Chapter XI: Book 15: , Line 156, &c., as follows (2)

The mental body, after exhausting the forces that make it up, also dies, and the soul is "centred" in the only vehicle it has left, the causal body, a body that is immortal, one may say, up to a certain point, since the soul retains it until the time comes when it can function in a still higher and more lasting vehicle,[244] and this happens only after millions of years.[245] Here, another diminution of memory takes place, because the soul loses a large portion of its consciousness when it comes into contact with none but the vibrations of this body, which is even more incompletely developed than the former ones, though holding within itself all the germs of these latter. The Ego then remains apparently sunk in sleep for a varying period, though never for very long; then the germs in the causal body become active, build up a new series of bodies in succession--the mental, the astral, and finally the physical--and the soul returns once more to incarnation.

It will now be understood how it comes about that a soul of average development--on entering a new cycle, with the memory of the last cycle considerably obliterated by the loss of the physical, astral, and mental bodies, sheathed in new bodies on these planes, bodies that have nothing in common with the life of the past--is unable to impress its dim memories on to the brain; but it will also be seen that, with the progress of evolution, the soul acquires ever clearer consciousness in the causal body, in which it finally preserves the memory of the various life-cycles. Since, at this stage, it has become capable of projecting its vibrations, voluntarily, through the lower bodies, it is able to transmit this memory first to the mental body, then to the astral, and lastly to the physical body; when this is possible, man, in waking consciousness, remembers his former lives.

This transmission requires a purificatory process in the vehicles and a special training of the will. The matter of all the bodies--that of the brain in particular--must be refined, its constituent elements must be subtler, and its atoms must be fully awakened to activity[246]; whereupon the cerebral cell becomes capable of responding to the thought of the Ego, _i.e._, of vibrating in harmony with the higher matter.

The second condition of the brain's receptivity is that this organ be brought into a state of complete rest. So long as the waking consciousness is active, the brain vibrates powerfully, and if, at this time, the soul sends the brain its thought, this latter can no more make an impression on the existing cerebral activity than a faint note could be heard amid the clash of an orchestra. Consequently, man, by the training of his will, must have acquired the power to stop the thinking activity in the waking state, and to "centre" his attention on the causal body, the only vehicle in which he can know the facts of his past incarnations; this done he is able, at will, to project on to his brain the scenes of his former lives and to imprint them thereon with greater distinctness, in proportion to his development and training.

In order to avoid continued explanations, we will deal with another side of the question, however incomprehensible it be to such as have not studied theosophy.

A vehicle of consciousness is both a registering apparatus[247] and a conductor of vibrations.[248] The kinds of matter of which forms are made up are perfectly graduated; the finest atom of the physical body is built up of the densest atoms of the astral plane, the finest atom of the astral body is made of the densest atoms of the mental plane, and so on. Each atom is linked to the one that precedes and to the one that follows it in that immense chain which stretches from the densest to the subtlest plane of the Cosmos. Every vibration follows this path, passes in all directions--in the seven[249] dimensions of space-and terminates in the very Centre of consciousness, the Logos, God incarnate in the world.

It is then comprehensible, even logical, that God should be both conscious, on his receptive side, of everything that takes place in the world (_omniscient_), and should produce, on his active side, all the forces of the world (_omnipotent_). It is likewise admissible that the human soul, when fully developed, should find in the causal body the memory of the facts that have echoed therein, from the time when it could function consciously in it. But, it will be asked, how could it find, in the causal body, memories of existences it has not been able to register individually, of which it has not been conscious, those, for instance, that form the early stages of its evolution at a time when it was conscious only in the lower vehicles?

Memory possesses many store-houses. The vibrations of which it is composed affect the whole Universe, there is not a single local shock that is not felt throughout all the worlds. The eternal registering of things takes place in the great centre of consciousness, God, or rather, it exists in him, for to him there is neither future nor past, only one eternal present; evolution is unceasingly accomplished[250]; but if we look upon ourselves as finite beings, living in the illusion of time and space, we find that vibrating matter preserves for a longer or a shorter period the movement imparted to it. The denser the substance, which forms the medium in which vibration takes place, the feebler the vibration; that is why it speedily ceases on the physical plane; it continues long, however, in the higher conditions of matter, and it is there we must look for it,[251] if we would recall certain events at which we have not been present. When anything exciting, a murder, a battle, for instance, has happened anywhere, the subtler atoms of the surrounding objects receive a powerful shock and continue to vibrate for centuries. Those who have developed their inner senses can thus witness the scene which is continually repeating itself, or rather, is happening all the time.[252] Thus, psychometrists,[253] in presence of a portion of a fossil, are enabled to bring back scenes that this fragment has witnessed millions of years ago.[254]

In these cases, the memory of the facts is connected with that of the atoms which register it; this memory can only be recalled by coming into contact with these atoms.[255]

There is also another memory, midway between the unconscious memory of atoms and the conscious memory of the human soul; that of the forms of the various sub-human kingdoms. It is only slightly conscious, for it is not individualised; all the same, it is precise in its nature. It dwells in the vital essence of the form, an essence taken from a collective "block" which supplies a portion of its substance to the individuals of the same species; this incarnate portion of essence, when the form disintegrates at death, returns to the parent "block," to which it communicates the result of its experiences, and when the latter sends out a portion of itself, into a new form, this tentacle, which is, so to speak, the soul of the form, is in possession of the whole of the experiences of the "block."[256] This explains how it is that the individual members of certain hostile species know one another from birth--the chicken, for instance, which, immediately it has left the egg, trembles before the hawk hovering above in the air; such is also the reason why a duckling plunges into water as soon as it comes to a pond, and the same instinct impels a bird to leave its nest and trust itself to the air when fully fledged.

In these collective souls, belonging to the mineral, vegetable, and animal kingdoms, there can be recovered the past to which they bore witness, when the atoms of their bodies have been dispersed and entered into new combinations.

When the elemental Essence[257] has definitely split up, and the "blocks" have become separate, individualised, human fragments,[258] each of these fragments is a causal body, a definite, immortal _centre_ in the total Centre. Consequently there are in man three kinds of memory: atomic memory, that of the atoms of his bodies; instinctive memory of the special elemental essences which are the collective souls of his various vehicles; and finally, the individual memory of the centre,[259] which is one with the total Centre from which it comes.

This element of unity, this human "I" in the divine "I," when sufficiently developed, is able to evoke the memory of all the events in which it has participated in the causal body, and also the memory of those it has witnessed as a collective soul (elemental "block") in bygone ages when active in various mineral, vegetable, and animal species. As a centre in the great Centre, it can also call forth the memory of everything in the Universe that its consciousness can grasp.[260] And when, in this long pilgrimage, it has developed to the farthest limits of the Universe it knows all that has been, is now, and is to be in this Universe, consequently it knows both what it has and what it has not participated in, for everything in the Universe has then become part of itself.

Thus it is seen that the memory of the past is everywhere registered, and that the difficulty a man has in bringing it back is caused by nothing more than his imperfect development. Once he has entered the "Strait Gate,"[261] and his consciousness is awake on the first plane of Unity,[262] he becomes able to read the Great Book of Nature, in which all vibrations are kept in potentiality; he can revive them by an effort of will, similar to that he makes in a waking state, when he wishes to bring back past impressions to his brain. The difference lies in the fact that, in the latter case, being in the physical body, he calls up the memory retained in the astral body; whilst in the former case, being in the causal body, he brings memory within the influence of the buddhic body, or even at times of higher bodies still. The more the Being grows, and becomes able to fix his consciousness on the higher planes, the wider extends his sphere of influence, approaching that of divine Consciousness.

It is ignorance that brings forward this objection regarding loss of memory, ignorance of life and of death, ignorance of the phenomena that follow the last breath of a dying man, as well as of those preceding the first faint cry of a new-born child. Sceptics, however, might have shown a little more indulgence, for, as they are well aware, ordinary memory _is_ even now so unreliable that a man has great difficulty in recalling the whole of the thoughts that have entered his brain during the last few minutes; he has forgotten the details of the various events of the week; the facts of the past year have mostly vanished from his mind, and when he comes to the end of the journey, mere fragments of the story of his life are all that is left. For all that, he has all the time retained the notion of the identity of his "I"; he has the same body, the same senses, and the same brain; his environment is the same; everything is there to bring about association of ideas, to awaken memory. On the other hand, centuries have elapsed before Rebirth takes place; the human being has undergone the most radical changes and modifications; everything in him that was perishable has disappeared, and is preserved only in a germinal state. The visible bodily sheath has had its atoms scattered to the four elements; the etheric body[263] has become separated from the physical molecules whose vital support it formed; the body of passions and desires (_astral body_) has lived for a few years in what Catholics call _Purgatory_, Greeks, _Hades_, and Hindus, _Kâmaloka_; after which, only germs have been left behind; then the intelligence (_mental body_) has been dispersed in turn and endures only in a germinal state. Almost everything that made up the man of bygone times has disappeared, and is now concentrated in a complex germ hidden away in the causal body and destined to develop a new personality later on,[264] heir to the former one, though it will not be capable of remembering events in which it took no part.

This is the explanation of the myth of Lethe.

The soul, in the causal body, drinks of the river of Life, and from its sleep-giving draught forms the sheaths of the new incarnation, the new bodies that altogether blot out the memory of the past; it is, in very truth, a new-born babe who appears on earth.

The Root-Being,[265] however, survives the successive wrecks of fleeting personalities, remaining in the new man as a guide, as the "Voice of Conscience." He is the Watcher who strings, as on a thread, the numberless pearls (_personalities_) which form the inevitable cycle of human evolution, and is able, when fully developed, to summon up the distant panorama of past lives. For him, nothing is lost.

The pioneers of the race have obtained direct proof of successive incarnations, but apart from these rare and special instances, ordinary individuals frequently have reminiscences and distinct memories which are not investigated, either because they are fragmentary in their nature or are related by children. In India, where the natives believe in Reincarnation, such cases are regarded without astonishment, and efforts are made to prove their truth by serious investigation, whenever possible. And such proof is often possible. When a child dies in infancy, before he is able to use his body intelligently and of his own free will--before being able to generate karma--the higher sheaths (_the astral and mental bodies_) are not separated into their component parts. Return to earth quickly takes place, the memory of the past life exists in the astral body--which has not changed--and, more especially during the first few years of life, can be impressed on the new brain with tolerable ease, if this latter is at all delicately constituted. Then if reincarnation takes place in the same country and in the neighbourhood of the past incarnation, it can be proved to be true. Such instances do exist; the reason they are not mentioned here is that they would add nothing to the general proofs on which stress has been laid in this work. These proofs form part of universal Law; they cannot be separated therefrom.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 81: The fifth, or Aryan race, in theosophic nomenclature; the fourth was that of Atlantis; the third lived on the great southern continent, Lemuria; the two preceding ones were, so to speak, only the embryologic preparation for the following races.]

[Footnote 82: The "life-atoms," infinitesimal particles which by aggregation form the human body. Certain of these atoms are preserved, on the death of the body, as germs which will facilitate the reconstruction of the physical body at the next rebirth.]

[Footnote 83: The divine Essence which animates animals, and so, in another sense the astral bodies of men and animals, bodies whose particles _transmigrate_ as do the physical atoms.]

[Footnote 84: H. P. Blavatsky, _Secret Doctrine._]

[Footnote 85: These words are relative; they express differences in the evolution of souls.]

[Footnote 86: The atmosphere of subtle physical elements radiating round the human body and acting in a defensive _rôle_ by preventing the penetration of unhealthy elements from the immediate surroundings.]

[Footnote 87: The "material sin" of Manu.]

[Footnote 88: One, here means the "life atoms" of a man's body.]

[Footnote 89: The word is here used in a generic sense; in the present work, it would be more precise to replace it by the word Resurrection.]

[Footnote 90: This "triad" comprises the visible matter of the body, the etheric substance, and the life (Prâna) which the human ether absorbs and specialises for the vitalising of the body. See _Man and his Bodies_, by A. Besant.]

[Footnote 91: H. P. Blavatsky, _The Theosophist_, Vol. 4, pages 287, 288.]

[Footnote 92: The finer elements invisible to physical eye. Their function is sensation, and by their association with the human mental body incarnated in them, they give birth to the emotions and passions, in a word, to the animal in man.]

[Footnote 93: The _Umbra_ of the Latin races.]

[Footnote 94: The _Kâma Rûpa_ of the Hindus.]

[Footnote 95: The purgatory of Christians, the astral plane of theosophists, and the _Kâmaloka_ of Hindus.]

[Footnote 96: By the _fire_ of purgatory, says the Catholic metaphor.]

[Footnote 97: See A. Besant's masterly work on _Reincarnation._]

[Footnote 98: Dharma is a wide word, primarily meaning the essential nature of a thing; hence the laws of its being, its duty; and it includes religious rites, appropriate to those laws. This definition, as also the extracts quoted, are taken from A. Besant's translation of the _Bhagavad Gîtâ._]

[Footnote 99: Human souls, not all of them, but only the pious ones, are daimonic and divine. Once separated from the body, and after the struggle to acquire piety, which consists in knowing God and injuring none, such a soul becomes all intelligence. The impious soul, however, remains in its own essence and punishes itself by seeking a human body to enter into, for no other body can receive a human soul, it cannot enter the body of an animal devoid of reason: divine law preserves the human soul from such infamy. Hermes Trismegistus, Book I, _Laclé_: Hermes to his son Tat.]

[Footnote 100: Bodies.]

[Footnote 101: The physical body with its etheric "double," and life (_Prâna_).]

[Footnote 102: The kâmic body.]

[Footnote 103: The causal body.]

[Footnote 104: _History_. Book 2, chap. 123.]

[Footnote 105: The causal body.]

[Footnote 106: The buddhic body, which, in ordinary man, is only in an embryonic stage.]

[Footnote 107: Generally called _Prâna_, in man. _Jiva_ is the solar life which, on being transmuted by the physical body, becomes _Prâna_, the human physical life. Both _Jiva_ and _Prâna_ differ from each other in nature and in vibration.]

[Footnote 108: The mental body.]

[Footnote 109: The causal body. In annihilation--what has been called the loss of the soul--the kâmic principle (astral body) in the course of a rather long succession of lives, does not allow the mental body to become separated from it in purgatory; it keeps it imprisoned up to the time of its disintegration; the causal body reaps nothing from the incarnations, at each re-birth it loses the forces it is putting forth in order to form the new mental body. It gradually atrophies until the time comes when it is no longer fit to make use of the ordinary bodies of the race to which it belongs. Then it remains at rest, whilst the mental body gradually disintegrates; afterwards it takes up once again its series of incarnations in the imperfectly evolved bodies of primitive races. This will be understood only by those who have studied theosophy.]

[Footnote 110: In this passage, H. P. Blavatsky alludes to the few etheric, astral, and mental atoms which, at each disincarnation, are incorporated in the causal body and form the nuclei of the future bodies corresponding to them.]

[Footnote 111: _History._ Vol. 2, book 2, chap. 123 (already quoted).]

[Footnote 112: Of the elements of the personality--of the astral body, in all probability.]

[Footnote 113: The Ego (soul) also lives in the air (the symbol of heaven) and on the earth (whose symbol is water, dense matter)--in heaven, after disincarnation; on earth, during incarnation.]

[Footnote 114: The soul is immortal and needs no food.]

[Footnote 115: Its name, Khopiroo, comes from the root Koproo, to become, to be born again (H. P. Blavatsky).

Hartley says: "At the centre of the solar disk appears the Scarabeus as the symbol of the soul re-uniting itself with the body. The Scarabeus is called by Pierret the synthesis of the Egyptian religion--type of resurrection--of self-existence--of self-engendering like the Gods. As Tori, or Chepi, the Sun is the Scarabeus, or self-engenderer, and the mystery of God."]

[Footnote 116: Also called kâmic body, astral body, body of desire, etc.]

[Footnote 117: Reincarnation.]

[Footnote 118: Vol. 3, p. 124.]

[Footnote 119: The causal body illumined by the divine Essence, which theosophy names Âtmâ-Buddhi.]

[Footnote 120: He calls him "the prince of lying fathers and dishonest writers." (_Egypt_, vol. 1, p. 200).]

[Footnote 121: Eusebius even confesses this himself: "I have set forth whatever is calculated to enhance the glory of our religion, and kept back everything likely to cast a stain upon it." (_Proeparatio Evangelica._ Book 12, chap. 31).]

[Footnote 122: _Namae-Sat Vakhshûr-i-Mahabad_, also in the fourth "Journey" in chap. 4 of _Jam-i-Kaikhoshru_ (see _The Theosophist_, p. 333, vol. 21).]

[Footnote 123: See _Bardic Triads_, by E. Williams. Translated from the original Welsh.]

[Footnote 124: "'Abred' is the circle of the migrations through which every animated being proceeds from death: man has passed through it." _Triad_ 13.

"Transmigration is in 'Abred.'" _Triad_ 14.

"There are three primitive calamities in 'Abred': the necessity of evolution (of rebirths), the absence of memory (of past incarnations) and death (followed by rebirth)." _Triad_ 18 (the words in parentheses are our own).

"By reason of three things man is subjected to 'Abred' (or transmigration): by the absence of the effort to attain knowledge, by non-attachment to good, and by attachment to evil. As the result of these, he descends into 'Abred,' to the stage corresponding to his development, and begins his transmigrations anew." _Triad_ 25.

"The three foundations of science are: complete transmigration through every state of being, the memory of the details of each transmigration, the power to pass again at will through any state, to acquire experience and judgment, (_a_) This comes to pass in the circle of Gwynvyd." _Triad_ 36.

(_a_) The liberated being has power to call up the past, to tune his consciousness with that of every being, to feel everything that being feels, to be that being.]

[Footnote 125: In the poem _Cad-Godden_, quoted by Pezzani in _La Pluralité des Existences de l'Âme_, p. 93. Taliesin is a generic name indicating a function rather than the name of an individual.]

[Footnote 126: _Gallic War_ (Book 2, chap. 6). Valerius Maximus relates that these nations lent one another money which was to be paid back in the other world, and that at Marseilles a sweet-tasted poison was given to anyone who, wishing to commit suicide, offered the judges satisfactory reasons for leaving his body.]

[Footnote 127: _The Mystery of the Ages_, by the Duchesse de Pomar.]

[Footnote 128: In _Theologia_ or the _Seven Adyta._]

[Footnote 129: The "Cycle of Necessity" extends from the time when the soul begins to evolve to the moment when it attains to liberation.]

[Footnote 130: _Life of Pythagoras._ Book 8, chap. 14.]

[Footnote 131: Ovid's _Metamorphoses_. Book 15.]

[Footnote 132: All that remained of the shield was the carved ivory ornamentation, the iron had been eaten away by rust.]

[Footnote 133: Philostratus, _Life of Apollonius of Tyana._]

[Footnote 134: Philostratus, _Life of Apollonius of Tyana._]

[Footnote 135: Marinas, _Vita Procli._]

[Footnote 136: The Ego, the human soul properly so-called, what Egypt named the liberated intelligence which resumes its sheath of light, and again becomes a "daimon" (_Maspero_). In antiquity the name of daimon was given to the human soul or to higher intelligences.]

[Footnote 137: _Hades_; the Purgatory of Catholics; the _Kâmalôka_ of Hindus.]

[Footnote 138: Allusion to the struggle which separates the mental from the astral body in Purgatory.]

[Footnote 139: _Kâmalôka_; Purgatory.]

[Footnote 140: The subterranean hell, the lowest world in Purgatory.]

[Footnote 141: Plato's _Laws_, Book 10.]

[Footnote 142: Plato's _Republic_, Book 10.]

[Footnote 143: They are in the causal body.]

[Footnote 144: _Phædo._]

[Footnote 145: These considerations are taken from the writings of H. P. Blavatsky, and are also confirmed by modern criticism of biblical texts.]

[Footnote 146: Maimonides. Quoted in _The Perfect Way_, by A. Kingsford and E. Maitland.]

[Footnote 147: _Galatians_, chap. 4, verses 24, 25.]

[Footnote 148: _Starli_, part 4, p. 5.]

[Footnote 149: _Deuteronomy_, chap. 24, verses 1 to 4.]

[Footnote 150: _Deuteronomy_, chap. 17, verse 17.]

[Footnote 151: _Exodus_, chap. 21, verses 2 to 11.]

[Footnote 152: _Exodus_, chap. 21, verses 23, 24, 25.]

[Footnote 153: _Genesis_, chap. 9, verses 5, 6; also _Leviticus_, chap. 7.]

[Footnote 154: _Exodus_, chapters 6, 12, 14, 22, 32,]

[Footnote 155: _Ecclesiastes_, chap. 3, verses 18, 19, 20, 22.]

[Footnote 156: The souls of a race in its maturity are of a more advanced type than those of its infancy or old age.]

[Footnote 157: The Kabala is the secret teaching of the Jews; in it lie hidden doctrines that are too profound to be taught in public.]

[Footnote 158: _Zohar_, 2, 99, quoted in Myer's _Qabbalah_, p. 198.]

[Footnote 159: Evolution develops the soul, enabling it to reach its goal: the divine state.]

[Footnote 160: The force of evolution comes from God and ceases only when the soul is fully developed, and has reached the "promised land" at the end of its pilgrimage: the divine state.]

[Footnote 161: Franck, _La Kabbale_, p. 244, etc.]

[Footnote 162: _The Hidden Wisdom of Christ_, 1864, vol. 1, p. 39.]

[Footnote 163: _De Bell. jud._ 2, 11.]

[Footnote 164: One of the lowest sub-planes of _Kâmaloka_ (Purgatory).]

[Footnote 165: The Christian Heaven (_Devachan_ of theosophy).]

[Footnote 166: The earth, which is above when compared with Tartarus, but not so in relation to the Elysian Fields; versification imposes such strict limits on expression, that it must have the benefit of poetic licence.]

[Footnote 167: Fréret, _Examen crit. des apologistes de la relig. chrét._, pages 12 and 13, Paris, 1823.]

[Footnote 168: Faustus.]

[Footnote 169: And yet the _Gospel of Saint John_ denies this (chap. 1, v. 21). The contradictions in the gospels are so numerous that they alone have created thousands of infidels.]

[Footnote 170: Stolberg expresses himself as follows on this matter: "This question was evidently based on the opinion that the disciples of Jesus had formed, that this man, whose punishment dated from his very birth, had sinned in a previous life." (_Histoire de N. S. Jésus-Christ et de son siècle_, Book 3, chap. 43).]

[Footnote 171: _Revelation_, chap. 3, v. 12.]

[Footnote 172: _Revelation_, chap. 2, v. 28.]

[Footnote 173: _Revelation_, chap. 22, v. 16.]

[Footnote 174: _Revelation_, chap. 2, v. 17.]

[Footnote 175: H. P. Blavatsky.]

[Footnote 176: "Taken literally, the Book of the Creation gives us the most absurd and extravagant ideas of Divinity."]

[Footnote 177: First _Ennead_, chap. I.]

[Footnote 178: The Universe, which can exist only through _multiplicity._]

[Footnote 179: Second _Ennead_, chap. 3.]

[Footnote 180: Second _Ennead_, chap. 8.]

[Footnote 181: Third _Ennead_, chap. 4.]

[Footnote 182: _Concerning Abstinence_; Book 2.]

[Footnote 183: _Egyptian Mysteries_, Book 4, chap. 4.]

[Footnote 184: Here, _reincarnation_ is meant.]

[Footnote 185: This philosopher was surnamed _Peisithanatos_ (the death-persuader).]

[Footnote 186: _Vie de Pythagore_, vol. I, p. 28.]

[Footnote 187: _Hist. de l'Ec. a'Alex._, vol. I, p 588.]

[Footnote 188: In this work, he says:

"The winged tribe, that has feathers instead of hair, is formed of innocent but superficial human beings, pompous and frivolous in speech, who, in their simplicity, imagine that the sense of vision is the best judge of the existence of things. Those who take no interest whatever in philosophy become four-footed animals and wild beasts...."]

[Footnote 189: _Commentaries on the Golden Verses of Pythagoras._]

[Footnote 190: Hermes, _Commentaries of Chalcidius on the Timæus._]

[Footnote 191: _Procli Diadochi in Platonis Timæum Commentaria._]

[Footnote 192: September, 1898, p. 3.]

[Footnote 193: The life of the animal to which it is bound.]

[Footnote 194: The instrument must be suited to the development of the artist; too highly developed a body would be bad for a man very low down in the scale of humanity. This will, in some measure, explain the paradoxical word here used; the _advantage_ there may sometimes be in putting on a rudimentary body.]

[Footnote 195: G. R. S. Mead tells us that Justin believed in Reincarnation only whilst he was a Platonist; he opposed this teaching after his conversion to Christianity (See _Theosophical Review_, April, 1906).]

[Footnote 196: Does this obscure passage refer to the resurrection of the body?]

[Footnote 197: _Adversus Gentes_. "We die many times, and as often do we rise again from the dead."]

[Footnote 198: Hyeronim., _Epistola ad Demetr...._]

[Footnote 199: Book 2, quest. 6, No. 17.]

[Footnote 200: _Ephesians_, ch. 1, v. 4 ... he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world.]

[Footnote 201: _Instit. divin._, 3, 18.]

[Footnote 202: _Confessions_, I, ch. 6.]

[Footnote 203: _On the Immortality of the Soul_, chap. 12.]

[Footnote 204: _Hist. de Manichée et du Manichéisme_, vol. 2, p. 492.]

[Footnote 205: _Stromata._, vol. 3, p. 433. Edition des Bénédictins.]

[Footnote 206: The words in parenthesis are by the author.]

[Footnote 207: _Cont. Cels._ Book 4, chap. 17.]

[Footnote 208: [Greek: ti akolouthei].]

[Footnote 209: _De Principiis_, Book 3, chap. 5.]

[Footnote 210: _Contra Celsum_, Book 1.]

[Footnote 211: _Contra Celsum_, Book 1, chap. 6.]

[Footnote 212: _De Principiis_, Book 3, chap. 5.]

[Footnote 213: _De Principiis_, Book 4, chap. 5.]

[Footnote 214: _Contra Celsum_, Book 7, chap. 32.]

[Footnote 215: E. Aroux. _Les Mystères de la Chevalerie._]

[Footnote 216: Quoted by I. Cooper Oakley in _Traces of a Hidden Tradition in Masonry and Mediæval Mysticism_, a very interesting work on the sects which connect the early centuries with modern times.]

[Footnote 217: See _L'Islamisme et son Enseignement Ésotérique_, by Ed. Bailly. _Publications théosophiques_, Paris, 1903.]

[Footnote 218: Chapter 18.]

[Footnote 219: Islam is now awaiting the coming of the Mahdi, its last prophet; prophecy says that he will be the reincarnation of Mohammed (_Borderland_, April, 1907).]

[Footnote 220: This is the reason Afghans still undertake pilgrimages to Mecca.]

[Footnote 221: Chap. 22, verses 5, 14, 15, 17, 18, 19, 20, 41. Quoted by Lady Caithness in _Old Truths in a New Light._]

[Footnote 222: Chap. 23, verses 17, 26, 27, etc.]

[Footnote 223: By religion is here understood the devotional aspect and the scientific side of the teaching of Truth, _i.e._, the science of the divine Soul.]

[Footnote 224: _Nirmânakâyas_ are beings who have become perfect, and who, instead of entering the Nirvâna their efforts have won, renounce peace and bliss in order to help forward their human brothers in their evolution.]

[Footnote 225:

O! genus attonitum gelidæ formidine mortis,
Quid Styga, quid tenebras, quid nomina vana timetis,
Materiam vatum, falsique piacula mundi?
Corpora sive rogus flammâ, seu tabe vetustas
Abstulerit, mala posse pati non ulla putetis
Morte carent animæ: semperque priore relictâ
Sede, novis domibus habitant vivuntque receptæ
. . . . . . . . .
Omnia mutantur, nihil interit ...

]

[Footnote 226: _S. John's Gospel_, chap. 9, verse 2.]

[Footnote 227: The following passages are taken from three of C. Savy's works: _Comment. du Sermon sur la Montagne_ (1818); _Pensées et Méditations_ (1829); _Dieu et l'Homme en cette Vie et Audelà_ (1838).]

[Footnote 228: _De l'Humanité_, vol. 1., p. 233.]

[Footnote 229: _Théorie de l'Unité Universelle_, vol. 2, p. 304-348.]

[Footnote 230: _Vie Future au Point de Vue Socialiste_, and _Confession d'un Curé de Village._]

[Footnote 231: _Destinées de l'Âme._]

[Footnote 232: Alluding to the complete renewing of the material molecules of the body, every seven years.]

[Footnote 233: Whose consciousness, however (along with memory), is at the summit of the hierarchy which is its origin.]

[Footnote 234: Molecules and atoms have a particular consciousness of their own which does not cease to function when, on the departure of the individual soul, the body, as such, ceases to function.]

[Footnote 235: If sufficiently developed, however, he can be made conscious of this in a higher vehicle.]

[Footnote 236: When man has barely entered the human stage--in primitive man.]

[Footnote 237: Consciousness begins in the physical body, its simplest instrument.]

[Footnote 238: There are other vehicles above the causal body.]

[Footnote 239: All the powers of the Universe are in the divine germ, as the tree is in its seed.]

[Footnote 240: Because it no longer has a dense physical body. There are exceptions to this rule, but there is no necessity to mention them here.]

[Footnote 241: The Christian Heaven, the _Devachan_ of Theosophy.]

[Footnote 242: This character has already appeared on the astral plane, though not in so striking a fashion.]

[Footnote 243: Unity exists on the plane of the Ego, and the latter sends his thought into the forms made out of his vehicles; this will be understood only by the few, but an explanation cannot be given at this point, without writing a volume on the whole of theosophy.]

[Footnote 244: We are still dealing with the ordinary man.]

[Footnote 245: When liberation is attained. This can be effected rapidly by those who _will_ to attain it.]

[Footnote 246: Only four of the seven atomic _spirillæ_ are active in this our fourth planetary Round (one for each Round). They can be rapidly vitalised by the will.]

[Footnote 247: When the soul is "centred" in it.]

[Footnote 248: The vibrations, whether registered as they pass or not registered, continue their course through the substance of the Universe.]

[Footnote 249: Science even now recognises four of these dimensions.]

[Footnote 250: This is said in order to satisfy such as are of a metaphysical turn of mind, and frequently prone to criticism.]

[Footnote 251: When the inner senses are developed.]

[Footnote 252: A question will doubtless at once rise to the minds of many readers; how can the same atoms produce, at once and almost eternally, millions of different facts? We will reply briefly. Science has been able to conceive of an explanation of a fact apparently quite as absurd--the phenomenon of the balls of Russian platinum mentioned by Zöllner (_Transcendental Physics_, ch. 9) which pass through hermetically sealed glass tubes, and that of the German copper coins dropping through the bottom of a sealed box on to a slate--by accepting a fourth dimension of space. Who would affirm that the dimensions of space are limited to four? Or that the science of the immediate future will not be brought face to face with facts, and find, in a fifth or sixth dimension of space, a possible explanation of the phenomenon here mentioned, one which initiated seers can test whenever they please, because it is a real fact?

Still, as these seers say, the coarsest atoms generally register only one image, others register fresh images, so that in many cases there is quite a superposition of images which must be carefully examined to avoid errors.]

[Footnote 253: A psychometrist is a person endowed with a very fine nervous system, capable of repeating the delicate vibrations which act upon the inmost atoms of a body. In this way, by placing himself in presence of an object that has been in contact with some individual, he can clearly describe the latter's physical, moral, and mental characteristics. Hitherto, Buchanan and Professor Denton have been the most remarkable psychometrists; the experiments related in their works have been made before witnesses and permit of no doubt whatever as to the reality of this strange faculty.]

[Footnote 254: Instances of this are numerous in Professor Denton's _The Soul of Things._]

[Footnote 255: This memory is preserved in the first "life-wave."]

[Footnote 256: This is _instinct_, _i.e._, a semi-conscious memory, located in the "life-wave" of the second Logos.]

[Footnote 257: The divine Essence incarnated in the matter of the lower planes of the Universe.]

[Footnote 258: When the "essence," after the destruction of the form to which it gives life, no more returns to the parent-block from which it came, it has become individualised, ready to enter into the _human kingdom._]

[Footnote 259: The memory of the third life-wave, of the first Logos.]

[Footnote 260: Everything, for instance, that concerns the planes of the planetary system, on which it has finished its evolution.]

[Footnote 261: The passing of consciousness from the causal body to the nascent buddhic body.]

[Footnote 262: The buddhic plane (the one immediately above the mental) is one in which the forms are so subtle that they no longer _limit_ the Life (_the Soul of the World_) animating them. This Life comes directly into contact with the Life which causes all forms to live; it then sees Unity: it sees itself everywhere and in everything, the joys and sorrows of forms other than its own are its joys and sorrows, for it is universal Life.]

[Footnote 263: This body is composed of physical matter, and therefore belongs to the physical plane. It has been given a special name, not only because it is made of ether, but because it can be separated from the physical body.]

[Footnote 264: The whole of the bodies: mental, astral, and physical.]

[Footnote 265: The Ego (soul) in the causal body.]