Page 71 (part 10)

There reside mankind along with Daityas and Danavas, as well as with spirits of Heaven ( Gandharvas, Yakshas, Kimpurushas, etc .) and gods. " ( Chapter iv. ) There is but one exception in the case of King Priyavrata, the son of the first Manu, Swayambhuva -- who had ten sons. But of these, three -- Medha, Agnibahu, and Putra -- became ascetics, and refused their portions. Thus Priyavrata divided the earth again into seven continents. [[Vol. 2, Page]] 370 THE SECRET DOCTRINE. judgment of the ancient peoples, quite foreign to our entirely material ideas upon celestial mechanics and physical sciences . . . could not see in the stars and planets only that which we see: namely, simple masses of light, or opaque bodies moving in circuits in sidereal space, merely according to the laws of attraction or repulsion; but they saw in them living bodies, animated by spirits as they saw the same in every kingdom of nature. . . . This doctrine of spirits, so consistent and conformable to nature, from which it was derived, formed a grand and unique conception, wherein the physical, the moral, and the political aspects were all blended together . . . " (" Egypte, " pp. 450 to 455.) It is such a conception only that can lead man to form a correct conclusion about his origin and the genesis of everything in the universe -- of Heaven and Earth, between which he is a living link. Without such a psychological link, and the feeling of its presence, no science can ever progress, and the realm of knowledge must be limited to the analysis of physical matter only. Occultists believe in "spirits," because they feel (and some see) themselves surrounded on every side by them.* Materialists do not. They live on this earth, just as, in the world of insects and even of fishes, some creatures live surrounded by myriads of their own genus, without seeing, or so much as sensing them.** Plato is the first sage among the classics who speaks at length of the [[Footnote(s)]] ------------------------------------------------- * As a general rule, now that the very nature of the inner man has become as blind as his physical nature, man is situated on this globe as the Amphioxus is in the Ocean. Surrounded by shoals and millions of various other fishes and creatures that see it, the Amphioxus species --having neither brain nor any of the senses possessed by the other classes -- sees them not. Who knows whether, on the Darwinian theory, these "Branchiostoma" are not the direct ancestors of our Materialists. ** The Occultists have been accused of worshipping gods or devils. We deny this. Among the numberless hosts of spirits -- men that were, and those who will be men -- there are those immeasurably superior to the human race, higher and holier than the highest Saint on Earth, and wiser than any mortal without exception. And there are those again who are no better than we are, as some are far worse and inferior to the lowest savage. It is the latter classes that command the readiest communication with our earth, who perceive and sense us, as the clairvoyants perceive and sense them. The close proximity of our respective abodes and planes of perception are in favour of such inter-communication unfortunately, as they are ever ready to interfere with our affairs for weal or woe. If we are asked how it is that none but sensitive hysterical natures, neuro- and psycho-pathic persons see and occasionally talk with "Spirits," we answer the question by several other queries. We ask: "Do you know the nature of hallucination, and can you define its psychic process? How can you tell that all such visions are due merely to physical hallucinations? What makes you feel so sure that mental and nervous diseases, while drawing a veil over our normal senses (so-called) do not reveal at the same time vistas unknown to the healthy man, by throwing open doors usually closed against your scientific perceptions (?): or that a psycho-spiritual faculty does not forthwith replace the loss, or the temporary atrophy, of a purely physical sense? It is disease, or the exuberance of nervous fluid which produces mediumship and visions --hallucinations, as you call them. But what does Science know even of mediumship?" Truly were the [[Footnote continued on next page]] [[Vol. 2, Page]] 371 A UNIVERSAL CORROBORATION. divine Dynasties, and locates them on a vast continent which he calls Atlantis. Bailly was not the first nor last to believe the same, and he had been preceded and anticipated in this theory by Father Kircher. This learned Jesuit writes in " OEdipus AEgyptiacus " ( Vol. I., p. 70): -- "I confess, for a long time I had regarded all this (dynasties and the Atlantis) as pure fables ( meras nugas ) to the day when, better instructed in Oriental languages, I judged that all those legends must be, after all, only the development of a great truth. . . . ." As de Rougemont shows, Theopompus, in his Meropis, made the priests of Phrygia and Asia Minor speak exactly as the priests of Sais did when they revealed to Solon the history and fate of Atlantis. According to Theopompus, it was a unique continent of an indefinite size, and containing two countries inhabited by two races -- a fighting, warrior race, and a pious, meditative race,* which Theopompus symbolizes by two cities.** The pious "city" was continually visited by the gods ; the belligerent "city" was inhabited by various beings invulnerable to iron, liable to be mortally wounded only by stone and wood."*** De Rougemont treats this as a pure fiction of Theopompus (" Peuple Primitif, " vol. iii. 157) and even sees a fraud ( supercherie ) in the assertion of the Saitic priests. This was denounced by the "Demonologists" as illogical. In the words of De Mirville: -- "A supercherie which was based on a belief, the product of faith of the whole antiquity; a supposition which yet gave its name to a whole mountain chain (the Atlas); which specified with the greatest precision a topographical region (by placing some of its lands at a small distance from Cadiz and the strait of Calpetus), which prophesied, 2,000 years before Columbus, the great trans-oceanic land situated beyond that Atlantis and which "is reached" it said -- "by the islands not of the blessed, but of the good spirits [[ eudaimonia ]] (our ' Iles Fortunees ') -- such a supposition can never be an universal chimera." ( A word on " Atlantis, " p.