Fundamental Principles.—Ainong the facts asserted by some theosophical writers as being known to themselves and capable of verification by those who are willing to make the necessary sacrifices to gain the required powers are: (a) the existence of a few highly evolved men, called Adepts or Masters — not solely of any one nation, but of any of the advanced nations — who have gained these divine powers in their fullness; that they exist now as in the past; that they are substantially omniscient so far as the laws and conditions of our own solar system extend, and that their high stage of progress entitles them to advancement beyond human conditions, but that they of their own free will have chosen to remain in touch with humanity in physical incarnation, that they may aid in its evolution; that it is from the brother hood of these great adepts that from time to time have come into the outer world the great world teachers and that in their keeping has been the Wisdom-tradition, which in every age they have caused to be expressed in suitable form; that there have always been pupils of these men, and that theosophical teaching is published to the world to-day at their instiga tion and through a few of their pupils; (b) the existence of a very subtle order of matter, far finer than the ether which transmits light, upon which is impressed photographically, so to speak, in the form of living pictures, every scene or happening, however great or small, which has ever occurred from the very begin ning of things and throughout the extent of the universe; that to this subtle material has been given the name of the Alcashic Records, or the Memory of Nature; that not only does the trained observer who has acquired the power of sensing these conditions of the subtler medium of the universe, or of responding sym pathetically to its vibrations, see vividly the particular occurrence to which he turns his attention, but he hears and feels, etc., just as did the actors in any particular event which may be under review, perceiving their thoughts and feelings as well as seeing and hearing the outward conditions of the scene; that thus he can accurately, in proportion to his powers of observation, perceive any occurrence of the past, no matter when it may have happened, and in this way can know the true events of history; that he may also direct his vision to any period in the life of a planet and trace out its various evolutionary processes, and that he may thus enter a limitless field of observation wherein he may learn at first hand of the obscurer laws of nature; (c) that by the exercise of their highly evolved powers the Adepts or Masters of Wisdom can make definite experimental re search into the Alcashic Records in quite as real a sense as the physicist makes his investi gations within the physical world, and that they are, with these and other powers possessed by them, enabled to ascertain and teach certain general principles as definite facts, all of which are now and have ever been known to them, and very many of said facts have to a more or i less extent, been proven by the investigations of those of their pupils who have fitted them selves to do such work. In The Secret Doc trine' Madame Blavatsky mentions three such principles as being the fundamentals of theoso phy; they are: 1. An Omnipresent, Eternal, Boundless and Immutable Principle, on which all speculation is impossible, since it transcends the power of human conception and can only be dwarfed by i any human expression or similitude. It is beyond the range and reach of thought —un thinkable and unspeakable.
2. The Eternity of the Universe in Coto as a boundless plane; periodically "the Playground of numberless universes incessantly manifesting and disappearing' called "the manifesting stars?) and the "sparks of Eternity.) 3. The fundamental identity of all souls with the Universal Over-Soul, the latter being itself an aspect of the Unknown Root; and the obli gatory pilgrimage for every soul— a spark of the former — through the cycle of incarnation, or necessity, in accordance with cyclic and Kar mic law, during the whole term.
to the theoso phist all manifestation has its origin in the Ab solute, of whom naught can be said save that °He is.° As Mrs. Besant eloquently describes it in 'The Ancient Wisdom,' °Coming forth from the depth of the One Existence, from the One beyond all thought and all speech, a Logos, by imposing on himself a limit circum scribing voluntarily the range of His own Being, becomes the Manifested God, and tracing the limiting sphere of His activity, thus outlines the area of His Universe. Within that sphere the Universe is born, is evolved and dies; it lives, it moves, it has its being in Him; its matter is His emanation; its forces and energies are currents of His life; He is immanent in every atom; all-pervading; all-sustaining, all evolving; He is its source and its end, its cause and its object, its centre and circum ference; it is built on Him as its sure founda tion, it breathes in Him as its encircling space; He is in everything and everything in Him. Thus have the sages of the Ancient Wisdom taught us of the beginning of the manifested worlds. From the same source we learn of the self-unfolding of the Logos into a threefold form; the First Logos, the Root of all Being; from Him the second, manifesting the two as pects of life and form, the primal duality, mak ing the two poles of nature between which the web of the universe is to be woven—Life-Form, Spirit-Matter, Positive-Negative, Active-Recep tive, Father-Mother of the worlds. Then the
Third Logos, the Universal Mind, that in which all archetypically exists, the source of beings, the fount of fashioning energies, the treasure house in which are stored up all the archetypal forms which are to be brought forth and elabo rated in lower kinds of matter during the evolu tion of the universe. These are the fruits of past universes, brought over as seeds for the present.° From the Third Logos comes forth the seven Great Logoi, sometimes called the Seven Spirits before the throne of God; and as the divine outbreathing pours itself ever further outward and downward, from each of these we have upon the next plane Seven Logoi also, together making up on that plane 49. Omit ting the detail of intermediate hierarchies, it is said that to each of these 49 Logoi belong millions of solar systems, each energized and controlled by its own solar Logos. Thus the difference is vast between the Great Logoi, the Trinity standing next to the Absolute, and the Logos of a single solar system, though the latter is far greater and more sublime than mankind has ever yef conceived the Deity to be. It is said that what happens at the begin ning of a solar system (such as our own) is, allowing for certain obvious differences in the surrounding conditions, identical with what happens at th.e reawakening after one of the great periods of cosmic rest. Before a solar system .comes into existence we have on its futur.e.site, so to speak, nothing but the ordinary conditions of interstellar space, that is,' the seven subdivisions of the lowest cosmic or uni versal plane. These, from the viewpoint within our system, are identical with the matter df the highest, or the atomic subplanes of each of our planes. Upon this matter is poured out the energy of the third aspect of the Logos of th. e system, called the Third Logos, resulting in the quickening of the vitality which pervades all matter, so that when electrified by it the atoms of. the various planes develop all sorts of previously latent attractions and repulsions, and enter into combinations of all kinds, thus by degrees bringing into existence all the lower subplanes of each plane, that is, the six planes below the atomic subplane, until we have before us in full action the marvelous complexity of the seven planes of nature and their respective seven subdivisions as they exist to-day. These planes represent both the physical and the un seen parts of the system, the former being its most densified phase and each plane of the lat ter being made up of matter of a gradually ascending scale of fineness. These planes are called respectively, (1) the physical plane, (2) the astral plane, (3) the mental plane, (4) the buddhic plane, (5) the nirvanic plane, (6) the paranirvanic plane and (7) the mahaparanir vanic plane, each being a definite region of the system, and their various subdivisions appear ing in a general way, the same as the subdivi-, sions of the matter of the physical plane, namely, as solids, liquids, gases and four states of ether. The matter of the subtler planes, however., is permeable, one order freely inter penetrating another and all extending both within and without the physical. The properties of each plane are also said to have an additional dimension to the one next preceding it in density. Thus the physical plane having three, the astral has four, the mental five, and so on. As stated, the highest or seventh subdivision of each plane is the atomic matter of that plane, that is, is homogeneous and cannot be further subdivided without undergoing an entire change of properties. Thus in breaking up the ulti mate physical atom, it assumes the properties of the matter of the complex lowest subplane of the astral plane; in breaking up the astral atom it becomes of the lowest grade of matter of the mental plane, and so on. After the mat ter of all the subptanes of the system is by the action of the Third Logos formed and vivified, there is poured out upon it the energy of the second aspect of the Logos of the system, called the Second Logos, and is sometimes known as the monadic essence. The effect of this outpouring is to build the forms of the seven kingdoms of nature—the three elemen tal or pre-mineral, the mineral, the vegetable, the animal and the human. On the downward arc of its mighty curve this monadic essence simply aggregates round itself the different kinds of matter of the various planes, so that all may be accustomed and adapted to act as its vehicles; but when it has reached the lowest point of its involution or immeshing in matter and turns to begin the grand upward sweep of evolution toward divinity, its object is to de velop consciousness in each of these grades of matter in turn, beginning with the physical — the lowest. When in the highest animal life this monadic essence or evolving soul mass reaches the ultimate limit of evolution in that type of fortns, it is met by a third outpouring of Logic energy, that of the first aspect of the Logos of the system, called the First Logos, resulting by this union in the formation of the numberless human Egos— the individualization of the One Self in man. It is the presence within man of thjs third outpouring of the Divine Life, this spark of the One Self, that guarantees to him immortality, which, from this point on, the Ego, or real man, wins through innumerable incar nations in physical bodies.