one in the world today, and this our own holy order is it.

Student — I have a question which it may not be possible to have answered; but at a recent ES meeting in the temple, you spoke of the fact that a stranger had been present that night; and I am wondering if that stranger could have been one of the five you mentioned.

G. de P. — No, he was not.

Student — May I ask also: are these five working directly as Master M and Master KH do, for and through this body?

G. de P. — Yes, but of course they do other work in the world; yet these five are especially interested in the work which HPB started as an extension of the Oriental School in the Occident, for the theosophical movement is in the world as part of the general plan or effort in swaying men's minds and hearts.

Now, who this stranger was, I do not know. He was a stranger to me — an entire stranger; a tall individual (I did not see his face well at all). That is all I can say. I know nothing about him. I do not know whether he is an Oriental, or one of the few who have come in from the West. I simply saw the Oriental garb, but that does not mean anything at all; and I also noticed the fact of his great size.

Have you anything else to ask?

Student — No, thank you very much.

Student — Can you tell us anything about the Master in Mexico of whom KT has spoken?

G. de P. — Yes. You mean the one who has been known under the title of the Master of Vibrations? Is that the one you mean?

Student — I cannot answer that.

G. de P. — Well, the one called the Teacher in Mexico has been also called the Master of Vibrations. Now, KT also has spoken of another one working in Mexico, and I don't know which one you mean. There are two, as a matter of fact. Every country, really, has its own especially designated workers or teachers, each working in the silence and behind the veil, and it is so in every country in the world, in the Occident or in the Orient.

And the reason is that just as every country in the world is under the particular influence or guidance of the spiritual beings controlling one or another of the planets, so those designated to work in such countries are beings — men — who are also under the same planetary rays, if you understand me.

Student — In reference to the work in the world, do the teachers not deal consciously sometimes with outstanding characters? For instance, we hear about Jakob Boehme who spoke about some mysterious individual coming to him and teaching him. And in referring to history we find usually the positive influence of some one behind the scenes; but is not that consciously rendered at times to great characters?

G. de P. — Consciously or personally?

Student — At times of the great crises, so that the character himself knows that he is being assisted by a greater power than himself?

G. de P. — Rarely, very rarely indeed; and there are strong psychological reasons for its being so rare.

Remember that here we are dealing with very recondite questions of human psychology, and with matters pertaining to the human spirit, and to the human heart; and the Occidental has great difficulty in understanding that fact. His mind works after its own manner. He looks to the page of the open book, and the number of the page, and just how many lines are on the page, and how many words there are to a line, and he notes the particular spelling of the words; but such pragmatical and matter-of-fact views are altogether contrary to the spirit of esoteric instructions.

There is no harm in having brain-mind knowledge of that kind; but it is the brain-mind view. The teachers work along more mystical ways. They inspire general principles into human hearts; they sway human minds and hearts by general ideals, such as rule men. And I can readily see that one of the worst things in the world (with rare exceptions, of course) would be to let these men of destiny (for these are they who are particularly influenced by the Masters) know that they are singled out and to know whence their inspiration comes. It is not good as a rule. Just think the matter over and try to understand it. I think your own minds, your own intuition, will make you realize why the teachers work behind the veil of invisibility and silence.

Student — Can you tell us something more about the Master of Vibrations and why he has been given that name?

G. de P. — Yes, I think I have spoken of it before. He is one who has "gone." That is all that I can say. I do not say that he has died. I prefer to say that he has "gone." There are many ways, as a matter of fact, by which a teacher can absent himself from work for a time and for very good reasons. One reason may be that he is called to an initiation which in some cases in its results occupies years; and there are many kinds of initiations, high, intermediate, and low. He may absent himself also because he changes his physical body. He may absent himself because he is on duty in some other part of the world, possibly on some other planet.

At any rate, the one called the Master of Vibrations is not here. He was so called because one of his especial duties was, and his especial personal interest was, the instilling of scientific ideas into men's minds, which to these men were intuitions — a very important work in this phase of Occidental civilization. My own feeling is that the work of this great man, of this so-called Master of Vibrations — which words were a mere title given to him (and a very good title too, in view of the present status of modern scientific thought) — my own view is that when he returns to work it will not be in our time. He has done his work for the present. He was a very mysterious character in the sense that very little has been allowed to be said about him.

Student — I wanted to ask you about those three visions that General Washington had at Valley Forge. You remember them? And the last one in connection with what we were talking about just now, about who sent those visions? And might I ask a double question? You remember KT had them printed about thirty years ago, 1900, in one of the magazines; and then she had them reprinted again some ten or twelve years ago. And in that last vision the angel, as he described it, who appeared to him in his tent, described how a great hand came out and dipped out water from the Atlantic and poured it over Europe and that an army came over here and very nearly destroyed this country; and then one of the army of light sounded a bugle and woke these people up, and fighting, they vanquished it. And I would ask if it is possible for you to elucidate that a little.

G. de P. — Yes, I was trying to recollect. I remember hearing of these three visions. I think I read them very hurriedly. I know that KT spoke of them and had me put them in The Theosophical Path, just as you said. I should judge, as nearly as I can recollect the atmosphere of these three visions, so called, that they were actual visions and not teaching. I believe that in Washington's case it was one of those instances of inner inspiration which may happen to anyone, particularly to anyone occupying an exalted post. His own inner teacher, his own higher parts, illuminated for the time being his mind; and a great deal of such teaching comes in the form of pictures, of so-called visions, which only seem to be seen.

The inner receiving apparatus receives them as pictures, just as the receiving apparatus of the eye receives as pictures the outside world. In other words, the mind translates to its own understanding these things as pictures. I do not think that Washington was in any especial communication with the Lodge except in the manner that I have just spoken of. That is my own belief. I cannot go farther than that, because I do not know.

Student — May I ask another question in connection with that, because it seems to me it is a very important one? One of the lady members of the London Lodge, a very devoted, splendid member, had a vision. She woke up and wrote it down. She saw this vision at four o'clock in the morning. I thought it was genuine. But some six months later when KT was in London I told her about this and she said: "It is absolute imagination."

She said, "It was not genuine. The member, pure, devoted, splendid member, thinking about that a great deal, just had the vision. It was not from the soul. It was not real."

Now the question I want to ask you is this: how are we to tell those things, the true from the false? That vision to me had all the earmarks of truth. How can we, when we are absolutely sincere, looking for light, thinking (especially out in the world) of some great difficulty which we are impersonally trying to face, when we get a message like that, how can we tell whether it is truth?

G. de P. — The only way is by training, just as in any other department of life. You must learn to read before you can interpret. And may I ask why you received this as a genuine vision? What real authority was behind it?

Student — In what way do you mean?

G. de P. — In just the way by which you have presented your question. You speak of having been told of this vision.

Student — I had nothing to do with it. It was not I. This member of whom I spoke received it.

G. de P. — You speak of this member as having told it to you, and then a moment ago you spoke of it as a vision. Now I ask you, why did you think it was a message?

Student — I thought that she, being so sincere and so keen —

G. de P. — Pardon my interrupting; but I don't want you to lose the atmosphere of your question in explaining. Your earnest, honest, receptive mind took it for granted that it must be true, because this person was so sincere?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — Don't you see that just because you may believe a person to be sincere, and such a person is indeed sincere and truthful, yet sincerity itself is no sign-manual of truth? Therefore I say that the only way to distinguish between the true and the false is by training, by study, by aspiration — and this is the old, old rule.

You are warned again and again and again: beware of misleading lights. They sometimes come with all the clothing and paraphernalia of truth — logical, beautiful, thoughtful, kindly, apparently impersonal; and yet they may be quite false. Be alert, watchful. Remember the old rule: accept nothing as coming from the Lodge unless you have the authority of the teacher for it.

Never take anything that comes from anyone as being true in an esoteric line unless facts prove it to be true, or unless you have your teacher's statement on the matter. That rule may seem a little arbitrary, and I am the last one in the world to wish to put myself or my great predecessors in a position which would seem to make them Sir Oracles. That is not the idea. Yet, I am telling you truth: the Esoteric School of the Theosophical Society is the only — the sole — means of coming into direct touch with the Masters of Wisdom. That is what I mean when I tell you that the teacher is the only one, if you cannot solve the problem yourself, to go to. Do you understand me?

Student — Partly, but not altogether. This is what I was trying to get at: Judge says in one of those wonderful articles of his, that are so full of esoteric teaching, in the first three numbers of The Path — he says there that if we would only "go out" at night in the right way, we would bring back every night the wonderful things that the soul sees, and be able to live them in the daytime. I have never been able to do that, though I have wanted to so much; and I thought that in this case this member had gone out so absolutely sincere and had seen the Teacher (it was KT she saw) and it sounded so much like her — KT; and I was wondering not so much about the answer to that incident, but as regards a rule for all of us members. How can we tell if we

bring back a thought in the night like that, that has practically nothing selfish in it, but apparently all for the work, if it is genuine or if it is not?

G. de P. — I have answered this: you can tell by two methods — by training and by study in the ES School, and by spiritual striving. You cannot reach Olympus in a single stride. The ES study is a matter of many lives to attain to in full understanding. You are beginning. You have set your feet on the pathway for the receiving of light. You will have to grow into an understanding of these things.

Meanwhile, study, be careful, be alert. Do not be deceived; do not take things for granted because they are beautiful or apparently impersonal or touch one's sensibilities. The other pathway is, as I have already said: after you have tried your best to solve your own problem, and fail to find its solution, then turn to the teacher whom you trust. If he does not know or cannot tell you, he will so say. If he can, he will tell you in private.

Student — Thank you.

Student — Was Joan of Arc conscious of receiving messages from a higher power?

G. de P. — I think that she in a way believed this, but she was not a messenger of the Lodge. She was one of those rare and unusual cases of human beings who, through a peculiar psychological apparatus became, or who become, people of destiny. She did a noble work, a good work, for her country. But it was not a universal work. It was a local work, and therefore it lacked the touch of real spirituality. She was an uninstructed, but big-hearted, peasant girl. Her mind had been filled by her dreams with what she thought was a great and noble duty to perform; and being of the peculiar psychological type spoken of, she believed that she was told to do that work. Her visions, so called, were the product largely of her own inner feeling, of her imagination if you like. But they fired her; they stimulated her. She felt the force of something mystical and impersonal behind her; but it was not from the Lodge. She was one of these persons of destiny of whom I have spoken. Mr. J. W. Keely — quite another type, however, was also one of these humans of peculiar psychological nature. These human beings are the lusus naturae, the peculiar people and things of nature, that will grow more numerous as the ages roll by. As the race slowly grows out of the morass of materiality, of material thoughts, these unusual men and women will become much more numerous than now they are. But that they are to be considered as teachers — no, that is not true.

Do you understand the idea? Do you get the atmosphere of what I am trying to tell you?

Student — I see the difference between the teacher and the person of destiny; but she had unusual wisdom, had she not, in dealing with her particular work?

G. de P. — No, she had not. Her wisdom was instinctive. Wisdom is something which is consciously used in our work for a universal purpose. Local success often arises out of great mental or psychological individual capacity, but such capacity is not necessarily of a spiritual type; and nothing that lacks spiritual force belongs to the Lodge work. The test of spirituality is one test: universality.

Joan of Arc was a good girl. She was a most unusual character, and she did what was considered in her time to be a holy work — for her time, you understand me; but she was not a messenger of the Lodge. There are none of the marks of a messenger there, not one. That was one reason why I rebelled once, and gave vocal expression to my rebellion, when I heard some one state that in his opinion KT was a reincarnation of Joan of Arc! Her fate was tragic, to be sure — cruel, unjust, but Karma will take care of all that.

Student — In reference to the overshadowings that you were speaking of just now, I was thinking of Henry More and of Bismarck. Would they be included in that class? Henry More in his third dialogue — the Platonic philosopher — refers to his being out in a bark and a great Indian teacher appearing to him and teaching him a great many things. The thoughts are very theosophical. In fact, it includes nearly everything —

the rounds and the races and a great number of other things; and HPB in a letter speaks of Bismarck as having a private adept in the mountains or in the Black Forest, who helped him in his struggles against the machinations of the Church, which was then trying to get the domination of Germany and very nearly did so.

Would these cases be examples of just impersonal help by the Masters?

G. de P. — Yes. It is true that Bismarck was a very much misunderstood man. To say that he had an adept is speaking a truth. It does not mean on the other hand that Bismarck was a chela. It does not mean that he himself was an adept. It means that he was one of the men of destiny, whose exalted post at the time and whose psychological capacity fitted him to be a quasi-unconscious, a quasi-conscious, instrument for the work of the White Lodge against the Black Lodge. Do you understand?

Henry More was of the same category. He was a dreamer, an idealist. His thoughts were often universal.

There was high spirituality there, as there was also, by the way, in some of Bismarck's work. Henry More was an unconscious chela. Such exist — men who have not arrived at the point where they can, as yet, be told of their chelaship. They have not come to that point yet, but they are very near to the point. They are what you might call unconscious chelas — men who are being trained behind the veil of invisibility for a future great work in the history of the world.

Student — Can you tell us something more about the initiation period, which I understand goes on at this time of the year? Is there not something more, besides its being the time of the winter solstice, in the fact that so many of the great teachers have been born at this time of the year?

G. de P. — Yes, indeed. That is a question which I would like to answer as a finish to our study tonight. It is now ten minutes past nine. If there are any other questions, will you kindly ask them at present, and just remind me later of the question that you have asked.

Student — Mine is short. You have spoken tonight of the test of spirituality as being universality; and I have wondered so much many times about the Neoplatonist teachers, Ammonius Saccas, and the Alexandrian teachers, Plotinus and Hypatia, were they messengers?

G. de P. — No, not exactly. They were all human beings who knew of the existence of the Lodges of the great teachers. They were individuals who were chelas or rather who were beginning chelaship; but with the possible exception of Ammonius Saccas, they were not what could be called the messengers of the Lodge.

Ammonius Saccas might fall within that category. I think he belonged there. A messenger, Companions, means just what the word says — one who comes with a message from the Lodge. The next question, please.

Student — In connection with what you were just saying about Bismarck, may I ask if there is anything in the story of the "Little Red Man" who visited Napoleon?

G. de P. — I remember reading a very interesting book (I think it was written by Alexandre Dumas) about

"the little red man of the Tuileries."

Student — Mr. Judge refers to it quite profoundly, I think.

G. de P. — Now, as a matter of fact, Napoleon has been greatly admired on account of the character of the work that he did in his life. He was, in fact, one of the men of destiny. I do not believe, however, that he was at any time in communication with Masters of wisdom. I will go a little farther and ask you a question: do you think that if he was in communication with invisible powers, that these powers were Masters of holy wisdom or unholy wisdom?

Student — I think they were unholy, because you said in the Temple that Napoleon was an agent of the destructive forces.

G. de P. — Yes, I did say words to that effect. Alexander the Great, so called, Julius Caesar, Napoleon, even Charlemagne — Charles the Great of France — and many more men of the same kind, were agents of the White Lodge only in the sense that they were men of destiny and their work was a work which had to be done. But, considered from another viewpoint every one of them was an agent of the Black Lodge.

Now, that statement may sound like a paradox; but just think it over. I mean this, that knowing that certain things have to take place in order to bring to pass certain other events which are karmic consequences in human history, the Masters of holy wisdom, of the White Lodge, work with and in those circumstances in order to ameliorate, to soften, what otherwise would be much worse than it is. Furthermore, the white

magician will employ at times the agents of the black magician for that purpose. Do you get that idea?

It is said that one of the best ways to catch a thief is to employ a thief for that purpose and that principle is apparently one that the French secret police follow. The French surete generale are said often to employ men as police agents, as clever detectives, whom they know to be or to have been unusually clever and expert criminals.

And, somewhat after the same way, the White Lodge uses a certain type of workers among men. Knowing that certain events are destined to take place, the karmic consequences of causes which consequences have been waiting their time to come forth, they take the situation as it is and control it as best they may. They try so to direct the conditions that the consequences will become diffused and therefore less harmful to men than if they were concentrated, and therefore disruptive or explosive. Do you understand what I mean? And yet these very men, whose work they so direct and control, often are the agents of the Black Lodge, although usually unconscious agents.

Napoleon, Julius Caesar, Alexander the Great, and others like them in my judgment belong to the destroyers, not to the builders. Of course, every destroyer in a larger sense is a builder. That is true. I mean that every work of destruction naturally makes place, makes a pathway, for something greater, which will come after.

But that in no wise relieves the karmic responsibility of those who destroy. They will be held responsible to the very last iota.

Student — Before I ask my question, may I state certain things which I believe to be true? One is that a man must love his religion. I wonder, when someone who is a lover of material things, has esoteric parents, and those parents in turn who naturally love what they believe, force upon the child much that the child resents, does their very sincerity help the soul of that child in spite of himself?

G. de P. — Yes indeed, very greatly, very greatly. The influence of impersonal devotion is magical. Love, I tell you, is the greatest magic agent in the universe. Nothing can withstand its force. In time it permeates everywhere — even stony human hearts are finally captured by love and impersonal devotion. And just so, the devotion of good, self-respecting parents towards an erring child helps that child greatly, no matter what the child does, no matter what ingratitude it may show, even if it break its parents' hearts, that steady love, that impersonal love, that devotion and that desire to help and aid, in the end do affect the child's karma very beneficially indeed. Does that answer your question?

Student — Thank you.

Student — You spoke of the nations, each nation having its helpers and also receiving its planetary influence. Just what is the national spirit? Is it the higher nature of all the people of that nation, plus the planetary and the Lodge helpers?

G. de P. — In a vague way; but you are putting the cart before the horse, it seems to me. If you will look upon the question in another way, any body of human beings born in the same land are so gathered together on account of karmic attractions, attractions which bring them together. These karmic attractions in turn are more or less controlled by the planetary influences which control the different countries.

Now, this does not mean that the planet Venus, for instance, sends its rays only on one country of the earth, or on two, perhaps; not at all. But it does mean that certain lines of force from the different planets center or come together with larger fullness or greater intensity on certain spots of the earth, on certain countries in other words. Incarnating souls having vibrations most akin to these concentering forces from the planets are drawn thither, and gather together as a national body of people; and this combined common spirit, this quasi-identity arising in the similarity of vibrations it is which forms the national spirit of this or that or some other folk. Does that answer your question?

Student — Yes . . .

G. de P. — I sense the "no" in your voice, and I don't blame you at all, because you are touching upon a very deep question.

Student — It has always seemed to me that there was something quite tangible that was the national spirit in every country, and I had presumed that it was the composite higher nature of all the people. And tonight, when you spoke of each country having its helpers, and that both the country and the helpers had their inspiring influence from the planets, well, I simply added those to the national spirit that I supposed to be the basic thing; not that I felt that my national-spirit idea was the primary one, but I wondered: what is the national spirit?

G. de P. — The national spirit is the combined vibrations of a similar type existing in all the souls which incarnate in a certain country of the globe. Take the illustration of a tree. A tree above the earth has its stock, its trunk, with all its branches and twigs and leaves, and beneath the earth has its thousands of roots and rootlets. Let us say that each root or rootlet or leaf or twig is a human being. They all join in the trunk. A common vitality, as it were, flows from the trunk into all the roots and leaves and back again. Now the national spirit is this trunk, fed by the roots and leaves, it is true; but the roots and leaves in turn are fed by the trunk.

You look at your problem from below; you look upwards. Now try to imagine the national spirit as the aggregate of all the spirits, all the entities, incarnated in a certain country; and that they are drawn together on account of the forces flowing from the different planets rather than from the men themselves, considered merely as an aggregate of individuals composing or building up a so-called national spirit. Do you get the idea?

Student — Well, I had supposed that the national spirit, when we speak of the national spirit —

G. de P. — It is a phrase.

Student — It is a phrase; but it seemed as if the national spirit was the best quality in all the individuals. I have not included man's lower nature. Is the national spirit the best of the man or, in other words, is the national spirit the national character?

G. de P. — The national spirit is often inferior to the best of a man, usually is very much inferior. The national spirit, as I have told you, is simply the similarity of vibrations of a certain group of people, and belongs rather to the vitality than to the spirit side. I don't think that you have your question clear in your own mind. Just state your question again.

Student — I do not know whether or not to think of the national spirit, then, as simply a poetical phrase, simply as a literary phrase.

G. de P. — Well, what is your question?

Student — Well, I do understand the answer, that the national spirit is the individuals brought together, and I shall cease to think of it as only the combined higher nature of a people.

G. de P. — That is partially true, but I am afraid that I have not answered your question. State your question clearly, if you can remember it. Just state it anew, because it touches upon a very interesting topic of thought.

Student — I can make it no simpler than to say, what is the national spirit? What is it? What do we mean by that phrase?

G. de P. — The national spirit is the similarity of astral vibrations, which belong to a group of people. It is called spirit by courtesy. Individual men are usually far higher in ideals than their national spirit is, far higher; and this was shown very clearly in the last great war. Do you get the idea?

Student — Yes, I think I understand.

G. de P. — Probably every human being in all the countries knew perfectly well that the war was an insane outbreak; and yet the national spirit ran away with them. And I don't mean mere patriotism, I mean the

national spirit, such as you have been talking about. Probably every man in all the countries involved in the Great War, had he had his way, had he had the power, would have stopped it over night and resorted to reason and justice. Such is the man, the individual.

It is all right to have a national spirit, to be proud of one's country. The man who does not love his country, the land of his birth, is an unnatural sort of man. But higher than that feeling is the spiritual view that we are all children of our common earth — brothers not merely in instinct, brothers not merely in feeling, brothers not merely in human qualities, but actually, ultimately of the same blood, no matter what the colors of our skins are. If we go back far enough in time, we realize that we are of the same one stock, humanity. That is the fundamental thought which will make wars become impossible.

This national spirit, when it expresses itself concretely, produces the various nationalisms that you hear so much about. And these nationalisms make for wars. This does not mean that nationalism is necessarily wrong. Please do not leap from Charybdis into Scylla. Keep the middle view, the middle road, in your thoughts. Be proud of the fine qualities of your country; but in thinking of individuals remember the men in history who have achieved great moral deeds, impersonal deeds, rather than the military and naval heroes.

Student — May I ask a question? I think it is HPB who says that there is a body in Spain connected with the Lodge, or that there was at that time. Is that body still working?

G. de P. — Certainly. Every country has its own corps of adepts, if you like to put it in that way; and they are working all the time. There is one in each country.

Student — Is the one in Spain a center disguised, as you might say, under the form of a Roman Catholic institution, perhaps?

G. de P. — I would not say that it is disguised, but it does the work with the material which is present and with the human beings which compose the people among whom this center works. Now, the Lodge in Spain is not working for the immediate future. Its destiny lies on the horizon of time. Spain once more will be a great power in the councils of the world in time to come, but not yet. That time has not come, nor is it even close at hand. It is too far away. It is on the horizon in time. There is a devotion in the Spanish character which is the basic factor in keeping that people alive. Thus far it has expressed itself as national egoism, strong Roman Catholic views, and so forth; but that spirit of devotion, however misguided it may be at present, nevertheless is the vital power behind that folk, and it is on that devotion that is going to be builded the better and nobler Spain of the future.

Student — I think in the early days of 1900-1-2 or 3, somewhere about that time, KT spoke in a meeting in the Rotunda about there being a Lodge in Spain, and that she would come into an estate there before she passed out; that she would get this estate and work in Spain; and I have often wondered about that.

G. de P. — I don't know what the speaker's reference is to, I am sure.

Student — Perhaps some of the others here remember something about it. I made a little note of it at the time.

G. de P. — Well, may I remind you, Companions, of how often KT has protested against remarks made by her being taken down and, years later, brought up, such remarks being usually misunderstood, as signifying something that she did not mean. A teacher often speaks in parables, uses words that are perfectly proper and appropriate at the time, but does not mean that too much weight should be put upon such merely verbal statements. Yet some student will make a note of it, it may fascinate the imagination of that student, the imagination then begins to work to misconstrue; and a few years later a statement is brought up: "But you said so-and-so." Immediately the teacher, in that student's view, is put on the defensive. Why? Because the student himself has misunderstood.

Now, dear Companion, I do not say that you have misunderstood in this instance; but your remark gave me the occasion to point this fact out. "G. de P.," our beloved KT told me once, "my own students are going to damn me. They misunderstand what I say. I make a remark. It is treasured up, twisted or distorted or

misunderstood, and years afterwards I hear about it; and I shall be damned in the future if this thing goes on."

It was the same with HPB, and the same with Judge.

Student — Professor, may I ask that we have the answer to the question concerning initiations at the winter solstice?

G. de P. — Yes. Will you kindly state your question again?

Student — Can you tell us something more about the period of initiation which takes place at this time of the year as I understand it? Is there not something more in the fact that so many of the great teachers have been born at this time of the year, than the mere fact of its being the winter solstice time?

G. de P. — How do you know, dear Companion, that the teachers were born (physically born is what you have in mind), at the season of the winter solstice? I will tell you that it has reference to the mystical birth; and it is this mystical birth, achieved through initiation, which took place in the middle of the winter period.

The supreme initiatory cycle takes place when the Sun, and Mercury, and Venus, and the Moon, and the Earth are in syzygy, as the astronomers say, in a straight line as it were; that is to say a straight line from the Sun would pass through or very close to each of the other bodies mentioned.

Why was this combination of time and circumstance perpetuated as the time of the supreme initiation? I can tell you this: the Sun is a divine being. It is constantly throwing forth from itself currents of physical and vital power, as well as spiritual and psychological energies; and when a number of planets are in line, the influences received from the Sun are colored by the vitality, the vital and other powers, inherent in each planet.

Now, as regards the Moon. The Moon on this occasion must be new, not full. That is to say the Earth must be the outermost of the celestial bodies that I have spoken of, the Sun must be the most distant, Mercury must come next, then Venus, then the Moon, and then the Earth.

The Moon (now listen carefully) is the receiver and giver of human souls. It receives human souls at death, and they pass from the Moon to the Earth before reincarnating. The typically ideal situation for initiation is where a straight line will pass through the center, or nearly so, of all these celestial bodies. Then the spiritual influences streaming from the Sun carry along with them, as they proceed to the Earth, the respective vital impress or color of each one of the planets and of the Moon. The aspirant who has been in training for months or perhaps years before, approaches this date of his initiation in heart and mind (that is to say, in thought and aspiration) by still more and more intensive preparing. He has been told in general what is coming, what he is to expect. Preparations have been made. He is watched over and cared for by the teachers; and at the exact time when the Moon, the center of the Moon (this is the ideal situation) and the other celestial bodies — or at any rate at the exact time when the Moon is nearest this straight line — his spirit, the spirit of the aspirant, more accurately the soul-spirit, leaves his body and travels along that line by magnetic attraction sunwards, and enters the Sun. In some cases the return is made almost instantaneously, because human time is not a factor in these things so far as the mystical movements are concerned. The body meanwhile is entranced.

Now, I will draw a curtain here, and take you in thought to a period two weeks later than the date of the winter solstice, when the Moon is full, to the 4th of January. The aspirant then returns into self-conscious existence on Earth. During those two weeks his soul-spirit has been peregrinating, and on the 4th of January his soul-spirit returns, carrying with it the solar glory, and as it re-enters the entranced body and the physical man awakens to physical consciousness, the whole being is suffused with solar splendor, the very face shines with glory. And when I say the solar splendor, I do not mean the ordinary physical solar light. I mean the spiritual splendor of the Sun, of which the physical light is the outer garment, the vitality of the Sun streaming forth.

His face is suffused, his whole body is surrounded with this splendor, with the glory, so that, as the truthful word has come out of the crypts of initiation, he is 'clothed with the sun.' For the time being, for that period, short or long according to the man himself who has gone through this test successfully, he is a 'risen Christ,' a manifested Buddha. He is surrounded with the buddhic splendor, and for the time being is an incarnate god, an incarnate human god. He has seen his own higher self face to face, and has been taught — and knows!

Thus are the buddhas and the christs "born."

You may remember having heard the 6th of January spoken of in Christian ritual and story, for that date is in the Christian Church the Epiphany. Epiphany is a Greek word meaning "the manifestations of a god." By the various changes of calendar, the Epiphany in the esoteric mystical sense, strictly speaking, should now fall on the 4th of January and not on the 6th, because the 4th of January is two weeks after the date of the winter solstice. Therefore the 4th of January is, strictly speaking, the beginning of the esoteric New Year.

Thus were all the great initiates of the past "born" in the winter season, and, by Occidental habit and custom, they are said to have been born on Christmas Day, or what we call Christmas Day. Actually, the true date is not December 25th, but December 21-2, the day of the winter solstice. It is merely through a mistake of the Christians, based on a misunderstanding of a custom of the Mithraic teachers, at some date previous to the time of Julius Caesar, that the 25th of December was chosen as the day instead of the 21st. There is a similar mystery connected with what the Christian Church commemorates as Easter, the resurrection from the tomb, from the dead; but that is another very interesting esoteric story.

Student — Might I ask what happens in the years when the new moon does not come on the date of the winter solstice?

G. de P. — The same rites are gone through, but with much less effect; and as the mystic birth of the great ones takes place at rare intervals, these initiations may be reserved from one incarnation to the next, or until such astronomical conjunction takes place more or less completely. Meanwhile, the initiations proceed just the same; but men not so great are initiated. There are also times when actually no initiation takes place at all; but the period is remembered, is commemorated, and is held in reverence and respect.

I think that HPB in one of the volumes of Lucifer refers to the 4th of January as being the beginning of the esoteric New Year.

There are a number of things that you can learn from the facts that I have stated: first, that one's inner self is not the same as the personal self, nor yet the same as the psychological self. There is in man an inner god.

There is in man also the human soul. There is in man an entity still inferior — the animal soul; and all these three are the seats of entities, or the seeds of entities. The animal soul is an undeveloped human soul. The human soul is an undeveloped god. Yet they all work together in each human being to form the inner constitution which we call man. This inner god or inner self is at once you and not you. It is your parent, the source of all you are, the source of all your inspiration and illumination, the fountain of life and of all the noble virtues in you; and yet, while it is you, it is not you. You are the human soul, a child of the divine within you, and therefore a spark of divinity growing into full-blown divinity, or rather destined to achieve full-blown divinity, in time; and this fact is one of the great mysteries.

I do not expect you to understand it all at present. I have given to you the teaching, and I do expect that you will think about it and ponder over it and try to understand it; because this teaching is a key, a most wonderful key, to understanding the mysteries not only of the human being, but of the universal Mother Nature who surrounds us. We are all interlinked and interlocked. We are all interconnected, and yet each one of us is an individual. The very atoms which compose our bodies, our physical being, are our children and yet each one of them is a learning entity, destined through the coming ages of the future to bloom forth into self-conscious godhood. We human souls were such lifeatoms once. We have now attained the human stage, and as time goes on we shall become divine beings in our turn then giving birth to others who will rise up along the evolutionary path in the way that we have done. And, as a concluding remark, Companions, remember that every entity belongs to the vitality and to the heart of some greater entity in which it lives, and moves, and has its being; and this is universal throughout the cosmos.

I think this is enough for tonight, Companions. We will close.

Supplement to Meeting 3

Meeting 4

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

Supplement to KTMG Papers: Three

Masters | Egos Awaiting Reincarnation | Refrain from Judging | The Pleiades | Temptations of

Chelaship | Preparation Before Sleep | Four Sacred Seasons | The Tribunal of the Higher Self |

KT's Work

August 26, 1941

Masters

G. de P. — I suppose all of us have a certain amount of vague interest in the mere physical appearance of the teachers. But after all, they assume bodies at will, and cast them aside at will, and what does it matter whether the skin be shriveled like an old apple, or whether it be soft and smooth and downy like the skin of a child?

How does that affect the spirit or the soul? It is the inner power that makes the man.

There is no objection to speaking of the Masters or of talking about them to outside friends who are not theosophists, but the thing that we should do is to essay to place them before our eyes as a pattern, a copy, to look up to and to strive to become alike unto them. This really is very important. Have the ideal; for the Master is already in each one of us. Each one of us is a Master clothed with all the vestures of the lower consciousness. If we can figurate to our imaginations, reverently and beautifully, what the Masters essentially are, not in the body but in themselves, and strive to become like unto them, I think it is one of the finest yoga parts of our training. I think everyone of us ought to do that, every one of us. Furthermore it has this effect: the higher parts of the auric egg become strengthened in action in the constitution, the akasic powers of the auric egg collect around an individual who keeps the ideal of the Master constantly in his heart and before his eyes. I do not say that it will enable him to avoid every danger, because karma cannot be set aside, but it will act as a shield around him against temptation, against evil influences of all kinds, against doubt and envy, and against making new bad karma. It will make himself humble in the beautiful sense of the word. And it will enable him to see the beauty in others — and that already is a huge achievement.

We should keep the Master before our eyes as an ideal for us to attain to. To the Master within it is beneficial in every line, in conduct, in our dealings with others. In our own troubles and trials and difficulties it is an immense comfort and consolation. Keep the ideal of the Master before your eyes always, and you will find as time goes on that there will be an ever greater disinclination to chatter about them, because you feel the realization has become holy, sacred, something that you prize almost too much to talk about, although there is no harm in it.

The very fact that we proclaim the existence of these exalted and perfected men seems to clinch the argument in the minds of those who are not theosophists. It gives them an ideal. It is the answer to the question: Well, have there ever been men like that? The answer is: certainly; consult the annals of history. They live today and they founded the TS, and while they do not guide it, they protect it and watch over it, and will continue protecting and watching over it as long as we who compose the TS are faithful to our part of the work; and when we abandon that — should we ever become crazy — then they would withdraw, or found a new TS.

*

The point in the discussion of the Instruction just read is whether the Occidental world was ready for a more or less public dissemination of occult truth, instead of carrying it on as the Lodge had been doing for several thousands of years, more or less secretly and by the training of individuals or small groups of individuals.

-------

September 30, 1941

Visions

I honestly wish there were a little less running after visions and a greater concentration on facts that we know to be facts. I realize well that facts are not so easy to formulate. They require thought and study. Visions are often fascinating, because dressed in the habiliments usually of the theater and of the playwright. They are attractive. You don't have to think. You either swallow down or you spew up, according to whether you accept a so-called vision, or not. I don't see that any vision will do any man any good unless he has it himself, and unless it be a vision spiritually speaking. Then indeed they are very different, and are wonderful, because, as the Hebrew Bible says, "Without a vision — (which means without a glimpse of the Real) — the people perish." It is one of the truest statements in literature. But that is a vision which the people have themselves. It is not something which is handed to them and they are told: this is a vision. I hope you understand.

If sincerity in believing one has visions were enough in itself, then every fanatic in history, because every fanatic is deadly sincere, would be doing righteousness.

Purpose of the ES

It is a fatal error, I think, to assume that attitude of being "holier than thou," or of knowing all, because that is exactly what we do not claim. None of us believes that. We have to use our brains in these things, our tact, our diplomacy, our good sense, our judgment. In the first place, the whole purpose of the ES is to form a group or body of devoted students whose first thought is the TS. The ES was founded, not solely for the individual development, for the development of individuals, or for their gaining of curious and recondite teaching. Not at all. But to gather together a band of absolutely loyal and devoted theosophists who would give all they could of strength, time, and money, to keep the Masters' work in the world going, in other words the TS. Now that means that we have to use our tact and our diplomacy and our good sense, our judgment, our discrimination, the kindliness of our hearts; and it would be a fatal error, a gross breach of all the proprieties, not only of ordinary social conduct, but of the ES rule of humility in the beautiful sense of that word, to pose before the world as the only channels of truth. We know better than that, and it is only recently that I myself have taken a positive stand in a public gathering to state that there are millions of people in the world who are just as good Theosophists as we are, so far as inner feeling, and so far as direction of spiritual aspiration, go.

Of course, even publicly, if I were asked whether I thought the TS was a channel for truth, I would speak with emphasis: Indeed I do, Sir, or my friend. If I were asked if it is the only channel of truth in the world, I would say: Emphatically not, never has been. If I were asked by an ES student: Is there another body of students of the archaic occultism in the world directly connected with the Lodge, and helped by the Teachers, except ours, I would say: No, there is no other formally organized body or group or association, working albeit occultly, in the outer or exoteric world.

True Impersonal Love Will Not Condone Weakness

True impersonal love will never condone self-indulgent weakness in a child. Never. The parents' hands are always to be firm and never faltering. I was envisaging parents with some degree of wisdom. Such love should never excuse or condone deliberate evildoing or weakness, nor should the parental love and sympathy ever be allowed to affect the child as condoning further self-indulgence or weakness. The true love is that which will sometimes restrain, just as the spiritual love in a man's own heart will restrain and constrain the human soul of that man to act manly; and such spiritual love will never condone or assist in continued weakness. If so, you have the cases, so rare, of the parting of the soul from the spirit, resulting in what we call a lost soul, because the spiritual soul will never condone. It would not be a spiritual soul if it did. It would not be wise. It would simply be a partner in weakness, and no true parent will ever be a partner in the weakness of his child. That is the worst kind of love. It amounts to evil love, because it stimulates the child into thinking it has the sympathy of his parent in further ill-doing.

Egos Awaiting Reincarnation

When the egos are awaiting incarnation on earth, where are they, and what is their state of consciousness? All the egos are in the devachan, of course. When you recollect that life on earth may endure anywhere from a few moments of time after birth up to almost any age this side of l00, but that the periods in the devachan are

100 times as long averagely of course, not rigidly, you can readily see that there must be many, many times more egos in the devachan than there are imbodied.

-------

September 30, 1941

Refrain from Judging

Whether we will or whether we nill, whether we like it or dislike it, so great is the power of human destiny moving onwards and upwards, that wounds are healed, destiny is accomplished, even after the most fearful earthquakes, moral and spiritual and physical.

I think it a very wise rule for us students of occultism to refrain from judging. If anyone thinks he is wise enough, let him take the consequences. I can assure you that I for one do not think I am wise enough to sit in judgment of anyone. I know perfectly well in my poor dumb way what is right and what is wrong, and I strive to follow the right and to avoid what is wrong, and that takes all my time and all my energy. I have learned that I do not know enough to condemn any fellow human being whatsoever; and I bless the stars that be that I have learned this much.

The Pleiades

I am sorry but I fail to understand the desire of this particular companion to know more about the constellation of the Pleiades, unless indeed it is because of a very ancient belief that the group called the Pleiades stands relatively high in spirituality, so that even the Hebrew Bible in one of its passages speaks of the "sweet influence of the Pleiades." I can only say that among the great numbers of stars, some are higher than others, and others inferior, but the Pleiades is higher than the average, higher in spirituality.

Temptations of Chelaship

You are a chela, let us say. You are striving to break through a mist which to you is almost impenetrable. You do not seem to succeed. The teacher knows that until you break your own way out like the chick from the shell, you will never have freedom. If the Master comes and dissipates the fog around you, he has cheated you of the chance to gain in strength and knowledge and wisdom. You must grow yourself.

Now then, suppose the Master sees in your destiny the approach into your vicinage, or into your friendship we will say — no, not your friendship, but into your neighborhood — of someone else who, because of karmic links between you and him, gives you the opportunity to overcome something that is in your character, I can conceive a situation where your own teacher — you are a chela under this hypothesis — will not aid this agent provocateur as the French call it, this provoking agent, he will not aid that agent to tempt you, but he will stand aside, watchful, in pity, hoping that you will have the strength to repel and thus break through the fog surrounding you. Do you get the picture? Because you will have to meet that some day under the hypothesis we have just tried to sketch; and why not do it now when by overcoming you will have a chance to break out of the fog, rise into the sunlight and reach freedom.

Of course, every temptation is not like that at all; and when the Masters — to use the graphic language spoken of — use a dugpa for holy purposes, it is never to betray or to defeat the struggling spirit of the pupil; but on the contrary only when the Master's wisdom knows that that influence will act somewhat as a catalyst

— you follow me? — will act somewhat as the whip or spur to force you to rise in rebellion against the situation and free yourself. To me there is an enormous difference between the two. Do not assume for a moment that I mean to say that the Masters use the dugpas to tempt their disciples, because that would be awful, and it is not true. Sometimes our truest friends help us greatly, not so much by the comforting hand, but by arousing our innate powers of vision, of rebellion against an evil one could fall into. Often our own friends do that, and thus they prove themselves the truest friends. I can assure you that the teachings of occultism are held so strictly secret because, in the keeping of weak and unstable moral characters, the results could be disastrous. Surely you all see that! There are many truths that some people are just not fit to be told.

They would not take them in properly. They would take them in in the wrong way, and it might be an

opportunity for indulgence in evil, or an opportunity for self-indulgence along a weak line.

Furthermore, let me point this out, it is quite collateral, that sometimes the human being who in sincerity stumbles on the path, is rising more rapidly than the holy saint who is too high to stumble, and therefore has a plain pathway before him, and may even long for an opportunity to test his strength. Therefore blame never those who stumble on the path. It all depends upon whether the heart is earnest and pure and innately good.

Preparation Before Sleep

The reference is to the knowledge gained by the higher ego when freed from the fleshly trammels of the body during sleep. The man returns refreshed and inspired; and if the life on earth is at all accordant with the rules of spirituality, it helps to break down the barriers of what will later become conscious inspiration. One of the best rules to help this was that laid down by old Pythagoras which he taught his pupils in far past times in Crotona. It has been beautifully rhymed, I do not remember it exactly but it runs something like this: Let not the setting sun close thine eyes in sleep ere thou hast passed in review all the events of the day just ending. What have I done that was done amiss? What have I done that was done aright?

Let me learn to do all things aright.

I think that is wonderfully beautiful, and the mind falling into the dreamland, or the dreamless lands of sleep, with that urge carrying it upwards into the higher regions of the spiritual nature, returns when the morning comes, not only refreshed, but fired with spiritual and higher intellectual wisdom which acts as an unconscious vital urge through all the next day. We seem to arise quieted and at peace. Things fall simply and easily into place. There are no sweet bells jangled out of tune for that day. All things seem to run harmoniously, and it is true. Any one can experience it who will practise it. You people sometimes ask me for so-called practical rules of occultism. There is one of the finest: you can practise it and gain the benefit of it.

If you don't you won't.

------

October 28, 1941

Four Sacred Seasons

We celebrate these four sacred seasons in reverence, and some of us in holy awe — I cannot think of a better or more expressive term than this — and we do this because at each one of these sacred seasons actual initiations are held somewhere on the surface of this earth. Some human being at every one of these seasons is passing the portals of wisdom into the greater light. As far as I know, the supply of such disciples has never ceased; and it continues, and their number will grow larger as the yugas pass.

So please do not think that when we celebrate these sacred seasons, they are merely commemorative celebrations. We commune as it were in spirit with those who are actually passing through the trials.

HPB pointed out many years ago that every New Year was a new chance to take a step ahead, that there was actually something wonderful about the New Year time, which of course in her meaning did not signify the exoteric 1st of January, but it meant what we call the time of the winter solstice. Every one of us students —

we are approaching it now — has a new chance at each such recurring cycle every year to make a step forwards, if we will and dare. It depends entirely upon us, and I mean every word of this, Companions. It is easier to do it at the times of these four sacred seasons; easiest perhaps at the time of the winter solstice.

The Tribunal of the Higher Self

Our appearances before the tribunal of the higher self up to the time when we undertake a true initiation self-consciously are karmic. Periodically, indeed every night when we sleep, the karmic record for the past time, be it a day or a month, whatever it may be, is read by our higher self, by our spirit, by the god within each one of us. Our destiny is as it were written down. We ourselves have carven that destiny: our thoughts, our feelings, and our consequent actions following upon these feelings and thoughts. Indeed this happens every

night. We do not know anything about it, but what we are is registered, noted, and, to use a figure of speech, the inner lipika makes the record. From this there is no appeal, there is no recourse. We simply must abide by what we are, which means what we have made ourselves.

Now then, when at a true initiation, a self-conscious undertaking of the dread trials, if the neophyte is successful, he meets for a longer or shorter time his own inner god face to face. Self meets self and gives an accounting of selfhood. This is the same thing exactly, only instead of the higher self scanning the record of the time just past, and inscribing it as it were in the books of the karmic recorders, then is the time when a man faces the god within him. I cannot find the language to carry this thought farther, but I am sure that you can intuit what I am trying to say. Language simply drops powerless. We can sense it, feel it by intuition. The soul then learns its destiny from the karmic judge which is the god within, the man himself, man's own divine part. Self sees self unveiled. Self recognizes self, self calls to self, self helps self, self judges self. See the infinite wisdom and beauty of this. There is no favoritism, it is simply naked truth.

Now then, if the soul standing before its spirit can receive that spirit unto itself, if the soul can become the spirit, enter into the substance of the spirit, in other words to use the Egyptian phrasing, if the human being is capable then of becoming Osirified, becoming the inner Osiris, the man thereafter is Osiris, thereafter the man is Buddha, is Christ. If not, there is another chance.

KT's Work

It was proposed once in the KTMG early meetings that one evening should be devoted to KT. And you now ask would it be all right to do so now?

Well, I understand the devotion in the heart of this querent asking this question, and I remember some time after I took office I myself spoke of the great pleasure it would give us all to devote an evening's study to KT.

But I have come to the conclusion that no useful end or objective could be served, and furthermore it would concentrate the attention of our students too much on one single teacher; or to put it otherwise too much on a person as contrasted with the work itself. I think it is better to just wash that out of our thoughts, if you please.

KT's work itself was so grand that I prefer to have it stand as an unpainted monument, an unworked-over monument, in our hearts and minds.

Meeting 4

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Four

Meeting of January 8, 1930

G. de P. — As you know, this group was established in commemoration of the esoteric work of our beloved Katherine Tingley. It is in a very real sense, in an esoteric sense, a step higher and more advanced. I might add before passing on to other business, for your information and thought, that the higher the degree is in the esoteric work the less is the formality, the less the ceremonial, the less the ritual, the fewer the ritualistic observances; until, when the higher degrees are reached, all teaching is given in the silence by a method of transference of thought which in Tibet is called the hpho-wa; and of it some adumbration of understanding is known in the Occident as thought-transference.

In those higher degrees the students or neophytes or chelas do not necessarily even meet together. They study individually, and they may be in various and different parts of the world. They intercommunicate along the spiritual or rather the higher psychomagnetic line of communication. They assemble at the same time although the hours in the different countries may be quite different. I say that they assemble at the same time each one in his own private study, be it a cave, be it a room, be it in a busy marketplace of men, and hold communion and receive instructions.

Now I am ready to answer questions if anyone cares to ask.

Student — I would like to ask a question. In the first volume of The Secret Doctrine, page 571, there is this statement: "This is the Logos (the first), or Vajradhara, the Supreme Buddha (also called Dorjechang). As the Lord of all Mysteries, he cannot manifest, but sends into the world of manifestation his heart — 'the diamond-heart,' Vajrasattwa ( Dorjesempa)." Is there more that you could explain about that?

G. de P. — Yes. "The Lord of All Mysteries" is a title given in Tibet to one of the highest of the buddhas of compassion, called Vajradhara, who of course does not manifest in physical existence at all, but lives as an enduring spiritual energy or power in the solar system of which our own globe is a part. The sending of the influences from the diamond-heart means a remaining in conscious existence on that plane, which is a low plane for this buddha, in order that from that seat, that throne, so to speak, he may remain in spiritual communication with the entities below. In fact, this buddha, in another part of the teachings, is often called one of the Silent Watchers.

The meaning of the phrase Silent Watcher in general is one who has achieved all, who has learned all, that a certain cycle of life can possibly teach him, who is therefore omniscient so far as all in that plane and beneath that plane is concerned, and who renounces higher individual progress for the purpose of remaining as the dominating, dominant spiritual influence of a hierarchy.

Is that thought clear to you all? That I think may answer your question and give an outline of the meaning of the words which you have quoted.

Student — Yes, thank you.

Student — There is a statement made in The Secret Doctrine, I think in italics. In the great book of the mysteries we are told that seven lords created seven men. Three of these lords were purely spiritual; the other four not so spiritual and full of passion. And in the beginning of the next paragraph it says: "This accounts for the differences in human nature." There are many questions that I should like to ask on that; but there is one in particular: I should like to ask if we as a body of esotericists belong to a particular — do we go under one particular — hierarchy of these great pitris?

G. de P. — You belong to the hierarchy of the lords of compassion, the same as the buddhas of compassion; and as a group, as a body of students of the ancient wisdom, you are supposed to follow the rules of our own holy order emanating from our supreme head, the Maha-chohan. But that does not at all contradict the other

fact that each human being belongs to his own particular and especial solar and planetary ray. Is that responsive to your question so far?

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — Let me remind you, Companions, once more — I have told you this, I believe, a number of times

— there is a law of occultism that the answers you receive are strictly responsive to the questions that you ask. If your question is clear and definite, the answer will be clear and definite. If it is a spiritual question you ask, the answer will be responsive. If it is a psychical question, the answer will be responsive. If the question that you ask is not well phrased, the high probability is that the answer that you receive will be equally vague.

This is a strict rule, and you see the psychological reason for it. If you do not knock properly, the door will not open to you, or it will be opened ajar. You receive according to the manner in which you ask. Therefore please, for your own sakes, try to make your questions brief and clear-cut. Make them brief, clear-cut, right to the point; and if necessary ask two or three, four or five, questions, rather than trying to put all your thought into one long and involved question. Has anyone any other question?

Student — I think many of the older students have been interested in Damodar K. Mavalankar, the chela who worked so splendidly with HPB and was taken after great trials into Tibet; and Katherine Tingley told us many years ago several interesting things about him, and I thought many would ( I should certainly) be very glad to know if you could tell us any thing more. Is he still with us? Is he working with us?

G. de P. — Yes, he certainly is. He went to Tibet, I think it was in 1885, was it not?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — On a call from his teacher. Now, I am going to tell you something that involves a mystery, but it is the only way in which I can speak of it. It is this: Damodar arrived, and at the present time is working in Sambhala. Nevertheless there was circulated, many years ago, a very credible report that his body was found frozen stiff in one of the passes of the snowy Himalayas. Is that perfectly clear? I should like to know if anyone finds it difficult to understand. Don't be afraid to speak.

Student — Might I say in connection with that, that HPB says in one of her letters that she thought he might have arranged some occult "trick" (I think she used that word) in order to throw a glamor over the world. She said that openly in a letter in the tenth volume of The Path, I think.

G. de P. — And do you think that that has to do with what I have just spoken of?

Student — It seems possible to me that it gives a hint or two.

G. de P. — Well, it may. You companions must realize that the physical body has very little indeed to do with esoteric work, and that at a certain stage of spiritual progress it is not uncommon for those who have reached that stage simply to lay the body aside, sometimes in a trance more or less long, which may last for weeks or months or even years occasionally; or simply allow it to die and thereafter work invisibly as the nirmanakayas do. Now, I will go this far: I do not believe that Damodar's body died. He was a very unusual character, greatly beloved by HPB. He gave up a great deal, too.

Student — He was a prince?

G. de P. — He was a prince of men as the saying goes. All I can tell you is that now he is working in Sambhala. You know what Sambhala is, I presume?

Student — I do not know, Professor.

G. de P. — Sambhala is the esoteric name given to what may popularly be called the Central Lodge, the Great Lodge. It refers more particularly to the Lodge's geographical position on the earth. It is a district in the central or central western part of Tibet. No human being can ever enter that promised land, that holy land, unless he be called. It is surrounded by an akasic veil of invisibility; and an army of airplanes might fly over it

and see it not. All the armies of all the nations on earth might pass it by and not know that it existed. It is the home of the greatest of the Masters, and the residence of that particular maha-chohan who is the head of our own order. It is spoken of in Oriental legends, in the exoteric legends, as the happy land, the land of promise, and by other names. It is quite an extensive tract of country. It may interest you to know also that in it are gathered some of the most valuable records of the human race — not only literary records, but what is ordinarily called archaeological, historical, what not. There, surrounded by the greatest and most evolved human beings, the Silent Watcher of the earth has his invisible abode.

Student — I was wanting to ask if the Maha-chohan was the Silent Watcher spoken of in The Secret Doctrine, coming in with the third race and who would not leave the earth until the end of the cycle?

G. de P. — Maha-chohan is a title that applies to many individuals. It is a shifting title, somewhat like the word initiate. There are low initiates and high initiates; there are low maha-chohans and high. Now, the maha-chohan of the third race, if you refer to one particular individual, is the same as the maha-chohan of this present race. If you refer to another individual, of lower degree, it is not.

Student — Well, in the meeting several weeks ago you said that the Maha-chohan, Gautama Buddha, was our maha-chohan. I was wondering if he is the same as the one that is spoken of in The Secret Doctrine.

G. de P. — No. Please remember that Gautama Buddha was a man; but the buddha within Gautama was one and is one of the buddhas of the fifth race and is the maha-chohan of our own order. As the man Gautama he was the greatest initiate, the greatest of the Masters of Wisdom and Compassion who have lived in historical times; and, the buddhic essence or rather the spiritual maha-chohan of our fifth race was the inspiriting power of the Buddha Gautama. Do you understand?

Student — Would you please explain the term "Hidden Initiate"?

G. de P. — In what connection?

Student — Do the hidden initiates know that they are initiates or does that mean that they are perhaps initiates under a cloud or buried or asleep within their bodies?

G. de P. — I see what you mean. But I think that you could find a better term than hid initiates. Where did you get this term from?

Student — I do not remember. I have had it in my mind for some years.

G. de P. — It is an unusual term. An initiate, of course, is one who consciously passes through an initiation; and this being a fact, you could hardly speak of an unconscious initiate, if that is what you have in mind by the term hid initiate. But I have grasped your thought, I believe. I will say that there are those who are accepted chelas but who have not yet the brain mind cognizance of the fact. Is this answer responsive to your question?

Student — Yes, thank you.

Student — Might I ask something more on that? William Quan Judge says in one place that there is a great person in South America who is leading at present the life of an ordinary Spanish-American gentleman, I think, who unknown to anybody and unknown to himself is being prepared to come forward in several hundred years and do some great work. I think possibly the companion might have read that and not remembered it.

G. de P. — That is not an uncommon thing. That applies, as a matter of fact, not to a few but to scores of human beings — human beings who have advanced so far that they are almost ready to receive conscious initiation but have not quite attained the point. They are accepted chelas however only in the sense that they are being carefully watched, carefully guided, and helped, in secrecy and in the silence, so that they themselves know it not, except indeed it may be by an occasional flash of light, of inner illumination. They themselves wonder and aspire; but they are hardly accepted chelas.

An accepted chela can be of two kinds: one who is at the door, who has knocked and given the correct knock, but who is not yet inside, that is not yet conscious of his acceptance; and the other kind is one who is conscious thereof, who is cognizant of the fact of his chelaship, because he has his own teacher and has received the unspeakable blessing of conscious spiritual and intellectual communion with that teacher — and I know nothing that is so holy, so wonderful, an experience as that.

Student — Does not the aspirant himself have to make every effort to win the victory?

G. de P. — Certainly, he must walk every step along the pathway to victory. He is not carried there. Every step he himself must take. How could it be otherwise? Human adults are not fed like babes. We feed ourselves, we inform ourselves, we teach ourselves, we make our own way in the world; and if that is a necessity in ordinary human existence, I can tell you that it is tenfold the same necessity in the esoteric life.

There we must ourselves win everything. And why? Because we are simply bringing out what is within us, our own will, our own consciousness, must become awakened, fully awakened, and by our own efforts.

You cannot see unless you use your own faculty of vision. You cannot understand by some one else's understanding. Is not that clear? You must gain everything you ever have in the esoteric training. And that is why, to those who do not understand, there are aspects of the esoteric training which may seem to be a little hard, because people in the Occident have been brought up with the idea that they must be carried to victory, saved by the "blood of the Lamb," and all that kind of tommyrot.

This reminds me of the teaching of the Blackies, of the Brothers of the Shadow, with the aim of sending you to sleep, trying to down the individual spiritual impulses of your own being!

No! The opposite is the truth. You cannot live by trusting to someone else to live for you. You yourself must awaken in your own soul the holy flame. And it is the same with every other step in spiritual and intellectual progress that you make. How can you experience the unspeakable delight of compassion, the ineffable feeling of being at one with the All, by hearing that some one else has thus achieved? You yourself must be the vehicle of the inner light, must gain it. It is both in you and above you, invigorating you and inspiring you. Be it!

Student — May I ask a question? I would like to have your explanation of the "Angels of Mons." During the first year of the War, in August 1914, there was a battle fought at Mons. It was a very hard fight. Some of the soldiers say it was the worst of the whole war; and the English were defeated at that time. The story came back that the soldiers saw angels at Mons — not one only, but many — and it came into verse and song and story and recitation that these soldiers saw angels at Mons. I would like to have an explanation as to what they were or whether they were sent by the White Lodge to help the men at that time?

G. de P. — No, there were no angels there, no angels at all. Joan of Arc also thought that she saw angels.

Such imaginary events or episodes are one of the commonest things in human history; and in times of terrible stress and heartache, when men's minds are chastened and their hearts are more or less purified by pain, there is a tendency to imagine things like that, in other words, to see things. They are hallucinations. But in a sense they are more than that. They are, as it were, a call for help, an appeal, and the mind psychologically follows suit, and therefore apparently 'sees' these things. The forms that these hallucinations or so-called visions take is due to the respective religious trainings of those who are at the time subject to the cause. The Greeks and the Romans, the Persians and the Hindus, in fact the literatures of all other peoples, will tell you similar stories about supposedly spiritual beings appearing in the air, or on the earth; but in the case you mention, there were no angels, for such beings as the Christian conception of angels do not exist. Similarly, other people have imagined that in similar cases they have seen visions of the gods or of the devas, or of what not.

On the other hand, it is quite true that in exceptional cases, in very exceptional conditions, it is possible to have an individual or collective vision of the astral light, and even of inhabitants of the spiritual spheres.

I remember reading in the newspapers of the incident to which you refer very clearly indeed.

Student — May I ask a question? Some time ago you told us quite a good deal concerning the connection

which exists between the messenger and the spiritual home of the race in Tibet. Is there such a connection existing, or is it going to exist in the case of those who are sent from here? This is more or less a spiritual home for many of us. Is there anything similar in the two cases?

G. de P. — Yes, there is. Every companion who goes out from here into the world carrying in his heart the theosophical devotion, and in his mind the theosophical light, carrying what he here has learned with the sole desire, whatever other duties he may have to do, to communicate this light, this devotion, to others, leaves Headquarters under very much the same condition, in very much the same state of mind, and in very similar circumstances to those that occur in the case of a messenger who comes from the Great Lodge. The case is quite generally parallel. Is the answer responsive?

Student — Yes, it is, thank you.

Student — You have spoken a great deal about the Masters of Wisdom and Compassion. Of course I understand why they are called the Masters of Wisdom; but why was the virtue of compassion chosen as part of the title? It seems to me that the very fact that we do not understand why the word compassion was chosen as part of the title, shows that we do not fully understand the esoteric meaning of compassion.

G. de P. — And the gist of your question is?

Student — What is the esoteric meaning of compassion?

G. de P. — The Masters are called Masters of Compassion because they are members of the Order of Compassion. I have explained to you before that the buddhas are of two classes or kinds: one, the pratyeka buddhas, pratyeka being a Sanskrit word which may be roughly translated as 'each one for himself.' They are not Brothers of the Shadow. They work no evil, they work good. They are very great men, very holy men, very pure men in every way. Their knowledge is wide and vast and deep; but when they reach buddhahood, instead of feeling the call of almighty love to return and help those who have gone less far, they go ahead into the Supernal Light and leave mankind behind.

Whereas, the buddhas of compassion are they who, having reached buddhahood, feel so strongly the working of pity and of love in their hearts that they turn around, to use a figure of speech, and even in some cases retrace their steps backwards, in order to extend a helping hand to those still trailing along behind on the evolutionary pathway. That is compassion — fellow-feeling, the sense of fellow-feeling, a sympathetic understanding of the problems of those less advanced, combined with an overpowering urge to help, to save.

That is compassion. This word is from a Latin compound meaning "to feel with"; the Greek parallel word is sympathy, meaning also 'to feel with'; and only love, impersonal love, can produce it.

Is the answer responsive to your question?

Student — Very much so. May I ask one more question that occurs to me. If we belong to, or if we are studying under the Lodge of the Masters of Compassion, then in future aeons, when we reach that stage, we won't be pratyeka buddhas; won't we be buddhas of compassion? I suppose that in a way we have chosen to study under those latter.

G. de P. — It all depends. If in future ages when you reach the higher degrees of illumination you feel that the time is coming when you cannot take all for yourself, but must share it with others, that you must help others, that you cannot go into bliss alone, but must take others with you, then indeed you will not be pratyeka buddhas, but will be buddhas of compassion. It depends upon the individual.

Now, the Brothers of the Shadow are they who pursue a course of training, of self-sacrifice, of discipline (and of course I am speaking of the more powerful among the Brothers of the Shadow) which in many respects parallels the training received and followed by the Masters of Wisdom and Compassion. But instead of going upwards, spiritwards, they go downwards, matterwards. As the Masters ascend into the spiritual realms, so the Brothers of the Shadow descend into the realms of even grosser material existence than our own. Strange paradox!

Actually it is a case of deliberate spiritual suicide. And as you will find men doing the same thing on earth today, so these, our unfortunate Brothers of the Shadow, deliberately choose their ultimate end, which is annihilation as a self-conscious ego.

But some of these Brothers of the Shadow follow a path which it may be well to speak of, because otherwise you may not understand. They are often very charming individuals, delightful conversationalists, sometimes highly educated, well-born perhaps, or perhaps not. They are often very religious. They don't break the laws of the country as a rule.

What distinguishes the Brother of the Shadow from the Masters of Wisdom and Compassion is the fact that they lack in compassion. They are wholly for self, and for self alone; but in a way quite different from that of the pratyeka buddhas, because in gratifying self in achievement for self, the Brothers of the Shadow are workers of evil. They work in matter and for matter and for matter's purposes and ends, whereas the pratyeka buddhas do not. All this is a profound mystery, of course; but what I have just said is an outline of the facts as they exist.

Student — I would like to ask what is the karma of the pratyeka buddhas?

G. de P. — Do you mean the consequences?

Student — Yes, what should be the end of these pratyeka buddhas?

G. de P. — Yes, you are quite right in referring to this. You use the word karma with strict accuracy. The karma (the consequences) of the life of the pratyeka buddhas is this: they finally reach a point beyond which they cannot go and there they "fall asleep." It is true that this occurs in an extremely high spiritual realm, but there they have reached the end of their powers; and the reason is that they have reached the ultimate point of egoic selfhood and cannot pass beyond that into the universal. They remain there "asleep" (perhaps asleep is not the right term, but at any rate spiritually inactive), in a condition resembling sleep; there they remain while the stream of evolution passes them by. Whereas the Masters of Wisdom and Compassion, feeling the urge of almighty love in their hearts, advance forever steadily towards still greater heights of spiritual achievement; and the reason is that they have become the vehicles of universal love. As impersonal love is universal, their whole nature expands consequently with the universal powers that are working through them.

Student — May I ask if the development of the spiritual will is not one of the first steps in attainment?

G. de P. — What kind of attainment?

Student — The first steps in spiritual attainment, spiritual knowledge, becoming a Master of Compassion.

G. de P. — Yes indeed, certainly it is. But every human being has the spiritual will, if he will only cultivate it. It is the cultivation of the spiritual will which leads one upwards; and with it come coincidently light, peace, bliss.

Student — One of the companions asked part of the question that I wanted to ask about the pratyeka buddha.

We have heard that karma is collectively applied to the cosmos, that there is a racial karma and a cosmic karma. The pratyeka buddha going so far and no farther — is that because the collective karma of the cosmos holds them back to the end of the manvantara?

G. de P. — Yes, that is quite well put. They have reached the limit of their own spiritual powers. They cannot advance farther, because, after all, a pratyeka buddha enters into spirit for purposes of spiritual selfhood.

When the limit of that is reached the monad cannot advance farther. Only that can advance farther which feels the stirring within of something beyond individual selfhood; and that is the universal. Do you understand?

Student — Thank you.

Student — May I ask a further question in that same connection? When the pratyeka buddha reaches these supernal heights where no further progress is possible for him, is that the end? Does he eventually suffer a

fate much like the Brothers of the Shadow, or is there a new day for a further opportunity to learn the larger lesson?

G. de P. — Oh, decidedly so! Remember that the pratyeka buddha is a high spiritual influence in the world, a very high spiritual influence; and when the time comes when the general evolutionary stage of beings below him has reached the stage that he holds while he is in inactive spiritual function, then he feels the onward-moving evolutionary currents and begins again from that same stage. His fault, if it can be called a fault in human speech, is a concentration on spiritual selfhood, just as the fault of the Brothers of the Shadow is a concentration on material selfhood. The latter leads to annihilation; the other leads to a cessation of advancement until the general current of evolving beings behind him reaches him. Then he feels the awakening influences and begins another forward march; whereas the buddhas of compassion will be by that time far in advance; and they shall have become supergods.

Student — May I ask a question? Subba Rao somewhere says that when an individual unites with the Logos the whole of humanity feels a thrill and is raised. Could that apply to the pratyeka buddha when he reaches the highest possible for him?

G. de P. — Yes, the pratyeka buddha is a high spiritual influence in the world, and his very existence is good for the world. He is a channel, as it were, sending backwards spiritual influences, but unconsciously, not by his own choice. He is a human being who has achieved this high spiritual state, and along the track which he has traveled, spiritual influences flow. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes.

Student — Is it possible, Dr. de Purucker, for the pratyeka buddha to change and become a buddha of compassion after he has reached that state of perfection? Can he of his own willpower change over to the other path?

G. de P. — Yes, he can, and that actually does sometimes take place; but rarely.

Student — The idea of selfishness coupled with spirituality has always seemed to me irreconcilable, and I seem to be puzzled tonight over the teaching that a pratyeka buddha has reached a very high state of spirituality and yet somehow is fundamentally selfish. Can you clear up this confusion in my mind, please?

G. de P. — Yes. You can call it selfish only by keeping strictly to the etymological meaning of the word —

one whose thoughts are concentrated on self, but it is a spiritual selfishness. And the reason is this: egoity or ego feeling belongs to the material or vegetative side of being, whether it be in the spiritual world or the intermediate realms or in the inferior realms. The pratyeka buddhas belong in their inner essence to the spiritual world, but to the vegetative side of it, to what you might call the substantial side of it; whereas the buddhas of wisdom and compassion are they whose inner essence is allied to the active, the energic side of the spiritual realms. Do you understand?

Student — Partly. But, in continuation of that same line of thought, is not an aspiring chela, a pupil of a buddha of compassion, intrinsically more highly evolved spiritually than a pratyeka buddha who is seeking spiritual light for himself?

G. de P. — Yes, in one way; and in another way, no. Here again we have a paradox, and with paradoxes our esoteric studies are filled. Even in a chela of a Master of Wisdom and Compassion, whose destiny it is ultimately to become a buddha of wisdom and compassion, even in him there is already stirring the buddhic splendor, which is practically the same as illuminated compassion. Therefore he stands higher in that sense of the word than does even a pratyeka buddha.

But so far as mere rank and grade go, the pratyeka buddha is farther advanced in the spiritual realms. But the pratyeka buddha will finally come to a standstill. He has reached the limits of spiritual selfhood, and as that is what he was striving for, he cannot go farther; whereas this chela spoken of, who even as a chela of the Master of Wisdom and Compassion feels this indefinable something in his soul which will give him no rest or peace until his whole being expands in works of pity and compassion — even he, in this nobler sense, stands

higher than a pratyeka buddha; but not by rank, not by evolutionary grade. Do you understand?

Student — Thank you, yes.

Student — Professor, will you explain the term "initiates who have failed" as applied, I think by HPB, to some of the great writers, such as George Eliot and Bulwer Lytton?

G. de P. — I don't remember that HPB did use that expression, initiates who have failed, in connection with human genius such as you have spoken of. But it is quite possible; and if so, it is a vague way of speaking.

There have been great men, using the word great in the common sense of the word — geniuses in other words

— who fail to go higher because within them there is not yet awakened this buddhic splendor, this combination of illumination and compassion. They have genius, they have gone high, they could go higher; but the star within them is not yet shining. All they have is an occasional ray which produces the genius.

To put it in another way, such men have not yet received conscious union, in however small a degree, with the god within. They are merely the vehicles or recipients of a ray from the inner divinity. They usually fail through human faults — passion, ambition, etc.; and please remember that when I speak of passion, this word has many meanings indeed. I am not referring to sex alone, which is one of the grossest; but ambition is a passion. Love is a passion, and if it is too personal it blinds, it often distorts; and that is why you will find me so carefully speaking of impersonal love; whereas compassion is one of the noblest, highest, loftiest things in the human soul, for while it may have its personal aspects, its very characteristic, its swabhava, its being, is impersonal — is for others.

Student — May I ask a question? A mystery that presses very closely upon me is the mystery of sleep. It puzzles me why for millions of years we have passed so much of our time in a state of which we know so little. Is it permissible to know more about the mysteries of sleep?

G. de P. — Yes, assuredly. Sleep of course, physiologically speaking, occurs when the body is fatigued, and you will find it so. In time the electromagnetic charges have become — how can I express it? — they become equilibrated, and sleep produces a recharging of the physiological batteries. It is difficult to find words by which to express these things, except in familiar lines.

But sleep is a great blessing. In sleep the inner man is freed from the cares and troubles of material existence.

The higher part of the constitution wings its way abroad, not merely over earth, but away from earth. As a matter of fact, Companions, in sleep the higher part of you travels the spaces — not the intermediate part, but the higher part; not exactly the highest part, but the spiritual soul and the higher part of the human soul wings its way for the time being into higher spiritual realms.

Now, don't take that expression too literally. I don't mean that it has wings and flies; and I don't mean that it actually travels, in an ordinary human sense. I mean that it becomes more actually cognizant on its own plane, more awake, for this universal or spiritual self is not in your body; and the sleep of the body at night is simply an example of the longer sleep which men call death. Death is sleep; or, to put it in another way, physical sleep is quasi-death. It differs from death very little indeed, and in the one sense only that the golden, vital chain has not been snapped. When that chain is snapped, when the cord of vitality is broken, then death ensues.

Sleep is a smaller death, a minor death; and the Greeks knew this well, and spoke of hypnos and thanatos, sleep and death, as being brothers. These two states are even closer than brotherhood. They are two sides of the same thing; in fact, they are the same thing, only one in smaller degree and the other in absolute degree. In the case of certain individuals, while the body is asleep and resting and recuperating its energies, to use popular language, the human soul is receiving instruction in teaching. I think that is all I care to say about sleep at the present time. I think that more would now confuse you.

Student — Professor, I have two questions. You will remember speaking of the fact (I think it was last week here) that the moon governed initiations and that the period of the waxing moon was especially propitious, because of the position of the moon, and a particularly propitious time was when the planets were in syzygy because that made a direct path for the soul to the sun. Is that correct?

G. de P. — Yes.

Student — Now, one question is this: we are taught clearly that the moon is a corpse, with maleficent influences and baleful emanations, that it is teeming with a baleful life. Now, during the period when its influence is propitious is it because of a change in nature in some way or merely because of its change in position?

G. de P. — It depends partly upon its change in position, but not in a change in the nature of the moon, which remains the same. I cannot explain further because the teachings regarding the moon are held among those most strictly guarded; they are most rigidly guarded.

Student — Perhaps I had better not ask the other question.

G. de P. — Yes, ask the other. There is no harm at all in asking a question.

Student — It is this: if the soul passes through this path to the sun, when the planets are in syzygy, of course the soul passes through the moon. Is it conscious of the contacts there? Is not that a very painful experience?

And when the lost souls that are there feel the influence of this passage of the purified or aspiring soul, are they helped in any way? I am afraid that I should not have asked that.

G. de P. — Yes, you are touching upon very dangerous frontiers of knowledge indeed. These things that you are referring to very largely depend upon the position that the sun and the earth and the moon occupy. As long as the moon is waxing, the influences grow progressively more favorable for certain purposes until the moon reaches plenitude, fullness. Immediately afterwards they begin to grow unfavorable, progressively so, until the worst is reached just before the new moon and at the new moon. Then they change again. And the reason? I will tell you this much: when the moon is new it is between the sun and the earth and receives from the earth, the moon pulling very hard and aided by the sun. When the moon is full the earth is between it and the sun, and the earth pulls very hard on the moon and receives incoming souls. The outgoing souls pass forwards at the new moon, when consequently, as I have told you before, in cases of the conception of children, it is almost a crime for a child then to be conceived. If you understand me, conception is not proper at any phase of the moon except when the moon is waxing; and the best time of all is just before the moon is full. Nature then is working naturally, and the human act synchronizes with and is in electromagnetic sympathy with the solar and lunar and terrene influences — along the paths of interstellar communication.

You will forgive me; but I think that I will not say anything more about that matter.

Student — Thank you very much.

Student — I should like to ask how the system of Patanjali is to be regarded, whether it should be regarded as of the right-hand path or of the left-hand path.

G. de P. — The system of Patanjali belongs to the hatha yoga; but even hatha yoga has a certain nobler side to it, which as understood by initiates, can profitably be used and taught to their chelas. But any system of training such as that of Patanjali, such as is given in his Yoga Aphorisms, which if used in ignorance, is dangerous. It is hatha yoga, for it concentrates the mind on postures of the body, and on the lower psychical workings of man.

This duality in nature and practice occurs here as it does with everything else. You know that certain drugs, for instance, are poisons and might kill if used by one who does not know about them; but in the hands of an expert, one who is skilled, who has been taught, they can heal. It is much better, instead of using drugs, to turn one's thoughts to those things which are always safe — to practice the great noble virtues: love, pity, compassion, helpfulness, kindliness, fraternal feeling, self-forgetfulness. They are always right.

Keep in health, in other words; but if you are ill, then, instead of trying to practise dangerous things on yourself, instead of dosing yourself, seek a doctor in whom you have confidence and tell him frankly as much as you can of your troubles. If he is a true physician and not merely a book-physician, he may be able to help you by using remedies that might kill you, if you used them yourself in ignorance.

It is the same with hatha yoga. Anyone who tries to practise the teachings of hatha yoga books may easily bring himself into pulmonary tuberculosis or some other terrible disease, to say the least — to say the least.

But a true Master of Wisdom, knowing this chela and that chela, might say that this chela, for instance, could be helped by certain physical practices, and the Master's wisdom would show him what to do and how far to go, and it would then be safe and proper. Hatha yoga, then, could be profitably used. Do you understand me?

Student — You told us some time ago, I think, that the two Masters who are at the head of our work were taking a certain amount of time from it and were spending their time on a work even more sublime than this.

Can you tell us something of what that work is?

G. de P. — Yes, very easily. When a professor of Sanskrit or of Hebrew, or of Greek, for instance, begins to rock the cradle of his baby, he is doing a work which may be very good, but he is doing a work which his wife should do. If he happens to have no wife but has a baby and has to take care of it, it prevents him from doing work which is more exactly along his own line.

Now, following that homely illustration, you may perhaps understand what I am going to speak of. The Masters of Wisdom and Compassion are the channels or vehicles for receiving the spiritual forces emanating ultimately from the sun. Those forces pass through the Silent Watcher of the Earth, and from him are distributed as rivers of life through the intermediaries, his channels, between humanity and him. He takes them from the sun.

Now, these greater duties that the Masters of Wisdom and Compassion have consist in being what HPB, following the Tibetan expression, calls the Guardian Wall protecting humanity against cosmic invasions of elementary and cosmic influences which would be extremely dangerous to the human race were they allowed to play free and unhindered upon us. So a certain amount of time, therefore, in working with a body like ours, is taken by the Masters of Compassion, from this other work; and as they are relatively few, their places can with great difficulty be filled.

Now it is obvious, therefore, that going from the grander to the smaller work, we must not forget that this smaller work in itself has great spiritual significance. The Masters' effort is to instill through the Theosophical Society into the minds and hearts of humanity these things of spiritual, intellectual, and psychical value for the saving of mankind, for the saving of the souls of men in the theosophical sense. Is that responsive to your question?

Student — Thank you very much, Professor.

Student — Am I wrong in thinking that since we have been holding these meetings, there has been a stronger impulse in such vital matters in our country as trends towards peace and prison reform, and many other things, it seems to me, which are more progressive? I wonder if it is not the Masters working through this center, or whether they are working directly for these other objects.

G. de P. — Both. I tell you that spiritual teachings cannot be given out from one to others without striking similar responsive chords in the hearts of those who do not hear these teachings but who are more or less attuned to the thought currents. Being so attuned, they receive these impulses or impacts from the thought-atmosphere of the planet, and finding them great and grand and inspiring, they follow. That is what you may call the mechanism, I suppose, of how these minds outside are touched and refined and helped. Is that clear?

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — Of course the Masters always work with and upon mankind in general outside of the TS. Here, their work is concentrated in disseminating into the world through us as intermediaries the same spiritual impulses that they receive from the Silent Watcher who, again, receives them from the sun, from the god of the sun.

Now, Companions, I think we had better break up for tonight. We will have just a moment's silence, please.

[Sounding of the gong.]

Meeting 4 Supplement

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

Supplement to KTMG Papers: Four

The Buddhas | Conception and Birth | More About the Buddhas | The KTMG Teachings | The

Three Kayas | The Gods Cast No Shadows | The Esoteric Becomes Exoteric | Charge, Pledge |

Fidelity: Unity of Spirit | Pratyeka and Compassion Buddhas | Dharmakaya, Sambhogakaya,

Nirmanakaya | Eclipses | Spiritual Selfishness

London, England, November 24, 1932

The Buddhas

G. de P. — The deeper teachings concerning the buddhas, whether called pratyekas or those of compassion, are so subtle and difficult to understand, that it is small wonder that the minds of our students often are confused. But I have been wondering while sitting here and listening whether an illustration derived from the physical realm may not be a little helpful. It is an analogy, as it were.

Take, then, the case of Father Sun: here we have material splendor, glory unspeakable, streaming out into kosmic Space through what are to us human beings almost interminable periods of time; and yet this glory which we see is material, it is physical. But through this glory, back of it, behind it and working through it, there is a divine and intellectual essence, a spiritual and intellectual light, a spiritual and intellectual vitality.

Suppose then, taking this analogy from our own physical sphere, that we say that the pratyeka buddhas are similar in this instance to the devas, or quasi-divinities, who are the guardians and rulers of the physical splendor working through a sun, and giving to the sun its material light, its material splendor. They are ethereal beings as compared with ordinary physical matter. Yet through these beings, and back of them, behind them, is the spiritual-intellectual heart of Father Sun, the ineffable divinity working through them as his, or shall I say, as its, agents. It is somewhat in this way that the buddhas of compassion belonging to the Order of Compassion manage to work through one aspect of the vegetative side of spiritual nature which is the pratyeka buddha in its higher part.

It would be quite erroneous to suppose that the sun is composed of a divinity without intermediary agents forming and working through what we call the sun. The sun that we sense is merely a physical globe, or vehicle, expressing the combined energies and influences of the solar god, the solar divinity, as manifesting through his or its agents on this and on higher intermediate planes, where are the less evolved devas, the devas of the vegetative side. In exactly the same way the gods, the celestial buddhas, the dhyani-buddhas who are the heads of our own holy order, the Order of Compassion, work on a smaller scale through the pratyeka buddhas as their quasi-unconscious agents, as the agents of the vegetative side, so to speak, of the Hierarchy of Compassion or Light.

Or again, take the case of a human being, of Gautama the Buddha himself. Gautama was the human vehicle of a dhyani-buddha, or celestial buddha; and yet Gautama the Buddha had to work through the human ego called Siddhartha, prince of Kapilavastu, and this human ego again had to work through the various classes of elementals composing the lower or vegetative side of the constitution of the Buddha Gautama. Thus we have the celestial buddha working through the human buddha, which was working through the ordinary human ego, which last was born in a physical body composed of elementals of various classes all belonging to the vegetative or unevolved side of the indwelling spiritual being. The idea is a series of ascending links, a ladder of increasing sublimity as its rungs ascend upwards. Just as a human body is composed of lifeatoms, every one a learning and evolving entity advancing slowly on its upward path, and every one having at its own heart of hearts its own individual monad, which is an imprisoned divinity, just so does every dhyani-buddha or celestial buddha or buddha of compassion have to work through inferior beings, among whom are buddhas of inferior grade. Such is the idea.

These pratyeka buddhas are spiritually selfish individuals when compared with the dhyani-buddhas, or celestial buddhas of compassion. But nevertheless, see how high even the pratyeka buddhas stand! They are in some respects actually the channels through which reach us men streams of spiritual influence from higher

beings still, which streams pass through the pratyeka buddhas and backwards along the pathway that they have trodden and have advanced forwards upon.

Our human ego is a spiritually selfish thing as contrasted with our spiritual ego; and I go so far as to say that even our spiritual ego, although to us a god, is a spiritually selfish thing in the strict etymological sense of the word when compared with the divine ego working through it. It is all a very complex and subtle idea, and this fact has been intuitively grasped or guessed at by our students, as is shown by the questions asked by them.

The reason that the pratyeka buddhas after a time cease to advance during any manvantara and come to a standstill in their forward march, is because they have reached the limits of their powers for that manvantara; but when the new manvantara comes, they will then begin to stride forwards again. It is strangely and fascinatingly interesting how nature repeats herself on all planes.

You will remember the teaching with regard to the seven rounds of our own planetary chain, and how the door into the human kingdom closed at the middle of the fourth round, or, more strictly speaking, in what we call the fourth root-race of this fourth round of this globe. Those who had not entered the human kingdom by that time cannot now enter it during the remainder of the present kalpa, or planetary manvantara, but must wait until the new planetary chain-manvantara comes, and then their chance will come again. But nevertheless, there these retarded beings are in nature, furnishing with others like them the vegetative part of nature through which we as human beings and those more advanced than we, are working, for we are now making use of them as channels and aids, just as the human ego makes use of the lifeatoms of his lower vehicles and even of his physical body.

I make this explanation: it must not be thought that the pratyeka buddhas are treated unjustly by nature, or that there is anything arbitrary about the fact that when they once reach the limits of pratyeka buddhahood they cannot advance farther in any one manvantara. The entire situation is all due to natural law, and to very just and impartial causes. It is precisely like saying that such and such a man has reached the utmost limits of his capacity, or of his ability, at such and such a time, and cannot do more until he has evolved more forth from within himself where the seeds of all growth are.

Conception and Birth

I would like to add a few observations regarding the moon which may perhaps be helpful to the companions here. You may remember in a much misunderstood passage of The Secret Doctrine that HPB says in a footnote, I believe — I am repeating the substance only of her remarks — that one of these days she hoped it would come to pass that our astronomers teach esoteric astrology and the laws of the sun, moon, and planets governing human conception and birth. She hoped that this would come to pass not only for the well-being of the mothers but of the children themselves. Not only should the conception of a child take place while the moon is waxing, or, best of all, at a time shortly before the moon is full, but also conception should occur in the spring of the year between the winter solstice and the spring equinox, or say Easter. This would mean that the best period for conception would be between the months of January and the equinoctial lunation of March-April. As a matter of fact, the Greeks had a month corresponding more or less accurately to our January, which they called Gamelion, or "the month of marriages," showing how well they originally understood these esoteric mysteries.

I would like to add, furthermore, because it is something that our students should know, that the marriage relation is a very sacred one, and in ancient times the conception of a child was a religious ceremony, a ceremonial rite, a religious rite, which was undertaken with a chastened heart and with a full sense of the responsibility of the act. We moderns have wandered far from the ancient wisdom in these respects.

Conception of a child when the moon is waning, or especially at about the time of new moon, or during the latter part of the year, and particularly when the two wrong conditions combine, and if done by one of our own students possessing this knowledge, is equivalent to an act of black magic, for it is a direct violation of the knowledge gained and of the forces of nature which are then active. In the spring of the year everything is beginning to expand, to bud, to bloom, to express itself outwardly; and the conception of a child should follow the same natural course as the burgeoning of the trees and the warming of the earth, and furthermore, as said, it should take place when the moon is waxing, growing — let us say in the second quarter.

-------

November 25, 1941

More About the Buddhas

There are two kinds of buddhas, the buddha of compassion and the pratyeka, and what is the difference?

Every human being, indeed every animal, every plant, every atom, every celestial body, has likewise its own buddha, call it the inner god, call it the dhyan-chohan, ranking in each case according to the individual which is its vehicle. This means that each one of you, that I, that every other human being, that every other entity anywhere, is a buddha within in its higher parts. Therefore to become a buddha in our human life and sphere and action is to come into self-conscious union with the buddha within. This is what Gautama Siddhartha achieved, and thereby became buddha to the world.

Now then, in the case of a buddha of compassion, no matter what the degree of rank or of spiritual sublimity such buddha of compassion may have attained or may be, the part of the entity achieving buddhahood passes into nirvana, or becomes dharmakaya. And you know the teaching regarding the trikaya, the three kayas or so-called vehicles, bodies. The intermediate part of this same entity becomes bodhisattva, a Christ to use the Western term, a christos, which is sambhogakaya, the buddha of "participation" between the buddha above and the human below. The remaining third, after death, becomes nirmanakaya.

When buddhahood is attained either for the first time or again after having been buddha before, or several times before — when in the present life buddhahood is achieved, the higher part of the man enters or becomes dharma, dharmakaya, and interests itself no more in human affairs, for no more can it do so. It has ascended out of all the magnetic attractions of human affairs, of human concerns. But in the case of a buddha of compassion it leaves behind its bodhisattva who, as long as the man remains alive on earth, is sambhogakaya; but when the man dies becomes nirmanakaya in order to remain as an influence as an individual for the purpose of helping men and indeed all that lives. This was the case with the Buddha Gautama. Such is a buddha of compassion. He leaves behind him his representative, his agent, his soul, and in this sense, the soul or ego is in touch with human affairs, although the spirit has become dharmakaya. The bodhisattva becomes nirmanakaya, an active individual man or being, the soul of the former buddha or former man if you wish, and thus works as a nirmanakaya in beneficence and immense love on earth for the remainder of the manvantara, whatever that manvantara may be.

This bodhisattva, according to the exoteric statements of the Orient which are true, in order himself to become buddha, has but one more step to make (as Siddhartha made that step) to become buddha. But he refuses this, preferring rather to remain the vehicle of the buddha become dharmakaya in nirvana, and thus keep the links unbroken, than himself to achieve buddhahood and thus himself from bodhisattva nirmanakaya become buddha or dharmakaya, to enter nirvana and to know earth and its affairs no more.

You see now why and how it is that the bodhisattva doctrine is so beloved of all Buddhists or Orientals who understand it, or of all Occidentals who understand it. The immense sublime humanity of the conception is what appeals to us humans — this grand man, the bodhisattva, demigod if you wish, half-buddha and half-human, remaining on earth in limitless pity to work forever in utter self-abnegation for all others. The fact is so sublime that it appeals to everything that is noblest in us, and indeed to even the more human portions of us, for it means that there is a leader, a guide, a teacher, a compassionate helper forever, that is for the manvantara.

Now a pratyeka buddha is one who achieving buddhahood enters nirvana with all his constitution, leaving naught behind. No bodhisattva remains, for the bodhisattva, for the soul, is indrawn, withdrawn, upwards into the spirit and sinks into a lower nirvana; whereas the spirit enters dharmakaya or the higher nirvana. Naught is left behind, except as it were the sheen of the spiritual entity who has thus attained, the fading glory of a spiritual power which has left earth in its entirety, leaving something, indeed. Nevertheless even this something, the spiritual glow, in time fades out from earth.

Do you see the distinction between the buddha of pity or compassion and the pratyeka buddha? And Companions, that is the choice that each one of us someday, somewhen, will make, must make, for it is in our

future evolutionary destiny.

In this connection it is of truly fascinating interest to turn for a moment to the extremely profound Mahayana Buddhism as taught by the Yellow Caps in Tibet, which teaching is to those who can see it and understand it full of a deep occultism, and to compare this Mahayana teaching with what I have just been stating concerning the achievement of buddhahood by which the higher part of the man enters or becomes dharmakaya, enters nirvana, and therefore becomes buddha, leaving the intermediate part of the man behind as a bodhisattva — speaking here of course of the buddhas of compassion.

If we turn to the Tibetan teaching of the two buddhas revered by high and low, great and small, occultly instructed or ignorant layman, among the Tibetan people, these two buddhas being Amitabha, the buddha of

"immeasurable light," and the Buddha Avalokitesvara, the buddha whose being and functions "are seen from below," we immediately comprehend that the Tibetan viewpoint, as thus even publicly explained, is cosmic.

The human analog in the case of the adept achieving buddhahood is the following: in the human or buddha line, the adept's atman entering dharmakaya corresponds to the Tibetan Amitabha Buddha, both being of

"immeasurable light"; whereas the bodhisattva or intermediate part of the adept on the verge of buddhahood, yet not accepting buddhahood, corresponds with the Tibetan cosmic Avalokitesvara. The meaning surely is clear to all. In the human case, the man's higher principles entering dharmakaya or nirvana pass out of all human consciousness or cognition and become immeasurable light because becoming at one with the atman of the man, like the Amitabha Buddha of the Tibetan cosmic scheme. The bodhisattva of the man remains behind out of pity in order to work for all that lives, corresponding exactly to the Tibetan cosmic conception of Avalokitesvara — both entities whether of the man, whether of the cosmic line, remaining behind in order to labor in the manifested spheres for the toiling pilgrims who have not yet achieved "liberation." The analogy is close and exact. Indeed it is an identity, albeit in the one case the scale is cosmic, and in the other case the scale is human, an adept's constitution.

I will merely add in conclusion, Companions, that I think our study tonight from beginning to end has been one of the most beautiful, helpful, and profitable that this group has ever had. I have this feeling strongly.

Evidently there is an influence present here, Companions.

------

May 26, 1942

The KTMG Teachings

Consider the great advances that we all have made since those early times when this group was first started, cast a look backwards over those past years, and see how you have grown inwardly, not only in understanding but in a richer, deeper feeling for your fellowmen. In my judgment there is nothing nobler in human life, nothing that can give you greater happiness and peace than this feeling. I will add just here that I am now in process, or shall be as soon as we move and I can catch my breath, I am in process with the help of certain devoted students, of recasting the KTMG teachings into a series of booklets. This itself is a great work, and will take months and months of preparation. Then we shall have them printed and then distributed. All extraneous purely elementary matter will be dropped. The nobler questions, I mean those showing the deeper penetration will be kept, and it is my intention to enlarge, greatly enlarge, what we already have studied now for some 12 years, is it not? I think so.

The Three Kayas

A monad which becomes buddha simply re-enters its own monadhood; or to speak in the technical language of the Mahayana Buddhist philosophy, the buddha is that spiritual part of the man which enters into or becomes dharmakaya; and herein lies the reason why the exotericists of the Orient say that once a buddha there is no return, which is true for that manvantara, but not true for eternity. The nirmanakaya is the part of the man which remains on earth, or in its atmosphere as nirmanakaya, and in most cases participating in the glory of the part which has become a buddha, and therefore not only is such a man nirmanakaya but sambhogakaya. Thus, the human soul of the buddha remains behind as nirmanakaya for the duration of a period, depending largely upon the choice of that human soul of the buddha. It may be for the remainder of

the fifth round, it may be for the remainder of the fourth round on this globe. It all depends upon the individual.

The sixth round at its end will produce many buddhas, for in the sixth round buddhi will be developed, and re-entering buddhi means becoming buddha, the roots being the same, and the conceptions identic.

Now, it is my own opinion that the Buddha Gautama, to use the title ordinarily given to him, will be a nirmanakaya for the duration or period of our fifth race, and during the sixth and seventh will perform his part in aiding the spiritual and intellectual training and advancement of the humanity of those two following races.

It is my opinion that the human portion, what is now the Bodhisattva Gautama, in the sixth round will become full buddha. There will then be during the seventh round the still remaining portion of that entity becoming bodhisattva for those two rounds. If you cast your thought back and remember that the monads are eternal, there must have been many buddhas emanating from that catenation or chain of monads in previous manvantaras. Remember I have often spoken of a human being as being a stream of consciousness, beginning or rather arising in divinity, and therefore unending, and as it were marked at different places called monads.

Take our own consciousness as an example of the many monads in us, every one of those in time will become a buddha, just as the bodhisattva of Gautama, that which was left behind when the spiritual part became buddha, in its proper time will become a buddha.

Now at the end of the seventh round, the teaching is that all mankind which will have passed successfully the very important moment of choice at the middle of the fifth or next round, during the seventh round and at its end will become buddhas, in fact dhyani-chohans.

The Gods Cast No Shadows

The Hindus say, and very truly, that the gods when appearing to men cast no shadows, nor do they wink the eye — two typically human physical characteristics of heavy matter. I wonder if you get the idea behind this.

And along that line, and much more spiritual in conception, was the statement of other peoples that in the sanctum sanctorum or the holy of holies of whatever nation or religion it may be, the presence of the divine, or of the presiding or protecting divinity, was seen as a splendor infilling the chamber. It may interest you to know that I have seen that myself. No presence as we understand a body, but just a glory, a light, a splendor; and it is significant when we recollect our teachings that even our own physical bodies in the distant, distant, distant future will be ovoid or egg-shaped spheres of light, as our eyes would observe them now. To us they would be arupa, but merely by comparison with our own rupa world. Just here let me remind you again of the old Hindu saying that the gods cast no shadows, nor do they wink the eye. You know that statement is worth brooding over a bit.

The Esoteric Becomes Exoteric

A great number of what we now call our exoteric theosophical doctrines were in the times of Greece and Rome parts of the teachings of the Mysteries. HPB herself alludes to this fact. Portions of these then secret, and now published, doctrines leaked out, seeped out into the outer world, and were seized upon by intuitive minds and developed into the different systems of philosophy, as in the Stoic philosophy for instance. Of course, I can see very clearly that the time will probably come when what we now call esoteric we shall publish broadcast, because the time will have come to do so. But that does not mean, if you please Companions, that any one of you is entitled to break his oath of secrecy. It is not for me to say when. It is for Those who know more than any one of us here. But I can feel that it is coming. Then still deeper teachings will be given to us, replacing those which have been broadcast into the outer world.

Charge, Pledge

Here is something that I have been trying to hammer home into your consciousness for years. You often hear initiates spoken of in the Greek and Roman writings. Among those writers it meant those who had passed through the Mysteries of either Eleusis or Samothrace; and in the later days of those two countries such induction into the esoteric teachings of that time was called initiation, and it was. But it was not anything —

oh, please take this carefully — like what we have been studying here amongst ourselves. The whole purpose

of the ES is in the nature of a plea to you all to recognize that it is your duty — no longer a privilege — to live what you profess, which means to take the positive attitude inside, without any egoism or swelled-headedness whatsoever. If you become egoistic or proud, if pride finds a place in your heart that is a sure sign you have not got it — the realization that you have taken pledges which on your honor and in the presence of the god within you have sworn to fulfill.

Now if you can do that, I mean do it fully, can't you imagine, can't you see how it would change your lives, not only glorify them, but make you actual leaders among your fellow human beings. When I say leaders I mean leaders, spiritual ones, not creatures of power, or seekers for place, but leadership in spirituality, which means self-abnegation for the common good. And oh, what a beautiful thing this is, and how strengthening and ennobling.

Now every one of you is in that situation, and if you have not awakened to it, or realized it, it is your own fault. If you have realized it, it will cast a glory into your lives, and I mean this, every word of it. Just try to grasp the idea: "I have been accepted, I am pledged, I am the repository of knowledge so secret that it has been hid from the majority of mankind for millennia, thousands and thousands of years." If you can get this idea and get the consequences in your hearts and souls, you will automatically become leaders of men, because your whole inner being will be stimulated, awakened, stirred up, a new force will appear through you.

I want you all to be leaders, every one of you should aspire to be such — a leader, a spiritual one.

Fidelity: Unity of Spirit

To the spirit there is neither time nor place as the man understands it; and when Headquarters leaves Point Loma, it leaves theosophical and dear companions who can have Headquarters and the Leader at every meeting, if you wish it so, because it is so. The reason is that spirit is universal. Our bodies are localized, they will be gone, but the spirit will be present. And while I know that to millions of people the bodies are more tangible and more real, because they think they are more real than is the spirit, you will never be happy as long as you dwell under that illusion. Believe me, a man can sit in his armchair, and with the spirit pass in full consciousness to any part of the earth, or even beyond, to other planes and to other planets, even to the sun.

Now, those of course are adepts who can do that, but there is no human being who is deprived of the power of doing the same thing in relative degree. No human being is deprived of the faculty of understanding — our Leader has gone, Headquarters has gone, but they are here, for our hearts are one, our spirits are one, and you can make that just as real as a guide in life as you can tonight. I hope you will not take these words as merely consolatory. They are facts; and that is what is taking place in our Work all over the world today. Think how privileged we have been here in San Diego to assemble together so many hundreds of times on different occasions; while all our other National Sections and lodges and members-at-large who never see the Leader from year's end to year's end, who never in all their lives have a chance to come to Headquarters, they keep the link unbroken, because they have come to realize that the spirit has no bounds or frontiers. If you have never found that out, you are just to be pitied. You have not had an experience that is marvelous; and any one of you can have it. I might use the word vision. Imagine it, and keep on imagining it, and it will be a reality by and by. Vision it. That is the way greatness is achieved. It is not achieved by sitting down and dreaming about it, but visioning greatness, visioning reality. Keep on visioning it, and by and by that process of continuity, that application, will bring greatness into your lives. There is the whole secret of occultism, the way the mahatmas are made, or developed or born; and by dwelling on low things is the way evil men and women are developed and born. The same rule holds good. If a man keeps dwelling on low things, he gradually sinks to low things; because you keep thinking and dreaming and imagining about them. You soon begin to do them. It is the same rule.

Now there you have all the secret of occult training, all the secret of initiation. Vision, imagine yourself as being grand. Now no one but an idiot would think that I am suggesting to you to become egoists. If you do, you have not got it at all. Thus imagine yourself as a bodhisattva, having thoughts and having feelings and doing deeds of unimaginable beauty and beneficence, and keep imagining that. Do you realize that that continued practice of the only true yoga there is will bring bodhisattvahood into your lives, changing over, re-

forming and conforming your lives unto bodhisattvahood? That is the way the buddhas are born, the Christs are born, and that is the whole purpose of the training in the ES cycle of study and life. Figurate yourself as the noblest you can conceive. Keep on figurating that. And if you become egoistic, it just means that you have not caught it yet. It is just the opposite. Egoism is just the precise polar antithesis of what I am talking about.

Have you caught the thought?

But there have been on the other hand, and we have been told it clearly, there have been betrayals. I think the theosophical movement has been singularly happy in the fidelity of its adherents in these respects. We have had exceptions, but I know the case of a member who once belonged to this group, and who at the time was almost fanatically devoted to it, but later on through reasons of his own — I think a temporary obscuration of a part of his character — had a change of view. But even this person never, so far as I know, breathed one word of what he had been taught under the oath of secrecy. And that is very creditable to a person who must have suffered from a sharp attack of pledge fever, keeping the head enough not to let his own honor down.

That already is a lot.

I take this opportunity to say to you all dear Companions of San Diego, and the different lodges of the neighborhood, how much we Headquarters workers owe to you also. Your fidelity, your unfailing devotion, the feeling — I speak for myself now — the thought that not only our Headquarters workers but your Leader and friend can rely upon you to the end — I doubt if any one of you dear ones really understand how much that means to me. And while this is the last meeting that we shall hold of this group in this way, in this building, and on Point Loma probably, I want you — and these are my last words — to hold together forever.

As long as life lasts and beyond I want you to be like the old story told of chelaship, which is so true, to be like the bundle of sticks which when bound together in unity cannot be broken. But if the bond of unity which ties these sticks together be broken, the individual sticks can be snapped, disintegration will set in and the work of years will be lost. I do hope and pray and I feel it will be so, that the departure of our Headquarters workers from the physical neighborhood of you dear Companions whom we have loved and you who have loved us will be no symbol and no entering wedge of a lessening of your enthusiasm. Let it be just the contrary. We leave you behind with theosophical lines laid down here after many years of common work together. I want you to increase the influence of theosophy in your neighborhood. Make it an even greater spiritual and intellectual influence. Remember that 125 miles away, as Headquarters will be, is nothing. And furthermore, visitors from Headquarters may be able to come down and renew those personal touches of physical companionship which I do realize must mean a lot to you here. Oh, I do hope you get these thoughts.

Dear Companions, may the blessing and the peace be with you. Good night all!

------

Covina, California, July 28, 1942

Pratyeka and Compassion Buddhas

I have often wondered why there is so much confusion with regard to the pratyeka buddhas. It may arise from the fact that the common feeling in the Orient is that they are immersed or merged in a species of spiritual selfish bliss, and hence are called the Solitary Ones. Now, on the other hand, they are buddhas, and it is impossible to be a buddha unless one has attained buddhahood, as seems obvious. To attain buddhahood, as you now already know, you must have merged the soul into the spirit, the ego into nirvana, and thus have cut off — which is what nirvana means, "blown out" of these spheres into the higher — all links connecting you, if you are pratyeka buddhas, with all the worlds trailing along behind, with the world of humanity, these weary and footsore pilgrims of the ages.

It is for this reason, as I have repeatedly explained, that the pratyeka buddhas are described in the popular terms of the Orient as the selfish Solitaries because they enter the utter bliss of nirvana for themselves alone, and leave the suffering multitudes behind without their guidance.

Now, on the other hand, those egos or monads which reach nirvana and enter it with their spirits, with the atman-buddhi if you wish, but who nevertheless have forged links of pity and love still holding them to the world behind and beneath them, with the pitiful multitudes who have not yet become buddhas, these

individuals are called buddhas of compassion. They have attained buddhahood in the highest portions of their constitution, but have not wholly immersed themselves in nirvana, and therefore are still capable of guiding and leading and comforting and helping all beneath them. Now the portions of the buddha of compassion in the complex constitution of a human being which do not enter nirvana, these lower but nevertheless very high spiritual parts of the buddha's constitution, which remain in our world in fact and truth, are given the name of bodhisattvas. This is a very difficult pneumatological and psychological mystery. Take again the example of Gautama the Buddha. When Siddhartha, which was the Buddha's individual name, entered nirvana, it meant that the highest portions of his constitution became buddha, fully "awakened," which can only happen when a man's highest portions become dharmakaya, meaning the imbodiment of 'cosmic law,' therefore universal.

But the next lower part of the buddha's constitution, what you might call the personal ego, remained behind as bodhisattva — a Sanskrit word meaning one filled with the spirit of wisdom and love: buddhi. Thus Gautama as Buddha died when he entered into nirvana, died to the world, at 80 years of age. But the same man in his lower portions lived on for 20 years more in his physical body and spiritual-psychological part of his constitution as the bodhisattva, and the Bodhisattva Gautama died when his body attained 100 years.

For some reason this teaching, which is really simple and can be easily proved to ourselves if we take the trouble to analyze our own constitution, our own aspiration, and so forth, has seemed to present almost insuperable difficulties to Occidental students, and I have often wondered why. Isn't it a simple thing? If man is composed, following the Christian idea, of spirit, soul, and body, isn't it a simple thing to see and understand that the spirit enters nirvana or dharmakaya, and that man therefore in the dharmakaya part of himself becomes buddha; that the soul of that man, the bodhisattva, does not enter nirvana, but remains alive on earth as long as the body lives as bodhisattva; and when the body dies that bodhisattva becomes nirmanakaya? That is precisely what Gautama the Buddha did, who is the buddha of our own fifth root-race, and a buddha of compassion.

You see there the distinction between a pratyeka and a compassion buddha. The pratyeka so longs for things of the spirit, for the utter bliss, wisdom, happiness, the power that he can attain when his spirit enters dharmakaya or nirvana and cuts all links with the lower world, that he cannot resist the temptation to enter the spirit, enter dharmakaya. As he does this because he himself utterly longs for that bliss and wisdom, he is spoken of in popular parlance as a selfish solitary, solitary because he is alone in his bliss, selfish because he thought alone of his own bliss and of himself.

Now the bodhisattvas of the buddhas of compassion see the nirvana before them, know that their own spirit has entered dharmakaya or nirvana, has become buddha, and yet themselves then and there make the vow to refuse nirvana — this is only one more step before becoming buddha — and remain behind in the world in order to help the suffering multitudes trailing along behind them. In the long course of ages their recompense is correspondingly splendid; for they in time, because of that impersonal love for all things which is one of the very first attributes of the Logos, of cosmic spirit, universality, because of that very choice to be universal rather than centered upon one's own bliss, in time they enter the outer realms of paranirvana — a nirvana higher than any pratyeka buddha was ever enabled to attain.

There is a very profound and beautiful teaching which involves a truly esoteric wonder: it is in regard to the very similar thing on lower planes that happens between a devachani, one in the devachan, and those on earth who loved the devachani very truly when the individual was on earth as an imbodied man or woman or child.

While the devachani is not conscious of the ascending and beautiful love of those left behind on earth, they who feel this strong impersonal love for those who have passed on can reach the devachan with their love, and as it were enter into spiritual communion. A similarity of vibration is all that there is to it, so that the ones who truly love their dead may be with them in thought and in feeling, even though they are still alive on earth.

In proportion as the love is more personal, the more difficult is it for the love to reach into the spheres of spirit. But if the love is impersonal, nothing can hinder the wings of that love rising into the devachan, instinctual with the magnetism of love coming into synchrony of vibration with the one in the devachan.

Those who have experienced this know how true it is. But the devachani's rest is not interfered with by this.

There is the distinction.

Now the bodhisattva of the buddha is fully conscious, has full knowledge that his higher part has become buddha, has entered dharmakaya, has entered nirvana, and the bodhisattva is capable and in fact constantly does keep in intimate synchrony, that is identity of spiritual feeling and thought, with the buddha. The buddha is likewise, although now a nirvani, conscious and responds, not as bodies do, but with sympathy and understanding as vibrations can do, and as words often fail to do. The reason of this is that the bodhisattva already is so high spiritually that it is but one more step for the bodhisattva himself to become buddha.

Dharmakaya, Sambhogakaya, Nirmanakaya

Frequent reference has been made to one or another of what we call the trikaya: dharmakaya, sambhogakaya, nirmanakaya. Now every one of these three kayas is involved in this question of the buddhahood, of the buddhas of compassion. What part plays the dharmakaya? What part plays the sambhogakaya? What part plays the nirmanakaya? All three are involved in the status or choice of every buddha.

You will err greatly if you attempt to separate any one of these three, if you attempt to divorce nirmanakaya from sambhogakaya or from dharmakaya. They are always united. That is why they are called trikaya in a single Sanskrit

compound. They can be separated in a sense, that is a man knowing how so to do can live strongly in the dharmakaya or in the sambhogakaya or in the nirmanakaya, by an effort of his will and his aspiration, if he so desires. But the other two kayas are never for an instant abandoned or asleep. Do get that thought very clear.

Never forget the other points of teaching. Man or any other entity is a stream of consciousness, the stream at its source is dharmakaya, cosmic law, cosmic justice — dharma means the cosmic universality, cosmic law which obviously is universal and not restricted. Sambhogakaya means the vehicle of participation. Try to forget bodies because your thought will become more difficult. You will think of frontiers: how big a body, what type of a body, a thick body, a thin body, a short body, and thus your mind will be on details of form.

Sambhogakaya means a thought vehicle and a feeling vehicle. When your consciousness becomes universal, you are in that vehicle of thought and feeling — dharma, universal. Sambhogakaya meaning participation, sharing, communicating, is that vehicle of thought and feeling lower than dharmakaya which is nirvana or the buddha, and yet higher than the nirmanakaya which is essentially the glorified personal man.

Thus we have the cosmic thought-feeling or dharmakaya, the thought-feeling intermediate or sambhogakaya, participating with that above, yet also participating with the one below or nirmanakaya. Hence sambhogakaya is in a sense a unifier, the union, the antaskarana, participating in the dharmakaya and linked also with the nirmanakaya, therefore participating below and above. This corresponds to the human soul, as dharmakaya corresponds to the human spirit.

Then we have the nirmanakaya in which the bodhisattva finds its lowest vehicle, the nirmanakaya being the full complete man minus the physical body and the gross animal vitality, and of course minus the linga-sarira too.

Now then, you see that all these three, the trikaya, are in every one of us. When we live wholly in the dharmakaya, and as it were rise by the sambhogakaya and nirmanakaya and find rest and oblivion in the dharmakaya, then we are pratyeka buddhas. We leave nothing behind, there is no participation in the lower worlds. We selfishly isolate ourselves in the utter glory of pure spirit and hence become pratyeka buddhas.

When we live in the sambhogakaya and manifest at the same time in the nirmanakaya, our highest principle is dharmakaya or buddha or nirvani, as in the case of the Buddha-Siddhartha. Gautama was buddha in the dharmakaya; Gautama was bodhisattva in the sambhogakaya, linking dharmakaya with nirmanakaya — the lowest vehicle contacting these planes of human life for the purpose of enabling the bodhisattva to live and work in the world. Isn't that thought simple and isn't it clear and isn't it inexpressibly beautiful?

Is there any communication between the dharmakaya and the nirmanakaya? We have our answer because the bodhisattva is centered in the sambhogakaya, the "communication" vehicle, the participation, the sharing vehicle, and living as a nirmanakaya invisible to men but nevertheless perhaps for that very reason all the more powerful in the bodhisattva's work.

------

Covina, California, August 25, 1942

Eclipses

It is contrary to every rule of the archaic occult school for an esoteric gathering to be held during an eclipse, or indeed during any other of the several great phenomena of nature. Among such phenomena we can reckon earthquakes and very severe electric storms. Invariably our esoteric or occult meetings immediately close should any or all of these phenomena begin, although of course where great adepts are concerned, and earthquakes, eclipses, severe electrical storms are foreseen, no occult or esoteric meetings are even begun.

So strongly held was this rule, and so commonly understood amongst the ancients, that it is a matter of recorded history that even in the midst of most important human affairs, such as congresses, or meetings of the heads of states, or the founding of a city or what not, even during battles on land or naval engagements at sea, at the first sign of an earthquake, at the first sign of an eclipse, or even the coming of a heavy electrical storm, everything stopped instantly because, to phrase it in the exoteric language of those ancient days, the gods were angered with men at the moment. Greek and Roman historians, as well as those of other nations, have recorded several cases where an earthquake or an eclipse put an instant stop to military engagements or battles, and not infrequently ended the war, because it was thought that the gods were displeased with what men were doing and gave warning of their displeasure in such manner.

This sounds quaint to the modern man, whose mind has been so colored by scientific theory or speculation that he utterly fails to realize that all nature is knitted together in an absolute web of destiny. The ancients were wiser for they knew that earthquakes "don't just happen," that eclipses don't just happen, nor electrical storms, or any other of the serious phenomena of nature. The absolute unity of nature, including men, as well as the earth's electrical and seismic movements, and the movements of the sun and planets, were to the ancients all different movements of one common nature of which every part responds and calls to every other part. So that when men were fighting on land or on sea, or engaged in important deliberations, and then Nature takes a hand in other parts of the web producing an earthquake or an eclipse or a severe electric storm, or even an unusual chilling of the atmosphere or a sudden heat pocket — all these things to the ancients were significant of the unity of life. The idea that they just happened would have been dismissed not merely with wonder but with contempt. Which attitude is the more truly scientific, that of the modern who sees no fundamental webbing of event with event, no fundamental unity with nature, and who thinks that things 'just happen'; or that of the ancients and of many moderns even today who look upon nature as one and uniform, every part electrically connected with every other, human beings included, so that what one part did affected most intimately and perhaps powerfully every other greater or smaller part of nature?

Spiritual Selfishness

There is no difficulty whatsoever in understanding spiritual selfishness if you will keep in mind all the various phases of the teaching that we have received. In other words, remember everything about it before you allow your mind to set or to crystallize into any one channel. A channel immediately puts a frontier to your horizon, and you don't see what is over the ridge, the top of the channel in which you are going.

Now then, self originates in the atman so far as we humans are concerned. The atman is identical with the paramatman; the former is monadic so far as humans are concerned, the other is cosmic. Essentially they are the same. Now then, an intense spiritual longing followed by corresponding action looking to achievement to have the self sink into the utter bliss of atmic felicity, or paramatmic consciousness, is the mark of the pratyeka buddha. As this yearning concerns that individual monad alone longing for universality, and giving up its own atmic individuality in order to attain it even temporarily, this is concentration of attention upon self, and therefore logically, etymologically, and actually it is spiritual selfishness. The word selfishness in spiritual things obviously should not be construed to mean the selfishness of material things. That is where the slip in the reasoning of most people comes, and that is where therefore we look for the cause of the confusion.

Now then, to be buddha, whether pratyeka or of compassion, one must become dharmakaya, which is

equivalent to saying one must enter nirvana. To enter nirvana, to become dharmakaya, means that from the instant this glorious achievement is accomplished, all communication, contact or touch with everything beneath it in the hierarchical scale of values or on the ladder of life is broken; and hence it is said the nirvani is blown out, nirvana, "out-blown." His monad is extinguished in these material planes, much as the flame of a candle is blown out on this plane.

Now such is the spiritual selfishness of the pratyeka buddha — buddha because dharmakaya has been achieved, meaning the vesture of consciousness which has become one with paramatman, or the atman if you wish. All contact with everything else than it has been severed or broken. Hence such a nirvani has been called in the intuitive interpretation of even the exoteric Orient a spiritual solitary, a rhinoceros, a quaint term but descriptive because it is graphic.

The aim of the buddha of compassion is also to attain nirvana, dharmakaya, because otherwise there is no buddhahood — buddhahood meaning entrance into cosmic universality of consciousness which is nirvana, when the dewdrop slips into the shining sea and becomes one with the All. But here lies the distinction, and it is a very important one. The buddha of compassion leaves behind him in attaining dharmakaya or nirvana, a bodhisattva, another monad in his constitution, which bodhisattva, remains either in sambhogakaya or nirmanakaya. This is a buddha of compassion, a technical phrase comprehending more than merely the suggestion of the attainment of buddhahood. Such was the case of Gautama Sakyamuni, our Lord Buddha, and many other buddhas of past ages and manvantaras.

Thus we see what spiritual selfishness is: it means union with divinity brought about by the individual's own effort, yearning for spirituality and spiritual bliss for its own egoity. This means buddhahood, and yet it means pratyekahood, unless the buddha leave behind a bodhisattva to carry on the work of the buddha just become, in the buddha's place. Mark also the meaning of the Sanskrit compound pratyeka, and you will see that our theosophical interpretation as first given by HPB in The Voice of the Silence is absolutely correct, even in exoteric understanding. Prati, 'for' or 'towards'; eka, 'one,' meaning the individual's own self. Everything for myself, everything towards myself, so that I may become a buddha. Of course the pratyeka buddha likewise leaves behind him a wonderful aroma, a spiritual atmosphere of blessing, which is benign and holy and pure because he has attained buddhahood. It is like the saints in the Christian Church. They have made of the attainment of pratyeka buddhahood, which they call sainthood, one of the noblest of their aspirations because they have lost the occult or esoteric key that such action is the very essence of spiritual selfishness. They have lost the other and nobler part of this teaching: that the attainment of buddhahood is sublime, provided that the bodhisattva is left behind to carry on the work of the man become buddha. Isn't that clear?

I see no difficulty whatsoever in understanding what spiritual selfishness is, because obviously if it were the gross animal or physical or personal selfishness of the lower man it is not spiritual, and therefore that is not spiritual selfishness. Spiritual selfishness means the yearning to attain spiritual life for oneself, no matter what happens to the rest of the world.

Meeting 5

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Five

Meeting of January 22, 1930

G. de P. — Are there any questions?

Student — This is a question concerning the statements in The Secret Doctrine with regard to the commencement of the evolution of the human race on this earth: were the "sons of mind" called down to reincarnate into the forms that had been partially prepared for them? What I want to know is whether those sons of mind, the manasaputras, became identified with those forms or whether they remained as an overshadowing influence and afterwards became identified with the divinity of the entities that afterward evolved? Do you follow me?

G. de P. — I think so. But the question that you have asked, or rather the form in which you have put your question, I think shows that the character and nature of the manasaputras or 'sons of mind,' as they are called, are not quite correctly understood. The manasaputras are the soul-entities, or entities having reached the grade of soulhood, entities in a state between divinity and elemental existence, at the end of the preceding manvantara. They were in the bosom of the monads and resting in their nirvana, and reissued forth from the monadic essence when the point in the evolution of the human race had been reached where a proper vehicle to express mind, the mental faculties, etc., had been evolved. Then they "descended" and enlightened man.

Do you get the idea, or is the answer not quite responsive?

Student — Quite. But there is still a little confusion as to whether they remained as an overshadowing influence, whether the process of the enlightenment of the minds of the growing entities was like lighting a candle from another candle, or whether there was an identification of the sons of mind with the growing entities, the evolving entities.

G. de P. — You mean the evolving vehicles?

Student — Yes, vehicles.

G. de P. — Why, no; because were there an identification, that would mean that the sons of mind and the evolving vehicles are one and the same thing. The manasaputras overshadow and illuminate the human temples into which they sent their streams of spiritual fire, or rather quasi-spiritual fire, buddhic fire.

You see, man is a composite entity. He is composed of a number of converging bundles of forces: the spiritual, which issues forth from the divine; the spiritual-intellectual, to which range of life belong the manasaputras. These manasaputras overshadowing nascent humanity before they had incarnated actually brought up to a certain degree, up to the human grade, the slowly evolving vehicles, which they were overshadowing from the beginning, but in which they had not yet actually incarnated. It was not an identification.

Student — Thank you.

G. de P. — Ask again if the answer is not responsive, because your question is a very important one.

Student — Well, if I put another question on the same line it will perhaps help to illuminate the subject. In the fullness of time, I understand, when man has reached a certain state of spiritual evolution, he is conscious of meeting his own divinity face to face.

G. de P. — Yes.

Student — Now, as regards that divinity, which represents his guide, as it were: is there any identification there with the overshadowing sons of mind?

G. de P. — No, because the overshadowing sons of mind are precisely they who rise, who become progressively ever more self-conscious through their vehicles and through evolving. Their own inner spiritual fire, the inner god, manifests itself in ever larger degree. This inner god is not the manasaputra, but the divine-spiritual above the manasaputra — it is the parent of the manasaputra.

The monad itself really is a composite entity despite its name which means "unit." It is compact of, first a central flame — a consciousness-center, which is so to say a point or atom of the cosmic life, deathless and ever-enduring. Next, this inner center is surrounded by garments, by veils, which are vehicles, through which it expresses itself on the lower planes. One of these vehicles lower than the inner god is the manasaputra, the son of mind. The son of mind is the child, in a sense, the offspring of the inner god. Do you follow that idea?

You are an incarnated manasaputra. The manasaputras manifest themselves and manifested themselves, in the astral-physical vehicles, as spiritual souls.

Student — Yes, I see. Then there really is an identification between the manasaputra and the soul that belongs to it, but they are not identified with the vehicle; is that the idea?

G. de P. — No, not quite. The manasaputra is the center of the individuality, is the egoic center itself. The vehicle is merely a garment through which it expresses itself.

Student — Then at the end of the evolution at the end of this round, when we shall have completed our evolution, there will not be two? There is not the manasaputra that overshadowed us and we ourselves, but we are one? Is that the idea?

G. de P. — We are what?

Student — We are the manasaputras?

G. de P. — We are.

Student — The one that came and overshadowed?

G. de P. — Yes.

Student — So that the evolution was really for the sake of the form. Is that so?

G. de P. — For the sake of the vehicle, not the form, because the vehicle has many forms. But the manasaputra itself also evolves on its own plane.

Student — I mean the vehicle. So what has been gained by such an evolution? The manasaputra remains the same. I mean, there is not an additional entity as the result of this evolution?

G. de P. — Why, no indeed. But first understand that the powers of the manasaputra even yet are by no means fully manifested in us. The manasaputra is a ray from the monadic essence in much the same way as our physical sun sends forth its rays. The manasaputras are children of the monadic essence. The monadic essence is the only deathless part of the human constitution. The center of consciousness, individual intelligence, individual consciousness, consciousness individualized as an ego is the manasaputra; but it is merely a ray from the monadic essence. And that is what I mean by saying that the manasaputras rested in the bosom of the monadic essence during the pralaya.

Now, let me tell you something more. The mysteries of selfhood are very great indeed, very subtle, and in the beginning difficult to understand only because of man's miseducation to which we Occidentals have been subjected for hundreds and hundreds of years. The manasaputras are the soul part, the egoic part. But this ego in itself (listen carefully), this ray in itself from the divine sun within, from the inner god within, from the monadic essence — these manasaputras, I repeat, as evolution follows its course through eternity, in time will evolve so high and become so impersonal that egoity will vanish into universal consciousness. In their turn they then become monads, and will repeat in future aeons, in future manvantaras, what the parents of the manasaputras did in this our present manvantara.

I think the confusion that you have in your mind arises in your word identification. Take our bodies, for instance, as an illustration. Our bodies are composed of tiny lives expressing themselves through atoms, but each such tiny life is a learning, a growing, evolving entity, originally beginning its evolution as an unself-conscious god-spark. Through duration it passes onwards, upwards, through its own striving, finally reaching monadic self-consciousness. From self-consciousness as it evolves further through the aeons of time it will become divine, a monadic essence; and as this monad itself evolves on its own high planes it will in time become superdivine; and so on evolving for ever.

Merely for convenience is it said that in the human being there are three lines of evolution: monadic or divine, the spiritual-intellectual or manasic, and the astral-vital-physical. But carry your imagination higher than the monadic essence, higher than your inner god, and you will immediately see that that god itself is evolving on its own plane. And every one of these atoms of your physical body is evolving, although at present an elemental; and in the far, far manvantaras of the future it will blossom into godhood, a self-conscious god, a collaborator in the cosmic work. Then it will go higher, and then still higher. Evolution is endless. It has neither beginning nor end. Now, is that answer more or less responsive to your thought?

Student — Yes it is, but still I have the same difficulty with regard to the individuality of ourselves, shall we say. I understand, for instance, that the result of the influence of the manasaputra on the vehicle is to create a lower mind as the reflection, is it not?

G. de P. — Yes, that is right. One of the influences.

Student — And that lower mind has an evolution of its own?

G. de P. — Correct.

Student — And ultimately becomes at one with the higher mind from which it sprang. Is that so?

G. de P. — Quite so.

Student — Now then, is that lower mind which has now become a higher mind absorbed into the ray from which it got its inspiration, in other words the manasaputra, the angel that was sent down; or does it remain as a highly evolved entity which recognizes its source?

G. de P. — Both. You see, the manasaputra itself is evolving ahead of the ray from the manasaputra, which ray is the human soul, and therefore the manasaputra itself is the highest human soul, the highest part of the human soul — the spiritual soul, if you like. As this lower entity, the human soul or mind, evolves pari passu, step by step, with its parent-fire, so it is always in its parent-fire, although itself is evolving even as its parent-fire is evolving.

The whole purpose of evolution is to bring out the core of each entity ever more fully. Thus the manasaputra passes into divinity. The ordinary human soul becomes highly manasic or manasaputric, if you understand; but its own manasaputra above always remains and enfolds it. It is its parent-fire. It is therefore not an identification. It is not an absolute absorption in a sense of no longer being itself, but it is an assimilation as it were.

Student — Then surely as a result of that a new entity, a new evolving, a new manasaputra has been brought into existence, hasn't it?

G. de P. — No. Simply that the manasic ray develops forth more fully and continuously its inner powers. The atoms in our bodies are we. They are our children. They are not coming to us from outside. Otherwise, why should your atoms be different from my atoms? They are your own offspring, your own off-throwings. They will always be with you through eternity. But as they grow, so likewise you grow and evolve and expand and grow greater. They never become identified with you in the sense of becoming you, your ego. They are however always in your life, in your consciousness, themselves always growing greater, and themselves throwing forth other atoms in which they in turn will live in future time.

Each atom, each lifeatom, of your body began as an elemental in your consciousness — a thought, if you like. When I say began, I mean at the beginning of the manvantara it manifested itself as an elemental, as a

'thought' from you. It has a core, a heart. It itself is the reflection of a monadic essence. Therefore it is you and it is not you. Hence you cannot say that it is an identification, which means becoming the same thing. This is a part of the mystery of consciousness, and you have perhaps unconsciously to your own mind hit upon one of the most difficult things to explain to Occidental minds. But still, if you do not understand, ask again, and I will try to answer.

Student — Thank you.

Student — May I ask you a question on exactly the same lines in another way. In that wonderful meeting on Christmas night, towards the end you gave us a key which I have tried to use, and I want to know if I have got it right. I then understood that the I-am-I of each of us, the reincarnating ego, on the reimbodiment of this earth becomes the higher self of the new humanity. That which is our psychological soul becomes then the reincarnating ego of the new humanity; the animal soul becomes the psychological soul, for that which is now the soul of the animals on this earth becomes the human soul of that humanity. Is that correct?

G. de P. — That is about right in a general way.

Student — May I add to that question a second one? Then the next deduction at once shows that we have a wonderful chain of higher selves, in each manvantara being higher in evolution than the last one and stretching inwards to the center of things unendingly.

G. de P. — The general idea is correct and in part is exceedingly well put. You have grasped one of the ideas exactly, and if you will hold to that idea like grim death, it will lead you through many dark places. We have indeed in each one of us — or rather each one of us is attached to — the golden chain as the Greeks put it stretching from Father Zeus to us, and through Father Zeus into infinity in the other direction, as well as in front of us into futurity, range upon range.

We are endless, rooted in eternity. And it is to that thought precisely that I allude so often in the Temple, when I speak of the core of the core of the core, or of the heart of the heart of the heart, of the human being. I allude not to the physical organ, which idea is grotesque; but to the central, the more central, the very central, the farther inwards, in other words the highest in us. Do you understand?

Student — Yes.

Student — I wanted to ask about the relation of the monad from the moon with what has just been said. Is it then the human soul which is illuminated by the manasaputra and which really is the lower manas as we used to call it? That is to say, is it the ray of the manasaputra which illumines or lights up the monad-which-comes-from-the-moon and which last perhaps becomes the human soul? Is that right?

G. de P. — What do you mean by "it"? I do not just quite understand. Please pause a moment. Take your time, and please phrase your question briefly and clearly. Get it clearly outlined in your own thought and then you can express it clearly. Take your time.

Student — Is the human soul the monad from the moon? Does the monad from the moon become the human soul?

G. de P. — "Does the monad from the moon become the human soul"? Are you referring to the pitris — the lunar pitris?

Student — No, I am not referring to the lunar pitris, because I understand them to be those who make the vehicles for these. It says in The Secret Doctrine that they stay in the lower kingdoms, although they are really higher than the monads for which they provide vehicles; that they stay in the lower kingdoms throughout the manvantara and allow these who are really lower than they to go beyond them.

G. de P. — No, I think there is a misunderstanding of what you have read. That would not be possible at all.

Student — Then in another place I understand it to say that we would be obliged to do the same thing for these lunar pitris which they have done for us at the beginning of this manvantara.

G. de P. — That is true; but that pertains to a deep mystery indeed pertaining to future manvantaras. You have wandered from your question.

Student — I have because you asked me if I referred to the lunar pitris, and I explained what I understood the lunar pitris to be. But my question pertains to these monads for whom the lunar pitris provided vehicles.

G. de P. — Are you referring to the human being?

Student — I suppose I am. Perhaps I am. I am asking. But perhaps I can put it in another way. These manasaputras illumine something, and I understand it to be the monads that come from the moon.

G. de P. — That is correct. The home of the manasaputras is the sun — not the physical sun, but the sun behind or within or above the physical sun, the superior sun, of which the physical sun is the garment. What you call the lunar monads belong to the moon. Now, please remember that the moon is a corpse, a cosmic corpse. It is a dead body. And the circumstances therefore are different there from what they are in the case of the manasaputras, who come from a living body.

You see, Companions, you are touching upon mysteries here; and it is very difficult indeed for me to answer questions such as these without stepping over the frontiers into things which I have no right to speak of. But I will tell you this: that your lunar pitris or what you call the monads coming from the moon, come from the moon only in transit. They do not spring from the life-essence of the moon as the manasaputras do from the life-essence of the sun.

Student — I understand that.

G. de P. — Now, dear Companion, just ask your question again.

Student — These monads have passed a certain amount of evolution on the moon and after they have gained what they could there, were transferred to the earth, as I understand it. And it is those monads which are transferred to the earth to continue their evolution, which are to be illumined and awakened to consciousness by the manasaputras.

G. de P. — By the manasaputras; that is correct.

Student — Then I ask if the idea is correct that they which have been awakened by the manasaputras are the human souls?

G. de P. — Yes. But remember this: that these human souls are the children of the manasaputras, whose duty it is to call them to self-consciousness, as the children of human beings are the offspring of their parents, whose duty it is to train them up, to bring them to self-consciousness. The children are not identical with their parents and yet they come from them; they belong to the same life stream. Therefore have I said, you cannot speak of identification, and yet they are the same, literally: bone of the bone, life of the life, blood of the blood, flesh of the flesh, and more — soul of the soul.

Student — May I ask one more question, so as to clear up the subject?

G. de P. — Certainly. Your questions are always so full of meaning and depth that I am very careful how I answer them.

Student — I would like to know concerning these human souls, which I understand are not identical with the others, but which have been awakened to consciousness by the manasaputras, what will be their standing at the end of this manvantara?

G. de P. — They will be members of the dhyan-chohanic hosts, in other words, manasaputras, or rather will

be manasaputras at the opening of the manvantara succeeding the one we are now in. Is that clear?

Student — Thank you, it is. I would like to ask another question, if I am not asking too many. Now, it is said that the manasaputras choose their vehicles.

G. de P. — They have to.

Student — Then they must in some way of course belong to them, those particular vehicles that they choose, each one of them.

G. de P. — Precisely.

Student — They give up certain vehicles if these vehicles fail. For instance, if the human souls become evil, go on the wrong path, they are thrown off by the manasaputras.

G. de P. — Correct.

Student — Then they choose another one.

G. de P. — Correct.

Student — And suppose that the first one succeeds?

G. de P. — The first what?

Student — Suppose that the human soul they have chosen in the first place — I have supposed that it has failed and been thrown off. Suppose now that it does not fail. Then the one that it would have had to choose after the first one had failed, must also belong to it. That is to say, there must be many belonging to it.

G. de P. — Correct, and the word "many" is not strong enough. But let me ask you: how does the human soul reincarnate and make a body for itself? How many cells, how many atoms, are there in the human body? If one fails in the reincarnating process another is chosen by the life fluid of the reincarnating ego because they all belong to the same life stream. All are children of the reincarnating ego. Do not believe for an instant that a reincarnating ego is drawn to a family, to a parent, by chance, or is allotted a human cell by chance.

The rule is the same in the case of a black magician, going now to the other extreme of life. When a monad abandons a vehicle which has failed through wickedness, in other words a human soul which has failed, that monad immediately assumes another human soul belonging to itself which has not failed, which has been in latency, asleep (do you understand me?), which has been dormant.

Student — I do.

G. de P. — Your question is very profound.

Student — Following along this same line: is this which has been described not then analogous to the transmigration of the lifeatoms, only on a higher plane?

G. de P. — It is. But that again is another profound question. Let me tell you that the monadic essence, the monads, on their own divine-spiritual plane, are the lifeatoms of a higher series of worlds. Do you understand that thought? Precisely as the lifeatoms of your physical body are the vehicles, or in their conglomerate aggregate become the vehicles, for the manifestation of the higher powers of us humans. Just so the monads themselves are the lifeatoms of entities still more sublime.

Realize, that even as shown by our ultramodern scientific research, just as the physical atom, the atom of chemistry, is composed of subordinate parts, which our chemical researchers call electrons and protonic nuclei, so these electrons themselves are freighted with subordinate lives, living entities; and there are hosts, hierarchies, families, of living entities in and on those tiny spheres of life. Nature repeats herself everywhere.

Do you understand that thought?

Many Voices — Yes.

Student — If we, the reincarnating egos, are to be the higher selves of the humanity to come, it would naturally follow, would it not, that each one of us would be compelled to be the higher self of our own, or what is today our psychological soul, that will then step forward to be the reincarnating ego of that new humanity, and we should have the same cycle of matter to deal with? Is that correct, please?

G. de P. — The idea seems to be correct. I don't understand what you mean by saying the same "cycle of matter to deal with." Just what do you mean by that thought?

Student — We today have our cycle of matter, the atoms that compose our body and our various sheaths, and as we progress that would always be in relation, follow us to the end, but always tied to us.

G. de P. — Correct; always tied to us. Every human being is a microcosm. In time to come every human soul will become a spiritual soul or monad, and each one of these monads will become a sun, S-U-N. And the higher ones, the most evolved, of these lifeatoms, which higher ones are always relatively few in numbers as contrasted with the hosts of less evolved lifeatoms, will be the planets around the sun.

You in future aeons will be a glorious sun in space — that is, if you make the grade! And so will all the other companions. There is a god within you, and that god will manifest itself in time as a sun in infinite space. And then in times after that, that sun will become arupa, bodiless. That is, what we humans call form will pass on to destinies still more ineffably grand, to what we call formless worlds.

Evolution is endless. Every entity at its core is a stream of consciousness, for consciousness per se is the fundamental thing in the universe; and the capacities for evolution of any such individualized stream of consciousness are practically without frontiers, because every such stream of consciousness issues from the ocean of infinity. Everything is involved in everything else. We are all bound together inseparably. The mysteries of consciousness are the greatest mysteries of the universe. And all initiation, to put the matter in a somewhat different form, all initiation is a bringing forth of the cognizing consciousness of the one initiated, a higher and grander view of his own inner stream of consciousness.

Student — A thought has been forming itself in my mind since you have been answering these very deep questions, and not merely forming, but the same thought seems to have been more or less repeated each time, and it is something like this: however sublime and in a sense important it may be for us to know these mysteries, because we receive I believe added strength, we cannot remain at the necessary height in our present state of development. We must descend. And not only must, but it is our duty to descend with what we can bring with us of these wonderful things so as to make our own efforts more effective on the plane on which we are now living and have to work.

G. de P. — Correct, and very true, very true.

Student — I was wondering, if our ego will become a sun, what organs of our body will constitute the planets in that system?

G. de P. — The question is clear enough; but I must, for the sake of accuracy, call your attention to the fact that it is not your ego which will become a sun. Your ego will evolve out of your present egoity into sunhood; and the organs of your body are merely sub-organs of your organism as a human being, which express certain lower powers of the stream of consciousness. I would not say that the organs become the planets. It is some of the subordinate lifeatoms of your inner being which will become the planets; but only the higher of those lifeatoms of the inner constitution will become the planets. Your physical organs are merely temporary forms, temporary aggregates of lifeatoms drawn together into a closer community of evolutionary state, or belonging more nearly to the same evolutionary stage than other lifeatoms of your body do. Do you understand me?

Student — I understand that the organs of our body correspond to the planets of our solar system, that the planets work through them. In our esoteric instructions it gives Mars as controlling certain organs — certain

planets controlling certain functions.

G. de P. — I see what you mean. But that does not mean that the organs of the physical body will evolve into planets. Do you see my point? The organs of your body are merely temporary forms, groups of lifeatoms.

Student — I understand that that aggregate of lifeatoms will continue as an aggregate in their evolution and form a planet.

G. de P. — Not necessarily at all, because each and all of the lifeatoms belonging in a particular organ are all evolving at different rates of speed, so to say, so that in five or six or a dozen human incarnations from now certain lifeatoms now forming part of your heart may form part of your brain. Do you now see my point? The organs of the body themselves interchange lifeatoms. The planets mentioned above will be those lifeatoms in your constitution which when you — the higher part of your stream of consciousness — become a sun, will themselves have become planets.

Student — I think I have read somewhere that the atoms of the heart are more highly evolved than any other part of the body.

G. de P. — No, they are not. The lifeatoms of the brain stand the highest. Strictly speaking, the physical heart is the organ of the personal man; and the brain is the organ more particularly of the manasaputra.

Student — Why does the Master in the Instructions to us say: "Think of the Master in your heart"?

G. de P. — Yes, but the word heart here does not mean the physical heart. It means the core of your being.

The word heart is commonly used in our Oriental order as meaning the center, the heart of a thing, the core of a thing, like the core of an apple. It does not mean the physical heart.

Student — I think that the physical heart must be around that core surrounding it.

G. de P. — As a matter of fact it does not. You will remember that nature is symmetrical throughout, and that even in our physical body the higher from the feet the organs are, speaking in a general way, the higher they stand in the evolutionary grade. Do you follow my thought?

Student — Yes, I see.

G. de P. — Passing up from the abdomen, through the chest, into the brain. The brain is the highest, and the brain itself is bathed in akasa, which is the highest form of ether, or rather ether is the dregs of akasa. And the ether is the means of transmission into the brain of the thoughts, the vibrational forces, springing from the manasaputra overshadowing us, the manasaputra being the highest part of the human soul, buddhi-manas. Is that clear now?

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — I might add that all that has been said, true as it is, is not contradictory of the other fact that each organ of the body is under the influence of a particular planet, or, to put it inversely, a particular planet controls each one of the organs of the body. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes.

Student — Is there an analogy between the courses that the lifeatoms take before returning to be taken up by the ego, and the elements that make up these monads that come from the moon? Is there an analogy between the courses that the lifeatoms take and the course that the higher elements take on their way back to the sun that they belong to?

G. de P. — Yes.

Student — And for that reason you say that the monads came from the moon in transit?

G. de P. — Yes, exactly so.

Student — What corresponds to fohat on the human plane?

G. de P. — On the human plane?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — A nice little word spelled P-A-S-S-I-O-N, or desire.

Student — Fohat on the cosmic plane is called cosmic electricity.

G. de P. — Fohat is what you might call the cosmic kama, and thought is its rider. That is to say that thought directs desire and passion, although passion in us human beings too often takes the bit in its teeth and runs away with the rider. Do you understand?

Student — I had thought that it was the magnetism that played between people. That idea was wrong, then?

G. de P. — Also that is right. Fohat in another way of looking at it might be called kama-prana or prana-kama — desire combined with vitality. They are inseparable, because there is vitality in every one of the principles of the human constitution. Otherwise we could not cohere, we could not become and be an entity.

Student — If our thoughts become elementals, what did our thoughts evolve from? They must have had infinite time before they became thoughts. Is there no beginning or end?

G. de P. — No. That is a good question. When we say that thoughts become elementals, this is but a manner of speaking, a manner which is conveniently brief. A thought is an elemental actually. We have thoughts because these elementals pass over and through the stream of consciousness and catch our attention at the instant; but these elementals exist as part of us from eternity. Thoughts are not born out of nothingness. They are in us and have been in us always. But a time comes when they express themselves. They express themselves as elementals, because they are elementals. Does that answer respond to your question?

Student — Yes, but not exactly.

G. de P. — All right, try again.

Student — If those thoughts were always in us, they must have had a beginning somewhere — not a beginning, but they must have been something before they were thoughts.

G. de P. — This is the old idea of "where and when did I begin?" Nothing has a beginning except in a relative sense. What we call beginnings and endings are the passings of energies through a certain plane, as it were. If the consciousness is functioning on that plane and sees the passing of the energy, be it a thought or an elemental, we recognize it and say it began and it ends. All we see is the beginning, or rather the appearance, and the ending or the disappearance.

A thought comes into perceptive consciousness from the recesses and deeps of our own being, has its time —

an instant or an hour or a week perhaps — and vanishes for the time being out of our consciousness. But what becomes of it? It returns to the reservoir of our aura, also to the reservoir of consciousness, re-enters the stream, the general stream of consciousness, to reappear at some future time. That is where they come from.

We think thoughts and we imagine that we never thought them before. Actually we are merely thinking once again what we have thought before. The thoughts are elemental entities, growing things, learning things. Each thought at its reappearance is a little more clearly defined, a little more symmetrical, and thus we recognize its growth. But they spring from the consciousness, from the fountain of consciousness, which we are. And when their energy is spent in our minds or in the state of consciousness in which we happen to be, as we say we forget them. It merely means that they have lapsed back into the fountain again.

So a human being comes to Earth, is born a child, lives his life, makes his gestures, has his aspirations, his hopes and his hates, and so forth, and finally disappears and we say he is dead. Do you suppose that man began when he was born and ends when he dies? That is contrary to all our teaching. As a monadic essence he never had a beginning and never will have an end; and the elemental in its evolutionary stage called a thought, follows the same rule.

Student — Then they are always thoughts, but they evolve as thoughts?

G. de P. — Certainly they evolve; and it is precisely because they evolve, that they appear and begin or disappear and end, or are forgotten from our standpoint. And furthermore your thought opens a door ajar, which I will push open wider for you. We human beings originated as the thoughts of human beings in preceding manvantaras. We were elementals once and now are human beings.

Student — Now, I have understood that the god which is seen by the human in the initiation when the human being comes face to face with his inner god is the manasaputra which he comes face to face with, something higher than his own soul. Did I understand correctly?

G. de P. — Not quite. It is the higher part of the human soul, not yet fully evolved into the manasaputric plenitude, which through the particular training involved in the initiatory ceremonies meets its own monadic essence, figurated as an entity, face to face. To put it in another way still: the human soul of the aspirant meets his spiritual soul face to face, for the human soul is a man, and the spiritual soul is a demigod. Do you understand? It is an actual meeting, an actual cognition, recognition.

Student — I think I understand.

G. de P. — You are wise if you do.

Student — No, I don't mean that. Of course I don't understand it fully. But then, it is this human evolving soul — my ideas were upset in your earlier answer — it is the human evolving soul which meets its higher god.

G. de P. — That is it. It is the superior human soul only which is capable of so meeting the inner god. The average man is not spiritually strong enough, you see.

Student — I understand. After it has evolved up to this point of almost becoming a manasaputra.

G. de P. — That is right.

Student — May I ask one more question in relation to what you said about thoughts? If we are evolved thoughts, a thought flashed into my mind: what happens to evil thoughts? Is it possible to wipe them out, or will the future progeny of those evil thoughts be Brothers of the Shadow for which we shall be held morally responsible?

G. de P. — Oh, no, not necessarily. We call thoughts evil which are immoral, which are contrary to the rules of action followed as right by human beings.

But I want to let you into a little secret in answer to this question, and you must think long and carefully on what I am going to tell you, otherwise you will be led astray. Now, beware, Companions, because it is a dangerous thing that I am going to tell you. Sin, what men call sin, in the past, but not in the future and not at present, has been one of the means of evolution. Do you understand me? And what you call an evil thought is merely the elemental passing through that phase of its evolutionary journey as a thought. It will refine itself in time as it progresses.

Now, this is a dark saying and a difficult one; but you will remember a passage in The Secret Doctrine, where HPB quotes from one of our esoteric works: "Fish, sin, and soma" — all belonging to the moon, all symbolic of lunar energies.

Student — Thoughts we express on this plane as words; but they may be on another plane something besides that, may they not?

G. de P. — Quite true. Thoughts are elementals; they are energies of the human mind. The human brain mind construes them as words, imbodies them in words. But how feeble words are adequately to express or imbody a thought! Isn't that true? We are faced with this difficulty all the time. We try to express our thoughts clearly, adequately; and it is one of the most difficult of things to do.

Student — If I understand you rightly, then I understand that after a thought leaves the mind of the thinker, it retires into the reservoir of his aura. Then why, in the case of a criminal, who meets a violent death and perhaps goes out with his mind full of hateful thoughts is it so dangerous for his thoughts to be released, if they are simply going back into the reservoir of thought? Or do they not go back into the reservoir but remain in the atmosphere?

G. de P. — The thoughts retire into the consciousness of the criminal, who has been the channel through which these evil thoughts had come forth. These thoughts work on the inner constitution of the criminal, give that inner constitution, as it were, a shape and a form, also an impulse, an urge, a drive; so that when the criminal is executed, the kama-rupa automatically becomes an evil entity, and follows the urge and impulse which these thoughts have imprinted on the astral substance of the kama-rupa; and the kama-rupa, being of ethereal matter, affects the minds of human beings in physical bodies, who are negative to such things. Do you understand me? Is the answer responsive?

Student — Yes, Professor, thank you.

G. de P. — But the thoughts themselves, formless, retire into the consciousness-stream of this human being who was a criminal, and they will reappear in some future reincarnation of his as avenging fiends in and to their creators, to use the popular expression — their parent. Do you understand that?

Student — Yes, Professor, thank you.

G. de P. — We get only what we deserve, and we get only what we are. Nature's inflexible rule: we reap not merely what we sow, but because we sow ourselves therefore we reap ourselves. We reap what we are, what we become. Is that thought clear?

Student — Yes, Professor.

Student — Going back to what you said about thoughts that we call into activity and the amount of activity that we give to them and their disappearance — that comprises the whole subject of habits and the building of character, does it not?

G. de P. — It does. It does indeed.

Student — May I ask a question that has puzzled me very much and seems to have some very deep meaning?

It is said in the Bible that Christ — and in mystical literature that the candidate for initiation — during three days enters into, goes down into, Hades and ministers to the spirits, the souls, of the suffering in Hades. That teaching seems to me perhaps to open something, and I don't know whether it is permissible to open it or not.

But it seems very suggestive, and it would help if we could hear something about the matter.

G. de P. — It is true. Initiation in the higher degrees is learning by individual experience. Experience means becoming the thing, temporarily at least, which you are learning about. You cannot truly experience a thing until you become it, until you are it. For instance, you can hear about good, but you cannot know good until you become good. The consequence is that initiation, which is simply a copy in brief of nature's lessons learned by the average human being over a long period of time, means that one undergoing initiation must experience himself and become what he had been formerly taught of. That is why so many fail. They are not strong enough to go through the tests. The aspirant must go, not only through the gates of the sun and confabulate with the gods, but he must likewise take the downward path, and, supreme and strong, pure and high, conquer all, but nevertheless meet, face, overcome, and help the beings in Hades, in the lower realms of

the cosmic life. Do you understand me?

Many Voices — Oh, yes.

G. de P. — Hades is the underworld, meaning by that word the spheres of cosmic life beneath the human cross-section of the Universe, as the spiritual life is that phase of the cosmic existence above this cross-section which we call the human stage. Is that clear?

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — Hades is the underworld — everything beneath the human stage. The word is applied more particularly to those invisible realms or kingdoms of nature which are more material than what we call the human stage. Death opens the doors; and therefore, as I have told you before, the mysteries of initiation are relative to and deal particularly with death and its mysteries. Initiation is death for the time being. You die as a man. And if in this part of yourself which goes through these experiences you are not sufficiently strong to meet successfully the tests that will face you, you fail. And one undergoing initiation is fortunate if he can rise when the trial is over, having failed, a living man and a sane.

I cannot tell you how serious and dangerous a thing initiation is. It is no wonder that the Masters of Wisdom and Compassion never undertake any initiation unless they are very well assured, through the tests in daily life of the one whom they have watched and studied, perhaps for several lives, that he is capable and ready and prepared.

Why, if you will just think a moment — the passing through the portals of the sun, to use one of our expressions, must be done consciously. Otherwise it is useless. And the sun itself is a mass of titanic energies which would annihilate anything beneath the grade of a spiritual soul. The sun's energies would simply disrupt it entirely, as fire does wood, consume it — a thought which has been alluded to in the beautiful Greek story about those who have tried to look upon the face of Isis, to raise her "veil," and have died.

Occultism is a very, very serious matter indeed. It is no child's play. It is in every respect awful, in the original sense of the word — arousing awe. And therefore the old saying is true that discipline, training, precedes the Mysteries, for the aspirant's, for the neophyte's own protection.

Student — May I ask another question? I believe that in the early days, from a very close study of Olcott and the theosophical history, Olcott was anxious to make the Society very largely a philanthropic society only. He had the idea of a great deal of work on that line, in broadening out lodges for philanthropic work. I want to know if it is correct, if HPB did not think that merely to make another philanthropic society would be of little value to the world, but that there must be, behind, the idea spread everywhere that there were the Mysteries, that there was something very great to aspire to, even if it takes lifetime after lifetime. There is a flash of something that she gave to the world, which is something infinitely higher than we see. And Olcott differed; and that is what is now to be given to the world again as HPB wished it — the idea that there is something deeper, something that arouses in the souls of those who hear it a spark that nothing else can arouse. Is that the correct view of it?

G. de P. — It was Olcott who was strongly of the opinion that the Theosophical Society should be made into a magical society; and it was HPB who insisted that philanthropy, in the original sense of the word —

brotherly love — should lie at the basis of all theosophical work. And she further pointed out that it was not magical practices which elevated men, but that it was occultism which did this.

This is the second part of what you say, and rightly say: that it is occultism, the wisdom of the ancient religion-philosophy-science of the human race, which gives the explanation, the philosophy, the keys, of life, and shows how philanthropy, brotherly love, human kindness, are explained not as emotional indulgences but as the first law of ethical conduct for human beings.

Olcott possibly had the idea that the Theosophical Society in its various lodges and branches, and in its general work, could ameliorate human conditions by ordinary fraternal feeling, such as you have in some of the fraternal orders. Olcott was not a mystic. He was not a spiritually-minded man, though he did good work

in his day; but it was HPB who said: "No; brotherhood is the keynote of occultism, a fundamental law of the universe."

Student — That is really what I meant, except on one point. I would like to say a little farther, that in pointing out (Olcott certainly did so in many ways) the ideal of the Masters as living beings, that such as they existed, he did good. For if HPB herself had not raised something in the spirit of mankind, something higher than had ever been thought of before — namely, the idea of the great beings who have attained by spiritual development to such great heights — she would have lost a great influence for good. But Olcott was looking more for a merely benevolent Society, as it were? Is not all this true?

G. de P. — That is true; but your alluding to the Masters in the way you have here is somewhat different from what you said before. It is true that Olcott wished to promulgate before the world the teaching of the living, actual existence of greatly superior human beings — men who through evolution had attained Buddhahood, Christhood. That is true. And he was right. But HPB had given that idea to him. He got that idea from her.

There was no conflict of opinion between them on that idea at all. But a danger lay there — and HPB pointed this out and emphasized the danger — to the effect that every traveling or itinerant lecturer would announce himself as a pupil of the Masters of Wisdom and would distract attention away from real occultism; which is precisely what has happened.

You will find men of various types, and various adventurous Oriental teachers and other lecturers following lines of thought basically their own, yet trying to teach some of our doctrines — who wander up and down the countries, teaching in some cases extracts from the Oriental religious books, which in most cases they only partly understand.

The world at the present day has many of these uninspired and divergent movements or societies. It is the teachings given out by the Theosophical Society which are taken, to some extent, by these people; and therefore what they do is our karma to a certain degree, and we shall have to face that karma as a Society because we are responsible for it.

It matters not that we as individuals are struggling all the time against such misrepresentation and pirating of our teachings. It is our Society which in the last analysis brought our teachings into public notice, and even though our teachings be misrepresented and pirated, nature will follow the threads of responsibility to the source, because our teachings misrepresented by these people have misled many, many minds. And we are responsible, unwillingly it may be; but our movement is responsible to a certain degree nevertheless.

Consequently when you see your Leaders speaking with emphasis at times and in a tone which to some may seem a little unkind, it is because of the fact that we cannot morally permit our fellow human beings to be led astray.

It is not a good answer to say: "But these people even teach high thoughts." Some do; but the answer is beside the mark. They are distracting people's attention from the real thing, the source of it all. Do you follow my thought?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — The protest that we make is not bigotry. It is not dogmatism at all. It is simply stating a fact and uttering a warning. Nevertheless we should treat these people kindly who misteach and misconstrue our doctrines; but also we should tell the truth and take the consequences.

The next question, please.

Student — I do not understand what you said about initiation meaning death. I had thought, until you spoke of Isis in connection with it, that perhaps it meant death of all the lower in man, and of everything that tended to degradation in any way; but perhaps I misunderstood.

G. de P. — It does mean that; but it also means death in the sense in which I spoke of it. It means that the higher part of the constitution of the man undergoing initiation follows the pathway that the average human being follows when he dies, but the man is nevertheless alive in the body, kept alive by white magic. He passes the portals of death for the time being, and returns.

The story of Orpheus in Greek myth refers to the same fact wholly. Orpheus went into the underworld in order to see his beloved Eurydice; and he was told that he could return and bring her back safely if he did not turn around and look at her. But the human love in him prevailed over the teachings and he turned to look at her and lost her. This teaching also has reference to Orpheus as the monad entering the underworld, or our material sphere, in order to lead into the upper world the human soul Eurydice. Now, think over the tale. It is beautifully conceived, full of esoteric meaning. You must be absolutely impersonal in order to succeed in initiation, swayed neither to the right nor to the left, doing neither evil nor anything personal at all — an impersonal energy, neither knowing fear nor being subject to any other distracting influence. Love alone must fill your soul, compassion — one of the aspects of love — pity, kindliness.

Student — Thank you.

Student — Does not philanthropy in its highest sense include occultism? There came into my mind the statement quoted by HPB, and said by her to have been from the Maha-chohan, that the true theosophist is the philanthropist, who not for himself but for the world lives; and I think in my deepest thought that philanthropy — to use every means that mind and heart can devise, and the soul of man encompass — must include in its fullest sense occultism.

G. de P. — It does; it does indeed. But philanthropy is an aspect of, one of the faculties of, the spiritual being; whereas occultism is not only the wisdom and knowledge of the visible and invisible universe, but a method of lofty spiritual training. Occultism means the knowledge of the inner and invisible side of the universe, as well as of the outer, both the spiritual and material worlds. Imperfect knowledge is not wisdom.

But when the soul is filled with love and compassion, it is ready and fit for the study of occultism and for the practising of occultism successfully.

Student — May I ask if there is any preparation during sleep for the tests of initiation?

G. de P. — For the neophyte, you mean?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — Certainly there is. He is under training all the time, night and day, waking and sleeping. He is tested while he sleeps. Not tested, please understand, as the word is usually construed, that is, stumbling blocks and difficulties thrown in his way in order to see what he will do — that sometimes happens, but more rarely — but he is tested as to how he faces the things which nature herself naturally produces: how the man meets situations, sleeping and waking, how the inner being conducts itself when out of the body, where it is watched; because — you see the reason? The reason is obvious. Were strange and artificial conditions prepared and thrown in his way, they would not call forth the same reactions that nature herself calls forth.

For instance, I can test a man in two ways. I can say to him: "Now, dear Brother, I am going to test you. I won't tell you what I am going to do nor tell you what the test is; but I am going to see how you react." Then I prepare a situation, and naturally he is alert and on his guard; he is watchful. Now, that is an artificial test.

Under certain rare circumstances perhaps it may have a certain value. But the value is relatively small. My imagination is not large enough nor deep enough, nor are the imagination and constructive ability of the Masters of Wisdom and Compassion profound enough — not even theirs — to prepare such tests as nature herself provides.

The other test is: I say nothing to the man, but I watch him — how he thinks, what be thinks, how he acts, what he does. He is not aware that he is watched. Do you see the difference? And such testing is severe, because Nature herself — which is equivalent to saying the man's own nature — is relentless in her tests. The neophyte in his reactions places himself where he really belongs, in Nature's category of being, and he is judged thereby.

Student — May I ask just one short question? Is not the state of unpreparedness in which even we to a very great extent live, and the whole world to a very large degree, the one thing that we have to guard against?

G. de P. — Unpreparedness?

Student — Yes. The idea has been in my mind for some little time that we could be tested, that is, that we could stand any test, if it were not for this state of unpreparedness in which we tend to live and go on.

G. de P. — Yes, there is truth in that — a great deal of truth. It is the duty of every one of us to be constantly alert and watchful of ourselves. You need not bother about anything else — neither your brothers nor nature, but you should watch yourself. Be prepared. Always be alert. It is for your own sake.

Now, the aspirant, the neophyte, in these initiations knows that he is going to be tested, but he has no understanding how, except that he is told the truth: you yourself will test yourself. Nature will be merely the background upon which you as the actor will perform.

Student — To go back to this question of orderly place for every atom and every entity in the hierarchy of evolution — is that not the ultimate reason for the objection against serum treatment and vivisection? Do not these two reverse the order of nature, since the duty of everything is to evolve consciousness from its own standpoint?

G. de P. — I think so. That is well expressed. My own chief objection to the serum treatment is that it introduces into the blood stream something which the body itself has not placed there — in a relative sense, of course, an alien, an enemy, an alien power or energy or seed.

Of course the question is not as easy as it looks. If we go back far enough in time we would see that the very beasts sprang from original humanity; and in that sense the serums could hardly be called absolutely alien to the human blood stream. But they are alien in the sense that the distance in evolution that the human race has traveled since that time is so great that serum treatment actually is an introduction into the human being's body of seeds of disease, or the off-throwings or outflowings of diseased conditions, of diseases in lower beings, which ultimately become highly detrimental to the body into which they are introduced.

You can cure one disease and implant three worse, or lay by the seeds of three worse diseases. Now, which do you choose to do? I have heard of men who had the toothache and pondered whether it might not be wise, in order to cure the toothache, to cut off the head. It certainly is one way of curing a toothache.

Student — In connection with this question: when one is drafted into the army, one is more or less from the ordinary standpoint helpless. On about the second day that you have been in the army, you are inoculated against typhoid fever, and on the third day or a week later you are inoculated against smallpox. Your whole nature rebels against it; but what is a man to do?

Cannot he realize that after all his body is not himself; and if his karma places him in that situation, he has to let the powers that be take their course, does he not, and try to rise above it? At least, that is the attitude I took when I was in the army.

G. de P. — Yes, that is a puzzling problem to solve. I have often wondered what I should do. I don't know what I should have done. By law I also had to register my name. I suppose that if I had been drafted, they would have inoculated me. I should have protested with all my strength and power. I don't know what else I might have done.

Student — Would it not be justifiable under such conditions to use ordinary means of deception such as telling untruths, in order to prevent such inoculation?

Student — I didn't know which untruth to tell.

G. de P. — I don't know what I should have done in those circumstances. It is one of those situations where a

human being is subjected to something that he knows to be wrong; yet he owes a duty to his country and to the laws that exist, wrong though they may be.

Of course, all such things are taken care of in the long run. A man who contracts a disease in some future life from his own evil acts in this life is wholly responsible. But the present question is a problem. I hardly know what to say in answer to that question. I should certainly not in any circumstances advise a willful, deliberate flouting of the laws of one's country to which one is rightfully subject, even if one believes these laws to be wrong. Personally I could not do that. It would not be right.

I suppose that I should say that the only thing is to leave the problem to the individual's own conscience.

Student — Well, in the last analysis is it not the karma of those who have to be inoculated?

G. de P. — It is, of course. Quite true. There is an old saying: "Evil must needs be in the world; but woe be to those through whom the evil cometh." And it is true.

Student — I happened to hear Mme. Tingley tell her students about that very thing when they went away.

Now, the question has brought to mind this point: if anyone has to go through such a difficulty and masters himself, as truly as KT charged her boys to do when they went away, then he comes out as safely as possible in the circumstances.

G. de P. — That is true, quite true. The natural physical karma is greatly mitigated, is small, in such circumstances.

Student — May I ask a question that has troubled me very much? I refer to the question of evolution. We have been told that we are very much behindhand, that we ought to be much farther advanced at the present time than we are, and that this is the cause of so much of this strain. And I wondered if you could tell me whether the whole course of evolution was not abnormal?

I would like to refer just a moment to the matter of Jehovah, who HPB makes no bones of declaring was one of the lower gods. She speaks of him in one or two of her footnotes, and of his action in driving Adam and Eve out of the Garden. Now, if Adam and Eve had stood up, because they did not do wrong in receiving the light, and had said they would not go out of Eden, what then? These stories have bothered me for a lifetime. If they had simply said: "Mr. Jehovah, we will not go," they would probably have not gone because they had in themselves what he did not have. They were superior, according to the teaching, to Jehovah himself; and then they could have gotten a breath and gone out and taken up the course of evolution outside Eden willingly and gladly, and everything would have been different.

Now, is that simply a wild theory or could that have happened? Do we need to feel that the whole of our karma as human beings after that golden age, that childhood period, is just, as it were, like beasts driven through the difficulties of life with never a chance to get a breath or to find ourselves? Or was our karma abnormal from the beginning?

G. de P. — You are taking a mythological story, which you recognize to be mythological, and yet asking a question about it as if it were an actual event.

Student — I meant what the story represented.

G. de P. — Yes, I understand that. Answering your question about karma I answer: I don't think so. It is perfectly true that an entity at any stage of its existence can say, "I refuse to perform further," but I doubt if that refusal would do the entity much good. Children, such as the supposititious Adam and Eve were, may say: "No, I won't do that. I will do this or that or the other thing." Does that declaration advantage the child much?

The Biblical story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden refers to the early mankind in its then unevolved state of existence; and all the events mentioned in the Hebrew Bible are told in story form. Adam and Eve had to leave the Garden of Eden, in other words their then condition of innocence, in order to learn, to evolve, to

grow; and it would have been foolish, just as foolish as a child is when it says, "No, I won't learn," it would have been foolish, I say, for Adam and Eve — the early humanity in other words — to have said: "We refuse to leave our innocent childhood state and learn and grow and evolve."

Suffering is the greatest teacher that we have. Pain of any kind, particularly spiritual pain, mental pain, emotional pain, is another one of our great teachers. Good luck is an awfully poor teacher. It sends us to sleep. It gives us self-satisfaction. But it is suffering: it is the divine dissatisfaction arousing us out of smug comfort, smug complacency, which urges us onwards. Do you follow the thought?

Many Voices — Yes.

Student — Yes, Professor. May I ask another question very briefly? The thing that confused me was the fact that Jehovah was considered by HPB as rather despicable, that his driving them out, his whole action, was a jealous and cruel action. And I wondered if an entity or a god in his place, who had had as his keynote compassion instead of cruelty, would have driven them out in such an unprepared way.

For instance, it is like this: a mother is obliged perhaps by karma to carry the heavy burden of taking care of an aged friend or relative; and that person can be obliged to do this by law, and she can do it unwillingly or unkindly. Or she might go forward in her strength and in her love and compassion and do it most lovingly and willingly, and do it with happiness all along, and thus do it better.

This is what my thought was, that if we had not had that particular god standing in the way, and if he had acted with compassion at that time instead of with cruelty, would not evolution have been taken up willingly and been endured gladly? We would have caught up with ourselves long before now, and things would have been more normal. Or is that a mistake? Will every world have the sad time that we have had?

G. de P. — It is only evolved human beings that possess the high degree of understanding that you speak of.

But in the innocence of childhood the young and baby race had not yet learned to understand that evolution, that growth, comes only with pain and suffering and with the struggle to achieve. Furthermore, Jehovah, the esoteric meaning of Jehovah, as represented in the Hebrew Bible, is a term symbolic of natural forces. In themselves they are not cruel. The heart of them is compassion and wisdom. Jehovah and the angel with the flaming sword are merely expressions, mythological expressions, of the working of these natural laws, of the working of nature.

Furthermore, our planet, this fourth planet of our chain in this fourth round, is directly under the influence of the planet Saturn, with which Jehovah is very closely connected in Jewish mythology, if you understand me, and therefore the representative term Jehovah was used.

But I have said enough about this. The matter would lead us into abstract and perhaps uninteresting questions of astrology.

Student — May I ask a question that I heard when I was visiting the Boston Lodge? It may not be esoteric, but then it may be. It was a question about eating meat. There were members who were distressed at the thought of eating meat, eating our younger brothers, as they said. It was so dreadful from the compassionate idea of the suffering that the creatures went through when they were killed. Then another side of the question was advanced that by eating our younger brothers we gave them a chance to live a great many more times; and if we did not eat all these chickens, and so forth, they would not come to live so many times. The question was not decided there.

G. de P. — Well, of course I will tell you frankly that meat eating is something that every esotericist should try not to do. Nevertheless, it cannot be called a crime; and yet I must make a reservation there. It is one of the horrible things that belong to the present stage of our humanity.

I think that the idea of killing our unfortunate fellow beings, the beasts, in order to live on their carcasses is indeed a beastly one; and in the higher degrees in this our Order meat eating is not permitted at all — not so much because it is a crime, but from motives of compassion and from reasons of bodily purity. Actually we do not need meat. Flesh foods have a stimulating effect on the body, and also a grossening, coarsening effect.

And yet I have known a man, a chela (he was an exception, it is true, but he stood relatively high), who ate meat occasionally for one purpose (you may be surprised to hear it), in order deliberately to coarsen his body.

It could not be done by drugs, which are strictly forbidden. It could not be done by drink, which is also a drug. In this sense he was looked upon as being unfortunate. He did it deliberately, in order to keep himself in his philanthropic work more in contact with the physical plane — if you can follow my thoughts. The idea is rather difficult to express.

I do not bring this instance forward as an example to follow. On the contrary, I bring it forward as an example of a really great man who in his present incarnation was in one respect karmically unfortunate.

Meat eating is not a good thing. You might as well face the fact. But constituted as the human race is, and in view of past evolution it probably cannot be called a crime. It is a misfortune; and every one who can cease eating meat — especially those who belong to our Order — should do so if he feels that he can do so.

We do not help the progress of the beasts by eating their flesh. That is an error. We prevent them advancing as otherwise they would naturally advance, because we cut short their lives. They have to repeat the incarnating process.

But much more important than the eating of meat, far more serious, is the controlling of the gross human passions. These are the real things against which the neophyte must struggle and which he must conquer. And what are these gross human passions? The sex passion is not the worst of them, although bad enough. It is not the worst. The most deadening to a soul are passions such as hatred, anger, jealousy, envy, etc., for gross mental movements like these prevent all spiritual instinct. These are the inner beasts whom we must slay.

And I mean these words literally. Do you understand me?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — You may ask one more question, if you like.

Student — In continuation of what I said before, I have found a great many persons are just as radical in opinion about wearing furs, which cause the cutting off of animals' lives — anything that has to do with shortening life these persons have warned us against.

G. de P. — I must say that I admire the spirit, the kindly feeling of pity, of compassion, behind what you have just said. But I think perhaps that the form of conduct or the verbal expressions which this compassionate instinct took in the cases you mention was a bit extreme.

I knew a man once, a member of the TS, an average man otherwise, who was a vegetarian. He did not drink.

He took no drugs. And he thought he was advancing rapidly. But I learned one day that he had the extremely unpleasant habit of beating his wife and children. He was a very angry man in temper and easily afflicted with that degrading passion. I found also — at least it was told to me, and I had no reason to doubt it for my informant I knew to be an honest man — that in a younger period of his life he had amassed quite a fortune by cheating.

And yet he thought he stood high. He was quite a prominent man in his lodge. He did not eat meat. He did not drink. He did not swear. He took no drugs. To use the expression of one who spoke to me: "He is the most soft-spoken man I ever met." His hands were clammy and his eyes were fishy; and I did not think that he was at all spiritual.

No, Companions, it is the inner beasts that we must kill — our own evil side. When that is conquered, and wholly conquered, then you won't eat meat. You won't need to do so. But, as HPB says in The Key to Theosophy, in substance, "Dreadful as meat eating is, it is not a crime; it is a misfortune."

One more question, please.

Student — If we are the thoughts of those who were the humanity of the last cosmic manvantara, are our thoughts to be the humans of the next?

G. de P. — Of the next cosmic manvantara, not planetary manvantara. Make this distinction.

Remember that thoughts are elementals, which merely take the form of thoughts as they pass across the horizon of our consciousness. They are our children, sprung from us as their fountain of vitality. We call them thoughts. Actually they are elementals, that is, consciousness-centers, which in this present manvantara are in the lowest stage of growth.

Well, Companions, I think that we had better close for tonight. We have had a very interesting meeting indeed.

[Sounding of the gong.]

Meeting 6

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Six

Meeting of February 12, 1930

G. de P. — Companions, before calling for questions tonight, I want to refer to a matter which I think was brought up at a recent KTMG meeting here. It was a question asked of me concerning the nature of the avatara. I regret that this matter of the avatara — its nature, character, and destiny — does not seem to have been understood.

Now, the avatara, considered as a divine-human being or quasi-human being or as a god-man, although the product of an act of supreme white magic, nevertheless is a purely natural occurrence in the Law. In a very important particular, the avatara is a sporadic instance or occurrence of the same fact of evolutionary progress that the descent or incarnation of the manasaputras was during the third root-race. The difference is this: that the avatara is an avant coureur, a forerunner, of what is in the distant future to be a very common event.

Precisely as the manasaputras or sons of mind enlightened the imperfect, waiting vehicles of the mankind of the third root-race, so do these forerunners, the avataras, divinely enlighten individual grand human beings, who automatically thereby become of the number of the greatest of the teachers of the human race.

I wonder if this explanation will help those who have found difficulty in understanding just what an avatara is. It is in a very real sense of the word a repetition in an individual case of what the incarnation of the manasaputras was in the general. It is a particular and nobler and higher instance of the same rule. As the manasaputras enlightened, inspired, gave understanding and self-consciousness to, the imperfect and waiting vehicles in the third root-race, so the avatara is a case where an individual human being receives not merely intellectual light, illumination, and self-consciousness, but divine light, divine illumination, and divine self-consciousness.

In the far-distant future, the avatara-phenomenon will no longer be a sporadic and unusual event, but will be a common phenomenon. In times still more remote, practically everyone of the then glorious humanity of the future will be in a certain sense an avatara. The incarnation of the manasaputras or sons of mind raised the imperfect mankind of that time from the dream state into self-consciousness and intellectual activity with a strong gleam of spiritual light as their guiding star; but the humanity of the far-distant future will all be avataras in the sense that the same phenomenon will be repeated, but will be repeated by the divine part of the then human being instead of the intellectual part. Thus the avataras when appearing among us today are forerunners of what will happen to the general humanity in the future. Do you understand that general idea?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — That is fine. Do not forget, however, that the avatara today can be only when the human essence of a buddha lends itself as the purest possible human vehicle, as the intermediate link between the waiting divinity and the human body-vehicle. There is thus a difference between the avatara of today and what will take place in the future, but the difference today is one of arrangement due to the psychomental loan of his self-consciousness on the part of the buddha. The whole question is a very difficult and intricate one, and should be carefully studied from the hints here given.

Now I am ready for questions, Companions.

Student — What is the relation of the monad to the manasaputras? I became a little confused at our last study class and have been waiting to ask you.

G. de P. — The monad is a divine spark — spark is a name. It does not mean that it actually is a spark of some fire, but that it is an atom of the cosmic consciousness, a spark of the cosmic fire, a ray of the cosmic fire. In its bosom resides a germ, a seed, which is the fruitage of the consciousness, somewhat as the acorn is of the oak on earth, of an individualized entity of the preceding great manvantara. This germ is its own ray, its own child. This germ or ray is a manasaputra. When the proper time comes, the manasaputra, this germ or

seed, enters into or rather overshadows an imperfect being to which it is karmically attracted by the lifeatoms forming that imperfect being, for these lifeatoms are the lifeatoms that it used in the former great manvantara; and it is in this way that the incarnation of the manasaputra in that particular vehicle — man, imperfect man — takes place.

As I have pointed out many times, man is a composite entity. He is formed of many things. He has a divine root, the monad. He has a spiritual consciousness — his own highest self, his own highest self-consciousness.

He has also his human consciousness; and likewise he has his animal consciousness. They all work through the vital-astral-physical body. This stream of consciousness with its different "colors" makes a full or complete man. You cannot separate these colors or principles except for convenience of thought into the human and the spiritual and the divine.

But here is the wonder of it all: each part of the human being lower than the monad is destined in its turn to become a monad by bringing out from within the core of the core of its own being the divine faculties latent therein, because latent in every mathematical point of the universe. Also in several maha-manvantaras hence our monad will be a super-monad, a superdivinity. The intellectual part will then have become a monad or a divinity; the human part will have become the spiritual part; the animal part will have become the human part; and the atoms, that is, the lifeatoms, of the lower vehicles in their turn will have moved up a grade or two or three. Do you understand? Man is a host; he is a legion — each one of us is such. Pray try to get the idea.

There is not in the human being a unitary, everlasting, immortal soul. If such existed, it would exist forever.

But everything is growing, changing its status, its condition, its grade — in other words going higher. From atom it becomes soul; from soul it becomes spirit; from a spirit it becomes a god; from a god it becomes something else still more sublime. And this becoming is altogether and wholly from within, just as a seed grows, pouring out from the core of itself what is locked up within. Even in physical things the rule is the same. Thus it is that the acorn produces the oak. It is thus that the apple-seed produces the apple tree; and thus it is that the human being produces the monad and the monad the god and the god a supergod — in each instance the growth or evolution flowing forth from within. Therefore the monad is the parent; the manasaputra is the child because it is a monadic ray. It is an atom of the monad, a spark of the monadic fire.

In our higher human consciousness, in other words in our spiritual consciousness, we are manasaputras.

Is the answer responsive? Does it clarify your thought?

Student — Yes, thank you, Professor.

G. de P. — You have something more in mind. You do not fully understand yet.

Student — Well, I cannot quite see the relation of the monad that is traveling through all the different experiences, through the mineral, the vegetable, and the animal kingdoms — I mean is there a difference between the human monad and the monad that travels through the different kingdoms?

G. de P. — Why, certainly; but it is not a difference in essence. It is a difference in evolution, and hence we give them different names. Every entity is a stream of consciousness which in its higher parts is divine, which in its intermediate parts descends — descends? no — becomes, spiritual, human, animal, astral, physical. But it is the one stream of consciousness; and this stream of consciousness like a river is formed of drops so to say; or just as a block of stone is formed of atoms or just as your body is formed of atoms. They are all you, and yet each one is an entity.

Now, in a more definite way of dividing the human being, not as just said into a host of lifeatoms, but into parts more easily understood — we have the divine part, the spiritual part, the human part, the astral part, and the physical part; and each part pursues its own peregrinations in its own appropriate and corresponding sphere of life. Do you understand now?

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — No, I don't think you do. Your voice shows it very plainly. You speak of the mineral monad. That phrase does not mean that the divine monad drops down into earth and becomes a stone — not at all. The

phrase mineral monad merely means that particular ray of the stream which, passing through that phase of its long evolutionary journey, is a stone, a particle of stone. It is therefore called the mineral monad. That particular ray of the divine monad which is passing through the human stage is called a human monad. It does not mean that it is different in essence from the divine monad. It means that it is a ray from it, an atom of it, a droplet of the stream of consciousness. But that droplet also is evolving, because every mathematical point of the universe has all the potentialities in it to become a god.

You see that your mind is crystallized into the Christian soul-idea of an everlasting soul. I have just told you that there is no such thing. It is a dream. It is an imagination. You are a stream of consciousness, composed of drops, if you like. Do you now understand a little better?

Student — Yes, I understand.

G. de P. — I hope so. At least I hope that I have given you an idea to think about.

Student — It is the idea of the drop from the spiritual consciousness passing through all these phases, itself becoming consciousness.

G. de P. — Yes, you can put it in that way. It actually is consciousness; but its consciousness at first is diffused. It has not reached the point of inner development where it evolves or becomes self-consciousness or a manasaputra. That manasaputra in its turn will develop, will bring forth from within its own heart, from the core of its being, something still higher; and thus it will attain what we may call divine consciousness thus becoming a divine atom. That is a monad. And that monad in its turn is growing, and also is continuously throwing forth from within itself other streams of consciousness.

Forget the idea of the everlasting personal soul and you will understand the teaching about the stream of consciousness. You are not two consecutive instants of time the same being. You are changing all the time.

But as evolutionary change is slow, you have the illusion of being the same being for a few short months or years. You have changed since you were a child, both in feeling and in consciousness, actually changed.

Now, instead of taking a few short months or years, think of many billions and trillions and quadrillions and quintillions of years — which are nothing in eternity — and imagine how you will have changed in this time.

Not merely still being what you are now only bigger, but radically changed, having become greater, virtually universal, instead of a mere human consciousness on earth.

Student — Thank you very much.

Student — Does not what you say imply that all immortality is conditional; that there is no stopping, and that what is commonly called immortality depends upon our continual ability to advance?

G. de P. — True.

Student — Each stage of consciousness that we attain to takes up into itself the lower stage, at which, if we had stopped, death would ensue. That is perhaps rather crudely expressed, but I look upon death as an arrest of progress; and we are all compelled to advance continually or be failures.

G. de P. — That is true. Please remember that immortality is a relative term. If you were forever immortal as you are now, you would not advance; you would be eternally immovable. If you changed a particle, then you would not be immortal. Don't you see? Therefore, there is no immortal soul, no immortal entity within you.

There is no such thing. Everything is changing, moving, growing, enlarging.

And furthermore, in one sense of the word everything is immortal. The word may be used according to the point of view. When one speaks of individual droplets always remaining the same, the reference here is to the essence of the droplets, which, so far as the material world is concerned, remains through enormous periods of time practically the same. We have here a paradox: nothing is immortal in the absolute sense; everything is immortal in its divine essence because it is fundamentally a droplet in the cosmic consciousness; but as even the cosmic consciousness is evolving, therefore we cannot call even it absolutely immortal in unchanging

identity.

A lifeatom becomes — let us say evolves to become — a beast, which merely means that it brings forth from within itself its own interior fires passing through the beast phase. It might say: "I want to be immortal as a beast." Poor thing! Similarly the human being says: "I want to be immortal as a man. That is what my heart craves for." It wants to remain an immortal human being. Poor thing!

No! There is no such immortality simply because there is continual growth. And this is the secret meaning of our Lord the buddha, when he said: "There is no immortal soul; for each entity is the reincarnation or rather the reimbodiment of its Karma" — meaning itself. You yourself are an imbodied karma, not only of the second last past, and of the year last past, and of the life last past, but of the manvantara last past.

Student — May it be because there has been lost to the Western world at any rate the knowledge of these higher reaches of spiritual development, that this idea of immortality has taken hold?

G. de P. — I think so. I think that you are quite right. I know nothing that so beclouds spiritual vision as the concentration of the attention on human immortality — what human beings think they imagine when they speak of immortality, which in all cases means remaining identic as you are now, or, as some say, growing but remaining identic. There is no such thing. You are growing, you are advancing, you are expanding. If you remained identic two consecutive seconds of time, you would not have grown in that small period.

Who wants to be immortal as he now is? I don't. But what we know to take place is an ever expanding consciousness, always becoming something greater, something newer, something finer, something nobler.

Student — May I ask another question along that line? We have been told that we are sons of the sun, and the expression has been used, the parent-star. Now, if there is a parent-star, we are children of parent-stars. Is the avatara — this extraordinary, natural, spiritual, phenomenon — occurring as you say in a sporadic way at first —

G. de P. — At present, yes.

Student — Is that an earnest of the glorious state of consciousness that is to be the destiny of the advancing humans when they shall have realized not only the consciousness of themselves as sons of the sun, but as children of the parent-star?

G. de P. — It is. Miss -----, did I hand to you three questions written on a slip of paper? The questions asked thereon are so closely akin to what has just been spoken of, that I am going to ask you to fetch me that slip of paper.

Student — May I say that I meant this in line with the idea about immortality: that as our ideas of what is ahead on these higher reaches of spiritual attainment come home to us, the idea of immortality in the old sense actually fades into insignificance. That is what I meant by my question.

G. de P. — That is perfectly true; and Jesus the Syrian also had this in mind when he said: "If ye would find your life, lose it." You must lose your life to find it. You must lose your human consciousness if you would find the divine consciousness. It is this human consciousness which we have which prevents us from advancing more rapidly than we do, because we concentrate on it, thinking that we have no other consciousness. Now, initiation is a short-cut to recognizing the higher consciousness. Do you understand that?

Many Voices — Yes.

Student — May I express the thought that came to me (while you have been answering these questions) in connection with one of the most remarkable quotations, in my estimation, in The Secret Doctrine, from the Commentary, where it says that the thread of radiance will emerge in its integrity when the great Law calls all things back into existence? And in connection with this idea of immortality, let us consider ourselves from day to day: what I am today is not immortal; it will be different tomorrow. But the thread of radiance has

passed over through the night; the thread of radiance has passed over through an incarnation — the stream of consciousness continues. Yet there is continual growth, and that thread of radiance from the very heart of the universe is that which emerges. Is this correct?

G. de P. — It is absolutely correct, perfect; and this thread of radiance looked at from the consciousness standpoint is the same as what I have told you before in drawing the distinction between the "I am" — the same in all of us — and the "I am I" — different in each one of us: John Jones, Will Brown, Sarah Thomas, and so forth. This "I am" is the same in all of us. It is the thread of divine-spiritual radiance. And it will grow more splendidly manifest as the aeons pass. It will grow brighter with each change that we make upwards.

But if you want to have immortality, then you must stop somewhere and be immortal in that condition, because if it changes it is not immortal. Do you see? If you understand me, then you will see that immortality cannot be attained because there is no such thing, due to the constant and eternally unceasing advance in evolutionary growth.

Student — May I ask one question on what you have said? I think you have given what to me is a most illuminating conception of the distinction between the "I am I" and the "I am," and it answers the great question that most people have in regard to reincarnation. They say: "I don't want to be somebody else." They want the 'I am I' which they know in this incarnation to continue forever. Now, that 'I am I' does not continue and does not appear again; but the "I am" continues from incarnation to incarnation.

G. de P. — Correct; but remember this, that the former "I am I," the former ego, has gone forever, because you have advanced into a larger ego. Nevertheless the karma of that former ego, that former "I am I," is so like the one that has gone before it that it is almost the same, the difference between the two being very small; and the reason is that evolutionary growth is slow. Therefore, we can properly speak of the reincarnating ego as the same man as he was in the last life, with just the difference that he has grown a little larger, grown a little different, and therefore not absolutely the same because it has changed, however small that change may be. Instead of thinking of a few years or of one life, think of millions and billions of years, and accumulate the changes in your imaginative consciousness. You will then see that man in the distant future, due to the reincarnations leading up to that distant future, will be quite different in consciousness from what he is today, individually and collectively.

Student — May I ask one more question along that line? These reaches of the future stimulate my imagination. I would like to ask this. The earth is going around the sun. That is one sign that we are moving on; and we have this relation to the sun. But the sun is going around something else — there is a greater system. Is there, at the present time, the seed of the consciousness of ourselves in that greater cycle?

G. de P. — Certainly.

Student — Has the avatara to do with that?

G. de P. — In a way, yes; but you have involved so many things in what you have said that I don't like to answer with a brief yes and no. An adequate answer would require a long explanation. Therefore I say: in a way it does.

Now, will my secretary kindly read the three questions that I called for a few moments ago. These questions pertain more or less to the same matters that you have spoken of; and I think that my answers will throw some light on the subjects of thought involved. You have three questions there, have you not? Please read the first one.

Secretary (Reading) — "When that part of our galaxy known as our solar system has reached the end of its cosmic evolution when the present maha-kalpa ends, will our humanity thereafter continue its evolutionary course on another of the (seven?) solar systems of which our galaxy consists?"

G. de P. — In the first place, there are many more solar systems than seven in our own home-universe; and the entities reaching their culmination of evolution at the end of the present evolution of our own solar system will continue in the reimbodiment of that same solar system, when that reimbodiment occurs. Is this thought clear?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — The same cosmic law works in solar systems that works in the smaller range of a planetary manvantara. But there is this difference between the two, or rather not a difference, but this thought to add: that while the entities belonging to any one solar system belong to it as a family, begin with it at the beginning of any maha-kalpa, and end with it at the end of that maha-kalpa, nevertheless, in the interim, that is in the long trillions of years between the beginning and the end of the maha-kalpa, the entities belonging to that solar system as individuals have outer rounds, and pass from solar system to solar system in these larger outer rounds.

Please remember that I have spoken to you before about inner rounds and outer rounds so far as our own globe, and so far as the planets of our own solar system are concerned. Now the same rule occurs on a larger sweep in the case of solar systems.

These questions really touch upon so many things, all of deep interest, and at the same time are intuitions of things I cannot speak of, so that I am faced with a difficulty in trying to give a satisfactory answer. If anyone does not understand the general drift of the thought, please speak before we go to the next question, because it is my duty, as far as I can do so, to answer all your questions.

Student — I simply did not follow it, Professor. I lost it about half way.

G. de P. — Well, let me see. I do not blame anyone for having difficulty in understanding. This teaching is exceedingly difficult to follow, because the thought is so new to us Occidentals.

Let us take as an illustration of the meaning of the teaching, the cases of the planets of a solar system — our own planet, for instance, our planet earth. The monads forming the earth's family, as you know, pass seven times around the seven globes, each such passage being called a round. After seven such rounds the planetary manvantara ends, and all the entities go into their nirvana. But during this time-period of seven planetary rounds, during each round, the entities nevertheless have outer rounds as well as these inner rounds; these outer rounds being cases where entities pass to other planets of the solar system. Do you catch that thought?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — Now, all our planets and all the vast armies of entities belonging to a solar system have their own life cycles within that solar system — our own solar system, for instance; and they remain with our solar system from its beginning to its end. But during this long time period from the beginning to the end of the solar system, they have also outer rounds carrying them to other solar systems. Any individual monad, for instance, passes from solar system to solar system and back to the first solar system again. Do you understand that?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — That is the main idea.

Student — Do these outer rounds that the monad makes take place between incarnations, or at other times?

G. de P. — Do you mean now with regard to the planetary rounds?

Student — I am talking simply about the planets. I think if that were clearly understood, these larger things would be clearer.

G. de P. — The outer rounds are followed by the monad between incarnations of a reincarnating ego. That answer is responsive, is it not?

Student — Thank you, yes.

Student — That almost answered the question that I was going to ask. It was, whether our education still

went on during the outer rounds as well as on this planet.

G. de P. — Oh, certainly, if you refer to the monads. The monad is sleepless during its own life cycle. It emerges from nirvana, has its period of active manifestation, of being awake. Then at the end of its life cycle it re-enters its paranirvana only to reissue forth again when the time comes for it to do so. And the reincarnating ego which is a ray of the monad merely repeats the same thing in its turn; for nature, in all its parts, great and small, follows grooves of action, that is to say lines of least resistance, habit in other words.

This is the meaning of the Hermetic axiom: "As above, so below." What is here on earth is simply the mirroring of what takes place in spiritual realms. What the great does, the small does in its own small cyclic periods of manifestation; but the evolving entities are learning all the time, always growing, always changing, always advancing.

Now, the next of the three questions, please.

Secretary (Reading) — "Are these higher solar systems the higher spheres, spoken of in The Secret Doctrine, from which 'the Serpents redescended, taught, and instructed our present humanity'?"

G. de P. — No, the higher spheres spoken of in this quotation from The Secret Doctrine are the higher spheres of our present solar system, but not of the other solar systems forming our home-universe.

Remember, our home-universe means all that is included within the bounds of our Milky Way, the galaxy.

These serpents spoken of are the large hierarchy of the manasaputras, for the manasaputras themselves form a hierarchy containing ranges of entities: the greatest, the intermediate, and the less great, just as you see it all in men, great men, ordinary men — manifestations of the power of the manasaputric forces. The gods follow the same rule: supergods, intermediate gods, lower gods, demigods, men, animals, vegetation, minerals, and the three elemental kingdoms.

The next and last of the three questions.

Secretary (Reading) — "Do our monads according to their evolution, belong to one or another of these solar systems?"

G. de P. — Yes, they do. They belong to our solar system, because they are involved with this solar system.

Now, I am going to confuse you a little again, I am afraid; but it cannot be helped. There is an advantage in it because it makes you think. Each monad of the hosts of monads belonging to our solar system nevertheless has its own parent-sun.

Go into a great city of our country, of any country. You will see a multitude of men and women come from the four quarters of the earth. They all belong to that city. They are citizens of that city. Nevertheless they come from the four quarters of the earth, and from outlying cities and towns and villages. Their home places are where they were born; but they are all gathered together for the time being in the one metropolis. That is the idea. All the hosts of entities belonging to our solar system are here, are gathered here together, because they are attracted together by similarity of evolutionary type and destiny. A similar attraction draws men to the great cities.

Nevertheless, considered distributively — that is, as individuals — each monad has its own parent-star of which it is an atom, a spiritual atom, wandering on its peregrinations and transmigrations through the mansions of life, in this case the solar systems. Think of the sublime outlook that this gives to you! Do you see the wonder and the beauty of it? Do you see how it stimulates the thought and imagination?

Student — One of the companions in asking a question mentioned that our earth is going around the sun and that the sun is revolving around something else. What is this something else, and what does it belong to?

G. de P. — Another sun. The something else is another sun. Suns go around suns just as planets go around the sun; and the central sun is not of necessity a physical sun, either.

Student — May I continue a question? In speaking about passing to the outer spheres, is the entity limited in the passing to the plane on which the individual has incarnated? For instance, I mean that we are now on the

manasic plane. In passing to these outer spheres, is this journey confined entirely to the manasic plane of the outer spheres? Am I clear?

G. de P. — You are clear; but I want to make myself a little more clear. Are you speaking of the monad or of the reincarnating ego?

Student — I am speaking of the reincarnating ego. As I understand it, during the manvantaric life the reincarnating ego can pass to the outer spheres, as once said, between incarnations. Well, being on the manasic plane now, is that passing limited to the manasic plane of the outer spheres?

G. de P. — I think you have misunderstood the answer.

Student — I am mixed.

G. de P. — Yes. It is the monad that makes the outer rounds. I have told you before that the reincarnating ego at the death of its body at the end of that physical incarnation is withdrawn into the bosom of the monad, and there it passes its devachanic rest. But it is the monad which follows these outer rounds. Let me tell you something more: any monad has a host of reincarnating egos resting in its bosom (this is but an expression, you understand, "resting in its bosom" — it is a figure of speech). In other words, the sun, which is the expression of a solar monad, withdraws into itself its armies of sunbeams which thus typify the reincarnating egos leaving and returning to the parent monad. That is the idea. Do you understand me?

Many Voices — Yes.

Student — We understand that the earth's orbit is an ellipse and that the sun is in one focus of that ellipse.

What is in the other focus? Is there any center of forces in the other?

G. de P. — No. No, there is not — at least none that I could speak of.

Student — May I ask another question about the planets before we turn to something else. In the January number of The Theosophical Path [1930] in your article you speak of the seven planets and the earth and the sacred planets. That, of course, is not the planetary chain. But that makes eight planets. I have been very much interested and puzzled over that. Are those seven planets the planets of the outer ring? How is it that the eight comes in? That includes, I presume, the moon in the seven?

G. de P. — It does, as a substitute planet only, just as the sun is used as a substitute planet, because one of the planets (and this will amaze you) is near the moon and the other planet is near the sun. The reference there is indeed connected with the outer rounds. The earth, in fact all the seven globes of the earth-chain, are builded each one — or rather the building of each one of the globes of the earth-chain is supervised — by one of the other planets. Consequently there will be seven planets building the seven globes of our earth-chain. Our earth-chain thus becomes the eighth. Do you understand? And our earth in its evolution helps to build one of the globes of some other planetary chain. Do you understand?

Student — Yes.

Student — This other sun around which our sun is moving: does it belong to another planetary chain?

G. de P. — No, no. The great sun — you may call it a raja-sun, or king-sun — around which our sun is circulating, belongs to a chain of its own, a solar-chain. There are seven suns to every sun, if you understand me. Every sun that you see has six companion globes. Seven suns form it, of which we see only the physical sun. There are countless multitudes of suns in space that our physical eyes do not see at all. They belong to superior — or inferior — spheres or realms or worlds, invisible therefore.

Student — There were two matters which interested me. The first refers to the moon. If I understand it aright, the earth-chain is one grade higher than was the moon-chain. And therefore we see with the physical eyes not the physical globe of the moon-chain, but its kama-rupa. Now, if it is the kama-rupa phantom of the fourth globe of the moon-chain that we see, it is on the astral plane of the moon-chain, or what used to be the moon-

chain. Now, if that is so, that astral plane of the moon-chain that was had two globes, two globes immediately superior to the then physical moon. Why don't we see three bodies?

G. de P. — You confuse the kama-rupa of the moon that was with the two globes on the cosmical plane immediately superior to the physical body of the moon that was. The two moons next above the physical moon that was, and is now no more, existed on a cosmical plane higher than even our present kama-rupic moon exists on. Do you understand?

Student — Well, in other words, the kama-rupic phantom of the physical moon is merely on a superior subplane of the physical plane of the moon-chain, but not on the next superior cosmic plane?

G. de P. — That is it exactly.

Student — May I ask another question? It is really not a straight question. At any rate —

G. de P. — Just let me interrupt a moment. You remember that every cosmic plane has seven subdivisions?

Student — Yes, I knew it; but I wanted a confirmation of it.

G. de P. — Now your next question.

Student — In your first General Letter you spoke about Master KH as having come to you here. Now, some time ago in one of these meetings a comrade asked you something about the Masters and you gave us a most wonderful informal talk about them, which really was not an answer to a question; but you told us many wonderful things about them. Now, would it be possible to hear something more about this meeting with the Master which you referred to in the first General Letter?

G. de P. — What would you like to know?

Student — You referred especially to the fact that you were shown the future of the Theosophical Society and what was to be expected. Can any further elucidation be given in regard to this point?

G. de P. — Yes, I can speak briefly — and vaguely. I do not know whether you will be satisfied at all. By being shown the future, I did not mean that the Master brought a picture or a photograph of the future; but that, in the course of the talk and in the course of the instructions that I received then, I was given to see clearly, to understand clearly — I had a clear mental picture — of what the future in general outlines was to be, if I would do certain things. Do you see the point?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — Is the answer responsive?

Student — To a certain extent.

Student — I would like to ask, from an evolutionary point of view, what is the relation of the manasaputras to our Masters?

G. de P. — The question is a very general one, Doctor. You might say: what is the relation of the manasaputras to the average human being? The answer would be the same. Average human beings manifest those manasaputras who incarnated later than others. The Masters, the buddhas, manifest the splendid powers of those manasaputras who belonged to the most advanced part of the manasaputric host who first incarnated in early humanity. Do you understand?

Student — Yes.

Student — I was very much impressed — I think we all were — with what you have told us about the fact that we are not immortal, that we are a stream of consciousness.

G. de P. — Not immortal as persons.

Student — As persons, yes; but that the immortality that we have been believing in in a certain brain-mind sense does not exist. But in accordance with this new light, this new knowledge, we find a great deal more explained than hitherto has been the case about immortality in the public utterances of the teachers; and I have two questions. For instance, Madame Tingley has often answered, when people would ask: "What is theosophy?" "Theosophy is based upon the immortality of the soul." Was that for the public in order to fit the public for the higher knowledge? And my second question is: what is the reason? I can understand why many teachers —

G. de P. — May I answer one question at a time? KT was an esotericist through and through. As such, she would not under any circumstances give out esoteric teachings to the public. The real explanation of this whole immortality subject is an esoteric one, and is not fit for the public, who simply could not make head nor tail of it. So our beloved Katherine Tingley always used simple language, the simplest language that she could think of, language that people had been accustomed to, in order to give them hope, in order to lead them inwards, to lead them upwards, to train them. There is the whole answer to your question.

Student — May I ask another — very short? It is this: of course we all know that many doctrines are not given out because it would be dangerous; that they would be misused and harm would be done. But are there other reasons why this truth about the stream of consciousness was not given out? Is it because people could not understand it, or are there other reasons still? I cannot quite see how it could be misused. Perhaps I should not ask this question.

G. de P. — Your question is all right. You have put your finger right on the point, I think, whence the explanation begins. There are really two general explanations. First, as you have hinted or pointed out, the public could not understand, could not make head nor tail out of it. They would not be interested. And the second is that the teaching about this stream of consciousness, once you understand it, is an open sesame to great mysteries. It is a wonderful key. If you once get the understanding of it, things will flow into your mind that belong to higher teachings. These truths are yours if you can take them. They belong to you. They are your heritage by natural right. But you must take them yourself. I will tell you plainly that our theosophical doctrines in their esoteric aspect can lead to two things: one is supreme light, and the other is insanity or black magic. Now, that is the truth.

And this implies nothing against the theosophical teachings themselves. It is simply that people who are not prepared to go into a chemical laboratory (to use our old illustration) and play with the chemicals and explosives there ought to be kept out. Furthermore, anyone who gives a teaching, any teacher, becomes in a very real degree, karmically responsible for what happens to those who listen to what he says and who believe it, who are convinced. Their whole life thereafter is changed.

This teaching is a very serious matter indeed. All our theosophical doctrines, such as that of the stream of consciousness and the teachings concerning the nonexistence of immortality, unless they are carefully phrased, are dangerous teachings. There are men and women whose minds are so constructed that they would immediately say: "What's the use? I am nothing but a beast, after all. I go to pieces when I die and that is the end of me. What is all this palaver and talk about the karmic fruitage? I don't understand what that means. If there is nothing permanent in me, if I am not immortal, if there is nothing in me to be punished when I die, or to receive the recompense of my bad acts, why, let's go to it, and enjoy life while we can."

You understand, do you not? And these possibilities are very real. Indeed, there have been instances in the TS

where this has taken place. A man who wrote in the early days of the TS a little booklet called The Elixir of Life, is an instance in point. He was an Englishman, born in India, G----- M---- was his name, I think. He left the Christian Church early in life and became a Mohammedan, then an atheist, then a Roman Catholic, then met HPB and joined the TS, took the teachings, was greatly attracted by them, was convinced of their truth, but in a little while lost his moral balance, took to drink, became a Mohammedan again, then again an atheist, and finally suicided. I think that I have correctly stated the sequence of his doctrinal changes. The TS is not the only organization faced with the same problem. Are there not religious fanatics and "queers" in all the churches? Look at the Church of Rome, for instance. What has it produced in the way of murderers, fanatics,

people who go fanatically crazy. You understand, do you not?

Student — May I ask a question? What makes a planet a sun? For instance, in The Voice of the Silence, it speaks of Mars and Mercury having been suns in past kalpas and that they will again be suns. Will you tell us something of how a planet becomes a sun and how it can fall from that high estate?

G. de P. — Yes, I can say a little about that. Every planet is an evolved portion or particle of the sun that was in the previous solar manvantara. Therefore it is that the Tibetan work from which HPB quotes, speaks of Migmar, Mars, as having been once a portion of a brilliant sun. When a sun reaches its term of life and dies, it disintegrates; and the portions of it become the originals of planets, and cosmic dust, meteors, and what not.

But as every planetary body is an aggregate of lifeatoms, it evolves just as the human being evolves. It is an aggregate of life forces.

Our own earth, for example, as an instance of a planet, in the beginning of its evolution was an ethereal planet, starry, translucent. It became coarsened and grossened, and finally reached the state of gross material existence that it has at the present time. As the rounds go forward it will henceforth grow more immaterial progressively, until it reaches the same ethereal state, more or less, that it had in the beginning. It will then die. In time its reimbodiment will be a new earth, and our earth will then be its moon. But after a number of these reimbodiments have taken place, it will have evolved to be so ethereal, so spiritualized, that it then will be on its way to become a sun again in its own turn — no longer an atom of the sun, no longer a particle or a portion of a sun, but a sun itself. Do you understand?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — In the beginning it is a sun. It then dies, and breaks up. Its atoms, its particles, wander through space for aeons. All are sun matter; matter in its highest stage. This sun matter slowly concretes and grows material, each such particle or portion of the sun that was, and becomes a planet. A planet has its own evolutionary course from the ethereal to the physical and back to the ethereal. And after this has gone on a certain number of times, that is to say after a certain number of planetary reimbodiments have taken place, it rebecomes wholly etherealized, spiritualized again. It thus becomes a sun, so also we human beings are sons of the sun, spiritual atoms of the sun, or of some sun which is our parent-star; and we in turn shall grow from having been atoms of our parent-sun to become suns in our turn. Thus it is that the atom of the old sun in its turn becomes a new sun. You understand now, do you not?

Student — Yes, thank you.

Student — What you said a short time ago about karma — that we are in a very real sense our own karma —

reminds me of that wonderful statement in the early part of The Secret Doctrine to the effect that every being in the universe is self-produced, the result of its karma.

G. de P. — Correct, absolutely correct.

Student — But that being so, what an appalling thing it is from one point of view the amount of karma we must have yet to live through. We exhaust, as Mr. Judge says, only a very small portion, a minute portion, in any one life.

G. de P. — Fortunately.

Student — And there is waiting for us when we come out of devachan, the great reach of karma.

G. de P. — And that is yourself.

Student — And so it will go on practically endlessly.

G. de P. — Unendingly.

Student — We contact our own existence, our own selves.

G. de P. — Absolutely. We are our own children. We are self-produced from the spirit within us.

Student — If once we can get this great truth, terrible as it may seem — because we all know that we have done some very bad things — we shall see that it is also our salvation.

G. de P. — Absolutely true. And let me add to what you have said, that if you did not have as an individual this eternity of karma behind you, you would not have the eternity of the future before you. You are your own production. You have made yourself in past eternities what you are now. You are continually working out old karma, also continually creating new; and this process will continue throughout infinity.

Student — And I shall always be myself.

G. de P. — Always be the self, the stream of consciousness, which is "changeless." But remember, please, that all manifested existence is mayavi, illusory really, and the only fundamental thing in the human being is this stream of consciousness self-consciously growing ever larger, brighter, clearer. And this stream is endless. If at some indefinite time in the far distant past you may choose to say you began, this beginning of course is really the middle point of eternity, so to say, for you did not begin then. You have grown to be what you are now out of the past eternity, and you will keep on growing to be something ever greater in future eternity. You will become a god; then a sun; then something still more sublime. Consider the electron in an atom of our physical earth — it also is passing, enlarging, and growing forever. Don't be afraid of the load of karma that you have accumulated and that you are passing through, because if you are afraid, you are afraid of yourself.

Student — I was going to add, if I may, this thought: that this is the immortality that I desire and that it is the only sense in which I can understand immortality.

G. de P. — Certainly, you are quite right — the immortality in spiritual selfhood. And even that is not a true immortality, because that spiritual selfhood itself is changing and growing greater, does not remain the same thing for two seconds of time.

Student — If we did not do anything, if we did not make any karma, when we became planets and suns, we should not have anything to assemble, should we?

G. de P. — Exactly, exactly, perfectly right. You would not; nor in such case would you become suns and planets. If it were possible for an evolving entity to work out its karma entirely, why, it would be all annihilated, nothing left of it — which is impossible.

Student — I wanted to ask in what part of our nature the memory inheres. What relation has it to immortality?

G. de P. — Memory inheres in every part of us. There is the atomic memory, the human memory, the spiritual memory, the divine memory, even the physical memory, considered as an aggregate of atomic memories.

Student — Then we do not lose the sense of "I-am-I-ness"?

G. de P. — Why, you lose it at every instant. You are changing at every instant.

Student — Sages and Seers remember last lives.

G. de P. — Why, yes, but it is not the "I-am-I." It is the stream of consciousness, the "I-am," the thread-consciousness, the sutratman, the thread-self, which remembers.

Student — They remember the "I" as they were in past lives.

G. de P. — Certainly they do, because it is the stream of consciousness which includes these evanescent phases called the "I am I" when alive, and when dead, "I was." Each life is like a pearl strung on a string —

or, if you like, a bit of dirty coal. But everything that happens is a part of the stream of consciousness and therefore in a certain sense is deathless, indelible on the records of eternity.

Student — May I ask a question about karma? It is a pity to leave that subject unfinished, I think. There is a very famous passage in Light on the Path that I have studied, that many of us have studied, very deeply; and it is in our other literature also, about not trying to make good karma. The passage there says: "Don't try to make good karma, but try to become karmaless." I know that it is a phrase which is allegorical; but I would like some more information about that. It says: "Set the heart and mind on that which is above karma in a sense." We see the giant weed, looking for personality.

G. de P. — That is correct. That passage has reference to the fact that when the human being passes out of the state of human karma into the spiritual or divine, he is outside of the reach of any karma that could touch him as a human. He has left humanity, or rather the state of a human being, and has become a demigod. Human karma can no longer touch him, but spiritual karma can; because karma, please understand, is not something outside of him; it is what you yourself are. Karma means 'action,' 'movement,' whether of consciousness —

fundamentally of consciousness — or of anything else.

You frequently hear the statement in the Oriental works: "To pass beyond the bonds of karma," here referring to human karma, rising out of the mire of mere physical existence, rising out of human consciousness to spiritual consciousness, where human karma no longer exists. But spiritual karma there exists. The teaching is from the standpoint of the human, you understand. And it is also a blind — true as far as it goes, but not containing all the truth. Is the answer responsive?

Student — I would like a little more about the meaning of not trying to make good karma. It means not looking for results, I suppose?

G. de P. — That is it exactly. I have known people so intent upon being good that they thwarted their own objective. Don't set your mind on being good. Set your mind upon being impersonal, and you need not bother about evil or anything else; because if you are truly impersonal you will be incapable of harming or injuring any living thing. That is what the teachers are much more than we are: they are impersonal. There is much more about this teaching that I do not dare even to touch upon.

Student — Can a devachani make karma for himself while in the state of devachan? That is, is the devachani immortal while in that state? Can he make karma for himself as a devachani?

G. de P. — He cannot. No, he cannot.

Student — Then he is immortal in that state.

G. de P. — No, because he has the vast eternity of karmic results lying in the fabric of his being; and it is precisely the working of this past karma which brings the devachanic term to an end. Immortality means an immovable condition of identity enduring throughout eternity, and that is an impossibility, because we are changing and growing all the time.

Student — Then there is a constant state of change in devachan.

G. de P. — Absolutely. That is the very essence of devachan. It is like a man in a happy daydream —

constant change of thought. The mind fashions to itself pictures of beauty and glory, shifting and changing all the time like the incidents in a dream, like a picture continually changing. But being devachan, it is always beautiful, it is always happy. And avichi is just the nether pole of what devachan is. It is a condition in which the consciousness is undergoing a constant succession of horrors, of miseries. You understand that, don't you?

Student — Oh, yes.

Student — What you have just said brings out something that I have wanted to know. If a man of marked ability in this life with many fine things in his nature and many evil things also, dies, do the various bundles of consciousness suffer and enjoy by themselves? What is his state?

G. de P. — Is it the state of the reincarnating ego that you are referring to?

Student — Well, I don't know. If he is dissipated, if these bundles of consciousness separate at death, and the higher part of him goes off to enjoy itself, and the evil part suffers, are the enjoyment and the suffering two separate things?

G. de P. — Certainly.

Student — So, does the thing average up?

G. de P. — Remember, Doctor, that the human being is a composite entity, composed of a divine, a spiritual, a human, an astral, and a physical portion or portions, all these together working, and thus making the full or complete man while in incarnation. Now, when death supervenes, the lowest three principles drop to pieces, go to pieces. They are detached from the upper four, and they go to pieces, are disintegrated into the respective lifeatoms which compose the lower triad — the physical body, the pranic fluid, and the astral parts.

Student — Are they suffering for their evildoing?

G. de P. — No, they have no percipient consciousness to suffer as entities. The lifeatoms simply pursue their transmigrations through the realms of being. The physical lifeatoms go through the physical; the pranic lifeatoms go through the pranic; the astral, etheric, go through the astral realms. But the upper four principles consist of two duads, the monad per se formed of atman and buddhi, and the manas conjoined with the kamic principle form the lower duad. There then takes place what is called in the Mystery schools the second death: the separation of these two duads — the one, the higher, from the lower — the monad or the higher; and the kama-rupic spook, or lower.

Now, the kama-rupic spook has a quasi-consciousness for a certain time simply because it has a certain remnant of the consciousness of the man that was, inhering in the atoms of its being; but it is not conscious as a human being is. Its consciousness is a dream consciousness, very thin and vague, except in the case of very evil human beings. Then, in such case, as most of the consciousness of the man that was, was concentrated in his passional nature — in his selfish, personal nature — the kama-rupa is very strong, very active. Its kama-rupic consciousness is more or less keen, and it indeed does suffer. But not even then as a human being. It suffers automatically but with a dulled and imperfect perception.

As to the upper duad, the monad per se, the atman-buddhi — with all the best part of the consciousness of the man that was, which best part is the higher manas, withdrawn into the bosom of the monad — pursues its own peregrinations through the spheres, as I have told you before this evening, passing both on its outer rounds and on its inner rounds.

Student — Does the suffering consciousness learn anything from its suffering?

G. de P. — What do you mean by "the suffering consciousness"?

Student — Does the suffering after death —

G. de P. — There is not any.

Student — Not even for the spook?

G. de P. — As I have just told you, Doctor, the kama-rupic consciousness of the average man can hardly be called a consciousness. It is a vague, scarcely realizable dream sense, and so vague and faint that it is little more than perhaps the consciousness of the higher plants or of the lower animals. There is no suffering unless in the case of very evil beings; and then only because during the life last passed the evil man concentrated his life, his consciousness, in the lower parts of his being. And so the kama-rupa, being thus more closely knit together, impedes these remnants of the lowest part of the passional nature of the man that was from breaking up. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, I do; but I don't like to have this suffering not count for anything.

G. de P. — But there is not any suffering. You would not say that a plant suffers. We human beings with our tender hearts know that when a plant wilts, we may say that it suffers. Well, there is indeed a plant consciousness; but the plant is not self-conscious of what it is undergoing as being suffering. It is conscious of it only as a diminution of consciousness. So the kama-rupic spook, unless it be the kama-rupa of a very evil human being, has scarcely any consciousness at all.

Student — Then, is it during life that we must learn, where we have made our mistakes?

G. de P. — Certainly, certainly. Earth life is what is technically called the sphere of causes for the human being. (You are speaking of the human being now; you are not speaking of the monad, of course.) Man is a composite entity. Man is a composite entity. You are thinking of the human monad; in other words, of the human soul; and you think that that is all there is of man. But it is not. There is the monadic consciousness, the spiritual consciousness, the divine consciousness, within us or above us. Man is a composite entity.

Forget the idea that there is any suffering at all. There is suffering, however, in the case of willful black magicians reaching their end. There is suffering in the case of a human being who has pursued for many lives a deliberate, willful, course of evildoing and bestiality. But these are exceptional cases, extremely exceptional. And the suffering that occurs even there is ninety-nine percent of it in the life, before death —

except in the case of black magicians, as I have just pointed out. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, I do. I haven't said much about the monadic side, but I do really accept that. It is this separation of the bundle of consciousness that has confused me.

G. de P. — When the human being dies, being a composite entity, its component parts pursue each one its own path. The bundle falls to pieces, becomes, or separates into, the skandhas. The lifeatoms of the physical body pursue their course. The lifeatoms of prana pursue their peregrinations and transmigrations. The lifeatoms of the astral body pursue their transmigrations in the kama-rupic spook; each lifeatom attracted in every instance to spheres or to other bodies or to other living entities which are most like its own instincts and impulses. It is electromagnetically attracted to these new bodies into which the lifeatoms enter. Similarly so with the lifeatoms forming the lower part of the human soul on their plane.

Student — May I add that the thing which concerned me most was that we learn so slowly; and we are so blinded in life as to the reality of things, that I was hoping that we might get something out of the time between lives — that we might digest our experiences.

G. de P. — We do. As human beings we do so in the devachan. You might call it a period of digestion. There we assimilate what we have learned. It becomes part of us. That is very largely the function of devachan. We do not go to devachan to be happy. We go there, or rather we are in that state, because it is nature's law. Don't let the question of suffering bother you. You won't suffer when you die, nor will anyone else in this room.

Student — I would like to ask if there is such a thing as separation of the principles in some cases before the body dies?

G. de P. — Practically always. Practically always.

Student — In the case of a very brilliant-minded man who during the last ten or fifteen years of his life loses his mentality seemingly altogether, and loses his memory — in such case have not the higher principles, that is to say the higher ego, already gone?

G. de P. — That is a manner of expression. It is in the process of disjoining itself from the bundle, but it has not actually broken away from the bundle until death ensues.

Student — At death does he have this review of life?

G. de P. — Certainly.

Student — Then the whole being, the whole man, is there at death?

G. de P. — At the instant of death the entire man is there except in those few cases of the lost souls.

Student — May I speak about that? HPB gives in one of her writings the account of how at a pyramid in Egypt she met her old gardener or coachman, Piotre, who had died. She said that he was trying to get drink and trying to speak to her in great agony and suffering, because he could not get drink. And somebody took a drink and she said that the spook obsessed him. Is not that perhaps what the student was thinking of? Here was this person, a drunkard, who had lost his drink and could not get it, and he was suffering terribly.

G. de P. — But it was not anything of the coachman that was, except the kama-rupic spook, being the case of an evil man, a weak man, addicted to a prevailing vice. The kama-rupa reflects the viciousness of the man that was, and thus becomes an incarnate appetite, so to speak, and in the case you cite may be called the coachman only by courtesy.

Student — May I clear up a question which has often puzzled me? HPB says distinctly just what you have said, that there is no punishment after death, except in the case of the black magician. But Mr. Judge, in the

"Notes on the Bhagavad-Gita," gives quite a picture of a place of purification, almost a purgatory, in which he says there are as many different states as there are people, and that they go through a mental suffering there until they are freed and then go forward to devachan. Will you explain that apparent contradiction?

G. de P. — I don't see any contradiction. The process of the breaking up of the bundle which forms the complete man on earth takes place automatically and painlessly, as a rule. But the second death that I have already spoken of in the case of evil people is not an easy one. There is no suffering about it as we understand the word; but it does not take place easily and smoothly like growth, like the budding of a flower, which it ought to be and is in the case of normal people, of good people, of average people.

When a great soul dies, the separation of the principles is as simple as anything you can imagine. When an average man dies it is not quite so simple. The process takes more time, but it is painless and automatic.

When an evil man dies the separation of the principles is still more difficult on account of the concentration of material appetites, instincts, and impulses, in the fabric of the kama-rupa.

That is doubtless what Mr. Judge was referring to. There are in fact practically as many planes or grades in the kama-loka as there are human beings, because no two human beings are exactly alike.

Now, Companions, it is nearly half-past ten o'clock. I will answer one more question.

Student — I would be very glad to defer my question if you wish. But it is very short. We are told somewhere that the number of those who reach utter disintegration and who reach avichi is comparatively small, if I mistake not; and yet HPB says in one of her writings that we elbow soulless people at every step; and we are given to understand that it is not an uncommon phenomenon for the soul to depart during life.

Now, my question is: does the soul come back? What happens? What is the future of those who are described as soulless?

G. de P. — You confuse two things. I really do not understand why, because I have referred to this matter I should think a dozen times, both when KT was here and frequently since. Lost souls and soulless beings are not the same. A lost soul is one in whom the monad has definitely and forever left the intermediate and lower parts of the human constitution. A soulless being, so called, means one not in whom the soul is no longer there, but one in whom the soul — that is to say the higher part — no longer manifests its powers; but nevertheless a soulless person is not a lost soul. If a human being is not expressing the powers of his spiritual nature, we call him soulless. It does not mean that he has no soul; the phrase is a manner of speaking.

Consequently, as very many human beings do not live in their higher parts they are spoken of as soulless —

not meaning that they have no souls, which is ridiculous, but meaning that the soul is not actively manifesting as it should; and when we here say soul, we mean the spiritual soul. Consequently we elbow soulless people

at every turn. Our homes are full of them and so are the streets.

But a lost soul is a very rare occurrence, thank the immortal gods! It is one in whom the spiritual nature, the monad, so far as that human constitution is concerned, has definitely abandoned and left the wicked human soul. This case is spoken of as a lost soul because its final destiny is annihilation.

I don't want to end the meeting with this word. So I will remind you, Companions, that all of you in the core of you, are all sons of the sun, children of spiritual glory. It is well worth your while in every way to know this truth and to try to live it, and to be your real highest self. It is a god.

The meeting is now adjourned.

[Sounding of the gong.]

Meeting 7

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Seven

Meeting of February 26, 1930

G. de P. — Will you please come to order? [The sounding of the gong.] Has anyone any business this evening?

Miss E. V. Savage — Yes, I have something interesting to mention. In 1924 Katherine Tingley started a series of what were then called L. of L. [Lodge of Light] Meetings, first with a few members, and later others were added. And in looking over some of the papers of these meetings, I found a particularly interesting statement made by Katherine Tingley on March 13, 1924, at one of these meetings, and it is of interest to this group I thought because she speaks about the lectures that Professor de Purucker was giving at that time, and which are now going to be published in his book called Fundamentals of the Esoteric Philosophy — which this Katherine Tingley Memorial Group is trying to have published. I thought that I would read one part of it.

KT said: "Remember that you are speaking as though you had the listening ears of every esoteric member throughout the world, and that ultimately all this will be printed, and will be kept for later generations."

In another place she says to the members: "Remember that not only all that the Professor says will ultimately be printed in a book after it has been edited, but all that you members say will be passed on to the different centers where there are esoteric bodies."

In another place — this has nothing to do with the other quotations, but it is very interesting in view of what has since taken place: "Knowing the devotion that Professor de Purucker has always had for these studies, etc., I was very sure that no matter what might happen to me, I could so arrange it that he could carry on these lessons." Of course as ES members we can clearly see what that meant.

That is all.

G. de P. — Companions, I am ready to answer any questions now.

Student — You once stated, if I understood you correctly, that the passage of Orpheus through the Underworld was in fact an experience or stage on the path of initiation, but that in looking back at Eurydice he allowed a personal feeling to master him and thus failed.

How then, did he become the great spiritual teacher that accounts of his powers lead us to believe he must have been? Did he try again and succeed — this later trial and success being unrecorded? Or what?

G. de P. — The tale of Orpheus going to the underworld to rescue Eurydice symbolizes a very beautiful and very deep fact in the initiatory training of disciples, the fact that if one goes ahead to the very end — and indeed there is no end — to put it otherwise, the fact that if one goes ahead with the face constantly forwards, one is safe. But turning and looking at the life and pathway over which one has come, as one might turn and look at the stretch of land behind one over which one has journeyed, is a very dangerous thing to do, because the very act of turning, the curiosity drawing one back to material things, shows that full attainment has not been reached. It is precisely this hunger or longing for the things of the human heart, beautiful as they may seem to us human beings, which prevents one reaching the higher grades, the higher stages, of awakening, and the receiving of light — and this is initiation.

Now I would not like to say that the great sage known to the Greeks and to us as Orpheus ever went through such an experience as the myth sets forth. The myth is a symbolic rendering of the esoteric fact — and my own interpretation of it is subject to correction by a larger experience which of course I shall receive in future years — my own present interpretation of this beautiful myth is that the name of the great Greek sage was used in order to carry weight (for he was greatly revered in the early days of Greece), in pointing the moral of the story, and in instilling into the minds of the initiants the very obvious fact that higher than the human relations of husband and wife — Orpheus and Eurydice — there must be self-control, impersonality. Merely

placing this fact as the ground of a beautiful tale of self-control and self-forgetfulness taught the necessary ethical lesson of impersonality and prudence; because obviously it was the human love, according to this tale, which led Orpheus to look back upon the face of the woman whom he so dearly loved and whom he was leading out of Hades into the upper world, and which caused him to lose her. The idea is that first of all in esoteric training comes self-control, self-understanding, an inflexible will to do the right thing. And indeed without these even marriage itself is a mockery.

Student — Were Lao-Tse and Confucius messengers in the sense that our theosophical teachers are?

G. de P. — Yes, generally speaking they were; Lao-Tse in particular. He was a great sage, one of the greatest and noblest in Chinese history. Practically nothing is known of his life. There are few legends remaining about him, scarcely aught except a few vague and rather fugitive thoughts. He is supposed to have lived in about the sixth or seventh century BC, to have passed all his time in a certain kingdom of China, to have lived quietly his entire existence in this particular kingdom, to have taught mostly by means of paradoxes; and the following and influence that he had were very large. The only certain fact that is known of him is that at an advanced age he traveled westwards towards Tibet, and at the frontiers of the Tibetan-Chinese territories he disappeared and was heard of no more. Of course it is simply a case of one of the messengers of the Lodge returning Home, but doing so only when his life work was completed, and in this case doing so openly.

Personally I am very fond of the sayings of Lao-Tse. To me they are full of profound wisdom. He was a paradoxical philosopher. He would say in substance for instance that tao — an expression which is almost inexplicable in English, meaning somewhat what the theosophist means when he speaks of parabrahman —

"Tao is endless, tao is the minutest of the minute, tao is quiet and peace, and yet everything comes from tao.

Tao is endless, tao is beginningless, and yet is the beginning of all things." These are paradoxes of that type which you can understand immediately when you have the theosophical teachings which thus become a key.

I may add that Confucius was a pragmatical philosopher, and although his reputation in China is perhaps today greater than that of Lao-Tse, this is very easily understood when you remember the matter-of-fact and pragmatical Chinese mentality. On the whole, though, it may be said that the teachings of Lao-Tse have made a deeper spiritual impression on China than have even the nationally popular teachings of Confucius.

"In inaction," said Lao-Tse, "are the roots of achievement." "In action," said Lao-Tse, "a man wastes his strength and achieves naught. In inaction all is achieved, for strength is conserved. Thus also does tao."

I am here giving in substance some of the sayings of Lao-Tse, and not word for word.

Student — What are our relations and interrelations with our fellow human beings?

G. de P. — This is a very broad question indeed. It deals with all possible phases of human existence. What are our relations and interrelations with human beings? We are related to each other on spiritual and intellectual lines, psychical lines, and astral and vital lines, and physical lines. We are related by our diseases; we are related as fellow members of a common civilization, indeed of a common human brotherhood. The life forces which flow in any one human being pass to other human beings, and come from other human beings to any one human being. We are bound together by unbreakable bonds, not merely of destiny but of actual energy operating constantly, continuously, and operating among us as a human host from the very beginnings of time — which is a perfectly vague and indefinite way of speaking, and deliberately so chosen — in other words, from a time so far back that ordinary human history does not know its beginning.

We shall be so related in the future as we all evolve and grow until, and after, the time when we shall become gods. Then we shall be a spiritual host of dhyan-chohans, and we shall continue working together, each one of us human beings ultimately becoming a star, a blazing and glorious sun in the cosmic spaces, and such a collection of suns will form a universe. You who have ears to hear, hear.

Student — How deep or far-reaching is the influence that we have on each other?

G. de P. — I think that question has already been answered. This influence goes to the very roots of our being, from the spiritual to the physical, and in time it prevails from the eternity of the past to the eternity of

the future.

Student — You have often spoken to us of the various influences of the moon when it is waxing and when it is waning. In regard to this may I ask if there is any influence one way or the other at the time of an eclipse?

G. de P. — This is a most extraordinary question. There is, indeed, such an influence, and it is a very intimate one, not connected with the life of a globe merely, but with the life of humanity. I will not answer this question fully. I will say only that an eclipse of either the sun or of the moon is very closely connected with the circulations of the cosmos, and represents, or is in actual fact, the time of the transference of life energies from one celestial body to another celestial body.

Student — What effect will this have on the great initiations that take place about Easter time, as I understand there will be a partial eclipse of the moon during or about that time in this year [1930]? There will also be a partial eclipse of the sun during that same month.

G. de P. — I did not know of any eclipse of either sun or moon taking place at Easter time in this year. I believe, however, that there is an eclipse of the sun within a week of Easter, but that is not at Easter.

I will say the following in answer to this question, and I will transfer the date from Easter to the winter solstice about which I have spoken on other occasions with some definiteness of outline and in some detail.

The successful initiation of a Christ — using the word as a general term — or of a buddha, takes place at the time of the winter solstice, and takes place only when there is an eclipse of the sun on that day, or night of course — and this is a very important observation to make, and if you can understand it you will receive your own reward — when sun, moon, and earth, are in syzygy, that is to say in one straight line.

Student — Will you please tell us something about the causes of earthquakes and the consequences of them?

G. de P. — If I did, I would tell you something which would be considered very unscientific today, and which nevertheless is a fact in natural being. Earthquakes, of course, are karmic results. The instrumental cause of earthquakes — leaving aside the originating cause — the instrumental and material causes of earthquakes are certain positions of the earth in connection with the sun and moon; and three of the planets in particular are connected with the occurrence of earthquakes. These planets are Jupiter, Venus, and Mercury; to these should be added the powerful influence of the Moon and the Sun.

Earthquakes are electromagnetic phenomena. The originating cause is not the slipping of the strata of the earth nor the movement of rock upon rock. These movements occur, but they are the effects or results of the breaking — if I may so express it — of the electromagnetic tension. To put it in another way, these movements represent the discharge of a current. Do you understand me? Earthquakes are merely a phenomenon accompanying electromagnetic adjustments in the earth. Is that thought clear to you?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — And as the forces involved are deep-seated and enormous, their results of course are widespread and enormous in effect. In some countries earthquakes cause gaping chasms to open in the earth. I have been told that at the time of the earthquake in San Francisco in 1906, a certain section of a highroad was shifted bodily, I forget how many feet, six or ten feet, I believe.

But all these earth movements, earthquakes in other words, the quaking of the earth, the shaking of the earth, the chasms in the earth, the cracking of the earth's crust, the moving of rock over rock, are merely results of the breaking of the electromagnetic tension.

Student — May I ask something about earthquakes? Mr. Judge says something about the earth becoming suddenly fluid for a moment and great waves appearing.

G. de P. — Yes.

Student — I have heard that people who have been in great earthquakes have seen these extraordinary waves,

like the shaking of a carpet, not at all like our familiar, supposedly unmovable ground. But there is one thing I would like to ask: he says that great souls are born when there is an earthquake. That has always been a great difficulty to understand, because the scientists tell us that there are about a thousand or more earthquakes every year, many more than one a day — slight tremors — not large ones, but slight waves. Was Judge referring to something special, or did he refer to something esoteric? My specific question is about the great souls being born.

G. de P. — I may answer that you are right. I myself have seen the earth moving in waves. I was in San Diego County once, at a place not ten miles from San Diego, when I was quite a young man. I was at the time on the ranch of a friend, and was picking some raisins from a tray in a grape field or vineyard, when I suddenly heard this menacing, rolling, thunderous sound. I could not at once locate the sound, but I knew that it meant an earthquake. In a second or two afterwards, I could see the earth rolling like the waves of an ocean towards me; and the strange thing was, when it passed under me, I felt the quiver and the quake, but I did not feel the rolling motion, although I knew that the wave was passing under my feet.

Now it is true that there are many thousands of earthquakes a year; and, as a matter of fact, my own opinion, my own feeling, is that earthquakes are occurring all the time in some part of the world. The earth is in a constant state of tremor. It is only the larger and more violent quakes that we human beings with our imperfectly developed and gross senses take any cognizance of.

Furthermore, I will go a little farther into the cause of earthquakes. The cause of earthquakes is of course astral, which is but another way of saying that they reflect spiritual energies and movements which express themselves in the astral and physical worlds as tensions and the breaking of tensions. Furthermore, earthquakes do not occur merely when some great soul is born, but often also when some great soul dies —

for death is another kind of birth. All this is very unscientific, but of course that fact does not matter to the value of a bean. Many things today are accepted scientific facts which even so short a time as fifteen or twenty years ago would have been violent scientific heresies — superstitious beliefs they would have been called.

Every time when a child is born, there is a quake, but usually it is so small, so slight, that it of course passes entirely unfelt. No great soul can pass out of life — that is into the larger life, which is a birth — without the earth feeling it sympathetically. There is a rupture of a great spiritual force in this case, and the earth reacts either with a storm or with an earthquake, and sometimes both. In other words, death is an electromagnetic phenomenon and it is accompanied with electromagnetic phenomena. This is esotericism, of course, which after all is only a description of the truths of natural being.

But I can imagine how a modern physical scientist would look upon statements of this kind. I tell you that there is more truth in some of the popular legends of the barbarous peoples than there is in most of the textbooks of the academies of our most civilized countries. The reason is that these so-called barbarous peoples are the decrepit and degenerate representatives today of once wise and mighty ancestors, and they have kept a memory, or have kept recollections in the form of myth and legend, of this scientific knowledge of their once mighty forefathers.

Student — What are those little ripples of shadow that occur for a second or two when an eclipse of the sun is occurring? I forget the scientific name.

G. de P. — I know what you mean. I think the scientists call them shadowbands. I think that these are due to a movement of the air, which in its action is caused by the same type of electromagnetic adjustments of which I have already spoken. The earth quivers slightly, the motion is communicated to the atmosphere, which of course manifests the communicated motion in the quivering and causes the shadowbands, or whatever their name is. I have not really given the matter much thought. It is not of importance. But I think that what I have said is actually the true explanation.

Student — We study a good deal about the law of gravitation, and the motions of the planets in their orbits.

But is it actually that these laws are governing the physical globes, or are these laws governing the astral globes around which the physical are built? Otherwise, what is it that keeps the Earth rotating, or pursuing its

course along its orbit?

G. de P. — You were speaking of gravitation, were you not, a moment ago?

Student — Yes, gravitation or any of these forces that keep these globes going.

G. de P. — Is it your opinion that gravitation has anything to do with the rotation of these globes?

Student — I think it may have something to do with it.

G. de P. — Well, please frame your question clearly, get a clear-cut idea, because you have asked a question which is not clear, and which involves a number of other questions; and in order to do justice to your splendid mind, I want to give you a definite answer, if I can. You see, you have spoken of gravitation, rotation, of forces of nature, and your question is not clear because it is involved.

Student — What I meant to ask, Professor, was this: are these laws which govern the motions of the planets around the sun and around their own axes, actually governing the physical globes, or the astral globes around which the physical globes are built?

G. de P. — The astral globes. The physical body of both earth and man, which is as much as saying of every celestial body, is but the illusory effect of astral forces. The real physical man — using the word physical in a general sense — is the astral man. The astral is only a little less material than the physical, and the physical is merely the lees or dregs of the astral, if you understand me; just as wine has lees, or dirty water has a deposit.

Do you understand what I am trying to explain?

Student — Yes, Professor.

G. de P. — Therefore the answer comes immediately: it is the astral body which is the responsive seat of the forces playing upon any body, whether it be man, or celestial body, or beast, or tree, or even chemical atoms.

Do you understand? I may add that so far as our solar system is concerned, it is in the sun that originate all the forces that play so marvelously upon the astral bodies of the various celestial physical bodies, which of course, being the mere veils or garments of the astral, copy instantaneously whatever the astral undergoes.

You understand that, do you not?

Student — Yes, I do. Thank you.

Student — May I ask a question? There are thousands of people killed in these earthquakes. Is that their karma for wrong action, wrong thought?

G. de P. — Certainly it is. Do you think that they would be killed by chance?

Student — No.

G. de P. — If they are not killed by chance they are killed by law — what you may call cause and effect.

Student — Then the earthquake must be caused by karmic adjusters?

G. de P. — Certainly. Do you understand what these karmic adjusters are?

Student — I understand what The Secret Doctrine says about it.

G. de P. — What does it say about it?

Student — That they are the maharajas of the four corners of the earth, I believe.

G. de P. — The four corners of space. The karmic adjusters are actually the celestial bodies, the instruments of karma, and it is upon this truth that reposes the true meaning of the ancient astrology. Earthquakes are merely reflections on earth — and this is in addition to all that I have said before, not in contradiction —

earthquakes are merely the reflections on earth of karmic adjustments brought about through the instrumentality of the celestial bodies. Just exactly as in our own human life, our karma comes to us usually by means of or through the instrumentality of other human beings — whether for our weal or for our woe —

because we have put ourselves by past acts and thoughts and emotions in such karmic condition that we are there at the particular point, when whatever it is occurs, receiving then and there what men call good or what men call ill, good fortune or bad fortune.

Please understand that karma is not something outside. It is proper to speak of the law of karma, of course.

But a law is usually supposed to be a course of nature, acting consistently always in the same direction and in the same manner in identic circumstances or closely similar circumstances; in other words an invariable course of nature's operations. But that obviously means that karma is in nature, it is not something outside of it. Your karma is not outside of you. You are your own karma. Try to understand this. We affect each other because our vital relations together — the vital bonds binding us together — are altered from instant to instant, and from year to year, and from life to life, by the thoughts we think and the acts we do and the emotions that we feel.

This is a very deep subject indeed. I don't know whether I have made the general drift of the thought clear.

Have I or have I not?

Student — Yes, thank you.

Student — If we are ready to change the subject, Professor: we have some cases in the School of ambidexterity among the children. Could you tell us something of the cause and of the proper training of an ambidextrous child?

G. de P. — Left-handedness or double-handedness?

Student — Double-handedness.

G. de P. — Well, of course, physical left-handedness which is half of ambidexterity, just as right-handedness is half of ambidexterity, are karmic results like everything else, and either of these depends upon the flow-magnitude of the pranas in the body. I believe myself, although this is a question to which I have not given much thought, but answering immediately and offhand, extempore as the saying goes, that if we could trace the exact condition of the organs of the body, and the state of the various lobes of the brain, we should find that there is a difference in these matters as between right-handed people and left-handed people. Not that either is superior to the other, although right-handedness is the norm, is the rule.

Now I am not certain myself that ambidexterity is an altogether good thing to cultivate. I have heard many people say: "I think it would be splendid to make my child ambidextrous, able to write with either hand." But I wonder; I am not so sure. If nature had considered ambidexterity the better, I have an opinion that ambidexterity would be the natural or normal thing, and either right-handedness or left-handedness would be abnormal. Nature follows always the lines of least resistance.

It may be that for some particular individuals, ambidexterity would be useful in a material way. But I think that cultivation of ambidexterity might lead to too much attention being given to matters of the body. The whole of esoteric training, which is the finer part of life, is an attempt to lead human attention away from the body as much as can properly be done towards the things that clarify human life, make it grand and splendid; in other words, towards the things of the spirit, the things of the intellect, the things of the heart.

Student — Can you tell us what is the difference between right and left?

G. de P. — I think I understand the question, but it is rather vague. Just what do you mean by the difference between right and left?

Student — I have never been able to find any definition of what right and left are. If you look in the dictionary they tell you right is not left and left is not right, which is no explanation. I have often wondered what the real difference between right and left is.

G. de P. — Well, I can give this answer. It is customary to call right the norm in natural function: a right-handed man, a right-minded man, meaning that which is nature's rule, acting in accordance with which means harmony, acting in opposition to which as a rule brings trouble.

We speak of the right-hand path and the left-hand path. This is a phrase meaning that the right-hand path is the path of the normal action of nature: working with nature and not contrary to the set or general direction of her current of evolution; acting contrary to which is called the left-hand path. Now this does not mean that left-handed people are on the left-hand path. Please understand that, because nature does not bring human beings into life destining one to the right-hand path and the other to the left-hand path. It is the individual himself or herself who makes or who takes the right-hand path or the left-hand path; and as I have before stated, left-handedness is a peculiar karmic result of some obscure psychological and therefore physically organic condition.

I do not know that left-handedness has any particular significance; nevertheless, if our anatomists were clever enough and had the opportunity I doubt not personally that they would find a difference in the anatomical structure between right-handed and left-handed people; although the difference might be apparently small between the right-handed person and the left-handed person. As to right and left, it is like saying before and behind, and up and down — in all cases referring to directions in space.

I suppose that if human beings were born ambidextrous — if that condition were the norm — we would not use the words right and left at all. I hope that you get the drift of my rather labored answer to the question. It is rather an abstract one, and I have tried to make it as concrete as I can.

Is there any other question?

Student — Could I have a further explanation of Mme. Blavatsky's statement about no Master of Wisdom coming till the end of the century?

G. de P. — Well, it is in the Book of Rules which was sent out by HPB. I can tell you this: that a Master of Wisdom will not come during the last quarter of this century, but of course a messenger will come. And I will tell you more: that the Lodge is sending out messengers into the world virtually all the time. By that I do not mean every day, but I mean when one messenger has finished his work, another messenger will come if the call has been made, and if the link has been kept unbroken. If it is broken, no messenger will come until the next century comes around and the last quarter of it begins. Then as a rule the new messenger comes from the Lodge to forge a new link.

Now it is these things that HPB had in mind, and it is this that one branch of the theosophical movement, I believe, refers to when they say that there has been no messenger since HPB and Judge. Now that is not true.

It gives the idea that the Lodge was beaten in its struggle to carry spiritual light into the world; that the spiritual forces have stopped flowing so far as the world is concerned; that the world is left to do the best it can with the feeble light emanating from theosophical books. The Lodge does not work in that way. It is working among men all the time, although it is true, on the other hand, that at the end of every century, a new effort, or an especial effort, is made to instill spiritual principles and thought into men's minds.

If the link is broken after I am gone none will appear again until the last quarter of the century comes.

Hitherto your hearts, your minds, have been true and devoted enough to keep at least the link unbroken. The golden chain of communication, the golden thread of spiritual union, has not been snapped, and that is saying a great deal, I can tell you. Study the words of HPB in the Book of Rules. Try to understand them. They are well worth it.

Is this answer responsive, at least in a general way, to your question?

Student — Not exactly, Professor, because I did not mean to lay weight on that one statement or anything that was said about it. This is what puzzles me: how can anyone make any statement about what will happen in the future when the future does not exist until it becomes the present — that is, as far as I can see.

G. de P. — But it does. The future does exist in the present because the present is its parent, its cause.

Student — Well, in that case, could not people argue that the future is already planned, so what is the use of making special efforts?

G. de P. — No. You are touching upon the question of destiny and fate, a very profound question. Now let me tell you one thing. Forget the matter-side of existence and you will understand. It is our brains of matter, the passage of time, which make us believe that there is a past, that there is a present, and that there is a future, which are all fundamentally distinct, whereas in reality they are not. I tell you that they are one: that we human beings and everything else are rooted in an eternal consciousness, in a stream of consciousness whose characteristic is now; and that past, present, and future, when rightly viewed, are an Eternal Now.

Examine your own consciousness. The only thing you are really conscious of, that you really know, is the now. You cannot remember the past very well. You cannot throw your consciousness forward into what your brain-minds call the future, because you think of the rotation of the earth on its axis and of tomorrow morning, and of ten years from now, and of twenty years from now. But in twenty years from now, if you live, your consciousness will be just the same as it is now, and you will have the same feeling as now, of the Eternal Now. It is the consciousness. Do you get that?

It is a most subtle and difficult question which has puzzled philosophers for ages. Questions of destiny and prophecy and all the rest of it are bound up in this conception. From the standpoint of matter, there is a past, there is a present, there is a future, but simply because these things, being involved in matter, are an illusion.

They have no existence in themselves. They are a reflection of interior energies and forces springing from consciousness.

The reason why the Masters of Wisdom can see into the future is on account of the mathematical relationship that the human consciousness bears to the operation of cycles in nature. Knowing that cycles exist, and when they begin and end, and the manner of their working, these great sages can tell from the nature of a cycle when it begins, how it will end, and consequently can predict, prophesy, prognosticate, and in a general way know, just about when certain things will be repeated in history in the future. If nature did not move in cycles, prevision, or prophecy, or seeing into the future, or whatever you like to call it, would be utterly impossible.

But as cycles exist, which are merely repetitions of nature's operations, with the great knowledge that they have, and with the exercise of their spiritual vision, they can look into the future and tell what is coming.

So far as the Theosophical Society is concerned, and the special spiritual effort that is made in the last quarter of each century, they know when this will happen because it has been the custom of the Lodge to do this for many, many ages; and they know that this will be done in the future.

I have now in brief answered your question.

Student — Professor, I am a little puzzled about the music that one hears in one's sleep. Perhaps you can explain it a little. Speaking about illusion, has that music actually been played, or is it being played at the time one hears it when one is asleep?

G. de P. — How do you hear it?

Student — I can hear a string quartet, or an orchestra, or individuals, playing. I have even heard my sister who has passed on. I have seen her at the piano and heard the music as plainly as if she were in the room. But what is that music? Is it being played and do I hear it?

G. de P. — Yes, it is in your consciousness.

Student — But is somebody else playing it?

G. de P. — No, it is in your consciousness.

Student — But I cannot play that music. I cannot play the whole orchestra.

G. de P. — But, dear Companion, you are very much greater in your inner constitution than you are in your physical brain-mind. Your spiritual consciousness is vastly greater than the brain-mind consciousness which we know as you. Do you understand? Similarly a philosopher will solve philosophical problems in his sleep.

A mathematician will receive the answer to mathematical problems in his sleep and then wake up — this is common, it is well known to be a fact — and if he is alert, and if the impression received when first waking is very strong, instances have been known time and time again when he will immediately write it down, lest he later forget. The entire music is something that you experience in your own consciousness.

Student — Then that music is not actually played by someone else?

G. de P. — It is played in your own consciousness. It is more real music than the music that you can produce on your violin. It is pure vibration engendered by your creative spirit, by your intelligence, by your consciousness. You don't have to resort to catgut and wood in order to produce sounds.

Student — Thank you.

Student — I would like to ask, Professor, where does the inspiration come from to play beautiful harmony, when one cannot understand music, or read music, and yet the most exquisite harmony will come at times —

where does it come from?

G. de P. — I think in this case it is a reflection of the past, a memory of the past; and if it is yours, I would say that it is a soul memory out of the past. You were a musician probably, loved the art, and the memory of it remains in your soul, and in this incarnation, you receive, as it were, reflections. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes, perfectly.

G. de P. — I think that is the case in the instance of which you speak. You see the phenomena of consciousness are so many and so subtle, so difficult to locate with exactitude in any one particular instance, that I hesitate to give a generally inclusive and very definite answer. I can say the general rule, but I might err in the instance, if I were too particular in defining just what it might be.

Student — Pardon me for referring to a subject that you have already spoken of this evening. Is there not always a messenger of the Masters of Wisdom operating on what we term our earth plane, and it is we who fail to recognize him?

G. de P. — Yes, lack of recognition is usually the case, alas! And not only one messenger, but sometimes several are at work. Now I know for a fact that the Lodge at the present time has five different messengers working in various parts of the world, but only one is known and he is the Leader of the Theosophical Society

— I mean known as a messenger — the only one authorized to proclaim the fact. That does not mean that he is the greatest of the five, not at all, I do not mean that. But on account of conditions he is the only one who is authorized to proclaim the fact. Do you understand that?

Student — Perfectly. Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — There are many cases where the Lodge works in the silence, and behind the scenes, so far as the knowledge of men goes.

Student — It is simply the secret work that is continually going on?

G. de P. — Continually, uninterruptedly, unceasingly. The idea that the Lodge of the mahatmas is quiescent, or goes to sleep, or stops its grand work for humanity even for an instant, is altogether wrong; wrong all through. And no one could believe it for an instant — no theosophist, at least, if he gave time to think about it.

Student — I understand you.

G. de P. — The next question, please.

Student — I would like to ask a question on astronomy. The present-day position of the scientific world, in regard to the motion of the solar system as a whole, is that to all appearances the solar system revolves around Alcyone in the Pleiades. What has the esoteric doctrine to say about this? Is it true?

G. de P. — Well, if it were true, it would not be of especial importance. Even the Hebrew Bible speaks of

"the sweet influence of the Pleiades." Alcyone, one of the stars of the Pleiades-group, is a well-known star in occultism. I may say: from that group come to our solar system some of the most elevating spiritual influences that it receives from the entire cosmos — which is the basis of this Hebrew remark.

I don't know that our solar system revolves around Alcyone as a central sun. In fact I do not believe it does. I am practically sure that it does not. You must remember that Occidental astronomy is still an infant. It is a lusty infant, a vigorous infant, it is making rapid growth. Our astronomers are becoming really almost astrological in our days. They are making wonderful strides forward. I read their discoveries and philosophical deductions with fascinated interest to see how rapidly in some cases they are fringing the frontiers of our esoteric truths. But until our astronomers can free themselves from materialistic ideas, their imagination will still be earthbound.

No, I do not think that Alcyone is the great central sun. In fact I know it is not, although the movement, as far as our astronomers can trace it, of the solar system today may seem to be pursuing an orbit of which Alcyone apparently occupies either the center of the circle or one of the foci of a cosmic ellipse.

Our astronomy is not yet old enough fully to have traced the orbit that the solar system is actually making around some greater spiritual center. The real central sun of the solar system is invisible. In fact, it is not on this plane; and it is what we call in Tibetan and Indian occultism a raja-sun, a king-sun.

The next question, please.

Student — May I know if the seven globes of the earth-chain are coexistent and interpenetrate? Are we living right among them ourselves unconsciously?

G. de P. — I will tell you this: there are seven globes to the earth-chain. These globes are not the seven principles of the earth, although the analogy is very close. Each one of the globes is a planet, although the seven together form our earth-chain. They are coadunated, that is, united into one group forming a distinct entity — not a body, but a distinct entitative aggregate. Do you understand me?

They are not consubstantial — that is, of the same degree of ethereality or materiality. We are not living among them; in other words they do not interpenetrate us as they would if they were all concentric. You understand what that means?

But do not believe, on the other hand, that the other six globes of our planetary chain form a circle as it were, or rather links or condensations on a mere circle like a necklace. They, all the seven globes, are represented that way on paper for purposes of convenient illustration, but they are actually scattered about in space not far from our earth; and by far, I am speaking in cosmic terms. Nevertheless they are coadunated and in one sense their influences interpenetrate each other.

Mrs. Besant, unfortunately, I believe due to the teachings of Mr. Leadbeater, confused herself up very erroneously, mentally speaking, with regard to the teachings concerning the seven globes of the planetary chain, and has adopted a view about it which is quite contrary to what H. P. Blavatsky sets forth in The Secret Doctrine. I don't blame Mrs. Besant, I don't blame Mr. Leadbeater. They simply have not understood.

Student — Is the devachanic state possible only when the physical body dies?

G. de P. — It is not. It is quite possible for a man to be alive and to be in a quasi-devachanic state, which is but another way of saying already partly in devachan. It is usually shown in a certain type of dreamy, rather erratic mentality, and it is not a good state to be in. We are here on earth to be alive, to be alive all through and awake and alert, to be a sevenfold human being, ideally speaking, with every one of the principles fully

active. That is the ideal, of course. It is impossible for them all to be equally active, but many human beings, especially towards the end of life, are already partly in devachan. They begin to dream and to allow the mind and the emotions to become devachanic. It is bad, and it should be stopped.

Student — Are not children also in that state?

G. de P. — Quite so. Children having just come out of the devachanic state — just come out I mean relatively — are therefore not yet fully out of it. And this accounts for their dreamy, undeveloped attitude. It is very difficult to describe these states of consciousness, but I think that I have made the meaning clear.

As a human being grows, he grows more fully out of the devachanic state and becomes alert. But that alertness is not necessarily spiritual. Human beings as yet are very imperfectly evolved. The ideal human being, Companions, is one in whom every principle is functioning, every one of them — the highest principles taking their proper places as the leaders in the functioning, as the chief elements in the consciousness: the spiritual first, the intellectual next, and the mental and psychical third, and the astral-physical last. That is the ideal, the body being merely the vehicle and the utterly slavishly responsive instrument of the promptings of the higher part of man's constitution.

Student — Mr. Judge, I believe, in The Ocean of Theosophy makes this statement that the egos come down with the rain. Is that so? Can you explain it? I understand it was in the Ocean, but I could not find it the last time I looked it up.

G. de P. — Come down with the rain?

Student — Yes, that the egos come down with the rain.

G. de P. — What put that into your head?

Student — It was simply that I didn't understand it when I read it. It was the statement of Mr. Judge, and I think you made some similar suggestion one time before when you were speaking on that subject. I got some idea but thought that you might enlarge upon it tonight.

G. de P. — Well, it is a matter which really does not have any particular importance in practical affairs of daily life. A great many of the ancient literatures, religious and philosophical, allude to the fact. I won't say it is not true — please understand me — but it is one which requires a great deal of thought, and I would not like to answer it tonight.

The next question, please.

Student — Is there an esoteric explanation for the different colors that we notice in the various stars? I would like to know.

G. de P. — Yes, there is. Of course the differences in color that our imperfect eyes see are merely feeble reflections of the different tints, as we humans construe them, of the spiritual forces working through the various orbs. I mean by that the following: each star is a seven-principle entity first. Nevertheless each star has its own individuality just like human beings; each one is a seven-principle entity, yet each one has his or her own individuality. And one of the expressions of this individuality is the color of the life-aura streaming through it.

Now one of the phases of this life-aura is light. And all light is color. There is no such thing as colorless light.

If you could see your fellow human beings in their proper colors, you would see that one man was surrounded by a blue atmosphere, another by a darker blue, another with a red atmosphere, another with a darker red, another with a yellow, and so forth all through the range of colors. Each color emanating from a human being, and likewise from a star or any other entity, is not simply a dull color, but is scintillating and glittering all the time with shifting phases of the most wonderful tints. A blue man, for instance, would have a background of blue, and yet there would be flashes and coruscations of red and green and pink and gold and violet and all the rest of the shades and tints.

Therefore each star, whether it be what the astronomers call a blue star or a yellow star or a white star or a red star — these are the main ones that they know — is such because the life forces stream from it as light, and its light is of such or another color.

Of course, here again we must make allowances for what our earth atmosphere does to these colors. It not only darkens the colors, but to a certain extent absorbs them and therefore changes them, modifies them. For instance, the color of our own sun is blue, it is a blue star. We think its color is yellow because its color is changed by our atmosphere and by other things. Yet the actual color of our sun is blue, a dark blue, and I do not mean indigo, but a color intermediate between cerulean or sky blue and indigo.

Student — Frequently in our literature such expressions as this occur: if the manas succeeds in uniting itself with buddhi, such and such a thing happens — implying that there is a question whether that union will be made, that it is something to be achieved, but is not certain. And we have been told of the wonderful initiations which take place for the human ego which raises itself to the level of the manasaputra. Now my question is: is there an initiation for the manasaputra to unite itself with buddhi?

G. de P. — Is there what?

Student — Is there an initiation for the manasaputra to effect this union with buddhi?

G. de P. — It has already done so, and therefore it is a manasaputra. Now the reference here evidently is to the self-conscious union of manas with buddhi. Manas is always connected with buddhi because it is its child

— it is the dregs so to say of buddhi, the lees or the deposit thereof on a lower plane. Hence also it is the vehicle of buddhi. But when there is a self-conscious union, when the human self consciously allies itself with its inner god, then there is the self-conscious union, and the phrase goes: "manas has become one with its parent buddhi." Is the answer responsive?

Student — Yes, thank you.

Student — May I ask a question? I believe you said that the initiations of the Christs or Buddhas take place at the time of a solar eclipse. I have two questions: would the path of shadow — that is the narrow path of shadow cast by the moon being between us and the sun — would that part of the earth across which that shadow passed be one of the places in which the initiation took place?

G. de P. — Not necessarily.

Student — My second question: is there a set influence coming from the sun to that band of shadow that crosses the earth at that time?

G. de P. — Emphatically yes. You are growing very intuitive. Where do you get these ideas from?

Student — May I ask you that question?

G. de P. — Well, I have been taught, and I have had experience; but I would like to ask you that question.

Was it an intuition?

Student — Well, when we were studying the matter of the solar eclipse, when I thought of an eclipse, I thought of that dark shadow that flits across the earth, having seen it on maps representing the time of an eclipse, and I have often wondered if something from the sun goes specially to that line of shadow.

G. de P. — It does indeed. You are very intuitive.

Student — May I ask a question about music, to go back to a more mundane subject? During the first congress — I came to Point Loma shortly afterwards — quite a number of students, and I think some of them are here now and one I know is here tonight, said that during the laying of the cornerstone wonderful music was heard in the air over the cornerstone during a certain part of the ceremony. And then I was told about two other occasions when I have good reason to believe there was exquisite music. It did not seem to be anything

existing in one person's consciousness because many heard it. Would that be what the scientists call a collective hallucination from one person, or was it some real spiritual presence? I think KT spoke of it too.

G. de P. — I have no doubt that the scientists would call it a collective hallucination. It is very usual to use words like these and to think that you are explaining something when you are merely exposing your ignorance; and human beings are apt to be fond of exposing their ignorance by their explanations — not of course willingly doing so.

I think those cases were due to the combined elevation of soul, the deep devotional feeling, of the members present who, on account of that deep devotion, were temporarily raised out of their ordinary human consciousness into the harmonies of the spiritual part of themselves. And those harmonies are not unreal: they are more real than the harmonies of earth.

Music is not something that the body produces. The musician merely brings to earth and interprets — oh!

how can I express it — the harmonies within, the things which the inner so-called spiritual ear hears, the harmonies of his own soul. He is an interpreter of harmony, the harmony which exists in nature. I tell you that the very atoms sing. The stars in their courses sing. The planets as they whirl around the sun, each one sings its own note. Every atom in the body of every one of you is singing its own particular note, and this note in its turn is a composite note. It is a chord, composed of the various smaller notes of the electrons and protons of the atom. And if we had the ears to hear, we could hear the symphony that even the physical body of each one of us is continuously making, all the time, day and night; and what exists on the physical plane exists likewise on other planes.

Student — May I ask a question? I would like to refer to the subject of initiation and globes. Speaking of these both — a shadow thrown by the moon during an eclipse — is it that the combined effort, the combined attraction, of the sun and the moon, the electromagnetic attraction that they exercise upon the earth and especially upon the line on which the shadow of the moon falls at the time, raises the neophyte, the one to be initiated, into the final mysteries, along that ray, along that path from the earth where he is, through the moon to the sun?

G. de P. — I am not permitted to answer your question. And yet you have made a call and it is my duty to make some answer. I perhaps can say this — and you may take the hint — that you are not far from having stated a great natural truth.

Student — May I ask a question? Aside from the usual tawdry teachings of numerology, is there any real affinity between individuals and numbers?

G. de P. — You are right when you speak of the tawdry aspect. There is an affinity however. Every human being has his own vibrational number, which is the combined expression of all the vibrations of his constitution, if you follow my vague explanation. He has, therefore, a number; this number is his vibrational rate. This rate is made up of all the rates of every particle of his being, within and without. That answers your question, does it not?

Student — Yes.

Student — Last week we had several very beautiful sunsets, and one in particular. I wondered what the cause was, beyond atmospheric conditions, for these wonderful sunsets? Do they have any connection with the idea that thoughts become entities? Are they the expressions of particularly beautiful thoughts that have been given out at any one time?

G. de P. — In a way, yes. But not so much thoughts emanating from human beings, as the expression of the working of solar spirits. I know what the labored explanation of sunsets is as delivered to us in the textbooks of the scientists, and there is some truth in it too. But what causes, what makes, what produces, the conditions in which beautiful sunsets occur? Why do they arise? And after that question is answered: why do they arise at such and such times? I tell you that every phenomenon of nature is a product of spiritual activity, if we go back far enough in nature's life, into the treasuries of life.

There is more mystery in the life of a tree, in the petal of a flower, in the color of a flower, than the average human being has any realization of. Flowers have souls, and the color and perfume and shape of a flower are the expression on this plane of the soul of that flower. Just as human beings have, each one, his or her respective odor, respective color, which our sense organs cannot usually perceive, and which ultimately we may call the expression on the physical plane of the soul of that human being. Thus is it likewise with sunsets.

What if I were to tell you that sunsets are produced by entities which have died? I should be telling you a truth, but here I can go no farther.

Will some one please ask a question that does not put me in an embarrassing position?

Student — You spoke at our last meeting of the third eye, and I wanted to know if this passage in The Voice of the Silence has reference to it: "Merge into one sense thy senses, for it is by that sense alone, concealed within the hollow of thy brain, that the steep path which leadeth to thy Master may be disclosed before thy soul's dim eye."

G. de P. — Yes, it is. The third eye so called is the main organ in the physical body at present through which the forces of man's higher constitution play. It is the main organ in the physical body at present through which the forces of the higher part of the human constitution, in the present stage of human evolution, play; and therefore is it very straitly, very closely, connected with the working of karma.

Student — May I ask a question, please? You told us, I think it was the last time we were here, that thoughts are elementals passing across the consciousness, and I can understand how this could be true of the thought-stream that rushes through most of our minds; but surely it is not true, is it, of the only real thinking that a person does? Not thoughts but thought?

G. de P. — Of course pure thought is the manasic aspect of the stream of consciousness, and thoughts are the children of thought. Every thought is an elemental, it is a manasic elemental. It is rooted in the manasic side of us. Every personal emotion, or thought which produces a personal emotion, the energy behind that personal emotion — and this amounts to the same thing — is already an elemental, and these are rooted in the kama-side of our constitution; kama, of course, as you know, having its lofty side as well as its low side.

Every one of our seven principles has its own subdivisions. Take love for instance: love in its loftiest part belongs to the highest part of our being; and its lowest side —

Is the answer at all responsive to your question?

Student — Yes, I think it is.

G. de P. — You think it is, but you are not sure.

Student — Well, I have to think about it some more.

Student — Is it not a fact that the Theosophical Society has made greater progress, just as the city of San Diego has, since the complete eclipse [September, 1923] which took place some seven years ago, both in its entire history and in its progress of spiritual advancement — I mean in spreading the truth to the general public?

G. de P. — That is true. More spiritual progress has been made in the Theosophical Society since that last eclipse than — I think I may state this truthfully with no reservations — than had been made from the Society's founding up to that date.

Is the answer responsive to your question?

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — I think it is now nearly ten. I will answer one more question.

Student — May I go back to the question of karma? You say that the death of a person is his karma. In that case I suppose it is incorrect to state that anyone's death is premature?

G. de P. — It is incorrect, if you look strictly at karmic causes. Whatever happens is karma and is therefore

"in the law"; but when we speak of a premature death, we do so with the feeling that if the individual had had a different karma, a better karma, he would have lived longer and accomplished more in the present life.

We speak of a chela failing. Well, of course, it is his karma to fail, that is true; nevertheless we recognize that it was a failure. Do you see the point? It was indeed a failure, and he must try again. Similarly therefore we speak of a premature death, a child dying for instance. It is not the normal thing in nature. It is a misfortune

— karma to be sure — but nevertheless it is misfortunate because it is premature.

Student — I suppose that explains why, when a death occurs and we feel it is premature, there is a particularly wicked-feeling storm. It is not a rainstorm, but it has generally been a very violent windstorm that seems to come out of nowhere.

G. de P. — Yes, I think I understand your thought. But if you are referring to the great ones who pass, and the storms which then usually occur, but not always, I would not call such cases premature deaths.

Student — No, I was not referring to the great ones. I was referring to some of the people who have died quite young from some sickness or other cause. What I was thinking of was this: we have often noticed that when a death occurs, which we call premature, the forces of nature seem to be stirred up because of it. And thinking that, if all death was karmic, there could be no such thing as prematurity, I wondered about that phenomenon?

G. de P. — I see what you mean. Yes, there are premature deaths, in the sense that I have tried to explain; deaths which in the natural course of normal human beings should not, and would not, have occurred at the time. But of course it is their karma. It is what they have reaped in consequence of what they have sown.

Student — If everything is according to law, how is it that we may apparently have a dozen paths to choose?

Is the one that we do choose eventually the one that it is in the law for us to choose?

G. de P. — Well, yes. But I never knew before that a human being had a dozen karmic paths to choose from.

Student — Well, there may be many different things you might do; and I wondered whether the one you eventually did do, was what was in the law for you to do.

G. de P. — Yes, certainly. Now I understand your question. Certainly it is.

Student — Well, why do we go such a devious route, again, and again, and again?

G. de P. — Because it is human stupidity. Human beings have free will, and because they are unevolved, the exercise of that free will is often unintelligent.

Student — We don't use our intuition.

G. de P. — We don't use our intuition in most cases, but any human being has free will and intelligence, and he can misuse his will, and abuse his intelligence, and instead of taking the right path, take the inferior one.

But once he has taken it, he will have to abide by the consequences, the karmic results.

Student — May I ask a question? You stated some time ago, I understand, that unless one's star is in a certain position, no one can possibly die. Could you tell us something more about that: as to what the position is, and how often in the year that star comes into that position?

G. de P. — Well, I don't know that any star comes into any one position more than once a year. I did not mean, when speaking before, that the stars abandoned their natural laws and were seen racing in circles over the sky. I merely meant that every human being is spiritually rooted in a star, and until the earth arrives in a

certain position in its orbit death cannot occur.

Now just what that position might be, obviously I cannot say, because there are something like two billion inhabitants of the earth, and you would have to divide, therefore, the orbit of the earth into two billion points, and tell me which one of the two billion points your particular individual belongs to, or which point belongs to him. Do you see the idea?

Student — Yes, I do. What I meant was: does the earth come into that position every twenty-four hours, or only so often, so many times a year? That's what I mean.

G. de P. — It happens once a year for each individual, depending upon the position of the earth in its orbital revolution around the sun. Then of course it depends upon the rotation of the earth also. We do not die by chance or haphazard. We are linked with the stars, and not only in origin; but all nature is a vast organism —

you may call it a mechanism, to look at it from the material side, from the material viewpoint — and everything works together.

Every atom is connected and interrelated and interlocked with every other atom. It is like the atoms and molecules of the physical body. If one single molecule of the physical body is out of order, you have the beginning of a disease there — not necessarily, however, that it will eventuate in a disease. Order may be restored; but if order is not restored, you have the seed of a disease there.

And in the same way everything that is, is related to everything else: human beings to stars, stars to other stars, planets to stars, human beings to planets, atoms to human beings, and so forth. Looking at it in this way, therefore, as a most wondrously complex mechanism, it is obvious that certain positions of things must take place before certain energies can operate or begin to run. Do you get that?

Student — Yes, thank you very much.

Student — May I ask a question, Professor? About not being able to die until the earth is in such and such a position. How about the case of a person meeting with an accident?

G. de P. — It is the same thing. The accident is karmic. You could not have an accident unless — to use the old expression — it was your destiny. It was the karmic fruit of your previous life or lives. Do you see?

Student — Then any effort of anyone to save life is simply futile?

G. de P. — Oh no, not at all! No indeed! You see just here one of the difficulties in trying to explain these recondite things. You must remember that theosophy does not teach fatalism, for this reason: that the core of the human being is the very heart of the universe. Do you get that point? Man is not a helpless atom, driven hither and yon by the winds of destiny, by the winds of fate. He himself is the heart of the universe in the core of his being. Nothing can happen to him which he himself has not prepared by the exercise of his own will and of his own intelligence, both ultimately rooted in the will and intelligence of the universe — the same thing. This is high philosophy, but you have asked a question of high philosophy.

Student — I would like to go back to a question that was asked on the subject of ambidexterity. Are not the causes underlying what we might call right-handedness and left-handedness related to the time when the race was hermaphroditic, and is it not a fact that the masculine principle is considered to be related to the right-hand side, and conversely?

G. de P. — Yes, in a general way. But I would not say that right-handedness or left-handedness is a reversion

— what is the biological expression? — a throw-back. I think either is merely one of the minor phenomena of human psychophysical life, due to a combination of small and individually unimportant circumstances.

It has been my experience that the left-handed people whom I have known are in no wise inferior to those who are right-handed, though usually they are a little original in some way. I do not know whether the answer is responsive to your question.

Student — What made me ask you is: in an old book on architecture that we have, there is a diagram showing a medieval cathedral, and the north side is called masculine and the south side, feminine.

G. de P. — Quite true, quite true; but that pertains to a number of things: the north in esotericism is often spoken of as the right-hand, and the south as the left-hand or the feminine, or the material.

You must understand these technical allusions. It does not mean that all men are spiritual and all women are material. But it does mean this: that man on earth represents energy and the creative faculty, and the woman represents passivity and receptivity. These respectively are phenomena of spirit and matter. On the other hand, many women are more spiritual than many men. You will find masculine women, and you will find feminine men.

And as a last word — and please remember this carefully — the reincarnating ego is neither masculine nor feminine. He who is a man in one body may be a woman in the next. She who is a woman in one body may be a man in the next. It is a matter which depends upon an aggregate of karmic tendencies.

I will go just a little farther and leave this final thought with you — and please do not degrade it in your minds — I am going to tell you a deep truth. It is time that you knew this truth: the causes of sex, or rather the causes of the two sexes on earth, are attraction. Understand me. I will take my own sex for an example. When a man is very strongly drawn to the other sex, he becomes like the other sex ultimately, especially if there be indulgence. The attraction becomes ever stronger, the indulgences become larger and more frequent, until the feminine influence to which the man thus continuously subjects himself begins to prevail in his own character, by synchronous vibration. You understand my thought?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — And thus the man is actually womanizing himself. And the same rule exactly applies to women.

Women become men, or rather incarnate in male bodies, from the same reason that I have just explained —

from the same reason which causes men to incarnate in female bodies.

If any one of you wants to retain his present sex, or her present sex, in the next incarnation or for the next few incarnations, do not allow the attraction of the other sex to prevail upon you. It is attraction and indulgence, yes, and imitativeness, which change your vibrational rate: to the feminine one in the man's case, or to the masculine one in the woman's case; and this produces in the next birth, or at any rate when the attraction is strong enough, a change of sex. It is thus obvious that men, as a rule, remain men for two or three or several incarnations; and women do the same. You understand what I mean, do you not?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — The reincarnating ego is sexless, or, as the Christians express it: "In heaven there is no marriage, or giving in marriage." And it is merely the prevailing tendency of the lower lifeatoms which governs the entrance of the reincarnating ego into a body of the one or of the other sex — or, to express it more accurately

— which draws the reincarnating ego and causes it to overshadow a body of one or of the other sex.

Very strictly speaking, the reincarnating ego does not even enter the body, it overshadows it. It hovers above it so to speak. It is only the astral monad that can be spoken of as in the body. All the higher part of the constitution hovers over it, or rather around it, in the auric egg — in the most ethereal part of the auric egg, which is the psychomagnetic atmosphere that each human being is surrounded with — the astral, the psychical, the intellectual, and the spiritual, atmospheres, which all combined produce what is called the human auric egg.

This auric egg is the actual man, therefore; and the body is merely its dregs, its lees, the deposit of the lowest and most material atoms composing the auric egg.

Now, Companions, I think that we had better close the meeting for tonight, if you please.

[Sounding of the gong.]

Meeting 8

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Eight

Meeting of March 12, 1930

G. de P. — Well, Companions, we seem to be increasing in numbers all the time. Are there any questions this evening?

Student — Can anything be explained about the functions or the meaning of the five life-winds: prana, apana, samana, vyana, udana?

G. de P. — Five are the number of the vital currents working in the human body as spoken of in the exoteric Hindu literature. There are actually seven different vital currents, or if you like — it comes to the same thing

— one general vital activity manifesting in seven different forms. It is customary in theosophical literature to give them the general name of prana or the pranas, but this is, technically speaking, an inaccuracy.

Concerning the two which are not mentioned in the exoteric works I may merely say they are the two highest, and are the links by which the other five hang from the central entity of the inner constitution. The two highest are connected actually with the individuality. The general significations of the five vital currents with their Sanskrit names are as follows:

• Prana means the "forward moving one," to use the exoteric expression; otherwise the vital activity whose manifestation is general and diffuse, or moving everywhere.

• Apana is that one of the vital winds or of the vital activities which "moves downwards"; and you can readily see from this adverb downwards some of the functions which it controls in the physical body of man.

• Samana is that one which aggregates, collects, or brings the matters under its influence together. It is closely connected, I may add, with the functions of digestion and assimilation.

• The next, Vyana, is the vital wind whose action is diametrically contrary to the preceding, that of the samana. It is that one of the winds or of the vital activities which has a disintegrative or dispersive effect, and it likewise is closely connected with the functions of digestion.

• Udana is one whose function is that of moving upwards and is, in activity, the opposite of the apana or the downwards moving activity.

I cannot go into more definite descriptions, but the short explanations which I have just given will enable you to get some idea of how these five life-winds or vital activities work in the human body. Please remember that vitality is something that manifests in seven different operations or waves, and to five of these these Sanskrit names have been given.

The next question, please.

Student — Can dorje be explained in the verse from The Voice of the Silence: "Close not thine eyes, nor lose thy sight of Dorje."

G. de P. — Dorje is a Tibetan word for the thunderbolt, and is a translation of the Sanskrit word vajra, likewise meaning a thunderbolt. It is a technical term both in Hindu Brahmanical literature and in Tibetan Buddhism. While it has a certain specific reference to the diamond-heart of the initiate — clear, transparent, insensible to its own suffering and pain but reflecting the pains and sufferings of the world in compassion and pity — the term dorje, or the thunderbolt, likewise has more general reference to the spiritual nature of man.

In Tibet, in the land of Bodyul, the dorje is engraven and drawn as a curious instrument shown as held in the hands of certain divinities, and looking like a short double-headed battlemace. It really refers to the tremendous spiritual powers that flow from the spiritual being of man, which are more especially under the control of the highest class of the initiate-chelas and Masters. He who wields the dorje, the thunderbolt, or the diamond-heart, is the one who has completely subdued the lower personal selfhood and has become a channel

through which streams from the god within the spiritual electricity, manifesting as a thunderbolt in material existence, much as the electricity from the clouds often manifests in what humans call thunderbolts in physical nature. It is an entirely mystical term, and consequently the chela is advised not to lose sight of the dorje, but to keep hold of it and to put himself under the influence continuously of his spiritual higher powers and being.

The next question, please.

Student — Does the disciple develop in himself the mayavi-rupa in the same sense as The Voice of the Silence states that the nirmanakaya body "is woven by himself"?

G. de P. — A curious question. I am not sure that the questioner understands just what the mayavi-rupa is. In a sense, yes. In a sense the chela, the initiate, does develop the mayavi-rupa in himself; but more accurately it should be said that the high chela or the initiate acquires the power or faculty of projecting the mayavi-rupa.

Mayavi-rupa is a compound Sanskrit term which means the "illusory body," called illusory because it is not the actual physical body of the initiate or mahatma or chela. There is in Tibetan Buddhism a teaching regarding what is called the hpho-wa, to which I have referred before, the essential meaning of which is the power or faculty of projecting to a distance your will combined with your full consciousness. When you can do this, and collect around this projection of your self (because you yourself are fundamentally will and consciousness) the ether of space, of the place where you are, of the atmosphere there, collect around this projected will and consciousness the atoms existing there at the place where your will and consciousness are projected, this forms the mayavi-rupa, and it is an exact duplicate of the physical body in all essential particulars.

In other words, the hpho-wa signifies the faculty or power, or rather the description of the faculty and power, which enables the initiate to project himself at almost any distance from the physical body. A faint adumbration of this power is known in the Occident under the common term thought transference, but telepathy gives a very feeble idea of what actually can take place when this power is fully exercised.

Now the mayavi-rupa actually contains a complete human being minus the three lowest principles, the lower triad, that is, the physical body, the merely physical vitality, and the linga-sarira or model-body around which the physical is built. All the rest of the man is actually in the mayavi-rupa, and the physical body left behind remains in a trance as it were.

If you were to see this physical body left behind, from which the will and consciousness have been projected, you would say: "what a curiously intense brown study that man is in." For instance, if you knew how to do this, you could sit in your chair at your desk, or lie in your bed, or sit on the grass — it does not matter where you are: in prison or on the top of a house, or in a railway tunnel — simply compose yourself, touch a certain psychical spring, as it were, which you know how to touch, and in a few instants you are off and gone wherever you want to go. This is the projection of the mayavi-rupa.

So when the questioner says: "is the mayavi-rupa builded up in the same way by which the nirmanakaya-body is builded up," it is a curiously inaccurate way of expressing the matter. The mayavi-rupa is not existent until it is projected. You understand that, do you not?

Many Voices — Yes.

Student — Is the mayavi-rupa the vahana for atman?

G. de P. — Yes, certainly. Atman means self, and as the true mayavi-rupa — not a merely aberrant projection during sleep by the average man of the linga-sarira which can go only a few feet from the sleeping body — is actually the ether condensed around the whole man who has gone, it obviously includes atman, or the root of selfhood. Please understand that the mayavi-rupa is the whole being that is worth anything. All the will, all the self-consciousness, all the highest part of the superior four principles are in and above and around the mayavi-rupa.

To one who is highly skilled in hpho-wa, or the power of projecting the mayavi-rupa, this mayavi-rupa can be sent to incredible distances. In the case of the very highest initiates it can probably be projected even to the other planets, and they can appear on these other planets with what I may call the spiritual mayavi-rupa, and thus learn, as it were, and be seen, and not merely go there in pure thought, but be there, have the whole consciousness there.

So that when you have heard in our theosophical literature of mahatmas or Masters appearing in the mayavi-rupa, it simply means that they have projected themselves to a certain place and there have covered around this projected consciousness-will or will-consciousness the atoms of the atmosphere — I am speaking very simple English indeed now — so that their mayavi-rupa-personality shall become apparent to those to whom they wish to appear "physically." And the whole man is there. The body left behind is for the time being a shell, an empty carcass, apparently plunged in a deep brown study or trance, oblivious to everything around it, and is kept alive merely by the golden vital chain which connects the mayavi-rupa with the physical body.

I hope that this is clear.

The mayavi-rupa does not belong to the physical body. The mayavi-rupa with its inner consciousness and will represents the whole man. It is an exact copy physically speaking of the physical body. I hope that this is clear.

The next question, please.

Student — Great stress is laid on the fact that Colonel Olcott received a fehtah. Does that necessarily prove the presence in the physical body of the Master?

G. de P. — Certainly not. Certainly not. I suppose the reference is here to an incident that Colonel Olcott has described in his Old Diary Leaves. He was a very inaccurate writer, but I see no reason to doubt that this incident took place — of one of the teachers visiting him in his study or bedroom in New York, and appearing to him out of invisibility, I forget just how he expressed it, and I believe leaving him a scarf which the Master was using as a turban. After all a turban is a form of scarf wound around the head.

No, it by no means signifies that the teacher was there in the physical body. It does not mean that the teacher could not come to someone in the physical body. But as the question relates to Colonel Olcott, and I take it that it refers to the incident that Colonel Olcott relates, it was not the physical body of the Master which appeared, but the mayavi-rupa.

Student — Could the fehtah have been left by means of the mayavi-rupa in the same way that letters are left?

G. de P. — Yes, certainly, but letters are not always brought to their recipients by means of a mayavi-rupa of a high chela or a Master. Strange as it may sound to you, there is a way by which even physical things can be disintegrated into their component atoms, and carried along the astral lines of communication to another part of the world, and there reintegrated; and this has taken place frequently. Letters have apparently been dropped out of space. I could tell you some strange things about the formation of rain, for instance, that would astonish you, but that is another story as they say.

Student — In Theosophy: The Path of the Mystic, Katherine Tingley says: "Harmony is the key to all occult advance, and it is a knowledge of its laws and the relation of sound, number, and color as applied and directed by the pupils that enables the teacher to strike the higher tones and awake the spiritual vision."

Is a full knowledge of these deep and recondite matters essential to the spiritual vision?

G. de P. — It certainly is not. I am going to tell you very frankly that the less you bother your minds about number and sound and color, and instead turn to the spiritual light within you, the more progress you will make. These things spoken of are for the teachers to attain to. The duty of the disciple is to raise the lower by the higher self, to make the link with the higher self, to receive illumination from the god within; and all this other knowledge then will be added unto you.

But do you know that when HPB came, she could not make people see these things. What they wanted was

"magic." They wanted to know the mysteries of number, the mysteries of color, the mysteries of sound. And they thought that they were getting very deep knowledge when they were told truths indeed, but nevertheless truths that were simply over their heads. They beat their brows and wasted their vitality in thinking about things that did not help them at all, except in the one respect, that it all helped HPB in gathering around herself a band of students whom she held until she could train them to nobler things.

Indeed, it is perfectly true that the universe is founded on number; that every entity, every thing, every human being, has its or his own number. It is perfectly true that every entity and thing has its own individual color; and its own individual musical tone or note. But when that is said, and when I further tell you that if you want to practise magic you must know the note of the thing that you wish to work upon, or the being that you wish to work upon; that you must know his or its color, and that you must know his or its vibrational rate or number — when I tell you all this, what good does it do to you, and what good have you really learned? You learn that these things exist, but that is all.

I tell you, on the contrary, to look to the god within you, to that immortal bright intelligence which is the source of all inspiration, of all aspiration, of all advancement. Then your progress will be a hundredfold more rapid than if you wasted your time in studying these things that at present are entirely beyond you. There is no harm in knowing this; as mere knowledge it is all right, but you are not getting spiritual help from it, and you won't advance as quickly by studying this as you would by following the path that I have pointed out. Do you understand what I mean?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — Now, in the case of a teacher, it is a different thing. He must know the vibrational rate, or what is popularly called the number of his pupil. He must know that pupil's color; he must know that pupil's musical tone or note; because the teacher is working white magic with his pupil, with his disciple. The teacher studies these things, and studies their interrelations and combinations; but he does this because he is wise enough to do so; he has advanced far enough to do so; he has the interior illumination, and therefore he can do so.

But for the disciple to try to take the Master's place is simply a waste of time. Therefore I tell you, and I repeat it, and put emphasis upon it: turn to the source within each one of you of all inspiration, of all wisdom, of all true knowledge, the source of illumination, the source of light, and then all these things will be added unto you, and much more normally than if you turned your back on the light within and passed an incarnation or two or three as a small brain-mind student of merely natural phenomena which you do not understand.

The next question, please.

Student — Each one of us has a golden chain of higher selves, linking us to the very heart of things. Is it right to picture all the human beings on this earth and all their higher selves as forming one vast and glorious entity?

G. de P. — I hardly know how to answer this question. It is very intuitive, but it is likewise very much involved. I do not like the phrasing: each one of us has a golden chain of higher selves. It is misleading, and therefore in that sense it is wrong. You have but one higher self, and that is the god within you, and the heart of that god is its own spiritual divinity, and the heart of that spiritual divinity is something still more divine.

To say that you have a string of golden higher selves gives the impression that there are many different higher selves. It is a bad way to express it.

Each one of you has within himself or herself boundless infinitude, and this fact is expressed in the Brahmanical philosophy, and truly expressed, under the name of the paramatman, the supreme atman. It is a brief and terse way of expressing the truth that if you follow this pathway leading withinwards you will have a constantly increasing consciousness of your own essential divinity. In other words, your own higher self will become to your consciousness ever grander and more glorious, but it is always the higher self.

It is misleading to say that you have a golden chain of higher selves. I know just what you have in mind. You are referring to teachings that I have given to you before. I am now talking of the phrasing of the question. I do not like it because it is misleading. To say that all human beings with their collective higher selves — what

was the exact wording, "forming a supreme higher self," is that it?

Student — Is it right to picture all the human beings on this earth and all their higher selves as forming one vast and glorious entity?

G. de P. — Yes, in the sense that we are all spiritual atoms of some glorious divine entity, just as the atoms of our physical body compose our one physical body. That statement is true, but you must not think of this glorious entity, of which we are all spiritual atoms, as being limited to us human beings. We human beings are merely one host out of the multitude of hierarchies forming the structure or fabric of this cosmic entity.

In similar fashion, all human beings do not together form one big man. But we are very inferior spiritual atoms so to say — monads is our technical term — of other hierarchies forming the fabric or structure of some divine entity. Even our physical body is builded up of innumerable hosts, countless numbers of them, of monads passing through that particular phase of their long pilgrimage through eternity. Is that clear to you?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — It is a very intuitive question, but an unfortunately involved one and unfortunately badly phrased.

The next question, please.

Student — Then we are but lifeatoms of that entity, but with the capacity eventually to share in the full consciousness of that great being?

G. de P. — Very well put. The answer is yes. We share in that consciousness even at present, and that consciousness is the feeling of "I am." It is the same in you as it is in me. It is the same in all of us. There is no difference at all. We all have the same feeling of "I am." You must not confuse this with the feeling of "I am I" which is different in each one of us.

This latter is the mere ego, a learning thing, an inferior thing; and as the aeons pass, this "I am I" also will expand and grow by bringing out what is within it, in other words, by more fully developing the "I am"

feeling; and finally the "I am I" will vanish away into the single feeling of "I am." The personality will first fade out into individuality, and then the individuality in its turn will finally fade out into universality. Then we shall enjoy full consciousness of this divinity, of which each one of us is a spiritual lifeatom.

And yet understand clearly that this spiritual divinity will be forever beyond us. We shall be forever growing towards it, because we shall be forever expanding. But it likewise, in its turn, on its own spiritual-divine planes, is evolving and expanding. What a sublime prospect!

These are the teachings — which I am now more definitely trying to explain to you tonight, Companions —

which on every Sunday afternoon in our Temple I refer to and repeat, to try to bring home to my listeners the essential thought, because not only is this very helpful, but it is illuminating and inspiring.

The next question, please.

Student — I understand that the lunar pitris oozed out their chhayas, around which was concreted the more physical form, and became in that way the lower entities; and then they became the vehicles, became the bodies, of the future men; and then that other monads from the moon, still lower than these lunar pitris, behind them in evolution, incarnated in the forms which the lunar pitris had created. Is that correct?

G. de P. — It is not wholly so. The lunar pitris actually are what we now call the human personalities. These oozed forth from themselves — and you have correctly chosen the term — the chhayas, which is a Sanskrit word meaning "shadows," in other words bodies, a body being the shadow of the inner light. And in these chhayas the lunar pitris themselves were; and these lunar pitris, when the evolutionary time came on this earth, became the vehicles of the higher class of pitris called the solar pitris or the agnishwatas, which are the lower part of our present monadic essences.

On many occasions I have pointed out the matter of the sheaths or the vehicles which ooze forth from the immediately superior element in man. I have tried to show you that the ego oozes forth from itself a vehicle or chhaya or shadow of itself, which is the soul. This in turn oozes forth from itself, or concretes around itself from its own substance, something still more material or less ethereal, and this is the vital-astral body, or the model-body. And this in its turn oozes forth from itself its chhaya or shadow of itself which is the physical body. Do you understand that?

Student — Yes, thank you. But I would like to ask what is the meaning of the expression that these lunar pitris then created beings who became superior to themselves? Surely it could not be the agnishwattas, because they did not create them; but what did they create that became superior to themselves?

G. de P. — Evolution is the key to your problem, and you have asked a very natural question. We of the fifth are superior to the third root-race. The fourth root-race was more evolved than the third. We are more evolved than the fourth. Yet each is an emanation of the preceding race. There is the key.

The lunar pitris brought forth their chhayas, which means the bodies they had then and in which they lived.

They sent forth, oozed forth, from themselves, evolved forth from themselves, their bodies, which as time went on projected their kind, begot their kind, and under the working of evolution these were superior to their originals. The lunar pitris themselves were evolving and advancing.

Please remember that all the stanzas of The Secret Doctrine are Oriental in form with Oriental imagery, Oriental metaphors, Oriental figures of speech. Do you understand now the idea?

Student — I think so. But I would like to ask some more questions. The lunar pitris did become, did raise themselves, to the plane of the manasaputras?

G. de P. — We have not so done yet.

Student — But they are the ones to do it? They are the lunar pitris?

G. de P. — The lunar pitris will themselves evolve into becoming agnishwattas — solar pitris — in the future. Yes, that is correct.

Student — And then at that time will these agnishwattas have accomplished their work and be free to go Home? I mean the higher ones.

G. de P. — I don't think I quite understand your question.

Student — The manasaputras which incarnated in the third root-race, in those lower forms: will the manasaputras who incarnated then have accomplished their task and be free to go Home when the lunar pitris shall have become manasaputras in their turn?

G. de P. — They will have accomplished their task at that future period of evolution, and then they will "go Home" for their rest. Nevertheless they will be forever bound to the inferior beings trailing behind them whom they have been working with.

Let me try to explain this matter by turning to lunar history. The present human race, in great bulk now fully human, had at the time the moon went into its planetary pralaya barely reached the stage of humanity. Really they were what now on earth would be called the higher beasts; and I am referring to what is now the average humanity at present on this earth. But every entity is a sevenfold entity, with its highest part, its intermediate part, and its lowest part or body. Even the beasts have latent within them all the fires, to use a technical term, that the human being has, but in the beasts these fires are not yet manifest.

Now when these higher fires manifested in earliest mankind in this round the Oriental expression has it that then the solar lhas incarnated in the new humanity, which means when the fires within began to express themselves, began to manifest themselves, the evolving entities then began to show the solar powers: self-consciousness, intellect, and all the rest of it. The lunar pitris were those entities just spoken of, the lunar

fathers, who were destined to become human beings on this earth, that is to say on the new chain of globes, on the earth-chain. But linked with these lunar fathers, with these lunar pitris, were their own higher principles which had not yet manifested themselves on the moon, but would begin to manifest, to show their transcendent powers, in the humanity-to-be of the new earth-chain — and this was the incarnation of the agnishwattas, the solar pitris, the solar lhas. Do you now understand?

As the human ego evolves, throws forth from itself, unfolds, unwraps its inner powers, and thus develops into a manasaputra, the manasaputra which had been overshadowing it in its turn goes still higher towards becoming a pure monadic essence, the god within. Thus, if you can understand this series of thoughts just explained, you have an outline of what took place. Now do you understand better?

Student — Thank you. But I would like to ask just one more question. What is it then that guides or keeps the body, for instance, through the sympathetic nervous system? I have always thought that it was the lunar pitri; but the lunar pitri, as you tell me now, is the human ego.

G. de P. — It is. The lunar pitris have now become the human egos.

Student — And there is another one behind doing what the lunar pitris did in the beginning?

G. de P. — What do you mean?

Student — Something must be running the bodies.

G. de P. — That is what is called the animal soul; and these will be the earth-pitris of the next great planetary manvantara — our present animal souls. The animal souls which were on the moon are called lunar pitris, that is to say we now call them lunar pitris. When the planet earth goes into its pralaya, what are now the animal souls here will, in the next planetary chain — the reimbodiment of our earth — become the humanity of that planet, and we shall have become manasaputras. Now is that clear?

Student Yes, thank you very much.

G. de P. — There is a constant chain, as you have very neatly drawn attention to, of highest, less high, lower, and lowest monads, and they are all connected together in any one human being, and their various powers and faculties are what we call the seven principles. There are actually ten of them, however. The very god within, say the inner god of each one of you, in aeons upon aeons upon aeons upon aeons in the past, in other planetary manvantaras, was then an animal monad — that is to say, a monad passing through that phase of its long evolutionary journey. Through evolution it developed into a human monad. Through evolution the human monad developed into a manasaputra or solar monad; and then later became through evolution a divinity, a pure monadic essence, a divine energy, a divine flame, a divine fire.

And marvelously enough, this strange mystery of consciousness lies in the fact that all this chain of entities form one consciousness, and yet individually are all different consciousness-centers. It may perhaps be exemplified by thinking of the droplets of water which compose a stream.

Thus do we see that man is a microcosm, a little world, his very stream of consciousness being composite of droplets. Marvelous mystery! It is the most difficult to understand in the whole esoteric philosophy, and yet it is the most sublime and the most fascinating study of all. Man is a stream of consciousness fundamentally. I do hope that you understand this — at least that you have some inkling of what I am trying to explain.

The superdivine entity, about which a question was asked in the earlier part of the evening, is an instance in point of exactly the same thing. That superdivine entity, in aeons upon aeons upon aeons upon aeons upon aeons in the past, was a human being or some being equivalent to us human beings — that is a being possessing self-consciousness and will power. It had its various vehicles, its various centers of consciousness; and as the aeons of evolution passed, while itself was evolving, all the lower train of the droplets of the stream of consciousness which was it — all these lower entities composing that stream — were likewise evolving, until it has now become a superdivinity. It is a perfect macrocosm.

So we, each one of you, in future times will become a sun, a center of a solar consciousness-stream; and all the atoms now composing your body will then be the monads of the satellites of that sun, connected with that sun and belonging to it, for they are all its emanations, the products of its own consciousness-stream. This may be illustrated by the following: the atoms of my physical body belong to me. They have sprung forth from me, flowed forth from the fountain of consciousness which is I. And as I am evolving, so are they evolving but trailing after me. I am their inspiring, and inspiriting, and invigorating god, just as my own inner god is I — and yet different. I am going to evolve into becoming a similar god. The ego of me will become a pure monadic flame in time, and after it will be trailing all these hosts of entities which flowed forth from its own consciousness, and each one of such entities is in its turn an evolving entity: learning, growing, becoming, unwrapping its inner latent powers. Every mathematical point of space, every mathematical point in human consciousness, is a monad.

The next question, please.

Student — I think The Secret Doctrine states that the higher ego incarnated or came from the planet Venus, does it not? Now did we evolve that higher ego when we were on the planet Venus?

G. de P. — You are asking a question which I deeply regret that I cannot answer fully; but as it is my duty to give some kind of responsive answer to every question I will say this, that the highest egos of men today are native to what we humans call the planet Venus. That is all I can say. You who have ears to hear may perhaps understand.

Every planet of our solar system has done its own individual part in building a man, likewise in building our Earth. We are all interlinked, all interlocked, with vital bonds and with bonds of consciousness. We are most wonderfully and mysteriously made. There is no separateness anywhere in the universe. It is the great heresy to have that idea. We are at one with the Buddhists in this teaching.

Student — I have two questions that I would like to ask. First: can you tell us what the attitude of the Masters is to the publication of the book called The Mahatma Letters to A. P. Sinnett? We read in the Introduction that the Masters said that they would never consent to these letters being given to the world.

G. de P. — That is true, and doubtless if they could have been consulted, they would have said no. But at the present time, when the Society has advanced so far beyond what the Society was when those Letters were first written to Mr. Alan Hume and to Mr. A. P. Sinnett, I cannot feel that much harm will now accrue to our Cause. This is because the understanding of theosophists has grown, has broadened. Theosophists today have a much livelier intuition, a much deeper understanding, of what theosophy means than had the brain-minded Mr. Hume, and the brain-minded Mr. Sinnett of those days, and of course obviously than had the brain-minded men of the world of those days.

I personally feel that The Mahatma Letters, making due allowance for any possible misprints, is a valuable contribution to our literature today.

Times change. I am positive that the teachers would never have consented to the publication of those Letters at the time when they were written. Let me see, when were they written? — I think it was forty or fifty years ago.

Many Voices — 1881, or 1882. 1884.

G. de P. — Between forty or fifty years ago, you see. But times have changed. Science has made enormous strides towards a more mystical understanding of the universe. Our theosophists have broadened and deepened in understanding.

You have one more question to ask, I believe.

Student — Yes, Professor. We are told that everything is illusion on this plane. Is it on this plane, or is it on this earth?

G. de P. — Both.

Student — And is it so on all other planes of existence? I mean, on other planets?

G. de P. — Quite true. It is but illusion, however, in the technical sense, or maya. Illusion does not mean that things do not exist. It means that the perceiving and percipient consciousness does not rightly understand the truth about and in things. Everywhere in the universe there is illusion or maya. Even on spiritual planes there is illusion or maya belonging to those planes, although to us imperfect humans it is brilliant and perfect truth.

Nevertheless there is spiritual illusion to beings living on spiritual planes, because there are always higher states of understanding than those possessed at any time on any plane. Consequently as progress is endless, as evolution is endless, as advancement in understanding and growth in consciousness are endless, it immediately becomes obvious that no matter how high we go, there is always a higher truth to learn, a more sublime sweep of consciousness to comprehend, and naturally every entity that is inferior to these high states of consciousness sees things in an imperfect way.

Do you understand what I am trying to say?

Student — After a fashion; but is there then anything that is real? Do any of the things that we do, or that we learn, or that we work on, matter? Is there nothing but spiritual knowledge and development?

G. de P. — Yes indeed, and that is reality. And it is that reality which is the treasury in the heart of the god within you. You see how important this primally basic truth is. There is reality in the heart of things, and it is our duty to broaden our consciousness and thus get an ever-enlarged view of this reality. The universe is divided into hierarchies, with a sublime divine summit, and a material base. The more nearly you approach the divine summit, the more nearly you approach reality — truth. When you have reached what is for you truth, then you enter a higher hierarchy, and advance towards a still more sublime conception of infinite reality.

Can you therefore see that infinite reality can never be comprehended, that infinite perfection can never be understood? If you could ever reach reality in fullness, there would then be nothing more to learn. There would be no grander and more sublime stages of evolution to reach and pass through. Don't you see this?

Therefore evolution is endless, there is always a higher truth to gain, always a higher expansion of consciousness to attain, always sublimer heights to climb; and thus there is endless growth, endless expansion.

I hope that my meaning is clear. Is it? [Silence.] Please do not all answer at once, but do you understand, Companions, what I am trying to tell you?

Many Voices — Yes, yes, Professor.

G. de P. — I want to add this. Beware of one thing: if you let discouragement enter into your hearts, you are in a very dangerous and precarious state of mind. It shows that you are then more than ever under the sway of maya. The very foundation-stone of the esoteric wisdom is that reality manifests as a constant expansion in consciousness lasting for ever.

Student — Professor, is it right to say that at the time when we were in nirvana, before the present manvantara, and when we were coming out of it, we threw off from ourselves the atoms in much the same way as the sun throws out the forces which make up the planets for its next solar manvantara?

G. de P. — I think I have your idea, and the answer is yes. Coming out of the intermanvantaric nirvana means entering upon the beginning of a new cycle of manifestation. This entering upon it is done by throwing out from yourself, by oozing out from yourself, various vehicles, in which you will thereafter live and work throughout that manvantaric cycle of manifestation. Time and time again on all the different planes you will be doing this, just as you have done it in your present incarnation as a man. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, but may I ask something else? These atoms which we have thrown off and which we have used to build our vehicles, have they a separate line of evolution of their own? Have the monads behind these

atoms to pass up through the various stages of evolution: mineral, vegetable, and animal, finally becoming men such as we are?

G. de P. — Yes; but if I say yes, then I fear that you will misunderstand me. The idea is right, but your phrasing is awkward, and I do not dare say merely yes, because then I fear you will get a wrong idea; and yet I cannot say no, because that would be untrue. It is not the monad which becomes a man. It is the monadic projection or offspring which becomes the man. The monad is really a god. It has achieved monadic godhood.

Nevertheless each monad was a man in a former manvantara, do you understand?

Student — Not altogether.

G. de P. — I don't blame you.

Student — Well, I will think it over.

G. de P. — No. I am not satisfied with that. Ask your question again, and perhaps I can answer it according to the way in which you ask it.

Student — Well, what puzzled me was your statement that when we shall have become suns, our atoms will have become the satellites.

G. de P. — And other things, yes.

Student — Well, before they can have reached their high state of being planets and other things, they must have passed through all the stages that we are passing through now.

G. de P. — Why certainly, they will follow the long evolutionary road, just as we humans have, who will in time become suns. Every mathematical point in infinite space is really a monad, at its core a superdivinity, and surrounding it there is its body or vehicle. That body or vehicle or series of sheaths is composed of atoms, at the heart of each one of which is a monad again. Different hosts of monads are passing through different phases of their experience contemporaneously. But don't think that a monad goes, drops down, into matter. It clothes itself with matter at one time, then clothes itself at a later evolutionary stage with more ethereal matter, and then at a still later stage, with matter still more spiritual; and then at a still later stage, with monadic matter.

Meanwhile the monad itself has evolved and gone ahead. Everything is evolving. There is no cessation at any time nor anywhere. You do not become a monad and stay forever in that condition. You yourself go on evolving while you become a monad; but while you have been becoming a Monad you have been constantly throwing forth from yourself what I may perhaps for convenience call children-monads, flowing out from your consciousness, and each one of these children-monads when it first flows out has to clothe itself in the lowest part of the substance of that hierarchy and evolve upwards. It itself is a spiritual essence, but temporarily joined to these lower planes until it works out of them and self-consciously becomes a god.

You people this evening are touching on some of the most deep and profound questions of consciousness, and I have already told you that these questions form a most difficult subject to explain.

But try again. Go to it. Hang on like grim death until your ideas are so clear that you can phrase them clearly; and then I can give you a clear answer.

Student — Yes, thank you, Professor.

G. de P. — Well, you are not yet satisfied?

Student — I will think it over, until I can phrase it better. I will ask the question later on.

Student — Then a monad is simply a conscious energy-point?

G. de P. — That is it exactly. And that conscious energy-center, or energy-point, at the core of its being is divine, for it is of the very substance of divinity, of the cosmic divinity, of the cosmic ocean of life. It is a droplet, as it were, of the cosmic consciousness-life.

Even matter itself is such. Matter is not something different from spirit. Matter and spirit are fundamentally the same thing, each in its own phase of evolution. The great difficulty that you Occidentals have in understanding these things is because you are all psychologized by the scientific teaching of lifeless matter which you think is something different from energy or from consciousness; or by the old Christian teaching that spirit is one thing and matter is something absolutely different, created to house spirit. Now that is not true. Spirit and substance, force and matter, are fundamentally one thing: two phases of the same underlying reality.

I keep saying these things again and again, and again and again. I try to drive them home by repetition, and keep repeating them, because you must see the necessity of understanding these fundamental postulates.

The next question, please.

Student — I would like to ask a different kind of question. How soon after cremation are the life ties of the individual broken?

G. de P. — What do you mean by the "individual"?

Student — Of the human being that has passed on.

G. de P. — The life ties are broken —

Student — With the earth, and with the surroundings that he left.

G. de P. — The life ties are broken at the instant of death. Cremation merely dissipates the atoms of the physical shell left behind. All the higher and inner part of the man is already separated from the physical shell.

Student — Well, I was perhaps under the wrong impression that the higher part, the spiritual part, of a being stayed on earth a certain time after death; but I didn't know whether the actual fact of cremation helped to break all those connections, so that it could go into the repose that it had earned.

G. de P. — No, that is not quite right. As I have said before, at the instant of death the disintegration of the inner constitution begins. At the very instant of death, your highest part returns to its parent-star. The higher of the intermediate part, the higher ego, the reincarnating ego, is withdrawn into the bosom of the monad and pursues its peregrinations into invisible realms. The lower part of the intermediate nature, or the lower human soul, hovers for a time in the fabric of the kama-rupa, or desire-body, the shade as the ancients called it, until its release therefrom, and then it is snatched up, as it were, to rejoin the reincarnating ego in the bosom of the monad; leaving then only what you might call crushed rose leaves, a mass of putrefaction and decay of the material part of the human ego that was. This is the kama-rupa abandoned by the last spark of divinity, and it slowly disintegrates.

Now cremation has the advantage that the kama-rupa is no longer so heavily attracted to the physical body or physical world. There is no longer so strong a magnetic pull, for the body is dissipated. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, thank you.

Student — May I ask a question? In fact I have two; they are somewhat connected together.

G. de P. — You are going to ask them one at a time, are you not?

Student — Yes, indeed. It is of course evident that some people die at an hour and a place when and where the earth is under the full influence of the sun; and others die during the night. Now is there any difference in

the postmortem states of man, according to whether he die during the daytime or at night? Is there such a thing as what I may call solar death and lunar death? I have an intuitive feeling that there is something behind it, but that is as far as I can go.

G. de P. — There is practically no difference for the average human being at what hour of day or night physical death takes place. What is your other question? I may say that you have an intuition of something which, as usual in such cases, I am obliged to tell you I cannot speak of. But answering your question as best I may, the answer is as I have already told you: there is practically no difference for the average human being at what hour merely physical death takes place. What is your other question?

Student — My mind dwelt quite a good deal on the teachings which you gave out with regard to eclipses.

Now if it happens that a man dies at the particular time and place when a total solar eclipse is seen — of course I am not talking about an initiate, but the average man — does this in any way affect his postmortem states?

G. de P. — Very greatly, but may I ask you to what teachings you are referring when you speak of the teachings that I have given out with regard to eclipses? What are you referring to?

Student — Well, the action, the influence, or rather the role, played by total solar eclipses and initiations. But I am referring to the death of the average man, a thing that may occur at any time; and I am referring to the particular place and time when and where a solar eclipse occurs, and the man then dies.

G. de P. — My answer is, a very great difference indeed. Have you any other question?

Student — I am wondering whether you can explain in what that difference consists?

G. de P. — Yes, I can explain it, but it would take quite a long time; and I don't know that without a rather long preparatory study, or at least a rather long preparatory lecture, I could make my meaning clear.

You are entitled to ask another question if you like. I will tell you just what I mean. When an intuitive question is asked, even if I am not permitted to give an answer, there is a call made which it is my duty to respond to: to foster the light, the touch, of the buddhic splendor from which the intuition came. That is what I mean. You have made a call, and it is my duty to answer you as far as I can do so. Now try again.

Student — Well, if I made a call, and if you can say more, why don't you say it?

G. de P. — I cannot say more.

Student — Then, if I may refer to the first question: it seems to me that you referred some time ago to the fact that at death man passes through the moon, or rather is attracted by the moon. Can anything further be said on this subject? It is directly connected with my question. Now suppose a man dies at night at full moon, what happens to him?

G. de P. — He dies. The normal processes of rupture of the vital cord take place. Death is death, no matter when it does take place, although certain times and certain conditions modify the process enormously.

I will tell you that you are skirting very, very esoteric truths, and I deeply regret that I cannot say more. I have no right to. Try again. If I can give you light, that is what I am here for, as far as I can do so. Would you like to try once more, and ask some other question along the same line?

Student — Why, no. Why should I? I don't want to ask a question that does not interest me. I am putting a question. If you cannot answer it, I have no right to force your hand.

G. de P. — You could not do that. Has anyone else a question?

Student — May I ask two questions about death? I was reading in Letters That Have Helped Me today, and Mr. Judge says that death is a disappointment to the self. Will you please explain what that means?

G. de P. — Yes. The ideal condition for the higher part of a human being is continuous learning, a continuously learning existence; and in the devachan there is an interruption in the schoolwork of life, a very necessary interruption indeed, because the assimilation of what has been learned there and then takes place.

The experiences of the past life are molded or burned into the character. Nevertheless this interruption of the schooling in life is a disappointment to the reincarnating ego. It is a rather curious way of phrasing the fact that Mr. Judge is speaking of there, but it is true enough. I think that this is the answer to your question.

Student — The word disappointment I was interested in, because I wondered why anything that was so natural could be a disappointment.

G. de P. — Yes. The word is unfortunately chosen, but it does not mean disappointment as we ordinarily understand it.

Student — Then the book says a little lower down the page that the living have much more to do for the dead than the dead for the living.

G. de P. — That is true.

Student — I wonder whether it means that those whom we love we do feel very, very close to. We cannot disturb them; we would not want to. I wonder if it is the fact that our love does go to them, and in doing our very best, we rise to their plane without disturbing them and in that way we do really help them?

G. de P. — We do. A pure and impersonal, clean love reaches even into devachan, and silently, quietly, enhances the peace and bliss of the resting soul.

Student — And then does not their love really flow to us too?

G. de P. — It does, it does indeed!

Student — May I ask something in connection with what has just been asked? Then something of the person who has gone can reach one who is living?

G. de P. — Yes.

Student — May I ask you: one day I was sitting in the woods by a brook reading The Ocean of Theosophy, and as I rose to go back to the hotel — I was all alone — like a flash of lightning, I said: "Why, Kate, are you here?" Well, now, could she — it was my sister Kate — have been there, Professor? It was just like that —

why I never felt such a joy in my life! And it lasted with me, stayed with me for perhaps five or ten minutes.

Well now, what was that? And I felt the same way once again: I think it was just at the time when the Leader

[KT] died, I waked up and felt that same feeling about my brother. Can you tell me what it all was?

G. de P. — I think from your description, dear Companion, that it was a case which, to speak scientifically, we might call a synchronous vibration of two souls. In other words, your love reached both your sister and brother at the different times, and caused an instantaneous reaction of a similar flow of love towards you, making the sense of imminent personal contact very acute. Do you understand me? The love of you two joined, in each case.

Student — But it reached my personality. It had to go through my personality to reach me.

G. de P. — Certainly. The brain became conscious of the actual fact of joining in the currents of love of the two souls which were so closely united. You understand me, do you not?

Student — Then the other soul, of either my brother or sister, was also conscious then?

G. de P. — Not conscious. Your sister was dead, you say? Then, not conscious as you were, because for her there was a perfect, blissful, deep sleep. It would be a terrible thing if human beings could disturb, annoy, no matter how much our own human hearts may crave communication with them. It would be a terrible thing if

the love flowing from our human hearts could reach and disturb in their time of rest and peace those who have passed on. Nature is too kindly for that.

Student — Yes, I had that feeling. It was more my own joy I felt. I didn't have the feeling that the other person — I mean that it was all my own joy.

G. de P. — I think what took place was that your love felt both for your sister and your brother at the times, due to the devotion of your heart and mind, reading this book, reached even into the devachan — into the condition in which were the individuals whom you loved — and established a contact of love, if you understand what I mean.

Student — Thank you very much.

G. de P. — And love, remember, is the very cement of the universe. It keeps all things together. It is a manifestation of cosmic harmony, and is the vital essence of the universe.

Student — You say that it makes no difference at what hour of day or night one dies? Does it make any difference when one is born — the hour when the soul enters?

G. de P. — Well, every moment of the day and night has its own different solar and planetary influences, so of course it does make a difference in that sense of the word. But I don't think that in any other way it could rightly be said that a child born in the morning, or at noon, or in the evening, or at midnight, is under either an advantageous or a disadvantageous set of circumstances, merely by the fact of being born at a certain hour.

Student — Thank you.

Student — May I ask a question? The same question that was bothering Mr. L----- bothered me. I do not know whether he would rather rise and continue this question, or if I can ask what I think he is still thinking about.

G. de P. — Certainly.

Student — You know when you said that a man becomes a sun, it was implied also that every part of him becomes some part of the sun in some form. I think the thing that bothered me was that surely all the different energies that belong to oneself must have been made as we have been, and gone through all that we have gone through, before they can become a sun. I don't know if I am clear. Yet what business have all the little parts that go to make up your physical being, before they are a man?

G. de P. — I don't think I quite understand you. No.

Student — Unfortunately I had the same difficulty seeing it, but it occurred to me that they are all progressing simultaneously: the entity and the atoms that it throws off with which it makes its vehicle; and that these atoms are not essentially any lower than the entity itself. Therefore they have the right to make the vehicle of the sun, just as they have now the right to make the body.

G. de P. — Yes, that is quite true, but the atoms which compose even your body are of different grades and degrees of evolution. Furthermore please remember that when I spoke of the atoms of the human being I did not refer to the atoms of the physical body only, but to the atoms of the several states or grades of his entire inner constitution, reaching from the spiritual downwards to the physical.

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — The sun is a wonderful conglomerate — I am going to tell you very plainly — is a wonderful conglomerate of entities, vital entities, under the control and held in the grip of the dominating supreme entity, the god of the sun. It is a host, a vast host, an enormous multitude, of spiritual beings. Remember please that there are seven suns and we see only the physical sun, the body of it, so to speak.

Student — Well, what about the three higher planes above the seven? Are there what correspond to the seven suns on those planes?

G. de P. — Yes.

Student — In connection with one of the earlier questions, is it correct to say that the earth at one time is under the influence of the sun and at another time under the influence of the moon, because both moon and sun are influencing the earth at the same time? While we are under the influence of the sun at one place at some other place it is night, so one cannot conceive of the whole earth being under the influence of the solar rays at any time.

G. de P. — You are quite right. I think the meaning of the questioner was that at certain times the influences emanating from the sun are more strongly felt on the earth than those emanating from the moon, although the lunar influences are emanating concurrently all the time. If he meant that the influences from the sun at one time control the earth entirely, and the influences of the moon were not felt at all those times, then he is wrong, but I did not so understand him. You are quite right in your statement.

The next question, please.

Student — Is there one great sun? Or are they all equal?

G. de P. — One chief sun, do you mean?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — In every universe there is one sun which is the dominator in that universe. But there are armies of suns, multitudes of them; and our modern scientists are beginning to have an adumbration of this truth when they talk about island-universes. Our own home-universe, for instance, is pretty closely all that is comprised within the encircling zone of the Milky Way of which our sun is a part. And there is one dominant solar center in the Milky Way — but I do not say that this solar dominant is on the physical plane.

We have in our philosophy what we call raja-suns, king-suns; and I may add in passing that there are also emperor-suns, so to speak, maharaja-suns. But there is no need talking about these, because the idea is entirely strange to you, I suppose, and very few of those raja-suns or maharaja-suns are on the physical plane.

Student — We heard at one of these gatherings that the atoms of the body come to us on reincarnation from the moon, in transit, as you expressed it. Is it possible, or is it permissible, to ask if the higher principles of man come in transit from different quarters of the universe, in transit from the sun?

G. de P. — I would not say that the atoms of the physical body alone come in transit from the moon, because that statement would not be correct. It would not be true as a matter of fact. But all our principles are in transit all the time, and pass from sun to moon, and from moon to sun, and from planet to planet, but under different conditions for each set of principles.

Now that may sound very vague indeed, and I recognize that it is, but it is just about as far as I can speak.

I don't see why you dear people don't make up your minds to take a great step forward: assume the duties of chelaship, take the oath and get the knowledge which you will then be entitled to.

Student — May I ask a question? Is it not most important that we use our thoughts, and guide them in an understandable area, in an area that to us has a meaning and has the power to affect our lives so that our lives will be beneficial both to ourselves and to the world? For instance, we may ask questions innumerable, but are we more qualified in relation to real living as it should be lived? And can we not get much light in other directions by evolving the light within, and clarifying our own thoughts so that we will not ask questions which even if answered we don't understand?

G. de P. — Well, in a general way your statement is perfectly right. The main thing to do is to follow the

inner light. That is the prime requisite. It is a royal road, it is a great key. It is the first and last password, the most important open sesame to achievement.

But, and this I think you should remember: the asking of questions may seem unimportant to one or to a few, but may be very important to others and to the one who asks the question. If the mind, if the intellect, if the heart, are troubled and disturbed about a problem, and are not satisfied, evolution is entangled, because the intellectual part of man should be fed properly, just as much as any other part of the constitution. Now that could all be done, just as you point out, and as I myself have pointed out before this evening, by turning to the inner light; but a help in turning to the inner light is in having clear, defined teachings about the problems which the mind is faced with. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes, I understand. But the only reason why I spoke of it is the following: we had quite a number of questions about death. Now in proportion as we go into states that do not affect us, so to speak, we are not in the relation with ourselves in which our own light can shine upon our own problems. If we guide our thoughts in wrong directions, we cannot have the benefit of that inner light which we really have when we deserve it.

G. de P. — That last remark is true, very true. But let me give to you a practical instance of how esoteric teaching will help you. If you understand what happens to you after death, and when the time of passing comes, that knowledge will remain latent in your consciousness, and will be an instinctive guide to quicker release, and a more happy joining to the god within. It will act automatically.

Furthermore, such teaching will change your life while you live. It will change your thought currents, it will give a new direction to your thinking, a new and better impetus to your brain-mind. It will abate your violent passions, and it will help you in many ways.

All these will affect your postmortem state; and therefore the Masters not only endorse the giving of esoteric teaching to those who hunger for it, but themselves constantly use it.

Nevertheless in a certain sense you are right. The real key to all is the inner light. Cultivate that, hunt for that, search for that. Try to enlighten yourself with and by your higher nature, with and by the god within, and all other things of good will be added unto you. Knowledge will then come to you instinctively, intuitively. You will then have everything. Remember that the supreme Master is your own inner god.

The next question, please.

Student — May I ask a question? Is it not a fact that after we pass from this physical state through the vale of death, our highest soul or self travels into the various other planets, as to schoolrooms, so that we may gain information to lead to what I may call a better preparation for the next reincarnation?

G. de P. — Yes, that is so. But not all of your constitution does it.

This reminds me, Companions: I have been wondering a little lately, taking very seriously to heart the thought whether we have not been advancing in instruction a little too rapidly. I have been asking myself if I have given you adequate time to digest, mentally and spiritually, our studies here together. I have in consequence also wondered whether it might be better to omit our meetings for a few weeks, or months even.

Has anyone any opinion about this? I am asking this question myself because it is so near our closing time for tonight. I would like to get the opinion of a few of you.

Student — If I may say something: so far as I am concerned myself, I do find it difficult to keep in mind all the teachings which you give to us. For many years I have been in the habit of striving after constant meditation, that undercurrent which Mr. Judge so strongly recommends, and I have found snatches of what you have said at these meetings and also in the Temple coming into my mind. I have had duties, as we all have, which imperatively demand fulfillment and which we want to do, and the meditation and consequent deeper understanding of the teachings is perforce held over, and, as it were pushed back.

For one, I think that it might be advisable to have these meetings a little less often. I don't know whether it

would really be of much advantage merely to postpone the meetings for a month or six weeks, but if we could have a longer period of time, say a month, between the meetings, in other words a double length of time between these esoteric meetings, it might be a good thing.

G. de P. — Well, there is a good deal of truth in that. I have not brought this matter to your attention, Companions, merely because I want it so. On the contrary: I have a message to deliver. I am eager to deliver this message to you and to the world. When that message is delivered, my duty will have been done, and I will then leave you. But, on the other hand, I know from my own experience, from having myself been taught, that there is such a thing as too rapid progress — no, that is badly phrased. There is such a thing as forcing the teachings a little, and in such forcing the mind becomes weary perhaps.

If anyone has any other idea, will he speak, please.

Student — I don't feel at all in that way. I find that these meetings enliven me. There is more inspiration to do every duty that I have, and in every week things become clearer and clearer to me. The weeks when we have these esoteric meetings are looked forward to by me and with my whole heart, and I would feel deeply regretful if they were broken off. I do not know if the others feel in that way.

Student — I agree with this.

Student — I feel, dear Teacher, that these opportunities will never come again; and if you are to be considered — that is our first consideration, because we do know from what you have said that it is a tax on your strength. But these meetings give us an opportunity to broaden our minds, to let our hearts express themselves, to move away from our personal lives and our personalities into the greater world that you have shown us glimpses of, and therefore I say, let them continue. We are more favored than any one of us realizes.

Student — Of course I feel just as the last speaker has expressed herself as feeling. But I have also this thought. I think that the view here gained of the greater spaces, of the things that may be beyond our grasp just at this time, has nevertheless shown us human life in its true proportions in the whole scheme of evolution, as nothing has ever shown us before. I feel that these revelations have placed life on earth, and life in a physical body, in their true relation to the Whole as none of the teachings that we have had before has done. How can we see the life that we live in one incarnation in its true proportion unless we have these great glimpses?

I cannot imagine anything more helpful to an aspiring human being, even though he cannot grasp it all and hold it and formulate it, or repeat it, than these glimpses of the whole. I would beg that at least we have periodical glimpses of this kind, in order that we may rectify ourselves, as you might say, in our relations to the great spaces and never forget, never be without these glimpses long enough to forget, that sense of the greater whole that these teachings have given to us.

To my mind those are unfortunate who have not had glimpses of this kind. What do they know of life that is past, or of life to come? What do they know of death? How can they do otherwise than suffer and grope in the way they follow? I would sit on hot plowshares to receive teachings of this kind, so that they could be voiced, and that the atmosphere might vibrate with them, and that they might reach some who crave for them, who long for them.

G. de P. — That is the true chela spirit. I didn't bring up this matter, I didn't ask this question, please understand, Companions, because of a diminution of my own strength, nor because I am vampirized. That is not the idea at all. But I have been earnestly desirous for the last month or six weeks to find out what your own mental reaction is. Does anyone here feel that he or she is receiving too much, that he or she is becoming bewildered, or puzzled?

Many Voices — No! No!

Student — Yes, sometimes I do feel in that way. Could you tell us some of the dangers that might result from receiving the teachings too rapidly?

G. de P. — Weariness, bewilderment, and in weak characters — in some weak characters — a falling into a feeling of satiety. This arises out of the weakness of our lower human nature. Now I am not saying that this is your case. On the contrary, it is your honesty that has made you speak thus. Nevertheless there is that danger, and I have to take it into consideration.

It is my duty to deliver my message to you, and I am eager, anxious, to do it. But I cannot rightly do it if it causes any one of you to incur the danger of falling back. If anyone here has a weak strain in the character, there is that danger present, and it is my duty to tell you about it — that simply from bewilderment, from weariness, you may fall.

Student — May I say that these meetings are always very exhilarating to me. I always feel myself full of enthusiasm, happiness, and inspiration, and it seems to me also that the advantages of being able to read what is given out at the meetings helps very much to assimilate it all mentally.

G. de P. — That is true. It does help very much indeed.

Student — I always find that some new light is thrown upon some of the teachings that have been given in previous meetings, and with this new light additional help comes. My feeling in regard to the continuance of the giving out of the teachings is something that I think rests with the teacher. I think that he knows how far we are really responding and are able to respond; but I do think that our hearts are eager to receive all that we are able to receive, and I think that he surely knows this.

Student — I was going to say that it had not entered my feelings at all, the idea of making any conditions as to receiving these teachings. It seems to me the greatest possible privilege, for which we cannot be too thankful; and the idea of making any conditions is altogether opposed to my feelings in the matter. I think that we should seize the opportunity while it is here. We do not know how long it will last. It may stop tomorrow forevermore, for anything we know, and if we want time to sit still and meditate, we may get a good deal more of it than we want, later on. My conception of the chela spirit is to take thankfully what you are fortunate enough to get while you can get it.

G. de P. — That is true, quite true.

Student — I was going to beg you to continue, but of course you will decide. However, I am new in these meetings, and I cannot express what is happening to me — the feeling of expansion and expanding. And I for one should be extremely sorry if the meetings were discontinued or even the time interval lengthened into a month. I feel that I cannot get enough at present.

G. de P. — Well, I will tell you, Companions, the situation is just this. If you make the call earnest enough, the meetings will continue; and I beg any one of you who may feel that he or she is becoming bewildered or weary — and this feeling is not a crime, it is just a natural reaction — kindly to let me know the truth.

Student — It seems to me that in the very atmosphere that is created at these times, when the questions are asked and the answers to them are given, something in my own nature is stirred and wakened up, and that I had known these things before. I think that there is a tendency on the part of some of us to go along too calmly, because we need all the stirring up that we can get.

G. de P. — That is quite true.

Student — Dear Teacher: I cannot put at all into words what I want to say. Life to me consists very largely of the ES meetings. I mean to say that the one thing I am dwelling on in thought is the longing for the next meeting to come. These meetings have been simply marvelous to me, in the way of opening inner doors and calling forth spiritual understanding that before was absolutely asleep, although I can grasp but a small part of it; and I guess that this is true of all of us. But we each take something with us which helps us to grow; and things that we cannot carry in our minds come to us quite unexpectedly when we need them.

These meetings are absolutely priceless. I am always afraid they may cease, and we want them all so much.

Student — A few moments ago you said: "Your questions amaze me. Why don't you make a step forward and take the oath of chelaship, and —" I don't remember the rest of the sentence. You have come here to give, and while we would gladly relinquish every prospect of receiving if it would save you, at the same time you have come to give your message. If we are not ready to receive it, I think we should look to ourselves to see if there is anything to do to make ourselves ready while you are here. If it means a daring step forwards, then we should take it. If it means something else, we should do it. Our business is to do our part. You can only give, but you must have the channels to receive.

G. de P. — Thank you.

Student — As one who is continually in the outside world, away from this perfect atmosphere, these esoteric meetings carry inspiration which enables me in a very humble way to pass many truths to people which, if I had not had the privilege of attending these meetings, and having had my eyes opened to the realization of these truths, I would not be able to pass on to my fellow beings.

I believe you will be given power. We do not want to tax you. We are willing to stop when you say so. I think I can say that truthfully for every soul in this room. You have been sent to give the message, and we should prepare ourselves to receive and retain as much as possible of it. If you feel that you can continue and it is right that you should, I am sure that we will all welcome the words of truth which will come from your lips.

G. de P. — Thank you.

Well, Companions, I think, then, that the consensus of opinion is that these meetings had better continue as we have been holding them. May I ask, however, that in case any one does feel that he or she is becoming bewildered or tired — I mean in a mental sense, you understand — he or she will please to let me know, and I will then come to some arrangement with such companions, either by suggesting a temporary withdrawal until new interest and strength have come back, or by suggesting some other arrangement.

I think that we will close the meeting now. A few moments of silence, please.

[Sounding of the gong. Silence.]

Meeting 9

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Nine

Meeting of March 26, 1930

G. de P. — Will you please come to order? [The sounding of the gong.] Have you any business to bring up this evening?

The Secretary — This letter is only one of several such letters that the Leader has received, and being the mildest of them, he has been requested to allow it to be read. It is dated March 15th.

"Dear Leader: After much reflection I have been moved to address you personally with reference to certain impressions received from the KTMG meeting last Wednesday. My reasons for taking this course are that the necessity for preserving the harmony of the meetings prevents one from protesting at the time and place, as one would naturally do at any ordinary meeting; and that our obligations of silence and secrecy as members of an esoteric body preclude any joint action on our part.

"I refer to what seemed to me a manifestation of disrespect towards the teacher, and even of a certain contemptuous attitude towards the teachings. The effect on me, as doubtless upon others, was to produce a conflict between the desire to avoid anything like anger and the desire to defend the teacher. I feel on the one hand that it will never do to allow a scene to take place in one of those meetings, and that any manifestation of anger would produce a deplorable result. And yet, how can we sit silent and permit the possible growth and spreading of a feeling of disrespect, or flippancy, or lack of appreciation, and ingratitude? Is it not indeed a case of "silence gives consent"?

"I feel that the private letter is the only channel open to us to express our feelings, and I suspect that others may avail themselves of it.

"Another thing is that I dread the possibility of a scene occurring at some future meeting.

"It may be that my feelings are exaggerated, but they do exist. It is not for me to suggest any course of procedure, but the receipt of such letters might serve to strengthen your hand; and the strong feeling of loyalty which we have should not be allowed to go unuttered at times when an expression may be specially appropriate.

"I feel too that it would not be enough merely to suppress the manifestation of any feeling of disrespect that may exist; but that it should not exist at all. But perhaps I have now said all that is needed, and enough. I conclude with a renewed assurance to you of my (our) great respect, appreciation, gratitude, recognition, and love; and deep regret that anything like a spirit of heckling should ever show itself.

"I also feel strongly that there may be a very few who have mistaken the teacher's generosity for weakness, and his reticence for ignorance; and I am anxious for the effect such an atmosphere might produce on some of our younger members. If I am too presumptuous, I may offer the plea that you have so often invited the candid expression of our feelings.

"Yours in all devotion,

"HENRY T. EDGE."

G. de P. — Are there any more communications? If not, I would like to make a little comment; not so much on the beautiful spirit of the companion whose letter you have just heard, but on the fact that this letter does show on the part of some of you — I will not say a lack of appreciation of the esoteric spirit — but a lack of a

sufficient appreciation of the esoteric spirit. And likewise — and this perhaps is the cause of the fault — a lack of understanding of what it meant when you took your pledge.

Now as an illustration of this: within a month, my work — the necessities of the work which I have to do, and for the purposes of the general Society — led me to ask three individuals belonging to this Group, each one to undertake a certain duty and in each instance my request, my appeal, was refused. I asked nothing that would touch the pocketbook, that would touch the family life, that would touch anything, it seemed to me, except your heart — an appeal for help.

Now if this were a higher degree, a mere refusal would automatically have placed the student beyond the pale of the School. You have taken a pledge to give all you can "in time, money, and work" to the theosophical cause; to obey without caviling, without argument, without delay, all the orders that the Outer Head issues to you in all that concerns your work for theosophy or the theosophical movement. That is the pledge you took in two of its clauses.

Now if this pledge had been properly understood by these three companions, I should not have been in the position of your teacher asking for help, and having that help refused. In the Oriental School, of which our School is a prolongation or extension, it is considered an honor to be singled out to undertake a duty — an honor so great and so high that the chela lives in the hope that he may be so singled out, in order to express the love and devotion in his heart.

I know, Companions, that many of you have not understood the pledge that you have taken. You don't know what it means, and I have on various occasions tried to tell you. You are Occidentals: you are frightened at the thought of giving up your most precious "personal independence." You think that it is a terrible thing, which really means that you don't trust the School and that you don't trust your teacher. If you did, you would have no fear; you would be as fearless as the sunlight penetrating everywhere in any circumstances.

And I have not been surprised that these three consecutive refusals — the one after the other — took place. In a way I have been glad of it, because it has given me an opportunity to request those of you who do not desire to carry on, kindly to withdraw.

You don't know what this School may be in the future. You don't know what you may be called upon to do; and I don't want those who are ignorant of their esoteric duty in the School. I don't want any weak links in our chain. I dare not have them. You have had your chance. You have been given more than outer students for many, many centuries in the world's history have been given; and what you have received will remain as a precious treasury in your hearts and minds until you die.

But I want strong men and women in this group, who are not only willing, but able, to live up to their pledge: to take that pledge and study it and realize what it means, and be proud of it. If any one of you thinks that I could call upon you to do a wrong or an immoral or an impossible thing, then your place is not here.

Now I don't speak unkindly. I speak with the firmness and intensity with which my heart is filled. It is my duty so to speak to you. My heart is filled also with love and pity. I have no censure for these companions, not a particle. I know human nature too well; but they have done wrong in taking a pledge which they have not more carefully considered, for the plain English of it is sufficiently clear. And therefore I request you, I beg of you, to send in your resignation from the KT Memorial Group; and at the same time from the ES.

I am speaking now to those of you who in their hearts feel that they cannot carry on. It is the only honest thing to do, the only right thing to do. Otherwise you are here under false pretenses, coming here perhaps because others come, coming to gain what to you should be forbidden wisdom, because you are not willing to live up to your pledge.

I would liefer have a hundred men and women upon whom I could depend than one hundred thousand weaklings, forming a weak chain, a chain of straw. And in this degree, oh, how little you are called upon to do — practically nothing, babies' play! You don't know what it is to belong to the higher degrees, you have no conception of it.

In the higher degrees you are tested by life, by the forces of nature, which test and wring every fiber of your being. That is the way in which the real tests come: heart and mind, soul and spirit, will and consciousness, all are tried. It is like the gold which is cast into the flaming furnace; and like it you must come out purified. I have been through it myself, and I know whereof I speak. And that purification washes out all personality.

Only karmic weaknesses remain, and those karmic weaknesses belong to the fabric of the cleansed material, whether it be cleansed copper, or cleansed iron, or cleansed lead, or cleansed gold.

It is my duty to warn you in this way, dear Companions. I am not chiding, I am not scolding. I am simply pleading with you to do the right and honest thing. If you resign honestly, you will be respected. In my own heart there will be more respect for the honest, manly and womanly withdrawal, with the statement that you feel that you cannot truly and forever live up to your Pledge, than for your continuing to come where you don't belong, and for your receiving what you are not entitled to.

I will say in answer to this beautiful letter from Brother Edge that I was not aware at the time nor did I feel that there was the slightest wish to heckle or to embarrass me. I think I know the comrade to whom Brother Edge refers and I know that his heart is as devoted as anyone's, but he does indeed have an unfortunate way of expressing himself, which, when I first knew him, I also took to be a sarcastic way. But it is not so intended.

Nevertheless Brother Edge is right. It is greatly to his credit that he wrote as he did. It shows his devotion. It shows the real chela spirit, for the chela's first duty is not to protect himself but to protect his teacher.

Has any one any questions?

Student — It seems to me that the theosophical teachings concerning the essential divinity of man add to the difficulty of an explanation of the origin and existence of moral evil in the world. The nobler the nature of man intrinsically is, the more incomprehensible does wrongdoing on his part become. May I ask for further light on this subject?

G. de P. — This is a very interesting question, really a most thoughtful question, and one which probably has baffled every esoteric student at different times, and yet the answer is very plain. I will illustrate by asking a question after the method of Socrates: do the rocks commit sin? Are the plants guilty of moral evildoing? Can it be said even that the beasts are held karmically responsible for what they do? In each case the answer is no.

It is only when there is self-consciousness, and spiritual attributes misused, and spiritual energies misapplied, that evil enters into the life of the world. The rock does no evil. The rain which pours down and perhaps washes away a mountainside, carrying human lives with it, does no evil; but a man does. The man can do it, I mean. He has self-consciousness, he has discrimination, he has judgment, he has vision, he has understanding of these qualities, being an individualized entity; and when he misuses these through his lack of a still larger vision — in other words, through being imperfectly evolved — that is evildoing.

Now if we lived in the spiritual-divine parts of our nature, there would be no evildoing; but we do not live in those parts yet. We are as yet undeveloped creatures as compared with what we shall be in the far distant future; and while it is therefore obviously true that every one of us in the core of the core of his being is a divinity, we human beings are not gods, we are but poor and imperfect expressions of that inner divinity. The inner divinity sins not, for all its operations and motives are at one with the universe of which we are children.

Extremes meet: the highest and the lowest are sinless; they sin not. But the intermediate portion of the ladder of life brings evil or disharmony into the world, and this portion is men. And just in proportion as the faculties and powers of this inner god shine forth, in the same proportion does evildoing become repulsive to that man, become horrible.

There is such a thing as spiritual evil in the world, and the Christian Paul speaks of it, "spiritual wickedness in high places." This is due to the fact that there are certain beings who are one-sidedly developed. It is very difficult to explain this, because the cases are very rare. There are beings who have reached a certain spiritual stature, but one-sidedly: they are spiritual abnormalities. They are like some beings whom you occasionally see born into the world, with enormous intellectual capacity and a poor, feeble, little physical body — or vice versa.

I will go a little further in order to round out the philosophical thought. While our inner god to us humans and

in our own universe is sinless, incapable of sin, because it is the primal expression of divine nature itself —

"children of the most high" to use a Christian expression — nevertheless when we humans shall have self-consciously attained that high plane of spiritual-divine development, even there there are spheres of life, mansions of life, as much higher than we shall then be, as our divine is higher than the point which we now occupy; and these second still more sublime entities, even what we call gods, could commit sin, not human sin of course, but what we may call spiritual sin. This is merely another way of saying that evolution is endless; that there are always higher, and sublimer, and grander heights to attain, to reach to. That is what it really means.

Student — We are taught that the dhyan-chohans through conscious efforts direct cosmic law. Does man in his sphere, by the magical power of forgiveness and love, consciously direct, but in a less degree however, the higher law?

G. de P. — No, I would not say that man directs the higher law. Great and noble men can become vehicles and channels for the higher law. They become alive to the higher law and become expressions of it. Perhaps in that restricted sense they could be said to direct the operations of the higher law, just as the mahatmas and demigods may be said to direct law — the actual truth, however, being that they become channels, vehicles, for expressing the divine law.

This is true because man is destined to become a collaborator and coworker with the gods. He is so on earth even today in his poor feeble way. He has attained self-consciousness, he has attained conscience — the sense of right and wrong. Ethics and morals are not conventions, Companions. They are based on the laws of nature, spiritual nature; for right is right and wrong is wrong eternally, no matter how high you go. Man's views of ethics or morals become broader, deeper, more profound, as he evolves — the fundamental characteristic of right action remaining always the same.

No, I would not say that man directs the higher law, but he becomes a channel through which the higher law may flow, so to speak. His love becomes consonant with the operations of spiritual being. And the dhyan-chohans, the lords of meditation, are channels on their lofty planes in just the same way, but are much grander and nobler channels than we half-developed human beings are.

Do you know that on the higher globes of our planetary chain, along the ascending arc, the animals there are hundreds of times more spiritual than we, and more evolved? That is a fact. You don't know what you have locked up within you. To say that you have an inner god is true, but you must free your imagination, wash all the superstitious cobwebs out of your brains; let your spirit soar, intuit, see, and then you will get some inkling, some intimation, of the ruling awful splendor that is within each one of you.

Student — Will you please explain the meaning of the term descending dhyan-chohans?

G. de P. — I don't quite see the application of the word "descending." Does it refer to evolution or is the reference to a mystical descent? I suppose in a general way the reference is to evolution: the descent of spirit into material life, of cosmic spirits into material existence. But if that is so, I wonder why this question is asked, as I must have explained the matter a hundred times before.

The monads, cosmic spirits, dhyan-chohans, do not descend. This word is a figure of speech; but they extend an influence from themselves, a ray as it were, just as the higher part of your own constitution does not become your own human physical body, but enlivens it, invigorates it, fills it with the reflection of its own splendor and glory, which reflection is the human soul. Furthermore this reflection on a lower plane is even the animal soul and the life in your body. But this reflection is not a descent of the god within you, into becoming flesh. That metaphor is the gross Christian way of expressing the matter, and shows how degenerated the old teachings had become when that phrase first gained currency.

While all this is perfectly true, it is also true to say — and I have pointed this out many, many times, and it is the root of the meaning of what I have just called this gross Christian expression — that this very ray from within reaches its most material aspect in our physical bodies. The modern European poet who said that when he looked upon the face of one of his fellows his heart was filled with awe, and that he knew also that when he put his hand upon a fellow human being he touched a god, spoke truth. The physical body is a concretion

in matter of the lowest aspect of the monadic ray. This ray can go no lower into matter in the present stage of evolution of our hierarchy and therefore stops at and in the physical body.

The same reference, and the same allusion just spoken of, may be made to the planetary chain of seven globes

— the descent of the life-wave on the descending arc until it reaches the fourth globe, which is our earth; then the turning point in the fourth root-race occurs and the beginning of the ascent along the luminous arc. In every planetary chain the life-wave can go no lower down than what is its karmic lowest point which is the most material globe of any planetary chain. Consequently, there are planetary chains in our own solar system much higher than ours; so much higher that their lowest or fourth globe we humans cannot see, because it is invisible to us, being too ethereal for our eyes to take cognizance of. Such a fourth globe is on what is to us a spiritual plane, and yet it is the most material plane of such a superior planetary chain.

The next question, please.

Student — You have told us that there are actually ten principles instead of the seven usually mentioned.

May we know something of these three additional principles, please?

G. de P. — Forbidden knowledge! And yet it is my duty to answer every question if I can — at least to give some responsive answer to it. I can therefore say this, Companions, that the upper triangle or the three principles above the seven are the link by which we hang from the heart of the universe; and the seven lower principles are the pendant of jewels — to follow the figure of speech — hanging from this link. To put it in another way: the three highest principles, the three above the seven, you may look upon as an open door leading into the next and higher hierarchy.

Yes, there are not only seven principles: there are ten — three to us unmanifest, seven manifest. And there are also ten globes to every planetary chain. The three highest occupy the same analogical relation to the lower or manifest seven globes that these three highest principles of our human constitution occupy to the lower seven principles of our constitution. In a general way, these three highest, with the first of the seven, are exoterically summed up under the one generalizing word atman — the self — the essential self.

Student — You said in a former meeting that the sixth race would have two backbones, no hair, and one eye on top of the head."

As the early third race were hermaphrodite and their manner of running circular, will the sixth race also be as the third were, hermaphrodite and round? And how will they get two backbones unless two, a male and a female, incarnate in the same body? Will it be the same two that separated on the third race?

G. de P. — In the first place, I made no such statement as this questioner says. I did not say the sixth root-race, and I did not say that the eye would be on top of the head; and the reference to the circular movement of the "pudding-bags" of the third root-race was not mentioned by me at all, but is taken from a reference by HPB to Plato, who in his Banquet tells the story, a mythical tale: which is a true tale, but told in Greek mythological form.

I hardly know how to answer a question which is not accurately phrased and which makes reference to things which were not spoken of at all — things which I did not say.

I said that man in the far distant future (why the sixth root-race? perhaps in the sixth round — I particularly avoided specifying the time) would be very different in shape from what he is now. And I asked a series of questions. I said: "Would you like to have two backbones, no hair, no teeth, to shed the nails of toes and fingers yearly as a serpent does in its own particular time?" I will add to that — and this is by way of answering the unmistaken portion of this kind companion's question — if future man has two backbones (and I now say that he will have them) it will most certainly not be because the physical body is the joint dwelling place or joint vehicle of a man and of a woman, because in those times there will be no men and no women.

Men and women are an evolutionary event — a present passing transitory phase of evolution. We are in that phase now. We were not in it in the early third root-race, nor in preceding root-races; and when we shall have passed through this phase sex will die out, and any child then born having one or the other sex will be a teratological phenomenon, and will be considered a monster.

The two backbones will come from this: the expression in one human vehicle of the positive and negative aspects of life — in other words of the pranic life currents acting differently from the way they now act.

These life currents even today have their main channel in the spinal column.

I will go a little further than this. In our esoteric teaching, the spinal column on the astral plane is divided into three internal tubes or channels, the central one occupied by what the Hindus call the nadi or current-stream of the sushumna. Another one at the right is usually called the tube or the channel of what the Hindus call the currents of ida, and the one at the left, of the current called pingala. The one, ida, even today transmits what may be called the positive currents of life of the pranic stream, and the one at the left transmits what may be called the stream of vital electromagnetism of the negative character.

It is most difficult to find proper words for these things. I confess the words that I choose may be not the best, but they are the ones that at present occur to me, and I use them — with great reservations as regards accuracy of use — merely because they are phrases, expressions, familiar to you, and will give you some idea of what I am trying to say.

Ida on the right — and in some Hindu books the positions of ida and pingala are reversed — ida on the right then, and pingala on the left, will evolve forth into the two spinal columns, the two backbones, each one to contain half of the vital currents connected with the sushumna-current which is spoken of in the Hindu scriptures as one of the rays of the sun, transmitted to the moon — referring not only to the exterior sun, but also to the invisible orb.

Yes, I will go a little further still than this. It is along the sushumna-tube of the spinal column today that the entity whether incarnating or excarnating takes its entrance into, or departure from, the physical body.

There are many other things which future man will possess, which mankind today does not possess. Many strange things will happen to the physical body of man as time passes. Furthermore, why should this questioner think that the third race corresponds with the sixth race, which is next to the seventh or last. The correspondential race to the sixth on the ascending arc is the second on the descending arc. We correspond to the third root-race because the third is the third from the beginning and the fifth is the third before the ending.

One, two, three — four — five, six, seven. Mankind will not have two backbones before our present fifth root-race has run its course. But the two backbones will most certainly come. When — I don't care to say; but they will come.

Referring a moment to the question of sex: I think that I have mentioned this before in the Temple at one of the meetings conducted under our beloved KT, when I spoke under her direction. The children of the future, that is the offspring of the human race of the future, will no longer be men-children or women-children, nor born in the present method of birth; but will be born by will power and imagination uniting together — and born consciously of course. By deliberate will and strong imagination, by kriyasakti, children will be brought forth — from what part of the body, I leave it to you to imagine. Perhaps from the head. Even today the human germ-cell is an astral deposit which grows into the human generative cell; and the children of the future will be born from their parents first — in the time of which I am speaking — as wisps of opalescent, translucent substance issuing from the body.

Student — Please explain further the three nadis: ida, pingala, sushumna.

G. de P. — Well, I think that this question has already been covered in the answer that I have just given to the previous question. I will add, however, that these three nadis, as the Hindus call them — and nadi is a Sanskrit word which means "stream," as a stream of water — are the three main vital streams in the human body, and these three nadis are in and around the spinal column. From the topmost of the cervical vertebrae, to the lowermost or the os coccygis — that is, the lowest vertebrae of the spinal column — these three channels are the channels of the life forces; and when one knows how to control them he can work wonders of magic.

I think I have said enough about this. What is the next question, please?

Student — Can something be told about Mithila, referring especially to the verse from the Mahabharata: "If Mithila is on fire, nothing of mine is burnt (in it)" (ch. 178, st. 2).

G. de P. — Mithila was one of the famous cities of ancient Hindustan. I don't recollect the passage here spoken of, but I get the idea very clearly. The writer evidently attempted to show that one who is of high spiritual grade, such as Krishna in the Bhagavad-Gita, has no fear of any possession that he may have being destroyed; and even though the capital city of the country may burn, whatever he owns or possesses will be safe from the conflagration. That is a statement of truth. I don't recollect at the moment the passage in the Mahabharata here spoken of, so I cannot give any more definite answer.

Student — In the srutis, seven orders of pitris are mentioned. What class or grade do the lunar pitris of The Secret Doctrine belong to?

G. de P. — A very low grade, relatively speaking. The seven classes of pitris mentioned in the srutis of Hindustan are the seven classes of the monads that HPB speaks of in The Secret Doctrine; and the lunar pitris are one of the lowest classes of these monads — one of the lowest monadic classes.

Srutis is of course a Sanskrit word, which means "tradition" — things handed down in traditional writings, the Hindus making a distinction between srutis and smritis. The smritis are the things handed down by unwritten tradition, as possibly might be said in European countries: transferred from teacher to pupil, at low breath and with mouth at ear; and this is the root of HPB's meaning where she speaks of the Smartava Brahmanas as being superior to the srautas — the smritis standing higher in the esoteric sense than the srutis, the srutis containing merely the written scriptures, whereas the Smatava Brahmanas study the smritis more particularly

— the tradition handed down by word of mouth from teacher to pupil. Sruti comes from the root sru, which means to "hear." Therefore tradition heard and written down; smriti comes from smri, to "remember,"

therefore unwritten tradition handed down by word of mouth.

Student — Can you tell us the difference between the lives of our body that constitute our family, and the lives that merely pass through our bodies?

G. de P. — The lives that constitute our family? I presume the reference is here to the family of lifeatoms which make up one's physical body. I have explained this many, many times before. Our bodies are merely built up of our own lifeatoms, our own children, our own offspring, from the fount of vitality within us, therefore enchained to us through eternity. It is these, mainly, that make up the body.

The other and many fewer lifeatoms that compose our body we are hosts to; but they do not remain with us.

They are in peregrination through us, in transit through us.

For instance, when a man dies all the lifeatoms of his being on all the planes, pursue, each lifeatom, its own peregrinations or transmigrations through the beings and entities of its own plane. The lifeatoms of the physical body of the man who has died pursue their peregrinations or transmigrations through entities and beings of this physical plane, through other bodies; in other words, through the bodies of other men, the bodies of beasts, the bodies of plants, even through the atoms and molecules of the mineral kingdom. But they are all gathered back into the physical man when that reincarnating ego returns to incarnation, drawn to him by a psychomagnetic attraction which is extremely powerful. They come to us through the air, through the water, through food. The man takes them in with every breath he draws, with every particle of food that he eats, and it is his own atoms that thus build up his body; and most of the rejecta — the food that is cast out of the body — is composed of the lifeatoms that really do not belong to him.

So you see what it means. When you next return to physical incarnation on this earth, you will have a physical body that is simply the carrying on of this same present physical body — the same lifeatoms — and having the karma behind it that this physical body has when it dies. The new body will be almost identical, improved somewhat to be sure, of different complexion perhaps, possibly not so tall, or perhaps taller, fatter or thinner as the case may be; but actually the same identical person and more or less with the same tint of complexion and color of hair, and so forth.

But through the ages there is a slow but constant improvement, so that when it is said that when a man dies he

will never have his physical body again it is practically a true statement. He never will have that physical body again. It is an event which has passed, but the body he will have is the karma of this body — which is just the same thing. You know what karma is.

You have not even now the body that you had ten years ago, nor the body you had when you were a little child, and yet you retain your physical personality and grow.

It is just the same from life to life, the same identical lifeatoms coming and going, but changing through the ages, just as your present physical body has changed through the years from birth. Truly this ought to be plain. And when you hear the statement made as I have made it to you so often, that you will have the same body again when you come back, you now should see the meaning. I mean that you will have the same lifeatoms in the karma of the body that has gone: the same thing but just a little changed, a little improved; just as you are today not exactly what you were a week ago even, or even an hour ago. Not exactly and identically the same. That is the idea.

Student — I have been looking over the periods of Theosophical cycles, and note that the Master speaks very strongly of the first seven years in The Mahatma Letters to A. P. Sinnett saying that if the Society passes through it — he didn't think it was certain that the Society could — then the Society could go on; otherwise they would have to postpone for many years.

G. de P. — Quite true, quite true. There is a seven-year period just as there is a ten-year period, which is a fuller part of the same law, and which is the same period as the solar spot cycle, usually conceived of as an eleven-year period. Questions dealing with cycles are matters which resemble very much all questions concerning the moon, which, as you know — because I have seen it in some of your articles — is in one sense the master or mistress, in other words, the governor, of earthly cycles as a rule. There are many kinds of cycles. There is a very interesting cycle of four years' duration, and this cycle arises out of a still smaller cycle of three years' duration — four and three make seven again, and three more make the ten.

Every fourth teacher is a renewer, a regenerator, or should be, and will be if the Society has lived true and has kept the link unbroken through the times of the three previous teachers. Every fourth year begins a new cycle again. It is a case of wheels within wheels. It is a most bewildering subject.

Has anyone any other question to ask?

Student — Many times during our gatherings here you have mentioned that if we only knew why it rained —

and I have often wondered what you meant by that. Could you tell us? "If you knew the meaning of why it rained."

G. de P. — Yes. I could tell you but I have no right to speak of it. I am awfully sorry to have to give an answer like that. But as usual I must give you some kind of answer, and I now try. It rains because the pranic currents of the earth carry rejuvenating elements from the inner worlds into the physical sphere, largely through the rain. Rain is not a haphazard phenomenon. It comes strictly according to precedent cause, and that precedent cause is in the invisible realms, as indeed everything causal is. Let me give you a little hint.

In one of the ancient Hindu scriptures, one of the Upanishads, it is said — and it is also in the Bhagavad-Gita, I believe — that men are born from food, food is born from rain, and rain is born from sacrifice. Now just take that — I won't say put it in your pipe, because you don't smoke, but put it in your mind and think it over.

Student — May I ask a question regarding the cycles?

We understand that the age of Brahma is 311 trillions, and 40 billions, of our years, I think. But is that gaged by what our year now is? Because our year has changed, has it not, from ancient days?

G. de P. — How can I answer a question like that until you define what you mean by change?

Student — I understand that the year used to be longer than it is now.

G. de P. — Oh, you mean in length. Let me tell you what a year is in the esoteric teachings: one complete circling around the sun, whatever length of time it may take. Time has little to do with it, but from the astronomical standpoint it has everything. These years are calculated according to the number of full revolutions of the earth around the sun, where each one such revolution takes an absolute time — one of our present years, or a time period equalling ten, twenty, thirty, times the length of our year or thirty times shorter. That is your answer.

Student — Yes, thank you, Professor.

G. de P. — Therefore you see that if you are calculating in Venus years, it would be many more so far as the numerical figure goes. If you were calculating in Saturn's years, it would be many fewer, so far as the mere numerical figure goes. Do you understand me?

It is the teaching of modern astronomical science that the year is one of the constants, one of the invariables in the solar system; but that is not our teaching. Our teaching is that the year not only lengthens but decreases in what I may call absolute time.

Student — May I ask about the year? I wanted to ask a question about that for a long time. In the letters to Hume, not one of HPB's but one of the Master's, he refers to the fact that one of the patriarchs, I think it was Seth or Enos —

G. de P. — You are not going to bring in those elder Jews, are you?

Student — He said, coming down to 365 years meant that the earth came to 365 days at that time, I think; and that I fancy refers to the third and a half race, does it not? It is a very subtle allusion and I want to ask about it. I cannot find anything in The Secret Doctrine that gives, except by analogy, even a slight suggestion about it.

G. de P. — Let me understand you. You ask whether the year is illustrated by one of the Biblical Jewish Patriarchs whose lifetime was only so many days long?

Student — No, with the preceding ones, Methuselah, etc., before the third and a half race, the year was 900

days, and then shortened according to that statement; and it is given allegorically in the lengths of the lives of the Patriarchs; and when it came down to Seth or Enos, his life was said to be 365 years, which the Master said meant 365 days, and the year settled down to its present condition. I am not quite clear if that was in the third and a half race.

G. de P. — You are confusing the idea. The cycles themselves do not change relatively to each other. The year — however long it may be absolutely, in absolute time — will always have 365 days, or more accurately 360 days, and these days are rotations of the earth on its axis. The length of the day, the absolute length, may be longer or shorter; and the length of the year, the absolute length of the year as far as time periods go, may be shorter or longer than it now is. But each year will always contain 365 turns or rotations of the earth on its axis. Cycles within cycles. For instance, the year will never have 300 days or 2101/2, or 940.

Now these Jewish Patriarchs are not only men; they refer to time periods. Do you get that idea? Racial time periods. And actually Methuselah represented a race; so did the others.

Student — May we hear about the new planet? I am surprised no one has asked the question, as we are all so much interested. HPB said that Neptune does not belong to our system. Is it possible that the new planet and Neptune and onward are another septenary that we have not found yet?

G. de P. — No; the new planet — if it be proved to be a planet and I doubt it not — is simply an instance of another capture, just as Neptune is, and I don't myself believe that Uranus belongs to our solar system. In fact I have every reason not to think so.

You know what the modern chemical teaching is with regard to the capture of electrons and the ejection of electrons from the body of an atom, of course; each such capture or ejection of an electric body changing the

polarity of the atom from positive to negative, then back to positive and then back to negative again. And the solar system is merely an atom on a grand scale — or, to put it more accurately, the atom is a solar system on an infinitesimal scale: and the same rule prevails in both. Hence outside bodies can be captured, and such a capture changes, reverses, the polarity of the solar system. The solar system, just like an atom, can make one or two or more captures or undergo one or two or more ejections, each such capture or ejection reversing the previous polarity of the solar system in question. Is my answer responsive?

Student — Yes.

Student — May I ask why the sun and moon are used in place of planets?

G. de P. — Simply because — and this is an easily understandable answer, I think — the planet for which the sun stands cannot at present be seen, and also simply because the planet for which the moon stands cannot at present be seen. Both are more ethereal bodies than the other planets that the astronomers see. And the planet for which the sun is used or stands is very close to the sun, and the planet for which the moon is used or stands is very close to the moon.

Now this answer, the latter part of the answer of course, would be to a scientific man the most blatant nonsense, and yet it is true.

Student — Are they the only two planets that are so closely linked to our globe that they affect it?

G. de P. — Oh no, all the other planets do, that is, all the seven sacred planets do so especially affect it.

Student — But the others we can see.

G. de P. — The others we can see?

Student — These are the only two we cannot see.

G. de P. — I see what you mean. These are the only two we cannot see.

Student — May I ask a question about planet capture? Do these planets really belong somewhere else?

G. de P. — In the first place, neither Neptune, nor this newly discovered ninth planet, are really planets. They were errant bodies in space and they have a planetary type, but they are not planets, to use the popular word, belonging to our solar system at all. They are strangers in it, they are captures.

Student — Then they don't belong anywhere? I wonder what is happening — where they really ought to be?

G. de P. — Space universal is just filled with wandering bodies of all sizes, from atomic sizes up to immense masses of solar stuff, of cosmic stuff — bodies of all sizes. The solar system is capturing cosmic atoms by the untold decillions every instant of time and also ejecting them, but these are very small in size. It is very rarely that a solar system captures a body sufficiently large to approach the dimensions of Neptune or of this newly discovered planet. They are really more of the nature of comets far advanced in cometary age.

I don't know whether that answer is very illuminating, although it is quite exact.

Student — May I ask a question which is not scientific? Why is it when there is anything of exquisite beauty in music, or in a scene, or in a character, you always feel — if it is of any deep beauty — a sort of pathos with it?

G. de P. — I think that this is very true. How often have I not felt that also. There is something about the splendor of a sunrise or of a sunset, particularly a sunset, which always impresses me with an indefinably vague pathos. I look into the heart of a rose, for instance, and I see unspeakable beauty.

There too, there is something about it that appeals, touches — appeals to me in a peculiar way, something that touches the core within me. It arouses the feeling of sadness, of pathos almost.

It is true. I would hardly know how to answer that offhand, without giving it more thought. It may be that beauty is so lofty and noble a thing that when we sense it, as we do in such circumstances, the human soul feels its own inadequacy to understand fully, to appreciate fully and to grasp such beauty; and thereupon there ensues a natural reaction upon that human soul — a self-pity perhaps taking the form of sadness or pathos —

that it cannot understand or penetrate more deeply into this beautiful thing. It may be so.

Student — Will you help us to understand better the relationship of the higher self with us? Is it in the slightest degree cognizant of our interest in our troubles, and our trials, and our attempts to win out? Or is it analogous to the average man in regard to his own lifeatoms?

G. de P. — The latter is the case, and how fortunate it is! Suppose that you as a human being with your ordinary human mind were so engrossed with the lifeatoms of your body, that all the great and splendid things that properly and rightly should be the field and activity of your consciousness were shut out. Don't you see? The human soul is the god or the inspirer atomically of the lifeatoms of the body, and just so is the inner god within us the inspirer, the enlightener, the invigorator, the guide, the teacher, the leader, of the human soul. You see the point, do you not?

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — It is for the human soul to raise itself up to, aspire towards, the Splendor within, to become at one with it — to feel the sunlight of beauty, and the truth within. Then the whole being is illuminated. Then come peace, and love, and compassion, and the sense of oneness with all that lives. I know nothing more beautiful and holy as a human feeling than that. The god does not descend; it is for the human to become at one with the god and thereby become godlike.

Student — I don't want to be personal in telling this little story, but I think I will have to mention two names, so as to be able to tell it quite correctly. I was at my mother's home the other night and we were looking at the family album, and when we came to the pictures of the twins, she said, "Now this is a picture that I sent to KT. She called for it." And on returning it, KT wrote to mother, saying that over the little boy's picture was a very dark cloud or shadow, and to be very careful with him, he was going to be very ill; and as we all know, he was. My mother asked me: "Do you think now if that picture were to be seen by a seer, would the shadow still be there?" I am going to ask you, if you answer this, may I please pass it on to her.

G. de P. — Well, this is not an easy question to answer. Shadows do not hover around the photograph and change with the advancing years. A photograph taken at a certain period of life, to the seer's eye will show shadows at that time and in the immediate future, but it would be very unlikely that shadows or light —

unless the light were very strong — would be visible in the photograph even to a seer's eye for a time period much later in life. That is the general answer to your question, if I have understood it aright.

Student — Thank you very much.

G. de P. — The seer would much prefer to see the individual rather than to look at a photograph. Indeed a true seer would not even need to see the individual, but could get the seeing reaction — if you understand what I mean — from a piece of paper that the person had touched, or a lock of hair, or a garment worn, or a finger ring, or a fountain pen, something that the individual had had on his body. There are some seers so highly developed that the mere mention of a name to them, although totally unknown to the seer, immediately brings up a picture, and that is because the one who mentions the name and who knows the person, presumably has a picture in his or her mind which the seer sees, and also senses other things beyond. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, thank you.

Student — May I ask a question in regard to the higher self ? It is sometimes said that the failure of the lower ego is due to the responsibility resting with the higher self, implying that the higher self is responsible for the failure sometimes, or successes, of the lower self. It is also said that the higher self may be turned towards duty, or may be attracted lower down; and I want to ask if it is possible for the higher self to be affected in

that way by the lower self?

G. de P. — Yes, yes, indeed, but not directly; vegetatively, if you understand my meaning, rather than actively. The truth that you have touched upon lies at the very basis of the heavy responsibility that the teacher in any initiation school has. He becomes individually responsible for the effect that his teachings have upon his pupils, and as his teachings affect the whole life in the future of those who believe in him, he links himself to them, to their karma, practically for ever.

The higher self is partly responsible for what the lower self does; the lower self is responsible wholly to itself.

But the higher self — the link between the lower and the divine part of the life-stream — becomes responsible. The teacher becomes partly responsible for the noble deeds done or the ignoble antics made by his disciples. That does not relieve the disciples however. They will have to pay to the last penny. They will also receive the reward to the last penny. Likewise the higher self is bound, karmically bound, and must remain with the lower self until it redeems it or saves it by its own constant presence; or until the lower self, through utter degeneration cuts off the link connecting the two, and then the lower self goes to pieces, is annihilated, and this is the case of a lost soul. A lost soul is a very, very rare and unusual case. But it happens.

This idea is at the basis — unknown to the Christians but known to the framers — of some of the Christian writings of the Christian New Testament, at a time when the idea prevailed that the Christ-spirit was responsible, or became responsible, for the sins of the world.

Student — Is this then the esoteric significance of vicarious atonement?

G. de P. — That is the real background of it. Nevertheless it is not vicarious atonement. Vicarious atonement is a degraded, distorted misrepresentation of the esoteric truth. The esoteric truth is, as I have told you, that the higher self is in part spiritually responsible for what its own child does, just as the human soul is ethically and morally responsible for what its body does, because the impulses originating in the human soul, and the impulses, spiritually speaking, which prevail in the human soul, originate in the higher self. There is a deep and profound mystery here, but the general idea should be clear to you. You understand me, do you not?

Student — Yes. The question of suffering connected with that is of course something that I should like to know more about if it is permitted.

G. de P. — The suffering on whose part?

Student — The suffering of the teacher: the one who gives, the one who gives the teachings.

G. de P. — The case of a mother who brings up her child and brings it up so unwisely, or so well, that the child goes wrong or becomes a noble example of manhood, is understandable, is it not? The joy in one case and the suffering in the other. It is just so with the teacher. The mother becomes responsible for the teaching which she has given to that child, and which will give to its mind a tendency upwards or downwards.

I know no more pernicious teaching in the world than the idea that children should be allowed to run wild, grow up naturally, as the expression goes. Teaching a child is a duty. The child should be helped, it should be guided, it should be taught, it should be restrained when occasion arises; and that is what the higher self in its own spiritual plane is doing all the time. But if its admonitions fail to reach the human soul, or reach it too feebly, so that the human soul goes crooked or goes wrong, the human soul will suffer; but the higher self is partly responsible just the same. Similarly so is the teacher. The mahatmas who started the TS, who founded our Esoteric School, will be karmically linked and tied to the members of that Esoteric School forever. And they have not so worked in this life for the first time. But this refers only, of course, to those ES members who come in and who put will and creative imagination into their ES pledges and work.

The mere curiosity seeker or monger who comes in under false pretenses will naturally get the karmic consequences and payment of falsehood and evildoing. But in this case the links with the teacher are naught, because there never have been any. You understand, do you not?

Student — Yes. May I ask one more question? Is there connected with the responsibility and suffering —

will the responsibility of the teacher, of the higher self —

G. de P. — You can say suffering also in many cases.

Student — Is there connected with that perhaps the greatest power in the universe?

G. de P. — There is. There is. The power arising in the very heart of being, which is compassion divine. And that compassion divine when manifesting through the teacher I will not say is the fruit, but at any rate originates in past — in the karma of acts done and undone — successes and failures.

Student — May I ask one more question? Is it then a smallness, a failure to understand these greater things, to attribute the suffering of the teacher to personal karma?

G. de P. — I do not think I quite understand your meaning.

Student — Well, I am afraid it is a kind of statement rather than a question.

G. de P. — I don't dare to answer such a question unless I understand it.

Student — Is it a lack of comprehension of these great laws on the part of people to attribute the suffering of the teacher to personal karma?

G. de P. — Most disciples usually think that. But this is because the disciples are blind, they are ignorant. A true teacher suffers in a manner that the disciple can hardly understand. It is an agony of soul that sometimes is indescribable, to see the divine spark in the disciple quenched by self-indulgence; to see possibilities slowly die down which the teacher has been working to bring out into high vigor and power. It is agony. The pupil usually ascribes this to the personal karma of the teacher and in a certain limited sense it is.

There is no denying that in a certain sense it is the teacher's karma, his individual karma. If I have rightly understood your question, this is the answer. If I have not, please try again.

Student — It seems to me it is a mistake to attribute it to personal karma of the teacher. I don't believe I have put my question clearly. Is it not a mistake of the pupil to attribute the suffering that the teacher may have during an incarnation to that teacher's personal karma, rather than to some of the wonderful laws according to which that teacher is helping?

G. de P. — I see what you mean — yes.

Student — To some higher laws that we do not understand at all?

G. de P. — That is true; and it is just of this last that I have at times attempted to give you a little inkling. I must also add that any teacher, for instance the mahatmas who started the ES and the TS, necessarily have their own individual karma, also; but the suffering that they undergo in connection with their pupils is due rather to the cosmic light of compassion, which very few pupils in their early stages of growth seem to understand anything about. It is like the alleged cry of Jesus on the Cross, and it is like his alleged exclamation: "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." Is the answer responsive?

Student — Yes, thank you.

Student — May I ask a question on the same subject of karma? There are one or two points that I would be very grateful if you could clear up. We are told of course that we have the power to rise above our personal karma. But there is another point and this is whether the disciple — one who undertakes a course of self-purification and service under a pledge and under a teacher — has the right to judge of another? Is it not impossible to judge another person? Because one who has taken the pledge and has pushed forward under the guidance of a teacher is meeting very many experiences for the sake of developing certain qualities in his nature. This is the way I have worked it out: a pupil in school would have many hours of study and hard work that a person not taking that certain course of study could avoid. And yet there is that other strict statement

that we reap only what we sow.

Now if we sowed in those finer fields something that has brought this reaping which is a precious reaping, although it may be very bitter — we have not done so in the ordinary definition of karma. We have not sown the seeds of it. Is there not a higher law —

G. de P. — Everything that happens to anybody, god or man, man or beast, beast or mineral, is karma. The pupil is not judged by his teacher, ever. But the teacher follows the rules of the School, for those rules generation after generation of seers and sages have tested and proved to be nature's laws. He knows that if he follows those rules strictly he is working in accordance with nature's laws. But he does not judge the pupil because of the pupil's mistakes. He knows that the mistakes of the pupil arise out of two facts: in striving to reach a greater light through the present darkness, almost certainly mistakes will be made; and secondly, that that urge to strive arises in karma. No pupil enters today the Oriental School unless he has been in it in other lives. And, of course, I refer to a real pupil, a sincere student; not a false-hearted curiosity monger. Is my answer responsive?

Student — Thank you.

G. de P. — Companions, it is very nearly time to close. I will answer one more question, and then we shall adjourn the meeting, please.

Student — I would like to ask a question in regard to the three planets which are above our seven planets.

You once spoke of them in those lectures that you gave when KT was with us in the ES meetings. [Published as Fundamentals of the Esoteric Philosophy. ] And I think you said, if I remember aright, that there was the upper spiritual pole; and you spoke of the connecting planets, at least that was my impression. Now I would like to ask whether these three planets, which are above, have to do with what we shall pass on to when we leave this planet; and when we have dropped those three planets below us — well I won't say this, because it would mix things up. I will simply ask the other question. Do the three planets have to do with the planets that we shall pass into, when we leave this planet?

G. de P. — They do. But we should speak of them, dear Doctor, rather as globes, in order not to cause confusion with the planets passed through during what are called the outer rounds. You are evidently referring to the globes of a planetary chain. If that is what you mean, then the answer is, yes. The three highest of the planets must also be passed through by the evolutionary life-waves before the complete cycle or turn through the chain is ended.

Student — Do you mean after we have finished these here?

G. de P. — After we have finished with the three on the ascending arc of the seven manifested globes, then we enter the two highest. Do you understand? Figure to yourself a triangle.

Student — Thank you.

G. de P. — Well, Companions, I think that we had better close tonight. It is a little late. We will have a few moments of silent thought, please.

[Sounding of the gong. Silence.]

*

G. de P. — Before we part tonight, Companions, I would like to add a few remarks. I have told you that a teacher never judges his pupils. The statement is accurate, but it has occurred to me that some of you may question this word "judge" and suppose therefrom, from your misunderstanding, that a teacher never should correct. It is a teacher's duty to correct as long as he feels the link between himself and the pupil to be existent. And this link depends upon the honesty of the pupil. A teacher would be a poor and imperfect preceptor if he omitted what is quite one-half of the duty of a teacher — to guide the mind and emotions of his pupils — and this he can do only at times by correction, verbal or other.

I have known teachers in this School who have been severe, but only when the character of the disciple was strong enough, pure enough, fine enough in temper, to take the severity and take it gladly and happily. Any other course would be simply a repetition of the fault in training that I have already spoken of in referring to children — allowing children to run wild. A mother, a parent, a teacher, would be at fault in permitting that, if he or she could possibly do otherwise.

It is a duty to help, and sometimes the best help can be rendered by frank, honest-to-goodness speech in reproof and reprimand; not unkindly in severity — in the sense of an injustice — but exposing the truth, without mincing of words. Then it is for the disciple to be glad and grateful for the opportunity rendered, given to him to see himself as the teacher sees him.

Good night, all!

Meeting 10

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Ten

Meeting of April 9, 1930

G. de P. — Are there any questions this evening?

Student — On March 13th I understood you to say: "You imagine that you originate thoughts from your brains — poor men!" From this striking utterance, taken in conjunction with KT's very emphatic and repeated injunction to "think four times on a subject, and then light will come," I deduced: first that our minds are but magnetic sieves through which continually flow thoughts of many kinds and from many sources, but that we have the power to repulse or attract what class of thoughts we desire, and that by the fourfold, purposeful concentration on a given subject, we at last attract the stream of thought from the higher self and so get at the truth of the thing sought after.

In other words, each of us has the power to compel a continuous stream of thoughts from high spiritual entities to pour through our minds, in place of the heterogeneous rubbish that flows through our brains as a rule, and it is our mission to hold these high thoughts in our minds and to live them, for by so doing we clothe them with the matter of this plane and as it were imprison them in this earth's sphere so that all men can get them without effort.

Is this correct? Will you elucidate your words, please?

G. de P. — That is a long question! Remember that every thought is an elemental. Even a human being gives utterance to energy centers: utters them, that is emits them, emanates them — and these energy centers are thoughts. Being elementals they have a future before them, but they do not begin with him. I do not mean by this on the one hand that he is merely a channel through which these thoughts pass. He is more than that. He is their father, their parent. But may I ask you if the father of a child creates his child? He is somewhat more than a channel and yet he is not a creator.

Thoughts come to us, enter our minds from the thought reservoir of the planet, and yet they would not come to us if we were not capable of receiving them. The thoughts we have depend upon our own individual grade in evolutionary development. Coarse people have coarse thoughts; spiritual people attract spiritual energy centers, or thought-elementals. Furthermore, there are certain thoughts which originate in the very life essence of a human being, and these are his own very children, born of his being. They originate in the thought organ, commonly called the mind, which is one of the apparatuses of the monadic essence, somewhat like an organ in the body, a part of the body, and yet not the whole body. So the organ of thought is not the whole mind, but a part of the inner constitution, devoted, or consecrated, or built rather, for uttering, giving birth, to thoughts; just as other parts of the constitution give birth to other energy centers.

The series of observations in this long question is so complex and so complicated, and deals with so many things, that I can see the mental distress of the companion who has asked that a reply be given; but it is almost impossible to do so without spending an entire evening on this in order to answer all the points.

It is quite wrong, for instance, to speak of thoughts as being attracted down from high spiritual beings, and imprisoned here. Human beings do not do that. Human beings are merely one of the channels, one of the circulations of the cosmos, of the universe, through which the energies of the universe pass and manifest themselves. We human beings are not so frightfully important in the universe as all that the questioner's idea implies. Strictly speaking, the human being is no more important than the merest atom, for in the absolute sense of the words there is neither great nor small in the divine economy. The atom has as much right to be, and to live, and to grow as a human being has.

Thoughts are things because they are elementals. Entities are beginningless, really. Try to grasp the idea.

They come into one hierarchy on the lowest plane, and grow and evolve in that hierarchy until they attain the highest plane thereof, and then pass on into a higher hierarchy, entering into the lowest plane of that superior

hierarchy; and thoughts act like everything else does. We human beings may be considered to be thoughts of some entity still more sublime than we are, in which entity we live and move and have our being. And by human beings, I do not mean our bodies. I mean the thinking self-consciousness part of us, living temporarily in these physical bodies — the energy part of us.

No, the remark that I made was an attempt to destroy the impression that human beings by their brain-minds create or originate thoughts out of nothing at all; that thoughts begin and never had an existence before. That idea is all wrong. Think of the example of the father and the child: the latter bone of the bone, blood of the blood, flesh of the flesh of the former; and just passing through the father as a channel, and yet not wholly as a channel. The germ of life would not go through the father, unless there were a strong psychological bond, indeed a spiritual bond, as well as a physical bond. We are all interlinked together. We are all interblended.

We are all intercommunicating.

So it is with thoughts which pass through the mind, except that wonderful class of thoughts that originate in our own Monadic Essence, and are, in a still more intimate sense, born of us, our very children; and these will be with us for eternity. We are throwing them forth constantly, evolving them forth, as well as receiving vagrant thoughts that come to us from the thought reservoirs of the planets in which are the children of other thinking entities. These other thoughts that come to us are the very children of other human beings, just as our own very children — the particular class that I spoke of — in their turn become vagrant children, through the minds, through the thought-organs, of other human beings.

These problems of consciousness are exceedingly difficult, and I have been rather astonished that so many questions have been asked about them, but I can readily see why it is so, because up to the present time, in our teachings, so little has been said about them, and it is therefore a very natural thing that you should be desirous of more explicit explanation.

Student — It cannot think thoughts; where then do thoughts originate?

G. de P. — What a most beautifully explicit and lucid question! Does It refer to parabrahman, or the brain, or the human soul, or an atom, or what? Can you kindly explain to what the It refers?

Student — If thoughts do not emanate from man, where do they emanate from? The IT is in capital letters, so to speak, as standing for the Supreme.

G. de P. — I see. The verb emanate is both right and yet wrong. Remember that thoughts do not originate out of nothing. They come into this sphere from another more ethereal sphere.

On the other hand, the human thought organ, the mind organ, which transmits them into this sphere is not the mere channel only, the idea being that a thought could not come to one particular organ and pass through it, into this sphere, unless it had karmic links with that particular organ or those particular human beings to whom it passes.

Here again you have one of the mysteries of consciousness. But how wonderful that it is so! Just imagine a universe in which thoughts were created — never had a beginning before — by every human being who thus created them, thoughts which never could pass onwards to any other human being, and you see what would happen. No two men could ever understand each other; each one would be living in an absolute universe of his own. We understand each other because the thoughts of all men are more or less akin to each other and pass through the minds of us all; and of course because men are akin to each other. This is a problem for you to think over.

Student — I have understood that insomnia keeps the soul tied to the body, when it ought to be winging its way to spiritual planes, learning, growing, expanding. Is not insomnia then a very serious handicap to soul growth?

G. de P. — No, it is not. On the contrary, it is an opportunity for soul growth. Everything that calls for the exercise of will power, self-forgetfulness, self-control, exercises the spiritual faculties and powers of a man.

Sickness, disease, misfortune, are our best friends, because they call out the best that is in us.

Insomnia is not a bar to soul growth. The idea is that insomnia, just as ordinary waking during the daytime even if your sleep be perfect at night, keeps the self-conscious center of the human being more or less on this plane. And that self-conscious center does not get its period of repose and refreshment in the spiritual world, which it does during sleep. But that self-conscious center, or the ordinary man consciousness, human consciousness, is not the spiritual center at all, and the very fact that it has a longer time in wakefulness is more time for soul growth, also for self-control, the exercise of will power.

How far insomnia may affect the body adversely, is another question again; but the question that this companion asks does not refer to the body.

Student — What is its cause and cure from the spiritual, not medical, viewpoint?

G. de P. — Curing insomnia by the spiritual? I do not quite understand the question. Would you try to cure a toothache by a spiritual faculty? You would be degrading the faculty if you did, and if you could. But if you mean what method of living would so train the mind that the body would sympathetically react and insomnia would be cured, then my answer is by living aright: eating properly, thinking properly, living properly, exercising properly — in other words, clean living and high thinking. In some cases insomnia, like every other disease, is karmic. In fact everything is karmic, but here karmic in a particular sense, in the sense of its coming upon one who in the ordinary course of evolution would have passed pretty well beyond suffering so badly as you seem to have in mind. No, insomnia, like everything else, while distressing, and while every proper means should be used to cure it, is an opportunity for soul growth.

May I ask: does anyone feel sleepy?

Student — I have been feeling a little sleepy.

G. de P. — You have? Well, if sleepiness comes again, I think that you had better leave the meeting for tonight, please.

Student — I have thought this: that it is by means of the three principles above the seven generally named as composing the constitution of man, that atman the highest of the seven is drawn into its parent-star at the death of the body; and that when drawn thus it passes through the three globes of the earth-chain which are above the seven usually spoken of. Is this right?

G. de P. — The general answer to this question, without going into details is, yes. I might add, perhaps, that atman stands for the highest principles of the human constitution: in other words, the three principles forming the supertriangle, or our divine root, and the highest of the seven manifesting principles popularly called atman alone. And these do pass at the death of any human being through the three superglobes of the earth-chain, and wing their way to their own wonderful home, their original source.

This does not mean that such going home is an utter rupture or disunion with the remaining elements of the constitution of the man who has just died. Can you understand me when I tell you that your highest part may be in its own spiritual or divine home, and yet be present elsewhere? That is a fact. And it may be a hint to you of a great truth; but I can go no farther in explanation.

Student — Is it possible to take on a part or the whole of another one's karma? If possible, is it advisable?

G. de P. — Strictly speaking, it is impossible; but after laying down that statement as a general postulate, it is also right to make a modification — not of the principle that it is impossible to take upon yourself the karma in whole or in part of anyone, but a modification of the manner in which that rule should be understood. If it be a person's karma, let us say, to die by drowning — and this not in the sense of fate, but in the sense that all the circumstances of his past actions and thoughts have shaped his destiny so that that person has brought upon himself the karma of drowning — then in case someone else seeing him struggle in the water, plunges into the water in an attempt to save him and also drowns, obviously the would-be savior is not taking upon himself that other person's karma by trying vainly to save the other person and by drowning himself.

Nevertheless he has tried to save that person, tried to save that life, and has perhaps helped that person

unconsciously.

Now, let me take another instance, which may illustrate the point still better. A business man, let us say, involves himself by a number of careless monetary transactions in a position where he is burdened with debt.

He is faced with ruin. And according to modern ideas — American ideas in particular — perhaps faced with dishonor. He has a friend who has means, and this friend comes to the rescue of the one who is so burdened with debt and helps him out of his difficulty, but at enormous cost, let us say, to himself. He saves his friend from financial ruin, but at heavy cost to himself. Has he taken upon himself his friend's karma by that noble act? No, strictly speaking he has not. But he has nevertheless involved himself closely and intimately with that person's karma, wound himself into the web of that person's karma. Had it been that person's karma to fail in every sense of the word, he would have failed. He would have undergone a financial crash. But it was his karma to have this friend come and help him.

Whatever happens, and no matter how it happens, is karma. You cannot take upon yourself another person's karma, even if you would. But one who is free — and now listen carefully, I go a third step ahead — one who is naturally free karmically, free from a certain karmic web, can by his own will power enter that web of karma and become involved in it. He cannot relieve the other one, but by his action he can help that other one.

And at the bottom of this idea lies the distorted fiction of the teaching of vicarious atonement in the Christian Church.

You cannot take upon yourself the karma of another, either in whole or in part, but by your own action you can alleviate and soften that karma. In so doing, you do not take upon yourself the other person's karma, but you take upon yourself a new karma by your own action. Nevertheless, if it is done with a noble motive, in order to achieve a magnanimous end, it is, however unfortunate it may be at the time, a karma which will bring good to you someday, somewhere, and with interest added. You have done a noble act.

No, you cannot take upon yourself any part or portion of another's karma. If it were possible, then you could cheat the laws of nature, and cause and effect would be but words. You might as well say that you could take upon yourself the gaping wound in the body of someone who shoots himself. It cannot be done. Nature is not mocked. What ye sow ye shall reap, to the uttermost farthing. That is a law — nature's own operation, which the actor himself has brought upon himself. Karma is within you, not without; and everything that happens to you, you have originated in this or in some former existence.

There is no chance in the universe. You cannot interfere in another's karma, but you can help, you can alleviate, you can comfort, you can do many things along the pathway of pity and compassion. And you are acting with nature's innermost forces when you do so.

Now let us pass to the next question.

Student — You said that it is through or along the sushumna channel or tube of the spinal column that the ego enters and leaves the body at incarnation and disincarnation.

On the other hand, HPB says ( The Secret Doctrine, 1, 537) that "animal vitality descends in a larger supply to vegetation in the Sushumna sun-ray which lights and feeds the moon" — penetrating man and animal during their sleep.

Do these two statements combine to show that the disincarnating ego travels along this particular sushumna ray to the moon and thence to the sun, after it has become free from the flesh?

G. de P. — Here again is the same difficulty of which I have spoken before. Parts of this question, I cannot answer — I am not allowed to do so. I like the tone of this question though. It does not ask if there is a contradiction between the two statements, which is implying a doubt in the questioner's own mind. There is an obvious attempt to reconcile the two statements, and that spirit is very good. Let me see if I cannot give some answer. That is also my duty. There is an individual call for light here. A true note of aspiration in thought has been struck.

There is a slight misunderstanding of my meaning where I speak of the sushumna nadi, or channel of the

spinal cord, as being that by which the consciousness enters and leaves the body. That is true enough. But the sushumna ray is not one of the highest; and obviously the process of death has to do with the body, being a release from the body. Therefore both the sushumna ray and the sushumna channel are concerned in the release of the parts of the human constitution which temporarily are freed from the body, such as in sleep, or when the mayavi-rupa is projected, and at death. There is a slight misunderstanding here also about my words when I spoke of the reincarnating or incarnating ego entering the body through the sushumna-channel. How can that be when the body is not yet born?

I think that I have said almost enough. When the inner man leaves the body at any time for any purpose, it does so along the sushumna nada or sushumna channel of the spinal column, and it does so also at death.

I think we had better pass on to the next question. Very esoteric things indeed are touched upon unconsciously in this question, and I think I have said quite enough.

Student — I understood that the physical was always the exact replica of the astral. You said that the spinal column is composed on the astral plane of three tubes. Why then is not the physical spinal column composed also of three separate or interdependent parts? Or are the two parallel trunks of the sympathetic nervous system, running along the spinal column, the beginning of the physical manifestation of the other two astral tubes — ida and pingala?

G. de P. — The last observation is quite correct. I am not so certain that the two columns of the sympathetic nervous system here spoken of are correctly alluded to, but the idea is absolutely correct. Furthermore, the body merely reflects what the astral body is, and the reason it does not reflect everything that the astral body has, but merely foreshadows it, is because the physical body is not yet a fully evolved thing. Everything that appears in the physical body at any time originates in the astral body. That thought, I think, is clear, and there are three channels in the spinal column of the astral body, and these three channels will blend into two in time and will manifest in the physical body as two backbones. This will come in the distant future.

The three vital channels, or channels for the passage of vital currents now working up and down the spinal column, exist in the astral body as three actual tubes or channels. And the Hindus usually call these three tubes or channels running up and down the backbone or the spinal column by the names of ida on the right, pingala on the left, and sushumna between them.

It may interest you to know that the growth of the embryo in the mother's body, and the growth of the little child when born, follows slavishly, point by point, the growth in formation of the astral body. But this astral body is always ahead of the physical body which comes trailing after, so to speak, in development. It is, I suppose, something like the trailer trailing along behind an automobile. As the automobile goes with all its turns, so does the trailer go.

And these three channels of the astral body are the actual ones that are in use all the time, that are working all the time, because the real physical man — now please try and understand this — the real physical man is the astral man. The body is as it were a garment of atoms collected around the astral man, a sort of cloak. It is like a veneer, so to speak, or a patina, which gathers around some art object. It might perhaps be spoken of as a rust around an iron tool. The real man is the astral man, and is the seat or focus of all the activities of the man, and the physical body slavishly copies everything, everything.

Student — What is meant by the "vibrant blue light behind the sun" mentioned by KT in The Gods Await, while quoting Master M's words? Is there any connection here with the scientific theory that our sun is a blue star?

G. de P. — Yes, there certainly is. Our sun is blue. And the reason that we see the solar light as golden light, is due largely to the influence of the earth's atmosphere on the solar rays. Our sun is a blue star, and this color is one expression of the individuality of that star, just as a human being has his own particular vital color, or tint, or shade.

If you could see human beings with the color-eye, so to say, you would see some beings surrounded with a red cloud, others with a blue cloud, others with a violet cloud, others with a golden cloud; others again with

clouds of different shades, light green, dark green, indigo, sky blue, turquoise color — all the possible shades.

Furthermore in addition to these fundamental shades, every human being at times, when in anger, or when in emotion, or in deep thought, has of course his background of aura tinged with his fundamental color, but on this background there is a constant coruscating play of other vital colors. It is a beautiful sight, beautiful to see. All these colors are merely expressions of the life forces, of the pranas, of the entity.

The blue of the sun, as I have already said, is an expression of the vital entity in and behind and above the sun. There are violet suns, there are red suns, there are yellow suns, and suns of other colors.

Student — In the last ES paper you say: "There are seven different rivers of life flowing through the human body, each one, so to say, the mother of a particular sense."

In No. 5 EST Instructions, it says: "The atom esoterically contains the six principles and dwells in the molecule."

May the electrons of the human lifeatom be the six principles referred to within the molecule?

G. de P. — Most decidedly not. All the electrons of an atom, whether it be a chemical atom or a pranic atom, or a vital atom, are bodies, infinitesimal entities, all more or less on the same plane. For instance, in our solar system, are the planets revolving around the sun the principles of the solar system? Of course not. Every atom is a sevenfold entity, with its physical body, its vitality, its astral body, its kamic principle, its manasic, its buddhic principle, and its atman. It is as a human being is.

But the atom, physically speaking, or structurally speaking, is composed of a center and subordinate infinitesimal bodies which modern chemists call electrons. These electrons are not the seven principles of the atom, but are manifestations on the physical plane of some of the energies of the atom. That ought to be clear.

You might as well say that the organs of the human body are the seven principles of the man. What the organs of the body are to the body, that the electrons of the physical atom are to the atom. They are organic parts of the structure of the physical atom, but they are not the six principles of the atom.

Student — Is this what you call the "seven rivers of life," flowing through the human body, into the seven vital laya-centers or chakras, each being the mother of a sense?

My questions may not be clear, but I trust you get my thought.

G. de P. — I think so. I think I get the thought; although your questions are not very clearly phrased, because they are not very clearly thought out.

No; the seven rivers of life referred to are the seven different pranas. I think I made that clear at the time. And these seven different pranas represent seven fundamental energies which play in the body. These seven fundamental pranas or fundamental energies as manifesting in the physical body are, each one, the mother of one of the senses of the body, of which senses five have so far been developed, and two are still to come.

Nevertheless, all seven pranas are active, but only five of the pranas are usually spoken of in ordinary exoteric works simply because only five senses hitherto have been evolved, and indeed very imperfectly evolved. But while the two highest senses are not yet evolved, physically speaking, that does not prevent their energies, that is the energies of the two future senses, from being brought forth into physical life in the future.

The two pranas corresponding to these two future senses are active in the body somewhat as the spirit of man is more or less active in his consciousness, or as his buddhic principle is more or less active in his consciousness, although neither man's spiritual nature nor his buddhic nature has been fully evolved forth as yet. Nevertheless there they are; and they act.

The next question, please.

Student — Please may we have the esoteric explanation given regarding magnetic healing — more

specifically, how does it affect the healer, likewise the one who is being healed? I do not refer to thought healing or any kind of hypnotic healing.

G. de P. — Well, practically all magnetic healing is hypnotic. Practically all of it. And furthermore magnetic healing is very bad for the healer. Very bad. While cures have been made, it is a method of postponing karma which is disadvantageous ultimately to the one who is relieved, or possibly healed.

You have been told before, and very clearly, that every physical ailment, every sickness, and indeed mental ailment or mental disease, is karmic; is something which is trying to work out through the channel open to it, and that channel is the physical body, including the brain. Now, if you dam that back, if you prevent its coming out through its natural channel, you are laying up all kinds of trouble for yourself in the future, and probably at a time when you will be less desirous, perhaps, to undergo that trouble than you are at present when nature wants it to come out and have done with it.

I do not know much about medicine, and I care less, but I have a notion — and I may be wrong — but I have a notion that if a doctor today tried to dam back a disease instead of leading it out carefully and naturally, and exhausting it, he would be a very poor doctor. That is my impression.

People are afraid. They do not want to face what has come upon them. They do not know the law. They do not know what karma is. They often think diseases are unfair; that they should not be afflicted; that they are not responsible; that it just happens that they are the victims of some Moloch called Nature. And they will do almost anything, and go to almost any extreme in order to get relief.

But as the wise man knows that the sooner a thing is allowed to come out the better, he goes to his physician for help. That is right, and it is the duty of the physician to help. He cannot prevent the karma, he cannot take over the karma of his patient, but he can try, by compassionate acts of helpfulness and skill, to relieve the suffering and to help the disease to come out and save the life and try to cure his patient.

Now I do not care a snap of the fingers whether modern medical theory agrees with that or not. My experience of medical theory is that it is like all other scientific or quasi-scientific theories — it is changing, it is a very changeable thing. One idea in one decade in medicine has great vogue, and in the following decade it is discarded; and a physician would feel himself disgraced, perhaps, to do what his father did, or what his grandfather did. Therefore the ideas of today will in their turn change to something else.

The time was when it was considered a medical crime to give water to a patient stricken with fever. It was thought that water would kill him. I have no doubt that in those days a physician who gave a glass of water to a fever-stricken patient might have been imprisoned. Today it is all the other way in the treatment of fevers.

The best thing about modern medical theory is that it is a changing thing. The doctors are learning. The worst thing about it is that every new theory becomes a dogma and has to be smashed by some great man who comes along and risks his reputation in smashing it.

I have many medical friends whom I highly respect, and I respect them just in proportion as they are willing to learn and do not think that they know it all. I know the history of science too well, and of medicine also, to believe that the last word in medicine has been found. The more they know and the more they study, the less they find they really understand. A sad outlook, some of you may say. On the contrary, I think it is an encouraging outlook.

Have you any more questions? And please avoid medical subjects.

Student — I have been reading reports of the meetings that you held before I came here, and I was very much interested in the one that was held on Christmas Eve. And when you gave that wonderful explanation of the real meaning of Christmas, you said that there was a similar story about Easter. May I ask you to give us the story of Easter?

G. de P. — There are four seasons of the year in which, in ancient days, initiations were held. These seasons of the year are: the winter solstice; the spring equinox or what is popularly today called the Easter season; the summer solstice; and the autumnal equinox.

These seasons were chosen on account of astrological facts. The earth and the sun, and especially the planets, in theory at least, being so placed at these seasons that the line of intercommunication between the lord and giver of life, in other words the sun, and the earth, brought about conditions which greatly favored initiation.

The Easter season, or in other words and more correctly stated, the spring equinox, is one of those seasons.

Perhaps the holiest and the most sublime of the initiations is the one which takes place at the time of the autumnal equinox. But it is sublime in the sense only that he who is then initiated enters upon the pathway which takes him out of the world of men. This initiation ranks the highest. But in our own Brotherhood of Compassion it is not considered to be the highest. It is the sublimest, but it is not the noblest, paradoxical as it may sound.

Let me try to illustrate this. It is so difficult to explain these things. There are two men, let us say, both of them good men. The one sets his whole heart and soul upon becoming at one with his inner god. He lives the life in every good sense of the word. He is compassionate and pitiful. He grows to love all that is. But his whole energy is set upon achieving sublimity for himself. He harms no one and nothing. He achieves, and leaves the world of men behind. It is sublime what he has done.

The other man longs to achieve, longs to be at one with his inner god, only and solely that he may the better serve his fellowmen; in order that he may the better be a channel between the gods and his fellowmen. He gives up the self for All-self. He gives himself up, his own chances, renounces attaining sublimity for himself, and consecrates his life to service for all. He, in our Order, stands highest, and is indeed nobler, superior to the first man. To this I referred a moment ago when I said that the initiation of the autumnal equinox was perhaps the sublimest in itself; but the man who went through this most sublime initiation left the world of men behind.

The initiation at the Eastertide and at the winter solstice, these two are initiations into which those who desire to live to benefit mankind pass and therein consecrate themselves. The Buddha, to speak personally, is "born"

at the winter solstice, or a few days afterwards — a fortnight afterwards, let us say. The Easter or spring equinoctial period is the initiatory time chosen for those who enter among the gods, but nevertheless do not leave the world of men wholly behind.

Companions, I do not know whether you understand me or not. If you get an inkling of what I am trying to say, that is enough. There are the two classes. They are spoken of in the Buddhist scriptures: the one as the pratyeka buddhas, those who achieve buddhahood for themselves alone. It is sublime; their work in the world is beautiful, or rather their work in the universe is beautiful. They become links between humanity and divinity; but their own motive, their own effort, is for themselves. It is, in fact, a sort of spiritual selfishness, pure and holy as those beings are. Whereas the buddhas of compassion live to benefit mankind, and remain on earth among men as nirmanakayas for aeons and aeons and aeons, sacrificing their own advancement in order to be helpers of their fellowmen, to guard them against evils of which the average man has no conception. Their life is one long sacrifice. Of course, their ultimate reward is incomparably grander than that of the pratyeka buddhas.

Student — If a man or a woman working, hurts his eye on a protruding branch or twig of a tree, and it causes the loss of his sight, is there any peculiar line of karma connected with that? One can hardly think of it as just a matter of chance. It seems an extraordinary thing that such a simple thing as a twig which seems to have no connection with the man should cause him such a dreadful injury.

G. de P. — Quite interesting. But the karma has nothing to do with the twig. The karma of the man has been such that the loss of the eyesight occurs to him, and the twig is merely an incidental or instrument. It might have been anything else. It might have been a man's golf stick or a friend's tennis racket. The twig is an incidental. The karma is that he loses his sight. Everything that happens is the result of preceding causes. That idea should be perfectly clear. Everything that happens is a consequence of some preceding thing, out of which it grew, and thus a chain of cause and effect, of causation as it is called, stretches back through ages, along the lifeline of an individual, and, following it forwards it reaches the karmic culmination: the eyesight is gone. But is that the end? That is just the beginning of a new phase: the chain of causation continues. And who knows, looking at it from the theosophical standpoint, who can say, that that deprivation of one of the

most precious faculties of a human being — eyesight — is not a heavensent blessing.

We human beings are so selfish, we are so unevolved, that if things do not go exactly as we want them to go, we think that it is all unjust. We are not logical. We talk of chance. There is no chance. You used the word chance, I believe — there is no such thing. Do you think an automobile accident is a chance happening? That a fire is a chance happening? That the loss of one's fortune is a chance happening, that sudden increment in fortune is a chance happening? Examine any such thing, or any other thing, and you will find that there was a preceding act or thought, or both; a preceding cause, out of which this result grew; and that this effect or result in its turn becomes a cause for something else.

As HPB so nobly puts it: we weave karma around ourselves as a spider weaves its web. Everything we do is karma. Everything we have or do not have is karma. We ourselves are our own karma. That is the best way of all in which to put the matter. We ourselves are our own karma. And this is precisely what the Lord Buddha meant when he said that there is no such thing as a personal or individualized soul which is eternal. It is the man's karma which lives, the man himself, the continuation of the chain of causation which any human being is. It is obviously true; but Westerners are so utterly under the old Christian psychology of a created soul, that God Almighty does everything in the universe around us, and that we are the helpless creatures of an inscrutable divine destiny; that the hand of fate writes over our forehead all we are and shall be, and having written, returns to write some more. It is not so. Man is his own creator, his own redeemer, his own sufferer, his own damner. He damns himself, he condemns himself, he saves himself.

This is an ethical doctrine and it is a doctrine of hope. It is a doctrine of optimism in the deeper sense of the word, because it shows another chance; it says that you can make yourself to be anything. You can raise yourself so high that you can confabulate with the gods, and that is but a step ahead, so to say. You can go on eternally, or you can send yourself down into the Planet of Death. You can make of yourself whatever you will. And what you are now you made yourself to be in the past. What you will be in the future, you are now making yourself to be.

Such an incident as the deprivation of sight by the mere instrumentality of the twig simply illustrates the point. An earthquake occurs, shakes buildings to pieces, crushes human beings. Is it chance? Not to me. No human being would have lost his life unless his karma, his chain of causation, had brought him to that spot at that time. He himself is responsible. And I tell you that there is no protective power so tremendous, there is no saving element in human life so certain and sure, as that of love. It casts around every human being an akasic veil, an akasic buckler, which shields against harm every human being who truly and impersonally loves, does no evil, does nothing selfish, does nothing that cripples his own forces or powers, thus making him careless and thus inviting accident. It makes one loved of others. It brings harmony and peace and beauty into life. Love and ye shall be loved. Love and ye shall be saved.

The next question, please.

Student — Is it permitted to ask a question about the teachings given in the Temple a few years ago? At that time, you gave us some teachings about the doctrine of hierarchies. It was less familiar to us then, and I would like to refresh my memory about some of it, if it is permitted. There was a word that you gave us once: hyparxis as I remember, was the word, and I should like to have that teaching explained again.

G. de P. — Hyparxis is a Greek technical term, of Greek philosophy, and favored in the Neoplatonic school, and in brief it signifies what I have at other times called the summit or acme of a hierarchy which at the same time is its essential essence or heart, and which is both beginning and end — the seed of the hierarchy, in other words its source, and also its ending. The circle meets its beginning. But please remember that any such hyparxis, or acme, or summit, or climax, is but the lowest part of the succeeding higher hierarchy from which the first one just spoken of hangs as a pendant. Have you the idea?

Student — A little while ago when our Junior Executive Committee gave a Greek Symposium, one question happened to come to me to answer; and the answer that was given in the symposium seemed depressing. The question was: "What part has philosophy to play in the awakening of the soul?"

G. de P. — Is that the question that you ask me now?

Student — Yes, please.

G. de P. — It is a typical Greek question. I do not know that a Hindu would ever ask a question like that.

Supposing a Westerner were to ask one of his college professors: what part does science play in the awakening of the human mind? Now the Hindu would say, in answer to your question, that philosophy is simply the exercise of the powers of the human illuminated intellect. You cannot philosophize until your soul already is awakened; but you can study before your soul is fully awakened, and this study will help to awaken the soul more completely.

Philosophy, therefore, answering it from the Greek standpoint, plays a very prominent part in the awakening of the inner consciousness, what is called the soul here. It teaches the mind organ how to think clearly, logically, accurately, consequentially. It teaches the intellect its own powers of coordinated thought, and its own powers of reflection, and of delving into the deeper wells of consciousness. It teaches man of his destiny, of his origin, of his nature at the present time, and similarly of the universe around him.

Of course, if you construe the Greek word philosophy as a modern American student of the twentieth century, using the word philosophy in the sense in which it is usually used in the schools today of the Occident, you will not get the original Greek idea. Philosophy in Greece, when applied, meant a love of wisdom, and the wisdom of love.

Tell that to a modern professor of philosophy in one of our European or our American universities, and he would smile. His idea of philosophy is an accurate enumeration of categories; and he thinks that thereby he is thinking something. There are mathematicians who think that they understand mathematics because they have studied formulae and can work problems; but it takes a real mathematical thinker and genius to understand the meaning of these formulae themselves, and why they work.

I do not see why the question should have discouraged you.

Student — Well, the more I read it, the worse it seemed.

G. de P. — Well, do you understand the Greek idea a little better now?

Student — Yes, thank you.

Student — May I ask a question, Professor? Was there any special connection between Madame Tingley and Madame Blavatsky?

G. de P. — Yes, certainly there was.

Student — I meant to say, more so than between any of the other great Leaders.

G. de P. — Yes. Now I am going to tell you something here, and this in particular I ask you to be very careful about.

KT was closely allied spiritually and intellectually to HPB, and was in a certain peculiar sense the mind-born student of that being — I will talk plainly — of that man who worked through the female body you called HPB. Now I don't know whether my answer will make anything clearer to you, but that is the fact.

Put it in a slightly different way and say that HPB, or this inner power — this man working through HPB's body — and KT were twin rays from the same planet if you like. That is the astrological way of stating the same fact. The mystical Hindu perhaps would have spoken of a mind-born child. The meaning would be much the same, but it would be a different way of phrasing. You may be a little astonished to hear me speak of the man who was HPB, but nevertheless that was a fact.

One of HPB's principles, or to speak more accurately, a certain portion of her consciousness, was held in Tibet, and its place was occupied in her inner constitution by a teacher, a man, who worked through her. That

does not mean that everything that HPB did was his doing. In the ordinary affairs of eating, drinking, clothing, washing, ordinary letter writing, that was all HPB; but as Teacher and Outer Head her body was his to work through. And this accounts for the strong masculine characteristics that so many of her students —

and indeed outsiders — have spoken of as having been noted in HPB. Do you understand?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — Every one of your Leaders, every one of your Outer Heads, so far, has gone through the same trials, the same experience. A certain principle, or to speak more accurately, a certain organ of the consciousness of the inner constitution, has been removed, which does not mean lifted out of the body, but has been detained under akasic guard; and in that vacancy which is created at times there flows in the consciousness of one of the teachers, and works through the body — yes, but also through the inner constitution thus offered and given.

Are there any other questions, please?

Student — Is the part removed, that portion which we are so familiar with in ourselves as the egoistical, the assertive personal self? The selfish self?

G. de P. — The personal man, do you mean? No, it is not that part. I do not know how I can describe it to you. It is not the personal self. If that were so you would have practically a dead body before you. Nor is it the higher part. It is the intermediate part or what you might call the human soul, something better than the egoistical, fault-finding, lower, loving and hating, part of the constitution. I think the best term than can be given to it, at least the most understandable term, is what is called the human soul.

Student — That word does not have any definite meaning at all, to me.

G. de P. — Well, that is the best way by which I can describe it. It is not the atman, it is not the buddhi, it is not the physical body, it is not the prana, it is not the linga-sarira, it is not even the kama, it is not even the kama-manas. It is what you might call the kama-manas overshadowed by the buddhi. The human soul.

Student — May I say something? This is not a question, but I have a question. In Countess Wachtmeister's Reminiscences of HPB she speaks of seeing HPB's head transformed into a leonine masculine head; and I knew somebody when I was in England, who had a private interview with Madame Tingley and came away extremely overpowered, and told me afterwards that she saw a most marvelous transformation while she was speaking to her, into a large, powerful, very unusual masculine figure and head. I do not know that there is anything in those ideas, but they seem to be rather significant.

G. de P. — I think they are. Countess Wachtmeister was, in many ways, a good woman. She was rather emotional and thought she saw things; but what you describe is very probable indeed. I have seen KT in her days of strength, and I doubt not that you also have seen her at times, when she was positively transformed. I have seen her on the lecture platform, and the language she then used was as different from KT's ordinary language as it is possible to imagine two things to be different.

Student — My question refers to the giant forms of the Atlanteans. There is a very peculiar difficulty which has never been faced, I think in our literature, and we are sure to meet it sometime amongst the number of new members who are coming along, and the scientific people that we are going to attract very soon. It is the difficulty of understanding how beyond a certain size a living being could actually walk or stand, because the proportion of force necessary to move against gravitation increases, I think, by more than the square, while the height increases only double. Beyond a certain size it would be impossible to move. The elephant is almost the largest thing that can move on the surface of the earth at present; and the difficulty is to know what would have happened to those figures, persons, nine yatis high or twenty-seven feet. Were the gravitational conditions different in the Atlantean period, or had they some other source of energy; or were they more astral? It has never been explained. That difficulty has come up, and I would like to have some light on it.

G. de P. — Your difficulty is that you think they would be crushed under their own weight?

Student — Oh, yes. They certainly would, according to physics.

G. de P. — Well, that is a very pleasant theory, pleasant in the sense of being agreeable to gossip about, but I have never seen the proof of it on earth. It is just one of those theories that people like to theorize about. Now nature makes no such mistakes. If she builds a colossal body, she gives to that colossal body colossal muscular development.

It seems to me that a little thought answers the question itself. I have watched elephants move. Those pachydermatous creatures don't seem to be crumbling under their own weight. I have heard it stated very seriously indeed by engineers that it might be quite possible to build a modern building so high that it would crush its own foundations. It is possible, perhaps, but the works of man are not the works of natural forces.

I can think of a man with a head so enormous and legs so puny that the legs would give way under the weight of the head. But while I can indulge in fantasies of that kind, I know nothing in science — that is in sober science — outside a theory that would permit me to suppose that such a thing could exist. I think those theories are theories and praeterea nihil — theories and nothing more. You may be assured that if nature built huge bodies, she would put muscles in that huge body quite competent to carry it. I suppose that an ant or a mosquito might look at us human beings, and wonder why we are not crushed under our own weight, but we are not.

Student — May I ask a question, please? Was Charles Lindbergh a messenger sent in the interests of science?

G. de P. — I do not think so. Colonel Lindbergh was a fortunate young man. He was in a way one of the little men of destiny. He did a brave act, but he must have had great sport out of it. I think I would have enjoyed it too. I do not think that there is anything so very especial about Lindbergh that requires feminine adoration. I knew a young man once who cared for a father and a mother and a paralytic sister and a grandfather and two aunts, and gave them all a good home, gave up his own career and devoted himself to care for his family. He is a noble and self-sacrificing man, incomparably superior to one who merely takes joy in an adventuresome deed.

There are plenty of young fellows like Lindbergh who were not as karmically "fortunate" as he was to get the attention of the world. It is these spectacular things, you know, that attract people; but I can tell you that there is more real heroism at your elbow than perhaps you realize. A man or a woman who can go through life with a breaking heart and with a smiling face and doing good to his fellowmen, is a hero or a heroine. They are the ones who are the real kings and queens of human life. I mean kings and queens in the spiritual sense, in the real sense, of the word. The great ones.

I am not fond of spectacular achievements. But that, of course, is not said in derogation of Colonel Lindbergh.

He did a very brave thing. Quite a fine gesture of self-confidence and goodwill! He did a fine act, as far as that goes. But I think that the radio operator that I was reading about some little time ago who stuck to his post sending out his SOS signals, with the ship sinking under him, and stuck to his post until everybody was off in the boats, did a far finer act than a dozen of what Lindbergh did. Heroism requires self-abnegation, devotion to duty, real self-forgetfulness of heart and mind in the service of others.

What about that telephone girl in a burning building — I forget just what the circumstances were — but there was an earthquake and the building was on fire, and she sent out calls around her for help, risked her life, was badly burned. There also was an instance of a hero-heart. These are the things that attract a real man. They are beautiful. They are sublime.

Are there any more questions? We have a short time left.

Student — I should like to ask, Professor, just what is antaskarana? Is it what is withdrawn?

G. de P. — That is a curious question. The antaskarana in any one personal human being is the bridge between the higher self and the personal man. This antaskarana, as Mr. Judge has told you, is the link; and as HPB has told you also, I believe, is the link between the Lodge — and I am now referring to one of your

Leaders — and the TS; and more particularly the ES, of course.

Your question is an odd one, because it is very intuitive. This antaskarana, however, need not be withdrawn; but when withdrawn, the channel of communication is much more easily traveled. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes, Professor.

Student — I would like to ask two questions.

G. de P. — One at a time, please.

Student — You told us what happened to you as a teacher on the 11th of July. When did the same thing, or a similar thing, happen to HPB in her life?

G. de P. — To HPB?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — When she was sent forth to do her work.

Student — Does that mean when she met the Master in London?

G. de P. — No. After that. I can give you a general date, but I do not want you to put it in your mind too particularly and too definitely, because I am referring now to her going forth as an accredited envoy, a messenger. It was at the time — leaving a few months on either side, please — at the time when she passed through the Suez Canal before the blowing up of the Greek boat on which she was, and of which you have read. That was in 1869, or '70, I think.

Student — '67, I think.

G. de P. — It was at the time of the opening of the Suez Canal, whatever year that was.

Now what is your other question?

Student — I have in my mind the terrible suffering that KT went through year after year. Now it was impossible, as you said, to take upon oneself another's karma. It is also impossible to imagine that KT, being what she was, was living out her own past karma. What is the real esoteric explanation of the reason of that suffering?

G. de P. — Because she took the karma of the Society upon herself, and that statement is not a contradiction of what has been said before. If you have a friend lying at death's door, and you give up everything to nurse and succor and help that friend, becoming infected by your friend's disease, you do not take upon yourself that person's karma in the usual sense of the word, but you take upon yourself a karma exactly equivalent. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes, to a certain extent.

G. de P. — You carry the load, you help, you give up yourself. Do you understand what I mean?

Student — Not quite, because the Society is composed of individuals.

G. de P. — Yes, but every aggregate of individuals has its karma. A body of people on a train, or on shipboard, in a flying machine, in an automobile — they have their aggregate karma. They would not be there if they did not. And someone who enters that automobile knowing what is going to happen, or goes on that ship, or into that flying machine, on a mission of mercy and compassion, takes upon himself or herself all that is going to happen. And if the act is done with an intent to ameliorate, to alleviate, to save, to help, it brings upon the one so doing unmerited suffering and pain because it is a deliberate act of choice in making the new karma for oneself. Do you understand what I mean?

Student — Yes, I do.

G. de P. — That is good. And it is precisely the same train of thought to which I was leading in the beginning of the evening, when speaking on the same point.

I will answer one or two more questions, Companions, and then we shall have to close the meeting.

Student — I would like to ask a question. By the way the last student spoke, I took it that he meant that KT

was too high to be having all that karma of her own. Well, it seems to me that it is a sign of very, very high souls to go through such karma, because it might be that they are pushing through evolution so quickly in order to help humanity; and they are condensing all their karma into a very short period.

G. de P. — You are quite right from that standpoint. Of course in one way you are quite right, because everything that happens to an individual is his or her karma. So, it was KT's karma. It was the Buddha's karma. It was HPB's karma. That of course is true, but that is a very general way of putting it. It does not modify the other fact that the act of self-sacrifice for the benefit of others was deliberately chosen as the path to be followed, and therein lie the beauty and the grandeur of the act.

Student — May I ask something in that connection? KT once said to me in speaking of what she went through in her earlier life, before she was identified with this movement — she had such terrible things to pass through; they were things that you would have imagined she would have been evolved enough to escape

— "I had to do these things in order to understand in this body the suffering of humanity in all these different situations."

G. de P. — Correct. That is quite true. Let me give to you an instance of how strangely karma works. When HPB married in New York the young Georgian, whose name escapes me, but you can find the name in Olcott's People from the Other World as I recollect — at any rate her marriage to him was an instance of a deliberate choice in doing what the world would regard, and properly would regard, as a most colossally foolish act, and yet it was done with a noble motive: to live out a karmic hangover, if you understand me, out of which general karma she had long since passed lives ago. But nevertheless there remained this karmic hangover. Misjudged, misunderstood, she nevertheless met the situation. From the ordinary worldly standpoint, it was a grotesque act. From HPB's standpoint it was a fine act. I should have done exactly the same thing — snapped my fingers at the world — let the world think what it liked provided my own conscience was clear; and I would know that by doing this, I should be fully foot-free for the future.

How could HPB explain these intricate details to a mocking, disbelieving, denigrating, public mentality?

Impossible! She just let the matter go, just as I would have done.

It is a peculiar thing that human beings declare themselves or expose their characters by their reactions. A person who is always sneering has not a very largely developed intellect. A person who is always seeing something dirty and immoral in his fellows obviously does not stand very high in evolution. He exposes his own character, because he instinctively thinks that others are like him.

Never be swayed from your path of right by what the world says. In such case never mind what the world thinks of you. If it must be so, it is wise and good to have the world's respect; but when a question of principle arises, then follow principle always.

Now one more question, Companions, and then we will close the meeting.

Student — May we know something more about the two classes of buddhas? There is something almost irreconcilable in the idea of a selfish spirituality advancing into the condition of buddhahood.

G. de P. — Yes, that is a very natural reflection, and it is just this matter among others that Mrs. Annie Besant failed to understand. I believe that she published a statement somewhere to the effect that it was absurd to speak of the pratyeka buddhas, such lofty and exalted beings as she expressed it, as being tinged with spiritual selfishness. It was, of course, a direct criticism of HPB's comments on the pratyeka buddhas as

published in The Voice of the Silence. Mrs. Besant didn't understand the fundamental truth of the distinction between the two classes of buddhas.

The word selfish is used here, not in the ordinary human sense of the word. It is used in the more strictly etymological sense of one who cultivates the inner faculties of his own selfhood, in order to attain a beautiful and sublime end, doing so when such cultivation is for the individual's own evolution, and forgetful of the world, and of others' sufferings and pain. Whereas the buddhas of compassion, who are older souls riper in wisdom, more closely knitted to the compassionate heart of being, follow the instincts of their nature which urge them to remain as guides and inspirers of those less advanced. Therefore are they called buddhas of compassion.

This reflection may help you: these buddhas of compassion become absolutely impersonal channels for the divinest side of nature to work through, whereas the pratyeka buddhas have still the tinge within them of their individual longing for achievement, for flowering out, for developing, although on a very high and lofty plane. There is, therefore, the difference between on the one hand, the buddhas of compassion, utterly impersonal channels for the cosmic life, and compassion, and intelligence; and on the other hand, the pratyeka buddhas who are not so far advanced, spirit-souls not so old and ripe in wisdom, who have the longing to be still greater and nobler. Do you see the point? Therefore is their condition spoken of as a sort of spiritual selfishness.

The buddhas of compassion are utterly selfless in motive and in feeling. And, paradoxical as it is, it is the pratyeka buddhas who are cold as compared with the buddhas of compassion whose whole being radiates love, pity, tenderness, and all the things which make human nature sublime.

That answers your question, I hope.

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — Well, Companions, I think we had better close the meeting. It is growing late.

[Seven strokes of the gong. Silence.]

Meeting 11

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Eleven

That which men would receive from Mystic sources is frequently often repeated, and in such a quiet, unobtrusive voice, that he who is waiting to hear it shouted in his ear, is apt to pass on unheeding. — William Q. Judge

Meeting of April 23, 1930

G. de P. — Companions, I call your attention to the fact that the higher you progress in esoteric studies, the farther you progress along the path of chelaship, the more informal do things become. So much so that in the higher degrees there is no formality whatever. The teacher may be in one part of the world, say in Egypt, in some European country, or in America or China or Java, or anywhere else, and the chela may be anywhere else likewise. The latter may receive a call, or what HPB used to call the astral bell. The chela may be at work in a field; he may be driving an automobile; he may be sitting at a meal, in his armchair, lying in his bed; but instantly when the call comes, he is alert, and he receives the message or communication in the silence, thus not given even by word of mouth.

The reason for this is that in the lower degrees a certain amount of ceremonial and ritual helps those who have not developed the spiritual ability to concentrate their thoughts on higher planes; but in the higher degrees, when this concentration of thought and attitude of mind, when this elevation of thought, becomes instinctive, ritualistic observances and ceremonials of any kind actually become an obstacle or bar. They become a hindrance because they distract the attention to outward things.

Student — When at these meetings I am seated next to a comrade who is asleep, or between two who are dozing, try as I may to avoid it, I become very uncomfortable and restless. This is not good. Please tell me how best to overcome these feelings?

G. de P. — A very proper question indeed; and I cannot tell you how much it has pained me to have learned in the course of the last six weeks or so, that certain of our companions — one or two or three, perhaps, especially — have gone to sleep at one or another of these gatherings. I have spoken of this before, when I first learned about it, and I wanted to be as kindly as I could, because the rules of the Oriental School must be strictly enforced. I then suggested that any companion who was so drowsy that he or she could not keep awake, should quietly leave the meeting, and not come again until so gross a violation of esoteric proprieties could not possibly recur.

Now in direct answer to the question, I suggest that a strong effort of the will be made to be more alert, more wide awake than ever. I can readily see how this companion must feel sitting by one who is dozing or asleep

— and as I happen to know in one instance even snoring.

Do you know that if such a thing happened in an esoteric school in the Orient, in the lodges of our Esoteric School in the East, if a companion should be drowsy or go to sleep in a meeting like this, he would be looked upon as a monster. I do not mean this unkindly. I am simply telling you the truth. If these teachings interested you sufficiently, and if you had the heart-light within you sufficiently bright, burning with sufficient strength, you could no more go to sleep than you could commit suicide. This fault shows a mental inertia and a spiritual darkness — even if only temporary. This again is not said unkindly. It is a statement of truth, and I speak with vigor because there is something akin to indignation in my heart that such a thing could have taken place. There is no excuse for it.

Be kindly, however, and remember that some companions have to struggle against a physical vehicle which is very strong. I have known people who have gone to sleep at the most unheard-of times, but here in our ES

meetings such a thing must not take place.

I am even impelled to say that if any one of you sitting next to a companion who falls asleep discovers that such is the case, he or she should immediately arise and state the fact.

Student — Will you please explain what HPB means when she speaks of "the seven-headed serpent on which rests the god Vishnu"?

G. de P. — What HPB says there is simply stating a fact which I suppose that every initiated Brahmana knows; and had the Occidental world been more accustomed to understand Oriental psychology and Oriental metaphor, the actual explanation would not be required because the matter would be as clear as day. Vishnu represents one aspect of a hierarchy in connection with the teaching of hierarchies that we have given in this group before. Resting on the seven-headed serpent means resting on the seven principles of the boundless cosmos — Vishnu, a part of the manifested hierarchy or universe, reposing on the bosom of infinite time and infinite space, called the seven-headed Sesha.

The word Sesha means "remainder" or :remainders," and Vishnu sleeping on the seven-headed or thousand-headed serpent Sesha refers to two things: the karmic remainders of the preceding cosmic manvantara forming the basis for the manifestation of the present one, and also what I have just briefly said, the seven principles of the cosmos on and in which the manifested universe exists. Thus Vishnu also sleeps on Sesha during the cosmic pralaya. This teaching is very closely allied to a profound aspect of karma in a cosmic field.

Between the individual human being (a manifested entity existing in and of and from the boundless universe of which it is an inseparable part) and that universe itself (a manifested entity or hierarchy sleeping on or in the bosom of infinite time and boundless space) there is much similarity in all senses of the word, and you can see this if you remember the doctrine of analogy.

Do you begin to understand the idea? Vishnu, an aspect of the manifested universe, the preserving power, sleeping during pralaya on the bosom of infinite space, through infinite time, which universe has its cycles of both waking and sleeping.

Likewise a sun could be spoken of in much the same way, glittering in its starry brilliance, somewhat like a cosmic gem, hanging on the bosom of the seven-principled eternity, of the seven-principled space; and all this pertains to the great ineffable mystery of universal Being manifesting itself in periodical cycles of manifested Vishnu and Vishnu unmanifested.

Do you understand somewhat of the thought?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — Has anyone any further question to ask on this point before we pass to the next?

Student — In the Forum, July 1895, a chela writes: The "bright side of the moon stands for one of the seven sacred planets hidden from profane eyes and telescopes and visible only on certain spots of this Earth and at certain seasons of the year."

We are also told elsewhere that the moon is a substitute for an invisible planet.

Is the lunar chain, so far as we connect it in our minds with the visible moon, a blind intended to conceal the true chain of which the invisible planet is the known representative? In other words, did we really come from the chain of which the invisible planet is part, and not from any chain connected with our moon? Or is the moon only a substitute in some other sense — perhaps astrological — and the moon's chain is the veritable parent-chain?

G. de P. — The moon-chain is the veritable parent septiform chain from which our earth and all its host sprang. The matters regarding this astrological planet, this mystical planet, for which the moon stands as a representative, do not belong, companions, to this Section. I am very sorry to have to say these words so frequently; but in one sense the questions which call for such an answer from me demonstrate a good thing: they show that your minds are alert, that you are thoughtful, that you are becoming more intuitive with each meeting that we have together here, and that the teachings that you have received at others of our meetings have cast the light into your minds so that you evolve questions therefrom. That is all a good sign.

I can say the following however. What I say will make an astronomer in the Occident laugh, and yet it is true.

The invisible planet for which the moon stands in esoteric ancient astrology as a substitute, is very near the moon and partakes in large degree of the characteristics of the lunar forces. There is a similar planet which is very near the sun, for which the sun stands as a substitute. These two sacred planets are two of the seven sacred planets of the ancients.

Student — If allowed to ask about a personal experience, I beg for an explanation of the following: Several years ago, on a morning while I lay in my bed and was just wakening from sleep, but before I had opened my eyes, I had a very clear vision of KT's head in profile. It was at first motionless, but finally she turned towards me and smiled, and at the same time there emanated from her what I can describe only as a strong vibration of benevolence that made me feel happy; and then she was gone.

Was this only a dream-vision, or was it a real vision of KT brought about by thought-transference or by her presence in her mayavi-rupa? I never asked KT about it.

G. de P. — It seems to me from the atmosphere of this question that what this kindly-hearted companion saw and felt was a reality; but not taking the form of a mayavi-rupa, or projected body, which the Tibetans call a manifestation of the hpho-wa. I think it was a case of psychomagnetic perception of KT's actual individuality as cast on the astral light. There was a moment of intense mental and spiritual concentration on the ideal held in the heart of this companion as regards his leader and teacher; and a strong bond of love, sympathy, and devotion, enabled him to see for the time being a picture of KT of which she was quite possibly fully aware.

A question like this is obviously very difficult to answer, because we would have to go back to all the details and inquire into the circumstances of time and place, and conditions and surroundings. But such is my impression.

What is the next question, please?

Student — Can the sentence: "I am alpha and omega, the beginning and the end," symbolic of the Logos, allude also to 'the magical point'?

Is such a 'magical point' to be found at the beginning and the end of everything, where the application of willpower will have the greatest effect?

Is the first and the last point in time of any period or cycle such a magical point? For instance, at sunrise and sunset, and when we begin and end a work? Or, for instance, at the beginning and the end of a stair; or where, at a crossroads, other roads lead out? Or in a portal that leads into a house?

There seems to be a magical point at each end of a magnet; is there not such a point also at the end of every stick or rod, especially if it is sharp-pointed?

Is not the sharp top of the pyramid, and of church towers, meant to symbolize the Logos, because it is a magical point?

If there is anything in all this, cannot the observation of magical points be useful in meditation?

G. de P. — That is quite a long question! What this companion has in mind, who evidently is of a mystical bent, in speaking of the alpha and omega, I think, is referred to often in theosophical literature as the head and the tail of the serpent of eternity, or the beginning and end of a cycle of evolution. Or, as he puts it, the two poles of a magnet. He calls them magical points; that is an unusual term. Some philosophers have spoken of similar things as neutral points, where things begin and where things end, and which more accurately would perhaps be called laya-centers — dissolving points, which are likewise points of beginning as well as points of ending.

I am reminded of a thought of one of the great English men of science, an astronomer, Sir James Jeans, who speaks of what he calls singular points as being the points of "creation" in a nebula in space, through which

singular points, or points of creation, there streams into our physical universe from another dimension, to use his term, from another invisible world as theosophists would say, energies and substances.

This is a very remarkable statement indeed for a modern scientific thinker to make. It describes neatly and accurately pretty much what we mean in one aspect when a theosophist speaks of a laya-center or a laya-point. These are points, neutral or magical points, to adopt the term of our questioner, which exist in the thin and indeed totally illusory dividing line between two planes — through which pass from above downwards, superior energies and matters; and likewise through which pass upwards from the inferior plane to the superior, forces and energies which have temporarily finished their evolution on the lower plane. Such is a typical laya-center.

I do not think it would be at all advisable to try to concentrate on such magical points in meditation, for the mind would be distracted to the exterior instead of turned inwards to the light within, which is the true road to spiritual illumination. Anything that exteriorizes the consciousness is just the opposite of what an ES student should strive for.

Have you any more questions?

Student — Dear Teacher: on October 17th you discouraged members from applying for admission to a higher degree. Speaking to us on March 12th, you said, in substance: "Why don't you make up your minds to assume the duties of chelaship, take the oath, and get the knowledge you then will be entitled to?"

Important points are raised by the latter statement. If a member of this group feels qualified to apply to take the very serious oath mentioned, is he expected or permitted to do so?

G. de P. — The question is answered in the preliminary statement. I repeat to you again: why don't you take the kingdom of heaven by violence — to use a Christian term. It is perfectly useless to write to me a note, a request, saying you want to come into a higher degree. Prove it! Prove that you are worthy, and you won't need to write any notes asking to come in. I shall know. I shall see it in your faces. I shall feel it in your atmosphere. I shall know by what you say and what you do. And then you will be told all that it is necessary and proper for you to hear at the time.

Why certainly, anyone who desires with sufficiently fervid desire to go higher, will go higher. It is you yourselves who must make up your mind. You yourself must make up your mind. You yourself must take the first step. I cannot take it for you. I could not even if I wished to do so. I am bound by restrictions more severe than you know anything about. I have no choice in the matter whatsoever; but I am constantly on the alert and watching day and night for one single gleam of the buddhic splendor in any one of you. And when I see it, it is my duty to answer the call, because that gleam of light is a call, and the call, Companions, will be answered. I have not failed, nor shall I fail; but I must see the light first.

Student — Is it right to regard the obtaining of higher knowledge as a part of the desire for chelaship; and if so, how shall one be sure that no wish for personal possessions steals in? In view of the complexity of the lower nature, its subtlety, and the possibility of self-deception, what is the best way of testing oneself that the desire for higher knowledge and wisdom is pure and altruistic?

G. de P. — Self-study. Study yourselves. The daily life is the field of your study. If you find that you can do your duty impersonally and that you love it; if you find that the duties you do are a grateful labor; if you find that the knowledge you already have you can contain in secrecy and silence without itching to give it to others; if you find that you do not fail in the life that you lead — if you find these things, then the buddhic splendor is beginning to work in you and I shall see it.

And you will know by the results in your life, by the way you live, by the way you do your duty, even the common daily duties, whether you are fit to go higher. You are your own judges. I cannot judge you; that is not my work. You will know very quickly whether selfishness is the motor in your life, or whether your urge is a love which knows no bounds. However small that love may be, if there is even a glimmer of it in your hearts, you will feel it.

Judge yourselves. Knowledge is a holy thing. You have a right to it. It is not selfish, it is not personal, to desire to know; but you are not entitled to knowledge until you know yourself that you won't abuse that knowledge, or will not betray it. These are the old rules of the Oriental School and they are just, very just, because they are based on nature's own operations, on your own human nature. Analyze yourselves. Judge yourselves. Study yourselves.

I tell you that there comes a time in a student's life, in the life of a chela, when nothing can restrain him. He would walk barefoot to the ends of the earth for what his heart craves; and many and many and many a chela in the past has done just that — abandoned everything. The world said: what supreme folly! But the student with the eye of his spirit saw the gleam on the mountains in the mystic East, and won the treasure of initiation. He found himself, recognized his kinship with the gods, and came into self-conscious communion with the powers that guide and control and govern our globe. You know what I mean. He abandoned the personal life and found infinity.

Student — All our teachers say that one who challenges the trials of chelaship and calls upon the Law to test him, has to face a mass of his past karma in a very short time.

This is a very different proposition from meeting the same karma in the normal way — spread over a long period with intervals for rest and for gaining strength for the next trying experience.

Does not this show that the actual dynamic effect of karma can be modified by being hastened or delayed by the action of the human will?

G. de P. — Certainly it does. And when one's karma through one's own efforts is aroused and accumulated on a single spot of the character, then occurs usually what HPB spoke of as pledge-fever. The whole psychological apparatus is then thrown into a fevered state, and it is a dangerous time. Every chela, every would-be chela, has to face this condition and conquer it. Conquest means the Golden Crown. Failure — well

-failure means trying again.

Please remember what karma is. Karma is not an outside power. Karma is yourself. Our Lord the Buddha told the truth: what you are is your own karma. You have built yourself to be what you now are. You are now building yourself for what in the future you will be. You are your own karma, the consequence of the you that was. And you are now the roots, the seed, of the you that will be. In either case you are your own karma.

This concentration of karma means simply facing all the aspects of your character at a single time, instead of spaced out over a long period. The average man finds it easy enough, I suppose, to meet the weaknesses of his character, and his failings, when these are spaced out over a long time. But imagine meeting, facing, all your weaknesses at once. Every chela has to go through that. That is the initiation test. Success means glory, wonderful things, strength, power, vision, wisdom, knowledge.

Do you know, Companions, that your thoughts are so much things, that a train of thought, in other words a bias of character, held throughout a lifetime becomes an actual entity in the astral world — an aggregated entity? Do you know that the chela, the neophyte, in the schools of initiation, has to meet and face these his own astral children and slay them, kill them, which means dissipate them? Strange paradoxical statement —

and yet it is true!

The minds of some human beings are beautiful, and the minds of other human beings are awful. These aggregate entities actually have form, power, vigor; and it is they to which Bulwer Lytton alluded in his novel Zanoni, when he spoke of "the Dweller on the Threshold." If men only knew what they are surrounded by —

their own children, their own thoughts, their own offspring — from very horror and fear they would refrain from doing and thinking what often men and women do do and think.

You have heard people commonly say in ordinary walks of life: "I do not like the atmosphere of that person he is positively offensive to me. I cannot stand it!" Now such a speech is often unkind, and such thoughts should be overcome. You should overcome all that; you should be stronger and rise above those feelings. But yet they prove the fact that people are surrounded with an atmosphere — an akasic or astral atmosphere —

which is the offspring or outcome of each individual's thoughts, emotions, will, ideals, all gathered together.

You sense the characteristics of a person's auric egg, and the beings which the auric egg harbors. However, this matter is, perhaps, rather too deep for this evening.

Have you any more questions?

Student — I am very much interested in health and healing because it means greater capacity to serve. Can you tell something helpful along that line? I have studied many books along that line, and I have been with people who were very splendid in healing; and it seems to me that all real theosophists should be healers to a certain extent. Is it true?

G. de P. — Well, that is a very natural question for you to ask. Let me point out one or two things. No human being likes to be ill. No human being likes to be in pain. Most human beings are cowards. They prefer to evade if possible the results of their own evil thoughts and acts. They do not understand that while it is right that healing should be done by all normal and proper ways, there is such a thing as damming back, or forcing back, the coming into manifestation, the flowing out and working off of accumulated karma, which ordinarily would take the form of disease or physical trouble of some kind.

Now it is very questionable whether, for a chela at least, that would be a useful thing to do, or a proper thing to do. It is difficult for Occidentals to understand this because the whole trend of our minds and training from childhood has been just the contrary. Most Occidentals, really, do not believe in an astral world. They do not know of such things. If they hear about them they doubt. Most Occidentals today do not even believe that they have a soul. Although they hear of it, they do not know anything about it. They are ignorant. They live in the body; they live in the brain mind. The body to them — its comforts, its successes — is supreme.

Now the wish to heal is fine, is a beautiful instinct, and it is the duty of every human being to bring comfort, solace, peace, to others — in other words to help. It is the duty of every doctor to try and bring the same to those who come to him and who suffer, who are in pain. That is right. But I believe you are alluding to such things as magnetic healing, are you not?

Student — No, sir. Of course I know something about that, but I want to get at real healing. I know that I have made many mistakes in the past, and others are making them constantly, and I feel sure there is a right way of healing, and of course I am going to know it.

G. de P. — Quite right. I admire that spirit. The will to know is the first step to the gaining of wisdom. I do not quite understand then what you mean by healing, but if you are referring to the New Testament life of Jesus — and he was supposed to have been a healer — let me remind you of an esoteric fact, that the term healer was commonly used among the ancients of one who brought the supreme blessing of peace of mind and harmony of soul to his fellow human beings. When these exist in the life, and throughout the lifetime, they bring in their train physical well-being. Therefore, follow the example of the Buddha, and of Jesus called the Christ. Be kindly, be charitable in thought, judge not your fellows, learn to forgive, learn to love, for love is harmony. To do these things is not merely our duty, but it is a blessed privilege to live in the thought that we can do these things. We have a right to do them. We should do them; we should love our fellowmen. We should send out currents of good will, of kindly feeling, of helpfulness, and if we keep these up through a number of years, if we watch carefully we will see that our character grows more kindly, richer, mellower, more lovable; and our own health will be much better.

Man is a wellspring of energy. That is the fundamental of his character. The very heart of him is love; it is harmony. Disease of any kind is a resultant of inharmonious thinking, of inharmonious emotions, and therefore inharmonious living.

Are there any other questions, please?

Student — In The Mahatma Letters, the Master states that there are apparently many fifth rounders, talking of adepts, and those men that stand out — the prominent politicians, and the great scientists, and so forth.

Will you explain to us how one starts to become a fifth rounder, and also how the people are able to evolve on the globes that are now in pralaya?

G. de P. — You have asked one question, which imbodies many others. It would require a week with meetings every night for half a dozen hours each to explain them all.

How to become a fifth rounder? By following the Law, cultivating the six glorious virtues, cultivating your intellect, cultivating your heart. Become impersonal. Learn to forgive. Learn to love. These are manly virtues.

A fifth rounder is one in whom the inner god manifests more fully than he does in fourth round men.

Whatever is superior in human life, learn to love that. Try to make it apparent in your own life. Drop as far as you can the personal aspects of your existence. Learn to put value upon the things of permanence. Learn to understand the illusory nature of the things of impermanence, the things you cannot carry with you when you pass on. Build for yourself treasures in Heaven, to adopt the language of the Christian New Testament, where no thieves break in or steal, and where there is no corruption by moth or rust; rather than build for yourselves temples on earth which you will leave. Palaces are all right in their way, but be not a slave of the palace; be the genius within. That is the Way. Begin to cultivate the virtues which will put you on the path of becoming more quickly than in the ordinary way a fifth rounder.

A fifth rounder merely means one who is a whole round ahead of the average run of men today, who are fourth rounders, and every outstanding spiritual human being is a fifth rounder. Not necessarily politicians.

But the great philosophers, the great humanitarians, the great artists, those who have brought genius to soothe human hearts, to comfort human souls, who have bettered mankind by living among us — these are the fifth rounders, the great men who have inspired their fellowmen to do nobler and better things.

Now as regards the method of evolution on the planets which you state are in pralaya. First let me point out to you that pralaya is not the proper term; obscuration is the correct term in this case. And secondly, let me point out to you that these other planets are not in obscuration necessarily all the time. The periods of obscuration of any one of these globes — which is the proper term, and not planets when you are speaking of the seven globes of the chain — these periods of obscuration are not long as compared with the periods of passage of the active life-wave.

For instance, when our own human race shall have left this earth-globe of our own earth-chain, and shall have passed on to globe E, this globe D, our earth, will go into its obscuration period, and that period is, generally speaking, only about one-tenth as long as the preceding period of activity. When this short obscuration period is ended, another evolutionary wave will enter this earth-globe. We shall then still be on globe E.

There are waves or groups of entities following each other in regular time periods around the planetary chain.

We humans are not the only beings of the planetary chain commonly called our earth-chain. We are but one group or life-wave.

Take an instance of another planet than our earth. The planet Mars is in obscuration at present. Some people seem to think that that obscuration period will last while the life-wave, which previously manifested there, passes through all the other three globes of the Mars planetary chain on the upward ascending arc, and until that life-wave reaches the fourth globe of the Mars-chain again — that fourth globe being the visible planet which we see. That is not so. The obscuration periods of the globes on any planetary chain are very much shorter indeed than are the periods of manvantara or active manifestation of any globe.

And I might add that there are really enormous changes in the type and characteristics of a life-wave or group as it passes from globe to globe of any particular chain. For instance, the animals on globes F and G of our own earth-chain — or rather what corresponds on those globes to what the animals are on Earth — the

"beasts" on globe F and on globe G are hundreds of times superior to what we are as men on this globe D.

Imagine therefore what the humanity of globes F and G must be like. Do you understand that idea?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — Our globe D is the most material of all the seven globes of our earth-chain. The globe which follows us next on the ascending or upward arc is a relatively spiritual globe. Globe F which follows it is still more ethereal or spiritual, beginning to partake somewhat of the nature of actual spiritual substance; while globe G is almost a spiritual globe.

You see how marvelous this teaching of theosophic evolution is. We begin on globe A in any round, which is a relatively spiritual globe; run through our seven cycles or root-races as we call them there, but on a lofty plane. We leave that globe A; and passing to globe B on the downward arc, globe A goes into its short period of obscuration before it receives its succeeding life-wave or group; but we meanwhile are on globe B, and go through our seven root-races there. When this is accomplished, we leave it for globe C; and then globe D, our earth; sinking into matter more deeply all the time. There is a constant increase in material powers and energies as we go down the arc, and a constant decrease of our spiritual and more loftily intellectual faculties.

Contrariwise, as we begin the arc of ascent, or the luminous arc as it is called, the exact reverse takes place: we de-materialize ourselves more completely with each new globe on the upward arc, and coincidently spiritualize ourselves. And therefore, as I said, even the beasts, or what corresponds to the beasts on globe F

and on globe G are hundreds of times — I might say possibly even thousands, so far as globe G is concerned

— superior to what we men on earth are, that is, we now manifesting on this densely material globe D in these our dense and crippling physical vehicles. I hope that all this is clear.

Student — May I ask a question in regard to this last statement that you have made? I understand of course the spirituality of the beings on those two globes. But the globe that precedes us — the globe C: when you say that the animals are superior to the men that are on this globe, I suppose you mean, superior in that they have more spiritual qualities. But they are not more evolutionally advanced than we are; they are behind us in evolution, are they not?

G. de P. — Well now, you are asking a very pertinent question, and a very interesting one. Perhaps this will help you — you are speaking of the beasts, are you not? The beasts on globe F, or what corresponds to the beasts there and on globe G, are more advanced from the evolutionary standpoint than are the men on earth.

Now if you can understand that, there is the key to your answer. But of course the beasts on globe C — the globe preceding our globe D — are behind us in evolution.

Student — We are told that to be man means to have the development of the manas, of the mind; and to be an animal is not to have that development. That is why I think we are a little bewildered, because if the animals could be ahead of us without having mind, it must be in some other form of evolution.

G. de P — That teaching is with regard to evolution on the earth alone. Remember that the earth belongs to a chain which is septiform. There are seven grades or degrees of the manasic faculty or power. Do you understand me? Man is man, when heaven and earth meet, so to say, when the spiritual and the material are evenly balanced. That is the teaching with regard to globe D, our earth.

I will further say this: that the animals on globe G, the last and highest globe on our chain, have more manasic power than we have. They are only called beasts because they represent on the hierarchical scale the same state or grade on globe G that our beasts represent on the hierarchical scale on earth. You know what that hierarchical scale is: the three kingdoms of the elementals, the mineral kingdom, the vegetable kingdom, the animal kingdom, the human kingdom, and the three kingdoms of the gods, making the full ten.

Student — Here is another question. It was said tonight that a chela, a person who wants to become a chela, has to meet his accumulated karma. Now I have often wondered about Subba Row. As many of you may remember, he died of a skin disease that Olcott claimed came from his desire to have experience in the fohat.

Now I wonder is this an identical case with a chela, with a person trying to become a chela on a higher plane, except that he tried to advance higher than his karma permitted; or was it merely an inability on his part to understand the right processes?

G. de P. — No. I don't agree with Colonel Olcott at all in this. Colonel Olcott did many good things, but he was greatly given to imagining things too, not only about his own teacher HPB, but about other things. And I don't say this unkindly, for I think that I am simply stating a fact.

Wasn't it very recently that one of the questions I had to answer gave me the opportunity to call your attention to an interesting fact that even a high chela, and particularly a high chela, cannot avoid meeting karma; that there is such a thing as old karma that has not yet been worked out even in relatively high chelaship? Disease, I think, was one of the things I spoke of, and of the bad effects of damming it back. This damming back can

be done, but if you do so you merely store up the disease, force it backwards into latency, and it will inevitably come out at some future time, and in high probability at a time when it will be still less welcome than when nature in the ordinary processes brought it out or tried to cast it out of the body in the form called disease.

Now please do not understand that this means that we should not try to be healed. It does not mean that we should lie down and suffer like the dumb beasts, as the saying goes. Not at all. The idea should be not to dam back the disease or force it into latency, but to bring it out, to lead it out as easily as possible; and the medicine of the future will realize this so keenly, and knowledge of the physical body in the future will be so much greater than now it is, that the physicians of those future days, future times, will be able to lead out a disease carefully and gently so that the body will scarcely be hurt, certainly not wrecked as unsuccessful experimentation in medical treatment often wrecks the body today. The motive may be good, but we all know the old saying in our Occident that a certain hot place is paved with good intentions.

I think that in the case of Subba Row it was simply some old karma that was coming out, and he had the manhood to let it come out, and died knowing that once it was finished with, the karma was ended. He was a good man. He could have been greater. He was a Brahmana, living under the psychology of that very proud and very haughty caste; but he was a good man and an earnest man. He was a chela and a fairly high chela, for his class. I have read with interest his disputation with HPB regarding certain recondite questions of esoteric philosophy, and it always made me think of two friendly antagonists fencing with each other, for neither one dared to show the full hand. Each understood the other, and yet each preferred his or her own way of setting forth the esoteric wisdom. HPB was a disciple of the Masters of the Himalayas, to use the ordinary expression — in other words a disciple of our Lord Buddha.

Subba Row on the other hand was a Brahmana. His whole mental bias was along, or rather followed the thought-trend of the magnificent system of the Vedanta — the noblest form that the philosophical thought of Brahmanism has ever taken. He was a Vedantist; and it may interest you to know that in the Adwaita-Vedanta its students are often called by their sectarian antagonists, "Buddhists in disguise"; whereas, strangely enough, certain classes of Buddhists are called by other Buddhist classes, "Vedantins in disguise"; the meaning being that the Adwaita-Vedantism and the Trans-Himalayan Buddhism are exactly the same thing in fundamentals and in principles. The differences between them are more of form, of garment, of expression, than of essentials.

Student — I would like to ask if the animals on globe G will have more manas than we have now, because we shall have manas of a higher kind, and they coming after us will also have more manas, and we at that time will have passed to higher manifestations, or the realization of higher principles.

G. de P. — I don't think I understand you. Just try to phrase your question again. I deeply sympathize with your difficulty. I think I get the drift of your question, but I don't quite understand it. And I don't dare answer it until I do.

Student — Well, we are taught that the animals are behind us in evolution. Yet, if on globe G they are ahead of what we are now, does not that mean that they are still behind the humans; that the humans are simply so far ahead of them in development on globe G?

G. de P. — On globe G you mean. That is quite true. And it is a good thing that you brought it out. The humans on globe G will of course still be far ahead in evolutionary development of what for purposes of illustration we may call the beasts of globe G. The relative grades will be maintained as the life-wave passes through globe to globe.

Student — My question is on a similar thing. These entities, beasts and men, who are at present on globe C, when they descend to globe D when the time comes, will they have to pass through the same experiences, and be practically where we are now? I mean the same experiences that we are passing through now. They are now more spiritual, but when they come down to this globe — when their time comes, and we are gone to the globe next higher, will they then be what we are now — much less spiritual than they were of course, but practically what we are now?

G. de P. — I understand you. In a general way the answer is yes; but instead of being more spiritual they will be more material, because they will have descended from globe C to globe D.

Student — Yes, I mean that; but inasmuch as they are superior to us at present, I wondered if they would have to go through the same experiences that we are going through now.

G. de P. — You are speaking of globe C?

Student — Yes. You have said, I understand, that they are superior, that even the animals on globe C are superior to us.

G. de P. — No. On the ascending arc, yes; but, furthermore, you are right in one sense of the word. The beasts, even the beasts on globe C, are "superior" to the beasts on globe D in the sense that they are more ethereal, but they are not so advanced in evolution, in time of growth, as the beasts on this globe D. You understand?

Student — Yes, that I understand.

G. de P. — And furthermore you were doubtless alluding to the life-waves that will succeed ours. If so, you are quite right.

Student — You have told us frequently that a thought is an entity which will evolve a life of its own. But just what is a question in a mind? It takes considerable thought sometimes actually to formulate a question, and unless you actually know what it is you want to know, your question has not got much definition.

G. de P. — Quite true.

Student — But what is a question?

G. de P. — A question is a thought-elemental in the throes of birth. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — You have some vague idea which you would like to define. You try to bring that thought into the form of a question — trying to form that question, to shape your thought which means giving birth to that thought. If you will examine yourself, you will find that a question really contains its own answer if you are wise enough to find it. A question is simply a thought in the throes of birth.

Some people can ask questions very easily. Some people have great difficulty in asking questions; and I might add, perhaps, Companions, that this latter class might very readily be deeper thinkers than those who can formulate and ask questions with perfect facility, the only exception being in the case of very advanced humans whose intellectual powers are so completely trained and under control that perfection in thinking is natural to them. Do you understand what I am trying to say? Is the answer responsive to your question?

Student — May I ask regarding something that you said a while ago about healing? In San Diego I met a lady the other day who was having a healer come to the house. She had been very ill, and he got her out of bed in no time. He was a magnetic spiritual healer. Now was it imagination on her part, or did he really heal her?

G. de P. — Well, I could not tell unless I knew the person, and knew all the circumstances.

Student — I mean have these magnetic healers the power to help one physically, although it may be bad for them in another incarnation or at a later period when they have to work out the karma of it?

G. de P. — Yes, real magnetic healers certainly have a magnetic power of healing — damming back a disease, if you like to call that healing. It is postponing the trouble; but they are most certainly not spiritual healers. That is an entirely wrong idea. A magnetic healer heals through material or rather animal or psycho-

animal magnetism. A spiritual healer is one who rights a crooked life, who forms into shapely configuration a deformed character. Such was the Buddha, such was Jesus, such is every great seer and sage. They are the true healers, the true spiritual healers, because they heal men's minds and souls. The others heal by what is popularly called animal magnetism; but they don't like the word and so they call themselves spiritual healers, an entirely wrong and erroneous use of the term.

Now please understand, Companions, that these remarks are not meant unkindly. I am here to tell you the fact, but it does not imply that I mean that these magnetic healers are bad men and women — not at all. They are ignorant, and many of them are doubtless quite sincere; but to call themselves spiritual healers is grotesque. They know nothing of the spirit. Very few of them have any conception of spirituality. Even the average hypnotist can heal, he can dam back a disease; and he is as much a magnetic healer as these others are. It is a form of psychologization popularly called hypnotism.

Student — Are there some animals on this round or plane living now who are superior in their evolution to the average animal? I mean, can they be in advance of other animals, just as you say there are some fifth round men here? There seem to be some animals who seem to be more human than the humans; and I wonder if they could be a little farther along than the average animal.

G. de P. — I understand perfectly; and you are quite right. Is that all to your question?

Student — Well, are they not advanced as a fifth round person would be? Can there be fifth round animals?

G. de P. — I understand. The answer is this: there are certain families of the beasts who are evolutionally more advanced than other families of the beasts. That is obvious. Everyone can see it. The monkeys and the apes are much farther advanced than the other beasts are. The reason is that they have a certain amount of human blood in them due to the terrible error, first of the third race of men, and later of a degraded portion of the fourth race of men. They stand in the beast world just about where fifth rounders stand to us humans, when we speak of human fifth and sixth rounders.

Now in the human kingdom, fifth round men are coming amongst us and will come in continually greater numbers until we leave this globe. As I have explained, the fifth rounders are all the really very noble human beings, the unusually spiritual men. The sixth round humans are exceedingly rare. The only one known in recorded history was Gautama the Buddha. There are others, but they are not known. And they are very, very, very, few. You are quite right in your general statement. Do you understand the answer?

Student — Yes, Professor; only I was not thinking of that kind of animal. I was thinking of a very, very, fine horse or dog, that seems to have qualities less beastly than some humans.

G. de P. — No. There are no fifth round beasts in that sense of the word. The only possible reason for speaking of actual beasts who are more advanced than others is this: domestic animals or domestic pets are more advanced in evolution than are the wild beasts, the beasts of the wilderness. But such close intercourse is not good for pets. It is not a good thing to have pets, because the door into the human kingdom has closed; it closed at the middle point of the fourth round, during the fourth race. No beast can now enter the human kingdom, or could enter the human kingdom after that time. Consequently, pets are beasts existing in an artificial and forced state of evolution which is unwholesome. They hover between the inability to go farther for the rest of this entire planetary manvantara and their natural state of beasthood. It actually is an unfair thing to keep pets. It is unfair to the beasts.

Student — Thank you.

Student — This question is one that has troubled me very much; and your answer to the previous question brought it out. Roughly, the great difference, of course, between the human and the beast, is that man is self-conscious and knows he is man; and the beast does not know he is a beast. But in the aeons to come, when the beast possesses manas, he will find that out; and it seems to me that it will be unspeakably tragic. I wonder if you could tell us something about that.

G. de P. — Let me see if I understand you rightly.

Student — Well, for instance, if an animal should get enough of the manas to know that it is an animal, it would be a frightful tragedy. Now, in the future, animals will be in advance of what we are today. They will possess manas. How will that be managed?

G. de P. — Your question is not very clear in your mind. You say that in the future the beasts will be more advanced than we are today. But just what do you mean by that?

Student — Just what you told us a little while ago, that they would be more advanced than humanity is today, although humanity would be in advance of them still. But if they possess manas at that time, if the time ever comes when the beasts will possess manas, then they will be self-conscious; and won't they feel the limitations, as they would today if they possessed manas? And would not that be a tragedy?

G. de P. — It would be a tragedy if that were the case, but the beasts, or what corresponds to the beasts on globes F and G, are not the beasts of earth. They are entities which, at one time beasts of earth, in the superior globes have their consciousness-center in a part of their constitution far superior to that part in which is centered the human consciousness on earth today. There is no tragedy about that. But it is a tragedy for these poor pets to have the manas faculty stimulated, however slightly, on earth, because they cannot go farther.

The door into the human kingdom, or manasic kingdom, is closed for this manvantara, and they are like Mohammed's coffin, so to say, hanging between heaven and earth. Do you understand now?

Student — Yes, I am quite satisfied now.

Student — Would it be permissible to ask you to repeat the last part of the question about the beasts on globes F and G?

G. de P. — Let me try to explain. The beast has every principle that the human being has, but not all the principles in the beast are in manifestation, are active. Indeed, the case is the same with humans; not all the highest part of the human principles are active. But these beasts as they exist on earth today, when they reach globes F and G, to use a very misleading statement — because I am not speaking of bodies now, I am speaking of the monadic essence — when the monadic essences of these beasts as they are on earth today reach globe F and globe G, they will be functioning consciously in that part of their constitution which is superior to the part of the constitution in which men are today functioning. Do you understand?

Many Voices — Yes.

Student — Professor, it would seem almost that even on this earth that statement is true to a certain extent, as for instance when in the early morning you hear the birds singing for all they are worth; their consciousness seems to be even of a higher tone than ours is.

Student — Professor, may I ask a question? Does not the element of ratio enter somewhat into this discussion? The monadic entities have to have a long pilgrimage in the animal kingdom, and then they go through the human kingdom when the animal kingdom is finished. But I should think that there would be ratios of intelligence, like forming an equation, from one group to another group. But the two kingdoms are absolutely distinctly separate, because each one has its own pilgrimage to make on these planetary globes, and then when the human kingdom is entered there is another pilgrimage and then more faculties are manifested and these faculties of consciousness are expressed.

G. de P. — That is true. The question of ratio does enter in, and that is what I alluded to when I spoke a while ago of the different grades remaining relatively the same. If you imagine the beasts of today functioning most generally in what you are accustomed to call the kama or desire principle, and human beings, average human beings of today, functioning most generally in what we call the manasic principle or the kama-manasic principle, you will see what I mean.

Now when they reach globe F or globe G, each one of these principles having its own seven degrees or grades from the lowest to the highest, the consciousness rises proportionately with the advance from globe to globe.

Thus, while human beings on this earth function in the manasic part, or rather in that part of the manas which

is what we call the kama-manas, on globe F the consciousness will be functioning in the part of the manas which corresponds with the buddhi — the buddhi-manas. On globe G it will be in the atman-manas.

Similarly with the beasts: the kama principle has its seven grades from the lowest to the highest, corresponding with the general seven principles. Therefore the beasts on globe F will be functioning in the buddhi principle of the kama, and on globe G in the atmic principle of the kama. Do you understand now?

Student — You said that certain pets would be injured by being petted by men. I wonder, does that include wild animals when they come of their own accord to certain men, and gradually become more and more intimate and friendly, but still live their own wild life? That will not interfere with their animal evolution, will it, even though they stay with a man as much as ordinary pets?

G. de P. — No, you are right, because those are not examples of pets. Nature and the beasts' instincts take care of these things. The animal finds its own level in such circumstances just as water does. The evolution is not forced in these cases as it is in the case of pets. Pets which are petted and fed and barbered and clothed and have done to them all the other funny things that human beings do to their dogs and cats and horses, undergo a training which is really a forcing of the growth of the higher principles in the beasts, and it is a very unfortunate thing for the reasons I have already stated. It is a misfortune to the beast.

Student — There is some confusion in my mind regarding entities, principles, and lifeatoms. I have the idea that behind or overshadowing every atom and entity — if they are identical — there must be the monadic essence, and I am confused as to this. If a human being generates a thought that becomes an entity, when does it become overshadowed by the monadic essence? It seems ridiculous, but I would like to have an explanation.

G. de P. — You have touched upon a very profound question, one that I have often tried to explain; and I have paused in almost despair sometimes at my own inability adequately and clearly to set forth to you the exact state of the facts. However, I will try again.

A thought is an elemental. The root or fundamental of every elemental is a monad, just as is the case of a human being. Here again is one of the marvelous mysteries of consciousness: that every monad is a creative center, not in the sense of creating something out of nothing, but as producing forth the atoms of itself which in turn grow to be evolving entities progressing through eternity. These monadic atoms are not created by the parent-monad, but pre-exist in the substance of the parent-monad until their time for manifestation comes.

Then they begin their existence as child-monads or elemental monadic centers.

A thought springs forth from a monadic entity, such as a human being. It cannot so spring forth unless it partakes of everything that the human being has — in other words possesses everything from the highest to the lowest that the parent has. Therefore its own highest is a monad. Its lowest aspect is a thought-form or body. Do you understand?

Student — I get a glimmer, yes.

G. de P. — Well, a glimmer is already very helpful. Every monad is like a flame of fire: a candle flame for instance, at which you can light innumerable other candles. Just so fire itself may be looked upon as the parent of the sparks which spring forth from it, each spark arising out of the bosom of its parent-flame; and if you can imagine that spark lasting through time, you have the idea.

To put it in a somewhat less mystical form: my monad, let us say, is A; your monad is B. Through eternity my parent-monad A is giving forth a stream of children-monads, all of them fundamentally A, but varying individually, such as A plus 1, A plus 2, A plus 3, A plus 4, each plus meaning a little difference, that is to say signifying an individuality for each child-monad. Similarly, your monad B through eternity is giving forth always, without intermission at all, a stream of children-monads: B plus 1, B plus 2, B plus 3, B plus 4, etc.; each plus here again meaning a different individuality. Do you catch that?

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — Each one of these children-monads in its turn is a creative center giving birth to a stream of other children-monads — not children in the sense of being inferior to their parent, but children in the sense of being offspring. Do you get the thought?

Many Voices — Yes, Professor.

G. de P. — It is a most subtle one and most difficult to explain; but it is the true answer to your question. For a thought is an elemental: its heart, its core, is a monad; and its body is a thought-form.

Student — If it is an evil thought, will it go on perpetuating itself through the ages?

G. de P. — Evil and good are relative. There are evil men, but they change to good. There are good men who become evil. What you call from the human standpoint an evil human thought will probably evolve and become a good thought-elemental, perhaps become evil again and then good again. Just so it is with human beings as they themselves grow.

Even a child which is born will have its good phases and its bad phases. Evil is not eternal; good is not eternal. These are relative things, belonging to imperfect creatures, which means all entities manifesting in the material and spiritual realms.

Student — If thoughts are really the seeds of actions, then would you say that every action is simply the most physical form of that thought-entity?

G. de P. — Not a physical form; but a manifestation of the energy inherent in the thought.

Student — Then the actions themselves are not really as real as the thought itself?

G. de P. — The actions are merely results of the energy inherent in the thought. A strong thought will unquestionably produce vigorous action. A weak or vague thought will unquestionably produce weak action, undecided action. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, I do. Then that is why, is it not, that our actions are our karma; and the reason is that those thoughts are our children, and naturally they will always belong to us? And the actions are only part of our karma because they are results of our thoughts?

G. de P. — That is it. Actions are the results of thoughts and emotions; and of course emotions are but one kind of thoughts.

Student — Should we not always try to do everything while trying to realize our essential divinity?

G. de P. — Absolutely. If a human being were to keep before him, day and night, the splendid picture of his own inner god, his own essential divinity, he would grow apace spiritually. Progress would be rapid. But unfortunately men do not do that. They live in their bodies; they live in their whims and prejudices, in their thoughts of the ordinary character, of the personal character. They live in their brain-minds instead of in the consciousness of their essential divinity, as KT so often appealed to her audiences to do.

Student — I should like to ask if this illusion that we have, living as we do on the fourth round, on the globe D at present, about meeting our karma and looking on it as suffering, belongs to this round? Something you said about Subba Row made me think of that, and I have often thought of it before: that the superior mind, the superior man, would be willing to restore the harmony that his past actions had disturbed; and that when we have evolved farther that would be done consciously, and almost harmoniously, without this fear; and this illusion of suffering that we now have about restoring the harmony, does it belong to globe D?

G. de P. — It does. And when we shall have arrived at globe D in the fifth round, the human race then will realize that not only is suffering one of our best friends, but there will be cases, many of them, where men will deliberately choose to take a path of toil or deprivation or what we call suffering for the time being in order to bring out the best that is within them.

They will no longer look upon it as suffering, but rather much as our youth today looks upon training in a school — as advantageous, and proper.

Student — Professor, will it then be suffering?

G. de P. — It will not. Suffering is indeed an illusion; but is nevertheless one of our best friends.

Student — Will it be correct then to look forward to a time for the human host when this restoring of the harmony will be similar to what we now see in the opening of a bud? Or the bursting of a chrysalis?

G. de P. — Quite true, quite true.

Student — Aside from these cases of spiritual healers, real spiritual healers, and aside from the magnetic healers, so called: will not the ordinary physician who is practising medicine and attempting to heal ordinary diseases here and now in this round by nature's remedies in plants and chemicals and minerals — will he not have to have a degree of intuition and impersonality in order to know which remedy to choose?

G. de P. — Absolutely so. And the physicians of the distant future will have all that. Furthermore, the time is coming, I believe that it will arrive in part even in this present round, during the seventh race on this globe, when the physicians of the future will not only be able to heal at will and to heal properly all diseases; but actually be able to resurrect from the dead, provided, of course, that decay, that dissolution, has not proceeded too far. I mean that even after the golden cord of life has been snapped they will be able to bring back, if such be the wise and proper thing to do, a departed soul. To do that now would be black magic of the worst kind, because knowledge lacks, wisdom lacks. It would be pure experimentation, and the motive in every case would probably be inevitably selfish. But for a grander race, a more impersonal race, causes might be where such an act of white magic would be the proper course for a physician to take.

It is after ten o'clock. I believe, Companions, that I can answer one more question, and then we will close our meeting.

Student — Dear Teacher —

G. de P. — Don't you think that you have asked questions enough tonight? No, forgive me, I did not mean —

Student — I am full of this healing idea and health. Is not motive then a most important factor?

G. de P. — Yes, but not everything. Motive is a very important factor; but a man may have an excellently good motive and yet lack wisdom. I have known theosophists whose motives have been admirably impersonal, but who have done the most outrageously foolish things.

I will answer still one more question.

Student — Going back to one other subject of the evening, I am reminded of the old Qabbalistic saying: first a stone, then a plant, then an animal, then a man, who grows into becoming a god. I imagine that this is the way along which we evolve on this globe through all the different stages and kingdoms of nature. But do we evolve in the same way relatively, on other globes?

G. de P. — We do.

Student — Then that explains why animals are more evolved than we are?

G. de P. — Exactly, provided, however, that we compare the animals on globe F or G with us humans as we now are on globe D, this earth, and also provided that the evolution here spoken of from stone to plant to animal to man to god, does not refer to the physical body but to the evolving inner constitution expressing itself in ever more perfect physical vehicles.

Yours is a very pertinent question. Remember the old Hermetic axiom: "as above, so below"; what you see

below is a reflection of what is above.

Student — Then there is another thing that troubles me. It is about those animals that cannot evolve into men after the middle point in this round. I feel sorry for them. Are they not going to get some compensation for it, or is there some karma of theirs to be worked out in that way?

G. de P. — It is nature's law that those laggard-monads that did not reach the critical point, the turning point, in due time, must wait until the next round. Otherwise there would be confusion right along, and at the end of the seventh round there would be laggard monads of all kinds utterly unfit to enter into the nirvana that awaits all beings at the end of the seventh round.

The animals will slowly die out as time passes. This does not mean that their monads die, but that the bodies, what we call the beasts, will slowly vanish from the earth. Their physical productivity will gradually grow less and less. The only exception to this case is that of the anthropoid apes which will, in all likelihood, evolve into an inferior race of men before the present life-wave leaves globe D, this globe-earth in this present fourth round. They will be the servants of the nobler humanity of the sixth and seventh races — they will be inferior human beings. This does not mean that these ape bodies will grow into human bodies, but that the monads now inhabiting those present ape bodies will have brought those ape bodies to become at that time human bodies.

This, however, is not Darwinism, which, except for certain minor details, our esoteric philosophy rejects. No physical body could grow into something nobler and better were it not for the evolving inner constitution expressing its fires and urges and impulses through the plastic physical vehicle which more or less slavishly follows the urge of the inner life. Darwinism says that the physical bodies, soulless, grow into nobler things.

This we absolutely reject. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, Professor.

G. de P. — Now Companions, it is time to close for tonight. I want you to realize your sense of oneness with the teachers, and the fact that you are under observation — which does not mean spied upon. The teachers are hunting, even as I am, and as every great soul who is beyond me, is also doing — always hunting and watching for glimpses of the buddhic light. That is part of their sublime duty. Every member of the ES

undergoes at least one scrutiny; and their judgment is so certain and sure in these things from centuries of training, that they can tell with practical infallibility just those who should receive the most help, and those who will have to wait.

We will close the meeting please, Companions.

[The sounding of the gong. Silence.]

Meeting 12

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Twelve

Meeting of May 14, 1930

G. de P. — All right, Companions, I am ready to answer any questions that may be asked.

Student — I would like to ask what is the karana-sarira?

G. de P. — The karana-sarira — a Sanskrit compound, karana meaning "cause," sarira meaning "body," the causal body — actually is the veil of energy and substance surrounding the reincarnating ego. It is of a quasi-spiritual character. And it is from this karana-sarira or causal body that emanate or flow forth all the lower vehicles of the human constitution, such as the desire body, and the various grades of the ethereal bodies.

Actually the physical body is the lees or deposit of the energies and substances taking their origin in the karana-sarira.

Student — I understood you to say that the soul took a long rest between incarnations. This I presume had reference to the human soul, as the ego returns to its monad. I understood the human soul had an opportunity of progression between incarnations. Is this correct, please?

G. de P. — No, it is not. The human soul's field of activity is the time of incarnation or imbodiment. Its postmortem period is the time of rest, assimilation, digestion, and the building up of character, out of the lessons learned in the preceding life on Earth. Do you see?

Student — Yes, thank you.

Student — It is said that at death, or just after death, everyone sees or comes face to face with his warrior-soul. Does that refer to the human, to the manasaputra?

G. de P. — Where did you find that statement?

Student — I cannot tell you. I don't think I have found it. I have heard it always it seems to me, that at death one comes face to face with his warrior. Is that not true?

G. de P. — It is true in a general way. The warrior here referred to is not so much another individual, but it is an ideal term, representing the entire spiritual portion of the human constitution. So that when the human being dies and after the breaking up of the astral body and the kama-rupa, the excarnate soul, just before entering into its devachanic period of rest and bliss, has a vision of the inner god. That vision unfortunately is usually very brief, very brief indeed. It is possible for human beings who are, evolutionally speaking, far along the path, to make a personal contact with the divinity within during physical life, and actually that is what takes place in some of the higher degrees of initiation. Is the answer responsive to the thought in your mind?

Student — Quite, thank you. And I would like to ask one more question, if I may. I would like to know just where the personal consciousness is centered? I mean the consciousness which feels "I am I."

G. de P. — Do you mean in what part of the fabric of the constitution it has its place?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — It is an illusory thing, this human consciousness. I think, in fact I know, it is wrong to look upon it as a permanent, durable, everlasting, center of consciousness; so consequently when you ask where does this human consciousness have its locus standi, that question is a very difficult one to answer. The consciousness, illusory as it is, is centered in two principles mainly, in the manasic principle and in the kama.

You can figurate it to yourself by picturing to yourself a whirling pool or vortex in these two principles which interblend.

Please do not look upon the seven principles of man as you conceive a stair to be, one principle over the other. That is wrong. Each of the principles interpenetrates all the other six; every one of them. So when you speak of it being centered somewhere, you see the difficulty in giving a perfectly clear answer. It is centered in the stream of consciousness because it is a state or condition of the lower part of that stream of consciousness. It is not on any one of the stairs of the seven principles of the human constitution because there is no such stair. The principles are not one on top of the other like a pile of books or like the steps of a stair. They interpenetrate each other.

But I think what you have in your mind is this: in what part of the human constitution is the ordinary human consciousness placed? And my answer is: its vibrations are kama-manasic. Do you understand the answer?

Student — Yes, thank you. When you say manas, I suppose you mean lower manas, because I understand that above this human stage of evolution there is no such feeling. I mean, I suppose, that the pure manasic entity has no feeling of human separateness such as exists with us.

G. de P. — The higher part of the manas principle of course has no idea of separation, because the higher part of the manas is atmic or universal; in its universal aspect it is called mahat. Naturally the human consciousness, being conjoined with the kama, would be in what you call the inferior or the lower part of the manas principle; but you see — you will forgive me for pointing out this fact — you make a high and a low, and that shows that your mind still conceives these principles as existing in steps, like the steps of a stair.

Please try to figurate the human principles as states of consciousness, not as one thing piled over the other, so that you can speak of a top one and a bottom one. That is quite wrong. You understand, do you not?

Student — Yes, thank you; I do.

Student — When the soul is passing out at the time when the person is dying, where is the state of consciousness — that is, when the person is very happy and peaceful?

G. de P. — Do you mean the state of consciousness of the human being, or simply the brain-mind consciousness?

Student — Well, I don't know the difference. I thought it was the brain-mind consciousness; yet it didn't seem like that. I have seen a number of people passing out, and in every case they were so conscious on some plane, and so supremely happy, and apparently cognizant of a very great deal. Now I have wondered every time where that consciousness was.

G. de P. — This sounds like a very simple question, but if you will pause a moment and reflect how complex the human consciousness is — and by human I now refer to the entire constitution of the human being — the one who is dying may have his consciousness for the moment centered in the loftiest — referring here to quality — part of his constitution, the noblest, the most impersonal. And other human beings who are dying, due to the tendencies and habits of a lifetime, may die in a state of consciousness but little superior in quality to that of the beasts. So when you say: "Where is the consciousness centered at the moment of death?" all I could answer to so general a question would be: who is the individual who is dying? Is it a noble-minded, a spiritual-minded, impersonal man, or is it one who has lived a grossly physical existence, with scarcely a thought of anything impersonal or spiritual?

Student — I can understand that that would make a difference, but it just happens to have been my experience that in all these cases they were theosophists, and they had been making very strenuous efforts in their lives to progress on spiritual lines. And as I saw in every case, there was that wonderful, beautiful, peaceful consciousness; while they were not wholly in a state of coma, that is wholly unconscious, nevertheless they were on a different plane of consciousness from the physical. They seemed to be so conscious of a state where there was something existing that was peaceful and beautiful, and they seemed to understand it so thoroughly. It happens to have been my experience to have seen this in every case, so of course I had that kind of person in mind, rather than the other one.

G. de P. — Now I understand. Now you have defined it. I can answer by describing to you a little bit of what

happens before death. Death is actually the approach of the condition of devachan. Death does not take place suddenly, except by accident, or by such deaths as occur from crime, or hanging, or something of that sort.

But when the body dies from disease or from old age, there has been a preparation for the death for weeks, it may be months, before the actual snapping of the vital cord. This preparation is an entering, a preliminary entering, into devachan. Remember, please, that devachan is a condition of consciousness, a state of consciousness, and not a place.

Consequently, when a noble-minded person dies, such as the high-minded theosophist you have spoken of, the consciousness is already more or less in the devachanic state. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, thank you. I follow you completely.

G. de P. — Therefore it is a spiritual state of mind. And this accounts for the beautiful things that the dying sometimes whisper or say to those around them: "Oh, how happy I am!" "How beautiful, how sweet!" Words like that.

Student — Are these different experiences of the soul in devachan, between incarnations, linked closely together one with the other? In a chain of incarnations in devachan, would they be progressive, like progressive lives, or days in one life? That is, would the consciousness beginning at the end of this life carry on from the similar state of consciousness at the end of the last life?

G. de P. — No. Whatever the keynote struck at the time of death may be, whatever may be the dominant, characteristic, note of the individual who dies, that will furnish the beginning of a stream of consciousness-events. A series of thoughts, happy dreams you can call them, but they are actual and real to the consciousness that experiences them; and this series of thoughts blends into each other, the one after the other. It is like going through a beatific experience while living in the physical body. It begins, then one thought leads to the next thought; this leads to something else; and so it continues until that specific thought-current ends. But that ending immediately starts a new train of very similar thoughts; and so the procedure continues throughout the entire devachanic period. Do you get the idea?

Student — Yes, thank you very much. I get it very clearly.

Student — I would like to ask, in regard to the review of the life that takes place at the time of death, as to the extent to which the person then sees through the delusions with which he has surrounded himself during life, and also the delusions for which, perhaps, he is not entirely to blame, as to fact. Does an individual actually see the true facts which during life he allows himself not to see?

G. de P. — He sees the truth, the actual things as they are in themselves, and his relation to them. This vision of unclothed truth is the greater and the larger, the greater the individual is who is passing.

In every case a panorama of the past life, from the first record of thought until the last conscious thought before temporary unconsciousness supervenes, is seen as it were through and through. The consciousness penetrates behind the illusory aspect of things and sees reality, sees causes, sees results, places responsibility

— its own always — sees how it has acted and how it should have acted. But all this process is perfectly calm. It is uninterrupted by any emotion whatsoever. It is like a mathematician who is completely enwrapt and absorbed in solving some mathematical problem. This state is nothing wonderful. Emotion does not disturb the mind at all, even as adults look back to the experiences of youth and childhood — and many of us can do that and we find we are quite impersonal. We can see where we have made mistakes. We don't grieve for them. We feel the folly of them and we can stand off from them and regard them as something outside of ourselves; and yet know that they belong to us. In other words, the consciousness at death is detaching itself from purely personal relations — the detached feeling. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes.

Student — In cases of men facing death many times, that would have the special effect of creating such a detached feeling. In the cases of those who served during the War, for instance, they faced death every day and had those feelings coming. Would that have a special power in creating future character?

G. de P. — It would. But I must point out, dear Companion, that this stream of the panorama of the past can occur only when death actually is taking place, not when the consciousness merely anticipates that death may occur. In other words, only when death is actually occurring does this panoramic view supervene. Do you understand?

Student — Yes.

Student — If I recall correctly, you have stated that the devachani in emerging from devachan, before physical contacts are made, reviews the last incarnation in minutest detail. And I would like to ask: is that review in the nature of a memory, or is it as if that which is being reviewed is actually occurring?

G. de P. — No. It is a repetition of the panorama that ensued at the moment of death, the reason being that that panorama has been stamped on the consciousness of the reincarnating ego, and as it passes out of the devachanic condition or state, it of necessity follows step by step the same pathway or road by which it entered into the devachanic state. So consequently it passes in review these things, but in reverse order.

Student — What I was particularly desirous of knowing is whether this review is a conscious memory? Does the reviewer realize that it is a memory of what has been, or is it as if he were passing through the same experience again?

G. de P. — It is both as a matter of fact, because he could not understand this panorama or experience it unless he himself realized that he is going through it. But the process is exceedingly quick. It does not mean that a lifetime, in human time periods, is spent in going over the panorama. Just as in the dying brain the stream of consciousness passes rapidly by, so in re-entering earth-life, in going out of the devachanic state, the reincarnating egoic consciousness passes the panorama rapidly in review, and knows that these things were of its former existence on earth; but sees the events of the panorama and their connection as a detached view. Do you understand?

Student — Yes. It is probably a foolish idea on my part, not an idea, but simply a query, that in such experiences, as I understand it, time is only a figment of the imagination, in one way. You can live a lifetime in a few minutes, and vice versa; so that the fact that this review occurs in a very brief space of time does not signify so much. And if they were reviewed as if they were actual events in which the reviewer were the actor, by what method would we be able definitely to determine whether the life each one of us is living at the present time be a new life or be a review of what we have done before, with perhaps some improvements?

G. de P. — It is seen as a review. It is a recollection, a throwing on the field of consciousness of pictures, scenes, one after the other, and all this takes place but in inverse order to what takes place at the time of dying. So that when the end is reached the ex-devachani is just about ready for the period of unconsciousness supervening before entering the womb.

Student — This is a very simple question which, however, has troubled me lately somewhat. It is: what is the dividing line between reality and illusion? You have said that there is no such thing as that; even the grossest matter is fundamentally spiritual; everything exists and continues, although in different stages. Consequently it has appeared to me many times that this word illusion is merely a figure of speech, or does it signify something that has its lifetime and passes forever?

G. de P. — The question is a little involved, but I think I understand you. Illusion is not a figure of speech.

Paradoxically enough, the fact that illusion exists, or a series of illusions, is the real state of affairs. The reality is that it is nothing in itself. The fundamental is pure consciousness. I do not know whether I have seized your idea. If not, please ask it again.

Student — I am sorry I made it involved. I should not have done it. You have said lately that even the grossest matter that is, and life here on earth in a later development, is fundamentally as spiritual as any of our highest faculties. Consequently these being illusive here, does not the word illusive simply apply to a single plane or to a single period and not to a later period or to a later plane? Because if that which is illusive now were to disappear, we would come to the question that matter whether spiritual or material is not

indestructible, but is destructible.

G. de P. — I am awfully sorry, but I really do not quite get your idea. I do not think I have ever said — I am subject to correction — that the experiences of any one life, all the experiences indeed, while illusory are fundamentally real. Is that the way you understood me?

Student — Well, I —

G. de P. — Shape your question in a little different way, if you can.

Student — What is the dividing line between reality and illusion?

G. de P. — Illusion is everything which pertains to the phenomenal world of material existence. Reality —

and reality itself is a relative thing — is everything which pertains to the spiritual world. It is the root of this material world. But as that spiritual world — the reality of any illusory world — is itself one of a host of worlds, some still more sublime, even that spiritual world is illusory to the reality of that still higher world. In other words, maya (illusion) and reality are inextricably blended.

Student — Yes, thank you so much. That is what I wanted to know. So that means that illusion and reality are only relative terms.

G. de P. — Yes, certainly.

Student — So the English word illusion is perhaps not the best word. It is a theosophical term in other words.

G. de P. — Yes, that is right. And I may point out here — and I am glad that you brought this matter forth —

that illusion is an English translation of the Sanskrit word maya. Now maya does not mean a nonexistent thing. The meaning is directly the opposite of that. It means something which exists, but which the consciousness of the perceiver does not rightly understand. The Vedantists of Hindustan, for instance, illustrate this by a man returning home at night and suddenly starting aside when he sees a coiled snake in his path. He looks again and finds that it is not a snake, but a coiled rope. It was an illusion, it was maya — maya really means magic — the magic working of nature, deceiving the percipient consciousness. In other words, the consciousness does not perceive things as they are in reality. But as that consciousness grows in wisdom and experience, it perceives in constantly better ratio, in increasing ratio of certainty, the thing as the thing itself actually is. I hope that the matter is clear, because this is a very fine point of philosophy.

Student — Thank you so much.

G. de P. — The Vedantists have one more curious illustration. It is quaint. A man at eventide is walking along a path. In front of him there is a hill. On the top of the hill, against the evening sky, he sees a hare, and he sees that that hare has horns — two horns sticking up out of its head. At first glance, he is positive that the hare has two horns. He looks again and he sees that the long ears of the hare are what he mistook for horns.

That is the idea of maya, illusion. The actual hare was there with its long ears, but the percipient consciousness misunderstood, misinterpreted what was seen, misrepresented the actuality, and consequently caused or took or received an illusory impression of the thing that was.

Student — Before leaving the seven principles, may I ask a question? One thing that has been very difficult to understand. I think we clearly understand that there is one state of consciousness streaming along, but in The Secret Doctrine and elsewhere in the Instructions, HPB very explicitly points out that an adept can divide himself into the three states, three definite states, without killing himself, she says, and can send one away, and remain in another, and yet throw out a third. And then after death there is the sheath or kama-rupa which after a while according to the Masters' teachings gets a consciousness of its own, in a sort of way reflected.

Now my point is that it seems possible to separate them as if there were really divisions between the principles in some way, and yet at the same time, we feel that there is a unity.

Is that one of the mysterious paradoxes of the teachings that we may grasp in a sort of intuitive way, but

which is difficult to define mentally?

G. de P. — Yes. Simply because the human mentality will constantly represent to itself states of consciousness as separate radicals. That is all wrong. It is deceiving itself all the time. Now, for instance, you would die if you could separate your present brain-mind consciousness from the body. You could not do it.

But there is a state of your consciousness which you can send out of the body, send out to some other part of the planet, to the Moon, to Venus, to Mars, to the Sun. And it is this science, this wonderful magic science of the sending forth of the self-conscious individual, which the Tibetans call hpho-wa.

Student — I would like to ask first a question that has come up in my mind in reference to what has just been asked. When one is doing what one habitually does, and paying attention to it, and at the same time listening to another, and also keeping one's thoughts going on a higher plane: is this an analogy with different states of consciousness?

G. de P. — I think it is, I think you are quite right.

Student — And my other question is: we are often told that if we place our consciousness on a higher plane than the habits and thoughts of the lower self that we are wishing to overcome, and do it impersonally, we rise above that lower self. Well, I have often seen one sincerely doing that, who actually suffers physical pain from the effort, who often is made sick by the effort, and yet I have to acknowledge that those that I have seen in that condition are earnestly, and as far as they are capable, impersonally striving to follow out this rule.

Can you please tell why that is?

G. de P. — You mean why certain individuals --

Student — Who sincerely, and as far as my mind is capable of judging, impersonally strive to raise the consciousness above habits. For instance, it is hard for all of us suddenly to change our habits from one to another, not necessarily bad habits, but set habits, and I have often seen physical sickness result from a sincere effort to do so.

G. de P. — That is occasionally true, and it is something that every chela has to face. In fact, every reversal of consciousness, when it is forced by the will to take a direction opposite to that of the roads of habit, necessarily produces a sort of dislocation of the consciousness for the time being, and this is one of the reasons why all occult training goes step by step. As Katherine Tingley used to say: "Step by step we climb."

The Masters are constantly warning you against the danger of sudden and violent subversions or reversals of things.

Now that statement, while very true, could be subjected by an ignorant man — I don't say any one of you here

— into an actual invitation to keep in the old evil ways. But that is not the meaning at all. The meaning is to check evil habits and to overcome them, and to climb, to grow, but to do it symmetrically, not to do it violently. And yet even that, while it is a statement of truth, can be subjected to misconstruction too. I tell you frankly, Companions, I have answered the question truthfully, but I much more admire the man or woman who — once the light has dawned in his or her heart — immediately and if necessary forcibly follows that light, no matter what the consequence to the body may be. I tell you frankly, it is incomparably grander.

Take the case of a drunkard, a very common case. Will you tell that unfortunate human being the obvious truth: that little by little, he can come out of drunkenness into living a sober life? Or will you tell him and show him, as I would, the pathway and the means to stop it at once? Never mind what the body does. Go to your doctor, if the body soaked through with alcohol kicks up pranks. Let the doctor help you; but don't, don't parley with the devil. Have nothing to do with it. Stop it. That is my advice.

If you go to a materialistic physician who has no sense of spiritual realities, who does not believe that there are other lives, who has no idea of spiritual heroisms at all, he will say: "Oh, well, forget it! Forget it! Just keep out of jail, and do what you like. Better be decent, of course, but you cannot do it all at once." That is wrong advice. The advice of the great seers and sages has always been the contrary: "Friend — or woman —

go and sin no more!" It is true.

The two parts of my answer are not contradictory. They are paradoxical. I have told you first the actual physical condition, and how the healing may be done step by step; but if you ask me as a teacher what I should advise from the standpoint of morals and decency, and as an esoteric student, I should say: "Go to it, immediately! Stop it, whatever it may be." As HPB put it once: "Play ducks and drakes with the body,"

providing that the soul soars supreme above it.

Let the doctor take care of the body if he can. We human beings are faced with really serious problems at times. There are times when the hero has to act, even at the cost of life, of limb, of health — and such are men.

If you, on the other hand, have not the courage, if you are a weakling and want to parley and have not the strength to step out and plunge into the noble act, there is the long slow path of evolution — but I have little patience with that slow method, at least for us of our Order.

Now that does not mean that I should advise the physician in attendance to be abrupt, unkind, harsh, critical, or unsympathetic — not at all. The physician's duty is a truly sublime one, and kindliness, understanding of the conditions, and comfort and consolation, are even, I think, sometimes more healing to a sick body than are the remedies that a physician gives.

Student — Professor, is it any use for the scientists of the present day to try to establish interplanetary communication? Because if they should accomplish it with any faculty that they have, what good would it do them? Even just the mere difference of language is an obstacle. The inhabitants of the other planets may have entirely different ways of communicating, different senses, and different everything.

G. de P. — They almost certainly have.

Student — So it seems to me that it is just a waste of time. After they have advanced sufficiently, perhaps they will be able to do it in other ways.

G. de P. — I would not go that far. The mere fact of trying to establish interplanetary communication is a good thing, I do believe. It raises the mind away from earthly things. It enlarges the imagination; it increases our sympathies, and gives us illuminating suggestions of animate entities on other planets. The effort is a good one to make. I do wonder though what would happen if our scientists could catch a Venerian or a Jovian, and put him in a glass case! What would they do to him — if they could; and I might say what might not a Venerian do to our scientists!

Student — I have been trying to formulate what would, I suppose, be called brain-mind pictures of the relation of the human ego to the god within, and one of them was in this manner: In the case of a very large business establishment, employing perhaps thousands of people, the office boy would be very likely quite unknown to the general manager. Would it be correct to think of the human ego as being practically unknown to the inner god, except through the medium of various other entities, corresponding to the managers of departments? If that were so, then the office boy by his effort and initiative could come into contact with the manager by improving himself?

G. de P. — Exactly. That generalized statement is quite true. Note that there is a difference between the human ego and the higher ego. A little while ago one of the companions spoke of the human constitution as being a stream of consciousness, and that is exactly right. But that statement is not a denial of the other fact that this stream of consciousness can be separated into principles, into different rates of vibration of that stream, if you like to put it in that way. The entire human constitution is indeed a stream of consciousness, but, to change the figure of speech, it has different colors, so to say. These different colors are the different principles — the passional, the intellectual, the spiritual, the vital, and what not. They all belong to the stream of consciousness; they are all integral therewith or thereto. Nevertheless these different aspects of the stream of consciousness exist, and are what are called the principles. Do you understand me?

Student — Thank you.

G. de P. — Now the human ego, at the core of its core, is a monad — a child-monad of the inner god, and

therefore partakes of the stream of consciousness of that inner god which it recognizes as the fundamental "I am." Its own consciousness is "I am I." As time passes, as evolution proceeds, this "I am I" slowly diminishes or vanishes, and an ever larger and fuller, more universal, consciousness takes its place — "I am" — which is actually the consciousness of its own monadic essence. A wonderful mystery, I tell you, this mystery of consciousness. It is one of the most difficult studies that we have, and yet one of the most profitable to undertake.

Man is a complex entity. He has streaming through him, as a part of his stream of consciousness, the cosmic consciousness, the consciousness of his own inner god, the consciousness of his spiritual ego, of his human ego, the consciousness of his astral ego — or the ordinary brain-mind man; and there is even the sense of the consciousness of his physical body, which shows itself very clearly when the body is in pain. Every atom, and a fortiori, even more strongly, does the human ego have in itself latent capacities for becoming a god. Every atom of the physical body, every lifeatom of the astral body, of the kama-rupa, every lifeatom of the reincarnating ego, of the spiritual ego — and of the monad — every one of these hosts of lifeatoms on any plane is destined in future aeons to evolve into a god.

Consequently, this means that one's inner god is the fundamental "I am." That is, my inner god is I and yet not I. The personal "I" is its child, destined to grow up to be an inner god like my Father in heaven, for that father in heaven is my inner god. Similarly every atom even in the physical body, in the core of the core of itself, is a monad of which the highest part, the noblest part, is its inner god. We are therefore legion; every human being's name is legion. Do you get that thought?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — Every human being, every entity, is a microcosm or little universe with its own supreme god, and all the hosts of inferior gods, and all the hosts of still less evolved entities, and thus right down the scale of the human constitution to the physical atoms of the sthula-sarira or physical body. What a wonderful picture!

And if you look around upon the universe surrounding us, you see the same thing on the great scale, the macrocosm: the suns, the planets, and all the varied entities of our globe for instance, and all the varied entities of the other globes — one huge macrocosm, or great world, comprising within its boundaries hosts of microcosms or little worlds. Marvelous thought!

Student — It is not quite clear to me, but it seems as though something must prompt a great aspiration. Is it something inherent in the monad? It seems as though the spiritual will must have something to do with it.

G. de P. — It does.

Student — And yet where is that spiritual will? In the monad itself?

G. de P. — It soars forth from out of the abysses of your own fundamental consciousness-center. You may call it your own monad. It is a stream pouring forth, manifesting itself, in your human consciousness as aspiration.

Student — And to strengthen that spiritual will, I suppose that nothing but practice will do it?

G. de P. — Yes, that is it. Ever striving to be it more and more, trying to evoke more of it all the time, trying to live in that aspiration, in other words, aspiring towards the aspiration. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, I do, thank you.

G. de P. — It is all a matter of the working of consciousness.

Student — Well, as Mr. Judge says: "Behind will stands desire." Can that very spiritual part of us desire? I suppose the desire is the aspiration.

G. de P. — Behind will stands desire. The word desire here does not refer to body-desire. It refers to spiritual desire.

Student — Yes, I mean it in the spiritual sense. Then the spiritual part of us does desire to become more and more spiritual?

G. de P. — It does. The spiritual part of us aspires or desires to become greater, more spiritual. In other words, it aspires towards the divine. Just as the human aspires to become more spiritual, aspires towards the spirit, and just as the beasts around us unconsciously aspire to become men.

Student — Shall we become cognizant of this inner god, united with it, while we are still in these bodies of flesh? And if so, is this the meaning of the saying in the Bible: "While yet in the flesh, I shall see my god"?

G. de P. — Yes. There is a time in the series of initiations, as I believe I have mentioned on several other occasions, when the neophyte, no matter how high he may stand — a Master preparing for a high initiation is a neophyte until he attains that illumination — sees his own inner god face to face. And this inner god is what Jesus the Christ referred to in the New Testament, when he said, "I and my Father in Heaven."

Student — In that case do they then become what we call initiates or are they even higher?

G. de P. — Oh, there are many degrees of initiation, many degrees. There are low initiations and high initiations. Low and high as adjectives of course refer to quality, the low initiations are not so spiritual as the high initiations. Do you understand that?

Student — Yes, I understand.

G. de P. — Have you anything further to ask?

Student — No, thank you.

Student — My question is a little out of order now. I wanted to ask, when you were speaking of visiting the planets: is it possible for the ordinary psychometer to visit the planets of our solar system?

G. de P. — No, the psychometer does not visit the planets. The psychometer gets by a receptive state of consciousness an interpretation by vibrations or pictures impressed on the body which he handles, or by a ray of light for instance. But the psychometer does not visit places, such as the planets or the sun or the moon.

Student — I have been reading Denton's work, third volume, giving his experiments, such as the alleged sending his son to Mars — seeing the inhabitants on Mars. I didn't think it was possible.

G. de P. — No, the psychometer does not travel to other planets. That is something which high initiates can do, but not mere psychometers.

Student — I think it was Jesus who said: "Resist not evil." We are pledged in our Order to maintain a constant struggle against our lower nature. Is it necessary at times actually to struggle and fight with our lower tendencies, or is it best to forget ourselves and simply have high and noble thoughts and live unselfishly, so that we may best overcome our lower natures in that way?

G. de P. — Infinitely better. Don't dignify the evil in you by fighting it; ignore it, and it will die a natural death. Furthermore, the statement "resist not evil" is perfectly true, but it means do not try to fight your brother because you don't like the evil in him. That idea has led to much of the misery in the world as it exists today. We fail to see the evil in ourselves, but are continually fighting the evil which we see in others. Your hands will be pretty well filled with your own case, if you simply look at home. Then you won't have the slightest temptation to resist the evil in others in the sense in which Jesus' words are usually taken. He meant kindliness. Better it is for us to have an evil deed done to us by someone else, than to resent it and fight back and thus cause double misery in the world; remembering also that nothing comes to you which is not karmic.

Student — May I ask you how that applies to ourselves in regard to maintaining a "constant struggle against our lower nature"?

G. de P. — That is a manner of expression. For instance, the very act of ignoring the evil impulses in yourself with your will, you can properly call a constant struggle against that evil. You certainly will not ignore that evil, however, if you just set your teeth or clench your fists and say: "I won't, I won't, I won't, I won't." Then you are already its victim in that degree. You are paying so much attention to it that it has captured you thus far. Forget it! Ignore it! Let your struggle be one of willpower in the quiet ignoring of all that is base and ignoble. That is all the struggle there is about it. The phrase you quote is a manner of speech.

Student — I thank you.

Student — In The Mahatma Letters to A. P. Sinnett, the Masters say that the greatest evil of the world today is religion under any guise whatsoever. May I have an explanation?

G. de P. — I think so too. But religion there means formal religion: any ceremonial faith, ritualistic faith, in which the soul of religion is lost and men seek salvation through a priesthood living on human credulity, who think, it may be sincerely, that certain ritualistic or ceremonial forms can take the place of honest-to-goodness growth by the effort of each individual from within.

The teacher there was referring to the fact that the only way by which to grow was by self-directed evolution, as our beloved Katherine Tingley used to say: by self-devised efforts for betterment, in other words growth from within, and not seeking to grow merely by looking to the teaching of someone outside of yourself.

Furthermore, religion of any exterior kind brings in its train superstition and hatred between men and men, also misunderstandings, and therefore it distracts the attention entirely away from the really important things of the spirit within.

Within you lie beauty, love, peace, hope, charity, kindliness. Cultivate these things in yourself by your own efforts, and don't turn to a priesthood, or believe that by reciting credos or by following any forms or rituals, you can evolve, or that you can do good to your fellowmen. You understand, do you?

Student — Yes, thank you, Professor.

Student — In The Secret Doctrine, HPB says that theosophy is the foundation of or is to be the future religion of the world. Now she certainly means something quite different from this formal religion?

G. de P. — That is very true.

Student — Now one more thing: for undeveloped persons in a very primitive state, who understand only the very crudest things, will it not be necessary for them to have some kind of formal religion?

G. de P. — Why do you think so? That is a common Occidental idea. It is found especially in the Church of Rome, but the Protestants have it too. Will you tell me that the barbarian living as he does in some parts of the world today is a worse man than the civilized barbarian of our European or American capitals? I fail to see it.

He has his faults and his grossnesses. Look at our big cities. Walk the streets. Note what our own men and women do. Is the simple barbarian without an organized religion, an organized Church, and with all his witchcrafts and voodoo practices and all the rest of it — take it all together, long and short, near and far — is he much worse? I do not think so.

The simple doctrines of brotherhood and kindliness, of universal love, of duty, of compassion, of self-sacrifice, which train the will in the way of these noble and beautiful things which the individual must practise — these are a beautiful and sublime religion in themselves because they are natural, spiritually natural. Any exoteric religion, any religion of forms and ceremonies with a priesthood to carry on these things

— whether such a religion be of the barbarian or of the civilized European — distracts the attention away from the real things of the spirit living in the heart and soul of man. Now that is true.

I think that if our undeveloped people, these ignorant ones that you have spoken of, were taught these simple and beautiful rules of conduct, they would make a far better karmic record than they do now, by deceiving them with churchly observances, however sincere they may be, in which observances, if they believe at all, there is a belief based on fear and groveling because selfish hope. I see nothing ennobling about it.

Student — Have there not been ancient civilizations in which there were ignorant and undeveloped people in very large numbers, but who gave a loyal and willing and gracious obedience to spiritual teachers who ruled them?

G. de P. — True, that is quite true.

Student — I have a question, which I am afraid is a very brain-mind question, but it puzzles me very much.

The universe is filled with gods, and every atom is tending to become a god; and everything is growing more and more towards godhood. Is the universe more evolved now than it was eternities ago? And yet we cannot think that there could be any improvement in a perfect being. "Being" may not be the right word, but perhaps you catch my meaning?

G. de P. — I do. That question is a very natural one and shows a thoughtful mind. It is one which I have answered on a number of occasions, but perhaps not clearly enough. In the first place, when you use the word universe, do you mean our own home universe, or boundless frontierless infinitude?

Student — I mean the latter.

G. de P. — Then how can boundless frontierless infinitude evolve, since evolution applies only to imperfect things growing steadily more perfect?

Student — That is exactly it.

G. de P. — Therefore, boundless, frontierless infinitude does not evolve, because only an imperfect thing can evolve; and if a thing is infinite and eternal, it must be infinite and eternal. Now boundless infinitude is not an entity. It is a phrase imaging an abstract idea. Furthermore, the universes which bestrew the spaces of space are infinite in number. In fact, it is these which compose boundless infinitude in their infinite aggregate.

Universes are constantly coming into being from other planes. The planes are also infinite in number, infinitely beneath what we call the material, infinitely above what we call the divine, and also infinite both inwards and outwards. Consequently as things evolve, as entities evolve, they take eternity in which to evolve. There never was a beginning, there never will be an ending, but each step ahead is superior to the last

— in other words an entering into new fields of space, with new forms of both cosmic energy and cosmic substance.

For instance, we of this universe entered this universe and indeed made it as being parts of it, as small atoms of it, from a universe which previously existed. We are gaining experience in these states of matter and spirit and divinity as existent in our present universe; and this process is repeated in the small in a planet which reimbodies itself from the life essences of its previous planetary parent. Do you get the idea?

Student — Yes, thank you, I understand that.

G. de P. — We begin at the beginning as unself-conscious god-sparks, go through all the evolutionary stages of a universe, reach divinity in that universe, finish with that universe in its entirety; and then that universe with all its conscious lifeatoms in all grades of evolution begins a new universe on a higher plane, and at the beginning. And this process continues through infinitude and through eternity. This is a difficult problem for a human brain-mind to solve, but it is a fascinating and profitable subject for one's hours of quiet reflection.

Student — We know that everything is evolving. Well, the planets must be evolving; and I want to know if my view is correct: when the planets pursue their courses around the sun, is that their mode of evolving in cycles in the way human beings do? Because the sun is always entering new regions. Hence the planets are never going around the sun in the same courses that they followed before; they are going into new regions. Is that their way of evolving?

G. de P. — That is one of the aspects of planetary evolution. Your statement is quite true so far as it goes.

Student — But where is the highest point of their cycle?

G. de P. — It has not been reached yet.

Student — But I mean in relation to the planetary course — which is the highest point in that course?

G. de P. — Do you mean the highest point in the orbit that any planet follows?

Student — Yes, in the cycle of evolution.

G. de P. — That is a difficult question to answer for this reason: the planets, as the ages pass, slowly approach the sun; their orbits become orbits of continuously decreasing diameter. Their ultimate will be union with the sun. Now, that is another hard nut for you to crack. I do not dare to say more than this at present, because you have touched upon a very recondite matter, very recondite.

I perhaps ought to add this: I don't know whether I shall astonish you or not, but our astronomers don't yet understand the real truth about the revolutions of the planets around the sun. Would you be very much astonished if I were to say to you that the planets revolve around the sun only in our imagination, and yet that they actually do revolve? Now that is a statement of fact, and yet I simply cannot undertake to explain it in one evening; it would take me a year, I think!

A very interesting book has just been sent to me. It is written by Professor Charles Nordmann of the Observatory of Paris, in which he argues very logically and intuitively that the proponents of a geocentric universe and those of a heliocentric universe are both right, and both wrong. In other words; that Galileo was right, and also wrong; and the Roman Church was right, and also wrong.

Now, put baldly as I have put the matter before you it is true in a way; and yet in order not to mislead you and therefore to confuse you, I have to tell you that the planets do revolve around the sun, and yet at the same time it is our consciousness which figurates them as so revolving. Understand that if you can. It is a question of Einsteinian relativity.

I think that one of the most interesting, and indeed one of the most marvelous, events that have happened in the history of the Occident has been the teachings of that remarkable man, Einstein. He wanders from the truth in some instances very far, but his fundamental ideas of relativity are, I believe, our own teachings. He says, for instance, that there is no such thing as an infinite universe. That is true. We say the same. Secondly, that a ray of light leaving the sun and going straight ahead will ultimately return to the sun which it had left. It pursues what seems to be a straight path but actually is a curved path, because its path is within the universe which it cannot leave, and because the universe is so immense in extent that any one section of the path of that ray would seem to be a straight line, but taken as a whole it must be circular or elliptical. Now do you understand that part of Einstein's relativity-thought? It seems simple enough to me.

Student — Is there such a thing as using our intelligence in too great a radius and in too wide a field, and through that fact losing the possibility of making the right kind of relationships for our own mental and spiritual growth?

G. de P. — Yes there is; there certainly is. A man can become so involved in pure abstract philosophy that he loses himself in the maze and entangled problems of the forest of illusory thoughts which his own intelligence builds. And secondly, he fails to evolve himself along the lines of practical evolution, which it is his duty to do. Much better is it to cultivate the faculties that are spiritually within us — all the faculties, not merely one, as you have rightly pointed out.

It is right and good for a man to cultivate his intellect, to polish it, to use every intellectual faculty and power that he has, but in order to be balanced he must likewise use the faculties of what it is common to call the heart. He must cultivate love as well as intellect. Otherwise he becomes an unbalanced creature and loses half of life.

Student — Professor, were the primordial sages, who incarnated in illusory bodies at the beginning of the third race, avataras?

G. de P. — In a few instances they were. But in the majority of instances the great primordial sages were premature — if you like to put it in that way — incarnations of manasaputric divinities; and these last were the evolutionary cream of the preceding planetary manvantara.

Student — In that case, what does H. P. Blavatsky mean by illusory bodies, if they were not all avataras? I had supposed that an illusory body meant one that would have no previous karma nor any future karma.

G. de P. — Well, so far as the physical body is concerned, in the case of avataras their bodies are no more illusory than ours, because they are bodies of flesh, and you have described the case exactly aright in pointing out that these bodies have no individual karma. But I think that HPB alludes to the fact that all bodies, in the last analysis, are illusory. Our present physical bodies are mostly holes, mostly vacancies, empty spaces, as I have often tried to describe. The human being — if you had the electric eye, for instance — would probably not be visible to your eye at all. If you did see it, it might be as a thin vaporous and opalescent cloud. All our bodies are illusory in that sense.

Student — But in this sentence, Professor, she especially said illusory bodies, not human bodies. What is the distinction?

G. de P. — Where did you find this?

Student — On page 207 to page 210 of The Secret Doctrine, Volume I, where she was telling about Hermes and Orpheus, and the seven primordial sages who incarnated at the beginning of the third root-race.

G. de P. — I see what you mean now. These are the cases of gods, manasaputric divinities, who incarnated to waken the flame of intelligence, nascent intelligence, in the hitherto unself-conscious beings of that time, who had a consciousness something like that of little children of today. Little children today have no intellect; they are not really awake. They are in a dream state almost, intellectually speaking; physically alert, physically alive, physically conscious, but not possessing that delicate balance of spiritual and intellectual powers which the adult has and self-consciously exercises.

So these great primordial sages, manasaputric divinities, incarnated in bodies of light, illusory bodies, and taught. They taught the early human protoplasts. It was a marvelous thing. The bodies of what were to become human beings, or call them human beings if you like, of that early period were enormous in size.

Well, you might figurate them to your present minds as masses of cloud wandering over the earth. The earth itself was much larger than it now is, and much more ethereal. It was a quasi-astral world.

Student — Is it because the solar system is a unit revolving within a greater unit, and the sun has the highest rate of vibration, that there is the illusion which you speak about? Is that any idea in explanation of it?

Perhaps I am not clear.

G. de P. — Not very clear, I am afraid. I do not quite follow the logic of your thought.

Student — You were speaking about the planets' revolving around the sun as being illusory. I was thinking the solar system is a unit that is revolving within a greater unit. And in that case the sun, being the magnet of our unit, of the solar system unit, would give the illusion of the others revolving around it, when it is all a single unit in the greater system.

G. de P. — I see what you mean. Yes, you have seized one aspect of it. I will add this: when our chemical physicists have discovered the reality of what the atom of chemistry is and contains, they will understand this other matter better. Today our chemical physicists are greatly puzzled by the fact that the electrons which compose the atom behave in the most unaccountable way, according to the manner in which the chemists put the matter in their reports. They say that these electrons at certain times seem to be all over the place; they seem to pursue an orbit around the protonic nucleus or the 'sun' of the atom, and yet at times they seem to be everywhere in their own orbit. So that instead of being a tiny little body whirling around the protonic nucleus, an electron seems to be a streak of electronic matter.

Now if the electron is a ring around the atomic sun, instead of a tiny little body following its orbit around the

protonic nucleus, of course the revolution of a spherical planet around the atomic sun does not exist in the orbits of the planets of our solar system. But — and this is the important point — it is all a matter of envisaging the problem. Our planets actually revolve around the sun, but that revolution is so because our consciousness figurates it in that way — which to some minds might be equivalent to saying that they do not in themselves revolve around the sun. But I must give up in despair any attempt to set forth in a few words the actual explanation of what I have hereinbefore said. It is almost impossible to describe briefly. I am actually sorry that I touched upon it this evening. I suppose now that I shall have all kinds of questions on it. I shall simply say, Companions, that I cannot answer them in this Group.

Student — Some few months back you described the fact that the great sages and seers could carry on interplanetary communication. I wonder if I am on the right track in the following thought: for instance, we take a man like Beethoven who hears wonderful melodies that, as far as we know, have never been heard before; and he puts them down in a symbol of notation which other people can read and reproduce as music.

Now is it possible that the interplanetary communication is in the sense of a spiritualized thought? Is the communication somewhat in the nature of a very highly evolved thought?

G. de P. — Are you referring to the interplanetary communication that takes place by means of those who have been trained to do it?

Student — Yes, I am talking about sages and seers, not about scientific experimentation, but of sages and seers who project their spirits, actually project their spirits to the portals of the sun. And I am wondering if thought is a suggestion of the initial stages of the method perhaps.

G. de P. — You may call it a suggestion; but the actual fact is much more than thinking towards the sun, much more than imagining you are there. It is an actual localization of the higher part of the initiate's consciousness on the sun or moon or planet, or on some part of the earth it may be. It is an actual transference of consciousness and will. In fact, the whole being is there at the time — that is, all the important and higher part of the constitution.

Student — Doctor, may I ask another question, please? You have stated that sleep and death are twins.

Sometimes one retires absolutely fresh, not feeling at all fatigued, rests well, sleeps well without any dreams, and yet arises in the morning tired and exhausted. May I ask if there is any spiritual connection, so to speak, with such a condition?

G. de P. — No, I think not. I would not ascribe the condition you describe to the spiritual part of you as causing it. I think it must be the karmic resultant of circumstances which probably, largely, had their root in the activities of the preceding day, and both in mind and body. It is not an uncommon experience, and, as you say, a man will go to bed fresh and have a good night's sleep. Theoretically he ought to awaken in the morning fresh, but actually he awakes fatigued, if I get your idea aright. That is a karmic resultant of the thoughts and emotions and the bodily exercises, whatever they may have been, of the preceding day. Possibly also he ate too much. I trust I have got your thought.

Student — Yes, you have. Thank you.

Student — I wanted to ask about this magic thing: our going to bed tired and waking up rested. I never could fully understand it. To me it always seems wonderful to wake up every morning refreshed.

G. de P. — Yes, it is a truly wonderful thing. You see people at night before they go to bed look simply worn out, sometimes tired and positively weary. They go to bed; they sleep; in the morning their whole physical being is restored, changed. It is indeed a magical thing. The secret of it lies in the electromagnetic forces which actually build the body and which when balanced hold it in health. These forces have their seat in the astral-atomic structure of the physical body; and health is simply the equilibrium between the positive and negative of both the body magnetism and the body electricity, and the way they work and work together and interblend is a most marvelous thing. It is truly magical.

Student — May I ask this: do we not live too much in the shadow, and through that medium lose our possibilities of real living? What I mean is we give the material and shadowy side of nature too much credit,

and we live too little in the right things, and through that error lose our possibility of real living.

G. de P. — Yes, that is very true. That is really the basis of the teaching of all the great instructors of humanity. They are always telling you: "Live in your higher part. Strive to become your greater self. Be it."

The tendency of humanity today, especially of people in the Occident, is to live in the body, to live in the things of the exterior world. You place all your values there, as a rule. What is his wealth? What has he learned? What can he do? You very rarely ask: What is he? Or rarely is your attention turned to what he is in himself. And if you do turn your attention to this nobler aspect, your pragmatical minds do not dwell so much on the fact that he is something, is of some outstanding spiritual and intellectual value, but rather to the idea: What can he do? What can he produce? What has he done? What has he won? What has he gained? — all of these being estimates in material values again. Of course, this distracts the whole attention, the whole consciousness, away from the inner realities of a man, of the man himself. You take that to heart. It is a beautiful thought that you have brought up.

Student — I would like to go back to the question of death and ask whether there is a difference in the postmortem states of a messenger as compared with those of the average man; whether you could illustrate this point by referring to any one of the three messengers who preceded you.

G. de P. — Yes, there is a great difference, which is not contradictory of the other fact that each case stands on its own ground. There are differences among the messengers themselves, as ought to be obvious, because each one has a different individuality. In the case of ordinary men the usual rule of the postmortem karmic destiny is followed out. The rule remains pretty much the same for all. In the case of a messenger, however, his postmortem adventures are very different indeed. The probability is that there is a very short devachanic period which nature almost demands, but it is very short; and then the return to work begins immediately.

In some cases, the messenger will apparently die, in other words abandon the body which actually does die, but yet the messenger does not go into devachan, but reincarnates almost immediately; passes a few days, or weeks, or months, even, in the state of rest — this is the best way I can describe it — in the auric egg, in his own auric egg, fully conscious, however, a state closely akin to but not identical with that of the nirmanakaya, and then returns to physical incarnation in order to carry on work for the Great Brotherhood.

There are cases of messengers, also, who as individuals leave one body when it is practically worn out and death in the normal course would come very soon, and enter another body, a child's body, or a body which has died but is not yet cold, and resuscitate that body. In fact, the case of each messenger stands on its own ground. It is not, I think, possible to answer your question in a general way, as applying accurately to all instances.

Companions, I think that we will now close for tonight. Good night.

[The sounding of the gong. Silence.]

Meeting 13

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Thirteen

Meeting of May 28, 1930

G. de P. — Will you please come to order. I am now ready to answer questions.

Student — Professor, could you give us a talk from the esoteric standpoint on the matter of overeating, undereating, and unnecessary particularity about the food that is eaten?

G. de P. — The ideal practice is to eat just enough to keep the body healthy and in good running order, and there is nothing so dangerous as eating more than you need. It is fatal. It leads to disease, or brings out latent seeds of disease. Overeating weakens the body, renders it very susceptible to attack by disease; and worst of all, it dulls the mind dreadfully. Overeating produces a vicious circle of consequences. Indeed, the very impulse and desire to overeat is a psychomental sickness.

I want to tell you something about food. It is not eating that makes you strong. It is what you assimilate that gives you strength and keeps you healthy. Eat naturally, eat normally, eat what is set before you, and then forget it. If you do not like it, and there is nothing else, then go without it. A little fasting won't hurt you. Or eat a little of it, and let it go at that. If you feel that you need a little meat, then eat a little meat, but be sure that it is a need, not merely an appetite for flesh. If you can do without meat and eat eggs, so much the better for you. But watch yourself a little.

The ideal thing is to eat just enough to keep you healthy and strong; to think as little as you can about your food and let it go at that; and thus you will give your bodies a ghost of a chance to heal themselves, if you are troubled with any physical ailment. No doctor who ever lived ever healed his patients. It is nature who heals you, and the wisest doctor aids nature and does nothing else.

Now, as regards over-particularity or squeamishness in matters of food: that is a sign of a disease, I think. The person who is really healthy and normal is not over-particular. He does not think so much about his food.

Therefore, the result is that he gives his body every chance in the world to keep in health, and to right itself when things temporarily go wrong. He has a natural, not an artificial or a diseased appetite, which always follows overeating. He is not over-particular.

I repeat: you do not gain strength by filling the body to repletion with food. Please take that clearly in your heads. You gain strength from what you can take care of, that is, from what you can assimilate. The body in cases of overeating has to take care of the surplusage, and the body does this as best it can.

Practically every disease that human flesh is afflicted with arises originally out of wrong feeding: I mean that if you could trace the disease back to the original cause, you would discover it in wrong feeding and overfeeding — and wrong feeding usually means overfeeding.

I do not know why the questioner asked me this question, but it is one that I have been thinking a good deal about lately, and I have almost despaired of being able really to help people in the matter of food. Why?

Because if there is one thing that makes people irritable and cross, crotchety, and sometimes really unkind, it is to probe them on the matter of their food. Everybody is more or less sick, unwell — diseased more or less.

Consequently, everyone has unnatural appetites for food. People think that it is a crime to let them grow weak

— as they think they will, if you tell them to cut down the quantity of their food: they usually believe that they are going to die within a month or two or three. Few, I think, realize that a little wholesome dieting would give them renewed health and strength, because it would give the body a chance to right itself. Clean out the organs of the body, and all the rest of the tissues, which can be done in one way by eating very lightly and by drinking a good deal of water: in this way you will freshen up the blood, cleanse it, purify it. Nature will take care of all these things if you will only start the thing going.

Really the ideal is never to eat until you are actually hungry, and then to eat moderately, and not to eat again

until you are hungry and then again eat moderately. But look what people do. They go to the table just exactly in the same way as they go to the office — at certain specified hours by the clock, and then they eat heartily as a rule. Does the body require it? Twice out of thrice, no. And yet if you talk to them, and suggest a change, when they complain of feeling poorly, suggest cutting down the food taken to one meal a day, note the howl of despair and terror that would almost certainly arise. "If I do that I am going to die. I am going to lose my strength. It will kill me." They don't know the real road to health!

Chelas in training never eat more than one meal a day, and a very simple meal at that: usually a few tablespoonfuls of rice, perhaps boiled in milk, no salt, no pepper, perhaps a little dab of butter, and a little fruit, and all the water they want. European chelas, or Chinese, may possibly take a little tea or coffee. No chocolate, however — not that chocolate is bad in itself, but it is a powdered nut that is very rich and nutritious, and to a certain extent it prevents what the chela is aiming for: to make the body as much as is possible transparent to the higher energies, nevertheless keeping it strong and in good health. If you could see one of our chelas you would marvel at him, for you would probably see a picture of health and normal strength.

Overeating is fatal to chelaship. The Zulus have the following proverb: "The gods never visit a man whose belly is constantly full." The meaning is: you will never get inspiration, you will never be able to confabulate with your own inner divinity, if there is a mass of food in your body all the time. The brain thereby is dulled and stupefied, the nerves are poisoned, the body becomes cranky and upset.

On the other hand, do not underfeed, which means perhaps eating not nearly enough to provide the minimum nourishment required. Some Oriental fanatics do this and reduce the amount of food taken into the body to an absurdly small quantity. One who is thus underfed is apt to see illusory visions in the lower regions of the astral light, and he would probably mistake them for beatific visions — which is all nonsense. Eat what you need. Drink plenty of good water. If you like tea or coffee, use them moderately and not over-strong, not so that they drug the system. If you find that you need a little more food than your first attempts show, then eat a little more. If you find that you eat a little more than you actually need, omit a little; but in every case don't think so much about it. Give it a little serious thought, and when you think that you have found the normal for you — and each one differs — then keep to that and forget about it.

Has anyone any other question to ask?

Student — I would like to ask if there is any connection between the luz of the Hebrews and the sushumna-nadi?

G. de P. — The "Luz"-bone is a bone which the Arabs say is the seed of the man when he shall arise when Allah calls him. It is the "seed" of his future being; and the luz-bone, according to most Mohammedan Doctors of theology, is the os coccyx. It is one of the last, or the last, bone of the spinal column. No, I do not think that there is any especial connection between the luz-bone of Mohammedan legend and the sushumna-nadi. The latter is rather a spiritual current, a canal, a channel, in and around the spinal column.

Student — The description that I read, gives it as being in the neck.

G. de P. — Where did you read that?

Student — In an article on the Egyptian mysteries, that word was given as showing the ansated symbol that they use, and it gave it at the neck.

G. de P. — I believe that some Mohammedan doctors do place it as one of the cervical vertebrae, but the majority, I think, incline to believe in the sayings of Mohammed about the luz-bone, which is to be the seed of the body of the future man, and that it is the os coccyx. They really don't seem to know themselves. At any rate, the matter is of no importance.

Student — You told us some time ago quite a good deal about thoughts, but I would like to ask you how it is that we can have a melody running in the mind, a melody that we pick up from someone else. Sometimes a melody will persist in the mind, and it is actually a melody that we hear inside.

G. de P. — Well, what is the question?

Student — What is going on in the mind? Is the melody actually a thought that you are thinking?

G. de P. — What do you think goes on in the mind when you are studying some mathematical problem?

Student — Well, you are concentrated on the problem in hand.

G. de P. — Yes. Your question then is: "What is happening in the mind when music is heard?" Is that the idea?

Student — Yes, it is. Suppose that you have heard a melody and it repeats itself over and over in your mind during the day. You almost grow tired of it.

G. de P. — I see. What you speak of is a reflex action, as modern scientists would say, due to the state of the nerves which have received a strong impression. The musical melody has made a strong impression upon the brain, which automatically repeats and reproduces the melody.

Some musicians, the so-called creators of beautiful musical productions, receive definite musical inspiration from the higher spiritual part of their being. It really is a light, which takes the form of music. This light is transmuted in their consciousness into inner sound, which is heard by the inner ear, because light and sound are but two phases of the gamut of vibrations, two different ranges. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes, Professor.

Student — May I ask a question regarding what you have just said? Why is it that some composers have such different methods of composition? For instance, Schubert was simply so inspired that the music seemed to flow through him almost without thought. He would be sitting at a restaurant table, and suddenly say: "Such a beautiful melody has come to me." And he would write it down just as it came, and the next day he would forget all about it. Whereas Beethoven would hear melodies and work them out, and revise them and change them until they were what he wanted them. Why is it that great musicians should receive their inspirations and work them out in these different ways?

G. de P. — I think that the fact you speak of is due solely to differences of temperament and character. You might ask an equivalent question with regard to wonderful literature. Why should some authors see the same thing in different ways, or produce such different things, all however things of beauty? It is ascribable to differences of character, of temperament, and to the different stages that they hold along the evolutionary pathway. I do not think that there is any other reason.

Student — In an article of yours in The Theosophical Path, September 1929, the discussion of the Weissmann cell was spoken of and what it lacked was supplied by you according to the esoteric doctrine. But that part is not what I want to know something about. I am rather submitting this interpretation for your correction. It spoke of the immortality of the germ-cell, and that it descended from remote ancestors and was passed on to successive generations unutilized, and this germ-plasm never changed, and was not used for the building up of the body either of the parent or of the offspring to be.

Now for a long while I have thought about that, and I could not imagine what the function of this latent parent germ-plasm could be, and yet, according to theory, it was passed on through the ages. And finally it came to my mind — probably I heard it, I don't know — but lately I have just thought that its function was to preserve the characteristics of the human type for the reincarnating entity. And this accounts for the one type of the human race. That is, all through the five races, the human type is the same. I do not know whether that is correct or not; but that is one part of the question that is in my mind. What is the function of this immortal germ-plasm?

G. de P. — You have asked a very interesting question, and your answer is in the question itself, as far as it goes; but it does not go far, not far enough. The germ-plasm is really the concreted deposit or concretion of

the astral fluid, which is but an other way of saying a deposit arising originally in the monadic essence and flowing to and through the various vehicles, concreting more and more as it goes earthwards and finally reaching its last stage in the germ-plasm of the physical man. This germ-plasm is passed on untouched from parent to child, and is, just as you say, the human background of the physiological processes — well, perhaps physiological is not the proper word — but at any rate the human-astral-physical background towards which, and into which, the lifeatom of the reincarnating ego is drawn and falls. By so doing, by entering that, it starts a prepared and ready lifeatom into beginning the growth of an individual physical vehicle. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes. But this germ-plasm, I thought, was different from the dhyan-chohanic astral fluid, because that astral fluid or those astral forces were mixing with the vitalities, that is the activities and potentialities of the soul, and that fluid was helping to build up the body; whereas that latent germ-plasm had nothing to do whatever. It was unutilized; it was a latent germ just passed on. Therefore the question came into my mind: what really is its function?

G. de P. — That is correct. Its function is to preserve the human type from age to age, and therefore it itself slowly changes. Atoms of it in each generation are utilized to prepare and to make the beginnings of the children then born.

In each generation there is an added concretion from within to replace that portion devoted to make the growing cells of the body to be. In other words, a certain part of the germ-plasm is used for the growing germ-cell. In that germ-cell is always latent a certain unused part of the same parental germ-plasm passed from parents to child, and when that child grows to maturity, is prepared, or physiologically is able, to procreate, a certain portion of that passed-on parental germ-plasm is utilized to prepare, to make, and to begin, the body of the next generation.

But in all cases the germ-plasm, the germinal fluid, the germ-fluid, whether utilized or passed on, is the concreted deposit of the astral fluid of what you call the dhyan-chohan, which is but another way of saying the reincarnating ego.

Student — Thank you. May I ask you one more question?

G. de P. — Yes; but first let me add that our physical bodies are not different either in substance or in type from the astral linga-sarira, but each body is merely a concretion of the linga-sarira. In other words, a certain part of the linga-sarira thickens, grossens, coarsens, materializes, and becomes the physical body.

Now, Doctor, ask your other question.

Student — There were detached cells, I think, that did not come under that human dominant influence in this germ-plasm, and they furnish or produce the stocks of the beast world. Now these detached cells have not that germ-plasm, therefore the animal body of the beast world, of course, could not be human. Is that it?

G. de P. — No, that is not it. The body of the beasts contains the same germ-plasm that the human body contains; but it is not fit, not ripe, not evolutionally ripe, to produce human beings. The same fact exists in all Nature, as is shown in chemistry. The atoms of chemistry are the same in a tree or in an ox, or in an elephant or in a stone, as in the human physical body. But in one case these atoms are concreted to enshrine a certain vital energy or urge which is a tree; in another case, an ox; in another case, an elephant; in another case a man. But the elements are the same in all cases. Exactly the same plasm exists fundamentally in the beasts as exists in the human body, otherwise there would be no possible chance for the beasts gradually to refine themselves as the long ages pass, and grow more humanlike. This most emphatically is not Darwinism.

Darwin, however, was not wholly wrong in some of his profounder views.

Student — When we set a cord in as rapid vibration as it is possible for us to do, it appears still. And I wondered when the vibration of light is increased beyond light so that it becomes what HPB calls the mineral kingdom — where she speaks of the mineral kingdom as being light immetalized, on the idea that the rapidity of vibration is so great that it is apparently still — I do not know whether I am clear or not.

G. de P. — I think I understand. Now just frame your question again in a few words.

Student — When HPB speaks of the mineral kingdom as being light immetalized, is it because light increases its vibration so rapidly that it becomes what we think of as still?

G. de P. — That is correct. Actually the rate of vibration in a stone is more rapid than it is in what the physicist calls light. It is rapidity of vibration which coarsens, grossens, and concretes the fundamental substance of the universe; and that means also that the vibrations becoming so much more rapid become smaller.

Instead of the swing of the pendulum being from sun to planet or from star to star, the magnitude — or what is the term they use? — the amplitude grows smaller and smaller, and at the same time more rapid, all the time. And when in our own hierarchy it reaches its utmost possible rate, its highest rate of vibration in rapidity, you have the mineral kingdom.

Student — May I finish with another question about it? In a recent article by a chemist, the statement was made that the rapidity of vibration in the atom approached the confines of the vibration of light, but if that is accurate, is that then why the atom is the sheath of the monad and really belongs to the mineral kingdom?

G. de P. — No, that happens because the atom when it produces a light ray is in a state of disintegration or explosion. Do you understand me?

Student — I see.

G. de P. — And this means that the rate of vibration, due to some cause or other, whatever it may be, is rapidly and suddenly slowed down, so that an electron, or more than one of the electrons, or a portion of the electron, in the atom probably leaves the atom in an explosion so to say — disappears in a burst of light.

I might call your attention, Companions, in passing, to the fact that following the law of universal and analogical similarity in nature's operations, this same thing sometimes happens to and in the planets circling around the sun. The reverse also takes place: just as an atom will capture another electron when it is electron hungry, and thus change its polarity, so can a solar system, our own, for instance, capture a wandering cosmic body. When that body is so captured, it changes the polarity of the solar system. Neptune is such a case, and Uranus also is such a case.

Concerning this new planet 'X' I have not been able to get facts enough about it yet properly to answer any questions about it. My feeling is that it also is a capture, from the few items or bits of news I have read about it. This planet 'X' is not counted in the esoteric astrology at all — at any rate I have seen no mention made of it.

Student — I am very much interested lately by these new discoveries of early men in China. The ethnologists and anthropologists are more excited over them than anything they have found for twenty or thirty years. And I have puzzled over something HPB said in The Secret Doctrine: that man two million years ago was much more primitive and animal-like in structure than now. Of course the Atlanteans and Lemurians were long before that; but she says that most definitely, and the ethnologists think that these men they have discovered lately are about a million years old. Most of them do. Some think five hundred thousand, and some a million.

And I was wondering whether those ancient men are very much older than they are, and whether they are what the scientists think they are, really primitive. They claim they are of the early Pleistocene — it may be much earlier. Of course they have no way to date those things. I would like to know anything you can tell us on that subject. It is so important in many ways.

G. de P. — Yes it is. My own impression is this: because cremation was almost universally practised by all civilized peoples and by most barbarian people up till a few tens of thousands of years ago, practically all the human relics that are found by our delving and digging explorers belong to savage tribes who buried their dead, or to savages who lost their lives in battle or by hunting wild beasts, or to those who died from some sudden sickness while on a journey, or something like that.

I do not think that these ancient men whose remains have been discovered are very primitive. I think rather strongly to the contrary, from the few facts and data that I have been able to gather. The same thing happens today. We have savages living among us in various parts of the world. Their bodies are not cared for as civilized men care for the bodies of their dead as a rule. They are drowned, or overwhelmed in some disaster, or slain by beasts and forgotten. Ages hence, their remains may be digged up by some future explorer, who will ponder and wonder whether they belong to "primitive man" or not.

I want to say something, however, with regard to HPB's statement that our present Aryan race is about a million years old. Please do not let that statement, true as it is, mislead you, on account of your own minds misconstruing her statement. It is true that our own present fifth or so-called Aryan race, as a race of its own type, and utterly separate in type, from other races, is about a million years old. But actually as a race it is much older than that. It is some four or five millions of years old, counting from its beginnings.

At about the time of the Miocene period, we were, that is our ancestors were, savages and barbarians in the ages when the Atlanteans had reached the culmination of their glorious civilization, however material it may have been — and it certainly was grossly materialistic in type. Slowly, as the Atlanteans degenerated, this group, our fifth race ancestors, gradually through the ages became more and more refined, also more productive of offspring, and thus grew and spread over the earth, until one day it found itself in the majority.

From that time really begins the beginning of the present fifth root-race.

But many ages still passed before it became a race wholly distinct from the preceding Atlantean race; and about one million years ago, at just about that period of time in the past — it reached a point in its evolution, in its progress, where it became indeed a race sui generis. Our race, our present fifth or Aryan race, will live for some four, possibly four and a half, million years more before it shall have died out. The sixth root-race is even at the present time in seeding. The seeds of it are just beginning to show themselves, just beginning to start growth; and that beginning, that starting, and the seeding country, the seeding continent — well, what is the term that the gardeners use when they plant seeds in a place? — the nursery, is the present American continents. But the Americans of that far distant time will have vanished under the waters of the ocean, not in entirety, but most of them, before the sixth root-race in its turn shall have become a race with its own type and character. That event will happen some five million years hence. There is, therefore, you see, plenty of time for our present race to continue and complete its evolution.

Student — Talking about races has given me an opening to ask for some more definite knowledge on a subject which I have thought a very great deal about.

All of us, or most of us, have met, generally while traveling, or we know something about that class of humanity that is called sometimes hermaphrodite, sometimes androgynous, perhaps very usually bisexual. It has also become quite an educational problem. First, is the influence of such a type of person not almost invariably an evil one? We all know some, or know of them anyway. But given right conditions of education and very particular training, must they inevitably have evil influences?

G. de P. — Well, they are abnormalities at the present time. And being abnormal, being out of time, their influence is not good. That is quite clear. In a certain sense they are unfortunate. They are not only born far later than the time of the race when the androgynous state was the normal state, but they are also far ahead of the time when the race will become androgynous. Hence in a sense they are individuals to be pitied.

Now I know that some physicians, some anthropologists, some scientists, say that real hermaphroditism does not exist; but I doubt it. I doubt the statement. Certainly, mental hermaphroditism is becoming fairly common, and that simply prognosticates what will take place in the physical body in due course of time in the future.

I am sorry to say that I am afraid their influence is not a good one, for the simple reason that the people of our own fifth race are still carrying a heavy load of Atlantean sexual karma. We are still under the sway of the influence of sex; and the less people think about it the better. When you see these mental hermaphrodites, or what are commonly called degenerates — and they are often degenerate in a certain sense — their action on our own feeble minds and weak ethical sense produces an action of which the influence is not good. You understand me, of course.

Student — Quite, Professor. And the second part of the question I think you have answered. I was going to ask whether they were the prelude of the future race which you have pictured to us?

G. de P. — Yes; but that androgynous race of the future will last a very short time; will last a much shorter time than the androgynous races of the third root-race. Then nature was molding things, building, preparing.

The future race will come, abide a short time, and pass relatively quickly away. Humanity will be ever more and more tending to become utterly sexless. What a beautiful hope to carry in mind!

Student — Thank you, Professor.

Student — Reading an article in The Theosophical Path not so long ago, speaking about the Valley of the Kings in the Nile region in Egypt, I was thinking of those great chambers that were engineered and constructed, and that the different kings must have been advised by initiates as to how long those chambers would endure. I was wondering if it was proper for these places, that are sacred in a way, to be opened up —

even for investigation. For they are sealed there for a purpose. I would like you to give a little light on that please.

G. de P. — Yes. Then you don't like the idea of the tombs being violated, I suppose?

Student — Well, it does not seem exactly right.

G. de P. — I think your instinct is sound, dear Brother. I have the same feeling. It is all very well to talk about exploration in the interests of science, and there is a good deal to say for that I will admit; but we all know what we think of human beings, ghouls, of the present day who violate graveyards. There is something horrible about it. I do not like the idea myself.

Perhaps the mere entering of these ancient tombs is all right. It might be all right just to explore them, and if they were carefully sealed up again and left in peace I would not have anything especial to say. But to enter them and to violate the sanctity of the dead — there is something repulsive to me about it, especially when the things found are afterwards scattered over the face of the earth and the mummies put into glass cases and stared at by hordes of curious people. It does not seem right.

I know the Valley and the Tombs of the Kings well. When I was there with our beloved KT in 1903 or 1904, I think it was, we entered quite a few of these beautiful and solemn places, beautiful and solemn in the sense of the majestic peace that still prevails. I remember that we entered one tomb, descending along the corridor cut in the living rock. We walked on and on, descended a few steps, then walked on. Electric lights were strung along the corridor.

Finally we came to the chamber and there in a sunken rectangular cavity, cut out of the solid rock, we saw the sarcophagus of one of Egypt's greatest kings. The explorers had taken off the top of the sarcophagus and had put a high-powered electric bulb just above the coffin, the sarcophagus. The light was strong, and you stood leaning over a modern railing and looked down at this famous king's dead body, lying there with the garish light beating upon it.

I did not like it at all. It seemed wrong to me. But there was nothing that we could do about it. I detest the lack of reverence that so many of our explorers have for the rights of the dead, for the rights and the feelings of the by-gone peoples, who were we ourselves, if you please.

Student — May not the feeling that a good many people have, that after they have been cremated their ashes shall be scattered in nature, so as to avoid anything like that happening in the future, be based on that same feeling that you have expressed?

G. de P. — I think so. And outside of that, it is a great help to the excarnating entity to have its decomposing physical body dissipated into its component atoms. Cremation is a help: it is a quick freeing of otherwise very strongly magnetic attractions to the living body that was. You see, the excarnating entity for a short time after death is almost physical, and all the lower part of the intermediate constitution still is in the atmosphere of the earth. It is true that the spirit has already joined its parent-sun. It is true that the reincarnating ego is very soon

to be withdrawn into the bosom of the parent-monad. But the lower intermediate part, the human soul part, still is in the atmosphere of the earth, joined to the kama-rupa; and if the physical body is allowed to decay, or if it is mummified as the Egyptians did it, there is a strong psychomagnetic attraction to that dead body.

It was part of the being you know, part of its life, a deposit of its own essence; and, as I tell you, the attraction is tremendous. Therefore cremation, outside of what you have pointed out, has the added advantage of more quickly freeing the excarnating entity from earthly attractions.

Student — Does the place where the ashes are buried or scattered have any consequence whatever?

G. de P. — None at all. None at all.

Student — In the case of the disintegration of a black magician, when the last thing has happened, and the lifeatoms are set free, I would like to know whether these lifeatoms, which of course will have begun their upward march, will continue once again. Will they not?

G. de P. — Yes.

Student — Have they any bent one way or the other on account of the experience through which they have passed?

G. de P. — Yes, a very strong one, a very strong one indeed. But please remember that there is nothing unjust about this, because the lifeatoms that have been attracted to a Brother of the Shadow that was, are of a very gross type, not necessarily gross in the sense of being very material, but psychically gross, if you understand me.

Student — Yes, thank you.

Student — I wondered why it was that the Egyptians who had such a wonderful civilization, and must have been rather spiritual, embalmed their dead if it was such a bad practice, and thus delayed the separation of the soul from the physical world.

G. de P. — I am very glad that you asked that question, because that very fact passed through my mind when I spoke a moment agone, and I then thought that it would be a good question for someone to ask. Please remember that the Egyptians of history were a very devout and a quasi-mystical people, but nevertheless they were not a highly spiritual one. They were a mixture of late Atlanteans and immigrants from the Orient. Not only the Egyptian architecture, but the Egyptian religion as a whole and many of the Egyptian customs were hangovers, relics, of Atlantean culture; and mummification of the dead among the late Atlanteans was widely and extensively practised.

The original Egyptians actually came from the Atlantic islands that Plato in his Critias called Atlantis, and which was also called by some of the ancient Greeks Poseidonis, the name of the largest of these lost islands of the Atlantean continent. Poseidonis was the last island-remnant of one of the continents of the Atlantic system, and this island disappeared some 12,000 years ago. But of course Egypt, the northern part of Africa, which had been slowly emerging from the ocean bed, and also slowly built up through the ages by deposits from the Nile, had been settled by Atlantean immigrants for ages preceding the time of the submergence of the island of Poseidonis. In addition to this, during the course of the last two or three decades of millennia, it had also received large numbers of immigrants from what is now southern India, and lands once adjoining Southern India but now submerged. The Egyptians, therefore, of history, were a people of mixed Atlantean and Aryan race.

Student — HPB says that the Egyptians came from India. Does that mean another set of Egyptians?

G. de P. — No, as I have just said the Egyptians of history were a mixture of Atlantean immigrants who had settled ages previously in Egypt, and of later people who came from the Orient, from southern India and from now vanished lands then adjoining southern India and Ceylon. The two peoples combined and formed the Egyptians of history.

Student — And were the ancient Egyptians, those that were there previously, superior to the Egyptians of history?

G. de P. — Well, they were late Atlanteans who had immigrated to the rising lands of the Egyptian delta.

Student — I mean the very ones that settled in Egypt before those whom you speak of, the historical Egyptians. I had the idea they were a purer type of Egyptians than the others.

G. de P. — No, I doubt that. I believe even to the contrary. I think that I have already pointed out in answering a previous question that Egypt was first settled by Atlantean immigrants who colonized Northern Africa. These Atlantean immigrants settled on land formed by the deposits of the river Nile, and this land later became the delta of Egypt. At a much later time in history, possibly some twenty thousand or fifteen thousand or twelve thousand years ago, other immigrants came into Egypt from the Orient, from the districts where now southern India is, and these later immigrants, intermarrying with the Atlantean Egyptian stock already resident there, produced the Egyptians of history, the historic Egyptians. Do you understand now?

Student — Yes, thank you. I didn't know whether it was a purer kind of Atlanteans who went there in the beginning, or a bad kind. That was my difficulty.

G. de P. — They were not of the most spiritual kind.

Student — I would like to ask: would it seem possible for there to be a very widespread religion whose adherents are devoted and mystical, but not essentially spiritual? And I have wondered if this is the case with the Mohammedans.

G. de P. — Very true, but on a lower plane even than were the Egyptians of history. You are quite right in your idea. Without any wish to offend the feelings of the adherents of Islam, the Mohammedans, and recognizing also that there is much truth and beautiful mystical thought in certain aspects of the later Mohammedanism, nevertheless I feel it my duty to observe that Mohammedanism, taking it by and large, has produced in its adherents a very devout, sometimes mystical, but, on the whole, an unspiritual people.

Student — May I ask you to tell us something about the Mayas of Central America? Who were they?

G. de P. — They were Atlantean stocks which, like so many others when Atlantis began to sink, foresaw what was coming. They had a great deal of magical knowledge at that time. They left their native lands and migrated to the Americas at different times through later ages, and settled the new lands which were rising on east and west and south. These new lands became the Americas, became Africa, became parts of Asia; and the present European countries, stretching from the Ural mountains of Russia, westward to include the British Isles, and even farther westward than that in former times. All these Atlanteans who emigrated from their own greatest continent, slowly settled through the ages upon these new lands, and in time lost almost all recollection of their own homeland and became the stocks of the ancient Americans, such as the Mayas, the Incas of Peru, and also the archaic Egyptians, and again the very earliest Aryans, and so forth.

Student — I was just going to ask about Mexico. It was just the same with regard to Mexico, wasn't it?

G. de P. — Yes, just the same.

Student — Where do the Basques come in?

G. de P. — The Basques are also of just the same origin as the other peoples — Atlantean remnants, but dwindled to be very few in number at the present time. I believe that the language and many of the customs of the Basques have a very close relation to the language and customs of the Guanches of the Canary Islands.

Student — You said that the Atlanteans were very materially inclined and left a stamp on the Egyptians and probably on these other later peoples. But were there not some among them, very highly evolved people, who must have settled somewhere in the world and had not that material stamp?

G. de P. — Certainly there were. When a race is spoken of as being grossly material in tendency, that doesn't mean that every individual of the race was such. As a matter of fact, the Atlanteans produced some magnificent initiates of the right-hand path, wonderfully spiritual. Furthermore, it was in or out of the bosom of the Atlanteans that grew our own more spiritual fifth root-race. Bad as we are, we are not as bad as the bulk of the Atlanteans were at the time when nature could tolerate them no more and tolerate is not a merely poetic phrase.

The psychic vibrations of the continents of Atlantis, or rather of the people who dwelt upon those continents, grew so powerful and so penetrating and so disintegrative that this more than anything else helped to bring about nature's reaction in the form of geological catastrophes. I mean here not merely a reaction among humans, but a reaction of nature herself.

Let me remind you that the Atlanteans were, as a race, very magical. They had many more powers than we have and they used them badly. A man at the present day, one of our fifth root-race men, can do little more than destroy his own health and his own body by his evil practices, and thus ruin his soul if he goes far enough, and also act to disintegrate the physical and psychical principles of his fellows. His influence on physical matter is relatively small because we are slowly drawing away from physical things, the distance between us as a race and grossly physical matter is very slowly increasing.

But among the Atlanteans, with their enormous bodies, their tremendous wills, and with their magical practices based on magical knowledge of nature's laws and operations, this combination of factors was, spiritually and ethically speaking, an extremely powerful and bad one. The bodies of the Atlanteans were much grosser than ours, heavier, I mean, pound for pound. A pound of Atlantean flesh was heavier than a pound of human flesh today. Everything was coarser, heavier, grosser, more material, but all this does not mean that the Atlanteans were men of striking ugliness. On the contrary many of them were men and women of remarkable but evil beauty. The same condition prevails even among us today. There is such a thing as evil beauty today, both in men and in women; human beings who impress one unpleasantly when one sees them, although they may be very handsome — and the Atlanteans were just so.

Student — I have been wondering if there is any special significance in the fact that the name Atlantis is the genitive form of the name Atlas. Of course there are the Atlas Mountains in the north of Africa. Can you tell us?

G. de P. — I do not think that there is any particular significance in that. Atlantean of course comes from the Greek term Atlantis which was the term that the Greek Plato used. It was certainly connected with the mountain range called Atlas — probably the name Atlantis originated in the name Atlas; and Mt. Atlas, by the way, was one of the Atlantean mountain chains which has now dwindled to the small range in North Africa.

It is curious how beautiful, how strikingly beautiful, these remnants of the Atlantean continent still are. I have traveled a great deal in my life, but I do not know anything so naturally beautiful in wondrous colorings and in strange and mystical outlines as are the Madeira Islands for instance. They often have an appearance of being fairylike, and I remember when KT and I reached Funchal, Madeira, it was at night. The ship slowed down speed and went very slowly — there is a series of small islands there — into the open roadstead. There is no real port. The very atmosphere was vibrating with an unworldly feeling, a weird feeling. It struck us both forcibly. In the morning when the sun came up, those wonderful blue hills, tree-covered, and the stretch of white sand, and the peaked islands out at sea around us, were most impressive. I do not think that I have ever seen anything just like it elsewhere.

Do not make the mistake of thinking that the Atlanteans were an ugly people or that they were all black magicians, or that they were uncivilized. On the contrary, their culmination of civilization reached a height and splendor which we have not yet attained. In some respects they were far wiser than we are today. They were very advanced in their cyclical evolution, but nevertheless they were on the whole unspiritual. They were gross in matter, with strong material instincts; and every Atlantean was a natural magician born, and usually a black magician born. The good and wise ones among them fought these tendencies and strived against them, and these wise ones were the bearers of light — the white magicians of those days.

Student — May not a good many of the best Indians and those in Mexico be then a sort of mixture between the Atlanteans and possibly Indians who originally came from Asia or somewhere else?

G. de P. — Yes, and there is a strong negroid mixture in Mexico at the present time. Mexico is one of the few countries which has absorbed the negro-element, an element imported into Mexico by the Spanish conquistadores. You all know, I suppose, somewhat of the history of the importation of the negro slaves into the New World, originating in the Friar Bartolome de Las Casas, as an act of mercy and compassion for the Indians who were dying in hordes under the hard work, the semi-slavery, to which they were unaccustomed, and under which they were forced to live by the well-meaning, but unwise, Spanish conquerors. The negroes according to the Christian idea were the sons of Ham, and therefore born to labor; and so this kindly-hearted missionary, Las Casas, conceived the idea of saving the Indians from extermination by importing the negroes to take their place as laborers. Mexico has practically absorbed its negro element by intermarriage and Brazil is in a fair way to do the same thing.

In speaking of the Negroes, I might remind you that they have a destiny before them — a destiny in civilization and power, but when that future period comes, they will no longer be Negroes. They will have intermarried with whites, with the yellow-skinned men, and with the brown-skinned men, so that the present negro elements will have largely disappeared; but the racial urge, the stock, the main stock, will be negroid.

Then their time of influence and civilization and power will pass. But before this they will produce their own civilization.

Let me remind you that we pink-skinned men, we who call ourselves the white race, were once considered as barbarians and savages, as horrible, ungainly creatures, by the civilized late Atlantean races who preceded us.

Even in Atlantean days our racial seeds, our forefathers, who were the seeds of the present race, were contemned, scorned, looked upon as outlandish, and as unpleasant creatures. Yet with the remnants of the Atlanteans, such as the Chinese and the tribes of the southeast of Asia, and the American Indians, it is the pink race today and their congeners of India who really are the present masters of the globe. But our time of power and influence will pass, and we shall be succeeded by others.

Student — Is it wrong at the present moment still to discourage the intermarriage or mixture of the black and white races?

G. de P. — The miscegenation of races, you mean? In many countries it is forbidden by law. In this State, I believe, it is against the law for the so-called white race to intermarry with Asiatics. I am not sure of this fact, but at least I know that in some States the miscegenation of races is against the law.

Now is it right to say that these various races should not intermarry? I have often pondered over that question, and I hesitate to give an answer, because I shall almost certainly be misunderstood; but I shall tell you what is happening just the same, whether we like it or not. Miscegenation is proceeding constantly, and there is more mixed blood of the Negro and of the so-called 'white' people in the United States today than the average man or woman has any realization of. Miscegenation is actually going on. Nature evidently is preparing the race to come. When you realize that most of South America and many of the West Indian Islands contain these mixed races, when you realize that the Asiatics are also mixing rapidly, when you realize that importations into European and North American countries of these outlanders and mixed races of alien stock are going on steadily, and that they are finding a home here and slowly mixing their blood with the so-called 'white' man's blood, you can easily see in which direction the finger of racial destiny is pointing.

In Brazil, for instance, when I was down there I had many interesting conversations with intelligent Brazilians of various shades of color: with the so-called pure white Portuguese, also with the mestizos as they call them, who are mixed, the mulattos, and with representatives of all the other various kinds of racial mixtures, and they all agreed on one thing, and often spoke of what they called the political mistakes of the North Americans, and by this phrase they meant the people of the United States in particular. They all told me in substance: "You are very unwise, you people of the North: you are opposing nature's law. Miscegenation is coming despite you. We here in Brazil, by our laws, favor miscegenation which will produce in the end a stronger and more intelligent stock, for the mixing of stocks always produces sturdiness."

That was their argument, and in fact they were practising what they said. I attended a session of the Congress of one of the Brazilian states, and it was exceedingly interesting to me. There were negroes, there were white men, there were various shades of tan and yellow and black, and Indian, and pink, and all mixed on a footing of perfect equality, as far as I could see.

In answering your question very briefly, I can say simply this, that the time has not come when I would willingly suggest intermarriage; but I am in honesty bound to qualify that by saying that the race of the future will be a composite, composed of the many different races on earth today. Let us also remember that all men are ultimately of one blood.

Student — Since we have had all these new teachings during the last year, the book of devotion, The Voice of the Silence, has appealed to me very strongly. There is one passage I should like to quote and then ask two questions:

"Let not thy 'Heaven-born' merged in the sea of Maya, break from the Universal Parent (SOUL), but let the fiery power retire into the inmost chamber, the chamber of the Heart. . . .

"Then from the heart that Power shall rise into the sixth, the middle region, the place between thine eyes, when it becomes the breath of the ONE-SOUL, the voice which filleth all, thy Master's voice."

There are two points I don't quite understand. I should like to have some explanation of the part that says:

"Let the fiery power," which refers to kundalini as the explanation is given in the footnote, "retire into thy heart." Then the passage speaks of the power rising again into the middle region placed "between thine eyes."

Can you give further explanation?

G. de P. — There is a more spiritual interpretation than the mere verbal one, but I will keep to the verbal one.

Kundalini penetrates every atom of the body, but it is likewise more particularly located in its channel running up and down the spinal column; nevertheless it reigns everywhere. Localizing it in the heart means not so much the physical organ, but in the center of the human consciousness which the ancients always placed in the region of the heart. The human consciousness I mean, not the spiritual, and from that the power rises into the akasic region of the brain, into the temple or chamber of the brain, which in the phrase you quote is localized between the eyes. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes, but is there a spiritual meaning behind it?

G. de P. — Oh yes. The spiritual meaning is the rising of the human into becoming quasi-divine, and that is the way of the Masters. The Master's consciousness, a mahatma's consciousness, rises out of the heart, out of the merely human into the akasa which fills the brain-substance and hollows, and there it works upon two glands in particular: the pineal gland and the pituitary. The one the organ of impersonal and therefore of personal will; the other, the pineal gland, is the organ of spiritual vision.

I can tell you more. By his will the mahatma can set up a vibration in the pineal gland, which is the organ of the higher nature in the body, and so stimulate it, so to speak, that vision almost of infinity ensues. Do you understand what I am trying to say?

Student — Yes, Professor.

G. de P. — Now, what is your next question? Or have you asked them both?

Student — You have answered them both. They have been included in your answer.

Student — The time is coming when it will be the anniversary, one might say, of our heart's opening to this wonderful new time, and I was wondering if in a very particular sense at the time of that anniversary, a still greater door would not open to us if we are ready for it? Have we not also a serious responsibility, perhaps, in making this so?

G. de P. — It is quite true. Everything in nature moves in cycles, and one of the most familiar and also one of the most important, is the cycle of the year. The passing of our beloved KT took place close, as you will remember, to the time of the summer solstice. And those of you who are ready, Companions, when the summer solstice now close upon us, comes again, can take a great forward step. It depends upon you, upon the impulses in your heart, upon the strength of your will. Make the call, and it will be answered.

I want to say this, Companions, before we close: that I am very happy to be with you, to do what I can to help you. I feel that a large part of the work which I was sent to do is in accomplishment here in these meetings.

You are all true comrades, loyal, sincere, true, aspiring, and I am very happy to be with you.

I only hope, and I think that it will be so, that when my time comes to go, or when I am called, you will be as faithful and true to the one who will follow me as you have been to Katherine Tingley and to me.

Will you kindly sound the gong?

[ The sounding of the gong. Silence.]

Meeting 14

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Fourteen

Meeting of June 11, 1930

G. de P. — Will the meeting please come to order. I am ready to answer any questions that may be asked.

Student — I understand that in the case of an ordinary, normal individual, the avesa is only possible at death.

G. de P. — Just what do you mean by that term?

Student — Well, when the individual has reached a high degree of training, such as that of a high chela or Master, he is able to enter into the body of another person, and I believe the term is called avesa.

G. de P. — I was wondering where you found that term. It is a Sanskrit compound word, from the root vis meaning "to enter," or "to penetrate," and the particle a.

I asked the question in order to clarify the word for others who might not understand it. Now go on. Pardon me.

Student — The first question is: is that possible only at the death of the normal individual?

G. de P. — You mean the actual transference of the consciousness and will?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — No, it can be done during life — that is to say, the person whose consciousness and will are so transferred does not need to die.

Student — I did not make the point clear. I mean the person who had died, the ordinary normal person. In other words, the intermediate consciousness must be absent from the body in order that avesa may take place.

Is that right?

G. de P. — I am afraid that I do not understand you. Of course if the person has died the intermediate consciousness is not there.

Student — I was thinking of the case of a messenger like HPB, for instance. The intermediate consciousness is there; but that may occur, may it not?

G. de P. — What may occur?

Student — The avesa of a Master into a messenger.

G. de P. — Yes, but a moment ago you spoke of such occurring when a person died.

Student — That was my first question. My second question is about the case of a messenger.

G. de P. — I think that I am beginning to catch the drift of your thought now. The first question was answered satisfactorily then, was it?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — Now repeat your second question.

Student — What becomes of the intermediate consciousness of the messenger when the avesa takes place? A part of it, you told us, is under akasic guard.

G. de P. — You are probing rather closely, and I really don't know just how far to answer that question. You have asked in all sincerity and with a desire for greater light, but I warn you that what I am going to say is not all that could be said. You understand me?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — A certain portion of his own intermediate nature remains in the body of the messenger, otherwise there would be no living messenger — there would be only a corpse. That remaining intermediate part is not the higher part of the intermediate nature itself. I mean to say that the part removed and held under akasic guard is the higher part of the intermediate nature. In other words, the person of the messenger remains practically intact, but almost the entirety of the individuality of the messenger is removed; with this reservation, however, that the removal is not absolute, and the monad, which is superior to and higher than the intermediate part, of course is not removed. The monad is not removable in the same sense. The monad is a spiritual entity. Does this brief explanation throw a little more light on the question that you have in your mind?

Student — Yes, thank you. Of course it is not complete, but it is sufficient.

G. de P. — It is not complete. I am very sorry indeed to find myself so often in a position which makes me appear to do what the Lord Buddha said he himself did not do: "Holding back as in the fist, knowledge that should be given out." But I cannot do otherwise sometimes, because I have no right to tell the whole truth about everything on every occasion when I speak.

Student — I would like to ask whether in the case of a black magician — that is to say, when the severing has been complete between the higher monad and the lower ego — whether in such a case the higher manas, the manasaputra, is involved?

G. de P. — It is involved in all cases of the lives of black magicians, whether these Brothers of the Shadow be of a high grade or of a low grade. But don't you see, Doctor, that when you use the word involved you are employing a very general term? Of course the higher manas is involved in anything that happens to any human being. Now if, instead of using the word involved, you want to be more specific and to ask: is the higher manas a part of the black magician whose fate is annihilation ultimately —?

Student — That is what I wanted to find out.

G. de P. — I see. That is a clear-cut, definite question. My answer is: the higher manas in such case is not a part of the black magician whose fate is annihilation. Please remember that a division necessarily is made between the higher and the lower parts of the manasic principle. This does not mean that the manasic principle is like a block of wood that you can cut into two halves. The manasic principle is an energy. It has its lower side and its higher side. Love, for instance, is an energy. It has its supremely beautiful, impersonal side, and also its gross and elemental side. So likewise is it as between the two manasic qualities that are separated in the case of a black magician.

A black magician is one who has, through utter selfishness extending over a number of lives, either completely separated, or so nearly completely separated, the personality from the spiritual individuality, that all the higher part, the spiritual individuality, has been withdrawn upwards into the bosom of the monad, and all the lower part, the personality, has been drawn downwards into the personal range of that evil human being who has chosen the path of wrong doing. Do you understand me?

Student — I think I do.

G. de P. — So when you ask whether the higher manas follows the fate of the black magician and is annihilated with that evil personality, the answer is, no.

Student — Yes, I had always thought that, but I have read something lately that made me a little uncertain. I would like to follow this first question with another. Will the monad in the case of such an annihilated black magician find another personality to work through?

G. de P. — Yes.

Student — Is the monad that finds another personality the monad that came from the moon, or is it another monad higher up?

G. de P. — I don't quite understand your question. In the first place, the monad does not "find" another personality. It evolves from within itself another personality, and in doing so must begin at the very beginning of such an evolution. It cannot evolve offhand, or create — for such immediate production would be an act of creation — a personality without any karmic past. The monad must begin again to evolve this personality in and from the lowest elemental ranges of life, and slowly build up a new personal monad or ego, through the ages to come in such case.

This new personal monad must be evolved before it can continue manifestation on our planes; and in that fact alone lies the fearful wrong of continuous and deliberate evildoing in the dark side of nature, for such a loss of a personal monad as in the case of an annihilated black magician delays or postpones the forwards movement of the spiritual monad.

Remember also that it is spiritual sorcery or wickedness — which means deliberate choice of evil as the path to follow — that makes a Brother of the Shadow per se.

Student — Then the monad that evolves this other or second personality is the same monad that came from the moon in the first place? I understand that we have many monads in different grades of development.

G. de P. — When you say the monad which came from the moon, you are thinking of the lunar monad?

Student — Yes, I am.

G. de P. — But it is not the lunar monad that the black magician separates from. It is precisely the lunar monad that goes downward. It is the spiritual monad, the spiritual-divine monad, the Son of the Sun per se, which is the higher part from which the Brother of the Shadow separates himself by a continuous use through many lives of selfish evildoing deliberately chosen and wilfully followed.

Try to see, Doctor, that the word monad when employed thus, without a qualifying adjective, always means the spiritual monad, the ultimate root of any entity, the original source of that entity, and really that entity's ultimate spiritual destiny. But the word monad is also employed with distinguishing or characterizing adjectives in order to designate those lower centers of consciousness which can endure from life to life; but which, nevertheless, not being spiritual centers, partake only in a limited degree of the spiritual immortality that the monad per se has. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — Therefore, it is proper to speak, with this explanation that I have just made remaining in your mind, of a human monad, of an astral monad, and also of a beast monad; and all these characteristic monads are derivatives of their parent, the divine monad, which is the monad or immortal center of a god — each individual's own inner god.

Monad is a word which is used for a number of things, just as is the word body. When you use the word body without any qualifying adjective, you see how vague such a word is. In order to make the idea definite you must say a human body, a beast body, a mineral body, a solar body; similarly so with the word monad. There is the divine monad, the beginning of everything and of every entity, the core of the core of the core of his or of its being, his or its inner god. Then there is the spiritual monad, its garment, and this is the expression which is not quite so perfectly arupa or formless as is the divine Monad, and this spiritual monad, the garment of the divine monad, is the spiritual soul of you.

Then, still more deeply involved in matter there is the human monad, or reincarnating ego, which is the child of the spiritual monad; then, still more deeply involved in matter there is the astral monad, or ordinary human

being, with his usual brain-mind and fitful, fretful emotions. This last is the astral monad or the ordinary human being as I have just said. Do you now see?

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — These subordinate centers of consciousness, such as the astral monad and the human monad and the spiritual monad, are rightly called monads, because the destiny of each one of them is to blossom forth finally into becoming a divine monad, or a divinity, like their own originating source or parent within. This blossoming or evolution is achieved by each one of these subordinate monads bringing forth more and more from within its own core of the core of itself an ever-increasing and larger proportion of the divine forces and faculties within. Because every subordinate monad in its turn has its own divine monad.

You see, it is a case of wheels within wheels. In addition to the originating monad that I have just spoken of, every such subordinate monad has, at the core of the core of its being, its own individual divine monad, which is its father in heaven, its own inner god.

I hope that this is perfectly plain. The atoms of my body are each one in its essence a monad, a divine monad, feebly expressing its transcendent powers through such an atom; yet all these atoms are linked to the general monad, which is my inner god. Consequently, all these other monads are parts of my train of life — offspring from me, my own divine monad. Do you now see and understand this? It sounds complicated, but if you get the idea of it, it is very simple indeed.

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — Do you really understand, dear Doctor, because this is a most important point, and so many questions are asked on just this line of thought, which show me that the fundamental idea has not yet been grasped, that I realize the need of close attention and careful meditation on this, in order that the fundamental simplicity and extraordinary beauty of the fact be seen by you all.

Student — May I ask another question about that? All these various monads were then given birth to by the one spiritual-divine monad, and their karma is linked throughout all periods?

G. de P. — Yes, those in the one life-stream, such as the life-stream of a human being. That is correct.

Student — Then if there is the experience of the lower path chosen by a monad that has been emanated from a spiritual-divine monad, that karma then affects every one of the subordinate monads connected with that stream of consciousness?

G. de P. — Correct.

Student — That karma has then to be met with whenever there is any assembly, on reincarnating, by each and every one of these monads. That karma in other words has to be met by each one and all.

G. de P. — Yes. It is a karma which belongs to all the component lifeatoms or monads of that stream of consciousness. They are all involved in it. Similarly we have the karma of our solar system, the karma of any planet, the karma of the race, the karma of a family, the karma of an individual, even the atomic karma of a single atom of the body of a human being.

Student — Therein lies the seriousness of this choice of the evil path?

G. de P. — Yes, because the human monad which degrades itself by separating itself away from its divine father in heaven has annihilation before it instead of a future eternity of evolutionary progress. Its fate is to be broken to pieces, or psychically dissipated in nature's laboratory. It has chosen matter rather than spirit as its field of action and as its goal. It descends deeper, ever deeper, into matter, to which its attractions draw it, until finally it reaches absolute matter, which is nature's great laboratories; and there, to use HPB's expression, it is ground over and over, broken up into its component lifeatoms, and there its career is ended as a human monad. Such a failing monad is a mental-psychical abortion. It has failed to come to birth as a

spiritual being. Do you get the idea?

Student — Yes. Is this terrible choice then related to the disasters and catastrophes and frightful things of nature? Does it bring a general karma as well?

G. de P. — Do you mean any individual Brother of the Shadow?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — As I understand your question, you ask if such a fate might produce or effect great terrestrial catastrophes. Is that what you mean?

Student — Yes, and all the hideous dark side of nature that we have hints of.

G. de P. — I don't think so. But let me offer a suggestion here. Don't think that these natural catastrophes are necessarily the products of evil forces.

Student — I didn't really mean that so much. It was a wrong expression. I was thinking of the dark, threatening, side of nature that one has hints of. I realize that karma brings those others, and purifies and frees; but one feels that there is another side of nature.

G. de P. — There is indeed.

Student — And that these terrible choices that are made by the Brothers of the Shadow must govern those parts of the world — of development.

G. de P. — They are closely involved in the dark side of nature and in that side of nature's operations. Your intuition is quite correct. I don't want to say too much upon that point on account of the very depressing effect that it has on most human minds. But you will understand me very clearly if you keep the duality of nature clearly in mind: the bright and beautiful forces of the spiritual sun on the one hand, and the evil and disintegrating influences of the lower or dark side of nature on the other hand.

I will give you the following hint. The fate of the Brothers of the Shadow is very intimately related with the moon and with lunar influences. The Brothers of the Shadow ultimately pass to the Planet of Death.

Student — I would like to ask if these Brothers of the Shadow realize, in their taking the downward path, when this separation comes — do they realize the great injustice, the great evil that they have done? And the spiritual monad — you spoke of it as having to begin anew in evolving a new personality in which to manifest. Is not that an injustice to it? And will there be a sort of reward? Will it pass quickly through all these stages, having experienced them once?

G. de P. — You have asked three questions in one breath. Of course you cannot say that it is an injustice to the spiritual monad, because in a sense the spiritual monad is responsible for the lower or subordinate human monad which has fallen, much in the same way as a human being karmically is responsible for an abortive birth. There is responsibility in that sense of the word. That is the answer to your second question.

Now, in answer to your first comment: it depends upon the spiritual stage reached by the Brother of the Shadow before he turns his face from the light and begins to tread the downward path. If he has gone high as a human being before he chooses evil for its own sake — loving evil because it is evil — then there is a consciousness of terrific loss, a mental torture, enduring for ages, until nature in mercy throws a veil of unconsciousness over it, which always happens, and this veil of unconsciousness precedes final dissolution.

But in many Brothers of the Shadow who have not as human beings become spiritually potent, in other words become highly developed men: in ordinary human beings, I repeat, who are Brothers of the Shadow, there is very little consciousness indeed of pain or regret or sorrow. They have come to love evil for evil's own sake.

They rejoice in evildoing for the sake of doing evil. They find a happiness of its own type in working acts and thinking thoughts of malevolence. They approach somewhat to what the Occidental of a few hundred years

ago had in his mind when he spoke of a devil.

Such states of mind are not uncommon even in ordinary human beings. There are some human beings, apparently normal to the ordinary observer, who take pleasure in inflicting pain, and in doing deeds of wrong, and I suppose that every well-informed physician is acquainted at least somewhat with what are called the phenomena of sadism. This name was taken from the family-name of a Frenchman who became notorious for the monstrous cruelties, mental and physical, that he perpetrated, and in the doing of which he found what was to him exquisite pleasure. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — Conscience is the light of the inner god, and when that light is withdrawn, conscience ceases; and with the ceasing of conscience, and bearing in mind the explanation just made, there is no longer resident in the brain and heart of such an individual the consciousness of the laws of spiritual life.

Answering your final question, it may be said in a general way that the monad, in beginning anew its evolution of a new personality, does pass somewhat more quickly through all the evolutionary stages, because the memories of the previous series of existences are impressed within itself; and this quickens the new evolutionary course in producing the new personality.

Student — May I ask one more question with regard to the monad that has to go through that stage of evolution? Is there any consciousness that it has to begin all over again, or is it just in the evolutionary course of things? It seemed to me a great injustice that it had to begin all over again.

G. de P. — You are now speaking of the parent divine monad again, I take it?

Student — Yes, because you spoke of its evolving a new personality, and having to begin again from the beginning.

G. de P. — No, there is no consciousness such as you imagine it. It is no such consciousness as you would have if you were to become the victim of some terrible calamity, and for the following reason: that the spiritual monad's whole sphere of activity and consciousness is on a plane so far above the plane of the human monad which had ruptured its relations with it that the spiritual-divine monad is practically only slightly conscious of that lower plane. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, I think so. Thank you, Professor.

Student — Would you say that the knowledge of these things, of the right-hand path and of the left-hand path, and of these matters of which you have been now teaching us, are a corrective for all the ridiculous beliefs that there have been about eternal punishment and so on? And also a corrective and a challenge for the conditions that exist now of no belief at all in any great crises of this kind?

G. de P. — Do you mean, by your question, to ask whether knowledge of the esoteric philosophy is this corrective?

Student — Yes. I think it is just that.

G. de P. — You are right; but from another standpoint there is the pity of it all. There are certain beings so mentally situated that they cannot receive this truth. It would work more harm to give it to them without reservations and in full measure, than to leave them in ignorance to a certain degree and try to help them with ethical, moral, and so-called religious teachings; letting them know, perhaps, that there is much more behind

— secrets which cannot yet be given out. That is precisely the method that the Masters of Wisdom and Compassion employ even with ordinary human beings.

Student — May I ask a question?

G. de P. — Yes, in just a moment, please. I have something more in answer to the previous question. Pause a

moment and realize that there is truth in the universe; that truth can be had by those who are fit to see it and receive it, and who, seeing it, have the courage and will to take it. But knowledge is sometimes dangerous if the minds which receive it are feeble, selfish, and unprepared. If the entirety of the esoteric wisdom were to be given to ordinary human beings, my own conviction is that it would turn ninety-nine human beings out of a hundred into black magicians on the spot. They would not have the moral stamina, the spiritual strength, to receive, to contain, and to hold it, but would be simply swept away by their innate selfishness due to their lack of evolutionary growth. You understand me, do you not?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — You do?

Student — Yes, I do.

G. de P. — That is good. Now, the next question, please.

Student — On November 28th, in the Temple, speaking of light, you said: light is an aspect or form of the vitality of a god. Will you explain how striking a match or lighting the wick of a lamp can bring into manifestation, so that we can see and feel, this vitality of a god?

G. de P. — This is the first time that I have ever heard divine vitality connected with the striking of a match!

But the analogy, or rather I should say the example, is quite permissible, analogically speaking. Light is the manifestation of the vitality of a god, as is illustrated in the case of the sun. The sun pours forth continuously without an instant's cessation forces of many kinds: spiritual forces, intellectual forces, astral forces, electrical forces, magnetic forces; and the striking of a match is an example of an electromagnetic phenomenon. I do not mean the act of striking, but I presume that you refer to the light which comes from the striking of a match.

Now the entire solar system is flooded — using this one example that you have presented — with electromagnetic energies ultimately derived from the sun. All manifestations of light are manifestations, fundamentally, derivatively, of and from these electromagnetic forces, or solar forces. Light, physically speaking, is an electromagnetic phenomenon. The life of a human body, as another instance, is ultimately derived from the sun. Human life is in part electromagnetic, but this phase is only its grossest manifestation.

In its higher part it is the lower part — in its higher part, I repeat, it is the lower part — of the psychical forces flowing forth from the sun. Also these forces flow forth from the human being. The life of any human being is thus ultimately derived from the sun, but immediately derived from the inner constitution of the human being himself. I hope that this statement is clear to you.

Student — Not quite, dear Teacher. What I want to get at is this: I realize that fire or light is all about us, invisible, but if you take some pieces of soft iron and steel, and put them together in a certain way and thus make a dynamo, you bring into manifestation a power that is either light or heat, in the same way as striking a match. I want an explanation, if I could have it, of how we bring those invisible forces all about us into visible manifestation?

G. de P. — Your question reminds me a little of a story that I once read about a savage who asked a question when he first saw a locomotive, as to what made the locomotive move. He had an idea that as nothing was visibly pulling it or pushing it, there must necessarily be something within it that made it go. But what was that thing within it? He finally came to the conclusion that it must be a number of horses inside. One horse would not make it go, and there was not room enough for many horses, so he thought that there might be three.

Now you ask me what is the method by which the electromagnetic force produces its physical manifestation; or rather what is the link, or the series of links, between the originating cause and the visible light or heat. I think that I can answer that question only by referring you to our theosophical philosophy, because there is no scientific theory about it at all, that I am acquainted with, that gives any satisfactory explanation. Hence your question is perfectly proper, and I will try to answer it briefly as follows: the psychoelectromagnetic force expresses itself through intermediate astral stages, and when the proper conditions are present on the physical

plane, such as those brought about by the striking of a match or the building and working of a dynamo, then the psychoelectromagnetic force can express itself. But this electromagnetic force expressing itself according to the mechanism or phenomenon which is engineered, is itself but a phenomenon of a more recondite and still more interior force — a psychical force.

For instance, a flash of lightning, a thunderbolt, is fundamentally a psychical phenomenon. It is also a physical one too, obviously. By calling it a psychical phenomenon at its root, I do not mean that it is not a physical phenomenon in its physical expression. It is. Life is everywhere all about us. It pervades everything; and when conditions are right, then it expresses itself on the physical plane in what you call a phenomenon —

the phenomenon of light, the phenomena of movements of various kinds, sound, color, heat, what not. You must have even the proper physical arrangement before you can get the horrible noises which you hear from a victrola.

Is the answer responsive, at all, to your question?

Student — Yes, very. I understand now. Thank you, very much.

Student — Would it not be right to think of an atom, a man, or a solar system, as being, or containing, systems of circulatory systems?

G. de P. — Yes, it is certainly so. Every atom has its own system of forces, and even the modern theory of atomic structure is, in the minds of most physicists, representative in the infinitesimal of what the solar system is in the great — a matter of circulations. The solar system in its turn is but a representation of a circulatory system of a still larger sweep, existing in some still greater sphere. By this I mean the interior and causal realms — and do not forget this.

Just so in a man. The circulation of his blood, and the circulation of his vitality also, are inextricably interconnected, and are two aspects of the same thing. Both originate in his interior constitution, and more particularly are manifestations of circulations having their locus in the Auric Egg. The blood and the vitality are very closely connected, and manifest in the human form the same ultimate or fundamental laws that manifest in the sun, or in an atom, or what not. Nature moves, and moves continuously; and most of her movements, when regarded freed from any physical range or mechanism, are circulatory.

Is the answer responsive to your question?

Student — Thank you.

Student — Sometimes in the performance of duty one does something that helps somebody else and brings joy to that person. And there is a joy that comes to the performer of his duty, a very great joy. Is that joy derived from the personality taking the form of satisfaction, or does it come from a different part of his nature?

G. de P. — The joy itself lies in the personality. You can hardly say that a man has joy in winking, or in the necessary movements of his hands or feet. They are natural to him. They are unconscious. The movements of the spiritual part of the human being similarly do not take conscious pleasure or have conscious joy in their automatic movements. Such movements are native to it, belong to it, are natural functions of his being. Joy is automatically natural in the personality which strives high and which attains, which feels the sense of glorious achievement; and hence very naturally the reaction expresses itself as joy in the percipient personality. Such other gross pleasures as human beings understand, are explainable along exactly the same lines, but in the case of gross physical pleasures they are mere gratifications, and the part which is gratified is on a low plane.

Student — Dear Teacher, my question has to do with what you have been telling us tonight about the action of the divine monad in withdrawing the upper parts of the human being to itself when the evil choice is made, and when the bridge or tie between the lower and the higher natures is broken. Somewhere I have read, and then you also told us of course, that the spiritual monad then evolves another lower nature, or sends out its ray, which ray begins the long journey upwards; and, if I am not mistaken, in such a case, when it reaches the human stage is in the unfortunate position of being haunted by this dweller, its lower self that was lost, this

lower human monad. Is that correct? Or have I remembered it incorrectly?

G. de P. — It is not correctly stated. You are referring to the case which HPB warned her students about and against, and which warning she illustrated by speaking of Robert Louis Stevenson's Strange Case of Dr.

Jekyll and Mr. Hyde — having a Mr. Hyde (the kama-rupa of a previous incarnation) haunting the new man.

It is impossible for a new human monad which has grown to the stature of a human being to be haunted by another formerly lost human monad, which latter had been dissipated ages previously as a black magician.

Student — That is what seemed to me to be true, and my memory was incorrect. I was thinking of the case of a just previous incarnation, the case of one who had then lived so evilly that the kama-rupic shadow still haunts this earth plane.

G. de P. — That is correct.

Student — Until after the new incarnation?

G. de P. — Yes, and I am glad you spoke of it. This horrible event happens in the cases of black magicians always. Sometimes the reincarnations of one following the downward path succeed each other so quickly, with so short an interval between one and the other, that cases have been known when not only one kama-rupa remains to haunt the new man, but two or even three. It is a perfect siege of horrible astral forces held together as kama-rupic haunters in a state of slow dissolution. Of course the result of this vital haunting of the new man, due to the continuous and unceasing evil impulses flowing into the new man's vitality from these haunters, is a continuously increasing speed downwards, morally and intellectually speaking.

I tell you, Companions, that nature indeed has its dark side, and it is just as well for the sanity of the average man that this dark side of nature is kept closely veiled from their students by the teachers. The average human being is not strong enough morally or intellectually fully to know these things, but those of you who win out and attain chelaship, if any of you do, must in time know these things. The time will come when you will be taught them more or less fully; and I tell you now to prepare against the day when you will have to meet these teachings and understand them. You will have to meet these conditions, this knowledge, these circumstances

— and conquer yourself! If you conquer, the result is masterhood; and if you fail, as HPB has nobly said:

"There will be other chances in other lives."

Student — Is not this fact of the entity being besieged by one or more Dwellers responsible for many cases of insanity? I have seen insane people who acted as if they were in a constant state of withstanding an inner siege of something horrible.

G. de P. — I should not say that it is responsible for many cases of insanity, because the case of the black magicians who have two or more Dwellers is a very, very rare event, exceedingly rare. In the case of a normal or subnormal human being who may be haunted by a Dweller, I am inclined to think that your question touches very closely upon the truth. The influence of such a Dweller is a constant suggestion to evildoing.

The Dweller must not be looked upon so much as hanging around in the atmosphere of the new man, but as permeating his vitality, as being a part of his life, a part of his brain-mind, a part of his passions. The Dweller oozes into the astral fabric and vitality of the new man, sucks that vitality continuously, and constantly injects evil thoughts. Do you grasp that idea?

Student — Yes, Professor. May I follow it with just one more question? And that is — not asking you to speak more of the dark side of nature, but merely asking if it is true that the darkness and relative darkness of this dark side of nature is due to karma, and is the result of human mistakes, or is it inevitably dark, no matter how successful and spiritual a humanity might be?

G. de P. — A spiritual humanity will have raised itself out of the dark side of nature; and for them there is no dark side in the same sense that there is with the average humanity. The dark side of nature is very largely, but by no means wholly, the product of human wills, human passions, human thoughts, continuously throwing out energies which take the form of entities. Thoughts are things indeed.

When you ask if the passing through the dark side of nature is an inevitable karma of the race, I am inclined to answer you, yes. But I do so with great hesitation, because if your intellect, if your mind is not alert and on guard, you would be apt to receive a wrong impression from what may be said, and to imagine therefore that you must do evil, must sin, it being a necessary part of your evolution. Baldly stated, it is necessary because you grow through that imperfect side of nature but ultimately raise yourself out of it. You grow from imperfection to a less imperfect stage, and then to a still less imperfect stage, eventually reaching a more perfect stage and then finally a still more perfect stage, thus ever marching steadily forwards towards the spiritual.

But remember this: that the human race at its present stage of evolution need not sin in order to learn, need not be selfish in order to grow. The human race at its present stage of evolution has ascended quite sufficiently far along the luminous arc of ascent, however small its progress may yet have been, comparatively speaking, to have taken the necessity of sin and evil doing entirely out of the picture, entirely out of the purpose and plan of evolutionary growth. Sin and evildoing and selfishness and wickedness today are wrong all through. Acting evilly and selfishly and wickedly today means going backwards, following the downward path. Do you understand what I am trying to say?

Many Voices — Yes.

Student — In reading about the third eye, I found this passage in The Secret Doctrine, vol. II, page 302:

"Now that which the students of Occultism ought to know is that THE 'THIRD EYE' IS

INDISSOLUBLY CONNECTED WITH KARMA. The tenet is so mysterious that very few have heard of it."

May we have a further illustration of those two statements?

G. de P. — I think that I answered this same question some weeks ago.

Student — I know you have spoken of the third eye, but I would like to know a little more about it, if it is permissible?

G. de P. — Yes. If you will recollect that all karma originates in the actor and not outside of the actor in environment, and if you will recollect also that all your acts of choice, all your choosings of right or wrong —

the right path or the left path — originate in your will and in your understanding, which basically are rooted in the third eye, you will immediately get the key to my statement. The third eye is necessarily connected with karma, because in what is called the third eye resides your spiritual vision, which leads to the choices that you make. If that vision be imperfect, your choice will be imperfect. If that vision be clear and strong, your choice will be correspondingly high.

Therefore strictly in ratio with the exercise of the third eye faculty in the human being is his better and nobler karma chosen, followed. If the third eye is active in a human being, his karma will be a good one. If the third eye is slightly active in a human being, slightly functioning, his karma will be complex, partly bad, partly good; because the choice of what the man thinks, and what he chooses to do, will make such a complex karma. If the third eye is functioning very slightly or not at all, the karma as a rule, will be heavy and bad. Do you understand the answer?

Student — Yes, Professor, thank you.

Student — From what has been given out at a number of meetings our ideas as to the constitution of the sun have been very radically changed. The status of the sun, the absence of flaming fires as is indicated by the astronomers, the very constitution of it, is so different from what we supposed. How do the observations of astronomers, particularly with the spectroscope, harmonize with that idea? That is, what would be the explanation of the elements revealed by the spectroscope as being constituents of the sun? How would that harmonize with what we have been told about the real constitution of the sun?

G. de P. — In a general way, they harmonize quite well. The spectroscope merely reveals the presence or

absence of certain chemical elements in a star, or in the sun, depending upon the light of such or another physical character which reaches us from the star or from the sun.

Take our own sun, which is a star of course, as an example. Every sun is surrounded with its auras, its veils.

These veils are its bodies. Collectively they compose the physical body of the sun; and just as the human constitution which is a bundle of energies manifests through the physical body which has its own lees and dregs, just so the bundle of energies which composes any sun or star manifests through these stellar or solar veils surrounding it, and which in their aggregate form its body. As the body of a human being contains the chemical elements, so these veils surrounding any sun contain the chemical elements also.

Every sun has of necessity every chemical element that the solar system of which it is the heart contains, because it is from such a sun or star that are sent throughout that particular solar system of which it is the heart all the chemical elements that are found in the solar system. As a matter of fact, there are chemical elements in some parts of the universe — and I use the popular expression chemical elements — which are not present in our solar system at all. We have in our solar system, contrariwise, certain chemical elements required for its growth, which are not present in other solar systems. Nevertheless as a general rule, throughout our own home-universe — which, please remember, is all that is comprised within the encircling bounds of the Milky Way — the elements of matter, of material substance, which we call the chemical elements, are more or less universally diffused or found everywhere within that home-universe.

I believe that one of the latest estimates of the number of stars in our own home-universe is something like thirty billions, but thirty billions of atoms in a human body is a very small number indeed, relatively speaking. I would not venture even to guess at how large a part of the human body thirty billion chemical atoms would make, but I fancy that it would be a very small part; and recollect in this connection that every sun or star is the heart of a cosmic atom.

Student — Is there any connection between what you have told us about the haunting of the new man by the kama-rupa and that of obsession?

G. de P. — It is indeed a case of obsession. There are many kinds of obsession, but the haunting by a Dweller is one of these, and is one of the worst. As a matter of fact, the haunting by the Dweller sometimes is more than an obsession, it is a possession. The unfortunate new human is not merely haunted by the old kama-rupa, but the kama-rupa actually takes astral and physical possession of the man and dominates the life. Obsession means besieging. Possession means taking control of the entity, possessing it. Do you understand?

Student — Of course in the case of obsession, it may be merely temporary?

G. de P. — Obsession is usually temporary.

Student — But the other case would be practically for life?

G. de P. — Yes, for a lifetime. The difference between the two is rather a difference of quality and degree than of time. An obsession may last only a minute or two, or it may last a lifetime. Similarly possession may last only a moment or two, and it may last a lifetime. Obsession is the thing in minor degree and quality; possession is the thing in complete degree and quality. Obsession is besieging which has not yet reached the stage of absolute mastery or control. Possession is absolute mastery or control, whether for a moment or for a lifetime.

Student — Could this obsessing entity be driven out by someone who understood the case?

G. de P. — Yes, it could be. The very presence of a great and good man is not only a protection, but it aids in causing such cases of obsession to cease. The obsessing entity is repelled by the aura highly charged with spirit, of some highly evolved and spiritual human being.

Student — When you spoke a little while ago about not being able to give the teachings out to many minds that would feel the attraction of black magic — that is not quoting your words of course, it is the way I understood your statement — this remark made me wonder if that was one of the reasons the Masters allowed

the Society to break up into so many factions, because formerly so many minds were attracted by black magic and they were safer away from the strong influence of the light of the Lodge than within it, and perhaps for that reason KT stopped easy entrance to our esoteric studies. I had the idea when she did it that it was perhaps to protect those of us who stayed within the ranks. If that is so, the thought came to me that now that the world has awakened to the deadly danger of psychism — as we see plainly set forth more and more in print and more or less in an awakening consciousness in that direction — the time is now ripe when they can be gathered home again, because they have to a certain extent learned their lesson, and thus they can be in line with the Masters again to fight against the dark forces. Is that true?

G. de P. — I would hardly change a phrase that you have said. Generally speaking you have stated the case, but I must add that it was not the light of the Lodge as you phrase it, which was the danger to those former would-be-esotericists, but simply that they could not at the time see that light, and misunderstood the fantasmal gleams of the lower psychical nature for the blessed light of the Lodge. Do you understand my answer?

Student — I think so.

G. de P. — In a general way, what you have said is very true indeed. But it is something upon which I do not wish to weigh heavily at present for reasons which are so obvious that I think all the companions here will understand them. Someday the members, not only of the ES but of the higher grades of our Oriental School, will know and understand at least something of the magnificent work that Katherine Tingley did in the service of the Masters of Wisdom and Compassion. Never has there been a messenger so misunderstood.

Never has there been a greater martyr to their cause, to the cause of the teachers, than she was.

Student — This is a subject in which we are all deeply interested. Is it then just not the time now to ask for more information about that matter?

G. de P. — No. Ask your question, and I will try to answer.

Student — I have wondered at times if you would give us an evening when we could all ask questions about KT, just along this line?

G. de P. — Yes, I will, I promise it. But pray wait a while.

Student — Yes, that is just what I wanted to know. It is not quite the time?

G. de P. — No, not quite the time.

Student — All the teachers have told us of and hinted at great troubles coming upon humanity, and that if we did our duty, we could very much mitigate or possibly prevent them.

G. de P. — That is true.

Student — Can you tell us more about that, because humanity has suffered so hideously? We must help them.

G. de P. — That is true. Well, Companions, I can say this, that humanity is passing out of one cycle and entering into another one. Such periods of transition are always very dangerous to the spiritual and intellectual, social and political, welfare of mankind. They are always times of crisis.

At present we are not far distant in time from a social and political upheaval which will shake the very foundations of present civilizations. It will unquestionably be accompanied with bloody revolutions in different countries, and with wars; and I do not care to go farther into it. I think that I had better not. One of the efforts of the teachers, or rather perhaps, the main effort of the teachers, in founding the theosophical movement was to provide an international body of men and women who by the power of their thought expressed in words, in teachings, whether oral or written, and by their acts, would tend to alleviate the evils that are coming, that are about to fall upon humanity.

It is amazing how much a few determined and doggedly-willed men and women can do. History has shown it repeatedly. That is why I say preach theosophy from the housetops, teach it, declare it. Neglect no opportunity to pass the good tidings on. Our main duty is not so much to propagate the Theosophical Movement, although that is the way by which our main duty is done. In itself it is a secondary thing. Our main work is to change men's hearts, men's minds, to soften the horrors when they come, to alleviate the distress by preparing for it before it comes.

There is no humanitarian work so lofty as this. There will be an unloosening of human passions when these things come about which will be more terrible than anything history has known of, and while the Theosophical Society, our theosophical movement, will probably be quite unable to stop it entirely by the influence of theosophical thought, and theosophical thinking, and by its refining and alleviating power, nevertheless all this will greatly help in diminishing the evil that might otherwise be done.

Teach men brotherhood, teach men that they are inseparably bound together, that what one does all are responsible for, that what all do everyone is responsible for; that there is no fundamental separation of interests at all in any line — spiritual, religious, political, what not. Those are the thoughts that must go out into the world's consciousness.

Teach men the nature and characteristics and function of the proud and selfish brain-mind in which most men live today, and which in their ignorance they are proud of. Teach men its limitations, and also its value as the instrument for spiritual wisdom, when it is properly trained and directed by the spiritual will. These are also some thoughts that will help. These are the teachings that will raise men's ideals and ideas. Furthermore, but by no means last, teach men the philosophy of the ancient religion of mankind, showing to men their common origin, their common destiny, on the one hand; and the interlocking and interwoven spiritual, psychical, and physical forces, energies, and powers of nature on the other hand.

Do you think, for instance, that this recent Great War would or could have come about, if for the last eighteen or nineteen hundred years men had had theosophy in their minds? If the psychic and mental atmosphere in European countries had been filled with theosophical thoughts and ideals and truths? No! The Great War arose out of centuries of wrong thinking and wrong doing, out of selfishness, out of a lack of knowledge of the nature of man and of his being rooted in the universe; and that the universe is essentially a spiritual being; that man fundamentally and intrinsically is a god; and that his main and noblest duty is so to live — to live divinely, to live godlike. Deprivation and loss of possessions are as nothing at all in comparison with knowing and possessing and living these sublime truths. They could have made a civilization which would have held in chains the passions, the selfish impulses, the grasping, acquisitive spirit, which have dominated all European civilization up to the present, and which still dominate it.

It is the duty of the theosophical movement to loosen into the world a new spiritual energy, an illumination —

to change men's hearts and to give light to their minds.

Are there any more questions?

Student — I wonder if you would like to tell us a little about the Mystery-schools that have existed throughout the ages?

G. de P. — The Mystery-schools? Such schools have existed in every country and in every age. Every real and great Mystery-school has always had its succession of teachers who followed each other in orderly sequence. No such school could have existed very long if this succession of esoteric teachers had not been.

The forms of the schools varied, of course, according to the time and according to the country, according to the race; but the fundamental doctrines, the essential principles of thought, the truths taught were identic in all of them.

I feel that one of the most needed things in the other Theosophical Societies today is a comprehension of something which they do not seem to have, and which, when we present it to them, they invariably misunderstand. I refer to the fact that if any organization working to disseminate light and brotherhood in the world is to live and to live true to its purpose, and to accomplish its mission, it must be the channel for and

have the stream of inspiration from the Great Lodge.

Now how can that come? To all members of the Theosophical Society whatsoever? Or through a series or succession of trained teachers? Men, or women for the matter of that, trained from childhood to hand on the light?

There is today an association of theosophists who now call themselves The United Lodge of Theosophists. As far as I have been able to gather, they apparently think that all esoteric inspiration and all receiving of new esoteric light stopped when HPB and WQJ died — that all the esoteric wheels stopped then and there, and that there remains nothing in the world for men to live up to or aspire to in the way of a stream of illumination and teaching excepting the books that these two messengers wrote and left behind them.

Yes, The United Lodge of Theosophists are in fact bibliolaters, book worshipers. Because they have HPB's and WQJ's books, the situation is not so bad; but is not this situation just what the sects in Christianity have degenerated into?

Now these good and earnest people otherwise deserve credit for their splendid loyalty to HPB and to Judge, yet if they don't know it themselves intellectually, they are instinctively conscious of the fact that they have cut themselves off from the living stream of inspiration flowing from the Great Lodge; that their whole dependence is on books. They disclaim any teachers.

Our own holy school is a Mystery-school. It is a strictly esoteric one; and therefore rites, ceremonials, and rituals, are conspicuous by their absence. In the exoteric-esoteric, or esoteric-exoteric, Mystery-schools of Greece, for instance, a great deal was made, both in Samothrace and Eleusis, of ritual and ceremonial, and these rituals and ceremonials were very happily conceived and successfully carried out for ages. The difficulty and danger of course were that they distracted the attention of the neophyte away from the essential truths, from the heart-light behind the ritual and the ceremonial. What were these rituals and ceremonials?

Representations in dramatic form of the teachings given orally and in secret in the higher degrees, and without ritual and ceremonial.

Some of these Mystery-schools of ancient times actually degenerated so low before they died out that they became societies of unconscious black magicians. The practices of the negro voodoo, for instance, are such instances of degenerated teachings and associations — pure sorcery of which practically all the power is gone because all the knowledge is gone. They are mere ritualistic black magic practices.

You know that what distinguishes the white magician from the black is the motive and the use made of the knowledge and of the forces employed. Nothing but that: the motive and the use. Nature's forces act equally and without choice upon and in both good and evil. The rain falls upon the just and the unjust. Electricity can be handled for purposes of benevolent work just as well as it can be used for evildoing; and so forth. It is not the force per se employed that distinguishes the black magician from the white, but the motive governing the use of the force, and the use to which the force is put.

Now I will go a little farther, and with a good deal of reluctance; but my feeling is, Companions, that you should know the truth. There is much in the Christian Church that is fine. But it is fine because there are fine people in the Christian Church. Subtracting, taking away, eliminating, these splendid people, you have left only an association living and working in a manner resulting in evil for the human race, and this is so because it is all materialistic.

The dead-letter dogmas and doctrines derived from the books take away the sense of the individual human, ethical, and spiritual responsibility for thoughts had and actions done, and places that ultimate responsibility outside of the individual. The importation into this psychological equation of the factor of free will simply introduces an unsolvable puzzle. Instead of men being taught the truths about the universe, and about men's own origin, their destiny, their nature, their inherent and ineluctable responsibility for what they think and do, they are taught that they can escape the consequences, the results, of evildoing, by believing certain things.

The Christian Church originally was a Mystery-school, a Theosophical Society, and it lived as such probably for some sixty or seventy years after the death of its founder — or the "passing" of its founder is a more

correct word.

There is no single, unique, cosmic, individual, and eternal God; but on the contrary the universe is filled full with bright and flaming intelligences, who are truly gods. There are vast hierarchies of them in all grades of evolution, some so high that not even the most developed human understanding can have even an adumbration of comprehension of their spiritual-divine state, status, condition; and there are others only little greater than men. And even this evolutionary range of these divine beings is as nothing in comparison with the frontierless spaces of space, invisible and visible.

The utmost that an enlightened human being can say, the utmost that a Master of Wisdom can teach, the utmost that a dhyan-chohan of the highest grade belonging to our universe can conceive, is this universal life, and this universal consciousness, which are both divisible into innumerable hierarchies of entities, all evolving, from the less to the more perfect.

These Mystery-schools of ancient times were of various types. Some taught what would be called today the scientific aspect of nature. Others specialized more in what would today be called the religious side of man's outlook and understanding. Others again were of a philosophic type. Samothrace in Greece would have been called a scientific school. Eleusis would have been called a religious and mystical school. But in all these schools, wherever they were, and in whatever time they existed, there was a succession of teacher following teacher. In some cases these teachers were messengers from the same Great Lodge which sent H. P.

Blavatsky into the world in our own age in order to bring to men once again some elementary teachings of the wisdom-religion of mankind.

It is absurd, it is preposterous, to suppose that she brought all the truth in the universe, all that ever could be said. Such an idea violates not only all her own statements, but even common sense.

Student — I have read that there are both the Red-coats and the Yellow-coats living in Tibet, and that the Red-coats are working more selfishly, and that the Yellow-coats are working for humanity. Is that true?

G. de P. — In a general way it is quite true. The so-called Red-Hats are a Buddhist association or fraternity or organization which represents today the unreformed Tibetan Buddhism before the day of Tsong-kha-pa, who founded the order of Yellow-Hats. The Yellow-hat order is a much more mystical one than the Red-Hat order is; and the Red-Hats, furthermore, follow a great many teachings and have a great many ceremonials and rituals which certainly are not pure Buddhism, but belong rather to the indigenous animism of the ancient Tibetan days, before the days of Buddhism.

Do you understand me?

Student — Yes, sir. And these Red-Hats are not black magicians, are they?

G. de P. — Not necessarily, not all of them at least. But they are by no means as powerful even in political matters, nor as powerful in spiritual things, as are the Yellow-Hats. You will find the Red-Hats mostly on the Tibetan frontiers running all around the country; and in the east towards China, and in the south towards Sikkhim and Bhutan, you will find most of the Red-Hat monasteries.

Student — Thank you.

Student — The difference in the enlightenment of human beings during the Christian era and during antiquity is so marked that one wonders if there was a malicious attempt made to blind the human mind, or simply if humanity had entered an era of obscuration of spiritual truths?

G. de P. — The latter was so. And of course that entering of an era of spiritual obscuration carried in its natural karmic train the consequences — the coming into existence of churchly organizations possessing great political and social power, whose interest it was to cultivate ecclesiastical interests, rather than pure spirituality and also the teaching to men of their own responsibility, spiritually and ethically.

Student — Have there been any periods of history that we have no record of, other cycles, when everything

was so dark, when mankind had lost so utterly the true teachings?

G. de P. — Yes, there was such a time some four hundred thousand years before the downfall of the Atlantean race, but it was much worse then even than now. You must remember that we are now beginning the kali-yuga of the Aryan race, so called — I am employing the terms used by HPB in The Secret Doctrine

— and this kali-yuga is not altogether black. It is a time when great progress can be made because the currents of life are running strong; but naturally more willpower, and greater concentration of it, are required than in times when the spiritual forces are more easily attained. But as we have only begun the kali-yuga period we have by no means seen the worst.

But here is the consoling part: the seeds of the succeeding race — the succeeding subrace I am now speaking of — have already been sown. That subrace is in the making, even today. Those whose hearts burn with the pure light of spirituality, in however faint a degree, will be attracted to safety and peace. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes, thank you. There is something else I would like to ask about that. One reads in the Upanishads about the "world-food," that one must not refuse the world-food; as if it means that spirit must conquer and permeate the densest matter and in that way take the world-food. And I wondered if a period of darkness like this that we have passed through was an opportunity for the spirit to permeate deeper into the world-food, and in that way accomplish the destiny of the human race.

G. de P. — I think so. I do indeed. I might also say, perhaps, that referring to the change of cycles to which I adverted when answering a question some time ago, the cycle upon which the race is now entering is a rising one. Humanity, so far as the European stocks of peoples go, was on the downgrade progressively since the fall of the Greco-Roman civilization. The lowest point was reached about the time when Christopher Columbus is stated to have made his Atlantic journey, his Atlantic voyage. Since then, slowly in the beginning, very slowly, but gradually increasing its speed, the stream of life flowing along has been generally rising.

The cycle we are entering upon — and it sometimes takes a number of centuries really to enter upon a cycle, really to begin to show its own qualities — the cycle we are now entering upon, or have been entering upon, is a rising one. Kali-yuga does not mean a steady run downhill without any upgrades at all. The general tendency is down, downwards. But there will occur a large number of relative rises; and we are at the foot of one such small rise. Fortunately!

I think we shall close the meeting for tonight, Companions.

[The sounding of the gong. Silence.]

Meeting 15

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Fifteen

Meeting of June 25, 1930

G. de P.— Companions, I am ready to answer questions.

Student — Recently one of the comrades asked a question in regard to the highest point in a planetary cycle.

You told us that the orbits of the planets gradually become smaller, until finally they become absorbed in the sun, at least so I understood it.

I believe, if I am not mistaken, that you told us at another meeting that beyond the sun there were other planetary chains. Perhaps planetary is not the correct word. But at least the sun was not the final point of everything. But now if it is the case that the planets shall finally become absorbed in the sun, is that the beginning of another chain or something corresponding, something still beyond our present order?

G. de P. — Yes, I think I see your point — that is to say I think I see the meaning of your question. Let me point out first, however, that when you speak of the highest point in the cycle of a planet, I don't quite understand what you mean, because apparently you are referring solely to the physical orbit of the planet. Are you referring to the mystical, or evolutionary orbit?

Student — I meant the evolutionary.

G. de P. — Yes. In other words, the path followed by a stream of light which at a certain point reaches its highest, spiritually speaking.

Answering your question then, it is quite true that the planets as the solar manvantara proceeds to its end, are, not exactly "absorbed" in the sun, but are dissipated and become part of the body corporate of the sun and its neighborhood for the time being, so that the entire solar system then passes out of manifested existence together with the life and individuality of the sun, into the inner and invisible realms of the nirvanic peace. In other words, every life-stream composed of hosts of entities collected around a planetary center or evolutionary heart, enters into the sun as the last stage in the long, long road of planetary evolution. What follows after the solar system has disappeared, and also when the long intersolar nirvana is ended, is not a new chain, but a new solar system. Do you understand me thus far?

Student — Yes, Professor.

G. de P. — Just as our present solar system is the karmic consequence or fruitage of the solar system which preceded ours. The preceding solar system simply being the present solar system in its former imbodiment, precisely as a man's former life has produced the causes which make the man what he is in the present life —

at least many of the causes.

Furthermore, every body of a solar system, ours for instance, is a planetary chain. The sun itself is a solar chain composed of seven suns. Every planet is a septenary planetary chain, composed of seven planetary globes. Every moon, which in every case is the body of a dead planet, likewise is a dead septenary chain. In other words, there are seven moons of which our present visible moon is the lowest and most material.

Student — But the others exist and we cannot see them?

G. de P. — What others?

Student — The other six.

G. de P. — Exactly. Only one globe of any septenary chain on the same plane of the cosmos as our earth's planetary chain can be seen by the men of earth who live in this fourth round of the earth's planetary chain.

The fourth globe, the lowest globe of any chain, is that globe which can be sensed by the inhabitants of this

fourth globe of the earth-chain, because all such visible globes are all on the same plane of material existence on which we are in this our fourth globe of the earth-chain. But there are other planetary chains in our solar system whose fourth globe even we cannot see because such chains are on higher planes than our earth planetary chain exists on. Consequently even the most material or fourth globe of these chains exists on a cosmic plane superior to our physical plane.

Student — Are the rest of the moons different? They have no connection with the other globes of this earth-chain?

G. de P. — Certainly they have.

Student — Is there a moon for each globe?

G. de P. — Now you are probing rather deeply: I think I can answer that question rather definitely, however.

There are seven globes to the moon-chain as it presently exists. All these globes of the moon-chain are different because the entire moon-system or moon-chain is a different chain from the earth-chain; and all that remains of the moon-chain are the seven dead globes of the moon-chain. The moon that you see is the lowest globe of the moon-chain.

On the next plane superior to ours, that is to say the next solar plane superior to our present physical solar plane, our own earth planetary-chain has two globes existing thereon. And likewise there are two moon-globes existing on that same next solar plane superior to our physical solar plane.

And so on up the scale. But it would not be correct to say that the two moon-globes are restricted each one, and each to each solely, to the two globes of the earth-chain on the same solar plane; because the fact is that while each one of these two moon-globes of this superior plane to ours is the respective parent of one of the two earth-globes on the same plane, nevertheless the moon-chain as a whole affects the earth-chain as a whole, also.

I might say, Companions, that, strictly speaking, all the globes of the moon-chain are the kama-rupas of the globes of the original moon-chain that was. For instance, our present moon, although it is on the same fourth cosmical plane on which our present planet Terra is, is none the less a kama-rupa of the old fourth-plane moon that was. It is the Mr. Hyde, to use Robert Louis Stevenson's word, of the earth, the old kama-rupic phantom or spook that haunts us still. There are actually some planets in the solar system which have more than one kama-rupic moon. In these planetary cases, the planets are so material in character and evolution that their reimbodiments have taken place before the kama-rupic phantoms of their former imbodiments have had time to disintegrate into cosmic dust. In consequence they are haunted by two or even more kama-rupic spooks — something which also happens to human beings of grossly material characteristics. Such moons, therefore, and such kama-rupic phantoms in the cases of human beings, are instances of what H. P. Blavatsky meant when she spoke of planetary or human Dwellers on the Threshold. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes, Professor, thank you.

G. de P. — You are a bright girl!

Student — Well, I understand as far as you have gone, but it gives me a great deal more to think about.

G. de P. — Well, your questions are very intuitive indeed, and show deep thought and study. I like questions like that.

Student — What relation to these seven globes does the septenary constitution of man bear?

G. de P. — Do you mean to ask whether the seven globes of a chain, our earth-chain, for instance, are the seven principles of the earth?

Student — Well, possibly, yes. But I was thinking, do they bear a correspondence to the seven principles of man?

G. de P. — They do, and each to each.

Student — If that is the case, we speak of such and such a globe as the highest, and of another as not quite so high; but can you speak of human principles as such a one coming first, and another coming second? Does not the predominance of certain principles vary in individuals, according to which principle is the most pronounced in any individual?

G. de P. — Do you mean first and second, etc., in order of time of evolution, or first and second in order of quality?

Student — In time of evolution.

G. de P. — In other words, your question runs to this effect: are the seven principles of man produced from the monad one after the other in successive periods of time? Is that your question?

Student — That is it.

G. de P. — Yes, they are. The monad produces forth from itself, before any reincarnation begins, an aura or emanation of a spiritual and lofty character and type. This is the veil surrounding the monad and actually is the buddhi, or spiritual soul. From the buddhi in precisely similar manner there emanates or flows forth the next more material or lower principle of man, which you can call the higher manas or reincarnating ego. From this again there issues forth as an emanation, or as the child of the reincarnating ego, its veil surrounding it —

or its body, or the vehicle surrounding it, its aura — the name matters not at all, if you have the idea. And this succeeding emanation just described is the human ego. It is the kama-manasic part. This series of emanations succeeding each other continues right down to the physical body, which is the last emanation or exudation from the vitality of the auric egg; and the auric egg is simply the living atmosphere or vital aura surrounding the monad. This auric egg therefore has its seven degrees of materiality or of ethereality extending from the most spiritual down to the physical body.

Student — These so-called principles, then, are made of the substance, in its varying grades, of the auric egg?

G. de P. — That is it. But don't forget at the same time that the human principles are cosmic in origin, because the substance of the auric egg is cosmic in origin. Now, any part of the constitution of man cannot be different from the universe in which it lives. Please get that idea very strongly fixed in your minds, because it destroys the heresy of separateness that human beings are so wont to feel and imagine on account of the deceiving illusion of personality.

Student — I believe you said, in speaking of the moon-chain, that any two globes on a given plane in the moon-chain were the parents of the two earth-globes on the same plane?

G. de P. — They are. They were the parents on the same plane of the corresponding globes of the earth-chain of that plane.

Student — But are not those earth-globes on a higher plane? For instance, is not the physical earth-globe on a plane one higher than the physical moon-globe which was its parent?

G. de P. — Yes, that is quite true.

Student — Well, that seems a contradiction.

G. de P. — Why?

Student — Because it seems that the parent-globe is one plane lower than the earth-globe.

G. de P. — I see your difficulty. You are confusing solar planes with the septenary grades or subplanes of any one solar plane. Now the earth is not on a higher solar plane than the moon, but one stage higher, or one

subplane higher, in the same solar plane.

Student — I see.

G. de P. — Every cosmic or solar plane has, or is composed of, seven subsidiary planes; and the earth is on a subsidiary plane higher than the subsidiary plane on which the physical globe of the moon is.

Student — I would like, if I may, to ask four questions on the same subject. Is every entity, each of us, the sun, the earth, etc., a single lifeatom evolved?

G. de P. — Do you mean the perfected, or rather relatively perfected, evolution of a center which at one phase of its journey manifested as a lifeatom?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — The answer is, Yes.

Student — Now then, I want to ask, first of all, where the earth stands as compared with a human being in evolution. I mean the entity of the earth?

G. de P. — I cannot answer that question here. Please pass on to the next.

Student — May I ask something with regard to the construction of the earth? Is it like a bubble, taking the analogy of what you told us of the sun, matter as we know it one hundred or a few hundred miles thick, and the rest of the earth compressed ether, or akasa and forces?

G. de P. — Do you mean what is the nature of the earth's interior?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — I will try to answer that question, but I doubt very much if I can make myself understood. It is not merely compressed gas or ether. There is compressed gas there, but its nature belongs to the third or the lowest of the three elemental kingdoms. I am now talking more particularly of the center of the earth, and the region surrounding the center of the earth. It is elemental physical substance. Around this core of elemental physical substance there is an intermediate material phase, which, as one ascends towards the earth's surface, becomes rock and the various metallic bodies. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — Now, I simply could not undertake to explain to you what elemental material substance is because I have no words in which to express it. It is not exactly electrical. It is much more condensed than any electron of an atom is. It is physically speaking neither molten, nor solid, nor is it gaseous. It is not hot, nor is it cold. It is another kind of matter entirely, and the only way by which I can give you any idea of it at all is by saying, as I did before, that it is elemental physical substance — physical substance before it has reached the peculiar type of concretion which we call physical matter. I am afraid that is the best I can do for you.

Student — Thank you. One more question: where does the intelligence, the entity of the earth, reside?

G. de P. — That is very much like the other question that to my deep regret I was obliged to say I could not answer. Perhaps this question, however, I may answer in the following way, but don't take it too literally. The answer is true as far as I can express it. The intelligence of the earth resides in the akasa which permeates the earth through and through, and which also surrounds it as an akasic veil, precisely as human intelligence does not reside, or have its locus standi, in the physical brain and being of material substance, but permeates the physical brain and fills the skull and nevertheless radiates as an aura and thus surrounds the form. Do you understand the idea?

Student — Yes. Thank you very much.

G. de P. — The earth is soaked through and through, if I may use an easily understood expression, with this vital akasa, and therein resides, what you have — and you will forgive me — rather inaccurately alluded to as the intelligence of the earth.

Student — When the question was asked about the orbits of the planets becoming smaller and ultimately the planets becoming absorbed in the sun, I remembered that I have understood from HPB's calling the sun the elder brother of the planets that therefore the sun's evolution is farther advanced. Then, if that is right, the sun's period of manifestation in the solar system will have been finished ahead of the planets; and, if that is right, then does the sun remain as the life-giver for the rest of the planets, just as the Silent Watcher does on our earth-plane?

G. de P. — On the whole your question is admirably expressed with one exception. The sun is our elder brother, and not our parent. Our elder brother for two reasons: first, it is farther advanced along the evolutionary pathway — in fact the sun enspheres a living god; the other reason is that we are karmically and for eternity bound up with the vital essence of the sun, and as entities, both planets and the individual inhabitants of any planet, must live in that vital solar essence forever. But not necessarily always living in the same part of the solar system. The exception I have to note is that you are wrong in supposing that the sun's period of manifestation in the solar system will be completed ahead of the planets'. That is wrong. All the planetary vital, psychical, and spiritual energies — and this applies to all the planets — will be gathered into the sun before the sun's end comes. The sun is the first to appear in manifestation, and is thus our elder brother again. It is the last to vanish from this plane.

The vital essence of the sun extends throughout the solar system, permeates it. If you could see the solar system from another plane, you would find that to your then vision on this other plane, what is now the empty space of the solar system would seem to be a relatively solid body of matter, because the entire solar system is filled full with the energies, and with the physical, psychic, and spiritual substances, emanating from the sun and returning to it in circulatory lines, or rivers or streams. These circulatory lines or rivers or streams are the circulations, so far as the solar system is concerned, which I have called the circulations of the cosmos.

They are rivers of life, connected always during the manifestation period of any solar system with innumerable multitudes of entities passing backwards and forwards from the heart of the sun outwards, and from the boundaries of the solar system backwards to the heart of the sun. The beating of this solar heart, which beating is known to our astronomers as the solar spot period of eleven years, is one entire circulatory round. Do you understand what I mean?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — Is the answer responsive to your question?

Student — Thank you, very much so.

Student — In The Voice of the Silence it says that Mars and Mercury were once two luminous suns, and in future days they may become two luminous suns again. And I was wondering, does the sun reimbody itself in planetary substance?

G. de P. — I will answer your intuitive question. What you quote refers to a somewhat different fact. When the sun reaches the end of its manvantara or period of manifestation, it breaks up into innumerable billions of particles, is dissipated, much as the physical body of a human being, when left to decay, is dissipated into its component atoms. These particles during the entire period of the solar nirvana or pralaya wander through space, and when the next solar manvantara at the end of the solar pralaya begins, these wandering particles of the sun that was, are concreted together into the planets and help to form the future planetary bodies.

Thus every planet in a former period of its existence was a glorious sun — that is, a part of a glorious sun. As all the planets re-enter the solar body when the solar system nears the end of its manvantara, so will they reissue forth again — the same lifeatoms which compose the old planets — and form planets anew.

Is the answer intelligibly responsive to your question?

Student — Yes, thank you. But it is not the entity that composed the sun, but it is just the particles, the atomic particles, of the structure of the sun?

G. de P. — Yes. The reference there is to what we see and call the sun, the glorious vesture of light and psychomagnetic forces which in their aggregate compose the body of our physical sun. The ensouling entity of the sun, the divine being of which the physical sun is the body, is of course alluded to only inferentially.

Student — May I ask a question, dear Teacher? Especially about health karma, or ill-health karma. I have noticed before I have a sick spell that I have a tendency to let myself down and to overeat. If I can hold up, I can ward off from within that spell, and I can also ward it off sometimes by having an osteopathic or a magnetic treatment or something of that kind. But fundamentally it seems that karma is force, or forces; and if we understood how to handle forces, we should understand how to handle karma. Is that right?

G. de P. — That is correct. It is very fortunate that the average human being does not understand how to interfere with his karmic destiny. If he did, he would make for himself a karmic destiny incomparably worse than that which he in his ignorance in his present state makes for himself. You can indeed — or rather it is possible indeed to — stave off sickness and illness by damming sickness back into the constitution, as Mr.

Judge has pointed out. But this is a very dangerous and unwise thing to do. Don't confuse that statement, however, with the other fact that it is perfectly proper to keep a bright, cheerful, and happy mind. Try to keep that state of mind, because it is a great help. It helps you to produce better karma and to avoid making karma similar to the one which we are suffering at the present time. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes, sir. But still not as well as I am going to understand you later of course. Because it seems a very vast and profound subject that we will have to learn in regard to these forces within us. It seems that there must be a right way. For example, we read in the Bhagavad-Gita something about that, and about balancing the forces, and about acting without making karma.

G. de P. — Oh, certainly, that is the case. When a man becomes wise, he will no longer do evil deeds, and thus lay up for himself causes of suffering and pain. He will be always compassionate in action. Compassion is one of the greatest preventives of sickness that I know. He will always be forgiving. He will always be loving. His whole nature will become harmonious by having these magnificent and powerful forces active in his heart and mind. Therefore his body will reflect the harmony of his soul; and the acts that a man does when in such a spiritual state are acts the karma of which is health, vision, evolutionary growth — all the good things.

It is selfishness that produces disease, and I mean selfishness when you go to the root of it all, not necessarily selfishness in the present life. There is such a thing as old karma not yet worked out. This old karma, having originated in the last life or in two lives last past, or it may be ten lives agone, has not yet had an opportunity to come out and dissipate its energies. Diseases are old bad karma working themselves out through the physical body. As I have said before several times, the physicians of the distant future, who will be wise magicians of the right-hand path, will know how to lead diseases out of the body carefully, wisely, so that the body will not be injured or hurt, and thus the system will be cleared in nature's own way of the poisons that it contains.

Student — May I ask another question then about selfishness, because selfishness seems to me to be the greatest root of our trouble?

G. de P. — Yes, it is. Well, what is your question?

Student — It is about selfishness. I know I am selfish. I analyze and study these things, and I see that when I want to overeat it is selfishness. It is selfish for me to want things that are nice to the taste and that appeal to my desire-body, and I want to overcome that. I must overcome that selfishness.

G. de P. — That is quite right, and the very fact that you recognize it shows that you have already begun to climb. It is very creditable to you, I think, that you have made so frank a statement; and when I spoke of

selfishness in answering your question, dear boy, I was not alluding to you personally. It is the same with all of us. All our troubles, and sorrows and pains — psychical, mental, astral, and physical — originate in the fierce selfishness of the lower part of us, the grasping, acquisitive nature of us, the hunger for sensations of various kinds, which in order to gratify we do things and think thoughts which in their essence are selfishness imbodied.

Student — Is it not wise to feel that the body, which is the temple of the divinity that is within, should always be in perfect condition to house that divinity; and that when one feels the slightest inclination to do the least ill, the thought should be continuously held that the house should be perfectly clean for the divinity? Is that a good idea?

G. de P. — It is a most excellent idea. It is picturing and imaging the glorious Master within, and it produces a longing and a yearning to live up to the ideal which the mind thus holds.

Student — This is another question on the subject that was begun about the revolution of the planets. I understand that as they advance in their evolution their orbits become nearer and nearer the sun. Now the earth is, we might say, a reincarnation of the moon, and I imagine from what you have said that it is not this earth whose orbit changes and comes nearer to the sun, but when this earth passes away it will reincarnate as another planet. Now does that imply that as each reincarnation takes place the orbits become a little nearer to the sun? And will that mean the same thing, that the orbit of the moon is farther from the sun than the orbit of the earth is at present? Is that clear?

G. de P. — Quite clear. Let me say first, Doctor, that it is not correct to speak of the reincarnation of the earth. You mean the reimbodiment of the earth. You will remember of course that "reincarnation" means the reinfleshing, and thus this word reincarnation can be used only of men or of beasts which have houses of flesh.

Student — Thank you. You have corrected that before. I am sorry I made the mistake.

G. de P. — Now the question that you have asked is one that again touches upon very dangerous ground. Let me give the answer in the following way, and then you will make your own deductions. As I have already told you this evening, every planet of the solar system will re-enter the sun before the end of the solar manvantara. Is the answer sufficiently responsive to your question?

Student — Yes, I think so, thank you.

Student — You have told us, as I understand it, at different times that the sun and the moon stand for two planets which are very near to them, but which we cannot see. Now when we speak of these planets gradually being absorbed in the sun, does that mean the sun itself or the planet for which the sun stands?

G. de P. — It means that it is the sun which receives the planets of the solar system. But you use the wrong word when you say absorbed. They are not absorbed. They do not become part of the individuality of the sun.

They merely enter the sun and then leave it afterwards; again to re-enter the sun, again to leave it. It is so with the lifeatoms of our own physical plane. Any human body is constantly casting forth hosts of lifeatoms —

every day, every moment. These lifeatoms leave the body, they peregrinate into other bodies — not necessarily of flesh. They may go into plants, they may go into the mineral world, they may go into beasts, may go into other humans; and they return to the body from which they came, pass a certain time there, and then move forth again on a new cycle of peregrinations. There is a constant stream of circulations all the time.

But it is not the mystery-planets, or the mystery-planet for which the sun stands in symbolic astrology, into which the other planets enter, but it is the sun into which they enter.

As a matter of fact, the planets of the solar system, our solar system, are one class of highly evolved lifeatoms originating from the substance of the sun; and therefore by nature's fundamental laws must, at certain periods of their evolution, return to the sun. In the bosom of the sun they pass a nirvana precisely as the more highly evolved reincarnating egos, the evolved lifeatoms of the spiritual monad, pass their devachanic interludes in the bosom of the monad. The fact is the same in both cases, and the law is the same. In the one case it is the sun and the planets, in the other case it is human beings; and this is a striking example of how

wonderfully the law of analogical reasoning will correctly guide your thoughts in these studies. "As above so below; as below so above." What takes place in one part of the cosmos is duplicated in other parts of the cosmos. That, I think, answers your question.

Student — Yes, Professor, but another one comes to mind. What is the relationship or the connection of this mysterious planet?

G. de P. — With what?

Student — With these planets that we have spoken of.

G. de P. — I think I see what you have in your mind. These mystery-planets are simply planets and no more.

Just as our visible planets are planets and no more. You will understand that matter better when I add that our solar system contains scores of planets, which are perfectly invisible to us because our eyes have not been trained through evolution to catch and interpret the vibrations of the reflected light coming to us from them.

Student — But these are not just simply planets, are they? They are connected with something else; they are linked up with something.

G. de P. — With the solar system and with the sun. But not more so than our Earth, or Venus or Jupiter or Mars or Saturn or the Moon that was. These two mystery-planets, for which the sun and moon respectively are astrological substitutes for purposes of convenience only, are simply planets in the same way that the visible planets of the solar system are. They are simply invisible to us because our senses of perception cannot take them in; our eyes do not see them. And the scores of planets which are invisible to our eyes are some of them much higher than our earth. Others are much lower than our earth. The mere fact of their being invisible does not of necessity mean that they are superior either in quality or ahead of us on the evolutionary pathway.

For instance, absolute matter is invisible to us, and yet it is matter so dense or gross that nothing in our solar system can be denser or grosser. Therefore we humans speak of it as absolute matter. Do you understand me?

Student — I think I do. I will have to think about it.

Student — In speaking of health, the matter of accidents has caused me and many others a good deal of consideration, because in the many years we have been here we have noticed that accidents come in cycles.

The medical authorities here will say that it is so, as it is with other things. Now accidents come in groups, and we have had several singular illustrations of that — the same kind of accidents happening to people quite independently situated at about the same time. Is there any way to minimize this or check that cycle? Or must it come? Or can we spread it out in some way more thinly? Or what is really at the bottom of that cycle of accidents? We can understand a cycle of contagious diseases, but a cycle of accidents seems a less simple thing.

G. de P. — I do not know what cycle of accidents you refer to.

Student — I mean three or four times when there have been similar accidents to members on the Hill; cases of broken bones, coming always within a few weeks or months of each other. And then long periods of none at all.

G. de P. — Is not that the same elsewhere? And are diseases in any way different from the standpoint of karma from what you call accidents, as when an epidemic breaks out and sweeps over the country, as the great influenza epidemic of some years ago did? It seems to me that accidents are merely more noteworthy to us because they are more sudden, and when several of them come along in the course of a few months we think that there is a cycle of them. Well, perhaps there is a cycle in a certain way. Of course, it is all a matter of karma, but I do not think that there is anything of particular importance about it.

I have noticed in my own life that sometimes I have caught myself passing through periods of mental and physical inattention — phases of my karma which I have noticed sometimes to last for days or even weeks.

During those periods of abstract thought or concentration upon something that I have in mind, I am continually in danger of bruising myself, or stubbing my toe or knocking my head or hammering my thumb or something like that. We can speak of this as a cycle of accidents, I suppose, and so it is, but I do not see anything of particular import about it all.

Student — I am afraid I didn't make it quite clear. I did not mean accidents to one single person, I meant to a dozen people, and accidents of a similar kind. For instance, several of us all fell down from bicycles within a few weeks, and one or two broke a jaw.

G. de P. — Well, I had the same thought at the time that you did; but it is quite possible for a body of people to have collective periods of enthusiasm or collective phases of mental depression, or very often it is the weather that is largely accountable for such states. Heat and sultry weather make one a little more negligent perhaps, and when the morning is cool and bracing, the nerves are alert. I do not think that there is any particular matter of spiritual or psychical import about it.

Student — May I come back to the sun again?

G. de P. — I am afraid you are a Son of the Sun — and it is verily so!

Student — I hope so.

G. de P. — Pardon me, let me change that: I am very happy to see that you are a Son of the Sun.

Student — Of course we all know that a planet dies and becomes a moon, and for a great number of ages must revolve around its child-globe. Now when the whole solar manvantara is ended, does the sun die and become what you might call a sun-moon to the next sun, its child?

G. de P. — That is a most intuitive question that you have asked. And the answer in a general way is, yes.

There is such a thing in nature as solar Dwellers on the Threshold, just as there are lunar Dwellers on the Threshold, or human kama-rupa Dwellers on the Threshold. Remember this, however, that the sun stands on a very high plane as contrasted with the lower entities of the solar system such as the gross physical planets, and the more or less gross entities inhabiting a planet like our earth.

The term solar Dweller on the Threshold is rather one of explanation, than of actual fact. It would be more truthful, I think, to say that what you might, for purposes of comparison only, call the kama-rupa of the sun that was, is rather the etheric atoms which once composed that sun, and which surround the new sun in the process of developing a solar system, as its field, as its electromagnetic field of activity.

Student — Thank you. That is very clear.

G. de P. — Somewhat as the ground into which a sower sows his seed — the sun being the sower and the ground being the electromagnetic particles. Strange as that term may sound to modern physicists, it is yet true.

Student — I would like to ask if you can tell us something about the summer solstice initiation?

G. de P. — Very little that I feel would be right to speak of. It is the least important of the four main periods of the year, and the least important also from the standpoint of initiations. Nevertheless it is important, very.

Initiation can take place really at any time; but the greatest of the initiations take place at these four periods of the year: the winter solstice, the spring equinox, the summer solstice, and the autumnal equinox.

The autumnal equinox is the most mystical of them all, but perhaps not the greatest. The spring equinoctial initiation, if I may so speak of it, is perhaps the loftiest. The winter solstitial initiation is perhaps the easiest to understand because it is the time when a high chela has the opportunity of meeting his own inner god face to face, and becoming at one with it. The summer solstitial initiation is the period of initiation which is the least important, but only in the sense that it does not necessarily mean a step forward for the individual; yet from one standpoint it is I think the holiest of all the four because it means a sublime sacrifice of the individual. I

do not know whether I make my meaning clear. It is very dangerous ground to touch upon.

The winter solstice, the spring equinox, and the autumnal equinox, are all initiation periods when enormous benefit accrues to the neophyte — and anyone who is initiated is a neophyte no matter how high he may be.

Whereas the initiation that takes place at the time of the summer solstice is one in which the neophyte renounces self-progress for the benefit of others, and therefore this is why I called it the holiest. I cannot go farther into this: it is too sacred a matter. But I have given you perhaps a few ideas.

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — It is not the highest initiation, if you look upon mere rank, and I will try to elucidate that idea.

Two men will enter a room. One is a General, the other is a Lieutenant. The General has a rank higher than the other, but the man of the minor rank as man may be incomparably farther along the path than his ranking superior.

Student — HPB says a majority of the world's inhabitants still belong to the Atlantean or Lemuro-Atlantean stocks, yet they have all moved on so that they are in harmony with our Aryan or fifth race, and are quite modern in physical type, and not by any means deficient in intelligence in most cases.

G. de P. — One moment. Of whom are you speaking here?

Student — The majority of the world's inhabitants. What is the quality that differentiates these lingering Atlanteans from us? Are they essentially different, or is the difference merely superficial? How is it that they did blend in with the fifth race long ago?

G. de P. — Well, they all belong to the fifth race technically, because they are all with us, all living in fifth race times and in fifth race conditions; yet psychically and physically they are not as far advanced along the path as the type-man of the fifth race is.

Furthermore, most of these old stocks will die out. In this connection, I want to call your attention to a couple of statements made in the course of an article written for a magazine published by the Adyar Society, this article having been written by one of the ablest and, I honestly believe, one of the sincerest theosophists of the Adyar Society. I mean Mr. Jinarajadasa. During the course of this article, he speaks of the negroes as being hangover or leftover Lemurians. That statement is wholly wrong. The negroes of the backward peoples are precisely the one human stock which has a future before it, a destiny, a probable racial destiny, of grandeur and splendor. They are a young people so far as destiny is concerned, although they came forth from the Atlantean originating race just as we have also come forth; but their time for full self-expression in a culmination of spiritual and intellectual development and in consequent civilizations, has not yet arrived.

The negroes can be called Lemurians only in the same sense that we of the Aryan race can be called Lemurians — simply meaning that our forebears of aeons and aeons ago did live in Lemurian times, in Lemurian ages.

The negroes, more accurately, are derivatives of Atlantean stocks, just as we fifth race men are. We are now in the heyday, in the culmination or movement towards the culmination, of our fifth race power, brilliance, and all the rest of it. The negroes have been sleeping as a race. They have not yet begun, or perhaps they have just begun, the beginning of their rise into racial power and prominence. When they reach the culmination of their civilizations, and indeed long before that time, they will then have become something other than negroes, if you understand what I mean. They will have become refined, more evolved, more expressive of the inner powers and faculties of their branch of the human race. In other words, the negro-phase is just what that racial stock is passing through, as we of our stock are passing through the phase in which we presently are.

Another wrong statement made by this same theosophist of the Adyar Society was to the effect that the seventh subrace would be born in South America. That is also quite wrong. The seventh subrace will be born where the beginning of every race or every subrace is born, and that is in the far north. Every new race, whether it be a root-race or a subrace, a family-race or one of the small branches — every single one is born

in the north. As it grows to power and begins to exhibit or throw forth its own faculties, it verges southwards, just as the English poet says: "Westward the course of empire takes its way," following the sun. It is true. So, likewise, does every race begin in the north, and through the ages it travels spirally southwards; and all Races, whether root, sub, family, or branchlet, end their careers in the south below the equator.

There is this much only of truth in Mr. Jinarajadasa's statement, and it is not a large portion of the truth, and I am obliged to tell you this fact lest his statement mislead you. The seventh subrace will unquestionably live on land south of the equator, but it will not be born either in South America or on land south of the equator; but I repeat like every other race, will be born in the north.

Take ourselves today. We are verging towards our racial culmination, towards the culmination of the innate powers and faculties and energies inhering in us as a race. Civilization is slowly tending spirally southwards.

The scene of power is slowly moving southwards. It will pass the equator as it already has done so in the South American peoples, for instance, or as in South Africa. As the race grows old the most brilliant civilizations coming to pass towards the end of our fifth race will be south of the equator; and new lands will rise out of the ocean to be the future homes of the final branchlet-races and ends of the subraces of our present fifth root-race.

I call your attention to these two mistakes merely to illustrate the fact that esoteric knowledge, my dear Companions, can, it is true, come to the individual who is uninstructed and uninitiated, and who is yet an aspiring theosophical student — but only in accordance with his native abilities and his evolution. The esoteric wisdom, the actual truths, what you might speak of as the keys, can be communicated only by a teacher. Bear that fact in mind.

Student — May I bring up the point that Mrs. Besant and Mr. Leadbeater have also taught the same idea as Mr. Jinarajadasa in relation to the sixth subrace, which Mr. Leadbeater says will start here in Southern California and also in Australia. And I believe that Mrs. Besant teaches the same. I know Mr. Leadbeater does.

G. de P. — Yes, I knew that fact, or rather I suspected it so strongly that my suspicion was equivalent to insight. I understood quite well that Mr. Jinarajadasa, who really is a most capable man, a very earnest, devoted, sincere, and good man — I understood, I say, that he was merely quoting what his gurus, Dr. Besant and Mr. Leadbeater, had taught him. I am glad you spoke of this, because I hesitated myself to introduce the same thought.

Student — May I follow the same thought? I have read all those articles to which you have referred, and I particularly noticed the difference between some degree of intuition, very fine perception of things, very clear and ethical statements, and real esoteric truths. The articles you speak of are very fine, as I would judge them, in some respects.

G. de P. — Yes, they are.

Student — Yet they make some very glaring errors which you have kindly corrected. I was puzzled over them. Thank you very much.

G. de P. — Yes. You will understand, dear Companions all, that I don't speak of this brother of the other Society in terms of criticism but merely as a warning to you. That is my duty in this School. Personally I think that Mr. Jinarajadasa is one of the most capable men in Mrs. Besant's Society; one of the most intuitive, one of the most honest, and one of the ablest. And the very fact that he — I am sure of it in my own mind, but I have no right very definitely to affirm it as a truth, because I do not know it otherwise than by my own inner conviction — very probably subordinated his own intuitive vision, his own inner feeling of the truth, his vision of the truth, in deference to the quite erroneous statements that he had been taught, is significant. I admire him for his loyalty to his teachers, although I do regret that a man of such natural innate power should not have the field, and the atmosphere, and the environment, in which to grow, and to let the really intuitive splendor within him come out.

Student — May I say that some time ago here in California Dr. Besant made a very long speech to the

Parents' Association or to some such Society, in which she stated very strongly that the new children in California were changing; that upon the evidence of many educators there was a change in the mentality. The children were more intuitive and were different from children even in other parts of the United States. She claimed the same thing was happening in Australia. And it was on this that she based her idea that the new race was being formed in America.

Do you think there is anything plausible in it?

G. de P. — Nothing at all. For this reason: the great subraces do not come into being so rapidly. The mere fact that the American is developing a type of his own does not mean that the American of today is superior to the European races. As Judge has pointed out to you, the American is somewhat more psychical and sensitive, which is by no means always a benefit to him.

I understand that Mrs. Besant says that within or after, at any rate about, 750 years from now, the sixth subrace will begin here in California, and will grow from the Californian children, and will take its primary rise in Ojai Valley. I am really very sorry to say anything that sounds unkindly regarding Mr. Leadbeater's erratic views as expressed by Mrs. Besant's mouth, but my duty compels me to say that the sixth subrace of which HPB speaks in The Secret Doctrine will not even begin before tens of thousands of years from now.

HPB speaks of twenty-five thousand years from now as the opening of the time when the sixth subrace seeds

— that is the meaning of her words — will begin to be. Nevertheless the seeds of the sixth subrace are now in preparation in the United States, and especially in the West. There is a vast difference between 750 years and 25,000 years — let us say an entire sidereal cycle; and furthermore recollect that 25,000 years from now will show but the seeds beginning. It will be more like 75,000 or 100,000 years before the sixth subrace is even noticeable on the earth in any wise.

The root-races have a life-period of at least four and a half million years; and as a matter of fact with the exception of the seventh root-race, which will be very short relatively speaking, all the other races have term periods or life periods of several more million years than four. For instance, the Atlantean race lasted for nearly ten million years. Our own fifth race will last, will endure, for something like eight million years and something more. Evolution does not make such theatrically rapid strides ahead as is implied in the statements of these Adyar theosophists.

I am rather glad that these few remarks have been called forth by the question asked, for at least one good and sufficient reason. In the work of brotherly love and peace and harmony and ultimate unification among the Theosophical Societies, upon which we are now embarking, we are bound to traverse rough parts of the road which we have before us. Nevertheless we should at no time abandon our genuine theosophical teachings merely for the sake of a false peace. We should at no time give up our convictions and principles of right and wrong, upon which we should remain immovable, of adamantine will.

You understand me — do you not?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — Are there any more questions?

Student — May I ask again: In reading those articles I felt a heart-hunger and a sort of feeling in the dark for an answer to the heart-hunger. And if I understand it, the spirit of your work would be largely the feeding of the hearts of many thousands of theosophists that there are already in South America for example, who have been — well, it was very beautifully expressed by one of our young members, when she said in regard to this:

"But all that is where we were fifty years ago."

Now that expresses the idea that I had after reading those articles. They were beautiful, and showed striving, hungry, thirsty hearts. If I understand your idea, it is to give to them a kindness, a love, which would be an inspiration, which it is quite evident from my study of them, they lack. Is that right?

G. de P. — It is absolutely right, dear Brother. Let us pass to other things now, Companions. Has anyone any other questions?

Student — At one of the earlier meetings I understood you to say that when H. P. Blavatsky left this life, she spent a very short time in devachan, and since then she has been working consciously, protected, or held or guarded, by an akasic veil. Is it permitted to know more of what is meant by consciously, and if it necessarily implies incarnation?

G. de P. — Yes, the statement is quite correct except for one small phrase: guarded by an akasic veil. That was the fact only when HPB was in her last physical body, and a certain portion of her inner constitution was removed and held under guard for its own protection, you understand. HPB has finished her very short devachanic period and is working consciously. She is not incarnated in the West, but she is in a physical body and I am not authorized to say here whether that body is a child's body growing through natural processes, or whether it is an adult body into which she passed.

It is quite possible for an adept or for a chela with the help of an adept to leave his own body to die, and to pass into another adult body, which in certain circumstances is waiting and ready for it. You can draw your own conclusions.

Student — I wish to ask if the historical character Gautama the Buddha was the same as the ninth Vaishnavic incarnation of the avatara cycle. As I understand it, the ninth Vaishnavic avatara was called the Buddha. Is that the same character as Gautama the Buddha?

G. de P. — Well, you have asked a question bearing upon a very intricate problem. The Hindus of his time, and later Brahmanists, admit that the Buddha was a Vaishnavic incarnation, but say that he came as a karmic retribution in order to sow confusion into the minds of the people among whom he came. That is not the fact.

The Buddha was the greatest of the sons of men in historic periods — covered by the last several million years. In only one sense was Gautama the Buddha an avatara. Not an avatara in the sense that Jesus was or Sankaracharya. In other words, the Buddha incarnated in the Prince Siddhartha of Kapilavastu, as the Buddha who was the next one to come in the line of the Buddhas of Compassion. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes, thank you. I was just going, if possible, to bring that in with the line of buddhas.

G. de P. — To bring what in?

Student — As I understand the teaching, there is a line of buddhas for every minor manvantara, and I wanted to ask whether he was one.

G. de P. — He was. He was the human incarnation of a celestial buddha. He was what is called the manushya-buddha, or human buddha, the representative on earth of a celestial buddha.

Let me tell you that esoteric Brahmanism and esoteric Buddhism are one and the same thing, the same body of doctrines exactly; but the Brahmanic hierarchy — that is, the religious organization of Brahmanism — is afflicted, although less so, with the same ecclesiastically narrow spirit that you will find in the Christian Church.

So consequently when the Buddha Gautama came, and by his teachings opened the doors of the initiation chambers a little as he did do, he immediately aroused the antagonism of the entire Brahmanical hierarchy who were the only ones at that time in India who had the keys to the truth, and who found it convenient, and in their vision wise, to keep those keys in their own possession, and not to let the people have a greater light than that which their ecclesiastical organization could give to them.

This the Buddha opposed. He said: "My message is for all mankind." Therefore did the members of the ecclesiastical Brahmanical hierarchy say: "He was an incarnation of a portion of Vishnu, but on account of the sins of the world, the teachings that this incarnation gave came as a retribution and a chastisement." Do you understand their idea?

Now Companions, I will answer one or two questions more, and then I think that we had better close the meeting.

Student — Among the questions that have been asked tonight were many that might be described as cosmic in a sense, because they were not personal; and others would be personal in the sense of touching upon selfishness and unselfishness in conduct. Is it not true that in order to understand the real inwardness of the study of unselfishness, we must raise our minds to that difficult, extremely difficult, study of the cosmic side of being?

G. de P. — Yes, you are quite right. And precisely because such questions as the genesis of worlds and their nature and their destiny bear very strongly upon questions of ethics, do the great teachers lay so much stress on the necessity of a proper understanding of the philosophy of theosophy, of its cosmic philosophy, of the scientific aspect, and the philosophical aspect, as well as the religious aspect.

It may not seem immediately apparent to many students in what manner or after what fashion the study of the seven principles of man or of the universe bears upon morals; but yet they do. They show the fundamental oneness of all things; they show how things are knitted together; they show how nothing can live unto itself alone — that what one does is felt and reflected by all others. These bear directly and powerfully upon the reasons for ethical conduct. Such teachings show the need of ethics. They discover, that is uncover, lay bare, the truths of Being. Ethics thus become a sublime study, a need and a duty, and are no longer a study of mere human conventions. It is much better to study the seven principles of man and the seven globes of the planetary chain or of any other chain, and similar subjects, than to sit down and write merely flapdoodle articles: "It is good to be good, because being good is good." Unquestionably true, but it tells you nothing. It lights no fires of inspiration in your heart. You see no reason for being good. No truth is thereby uncovered.

Student — I think it was a week ago that you spoke of HPB as the latest of the avataras. Can you give us more light on this subject?

G. de P. — Yes, I did say something like that, but just what I did say I don't recollect just now. I did then use the word avatara, but in a more restricted sense that I would have used it had I been speaking of Krishna, or of Sankaracharya, or of Jesus. I used it as descriptive of the fact that, like these three just named, so also was it in the case of HPB — she was an imbodiment of a spiritual-divine power working through her and apart from the powers of her own inner god. In that sense she was an avatara, or the representative on earth in human shape of at least some of the powers, energies, faculties, capacities, capabilities, of at least a portion of some lofty sublime entity. Added to the fact — and here also comes in the avataric aspect — that her intermediate nature as a messenger was often not her own, which had been withdrawn, but was that of a superior temporarily dwelling in her and working and teaching through her. That is the avataric idea, and therefore I said what I did about her being in a restricted sense an example of an avatara.

Now, Companions, I think that we had better close the meeting. Will you kindly sound the gong.

[The sounding of the gong. Silence.]

Meeting 16

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Sixteen

Meeting of July 9, 1930

G. de P. — Now, Companions, I am ready to answer any questions, according to our usual course of study.

Student — Are questions on the Mysteries of Eleusis in order?

G. de P. — Certainly, if you don't go too far.

Student — I would like to ask if the drinking of the kukeon had a significance like the drinking of the soma-juice?

G. de P. — Yes, the idea was exactly the same.

Student — Then there was an effect upon the neophyte more than just the simple symbolical significance?

G. de P. — You mean a magical effect, a psychological effect?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — Well, it was not so towards the downfall of the Mysteries. At about the time of the beginning of the Christian era, so called, the Mysteries of Eleusis had greatly degenerated; the whole thing had become a mere ceremonial. But in the early days, hundreds of years before that, the drinking from the cup, the "blood of the god" meant — don't you understand from the words I have just said? — becoming one with the god-life.

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — It was a communion which as a form passed into the Christian Church as the partaking of the cup and the partaking of the bread of the Eucharist — wine and the cereals standing respectively for spiritual life and intellectual teaching.

Student — One more question, if possible. It was said that the epopt gave to the neophyte the words katchka om paksha — according to the French version. Could you give the meaning of those words?

G. de P. — Those are words which have exercised the imagination of archaeological scholars for more than two hundred years: Knox ompax. These vocables have no particular meaning at all as words. They are actually passwords. I am awfully sorry that I cannot say more here. I wish I could tell you more. Perhaps sometime I will.

Student — Referring to the subject that was discussed at our last meeting about the moons and the planets: we know that our moon is dead. But are all the moons of all the other planets dead likewise?

G. de P. — No, they are not. Some of the so-called moons of other planets are really not moons at all, if we mean by the term moon a dead planet — the former imbodiment of the new planet around which that now dead moon revolves. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, Professor.

G. de P. — Our moon is a true moon. It was the parent of the earth. No planet can have more than one true moon at a time. Consequently the other moons, so called, are captures, such as the moons of Jupiter and the moons of Saturn.

Student — Yes, that was what puzzled me. Then each planet has one real moon, one dead moon?

G. de P. — No. Every planet does not now have a moon; but every planet has had a moon, and many also still have a moon. For instance, neither Venus nor Mercury has a moon now, but they once had moons just as the Earth has. They had parents just as the Earth had. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, thank you, Professor.

G. de P. — I do not think you do.

Student — I think I do.

G. de P. — Very well, if you are satisfied. I thought that I detected a note of doubt in your voice.

Student — I would like to think about it more. I may ask more at our next meeting.

G. de P. — I would like to add, Companions, that the reason why neither Mercury nor Venus has a moon is that the moons of these two planets have long since been dissipated into cosmic dust. These two planets are much older than the earth, both of them; and our moon, before the earth finishes its evolutionary period, will likewise have vanished into cosmic dust. In far past ages the moon was much larger than it now is, and also much closer to the earth than now it is.

Student — May I ask something about moons? There is always a big difficulty about the moons of Mars.

They seem to be quite different from others, because they are so ridiculously small in proportion to Mars.

They are almost invisible, one being not larger than Point Loma. There is a suggestion in The Secret Doctrine that they are captures also, and are not properly moons. Did Mars' real moon disappear too? Was it a large one?

G. de P. — No, the true moon of Mars has not disappeared yet. Mars is a much younger planet than the Earth is; much younger, as the planets now stand in evolutionary development at the present instant. In other words, Mars is not as far advanced along its own evolutionary journey as our Earth is. Similarly Venus and Mercury are much farther advanced along their evolutionary journey than the Earth is.

I was told a day or two ago that some recent idea of Mr. Leadbeater's is, that the Masters now on Earth have been invited by somebody or something or other to go and be the humanity or the overseers of the humanity on the planet Mercury, I think.

Student — Yes, that was in general what his statement was.

G. de P. — Evidently Mr. Leadbeater does not read HPB's Secret Doctrine; or, if he does, he does not believe in it, or perhaps he does not understand it.

Student — May I ask a question? What is the red spot on Jupiter?

G. de P. — You mean the red spot that caused so much discussion some few scores of years ago?

Student — Yes, Professor, that one.

G. de P. — Naturally that red spot has interested astronomers and bothered them a good deal, because they do not know what caused it; but it is nothing of particular importance. It is due to two things: first, to a phase in the evolution of the planet Jupiter; and also to the effect, the karmic effect, on that planet of one of the raja-stars. I do not know whether you know what a raja-star is.

Student — You have spoken of it before.

G. de P. — A raja-star, or king-star, is one which on account of the enormous spiritual and psychical influences that it exercises on surrounding space, is given that name.

You might call it a central sun around which other suns and satellites revolve. A raja-star may or may not be accompanied by planets.

As a matter of fact, cosmic space has millions of these raja-stars scattered through it. Some of them are connected with our solar system karmically, and others are not.

Jupiter is a very interesting planet in some ways. The planets outside the orbit of the earth, those farther from the sun than the earth is, are at one and the same time more ethereal than are the planets nearer the sun beginning with the earth, and yet in one or two cases are of a more material quality. Now that statement sounds like a contradiction, but it is not. They are more ethereal because they are younger than the earth is, less materially consolidated. But the character of them, their intrinsic swabhava or characteristic quality, will lead them into a grosser and more material development even than that of the earth.

Saturn, for instance, is at present less dense than water, much less dense actually, and yet it is a much more material planet in swabhavic characteristic even than our earth is. I do not mean physically material, I mean more material in quality.

Now this red spot on Jupiter — if you can imagine a collection or aggregate, or group of psychical-material entities swarming like bees in or rather on a young planet, and on account of certain peculiar karmic conditions closely connected with a raja-sun which actually has produced that collecting together, then you will understand perhaps what the red spot is. Jupiter is inhabited, but by beings of its own kind or type, or quality. They are inhabitants of a Jovian type, just as the inhabitants of earth are inhabitants of an Earth type.

Are there any other questions?

Student — Is it not said in The Mahatma Letters that Jupiter hides a raja-star, or raja-sun rather? And may it be that sun causing the red spot shining through the etherealized material of Jupiter, but only visible to us as a red spot?

G. de P. — Yes, the first part of the statement is quite correct. I believe one of the Masters in The Mahatma Letters speaks of this. But it would not be the raja-sun shining through the material of Jupiter and producing this red spot, because this raja-sun you could not see; it does not produce light that our eyes could take in and vision as light. It is an invisible star — that is, invisible to our eyes. It exists on a superior plane. It is nevertheless a sun.

Actually, this raja-star, so far as this our own cosmic plane is concerned, is a nucleus of matter in its seventh or highest stage, just as the heart of our own sun is. It is therefore utterly invisible to merely physical eyes. It is, in fact, energy — what the scientists would call a ball of energy. Nevertheless it is a star on its downward path, that is, on its descending arc of its own particular solar round. Stars themselves have their rounds, just as planets have. Beginning in the invisible worlds, they gradually descend through the intermediate worlds down into more concrete and material existence until they reach the bottom, each one, of its own individual cycle of descent; and then they begin the rise again on the luminous arc, or ascending arc. This particular raja-star behind Jupiter — and it does not mean so much "behind" it physically — is in just that period of its evolution.

There is an interesting point of thought here. The influence of raja-suns is not derived solely from size and volume, but from the intensity of the spiritual and psychical currents pouring through them — pouring through each one as an individual. The raja-sun here spoken of in connection with the planet Jupiter is actually a mere physical point, atom-size; and yet its influence over its own realms, or in its own realms, is enormously greater than that of our own sun in its realm.

Do you understand?

Student — Yes, thoroughly.

Student — Already some of our members have been presented with the problems of meeting Adyar members holding very strong views about Krishnamurti, the new race forming in California, astral experiences, etc.

Suggestions as to the way in which to handle this matter without giving them offense would be very welcome.

G. de P. — Kindliness, listening rather than talking. But if you are asked questions, then tell the truth. State frankly that Mr. Krishnamurti according to his own public declarations is not a theosophist, and that consequently our business is not with him. You can say — if it is true, of course — that you have respect for him as an honest young man. I would say that if I were asked the question. I don't think that he is very wise; I don't think that he is very farsighted; but I believe him to be honest and kindly. I think that he wants to do good; but as he is not a theosophist I cannot take precious time to give to him and to his teaching. In general I would answer: my work is among theosophists, I want to work with theosophists — for genuine theosophy.

If people talk to you about psychic experiences, then listen kindly to them and of course draw your own conclusions. Do not be unkind or harsh or, as the saying goes, 'slap the face' of people who do not know better; but by kindly words and hints point to statements in our books and in our teachings that will give them a more proper view of things, a more sane view.

Nevertheless — and this is not only honest, but it is wise — when it comes to matters of principle, then declare yourself positively, but do so kindly. Don't do so abruptly and rudely, do it kindly and fraternally. Try to understand their view, and if you need to talk to them, then explain. Do so, if you need to do so; but try to teach them rather in the silence and with a kindly heart.

Sometimes a mere little gesture of the hand is much more effective in causing the other man to think than is an angry answer, or than is an answer which makes the other man think that you look upon him as a fool.

People are not helped that way, you know. In other words, use common sense, let your heart speak with your brain wide awake and alert. Be wise, be kindly. Wisdom and love, the serpent and the dove: the initiate and the neophyte.

Is the answer enough do you think, to give a clue to what I would suggest as a proper answer?

Student — Yes, I am very much obliged. But I was just thinking of some cases. I heard one the other day say: "Oh, I visit Point Loma in the astral very often, and I know every detail of your place." Well, one can smile and pass it off, I suppose?

G. de P. — Yes, I would. Just smile kindly, and pass it off in that way, and you can add a little touch of humor to your smile too. Why not say: "By Jove, isn't that interesting. Do tell me, what did I do this morning?"

Student — May I ask one more question? We are taught that man being the microcosm of universal forces, each part of his body represents the effect or reflection on the physical plane of some intelligent creative force-consciousness expressing itself in matter. Does this apply to men — intelligent beings possessing mind

— on other planets, although they may differ from us in shape? Do they also represent, though under dissimilar forms, the same seven or ten primary creative forces, or do other unknown forces come into play in the formation of men on other planets?

G. de P. — No, the same forces exactly, because the same forces are fundamental and ubiquitous in the universe. But remember that because the seven cosmic planes have each one seven subordinate planes, and each of these subplanes can again be subdivided, the interminglings of these planes are very numerous indeed, and thus produce the vast variety and diversity that we see all around us. Consequently, on another planet where conditions are different, the same forces would be working but would be expressing themselves in different and differing ways.

But here is a most important point which our theosophists continually lose sight of, I do believe: the originating causes of all things, and therefore of all diversities and differences, are from within. Do you get the idea? Back of the swabhava, back of the individuality, or monadic essence of every entity or thing, there is infinitude. Consequently upon this inner, inmost, reservoir you can always draw. All the various phenomena of manifestation ultimately spring forth from within. This 'within' contains all things, and all varieties of things; and the one phase of the eternity-long movements of this inmost stage, or nature or characteristic, which is now developed in the case of us, is manhood. In the case of the gods it is godhood.

We shall also in time evolve forth godhood, just as we have evolved forth manhood.

Consequently, the inhabitants of other planets, and the spiritual inhabitants of the stars which bestrew space, live fundamentally in the same essential cosmic energies and substances; but in each individual instance these fundamental substances or elements and energies express themselves according to the particular phase which any entity at the time is passing through.

Student — May that idea be used in writing at all, without being too explicit? Because it is very important if it can be.

G. de P. — Certainly you can. HPB speaks of it again and again in a rather veiled form in The Secret Doctrine. But this idea of the inner god as the fountain of what any entity is, is a most wonderful key if you will allow your mind to dwell upon it, ponder on it, brood upon it.

Student — Out in the world there is the common idea that man is the victim of his environment, that his environment makes him. Of course as theosophists we do not believe that, but we have to meet that sophistry.

And yet it seems to me that there is some truth in it, because it is very difficult for weak souls to come into a world that has such hard social conditions. You see, we meet those two ideas: one, that man is the victim of his environment; and the other that it is his karma.

G. de P. — Well, you have very neatly and well set forth the essential difference between evolution as expressed in modern scientific circles based upon the idea originating with Darwin, and the theosophical teaching of evolution. It is practically true that environment does influence entities; but it must be remembered that the entity enters such or another environment because it is his karma to do so. He himself so lived in past existences as to bring about the present new existence in this environment; and that same entity

— and similarly so with all other entities involved — is a part of that environment, an integral part, and thus helps to form the same environment for all other entities which in their turn likewise help to form that environment. It is all action and interaction, mingling and intermingling, locking and interlocking.

The only way to meet inquirers along this line and to answer their questions properly is by teaching theosophy, by explaining, by working, and by hammering at the truth; trying not to be discouraged by the dull minds that one meets, but keeping at it all the time — teaching, teaching, teaching through the years.

Just look at ourselves, how long it has taken many of us to assimilate the majestic theosophical doctrines.

Remember how simple they appeared at first, and then came the mental difficulties when we began to know a little more about them. But those difficulties were just the things that we needed in order to stimulate a livelier interest to probe more deeply into them. Then came a newer and stronger and brighter light.

Do you understand me?

Student — Yes, thank you. But it seems awfully hard for those young souls.

G. de P. — Yes, in a way it may be so, but isn't that the case with all of us? It is the way by which we learn.

When you think about it, in this wonderful universe the highest god in highest heaven as compared with eternity and infinity is but an embryo-entity just beginning to learn, beginning to grow, because it is always entering upon a new phase of illumination and progress. Growth is endless, and in one sense is but a continuous unending expansion of consciousness flowing forth from within.

Student — It is customary with us in thinking of inhabitants to associate them entirely with the various heavenly bodies; but is it also true that there are just as many inhabitants in the spaces between the heavenly bodies? There is much more room there.

G. de P. — Why of course. And of course also is it true that what human beings popularly call empty space is filled full with entities; but nevertheless — and this should be carefully noted — all exist in some home, in some sphere, on some globe.

Let me tell you something. Interstellar space and interplanetary space is packed full with interpenetrating globes. On any one plane like our physical plane, the globes are spaced rather widely apart. But there are planes within planes, wheels within wheels, realms within realms, all interpenetrating. There is not a point, a

mathematical point, in infinitude which is not a monad.

Student — This is on another subject. I have often wondered how it is that the religion that was started by the Buddha should have deteriorated to its present state; and I wonder, is there not the same danger for the theosophical movement to crystallize into a religion? The messenger in the first case was the Buddha; he was perhaps the highest messenger who has come to the earth for millions of years.

G. de P. — True.

Student — And in the second place it was H. P. Blavatsky, who was not as high as the Buddha. Was the coming to this earth of the one less momentous than that of the other?

G. de P. — Yes, it was less momentous. That statement is quite true. But with regard to the second or rather the intermediate part of your remarks: it is precisely the danger of the degeneration of theosophy into a sectarian religion that we must prevent, and that fate has already begun and is proceeding apace in the largest of the Theosophical Societies, so called, existing today. I don't care to point more particularly. It was because of this danger being imminent that the need for checking things, for separating the sheep from the goats, has become so great at the present time. The theosophical movement must be kept pure and inspired by the original unadulterated teachings derived from the flow of inspiration from the Great Lodge. The theosophical movement must not be allowed to degenerate into a dogmatic religion, into a sectarian faith.

It matters not what happens to individual theosophists. It matters not what happens to the messengers. The work of safety and purification must be done, and it will be done. I will tell you frankly that I was sent to do that work more than anything else — to rescue genuine theosophists in the other societies, and to keep our own Society in the purity, in the theosophical purity, that at present distinguishes it, and this is due more than anything else to KT's masterly esoteric training. That saved the situation even in the earlier days when she first came into office. You should know this fact. One less strong than she would have failed. It was her very strength, her willpower, her vision, that brought upon her devoted head the hatred and misrepresentations regarding her and her character and her work that exist in the world today outside of our Society.

Now coming to the first part of your question regarding the religion of the Buddha: it is true that in certain doctrinal aspects it has not retained the crystalline purity that it had as long as the great master lived. But granting that, nevertheless this also should be said, that it is the most theosophical in the proper sense of the word of any religion or religious philosophy on the earth today. It is the cleanest, the purest, the loftiest religion on earth today, and the least degenerated of them all.

Student — My question is regarding thoughts. It has been partly answered in speaking of the monadic essence in which lies the fountain of all we receive, and in speaking of the will, of which we partake, being universal.

I do not quite understand how it is, but a thought comes to us and it becomes good or evil as we use it. Is it that a thought coming to us from the monadic essence in its purity is colored by our lower rays, egos, veils?

G. de P. — You are speaking of thought?

Student — Yes, thought.

G. de P. — No. Thought originates in the ego. Thought is really thoughts. Thought is merely an abstraction.

There is, strictly speaking, no such thing as thought, per se, any more than there is such a thing as length, per se, or breadth, or depth. But there are long things, broad things, deep things. There is no such thing as thought, but there are thoughts, and thoughts are born in the egoic part of the human constitution. It is consciousness which flows forth from the monadic essence; and this consciousness builds for itself mansions out of its own stuff, much as a cocoon is built out of the very stuff of the entity within it; and it is this ego thus builded which thinks thoughts.

Now as regards the will. Will is a part of what I have called consciousness. It is an impersonal energy, just like electricity for instance. Electricity can be used for evil purposes or for good purposes. In itself it is

impersonal. The will likewise, when passing through the egoic center, through an ego, can be used for evil purposes or good purposes — evil and good meaning respectively against nature's evolutionary river, or flowing with it, with the Law, or against the Law.

Do you understand?

Student — Yes, Professor.

Student — I would like to ask whether the time has come in the evolution of the race when it will be possible with great care to keep this movement pure, so that never again it need fall into the same mistakes that other movements have made in the past.

G. de P. — Yes, Doctor, it is possible. The time has arrived in the racial evolution when this last effort made by the Masters can be kept as it was given to us, pure and unadulterated. And that is what we are here for.

Please remember, Companions, that it is not mere numbers of adherents to which the Masters look as the distinguishing quality.

The Christian Church, for instance, as compared with our own small Theosophical Society, is a giant, and yet see how weak it is in spiritual things. It is quality that we are striving for; and although, as I have written again and again, one of our first duties is to increase our membership by every means in our power, nevertheless we should never forget that at the same time what we really want is not only members but first, and above all other things, quality in the members that we have. This quality shows in those who love theosophy so that it fills their lives, and thus there is an instinct in them to live for it, and to die for it, if needs be. That is the chela-spirit.

As long as that spirit can be kept alive, the Theosophical Society will live on into the future, pure and undefiled, and nothing in the universe can prevail against it, or will, because a spiritual movement such as this was intended to be — and in our own Society even yet is — is allied to the very heart of the universe, which heart is the fountain of light.

If it fails, if the theosophical movement fails, we shall be responsible — you and I. The theosophical movement is humanity's hope, and this is no grandiloquent phrase, no vain boast. It is holy truth. Nothing matters in comparison. Nothing matters at all — what happens to you or to me — if we can keep the Society as it was given to us. As we have received it we must hand it on; and, please the Immortal Gods, we will!

There are millions of people in the world who, when they know something of genuine theosophy, will be drawn to it and will join us. The great difficulty is in destroying the cobwebby veils which becloud people's brain-minds; trying to open their eyes so that they will see and understand what the theosophical movement is, what the Theosophical Society is, what we are working for. To use an old expression, "God and one man can conquer the world."

Student — May I ask one more question? I would like to know if the pratyeka buddhas have a Lodge and are working to gain adherents among humanity, and so in a sense are working against us. I mean to say, are they interested in trying to bring humanity to their views instead of ours?

G. de P. — Yes, in a sense they are. And yet they are very pure and holy beings. They have no Lodge, at least as far as I know. The very name pratyeka means "for himself alone." The pratyeka buddha is a buddha, one who has become at one with the god within, more or less, because there are pratyeka buddhas of different degrees — but note well that they are not buddhas of compassion. They are great and noble, highly evolved, spiritual men, whose whole strength is concentrated on gaining "salvation," but for themselves alone. They would like the world to be where they are; they have great love and sympathy for the world. They do no harm at all, could not be buddhas if they did, but they are solitary; the whole strength of their being is concentrated on evolution for themselves, to attain nirvana for themselves.

Whereas the buddhas of compassion give up, resign, renounce, the gain for self in order to help mankind —

more than that, in order to help the world, all things both great and small. In order to do this, to achieve their sublime work more easily, they found schools, they institute societies, orders, among men, like our own

theosophical movement. As I have already told you, our own holy Order is headed by a buddha of compassion, who is often spoken of as the Maha-chohan.

Student — May I ask if there are any pratyeka buddhas in history or known to the world, or would they just seem ordinary people to us, perhaps all around us?

G. de P. — The pratyeka buddhas do not found schools. The very name means "each for himself," therefore solitaries. They are often called in the mystic literature of the Orient rhinoceroses, because they live alone as that beast does. They retire from the world. They go into retreats and attain nirvana in peace and happiness for themselves. But they are very holy simply because they have reached the sublime state of true spirituality, but nevertheless for themselves alone. In other words, they are human beings who have advanced so far along the evolutionary pathway that they are like men-gods, at least in the highest grades of them; whereas the buddhas of compassion remain in the world, teach, help, guard humanity, save, as far as they can, and found schools, institute sacred orders such as ours at different times in history, and live in the world for the world, not for themselves. But both classes are buddhas.

Student — May I ask a question? We have been told of course that we are entering kali yuga, a period of enormous extent.

G. de P. — We have entered it.

Student — Yes, we have entered it. And that the depths of that cycle are still to come. As I understand it, we shall sink lower and lower, pass through much more material experiences is that correct — than we have known thus far?

G. de P. — That is correct, yes.

Student — And that in this great cycle there are numberless or several small rises, and that at the present time we are at the beginning of one of those rises? Now if theosophy is kept pure, is it possible to carry it through? We can readily understand that it might be carried pure through the extent or period of this one rise, but could it be carried pure over the great fall or descents that are to come? And also I have another question in connection with that which I shall ask later.

G. de P. — Well, what is the question?

Student — The present question: is it possible for theosophy to be kept continually pure throughout the entire kali yuga, no matter what the descent may be?

G. de P. — Certainly. You have forgotten, or at any rate you have not stated it, one most important fact of the spiritual psychological equation that you have just spoken of: that all things on our earth's planetary chain are now on the ascending or luminous arc. Therefore all things are constantly ascending, although it may be at present with extreme slowness because there is little momentum behind us, which nevertheless means that we have back of us an enormous spiritual force.

Student — Yes, that was never clear in my mind how you could combine the two.

G. de P. — We are steadily going up the mountain, so that kali yuga means a deep descent into a valley, although the descent itself is on the steady upward rise. Remember also that any deep descent is composed of an up-and-down pathway, but with the general tendency rising. Do you see the picture?

Student — Oh, yes. May I ask another question? What constitutes or makes the terror, the force, of this descent? Is it the coming into incarnation of evil beings that are not with us now; or the falling upon us of old karma? Or is it something that we could avoid, and pass through without the experience under the wheel, as it were?

G. de P. — In other words not have any kali yuga?

Student — No. We might say that the world, humanity as a whole, is underneath the wheel. But those who have the light of this philosophy, though we may experience the same sorrows, are not under the wheel. We are on top. We are as powers above it.

G. de P. — That is true.

Student — Now is it possible for humanity to pass through the terrible experiences — as seen from the higher viewpoint — that are coming?

G. de P. — It is possible, but the average humanity won't do it. And I will tell you the reason why in a moment or two. But first let me say that in order to minimize the evil as far as possible, in order to render great and substantial spiritual and intellectual help in the coming dark periods, the theosophical movement, a spiritual movement, was founded. The reason why the bulk of humanity will not remain on top but will deliberately go down into kali yuga until the next rise begins, is the fact that all these four yuga periods succeeding each other regularly through time are cyclical periods arising in nature's own processes. They are like a wheel, a rapidly whirling wheel of life. You cannot go up unless you have come down previously, and if you go up, that wheel will turn you down. But for individuals or for any collection or aggregate of individuals, while the downward turn will undoubtedly take place, even so they can call upon their inner divine powers, so that although the physical body and the mentality, as they certainly will, will be affected by the descent of the wheel, nevertheless interiorly they can be on higher planes. The figure is involved, the picture is rather obscure, perhaps, but likewise it may help you to understand. Do you?

Student — Thank you, yes, fully I think. And I have one more question.

G. de P. — For instance, the Masters of Compassion and Wisdom and Peace, when they incarnate, have to take physical bodies belonging to this gross earth, because it is a material earth. It is almost at the lowest point of the descent, but yet they are Masters of Wisdom and Compassion and Peace even now. Similarly is it with the buddhas of compassion. When they incarnate they have to take fourth-round bodies, because there are none others on this planet, but they nevertheless remain buddhas of compassion. Is that clear?

Student — Perfectly clear.

G. de P. — What then is your next question?

Student — It is this: what you have just said seems to be an explanation of that stanza in The Voice of the Silence which asks the question, "Shalt thou divert the stream for thine own sake, or send it back to its prime source along the crests of cycles?" Now that "along the crests of cycles" was in my mind; and is it not what you have just explained?

G. de P. — Yes, the reference actually is to the fact that cycles exist, and that their periods of flowering will be on the crests, along — it is "along" there I believe — crest after crest. It does not mean that they will jump, so to say, from crest to crest. They must follow the wheel of life because they are karmically bound to it. You have clearly set forth also, in using that quotation, the essential difference between the pratyeka buddhas and the buddhas of compassion. The one diverts the stream of the spirit for his own ends; but as those ends are very pure and lofty, they are buddhas.

Pratyeka buddhas are not evil; just the contrary, they are very pure and holy men. But judged from the standpoint of the buddhas of compassion, there is a spiritual selfishness there, a concentration on self. Do you understand? The time will come in the distant aeons of the far future when karma, having written the record, will expose the entries on the books, and then the buddhas of compassion, having laid up treasures in heaven, to use the figure of Jesus, will draw upon those treasures, and will be aeons ahead of the pratyeka buddhas in an evolutionary sense. I think that I have tried to explain this matter at some former meeting.

Now, Companions, I will answer two or three more questions, if there are any to be asked.

Student — Was Moses a messenger sent out also? When he took the Jews from Egypt?

G. de P. — Yes, I understand what you mean. I am trying to think how best to answer your question so as not to mislead you. Moses was a type-figure, but was actually founded on a real man who as a messenger was sent to the Jews. The stories told about him in the Old Testament are allegorical stories. I think that this answers your question.

Student — Yes, thank you.

Student — In thinking over our relation with our own inner god it seems to dawn upon one's consciousness that we are really not inhabitants of a physical world, but rather inhabitants, if you could put it in that way, of a being. If that is so, would there not be what you might call a geography of that being, just as there is a physical geography of the world? Is it not possible to know it with great exactitude?

G. de P. — Yes, it is. It is perfectly true that we humans are lifeatoms in the physical vehicle of some cosmic entity. It is exactly like the atoms of our body which are inhabitants of us. There is furthermore what you might call a topography of this divine being, or a cosmography, and you see it in the skies above you in its physical aspect. A solar system is an atom of this cosmic being. Our own home-universe, which means everything comprised within the bounds of the Milky Way, is a cell of this cosmic being. And all other outlying universes are other cells.

As I have tried to tell you on other occasions, my dear Companions, the entities inhabiting some of the atoms of our physical bodies — and this is a fact — are as incognizant of us, except intuitively, spiritually, as we are as men incognizant of this cosmic entity "in whom we live and move and have our being," as Paul of the Christians said. We live in its life. That life is our spiritual fountainhead. It is the source of our being. To it we shall ultimately return in consciousness. This cosmic entity in its turn is but a lifeatom in the being of some other entity still more incomprehensibly vast.

What pictures, what thoughts, our sublime philosophy gives to us! Do you know that every human being is destined in the future not only to become a solar system, but at some later date in eternity, if I can use such an expression — is destined to become a universe? And then ascend still higher?

Student — May I ask a question? Do the electrons in an atom have their origin in the proton in the same way that the planets have their origin in the sun?

G. de P. — In the same way as the planets have their origin in the sun?

Student — Well, by that I mean that they are children of the sun, they belong to the sun; and don't I understand that they come into being from the remnants of the old sun that was in the previous manvantara?

G. de P. — Now that you have explained yourself, your remarks are all right. And it is so in the atom. But remember that the sun, while our parent, is nevertheless only our elder brother, paradoxical as that sounds.

The reason being that we are just as old as the sun is. The sun is simply an aggregate of such lifeatoms manifesting as a ball or bundle of cosmic forces, energies. We enter the sun and then we leave the sun.

Planets are of the body of the sun, and yet are themselves entities pursuing their own lines of evolution. They are co-eternal with the sun, and yet because they pass through the sun at certain periods — enter the sun and leave it — it is also appropriate to say that the sun is our parent; just as the lifeatom of a child at one time existed in its father's body. The father therefore is the elder brother of his son, and also his parent. These expressions sound quaint, but simply because we have no words in which rightly to express these thoughts.

I think, Companions, that we had better close the meeting for tonight.

[The sounding of the gong. Silence.]

Meeting 17

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Seventeen

Meeting of July 23, 1930

G. de P. — I am now ready to answer questions.

Student — One of the members of this group in reading one of Robert Browning's poems gave a unique interpretation of it, and I would like to ask you if such a thing would be possible. There is a king, who in the mind of this member was somewhat of an initiate or teacher, and he had a very dear disciple or chela who was devoted and faithful. The teacher was going through a struggle with some evil forces, which perhaps he had attracted to himself in some former incarnation, and the pupil through his utter selflessness and impersonal love was able to draw away these evil forces, and the teacher thus came out of the struggle successfully.

It seemed such an interesting and unusual situation I wondered if such a thing could ever be possible.

G. de P. — It is indeed a most unusual — or would be rather — a most unusual thing. Usually, of course, it is the teacher who watches over his pupils, guides their steps, and saves them from danger. But at the same time the devoted love and watchfulness of the chelas for their teacher is a very real force of protection thrown around the teacher. The chelas can at least free the teacher's attention, to a certain extent, from guarding — if I may so phrase the matter — his own atmosphere, his own individuality.

I don't think that the power that a chela could ordinarily have would be strong enough to interfere with the teacher's karma. Karma always must come, and the teacher would be the last person in the world to prevent its coming, to impede its coming. With the wisdom and insight and spiritual strength that a real teacher has, or is supposed to have, he would be able to lead such an evil karma falling upon him into rivulets, or small runlets, of exhaustion, so that the entirety of the burden might not fall upon him as a crushing blow. Such cases occasionally happen. Disease, for instance, along the lines of the explanation that I have tried to give on other occasions, is frequently treated in this way. I do not know what else I could answer. Is the answer at all responsive to your thought?

Student — Yes, thank you. It is just what I thought.

Student — Four weeks ago you told us that only one globe of any septenary chain on the same planes of the kosmos as our earth's planetary chain, can be seen by the men who live in this fourth round of the earth's planetary chain. In other words, the fourth globe of any chain, the lowest globe of any chain, is that globe which can be sensed by the inhabitants of this fourth globe of the earth-chain, because all such visible globes are all on the same plane of material existence on which we are in this our fourth globe of the earth-chain.

G. de P. — That is right.

Student — That was quoted from the corrected stenographic report of four weeks ago. Question: I believe, if I understand correctly, that each one of the planets that we see is part, or rather is only one globe, of each respective planetary chain. Is then this globe that we see the fourth globe of each respective chain?

G. de P. — Yes, it is; and we see these fourth globes of the other planetary chains only because we are on the same cosmic plane. There is one reservation that perhaps I should have made in the quotation that you have read from me, and it is this: that those who have passed the fourth degree of initiation can see other globes than the fourth one of the several planetary chains. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, thank you. May I lead up to my next question with this remark? I understand that there are seven planes with a globe on each corresponding plane — in the large sense — and that also there is a moon connected with each globe of the earth-chain. Is that correct?

G. de P. — The latter part is correct. Each globe of the earth-chain has a corresponding globe of the lunar

chain which is its own parent. But the seven globes of the earth's planetary chain do not exist on seven different cosmic planes. All the seven globes of the planetary chain of the earth exist only on the four lower cosmic planes. On the fourth cosmic plane there exist two globes of our planetary chain, the first and the last, globe A and globe G. On the fifth cosmic plane counting downwards there exist likewise two globes of our planetary chain, globe B and globe F. On the sixth cosmic plane counting downwards there likewise exist two globes of our planetary chain, globe C and globe E. And on the seventh and last or lowest of the cosmic planes, there exists one globe, our earth, it being the turning point of all the rounds. Have you the picture in your mind?

Student — Yes, thank you. I think that it also answers my next question. Then that is why you speak of two moon-globes and the two earth-globes existing on the same next solar plane?

G. de P. — Correct. That is quite right.

Student — Referring to this question about the poem that Browning wrote about Saul: in order to make any sense out of it, it seems that we have to interpret the Bible story theosophically, in order to face the characters where they have a meaning; and would it be correct to assign the name Saul to the human soul, and David to the divinity?

G. de P. — Well now, there is a mystical thought which is not so wide of the truth; but I do not think that the two Jewish Biblical characters of David and Saul refer specifically to the two human principles of which you speak. There is, however, a mystical allusion, or rather a forced one, if you like.

David, I understand, was "a man after God's own heart," was he not?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — Well, in our own times, I am afraid that the police would have jailed him for bigamy among other things, or trigamy, or some other kind of "igamy." You see, I would not like to say that the application that you have made is an exact one, though your thought runs along the true line. Do you understand me?

Student — The picture that the poet paints of David seems to be very beautiful.

G. de P. — Well, David has been given a coat of whitewash, like so many others of the biblical characters.

He was perhaps no worse than other folk of his times, or of our times for the matter of that.

Student — What is the relation, if any, between the globe D of the earth-chain and the humanity of globe D

of the earth-chain, and the three superior globes during earth-life, or at any other time? What is the relation between this globe D and the three ascending or superior globes of the chain?

G. de P. — The three ascending globes of the chain? There is a very close relation indeed. I may perhaps say this, following the ancient rule that when an intuitive question is asked, some answer must be forthcoming.

Physically speaking, human beings are the children of the earth. The moon is also very closely involved in the production of our physical form. The three ascending globes of the earth-chain have practically nothing at all to do with the physical body of man, but a very great deal to do with the interior part of man's constitution, and especially after death. I will also say this, that the monad after the death of a physical body on earth passes through these three globes on the ascending arc of the earth's planetary chain, before the monad goes on to destinies still more wonderful.

Do you get a hint from what I have answered?

Student — Yes, thank you.

Student — Who created the animals and vegetables and the mineral kingdom of the first round if man came after them? Were they the result of what we did on the moon?

G. de P. — Are you speaking of the first round?

Student — Yes, Professor. Because we understand that the animals came from man, and indeed that all the lower kingdoms came from man. I am puzzled.

G. de P. — It is quite true that the animals and the lower kingdoms came from "man," and yet man, as we know him, came later than the minerals and vegetables, but not the animals. Now this is a puzzle, worthy of Oedipus, is it not? Well, here is the idea. You are speaking of the first round. That was the formative period during which the seven globes of the earth's planetary chain were formed — were in formation. There were no men when the earth first began to form. There were the three elemental kingdoms which did their work around the laya-center, helping to build up this aeriform, luciform, translucent body which the earth then was.

Are you referring only to our fourth globe?

Student — No, I was referring to globe A.

G. de P. — Very well, then, globe A. In that case the same remark applies exactly. When the three elemental kingdoms had done their work on globe A, they went into obscuration, and then the surplusage of their life passed downwards into a more material region and began the elemental work of forming the succeeding globe B. But meanwhile on globe A, the mineral kingdom had begun to come into existence, and the mineral kingdom at this early time was the product of the monads which in the fourth round were destined to become men, or rather, destined to manifest as men. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, Professor.

G. de P. — When the mineral kingdom had finished its work on globe A, it in its turn then went into obscuration, and its surplusage of life passed to form the mineral kingdom on globe B; while the three elemental kingdoms which had preceded it on the downward arc during round one, moved forward, each one, a step to globe C, D, and E, beginning the elemental forms on these three globes. Meanwhile, going back to globe A which the surplusage of life in the mineral kingdom had left and which partly remained in obscuration on globe A as the mineral kingdom there, the vegetable kingdom then began to put in an appearance on globe A, a still further manifestation of the seven classes of the monads which were to produce men, the monads which were to express themselves as humans on globe D, our earth, in the fourth round.

When the vegetable kingdom had run through its seven root-races, or had finished its work on globe A, then just exactly as the preceding kingdoms had done, a part remained on globe A as the sishtas, the seeds, in obscuration; and the surplusage of the life forces of the vegetable kingdom passed on to globe B, the second globe on the downward arc, in order to form the vegetable kingdom there. And with its incoming into globe B, or the second globe, each one of the kingdoms which had preceded it and which were then existent on different globes, moved forward each one a globe or a step in evolution. Returning again to globe A. Almost immediately coincident with the entering into obscuration of the vegetable kingdom on globe A, the animal kingdom began to put in an appearance on globe A, these animal monads being one of the classes of monads which later on, and during the fourth round, would become human beings, men. Do you follow the scheme thus far?

Student — Yes, Professor.

G. de P. — When the beasts, if you may call them that, on globe A in the first round had run through their seven root-races on that globe — or seven rings, or seven cycles, call them what you will — and had finished their racial evolution, a part of them went into obscuration as the sishtas or seeds for the next planetary manvantara, and the surplusage or remaining life-forces of the animal kingdom passed in their turn down into globe B which was then ready for the incoming animal kingdom, because on globe B the preceding or vegetable kingdom had finished its work. When this occurred each one of the kingdoms already in the procession forwards, took still another step forwards, that is, each one of the kingdoms went to another globe.

Returning again to globe A: now comes the time for the primary human beings to appear on globe A in the first round. They came — sketches of a humanity, so to speak. And this embryo humanity went through its seven root-races on globe A producing in the seventh root-race beings very closely akin to what we would call men; but beings appropriate in every way, physically, psychologically, spiritually and otherwise, to globe

A during the first round. When the seven root-races of the human kingdom on globe A during the first round were ended, then globe A as a globe went into obscuration, because the human kingdom passed on to the next globe B; and just as before each one of the preceding classes of monads, the three elemental kingdoms, the mineral, the vegetable, and the animal, moved each one a step ahead.

Thus then the auric eggs — and I am changing the figure of explanation now — the auric eggs which began the building up of globe A as the three elemental kingdoms are the same auric eggs which in the fourth round enshrine human beings. Do you see the picture?

Student — Of the elemental kingdoms, yes.

G. de P. — Man is a microcosm. He has in his composition the three elemental kingdoms, the mineral kingdom, the vegetable kingdom, the beast kingdom, and the human kingdom, and in addition is overshadowed or over-lightened by a god — his own inner god.

The time periods of the respective appearances of the beasts and men on earth are puzzling because in certain of our teachings it is taught that man preceded the beasts, and in other parts it is stated that man came after the beasts. As a matter of fact, both statements are true, but depending upon the time periods one has in mind. So far as the globes are concerned and the rounds, the beasts preceded man as man now is, but man outran the higher orders of the beasts; so that when in the fourth round on this fourth globe man appeared, he appeared before the mammals, and this word mammals is the important word to recollect. The lower animals evolutionally beneath the mammals appeared on earth, this earth, this fourth globe in this fourth round, before man did, being sishtas and products from the preceding third round; but the mammalian beasts came after man, and as a matter of fact directly from him in the early third root-race and after. Do you understand it a little better now, perhaps?

Recollect this also, Companions, that everything on globe D, earth, and throughout the entire planetary chain of earth, ultimately or rather originally came from man. The three elemental kingdoms, the mineral kingdom, the vegetable kingdom, the beast kingdom, and of course his own kingdom; and when the word man is used in this way it does not mean man as he now is, but that particular stream of astral monadic essences who inform man even at the present time. I repeat: during previous rounds the leading family of monads, which now is the human family, threw off from itself during those different rounds first the elemental kingdoms, then the mineral kingdom, then the vegetable kingdom, and then the beasts beneath the mammals, and man as we now know him came afterwards. But in the fourth round on this fourth globe, man had outrun in his evolutionary course those higher classes of beasts called the mammalian astral monads, and therefore man as a family appeared before they did. Do you understand it better?

Many Voices — Yes, thank you, Professor.

G. de P. — As a final comment, I might also add that as mammals signifies beings with breasts, sexual beings, man must have separated from his former androgynous or hermaphroditic state before the mammalian beasts appeared. Of course non-mammalian sex appeared before the mammals, but here we are discussing that form of sex which we call the mammalian. Man himself is a mammal, physically speaking, remember.

Recollect also in this connection that the original appearances of the first and second root-races appeared far back in geologic time — in fact in what is now called the Primary Age by geologists, and even as far back in the Primary Age possibly as the Devonian and Permian Periods. It was probably in the Triassic Period of the Secondary Age that man first "separated" into the two sexes, and this was about the fifth subrace of the third root-race. The small mammals of marsupial type, which the geologic record of the rocks shows as appearing in the early Secondary, prove by the esoteric records that man himself must then have separated into the two sexes from his former androgynous state.

When I used the word outran in my preceding observations this evening, I was referring to the fact that the higher classes of monads run more rapidly up the ascending arc than do the lower classes, because it is here that the law of retardation weighs upon the lower classes; and the law of acceleration aids the higher classes of monads such as the human, because these higher classes are more spiritual. Also in a general way it may be stated that the highest classes lead in the van and the lower classes come trailing afterwards. Nor is this

contradictory of the other fact that, merely regarding the geologic evolutionary record, we find that the lowest classes of monads, as living physical entities, came first, then the next higher, then the next higher, and then the next higher up to man. This is a paradoxical statement, but it would require an hour's explanation for complete elucidation, and I must let the statement go as it is for your thoughtful study. Even in an army, although the scouts and the privates come first, the general and his staff are guiding the campaign and lay out the routes, and often actually physically may be found in the van themselves. The idea is an imperfect illustration, but it may help.

[ The sounding of the gong. Silence.]

Meeting 18

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Eighteen

Meeting of August 12, 1930

G. de P. — Will you please sound the gong. Are there any communications this evening?

Secretary — Yes, Professor.

G. de P. — Please read.

Secretary — "Dear G. de P. and Teacher: All through the study and preparation of the symposium on the Buddha, we felt that there was an inner meaning underlying the whole life of the Buddha, and several points definitely suggested themselves to us as being distinctly esoteric.

"Would you be willing to devote a KTMG meeting to the esoteric interpretation of the exoteric life of the Buddha?

"We felt that if through the mere relating of the exoteric story of the Buddha's life we could be so raised and inspired, then a glorious and indeed wonderful inspiration it would be to us to know the real esoteric meaning of his life.

"Those words which you spoke at the close of our meeting on last Sunday evening urged us to write and ask you this because we believed that they were the key to all knowledge. Knowing also that you have so often spoken to us of the splendor of the Buddha's character, and have held him up to us as a supreme example, we felt that if we knew more of the meaning of his

life it would help us to understand our later teachers; and also, we felt that your interpretation would help us to make the buddhic splendor even more real to us.

"Devotedly,

"A GROUP OF YOUR STUDENTS."

G. de P. — This is a beautiful communication, Companions. We shall devote a part of the evening to it. I don't think that it would be fair, however, to give all our evening's time to this one subject. There are other reasons too, which strike me immediately as making it inadvisable to say too much regarding the life on earth, as a man, of one who has been rightly and properly called the light of the world.

He was one of the two buddhas of our present fifth root-race. He took human form, that is to say, incarnated in the body of a boy-child, according to our own esoteric records, in the year 643 BC, in a town in the foothills of the Himalayas, commonly known in the ancient Buddhist records as Kapilavastu. His father was an Indian raja, his mother was an Indian princess, the daughter of an Indian raja. The name of the clan, as Occidental scholars use the word, in which he was born was the Sakya clan, and this word Sakya accounts for the title that was in later years frequently given to him, Sakyamuni, the muni of the Sakyas: muni being a Sanskrit word which means sage or recluse. His father's name, according to the exoteric legends, was Suddhodana. This is a Sanskrit word which means "pure water," or "pure flow." The name of his mother was Maya, or sometimes Mayadevi, meaning "illusion." The child that was born to him was called Rahula, his son. His wife's name was Yasodhara, also a Sanskrit name which might be translated as "holder of glory" or

"of splendor."

All these names, as is obvious, immediately suggest that the entire exoteric story of the Buddha was a symbolic one, showing him to have been born of a mother called Illusion and a male parent called Pure Wave, in other words Pure Inspiration, which is the food of the mind; his wife's name being Bearer of Splendor would signify some great spiritual quality that he possessed and which surrounded him. And yet, as far as I know, these names were the actual names of the individuals in question, and really pertained to his parents

and to his wife. I do not know of any reason to regard the general exoteric story of his birth as being wholly symbolic. Every Sanskrit scholar in European countries knows by heart the beautiful, tender, and touching story of the Lord Buddha. As it has come down to us, there is much of legend about it, of course, but every part of these legendary accounts has a basis of esoteric fact.

His son, Rahula, was an unusual man, but yet was a fourth-round man; whereas the Lord Buddha himself was a sixth rounder, which means that he had preceded the general evolution of humanity in this fourth round by two rounds — he had run ahead by two rounds of the general evolutionary status of the majority of mankind today. And this was actually so. His inner constitution had through the ages past ascended through the entire planetary chain, time and time again, imbodying itself on each globe of our planetary chain, so that at the time when this great soul was last born as a man, as Siddhartha of Kapilavastu, the intermediate part of his constitution, or his human part, was in actual fact a sixth rounder. He was then as all mankind will be in the sixth round of the seven rounds which comprise the entire cycle of the planetary manvantara.

The Buddha did not teach anything new invented by himself. He taught merely the wisdom of the gods, the secrets and hid mysteries of the sanctuary, known to a few initiated Brahmanas of his own time, but by them very carefully hid away from the majority of mankind, according to the ancient traditions which had been followed faithfully since the middle point of the fourth root-race. He brought some of these secrets out, and incorporated them in his magnificent philosophy; and these secrets thus form the basic elements of his teachings known in modern times as Buddhism. It has been said of Gautama the Buddha that he was the very incarnation of wisdom and love, and this statement is true.

He was, in fact, not merely overshadowed by, but was the actual manifesting vehicle of his own divine inner being, his own inner god. That inner god manifested through the human intermediate part, and even through the physical vehicle, so that his very presence irradiated wisdom, love, compassion, and peace, and the inner buddhic splendor. He also was a human being of great and outstanding physical beauty, far, far, superior to what human beings usually call a very handsome man. He was tall. He was majestic in deportment. He had all the attributes of sublime manhood through which shone the divinity within.

You all know the story how even as a child he manifested transcendent powers, and there is a substantial basis of fact in this story. Being a sixth rounder, even in childhood he was what in modern times would be called a genius, but a genius on all lines, not merely on one line like some of these curious children who are occasionally born as musical prodigies, or as mathematical prodigies, or what not; but in all lines of human development interiorly he showed forth the transcendent powers of the inner divinity. That is the basis of the exoteric story that even as a little boy he confounded all his teachers, confounded the masters of wisdom of his time. He seemed to know everything without having studied, and it was largely true.

I may add in this connection, Companions, that there are very, very, very few sixth rounders. They are so few indeed, that their appearance comes only at long intervals, and they are all of buddhic standing; not necessarily all buddhas, because the buddhas are sixth rounders in the seventh or last degree or stage of the sixth round, but there are other sixth rounders not so high, who do, at rare, rare intervals appear. There are also such human beings as fifth rounders who are by no means so spiritually elevated, so intellectually sublime, as the sixth rounders are; but these fifth rounders are fairly frequent occurrences even in our fourth round. They come fairly frequently in time and they are the outstanding geniuses of the human race, the really great men, the high and noble spiritual teachers, the founders of religions and of great world philosophies. As a matter of fact, an advanced fifth rounder is what you would call a mahatma, a Master, an advanced one.

Even among the mahatmas, seventh-degree sixth rounders are rare. There are some who are in the earlier stages of the sixth-round period; but the Lord Buddha was one who might be called a sixth rounder in the seventh or last stage of the sixth round, therefore almost a god incarnate in flesh.

There are also fifth rounders who are in the early stages of fifth-round development, and these are what would probably be called superior or very exceptional men and women of a much higher spiritual and intellectual type than the majority of men are who belong, of course, to the fourth round.

You all know the story how his parents, alarmed at the signs of amazing wisdom and intellectual power that he manifested, and warned by the wise men of the time who lived more or less in the spiritual life and light,

and hence could foresee, tried to hold him to the family life, tried to prevent his inner nature being aroused by the sorrow and sadness of the world. All these exoteric stories are based on grounds of actual fact, although the exoteric stories are more or less embroidered. But the time finally came when the Buddha within the young man began to show itself clearly; and when that happened, then the awakening came to him even as a young man, after his son Rahula was born. He left his home, went into the Himalayas, tried this discipline and tried that, investigated all things, seeking wisdom, seeking the greater light, withdrawing more and more into his own inner being, being more and more irradiated by the divine splendor and the brilliance of the divinity within; until one day he sat himself down under the Bo tree as it is called, the Bodhi tree — which means the tree of wisdom, so called because there he became the full-blown buddha.

It was prophesied of him in his childhood by the wise men of the time, and prophesied very truly, that he would either become a buddha shaking the world, shaking the hearts of men, with his teachings — or a Chakravarti. A Chakravarti means one who "turns the wheel," and is used of the great world-kings — world conquerors is the way in which the warlike Occidental is accustomed to explain the term. But all these Chakravartis are good men, great men, ethically speaking, not mere world conquerors driven by ambition and the hunger to control and to possess.

Under the Bodhi tree, at that eventful time, the inner buddha entered into the consciousness of the outer human being, and the Buddha thenceforth was manifest. Thereafter he set forth on his wanderings, on his pilgrimage over India, teaching, gathering disciples, but always teaching, teaching, teaching. He taught the esoteric wisdom, then held closely secret by the few Brahmanas of his time who knew it. He taught it, explained it, developed it, set it forth, and those who were great enough to receive this, and who surrounded him as his chosen pupils, became the arhats, a Sanskrit word which means the "Worthies," that is, the chosen disciples who surrounded the teacher, and who became the depositaries of his great and sublime system in so far as he was able to communicate it to them.

So the years passed. The stir that he made in the land was great. Pupils flocked to him from every quarter. His name spread far and wide. He performed works of wonder, of human kindliness. He taught the gospel of love and compassion and pity; of love without bounds, infinite, taking the universe within the compass of its reach.

He taught the essential oneness, the spiritual-divine oneness, of all things with each other, the spiritual-divine oneness of the human being with the spiritual universe. He sent out his disciples two by two all over India, and told them to go farther afield, which in many cases they did then and in times afterwards to come.

When he was eighty years old and his hair was white, the legend states that he lay himself down one day, and his last words, according to the Buddhist scriptures, were: "My Brethren, all things are composite. Work out your own salvation with diligence." Then he passed into nirvana: passed through all the stages of consciousness from the human stage up to the highest spiritual stage, descended the ladder of consciousness again, and opened his eyes, and looked around. A second time he ascended the steps of consciousness to divinity and descended the steps again, opened his eyes and looked upon his disciples who were surrounding him. The third time he ascended all the steps of consciousness to divinity and as the exoteric legends put it, the Blessed One expired.

Our own esoteric records are different. This, as just described, was what truly happened when he died in the physical body, but that occurred twenty years after his attainment of nirvana at eighty years, so that the Lord Buddha lived to be one hundred years old as a man, and physically died in his hundredth year, having attained the nirvana in his eightieth year.

Now as he was born in 643 BC following the Occidental Christian chronology, he therefore physically died in 543; and it was in 563 therefore that he attained the nirvana. Among these facts lies the mistake that the Southern School of Buddhism makes in confusing the nirvana of the Lord Buddha, which he entered into at eighty years, with the actual passing, or throwing off I should say, of the physical vehicle — his death.

For twenty years after his nirvana, he lived, but retired from the sight of men, teaching only a few of his chosen arhats. In other words — and I am going to speak plainly — he went to the Himalayas, he went to Sambhala where he is Chief. You have heard me speak of Sambhala before. At the time when he cast off the physical body he remained — and still remains — as a nirmanakaya, more exactly as the buddha of the fifth

race, or rather still more accurately to speak, as one of the two buddhas of the fifth race — the first one. This buddha is at present the spiritual head of the Great White Lodge. He remains as a nirmanakaya still, known to and in constant conference with the mahatmas and chohans. He is therefore our own supreme Head, and it is he who can truly be called the Silent Watcher of our fifth root-race. Not the Silent Watcher of the planet, but of our fifth root-race.

Bear these few facts in mind, which I have tried to outline to you as briefly as I can in order not to take up too much time. You will immediately see why the mahatmas, in The Mahatma Letters published by Brother Trevor Barker, frequently speak of "our Lord," meaning the Lord Sanggyas, which is the title given to the Lord Buddha in Bodyul or Tibet, and why they speak of him also as our Chief. This is also the esoteric reason why the name of Mr. Sinnett's first book was called Esoteric Buddhism, a name actually chosen by the teachers themselves, and used by H. P. Blavatsky, because that name involved a literal truth.

The esoteric-exoteric religion which the Lord Buddha taught while he labored in the body among men on earth, and called Buddhism, is the outer form of the ancient wisdom-religion of mankind. Therefore it has been the greatest and the noblest of all the exoteric religions of historical times, and it is the least degenerated even today. Furthermore, this title, Esoteric Buddhism, was a true title. There is an esoteric Buddhism, and anyone who knows the facts can simply laugh quietly when the wiseacres of the Occident who think that they know everything about Buddhism quote the exoteric scriptures of Buddhism, and even words of the Lord Buddha himself, and say that there was no esoteric school of the Buddha. There most certainly was, but it was truly esoteric, and therefore it is not known today. I wonder what these Occidental scholars think. If it were truly esoteric, it stands to reason that they would not know anything about it from the exoteric scriptures.

Those of you who are students of theosophy will see the logical, absolutely logical, necessity of an esoteric teaching, of an esoteric school wherein the deeper teachings are given: the profounder, broader, larger secrets of the universe and of man's constitution, which cannot be given out publicly because they cannot be understood without at least some real esoteric training.

When HPB spoke in later years in her Secret Doctrine about the mistake that was made in the name of Sinnett's Esoteric Buddhism, it was a very wise and clever thing that she did. Every word that she wrote was true, yet it was a deliberate pulling of the wool over the eyes of those who thought they knew so much, that it blinded them and thus they could not see the truth. I have used the same policy myself. When I find that an esoteric teaching is being argued about, or mocked at, or misconstrued, then instead of trying to remedy the situation by denying it, or explaining it, I say something like this: "Why yes, of course, this is the way to look at it," apparently but not really agreeing with the proud brain-minds who cannot because they will not see. It is an ancient rule in our School that when a teaching is misunderstood or is in danger of being abused, then it must be veiled. This is a wise thing to do. When HPB said that if Mr. Sinnett had only called his book Esoteric Bodhism, or Esoteric Budhism, meaning "Esoteric Wisdom," it would have rightly expressed the teachings of the Masters, as far as it went, she made a true statement. Nevertheless, the title first given to the book was right, for it was indeed the esoteric teaching of the Lord Buddha which was in the background of the Masters' minds when they gave to Mr. Sinnett the knowledge that he received. It was in very truth Esoteric Buddhism.

Colonel Olcott took pansil, a Pali term meaning the five vows of Buddhism, in other words became a Buddhist. He did it in Ceylon, and more or less at the same time our own beloved HPB took pansil, the five vows, and became an exoteric Buddhist. For reasons of their own they did this; and yet in her Key to Theosophy and elsewhere HPB says very plainly that theosophy is not Buddhism. It is not Brahmanism. It is not Christianity. It is not Taoism. It is not Confucianism. It is not the ancient religion of the Magi, or Zoroastrianism; nor the religion of the ancient Egyptians. Of course not, because it is the heart of them all. It is not any exoteric religion in particular, but is the esoteric wisdom behind them all. Therefore it actually is Buddhism, Brahmanism, Taoism, Zoroastrianism. It is all these, but not any one of them in particular.

Do you see the clever way in which these matters must sometimes be told to an uninstructed and unenlightened public? You must be subtle in your minds, subtle in presentation of facts, but never untruthful.

That is against the Law. Always tell the truth, but don't tell the whole truth. Sometimes it is advisable to tell the truth in a way which will not give the inner secrets out. But never tell an untruth. Sometimes it is wise to

withdraw a teaching, and the way that is done is by covering it up with some later explanation. The latter explanation is perfectly true, but it is like veiling the first explanation, which was the deeper and the truer one.

You understand?

Many Voices — Yes, certainly.

G. de P. — That is constantly done, and it is in this way that some of the most esoteric teachings of the ancient wisdom have been at times withdrawn from the world. The brain-minds of those who hear take the later explanation as being the greater light, instead of being the smaller light, and thus they deliberately pass by the greater light. Men forget.

Now even the Lord Buddha with his godlike wisdom and his godlike love made minor mistakes in his life. In his spiritual yearning to give to men truth, light, love, peace, on several occasions he went rather too far, opened the doors a little too widely — and there is always danger in this, great psychical and spiritual danger.

Therefore he later did what his predecessors, the buddhas of the other root-races, did in similar cases, and probably what the buddhas of the sixth and seventh root-races may do. In order to correct what he had done in his boundless love for mankind, he provided, he became, he was, the intermediate part of the avatara Sankaracharya. Sankaracharya lived about half a century, as I recollect the dates, after the Buddha dropped the physical vehicle.

An avatara you will remember is a divine being, enlightening or overshadowing the Buddha's intermediate part or human soul, and this combination was born in a physical body. The teachings of Sankaracharya were on the whole just such as to correct that small excess of esoteric wisdom, which the Buddha in his boundless pity and love for mankind had given out. Sankaracharya taught the Adwaita-Vedanta, that part of the Vedanta system in India which is called the Adwaita, the nondualistic Vedanta; and in its essentials it is so much like Buddhism that frequently Buddhists are called by their enemies Vedantists in disguise, and the Adwaita-Vedantists are frequently called by their enemies Buddhists in disguise.

Some hundreds of years later than Sankaracharya there was born in Palestine a boy-child. This also was an avatara. A god had been waiting to manifest in the human sphere of consciousness, and the Lord Buddha as a nirmanakaya gave his human soul, so to speak, to provide the intermediate part, so that this divine principle or this god, could manifest on earth. This intermediate principle with its divine companion then incarnated in this boy-body. It requires a buddha, or at least one in most respects as lofty as a buddha, to enable a divine being to manifest in human form. This is an avatara; and this second avatara in later centuries was called Jesus the Christ.

Our Lord still remains as the Chief in Sambhala and exists as a nirmanakaya. He is still watching over the spiritual destinies of our own fifth root-race, because he is the first buddha of the two who are to come in our fifth root-race. The second buddha will not come until the end of our fifth root-race, which will be many many hundreds of thousands of years yet; millions of years as a matter of fact, some three and a half or four million years yet will our own fifth root-race endure on earth. But at the present time, at about the midpoint of our own fifth root-race, the seeds are being dropped into fifth-race soil, which seeds will grow into the beginnings of the sixth root-race. And it was the Lord Buddha who inaugurated this dropping of seed for the sixth root-race. That is one of the duties of the first buddha of any root-race.

There are many more mysteries, truly wonderful, that might be told about the Buddha Sanggyas as the Tibetans call him. You have heard of course about the reincarnations of the living buddhas in Bodyul, in Tibet. This does not mean that the nirmanakaya, Gautama the Buddha, is the spiritual principle which passes from Teshu Lama to Teshu Lama, or Dalai Lama to Dalai Lama, or the really scores of instances in Tibet of the passing of a living buddha to a new body. That is not the idea involved in this reincarnation of the living buddhas. The idea is based on the following fact: that in addition to the buddha, the two buddhas of any root-race, there are other high and loftily spiritual human beings, who are not buddhas, but on the way to buddhahood. These are called bodhisattvas, a Sanskrit word which means "of the essence of bodhi," wisdom, the word bodhi, coming from the same Sanskrit root from which the word buddha comes. Now these bodhisattvas exist in various grades or degrees of spiritual advancement. There are some who are very high, some not so high, and some still not so high, of an inferior grade, but nevertheless they are all very greatly

evolved spiritual human beings, and all are entitled to the name bodhisattva. They are all of them chelas of the racial buddha then in command of the spiritual forces of that race. Therefore in the present instance these bodhisattvas are disciples of the Holy One, the Blessed One, whom the world calls Gautama the Buddha.

These reincarnations of the living buddhas in Tibet are an actual fact. In the instances where they actually occur, these unusual men, when the time comes or when they wish to pass from the body in which they are living and working and teaching at the time to some other body, they can do so. It may be that the passage is to the body of a little child, then born or shortly to be born, or it may be that the passage is to the body of a young man, or to an adult even. But they can do it at will. The old body is simply dropped, dies, as men say; and all the rest of the constitution of that individual passes corporeally over into the new physical body.

Are there any questions that anyone would like to ask on this subject before we pass to something else?

Student — May I ask a little more about Christianity and its relation to Buddhism, as it, Christianity, came out into the world?

G. de P. — Yes. The original teachings of the avatara whom men in later times called Jesus, or Jesus Christ, were in all essential principles precisely the same as Buddhism, which is merely saying that the essential principles of both are the gupta-vidya of antiquity, the wisdom-teaching, the wisdom-religion, of the past ages. But the teaching and mission of Jesus very shortly proved to be a failure. This had to come.

The cyclic time for the avatara had come. He then appeared, but everything was working against the spiritual forces for which the avatara opened the way. The cycles of civilization were running downwards in every direction, in spiritual and psychological respects especially, and within less than one hundred years after the disappearance of the avatara Jesus, the body of teachings that Jesus had left behind, had degenerated. His disciples failed in practically every instance. In many cases they became ambitious for personal prominence and power. They allowed their judgment and their love for humanity to be distorted and twisted from what they thought was a good motive in order merely to make converts, to gain mere adherents. They thus also obscured and even changed the original teachings. They made them what they thought would be more simple and more easily understood. They took in a lot of extraneous material, this extraneous material having been in its origin spiritual teachings but then degenerated; and they incorporated this with the sublime teachings of the founder. Books were written, easy books, and conceived in a quasi-mythological and mystical style in order to make them more easily understood. These were the originals of the Gospels. They took some of the teachings of the Mystery-schools, perfectly true and beautiful and spiritual, and wove around the figure of the man, of the avatara, of the man-avatara Jesus, whom already they were beginning to forget, all these extraneous things, these mystery-teachings, both in doctrine and in ritual. Thus they succeeded in their perfectly honorable but very shortsighted desire to make their religion more easily comprehensible. They succeeded, I say, in making a purely exoteric religion. I wonder if my meaning is clear to you?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — This process was continued through several hundred years, so that the real inner illumination having been forgotten there remained only these mystical teachings, these quasi-esoteric, quasi-exoteric teachings, early imbodied in the Christian scriptures, especially in what were later called the Gospels.

There were perhaps scores of Gospels written, but finally only four prevailed as canonical — Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Presumably these prevailed because they were the most popular and the most dignified. To these four Gospels were added certain other writings of very early adherents to the Christian faith, and to these writings were given the names of some of Jesus' own earliest disciples or followers as authors. Such were the Acts of Paul, and his Epistles to the Romans, and to the Ephesians and to the Philippians and to the Galatians, and so forth; also the Epistle of James. Finally there was added on to the assemblage of scriptures or writings thus gathered together what was called the Apocalypse, a Qabbalistic writing which had become a favorite among some mystically minded people of the time. What became later the Christian scriptural canon was probably finally established at or about the time of the first Nicaean Council.

At that time Christianity had practically become a dogmatic faith, as exoteric as it is today, and in fact more exoteric in a way than it is today. The Roman Empire, as the contemporary historians tell us, was then filled

with the noise of religious squabbles, every sect fighting every other sect, bishops and delegates to religious councils or conventions continuously running hither and yon all over the Empire. As they had the right, at least in somewhat later times, to use the posts of the Empire, which in those days were saddle horses and carriages, even the imperial officials began to complain loudly that the business of the Empire could no longer be carried on efficiently because messengers of State were prevented from using the posts on account of the hordes of bishops and their satellites and the deacons who were running all over the place, chasing each other from Council to Council. These times offered a perfect phantasmagoria of religious thought and distempered enthusiasm.

Student — Is it permissible for us to know a little more of the nature of these seeds that are being prepared or will be strewn into the soil at the midtime of our root-race?

G. de P. — Yes. It is a very difficult subject to explain, but I will try to do so — difficult to explain because the thoughts are so unusual. It means first that certain human beings are being worked on, as far as karma will permit this to be done, in order to form a nucleus of more spiritually-minded human beings than the average men. This does not mean that these human beings are especially favored, because, of course, karma cannot be interfered with; and, as a matter of fact, Companions, it is really only those who are karmically ready for this increase in spiritual growth, who are worked upon by our Head and his helpers. It means that even in our present fifth root-race there are certain human beings who have advanced a little farther along the pathway of spiritual evolution than others have, and these are being carefully watched over and guided as the ages pass.

When they are found as individuals in any one lifetime, when a touch of the buddhic splendor is seen, they are then watched over and guided as far as it is possible to do so. They are inspired to do better, to improve, to grow, as far as their karma permits. They receive especial instructions, especial training.

This is usually utterly unknown to those who receive these blessings. Nevertheless, these are the human seeds in preparation for the beginning of the sixth root-race. They will be and actually are the pioneers of the sixth root-race. And among these seeds there are always to be found a rare few, still more advanced than these special human seeds are, the rare few who are in the van of the others, and it is these who become chelas. Do you understand the idea now?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — Therefore it is part of the work of the first buddha of any root race to inaugurate this labor of preparing the human seed for the succeeding root-race. That is a part of his great duty. The first buddha of the two of any root-race comes at about the middle point of his root-race, passing on the light that he communicates to receptive minds, which in turn hand on that light from hand to hand, from mind to mind, from soul to soul. Thus are men spiritually guided, and the races of the future builded in their beginnings.

You, among others elsewhere in the world where groups of our own Order are likewise being taught, are the seeds of the sixth root-race. It is not only in California, as our Brothers of the Adyar Society are teaching, that the seeds of the sixth root-race are being sown. This sowing or preparation takes place all over the world. But it is in the Americas both North and South, and especially in the North for a reason I have already explained to you, that these human seeds are most carefully watched and cultivated. It is true, however, that the first subrace of the sixth root-race will not only have its home in the northern part of the American continent, but this first subrace of the sixth root-race will also be born on the western coast — not necessarily in California, but all along the Pacific coast of the two Americas.

Are there any more questions on this topic, or shall we pass to some other theme?

Student — Did I understand from what you have just said that there was no deliberate intention of deceiving people in compiling the Christian scriptures, but that there was simply a confusion and ignorance?

G. de P. — That is more or less true. There may have been a few cases of deliberate deception. Personally I happen to think that there were such cases in which deliberate deceit was used, but this was undoubtedly due to the influence of the Brothers of the Shadow. But this very ignorance of which you speak, and also this very excess of kindliness of the earliest Christians, as well as their excess of unregulated enthusiasm, were used as fertile fields of action by the Brothers of the Shadow, who can work powerfully when the times are ripe for so

doing. It was ignorance, and enthusiasm unguided by wisdom, which brought about the degeneration of Christianity within a hundred years after the disappearance of Jesus the avatara. Nevertheless his work had been done. There was enough of his influence and teaching left to provide a spiritual pabulum for the obscured minds of the European peoples during the Dark Ages — sufficient to provide a small focus of light, however dimly that light burned. Such Dark Ages needed a relatively obscure religious thought. A greater light would not have been accepted, because it would not have been understood. Do you understand now?

Student — Yes, thank you.

Student — I should like very much to know something about the cycles that made such a tragedy in human history possible as the failure of the work of an avatara. It must have been a strange concatenation of causes that brought about those cycles of religion.

G. de P. — It was. It was the kali yuga — events occurring more or less at the beginning of the kali yuga.

The history of a race includes the history of a rise, a culmination in brilliance and power, and then a fall. It is the same with any nation of men, the same with any people, the same indeed with any individual human being. It is the same with us all so far as our bodies are concerned: birth, growth, vigor, normal life, activity, growth in brain-power, reaching a culmination of physical strength and mental energy, and then a gradual weakening, and finally decay and death. Such is nature's law. The avatara Jesus came at a time when the cycles — not only one but a gathering together as it were of four or five different cycles — were on the downward arc, running down. It was not his fault. That is not the way in which to look at the matter. He came at a time of a downwards-running cycle in order to sow some seeds at least of spiritual light, preceding a time which was going to be spiritually dark.

Indeed, there is usually more than one effort made by the teachers in such cases, so that in case one fail entirely there will be help from some other source. In the case of the Mediterranean peoples who were to pass on their light to the European peoples of the north and west, look to the history of Mithraism which ran Christianity close so far as power and influence went, so close, indeed, that it was only by a fluke of chance that Christianity prevailed over Mithraism.

Shortly before Mithraism fell, due to causes innate in its own system, it almost succeeded in becoming the state religion of the Roman Empire, for it was then accepted by the great, accepted by the armies of the Empire, accepted by the entire officialdom of the Empire. And Mithraism — shall I tell you why it failed?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — It was somewhat higher than Christianity, somewhat more spiritual, a good deal more esoteric; and as the cycles were running downwards, and running downwards fast, it finally lost its grip — and lost it very quickly once disintegration had begun — on the hearts and minds of the people. Mithraism one hundred years before it fell had almost grasped the dignity of being the official religion of the Roman Empire. It was Christianity with its more easy-going and more accommodating spirit, with its simpler teachings and weaker principles of thought and conduct — but which teachings and principles nevertheless happened to be more appropriate to the time and the environment, the circumstances, than Mithraism was — it was Christianity which, on account of these causes, finally prevailed.

Student — Would it be right to say that the breaking up that happened to the Theosophical Society was an event in human nature and in times similar to the event that happened to Christianity? Is there any similarity between the two?

G. de P. — There is a similarity. This similarity exists in the fact of the breaking into different bodies, into different sects — because there actually are sects in the theosophical movement today. We have to face the truth. We must, Companions, keep theosophy pure, broad, deep, generous, and ourselves be great-hearted and forgiving in our work. We must do Masters' work!

But there is this difference in the parallel which you have drawn between Christianity and the modern theosophical movement. In our own theosophical movement, comprising all these various Theosophical Societies today, the break-up into these various Societies was deliberately engineered. Why? Because the

teachers knew that if certain ones were not called out, called apart — I mean certain ones who could be depended upon — they would be swallowed up, lost, in the welter of religious and psychical superstition which had already begun to invade the theosophical movement before Judge died. Do you understand me?

Many Voices — Yes.

Student — In The Ocean of Theosophy Mr. Judge speaks of the Buddha as an avatara. Was this because he was actually the vehicle of his own inner god?

G. de P. — Of the Buddha as an avatara? Yours is a very difficult question to answer. The Buddha technically was not an avatara, and yet in a certain sense he was. Here is the explanation, if I can only make it clear to you. The Buddha per se is a spiritual principle, a ray from the Silent Watcher of the planet. This ray is from what is called the celestial buddha. When this ray illumines a great and noble human being with all his seven principles, who is born on earth as a man, you have the manushya-buddha, or human buddha. Such was the case with Siddhartha, Gautama the Buddha. He was born a man, although a sixth-round man. But this ray, this buddhic ray, illumined him in much the same fashion as the manasaputras entered and illumined the undeveloped manases of the third race, and inspired them. So, very much after this fashion did this ray from the Silent Watcher illumine Sakyamuni, and in this sense this ray became incarnate in the man. Do you understand?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — In principle it is the same process that makes technically an avatara. Therefore in that sense the Buddha was an avatara, but made so by a ray from the celestial buddha; whereas strictly speaking, technically speaking, an avatara is a divine being shining through the Buddha's intermediate psychological apparatus, which incarnates for that direct purpose in what will become when born a human infant. Do you see the difference? An avatara, therefore, is not a complete septenary human being born as men are.

An avatara has no past karma, never was born before, never will be born again. It is, as I have tried to describe it to you, like a brilliant flame passing over the horizon, enlightening the earth for a time and then vanishing. An avatara has no previous karma, has no future karma, never was born before, cannot be born again. In other words, an avatara is a supreme act of white magic done in order to bring divine influences and light to earth at certain cyclic times. Do you understand?

Many Voices — Yes.

Student — May I ask a question about that? It has exercised my mind a great deal. I refer to the subject of the avataras of Vishnu. According to the Indian teaching, Vishnu reincarnated as the Boar, the Dwarf, the Tortoise, and also the other avataras — many times, and will come again. Is not Vishnu a god? Did not the gods have a past and evolve in some past manvantara? I thought perhaps you were speaking now of evolution in this manvantara. The problem is very difficult with that succession of avataras.

G. de P. — Your question is not very clear, but I think I understand you.

Student — You say that the ray flashed down. You said that once before, and I have been thinking of it a great deal in connection with the recurring avataras of Vishnu.

G. de P. — I think I see your point more clearly now. I have been speaking in general of an individual who on earth is an avatara. But the god part of the avatara of course has a past; the god also has an infinite future, just as he has had an infinite past; so also has had the buddha. But that particular act of sublime white magic, which produces this peculiar and temporary composition on earth which is called an avatara, is this flash of spiritual light on earth. Do you now understand me?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — It is like a chemist bringing together certain chemical elements in order to produce a certain brilliant flame. That flame has no existence as an entity, either before or after its production. It comes and is

gone. But Vishnu is a divine power, a god if you like, one of the three fundamental divinities of the solar system, originating in the heart of the solar system or the sun, and at certain epochs this divine power sends a ray from itself to manifest as one or more of these avataras that you have spoken of. Certainly the god part of the avatara has a past, a present, and a future, just as any other monadic center or entity has.

Student — May I ask about the buddhas? There were stories printed a few years ago about living buddhas in some of the tribes of Central Asia. And apparently the stories were more or less garbled for sensational purposes, and it appeared that some of those tribes and some of those living buddhas were not of a very high order, but were magicians who belonged to the warlike tribes or others who were not of a high order. Now of course those accounts were presumably quite untrustworthy. Can you throw any light on it? Are there those who are not genuine buddhas, but are yet magicians, who use the names of living buddhas? Or are there not?

G. de P. — I do not know to what you refer, but here, I think, is the answer to your question, which I believe I understand.

In the first place the whole matter is complicated. Occidentals don't understand the principles governing the existence of the living buddhas. They take every instance which they suppose to be a living buddha according to the usual idea, and rather ironically give to these false living buddhas the name of living buddhas, because they have heard of such things in Bodyul or Tibet. Do you understand, thus far?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — In the second place, it is possible that savage and barbarous tribes adopt the title, adopt the name living buddhas, and apply this name to entities who are not truly such at all. If and when this is done the doers simply steal — try to steal — the thunder of Jove. Do you understand that?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — The third point is — and please be very careful how you allude to this — that there are what you may perhaps call buddhas of the Brothers of the Shadow. They are not real buddhas, but they occupy in the ranks of the Brothers of the Shadow the same rank that the true buddhas occupy in the ranks of the Brothers of Light, of the Sons of the Sun. Do you understand?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — Now just to which one of these three things the instances you allude to belong I could not answer without studying the instance; and I really do not know to what cases you allude.

Student — What you have said answers what I asked — the general idea of the principles involved.

G. de P. — All right, then.

Student — May I go on to another subject? I find considerable difficulty in finding an analogy between the seven principles of man and the seven globes, for this reason: I understand that the first globe evolved from entities from itself the second globe; and so on to the seventh, the fourth of that series being the lowest in matter; and then on the ascending arc getting more ethereal until the seventh is more ethereal than the first. Is that correct?

G. de P. — If I understand you, yes, it is generally correct, but requires some important modifications.

Student — But it seems that in the case of man, each succeeding vehicle is more gross until finally the last vehicle is the physical body, which is the grossest of all. There does not seem to be a parallel. Perhaps it is only a limited understanding on my part.

G. de P. — You are quite right. There is not a parallel in the way you have put it, but you are quite wrong in so putting it. The physical body is not the grossest of the human principles. It is a mere composite. It is a cadaver, a living machine, a collection of chemical atoms. The grossest principle in the human constitution is

the fourth, which is the most material, the most essentially personalized, if you can use that word. In itself it is not evil, not any more than matter itself is evil. But it is the least spiritual. It is the fourth principle in us which is the seat of crime, of sin, of distorted views, of evil doing — it is not the body which is a mere limb of the constitution. The body is a garment, totally — no, that is not right — but practically totally unconscious as an entity. It is a mere composite. It is not really even a principle, but a temporary gathering together of atoms in order to manifest certain energies and powers in the human constitution.

There was a time when the entities, the monadic entities, who are now human beings, had no physical bodies at all, and in future days we shall have no physical bodies. We shall have vehicles indeed, but they will be vehicles of light, shining like the sun, literally, or irradiating light like an electric bulb. Clothed in light we then shall be. I repeat, the physical body is not the grossest of the human principles. It is the fourth principle which is the grossest.

Student — Which principle is it that corresponds to globe G?

G. de P. — The last globe?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — Well, you cannot make an exact correspondence between seven material things and the seven principles of the human being. All the globes are bodies, all the globes are vehicles, temporary composites.

Do you understand that? But each globe in addition has its own six principles, therefore its own septenary constitution. You could not say that atman is globe A or the first, and globe G is the physical body. There is the problem that disturbed you when first you spoke. Remember then that all the seven globes are bodies, representing each one the lowest, but not the grossest; the lowest because it is the body of a septenary constitution called a globe.

You have thus the forty-nine substance-principles in the planetary chain, and they are sometimes spoken of as the forty-nine fires, because even physical matter, out of which our bodies and our gross globe are built, is essentially fire, light, life — concreted light, solar light. Granite, diamond, gold, silver, copper, wood, grass, trees, flesh: all is concreted light, solar light, energy, energy-substance, force. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes, thank you. If we could see these seven globes all together, would they appear to make a geometrical figure, combined in their positions, or is such a thing impossible?

G. de P. — You are probing rather deeply. I may answer by simply saying this, that the common chain-like representation of the seven globes as given in our books is correct symbolically. The seven globes are actually scattered about. Therefore they do not form a geometrical figure in the sense that you imply, and they are certainly not a "collar" of globes, like a collar of pearls or of diamonds. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes, I certainly did not think of them in that way.

G. de P. — Yet that is the way in which they are represented in our books. It is a perfectly good way of so representing them because it shows the fourth or lowest globe on the lowest plane, two globes on the next higher plane, two globes on the next higher, and two globes on the highest plane. Each pair of globes in the above outline is on a cosmic plane. Consequently all the seven globes are on the four lowest cosmic planes.

Don't forget this. It is an important thing to remember.

Student — I am so anxious to ask you this, but perhaps it is out of place. Something has been puzzling me this last month, and you have just said something that shed a little light on it, about force being in everything.

I have been so often where there are great mountains and rocks, and have been very much impressed with the forms that they presented. I wish you could tell what there is behind these forms. I could not help but look at them and study them; and every time when I went there, I felt that I must almost pay obeisance to them.

There was one in particular. I want to ask you if there are the same causes behind all these manifestations. It does not seem possible, for some are horribly ugly and others are beautiful.

G. de P. — Do you mean rock conformations that look like human faces?

Student — Well, those also. You see the edge of the rock would form the faces, and it was actually as though one had taken a pencil, or a knife, or a chisel, and worked the faces out. There was "Uncle Sam" just as plain as could be, and that great Half-dome in the Yosemite. And there was a face of a beautiful girl looking up.

And then, off to the right was a face, not entire, but it startled me, and I could not help thinking it might be that of a holy man. The great folds of drapery came over his head, and beautiful flowers; and the nose and eyes and forehead were very clear although the lower part of the face was not there. And then off to the side there was something similar to the face of the Leader KT with her cape on.

G. de P. — You want to know what caused all this?

Student — I want to know whether there was anything behind it, or whether I was just foolish in feeling that reverence.

G. de P. — Not at all. It was not foolishness. What caused them is wind, rain, cold, heat, the handiwork of nature's forces; and the way in which these forces work is governed by the pictures in the astral light. These forces can work only in that way. Then when one like yourself comes along with an artistic temperament, with a devotional turn of mind, you immediately catch these outlines, and to a certain extent your own soul paints the pictures with the help of these skeleton backgrounds. Do you see what I mean?

Student — Yes, but they were there.

G. de P. — Of course. Have you ever looked at a pansy and seen as I have — I am sure you must have seen it too — the outline of a human face in the flower?

Student — Oh, yes.

G. de P. — Sometimes it is striking. And you can see the outline of a human face in the moon. It is the pictures in the astral light which nature reproduces in her physical handiwork. Our very bodies are shaped after the pictures implanted in the astral by the thoughts of past ages. Nature is a conscious entity. She is not dead. She is a living entity, a vast conglomerate of substances and forces, working according to karmic impulses. The delicate tracery that we saw on the screen last night when Professor Hujer was lecturing — did you see them, the crystals? They were beautiful, those pictures of the snowflakes. And they reminded me oddly enough of nothing so much as the sparkling decorations that are worn by European diplomats! They looked like the diamond-studded decorations on the breasts of these men! But how much more beautiful was this handiwork of nature, in the perfect symmetry, and in the marvelous geometric patterns, what one might call the marvelous artistic invention reproducing such beautiful outlines. It was delightful to me. I have also seen gnarled trees which look just like faces, goblin-faces, human faces, faces of angels almost. It was partly nature's handiwork and partly my own thought.

Student — There were also some very ugly faces that I saw.

G. de P. — Yes, indeed. And your soul was repelled by these ugly things, of course.

Student — Then there was a conscious chiseling, actually conscious?

G. de P. — The chiseling of the elementals. You can hardly call it self-conscious, but rather quasi-conscious.

Student — Thank you very much.

Student — In the Orphic Hymns it is said that the immortals called the moon Selene, and the mortals Mene.

Can you throw some light on that?

G. de P. — That reminds me of something else in the mystical Orphic writings. It was not uncommon for Greek Mystics such as the Orphics to speak of the gods as giving names to certain things, and human beings as giving other names to the same things. The ancient Hindus had the same thought. This refers to certain

secrets of esoteric teaching. There were passwords, openly uttered, suggesting to men that one word was the keynote to a certain mystery connected with the moon, and the other word was suggestive of some other hid thing or secret connected with the moon. The word immortal does not refer necessarily to the gods, but to the immortal part of one's own constitution. Do you understand that?

Student — Yes. I have another question on the Orphic Hymns. In the Hymn to the sun they called the sun the eternal source of light:

"With thy right hand the source of morning light,

And with thy left the father of the night."

Proclus (in Theol. Plat., lib. 6, p. 380) says that those who are skilled in divine concerns attribute two hands to the sun, denominating one the right hand, the other the left. Can you throw light on that?

G. de P. — Yes. I will try to answer it briefly, although it is an exceedingly mystical passage in the ancient Greek mythology which you ask me about. All ancient mystics spoke of the right hand in connection with light, and of the left hand in connection with darkness. Or what comes to the same thing, the right hand signifies spirit and the left hand signifies matter. We must remember that the Sun is continuously pouring forth two kinds of energies, one light which nevertheless is an ethereal form of substance. The other kind is a much grosser form, and has often been called the heavy solar vitality, grosser than light and yet tremendously important for the feeding of the bodies of his planetary family. Light also signifies the spirit and the intellect; whereas the left-hand action of the Sun, so to speak, here signifies the solar effulgence of the vital essence building up and feeding and stimulating the lower quaternary of his solar family. This is the essence of the idea, and I hope that my few remarks will have made the matter more clear to you.

Student — You spoke a few moments ago about certain sects in the theosophical movement, which had been engineered as you express it. Does that remove responsibility from those who perhaps brought it about?

G. de P. — No, indeed, it does not. No indeed. But I did not say that the existence of sects in the theosophical movement had been engineered. That is not true. The division was engineered, but not the formation of sects.

When I say that this was engineered, I do not mean that the teachers used their willpower and occult forces to violate right and to direct certain human beings into the left-hand path, and others into the right. That would be a horrible misconstruction of both my meaning and the facts. My meaning was that they took advantage of the natural tendencies of some human beings to aspire and to follow the right, and the natural tendency of other human beings to prefer the left-hand path. In other words, they knew that these things would happen, that the sheep would go one way and the goats the other way. They simply took advantage of what would happen in order to guide to better things and thus to prevent a greater hurt — and I am going to talk to you quite frankly — and they did this in so far as they could help nature's work by working with her, but they went no farther. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — So that the good were saved as the seed for the future. It was not corrupted. I do not care to add anything more to this. You truly understand me?

Student — Yes, certainly.

G. de P. — I will answer one or two questions, and then we will close for this evening.

Student — I would like to ask if you can tell us a little about skandhas, and what happens to them between incarnations, and where they are?

G. de P. — Do you refer to the skandhas in general?

Student — Yes, Professor.

G. de P. — The skandhas are of two main kinds: spiritual and those which are unspiritual — material in other

words. The skandhas are the attributes, whether of a human being, or it may be of a god, because the gods have skandhas of their own sublime kind; but let us take the case of a human being. The rules remain the same. These attributes are manifested when the forces of the monadic essence build up the human entity.

Then these skandhas collect and form the human being. When the reverse current sets in, and the forces hitherto flowing outward into manifestation as a human being are called back to their fountainhead, or when the ebb tide sets in if you understand me, then the forms which these skandhas builded up break and go to pieces, and the skandhas themselves are gathered back into the bosom of the monadic essence where they remain in latency — just as the human soul is, which is a bundle of skandhas as a matter of fact — around a secondary monadic center of its own. These skandhas remain dormant in the bosom of the monadic essence

— in the bosom of the reincarnating ego, to be more particular, which is sleeping in the monadic essence —

until the time for the next incarnation on earth takes place. Then they flow forth again and build up the new human being. But as these skandhas are the attributes of the human being that was, therefore the new human being, thus coming into existence again, is a virtual reduplication of the human being that was. Is not that clear?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — So that the new man on earth, the new reincarnation, almost is, actually is in fact, the same old man, and yet a new man. New, because it is a new gathering together of the skandhas, and yet the man is the same, with the single exception that these skandhas, each one of them, is modified, they are all modified, by the experiences of each life: by the use of the willpower and of the intelligence flowing forth from the higher part of the human being, and by all the spiritual energies which more or less modify these attributes or skandhas. Is the answer responsive to your question?

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — Now, Companions, I think that we had better close. Will you kindly sound the gong and then we will have a few moment's silence.

[The sounding of the gong. Silence.]

There has been a very strong Lodge influence here tonight, Companions. Goodnight all.

*

August 30, 1932

G. de P. — I would like to add a few words to the matter that you have heard read tonight concerning the so-called minor mistakes that Gautama the Buddha made, which were corrected, according to the statement, by the avatara Sankaracharya. This has especial reference to our Lord's teaching concerning the composite nature of man: that man is a composite or compounded entity, and that at death the man is ended with the exception of his karma which passes into new vehicles, into new bodies. This teaching is absolutely true, because, as you know, the karma of a man is the man himself. There is no such thing as karma outside of the entity which makes the karma and carries it from life to life and produces new karma, that is, new lower selves. But this sublime teaching, so illuminating when properly understood, was insufficiently developed by our Lord, and he was misunderstood by later generations to mean that there is no principle of any kind in man which perpetually endures. It should be obvious that if the karma of the man endures, there must be something in which this karma inheres, and this is the man himself, because the man and his karma are one.

When Sankaracharya came and taught, it was really the Buddha who taught through him. It was Sankaracharya who developed the so-called nondualistic or Adwaita form of the Vedanta the teaching that there is no difference in essence between man and the spirit of the universe: the two are one, not two. Hence the term Adwaita, or nondualistic. This teaching corrected immediately the misunderstanding based on the Buddha's former teaching that there was no principle or element in man which perpetually endured. The Buddha had indeed taught that there is a spiritual universe filled full with entities in infinitely varying grades of development; but the teaching imbodied in this doctrine, that these entities in the universe were fundamentally and essentially one, had not been understood, and the teaching of Sankaracharya corrected this

misunderstanding, because Sankaracharya amplified and explained the Lord Buddha's previous doctrine. Do you get the idea?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — Now, Companions, before we close, I want to say that on account of our leaving on our extended lecture tour, including the temporary transference of our TS and ES Headquarters' staffs to England, I shall be very busy indeed in preparing for this event, and hence this meeting will be the last of our gatherings at which I shall be present with you until I return.

I have felt, when meeting you here, and on each and every occasion when we have gathered together, that there has been a unity of spirit, a meeting of hearts and of minds, which is beautiful beyond words to express.

Do not forget this during my absence, Companions. When you attend these gatherings, come with your heart and mind open and at peace. Leave at the threshold of this Temple — for every ES meeting place becomes a Temple for the time being — I say, leave at this threshold all your worldly cares and worries and personal feelings. Enter this room and bathe spiritually in the beautiful atmosphere that you can make for yourselves here. My last words to you are: "Keep the link unbroken." Do not forget this.

Meeting 19

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Nineteen

Meeting of August 26, 1930

G. de P. — Companions, I am now ready to answer questions.

Student — A question was once raised here as to how it was that the animals appeared before men. Is it right to suppose that the animals were not animals as we know them now, but were perhaps ethereal forms that had evolved through the mineral, then through the vegetable, and which in a later round will evolve into the human form? Is that correct?

G. de P. — No, it is not. Where did you find the suggestion that the beasts preceded the human race in time?

Student — I have not read it. I just imagined that my comments might be a possible solution of the question.

G. de P. — No, just the contrary. The mammalians are posterior in time of appearance to the human stock, and actually sprang from the human stock, and that was because both the human stock as it presently exists and has existed, and the mammalians, are of fourth-round origination.

Now, with regard to the animal stocks beneath the mammalian, those are hangovers or carry-overs from the third round, and even to a certain extent from the second round of the present planetary manvantara. The mammalian beasts as they at present exist are evolved descendants from their primal parents, who originated from the human stock of the third root-race of this globe in this fourth round. The third root-race at that time had not yet become the conscious vehicles of the manasaputras, or sons of mind. In other words, intellect had not evolved a vehicle enabling the intellectual powers to manifest within that early race. That race also, physically speaking, was very plastic. It was a semi-astral race — at least in its first part. Its methods of propagation were those that you will read of in HPB's Secret Doctrine.

The first races on this earth during this fourth round issued their chhayas or astral doubles. Later subraces propagated their species by dividing into two parts. Then still later came budding. Still later came the throwing off of small portions of the human physical body, or propagation by spores, or seeds, although those seeds at first were large, very large. Later in time, during the first portion of the third root-race, came the androgynous or hermaphroditic period, which gave place to the true sex-form of propagation which exists at present.

At the time when this third root-race, and before it the later part of the second root-race even, was propagating its kind by throwing off from itself portions of the body, this would happen by bits breaking off and growing to the size of the parent. The mammalian beasts can trace their ultimate origin to that fact, because certain of the cells thus thrown off by the then human stock for various reasons did not grow into human bodies just like their parent-bodies. You cannot call the early third root-race true men, because men as we now know ourselves did not then exist. But these particular cells that I speak of did not grow into other humans — as the humans were at that time — but followed the dominant line of evolution inherent or coming to the front in these cells or aggregate of cells. It is to these divergent cells that can be traced the primal beginnings of the mammalian beast strain.

Now with regard to the beast stocks which came before the mammalian beast stock — the horse and the bovine species, the cat and the dog, etc. — I say with regard to those who are beneath or not so highly evolved as the mammalian beasts, these also originated in the early "human" stock which later became mankind as we know men, but these sub-mammalian beasts originated in the preceding or third round. We cannot say that when these lower beasts originated in what later became the human stock, that human stock was then human as we now know it, because it was not. In other words, the "man" of the third round was not the highly evolved man of this present fourth round, and I am referring here to the fourth globe in both third and fourth rounds.

Thus then, from this human stock which had not yet become human as we now know it the animals below the mammalian beasts originated. Just as the mammals came from the human stock in this fourth round and during the third root-race, so did the reptiles, the fishes, the shellfish, and, as a matter of fact, so did the vegetation, but not in this present fourth round. The mineral kingdom came over from the third round and even from the second round. The plant kingdom likewise came over from the later part of the second round and from the third round. The lowest of the beasts such as the fishes, worms, insects, reptiles — all below the mammalian beasts — likewise came over from the third round; and were originated in that third round in and from what was then the life-wave which in this fourth round became truly human. Do you understand?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — You see the difficulty is that if we speak of "human" and of "human beings" in connection with the leading life-wave of the third round, and even the early third root-race of this round, this word human immediately puts a false idea into your mind, because we did not become truly human as we now are until about the middle point of the third root-race in this fourth round on this fourth globe. But that racial strain or life-wave which became human was the actual strain of our remote ancestors, and from it we have become what now we are; but that racial strain was never a beast strain.

I repeat that the beast strains in their beginnings originated in the leading racial strain both in the third round and in this fourth round which eventuated in present humanity. This racial strain was the man of those periods, but man not as yet intellectual, although not a beast, but still not intellectual man — not man enlightened with mind.

For instance a newborn babe, or a babe in its first or second year, in our present state of evolution is human, but is not yet a man. Intellect is not manifesting there. Judgment is not yet manifest there. Discrimination is not yet showing. The wonderful corridors of memory have not yet been opened in the babe's mind; and yet the babe is the being who is growing to produce the adult, the man.

Similarly at the period in human racial evolution, which corresponded to its infancy or very early childhood when the racial mind had not yet come into operation, then the mammals in this fourth round came into being, from cells or cellular aggregates that this infant humanity cast off in just precisely the same way as it cast off those parts of itself which developed into other human beings like unto their parents. But those particular cells or cellular aggregates for a number of reasons did not grow into other humans, but were arrested in development. As the cells then were just as full of life as they are now, but not under the dominant control of the mentality of humans, each such cell could — if the opportunity offered, if the environment was right, as then it was, and there were no hindrances — each such particular cell or cellular aggregate could develop into an entity deriving from what that cell or cellular aggregate held within itself as a dominant energy. Such inferior dominant energies thus working through these particular cells arrested in development produced the first ancestors of the mammalian beasts. Do you understand all this?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — The human germ-cell even today, if it were not held in the dominant human grip of the human vitality and mind, the racial mind, so that its inherent cellular swabhava or characteristic is held strictly in abeyance, thus compelling it to follow the human line — even a human germ-cell, today, I repeat, could and probably would develop into some living entity which might be almost of any type, but beneath the human type. Just so the beasts originated from the human stock.

Let me see if I can make this even a little more clear, because I have been amazed that there should be so much misunderstanding about this matter. Let us return in thought to the first portion of the third root-race.

The method of physical propagation at that time was by what is now in biology called budding: a small portion of the body would rise on the surface, take on an appearance somewhat like that of a boil or of a cancer. This protuberance or bud would grow, swell, and as time went on, be united to its parent only by a filament connecting it with the parent-body. This filament would gradually grow thinner and smaller, and finally the bud would drop off and immediately begin to grow into an entity exactly like its parent. Thus did the late Second root-race and early third race propagate. The rule was for the bud to grow into a being like its

parent, but nevertheless occasionally some of these buds, for a number of reasons, instead of growing into beings like unto the parent, would seem to have been arrested in development; for some reason they seemed to have no possibility of continued normal development, and instead branched off into a sideline and grew into what we would now probably call a beast. There were many, many beasts of those days which have since become extinct, animal races which have since died out. Some of the races which then were originated have survived.

Thus were the mammalian beasts originated in this fourth round. They sprang from the human stock, and this fact would seem obvious enough too. The human stock today is the most advanced on the face of the earth. It is also the weakest physically, and in its youth the most helpless. The human babe is perhaps the most helpless offspring of all the mammalian stocks. It could not live unless it were carefully cared for and protected, whereas the young of the beasts when they are dropped in most cases can take care of themselves almost from the moment of birth; but the human babe cannot do that. The reason is that the major part of the energies of the inner human constitution is gathered together in order to form a fit and appropriate — and such is nature's working in the case of mankind — impersonal vehicle, an expressive vehicle, so that the divine splendor of the monad within can more easily manifest its transcendent spiritual and intellectual powers. With the beasts the opposite is the case. Nature in the case of the beasts is attempting to perfect a vigorous astral vehicle and vigorous physical body.

At a still later period of the third root-race evolution, instead of a single cell or cellular aggregate budding off, a single large cell was exuded by such a third root-race human being. Please remember that the mere size of a vital cell is of no intrinsic importance at all. Some of the cells therefore of this third root-race period were large, as large as ostrich eggs today, or perhaps much larger. Remember also that an egg is a cell, a typical cell. Some of the cells at that far distant age were very small, even microscopic in size. Every cell was a life center, with almost untold capacities for evolutionary development within it, once it began its course of growth.

In the preceding remarks you have the key to the whole matter. Thus the mammals originated from the early human stock in this fourth round. Thus also the entities below the mammalian beasts originated in the third round in just the same way, mutatis mutandis.

Do you know that the physical bodies of the mammalian beasts are today more highly evolved in specific directions than the human body is? That is a fact. They are more specifically evolved, but nevertheless not superior to the human body. Evolution of a body does not necessarily mean general superiority. Evolution means bringing out what is latent within the evolving entity, whether that evolving entity be god, man, or beast. Consequently, when I say that the mammalian beasts are more fully evolved specifically than the human body is, I mean that they have gone farther in their own lines of physical evolution — they are more specifically evolved.

For instance, consider the long fan-like ears of the elephant and its long proboscis-nose, the marvelous tail-fin of the fish, and the wing of the bat. The bat, although not a bird but a mammalian beast, is perhaps the most perfect flyer on earth. Its flight is the swiftest for its kind, and the most silent, the most efficient, and yet it is not a bird. Take again the whale: here is a case of intense and far-advanced specific evolutionary growth. The whale is not a fish although it looks like one. It is a mammal, yet it lives in water just like a fish.

All this means also that the human body today is the most primitive mammal on earth. That also is a fact.

This entire body of teaching I tried to bring out clearly in those lectures which I gave in the Temple at Point Loma in 1927, and which have recently been collected and printed as the book, Theosophy and Modern Science. [Reprinted in 1941 under the title Man in Evolution. ]

This is a long answer to your question, but I hope that it is at least fairly clear. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, thank you. I understand a great deal better.

G. de P. — Remember that the human stock was the original and originating stock of all the animate and inanimate entities on the earth. The human stock originated not only the mammalian beasts but also all the beasts and living entities which are below the mammalian. The human stock in still earlier rounds originated

the vegetation. And, as a matter of fact, the ethereal racial strain which was to become human threw off from itself in the first round what we now call the mineral kingdom. Thus you see that all entities are connected together. All are interlinked and interlocked and interrelated.

Are there any other questions?

Student — May I ask a question in relation to that? I have been for a long time wishing to bring forward a question on this point, and now seems a good opportunity. The great difficulty comes in regard to the changeover from the early third root-race astral condition to the actual physical man, and the actual physical mammals. HPB says that the forty Stanzas of Dzyan that are omitted from her book, The Secret Doctrine, refer to this matter. I would like to know whether we can have any light on it, because it is the most difficult point in our whole philosophy.

We can see the beginning as you have just been explaining it so extremely beautifully, and we know the primitive physical man existed in the Lemurian period of geology; but the point is, how did the astral man densify and gradually become physical and subject to physical gravitation, gaining physical weight from being an astral body which, presumably, would be invisible to us now in the ordinary way? The astral body is just that link between astral man and physical man, and astral mammal and physical mammal. That is what the Darwinians practically always ask us about, and what are we going to say to them? We have never had that clearly brought out. I know it is one of the mysteries, but may more light be thrown on it?

G. de P. — If I understand your question correctly, you ask: how could astral man produce physical beast? Is that the question?

Student — Not exactly. How could he live at all? I mean the link between him in the astral condition and in the physical condition. At the time when he began to be something on the physical plane, he was not on the physical plane in the ordinary sense, and yet he was something intermediate.

The matter of the bat that you mentioned is, of course, a question that has puzzled the scientists. There was a bat fully formed and found among the earliest fossils. How did it come there? It must have precipitated quickly. But it is what happened between that original condition and the later condition that we cannot understand fully. It is this junction between the two states that we have discussed many times and have never been able to get quite clear in our minds.

G. de P. — That seems very simple if I understand your question aright again. It is all a matter of progressive solidification. The first race was distinctly and purely astral to our present physical senses — the physical eyes of the men of the fifth root-race of our fourth round on our present physical earth. And man of the first root-race on this earth during the fourth round would have appeared as translucent and vaporous as a wispy cloud, perhaps even more diaphanous than that. The second race was somewhat more materialized, a little denser. The third race much more so. The fourth race was the grossest, the densest, the most material man of all, more material even than we are today.

If you could resuscitate a fourth-race man and bring him into this room this evening, you would see before you a magnificent physical body, perhaps twenty-four or twenty-five feet tall. He would not be able to stand upright in this room. The thing that probably would strike you most of all would be the intense grossness of his flesh — the heavy, gross, sensual, characteristics of that human physical being; and yet he might be a high, spiritual initiate of that fourth root-race. I am now speaking only of the fourth-race physical body.

If you could bring in the same way a third root-race man into this room this evening he would tower — I will now take a period towards the end of the third root-race — he would tower some sixty feet in height perhaps, and would be proportionately broad. He would be a giant, and yet you would perhaps marvel at the curiously ethereal aspect that his body would present to your present eyes.

If you could bring a second-race individual into this room tonight — which you could not do because that individual would be a hundred feet or more in height — you would see before you a thick cloudy body, a cloudlike body almost diaphanous. Perhaps you could almost see through it as you can almost see through a jellyfish. And as regards the first race, if such an entity were to extend a protrusion of its physical body —

because the first root-race did not possess our present human form at all — if a protrusion of an entity of the first root-race could be brought into this room, it would perhaps seem like a wisp of transparent, diaphanous cloud that had drifted in.

The races became progressively more material from the first to the fourth, and we, the fifth on the ascending arc, have grown somewhat more ethereal than the fourth root-race was.

So therefore you see that the change was gradual. The mammalian beasts when they originated in the third root-race from the third root-race stock were themselves beings of equivalent ethereality. They were not the gross heavy beasts of today. The early third root-race men were not the gross heavy physical men of today.

Have I grasped your thought? Is the answer responsive?

Student — Yes, as far as we can expect to understand it.

G. de P. — Well, let me take the physiological growth of a human being today. I will tell you something. A child even today when it first begins its embryonic growth is thickened astral. Now there you are! That astral grows slowly more concrete, more physical in appearance, as the growth of the human embryo proceeds until it is born a babe. Everyone knows that the flesh of a babe seems to be tenderer than the flesh of a full-grown adult. The pebbled skin of an adult, for instance, is quite different from the soft, delicate, smooth skin of a newborn babe. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — If I have not answered your question, please come at me again, because it is sometimes very difficult to understand questions as long and as involved as yours was. I know also how difficult it is to ask questions of that kind in short and clear terms.

Student — The real difficulty is of course just at the time of actual physicalization, if you may call it that.

For instance, it became at a certain period necessary that they should eat other fruits or other animals, or something like that, yet before that time, are we to imagine them eating astral fruits or astral animals?

G. de P. — Yes, certainly, in a certain sense of the word, but they did not require eating as we now require it.

Student — That is something that HPB avoids very carefully. She did not cover that particular point.

G. de P. — I don't think that she avoided it. The matter seems to be obvious.

Student — She says that forty stanzas are missing in her Secret Doctrine, and you have filled up the gap very wonderfully.

G. de P. — Let me add this. I think I see better now what is in your mind. The earth was in its fourth round when our fourth-round humanity appeared, but appeared as an astral humanity. I see where your hesitation is now. The first, second, and earliest third-race man did not eat as the fourth-race man did, nor as we now do.

The later third-race man did begin to eat, but the method of taking material into the body for nutrition of the first, second, and earliest third root-races was by osmosis — endosmosis — very much in the same way as we feed ourselves through our lungs today, to a certain extent. Don't you realize that air is food? You take in the oxygen from the air just as you take in water to the stomach, or vegetables, or cereals, and the digestive processes thereafter proceed, and the body takes from this wonderful process called digestion just what it really needs — which is not much, by the way. Just as our lungs draw nutrition from the air, so in the earliest part of the third root-race was the entire physical being of the mankind of that day fed from the surrounding atmosphere. But these changed very quickly after the first period of the third root-race. Then as the body of man coarsened, grew denser, physically speaking, but weaker ethereally, as the body of the third-race man grew denser through the long, long ages that passed, it began to copy what the beasts who were already on earth did — especially the mammalian beasts, but also to a certain extent what the fishes and the reptiles did.

With the dawn of intelligence came watchfulness and observation. Men began to see and understand what was passing around them, and observed intellectually, and then they said to themselves — to adopt the language of the Stanzas which HPB employs — "Come, let us do as they, the beasts, do." Do you understand?

Student — Oh, yes, I think I do.

G. de P. — Thus they began to eat and to drink.

Student — That makes it wonderfully clear now. It gives much that has been thought over, but never so clearly understood.

G. de P. — You do understand then?

Student — Oh yes, that clears up most of the points.

Student — I would like to ask two questions, and in regard to one I should like to submit what I have worked out, but I don't know whether it is correct or not. My question is: what relation does the laya-center bear to the monad, whether it be the monad of a planet or of a solar orb or of a human being?

I thought that when a monad needs to pass on to another sphere for manifestation it is attracted to a laya-center. If it is, there must be a karmic connection between the two. Does the monad issue forth the laya-center first, and then when the cyclic time comes for its manifestation, does it follow? Then when its manifestation continues, does it again reabsorb the laya-center, and is the laya-center then a principle of the monad? That is my first question.

G. de P. — You have uttered a number of varying ideas. The laya-center is not exterior to any monad. Each monad at its own heart is a laya-center. Do you understand that?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — A laya-center is the mystical point where either ethereal matter enters the physical world, or physical matter in this world passes out and upwards into the superior world, let us say for purposes of illustration the astral world. Any laya-center is the center around which an entity is builded, whether that entity be sun or planet or human being, or the seed of a plant or what not. Laya comes from the Sanskrit verbal root li meaning to "dissolve." It is so called because it is the point where physical matter dissolves or becomes etherealized into ethereal matter and passes into the astral plane; but the same process takes place inversely from the astral world into the physical world through the same laya-center. Do you understand that thought?

Student — Yes, I can follow you perfectly. It opens up a new line of thought; only, if the laya-center is this point around which the monad builds, then what is it? Is it a principle?

G. de P. — The laya-center is not so much a point, Doctor, around which the monad builds, as it is a characteristic of the heart of the monad itself. Do you understand that now?

Student — Yes, that is different.

G. de P. — The monad is not a physical, concrete entity, which can be separated off from everything else. It is a consciousness-center. These certainly are deep questions.

Student — Isn't it the monad itself at one stage or aspect?

G. de P. — It is the monad itself, but not at a stage, because the laya-center is always there. The laya-center is actually not a point in space which is a locality. It is an attribute or a condition. That perhaps is the best word

— a condition of the heart of the monad which at a certain time enables the energies which are characteristic of the monad to ascend or descend through that monad's heart. For instance, you have a spiritual impulse, you are illumined with some great idea. You would confuse your mind if you tried to locate that inspiration, or to locate that idea. It is in you. It is a part of you. It is a condition of your consciousness. Being a spiritual idea, it shows this because it has penetrated like a ray into your brain-mind, and enlightened that brain-mind. This condition of "passing up" or "coming down" is what is called the laya-center — center meaning not so much locality as the center of consciousness, a condition or state of the consciousness. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — This is a spiritual conception and it is wholly wrong to look upon it as a physical entity. For instance, a sun is builded around a laya-center. You could say with equal truth, a sun is builded around a spiritual heart. You could say with equal truth that this spiritual heart is a condition of the essence of the monad, in which condition there is a passing up or down, both perhaps at the same time, of the lower rising through aspiration into the higher, or of the higher descending through evolution equally into the inferior.

Try to imagine from what I have just said what a laya-center is. In one sense of the word I will admit that it is not far wrong to look upon it as a mathematical point, the center of your consciousness. The self-point, and the essential laya-center, are selfhood. The essential laya-center is but another way of saying that the essential selfhood of an entity is eternal — the essential selfhood.

Now then, let us try to go a step farther. Why should a sun, for instance — and the same observations will apply to a human being or a plant, or anything — why should a sun have a certain form? Why should it be located in a certain portion of space? This is accounted for by karma, the consequences of preceding conditions. The laya-center is not "located" in any one part of space which part it cannot leave. Just as consciousness will carry you in thought to the utmost limits of our own stellar galaxy, so does a sun pass along the circulations of the universe, pass along the highways of space. It is carrying its laya-center with it.

Just so a human being in traveling around the earth carries his laya-center with him. It is himself. It is the core of his being in one sense of the word.

Look upon a laya-center as a channel between the high and the low, between spirit and substance. When a human being rises out of the gross, passional characteristics of ordinary humanity and becomes a demigod walking the earth, this is because he has ascended through his laya-center into loftier inner realms of his own being. He has raised his self-consciousness, and this is an actual transfer of energies and substances from below upwards, and it is done through the laya-center, the center of his being, his essential self, his essential egoity. Oh, I do hope you understand this?

Student — Yes, very well.

Student — Does not the nucleolus of a cell correspond to the laya-center of that cell, the center of consciousness and activity?

G. de P. — Yes, in a way. Just as the nucleolus of a cell represents the point at and through which the incoming and growing individuality of the entity-to-be comes or passes, just so does the same thing take place in the laya-center of a human being, or of a sun or of any entity or thing. The illustration is a fairly good one, I think. The laya-center of a cell, just as you have pointed out, may be physically represented by the nucleolus

— not that the nucleolus which is a physical thing is the laya-center per se, but its action corresponds to that of the laya-center. Out of the nucleolus come all things that the cell is destined to grow into. Do you get that idea?

Many Voices — Yes.

Student — Could a laya-center be expressed in terms of Einstein's theory about the space-time continuum, and be said to be a line of fission that exists in that continuum — a special line of fission?

G. de P. — I think that it could in an abstract way, but the laya-center means a good deal more than that. It is a spiritual conception rather than merely a metaphysical one, although it is that also. Your illustration is not bad from one aspect. I have found in talking with brother-theosophists that the laya-center question is the one that they seem to find most difficult in all their studies, and I can readily see why.

But having said thus much, remember also that just as an ego expresses itself through a brain and physical body, which are localizations of individuality, just so does the laya-center of an entity express itself through concrete localizations also. This accounts for the fact that entities are builded up by aggregate groups of atoms around a center or heart which is the laya-center. Therefore, a laya-center is the heart of the entity, and

in this sense of the word on the lower planes such as the astral and physical planes a laya-center may be said to have position or localization, but such position or localization is not fixed in abstract space from which it cannot move.

Student — Do the words involution and evolution have any significance in connection with the laya-center?

G. de P. — Yes, quite true. It is through the laya-center of an entity that involution takes place and evolution takes place, and these two always work together.

Student — At the last meeting you promised to tell us something very interesting about the globes, with the blackboard. I took the opportunity of preparing a question, if it will be of any help.

In Chapter 3 of The Ocean of Theosophy, W. Q. Judge refutes Sinnett's claim that the seven globes of the earth-chain "do not interpenetrate each other but are only connected by magnetic currents." Mr. Judge declares that they are united in one mass and do interpenetrate each other, though, of course, they differ in substance. He quotes The Secret Doctrine in support of his contention against Sinnett. In the ES Report for February 13, 1930, you also speak of the globes as being united in one single unity.

But in the KTMG of August 12th, and on a previous occasion, you strongly suggested that there is an actual separation in space of the seven globes, a scattering was the word used, I think. There is evidently some hid meaning that could not then be published in The Secret Doctrine or in The Ocean of Theosophy. Can any further light be given here on this subject?

G. de P. — The reason that it was not published, Companions, was simply because it is so difficult to understand by people who have not been trained to study these difficult things.

Listen. The seven globes of our earth-chain — and these same observations will apply to any solar or planetary chain — are coadunated into a unity of life, but they are not consubstantial. They form a unity, but are not a unit. They are seven distinct and separate globes existing in different parts of space, which does not mean widely separate from each other because they interpenetrate, and thus they form one unitary body. A man's physical cadaver, his physical body, is a unitary aggregate of different organs connected by one life, or one aggregate of life-forces, themselves containing one dominating intelligence which is imposed over numberless decillions of inferior little entities, atomic and cellular, which are all growing intelligences; and yet the arm is not in the eye, nor is the foot in the mouth. So with the seven globes of the planetary chain.

HPB usually draws the planetary chain in symbolic form, like this:

That is the way in which she usually draws and connects the seven globes of a planetary chain: globes A, B, C, D, E, F, and G. But the globes do not exist in space just like this symbolic diagram. In one sense of the

word, and a very true sense too, they may be looked upon as existing more like this diagram: Imagine seven concentric spheres or circles. They are all coadunated together around one laya-center or heart, so far as a planetary chain goes; yet each globe has its own individual laya-center, also the globe that is at the heart is the physical globe, and the outermost one is what you might call the most spiritual or globe G. Now the objection — a very strong one — to this delineation of the seven globes is that you immediately ask: but where is globe A? You see the difficulty. This is an objection to this manner of trying to figurate in drawing just how the seven globes exist. Therefore HPB's choice was a much better one, because it showed that two globes, the two highest globes, are on one cosmic plane; that the two next inferior globes are on the next lower cosmic plane; the two still more inferior globes are on the next lower cosmic plane; and one globe, our globe D, is on the lowest or seventh cosmic plane. This figure of seven concentric circles nevertheless is valuable because it suggests strongly the idea of the coadunation of all the globes, showing them as all bound together into one entity, and yet being distinctly seven separate globes.

Now suppose we take a departure in thought. Try to forget both these diagrams, the one of the seven concentric circles and the other of the seven globes as HPB delineated them, her diagram suggesting a necklace of seven pearls. Let us try another diagram, putting the seven globes more or less at random but on different planes, with one globe, globe D, as the lowest to represent our earth. We have therefore a third symbolic diagram.

Let us call these circles globes A, B, C, D, E, F, G. This diagram would be just as good in illustration, if by this way of drawing the seven globes we were desirous of emphasizing the fact that they are seven distinct globes scattered about in space, which fact is also true. Yet they are all coadunated, making one unity; and are

each one of different stages of matter. No two of these seven globes are of exactly the same degree of matter.

A and G, for instance, although on the same cosmic plane, are not exactly of the same degree of ethereality.

Thus, if we follow this last sketch or diagram of the seven globes, the Life-wave begins its evolution on globe A, descends to globe B, then passes on into globe C, and finally comes to globe D, thence it passes to globe E, up the ascending arc to globe F, and ends the round on globe G. Now what happens then? I might say merely in passing, Companions, that there are three more globes that are never spoken of, making ten globes in all.

Student — Is there some sort of matrix holding them together?

G. de P. — Not so much a matrix as the bonds of karmic unity. You simply cannot get the right idea about these things until you clean your minds of physical likenesses or physical similarities. There are seven distinct globes. These seven globes exist on the four lowest of the seven cosmic planes. Our globe D exists alone on the lowest or the seventh cosmic plane. The two globes superior to our globe D or earth exist on the next superior cosmic plane — or the sixth, counting downwards. The two globes superior to these two exist together on the fifth cosmic plane counting downwards, and the two highest globes of our chain, respectively A and G, exist on the fourth cosmic plane counting downwards.

Now is it not sufficiently obvious by what I have just said that these four cosmic planes with their respective globes are distinct each from all the others? Furthermore, please remember that these seven globes are not the seven principles of the planetary chain. Each globe is a substantial entity, but nevertheless the analogy between the seven principles of man, or of the universe, and the seven globes of the chain, remains as a bare analogy. Despite all that, the seven globes are not the seven principles of the planetary chain, because each globe has its own seven principles. Again saying that the globes are not just one globe in seven different degrees of materiality or ethereality, remember also that these globes to a certain extent interpenetrate each other. Now that may seem a little hard for you to understand.

Student — That is just what I wanted to ask.

G. de P. — To a certain extent these globes interpenetrate each other, but that does not mean that they are simply all one globe in seven different states or stages of substance. They interpenetrate each other because each globe has an atmosphere, just as our physical globe has an atmosphere that the scientists know about, and which we call air. But our globe has another atmosphere, an astral atmosphere, extending for thousands of miles away from it in every direction, not merely, let us say, 120 or 130 miles or something like that, which the scientists say our physical air reaches to, but a vital-astral atmosphere, an ethereal atmosphere, extending out into space for thousands of miles, and thus touching and linking with the next two higher globes. The same rule prevails with all the other six globes as well as with our earth.

As a matter of fact, Companions, the seven globes of our chain are merely a copy in the small of what the seven sacred planets of the solar system are — these being the seven sacred planets of the ancients. Just as these seven sacred planets are scattered about in space, each one following its own orbit and yet linked together in our teachings as the seven sacred planets, all these being coadunated in evolution, so are the seven globes of our planetary chain linked together in evolution to form a planetary chain. They are coadunated, but in the case of the seven globes of the planetary chain they are not consubstantial. Nevertheless the principle is just the same as that which exists as regards the seven sacred planets of the ancients.

The three different designs on the blackboard were drawn each one merely to illustrate one aspect or one way of looking at the planetary chain of seven globes and their interconnections and interrelations. Each diagram, therefore, is imperfect because incomplete, and by so much each diagram is an imperfect representation.

Nevertheless each one is correct in the sense that it conveys to your mind an idea. Please always remember that a schematic diagram in occultism is to be taken because illustrative of an idea, and not because it is a photographic production of an actuality. In other words any such diagram is symbolic.

The diagram containing the seven concentric circles emphasizes the idea of coadunation. The way HPB had it emphasizes the idea of the seven distinct and separate globes. The diagram that I have drawn last emphasizes the idea that the seven globes of the planetary chain are scattered about in space, and are not to be considered

as forming a collar or necklace having a symmetrical, quasi-circular form.

Student — But in regard to the analogy between the human and the earth-globe. You say that the different physical and astral globes are separated in space. But in the human being they are not separate, are they?

G. de P. — They certainly are, because you must be referring to the seven principles of the human being, as the human being is not composed of seven planetary globes.

Student — I thought the physical was built on the astral, and that the physical penetrates the astral.

G. de P. — It does, but it would be more correct to say that the astral penetrates the physical; and this is done very much as the globes interpenetrate one another.

Student — And are we separated like that?

G. de P. — You mean, I suppose, are our principles separated? The answer in a sense is, yes, although all originate from one source, and each lower one is the child of the next higher one, and all are composed of the substance of the auric egg in its various planes of substance.

For instance, you take the atman. It permeates all your principles. Indeed, every principle permeates all the others. They all interpenetrate each other. Your buddhi is not in your brain, for it is not localized there. It surrounds you as an influence, an atmosphere, as well as permeating all the principles beneath it in dignity. It extends out beyond you for hundreds, indeed hundreds of thousands of miles. The atman within you actually reaches from sun to earth. I mean yours, and mine too. But all the principles express their energies within the concreted or individualized entity which is called the auric egg. It is in its lowest form the last expression on the material plane of the collected six principles, or rather the collected energies of the six principles. Just let me add, my dear Companion, that you are one although you are so widely scattered about!!

Student — We have these different representations giving us different ideas. It occurs to me to ask if we can truly grasp it all, short of an initiation.

G. de P. — You cannot. That is quite true. Your remark is very apt. I have pointed out to you many times that the only way by which really to know, really to understand, a thing, is to be it. Do you get the idea?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — In initiation, you are shown how to become, or, if you like the phrase better, you are made to become, for the time being, the thing or things or entities you have to know or understand. For instance, in some of the initiations the cognizing entity, the percipient ego — call it what you like — the recognizing consciousness, goes to the underworld, actually becomes a soul in torment in order to know what it means. It may go to the sun for the time being in order to become a god, a solar god, to know what that means. It enters the planets Venus, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Saturn, etc., and for the time being you become at one in consciousness with that to which you go, so that you may know and understand, from being it, from having become it for the time being.

For instance, you may have a pet, a pet dog. You watch it, you study it, you notice its pretty antics, you see it at play, and your brain-mind gives you some vague and general idea of what its consciousness is. But really to know that dog, from the inside so to speak, you would have to become that dog for a while, retaining in the interim your own individual consciousness as the observer. Do you understand?

Many Voices — Yes.

Student — I understand that it took us to the latter part of the third root-race of this fourth round in order to become human as we are now, intellectual beings. I was wondering if it would take us as long a time during the fifth round and the sixth round, etc., because we have been through all these experiences. Do we have to take so long a time to go through them again during the succeeding rounds? In the seventh round, won't we be able to enter it as self-conscious beings instead of going through the whole process of evolution in the

mineral, and plant and animal kingdoms first? Or shall we have to wait until we reach the tenth globe?

G. de P. — No. Your question is very intelligent indeed. Actually, each round is a little shorter than the preceding round, and the seventh round is the shortest of all, the reason being that the entity is approaching graduation from that schoolhouse which is the planetary chain. Having studied as in a schoolroom for so many aeons of years, having become proficient in the lessons learned there, the entity takes its last and final examinations with relative ease and quickness, and passes through the last or seventh phase of learning much more quickly and easily than it did in the preceding times. Furthermore, after the first round, an entity in passing through each new round thereafter very quickly goes through a review of what it had experienced previously, and beginning with the fifth round, the next round, the host of human monads passes a very short time in all the kingdoms below the human.

Student — Then could you tell us what we have to go through in the eighth, ninth, and tenth rounds?

G. de P. — No, I am afraid that I could not do that.

Student — Thank you.

Student — May I ask a question?

G. de P. — About the globes?

Student — Yes, Professor, about the globes. From what you have explained I take it to be a fact that the seven globes of the chain were all born at once. Is that correct?

G. de P. — No, it is not.

Student — Then this is the point: does globe A of the lunar-chain give its energy to globe A of the earth-chain?

G. de P. — That is right.

Student — In regard to the initiation question: is it possible for the one going through the initiation rites to go to the other globes of the earth-chain, to send his consciousness there?

G. de P. — That is exactly what happens in the fourth degree of initiation.

Student — And are the influences from these higher globes of the chain, E, F, and G, able to penetrate our present earth?

G. de P. — They do it constantly, and in proportion as the human being can sense or catch these higher or more spiritual rates of vibration, just in that degree is he what ordinary human beings call a great man. A sixth-rounder really is one whose consciousness is not only of the sixth round — or rather as the average man will be in the sixth round on this earth — but his consciousness is one which is like that of the inhabitants of the sixth globe. Do you understand?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — There is an analogy all through these different degrees of growth.

Student — One more question. If globe D of the moon-chain is fading away, what is globe E doing? If the lunar globe D gave birth to globe D of the earth-chain, what is the lunar globe E doing?

G. de P. — It also is fading away. All the seven globes of the moon-chain are slowly becoming dissipated, each one on its own plane.

Student — In other words, they all went into pralaya at once?

G. de P. — They all went into pralaya, but not all at once. Globe A of the lunar-chain went into its pralaya first. Then it was followed by globe B which cast all its life-essences and forces and energies out into space, and slowly informed the laya-center destined to become globe B of the earth-chain. While doing this, globe B

of the lunar-chain entered upon its disintegration; and so on all around the lunar-chain.

Student — Then is globe C of the earth-chain now more or less in pralaya?

G. de P. — Globe C of the earth-chain? Do you mean the globe preceding our present globe D of the earth-chain? It is not in pralaya, but it is in obscuration. There is a big difference between pralaya and obscuration.

Pralaya means disintegration. Obscuration means quiescence, sleep, dormancy. When a man dies he goes into pralaya — that is, his physical body dies. When a man is asleep, the physical body is in obscuration. Do you see the idea?

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — A race can be in obscuration many times before the race finally dies or enters into its pralaya. Let me tell you something here. The mineral kingdom as we have it on our present globe D is now in obscuration.

The plant kingdom on our globe D as it exists at present is in obscuration, but not so fully as is the mineral kingdom. The animal kingdom, or beast kingdom, as it exists today, is beginning its period of round-obscuration — just beginning it. What I have said shows the reason why the mineral kingdom is so quiescent.

The plant kingdom is a little less obscured, and is not quite so still as are the minerals. And the animal or beast kingdom is beginning its obscuration, and therefore it is more active than are the two other inferior kingdoms. The human kingdom is not in obscuration at all as a kingdom, although races may be racially in obscuration for short periods. Do you get the idea?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — Consequently, when the mineral kingdom is in its activity it is enormously more active than the mineral kingdom on our globe D today is. If I were to tell you that the mineral kingdom, when it is fully active, is so active that you would see the rocks move and crawl, you would then perhaps get the idea. And I am not wandering far from the truth in telling you that the vegetable kingdom, for instance, when it is fully active, is very much more active than our vegetable kingdom is today as it now exists on earth. For instance, you would possibly see trees move their branches about almost as human beings move their arms: reach to earth, take things, envelop and surround passing entities, and do things like that. There are, I believe, even on earth today, certain plants which capture flies. That fact will give you the idea of what I am trying to hint at.

Thus a man, when he is awake during the daytime, is active, makes movements, goes around; he does things.

At nighttime he is in obscuration, or asleep. His body then lies quiescent, occasionally moving; it is breathing, the blood is flowing, he may turn in bed, he may murmur a few words, he may have a dream; but the body as a whole is in obscuration. So it is with these kingdoms. When the mineral kingdom is active and not in obscuration as it is on earth today, one way of manifesting its energies is by tremendous volcanic activity. If you could be there at the time you would see the earth actually pulsating, rising and falling, moving, flowing, as if alive.

The scientists who do not believe in the ancient wisdom and who do not know anything about it, and who have not the intuition to understand these things, think that because the mineral kingdom is so still, relatively immovable, it is dead. It is not. It is very much alive. But it is sleeping. It is dormant. Furthermore the mineral kingdom as it exists today is the sishta, or the highest portion of the mineral evolutionary activity that had its end and then left the mineral kingdom sleeping. So also with the plant kingdom. What is left today of the plants are the sishta, or remnants — the last, the most evolved entities, before the plant kingdom went into its more or less, but not quite, perfect obscuration. And when the next mineral awakening comes, the present minerals, or rather the minerals as they then will be — practically the same as now — will begin to move, will begin to awaken, will begin to enter upon a mineral period of activity. Similarly the plant kingdom. As you see, it is all wheels within wheels. All is living. All is animate. Some things are sleeping, and some things are awake.

Sometimes an entire planet goes into obscuration. Such is the case with the planet Mars at the present time.

But I must also point out, Companions, that the obscuration period does not last for any one planet — and I am now speaking of planetary obscuration — it does not last, I repeat, until the life-wave passes through all the succeeding globes, then passes through its interplanetary nirvana, and after that entering globes A, and B, and C, reaches our globe D again. Do you see what I am striving to say? I mean that our globe D, when it is in obscuration, does not remain in obscuration so long a time as I have just described. The reason of it is that there are life-waves following each other, each wave being composed of families of entities.

Our human family is one of such groups. When we shall have left globe D, globe D will go into obscuration, but it will not remain in obscuration until our human family circles through globes E, F, and G, then goes through the interplanetary nirvana, and then returns down through globes A, B, and C, in the fifth round. Our globe D will not wait in obscuration all that time; and when we shall have left it as a human family, another family of monads will enter our globe D. Do you understand what I am trying to tell?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — I want to add just this: you see therefore that there are families of evolving entities following one after each other in every round, and all going around the seven globes. One family coming after the other, and each such family leaving behind, when it abandons the globe, its sishta, its remnants, meaning the highest evolved representatives that that particular family has up to that time brought forth. They remain on the earth to be the seed-nursery for the time when that family will come during the next round.

Student — Is it because we are preparing to leave globe D that the lower kingdoms are already in obscuration?

G. de P. — No. They are in obscuration because their representative life-waves have passed on to the higher globes entirely or partially. At present the case is entirely so with the mineral kingdom, and very largely so with the plant kingdom, and only partially so with the animal kingdom. The entities of this last or animal kingdom are just beginning to pass on to the globe E — the next one following our globe D. Hence, as I said before, the animal or beast kingdom is only beginning to enter upon its obscuration period. The monads composing that beast kingdom are beginning to leave the earth, passing on to the next higher globe. Similarly will the human kingdom do, when its time to leave this globe D shall have come, towards the end of our seventh root-race. It will begin by the forerunners leaving our globe D and passing over to globe E; and that process of passing over will continue until all the monads of the human family shall have left our globe D for globe E, excepting the sishta, the remnants — those left behind to be the seeds for our same human family when it comes again to globe D in the next or fifth round.

Student — I see. May I ask also, what is the difference between pralaya and nirvana?

G. de P. — Oh, an enormous difference! They are two different things entirely. Pralaya means dissolution, disintegration. Nirvana means a state of evolution or attainment so high and so spiritual that all of the humanity of a human being has become evolved into quasi-divinity, temporarily or permanently as the case may be, because it is possible for a lofty spiritually-minded human being, even today, to have a temporary nirvana. Such a temporary nirvana, by the way, is one of the loftiest experiences of the sixth degree of initiation. The mahatmas experience that. Do you understand?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — Nirvana is a state. Pralaya means dying, death, dissolution, disintegration.

Student — Can this state of nirvana take place without the form being destroyed at all?

G. de P. — Oh, yes.

Student — I see. Because I have wondered, when a globe-chain goes into nirvana after its complete cycle of rounds, whether the forms remain or whether they re-form again as the moon-chain after the nirvana.

G. de P. — You have the answer to your question in what happened to the moon-chain at the end of the lunar

seventh round. All the entities composing the ten classes of monads which had enlivened and invigorated that moon-chain at the end of the lunar seventh round passed over to the seven laya-centers in order to build up the earth's planetary chain of seven new globes. But what was left behind of the moon-chain consisted of the lowest monads of the mineral kingdom, which compose the seven decaying corpses of the seven globes of the lunar chain.

These lowest mineral monads came trailing along over to the new earth-chain as the ages passed and as the lunar chain continued to disintegrate. Just the main body is disintegrating. As it disintegrates its atoms pass over to the earth, and this is what HPB refers to when she says that the earth is soaked through and through with the evil influences of the moon. There are two meanings to her observation: one psychical, to which I cannot allude here; and one physical which I have just tried to explain. The atoms from the disintegrating moon pass to the earth and carry with them all the influences and elements of decay and death of which the moon-chain is the field. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, thank you very much, Professor.

G. de P. — I hope you do.

Student — Has what you said about the vitality of the mineral kingdom any relation to the old geomancy that was practised by means of stones, that HPB speaks of? Could you tell us anything about the rocking stones and how they were used?

G. de P. — Well, the rocking stones were a different thing entirely. Those stones were made to rock by the exercise of magical powers, which every human being has in himself but which very few human beings know how to use — fortunately! For instance, if you knew how to do so, you have the power in your constitution to raise the roof of this room two, six, ten, fifty, feet straight up; indeed to tear it from its bindings to the walls.

By the exercise of your willpower you could close the folding door by your side over there. You could cause rain to fall, and quite easily too.

The will of man is a magical agent of unsuspected powers. Those stones that you speak of were made to rock by willpower. They were poised so that they could be rocked, and when the magician who knew how to do so unleashed or unloosed the psychical and spiritual powers within him he could perform wonders; and he did so.

Student — Didn't those stones play an important part in the spiritual cycles? Or were the rocking stones simply a sort of phenomenon?

G. de P. — It was this way. Such examples of the use of human psychical and quasi-spiritual powers were never, or at least very rarely, used by white magicians. They were used by magicians who, in most cases, were trying to do in their time what their ancestors of the fourth root-race did — the great magicians of the fourth root-race — trying to obtain control of men and circumstances by using, and in fact misusing, the powers latent in man, prostituting them to material uses instead of to the spiritual and intellectual. Now that is the truth in the majority of cases, but not invariably the truth.

Student — That would not apply to the stones that the Egyptians used for producing anaesthetic effects?

G. de P. — Oh, no. There were exceptions, of course.

Even today the white magicians use physical means if such means are wholly impersonal, and for an end so good and necessary that there is a legitimate reason for doing so.

Student — Does not this power of the Masters in using the energies of nature depend upon the fact that those energies are natural, living entities? Does it not depend upon the fact that they for the time being are those entities, and rule them by that power in the universe that makes for union — by love? Does not the white magician make those energies of nature serve him because he has learned to do it, because a part of his being, his love, has entered into them?

G. de P. — That is the case always with the white magicians. The Brothers of the Shadow use the same forces of nature for other purposes. The Brothers of the Sun, the white magicians, use precisely the same forces, and often in the same way, but solely for impersonal and holy purposes. Their actions are dictated, just as you say, by love for their fellowmen. Therein lies the difference between the black and the white —

between the White Brothers and the Brothers of the Shadow. In the one case, impersonal love dictates the action; the objective is a noble one, an impersonal one, to do good. And in the case of the Brothers of the Shadow, the motive is an evil one.

Student — I would like to ask a few questions that are connected together. Is it then correct to think that the elemental kingdom on globe A in the first round was the manifestation of what we are today — I mean the same beings as the humanity of today?

G. de P. — Yes, the same entities which then manifested in elemental form. You speak, however, of the elemental kingdom. Please remember that there are three elemental kingdoms — that is, three classes of elementals.

Student — I had not thought of that. I did not know which one. Next I want to ask: on globe A in the first round there was a humanity of human beings. Now was that humanity the sishta of the last manvantara, and have they evolved to dhyan-chohanship, or gods, by this time?

G. de P. — What are you referring to when you say: "are they the sishta of the last manvantara"?

Student — Well, if they came on earth —

G. de P. — Who came on earth?

Student — Those human beings who came on globe A in the first round. They came on earth as evolved human beings. They must have lived and attained in some past manvantara in order to have arrived at that stage.

G. de P. — Quite true. They were not the sishtas. The sishta matter applies only to entities left on any globe of a chain at the end of any round through that chain. I think I misunderstood your first question which was not very clear. The three kingdoms of elementals came indeed first on globe A; but those elementals were not the entities who became human beings during the fourth round on our globe.

The first kingdom to appear, when by evolution a new planetary chain comes into being, are the three kingdoms of elementals who build up the elementary work or preliminary sketches of the chain-to-be.

Immediately after them come the dhyan-chohans of the preceding chain who then take charge of things, and who thereafter direct and govern the course of evolution in that chain during the succeeding seven rounds.

Nevertheless, in a certain sense these same dhyan-chohans directed the preceding preliminary work of the three elemental kingdoms by overshadowing or inspiring — much as an architect will lay down the plan of the building-to-be from which the laborers thereupon begin to build the foundation.

And among these dhyan-chohans who thus come — and there are seven classes of them also, actually ten —

were the entities who became human during the fourth round, fully human I mean; and these entities are we.

There are ten classes of beings who left the moon-chain when that moon-chain died, beginning with the elementals and ascending in dignity upwards to the highest dhyan-chohans; and each one of these ten classes of monads has its own work to do in building up the chain-to-be — the earth planetary chain to become.

What is your next question?

Student — In The Secret Doctrine it says that it is only in the first round that heavenly man becomes a human being on globe A, and rebecomes a mineral, plant, and animal on globes B, C, etc. But that in the second round evolution changes entirely its procedure. Could you tell us how it proceeds in the second round?

G. de P. — That is a very deep question, and would require a very long answer. I am searching for words which will convey clearly and without too many of them an answer to your question. Globe A is formed first

by the three kingdoms of the elementals coming over from the moon-chain who sketch out what that globe A is to become — make a sketch, as it were, around the laya-center through which they descend into activity.

They are followed by the most evolved entities of the lunar chain that was, who thereafter begin to take direct charge as dhyan-chohans, or gods, of the formation of the new planetary chain. Kingdom one of the elementals comes first, and builds the first elemental kingdom on globe A. When its work is done, it leaves behind it its sishta or remainders, and passes down the scale one degree in order to begin the formation of the first elemental sketch of globe B. When the first elemental kingdom on globe A has thus finished its work there and gone to globe B, then the second elemental kingdom comes into globe A, and runs through its own seven races of activity. When its seven races of activity are ended it leaves its sishta behind, and passes on to globe B; at the same time globe B, feeling this impulse of the inrushing elementals of kingdom number two, sends forth the elemental kingdom number one, which had been working there, and which now leaves its sishta on globe B, and passes one step downwards in order to build up the first elemental sketch of globe C.

Now returning in our thought to globe A again: when the second elemental kingdom has finished its work on globe A, then the third elemental kingdom comes in to globe A, and then the elementals on globes B and C

each move a step forwards or downwards, and the first elemental kingdom thereupon begins the formation of the elemental sketch of globe D. When this third elemental kingdom of globe A has run through its seven root-races or seven periods of activity on globe A, then the mineral kingdom comes into globe A and runs through its seven races, and finishing leaves its sishta behind and passes to globe B which has been built up by the three elemental kingdoms that preceded the incoming mineral kingdom. The third elemental kingdom had commenced coincidently with this to leave globe B and to pass over to globe C. The second elemental kingdom coincidently leaves globe C in order to pass on to globe D. And the first elemental kingdom which has been occupied in building up the elementary sketch of globe D coincidently passes on to do the same work on globe E; and thus these kingdoms pass forwards, one after the other, until all the globes have been sketched out and builded to the extent of one round. At the end of this first round which takes place on the seventh globe all the seven kingdoms have passed through the planetary chain during this first round.

Student — Yes, but the human kingdom on globe A — do not the dhyan-chohans create it, do they not bring it into being?

G. de P. — They bring it into being, certainly. But we, who became the human kingdom on this globe D of our fourth round, were not human beings on the moon-chain.

Student — I understand. It was the dhyan-chohans who were humans on the moon-chain.

G. de P. — Those who are the dhyan-chohans of the earth-chain were the human kingdom on the moon-chain. We who are the human kingdom on this chain will be the dhyan-chohans of the next chain.

Student — And the human kingdom on globe A is one of the first hosts of human beings that came over from the moon-chain?

G. de P. — That is correct. They were the dhyan-chohans, the former human kingdom on the lunar-chain, having completed the seven rounds of the lunar-chain; and they built up the human kingdom on globe A of the earth-chain during the first round. Now then, the first round has very briefly been sketched.

During the second round, the whole scheme changes in important particulars, for the reason that all the lines of future evolution are now ready and waiting, and hereafter the life-waves or classes of monads follow each other from globe to globe, one after the other, much like the trains which leave some great central station in a large metropolis one after the other each day — each day, in this case, being a round in the planetary chain.

Do you understand me?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — Those lines were laid by the work of the seven classes accomplished during the first round, and thereafter all the classes of beings follow along the tracks thus already laid and prepared and waiting for them.

Student — Didn't you tell us once that the dhyan-chohans become men in the first round?

G. de P. — Yes, they do. Dhyan-chohans, I may add in passing, is a very general term meaning "spiritual entities." As a phrase dhyan-chohan means "Lord of Meditation," and refers to the spiritual part of the constitution of any entity: god, human, beast, plant, mineral, elemental. No matter what the kingdom is, the spiritual parts of that kingdom are the dhyan-chohans; just as in a human being today, his spiritual part is a dhyan-chohan, although not as yet by any means clearly manifesting through the human vehicle.

At the end of the seventh round of the earth planetary chain, the human vehicle will have become so spiritualized that it will be able properly and adequately to manifest the transcendent powers of the god within. When we speak of the dhyan-chohans coming from the lunar chain and building up the earth-chain, the expression dhyan-chohans when thus generally used without qualification refers to the entire seven (or ten) classes of entities. Do you understand me?

But when you particularize the classes then we must speak of the three elemental kingdoms, and the mineral kingdom, and the plant kingdom, and the animal kingdom, and the human kingdom, and then in addition three kingdoms higher than the human kingdom, which last three were the three highest classes of the dhyan-chohans who had left the lunar chain after the lunar chain's last or seventh round.

I hope that all this is clear to you. Companions, I believe that it is now ten o'clock. You have embarked upon lofty themes tonight, and I wonder just how far I have succeeded in answering satisfactorily.

Many Voices — Excellently! Wonderfully!

G. de P. — Well, I hope so, Companions. Sometimes when you leave the room, I query how much better I might have done if I had had a greater command of language.

Please remember also the following before we leave each other tonight. The whole scheme of the planetary chain and its evolving entities is not difficult to understand in its elements, and hence I am continually striving to give you, first, a general view. What really is very confusing to the mind is the intricacies of the working of nature's living forces. That is indeed complicated, just as it occurs in a human physical body.

Consider how wonderful a thing the human constitution is, how marvelous, how complicated, built up of numberless entities, each one a living entity, a learning, growing thing! — with its spiritual nature, its psychological, its astral, its physical nature; and yet all these entities combine to form the human constitution which is a microcosm or little world. So simple is a human being when we look at him from the general point of view, and so marvelously intricate and complicated when we follow the devious byways and paths of his constitution. Just think what health is: a wonderful balance of the forces of the human, mental, psychological, astral, and physical being. It seems so simple to say that, so easily understood, and yet were we to analyze what we mean when we speak of the balance of the forces in a human physical being we should enter upon a perfect welter of marvelous thoughts!

Well, Companions, I think that we had better now close the meeting.

[The sounding of the gong. Silence.]

Please forgive me, Companions, if I have not been able to answer fully all your questions. Remember two things: first, that some questions which are asked I am not allowed to answer properly, but I am also required to give some kind of answer which will be truthful and yet which will not betray keys that are not given to me to give. The second thing to remember is that often I am very tired when these gatherings take place, and I know — at least I have the feeling — that, try as hard as I may, I have not been fully successful even in answering questions to which you are entitled to receive answers. So I ask you to forgive me and to bear with me; and by patience, and by studying together, at least we shall teach each other some things of benefit and receive mutual help. Your love and trust in me are great helps to me. I also feel that the love I have for you all, and the trust I have in you all, will be something that you can carry in your hearts and minds and that they will help you.

Goodnight, Companions.

Meeting 20

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Twenty

Meeting of September 9, 1930

G. de P. — The meeting is open for questions.

Student — May I ask a question, Professor? For a long time I have wanted definite information on this: when one looks into the atmosphere, not to look through it, but into it, one sees a number of what appear to be entities moving about apparently with a turning movement. Sometimes they are bright, and in stormy weather they appear dark and very much agitated. Are they elementals?

G. de P. — Do you mean the dancing motes?

Student — I do not mean the ordinary motes — I do not refer to them at all. What I refer to seem to be definite entities, very different from what is seen in objective vision.

G. de P. — Do you mean entities having definite shape?

Student — Very like animalculae, very small.

G. de P. — Flashing things?

Student — Very inconstant, moving about in semicircular motion.

G. de P. — If I understand you aright, I should say that they are the tribes of larger lifeatoms. I suppose that everybody has seen these; and sometimes in a clear atmosphere on the top of a mountain, for instance, when looking into the atmosphere they present a wonderful sight. It is a beautiful picture: wonderful, flashing starry points, dashing in all directions. It is this to which you refer, I suppose?

Student — Yes, that is the idea.

G. de P. — They are the tribes of larger lifeatoms. As a matter of fact, the entire world is full of lifeatoms.

There are many, many tribes and families and classes of them, some large, some small, some microscopical in size, some vastly larger; but all are moving, all dashing hither and yon, some slowly, some very rapidly, some very brilliant, some less brilliant, but all are in movement.

Everything is filled with lifeatoms. In one sense of the word, they may be called the building bricks of the world. Is the answer responsive?

Student —Yes, thank you very much. It helps very much.

Student — I should like to ask if it is correct to think of the higher manas as a ray of the manasaputra, and of the lower manas as a ray of that ray?

G. de P. — The latter part of your question is correct. But I should say that the higher ego, or the higher manasic faculty in man, is the manasaputra itself. The manasaputra in the core of its being is a god, a monadic essence, but that essence is passing through the phase of its evolution when its self-consciousness is centered in the higher manasic part of its constitution. Consequently such a being is called a manasaputra. We human beings are passing through the phase of our spiritual-psychological evolution when our consciousness is self-centered — or our self-consciousness rather is centered — in the kama-manasic part of our constitution, and therefore we are humans.

Student — The reason I asked that question is because I understand that the manasaputra reincarnates; and I thought it might be a ray of the manasaputra, rather than the manasaputra itself.

G. de P. — As a matter of fact, the manasaputra does not reincarnate at all. It is far above the realms of physical flesh. It is a ray from the manasaputra which produces the astral monad which indeed incarnates. The manasaputra is so far above the physical flesh that it could not possibly affect that flesh at all unless there were the intermediate links of consciousness. We have, then, the manasaputra issuing forth from itself its ray, which is the true human being, the human soul, which in its turn issues forth from itself the astral monad working through the auric egg, and it is the astral monad which actually incarnates in flesh. Do you understand?

Student — I think so. Then that astral monad is really the higher ego?

G. de P. — Dear me, no! The astral monad is the end of the ray projected from the manasaputra. It is the tip or point of the ray, ultimately or originally issuing forth from the manasaputra, which contacts and thus enlivens and inspirits flesh — makes it alive, in fact really brings about the existence of living flesh.

The manasaputra does not incarnate. First, the monadic essence; then its child, the manasaputra; then the manasaputra's child, the human monad; then the human monad's child, the astral monad; then its child, the physical body — all these are connected by the stream of consciousness and vitality running through them all from the highest to the lowest. I repeat, the manasaputra does not incarnate.

Student — That is what I thought. It could not.

G. de P. — You are quite right. It sends forth from itself its ray, its child, which is the human soul; and even the human soul does not incarnate directly in the body, but sends forth from itself its child in turn, which is the astral monad, and this is sufficiently gross and material so that it can and does incarnate, become flesh in its lowest parts, flesh being its dregs or lees. You see, therefore, a series of steps, counting upwards, from the grossest to the ethereal, and in each one of which is a monad of its own kind. As I have told you before, there are many monads pertaining to the constitution of a human being: the divine monad, the spiritual monad, the manasic monad or manasaputra, the kama-manasic monad of a human being, the astral monad or elemental or astral-vital self. It is through this last that the other monadic elements can manifest or express themselves or work in the physical brain. They enliven or give some of their own effulgence to the physical brain, which the physical brain thereupon expresses as thought, as life, as sensitivity, and as physical consciousness.

Remember that man is a compounded entity. This fact is so supremely important that I suggest you dwell in thought upon it all the time when studying these matters. Man is a compounded entity, a pillar of light, extending from spirit to flesh: pure light in its highest or spiritual part, and growing gradually more dense and still more dense and darker and darker until it reaches or becomes flesh, which by comparison is as black as night. Do you understand this figure of speech?

Student — Thank you, yes.

G. de P. — All this process of condensation or materialization or thickening is done through and by means of the auric egg, which therefore exists on many planes. To put the same thought in equivalently accurate fashion, the auric egg has many planes of ethereality — or materiality which comes to the same thing —

many planes, many layers, many degrees, many steps. The auric egg is not merely the astral atmosphere which surrounds the physical body, which is merely the lowest plane or layer or degree of the auric egg. The auric egg extends "inwards" and "upwards," directly to the divine spirit, the god within, which is surrounded by the most spiritual portion of the auric egg.

Student — We understand that previous to the time when humanity was endowed with manas it made no karma. In referring to this HPB in almost the same breath speaks of the sin of the mindless. Of course that expression aroused a question: is not the second race the karmic result of the first race?

G. de P. — Yes.

Student — If it is, then is it simply because it is the racial karma, and the karma spoken of when referring to the endowment of manas is the individual karma? Is that right?

G. de P. — Yes, your question is a very thoughtful one. The "mindless races" had no karmic moral responsibility; and HPB in the passage you refer to was alluding to ethical or moral responsibility, which is a very high kind of responsibility. But everything that is high or low or intermediate has its own natural karma, or series of natural consequences. Furthermore, these natural karmas of the different kinds are by no means all of an ethical type. The "mindless man," if ever his mindlessness put his body in danger, would necessarily and naturally have suffered pain as a consequence, which is physical karma, physical consequences. But there was no real ethical karma about it, because there was no awakened mind, no seeing, guiding mind in such case, which deliberately chose the wrong path — the path of evildoing. Do you understand?

Student — Then the sin of the mindless was not an ethical sin?

G. de P. — It was not an ethical sin, and could no more be so called than the acts of a beast today, or the acts of a little child before the child's mind has begun to manifest itself. A little child, if it falls into the fire, will be burned. This is physical karma, and of course it is karma — consequences. Karma therefore acts everywhere and always. A little child, who in a spirit of sportive play will lift a knife and perhaps stab its parent, or its brother, is not ethically responsible. There was no intent to commit murder in such case, but the consequences ensued just the same. The blow falls and the victim is injured. But, of course, on the other hand, the person who suffers, suffers because such is that person's karma.

Everything that is, is karma, but there are many kinds of karma: spiritual karma, intellectual karma, moral karma, psychical karma, astral karma, vital karma, physical karma. Along still another line of thought, there is personal or individual karma, and collective karma — as in the case of a body of people, let us say, meeting an accident or death in a sinking steamship. Again, there is family karma, national karma, racial karma, the karma of the globe — of the earth in which we are all involved — cosmic karma, universal karma. Do you now see? So HPB spoke with perfect propriety and accuracy.

To speak of karma, in the words of Mr. A. P. Sinnett, as "the law of ethical causation," is true enough as far as it goes, but it does not go far. Such karma is ethical karma. It exists, most emphatically. It is a high kind of karma; and so far as we human beings are concerned it touches us very close; but there are many other kinds of karma. Therefore karma should preferably be called the doctrine of consequences, meaning that an act anywhere, at any time, done by any being, will inevitably and naturally have its consequences. Such is karma when defined in a very general statement. Surely this ought to be clear. Is the answer responsive?

Student — Yes. And my thought then was right, that no race could succeed the previous race, except as the karma of the previous race.

G. de P. — Perfectly correct. Every succeeding race is the child of the preceding race, and is its karma, is its consequence, is its consequences. Hence the Atlantean karma still weighs heavily upon us of the fifth root-race, because we, from another standpoint again, are actually fourth-race egos, now evolved or now become fifth-race egos, and therefore manifesting and living and working in fifth-race bodies.

Student — In view of the fact of what you have said previously, I should like to ask: where is the pivotal point of the human constitution? Where is that part which the philosophers call 'I am I'?

G. de P. — A very pertinent question. Here again we have an aspect of consciousness. As I have told you on other occasions, the words of the Lord Buddha are full of profound wisdom which has never been understood in the Occident, because we have not the key to one of the great Buddha's sayings: There is no immortal soul or self in man. The Occidental immediately misunderstands that statement. He thinks it means that the human being is mortal throughout. That is not the idea at all. In a compounded entity, an entity existing only by reason of its temporary composition: in that entity, as an entity, there is no immortality. If there were, then that compounded entity would last from infinity to infinity and it could never change. If it changed an iota, it would not be the same entity. Do you grasp the thought?

Many Voices — Yes, yes.

G. de P. — But change, or growth, or evolution, or progress — words which mean changing from instant to instant, growing into something better — if you catch that thought then you will see something of the inner

meaning of what the Buddha called his heart-doctrine: a phrase not meaning the doctrine of the physical heart, but meaning the heart of the thing, the core of the teaching, the essential significance of the teaching; whereas the eye-doctrine is merely that which appears, the superficial part, the garment in which the heart-doctrine is hid. In other words, the heart-doctrine is the esoteric, and the eye-doctrine is the exoteric teaching.

The 'I am I' resides in one of the centers of this compounded entity called man. It resides in one of the subordinate centers or component parts, which Occidentals call the human ego, in the ray of the manasaputra.

You have your consciousness centered in this human ray of the manasaputra because you are passing through the kama-manasic phase of your evolution, and thus the manasaputra is the essential I am I. The manasaputra is the monad passing through the manasic phase.

Thinking along these lines on many other occasions I have told you that the human entity, being a compounded entity, is a microcosm, a little world. Every one of these components, which together make up the constitution of man, is a learning, growing, evolving monad, each one expressing itself in that particular phase of its evolutionary journey. The human soul or manasaputric ray will in future time become a manasaputra, and will then evolve in still future aeons to become a divine monad or god, by bringing out more and more what is locked up within it. But the inner god, or again the manasaputra, or again the human soul, or again the astral monad — not any one of these is the human being. The human being is the composition of all of them, all working together, and thus is a compounded entity and therefore is unstable, and hence as a compound is mortal. This seems very simple and clear. Do you or do you not understand it?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — Well, that is good! Consequently, the I am I is the human ego, that part of the composition which says "I am I," meaning not you, and not someone else, and not some other thing, but myself. This immediately shows the great heresy of separateness and hence it is not the highest element in man. There is something far higher in the human constitution than the I am I, and this higher element is the spiritual splendor of the loftier part of an individual's constitution, which splendor shines upon the human monad and stimulates its growth upwards to become like unto itself. This splendor is the manasaputra, and upon the manasaputra shines, in just the same way, the light of the god within the manasaputra's essence.

We are one and yet we are many — and it is so with every human being. The physical body is an instance in point. The physical body is also a compounded entity. It is composed of incalculable hosts of lifeatoms. Each lifeatom is a growing, learning, living, evolving entity, on its way to become a god in far distant aeons —

just as we humans are, just as is the manasaputra. But the body, as compounded body, is not immortal. If it were immortal the body could never change. It could not even grow from childhood to adulthood. If a thing changes then immortality instantly vanishes, because immortality means fixity or crystallization, forever, without any change, always remaining just as it is. Do you understand?

Student — Thank you so much for the answer. There was, however, one point which I would appreciate your making clear about the manasaputra, and about the ray, the projection of the manasaputra; is that ray the human monad or not?

G. de P. — It is. I think I answered that it was.

Student — Then, may I ask another question? What was it in the Buddha when he died that went through all his principles three times, as you have explained on a previous occasion? Was that the same thing, or was it the consciousness of the Buddha?

G. de P. — The consciousness of the Buddha is the buddhic splendor, which is the manushya-buddha or human buddha, in other words the pure unveiled manasaputra. Please remember that every entity is a compounded entity. I must repeat this, because evidently you have not fully understood. This compounded entity comprises a celestial buddha or inner god — two ways of saying the same thing. The Buddhist says the celestial buddha. Occidentals in their present age are accustomed to speak of it as the inner god. You may also call it the immanent christos, a third term for the same thing. A ray of this is the manushya-buddha. It is a growing, living entity. In the Buddha, the manushya-buddha manifests on account of the highly evolved constitution. But in average humanity this manushya-buddha is not yet manifest. Evolution has not gone far

enough. In the case of average men again, the ray from the manushya-buddha is the human ego of the buddha.

In the case of a buddha, this human ego is far evolved along the path. In average men, it is but slightly evolved.

Now therefore this passage of the consciousness of the Buddha, which is referred to in the Buddhist Scriptures, has reference to the human ego of the Buddha. It ascended from the ordinary human consciousness when death ensued for the Buddha, upwards into the spiritual, and touched the divine. Then it came back again along the pathway of the inner constitution, and the Buddha then opened his eyes. He closed them again, and the same human consciousness ascended a second time through the interior stages, ever more high: touched or became at one with the celestial buddha for a few fugitive instants, and then descended again for the second time, and when the brain-mind was reached the Buddha opened his eyes. For the third time, the same thing happened, and after the third opening of the eyes, the Blessed One expired.

In other words, the celestial buddha entered into nirvana — or no, pardon me, I will withdraw that. The manushya-buddha then left the lowest principles of his being to fall apart at the death, and the manushya-buddha then remained in the astral realms with all parts of his constitution as a nirmanakaya, excepting only the physical body, the linga-sarira, and the gross animal vitality or prana. In other words, all the Buddha was there except the lowest compounded vehicle. Such is a nirmanakaya.

As a matter of fact, Companions, you may know that when even the average human being dies, what HPB

refers to as the panorama which the physical brain sees passing — a rememorizing of everything that has taken place in the life just lived from the earliest record of memory until the last instant of individual consciousness — is merely a repeating of the process of dying that I have just spoken to you about as having occurred to the Buddha. In the case of the average human being, because he is not spiritual enough, his consciousness cannot follow it, for he is not conscious in the highest parts of his constitution. Hence the only element that remains conscious is the physical brain-mind, for a short time rememorizing all the events of the life that has closed. This consciousness gently and softly finally fades away; at a certain instant unconsciousness then supervenes, as quietly as the passing of a shadow — and this is death.

In the case of the Buddha, however, on account of his highly evolved inner constitution, there was this self-conscious ascent along the planes or layers of consciousness, up to the highest, and then down again; then up to the highest, and then down again; then up to the highest, and then down again for the third time. After this the body was cast off, or, as Westerners say, the body expired — the man died.

Now, referring to the question once more in order to clear up another point with regard to the 'I am I,'

remember that this I am I is the egoic part of man's constitution, but it is not the fundamental consciousness. It is the atmic consciousness; and very few human beings are able to become "at one" with it, although actually it is the most familiar thing in human life. If you will examine yourself closely, you will find that this sheer consciousness, this pure consciousness without any color of individuality, or of personality, or of egoity, is the most fundamental thing in you; closer to you than hand or foot, because it is your essential SELF; and your ego, your individuality, your personality, and your hands and feet, are but instruments. Even your ego is but its channel, or perhaps better expressed, a whirl or knot in the stream of fundamental consciousness.

Student — In the West, in religion and literature, this idea of immortality is one of the chief things thought of.

G. de P. — It is.

Student — Now, in spite of that, many persons have never desired it. They have never wanted to go to heaven. They have not felt that they would miss anything by not going to heaven, as was held up to them as a possibility or an impossibility.

Now is this condition of the desire for immortality and the dwelling upon it, as it has been dwelt on in the West, inevitable, as the real teaching has been lost? Is it one of the bogies that will be laid by the revival of the true teaching?

G. de P. — Yes, it is. Furthermore, this bogy of a longing for personal immortality is the most fecund, fertile,

fruitful, womb of human misery and sin; because the desire for personal immortality is exactly the same thing as the desire for continuous, personal gratification. This bogy is an insatiate craving to continue, to get, to be, for yourself, instead of the consciousness of this fundamental reality, the impersonal life-consciousness, which is within you all the time, which never leaves you, which is eternal, and which actually is you. Personal immortality is a bogy, and really it is a devilish thing. It is the mother of sin, of human unhappiness, of misery, and of fear: of fear to die, of fear to lose, of fear not to achieve, of fear not to gain, of fear not to live.

It belongs to the lower part of our constitution.

The man who truly knows himself, who knows the essential "I am" within him, the essential life, lives in the Everlasting — which means the ever-evolving. He lives with everything that is. He is at home anywhere. He has no fear. He has no worries. He knows that he is — I AM! But the lower manifestation of the I am I of egoity is imperfect, and being an imperfect thing its vision is clouded. It is always hungry to be itself, to be more itself, to get things for itself. It fears it will lose. It does wrong acts to satisfy this wrong hunger; and, as I say, selfishness and sin and misery and pain are the children of this bogy.

It is at once obvious that far from being a doctrine of unreasoning pessimism, this teaching of the Buddha is a fountain of hope and of strength. I think that anyone is an arrant fool who wants to be personally immortal.

How can you be immortal if you are changing constantly? If you are immortal, you do not want to grow, you do not want to become the god within you. It is against all nature's laws and processes, because nature's essential law is growth, change, progress, evolution, expanding consciousness. And therefore the Buddha said very truly, hitting at the root of the evil: "There is no immortal soul or self in man." It is true, because everything is changing. Everything is growing.

Indeed, nature proclaims it on every side. Look at the child: born from a microscopic life-germ, he grows up a six-foot man, and then death ensues. Look at the tree springing from the seed; look at the flower; look at the opening bud; look at the nebula in space: everything is moving in change, in growth, in progress, becoming something else; and from the highest standpoint this means learning, a spiritual becoming. As Heraklitus, another much-misunderstood sage of Greece, expressed the same thought: panta rhei, everything flows; meaning everything is in movement.

Are there any other questions?

Student — As I understand it, in the first race of our round, the fourth, we did not have speech. I suppose we had no self-conscious thought. And then in the third race, after a great deal of effort, we finally developed a certain sort of speech. In the fourth we developed language; and in this present race we have the various languages that we now use. What I would like to know is this: In the next race, shall we have only one language; and in the seventh race shall we have none? Will it be simply mutually conscious thought, a perfect understanding without having to translate thought into physical carriers?

G. de P. — You are speaking of the fourth round, the present round, and of this earth, of course.

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — No, the sixth race will have languages, just as the fourth had them and the fifth has them, and so also will the seventh race; but there will be a constant tendency for languages to become more alike unto each other. In the seventh round, even on this fourth-plane globe, there will however be one language, and that language will be almost a voiceless speech. There will be transmission of thought along the etheric currents, a far greater and higher thing than mere thought-transference. Beings in those ages will know what is passing around them and in the minds of their fellow beings. We fell down very greatly indeed when as a race we acquired speech. Speech is not at all something to be proud of, and in the present state of the world it is often a positive pest! It is a feeble instrument of thought, and everybody knows how inadequate words are to convey thoughts.

The individuals of the first race did not need speech. They did not have it, because they did not need it.

Therefore it had not come into existence. They had not descended far enough into matter. They had not lost their inner powers sufficiently to need the acquirement of the feeble substitute for voiceless intercommunication that men call speech. The first race was in a state in many ways much like that of a

newborn child. A newborn child has no speech as such. It makes queer little noises and coo-coos, and expresses itself in a manner that everybody knows. Mentally speaking, the first race was in a daze, in a dream.

It didn't talk. It did not want to talk, and in fact did not have anything to talk about.

The individuals of the second race were a little worse. From making occasional inarticulate noises, they finally began to utter more or less musical sounds, and also squeaks and grunts and groans, and a series of musical notes, but at first more or less unconsciously. Finally through habit these different sounds began to mean something to those who heard them. Certain noises began to signify danger. Certain other noises began to signify pleasure. It is the same with the beasts today. It is the same to a certain extent with the human child.

Before the child learns speech the parents very readily understand the attempts of the child to express its wants by more or less musical or unmusical noises, or by cryings, and by strange sounds of various kinds.

In the early part of the third race these noises had become more or less — how may I express it? — not linguistically classified, but more or less systematized or formulated, and thus true speech began. Early speech in the third race was largely onomatopoetic, as linguists say, that is, sounds expressive of the thing itself — something which exists even today among us. We talk of the swish of water, or the booming of cannon or thunder, or of rattle and clap-trap. As you see the sounds convey the idea.

In the fourth race fully inflected speech was developed — a purely mental production. I shall be very glad when we can do without speech. Even today, although the speechless use of speech — if I may so express myself — is but poorly evolved, yet even today a great many human beings already begin to understand, at least sometimes, without words what others mean — by a gesture, a motion of the hand, or by a wink of the eye, a movement of the leg. Understanding is thus had of what the other person means. This is voiceless communication of intelligence, and it will go on developing and improving more and more through the ages and through the future races, until speech itself will finally vanish and men will communicate with each other without speech.

A time comes in esoteric training, in occult training, when the teacher has no longer need to meet his pupils in class or in a group. The teacher may be occupied in whatever he may be doing: sitting in his home, or perhaps traveling, or on horseback, or in an automobile, or in an airplane, and send out his messages by communication along the pathways of the ether by what people now call thought-transference; and his highest pupils will receive the messages instantly. The pupils themselves may be anywhere. The teacher may have a hundred pupils or more scattered all over the world; and yet they will all get the message, if awake, at the same time. Furthermore, the teacher has a means of calling the attention of his pupils to the fact that he is preparing to send a voiceless message along the etheric currents. HPB used to refer to this call as the astral bells. These bells have a silvery sound. It is hard to say whether this sound is heard only interiorly or by the physical ear, sometimes rarely by both, but mostly with the interior ear. The sound is like that made by the plucking of a silver cord, or by the sweet ringing of a silver bell, just a note or two. It means: Prepare! Ready!

Attention!

Student — May I ask a question? On one occasion in the Temple, in speaking of the inner rounds, you said that the reincarnating ego, after death, passes up the ascending arc, having at least one imbodiment on each of the ascending globes of this chain; and that at a later date the reincarnating ego again descends to this globe.

How then can it be said that we belong to any one globe at the present time more than to another; and that we are now on globe D as part of the life-wave of globe D only?

G. de P. — Are you referring to what happens after death?

Student — Yes. You spoke of that in the Temple, saying that the reincarnating ego is imbodied in each of the other globes of this chain. Now therefore how can it be said that it belongs to any one globe alone?

G. de P. — It does not. It belongs to the planetary chain.

Student — Well, I do not quite understand the difference between that and the life-wave passing from one globe to another. Is the life-wave passing along all the time?

G. de P. — The life-wave passes from globe to globe of a planetary chain according to certain cyclical

intervals. But while the life-wave does this as an aggregate body of evolving entities, nevertheless each one of such entities, distributively or individually, at death must, is obliged to, follow the lines of communication in the cosmos, which lines I have usually called the circulations of the universe. Is what I have said responsive to your question?

Student — Well, not altogether. May I put it in another way then? How do we know that those around us necessarily belong to this globe D at the present time? They may be only visitors from another globe to this globe?

G. de P. — They don't "belong" to this globe D. Every entity belongs to all the globes of the planetary chain.

But we are here together as a life-wave on this globe D at the present time. We are here together because we belong to that life-wave. Do you understand that?

Student — Yes, I understand that.

G. de P. — Well, do you?

Student — Yes, I understand that as far as it goes.

But I don't understand the difference between this passing of the individual monads and the great passing of the life-wave. Is not the life-wave composed of the monads?

G. de P. — Certainly. Let me try to give you an analogy which may help you. A root-race, for instance, is a life-wave. But that root-race is composed of individuals. Now those individuals as human beings do not live, each one, for the several million years that a root-race endures. Those individuals reincarnate. Each individual comes back to reincarnation again and again. Do you understand now?

Student — Yes, it is clear to me now. And may I ask just one more question on the same subject? Of course we understand "once a man, always a man." Then how can the reincarnating ego imbody itself on other planets where the humans are so very much higher than we are here? That would seem like taking a tremendous jump in evolution, and then coming back to our relatively lower evolved humans on this plane and globe.

G. de P. — The phrase once a man, always a man does not mean that you cannot at any time be temporarily higher than a man. It has specific reference to the so-called doctrine of transmigration as that doctrine is so badly misunderstood in the West. It is misunderstood to mean that the human soul reincarnates or occasionally reincarnates in the bodies of beasts; and in order to combat that idea the phrase became current among us, once a man, always a man, meaning only that once a human soul has unfolded itself as a human soul it cannot ever become a beast soul and therefore reincarnate in the bodies of beasts. But it does not mean, and it should not be construed to mean, that when you become a man you remain forever thereafter a man.

That is absurd.

Student — Yes, of course. Thank you very much.

G. de P. — I don't know whether I have answered your question clearly?

Student — You have given me plenty to think about.

G. de P. — No, I am not satisfied yet. You are so kindly in your questions that probably you do not care to press your question further. I want to satisfy you fully, if I can.

Student — Well, you told us that the animals on some of the ascending globes, if that is the right phrase to use, are probably hundreds of times higher than men are here on earth. Therefore, how can a reincarnating ego imbody itself on those ascending globes in anything greater than an animal there? It must be a tremendous jump for us to imbody ourselves in anything so high.

G. de P. — It is not. Not only are the beasts, or what corresponds to the beasts on the globes of the ascending

arc, hundreds of times more spiritual than we men are here, but they are perhaps even thousands of times more spiritual. Furthermore, the human ego does not imbody itself again in appropriate human encasements on the three globes of the ascending arc, because I have already told you that the human monad, when death ensues, is gathered into the bosom of the monad, and rests there in its devachan until its next reincarnation comes. What does go to these three globes of the ascending arc, and what imbodies itself, is not the human monad.

The difficulty in understanding the teaching regarding all this is largely because adequately descriptive terms or words are lacking, and therefore I can only say here that the human ego is an earth-child, whereas the higher ego or the root of the reincarnating ego is the manasaputra which does imbody itself in appropriate vehicles on the three higher globes of the ascending arc just as it does through the human ego on our fourth globe D or earth.

Please remember that the animal monad, or astral monad, could under no circumstance incarnate as a human ego before it has evolved forth from within itself that human ego. All this is very mystical, but very true; and I can only hint at it. You understand what I have said, do you not?

Student — Yes, Professor.

G. de P. — All right. Now, please try to keep the thought in your mind.

Student — I would like to ask a question about consciousness, which is difficult to express in words. You have often told us to look within us, and that then we should know all because all is there. But when you say this, obviously you do not mean merely within this human body; but do you not rather mean within the vast universal self that reaches to sun and stars, which is really our higher part but is not incarnated in human flesh because too high? I know that when I study, my feelings and my consciousness — when I am aspiring or inspired — these lofty incarnations or consciousness-reactions do not seem to be merely within the personal ME. They seem to be beyond or above me, and yet they seem to be a part of me; and thus I cannot quite understand it.

G. de P. — What you say is quite right. Of course, when I ask you to examine yourselves, to look within and to try to ally yourselves with the inner god, most emphatically I do not mean to ally yourself with the lower part of your consciousness. Ordinary psychological study of that kind, such as is pursued in our universities, often leads to morbidity, to morbid, unwholesome, unhealthy thoughts. On the contrary, my meaning is: look to the god within. Try to be at one with it. Be your highest always. Study the working within you of those splendid sublime aspirations of your spiritual soul, your higher ego. Try to make them real in your daily life.

That in brief is what I mean; and it is the same as the teaching of all the great sages and seers. Be the god within, be self-forgetful, impersonal, loving.

The universal and impersonal self that you sense so clearly within you and which you distinguish so sharply from the higher part of your constitution is touching you with its buddhic splendor. This higher part of you is the cosmic part of your monadic essence, whereas your personal or lower selfhood is but the dim and distant reflection of the buddhic splendor concreted in and around the merely human ego, the earth-child.

The whole aim of evolution and the whole aim of initiation is to make the lower part become at one with this higher part, and when this at-one-ment is fully achieved the individual is a human god, a full-blown buddha.

This higher consciousness is the I AM, and the lower part or human ego is the I am I.

Student — We are taught that the influence of the moon is evil. I cannot understand this. You have said that the seventh and highest globe of the planetary chain and also the seventh root-race of any globe are both under the particular dominance and control of the moon, or rather of that secret planet for which the moon stands as a substitute. Is it because all the monads that enter the earth-chain have to come in through the particular life-current or channel from that secret planet, the moon, and that all, when leaving it — as in the seventh race — must go out by the same channels, leaving all that belongs to the Planet of Death in the moon? Is not that why the moon is called both a planet of birth and death? As you say, the seventh globe and the seventh race are the gates of life, and also the gates of death.

G. de P. — Now, just what is your question? You have asked some very interesting things, but I do not think that I quite understand your main question on account of the many details that you speak of. I want you to clarify your question and to make it brief, so that I can give a clear answer.

Student — My question is: owing to the seventh race and seventh globe being under the dominance of the moon, is it for that reason that in going up we pass through that channel, through the moon?

G. de P. — You have touched upon the idea in part, and in part you wander from the truth.

Student — I cannot express it very clearly.

G. de P. — That is unfortunate, because if your question is not clear, how can it be clearly understood?

Please remember that it is a correspondence that you are referring to. You doubtless understand what a correspondence is. It does not mean an identity. The last globe of the earth-chain, and also the last race on any globe in any round, both correspond to the moon, because each is, mystically speaking, the death-planet or the death-race before the new thing ensues. Just so the moon was the death-planetary chain giving birth to the new planetary chain or earth-chain. Do you now understand a little better?

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — Your fundamental idea is in part correct, and I am not at all surprised that you are puzzled, because some of the intricacies of the teachings regarding the rounds and the races and the globes and the planets are very difficult to follow. I myself do not pretend to understand clearly all the details. In their higher reaches they are very difficult for me. I suppose that the great teachers themselves at times have difficulty in following out every detail with perfect clarity of thought. How can it be otherwise, when the gods themselves have their own studies, have their own problems!

Consider how vast nature is: limitless, not only in physical terms, but interiorly, boundless space filled with problems of which we human beings have no conception — and yet such facts of nature must be. Thus it is natural that any aspiring student should have difficulty in understanding an intricate problem like the rounds and races, and this is not at all to be wondered at. Hence I am glad that you had the intuition to catch a thought like yours. It shows that your mind is dwelling on these problems in the silence, and that you are gathering unconsciously the fruits of your thoughts. But always remember that correspondences are not identities.

Remember also that the seventh globe or the last globe is not our moon. Remember also that correspondentially the last race on any globe in any round is not wholly under lunar influences. The idea here is only that both the seventh globe and the last race on any globe correspond in type and in work to the moon, or rather to what the moon has been, to what the moon does even at present.

Student — May I ask a question? Could you tell us something about the Voice Bath-Qol. I know the exoteric meaning, but could you tell us anything further?

G. de P. — Bath-Qol means the daughter of the voice. This is a matter which pertains more to the Hebrew Qabbalah, and I doubt if I could make my meaning clear in the few words that I have time to give to it now. It was a Voice, according to the legend, which was alleged to "speak from on high" to certain hearers or seers.

This mystical voice, whether actually heard with the physical ear or heard interiorly, was supposed to emanate from divinity, and to it was given the curious name Bath-Qol. The Hebrews like other ancient peoples had their own types of the Mysteries, their own way of looking at nature's processes, and their own religious feelings; and each such people expressed in its own terms and manners these various matters.

The Bath-Qol you may perhaps look upon as a spiritual influence which in difficult times guides the great men of the race; because all races are led, are guided, by their great men. Is the answer responsive?

Student — Yes, thank you. May I ask another question, please? May I have the Sanskrit term used for the word monad?

G. de P. — Jiva is perhaps the best word that corresponds to the Pythagorean term monas or monad. But here again I must utter a word of warning, because in the exoteric Indian literature the word jiva is employed in a variety of ways, but the original Upanishad meaning of jiva is pretty close to what the theosophist means when he speaks of the monadic essence. Jiva means a life center. A monad signifies also a life center, but you see how vague this expression is. The liberated or fully evolved monad is called in Sanskrit the jivanmukta, meaning the "freed jiva," the "freed monad." A liberated monad is a monad which has attained fully evolved and self-directed individuality, has become a self-conscious expression of the inner god. Or, to speak more accurately, since the inner god and the monad are the same, it means the entity who has cast off the limitations of personality, and who lives in the highest part of his constitution as a liberated monadic essence.

Such is the jivanmukta — a compound Sanskrit word coming from jiva and mukta, mukta being the past participle passive of a verb which means "to free" — hence a freed Jiva, in other words a mahatma of the highest class, a buddha.

Student — About immortality: can it then be said that there is nothing eternal and indestructible except the boundless All, and that all separate existence must ultimately fade away?

G. de P. — That is essentially correct, because universes, supergods, gods, and all inferior beings, are all impermanent as entities because all are growing or evolving. The only thing that changes not, at least according to human conceptions, which lasts from eternity to eternity and throughout infinitude, is that triune essence which is consciousness-life-substance — three things which are one, but which human consciousness, reflecting the shadow of its own composition on the background of infinitude, divides into this triad. As H. P. Blavatsky expresses it, it is the cosmic life, the same thing as universal endless and beginningless motion, which is at the same time consciousness-substance.

Everything is impermanent. Everything changes. Everything grows. Everything evolves. Nothing is eternally the same. Just think of it! Once you get the idea, you will see boundless hope in this thought; and you will see such horror in the old-fashioned idea of an entity unchanging throughout eternity that it will lead your percipient faculty into wider fields of understanding.

You are essentially quite right. Everything, from gods in their universes to atoms, is impermanent, because all is in change, is in movement, is in growth, in progress. Consider the starry galaxy. Modern Occidental astronomers estimate, roughly of course, that the galaxy or Milky Way is composed of some thirty billion suns, and nobody knows how many solar systems may accompany these suns. All is impermanent because all is changing. In the Eye of Eternity, the entire life-term of the galaxy, of the Milky Way, which seems so permanent to us humans and lasts for such an incomputable number of human years, is but a momentary flash.

The heart of the heart, the core of the core, of every monad, which means every mathematical point throughout infinitude, is that infinitude itself. What a wonderful thought this is! The universe is therefore your boundless home. Hence, you are at home everywhere, for you are compact of all the principles and substances of which the universe is builded. And more, within these substances you are the cosmic life. How small and petty ordinary human affairs seem by contrast! Do you see how these thoughts wash out selfishness, wash out the desire to do evil, and destroy the sense of separate personality? Do you feel the sublimity of them? Do you not see how they clothe the essential man with ineffable dignity!

Let us close, Companions, please.

[The sounding of the gong. Silence.]

Meeting 21

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Twenty-One

Meeting of October 14, 1930

G. de P. — Are there any questions this evening?

Student — Could you tell us something about the doctrine of the anupapadaka?

G. de P. — This is a Sanskrit word which means "parentless." A more literal rendering of this compound word is "one who does not follow," or "one who is not a unit in a serial order," or, "one who does not follow a predecessor"; and is a term applied directly to one class of avataras. In one sense of the word all avataras are anupapadaka. They come without preparatory predecessors, karmic or otherwise. They do their work and then they vanish. Each avatara does not come as one in a series of beings. Consequently they are called parentless, anupapadaka, because being just the contrary in this respect of the regular karmical serial succession of teachers following one after the other, handing on the light from hand to hand — which is the regular case.

The two classes of avataras are, first, the human avataras such as were Jesus and Sankaracharya; and second, the divine avataras — a very mystical fact and doctrine indeed, which would take too long to explain tonight.

I can say this perhaps, in order to give you some idea at least of what this second class of avataras is, the divine avataras: there exists in the spiritual realms a kind of divine imbodiment, acting like and equivalent to in those spiritual realms what the human avataras are among men on earth. I mean that the gods occasionally receive superdivine visitations among themselves, that there are superdivine gods who appear in the realms of the gods very much as the avataras appear among us humans. Both cases of avataras are called anupapadaka, parentless, but this technical Sanskrit word applies with particular force to these god-avataras.

It is this very mystical and recondite and difficult doctrine of the avataras which was at the root of the teaching regarding the virgin-birth of Jesus — having no "father," in other words parentless. This idea is to be accepted or understood in the literal meaning of having no spiritual predecessor from whom the light was received in regular serial order — no guru who named the successor to take the post in his turn, and in his turn again hand on the light. Do you get the idea?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — Such, briefly, is the meaning of the word anupapadaka. It exemplifies a very beautiful doctrine, beautiful because so suggestive, and yet it is a difficult doctrine, very difficult indeed. I don't pretend to understand everything about the divine class of avataras. I have been taught the general idea, and I have made my own deductions, and have thought a great deal about the doctrine. I would not even try to give all the details because I myself don't know them.

Student — I would like to ask if the maha-manvantara refers to the period of the life of the solar system.

G. de P. — That is a very pertinent question. The phrase maha-manvantara is also a Sanskrit compound and means "great manvantara." When used without qualifying adjective, it can apply to a number of things — to the entire life of the solar system; or, to the entire seven rounds of the planetary chain; or, to the entire life-cycle of our own home-universe, which means everything comprised within the bounds of the Milky Way. It is the qualifying adjective which describes what kind of great manvantara a writer may be alluding to; and it is a lack of remembering this simple rule that has caused so much confusion about this word among students.

Student — You once said that the dhyan-chohan from a preceding maha-manvantara, after a period of paranirvana, entered this manvantara as an unself-conscious god-spark, and being the fruitage of that past manvantara is what we call our inner god. Now we have also learned elsewhere that in a complete cycle of any planetary chain all the egos are elevated one plane higher.

G. de P. — One cosmic plane.

Student — One cosmic plane?

G. de P. — Yes.

Student — So this is my question. I was wondering whether there are as many planetary reimbodiments as are necessary to raise all the egos — well I hardly know how to express it --

G. de P. — The monads.

Student — The monads. In other words, to produce an inner god from the very beginning. And if that is true, whether that solar system which produces that inner god is the parent-star of that inner god. I suppose it would be seven or ten reimbodiments of planetary chains which would make that solar cycle, solar manvantara. Do I make myself clear?

G. de P. — I think so. The maha-manvantara that you refer to, if I remember aright the passage that you speak of, is an entire solar manvantara. The solar system would not, however, be the parent-star.

The idea is this: The planes, or hierarchical system, of our universe comprise seven manifested and three unmanifest planes. As each planetary chain in its new imbodiment takes place on the next higher or cosmic plane, in order to raise an unself-conscious god-spark to self-conscious divinity there must therefore be seven reimbodiments of any planetary chain in the solar manvantara.

Student — Then is that sun the parent-star of that inner god?

G. de P. — No. The matter of the parent-star is contained in a still more recondite doctrine. The reference to the maha-manvantara is a reference to the sun of a solar system. Please think very closely, and I believe that you will easily yourself see the answer to your question, because what you have stated in asking your question shows me that you yourself have the key to it in your own mind.

Student — Regarding your teaching concerning rebirth and the male seed cast into the female field, you seem to say that it is the male germ from which grows the child-to-be when that germ enters the fertile female germ or field. But I am puzzled by two quotations I find in HPB's instructions, which read as follows:

". . . no sooner is the Devachanic state of reward ended, than the Ego is indissolubly united with (or rather follows in the track of) the new Astral Form. Both are Karmically propelled towards the family or woman from whom is to be born the animal child chosen by Karma to become the vehicle of the Ego which has just awakened from the Devachanic state. Then the new Astral Form, composed partly of the pure Akasic Essence of the Auric 'Egg,' and partly of the terrestrial elements of the punishable sins and misdeeds of the last Personality, is drawn into the woman.

Once there, Nature models the foetus of flesh around the Astral, out of the growing materials of the male seed in the female soil."

G. de P. — That is the key.

Student — And again I find the following:

"The Auric Egg furnishes the basis of the new Linga-Sarira and the Tanhic Elementals form it within the Auric Envelope, the continuity being thus preserved; it lies dormant in the foetal state, during the Devachan of the entity to whom it belongs, and enters, in due course, a woman's womb.

It is first in the womb, and then comes the germ that fructifies it, from the male parent."

These two quotations from HPB seem to state that the reincarnating ego is connected directly with the female germ-cell or ovum, and that the male germ-cell is merely the vitalizing or fructifying element, thus causing the female germ-cell to grow into the child-to-be. You seem to state just the contrary: that it is the male germ-cell which contains the lowest part of the reincarnating ego, but that this male germ-cell cannot grow into the

child-to-be until it enters or joins with the female germ-cell or ovum, which HPB and you both call the female field.

Is there a contradiction in these two teachings, or have I misunderstood? I should be very glad for a clearer answer.

G. de P. — Let me say first that there is no contradiction at all — there could not be, because both HPB's and my teachings are one. The questioner has, I think, allowed the psychological force of words and phrases to sway the understanding. It seems to me that the two quotations from HPB are clear enough.

The new astral form, in order to grow into the animal child-to-be, enters the body of the maternal parent, and from the paternal parent goes the vital germ, out of the growing materials of which is produced the entity which is born. It is obvious that the human child, in our present stage of evolutionary growth, does not come from one parent. Two parents are required. In past ages of the history of the human race, one single human being brought forth progeny; and in the future evolutionary history of the human race, one single human being will again bring forth progeny, because the two vital polar opposites, the positive and the negative so called, will be united in a single human individual.

It does seem to me, Companions, that instead of thinking there are contradictions in the teachings, and instead of trying to find these contradictions, and puzzling over them, it would be better to keep a problem which any one of you may have in the mind and brood in thought upon it. However, it may be that this companion has indeed done that and has been unable to arrive at a reconciliation of the two statements. Let me try therefore to make the matter more clear.

When a human being dies — and let me skip all explanation of the intermediary kama-lokic period — as soon as it enters its devachanic rest, it does so enclosed in the appropriate layers of its own auric egg, in its own auric or akasic envelope. Now this auric egg or akasic egg, so far as size goes, is usually exceedingly small judging by human standards. It may be no larger than a pin-point, but in comparison with an atom, for instance, even this is an enormous sphere of scintillating light. It may be much larger. You must not suppose that the auric egg has to depend upon size in order to function, or to have energy, or to be the chamber or field of consciousness. Consciousness per se is dimensionless. It exists in the smallest of the small, and it exists in the greatest of the great. Dimension, bulk, size, all pertain to the material worlds.

As soon as the devachani begins its period of rest and repose, the auric egg in which it dwells, or in which it is enshrined by karmic necessity, automatically from karmic impulses begins to build within itself the fetal beginnings of the linga-sarira of the human entity-to-be in its next rebirth. This is done by what HPB calls the tanhic elementals — the elementals of appetite, and emotion, and thought — working automatically upon the substances of a portion of the auric envelope enshrining the devachani. This new linga-sarira within the auric egg or auric envelope remains in the germ-state until the full period of the devachan in question is ended. In other words, the linga-sarira has a fetal existence in the auric egg during the entire period of the devachan. I trust that this idea is clear.

Now then, let us suppose that the devachan is coming to its end. The devachanic unity begins to be drawn earthwards again. It is karmically attracted in all its parts, both as an ego and as an auric egg to the mother, with whom it has certain karmic links, psychomagnetic links. Now please listen carefully, because we are dealing with questions not of material existence here; and you won't easily understand if you think of such material things as extension, and bulk and size and place, and time. We are dealing with matters of consciousness in all its ranges from physical consciousness to egoic consciousness.

Existing as the human race does today, as men and women, there are certain attractions between these two halves of the human race. Certain women are attracted to certain men; certain men are attracted to certain women; and there is mutual interchange between any two human beings thus attracted — even if only by mental attraction — which induces an outflow and an inflow, and a flow backwards and forwards, of lifeatoms on all planes: mental planes, astral planes, emotional planes, and the physical plane. Such an interchange of lifeatoms, if the friendship between the man and the woman is of long duration, allows, as is obvious, a very great interchange of lifeatoms between the two. If their association is very short, the

interchange of lifeatoms is correspondingly small, but it is sufficient.

The lifeatoms, remember, are infinitesimal entities. A man and a woman meet, for instance, and shake hands.

At that instant there is an interchange not merely of one or two lifeatoms, but of hundreds of thousands, between the two who thus meet. I may add in passing that the long association of a married couple brings about what everybody must have noticed that husband and wife grow to look like each other.

Now then, suppose that the man and the woman have associated on the physical plane, a reincarnating ego, or more than one, will be attracted to both — if, mark you, there are karmic links between such attracted reincarnating ego or egos and the father and the mother-to-be. The new astral form of such an attracted reincarnating ego enters the woman's body as the vital aura of the lifeatom containing such reincarnating ego. A higher part of the substantial energy of such reincarnating ego meanwhile enters the father's body also as a lifeatom, but on a different plane. The mother's body receives the linga-sarira, now passing from the fetal state it had in the auric egg of the devachani into a more advanced stage of growth.

The fetal linga-sarira, existent in the auric envelope of the reincarnating entity, associates itself with the ovum, and similarly is the case as concerns the man. Union takes place between father and mother and then the two lifeatoms simply conjoin or associate, because they are psychomagnetically intensely attracted together in the woman's body. Thenceforth the fetal linga-sarira, the new astral form, begins to grow and to develop into the child which is finally born. The woman receives the lower element or new linga-sarira; but the seed of individuality, the seed of the egoic part of the reincarnating entity, is that lifeatom which has entered the man's body.

So there is the matter in brief; and if you will closely examine the two citations from HPB, you will see that she speaks a great deal more plainly about the subject than I have ever spoken.

Are there any other questions?

Student — Professor, there is one thing that still puzzles me about the avatara doctrine. I don't understand where the physical body comes from that the avatara uses as a vehicle, that is, where those atoms that are in the physical body come from. I understand that after the period in devachan, the reincarnating ego attracts to itself the atoms which its physical body had in the former life.

G. de P. — Quite right.

Student — And thus it comes to physical birth again. But in the case of the avatara, there was no former physical life, so where did his particular physical lifeatoms come from?

G. de P. — That indeed is quite a question. As a matter of fact, I have wondered sometimes if someone would ask me just this question that has now been asked. The questioner has stated the facts.

Now I will tell you how that happens, and to do so I shall have to go a little deeper into the avatara mystery.

An avatara has no previous physical or human karma, and also has no physical or human karma after the avatara disappears from the scenes of earth-life. Consequently in either case there is no karma at all. There is of course the spiritual karma which allows this act of white magic to take place, for an avatara is indeed an act of supreme white magic in the sense of bringing a divine energy into existence in the physical world.

An avatara consists of three separate and temporarily unified elements: (1) its highest portion is a projection from a divinity, manifesting through (2) a supremely grand human psychological vehicle or intermediate part commonly called soul. For it is the soul part of a mahatma of the highest class, usually of a buddha, and in the cases of avataras during the last million years actually has been the psychological apparatus which in its last human existence was the soul of Gautama the Buddha. Then, (3) of a very pure human body.

Now, how are these three connected? What brings them together? That, I believe, is the root of your question, is it not?

Student — Partly that, Professor. But also I do not see what the origin of that physical body is, of its life-

atoms.

G. de P. — That is part of the answer, as you will see. Now then, to produce a human body in the present state of human existence the cooperation of two human elements is necessary. There must be a human father and a human mother in the manner I have already described. Hearken now, carefully.

The human seed, which in the ordinary course of events would produce a human being, is in the case of an avatara overshadowed or entered, if you like, by the grand psychological apparatus or soul of a buddha. You will perhaps say then that this means that there are two souls in that body. This suggested question is a pertinent one. But the supposed fact does not exist, because what you would call the natural soul has been set aside — not driven out, that is too harsh a phrase — but set aside by this act of white magic. The buddha's psychological apparatus is so strong, so tremendous in its power, that it assumes full and complete control of the growing embryo, and thus sets aside what you would call the natural reincarnating soul that otherwise would have become a man.

When the body is thus borrowed, it actually amounts in a certain sense to a reincarnation of the buddha, or of the mahatma — in this case of the buddha. The reincarnating entity, who has been set aside, is very carefully guarded and taken care of until it is again led to enter another incarnation fully as appropriate and proper as the one which nature's unaided forces were in the way of bringing about. There is thus no injury done to the ego set aside. In fact, the lifeatoms that have been thus borrowed for the purpose of the avatara and belonging to the dispossessed ego, receive such a tremendous spiritual and intellectual impress from the reincarnating, or rather from the psychological, apparatus of the buddha, that their karmic benefits are very great. Thus no harm has been done to the ego temporarily set aside, and no injury has been wrought either upon it or upon such of its physical lifeatoms as were already in the embryo.

Sometimes, instead of being a case of setting aside, the same general procedure takes place when the embryo otherwise would simply have died. Instead of allowing the death of the embryo to occur, that embryo at the moment of its "death" is revivified by the overshadowing or entering of the psychological apparatus of the buddha. In fact, the whole process in either the one or the other case is not uncommon among initiates of a high grade who seek an early reincarnation, or a new body, in order to continue their sublime work among men, and without the devachanic interlude. Thus the embryo grows and develops and finally is born as a little child.

There is, then, the body composed of the lifeatoms which have been borrowed for the purpose by the overshadowing intermediate part of the buddha. The soul of the buddha enlivens and invigorates and watches over the borrowed body — borrowed as an embryo, please understand — until the child attains adulthood or grows to be almost of the age of a full-grown man. The overshadowing soul of the buddha watches over and stimulates and strengthens this body, prepares it, quickens the best part of its vital energies, until the time comes, which changes according to each case, when the young man has reached a point in development where the brain can begin to receive the fuller incarnation of the spiritual and intellectual energies of the soul of the buddha.

Somewhat later there occurs the great mystery. It happens usually when the borrowed body has reached its physical majority, physical adulthood. Then the soul of the Buddha, thus overshadowing this borrowed body, by a tremendous effort of spiritual energy rises through the ether and links itself with the waiting divinity, and from that instant, which usually takes place in initiation at the time of the winter solstice, the avatara exists —

and is thenceforward a complete entity: (1) manifesting divinity, (2) the buddha-soul, (3) the pure and trained physical vehicle.

Thus then, after that, the divinity works through the psychological apparatus of the buddha which steps down through itself into the brain of the man — the grand man — the divine powers, impulses, principles, from above-within or within-above, and you have the avatara, call it by whatever name you may choose.

Here then is the answer to the question: the body with its lifeatoms is provided for the avatara.

How can one explain a doctrine like the avatara doctrine when lecturing in public to an average audience? I have tried in the Temple again and again and again to give hints of this wonderful teaching, and have always

despaired of being able to do so. I look at the faces of the audiences there. Here and there I catch a faint responding gleam of understanding, but on so many faces I see indeed interest, I see indeed a real attempt to understand — but alas, usually vacancy, showing that they have not got the thought. How can it be otherwise? They have not been trained. This illustrates again very clearly how unwise it is to give out profound teachings to the public which has not been trained to receive and to understand them.

Student — May I ask a question in connection with that?

I wondered if the buddha in any past lives had had lifeatoms stored up which belonged to his human existences; and my thought was that in the case of an avatara, there was that source of physical lifeatoms to draw from.

G. de P. — Yes, there is that source also. That source is always drawn from. It cannot be avoided, because the psychological apparatus of the buddha, no matter where it is, as soon as it touches the human sphere instinctively draws towards itself the lifeatoms that formerly belonged to it. You have uttered a very profound thought.

Student — May I ask a question? I may say that I had precisely the same idea. I had thought about this and I thought that the supreme act of magic in producing the avatara was to draw on the storehouse of nature, where were stored the purified atoms that had been so raised by the use of the buddha in former incarnations.

G. de P. — Just so, so far as the lifeatoms are concerned.

Student — And I should like to ask if there is any limit to the processes of white magic in producing spiritual beings that are needed at cyclic periods? It would seem to me that we are just at the beginning of the knowledge of this higher psychology.

G. de P. — Very true indeed. I would not venture to answer that question now, nor to place definite bounds to such an answer. To say how far the power of spiritual magic extends would be very risky. The power of spiritual magic is enormous, unbelievable. Nevertheless there are bounds, because even the Masters are human beings. There is a boundary beyond which not even their grand power can go.

Let me point out one thing, however, which these questions have brought out. There comes a time in the growth of the physical body which enshrines the avatara when the lifeatoms of that body belonging to the natural ego which was set aside, and assembled in the beginning by that natural ego, are practically evaporated, if you understand me, have gone to their respective places, and they have been superseded by the lifeatoms which belonged to former incarnations of the buddha himself. So you see during the main part of the avatara's existence practically all the lifeatoms of the lower part of the constitution including the physical body are those that the buddha had in former lives. Do you understand?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — The atoms of the body are changing constantly. It is commonly said in our theosophical books that they change every seven years or so. I have no doubt that is true. I have always thought it a little unwise to say that the term is exactly seven years, because circumstances sometimes alter cases, in fact always alter cases; but I think the rule is generally correct.

Student — You have told us of the fact that after the death of the physical body on this earth, the monad goes through its peregrinations from planet to planet, and to the sun and then back again; but in regard to that, a question came to my mind as to how the monad can go in its peregrinations from the fourth or fifth round of one planet to the seventh round of another planet which in itself is therefore so much more advanced in a way, such as Venus is, for instance?

G. de P. — The monad is a spiritual entity which, in past manvantaras, has been through all the planes of experience of material existence. The different planets in their seven stages or rounds are all far behind the spiritual perfection, relatively speaking, of the peregrinating monad. And the small differences — and they are small in the vision of the monadic essence — which exist between a planet like the earth in its fourth

round, and a planet like Venus in its last or seventh round, are to the monads practically insignificant, if you understand me.

Student — Yes, I think so. Well, I have two other thoughts. One is: why then, if the monad is so advanced, does it have to go so far back to some of these very coarse and very material planes?

G. de P. — That is a pertinent question. For this reason, that the monad is a creative center continually giving birth throughout eternity to child-monads. These child-monads, when first issuing forth from the bosom of the parent-monad, or from the monadic essence, are in their first stages of the long evolutionary journey towards divinity. They are unself-conscious god-sparks, but they are bound to the monad, and the monad is bound to them. The attractions are mutual, and the attraction of an unself-conscious god-spark born from a monad, in its way, is just as strong as is the attraction of a very evolved human being. Do you understand the answer?

Student — Well, I think I do. Is the idea then that it is the different offsprings of this monad which go to these different planes?

G. de P. — Not altogether. A monad also is drawn to the different mansions. "In my Father's house are many mansions," Jesus is reported to have said. The monad is drawn to the different planets and to the sun because of karmic attractions which draw it thither. On and in each such globe it has a chance to imbody from its bosom, to give birth to a waiting child-monad which is going to get its planetary or globe experiences in the planet to which it goes. Do you understand?

Student — I think I do.

G. de P. — Just in the same way, we children of the monads, but also children of earth, attract each one our own monad to our fourth globe; and when we die we are then withdrawn into the bosom of the monad. We return into the monadic essence and there have our devachanic rest and sleep. Then the monad goes to some other globe, and sends forth from itself, or gives birth to other children there.

The monad is like the sun continually sending forth its rays. One such ray is a human being, a human soul, a human monad. Another such ray is a being or soul or entity connected with Venus. Another such ray is a child-monad connected with Mars, or with Saturn, or with Jupiter, or with Mercury, or even with the Sun. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, thank you, Professor. I had another question. May I ask it? Venus being in the seventh round will comparatively soon become taken into the sun. You told me once not to use the word absorbed. I don't know what other word to use. What then will take its place for the monads to go to, say, from one of the other planets?

G. de P. — I have often wondered why that question has not been asked before. In the first place, it is a mistake to say that Venus is drawn into the sun. That sublime consummation of the destiny of the planets of the solar system does not take place until the very end of the solar manvantara; but when Venus has ended its seventh and last round, all the life-essences, the hosts of monads, composing the Venus-chain, go into their nirvana. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes, Professor.

G. de P. — They go into what you might call the laya-center of the planetary chain of Venus. Now then, what will be the substitute for the present planet Venus, when the present planet Venus has become dead? I regret to say that I cannot answer that question now. You will forgive me, I am sure.

Student — My question refers to the same subject. Are we to understand that between one incarnation and the next of a human entity, the other entities associated with that monad to which that human entity belongs, would have passed through their planetary existence: that is to say that probably there would be four or five incarnations or as many as the peregrination involved, between the one incarnation on earth and another one?

G. de P. — That is correct, exactly right; but instead of incarnations I would suggest the word imbodiments

in this case.

Student — If I may be permitted — this is on quite a different subject?

G. de P. — Just a moment. Are there any more questions on the present theme?

Student — In the case spoken of, in some instances this reincarnation must take place very quickly, because those who have lived a very short time reincarnate early. They have a very short devachan. Is the case the same?

G. de P. — The case is exactly the same. When you remember that the average span of human life today is fifteen years, you will realize that on the whole there is time enough. On the contrary, suppose that a man lives for eighty or eighty-five or more years on earth. The rule is that his devachanic experience will be one hundred times the length of his life on earth. Consequently the next reincarnation on earth will not take place before some eight thousand or eighty-five hundred years have passed.

Student — Then these imbodiments on these other planets are not reincarnations such as we have on earth?

G. de P. — It depends upon circumstances whether you can call them reincarnations or not. It depends upon the kind of bodies that the other entities have on other planets. On earth we have bodies of flesh, and reincarnation is the correct term to use because it means reinfleshing. But the bodies of some of the other monadic children on other planets are not imbodiments in encasements of flesh. Such encasements may be of airy character and they may be of some quite other substance.

Student — I understand. But are they reimbodying egos?

G. de P. — Certainly they are.

Student — Then they have to come and go just the same as we do.

G. de P. — Certainly. They have a beginning, a culmination, and a death.

Student — May I ask another question on that subject? It would seem from that idea, that when we are incarnated on earth, other entities belonging to our monadic essence are in devachan?

G. de P. — That is generally correct.

Student — Is there any interacting influence between these during an incarnation on earth?

G. de P. — There is a constant spiritual connection, of course. When the monad ends its evolution at the end of a solar maha-manvantara, it is on its way in far future time to becoming a sun. Its various "children," which previously had been its various kinds or types of egos, will be the family of that future sun in its own solar system, being as closely connected with it as a sun, as we now, as a family of egos, are connected with it because we all belong to the one monadic essence. Is the answer responsive to your question?

Student — Well, I had wanted to know a little more of something about what is going on at present. There must be some way by which we, even when incarnated on earth, are reached or affected by these other selves of ours?

G. de P. — They are not other selves of us. They are other selves existing in the full integrity of their individuality just as we are, but closely linked with us by spiritual bonds because we are all born from the same monadic essence. Each one of us is a spiritual lifeatom of that monadic essence, just as the lifeatoms of the physical body are each one distinct, individualized, different, from every other lifeatom of the physical body. Yet all are the children of the entity which we call the man. Do you understand?

Student — Yes. Shall we ever be conscious?

G. de P. — Of our relationship?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — Certainly. In future times, very conscious.

Student — Is it initiation which she is asking about?

G. de P. — It is one of the fruits of initiation. Initiation will bring to us human beings a fuller consciousness of our intimate relationship with these other egos. You might in a sense call them parts of us, but that is rather a figure of speech. There are entities so close to us that they are like twin-souls. The phrase is wrong, but doubtless you understand me. Other sparks of the same fire, life of the same life.

Student — Are not all things in the solar universe interblended, the same as all things on earth?

G. de P. — Exactly.

Student — We are related, are we not, on what we call the inner globes; so there is really a question of recognition of that through initiation into the cosmic state of things?

G. de P. — I think I understand you. If I do, the answer is yes. Please remember that every entity in the solar system is spiritually connected with every other entity in the solar system — spiritually connected. But there are various kinds of relationships in the solar system. There are the most intimate relationships which concern the various egos which all spring forth as children from the heart of a single monadic essence. Then there are those relationships, not quite so intimate, which belong to the different planets. There are other relationships, still less intimate, which belong to the other families existing in the solar system. And so it is with human beings. The children born in one family possess the most intimate relationship, and then the cousins and the aunts and the uncles, and then the second cousins, and finally the more distant relationships, and yet all belong to the human race; and the human race again is but one hierarchy or grand family connected with many other similar grand families.

The gods, for instance, are of many classes, some very closely related; others more distantly related.

Student — Professor, I would like to ask for some information about the Great Pyramid. Was it built by mechanical means or by means of what we may call magic — by music and vibrations?

G. de P. — No. It was builded by mechanical means, but magic in the higher sense of the word had a great deal to do with it. Great initiates were the architects of the Great Pyramid of Cheops, which is the one you allude to especially, I believe. Human hands cut the stones and put them into place, but magical wisdom directed the work of those human hands. I will tell you that the Pyramid of Cheops was a temple of initiation, as some others of the pyramids were, but not all.

I never shall forget the feeling that I had when KT and I stood in that wonderful initiation chamber in the heart of the Great Pyramid of Cheops, and there saw the sarcophagus, as they call it, in which the neophytes of ancient times had lain.

The very air was vibrant with mystic memories of the past. That visit was an initiation in a way — merely to go into that chamber and to think and to stand silent and to feel.

Now, I will answer one or two more questions, Companions.

Student — I have a question — but I do believe you have answered it. It is concerning the lifeatoms of the human body. Is there any equalization or rejection of lifeatoms from one life to another? Or does the human ego bring with it the same lifeatoms from the beginning of the present round and add to their number all the time?

G. de P. — The last inference is correct. The highest lifeatoms of the human constitution which, you will remember, exists on seven (and really ten) planes, are they which first issued forth from the heart of the

human monad, in the beginning of the planetary manvantara. But every monad by its very nature is a creative entity, and throughout all the time of evolution it is continually bringing forth new atoms from its bosom, from the womb of its own being, and each such new atom when it first comes forth takes its proper place in the constitution. There are lifeatoms of a divine type; lifeatoms of a spiritual type; lifeatoms belonging to the intellectual planes, to the kamic planes; lifeatoms belonging to the astral, vital and finally to the physical plane. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes, certainly. May I then ask a second question too? Can any of these lifeatoms who are the children of certain individual monads be used by another monad?

G. de P. — Yes. That takes place constantly, and it is an example of what I have often spoken of as an interblending, interworking, interaction, of all things that are. The lifeatoms of my body, for instance, are constantly streaming forth into the circumambient atmosphere, and enter your body and the bodies of the other companions here. And every one of you is doing the same thing exactly. Then after a while, after they have peregrinated, they come back to me again, and yours return to you again, and pass a certain time with me, or yours with you, and then again go forth. In exactly the same way — now hearken carefully, my Companions — do we as human lifeatoms of father sun pass from planet to planet and to the sun and back again.

Student — I want to ask if you will give us some more explanation concerning the sishtas? How are they chosen? And also, are not the sishtas a whole round behind their family when the life-wave returns to the globe whereon they have waited, and if so, how is this adjusted?

G. de P. — Yours is a very difficult question to answer, for the reason that it is not allowed to go too deeply into this matter. I can tell you however that the word sishtas is a Sanskrit word, here used in the plural, which means "residuals" or "remainders," signifying in this case those who remain behind on a globe after the life-wave has passed to the next globe of the planetary chain. These sishtas are always the highest, the most evolved, of the life-wave, so that when the same life-wave returns to that same globe the sishtas are practically ready to receive the new impulses from the returning life-wave. Thus they may be called the seeds of life. Do you understand me? They begin the new planetary manvantara of the succeeding seven root-races.

The sishtas are not chosen in the usual sense of the word, unless you use the word chosen with the meaning of beings who themselves, to a certain degree, choose to undertake this function.

Companions, their function is, in one sense, and among the highest of them, an act of magnificent self-renunciation. They are the greatest of the human race — taking the human race on our globe as an example —

who deliberately choose to remain behind, who forego their own opportunities in that planetary round for further personal advancement, in order that when the less evolved monads, human monads, come back with the returning life-wave in the next round, the residuals, those who remained behind, shall be ready to be the seeds of the first root-race in that new round. Thus they provide the bodies and the psychological apparatus of such first root-race in that new round. The same function of the sishtas applies, but without the grand feature of self-renunciation, in the cases of the other races of entities, such as the beasts and the plant kingdom and the mineral kingdom.

Student — I have been thinking of A. P. Sinnett's book referring to the interior of the earth. Has he any real foundation for his ideas, and can you tell us something about the inner composition of the earth?

G. de P. — I have not read the book, or passage, that you speak of. What is the name of the book?

Student — I do not remember the title of the book, but it states that there are seven spherical bodies inside each other; that the earth is hollow; and that inside the first is another similar one, and so on to seven —

somewhat like those Russian eggs, one egg containing another egg; and that these spherical bodies are rotating more or less independently of each other.

G. de P. — I do not know where Mr. Sinnett got this idea. It is not the teaching that I have received. The interior of the earth is not hollow. There are indeed great hollows or caves, but so there are on the outer surface of the earth. The core of the earth is under the entire control of the lowest or third kingdom of the elementals. I don't know that I can describe this state of things to you. In any case the earth is not a hollow

sphere. The interior of the earth is material, but it is material in a state of which we on the surface of the earth have little or perhaps no idea. This interior is not liquid, and it is not gaseous, and yet it partakes of the nature of both. I don't know anything in ordinary human experience that would give me the words with which to describe it.

At any rate, if you will remember that there are three kingdoms of elementals of which the third is the lowest and the nearest to the mineral world, you may get some adumbration of the state of the earth's interior.

Perhaps it might be correct to say that the heart or core of the earth is concreted electricity. I don't know if you understand me, although I am trying to give you the best picture I can. I don't know how to describe it definitely in terms that are familiar to you. At any rate, it is this concrete electrical core which contains, or is the locus of, the great bands or bonds of attraction which hold us to the other planets and to the sun.

It has just struck me to say that if you will think of what the modern physical chemists call the protonic nucleus of an atom you may get some idea of what I mean.

Now, Companions, I think it is almost time to close, unless someone has a question which would be lost if not asked now.

Student — When we die I understand that the reincarnating ego goes to the bosom of the monad. And I also understand that it follows the monad on its way to the other planets. But if this is so we must have several entities sleeping in our bosom now — or rather in the monad's bosom now.

G. de P. — Hardly. We humans don't have these monads that you refer to sleeping in our bosom.

Student — No, I don't mean that. I mean the entities which are imbodied in — I don't know how to express my meaning!

G. de P. — Can you say it in Swedish and then perhaps one of the other companions will translate it — but your English is excellent.

Student — I mean that — I think Miss C---- can express it, because I think she understands what I mean.

G. de P. — Miss C---- do you understand the question?

Miss C----: I believe she is thinking that the monadic essence in its incarnations on the other planets has, as she expressed it, a reincarnating ego for each of those planets, and therefore there must be sleeping in the bosom of the monad, of which we are an expression on this our present plane of existence, the various reincarnating entities which imbody themselves on other planets.

G. de P. — Yes, that is perfectly right, except that you should not say incarnations on other planets. You should say imbodiments, for reasons that I have already explained to you. I think also that this question has already been answered. Each one of us human beings is the child of a monad. Each one of us human beings has its own parent-monad; but as each such parent-monad is a creative entity, it produces other entities in addition to the human entity. In other words, any divine-spiritual monad being a creative entity has many children, produces many child-monads. Each such divine-spiritual monad, therefore, in addition to having a human child-monad which reincarnates on this earth, has also a Venus child-monad — seven Venus-children, as a matter of fact, one for each of the globes of Venus. In an exactly similar way one for each of the globes of earth; and again for the globes of the planet Mars, and similarly for the globes of Saturn and for Jupiter, and so forth. Do you now understand?

Student — Yes, I understand.

Student — I would like to ask a question. It will be too late to ask it at our next meeting. On next Tuesday there will be a total eclipse of the sun, and although it is not visible here, I would like to know whether we are likely to observe any climatic effects which would be unobserved by the astronomers not looking for them. It is visible near Australia, and it is a very important eclipse.

G. de P. — I don't think so. But often and perhaps usually the magnetic phenomena which accompany an eclipse of the sun extend far beyond the path of the shadow. An eclipse of the moon is also a very important event, especially for those parts of the earth which are just opposite the moon at the time. Do you understand me? Remember that eclipses of both kinds, whether of sun or of moon, produce enormous psychomagnetic movements on the earth, rushings of entities to the earth or to the moon. I cannot say more upon that matter here.

Now, Companions, we will close the meeting. Good night.

[The sounding of the gong. Silence.]

Meeting 22

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Twenty-Two

Meeting of October 28, 1930

G. de P. — Companions, I am ready to answer questions now.

Student — Could you give us a little more information about the pitris? I understand that there are many classes of pitris; and from what I have read it seemed to me that the barhishad-pitris were the same as the lunar pitris, and the agnishwatta-pitris were the same as the manasaputras; but I am not at all clear on this point.

G. de P. — You are quite right. The word pitris is of course a Sanskrit word and means "fathers" — fathers in the sense of progenitors, ancestors. To say that there are many classes of pitris is of course very true. The world, the universe, is full of pitris. There are divine fathers or pitris — or progenitors or ancestors. There are also spiritual ones; there are intellectual ones, emotional ones; there are astral, vital and physical pitris.

Barhishad-pitris is another name for the lunar pitris, or rather that aggregate class of ancestors or progenitors which came from the moon. The agnishwattas are the solar pitris, and this word solar is a generalizing term signifying all the solar lhas, or solar deities, who form an appropriate part of man's constitution. There are pitris of many, many, many kinds, but the agnishwattas and the barhishads are two important kinds concerning which HPB writes a great deal in her Secret Doctrine.

Would you like to have a further answer on this question? If so, please elaborate your query a little.

Student — Well, I was a little confused about the matter. You told us once that the agnishwatta-pitris were those who had gone through their human evolution in preceding manvantaras, and in The Secret Doctrine HPB says that they are very pure spirits who cannot touch matter except through transmission and —

G. de P. — Except through intermediaries, you mean.

Student — Yes, that is what I mean. I was a little confused in my mind how it could be that after they had been through their whole period of human evolution before, and while they still remained pure spirits, they had to wait for the creative forces belonging to the lunar pitris before they could have any communication with humanity on this globe.

G. de P. — And you would like a few words of comment on that, then?

Student — Yes, please, Professor.

G. de P. — Of course the phrase pure spirits is a relative term, just as purity is a relative term. A pure beast is hardly the same thing as a pure god. Therefore this phrase, pure spirits, refers only to our own solar system. It is quite true to say that the agnishwatta-pitris, or pitris of the sun, were men in a far by-gone cosmic manvantara, that is, in a by-gone manvantara of the planetary chain. They have evolved so far, as compared with us composite beings of mind and gross matter, that they can truly be called pure spirits. But they are very far from being as pure spiritually as are the pure spirits of some other solar system which, aggregatively speaking, is much farther advanced along the evolutionary pathway than our solar system is with its hosts of beings.

Your statement is also perfectly true that pure spirit cannot communicate directly with gross physical matter.

There are indeed a number of intermediate states, or intermediaries, between the pure spirit of a human being on the one hand, and his gross physical brain on the other hand. These intermediate stages of the human constitution are formed partly of the pitris which came from the lunar chain — fathers also of us, ancestors, progenitors, but only so in the sense of being the ancestors or progenitors or fathers of this intermediary or intermediate part of our constitution. The lunar pitris are much more ethereal than our gross flesh is, but much less spiritual than are the agnishwatta-pitris. Furthermore, in a very true sense the lunar pitris are the human

part of us men ourselves. They are we as human beings, and we are they.

Thus then, we have in the composite human constitution four main classes of entities — the divine being, or the monadic essence, or the essential monad, using here the word monad in a generalizing sense. Then the agnishwatta-pitri through whom this monad expresses its powers. Then the lunar pitri through whom the agnishwatta-pitri expresses its powers combined with those of the divinity. Then and last, the lowest class of the earth-pitris which form the astral-vital frame of the human vehicle or constitution. Through this astral-vital frame, all these combined essences just spoken of attempt or try to express each one its individual energy or power or character. Then, of course, there are the pitris of the physical body, and these pitris are our human parents, the father and the mother who brought the physical body to birth.

Is the answer now responsive to your question?

Student — Yes, thank you, Professor.

Student — I have two questions to ask on the same subject. Some weeks ago you told us that as the monads came over from the moon, they came from globe A in the seven different --

G. de P. — You mean from globe A of the lunar chain.

Student — Yes, of the moon; in seven different classes, one class after the other in serial order; and that thus the different globes of the earth-chain were gradually brought into being, one after the other, first by the three classes of the elementals; and that one class after another of these seven classes inhabited each in turn the seven earth-globes — each class following the next class so that all the globes of the earth-chain were in turn occupied, beginning with globe A; the beings from globe A of the moon-chain occupying all the globes of the earth-chain before the entities of globe B of the moon-chain passed over in their turn. Hence I infer that all these different globes of the moon-chain are also in different stages of evolution, that is, that there were seven grades of evolution on globe A of the moon-chain, and that the other globes were in different stages of evolution of the moon-chain.

Now, is it permissible to ask which of the globes of the moon-chain our present humanity on globe D of the earth-chain came from originally?

G. de P. — It came from all the globes of the lunar chain, from the lunar planetary chain.

Student — Yes. Of course I know that all the globes of the earth-chain are occupied by all the monads from the moon-chain; but I mean that our present humanity on globe D must have come from some particular globe of the moon-chain.

G. de P. — No. Our own humanity is but one family of a number of families coming over from the lunar planetary chain. The humanity on this earth planetary chain does not belong to the globe earth only. It belongs to the earth planetary chain. Just so when we were evolving entities on the lunar planetary chain, we belonged to all the seven globes of the lunar planetary chain.

Student — Well, perhaps I have not made my question quite clear. I know that we are going to circle around all the globes, and therefore I see that we belong to all the globes; but I thought that because it is taught that globe B of the moon is the parent of globe B of the earth-chain, therefore each globe of the moon is the respective parent of the same corresponding globe of the earth-chain. Hence I thought that our present humanity — that is our humanity of globe D — must originally have come from some one particular globe of the moon-chain.

G. de P. — No. If you will pause a moment in thought, you will readily see that just as our human family passes around and therefore belongs to all the seven globes of the earth-chain, so did our human family at a less evolved stage of its evolution, when it belonged to the moon-chain, belong to all the seven globes of the lunar chain. Of course globe A of the moon-chain is the parent of Globe A of the earth-chain. Globe B of the moon-chain is the parent of globe B of the earth-chain. Globe C of the moon-chain is the parent of globe C of the earth-chain, and so forth. I think you are confusing, and it is a very common confusion, the transference of

the vital principles of the seven globes of the lunar chain to the laya-centers destined to become the corresponding globes of the earth planetary chain — in other words, confusing this transference of the vital essences of the seven globes of the moon with the seven classes of the spiritual entities which form seven families, seven evolving groups, seven peregrinating groups. Is not that so?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — For instance, in the last or seventh round of the lunar chain, there were a number of different family groups of which our present family group was one. At the beginning of the seventh or last lunar round, this beginning of course took place on globe A of the lunar chain, seven root-races of all the seven classes or family groups were run through there. Then the life-wave passed onto globe B of the lunar chain, and seven root-races were run through on globe B of the lunar chain; and so forth around the seven globes of the lunar chain. When these families reached the seventh globe of the lunar chain, from that seventh globe they took their flight like seven (or like ten) groups of winging birds into their nirvanic rest. But when all the higher essences, the evolving families, had left globe A of the lunar chain, that globe A thereupon began to die; and its decay proceeded until complete death occurred, which meant the passing of the last globe-essences to the laya-center which was to become, in the future, globe A of the earth-chain.

The same series of operations took place with regard to globe B of the lunar chain. Similarly so with regard to globe C of the lunar chain; and similarly so with all the other globes of the lunar chain, until the last or seventh globe of the lunar chain was reached. Then it finally followed the same course of action, and globe G, or the last globe of the lunar chain, in its turn died. Then the entire lunar planetary chain was dead, and has remained ever since a decaying corpse — I mean that all the seven globes of the lunar chain thereafter have been continuously decaying, dissolving corpses.

The component atoms of each one of the seven globes of the lunar chain, at the death of each respective globe, immediately began to dissociate, and this process of dissociation or decay has continued to the present time. I don't know how long it takes a human body to decay when buried. I suppose six or seven years, more or less, if left undisturbed; but in the case of a planetary chain, naturally the time of dissolution is one to be measured in cosmic time periods, and of course is very much longer than the dissolution period of a human corpse.

Has my answer thrown any light on your thought? Perhaps I have not yet fully understood your question.

Student — Thank you, I think so. My idea was that the entities, the monads, of these different globes were not mingled, that they stayed in a certain way separate; that inasmuch as they were constantly revolving, there would always be certain ones from A on A, and certain ones from B on B; that each globe would have a different class of entities on it, inasmuch as the different globes were different. But I see now that they are mingled on the earth-chain — all the different classes.

G. de P. — Exactly. Just as they were mingled, to use your words, on the moon-chain. Remember also that there is a constant transference of lifeatoms proceeding all the time, and this fact occurs just the same with celestial bodies as it does with our own human physical bodies, or again with the sheath of our mind or of our soul — a constant transference or cycling of the lifeatoms.

Student — Thank you.

G. de P. — I might add, perhaps, to make the matter a little clearer, that our human family is not the only evolving great family group of our earth-chain. There are other family groups which are ahead of us, and others which are cycling along behind us, but all have come from the lunar chain. We human beings are only one family group or group family.

For instance, on the globe immediately preceding ours of the earth-chain, globe C, there is a family group which is just in the beginning of its first root-race there. We are in our fifth root-race on this globe D. As soon as we shall have left this earth, two root-races and a half, more or less, from the present time, after a relatively short period another family group will enter our globe D on this earth. Our human family will have left it except for the sishtas, the remainders — those who will then wait through the ages to come to form the seeds

of life for our present family group when it returns again to earth after having completed the fourth round, and also after having passed its interglobal nirvana, and after having passed through globes A, B, and C in the fifth round.

It is a very intricate subject, this of rounds and races, but it is one of the most fascinating, instructive, and one of the most suggestive. You cannot really study it too much. I have heard it said sometimes that what theosophists should do is to concentrate on the ethical or moral values, and that rounds and races and that kind of thing are merely high-brow intellectual studies. Don't believe it! There is inspiration in these teachings about the rounds and races. They are exercises for the higher intellect. They are exercises for the spirit part of us; and, best of all, they teach us our perfect unity with all that is. They show us the reason for ethics, how ethics are based on the common brotherhood of all things that exist and are. They show us our essential unity, not only with the different family groups evolving on our own planetary chain, but with the entire cosmos. It is this intermingling and inter-revolving procedure which teaches us that the other planets of our solar system are sister-planets of this earth's planetary chain, and that we belong to those other planets as fully as we do to this earth; and furthermore that our entire solar system is our present home, but that the other solar systems in our home-universe, the galaxy, the Milky Way, are all interconnected, inter-evolving.

No, the study of the rounds and races, and of the seven principles of man and the universe, and of other fundamental teachings similar to these, is all very important. Spiritually, ethically, intellectually, in every way they are worthy of your highest regard. Of course, there is another side to this matter. If a man or a woman belonging to the TS has merely an intellectual interest in some of these teachings, and likes to spend time in speculations upon them, the while neglecting his duties, then of course he is not doing right. He is doing wrong. But those instances would be exceptional cases.

Student — May I ask two questions about the seven principles? One is about prana. We are used to speaking of the seven principles as vehicles or sheaths. I have always had difficulty in seeing how prana could be looked upon as a sheath.

G. de P. — Quite right.

Student — Can you throw any illumination on that?

G. de P. — You are perfectly right. It is a matter on which I have spoken on more than one occasion. The seven principles are not vehicles. They are not sheaths. To call the seven principles the seven elements of man's constitution is just as good a manner of speaking. It depends upon the point of view whether we speak of seven principles or seven elements. The two are the same. They are principles when looked at from one point of view and elements when looked at from some other point of view. The vehicles, on the other hand, are aggregated centers or focuses or vortices in which the respective egos live, but these vortices, focuses, are in each case themselves all composed of the seven principles or elements.

No, you are quite right. The seven principles or elements are the seven cosmic essences with all their various modifications and changes, whether in the case of a man, or of a planet, or of a solar system, or of a god.

Student — Now my other question is about the astral body. In some of the literature of the other Theosophical Societies, they speak of the astral with a number of complications or rays. They speak of various degrees. They use the words "ethereal body" a good deal. I don't know clearly if there is any basis for those ideas in HPB's teachings and instructions, and yet there seems to be something in it — that there must be degrees of ethereal and astral substances. These people speak so much of the ethereal body as something separate from the astral. They are so confident on that subject. I would like any light there is to be had on this point.

G. de P. — Yes, it is true, I believe, that certain theosophists so write; but to a large degree it involves a distinction without a difference. Any astral matter is ethereal as compared with our gross physical matter; and astral matter has seven stages and extends from the highest to the most gross. The highest part of the astral is the akasa, and really astral and ethereal, in a general way of speaking, are interchangeable as words, although it is advisable perhaps to draw a distinction in words in order to define more clearly. For instance, the mayavi-rupa is an ethereal body. Our own astral body, if we limit the term astral to the linga-sarira or pattern-

body, is an ethereal body too, using the word ethereal in a general sense, as contrasted with the gross physical body. But I have noticed the same tendency in the writings of these brother theosophists that you speak of; and in many cases, perhaps in most cases, they seem to me to make distinctions without real differences between astral and ethereal. The two are practically the same thing; although I now repeat, there may be times or occasions in writing or in speaking, when it is convenient to draw a pro tempore distinction between astral and ethereal.

Student — You were speaking of the essences that are transferred from the different globes of the lunar chain to those of the earth-chain, but I have not been able to understand what these essences are. Are they the seven elements of some being?

G. de P. — They are the monads; seven, or actually ten, classes of monads.

Student — I don't mean them. I mean the essences that go into the new laya-center from the lunar globe itself

— not the life-hosts on the lunar chain.

G. de P. — Oh, I see what you mean. The essences that I spoke of a few moments ago and which are what you now refer to, were the essences which become the three kingdoms of the elementals, the mineral kingdom, the plant kingdom, and the beast kingdom. Of course, strictly speaking, the entities of the human kingdom are essences also in their monadic parts.

There are also the globe essences, and I now here refer to the various essences composing the fabric or substance of the individual globes. Perhaps it is to these last that your question more particularly points. Is my answer responsive?

Student — Well, yes. It gives me an entirely new line of thought. I have always heard that the earth is like a being in itself. I didn't quite understand what hierarch was governing the earth as a globe, or as one of seven globes.

G. de P. — Please repeat your question.

Student — We have heard of the earth as a being, and I have often wondered what hierarch was at the head of this earth considered as an entity.

G. de P. — Does your question run to the point of asking whether there be a hierarch for every globe of the planetary chain?

Student — No. Not for every globe, but for all seven globes.

G. de P. — There is such a hierarch, but there is also a sub-hierarch for every globe.

Student — Yes, I supposed so. But what is that hierarch? Is it connected with us in any way?

G. de P. — Certainly it is. It must be connected with us, otherwise we should not be here.

Student — But it is not the same hierarch that governs our actual essence, our being, is it?

G. de P. — That governs what?

Student — Our own being?

G. de P. — Our constitution?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — As individuals?

Student — As individuals. Because we are not certainly in the same stage of evolution as the globes on

which we are living.

G. de P. — We are individually higher than the globes on which we live.

Student — Yes, I remember you told us that before, but I don't quite see the relation between the two.

G. de P. — Well, you are touching upon very deep problems indeed. "In my Father's house are many mansions." The reference there to the father is to the grand hierarch of the solar system. Now there is a householder, or a mansion-holder, for each one of these mansions, and he is the sub-hierarch or planetary spirit. Do you understand so far?

Student — Yes, I do, Professor.

G. de P. — And it is in and on the physical expression, or vehicle, or body of this planetary spirit that we at present live, so far as our earth is concerned. We are intimately related karmically with this planetary spirit.

We belong in a certain sense to the planetary spirit's family, just as we belong to the family of the sun.

Now use your intuition. You are touching upon very dangerous ground. When I say dangerous, I mean forbidden ground. If I were to tell you a little more, then you would begin to ask me further embarrassing questions, such as: where does this planetary spirit live? What kind of appearance has it? And I simply cannot answer those questions here. So I merely suggest that you think over the phrase of the Christian New Testament: "In my Father's house" — look at the curious phrasing — "are many 'mansions,'" or dwelling places or rooms. Let us call them mansions, in my Father's kingdom are many mansions; each mansion has its own mansion-holder or householder; and we come into the mansion not merely as transient guests but as members of its family. We abide awhile, and then go to one of the other mansions of the great father, the king of the country, so to speak, who is the solar grand hierarch.

Let me tell you that every human being is on his way to become a planetary spirit. In times of the future still more remote, speaking now in cosmic terms, every human being will become a sun. Just as the blood with its burden of cells flows in the human body through the different organs, so do the life-waves or family groups flow around in circulatory fashion, following the circulations of the solar system, to and from the various organic points or organs, if you like, of that solar system, and these organs are the planets. Do you begin to understand me a little bit at least?

Student — Yes, indeed I do.

G. de P. — Well, I am so glad!

Student — I want to ask another question although it is not quite on the same line. It is about the term palingenesis. We learned that it meant the transmission of an identic life, and the illustration was given of the oak tree producing the acorns, and each acorn producing its oak tree. But I don't understand whether it means that the life that is in the new oak tree is actually a part of the same being — as far as it is evolved from it —

as the other tree, or if that first tree was just a channel through which the new life essence, which was like it, passed and then became a new oak tree.

G. de P. — It is both. It is both a channel and the same identic life essence.

Student — But there does not seem to be the right analogy then between the vegetable world and the human kingdom for instance. Because it would seem then that in the vegetable world, the being that was in this tree, or the evolving beings in this tree, were as evolved as it is, at least within the space of a few years. For instance, in the human kingdom we of course are throwing off atoms, and these in time, in future aeons, will evolve into human beings; but why is it that the beings evolved by the tree so soon become trees again. I should think that they would be much lower in the scale and would evolve into trees at a much later time.

G. de P. — I think your trouble arises almost wholly because you forget the essential meaning of the term palingenesis. A father produces his human offspring, who grows up to maturity in the lifetime of the father, just as a tree does.

Student — But that offspring is not part of the father's essence, not part of the father's ego.

G. de P. — No, certainly not part of his ego; nor is the child oak the same as the ego of the parent oak.

Student — Then I understand. I was confused by the term identic life. I thought it meant the same life as itself.

G. de P. — No. I mean the same encompassing life appertaining to a certain strain, a vital current, a vital river.

Now then, a human being in his constitution is a composite entity. That fact is a most wonderful key, if you will hang to it in thought like grim death. This composite constitution comprises the inner god and all the smaller entities of which the inner god is the hierarch. Now this inner god is our essential we. I mean that your inner god is your essential you, my inner god is my essential I, and yet in each case the parent-essence is different from the child essence. Both statements are exactly correct. The one is different from the other because that inner god has its own egoic individuality, its own swabhava. Yet you or I or any other human being or any other entity springs from its own inner god, from the same vital stream or life-stream immanent in that same vital atmosphere continuously through the ages, that is, in imbodiment after imbodiment. Yet each one of us as a growing, evolving, learning, monadic entity or monadic ego is different in its swabhava from the swabhava of the parent inner god.

This fact as applied to the egos of the human constitution is another example of palingenesis. My inner god is I, and yet not I. I in my origin was its thought, a thought of it, an atom of its life, a particle of it. And yet I have my own core of the core of me, my own heart of the heart of me, which is my own monad. As I evolve or grow through the ages, I shall be continually bringing forth into ever fuller and greater manifestation what is thus locked up in me as an entity, as an individual, as a swabhavic entity. Meanwhile, my inner god in its turn is evolving on its own supernal plane. Thus, the god within me is I, yet not my ego. It is not the I am I of me, for that is my ego, but it is exactly my I am — or sheer, pure consciousness.

Oh, if you could only get this thought! It will open more doors of understanding for you than I can easily tell you. The divinity of our solar system, father sun, whose life essence extends all over the solar system and permeates everywhere, for in it we live and move and have our being, is I, is you, is the root of every one of us. And yet despite that marvelous fact, each of us, as an entity, as an individual, is an essential individual; and as an individual, in future aeons it is destined to evolve forth into becoming in the future what father sun is to us now. Further, the lower lifeatoms now forming our constitution on all its planes, and also forming our various vehicles, will in that future time — when each one of us shall have become a father sun — be the various human entities, angelic entities, etc., infilling our cosmos. Do you understand the idea?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — Father sun, the spirit of our solar system, in a far bygone cosmic manvantara, that is a far bygone manvantara of the solar system, was a man, or a being equivalent to a man. And I use that term, a being equivalent to a man, so that you won't imagine that this entity must of necessity have had just the exact physical bodies that we now have, with two ears, and two eyes, and two arms, and two legs, etc.; but had the intelligence, the willpower, the self-consciousness and all the spiritual and intellectual faculties, which we as human beings have at present evolved and which make us men — in other words, a self-conscious individuality. The beasts have not yet evolved forth this self-conscious individuality. The gods have lost their self-conscious individual personality because they are universal, nevertheless they are egoic. Their personality has melted into impersonality, which finally became universality. Always however the gods retain their divine egoic individuality which is the indivisible part of each one of us, considered as an entity, and this indivisible part is the swabhava.

Student — May I ask if it is this swabhava that belongs to the parent star and to the child of the parent star?

G. de P. — Palingenetically yes. I could not say, however, that the essential individuality of any human being is the identic essential individuality of his parent star, because that would make of that parent star an entity

having an individuality no more highly developed that yours or mine is.

Student — No, I mean a child of it? Just as we speak of a child of the sun?

G. de P. — Your fundamental idea is right. The swabhava of you or of me or of any other is a child of a parent and closely similar swabhava, but is not the same swabhavic swabhava of the parent — or is not swabhavically identic with the parent. In other words, any particular life-stream is composed of monadic units closely similar to each other, but no two of which are swabhavically identic. It is almost impossible to express these ideas in a language that has no words to express them in.

Student — I understand. I never understood before what part of us did belong to that parent star.

Student — If space is filled with high beings, and every such high entity has its children, and they grow up, how can there be room for them? It is like every tree, every little branch of that tree becomes itself a big tree.

Thus there is no room for the forest.

G. de P. — That is a very pertinent question. The answer lies in the fact that space is frontierless. It has no boundaries. It is infinite, beginningless, endless, both in duration and in what we may call extension. Space has no beginning, has no end. You have stated the problem admirably. Every mathematical point in space, which means any point anywhere, is a monad — or, if you like, that point is occupied by a monad — a monad destined to become in time a universe in the boundless, frontierless, beginningless, endless, reaches of utter, sheer infinitude.

Student — Is this the old question of parabrahman?

G. de P. — Yes, I think so, in the terms that he used.

Student — My question is about the sishtas, and I am not quite clear on one point. You speak of them as seeds left behind at the passage of the monads in order to be the seeds of the future humanity when those monads return. But are they not also the seeds of the evolving humanity that comes in to take the place of the host that has gone on? Is there not a part, perhaps, that does remain through the ages to hold the model, to keep the evolution level, as it were, and then another part that serves as seeds for the next incoming humanity?

G. de P. — You mean by the term incoming humanity the great family group which follows us?

Student — Yes, Professor.

G. de P. — No, it is not so. The doctrine of the sishtas is one upon which very little has been said, and you will understand the cause of this reticence. First, because it is very difficult to explain, and second, because it is still more difficult to understand.

Perhaps the following illustration, and the deduction to be drawn from it, may help you. Our entire mineral kingdom as it is on earth today is the mineral sishtas of the mineral group-wave which has passed on. Do you understand? The beasts came afterwards. They were not minerals, but yet they were associated with the mineral sishtas. Plants came before the beasts, and the humans followed the beasts — and here I do not mean the mammalian beasts, because the mammalian beasts came after man.

Next, the plant world as it exists on the earth today is almost entirely a group of sishtas, almost but not quite.

It has still some of the vital flow of the plant life-wave; I mean that the plant life-wave has not fully left the earth, but has almost done so.

Again, the beast kingdom is about fifty percent sishtas, which means that the beast life-wave or family group is about fifty percent efficient, evolutionally speaking, today.

The human kingdom is here almost in its entirety as an evolving family group. You doubtless now understand what this means. If you could have seen with your present human consciousness and powers of understanding

what happened at the time when, for instance, our mineral life-wave was in its heyday of evolutionary growth, you would have seen what would have seemed to you to be most extraordinary things — moving minerals advancing on the surface of the earth; extraordinarily great volcanic and seismic phenomena of various kinds.

Carry your thought to the plant world. In their heyday of evolutionary development, you would have seen plants acting in a most extraordinary way: trees waving their branches in a manner suggestive of intelligence, folding their fronds and doing other strange things. Even today you will find horticulturists and agriculturists telling you of the remarkable "instinct," shown by the roots of certain trees, which will, as the trees grow, travel along under the earth for sometimes twenty, forty, sixty feet and perhaps a greater distance, going straight for water which exists at the distant point — the roots seem to be drawn to the water as by an instinct.

This fact seems ordinary to us simply because we are accustomed to it. But in the heyday of the evolutionary development of the plant life-wave you might even have seen plants bend down towards the water, and apparently suck it up much the same as when you see the beasts drink. There are certain plants today which exemplify these unusual life-movements.

The telegraph plant ( Desmodium gyrans) of the East Indies is one of the most remarkable examples of movement, and the modus operandi and reason for its behavior is a mystery to science. The leaves of this plant are divided into three leaflets, the outer ones, which are smaller than the central one, move up and down with distinct jerks, traveling through an arc of 180 degrees. They also gyrate or turn on their stalks as axes.

The central leaflet only moves slightly. This motion is continuous and easily seen, and does not cease during the life of the leaf.

The sundew ( Drosera) is another plant that moves its leaves but with deliberate intent. It is one of the meat-eaters that lives on insects. The rounded leaf is covered with long tentacles which glisten attractively with sticky honey. When the unfortunate insect lands on the leaf these tentacle-hairs bend over and entangle it, and then the leaf begins to curl up and form a bag from which the prey cannot escape. Digestive fluid pours out, and the dinner is peacefully digested. Darwin showed that no chemical action serves to explain the bending over of the tentacles that are far removed from the insect. This plant is widely distributed; it is found both in England and California.

The Venus' flytrap ( Dionaea muscipula) is a member of the same family as the sundew, but more lively. Its leaves are bordered with formidable spikes, and are tipped with tempting honey. As the unsuspecting insect steps on one of the sensitive nerve-hairs, the sides of the leaf snap together like a mousetrap, and there is no escape. The action is instantaneous. When the prey is digested the leaf opens again and the trap is set for the next meal.

We are all acquainted with numerous plants that open and shut their flowers at certain times of the day or night, and it is clear that this motion is not purely mechanical because their hours of awakening or sleeping are entirely different in so many cases. Some even close at noon, others at dawn.

Many other illustrations could be given of the power of spontaneous movement in plants, but the above are enough for our purpose, which is to show that a remnant or sishta of the far greater characteristics of archaic vegetation still exists.

In regard to the rocks, it is worth mentioning that Ruskin in his Ethics of the Dust treats the subject of crystals in an interesting way. He shows that in their growth they exhibit all sorts of quaint resemblances to the behavior of human beings. The titles of some of his chapters are, The Crystal Life; The Crystal Virtues; The Crystal Quarrels; Crystal Caprice; Crystal Sorrows; and The Crystal Rest. Ruskin was a deep student of crystals and rocks, and frequently shows remarkable intuition in his observations.

The lower kingdoms — and this is especially so with the mineral and the plant kingdoms, because their sishta-condition is practically perfect — are sleeping or dormant. The sishtas of all kingdoms when left behind after the departing life-waves "sleep." I do not mean that the human sishtas when our family group leaves globe D will all be plunged in sleep, somewhat like the Beauty in the Enchanted Wood of the well-known fable — I do not mean that. The human sishtas will be men as much awake as we are now, and they

will be working even as we do at their various avocations and callings; but the human evolutionary impetus, that the life-wave when present possesses, will be absent.

As a Frenchman whom I knew might have said: On ne vivra pas, on existera — "They will not live, they will exist."

Student — May I ask another question? As I understand, the beasts will leave this earth before we do, and the time will come when there will be no beast kingdom — no evolutionary expression through beast bodies.

Is that because they are fifty percent sishtas, and are moving out? And if that is true, will the plant world also leave us, or will it become somewhat more dormant, or static?

G. de P. — The plant world will be somewhat more static, to use your excellent term; but the beasts being a higher body of entities will be represented by a far smaller number of sishtas than the gross aggregates of the mineral and plant life-waves. As a matter of fact, the beasts will practically die out from the earth, which simply means that the young brought to birth will grow fewer and fewer as time goes on, and only a relatively small number of the most highly evolved beasts will remain on the earth as the sishtas. And do you know what these beasts will be? They will be what are now the highest monkeys and the apes. Whether there will be sishtas also of most of the other groups of the beast kingdom is a matter which I do not care at the present time to state definitely, beyond saying that there is a high probability of there being such remainders also.

The human sishtas will be very few, the reason being — and it will require some thought on your part probably to see the reason why, but it is clear enough — the reason being that human entities are so much more highly evolved than the plants or than the mineral life-wave, that the call to go onwards and higher is much stronger with the humans. You must remember that we have passed the midpoint of our manvantara of this planetary chain and are beginning to rise along the ascending arc. Individualization has advanced to a much greater degree with human beings than with the beasts; with the beasts it is more advanced than with the plants; with the plants than with the lifeatoms of the mineral kingdom. This entire matter of sishtas is a fascinating study.

Student — Is it then those who are not ready to proceed farther along the path, as far as their evolution goes, who remain as sishtas, or will they voluntarily give up the idea of further individual evolution for the time being in order to remain as sishtas?

G. de P. — That is a good question. When self-conscious individuality has been attained, as it has in the human kingdom, man takes a self-consciously active part in the cosmic work, which means that the human sishtas — who, as I have already explained to you, are in all cases the most evolved entities in the human kingdom — will be the very highest fruitage of humanity. I don't dare to use the phrase that I had on the tip of my tongue, because I am afraid I shall be misunderstood; but I was going to say that the human sishtas will be the Masters. That is a fact, but I am afraid you will misunderstand me. In the instance of the human sishtas it is largely a case of deliberate self-sacrifice, giving up their own individual evolution for the time being in order to be on earth and ready and waiting for our own human life-group or life-wave when next it returns to earth during the fifth round. These human sishtas will be the great leaders and guides of the infant humanity of the fifth round on this earth; just as when we entered this earth during this fourth round there were the great leaders who were waiting for us — the great teachers and instructors of our child-humanity. Do you understand me?

Many Voices — Yes, Professor.

Student — May I ask one question more on the sishtas? You spoke a moment ago of the fact that the sishtas of our humanity would be represented by a race that was highly evolved. Yet it seemed to me that you also pictured them as a race rather dormant in many ways. There is now a confusion in my mind between that statement and the statement you have just made about their being the Masters.

G. de P. — Did I say that the human sishtas would be a race?

Student — No, you spoke of them as being a few. I got the impression that they would be a sort of drowsy species of human beings.

G. de P. — That is not true, if by the word drowsy you mean actually drowsy physically and mental-psychically. It is true if your word drowsy means a relative quiescence of the evolutionary urge. This last is just what I meant in referring a little later to the fact of the great sacrifice that these sishtas will make. The evolutionary life-wave will have swept onwards and will have left these noblest examples of humanity behind, stranded by their own will on a sandbank in the river of evolution. This does not mean that they are standing utterly still. They can evolve indeed, but their evolution then will be extremely slow. Opportunities existing when the life-wave was present have gone.

These sishtas will be very few in numbers on earth as compared with what will happen after the human evolutionary impulse again returns to earth, and sweeps them along on its advancing current. Nevertheless, they are not actually sleeping or literally dormant, and this is because of the high stage of evolution that these human sishtas will have attained. The mineral kingdom will be utterly dormant. The plant kingdom will be very dormant, but somewhat less so than the mineral kingdom. The few beasts who will remain will also be dormant, but somewhat less so than the entities of the plant kingdom. The human sishtas, however, will be relatively fully awake but dormant as compared with what they will be when they rebecome the great instructors of the infant humanity of the fifth round.

It is a stage of quietude rather than dormancy in their case, just as in the human beings today among our average mankind, you must have noticed instances where men for a time show an unwonted expansion of innate power, of relative quiet, of rest. Such men during these periods of quiet produce no more great books, or they make no more great inventions, or they show quiescence of their latent faculties, until the new impulse or urge comes, and then they make a new start. Do you get the idea?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — I will add that in the case of the human sishtas, these great souls will deliberately choose to become such sishtas, because they belong to the order of the buddhas of compassion, and their whole being will be pledged to service for the world. Of course, they gain greatly in the end, because all sacrifice of self-interest for others makes glorious karma. That very choice is written large on the registers of the lipikas. They will make a great and superb record, and they will infallibly gain their sublime compensation, their great reward. But they will have to wait for aeons; and just here is where the sacrifice appears. It is very much like a man who, in one of our educational institutions, out of pity for some struggling soul whom he is trying to help, will deliberately forego his own studies and give up passing his own examinations and thereafter taking his place in the world, doing this so that he may remain as a student and help along the one to whom his heart impels him to act as a helper and guide.

Student — Professor, this question came to me in listening to your lecture on last Sunday. We are all parts of a greater entity, are we not?

G. de P. — We are.

Student — That entity must have a kind of body, must be some sort of being. I was wondering, for instance, when any great war occurs and men's passions are in a particularly turbulent state, or again when one single person is treading the downward path, although it may be temporarily, whether such occurrences have the same effect on this greater entity of which we are a part as any disease in our human body has on that body.

G. de P. — Yes, the analogy is a good one. The acts and consequent karma of a single human individual would affect this greater entity you speak of, but very slightly indeed. Nevertheless, to follow the analogy that you make, such an occurrence as a great war or the instance of a lost soul might be considered to produce a very slight irritation, a very slight local irritation somewhere in the fabric or structure of the greater entity.

You should remember, however, that a single human individual as compared with this greater entity has relatively much less effect by his acts on that greater entity than does a single cell or an aggregate of cells have on a physical body. The effect of any great human war, for instance, on the fabric or structure of such a greater entity, would be practically infinitesimal, and would be as slightly sensed by that greater entity as would some atomic change in a human body affect that human body.

Student — Then we have a certain responsibility upwards towards this greater entity, just as we have a responsibility downwards to the smaller entities in our own bodies, haven't we?

G. de P. — Assuredly so, so far as spiritual and moral responsibility goes. The responsibility indeed exists, but it is less great. We are responsible for what we have done in the past, for the manner in which we have traveled the evolutionary road, for the things that we have done and have left behind. Consequently, for what we have done or left undone we must answer. We are also held responsible by nature for what we have the capacity for doing, if we don't do it; but held less rigidly responsible, if you understand me, than for those things that we ought to have done or ought to have left undone, or for those things which we have done and should not have done.

Student — This question of this larger entity I have been thinking about too. Are there rounds and races and periods of development for such a larger entity in order to carry out the structural intention of universal nature for such a being?

G. de P. — There are. These greater entities have, in and on their own larger spheres of life, time periods and evolution periods of which our own time periods or rounds and races, and evolution periods in these rounds and races, are mere copies.

Student — Have we nothing to do with these larger time periods and larger evolution periods? Do they have no influence on us?

G. de P. — They have, decidedly. Exactly in the same general way as whatever takes place in the sun affects us although we are not directly involved and are not individually responsible, because it is not our deliberate, willful doing. Nevertheless we are indirectly involved, because we belong to the cosmic life-stream of the sun.

Student — Shall we learn sometime to grasp these greater rounds and races?

G. de P. — Yes, indeed. That is part of the teachings of initiation; and please remember that initiations don't stop at the third or fourth or fifth or the sixth or the seventh, but continue. We shall speak of the seventh or last initiation as being the highest which a human being can normally take. With the seventh initiation comes mahatmaship.

Student — You made this statement on Sunday: "So many men on earth, so many gods in heaven." I would like to have you tell us something more about that statement.

G. de P. — I have already alluded to this in an earlier part of the evening, when speaking of the inner god.

Student — So I noticed.

G. de P. — It is an actual fact that with the single exception of what we call lost souls, who are exceedingly rare, every human being, and indeed every entity, is over-enlightened or, to use the curious English expression, overshadowed, by an inner god, of which inner god such human being or such other entity is the expression, one expression at least, on this earth. This inner god is our link with the divine worlds, and the channel through which we receive those numerous and voiceless intimations of spiritual glory, of self-forgetfulness, and of impersonal love. This is what the avatara Jesus had in mind when he is reported to have said: "I and my Father are one." It is verily so. I will now go a little farther in explanation, and I hope that you will understand me.

This inner god is our parent-star. Now make of that statement what you can! It is not so much the physical star, although that is true also as being the corporeal vehicle of the inner god. Mere spacial distance has nothing to do with this fact, because the links are links of consciousness and of spirit.

Student — You used the word this evening laya-center, and I have also been puzzled somewhat over the word pralaya, not that the contexts of our books do not show generally what these words mean; but will you

kindly give the derivation of those words and their meaning and interpretation?

G. de P. — Laya and pralaya are both words derived from the Sanskrit verbal root li, meaning "to dissolve."

Pra of pralaya is a prepositional prefix, having the force of "apart," as in the expression dissolving apart, signifying therefore a complete dissolution. A laya-center is a point or channel or portal or door of ingress and egress. It is that actual point where and through which substances of the lower plane pass upwards and are dissolved — therefore the word laya, dissolving — into the lowest grade of the plane next superior. A laya-center also is the point or channel or portal or door through which and by which substances pass from a superior plane to the plane immediately below it or inferior to it. In other words, the laya-centers are the channels of communication between two immediately contiguous planes or worlds.

Every human being is builded around a laya-center, and through this laya-center pass all the spiritual influences into his consciousness as a human being.

Pralaya as a noun signifies dissolution, complete dissolution, the complete falling apart of the component substances or atoms, if you will, of an entity, whether that entity be a world or a human being, a solar system or a cosmos.

Make a clear distinction in your mind between pralaya, "dissolution," death, on the one hand, and obscuration on the other hand. Obscuration means the obscuring or darkening of an entity or of a world. A world or an entity, such as man, is in obscuration when that entity is resting or is dormant, as in sleep or when in a state of extreme repose. The mineral kingdom on earth today, which is the aggregated sishtas of the mineral life-wave which has passed on, is on this earth in obscuration now. A planet is in obscuration at that particular period of time when all the various family groups have left it and it rests, but with its families of sishtas remaining.

Any globe can be either in partial or complete obscuration. It is in complete obscuration when there is no actively evolving life-wave on it. This is rather rare, but happens frequently enough when compared with the immense ages of a chain-manvantara. Partial obscuration occurs when a life-wave has left a globe to pass to the next succeeding globe, although there may be other families still evolving on the globe which has been left.

Partial obscuration is the case with globe C. It is in partial obscuration because our life-wave has left it, and it is partial because a globe is in full activity only when representatives of all the seven or ten life-waves are on it. When any one has left it, or two or three have left it, then it is by so much in partial or greater or still greater obscuration. When every one of the life-waves has left it, then it is in complete obscuration, and so remains until the next incoming life-wave awakens that particular portion of its activities. And this last case might be spoken of as one of partial awakening.

Now globe C is in obscuration — I should have said partial obscuration in my answer — because not only the human life-wave has left it, but as I understand the matter, also other life-waves. But at the time I was thinking only of our own life-wave. Nevertheless I do happen to know that there is one of the life-waves just opening or beginning its first root-race on globe C. So therefore globe C could hardly be said to be in complete obscuration. Here again we have another case of the immense complexity of the teachings making any partial statement of them quite subject to the charge of contradiction or inaccuracy.

It is thus very rare for a globe to be in full activity with every one of the life-waves functioning on it, and equally rare for a globe to be in full obscuration with not one of the life-waves at the time evolving on it. The usual case is for a globe to be partly obscured and partly active. And I may say that such is the case with our own globe at the present time, because the mineral life-wave has already gone on to globe E, which makes our globe only partially active, and therefore in partial obscuration because the mineral life-wave is no longer fully active here. And exactly the same thing may be said with regard to the vegetable life-wave on our globe.

It is rapidly passing over to globe E. But not completely so yet. Thus the minerals on our globe D are the sishtas and therefore our globe D is in partial obscuration. It is hard to understand these things.

As an afterthought I might add that the life-wave, which is just beginning or opening its first root-race on globe C, is a far higher life-wave than is the human, and actually is a dhyan-chohanic Wave. Its time will

come when it will reach the earth, of course millions of years hence. But our human life-wave then will have passed on to globe E. Thus the life-waves succeed each other in a series of waves rolling around the chain, occasionally overtaking each other, but rarely all being on one globe at the same time. It is always the case, however, with globe G at the end of a chain-round, due to causes already explained.

Student — Thank you very much. It has cleared up my confusion.

G. de P. — Do you understand? Have you clearly understood?

Student — I think so.

G. de P. — Thank you. Well, Companions, I think that we had better close the meeting now.

[The sounding of the gong. Silence.]

Meeting 23

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Twenty-Three

Meeting of November 11, 1930

G. de P. — Have the recorders anything to bring to our attention this evening?

Secretary — Yes, Professor, I have something. It has to do with the form in which questions are asked. Some of the questions are extremely difficult for the recorders to take down, because the form of the question is often very much involved. It is even difficult to understand what the questioner is trying to ask. I might also mention for the information of those here present, that it took the Teacher more than five hours of solid work to correct the last KTMG Report, in order so to correct the questions that people reading the report would be able to understand just what the meaning of the question was. I wonder if we could not all make an effort to have our questions grammatical, clear, and concise?

G. de P. — Yes, I do think that this is a matter of real importance. The difficulty in asking questions, I believe, lies largely in the fact that the questioner's ideas are not clearly outlined in the mind. If you have a definite and clear-cut idea, then you can phrase it briefly and clearly. If you are desirous of having an answer to some question which happens to be more or less vague in your own mind, then almost certainly your question will be wandering, devious, diffuse, vague, and full of corrections and repeatings of incidental thoughts and words. As a matter of fact, it is easier to think out your question before you ask it, and then to ask it briefly, than it is to be troubled with the feeling that you have not done justice to the question that you desire to ask. Please, therefore, do be careful in these respects. As you know, these questions with their respective answers will in time be printed. They will then go to many parts of the world, to people who read English perhaps, but who don't understand English as well as you do. In justice to them as well as to others to whom English is their native tongue, your questions should be brief, clear-cut, well-defined.

I am now ready to answer questions.

Student — I have two questions. How should I explain to a child the septenary constitution of nature in the lower kingdoms, since manas is one of the principles?

G. de P. — That is indeed a difficult thing to do. You meet with the same difficulty there that you meet with in attempting to explain to a child any recondite and difficult problem. How can you explain to your child, who may question you about it, what electricity is, what the solar system is, what the functional apparatus of the sun is, why does it rain, why does our blood flow, why have we two hands and not four or six? It is always difficult to explain things intellectually to a child.

I think that if you appeal to your child on the same grounds of understanding that you employ when you try to answer other questions that he may put to you — not so much in an intellectual way, but by appealing to his instinct and his intuitive understanding of things — you will then have less difficulty in answering his questions.

I think you will find that a child very rarely desires or even craves for a purely intellectual answer to his question. It wants an answer of some kind, of a type calculated to satisfy its feelings as well as its mind.

Student — The point was, there was not enough importance attached to the descent of manas.

G. de P. — Just what do you mean?

Student — Well, if animals have seven principles, and in humans we call one of the principles manas, the child considered that there was not enough importance attached to it.

G. de P. — Importance attached to — ?

Student — To the descent.

G. de P. — Do you mean that the child thought that —

Student — Well, that the potentiality of manas was not enough.

G. de P. — Oh, I think I understand you. If I understand you aright, your child thought that your reply, running to the fact that manas in the beast was not fully acting, but was merely latent, was by no means a satisfying answer.

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — As a matter of fact, it is a satisfying answer, and I would suggest that you tell the child to study and to think; also talk with it about these matters, and tell it of your own difficulties of understanding, and of

how it took some years for yourself to get the idea clearly.

Student — The point was we don't consider manas present until we refer to human beings; so that evidently, so far as speaking about the septenary constitution of all entities is concerned, manas does not exist until we become human beings, and then there is a descent of manas into the human being.

G. de P. — I am afraid, perhaps, that I don't quite get the idea. Just what did your child have in his mind when asking you the question?

Student — Well, don't we say that animals have a septenary constitution?

G. de P. — Yes, indeed.

Student — When we count the septenary constitution of humans, we count manas as one of the principles.

Then manas ought to be the eighth.

G. de P. — The eighth?

Student — Yes. Because when we become human, it is added to us.

G. de P. — How can something be added to us in order to complete our septenary constitution, when what already exists before is our complete constitution?

Student — That is the answer.

G. de P. — Yes.

Student — That is the potentiality. That is what the child took exception to. He said we are not attaching enough importance to the descent of manas, to the activity of it.

G. de P. — In the beasts, or in the humans?

Student — The humans. He meant the self-conscious stage.

G. de P. — Well, the idea is probably true. Possibly a great many humans attach too small an importance to the value of the highest manasic faculty. Perhaps if you suggest to your child the idea that everything in universal nature exists everywhere in universal nature, he will see that every part of universal nature has either the activity or the potency of whatever exists everywhere else. Consequently the manasic faculty must exist in the beasts just as it exists in the newborn infant — as a potentiality.

If this child has a little brother younger than he, or a little sister younger than he, then point to the little one and say: "You see Johnny, or Sarah (whatever the name is), is not as manasic or mentally developed as you are. You are older; you have developed more of what is within you."

Indeed, the beasts are as children when compared with us. Manas is not as evolved in them as it is in us; but it will develop ever more largely as the beasts evolve in future aeons. I don't know whether I quite understand what question the child desires to have answered, but I think that I understand you.

Student — Yes. The question is answered.

G. de P. — What, then, is the other question?

Student — The other question is: I understood you to say that during an eclipse of the moon, entities are constantly passing from the moon to the earth, and from the earth to the moon. I can understand their passing from the moon to the earth, but not from the earth to the moon. I don't see why a disintegrating body should attract living entities.

G. de P. — Nevertheless, it is so. You are speaking of an eclipse of the moon, are you not?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — This matter of eclipses is a very interesting study. During an eclipse of the moon the transfer of living entities takes place in both directions; but especially so in the direction of passing from the moon to the earth. This is because of a stronger pull on the moon than on the earth. In other words, what takes place is that entities leave the moon in order to seek incarnation or embodiment on earth.

An eclipse of the sun has the same two cases of transfer of living entities, from moon to earth and from earth to moon; but in the latter case — during an eclipse of the sun by the moon — the stronger attraction is from earth to moon. I mean that during an eclipse of the sun, the stronger attraction is from earth to moon than in the other direction — from the moon to earth. Do you understand?

Student — Yes. Thanks.

G. de P. — Of course there is a great deal more to be said on this matter of eclipses.

Student — I wondered rather whether all disintegrating bodies attracted living bodies.

G. de P. — All disintegrating bodies emit lifeatoms continuously. As a matter of fact, the process of disintegration or dissolution is nothing but the passing out from the decaying entity of the lifeatoms of which the decaying entity is composed. This leaving on the part of the lifeatoms is the producer of the decay.

Decaying bodies don't attract so great an influx into themselves of exterior lifeatoms as is the quantity of lifeatoms which they throw forth. The moon is in exactly the same case; but in certain positions, as in an eclipse of the moon, the pulling power of the earth conjoined with the pulling power of the sun, acting together, makes, as I have just told you, the pull from the moon towards the earth greater than is the flow of the entities in the other direction from the earth to the moon. Even the decaying or dissolving body attracts appropriate lifeatoms; but this attraction is weaker than is the energy of expulsion of lifeatoms from the decaying body.

Is the answer responsive to the thought in your mind?

Student — Yes, indeed.

Student — Am I right in thinking that there are seven life-waves passing through the seven globes, one after another, seven times, making in all the seven rounds? That is to say, after the first class of monads coming into the earth-chain has passed through globe A and gone on to globe B, the first class of the second life-wave comes into globe A. Am I correct in thinking thus?

G. de P. — That is right, you are correct.

Student — Then taking as one example, the vegetable kingdom on our earth, is it not so that there are sishtas of seven classes, one for each life-wave that passes through a globe?

G. de P. — That is also correct.

Student — At our last meeting you told us that at the end of the seventh race on this globe the flower of humanity would remain — a certain number of course — as sishtas for a whole subsequent round, until the same humanity returned. I ask then, are there now on this globe six classes of sishtas waiting the return of their respective humanities?

G. de P. — That is a very pertinent and interesting question. You can count the classes of sishtas in the following way: first kingdom of elementals, second kingdom of elementals, third kingdom of elementals, the mineral kingdom, the vegetable kingdom, the beast kingdom — this last not yet fully in obscuration, and therefore not yet fully in the sishta stage — and the human kingdom. How many kingdoms have I enumerated thus far?

Many Voices — Seven.

G. de P. — Good. There are also three other classes of monads or life-waves who will follow us after the human kingdom shall have gone on, thus making ten classes in all. Is the answer responsive to your question?

Student — Not exactly. I was asking whether there are six classes of sishtas — which would be sishtas belonging to the other globes — awaiting the return of the humanities on the other globes, just as their humanities come to this globe.

G. de P. — Certainly, but why do you limit the number of sishta-Groups to six?

Student — Because I was thinking only of the human.

G. de P. — You were thinking only of the human sishtas of any round through the seven globes of the planetary chain?

Student — My question referred only to the human. Of course I know that there must be the same on every one of these planes.

G. de P. — Yes. Now I think I understand you; but will you state your question once more, and briefly?

Student — My question is: are there six classes of human sishtas on this globe now awaiting the return of their respective humanities from the other globes?

G. de P. — No. The human class of monads, or the human life-wave, leaves only one class of sishtas on any globe. Of course, this one class of sishtas itself is divided into different families or grades, because it is obvious that all human beings are not equally evolved. We have the white men — or rather the pink men, more accurately perhaps pink-brown — then the yellow-skin men, then the black men so called, and the various tribes of barbarians and savages now living on the earth. These men all belong to the human kingdom, to the one human life-wave, and in some cases are simply relics of different human races which have previously passed through their period of racial supremacy. Remember, however, that the sishtas left on any globe are always the highest or most evolved of that respective life-wave.

Why do you think that the human life-Wave is divided into six?

Student — Because there are six globes.

G. de P. — There are seven globes.

Student — Yes, seven. But on this globe there is of course one active humanity. Now when the next globe comes to this globe — when the globe just behind us moves on to this globe — there must be some sishtas, I should think, waiting here for them, just as sishtas on the next globe will be waiting for us.

G. de P. — Will the recorder read back this question? I think the questioner will easily see there is a slight misapprehension here when she hears her words as read. [Recorder reads question.]

You see your question is so involved that it is almost impossible to get your idea clearly; consequently, I cannot give a clear answer. First, you speak of one globe coming to this globe. Such an occurrence does not take place. Now please frame your question just as clearly as you can in your own mind before you ask it.

Student — The picture is very clear in my own mind.

G. de P. — That is good. Please then give us that clear picture in clear words. Just take your time, dear friend.

Have your picture clear, then ask the question.

Student — You told us that sishtas of this humanity will await our return to this globe. That will mean a whole round. Now, then, I inferred that there must be sishtas waiting here for the humanity of the globe which will follow our humanity. Is this question clear?

G. de P. — I am afraid it is not clear. Let me try to explain. Let us take any one life-wave, our own human life-wave as an example. We will begin with the beginning of any one round, in other words, with globe A, the first globe. This human life-wave passes its seven root-races on this first globe A, then leaves its sishtas there and passes to globe B; it goes through seven root-races on globe B, and then leaves its sishtas on globe B, and passes to globe C. It does the same thing on globe C: leaves its sishtas there, and then it as a Life-wave passes to Globe D and leaves sishtas there, and then passes to globe E and leaves its sishtas there. Then it passes to globe F, goes through seven root-races on globe F, leaves its sishtas there, and then goes to the last globe G, where, after passing through seven root-races, it leaves its sishtas again. Then the life-wave goes into its nirvana, and at the end of its nirvana begins the next round, and the sishtas previously left on that first globe A are the ones which are the seeds of life, giving to this same life-wave now entering upon its next round, its first bodies. Do you understand? In other words, each life-wave leaves but one group of sishtas on any globe.

Student — That would seem to me to be true, if the globes were not occupied all at the same time. I supposed that they were. I supposed that there was a humanity on every globe simultaneously.

G. de P. — No. But remember, however, that there are other evolving groups or life-waves simultaneously on different globes.

Student — That I never have known. I was entirely mistaken. My question had no meaning in these circumstances.

G. de P. — Then I am very glad that you asked it. Your asking must have helped the other companions, because your question involved a very difficult subject. It is true that other life-waves are on the other globes, but these other life-waves by no means necessarily are human life-waves. Any one globe of the seven of our planetary chain may be in obscuration at the very time when others of the six globes are filled with respective life-waves. Do you understand me? But that temporary global obscuration does not last for a long time; and at the end of this obscuration another life-wave — some other life-wave than the one which had previously left the globe — comes on to that globe. In other words, the different life-waves follow one another around the globes.

There are seven life-waves — really ten, but we will speak of seven only. All these seven life-waves follow each other from globe to globe around the chain: from globe A to globes B, C, D, E, F, and G. After any one life-wave or family group has left a globe, that globe then has a short or temporary obscuration. When that short or temporary obscuration is ended, then another life-wave — the next one in succession — comes on that same globe. Do you see? Is the explanation responsive?

Student — Yes, thank you. I certainly misunderstood.

G. de P. — Well, I am very glad that you asked the question, because I am sure that this discussion has helped us all.

Student — May I ask a question?

G. de P. — May I ask, dear friend, if your question is clear in your mind?

Student — It is on the same subject. Is it permissible to ask if any of these successive life-waves are another kind of humanity, or another kind of being, that we humans cannot conceive of?

G. de P. — Not necessarily at all. These different or succeeding life-waves, to the number of ten or seven, as I have just explained, are different family groups of evolving monads. For instance, on our own globe we have the three kingdoms of the elementals; after them came the mineral monads; after them the plant monads; after them came the animal monads — but not the mammalian animals, for a reason that I have explained before, because the mammalians followed man in time. After the animal monads, came our humanity.

Thus you see we have these different family groups or evolving families of monads succeeding each other around the chain. Obviously then, the three kingdoms of the elementals, and the minerals, and the beasts, are not human, and yet they are distinct family groups or life-waves, which we humans can certainly conceive of and understand in some degree.

Now, the three life-waves or family groups who will follow our humanity are much superior to us. They are actually imperfect dhyan-chohans; and hold the place, beyond or above us, as three family groups superior to us, that the three kingdoms of the elementals hold at the beginning of the life-stream of succeeding family groups. Thus we have the relatively perfect above us or in advance of us, and the relatively elemental so called, in the beginning of the life-stream.

Student — May I ask one more question? When we leave this globe at the end of the seventh race, and the sishtas are left behind, then I understand that thus the next life-wave comes on: these beings, these dhyan-chohans, while we are on the next, the pralaya between the next round, before the next round. Is that the idea?

G. de P. — Will the recorder please read back the question, so that our dear Brother may hear how he has framed his thought? [Recorder reads back question.]

Student — It does sound a little mixed.

G. de P. — Won't you try again?

Student — We must write some of these questions in order to have them clear and thus save our time.

G. de P. — It will be all right if you companions will bring your written questions and will read them here yourselves.

Student — These questions are very difficult to formulate. Advanced geometry is not in it! I am trying in my mind to clarify my question.

G. de P. — Well, before you ask your question, I might point out that you mistake the meaning of pralaya when you speak of a pralaya between the globes or between the rounds — that is, if I understand your question aright. There is no pralaya between the globes and no pralaya between the rounds. There is an obscuration of every globe which has just been left by the advancing life-wave. Have you your question now clear-cut, clearly defined, in your mind?

Student — Not quite. I think that I will ask it a little later.

G. de P. — Very well then.

Student — May I ask a question? It is about the seven principles in nature. Are they immutable and eternal, or are they of such character that the one may change into the other, such as the kama becoming the manas, and the manas becoming the buddhi, and so forth? If that is not correct and they are eternal and immutable, then is it so that the lifeatom, the divine spark, travels in its evolution through the seven principles?

G. de P. — That is a profound question, very; and the answer is the following: nothing in universal being is changeless. Everything changes because everything grows. Everything is advancing to its next higher stage, the cosmic principles just as much as everything else. But there is nevertheless throughout eternity — and you will see the reason why, if you reflect — the same continuing division of universal being into seven principles, because any one principle as it changes its character or type to that which is next higher is succeeded by the one inferior to or beneath it, which takes its place. As nature is eternal, as infinitude has neither beginning nor end, there is this constant wave of evolutionary progress passing through eternal duration. It is like a river of life without beginning and without end. Is the answer responsive?

Student — I had this thought in my mind —

G. de P. — Just a moment. Is the answer thus far responsive? Do you understand it?

Student — No. It is too deep for me.

G. de P. — It should not be.

Student — I should like to think about it some more.

G. de P. — What is your question now?

Student — In The Key to Theosophy, HPB speaks of manas gravitating either to buddhi or to kama. It would seem from this, that if manas is a principle, then it is possible for manas to change to either buddhi or kama.

Is that correct?

G. de P. — It changes to buddhi. It cannot retrace its steps. If that were possible, then there would be no such thing as the constant steady advancement or unfoldment of what is latent in the heart of things. Nature would be a chaos. Everything is moving steadily forward. To use your illustration, manas steadily becomes more and more buddhic until finally manas merges into buddhi. But its manasic place on the stairway of life is taken by the new manas which was the kama principle beneath the manas which has gone on to buddhi, and

therefore this kama-principle thus takes the manasic place. Nevertheless, so far as the human constitution is concerned, it is true that the egoic principle, itself an evolving entity in our present stage of evolution, is continuously hovering between buddhi and kama and gravitates to the one or to the other. Your difficulty arises out of confusing centers of consciousness with the seven principles either of man or of the universe.

Is the answer responsive to your question?

Student — Yes, thank you. I understand now.

G. de P. — Please remember also that the seven principles, while they themselves change their respective character types, nevertheless always fill universal being. There is always a cosmic buddhi, always a cosmic manas or mahat, always a kama, etc.

Student — My question is on another subject. You said in one of the Sunday afternoon lectures not long ago that it is better to remain in devachan the full karmic time, because the repose gained therein is needed. Does this apply to theosophical students who are anxious to come back and work for humanity?

G. de P. — It applies less rigorously of course. The mere fact of the existence of the hunger of the heart to do good to one's fellows brings the devachani back to his work on earth sooner than otherwise would happen. As the student grows, as he evolves, as he passes higher along the stages of initiation, he is tending towards a time and a point in his own development when he can at will reduce his devachanic term to such time period as he may please to do.

Student — As I understand, the whole universe is not simply consciousness, as an abstract something, but is filled with consciousnesses, and my question therefore is the following: does not this same thought apply to the principles — the principle of kama, or of manas, or of buddhi? None of these principles is an abstract something in an abstract state, but each principle, as it were, is a stream of consciousnesses.

G. de P. — That is absolutely correct. We speak of buddhi, manas, kama, etc., as merely generalizing terms, or abstractions. The actual situation is, however, that the buddhic principle is simply the aggregate of buddhic entities with their buddhic vital auras; and it is so also as regards the other principles. Thus, we speak of mankind or humanity. There is no such thing per se. These terms are abstractions or generalizations, but nevertheless there are men who in their aggregate compose mankind or humanity. Don't you understand? You will not find humanity or mankind anywhere as an entity. These are merely words, abstractions signifying men; similarly with the principles such as buddhi. You won't find such a thing as buddhi per se as an entity in the universe. What we call buddhi is the aggregate of buddhic entities who are in that stage of their evolutionary growth; and it is their buddhic vitality, their buddhic essence, which makes that buddhic ocean to which we give the name buddhi. The cosmic buddhi is the spiritual or superspiritual film of substance which is the cosmic akasa in its highest essence, and is therefore a phase of mulaprakriti.

It is the armies of entities in the universe of closely similar or identic grade which make the cosmic principles.

Just so in the case of human beings. There is no such thing as intellect per se, existing as an entity. You cannot find intellect anywhere, but you will find intellectual entities everywhere.

Student — May I ask a question about the gunas? Are not the three gunas the basis of the seven throughout nature?

G. de P. — The basis of the seven — what?

Student — I understand that from the three fundamental principles the gunas naturally dissolve themselves into the seven principles, that behind the seven are the three always — three fundamental principles.

G. de P. — I would not say that the three gunas — sattva, rajas, and tamas — are the causes of the seven principles. That is quite wrong. The gunas are simply attributes or qualities of any principle, of any one of the seven principles; and obviously so, because tamas means inactivity, rajas means activity, and sattva you may describe as the true essence of a thing, its true being. Sattva comes from sat — reality, and twa — the element of it, the actual essence of it, the reality of it. The three gunas belong to any one of the seven principles. Do you understand?

Student — Well, I had the idea that the one contained the three and the three the seven.

G. de P. — That also is true as you now phrase it. The universe is the one. Its deathless portion during its existence in manvantara is its three higher portions or parts; and from these supernal three hang as a pendant the manifested seven. That is the explanation, I am sure, of the idea you have in your mind. Do you understand it?

Student — I have ideas in my mind, but I do not think that I understand it as clearly. There is a question of progressing in understanding always.

G. de P. — That is right, that is quite right.

Student — You rather surprised me in regard to your reference to the kama-manas. Would you kindly tell us the evolution of kama-manas?

G. de P. — Please frame your question again, and a little more definitely, if possible.

Student — I would like to know how the kama-manas is formed, because I understood that it was due to the desire principle in man assimilating the manasic, and that the combination formed the lower mind. But you said just now that the mind didn't descend to the kama-manas. It was always a point of evolution. I would like to know what is the evolution of the kama-manas.

G. de P. — When the human center of consciousness hovers midway between desire on the one hand, and the desire for abstract truth on the other hand, and is neither the one nor the other, which is our present human state, there is then born the self-consciousness of the entity as existing in the kama-manasic state. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, so far. But what about the entities which form the kama-manasic, which give the color to that principle?

G. de P. — The kama-manas is a state or condition of the human egoic consciousness, and therefore the kama-manasic state is not an entity per se. The kama-manasic quality is not something which exists per se apart from kama or apart from manas. It is a state midway between manas and kama, and it is the state of the human egoic consciousness when hovering between these two principles of the human constitution, and neither descending wholly into kama nor arising out of kama wholly and dwelling entirely in the next higher or manasic principle. Similarly is it when the human consciousness is centered in the buddhi-manasic state between buddhi on the one hand and manas on the other hand. It is then not yet purely buddhi. It is rising out of the pure manasic state. It hovers between the two.

Human beings in their present state of evolution are between the beast and the demigod, in other words between kama or the desire principle and manas or the mental faculty. Consequently, our present egoic self-consciousness is centered in the kama-manasic part of our constitution, at that critical point where kama and manas, as it were, blend. Is the answer responsive?

Student — Yes; but isn't it true that man's evolution is the ascent upwards from the kama-manasic state into manas?

G. de P. — Quite true, perfectly true; and man is so evolving at present, and he has not yet reached the pure manasic condition. As I have told you, he is in the critical stage between the two principles. He has not yet fully abandoned the kamic or desire-pull, and he has not yet entered fully into the intellectual. He is between the two. Intellect is not yet fully developed in us, nevertheless we are far above all the beasts on account of the manasic influence in our being. We have these physical bodies enshrining an intellectual flame, but we are not yet manasaputras, sons of manas or mind.

Student — Thank you. I think that your answer will help.

Student — Is the atman also an aggregate of entities, of living entities?

G. de P. — It is — if you are keen enough to understand this affirmative reply.

Student — In that case there must be something higher than atman. Is that so?

G. de P. — It is so. And it is just this matter that I have tried so often to explain when I have spoken of the hierarchies succeeding each other on the endless ladder of life. I have tried to point out that the highest or supreme hierarch of any hierarchy is the atman of that hierarchy; but that hierarch, although the highest of his own hierarchy, is nevertheless lower than the hierarch of the succeeding hierarchy. The hierarch is the atman of his hierarchy. Just as we human beings are composite entities composed of hosts of beings, just so is the hierarch. Although possessing its own individuality, it is an aggregate of all the entities composing its hierarchy, its family, of which the hierarch is the supreme head, and also the source and fountain and root and cause of all subordinates flowing from it. The hierarch or atman is an individual. It is an entity, it is the supreme self for all that hierarchy. Its vitality permeates all; its selfhood permeates all subordinate entities of its own hierarchical group, and thus composes for that hierarchical group the essential I am of all the entities it encloses. Although it is thus an individual, it is mystically divisible into all the beings of which it is the supreme self, the atman.

You have asked one of the most difficult questions of occultism, one of the most sublime and great; one, for that very reason, very difficult to understand. For instance, I am an ego. At the heart of this ego is my I AM, my atman, a stream of consciousness permeating me from the hierarch of this hierarchy; and yet, what am I as an entity? A composite, an aggregate of lifeatoms of many degrees, existent on many stages of consciousness, and all following the evolutionary path. My body, again, is but an aggregate of physical-astral

lifeatoms, and yet my body is an individual. Every one of these lifeatoms composing my body is per se a learning entity, destined in future aeons to be a human being, and in still more distant aeons of time to be a god. We human beings were such lifeatoms, each one of us, and even of the physical body in some other entity in some far bygone cosmic manvantara. What wonderful and yet what mysterious doctrines these of occultism are, so inspiring, so comforting; and how they save us from the worst sin of all — the sense of personalism!

The atman is indivisible in the sense that it is the being or entity of the hierarch of our hierarchy, therefore permeating and manifesting in all things and entities as their essential Self: the essential sense of I AM, deathless at least for as long as that hierarchy endures in its cosmic manvantara. Hence the atman is the aggregate of the monadic essences of all the entities composing that hierarchy. Similarly on the physical plane, and following the law of analogy, my physical body is an individual and yet is composed of the lifeatoms which build it, make it, form it. Do you begin to understand?

Student — Yes, thank you, I do believe I understand.

G. de P. — It is a very difficult thing to explain, but I think that I have given to you the key.

Student — If evil is imperfection, then it should seem that evil depends upon ignorance altogether, and that even the Brothers of the Shadow do not really know that they commit any crimes; and, in the main, wherein lies real responsibility? Can you clear our minds regarding this?

G. de P. — Yes. You are quite right in saying that avidya, nescience, lack of knowledge of the essential reality of things, is the cause of imperfection. This avidya, or ignorance if you like so to call it, is the cause of the disharmony in the universe and in human beings. Now, the Brothers of the Shadow present a very abstruse problem. If they had the consciousness, the intuitive consciousness, that they are what they are, they would not be what they are, but would already be on the path of growth leading to fellowship in the line of the Buddhas of Compassion. But unfortunately, the Brothers of the Shadow — the real ones, I am now speaking of — are convinced that their views of things, that their course of life, are just as right as are those of our Masters. To a certain extent the case is the same with the criminals in our human affairs. The real criminal, the one of essentially criminal instincts, would not be a criminal if the consciousness were in him clear that he was doing wrong, that he was inharmonious with his surroundings and with other entities. The criminal is a battler against what the average of humanity instinctively feel to be right, but which he does not yet overpoweringly feel to be right.

I am now speaking of the deliberate instinctive criminals, and there are a very few such. Most criminals don't belong to that category. They are simply weak and foolish men and women. You will often find it stated in the Oriental writings that avidya, ignorance, is man's greatest foe. It is true.

Student — Yes, but I have been thinking sometimes that the real evil does not consist in a special state, but rather in the direction an entity follows. When an entity goes intentionally down, then there is evil, and when the entity rises, then there is good. I have also been thinking that imperfection in itself, for instance a less developed entity than we, a flower, a child, although in a state of imperfection, does not appear to us as something evil. The flower or the child is rising, it is trying to go forward and thus we recognize this as something good. It is good, it is not evil, and we think because of its imperfection — I have been thinking of this and cannot get it quite clear — that that imperfection in itself should be or produce evil; although naturally through ignorance a man or any entity can commit an evil act, that is, go down.

G. de P. — That is all perfectly true. But why do you think that a flower is imperfect? A flower is by no means imperfect. Imperfection, as employed in the occult sense, refers to an entity which through ignorance opposes its will to the higher and nobler laws, thus creating disharmony in nature's evolutionary stream which is advancing forwards, going forwards always. Imperfection in this sense is the abstract creator of inharmony, which is evil, and arises out of a misuse of will, and this misuse of will is born in an imperfect understanding or relative ignorance of truth. Now a flower does not do that. Similarly again the beasts are not evil. The insects are by no means evil. They are each and all harmonious in their respective environments. The flower is a thing of beauty, a joy forever. It is not ignorant because it knows its own station in life, so to speak. It follows its own pathway, where it is, in perfect harmony and in accordance with nature's evolutionary stream.

Do you understand?

Student — Yes, but —

G. de P. — But when an entity opposes its will, driven by inner desire, to nature's advancing evolutionary stream, that opposition produces inharmony and surrounding evil, and this is the cause of what human beings call evil. The entity is imperfectly evolved; therefore we can truly say, and briefly say, it exists in

imperfection, creating disharmony in its environment; and hence, as you see, imperfection in this sense may be truly said to be the cause of evil. Any thing, any entity, which is in harmony with its environment, and following the pathway of the clean, natural instincts implanted within it, is "good," no matter what its evolutionary grade may be.

Thus a human being is highly imperfect if we compare him with a god; but if that human being lives to benefit mankind, and in all thoughts and acts of his life tries to lead a harmonious existence, that human being is an entity of inner beauty. He is harmonious with his environment. He is advancing along nature's evolutionary stream in the proper way. He creates no disharmony.

Student — Does your term lifeatoms comprise the same entities which HPB in The Secret Doctrine calls the fiery lives, or the creators and the destroyers?

G. de P. — The fiery lives, or the creators and destroyers, are one great family group of the lifeatoms, or rather two great family groups, one the creators, and the other the destroyers. These names are but two generalizing terms. Let me try to illustrate this. Any entity at any time, although perfectly harmonious with its own environment, may be passing through a stage of its evolution in which it may belong to either one of the two classes — creators or destroyers. If that is part of its natural growth, then its action is harmonious, and no evil is created. For instance, the destroyers have a role in universal nature which is just as important as is the role of the creators, so called.

Student — Yes, I understand that. I wanted your definition of lifeatom — if it is the same as the fiery lives.

G. de P. — If you put it in that way, then the answer is, yes, because every lifeatom is a fiery life in the sense that it is filled with the fire of life, with the warmth, the glowing vitality, in other words the solar vitality. But when you speak of the creators and the destroyers, then you restrict the term merely to two spheres of activity of the lifeatoms.

Student — Yes, I see. May I ask another question? Is the planet which is the substitute for the moon in the enumeration of the seven sacred planets, the one referred to by HPB in Isis Unveiled as the one that takes up all the refuse of the earth?

G. de P. — In other words you are alluding to the Planet of Death?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — I am very sorry that I may not answer your question. But, as usual, it is my duty to give some kind of answer.

Student — I would suggest that he withdraw the question if it embarrasses the teacher.

G. de P. — It is all right. I was just thinking of the proper words in which to say something, because the very fact that the question has been asked, shows that at least some answer ought to be given. I am indeed sometimes more embarrassed than I can easily describe. Let me say the following.

The entities, which through willful following of evil in life after life, separate off the higher portions of their constitution so that by mere weight of evildoing, they drop into a lower sphere, pass to the Planet of Death, which is one of nature's laboratories where these entities who no longer belong to the human life-stream, to the human life-wave, are mercifully broken up and disintegrated. The human constitution, which as you know is a wholly composite thing, in its lower parts is rent into all its component elements. This takes place in the deepest part of avichi. You have all heard of avichi, which exists in seven stages or degrees. It is intimately connected with the moon; and I will merely add this, that the planet, the secret planet, for which the moon stands as an astrological substitute, is very intimately connected with the work that the moon does on the earth and on human beings, and on other entities having their home on earth.

I really believe, Companions, that if those of you who are interested in this horrible subject really understood what it implies, you would not care to ask these questions. The whole teaching is horrible, simply because it is a true description of the end of these wretched beings. It is unwholesome to let your mind dwell too long on these things. Some day you must know all about it; indeed, you will be obliged to know. You cannot pass the examinations, so to speak, you cannot pass into a higher grade — until you know the truth. But that time has not come yet. You must be very strong spiritually, intellectually, and morally, to know the whole truth about this subject.

Nature has its terrible aspects, just as it has its sublimely beautiful aspects.

Student — We always speak of the globes as being seven in number, and of the life-waves as being seven in number, and also as regards the hosts of entities, etc. But you told us that there are ten classes. I desire to

know if there are not really twelve, that is, two more added in the following manner: one more elemental than the first elemental kingdom, the lowest or the nether pole; and the other, the very highest or the north pole, the very expression of the highest spiritual manifestation.

Am I wrong?

G. de P. — No; you are very greatly right, and yet wrong in one detail. There are indeed actually ten globes, just as there are ten classes of the monads. But there are also a sub-elemental sphere and a superdivine sphere, just as you say; these two latter being, or rather acting as, the junction-globes between any three hierarchies: the superior, the one intermediate, and the inferior. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, perfectly.

G. de P. — The first and the twelfth, if you follow the teaching of the twelve, are the junction spheres, so to speak.

Student — May I ask in what form did we entities of the present human race manifest when we entered globe A in the first round?

G. de P. — Do you mean what corporeal form did the entities then have?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — During the first round, you mean?

Student — Yes, on globe A.

G. de P. — In other words, your question is this: what form did the entities which are now human beings have on globe A in the first round?

Student — Yes, Professor.

G. de P. — They had forms which you may speak of as fire. That answer is not exactly correct, because the substance was not fire as we now understand it; but fire is the nearest word that I can think of to describe the type of corporeal encasements that the imbodied monads then had. It was of a fiery character, but of a fire still more fiery, more ethereal, than the fire that we know here. You might call it a form of electricity, and you would not be far from the truth.

Student — Then we belonged at that time to one of the elemental kingdoms — to one of the three elemental kingdoms?

G. de P. — No, no. We belonged to the same human kingdom that we now are, but that human kingdom was then in its earliest stages appropriate to the first globe of the first round.

Let me tell you something, and this will perhaps make it clear. We human beings were the most highly evolved beasts of the lunar chain. During this earth-chain — I mean during our evolution on this present earth-chain — we have evolved forth humanity. When we leave this earth-chain, we shall have evolved forth dhyan-chohanship, we shall have become gods; and the higher beasts now following us on earth will be the

"men" of the planetary chain succeeding this earth-chain. Just as we are the men of this chain, who were on the lunar chain the beasts of that lunar chain — the higher beasts of that lunar chain.

Every beast of earth today, and the mammalian beasts preeminently, in its essence contains the potentiality of a human being, which we may look upon as "locked up" within it; just as we human beings now, each one of us, has a god locked up within him. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, Professor. But then, after our first appearance on globe A in the first round, do we have to go through the other kingdoms of nature: the elemental, the vegetable, the animal, etc.?

G. de P. — That was true during the first round. But this is a very different question indeed from the one that you asked before.

Student — Yes, I know.

G. de P. — I will also point this out, that there were human beings on globe A during our first round; and I mean by that statement, entities then living on globe A during the first round who had already evolved sufficiently to be human beings. Now those entities are the entities whom today we call the mahatmas and the buddhas. Is the answer responsive?

Student — Yes, thank you very much.

G. de P. — In regard to the manner of evolving through all the kingdoms of nature from the elementals up to the highest, during the first round, that is indeed a very interesting subject for thought and discussion, but it is a subject quite different from the question that you asked.

Now, Companions, I will answer one or two questions more, if you please.

Student — With regard to the term used in our philosophy, the inner god: is it the head of our hierarchy or is it a composite being consisting of the manasic entities, the buddhic entities, and the atmic entities?

G. de P. — You are referring to the inner god of any one human being?

Student — Yes, Professor.

G. de P. — Answering your question with exactitude, the inner god of any one human being is not the head of our hierarchy, and therefore it is not a hierarchical, composite being as you outline. You should understand that this term, the inner god, does not mean one general entity who is the only inner god of every human being and every other subordinate entity. That is not the idea, because although your question is correct in its statement when applied to the hierarch of our hierarchy, it does not apply to the individual inner god of any human being. Each human being has his own inner god, or, to speak more accurately, every human being is the manifestation of an entitative inner god. The thought is clear thus far, is it?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — This inner god is a dhyan-chohan, and on the lunar chain was a mahatma of that lunar chain.

Every human being, now going a step further in our explanation, is a composite entity. My inner god, your inner god, the individual inner god of every individual human being, is at one and the same time the higher self of that human being, and yet different. For this reason, each one of us as a human individual is destined to become in his turn an inner god in future ages. Let me explain it in the following way.

Every human being, every human soul, every human ego, is a child of his own inner god. From and through that inner god he receives his I-AM-NESS; but as an egoic human being he is an I-am-I. I hope that you understand this. Every human being is a little world or microcosm. He is composed of an inner god. He is composed of a spiritual soul. He is composed of himself, the human soul, or human ego. This human soul or human ego lives in vehicles formed of hosts of lifeatoms. Each one of these lifeatoms is a growing, evolving entity destined to become a human being in future aeons, and later still to become an inner god. Each one of us human beings is going to be in future aeons the inner god of the most evolved subsoul of his present constitution, which subsoul in those future aeons will be a human being, a human ego. Do you understand that?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — Each one of us is like a ladder of life. One rung of that ladder of life is our human ego, our human soul; and the other rungs are our links both above and below, and these other rungs with our human ego form our composite constitution. Let me change the figure of speech.

Every human entity may be likened to a chain composed of links, one link in this beginningless and endless chain is I, or is you, or is any other human ego; and the other links of any such chain are the other parts of that entity's constitution.

Further, we are connected by the higher links and the lower links with all the universe that surrounds us, and our constitution is wholly formed of all these links. Thus we come back to what I have so often told you that each human being is essentially the universe, and the universe is distributively each human being.

You must get rid of the idea of the immortal eternal soul. There is no such immortal soul in man, for the simple reason that every part of your constitution is evolving, growing. This means changing, this means evolving to something greater. Consequently, the soul at no two consecutive seconds of time is the same, and therefore a crystallized immortality is a mere figment of the imagination, a dream, an illusion. Do you understand?

Many Voices — Yes.

Student — What is the work, if I may put it in that way, of the inner god? Is it merely waiting to be recognized by us, so that it can manifest through us? Or, if it has a work on its own plane, what is that work?

G. de P. — Yes, indeed, it has a work on its own plane. Every part of the human constitution is evolving on its own plane, because every distinct part or link is a distinct entity. But they are all interlinked, interconnected, interbound, interworking, and in a very true sense interpenetrating. No entity anywhere can live unto itself alone. The gods live in their own spheres, have their own ways of life, but they permeate all entities and things subordinate to and beneath them, and they themselves are permeated by the essences of superdivinities above them, which therefore of course likewise permeate us.

I will tell you a truth, I will go a little farther — the gods have their own worlds; they have even what we

humans would call their own dwellings, they have their own duties. We pass through them constantly, we pass through what we may call their lakes and through what we may speak of as their houses, and we have no cognizance of it. But because we live, each one of us, in the vital essence of the entity superior to us — our divine parent of which we were a lifeatom in a former manvantara — we call this superior entity our inner god, because it is such.

We are it actually, because the I-am-I of that inner god manifests in us as our "I am." Then, each one of us as a human has his own I-am-I, which is the "I am" of all the subordinate entities of that human being. Don't you see?

The gods live in their own spheres. They have their own duties, their own occupations, their own avocations; we may doubtless say that they have their own schools, their own temples, their own houses. I am employing human terms in this connection merely in order to make the idea clear to you.

Nature repeats herself everywhere. We are all interlinked, interconnected, interbound. The same life flows through all. These inner gods in their turn are similarly linked to other superdivine entities, supergods, higher than they.

Student — May I now restate my question? At the end of the seventh race, after we pass on to the next globe, am I right in understanding that in the sishtas which we have left behind, these other beings — dhyan-chohans — come and live in those sishtas on the earth during the time that our great humanity is on some other globe? I mean, do these dhyan-chohans incarnate in these sishtas? That is what I was trying to get at.

G. de P. — I have often wondered whether this same question would at some time be asked. The general answer to it is, no. But I wish to make a certain reservation here regarding the very lowest class of the life-wave succeeding ours, which possibly, and I think in all probability, will to a certain extent incarnate in the noblest of the sishtas that we shall leave behind. But generally speaking, and leaving these possible exceptions aside, the answer is, no. And if you will look around us and consider the sishtas now living on earth that the preceding life-waves have left, you will see that we do not embody ourselves in the beasts, nor in the plants, nor in the minerals.

The life-wave following ourselves, or the family group superior to ours, will come in their own way, and their sishtas are living and waiting on this earth today. You may ask where? And I will answer with an echo: where indeed? There are many mysteries about the earth of which very little has been said, even in our Esoteric School.

The sishtas that these superior beings left during their last round are on earth today, and are waiting for their own life-wave to return.

Student — Have the mysterious Todas of India that HPB speaks of any connection with these sishtas?

G. de P. — No. Truly, they are by no means high enough. The Todas are one seed of a future great subrace of our fifth root-race. They are a part of the seed-bodies of one of the forthcoming subraces, and I mean grand subraces, because this phrase subrace is a generalizing term and can be used for different kinds of subraces, small or great.

Now, Companions, the time to close our meeting has come. But before doing so I would like to tell you that you should not be discouraged if you are unable immediately to seize the inner meaning of these very difficult teachings regarding consciousness that we have discussed tonight and on other occasions. The study of consciousness is one of the most difficult to understand. I have wondered, I have indeed been astonished, that so many of your questions have been on this subject. I am glad to see that it is so. It shows that you are awakening, that you are indeed beginning to get real gleams of light.

Strive for initiation. Strive for initiation. Because when initiation comes to you, as it certainly will if you don't fall by the wayside, if you don't fail in the tests, then all things will become clearer to you, because you will be taught to become what you are taught. Initiation is the actual pro tempore becoming the things that you have been taught about, so that your consciousness has immediate cognition of all these different states of consciousness, of all these different beings and worlds and spheres.

There is a stage in initiation, and it is one of the highest, when the neophyte meets his own inner god face to

face. Now think what that means! Any individual can say: it is my self and yet not my self. Now take this thought and ponder over it; and let me draw a little moral from it before we part tonight.

When HPB came to the Occidental world in 1873 — I think it was, at least to New York in 1873 — carrying all these teachings and plans in her consciousness — knowing what she had been sent to teach, knowing that she had been sent to found a School — what, I ask you, must have been her feelings and her mental outlook at the almost insuperable difficulty of making the mass of mankind understand what she was talking about?

Even we, with more than fifty years of study and reflection, find it very difficult to understand these matters.

And yet she came to a world which knew nothing at all of esotericism, nothing of occultism, nothing of the real mysteries of life, brought up in the tenets of a dying church, and hypnotized, psychologized, with the teaching of a haughty and arrogant science, which since then has changed practically all of its basic teachings.

My dear Companions, as I look back at it all and consider her work, I think it is truly masterly. She made an impression in human consciousness which as an effort and as an accomplishment was divine in its power.

There was divine power behind it. I want you to think over that; and then when you hear some so-called theosophists belittling HPB because they don't understand her, because they have no comprehension of her or of her life and character, just remember what she did, what she brought with her, what she knew she had to teach, and how she had to give that teaching out. And remember that when she died she left behind her a Society, she left behind her teachings, and her books, which have brought you here.

She gave back to man the consciousness of his essential divinity, of his essential oneness with the universe, of the existence of an esoteric wisdom which has lasted through the ages, of the existence and actuality of a band of great men, masters of life. She changed the entire spiritual, moral, and psychological outlook of humanity; and this is no overdrawn statement, because our theosophical ideas in so many respects are, as you well know, now becoming actually popular.

Look at the different societies that have sprung from her work. They are really all offsprings of the theosophical movement, in many cases verging into the left hand, and are thus aberrant on their way, for they know little of the truth. But yet it all has come about since H. P. Blavatsky came to the Occidental world.

They all teach her doctrines, though in a more or less distorted form. The Rosicrucians, as one of our companions told me this evening, refer their students to H. P. Blavatsky's The Secret Doctrine. Look at all these various societies, mystical, quasi-occultist, so-called theosophical, and what not. Remember HPB, my dear Brothers. Remember her and love her.

I will conclude tonight with this one statement: that the woman H. P. Blavatsky, the Russian body known under the name of H. P. Blavatsky, was the vehicle of one of the Masters themselves. This does not mean that this Master evicted the soul of HPB. Not at all. But HPB was the psychological cripple that I have tried to explain on other occasions. There was a vacancy in her constitution; I believe you will remember that I have spoken to you about this before, and this vacancy in the constitution was at times filled with the presence, that is with the consciousness and with the will and with the mind, of a Master of Wisdom and Compassion and Peace, who worked through her; and on these occasions she always signed the documents that her hand wrote with the three initials, 'HPB.' She alludes to this matter herself in more than one of her letters addressed to Mr.

A. P. Sinnett; and in others she alludes vaguely to the same fact.

The meeting is adjourned, Companions. Will you kindly sound the gong.

[The sounding of the gong. Silence.]

Meeting 24

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Twenty-Four

Meeting of November 25, 1930

G. de P. — I am ready to answer questions, Companions.

Student — I was wondering if the nature of good and evil can be compared with what we learned in physics about heat and cold: that there are not two distinct things, heat and cold, but that cold is merely absence of heat. Is not evil merely absence of good and therefore moral inharmony, lack of beauty, or lack of a proper vision of things, relatively speaking of course, in whatever sphere you are dealing with?

G. de P. — Yes, in a sense that is quite true. Evil is not a thing per se, existing as an entity, that is, as a cosmic element; and good is also by no means a thing that exists by itself as an entity or as a cosmic element.

Each is a condition of living entities. I repeat, each is a temporary condition of living entities. Neither the one nor the other can exist apart from the entities which are "good" or which are "evil." You might as well say that length can exist apart from things which are long, or that breadth or depth or heighth or lowth can exist apart from things which are broad or deep or high or low; or that heat can exist apart from things which are hot. Heat is not a thing which exists per se. It is merely a condition of things which are temporarily hot; and the same applies to things that are cold. There is no such thing as cold per se; but there are cold things.

I must add, however, with regard to heat and cold that the analogy with good and evil is not absolute; because it is our esoteric teaching that the old theory of the phlogiston or heat element or heat-essence has much more of truth in it than has been supposed since that theory was abandoned in the last two or three hundred years.

The cosmic element fire is at the bottom of the old idea of the phlogiston, and in essence that old idea is true; whereas good and evil are states of relative perfection or harmony with environment, and states of relative imperfection or inharmony with environment. What is harmonious is called good. What is inharmonious or imperfect is called evil.

There is one other way of looking at this so-called problem of evil, which is a problem merely to Occidentals who have been psychologized through many centuries by false religious, false scientific, and false philosophical education. Whatever evil exists in beings, or aggregatively in the universe, exists from and because of the use and misuse of wills. Intelligences and wills misapplied produce inharmonies which are imperfections, and therefore evil. Similarly, intelligences and wills rightly applied in conformity with nature's fundamental currents of evolution and operation are harmonious therewith, and this condition is what men call good. This is the active aspect of the existence of good and evil, and it is the aspect which most human beings seem to have in their mind when the so-called problem of good and evil arises. It is not a problem, really. Both good and evil are relative, because arising out of entities in themselves only relatively evolved as compared with greater and less entities.

An exceedingly good man on earth may act from what are to him exceedingly lofty motives of conduct. And yet, pause a moment in thought — in the sight of the gods or of the supergods, the noblest human action is of necessity imperfect, therefore relatively inharmonious, therefore relatively evil. That is about all there is to it.

One of our companions at our last meeting mentioned a flower in this connection. A flower is an imperfectly evolved entity, if we use the evolutionary status of a human being as a standard. We have no absolute reason for so placing a human being as a standard whereby to judge the evolutionary status of any other entity in the universe, but people usually do so. It is a natural thing to do. But while that is perfectly true from the human standpoint, in itself a flower is as perfect a thing as is a human being. It is just another way of saying that both are relatively imperfect, because neither is absolute cosmic perfection. Each is an entity having attained a certain stage in its own line of development. But as a human being is much more evolved than a flower, and therefore uses much more aggressively his native power of will, and his native intelligence, he can be said to be more productive of evil in the world than a flower, because a flower is relatively innocent of evil doing.

Evil therefore is relative; good is relative. The one cannot exist apart from the other. As long as there is good

in the universe, there will be evil in the universe; because if every entity and every thing were utterly harmonious with every other entity and every other thing, there would be no good, because there would be nothing at all to contrast it with. We say that one man is good, when we contrast him with other beings who are less good — or evil. If our world had but one color for everything, what we now know as color would be unknown to us because everything would be of one uniform shade.

Briefly, therefore, the active phase of good and evil is the exercise or use and misuse of individual wills, either cooperating harmoniously together or struggling against each other. The former is what men call good.

The latter is what men call evil.

Student — May I ask if that gives any light on the mysterious tenet of spiritual wickedness? This is one of the most difficult things we have in our literature.

G. de P. — Yes, precisely so. As you have opened this door of explanation, I may add that the reference to beings of spiritual wickedness, which the Christian New Testament speaks of, actually implies that there are entities in the spiritual world much higher than human beings — so far as evolutionary development is concerned — who because of their relative imperfection in their own spiritual sphere are not utterly harmonious there. Therefore they produce a relative inharmony or disharmony there. It is bound to be so in all the rupa-worlds, or worlds of form and manifestation, because form and manifestation in themselves signify entities which are relatively imperfectly evolved. Differentiation is material existence, however ethereal that existence may be; and material existence signifies imperfectly evolved entities, beings, things — and this means relative evil, also relative good.

You cannot have one without the other. You cannot have spirit without matter. You cannot have matter without spirit. The time is coming in the aeons-long distant future when neither spirit nor matter will exist; but only that from which both flow forth as two streams of manifestation.

Student — Professor, in reference to this subject, when you speak of good as a matter of will, does that also cover the fact that a good person sometimes by his goodness actually does harm to others?

G. de P. — That can also occur, simply from the fact that the good person's action is relatively imperfect on account of the individual so acting having a relatively imperfect judgment. A man may be a good man, have a good motive in acting; but the motive though good, may produce an action which is unwise. This is because judgment, insight, vision, are imperfect in a certain degree.

Student — May I add to my question? We know that unselfishness in a person invites selfishness in others. Is it because the person who is unselfish is unwise in his judgment in expressing his unselfishness?

G. de P. — I would not say that unselfishness "invites" selfishness. Unwise unselfishness often arouses antagonism in others, which is "evil." But pure unselfishness is always spiritually clairvoyant, and cannot act

— and I am speaking relatively of course — cannot act unwisely. Therefore it arouses no antagonistic reactions of evil. This is evident in the case of the elder brothers of mankind and also in us ordinary humans.

For example, two men exist: A is a Master of Wisdom and Compassion and Peace; B is an average human being, a good man, as men go. A, the Master, acts with wisdom, with pure unselfish desire to help others.

Having no element of personality or selfishness in his acts, with his clairvoyant vision he acts wisely, he acts in harmony with nature's laws and currents of being. There is no evilly antagonistic reaction produced. B, the average man, a good man, wants to do right, tries to do good to others, but he may do it unwisely, he may do it impulsively, over-enthusiastically, without taking proper consideration of time and circumstance and condition. His motive is good, but the results may be ungood, if I may coin a term. You cannot exactly call them evil, because the intention was not to produce evil. It is ungood, and it may actually result in evil in the sense that it can arouse evil feelings in others.

I would not say that pure unselfishness ever invites selfishness in others. I know that the thought that you have expressed is a common one, but I think that it is a feeling which is produced by human fear. A truly unselfish man never fears. Fear and unselfishness cannot exist together. Fear is the child of cupidity of some kind, as instanced by the fear to lose what we love or desire to retain, and this is not purely unselfish.

Student — Are the lipikas to be considered after the manner of teachers and parents, who distribute punishments and rewards, according to the acts of their children? Is it in this way they act, distributing the karma of those entities that they supervise; and are they then in their way karmically responsible or the relatively perfect or imperfect way in which they act?

G. de P. — No, dear Brother. You have touched upon one of the most difficult and abstruse problems of our entire esoteric teaching. The lipikas are the cosmic "scribes." This word lipika comes from the Sanskrit verbal root lip meaning to write, to inscribe, to set down, to engrave. They are cosmic spirits, intelligent, self-conscious, whose whole action in the evolution of the universe is automatically to record, as automatically as the stylus of the phonographic machine, all that takes place. Their magnetic or psychomagnetic aura permeates the entire solar system. Hence, they automatically feel every thought, every current of emotion, as well as every act, and in consequence they instantly and automatically make a record. I do not mean that they record with pen or pencil, but in their own being, if you understand me. They are the karmic scribes, the scribes of karma; and according to the imprint or impression thus made in their vital essence, do their later and subsequent actions follow, precisely as the needle of the phonographic machine follows the grooves in the disk. That is why karma is so impersonal.

They are not responsible at all for what takes place. They are infinitely more impersonal and more automatic in their action than are the recorders in a court of law, setting down word by word, act by act, whatever takes place in the cosmic courtroom; and their record is infinitely accurate and just. There is no personal equation at all. The answer to your question is a most difficult one to give. You may call them gods, and yet they are hardly that. They are more like karmic organs of the universe; and when I say organs I have reference to the organs of the physical body. The heartbeat may be an instance, although in imperfect one, an imperfect illustration. Their action is entirely automatic, but it is an automatism of consciousness.

Student — Have these lipikas ever been human beings? Or are they some sort of divine spirits that don't go through the process of evolution?

G. de P. — They have not yet been human beings. Had they been human beings, they would now be self-conscious gods of another type. Let me see if I can place the matter a little differently before you by giving you a picture of another kind. Instead of calling them the karmic scribes, the cosmic scribes, of the universe, which is just what they are, suppose you call them the conscious cosmic elements, using the word elements in the archaic sense. For instance, a human being's aura, which is a part of his auric egg, responds automatically to whatever the man thinks or feels or does, and an imprint, an impression, of everything, is instantly registered. This is a karmic record, a karmic inscription. The aura in this sense of the word is a karmic scribe, imprinting in itself as a record what takes place in the constitution of a human being. In somewhat similar way, these cosmic lipikas — I cannot call them exactly entities, but these cosmic substance-forces — are karmic scribes of everything that takes place in the solar system, in and of which they are essential parts.

They are at once the karmic record and the karmic recorder. It is a most mysterious and a most difficult doctrine; and it is small wonder, indeed, that HPB does little more than allude to them in the metaphorical way in which she writes.

Of course, back of and behind, beyond and above, the cosmic lipikas are the cosmic gods in and for whom, and by the consciousness and energy of whom, these lipikas work or act -exactly as a man's aura exists in and from him, and works, makes its records for and in him, and from the man himself receives its true life, its essence. They are metaphorically called beings, because in a generalizing sense of the word a man's aura is a being — not a self-conscious entity, but an element or essence permeated with the consciousness of the self-conscious being from which it flows.

May I ask if the answer is partly responsive to your question?

Student — Yes, it is. But then come the cosmic gods that act on the lipikas and whose constructive will decides what is going to happen. And then my question is: they must be in some way karmic agents, acting through the lipikas and using the lipikas as tools, so to say, or —

G. de P. — They do so, but if you have understood the illustration that I gave you of the aura of a human

being, which registers automatically all that the man thinks and feels and does, you will also see that that aura registers the movements of every single lifeatom composing that aura, just as much as it registers the thoughts and feelings of the man from whom it flows. Now, these lifeatoms, in the cosmic sense, are all entities living in that cosmic aura, such as the sun, the planets, comets, the inferior gods, the Masters, human beings, the elementals, the chemical atoms, and so forth.

One great rule which is very helpful in studying these questions is to remember that no entity lives unto itself alone. Every entity is both actor and agent, also both giver and receiver.

Student — A writer on cosmic consciousness, the other day, made the statement that all references in archaic writing before and at the time of the ancient Greeks never mentioned the heavens as blue, and he ventures the opinion that the consciousness of "blue" did not exist in those days, or previous to that time. Is that true?

G. de P. — Who makes that statement?

Student — I am trying to remember his name, but I cannot. He is a man who has written a book lately, which is rather popular, on cosmic consciousness. The reference I saw was a little extract published in a periodical called The Thinker. It was digest of the book.

G. de P. — I think the opinion is absurd, I mean the remark that he makes as quoted by you. Did he refer to human beings so recently ancient, if I may so express myself, as the Greeks and Romans?

Student — I think he especially mentions Homer, and he said that you never see in any of these old books any references to the blue heavens. I thought it was rather a bold statement; and I wondered whether there was any significance in it?

G. de P. — I don't think that there is any true significance in it at all. His references to Homer and other old writers are purely negative testimony at the best. Were we to follow such a rule of judgment, then we must say that everything that ancient writers did not specifically speak of either did not exist or was unknown to them, which is absurd in the former case and very unlikely in the latter.

Archeologists have discovered in Egyptian tombs and elsewhere the remains of artists' colors, showing blue, showing red, black, green, white, and other tints. Shall we say that they saw blue, but saw it as some other color?

Student — Yes, that was the suggestion.

G. de P. — Yet, on what grounds is such an idea based, since we have the Greek word for blue, kuanos, and Homer even speaks of it. The mere fact that he may not have spoken of the blue heavens has no particular importance. He also speaks of the wine-dark sea. And I venture to say that no one man in fifty millions today would ever call the color of the sea, the color of wine. And yet indeed I have seen the sea, under certain shades of light, and in certain parts, having a color somewhat like that of the lees of wine.

I think that such an idea is merely a result of the old materialistic Darwinian theory of evolution leading man to the belief that the human race is only a few thousand years old, seven or eight or nine perhaps, possibly ten, and that it is only within the last six or seven millennia that human beings have grown to have the percipient faculties that we egoistic humans of our present day have. I think that the idea you quote is absurd. I can't see that it is founded on any fact at all.

Student — Thank you, Sir. I am very glad to hear you say it.

G. de P. — It is rather absurd, I think, to suppose that human faculty, which is so slow in development in human beings, can have evolved the sense of color within a few thousand years last passed.

Student — I think there is something in The Secret Doctrine about the development of the perception of colors by the human, the perception of them increasing by degrees. Is it not that the colors have probably gradually become sensible to the sight through hundreds of thousands and millions of years, one after the

other?

G. de P. — Oh, certainly that is true; but that is a very different question. The former question was about the ancient Greeks and Romans. Yes, it is most certainly true that if you go back far enough in time, say twenty million years, ten million years even, the human eye saw colors in somewhat different tints from those which we see today. Ten million years from now the senses of the human race will have become much more subtle than now they are, much more percipient, much quicker to receive sensory impressions, and therefore will see tints and colors that at present we don't see or see only partially. Yours is a different question entirely.

Student — I would like to say that experiments on insects have proved that certain insects, bees and others, can see nearly all the colors quite separately; and in Babylonia, the ziggurats, or those seven-story temples, were painted in the prismatic or seven colors, and the people then living would not have done that unless they could have seen them so.

But in regard to the wine-color statement of Homer, that I think, at least most of that, is nonsense; and yet some wines are green. They may have been thinking of that.

G. de P. — I think the probability is that he had in mind the wines of Greece, which are, generally speaking, white, or more accurately speaking, yellow; and also the various shades of red wine.

Student — I would like to ask what it is that controls the pranic principle in our constitution, and what it is that governs or controls it to the extent in which it is active. Is there any way in which we ourselves can ever control it or stimulate it or regulate it?

G. de P. — Decidedly so, but only on the planes of prana which are inferior to the will of the person so acting or controlling. Please remember that jiva, of which prana is a modification, is universal. It runs through all the seven principles of man and of the universe. There is a divine prana, a spiritual prana, an intellectual prana, and so forth.

You must be very careful indeed not to look upon the seven principles of man, as given in our exoteric books, as meaning that they exist in seven layers or stages, each separate from all the others. That is not at all so. If it were so, then atman per se would have no included buddhi nor manas; it would have no included kama, nor would it have jiva or prana. Yet it has them all. Every principle has every other principle inherent within it, integrally a part of it. The seven principles intermingle, interblend; and instead of being seven distinctly separate principles, they are all merely seven aspects of the cosmic life, seven phases of the cosmic life. So therefore I say that the human entity acting, can control perfectly, if his will be developed to that end, all phases of prana or vitality inferior to his own mental and will-plane. He has no particular and specific control over the prana existing on planes superior to his own mental and will-plane.

Student — In March of this year, one of the companions asked a question about human blood, and you concluded your answer with the words: "Some day, I will tell you about the human brain." Is the time now opportune?

G. de P. — Well, we have gone forwards a good bit along the pathway of understanding since last March, Companions; and as I then told you that blood, human blood or beast blood, is an actual deposit from the prana of the entity, I will go this far in answer to your question and say that the physical substance of the human brain is a deposit or is the lees of the human manasic quality expressing itself through the aura of the auric egg and depositing these lees as the human brain. Now, whether you will understand much out of that I don't know, but the answer is correct as far as it goes.

The human body in all its parts and in all its various tissues, even the bones, is in each individual part or instance a deposit, or is the lees of the corresponding principle or of a corresponding layer of the constitution.

Human thought — the average of human thoughts rather, and this means the lower thoughts generally speaking, our everyday quasi-animal emotional thought-stuff — is a deposit in its turn, or is the lees of the manasic akasa; and these thoughts exude or ooze forth from themselves the stuff which becomes the substance of the physical brain.

Please look upon the human entity, the human constitution, in all its parts as one. The lowest and grossest and coarsest part is the physical body. It is a garment, a deposit, a shell. It is a skin — a favorite word of Tibetan occultism, as for instance when the latter speaks of the skins of the earth. Just so, the human body, in this metaphorical or mystical sense, is the outermost skin of the entity; and this skin is the exudation or concreted ooze from the entity within. It is a shell, it is a bark, like the bark of a tree. It is mortal because it is a composite entity, highly composite, and in time it is cast off with as little injury to the real entity as is dead hair, or the nails. Do you understand ?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — The body is simply an aggregate of lifeatoms existing on the lowest plane of the human constitution. Of course, in themselves these lifeatoms are each one of them a learning, growing, evolving entity on a low plane at the present time. But each lifeatom of the hosts and multitudes which compose a human body, being a growing, evolving entity, in future aeons is destined to become a human being, and after that a god, and after that — ! You know what it will become as well as I do, from what I have already told you.

All nature is conscious in every smallest part, in every infinitesimal part of it. Every mathematical point of it is conscious in its own degree. And just because our body is composed of this aggregate of lifeatoms, do we at times feel it to be so familiar to us, and at other times so unfamiliar, so strange, even unfriendly at times.

Your body at times seems almost like a stranger to you, like an unwilling slave of your will. And yet the great majority of the lifeatoms of which it is composed flow forth from the core of us, where they are born. The core of us is the parent of every lifeatom essentially composing our body, because every such lifeatom is an entity per se, in itself a monad at its heart.

Student — Could not our seven principles come from the seven classes of lifeatoms? Do they constitute the seven principles?

G. de P. — There are indeed seven general classes of lifeatoms, but they come from the seven principles.

Student — They come from the seven principles?

G. de P. — Yes.

Student— I thought the seven principles came from them. The atoms certainly must exist before the principles.

G. de P. — I see what you mean. The answer depends upon the point of view. Every lifeatom is a seven-principled entity also. The lifeatoms, so far as the human being is concerned, flow forth from his seven principles; but each lifeatom again, being a seven-principled entity in its own essence, produces other lifeatoms. Which came first — the hen or the egg? Which came first, high or low? You see that both of them

"came" at the same time. There is a very excellent rule in our studies in occultism: keep your ideas free all the time, free and fluid, in order to avoid crystallizing ideas. Remember also that each of the human principles produces its own class of lifeatoms.

Student — May I ask a question? We have learned that the lunar pitris are the "I am I" part of us. In the next manvantara, if they make the grade, so to speak, they will become agnishwatta-pitris. Now what part of us is it that in the next manvantara will become the lunar pitris?

G. de P. — The part of us which is called the animal part.

Student — So it is really an entity in itself, the animal part?

G. de P. — It is. Or rather the animal part of us coheres around that particular center of our constitution which is the animal center. Every entity is sevenfold. At one phase of its evolution, the spiritual is to the fore.

At another phase of its evolution, the intellectual is to the fore. At another phase, the animal part is at the fore.

But every lifeatom, or every monad, passes through all the seven kingdoms of nature: the three elemental states or kingdoms, the mineral, the vegetable, the animal, the human, and beyond that there are three others which are dhyan-chohanic.

Our animal part will refine itself through evolution into becoming a human soul. That human soul as the ages flow by into the ocean of the past will refine itself, or evolve forth from itself, the spiritual part of us, the dhyan-chohan. This dhyan-chohan as the ages go by will become a full-blown god, and that in its turn, as other ages pass, will become a supergod and so on.

Every evolving entity from the beginning of the cosmic manvantara to its end is destined to pass through all the seven kingdoms of universal nature.

Student — Can most of the suns in our home-universe be looked at as transmigrating lifeatoms, in reality belonging to a higher universe as their real home?

G. de P. — Exactly so. That is absolutely correct in every detail. The gods themselves, as I have told you before, are but the lifeatoms of a universe beyond, above, superior to ours.

Student — I believe it was at our last meeting that one of the companions asked a question in regard to the Todas in India, and I understood you to say that they were the seeds of a future subrace. But are they at the present time a particularly philosophic or religious or mystic sect of people? Why is there this — well —

reverential feeling, if I can put it in that way, presented or brought forward by some of the other peoples surrounding them?

G. de P. — The Todas are a very peculiar people, very strange. The only other clans or families of Indian natives who look upon them with awe and reverence are, I believe, some three or four clans of people who surround them, and who serve them almost as slaves. The Todas are superior to these three or four other clans that I have just spoken of, but the Todas themselves as contrasted with the higher-class Hindus, or as contrasted with us Europeans or with the Chinese, are by no means especially superior. Nevertheless, the Todas are a part of the seeds of one of the future subraces of our race.

I will try to illustrate this by an exactly parallel case or example, which exists on a much larger scale. I refer to the Negroes. The Negroes come down from Atlantean times. They are at present an undeveloped people.

They are by no means the equal of the white man in several respects, not from lack of intrinsic capacity, not because the white man is essentially superior, or because the Chinese is essentially superior, but because the Negroes are in a waiting-time of their evolution. They are still sleeping. They live their barbarian or quasi-savage existence in Africa. They live in a somewhat superior civilized state in those lands whither the white man took them. But the Negroes who are destined to become, or rather to take a large part in, the civilization of a future subrace, will not begin to play the part on the stage of humanity and evolution until the proper time arrives. Then they will begin to change, and change marvelously. They will be refined in body. They will begin to produce men of outstanding genius; but they are not this and do not do this at the present time.

They are racial "infants" in a way. They are a fetal humanity. Do you understand me?

Many Voices — Yes, Professor.

G. de P. — But that time is not so very far off, speaking in geologic time periods. The Negroes are already beginning to stir slowly, and this is shown by the extraordinary miscegenation of the Negro, which is going on at the present time with other races — with the white race in particular, and the yellow race, and the other brown-skinned peoples of the earth, but with the white race especially.

I believe — I am not sure, but I believe — that within three or four or five hundred years, there will be practically no pure-blooded Negroes on earth. The black race by that time, I believe, will have more or less completely mixed its blood with other peoples and especially with the so-called white man. Miscegenation is taking place at an amazingly rapid rate of speed in both the continents of the New World.

Student — This year the great initiatory time, beginning at the winter solstice, occurs during the waxing moon. On the 21st, the moon is two days old, and at the end of the initiatory period, January the 4th, the

moon is full. Will this have any great effect on those great beings who go through their initiation at this time?

G. de P. — It certainly will. If the new moon falls at the time of the winter solstice, and is in conjunction, more or less exact, with Venus and Mercury, the occasion is one of those rare periods when the greatest initiations, I should say one of the four greatest Initiations known to man, take place. It is the buddha initiation.

It is a most solemn time; and I don't use the word solemn in a sad sense. It is a very sacred time.

Student — Professor, are the words monadic essence synonymous with the word monad?

G. de P. — Not quite. The monadic essence is the essence of the monad, and refers in a general way to that something still higher than the monad per se, which having the monad in view we may call the inner god of the monad.

Similarly we may speak of the soul of the human being or the essence of the soul of the human being. They are pretty much the same, and yet there is a clear distinction between them.

Student — May I ask another question? Is the monad the sun?

G. de P. — Just how do you mean?

Student — Well, I understand that the monad has many rays which it sends into the world, and into different worlds for reincarnation, and we are sons of the sun. Does that make the monad and the sun the same?

G. de P. — I understand you. Your question is a very good one. Indeed, it is a profound one. Cosmically speaking, that is so far as our solar system is concerned, our sun is the Pythagorean monad, monas as Pythagoras put it. So far as our own individual monads are concerned, they are our own individual spiritual suns. The monad of each entity is the spiritual sun of that entity. Is the answer responsive?

Student — Yes, Professor, but I have another question. Each monad has many rays. Could it be, for instance, that everyone in this room might be a ray of the same monad?

G. de P. — We are all rays of the cosmic monad, which is the sun. Therefore we are all sons of the sun; but each individual has or is, if you like, his own individual monad, which is the heart of the ray. The ray comes from the cosmic monad which is the sun, but that ray itself contains a heart, and that is the monad of you, and my ray's heart is the monad of me. Do you see?

Student — Yes, I see that much.

G. de P. — Do you understand then?

Student — Yes, that much. But then it seems as if monad is a term that is used for many gradations of — I cannot say anything else, but of monads.

G. de P. — Just so it is. The term monad is a generalizing term. There are divine monads and spiritual monads, intellectual monads and astral monads, even physical monads. Then following another line of degrees, there is the monad of our home-universe. There is the monad of a solar system which is its sun.

There is the monad of every planet. There is the monad of every atom. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — The term monad as a generalizing term is like the word atom or soul. There are animal and human souls, god souls, divine souls, and superdivine souls; and souls of suns, of planets, and of universes.

The soul of a universe or of a solar system is commonly called the anima mundi.

Student — Referring to the question that you were answering, that the brain is the lees of manas, I now ask: is the Eye of Siva, the lees of the buddhi principle?

G. de P. — If you refer to the pineal gland, then the answer may be said to be affirmative; but strictly speaking the Eye of Siva means rather an organ of the buddhi-manas.

Student — May I ask another question? On a previous occasion you referred to the rupa-lokas. Are the arupa-lokas the same as the other globes of the earth?

G. de P. — By the other globes of the Earth, do you mean the other six globes of our planetary chain superior to our own fourth globe?

Student— Yes.

G. de P. — Then the answer is, no. All the seven globes of the planetary chain belong to the rupa lokas or form-or manifestation-world. The arupa lokas you may perhaps attribute to the three globes higher than any of the seven.

Student — Are those called the bhur, bhuvas, svar?

G. de P. — Those which are called the bhur, bhuvas, svar, belong to the rupa or form world, the worlds of manifestation in form.

Student — You say that we are sons of the sun. Do you mean then that the sun is our parent-star? I have heard you also speak of the parent star.

G. de P. — You are asking a very difficult question. I will try to say something, however, that may answer your question at least properly if briefly.

We are called sons of the sun, because through and from the sun we come. The expression parent-star refers to a matter still more recondite, still more deep, and signifies the ultimate essential root of each human being.

In other words, each human being has his own parent-star; although all human beings must come from or pass through the parent of the solar system in which we at present are. Do you understand me?

Student — Thank you, I think I do; at least I have a little glimmer.

G. de P. — Well, just follow that little gleam of light and use your intuition. I am awfully sorry to have to answer sometimes in this way. But I am bound by rules that are exceedingly strict.

Student — That was a great help, what you have just said.

Student — I would like to ask whether music — and I mean by music that great reservoir of music which a composer taps in his inspiration — is the language of the cosmic gods in the sense of being their creative speech, their active being?

G. de P. — I would not so look upon it, dear Brother. The reservoir of music, to use your rather unusual phrase, is rather the cosmic harmony which is the resultant of the harmoniously vibrating aggregated lifeatoms — of the vehicles or encasements or bodies of a spiritual type in which the supergods live. The cosmic harmonies are the resultant of, or rather are, the symphonic hymn resulting from the incessant movement of the lifeatoms of the divine beings which fill the universe full.

Student — May I ask another question? Could this that you have just spoken of, the music of the atoms, apply to the music that the brook makes? I have heard lovely tones in the water of a brook.

G. de P. — Yes, in a general way I think so. The musical harmonies that a waterfall or a running brook give forth are simply translations through and on our plane of parts of the cosmic harmony which exists. In the same way, the glorious colors and graceful shapes of flowers are other manifestations of the symphonic harmonies with which the universe is filled full.

Student — Professor, we are all familiar with the picture that Katherine Tingley made so clear to us of man,

the consciousness, standing between the higher and the lower parts of his nature, and that this higher and this lower are actual entities. Now what is the relation between these entities and the seven principles? Are they the focusing or aggregation respectively of the higher and lower principles, or of only parts of them, or what?

And if they are actual entities — but I think that this question is enough!

G. de P. — If I understand your question, it runs to this and you will correct me if I misunderstand you: what relation does a human soul, as an intermediate entity, bear to its spiritual parent on the one hand, and to its own child, the lower part of the man, on the other hand? Is that what you mean?

Student — Not quite. What relation does this higher part and this lower part — these two entities —

supposed to be battling for the mastery of the soul, what relation do they bear to the seven principles?

G. de P. — They are foci, focuses, in the sevenfold constitution of man. Each such focus is caused by the swirl of activity around respectively the spiritual monad at one end, and the astral-vital monad at the other end. The human entity, a third focus, stands between, as intermediary between the two. Do you understand the answer?

Student — Yes, that is a wonderful explanation.

G. de P. — Please remember that the seven principles must not be looked upon as separate entities or factors, each one utterly different from the other six. All the seven principles of the human constitution intermingle, interblend, and are rather seven phases or manifestations or aspects of one fundamental pranic life-substance.

I have sometimes wondered if the manner in which the seven principles are set forth in our exoteric books has not caused more confusion in the minds of students than some other exemplification of the seven principles of man might have done. The Occidental mind is so prone to take a drawing, or a figure, or an outline, or series of planes of principles as usually set forth in our books, as signifying actually different things, or as being radically different states. They are not. You might say that good in a man and evil in a man are utterly different things, the one utterly different from the other. They are not. They are simply two phases or manifestations of his consciousness and of his willpower — of his emotional and psychical activity.

Now all the seven principles of man, and a fortiori, on a larger scale, all the seven principles of the universe, are simply seven different manifestations or aspects or phases of a fundamental life-substance — of an entity, in short. Every human being, as also the universe, has inherent in him or in it a divine manifestation or aspect, a spiritual one, an intellectual one, a passional one, a vital one, and an astral-physical one. Now you cannot separate these individually into watertight compartments because they all go inseparably together. They all interblend, intermingle, interpenetrate, interwork, and are interconnected. You cannot say that a man is just mind and feeling, and that the body he lives in is something entirely different, and that the inner god from which he springs is something absolutely different from him. He is essentially one stream of consciousness manifesting in seven different ways called principles.

Student — Was not the real reason that Madame Tingley so accentuated the teaching of man's duality, because man stands in his present state of development halfway between the spiritual and the mental, using his willpower to move in either direction?

G. de P. — I think so. I think you are quite right. The willpower itself is colorless. It is colored by the quality which the mind gives to it. The mind can direct the will upwards or can direct the will downwards, but the will itself is colorless.

Therefore the center of man's consciousness is not in the will, but in the mind. The will flows through him and from him and takes the direction that the mind, the directing intelligence, points out.

A man can rise along the pathway of the ray which is in him, and which indeed he essentially is. He can rise along that ray to join the gods, or he can descend along that ray deeper and deeper and deeper into matter. He can become god or demon, as he chooses. And the choice is in the mind. Regarding this point, my dear Companions, my Brothers, you have been told that the fifth round will be the most critical for the human race in its evolution around the globes of our present planetary chain, because during that fifth round there will be

the supreme struggle of the mind between spirit on the one hand, and the deeps of material existence on the other hand.

In the fifth round will come the final and deciding choice, whether the human race — or rather whether the entities, the individuals of the human race —shall follow along the pathway upwards to become dhyan-chohans and to join the gods, at the end of the evolution of the planetary chain, or whether individuals of the human race shall take the downward path.

Let us close the meeting, Companions, if you please.

[The sounding of the gong. Silence.]

Meeting 25

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Twenty-Five

Meeting of December 9, 1930

G. de P. — Companions, I am now ready to answer questions.

Student — You have told us about the monad at the death of the man taking into its bosom the reincarnating ego, and journeying through the inner and outer rounds. I want to ask specifically: is that monad the dhyan-chohan that was a reincarnating ego on the moon, and is it now our higher self?

G. de P. — Your question is a very intricate one, although you have expressed it clearly enough. First, it can hardly be said, if you wish to speak accurately, that the monad, or rather that the sleeping human monad in its bosom, goes through both the inner and outer rounds, the reason being that the inner rounds as a phrase is a term which applies only to the rounds of the life-waves passing from the globe A to globe G of a planetary chain; and the term outer rounds as a phrase applies only to the monads which pass from planetary chain to planetary chain.

It is also quite true that the monad after the death of the human entity does go through rounds which in most respects are identical with the inner and outer rounds respectively. Nevertheless, the adventures of the monad after the death of the human entity are not called the inner and outer rounds — these being terms restricted to the two kinds of adventure that I have spoken of. Now, will you kindly repeat the latter part of your question again?

Student — I want to know who that monad is. Is it the dhyan-chohan who is our higher self now, and who was the reincarnating ego on the moon-chain?

G. de P. — Which monad do you mean? The spiritual monad in the bosom of which the human monad sleeps?

Student — Yes, the monad in whose bosom we sleep in our devachanic period.

G. de P. — I would not speak of that spiritual monad as a dhyan-chohan for this reason: the term dhyan-chohan means an entity expressing the powers of its monad, just as a human being is an entity expressing the powers of the human monad. A monad in every case is the essential center or fountain of the energies and of the individuality of an entity expressed. This entity expressed is a soul, whether this soul be a spiritual soul or a human soul or a beast soul. Do you understand?

Student — Yes —

G. de P. — Well, but I see that your mind is still not clear. Continue with your question. You will forgive me for checking you on these points, but I desire that you have your mind clear on your own question. That cannot come until the facts which you state and the way of stating those facts are also clear.

Student — I am trying to visualize my higher self, which I understand is that monad.

G. de P. — That is right — the spiritual monad.

Student — Yes, but I have a monad too, and the animal soul in me has its monad, and the dhyan-chohan has its monad, has it not?

G. de P. — It has.

Student — Well, which is the — it is so hard to state it — which is the monad which you describe to us as carrying the reincarnating ego in its bosom?

G. de P. — It is the spiritual monad which carries the human monad in its bosom. Let me try to help you a little. I think I see your difficulty. The expression of the individuality and of the powers of the spiritual monad is the dhyan-chohan on its own plane; but the monad is not its child the dhyan-chohan, which, as just said, is only an expression of the energies of the monad which after the death of the human being carries the human monad in its bosom. The soul of the dhyan-chohan is the spiritual monad; the soul of the human being is the human monad.

Student — May I ask a question? In the book, Man: Fragments of Forgotten History, we read that the reason of the elemental kingdom being so inimical to man is that at one time man neglected his duties towards the elementals, that duty being to evolve men from these elementals. Would you kindly throw more light on that subject?

G. de P. — Dear me! I read the book you speak of some thirty-five or forty years ago when I was a boy. That book is not a standard theosophical book. It was a clever attempt by two students, at one time, to put into simple language certain doctrines which then were very new in the Theosophical Society. Their attempt was successful in degree; also very unsuccessful in other respects. I really don't know what the meaning is of the citation, if it is one, which you have made from this book. I don't see the accuracy of the citation that you make.

Student — Well, it seemed very strange to me that these elementals could be created into men without going through all the kingdoms.

G. de P. — Quite true. It is utterly impossible for any entities in nature to make such evolutionary leaps ahead, because elementals cannot be "created into men" — they slowly evolve into men. It is the only way by which elementals can become men. Similarly, evolution is the only pathway by which human beings can become gods.

Student — What might have been meant, then, by "man's duty to them which man neglected"?

G. de P. — Man has a duty towards all things beneath him, just as the gods have duties towards all things beneath them. We owe a duty to the elementals who are our children; but I don't know that any man, any human being, has self-consciously neglected his duty, willfully neglected his duty, to the three kingdoms of the elemental world. I simply don't understand what you allude to, unless it be indeed, that the passage in the book you quote refers to the failure of man to do better than he did; and if this is all the citation means, the authors of the book should have stated it in language equally simple and should not have used language which implies that men formerly deliberately neglected a duty towards the elementals, which duty they were self-conscious of not doing.

I think that Man: Fragments of Forgotten History contains a great many examples of forgetfulness in writing about the past history of the human race and of the planetary chain man lives on. Apparently the writers forgot much of the "Forgotten History." It may be that the statement in the book is perfectly correct; but as you cite it from memory, dear boy, I don't understand it. Would you like to try again?

Student — I don't think so, Professor, because what I said expresses the idea as clearly as I took it from the book.

G. de P. — Very well. If you like, you can consult the book again, and at some future gathering you can ask the question a second time.

Student — Is there a definite point of time in a man's evolution when he chooses to become a pratyeka buddha or a buddha of compassion; or is it a daily and hourly choice up to the time of the final great choice when he is nearing perfection and buddhahood?

G. de P. — It is both. For this reason: the final choice between following the pathway leading to the bright realms of spirit, or the pathway leading into ever-deepening glooms of material existence, is a pathway which obviously begins at its beginning. In other words, the chela or disciple is preparing for his final choice from the very beginning of his first aspirations in chelaship. This answers the second part of your question.

But there comes a definite period, a definite time, when he must actually make the final decision as to which of the two paths he intends to pursue — the path leading to the right-hand or upwards, or the path leading to the left-hand or downwards. The same choice must be made collectively by the egos of the life-waves in our own planetary chain, and this final choice for the egos is taken at about the middle period of the fifth round.

I think I told you at our last meeting that it is during the fifth round that will come the final and supreme choice of the egos as to whether they intend to follow the evolutionary pathway upwards, or sink, by failing to make that choice, into the realms below — by taking the downward path. It is obvious that their making of that choice is largely governed by all their previous existences, by what they have builded their character to be — what amount of spirit, of vision, of discrimination, what amount of judgment, they have builded into themselves in past existences. If they have builded a strong character during past lives, then when the moment of the definite final choice comes, the presumption is that it will be a choice to go onwards.

Student — Why is it that Jesus the avatara seems to have left almost no certain traces in history. It would seem that an avatara, such a great spiritual light, should act very strongly on his contemporaries, so that history ought to speak more definitely about him. The avatara Sankaracharya seems to have been much better known in history. Was it because Jesus worked more esoterically and kept himself secret? Was it for this reason that he did not enter into the outer history of the world?

G. de P. — Your question is a very profound one. I think it can be explained in the way you suggest, at least in part, and what you have said is of course generally true. Other scholars also have found it an amazing fact that one like Jesus, a man of such outstanding spiritual powers, should have left so small a mark on contemporary history. Practically nothing is known about him. In fact, we might say that nothing is known about him outside of the Christian scriptures. I think the explanation is this: Jesus came at a time when the cycle of European history was tending downwards. It was a downward-moving cycle. Civilization was decaying at the time — that is, the civilization of the nations around the Inland Sea — and consequently Jesus had a great deal to contend with in psychological and physical conditions as they then existed.

Sankaracharya, contrariwise, came at a time, not indeed in a brilliant period of human thought, but at a time when there was a gently rising grade of evolutionary progress soon nevertheless to tend downwards.

Therefore he had more chance. His name became better known in the great Indian Peninsula than did the name of Jesus in the countries surrounding the Mediterranean Sea. I speak of course in each case of contemporary history.

If you remember your Bhagavad-Gita, you will find there a statement, which I repeat in substance, where Krishna is alleged to say: "When wickedness waxes great in the world, and virtue is in decline; when men's hearts have grown cold, and their minds have become obtuse to spiritual things; when virtue is scorned and wickedness is prized; then do I send a portion of myself into the world, for the destruction of evildoing, for the regeneration of right, and for the protection of the good." The meaning of this is that the avataras come at cyclic periods, and almost always at the beginning of a cycle whose impetus is to move downwards, instead of moving upwards. I don't know that any better explanation of the problem in your question would occur to me.

There are avataras of different kinds. There are very great avataras, and avataras of less brilliance. There are some who do one kind of work; and others who do another kind. As far as Jesus is concerned, let me also remind you that the Jesus of the New Testament is an ideal figure — a figure built up of ideas. The Jesus of the New Testament is not a photographic portrait of the real avatara, Jesus; but is a type-figure, an imagined figure, containing doubtless some real elements or features, of the real avatara, Jesus; but just the same an ideal figure, first constructed and then around which was built up a legendary story, setting forth in mystical symbolism actual facts that then occurred in the initiation chamber.

Student — I have heard you allude to the divine monad, the spiritual monad, the manasic, and the astral monad. I have been wondering whether I am correct in thinking that the lunar pitris are the astral monads, generally speaking, and the manasaputras are the manasic monads, and the agnishwattas are the spiritual monads, and the kumaras are, I think, our theosophical agnishwattas. I cannot tell, really, the differences among these.

G. de P. — That is correct. The names used by you are simply terms that describe different classes of monads.

Student — Then what classes of divinities would correspond to the divine monads? Is a divine monad a cosmic force? Would it be like Brahma that radiates its ray which makes that divine monad in its triple aspects; or would it be what is spoken of as the agnishwattas, or something like that, a correspondence to that?

G. de P. — Yes, correspondentially that is correct. Generally speaking, the divine monads are what we call the gods. There is a divine monad at the heart of every entity, of every human being, which clothes itself in or manifests itself through its child, a spiritual monad. This in turn clothes itself in or manifests itself through its child, the human monad, which in turn clothes itself in or manifests itself through its child, the astral-vital monad which is the beast monad, which clothes itself in or manifests itself through its family of children, the lifeatoms of the astral-vital physical vehicle. There is the whole scheme in brief.

You speak of the lunar pitris, and you have stated that they are the astral monads. The statement is true as far as it goes, but don't forget that every class of entities that came over from the moon is also a class of lunar pitris. The dhyan-chohans which came from the moon are lunar pitris, because they are lunar fathers. The astral-vital pitris are also lunar fathers or lunar pitris because they came from the moon. Lunar pitris does not mean only one class. Any entity that came from the moon was a lunar pitri, no matter how high or how low it may have been.

Think! When the entities composing the life-waves of earth, or rather of our earth's planetary chain, leave this chain at the end of the seventh round or manvantara, and wing their way like birds into their nirvanic rest, they will all be earth-pitris for the succeeding planetary chain, no matter how high or how low they may be.

They are all earth-pitris or earth-fathers, earth-progenitors, because they will have come from the planetary chain of the earth.

A distinction, I think, which has confused many theosophical students is that which HPB draws between the solar pitris and the lunar pitris. She meant by these the two classes of entities who came respectively, the one from the sun, and the other from the moon.

Student — Are there any esoteric reasons why a surgeon should abstain from operating during the waning period of the moon?

G. de P. — You ask a question which I answer with great reluctance, Doctor, because the results might mean a question of life or death; but nevertheless, following the rule, I must give an answer of some kind. There is a very strong reason why it is better if possible to defer any operation until the moon is waxing. Don't operate after the moon has passed the full if you can avoid it. If, however, it is a matter of immediate urgency, then operate.

Student — It becomes a matter of karma then, I presume? That was my own opinion in the matter. And another question: is there any reason to study the relation of the quarters of the moon to the various parts of the body? I know that some of the astrologers are very keen on this. They won't allow themselves to be touched in certain parts when the moon is in a certain sign which controls that part of the body which is about to be operated on.

G. de P. — The astrologers are perfectly right in theory, but here again we face what may at times be a very difficult situation. My suggestion would be that if you know enough of the true ancient astrology, to know that the particular portion of the body you may have to operate upon is at the time under the influence of a sign which prognosticates either death or a long and lingering recovery — if you know enough, I say, then defer the operation if it is possible to do so. But as there are practically no astrologers having cognition of the spiritual side of their science today, my suggestion is to do your best, following your experience and training, and not to trouble your mind about these things.

I may add here that the great Alexandrian Ptolemy, whose works on astrology have been the basis of all

medieval and modern astrological works, gave it as his very definite opinion that no part of the body should be operated upon if that part of the body is governed by a sign in which the moon then stands. This is, I believe, exactly what you yourself allude to, and the theory is based on actual fact.

Theoretically the astrologers are perfectly right, and, in a general way even the consensus of the teachings of modern astrology on this subject is correct. Every part of the body, every organ in particular, is under the immediate and continuous influence of one of the twelve signs of the zodiac. Should the moon be in that particular sign governing a diseased organ or part of the body, and furthermore, should the moon then be waning, the chances for recovery are poor.

Student — But you would not recommend that one should abstain if there were any urgency at all?

G. de P. — You are quite right. I repeat: if you are an adept astrologer, if you know the true spiritual astrology from beginning to end, and furthermore know your science perfectly, then I should say, defer the operation if you can do so. But if your opinion is merely guesswork on your part, or if you have to go by most of the modern books on astrology, then my answer is: be careful about endangering your patient's life.

Operate when your medical experience and your medical training tell you that it is the best time to do so.

I don't like to answer these medical questions, Companions, as a rule, for the reasons that I have tried to set forth. There is the esoteric teaching; the astrology, even of modern times, is right in theory, but where will you find the astrologer who is at one and the same time an adept in these things, and at the same time a spiritual clairvoyant? They are as rare as blue moons — or almost as rare at least. You understand me, do you not, Doctor?

Student — Yes, I think so. And the greatest danger would be, I presume, between the full moon and the new moon?

G. de P. — Between the full moon and the next new moon — a general rule like that you can follow. It is on the whole a wise rule to follow. Defer any operation, if you can do so, while the moon is waning —

decreasing from full to new. That is a good general rule. But, on the other hand, don't defer any operation if you know that there is imminent risk of your patient becoming worse, or if there is risk of death. Then I should say — operate.

Student — I should very much like to know the true relation between the average humanity and the higher self. It seems to avail men so little that they have a higher self. And, in a sense, to tell them to have faith in the higher self is like asking them to have blind faith. This higher self, living a life of its own, on higher spheres, seems, with the exception of students who have penetrated into the deeper truths, to have very little bearing on the daily life. I should really like to know more about the relation of the higher selves to their respective children, their reincarnating egos.

G. de P. — My dear boy, the higher self is all the best part of you. Do you mean to say you don't know what love is, and compassion, and beauty, and forgiveness, and kindliness, and brotherliness, and peace, and mercy, and charity and purity — all those great and lovely things which adorn human existence? Why, you know as well as anyone does. The higher self, the spiritual self, is working through the human self all the time, at least is trying to do so. So wonderful is its power that despite our crystallized brain-minds and all our selfishnesses and egoisms it succeeds more or less. Every human being is an outstanding example of this. All civilization is built upon the powers of the higher self: upon law, order, upon thought for others, upon honor, trust, and mutual confidence, upon honesty and upon cleanliness of thought and action. The higher self is expressing itself, even though it be feebly, all the time. Just think over these things.

Student — My question arose from considering the statement of the existence of so many so-called soulless beings. That was what gave rise to the question — how there could be so many.

G. de P. — Your question is a good one. The idea of the soulless beings is this — and you must not confuse soulless beings with lost souls. Soulless beings are they who self-consciously are not allied with their spiritual nature. We call them soulless beings, not meaning that they have no soul, but meaning that they are not self-consciously allied with their spiritual essence. Soulless beings in this sense are so numerous that, as HPB

says: "We shoulder them at every turn." They are not self-consciously cognizant of the wonderful spiritual powers within them.

Human beings who are "ensouled" are those great men and women who are spiritual leaders of their fellows, who are the kindly ones, the thoughtful ones of humanity. They are leaders who are unselfish and who show unselfishness in their daily lives, because they have the inner feeling, the inner sense, of union with all that is.

When they look to the stars they have that wonderful mystical feeling of cosmic unity, and when they look into the bosom of a flower they can sense the same life stirring there as in themselves. Such beings are truly ensouled. But the average human being who obeys the laws of the land in a merely mechanical sort of way, who recognizes academically that right is right and wrong is wrong, but does not care much about these things, and who is more drawn by temptation than by the willing urge to be spiritually alive — such human beings as these are very numerous in the world. They are called soulless because the soul in them is not self-consciously manifesting itself. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, it is of course to those that I refer.

G. de P. — They are very numerous indeed. But nevertheless even these humans manifest automatically, despite themselves, somewhat of the influence of the higher self, but they do not do it self-consciously.

The one, the so-called soulless human, is like a man in a daydream, in a sort of trance. He walks the streets, goes to his office, comes home, eats his meals and goes to bed. He has his family and his children, follows his ordinary daily avocations, has little or no inspiration of a spiritual kind, and thus is more or less an automatic psychovital entity. But the other, the ensouled human, is a man whose every fiber thrills consciously with the great soul and the great love in him; and when he meets a fellowman and puts his hand upon his shoulder, instinctively he feels that he is touching an imbodied god.

Such men as these latter are indeed ensouled. They are living consciously in the higher part of themselves.

The others, the former, are vaguely and automatically influenced by the higher part, nevertheless they are what Pythagoras called the living dead. Physically alive, yes; psychovitally living, yes; but spiritually sleeping, spiritually unawake.

It is the simplest thing in the world to feel and to know the influences of the spiritual nature if a man will only closely examine himself. Examine yourself, as I examine myself. I am not fully awake to the loftiest and noblest that is in me, nor are you, because if any of us were so fully awake we should be like gods on earth.

Nevertheless you and I, or anyone else, have moments, have times more or less long, when, like a rending of the enclouding veil, we see the glory, and then we wonder how we could have been so blind, so asleep. At such splendid times, and for the moment, we are ensouled, the soul is there working self-consciously through us like a fire of inspiration; but at other times we are, according to our degree of being awake, more or less like human automata living the day-to-day life uninspired, relatively unensouled. This, then, is what is meant by the two phrases soulless people and ensouled people.

Student — May I ask a question? Four weeks ago you told us that on globe C was a very high class of beings, dhyan-chohans. Are these the dhyan-chohans who were human beings on the moon?

G. de P. — All classes of entities which form the different life-waves now evolving on our earth's planetary chain, of necessity came originally from the moon.

Student — So I thought. But one student spoke of these as our higher selves; he spoke of the dhyan-chohans from the moon as our higher selves; but I thought our higher selves were the agnishwattas, the solar pitris.

G. de P. — Just so they are. The agnishwattas or solar pitris should however be called our higher egos rather than our higher selves.

Student — They have incarnated and given us the manas principle, awakening in us the manas — I mean the agnishwattas. Is that correct?

G. de P. — They "overshadowed" the incarnating astral-vital monad, and thus gave us our self-

consciousness. That is correct. The kumaras or agnishwattas, however, did not enter the physical body when this happened during the third root-race of this round on this earth. In an exactly similar way the reincarnating ego does not actually enter the physical body at birth or even before birth, but inspires the astral-vital monad which enters the human seed, and as the infant grows expresses in ever greater degree its own spiritual and intellectual powers. In other words, the reincarnating ego does not manifest without the intermediary principles of the human constitution which enable that reincarnating ego to manifest in the body.

Student — Yes. I understand that. But I was puzzled by what this student said in speaking of these dhyan-chohans from the moon as being our higher selves. I would like to ask what relation they had to us?

G. de P. — The dhyan-chohans from the moon? Now I think I get the drift of your question. If you refer to the lunar pitris of the lower classes, I answer that they are the builders of the human parts of us. They are we; whereas the agnishwattas, the Sons of the Sun, gave us our self-consciousness, because self-consciousness essentially is a solar power. The moon builded the bodies and furnished originally the classes of incarnating entities; but the sun gave the life and also the intellectual souls. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, thank you. May I ask one more question? Is there another globe of our chain inhabited by beings corresponding to our buddhi principle?

G. de P. — Let me think a moment over your question. You ask, is there another globe of our planetary chain inhabited by beings corresponding to our buddhi principle?

Student — Yes. You told us once, long ago, that there are globes of our chain higher than our earth, on which even the animals are more spiritual than we are. Since that time, you have told us that globe C is inhabited by dhyan-chohans; and I am now thinking about this C globe, which is very secret, and I am wondering if these dhyan-chohans can be beings who correspond to our buddhic principle. Is that clear?

G. de P. — I fear that there is a confusion in your mind. In the first place, I don't think that I ever said that globe C was inhabited by dhyan-chohans, but I may have made some remark to the effect that globe C is a field of life of certain dhyan-chohans. That of course is true. But I did not mean to imply, to convey the impression that globe C was inhabited solely by dhyan-chohans, which would not have been a true statement.

Now turning more directly to your question, the higher globes on the ascending arc of our planetary chain are the fields wherein the higher parts of our consciousness will manifest more than they do on earth, and that is the only proper way in which I can answer your question. For instance, globe F and globe G on the ascending arc are globes on which, when we shall have come there, we shall live in and manifest the higher parts of our individual septenary constitution; as on this material globe D, the fourth globe of the chain, we manifest the more material parts of our constitution.

Student — I understood that the agnishwattas provide the spiritual and intellectual parts of man. How does the intellectual part of the agnishwatta differ from that of the manasaputras?

G. de P. — The agnishwattas can hardly be said to provide the spiritual part of man, but do provide the intellectual part — using intellectual in the higher meaning of that word. The manasaputras and the agnishwattas and the kumaras are virtually all the same. The manasaputras are Sons of the Sun. These are likewise the agnishwattas; and the kumaras or "virgins" is but another name given to the same classes of entities. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, Professor. But because these names are used so frequently in The Secret Doctrine, one thinks that they are different classes entirely.

G. de P. — Yes. I am not at all astonished that students of The Secret Doctrine are puzzled sometimes, because HPB could not give out the complete teachings in a public work, in a work which anybody could read. Furthermore, the intricacies of the teachings are so great that it is small wonder that the student is sometimes nonplussed as to just what the meaning is. But continue studying The Secret Doctrine, and some day a greater light will come, and then everything will be clearly outlined in your mind. All the scattered pieces of the teaching will fall each in its proper and appropriate place, and will make a beautiful pattern.

Student — Is it time to ask about the fourteen lokas, or not yet time?

G. de P. — It is time, but the lokas are a very intricate subject indeed. It would take us hours to explain it and to understand it. Have you some question about the lokas that you would like to ask which I could answer in a very general way?

Student — A short question, yes. Are the lokas which begin from satya downwards to bhur the same as globes A to G?

G. de P. — No, you could not make them correspond in that way. There is indeed a certain relative correspondence. The truth is that every globe of the planetary chain has its own series of lokas and talas. For instance, globe A has all the lokas from satya downwards to bhur — but so has globe B and globe C and all the other globes of the chain. But as satya-loka is a spiritual loka and as globes A and G are relatively spiritual globes of the chain, it is obvious that on globes A and G the satya-loka of each is more spiritually manifest than on the more material globes such as globe C or D or E.

Consequently, and following the same line of reasoning, bhur-loka is the lowest of the lokas and in a general way does correspond to the most inferior globe of the planetary chain, which is our globe D. Also, because bhur is the lowest of the lokas, Globe D of the chain is the lowest of the globes, therefore bhur-loka is most strongly manifest on globe D, our earth. But as I have just said — and here is the answer to your question, and it will show how intricate is the general subject that you have touched upon — every globe has its own seven lokas.

Let me put the matter in the following way. The respective inhabitants of every globe of the planetary chain can be in seven different states of consciousness ranging from the spiritual to the material. Each one of these seven different states of consciousness is, or rather expresses itself through, an appropriate part of the human constitution, which is the appropriate vehicle of its respective state of consciousness. This appropriate vehicle lives or exists in an appropriate cosmic sphere or plane or loka.

The human beings of our material globe earth, for instance, can be in satya-loka although living here on earth; they can be either in the bhur-loka or in the satya-loka, or in any intermediate loka between satya and bhur.

Similarly, an entity living on any one of the globes of our planetary chain can place his consciousness in any one of the seven lokas appertaining to that particular globe — in other words can enter into any one of seven states of consciousness. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, thank you. Then patala and atala and the intermediate talas are another series of states?

G. de P. — The talas and the lokas are like the two sides of a coin. They are like the two ends of a stick. The lokas

generally are used in connection with the ascending arc, and the talas generally with the descending arc. Or, put it in this way: the lokas, as a rule, refer to the seven planes of the higher or more spiritual world, but ranging from the spiritual to the material. The talas generally refer to the seven planes or worlds of the negative or material side of existence, from the spiritual-material to the material-material. You see that it is a very intricate subject indeed.

Student — May I ask a question? In the case of a nurse, or a mother with young children, or a guard, who has to sleep in what we call cat-naps, or who is constantly "aware," is sleep analogous to death? Is my question clear?

G. de P. — Is the sleep of such a nurse analogous to what happens to a human entity after physical death —

is that what you mean?

Student — Yes; or what happens to an entity in a quiet, dreamless sleep, uninterrupted.

G. de P. — No, I could not say that it is, Doctor. Death is much more like the dreamless sleep, followed by

dreams, and then finally followed by dreamless sleep again of the man in his bed after a hard day's work. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes. Then the one who has not that sleep really remains in the neighborhood of his place of rest, and is not able to take any departure?

G. de P. — Are you referring to the nurse or are you referring to the excarnate human being?

Student — I am speaking of those people who are not able to sleep the sleep analogous to death. In their sleep are they held at the place where they are physically?

G. de P. — I see what you mean. Yes, in a sense they are — if indeed any spiritual entity can be said to be held in a physical locality. And that is why such cat-nap sleeping is not as restful and reposeful as is quiet dreamless sleep. Such cat-nap sleep is constantly disturbed, and is therefore constantly caused to cease, and then is resumed, only to be broken again.

There is a certain analogy between the self-sacrifice of a truly devoted nurse and that of the chela. There are certain chelas striving to attain mahatmaship who renounce devachan, just as the nurse renounces quiet sleep.

Naturally, these chelas suffer certain reactions on their constitution. The higher the chela is, the more complete is the renunciation, and the more he stays "awake." But chelas less high have moments when, despite their utmost efforts, they slip at times into a temporary devachanic state and have to pull themselves back, much like the nurse whom you speak of awakes when he or she feels that duty calls.

Student — Then on a higher plane she gains, although she loses physically. Is that it?

G. de P. — Certainly, if the renunciation of needed rest is done with a will for a good purpose, then the karmic result is fine. There is a comparatively rich reward flowing from the spiritual quality of self-forgetfulness in such action. Just as when the chela renounces his much needed devachanic repose in order almost immediately to come back into the world and take up the duties of self-forgetful service for humanity anew, the ultimate reward is very great.

I remember one case — and this may interest you — which I happen to have known myself. It was a man who for three incarnations had renounced his devachanic rest. That man was doing a grand work, and yet he was so tired, those parts of his constitution which nature was beginning to demand sleep for were so tired, that although he managed to do his work there were times when he actually seemed to be scarcely conscious.

He would then do erratic things, unaccountable to the average person who did not know his secret; and yet that man was living a life of supreme self-renunciation. Those moments when he was thus strange, I mean when he was in those strange moods, were simply moments when his willpower temporarily failed, and he slipped into the devachanic rest before he could catch himself again — just as a very, very tired man may catch himself falling asleep, and then awaken with his will alert. Falling asleep at the switch, I believe the expression is — and it is a very dangerous thing to do.

Of course the higher chelas, and the Masters with their tremendously developed willpower all running in one direction, can do things that the younger chelas — chelas younger in experience — cannot do. But the principle is the same in all. There come times when even the mahatmas have to rest, not that they desire it, but nature compels it. Of course, and this is another side of the picture, there comes a time, a stage, in human evolution, along the path of chelaship and mastership, when a man can completely forego these things. He can place his consciousness so far above the ordinary demands of nature that he can go for life after life, at least for a number of lives, incarnating immediately if he will, and when he will, without suffering any unusual or untoward effects in his constitution. Such is a nirmanikaya.

Student — This is a sentence from the Master KH in The Mahatma Letters to A. P. Sinnett that is very remarkable, and I should like a little light on it. I think others have thought so too. He says on pages 230-1:

"A chela under probation is allowed to think and do whatever he likes. He is warned and told beforehand: you will be tempted and deceived by appearances; two paths will be open before you, both leading to the goal you are trying to attain; one easy, and that will lead you more rapidly to

the fulfillment of orders you may receive; the other — more arduous, more long; a path full of stones and thorns that will make you stumble more than once on your way; and, at the end of which you may, perhaps, find failure after all and be unable to carry out the orders given for some particular small work, — but, whereas the latter will cause the hardships you have undergone on it to be all carried to the side of your credit in the long run, the former, the easy path, can offer you but a momentary gratification, an easy fulfillment of the task."

Yet it says that the easy path will lead you more rapidly to the fulfillment of orders you may receive. It seems to be something like what you have been telling us just now, but it is a little complicated.

G. de P. — It is a case on the small scale which likewise finds place in the big scale in the case of the buddhas of compassion and the pratyeka buddhas. The pratyeka buddhas concentrate on the one thing — self-advancement for spiritual ends. It is a noble path in a way, but although it is a more rapid path, nevertheless being essentially a selfish path, the karmic records will show deeper lines ultimately to be wiped out than will the other striver after the spiritual life who follows the path of complete self-renunciation, and who even gives up all hope of self-advancement. Do you see the idea? The latter is of course by far the nobler path, but it is very much slower, much more difficult to follow. The objective, the end, are more difficult to obtain; but when obtained, then the guerdon, the reward, the recompense, are ineffably sublime. It is a slower path, but a perfect path.

The one who is determined to become a pratyeka buddha reaches a state of development where he more quickly is able to follow out orders received, should such orders ever be received, which is doubtful; but he reaches his term after a while, and can go no higher on that path. He becomes a useless tool in nature's, the master craftsman's hand. Whereas the other one who gives up everything has much more to combat, much more to fight against, and will not be so perfect a tool in the beginning in the Master's hands, but in time will be forged to become an infallibly accurate tool for the master craftsman. Do you understand that?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — I may add that the allusion in the quotation from The Mahatma Letters about being tempted and so forth, must not be construed to mean that the teachers are devils, deliberately laying traps for the feet of the chelas in order to test them. Abhor that thought. It is false. The statement merely means that anyone who follows the pathway of the buddhas of compassion, of necessity having challenged all the forces of his lower nature — which does not mean merely the physical body, because it more strictly means the lower mind, the passions, the emotions, the desires — obviously will be tempted at every step, in other words find temptations to abandon his objective and to return into the easy path.

Student — May I ask a question about the pratyeka buddhas? Is it then a certain eagerness or impetuosity of desire to be able to serve in a special way that makes them choose that path?

G. de P. — Yes, probably so in certain cases. But it is a wonderful paradox that is presented in the case of the pratyeka buddhas. You know that this name pratyeka means "each for himself." Now this spirit of each for himself is just the opposite of the spirit governing the order of the buddhas of compassion, because in the order of compassion the spirit is: give up thy life for all that lives.

The pratyeka buddha knows that he cannot advance to spiritual glory unless he lives the spiritual life, unless he cultivates his spiritual nature, but as he does this solely in order to win spiritual rewards, spiritual life, for himself alone, he is a pratyeka buddha. He is for himself, in the last analysis. There is a personal eagerness, a personal wish, to forge ahead, to attain at any cost; whereas he who belongs to our own holy order, the order of the buddhas of compassion, has his eyes set on the same distant objective, but he trains himself from the very beginning to become utterly self-forgetful. This obviously is an enormously greater labor, and of course the rewards are correspondingly great. The time comes when the pratyeka buddha, holy as he is, noble in effort and in ideal as he is, can go no farther. But, contrariwise, the one who allies himself from the very beginning with all nature, and with nature's heart, has a constantly expanding field of work, as his consciousness expands and fills that field; and this expanding field is simply illimitable, because it is boundless nature herself. He becomes utterly at one with the spiritual universe; whereas the pratyeka buddha

becomes at one with only a particular line or stream of evolution in the universe. Do you get the thought?

Many Voices — Yes.

Student — May I ask another question about it? It has been very puzzling to me, this subject of the pratyeka buddhas. I don't see what spirituality consists of, if it does not mean forgetfulness of self, and even what you say now seems to indicate that there is a technique of spirituality which the pratyeka buddhas master.

G. de P. — There is such a technique and your statement is quite true. Please don't forget what I now tell you

— and I think that this will explain your very natural confusion of thought. You have heard the expression, beings of spiritual wickedness. Now, there are such beings. The greatest of the Brothers of the Shadow are spiritual entities, beings possessing spiritual faculties, which means cosmic spiritual faculties, relatively universal faculties, but they are used for the individual self. Instead of doing as the Brothers of the order of compassion do, consecrating the individual self to the universal self, these others, the Brothers of the Shadow at one end, and the pratyeka buddhas at the other end of the class, try to subordinate the powers and fields of the universe to their own individual purposes. Self with them is always predominant.

Contrariwise, in the order of compassion, self is the very thing — selfhood, self-seeking is the very thing —

that one strives to forget, to overcome, to live beyond. The self personal must blend into the self individual, which then must lose itself in the self universal.

There is certainly a technique in the case of the pratyeka buddhas. There is a method of striving to become a pratyeka buddha, just as there is a technique in becoming one of the order of the buddhas of compassion. The latter are called buddhas of compassion because they feel their unity with all that is, and more and more so as they evolve, until finally their consciousness blends with the universe and lives eternally and immortally, because it is at one with the universe. As the beautiful Buddhist saying has it: "The dewdrop slips into the shining sea."

Student — It seems then that there is a technique of spiritual development that one can follow with the idea of self in view, that still does not involve becoming a Brother of the Shadow?

G. de P. — Quite true. And I will try to explain that thought. When the human soul yearns to become nobler than it is, yearns to become its spiritual self and finally becomes it, then if the same quality of aspiration remains it yearns again, and now yearns to become its divine self, and it may succeed. Now all that is grand.

It is holy. But if this yearning is to attain for the individual self alone, the resultant is a pratyeka buddha.

Training in chelaship in our order runs just to the contrary. Do not aspire to become your spiritual self for your own benefit, but do aspire to become your spiritual self solely that you may be a worker for others, that you may help others. You see therefore that it is really a fundamental difference in quality of aspiration.

The pratyeka buddha desires to retain constantly the self of himself — somewhat like the immortal soul idea, and all nature's structure and currents of evolution are finally against it. Therefore do I say that the time will come when the pratyeka buddha can go no farther. He has reached nature's end so far as he is concerned, and in that condition he sleeps in crystallized relative perfection for ages, and aeons and aeons, before he awakens and his chance comes again to evolve.

Whereas those who have followed the other path, the pathway of self-forgetfulness, of losing the personal and individual self in the universal self, expand ever more and more greatly, because their expansion of consciousness becomes cosmic. The dewdrop has become one with the shining sea, its origin.

Student — Do the pratyeka buddhas belong to the White Lodge, or have they their own organization; or have they no organizations, and go their own solitary way?

G. de P. — In the beginning, and for a fairly long time afterwards, they may be said to be organized, and I will explain this statement in a moment or two; but the time comes when the very essence of their purpose, their quality of growth, the type of beings that they are, leads them into individual pathways, and hence they are called the solitaries. There is a technical term, rhinoceros, by which I think they are even called. An example of this, in a small way, you will find in the various churches or religions. The Church of Rome, or

the Eastern Orthodox Church as instances, have produced and can produce, on account of the moral teachings they have and their peculiar kind of mystical aspiration, men and women often of saintly lives, of aspiring character, doing deeds of good, relatively holy men and women. So also is it in Brahmanism, and in all other religious churches or beliefs. But all through these, throughout all the efforts of these people, the aim is increase in spirituality or holiness for the one so striving, for the striver; whereas our teaching, that of the buddhas of compassion, is from the very beginning to learn to be self-forgetful. Don't strive to become holy for yourself. Strive to become holy as others strive to become holy, but only that you can forget yourself for others. This is the teaching also of Light on the Path. That little book contained the same idea. Work as those work, who work most strenuously for self. But you work not for self but for all.

Student — The pratyeka buddha then is the very acme of self-righteousness, is it not so?

G. de P. — I would phrase it a little differently. I would not say self-righteousness. It is the very acme, to use your words, of a human soul seeking improvement for self. This phrasing just describes it. I do not know that you could find better words. You see how difficult it is to understand this explanation, because all the universal rules of ethics are for the individual to become more spiritual. Well, all such universal rules are true, they are right, it is our duty to follow them. Nevertheless, after that is said, then comes the important corollary, that all such rules of ethics and all such striving must be not for yourself alone, but only that you may lay all that you become and are and gain on the altar of service to humanity. Strive indeed to become more spiritual, not for yourself, but solely in order that you may become more spiritual for the sake of helping others.

It is the quality of the effort, of the striving, which makes the difference between the pratyeka buddha and the buddha of compassion. The one does it for self and therefore it is a spiritual selfishness, however high; and the other does it so that he may become an impersonal instrument of the heart of cosmic compassion, of the universal life, which is the cement, the binding power, in the universe. Love never seeks self for self. Love always seeks to give.

Student — Are there not certain saints who first achieved one path by living in the deserts and by losing themselves there and afterwards turned into the other path?

G. de P. — There may have been many such cases; and many individuals who have followed the path to become pratyeka buddhas end not in pratyeka buddhaship, but in becoming Brothers of the Shadow.

Student — I would like to ask a question about the Buddha. When a buddha loans the intermediate part of him, as particularly exemplified in the case of Gautama, our Chief, is he not handicapped in his own work during that time? How can he manage without the intermediate psychological apparatus?

G. de P. — That is a pertinent question. A buddha of compassion such as Gautama was, has reached human omniscience so far as this planetary chain of earth is concerned. This earth therefore can teach him nothing more. Nevertheless he remains in the schoolroom of earth in order himself to become a teacher of others still learning in this school of earth life. Consequently, the temporary giving up of his own human psychological apparatus or soul part for the purpose of producing an avatara is by no means an injury to the constitution of such a buddha of compassion, but, as a matter of fact, actually induces or produces a very wonderful karma for good. Do you understand?

Student — Not entirely, because he is doing a noble work all the time; that is, he is guarding or watching what is going on.

Student — Well, in one sense, part of one of his principles is gone, isn't that correct?

G. de P. — It is. But all the messengers of the Lodge have been in similar case, beginning with HPB. In the case of the messengers, they are psychological cripples. They are not working at their full possibility of efficiency. Nevertheless they keep going because there remains sufficient of the aura or atmosphere of the principle which is absent, or which has vacated its natural seat, for them to be able to live as men or women and do their work, but of course doing it under unusual difficulties. So also is it in the case of the Buddha when he gives his human portion in order to help produce an avatara. There is a sufficiency of the atmosphere

or aura of the psychological apparatus of the Buddha remaining in his constitution for that constitution to carry on and continue to do the work that it has been doing, but under greater difficulties than before, of course. Do you understand better now?

Student — Yes, thank you.

Student — May I ask where the selfishness of a pratyeka buddha is placed, situated? I mean how can it work? Has it an instrument?

G. de P. — I do not understand the first part of your question.

Student — I said, where is the selfishness in a pratyeka buddha — where is it located?

G. de P. — Spiritual selfishness is located in the lower spiritual part of the nature. Human selfishness is located in the human part of the constitution. Animal or beast selfishness is located in the animal or beast part of the constitution. There is a spiritual selfishness, as I have so often tried to explain; and the selfishness, if you like to call it that, of the pratyeka buddha, I understand to be located in the highest portion of his manasic part. This principle in him is high, because he is a pratyeka buddha and therefore more or less spiritually evolved, but yet this principle contains this streak in it, this bent, this tendency, this skandha, to use a technical term. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, thank you.

Student — May I say one more word on the same subject? In Light on the Path, there are passages which I think have attracted the attention of many students to that book, particularly such passages which speak of the flower growing and opening its heart to the light, and not itself trying to do anything. Yet it is the light that attracts the flower. My question is: would it not be possible for you to write something for us, or give to us something, which would give this very valuable central core of the core of the teaching that you have given to us tonight, and that we have tried to get from Light on the Path? Can you not write something that would give the teaching in a form that would be suitable for the new era?

G. de P. — Yes; I have given it here tonight, dear Brother.

Student — True, but this is not for the public.

G. de P. — Yes, that is right. If I can find time, and if I find the strength to do so, I will do so; but there are many, many things that I desire to do and have not yet done.

Now, Companions, I will answer one more question before we close for tonight.

Student — I have wondered if there is in the teaching, any figure of speech, or any story, or tradition, or even a word or name, that would indicate the dramatic situation of the pratyeka buddha when he comes to the realization of the other path that he must follow. Is that a part of the teaching?

G. de P. — By the other path that he must follow, do you mean the path of the buddhas of compassion?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — No pratyeka buddha realizes this while he is in his pratyeka buddhahood. This pratyeka buddhahood, as I think I have already said this evening, ends finally in a state of crystallized purity and intellectual immobility. The pratyeka buddha ultimately becomes, as it were, unconscious of the need for further struggles in evolutionary progress; and thus in time the advancing current of spiritual evolution will leave him in the rear.

Student — Does he not awaken?

G. de P. — Ultimately; but he remains in this state for ages. It is a species of super-devachan, or perhaps a

particular kind of nirvanic absorption. When he awakens, he is far in the rear of the evolutionary current in which he first began his progress, and he does not therefore reawaken as a pratyeka buddha compared with that same evolutionary current. He awakens as an "inferior" entity because he now is in the rear. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, thank you, that is the point.

G. de P. — As compared with other entities, of course of inferior grade, he stands high. He is indeed a spiritual entity, but as contrasted with his fellows who have followed nature's evolutionary current, he is now far in the rear, because while he has been "sleeping" and thus wasting time, they have been steadily advancing. You might say that it is a spiritual case of the tortoise and the hare.

Now, Companions, let us close the meeting, please.

[The sounding of the gong. Silence.]

Meeting 26

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Twenty-Six

Meeting of January 27, 1931

G. de P. — Will you please sound the gong. Is there anything to bring before the meeting this evening?

Secretary — The teacher has asked that I read an extract from a letter just received by him:

"I am on the lookout for every crumb of teaching I can set eyes on. Light and more and more and more light is the cry of my soul tho' it is growing all the time. I have all the proof I want that I am in a genuine school in our E. S. The only thing is now I want discipline — more of it — something to help me to get rid of the personal idea more and more, so that I can make the Light shine for all those others more clearly."

G. de P. — That is a beautiful communication, Companions. I was touched by it and I will tell you why. It shows the touch of the chela-spirit, the craving for discipline in order to loosen, to shake off, the shackles of the personal selfhood, the enshrouding veils, the crippling chains of personality. I wonder how many of you, dear friends, dear Companions, would be willing to undergo a course of chela discipline for even so short a period as six months? I wonder! The first thing that would be aroused in your natures, I am almost sure, would be rebellion. You would ask yourself first: "Why should this be asked of me? Don't I know my life?

Don't I know my duty? I want discipline, I want more light, I want to be shown the path, but I don't want to be shown the A B C of things that everybody knows." Do you see the point?

The ES discipline, the chela discipline, the chela training, comes with absorbing power into all the events of the everyday life. It would be a somewhat fantastic procedure to train a man to meet and to undergo a set of artificial tests for which he would have been — during a process of training and thought and a preparation extending over weeks and months perhaps — tensing his spiritual and intellectual muscles in order to meet these artificial tests. You may read in romances about this latter kind or method of training, but they do not actually exist in the lower degrees of our School. Only in the higher degrees, after the chela has shown that he is capable of meeting successfully the conditions of life as they come, and overcoming all temptations, are these other greater, severer tests put upon him, and even then they come unexpectedly always.

Suppose that I were to ask of you, Companions, for six months only, never to justify yourself and never to answer back. I wonder how many of you could stand the strain of even that simple little test which as you see would operate so strongly in the events of daily life. This is one of the commonest rules in the ordinary ethical training even of the exoteric schools, and yet it is the very first rule in the chela's course of training.

Never indulge in self-justification in any circumstances; but when another is unjustly attacked then spring immediately to his defense, if you feel that the attack is unwarranted and unjust.

I am very desirous that these meetings of the KTMG continue. I have given largely of the teachings, and have done so with all my heart and all my mind. I have given generously. I have given to you directly from the fountain of the ancient wisdom, even as I myself have drunken of it, and have done so without a thought of holding anything back that was appropriate.

But don't you realize, my dear Companions, that occultism is not a plaything, and that you are now in what, in ancient times, would have been called a Mystery-school, such as the Mystery-schools of ancient Greece, and of Hindustan, and of Egypt, and even of the archaic European countries?

Keep therefore the strictest silence about all the teachings that you have received. Even threats of death, or the actual coming of death, are not sufficient excuse for you to open your lips, even to save your life. It matters not at all that you may possibly think — and some unwise person may so think — that the teachings hitherto given are such as you might have gained elsewhere or yourself have read in books. That is not the point, nor is it indeed the fact. The point is that you are pledged to perfect secrecy. Some day you will realize that the teachings that you have received here, you could not have received anywhere else in the world, unless indeed it be in some other branch of our own order.

One of the companions wrote to me a little while ago that, in his mind, there was a strong doubt of our moral right to keep such beautiful teachings from mankind in general. The letter continued that he had received such help, such an inner illumination, that it seemed a crime to keep these teachings secret, and that they ought to be given out publicly in order to give the same help to others that he had received. One who had lived a longer time in the atmosphere of our school and had thus imbibed a larger portion of the esoteric life never could have suggested or written a thing like that. The motive was good, the spirit was altruistic, and there was the desire to help others and to give to others what had been received. But it was entirely wrong so easily to forget the pledge of utter secrecy which this companion had taken.

I can tell you that the teachings you have received here in many cases might be dangerous to talk about in public. I have on previous occasions given you reasons to show you why in such cases they could be dangerous. They are not fit for the public, simply because the public is not prepared to receive them.

Furthermore, there is another side to this matter. These teachings are a reward; they are a guerdon, a recompense, a compensation, for duty nobly done, yet not at all as a mere question of payment.

Now catch yourself carefully just here! Does anyone think that these teachings come as a recompense for anything that it is your bounden duty to do? If so, you fail to understand me, and you distort my meaning.

Nevertheless, it is a fact that these teachings are a reward to which the genuine occultist living a self-forgetful life in the service of others is entitled, and entitled only that he may be prepared and ready to give them to others at any time, should he be ordered to do so. They are a just recompense for self-forgetful service for humanity, an accompaniment, if you like the word better, of the training that you are receiving, of which these teachings form a part, helping to evoke glimmers of the buddhic splendor within yourselves. These teachings are, as it were, glimmers of the buddhic splendor coming from the minds of the great ones, intended to awaken the buddhic splendor in you, to fire it into a more lively flame, to set your souls on fire with the holy light. It is a very difficult thing to take these age-old doctrines and to give them to Occidental minds which have been trained to look upon as actual virtues some of the things that a far deeper penetration into the psychological mysteries of the human soul would show to be not wise things, not intrinsically good things.

There is a common feeling among scientific men and the public of the Occident today that all knowledge is sacred and should be given to everybody. You frequently hear this idea spoken of. It is said that knowledge of any kind belongs to humanity, and therefore that everybody should have it. Tom, Dick, and Harry should be acquainted with everything that is in the universe if it be possible to give it to Tom, Dick, and Harry. This is all wrong. There are facts in nature and teachings about nature and about man which should be given only to those who have been spiritually, intellectually, and morally trained to receive and to guard them — put into the minds of men and women who would guard them sacredly. There are keys unlocking powers and forces in the human being which could be dreadfully misused. Some men and women are far cleverer than others, but cleverness is no guarantee of moral fitness; and because half-a-dozen men or half-a-dozen women think that knowledge could be safely entrusted to them, is no proof that it could be safely entrusted to others.

You may remember what HPB says in more than one place about so apparently harmless and simple a thing as the teaching regarding the septenary nature of man and of the universe. "How on earth," it has often been asked, "could such a teaching bring harm to anybody?" And yet it most certainly might. Take for instance the teaching of karma: as you sow, ye reap; what you are, you have made yourselves to be; the ultimate end will be a perfecting of you. Do you not see how this teaching could be distorted to evil uses? Someone might argue: "Ah, I see. I make myself to be what I shall become. Nevertheless the ultimate end is my perfection; therefore what really matters it what I do now? Why may I not take a vacation and play ducks and drakes with the ethical laws of being, since my ultimate end is perfection? Why not vent my hatred and rage on so and so who has misused me, wrongfully mistreated me? Doubtless I shall pay for it with suffering, it may be; but after I have paid, then I shall be freed from the sin, and meanwhile I shall have had the pleasure of being revenged on my own enemy."

Such people forget the other side of the teaching, the teaching regarding the fate of the lost soul.

Are there any questions that you would like to ask?

Student — Is not man himself primarily responsible for the races of the new globe which he is destined in

future to inhabit? Continually man emits thoughts, and these thoughts become entities, and these entities, what happens to them if they do not amalgamate and form the world substance? If they don't, how can man meet the thought currents that he sets in motion all the time? How does he ever meet the result of his thought

— karma, if I may put it in that way? Do you get my thought?

G. de P. — I think I do. But could you elaborate a little more; then perhaps the question will become shorter and clearer.

Student — Well, I want to know how worlds began, and why they should begin unless man is responsible for them. Why should he have to live on a world that he has not made? Shall I say anything more?

G. de P. — I think I understand you now. Your last words are much briefer and much clearer. As a matter of fact, man and the world he lives on are essentially one. They are both of the same blood, bone of the same bone, flesh of the same flesh, so to speak. The very atoms which compose him also compose the different parts of the constitution of the chain of globes — or the planetary chain — with which his destiny is linked.

As he is part of the substance of this planetary chain, he therefore is bound into it. But man is a creative center, a focus of creative fire. This creative fire is consciousness-thought-will, three aspects of the same fundamental. From this creative focus which is the center of his being he is continually emitting, sending forth, thoughts — elementals, thought-centers, if you like — and these are unself-conscious god-sparks. It is thus that the universe is continuously repopulated and provided with the new rivers of incoming entities beginning their aeons-long evolutionary journey; and with equally continuous flow through much more progressed entities, relatively perfected entities so far as our universe is concerned are passing out at the other or concluding end of the cosmic circle of existence as fully self-conscious gods.

Man, therefore, as one host of the inhabitants of our planetary chain, is indeed fully responsible for the globes on which he lives in so far as his thoughts and emotions and acts have modified those globes or changed them. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes, Professor.

G. de P. — The remarks that I have just made apply to all human beings. They apply fully likewise to the cosmic spirits or dhyan-chohans or gods, who having been men like us in a former manvantara are now at the most evolved end of the cosmic chain of being. They too are connected with our world, or with our series of worlds, and with our universe also. It is therefore they who are our elders, our light-bearers, those who are ahead of us and carrying the torches. Seeing their light we follow after, much as the traveler follows after the bright light of the one at the head of the caravan.

Gods at one end of the spiral of cosmic existence. Unself-conscious god-sparks at the other or beginning end; the intermediate stages or grades of the ladder of life, filled with all other classes of beings. Such is any universe, or planetary chain, or world, in each case depending upon the scale of existence that you have at the time in your thought.

Student — Thank you. May I say just one more thing? I want to know what the actual planet or globe is formed of the actual world substance.

G. de P. — I see what you mean. Every cosmic body, every celestial body, our earth for instance, as also all the other globes of our planetary chain, is formed in the last analysis of monads who happen to be passing through that especial phase of their evolutionary journey. We human beings in past aeons, in past ages, were just such monads then composing the physical substance of a globe, or a series of globes, on which other entities then lived as human beings; and these other entities are now our gods and our supergods. Do you understand?

Student — Yes. So then the earth itself, or the globe — well, we are responsible then for making these monads. The globe that we are going to go on now is the reimbodiment of the globe or the monads that we were then?

G. de P. — No. I think that you are wrong there, or at least you have not expressed your idea clearly. Your

fundamental idea possibly may be right, but it is not clearly expressed. We originally were the thought-elementals of those entities who are now gods, just as we human beings are now constantly emitting thought-elementals who in their turn in future ages will become human beings and later blossom into gods. The universe, looked at from an abstract point of view, is composed of two general classes of entities: first, those beginning their journey, which are the monads in the three elemental kingdoms, in the mineral kingdom, in the plant kingdom, and in the beast kingdom; then comes the human or intermediate kingdom; and, second: the other great general class which comprises all monads which have blossomed forth and become gods. The matter of our earth consists in the last analysis, as I have already said, of monads. These monads do not actually fully exercise their creative powers of casting forth other monads until they themselves have become more or less adult or mature. Then and thereafter they begin to "create." It is even so in the growth of a human being. A human being cannot very well cast forth seeds of life until a certain age has been reached. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes, Professor, thank you very much.

Student — I am going to ask a question with great diffidence. Do the entities of the pratyeka buddhas become the manasaputras of some future manvantara? I mean, do the monads have to send forth the manasaputras to go through another stage of growth, so that they can have a chance to become the unselfish buddhas?

G. de P. — Do you mean: do the pratyeka buddhas become the manasaputras of a future manvantara so that thus they may learn nature's grandest lesson of impersonality?

Student — Yes, Professor, that is my idea.

G. de P. — Yes, they do; but I would add that the pratyeka buddhas who thus become manasaputras, or children of mind, of a future manvantara belong to the lower classes of the agnishwatta-pitris who also are the manasaputras. The higher classes of the manasaputras are those entities who had already in the preceding manvantara attained a certain high degree of impersonal existence.

Student — May I ask two questions? In The Secret Doctrine it speaks of atma-buddhi, the spiritual monad, as transmitting its spiritual and intellectual enlightening forces over the bridge formed by manas and kama into the personal ego.

G. de P. — Just so.

Student — Or quaternary. And then we have heard that the agnishwatta-pitris enlighten and inspire the lower lunar pitris with their spiritual-intellectual energies and forces. I would like to know what the difference is between these spiritual-intellectual energies and those of the atman-buddhi which are transmitted into the personal ego.

G. de P. — Yours is a very profound question and involves two lines of evolution, both of which are spoken of rather vaguely in The Secret Doctrine. What you have said is perfectly true. All man's noblest impulses, all his inspirations of genius, all his evolving faculties and powers — or rather all the spiritual fire within him bringing forth the evolution of his faculties and powers — all this and much more comes from the spiritual monad, the atma-buddhic monad. But in order that this atma-buddhic monad may manifest in the brain of the physical man it must be stepped down or transmitted to that brain by an intermediary organ. This intermediary organ is what is popularly called the human soul, the kama-manas.

Now having said this much we go a step farther. In the early races of humanity on this globe, in this fourth round, and more exactly at about the middle point of the third root-race, there occurred the most wondrous event in human history: the firing of this hitherto latent intermediate part of humanity by the descent into, by the incarnation or rather imbodiment in that intermediate part, of more progressed manasaputric entities from previous manvantaras. This is called the descent of the manasaputras, and this entrance or descent of the manasaputras quickened with its living flame the hitherto sleeping intermediate nature of the third root-race.

The third root-race had potentially all the capacities of the man, but the intermediate nature was asleep, latent, not yet evolved, not yet strong enough to transmit or step down the spiritual influences from the atma-buddhic

monad. But these manasaputras entered into those waiting vehicles, those waiting entities, and with their living flame quickened the sleeping intermediate part, the sleeping human soul, awakened it, stimulated it, so that it became active.

Remember that there are two sides to this matter. First, the individual human being in the third root-race had all the capacities that man now has, but they were then wholly asleep so far as the intermediate or soul nature was concerned. Perhaps it would be better to say that they were not then as yet evolved. It would have taken ages and ages of slow evolutionary work to awaken these latent soul parts of the then mankind. But in order to help mankind, in order to quicken man's evolution, in order more quickly to bring into action this intermediate or soul part, the manasaputras from a previous manvantara, spiritual beings as they are,

"descended" into man, quickened by their own living fire his sleeping or unevolved soul, and thus awakened it. Do you understand? Is the answer responsive to your question?

Student — Yes, and it covers it completely; but I could not solve it myself. I have another question, if I may ask it. The Secret Doctrine speaks about kama. Kama, the seat of desires, requires a spiritual fire which, as I understand it, has been appropriated by the "triangles" and is analogous to the fire that has been appropriated by Prometheus. I should like to know what the triangles are, or who they are. Are they dhyan-chohans, or higher archangels?

G. de P. — This question refers to the same matter that your first question contained. This word triangles is a technical term given to the upper triad, the atman, buddhi, and the higher manas, combined into one. A fiery triangle is the title often given to such an entity, and they are the manasaputras. It is their descent into, or rather their overshadowing of, the kamic part of the human being which completes the man and makes him a septenary man-plant, that is, a man-plant with every part of his constitution more or less in active function.

Do you understand me? If you do not, please ask again.

Student — Yes, I see how the manasaputras have entered into the kamic principle, and through their fire have given the spiritual fire that makes kama a cosmic principle.

G. de P. — Yes, but you phrase it wrongly. Kama is a cosmic principle itself. It is the cosmic fire, a psychoelectromagnetic principle. You may divide the human constitution into three parts: an upper fiery triangle or spiritual triangle; a lower psycho-astral physical triangle; and the two connected by the antaskarana or link or bridge. It is this intermediate element or link or bridge which was awakened in the third root-race by the descent of the manasaputras. This intermediate link was there, latent, but it was not then manifesting, it was not then awakened. It was "sleeping."

So it is at present with the beasts. The beast has all the principles that we as men have. There is everything in the beast that a man has. But all the upper part of the beast's constitution is not yet evolved to the point of manifesting itself. To use popular language, it is asleep, it is not yet awakened. The time will come when the upper or superior parts of the beast constitution will be awakened, and then the beasts will no longer be beasts: they will have become men, or individuals occupying the same evolutionary stage that we men do.

Whether they will be men exactly as we are men is a matter for debate; but they will be men, self-conscious thinking entities with a conscience, with will, and with all the other faculties that man shows.

Student — Are the manasaputras the same as the spiritual monad in us?

G. de P. — No, they are not, Doctor.

Student — Are they children of our inner gods?

G. de P. — Children of our inner gods?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — No, they are not, Doctor.

Student — Then I am wondering what is the karmic relation that makes them incarnate in our constitution?

G. de P. — A very pertinent question indeed. Some of the questions of our companions who have studied longer than others probe very deeply into the esoteric teachings. You here touch upon a matter which I have often tried to explain. Every part of the human constitution may be considered as an evolving entity. For instance, taking myself as an example of all other men, there is in me an inner god; a spiritual soul some day to become an inner god; a child of this spiritual soul which is my human soul, some day to become a spiritual soul, and therefore on its way in still more future time to become an inner god. There is in me again an animal soul, a child of the human soul; and this animal soul is on its way to become a human soul, later to become a spiritual soul, later to become an inner god. There is in me, besides all this, the lowest part of my constitution

— the psycho-astral-physical triangle.

Now the spiritual soul, when it has raised the human soul to become like unto itself, will at that time have become an inner god. But when the human soul, thus raised, has attained that grade of spiritual soul, it becomes a manasaputra and thereafter takes an active self-conscious part in the evolutionary work of the universe. Among others of its functions or duties will be the quickening or enlivening or inflaming of the soul part of some future race of beings — just as the manasaputras in our own human case enlivened us, quickened us, inflamed our souls, awakened our souls.

Therefore the manasaputras spoken of in The Secret Doctrine are not we ourselves and yet are we.

Mysteriously, they are a part of us, because they awakened us. They could not have awakened us unless they had been karmically connected with us, and they are karmically connected with us because in a past manvantara they had evolved from being human souls to becoming spiritual souls or manasaputras.

For instance, in me there is a manasaputra not yet evolved forth, but evolving. It is the lower part of my spiritual soul, or the highest part of my human soul you may say. That statement is true enough. But that manasaputra within me and part of my own monadic essence is not the manasaputra which inflamed my human soul and awakened it in the middle of the third root-race. This latter manasaputra is a spiritual soul which still overshadows me with its spiritual splendor. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, thank you, but I don't quite yet understand the karmic relation. I don't know why this son of the sun — is it greater than the inner god? No, of course it is lower than the inner god.

G. de P. — What is?

Student — The manasaputra that awakened a human soul in the third race — is it greater or not than our inner god?

G. de P. — It is less great. A manasaputra has its own inner god, and a manasaputra is a human soul raised to become a spiritual soul, because it has become at one with its inner god. The inner god at the top, the human soul at the bottom, the spiritual soul between. Now these three form a manasaputra. But a manasaputra is an entity in which the human soul has become so inflamed with the spiritual fire that that human soul itself is on the verge of becoming a spiritual soul, a pure buddhic essence. Do you understand?

Student — The manasaputra then is from another manvantara?

G. de P. — Yes, from another manvantara.

Student — Yes, I understand.

G. de P. — May I add this, and it may help you a little. All entities throughout our universe are karmically linked together, some more closely knit together than others are. That is why we earth creatures are all here together. We all help each other, whether we will or whether we nill. We help each other. We are all children of this universe. We are all linked together by karmic bonds of existence, therefore of destiny. Just as the manasaputras helped us by awakening our human souls, in exactly similar way we in future aeons as manasaputras shall awaken the human souls of a future race of human beings, which I myself believe to be what we now call the races of the beasts who then will have become human or verging into becoming human.

Or, again, as we are karmically connected with the beasts who are in a sense our children, so are these manasaputras connected with us, for we in a certain sense are their children.

Student — Thank you, but it seems to me such a gap between the spiritual monad and the human monad, that I ask whether there must not be two or three grades of dhyan-chohans which became part of our inner constitution in order to make the necessary evolutionary steps. Is that true?

G. de P. — I would not say that there are these many grades of dhyan-chohans between the spiritual soul and the human soul. Please recollect that the human soul is the child of the spiritual soul; or using another figure of speech, the spiritual soul is the sun-center and the human soul is a ray from it. The ray is of the same essence, of the same light; nevertheless the ray is not the sun. It is merely its offspring, an influence from it, an effluence from it. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, I see. But where are the dhyan-chohans which came from the moon? Are they not between us, the human, and the spiritual monad?

G. de P. — No. Dhyan-chohan is a generalizing term meaning "Lord of Meditation," and is applied to any spiritual or quasi-spiritual entity whatsoever when considered as such an entity. The manasaputras are dhyan-chohans. Even our human souls, when in devachan, can technically and properly be called dhyan-chohans of a low grade because they are in a spiritual condition then. Do you understand? Dhyan-chohan is merely a title descriptive of any class of spiritual or quasi-spiritual entities. So, you see, I do not think that it would be quite right to speak of many classes of dhyan-chohans, or of spiritual beings, between the spiritual soul and the human soul. There are practically no such grades at all.

Student — May I add a question along this line? I had thought that the third race which was endowed with a spark of mind by the manasaputras had formerly been, as it were, atoms in the beings of the manasaputras when these manasaputras had evolved to a state corresponding to our humanity. I don't want to call them humans, but I refer to a time when they occupied a plane equivalent to the human. I have reference to something analogous to what The Secret Doctrine means when it says that the beast kingdom is composed of cast-off atoms from our previous humanities. Is that wrong?

G. de P. — No, that is right; generally speaking, that is quite right. But I would like to enter a caveat here, or rather utter a little word of warning, if I may. You speak of the manasaputras "endowing" our human souls with self-consciousness. Perhaps the word endowing is all right, if you make a careful distinction in your mind when you use this word; but if by using the word endowing you mean giving, conferring upon, then it is wrong.

Student — No; lighting, I should have said.

G. de P. — Yes. It is a lighting. It is awakening light in what is already there. It is an awakening of self-consciousness in the hitherto unself-conscious vehicles through the action of the manasaputric fire. Consider this as an analogy: when a teacher awakens interest, intelligence, in his pupil, he sets a spiritual fire to the mind of the pupils. He awakens it, he stimulates it, he brings it into activity. He does not give mind to his pupil, but he merely works on what is already there, and inflames it so that it begins to work from its own energies, and thereafter to act. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, I see, endowed was the wrong word. Fired or awakened would be better.

G. de P. — Yes. Nevertheless you are justified in using the word, because HPB frequently uses it. But please understand what the word implies. The mysteries connected with the "descent" of the manasaputras are really very great, and I am not at all surprised that in so intricate and difficult a subject there should be room for so many questions, so many doubts — if you like, so many misunderstandings. It is perfectly understandable.

Nevertheless the matter is one of the most fruitful subjects of thought, and very productive of benefit.

Student — I would like to ask if the manasaputras are not our reincarnating egos.

G. de P. — No, indeed, they are not, if you refer to the "descent" of the manasaputras in the third root-race.

The manasaputras are evolved entities from another manvantara who, descending into, or rather quickening, enlivening, setting fire to the sleeping or unevolved souls of the then mankind, brought these souls into activity, awakened the latent faculties which were already there. These awakened faculties thereafter were and are the reincarnating egos of the individual humans.

Student — Oh, the awakened faculties are the reincarnating egos?

G. de P. — Yes. Certainly these awakened parts of mankind were and are the reincarnating egos, a reincarnating ego being the spiritual-psychological parts of the constitution. The manasaputras are spiritually and intellectually progressed entities from another previous manvantara; and these manasaputras, in that past manvantara, were themselves then human souls who had been awakened in their turn. They were awakened in that previous manvantara just as we have been awakened in this manvantara. In future aeons we shall be manasaputras and in our turn shall then awaken other sleeping or unevolved souls of an inferior race or humanity of that future home.

Student — Why do they call them reincarnating egos, then?

G. de P. — You mean the manasaputras?

Student — No. You said the manasaputras are not the reincarnating egos, but that they awakened the faculties of the human soul, and that these awakened faculties are the reincarnating ego.

G. de P. — The awakening human soul becomes the reincarnating ego; and these egos are awakened by the egos of the gods, by the fire, the divine fire, by their connection with the divine fire resident in the manasaputra. Remember the analogy that I gave you a few moments agone: a teacher will awaken the sleeping soul in his pupil. The soul was there, but it was sleeping, unevolved. But contact with the teacher, the stimulation of the teacher's words and teaching and example — all this awakens the sleeping inner part of the pupil, so that thereafter the pupil himself begins to learn truly to live, truly to be.

Student — I don't see why they call it reincarnating ego.

G. de P. — Call what reincarnating ego?

Student — What is the reincarnating ego?

G. de P. — The reincarnating ego is the awakened human soul.

Student — But awakened does not exactly mean reincarnating, does it?

G. de P. — No, of course not. But it could not reincarnate as an individual ego until it had evolved the egoic reincarnating faculty.

Student — But it was a soul before, I understand.

G. de P. — Yes; it was a soul, but a sleeping soul, a latent entity, as it were. When the manasaputra awakened it, it became an individual, it became egoic, or rather an egoic quality was evolved forth from within it.

Student — It is then only called a reincarnating soul in the case that it reincarnates after every earth life.

G. de P. — That's it. And it was the descent of the manasaputra on the sleeping embryonic soul which trained it into becoming, or evolved it forth into becoming, a reincarnating ego. The next step in evolution that the reincarnating ego will take, will be to become in its turn a manasaputra. The manasaputras, as I have already told you several times, in a former manvantara were simply reincarnating egos. Before that they were sleeping or unevolved souls. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — That is good.

Student — I would like to ask one or two questions. First of all, if the manasaputras quickened the human souls of entities who were in the beast kingdom — I mean, who came from the beast kingdom into the human kingdom — does not this imply a responsibility of the manasaputras to their own thought-children?

G. de P. — Assuredly it does.

Student — Does that not show why the manasaputras came to them?

G. de P. — Just so.

Student — And is it the destiny of every human soul to go through that phase of its evolution in becoming a manasaputra, and quicken its own children of some past manvantara?

G. de P. — First there is the sleeping monad, the unself-conscious god-spark — two ways of expressing the same thing. Then through aeons of slow natural evolutionary growth there come the first faint adumbrations of individualized consciousness, which we may call soul. Soul is a vague term, admittedly so, but our language in these esoteric respects is very vague. Such souls you will find in the minerals, in the plants, in the lower orders of the beasts. Then as its evolution proceeds, this individualizing process becomes greater or stronger. In other words the individual soul becomes more compact, more concrete, more definite; and then we have the highest orders of the beasts and the very lowest orders of the humans.

But no such evolving soul can actually attain full self-consciousness until it has been touched by the divine fire, quickened, you understand, by some manasaputra with whom it is karmically connected. Thereafter, spiritual individuality has been achieved, and the reincarnating ego begins its aeonic career as an individual, destined in its turn to blossom forth in later future aeons into becoming a manasaputra. Each manasaputra, furthermore, is attended by a long train of karmic followers, its own psychovital "children." And in some far distant future aeon each such manasaputra must awaken or quicken these, its psychovital offspring. It is thus its own psychovital children, over which the manasaputra watches, and it has an intimate karmic connection with these psychovital children of itself.

Now carry your thoughts far into the future. Each such manasaputra in the distant aeons of future time will be a sun, shining in splendor in space, attended with its family — its spiritual, intellectual, psychical, material, vital-material family — which are the planets and the comets and the nebulae of the solar system. Something that our astronomers have not yet even dreamed of. This family relationship exists indeed not only on the visible plane of the solar system, but on the invisible planes and spheres also.

Furthermore, as each one of us human beings is going to be a manasaputra, therefore we can say that each one of us in far distant aeons of the future is destined to become a sun shining in splendor in space.

There is one law running throughout universal being which is the law of its own essence, and consequently every entity existing in universal being has this fundamental law at its heart and therefore governing all its career through time and space. Hence it is that the Hermetic School said: "What is above is the same as that which is below. What is below is fundamentally the same as that which is above."

Student — Dr. de Purucker, the point that puzzles me is this. I can understand how a teacher can fire the pupil's imagination and awaken it, but I do not understand the manner in which the manasaputras awakened those sleeping entities.

G. de P. — The manner or the method of doing it is by surrounding the child or the pupil with its own vital psycho-astral flame. This is called the descent or the incarnation. Admittedly, these two words descent and incarnation are inaccurate, because really the manasaputra does not actually come down into the flesh.

Incarnation and descent when so used are but figures of speech. What actually happens is that the manasaputra surrounds, incloses, with its aura, with its vital atmosphere, the soul which it is its karmic duty to awaken, very much as a mother surrounds her unborn babe and newborn babe with her own vitality, her own atmosphere, her own aura, thus giving it its fit and appropriate opportunity or bed or place in which to grow.

The mother not only provides this atmosphere and unconsciously gives it, but furnishes also the womb in

which the child, the entity-to-be, can grow safely, can take its first steps in evolutionary development in the new sphere of life. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, I understand. When that word incarnate was used it always gave me the impression that something was put into us.

G. de P. — Just so. The word was used for this reason: the manasaputra infuses, as it were, a portion of its own actual psychovital flame or life into the as yet undeveloped human soul. For instance, when fire takes hold of wood and consumes it, it is as if the flame entered into the wood and quickened the material of the wood into glowing, into consuming itself. Do you understand? The fire infuses itself into the wood. Thus gold is heated also. The fire penetrates into the molecules of the gold, the heat penetrates, and soon you see the glowing molten gold.

Of course figures of speech like this should not be pressed too far. They are but attempts to illustrate an idea.

But actually what happens is that the manasaputra infuses a portion of its own spiritual-intellectual flame or fire, and a portion of its own psychovital essence, into the hitherto sleeping human souls. As this infusion remains with the human soul through many ages as a constantly and continually quickening, enlivening, inspiring energy, little by little the human soul awakens and comes into the native activity of its own inner faculties. Thus it is that the manasaputra awakens the latent fires in the soul. Do you understand?

Student — Thank you, yes. May I ask one other question? You referred in the earlier part of the evening to the chela-spirit, and the rule of discipline of always avoiding any self-justification — that first simple rule that one should never justify oneself for any personal reasons. I am not quite clear as to what you mean by never justifying oneself. For instance, in a business way one may have to make explanations of misunderstandings.

To what extent do you mean never to justify oneself?

G. de P. — Of course this rule of no personal self-justification is a rule for chelas. Naturally, in the affairs of the business world, it is often advantageous and perfectly proper that an explanation should be given for certain acts, if indeed one's best judgment shows that such explanation is the easiest and the wisest and the kindliest way of composing difficulties. In such case the chela is permitted to do that. But personal self-justification does not mean that.

The rule regarding self-justification is this. If you are attacked justly or unjustly, do not be vindictive, do not hit back, do not begin to fight, do not justify yourself merely in order to satisfy yourself, your own sense of personal justice. With your fellow chelas, and even in the world, try rather so to live and so to conduct yourself that your actions will speak louder than your words. Suffer in silence if it is better so to do, and do it with a tranquil heart, rather than taking offense, firing up and causing more trouble in a world already overburdened with sorrow and passion. Forgive and love, and you will never care to justify your personal self in the way that is forbidden.

As I say, sometimes a quiet and wholly impersonal explanation is perfectly proper and justifiable even for a chela, because in that way sometimes difficulties can best be avoided; but this is not what is meant by the rule of no personal self-justification. I think that I have explained this before. Don't battle, don't fight back, don't create more trouble in the world merely because you feel that you have a right to be heard and that you have a right to put your side of the quarrel before the world, or before the one who has offended you. If it is a matter of mere offense to yourself personally, then let it go. Don't prolong the quarrel. Keep the peace. Be quiet. Be still. Forgive.

Student — Yes, thank you, Professor. I see what you mean.

G. de P. — It is a very simple rule. Of course, one must use one's sense in following it. But as a rule it is very easy. It makes life so much simpler and kindlier. It means: avoid quarrels, avoid disputes, avoid unfriendly discussion, avoid prolonging a difference of opinion. Don't justify yourself. Let the matter go. It will all be forgotten in a little while. Then you will be at peace. If your actions speak louder than your words and your actions are noble and beautiful, you will have nothing to worry about. Leave it to the Law. As the Jewish-Christian Bible put it: "Vengeance is mine" — and verily it is so. In other words, be on the side of right every time, and then you will have nothing to worry about.

Student — May I ask a question? In our study of the Ramayana many points came up that we have not been able to solve. One question I would like to ask is about the bow of Siva. Is it right to interpret that as a symbol of the power of the spiritual soul?

G. de P. — Yes, you could so interpret it, as also the arrows flying from the bow. It really means the exercise of the spiritual will, because the will is like a bow used by a clever bowman. It can shoot shafts of thought and feeling, and some of these shafts are very dangerous. But when this will is used by a god, it can cleave all material things, pass through all things and reach its goal — like the arrow so discharged. Frequently in Occidental heroic stories of the same type, the symbol or emblem of the sword is used instead of that of the bow, and signifies the same thing: the sword of the spiritual will.

Many of those ancient epic stories contain really beautiful and profound truths expressed in mystical fashion; and there are hundreds and hundreds of such stories. For instance, there is the cloak of invisibility of which you have doubtless often heard. Now what do you think that means? Have you had any thought about it —

wrapping around oneself the cloak of invisibility?

Student — Going into obscuration?

G. de P. — Think it over, and the next time we meet, if the Secretary will remind me, I will ask if you have solved the problem of the cloak of invisibility. Do you mind?

Student — No, I would like to. Now about Rama and Sita. You remember that towards the middle of the tale, Rama deserts Sita. Is this the explanation, that Rama came down to earth — he was really a god in human form — in order to kill the demon Ravana, or to help to kill evil in the world? In order to do this work, he would have to unite with the earth principle, which was represented by Sita; and when he had completed his work, he had no more need for this earth principle, and so he left her alone.

G. de P. — That could perhaps be one mystical way of construing the legend. Another way would be supposing that Sita represented the spiritual side of his being and one or more of his spiritual energies. But in order to do a certain work in the world, he had deliberately to turn his back on his wife Sita, that is, on the higher part of his being, and descend into the earth, temporarily leaving or forgetting his divine home.

Interpretations always depend upon the way in which the allegory turns or twists, and you have to make your deductions accordingly. Some of the parables of Jesus are subject to the same diversity of interpretation.

Are there any more questions before we close?

Student — May something be said on the subject of the seed and root-manus?

G. de P. — On the seed-manus and the root-manus? Yes, you will find a great deal said of these two kinds of manus in The Secret Doctrine. There is a root-manu at the beginning of every evolutionary period, whether it be of a planet, of a planetary chain, or of a race of mankind. Manu is a generalizing term. Applied to human beings it means the originators of a human race. There is the root-race in the beginning and there is also the seed-race at the end. Now it is obvious that every seed produces a root, and every root produces a seed; so whether you call the root-manu the first manu, and the seed-manu the last manu, or invert these names, it all really comes to the same thing.

However, let me take the case of a globe, our own globe for instance in its present fourth round. We can see that the root-manu, which originated mankind, became the human race, which, passing through all its manifold and all-various states in evolutionary progress, will when it finally quits the globe leave behind it a portion of itself as the seed-manu. But really it is as correct to speak of the first manu as the seed-manu and of the last manu on the globe as the root-manu furnishing the root for the next life-wave when it returns to this globe.

In the literature of the Adyar Society there is a great deal said in our days about manus. My main objection to their ideas in this respect is the fact that there is too much personification of the manus. Many of their writers

speak of these manus as if they were solely individual entities; and while that idea is true in a very general sense, much as we can say that any race of mankind is an entity, nevertheless this intensification of the person-idea is very misleading. In fact it may be said to be so misleading as actually to be divergent from the teaching of The Secret Doctrine. I don't know whether what I have said has answered your question?

Student — I wanted to ask if the sishtas were the seed-manus, or vice versa.

G. de P. — They are.

Student — Then Vaivasvata-Manu refers to the seed?

G. de P. — Yes, you can call that the seed-manu. But Vaivasvata can correctly be called the root-manu. As a matter of fact the sishtas are indeed the seed-manus.

Student — One question in regard to the manasaputras. You say that it is scarcely correct to speak of their descent. Well, when they come and fire the latent principle, they themselves in acting as the spiritual soul are really functioning in a progressive way for themselves, are they not? Is not that a new experience for them, so that they are not really losing time?

G. de P. — Oh, bless you, no! No, indeed! They are not losing time. But there are two ways of looking at the functioning or work of the manasaputras. You could say that it is partly by their noble act of descent that they thus gain good karma; but, on the other hand, we must not forget that they are also actually karmically bound to accomplish this work.

Student — Is it not new work for them? Have they functioned in that way before?

G. de P. — They have not twice so functioned in the present manvantara — no. A manasaputra functions in that way for the term period of one manvantara. Then when the next manvantara comes and a new crop of manasaputras appears on the scene, the original manasaputras will have gone on much farther, and will have become gods. There are certain manasaputras, however, which we may call failures, and these are dhyan-chohans who have not made the full rise to godhood at the end of any manvantara, and they have to return to function in the new planetary chain of the succeeding manvantara.

So it is in a school among us humans. There are the professors who teach the pupils, but these professors themselves may be taking postgraduate courses of one kind or other, and they may or may not pass on successfully to the objective which they have put before themselves to attain. If they fail they must continue teaching in the next term. But of course they have gained the benefits of their experience and study.

Meanwhile, the pupils are advancing, will have graduated, and in their turn may have become professors or teachers.

The work of the manasaputras is part karmic and part willful, that is, done by choice, done by will. Indeed, so it is in ordinary human life. Every time when we do a noble deed, a deed of self-forgetfulness which helps others, it is karmic merely from the fact that we do it. But nevertheless we do it by our own choice, and make thereby a future better karma. Hence, the karmic work cannot be called a waste of time. Assuredly not. That would indeed be absurd.

Is the answer responsive to your question?

Student — Yes. I thought also of the illustration of the mother giving of herself, her atmosphere, to the child.

She also is gaining her experience in motherhood.

G. de P. — Quite true.

Student — Is it something like that? It then is progress, it is evolution, for the manasaputras.

G. de P. — Yes, it is evolution. I can see that your mind hesitates at the thought that perhaps the manasaputras are losing time.

Student — Well, I should think that they would be so terribly bored.

G. de P. — Have you ever been bored, Doctor?

Student — I certainly have.

G. de P. — Doing a noble deed?

Student — Well, I don't know that I have ever done anything like that.

G. de P. — Well, I am sure that you have. Every human being finds his greatest joy in doing deeds of beauty, in doing deeds which evoke hitherto sleeping spiritual qualities. However, it is just as you rightfully point out: such evocation from within of inner spiritual strength and beauty is never something lost. It is indeed a gain.

But we do it partly by will, partly by our choice, and partly because it is our karma so to choose.

Now, Companions, I ask that we may close the meeting.

[The sounding of the gong. Silence.]

It is a beautiful atmosphere we have in these gatherings. The very spirit of the Masters seems sometimes to be present — at times more than at other times. There is the sense of peace, the atmosphere of goodwill, of kindliness. There is quiet.

Good night all.

Meeting 27

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

Teacher and student are links in a great spiritual chain, extending from infinity to infinity, from past to future. Invisible and intangible, this nevertheless exists, a golden chain of spiritual life, a great Reality. As a link in this chain, man becomes both giver and receiver, passing on the torch of truth from hand to hand, from nation to nation, and from age to age. — Katherine Tingley KTMG Papers: Twenty-Seven

Meeting of February 10, 1931

G. de P. — Companions, I am ready to answer questions.

Student — In the past six weeks, we seem to have had a large number of catastrophes: earthquakes, fires, accidents, tidal waves, and an especial tendency towards accidents connected with fire. I have thought that it must be due to some very special influence of the planets at this time, and I wanted to ask you, since that is possibly true, if there is not also a particular influence on the inner life of the students in this connection that it might be helpful for us to know.

G. de P. — Yes, what you say is quite true. If you will examine the positions that the sun, moon, and planets have taken during the last three months or so, you will find very interesting and unusual configurations. For instance, the planet Jupiter and the planet Mars have been very close together, the latter in the sign of Leo, and Jupiter in the sign of Cancer, and both have been at different times in opposition to the heavy planet Saturn.

In addition to this, the moon of course has made its usual rounds and has made various astrological configurations; but perhaps the most important aspects or positions of the planets that I have spoken of have been the oppositions. Leo is supposed to be and is in fact a fiery sign. Mars itself is called a fiery planet, and is also one of the two "infortunes" — so called. Thus, a fiery planet in a fiery sign is very significant indeed, and in near or close opposition to the planet Saturn — as it has been for quite a long time — it must produce corresponding effects on the earth.

As regards similar effects on the minds of human beings, I see no reason why the great energies of the solar system which produce such effects on the earth, and on the other planets — I see no reason why these same spiritual and psychomagnetic energies should not affect the minds and psychical apparatus of human beings; and, as a matter of fact, they do. I do not care to speak overmuch on this subject, and I will tell you very frankly why.

There is indeed a true science of astrology. It is a sublime science, fascinating to study, productive of great benefit, not only to man's intellect, but also to his ethical instincts in the lessons that he can draw from that study. But this sublime and genuinely real and very archaic science of astrology is practically unknown in the Occident. All that the Occident knows of astrology is the more or less tattered remnants of the ancient and sacred science of the stars.

I do not mean to imply by this remark that Occidental astrology has no value whatsoever. On the contrary, even those remnants, those mere fragments of the ancient sacred science of the stars, can today give lessons of real value to the student who knows how to interpret what has come down to us from the past. You can actually read human destiny, racial, national, and individual, in the positions and so-called aspects or configurations of the sun, moon, and planets.

The old astrologers had a saying: "Stellae non cogunt, agunt," which means that the stars — that is to say the sun, the moon, and the five planets of the ancients, as well as the stars — do not compel, but impel. This means, however, that individual human beings always have their native free will unimpeded and uncoerced.

The stars, the planets, the sun, and the moon, by the energies that they send to us, impel us to think certain things, to feel in certain ways, and therefore to do certain acts; but they do not compel us to any of this. Man always can change his own feelings, his own thoughts, and necessarily, therefore, his own acts. You must not

suppose that the ancient astrology taught a rigid fatalism, or indeed a fatalism of any kind. It did not. The main idea was that man, being an inseparable part of the universe, can read in all the various parts of the universal machine, considered as a mechanism, exactly what the past has been. Therefore, due to the laws of cause and effect, he can deduce what the present is, and therefore again, due to the same laws of cause and effect, what the conditions and impulses arising in the future will be.

Now, any individual man, due to his spiritual faculty of choice, of free will in thought and in action, and due to his spiritual insight, can change his own course of destiny, and the course of destiny of others, at least in some degree, at any time whatsoever — no matter what the positions or aspects or configurations of the celestial bodies may be.

It is obvious that certain human beings will be more strongly affected, impelled, by certain aspects or configurations of the celestial bodies than other human beings are. Certain individuals are born under one of the twelve signs of the zodiac, which merely means that they have closely sympathetic relations with that sign. Other human beings are born under some other sign, for the same reason; and so is the case with all the other ten signs, there being as you know twelve signs of the zodiac.

We may see by this that mankind may therefore be divided into twelve classes of beings, this division corresponding intimately and very accurately with the ten classes of the monads, of which HPB speaks in The Secret Doctrine. As a matter of fact, there are twelve classes of the monads, but they are usually referred to as ten — just why, would take me too long to explain tonight. Again, these classes are but infrequently alluded to as numbering ten, and usually only seven classes of the monads are spoken of in our literature. The reason for this common or usual reference to the monads as of seven classes and not ten I can tell you at once. In the division into ten, it is always understood that seven composed the manifested or active portion of the hierarchy, thus leaving three classes "unmanifested." Just so it is with the structure of the universe: there are ten, and indeed twelve, planes or realms or spheres or worlds — call them what you like — in any one hierarchy. Let us say that there are ten, which is the usual way of speaking. Of these ten worlds or planes or spheres, seven are manifested, and three dwell, as the Pythagoreans used to say, in the silence and in the darkness of unfathomable spirit.

Now then, it is or should be clear, I think, that when certain planets rise — as human beings see them from earth — or apparently rise in certain signs, those individuals most intimately connected with those signs are affected strongly, not only by the signs but by the planets which happen to be transiting those signs at the time.

Hence it should be obvious that at the present time when the planet Mars, a fiery body astrologically speaking, is transiting and actually is retrograding through the fiery sign of Leo, all those human beings whose natures are more or less fiery, martial, and of the type of this sign, will be more strongly affected than are other human beings.

If the planet Jupiter were transiting the sign Leo, as it will in a few months from now, then the sign Leo combined with the Jovian influence would affect very strongly those human beings who were born when the sign Leo was rising, but who at the same time were strongly affected at birth by certain aspects of the planet Jupiter, and so forth.

All these remarks, my dear Companions, I ask you not to construe to mean that human beings are the mere slaves of an inscrutable destiny flowing from the celestial bodies. It is not so. This warning is not ill advised; it is advisable to give it. I have known men and women, and I doubt not that others of you have, who will find plausible excuses for evildoing in almost any fact. I have known them to say: "Yes, I admit I have certain faults and vices in my character, but what will you? I was born that way. The stars fought against me when I was born." I mean that no one should seek in the influences of the planets and of the sun and of the moon and of the stars, excuses for the faults in his character and lay upon the celestial bodies the moral responsibility for thoughts and feelings and acts which arise within himself.

I am talking vaguely because I do not desire to go too deeply into this matter. I do not want to fire your imaginations or your thoughts and have you all studying astrology as it is taught in the West. I do not desire

that. Here is the point of thought that I am trying to elucidate. A human being is born at a certain time on earth when sun, moon, and stars are in certain positions and have certain aspects to each other, not because he is attracted by them to be born then, but because coming to birth at that moment, the instincts and impulses of his being find, with such conjunctions, oppositions, quadratures, semisextiles, trines, and what not, the open and proper door to physical birth. In other words, such influences as then prevail are they which fit his taking a body at that time. It is the inner man who has the free will and who acts, and who enters life of his own choice, impelled also by his own karma — planetary configurations and aspects and positions, being merely like an open door, define or designate or point out the type or kind of human being who then is coming to birth. Therefore I repeat the old axiom: Stellae non cogunt, agunt; the stars do not compel, they impel. Or, to change the phrase to accord with my last remark: the stars do not make you, they mark you for what you are.

Are there any other questions?

Student — May I ask a question? It is regarding Reichenbach, the German, or Austrian I think he was. We have been told that it is best while sleeping to have the head turned towards the north. Now Reichenbach says that it is even more important to lie on the right side in the northern hemisphere, because the strongest polarity in the human body is not between the head and the feet, but between the right and the left side. He says there is a triple polarity in the human body, the strongest between the right and left side, the next strongest between head and feet, and the third or least strong between the front part of the body and the back.

So if people sleep in the southern hemisphere of the earth, they should lie on the left side. But he seems to say that it is because of another reason almost the opposite of the one that you have given us. It is not because the head, for instance, is the similar pole to the north pole of the earth, but because it is the opposite pole, because opposite poles attract each other, and he had found this fact through his experiments with magnets. The astral of the human body is kept safe just because the right side of the body and the head of the body are of opposite polarity to the north.

It seems rather remarkable to me because, according to our teaching, I understand that the head and the right side of the human body have similar polarity to the north pole, in which case they should repel each other. So if magnetic conditions reign over such things, one ought to sleep less well, perhaps be turned out of the body, by sleeping in the position you recommend.

Reichenbach says he has made several experiments and observed many things. For instance, certain people, weak ladies, sitting in a church for a couple of hours, turned towards the east, have the left side to the north: that is the wrong side, and so they are turned out of the body, and swoon, fall down — in short cannot stand it.

I should be thankful if you could give some explanation of the philosophy of this matter.

G. de P. — Yes, it is a very interesting matter that you have spoken of, and I think Reichenbach has on the whole seized a real truth. But there is one thing that you speak of which, if I understood you aright, perhaps really is that you make a distinction without a difference. The magnet according to modern Occidental theory has two poles, has it not? That which is called the north pole and that which is called the south pole. Now when you put two magnets together, it is the north pole of one magnet which must be presented to the south pole of the other magnet in order that the two shall hang together or cohere. Is not that correct?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — Just so. Therefore the two north ends are pointing in the same direction, and thus do not repel each other. Just so is it with the human body sleeping in bed with the head to the north. The man's positive pole, his north pole, his head, is then pointing to the north pole of the earth, and thus it receives the magnetism coming from the south pole of all objects immediately contiguous to or touching his head. Do you understand me? Do you now follow the thought?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — That is the reason why the north pole, so called, should be pointed to the north. It is also the reason why a man should have his north pole, his head, also directed to the north. It is because the influence,

the magnetism, coming into his north pole, his head, comes from the south pole of the magnet, whatever it may be, visible or invisible, with which his head is in immediate connection. The distance between north pole and head of sleeping man may be small or may be long. But this distance is composed of matter or material things between the north pole and the human head, and thus is like a series of magnets one pendant from the other, in a shorter or longer chain of magnets. In all cases the north poles all point in the same direction to the north pole of the earth. Do you get the idea?

Student — Yes, I now see.

G. de P. — Outside of what I have just said, I doubt very much whether Baron Reichenbach is quite right about sleeping on the various sides of the body. I understand that certain doctors recommend that men should sleep on the right side, due to some theory, I believe, regarding the alleged fact that the heart thereby has freer action, is not compressed. But much more important than that is the following fact: the ideal way to sleep, if human beings could become accustomed to it, is the head to the north or northeast — but best of all is to the north — and the body somewhat curved in bed, with the knees more or less drawn up, not uncomfortably so, and with the feet pointing to the south.

It is a very interesting fact that many ancient peoples buried their dead in this semicircular or curved position,

"sleeping their last sleep." It is also said to be the position of the unborn child in its antenatal sleep. The theory is, the idea is — and it is a fact — that all electromagnetic energies move in spirals or circles. That is their perfect way; and the body lying in the bed thus curved with the head pointing preferably to the north, and with the knees more or less drawn up and the feet pointing south, offers every opportunity for the natural magnetic circulations of the earth to have freest passage through the body, without undergoing an unnecessary resistance. We have nature likewise showing us the unborn child so sleeping.

So far as human beings can do so, I would suggest, indeed strongly urge, that they try to follow this position of the body in sleep. It is not perhaps of high or great importance, because the average healthy body can withstand a great deal.

Are there any other questions?

Student — May I add another point? Modern physicians [[physicists?]] have found out something that corroborates Reichenbach with regard to the right and the left sides of the body. They have found that at each beat of the heart an electric current passes through the body from right to left.

G. de P. — That is true. You say that Reichenbach discovered this?

Student — Yes, the polarity, but not the fact of the electric current. But the newer discovery seems to corroborate his teaching about the polarity.

G. de P. — I think that is true. The head is certainly the north pole of the human body, the feet the south pole; the front of the body, again, is positive, and the back is negative; the right side is positive, and the left is negative. There is thus a triple but uniform current swirling or circling through the body at all times.

Student — I want to be quite clear on this because of my work with the children. When you speak of sleeping with the head to the north and the legs drawn up, does that mean on the back or on one or the other side?

G. de P. — On the side of the body.

Student — With the children I notice that young babies almost invariably lie flat on their backs with the knees drawn up slightly; and three of the older children in my care sleep similarly, and I did not think it was a very good position.

G. de P. — I do not think that it is, unless it occur with a very young child; and in that case I would not disturb him because very young children act from instinct. But in an older child, or in an adult, the conditions are altered. I would not advise anyone to sleep on the back. As a matter of fact it is better to sleep on the

stomach, face down. But I find that the most restful position in the bed is sleeping on either the right side of the body or on the left, and preferably on the right side with the head to the north and with the legs drawn up as I have said, but comfortably so, and with the body at ease — relaxed. Of course, if you try to draw up the legs and use energy and willpower in so doing, you will very greatly disturb your rest, very greatly.

Student — The children I speak of are about seven or eight years old.

G. de P. — That is not old; that is not old at all. I was thinking of older children or of adults when speaking.

Student — Yes, Professor, I quite understand.

G. de P. — I would suggest that after ten years of age any child be advised to try to avoid sleeping on its back. I do not think it is a good thing for adults or for growing children. For babies, of course, I would let them lie just as they seem instinctively to take a position in sleep.

Student — Is there any danger, if one lie constantly on one side and not on the other, of producing an abnormal curvature of the spine?

G. de P. — Just so.

Student — On November 2nd (1930) at the close of the program on Cagliostro you made certain remarks and two of them were as follows: "To every Cagliostro who appears there is always a Balsamo closely accompanying him, and indeed inseparable from every messenger is his shadow." Can these statements be elucidated, if permissible?

G. de P. — I think so. At least I can say something about them here that I could not say in a public meeting.

You have all heard the story of the Christ and his Judas. There is a very interesting meaning to this story. It can be construed as a tale of the betrayal of one human being by another — in other words as just common or current legend. But, as a matter of fact, every human being contains in himself his own Judas, which is the lower, passionate, evil side of his nature.

Coming to the matter of the messengers from the Lodge, every one of the messengers who has appeared thus far has had his or her Judas. I prefer not to define, or rather to specify, who these Judases have been, or who the one is at present. I have my Judas.

It is a strange law in Occultism, and it works out in daily life too, that no spiritual impulse in the present state of human evolution seems able to succeed or to be carried on, or carried out, alone — I mean, unimpeded, unhindered. Every spiritual impulse seems to arouse a corresponding and equivalently powerful reaction, which brings forth as its imbodiment a human Judas, so far as the messengers of the Lodge are concerned.

Giuseppe Balsamo was unquestionably the Judas of Cagliostro. That I think is obvious. The fact has already been spoken of, and there is no reason for hiding it. The one who was the Judas or shadow of the Comte de Saint-Germain seems to be unknown, and perhaps that fact is fortunate too.

And now I want to say something that may sound very odd. There are many mysteries in occultism, and yet they are so fruitful of profitable thought when they are brought to our attention. I go so far as to say that not only does every messenger have his own Judas, but that the Judas is brought forth by the messenger's own acts, and seems karmically destined, in some strange and mysterious way, to be the means, first of hindering the messenger's work, and finally of bringing it into brilliance, into success.

Take the story of the Christian savior, Jesus, called the Christ. It has been said of him that unless there had been a Judas to betray him, and thus to permit the "divine plan" to be carried out, he could not have accomplished his work. Do you understand that idea? It has been similarly said of the Christian Devil, considered as a hypothetical personality, that unless the Devil existed — unless the Devil had existed — what on earth would have been the use of the coming of the Christ?

Now back of this strange and weird story of the Christians there lies an actual esoteric truth that I have tried

to hint at. The messenger cannot do his proper work, and finally does not succeed in his proper work, unless he can bring the Judas forth to oppose him. Is not that a strange, weird, mysterious thing? And yet it is so true.

It thus would seem that the messenger himself is, in a sense, responsible for the Judas who betrays him.

Student — I am reading a book, The Face of Silence by Mukherji. There is much of interest about Ramakrishna who seems to have been a remarkable man, and a messenger of a different type. Is it not true that there are different types of messengers? You see, his terminology is so different from ours. It seems to me that he lacks the theosophical wisdom, but he seems to have a very wonderful insight in many ways.

Would you mind explaining these different types of messengers?

G. de P. — Yes, as far as I can, my dear Brother. I would not call Ramakrishna, or another Hindu, whose name occurs to my mind, Ram Mohun Roy — and indeed there have been a number of similar men —

messengers. The situation is this: a messenger is a certain individual who comes with a mandate from the Lodge of the Masters of wisdom and compassion and peace to do a certain work in the world. But outside of this particular class, set aside, and whom we call the messengers, the human race at different times in its history brings forth great men, sometimes very holy, very good men, highly spiritual, who although they are such cannot technically be called messengers, because they are not sent forth by the Masters with a particular and especial mandate to do certain work in the world. Do you see what I mean?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — So therefore I would not say that Ramakrishna was a theosophical messenger in our sense of the word.

Student — Is there any analogy between this fact of the messenger having to bring forth his Judas, and the individual who is strong bringing out difficulties and obstacles to overcome in his nature, and meeting them?

G. de P. — It is exactly the case. You have put your finger just on the pivotal point of the fact. It is just that.

Student — Thank you.

G. de P. — And I will go a little farther even. You may call the Judas of a messenger his twin, but a twin of the Shadows. It is a strange fact, that as far as I know, as far as I have learned, for every Master of Wisdom who has worked in the world there has been a corresponding Brother of the Shadow.

It seems somewhat like the polar antithesis that was alluded to a little while ago with regard to the physical body. It would seem almost as if a positive pole could not exist unless there exist its equivalent other end, the negative pole. That is the case in the present stage of human evolution.

I believe that I may be wrong in what I am now going to say, because the matter is a very, very deep one. I may be wrong in making the following statement, my Companions, but I believe that this matter of a messenger and his shadow will not always be the case in the far distant future, meaning the seventh round and possibly the sixth round of our planetary chain, for instance. I do not think that the same dreadful — and it is dreadful in a very true sense of the word — that the same dreadful condition will then prevail, that a teacher of light cannot appear in the world without arousing an equivalently powerful force of darkness, force of evil.

Of course, ultimately the light will always prevail. There is a logical reason for it, as we think it over.

Every man who makes a struggle to conquer himself — and I use the word struggle because following the ordinary parlance — instantly arouses exactly opposite energies in his being. He has issued a challenge, and the dark forces in his own character immediately spring to the fore, and they are the things which he must conquer — or perish if he does not. This same fact prevails in all the initiations, and doubtless those of you who are well acquainted with HPB's works will remember some of her hints as to what takes place during the initiations, when the initiant, the neophyte, must face and overcome, or perish — face and overcome himself.

For in the initiation no quarter is given or taken. It cannot be. Either the light must shine, or go out.

Student — May I ask a question, Professor? If we did not have the opposing forces to arouse us and fight us, what incentive would there be for us to strive towards the highest pinnacle of spirituality — if we did not

have to put forth an effort to overcome the lower nature? Is not that the main reason why temptations come upon us?

G. de P. — I think so. On the principle that we are all so well acquainted with, it is by overcoming our faults that we climb. What does the poet say? I do not remember the words exactly: "It is on our dead selves as stepping-stones that we climb to higher things."

Student —

that men may rise on stepping-stones

Of their dead selves to higher things. — Tennyson

G. de P. — That is it exactly. It is a very true saying. Of course the incentive in rising is the sublime victory that the striver knows he will gain in the end. But the process itself consists in rising over our dead selves as stepping-stones to higher things.

Student — Thank you.

G. de P. — It is a beautiful thought.

Student — In Leonid Andreyev's very wonderful mystical story about Judas Iscariot, he depicts Judas in a very different light from that in which we generally think of him. He seems in one part of himself conscious of what he is doing, and he has really a great love for Jesus. In this story he seems impelled in spite of himself to carry out this particular thing that he must do. I was wondering if it would be possible for such a condition of things to be true — if the Judas could be conscious of some higher feeling, but at the same time be obliged to carry out what he must carry out.

G. de P. — In a sense it is not only true, but it contains a great esoteric secret. Please remember that every Judas is a Christ in embryo. Every evil passion in the human being is a divine energy at its heart. It is the straightening of these energies, popularly called the destroying of them — the straightening, the rectifying of them — which once done, makes the man who thus conquers himself so grand and strong, because all his nature thereafter runs upward in one single current of energy.

Even the Judases, although their hatred is terrible, although they fight for their evil life — just as all evil energies do — nevertheless somewhere within their constitution know that their own death means a victory for their own spiritual selfhood. Of course I am employing ordinary human words, death, victory, and so forth. Their own overcoming paradoxically means salvation for themselves. In the Judas the currents are running downwards; in the Buddha, in the Master, the currents are running upwards. But in each case the energies are, relatively speaking, the same. This is a very fascinating subject of thought indeed for mystically inclined minds. Here again we see a reason for the grand old injunction which has come down to us from the gods: "Learn to forgive, learn to love, for this brings harmony and strength." The rule is simple, so simple indeed, that a child can understand it.

Student — May I ask a question about that?

G. de P. — Yes, in just a moment, please. And it is the duty of the Buddha, of the Christ, of the Master, to save his own Judas, and to turn him from being a bitterest foe, a most malignant and uncompromising opponent, into the greatest and most trusted helper. Strange paradox!

Now, you had a question to ask.

Student — We hear in our theosophical work of the necessity of struggling and striving against the lower part of our nature, and this is usually construed as meaning to strive against violent passions. Is it not more likely that we shall be affected by more subtle and what might almost be called negative passions — the absence of doing the right things or of holding the right feelings?

G. de P. — The answer is very easy to give. You are quite right. The most difficult problems we as human

beings have to face lie, I think, not so much in our more violent instincts and impulses and passions, but rather in the subtle energies of our being which steal upon us unawares and capture us by storm, as it were.

You know that every human being considered as an entity has three fundamental inherent qualities which the ancient Hindus called respectively tamas, rajas, and sattwa: otherwise the tamasa, the rajasa and the sattwika qualities. The tamasa qualities are they which you have called the negative qualities. The rajasa qualities are they which you have called the violent passions, the strong and unruly elements of our constitution. The sattwika qualities are they which are the most subtle of all the three classes perhaps, and although standing highest in serial order, they are also the qualities or energies or parts of our constitution which are the most difficult self-consciously to control because the most difficult to understand.

For instance, a man can fail from a good or sattwika impulse just as readily as he can fall from submission to a rajasa or violently passional impulse. As a matter of fact, the most difficult things to conquer in our character are the good parts of us. Is not this a strange paradox? It all means that a man must be completely master of himself, not partially master. He must not allow even his will, or his judgment, or his discrimination

— the higher part of himself in short — to be led astray by his good impulses. He must not do good things unwisely, for any amount of mischief can be caused by unwise action even when trying to do good deeds.

Man must be completely, wholly, entirely, master of himself to be a Master of Life. He must have self-control over all parts of himself. He must be master not only of his body, which we may call the tamasa part; not only of his passionate and psychical part, which we may call the rajasa; but he must also be master of his higher nature, his sattwika part.

I sometimes believe that there is no such thing really as sin, so called, in the world. I have yet to meet a human being whom I could honestly qualify as a deliberately, willfully, malignantly, wicked man — wholly and absolutely so without any reservations whatsoever. In the worst men whom I have ever known I have always managed to discover that the evil things that they do arise more in their attempts at self-adjustment than in any unnatural and unholy love for horrible and repulsive acts and things. This last remark illustrates the point, if I have understood your question aright.

Again, it is the little things which often are very important. It is often the negative, the passive side of our character which leads us astray. Indolence is an instance in point. I have much more hope for a man who is violent in his feelings, violent in his instincts, even violent in his actions, than I have for a man who is drunken with spiritual self-satisfaction, or who is sunken in absolute ethical sleep. And, finally, I am most afraid of the man whose instincts are themselves good, whose impulses are aspiring upwards, but who does not understand himself properly. Such a man though advancing rapidly is nevertheless always in trouble, always in hot water, as the saying goes. Always misunderstanding others he is himself always misunderstood.

So you see with these observations, it seems to me that the only answer that we could give to your question is this: Man must learn to control himself on all planes, to control all parts of his constitution, and then to act impersonally with his heart filled with an impersonal love in self-forgetful service to all that is.

Now I want to say a word about these usual expressions which are so common not only in our literature but in the literature of the world — struggle, fighting, battling — the figures of speech of the battlefield or of the prize-ring. They are very customary in all parts of the world. But I very much question whether victory — to use the same line of thought — whether victory is not more easily gained by not struggling and battling and fighting. You see possibly how dangerous this remark might sound to some who do not grasp my thought.

I believe that the way to win is to win by love, by kindness, by impersonality. I believe that the best way to overcome the lower nature is not by battling it and fighting it, thus exercising it and making it strong and vigorous, but by understanding it to be a part of yourself and by resolutely putting it in its proper place with inflexible and impersonal kindness and gentleness. Sometimes and very often indeed the best way to begin to do this is by completely ignoring it, turning the back upon it.

I have often seen men and women who obviously have passed their lives in fighting themselves, battling themselves, struggling with themselves. The fact was written large all over them. It showed in the way they walked. They were bundles of nerves, red hot nerves. This seems to me a totally wrong psychological method. It is much easier and much more effective quietly to rise above these lower elements of our

constitution, and thus to live in an atmosphere of inner peace and of inner harmony, simply ignoring the ignoble elements in us; and finally they die a natural death. In this way you don't stimulate them and feed them by paying undue attention to them. Just ignore them! Let your heart be filled with harmony, with peace, with impersonal love. That is the real word — with love for all things great and small. The man or woman who is continually in a battle, continually in a struggle, continually in a fight, is really beaten before he has begun to achieve. I do not know whether you follow my thought or not?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — Lao-Tsu of China was a wise old boy, a wise man. His Paradoxes contain more profound psychological truth in this particular line than those of almost any other teacher, than the teachings of almost any other sage. He used to tell his disciples constantly: "Don't fight, don't struggle, don't battle. Be still; be at peace; be harmonious."

Student — Can it be that it all depends upon the part of our constitution with which we identify ourselves? If we identify ourselves with the personal being for whom there is this code of struggle in the world, and see ourselves only in that light, we limit ourselves to that circle. If we identify ourselves with the higher part of our nature, the spiritual part, the part that is going to live and see throughout the whole period of activity, would it not seem that identifying oneself with this last in a way deadens the struggle on the lower planes: that the energies are then so uplifted that they are applied to these wider circles, and that there is not then this life of struggle on the lower planes?

G. de P. — Just so. Just so. What you have said is profoundly true from the psychological standpoint, and it is what I was alluding to a little while agone. It is obvious that if you identify yourselves with your lower nature you will have to battle with it, to fight it, to struggle with it. You are then on that plane. You are then bemeaning yourself. Consequently, why not rise above it all, ignore it all, forget it all? Be at inner peace. If your heart is filled with harmony, your lower nature won't bother you. Remember that every time when you give way to your lower nature you are not only making it more difficult for you at the next time to rise above it, but you are also degrading the very fiber of your constitution. Therefore don't live on the lower planes.

Don't sink to those planes. Don't recognize these other and ignoble things. Be still, there. Be quiet, there. Rise above it all. Live on another plane. It is just as easy, in fact easier — infinitely easier.

Any man or woman who battles with passion — let us take that instance — identifies himself with that passion for the time being and does so at a fearful cost. Don't acknowledge such passion by sinking to its plane. There is the rule. How many of you are strong enough to follow it, and to live in peace, to live in harmony, with all other things? For that is really what it means. Such is the recompense. You ally yourself with the higher parts of your nature, and in consequence you identify yourself thereby with the higher parts of the universe. And I now return to what I said before, I think that all this talk about struggling and fighting and battling is horribly bad psychology.

Student — Is it identifying ourselves with this lower self when we feel remorse or suffer, feeling that we have not lived up to what we know is best in our natures?

G. de P. — Yes, it is true in a very real sense. It is a much less evil way of self-identification with faults that we have committed, or with evil deeds that we have done, than fighting them, struggling with them.

Nevertheless, the abnormal and unwholesome dwelling in thought upon our sins of the past is a self-identification with them, and is a great stumbling block to progress.

Student — What is it in us that suffers when we have made a mistake? It is not the higher self, is it?

G. de P. — It certainly is not. It is not the Christ within you which suffers. It is the Judas which suffers. It is the lower nature which suffers from shame, from anguish, from remorse.

Student — Would not the same pertain to mourning and sorrow for the departed?

G. de P. — Quite true. This may sound a little harsh to some whose hearts are tender. We all love those who have passed on; but after all, when we think about it, to us theosophists how foolish it is to waste our strength

in unwholesome lamentation, in allowing our hearts to be so continually wrung. It is not good. It is not a virtue. It is a weakness. This does not mean, please understand me, that we ought to be hard-hearted. Hard-heartedness is a vice. No human being can escape feeling pain and regret when those he loves have passed on.

That is natural and in a way it is quite proper. But admitting that fact, the unwholesome dwelling in thought upon the virtues of the loved one who has gone, and our own reaction in personal pain and suffering because we are deprived of their companionship — that is indeed foolish and therefore wrong. Let us remember their virtues. Let us hold their memory green in our hearts. Let us love them more than before. That is human, divinely human and proper. All that is one thing; but loud lamentations, or silent lamentations, mourning and mourning and mourning through the months as they pass by — all that is not right.

Student — May I refer for just a moment to the subject of the Judas? On at least two occasions Katherine Tingley spoke at length upon an enemy of Mr. Judge whom she called the man behind the tree; and on one of these occasions that enemy was her enemy. Now is my idea correct that the Judas that follows each teacher like a shadow, or that is brought out by the teacher, is a person, a man among men, or a woman among women, imbodied on this plane? Or is it possibly on another plane — one of the Brothers of the Shadow? I was under the impression from what KT said, that this man behind the tree, who was Mr. Judge's great enemy, was not on this plane.

G. de P. — Answering your question briefly this may be said: the Brothers of the Shadow in certain respects are like the Masters of Wisdom, they may or may not be on this plane. But the Judases, to whom I alluded when first speaking, were all men or women — human beings. Every Master has his shadow. Every messenger has his or her shadow. And this term shadow is not used unadvisedly. It is an individual very closely connected karmically with the messenger, so closely indeed that they may be called as individuals alter egos. There is a strong bond of union between each individual case and his shadow or her shadow.

Student — Thank you.

Student — Could it be true then that when the messenger is withdrawn, the shadow dies or is also withdrawn?

G. de P. — It is so. Almost invariably it either dies or fades out of the picture. Sometimes it happens that the shadow goes first.

Student — Referring to this matter of the lower nature suffering remorse and shame: in that connection I would like to ask where the state of consciousness can be considered to abide? Is it partly in the lower nature?

G. de P. — It is in the lower nature. That fact is just what I have often alluded to when I have spoken of the conscience as being a guide, but by no means an infallible guide; for the simple reason that the higher nature within the lower nature in which the conscience is, is not yet brought forth sufficiently to be an infallible guide. Do you understand?

Student —Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — You see somewhat the same thing even in the beasts. A pet dog, for instance, has the rudiments of a conscience. It knows perfectly well when it has done wrong, at least for the time being. Is not that a fact?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — And this illustrates the question that you have asked. The conscience is the guiding light of the lower nature, and this lower nature is the average human being, that part of his constitution which is the lower human part. The conscience working in it is the higher human part, a part of the divine ray from the inner god, imperfectly expressing itself because the lower nature, the ordinary human part, has not yet been enabled to bring it forth into greater glory. It shines dimly, but still it shines and it is a light.

Student — The Voice of the Silence speaks of losing the very consciousness of desire. When you have spoken to us of the buddhic splendor, does this mean that the consciousness at that time has identified itself with a part of the human constitution above the consciousness of desire mentioned in The Voice of the

Silence? Is it then that the buddhic splendor is visible? Am I putting the question badly?

G. de P. — Well, I think I understand you.

Student — My idea of the expression in The Voice of the Silence, "to lose the very consciousness of desire,"

was what you said about rising above all the temptations and the so-called struggles of the lower planes, so that we might become unconscious of anything that is beneath the higher.

G. de P. — That is right.

Student— Then that is why the buddhic splendor is visible?

G. de P. — Yes. Of course this is a very profound, a very, very deep, subject of thought that you have touched upon. The expression losing all consciousness of desire refers, of course, only to the lower desire.

Remember that desire can be a divine thing as well as a material thing. There are the divine desires.

The buddhic splendor can hardly be said to be seen with the physical eye, although its effects are actually visible in the human being in whom the buddhic splendor shines. The buddhic splendor radiates energies that are instantly sensed. In the man whose lower parts are so filled with evil desires that they entirely control him, it is practically impossible for the buddhic splendor to work. Rising above the desire plane, the plane of the lower desires, the man allies himself with his spiritual parts, and instantly thereafter his whole being becomes irradiated with the buddhic splendor. Have I answered your question responsively?

Student — Yes, so far. I have received the impression this evening that one should rise above even the higher desires and be unconscious of them.

G. de P. — I would not say to rise above them, but to control them.

Student — And be unconscious of them?

G. de P. — Not exactly. For instance, impersonal love is a divine desire, the fundamental desire of the universe. The love that I here speak of is totally impersonal. Now no entity can ever become totally unconscious of love. But even love he must control; in other words, love must control itself. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes, now I do.

G. de P. — It is a subtle point, of course.

Now, Companions, before closing I would like to make a few brief remarks with regard to the life that the chela should follow. Training in chelaship, please understand to be training of and in your own constitution, the energies which are you. It is not something outside of you imposed upon you as a strange or outer code or course of conduct. This training means bringing forth ever more into ever fuller manifestation your own inner self, your spiritual self within, the spiritual-divine part of you. It means being truly natural in the spiritual sense of the word, and therefore quiet. Be quiet. Be at peace. Be still. Be harmonious. Live in love, impersonal love. Strive always for that which you feel and find to be noblest and best, and let the rest go. Be yourself, your spiritual self.

There is all the training of chelaship in a few words. Bring out the inner god; and when you realize that even ordinary human beings know somewhat of this, and find happiness and peace in practising this, you will realize what I mean when I say: the training is in you. Avoid struggling. Avoid battling. Avoid striving within yourself. Search for the inner harmony. Be it. Find the love within you. Be it. Search out your own mind, intellect, intuition — all the faculties of which these three are examples. Be them! Do you understand?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — Very good then. And now you will easily see the next thought. Forget yourself. Is not this a

strange paradox? Forget all the lower self. Be your higher self; and the time will come when you will even have to forget that. For the ultimate end of every human being is to become a self-conscious but impersonal energy in the universe. That is what the laws of nature are today. Every so-called law of nature, such as gravitation, is an instance of one of them. Electromagnetic energy is an instance of another, although gravitation and electromagnetic energy are like two sides of the same thing. This is an instance of energies, impersonal energies, flowing forth from the heart of a divinity who in some far bygone aeon — manvantara

— was a man.

Mr. Judge used to teach his pupils, his friends, always to look to the Master within. That is a beautiful thought, for within every one of you lives a Master even at present. Do you think the Masters are born as Masters? Indeed, when a Master is born as a little child he has to go through all the life that little children have to go through. He has to conquer himself in the new life stage by stage. But because he has been through it so often, the goal is achieved very rapidly, and by the time youth is reached he is already a most remarkable individual. When young manhood comes he already is a Master, but still not expressing in full perfection all his inner faculties and powers. And then comes middle age, or early middle age, adulthood, and the Master then is there in full bloom, a quasi god-man. Masterhood could not have expressed itself unless it had been already within. Therefore I say: within each one of you lives a Master, as Mr. Judge used to teach. Carry this thought with you, aspire towards this goal. Look for it. Try to be one with it. This effort will bring you peace and wisdom.

Close the meeting, please.

[The sounding of the gong. Silence.]

Meeting 28

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Twenty-Eight

Meeting of February 24, 1931

G. de P. — Will you please sound the gong. I am ready now to answer questions.

Student — My question was rather difficult to phrase verbally so I have written it out: In The Secret Doctrine, volume II, page 228, there occurs the following:

"As to those 'Sons of Wisdom' [Manasaputras or Kumaras] who had 'deferred' their incarnation till the Fourth Race, which was already tainted (physiologically) with sin and impurity, they produced a terrible cause, the Karmic result of which weighs on them to this day. . . .

"This was the 'Fall of the angels,' because of their rebellion against Karmic Law."

Then on page 246, same volume:

". . . the Secret Doctrine teaches that the Fire-Devas, the Rudras, and the Kumaras, the 'Virgin-Angels,' . . . the divine 'Rebels' . . . preferred the curse of incarnation and the long cycles of terrestrial existence and rebirths, to seeing the misery (even if unconscious) of the beings (evolved as shadows out of their Brethren) through the semi-passive energy of their too spiritual Creators. .

. . To do this they had to give up their natural status and, descending on our globe, take up their abode on it for the whole cycle of the Mahayuga, thus exchanging their impersonal individualities for individual personalities — the bliss of sidereal existence for the curse of terrestrial life. This voluntary sacrifice of the Fiery Angels, whose nature was Knowledge and Love, was construed by the exoteric theologies into a statement that shows 'the rebel angels hurled down from heaven into the darkness of Hell.' . . ."

HPB's Theosophical Glossary defines the manasa-dhyanis as "the Solar Ancestors of Man, those who made of Man a rational being, by incarnating in the senseless forms of semi-ethereal flesh of the men of the third race."

And under manasa: "The Pitris are identical with the Kumara, the Vairajas, the ManasaPutra (mind sons), and are finally identified with the human 'Egos.'"

It was these passages that gave me the idea that the manasaputras and our higher egos were one and the same.

Will you please elucidate further? I am yet somewhat mystified.

G. de P. — It is not surprising that you should be mystified. I have often wondered why so many of you in your questions touch upon the most recondite problems of our philosophy. Your minds seem to run to them.

Can it be that there is an instinct working in your minds or in your hearts which really is an intuition?

As I recollect, you formerly asked whether the manasaputras (sometimes called the manasa-dhyanis or the solar devas, the rudras, or the vairajas, the Sons of Flame or the solar lhas) were the same as our egos; and the answer is obviously, no, they are not. Nevertheless they are "identified" with our egos. This may seem a very strange thing to say. It is one of the paradoxes which we so frequently meet with in our studies. You will please remember, dear Companions, that a paradox is not a contradiction. A paradox is a statement of two facts or two sides of a question, two aspects of a question, which in fact mutually complement or support each other, but which when put thus into juxtaposition seem to those who do not know all the details to contradict each other.

The human constitution is composed of a number of elements. Man is a composite being. He is an aggregate.

He is not an inseparable unity. He has distinct elements or principles in his composition, consequently he is not a simple unit but is at least a septenary entity. The seven parts of his constitution consist of elements or

principles derived from the sevenfold elements or principles of the solar system. There is in man a sun-or solar element, a moon-or lunar element. There is in man a Mars element, a Saturn, a Jupiter, a Mercury element, a Venus, as well as an Earth element. All these elements, or element-principles or principle-elements, when combined by karmic destiny, form man. Man is called man because his consciousness in the present stage of his evolution is centered in what is called the manasa-part of his constitution. This manasa part is the lower part of the essential characteristic of the solar devas, otherwise called the manasaputras or the vairajas.

Man is not yet self-conscious in the higher manasic part of his constitution, which when evolved forth will make of him a manasaputra, a manasa-dhyani, a solar deva. He then will function in the sun part of his constitution. The lower part of his manas we call the lunar part, the moon part, and it is this moon part which came over from the moon. The solar part of us is not yet awakened to full self-consciousness in our constitution; but we are beginning to become cognizant of this higher egoity in us, although we are not yet self-consciously it.

The manasaputras — or the solar element in our constitution — are progressed or evolved egos from a previous manvantara, who attained manasaputric dhyan-chohanship when the moon-chain went into pralaya.

When the time came for the earth-chain to begin its evolutionary progress as a chain, these manasa-dhyanis, who are essentially solar gods, although they came from the moon-chain, waited in their own realms until conditions on the earth-chain were appropriate for their manifestation. Then, being as they are members of the cosmic order of buddhic compassion, their opportunity came to inflame the mankind of the third root-race on this fourth globe in this fourth round. Hence it is clear that these manasa-dhyanis, being progressed or evolved egos or individualities from a previous manvantara, are not we humans, and yet they are identified with us because they inflamed us. They aroused into activity our own latent manasic self-consciousness. They warmed us or inspired us with their own manasic rays. They set our own egoity on fire, brought it into active function. In every man today, even yet, although he is fully self-conscious only in his lower manas, the ray from his individual manasaputric savior or awakener or inflamer still works upon him and through him in its own native splendor.

These manasaputras are not our human egos which are the parts of us which were inflamed into becoming self-consciously functioning; nevertheless a vivid ray in each human being comes to him from the manasaputra which set his sleeping lower ego on fire — awakened it. The manasaputras are, therefore, at once we and not we. They are we because we still are bathed in their spiritual flame, but they are not we because we are ourselves. Each one of us is his own human ego.

In similar fashion we human beings, when our own earth-chain shall have reached the end of its seventh round at the end of the earth-manvantara, will become manasaputric dhyan-chohans if we make the race of evolution successfully. Then we shall be manasaputras in our turn, because we shall then have awakened the full manasaputric or solar element in us; and it will be our turn in the planetary chain which will be the child of this earth-chain to overshadow, to set aflame the divine fire of self-consciousness in the hosts of lives now trailing after us, which hosts will be the humanity of that future planetary chain. I refer specifically here to what we now call the beasts, all the hosts of the beasts.

I will try to make a little clearer to you what happened at the so-called "descent" of the manasaputras in the third root-race in this fourth round on this globe. Consider a beast, a beloved horse or pet dog: it is quite possible if one knows the magic of it for a human being to incarnate or imbody a ray from his own self-consciousness into the beast, send a ray from himself into the beast mind, and thus set that beast mind aflame, quicken it, vivify it, arouse it, thus bringing forth the beast's own latent faculties — much as fire warms your body bringing out its natural latent heat, quickening the vibration of the molecules of the body, thus producing heat.

Of course, such an act today would be an act of black magic, not an act of white magic, and this is because the beasts are not yet prepared to receive the manasaputric incarnation. I am using this illustration merely to show you in some degree what took place during the third root-race. Were any one of you to do such an act with your favorite pet, you would be performing an act nearly equivalent to what a manasa-dhyani did to any one of you as an individual human during the third root-race.

There is this great difference to remember, however: it is an analogy, an illustration, and not an identic set of circumstances. Humanity even during the third root-race were not beasts. Man has been human from the beginning. This is an important distinction that you must remember, please. Nevertheless, the above illustration will show you somewhat of the modus operandi, of how the thing is done, and it becomes at once obvious therefore by this illustration that the projected manasaputric ray is not the quickened, vivified, inflamed, newly-brought-into-being ego of the beast-pet, but is yourself. Yet, in a certain sense, it is the beast ego too because thus inflamed and thus vivified, it is bathed in the spiritual splendor of your self-consciousness, and draws its vivifying intellectual life from that spiritual self-consciousness.

The karmic time comes in the spiritual and psychological history of mankind when this act of self-sacrifice on the part of the manasa-dhyanis is called for by evolution, and it becomes the duty of the manasaputras to do it.

This act is sometimes spoken of in the ancient literatures as the time of the incarnation of the gods in men, when the gods walked familiarly with men. There is nothing very wonderful or strange about this fact. The identic thing happens today, but after a different manner, in a different way.

When a child goes to school, the teacher awakens its mind. The teacher sets the child's latent faculties aflame, develops or evolves its latent intellectual and psychic powers; and he does it by companionship, by teaching, by example, by appeal. It is the same fact, the same event, but in much smaller degree. We act upon each other and react against each other every day in precisely the same way. Consider how imitative children are, how they copy their teachers and preceptors and parents.

There is something else, and it is a lesson which we can draw from this fact regarding the great care that should be exercised in choosing proper teachers for our little ones. The influence of a bad teacher can be very pernicious indeed on the developing mind of the child.

Some of the ancient literatures have referred to this general rule of nature in various ways. Some speak of it as the passing on of light, others as the communicating of knowledge. Initiation is exactly the same thing, but in a particular set of circumstances. The initiator awakens the higher or spiritual ego in the initiant, brings him to a second birth, a new birth — that of the higher ego; brings out the native faculties and powers of the higher ego, and thus makes him for the time being a quasi-god, a demigod.

What took place in the case of the descent of the manasaputras at the time of the third root-race is simply a grand example, an example in the large, of what takes place in the case of every individual human being today as he grows from childhood to adulthood. In each instance the rule is the same: the quickening of latent faculties, the setting aflame of hitherto sleeping powers within.

So it becomes obvious, therefore, that these manasaputras belonging to the order of buddhic compassion — as we also do as chelas — did their work as an act of compassion. It was a self-sacrifice on their part because with them the act was complete and whole. They actually incarnated in the latent humanity of the third root-race, and awakened it, intellectually quickened it, and made the hitherto quasi-senseless, intellectually somnolent or sleeping man, truly man. Therefore I say that even today the manasaputra of each individual overshadows him. You cannot call it the higher ego, because the higher ego is an essential part of each one of you although not yet awakened, but it will be awakened as evolution does its work in the future. Therefore I say again: the manasaputras are in one sense we; in another sense they are not we. The manasaputras are identified with our egos because they brought our egos forth, but actually they themselves are not our egos.

Take the beast again, in order to make this matter more clear. The beast has everything in it that you have.

The horse, the dog, the giraffe, the elephant, the rhinoceros, the cock — any beast — has everything in it that you have, everything. But the higher faculties are not awakened, they have not been set aflame, they have not become self-conscious. There is in each one of you a manasa-dhyani, a manasaputra, in addition to the one which awakened you as an individual; but this essential manasaputra within, you have not yet yourself evolved into becoming. You have not yet become this higher part of your own egoity.

I do trust that this explanation is clear to you. Is it?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — Very well, then we can pass on to other questions.

Student — Is the divine monad in the human constitution synonymous with the inner god, or is it a different entity?

G. de P. — No, it is the inner god. But don't confound it with the divine monad of the inflaming or awakening manasaputra.

Student — No, I will not. I have two or three questions. First, you spoke in the first place of the animals that become human beings in the next manvantara — the present animals. Of course that must include the animal monad in our present constitution.

G. de P. — Do you mean the animal monad in the constitution of each human being, or the animal monads of the beasts?

Student — No, the animal monad in the human constitution.

G. de P. — Then my answer is, no. I was referring to the animal monads of the beasts.

Student — Yes, but I wondered if you were also referring to what I said.

G. de P. — No, I was not.

Student — Another thing puzzles me very much. The manasaputra has assumed responsibility for us, and I understand perfectly why it is so from your explanation. But the spiritual monads take care of us between incarnations; and the spiritual monads, you told us a month ago, are not the same as the manasaputras. I cannot quite understand how that happens; and I wondered whether the spiritual monads are making the outer rounds with us between incarnations.

G. de P. — Pardon me, Doctor. May I interrupt lest there be confusion here. Did you correctly understand what I said when you say that I said that the spiritual monads were not our manasaputras?

Student — Well, I asked that question four weeks ago and I understood you to say they were not.

G. de P. — We have come back here to the same confusion. Which manasaputra do you mean: the one sleeping in us, or the one which inflamed us?

Student — Oh! the one which inflamed us.

G. de P. — They are quite different.

Student — Yes. But it is the spiritual monad, I understand, in whose bosom we sleep between incarnations.

G. de P. — It is the individual's own spiritual monad in whose bosom the human monad sleeps between incarnations. That is correct. That is quite right.

Student — So it is the spiritual monad — which is another entity and not the inflaming manasaputra — who takes care of us between incarnations? And it is the awakening or inflaming manasaputra that takes care of us during incarnations. Is that correct?

G. de P. — That is quite correct from one standpoint; and I say this because I understand what you mean. Let me point out that the one which you call the spiritual monad is actually the individual's own manasaputra. But it is not the manasaputra which inflamed or awakened the latent intellectual powers in the individual. Do you now understand?

Student — Thank you, yes, I do.

Student — Is this manasaputra that inflames us, or who inflamed us, our parent-star?

G. de P. — No, no. The parent-star of any individual is the source of the divine-spiritual part of his constitution. The manasaputra which inflamed us is another entity, another individuality, having its own parent-star — possibly the same parent-star.

Student — Is there another relationship then between the manasaputra and us?

G. de P. — When you speak of the manasaputra, do you mean those entities who sacrificed themselves in order to help or awaken mankind intellectually?

Student — Yes, Professor.

G. de P. — The relation is a karmic one. For instance, I might ask you: what is the relation between you and me? We are friends, we would do much for each other. We would help each other to the end. That friendship builds up karmic ties which are bound to draw us closer together, in the spiritual sense, all the time. Now just take this same thought and trace in your mind the evolution of an unself-conscious god-spark through the aeons. It builds up ties or links, karmic bonds, with other god-sparks more or less advanced than it. They act and react upon each other, and the more advanced god-spark has a karmic responsibility as regards the less advanced god-sparks. The relationship is closely parallel to the relationship existing between us human beings and the beasts trailing along behind us. The human race has treated the beasts, as a rule, abominably, ignobly, so that this treatment has formed and is forming steadily through the ages karmic ties of a most intimate kind. And the human race will feel, when the time comes for it, these karmic bonds acting upon it, pulling it or attracting it to help the beasts. Such is the relationship. It is composed of karmic ties originated in past manvantaras.

I hope that I have made the thought clear to you.

Student — Yes, you have. Thank you.

Student — When we become manasaputras, will the manasaputras who inflamed us then withdraw?

G. de P. — They will not withdraw. They will have advanced by that time to become gods — full-blown gods. They will then be our divine guides. We as manasaputras will still look up to them as gods, just as we humans now unconsciously look to our inflaming manasaputra-guides as gods.

Student — Could you tell us what happens to the manasaputras who came to awaken our manasaputras after we die? Surely they must have another course than ours to follow.

G. de P. — Do you mean after our physical body dies?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — The manasaputras which inflamed us, or awakened us, during the third root-race, did so because of the karmic bonds of which I have just spoken. These karmic bonds cannot be ruptured at the death of a physical body and thereafter cease to exist. Also each new act becomes a new cause, the karmic bonds continuing to change through the ages. Consequently, when such an insignificant act as the death of the human body occurs — insignificant from the standpoint of the inflaming manasaputra — it has no effect on the inflaming manasaputra at all, nor on its relationship with the ego which it is still overshadowing, and to a certain extent guiding and inflaming. The ties continue through the devachanic period, through the succeeding incarnation, and so on through the ages. Indeed, if you pause a moment in thought, you will see that if karmic ties could be ruptured absolutely, the universe itself could not cohere. It is held together by karmic ties existing mutually among all its parts high and low.

Student — I thought perhaps that between births, between incarnations, the manasaputra had another course to follow.

G. de P. — Oh! The manasaputra which inflamed us is evolving in its own high sphere just as we are

evolving here. In many, many cases, perhaps in most cases, the manasaputra which inflamed any human individual is scarcely conscious at the present time that it is the directing genius of some human being. Again, the human body is composed of atoms, of unself-conscious god-sparks. These atoms cohere, are held together, in the body by reason of the encompassing and permeating life of the man. These atoms are, furthermore, his children, his offspring, parts of his own vital essence, attracted back to him in each new life.

When the body dies, although these atoms pursue their many, many, many and various peregrinations, and through all the kingdoms, nevertheless they are permeated all the time by a mysterious attraction to each other because they all come from the same source, the same fountain of life which pours forth from the heart of the man whose body they now form. These atoms are like a vital stream. They all belong to the one life-stream.

The manasaputra which inflamed us is evolving on its own lofty plane all the time. It has its destiny as we have ours. Its inflaming of us is but an incident in its karmic career.

I have told you before, Companions, that to speak of the descent of the monads, or even of the manasaputras, is correct as a figure of speech, but this descent is not to be understood as an actual falling down through space into a human body. That is not the idea, nor is it the fact. It is called a descent because it is a descent or change from a higher state to an inferior state. It is somewhat as if a man were partially to incarnate in a beast body in order to give that beast entity a modicum of self-consciousness; meanwhile he might or might not be pursuing his regular avocations. Such an act of psychological magic would not be a descent or a falling through physical space into the beast body, but it would be a descent in the sense of changing a noble degree for an inferior degree.

Student — When you say that the manasaputras inflamed us, what do you mean by "us"?

G. de P. — I thought that I had made that point clear. I mean the undeveloped man, or humanity, of the third root-race in this fourth round on this earth. Those then imperfectly developed or evolved human beings were not beasts. Physically speaking, they were psycho-astral bodies evolved by the lowest class of the lunar pitris who could indeed build a body having animation, having a certain low grade of psychic energy, having physical heredity and so forth; but these lunar pitris could not endow those imperfectly developed beings with mind, because they themselves had it not. The mind was undeveloped. It was there indeed, but unawakened, latent. It was not self-consciously there. Consequently, those men of the early third race lived, as it were, in a trance, in a daydream, very much as a little child with us lives for a year or more after it is born. The human child is not a beast. It has a human physical body. But there is as yet no self-conscious mind there. The germs of mind are indeed there, but mind itself is not yet brought forth, it is not awakened, it is sleeping. Then slowly, as the days and months and years pass, the watchful mother will see the sparkle of intelligence come into the child's eye. Even its acts become different.

It was just so with the third root-race in its first portion, when men lived as it were, in a trance, in a daydream.

They grew from childhood to maturity and then died, but all in a daze, remaining in a childlike state their whole life long. There are human beings today who, many of them, live somewhat like that. They are not really fully awake. It is of course perfectly true that they are much more evolved now than the third-race men were then, but nevertheless these present-day individuals that I speak of are only imperfectly developed psychically, mentally, morally, and spiritually. They have not really awakened. The work of the manasaputras, as regards these individuals, was achieved much later in human evolution, perhaps even not until the fourth root-race. These are instances of the cases where some of the manasaputras — as you may read in HPB's The Secret Doctrine — put off their work of compassion until a much later time than others.

Student — The Secret Doctrine speaks of the lower kingdoms, the beast kingdom for instance, being made from the cast-off "skin" of the early humanities.

G. de P. — That is essentially quite right.

Student — Does that not make the kingdoms inseparable from us, thus forming the karmic bond that requires our firing or quickening them when we in our turn pass upwards to the plane of the manasaputras?

G. de P. — You have caught the thought exactly. That is exactly right. We and they are all bound together.

No entity can possibly live unto itself alone. We help each other and hurt each other whether we will or

whether we nill. It is our duty to help each other deliberately and with a will, rather than to hurt each other deliberately and with a will. This is the difference between the great man and the man who is not great.

Now listen carefully because this is a difficult subject: the beasts, at least the mammalians, the higher classes of the beasts, are bone of our bone, flesh of our flesh, blood of our blood, because originally they came from us. We were not beasts, but the beasts were born from us — inferior entities that the human race cast off mostly in the second and third root-races. I have tried to explain this mystery in other lectures, and you will find it set forth more or less clearly in the book Theosophy and Modern Science [Republished in 1941 as Man in Evolution].

Student — At a preceding lecture you said, if I remember correctly, that the beasts were a class of elementals. Now are they more advanced and for that reason have they been pushed into this plane, or are they on this plane for some other reason, from some other cause?

G. de P. — The beasts, you mean?

Student — Yes. One gets the impression from reading, and from what one hears of the elemental kingdom, that the beasts are not at the point of evolution that some of the denizens of the elemental kingdom hold.

Some of the elementals are actively hostile, some are actively friendly; and many of the entities of the beast kingdom do not seem to be so developed.

G. de P. — You speak of the elemental kingdom, but please remember that the elemental range of life is divided into three distinctly separate kingdoms: the least evolved or original, then the intermediate, and then the most evolved. These three kingdoms of the elementals can themselves be again subdivided into at least seven subdivisions for each kingdom. There may be and probably are ten or twelve subdivisions for each kingdom. This makes, therefore, twenty-one, it may be thirty, or thirty-six, different classes or families or groups of elemental beings, ranging from the least advanced in evolution to the most advanced. Every entity, high, low, or intermediate, in the universe, passes through the elemental stage at some time in its career. We human beings were elementals once, and have passed through all three kingdoms of the elementals. The gods did the same. Every unself-conscious god-spark will become an elemental at some time in the course of its evolution.

Elemental, as a word, is to be construed in its exact etymological sense, meaning the element of an entity which will in the future attain developed self-consciousness, when that element or elemental shall have brought out from within itself, by unrolling, unwrapping, unfolding, what is locked up within it. In other words the god-spark will slowly unfold through the ages its latent powers and faculties.

Now the beasts, all of them from the smallest infusoria up to the ape, are elementals. The ape is on the threshold of becoming a human being. The ape is the highest class of imbodied elementals on this earth.

Some of the beasts are low in the scale of elemental lives. So much for that part of the subject, looking at it as an end-to-end line or series of entities, one behind or following the other.

Now let us change our standpoint of vision, and look at the elementals from a new standpoint. There are spiritual elementals, and those less spiritual. There are elementals ethereal. There are astral elementals belonging to the astral world, some classes of which are much more material than others. In other words, the elementals comprise a vast range of beings, and they are called such because they are new to this cosmic plane or series of cosmic planes. They live and work in the elements of this cosmic plane. Do you grasp that thought?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — Good. Now let's take a long leap ahead. When we humans shall have become gods, full-blown gods, in our present cosmos or universe with its seven cosmic planes, and when we shall then prepare to leave our present universe in order to pass into a higher universe, we shall enter the sevenfold planes as elemental beings in that higher universe, although we shall have attained the status of gods in this universe.

Hence you see again the reason for speaking of the god-spark at the heart of every entity beginning its

evolutionary pilgrimage. Every cosmic range of life, or every universe, is a new and wonderful adventure for the entities which enter it. They begin of course at the beginning. They go through all the evolutionary experiences in that new universe, and finally leave it as full-blown gods — for that universe only — in order to begin a new series of experiences in a universe more sublime still.

The beasts are elementals, but there are different kinds of beasts. Some are much more evolved than other beasts are. There are also certain elementals that in this manvantara of our planetary chain will never enter beast bodies. This is because they are not yet ready. But all the beasts that exist today, which is the same as saying that have existed in the past, are on their way to become men, not at all according to the Darwinian theory, but because they will slowly evolve forth from within themselves the latent or dormant spiritual and intellectual powers and faculties. Thus they are inevitably destined to pass through the human phase, to attain the human stage or grade.

So far as the shapes and forms of the elementals in their three kingdoms are concerned, or what comes to the same thing, in their twenty-one or thirty-six classes, they have many kinds of shapes or bodies, some very spiritual, almost arupa — formless; others being definitely rupa or form-like. Some are spiritual, some are ethereal, some are astral. The elementals are all passing through the different respective phases of their evolutionary journey, just as we humans are. Some of the elementals of the highest classes have a human form or shape, or at least quasi-human. If you could see them you might possibly think that they were ethereal human beings of rather strange form; and yet you would pause in your opinion because they would seem to be so strange. To you there would be something weird about them. You would say, manlike, most certainly so; but yet they are not men. They have a quasi-human shape. They evidently copy men. The influence of humans evidently affect them greatly, so that they automatically and distinctly take on somewhat of the human form and shape — but yet they are not men.

It is to this fact that the medieval mystics in European countries have alluded when they spoke of the four great classes of unevolved beings, and called them gnomes, undines, salamanders, and sylphs — respectively elementals of the cosmic elements earth, water, fire, and air. These titles are merely names of course. But all the elementals of whatever class and of whatever type are on their way to becoming men. In order to become men they must first pass through the beast stage. This does not necessarily mean the beasts that we know, but means evolutionary stages equivalent to the beast stage with us. This is a stage below self-consciousness, or the human stage. Do you follow all this?

Many Voices — Yes, Professor.

G. de P. — The world is full of lives. There are elementals in the air that we breathe. There are elementals in our bloodstream, in our brain matter. It is the elementals which form the babe in the womb. It is the elementals by which we grow physically. They follow instinctively, automatically, nature's fundamental laws, and men unconsciously make use of them. It is by elementals that we cook our food. It is elementals that drive our electric trains, our automobiles. It is the elementals that give us our energy to move leg or limb or eye. It is the elementals within us that enable the heart to beat.

Every such elemental began as an unself-conscious god-spark, is now on its way to become a man, and is passing through the beast stage, or a stage equivalent to the beast. Each such elemental will finally blossom out into becoming a full-blown god, a divinity — grand, glorious, nature's most perfect evolutionary work —

thereafter, however, only to begin in a new cosmic world or series of worlds a new range of wonderful adventures, but much higher than the one last gone through.

Student — May I ask then if these elementals are not really agents of karma?

G. de P. — They are. Everything is an agent of karma; but in saying so please do not think that karma is an abstract law or entity outside of us. Karma is whatever is. Whatever is, is karmic — karmic consequences.

Student — Could you tell something about the way in which the law of Karma acts? I mean if one performs a certain act, is there something inherent in that act which has the power — I hardly know how to express it!

Are there elementals or spirits or beings of some sort who cause the effect to come about?

G. de P. — The elementals cause it. Humans cause it. The gods cause it. Let me tell you what karma really is.

From one standpoint, it is consequences, results — that is, the effect of an energy, the effect of a force.

Consequently, the cause is an entity which acts, acts from powers innately belonging to it. It acts from and of itself. Then surrounding nature, composed of other entities, instantly reacts. The act is the cause, the reaction is the effect. The entity reacts to the reaction, thus producing cause two. Then surrounding nature reacts to the action two. And so it goes on. Karma otherwise is the adjustment between action and reaction; action originated by and in some entity, the reaction abiding in surrounding lives which react against the act. That is all there is to it. There is no such thing as karma existing apart from entities.

Please do not make the mistake of imagining that karma is a kind of thing that exists apart from us. It is not.

There is no such thing. For instance, many people imagine that gravitation is a kind of law of nature to which things are subject. It is not so. Gravitation is merely the working of forces of attraction inherent in acting entities. There are no such things as laws of nature apart from entities which act. It is the acting entity which produces or originates karma. Karma, therefore, is the entity itself in the last analysis.

Student — May I ask a question about avataras? In The Mahatma Letters to A. P. Sinnett, there is a statement indicating that there are still a few avataras on earth. Could you throw some light on this?

G. de P. — I think so. The reference to avataras was a general one and not to specific avataras which are taken as types, like Jesus, or Sankaracharya, or even Gautama the Buddha who was an avatara of a certain type. The meaning in The Mahatma Letters was that certain human individuals even today, sunken in matter as the human race is, nevertheless have attained a more or less self-conscious union with the god within and thus have become avataras of that inner god. The Masters themselves are such avataras, you understand.

Specifically, however, and if the word is used without any qualifying adjective, avatara means what I have already told you on several occasions.

Student — You stated at one of these meetings that there were human beings on the earth-chain, on globe A, or rather who were there when we arrived there, whom today we call Masters and Buddhas. I want to ask who they were and where they came from, and if their being what they are is connected with the period of choice in the fifth round — of course I mean the fifth round on the moon-chain?

G. de P. — Yes, it is. The individuals to whom you allude as having attained humanity on globe A or the first globe, even in the first round, were the highest class of the monads coming over from the moon-chain. They were the elders of the stream of lives coming over from the moon, who were so far advanced even on the moon-chain that they became the elders and guides of the lives of the new planetary earth-chain.

Student — Were they the ones that failed to go through on the moon-chain? Would you tell us about the period of choice and what happens to those that fail to go through, and if those were the ones that led on this earth-chain?

G. de P. — What do you mean by the expression, failed to go through?

Student — I understood from what HPB says in The Secret Doctrine that during the fifth round there comes the great period of choice for humanity, and that a certain portion of humanity will not be far advanced enough in evolution to be allowed to go forward, and therefore that they go to sleep, whilst the remainder of humanity go forward. If that is correct, it seems that when the new earth-chain is formed these followers naturally having already gone through four and a half or five rounds, would be the elders of the next humanity. I wondered if that was where the Masters and the Buddhas came from?

G. de P. — You are quite right, and you have explained it well, on the whole. In every planetary chain during the course of its seven rounds there comes what is technically called the period of choice, the final choice.

This is always in the fifth round when the manasic part of the constitution of the evolving entities reaches its maximum of development in that planetary manvantara. It is in the manas that resides the human willpower, and the human intelligence, and the human self-consciousness. These three are practically one.

Take our own earth-chain, for instance. We are now in the fourth round. The next round will be the fifth.

When we as human beings shall reach the fourth globe or earth during the fifth round, this fourth globe will

be the turning point in the fifth round, and then we must make our "final choice" for this planetary chain. If we shall have evolved forth sufficiently the spiritual powers within us to enable us to climb the hill of the sixth round and afterwards of the seventh round, we shall leave this chain as full-blown self-conscious gods

— dhyan-chohans. If we have not reached sufficient strength of will and of spiritual intuition, if during the fifth round we shall not have become sufficiently allied with the god within us, each individual with his inner god, then we shall not be able to make successfully the run up the grade of the sixth and the seventh rounds.

We shall sink into obscuration, into a sort of aeons-long sleep, until the next planetary manvantara — until the new planetary chain, the child of the earth planetary chain. Then we shall come forth again into evolutionary manifestation as highly evolved human beings, and have our new chance during the new earth-chain. Do you understand?

Many Voices — Yes.

Student — As you have said that all entities must begin as unself-conscious god-sparks in passing from one manvantara, or one chain of globes, to another, like the dhyan-chohans — those who attained dhyan-chohanship on the moon-chain — I suppose that these came on to this earth-chain as unself-conscious god-sparks, and had to go through all the stages of evolution, and hence they must have been human beings at some time on this earth — these manasaputras. Do I explain what I mean?

G. de P. — I think so, Doctor. May I ask the Recorder to read the question. [Question read.]

I am afraid I do not quite understand that question, Doctor. I may point this out. It may help you. I do not think that I said that the entities leaving one chain afterwards enter the next chain as unself-conscious god-sparks. Because they do not.

Student — Then I misunderstood.

G. de P. — I said that they leave one universe in order to go to the next succeeding and higher universe as unself-conscious god-sparks for that new universe.

Student — Then I misunderstood. I thought everything had to go through all the stages on a new chain.

G. de P. — That is true also.

Student — Then I suppose if they have to go through all the stages, the manasaputras must at some time have had to pass through the human stage on the earth.

G. de P. — No, because the manasaputras are evolved or progressed egos from a previous manvantara and are not bound to go through the lowest, the lower, the intermediate, and the higher, stages on the earth-chain succeeding the moon-chain. In other words, a full-grown man does not go back into the kindergarten when he moves to a new town.

Student — But when he is reborn he has to form a new body.

G. de P. — Yes, that is true. But please understand that the manasaputras who inflamed us or awakened us are not egos now belonging to our own planetary chain. They are, however, karmically connected with us.

They are entities who in past manvantaras attained humanity and then dhyan-chohanship. They live in their own realms. On the other hand, even the dhyan-chohans who attained dhyan-chohanship when the moon-chain was ended, in the beginning of the new earth-chain must pass a short period in the elementary stages of the new earth-chain, because it is that which they help to build.

For instance, a human being in the beginning of every new reincarnation must pass through all the stages of the growth of the physical body from life-germ to adultship, although he has often been a man before in other incarnations. He must begin the new body as a life-germ. Do you understand me?

Student — Yes. That is exactly what I meant.

G. de P. — And pass through all the stages of intrauterine life before he is born as a babe and can grow into a man again. But that is merely his body and has no reference to the god within him. It is not the god who becomes the life-germ. The god is the product of past manvantaras of humanity. Is the answer responsive?

Student — Yes, quite so, I think. They have to go through —

G. de P. — Whom are you speaking of when you say they?

Student — The manasaputras who were dhyan-chohans on the moon-chain. They are manasaputras on this chain, and they have to use the elementals. Is that correct?

G. de P. — That is correct.

Student — And they have to use all these different forms which will inhabit earth. So I should think that they would also have to use a human form for a short time.

G. de P. — Do you speak of the manasaputras from the moon-chain?

Student — They were dhyan-chohans in the moon-chain. I understand these dhyan-chohans on the moon-chain are our manasaputras.

G. de P. — Do you mean those who inflamed us or our own latent ones?

Student — I mean those who inflamed us.

G. de P. — No, Doctor. The manasaputras who inflamed us are the highly progressed entities from far past manvantaras.

They dwell in their own spiritual realms; but not being sufficiently high to be completely detached from all events on this cosmic plane they are still, therefore, karmically bound to the entities on our earth-chain, the child of the moon-chain. Being thus karmically bound they sacrificed themselves in order to inflame the unevolved manasaputras of the humanity of the third root-race. These baby-manasaputras or unevolved manasaputras are we.

This is a difficult subject, isn't it? It is indeed. It is one which requires years and years and years of careful thought. But once you get the key it is very simple indeed.

Student — That part is not difficult for me to understand — that inflaming. But I understood you to say that we on this chain become dhyan-chohans and pass through the seven grades, the seven rounds on this chain, and that we shall then be those who will inflame the human egos on the next chain.

G. de P. — That is right.

Student — The human egos on the next chain?

G. de P. — That is right.

Student — Then I suppose that they, our present manasaputras, were the dhyan-chohans on the moon-chain.

G. de P. — Not quite. You see, I think that your difficulty arises in the fact of that one word manasaputras being used for several different things. Remember, dear Doctor, that there are many classes of manasaputras, low, intermediate, and high. Manasaputra means "son of mind," a fully awakened mental entity, a fully awakened ego. In every human being there are two manasaputras: the individual's manasaputra not yet evolved to its full powers, nevertheless slowly evolving, and the other manasaputra which inflamed us —

you, me, all others. This second manasaputra is an entity from far past periods of evolution. Do you now understand?

Student — Yes, thank you.

G. de P. — Now let me ask you a question. I think it may help to elucidate the matter. What were we humans on the lunar chain?

Student — I suppose that we were beasts.

G. de P. — The answer is practically correct. Or entities corresponding to or holding the position on the moon-chain in evolution that the beasts hold on this earth-chain in the present evolution. That answer is quite correct.

Now what is it that gave us our ego?

Student — Which ego?

G. de P. — Your ego, my ego.

Student — I suppose that we always had that ego, but it was awakened — I suppose you mean the manas element — awakened by the manasaputra. Perhaps I do not understand.

G. de P. — Your answer is correct, but it is not a complete answer. Did the beasts, or beings equivalent to beasts, which we were on the moon-chain have this ego in them then?

Student — Sleeping, certainly.

G. de P. — Correct. Then how is it that we are now humans on this earth-chain?

Student — Because we have been awakened.

G. de P. — Partly correct.

Student — And also because we have evolved.

G. de P. — That makes a complete answer. We have brought out our own faculties by evolution assisted by the manasaputras who inflamed us, who quickened us. But these manasaputras who quickened us, who inflamed us, what relation did they have to the moon-chain?

Student — That is what I have been trying to find out.

G. de P. — Well, I thought so.

Student — I wondered if they awakened the manas element in the human beings there.

G. de P. — That is the answer. And I have been trying to give that answer; and by following Socrates' way —

that is by asking you questions, we now have come to understand each other. The manasaputras who inflamed us on this earth-chain also were dhyan-chohans who inflamed entities on the moon-chain.

How did these manasaputras who inflamed us originate?

Student — They have, of course, gone through the grades that we are now going through. In ages past they had been through the human stage, and they have been and are dhyan-chohans. That is the reason I asked whether they were the spiritual monads. I wanted to know how many manvantaras ago they had been human.

G. de P. — As to that, I don't know. I cannot tell you how many manvantaras ago. I simply don't know. The answer depends upon the grade of manasaputras. There are some manasaputras who stand very high. They are really gods. There are other classes of manasaputras who are but slightly more evolved than the essential manasaputras in human beings.

Do you realize, Companions, that you in your human egoity are manasaputras to the beast side of yourselves

— that is, to the animal monad within you? There is not only one class of manasaputras operating in the universe. The universe is filled full with gods, with manasaputras, many classes working on different planes.

Indeed, even the gods themselves are inflamed at certain periods in their evolution by beings still more sublime who are the manasaputras of the gods.

Nature has one rule throughout, one law of evolution everywhere. If you follow carefully the law or rather the principle of analogy, you will be able to think out many most wonderful problems and arrive at their accurate and exact solutions.

Student — Did I understand you to say that the unself-conscious god-spark, after having evolved into self-conscious godhood, passing after the dissolution of this universe into the succeeding universe, will enter it as an unself-conscious god-spark there?

G. de P. — Yes, in the very beginning of it. But the god-spark will run through the lowest stages in the new universe very rapidly and easily, and assume its godhood again self-consciously. So is it in the case of the human child. Analogy again! The human child is born from a life-germ, but yet that life-germ carries at its heart the reincarnating ego, and very quickly the human child runs through all the earliest stages of human life, and soon assumes its humanity again.

Student — The point is, that I could not understand how any entity, when once it had gained self-consciousness, could ever lose it. I see now that its self-consciousness is merely obscured for a short time.

G. de P. — That is practically the idea. It cannot lose it, if we use the term "lose" absolutely. The self-consciousness simply drops into latency for the time being, just as in the case of the reincarnating human ego.

The unborn child is not self-conscious as the man is. Do you understand?

Student — Yes, thank you very much. Now, may I ask one more question? It is very short, but I have thought about it for years. We are told by Mr. Judge and by others, and we know, that the beasts do not make karma in the sense that we do, because they have not developed manas. They have no devachan, Mr. Judge says, for that reason; and yet they suffer so cruelly at the hands of man. I cannot find an explanation of this situation on lines of justice.

G. de P. — Let me tell you something. There are several kinds of karma. The beast makes no karma self-consciously as man does. Therefore there is no moral stigma in what the beast does. Were a man to do beastly acts, there would be very definite moral iniquity about it, because he knows better. He is so much more evolved than the beast is.

But there are other kinds of karma. The atoms have their own karma. The beasts have karma. The elementals have karma. Sun, stars, moon — everything — is governed or runs by karmic lines. Every act, conscious or unconscious, is karmic; because every act issues from, or is the manifestation of, an actor conscious or unconscious. Necessarily, therefore, every act must suffer a reaction, and you thus have the same chain of causation, of consequences, of results.

Now, why do the beasts suffer so? It is wrong to look upon their suffering as we look upon human suffering.

Their sufferings are not understood and appreciated, nor in fact felt by them in the sense and in the degree in which human beings understand and appreciate and feel suffering. Nevertheless they suffer. They do, indeed.

The sufferings of the beasts are karmic consequences of actions done in previous universes — or rather in previous imbodiments of the solar system. There is your key.

When a boy foolishly puts his finger into the fire as a gesture of bravado, you might say that in such case the molecules of flesh feel the pain of the burn, and that the pain is unjust to those innocent molecules. You might add that their individual existences are temporarily stopped or cut short; that the greater mind of the man has interfered with the karmic life-stream of the molecules and of the atoms. Nevertheless, so accurately and delicately is nature balanced that not one molecule or atom in the parent vehicle suffers unjustly in the last analysis. Any suffering is in a sense simply an automatic reaction. Those molecules of flesh are there at the time when the act happens. They are there by karma.

Student — Does there exist a karmic relation between the two manasaputras: the manasaputra of which we ourselves are an incompletely evolved entity, and the manasaputra that inspired us?

G. de P. — There does — a very intimate relation.

Student — Because if there is, I mean if it is a karmic relationship between the manasaputras themselves, then it must be so far-reaching, so deep, that anything that we ourselves do in our effort to evolve does not enable us to choose for ourselves a manasaputra of a higher order to inspire us.

G. de P. — No, the choice is from above, dear friend. The choice is from above. But the karmic relationship existing between the manasaputra which inflames and the latent or unmanifest manasaputra whose lower part is inflamed, is exceedingly close. Now I will tell you this: in each individual case such inflaming happens because the two manasaputras are usually children of the same star. Their karmic destiny in the universe is intimately interconnected, interallied. Oh! Companions, I tell you that there are most wonderful mysteries in these things. The relationship between chela and teacher is a very intimate one, which goes far deeper than anything that pertains to the physical, deeper than the mental part, deeper even than the spiritual part. It goes back to the very roots of the universe.

It is along this line of thought that you will remember HPB's beautiful quotation from the Esoteric Catechism to the effect that the teacher is closer and nearer and dearer than one's own parents. It is true. The parents give the body, and they are karmically related mentally and spiritually to their children, but the teacher brings to birth the man himself. It is the teacher who brings to birth the inner man. Every teacher in a sense, and to use Socrates' graphic phrase, is a spiritual midwife. Do you understand this?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — Now, Companions, let us close the meeting for tonight.

[The sounding of the gong. Silence.]

Meeting 28 Supplement

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

Supplement to KTMG Papers: Twenty-Eight

| The Solar Initiation | Elementals | Animal Monads |

October 24, 1933

The Solar Initiation

G. de P. — I would like to point out, Companions, a fact that may be illuminating to you in connection with the "incarnation" of the manasaputras. When a chela of higher degree is prepared to undertake one of the higher initiations — and I am thinking specifically of the initiation occurring at the time of the winter solstice

— and is successful in passing the trials, then on the return of his peregrinating spirit-soul from the cosmic spaces he returns not as he went out, but more accurately he returns as he went out plus the companionship of a divinity which returns with him and abides with him for a period more or less long, depending primarily upon the grade of the new initiate, or rather the initiant, and depending also upon a number of other factors.

The divinity that returns with him, as a guest of his own constitution, fills the new initiate with the divinity's own divine flame, so that it appears as if the initiate's very body burned with the holy light. From every part of his being he radiates light. His body actually shines with the light of the sun, for indeed it is a sun-god who for the time being has imbodied itself in the new initiant's own higher manasic parts and thus infills him; so that when the newly created initiate rises from his trance, he does so literally as a man-god, a man with his higher parts temporarily fully awakened, and at the same time suffering, in the technical sense of the word, that is being the carriage of the solar god who has returned with him. The twain live for a while together as one. The solar god has inflamed the higher parts of the higher parts of the constitution of the neophyte; so that actually for a number of days or weeks, or months it may be, the man moves about as an incarnate god-man awakened to his own divinity, and likewise being the carrier of the still higher divinity unto whom he was joined when he reached the sun.

After the few hours, the few days, weeks or months, the divinity retires, returns to the sun; and the man thereafter is indeed a god-man who was, and who will be a god-man again, but no longer — at least for the time being — the carrier of the solar divinity. Nevertheless that solar divinity for the remainder of the incarnated life of the initiate infills him and clothes him with a ray from itself. This is exactly the way in which buddhas become: become such of course by their own self-devised efforts in the first instance; nevertheless it is thus that they become true buddhas because a ray of the buddhic splendor of a solar god infills them. A true buddha has this theopathy, to use the technical term, throughout his life, although the fact may not be perceptible to those who surround the buddha — at least not perceptible to all. Now then, in almost exactly similar way, but in less degree of intensity, did the manasaputras inflame the sleeping minds of the child-humanity of the third root-race on this fourth globe in this fourth round.

-----

November 14, 1933

Elementals

This is indeed a very difficult theme; and yet, Companions, I have often wondered why it should be found to be so difficult. Let me try to explain very briefly just what elementals are. According to our esoteric teaching, which is the doctrine taught in the Mystery-schools, the universe is built up of elements, i.e., of fundamental element-principles. As the entire universe is animate, full of life and lives, these fundamental elements or element-principles are compacted and builded of lives — not merely living in them, but these lives verily form or compose these fundamental elements. Now those entities or lives of these elements, which are the first remove from homogeneity in any of the elements, are what are called elementals — in other words entities just beginning to evolve into greater complexity of consciousness and structure. They too are beings growing from unself-conscious god-sparks in order finally to reach self-conscious godhood, and thereafter to

take a self-conscious part in the labor of the universe.

Now then, the elementals really can be looked upon as the building bricks, or individualized substantial particles of energy-substance, belonging to the seven ranges of prakriti, and therefore of the universe.

Everything in the prakriti or substantial side of the universe reposes on the three kingdoms of the elementals.

From this point of view the elementals correspond to the lifeatoms in our own bodies, because these lifeatoms themselves are of seven or ten different classes corresponding to the seven ranges of prakriti, and therefore to the seven or ten cosmic elements. These lifeatoms in our bodies build our bodies, and are used by the various monads composing the sevenfold, or tenfold, constitution of man. Hence, there are elementals which compose or are the foundation of every one of man's seven principles.

The elementals, therefore, in the aggregate are the forces of nature as well as the substances of nature. When acting aggregatively as energies they are forces, and when acting aggregatively as bodies they are the substances of nature. It is quite erroneous to look upon the elementals as beings merely living in nature, and as not forming nature; and it is also erroneous to consider them in a weird or spooky way, as mere little ghostlings flitting around us. The elementals are the inhabitants of the elements; and all beings more evolved than the elementals use these elementals for everything that these more evolved beings do or are.

The elementals may be also called the nature forces, or nature spirits, because all nature being conscious in greater or less degree, whatever takes place however seemingly unconscious, actually is brought about by the deliberate or unconscious action of elementals, either acting for themselves or as the vehicles of higher intelligences.

Therefore is it said that some of the elementals in the universe are friendly to man, because man happens to be at the certain point of his evolution where these particular elementals aid him. Other elementals are said to be unfriendly to man — not because the elementals themselves are evil, or wickedly wish to do evil to man, but simply because man happens to be in such an evolutionary position at the present time that these elementals automatically react unfavorably on him. As an instance, a draught of cold air may give a man a chill. This is not the fault of the elementals involved, but the fault of the man who remains in the cold draught thus exposing himself to this particular type of automatic elemental action. But there are elementals on all the planes of prakriti, and therefore on all the planes of man's constitution. Consequently there are manasic elementals, and kamic elementals, etc.; and some of these elementals belonging to the higher grades of prakriti can do man great injury unless the man is watchful and resists their action which he can always do by reason of his masterful will and high intelligence.

Now there are also elementals which have reached a point in their own evolution where they seek and can have imbodiments on our earth; and these are the classes of elementals which are much more evolved than other classes. Consequently they form the various orders and families of the animate beings below man, commonly spoken of as the higher vegetables, the insects, and the beasts. They are imbodied elementals, all of them; the beasts are highly evolved elementals; the insects are less evolved elementals. We humans also at one time in our far past evolution passed through the elemental stage, and obviously then were elementals.

The elementals of fire can be very friendly to man when he uses them properly; but they can become bitter foes of his, most dangerous enemies. The fire elementals can burn down his house, or burn the man's body; but it would be foolish to say that because the fire elementals automatically act according to their nature, they are wicked, or that they are fundamentally unfriendly to man. Taking the elementals of the four lower and best known classes, the salamanders, the sylphs, the undines, and the gnomes, it is probably the sylphs, the elementals of the air, which to man in his present state of evolution are the most dangerous of all, because for some strange reason they seem to have a peculiar psychological effect on the kama part of his constitution.

Finally, the elementals, being the inhabitants of the respective elements, themselves exist in orders, in families, and in various species. They actually compose the seven prakritis or elements of nature; and these seven cosmic elements are the great reservoirs of beings who in these elements begin their evolutionary march upwards to divinity. The elementals are therefore again partially individualized entities, baby souls in the school of life. Ordinarily they work in groups or in waves or flows; but quite frequently also there are manifestations of the action of individual elementals. It is wrong to look upon the elementals as quite

individualized little sprites, in the manner in which European folklore regards the brownies or the pixies or the fairies or the kobolds or the leprechawns. All these are names for different kinds of elementals; and even the medieval descriptions of them are accurate enough, provided they do not induce the belief that the elementals are as intelligent as man or as having man's freedom of will or conscience, because all this last is not true. The elementals are quasi-individualized nature sprites, and actually perform all the physical work of the world. They may also be correctly looked upon as lifeatoms in a certain stage of the latter's evolutionary progress.

Remember also that the elementals are monads imbodied through their rays in the respective prakritis or elements of the universe. In consequence, every elemental is on its way to become a man, and finally a god.

Further, as every one of the seven or ten prakritis of nature, every one of the seven or ten element-principles of nature, is composed of these lives or lifeatoms, therefore there are elementals of all these seven or ten different grades of ethereality or spirituality. These different grades of elementals slavishly copy the pictures in the astral light of past events, including of course the pictures of forms in all their multimyriad types.

Furthermore they slavishly follow and try to emulate, although unconsciously, the orders or families or species of beings more evolved than themselves. Hence it is that the elementals of the higher prakritis or elements sometimes have a human shape or quasi-human shape, or have the forms of beasts, whether patterned after humans or beasts now on earth, or after the pictures in the astral light of human beings or beasts who lived in past manvantaras.

The elementals of the fifth cosmic plane, counting upwards, or what we may call the mahatic or manasic elementals, tend to assume the human shape; but this is merely a maya, the appearance of form, because although they may have as semi-individualized entities the human shape, they are soulless because without a human soul. It is merely the form in the astral light that they copy blindly, slavishly, automatically. This is one of the reasons why the kama-loka and the astral light are filled with elementals in various degrees of advancement, who take on, assume, or disguise themselves in the appearances or forms of human beings who have lived. Mark these words because they are important. But all these appearances are soulless because they are merely elementals in the human shape or form. The elemental has as yet evolved no human soul, and therefore from the human standpoint is without conscience or moral principle.

Thus it may be seen once more how elementals of this type can be friendly to man or very unfriendly, in fact even malignant, not because of any evil in themselves, but because of the mischief that they can work by reason of their mayavi or illusory appearance and the effects they can produce.

In conclusion — and to draw a comparison which may be helpful — there is somewhat the same difference in evolution between an elemental and a man that there is between a lifeatom and a man; or to put the matter in another way, between a human embryo in its first stages of growth and a full-grown man, as there is between an elemental and an animal.

------

September 25, 1942

Animal Monads

The matter of the animal monads entering the human kingdom sounds complicated; I suppose it is, yet the principles are simple enough. Suppose we abandon the details and just turn our minds for a few moments to fundamental principles, then perhaps we can get the Ariadne's thread which will make it easy. Details are important always, but they confuse minds.

Now then, the general principles by which any life-wave or kingdom of beings moves into the next higher kingdom are the same for the entire ladder of life, the same in analogical outline, not necessarily the same in details. This is the first point to remember, and it will be illustrated by the manner in which humans move into the lowest of the three dhyan-chohanic kingdoms just above our own.

The next point to remember is that it is the migrating, peregrinating monads which are the important things to keep in mind. If they have attained self-conscious individuality you might call them even higher egos. If they

have not attained self-conscious individuality, the term monad is better. Thus we speak of the monads of mineral, vegetable, and even animal kingdoms, although the highest animals, the very highest, are beginning to become egoic. In other words the monad is sufficiently experienced in these low planes to have built around itself an egoic sheath of consciousness.

The third point to remember is that monads cannot enter into the next higher kingdom until it is itself ready to receive the incoming monads from the next lower kingdom. The next higher kingdom must have very lowest ranges of beings providing bodies for the monads from the kingdom below, and these monads from the kingdom below are always the highest from that kingdom, otherwise they would not be ready to move into the bodies of the lowest of the next kingdom above.

Thus the highest of all animals are the anthropoid apes, that is the most evolved as regards a feeble glimmering of egoity. During the fourth round the egos or infant egos or monads of the apes will gradually begin to incarnate into the very lowest, most savage, and least evolved of the humans of the sixth root-race.

Please remember this has nothing to do with the bodies of the apes. The apes as apes will die out during the sixth root-race, thus freeing the apes to enter into the very lowest human bodies of the sixth root-race.

The bulk of the animal kingdom will also die out, and go into the animal nirvana where they must wait for the next earth imbodiment before they can have their chance to become humans. The reason is that the bulk of the animals are not yet ready to follow the ascending arc, but the anthropoid apes will be able to do this and will become in the manner explained very low humans by the end of the sixth root-race. The opening of the seventh root-race in this fourth round will see no more anthropoid bodies at all. They will have died out, and their baby egos will be then the lowest humans. Some animals, many indeed, will have appeared for a brief while during the fifth round on our fourth globe, but they will not last long, and will die out more quickly than they will in the future die out in this fourth round. Then indeed they will have entered their nirvana permanently for the remainder of the seven rounds in which our chain is now working. All these sidelines of thought are parts of the explanation and therefore must be brought into the picture.

Thus the lower kingdom by evolving gradually rises towards the kingdom immediately above it, and the monads in many manners and in many ways seek to enter the higher kingdom, just as we humans seek to become dhyani-chohans by evolving more. There are several ways in which we can enter the dhyan-chohanic kingdom, and there are several ways in which the beasts can enter the human kingdom. Please remember I am speaking of monads, not of bodies. No beast body ever becomes a human body. No human body ever becomes a dhyan-chohanic body.

Now with regard to the so-called animal monads in the human kingdom: these animal monads in the human kingdom are the highest of all possible animal monads, and are the first to become genuine humans in a new or future manvantara. They are monads at one time belonging to the animal kingdom below the human, which because of karmic links of destiny with a monad, pass into the human kingdom as a human animal monad when that animal monad out of the animal kingdom has reached what might be called a semi-human stage, the dawn of egoity, the beginning of semi-human consciousness, but yet of an animal type. It is what might be called an animal human, and not a human, as human beings are.

Carry out the same line of thought on how human monads enter the lowest dhyan-chohanic kingdom, and you will perhaps understand it better. Just above I have spoken of the ape monads, or ape baby egos, entering the lowest stages of the human kingdom during the sixth root-race. Now what does this mean? It means that an ego called X of an ape, when it has finished with the animal kingdom and is seeking imbodiment, does not again reincarnate in the animal kingdom because it is finished with all possible evolution there. Its tendencies are upward, and it is as it were caught by a human monad which will incarnate in one of the lowest races of the human kingdom.

Thus, this ape X when the apes die out towards the end of the sixth root-race will on its last ape imbodiment be semi-human, or a little more. Its egoity is beginning to function, and it will reincarnate as part of the constitution called the animal monad of a low human being during the sixth root-race, and will become the human animal monad of that low human of the sixth root-race. And that is what has been happening in the past and provides us human beings with what we now call our animal monads. They are graduated animals

from the animal kingdom, caught by karmic links of destiny in the incarnation of a human monad, providing that human being with his human animal monad.

Now then, at the next chain-manvantara, the next imbodiment of our globe, we humans or human monads will become the low, lowest dhyan-chohans of that future chain-imbodiment when our earth will be the moon of the new chain. What are now our human animal monads will then be the distinct human humans of the human kingdom of that new chain. I hope all this is clear. I am being much more explicit than I have ever been before, because I think sufficient time has elapsed for the puzzled minds of our students to have pretty nearly grasped the truth by their own efforts, and thus they will not forget that truth.

To recapitulate. Animals enter the human kingdom by any method nature permits. There are several such methods, but they all reduce to a few general facts. No animal can enter the human kingdom until that animal's baby ego has become ready to do so, in other words more or less human. It then enters the human kingdom by attaching itself because of karmic links of the spiritual past with an imbodying human at some stage in that human being's destiny, and thus becomes the animal monad of that human. It is thus that the graduated animal egos become distinctly humanized by being for long periods a part of the constitution of a human being, and then finally become fully human, and are then independent human human beings, or human monads when the age arrives. Please understand that there are always exceptions to every rule. But even to touch upon the exceptions would, I fear, bring about intolerable confusion, for the teaching is so contrary to anything the West has known for ages — contrary to its religion and to its science, and even to its philosophy, nevertheless intuitively perceived by poets sometimes or other uninitiated people who get flashes or glimpses of the truth.

With the exceptions referred to, it is my belief that no animal monad can pass directly from the animal kingdom into the human kingdom as a human being, for there are intermediate stages of mental and psychical growth that must be passed through before an animal monad by unfolding itself can become a true human.

These intermediate stages are found in the animal monads in human beings. I hope these many repetitions are not tiresome, but I have discovered that unless I repeat and keep repeating thoughts do not sink home.

Numerous questions in the minds of students are bound to arise, mainly because they ask questions before they have tried to solve these questions themselves by careful meditation and brooding over the matter. So students should not be anxious if questions arise in their minds about this new raising of a corner of the veil, but should themselves endeavor to reconcile what I have here stated with what they already know before rushing into questions and expecting to have them answered. The only way of learning a thing thoroughly is by solving it yourself, and that is what a true teacher always does. He tries to stimulate curiosity, to arouse the student's own intuitive perception, and even will not answer a question plainly, but will insist that the student answer his own questions. Only when the student is too confused to get a clear answer from his own mind will the teacher give another bit of help.

Meeting 29

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Twenty-Nine

Meeting of March 17, 1931

G. de P. — I am now ready to answer questions.

Student — Does any part of the higher triad incarnate or imbody itself between earth-lives?

G. de P. — The higher triad essentially is the spiritual monad and is linked to its own inner god, the divine monad. But being a spiritual entity it could hardly be said to incarnate itself or to inflesh itself or even to imbody itself in vehicles or encasements equivalent to what our bodies of flesh are on earth. The spiritual monad — or the reincarnating ego in all its parts or aspects — is what is called the higher triad. Strictly speaking, however, the reincarnating ego is the manasic part of this higher triad. But even this manasic part, the lowest part of the higher triad, does not actually enter bodies of flesh, but overshadows them. In other words it illuminates, or sends a ray from itself into the astral realms, or works through the astral or ethereal body of the entity, and it is this ray therefore which conveys the triadic essence and its principles and qualities, and thus ultimately forms or composes the human being.

No, the higher triad cannot be said to imbody itself anywhere at any time, unless indeed we suppose, and the supposition is true, that the higher triad or peregrinating monad imbodies itself in vehicles very similar to its own spiritual type or character.

Nevertheless the higher triad may be said to imbody itself in a spiritual body which is an efflux from its own heart — the deposit, the lees or dregs, spiritually speaking, of what itself casts forth. In an exactly similar way, the physical body is the lees or dregs or deposit of the astral man, the astral monad.

The answer therefore is no, with the explications that I have just tried to give.

Student — We are told that at our death a certain part of us returns to its parent-star. Is that part the manasaputra which enlightens the manasic principle?

G. de P. — Oh, no, dear boy, no indeed. The part which returns to its parent-star is the divinest essence of the individual. The use of this word return, however, is a purely human usage. You must not think of this divinest part of the entity at mere physical death streaking through cosmic or solar space like the tail of a comet. That is not the idea. Its very essence is its parent-star, and its interaction with that star is through a space of time so long that to us humans it would seem like eternity. Even during the life of the human being on earth it is as much in and of its parent-star as it is after the death of the fleshly integument which we call the physical man.

What therefore is meant is this: that it becomes more divinely conscious of being at one with its parent-star.

Taking on the vehicles of incarnation or of imbodiment on any planet dims its light to a certain extent. It is conscious of this dimming of its own light. It is conscious of the drain on its vitality, mystically speaking; but when it has cast off these imbodiments, when it has thrown aside its existence as a sevenfold entity and becomes unifold in essence or monadic again, then it rebecomes fully conscious of its own glory, and this change of its consciousness is technically described as a return or ascent to its parent-star. Do you understand the idea?

Student — Thank you, I do. But may I know then what happens to the manasaputra at the death of the physical body?

G. de P. — The manasaputra returns to its own realm as every other part of the human constitution does at death. When the sevenfold entity breaks up and dissolves — and this dissolution we call death — each part of that sevenfold constitution immediately "returns," instantly in some respects, to its own realms, to its own sphere. Hence, the divine returns to the divine realms, the spiritual returns to the spiritual realms, the higher manasic part or manasaputra returns to its own proper home or dwelling. The passional and emotional part

returns to its proper habitat in the higher atmosphere of the earth; the vital part is attracted back to the vital reservoir of the planet on which the body dissolves or dies, and finally the physical returns to the earth from which it is drawn. "Dust to dust" is the old ecclesiastic saying. So far as the body goes, this saying is one-seventh part of the truth.

You will find these facts of the dissolution of the sevenfold entity stated with fair clearness in all the ancient literatures, not always with perfect clarity, because these facts deal with some of the teachings of the inner mysteries of the Schools, and of course these mysteries have always been closely veiled. But Vergil, the Latin poet, for instance, towards the end of one of his books, in describing the death of one of his heroes, uses words which clearly set forth that the body returns to earth, the "breath" to the air, and so forth. Furthermore, in many of the ancient literatures you will find set forth in more or less embroidered statement the true fact that the solar part of the man returns to the sun, the lunar part of the man returns to the moon, the body is given back to earth, while the spirit returns to the divinity from which as from a fountainhead it issued forth.

Man is a composite entity. How many times have I repeated this statement! It is a wonderful key. Man is a microcosm. He contains in himself every principle, essence, faculty, matter, substance, and energy, that the Boundless contains. Now see how this wonderful thought, how this wonderful doctrine, strikes at the roots of human selfishness. Once a man realizes that he is but a transitory compound gathered around an immortal, divine-spiritual center — immortal only in the theosophical sense of enduring through eternity but only by growing which means changing — once a man has this idea implanted and fixed in his consciousness, then his sense of values changes. He becomes gentler, kindlier, more thoughtful of others. He realizes his own personal impermanence and the impermanence of the things which ordinary men place such value upon. He then lives for the grand things. He lives in eternity where his aspirations and hopes are fixed.

Student — There was a discussion in the San Diego Lodge recently regarding memory, and I would be glad to have a little more illumination on that subject. Why is it that an old person whose mind has practically gone, will have such a keen recollection of childhood experiences? And to just what extent is memory registered in the brain-mind; and is the real memory outside of the body?

G. de P. — The real human reminiscence inheres in the migrating entity, in the reincarnating ego. Therefore the memory of the human being inheres in the human essence which is the reincarnating ego. The reason why very old people think, or rather have, recollections of childhood is because the cycle of life is returning upon itself to a new beginning — spiral fashion. The mind at death, and perhaps for a few years previously to physical death, has already begun to pass in review the millions of incidents, events, and the few great facts of consciousness and feeling that the past life has contained or has brought forth. As the old human being approaches nearer and nearer to what men call death, the physical memory grows feebler and feebler with regard to incidents and events that then take place, and hence as is obvious approaches more nearly the state of the child. Nevertheless important events inhere permanently in the essence of the migrating ego, and because the mind of the man approaching death is feeble and the will has less control over it, the mind automatically reproduces the more striking events that impressed its consciousness forcibly in childhood and youth. These are reproduced almost as automatically as are the sounds on the disk of the phonograph.

In such an aged human being the tablets of memory are being read anew, but backwards as it were. The strings of thought and feeling to which we were tied during growth from childhood to adulthood are now being unwound and untied anew and laid aside.

Student — Thank you. Then it is not the brain-mind that is remembering, that has the memory —

G. de P. — Oh no. The brain-mind is a mere instrument, and in fact one of the feeblest instruments of the human being, but the one, strangely enough, in our present stage of evolution to which he is the most straitly or strictly attached. The brain-mind nevertheless is a very important instrument of consciousness, but it is for all that a low, material instrument. The brain-mind per se cannot reason clearly. Its operations are quasi-instinctual. The real faculty of genuine reasoning is something higher. Strictly speaking, reasoning is vision

— vision of truth. The brain-mind merely reflects what the intellect reasons or intuits.

I may add, furthermore, in answering the first part of your question, that what men call the childishness of

great age has also to do with something else, which is not often spoken of. Death, while being as we all know a dissolution of the then living man, is also a preparation for the infancy which will follow death — for a change in the state of consciousness in other spheres.

You will understand this more clearly if you understand what devachan is. The devachani begins his devachan with his consciousness dwelling on those spiritual longings or yearnings that were the first to appear in the consciousness of the man when he was incarnated on earth — in very early life. Devachan is a going over, a repeating, of all the noble, spiritual, impersonal, beautiful, holy aspirations and thoughts that the man when alive had, beginning from early childhood, and continuing until the time when he lost personal consciousness at death or just before death. Here is the marvel of it all, that instead of running them over quickly in the consciousness, each such noble aspiration, beautiful yearning, and unfulfilled spiritual hope, is in devachan repeated by the devachani over and over in the consciousness, and is thus looked at and experienced from a thousand different and new angles of view or inspection. All the changes are rung, so that if you take a single aspiration that the man had when in physical life, in the devachan it is repeated and repeated and beautified and glorified and seen from many different angles.

Student — If one has had no consciousness in earth-life of aspirations until one comes to physical maturity, would the life in devachan, in spite of that, begin with the unconscious aspirations and pass these in review?

Or could one be said to begin his life, his growth, in devachan with the first self-directed inspirations and longings to live aright that the man had before death?

G. de P. — I think I understand your meaning but I also think that there is a little misunderstanding. Devachan is not a growth. It is not a new phase of life and experience. It is not a realm of causes, in other words. It is a realm of spiritual and intellectual effects, of results of all that was noblest in the past life, also of sublime rest or repose; and is, therefore, somewhat like a beautiful dream, the nature of the dream depending upon the life of the individual when he was awake.

Everything of a spiritual and truly intellectual character that the living man experiences will come again to the consciousness of the devachani, but a thousandfold beautified, glorified. Devachan in another sense of the word is a digestion and assimilation of all that was beautiful and glorious in the life just lived. If there was very little of beauty and of spiritual glory in the life, the devachan will be very short. If the life has been filled from childhood until death with unfulfilled spiritual hopes, unfulfilled yearnings of spiritual grandeur and beauty, and with self-forgetfulness, then the devachan will be a very long one and an exquisitely beautiful one. The devachan is actually the place where character is — I cannot say formed — but where character is consolidated, where character is shaped. The reason of this is that our permanent character consists of all the spiritual and intellectual evolution of the ego.

Student — But is not that growth?

G. de P. — No, because the growth was made during the life last passed, where will and intellect were consciously applied to ends and purposes. Perhaps you could say that sleep and assimilation of food are a phase of growth. Putting it in this way, then I would not object to saying that the digestion and assimilation of experiences and of consciousness in the devachan could be called a phase of growth; but technically the word growth is incorrect. Growth is increase, it is development, and in the devachan there is no increase or development of the fundamental consciousness. There is a digestion and an assimilation and a framing or shaping of the essential character of the man wholly depending upon what use the man made of his faculties when last alive on earth. It is therefore akin to sleep.

Student — May I ask about the zodiac and man, in connection with what Mr. Judge says, that modern astronomers have not yet come to know that man is himself a zodiacal highway through which his own particular sun makes a circuit? You have given us so many pictures of the stars that I would like to ask now, if we are entitled to it, for a more definite picture of the analogy pointed out by Mr. Judge: the analogy of the journey of our own sun through our own human zodiac, and that of the great pilgrimage of the earthly luminary.

G. de P. — The total course of human evolution on this planet may be divided into twelve stages or grades

from the beginning to the end, and each one of these twelve stages or grades of evolution is of its own type or character, exactly as the twelve houses of the zodiac, or the twelve signs or the constellations of the zodiac, has its own type or character. The journey of the human sun, to use your own decidedly poetic phraseology

— this human sun being the inner god — through these twelve stages of evolution on our planetary chain, therefore brings forth by evolution from the inner god twelve different qualities or characteristics through and by that planetary chain in that cosmic time period.

Your question is a very esoteric one. I have answered it as fully as I can, but I admit rather vaguely.

Student — I would like to return to the question regarding memory. We hear very little about memory, and to me it is one of the great mysteries. You stated before that the memory resides in the reincarnating ego.

Now am I right in saying that this is the same as intuition, and that if intuition is spiritual memory, then I take it that the instinct, the physical memory, is something that would reside in the lifeatoms as they return to the body during incarnation. Am I correct?

G. de P. — You are correct. What you say is perfectly true with one minor exception. Instinct is not physical memory as you state, but is rather the psycho-astral memory of which the physical memory is a reflection, and this psycho-astral memory resides in the essence of the astral or ethereal lifeatoms. You remember what the great Plato had to say about all this, that all the workings of consciousness were reminiscence, recollection, remembering, of the activities of the consciousness in other lives. Therefore intuition, I really believe, could very readily be called the unlocking of the doors of the memorized treasury of past lives —

intuition being immediate consciousness, instant recognition of truth or of things or of individuals.

But there is another side of intuition again, and I may describe it imperfectly perhaps as the native working of the spiritual consciousness. But again, even this last, as I reflect upon it, could properly be called the reminiscence of a grander life cycle passed in former manvantaras. Yes, I believe that you are right on all points. The next question, please.

Student — Following your thought about devachan, can you give us a fuller explanation about the gestation state before birth?

G. de P. — The gestation-state before birth?

Student — Yes. In The Mahatma Letters there are several allusions to a condition, which, I understand, is called the gestation state.

G. de P. — Oh, what you refer to is the state before the devachan — the gestation state of the disimbodied ego. You spoke about the gestation state before birth. Which one do you mean?

Student — Perhaps I misunderstood. I thought the higher principles went into this condition called gestation before birth, and that before birth there was this gestation state on the spiritual plane which corresponded to the state on the physical plane just preceding physical birth.

G. de P. — There is of course a gestation state before physical birth, but I think you are referring to the psychospiritual gestation state which precedes the devachan. Now the term gestation in the latter sense is a term adopted from human existence. It does not mean, however, that the devachani is born of parents who are in the devachan and has to go through a gestation in the devachan as the physical babe has to pass through a phase of physical gestation. The word is merely a human term adopted from human life in order to explain how it is that before the excarnate entity can become conscious in the devachan it must have prepared itself for the devachanic spheres — and this preparation, this final casting off of the ties of the life just passed, the teachers have called the gestation period. In other words, every state of consciousness has its beginning, its culmination, and its end. This applies to human life, to the devachan, and in fact to every phase of being. Is the answer responsive to your question?

Student — Yes. I now understand that it is on that plane. It is equivalent to preparation for birth on a higher plane.

G. de P. — Not exactly. It is a preparatory state passed through by the reincarnating ego which that ego undergoes as it sinks into complete unself-consciousness of the life just closed. This final casting off of the last thread of personal recollection of the earth-life, and the gathering in of the threads of its own consciousness in preparation for the devachanic period, is the gestation period of which you speak.

Furthermore, it is not the higher spiritual part of our constitution which becomes the devachani. It is the higher human part of us which enters into the devachan. It is the human entity in its spiritual-intellectual essence which becomes the devachani, and it is precisely that casting off of all the less perfect and less spiritual attributes of the human being which constitutes the gestation or preparation period which you have spoken of. This occurs when all the lower human elements have finally dropped away from the consciousness of the entity, and it then sinks into the purely spiritual-intellectual state. This is its birth into the devachan —

the word birth here being merely a figure of speech, just as we might speak of a man sinking into a dream, his birth into the dream state.

Student — If I am right in thinking that there is a consciousness belonging to every part of the septenary constitution, then that phase of consciousness is continuous all the time on its plane although we are cognizant only of the one plane on which we are acting?

G. de P. — That is correct.

Student — And if we live in our entirety, or on all planes, we could be conscious, we could be aware, of all the phases of consciousness as and when we will.

G. de P. — Just so. That is the stage of the incarnate Buddhas of Compassion. They are self-conscious on all planes of their constitution. We human beings are conscious with relative fulness in only one part of us, in the human part, partly conscious in the lowest triad and with intimations only of the consciousness of the higher triad. It is precisely because our self-consciousness is centered in the human part that we have the devachanic existence after death. The other parts of us, although belonging to us, and returning to us at the next rebirth, we have not mastered in fulness; nor have we passed beyond or forgotten their respective states of consciousness. We have not as entities collected them into our self-consciousness, and the consequence is that these other parts of us drop away from our self-conscious perception. We lose consciousness of them — at least temporarily.

Every part of the human being of course belongs to the human being, which is a compound entity and at the same time is a unit. Here again is one of the mysteries of consciousness. I have often been astonished that among the questions asked of me in these gatherings, the questions regarding consciousness seem to interest you so deeply, and I am glad to see this, because it shows that you are really thinking and hunting for truth within yourselves — becoming self-consciously acquainted with yourselves.

Student — Knowing how much misery and sorrow and suffering there are in the world today, is it selfish of us to try to forget these and to turn our eyes to the beautiful and sweet side of life? Sometimes I have found that dwelling even in thought on the gloomy and morbid state of life almost paralyzes me; but in forgetting it, or rather in leaving it alone, are we selfish and cowardly and without mercy in doing so?

G. de P. — Your question is a profound one. You have stated in it the problem which every human being will some day have to solve. You have set forth to your own consciousness the choice which one day we all shall have to make. It is this, which path shall we follow: the path of peace and happiness for self alone, the path of the pratyeka buddhas — a holy path, to be sure, a beautiful path, yes — or shall we, on the other hand, choose the path of self-renunciation for the world, a path of sublimity, a path of personal sorrow, but nevertheless a path with the sunlight of eternity shining upon it, and with the reward of the gods awaiting us after long aeons.

No, it is not wrong to hold strongly to the beautiful side of life. It is in fact a duty to do that; but it becomes a spiritual selfishness if by so holding to the beautiful side of life we become selfishly absorbed in it and thus forgetful of our brothers and of the world. We must indeed hold to the beautiful things, to the beautiful side, but at the same time we must work for others, and try to bring them into the life beautiful.

It is like a man whose heart yearns to help the world, and yet he loves all things of beauty. He loves all holy and great and noble things. There is no contradiction here. The man must cultivate his love for the beautiful, for the grand, for the sublime, for the true. He must hold to these by day and by night and all the time; but while doing so he also must work to make others see and long for the same grand things, and he must help others to have that same sublime consciousness of which he himself is beginning to get a few fugitive gleams.

The Buddhas of Compassion are, really, far holier than the Pratyeka Buddhas. The Buddhas of Compassion live for the world. They renounce everything of a selfish character. They give up their own spiritual goals in order to return along the path so that they can help their fellow beings who are less progressed than they themselves. But while doing so, they live nevertheless in the glory and beauty of life. They live in the light.

Their own inner life is a beacon of divine light.

They never at any time lose their connection with the spiritual side of being; and the strange and beautiful thing about the path of renunciation is the following: it is, after all is said, the quickest way of spiritual growth. It is the way by which we advance the most rapidly, although apparently it is the slowest because we abandon the longing for personal or rather individual attainment. Is not this an interesting paradox, that by remaining behind, refusing salvation for ourselves in order that we may help our fellows, we obtain salvation more quickly than do the Pratyeka Buddhas who, fascinated by the glory on the distant mountaintops, forget everything else and leap towards it in individual spiritual exaltation. The pratyekas are finally passed in evolutionary growth by the Compassionate Buddhas who have turned around on the Path and who extend their helping hands to others less spiritually and intellectually strong than they — to those toiling behind them.

The reason why the path of the Buddhas of Compassion is the more rapid path of achievement thus becomes obvious, because it is an exercising and therefore a training of our noblest and loftiest and divinest faculties. It is giving exercise to the most beautiful qualities within us, to the divine and spiritual parts of our being.

Having this continual exercise these parts grow strong and grow strong more quickly. You understand, do you not?

Student — Yes, Professor, thank you.

Student — Recollecting a portion of the teaching you gave us at some length during last autumn in connection with monadic evolution and the sishtas — on which you threw a great deal of light, the first light that we have had, I think — it seemed as if there were a gulf measured off by vast evolutionary periods, between the different kingdoms, such as the vegetable, animal, human, and so forth. Then, you told us, above the human kingdom there were three higher kingdoms, commonly spoken of as dhyan-chohanic types of evolution. Now, our mahatmas are, some of them, spoken of as chohans. It occurred to my mind that there are relatively few of such beings on earth, and that these few seemed to be here, in their relation to the chohanic evolutionary hosts, as sishtas. If so, the degree of compassion that they have reached is far beyond any other so far conceived of in our study of evolution.

Now the point of the question that I wanted to ask is in continuation of the subject of consciousness. It seemed that they as our teachers, are connecting links between our human host and that sublime chohanic host, and constitute as it were an open door, or a road of ascent, between our human host and the chohanic host. Can you give us some more light on this matter?

G. de P. — On the whole, that is exactly right. The Masters are of many grades and degrees. There are some who are but slightly more than advanced chelas. There are others who are Masters of these last. There are others again still higher, who are the Masters of the Masters of these last; and so the ladder of spiritual evolution extends upwards through all the grades of life to the very gods. Each grade of the Masters is a rung on this ladder of life, and this particular ladder of life, Companions, is in its totality what you have often heard me call the Order of the Buddhas of Compassion. It is our own holy order, that is to say the order in which we are aspirants, learners, workers. We are linked — we are connected rather, through and by these various links ascending ever higher — with the very gods who themselves exist in hierarchical stages.

You have often heard me speak of the heart of the universe, and I sometimes have wondered whether this

phrase heart of the universe has ever been mistaken, misunderstood, to mean a locality or a certain unitary entity.

Please don't so understand it. It is but a graphic phrase. It means that vast and inexpressible ultimate — and even this word ultimate is wrong. Really, there is no ultimate; but I mean that vast and inexpressible aggregate of the rungs of the ladder of life which has no beginning, which has no ending, and which runs continuously and without interruption more and more inwards for ever. It is almost impossible to describe these things in ordinary human language. But see what a magnificent prospect this opens out to the one who succeeds, who wins on, who achieves: first discipleship, then masterhood, then chohanship, then a grade still higher, and so on throughout endless duration for ever.

Carefully remember this: it is all within you even now. The heart of the universe is your divine heart.

Individually, you as individuals are, each one of you, the boundless universe. Again, the universe is one in diversity and yet is diversity melting into unity.

Student — You have very clearly answered a part of my question. It would seem, from a study of the evolution of the hosts of beings, that there are, so far as we are informed, a limited number of those exalted human beings belonging to the mahatma order or grade that are spoken of as chohans. It would seem as if they have a relation to the next evolutionary tide of souls; just as the sishtas are described as having relations to other succeeding evolutionary tides of souls. Is that true?

G. de P. — There is certainly an analogy there, but not an identity. The sishtas are the remnants left by an advancing life-wave of entities in order to provide the vehicles for the same Wave when it returns.

Student — Yes, I understand that clearly. Now if there are three other life-waves above the human, and if these other three are commonly referred to as dhyan-chohanic life-waves, then it would hardly seem as if they were in an active manvantaric condition on the earth at present.

G. de P. — Oh, but they are. That is simply the wonder of it all!

Student — Then we are very far from being conscious of it?

G. de P. — That also is true. We are very far from being self-conscious of it.

Student — Then in that sense none of the mahatmas are sishtas. Yet, they are rungs or degrees on the ladders of life between us and those monadic hosts.

G. de P. — I think I now see to what your mind is tending.

It is a most intricate subject of thought that you have touched upon. I hope that I can make my answer clear.

In each great period of human evolution there is one grade of the mahatmic order which is more active than it is at other times. If you refer to those dhyan-chohans who are not of the present great period of evolution, but who nevertheless exist as the sishtas of coming cycles, in that sense your statement is perfectly true; and when these new and grander cycles of evolution come to a human race, then these grander dhyan-chohanic entities will manifest or work more forcefully and more strongly than they do at present.

Student — That was my question; and such an evolutionary tide must have its sishtas on the earth even at present, although to us in our limited consciousness of invisible realms these sishtas are too far evolved for us to cognize them. Yet it seemed to me that our Masters might be related to those sishtas of the future and far grander evolutionary tide in the mahatmic condition of evolution — instead of being as now limited to a comparatively few. Is that correct?

G. de P. — That is perfectly correct, if I understand you aright. But the usage of the word sishtas is inaccurate. These waiting grand ones are never called by the term sishtas. They are watchers, guardians —

Silent Watchers is a general name for them. They are not sishtas; they are the elders, they are in the van of the race, they are far more spiritually and intellectually awakened than we. But, as I said, there is a certain

analogy between the human sishtas and the Silent Watchers of any great life-wave. That indeed is true.

Student — That answers my question. Thank you.

Student — As the great ones in these different hierarchies exist on the various ascending rungs of the ladder of life, we are told that there are gods, but no supreme personal god. In thinking of the ladder of life, I am reminded that, for instance at school, there are the teachers, and the principal, and the superintendent, and so forth. Now I wish to ask: as these hierarchies become greater and grander, are there fewer individuals in them, or contrariwise?

G. de P. — Do you ask whether, as we rise in thought along the scale of the ladder of life, the entities occupying these grades become fewer and fewer as the summit of the hierarchical ladder is reached?

Student — Yes. Or do they become more in number?

G. de P. — They become fewer and fewer until we reach the summit and peak of any hierarchy. In our own spiritual hierarchy, for instance, that summit is an entity, the spiritual father, the Silent Watcher of our hierarchy. And it is the same with every other hierarchy, wherever that hierarchy may be. That is quite true.

Student — Then how is it with the universes? Does the same analogy hold true?

G. de P. — It does. But you must remember that these hierarchies never come to an end, for the universe is endless, boundless, without frontiers. The thought you have in your mind has often been alluded to and exemplified in what I have called the doctrine of hierarchies. All these hierarchies interlock, interblend, interwork, interexist; and in their incomprehensible aggregate forming whatever it may be — a solar system, a universe, or even the Boundless. This term boundless is, after all, but a descriptive term. It is an expression confessing human incapacity to understand frontierless infinitude, and beginningless and endless time or duration. It is a term self-confessing our incapacity to understand infinitude and eternity. We theosophists simply call it the Boundless. Most emphatically it does not mean one supreme entity, one supreme being.

Student — One would naturally think that as these beings become higher and higher they would ultimate into one great being. But it evidently is an incomprehensible.

G. de P. — That is it. It is an incomprehensible, verily. Please understand that the peak or loftiest point of any hierarchy is the Silent Watcher of that hierarchy; and he — we will speak of this entity as "he," if you like —

he is the link with the lowest rung of another ladder of life, another hierarchy, which in its turn at its loftiest point has a Silent Watcher. And this last one, again, is but the link with the lowest rung of still another ladder of life; and so on throughout endless space.

And not only that. You must not consider these hierarchies as being one on top of another, like a series of apartments or flats in a dwelling house. They extend in all directions. They are hierarchies of consciousness.

Do you grasp the thought?

Many Voices — Yes.

Student — Noticing the perfume from some flowers before coming to this meeting, it suddenly struck me very forcibly how those flowers seem to enjoy giving out their perfume. They were beautiful and they exhaled an exquisite odor. It seemed that there was more than simply some material idea of attracting the bee or the butterfly. They seemed to give it out from their inner nature. This fact brought to my mind what the holy man of Benares said about his teacher having been in a village and his very presence giving out a spiritual aroma that kept those people in a higher state through many of their difficulties. And this reminds me of the idea of our work, of the importance of being unselfish, and yet at the same time working as those do who are ambitious. I would like to hear a little more about this matter, following the thought of the flowers —

the flowers giving out their perfume, beautifully, inspiringly; and yet at the same time they are working, making their seeds, and so forth.

G. de P. — Yes, a flower exhales its life in odor and in beauty. Now it so happens that evolution has given to

us the olfactory organ with which we can take in and grasp the existence of this particular exhalation of vitality which we call the perfume of certain flowers; but this instance of the beautiful flower exhaling its life in sweet odor is not a single one, but exemplifies the universal rule.

Do you realize that human beings likewise exhale their life in odor, also in color and in sound, but we have not the sense apparatus to grasp either the sound or the color. We see the colors which the flowers exhale because we have the sense apparatus to see them. They also exhale sound, but we have not the hearing, the sense apparatus, to hear the sounds that they send forth.

Every atom of the enormous hosts of atoms composing the bodies of any entity has its own keynote of sound, sings its own chant or hymn continuously. It not only has its own singular keynote, but also that keynote changes through the ages. Now when you remember that a human being or a flower or a beast is, physically speaking, an aggregate of atoms, we recognize that had we the sense apparatus to take it all in, we should hear the life, the movements, of such an entity, as a wonderful song or harmony, as a chant. Also had we the proper sense apparatus we should see a human being clothed with iridescent beauty of color. But our senses for these are not as yet evolved. We are incognizant of many wonderful things that actually exist around us; and all these things that are exhaled or sent forth by any entity, be it flower or beast or man or other, are simply manifestations of its vitality — of the life welling up from the fountain within it and expressing itself in form and color and sound and odor and otherwise. Some of the beasts can see and hear things that human beings cannot. Some human beings can see and hear and otherwise have sense cognition of things that other human beings have not.

The training of a chela, not in the beginning of course, but the later training of a chela, is partly along these lines in order to make him more fully conscious of what exists in the universe around us. He becomes cognizant through this training of the manifestations of the life forces of the beings which surround him. He can accurately read the aura of a fellow disciple. He can see and interpret in the aura surrounding a beast what the beast's intentions or thoughts are. He can hear, by being in the presence of some other man, what the other man is thinking about and what plans he has. He does not have to think strongly about all this. The knowledge comes to him instinctively, just as we now see with our eyes the type of nose that a man has, or the shape of his shoulders, or what not. We do not think about how we see. Sight has become so customary that we no longer realize that it is very wonderful.

But the things that our senses show us, imperfectly evolved as they are, are nothing as compared with what actually exists. Had we the other senses evolved to enable us to take in what happens around us, we should know that a man in anger, for instance, is not only surrounded with an ugly dirty red which changes the color of his aura completely, but the sounds he inaudibly throws forth affect the ear with their jangling discords, and these are very unpleasant. We have five imperfectly developed senses: sight, smell, touch, hearing, and taste.

There are at least two other senses that human beings will physically evolve before they leave this planet —

to some extent even in this fourth round. One will be the ability to see through material things, and I use the word see because it is the only one that occurs to me with which to describe this as yet unevolved faculty. It is not only seeing, it is also sensing. It is this sixth sense — and I am not alluding to the last or seventh sense, but to this sixth sense — which is the power to get cognition of what is within things: to see through them, to use the popular expression. This sense will be as instantaneous as our other senses now are. It will require no willing thought at all. It is like touch at present. You touch something hot, and you don't have to think about its being hot. You know it is hot.

We human beings have wonders in us that the present unevolved man knows nothing about, and does not even dream of. He has no realization at all that these wonderful things and as yet unevolved faculties and powers exist within him.

Student — This training in chelaship then I suppose would be a spiritual training in order to develop the sixth and seventh senses especially?

G. de P. — Oh no, the training in respect of these two senses is only a side issue, only a side activity. The

training in chelaship is to bring out what the man has within him, and especially of a divine and spiritual and intellectual and psychical character — that is, the faculties and powers belonging to the higher part of his being. Obviously, therefore, such training means also evoking to some extent the inner but as yet latent senses, but this last is merely an incident. It is the least part of the training for chelaship. Much greater things than merely the development of the inner senses take place in the training for chelaship — grander and nobler things by far.

Let me tell you something. The fourth degree of initiation, Companions, is the one where teaching and discipline continue indeed as they exist in the three previous degrees or grades, but nevertheless with the fourth degree something new to the initiant takes place: actual individual or rather personal experiencing of what happens on other planets, in other realms, on other worlds, so that the initiant may properly cognize conditions there. In order so to cognize, you must have previously, to some extent at least, evolved the proper inner sense apparatus — otherwise your journey into these interior realms or spheres, or even on other physical planets, would be more or less like a dream, a more or less crazy dream too. You would be conscious of being there, but could not interpret anything.

As a matter of fact, normal human beings during quiet sleep go to these inner worlds or planes; in some instances they go to other planets of our own solar system, but they remember nothing about it. They have indeed been there, but, having evolved no inner senses of cognition, the consciousness is not touched, and the consciousness not being touched, nothing can be recollected or brought back to mind. Do you understand?

Many Voices — Yes.

G. de P. — Initiation and the training in chelaship are not only a quickening of evolution, although evolution will in the far future bring forth these new senses into active manifestation. Initiation and training are not only that, but also are the evoking, the evolving, of the power to understand and to be.

The man, the individual, has everything in him that the universe has, so wherever he may go in the interior worlds or in the outer worlds, he is essentially at home there. And he is the more at home in direct proportion with the greater degree that his inner being and its inner senses and faculties are awake. In other words, to enable him to cognize, therefore to know, therefore to retain what he knows, he must have the self-consciousness of realizing what he experiences in these interior worlds. I do hope that you understand.

Student — I was not speaking only of the flower, dear Teacher, but also of the ethical aspect involved. Are we justified in enjoying life while there are such terrible things existent all around us? At the same time, are we not right in being like the flower, giving out something beautiful as part of our work, and not merely indifferently "doing things"? That is what the man of Benares said: "Don't be worried about doing things. Be worried about being."

G. de P. — That is quite right. It is a duty to keep the beautiful things, the noble things, and it is not wrong to enjoy them impersonally. Enjoyment of beautiful things never brings a surfeit. It never palls. It refines the nature. But the real point of importance is that we must never forget that we enjoy only in order better to help others. We must never become so self-involved in our own personal enjoyment that we lose sight of our greatest and noblest duty, which is to help others, to aid others, to give them the blessings that we have. We should in these respects be like the flowers, exhaling beauty and peace and goodness. Our lives should be like the beautiful flowers giving freely to all, impregnating every passing breeze with the inner beauty welling forth from within our own souls, so that the very breeze may thus carry our inner beauty to others and thus help them and charm them to copy us.

Furthermore, we should so live that we become ever more and more conscious of everything. This is the gist of it all. The Pratyeka Buddha, please understand, is not an evil being. He is not selfish in the ordinary human sense. The Pratyeka Buddha, on account of the spotless purity of his life and aspirations, is a holy entity, a very lofty and in many respects a beautiful character; nevertheless, after all is said, there remains the fact that he thinks of himself alone. His life is, therefore, restricted, and he will enter his nirvana and will remain in crystallized purity therein for aeons, advancing not at all. Whereas the Buddha of Compassion who lives for the world and in the world, but not of the world, is growing and evolving and increasing in inner grandeur all

the time; so that in the far distant future, when the Pratyeka Buddha issues forth from his nirvanic state in order to take up a new course of evolution in some loftier existence than the one he left when entering the nirvana, he will be far in the rear of the Buddha of Compassion who has been evolving continually in the interim.

Student — I have often wondered in reading in the Christian New Testament the parable of the prodigal son, whether we should relate it to the manvantaric life cycle. If so, is there anything that we should attach to the part of the parable which has reference to the brother who went not forth and was somewhat aggrieved when the other brother returned rejoicing? When speaking of the pratyekas, I have wondered if there is any possible connection?

G. de P. — Well, there are usually certain analogical similarities between the parables or moral legends of the different ages. But I think that the parable of the prodigal son sets forth the joy which the teachers have when the wandering souls of men finally refuse to eat of the husks of life and return home — come back into the family.

You know the old Christian saying containing the statement that there is more joy in heaven over one sinner that repenteth than over the ninety and nine just men? The sinner that repenteth may be looked upon as another version of the parable of the prodigal son who finally returned home.

Student — In the Book of the Dead there is a reference to the initiant or departed one regaining different senses: for instance, the senses of hearing and smelling. Does this refer to the inner senses that you say a chela develops?

G. de P. — You are speaking of the Egyptian Book of the Dead?

Student — Yes.

G. de P. — No. Of course there may be an indirect reference, because all parts of nature being built alike, it follows that what exists in one part has its correspondences in all other parts. But I think that the reference in the Egyptian Book of the Dead is to what takes place after death, and in initiation also.

Student — There is also one passage that treats at some length concerning "opening the mouth," and I have wondered what that passage referred to. Can you explain?

G. de P. — You know, perhaps, that the mouth has sometimes been called in esotericism the organ of the creative logos. This simply means that the mouth in the physical body is one of the organs representing an inner power: the organ through which thought comes forth as words and modifies and changes the lives of our fellows. It is by the mouth, by the tongue, that we express the thoughts within us. It may be by gestures also, but particularly through the mouth. The opening of the mouth is a technical phrase of the ancient Mysteries. It refers to the gaining of a spiritual power, the power to communicate the esoteric wisdom so that it is understood of others. Do you understand me? It takes an initiate to be able to communicate the esoteric wisdom. The teacher must have the teaching crystal clear in his own mind. He must have in addition the ability to express in duly understood words the crystal clear thought which his own mind holds.

Now, Companions, I think that we had better close the meeting tonight. Will you sound the gong?

[The sounding of the gong. Silence.]

Meeting 30

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Thirty

Meeting of April 14, 1931

G. de P. — Companions, in a very short time I shall be leaving Headquarters for five or six moons. Before going I am desirous of testing how much you have assimilated of the teachings that have been given in the KTMG. Therefore I think that for tonight I shall change the program, and instead of answering questions, I shall ask them. I have not quite decided in my own mind whether I shall call for volunteers to answer the questions that I propose asking, or whether I shall call for certain speakers by name.

First, then, and by way of introductory, I have often wondered how much your minds have assimilated of the real esoteric teaching concerning the devachan, and with regard to what it is that experiences the devachan, and where the devachan is if indeed it has position or locality, and just what these devachanic experiences are; and, secondly, I then desire to test you a little as to your ideas regarding nirvana as contrasted with devachan.

In the first place, then, what is this word devachan? Will anyone volunteer to answer this question?

Student D — A state of rest.

Student E — The abode of the gods.

G. de P. — Well, these answers are brief descriptions of the devachanic state; but as regards the word itself, is it an English word?

Many Voices — No.

Student F — (Heard above many voices): devachan is a borrowed Sanskrit word.

G. de P. — Pardon me, Companions, for saying that if you all answer together, the Recorders will be utterly unable to take down the answers. Here I shall have to call speakers by their names. F----, what is the devachan considered as a word? What are the origin and the root of it?

Student F — Deva is a Sanskrit word and chan is a Tibetan word; and the meaning is "the god-world."

G. de P. — That is correct and exact; and that is also the exoteric meaning given by the Tibetan people to the word devachan which really signifies a particular state of consciousness undergone or experienced by an excarnate human being. To call it the god-realm is to give an exact translation of this hybrid term, part Tibetan and part Sanskrit; and this exoteric rendering is correct in one sense, because the entity which undergoes the devachanic experiences belongs to that class of beings which is frequently spoken of in India as devas.

Now a deva, or rather the Hindu deva, is not exactly the same as was the Greek god in the popular mythology of Greece. There is in fact quite a large difference between the two. Nevertheless a deva or a devata is a spiritual being, or a being partaking of spiritual qualities. It was customary among the ancients of the Far East to speak in a general way of any individualized part of the human constitution above the astral as a deva or a devata, which is correct enough, the devas or devatas themselves existing in greatly various grades or degrees of ethereality or of spirituality, and of many diverse types or kinds. Deva, or devata therefore is a generalizing term signifying a spiritual or quasi-spiritual being of almost any type.

I now ask you, what part of the human being is it which enters the devachan, or goes to the devachan, or better still (and this is perhaps the best way of expressing the question) what part of the human constitution is it which becomes a devachani?

Student D — The fifth and sixth principles.

G. de P. — Yes, that is correct, with an emphasis laid upon the fifth principle.

Student B — It is the higher part of the manas.

Student P — The reincarnating ego.

G. de P. — That is correct. May I ask you, in giving the answers, that for the sake of the record, you will please first give your name when answering — please!

Thus far the answers have been, generally speaking, quite correct; nevertheless these answers you could easily have found in even our exoteric books. They do not show a very deep and clear understanding of the exact nature of the devachan. What do you consider the devachani to be? Is it an entity? Is it a mere energy?

If an entity, has it a body? Will anyone venture to answer that question and to elaborate it a bit if he or she so pleases?

Student F — The devachan is a state of consciousness, the highest state of consciousness that we are capable of.

G. de P. — Yes, that is true when we consider the ordinary human being; but that answer does not quite respond to the question. The question is: what is the devachani? If it is an entity, has it a body? Is it six feet tall, or five feet two inches tall, or has it broad shoulders or not? Has it a long nose and big feet or a small nose and small feet? Of what color are its eyes? In other words, what is your mental picture, if you have one, of the devachani? Would anyone like to answer this?

Student V — It is the human monad, and it has a vehicle; that is to say, it is an entity; but it is really a lifeatom one might say. It comes back as a lifeatom, and so I imagine —

Student T — I venture to suggest that the devachanic entity, or at least its body, is the auric egg.

Student L — For my part, I think that it is the cream of the last personality of the ego on earth — that part of it that is able to unite with the higher manas, and that hence it lives in the spiritualized and highest elements contained in the last earth-life. And as to its body, it might indeed be said to have a body, and that body might be represented as a very small extension of space. I cannot express it quite clearly — but I think it is living in a sphere of the auric egg and also in the bosom of the monad.

G. de P. — Yes, all these three answers are each one correct as far as they go.

Student K — I hardly see how it could be the monad. I thought it was rather the projection of the monad: the child, as it were, of the monad through which the monad gained experience in earth-life and thus evolved; and that it would be imbodied in material belonging to that plane. It would not be formless. I should think that it would have a form, but of matter belonging to the devachanic plane. I really never have pictured a devachani.

G. de P. — You are speaking of the human ego, are you not?

Student K — I am speaking of the reincarnating ego, the higher part of the ego: I mean to say, the higher manas and the buddhic principle, perhaps the atma-buddhi-manas.

G. de P. — You figurate it therefore as a part of the monad, and that is correct. The human ego is a projection of the monad. That also is true. But while all these answers have been excellent, they are not clearly and accurately responsive to the question. Companion V, I think, in the few words that she said, came the closest to a responsive answer; but the question itself has not yet been answered. I now repeat it: what is your conception of the devachani as an entity, leaving apart for the present moment its spiritual and intellectual qualities? Has it extension? Does it occupy space?

Student C — I try to conceive of this by always studying myself. I find that the center of consciousness within myself must have space; and yet it cannot be clearly defined. It seems to be a unit of space that has almost infinite extension in either direction, large or small; so that I don't conceive of myself as a center of

consciousness with a definite limitation as regards spacial extension.

I understand the devachani to be a center of consciousness in which the high aspirations and high thoughts of the past life have been drawn together around this center of consciousness by affinity or by attraction, and united, condensed, about this center of consciousness; and that this center stays within the auric egg, albeit as an emanation of the monad, for the period of time necessary to digest and to assimilate the spiritual experiences of the life just passed, the process of thinking or digestion going on somewhat after the manner of profound meditation or reflection. This may help to give the idea that I have formed of the devachani; and I think that it has form and substance and yet these are of a kind difficult to limit or even to define.

G. de P. — That is very well said indeed, but still I feel that the heart of my question has not been answered.

Let me explain a little more, Companions. I would like a definite and clear-cut answer to the following question. In your vision or conception of the devachani, do you figurate it as an entity having extension or as being extensionless? To speak of it per se as a center of consciousness is exactly correct. It is also the reincarnating ego. It also exists at the heart of the auric egg. All the qualities and attributes that have this evening been stated as belonging to it by the various speakers have been correctly stated; but — has the devachani extension in the same way that our human physical body occupies space? Just let us answer each point as it arises; and then we will go to the next point and have that answered. In this manner I hope to bring out from within your consciousness the wisdom and the knowledge which I know exist there, but which you have not yet yourselves brought out. Will someone, therefore, answer my question?

Student T — No extension in the sense that we humans have of extension.

G. de P. — That is quite correct.

Student G — That is what I also would have said. Since the devachani is no longer on the planes of form, it would have no form, and being a center of consciousness it would have no material extension.

G. de P. — Yes, that is true; nevertheless the devachani does not strictly belong to or exist in the arupa or so-called formless worlds. The devachani still belongs to one or to another of the rupa-worlds; but devachan itself, mark you, Companions, has many degrees which range from the highest degrees of the rupa-world upwards into the arupa or formless worlds.

The devachani has been correctly defined as a center of consciousness without material extension. Now please make an important deduction from this correct answer. A center of consciousness without extension means a center of consciousness without parts, without body, occupying no space as ordinarily thought of.

What then is it? A mathematical or an ideal point — and yet it exists. Hence it is. Go a step farther. Be courageous! Don't be afraid of a truth when you see it. Where is the devachan?

Many Voices — Nowhere! Everywhere! All around us!

G. de P. — Nowhere, everywhere, all around us, that is the answer. (I must again ask, Companions — this is so interesting, that in the impetuosity of your thoughts you forget my plea — for the benefit of the record, we must have the names of the speakers, even if their answers be but one word.) Do you then understand that an entity — a center of consciousness without extension — may have its devachan in the sun, or in the moon, or on one of the planets, or in the petals of a flower on earth, or in a drop of water, or in a bit of lead or of steel? Is that correct?

Student F — It is in the bosom of the monad.

G. de P. — The answer is correct as far as it goes. But then how do you reconcile that answer with the statement which was previously made that the devachan can be anywhere?

Student L — The devachani, as I think of it, lives in its own ideal consciousness in a world of mental forms, in its thought images; and thus it also lives in a world of color and form, and hence moves and lives a real life. It has conception of extension of form, of sounds, of colors, with a spiritual content, that is true. This is,

of course, maya, as everything is; yet the devachani must be represented in some way — not so fixed as are our bodily lives, with form and perhaps some ideal extension, but the latter might be very, very small; and also the devachani might follow the circulations of the cosmos in company with the monad, to the sun, even perhaps to the parent-star.

Devachan, therefore, has no fixed place in space, but I always think of it as a world consisting of a finer matter, yet that world might be exceedingly small. If everything in that world is relative, the devachani will have conceptions of that world just as easily as it would have of a great world.

G. de P. — The latter part especially of the answer is quite correct. The former seems rather vague but also correct. A mathematical point, say mathematicians, has position but no extension. Now comes the question, can a mathematical point be a portion of any concrete substantial entity? Can it be in the petal of a flower?

Can it be in a part of a steel blade of a pocket-knife? Can it be in a part of the branch of a tree? No, because all these things are material things, and the devachani exists in another sphere of consciousness than that in which inhere and exist these various material things that I have mentioned. Nevertheless, the devachani, although existing in another and a more spiritual world or realm than our physical one, could be located by the imagination anywhere: in the petal of a flower, in a bit of wood, in a bit of wool — anywhere in fact —

but not as an atom of such material things. The devachani essentially is a consciousness-point or center.

We have now come to another very interesting deduction. The adept, the Master of human consciousness, a mahatma in other words, finds it easily possible to make his consciousness smaller than the smallest atom, in other words, to become a consciousness-center. Having become that, the entire material sphere is permeable to that consciousness-center, and with a single effort of the will he can transfer himself, this consciousness-center, anywhere in space whither he chooses to go. And it is in this fact that lies the secret of what the Tibetans call the exercise of the hpho-wa — the projection of the consciousness.

I have chosen this question for an especial reason. If you can have your ideas clear concerning the devachani, its nature, its character, its position if any, that is its locality in space if any, its attributes and its powers, then from these clear ideas you can deduce many interesting secrets of occultism and find many explanations of mysteries that have hitherto been recondite and difficult for you to understand, because you have not had the clarity of ideas and the definiteness of vision concerning these matters.

We shall now come, if you please, to the nature or character of the devachani's consciousness. It has been spoken of as a dream. Do you consider this statement to be accurate, that devachan is actually a dream? Will someone answer that question?

Student L — No.

G. de P. — Mrs. L---- says, no. Her answer is correct. Well, but why is it so frequently spoken of, and in a way correctly spoken of, as a dream state?

Student S — I should think that it would be because the dream state is the nearest conception of devachan that our human minds can grasp. It is most like the dream state that we know.

G. de P. — That is correct as far as it goes. It is also, and perhaps more correctly, called a dream state because it is not a causal state of consciousness. It is an effectual state of consciousness, a result — and a dream state is a result of what has preceded the sleep in which the dream occurs. Devachan is called a dream merely because this word dream is the closest familiar illustration, perhaps, that can be found to describe it.

Devachan is called a dream because, just as the dream state of a sleeping human being is an abstraction from actual participation in physical affairs and is nevertheless a state of consciousness, so is the devachani abstracted from working causally in the world, and nevertheless is in a state of spiritual digestion and assimilation. The devachani is in a state of effects, just as a dream of a sleeping man is for his consciousness a state of effects.

To say that the devachani is asleep is incorrect, if you use this word asleep literally. Actually the devachani is in a very active state of consciousness, but a dream also can be a very active state of consciousness. Just as dreams are the results of not only all the events of the preceding day which have made an effect on the mind,

but also of the entire preceding life — that is, the life since birth up to the day of the sleep — just so is the devachan the effectual consequence or results, the effects, of the life which has just closed and indeed of all the previous reincarnations.

If you have these ideas clear in your mind, Companions, you will be enabled to answer the questions of new students, of strangers, who are just coming into theosophy, and who very naturally are more or less bewildered by what seems to them the richness of imagery and the rich treasury of thoughts which first then open out to their minds. Hence a few simple ideas concerning these things will be a great help to you in answering questions, as well as in giving to yourselves hints of other mysteries that I have pointed to.

Now then, in what way does the state of the devachani differ from the state of the nirvani?

Student R — That brings up a question that I was just going to ask. We are told that the devachan is a lower state than the nirvanic state. That statement would imply that the devachan is nearer to the material plane, in a sense. I should imagine the nirvani to be a mathematical point of consciousness, and the nirvanic plane to be or to exist in another space than that of the devachan. However, we understand the nirvani to be superior to the devachani. I was thinking, then, that if the devachani becomes a mathematical point, how can the nirvani which is also probably a mathematical consciousness-center be in any wise superior to the devachani, since both are described as consciousness-centers.

Some time ago you spoke of the different kinds of divisions in the auric egg; and you said that there were grades in the auric egg rising from something which was very nearly physical to something which was almost purely ethereal.

G. de P. — The last statement is true.

Student R — That seemed to give me a valuable clue. With our feeble brain-minds, we cannot understand a point without extension. We cannot comprehend it. We can only believe it to be so. In a sort of humble way we can get an intuitive glimpse of such things.

But my difficulty was that the grades of devachan being lower, more towards the material than the grades of nirvana, and yet both the devachani and the nirvani being spoken of as consciousness-centers which are immaterial points, how then can the devachani which is an immaterial point be less high than the nirvani which is also an immaterial point?

G. de P. — Professor R---, you have made not only some very interesting remarks, but you have included among them what is a rather perilous statement. You say that the human mind cannot conceive the state of nirvana, or words equivalent thereto?

Student R — No, I meant that the human mind cannot conceive of the state of a purely mathematical point, a purely abstract point.

G. de P. — Why not?

Student R — We have tried to do it with Euclid.

G. de P. — If you will remember that a mathematical point, according to theory, has no extension but only position, you will realize that there is nothing to understand about it as a material entity, which in fact it is not. Consequently you are running circles around the thought when you so try to consider it. A mathematical point can be understood as a point of consciousness. Examine the consciousness-side of it rather than the material extension side of it, which it does not possess, and it immediately becomes clear, easily understandable in theory at least.

Now, the nirvana in one sense of the word may be considered to be the exact opposite of the devachan. In the nirvana the consciousness-center or point is wholly and totally awake, active, in full self-conscious realization of its individual existence as an entity, and despite this fact self-conscious of its oneness with the universe.

These two of necessity include each other. They are converse statements of the same thing. The devachani on

the other hand is a dreaming entity, is in a state where the consciousness deals with effects only, therefore, with a certain number of visions, of seeings, of pictorial exercisings or figurations of consciousness. Through and around and above these limited numbers of pictorial exercisings of consciousness it endures through the ages as long as the devachan lasts. It runs the rounds of the body of thoughts in which it is then involved, rings all the possible changes of this group of states of consciousness. Do you follow the thought?

Student R — Most illuminating. Yes.

G. de P. — Whereas the nirvani is wholly free in his or its consciousness. It is wholly awake. It has become at one with the universe. It is in one sense the exactly opposite state of the devachan, if you understand what I mean. It has freedom instead of being involved in a dream state of its own imaginings.

Nirvana means a "blowing out," a vanishing, as, when you blow out a candle, its flame vanishes. All the flame and heat and smell and noise and fretful and fevered chattering life of the physical person is blown out, and the pure consciousness, undiluted, unadulterated, unrestricted by limitations, is then freed so that that consciousness alone remains. That is the nirvana.

When a human being can transcend all personal limitations, all personal restrictions — and they are myriad in number — then he is in nirvana, at least in one of its lower degrees. The devachani is an entity still enwrapped within the veils and garments of individual personality; or, if you like, of personal individuality, although spiritualized and dreamlike.

The matter is very simple and clear to me; I don't know whether you also understand?

Many Voices — Yes, indeed.

Student C — May I say just a word? It is more of a question than of a word, however. According to my comprehension of the devachani, as we have gathered its condition from the books, it is a something that supervenes after the death of the physical body. It is a condition of consciousness where the entity is surrounded by that which seems as real and substantial and actual as the world in which his consciousness was before the change called death took place. It is likened to a dream condition, but it is a dream condition in which there is as much of reality as there is in what we call the waking condition. In our dreams that are vivid there are causes that move to effects according to our character of consciousness at the time.

Therefore this question arises, by what standard are we to determine in our own consciousness whether we be a devachani or not? And does it not follow with a certain logical sequence that until the consciousness-center, that is the inner entity of each one, has become thoroughly self-conscious, conscious of its own divinity, of its real selfhood — in other words a nirvani — until that time of self-conscious realization has been reached and that status has been acquired, can it be said that the devachanic condition exists continuously? By what standard are we going to determine whether today in this apparently real world we be in the devachanic condition that our own imaginations have created? How is one to know?

G. de P. — That is very admirably put. In fact, it is a notably thoughtful statement. I would like to make one qualification, however. What Brother C---- has stated is perfectly true. The devachan is merely an extension of our present human state of consciousness in an ethereal realm, precisely as a dream is. But devachan nevertheless is a technical word limited to the consciousness state of the excarnate reincarnating ego.

As a matter of fact, Companions — and I have told you this before — there are human beings, many of them now on earth, who are even at present scarcely out of their last devachan. They have brought the devachan back to reincarnation with themselves. They are still to a certain extent in the devachanic state, a dreamy state, a state more or less a continuation of the inter-lives condition. The master of life is precisely he who from this dreamy state, falsely but nevertheless popularly so called, has succeeded in passing permanently into a higher spiritual state of reality, and this is the beginning of nirvana even in earth-life.

Student B — Should we not be justified in speaking of devachan as a beatific vision, and of nirvana as a beatific realization?

G. de P. — Yes, that is perhaps true from one viewpoint.

Student B — And should not one describe the nirvanic consciousness as monadic, a state of consciousness where one's individual consciousness is absorbed into the monadic?

G. de P. — Yes. Both the statements are correct, Dr. B----. I would like to qualify the last part of your statement, not indeed to correct it, but perhaps to throw a little further light on it.

The nirvanic state is a purely monadic state, but in the sense of the developed monad. All the faculties and powers now inherent in or native to the monad are then fully brought out and blossoming.

Now I want to return to Mr. T----'s perfectly correct statement regarding the devachan and its connection with the auric egg. Do you understand the auric egg to be changeless?

Many Voices — No.

G. de P. — That is correct. The auric egg like everything else changes continuously. It is not the same through two consecutive seconds of time. Like everything else it is in movement. It is growing, it is evolving, it is changing. But while it is true that the devachani is seated, so to speak, at the heart of the auric egg, is this auric egg during the state of devachan as extensive, spacially speaking, as it is during life?

Student L — No.

G. de P. — That also is correct. What then becomes of the auric egg during the devachan if it is smaller than it is during the life on earth of the individual?

Student G — Since the principles forming the constitution of man are composed of the varying grades of the auric egg, when the lower principles are thrown off it would follow that the lower grades of the Auric Egg are de facto thrown off for the time and only the higher parts remain and enter into the bosom of the monad.

G. de P. — That is correct, but still it does not quite answer the gist or heart of the question. I will put it a little differently: what size has the auric egg of the devachani? What space does it fill?

Student J — One in proportion to its size in that state.

G. de P. — Just elaborate a little. You are not wrong, but I would like to bring out your answer more clearly.

Student I — If the devachani is a mere mathematical point, the auric egg would be a mere covering of that mathematical point.

G. de P. — That is correct. Do you mean that the auric egg shrinks in dimensions to a mathematical point which has no dimensions?

Student J — You don't think of it as having dimension.

G. de P. — How do you think of it, then?

Student J — Well, a mathematical point is a center of consciousness which is alive, and therefore its auric egg must be alive too. It can be a center of consciousness, and the auric egg the effects of this center of consciousness.

G. de P. — That answer is much closer to the truth. As a matter of fact, the entire auric egg, which is the entire man, shrinks during the devachan, but differently with different individuals; yet it may be said that as a general rule the auric egg shrinks to be a mere covering or a skin around the consciousness-center.

Now here is another question. The consciousness-center being likened to a mathematical point having position but no volume, no extension, does this fact apply only to our physical world, or to the inner realms as well?

Student F — Only to the physical worlds.

G. de P. — That is correct. In other words, then, the auric egg still exists on other planes as the veil, or body of veils, surrounding the devachani. Is that correct?

Student F — Yes.

G. de P. — That is correct. Now, I want to point out something here. The auric egg is an extension of the various energies which are comprised in the center of consciousness during reincarnation. As these energies well forth from the heart of the consciousness-center, from the monad, the auric egg grows or swells pari passu. And this swelling begins and continues at and from the time the devachani leaves devachan; in other words, grows out of that state of consciousness, continues the swelling before birth and after birth until the full-grown adult is reached. The whole process post mortem consists in a drawing in of the various veils composing the auric egg which are thus reabsorbed into the consciousness-center. You must not look upon this reabsorption in the sense of a condensation. That is not the idea. They are reabsorbed into the consciousness, and that which had formerly been cast forth is now withdrawn into the consciousness-heart.

Therefore the devachani is an entity which can exist anywhere, because it has no definite bodily proportions.

The devachan is a state of consciousness. The devachani is a consciousness-center seated at the heart of the human child-monad, and this child-monad, being as it were a dimensionless point, is thus withdrawn into the bosom of the monadic essence, into the bosom of its parent, the spiritual monad.

Student G — May I ask you a question?

G. de P. — Yes. I am asking questions tonight, but nevertheless ask your question.

Student G — Is it correct to say that because this entity, this devachani, is in the bosom of the monad, the monad therefore contains within itself the state of devachan, and, going still farther, that it contains within itself the state of nirvana, or in fact any state?

G. de P. — Certainly.

Student G — And that is why we say "I am That"?

G. de P. — Just so. Speaking now of the monad in a general sense and not of any specific monad, whether spiritual or human or psychological or astral, it is correct to say that the monadic essence contains within itself either active or in latency all states of consciousness. Its higher part is in nirvana or is a nirvani. The human part of it is, after the death of the physical man, in its devachan. The astral part is in a dreamless sleep, annihilated for the time being as an entity, nevertheless existing as unconscious consciousness, if you understand what I mean, somewhat like a sleeping seed of life — as is the case with the seed of a tree in which the germ of life is temporarily negative and sleeping but still it is there.

As a matter of fact, Companions, the very items of thought or points of study that we have discussed this evening apply as well to a universe as they do to a human being. Do you realize, self-consciously realize, that what we humans on account of the feebleness of our intellect call the Boundless or boundless space, is simply the akasa and its ethers and the monads and atoms existing in that akasa and its ethers belonging to a perfectly vast and incomprehensible Entity? It may be compared on the small scale to an incarnated human being. As the Christian scripture sets the matter forth: "In It we live and move and have our being." As an atom, a chemical atom, in a human body lives and moves and has a life cycle in that human body, so does a solar system or a sun or a planet or a human being form a part or portion, large or small as the case may be, of this vast incomprehensible cosmic or supercosmic Entity. You understand that, do you not?

Nevertheless this supercosmic Entity, in comparison with boundless infinitude, shrinks to the dimensions, to use a paradox, of a dimensionless point. The supercosmic Entity itself is but a lifeatom in the being — in the body, to use plain English — of some Entity still more vast. Nature repeats herself everywhere, because there is one life existing according to one law, which is the law of that universal life itself, and therefore every

subordinate entity or lifeatom which forms the corpus or being of this one life must obey that fundamental law. This is the reason, I say again, why nature repeats herself, why cycles exist, and why the law of analogy is such a grand key for unlocking the mysteries of the universe. "As above, so below." What is below you can read as being a cyclic reproduction or reflection, if you are wise enough, of what is above.

We have used frequently this evening the expression a mathematical point. This is a favorite phrase with modern European and American mathematicians, and I have often wondered just exactly what they mean by it. It is a very convenient counter of thought, a little pigeonhole of consciousness, which has been ticketed or labeled a mathematical point. These mathematicians say that a mathematical point has position but no extension. The statement is correct in a way, because it more or less exactly describes a point of consciousness. Consciousness per se has no extension, which means limitation, because it is both punctual and universal. It has position, it has endurance, and it also has a history. It signifies an entity or a group or groups of entities.

But I want to go a step farther into the teachings of our own Oriental School and point out that because a mathematical point of consciousness is an entity and has a history — because it makes and unmakes karma —

therefore its sweep of selfhood, just because it is dimensionless, is not limited by extension. Again, such a point of consciousness is not per se fixed anywhere in particular because its root is the universal consciousness; and all this is exactly the same thing as saying that it can be everywhere.

Please think over this wonderful paradox of essential consciousness. It means that the essence of consciousness is both universal and particular — universal per se and particular in the position it holds at any one time or during any one cycle. Or we may say that the essence of consciousness is universal but its living or particular veil or vehicle has position. The root of the root of the core of the heart of the core of you is the heart of the universe. Amazing paradox it is! You cannot limit the essence of consciousness, consciousness per se, by any enlargements or restrictions of special [[spacial?]] extensions. Consciousness is outside of time as human beings conceive time, such as day and of night, and of years, and of the time periods of the universe. It is greater than these which are phenomenal, and it is noumenal. It is, therefore, superior to any extensions or mensurations belonging to matter. It is in fact nowhere because nowhere in particular, which would mean that it exists in one place and could not exist elsewhere. Hence, existing nowhere in particular it exists everywhere.

Some modern European philosophers have seized this thought more or less clearly, such as the Frenchman Pascal, who adopted the idea from certain Greek and Roman philosophers. Pascal pointed out that God may be thought of as a circle which has its center everywhere and its circumference or bounding limits nowhere —

which means everywhere. Or, you can invert the figure of speech and say that divinity is that which has its center nowhere and its circumference or limiting boundary everywhere. The phrasing in either case returns to the same ideal conception.

--------

Now, Companions, don't you think that these my questions and your answers have been helpful to you?

Many Voices — Yes, Professor.

G. de P. — I also think so. We shall continue our discussion a little longer, Companions, and then I will close the meeting. Do you understand, from what we have thus far studied together, what the essence of the human being is? Leaving aside all attributes, what is the essence of a human being?

Many Voices — Consciousness.

G. de P. — Consciousness, that is it. That consciousness exists in each of us humans as an individualized consciousness-center. Do you understand that this consciousness-center is eternal?

Many Voices — Yes.

Many Voices — No.

Student C — It can be.

Student R — I think that the consciousness-center could not be eternal, but that the consciousness itself is eternal.

G. de P. — That is the correct answer when referring to the essence of consciousness or consciousness per se.

But the consciousness-center is a temporary focus of a consciousness-energy; and that focus having history, in other words making and unmaking karma, must therefore of necessity be undergoing a continuous and never-ending series of changes.

Therefore when the Lord Buddha uttered one of the greatest and noblest truths in saying: "My Brothers, remember that man has no eternal soul," he gave voice to one of the profoundest psychological facts that ever human mouth uttered. This declaration is one of the most hope-giving thoughts known to me. I wonder if you understand why it is so? This declaration of the Buddha signifies eternal growth, and destroys the idea that the human ego has a supposititious immortality remaining always the same in crystallized immobility, again signifying incapacity to improve. Is it not remarkable how that grand thought of the Lord Buddha has always been so unacceptable to European minds? Indeed, it is a most helpful doctrine, a most comforting thought.

How Occidentals do love themselves in their personal limitations!

Student A — I would like to say that the idea that has forced itself into my mind during the discussion this evening is that impersonality is the key to everything in the universe; that the devachanic state itself is only a sublimated state of impersonality — that is, the highest after the personality; and the more impersonal we become, the nearer do we approach to nirvana and become conscious of our real Selves. That is, the ordinary consciousness of the self is transcended and becomes the consciousness of everything that is.

G. de P. — Ah, that is very true. Brother A----, you have caught the idea of the very essence of the truth.

Impersonality, which implies a growth in consciousness, is the secret of divinity, the secret mystery of divinity. All esoteric evolution, training for chelaship, is a continuous growth in impersonal life, an ever-expanding and enlarging impersonality in and of consciousness. The divine is wholly impersonal, at least to us humans. As contrasted with the utter boundless, frontierless, infinitude, what is divine to us is in fact an entity; but for us human beings, divinity is impersonality and that divinity is the very core of us. All growth, all evolution, all training in chelaship, are simply a becoming ever more and more impersonal in our consciousness. Our individual limitations are the things which restrict our consciousness, which bind us down to personality, which blind us, which are the shackles on us — on our limbs of spiritual energy. These limitations restrict our vision, because they are the personal veils around us.

The strong man is the man who is more impersonal than other men, who can take the detached view, the impersonal view; in other words see more, spiritually feel more, understand more, because he is not constricted, condensed, around the more or less temporary center of consciousness which he calls myself —

me, I. The "I am I" is transmuted or passes into the I AM.

Student A — I should like to add a few words to what I said previously. Your comments on the answers that have been given to the questions you have asked seem to me to be an explanation of that wonderful passage in The Secret Doctrine, where H. P. Blavatsky speaks of life, true life, as a progressive series of awakenings, becoming ever more and more alive to the consciousness of the whole of which we as individuals, individual growing consciousness-centers, are integral parts.

G. de P. — That is so. Perfectly true.

Before closing the meeting, Companions, let me say that I am grateful to our Brother A---- for enabling me to close the meeting with thoughts on this lofty theme. Remember always that impersonality does not mean loss of consciousness. It emphatically means an ever growing extension of it. It means that the personalized consciousness breaks its shell of personality belonging to the lower selfhood and wings its way into the cosmic spaces. When we can live in those cosmic spaces consciously, we become as gods, and this is our future destiny. Nor do we end there; from divinity, from godhood, from becoming a god, there are endless series of rungs extending above us on the ladder of life. We become higher gods, then supergods, then

divinities above the supergods, etc., etc. The series is endless. Every change towards impersonality in consciousness is really a new awakening, an awakening to a grander life, a happier life, a sweeter life, and a vaster life.

Have you ever looked into the bosom of a beautiful flower? Have you never felt your own consciousness vibrate in sympathy with the consciousness of that beautiful thing? If you can do that, you are already breaking the shell of the personal restrictions, the personal shell; and then — and this is perhaps easier to do for some people — look impersonally into the eyes of someone whom you love impersonally and take note of the wondrous mysteries there, the mysteries of consciousness, and the veiled depths of thought. Going out of your personal shell in this manner is, in a way, an initiation, my Brothers. When you can do this, you are breaking the personal shell around you, the shell of the personality. Continue this training, expand always —

expand your self. In each new expansion is a new awakening to glory, to a sense of holy and wondrous power. I don't know how to describe adequately these things. Words fail me; but at any rate, I can give hints of the truths to you in talking in this manner.

Student P — Professor, there is one thing that clamors in my mind. As you speak, I feel that this I AM

consciousness is an unconscious consciousness, which is the only manner by which I can describe it. Is it not so?

G. de P. — Yes. It is indeed unconscious consciousness to the feeble personal mind; but as you break the shell of the personal mind, this unconscious consciousness becomes a greater light of self-consciousness in the spiritual and unlimited sense. Personality vanishes into impersonality, the darkness fades into the dawn.

Let us close, Companions. I think that we have reached a point of thought in which it is good to rest and at which it is wise to close the meeting. Will you sound the gong, please?

[The sounding of the gong. Silence.]

Meeting 30 Supplement

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

Supplement to KTMG Papers: Thirty

| Devachan and Nirvana | Free Will |

September 11, 1934

Devachan and Nirvana

G. de P. — It would help us all if we cleared out of our minds the idea that the devachan is some exterior realm into which we enter after we die. It is not so. The devachan is simply a change of consciousness of the human being which takes place after death. Devachan is no locality; it has therefore no position anywhere; it is change of consciousness from earth-consciousness to intellectual-spiritual consciousness. That is all. That is the devachan. It is the child-monad of the spiritual monad, in other words the human monad, which has this change of spiritual outlook and feeling, change of consciousness. That is its devachan; and this is precisely why every devachan is unique to the individual. One man has a long devachan, another man has a short devachan; one a high and lofty devachan, another a devachan of a much inferior degree.

Nirvana is likewise a change of consciousness, but one which takes place in a much more radical degree.

Nirvana is the pilgrim-monad's casting off and complete freeing from itself of all its inferior parts, portions, passions, impulses, emotions; so that it enters into perfect wisdom, perfect peace, perfect bliss. It is for the time being utterly free, living in its own essence, a jivanmukta, a freed jiva. A jiva is a monad.

Do not think at any time of the devachan as being something exterior to yourself, as a realm even of consciousness into which you pass. It is you yourself who make each one your own devachan. You become your devachan because for each one of you your devachan is a change in your consciousness. Devachan has no locality, no position in space; and thus it is that the excarnate entity may have its devachan, from the standpoint of position, virtually anywhere in the solar system: the heart of the sun, the heart of the earth, in a filmy cloud, in the petal of a flower, in an atom in your hand — anywhere, it matters not. It has no consciousness of position; it is a point of consciousness in a beautiful dream state; a point of consciousness is the human monad. Death frees it from the magnetic and emotional attractions which bind it to this life of flesh. Being freed from these lower attractions it can indulge its dreams, its yearnings for beauty, peace, love, happiness, grandeur, philosophy, religion, music, whatever it has been most intent upon and spiritually attached to while alive in the body.

That is the devachan. Each individual makes its own devachan. I do hope this is made clear. I repeat, do not think of the devachan as a place or realm or kingdom or sphere to which you travel after death, or into which you enter after death. It is a change of consciousness, just exactly as a man may awaken from sleep in the morning unhappy, let us say, wretched about some thought he has in his mind, some worry. An idea touches his mind and brightens it, and he becomes happy and his heart sings. It is just a change of consciousness. That is a sort of devachan; and actually many people live in devachan while they are incarnate in a body on earth.

They are devachanis, they are not awake, they do not really live, they live in a dreamland, happy it may be but temporarily insensate because unreal.

Now nirvana, contrariwise, is consciousness and vision of Reality, because the consciousness then is freed of all crippling, enshrouding veils which blind it. It cognizes, knows, "feels," and understands essences exactly as they are. Why? Because the consciousness of the monad for the time being has become coextensive and co-vibrational with the cosmic mind, with the cosmic soul, the anima mundi. The dewdrop for the time being slips into the shining sea.

Free Will

There is a seeming reluctance on your part, my Brothers, boldly to face and to understand the so-called problem of free will. There is no need to shirk this problem. The essence of a man is will, which is one of the

facets of that eternal mystery of which other facets are consciousness, intelligence, love — human words, but it is in words that we imbody our intuitions of these realities. Every monad of the countless hosts of them —

and they are infinite in number, which means beginningless and endless — every monad, however far evolved or however greatly unevolved, has its modicum or portion of free will, which it has self-won by evolving forth its own essence through striving — but through karma likewise. Why? Here is the secret, and you have been told it time and time again. The core of the core of the heart of the heart of each one of you is THAT, Parabrahman, the Boundless. Strip off sheath after sheath after sheath of consciousness through almost endless ages. That final kernel — you will never reach it because it is infinity — that final kernel, that ultimate something, is THAT, the heart of the Boundless: Tat twam asi, That thou art.

Therefore our free will, however much it may be crippled through our ignorance, stupidity, and sleeping in matter, that free will is essentially the free will of infinitude with which each one of us is inherently endowed, because it is a part of our essence, since we are all children of this infinitude. We are drops in the ocean of cosmic life, and the heart of each such drop contains its portion of that cosmic ocean's free will. And a man's free will becomes progressively freer precisely in proportion as he can outgrow his humanity and become more divine, which means become more alike unto his own inner center of being, the heart of things, the heart of the universe, Parabrahman, THAT.

What is karma? Karma comes upon us because we are integral and inseparable parts of a greater cosmic life which works upon us, which reacts against our feeble efforts to kick against the pricks: that is to say, willfully to follow our selfish or quasi-selfish passions and thoughts. Nature strives eternally to re-establish broken equilibriums, which mean disharmonies. As long as a being lives for itself alone, or partially so, and forgets the universe of which it is an inseparable part and the rights and interests of other beings, just so long will such action be selfish or partially selfish — and the great weight of nature will be reacting against such selfish procedures. This action and its consequent reaction form karma. The road to peace, inexpressible power and bliss, is by remembering — and acting upon the remembrance — that we are all integral parts in the greater life in which we live. This greater life in its turn is but one of a multitude of other greater lives forming a still greater life; and this forms part of the background, the ocean of consciousness, which rolls its waves through us, unconsciously to us. This greater life in its turn is but one unit in a body, an aggregate, forming an atom, if you like, in the being of a still greater consciousness; and so on as far as our universe extends. And our universe is only one of an infinite number of others, which in their fashion build up still greater structures of cosmic existence.

Now, you have all the weight of these various aggregates pressing upon the will of each one of you; and your will is supreme above them all, if you will use it; for you are a child of the Boundless. That slender thread of will which is a function of consciousness, of intelligence, can prevail over a universe. The weight of the universe cannot crush it out, for that universe is but a larger imbodiment of the same thing, which finds its more feeble thread of action in each one of us. The very heart of a man is free will — but this is not the indeterminacy of which modern scientists are talking, not at all. There is absolutely naught that is fortuitous or chancy about it. It is the very essence of things. A man has free will because he is an integral and inseparable drop in the cosmic life-intelligence; and as a man enters ever more and more into the wondrous deeps of his being, he comes into ever larger and larger measure of will, of intelligence, of wisdom, of love, of all the cosmic qualities of which we feel but feeble reflections.

Now, an atom, a molecule, or a cell in our physical bodies is as much an entity as any one of you is —

because each one is a composite being, just as you are in your composite character, and yet each one imbodies a monad just as each one of you imbodies a monad. Each such individual feels all the weight and the urge of the will, the aspirations, and the sins, of the man whose body it helps to build. Yet nothing that the man can do, no matter how greatly he sin or how greatly he rise, can change that spark of free will in that molecule, in that atom, in that electron, in that inhabitant of an electron, or in that cell which helps to build his body; and that entity, call it by what name you will, can strive against the great weight of your will and your karma acting upon it, and react against it. Just so we human beings, or the gods, or the beasts, or what not in our own universe, strive against the surrounding weight of the universe which presses against us. We act upon it, and it reacts against us; yet it cannot crush us. We can control it, or portions of it, if we use our will, just as it to a certain extent controls us and uses us.

Do not get the idea that man is a mere machine. It is not true. Man has free will, because his essence, the fountain of his being, that kernel in him from which flows forth into manifestation all that is, that heart, the core of that kernel, is That — and all relations between it and any individual offspring of it are karma. This is so because the part, the offspring, is absolutely and unto eternity inseparable from the whole. Tat twam asi.

Meeting 31

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Thirty-One

Meeting of May 12, 1931

G. de P. — You remember, Companions, that at our last gathering, instead of answering questions, I thought it would be interesting to make a test of the degree in which you have understood the teachings that have already been given in this KTMG. I am glad to say that, on the whole, the responses were eminently satisfactory. There was, indeed, noticed a certain lack of acquaintance with details of the teaching, but this was only to be expected; yet the fundamental ideas seem to have been clearly caught by you and were, on the whole, quite clearly expressed. I think that we had better continue with the same line of study tonight.

I am a little sorry that this is our last meeting before I leave on my lecture tour, because I had hoped to reinforce your understanding of the teachings by pursuing for a few meetings this new plan, which is not only interesting to me in testing your ability to grasp what you have already heard, but also strengthens your own understanding of the teachings. There is no way of learning so good, so practical and efficient, as to express the teaching that you have heard in your own words. Your own mind then becomes your teacher, for you are obliged to frame your thoughts into understandable language, and this makes a call upon certain mental and indeed spiritual faculties that the mere hearing of teachings does not so readily and easily evoke.

Following this plan, therefore, again tonight, I will begin with the first question, and anyone may answer who chooses. I would like then, first, to ask you: how do you understand the statement, which is so common in our esoteric teachings and equally common in the Hindu religious and philosophical scriptures, that the essence of man is the universe? How do you understand that statement? What picture does it bring to your minds?

Student D — That man is simply a ray, the highest essence of man is a ray of divinity from the All-divine that permeates everything.

G. de P. — Quite correct. May I then ask in continuation of the same line of thought: if man in his essence is boundless infinitude, the universe in other words, why is it that he has not boundless consciousness active at present? Why is it that he has not a functioning intellect which knows no circumscribing frontiers of knowledge? Why is his consciousness a human consciousness? Why is it not a cosmic consciousness?

Student M — I have explained it to myself in this way: the supreme essence in starting on its long evolutionary journey, deliberately surrounds itself with illusion, an ever deeper and deeper illusion of separateness, in order to develop an understanding and an appreciation of its own essential unity; and in discovering that, it realizes what is the meaning of compassion which is not only unity, but a self-conscious unity.

G. de P. — Yes, that is true as a general statement; but if you go no farther than that, dear Brother M----, you are immediately faced with this question: how is it that infinity takes unto itself the garment of finity, of finitude? How is it that boundless energy and power become very limited energy and power?

You have often heard me say that man is a composite entity. He lives in a composite universe — technically we say a tenfold universe, or a septenary universe on the manifested planes.

Oh, I beg your pardon, Brother E----, will you not speak first, and then I will continue my own explanation?

Student E — I was going to say that perhaps the question contains an implication contrary to fact. The question was asked: why is it that man has not a cosmic consciousness? Well, perhaps he has. I seem to see what might be called a scientific heresy or perhaps a religious heresy which we surely are trying to get out of

— that of regarding man as something small and the universe as something very big, outside. But I don't see why the universe is big and man small. Man may have a cosmic consciousness, and if his consciousness be limited, then may cosmic consciousness be limited. We are all in the same boat as far as I see it.

G. de P. — From the philosophical standpoint that is admirably expressed. I will then continue what I was beginning to say before you spoke. Man has indeed a cosmic consciousness in the cosmic part of his constitution. He does not win that cosmic consciousness. He does not form it or evoke it from the vast deeps of space and time. He already has it essentially. He is it, to speak in a deeper way. He is that cosmic consciousness in the cosmic part of his constitution.

Man being a composite being, lives on at least ten planes, of which seven are manifested and three are recondite. Now the highest part of man's constitution is that which you have often heard me speak of as the heart of the heart of the core of the core of him — of his constitution. All the parts of his constitution which are inferior or exterior to this, all his other faculties and powers, meaning all the other planes of his septenary or tenfold being, are simply veils or garments of energy and consciousness, which by his own psychological magic, working through time and space, by means of evolution he has woven around himself, much as the cocoon is woven around its indwelling entity.

To say that infinity takes unto itself the garments of finity is what the brain-mind says. Actually it is not so because through boundless duration of time the universe remains tenfold. The universe you may figurate to yourself as a constant life-stream, or as rivers of life arising out of the heart of being, and continually carrying along innumerable hosts or armies of self-conscious and unself-conscious god-sparks, born of the very womb of the universe. It is these entities which freight these rivers of life. Indeed, these rivers of life are themselves actually composed of these self-conscious and unself-conscious god-sparks, which pass through the eternally enduring mansions of life, through the ten planes of boundless space, passing from the innermost outwards until the tenth is reached. Then retracing their steps, but with each step outward and with each step inwards again towards the center from which they originally sprang, they evoke, each one from within itself, divine and spiritual and intellectual and psychical and astral and vital and physical energies and faculties and powers. These divine sparks or monads on their return journey or after the turn of the cycle upwards, approach ever nearer and nearer to the divine source from which they originally sprang, but no longer as unself-conscious god-sparks, but as self-conscious gods constantly evolving forth more perfect manifestations of the inner ever-living energies.

Man indeed has, or rather is, a cosmic consciousness in his inmost. It is the heart of his being. It is actual infinitude. He has also a divine consciousness which is the link with the home-universe in which he now lives; and this home-universe is all that is comprised within the encircling zone of the Milky Way. In addition, he has also a spiritual consciousness by which he is karmically in relation with our own solar system and which makes him therefore a Son of the sun, for the spiritual sun is the spiritual heart and mind of our solar system. He has likewise developed or evolved forth from within his own spiritual deeps an intellectual consciousness, a manasaputric consciousness, which is the highest part of his own egoic individuality. He has likewise developed a merely human consciousness which is the kama-manasic consciousness, the consciousness in which he at present lives on this earth, the ordinary human consciousness. He has likewise developed an animal consciousness destined to grow into a human consciousness in time, just as the human consciousness is destined to grow into a spiritual one, and the spiritual one is destined to grow into a divine one, and so forth.

In addition to the beast or animal consciousness he has likewise evolved forth a physical apparatus, comprising a certain physical or instinctual consciousness, more accurately an astral-physical consciousness, which is his vital power conjoined with the linga-sarira or astral model-body and his physical body. Actually, man functions on all these planes at one and the same time, functions on all the ten different grades or planes of his constitution, but not in all with equal power at the same time.

I will now answer my own question with more definiteness, after thus having given you this brief universal picture. Although man is cosmic at the heart of the heart of him, he is not cosmic in the human part of him.

Why? Because the human part of him is an ego which he has evolved out from within himself, and this partly evolved egoic center of consciousness obviously has a reach of relationship or a reach of consciousness exactly concordant with its own partially developed inner energies. Similarly and on a higher plane he has evolved a spiritual ego, the source of all that is great and noble and beautiful in mankind. Indeed, higher still he has evolved a divine ego of a cosmic reach still grander than that of the spiritual ego, which has a reach of consciousness grander than that of the merely human ego. So then, while man functions on all the ten planes

of his constitution and while he is conscious on all of them, he is not self-consciously cognizant of his consciousness on any plane except that one which at the present time he is most active in, that is to say, the human ego.

Now, if you can get those points clearly in your mind, you will readily see how man can be at his inmost heart the universe itself, one with the universe — bone of its bone, blood of its blood, life of its life — and yet not be more than vaguely conscious of it, because the human vehicle which he has evolved and in which he now lives and functions is not yet capacious enough, fine enough, far enough evolved, to take in or comprise the cosmic consciousness. It is perhaps somewhat like a jellyfish living in sea water. The substance of the jellyfish is the same as the substance of the surrounding sea. But the jellyfish, an ego so to speak, is a condensed and therefore limited entity; and can only understand or comprehend, if we can say a jellyfish has understanding, in accordance with its own small degree of limited development. Nevertheless, while it is only self-conscious on that limited plane and in that limited vehicle, it is in the universal life from which it sprang and unto which it shall ultimately return, plus the karmic attributes of evolution or impressions that it shall have gained.

Sir James Jeans, the eminent English physicist and astronomer, recently wrote in his book, The Mysterious Universe, one of the most remarkable statements that I have ever known a modern scientist to make. His words are: "No matter how far we retreat from an electrified particle, we cannot get outside the range of its repulsions and attractions. This shows that an electron must, in a certain sense at least, occupy the whole of space." When you remember that an electrified particle is what modern science calls an electron, one of the component elements or building bricks of a physical atom, it becomes clear that so infinitesimal an entity, despite its limits or finitude, is likewise universal in its reach, or, what comes to the same thing, in its actions and in its corresponding reactions.

That is exactly the idea of the ancient wisdom. It is exactly the idea of the noblest systems of philosophical and religious teaching in Hindustan, and it applies definitely to the point of discussion that we are studying at present. If then the physical electron can be at once limited in sphere of action and in sphere of consciousness, and yet be of universal essence — or what comes to the same thing of universal reach — why should not, why must not indeed, the very center or heart or core of the electron, or the very center or heart or core of a human being, be also cosmic? It is obviously so. A man's inmost is cosmic, because it is of the essence of the heart of the cosmic energy-substance. Therefore man's inmost is the universe. I trust that I have made this explanation at least a little clearer.

Many Voices — Yes.

Student O — I have tried to explain it to myself in this way. There is a difference between consciousness and memory. We live through consciously many things that we don't remember afterwards; and so I have thought of time on this plane as vibration, having even its smallest vibration; and man living in reality conscious on all the planes, each such vibration could be considered as a little manvantara and pralaya. I think that these are called in The Secret Doctrine nitya pralayas and nitya sargas manvantaras. Between two such manvantaras is a pralaya during which man is cosmically conscious, but does not remember it the next moment in the manvantara that immediately succeeds. I don't know if this statement is correct.

G. de P. — It is a correct thought; and curiously enough, Brother O----, it leads me to the next question that I was going to ask, which is also a matter upon which we touched at our last gathering here. I then tried to explain to you that the devachani so far as size goes may be smaller than the smallest atom. In his inmost he has a cosmic consciousness. He undergoes the devachan, the limited devachanic dream world experiences, because the devachani's only partly-evolved ego is capacious enough to take in only that much of consciousness which its partly-evolved state permits.

Now the evolution within the human being of a mahatma — and as you know a mahatma already lives in each one of us — the manasaputric essence within us, is simply a raising of the human ego into spiritual egoship. The development of a mahatma is simply a quickened evolution achieved through initiation. If there be no initiation, the state of mahatmaship will indeed ultimately be reached, but only through the slow, long processes that universal nature follows. All initiation, all evolution, is simply an unwrapping process, an

unfolding process, of what is within.

May I now ask you what do you understand by the phrase son of the sun? Anyone may answer.

Student W — My feeling, my thought, is that one whose consciousness is on the solar plane of consciousness is a son of the sun in fact. We are, according to the plane on which we keep our consciousness, and if we keep that consciousness continuously on the solar plane, we then realize ourselves as sons of the sun. Is that right?

G. de P. — Absolutely so; very well said indeed. This solar son within us is the manasaputra which we inherently are. It is the manasaputric essence within us. It is rightly called son of the sun. If you will examine some, in fact most of the cartouches of the ancient Egyptian kings, you will see the title given to them is Son of the Sun. It means that they had passed through at least the fourth initiation and had become self-consciously cognizant of the solar essence within themselves, had begun not only to know it but to be it, to live in and with that part of themselves, instead of in and with the imperfectly developed brain-mind as ordinary men do.

This son of the sun, while correctly described as being the solar essence within us, is nevertheless an egoic entity. It is a being; and hence again I repeat: remember always that man is a composite entity. In him lives a god; above the god there lives what we may call — because it is so difficult to understand it otherwise — the cosmic essence. There lives in him also a subordinate divine entity which we may call the spiritual soul. Then there lives in him, as an entity, the manasaputra, the son of the sun. There lives in him also as a functioning entity and very strong in us today, the son of the moon, the lunar entity, which is each one of us as a human being. There lives in us also an animal.

It is possible, and in initiation it is always done, to separate these different parts of the human constitution so that actually they can live apart, at least temporarily, although most intimately interconnected, all working together, and yet functioning separately. And, indeed, that is nothing strange. Examine yourselves today. You know perfectly well that you are living in the human portion of your constitution where abide your human longings and loves, hates and fears, aspirations and griefs. You know perfectly well that in you there is also a beast entity. The animal entity of themselves is very attractive to some human beings, and they degrade their humanity by allying the self-conscious part of themselves with the beast instead of with the manasaputra part.

Never forget this part of the teaching, because it is a great key: man is a composite entity. Those were among the last words of the Lord Buddha, and he added, before he expired: "Work out your own freedom." He referred to the teachings that he had given to his pupils throughout his life, among which were just those that I have been telling you here. You can ally yourself with the god within you, or you can degrade your humanity by becoming at one with the beast within you.

Now you must not think from these words that the beast within you, that is a part of you, is different from you. It is simply the lowest part of you; and this beast by evolutionary progress in time will become a human part in you. But the human part of you by that time will have become a solar part of you, a manasaputra; and our present manasaputric part, at about the same future time will have become something loftier still.

Furthermore, the present spiritual soul at about the same future time will have become divine or an inner god.

As you see, every part of man is evolving. Man is a composite entity. He is a little universe; and I may add here, just to carry on the teaching to its end and round it out, that it is the destiny of every human being in the far, far distant aeons of the future to become a universe — first a sun glittering in the spacial deeps, and then a solar system, and then a universe infilled with its armies of evolving entities. Who and what are they who will thus become these armies of evolving entities? They are what now exist in man as the lifeatoms existing in and on man's ten planes of existence.

So, then, in asking you what is meant by the phrase a son of the sun, just what is your understanding of the origin of this son of the sun, this manasaputra? Can someone answer that question?

Student F — May I attempt to answer it, G. de P.? It seems to me that the last three questions are linked together, and the answer in the most general terms lies in the teaching regarding the outbreathing and the

inbreathing of Brahma. In the teaching, as I understand it, it is of the very nature of the highest to seek to manifest itself to itself. In order to manifest itself to itself out of itself, it sends forth from its own essence that which becomes its veil or garment, and this becoming manifested is of course on a lower plane than is the essence of the entity itself. But this veil or garment, thus emanated, which is composed of innumerable entities, also manifests or sends out from its nature another veil, and thus becomes the heart of this second veil which includes all the entities or lifeatoms which form that garment or veil. So that there is a heart within a heart. Thirdly, this last emanated living veil or garment, on a still lower plane manifests and clothes itself with those entities that we would speak of as the gods. Next in order, the gods out of their hearts send forth their own sparks in order to build vehicles of manifestation for themselves on a lower plane. Next, these entities likewise, the dhyanis and the manasaputras, out of their heart send forth sparks or lifeatoms of themselves, which become the human monads. The human monads in their turn send out sparks of themselves which become the beast monads, in their turn building for themselves succeeding veils on still more material planes.

In each instance of emanation, that which is the emanator is higher than the emanation and thus is the heart of its emanation. We can thus in thought reverse the stages of emanation, going constantly higher and deeper, until we come to the essential divinity of all. Hence it is that in the heart even of the lowest manifestation or emanation there is involved the very heart or essence of the universe. In the course of evolution which is the so-called outbreathing, this heart of all things invests or clothes itself in garments of ever-increasing manifestation or materiality. Then the inbreathing comes, which is the involution of matter but the evolution of the inner spiritual: the unwrapping, the coming out of the outer living garments, of that spiritual essence which is continuously at the heart of all things.

In our own stage of evolution we are seeking to find that which is our spiritual heart, that which is the son of the sun. But even when we have found this self-consciously, there will be another further unwrapping, another loosening of the living garments, of the sunlight garments, until as this procedure reaches its end for this cosmic manvantara, we find ourselves once more as the very essence of the All, plus self-conscious divine existence.

G. de P. — Very well said; it is very well put indeed. What you have said contains the main points of the teaching. I am glad that you have grasped it so well. That is the doctrine of evolution or unwrapping, and the doctrine of involution or inwrapping. Neither is superior to the other. Both take place concurrently throughout eternity, and obviously so. Pause a moment in thought. As the spirit evolves forth or unwraps its latent living powers and faculties, this is equally an involution of all material existence; and, inversely, as material faculties and powers evolve forth their energies this is an involution or inwrapping of spiritual faculties and powers. The latter is the descent of spirit, the former is the ascent of spirit.

Similarly, as a man grows spiritually greater, he evolves forth the spiritual heart of him, but involves again the lower parts of him, laying these lower parts of him aside as seeds for the next period of cosmic evolution.

Evolution and involution proceed concurrently. What is the evolution of spirit, which is taking place now because we are on the upward grade, on the ascending arc, is the involution of matter. Matter involves or disappears pari passu as spirit evolves or appears. Conversely, on the downward grade or the coming into that manifestation, called the descending arc or the shadowy arc, the outbreathing, the opposite process takes place, which is the evolution of matter, the appearing of matter, and pari passu there occurs the involution or inwrapping of the spiritual.

We hear a great deal about evolution in the modern world, but very little about involution. The Occident doesn't know anything about it as yet. They will know about it in time.

It is the destiny of every human being, as his consciousness progresses steadily towards an ever-enlarging cosmic reach, to pass from humanity into self-conscious divinity, ultimately to become a sevenfold sun, then a sevenfold solar system, then a sevenfold universe, then a still sublimer universe, and so on for ever.

Deduction: the universe in which we now live was once a human being, or an entity holding an evolutionary status like that of our own humanity. Our own glorious day-star was in far past aeons of cosmic existence a limited but self-conscious entity like us human beings. What a sublime conception this is to ponder over in

our moments of quiet thought. I have just spoken of human beings only, but that was merely taking an instance for purposes of illustration. Every tiniest atom that chants its chant of life as it lives, that sings the song of its own individual keynote, its swabhava, has the same destiny before it. We human beings, and therefore every glittering sun, indeed every universe, was once a simple lifeatom. That lifeatom had at its heart all the capacities, powers, faculties, possibilities, potentialities, that the ages have since evolved forth.

Therefore, everything that is is, in the heart of itself, the universe in which we live and move and have our being. I think that this point of thought has now been pretty well clarified.

Coming now to another question: why is it that the devachani, being freed from the encumbering weight of the astral and physical garments, should not have an even larger, profounder, nobler consciousness than that of its dream state?

Student J — Because the teaching is that in devachan we live our highest aspirations and highest hopes and longings, experienced during the life last passed, all over again; and if our consciousness has nothing higher than that, we obviously cannot experience a cosmic consciousness. If we don't have that cosmic consciousness on earth, we cannot have it in devachan.

G. de P. — Perfectly true. Let me then go to the next question on this same line of thought. You have been told that the only difference between an ordinary human being and a Master of wisdom and compassion and peace is that the latter has freed himself from the trammels and blinding veils of the lower part of his constitution, and therefore lives in the higher parts. Now then, as the devachani has cast off these lower and blinding veils, why is it that the devachani's consciousness is not that of a mahatma?

Student B — Because the devachani's dream state is not a self-consciously achieved mahatmic consciousness as is the case with the mahatma.

G. de P. — That is it, exactly. Your answer is correct, and J----'s answer also is correct. The two answers are seen from two different angles. The mahatma has, already while living as a man, become self-consciously at one with his spiritual nature. He has allied himself, to some degree at least, self-consciously with his inner god. Therefore when in physical life his consciousness is mahatmic. The average man's consciousness is human, and when he dies his consciousness becomes the devachanic beautiful dream state. As J---- has pointed out, he lives in the resultants or effects of karmic consequences of the stream of spiritual thoughts he had while in the physical body. But the mahatma when casting off the body enters either into the world again

— in other words takes up a new body in order to help his fellows — or he enters the nirvana for a time.

May I ask now: Can you tell me the difference between the buddha of compassion and the pratyeka buddha?

Student W — The pratyeka buddha is one who has passed through all the degrees of initiation on his way to nirvana, and enters nirvana, his whole aim being, although a holy, pure, spiritual entity, to enjoy nirvanic bliss throughout the remainder of the manvantara. But a buddha of compassion passes through the same initiations and all of them on his way to nirvana. I understand that on the way he fills his soul with love, with compassion, for all that is, all along the journey, so that finally he himself becomes the supreme choice, and when he stands on the threshold of nirvana, he is the choice, he is compassion itself, and therefore refuses nirvana and remains within the world in order to help on humanity.

G. de P. — That is correct. I might add as a slight correction that the pratyeka buddha does not necessarily pass through all initiations. Just as you say, however, the buddha of compassion must pass through every stage or degree of initiation, but the pratyeka buddha sometimes does not do that. Rarely he does. The essential difference is just as you have so beautifully set it forth: the buddha of compassion is one who having won all, gained all, gained the right to cosmic peace and bliss, renounces it so that he may go back as a son of light in order to help humanity, and indeed all that is. The pratyeka buddha passes onwards and enters the unspeakable bliss of nirvana, and there he remains for an aeon or a million of aeons as the case may be.

Whereas the buddha of compassion, who has renounced all for compassion's sake, because his heart is so filled with love, continues evolving. Thus the time comes when the buddha of compassion, although having renounced everything, will have advanced far beyond the state that the pratyeka buddha has reached; and when the pratyeka buddha emerges in due course from the nirvanic state in order to take up his evolutionary

journey again, he will find himself far in the rear of the buddha of compassion.

Now, Professor R----, I think you wanted to ask a question, or make a statement perhaps?

Student R — I was thinking about the devachan, but you moved on to the next point.

G. de P. — Well, please state your thought.

Student R — Is not the entity in devachan really in a very high state, with just a flavor of the past incarnation? Is it not the teaching that the entity has passed to a really very high part of his nature — not the ordinary personality simply in a transcendent condition, but to a very high part of the manas, as H. P.

Blavatsky says, with just enough of the flavor of the memories of the past life to carry on the connection between incarnations?

G. de P. — Just so, but it is this that you call the flavor of the personality which makes it the devachan. If the excarnate human being were strong enough in the spiritual life to be utterly oblivious of the imperfect personality that it has cast off, if the devachani were sufficiently evolved to live self-consciously in the spiritual part of itself, it would not need to undergo the devachanic experience, but would in fact be a mahatma. It is precisely because the devachani is so closely inwrapped within the karmic consequences of the spiritual longings and aspirations of the life just passed that it is a devachani. It is not high enough to rise above even its own spiritual aspirations, but is caught therein as a bird is caught by bird lime. Whereas the mahatma is so strong spiritually that he can rise even above his spiritually individual aspirations. He is much more impersonal than the devachani. His consciousness therefore is more universal, more cosmic. It seems very simple indeed to me.

Student R — Yes. May I ask also if the mahatma can or does refuse nirvana in order to come back as a buddha of compassion; or is that choice reserved only for those who have attained the very highest bodhisattva state?

G. de P. — The mahatmas of course are not yet buddhas. A buddha is a mahatma of the highest grade. A mahatma is one who has become self-consciously alive in the spiritual part of his constitution, whereas a buddha is one who has become self-consciously living in the divine-spiritual part of his constitution. There are mahatmas who can enter a lower grade of nirvana — a very few actually do this. Most of them prepare to become buddhas of compassion, and therefore to renounce a nirvanic state. They are already far above the devachanic state, and when the body is cast off they return, either to live as a nirmanakaya in the auric atmosphere of the earth and thus to work for mankind invisibly, becoming the living stones in the Guardian Wall, to use our own mystic speech, or they reincarnate anew.

Remember that a nirmanakaya is a lofty human being, a mahatma, who has simply thrown off his physical body, and all the other parts of his constitution remain together. In other words, he is a man just as he was before death, or before he cast off the physical body. He lives in the auric envelope of the earth. To say that he lives in the astral world would be true, but that phrase is too vague a way of speaking. The astral world is too extensive for such a phrase to be definite enough. To say that he lives in the earth's auric atmosphere is more correct.

Student P — You have said that a mahatma is one who has allied himself with his own inner being, with his spiritual being. In this life where we now are, we have been told that when we sleep it is possible for us to grow, in a sense, in that in sleep we can learn spiritual lessons. In such states, just as in practical life, it is possible to step outside of one's self so that one may endure pain or sorrow, for instance, withdrawing from that physical body. Then in meditation it is possible to think of a withdrawing from the physical body and allying oneself with one's spiritual essence. Then, further than that, it is possible to think of a withdrawing and an allying oneself with all there is, with all mankind, and to be universally helpful. Are these the progressive stages, known to yourself for instance, or are they only imaginary stages or becoming one with nature in the perfect thought known to a true student or a chela?

G. de P. — Do I understand you to ask whether a chela or a student can achieve this?

Student P — No, Sir. I think he can achieve it. But I wondered whether it was an imagination of mine as a way to such progress, as for instance the desire to live in a world of pure thought, which is of course a desire to ally oneself with one's higher inner spiritual self, and doing this through meditation but not with violence, and with the desire to help others. Are these truly the stages through which a mahatma passes, or is it only a very beautiful dream of the student that it might be?

G. de P. — No, it is by no means a dream. It is one of the paths of study that every chela follows. I would not say that a mahatma has to pass through this stage, because actually he has already advanced beyond it. He has already attained and passed that stage.

May I also say that meditation is an excellent word but one which has often been misused by inaccurate writers of theosophical literature, so that many people consider meditation to be a difficult procedure to follow in order to live in the highest part of oneself. The best form of meditation that I know is the constant thought, yearning, aspiration, to be my best, to live my noblest, and to keep this thought with me day and night. It is indeed the best form of meditation. One does not need to go into his private chamber, or into his closet, and to sit or to stand or to lie, and with an effort of the will try to whip the brain to think of certain things. Indeed, I doubt whether that is at all advisable. I do not say that you meant that by your question, certainly not, but what you have said has given me just the opportunity that I have been waiting for to make a brief explanation. The best meditation is a yearning to be one's best and to live one's noblest, and if this yearning is derivative from the spirit of compassion, welling up in the heart like a holy river of energy, it will lead one quickly to the Gates of Gold.

Meditation and concentration! How well I remember, when a young man, after having joined the Theosophical Society, the many erudite brain-whacking articles and essays that I heard and read.

Concentration means simply centering your mind on a point or object of thought and holding to it, which is one of the easiest things in the world to do, and the way by which to accomplish it easily, is to be interested.

If you are really interested in a thing your mind automatically will concentrate itself upon that thing.

Meditation is closely similar to this: it means not only being interested and therefore centering the mind upon a point of thought, but also mentally passing in review the various aspects and phases of the point of thought.

Student T — There is a difference between the human consciousness on earth and the human consciousness in devachan. Is it right to ask what is the difference between the consciousness of the mahatma or one who has attained cosmic consciousness on earth, and his state in nirvana?

G. de P. — Certainly it is right. I think the difficulty lies in the usage of the words cosmic consciousness. I would not say that the mahatma is one who has achieved cosmic consciousness while living in the body. He has achieved spiritual consciousness which, indeed, in a true sense is cosmic also.

You are justified perhaps in your query, but when nirvana is once entered it becomes cosmic consciousness per se, and all the sense of personal limitation which prevails when one is living in the body is dropped or cast aside. The nirvani becomes a spiritual energy enjoying cosmic consciousness, cosmic peace, cosmic bliss, without any distractions of the person or of the individual.

Student T — Am I right in thinking then that nirvana is really a state of the very highest activity?

G. de P. — It certainly is.

Student T — That it is most significant for all life that is going on?

G. de P. — It is. The nirvani is one who is "blown out of existence" — but not out of essential being. Only the divine and the spiritual and the manasaputric essence remain unencumbered, untrammeled, unshackled, ungarmented, unobstructed, by all the lower energies and planes of the human constitution. Nirvana means, therefore, perfect, total, complete oblivion of all the lower five degrees or planes of the universe.

Hence, the personal man is literally blown out of existence; but when you remember that the personal man is only a temporary group of lifeatoms, and that it is in the personal man that arise all our sorrow and pain, all our human wretchedness and misery, all our suffering and unhappiness, all our ignorance and limitation, you

will immediately see that to have all these things blown out is ananda as the Hindus put it, perfect bliss. You know those three words that are so commonly used in the Vedanta, sat-chit-ananda, usually run together as a compound: sachchidananda. Sat means pure existence — the Occidental would say, pure spiritual being. Chit means consciousness, pure consciousness, not any particular activity of an individual consciousness about things, but consciousness in itself, Das Ding an sich, as the Germans say. Ananda means bliss, containing no distracting and therefore limiting ideas of any kind, but pure consciousness in the spiritual realms, undistracted and undisturbed by anything inferior to itself. This is the state of nirvana.

Of course, in our own esoteric philosophy, the teaching is very clear that even nirvana has an end for any entity, although it may last for an almost unthinkable term of human years. When nirvana does end, then the individual must begin his evolutionary course anew, but naturally on a higher plane than before.

There are certain reasons, you see, from what has just been said, why even the nirvana can be looked upon, if chosen for oneself, as a species of sublimated spiritual selfishness. After all, when reduced to the last analysis, it would actually seem that the attempt of anyone trying to gain nirvana for himself is a solely individual yearning to free himself from manifested life, to stand apart in utter peace and utter bliss, in pure consciousness, and without regard for anything else.

How different from this is the teaching of our Lord: "Can I remain in utter bliss when one single human heart beats in pain?" Give me, rather is the thought, the suffering of personal existence, so that I may help and comfort others instead of attaining the purely selfish bliss of individual paranishpanna. Such is the teaching of the Buddha. It is also the teaching of our holy school. Such a noble choice brings its own reward, because nature in the end will not have any of her children stand aside in selfish isolation. It is against nature's fundamental law of unity, of union. We are all here together. We are all interlocked and interrelated. We help each other whether we will or whether we nill. "For a time, and for half a time, and for times," to use the mystic language of the Christian New Testament, we may set ourselves aside, stand aside and allow the rushing river of evolution to pass us by, but sooner or later nature will have no more of it, and then we must go forth again for our own benefit in order to grow, to grow greater and more universal.

Student M — I understand that for that being of which the spiritual sun is the heart, cosmic pralaya would be equivalent to death in the case of the human individual. Therefore it follows that during that cosmic pralaya there is a devachanic state for that being?

G. de P. — Yes, pralaya means dissolution. In the case of a man it is death. In the case of a solar system or sun, it is also a death, but death of its lowest composite parts. But it also means that the solar entity will enter upon a lofty, sublime, state of consciousness, which corresponds to the devachan in the case of a human being.

Of course things are relative. What the human calls his devachan would be a nirvana to a lifeatom, and indeed to all the hosts of lifeatoms which form his body. The devachan of a solar system would be a paranirvana to us human beings. All these things are relative.

Student W — May I ask whether the pratyeka buddha begins his evolution anew after he has concluded his nirvanic bliss throughout the remainder of the manvantara, and whether the nirvani who seems also to be enjoying a state of spiritual selfishness begins his evolution anew with the beginning of a new manvantara?

G. de P. — Each such case, of course, Doctor, is regulated by the karma of each such case or individual. The evolution begins anew at exactly the proper karmic point. One of our teachers, Master M, I believe, in The Mahatma Letters uses the analogy of a watch which has run down or stopped. Let us say that that stopping is the nirvana, which indeed is a stop so far as all the lower personal or individual existences are concerned. Let us say that the watch begins to go again: obviously it will begin to run from exactly the point at which it had stopped. Thus does evolution begin anew for the pratyeka buddha or for any nirvani, at the exact point where previously it had entered the nirvana or had become a nirvani. Is the answer responsive?

Student W — Yes, it is responsive in a way; but Master KH in The Mahatma Letters speaks of the failures of dhyan-chohans, and says that they must begin their evolution in the beginning, that is, with the elemental kingdoms. Therefore I thought that if they must pass through all the lower kingdoms in order to reach the

human stage again, and then only regain what they had lost — their spiritual and high intelligence as in devahood, at the end of the seventh rung in the seventh round — I wondered where the pratyekas would really begin their evolution anew.

G. de P. — Your question is a little complicated, Doctor. The pratyeka buddha begins his evolution anew at the exactly appropriate point in space and at the exactly appropriate time, all depending upon the individual's karma. Of course, it would be impossible to say offhand just where any particular case would begin a new evolutionary course; but it begins at the point in space and at the point of time which karma calls for.

The failures in dhyan-chohanship, that you speak of, must not be considered as beginning their evolution anew in the elemental kingdoms. That is quite inaccurate. They have already attained dhyan-chohanhood, and it is alone due to these "failures" that a new evolution of a planetary chain can take place. These dhyan-chohanic failures are lofty spiritual entities — failures it is true, because they were not quite evolved enough to have gone beyond the reach of karmic attraction drawing them to a new planetary chain. They had failed in attaining, let us say, the last degree of cosmic initiation, but nevertheless they are truly spiritual entities.

Hence, when the new planetary chain is about to begin its evolution anew, these dhyan-chohans who didn't make the last sixty or seventy feet of the grade, are then ready albeit as laggards, sluggards, failures, to inaugurate the evolution of the new planetary chain by setting and governing its spiritual pattern — and this indeed they do. They awaken first, even before the elementals, and by their activities, by their presence, by their energies working on the cosmic matter of that locality, they set forth and inaugurate the grand plan of the new planetary chain to be. They are borne in ahead of the elementals to the proper point in space and there begin their work, their grand plan.

When this grand plan is outlined or laid down in the cosmic place which karma destines, then the elementals are borne in as the next grade of cooperating entities, and begin to build on this plan which the dhyan-chohans have outlined or laid down. The dhyan-chohans then mingle with these elementals. They don't themselves become elementals, but they mingle the lowest part of their essence with these elemental beings, and thus guiding these elementals in their work, the beginning of the superstructure of the planetary chain to be is safely laid, is safely inaugurated. The beginning of a new planetary chain takes place.

Furthermore, in due course, after the three kingdoms of elementals, thus guided by the dhyan-chohans who had failed to make the full grade, have done their work, then come the remaining six classes of monads, which in due course of time build up the planetary chain and complete it.

Is the answer now satisfactory to your question? You have touched upon a very profound matter of cosmogony, indeed.

Student W — Yes, it is satisfactory, notwithstanding what is said in The Mahatma Letters to A. P. Sinnett.

Student T — We have a saying: "once a man always a man." Therefore the monadic essence after it has entered the kingdom of man, will not enter the lower kingdoms. Is it always true, once a dhyan-chohan always a dhyan-chohan?

G. de P. — Certainly. Once a god, always a god. But be not too exacting in attaching and using any such perfectly accurate and true statement. Take the phrase, once a man always a man, and nevertheless forth from the depths of man's inner being can pour the rivers of the lifeatoms, and he is involved with these lifeatoms with which he mingles the lower parts of his constitution. They are his own progeny, his own children.

He has brought them forth and he must work with them and raise them. He cannot help it. Such is nature's law. So that while he in his own essence remains always a man, once the human stage has been reached, he nevertheless has the lower part of his constitution formed from these rivers of lifeatoms which have come forth from his being. Do you understand?

Student T — Yes, thank you.

Student S — Professor, I had a question to ask about the nirvana, but before asking it, may I get a point clear in Dr. W----'s question? In it she seemed to differentiate between a pratyeka buddha in nirvana and a nirvani.

Is not a pratyeka buddha when he goes into nirvana a nirvani?

G. de P. — Yes, he is, because the term nirvani is simply a generalizing term for any entity in the nirvanic state. I noticed also the point you referred to. But I think that Dr. W---- spoke of nirvanis in general. The pratyeka buddha is a particular instance.

Student S — This is my question: is there not some time in the evolution of a buddha of compassion when he too must enter into nirvana, because the existence of nirvana is in nature's laws. And if so, then for a buddha never to go into nirvana would be against nature's laws. It would seem to indicate that nature provided something as a temptation for people to fall into. Of course, I know that is not so. It seemed to me the only explanation was that perhaps, in the course of the evolution of a buddha of compassion, there are times when certain lessons must be learned by retarding his own individual progress — by going into nirvana.

G. de P. — That is really a profound question that you have asked, and I am glad you have brought it forth. I will answer it. But as a prefatory observation, you should not think that the nirvana is something to be looked upon as a retarding of progress, or as a species of delay, or as a punishment. That is not the idea. The entity does not renounce nirvana merely because he longs to have a quicker evolutionary progress. That itself would be a selfish idea. He renounces nirvana because nirvana is union with the divine universe, and this renunciation is sublimely unselfish and grand, and he makes this renunciation only in order that he can remain in the manifested world and help all that lives.

Now, answering your specific question, yes. Even for a buddha of compassion there comes the time — there will inevitably come the time — when for that particular current of cosmic evolution nature will imperatively demand that he rest, and his duty then will be to renounce the manifested existence and to take his turn of nirvanic being. It may be illustrated in the case of the physical body on earth. A man of great willpower, of strong vitality, of good health, can stave off the inroads of disease and even threatening death much longer than can the frail man; but sooner or later nature will demand that the body be cast aside. It is good that it is so. The results are excellent. In the case of human beings the analogy is the devachan. In the case of the buddha of compassion it is entering the nirvana — or perhaps the paranirvana.

But that is not the instance alluded to when the distinction was drawn between the buddha of compassion and the pratyeka buddha. In this distinction there enters the element of deliberate choice. Which path shall I follow — the path of personal rest, utter peace, bliss, and living in the divine; or the steep and thorny path of individual manifested existence, but yet it is an evolutionary road, and finally it leads to the heart of the universe.

Student K — May I ask a question? Is not renunciation of nirvana merely an instance in large of what we experience in having joys of renunciation all along the path of life? We have these daily opportunities; and as we grow in consciousness and grow in strength and in vision, do we not have opportunities in a similar way to make that very renunciation which is, perhaps, just as great for the consciousness at that point as is the renunciation of the buddha in his far higher evolutionary stage? Is not renunciation of nirvana the great instance of what actually occurs many, many times on a smaller scale on the lower rungs of the ladder of life?

G. de P. — It is so. The training for mahatmaship is precisely along that line of beginning at the beginning.

They begin at the beginning and begin at once. And each time when a man makes an unselfish choice, a choice which is beautiful because it is grand and manly, he has by so much prepared himself for that grand final choice, which will some day surely come to him. He is thus gaining strength for that last and supreme effort. You are quite right. Don't think for a moment that the renunciation so often spoken of in our esoteric literature is all pain and all sorrow and all misery! I tell you, Companions, that this renunciation is bliss so exquisite, so keen, that therein lies a very danger — the actual danger of a self-conscious feeling of personal or individual spiritual superiority. Wrench this feeling from your heart and cast it forever out. It is a serpent which will bite and sting and poison your inner life. Be impersonal.

Student K — May I ask one question more, Professor?

G. de P. — Yes. I myself was going to ask questions this evening, but please ask your question!

Student K — Well, I will answer one then. I will answer the question that you asked about the manasaputric consciousness: whence came the manasaputric essence in ourselves? Am I correct in seeking the explanation which seems to clarify it for me in your teaching with regard to the fact that we are composite of legacies, of portions, respectively from the seven planes of nature, and from the seven sacred planets, so that therefore a part of our essence is from the sun? That is why we are sons of the sun. But equally are we not sons of the parent-star?

G. de P. — Perfectly true.

Student K — Are we not also sons of the astral-vital parts of our nature?

G. de P. — Certainly. I have often told you that man is a composite entity. How often have I not repeated it?

This means that every cosmic part of the great Mother has given its quota to the making of man.

Universal nature produced man, its child, an inseparable part of itself. Therefore that child has within itself every part of the universal mother. The part is contained within the whole, and enjoys every faculty latent or active, every energy, of that whole; but this general statement is not all. The more particular teaching is that in our solar system, every one of the sacred planets — each one being the fourth-plane planet of its own sevenfold chain — gives its own particular and characteristic quota or stream of lifeatoms to the building of our planetary chain. Consequently there is in man a solar and a lunar essence, a Saturnian, a Jovian and a Martian essence, an Hermetic or Mercurial essence, and a Venus essence. I am speaking now of our own particular seven sacred planets which means the seven planets intimately related with the building of our planetary chain, and from each one of these seven sacred planets there comes to our earth a characteristic and particular vital flow fraught with living entities. Of course our earth reciprocates in kind as among these seven sacred planets. Furthermore, there are other groups of sacred planets connected with other arrangements of a similar kind in our solar system but these do not concern us so intimately.

Our manasaputric consciousness arises out of the fountain or source of our own core of being. But in order to awaken this manasaputric essence into functional activity, other manasaputras — intimately connected with us by karma, with individuals each to each — entered into the immature constitutions of the humanity of the third root-race in this fourth round and inflamed or stimulated the latent manasaputric essence of the individuals. After inflaming the manasaputric essence hitherto lying latent in each individual, the "savior"

manasaputras, the inflaming manasaputras, left this sphere — in other words, left behind them a host of individuals with an awakened manasaputric essence or instinct or capacity or faculty or organ, call it what you like.

It is this manasaputric essence, this solar flame within us thus brought into active work, which is now our higher manas — indeed, the buddhi-manas within us.

Now, Companions, it is almost time to close for tonight, but before doing so I desire to say a few words to you about chelaship, and about the training for the esoteric life. Chelaship, or the training for masterhood, is a strenuous and heart-stirring work. Every step of it is joy, although at times there come psychological reactions which must be guarded against. The chela life has often reminded me of the man who is engaged upon some important, fascinating, most interesting, but very strenuous physical work. He labors, he tires, the breath comes quick and fast, the sweat bedews his brow and body, but yet he feels growing under his hand a work of marvelous beauty. He is inspired to give to it every ounce of strength that is in him. The chela knows that over the distant hills, perhaps for him, if his karma is favorable, not so far distant there lies the temple of wisdom, and that its doors will open for him if he can reach it and reach it clean and strong. If he reaches it with soiled feet, with feet which he has not washed with the tears of his eyes and the blood of his heart, he must retrace his steps, or wait until the time come when no longer will the heart bleed, and no longer will the eyes be blinded with the tears of selfish personal devotion to merely personal ends. Then the eyes will be lightened with the undying inner flame, and the heart will beat only for others, because it will be utterly self-forgetful. Then beauty, then inexpressible joy, then unimaginable strength and peace, will enter into his life.

Chelaship means training for masterhood. In itself it is not difficult. In itself it is easy, almost inexpressibly easy. It means giving up pain, giving up sorrow, giving up anger, giving up lust, giving up selfishness, giving

up all the things that injure and blind and cripple and retard us. It means being clean, sweet, fresh, strong, pure, beautiful. It means beginning to live the life of an incarnate god. I am not using these words poetically.

It means becoming at one with one's inner god, ever more and more — a little at first, a little more at the next effort, for at each effort the chela gains more and more of the inner light, of the inner life, of the inner inspiration, of the inner buddhic splendor. In other words, it means becoming ever more and more at one with the inner Master. In every one of you there is now, even now, an exalted entity, a mahatma, the manasaputra that I have spoken to you about. Becoming a Master, means raising your humanity into mahatmaship.

Now consider a moment. Is it something so very frightful, is it something so very dreadful? Is there any reason or need why the eyes should be continuously blinded with tears, and why our feet should be continuously washed with the blood of the heart? Don't you see that it means exchanging things that injure and that retard and that pain, for things of inexpressible harmony and strength and beauty? It means exchanging weakness for strength. You have will — a divine faculty. You have intelligence — a divine faculty. You have life, which you can indefinitely prolong, in itself a divine faculty. Live in these! Live in them naturally. Let yourself grow naturally as the flower opens its petals, as the bud opens its heart.

The life of chelaship is a beautiful life, my Companions. Don't be discouraged if you fail, if you don't live up to your noblest. Don't even waste time in regretting. It is weakening. Simply make up your mind: I will not do it again! And then if you fail, repeat: I will not do it again, for by so doing I alone am the loser. The day will come when, by the constant repetition of the mantram, by the continuous aspiration of both the heart and the mind, and by the continuous striving or effort to be the best, the most beautiful, that is in you, you will suddenly be it, suddenly you will become it. You will be astonished at how readily and quickly you will grow, if you will just hang on like grim death. Never mind about death, should it come. You will come back to earth-life soon enough. I tell you that every member of our holy order, every member of the KTMG, is helped; but only helped when the help is impersonally taken. There is a paradox. You cannot be helped in a great effort like this unless you help yourself. You readily see the reason why: the Masters, the helpers, cannot grow for you. They cannot live for you. They cannot eat for you. You must grow and live and eat, yourselves. It is all very simple. The chela life actually is the simplest thing in the world: to be kindly, to be gentle, to be just, and to cultivate your spiritual and intellectual powers. At times it may be your duty to be severe. But if so, be severe with justice and kindness. Don't be swept away ever by anger or passion. Not only do they not pay, but thereby you make bad karma which some day you will have to meet and overcome. Then when the glorious day comes, you will hear the voice that you, perhaps, have been yearning to hear for many years past, when you will sense the presence of the teacher, and will then know that you have succeeded. It may be that even before you sense the presence or hear the voice, the beloved voice that you have been longing to hear, you will recognize that you are an accepted chela.

Strive after that which you love best and which you feel to be truest, and let all the rest go. Do your duty by all, and no matter at what cost to yourself, and you will find that there is an unspeakable joy in it all. You will almost revel in the sense of strength that will come to you, and in the sense of the new and grander life that you will feel. Then, sooner or later, there will come the opening of the inner eye, the vision, the opening of the inner sense, becoming cognizant of most wonderful and strange things around you.

I can give you perhaps an intimation, a little intimation of what this means. Has it never occurred to you to have suddenly a flash of inspiration, a sudden lighting up of the whole mind, and then you pause and wonder and ask yourself: why didn't I see that before? Has your heart never suddenly melted with pity, and you felt an unaccustomed warmth and peace? These are signs of the chela life. Has it never occurred to you to resist a favorite temptation and to overcome it, and to look down at the slain self, the ugly thing that formerly had you in its grip, and wonder how you could ever have been the victim of something so vile? I know you have had these experiences, Companions.

So don't look upon self-renunciation which you hear so much about in our books as being something which is very terrible! On the contrary it is exceeding beautiful. The sense of peace, the sense of growing faculty, the sense of inner growing power, the vision, the light, that all come, are treasures so great that nothing that I know of at least in physical existence can compare with them for an instant.

I remember when in this incarnation I first met my own teacher. I was not a bit astonished. It seemed the most

natural thing in the world — as natural as would be the meeting with some dear friend. I had never seen him with these eyes before I saw him this time; and it was all very familiar and inexpressibly comforting and fine.

It was just like meeting a dear, loved friend; and the beauty of that face, the gentleness, the kindly eyes, oh! it was worth all I had been through, all of the personal self that I had given up. I feel almost ashamed to introduce such an expression in the beautiful atmosphere of this gathering as "giving up." Indeed, my dear Companions, giving is receiving. Only the great can give themselves. You know what Jesus the Avatara said: Give up thy life if thou wouldst find it.

Will you sound the gong, please?

[The sounding of the gong. Silence.]

Meeting 31 Supplement

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

Supplement to K.T.M.G. Papers: Thirty-one

| From Boundless Space | Man Is a Hierarchy | Atomic to Galactic Consciousness | Dhyan-

Chohanic "Failures" | Relation of Teacher to Pupil | Devachan and Nirvana |

February 12, 1935

From Boundless Space Universes Come Into Being

G. de P. — Hierarchies within infinitude come and go like flashes, like sparks of light. Each such spark is an ending of itself as a manifestation, but those manifestations continue forever progressing. There are no absolute ends, but there are relative ends.

Boundless infinitude, however, has no attributes of change, nor of time, nor of extension of space. It simply is from eternity unto eternity, and that is all that our minds can grasp of it. But any manifested universe arising in the bosom of infinity, be this universe great, be it small, precisely because it is delimited by individuality, because it is a being, is by that same token and by so much a limited part of the Boundless.

Now then, a universe is therefore obviously not boundless infinitude which is not even one — one being the beginning of enumeration of manifestation — but boundless infinitude we must consider to be zero represented in symbol as a circle. The one signifies the universe, any universe, our universe, all the universes outside of our universe, which has a beginning, passes through its various phases or stages of emanational evolution and development, and after this is ended, retires again, as Pythagoras said speaking of the cosmic monad, into the utter silence and darkness of infinitude — silence and darkness to us. Following this line of thought, the infinite, that is the boundless, the frontierless essence of all universal Being, has no beginning, has no end, has no manifestation of itself, but forever and forever is.

Consider for a moment in the fields of boundless space universes arising here and there like sparks of light.

As they arise and begin their evolutionary unfolding, other universes are disappearing, unfolding and vanishing, in due time to reappear. Consider therefore, not one or two do this, but innumerable such over the fields of boundless space, so that we have the picture of infinity, eternally as it is, evolving forth and evolving back into its countless universes and systems of universes and supersystems builded of systems. But infinity itself: you cannot speak of infinity as the One. You cannot speak of infinity as manifesting. It is only beings or things, monads, however small however great, which undertake these stages or periods of evolutionary unfolding, and then involving or infolding. Infinitude undergoes no modifications of itself. If it did, it would not be infinity. It is only manifested beings and things which clothe themselves in the garments or veils of maya; and while some "portions" of infinitude are in their progressive unfolding into veils of maya, other portions here and there scattered over the limitless fields of space are involving and rising out of maya back into the bosom of the deep, only to come forth again in good time.

I wonder if you catch this thought. It is an exceedingly important one. Infinitude does not evolve as infinitude. If it did, then infinitude could change, and to speak of infinity which changes is to speak absurdity, because it is only things or beings which undergo modifications of themselves, and hence are subject to change.

The thought is important because out of misunderstanding of this fact that the universe is forever and throughout boundless duration in continual action and activity around us, through misunderstanding this thought rose originally the idea of a god, of a being who created and who acted and who did things. Now infinity does not create, nor does it act, nor does it do, because all these are limited operations, and infinity as infinity has no activity because no limitations. It forever is itself. It is only things which are active. If infinity acted, it would have to have an enclosing space greater than infinity in which to act, which is obviously absurd because then it no longer would be infinity.

The universes in the boundless fields of space are numberless. They are literally and actually forever and

forever appearing and vanishing, some higher, some lower, and there is no ending to the high nor ending to the low, because these very terms are terms of maya, terms of manifestation. But infinity as infinity is, we can only describe as motion itself, not anything which moves, but motion per se. Consciousness itself, not any one consciousness, but consciousness as consciousness. Intelligence itself, not any one intelligence, but intelligence as intelligence.

-------

March 12, 1935

Man Is a Hierarchy

What is it within any one of the different knots or foci of consciousness which allows it to grow first into the stage immediately above its own, and then continue to grow into the stage immediately above that, and so forth onwards, as far as we know forever? What is it within any one of these entities, within a human being, which enables it to roll forth from within its own essence virtually unending series of steps ahead?

Each one of the companion monads which in their aggregate make a human being's constitution, as it grows becomes more and more individualized, more and more a being in itself. Thus man is a hierarchy truly, and exactly the same observation may be made with regard to the literally uncountable hosts of embryo monads or lifeatoms which build up his various vehicles on the different planes on which his monads function.

Now then, this being the case, every one of these companion or composing monads at its own core is the rootless root of infinitude. Where then in this vast congeries of entities, in this vast assemblage of embryo gods or godlings, is man? If we say that man is the soul or the intermediate part of his constitution, we say truly; but when we analyze this soul or intermediate part more strictly, more rigidly, we find that it too unfolds into a hierarchy, and we are met again with exactly the same problem. If we seize upon a certain center of this second companion hierarchy, and say this is man, and then subject this point of inquiry or of observation to the same strict and rigid scrutiny, we meet again a hierarchy anew. Thus we discover a hierarchy within a hierarchy within a hierarchy, and we find that this third hierarchy itself is a composite entity; and yet each one of these hierarchies is a monad!

We see here the reason why the great Indian philosophical systems, particularly the Vedanta, say that the ultimate ultimate in any entity is the cosmic paramatman, the cosmic "I am." Yet, here we have these mayavi egos. They surround us everywhere, the universe is formed of them, every lifeatom is an embryonic one. As evolution proceeds, the ego expands its consciousness forever, and everything ultimately loses its I-am-I-ness, because this I-am-I-ness merges into and becomes identified with the cosmic "I am."

When you chase man around the universe after this fashion, where do you find him? It is one of the most important, one of the most difficult, one of the most subtil, and yet one of the most fruitful sources of investigation.

Do not focus your attention on vehicles or names, technically called in the Hindu Vedanta nama-rupa, "name"

and "form," but think of the essence of a monad as a point of consciousness — not as a body, not as a vehicle, not as a shape, expanding and growing and enlarging like a balloon constantly growing larger and larger and larger — a point of consciousness which unfolds, rolls forth, emanates from within itself a constantly increasing stream of its self-ness: points of consciousness. Such a point of consciousness is a monad. This monad is eternally, for ages, like an atom of parabrahman, the self of itself is infinitude, yet constantly unfolding from itself ever enlarging streams of its consciousness.

Thus man at the present time is a relatively small being from the standpoint of consciousness so considered.

As he evolves by flowing or emanating from within himself, ever enlarging streams of the things and beings within himself, he expands, he grows, and finally becomes a solar system, and then a universe. He keeps on growing, giving birth to children-beings, themselves doing exactly what their great parent is doing through infinity. But the point, the center which never changes, which is for each one through eternity the same, is not a body or a vehicle or a sheath or a veil or a garment, but a center of consciousness, a focus of consciousness.

That is the monad. It is eternal. It is not only always the I-am, but whether self-consciously recognized or not,

it is always I-am-I. Now the I-am-I is the limited form of it which will keep on growing forever, but it will always be limited when contrasted with the inmost of the inmost, the parabrahman within, the rootless root, the I AM.

Here is just the meaning of the famous statement of the Lord Buddha: there is no abiding soul in man, because those words refer to the old false teaching that I am a soul and am eternal or immortal as my self.

You are a soul, different from me, and are immortal as yourself. There is no such entity in man, because everything grows, expands, changes, evolves, becomes essential selfhood is the same in all of us. The limited I-am-I endures forever but with constantly enlarging horizons. It is never for two consecutive instants of time the same, therefore cannot be immortal. Immortal means enduring forever as you are; but by contrast with this, note the changeless consciousness expressed by the phrase, I AM.

Atomic to Galactic Consciousness

Our planet earth is a member of our solar system. Our solar system is a member of the galactic universe formed of many solar systems. Modern astronomers tell us that the number of suns or solar systems we see in the galactic universe runs into the thousands of millions. Our whole galaxy, all included within the far-flung zone of the Milky Way, is one molecule in the physical body of an entity whom we cannot cognize or recognize or understand, because of its immense spacial magnitude. Our little earth is an electron in an atom which is our solar system. We human beings live on this electron. Our galaxy is filled with hierarchies of conscious, quasi-conscious, self-conscious, spiritually conscious, and divinely conscious beings — gods, men, atoms, in the esoteric sense. Yet these beings who in their higher reaches live and think divine thoughts, gods, have their habitat in a molecule in the physical body of an entity whose mere physical shape is so immense, spacially speaking, that we cannot even see it. We simply see the solar systems of the galaxy by which we are surrounded.

Now turn the telescope around, the old-fashioned kind, and look through the big end, in other words, reverse the picture. Our bodies are formed of cells composed of molecules, builded of atoms, in their turn constructed of electrons. Who can say on how many of the electrons of any one physical body may not be living beings thinking divine or human thoughts, seeing a universe surrounding them as we see the universe surrounding us? Their universe is a single organ of our body, and their galaxy is a single molecule of a cell of that organ.

This is consciousness, atman, not name and form or nama-rupa.

Let us try to free ourselves from our servility to forms and names. Let us follow consciousness rather than bodies and forms. These latter are suggestive, but when we have grasped the suggestion, then discard the form and name and retain the thought. Indeed, I will go farther. For all anyone can say, there may be vast hierarchies of gods living in some molecule forming a part of a cell of a single organ of somebody's house cat, absurd as it sounds, or of a sparrow building its nest under the eaves.

Think of the wonder of the universe in which we live. Now that house cat or that sparrow may be killed, and its dead body cast into the flames, and its molecules and its atoms dissipated into the air, into the water, into the earth. But that does not affect in any wise these infinitesimal beings. They are perfectly safe.

Now then, transfer your thought to us and our galaxy. A catastrophe of unimaginable immensity might happen to this galactic cosmic being. We might not know anything about it, or little of it. The solar systems, the atoms of the galaxy, would probably simply begin peregrinating as do the lifeatoms which enter and leave our human bodies at every instant of time, these lifeatoms carrying their burden of armies of beings. I repeat, we must free our minds from the magic, from the maya, of names and forms, nama-rupa, the greatest delusion of consciousness, and try to understand consciousness per se. You can only understand consciousness by stilling consciousness, not by thinking names and thoughts but by entering into consciousness, being it. For instance, you cannot understand life if you merely think of it as a name or as a shape. You have got to be alive to feel life, to be in it, to be of it, to be life before you can even grasp what it means. The same with consciousness in even larger degree. Consciousness has no magnitude. It will fill space, it will fill an atom, and things incomparably smaller than one of our chemical atoms. It is dimensionless, because it has no shape, no form, no rupa. It belongs to the arupa world. We now see the meaning of this term arupa, formless. All entities have forms, but if we want to understand them we must

leave the rupas or forms of our universe, and enter into the arupa or formless which is pure consciousness.

Then our minds can contact the consciousness of these other beings. We can begin to realize, to understand, to feel, inwardly to see what is, because we coalesce in our consciousness with these other consciousnesses. It is a wonderful thought this, that an entity may exist in the infinitesimal, thinking divine thoughts, itself composed of atoms and electrons on a still more infinitesimally infinitesimal scale. It lends dignity to us. We respect the universe around us. We respect our own bodies. We treat not only ourselves, but we treat others with reverence. Wonderful mystery.

-------

August 13, 1935

Dhyan-Chohanic "Failures"

What we have studied in this group, advanced as it is, about the planetary chains, falls very far short of being the entirety of that doctrine. There is a vast deal more that might be given on this one branch of the esoteric philosophy.

Referring particularly now to the classes of monads of a planetary chain: there are twelve classes though it is customary to speak of ten classes of evolving beings, commonly called monads, which we divide arbitrarily as follows: the three elemental kingdoms, the mineral, vegetable, beast, human, plus the three dhyan-chohanic kingdoms. They are all akin; they are all related. Each class follows the other in spirituality or in ethereality, and conversely in materiality. Each such class through evolution reaches up to and takes the place of the class above it, which in its turn has progressed upwards or forwards one plane. If it fails to do so in any one planetary manvantara (and by that I mean a chain-manvantara) it is a failure, simply because it has not reached up to and taken the place of the class immediately above it.

Just so with the dhyan-chohans: if they do not pass out of dhyan-chohanship, in other words go beyond the three classes of dhyan-chohans belonging to a planetary chain, into that higher grade above it, beyond the ten of our chain, they are "failures." It is not a crime; and it is precisely these failures which bring about the architectural guidance, the spiritual overseeing of the new chain to be. See how carefully the great cosmic intelligence regulates things, so that the very failures in the highest classes become the gods and instructors and lights for all those behind and below them, and thus lead and guide the construction of the chain to be.

Do not construe mere words too strictly. Get ideas, and endeavor to coalesce these ideas, to blend them into each other, so as to get a picture of things. Now all this would be abundantly clear to you if I could talk to you with greater clarity about other portions of the doctrine of the planetary chains. I cannot do it here, but what has been given already is just crammed with hints and ideas. Try to visualize pictures. Let words be mere thought-carriers to your minds, and not stumbling blocks. Actually words are so imperfect in carrying these sublime verities that at the best they just hobble along, stumble along. I suppose it would take a dhyan-chohan to pick words which would become flashing lights into your minds.

Consider a moment: we of the human family on this our present chain were failures on the moon because we were not wholly human there. We had not even fully entered into the human kingdom, so we were failures in that sense. Do you understand what I mean?

Now then, we shall become dhyan-chohans when this chain reaches the end of the seventh round, or twelveth, the concluding round, the end of the present chain manvantara. Those of us who make the grade, who pass the peril time, those who can turn the corner and go upwards when the moment of choice comes — those of us who will do it, who will probably be the majority, will be dhyan-chohans at the end of this chain. A few will go beyond the dhyan-chohanic ring-pass-not. They will attain a higher grade. Those of us, however, who cannot go farther than dhyan-chohanship will be dhyan-chohanic failures because we do not go farther. But we shall nevertheless be high spiritual beings.

Every human being on the highest globe of this chain at the end of the seventh round will be an imbodied buddha, an imbodied dhyan-chohan, a high spiritual entity. If we fail to go beyond even that stage and thus enter into new and loftier spheres of cosmic life, we will be the failures who will inaugurate as spiritual

architects the karmic building up of the next chain, the child-chain of this earth-chain.

The same thing takes place when a man reimbodies himself. There is the spirit — before the intermediate part of his constitution has left the devachan fully, and before he is an imbodied man on this earth — there is the spirit of him moving and guiding elementals on the planes of his constitution to be, to build that constitution.

Just as in the building of the planetary chain, the high spiritual powers work through the elementals which are the lower parts of themselves. Architects work with pen and paper and blueprints. Now obviously there is an enormous difference between the mind of the architect and the pencil he uses, or the blueprint paper. Yet both are employed, and every atom of the blueprint paper or the pencil is as much alive as the mind of the architect, composed of lifeatoms every one of which is an imbodied elemental.

-------

September 10, 1935

Relation of Teacher to Pupil Analogous to Manasaputric Inflaming

On higher planes and by karmic destiny, the closer a pupil and teacher are, the more intimately are they conjoined in the future, and the more intimate, contiguous, and persistent throughout time is the interchange of thought, which means lifeatoms. It is for this reason among others that HPB has so plainly stated that the relation between teacher and chela, teacher and pupil, is more sacred even than that between parent and child.

Whereas the parent gives to the child its body, the teacher gives to the pupil his soul, awakens the soul.

Karmic links are established which persist throughout eternity.

It is precisely so that the manasaputra and the individual which it enlightened, are forever after connected together. They are constantly interchanging or exchanging thought currents. There is a close connection, so close indeed that it is correct in a way to say that the manasaputra which enlightened the individual is actually a part of that individual's constitution, although the manasaputra itself is pursuing its own evolutionary course. Marvelous thought.

Indeed, it is the same principle which keeps groups of egos together as families, as races, which brings about reimbodiments together at the same time, and on the same globes — spiritual, intellectual, psycho-astral-vital physical attraction.

There is a great mystery in the manasaputric inflaming of our own baby minds in the beginning of our human period on this earth. Yet it is so simple really. Now I will try to give you a graphic illustration. The individuals of the third root-race who were enlightened by the manasaputras were children in mind, because they had the same kind of mentality then that children today have with us.

Now hearken carefully: there is the manasaputra in the growing child, but the vehicle is not yet ready and does not respond to the appeal from the inner manasaputra. What happens? The child is taught by its parents.

Its mind is quickened, awakened, and as this education by the parents and by the child's teachers continues, little by little the mind of the child itself begins to function. If a child were allowed to grow up to manhood apart from all other human beings whatsoever, on a desert island let us say, it would never normally reach the expansion of thought, of mind, of intellectual consciousness, that it is aided to attain by the ministrations and loving care of its parents who awaken the mind in him, quicken the intellect, and bring it to the point where the child's own inner manasaputric faculty begins to function.

The case of the manasaputra inflaming us is identical with what happens with chela and teacher on whatever plane. Pause a moment in thought, Companions. We have all been through it. We all came into the school, our blessed school, thirsting for light. We received thoughts, our intuitions were quickened, our intellect was stimulated by the manasaputric light that was shed upon us, although each one of us had it already within. But the teacher aided, came and gave, and gave of his own, of her own, gave to us, and we drank, and were awakened, invigorated, and stimulated, quickened, just as a child is. Thus the manasaputras descended from their spheres on the mission of mercy, of compassion, members of the hierarchy of compassion and of light, to quicken the sleeping minds of the infant humanity. They did their work, left these spheres to return to their own, leaving behind them an infant but an awakened humanity. So is it with the child as it grows. Its mind is

quickened by its parents, later by its teachers at school, finally by the manasaputra within. There is the whole mystery. It shows again that teachers are needed. If you have not a teacher you will indeed progress, but it will be by the slow, faintly moving current of natural evolution that will take ages and ages and ages before you reach the point that you now reach by receiving a quickening. There is the secret.

-------

September 10, 1935

Devachan and Nirvana

What is the essential difference between nirvana, in its various degrees, and the devachan in its?

Devachan is the sublimation of the spiritual best of a person, and therefore it is, even though spiritual, a maya, transitory, changing, altering, always for the better. The nirvana on the other hand is the complete extinction or washing out of the limitations of the person, and an entering into the impersonal egoity of divinity. That is the reason it is called nirvana, "blown out." Consider yourselves as persons. We are all human. We have good in us and bad in us. In our moments of mental and spiritual rest and meditation, the bad part of us drops off and we live in the roseate bliss of doing consciously at least in our minds our human best. It corresponds with the devachan, because it is a spiritual sublimation of the personality. But now suppose that we have reached the end of the seventh round. Obviously we then are no longer the imperfect humans we now are. That will be an epoch of far past history, forgotten, wiped out, extinguished, blown out, finished with. We are living in a far higher part of our being. That corresponds with the nirvana. By the blowing out, we have lost nought. We have gained everything. When a prisoner breaks his shackles and steps from the gloom into the sunlight, he loses nought, but gains.

Meeting 32

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Thirty-Two

Meeting of February 28, 1932

G. de P. — Companions, I am ready for your questions.

Student — I wish you would give us an answer to a periodical question on the biologic gradations from the animal to man: where did man get his body?

G. de P. — You will find the answer in Theosophy and Modern Science. [Republished in 1941 as Man in Evolution.]

Student — This point always occurs to me: every physical vehicle has to have its germinating seed, and it has to have its place of germination. Now, concerning the physical body that man developed; where did he find his primary germinating place?

G. de P. — Do you mean the first race or the second, or the third race?

Student — There must be a womb for the gestation of every germinating seed; and if there were no human beings to furnish such wombs, where did such wombs come from?

G. de P. — In the first place, the first race in this fourth round on this globe did not possess wombs, for there was no sex-humanity in those long past times. The human womb today is a biological-physiological development belonging to the coarsening and thickening bodies which came in with the third root-race. You might look upon the first root-race as an astral or cloudlike, soft, butterlike, race of beings, physically speaking — something like a jellyfish, but even more ethereal: jellylike, butterlike, but of tremendous size. If you could see a first root-race "man" coming through our grounds, its body would seem to you much like a mass of dense cloud, it might seem almost formless; yet it would have an ovoid shape, and resemble a mass of cloud rolling over the land, a hundred and more feet high. But inside that cloud, as the psychomagnetic heart of it, there was the vital central point. It does not matter what size that point had. It might have been atomic in size. But that vital central point of it, the heart of it, might be wandering through and over the body, moving hither and thither, wherever the center's attraction at any instant carried it. This may give you an idea of what the first root-race was in its physical appearance in this fourth round. Yet, in spite of its ovoid shape, you would notice a peculiar shifting resemblance to the human physical frame even as it exists today.

I would say, however, that the word "cloudlike" would better represent the human race on this planet in the respective beginnings of the first and second rounds. During this fourth round the substance of the first root-race would be thicker than mist or cloud; it would be more like the substance of a jellyfish, yet still more ethereal. This is the nearest physical thing that I can suggest as giving an idea of the body substance of that first root race.

I might point out that the very first stages of the human germ, when fructified, in physical appearance will suggest the physical consistency of the bodies of the first root-race on this fourth globe during this fourth round. Do you get the idea? — jellylike, soft; and, just as the foetus hardens and becomes flesh, so did the first root-race thicken into the second, harden into the third, and solidify into the fourth root-race. We at the present time during this fifth root-race have bodies less coarse, thick, dense, than did the fourth root-race men.

We are already returning to the bodily consistency of the third root-race. I refer to the texture of bodies that the last part of the third root-race had. Our flesh today is soft and almost gelatinous.

Student — It is clear to biologists today that the relations between the human race and the animal races do not show correlations but simply similarity of development along one plan.

G. de P. — Let me finish my former train of thought before we go to your last question. All the organs of the human body are the products of evolution, but were not evolved by the third root-race human stock except in

the latter's last ages. The earliest third root-race, as also before it the second and first root-races, had no organs as such — no more definitely developed organs than a jellyfish has. The end of the third root-race was filamentoid in bodily structure; and around this filament structure, even at the end of the second root-race, began to condense and to form what you might call nerve centers, or at least what today would probably be called ganglia. These thickenings of the filamentoid substance of the body, the very beginnings of the structure of the nerves and organic centers, later were to become the organs and the ganglia, but originally were like spots in the body, which spots more or less retained their definite position.

It is very difficult to describe because our minds are so crystallized around pictures of the human body and its organs as these at present are. All organs or structural elements in the human or any other body are ultimately derivative from the energies in and structure of the auric egg, and are therefore deposits from the auric egg on the physical plane. Our human bodies even today are condensations of and from the auric egg.

From the bodies of the second root-race and the earliest part of the third root-race were thrown off vital cells, just as today man is constantly exuding or casting off cells from his body. He is not usually conscious of it; but as instances showing what I mean we may cite the scruff of the skin, the various excreta of the body, all which are merely aggregates of living or dead cells. All these in a general way represent today what happened in the beginning of the third root-race and the end of the second root-race.

These vital living cells, when they left the body like the spores from a plant, followed each one its own evolutionary development after it left the parent-body, and of course reproduced its own kind. As man is a storehouse and record of all the evolutionary stages that the race has passed through in other rounds, these vital cells, each one being an individual, a growing entity, after leaving the parent-body began to follow its own evolutionary path of development, thus producing beast stocks of various kinds, the bird and reptile stocks, and so forth. Many hundreds of these stocks ultimately perished. They were born out of time, and therefore could not live. They may have reproduced themselves for a few generations, and then, because they were unfit for the circumstances in which they were born, they vanished. It was a case of the survival of the most fit.

Please make a sharp distinction in your minds between the mammalian stocks which originally issued from man in the manner above described and all the so-called animate stocks beneath the mammalian, such as the birds, the reptiles, the insects, the mollusks, the fishes, etc. These last were the off-throwings of the "human"

evolutionary stream in the second and third rounds, which survive, many of them, even to this day. But the mammalian beasts were the off-throwings from the human evolutionary life-stream during this present fourth round on this globe.

Some of these off-throwings from the human stock during this fourth round reproduced their kind through the ages, and, continuing their respective independent evolutions — each family following its own particular pathway of evolution — finally, but many ages ago, produced the various subhuman mammalian stocks which exist today.

Each mammalian stock, after it was produced from the human life stream, began to specialize in evolution along its own line of development following the swabhavic impulses or urge within itself. The consequence of all these different evolutionary specializations in development is that the beasts today, being evolved products from very crude mammalian beginnings, have evolved farther from the original forms than the human stock has evolved. Although the human stock itself has likewise evolved, nevertheless it retains more of the primitive attributes and characteristics of the original "human" parent than the presently existing mammalians do.

If you have got this idea clearly, I might add a few words more by way of illustration. The human father, in the act of generation, emits a multitude of spermatozoa, each one a potential human being, but only one out of this multitude enters the ovum, fructifies it, and produces the fertilized germ which grows into the human child. The remainder of the multitude of life-germs simply die. This is an illustration of what I said a few moments ago to you: out of the vast number of vital cells that were thrown off by the third root-race, innumerable multitudes perished in the very beginning of their existence.

You may ask: How did these second and early third root-race entities propagate themselves true to stock? In other words, why did countless multitudes of the off-thrown vital cells produce the mammalian stocks, but some reproduced only the then human stock? The answer is that the cells thrown off from the individuals of the later third root-race were some of them overshadowed or inspirited by the beginnings of the manasaputric life, and thus produced what became the typical human strain and thereafter reproduced true to kind as the human sperm does today. If the cells in my body, which at present through many ages of subserviency, slavery to my dominant ego, were not subservient — which was the case at the end of the second root-race and the beginning of the third root-race — then any cell, a bit of skin for instance, a bit of finger nail, any such cell thrown off today might start a line of evolution of its own, eventuating in some new kind of entity.

But these cells cannot do that now. They have been checked because of the entrance into the human constitution of the powerful dominance of the manasaputric egoic fire — the cells are now held rigidly to follow the dominant impress of mental psychic habit, of natural habit, an impress which has become rigid like iron through the past ages of repetition, so that such cells cannot now reproduce a new stock from their own inherent swabhavic characteristics. They can reproduce only their own present kind, and only then, when in aggregative union with the organic entity which is my body. In other words, the individual vital evolutionary activities of such cells are now dormant, in obscuration.

Nevertheless every lifeatom of my body — and a cell of skin is a vast collection of such lifeatoms — is a growing entity, and in the aeons to come will blossom forth into a human being, after having passed through all the countless multitudes of intermediate stages.

You see how complex the answer to your question is, yet it is so very simple if you get the fundamental idea.

Student — There is one thing that is not quite clear — the statement that this off-throwing from the second root-race produced its own kind, if it lived; but that later on, it did not produce its own kind, but a lower kind

— the lower mammalian animal stock.

G. de P. — What do you mean? I don't follow you.

Student — I was referring to those below the humans. I understood that at one time they produced the human, that which is of their own class, of their own kind.

G. de P. — The germ-cells always did that; that is all they could produce — each its own kind only.

Student — I gathered that the lower mammalian, lower than man, are the product of the off-throwings of the early humans.

G. de P. — Yes, the mammalia below man are the evolved results of the crude mammalian cells thrown off by the earliest humans.

Student — I gathered that the method of reproduction of the second root-race was just such off-throwings of vital cells.

G. de P. — There is confusion here. The wandering vital center, the vital germinating heart, that I spoke of before as wandering through and over the body, and having no permanent location because there were then no real organs, was the reproduction on the then physical plane of the monadic center, the heart of the human strain. The cells flowing off from this wandering man-heart or vital human center reproduced true to stock the new human bodies of that early period; but only the cells thrown off from this wandering vital core or heart did so. The cells thrown off from the surrounding soma or body were they which produced the mammalian stocks — or indeed died in their millions.

There is one thing more to add. Man not only produced all the mammalian but he likewise was the original parent of all the beasts, and of all the living creatures beneath the beasts, such as the birds, the reptiles, the fishes, the insects, etc. How was that done? These lower creatures were not produced from the human life-stream in this fourth round. In the second and the third rounds, the original crude parents of these presently existing lower creatures were reproduced from off-thrown cells of the evolving human stream during the second and third rounds — if indeed you can call that life-stream human at that time. In a similar way the

mammalia were produced from the human life-stream in this fourth round.

Thus, therefore, all the stocks beneath the mammals preceded man on this earth in this fourth round, being the sishtas on earth of their respective life-streams which were originated in the second and third rounds.

Contrariwise, the mammals came later than man in this fourth round.

Thus, therefore, man, the human life stream — that particular vital current or life flow which is the human stock — is the oldest, the most primitive, strain on this earth, on the planetary chain as a matter of fact, excepting of course the three classes of the dhyan-chohans above man in evolutionary progress.

Student — Then science will not find the missing link between birds and mammals?

G. de P. — The more scientists know about the succession in evolution of the various stocks, the more are they becoming astounded at this fact: that, instead of there being a perfectly uniform ladder or series of link after link, leading out of the reptiles into the birds, from the birds into the mammals, there appear sudden, startling innovations in the geologic record — new beings appear as it were from nowhere. The geologist can trace the existence of different families or strains, with modifications, through ages; then these strains vanish, and a new order of entities, a new scheme of lives, appears in the rocks. The reptiles, for instance, vanished so suddenly that many geologists talk about a universal cataclysm or world convulsion, which occurred all over the earth. The dinosaurs were once the lords of the earth, so far as the geologists know. Suddenly they vanished in the Mesozoic Age, and were succeeded by new creatures, among them reptile-like birds such as the archaeopteryx. But the true reptiles had apparently vanished simultaneously pretty well over the entire earth, as if they had been suddenly wiped out of existence; and then a new stock of beings appears with equal apparent suddenness.

Please note carefully that the third root-race was in its heyday of greatest efflorescence already in the beginning of the Mesozoic Period, indeed, even in the Triassic Age of that period. The first root-race actually can be said to be pre-Secondary, and thus at least the beginnings of the first root-race can probably be definitely placed in the Permian Age. The mammals begin to take their dominant position on the face of the earth before the Quaternary, doubtless in the Cretaceous Age or even in the Jurassic; because it must be remembered that the mammals began to appear in numbers towards the end of the third root-race, and this was in the Triassic and Jurassic Ages. The esoteric doctrine does not teach that all mammals followed man, but it definitely does teach that the higher mammals did follow man, although there were mammalian forerunners before the separation of the sexes at about the middle of the third root-race. It is extremely difficult accurately to connect up our esoteric chronology of the races and their evolution with the geological time periods, because the modern geologists do not all agree as to the time periods in years that their various geological ages lasted.

Finally, it must also be remembered that sedimentation on this earth, globe four of the planetary chain, began in this fourth round between 300,000,000 and 320,000,000 years ago, thus preceding by many millions of years the appearance of the first root-race on this globe D — our earth.

Here is an interesting fact. The earliest beginnings, the primordial appearance, of the mammalia occur before the fishes — in the form of primordial little mammals, tiny little things, not much larger than a mouse, but yet distinctly mammalian. This is easily explainable by the fact that they were the evolutionary forerunners, the first attempts of nature, and were therefore like coming events casting their shadows before. These little mammals appeared as nature's first tentative efforts in evolution to reproduce what was ages afterwards to be the dominant stock on earth.

Student — You don't mean the ameba?

G. de P. — No. I refer to a little creature that has recently been discovered as a fossil in the geologic record.

It is said to resemble somewhat a shrew-mouse, and it is a mammal. It is found as a fossil, not in the earliest rocks, but nevertheless before the reptiles proper appeared.

Student — Is that on the fourth round?

G. de P. — It could have been; or at the very end of the third round, when the mammalia had first begun to appear.

Student — Is there any individual responsibility attached to this?

G. de P. — Your question is obscure. Ethical responsibility lies only where there is a self-conscious evolving soul, and that is found today only among the humans. The beast has but the glimmerings of it only. It does not realize responsibility for what it does. For instance, a dog will realize that it has done wrong, it will put its tail between its legs and whine, but it has not a sense of ethical responsibility such as a man has. It has become accustomed to know that if it does wrong something will happen to it, such as being whipped or severely spoken to. Nevertheless, there is the first very faint glimmering of an undeveloped ethical sense. You don't find even this much in a fish. A fish is so low in the evolutionary scale that it has no sense of responsibility whatsoever, and about all that you can teach a fish is by an appeal to its appetite or its habits — it learns that if it comes at a certain time to the top of the tank, it will be fed. But there is no ethical sense, no conscience, there.

Student — There must then be a certain element of karma developed in the dog?

G. de P. — What kind of karma: ethical karma or physical karma? Physical karma exists even in the atom. I don't think that it could be said that anything beneath the self-conscious human being, or some other self-conscious entity, could be burdened with genuinely ethical karma. Where there is no ethical sense or understanding, there is in consequence no ethical responsibility.

Student — But in the hierarchy to which they belong, from which the impulses come down —

G. de P. — In the question of the individual?

Student — With the lower animals. For instance, a fish: it belongs to a hierarchy. Higher up in that hierarchy is the source of certain impulses descending to urge that lower creature towards a larger development.

G. de P. — Do you mean as an individual or as a stock?

Student — Both as a stock and as an individual — a little in some way; some impulse descends from the higher parts of the hierarchy to that lower creature.

G. de P. — I don't quite understand the real point of your question, although the general meaning is perhaps clear enough.

Student — A fish, for instance, has an inner god, just as much as a man has; but the inner god is not manifest at all in the fish. In the human being the manifestation of this divinity is beginning. Now, the stock of fishes is as much cared for by what you might call the dhyan-chohans of the fish stock, as the human stock is; but only in the higher parts.

G. de P. — In the leaders, in the spiritual leaders, of the fish stock on earth, there is as much and even more responsibility than there is in the individuals of the human stock; and in man's own inner god there resides a spiritual-ethical responsibility which is greater than the man knows or can express. In the higher inner constitution of the fish or of an ant or of a bee, which creatures are feeble expressions on this earth of an inner god, there is the same high ethical responsibility as individuals.

Student — How could these last be spoken of, as architects or as builders?

G. de P. — The architects work through the builders; the builders work through the bodies.

Student — Then there was no great moral responsibility attached to the production of apes and monkeys?

G. de P. — So far as the humans of the earliest human stock are concerned, the answer is no; because the manasaputras who provide the spiritual-ethical understanding had not yet incarnated. If you can say that a

child of two or three years, let us say, is morally responsible because it happens to have a gun in hand and pulls the trigger and shoots its father, then you can say that the late second or the early third root-races were responsible; but nobody would say that an infant is morally responsible for killing its parent by accident. It simply does not know better; it is not ethically responsible. So, consequently, in the acts of bestiality that the third root-race in its beginnings engaged in with the lower mammals — which that third root-race itself had created — there was no conscious ethical responsibility; they didn't really know, or rather realize, what they were doing. The late second and the early third root-races were just like little children today; they lived in intellectual sleep; they had a sort of half-understanding consciousness like a little child today has; but no awakened and functioning mind. The manasaputras had not incarnated, and consequently the individuals of that early race were just like little children today so far as their inner faculties are concerned.

But in the fourth root-race, and even at the end of the third root-race, when ethical responsibility was present because the manasaputras had incarnated, and when relatively unevolved individuals of the fourth root-race repeated the bestiality of the third race man with certain families of monkeys, there then was genuine ethical responsibility. The product of this second series of bestial acts was the apes — the anthropoids, the manlike simians. There certainly was responsibility here; just exactly as if a man or woman today submitted to a beast: there would be the full sense of ethical responsibility for that bestiality. Nature, however, does not tolerate consequences from such act today, because the psychical frontiers between the two life streams, the human and the beast, are too far apart.

Student — Of course nature does not tolerate any offspring to be produced now; but the human stock at that time was very close to the union line, seeing that they could and indeed did get offspring.

G. de P. — They were close to the union line for this reason: the mammals with whom they associated were the descendants of the offspring of their own bodies in the preceding or third root-race. The psychical barrier between the two specific groups had not yet been made that now exists. Do you get the idea? The mammalian animals of the higher grades were then so fairly close to the human stock that intercourse was fruitful.

Remember, however, that the human stock of the third root-race in doing those acts of bestiality simply did not know, or rather realize, what they were doing.

Student — Do I understand that it was only a small part of the early human stock that did commit these bestial acts, or was it all of them?

G. de P. — It just happened so. Among the entities of the late second and early third root-races were those who now are the highest races of human beings and also the mahatmas and the demigods, who had at that time actual full human consciousness and responsibility; and they it was who were the human gods and elders, the fully self-conscious human beings, even then. And of course they were not involved in such acts.

Instinctively they avoided that kind of thing. For them there was no attraction. They knew well what they were about. But the vast masses of the human stock at that time — and we can only call them human because we are the descendants of them, they were not human in our sense of the word, as being thinking, self-conscious entities; they were like little children — the vast mass of the human stock could have done that kind of thing. I am here of course referring to the second and early third root-races. Of course in the fourth root-race responsibility was full and complete.

Student — But when the manasaputras had incarnated in them?

G. de P. — When the manasaputras incarnated in them, then they became self-conscious, and just as the little child grows from three years to fourteen or fifteen, they then realized what had been done.

Student — Did the first glimmerings of the manasaputras appear in individuals in the second and third root-races?

G. de P. — Yes, I have already told you so. Insofar as there was self-consciousness, there was ethical responsibility.

Student — Self-consciousness is really the same as the beginning of the incarnation of the manasaputras?

G. de P. — Certainly; because the incarnation of the manasaputras brought about self-consciousness. A little child has no conscience, has no ethical sense of responsibility. But as it grows up — study it from month to month — you can begin to see the dawning of self-consciousness, the beginning of thinking. More and more as the months pass it becomes a human being. The manasaputra incarnates in every human child even today in exactly the same way as it did then, but in much quicker time. The incarnation of the manasaputras was not an incident that happened like a snap of the fingers. It required ages.

Student — Did the manasaputras incarnate in the whole race of humans at that time, or did it begin in some kind of sishtas, who reproduced themselves and formed the human race, and the others died out?

G. de P. — The entities that we have been speaking of were first the sishtas, and the incarnation afterwards of the manasaputras was simply the influx of egos coming over from the third rounds. That was the incarnation of the manasaputras; just exactly as in human reincarnation today, every little child represents an incarnation of its own manasaputra, its reincarnating ego, in every new body. In some little children, the reincarnating ego, or the manasaputra, incarnates more quickly than in others, and then we say this is the case of a precocious child. In other cases the incarnation of the reincarnating ego, or the manasaputra, takes a longer time, and then we say: "Why, this child is rather dull."

Student — I don't understand it quite. There was this whole race, and were they human beings?

G. de P. — They were sishtas.

Student — Were all of them to be considered as sishtas, so that the manasaputras could reincarnate anywhere?

G. de P. — Let me try to explain that the sishtas in the very beginning or opening of the fourth round were very few; but coming events cast their shadows before. They began to feel the impulse of the inflowing of egos from the third round, coming from globe C on to this globe D. With each new little impulse, the sishtas in the bodies began to prepare more freely to provide the bodies for the coming stream of reimbodying egos or manasaputras. Hence, when the proper time came, the sishtas had become millions instead of being, let us say, a few thousands. Then, among these sishtas, the incoming manasaputras began to pick each one the body most closely allied to it by karmic destiny, and began to overshadow it little by little, but progressively more as the ages advanced; much as the incoming mind or reincarnating ego reincarnates little by little in the growing child, every day a little more, one more tendril of consciousness, one more fiber of thought, descending and touching the physical sensoria — the brain and the heart.

Remember this, too, that the first manasaputras to incarnate took the beast [[best? ]] bodies of the sishtas, and therefore produced that chosen stock, or race, which I spoke of a few moments ago as first attaining human consciousness; and these were what are now the highest mahatmas and the human demigods. Those were the pioneers, the first swallows of the incoming spring, as it were. Then the incarnating manasaputras, or egos from the previous round, began to come in in ever greater flow, and each one had to pick its vehicle, just as the reincarnating ego today is drawn to the family with which karmically, psychomagnetically, it has most affinity; and little by little, the human stock, from being a race of semi-conscious and quasi-dormant vehicles, became self-conscious.

Remember that as the sishtas grew from a small number to a large number under the urge of the incoming impulse, as the sishtas developed into the first root-race, then as the first root-race became the second root-race, and then as the third root-race followed the second root-race, the increase in self-consciousness although exceedingly slow was steadily progressive. At about the time of the middle or latter part of the third root-race, the human vehicles were sufficiently well prepared to be able to receive the incoming manasaputras, no longer as merely overshadowing rays, but as actual incarnations. From that period of time the human race became truly human — really thinking, self-conscious beings. But there were some of these human vehicles who were so backward in evolution that actually incarnation of the manasaputras in them did not take place until the beginnings of the fourth race; and these were the undeveloped degraded ones, the ones who committed the second act of bestiality — the barbarians, the savages, of the fourth race — which produced the apes.

Student — Were they the ones that refused to incarnate?

G. de P. — Those were the ones whom HPB speaks of in her The Secret Doctrine as refusing to incarnate:

"No fit rupas [or forms] for us!" They were by evolution less ready than were the pioneers; they were not evolved enough; they refused to incarnate: "No rupas for us!" But those who were the highest in development, the highest of the manasaputras, saw and knew what their karmic duty and destiny were, and therefore began immediately to incarnate, and hence thus produced that part of the human stock which now are the mahatmas and the human demigods.

Student — What part in this phase of evolution did the nirmanakayas and the buddhas take?

G. de P. — They came into working only as the race attained self-consciousness. They are, however, the leaders, the first of the pioneers, the very first ones. Leaders is just the word: those who lead the van, who go first, who prepare the way, who find or choose the path — who are always the first. Don't forget, however, in this rather intricate study of what is now forgotten history, that even from the very beginnings of the first root-race there were a certain few, the choicest even of the manasaputras, who had been the leaders or heads of the general body of the sishtas; and it was these heads or leaders who were the guardians, overseers, protectors, of the nascent human life stream of this fourth round.

Student — May I ask a very peculiar question? You said that the fishes are the products of previous rounds, of the first and the second.

G. de P. — The second, probably.

Student — Consequently the globe in the meantime was in obscuration.

G. de P. — At times between the rounds, certainly.

Student — Consequently, being in obscuration, there was no life, except latent.

G. de P. — There are always sishtas living, guiding, even during the obscurations.

Student — That is just what I puzzled over, that these sishtas, even though the globe was in obscuration, lived and propagated continuously.

G. de P. — The mineral kingdom today is but a body of sishtas; that is why it is relatively still and quiescent.

When the mineral kingdom next has its impulse to life, if you could see it you would not only be astounded but you would probably say: "In Heaven's name, what kind of uncanny, weird world have I come into?" You would see the rocks as alive, moving, and self-motive. Again, the vegetation today is very largely all sishtas, living; but if you were to live at a time when the plants were the lords of the Earth, during their particular era you would see the plants doing the most extravagant things: plants leaning towards each other, leaning towards passing entities, trying to throw their fronds around them, as you see even in the Venus flytrap today.

You would indeed see strange things happening. Vegetation would be incomparably luxuriant, everything a mass of vegetation acting almost like quasi self-conscious, living beings. On a very small scale this is happening in the tropics even today. Again, many of the lower animalia today are but sishtas. The insects, for instance, the fishes, the crustacea — they are sishtas. You would not like it at all if you were living on earth alone at a time when, let us say, the reptilia or the lobsters were having their heyday! You would have to be pretty active to keep out of the way!

Furthermore, the beasts, even the mammalia, today are becoming sishtas, rather rapidly indeed — except for the apes. More and more they are losing, not vital powers so much, but their aggressive power. They are becoming quieter and quieter and slowly dying out; and finally there will remain only the sishtas of them.

When the human stock goes to the next globe of our planetary chain, the human races will have become decrepit, sear with age; their aggressive power will have vanished. You see examples of that even in peoples who have had their heyday on earth. Their energies seem to die down, and the race or stock loses its power, and in this manner they continue for several hundreds or it may be a thousand or two years in a sort of

quiescent state like the Greeks were during the Middle Ages and as the Spaniards to a certain extent are so even today after their heyday of social and political power a few hundred years ago. The North American Indians are a good example of a racial stock, on the other hand, which is dying out.

The human sishtas will of course still be human beings; but they will be very quiet egos, relatively speaking, for though they will be living and reincarnating, and the very highest of the human race, yet they will be in a kind of rest period that lasts for ages. Nature keeps them alive for her future purposes as human beings through the ages awaiting the incoming of the next inflow of manasaputras in the fifth round.

Student — Do they keep the customs of the times?

G. de P. — What customs? Customs vary with every few hundred years. Nevertheless, I think I can answer the question by saying, yes, to a certain extent. It is very difficult to answer so vague a question. It depends upon the planetary chain; it depends upon the globe, upon the degree of evolution that the globe has attained to.

I can imagine that the sishtas of this fourth round globe, earth, when the human stock as a whole goes to the next globe, would remain very much like what we today call barbarian stocks, but of an unusually advanced and spiritual and even intellectual type — a kind of age of Saturn in which innocence and lack of sin will largely prevail. They would live for ages like a quasi-sleeping, perfectly happy, but unaggressive type of men.

I can tell you that those who take upon themselves to become the sishtas actually make one of the greatest of sacrifices, because they are deliberately giving up their own evolution — at least for the time being. This is the buddhic spirit — deliberately giving up their own evolution with the human life-wave during a part of the next round in order to be here on earth ready to be the seed-stock when the human life-wave comes again in the fifth round. When the living manasaputric fires come into them again, when the new inflow of egos comes, then the sishtas will begin to "awaken." They will begin to become aggressive anew, to evolve rapidly; they will begin to manifest civilization. They will build up something finer than has ever been known before; and a new round will have begun on this globe, earth.

You cannot say that even as sishtas they are inferior human beings. Take the course of Greek history as an example in the small. See the brilliant civilization that the Greeks attained in Athens and elsewhere. Look at the grand literature that they produced. See what they brought forth, even giving to us many of our standards, our canons; and yet, consider what later they became. They lived on, and today they are beginning to be something fine again; they are beginning to ascend a small racial cycle. But during the time when they were remaining as what you might call sishtas, they nevertheless were men. They had their towns, but these were insignificant in the history of the world; the vital wave had passed to other parts of the earth; or, to put it differently, the time for other human stocks had come. The sishtas of the race karmically destined to overthrow the decadent Mediterranean civilizations were the Northern barbarians. These as sishtas received the new influx of life, and came down the lands and conquered the Mediterranean peoples, and finally produced the modern European civilization. Take the Hindus for ages past; or take the case of the Chinese, many of the Asiatic tribes: they have all been in obscuration; they have been and in some respects still are human sishtas on a small scale.

Some races die out completely or become amalgamated with newer human waters, like the Egyptians, and the Greeks, and the Latins. The reason for an entire disappearance is because such cases are very old races. The Egyptians were from fourth-race stocks. They amalgamated with or vanished in the newer waters from the Orient and remained alive as Copts.

Student — Am I correct in thinking that when HPB speaks about pralaya in The Secret Doctrine, or about minor pralayas, she really used that term sometimes when she actually means to say obscuration?

G. de P. — It is possible. I won't say no; there is always the possibility of a wrong usage of terms through oversight or perhaps because it is due to visioning intricate facts from another standpoint. But I think that your remark possibly could be justified in a few cases. I know that there are instances in The Secret Doctrine, when the word pralaya is used, and I am sure obscuration could have been an equivalent term; but there are certain reasons which amply justify these cases, because very deep obscurations are almost like a pralaya

itself, almost a complete death. Yet the two are very different.

But I want to say this about the sishtas, and it is a very important point. Among the human sishtas who will remain when the human life stock goes to the next globe, there will always be a few who keep alive the bright light of civilization; and these are the highest. They will be far in advance of anything we know now. It is a certain body of masters, the highest initiates, the chiefs, who watch over the human sishtas all the time: instruct them and teach them, keep them in order, as the ages pass along, now and then dropping the seeds of civilizing thought among them to keep the light burning, so that at no time do the sishtas drop beneath a certain level.

Student — Then there actually is what we think of as pralaya between round and round? But are there any sishtas on a higher plane not subject to what is taking place in obscurations?

G. de P. — Certainly, there are sishtas on every plane — sishtas on earth, and on every globe, and on every plane of the solar system. There are sishtas among the gods, just as there are among men; just as there are among the beasts, the plants and in the mineral kingdom — sishtas everywhere; because every class of entities has its rise, its apex, its decline, its sishta stage, and then the rise again. Such is the way in which nature proceeds: everywhere one common, fundamental law of operation. But answering the first part of your question, you are quite wrong in supposing that there are pralayas on the globes between round and round.

Pralaya means death and dissolution, and you see immediately the difference between a pralaya and an obscuration. A man is in obscuration when he is asleep, but he enters upon pralaya of his lower principles when he dies.

Student — Are the nirmanakayas in a sense sishtas?

G. de P. — So far as humans are concerned, you could not call them sishtas. But there are sishta-nirmanakayas, as being the instructors of sishta-humanity.

Student — We speak about the mahapralaya, when all is dissolved.

G. de P. — Yes, that applies to the solar system, or even to the entire planetary chain.

Student — Does that word all mean more than our entire kosmos contained within the galaxy?

G. de P. — I see your thought. In this case it would mean all that is affected by the universal mahapralaya, that is, affecting everything within the galaxy.

Student — Is there a universal mahapralaya that applies to all the infinitude?

G. de P. — No, of course not, because then it would mean that infinitude passes out of existence, which is absurd.

Student — Because if there were, the sishtas would suffer also; and where would be the seeds for the next?

G. de P. — A pralaya or a manvantara, no matter how great, is a very limited thing as compared with infinitude. The consequence is that no matter how great the system may be, whether of a planetary chain or a solar system, of a galaxy, or of ten million galaxies, there is always the surrounding, encompassing infinitude, which has no limit, but is simply endlessness. It obviously cannot suffer pralaya, because if it did, then infinitude would be a limited thing — which is absurd. It is THAT beyond all human comprehension, because human comprehension is finite. I never would apply the word entity to infinitude.

Student — HPB speaks of space as an entity.

G. de P. — Yes, but only the space of a galaxy, or the space of ten billion galaxies; but beyond, there is always the frontierless infinitude — frontierless, boundless, without bounds.

Student — Is it not better to take such expressions as in the Bhagavad-Gita "a portion of itself"?

G. de P. — Yes, but that reference is to the imbodiment of a god, or the incarnation of a mahatma, or of a buddha, or of a human being. For instance, a ray from my inner god produces me, and yet my inner god remains separate, and I am but a "portion of Myself." The "Krishna" within me is on its own plane, yet produces me. The Krishna of the galaxy produces the galaxy as an entity, yet remains apart and separate. The sun exudes a ray, yet remains separate and distinct from that ray.

Student — Infinitude is inexhaustible.

G. de P. — Inexhaustible is hardly the word: it is THAT. No grander word was ever said in this connection than the demonstrative pronoun That.

Student — When the awakening to life comes, then there must have been sishtas inside of this world that was in pralaya, not merely outside; so that even the very greatest and most complete pralaya still would have living beings in a kind of dormant state and not in a state of dissolution?

G. de P. — Correct in a general sense; but these sishtas have vanished with everything else in the pralaya, yet remain as sishtas on the inner planes, and are therefore the seeds of life. You must be careful not to misuse the word pralaya. Sishtas on any one plane can remain on that plane only in obscuration. When that plane vanishes in the pralaya, not even the sishtas remain on the plane which has vanished — which would be absurd. Take our own galaxy: when the time comes, it will vanish; but in the abstract space now filled with what you call the galaxy, there remain the hid seeds of life, which are the spiritual sishtas of that galaxy.

Student — Are they conscious or unconscious?

G. de P. — It depends upon what you mean by these words. In the case of the human race on this globe, they will be conscious. In the case of the mineral sishtas, they are not conscious, they are asleep. In the case of the gods, the sishtas will be divinely conscious, but sishtas only when compared with what they are in their full heyday and midtime of evolution.

Student — But at that reawakening, have not the other galaxies of space something to do with the beginning?

G. de P. — Absolutely; all the galaxies are intimately related, every one of them; because every galaxy is an imbodied soul, like the soul of me; and in their aggregate they form the physical body or vehicle of some supercosmic entity which is living in still grander spaces of infinitude.

Student — HPB says distinctly in The Secret Doctrine that they reproduce their kind.

Student — Couldn't you take these sishtas as being life-essences on the formless planes of the past manvantara? When you talk about sishtas as seeds, one is apt to think of the seed of the material atom.

G. de P. — The sishtas do represent the material, as well as other aspects. For instance, the psychic sishta of a reincarnating entity is that particular lifeatom or life-germ which when the time comes will find its way into a female body and be fructified, and produce the new body of the reincarnating ego. That lifeatom, that one particular lifeatom, is the sishta of the individual body.

Student — If we had evolved the powers of observation, we could see the whole world and all that it means, going on around us all the time.

G. de P. — We could.

Student — All that you have said is a trying to give an understanding of the incarnation of the manasaputras, and of the same process, more or less, which takes place at the incarnation of the human soul into the body.

G. de P. — They are just the same in principle.

Student — I don't know whether I am correct in this: that this cell, this lifeatom, which becomes a sperm, the one that fructifies and grows into a body, is a monad, a monadic lifeatom in a much earlier stage, and

belongs to a multitude constituting a higher state of monads, so that gradually new monads incarnate into this body with higher monads, as officers in an army gradually come in until finally the general is there.

G. de P. — If I understand you correctly, that is almost exactly the idea; and if you will follow that thought, you will see how profound and how far-seeing is the statement of the Lord Buddha in his last words:

"Brothers, man is a composite entity; work out your own salvation." Man is an army of monads; he is a host; he is a cosmos; he is linked with the highest and linked with the lowest, everyone working all together. It is this very structure of man's constitution, topped by the spiritual general, and having the lowest psychophysical private who is I, you. The general is the inner god.

It is a real revelation when you catch the idea, and it is a key to understanding many things. I have been talking here for an hour and a quarter. Let us adjourn the meeting.

[The sounding of the gong. Silence.]

Meeting 32 Supplement

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

Supplement to KTMG Papers: Thirty-Two

| Ten Families of Monads | Life Waves and Sishtas | Why Animals Suffer | Sishtas Open the

Drama of Human Life | Cycling Life Waves |

November 12, 1935

Ten Families of Monads

G. de P. — Speaking of the dhyani-chohans and of the three classes of them existing beyond man in the hierarchical system of evolving monads on this chain: can anyone here tell me how many kingdoms or classes of monads there are evolving on the globes of our chain, and just what these kingdoms are? I submit that there is a world of suggestive thought in these matters. In addition, one more question: It has been stated in our literature, both by HPB and by myself, that there are different families of monads evolving on the globes of the chain, and following each other in serial order around the globes. Can anyone give us some suggestive thought on this point? Where are these different families or classes of evolving beings? We humans, for instance, form one such class.

The reason for my asking these questions is somewhat as follows: if you get the right answer to these questions, you will then understand what obscurations are. You will have some idea of how long a globe-obscuration lasts. You will see that all the globes of the planetary chain are not asleep or dormant in any obscuration of one globe, and that they do not remain dormant or asleep for the tremendously long time that it takes the human life-wave, for instance, to make a round around the globes of the chain. It would be absurd to suppose that our human stock is the only evolving family on all the twelve globes of the planetary chain, and that all the other eleven globes, except our globe D, remain thus ages upon ages in useless sleep or dormancy until the human life-wave again reaches these globes in evolving order. I rephrase my first question: can anyone give us an idea where these other evolving families of monads are?

[The answers given by various students for lack of space cannot be reproduced here. Their omission, however, does not destroy the clarity of G. de P.'s remarks.]

G. de P. — This is indeed a very complex theme, nevertheless it is simple if you get the fundamental idea of ten, or indeed twelve — but let us say ten — different families or life-waves following each other in serial order around all the globes of the planetary chain. Obscuration does not mean that a globe, when a life-wave leaves it, remains in obscuration or dormancy until that same life-wave returns to it after having passed around all the other eleven globes of the chain. Not at all. Obscuration means the time between the leaving of one life-wave and the appearance on the same globe of the succeeding life-wave.

Thus, then, answering a part of my own question, the ten different families of monads are on the different globes of the chain more or less at the same time; nevertheless they are all represented on this globe likewise, and similarly are all represented on each of the other eleven globes of the chain. How? By their sishtas. You see here the immense compass as well as the compassion of this arrangement: how the divine intelligence of the great planetary, who is the god of our chain, has by its own life and composite constitution infilled the whole procedure or process of the evolving of the lower creatures with both wisdom and love. As an example on this earth, in addition to the sishtas of the other kingdoms, and in addition to the life-wave now specially evolving here, which is principally our human kingdom, we have the sishtas of the three dhyani-chohan classes also with us.

Think what this fact means! That even above our Masters there are the representatives, the sishtas, of the three dhyani-chohan classes awaiting their awakening on this globe when we as a life-wave shall have left this globe D, and when the first or succeeding dhyani-chohan life-wave reaches this globe.

We have likewise amongst us our younger brothers, the beasts to whom we humans are dhyani-chohans. The plant kingdom has its superior aids in the beast kingdom; and thus it runs on down the scale. Every kingdom

leads, or helps by leading, the next lower kingdom forwards and upwards. Thus the plants guide upwards the minerals. The beasts guide upwards the plants. The humans guide upwards the beasts. The lowest of the dhyani-chohan kingdoms guides us humans upwards, and the next higher dhyani-chohan kingdom guides upwards the first or lowest of the three dhyani-chohan kingdoms; and the highest dhyani-chohan kingdom guides up the intermediate dhyani-chohan life-wave.

Do you catch the picture? Thus then, around all the globes contemporaneously, there is a constant turning of the wheel of life, every spoke of the wheel being a life-wave, comprising a constant movement of rotation or of revolution, so that no globe of the planetary chain at any time during the chain-manvantara, or Day of Brahma, is for very long asleep.

The only time when a life-wave is not on one or on another of the globes of our chain is during those relatively short intervals between globe and globe, when it is undergoing its relatively short interglobal period of transitional rest. But these interglobal periods are much shorter in every case than are the active periods that the life-waves have on the respective globes. -------

December 10, 1935

Life-Waves and Sishtas

Take the case of the life-waves. I really do not see why there should be any confusion about this. Life-waves is but a synonymous phrase or term for kingdoms, for classes of monads. Each kingdom is a life-wave. Now each kingdom or each life-wave during the course of its evolution on a globe, ours for instance, undergoes certain revolvings or evolutionary turnings or phases of experience. These we call root-races, especially when we speak of the human life-wave or kingdom. Each life-wave has seven turnings or whirlings or phases or evolutionary portions of development in its manvantara on a globe. These are the different parts of the life-wave. In the case of the human stock we call them root-races, seven or ten root-races to the evolutionary development of the human kingdom or life-wave on this globe D. A virtually identic process takes place with the other life-waves or kingdoms or classes of monads.

Now these kingdoms or classes of monads or life-waves follow each other in serial order around the chain of globes; and by serial order is meant that in the normal course first comes the less developed, the first kingdom of elementals. It has its seven turnings or whirlings or rings or revolvings. Call them root-races. It leaves the globe. Its sishtas remain behind and after a short obscuration or period of rest there appear the forerunners of the second elemental kingdom, which does exactly what the first elemental kingdom or life-wave does: has seven evolutionary turnings or whirlings or root-races, and then leaves the globe which undergoes a short period of obscuration. Then appear the forerunners of the third elemental kingdom which works in precisely the same way as the two preceding elemental kingdoms. After these come the forerunners of the mineral kingdom which runs through its seven whirlings or turnings or phases. When the minerals have finished on the globe, they leave. The globe has its obscuration period, and then come the forerunners of the plants and these do the same. Then come the forerunners of the animals; and finally the animals appear; and then comes the human kingdom or life-wave which runs through its seven root-races. Each root-race is in turn divided into subraces. Then the human life-wave or kingdom leaves the globe, which undergoes a short obscuration period; and then comes the first kingdom of the dhyani-chohans; and so forth and so on, until the seven classes of monads, alias the seven kingdoms, each one with its seven root-races, have run through each its own course.

Thus we see the reason why a globe becomes inhabited or filled with living creatures — the sishtas of the particular kingdom that may at any time be in manvantara upon the globe undergoing its life-wave experience there, as our human kingdom is now, plus all the other previous kingdoms existing on such a globe in their various representations. The life-waves of the dhyani-chohans, who are following us and are a superior kingdom to our human kingdom or life-wave, are descending along the preceding globes — globes C, B, and A — and will reach the earth in due course of time. Then of course we shall have passed on, leaving our sishtas here, and shall be ascending along globes E, F, and G. When I say we, I mean all the kingdoms preceding the dhyani-chohanic kingdoms. The principle is very simple. The complication comes because there are so many of these kingdoms and they intermingle in a sense.

Now I want to turn to the matter of the lower kingdoms or life-waves, their sufferings and pleasures, and so forth. Please hearken carefully to what I am going to say. Take any one such life-wave or kingdom as an illustration, and once you understand the thought you can make the application to the other life-waves or kingdoms. Take the fishes: they are a subordinate kingdom in the greater kingdom of the animals.

Nevertheless, they represent a certain class of monads. The monads of this particular class or subordinate life-wave are all under the general direction of a supreme dhyani-chohan after which they are trailing along behind, this particular dhyani-chohan having under its especial guidance or protection the fishes. This is applicable also to the other beasts, each subkingdom of which has its own particular or leading dhyani-chohan. This fish dhyani-chohan is the Silent Watcher of the fish subkingdom or sub-life-wave. In precisely identic fashion the Silent Watcher of our own human life-wave is that sublime spiritual being after whom we are trailing along the evolutionary path.

Now take the lifeatoms of my present body, I mean those which have been born from my spiritual substance as my own spiritual offspring, or children-sparks of my own spiritual fire, lifeatoms of my own particular monadic swabhava. These elemental beings in far distant future ages will be trailing along after me. I shall be their silent watcher, although naturally far, far ahead of them, and myself evolving in my own particular pathways of destiny. These lifeatoms then will no longer be as they are now, simply lifeatoms in my body.

But they, since they are learning entities, evolving beings, will be undergoing those particular phases of their unfolding individuality which they shall have reached at any particular time in the future.

Thus what are now the fishes of that particular subkingdom were formerly the lifeatoms in the body of a self-conscious being like a man. Now they happen to be fishes. This same class of monads in other ages in the future will become beings or inhabit bodies higher than their present fish bodies; and finally they will blossom forth into the human stage. I do not mean that the fish bodies will actually refine themselves until they take human shape as bodies. That is not the idea. The fish bodies, when they can no longer be useful for the monads using them, will simply die out. Like a worn-out garment they will become useless because the monads will have passed out of the fish state. They will have entered a state superior to the fish state. All the other classes of beings in the animal kingdom — horses, dogs, cats, worms, whatever you wish — represent, each such order or class or family of beings, a certain suborder, sub-life-wave, subkingdom, of monads which happen to be passing through their present phase of evolution.

I may add that this was the thought in the minds of the ancients when they spoke of such things as fish gods, wolf gods, man gods, plant divinities, and so forth. The hamadryads or dryads, the nymphs and naiads, were simply names given by the Greeks and Romans to the then existent monads in their then or present form.

Thus the dryad was the evolving being expressing itself as a tree — not the monad, but the tree itself.

Student — What is the difference between the monad and the hamadryad?

G. de P. — The same relative difference that there is between the monad which is your inner god and you who are the human being we know.

Student — That is manasic.

G. de P. . — It is kama-manasic, but the monad within you is your inner god. Now when you become your inner god, you will no longer be C---- R----. Exactly so with the case of the tree. It is not yet the divine monad. It is simply the dryadic or the hamadryadic entity. Just as you are a human being inspired by a spiritual monad expressing yourself in a body of flesh, so is a tree faintly inspired by a spiritual monad, and the hamadryad expresses itself in a tree body.

Why Animals Suffer

Now there is one more thought. It is to me, Companions, always a matter of some pain to see people salve their consciences about the sufferings of the lower creatures by saying: "Well, they don't suffer really very much. Their nerves are not as sensitive as our human nerves are, and anyway, they are not self-conscious, and they will be rewarded in the future." Well, I never liked the idea that I am going to heaven, and because I may have a chance to go to heaven, I simply have got to drink the skimmed milk here on earth!

There is a reason for these things. The lower creatures do suffer, and suffer perhaps more because they are dumb. Dumb suffering, unvocal suffering, even as we human beings can understand, is perhaps more painful than the case of the man who can yell and shout and make a fuss about his pains — and some of us certainly do it! I make no reflection on anybody except upon those selfish humans, for instance, who try to still our hearts and dull our nerves of sympathy by saying, as we so often hear, that the animals do not suffer, they are well taken care of, the gods will take care of them! Now that is not true, or at least only half true. The facts are these: karma is rigidly just, unceasingly merciful, but its mercy is cosmic in magnitude. If even a beast puts its foot in a springe or trap, it will be caught and injured, and may die. The laws of karma, in this case represented by a cruel steel trap, are not going to stand aside because the beast in its ignorance walks into the trap put there by human cruelty. Not at all. The animal learns from the suffering, that is true. But why should it suffer?

It is futile, it is wicked, to blind our eyes to what goes on around us. Now this is the reason. I have spoken vaguely of it, I admit, at other times, but I speak with extreme reluctance because it is playing with fire.

However, the animals suffer from two causes: first, because they prey on each other, karma. He who takes up the sword will perish by the sword is an old saying and a true. He who chases others will in his turn be chased. Obviously. The other reason is that because of evil karma sown in a former cosmic manvantara by these very creatures, evil karma then unbalanced, unpaid for, not yet wiped out, they entered the present cosmic manvantara in the lowest stage, and are now working their way upwards.

I will try to illustrate the matter by the case of the birth of a human child. Its karma brings it into certain surroundings, let us call these X. Another human child is born into other surroundings which let us call Y.

The surroundings X are such as would seem to give to that unfortunate infant no decent chances in life. The surroundings Y in the case of the other infant are such as to provide every possible human advantage. The former child's surroundings, we say, unless it has enough decency within it to enlighten its path and to guide its feet straight, will infallibly bring it, when grown, into the penitentiary. Now why is one child born in circumstances X, and the other child in circumstances Y? It is karma, its own previous actions.

Now that former life to the present newly born human infant is comparable to the former cosmic manvantaric existences of these present monads inferior to the human.

A further thought: in that former cosmic manvantara all the different classes of monads to reach their paranirvana, when the former cosmic manvantara closed, entered all of them into their nirvana. They exist in different classes; but when the new cosmic manvantara opens all these various classes of monads, from the most evolved to the least, have to begin that manvantara at the beginning. They cannot begin it at the middle, nor at the end. They all have to play their part in the drama on the stage of the new cosmic manvantara. Those whose karma has been high, lofty, beautiful, pass through the lower kingdoms, the lower stages, without realizing it; just exactly as the human monad passes through preliminary uterine phases of its growth without self-consciousness. But those monads which were karmically evil in the last life, or imperfectly developed, have a more or less awakening consciousness when the new cosmic manvantara opens in the lowest phases through which they have to pass. We call them the elemental kingdoms, the mineral kingdom, the plant kingdom, the beast kingdom. There you have the key.

So the suffering of the lower creatures depends from unexpended karma not previously atoned for in the former cosmic manvantara, which they now have to pay for, work out; plus their present bestial, gross, animal instincts. It is so obvious. If you study the lower creatures, you will see them all preying on each other; all chasing each other, trying to kill each other. No wonder this earth is called a Myalba, a hell. Men should have learned better than this; and yet to how large an extent do not we humans live on the same low plane in our own gross and bestial instincts and ways of doing! Look at the way men use and misuse, mistreat each other, sometimes by cunning, sometimes by violence, sometimes even by prostituting the noblest faculties of the human being himself, such as love and sympathy and kindness, to base and evil ends. Do you think these things will go unrecorded by the lipika? No indeed. In either the present cosmic manvantara or in the one to come, we shall have to pay to the uttermost farthing not only collectively as humans, but as individuals. All nature's purposes are to bring harmony out of disharmony, and injustice itself is turned to divine ends. There is occult compensation for the suffering that the lower beings undergo, and it is the way by which their bestiality is burned out of them. They learn the lesson, a hard lesson indeed, but we are dealing with hard

things.

And now, just let me point out here a suggestion such as the dugpas would like to insinuate into our minds.

They might say: "True, therefore it is a kindness to a human being to treat him as he has treated you. He learns by it." I tell you that this is a prostitution of wisdom to diabolism. You are simply perpetuating the hellish work. You are remaining in the pit instead of rising out of it and setting an example of harmony, self-restraint, self-control, justice, compassion. Return good for evil every time; ally the good with justice, which means avoid mere sentimentalism.

-------

February 25, 1936

Sishtas Open the Drama of Human Life

We have wandered wide and far afield from the original passage read. We have discussed sishtas, and manasaputras, and monads from the moon, and the development of manas in children, and rounds and races, etc., etc.! Yet if we come back to the passage read was it not something to do with the sishtas and the manasaputras?

Do not confuse the sishtas with the manasaputras, although of course the sishtas were imbodied manasaputras, just as in a sense we are. What are the sishtas? Among other things, they are the cream of each and every life-wave left on a globe when that life-wave leaves the globe for the next globe. These sishtas in their aggregate are called seed-manus. These same sishtas when the life-wave again reaches the globe on which they are — in this case our earth, globe D — HPB has called the root-manus, the seeds now having become the root or roots of the human races, the human tree being the succeeding seven root-races.

The evolving monads that pass from globe to globe in a round around a chain are manasic monads, therefore they are manasaputras. This answers the question of the manasaputras coming over from the third round into the fourth round, running through the globes until they reach our earth, globe D. Meanwhile on this globe D

there have been the sishtas, the chosen, the select, the elect, the flower of the race, as it was on globe D during the last round. They are always the highest, really the forerunners of a race, so that they will be ready to provide the bodies for the monads when they come in the next round. They are the roots, the parents, of the human stock. Therefore they are for our live-wave imbodied human beings, ranging in evolutionary degree according to the round in which they are sishtas.

There are various classes of these sishtas. They are not all like identic peas in one pod, no more so than human parents are identic individuals. The sishtas open the drama of human life on a globe. The sishtas opened the drama of human life on this globe at the beginning of this fourth round. As compared with the hundreds of millions that the human stock later became, at the beginning of the fourth round on this globe they were relatively few. But they felt the incoming impulses of the round reaching our globe in their different classes — let us say seven classes from the highest humans down to what we now would call barbarian humans, but sishtas in all cases, because each class represents the highest of its own class.

Now then, feeling the incoming waves of the round, they began to increase their number, and this kept going on, the individuals thus increasing in number evolving in the lower classes of them were more or less in a senseless, quasi-unself-conscious condition, not exactly brainless, but like little children in mind capacity, intuitive in a way, quick, alert, very much alive, but not yet intellectualized. Imagine races of them not yet awakened as true human beings, except the highest, and perhaps the next to the highest, classes of the sishtas, and possibly the third highest class. These were the spiritual gods, intellectual gods on earth, keeping the flame of spirituality and intellectuality alight as a brotherhood.

But the other sishtas were what we may call the as yet undeveloped classes mentally, the seeds or the roots of the future human stock. Thus evolution went on after the life-wave definitely impulsed into our earth. The numbers of what were at first the sishtas increased greatly so that there were millions upon millions of these individuals in a dreaming state of consciousness, intellectually speaking. First there were the astral pudding-bags, and then the second race, and then there came the third race. Now mark you: these manasaputras from

the preceding round, which were simply the human monads of the preceding round, were already waiting.

They would not incarnate into the first race. "No fit vehicles for us." They would not incarnate in the second root-race. Except a few. From even in the first race there were some of the monads, the most developed, a very few, who for karmic reasons actually did lighten as best they could with the fires of mind the imperfect

"human" vehicles, and thus produced human beings; and they joined the higher classes of the sishtas. In the second root-race more did so; but it was only in the third root-race that the human vehicles were then sufficiently evolved. No longer pudding-bags, no longer floating astral forms, they were more or less ape-like human beings, so far as bodies go, ape-like. But the monads were waiting; and when they found that the brain tissues, the nervous system of the bodies, and the interior psychological apparatus had been more or less stimulated by the preceding two and a half races of evolving growth, then the monads as a class began to enter the bodies and to awaken within them the fires of mind.

Remember analogy, the master key. Consider the incarnation of a monad today. There are millions and millions of human monads in the post-devachanic condition, awaiting incarnation at this moment. It has always been so. Those who are attracted to their particular family, and who find the proper body, incarnate.

So was it with the waiting manasaputras, the monads from the preceding round, the former humans. Now then, when a monad incarnates among us today it does not enlighten the unborn child in the womb with the fires of mind, nor the child just born, nor the child one year old or two or three years old, or five or six. It is a progressive thing, a process which takes time. But as soon as it can, the ray from the monad within more and more enlightens the mind of the child. Incarnation is steadily progressive.

Growth proceeds spiritually, intellectually and physically by impulses, impulse succeeding impulse, like waves breaking on the shore. Then suddenly we awaken and realize that something new has come to us, but there have been periods preparatory of each recognized impulse. The day finally arrives when we are relatively fully human; and we realize, if we reflect, that to become human we have had to traverse the space of past years.

The sishtas would correspond today to parents. The parent is a highly evolved being as compared with the child in the womb. The parents furnish the body; and the incarnating ego does its best to do the rest, combined with the forces of nature which mold the child's body and build it and cause it to grow and to develop, to form and to expand in faculty and power. Little by little, day by day, month by month, year by year, the mind enters the growing child more and more, until finally we see a thinker. Just so precisely was it with the classes of monads awaiting the time until the immature first and second and second and a half races became ready to receive in larger measure the fire of mind. There is no magic about this. All you have to do is to make the analogical applications from the incarnation of egos amongst us today back into the past where the egos were the classes of manasaputras and the bodies were races one, two, and three.

You can make the same picture amongst us today. There are on earth today highly evolved human races, most civilized. There are those in obscuration. There are the barbarian peoples, tribes, races, amongst us today. A human monad which by karmic destiny is drawn to incarnate in a body born in a highly civilized family, as for instance a European or American, would not be drawn to the body of a low-grade savage, a Hottentot or an Andaman Islander. Now I, a thinking man, would not choose to limit my spiritual vision and my intellectual capacity to incarnate and try to live in a human embryo. I would refuse: "no fit vehicle for my faculties. I will wait." The statement "no fit vehicles for us," which HPB used in The Secret Doctrine, was simply a quaint way of phrasing the fact that the waiting manasaputras, the waiting monads, were not drawn, because there was no psychomagnetic attraction, to the first race or the second race, or the first half of the third race. The vehicles were neither appropriate nor ready; they could not express the manasic qualities or attributes. So what happened? The manasaputras were simply in the invisible realms, as they are indeed with us today, doing their best all the time, each one, to project its ray into this or that or some other human, as the humans then were, pudding-bags or second race humans, or third race humans. But they could not do it. They were not successful. The vehicles were not ready. So they just remained waiting, precisely as the reincarnating ego remains waiting, as it cannot infill the mind of a three-year old child with its own intellectual fire, with its own spirituality or as much of it as it can transfer to this plane. But when the child is ready, when it has reached eight, ten, twelve years, according to the individual, possibly six years, the manasaputra is enabled to make more or less contact with this plane, and we say: that child is beginning to think, to understand and to have a sense of responsibility. It is taking cognizance of things around us.

These facts are very accurate, and if you have not understood, it is simply because I have not been able to find the words to transfer the picture to your minds. The manasaputras were simply the egos which had gone the round through the globes, had come down to this globe earth, and were waiting and ready to incarnate, but could not because the interior psychological apparatus had not yet been formed by nature's powers and forces.

But when the brain and nervous system and the interior psychological apparatus is more or less ready to receive the intellectual and spiritual ray, then it happens. The ray descends, tendril by tendril it links itself into the psychological apparatus, and the psychological apparatus thus affected by the fire of mind begins to affect the body, and finally what we call incarnation is more or less complete.

The key, then, is just precisely what takes place among us today when the reincarnating ego makes its link with the unborn child and watches until the child is born and grows and develops and becomes ready to receive its fire. Just so did the manasaputras make the link with the unthinking vehicles, the unready humans; and through the ages doing their best to make entrance and finally succeeding when the vehicles were more or less ready, which happened for the majority at the middle point of the third root-race.

But — here is something interesting. There were the sishtas from the very beginning of the round on this globe. Let us say the three highest classes of these sishtas; and these, because of being so high, could produce bodies, children, more or less ready for the most advanced waiting manasaputras to use, so that from the very beginning of the round on this globe, during this fourth round, incarnation of the manasaputras began in a few; and these few, as the ages passed, grew more numerous. When the second race was ready there were still more, but still few as compared with the millions upon millions of the second race individuals. When the third root-race was ready, practically all of the beings of the human stock were ready to receive the entrance of the manasaputras. There is the whole picture.

When the present human life-wave on this globe shall have reached its term, and shall go to globe E on the ascending arc, the sishtas that then will remain upon this our earth, will be the highest humans of the seventh root-race. They will live in a state of happiness, even the lowest of the sishta classes. It will be a Saturnian Age, an age of peace, of quiet, not exactly sloth, but of a happy, dreamlike period lasting for ages upon ages until their own life-wave returns. Why? Because the throbbing impulse of the body of the life-wave has gone on and left them behind as seeds. Now while this is a sacrifice, nevertheless they will have their reward, and a great one. Why? Because after the earth shall have ended its obscuration period or rest, when we shall have left it, the dhyani-chohanic life-wave now on globe C will soon thereafter reach here, and the human sishtas will then be living in the neighborhood and with the companionship, as far as they can grasp it, of a quasi-godlike race then inhabiting the earth, this globe, as we now inhabit it. It is as if some of us were left behind on an abandoned land, or continent, living there in a state of innocence and quiet happiness and dreamy peace, to find ourselves after a certain period of time the companions and cherished and loved wards of a godlike race which will teach us who remain. So while it is an immense sacrifice, there is likewise a recompense, a reward, that could be gained in no other way.

The dhyani-chohanic race at present on globe C, when it reaches this earth will be as far superior to us present humans, or even the humans of the seventh root-race of this round, as we are higher than the anthropoid apes.

Think what that will mean: to live on an earth inhabited by demigods. This is a picture which shows a different side from what I painted of the sishtas in the pamphlet No. 32. As I hear it read, I realize the picture is a little gloomy, probably the result of the original questions which brought out from me the answers which appear in the Instruction.

Although the sishtas more generally may be briefly described as those remaining on a globe in order to fulfil their karmic destiny thereon, and to provide the seeds of future races of their own kind when the respective life-waves reach the respective sishtas again, I feel impelled to add that there are two manners of viewing the sishtas of any one life-wave: (a) to look upon them solely as seeds; and (b) to look upon each one of the various classes of sishtas as individuals comprising the different serial stages or grades of unfolding and expressing the complete septenary aggregate of life-waves. This last manner of viewing the sishtas has been explained by me with some clarity in my Fundamentals of the Esoteric Philosophy, when elaborating the manner in which, during the first round, the globes are builded and the different life-waves succeed each other in serial order by passing from globe to globe. This second manner of viewing the sishtas is otherwise called the surpluses of lives, passing from globe to globe, each surplus of life being really a life-wave which finds its

characteristic evolution or expression when it reaches its own plane or globe during the first round.

The same principle prevails in the manner in which the cosmic planes or the cosmic hierarchies unroll or unfold from each other, so that as the aggregate or septenary life-wave descends from spirit into matter, each unfolding stage or evolving degree becomes a cosmic plane or a hierarchy, according to the scale, and the surplus of life passes on downwards, unrolling from itself the remaining stages of the septenary aggregate, thus producing a complete universe or solar system or planetary chain.

Now each such unfolded stage or plane or degree is technically likewise a sishta, because it is that which is left behind or which remains while the remainder of the aggregate septenary life-wave, otherwise called the surplus of lives, passes on, dropping or unfolding a new sishta at each stage.

Thus it is that while the doctrine of the sishtas is clear enough in principle, it becomes extremely difficult and complicate clearly to express or to elucidate the doctrine when we begin to study particulars or details.

-------

March 10, 1936

The Cycling Life-Waves

Our lengthy discussion of the sishtas has been exceedingly instructive. I have learned things tonight. I think we can all say the same. We have learned how deep the subject is, how many sides it has. If there has been diversity of opinion, it is my considered judgment that these diversities — different minds looking at the doctrine from different angles — when welded together into a unity, will give you a comprehensive view of the doctrine concerning the sishtas.

Take Brother W----'s idea, for instance. While he labored as we all do under the difficulty of putting into our ordinary, matter-of-fact language a most difficult and subtle thought, he nevertheless at bottom had a distinctly occult conception of one aspect of the sishtas. As for Brother W----'s idea of leaving personalities behind, which we as individuals reassume when we come back in the live-wave, the only objection I would make to this would be to the unfortunate choice of the word personality, which by convention in modern theosophical phraseology has come to mean bodies or brain-minds, in other words the lower part of an incarnated human being. Nevertheless his thought of picking up what formerly belonged to that individual each time an individual member of a life-wave reaches a globe on its rounds, is solidly true. As I think was read from the Instruction, the illustration there given of the human life-germ just illustrates that point. It would, however, be wrong to call that human life-germ a personality, but it grows into one. There is always a life-germ which becomes the beginning of the seed of the tip of the ray from the reincarnating ego, and which grows into the personality.

Furthermore, his idea brought forth a thought which is not often expressed in our gatherings; and it is that the life-wave in its roundings through the globes is simply a collection of monads. It is like a flock of birds winging their way from north to south, or returning again to northern regions in the spring. The life-wave consists of individual monads passing from globe to globe around the chain. Therefore on every globe that the life-wave visits or passes through, it leaves sishtas behind; so that Brother W----'s fundamental idea is a genuinely occult one. The manner of expression of course could be criticized, but that same thing might be said of any of us. We feel that we have not succeeded in accurately stating everything that we wanted to state; and the difficulty lies partly in language, and partly in the attempt to express one's thoughts in such fashion that all other minds will grasp them clearly.

I do not know that there is a more difficult doctrine in all our philosophy than is the doctrine of the sishtas, except perhaps the doctrine of karma which of course is closely involved with this. Every life-wave leaves its sishtas. There are many life-waves, different families of monads, passing around the globes in serial order, one after the other. So that on our earth at the present time there are life-waves on all the globes of our chain.

We are the human life-wave; and when I say we, I do not mean merely we who are now imbodied on earth, because there are about one hundred times as many human egos out of body as in body in any one year. In other words, if the present humans incarnated in human bodies on earth are two thousand millions, multiply

that by one hundred, and you have a fair estimate of the total number of monads in our life-wave; two hundred thousand million. Of this very large number of human egos, a certain number, the most advanced who really are fifth rounders — omitting for the moment sixth rounders who are exceedingly rare and are exceptional — the most advanced will be the sishtas when our human life-wave leaves this globe at the end of the seventh root-race. And as they thus will have already been through their fifth round, they are not missing anything. I would not say that they are selected or chosen to remain as sishtas, because that would mean there is some body or some thing which selects them or chooses them. Nature so arranges it that they become the appropriate, the natural, individuals to be sishtas. They become sishtas by right as it were, by the laws of nature.

The other life-waves which are weaker than they, who are merely fourth rounders, and who therefore are the vast majority of our human life-wave, must make their fifth round. They have not yet made it, and therefore they become the flock of human egos, the life-wave, going to the next globe, E, and then to globes F and G, and so forth around the chain. Then when this flock of egos or life-wave comes down our chain again, and reaches the earth, they will then be in their fifth round; and being fifth rounders, they will meet fifth round bodies which will, preceding their advent, begin to multiply rapidly in order to receive the incoming flock of egos ready to welcome them. As a matter of fact, this multiplication of bodies simply means that the flock of incoming egos, the life-wave reaching this globe again, is already sending forerunners ahead incarnating in the bodies which are increasing in accordance, one by one, as the egos come along during this opening of the fifth round on this globe. This is what is meant when we speak of the fertility of a race, or its lack of fertility.

When a race is fertile, produces many individuals, it means that there are many egos of that type which need just those bodies to incarnate in. When a race is infertile or is dying out, it means there are very few egos that take such bodies, and the egos not incarnating consequently, the women become nonproductive, barren, and the race slowly vanishes, its course is run, it dies out. That is the reason of the increase in the numbers of what formerly were sishtas, but are now the beginnings of the first root-race on this globe during the fifth round, or indeed any round, as the incoming life-wave reaches it.

Now here is another intricate and difficult thing; and really I don't know whether I ought to mention it, because it may be almost a cruelty to add more difficulties to what is already an exceedingly difficult topic!

Take the first race on this globe in this fourth round. HPB called them pudding-bags, which is a jocular expression but descriptive, because they had not two legs and two arms and a head and organs, and skin and hair and bones, as we now understand human bodies to be. But they were rounded, globular bodies, with a very faint resemblance, prophetic, to the present human shape, but of simply enormous size. They were astral beings, or semi-astral. They were the sishtas left over from the highest representatives on this earth of our human life-wave during the third round.

Nevertheless, the highest beings during the third round on this globe were monkey-like. They were not pudding-bags. Right there you are faced with a problem, because this shows us that even the sishtas are slowly evolving and changing. The sishtas are formed of egos which keep continually incarnating and reincarnating and reincarnating through the long millions of years in order to keep the sishta bodies going.

We are now speaking mostly of bodies. Although I have spoken of the sishtas as being in a static condition, this word static must not be taken to signify absolute immobility in evolution, for this would be wrong. I mean that the great impulses which take place when the life-wave is in full flower have passed on and their evolution is exceedingly slow. But it is just enough to make the bodies of the sishtas, when the incoming human life-wave reaches this earth in the next round, most accordant with the psychical and astral and physical needs of the incoming flock of egos during the first root-race on this earth in that next round.

So that the monkey-like bodies of the highest human representatives on this earth in the third round slowly changed and became like auric eggs, physical auric eggs, a globular kind of creatures, like the auric egg surrounding the human being. Then when the incoming egos reached our globe, they did not all come in one vast mass, but they had their forerunners; first one came, and then a couple came, and then three or four came, and then twenty came, as the years passed. So the bodies ready for them were the pudding-bags, as HPB

called them, and the individual egos overshadowed them. They were senseless, they were not yet thinking human beings; because according to another law of nature, they were merely in their first or elemental stages.

Is it not so even with a human child today? In the womb it is not a thinking, cogitating, planning, purposeful

entity. It is in its first condition or state, what you might call its first round, the embryo. During the second race the child is born. It is still not a thinking entity; it thinks in a vague sort of way, somewhat as animals do.

It is a human animal. The third race we can say is like the human child during its teens, the early teens. The fourth race is in the full flower and heyday of the youth, awakening, but not yet knowing itself or fully understanding itself, committing all the preposterous follies and often unconscious sins that young people are often addicted to, because they are not yet fully awake. When the fifth race comes, we can call it the man, as beginning maturity, and so forth.

We cannot carry the analogy farther, because we have not yet reached the sixth and seventh root-races, when old age will be the finest time of human life, when every faculty will be at its maximum from physical to spiritual. But so far as the analogy allows us, it is exact enough. That is why the first race, the second race, and the first half of the third, were unself-conscious — the first race completely so, very dimly self-conscious in the second race, beginning to awake to self-consciousness in the third root-race, which is what we call the incarnation of the manasaputras. The manasic faculties were then beginning to function, because it was in the manasic cycle.

There is a vast deal of teaching about the sishtas that has never been touched upon. They are the remnants, the remainder men or remainder beings, left on a globe when each life-wave or class of monads ends its seven root-races on that globe and wings its way to the next globe. But it leaves behind as the root-manu the best part of itself to furnish the seed bodies — not seeds in the sense of grains, vegetable seeds, or human seeds —

but seeds in the sense of bodies, the seeds of the new seven races in the next round.

There is a very strict analogy between a human incarnation from physical death to physical rebirth, and the rounds. But the analogy is so strict and therefore so subtle, that I adduce it only as a suggestion. I am afraid you would have more difficulty in finding analogies here than you would find help, but I point it out because it may help some minds of a particular bent. Every kingdom, which means the three elemental kingdoms, the mineral, the plant, the beast, and the human kingdom, and the three dhyani-chohanic kingdoms, in turn, as it reaches our globe, leaves its sishtas behind it when it leaves our globe, just as we are going to do after the seventh race. Then again, remember that these human sishtas which we shall leave behind are not in an absolutely immovable state or condition. They die, children are born to them in whatever way may then be nature's way. It certainly will not be as men and women, because sex will have gone out of the fashion of nature before we reach the end of the seventh race. Children will be born by kriyasakti through the ages and ages while the sishtas remain. They will be excarnating and incarnating just as we now do. But they will be as it were fastened to this earth as a body of monads, although slowly progressing. That is why they are sishtas, and their function will be to provide the bodies beginning the new cycle of human evolution on this globe when the fifth round opens with the incomings of the monads of the human life-wave.

Remember that there are many other sides of the teaching that could be adduced. So in the future, should you hear a new aspect of the teaching, please do not think it is a contradiction. It may simply be that the time has come to throw a little more light on this theme. Meanwhile, our study tonight has been helpful. It has given us all different thoughts from different minds, and if we can weld all these together, because as far as I know I do not think a single wrong thought has been expressed, then we shall obtain a pretty clear picture of the sishtas: what they are, what their functions are, and what they do. Let us try to weld these different ideas into this picture.

Meeting 33

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Thirty-Three

Meeting of MAY 5, 1932

G. de P. — I am now ready to answer questions.

Student — With reference to the expression "the pilgrimage of the monad" on page 570 of volume one of The Secret Doctrine, I came upon this passage on page 577, which much more clearly shows the unsoundness of recent criticisms of your teachings about the after death states as being "contrary to the teachings of HPB":

"The Planetary origin of the monad (Soul) and of its faculties was taught by the Gnostics. On its way to the Earth, as on its way back from the Earth, each soul born in, and from, the 'Boundless Light,' had to pass through the seven planetary regions both ways."

G. de P. — Things are working in just the way in which I want them to work. I want the members to point out these things, to look into our literature, to prove the statements, and I myself will keep quiet — at least for the time being.

Student — Regarding the monad and the seven planets: if the critics of your teaching had ever had a general view of the system, of the doctrine, they would never for a moment have had any objection to it.

G. de P. — Yes. They have not understood the teaching which they have.

Student — Why wouldn't they even guess it by analogy? Where did the monad come from? What is its pilgrimage? It comes, infinitesimally small, so far as spacial dimension is concerned, and it creates its vehicles, its rupas, one after another, up to a certain point, when it commences to shed them. Now, why should it not go back to whence it came, in order to make its circuit? Analogy points to the high probability of it.

Student — The fact that people are so imbued with suspicion makes them undesirous of testing or thinking of any subject that is submitted by someone else.

Student — These are to them uncharted seas and they don't sail on them.

Student — It was a new idea to me before I realized that the monads finally shed these vehicles.

G. de P. — One of these days I will either lecture, or try to answer questions, on kama-loka and the afterdeath states, and open the doors a little — try to tell men in explicit language just what the afterdeath state is, instead of in vague and general terms.

Student — I found a very interesting statement in Judge's old Forum regarding kama-loka and devachan. He said that Swedenborg did visit both kama-loka and devachan while in the body.

G. de P. — Many have done that and didn't realize it. Let me tell you something. Whenever you have a nightmare or an evil dream, you are in kama-loka. It is brief and temporary and you call it a dream. Now, imagine passing years in that condition, centuries perhaps. I can tell you that if people knew what is coming to them after death in the ordinary course of events as the reward of evil living, of giving way to vice and the appetites of the lower mind, such as hatred and anger, fear, dislike — if they knew, I say, then out of sheer fear, from self-protective interest, human lives would be radically changed. I tell you that it is our duty to inform people more about these things: to explain what kama-loka and what Avichi are. Hitherto our members have been so afraid of giving a bad impression, or of making people feel gloomy, that they have overlooked the importance of this. Perhaps it was a good fault, and quite a strong argument could be made out for the reticence. But there is another side to the matter, and I think the time has come now when men's minds have changed sufficiently to be able to take in these things and understand them properly. All the old doctrines regarding hell or the hells that all the religions have are based as teachings on what exists in the

kama-loka and avichi states. But men sometimes are in these states even while living.

Take a thoroughly evil man, one whose consciousness, when out of the body, or after death, is centered in the kama-loka.

I cannot imagine a worse hell than that undergone by an evil-minded suicide, for instance, or a murderer, repeating, repeating, repeating, evil acts through the years, and enduring the same awful series of feelings and thoughts and acts — a perfect and continuous nightmare of horror. That is kama-loka in some of its worst phases, approaching avichi.

On the other hand, average men, normal men, have a very short and indistinct kama-lokic experience; and it is not vivid. It is much more like an unpleasant feeling, a sensation of nervousness and dislike. One cannot say that they are happy. But nevertheless they soon pass through it.

Men while living enter the devachan in the same way that some men enter the kama-lokic state while alive.

You may see men going around for weeks in a devachanic state of mind, in a sort of dream state, living in a fool's paradise, enwrapped, for instance, in a musical composition, oblivious of almost anything else, scarcely eating, even careless in their habits for the time being — entirely enwrapped in a beautiful musical dream. It is a devachanic state absolutely, but totally wrong because out of place, and because abnormal and improper for a living man. Either of these two states is not proper for a man in physical life. A man is here on earth in order to live a true man's life, to do his duty, to be wide awake, manly to attend to all things that come his way.

What I have so often lectured upon and written to the effect that a man gets just what he wants, is absolutely, literally true. He gets exactly the devachan he has built for himself, exactly the kama-loka he has built for himself, to the very last point, not a single experience does he undergo unjustly. Nature is rigidly accurate in her justice in these matters. A man is a free agent, and therefore he will reap in retribution what he has made for himself, or in recompense; neither more nor less.

Student — Will that pay off any earthly karma?

G. de P. — Not a particle. Until the second death occurs, there is a certain daze of mind in the kama-loka.

The reaction of physical death produces a revulsion of feeling on the dazed entity which does make its mark on the ego and teaches it a lesson. These facts enable me here once more to point out the extreme necessity of preserving during lifetime an aspiring mind, a detachment from things and experiences of the gross, passional, earth-life. Morals are no human convention, but are based on the soundest and most far-reaching vision of the sages. They are founded on nature's own noblest operations.

Student — As you say in Fundamentals of the Esoteric Philosophy, a man goes to the exact place to which he is attracted, and he has made the attraction himself; he goes there only because he is attracted there —

wherever it may be.

G. de P. — Exactly so; and all the forces in the universe cannot push a man into, or attract him into, a place or state which he himself has not built for himself, whether it be kama-loka or devachan or nirvana or avichi.

If you consider the phenomena of dreams, or of human earth-life itself, we find there the same law and the same rule. Kindliness in life, brotherly feelings, a charitable state of mind, genuine forgiveness of others, mean that you are preparing for yourself a brief and colorless and painless kama-loka, perhaps even an unconscious passing through it; you don't even know you are there. Whereas, contrariwise, a man who leaves physical life in hatred, or as a coward, with his soul corrupted and burning with the fierce fire of earthly loves and attractions, or in any other way, will have a kama-loka exactly corresponding to what he himself is.

Student — Take the case of a congenital idiot: he has engendered no causes in this life that would merit any particular punishment.

G. de P. — Correct. He has no kama-loka to speak of, and of course no devachan. Reincarnation in his case is very quick — it may be said to be almost immediate, for the simple reason that the congenital idiot has built up during his earth-life, long or short, neither spiritual aspirations nor self-conscious evil attractions. I am

here speaking only of congenital idiots, those who are complete idiots from birth.

Student — It is really only paying off a debt for that earth life.

G. de P. — No, hardly that. A congenital idiot cannot be said to have incurred any moral debts. When a congenital idiot dies, it is therefore for him practically a complete unconsciousness from the moment of death until the new reincarnation brings him again to childhood.

Student — A congenital idiot might be merely a physical organism without any real entity connected with it.

G. de P. — That is virtually and usually the case, but it all depends upon the individual case. A congenital idiot may be the reincarnation of an astral monad from which the divine monad had previously departed —

just the reincarnation of a human psychomagnetic bunch of energies which works itself out and then vanishes.

In such case there is nothing permanent there to continue. But these cases are rare even where congenital idiots are concerned. Congenital idiocy is usually the result of a complicated karma from the past, and almost always signifies a number of previous lives on the downward path — but not always. Each such case must be considered by itself as an individual problem.

Student — Like the tag end of a storm.

Student — Just how much responsibility has the child before the higher ego has attached itself to the child's mental apparatus?

G. de P. — Very little; practically none. An infant has no genuine ethical responsibility at all, simply because there is in the infant no deciding will and no selecting reason. These faculties come later in life.

Student — I understand that the reincarnating ego does not really make much impression upon the child until he is thirteen or fourteen years old?

G. de P. — In the normal human being the reincarnating ego begins to show its transcendent powers at about seven or eight years — just begins; but it is about the time of puberty that the reincarnating ego begins to show its swabhavic qualities with some definiteness.

The average human being's kama-loka is very short; and its devachan does not amount to much as far as intensity and length of time go. This is because the average human being is more or less colorless in character. It is the strong characters that have an intense and terrible kama-loka if they are bad, and, contrariwise, a very beautiful and very long devachan if they are good men.

Student — I had a dream last night that some benevolent person — I did not identify him — had learned of the fact that we could do a great deal of good if we had more funds, and had donated us $150,000.

G. de P. — Well, my Brother, I take it that your love for the work and your desire to see it advance made you yearn for larger means to expand our beautiful theosophical activities; and as these desires are of the spiritual type, probably in your dream you were in the lower ranges of devachan.

Remember the following concerning the nature of devachan. Imagine the most beautiful moment of your life

— whatever it may be, because of course it all varies with the individual — without a touch of sorrow or pain or regret. Imagine it prolonged for hundreds and perhaps thousands of years, with every possible change and permutation of change of this beautiful moment — a scintillating, varying, changing state of unalloyed happiness, living, intense, and continuous, ringing all the changes that this beautiful thought could possibly have. That is devachan to express it in poor human language, and you are not conscious of the passage of time, don't know anything about it. You are inwrapped in a continuously changing panorama of exquisitely beautiful and spiritual dream experience.

Student — G de P, can this state be shortened by will?

G. de P. — Yes, it certainly can, but the will to do so must be set to that end before physical death ensues.

Student — Now, in the case of a man like Swedenborg, who was very unusual in that he could see things like this and really experience them: could he converse with these people in devachan as he says himself he did, or with those in kama-loka?

G. de P. — No. In the devachan there is the imaginary intercourse all the time with those we have loved with a spiritual love. The consciousness takes them in and considers itself to be in communication with them, just as happens in a beautiful dream when you sleep. The loved ones actually are not there in your dream, but nevertheless they are vividly present to your consciousness. You have the feeling or the realization that they are there with you, and this is just like the devachan, if the devachan happens to be along that line of consciousness. In the kama-loka, events occur in exactly the same way but inverted as it were. For instance, a murderer in the kama-loka, if he is a really bad man — I mean, if his murder was done with malice aforethought, as the result of weeks or months or perhaps years of horrid hatred, resulting in the act of murder as the consequence of mental deposits laid up all those years — he and his murdered victim will be together in his consciousness in the kama-loka. In his consciousness he will be committing the murder again and again and again — repeated, repeated, repeated, through the years — a perfect horror of consciousness like a terrible nightmare. Yet actually the murdered man is not there at all. It is the murderer's consciousness which is ringing all the changes of a scene which was stamped into the very fabric of his consciousness.

Student — What extent of time is there?

G. de P. — He is not conscious of the extent of time; the murderer is not conscious of the passage of time when he is committing the murder again and again in the kama-loka. Have you never had evil dreams? That will make this clear to you.

Student — If a person has a strong feeling of compassion, and suffers with those who suffer, he is convinced that it is a good and high feeling, but it is not a feeling really of genuine happiness. The suffering of others makes him suffer in a sense. Does this belong to the devachan life?

G. de P. — No; because in the devachan the state of consciousness is washed clean of any particle of unhappiness and pain. A character of the type you describe, who during his whole life has yearned to do works of compassion and noble kindliness, will have his devachan mainly along that line, simply because such is the main bent or direction of the individual's consciousness. But it will be without any touch of pain or sorrow; there will be no alloy, no adulteration of anything that belongs to the incarnated human, who is wide awake, with the reincarnating ego actively functioning and self-consciously active.

Student — You said that the devachanic state may be shortened at will.

G. de P. — It can be. Devachan is like a sleep. Just as a man lies down on his bed at night and rests, he can shorten his sleep if he will; and devachan in a sense is a sleep, a repose.

Student — Will his desire tend to shorten the devachan?

G. de P. — Not necessarily, unless combined with the feeling of compassion. The noble-minded man who desires to shorten his devachanic state and who is yearning to be at work again in such noble acts in earth-life, thereby stamps his consciousness with an impulse to return to earth to continue such noble work, just as a man who lies down in his bed at night and says to himself: I must arise early in the morning to help so and so.

In both cases the consciousness acts automatically and shortens the rest-period. Contrariwise, if the man had just the love of doing compassionate works, but without the yearning to be active in it — do you see the difference? — then all the devachan will be passed in that state of consciousness of an abstract love of doing compassionate works, without the definite desire to be active in them.

Student — Just like a mother who is nursing a sick child and who feels that she cannot leave the child alone; but she has to have sleep, and she knows that she will wake up in fifteen minutes or half an hour. It seems to me that this case is like the fact that you describe.

G. de P. — You are right. All chelas — and of course the Masters who are but higher chelas, the chelas of greater Masters — in their lower stages of training are taught how to shorten the devachan during the life on

earth, for the sole purpose of coming back quickly, coming back to continue their work on earth in service for mankind. This cannot be done with the average man because the bent of his energies is not in that direction.

Such men yearn for the devachanic rest; they crave personal happiness; they long for personal peace; they don't want to be workers; they want to rest. Do you see the point of difference?

Student — KT was always talking about coming back soon.

G. de P. — And she will, very soon. There comes a time, as the ego becomes more completely evolved, when there will be no more devachan for it. This is the case with the highest mahatmas. They have no devachan.

They simply pass from body to body, after a few weeks, or months it may be, of quiet repose in utter unconsciousness, which is a certain repose that nature's laws imperatively demand — because a certain tension producing psychological fatigue cannot be avoided in the parts of the human constitution which are the more material. But there are certain very high adepts who have advanced so far that not only have they no devachan, but they do not even know the short temporary repose that these others need. And in these lofty instances the mahatma either remains as a nirmanakaya in the atmosphere of the earth, or at will he keeps reincarnating immediately.

Student — Does that mean that the same individuals, when in imbodied existence, can go without sleep?

G. de. P. — No, but to a large extent they can shorten enormously their physical sleep periods. Remember that the physical body is, after all, a physical machine, although alive, and being subject to wear and tear needs recuperation or it dies. There are men even among ordinary individuals who find four or five hours of sleeping quite enough for health. Other men need eight or nine. This does not mean that the man who requires only four or five hours is the greater or better man; but my remarks simply illustrate the situation.

Student — There seems to be, as far as kama-loka and devachan are concerned, a complete cleavage between what is right and what is wrong. There is no such thing, then, in either one of those states, as choice — never an opportunity to choose.

G. de P. — Not while you are in those states, with a subtle difference, however, that the kama-lokic state contains. It is a strange paradox; but if you will notice your bad dreams, you will readily see that the same paradox exists there. In bad dreams you are dimly conscious that you can change the course of your dream by exercising your will. For example, you can hit or you can refrain from hitting; you can commit an act or you can refrain from committing the act; and I have been told by many people whom I have talked to about their dreams, that they found that their dreams are set to run in a certain way, but that by exercising their conscious will, even in dream, they can give to their dream a different direction. Summarizing, therefore, there is no real choice in the kama-loka either, no more so than there is in bad dreams; but both in the kama-loka and in a bad dream, due to preceding causes originated in active earth-life, one has a sense of being able to change the course of a dream; and to a certain extent because of these causes it is true.

Student — In your dreams or nightmares it is possible to recognize that it is a dream, and thus force yourself to wake up.

G. de P. — The same thing happens sometimes with individuals who die. An individual in the kama-loka, if of a sufficiently aspiring character when in the just closed earth-life, can actually raise himself out of the kama-loka and sink into the devachanic sleep. This actually often happens.

Student — If he has exercised himself in earth-life to drive away thoughts that intrude upon him, then he would have more ability to do as you say.

G. de P. — Absolutely so. That is the one thing that human beings should learn to do in earth-life: to refuse to let their evil thoughts control them; to be masters instead of slaves. This is what all the great teachers have taught — to control your thoughts, to be your spiritual self; and if men train themselves to do this in earth-life, then the passage through kama-loka becomes smooth and easy. They reach the devachan with scarcely any conscious experience in kama-loka.

Student — If kama-loka is a state and at the same time is a locality, how far does it extend around the earth?

G. de P. — The kama-lokic spheres extend from the center of the earth to the sphere of the moon and to the regions surrounding the moon. These describe closely enough the ranges of the kama-loka.

Student — When you say earth and moon, do you mean globe D of the earth and the kama-rupic phantom globe D of the moon?

G. de P. — Yes, certainly.

Student — It extends from somewhat below the surface of globe D of the earth to somewhat beyond the moon.

G. de P. — Yes; but remember that the lowest ranges of the kama-loka merge into and blend with the higher regions of the avichi; and avichi is practically around the center of the earth, so far as locality goes.

Student — Is devachan the same locality as kama-loka?

G. de P. — No, it is otherwise localized. Think first of the devachan as being preeminently a state of consciousness. The entity can begin its devachan even in the higher part of the kama-lokic region; but it very soon rises out of the kama-loka as a cork will rise to the surface of the water. It floats out of the kama-lokic region, and it continues its true devachan in the bosom of the monad. Wherever the monad goes, there will be the devachani inwrapped in roseate dreams of bliss, resting, resting like a seed of consciousness in the bosom of the monad.

Student — Does every globe of the earth-chain have its own kama-lokic sphere?

G. de P. — Yes; every one of them has its own kama-lokic sphere. For instance, globe F has its own kama-lokic sphere, which is a very ethereal one as compared with globe D. Nevertheless it is there, and it extends to the corresponding kama-lokic globe F of the moon. Globe G, or the last globe, has practically no kama-lokic sphere at all, but nevertheless there is the correspondence there of what the kama-lokic sphere is on earth.

There is of course a corresponding kama-loka of the globe G of the moon.

Student — Is it not of less magnitude and influence?

G. de P. — Yes, very much so. I would not say that it is less in mere size. One of the things that the chela has to go through in the initiations is to descend into the underworld, as the ancients put it. In other words, to go into kama-loka consciously, and experience kama-loka — be a kama-lokic entity for a time, but nevertheless inwardly living above it.

Student — Likewise avichi?

G. de P. — Likewise avichi. The initiate-neophyte must be able to "descend into hell," and yet to retain his purity there, to leave it unscathed. It is for just these and for other similar reasons that I have tried to point out that the results of initiation are three: success, death if absolute failure comes, or insanity. Insanity occurs where the initiant is not spiritually strong enough to pass unscathed through the trials. In this case the reason is unseated from its throne, and he returns to earth-life a madman.

Student — Could death be the consequence of his voluntarily casting in his lot with those in that locale?

G. de P. — That produces insanity. For instance, a lingering fear, a lingering horror; that produces insanity.

He is not strong enough to meet what he has to meet and escape unscathed; he comes back a madman — at least, he rises from the initiatory trance, mad. If he dies there may be observed a flicker of the physical eyelids, but the chain of life is broken. On the other hand, if he pass through unscathed, he comes back glorified. The very passage into kama-loka or avichi or devachan and to the other planets results in washing out the remnants of the personality. This is the cause of the glorification — living in his higher nature.

Student — Does not the initiant have a certain amount of assistance?

G. de P. — No; for that is just where the test comes. He must pass through the trials alone. That in itself is the test. His body, however, is watched over. He is helped to enter into these planes and then is left to his own spiritual and intellectual resources. There is no other way — there cannot be any other way. He must prove himself and show his character. It must be pure gold.

Student — That must be what my mind had thought; that his body was watched over, then.

G. de P. — Yes, the body is watched over. He is also trained carefully before the tests come. He is taught; he is intensively trained; he is tested in every possible way; and he is not allowed to undertake the trials or tests until the teacher feels practically certain that success will come. But so intricate are the pathways of consciousness, so intricate are the ways of karma, that sometimes even the Masters cannot see all the hidden streaks of weakness. And if there exists even one weak streak, when the acid test comes, then that weakness will come out, because initiation is a searching and a probing and a testing of the consciousness in every atom of its being. It is no child's play.

Student — But what a consoling thing it is that you do have this preparatory guidance!

G. de P. — Yes, indeed. These poor, misguided theosophists who prate about "No teachers are needed; all the teachers we need are the Masters," simply don't know what they are talking about. They don't understand esoteric theosophy.

Student — Is any reincarnating ego, while in its devachanic state, conscious to any extent whatsoever of the experiences of other egos belonging to the same spiritual monad then imbodied on other planets?

G. de P. — No; absolutely unconscious. That is the very essence of devachan: to have nothing intruding upon the vibrating consciousness except its own spiritual and intellectual and psychological memories of bliss.

Student — Like one drop in the ocean.

G. de P. — The ocean of life of course is. The devachanic ego is the one drop, and it is unconscious at the time of other drops.

When a devachani is in the highest part of the devachan, which is the same as the lowest part of the nirvana, it is no longer, as is the lower devachani, merely enwrapt in a personally conscious state. It is becoming conscious, is already conscious of other entities around it; but as those other entities already entering the nirvana are practically a unity with itself, its consciousness is therefore universal. Such is nirvana. "Blowing out" of all personality.

Student — A person like a theosophist, who is taught these things and keeps them in his higher mind, will he not remember them in devachan and begin to reason about the dreams?

G. de P. — Yes, the training in theosophy will materially change or modify the devachanic period. In direct proportion as the theosophist is sincere, is convinced of the truths of theosophy and loves them in his consciousness, will his devachanic period and also his devachanic quiet be affected thereby. He thus will become more and more conscious of himself as a spiritual entity, instead of merely being sunken in the devachanic bliss-dream.

Student — Then he will dream, for instance, that he is studying wonderful esoteric books. Will those teachings he then thinks he is reading, in reality contain any real teachings?

G. de P. — Absolutely, because he is living in pure consciousness and this pure consciousness will act and react on itself, and thus, at least in some degree, present to the devachani's eye visions of new realities, new truths. Nevertheless, most of the "new" teachings that the devachani receives will be from seeds of thought and developments of thought latent in the storehouse of memory from past lives. Not only will he pass his devachanic period in the most amazing psychical explorations of consciousness, but to a certain extent he will become slightly, or moderately, or even vividly, conscious of his relation with the monad in whose bosom he is resting; in other words, take a partially conscious part in the monad's pilgrimage.

In the vast majority of cases this last realization is very, very slight. It all depends upon the individual. If the devachani has been a theosophist of very spiritual type, an initiate, he will be partly conscious of his pilgrimage with the monad. If he is just an ordinary theosophist, like so many theosophists are — one who loves theosophy, but does not understand much about it — then his devachan will be superior indeed to that of the man in the street, but it won't be very much more. It is the man himself who makes his own devachan.

He makes for himself what he will get. For instance, the higher chelas, when they go into devachan always go to the very highest parts of the devachan or, perhaps, to the very low parts of the nirvana; but as such men reincarnate very quickly, for reasons set forth at other times, their stay in the devachan is not long.

But take a man with a very spiritual character, a good, earnest, lovable, kindly man, what we call a thoroughly good man. If he is no initiate, if he has not studied theosophy, if his consciousness is not colored or rather saturated with the truths that theosophy brings to him, then his devachan will be very, very long.

Student — Where do such men of destiny as Napoleon and Alexander stand in regard to devachan?

G. de P. — Just where their characters place them. That is the only possible answer to give to a question like that. It depends upon the amount of spirituality in the individual — the amount and the quality. A Napoleon would not have a very high devachan.

Remember that men of destiny are of two kinds: those who lead the race upwards, or those who lead it downwards.

Student — Here is something that is troubling me. From what you are stating, the devachanic period determined by one earth-life may be a long devachanic period. But should other lives on the other planets be so determined, for instance to be a short period? How do they work together?

G. de P. — Very easily; or, there might be a very short life on earth and a very long life on planet F, for instance.

Student — But the period for the round itself will always —

G. de P. — It is always balanced by the individual egos concerned. Here we are, two billions of individuals forming the inhabitants of this globe — two billion different characters. It is almost impossible to draw up a certain hard and fast rule and say of all: "Do just this, and all will have a long life here and a short life there."

You cannot do it. The matter is similar as regards the kama-loka or, again, the life on earth. There are certain cases where the monadic pilgrimage through the spheres is exceedingly rapid. There is only a descent into one of the sacred planets for a very short time and then out again. There are other cases where the descents last long, or are long on one planet and short on the next. It depends upon the individuals entirely.

Student — Does not the reincarnating entity have to wait for its next incarnation until that pilgrimage through the planets is complete?

G. de P. — Yes, for the next reincarnation on this earth.

Student — Could it incarnate on any other?

G. de P. — The reincarnating ego could in theory reimbody itself on the other globes of our chain. However, it never does that. It is sleeping in the bosom of the monad.

Student — Then it must wait for the next incarnation, until the pilgrimage of the monad is completed?

G. de P. — Yes; but remember that our earth is not the beginning of the pilgrimage; it is merely one in a closed series.

Student — And I understand until its circuit through the planets and back to the earth is completed —

G. de P. — Then indeed the reincarnating ego reimbodies itself again, takes up the same identical lifeatoms

that it had dropped before, and the same man who died before exactly is reborn and grows up.

Student — It seems as if the reincarnating ego governs the progress of the monad.

G. de P. — No; it does so only to the extent of pulling the monad back to this earth when its turn comes. It is the pull of the other egos that takes the monad to the other planets.

Student — Does our reincarnating ego on this planet control those egos on the other planets?

G. de P. — No. The physical body has a brain, a heart, a stomach, a spleen, a liver, genital organs, etc. You cannot say that one of these organs exercises a more important or controlling influence on the general consciousness of the man than some other does. Each one has its part to play, its work to do, and has its own specific influence, and colors the consciousness thereby. And so it is with the various egos in the bosom of the monad. For instance, we are incarnated here on this earth; other reincarnating egos are asleep in their devachan, in the bosom of the monad, and so remain as long as we as individuals are here on earth. The monad goes to another planet and then some other ego will end its devachan and imbody itself on that planet.

We shall then be in our devachan.

Student — I apprehend that; but this is what I had in mind. The period between earth-lives of different incarnating egos varies according to the status of each. Now, here is an ego whose degree of development entitles him, and he has it, to a short devachanic period between incarnations. Now, the brevity of that period, due to his own spiritual inefficiency, apparently is a determining thing in hastening the return of the monad to this earth.

G. de P. — I see what you mean. Answering briefly and generally I reply, no, not wholly. What about the other egos on the other planets? Now hearken. Here is the point. Such a reincarnating ego as you describe is an ego of fairly undeveloped type, springing from a monad which has not yet brought that low-type ego to a higher degree; and all other reimbodying egos in that monad are of more or less similar type. So in each case, you see, it is not a young monad, but a monad which has not yet brought out its baby egos to be more evolved, has not evolved them to be higher. Furthermore, due to the intricate nature of the karma of each ego, the time periods passed by any reimbodying ego on any planet are all so nicely adjusted by the action and interaction of the intricate psychological machinery which is in operation, that no ego can imbody itself on any planet until its time comes to do so. There are also many cases of egos waiting their time for imbodiment

— virtually ready for imbodiment but retarded until the impulse from the monad reaches it. The main point, however, to be noted here is that all time periods of the different egos issuing from any one monad are adjusted with extreme nicety.

Student — Suppose that one of these incarnations turns out a complete failure. Does that affect all the others?

G. de P. — Oh, no. Take the case of a child which dies shortly after birth. Here, the purpose of the incarnating ego has not been satisfied; the magnetic relations are not satisfied there; and the reincarnating ego simply hovers in the earth's atmosphere. Hovering is not really what takes place, but the word will give you the idea of my meaning. The monad in this case does not peregrinate further, but remains quiescent until the reincarnating ego, after its futile birth, enters a new child's body and has its new chance. But remember this, please: don't think of the monad as a mere slave waiting upon the karmic destiny of any one of its reincarnating ego-children. The monad is relatively unconscious of it all. The monad is a god in its own sphere. The monad is not conscious on this earth. Earth consciousness is the reincarnating ego's affair.

Student — In the same way as we are not conscious of what goes on inside the body, among the atoms and molecules in our body, which have all been trained previously? Although we are continuously conscious in our own egoity, we are not conscious of the consciousness of the atoms and molecules in our body.

G. de P. — Exactly so.

Student — May I ask a question, the idea of which struck me as very odd? All the planetary chains are sevenfold, and yet we don't see seven men walking around as one man; and yet I wondered if we perhaps did

not have the seven globes or rather their influences inside of us.

G. de P. — I don't think I understand your question.

Student — There are seven globes — they are all sevenfold — for a planetary chain. Now, in the case of human beings, of course that is not the case. Human beings as individuals are simply one; but there must be some analogy between those seven globes of a planetary chain and human beings.

G. de P. — A human being is sevenfold. The seven principles of man correspond not only to the seven globes of our planetary chain, but are more directly derivative from the seven sacred planets of the ancients; and, mind you, the seven principles of man, as hitherto given out in our teachings, are a very elementary and primer way of explaining man's constitution. It is like saying that man's physical body consists of the chemical elements: so much carbon, oxygen, nitrogen, phosphorus, calcium, etc. These are cosmic elements.

Our seven human principles are also cosmic principles. But when we speak of the seven principles of man in a more technical way, as used in our Oriental School, we mean them to be knots or centers of consciousness; as, for instance, the divine monad or ego, the spiritual monad or ego, the human monad or ego, the animal monad or ego, the astral monad or ego, and the physical monad or ego which is the body. It is these centers of consciousness, or monads or egos, which in their aggregate really are man. Therefore, an infinitely better way of looking upon man as a sevenfold being is to consider his stream or river of consciousness as consisting of seven centers or knots, whirlpools, of consciousness, ranging from the divine to the physical. These seven centers or knots of consciousness exist and work in and through the seven cosmic elements, which latter, expressing themselves in man, we call atman, buddhi, manas, kama, and the material last three.

Student — Did you mean to imply that the reincarnating ego belonging to any given planet, as is the case with the earth's planetary chain, imbodies itself on every globe of that chain?

G. de P. — Yes, as a reimbodying ego of that chain. But please remember carefully that you can speak of a reincarnating ego only when it incarnates itself in bodies of flesh; the proper general term for egos which may reimbody themselves in vehicles other than flesh is reimbodying ego.

Student — How is your former remark to be understood in connection with the other statement that at death the reincarnating ego is withdrawn into the monad?

G. de P. — It indeed is; otherwise it could not pass to the other globes of the chain.

Student — When does it imbody itself on the upper globes of this chain?

G. de P. — During its passage out of this chain to the chains of the other seven sacred planets. Not only that, but at death the divine ego, like a flash of lightning, is indrawn into the divine monad, into its parent-star.

Student — And the ego into the spiritual monad?

G. de P. — Correct.

Student — When it is withdrawn into the spiritual monad, that is not the time when it will be reimbodied in the upper globes of this chain?

G. de P. — No. Reimbodiment does not take place instantly.

Student — When does the reimbodiment take place? Before it leaves our own planetary chain to go to others?

G. de P. — Of course. But now please look at the question that you are asking me: when? Don't you realize that it depends upon the individual case? I cannot say just when. The question is too particular; it may be a year, it may be twenty or more.

Student — You did not understand me; I did not mean by when, human time, but sequence.

G. de P. — Your question was not clearly asked, I think. Having reference to sequence only, after the death on earth the monad passes to globe E and there is a reimbodiment short or long as the case may be there.

Then it passes to globe F where the same thing takes place, governed by generally identic laws. Then it passes to globe G or last of this planetary chain, and there again the same general rule is followed. Then it leaves this planetary chain and goes to the next in sequence of the seven sacred planets.

Student — Wouldn't you say this: that when a reincarnating ego has reached such a degree of consciousness and perfection that its proper environment is globe E — it will then incarnate on globe E?

G. de P. — Yes, generally speaking; it will imbody itself on globe E; but mark you this very important element of the teaching: only that portion or ray of itself which appertains, or belongs, or is attracted to globe E will imbody itself on globe E, and similarly so for the other globes of our planetary chain. The reincarnating ego belongs to all the chain; but only an aspect of it, or a ray or a phase of it, is appropriate to or fit for, or attracted by any one particular globe.

Student — It all depends then upon its own degree of evolution of character and consciousness?

G. de P. — Just exactly so. It must reimbody itself on globes E, F, and G, before it can leave the planetary chain. It must cast off the atoms of its constitution belonging to these globes before it can free itself from this planetary chain and go to the next chain.

Student — It went down the shadowy arc; but to leave those elements it has created, then it should go back or return through the shadowy arc.

G. de P. — No; it returns to earth by way of the shadowy arc; but it leaves the planetary chain by way of the luminous arc.

Student — It has not yet incarnated and has not yet created any elements there.

G. de P. — Oh, but it has done so before, in other passages through those globes. Now, don't you see it could not come to globe D on its return from its cosmic pilgrimage unless it had the lifeatoms resident within it, pulling it first to globe A, then pulling it to globe B, then to globe C, globe D, then to globe E, F, G. Then the karmic balance is struck. The lifeatoms become quiescent or dormant, and the monad takes its flight to the next in sequence of the seven sacred planets. It goes through the seven sacred planets only to return to this chain, reaches globe A, and then peregrinates through B, C, D, E, F, and G again.

Student — If the monad has withdrawn into its bosom the reincarnating entity at physical death, that reincarnating ego will again issue forth from that monad to imbody itself on globe E.

G. de P. — Correct, as to every reincarnating ego, and bearing in mind what I have just previously told you; but remember that here you are not dealing with lumps of iron or bodies of gas, but with states of consciousness, egoity.

Student — It will not be the same ego.

G. de P. — It will be the same ego, but made fit for or attracted to globe E, and then the other globes in serial order. For instance, you are a human being; you have ten rooms in your house; each room devoted to a different purpose. You go into the first room for the purpose of eating; your consciousness there is inwrapped in eating. Then you go into the succeeding room, and there your consciousness is involved, perhaps, in taking a rest or reading a pleasant magazine, or an interesting book. You then go into the next room, and you are perhaps involved in musical studies. You then go into the next room, and you may be listening to in interesting lecture, or perhaps it may be your workshop. Each of these is a different state of consciousness, a different ray from the reincarnating ego; and yet always it is the same essential egoity or egoship throughout.

You could not say, if you spoke strictly, that it is the same man which goes into each one of these rooms, because the state of consciousness is as different in the one case as it is possible to be from any other one.

When you have reached the tenth room, you have undergone or been in ten different states of consciousness.

You are the same, and yet you have been different in each room. So it is with the reincarnating ego which has

a different consciousness for each globe of the planetary chain. Then definitely and definitively and permanently it sinks into its super-devachan and remains in the bosom of the monad while the monad pursues its peregrinations on the cosmic pilgrimage.

Student — And when it comes back, it goes through the descending arc, beginning with globe A; but it would appear that the lifeatoms left on the ascending arc could not be very well collected on the descending arc.

G. de P. — No, nor does the reincarnating ego need them; those atoms belong each class to the respective globes E, F, and G.

Student — So the answer really is this: when the reincarnating ego is on globe D, it does not have the atoms of the succeeding globes until it reaches those globes?

G. de P. — The atoms of every globe belong to that globe as a vital center, and do not leave it except for their own individual peregrinations. But within the ego, which is the parent of these lifeatoms, there is the attraction of affection for each one of its children.

Student — We put on the suit that we have made for any globe.

G. de P. — Very much so. You take up again the lifeatoms that you left on any globe when you left it before.

Student — May it not be possible that while a denizen of globe D one can emanate lifeatoms that belong on globe E, and that go to globe E and await the appearance of that parent?

G. de P. — Yes; because there is a constant interchange of these lifeatoms throughout the planetary chain, but this is due to the individual peregrinations of these lifeatoms themselves. The bulk of globe D atoms remains on globe D; but these particular lifeatoms, just like the reincarnating egos, have their own pilgrimages to make, and each one takes its turn to go around the chain. Our lifeatoms are simply imperfectly developed monads, or to put it differently and more accurately, monads in the lifeatom stage.

Student — In that way we create our vehicles in advance on these superior globes.

Student — And pick them up and drop them again.

G. de P. — Just so.

Student — Lately I have been studying the matter of the higher and lower manas, and their connections with buddhi and kama. Now, in comparing the Esoteric Instructions by HPB re the lower manas, and what you have said yourself, I would like to ask this: is there ever a separation between the higher manas as such, and buddhi?

G. de P. — The antaskarana is always there. As a matter of fact, there is an antaskarana between any two of the principles; otherwise they could not hold together. The antaskarana is the link, like the coupling holding together two railway cars.

Student — And when you speak about an intermediate principle, you really mean the lower manas?

G. de P. — The lower manas — yes, but with the light of the higher upon it — the lower manas with the antaskarana.

Student — That is, in our normal condition?

G. de P. — Yes; such is the normal condition of all ensouled human beings. But soulless human beings, which means most of the people of the earth, who live in their senses and in their wants and desires and appetites and ambitions and little ideals and little ideas, can hardly be called ensouled. All that I have just said

is a manifestation of no soul life — or at least the higher soul is but very slightly active.

Student — The teaching says as I understand it that the higher ego will, as punishment, have to incarnate again, if the lower ego, the personal ego, has been either destroyed, or retained or detained within the kama-lokic region.

G. de P. — I think that your statement is hardly accurate. If I understand your question correctly, you are referring to the case of lost souls, which as you know are not the same cases as soulless human beings. As long as a manasic ego exists, its links are with the higher manas. You see, the higher manas is simply the parent of the lower. The lower ego is of manasic quality because being a manasic center of consciousness growing out of the higher manas, somewhat as a branch grows from the stock of a tree.

Now, if that branch from the stock of the tree lives and bears leaves and takes in oxygen from the air, and throws out carbon dioxide, the tree won't need to put forth another big branch in the same place because the present branch is alive. The tree is satisfied with its one big branch in that one place.

But if that big branch is cut off or dies, then the trunk of the tree, in order to live more largely, through its vitality seeks a new lung or big branch to take the place of the one that has gone, and thus throws forth a new child, which in this case is a new big branch. Thus does the higher manas replace its contact with the lower spheres by issuing forth from itself a new human monad or lower manas.

Student — Following your illustration, if this lower personal ego has been destroyed — gone to avichi, as the term goes — how is it that the higher manas protrudes or creates, or sends out a new ray, emanates a new manasic ray? Now this new ray has not had the advantages of all the circulations and experiences that were gathered in by the dead ray: how is it then? Can this new ray take up the thread of consciousness where the destroyed ego left off its connection with the higher ego?

G. de P. — Of course. Think: the lower ego in every case springs forth from, or is represented in, a treasury of former experiences gathered in through manvantaras past. The lower ego is simply a ray from the higher ego. Now, this treasury of past experiences has been built up from the many former lives, and has become a part of the being or essence of the higher ego. Each new life with its following devachan adds a newly written page of experience to the book which is this treasury. Change the figure of speech a trifle and call this treasury the book of life. Now, if a lower ego has written on a page during a life only a single word or even a single letter, this trifle is enough for something to be registered in the treasury. But in the next life, or in the second succeeding life, let us suppose that the lower ego, which in the last life or two failed to register experiences in the higher spheres, in the treasury, becomes a lost soul, dies its spiritual death. Nevertheless the book of life is there, into which this same ray, now dead, that is the root of this ray, had been writing its experiences. Hence from that same treasury of accumulated experiences of many, many past lives, there comes forth a new ray emanating from or flowing forth from the same ingathered experiences plus the light upon it of the spiritual monad, that is, buddhi-manas or the higher manas.

Student — I now understand exactly.

G. de P. — That new ray, as you now see, is not absolutely and totally different from the last or now vanished ray. It is as if the last ray were a diseased arm cut off from the body; and then the body, in order to have a good right arm again, emanated a new one in the place and position of the old one, with the old one's root as its own root.

Within the treasury house of experience, the book of lives, each new devachan is therefore a new experience accumulated in the treasury. Please remember that in these things we are dealing with spiritual matters, and must not fasten our minds too closely to these physical examples which are merely suggestive aids to the imagination.

Student — But if one consider the personal ego as a feeble sun which has sent out myriads of lifeatoms and rays, and these rays make actual records in the akasa or in the astral light if this sun, this center, of the personal ego is destroyed, what then?

G. de P. — But the sun is not destroyed. It is merely a ray from it which is lost in the outer darkness. Your illustration is not a good one because the personal ego is not yet a sun in any wise. The sun would really be the spiritual monad — atma-buddhi-manas.

Student — I am thinking, however, of the central point, which is what you have called the human monad. If that is destroyed, what then happens? Because it has the same relation, as I understand it, to the various skandhas which have been accumulated during the ages, as the sun has to the planets and rays in the solar system.

G. de P. — I think I see your difficulty. You have an idea that the human soul is the same from incarnation to incarnation; but it is not. It is a new entity each time, but a new entity born of all the old entities. Don't you understand? To phrase the matter in other words, every human soul in each new reincarnation is a ray from the human monad. Now the human monad, as a monad, cannot ever be destroyed, for it is a spiritual consciousness-center. It is only its ray that can be lost.

Consequently, when any one of these human egos, or rather human souls, becomes a lost soul, on account of the intense concentration of vitality and impulses and karmic impressions registered in its fabric, and thus pulling it downwards into more material regions, it preserves coherency for a while in the lower worlds just because of this vitality, but finally drops into avichi, and thence into the eighth world, the so-called planet of death, and therein it finally dissipates and disappears. But meanwhile, the manasic monadic sun from which it came as a ray shoots forth another ray to take its place — the body grows another arm to take the place of the amputated one.

Student — Supposing it were thus: that the lost soul, I mean ego, has broken the antaskarana — broken itself away from the higher ego: can the higher ego in the meantime emanate a new personal soul, while the other one has not yet been completely disintegrated in kama-loka?

G. de P. — Yes, it can, but it rarely does so.

Student — And then by sorrow or suffering it can again try to build a new antaskarana with the higher ego?

G. de P. — But that won't happen since all new egos thus emanated come from above, and it is impossible for a lost soul — one irrevocably lost — to regain its former link with its parent-monad. This is because the lost soul is so completely separated that its chance for reunion is entirely gone. Only then can the treasury send forth successfully a new ego or soul.

Student — It can be a dweller on the threshold.

G. de P. — Yes, the lost soul indeed can be so; and that is a much worse case than an ordinary dweller on the threshold, because the lost-soul dweller is a perfect demon. It is not merely a psychical dweller of the nature of a kama-rupa, a shell, remaining after the second death, and perhaps even remaining until the next incarnation; but the lost-soul dweller is actually a spiritual entity of evil. There is evil spirituality in it; and until it disintegrates it is a demonic dweller on the threshold to the new struggling ray that has been freshly emanated. This state of things could not be unless the new ray had some links of psychomagnetic attraction with the old ray which is now the lost-soul dweller. This takes place because the two are the products of the same consciousness.

Student — Then consequently the dugpas and black magicians are all such dwellers on the threshold?

G. de P. — No, the dugpas and black magicians can hardly be called dwellers on the threshold — certainly not the dugpas and black magicians who are imbodied. However, there are such things as kama-lokic or disimbodied dugpas or black magicians, and these indeed could very properly be called dwellers on the threshold. Nor would they be in any wise dwellers on the threshold to the new ray. The term dweller on the threshold has a technical meaning, signifying past kama-lokic or astral remnants of a former incarnation which haunt the new imbodiment of the reincarnating ego. Thus, you see, the dugpas and black magicians can hardly be called dwellers on the threshold of the new ego appearing to replace a lost soul. Mind you, I am not speaking of the great sorcerers now.

Student — That is what I was speaking of.

G. de P. — Then, in that case, the great sorcerers are in a different class. Their evil vitality is running so intense and strong, and the remnants of prostituted mentality are still so keen within them, that they can and do continue and endure, sometimes for ages. Some of them are so strong in evil spirituality that they last until the end of the manvantara. It is a most intricate and difficult thing to explain all this, and I do not care to develop the thought farther at present. It is not wholesome to keep these thoughts in the mind, but it is good to know at least something about them.

Student — I understand.

G. de P. — But there is in their case sufficient spirituality, which means universality albeit of an evil type, to enable them to retain unbroken, although wearing dangerously thin, the link with the spiritual monad.

Nevertheless they are going downwards towards matter instead of upwards towards spirit, and the break will finally and surely come.

Student — But can they or can they not enjoy devachan?

G. de P. — The sorcerers of the kind that I am now last speaking of are above the illusions of the devachan

— which is really an illusion when contrasted with pure spirit, for the devachan is a species of spiritual dream world. There is no dream world for them, any more than there is for the buddhas. They are simply beings of incarnate evil spirituality. They of course are very, very rare, as rare as the buddhas almost; but they exist.

Student — Can such a spiritual monad give birth to a new human ego that lives at the same time? Then the sorcerers would be very dangerous for that person.

G. de P. — The spiritual monad has many children, as you should know; but through that one creative point or pore — somewhat as the skin has pores — from that one creative pore in the monadic essence of the spiritual monad there can issue only one ray at a time. The other monads that come out from it you may call twin-souls or triple-souls, or by some other such titles. They are not the reproductions to take the place of a lost soul. As a matter of fact these great sorcerers are not yet lost souls, although they are rushing towards this doom.

Student — But I have had the idea that a lost soul can reincarnate.

G. de P. — It can and most certainly does until it sinks into the planet of death.

Student — And at the same time the higher ego has incarnated in a new human being and is living at the same time?

G. de P. — No, if you are still speaking of these great sorcerers. What makes such a great sorcerer so tremendously powerful in evil is the fact that he has retained the link relatively unbroken with the spiritual monad. It is this that gives to him his evil fire, his enduring self-consciousness and wicked intellectual vitality.

Student — Yes, but I mean a very, very evil and sensual person who incarnates the lost soul; and it is said in HPB's old Instructions that the higher ego then incarnates almost immediately also.

G. de P. — Ah, you are confusing two things. What you now refer to is a different situation — that of the already lost souls.

Student — And then they exist at the same time on earth.

G. de P. — This is a different situation again, if I understand you, my dear Brother. You speak of these evil sorcerers as being sensual creatures. That is not what they always are by any means. They are as individuals simply incarnate evil essences; and they are as keenly cognizant of the fact that any malpractices against the ordinary laws of nature will result in destruction for them — as keenly cognizant, I say, as a Master is. They

are Masters in evil as the others are Masters in good.

Student — You have said recently, if I have understood you, that the beneficent forces of this manvantara were evil forces in a past manvantara.

G. de P. — Almost certainly so; but not in this sense that we are now discussing. The confusion arises, I think, out of the common mistake of misunderstanding words. We human beings are evolving creatures, and we think that we are pretty good, or fairly good, or averagely good, creatures. Yet in the sight of the gods we would seem to be like devils. Look around you on earth and see what happens: the violations of nature's noblest laws by human beings, wilful, deliberate choices of evil, cruelty, harshness, unkindness, cheating, all the horrible things that sully and spoil human life — it is all fiendish work. Nevertheless, we humans are evolving creatures, we are growing; and in the sight of beings below us we are like gods to them; but in the sight of the gods we are like fiends. We are not insane, and cannot plead insanity for our evil doings. Yet these soulless people are fairly insane — and please remember that the soulless folk are not lost souls. The soulless people are like children, as yet unawakened. They don't as yet know. They don't know enough about good actively to work for good; they don't know enough about evil to avoid being afraid of it. Indeed, even the average soulless person is scared to death at the thought of evil. These soulless people are just colorless, feckless, lukewarm.

On the other hand, the Masters of Good and the Masters of Evil are ensouled beings: the one class ensouled by gods, and the other class ensouled by inverted gods — demons.

Student — Can they survive an obscuration?

G. de P. — Usually not. Here is the difference between the two classes: Masters of Good become one with spirit, with the essence of spirit; and the Masters of Evil, the great sorcerers, become one with the spirit of matter — not with mere material things which are but the bubbles of matter, but with matter per se; and matter per se is energy, just as spirit is — the energy down here instead of the energy up there. This is why these evil sorcerers can endure and last. But the essential difference between the two classes of beings is this: the brothers of light have allied themselves with cosmic consciousness, and the brothers of the shadow have allied themselves with the spirit of matter, which de facto is temporary and endures only during the manvantara, whatever that manvantara may be: whether a globe-manvantara or a planetary manvantara. The consequence is that when the manvantara ends and the pralaya comes, the black magicians just disappear with the matter in which they have lived and which they have worshiped.

Student — Excuse my interrupting. When I said obscuration, I meant the word in its technical sense.

G. de P. — Yes, I so understood you, and I use the word in its various technical senses. When a globe goes into obscuration, the great majority — but not all — of the great black magicians simply perish, are wiped out.

Student — But there are some that survive?

G. de P. — Yes, my Brother, there are some that survive, and survive even until the end of the round.

[The sounding of the gong. Silence.]

Meeting 33 Supplement

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

Supplement to KTMG Papers: Thirty-Three

| The Mystic Rose: Symbol of the Unfolded Monad | So Many Men, So Many Devachans | The

Problem of 777 Lives | Quality Incarnations | Imbodiments of the Ascending Arc | |Principles and

Rounds: Fifth and Sixth Rounders | Septenary Elements Universal | The Atmic Consciousness |

Lost Souls and 'Failures' | Soul Loss: A Dual Tragedy |

July 14, 1936

The Cross of Initiation

G. de P. — The matter of the trained human ego's having to go through initiation unaided and unprotected by its higher parts is one of great importance, and in the atmosphere of the thought that has been aroused by the various observations made, I want to add something of my own. It is perfectly true that we can receive help from others, for love is always permissible, and it is the sustaining power because it is like health and like fresh air. But when the test comes we have to take it alone. The initiate is in the universe, a part of it, the pulses of the universe are pulsing through him. He has the help of the universe precisely because it is a part of him. But no one helps him by holding him up, or wiping the sweat or dew from his forehead, or giving him injections, etc. The soul must stand naked before the test, and conquer by its own inner powers. If it succeeds, it succeeds, and we have an adept. If it fails, there are other chances, but he gets no help in a direct way whatsoever. If he did, it would be no test. He must learn to fit himself to be one of the stones in the Guardian Wall. The position is one of such heavy responsibility, one involving so much, that there can be no weak links. There is not only no favoritism, there is absolutely no pity shown for the naked soul. If pity were shown, and the soul were helped over and allowed to succeed by supporting hands, the result would be a weak vessel, incapable of holding its own against the terrific impact of cosmic forces outside. The Guardian Wall is composed of human and spiritual stones which are strong in every fiber and have proved themselves to be such before they can be builded into the wall.

Several weighty and momentous matters are involved here, and I want to drive it home into your minds that it is the unprotected, unshielded, trained ego, the human ego, which must make good or fail. Now if it is helped, if it is shielded, what is the use of undergoing the test? The test becomes a mere play, a farce, a cheating. In a school, who is it that learns? The divine entity living in the heart, in the soul, of each child? Obviously not. It is the child which must learn or fail. If the child learns it graduates. In an honest school, if it does not learn it does not graduate, though out of compassion it may be allowed to slip out with some degree of honor, especially if the child is earnest.

Just so is it with initiation, which is an intensification and hastening of the evolutionary process. It is that part of the human being which is tried, not a part superior to the trial, but that part which is tried and tested which must succeed or fail. And if somebody helps it, or suffers for it, or answers its questions, or casts a shield of protection around it, wherein lies the virtue in the trial out of which it comes successfully? It is no trial, it is a weakening process. It is like a man in the water. He either must swim or drown. Now suppose we take the man in the water as a test to learn whether he can swim. If someone stands in the water and holds him up, that is no test of the question: can the man swim? Precisely with initiation, because upon that man's success lies the soul's weal, the soul's safety, the safety of the souls of human beings. He must be tested to be pure gold throughout, without a streak of weakness, not a single point, not an atom can fail under stress. That is why initiation is fearful. And only those are allowed to attempt it whom the teachers believe to be capable of passing through the fire of trial and coming out purified.

What is it that undergoes initiation, so far as we humans are concerned? It is not the divine part of us. It is not the spiritual part of us. It is not the manasaputric part of us. All these are beyond the initiations that we humans go through. It is we, failing, fallible, weak, struggling, aspiring and sometimes succeeding, human egos who have the chance when the time comes in initiation to rise from the initiatory trance, a spiritual being

— or to fail. It is a testing and a searching out and a purification in the fire of suffering. The poppycock that is talked about initiation by the quasi-mystics and would-be occultists today is awful, and it is right and needful

that you should know these things.

I have told you a million times, it seems to me, that the human constitution is composite. There is a world of occultism in that one statement. "Oh yes, composite. We know. It has a divine soul, and a spiritual soul and a human soul and an astral body, a linga-sarira, and a physical body. Composite, yes. Oh, we understand." I have not yet, my beloved Companions, found an adequate understanding among you of that simple statement that the human being is a composite being. I have attempted by both direct and devious ways and round-about manners to awaken the intuition in your minds as to the meaning of this statement. I have called to your attention the fact that in addition to our usual exoteric enumeration of the seven principles, there are different monads in man, and that not only is every principle septenary or duodenary, but likewise that these different monads in man, while they form his constitution as we are now constituted, are nevertheless not all of them what I call I, and each one of you calls I. That is the human monad. That human monad is as septenary as our present constitution is, which means that the human monad alone, singling it out of the other monads in our present constitution, has a divine part, a spiritual part, a mental or intellectual part, a psychical, an astral and a physical.

Now it is this human monad, the human ego part of that monad, which is I, which is you; and it is this portion of the constitution which must be so to say temporarily wrenched apart from all the other elements in the human constitution, and must stand alone. It has its own inner god, its own human monad's god — not the atman of the usually understood septenary, but its own atman or inner god. And all initiation, which means all testing, all trial, all purification, of any monad or ego is for the purpose of bringing out the particular divinity of that ego which is being tested. Along this same line of thought you now perhaps will see the reason of H.

P. Blavatsky's statement which has intrigued so many of you, that the manasaputra, the manasaputric influence within us and above us, is like a plank of salvation thrown down to us. When the manasaputras incarnated within the early human protoplasts, they awakened the manasic portions in the human egos — they themselves were manasic devas — and they still hover over us inspiring, aiding, helping, guiding. But it is not the manasaputra of me and of you, because this I and this you belong to the one we call the human monad.

You can picturate the situation for yourselves if you like after the manner of a cross. Marvelous symbol again! The upright of the cross we can say is the line of the ordinary human constitution as given in our exoteric books: atman, buddhi, manas, kama, and so forth. The transverse or horizontal where it joins the upright on its line of junction we may call the human ego. We put it there because we are but humans. Now that line of juncture, where the general, the upright, traverses and crosses and therefore aids and lifts the horizontal, or the individual I or you, is, as HPB says, our plank of salvation, our contact with the universe in the upright sense.

But we must learn to find that universe through the divinity of our own monadic ego, within and above our own human monad, in other words to find the atman belonging to our human ego, that is the horizontal, as well as the general atman of the human constitution in and of the vertical. To use this figure of speech again, we must learn to find the divinity of the horizontal as well as of the vertical. Now the perfect god, and in a smaller degree the perfect man, is he who has learned to make the upright and the horizontal coalesce in his constitution and to blend in unity. Do you catch the mystical thought that I am trying to give — to see the divinity within his own essence and essay to be it? And at the same time to see and essay to be the cosmic divinity which is likewise in him and of him — the vertical.

Thus in initiation it is not the divine monad which is tested. That would be folly. It is not the father or the mother who learns the alphabet for their little child of four. It is the little child. It is not the spiritual monad which is tested and tried and purified in these human initiations; nor is it the manasaputra inspiring us, but it is the human ego, which during initiation must become, essay to become, and finally become, the human monad, the divinity within the heart or center of the human ego.

You see the reason for the statement that the soul which cannot stand the burning fire returns either a madman or returns but to die — that or success. It is infinitely just. The whole initiatory scheme would be a preposterous fake and farce, a cheating of the human soul, if the initiant went into the trials so protected and shielded that no trial could touch him, that no test could reach him, that no fire could burn out the evil within him. Each new initiation — and fasten this thought in your minds — means coming a step nearer to that inner

divinity which is not the ordinary atman of us, of the upright of the cosmic cross, but that divinity which is the very heart of the heart of the core of the core of the human monad, as yet a feebly manifesting evolutionary pilgrim.

That is why the mystic teaching was given in the Christian scriptures: my divinity, my divinity, how thou dost glorify me. No longer am I dependent upon the manasaputra above me. From within my own cosmic essence, from within the god of my own human monad, I have become, and through myself, my own godhood. How thou dost glorify me, thou divine part of me! Notice the peculiarly apt and aphoristic Greek: ho theos mou, ho theos mou — the god of me; the Greek is emphatic in its grammatical construction. Not merely my god, but the god of me.

And mark you, this can only come in initiation after the other cry comes: O god of me, why hast thou forsaken me? Yes. The god of the upright, because now the child must learn to walk, to find himself. The god, his god, himself, his divine self, not his outer god of the ordinary human constitution commonly called atma-buddhi-manas, but he finds the atma-buddhi-manas of the horizontal so to speak, of the individual, of the human monadic essence. Thus, every monad within the human constitution is septenary or duodenary, according to the way of counting, and every initiation that takes place, as far as I know, as far as I have been taught, in cosmic time or cosmic space, whether of man or of god or of being of the underworld, is just the same thing in principle. Details may change; places, individuals, may vary. But the fundamental idea and rule are the same. This is why it is that death and initiation are identical. So is sleep. I have said these things a score of times. Sleep, initiation, and death are all one. Sleep is the same thing, but happily veiled from our unwitting vision, from our ignorance and stupidity because we are too sunk in desires of this world to see, to realize. Initiation is a conscious awakening to the verities. And death is exactly the same thing in even greater degree than initiation, but because it is not undertaken with one's own will for the specific purpose of quickening our evolution, it is an automatic function of the portions of our constitution. Perhaps I am wandering a little too far afield, but these are hints for you. Your intuition may work upon them. I repeat that sleep and death and initiation are all essentially the same thing.

I hope all the dear companions will forgive me if I have spoken with too great emphasis tonight. I thought the opportunity was too good to miss.

------

November 29, 1938

The Mystic Rose: Symbol of the Unfolded Monad

Man is a microcosm, a copy in the small of what the universe is in the great. That is what is meant when reference is had to the different monads in a man, of which monads the human monad is the one that concerns himself most intimately because it is he. Now cast your gaze forwards into the future. All these different monads of the principles of his constitution will have been evolving, each one on its own plane and in its own way, his own human monad among them. When that destined future comes, he then from being a mere man will have expanded into a universe of which he will have developed to become its god, the hierarch of it. He will be surrounded with what then will be the different parts of that universe, and all the surrounding boundless naturally will be represented in him: things higher than the god, things on the plane of the god, things lower than the god. But what now is the human monad will then be the god.

The symbol of the cross is one that can be employed only during the periods of manifestation. Therefore the mystical saying has it that the Christ spirit, the buddhi within us, the buddhic essence if you like, is crucified on the cross, the cross of spirit-matter, or the cross of matter as it is commonly phrased. Please understand that the transverse or the horizontal is itself fully septenary. The transverse itself contains its atman, buddhi, manas, kama, right down the line.

As time goes on, and we ascend, or rather climb up the ascending arc, the cross will slowly disappear. The famous medieval Rosicrucian symbol which you will remember is that of a cross with the rose at the junction point — the rose and the cross — is a magnificent symbol, which the modern Rosicrucians brag about but of which they understand absolutely nothing.

As evolution proceeds in working its magic of unfolding growth, the horizontal shortens, the vertical shortens, until finally both vanish into the center or combined monad. The many have rebecome the One, the individual has become the universal symbolized by the beautiful figure of the full-blown rose. The cross has disappeared into the rose, a symbol of the unfolded monad.

When evolution opens, the mystic rose or the auric egg — suggesting beauty and spiritual fragrance — will begin slowly to develop the cross of the new manvantara on the new and higher plane on which the pilgrim will then be evolving. Little by little the vertical will begin to grow. Little by little the transverse or horizontal will begin to grow, until finally the cross again appears, a cross of spirit and matter conjoined, meeting at the center where the monad of that particular pilgrim or evolving entity abides.

------

August 11, 1936

So Many Men, So Many Devachans

Since devachan is essentially higher manasic, we make our devachan while we live, because it is a continuation of our higher mentation after death. Consequently, the devachan, depending upon the man, can range from a mere fool's paradise of dream up into the nirvanic range of highly spiritual men; and especially of those whose inner being has been aroused, whose minds have been brightened, illuminated, awakened, invigorated, by theosophical study.

So the way you live will be the way you will devachanize — to invent a verb. Devachan is a continuation of your state of consciousness after the interlude called the kama-loka. When the devachan begins, then the free mind begins automatically to reproduce and to elaborate upon the most beautiful pictures that the man had in his life; and whatever these pictures were, they will be his devachan. Thus, there is a devachan truthfully for every man, and as many kinds of devachan as there are minds to create them.

For instance, some people are so purely personal that even human love which fills all their lives — beautiful as it is — nevertheless has become a spiritual vampire in their lives. They will have a devachan of the loved one, a perfect fool's paradise, but in a wholly spiritual manner. On the other hand, a high chela whose dreams are of self-forgetfulness, of doing good, of discovering the noblest and most beautiful things in life, not only human life but inner life, will have a devachan so wide, so blissful, so inexpressibly glorious, that it will verge into the nirvana, because the mentality there is no longer self-centered and running like a crazy little thing around its own center of mentation. But as the aspirations of the man during his incarnation were universe-wide, his mentations in his devachan will be universe-wide. So many men, so many devachans.

The Problem of 777 Lives

We have an analogy between the life-waves passing from globe to globe in a round of our own chain, and the monads passing from planetary chain to planetary chain in the outer rounds. Thus we as a life-wave are at the present time on globe D, although essentially our inner essence is no more attached to globe D than to any other globe of our chain; but for the time being our monads are in station or fastened here. Therefore, for this time being, globe D is more important to us than the other globes, relatively speaking of course. But when our life-wave shall have moved on to globe E, or globes F, G, or any other, for that globe-manvantara, for that time period, we shall be more particularly attached to that or the next or the subsequent globe.

I think it would be a great error to take our Master's words 777 as being the numerical sum of all incarnations or imbodiments of the human soul, either on a globe, or on a chain, or during a round. That is not what is meant. Brother R---- has himself explained the matter perhaps without fully realizing it, because the Master's words themselves stated what is meant. 7 + 70 + 700 — a sort of mystical or qabbalistic enumeration reckoned by the Master in a somewhat different way as a qabbalistic cube, 7 x 7 x 7, and these are called quality incarnations rather than incarnations counted up as a sum.

Seven rounds, a quality-imbodiment governing all subsequent reincarnations during a round. Seventy, ten in

each round: a subordinate quality governing all subsequent imbodiments or incarnations during those minor periods within the round period, 7 x 1, 7 x 10, 7 x 100. Seven hundred — here again seventy times ten: the same rule within the last that I have spoken of. But remember it does not refer to the sum total of actual reincarnations. Read the Master's words in The Mahatma Letters, pp. 82-3, on subraces, greater races, etc., etc., and note that he states himself the solution of the riddle:

"(7b) As the above described race: i. e., at each planet — our earth included — he has to perform seven rings through seven races (one in each) and seven multiplied by seven offshoots. There are seven root-races, and seven subraces or offshoots. Our doctrine treats anthropology as an absurd empty dream of the religionists and confines itself to ethnology. It is possible that my nomenclature is faulty: you are at liberty in such a case to change it. What I call "race" you would perhaps term "stock" though subrace expresses better what we mean than the word family or division of the genus homo. However, to set you right so far I will say — one life in each of the seven root-races; seven lives in each of the 49 subraces — or 7 x 7 x 7 = 343 and add 7 more.

And then a series of lives in offshoot and branchlet races; making the total incarnations of man in each station or planet 777. The principle of acceleration and retardation applies itself in such a way, as to eliminate all the inferior stocks and leave but a single superior one to make the last ring.

Not much to divide over some millions of years that man passes on one planet. Let us take but one million of years — suspected and now accepted by your science — to represent man's entire term upon our earth in this round; and allowing an average of a century for each life, we find that whereas he has passed in all his lives upon our planet (in this round) but 77,700 years he has been in the subjective spheres 922,300 years. Not much encouragement for the extreme modern re-incarnationists who remember their several previous existences.

Should you indulge in any calculations do not forget that we have computed above only full average lives of consciousness and responsibility. Nothing has been said as to the failures of Nature in abortions, congenital idiots, death of children in their first septenary cycles, nor of the exceptions of which I cannot speak. No less have you to remember that average human life varies greatly according to the rounds. Though I am obliged to withhold information about many points yet if you should work out any of the problems by yourself it will be my duty to tell you so. Try to solve the problem of the 777 incarnations."

I repeat: the key to all this mystical or qabbalistical tangle deliberately stated here by the Master is not to be taken as a simple numerical sum in addition, but refers to quality-imbodiments or quality-expressions of monadic attributes, as a study of the Master's words will show; for it should be obvious that there is more than one imbodiment in a root-race, as the Master immediately goes on to state. What is here stated about the 777

has as its foundation the fundamental thought that man is composite, formed of different monads, whose qualities or attributes find expression in different root-races, subraces, and sub-subraces; and each such quality-expression is an imbodiment of that expression or attribute, although the process of bringing forth these quality-expressions or monadic attributes is of course in a way already given in the teaching of the repetitive reimbodiments. I wanted to avoid your getting the impression that 7 + 70 + 700 was the actual sum total of a human being's reimbodiments.

Student — I have three questions. One: you have stated that the globes of our earth-chain are planets scattered about in space, not far from our earth. If so, when we die, do we go first to the astral globe of our chain and then on to the others of our chain in our circulations of the cosmos, leaving our atoms belonging to each principle on these globes, before the reincarnating ego goes to the bosom of the spiritual monad for the rest of the circulation through the sacred planets to the sun; or are our atoms left on these latter, to be picked up on our return?

Two: "Each monad has its own particular star." Does that mean that each of our seven monads of our seven principles has its particular star?

Three: speaking of the fact that one cannot die until his star comes into position for that event, how may we know what star, or when it comes into position at our birth and death?

G. de P. — These are intuitive questions, but I cannot answer them at length for reasons which should be apparent. The first question calls for an answer as follows: on the outward journey we drop in each sphere the lifeatoms native to that sphere, and on the return journey we pick them up again. Thus the monad unclothes itself on the outward journey from heavy garments of more material things, and this is its ascent. On the return journey it reclothes itself in the lifeatoms formerly dropped, and thus invests itself again with the garments of the lower realms enabling it to manifest and live therein.

Question two: the answer is yes.

Three: it is perhaps very fortunate for us that we are not able, at least the majority of us are not able, to know just when our physical death will occur. I fancy that there are very few human beings who, if they cast in the scales of their judgment what they really would like in the premises, would not prefer to leave things exactly as merciful mother nature has left them. I do not think it a good thing to attempt to find out a more definite, a more exact, answer to this question.

------

January 31, 1939

Quality Incarnations

By quality incarnation is meant the bringing forth, in a series of human reimbodiments, of all the different purusha and prakriti qualities inherent in the human being as a microcosm, a small copy of the macrocosmos.

As there are 7, 10, and even 12 planes in our solar cosmos, each one of these planes having its especial series or scale of qualities or attributes, all are latent or more or less manifested in every human being. They come out continuously more and more as the reimbodiments take place one after the other in serial order. Many of these higher planes, although latent, lying as yet unmanifest within us, are to come forth in the future as qualities, attributes.

Many of our theosophists do not realize that all the qualities of our past lives or reincarnations cannot find expression in any one succeeding life, nor do all the karmic treasured-up storehouse of experiences come again into fruition in any one earth life. Thus it may be that if we call the present life A, and the next one B, and the following one C, and so forth, it may be that we shall run A, B, D, C, F, G, E — different qualities not all coming out seriatim like the spokes in a turning wheel. Sometimes it happens that the human ego in the next life brings out qualities which in the ordinary course might not or would not have come out for two or three lives ahead. The seriatim next life is, as it were, jumped over. And this introduces many complications in human existence, so that sometimes it appears that we have to go back and do an incarnation that we should have done three or four imbodiments agone. We pick up the threads that we had dropped. As we must pick up that thread by a certain time before we can take the next forward step, we have to go back and pick it up and work it out, untangle it.

This does not always happen, but it is not infrequent, and it is the haunting fear of the chela that his forward progress in chelaship may by karmic necessity be temporarily interrupted by karma, obliging him to go back and pick up an imbodiment, as it were, that he had jumped over, interrupting the smooth forward progress of things. This again is one of the reasons why chelaship, while the ideal of us all, is so surrounded with precautional measures of warning.

It is not really going back. It is merely a way of expressing the fact that progress has to hold until that omitted or jumped-over term can be expressed in imbodiment.

I almost think it is a benefit for the man who jumped over some imbodiments, because he can then approach them no longer as something new with fewer powers, but with a strengthened understanding and heart in certain lines that his later imbodiments which he would not yet have undergone, now enable him to do.

Nature is very merciful in these things.

------

September 8, 1936

Imbodiments on the Ascending Arc

Which parts of the human constitution are they which reimbody themselves on the ascending arc as the monad rises, winging its way on the outer rounds to the other sacred planets?

Think now: there are different monads in the entire human constitution. Each such monad has its own swabhava. Each such monad again is particularly and karmically bound to one of the globes of our planetary chain. It would be quite erroneous to suppose that the ego which reinfleshes itself on this globe D and produces a man, is the identical ego which after the death of the man again reimbodies itself on globes E, F, and G on the rising arc, or A, B, and C on the descending arc.

That particular monadic center of the human constitution which finds its field of karmic action on this globe D, our earth, imbodies itself here, and we call this reincarnation. In exactly identical fashion the other parts of the human constitution which find respectively their fields of action and of expression on the other globes of the chain, are the ones which reimbody themselves respectively on these different globes. When the life-wave shall reach globe E or globe F or globe G or any other globe, that part of the human constitution imbodies itself on this or that or some other one of the globes of the chain.

If that thought is clear, you have a perfectly clear-cut answer to your question. Thus then, what takes place for the individuals of a life-wave when a life-wave reaches any globe is now taking place here, because our life-wave is now here on globe D, and bringing out of us, because here is its particular field of expression, that part of our constitution which can express itself on this globe D. When we as a life-wave collectively shall reach globes E, F, and G, in turn, or any other, those portions of our constitution which find their fields of expression on globes E, F, and G, or the others, will manifest themselves, each one on its appropriate globe: X on globe E, Y on globe F, Z on globe G, and so forth on other globes of the chain.

Thus, after individual death, the same rule is followed. It is not the man after death which is wrenched out of its devachanic felicity in order to take on an imbodiment on globe E or F or G. It begins its devachan at some indeterminate period after the man dies, and is withdrawn into the bosom of the spiritual monad; and its devachan increases in intensity until it reaches its maximum, then decreases in intensity until it is ready for reinfleshing or reincarnation on this earth again.

I will recapitulate. The reimbodying ego — or the reimbodying monad is perhaps a better expression — has its field of activity in our planetary chain, as the divine monad has in our galaxy, and as the merely human astral monad has on this earth, this last producing a man. Now this reimbodying ego which has its field of expression or of activity on the globes of our planetary chain emanates from itself, or sends forth from itself, whenever it reaches a globe, the ray of consciousness which in itself is correspondential to the globe thus reached. Exactly as it has done here on earth: it has sent forth the ray which is appropriate to and fit to express itself here on this globe D producing us, as men. Consequently, it will not be the man, the present I, you, which will reimbody itself on globe E or F or G or globe A or B or C, either when the life-wave as a whole reaches these different globes, or after the death of us as individuals.

There will be, however, a temporary imbodiment, usually very short, after a man's death, of the appropriate ray on each of the other globes of the chain. The reason that such imbodiments there are so temporary is because our life-wave as a whole is now on this globe D. When our life-wave as a whole shall reach some other globe, be it globe E or F or G on the upward arc, and correspondentially so on the downward arc, then our longest imbodiments as individuals will be on the globe where the life-wave then is stationed — just as now, our longest imbodiment is here on earth because our life-wave is here. Thus when our life-wave after we leave this globe D shall reach globe E, then distributively as individuals our longest imbodiments will be on globe E; and when we go the rounds of the chain when we die on globe E, on coming to globe D, for instance, on our way back to globe E, our imbodiment here will be very short, a mere temporary projection of a ray, an imbodiment upon this globe, a touching of it, long or short as the case may be, but never very long. Then we, in due course of the peregrinating monad, move on to globe E where our life-wave as a whole is then residing. There we shall have our longest reimbodiment because the life-wave is there.

You notice what a fascinating picture of the future this gives to us. We recognize first that our human earth-personalities, while excessively interesting to us as individuals, are but expressions of one phase of the hundred-faceted character which each one of us has on the different globes of the chain. Each one of us expresses the particular facet of character which is appropriate there; that is, on each one of the globes we have as individuals a chance to manifest that side or facet of our swabhava, of our character, which is appropriate for manifestation and development and exercise on such globe.

You see again another deduction from these beautiful truths. We are really children of the universe, at home everywhere because on every globe we have kinship with it; some part of our character is native there, and on that globe expresses itself. So it is when on the outer rounds we peregrinate to the other sacred planetary chains. After our death here we merely touch the globes on these chains, because our life-wave is not then in that chain. But when during the outer rounds the time comes in the immensely distant future for our life-wave as a wave to reach one of these sacred planetary chains, then and there in that planetary chain we shall be fixed for a whole chain-manvantara, and then and there it will be our station, just as earth's planetary chain is for the time being. Is that thought clear? Good!

It strikes me, Companions, that there is a very important ethical deduction we can draw here. While our experiences on this earth globe, or globe D, are just as important in their way as our experiences on the other globes and indeed on the other planetary chains, yet our lives on this globe D are not of such vast importance as we imagine them to be. They are just phases in the soul's experience. And when we compare all the other eleven globes of this chain, and all the twelve globes of each one of the other planetary chains, we see how relatively insignificant each single earth-life is in the scale. It is immensely important, it is a link and cannot be omitted, if we look upon it from that standpoint; but when we compare it with all the other lives we pass elsewhere, this teaching has a tendency to destroy our favorite egoisms, and our immense attachment to things of earth. We realize that this single earth-life is like a traveler spending but a day-night in a single hotel

— and not a very good one at that, one of the worst possible of the whole solar system, because on the lowest plane — and that it is the other globes which give us the opportunities to bring into action, and give us the exercise of the far nobler parts of our constitution, which after all we really love the best, the intellectual and the spiritual and the ethical.

I might add here that when our meetings began some years ago, I had to speak in elementary style so that I would be understood. Now I would say the reimbodying monad instead of the reincarnating ego. Therefore a more accurate way of expressing my answers [See pp. 248-9] would have been to say the reimbodying ego emanates from itself on globe E the ray or portion of the reimbodying ego's swabhava which is fit for or appropriate to that globe as its field of expression, native there. In those days we were just working out of what we might call the HPB and WQJ and KT phase, when reincarnating ego was used in a rather all-inclusive sense, very much as the Christians still use soul.

Remember this fact: that we earth-men could not live on a higher globe. We are not fit for it. We could not properly express ourselves there. Now the earth-man we might describe as the human-animal monad which has its field of activity on earth, enlightened of course by the higher parts of our constitution still working through us and trying to influence us, giving us our ethical sense, and our spiritual aspirations, and our high intellectual power, and so forth. But we as earth-men would be entirely out of place on a higher globe such as E or F or G, or the still higher globes on the ascending arc. Similarly so when we as a life-wave reach globe E, we shall manifest on globe E what we can call the globe E parts of our constitution; and the globe D parts will be in abeyance. We shall not remember them, we shall not be fond of them, we shall not care about them.

They will have sunk into obscuration, lying like seeds which will not sprout until we reach globe D again, their proper soil. Similarly so, our globe E parts would not be fit for expression on globe F or on globe G.

This is a very simple thing to understand.

Thus you see you have from this angle of thought the answer to the question which was asked about the possibility of the astral monad's imbodying itself on globe E for instance, the next globe on the ascending arc.

It does not, because that monad is particularly the earth-child. Of course, in far distant ages of the future every monad, being a learning and growing entity, will have evolved by unrolling forth from within itself higher powers and attributes, will have become a nobler being and therefore fit to express itself on higher globes than is our globe D. But at the present time it could no more find fit imbodiment on globe E as a field of

expression than can a beast reincarnate itself in a human body. There is no attraction for the beast to enter a human womb. As a matter of fact, it is repelled therefrom. There is not anything in the beast that would call it to the human psychomagnet. It has not the aspiration which would bring it to a human womb. It just simply does not go that way.

So it is with all the globes of the chain. It is the reimbodying monad whose field of activity is our planetary chain; and this reimbodying monad has attributes, faculties, powers, within its own substance or swabhava which are called forth, and manifest themselves, when the reimbodying monad in its peregrinations reaches the different globes in serial order. On each one there descends from the reimbodying ego the ray native to that globe, fit to live there, fit to express itself there, and therefore attracted out from the reimbodying ego into the atmosphere of that globe — just as the reimbodying ego of us humans now, because our life-wave is here on globe D, finds called forth from itself what we can call the earth-man part of us.

Just here you will find place for the statement that has so often been made, that even those beings equivalent to the beasts on globe F or on globe G are actually, if we could compare them with us, higher than we are as humans on globe D, because the globes of F and G are so much higher than globe D, they are on a spiritual plane, or half-spiritual. Naturally what we can by comparison with our earth call the human beings on globes F and G are incomparably finer and grander in every way than we human beings are on this our globe D.

I think that is all.

-----

February 28, 1939

Principles and Rounds: Fifth and Sixth Rounders

There are seven rounds — using the septenary division of HPB — each round developing a particular principle of the seven principles which are we. We are now in the fourth round, which means that during the entire period of this round the kama-element is in development or evolution. This means that from the first globe to the last during this fourth round, the kama-round, all the evolutionary stages are in process of bringing forth the septenary divisions or grades of kama, the fourth principle. Thus on the higher globes of the chain — whether during sleep, whether after death, or when the life-wave now on this earth shall reach to these globes on the ascending arc — as long as this fourth round lasts or endures it will be the different phases of the kama principle that will be brought forth.

Thus, on this earth, being the fourth of the seven, we have the kama-kama. On globe E, being the fifth of the seven, we will have the manas-kama; on globe F, the sixth of the seven, we shall develop the buddhi-kama; on globe G or the last according to septenary classification, we shall have the atman-kama.

Now naturally during the fifth round, for example, it will be the fifth or the manasic principle within us which will be striving to bring itself forth into relatively full activity from the beginning of the fifth round to its end.

During the fifth round on this globe D we shall no longer be kama-kama humans, but kama-manas humans; and as this is the particular human quality, therefore is it said that during the fifth round there will be the especially important moment or time of choice, determining our destiny, whether we shall succeed in passing the danger point of choice, or not.

As regards the outer rounds, now or in the past or in the future, the different monads or consciousness-centers in our human constitution are each one peculiarly native to its own respective planetary chain of the sacred planets. Thus there is a chain-monad in us belonging to this chain. There is likewise a chain-monad for Mars; one for Jupiter, Saturn, Mercury, Venus, and other planets — some of them visible, some not.

When our life-wave shall abandon this chain and pursue as a wave its course along the outer rounds, the next planet that it reaches will bring forth from our constitution the particular monad which is peculiarly native or sympathetic to that chain; just as now we are here on this chain, and the chain-monad or monad which is particularly akin to this chain is in process of development. Thus it is not correct to say that the human entity as we now know him, on this globe at present, will be the same monad which will be manifesting during the

outer rounds on the other sacred chains. On each such sacred chain, it will be the monad specifically sympathetic to that chain, having especial links of sympathy with that chain; and identically so with the chain next in serial order, and so forth. Nevertheless all monads keep together at all times, but in each chain one is dominating.

In other words, when we shall reach the next chain, shall this earth-chain monad now undergoing evolution be then entirely quiescent, in nirvana, not manifesting? Obviously not. Because the other monads native to the other sacred chains are even now manifesting on this chain also, though more feebly than is the monad appurtenant to or sympathetic to this chain-monad.

Our monad on this chain will on the next Sacred chain, and the subsequent ones of the different sacred chains, be less strong in self-expression. The dominant will be the monad appurtenant to that next chain, and so forth.

Our chain during our present fourth round is bringing out the kama quality. This kama quality has a septenary range from the atman to the sthula-sarira. This earth being the fourth globe in serial order, we are now manifesting the kama-kama, as already stated. When the life-wave shall reach globe E we shall manifest the manas-kama, next the buddhi-kama on globe F, the atman-kama on globe G.

Now the same thing exactly takes place during sleep and after death, only in feebler degree than when the life-wave reaches the globes of the ascending arc. You see how complex this thing is, and yet how simple in principle when unraveled by the master-key — analogical reasoning. After death as we rise along the ascending arc, on globe E, although the earth-child, the human being, is already beginning its devachan, we must pass through globes E, F, G, and the higher globes. But as we go to each of these globes after we die, the strong attraction of each of these globes on the ascending arc will as it were pull forth from the pilgrim auric egg of the monad traversing those different globes of the ascending arc its corresponding ray. Thus, on globe E, there will be a temporary rush forth, feeble or strong, according to the individual case on globe E, of a certain manasic part of the kama which will be manifesting on globe E when the life-wave reaches E, and when our regular imbodiments take place there for a time, as they are now doing on this globe D.

So then, each one of the other monads of the constitution, while manifesting as best it can on this chain as long as we are here, will not be in the full flower of its activity, will not become the dominant, until each one such monad reaches the chain where it is especially at home, native or sympathetic to that chain. The other monads will be recessive there, as all the other monads (except the one appurtenant to this chain) are recessive in us now, this chain-monad being now the dominant one.

Thus obviously in the sixth round it will be the buddhi quality which will be in evidence. On the seventh round, which HPB graphically calls the last, it will be the atmic qualities which will then be in process of unfoldment.

During this fourth round we are evolving kama as stated; but owing to the spiritual aspiration always firing our inner nature, millions of the present life-wave or human race run ahead of their fellows; and during the afterdeath states, and during sleep, by this forerunning capacity or fact, undergo a quickened evolution, so that even today there are millions of the race who practically are fifth rounders. They are the more evolved people in whom the intellectual, the manasic parts, although in the fourth round, are nevertheless now evolving strongly, but in fourth round circumstances. A very curious and interesting event in human history.

By that I do not mean the history of nations, but — the history of the ego.

Very, very rarely indeed does an individual forerun the forerunners and manage to pass through sixth round experiences, and these exceedingly rare individuals are the buddhas — although this is done, mind you, during the time period of the fourth round. Yet even here, while these fifth rounders are people who are really fifth rounders, I mean as the life-wave as a whole will be during the fifth round on this globe, yet because we are in the kama principle still, they are fifth rounders of the kama. I wonder if you catch the thought that I am trying to put over.

It would be more accurate in a sense to say that these fifth rounders are like relatively fully developed individuals on globe E, as they will be when the life-wave reaches globe E during this fourth round. This answers the question: If fifth rounders are already here, what will these fifth rounders do when the fifth round

has its hundreds of millions of years to pass through? The answer will be that these fifth rounders will enter as excellently evolved and ready students of the manasic part then in process of full evolution. They will forerun even during the fifth round into the sixth round, thus forerunning the average or bulk of the fifth rounders.

So even the fifth rounders now are fifth rounders according to the kama principle; but when they reach the fifth round, when the life-wave is going through the globes during the fifth round, they will then nevertheless have essentially fifth-round experiences to go through, but enormously helped and running ahead faster, because they had managed to go through kamic fifth round experiences during the kama or fourth round. That is why we have unusually evolved people amongst us, fifth rounders, people whom we usually call geniuses or highly evolved individuals.

The advanced fifth rounders are the mahatmas; the less advanced fifth rounders are their chelas; the least advanced fifth rounders are the unusually evolved people amongst us today. Without any flattery to theosophists, I fully believe, I am convinced, that real theosophists are fifth rounders. Perhaps only beginning the fifth round, but nevertheless the fifth round. They are in consciousness in the fifth round. The mahatmas are far advanced in the fifth round.

-----

October 13, 1936

Septenary Elements Universal

Student — Are not the dhyani-buddhas or chohans who were the directors of the building of our earth-chain and its humanity the regents of the seven sacred planets — giving birth to the celestial bodhisattvas in charge of our earth globes? They gave us our seven principles, hence at death we have to make the outer rounds through the sacred planets to the sun — to our father stars, etc.

G. de P. — The question is extremely interesting and intuitive, but very complicate. We must never forget that the seven principles of an individual, whether human being or other, are not given to him. If that were so, one may ask: what remains of the individual if everything he is is just given to him from different sources?

The seven principles we are — or as is commonly said, we have — we are because we are integral portions of the universe, which is septenary. Therefore we are seven-principled entities ourselves. Just as in a little child the principles flow forth into ever-enlarging manifestation as increasing age comes, so do we as human beings grow into an ever greater enlargement of our sevenfold being as we evolve through the ages. What happens is that surrounding nature, which means surrounding hierarchies and the various hierarchies of dhyani-buddhas or planetary regents or what not, aid us, foster us, help us, and as it were feed us. But we ourselves are individuals because component integral parts of the universe. Yet for all this, the question asked contains a solid substratum of occult truth, for it is just from surrounding nature that we draw all that we are, and it is thus that we are component, integral parts of it. Thus, in a sense, we can say that although we are intrinsically and through eternity monadic essences of a septenary character, yet we draw as from fountains the different parts of our septenary constitution from these different dhyanic hierarchies.

Now the same thing exists with regard to a planetary chain or a solar chain or a galaxy. Every such unit is an individual, a septenary or a duodenary, according to the way we count; but the surrounding influences and powers do foster, help us, feed us, as it were, by their life energies, and thus compose and build us. So it is quite correct to say that the globes of a chain or the chains in a solar system, are builded up and guarded, fostered, and fed — let us take our own planetary chain as a concrete example — by the regents of the other planetary chains. Those other regents do so by a constant interchange of influences, of energy, of substances, or of lifeatoms. But each chain is an individual septenary or duodenary.

Then likewise the various dhyani-chohans and dhyani-buddhas of a chain are integral parts of the hierarchy of that chain, from the highest running downwards through all the different grades of our own planetary-chain hierarchy. Take our own globe D as a very concrete example in point. Being a member of the earth-chain, its main source of influence or of life, outside of its own inner fountain of vitality, comes from the other globes of our chain, originally from our own chain-regent and the hierarch of our chain and all the subordinate powers under that regent. But every other planetary chain in the solar system aids in building and "feeding"

our globe D, just as every other planetary chain in our solar system aids in building our entire chain. We reciprocate in identic manner by giving of our life essence as a chain, and as a globe D, to all the other planetary chains and globes of our solar system. So there is a constant interchange, interconnection, interblending, of life energies. Thus our own planetary-chain hierarch is the summit or acme or hyparxis of the hierarchy of our planetary chain, which means under our own planetary regent and under the subordinate chain regent of our globe D. There is a hierarchy of subordinate intelligences constantly at work, each to each.

Well now, it has been exceedingly interesting to me to listen to the stenographic record of these fine old meetings we held together in the early days. And you know, Companions, one of the thoughts that ran through my mind as I listened to the reading was this: how greatly have we all evolved in understanding since those times! We now appreciate, I think, very clearly the difficulties in understanding the intricate points of teaching which then faced us. I mean that I doubt very much if today these same questions would be asked, because our understanding has grown. We see a good deal of the unnecessary aspect of some of the questions that we have heard read. We understand the teaching better, we have a larger grasp of it.

-----

April 25, 1939

The Atmic Consciousness

The consciousness passed through by the monads on each one, and therefore on all the different globes, is swabhavic to that globe. Yet above and beyond in dignity and in swabhavic consciousness is the consciousness of the atman which is universal; and this consciousness can be reached by the monads on any one of the globes. It is the highest consciousness of all.

Thus, although during our long evolutionary journey towards perfection we must pass through these different globe-consciousnesses, in other words as monads must develop and perfect the relative consciousness rays belonging to each globe, yet on any one globe and beginning now there is always the atmic consciousness which we can intuit, and which certain rare individuals even imbody. This is the supreme consciousness not only of our own individual monad, but of the chain.

If you notice, the great spiritual teaching of the Masters of Wisdom throughout time has been an emphasis on just this point. Make yourself at one with your Father in Heaven, in other words with the atman. Thus you will find ineffable peace, ineffable wisdom, ranges of consciousness coextensive with the galaxy. Any one of us can begin to do that now on globe D, on globe E, on globe F; and on the higher globes our capacity for so doing is merely enlarged.

But it is our right, our duty so to do now, just as much as it will be on the highest of the globes, and the marvel of this wonder is that we can do it now. It is a strange paradox that while we shall in due course of evolution be obliged, in order to obtain a complete rounding out of our monadic consciousness, to pass through every globe of the chain, time and time again, during each chain-round, yet at any moment on any globe, any monad which has attained self-consciousness can self-consciously begin to develop the atmic consciousness.

-------

October 13, 1936

Lost Souls and "Failures"

Lost souls are those egos whose link with the higher part of their respective constitutions has been broken.

There being therefore nothing linking them with the higher part of the constitution, they sink, they drop ultimately into the Pit, into the Eighth Sphere, into the Planet of Death; and because it is the egoic soul which does this, we speak of lost souls.

Now I am going to put our thought right on the frontier of deeper teaching, and I have to speak with immense reserve, so please do not fasten your attention so much on my words, but try to get my meaning. Lost souls

are what the Masters and HPB have at various times called failures. These lost souls are spoken of as being annihilated; at other times as being wiped out; at other times as sinking into the Pit or Eighth Sphere. These words, these phrases, Companions, show you that these lost souls are merely annihilated, or wiped out, so far as this cosmic plane is concerned. They are failures which sink into a lower cosmic plane. The word annihilation, the phrase wiped out, do not mean that they are literally destroyed so that nothing whatever remains. They are destroyed out of this plane, annihilated out of this plane. Their link with their former higher nature on and in this hierarchy has been broken. They drop into a lower hierarchy as failures.

In one of the letters of the Master you will read a very significant passage there wherein the great teacher tells us that some of the beings who initiate evolution on our own planetary chain are failures from higher spheres.

Actually they are lost souls from higher spheres. To us they are spiritual beings.

"Now there are — there must be 'failures' in the etherial races of the many classes of Dyan-Chohans or Devas as well as among men. But still as these failures are too far progressed and spiritualized to be thrown back forcibly from their Dyan-Chohanship into the vortex of a new primordial evolution through the lower kingdoms — this then happens. When a new solar system is to be evolved these Dyan-Chohans are (remember the Hindu allegory of the Fallen Devas hurled by Siva into Andarah who are allowed by Parabrahm to consider it as an intermediate state where they may prepare themselves by a series of rebirths in that sphere for a higher state — a new regeneration) born in by the influx 'ahead' of the elementals and remain as a latent or inactive spiritual force in the aura of the nascent world of a new system until the stage of human evolution is reached. Then Karma has reached them and they will have to accept to the last drop in the bitter cup of retribution. Then they become an active Force, and commingle with the Elementals, or progressed entities of the pure animal kingdom to develope little by little the full type of humanity.

In this commingling they lose their high intelligence and spirituality of Devaship to regain them in the end of the seventh ring in the seventh round." — The Mahatma Letters, p. 87

Note how full of meaning is the phrase you so often hear me use, that man is a composite entity; that he is not, as many used to think he was, a soul and a body as the Christians teach; but that in his constitution, whether we look upon it as sevenfold or twelvefold, there are a number of different monads, egos, souls.

Now, when such a soul or ego or monad breaks the antaskarana linking it with the higher portions of its present constitution, there being nothing then to hold it up, it sinks into absolute matter and finally is annihilated so far as this hierarchy is concerned, so far as that constitution is concerned, and sinks into the hierarchy beneath. Such a being is a lost soul and a failure.

The first planet into which it sinks is technically called the Planet of Death. This planet is otherwise called the Pit, and by other names such as the Eighth Sphere, meaning the sphere not belonging to our own sevenfold planetary chain, but a planet belonging to a chain beneath ours; and because it sinks downwards it is called sinking into the Pit. These are but ways of phrasing the thought; and I repeat that such lost souls are failures with us, in our chain, on our globe. They enter the lower — well, I think I have said enough. But have you got the thought that these lost souls are not absolutely wiped out in the literal sense of it so that nothing whatever remains? They are annihilated and wiped out in so far as our chain is concerned. Therefore our globe D being the lowest one, it is on this globe that such failures for the chain take place. Such failures or lost souls sink into the chain beneath us.

This is touching on deep teaching, but I really do not see how the subject can properly be understood, after listening to the discussion tonight, without throwing this extra ray of light on it. We are met continually with this difficulty. Our teachings are so wonderful that to have a perfectly complete understanding of the simplest of our teachings you would have to be a Master. But we can all have various degrees of light upon a teaching, each one of us according to his understanding, and according to his inner development.

I might say as a rider in conclusion that this last thought, this last fact of occult doctrine, should teach us to be modest in our statements of our theosophical verities. For all we know, we may read a teaching in one of our standard books and think we have understood it, and doubtless we have to a certain extent. But let not one of us think we know all about it. Almost certainly there is a great deal more to know which the book does not state, but which is to be known some day if you win onwards.

So even these lost souls, which in another sense we can describe as monads which are too heavily weighted with matter longer to endure in our chain, sink as failures into the Pit, wherein they begin a new evolutionary cyclic course in the manner in which the failures that the Master speaks of — failures out of a higher chain into ours — help to build this chain and guide the evolution of beings inferior to us.

Then if you will remember also one really extraordinary and yet very significant fact: that we call evil in our chain that which is out of harmony here. As dear KT used to phrase it, there is a spark of divinity even in the most degraded, which is but another way of stating the sublime truth that even the lost souls, the failures, dropped monads, are out of tune with us and therefore workers of evil here. They cannot live here, the atmosphere is too thin and ethereal for them to breathe. But they drop by attraction to their own habitat lower than ours, where actually they can be workers of good. Isn't that a strange paradox? But don't get the idea for a moment that the lower chain is all evil in the sense of our chain. Evil is inharmony where you are. It is being crooked, twisted, distorted, out of tune, and therefore a discord where you are.

All in the universe is ultimately derivative from divinity. How then about evil? Do you see the application of this thought right there? Evil is inharmony. When two things are inharmonious together, they are evil to each other, and rightly so. When two things harmoniously conjoin in sympathy — and think what sympathy means, the Latin word is compassion — in unity of purpose, unity of thought, unity of feeling, then you have harmony and beauty, sympathy and right. Things are no longer for these two or more twisted or distorted.

Things are straight. But that same entity put in a different environment somewhere in the universe might be utterly inharmonious and therefore a worker of evil there.

You have also heard the statement that the Masters have made in the same connection, that the Guardian Wall guards humanity against evils of which it has no cognizance. What are these evils? They are simply entities and powers and influences and forces which, were they to enter our human sphere, would wreak evil upon us because they are not coordinate with us. They are not in sympathy with us, though in themselves just as good as we are. In their own spheres, in their own lands, they are no more evil than we are. If a human being, for instance, could go into some other planet he might be a worker of evil there, because he would disturb the harmonious relationship prevailing on that other planet. He might be considered a demon, and in a sense he would be there because he would be out of harmonious relationship, out of tune, with the new environment.

Consequently the Guardian Wall on such hypothetical planet has to protect that planet against the ingress of impacting monads. Then we should be evil there, not because we are essentially bad, but because we should bring disharmony into that new environment. We should be out of tune there.

Make the application of that thought to these failures: they could not make the grade with us. They are out of tune here. They have proved it. Whatever their struggles may have been, that merely shows the fundamental essence of divinity within them; but they could not be harmonious here, and their yearnings were for other spheres. Their attractions were thither, and thither they dropped. Of course, in later evolutionary ages they will work out of those lower spheres and by a transmutation of substance and feeling and energy they will come up to where we are again and then march forwards.

I have often wondered how many times you and I as human monads may not have been such failures in the past, before we passed the ring-pass-not, went beyond it and became native and familiar where now we are, so that we can be good here because we can be harmonious here — in relationship and sympathy and compassion with what is here. The world, the universe, is full of mysteries of all kinds. So you see another reason for the teaching of the great sages that even for the evil man we should have no hatreds. We should have the heart of compassion, the understanding mind. We should be pitiful, never condemning, never judging. Condemn the evil, the distortion, the disharmony, the twistings, because that is wrong, it means the thing is out of tune. But do not condemn the unfortunate monad which finds itself in a wrong environment. I do hope I have made myself understood on this very subtle and difficult point.

-----

June 27, 1937

Soul Loss: A Dual Tragedy

What is the Inner God of that which sinks to the Eighth Sphere? The answer to that is a simple one if you will remember the teaching that everything in the universe, every entitative being, even an atom, has at its heart divinity. Aham asmi Parabrahma: I, in my inmost, am parabrahman — the inner god of the highest god in the universe, and of every failure that sinks to the Eighth Sphere, to the Pit, to the Planet of Death — call it by what name you like.

Now then, the tragedy of this soul loss is dual. It is a tragedy to the sevenfold constitution of the entity, a man for instance, because it is a violent disjunction of the upper triad from the lower quaternary, of the soul from its spirit. HPB thus uses the term lost soul because it is a lost human soul. It is this which sinks into the hierarchy or planetary chain below ours, as a failure here, but actually as a spiritual being there — a thought which will become clear when you realize that our chain is on higher cosmic planes than is the chain next beneath ours.

Now both the upper triad and the lower quaternary, according to the later teaching we have, we understand to consist of monads: the divine monad, the spiritual monad, the human or psychical monad, the animal monad, the astral-vital monad, and the vital-physical monad. Even the body could not exist as an entitative being unless it were the expression of a continuing force which is a monad in one of the lowest monadic degrees of evolution.

Now then, when this disjunction takes place, due to a soul loss, the upper triad of that constitution of the man as he formerly was must lose ages of time in evolving a new lower quaternary in order that it may manifest again as a human being, as it did before. That is a tragedy on account of the time lost and for the waiting that the upper triad must endure. It is a tragedy likewise to the lower quaternary which sinks into lower cosmic planes, because it must thereupon evolve forth from within itself, bring into expression, a new upper triad so to speak, in order that it anew may become a complex composite septenary entity, as it was before the soul loss on earth took place. In other words it must make its inner god manifest in its life on the lower cosmic planes, otherwise in the Planet of Death, otherwise in the chain beneath ours. So it is a double tragedy, the tragedy is dual.

The idea may perhaps be illustrated by this: suppose it were the custom amongst us human beings to send members of our human family who would not accord with the laws established among mankind to be the chiefs over tribes of savages. They have lost the advantage of unity with their fellows of similar intellectual power, similar spiritual yearnings, and more or less similar evolutionary developments. That is a terrific loss to a man whose mind is awakened. On the other hand, they come as higher beings, as leaders, to the tribes of savages over whom they are placed. That will illustrate what happens to the beings who are failures here, who come as spiritual beings to the chain below. There are beings amongst us who were failures in the chain above ours. But we look upon them as god-men. You see how nature is consistent throughout.

I might put the matter in another way. A monad evolves an egoity or ego for the purpose of self-expression and learning on a plane. This ego in its turn emanates its auric atmosphere for the purpose of contacting the lifeatoms of that plane. This ego's auric atmosphere is what we call the soul. It is precisely this egoic auric atmosphere or the human soul, not the human ego, which is destroyed, annihilated, ground over in nature's laboratory, because it is useless in the chain below ours to which the ego sinks when it becomes a lost soul. It is useful only here on the proper plane of those lifeatoms which composed the human soul.

Therefore you see the reason why it has been said that the lost soul is ground to pieces, annihilated, is dissipated in nature's laboratory. That soul was its link with the upper triad and its link in the other direction with the lower parts of the lower quaternary: the astral body and the physical body, the man on earth. The teaching about the lost soul is really very simple, but because it verges upon higher teaching which must necessarily be kept secret, only hints have been given. It is these illuminating hints, however, which have so fired the thoughts, the imagination, that we instinctively feel there is more to this teaching about the lost soul than has been stated.

Meeting 34

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Thirty-Four

Answers to Correspondence

Student — I have inferred that the rays which the reincarnating egos send to the different globes of the earth-chain in making the inner rounds are the inhabitants of the respective globes. Is this correct?

G. de P. — Making certain reservations with regard to the form in which this question is put, I think that a general answer would be affirmative.

In the first place, this question refers to the inner rounds and not to the outer rounds, and this point must be kept clearly in mind. In the next place, to say that the different rays imbodied by the reincarnating egos as they reach each one of the globes of the earth-chain in serial succession are the inhabitants of the respective globes, is to state the facts altogether too inclusively. I mean that there are other inhabitants or living entities on the various globes of the earth-chain which are not the rays from the reincarnating egos mentioned here, and whose rays when imbodied on earth are human beings.

Just as on earth we have imbodied entities which are humans, others which are beasts, others which belong to the vegetable kingdom, others again to the mineral kingdom, and three other ranges of entities which belong to the three elemental kingdoms, just so is it on the other globes of the earth-chain.

It would be correct to say that the rays which the reincarnating egos send forth to the different globes of the earth-chain form collectively a part of the inhabitants of the respective globes, but not all the inhabitants of those globes.

However, the question on the whole shows an intuitively correct understanding of the general process. It may be more easily understood if it be remembered that our own globe D of the earth-chain is but one of a number belonging to this earth-chain, and that every human being of globe D is a ray emitted by each one's own reincarnating ego. This ray is the human being.

Now I come to a matter of the first importance in connection with a proper understanding of this answer. It would be taking an entirely erroneous view of the procedure followed by the reincarnating ego, as it passes from globe to globe of the earth-chain, to suppose that the reincarnating ego reimbodies itself on each globe, and is in all respects and without any change of color of consciousness exactly the same individual that it is on globe D, our earth, or on any other globe. Although it is the same individual reincarnating ego in each and every instance, the ray which it sends forth, being a ray of consciousness, or more accurately of consciousness-substance, is of necessity appropriate to, fit for, and evoked by the globe of the earth-chain to which such ray goes, or upon which it descends for imbodiment. In other words, each such ray is a phase or complex of consciousness, issuing, however, from the same reincarnating ego.

Perhaps this rather abstruse idea can be better understood if you will consider yourself as you are here on earth and living from day to day. On Monday you may be in a very optimistic, aggressively hopeful, and joyful mood or state of consciousness. On Friday you may be in an exactly opposite mood or state of consciousness. Now these two phases or complexes of consciousness are as opposite as one can readily imagine two things to be, and yet they both pertain to the same personality, and the stream of consciousness in each instance issues forth from the same individuality. To say that the man of Monday is the identic man of Friday is to utter an untruth, for the two states of consciousness are by no means the same.

Or take another illustration. A man, let us say twenty-five to forty-five years old, may be a selfish, egoistic, materialistic, and perhaps even a more or less depraved character. But something happens which causes a complete reversal of thought and feeling. Perhaps some great affliction falls upon this individual, causing an entire change of outlook on life, so that from forty-five to the day of his death he is a man who has entirely new ideas in life; he has had, as it were, a revolution of consciousness within. He is now kindly, strives to be unselfish, loves his fellowmen, takes a delight in nature's glories and beauties, and finds an absorbing interest

in scientific and religious and philosophic ideas which meant nothing to him in the first part of his life. Here we have two entirely different, even opposite, phases or complexes of consciousness, and yet both belong to the same personality, and both are manifestations of one stream of consciousness issuing from above-within, or within-above. Just so is it with the rays from the reincarnating ego taking form or imbodiment on the different globes of the planetary chain.

It becomes evident, therefore, that while it is the same reincarnating ego which passes from globe to globe and sends forth a ray from itself to take imbodiment on each one of the globes of the planetary chain, nevertheless each such ray is appropriate to, fit for, and of the character of the globe on which it imbodies itself. Consequently, it would be wrong to say that you or I, or any other human being — each one of us being a ray from a reincarnating ego fit for and appropriate to this globe D — is the same exact and unchanged entity which takes imbodiment on any other one of the globes of the planetary chain. In each case the reincarnating ego is the same, but the ray which issues forth from the reincarnating ego, although in each case ourself, is nevertheless different because of the change of phase of consciousness.

It is the same reincarnating ego for each and every globe of the planetary chain of earth, but manifesting not as a different individuality, but as the same individuality in another phase of its consciousness, or in another mask or persona, as the Latins would say. In other words another personality with all the psychic and psychological and vital-astral phases of conditioned existence that each such new personality brings about, and indeed is. A man in a vivid dream, for instance, knows himself to be the same consciousness, but often actually feels that he is almost a stranger to himself — realizes that there are untouched deeps or ranges of consciousness, even in the ray which he is.

Student — The consciousness of our reincarnating ego is limited to the earth-chain. Has our monad or spiritual ego in its constitution a reincarnating ego or dhyan-chohan belonging to each of the sacred planets in addition to that belonging to the earth-chain?

G. de P. — This is an exceedingly interesting question. Here the range of manifestation has shifted from the inner rounds to the outer rounds. I am glad to see that the distinction is clearly drawn between the reincarnating ego on the one hand, and the spiritual monad or ego on the other hand. This spiritual monad or ego has its range and function of consciousness in and over the entire solar system; but due to past karma, a karma dating even from previous solar kalpas, it is more particularly connected with and bound to those seven individual houses of Life which the ancients called the seven sacred planets.

You ask in brief whether this spiritual monad or ego emits, or contains in its constitution, a different reincarnating ego belonging to each one of the seven sacred planetary chains, in addition to the reincarnating ego belonging to the earth-chain. The answer to this question is a decided affirmative. Each one of the planetary chains of the seven sacred planets is the home, or field of action, of a reimbodying ego which is a child of the spiritual monad, in exactly the same way that the reimbodying ego of the earth-chain is a child of that monad.

I ought perhaps to call attention here to the fact that to speak of a reincarnating ego for a planetary chain, such as that of earth, is in all probability an incorrect way of phrasing the matter. We humans are imbodied in flesh, or we undergo reincarnation on this globe D. But on other planets the bodies of the reimbodying entities may not be composed of flesh like our bodies, but of other material; bodies indeed, but not flesh bodies; and the same qualifying reservations should be made even with regard to the other globes on our own earth planetary chain. Flesh belongs to our earth, to globe D of our planetary chain. But do the rays emitted by the reimbodying ego of our planetary chain imbody themselves in vehicles of flesh, for instance on globe F or G, or again on globe A or B? Be careful, therefore, as I have so often urged before, in employing the proper words to express your meaning. To talk about a reincarnated globe, or a reincarnated planet, is entirely wrong.

Such monadic rays are indeed reimbodied, but they are not reinfleshed, reincarnated.

Furthermore, just as the consciousness and function of our reincarnating ego on this globe D of earth is limited to the earth-chain, just so is the reimbodying ego on any other planetary chain, such as one of the seven sacred planets, limited in consciousness and function to its planetary chain. Now here again I must recall your attention to something which I have iterated and iterated and repeated and repeated and repeated

almost ad nauseam, so that my critics are even complaining of my repetitions. They do not understand that even though I repeat and repeat and repeat, I do so with a purpose — to drive certain truths home; and that despite these constant repetitions and reiterations, I have the greatest difficulty in hammering the truths home that I am endeavoring to fix in the minds of our students and in the minds of the readers of my books and lectures. Literary elegance is very pleasing, but it is a matter of no importance in my eyes when I speak or write as a teacher. Doubtless, were my intelligence far greater than it is, and my capacity far larger, I could state a fact once and for all in such brilliantly illuminating phraseology that the idea would be carried over even into minds which are dull, and repetition then would be unnecessary. But alas, I have not this capacity nor such amazing intelligence, and I have to do the best I can to hand on the teaching even as I have received it.

Now the matter to which I am referring here, is the fact that every monad is what may be called a creative entity continually issuing forth from itself streams of children-monads, and that each one of such children-monads follows its own evolutionary course until, the great consummatum est of the solar universe. Thus it is that the divine monad has hosts of children-monads, each one of which is a spiritual monad or ego. Each entity of these hosts of spiritual monads or egos, being in its turn a creative monad, gives birth to its children-monads, rays from itself, and these children-monads in their turn give birth to other hosts of children-monads.

Indeed, it is in just this manner that man's entire constitution is builded and composed. The very lifeatoms, not only of man's body but of all his other intermediate vehicles, are in their essence such children-monads, each one a learning entity, a growing entity, an evolving being.

Hence, as can readily be seen, the spiritual monad or ego has as its children-monads numbers of reimbodying monads or egos which, in the case of the question that we have just been considering, are contained in its constitution as the entities which reimbody themselves in the different planetary chains — in our own cases being men of earth, as reincarnating egos. The questioner limits her query, however, to the seven sacred planets, in and to or through each of which the spiritual monad emits, or sends, or imbodies a reimbodying ego.

Finally, I should state that each such child-monad commences its career in any solar kalpa or manvantara as a superspiritual elemental, and after passing through the innumerable myriads of imbodiments or manifestations in the various realms and planes and worlds of that universal solar system, emerges at the end of the kalpa as a self-conscious divinity. Beginning its career as an unself-conscious god-spark, it ends it for that kalpa as a self-conscious god.

Student — We have been told that our monad is limited in consciousness and function to the whole solar system. Does this mean that it sends rays to, and has in its constitution a reimbodying ego belonging to planetary chains of the whole solar system as well as to those of the seven sacred planets?

G. de P. — I am able to give to your question a general but brief answer with a distinctly affirmative yes. But after having given this answer, I must immediately qualify it, lest there arise in your mind very subtle misunderstandings, by stating the other fact that for any one solar kalpa or manvantara the spiritual monad or ego, although ranging in consciousness and function over the entire solar system, in a general way is limited for that solar kalpa or manvantara to the relatively small number of planetary chains with which it is for the time being in most intimate and straitest karmic relations — the particular case to which you refer being our earth, the seven sacred planets, and the sun and moon, making ten in all.

I might say a little more in this connection. Remember that Father Sun has often been spoken of by the ancients as surrounded with twelve rays or glories, as being composed inclusively of twelve ranges of consciousness-substance. Shall we call these worlds or planes or globes? Yes, they are all three, and as the Sun is the heart of our solar system, it is obvious that all minor entities under the sway and dominance of Father Sun must themselves be twelvefold in range of consciousness, because belonging to the same corporeal unity.

In Fundamentals of the Esoteric Philosophy, especially in chapter xliv, I call attention to the astrological correspondences between the Signs, the twelve constellations of the zodiac, and the seven planets. The five globes of the twelve which are above the horizontal line on page 487 of Fundamentals are connected with

five planets invisible to men, and for which in this particular diagram I have substituted the planets Saturn, Venus, Jupiter, Mercury, and Mars. These five known planets have very close spiritual and psychological correspondences with the five secret planets of which I can say no more; and hence are actually substitutes for the five unknown planets, unseen by men and utterly unknown in modern astronomy. In a similar way in this same diagram the sun and the moon are properly used as substitutes, because, as individual celestial bodies, they have very close and intimate spiritual and psychological relations with the two other secret planets for which they act as substitutes. The diagram as given is accurate and correct, and can stand exactly as it is, having the further advantage of showing that the five superplanets above the horizontal line of the diagram are reflected in the four lower planes of the solar cosmos. In other words, just as there are twelve constellations or signs of the zodiac, so there are twelve globes of our planetary chain.

Student — We have also been told that the range of consciousness for the inner god or divine monad is our home-universe. Does that mean that in its constitution there are as many monads or spiritual egos as there are planetary chains in our home-universe?

G. de P. — Here again you are passing the ring-pass-not. Nevertheless, it is always my duty to give some answer to every earnest question. I will therefore reply that the proper answer to your question is yes; but instead of saying planetary chains in this connection, you should have said solar systems, because the range of a spiritual ego is over and in the solar system.

Perhaps the following reflections may help to clarify my necessarily restricted and somewhat vague answer.

Our home-universe is everything that is comprised within the encircling zone of the Milky Way. Now the Milky Way, according to modern astronomers, contains — so the latest estimates of these astronomers say —

some thirty billions or more of suns, of which our own Sun is but one. In the wisdom of the gods which we call theosophy, every sun is known to be the beating heart and creative mind of a solar system, as our sun is of our System.

Next, as the range in consciousness and function of the divine monad or inner god is through and over the home-universe, therefore every one of these thirty billions or more of suns, that is solar systems, is intimately connected by divine, spiritual, astral, and even physical bonds, with every such inner god, or divine monad, or ego. They are all life of one life: all of the same life, all of the same bone, the same "flesh," the same substance, the same origin and destiny, all of the same fundamental incomprehensible, superdivine consciousness or Parabrahman. Hence, as the range of consciousness of a spiritual monad or ego is over a solar system, you now have the astounding fact before you that the divine monad or inner god, has, as its children "created" by itself, or flowing forth from itself, hosts which number at least thirty billions or more; and this number does not include the totality by any means. Moreover, each such spiritual monad or ego is intimately related to its own parent sun or star.

Furthermore, each such solar system of our home-universe has its own respective numbers of planetary chains; and for each such chain there is a reimbodying ego — what on earth we call reincarnating ego. Pause, then, in thought over this stupendous and amazing picture conjured from the treasure house of reality, and laid before you for your reverence. How great, indeed, how vast and sublime, are the illimitable fields of the consciousness from which man flows forth as a tiny, evolving spark. All the universe is in you, as I have so often repeated and repeated.

Student — From what you have written, is it not correct to draw an analogy between the spiritual monad or ego which sends a reimbodying ego to each of the planetary chains, and the reincarnating ego on the earth-chain, for instance, which sends rays of itself to each globe of the earth-chain?

As the reincarnating ego of the earth-chain sends a different ray from itself to each of the earth-chain globes, is it the same with each of the other sacred planets — that the reimbodying ego of each planetary chain sends a different ray from itself to each one of the separate globes belonging to that planetary chain?

G. de P. — Yes, there is a very close analogy, for it is but a repetitive functioning of the working of the fundamental consciousness obeying the primal law or impulse of the cosmos. In other words, what happens in the great in the cosmos will be repeated in the small in the same cosmos. The spiritual monad or ego, which

has its range over the entire solar system, emits from itself a reimbodying ego in each one of the planetary chains, and more particularly, in so far as we are concerned, in each one of what in esotericism are called the seven sacred planetary chains. Following exactly the same general rule of action, any such reimbodying ego belonging to a planetary chain sends forth from itself a ray or globe-ego or monad which has its sphere of activity on the globe to which it is sent, and to which in a sense it belongs.

Mark well, however, that just as every one of these planetary reimbodying egos derives its essential life from its parent the spiritual monad or ego, of which latter it is a ray, in exactly the same way the ray finding imbodiment on any globe of a planetary chain derives its essential or fundamental life from the reimbodying ego of that planetary chain. The analogy, therefore, is extremely close; and if you understand the working of one, you understand the working of the other.

Student — In previous ES meetings, you have pointed out that the keeping of pets is injurious to these animals as hastening their evolution beyond the normal. Is it not possible also that there is an injury to the human being because of the interchange of lifeatoms that must take place between beast and human who are in such close physical contact, and that some of the beast lifeatoms may find permanent lodgment in the human?

G. de P. — No, there is no permanent injury to the human being, because no lifeatom can find permanent lodgment in a human being unless such lifeatom is the offspring of the human being's own monad. All other lifeatoms pass through the human being, and very frequently, but do not find permanent lodgment in him. Of course, there is the minor question of the temporary injury that may be caused to a human being by too close an association with a beast pet, but I here refer solely to the more intimate interchange of rather gross physical lifeatoms that as a rule find their attractions to beast bodies.

In sheer justice to all phases of the question, I must add that in one respect a human being's character may actually be a little softened and made more gentle by the affection which such human being may have for some beloved pet. There are many instances in human story of men and women whose one saving grace seems to have been the pouring out of love or affection on some pet. We can say that at least to this extent the heart life has been awakened. Admitting all this, the affirmation must nevertheless be made, and strongly made, that in the general as well as in the particular the keeping of pets is injurious to both pet and master, but especially injurious to the pet. Many people feel a little sensitive about this question, because they dearly love their pets and often make companions of them; and every lover of animals knows how dear a faithful dog can become.

The duty of the theosophist, and especially so of one trying to lead the chela-life, is however quite contrary to the impulses which arise out of the keeping of pets. It is the chela's main objective in his training to free both heart and mind from particular and isolated attachments, and to make his life or affection, as well as his mental interests, absolutely universal. This objective, as becomes immediately obvious, is really divine. The personal must become merged in the impersonal, the restricted must become the universal, before the magnificent faculties and powers latent in the human being can be called forth into action. Personal restrictions, personal affections, personal loves, personal hatreds, all of them without any exception whatsoever, whether they be good, bad, or indifferent, condense greatly the sheaths through which the rays of the monadic essence pass in the constitution of the human being. Such personal limitations coarsen the fabric of substance of which these sheaths are builded, make them more dense and concreted. Hence it becomes immediately clear that instead of an intensification of one's personal feelings and views, they should be made impersonal, universal, unrestricted — in other words the shackles should be thrown off, and all one's strength put in an endeavor to clarify and etherealize the sheaths or vehicles of one's inner constitution. One's sympathies must pass from the personal to the universal, and one's interests, pari passu, must follow one's sympathies.

Student — We know that alcohol is injurious to the constitution because of its harmful effects; but can you not tell us something of the character or essential quality of alcohol that makes it injurious?

G. de P. — The reason why alcohol is injurious is because alcohol is a derivative of death; it is a product of decay; it is so to say the ooze of death. We may call it a condensation in a liquid of concreted lunar

influences. Its sickly sweet odor is exactly the same as one who has sensitive nostrils may sense in the presence of decaying flesh or even vegetable substances. Alcohol when taken into the body has an immediate effect on the brain and nervous system, deadening and stupefying them. More particularly it has a most dangerous and unfortunate action upon the pineal and pituitary glands.

The fumes of alcohol to one who has undergone chela training have a horrible and very distressing effect —

both disgusting and nauseating. Finally, I might add that alcohol feeds the lower evil flames of the matter-fire which, although it has its necessary place in the lowest realms of matter, is really the dregs of the pranas.

A confirmed dipsomaniac who suffers from the diseased state of the brain and nervous system called delirium tremens, is one whose nervous system has by this disease become attuned to similar vibrations in the lowest ranges of the astral light, which thus enables him to perceive or to feel, or as people say to see, some of the horrible, grotesque, and repulsive inhabitants or denizens of the lower regions of the astral light. The normal human being whose nervous tissues are not thus degenerated is unable to perceive or to become conscious of these lower astral regions, because the normal or functional vibrations of the nervous system are above these regions, and consequently there is no synchronous vibratory contact or fusion of consciousnesses.

Student — I am sorry that there are still some points that are not clear in my mind as regards kama-loka and the second death. When the higher triad separates itself from the kama-rupa, does the higher triad then enter the devachan, so that the higher part of the ego is in devachan at the same time that the lower part is disintegrating in kama-loka; or does the second death occur when the existence in kama-loka comes to an end?

G. de P. — When the higher triad separates itself from the kama-rupa, the higher triad thereupon immediately begins its devachanic existence, first in the lower part of it, then increases in intensity as the higher triad ascends to the higher parts of the devachan. Meanwhile, the kama-rupa which has been left behind is but an empty shell, and thereupon begins immediately to disintegrate. The separation of the higher triad from the kama-rupa is the second death. Just as the life energies quit the physical body and it thereupon expires and begins to decay, which is the first death; just so in the kama-loka, when the higher triad separates itself from the kama-rupa this is the second death, and the kama-rupa thereupon is a shell and begins immediately to disintegrate.

No, it would be impossible for the higher part of the ego to be in devachan at the same time that the lower part of the ego is in the kama-loka. Please remember that the higher part of the ego is the spiritual part, and that the lower part of the ego is the human soul. It is the human soul which has the devachan, but it cannot have the devachan until, joined with the spiritual part of the ego thus forming the higher triad, it enters the devachan.

There is a little confusion in your mind which I think lies in the fact you seem to imagine that the excarnate human entity has a human consciousness in the kama-loka by and through what is the kama-rupa. This is only the case at rare intervals, and in the instances of black magicians, or very, very evil men. When death occurs, the human soul, which is the lower part of the ego, becomes totally unconscious, although of course the spiritual part of the ego is as much and as fully conscious on its own plane as ever it was. This complete unconsciousness of the human ego still linked with the kama-rupa continues for a time, depending upon the individual. If the individual was very spiritual in earth-life, then there is practically no human consciousness at all in the kama-loka. If the human being during the last earth-life was very gross and evil, then there is a rather intense kama-lokic consciousness; because in this last case the human ego soon after death becomes conscious that it is dead and is in the astral world. The third case is that of the average human being, neither very spiritual nor very gross and evil, where the consciousness or sense of being alive in the kama-loka is very slight, more like a vague dream which lasts until the higher triad throws off the kama-rupa — which is the second death — and rises into the devachan.

Student — The last sentence of your reply has cleared the subject for me. I now understand that the second death does not occur until the entity has finished its sojourn or state of consciousness, long or short as the case may be, in the kama-loka; and that after the second death the devachanic state of consciousness then begins.

G. de P. — I might add here that the existence of the average human being in the kama-loka, before the devachan begins, before the second death occurs, also depends upon the individual case. With very spiritual men, the stay in the kama-loka is exceedingly short, a few months or weeks possibly; in the cases of the noblest human beings, perhaps only a few days or hours. On the other hand, the average human being may remain anywhere from a year to several years in the kama-loka; but this would be the very average human being who has had, during the earth-life last past, comparatively few intense spiritual aspirations.

Again, in the cases of very evil men, men very gross and material, with instincts strongly attached to material life, the stay in the kama-loka may last for a long time. Cases are known where the kama-lokic stay has been for a hundred and fifty years, before the second death is completed. But these last cases are exceedingly rare.

The teaching is, after all, very simple indeed. Just remember that the more spiritual a man is, the shorter the kama-lokic state. The more materially-minded he is, the longer the kama-lokic state. It is in every case a matter of attraction. The kama-loka after all is but the "shadow" of earth-life.

Student — This question about willing to cut short one's devachan, and other similar things, such as the Masters do, is asked of you so frequently, and was mentioned at a recent meeting. It appears to me that we are apt to minimize the difficulty of such acts, and that we are prone to imagine that all that is necessary in the premises is to decide that we shall do so-and-so, and it will then come to pass. But surely we can draw the comparison with a man who wills to become a physician. His effort does not stop with his intention, but he has years and years of hard study to go through before reaching the accomplishment of what he has willed. In the same way, I suppose that it takes lives and lives of active service for mankind, and unremitting efforts in self-conquest, before our willing to do acts similar to the Masters' has sufficient strength to insure accomplishment.

G. de P. — The last two sentences of this question, my dear Companion, are absolutely true. In order that we may rise to the plane, spiritually and intellectually speaking, whereon the Masters live, it should be obvious to everyone that we have to pass through incarnation after incarnation of absolute devotion to truth and loyalty to truth, and in absolute devotion to service for mankind, and, indeed, for all that lives. Truth, and the yearning to lay on the altar of service all that we have and are, must become one's very being before we can reach mahatmaship.

I do not say this by way of discouraging anyone, because my desire is to encourage all. Nevertheless, you should begin the new life, and begin at once; and who knows what past karma you may have of a splendid and lofty type, which, now that you have definitely set your feet upon the path, may be behind you as a great spiritual force, impelling, urging, driving you forward and, indeed, preparing and smoothing the Way before your feet.

It is, however, absurd to imagine that any student can pass from being an ordinary human to mahatmahood in one lifetime. That is simply not possible. It takes incarnation after incarnation from the time when one first definitely begins before mahatmahood is obtained. I speak here of course of one who has in this life for the first time in all his karmic history definitely set his face to accomplish this noblest of human objectives. As a matter of fact, however, all genuine theosophists have begun the path in other lives; and no one can tell how many lives ago the choice was definitely made to go forwards to join the ranks of our teachers and elder brothers.

The question of cutting short one's devachan by willpower is but one part of the training for chelaship. Even a single and strongly willed determination to shorten the devachan will indeed have its effect, especially if the same resolve had been taken in previous lives, so that there is now an accumulated energy behind the aspiration. All such acts are of course difficult to do, and it is foolish to minimize the difficulty of them. A good deal more is necessary than merely to imagine that we can do so by a single decision. In order to shorten the devachanic rest period in any appreciable amount of time, it requires the concentrated and unremitting effort of a number of lives.

But while I speak of the difficulties, and point out the obvious fact that Olympus, the seat of the gods, cannot be reached in a single step, nevertheless, dear friend, you should never forget that the time to begin is NOW;

that the moment of choice is NOW; and that the sooner you make the definite choice and set your will like iron to achieve your objective, the sooner will you reach it.

Student — Inasmuch as every human being is the responsible hierarch of that hierarchy which consists of his emanations, what is the ultimate fate of the several life-sparks which have emanated from any such hierarch who eventually becomes a lost soul and suffers annihilation?

What provision is there for the proper supervision and guidance through the aeons to come of such orphans?

Can there be a divine system of adoption, as it were, perhaps illustrated in a way by the attaching to our solar system of outside planets, meteors, and cosmic dust?

G. de P. — Yes, it is quite true that every human being is indeed the responsible hierarch of the hierarchy which consists of the children-monads which flow forth from him on all planes. But it should likewise be remembered that these children-monads are ultimately born of the essence of his essence, of the core of the core of his being. Consequently each one of the several life-sparks or children-monads which thus spring forth from him is an individual entity, thereafter pursuing its own karmic destiny and following its own particular path of evolutionary progress.

Now, in the case of one who after ages of emitting such children-monads becomes a lost soul and suffers annihilation, I must point out that in this case the annihilation is not of the spiritual monad, but only of a human soul of that monad. Consequently, the life-sparks or lifeatoms or monads which had come from him are not affected permanently or essentially by the loss through annihilation of the human soul belonging to the constitution of the entity which had thrown forth these children-monads.

These children-monads or life-sparks are as much connected with the spiritual monad of their parent-entity as ever they were; and just as soon as this spiritual monad evolves forth from itself a new reincarnating human monad from the stored-up karmic treasure-house of previous imbodiments, then do these children-monads or life-sparks attach themselves to this new reincarnating human soul or monad, because they have the strongest links of origin with such new human soul from the common karmic treasure house.

The questioner is confused because he has mistakenly supposed that these life-sparks or children-monads spring forth from the human soul. It is not the fact, because only a relatively small portion of their great multitude do so. This relatively small portion of children-monads are still as much attached as they were when first they were born to the spiritual monadic essence out of which the human lost soul originally came.

Please remember that the human constitution is composite. There is a divine monad, a spiritual monad, a human monad, and an astral-vital monad, in every human constitution. Each one of these monads of the human constitution is an individual, although belonging to one stream of consciousness. Each such individual has its own heart of hearts or core of the core of itself, which is its own divine monad.

With this last reflection, coupled with what I have just explained, the reason becomes clear why the life-sparks or children-monads of a lost human soul are affected but in slight degree by the annihilation of a portion only of their parent.

The "proper supervision and guidance through the aeons to come of such orphans," are provided by Mother Nature herself. They are not orphans really, although they may seem to our human minds to be such. They are living in nature's great bosom and in nature's surrounding care just as safely as any other souls, and they are as closely attached to the divine monad from which the lost soul broke itself off, as they were before such loss of soul — a portion of their parent — took place.

Even in human life a child, which has lost its parents and thereby becomes an orphan, still lives, still is a full septenary human being, still is in the midst of Mother Nature of which such orphan is an inseparable part, still has its own karmic destiny behind it, its own karmic destiny in front of it. The dhyan-chohans care for such orphaned life-sparks automatically, and as naturally and as instinctively as human institutions care for human orphans — and, indeed, a millionfold more completely.

In view of the foregoing there is no need to speak of a divine system of adoption, because there is no

necessity for adoption. It is really Mother Nature herself, if we follow the word of the questioner, which may be said to adopt such children-monads or life-sparks, very much in the same way as Mother Nature takes care of the seeds of plants which are cast to the winds, or eaten by birds and then dropped in proper and suitable soil where they finally take root and grow.

Student — Does the reincarnating ego, when issuing forth from the bosom of the spiritual monad, for its cycle of imbodiments on globes A, B, and C of the descending arc, and on globes E, F, and G of the ascending arc, imbody itself as a human entity on these six globes?

G. de P. — Here again there is a difficulty in answering this question adequately without some words of explanation. If we call the human entity man, as we know him on our own globe D, earth, then the obvious answer is no. But if by the phrase human entity we mean an entity possessing on all the other globes of our planetary chain a position equivalent in evolutionary dignity and standing to what the human being has on globe D, then the question must be answered in the affirmative, yes.

The matter is somewhat complicated by the fact that if we call the reimbodying entity on the other globes of our planetary chain "human," then we must conceive of a human vastly superior because vastly more ethereal and nearer the spiritual realms than the human entity on earth is, although occupying the same relative position on those other globes of our planetary chain that the human being does on globe D.

Indeed, even what we would call the beasts on the other globes of our planetary chain are, on certain ones of those globes — as for instance on globes F and G — superior to what human beings are on this globe D, although they occupy the same relative position in the hierarchical scales of globes F and G that they do on the hierarchical scale of globe D our earth. Just as on earth we have the mineral, vegetable, beast, and human kingdoms, so these same kingdoms exist on all the other globes of our planetary chain; but each kingdom on the other globes, although occupying the same relative step in the hierarchical ladder of life, nevertheless is vastly superior to the condition or state that it occupies on globe D.

The human beings on globes F and G, for instance, would be like human gods to us, because so much more ethereal, so much higher in the hierarchical ladder of life — higher not in the evolutionary scale of unfoldment, but in the scale of planes of the solar system.

Again, it can hardly be said that the reimbodying ego, when issuing forth from the bosom of the spiritual monad, imbodies itself as a human entity on globes A and B, for instance, of the descending arc, for the reasons just hereinbefore outlined. Such imbodiments occupy the same relative position on globes A and B

that the human entity has on globe D; but as globes A and B are much more ethereal than is globe D, therefore the actual state or condition of the imbodying rays is far more ethereal and, indeed, far more spiritual, than it is on globe D — but possessing less of the gross brain-mind mentality than the human entity on globe D has.

Student — Seeing that the reincarnating ego imbodies itself on the upper globes of the terrestrial planetary chain after the completion of an incarnation on globe D, in what way does this passage through the upper globes differ from the passage of the human life-wave as a whole from globe D to the next higher globe, and so on?

G. de P. — This is an exceedingly difficult question to answer. There is of course a similarity, a strong analogy, between the passage of a single entity from globe to globe on the ascending arc, and the passage of the entire human life-wave from globe D to the next higher globe, and so forth. But the passage of the entire human life-wave takes place when the globe-manvantara on globe D is ended, and, with the exception of the sishtas, all entities as a body in any one kingdom pass to the next higher globe. The individual entities which pass from globe to globe on the ascending arc of our planetary chain, after these entities as individuals have finished an incarnation on globe D, do so in regular serial order through the three globes of the ascending arc.

The ray from the reimbodying ego which descends into imbodiment on any one of the ascending globes of our planetary chain must obviously inhabit bodies which are of the type fit for and appropriate to each of the globes that the reimbodying ego passes through.

You have here come to one of the doors of the ancient Mystery teachings, above which we may say is written

the legend:

"No one shall enter there except those who know the knock. Knock, and it shall be opened unto you." The following, however, is a hint that may be useful. The mineral kingdom of globe D, our earth, is at present in obscuration. Nevertheless there is a constant stream — which, by the way, is not a complete life-wave but minor trickles as it were — of mineral monads passing through globe D. These individual mineral monads pass from globe C to our globe D, and find imbodiment in our present mineral kingdom of this globe D, and then they pass on to globe E. Such individual mineral monads are the forerunners of the general mineral life-wave which at present is imbodied on another globe of our earth-chain.

Exactly the same general rule is followed in our own higher human kingdom when the individual units of mankind die on earth and pass to globe E and then to F and then to G on the ascending arc. In a few words, they imbody themselves in the sishtas of appropriate classes waiting for them.

Please do not ask me any more embarrassing questions about this, such, for instance, as: "As the sishtas are very few on each globe, and as the human beings who die every day number many thousands, and in a year several millions perhaps, where will they find bodies numerous enough among the sishtas of the other globes to provide vehicles for them?" Ah, indeed, again I answer: "Knock, and it shall be opened unto you!"

Student — It has been said that while the life-wave passes through globe D, the other globes of the chain are in obscuration. How can a reincarnating ego imbody itself on these other globes if they are in obscuration at present?

G. de P. — It has never been said that all the other globes of the chain are in obscuration. This statement is not true. If you will remember that the human life-wave is but one of several other life-waves cycling or circling contemporaneously around our planetary chain, you will immediately see that it is impossible that when globe D, for instance, is in activity, all the other six globes are in obscuration. Verily, it is not so. I think that I have explained this matter, or have hinted at it with sufficient clearness, in answering other questions at different times.

Remember also that no globe remains in obscuration until the cycling life-wave of a kingdom passes through all the remaining globes and reaches again on the next round the globe it had previously left. For example, when our human kingdom leaves globe D which then goes into obscuration so far as our human life-wave is concerned, our globe D does not remain in obscuration while our human life-wave passes through globes E, F

and globe G, then has its interround nirvana, and then redescends through globes A, B, and C. On the contrary, within a time relatively short as compared with the long period of a complete chain-manvantara, our globe D will awaken from its obscuration to receive the next incoming life-wave or family-wave. This will happen long before our own human life-wave which had left globe D finishes its evolutionary career on globe E of the ascending arc.

All these time periods are very nicely adjusted during the rounds. A globe remains in obscuration after a great life-wave has left it for a period which is about one-tenth as long as was the previous period of global activity.

Let us suppose that our present globe D in its present period of activity, and from its beginning to its end of this period of activity, requires some seventy-odd million years: then the obscuration period will be some seven million years, with a few extra hundred thousands thrown in for good measure.

In consequence, the reimbodying ego in its passage through the globes of a planetary chain on the ascending arc need not bother its head — if it have a head! — as to the globes E, F and G being in obscuration. It is obvious that a globe in obscuration may be encountered, possibly, by the reimbodying ego ascending along the luminous arc; but conditions for its imbodiment are proper and are always waiting for it, whether the globe be in obscuration or in full activity.

Student — Is each imbodiment or vesture of the reincarnating ego on the six (or eleven) other globes of the earth-chain strictly analogous, as an experience, with its incarnation on this planet?

G. de P. — If I understand the question correctly, then my answer is yes: all the imbodiments of the reimbodying ego on the different globes take place along strictly analogical lines; although, of course,

because the states and conditions of the various globes differ very greatly, therefore the experiences undergone by the several rays from the reimbodying ego also are very different the ones from the others.

I suggest strongly to this questioner that for the present at least he do not confuse his mind with the six or eleven other globes that he speaks of. If he will restrict his study to the three globes of the ascending arc, globes E, F and G, of the earth-chain considered as containing seven globes only, he will in time come to understand more easily what takes place on the entire chain of twelve globes.

Each globe has its own kinds of matter, its own kinds of energies, and its own sorts and conditions and states of life, because no two globes of any one planetary chain are on exactly the same identic subplane of the solar system.

Student — Has the monad only one reincarnating ego for each chain that it visits on its pilgrimage, or do innumerable reincarnating egos, belonging to the same monad, coexist in other and to us invisible worlds?

G. de P. — Here the questioner is referring evidently to the outer rounds. First, as I have so often told you, it is erroneous to speak of reincarnating ego when what you evidently mean is a reimbodying ego. It is only to us men on earth who live in bodies of flesh that we can speak of an ego incarnating, infleshing.

Next, every spiritual monad which ranges over the entire solar system has one reimbodying ego for each planetary chain that it visits on its cosmic pilgrimage, and consequently there are as many reimbodying egos in such a spiritual monad as there are planetary chains. In fact there are more, because the spiritual monad or ego has very strong points of karmic union with other planetary chains than those of the seven sacred planets and our own earth. But as it would simply confuse you to talk of these other reimbodying egos I mention them only, and then consider them no more here.

Furthermore, I think the questioner has the wrong idea when he asks: "Do innumerable reincarnating egos, belonging to the same monad, coexist in other and to us invisible worlds?" The reimbodying egos belonging to any one spiritual monad exist as it were within the monad, within its sphere of life and substance, and are eternally attached to it. They do not exist apart from that spiritual monad in other and to us invisible worlds.

Of course it is true that all reimbodying monads pass through different worlds, visible and invisible, when they make the descents and ascents in the planetary chains.

We must try to get accurate use of language in these matters, otherwise we shall be continuously talking at cross-purposes. Quite possibly the questioner means what I have just tried to explain, but his manner of phrasing is confusing.

I must add as a final thought to this — and I do hope it will not confuse you still further — that every spiritual monad is throughout eternity a creative center, and therefore virtually at every instant of time throughout duration it is incessantly giving birth to new children-monads. This fact, however, need not be considered here in answering this question. I merely subjoin these observations in order to make my answer complete.

Student — If this latter be the case, is not then the spiritual monad's circulation in the cosmos a mere transference of consciousness within itself, partaking, as the monad does, of the qualities of the whole universe, and not an actual change of locality from globe to globe or from planet to planet?

G. de P. — This is typically an Occidental question. The Occidental mind is always hovering in confusion between the matter of abstract consciousness and imbodied consciousness, and seems to find great difficulty in distinguishing between the two, although there should be, and in fact there is, in the thing itself no confusion whatsoever. Of course there is a transference of consciousness, but this transference of consciousness, by the very words here used, implies that there is an actual change of substance and of energy, and these words mean an actual passing from plane to plane, or, more accurately, from globe to globe, or from planet to planet. There could be no possible change of consciousness if an entity were existing eternally on one cosmic plane, for then it would be conscious but of itself. But as all entities are in continual and eternal motion, the so-called transference of consciousness is but another way of saying a passage of at least a part of the consciousness into different conditions or states of being, into different conditions or states of energy, into different conditions or states of substance; and this takes place from spirit to matter, and again

from matter to spirit. The consciousness shifts and changes merely because it contacts in successive periods of duration different portions of the universe, at one time in the spiritual spheres, and at other times in the material spheres, and at still other times in the intermediate ranges between these two.

But here let me enter a very important caveat. It is not the monadic essence itself which leaves its own plane or transfers its consciousness to the planes of matter, but it sends forth from itself rays much as the sun does, and it is these rays which traverse or pass through the different realms or planes or spheres — the latter being globes of the cosmic universe or solar system.

Remember what Krishna says in the Bhagavad-Gita: "I establish all this universe with a portion of myself, and yet remain separate" — that is, "above" it, and yet "in" it and "including" it. A human being has a transferring of consciousness from day to day and from month to month and from year to year, from childhood to old age. Each day or month or year or series of years has its own kind of consciousness, and yet the dominant or encompassing or superior consciousness is the same throughout the man's life term.

The Occidental mind loves abstractions, loves to entify abstractions, to look upon them as concrete realities; and this psychological bias or habit is the cause of most of the philosophic and psychological confusion so noteworthy in the West at the present time.

Student — What is the esoteric teaching concerning the influence which the planets exercise upon the earth in general and individual human beings in particular, especially when this subject is considered in the light of the teachings regarding the circulations of the cosmos?

G. de P. — Your question calls for an extended answer on a very intricate subject, but because a full answer would be too involved for presentation now, I will point out only the following. Granting that the superior globes of our planetary chain do affect man, they affect him only through the intermediary influence or forces belonging to the globe on which man happens to be at any time. This should be obvious. All the globes on the descending arc of our chain work through globe D for and on man as long as man is on globe D; and similarly for the other globes of our chain. Expanding the thought a trifle, globes A and B, or globes F and G, do not work as individuals directly upon globe D, but only through the intervening globes as intermediaries or transmitters of the influences or forces, much as electricity will run along a chain but only through the links of that chain. The consequence of this is that the physical planets D, or globes D, of any chain, pour upon man, while he is on this globe D of the earth-chain, the various influences and powers flowing forth from these various chains through their respective globes D to earth.

There is, however, a secondary line of influences or energies flowing from the different planetary chains down to and upon globe D of the earth-chain; and this secondary line is from the respective globes of the other chains to the similar globes of the earth-chain, and thence through the intervening globes of the earth-chain to globe D of the earth-chain. Just here is where the circulations of the cosmos have to be followed.

These various kinds of influences or energies must obey the regular procedures of the solar system and follow the tracks or roads already laid down, exactly as electricity automatically follows its lines of least resistance, or as the blood in the human body must follow its circulations through the arteries and veins.

These influences and their various channels of circulation are indeed too recondite to speak of at any great length, and therefore can be treated only briefly. This whole matter is involved in the existence and workings of the circulations of the cosmos, of which I have said so much and concerning which so little as yet has been understood. It also shows that true or real astrology — just because it is a starry science, a vast and beautiful study — is completely outside the purview of the modern Occidental astrologer, who really knows no more about the inner intricacies of his study than he does about the inhabitants of Neptune, if any.

Yet I will say this: the tangled remnants of Occidental astrology still have some few accurate general ideas, as for instance, the obvious one concerning the physical globes of the respective planetary chains being the bearers or carriers of the influences flowing into and through them. Modern astrologers know little or nothing, usually nothing, of planetary chains. They do not know anything about the interior globes even of our own chain, except occasionally a flash of intuition concerning them; and such influences which they thus intuitionally sense they then call by the convenient but vague term "inner influences," or by some such

phrase. We must remember that esoteric astrology was one of the subjects of study in the higher Mysteries of ancient peoples, and was most carefully guarded because of the obvious dangers to human, moral, and intellectual welfare that could arise from profanation or misuse of the teachings.

The planets as well as the sun and the moon unquestionably exercise most powerful influences on human beings, not only individually as celestial bodies, but collectively as what one might call the conscious celestial machinery of the solar system. Furthermore, individual human beings themselves, just because they are units in this machinery, cogs as it were on the wheel of life, receive these influences and are affected by them. But the following fact must never be overlooked: that the human will and intelligence, precisely because this will and this intelligence are derivative from the spiritual heart of the universe, are never servilely or slavishly subject to this mass of energies, or influences acting upon humans. In other words, a human being can always react successfully, if he use his will and his intelligence, against the solar, lunar, and planetary influences. I repeat the old astrological saying: Stellae agunt, non cogunt — the stars impel but do not compel.

Furthermore, and this fact should be remembered, every human being born upon earth is spiritually a derivative from his parent-star, and is besides this closely connected because of an element in his constitution with one of the planets of the solar system — one of the seven or ten sacred planets. This last statement does not mean that such human being has no links with the other planets of the solar system. Just the contrary is the case. Every human being's constitution is builded of the same forces, substances, qualities, which the individual planets of the solar system imbody; but in every individual human being one of these planets is particularly powerful in his life, because of such human being's comprising in his constitution an unusual amount or proportion of such planet's swabhava or individual characteristic.

Student — May I ask for either a confirmation or a correction on a doctrinal point? In the course of a conversation with X concerning the processes of evolution, I pictured man as a composite being consisting of: The divine flame or atman — whose home is the galactic system — or divine monad.

The spiritual monad — whose home is the solar system.

The spiritual soul or higher ego — whose home is the planetary chain.

The human monad or human ego — whose home is globe D.

The kamic-astral-physical complex.

I made the statement that the spiritual soul or higher ego is the reincarnating ego and is the manasaputra or agnishwatta-pitri, that it endures as long as a planetary chain lasts, that it is that which is indrawn into the bosom of the spiritual monad and rests within it in devachanic sleep; that the human monad or human ego lasts — as an aggregate entity, not as a monad which of course is indestructible — only for one incarnation, and that the aroma or noblest essence of this human ego is assimilated by the higher ego before it (the higher ego) is withdrawn into the spiritual monad.

X asserted that it cannot be so; that it is the human monad or human ego that sleeps in the bosom of the spiritual monad its devachanic sleep; that the spiritual soul or higher ego is not the manasaputra or solar pitri; and that it cannot be that the human monad lasts only for one incarnation (as an aggregate entity).

In other words this seems to strike out of consideration one of the links of the chain above enumerated, namely, the spiritual soul. There is evidently a misconception somewhere along the line. May I ask who is right, and for a few words from you in elucidation of the above problems?

G. de P. — I will make this brief reply. You are almost right and also X is almost right. As a matter of fact, I think that you both mean pretty much the same thing, but each is a little confused in usage of the various terms: monads, souls, and egos — and, indeed, I am not astonished, because such confusion in usage of words is almost inevitably certain to arise until one's fundamental ideas on this intricate matter are clear-cut and definite in outline.

In the first place, then, man as a whole, being a composite entity in his constitution, is a collection of monads in differing degrees of unfoldment or evolution. Besides this, each one of these monads by the very fact of its being a monad is virtually deathless, that is, lasts as an individualized unit as long as the solar system does.

The only exception to this is the divine monad, whose tremendously long time period equals that of the

galactic system. Nevertheless, the ego issuing from the bosom of any one of these monads, on any plane, is an entity which has its periodic waking and sleeping times.

Again, surrounding such ego there is its vibrating, vital, conscious sheath, called the soul. Now this soul it is which, although a living being, dies or disintegrates, when its respective time period has elapsed. Thus, as an example, the human soul lasts only for one incarnation; but the human monad, after death, is withdrawn into the bosom of the spiritual ego which in turn is withdrawn into the bosom of the spiritual monad.

It is therefore the souls which die but which nevertheless are extruded or reborn again at each new imbodiment — because their respective lifeatoms are psychomagnetically reassembled and drawn together to re-form the substance of the soul which had died or had undergone dissipation. The different monads are likewise withdrawn each one into the bosom of the next superior monad, the cases varying according to the individual monads.

You are not quite right in saying that the manasaputra or agnishwatta-pitri is exactly the same as the reincarnating ego. This is just one of the most difficult things to explain clearly, and it would take me an hour to write a fully comprehensible explanation. The manasaputras who incarnated in the third root-race are not our human egos, but are our manasic parents — spiritually-manasically speaking. Our own spiritual souls or higher egos, which are the essence of the reimbodying ego, were set aflame or quickened, each one by its own manasaputra, its spiritual parent so to say. Even today, in our now complexly composite constitution, such manasaputra has its close links of consciousness and destiny with the reimbodying or higher ego, which it had illuminated and manasically inflamed, because in each such case there still remains an actual monadic-vital link of consciousness — a sort of antaskarana.

Honestly, I don't know how I can explain this more clearly in so brief an answer. Some of the most intricate and complex teachings of the esoteric cycle of study are bound up with all this; so I suggest that you study the matter carefully and brood over it intently until light of itself streams into your mind, which it will if you can rise to the plane of understanding.

X is right in saying that it is not the human monad which lasts only for one incarnation, because such brief existence belongs to what you call the kamic-astral-physical complex, otherwise the human-animal soul. Thus you are right in saying that the lower human ego, or more accurately the human-animal soul, lasts only for one incarnation. Nevertheless, out of this human or rather human-animal soul is drawn the aroma, the spiritual essence, of it, which is then ingathered into the spiritual monad in the manner that HPB so ably describes. Remember, however, that even the human-animal soul which lasts only for one incarnation, nevertheless is psychomagnetically drawn together — that is the lifeatoms which form it — when the next incarnation on earth takes place, thus reforming for its new life the lower man of the past life; and thus not only enabling this lower man but obliging him through karma to reap the seeds that he had sown in his last life.

You will see that both you and X really mean pretty much the same thing, yet each one of you is a bit confused regarding the terminology. I will further add that, on the whole both your and X's views as you describe them are generally correct. It is the old and familiar trouble of being confused about terms, which always gives rise to misunderstandings, friendly or otherwise as the cases may be. Your hierarchy of the various monads is correct enough, I believe.

Finally, both of you should make a sharp distinction between the deathless monads, no matter where they are functioning — whether in the galaxy or in the solar system or in the planetary chain or on a globe — and the respective higher egos of such monads, which egos with their souls are the respective imbodying principles.

Again, the souls are the living, conscious, sheaths or veils in which the egos clothe themselves, just as our physical body is what we may with perfect truth call the physical soul — the living, vibrating, conscious soul of matter with which the human ego clothes itself on this earth. Keep these distinctions between monad and ego, and ego and soul, clear in your mind, and then I believe that you will have little trouble in fixing their respective and proper positions in the human constitution.

Student — Could you please tell us from an esoteric standpoint what is the value of the usual custom of

ceremonial funeral observances? Just what would be the best procedure for a theosophist to follow, if he did not have to take into consideration conventions and the susceptibilities of friends and relatives?

G. de P. — To give to you my own perfectly frank and candid opinion, I think there is no esoteric value whatsoever in the usual custom of ceremonial funeral observances. This does not mean that I think that the body should be regarded in an utterly heartless and cynical way. On the contrary, I think that a body which has housed the soul of one whom we have loved, or indeed of one whom we have never known, should be treated with quiet dignity and respect, not forgetting that it is but an empty shell, the empty tenement of the self-conscious and vital spirit which has left it.

On the other hand, I do believe that many of the usual ceremonial funeral observances actually have a tendency to chain to earth, by a sort of psychomagnetic attraction, the excarnate entity which is doing its best, automatically of course, to free itself from all the attractions of this physical sphere. When the relatives and friends gather into a funeral chamber, and there is weeping and wailing, or a great many expressions of love and devotion, and the virtues of the dead are recited, and incidents in his or her life are dwelt upon — all this, because of the strong psychomagnetic vibrations and elements involved, actually does tend to hinder the departing ego.

Therefore such funeral observances are not only not good but distinctly bad. Furthermore, I think the effect on those left alive is bad, for this effect is one of depression, gloom, even of horror, and gives to death a somber importance which, as the casting off of the grossest vehicle of man's constitution, it actually does not have in nature.

As concerns the latter part of the question, it is my belief that the best procedure for a theosophist to follow, especially if he do not have to take into consideration conventions and the susceptibilities of friends and relatives, would be the simplest procedure possible compatible with the dignified care and disposition of the body of the departed and loved soul. In such case I would suggest that immediately death has supervened, the windows in the death chamber be opened; that the strictest silence possible be maintained in the immediate surroundings; and if evening is drawing nigh, that a night lamp or candle be lighted and placed at or near the head of the body, due precaution against fire being taken of course. Near the head of the body, once in the morning, and once in the evening after sundown, there should be lighted a stick or cone of fragrant incense; and this for every day that the body lies before cremation or burial. If one has no incense, then it is good to burn fragrant herbs or grasses, or a little wood in the room, due precaution against fire being always taken. It does not matter much what kind of wood is burned, but it is better if possible to have some fragrant wood like cedar. The reason of this is that the burning wood or herbs and especially the incense purify the atmosphere and have a tendency to repel evil and unpleasant elemental forces which are always attracted to a deathbed after the soul has left the body. The light also has a somewhat similar effect, in repelling elementaries. These astral denizens can do no real harm except to those who are alive, and their presence is unwholesome. Old custom and common human instinct in many cases have replaced the incense or the burning of wood or herbs by bringing flowers into the funeral chamber. This is good for a short time because of the perfume, but not nearly as effective as the incense or the burning wood, because within a brief period flowers begin to decay, and the smell and presence of decay are what should be avoided.

I might say that even the smoke of tobacco is a kind of incense, and it would not be improper to burn a little tobacco; but I would not suggest this, because if a member of the family were to smoke a cigarette, which is the simplest way of using tobacco, in the death chamber, critical relatives or friends would immediately proceed to call it a cynical and heartless act because they would not understand the idea behind. But the burning of incense or some fragrant wood or herbs would arouse nobody's critical faculty, and incense is the best of all forms of purgative fumigation.

As regards any funeral ceremony, this is something which the theosophist must decide for himself, in the case of the disposition of the body of someone he has loved. I would suggest, however, that the ceremonial be as simple as possible. If he has to consider conventions and the feelings of relatives and friends, which is always a kindly thing to do, then I would suggest a reading from some one of our devotional books, possibly two readings with an interval of silence between, say of five minutes or ten minutes or a quarter of an hour, according to the wish of the one arranging the ceremony. If it is possible to have a little quiet music, a short

musical number might be rendered immediately after the second reading, thus closing the ceremonial.

I have also been asked whether it is a good thing to hold the ashes in case of cremation of our beloved who have passed on. There is no objection to this except a somewhat depressing effect on those who are alive.

Possibly the best way, if the law permit, would be to scatter the ashes at the will of the survivors on some beautiful countryside, or on flowing waters, or on the sea, according to the wish either of the dead or of the living.

The ancients of course were very particular about funeral ceremonies and the retention of the ashes of the dead; but this was because the ancient religions had already largely degenerated, even centuries preceding the beginning of Christianity which merely carried on the same traditional observances more or less.

Whatever happens, the main thing to be careful about is as greatly perfect a silence as possible in the death chamber for a number of hours after the person has expired. The reason is the same as that pointed out by the Master in one of our books, to the effect that for a number of hours after the last beat of the heart, the brain is still partially alive going over in mental imagery the whole panorama of its past life from the first to the last moment of conscious existence preceding the drawing of the last breath. Noise of any kind disturbs the withdrawing ego in its panoramic vision of its life just ended; and the worst possible disturbance or noise is anything that will appeal to the withdrawing ego on account of its human emotions or affections, such as weeping or expressions of sorrow or pain or regret. Preserve perfect silence in the room of death.

Meeting 34 Supplement

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

Supplement to KTMG Papers: Thirty-Four

| Reimbodying Not Reincarnating Monad | The First Round | Children-Monads | Animals, Men,

Gods | After Death: A Dream Consciousness | White and Black Magicians | Adepts Enter Kama-

loka and Underworld | Time Periods and Life-Waves | Nirvana--Buddhas; Avichi-Nirvana-Lost

Souls | The Nature of Buddha | Mukti-and Avichi-Nirvana | Manasaputras | Three Classes of

Manasas | Avataras Function as Manasaputras | Manas, Prajapatis, Sishtas | Three Panoramic

Visions |

February 9, 1937

Monadic Classes

G. de P. — There are twelve globes in our chain. Each globe is a sphere of life with its own conditions, states, even perhaps minor laws. The inhabitants, therefore, of each such sphere of life must correspond to it.

We likewise know that there are ten and even twelve classes of monads circling around the chain, one after the other in serial order throughout time. Each such class of monads manifests itself on any one globe —

which means on all — as a life-wave. Therefore, as each such life-wave or monadic class reaches any globe in its serial course through the planets, its inhabitants, the rays from these monads as individuals, have bodies, have psychological apparatuses, and manifest themselves in manners, akin to the globe on which each life-wave is at that time.

Now, the situation, if you will follow this thought out, shows us very clearly that as these life-waves or monadic classes are composed of individuals, just as an army or a group of men is so composed, these individuals on each globe manifest a phase of their entire corporate consciousness, each such phase being appropriate and fitted for the globe on which it then is imbodied.

Thus a human monad emits a phase of its consciousness called a ray, which is appropriate to each one of the globes of the chain that it imbodies itself in and upon. A human monad does not manifest as an animal on one of the higher globes, but it manifests from itself a ray or a phase of its body-corporate of consciousness, which ray is fitted for that higher globe. The beasts, the plants, the dhyan-chohans likewise; which means again that on globe E, the next one after this globe D, our phase of consciousness, or the ray imbodied from our reimbodying monad, will be of a higher consciousness phase than the one here on globe D. This one on globe D we call the globe D child. The ray or phase of consciousness imbodied on globe E we can call the globe E child, and so forth all around the chain.

In all our studies it is very needful to keep not one thought in mind — because then your judgment becomes one-sided and imperfect — but different phases of the teaching. Remember the twelve globes; remember the twelve classes of monads and that they are life-waves. Remember that these are composed of individuals; that each globe differs from every other globe in ethereality or materiality or spirituality; that each monad never forsakes its own high status, which means that any ray emanating from it belongs to that status. But as each monad is a body-corporate of consciousness, a stream of consciousness, the ray emanating from it for any globe is appropriate to that globe. If you succeed in keeping these different thoughts in your mind you will get a clear vision.

Reimbodying Not Reincarnating Monad

Had we all at the time [1932] understood the meanings of the technical terms now fixed and in usage amongst us, I would not have then employed terms that it had become customary to employ since HPB's day. I would not have said the reincarnating ego for all the globes of our chain. I would have said the reimbodying monad or ego.

Strictly speaking, the phrase reincarnating ego refers to imbodiments on this globe D only, where bodies of flesh are used.

The First Round

You have heard it stated, and this in itself has been a cause of some confusion, that what happens during the first round is not that which happens in the succeeding rounds. After the first round the plan changes. It is during the first round only that all the ten or twelve classes of monads — all of them cooperate to build the filmy sketch of the first round globes, or of the globes as they are in the first round, each class following the preceding one in regular serial order. The Elemental and mineral kingdoms imbody themselves, but the plants, the plant monads, the beast monads, the human monads, and the dhyan-chohanic monads, do not imbody themselves even during the first round, but project as it were their astral fluid, their energy. They lend something to the process, thus guiding the building. Just as in the unborn child the initial germ is kept growing not because an ego has come down and is lying in the little germ-cell, which is utterly wrong; but because the egoic fluid is there, the astral fluid, the atmosphere of the mind is there, giving guidance to the growth of the embryo.

After the first round, when the tracks have been laid, the process changes, because now the tracks are laid, and all that the monads have to do is to enter in serial order into the different globes one after the other, and work upon the imperfect vehicles thus far evolved coming over from the first round. From that point each class of monads works only by its own rays and its own life-waves. Even in a little child, the monad, or rather the ego, is very imperfectly manifesting. Mind scarcely begins to function until the seventh year, and relatively speaking is not in full action until the man is of mature age and his brain is formed and his character begins to show. The spiritual faculties even then are more or less feeble in expression, because they have not yet succeeded in building up within us vehicles sufficiently subtle and delicate and pure and high to enable us to show forth the spiritual powers within us. Greater men can do it more than inferior men, and inferior men more than beasts.

------

July 25, 1939

Children-Monads

I would like to add a few words on the matter of the children-monads emanating from the divine monad, and the children-monads emanating from the spiritual monads. These matters become very simple if you do as I have so often requested: keep in mind all the facts you have been taught about any one thing. Thus, the range of the divine monad is over the galaxy; the range of the spiritual monad is over the solar system. Now then, the children of the divine monad, the spiritual monads, find their fields of action in different solar systems in the galaxy. The divine monad ranging over the galaxy reunites all these spiritual monads spiritually or divinely in itself; just precisely as the reimbodying monads or egos of the spiritual monads of our solar system find their reunion in that spiritual monad which has its range or field of action over the solar system.

The same rule, the same law, on a smaller scale.

Thus there are or may be many spiritual monads finding in one divine monad their parent, their parent star, if you wish. And as these solar systems exist in our galaxy, and as the range of the divine monad is over our galaxy, these spiritual monads are collected together or reunited in their parent divine monad. In precisely the same way, I repeat, are the different reimbodying egos of the different planetary chains in our solar system reunited in, or find their spiritual reunion with the spiritual monad which has its range over the solar system.

Another point: do not confuse planes of action. The generation of spiritual monads from a divine monad are identical in number and in law, with the generation of reimbodying monads or egos from the spiritual monad.

But while there is identity of law, there is no identity of fact. Thus, Mr. Smith may have a son, and Mr. Jones may have a son. The children are born according to the same laws of nature. But the two children are not identical, nor are the parents identical. Thus the rays from the sun which we see with our physical eyes actually are multitudes of lifeatoms or monads on this plane. Therefore the rule of generation from the higher to the lower prevails here also. But the rays of the sun are actually the pranic life, the vitality, of the sun sowing itself in its emissions of multitudes of quasi-physical or sthula-sariric lifeatoms — monads on this plane.

But do not confuse this with the generation of monads by the sun-spirit itself. The latter is very high, and is the generation, as a parent will reproduce his or her child, the bringing forth again of more or less advanced egos. Whereas the outflow of the pranic vitality from the sun is identically the same in fact as is the pouring forth of the vitality from the physical body of a man when he is exercising. He is generating lifeatoms, monads, in that plane. But he is not generating children when he is playing baseball, or walking, or doing something else, yet the outflow of lifeatoms is tremendous.

------

March 9, 1937

Animals, Men, Gods

With regard to the injury caused to beasts by keeping them as pets: the injury lies in the fact that the door to the human kingdom closed ages ago — at about the midpoint of the fourth root-race. The greater the love pets receive, the more they are with their masters, attached to them with ties of companionship and affection, the more they are humanized — and this is not good, because they cannot enter the human kingdom in this manvantara. If we were on the downward arc, it would not be so bad — in fact, it might be a good thing. But now — no. These unfortunate beasts are stimulated upwards towards humanity out of time and out of place, which prevents their falling, or rather rising and slipping into their monadic nirvana, which is what nature destined for the beasts before the seventh round.

Now, the whole beast kingdom will gradually die out long before our seventh round is reached, except the apes, and possibly a few more beasts which may manage through karmic past to struggle along until the seventh round comes. As a matter of fact, the apes can be called elementary men now — but I am speaking of the anthropoid apes, not the monkeys. The anthropoid apes will become a low grade of human even in the next round.

Now, that is the reason why having animals as pets is injurious to these creatures. It is hard to find an exact analogy in human life to paint a picture, but it is like taking a waif and bringing it up in the lap of luxury, trying to make a prince of it as it were, and then after it has been trained thus for a certain time, casting it out into the gutter again where it has to make a fresh beginning unlearned in the ways of its own line of life. It cannot be a prince. It was not born a prince, and yet it has been filled with ideas which cannot be realized, with hopes and yearnings which cannot receive fulfillment. It would be a cruelty to the human child to do that.

Student — Is there karma for their domestication, and is there compensation?

G. de P. — The answer is yes. As a matter of fact, this subject is recondite and difficult to explain. I will tell you this. The beasts on our globe in this fourth round are suffering degradation, and have fallen from a higher state because of karmic defects in that higher state in past manvantaras. I do not want to go too much into that because it would lead us far, far afield into abstract questions of metaphysics and philosophy, but you can think about that key I have just given you.

Why, as a matter of fact, we ourselves are fallen beings. We are fallen gods. We once were kumaras. Now here we are poor, struggling, suffering humans undergoing all the wretchedness and misery that we have in Myalba here, a perfect hell. See what is going on in the world. Men are scarcely human yet. The world is filled with fear, sorrow, misery, wretchedness, poverty, disease: all kinds of things that to the sensitive mind are torments. Of course, there is a great deal of beauty too, a great deal of the other side of life. If men would only turn to it — but they won't. They are perverse. Take the political condition of the world today — and I don't want to bring in politics, but just point to it as an example — men prefer to kill each other rather than settle their disputes by reason; and any sane man knows that any dispute leading to war can be settled by intellect, by reason and common sense, and by the Golden Rule. They won't follow it. We are fallen gods and we are, in our own higher condition, in pretty much the same state as the beasts are in theirs.

Student — Do the gods look upon us as we look upon the animals?

G. de P. — That is an intuitive question. It is an absolute fact that there are times when the gods dare not help us. We are not ready. We would be absolutely stunned, rendered insane, if we were given too large a measure of spiritual illumination all at once without preparation — we simply could not contain it. The gods have to treat us very much as we should treat the beasts: with great kindness, never chasing them and killing them in what we call sport. Fancy any normal human being thinking that because it is a beautiful day he can go out and kill something! It is awful. There is an example of the way we humans are still undeveloped. Yes, the gods look upon us as a low grade of semi-intelligent creatures, pretty much as we look upon the beasts.

Student — Would you say that it was just because of the danger of giving too much light to men that the Masters hesitated long before starting the Theosophical Society?

G. de P. — Absolutely. The very thought that I had in my own mind. There is danger in giving men light before they are ready to receive it. They will either turn sorcerers, or ruin themselves, if you try to spiritualize them in too great a hurry; and along the same line exactly it is bad for beasts to be humanized before they are ready to advance. It is an unnatural stimulation, and they will have to pay for it, poor things! And we will pay for what we do to the beasts, you can depend upon that.

Student — But from another standpoint, are not the beasts helped forward in their evolution by being humanized, and is not that some compensation to them for their sufferings?

G. de P. — That will be their compensation, but it is not good for them just the same. If you take the long view, it is good. If you take the short view it is bad; and in this case, strangely enough, it is the short view which it is our duty to employ.

Student — How about the animals after death? Those who have been petted — do they have an existence in the kama-lokic state?

G. de P. — Yes, they do; and that is one of the many things that shows again the unwisdom of lavishing too much human affection on pets. It stimulates a quasi-humanity in them, very feeble, but enough to give them a kama-lokic life of quasi-consciousness, and it is painful. There are a hundred reasons one could allege — to those who accepted the basic principles of theosophy.

Student — In the case of human beings having free will and conscious choice: is there a door into the dhyan-chohanic kingdom for those who can make the grade?

G. de P. — Yes. Any man or woman who would undertake to live the life can pass through that door, which is the ring-pass-not for most men because they won't do it.

------

April 13, 1937

After Death: A Dream Consciousness

Look upon all the after death states as flowings of consciousness. What the man was during earth-life, what his tempo plus his quality were, these will continue after he dies — the same flow of consciousness, be it high or low or intermediate. Consciousness does not flow according to clocks, or planets circling around a sun. In other words, consciousness is not governed by mechanical time as we may call it.

Kama-loka being a dream may be of any kind, precisely according to the dreamer; and the dreamer in the kama-loka is simply an extension of the dreamer as he was in his last life. Kama-loka, however, is a low quasi-spiritual or even psychic state of dreams, and for the spiritual man the spiritual dreams in the kama-loka so engross the man vaguely dreaming that he has no consciousness of anything nightmarish or horrible. He is simply in a kind of unconscious flow of dream consciousness.

On the other hand, if a very evil man dies, a man who joys in horrible things, who joys to do evil for the sake of evil, his flow of consciousness is so intense, the tempo is so tremendously fast in things of matter, that the

part of the auric egg which is around him is in the lowest realms of the astral light, and his dreaming is a horrible nightmare. Nature does not do this arbitrarily. The man is simply continuing in the kama-loka what he has been doing in the body; but now being freed from the body and its dampening effect on his consciousness, his consciousness is freer and his nightmare is correspondingly more intense. The tempo is faster. In fact, all kama-lokic dreams are unpleasant because they are in the lower parts of the consciousness, although the flow there is very intense, the tempo is quick, harsh, fast, rough, evil. On the other hand, when a good man reaches the devachan, then the flow of consciousness is a blissful dreaming state with no idea of time. He is simply enwrapped in the most glorious dreaming imaginings of his mind. All the higher parts of his human consciousness are free to think and think and think the most beautiful things. He has no conception of time. Twenty thousand years, if a man has as long as that in the devachan, are just like a quiet night's rest.

I want to point out the immense moral value of this our teaching regarding the kama-loka. You thus, knowing this, know perfectly well what you are going to get when you die; and it well pays a man to behave himself.

Most of us do not realize that our conceptions of time are ideas connected with mechanical time: clocks, sunrise, noon, sunset, or the seasons. But these ideas do not exist in the flow of consciousness. They are our conscious reactions against the acts of physical nature surrounding us when we are imbodied. When a man is thinking a thought and is lost in what is called a brown study or a daydream, he is not thinking of time. It does not enter his consciousness. He is just thinking his thoughts, dreaming his dreams. You must not get the idea that when you die you are going to step out of your body just as you are, or wander around in the astral light not knowing where to go, and not knowing the scenery. It is not a question of scenery. You do not think of those things. It is just a dream, a dream, a dream. Get that thought in your heads.

One thing more: even the early Christians had this idea of the after death state being a dream, as is shown by so many of the painted and carven inscriptions of early Christian times. One of the commonest was Dormit in astris, he sleeps in the stars. There is more in that statement than appears on the surface, and it shows that Christianity began right, and had real occultism behind it in its beginning. Echoes of this earliest occultism so soon lost, alas, continued for hundreds of years after it had been lost. Expressions like that one continued: he sleeps in the stars.

Now the nirvana is the only spiritual reality, and its bottom pole is avichi. Both are real. One is the reality of spirit, and the other the reality of utter matter, although that to the spirit is dreams too. That is why I have said that avichi is frequently called nirvana-avichi, because the lines of the pole are the same. One is the line of the spiritual pole, the other of the material pole.

White and Black Magicians

In connection with the kama-loka there are certain rare individuals who, after they pass physical death, are as conscious in the kama-loka as they were in the body. These individuals are either Masters of different degree, or Masters of evil of different degree, black magicians, as we call them, brothers of the shadow. Now the brothers of the shadow and the Masters have no devachan. They have passed far beyond that dream stage, and beyond the need of it. It is a need for us human beings of normal type. We need the rest absolutely, just as the body needs its rest occasionally. A black magician is not one who indulges his own wishes for pleasure, as so many people seem to think. He never could be a magician if he did that. He would simply be a very bad, foolish, ordinary, weak, silly man. The black magician has to undergo a self-discipline as rigid in its way, and as self-denying in its way, as the white magician has. The black magician differs from the white magician in one main point. He is essentially selfish for the things he is after, as the white magician is essentially unselfish for the things that he aspires towards. The black magician's main evil consists in the injury he works upon others, and upon the world. For various reasons these terrible men love it. They love evil for its own sake. They are self-denying, always chaste in various ways, always extremely strict in self-discipline. They have to be to retain power as magicians. But their life is evil. They reck naught of the sufferings of others, of the harm they do to others or to the world. They do it for their own evil objectives, whatever they may be.

I do not care to discuss them because it would lead us too far afield. Suffice it to say that they work evil upon others because they desire to do it. They love evil for its own sake. They love the sense of having power.

They love its use. And any one of us, normal human beings, who will sacrifice another in order to gratify one

of our own wishes is by so much a black magician, for that is the typical black magic type of action.

That is what is meant when the Masters and HPB and others have spoken of the Atlanteans as being on the whole a race of black magicians: not because they had mighty powers which they misused in the ordinary sense, but because they loved evil for its own sake. They lacked conscience. They enjoyed working harm upon others to see them suffer, in order that they themselves might gain something from it.

It is one of the commonest things in human life. We see it around us all the time. Now sometimes cruelty is mere thoughtlessness, it is not black magic; it is thoughtlessness as when some nasty boy or girl will strip the wings from an unfortunate fly. That is thoughtlessness. As the child grows he begins to sense the disgusting character of his act, and the horror of it, and stops it. You cannot call that black magic. A black magician would not do a thing like that, it would strike him as silly, inept, inane. But any human being who plays upon the heartstrings of another in order to get even with that other, and recks not of the pain caused thereby, and of the moral injury wrought, is by so much a black magician.

------

November 28, 1939

Adepts Enter Kama-loka and Underworld

It is the teaching that a good man passes through the kama-loka without actually realizing he is traversing it

— happily for him. Yet the adept can enter the kama-loka at will. The adept is a super-good man. Is there a contradiction? A good man is repelled by conditions antipathetic to his character. That is good, but it likewise shows that he lacks universality. How often do we not know, how often have we not heard of good men and women, who nevertheless have very little sympathy with those who disagree with them? The adept contrariwise has made his sympathies or is striving to make them universal. He is therefore at home everywhere, in the good and in the evil places of the world. He is master in them all. He sympathizes even with his brothers of evil — not the sympathy of collaboration or cooperation, but the deeper sympathy of understanding and pitiful compassion.

It is only rarely that an adept will enter the kama-loka, and then it will be done in order to help some misfortunate human who, because of entangled karmic acts while on earth, and yet having a substratum of great decency and good in him, has become caught as it were in the kama-loka, and needs the helping hand.

When we speak of adepts entering the underworld in order to help the spirits in chains there, as the old Christian phrase runs, it refers not so much, only rarely indeed, to the kama-loka which is a sphere of effects and not of causes. The entering into the underworld refers to a very deeply occult teaching. It refers to worlds, even globes, inferior to our own globe earth.

These descents into the underworld are extremely interesting, extremely occult, and you will understand this perhaps, although this is opening the door a little, when I tell you that what are called the avataras are actually descents into our world from a higher world by a divinity, which divinity in that higher world is at the time undergoing initiation. To us it is a visit of a god — and it is so; but that god's purpose, while wholly compassionate, is identical with that of the human neophyte, beginning with the fourth degree, who enters the underworld partly to help the so-called enchained spirits there; but also partly to gain individual experience of what nature provides in the various underworld spheres.

-----

June 6, 1937

Time Periods and Life-Waves

The lower the globe is, the longer is the time period passed on it by the life-waves which are material or materialized; and the shorter are the time periods passed on it by those life-waves which are spiritual, or spiritualized. Conversely, the higher the globe is, the shorter is the time period passed by the material life-waves in and on it; and the longer the time period passed by the ethereal and spiritual life-waves in and on it.

Thus the mineral life-wave has a very short manvantaric time period on the higher and highest globes of our planetary chain, and a very long time period on the lowest globe of our planetary chain, globe D. Conversely, the dhyan-chohanic life-waves and the human have a relatively short life period on globe D, the lowest of the globes, and a correspondingly longer time period on the higher and highest globes.

Thus, to speak with some exaggeration, but merely in order to make the idea very clear to you, we can figurate those monads in the lower regions, or rather in the lower states or conditions of evolution — as for instance in the mineral kingdom — as working very, very slowly through the lower globes C and D. They are a long time here, because here is their present special sphere of unfolding. But when the mineral life-wave reaches the higher and highest globes of the earth-chain, the mineral monads almost seem to rush through —

the attraction for them as a life-wave is so slight, so small.

Conversely, when the highest of the dhyan-chohanic life-waves is passing through these lower globes, globes C, D, and E, as examples, they pass through very quickly, relatively speaking, because their attractions here are slight. Karmic ties oblige them to take every step during the manvantaric run through the globes; therefore they have to pass through these lower globes. But their attractions are so slight they abide not here. But when this highest dhyan-chohanic life-wave begins to reach the higher and highest globes, then they feel in their own element, where they stay for aeons, evolving and evolving, and ringing through all the changes of experience. They are native there. They are at home.

Nirvana — Buddhas; Avichi-Nirvana — Lost Souls

Another comment with regard to the word annihilation and its connotations which evidently exist in your minds: you have all taken this word too strictly, too literally. It does not mean the absolute wiping out of all possibility of being, in the early Christian theological sense of God creating the universe out of nothing. It does not mean a reducing to nothing absolutely. It is a technical word.

Would you like to know how you should translate this word annihilation into Sanskrit? You would call it nirvana, by which hangs a tale, and a very fascinating one. You remember the long disputes that waged among Occidental Orientalists about the real meaning of nirvana when Oriental studies first began to grow popular in the Occident, and how the greatest ones among them insisted that nirvana meant annihilation, in its common meaning, a wiping out, in other words, a "blowing out." "It was, it now no longer is." Technically, their translation of nirvana was grammatically correct, for it does mean "blown out"; but they were totally wrong because they did not get the spirit of the sublime idea contained in the word nirvana. They took the word literally, and therefore got the verbal meaning, but lost the spirit and the teaching.

Now then, please hearken carefully. When a buddha, or any equivalent being, enters into nirvana absolutely, such entity does so leaving naught behind. It is wiped out, blown out, annihilated for these spheres. Therein lies the beauty and strength of the word, and its meaning, nirvana. It has left these spheres completely with the going, leaving naught behind. That is why the Buddhists insist — and philosophically they are correct —

that it is an absurdity to speak of a nirvani returning. Technically they are right. But esoterically they are wrong, because they take the technical meaning, but do not know the esoteric meaning of the word and are wrong therefore. A nirvani, nevertheless, at some time in duration, because of karmic links attracting it back, must return. But for the time being, and it may be for what to us humans may seem almost an eternity or quasi-eternity, it is annihilated for this sphere. It no longer reimbodies itself, no longer reincarnates, no longer has an influence on this sphere except as a spiritual energy, a steady, serene, silent, almost passive, very helpful, very important, spiritual energy to us humans, passive to us yet surrounding us and permeating us like the ether in which we bathe.

Now then, when a soul is lost, it is wiped out in that sense. It is blown out of this sphere. It is a failure. Just as the other is a great success, so this is the converse, the other end, the polar antithesis. It becomes a nirvani of avichi. You have heard me use the expression nirvana-avichi, just as the other nirvana first spoken of and commonly called nirvana alone, really ought to be called mukti-nirvana, the nirvana of spiritual freedom, the state of the complete jivanmukta, the freed monad.

Thus you see at one pole we have the mukti-nirvani, actually a divine energy, a divine being in the efflorescence, the fulness, of its highest divine consciousness or spirituality, depending upon the plane of mukti-nirvana that it reaches. At the other pole, we have the lost souls which have passed out of this sphere entirely for this manvantara, it may be for the whole solar manvantara, and therefore are technically spoken of as blown out, having reached nirvana below, absolute matter — as mukti-nirvana is absolute spirit —

annihilated. There is nothing left of them here.

The monad of which such soul was the vehicle now is obliged to bring forth from within itself a new human soul. Immense time is lost, and therefore we speak of it as one of the greatest spiritual tragedies in human history. For that it is. But these lost souls actually descend into other spheres. Let us call it into avichi, where they enter avichi-nirvana.

I here must draw the curtain. I can only say that we may look upon it as a process of being ground over and over in nature's laboratory, and obviously that means that it is something which is being reduced to its elements in order that it may begin again. Something is there, and it is evolving. It has so to speak lost its hold in these to it now superior worlds, ours. It is therefore a failure to us. It is in planes below us, and it must come up again through those lower planes, before it can again enter these our own where we now are. These fallen entities are failures, just as the former class of mukti-nirvanis are the great spiritual successes of humankind.

I remind you again of the poignant passage in a letter of one of the Masters in which the teacher speaks of the failures, those who fail in this sphere, and when their time comes, drop into inferior spheres, into the avichi-nirvana. And the Master refused even to give unto them a name, as he says it is not lawful for Sinnett and others to hear it. This was because Sinnett was no occultist, he was no initiate, he never even entered the ES.

That is what the Master meant.

Thus you see there is a nirvana of the spirit and a nirvana of absolute matter. The former is mukti-nirvana, the nirvana of spiritual freedom, almost to us incomprehensible wisdom and love. The other is the nirvana of what we have agreed to call avichi. Both are annihilations in this technical sense. Both monads have quitted this sphere, the one to rise in glory, the other to descend into the pit.

-----

July 25, 1939

The Nature of Buddha

It strikes me, Companions, that you have not yet in your minds a clear picture of what a buddha is. It can be illustrated in the case of the Lord Gautama who was born a bodhisattva, which technically means one whose next imbodiment will be that of a buddha. Being a bodhisattva of high spiritual character, he had succeeded in that life in unifying his humanity with the divinity within himself, with his inner god. This made him buddha.

This made him enter nirvana from which there is no return in any one manvantara. But the human being left behind, the still living vehicle out of which the Buddha had passed, was nevertheless far higher than any of us could ever expect to become, I believe, in a hundred imbodiments. The mahatma was left behind, the lower portion of the human ego of Gautama Sakyamuni.

Remember this: there is in each human being even now a buddha, one which has achieved buddhahood. This is our spiritual monad. Now when our human ego, as in the case of Gautama, attains self-conscious union with the spiritual monad, becomes that spiritual monad, then that man, a bodhisattva, becomes a buddha. The buddha enters into nirvana, rays from itself like a glory fill the soul remaining behind, enlightening the physical man's mind and brain, and that man will live on as one enlightened.

The Buddha of Gautama assumed the dharmakaya robe, the nirvanic robe, and the personal mahatmic soul-essence of the Bodhisattva Gautama entered the sambhogakaya, the vesture intermediate between buddha and bodhisattva; Sambhoga meaning participation with the buddha-glory and the mahatma-nirmanakaya-man below. And the occult records state that changing body from time to time the Bodhisattva Gautama, or if you like the Buddha Gautama, still lives in Sambhala and is our own supreme Chief.

Now, the laws of nature are not changed merely because one evolves higher. The animal man, therefore, died when the bodhisattva died. That is connected with the nirnmanakaya-state. But I would imagine, just offhand, speaking somewhat academically, that what we might call the animal monad of a bodhisattva would be very much higher than mine or yours, more evolved. I would say even that an animal monad in such a human being could practically be called a young human monad.

The exoteric tales about Gautama are very elaborate, heavily painted, but every stroke of the paint put on has some substratum of truth. As a young man, the son of the Raja, he married, had his son Rahula, and then the time came when he received the inner revelation, the inner call; and typically in accordance with the rules of conduct understood in India from time immemorial, understood by his beautiful wife as well as by himself, he left family and home to go out to undertake the great pilgrimage, to give of himself to save the world. He knew what was in him — the racial buddha coming at that time. He it was.

When, according to the exoteric records, he died attaining enlightenment under the bodhi tree, the human monad conjoined with the spiritual monad, and the twain thus united self-consciously entered nirvana as Buddha. That left behind Gautama, the bodhisattva, the mahatma, especially glorified because his inner buddha, his inner monad, still was showering him with its own transcendent glory.

Now then, the idea of the Buddha of Compassion is attaining nirvana only to reach that stage to be able to renounce it to come back into the world to save humanity. That is what the Buddha whose lower portions were Gautama will do because he belongs to the line of the Buddhas of Compassion. Sooner or later, before this manvantara is ended, the buddha part of Gautama will return as an imbodying buddha-man, and I personally have no doubt at all that he can return only into that same human vehicle which tabernacled it in its last life as Gautama.

Consider the amazing contrast of choice: the Pratyeka Buddha is a highly spiritual individual, and yet see what he does. He centers all his life and efforts upon his own spiritual bliss, salvation, peace and wisdom. A beautiful sublime objective, but dark shadow when compared with the perfectly divine objective of the Buddhas of Compassion. What is it in the characters of these twain which causes the one to choose aeons of what is to him sorrow for the sole purpose of helping the world, and the other to choose aeons of inexpressible, ineffable bliss, wisdom, love, peace for himself. These things have to be taken for granted, and doubtless there is an explanation, but it is one, Companions, that is too subtle to be caught in words. It must be caught in one's consciousness. There is no other way.

Saints of the Christian Church may have been quite holy men, but they were typically pratyekas, typically. I have often thought that other men, not saints, whose hearts have been moved with that holiest flame the human heart can contain, pity for others, divine compassion, and a yearning to help, actually stand higher than do the typical saints. In the former it is not saintliness; it is quasi-divinity, it is godlike. Saintliness may be for holy men; but alike unto the gods belong the Buddhas of Compassion who renounce all that to human hearts is dearest to come back, to remain in the world's light and the world's atmosphere: the Great Sacrifice giving oneself wholly and all the time for almost endless ages to help the struggling pilgrims who are we ourselves, trailing along behind. That is our objective: to become like unto them, the Buddhas of Compassion.

-----

December 26, 1939

Mukti-and Avichi-Nirvana

The force of the expression Avichi-nirvana lies in the compound. An entity may enter avichi or be in avichi, and yet not be an avichi-nirvani. The opposite pole of thought is mukti-nirvana, mukti meaning "free."

Turning again in the other direction and inventing a term we might say the avichi-nirvana is baddha-nirvana, and yet I doubt if that is a good term. Mukti means "free"; baddha means "bound" or "imprisoned," the idea being that monads which have descended so low as to go into the deeps of avichi, finally pass out at its extreme low point, thus reaching avichi-nirvana, and are blown out there — nirvana meaning "blown out."

There is a hint for you. We call these monads lost souls.

I will now try to give you a key, Companions. I refer to the mukti-nirvana and the avichi-nirvana. The essential significance of nirvana is the following: a universe, otherwise a hierarchy, has its twelve planes, each such hierarchy representing a mansion of life. When a peregrinating monad has arisen from the lowest plane in such a hierarchy, step by step upwards, stage by stage rising, and has reached the twelfth, and then leaves it for the next higher hierarchy, that monad is a mukti-nirvani — free from the hierarchy from which it has graduated. Contrariwise, when a monad, let us say in that same hierarchy, finds that it has not the spiritual strength to keep climbing upwards, stage after stage, degree after degree, as the former monad did, this monad instead sinks downwards or retrogrades, because attracted by the grosser matter below; just as the former monad was attracted by the spiritual substance of the hierarchy above. When this second monad thus goes downstairs — is that word clear to you? — instead of going upstairs, goes down into the cellar of the mansion of life, and reaches the lowest or twelfth stage, and then finally is swept out or blown out through the vent, that is the avichi-nirvana — blown out in either case, blown out at the top of the mansion of life, and blown out from the cellar of the mansion of life.

I am deliberately choosing very simple words and graphic expressions. The being in either case, leaving at the top, or leaving at the bottom, of the hierarchy, is for that hierarchy

annihilated, blown out. It does not mean that the entity itself is absolutely annihilated. The monad remains just the same. The former monad in this picture, reaching the highest stage of the mansion of life, enters the lowest stage in the next manvantara of the hierarchy above it. The highest stage we call spirit. The lowest stage we call absolute matter, but physical matter is not absolute matter. It is relatively superior matter. There are stages of matter below this physical stuff around us which we commonly call matter. But when the lowest is reached, that is absolute matter. What we call a lost soul — a better term really would be a lost monad, meaning lost for that hierarchy — descends to the lowest stage, and is swept out into the hierarchy below us through the "vent."

Now remember that this is a hint, and actually pertains to deeper teaching. But you will notice how this explanation links up even with the exoteric teachings of Buddhism, of Gautama the Buddha, as expressed in the religion of today that goes under that name. The word nirvana is a technical term, of course, and arises out of the mental picture that the originators of this technical term had of an entity being driven by karma and the winds of the spirit, driven by destiny. One passes out, to use Homer's statement, upwards by the Gate of Horn at the north. The other monad, the descending one, leaves the hierarchy according to Homer by the Gate of Ivory, or the pit, the south; and these have references to occult teaching concerning the earth itself also.

-----

July 13, 1937

Manasaputras

This matter of the manasaputras is one which recurs periodically, and is of perennial interest evidently. Some people find it a stumbling block; I don't know why. It really is one of the simplest albeit among the most profound of our teachings, and I think that if you could collect all the different ideas that have been stated this evening by the different minds, like the seven-colored sunlight, the parti-colored rays blending into the white light, coalesce them thus in your mind, you would have a very easy answer to the questions: who are the manasaputras; whom did they illuminate; when?

Let me ask a few questions also. Where did we come from before we imbodied on this chain? From the moon-chain. Where are we going, whither shall we go when we leave this earth-chain at the end of this manvantara? What will be the child of this earth-chain which then will be the moon-chain to its child? Has it not been stated that we shall play the part of illuminators, enliveners of mind, awakeners of intellectual self-consciousness in the new chain? In other words, that we shall be manasaputras to others less than what we then shall be? And that each such manasaputra will illuminate that part of his own stream of consciousness which, when that manasaputra was a man was to that man his astral animal monad? Are the manasaputras we, or different from us? Both.

For instance, is the human soul myself? Yes, especially so because on this globe in this round we are passing

through the human-soul stage of our evolutionary unfoldment. Is the spiritual soul of my constitution I, or is it different from me? Both. It is my inspirer with the illuminations of spirit, speaking of myself as a human soul, and yet it is another monad.

The human monad we call the human monad because only humanity has as yet been unwrapped from it. The spiritual monad in my constitution we call the spiritual monad because spirituality by now has become unwrapped from it. But it was once a human monad, which means a monad manifesting in the state of humanity; as a spiritual monad means a monad manifesting in the state of spirituality.

So we can say we who are now men on this chain were beasts or human animals on the moon-chain. And the manasaputras who each one enlightened its own human in the third root-race on this globe, on this earth-chain, were on the moon-chain the evolved human beings of that chain. We were then their human-animal souls.

An enormous help in these intricate and recondite studies is to make a habit of mental assembling in your mind, no matter how some other doctrine may appear to have no bearing on the problem which you are thinking about. Approach that other doctrine to your problem and see if it won't fit in somewhere.

"Manasaputras enlivening relatively unconscious entities — moon-chain? Yes, we came from the moon-chain; into this chain. Therefore, there must be some connection with events when we were on the moon as entities there." The mind running in the other direction, forwards, into the future, naturally says: "Why, of course, there would be manasaputras as the child of this chain when this chain dies and becomes the moon of the new chain. Who are these manasaputras-to-be? Why, they must be we ourselves, humans here now; because if we make the grade, we are at the present time evolving forth the manasaputric qualities in our humanity" — and so forth.

It is a great help to bring different doctrines into assemblage, as a child will bring the pieces of a Chinese or other puzzle and try to fit them together, so that when the work is done he has a pretty picture before him, an illumination. He sees the whole.

Another great fault we are all addicted to is the fault of separating ourselves from the encompassing life, from the universe. We think of ourselves; and the universe around me, you, us. Each man thinks that. He forgets that every other man thinks in exactly the same way. Now if we can overcome this habit of separating ourselves in thought and in consciousness from the surrounding cosmic life, we shall find the solutions of our problems much more easily; because that habit is a vicious thing, it affects all the different ways of our thinking.

When we think about the manasaputra, the habit of making separations between the universe and us immediately draws us into the old groove: "Oh, manasaputra, illuminating me. Therefore the manasaputra is something different from me, I must separate them because obviously they are two." Well, that is wrong, you see. That is the brain-mind running in a groove. They are we, and they are not we, from the angle from which we view the thing. My spiritual soul is myself, and yet it is different because there is another monad there, and yet I live in its life, in its inspiration. I am infilled with what I can contain of the sublime power, and that sublime power in all its work is endeavoring to awaken that part of me as a human monad which is identical with itself.

If we call the individuality-note of the spiritual monad X, the influence of that spiritual monad in me as a human monad is a constant attempt to awaken that X-quality in me as human monad.

There is still one important spiritually historic fact to remember: there are manasaputras of seven or even ten or twelve classes, like everything else in the universe; for seven and ten and twelve are fundamental hierarchical numbers running throughout the webwork of all being. Now then, some of these manasaputras of the higher, and even highest, classes or grades are specifically workers in or attached to the cosmic hierarchy of compassion, or cosmic hierarchy of light; and these, during the course of the evolution of life-waves on a planetary chain, have the function of descending avatara-like as beings from a higher sphere and inaugurating illuminations or periods of illumination. It is to this latter class that HPB points perhaps most strongly of all in her Secret Doctrine when she writes of the work of the manasaputras illuminating the lower pitris.

I will summarize briefly. In addition to the manasaputras mentioned by me first, there are these higher manasaputras who avatara-like come from higher spheres to inaugurate or start or begin the work of intellectual illumination in life-waves needing just this intellectual impulse or urge; and having begun it, these higher manasaputras retire to their own spheres. But this illuminating work once begun, starts the process, and then the lower manasaputras, our own manasaputras so to speak, continue the process of illumination inaugurated by the higher manasaputras. This statement can serve as a warning against our brain-mind habit of thinking that one explanation covers all the ground, and likewise makes us alert against the brain-mind habit of keeping ideas in watertight or thought-tight compartments.

-----

December 26, 1939

Three classes of Manases

We must not forget that there is in the beast the manasic element now latent, but in a future chain to manifest as an individual human, and the overshadowing manasaputra of every animal then will be the higher portion of the human being to become or to develop from within outwards, in the theosophical manner and not in the Darwinian. In other words, the animals in this our chain, will be the humans in the next reimbodiment of this chain. And those future humans will be over-enlightened by their spiritual parts. Remember also that there is a particular class of manases — I prefer that term for them in this case rather than manasaputras — manases who, driven by the urge of divine compassion, act as the inspirers of the then as yet non-fully developed peoples, races.

The manasaputras thus of the third root-race may be cast into several classes: the manasaputra of each individual human represents one class. Second, the manasaputras striving to bring up the beasts to some kind of mental cognition, who succeed very poorly because the vehicles are not ready. And the third class: the manases who, urged by divine compassion, appear on earth as inspirers, beings teaching by divine right, avataric instruments of karmic justice.

-----

January 30, 1940

Avataras Function as Manasaputras

As a matter of fact, avataras function as manasaputras to us. This is quite apart from the function they play, or the role that they follow or enact, so far as they themselves are concerned. It is a matter of occult historic record that at the beginning of every root-race, and at certain other specific times in human history, the great initiates appear among men and teach, inaugurate civilizations, start codes of morals, of law, of conduct, and sow in the minds of the then young humanity what European philosophers rather weakly call innate ideas, which take root and are carried on thereafter from age to age. These initiates are known in all ancient story, history, legend; and their disciples are called initiate-priests and initiate-kings.

What thus takes place in human relationships, takes place likewise with the classes of monads at the opening of manvantaric evolution on a chain. They actually perform the functions of and indeed they are imbodied manasaputras of varying grade.

Manus, Prajapatis, Sishtas

Who and what are the prajapatis? And what are the manus? And what relation do the manus bear to the prajapatis?

The manus are the sishtas — not necessarily divine, however. The prajapatis are the different classes of monads. Prajapati means parents of progeny or offspring, and they are, considered as an individual power in the universe, innumerable entities gathered together under that title or name or power. We will take the prajapati of the human life-wave. That life-wave, itself considered as a stream of consciousness composed of

units, individual human monads, is the prajapati. The manus are the offspring of the prajapati, following the phrasing of the Hindus as you will find in the Vishnu-Purana; and the manus are the sishtas.

There is a root-manu for every globe, and a seed-manu for every globe. The root-manu initiates the incoming life-wave on that globe, and the seed-manu sees its departure from that globe as a life-wave. And this tells you at once what the manus really are — the sishtas. The term manu of course applies only technically and very correctly speaking to thinking beings, from the Sanskrit root man, to think intelligently.

Now a seed-manu which sees the departure of the great body of the human life-wave when it leaves any globe of a chain, ours for instance, remains the seed-manu until the coming of the human life-wave on that same globe again during the next round. Then the seed-manu, partly due to the evolution of its component unit sishtas, and partly to the highest class of the monads of the incoming wave joining with the sishtas, becomes the root-manu. So really the root-manu and the seed-manu are almost the same, but not quite. We simply say the seed-manus are the highest egos of a life-wave when that life-wave leaves a globe. Those same egos remain the seed-manus during the interim until the life-wave returns to that globe. Then the seed-manus as it were change their name to root-manus, because of their new function of inaugurating the new human stock.

They are the roots of that new human stock. That is all there is to this distinction. The manus are the sishtas.

Of course a great deal more could be stated about these things, but there is the whole thing in a thumbnail picture. I will also point out that just as there are root-manus and seed-manus on every globe of a chain, so on a larger scale are there root-manus and seed-manus for every round. And on a still larger scale root-manus and seed-manus for every beginning and ending of a planetary chain or a full planetary manvantara.

Nature has one law throughout all her structure, and one series of operations therefore, and it is upon this fundamental fact that is based what we call our master key analogy. It is not an arbitrary thing; it is because nature is one, has one life, therefore one law of operation or of being; and therefore every part in universal nature, from the highest to the lowest, is subject to that one law or swabhava of jiva, of vitality, and follows it.

I would not say that the buddhas are the manus, because we have just called the manus the sishtas; and yet in another sense the statement is not wrong, because the sishtas are always the most highly evolved on a globe when the life-wave to which those most highly evolved egos belong moves from that globe to the next globe in serial order, and naturally the buddhas would be amongst the sishtas. Why are they the most highly evolved? Why do they remain as sishtas? Because they have been forerunners of the life-wave during that round, and perhaps the preceding round, and have already run ahead of the other egos in that life-wave, and no longer need to go the round again for that particular quality of evolution, which is just what makes the buddhas. Therefore they automatically as well as by choice — it becomes their law and their duty and their choice — altogether become and are the sishtas, the seed-manus, for that globe when the life-wave leaves it; the life-wave being composed of the less highly evolved egos of that life-wave. In connection with the buddhas and the sishtas we may perhaps say that the buddhas are the most advanced of all the sishtas.

You could speak of manus of a solar system too, and prajapatis. I repeat, there is in universal nature one law and therefore one common operation throughout. It is something like the vital structure of a man: its pranas or life-forces originate in his jiva. His jiva is practically the same thing as is his fundamental monad, there being thus one fundamental monad, and one jiva, its efflux, and therefore pranas in accordance with that one jiva. In other words, one life, and all that goes to make the man must follow the mandates, the swabhava or characteristics, of that jiva or fundamental monad.

We can by this universal fundamental fact of nature reason analogically, and if we can do so correctly, our foundations of thought will be true to fact. But we have to be very watchful against false analogies, because that is where the brain-mind comes in which often sees things that are not so. It thinks they are, and we call these false analogies.

-----

August 10, 1937

The Three Panoramic Visions

Before we close, I desire to allude, but very shortly, to the question of postmortem visioning of the life last past, and of the life to come. The first panoramic viewing is when physical death has intervened, and the only organ alive, or partially so, is the brain. That is the first of the panoramic visions. Such visioning is not perfectly elaborated and only rarely complete. It is general rather than particular. The second comes at the second death before the beginning of the devachan, and this is relatively completely elaborated. The third comes at the end of the devachan, and before the next imbodiment.

What is the difference, if any, amongst these three? Mainly this, that the first panoramic vision following physical death deals primarily with the life last past, concluding with a prophetic lightning flash of future sight in which the reincarnating ego sees its past life, sees what its destiny in the next life will be, as a flash on a screen, and knows the justice both of the past and of what it will have to face in the future. It recognizes itself as the worker and producer, the creator of its happiness and of its misery, both in the past life and in the next life to come.

The second panoramic vision differs from the first only in that the visioning of the past life is much less intense than in the first, is the short part; and the visioning of the future life to come is the longer part of the panoramic view and highly elaborate. The ego then foresees the future by reason of its own inner power of vision, the spiritual power; recognizes what it will have to meet in the next incarnation; recognizes the utter justice of it all, the mercy of it really; sees what is going to happen to it, not in full detail, but certainly in the large, and to a certain extent in detail also.

The third panoramic vision differs scarcely at all from the second, and is rather like a review of the second panoramic vision. Here the reincarnating ego having just ended its devachan receives this panoramic vision, sees what is coming to it, sees again the justice and pity of it all in a short brief viewing. Then the curtain falls, the ego drinks the merciful cup of Lethe, of oblivion, and some months afterwards is born as a child —

the body, that is.

Those are the only three distinctions amongst the three panoramic views. The first one is mainly of the past life with a brief but accurate foreseeing, prophetically, of the future. After the second death, it is mainly the future that is seen after a brief reviewing of the past. And the third panoramic vision is practically the same as the second, but shorter; just as intense and keen, but shorter.

The reincarnating ego is the seer, and it derives its vision from its Father in Heaven, the spiritual ego. I have always found it one of the most interesting, and I will say frankly amazing, things in human consciousness that there is a faculty in us which can pierce into the future and, exactly in proportion to the degree in which this faculty is polished by training and the proper life, the vision is the clearer and the more detailed. I do not like to speak of this because to many who do not understand the subtilties of occult thinking, the idea will come that the ego sees the future, foresees it, because the future is fatally destined to come upon it. That is but a half-truth.

There is a subtilty of comprehension and apprehension here which can be known and experienced, but I gravely fear is scarcely subject to explanation. It is an amazing thing, but if you will remember that everything that has been in the past is recorded in the astral light, not only on one plane of the astral light, but from the akasa downwards to the lowest part of the astral light, and that human egos follow the pathways of destiny largely guided by the corridors of the astral light, in other words follow the tracks of former lives karmically speaking, you will readily see that foreseeing, foresight, visioning of the future, is not only natural, but to one who can do so, inevitable. It must be so. But even to one who has studied these things for lifetimes, there is a never-ending amazement that the thing can be, because from our brain-mind standpoint, even of those highly developed, the future is to come but not yet is, the past is finished but reflects itself in the present, and the present is intermediate between the as yet uncome future and the quasi-ended past.

The matter clears itself up, however, when we ascend out of the realms even of the most polished brain-mind thinking into the realms of buddhic illumination, and there we see the utter reality of the old, old saying that past and present and future are not three things but essentially one, which we can best express by calling it the Eternal Now. Obviously then it would be impossible not to see the future and the past also, for they exist in the Eternal Now as a composite picture of reality, and to the seer it is somewhat like looking upon those

clever paintings of scientific artists who, although often erroneously as regards fact and detail, trace the beginning of a thing through its past history, through the present, and imagine its future. Thus the observer's eye sees at one glance the entire line — the past, the present, and the future — in the now. This is a poor analogy but perhaps suggestive.

Now, Companions, I believe this is the last time we shall be together before I return from Europe. That is right, is it not? I simply wish to say that I leave with you my love and my trust; that in your hands while I am gone lies the responsibility, under the officials whom I have placed in charge here, to keep our work going, to avoid strife, to live in brotherly kindness and love amongst yourselves. Please do it. I believe you will. I want to leave you for this trip with a feeling that there is not anything that I need to be anxious about, that everything will go well with you. The officials that I have left in charge here are all honest, devoted, earnest men and women. They can be trusted. I do not know that I have anything more to say at present, Companions, except to repeat: you have in your hands my love for you and my trust in you. Hold it!

Meeting 35

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Thirty-Five

Answers to Correspondence

Student — (Stockholm, Sweden) — In KTMG Paper No. 5 you give some information regarding the lifeatoms in different organs of the body, to wit, that the higher in the body the organ has its place the finer is the nature of its lifeatoms; and in comparing the heart and the brain you say in substance that the heart is the organ of the personality, but the brain, the lifeatoms of which are bathed in akasa, is the organ of the Manasaputra. Now, reading the paragraph 'The Heart,' in No. 5 of HPB's early Instructions, one could easily get an impression of 'contradictions.'

Dear Teacher, I am no hunter for contradictions at all, so I have spent some thinking to get the proper explanation for myself, and I think that I am on the track. You speak of the lifeatoms, and it seems to me only natural, that in our manasic era those of the brain should be superior to those of the heart, whose function, as the upadhi for the higher triad, still must be slumbering at least in the average man, and that hence its function is in this same period to distribute the pranic power to the body, its function as upadhi for jiva being still more or less latent.

However, there are some very interesting points here, which I think it could be of great value to get a little more clear, and as a matter of fact I know that some of my comrades here are working on the same problem.

G. de P. — There is no contradiction; but I can readily see how this earlier statement of mine would need elucidation for thoughtful and devoted students. I will try briefly to answer the question.

The statement as contained in the KTMG Paper No. 5 is quite accurate, and the explanation is as follows: the heart is the focal or central organ of the individual man, that is to say of the reincarnating ego. This of course includes the working of this ego through all parts of the body outside of the heart, therefore including the brain also. But nevertheless the brain, the atoms of which are bathed in akasa and remain so bathed throughout the lifetime of the body, is also the vehicle of the individual manasaputra which overshadows the human being as an inspiring influence, in exactly the same way as the buddhi overshadows the manas in the individual human entity.

The confusion seems to have arisen because of the usage in all modern European languages, and in some Asiatic tongues, of the word heart as signifying the noblest part of a being. But this is not exactly correct in the present matter. The significance of this phraseology means that the heart, as in the expression the heart doctrine, is the hid part, the secret part, the noblest part, that which also is invisible — just as we speak of the heart of Father Sun as being something different from the glorious physical globe which is the garment in which the heart is clothed.

The individual manasaputra overshadowing every individual human being works through that human being because it impregnates or permeates the higher manas or buddhi-manas of such human being. Similarly in the human body, the lifeatoms of the brain are the vehicle not only of the thought of the incarnated ego, but are likewise, because of the above stated fact, the vehicle of the influence, spiritual and intellectual, of the overshadowing manasaputric fluid or essence.

The reason for the brain as an organ being the vehicle for the manasaputric fluid or essence lies in the fact that the brain is a deposit of thought-fluid, therefore a deposit of the manasic essence in the individual. During the lifetime of the body, the lifeatoms in the brain are continuously bathed with akasa; and it is through the akasa in the human constitution that the manasaputra works. It is through akasa also in the human constitution, outside of the physical body, that the manasaputric fluid or essence permeates or impregnates the manas or buddhi-manas in the man.

As you all know, the overshadowing manasaputras chose their vehicles in the third root-race of this round on this earth; and from that time the hitherto sleeping minds of the then humanity began to awaken and to be

self-conscious individuals. In other words man then became truly man. Naturally, this wonderful fact or process was reflected in the bodies of the individuals then living, in the proper organ which evolution had made most appropriate for this. This organ was the brain; and the same organ, the brain, has continued up to the present day to be the vehicle not only of the manas in man, but because of this fact also is the focus of the manasaputric influence working through the human manas.

I hope that this answer will clarify the difficulty, and will show you that there is no contradiction. It will also explain another difficulty that many students experience, to wit, the manner in which the manasaputra is still connected with the reincarnating ego.

Student — I think that you here give the expression the heart a purely symbolical meaning, and this I cannot get in full conformity with the contents of the chapter "The Heart" in the HPB Instruction, the wording of which I find very definite indeed. I am sure that you will understand where my difficulties in this problem come in.

As far as the brain is concerned your explanation seems to me to be very clear. I think I understand that very well. But coming to the heart I fail to find a solution covering the different statements made. Nevertheless I feel sure that such a solution must be possible. That is the reason why I ask again and draw so much on your patience.

G. de P. — You are quite right to return to me with an expression of being unable to understand fully the matter of the lifeatoms and the relative importance of the brain and the heart in the physical body. I am not at all astonished that you, as well as others, should have difficulty in understanding, because the teaching here is not only recondite but so intricate in a sense that it is difficult for almost anyone to understand, and therefore to have a clear picture of it.

However, I will try once more to give you an explanation which I sincerely trust will clear away your difficulties. I am so glad that you are not one of those small-minded men, with whom HPB and the Masters had such difficulties in the older days, who immediately imagine that there are contradictions when they find differing or paradoxical statements in the Instructions. Almost invariably the truth is that the second or later of any such statements is a more advanced teaching than the former one; and hence, because more advanced, it may seem to be contrary to what had been stated or taught earlier.

In the first instance, you have a report of a KTMG meeting where I was endeavoring to give a new instalment of esoteric teaching brought out by the questions then asked. But as the question dealt almost wholly with the physical lifeatoms and their relative standing or ethereality in the body, I had to limit my answer more or less to the question of the physical atoms, at the same time trying to give a hint of deeper truths.

The passage entitled The Heart, we must remember appears in a pamphlet originally issued after HPB's death. In this connection I should add that HPB's own authentic Instructions are nos. 1, 2, and 3, which were issued during her lifetime, and therefore bore the imprint of her own personal care. Instructions nos. 4 and 5

were made up or composed or collected from teachings given orally by HPB, and which the members of her Inner Group took down in the form of notes, two of these members being the then secretaries, Annie Besant and G. R. S. Mead. These collected notes were later formed into what came to be called Instruction no. 4 and Instruction no. 5; and because these notes issued as reports were generally accurate, they were accepted by Mr. Judge as being substantially correct; and this is quite true.

My point is that had HPB lived to issue these two Instructions 4 and 5 herself, she would not only have elaborated them, but would have amended or corrected them, and made them more complete. However, as I have just stated, the Section entitled The Heart, in HPB's Instruction no. 5, is generally quite accurate, although quite incomplete in the teaching.

With this preamble, I will now try to make more clear the explanation. There is no contradiction whatsoever, as you yourself realize. Instruction no. 5 states that "The Heart is the center of the Spiritual Consciousness, as the Brain is the center of Intellectual Consciousness." This is perfectly true. This Instruction also states that

"The Heart represents the Higher Triad, while the Liver and Spleen represent the Quaternary, taken as a whole. The heart is the abode of the Spiritual Man, whereas the Psycho-Intellectual Man dwells in the Head

with its seven gateways." This statement also is quite true.

Now then, under the heading The Brain, the same Instruction reads: ". . . The Pineal Gland itself, illuminated, corresponds with Divine Thought." This also is perfectly true. So you have here from HPB's own words, the same apparent contradiction that seemed to puzzle you in reading over the KTMG Pamphlet, when contrasted by you with the statements in Instruction no. 5 of HPB's, under the heading The Heart.

To show you that you are right in thinking that there is no contradiction, I call your attention to my words:

"the heart, as in the expression, 'the Heart-Doctrine,' is the hid part, the secret part, the noblest part, that which also is invisible; just as we speak of the heart of Father Sun as being something different from the glorious physical globe which is the garment in which the 'Heart' is clothed." So you see, here I too speak of the heart as being "the noblest part," "the secret part."

Further, I speak of the brain as being the vehicle of the manasaputra, which it exactly is, for it is the organ or focus, "of the overshadowing Manasaputric fluid or essence." HPB also speaks of the heart as being the organ of the higher triad, atma-buddhi-manas; and the liver and spleen as being organs of the lower quaternary of the seven principles of man.

Where then shall we place our wonderful brain, which HPB calls the organ of divine thought? Here is the answer to all your difficulties, and I will try to make it now more clear and as brief as possible. There are three lines, parallel and working continuously together, of evolution for the human being, or indeed for any other entity, even a beast. These three lines are the divine-spiritual, the psychomental, and the vital-astral-physical. Of these three lines of evolution, the physical human body has the heart functioning as the focus of the divine-spiritual, because the heart is the physical focus of the auric egg, and the auric egg incloses, in addition to all the other principles, the cosmic jiva manifesting in this auric egg, and this cosmic jiva therefore passes through the heart as the various pranas.

The psychomental line of evolution has its organ or focus in the physical body in and through the brain, or rather the human skull containing the brain and other less important physical attachments.

The third or vital-astral-physical line of evolution has its representative foci in the body, first in the liver which is the vehicle of kama, or rather kama-manas; and second, in its lieutenant the spleen, which is the seat of the linga-sarira or astral model-body.

Now then, during the course of evolution in the third race of mankind in this fourth round on this globe, when the manasaputras "descended" into manifestation in order to inform and to give mind to the then senseless humanity, being psycho-intellectual beings in their swabhava or essential characteristic, they naturally and perforce chose the proper organ in the physical body, which was the then relatively undeveloped and feeble brain. By means of this descent or incarnation, the manasaputras through the succeeding ages built up the brain to be the wonderful and indeed marvelous physical organ or focus of thought that now it is. The brain has increased in size and in importance enormously since the third root-race, because of this descent or incarnation of the manasaputras.

Next, because the manasaputras or agnishwattas are psychomental or spiritual-intellectual beings, and because they have been working for ages directly on the psychomental organ, the brain, therefore the lifeatoms of the physical brain are of the highest character so far as ethereality is concerned in the human body, because actually the texture of the physical brain is more ethereal than any other part of the body, quasi-astral, and this is because the lifeatoms which compose it are actually the deposit from the manasic plane of the auric egg into the physical of the most ethereal atoms that the body can contain, because these most ethereal atoms are needed to carry the ethereal, quasi-spiritual, energy or fluid or essence flowing forth from the manasaputra. Therefore the lifeatoms of the brain stand the highest, for the reasons that I have just enumerated in connection with the manasaputric fluid.

Nevertheless, it is from the heart, the spiritual king of the body, that flows forth the individual's divine-spiritual efflux into his brain; and when this happens in the case of highly evolved human beings, then the brain, through the pineal gland — the special organ for this purpose — becomes the organ of divine thought.

The physical lifeatoms of the human heart are less ethereal than the lifeatoms of the human brain, because the spiritual energies are not yet incarnated to the same extent that the psycho-intellectual energies are incarnated in and through the brain.

Do you now get this subtle and difficult thought, which yet when once understood is so simple? Here you have the explanation of your difficulty, and why I said that the lifeatoms of the physical brain stand higher in ethereality, but yet that the heart was the organ of the personal man. Better adjectives here would have been central organ of the individual man, that is to say, of the reincarnating ego, here referring to the individuality, the reincarnating ego or monad, which is atma-buddhi with all the spiritual flower from the manasic fruitages of past lives.

I have also endeavored to give the teaching regarding the overshadowing manasaputra permeating the brain with its astral fluid, and thus conferring a reinforcement of self-consciousness in man. The brain is self-conscious. The heart is not self-conscious, but is conscious, and conscious of the spirit. But in order that the complete septenary man shall be self-conscious, the brain must receive the spiritual rays from the spiritual sun in the heart. I say in the heart, but this is a mere figure of speech. Actually, the spiritual man or individuality is not in the heart, but the heart is the organ for the individual spiritual ray flowing forth from the higher planes of the auric egg. This spiritual ray working through the auric egg, therefore through the astral body, reaches into the physical body and builds the heart.

But it is only the ray and its atmosphere which are in the heart and fill the heart with the pranic or rather jiva fluid. It is this jiva fluid which in the personal imbodied man becomes the various pranas; and this jiva fluid is likewise the same in its higher parts as the universal divinity of the solar system. Thus it is that the heart is the vehicle of the individual spiritual ray flowing forth from the god within us by means of the auric egg transmitting the jiva which becomes the different pranas in the physical body. When this jivic ray through the heart can touch the brain, it becomes illuminated and transmits this spiritual-divine ray through the self-consciousness. When this transmission is perfect, we have the buddha or the mahatma or the high chela, in a descending scale of perfection; and when it is more imperfect and less complete, we have the great-hearted man, the high-minded and spiritual average man. When it is still less complete, we have the ordinary man with his mere flashes of spirituality and intuition, but with the intensification of brain-mind activity that we all know so well.

Thus it is that from the spiritual standpoint the heart is the organ of the individual. The brain is the highly developed organ of the manasic part by reason of the continuous work and inspiration which the manasaputric fluid has had upon the brain.

In brief and in substance, when man unites his brain to his heart, then the brain becomes illuminated from the heart with the spiritual fluid from the god within, or what is the same thing from the higher triad or the spiritual monad, atma-buddhi-manas. Then we have that noblest product of evolution, a human god, such as a buddha, or one of the high mahatmas.

I trust that with this long explanation, necessarily complex as it is, because it is dealing with a very complex teaching, your difficulties will vanish. Your problem will be solved if you will give to this explanation the study that you may find needful.

I do not wish to convey the impression that I give to the heart a purely symbolical meaning. The heart is of course a symbol in one sense because of language-use; just as the brain is a symbol because of language use.

But the heart likewise is the actual organ of the individual spiritual ray, as the brain is the organ of the manasic ray. It is our duty, and our sublime privilege, and our future noble destiny, to unite the two into one.

Finally, the heart, the brain, the liver, the spleen, etc., as organs in the human body, exemplify on this physical plane the very important fact of the composite character of the human constitution. From each monadic center there flow forth energies with different characteristics or swabhavas, and the physical organs are merely their reflections, or the ends or termini of their respective rays, on this physical plane.

Please remember that these KTMG Instructions contain new teaching, and any such instalment of new teaching almost certainly will arouse new questions, therefore perhaps new difficulties. Every step forwards

always brings a new vision. Our students must be ready at any moment to realize that what they had thought they perfectly understood before, may, it is possible, be after all an imperfect understanding, to be replaced by a greater light.

Student — (The Hague, Holland) — In KTMG Instruction No. 1 it says: "Each planetary chain in any solar Manvantara, that is, a Manvantara of a solar system, has seven existences, seven planetary Manvantaras."

Could this be made somewhat clearer, please ?

G. de P. — The reference here is to the lifetime of that particular celestial entity or celestial body which we call a planetary chain, be it the earth's planetary chain (or the planetary chain of the moon that was), or of Venus, Mars, Jupiter, or what not.

After seven such existences — each such existence being a period of seven rounds — have been run through, or seven imbodiments of a planetary chain, then a grand cycle of the planetary chain's life comes to an end; and it has a long nirvanic rest or repose, corresponding to what a man's devachan is after life.

To particularize: each one such existence, or period of seven rounds, of a planetary chain brings into active functioning in the planetary chain, and for all the hosts of beings connected with it, one of the seven main planes of the solar system. Consequently, when seven such existences have been finished, when seven cosmic planes have been experienced, then the planetary chain ends its reimbodiments for a time, and enjoys a long, long repose period, after which it will come forth anew for another series of imbodiments or existences.

The case of our moon and earth is an instance of a planetary chain having two reimbodiments succeeding each other, which fact our students already know. The moon-chain was the parent of the earth-chain, or to speak more accurately, what were the ensouling principles of the moon-chain are now the earth-chain. Just as a man of one life is the parent of his own next existence in the next life, so the life of a planetary chain is the parent of the child planetary chain-to-be in the future.

The process above briefly described is greatly complicated because of the fact that each and every cosmic plane is itself septenary, comprising what is for itself its spiritual or highest part gradually materializing down to what is for itself its material part. This fact it is which accounts for the seven rounds in any one planetary existence before spoken of.

As an example, globe D on this cosmic plane begins in the highest subplane and gradually with each new round sinks to the subplane below till it reaches the fourth subplane in the fourth round. Then beginning the fifth it slowly rises again into the more ethereal planes. The same is true of all the other six (or eleven) globes of any planetary chain.

Student — Could something be said about "colour rays that lie beyond the so-called 'visible spectrum,'"

found on page 30 of The Mahatma Letters to A. P. Sinnett?

G. de P. — In order to understand at least something of the Master KH's words, the student must take an entirely different view of the character of light from that commonly accepted today — which different view means an entirely new vision of the nature of the invisible realms of the universe. In the first place we must remember that in occultism light is substance and is not merely a vibration, or again a mode of motion as science was teaching in the days of HPB's public work when the Master wrote this letter. Nor again is light entirely what our ultramodern scientists today seem to think it is — a vibrational radiation from some active or originating vibrating center. It is true that light is the last, but yet it is much more. Light is relatively conscious substance, I repeat; and as substance is sevenfold in the universe throughout its seven (or ten) planes, and as each plane is bipolar in action, having both its spiritual pole and its material pole, light therefore is likewise bipolar. Hence the seven cosmic rays belonging to these seven cosmic planes are to be considered as double on account of this bipolar character.

There are, therefore, really fourteen different kinds of light or radiation, every one of which is substantial and more or less conscious, as well as being a vehicle for higher consciousness, and corresponds to its own particular plane. The entire universe from this point of view is, in consequence of the foregoing, builded of light, crystallized light if you wish; or, to put the matter in another way, light or radiation is matter in motion

seen from an inferior plane to itself. Could we see light from a superior plane it would appear to us as material. Try to get this thought, for it is the key to a great many things, as well as to the essential meaning of this passage in the Master's letter.

For instance, the sevenfold constitution of man, composite as it is, can be considered from the nature and character of light, which we are now studying, and therefore as being radiation or light throughout; so that in very truth a man's constitution could be called a pillar of light consisting of seven (or fourteen) different kinds or types or varieties, each type or variety having its own innate characteristic or swabhava. This characteristic or swabhava expresses itself as the inherent or individual color of such type or variety.

The light which pours forth continuously from the sun may be considered to be force; but just because force and matter are fundamentally one, this light therefore can likewise be considered to be matter or substance.

Thus it is that Father Sun fills his whole kingdom, the solar system, with the outpouring of the seven (or fourteen) kinds of radiations from himself; and it is these seven (or fourteen) lights, or different kinds of radiations, which build and inform the solar system from its most spiritual to its most densely material parts.

Father Sun pours forth these seven (or fourteen) kinds of light or radiations out of his own composite constitution; precisely as a man in a strictly analogical fashion is continuously pouring forth from his own constitution the seven (or fourteen) different kinds of auric radiations which we can with perfect justice call various kinds or varieties of light, each having its own specific or characteristic or swabhavic coruscating color. Thus the human constitution merely repeats, on its own planes, what its great parent Father Sun does on his planes of cosmic spaces, inner and outer.

It is quite possible for an adept to be seated in his chair, or on a rock on a mountainside, or in any place, and to fix his consciousness in the realm or sphere of one of these seven (or fourteen) different kinds of radiation or light; and thus by attuning his consciousness to an identity of vibration therewith, to enter into interior communication with these inner realms of being, and to recognize and thus to know the respective inhabitants of these inner realms — for every one of the realms of the solar system, inner or outer, visible or invisible, is infilled with its own particular inhabitants, worlds, planets. It is this faculty of the trained adept, of being able to enter into one of the radiation realms of his own constitution, which puts him in sympathetic coordinate communication with the same realm in the constitution of some other human being, or of some other entity or thing, which thus enables him to read almost infallibly correctly the thoughts, feelings, emotions, impulses, of the other human being — indeed, even to read that other human being's past, and to a certain extent his future.

This great truth is the explanation of what the Occident calls spiritual clairvoyance, or more popularly simply clairvoyance, because the Occident knows very little indeed, if anything, about genuine spiritual clairvoyance.

It is to this group of natural facts of the solar system that the Master referred when he used the expression

"colour-rays that lie beyond the so-called visible spectrum." The visible spectrum is or consists of merely those particular and limited radiations or colored lights which our human eyes can sense — that is to say, can see. The other and very numerous rays that lie beyond the visible spectrum, and which to a certain extent are already recognized by modern science as existing, are the different radiations or lights belonging to other —

and to us invisible — realms or spheres, all of which are virtually consciously unsensed by the ordinary man, but which spheres can be easily entered by the adept through esoteric training. Of course each one of the different radiations or color-rays has its own vibrational period or frequency, as the scientists say, which is the vibrational keynote for that particular realm or plane.

These facts that I have just briefly described likewise explain much of what HPB referred to in her Secret Doctrine when she writes in substance that the material universe is builded of light. Some day scientists will acknowledge this to be the fact. I might add here in passing, as it seems a proper place so to do, that what science calls the infrared and ultraviolet radiations — and which were already known, I believe, by science when the Master wrote his letter — are indeed not extensions of the visible spectrum so much as they are the two types of rays immediately preceding and immediately following on what we now call the visible spectrum. These ultraviolet and infrared rays therefore proclaim, to those who have ears to hear their silent messages, that beyond even these lie other ranges of radiations, of colored lights, of which, even with the help of our most delicate and sensitive scientific instruments, we suspect the existence, but have not yet actually seen. Thus the infrared and ultraviolet rays are already proofs of radiations invisible to the ordinary man, and

unsensed by him except vaguely; and what a standing demonstration of our main theorem it is that the visible spectrum is but one cross-section of the endless series of radiations with which the universe is filled, and of which indeed it is wholly builded!

To speak more particularly and more definitely, the ultraviolet and infrared rays are rays on the borderline between our physical universe and the astral realms next above and next beneath our own physical world. The point to remember here is that there are no solutions of continuity between one realm or plane and the realm or plane immediately preceding it and immediately following it. Entities in any one realm or plane — and our physical realm or plane is an example in point — have a sense apparatus fitted for, appropriate to, and evolved to cognize that especial or particular realm or plane on which such entities live. By cultivating interior and as yet undeveloped senses in the average man, the adept can penetrate both above and below the physical sphere, and by fixing his self-consciously percipient organ, thus trained, in such realms above or below our own become conscious of the existence of the entities, the worlds, the spheres, belonging to such superior and inferior planes.

Let the esotericist, however, never forget for a single instant that our present illustrations are those belonging to that particular energy or substance of the mighty universe which we men call light or radiation in its seven (or fourteen) varieties or types or kinds. The question has been asked about light, and consequently the answer deals with the nature and characteristics of the many kinds of radiation, which be it always remembered is fundamentally both force and substance. Nevertheless, a much more spiritual manner of considering the structure and substances of the universe is by following out the planes and spheres of consciousness rather than of the substances, such as light or radiation in and through which consciousness works. To exemplify: when the cosmic pralaya begins, all the various realms of substance, including the many varieties of radiations, will gradually be withdrawn into each other, beginning with the lowest and running up the scale into the more ethereal and thence higher into the spiritual. Thus there will remain, during the cosmic pralaya, the spiritual realms into which all beings and entities and things which were so active during the manvantara are now engrossed in their paranirvanic state of conscious ineffable bliss — each such unit or individual remaining throughout the cosmic pralaya as a monadic seed of consciousness-life-substance, to blossom forth again as a new entity in a new manvantara and in still higher grades of evolutionary activity when the cosmic pralaya shall reach its end.

Now to return to our main subject and to change the thought a little bit, and putting our discourse in somewhat different words: light is matter, or rather substance; and hence the gross physical matter of the physical world around us may be looked upon as concreted light, crystallized light, crystallized radiation, so that our very physical bodies as well as all our interior sheaths or bodies are respectively builded of these widely different grades of concreted light. To certain beings on other approximate planes, and even to certain animals on this physical plane, a human body for instance shines and glows and coruscates with a marvelous display of radiating light.

In brief, therefore, light is but radiation, to use the modern scientific term; and radiation is what we call ethereal matter or rather substance, existing in very many grades or degrees; and all the phenomena of the universe can thus be connected with the seven (or fourteen) kinds of radiation in the solar system. Electricity, magnetism, heat, color, and other forms of force, are all different varieties of radiation, that is to say of light.

One could say equivalently well that light and magnetism and heat and color, etc., are forms of electricity. Or indeed one could take any one of the seven cosmic forces and, using it as the basis for our constructive thought, truly say that all the universe is builded of different and varying forms of it — just as we have, in this present answer, taken light and found that the universe is builded of it.

Hence it really matters very little, at least to the esoteric student, whether one speaks of a universe of spiritual substance, or a universe of ethereal substance, or a universe of matter, or a universe of light, that is of radiations; because fundamentally all these mean the same thing, all being derivatives from the essence of the universe, and therefore but different fashions of viewing things as they are. However, back of, behind, within, above, and superior to all these various kinds of radiations, are still finer cosmic elements such as intelligence, consciousness, love, which form the causal factors or the noumena of the universe; and which by their self-urged actions and interactions bring about the bewildering variety of the phenomena or appearances of the universe. Thus, the gods have bodies of pure light, just as human beings have bodies of concreted light.

But the center of a god is the divine monad, and the center of a man is his human monad — inspired by, enlightened by, and ultimately derivative from, his own divine monad which is his Father in Heaven.

Meeting 35 Supplement

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

Supplement to KTMG Papers: Thirty-five

August 10, 1937

Heart Illumines the Brain

G. de P. — In the first place, I wish to call your attention to the extremely paradoxical character of all our teachings. The brain-mind of man, sensing the paradox, not understanding, or misunderstanding, says:

"Contradiction!" The intuitive ordinary man says: "Why, this is extraordinary. The teachings, each one, seem to be consistent. Surely there is some connecting link of reason." The initiate or the highly developed intuitional man sees the truth instantly. For him there is no longer a paradox; it is simply a flash of understanding light.

In the second place, I wish to say that the heart — the physical organ, not the symbol — is the organ of the spiritual man in the physical body by means of a ray from the spiritual monad in the human physical vehicle.

Therefore it can be called several things: the organ of the reincarnating ego; the organ of the personal man; again, it can be called the organ of life, for it is the center of life of the physical body. It is from the heart that stream upward into the brain the rays illumining the mind, touching the pineal gland, setting it into rapid psychic vibration, and thus casting instantly over the akasa inside the skull a brilliant glory, so that to the Eye of Siva when the heart illuminates the brain through the pineal gland the entire contents of the skull are glowing, radiating, with light, so much so that in cases of ecstasy, as the Christians say, the light streams out forming a nimbus around the head and shoulders.

Now why is the heart the physical organ of the personal man as well as of the spiritual or individual man?

Because it is the organ of the human monad. Similarly, the liver and spleen are the organs of the astral-vital or human animal monad, a child of globe D. I won't go farther than that. This last statement should be a key to you. I will add this, however, that every important organ in the human body is the representative in that body and functioning for it of one of the monads in the composite human constitution. You will remember how many hundreds of times you have heard me repeat: man is a composite entity formed of different monads collaborating in the complete septenary entity to give him his septenary constitution. Man is a little world drawing all he is from the greater world in which he lives and moves and has his being.

Next, in the future, far far beyond the end of the seventh round of the present chain-manvantara, far far into the future, into the future so distant that I don't even care to attempt to define it, the form in which what is now the human being will imbody itself will be a globular or circular form. Call it a globe of glory, a globe of fluid, liquid light. The center or focus of this living globe will conjoin into one what now are two organs, to wit, heart and brain. At a still later date, when our destiny shall have been reached, when we become sun entities in the deeps of space, we shall then be as Father Sun now is. The heart of Father Sun, using the word heart in the sense of the focal life-intelligence center, is at once heart and brain, in other words spirituality and intellection or intellect. The two have conjoined, more accurately have reunited into one, and this will be not because what are now our present physical brain and heart shall move together and coalesce, but because of the fact of the heart's being septenary itself as the organ on this plane of the human monad, all the septenary parts of that monad will then be expressing themselves as a septenary entity. That thought is something I have often tried to explain — not so much the particular fact of heart and brain becoming one, but the fact that there are different monads in the human constitution collaborating to make the human constitution. But that particular monad which is the most important to us as human individuals is the monad we have agreed to call the human. It itself is septenary. It itself has its inner god, and all the other attributes of the other septenary qualities, powers, functions.

Meeting 36

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

KTMG Papers: Thirty-Six

Meeting of September 26, 1933

Notice to All Members

This pamphlet, No. 36, in the series of printed Instructions issued by me, will be the last for the present. I have felt for some time that the large amount of esoteric teaching hitherto given needs assimilation and digestion by our members, and that time is required for this. Otherwise there is a real danger of a sort of spiritual and intellectual indigestion, as well as the always imminent danger of allowing a spirit to enter into our ES cycle of study involving mere curiosity as to the next new teaching which may be issued. This would indeed be fatal to the main object of these studies, which is rather to bring out from within the student's own constitution latent powers of reflection and judgment, involving discernment and discrimination, than merely overloading the mind with newer teachings steadily increasing in both volume and novelty.

As most of our esotericists know well enough, I adopted in the beginning the Socratic method of teaching, which is by means of question and answer, at times almost partaking of the character of a running dialogue, because this method has distinct advantages; although, indeed, it is easy enough to recognize certain inherent disadvantages likewise.

The next or succeeding series of KTMG Instructions may or may not follow the present plan of question and answer. I shall wait to see what spiritual benefit accrues to our students before finally deciding this question.

— G. de P.

An International Gathering

Meeting held at Oakley House, Bromley Common, Kent, England, temporary International Headquarters during 1932-33.

Besides the Oakley House staff and the London Group, there were present other members of the English Jurisdiction, as well as visiting members from Wales, Ireland, and Holland.

As the evening's discussion opened with comments by G. de P. on three questions contained in paper no. 6, these questions are reprinted herein for the convenience of the reader.

Additional commentary by G. de P. on subjects discussed at this London meeting follows.

[Question — May I ask a question about karma? It is a pity to leave that subject unfinished, I think. There is a very famous passage in Light on the Path that I have studied, that many of us have studied, very deeply; and it is in our other literature also, about not trying to make good karma. The passage there says: "Don't try to make good karma, but try to become karmaless." I know that it is a phrase which is allegorical; but I would like some more information about that. It says: "Set the heart and mind on that which is above karma in a sense." We see the giant weed, looking for personality.

I would like a little more about the meaning of not trying to make good karma. It means not looking for results, I suppose?]

G. de P. — Concerning this teaching of the rising above the sphere of causes which produces karma of various kinds in any such sphere or hierarchy: rising above karma simply means the rising out of or above the continuously recurring cycle of change, of birth and death, of sorrow and pain and joy and happiness, the samsara as it is technically called, meaning the cycles of imbodied existence or lives. When a human being centers or focuses his consciousness in the higher part of his constitution, then obviously the elements of his constitution which in the average man attract him to these lower spheres are inactive in the sense of no longer dominating him. They lie asleep, at least relatively so; and consequently he then is in the bliss and enjoys the

illuminated vision of the higher part of his being. Yet because he is in imbodied existence, this living in the higher part or principles of his constitution is not what is usually referred to by the phrase, 'To rise out of or above the sphere of karma.' To escape from karma really means the rising out of all the material spheres or cycles of imbodied existences, the lower globes of our chain for instance, where we are subject to this perpetual and unceasing round and round and round of life after life after life in imbodied forms. Obviously, therefore, wherever there is imbodied existence one is subject to karma of some kind, although it may not be and doubtless is not the same karma that a man has when he is in a physical body on this globe D.

Now there is an escape from this perpetual round of imbodied lives, an escape from samsara; and this escape is found by following the path that all the buddhas have taught: to know ourselves, our spiritual selves, and to live in the spiritual Self, that is in the higher parts of our composite constitution. When this is done one becomes a coworker or collaborator with spiritual nature, becomes an active agent of nature's spiritual laws; and hence does naught that is in contravention of those fundamental spiritual laws. Therefore obviously one has risen above the sphere of karma, which means action and reaction, that is, action upon nature made by imperfect consciousnesses and nature's reaction upon us. This is the meaning of the phrase to rise above karma. That is all, as simple as that.

[Question — I would like to ask if there is such a thing as separation of the principles in some cases before the body dies.

In the case of a very brilliant-minded man, who during the last ten or fifteen years of his life loses his mentality seemingly altogether, and loses his memory — in such case have not the higher principles, that is to say, has not the higher ego, already gone?

At death does he have this review of life? Then the whole being, the whole man, is there at death?]

G. de P. — It is the case with almost all aged human beings in our present state of evolution that for a number of years, or it may be for a number of weeks or months, before physical death occurs there is a separation, slow but progressive, of the upper triad from the lower quaternary. It is as if the constitution of the aged individual were slowly breaking up in preparation for the new birth into postmortem conditions or spheres, into what we commonly call the devachanic states.

It is this progressive dissolving of the bonds holding the constitution together which will explain the instances of aged men and women who although still performing the usual functions that are required in order to keep the body alive, nevertheless seem to have lost all the better or nobler parts of mind and heart. Such aged people have lost memory to a large extent; they have also probably lost interest in life; their mind frequently becomes automatic in its actions, and reverts to the incidents of childhood. Consequently it is common to speak of such an individual as being in his second childhood, simply because he recollects most clearly what events or things had been stamped on the brain — photographically stamped — that occurred during his childhood and youth.

On the other hand, and this is the ideal state of old age, there are men and women who retain all their faculties in full power and function up to within a few hours of the last intake of physical breath. This is what should be normal to the human race in our state of evolution. But alas, it is only rarely so. The second childhood is due to the very unnatural sort of life that men and women lead today; due, I repeat, to the vital exhaustion of the quaternary in many ways common to folk who, like most of us, unfortunately abuse the body by common or usual excesses of various kinds which exhaust the vital powers sooner than Nature if left alone would have brought about. It is also due in part to the very yearning that old people usually have for rest and peace and quiet, for peaceful happiness, which is all a beginning of the devachanic life. Due to this variety of converging causes, in most cases of aged people there is for at least some months preceding physical death a slow withdrawal of the higher part of the constitution from the lower. The threads of the golden cord of life connecting the higher triad with the lower quaternary are gently and slowly snapped one after the other; when the last thread is broken, physical death supervenes.

[Question — May I clear up a question which has often puzzled me? HPB says distinctly just what you have said, that there is no punishment after death, except in the case of the black magician. But Mr. Judge, in the

"Notes on the Bhagavad- Gita, " gives quite a picture of a place of purification, almost a purgatory, in which he says there are as many different states as there are people, and that they go through a mental suffering there until they are freed and then go forward to devachan. Will you explain that apparent contradiction?]

G. de P. — There is no hard and fast division or frontier whatsoever between kama-loka on the one hand, and the devachan state on the other hand, or those realms of the higher astral world in which the devachanic experiences are undergone by the excarnate entity. Devachan in its lowest parts melts or merges into the higher parts of the kama-loka. In an exactly identical fashion, between the highest realm of avichi, which by the way is a condition rather than a locality, and the lowest realm of the kama-loka, there is no gulf, no separation, no frontier or hard or fast division. Insensibly the one blends into the other; and similarly at the other end of the line, between the highest state or condition of devachan and the lowest of the nirvana there is no gulf.

Now the kama-loka is not only a state but it is also a locality; but the avichi, the devachan, and the nirvana, are conditions of entities who are for the time being in these particular states; yet avichi, devachan, and nirvana are not localities per se. But because the entities in these states are entities or beings, therefore they must have position in space. In other words these entities are somewhere. Therefore, in a rather incorrect way of speaking we may also say that the avichi and the devachan and the nirvana have place or position in space, although these three are merely conditions or states of the consciousness of entities. These four, the nirvana, the devachan, the kama-loka, and the avichi, are all in what we call the astral light, using this term in a very general sense.

The astral light in its lower realms is gross ether; in its higher parts it is the akasa; but technically and more accurately speaking, we should call the astral light that portion of the ethereal realms of nature surrounding every globe of causes, such as our earth is, and extending from the highest spiritual or most ethereal spheres down to the grossest portion of such globe. The astral light begins in, or is the lowest part of the akasa; and the astral light grows thicker or less ethereal or more condensed until it reaches its grossest and most material parts, which we may actually call a physical globe. Consequently the crown of the astral light is the akasa, which nevertheless is the great kosmic spiritual aether from which all the respective astral lights are born. In this astral light are the various realms or spheres inhabited by entities in the various states of consciousness; and we call these various realms or spheres by the names nirvana, devachan, kama-loka, the physical globe, and avichi.

There is a great deal that can be said about the astral light that has not yet been brought out in our teachings, whether exoteric or esoteric, and some day I shall have to put my mind to it, because I feel the lacunae, the gaps, the lack of this teaching; and having in view the greater understanding of our teachings by our members generally, it is only just that more should be said about the astral light.

I would like here to add this: an entity undergoing a condition or state of consciousness needs not necessarily to be restricted to any dimension or magnitude. Consciousness is dimensionless and without magnitude; so that an entity can be in the avichi or in the devachan or in the nirvana, and yet have no more magnitude as regards size than a mathematical point has which has position but no magnitude. Consciousness is without magnitude, simply because essentially it is infinite, and becomes localized only through the abodes or vehicles through which it happens to be working at the time.

Take the case of Father Sun. The god whom we know as the solar divinity is a dimensionless point when considered as a monad of consciousness. And yet this divinity fills with its or his vital aura the entire volume or bulk or magnitude of the solar system; that is to say, with an aura or vital fluid which reaches even beyond the orbit of Neptune, but which is centered or concentrated around the central point which is the real heart of Father Sun. The sun that we see with our physical vision is the dense or concreted psychomagnetic and vital aura of this solar divinity.

There are a number of very important things that should be stated in this connection; and some day I must turn my mind to it if only in order to correct erroneous ideas that some of our students either now hold or have held. I remember once reading an article by some attentive student of former days — it may have been Jasper Niemand, who was the Mrs. Archibald Keightley of Judge's time. It was called "The Sleeping

Spheres," as I recollect — a rather attractive title because it gave the idea of vital spheres, which is more or less correct as the phrase brings to the mind the conception of the ovoid or egg-shaped form of the auric egg.

But the mistake that this writer made was in thinking that these sleeping spheres were the egos themselves sleeping through devachanic dreams; and this idea that egos are ethereal spheres was quite wrong. The ego in devachan may be utterly dimensionless, have no magnitude or bulk, or what we call volume or size, whatsoever, because an ego is a monad or point of consciousness. It is for this reason also that the ancient Hindu Upanishads used to speak of Brahman as aniyamsam aniyasam. This Sanskrit phrase means atomic of the atomic, smaller than the smallest. Equivalently they used to speak of Brahman as greater than the greatest.

These phrases sound like verbal contradiction, but they are not. The phrases are paradoxes; that is, consciousness can be at one and the same instant vast enough to inspire a whole solar system and be greater than it, and yet minute enough, infinitesimal enough, to find a universe in the heart of a chemical atom, and to be smaller than the chemical atom.

Trevor Barker — May I ask a question, G. de P., about the devachan and kama-loka — I mean about the devachanic and kama-lokic entities having to have a position in space, and that position being in some part of the astral light? I would now like to ask how we can understand this statement, in regard to the planes and to the globes of the planetary chain? Is there any connection, or none?

G. de P. — There certainly is, Trevor, and yours is a most intelligent and appropriate question. It would be obviously impossible to give the final answer, but I can say this much. There are devachans and devachans, kama-lokas and kama-lokas. When we speak in our exoteric literature of devachan, or kama-loka, or nirvana, these are all generalizing terms.

Remember, first, that the human ego after death sleeps its devachanic dreams, that it enters a state of devachan. It undergoes its devachanic experiences in what we call the bosom of the monad, meaning here the Spiritual monad — or rather, and speaking now accurately, in that ray from the spiritual monad which we can call the chain-monad or higher ego. The spiritual monad's child is the higher ego, and the higher ego's child is the ordinary human reincarnating ego, which in one sense we may call the child of this globe D. Now this entity, the chain-monad, itself peregrinates in proper cyclical order through all the globes of our planetary chain; but when it leaves our globe D its next stations are on the ascending arc, globes E, F, and G.

Meanwhile, the human ego is sleeping its devachanic sleep, or dreaming its devachanic dreams, or having its devachanic rest — use whichever phrase pleases you the best — in the bosom of its parent the higher ego, the chain-monad, which is wandering through the globes of the planetary chain. As just said, this chain-ego or reimbodying ego is the child or ray of the spiritual ego. The range of the spiritual ego is over the solar system, just as the range of the chain-ego, or reimbodying ego, is throughout the series of globes of the planetary chain; and just in its turn as the range of the ordinary human ego is through the seven root-races in due cyclical order of our globe D. What I have just been alluding to is called the inner rounds.

I have spoken on other occasions of the outer rounds. The spiritual monad or ego it is which peregrinates on the outer rounds, that is, from planet to planet, or more accurately from planetary chain to planetary chain.

I do not know that it is wise, at least for the present, to add anything more to these observations, because it is so easy to confuse these recondite and intricate teachings. It may be better to give the general teaching in outline, and to develop the details at later dates when proper occasions arise. In this way the minds of students are not overloaded at the beginning with a bewildering complexity of details.

But the other statement concerning the positions in space of the various realms of the astral light and the entities inhabiting them is also perfectly true, although it is a general statement. The nirvana, the devachan, the kama-loka, and the avichi, as well as the various realms intermediate between these four, are all in the astral light. Remember that the astral light is a general term for the entire range of the hierarchy of the solar system from its summit or most spiritual part to its grossest or most material part; and that each planet in the solar system is, as it were, a concreted center of the astral light and therefore is surrounded by a thickened or more compacted portion of this general astral light of the solar system. Hence each planet in the solar system may be said truly enough to have its own particular astral light — which is in each case obviously a part or portion of the general astral light of the entire solar system.

The crown of the astral light is the most spiritual substance of the solar system, which is properly called the sakti, or akasa, which again is the underlining of mulaprakriti, or original nature or substance; and, at the nether pole, the dregs of the astral light surround any material globe which we may briefly call the lees or deposits of the astral light.

To particularize in answering your question. Take the case of an elementary, or a pisacha, which is a Sanskrit name for what we call an elementary; or again take the case of an astral bhuta, which is the Sanskrit name of what we theosophists call a kama-rupa. Entities such as these are strongly localized, just as a physical human body is although the vehicle of a spiritual being, because the pisacha or the elementary, or again the kama-rupic spook, are grossly material entities, and therefore must find their natural habitat in grossly material spheres such as the lower realms of the astral light immediately in and surrounding our earth. This grossly material sphere, the dregs of the kama-loka, permeates and surrounds the globe, our earth, on which the entity last lived its imbodied existence.

Contrariwise, entities of more ethereal character such as the devachanis or the nirvanis find their natural and appropriate habitat or localized position in space in the more ethereal realms of the astral light where the influence of gross matter of course is only faintly felt. As the devachan and the nirvana are really states or conditions of consciousness of entities, it is obvious that such states of consciousness may be experienced by those who have entered them in any part of the solar system. Indeed there are some human beings so lofty in spirituality that they can even enter the nirvanic condition while still in the body, as the Buddha did, or as Sankaracharya is said to have done. There are human beings, not a few, who although still alive in the physical body, live in a sort of devachanic dreamworld, and are known among their fellows as dreamy, impractical kind of folk. But these last two classes are exceptions. The real devachani and the real nirvani when disimbodied find their natural habitat with the more spiritual portions or realms of the higher astral light where the monads belong.

The teaching is complicated of course because the facts are complicated; yet if the idea is clear in your mind that is the main thing.

Furthermore, every one of the globes of our planetary chain, such as globes E or F, or, in the other direction, globes B or C, has for instance its own avichi, its own kama-loka, and likewise its own especial conditions of the astral light surrounding it, which therefore form the fit habitat of entities who upon leaving such globe at death enter the appropriate devachan.

Mr. Barker — Then actually, if akasa is the crown of the astral light, does this comprise several or all of the kosmic planes? Do the kosmic planes come between the bottom of the astral light and the crown of akasa, or is this only one plane?

G. de P. — Answering briefly, the kosmic planes run along, or more accurately really compose, what we can, speaking in a generalizing fashion, call the seven or ten planes of the astral light, of which the crown is akasa and the bottom is the physical or most material sphere. Every one of the kosmic planes — which means all the seven (or ten) planes of the solar system — has each one its own subordinate seven ranges or realms or planes. But the astral light, considered as a generalizing term for the structure or framework of nature, extends from the uppermost kosmic plane of the solar system down to the lowest, grossest; and therefore may be said to extend from the highest — or lowest — through all the seven or really ten planes of the solar system, each one of these planes possessing its own portion of the general astral light. Therefore, again, each one of these planes is subdivided into seven subplanes. We can say that the globes on any one such kosmic plane have their own subordinate states of the astral light in which entities can have their nirvana, their devachan, their kama-loka, and their avichi.

Perhaps it can be illustrated better by thinking of the seven (or ten) planes or principles or constituent elements of the human constitution. Each one of these principles or elements of the human constitution has its own prana, its own vital aura; and yet throughout the entire constitution runs the aura of the full or complete constitution, from the atman down to the sthula-upadhi or sthula-sarira. In other words, there is one life energy running throughout the seven principles; but each one of the seven principles has its own portion of this life energy, and this portion is colored by, or has the quality of, the particular principle through which it

extends.

I might add here, because it may be useful to remember, that sakti, a Sanskrit word which means "energy" or

"power," and maya, a Sanskrit word which means "illusion," and prakriti, a Sanskrit word which means

"producing or productive nature," are virtually synonyms really. These three names refer nevertheless to three different aspects of the one kosmic mulaprakritic element: the substantial part, that which produces or gives birth to things, we can call prakriti; the energic part of the force part we can call sakti; and the third part or maya of this kosmic element we can look upon as the illusion-producing portion of the kosmic Element. To speak still more accurately we should say that mulaprakriti is the mother-stuff or original substance, and that its three aspects or developments we may class under the three names sakti, prakriti, maya.

Mr. Barker — Do these bear any relation to the three gunas?

G. de P. — Yes, in a general way the three gunas can likewise be classed under these three productions of mulaprakriti; but we should also remember that the three gunas more particularly apply to the conditions or states of imbodied entities; and next that every one of these hereinbefore mentioned aspects contains in itself the three gunas or varieties or attributes. Every imbodied entity — and as far as I know there are no exceptions whatsoever — has three qualities: sattwa, rajas, and tamas, which are usually translated as "truth"

or "reality," "force" or "passion," and "inertia" or "darkness." These are the three gunas: sattwa-guna, rajo-guna, and tamo-guna. In one sense, possibly, sakti, maya, and prakriti may in a general way be spoken of as the three guna-aspects of the kosmic mulaprakritic element; but personally I would prefer not to put the matter that way. I would prefer to say that every one of these three aspects — sakti, prakriti, maya — of the kosmic element has its own triguna or three gunas.

You see the philosophic idea here is that these three gunas or qualities are of universal character and run throughout the entire web of kosmic existence; just as in the three dimensional world of manifested life we are obliged to speak of length, breadth, and depth or thickness. As is obvious these three ways of measuring are inherent in three dimensional manifestation not only in the general but in the particular, not only in the kosmos but as concerns imbodied entities. Just so is it with the three gunas. The three qualities of reality or spiritual equilibrium, force or activity, and substantiality or inertia, are found everywhere, both in the universe generally as well as in the cases of imbodied entities. Sakti, prakriti, and maya, we had perhaps better consider to be three ways in which man's consciousness envisages or looks upon the universe. A little thought should make this rather intricate philosophical idea fairly clear.

Now here is an interesting thought in this connection. I think that it would be a capital error to look upon tamas as being always evil, as some people mistakenly imagine; or upon rajas as being always evil; or upon sattwa as invariably being what we men call good. As a matter of fact, in nature herself the three gunas are not found at all in that way. For instance, inertia can be most helpful at times, when meaning steadiness, resolution, or fixity; just as contrariwise inertia at times can be quite wrong when it means disinclination to progress, or fixity in material as contrasted with spiritual lines. For example, it is a most important thing to be able to hold the mind steady and fixed on a point of thought. If the mind is under the sway of the quality of rajo-guna, the mind then is in continual motion, continually moving, continually flitting from thought to thought, always unsatisfied. If the mind be under the sway of sattwa, then it is at peace, it is tranquil, it sees clearly, it is at rest, because it is in equilibrium. It may or may not be in motion, it may or may not have fixity, though probably it has both because these three gunas are not absolutes distinct from each other, but are blended with each other.

Thus in the quality of sattwa we have the sattwa-sattwa, the rajas-sattwa, and the tamas-sattwa. Similarly in the quality of the rajas, we have the sattwa-rajas, the rajo-rajas, and the tamo-rajas. And thirdly in tamas, we have the sattwa-tamas, the rajas-tamas, and the tamas-tamas. This will become clear if the student remember that in tamas, for instance, his mind cannot be merely fixed or steady and at the same time be deprived of any movement and of any quality of reality. It is impossible utterly to separate these qualities from each other, for they are inextricably interblended, and it is impossible for any one of the three to exist without the other two.

All three qualities or elements of character are needed to produce the complete man, or indeed a complete entity of whatever kind or type.

It is the one-sided development or overemphasis of any one of these three gunas which is dangerous. As for instance, a man in whom the sattwic quality is relatively inactive, lacks discrimination, vision, judgment; he lacks calm, he lacks peace. On the other hand, if in him the quality of the rajo-guna is relatively inactive, then he lacks in energy, he lacks in driving power, in force; and these obviously are very much needed for a complete or perfect man. Or thirdly, if the tamas quality is relatively inactive in him, he lacks stability and fixity or steadiness of purpose; he lacks inertia in the good sense of this word. Nature is builded of these three qualities or gunas, and all three are required in order to produce a perfect human being; but these qualities must all be under the control of the spiritual consciousness.

I here speak with great reserve, because this is a moot point even in our own esoteric studies, but I am inclined to believe that sattwa-guna, rajo-guna, and tamo-guna belong at least actively rather to the seven manifested planes of the universe, than to all the ten planes; and that the three highest planes forming the complete series of ten are above the sway of the three gunas. Therefore the god in man, or the divine spirit in man, is master of the three gunas rather than their subject. He is master even of the sattwic quality, because it should be obvious that even such things as peace and rest and quiet, vision, yea even discrimination and judgment, must be under the control of the supreme spiritual consciousness, from which indeed they all ultimately flow.

-------------

The statement is often made in our esoteric and even in our exoteric literature I believe, that continuous addiction to evil doing and evil living leads to the loss of the soul, and that continuous and unremitting addiction to goodness and purity, and to the practice of virtue and aspiration and love, lead to a becoming at one with the god within. I would now like to point out to you that both these cases are the results, although in diametrically opposite directions, of the same law of nature: the law of attraction — or perhaps more accurately of psychomagnetic attraction — and repulsion; one of the manifestations of that universal order of nature which we may indifferently call attraction and repulsion, or refer to under the name of the hate and love of the great Greek philosopher Empedocles, or again refer to under the phrase The Law of Contraries, or of polar opposites.

A Vedic commentator, Yaska, in his Nirukta, X, 17, or Commentary on one of the Vedas, makes the following statement: Yadyad rupam kamayate devata; tattad devata bhavati, which thought is likewise known in English under the phrase, "As a man thinks, so is he." This Sanskrit sentence means: "Whatever form (or body) a divinity longs for, that very form (or body) the divinity becomes." There is a world of occult significance in this. It is one of the most occult statements that I have ever read. It is replete with meaning. If you long for a thing, set your heart on it, bend your will and your consciousness and therefore your vital currents towards it, it means that you set your soul in it and therefore identify your soul with it. You identify your consciousness with it; your consciousness begins to vibrate synchronously with the thing which it yearns towards and therefore with which it finally becomes identified. In other words, you identify your consciousness with what you continuously long for, and this means that finally you will get it. Deduction: if you long for evil, long for evil doing, yearn for it, then you will in time become evil; because you ally yourself with some entity who to your mind, perhaps unconsciously, is the imbodiment of the objective upon which you set your mind and soul. Hence you become identified with that entity — you actually become it, become a part of its vital existence. To speak the language of the Christians, if you love the devil you will become the devil.

Contrariwise, when a man's yearnings are upwards and inwards towards the god within him, then he follows the path which nature's present operations and voluntary current bid us normally to follow, because we are now on the ascending arc upwards towards our reunion with spirit at the end of the seventh round.

In doing this we work with spiritual nature and thus we become identified with the god within us, which means also becoming identified with the solar logos and finally we become that solar logos, become a part of its vital being. To use the incorrect language of the ordinary Occidental translators of the Hindu scriptures, we become absorbed in Brahma. This does not mean the utter loss or annihilation of the monad, because such annihilation is simply impossible. The monad is eternal, because in essence it is a part of the spiritual being of the logos itself. When we yearn to live in the vital being of the god within us, then our vibrations become

identical with the vibrations of the god within us, which in turn are virtually the same as the vital vibrations of the third or manifest solar logos of the solar system. This means entering nirvana. Conversely, if you identify yourself with evil, which means progress towards absolute matter, this means avichi and the consequent loss of the soul as an independent spiritual being.

Now look at the marvelous series of ideas that we find in this teaching. By identifying ourselves with the logos we achieve self-conscious immortality. If we identify ourselves with evil, then, because such identification is a going backwards, against nature's forwards-moving evolutionary current, we finally bring about a rupture of the golden thread linking us with our divine monad, and we become souls who are lost. We finally are absorbed by the entity of evil which we have yearned towards and with which we have finally identified ourselves. You may ask me: what entity do you mean? My answer is, it does not matter what particular entity. No especial entity need be named. The universe is filled with hosts of entities: good, bad, and indifferent; and every human being belongs to the life stream of an army of entities: good, bad, indifferent. This is the real rationale, the real teaching, and therefore the real explanation, of what a lost soul is on the one hand, and what the becoming at one with the logos is, which means attaining nirvana, on the other hand.

There is still a third case, which however really belongs to the second class as a specific case of the general rule. This is that of the black magicians who not merely blindly go to annihilation as the lost souls do, but who with self-conscious deliberate choice and intent choose evil, worship it. In this case the absorption is not into an elemental energy-substance of the universe, as is the case with lost souls, but is identification with or absorption into a more or less progressed, or unprogressed, planetary spirit — one of those entities whom HPB called unprogressed planetaries. The Hindus would call them one class of the devas, and rightly so call them; although the phrase is insufficiently explanatory. The black magician therefore finally identifies his consciousness with the soul-consciousness of such an unprogressed planetary spirit and finally becomes one with it, living in it, and therefore receiving a quasi-immortality as a component part of the consciousness of this unprogressed planetary. I say quasi-immortality because when the manvantara ends, the planetary of course passes out of manifested existence with the end of the manvantara and reappears only after the end of the pralaya and when the new kosmic manvantara begins.

As you see, therefore, the important deduction that we must make from this teaching is the following. What we love, what we yearn for, we shall gain some day if we continue in our love for it and continue in our yearning towards it. You will immediately see the immense importance of placing our love and our yearning in the proper direction. The rule imbodied in the teaching works in both directions: upwards towards spirit and downwards towards matter. But we human beings, as self-conscious entities with a modicum at least of free will, ally ourselves with one or the other of the two currents, and do so by our own conscious volition.

We make the choice.

Perhaps the following also might be said in further explanation of the teaching. We are at present in the fourth round only of the present maha-manvantara of the planetary chain; and it will be in the next or fifth round when the great or final or deciding moral choice will have to be made by us as self-conscious entities, when the manasic faculty in us will have to decide whether its intentions are to go up towards spirit or not. One of the Masters has written that millions are destined to perish at the time of such choice.

Mr. Barker — Meaning what, G. de P.?

G. de P. — Meaning that their chances for spiritual and intellectual evolution for the remaining planetary maha-manvantara are gone, because they are not able to make the grade, to ascend successfully along the ascending arc. Such unsuccessful candidates for quasi-immortality are failures for that maha-manvantara; and the reason is that they have not as yet evolved forth from within themselves self-conscious spiritual energy enough to carry them up for the remaining two rounds (remember we are now speaking of the fifth round), so that they can graduate out of the school of life at the end of the seventh round as full-blown dhyan-chohans.

They will incur the fate that awaits the beasts during the closing portion of this present fourth round. They will quietly vanish out of manifested life, go into an unconscious state, which is however not exactly a nirvana, nor is it a devachan. It is for these particular entities whom we have called failures a state of utter unconsciousness; and they so remain, like points of crystallized consciousness, until the next planetary chain,

the planetary child of the present chain, is formed. Then these failures will be borne back on the river of planetary evolution and take their part in the kosmic work and have their chance anew; but they will perish or rather disappear so far as the remainder of this present or maha-manvantara is concerned.

Mr. Barker — Is that like the entity which has not enough spiritual stamina to give itself birth in the devachan after death?

G. de P. — Very much like it, Trevor, only I would not speak of an entity as giving itself birth in the devachan. Entities enter that particular state or mode of consciousness which is called the devachan.

Devachan is a change of consciousness, and in itself is not a locality.

Mr. Barker — But they do so on a wider cycle?

G. de P. — Yes, on a wider cycle; exactly so.

Mrs. L. J. Manning-Hicks — Is the meaning here the same as going back into nature's workshop?

G. de P. — No, that point of teaching refers to the lost souls only. Remember that a lost soul is not a lost spirit, or a lost monad. The meaning is that the human soul which has been built up so laboriously through many, many lives in the past, has lost all chance of evolving as an identical soul in the future, because it has preferred evil, it has preferred the material spheres to the spiritual, it has identified itself with matter. Such a soul on the way downwards to extinction loves matter, its attractions are matterwards; and it therefore is naturally attracted to, and it identifies itself with the material spheres. In thus identifying itself such a matter-heavy soul becomes a part of their material life and therefore must follow the destiny of these material spheres. This means that when the manvantara ends, or it may be long before that time, the psychic lifeatoms composing such a soul will be dissipated, and thus become a lost soul. Meanwhile these dissipated lifeatoms will be ground over and over and over again in nature's workshop or laboratory. But the freed monad has all the labor before it of bringing forth from within the womb of itself a new human soul-infant, a new human baby-soul, a new human monad. Such a terrible case also has the effect of retarding the evolution of the monad on its own plane, because it has to evolve forth from itself a human soul anew. As HPB truly points out, it is a terrible case on account of the waste of time, as well as because of the psychospiritual suffering that the degenerating or degenerated soul has to pass through as it wends its way towards its final dissolution.

Aeons and aeons may pass before the monad will be where it was before — not at all as regards its own purity, which is unstained, but as regards the bringing forth out of itself of a new manasic infant and training it up to be a human ego like the one which was lost.

The black magicians, those who persevere in their evil courses, also in time will become lost souls, but the distinction between them is what I have tried to point out: that a lost soul need not necessarily be a black magician. It is merely one which, because of an inherent weakness, prefers the realms of matter to the realms of spirit, and therefore is attracted to the realms of matter and goes to pieces — instead of going to peace as the successfully evolving human monads or souls do.

Mrs. Edith Norman — Will you elaborate what you said before: as the animals will do in the fourth round?

G. de P. — Yes. I was referring there to the fact of the door into the human kingdom having closed at the middle of the fourth round; and this midpoint was reached during the middle of the fourth great subrace of the fourth root-race. This is another way of saying that those animal monads which had not at that time become more or less humanized through bringing out of themselves the innate human faculties and powers, would have to wait until the next planetary chain is formed before they could enter the human kingdom. For the remainder of all the life of this planetary chain, that is for the next three and a half rounds, no beast for these reasons will enter the human kingdom, with the single exception of the apes and perhaps a few of the higher simians or monkeys; and the apes only for the reason that you have read of in The Secret Doctrine, to wit, that they contain certain elements of humanity in them due to the sin of the mindless, but yet human beings of the early third root-race, indeed of the later third for that matter. Then certain unevolved or savage peoples of the fourth root-race repeated the crime with the descendants of the first crime; and it was this later crime, this time committed with relatively full consciousness, which brought forth the ancestors of the apes. This last occurred during the Eocene or possibly the early Miocene periods of geology.

Mr. Arie Goud — Seeing that the anthropoids, at least some of them, in the course of this life cycle or manvantara will enter the human kingdom; and, further, as we are told that several millions of human beings will at the time of choice in the fifth round fail and become suspended from evolutionary advancement until the next planetary life cycle: must we conclude that these apes have a better chance than those future human beings have?

G. de P. — This is a new and very thoughtful question. My impression is that they will have more chance of making a proper decision for continuing their evolution than others in whom the kama-manas will be more highly developed, for the reason that they are innocent. You see, the element in the human being that makes him take the wrong path is the mixture of mind and desire, kama-manas. Now if the apes attain humanity, enter the human kingdom, towards the end of this round, which is what our Masters, or at least some of them, believe will be the case, they will then be relatively innocent of the great load of past karmic evildoing that many humans even now are burdened with. Therefore they will be like little children who, because of their relative innocence, will enter even where saints may go, to speak in a Christian way of phrasing; and thus will pass the guardians who would refuse to permit ordinary human beings who have lived a not very good life to enter.

I should also add that when the time of choice comes in the fifth round, it will be a choice on a far higher plane of intellectuality than was the choice which took place in this round at the middle point of the fourth root-race when the door into the human kingdom closed. During the fifth round the time of choice means that it will be then and there decided for all this present maha-manvantara whether or not the monads will choose the right-hand path of continued spiritualization through to the end of the seventh round; or whether the call of matter will be so strong that they will in choosing take the left-hand path, and thus prove their incapacity or inability to follow the path of spirit along the ascending arc. If they take the left-hand path or the path of matter, then during the remainder of the fifth round they will gradually die out because they will be unable to keep in with the procession advancing steadily upwards in spiritualization. In so dying out they will enter as it were a quasi-nirvana in which such egos will have to remain until the next planetary chain, when they will then have their new chances and really form the most progressed human elements, or at least one of the families of the most progressed humans, in the evolution of the new planetary chain.

It is a most unusual question that you have asked, and it shows that Brother Arie has thought profoundly upon this theme. May I also say in this connection, as it seems to be of interest to you: when the apes, and possibly some of the higher simians, attain the human stage towards the end of our round, which means on this fourth globe D, this does not mean that they will then be the equals of the humanity of that time. Much to the contrary. They will then be like savage-men, pure savage-men, but of a simple, unspotted type, with relatively little evil karma weighing upon them. It is really very difficult to describe all this because it is an attempt to describe something that is as yet unknown on earth today, and will happen only millions upon millions of years hence, during the sixth and seventh root-races on this globe in this round.

But if you can imagine a race of savages living in the Age of Saturn, in the so-called Saturnian period of innocence and simplicity, relatively unburdened by sin and relatively unstained by a heavy load of evil karma, who will in addition be the willing slaves, almost the automatic slaves, of the genuine humanity of that time

— then perhaps you will get some idea of what I am trying to picturate for you. If the apes and the higher simians actually attain the human stage during this round, they will from that moment begin to increase and multiply — of course within the limits of the comparatively small number of monads which at the present time we may call the ape monads. All the other beasts now on earth, or rather their future descendants, will slowly die out before this round on this globe reaches its end, for the simple reason that the beasts will not be able to rise along the ascending arc during the sixth and seventh root-races of this globe.

I am afraid that the millions who will perish when the moment of choice comes on this earth during the fourth root-race of the fifth round on globe D will be those human unprogressed races who live on the earth today, and which we of the more progressed families of the human species call the savage tribes of our times. This is the conclusion that I have come to. Of course, there will doubtless be also large numbers of the less progressed monads even in our own superior humanity today, I mean even among Europeans and Asiatics, who will also fail to make the proper choice. For obvious reasons it is extremely difficult to draw hard and

fast divisions as to which ones will and which ones will not succeed in passing the critical period of choice during the fifth round. But certain it is that millions of humans will fail to make the choice, fail to take the right-hand path, fail to continue in evolving spirituality and thus successfully evolving upwards along the ascending arc, during the fifth round.

Yet, as you know, and you must never forget it, there is in the beast everything that a man has: every monadic center of consciousness, all the upadhis, the "bases," all the energies, from the superdivine down to subterrestrial realms. The beast has them all, but in man some of them have become awakened, some of them are more or less active; while in the beast these particular faculties are not yet awakened, not yet active. The fire of self-consciousness is beginning to work in man, whereas in the beast there is no real self-consciousness, that is to say no reflective consciousness. The apes are the only possible exception; and among the apes even today there are a few fugitive signs that a low grade of human, a very low grade of quasi-human, elementals — which means the highest types of beast verging into the human state — are incarnating in the apes; possibly also in the highest of the monkeys. As you see, it is virtually utterly impossible to draw a hard and fast line.

Mr. Barker — This question of choice, G. de P., must depend almost entirely upon that which our hearts and minds are set and concentrated on, more than anything else. Therefore it is almost the most important, at least one of the most important, doctrines that we can possibly think about; because our own future progress absolutely depends on it, and because by it we create our opportunities for tomorrow.

G. de P. — That is absolutely right, Trevor; and not only our own future opportunities, but the future opportunities likewise of those whom we meet can be and are affected adversely or for good by us. We do not live unto ourselves alone. I think that we humans do not realize the tremendous influence that we have on each other for good or for evil, that is the constant play of suggestion and counter-suggestion which in many cases may almost decide the future fate of a soul. Indeed, Trevor, it was just this thought that I had in mind a few moments ago when I was referring to a quotation from the Vedic Commentator, Yaska: Whatever an entity — divinity or devata, it says, but the word nevertheless applies to every entity, because the inmost part of us, the divine in us, belongs to the higher deva kingdom — whatever an entity longs for continuously, that very thing the entity becomes.

Mr. H. Oosterink — Is not imagination the best faculty for growth?

G. de P. — The imagination, dear Oosterink, can lift us or abase us, can lift us to the gods, because it is a part of the working of the karanopadhi, the "causal organ" in us, that which causes us to do things. A part of it is the picture-making faculty, called the imagination; and I suppose that most human beings do evil more from the cultivation of evil in the mind by indulging in evil pictures and in wrong thoughts than from any other cause. It is the evil picturing in our minds which we allow to affect us that sends us down. Similarly it is the imaging or imagining of beautiful things, the picturing of great and sublime ideas, scenes, pictures, frames of thought, in our mind, which raises us.

Mr. Barker — Isn't it largely the desire to achieve, to reach union with that upon which our heart is set, which brings our will into operation?

G. de P. — Quite correct.

Mr. Oosterink — What is the cause of imagination, or what causes man to use the faculty of imagination which makes us seek either the higher or the lower? It is not the will, is it?

G. de P. — No, I would not say that will is the cause of our desire to go higher; but will is the instrument with which we carve our way, shape or make our way. We determine to do a thing because the karanopadhi within us, of which the imagination is one of the faculties, is continuously working through us and giving us ideas or impulses in ideation; and it is this ideation which arouses and stimulates the will, and the will is a function of the higher manas.

Let me tell you something, Companions. It is the buddha in us, the working of the buddhi principle in us, which makes a man a human Christ or a human Buddha, what we might call a human god. It is the working of

the kama-manas in us, contrariwise, which sends us down unless it be strictly controlled and guided upwards.

Now if we can successfully control the kama-manas, then we take the reins of a splendid driving power — we have a splendid source of energy which we can use. But the cause of our rising is a yearning in the higher part of us to return to its own native higher spiritual realms. The pilgrim wandering in these lower realms of matter longs to return to its spiritual home. This is the real meaning of the Christian New Testament story of the prodigal son who fed on the husks that the swine eat, until one day he said to himself: "I will arise and go to my Father." The prodigal son or wandering pilgrim is thereafter possessed with a divine nostalgia or homesickness for its own spiritual realms; and from that moment the pilgrim begins to rise.

I will add more. I will say that the faculty or essence of individuality, the monadic core of us, lies in the buddhi principle. It is in the working of the buddhi principle that lies our power to extricate our consciousness, to use hpho-wa, that is to project the mayavi-rupa. The buddhi principle has been insufficiently studied by our students, doubtless because in our books it has been insufficiently described. The reason is that it is a principle difficult to understand, and its study really belongs to the esoteric cycles of our thought.

I have read in some of our exoteric books that the kama principle is the principle which sends us down. That is not exactly true, because it gives the idea that the kama principle is essentially evil and born of matter, and this idea is wholly false. The kama principle has a divine side as well as what we humans call an evil side. To put it even more truly, kama is a principle which must be used — but used properly. It gives us the driving power that we need self-consciously to advance in wisdom and in development. For instance, the very yearning of the prodigal son or wandering pilgrim to return to its Father arises out of the working of the kama in the buddhi, that is to say that part of the buddhi septenary which is kama-buddhi.

[The sounding of the gong. Silence.]

Meeting 36 Supplement

Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

Supplement to KTMG Papers: Thirty-Six

| Past, Present, Future | Encapsulation | Astral Light, Anima Mundi, Akasa | More About After-

Death Consciousness | What Enters Devachan? | Transcend Humanity for Divinity | Fifth Race

Delayed by Atlantean Karma | Fifth Round Time of Choice | Rounds: Inner and Outer | Pratyekas

Become Avataras in New Chain | Bodisattvahood |

January 11, 1938

Past, Present, Future

G. de P. — Let us recollect a wonderful old phrase of occultism which is not empty of meaning, but filled with significance. It is: the past, the present, and the future are, each one and together as a group, illusions.

They are but aspects of the eternal now. Therefore the past and the present and the future are one, and merely seem different because we live in the time-illusion sphere.

An acorn, for instance, has in it its past which has made it what it now is. It is itself in the present; but this present is the womb of the future, and out of that acorn, because it is what it is, will grow an oak. Now that oak is in that acorn. The future is there. If the future of that oak were not in that acorn, that acorn would produce anything, or die perhaps. It might produce a radish or a human baby or a star or just a burst of gas. It does not. It produces an oak. All acorns produce oaks. Therefore the acorn has the past, the present, and the future all at once. And yet that acorn grows, it is not like unto any other acorn, it is an individual. It is a unit, it has its own swabhava. Now why is this? Because that acorn being an individual, an expression of an individual monad, is an expression of that individual monad's swabhava, of its life, its jiva which is represented on the different planes by what are called the pranas.

Take the case of a man. From his atman to his sthula-sarira or physical body there is but a mass of life fluids of the fundamental jiva expressing itself as the different pranas on the different planes or in the different principles. Now these different planes or principles have each one its own time sense, its own time illusion, its own past, present, and future; so that although something may be in the working out on the physical plane, the time of the physical plane — the past, present and future — is but a portion, a very small portion, an infinitesimal portion, of the time illusion on the higher planes. So also in the body part of the human constitution. Yet it is all contained in the auric egg, otherwise in the life of the constitution of a man.

Now the astral light in which are past, present, and future, is nothing but the life-stuff of a hierarchy, whatever it happens to be — a planet, a solar system, a galaxy — for there is an astral light for each.

Take the case of the action of will. This is a manifestation of life. We presently live largely in the kama-manasic part of our constitution, for through evolution we have arrived at that point. Yet our will is not native of the kama-manas part of us, but descends to us directly from the atman. Therefore it obeys a law which permits it to act on the kama-manasic part of us, but yet to have a large degree of its action from because native to the atmic part of us. Therefore, while our will is enchained, imprisoned, bound, by our present karmic destiny in the kama-manasic part of us, it can at any instant through exercising the spiritual prerogatives of its atmic swabhava say yes, or say no, or change its course of action instantaneously. It cannot do it with utter freedom because it is self-enchained, an act deliberately enchaining itself in the kama-manasic part. But it can always rise into the higher parts of itself and make that higher part operative here sooner or later if it will. Thus we have the divine gift of free will largely bound and enchained by our own kama-manasic perversities, but of which we can free ourselves if we exercise that same will in deliberate choice. In other words, we have the principle of free will, the power of choice, but very few of us ever exercise it.

Thus the astral light is the entire jiva of a hierarchy, whether of a planet, a solar system, or of a galaxy; just as in a man his entire jiva, the entire life of his auric egg, of his constitution, is his astral light. I use the words astral light in a very general sense here, and do so for purposes of graphic illustration of a point. Yet, speaking with stricter accuracy, the astral light should rather be called the lower and intermediate parts of the

jiva, the higher portions of the jiva really being akasa. Thus again we see that akasa at its summit and for the parts immediately below the summit, and the astral light from the intermediate down to the bottom, form the entire jiva or indeed also the auric egg of any entity. It is so in the solar system, where the akasa of that solar system is the divine and spiritual and intellectual parts of it, condensing and concreting into the lower quaternary which is the astral light of that solar system. The same rule applied on a still smaller scale to a planet, say to our earth, gives us the picture for these last bodies.

-----

February 26, 1940

Encapsulation

Think of the acorn producing the oak, every acorn holding within itself the potentialities of the whole oak tree. The early scientists of Europe, basing their thoughts on much of the Christian teaching, which in turn got distorted reflections from pagan philosophers, stated that in Mother Eve, in the Garden of Eden, in her womb were lying latent the seeds of all her posterity up to the present time. They called this the doctrine of encapsulation: that all future posterity, as it were, lay in capsules in the womb of Mother Eve. Now this is a greatly distorted conception — I cannot call it an intuition — a greatly distorted idea prevalent in medieval Europe, partly held by the theologians, partly taken over by the scientists from the ancient pagan Mystery doctrine, that out of the One comes the many, that from the single germ a nation can be born if circumstances are right.

Of course we know that the whole story of the Garden of Eden and the Adam and Eve of the Jewish scriptures is an esoteric allegory; but you may meet this word encapsulation if your reading ever takes you into study and investigations along that line, and you may wonder as to what the doctrine really was. Later scientists, who lost even the feeble glimmer that the medievalists had from pagan philosophers, hit all they were worth at this doctrine and called it a perfectly ridiculous medieval superstition. But what the pagan philosophers really had meant was that the past, present, and future, as a whole line of entities, are contained in any one single seed or germ at any time. That the past, present, and future are locked up there.

Man is thus a microcosm in very truth. If we were able by some wonderful cosmic magic to isolate a man and allow him to pursue his destiny in isolation through life after life after life after life until the manvantara ended; and there were none to begin the next manvantara except this isolated one individual, do you know that coming down into manifestation as the inaugurator, initiator, and evolver of the world, that one single man from the seeds of lives locked up in him even now, would produce ten classes of monads? Out of him would flow all the families of beings, all the races of beings. From him would come the three elemental kingdoms, the mineral kingdom, the vegetable kingdom, the animal kingdom, the human kingdom and the three dhyani-chohanic kingdoms. From him — to take a more particular illustration which will carry our thought back to the second root-race — would spring all the mammalia from the life-germs that would fall from him at that similar time in that new world. From him would grow as from eggs or seeds new animal stocks of all various kinds, and other new kinds not yet brought forth from the womb of destiny into manifested life.

Connect this up with what I tried in my Theosophy and Modern Science [ Man in Evolution] to point out that from the human races sprang not only the mammalia, but all the lower creatures under the mammalia, such as the reptiles and the birds, the fishes and even the insects and worms — all ultimately sprang from mankind, the human life-wave, in previous rounds. The same may be said of the vegetation, the same of the mineral and of the elemental kingdoms.

In the same way the dhyani-chohanic stocks gave birth to man — alluded to by the Greeks in the ancient phrase: men are the children of the gods. Man is but a human manifestation of his own inner god, belonging to the family of the god monads. What marvelously intricate and fascinating pictures of life the theosophist is privileged to have: intricate because of our feeble brain-minds; actually simple in the majestic energies based on nature's fundamental one law, one structure, one life, one cosmic mind!

-----

March 26, 1940

Astral Light, Anima Mundi, Akasa

I ask you: "What is the summit of the astral light, and what is its nether pole?" The astral light is certainly not only a bundle of conditions, but it also has place.

Now then, the astral light really is the dregs of the pillar of life extending from the highest cosmic plane to the lowest. Never mind on which particular cosmic plane our present globe is in which we are at present. I do not want to confuse the thought. But not only does each globe of a planetary chain have its own astral light, or its own linga-sarira — if you want to use that word, although linga-sarira belongs really to man and the beasts and plants and perhaps the stones — and not only does our solar system have its own astral light, but likewise every celestial body anywhere, stars, comets, nebulae, each one has its own astral light. It may also be said that our entire galaxy has its own galactic linga-sarira or astral light, on the principle again of the greater including the less; much in the same way as a man's body contains all the cells, the cells all the molecules, the molecules all the atoms, and the atoms all the electrons that all together as a unit go to compose his body.

Now this pillar of life, or pillar of light, extending from divinity to grossest substance in our solar system, is divisible for us humans into three main portions, something like the spirit, soul and body of a man.

Technically, the nether pole or body of the earth is the astral light; its soul is the anima mundi or "world soul"; its summit, or spirit, is the akasa, or what the Buddhists call alaya, meaning the "imperishable, the

"indissoluble," from a — not, laya — dissolving. Another name for it in Hinduism or Brahmanism would be paramatman. Thus alaya, paramatman, and akasa are practically the same. The topmost portion of the astral light blends into the lowest portion of the anima mundi; the topmost portion of the anima mundi blends into the lowest portion of the spirit or the akasa. The procession of descent is: first, akasa, then anima mundi, then the nether part or astral light (or the linga-sarira of our globe), and last the globe itself.

Moreover, another fact has to be kept in mind. The akasa stretches down into and permeates the anima mundi; again the akasa with the anima mundi as a combination in their turn stretch down through and permeate all the astral light, so that the astral light is actually not only ensouled, but is inspirited. The anima mundi is inspirited by the spirit of akasa and rests upon and in its body the astral light; whereas the spirit is the flaming fire, undilute, true, pure, at the top or summit of the column.

It is true that the linga-sarira in its coarsest parts coalesces and becomes one with the finer parts of the physical body; just so with the earth's astral light. There are places universally over the earth and around it where the astral light becomes indistinguishable from the more ethereal parts of the physical earth. You ask why it was that the Mysteries were sometimes held in caves and crypts, when the astral currents are so much more vile and confused near the center of the earth? Let me remind you that caves can hardly be called near the center of the earth. A cave, in fact, on a mountaintop would be above sea level.

When sensitives or seers while awake on this plane catch glimpses of the astral light, or of the earth's astral body, it seems to them to be self-luminous because it shines with a starry kind of luminosity; but actually it is merely because it is matter higher than our physical matter which makes it look luminous to us. If one had the eyes to see from one of the planes of the anima mundi, neither the astral light nor the linga-sarira of the man would shine, would look luminous, but would appear bodylike, cloudy, dull. It is very hard to describe these things.

The Medievalists referred to these temporary glimpses of the earth's linga-sarira they could catch, as astral,

"starry," not because the astral light was star-stuff, not at all; but precisely because those glimpses resembled the faint wisps of luminosity seen in the night sky, in the closer nebulae, or cometary matter. Astral light phenomena are actually far from being starry; and the physical phenomenon of luminescence: fluorescence, and what is called the phosphorescence of decay and sheen on the ocean waves, and similar things, are mainly due to physical chemical action, and are in no sense astral light phenomena.

Now then, I ask you to reflect after you reach home over what you might have gained from our study.

Remember the function played by the astral light as regards the earth only, and then think of the human

constitution, and ask yourself: are there no interrelations, intercirculations, intercommunications among the seven principles of man or his seven monads, exactly as there are the circulations and intercirculations and intercommunications between the alaya, the anima mundi and the astral light? There are. Think it over.

-----

February 8, 1938

More About AfterDeath Consciousness

Please remember that nirvana, devachan, kama-loka, and avichi, are all conditions of consciousness, and it does not matter two pins where that consciousness is because the locality, if an entity is in a state of consciousness, cannot affect that state at all. A man may be in nirvana although he be living upon the planet mara, which to us human beings is like a hell. A man living on one of the higher planetary chains of our own solar system may be in a kama-loka in that chain, or in the avichi belonging to that particular globe of that chain. Each chain has its own globes, each globe has its own inhabitants, these inhabitants are in a certain specific evolutionary stage. Being in this specific evolutionary stage they will have conditions of consciousness corresponding to it, so that what we call nirvana, devachan, the so-called conditions in kama-loka and the avichi are not absolute, each one identical for all possible planes of the universe, but are all relative. As should be obvious, the nirvana of one living on the highest cosmic plane is incomparably higher than the nirvana of one living on the lowest cosmic plane, and exactly so for any other state of consciousness, whether of devachan, kama-loka, or avichi, which can be repetitively reproduced on higher or lower planes.

To revert to us human beings: when we speak of the devachan as being spiritual — highly spiritual, I venture to enter a caveat, a word of warning. I know I myself have used that identical phrase and have regretted it. It is true in a vague way, but it is the conditions of the nirvana, when we come right down to brass tacks, which are spiritual. The conditions in the devachan are mental. Mind you, I am not saying high or low, or intermediate. I leave that for your own intuition to determine. It is easy. The entity in the kama-loka is in the kama-manasic state, the lower mentality manas, with emotions, feelings, what not; and likewise the same is to be said for the conditions of consciousness of entities in the avichi. Spirituality for the nirvani; high mentality, a spiritualized mentality, for the devachani; emotional and lower mentality for one in kama-loka; and intense mental suffering and emotional stress and storm for the one in the avichi.

Live a life striving towards the gods, your death will be peaceful, your kama-loka will be nil, because no kama-lokic seeds have come into your life. Your devachan will be relatively high and very short, or very long, depending upon your karma, depending upon the longing of your heart.

In connection with all these thoughts, there are exceptions, there are things to remember, which would change individual cases. Take for instance a chela. Now if we did not know of the teaching, we would say: Oh, a chela, a very lofty man or woman — surely that means a long, long, long devachan of rest and happiness and peace; won't it be beautiful for him when he dies! But you see that is not what the chela wants. He is striving to reduce his devachan. He is striving to become spiritualized rather than merely loftily intellectualized, he is striving to come back to earth to help. His heart is filled not with kama-lokic instincts, nor with devachanic instincts, nor even with nirvanic instincts which he resigns. But his whole being is filled with the love of everything around him. He wants to come back, he wants to help, he wants to give himself. His whole being is spiritualized. The result is that in him there is very little of the making of the devachani. Do you follow the psychological thought there?

Now a baby of course has no devachan, for obvious reasons. It has not had thought and feeling enough to make a devachan. But likewise a baby has no nirvana, and it has no kama-loka, no avichi, for the same reason. But a grown man can easily be in a devachanic state because he is cultivating it while living, and here is still another aspect of the teaching, he may actually have cut his devachan short, and have in his auric egg a psychological urge or impulse to go back to the devachan and rest like a most tired man rising from his bed before his body is fully recuperated. At the least temptation he wants to sit back in his chair and relax and go to sleep. So from a number of causes men can be in the devachan while imbodied.

I still am not satisfied, Mr. Chairman and Companions, and I confess to a very wee, very wee feeling of

irritability, and I trust you will forgive me if I speak with a certain amount of undue energy, but this matter really is so simple, and when I think that for fifty years the teaching has been given and turned and twisted, turned inside out almost, questions by the thousand have been answered, and yet some of our most devoted members with their high powers of understanding do not seem to have grasped the simplest thing about the devachan, which is simply that it is a state of consciousness in which a man or a woman enters after death, or during life perhaps, simply as the karmic result of the sum total of the workings of that consciousness while the man was alive. That is all there is to the devachan. If you live a life which is productive of a devachan, you are going to get it because that is in your stream of consciousness, that is you. That seems so simple. If you live a life while in the body which is passionate — and passion means many things, please remember: anger, hatred, detestation, and prejudice, etc. — you are simply building for yourself a vivid kama-loka.

Inevitably, because it is yourself; and when you die you simply carry on as yourself. All the other details of the teaching about the various bodies, and the throwing off of the kama-rupa, and all that, are merely the exoteric fringe of the teaching. The real teaching lies in understanding the fact that man is a stream or center of consciousness undergoing various phases, and that he can control these phases, or become subject to them.

He can master them, or become enslaved to them. If he master them finally he becomes a mahatma. If he becomes enslaved to them, he becomes a slave to his lower self. That is all. And you are going to get exactly, precisely nothing else but exactly and precisely what the sum total of your thoughts and feelings during life has been.

Let us take the case of the good man who is beginning to lose the love of himself, who is beginning to take an interest in others, in the stars, and in the sun, and in the beauties of nature. He is becoming impersonal. This cuts the root of that which produces devachan. Impersonality. Probably his death will be as peaceful as the dropping of a leaf from a tree. He won't know when he dies. There will be no kama-loka. There has not been anything in his life to produce a kama-loka; the Second Death will come almost — oh, we cannot say immediately, it depends upon the individual — but quite soon relatively speaking, and he won't realize that it has taken place. The kama-rupa will just drop away, and being of high astral substance will disintegrate quickly. Then the entity simply passes right through the lower devachanic regions; it is not attracted by them as there is not anything of the lower devachan in his being. He simply rises right up to higher levels of the devachan, perhaps even touches the fringes or enters into the nirvana-condition.

And so the time comes when a man is imbodied in life after life till his evolution is so far progressed that he passes beyond the devachan. He does not need it as there is not the need for rest and recuperation. The ego is not tired, it is not weary, there has been nothing in the past life to produce the devachan, he is a mahatma, in the highest conditions a buddha, and can enter the nirvana even when alive, and rest there.

Thus spirituality is the mark of the nirvani; high or spiritualized intellectuality is the mark of the devachani; emotional enslavement particularly if connected with instability, and mental enslavement, one's likes and dislikes, hatreds and loves, are the typical seeds producing the kama-loka. Whereas the avichi stands in a class by itself again.

The average man and woman is entirely too weak to enter the avichi — fortunately. The avichi, as states of consciousness (for the avichi comprises many states), is entered or undergone by those beings who are more or less high in spiritual wickedness, in other words, men and women with high native talents who deliberately prostituted these to the use of evil. That produces the avichi. A true individual in the avichi is beyond all ordinary human temptations, ordinary human passions. He is above them, or below them. I hardly know how to phrase it. They do not touch him, they are too gross. The avichi is a kind of inverted spirituality. One belonging there has no love for life on earth, no more so than has the typical nirvani. His love, his hope, his life, is in a desperate alliance with evil, if you can conceive of this thing. Human beings can be in certain of the higher states of avichi, which means for us the feebler states, while imbodied. I have seen men and women in an avichi state. They had no realization of it. They were perfectly convinced that they were doing just the right thing; and yet they had chosen with deliberation at that time to do an evil thing because they liked it. They liked the evil for its own sake. They did not want to hurt anybody. But evil itself attracted them.

I wonder if you understand this. There are human beings like that.

-----

March 26, 1940

What Enters Devachan?

That which enters the devachan is the human or psychical monad, the man of earth. It is not the vital-astral monad which has the devachan, because that is the monad of the animal part of us. We are psychic monads, human monads, the psychic-human monad being the center of our emotions and mentations or mental operations, but not the highest intellection which belongs to the higher human monad or chain-monad, the correct term for the true reimbodying ego.

Our spiritual or highest mentations or intellections belong to that part of us which is called the buddhi-manas, and at times will enter the lowest nirvana, or perhaps we might even say the very highest tip of devachan, so high a devachan that it melts into and becomes a low nirvana.

The nirvana is experienced by the spiritual monad therefore, and is no dream at all, but sheer reality. It is good thus so to progress while one is alive that the devachanic interlude of dreaming becomes short, and finally is not experienced at all, for the man who has transcended the devachan like the mahatma can reimbody himself immediately, if he so wish, or at a later time, but in any case passes from body to body in full self-consciousness, for he has begun to live in his spiritual ego, in the buddhi-sattva part of himself, which is above and beyond the illusory dreaming of the devachan and the gross, often hot and terrible experiences of the kama-loka; terrible because they are the workings of your own consciousness undergoing nightmares which you have prepared for yourself while alive, by your thoughts, by your feelings, by your wishes, by your hopes, by yourself.

-----

April 30, 1940

Transcend Humanity for Divinity

There is a beauty spiritual and a beauty material, the former dignifies and ennobles human life. The latter is a tempter.

Let us never forget that we, imbodied men, when compared to the dhyan-chohans, are but children, and that anything that leads us to a larger conception of abstract beauty is a help, whether it be the pathway of art or music, or of the finer pursuits of life. It is perfectly true that the dhyan-chohans replace the things that we look upon as so high and beautiful by other occupations that to us would have little or no attraction. We have not risen sufficiently high to feel the kama towards them. Our kama is lower and intermediate. The kama of the dhyan-chohans is in the higher branches or ranges of the kama-principle.

The seven so-called principles of man, as given from the beginning by the Masters and HPB, are not the monads of our constitution, but the fields in which the different monads work. That is really a very important point because I have heard some of our people speak of the manas as the ego, and it is not. The manas is the field of mentation in us. The kama is not the animal ego in us. It is the field of desire both spiritual and all kinds. There is a divine desire, the atma-buddhi of kama, as there is a gross desire, the prana and the linga-sarira of kama. There is also a manas of the kama, and that is why we speak of kama-manas, which is our own particular mental evolutionary state at present. In other words, these sevenfold principles of men are the fields wherein the respective monads work, the fields of their operation.

Now then, the range of consciousness of the human ego is over this globe D. The range of consciousness of the bodhisattva, and of most of the mahatmas, is over the planetary chain. The range of consciousness of the highest bodhisattvas and of the buddhas is in the spiritual monad whose consciousness-sweep covers the solar system, whereas he who has raised himself into the divine consciousness of the divine monad within him, his highest self, has a consciousness-reach or range or sweep which covers the galaxy.

It is a marvelous thing that the human ego, earth-child, because of there being in his constitution all these higher monadic essences or all these higher egos, can even while on earth ally himself more or less

permanently, usually temporarily, with these higher centers of essential consciousness within his own being.

And when that happens, with greater or less permanency, you have a bodhisattva, or a mahatma, or even at rarest intervals a buddha, and in the case of the avataras a combination of god and buddha, although the buddha really stands higher than the avatara as such. Another strange paradox.

Remember that the bodhisattva is a principle within yourself, whereas the buddha state is a still higher but contiguous state of consciousness into which the highest bodhisattvas raise themselves. In other words, the Christ, the bodhisattva — two words meaning the same thing — is a part of your own higher human constitution, the buddhi-manas, or the manas-buddhi, the Christ principle within you, living in you now. The buddha is the Christ principle which has raised itself so that the light of the atman shines upon and in and through it — hence the term dharmakaya, the vehicle of cosmic law, because atman is cosmic law and reality.

All the teaching of all the great sages and masters of all the ages has pointed to the same end: transcend your humanity to become the bodhisattva, the Christ, within yourself. And it can be done, and has been done.

Every chela is striving to do just that.

Never for a moment imagine that the consideration of ugliness or distortions is helpful or good. The spiritual beauty of life is ennobling, it is helpful. It is very good to consider harmony, for by the habit of so thinking, the movements of your consciousness become harmonious and therefore beautiful. Your very outward frame after a while (it may be lives, but it will come) takes harmonious proportions unto itself, because the inner life, the thought, the feeling, is harmony, is beauty, for harmony and beauty in a sense are identities.

Hate distorts. It is separative; that is why hatred is evil. Love harmonizes, that is why love is good and beautiful; and the more impersonal the love is, the greater is its sweep, the more comprehensive is its reach, and the greater is the magic that it works upon our consciousness. But even the lower loves that men have for each other are better than none at all. But these must be transcended, because they are personal instead of being impersonal and universal. Even a love between a man and a woman can be beautiful if it is high, but can be degrading if it is low because then it is purely selfish.

There are so many beautiful and holy and glorious things in human life and they are a balm to the hearts of men. They should be cultivated, they should be sought for, but not eagerly and selfishly for oneself, but only that by becoming ourselves beautiful inwardly we can shed the light of our beauty on others, and the light of our love with its softening and refining influence. Love is always beautiful, and therefore is always grand.

Especially the higher love, for it is universal. I wonder sometimes if the great scientists, those who devote their lives to the impersonal study of nature, realize that they are cultivating within themselves an aspect of the beauty in nature, because by the fact of losing themselves in their study they are becoming progressively more universal in their thoughts, less concentrated on self.

A selfish love can damn, and this is the inverse case of the evil spirituality. But a beautiful love can raise. You remember the saying in the Christian Testament: no man hath greater love for his fellow than to give up his life for him. This does not mean going and dying for him. It means losing himself in the higher impersonal self-forgetfulness of utter devotion, for all; and it is a strange, strange, and yet wonderful, truth that it is just the man who thinks most of himself and least of others who sees the least beauty in the world around us, because his thoughts are on himself. The proposition is so obvious, it does not require an argument; any sensitive, any person with sensitivity, feels it and sees it.

This does not mean giving up any duty that we may have assumed because that in itself is a kind of inverted selfishness. If we have assumed a duty, it should be fulfilled. If you have given a promise, fulfill it at whatever cost, for you are practising self-forgetfulness thereby, unless indeed it be a promise which you find out later and really know in your highest consciousness has been an evil promise, in which case in my judgment it is wise to make a clean breast of it, and emphatically desire to be freed from a promise which you will explain you took not knowing that it was evil in itself and has wrought evil. Any decent person would free an honest man from a promise thus taken. Otherwise, if a promise is given in honor and sincerity, keep it.

If you have a duty fulfill it. You are becoming unselfish in so doing. You are losing yourself in the greater self around you, in the spiritual self. You are universalizing your consciousness, you are transcending the things which make the kama-loka, yes, and the devachan.

-----

April 12, 1938

Fifth Race Delayed by Atlantean Karma

As regards the reference to the passage in Fundamentals of the Esoteric Philosophy, which states that we of the fifth race are not yet where we should be, this is not a case of failing so much as of being late in arriving, the reason being due to the heavy Atlantean karma lying on us, a weight upon us, which we have not as yet thrown off. We have been shackled with our past evildoing which clings to us as heavy weights, so that we run not as fast as we should. We have not come as far forwards as we should. That is simply due to the Atlantean karma weighing upon us. But it is passing. The weights are vanishing, and the result will be that having the capacities to make the end of the fifth race and enter the sixth, towards the end of the race we shall make very rapid surges or spurts forwards, and regain the lost time. At least I hope so!

There was a time when we humans were just as sinless, to use the old word, just as guiltless of sin and evil, as the beasts are, or as certain of the very lowdown races, as you call them, now are. But we made some terrific karma during the end of the third and during all of the fourth root-races. We would be more advanced today if that were not so. I do not think there is any puzzle in The Secret Doctrine about it. HPB is merely stating facts as they are at the present time. A little child, we can say, when compared with its mother and father, has enormous advantages over the parents because it has not made in this life all the bad karma those parents have made. But wait till that little child grows up. It may be a perfect saint, but it may be the other thing!

This specific reference must not be confused with the more particular teachings of the failures on the one hand, and that of lost souls on the other hand.

Failures merely means entities in a certain schoolroom, and in that schoolroom in a certain class of life. They may have been brilliant students, precocious, advanced, as it were beyond their natural strength. But they cannot finally succeed in passing the exams taking them out of that class into the next higher. Now they do not leave the school, they are not lost from the school. They are merely failures for those exams. But their failures in a sense may be quite creditable, when compared with other students in a lower class who have not had the ambition to rise into the class higher. So therefore failures are merely those who have not been able to pass the examinations in some particular class of life. They will come back to the school in the next term and then doubtless pass the exams.

Now the lost souls, following this same metaphor or picture, are those who from innate spiritual incapacity succeed in passing no exams in any class. They have no ambition. They do not care, they are indifferent to progress in their studies. They prefer to play, they prefer to take their ease. They will not strive. Their tastes, their yearnings, are not for the higher things. They leave the school. They may end in the penitentiary. Each seeks its own level. Those are the lost souls. They have dropped out of the school entirely. They cannot make the grade at all.

-----

May 10, 1938

Fifth Round Time of Choice

Please do not forget that the various adjustments of the individuals forming the life-waves, or portions of the life-waves, are all karma. They are not on the one hand rewards, and they are not on the other hand punishments, except in the karmic sense. There is no divinity which punishes some for failure to go ahead, and rewards others for being good boys and girls.

In the next or fifth round, the condition I am inclined to think will be worse because it will be changed from mere gross desire of the fourth round to more subtle, treacherous kama of the fifth. As long as a man has no mind he does not commit sin. It takes mind to bring about real evildoing involving choice: imagination and passion and thinking about it and working out ways and means. When you have no brain to do that, you

cannot do much harm in the world. That is why the Fifth-Round choice is so vastly more important than the Fourth-Round choice. An animal even today, a kamic creature, has its temptations, but you cannot call its weaknesses sins. They become sin and evildoing only when mind enters into the equation, on account of the immense powers of mind as compared with merely personal divagations of conduct.

The higher you go, the more subtle and the more dangerous are the temptations; and I may as well point out here that the temptations that beset a chela or even a Master are even incomparably more dangerous than those which beset ordinary men and women, because their faculties are more developed, more subtle; and the misuse of the higher powers is correspondingly more fraught with evil. The greater the power, the greater the danger.

Now then, what is the reason that at the moment of choice in the fifth round, the supreme time of choice, millions of human beings who take the left-hand choice or wrong choice will gradually die out, and go into this state of singular — because that is what it is — quasi-nirvana, not a real nirvana, because there is not the plenitude of self-conscious experience in spirituality?

The reason is that it being the fifth round, and the manasic principle being in full flush of growth and action, the mind thereby of these millions who fail is chained to the intellectual or manasic view and cannot rise into the spiritual or buddhic. Do you understand that point? Because even from the middle of the fourth round which we have passed, intensely so from the middle of the fifth round, the whole endeavor of nature is to make the individuals of the higher life-waves become dhyanis, which means a surging upwards of the intellectual qualities into union and identification with the buddhic or spiritual, which includes the manasic and the buddhic. Whereas in the case of those who fail during the fifth-round choice, it is because their life forces, their understanding, their thoughts, and their feelings, are wholly, or relatively so, manasic, intellectual, mental. The life-wave passes on, leaving them behind. They cannot keep up with the procession.

They cannot keep in step.

Why is it then that when the next chain-imbodiment comes, these human failures of the fifth round will become among the very highest humanity of the new chain of globes? For this reason: that these humans who fail are already humans. They have reached that far, so they will begin the new chain-imbodiment as humans

— not as a reward for their failure, but simply because they will come back to the new chain as monads who have already attained the human stage; and like a clock which has been stopped and wound again, and started running, will begin as humans exactly at the point where they stopped. Thus the failures in one chain-manvantara become the higher and highest of the next chain-manvantara or imbodiment. This is what the Master alludes to in The Mahatma Letters where he speaks of the failures in former manvantaras now rushing in and taking the lead in conjunction with the elementals.

In the long run things equate themselves. Balances are struck. It is true that the beasts on this globe on this chain have a somewhat better time, better chances, karmically speaking, than the beasts on the moon-chain did. But likewise, the dangers are greater. Furthermore, I think it is not quite correct to say that we as a human life-wave were all beasts on the moon-chain. A very large portion of the human life-wave was, or as individuals were beasts on the moon-chain. But those failures among lunar humans during the fifth lunar round are the very highest of the humans on our present chain, which accords exactly with what I told you a little while ago of the failures to come on this chain; whereas those who were full-blown humans on the lunar chain are now the lowest of the dhyani kingdoms on this chain. Just as those humans who will make the right choice during the fifth round on this chain, those who during this manvantara have made the choice of the upward path, and have gone ahead, will have become dhyanis at the end of the seventh round, and will function as the lowest class of the dhyanis, a kingdom higher than the human or the intellectual, during the next chain-imbodiment.

-----

February 26, 1940

Rounds: Inner and Outer

Please remember with regard to this matter of rounds the following facts: first, the seven globes of the twelve

are for convenience called the manifest globes or the globes of the rupa worlds, and the five upper globes are called arupa, not because they have no form, but to us in our present cognitional development they seem formless much in the same way as a thought is formless to us, and yet we know that thoughts are beings of form and that each thought imbodies an elemental.

Now then, no round of the seven begins with globe A of the seven and ends with globe G of the seven, according to the exoteric teaching. That is correct as far as it goes. Every round whatsoever begins with the first or topmost globe, runs through all the globes of the descending arc to our earth or globe D, then ascends through all the globes of the ascending arc until the first is reached again, which we can call the first or the twelfth.

The next thought to remember is that before the first of what are called by HPB the seven rounds, there are three elementary rounds. I myself wonder if that is a good word to give to these rounds; but I do not know a better. They are the rounds in which the elemental activities needed for the beginnings of the formation of the globes take place. This makes ten rounds. Then counting after this way, there are two rounds after the ten, making the twelve or closing out rounds before the chain dies; as the moon had died. Thus there are actually twelve rounds. The main or the most important to us at present are the seven manifest rounds, as we may call them; therefore particularly selected by HPB in her Secret Doctrine, as being exoteric teaching: but exoteric only because it was openly printed and published. Before she gave it out it had been for centuries esoteric.

The third thing to remember about rounds is that there are inner and outer rounds, and these inner and outer rounds respectively have two meanings: the pathways or round-circulations followed by monads not only at death, but in sleep and during initiation, both inner and outer, of which you have already studied and know at least something. The other significance of the terms inner rounds and outer rounds is this: that when the seven (or twelve) rounds of the life-waves of a chain have been run and are ended, there is always a certain number amongst the twelve classes of monads who then will graduate from the earth-chain, and in due course of time will take their next step to some other chain and begin in this sense an outer round for these graduated classes.

Remember, the inner rounds we call the rounds of life-waves from globe A to globe G if you follow the septenary system, or globe one back to globe one or globe twelve if you follow the duodenary system. Thus the inner rounds are the rounds taking place along the globes of the chain, our own as an instance. The outer rounds are the peregrinations or pilgrimages of the same monads, when the time comes, to the other sacred chains of the solar system.

Thus, as you see, Companions, it is always wise to check yourself when you say: "I know that; I have studied that; I have got it." You are bound to find that what you think you have got is but an entrance into a chamber of knowledge out of which you may look through translucent windows into still larger vistas of wonder; and that this chamber of knowledge possesses doors, one of entrance and one of exit through which you will pass into still more wonderful habitations — in this chain or into other globes, as the case may be.

There are many mansions of life in the Father's kingdom, and each such mansion is a septenary chain. That is one interpretation of that Christian saying.

You will therefore notice that it is not only certain classes which thus graduate from earth, but in fact it is the destiny of all the monadic classes to discover some day that they are not earth's children. But we stay during a seven or twelve round period in the earth-chain, as one stays in a mansion of life for a time; or in a hotel for a certain period and then moves elsewhere.

Those classes which have graduated from earth will run practically identical rounds, as far as systems or planes go, on the next planetary chain; and when that is ended and they have graduated from that, they will move on to the next. Finally in some far distant manvantara they will find themselves on this planetary chain again; but by that time the earth's planetary chain will have evolved to something far higher than what it is now. And the monads will have evolved from within themselves faculties and powers, attributes and instincts, and an inner development which will fit them for the new mansions here on earth.

-----

May 10, 1938

Pratyekas Become Avataras in New Chain

The pratyekas do play the part of avataras in the succeeding chain-imbodiment, and this is solely due to their spirituality, which in time will verge towards unselfish spirituality rather than the pratyeka self-absorption in individual personal attainment.

We must remember the pratyekas are nevertheless buddhas of a kind, they are high spiritual beings as compared with us; but they are buddhas, and consequently they certainly will, all of them, belong to the ranks of the dhyanis in the next chain-imbodiment. But on account of the intrinsically spiritually selfish attitude they had on the moon-chain, when they reach the earth-chain their karma will force or oblige them to follow correspondential courses of action in this new chain. Theirs being a course of spiritual action they will take a leading part in the awakening of mind, in the avataric functioning on the different globes.

We should always keep in mind that all these different states of consciousness are karmic after all, and being karmic they have to follow karmic lines of retribution or of recompense.

With this first point clearly understood, we pass to the next: the distinction between buddhas of compassion and pratyeka buddhas does not lie in the fact of either being awakened spiritually and intellectually, because both classes are; but it lies in the fact that the buddhas of compassion are older souls, whose spirituality is of a diviner or loftier type than that of the pratyeka buddhas. To put it plainly, the pratyeka buddhas have awakened the buddha in them, but it is in the lower parts of the buddha-septenate that their spirituality is awakened; whereas the buddhas of compassion have awakened, or rather have raised themselves to live in the higher parts of the buddha-septenate. Thus, we can say that a pratyeka buddha lives in the kama of his buddhi, or in the kama-manas of his buddhi; whereas the buddha of compassion lives in the buddhi-buddhi parts of his buddhi.

In the new chain-imbodiment, the pratyekas do awaken the sympathy in their nature. They suffer themselves, and being highly spiritual they are quickly led to see that the only way to abate that suffering and to gain peace is along the road of compassion; and it is a fact that what were the pratyeka buddhas in past times shall become the buddhas of compassion in after times. Because they had that latent power within them to change, they are called buddhas.

That is it exactly. That also is what makes the fifth rounder or the sixth rounder, except that the sixth rounder at present is an exceedingly rare case, and even so high that he becomes such now by virtue of what the Master in The Mahatma Letters calls a mystery. It consists in a special help given to them by the Brotherhood of Compassion. The very highest of that brotherhood help them to become buddhas. Isn't that a remarkable situation?

When a bodhisattva, entitled to nirvanic bliss, renounces this last, and instead of entering nirvana as a full-blown buddha remains behind to help and serve all: this is called the Great Sacrifice. Entitled to buddhahood and to the nirvanic wisdom and bliss, buddhahood shines on his forehead like the light of eternity. But he renounces this glorious privilege and remains as a bodhisattva, his heart, his mind, buddhalike in type, but retaining his humanhood in order that the links with the army trailing behind him and needing help shall not be broken.

It is a beautiful and sublime doctrine when it is properly understood, and it is the ideal of all chelaship to attain not so much buddhahood as bodhisattvahood.

-----

June 25, 1940

Bodhisattvahood

A bodhisattva is one who lives in the buddhic principle in its lower parts. A buddha is one who has been living in the buddhi principle, he who has raised himself by choice or has been impelled from necessity to rise

into the atman, into the atman alone with its sheath of buddhi, and this is the dharmakaya, nirvana.

In India you will find that those expert in these philosophic thoughts will say that entering nirvana means the impossibility of return. It is correct and incorrect. Correct for the manvantara in which the entering of the nirvana occurs, incorrect as regards the succeeding, or the next after the next succeeding manvantara, depending upon the seeds of karma.

Now then, a pratyeka buddha is one who has set his whole being on the yearning, the longing, the intense desire of achieving final culmination of these in entering nirvana: from being individualized, becoming universalized. No individual can be universal. The terms are contradictory. When the lower part which is the basis of individuality, when the lower part of the upper triad is outgrown or abandoned, then the dharmakaya is entered, the universality of life is entered, and you have Buddhahood and nirvana. The Buddhists say Buddha, the Brahmanists say nirvani. We use both terms according to our convenience and our desire to describe this or that phase of world thought.

The buddha of compassion is one who for many incarnations has refused the nirvana, buddhahood, has refused the universal life, from love for all that lives, from a desire to aid the world. His kaya is either the nirmanakaya or the sambhogakaya.

Now when this particular bodhisattva finally reaches the point where karma imperatively demands a change, and there is no help for it, he must obey the karmic mandate. Then he too must die to the manifested worlds and become a buddha; but because all previous imbodiments for ages have been bodhisattva imbodiments, we call such a buddha a buddha of compassion.

When the pratyeka buddha reissues forth from the nirvana when the future time comes, he does so as a learner, a high learner, but a learner. When a buddha of compassion reissues forth, he does so no longer as a pratyeka buddha learner, but already as a Master of Life. There is the double reward of the grand center of light we call the buddha of compassion.

The thought I wish to impress upon you here is this: the pratyeka buddha is rightly called by the Tibetans not a teacher, for to be a teacher he must remain in the world after he has attained buddhahood, and the bodhisattvahood is the graded rank below that of buddha. The next step means buddhahood, and those who become pratyeka buddhas always pass beyond the bodhisattva state for the buddha state. Those who are bodhisattvas of compassion life after life, as long as nature permits it, reimbody in the sambhogakaya, more commonly in the nirmanakaya, and remain bodhisattvas of compassion.

Now you see why amongst us and in the Mahayana system of Northern Buddhism such loving reverence is given to the bodhisattvas. Indeed, so strong is this human feeling of compassionate love for these friends of all that live, that even the buddhas in the popular estimation are less loved than are the bodhisattvas.

It is like the gods: the gods are revered, deeply respected, but not loved as are these great teachers, the bodhisattvas. They still have elements of humanity in them, of human perfect self-sacrifice for others. These indeed are the immemorial friends of all that live. The buddhas would be, were they amongst us. But there is no such thing as a living buddha imbodied in flesh, except so called by courtesy. The buddha is a nirvani; he cannot be a buddha unless he enters the nirvana, for then he is fully buddha, awakened, universal. The courses of cosmic thought and cosmic love are thenceforth his as long as he remains in nirvana. These are renounced by the bodhisattva who re-enters the world with its limitations. He refuses the buddhahood of nirvana, and accepts the limitations and the sacrifices of all that his spirit holds most dear and holy in order to help others.

These bodhisattvas often by compliment, by affectionate devotion, are called compassion buddhas, but strictly speaking they are bodhisattvas of compassion.

Now the reason that some of these bodhisattvas in time are obliged by karmic law to leave the planes of manifestation as above hinted is because of the fact that their entire constitution can stand the strain no more.

They absolutely need the nirvana, and nature demands that they take it: the analogue of those who refuse the devachan among the chelas as long as they can up to the time that nature demands rest, then they enter the devachan. You have been taught that teaching.

That is why the Tibetans say that the pratyeka buddhas are not teachers. That is why they say that the buddhas of compassion — actually the bodhisattvas of compassion — are the teachers. For the love for mankind and for all that lives (even the beasts, the plants, the stones) in the heart of the bodhisattvas drives them to teach all who have ears to hear. They are teachers. This is what we call the hierarchy of light, the sons of light.

But even in the nirvana the pratyeka buddha cannot ascend as high in consciousness as the buddha of compassion ascends. If rather arbitrarily perhaps we wish to describe this graphically, we can say that the pratyeka buddha ascends in the atman to the prana-atman, maybe also to the kama-atman, whereas the buddha of compassion ascends to the manas-atman, possibly even to the buddhi-atman. Ascending into the atman-atman means annihilation for our universe, which means that that entity has reached the point where karma demands rising into the hierarchy above. So wonderful is nature, similar in structure throughout, one law, one life, one love, one dharma or duty for all who have ears to hear. What is in the great is in the small. If you wish to know the great, study the small with the greatness in yourself. What is above is mirrored in what is below. All that is below is a reflection of what is above.

Tat twam asi — THAT THOU ART.

Conclusion

Contents

Document Outline

- The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

- Table of Contents

- Preface

- Meeting 1

- Meeting 1 Supplement

- Meeting 2

- Meeting 2 Supplement

- Meeting 3

- Meeting 3 Supplement

- Meeting 4

- Meeting 4 Supplement

- Meeting 5

- Meeting 6

- Meeting 7

- Meeting 8

- Meeting 9

- Meeting 10

- Meeting 11

- Meeting 12

- Meeting 13

- Meeting 14

- Meeting 15

- Meeting 16

- Meeting 17

- Meeting 18

- Meeting 19

- Meeting 20

- Meeting 21

- Meeting 22

- Meeting 23

- Meeting 24

- Meeting 25

- Meeting 26

- Meeting 27

- Meeting 28

- Meeting 28 Supplement

- Meeting 29

- Meeting 30

- Meeting 30 Supplement

- Meeting 31

- Meeting 31 Supplement

- Meeting 32

- Meeting 32 Supplement

- Meeting 33

- Meeting 33 Supplement

- Paper 34

- Paper 34 Supplement

- Paper 35

- Paper 35 Supplement

- Meeting 36

- Meeting 36 Supplement

- Conclusion

Table of Contents

The Dialogues of G. de Purucker

Table of Contents

Preface

Meeting 1

Meeting 1 Supplement

Meeting 2

Meeting 2 Supplement

Meeting 3

Meeting 3 Supplement

Meeting 4

Meeting 4 Supplement

Meeting 5

Meeting 6

Meeting 7

Meeting 8

Meeting 9

Meeting 10

Meeting 11

Meeting 12

Meeting 13

Meeting 14

Meeting 15

Meeting 16

Meeting 17

Meeting 18

Meeting 19

Meeting 20

Meeting 21

Meeting 22

Meeting 23

Meeting 24

Meeting 25

Meeting 26

Meeting 27

Meeting 28

Meeting 28 Supplement

Meeting 29

Meeting 30

Meeting 30 Supplement

Meeting 31

Meeting 31 Supplement

Meeting 32

Meeting 32 Supplement

Meeting 33

Meeting 33 Supplement

Paper 34

Paper 34 Supplement

Paper 35

Paper 35 Supplement

Meeting 36

Meeting 36 Supplement

Conclusion