Page 10 (part 5)

The reader must bear in mind that, according to our teaching which regards this phenomenal Universe as a great Illusion , the nearer a body is to the U NKNOWN S UBSTANCE, the more it approaches reality , as being removed the farther [[Vol. 1, Page]] 146 THE SECRET DOCTRINE. from this world of Maya. Therefore, though the molecular constitution of their bodies is not deducible from their manifestations on this plane of consciousness, they nevertheless (from the standpoint of the adept Occultist) possess a distinctive objective if not material structure, in the relatively noumenal -- as opposed to the phenomenal -- Universe. Men of science may term them Force or Forces generated by matter, or "modes of its motion," if they will; Occultism sees in the effects "Elemental" (forces), and, in the direct causes producing them, intelligent D IVINE Workmen. The intimate connection of those Elementals (guided by the unerring hand of the Rulers) -- their correlation we might call it -- with the elements of pure Matter, results in our terrestrial phenomena, such as light, heat, magnetism, etc., etc. Of course we shall never agree with the American Substantialists* who call every Force and Energy -- whether Light, Heat, Electricity or Cohesion -- an "Entity"; for this would be equivalent to calling the noise produced by the rolling of the wheels of a vehicle an Entity -- thus confusing and identifying that "noise" with the driver outside , and the guiding Master Intelligence within the vehicle. But we certainly give that name to the "drivers" and to these guiding Intelligences -- the ruling Dhyan Chohans, as shown. The "Elementals," the Nature-Forces, are the acting, though invisible, or rather imperceptible, secondary Causes and in themselves the effects of primary Causes behind the Veil of all terrestrial phenomena. Electricity, light, heat, etc., have been aptly termed the "Ghost or Shadow of Matter in Motion," i.e. , supersensuous states of matter whose effects only we are able to cognize. To expand, then, the simile given above. The sensation of light is like the sound of the rolling wheels -- a purely phenomenal effect, having no existence outside the observer; the proximate exciting cause of the sensation is comparable to the driver -- a supersensuous state of matter in motion, a Nature-Force or Elemental. But, behind even this, stand -- just as the owner of the carriage directs the driver from within -- the higher and noumenal causes, the Intelligences from whose essence radiate these States of " Mother ," generating the countless milliards of Elementals or psychic Nature-Spirits, just as every drop of water generates its physical [[Footnote(s)]] ------------------------------------------------- * See "Scientific Arena," a monthly Journal devoted to current philosophical teaching and its bearing upon the religious thought of the Age. New York: A. Wilford Hall, Ph.D., LL.D., Editor. (1886, July, August, and September.) [[Vol. 1, Page]] 147 PRIMORDIAL SUBSTANCE, A REALITY. infinitesimal Infusoria. (See "Gods, Monads, and Atoms," in Part III.) It is Fohat who guides the transfer of the principles from one planet to the other, from one star to another -- child-star. When a planet dies, its informing principles are transferred to a laya or sleeping centre, with potential but latent energy in it, which is thus awakened into life and begins to form itself into a new sidereal body. ( Vide infra , "A Few Theosophical Misconceptions, etc.") It is most remarkable that, while honestly confessing their entire ignorance of the true Nature of even terrestrial matter -- primordial substance being regarded more as a dream than as a sober reality -- the physicists should set themselves up as judges, nevertheless, of that matter, and claim to know what it is able and is not able to do, in various combinations. Scientists know it (matter) hardly skin-deep, and yet they will dogmatise. It is "a mode of motion" and nothing else. But the force that is inherent in a living person's breath, when blowing a speck of dust from the table, is also, and undeniably, "a mode of motion"; and it is as undeniably not a quality of the matter, or the particles of that speck, and it emanates from the living and thinking Entity that breathed, whether the impulse originated consciously or unconsciously. Indeed, to endow matter -- something of which nothing is known so far -- with an inherent quality called Force, of the nature of which still less is known, is to create a far more serious difficulty than that which lies in the acceptation of the intervention of our "Nature-Spirits" in every natural phenomenon. The Occultists, who do not say -- if they would express themselves correctly -- that matter , but only the substance or essence of matter, is indestructible and eternal, ( i.e. , the Root of all, Mulaprakriti ) : assert that all the so-called Forces of Nature, Electricity, Magnetism, Light, Heat, etc., etc., far from being modes of motion of material particles, are in esse , i.e. , in their ultimate constitution, the differentiated aspects of that Universal Motion which is discussed and explained in the first pages of this volume ( See Proem ) . When Fohat is said to produce "Seven Laya Centres," it means that for formative or creative purposes, the G REAT L AW (Theists may call it God) stops, or rather modifies its perpetual motion on seven invisible points within the area of the manifested Universe. " The great Breath digs through Space seven holes into Laya to cause them to circumgyrate during Manvantara " (Occult Catechism). We [[Vol. 1, Page]] 148 THE SECRET DOCTRINE. have said that Laya is what Science may call the Zero-point or line; the realm of absolute negativeness, or the one real absolute Force, the NOUMENON of the Seventh State of that which we ignorantly call and recognise as "Force"; or again the Noumenon of Undifferentiated Cosmic Substance which is itself an unreachable and unknowable object to finite perception; the root and basis of all states of objectivity and subjectivity too; the neutral axis, not one of the many aspects, but its centre. It may serve to elucidate the meaning if we attempt to imagine a neutral centre -- the dream of those who would discover perpetual motion. A "neutral centre" is, in one aspect, the limiting point of any given set of senses. Thus, imagine two consecutive planes of matter as already formed; each of these corresponding to an appropriate set of perceptive organs. We are forced to admit that between these two planes of matter an incessant circulation takes place; and if we follow the atoms and molecules of (say) the lower in their transformation upwards, these will come to a point where they pass altogether beyond the range of the faculties we are using on the lower plane.