But inasmuch, O beautiful one, as you came personally to speak to me (in the way you did, i.e.
proudly), therefore, O, Sarasvati!
you shall never speak after (hard) exhalation." "The goddess Speech" (Sarasvati, a later form or aspect of Vach, the goddess also of secret learning or Esoteric Wisdom), "verily, dwelt always between the Prana and the Apana.
But O noble one!
going with the Apana wind (vital air), though impelled, without the Prana (expirational breath), she ran up to Prajapati (Brahma), saying, 'Be pleased, O venerable sir!' Then the Prana appeared again, nourishing Speech.
And, therefore, Speech never speaks after (hard or inspirational) exhalation.
It is always noisy or noiseless.
Of these two, the noiseless is the superior to the noisy (Speech) .
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.
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The (speech) which is produced in the body by means of the Prana, and which then goes (is transformed) into Apana, and then becoming assimilated with the Udana (physical organs of Speech) .
.
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then finally dwells in the Samana ('at the navel in the form of sound, as the material cause of all words,' says Arjuna Misra).
So Speech formerly spoke.
Hence the mind is distinguished by reason of its being immovable, and the Goddess (Speech) by reason of her being movable." This allegory is at the root of the Occult law, which prescribes silence upon the knowledge of certain secret and invisible things perceptible only to the spiritual mind (the 6th sense), and which cannot be expressed by "noisy" or uttered speech.
This chapter of Anugita explains, says Arjuna Misra, Pranayama, or regulation of the breath in Yoga practices.
This mode, however, without the previous acquisition of, or at least full understanding of the two higher senses, of which there are seven, as will be shown, pertains rather to the lower Yoga.
The Hatha so called was and still is discountenanced by the Arhats.
It is injurious to the health and alone can never develop into Raj Yoga.
This story is quoted to show how inseparably connected are, in the metaphysics of old, intelligent beings, or rather "Intelligences," with every sense or [[Vol.
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function whether physical or mental.
The Occult claim that there are seven senses in man, as in nature, as there are seven states of consciousness, is corroborated in the same work, chapter vii., on Pratyahara (the restraint and regulation of the senses, Pranayama being that of the "vital winds" or breath).
The Brahmana speaks in it "of the institution of the seven sacrificial Priests (Hotris).
He says: "The nose and the eyes, and the tongue, and the skin and the ear as the fifth (or smell, sight, taste, touch and hearing), mind and understanding are the seven sacrificial priests separately stationed"; and which "dwelling in a minute space (still) do not perceive each other" on this sensuous plane, none of them except mind.
For mind says: "The nose smells not without me, the eye does not take in colour, etc., etc.
I am the eternal chief among all elements ( i.e.
, senses).
Without me, the senses never shine, like an empty dwelling, or like fires the flames of which are extinct.
Without me, all beings, like fuel half dried and half moist, fail to apprehend qualities or objects even with the senses exerting themselves."* This, of course, with regard only to mind on the sensuous plane.
Spiritual mind (the upper portion or aspect of the impersonal MANAS) takes no cognisance of the senses in physical man.
How well the ancients were acquainted with the correlation of forces and all the recently discovered phenomena of mental and physical faculties and functions, with many more mysteries also -- may be found in reading chapters vii.
and viii.
of this (in philosophy and mystic learning) priceless work.
See the quarrel of the senses about their respective superiority and their taking the Brahman, the lord of all creatures, for their arbiter.
"You are all greatest and not greatest," or superior to objects, as A.
Misra says, none being independent of the other.
"You are all possessed of one another's qualities.
All are greatest in their own spheres and all support one another.
There is one unmoving (life-wind or breath, the ' Yoga inhalation, ' so called, which is the breath of the One or Higher S ELF).
That is the (or my) own Self, accumulated in numerous (forms)." This Breath, Voice, Self or "Wind" ( pneuma?
) is the Synthesis of the Seven Senses, noumenally all minor deities and esoterically -- the septenary and the "Army of the V OICE." [[Footnote(s)]] ------------------------------------------------- * This shows the modern metaphysicians, added to all past and present Haegels, Berkeleys, Schopenhauers, Hartmanns, Herbert Spencers, and even the modern Hylo-Idealists to boot, no better than the pale copyists of hoary antiquity.
[[Vol.
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( b ) Next we see Cosmic matter scattering and forming itself into elements; grouped into the mystic four within the fifth element -- Ether, the lining of Akasa, the Anima Mundi or Mother of Kosmos.
"Dots, Lines, Triangles, Cubes, Circles" and finally "Spheres" -- why or how?
Because, says the Commentary, such is the first law of Nature, and because Nature geometrizes universally in all her manifestations.
There is an inherent law -- not only in the primordial, but also in the manifested matter of our phenomenal plane -- by which Nature correlates her geometrical forms, and later, also, her compound elements; and in which there is no place for accident or chance.
It is a fundamental law in Occultism, that there is no rest or cessation of motion in Nature.* That which seems rest is only the change of one form into another; the change of substance going hand in hand with that of form -- as we are taught in Occult physics, which thus seem to have anticipated the discovery of the "Conservation of matter" by a considerable time.
Says the ancient Commentary** to Stanza IV.: -- " The Mother is the fiery Fish of Life.
She scatters her spawn and the Breath ( Motion ) heats and quickens it.
The grains ( of spawn ) are soon attracted to each other and form the curds in the Ocean ( of Space ) .
The Hermetic axiom that the structure of the cosmos is reflected at every scale — 'as above, so below; as within, so without' — making each level a legible map of the others.
The passage explicitly states 'the correlation of forces' and 'the correlation of geometrical forms,' and asserts that the seven senses in man correspond to the seven in nature, making the micro-macrocosmic mirroring a central organizing theme.
The Stoic and Plotinian doctrine that all parts of the cosmos are bound by hidden affinities, so that a movement in one part resonates through the whole; the metaphysical basis for astrology, magic, and divination.
The passage states the senses are 'possessed of one another's qualities' and 'all support one another,' and that 'inseparably connected are, in the metaphysics of old, intelligent beings... with every sense or function,' expressing hidden affinities binding all parts.
Narratives or doctrines of cosmic origin — how heaven, earth, and the primordial deities first came into being. The Kojiki's deities born alone on the Plain of High Heaven, Voluspo's Ginnungagap, Genesis's tohu wa-bohu, the Timaeus's Demiurge fashioning the Receptacle, the Hesiodic Theogony, the Kalevala's egg-cosmogony, Egyptian Nun-and-Atum. Distinct from emanation_hierarchy (structural-ontological cascade), letters_of_creation (mechanism of creation), and apocatastasis/frashokereti (end-state restoration); cosmogony is temporally-narrative beginning.
The passage narrates 'Cosmic matter scattering and forming itself into elements; grouped into the mystic four within the fifth element' and the 'fiery Fish of Life' scattering spawn that forms 'curds in the Ocean of Space,' a clear cosmogonic narrative.
Salvation through direct experiential knowledge of the divine nature, not through faith, ritual, or moral works alone.
The passage distinguishes the 'two higher senses' from the five physical ones and states that certain truths are 'perceptible only to the spiritual mind (the 6th sense),' implying direct experiential knowledge beyond ordinary cognition.
Esoteric teachings reserved for those ready to receive them; outer meaning conceals an inner liberating truth.
The passage explicitly states that the allegory 'prescribes silence upon the knowledge of certain secret and invisible things' and that the noiseless (inner) speech is superior to the noisy (outer), encoding esoteric meaning within an outer narrative.
A non-physical dimension of reality, interpenetrating the physical world, populated by forces, beings, and forms ordinarily imperceptible to physical senses and instruments, that can affect embodied life without being seen — Dion Fortune's 'mind-side of nature,' the astral plane of Western esotericism broadly construed. Distinct from astral_light (a specific transmitting medium or fluid operating within this realm, not the realm itself), pleroma (the divine fullness at the summit of a cosmic hierarchy, not a parallel plane coextensive with ordinary life), and animism (particular indwelling spirits bound to specific natural objects, not the general unseen dimension itself).
The passage refers to 'secret and invisible things perceptible only to the spiritual mind (the 6th sense)' and to 'Intelligences' inseparably connected with physical and mental functions, positing a non-physical dimension interpenetrating the physical.
The doctrine that the cosmos unfolds as a structured descent of spirit into matter — a directional process traced stage by stage from an unconditioned principle down through successive planes to full materialization — complemented by its own eventual return ('evolution'). Distinct from emanation_hierarchy (the static structure of the resulting levels of the cascade) and cosmogony (a single originating event rather than an ongoing staged process) in naming the directional cosmic PROCESS of descent itself, paired with its own complementary ascent.
The description of cosmic matter scattering into elements and geometric forms (dots, lines, triangles, cubes, circles, spheres) traces a staged descent from undifferentiated matter into structured multiplicity.
The human being as a small-scale image of the entire cosmos; the body, soul, and intellect mirroring the structure of the heavens and the divine — distinct from correspondence in that it makes the human the privileged mirror.
The passage claims 'there are seven senses in man, as in nature, as there are seven states of consciousness,' directly mapping the human being as a small-scale reflection of cosmic structure.
The absolutely simple, undivided first principle from which all multiplicity and existence flows.
The 'One or Higher SELF' is identified as the source of the 'Yoga inhalation' breath, an undivided first principle from which the septenary of senses is synthesized.
Numbers, proportions, and mathematical relationships as the underlying structure of divine reality.
The passage repeatedly invokes the number seven (seven senses, seven states of consciousness, seven sacrificial priests) and the 'mystic four within the fifth element,' treating numerical structure as the underlying architecture of reality.
The Hermetic doctrine that nothing rests — matter, energy, mind, and spirit are a single continuum differing only in rate of vibration, from the grossest matter to the least material spirit. Distinct from cosmic_sympathy (affinity resonating BETWEEN separate things) in being a claim about what constitutes any one thing in the first place, and from magical_equilibrium (Lévi's operational balancing technique, which presupposes some vibration doctrine rather than stating this general principle).
The passage declares 'there is no rest or cessation of motion in Nature' and that 'that which seems rest is only the change of one form into another,' which is essentially the vibration doctrine that nothing is truly static.