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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 other men of Science, such as Sir H. James ( Athenaeum, Aug. 25, 1860), and Sir John Lubbock ( ibid ), 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 Book, where the geology and anthropology of our modern day are carefully compared with the same in Archaic Science. At any rate, the period assigned in the Secret Doctrine for the sinking of Atlantis, does not seem to disagree [[Footnote(s)]] ------------------------------------------------- * This event, the destruction of the famous island of Ruta and the smaller one Daitya, which occurred 850,000 years ago in the later Pliocene times, must not be confounded with the submersion of the main continent of Atlantis during the Miocene period. Geologists cannot place the Miocene only so short a way back as 850,000 years; whatever they do, it is several million years ago that the main Atlantis perished. [[Vol. 2, Page]] 315 THE INNER MAN IN THE ZOHAR. very much with the calculations of Modern Science, which calls Atlantis "Lemuria," however, whenever it accepts such a submerged continent. With regard to the pre-human period, all that can be said, at present, is, that even up to the appearance of the "Mindless" First Race, the Earth was not without its inhabitants. More may be said: that which Science -- recognizing only physical man -- has a right to regard as the prehuman 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 million of years.* The author of the Qabbalah remarks truly 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 (Rishoun), went into three principal classes corresponding to his three sons, viz.: Hesed, Habel, Ge-boor-ah, Qai-yin and Ra ' hmin Seth. These three were divided into 70 species, called: the principal roots of the human race." (p. 422.) "Said Rabbi Jehudah: 'How many garments (of the incorporeal man) are these which are crowned' (from the day man was 'created')? Said R. El'eazar: '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." (Zohar I., 119 b . col. 475; Qabbalah, 412.) This relates to the races (their "garments," or degree of materiality) and to the three principles of man in their three vehicles. [[Footnote(s)]] ------------------------------------------------- * Mr. Huxley divides those races into the quintuple group of Australioids, Negroids, Mongoloids, Xanthochroics and Melanochroics -- all issuing from imaginary Anthropoids. And yet, while protesting against those who say "that the structural differences between man and apes are small and insignificant," and adding that "every bone of the gorilla bears a mark by which it can be distinguished from a corresponding human bone," and that "in the present state of creation, at least, no intermediary being fills the gap which separates the man from the troglodyte" -- the great anatomist goes on speaking of the Simian characteristics in Man! ( See de Quatrefages ' " The Human Species, " p. 113.) -------