Chapter XV: Part I: Anthropogenesis (13)

It is Adam Kadmon who is the tree of the Sephiroth, and it is he who becomes the “tree of knowledge of good and evil,” Esoterically. And that “tree hath around it seven columns [seven pillars] of the world, or Rectores [the same Progenitors or Sephiroth again], operating through the respective orders of Angels in the spheres of the seven planets,” etc., one of which orders begets Giants (Nephilim) on Earth.

It was the belief of all antiquity, Pagan and Christian, that the earliest mankind was a race of giants. Certain excavations in America in mounds and in caves, have already, in isolated cases, yielded groups of skeletons of nine and twelve feet high.(671) These belong to tribes of the early Fifth Race, now degenerated to an average size of between five and six feet. But we can easily believe that the Titans and Cyclopes of old really belonged to the Fourth (Atlantean) Race, and that all the subsequent legends and allegories found in the Hindû _Purânas_ and the Greek poems of Hesiod and Homer, were based on the hazy reminiscences of real Titans—men of a tremendous super‐human physical power, which enabled them to defend themselves, and hold at bay the gigantic monsters of the Mesozoic and early Cenozoic times—and of actual Cyclopes, “three‐eyed” mortals.

It has been often remarked by observant writers, that the “origin of nearly every popular myth and legend could be traced invariably to a fact in Nature.”

In these fantastic creations of an exuberant subjectivism, there is always an element of the objective and real. The imagination of the masses, disorderly and ill‐regulated as it may be, could never have conceived and fabricated _ex nihilo_ so many monstrous figures, such a wealth of extraordinary tales, had it not had, to serve it as a central nucleus, those floating reminiscences, obscure and vague, which unite the broken links of the chain of time to form with them the mysterious, dream foundation of our collective consciousness.(672)

The evidence for the Cyclopes—a race of Giants—will, in forthcoming Sections, be pointed out in the Cyclopean remnants, which are so called to this day. An indication that the early Fourth Race—during its evolution and before the final adjustment of the human organism, which became perfect and symmetrical only in the Fifth Race—may have been three‐eyed, without having necessarily a third eye in the middle of the brow, like the legendary Cyclops, is also furnished by Science.

To Occultists who believe that spiritual and psychic _involution_ proceeds on parallel lines with physical _evolution_—that the _inner_ senses, innate in the first human races, atrophied during racial growth and the material development of the outer senses—to the students of Esoteric symbology the above statement is no conjecture or possibility, but simply _a phase of the law of growth_, a proven fact, in short. They understand the meaning of the passage in the Commentaries which says:

_There were four‐armed human creatures in those early days of the male‐ females [hermaphrodites]; with one head, yet three eyes. They could see before them and behind them._(_673_)_ A Kalpa later [after the separation of the sexes] men having fallen into matter, their spiritual vision became dim; and coördinately the Third Eye commenced to lose its power.... When the Fourth [Race] arrived at its middle age, the Inner Vision had to be awakened, and acquired by artificial stimuli, the process of which was known to the old Sages._(_674_)_... The Third Eye, likewise, getting gradually petrified,_(_675_)_ soon disappeared. The double‐faced became the one‐faced, and the eye was drawn deep into the head and is now buried under the hair. During the activity of the Inner Man [during trances and spiritual visions] the eye swells and expands. The Arhat sees and feels it, and regulates his action accordingly.... The undefiled Lanoo [Disciple, Chelâ] need fear no danger; he who keeps himself not in purity [who is not chaste] will receive no help from the __“__Deva Eye.__”_

Unfortunately not. The “Deva Eye” exists no more for the majority of mankind. The Third Eye _is dead_, and acts no longer; but it has left behind a witness to its existence. This witness is now the Pineal Gland. As for the “four‐armed” men, it is they who became the prototypes of the four‐armed Hindû Gods, as shown in a preceding footnote.

Such is the mystery of the _human eye_ that some Scientists have been forced to resort to Occult explanations in their vain endeavours to explain and account for all the difficulties surrounding its action. The development of the human eye gives more support to Occult Anthropology than to that of the Materialistic Physiologists. “The eyes in the human embryo grow _from within without_”—out of the brain, instead of being part of the skin, as in the insects and cuttlefish. Professor Lankester—thinking the brain a queer place for the eye, and attempting to explain the phenomenon on Darwinian lines—suggests the curious view that “our” earliest vertebrate ancestor was a “_transparent_” creature and hence did not mind where the eye was! And so was man a “transparent creature” once upon a time, we are taught; and hence our theory holds good. But how does the Lankester hypothesis square with the Hæckelian view that the vertebrate eye originated by changes _in the epidermis_? If it started _inside_, the latter theory goes into the waste basket. This seems to be proved by embryology. Moreover, Professor Lankester’s extraordinary suggestion—or shall we say admission?—is perhaps rendered necessary by evolutionist necessities. Occultism, with its teaching as to the gradual development of senses “_from within without_,” from astral prototypes, is far more satisfactory. The Third Eye _retreated inwards_ when its course was run—another point in favour of Occultism.

The allegorical expression of the Hindû mystics who speak of the “Eye of Shiva,” the Tri‐lochana, or “three‐eyed,” thus receives its justification and _raison d’être_: the transference of the Pineal Gland (once that Third Eye) to the forehead, being an exoteric licence. This throws also a light on the mystery—incomprehensible to some—of the connection between _abnormal_, or spiritual Seership, and the physiological purity of the Seer. The question is often asked: Why should celibacy and chastity be a _sine quâ non_ condition of regular Chelâship, or the development of psychic and occult powers? The answer is contained in the Commentary. When we learn that the Third Eye was once a physiological organ, and that later on, owing to the gradual disappearance of spirituality and increase of materiality, the spiritual nature being extinguished by the physical, it became an atrophied organ, as little understood now by Physiologists as is the spleen—when we learn this, the connection becomes clear. During human life the greatest impediment in the way of spiritual development, and especially to the acquirement of Yoga powers, is the activity of our physiological senses. Sexual action also being closely connected, by interaction, with the spinal cord and the grey matter of the brain, it is useless to give any longer explanation. Of course, the normal and abnormal state of the brain, and the degree of active work in the Medulla Oblongata, reacts powerfully on the Pineal Gland, for, owing to the number of “centres” in that region, which controls by far the greatest number of the physiological actions of the animal economy, and also owing to the close and intimate neighbourhood of the two, a very powerful “inductive” action must be exerted by the Medulla on the Pineal Gland.

All this is quite plain to the Occultist, but is very vague in the sight of the general reader. The latter must then be shown the possibility of a three‐eyed man in Nature, in those periods when his formation was yet in a comparatively chaotic state. Such a possibility may be inferred from anatomical and zoological knowledge, first of all, and then it may rest on the assumptions of Materialistic Science itself.

It is asserted upon the authority of Science, and upon evidence, which is this time not merely a fiction of theoretical speculation, that many of the animals—especially among the lower orders of the vertebrata—have a _third_ eye, now atrophied, but which was necessarily active in its origin.(676) The Hatteria species, a lizard of the order Lacertilia, recently discovered in New Zealand—_a part of ancient Lemuria so called, mark well_—presents this peculiarity in a most extraordinary manner; and not only the Hatteria Punctata, but the Chameleon, and certain reptiles, and even fishes. It was thought, at first, that this was no more than the prolongation of the brain which ended with a small protuberance, called Epiphysis, a little bone separated from the main bone by a cartilage, and found in every animal. But it was soon found to be more than this. As its development and anatomical structure showed, it offered such an analogy with that of the eye, that it was found impossible to see in it anything else. There are Palæontologists who to this day feel convinced that this Third Eye originally functioned, and they are certainly right. For this is what is said of the Pineal Gland in Quain’s _Anatomy_:

It is from this part, constituting at first the whole and
subsequently the hinder part of the anterior primary encephalic
vesicle, that the optic vesicles are developed in the earliest
period, and the fore part is that in connection with which the
cerebral hemispheres and accompanying parts are formed. The
thalamus opticus of each side is formed by a lateral thickening of
the medullary wall, while the interval between, descending towards
the base, constitutes the cavity of the third ventricle with its
prolongation in the infundibulum. The grey commissure afterwards
stretches across the ventricular cavity.... The hinder part of the
roof is developed by a peculiar process to be noticed later into
the pineal gland, which remains united on each side by its
pedicles to the thalamus, and behind these a transverse band is
formed as posterior commissure.

The lamina terminalis (lamina cinerea) continues to close the
third ventricle in front, below it the optic commissure forms the
floor of the ventricle, and further back the infundibulum descends
to be united in the sella turcica with the tissue adjoining the
posterior lobe of the pituitary body.

The two _optic thalami_, formed from the posterior and outer part
of the anterior vesicle, consist at first of a single hollow sac
of nervous matter, the cavity of which communicates on each side
in front with that of the commencing cerebral hemispheres, and
behind with that of the middle cephalic vesicle (corpora
quadrigemina). Soon, however, by increased deposit taking place in
their interior behind, below, and at the sides, the thalami become
solid, and at the same time a cleft or fissure appears between
them above, and penetrates down to the internal cavity, which
continues open at the back part opposite the entrance of the
Sylvian aqueduct. This cleft or fissure is the _third ventricle_.
Behind, the two thalami continue united by the _posterior
commissure_, which is distinguishable about the end of the third
month, and also by the _peduncles of the pineal gland_....

At an early period the _optic tracts_ may be recognized as hollow
prolongations from the outer part of the wall of the thalami while
they are still vesicular. At the fourth month these tracts are
distinctly formed. They subsequently are prolonged backwards into
connection with the corpora quadrigemina.

The formation of the pineal gland and pituitary body presents some
of the most interesting phenomena which are connected with the
development of the thalamencephalon.(677)

The above is specially interesting when it is remembered that, were it not for the development of the posterior part of the cerebral hemispheres, the Pineal Gland would be perfectly visible on the removal of the parietal bones. It is very interesting also to note the obvious connection which can be traced between the originally hollow Optic Tract and the Eyes anteriorly, and the Pineal Gland and its Peduncles posteriorly, and between all of these and the Optic Thalami. So that the recent discoveries in connection with the third eye of Hatteria Punctata have a very important bearing on the history of the development of the human senses, and on the Occult assertions in the text.

It is well known that Descartes saw in the Pineal Gland the _Seat of the Soul_, though this is now regarded as a fiction by those who have ceased to believe in the existence of an immortal principle in man. Although the Soul is joined to every part of the body, he said, there is one special portion of the latter in which the Soul exercises its functions more specially than in any other. And, as neither the heart, nor yet the brain could be that “special” locality, he concluded that it was that little gland which was tied to the brain, and yet had an action independent of it, as it could easily be put into a kind of swinging motion “by the _animal spirits_(678) which cross the cavities of the skull in every sense.”

Unscientific as this may appear in our day of exact learning, Descartes was yet far nearer the Occult truth than is any Hæckel. For the Pineal Gland is, as shown, far more closely connected with Soul and Spirit than with the physiological senses of man. Had the leading Scientists a glimmer of the _real_ processes employed by the Evolutionary Impulse, and the winding _cyclic_ course of this great Law, they would _know_ instead of conjecturing, and would feel certain of the future physical transformations which await the human kind by the knowledge of its past forms. Then would they see the fallacy and the absurdity of their modern “blind‐force” and “mechanical” processes of Nature; and, in consequence of such knowledge, would realize that the said Pineal Gland, for instance, could not but be disabled for _physical_ use at this stage of our Cycle. If the odd “eye” is now atrophied in man, it is a proof that, as in the lower animal, it has once been active; for Nature never creates the smallest, the most insignificant, form without some definite purpose and for some use. It was an active organ, we say, at that stage of evolution when the spiritual element in man reigned supreme over the hardly nascent intellectual and psychic elements. And, as the Cycle ran down towards that point where the physiological senses were developed by, and went _pari passu_ with, the growth and consolidation of physical man—the interminable and complex vicissitudes and tribulations of zoological development—this median “eye” at last atrophied together with the early spiritual and purely psychic characteristics in man. The eye is the mirror and also the window of the Soul, says popular wisdom,(679) and _Vox populi, vox Dei_.

In the beginning, every class and family of the living species was hermaphrodite and objectively one‐eyed. In the animal—whose form was as ethereal (astrally) as that of man, before the bodies of both began to evolve their “coats of skin,” viz., to evolve, from _within without_, the thick coating of physical substance or matter with its internal physiological mechanism—the Third Eye was primarily, as in man, the only seeing organ. The two physical front eyes only developed(680) later on in both brute and man, whose organ of physical sight was, at the commencement of the Third Race, in the same position as that of some of the blind vertebrates, in our day, _i.e._, beneath an opaque skin.(681) Only, the stages of the odd, or primeval, eye, in man and brute, are now inverted, as the former has already passed that animal non‐rational stage in the Third Round, and is ahead of mere brute creation by a whole plane of consciousness. Therefore, while the Cyclopean eye was, and still _is_, in man the organ of _spiritual_ sight, in the animal it was that of objective vision. And this eye, having performed its function, was replaced, in the course of physical evolution from the simple to the complex, by two eyes, and thus was stored and laid aside by Nature for further use in æons to come.

This explains why the Pineal Gland reached its highest development proportionately with the lowest physical development. It is in the Vertebrata that it is the most prominent and objective, whereas in man it is most carefully hidden and inaccessible, except to the Anatomist. No less light, however, is thereby thrown on the future physical, spiritual, and intellectual state of mankind, in periods corresponding on parallel lines with other past periods, and always on the lines of ascending and descending cyclic evolution and development. Thus, a few centuries before the Kali Yuga—the Age which began nearly 5,000 years ago—it was said in Commentary Twenty, if it is paraphrased into comprehensible sentences:

_We [the Fifth Root‐Race] in our first half [of duration] onward [on the now ascending arc of the Cycle] are on the mid point of [or between] the First and Second Races—falling downward [i.e., the Races were then on the descending arc of the Cycle].... Calculate for thyself, Lanoo, and see._

Calculating as advised, we find that during that transitional period—namely, in the second half of the First spiritual ethereo‐astral Race—nascent mankind was devoid of the intellectual brain element, as it was on its _descending_ line. And as we are parallel to it, on the _ascending_, we are, therefore, devoid of the spiritual element, which is now replaced by the intellectual. For, remember well, as we are in the Mânasa period of our Cycle of Races, or in the Fifth, we have, therefore, crossed the meridian point of the perfect adjustment of Spirit and Matter—or the equilibrium between brain intellect and spiritual perception. One important point, has, however, to be borne in mind.

[Transcriber’s Note: The graph shows, to the left, “Downward Cycle. Evolution of Physical and Intellectual Nature and the Gradual Regression of Spirituality.” To the right is “Ascending Cycle. Reëvolution or Reversion of Spirituality and the Gradual Decrease of Materiality and mere Brain‐intellectuality.” Below is “Meridian of Races.”]

We are only in the Fourth Round, and it is in the Fifth that the full development of Manas, as a direct ray from the Universal Mahat—a ray unimpeded by Matter—will be finally reached. Nevertheless, as every sub‐ race and nation have their cycles and stages of evolutionary development repeated on a smaller scale, much more must it be so in the case of a Root‐Race. Our Race then has, as a Root‐Race, crossed the equatorial line and is cycling onward on the spiritual side; but some of our sub‐races still find themselves on the shadowy descending arc of their respective national cycles; while others again—the oldest—having crossed the crucial point, which alone decides whether a race, a nation, or a tribe, will live or perish, are at the apex of spiritual development as sub‐races.

It now becomes comprehensible why the Third Eye was gradually transformed into a simple gland, after the physical Fall of those we have agreed to call the Lemurians.

It is a curious fact that in human beings the cerebral hemispheres and the lateral ventricles have been especially developed, whereas it is the Optic Thalami, Corpora Quadrigemina, and Corpora Striata which are the principal parts developed in other mammalian brains. Moreover, it is asserted that the intellect of a man may, to some extent, be gauged by the development of the central convolutions and the fore part of the cerebral hemispheres. It would seem a natural corollary to this that if the development of the Pineal Gland may be considered to be an index of the astral capacities and spiritual proclivities of any man, there will be a corresponding development of that part of the cranium, or an increase in the size of the Pineal Gland at the expense of the posterior part of the cerebral hemispheres. This is a curious speculation and would receive confirmation in the present case. We should see, below and behind, the cerebellum which has been held to be the seat of all the animal proclivities of the human being, and which is allowed by Science to be the great centre for all the physiologically coördinated movements of the body, such as walking, eating, etc.; in front, the fore‐part of the brain, the cerebral hemispheres, the part especially connected with the development of the intellectual powers in man; and in the middle, dominating them both, and especially the animal functions, the developed Pineal Gland, in connection with the more highly evolved, or spiritual man.

It must be remembered that these are only physical correspondences; just as the ordinary human brain is the registering organ of memory, but not memory itself.

This is, then, the organ which has given rise to so many legends and traditions, among others to that of men with one head but two faces. These legends may be found in several Chinese works, besides being referred to in the Chaldæan fragments. Apart from the work already cited, the _Shan Hai King_, compiled by Kung Chia from engravings on nine urns made by the Emperor Yü, 2,255 B.C., they may be found in another work, called the _Bamboo Books_, and in a third, the _’Rh Ya_, whose author was “initiated according to tradition by Chow Kung, uncle of Wu Wang, the first Emperor of the Chow Dynasty, 1,122 B.C.” The _Bamboo Books_ contain the ancient annals of China, found A.D. 279 on opening the grave of King Seang of Wei, who died 295 B.C.(682) Both these works mention men with two faces on one head—one in front and one behind.

Now what 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.

The “Eye of Shiva” did not become entirety atrophied before the close of the Fourth Race. When spirituality and all the divine powers and attributes of the Deva‐Man of the Third Race had been made the hand‐ maidens of the newly‐awakened physiological and psychic passions of the physical man, instead of the reverse, the Eye lost its powers. But such was the law of evolution, and it was, in strict accuracy, no _Fall_. The sin was not in using those newly‐developed powers, but in _misusing_ them; in making of the tabernacle, designed to contain a God, the fane of every _spiritual_ iniquity. And if we say “sin” it is merely that everyone should understand our meaning, for Karma(683) would be the more correct term to use in this case; moreover the reader who should feel perplexed at the use of the term “spiritual” instead of “physical” iniquity, is reminded of the fact that there can be no physical iniquity. The body is simply the irresponsible organ, the tool of the Psychic, if not of the Spiritual, Man. And in the case of the Atlanteans, it was precisely the Spiritual Being which sinned, the Spirit Element being still the “Master” Principle in man, in those days. Thus it is in those days that the heaviest Karma of the Fifth Race was generated by our Monads.

As this sentence may again be found puzzling, it is better that it should be explained for the benefit of those who are ignorant of Theosophical Teachings.

Questions with regard to Karma and Re‐births are constantly being put forward, and great confusion seems to exist upon the subject. Those who are born and bred in the Christian faith, and have been trained in the idea that a new Soul is created by God for every newly‐born infant, are among the most perplexed. They ask whether the number of Monads incarnating on Earth is limited; to which they are answered in the affirmative. For, however countless, in our conception, the number of the incarnating Monads, still, there must be a limit. This is so even if we take into account the fact that ever since the Second Race, when their respective seven Groups were furnished with bodies, several births and deaths may be allowed for every second of time in the æons already passed. It has been stated that Karma‐Nemesis, whose bond‐maid is Nature, adjusted everything in the most harmonious manner; and that, therefore, the fresh pouring‐in, or arrival of new Monads, ceased as soon as Humanity had reached its full physical development. No fresh Monads have incarnated since the middle‐point of the Atlanteans. Let us remember that, save in the case of young children, and of individuals whose lives have been violently cut off by some accident, no Spiritual Entity can reïncarnate before a period of many centuries has elapsed, and such gaps alone must show that the number of Monads is necessarily finite and limited. Moreover, a reasonable time must be given to other animals for their evolutionary progress.

Hence the assertion that many of us are now working off the effects of the evil Karmic causes produced by us in Atlantean bodies. The Law of Karma is inextricably interwoven with that of Reïncarnation.

It is only the knowledge of the constant re‐births of one and the same Individuality throughout the Life‐Cycle; the assurance that the same Monads—among whom are many Dhyân Chohans, or the “Gods” themselves—have to pass through the “Circle of Necessity,” rewarded or punished by such rebirth for the suffering endured or crimes committed in the former life; that those very Monads, which entered the empty, senseless Shells, or Astral Figures of the First Race emanated by the Pitris, are the same who are now amongst us—nay, ourselves, perchance; it is only this doctrine, we say, that can explain to us the mysterious problem of Good and Evil, and reconcile man to the terrible _apparent_ injustice of life. Nothing but such certainty can quiet our revolted sense of justice. For, when one unacquainted with the noble doctrine looks around him, and observes the inequalities of birth and fortune, of intellect and capacities; when one sees honour paid to fools and profligates, on whom fortune has heaped her favours by mere privilege of birth, and their nearest neighbour, with all his intellect and noble virtues—far more deserving in every way—perishing of want and for lack of sympathy; when one sees all this and has to turn away, helpless to relieve the undeserved suffering, one’s ears ringing and heart aching with the cries of pain around him—that blessed knowledge of Karma alone prevents him from cursing life and men, as well as their supposed Creator.(684)

Of all the terrible blasphemies and what are virtually accusations thrown at their God by the Monotheists, none is greater or more unpardonable than that (almost always) false humility which makes the presumably “pious” Christian assert, in the face of every evil and undeserved blow, that “such _is the will_ of God.”

Dolts and hypocrites! Blasphemers and impious Pharisees who speak in the same breath of the endless merciful love and care of their God and Creator for helpless man, and of that God _scourging the good, the very best of his creatures, bleeding them to death like an insatiable Moloch_! Shall we be answered to this, in Congreve’s words:

But who shall dare to tax Eternal Justice?

Logic and simple common sense, we answer. If we are asked to believe in “original sin,” in _one_ life _only_ on this Earth for every Soul, and in an anthropomorphic Deity, who seems to have created some men only for the pleasure of condemning them to eternal hell‐fire—and this whether they be good or bad, says the Predestinarian(685)—why should not everyone of us who is endowed with reasoning powers, condemn in his turn such a villainous Deity? Life would become unbearable, if one had to believe in the God created by man’s unclean fancy. Luckily he exists only in human dogmas, and in the unhealthy imagination of some poets, who believe they have solved the problem by addressing him as:

Thou great Mysterious Power, who hast _involved_
The pride of human wisdom, _to confound_
The _daring scrutiny_ and prove _the faith_
Of thy _presuming_ creatures!

Truly a robust “faith” is required to believe that it is “presumption” to question the justice of one, who creates helpless little man but to “perplex” him, and to test a “faith” with which that “Power,” moreover, may have forgotten, if not neglected, to endow him, as happens sometimes.

Compare this blind faith with the philosophical belief, based on every reasonable evidence and on life‐experience, in Karma‐Nemesis, or the Law of Retribution. This Law—whether Conscious or Unconscious—predestines nothing and no one. It exists from and in Eternity, truly, for it is Eternity itself; and as such, since no act can be coëqual with Eternity, it cannot be said to act, for it is Action itself. It is not the _wave_ which drowns a man, but the _personal_ action of the wretch who goes deliberately and places himself under the _impersonal_ action of the laws that govern the _ocean’s_ motion. Karma creates nothing, nor does it design. It is man who plans and creates causes, and Karmic Law adjusts the effects, which adjustment is not an act, but universal harmony, tending ever to resume its original position, like a bough, which, bent down too forcibly, rebounds with corresponding vigour. If it happen to dislocate the arm that tried to bend it out of its natural position, shall we say that it is the bough which broke our arm, or that our own folly has brought us to grief? Karma has never sought to destroy intellectual and individual liberty, like the God invented by the Monotheists. It has not involved its decrees in darkness purposely to perplex man; nor shall it punish him who dares to scrutinize its mysteries. On the contrary, he who through study and meditation unveils its intricate paths, and throws light on those dark ways, in the windings of which so many men perish owing to their ignorance of the labyrinth of life—is working for the good of his fellow‐men. Karma is an Absolute and Eternal Law in the World of Manifestation; and as there can only be one Absolute, as One eternal ever‐ present Cause, believers in Karma cannot be regarded as Atheists or Materialists—still less as Fatalists,(686) for Karma is one with the Unknowable, of which it is an aspect, in its effects in the phenomenal world.

Intimately, or rather indissolubly, connected with Karma, then, is the Law of Re‐birth, or of the reïncarnation of the same spiritual Individuality in a long, almost interminable, series of Personalities. The latter are like the various characters played by the same actor, with each of which that actor identifies himself and is identified by the public, for the space of a few hours. The _inner_, or real Man, who personates those characters, knows the whole time that he is Hamlet only for the brief space of a few acts, which, however, on the plane of human illusion, represent the whole life of Hamlet. He knows also that he was, the night before, King Lear, the transformation in his turn of the Othello of a still earlier preceding night. And though the outer, visible character is supposed to be ignorant of the fact, and in actual life that ignorance is, unfortunately, but too real, nevertheless, the _permanent_ Individuality is fully aware of it, and it is through the atrophy of the “spiritual” Eye in the physical body, that that knowledge is unable to impress itself on the consciousness of the false Personality.

The possession of a physical Third Eye, we are told, was enjoyed by the men of the Third Root‐Race down to nearly the middle period of the third sub‐race of the Fourth Root‐Race, when the consolidation and perfection of the human frame caused it to disappear from the outward anatomy of man. Psychically and spiritually, however, its mental and visual perception lasted till nearly the end of the Fourth Race, when its functions, owing to the materiality and depraved condition of mankind, died out altogether. This was prior to the submersion of the bulk of the Atlantean Continent. And now we may return to the Deluges and their many “Noahs.”

The student has to bear in mind that there were many such Deluges as that mentioned in _Genesis_, and three far more important ones, which will be mentioned and described in the Section of Part III devoted to the subject of pre‐historic “Submerged Continents.” To avoid erroneous conjectures, however, with regard to the claim that the Esoteric Doctrine has much in common with the legends contained in the Hindû Scriptures; that, again, the chronology of the latter is almost that of the former—only explained and made clear; and that finally the belief that Vaivasvata Manu—a generic term indeed!—was the Noah of the Âryans and the prototype of the biblical patriarch, all this—as pertaining also to the belief of the Occultists—necessitates a new explanation at this juncture.

The Primeval Manus Of Humanity.

Those who are aware that the “Great Flood,” which was connected with the sinking of an entire Continent (save only a few islands) could not have happened so far back as 18,000,000 years ago, and that Vaivasvata Manu is the Indian Noah connected with the Matsya, or the Fish, Avatâra of Vishnu, may feel perplexed at the apparent discrepancy between the facts stated and the chronology previously given. But there is no discrepancy in truth. The reader is asked to turn to _The Theosophist_ of July, 1883, for by studying the article therein, on “The Septenary Principle in Esotericism,” the whole question can be explained to him. It is in the explanation there given, I believe, that the Occultists differ from the Brâhmans.

For the benefit of those, however, who may not have _The Theosophist_ of that date to hand, a passage or two may now be quoted from it:

Who was Manu, the son of Svâyambhuva? The Secret Doctrine tells us
that _this_ Manu was no man, but the representation of the first
human races, evolved with the help of the Dhyân Chohans (Devas),
at the beginning of the First Round. But we are told in his _Laws_
(i. 80) that there are fourteen Manus for every Kalpa, or
“interval from creation to creation”—read rather interval from one
_minor_ Pralaya to another(687)—and that “in the present divine
age, there have been as yet _seven_ Manus.” Those who know that
there are seven Rounds, of which we have passed three, and are now
in the Fourth; and who are taught that there are seven Dawns and
seven Twilights, or fourteen Manvantaras; that at the beginning of
every Round and at the end, and on, and between, the planets
[Globes] there is an “awakening to _illusive_ life,” and an
“awakening to _real_ life”; and that, moreover, there are Root‐
Manus, and what we have to clumsily translate as Seed‐Manus—_the
seeds for the human races of the forthcoming_ Round (or the
Shishtas—the surviving fittest(688); a mystery divulged only to
those who have passed their third degree in Initiation)—those who
have learned all this will be better prepared to understand the
meaning of the following. We are told in the Hindû Sacred
Scriptures that, “The first Manu produced _six_ other Manus
[_seven_ primary Manus in all], and these produced in their turn
each seven other Manus”(689) (_Bhrigu_, i. 61‐63)—the production
of the latter standing in the Occult treatises as 7 x 7. Thus it
becomes clear that Manu—the last one, the Progenitor of our
Fourth‐Round Humanity—must be the _seventh_, since we are on our
Fourth Round,(690) and there is a _Root_‐Manu at Globe A, and a
_Seed_‐Manu at Globe G. Just as each planetary Round commences
with the appearance of a Root‐Manu (Dhyân Chohan) and closes with
a Seed‐Manu, so a Root‐ and a Seed‐Manu appear respectively at the
beginning and the termination of the human period on any
particular planet [Globe].(691) It will be easily seen from the
foregoing statement that a Manvantaric period (Manu‐antara) means,
as the term implies, the time _between_ the appearance of two
Manus or Dhyân Chohans; and hence a Minor Manvantara is the
duration of the _seven_ Races on any particular planet [Globe],
and a Major Manvantara is the period of one human Round along the
Planetary Chain. Moreover, as it is said that each of the seven
Manus _creates_ 7 x 7 Manus, and that there are 49 Root‐Races on
the seven planets [Globes] during each Round, then every Root‐Race
has its Manu. The present seventh Manu is called “Vaivasvata” and
stands in the exoteric texts for that Manu who in India represents
the Babylonian Xisuthrus and the Jewish Noah.

But in the Esoteric books we are told that Manu Vaivasvata, the
progenitor of our _Fifth_ Race—who saved it from the flood that
nearly exterminated the Fourth or Atlantean—is not the seventh
Manu, mentioned in the nomenclature of the Root or Primitive
Manus, but one of the 49 Manus emanated from this Root‐Manu.

For clearer comprehension we here give the names of the 14 Manus
in their respective order and in their relation to each Round:

1st Round, 1st (Root) Manu on Planet A—Svâyambhuva.
1st Round, 1st (Seed) Manu on Planet G—Svârochi, or Svârochisha.
2nd Round, 2nd (Root) Manu on Planet A—Auttami.
2nd Round, 2nd (Seed) Manu on Planet G—Tâmasa.
3rd Round, 3rd (Root) Manu on Planet A—Raivata.
3rd Round, 3rd (Seed) Manu on Planet G—Châkshusha.
4th Round, 4th (Root) Manu on Planet A—Vaivasvata (our
Progenitor).
4th Round, 4th (Seed) Manu on Planet G—Sâvarna.
5th Round, 5th (Root) Manu on Planet A—Daksha‐sâvarna.
5th Round, 5th (Seed) Manu on Planet G—Brahma‐sâvarna.
6th Round, 6th (Root) Manu on Planet A—Dharma‐sâvarna.
6th Round, 6th (Seed) Manu on Planet G—Rudra‐sâvarna.
7th Round, 7th (Root) Manu on Planet A—Rauchya.
7th Round, 7th (Seed) Manu on Planet G—Bhautya.

Vaivasvata, thus, though seventh in the order given, is the
primitive Root‐Manu of our Fourth Human Wave (the reader must
always remember that Manu is not a man but collective humanity),
while _our_ Vaivasvata was but one of the seven Minor Manus, who
are made to preside over the seven Races of this our planet
[Globe]. Each of these has to become the witness of one of the
periodical and ever‐recurring cataclysms (by fire and water) that
close the cycle of every Root‐Race. And it is this Vaivasvata—the
Hindû ideal embodiment, called respectively Xisuthrus, Deucalion,
Noah and other names—who is the allegorical “Man” who rescued our
Race, when nearly the whole population of one hemisphere perished
by water, while the other hemisphere was awakening from its
temporary obscuration.(692)

Thus it is shown that there is no real discrepancy in speaking of the Vaivasvata Manvantara (Manu‐antara, lit., “between two Manus”) as 18,000,000 odd years ago, when physical, or the truly human, Man first appeared in his Fourth Round on this Earth; and of the other Vaivasvatas, _e.g._, the Manu of the Great Cosmic or Sidereal Flood—a mystery—or again the Manu Vaivasvata of the submerged Atlantis, when the _Racial_ Vaivasvata saved the elect of Humanity, the Fifth Race, from utter destruction. As these several and quite distinct events are purposely blended in the _Vishnu_ and other _Purânas_ in one narrative, there may yet be a great deal of perplexity left in the profane reader’s mind. Therefore, as constant elucidation is needed, we must be forgiven unavoidable repetitions. The “blinds” which conceal the real mysteries of Esoteric Philosophy are great and puzzling, and even now the last word cannot be given. The veil, however, may be a little more removed, and some explanations, hitherto denied, may now be offered to the earnest student.

As Colonel Vans Kennedy, if we do not mistake, remarked: “the first principle in Hindû religious philosophy is _unity in diversity_.” If all those Manus and Rishis are called by one generic name, it is due to the fact that they are one and all the manifested Energies of one and the same Logos, the celestial as well as the terrestrial Messengers and Permutations of that Principle which is ever in a state of activity—conscious during the period of Cosmic Evolution, unconscious (from our point of view) during Cosmic Rest—for the Logos sleepeth in the bosom of THAT which “sleepeth not,” nor is it ever awake, for it is Sat or “Be‐ness,” not a Being. It is from IT that issues the great _Unseen_ Logos, who evolves all the other Logoi; the Primeval Manu who gives being to the other Manus, who emanate the universe and all in it collectively, and who represent in their aggregate the _Manifested_ Logos.(693) Hence we learn in the Commentaries that while no Dhyân Chohan, not even the highest, can realize completely

_The condition of the preceding Cosmic Evolution, ... the Manus retain a knowledge of their experiences in all the Cosmic Evolutions throughout Eternity._

This is very plain: the first Manu is called Svâyambhuva, the “Self‐ manifested,” the Son of the _Unmanifested_ Father. The Manus are the Creators of the Creators of our First Race—the Spirit of Mankind—which does not prevent the _seven_ Manus from having been the first “Pre‐Adamic” Men on Earth.

Manu declares himself created by Virâj,(694) or Vaishvânara, the Spirit of Humanity,(695) which means that his Monad emanates from the never resting Principle in the beginning of every new Cosmic Activity—that Logos or Universal Monad (collective Elohim) which radiates _from within himself_ all those Cosmic Monads that become the centres of activity—Progenitors of the numberless Solar Systems as well as of the yet undifferentiated _human_ Monads of Planetary Chains as well as of every being thereon. Svâyambhuva, or Self‐born, is the name of every Cosmic Monad _which becomes the Centre of Force, from within which emerges a Planetary Chain_ (of which Chains there are seven in our System). And the radiations of this Centre become again so many Manus Svâyambhuva (a mysterious generic name, meaning far more than appears), each of them becoming, as a Host, the Creator of his own Humanity.

As to the question of the four distinct Races of mankind that preceded our Fifth Race, there is nothing mystical in the subject, except the ethereal bodies of the first Races; and this is a matter of legendary, nevertheless very correct, history. The legend is universal. And if the Western _savant_ pleases to see in it only a myth, it does not make the slightest difference. The Mexicans had, and still have, the tradition of the fourfold destruction of the world by fire and water, just as the Egyptians had, and the Hindûs have, to this day.

Trying to account for the community of legends held by Chinese, Chaldæans, Egyptians, Indians and Greeks, in remote antiquity, and for the absence of any certain vestige of civilization more ancient than 5,000 years, the author of _Mythical Monsters_ remarks that:

We must ... not be surprised if we do not immediately discover the
vestiges of the people of ten, fifteen, or twenty thousand years
ago. With an ephemeral architecture ... [as in China], the sites
of vast cities may have become entirely lost to recollection in a
few thousands of years from natural decay, and how much more ...
if ... minor cataclysms have intervened, such as local
inundations, earthquakes, deposition of volcanic ashes, ... the
spread of sandy deserts, destruction of life by deadly pestilence,
by miasma, or by the outpour of sulphurous fumes.(696)

How many of such cataclysms have changed the whole surface of the earth may be inferred from the following Stanza of Commentary Twenty‐two:

_During the first seven crores [70,000,000 years] of the Kalpa the Earth and its two Kingdoms [mineral and vegetable], one already having achieved its seventh circle, the other, hardly nascent, are luminous and semi‐ ethereal, cold, lifeless, and translucid. In the eleventh crore_(_697_)_ the Mother [Earth] grows opaque, and in the fourteenth_(_698_)_ the throes of adolescence take place. These convulsions of Nature [geological changes] last till her twentieth crore of years, uninterruptedly, after which they become periodical, and at long intervals._

_The last change took place nearly twelve crores [120,000,000] of years ago. But the Earth with everything on her face had become cool, hard and settled ages earlier._

Thus, if we are to believe Esoteric Teaching, _universal_ geological disturbances and changes have not occurred for the last 120 million years, but the Earth, even before that time, was ready to receive her human stock. The appearance of the latter, however, in its full physical development, as already stated, took place only about 18,000,000 years ago, after the first great failure of Nature to create beings alone—_i.e._, without the help of the divine “Fashioners”—had been followed by the successive evolution of the first three Races.(699) The actual duration of the first two and a half Races is withheld from all but the higher Initiates. The history of the Races begins at the separation of the sexes, when the preceding egg‐bearing androgynous Race perished rapidly, and the subsequent sub‐races of the Third Root‐Race appeared as an entirely new race _physiologically_. It is this “Destruction” which is allegorically called the great “Vaivasvata Manu Deluge,” when the account shows Vaivasvata Manu, or Humanity, remaining alone on Earth in the Ark of Salvation towed by Vishnu in the shape of a monstrous fish, and the Seven Rishis “with him.” The allegory is very plain.

In the symbolism of every nation, the “Deluge” stands for chaotic unsettled Matter—Chaos itself; and Water for the Feminine Principle—the “Great Deep.” As the Greek Lexicon of Parkhurst gives it:

Ἀρχὴ answers to the Hebrew _rasit_, or Wisdom ... and [at the same
time] to the emblem of the female generative power, the _arg_ or
_arca_, in which the germ of nature [and of mankind] floats or
broods on the great abyss of the waters, during the interval which
takes place after every mundane [or racial] cycle.

Archê (Ἀρχὴ) or Ark is also the mystic name of the Divine Spirit of Life which broods over Chaos. Now Vishnu _is_ the Divine Spirit, as an abstract principle, and also as the Preserver and Generator, or Giver of Life—the third Person of the Trimûrti—composed of Brahmâ, the Creator, Shiva, the Destroyer, and Vishnu, the Preserver. Vishnu is shown, in the allegory, under the form of a _Fish_, guiding the Ark of Vaivasvata Manu across the Waters of the Flood. There is no use in expatiating upon the esoteric meaning of the word _Fish_ (as Payne Knight, Inman, Gerald Massey, and others have done). Its theological meaning is phallic, but the metaphysical, divine. Jesus was called the Fish, as were Vishnu and Bacchus; ΙΗΣ, the “Saviour” of Mankind, being but the monogram of the God Bacchus, who was also called ΙΧΘΥΣ, the Fish.(700) Moreover, the Seven Rishis in the Ark symbolized the seven “principles,” which became complete in man only after he had separated, and become a _human_, and thus ceased to be a divine creature.

But to return to the Races; details as to the submersion of the Continent inhabited by the Second Root‐Race are not numerous. The history of the Third, or Lemuria, is given, as is also that of Atlantis, but the others are only alluded to. Lemuria is said to have perished about 700,000 years before the commencement of what is now called the Tertiary Age (the Eocene).(701) During this Deluge—an actual geological deluge this time—Vaivasvata Manu is also shown saving mankind, allegorically—in reality, a portion of it, the Fourth Race—just as he saved the Fifth Race during the destruction of the last Atlanteans, the remnants that perished 850,000 years ago,(702) after which there was no great submersion until the day of Plato’s Atlantis, or Poseidonis, which was known to the Egyptians only because it happened in such relatively recent times.

It is the submersion of the great Atlantis which is the most interesting. This is the Cataclysm of which the old records, as in the _Book of Enoch_, say, “the ends of the Earth got loose”; and upon which have been built the legends and allegories of Vaivasvata, Xisuthrus, Noah, Deucalion and all the _tutti quanti_ of the Elect Saved. Tradition, not taking into account the difference between sidereal and geological phenomena, calls both “Deluges” indifferently. Yet there is a great difference. The Cataclysm which destroyed the huge Continent of which Australia is the largest relic, was due to a series of subterranean convulsions and the breaking asunder of the ocean floors. That which put an end to its successor—the Fourth Continent—was brought on by successive disturbances in the axial rotation. It began during the earliest Tertiary periods, and, continuing for long ages, carried away successively the last vestige of Atlantis, with the exception, perhaps, of Ceylon and a small portion of what is now Africa. It changed the face of the globe, and no memory of its flourishing continents and isles, of its civilizations and sciences, have remained in the annals of history, save in the Sacred Records of the East.

Hence, Modern Science denies the existence of Atlantis. It even denies any violent shiftings of the Earth’s axis, and would attribute the change of climate to other causes. But this question is still an open one. If Dr. Croll will have it that all such alterations can be accounted for by the effects of nutation and the precession of the equinoxes, there are others, such as Sir Henry James and Sir John Lubbock,(703) who feel more inclined to accept the idea that they are due to a change in the position of the axis of rotation. Against this the majority of the Astronomers are again arrayed. But then, what have they not denied before now, and what have they not denounced—only to accept it later on, whenever the hypothesis became undeniable fact?

How far our figures agree, or rather disagree, with Modern Science will be seen further in the Addenda to this Volume, where the Geology and Anthropology of our modern day are carefully compared with the teachings of Archaic Science. At any rate, the period assigned by the Secret Doctrine for the sinking of Atlantis, does not seem to disagree very much with the calculations of Modern Science, which, however, calls Atlantis “Lemuria” whenever it accepts such a submerged Continent. With regard to the pre‐human period, all that can be said, at present, is, that even prior to the appearance of the “mindless” First Race, the Earth was not without its inhabitants. We might, however, add that what Science, which recognizes _physical man only_, has a right to regard as the _pre‐human_ period, may be conceded to have extended from the First Race down to the first half of the Atlantean Race, since it is only then that man became the “complete _organic_ being he is now.” And this would make Adamic Man no older than a few millions of years.(704)

The author of the _Qabbalah_ truly remarks that: “Man to‐day, as an individual, is only a concatenation of the being‐hood of precedent human life,” or _lives_, rather.

According to the Qabbalah, the soul sparks contained in Adam, went
into three principal classes corresponding to his three sons,
viz.: _Hesed_, Habel, _Ge’boor‐ah_, Qai‐yin and _Ra’h‐min_ Seth.
These three were divided into ... 70 species, called; the
principal roots of the human race.(705)

Said Rabbi Yehudah: “How many garments [of the incorporeal man]
are these which are crowned (from the day man was created)?” Said
R. El’azar: “The mountains of the world (the great men of the
generation) are in discussion upon it, but there are three: one to
clothe in that garment the _Rua’h_ spirit, which is in the garden
(of Eden) on earth: one which is more precious than all, in which
the _Neshamah_ is clothed in that Bundle of Life, between the
angels of the Kings ...: and one outside garment, which exists and
does not exist, is seen and not seen. In that garment, the
_Nephesh_ is clothed, and she goes and flies in it, to and fro in
the world.”(706)

This relates to the Races, their “garments,” or degree of materiality, and to the three “principles” of man in their three vehicles.

Stanza XI. The Civilization And Destruction Of The Fourth And Fifth Races.

43. The Lemuro‐Atlanteans build cities and spread civilization.
The incipient stage of anthropomorphism. 44. Statues, witnesses to
the size of the Lemuro‐Atlanteans. 45. Lemuria destroyed by fire,
Atlantis by water. The Flood. 46. The destruction of the Fourth
Race and of the last antediluvian monster‐animals.

43. THEY(707) BUILT HUGE CITIES. OF RARE EARTHS AND METALS THEY BUILT. OUT OF THE FIRES(708) VOMITED, OUT OF THE WHITE STONE(709) OF THE MOUNTAINS AND OF THE BLACK STONE,(710) THEY CUT THEIR OWN IMAGES, IN THEIR SIZE AND LIKENESS, AND WORSHIPPED THEM.

At this point, as the history of the first two _human_ races—the last of the Lemurians and the first of the future Atlanteans—proceeds, we have to blend the two, and speak of them for a time collectively.