The secret doctrine

(e) The aggregate of Dhyân Chohanic Intelligence, Fohat.

(f) Life Principle in Nature.

(g) The Life Procreating Principle in Nature. That which, on the spiritual plane, corresponds to sexual affinity on the lower.

Mirrored on the plane of Gross Nature, the World of Reality is reversed, and becomes on Earth and our plane:

(a) Red is the colour of manifested dual, or male and female. In man it is shown in its lowest animal form.

(b) Orange is the colour of the robes of the Yogîs and Buddhist Priests the colour of the Sun and Spiritual Vitality, also of the Vital Principle.

(c) Yellow or radiant Golden is the colour of the Spiritual, Divine Ray in every atom; in man of Buddhi.

(d) Green and Red are, so to speak, interchangeable colours, for Green absorbs the Red, as being stronger in its vibrations than the latter; and Green is the complementary colour of extreme Red. This is why the Lower Manas and Kâma Rûpa are respectively shown as Green and Red.

(c) The Astral Plane, or Auric Envelope in Nature and Man.

(f) The Mind or rational element in Man and Nature.

(g) The most ethereal counterpart of the Body of man, the opposite pole, standing in point of vibration and sensitiveness as the Violet stands to the Red.

The above is on the manifested plane; after which we get the seven and the Manifested Prism, or Man on Earth. With the latter, the Black Magician alone is concerned.

In Kosmos, the gradations and correlations of Colours and Sounds, and therefore of Numbers are infinite. This is suspected even in Physics, for it is ascertained that there exist slow vibrations than those of the Red, the slowest perceptible to us, and far more rapid vibrations than those of the Violet, the most rapid that our senses can perceive. But on Earth, in our physical world, the range of perceptible vibrations is limited. Our physical senses cannot take cognizance of vibrations above and below the septenary and limited gradations of the prismatic colours, for such vibrations are incapable of causing in us the sensation of colour and sound.

Now, on this plane of illusion, there are three fundamental colours, as demonstrated by Physical Science, Red, Blue and Yellow (or rather Orange-Yellow). Expressed in terms of the human principles they are; (1) Kâma Rûpa, the seat of the animal sensations, welded to, and serving as a vehicle for the Animal Soul or Lower Manas (Red and Green, as said, being interchangeable); (2) Auric envelope, or the essence of man; and (3) Prâna, or Life Principle. But if from the realm of illusion, or the living man as he is on our Earth, subject to his sensuous perceptions only, we pass to that of semi-illusion, and observe the natural colours themselves, or those of the principles, that is, if we try to find which are those in the perfect man absorb all others, we shall find that the colours correspond and become complementary in the following way:

                                                

Violet
1	Red	Green
2	Orange	Blue
3	Yellow	Indigo
Violet

A faint violet, mist-like form represents the Astral Man within an oviform bluish circle, over which radiate in ceaseless vibrations the prismatic colours. That colour is predominant, of which the corresponding principle is the most active generally, or at the particular moment when the clairvoyant perceives it. Such man appears during his waking states; and it is by the predominance of this or that colour, and by the intensity of its vibrations, that a clairvoyant, if he be acquainted with correspondences, can judge of the inner state or character of a person, for the latter is an open book to every practical Occultist. 

In the trance state the Aura changes entirely, the seven prismatic colours being no longer discernible. In sleep also they are not all “at home.” For those which belong to the spiritual elements in the man, viz., Yellow, Buddhi; Indigo, Higher Manas; and the Blue of the Auric Envelope will be either hardly discernible, or altogether missing. The Spiritual Man is free during sleep, and though his physical memory may not become aware of it, lives, robed in his highest essence, in realms on other planes, in realms which are the land of reality, called dreams on our plane of illusion. 

One who comprehends well the above explanations will readily see how important it is for every student, whether he is striving for practical Occult powers or only for the purely psychic and spiritual gifts of clairvoyance and metaphysical knowledge, to master thoroughly the right correspondences between the human, or nature principles, and those of Kosmos.

This was why the previous knowledge of music and geometry was obligatory in the School of Pythagoras.

These Hierarchies can only be symbolized as concentric circles of prismatic colours; each Hierarchy being represented by a series of seven concentric circles, each circle representing one of the prismatic colours in their negative order. But in each of these “wheels” one circle will be brighter and more vivid in colour than the rest, and the wheel will have a surrounding Aura (a fringe, as the physicists call it) of that colour. This colour will be the characteristic colour of that Hierarchy as a whole. Each of these Hierarchies furnishes the essence (the Soul) and is the “Builder” of one of the seven kingdoms of Nature which are the three elemental kingdoms, the mineral, the vegetable, the (Page 482) animal, and the kingdom of spiritual man. [See Five Years of Theosophy. pp. 273 to 278.] Moreover, each Hierarchy furnishes the Aura of one of the seven principles in man with its specific colour. Further, as each of these Hierarchies is the Ruler of one of the Sacred Planets, it will easily be understood how Astrology came into existence, and that real Astrology has a strictly scientific basis.

The symbol adopted in the Eastern School to represent the Seven Hierarchies of creative Powers is a wheel of seven concentric circles, each circle being coloured with one of the seven colours; call them Angels, if you will, or Planetary Spirits, or, again, the Seven Rulers of the Seven Sacred Planets of our system, as in our present case. At all events, the concentric circles stand as symbols for Ezekiel’s Wheels with some Western Occultists and Kabalists, and for the “Builders” or Prajâpati with us.

The student should carefully examine the following Diagram.

The student will understand that the Orders and Hierarchies are here named after their corresponding colours, so as to avoid using numerals, which would be confusing in connection with the human principles, as the latter have no proper numbers of their own. The real Occult names of these Hierarchies cannot now be given.

The student must, however, remember that the colours which we see with our physical eyes are not the true colours of Occult Nature, but are merely the effects produced on the mechanism of our physical organs by certain rates of vibration. For instance, Clerk Maxwell has demonstrated that the retinal effects of any colour may be initiated by properly combining three other colours. It follows, therefore, that our retina has only three distinct colour sensations and we therefore do not perceive the seven colours which really exist, but only their “imitations” so to speak, in our physical organism.

Thus, for instance, the Orange-Red of the first “Triangle” is not a combination of Orange and Red, but the true “spiritual” Red, if the term may be allowed, while, the Red (blood-red) of the spectrum is the colour of Kâma animal desire, and is inseparable from the material plane.

O God Ani [the Spiritual Sun], thou residest in the agglomeration of thy divine personages.

These words show the belief of the ancients that all manifestation proceeds from one and the same Source, all emanating from the one identical Principle which can never be completely developed except in and through the collective and entire aggregate of Its emanations.

The Pleroma of Valentinus is absolutely the Space of Occult Philosophy; for Pleroma means the “Fullness,” the superior regions. It is the sum total of all the Divine manifestations and emanations expressing the plenum or totality of the rays proceeding from the ONE differentiating on all the planes, and transforming themselves into Divine Powers, called Angels and Planetary Spirits in the Philosophy of every nation. The Gnostic Æons and Powers of the Pleroma are made to speak as the Devas and Siddhas of the Purânas. The Epinoia, the first female manifestation of God, the “Principle” of Simon Magus and Saturninus, holds the same language as the Logos of Basilides; and each of these is traced to the purely esoteric Alêtheia, the TRUTH of the Mysteries. All of them, we are taught, repeat at different times and in different languages the magnificent hymn of the Egyptian papyrus, thousands of years old:

The Gods adore thee, they greet thee, O the One Dark Truth.

The Gods bow before thy Majesty, by exalting the Souls of that which produces them . . . and say to thee, Peace to all emanations from the Unconscious Father of the Conscious Fathers of the Gods . . . Thou producer of beings, we adore the souls which emanate from thee. Thou begettest us, O thou Unknown, and we greet thee in worshipping each God-Soul which descendeth from thee and liveth in us.

This is the source of the assertion:

Know ye not that ye are Gods and the temple of God.

This is shown in the “Roots of Ritualism in Church and Masonry,” in Lucifer for March, 1889. Truly then, as said seventeen centuries ago, “Man cannot possess Truth (Alêtheia) except he participate in the Gnosis.” So we may say now: No man can know the Truth unless he studies the secrets of the Pleroma of Occultism; and these secrets are all in the Theogony of the ancient Wisdom-Religion, which is the Alêtheia of Occult Science.

The reason of this difficulty in most cases has been that the point of view taken was erroneous; the purely abstract and metaphysical was mistaken for, and confused with, the concrete and the physical. Let us take for example the diagrams on page 477 (Paper II ), and say that these are entirely macrocosmic and ideal. It must be remembered that the study of Occultism proceeds from Universals to Particulars and not the reverse way, as accepted by Science. As Plato was an Initiate, he very naturally used the former method, while Aristotle, never having been initiated, scoffed at his master, and, elaborating a system of his own, left it as an heirloom to be adopted and improved by Bacon. Of a truth the aphorism of Hermetic Wisdom, “As above, so below, “ applies to all Esoteric instruction; but we must begin with the above; we must learn the formula before we can sum the series.

The two figures, therefore, are not meant to represent any two particular planes, but are the abstraction of a pair of planes, explanatory of the law of reflection, just as the Lower Manas is a reflection of the Higher. They must therefore be taken in the highest metaphysical sense.

The diagrams are only intended to familiarize students with the leading ideas of Occult correspondences, the very genius of metaphysical, or macrocosmic and spiritual Occultism forbidding the use of figures or even symbols further than as temporary aids. Once define an idea in words, and it loses its reality; once figure a metaphysical idea, and you materialize its spirit.

Let students, therefore, be very careful to spiritualize the Papers and avoid materializing them; let them always try to find the highest meaning possible, confident that in proportion as they approach the material and visible in their speculations on the Papers, so far as they from the right understanding of them. This is especially the case with these first Papers and Diagrams, for as in all true arts, so in Occultism, we must first learn the theory before we are taught the practice.

To this Occultism would reply: for two reasons:—

(a) The whole truth is too sacred to be given out promiscuously.

(b) The knowledge of all the details and missing links in the exoteric teachings is too dangerous in profane hands.

The truths revealed to man by the “Planetary Spirits”—the highest Kumâras, those who incarnate no longer in the Universe during this Mahâmanvantara—who will appear on earth as Avatâras only at the beginning of every new human Race, and at the junctions or close of the two ends of the small and great cycles—in time, as man became more animalized, were made to fade away from his memory. Yet, though these Teachers remain with man no longer than the time required to impress upon the plastic minds of child-humanity the eternal verities they teach, Their Spirit remains vivid though latent in mankind. And the full knowledge of the primitive revelation has remained always with a few elect, and has been transmitted from that time up to the present, from one generation of Adepts to another. As the Teachers say in the Occult Primer:

This is done so as to ensure them [the eternal truths] from being utterly lost or forgotten in ages hereafter by the forthcoming generations.

The mission of the Planetary Spirit is but to strike the key-note of Truth. When once He has directed the vibration of the latter to run its course uninterruptedly along the concatenation of the race to the end of the cycle, He disappears from our earth until the following Planetary Manvantara. The mission of any teacher of Esoteric truths, (Page 488) whether he stands at the top or the foot of the ladder of knowledge, is precisely the same; as above, so below. I have only orders to strike the key-note of the various Esoteric truths among the learners as a body. Those units among you who will have raised themselves on the “Path” over their fellow-students, in their Esoteric sphere, will, as the “Elect” spoken of did and do in the Parent Brotherhoods, receive the last explanatory details and the ultimate key to what they learn. No one, however, can hope to gain this privilege before the MASTERS—not my humble self—find him or her worthy.

If you wish to know the real raison d’être for this policy, I now give it to you. No use my repeating and explaining what all of you know as well as myself; at the very beginning, events have shown that no caution can be dispensed with. Of our body of several hundred men and women, many did not seem to realize either the awful sacredness of the pledge (which some took at the end of their pen), or the fact that their personality has to be entirely disregarded, when brought face to face with their HIGHER SELF; or that all their words and professions went for naught unless corroborated by actions. This was human nature, and no more; therefore it was passed leniently by, and a new lease accorded by the MASTER. But apart from this there is a danger lurking in the nature of the present cycle itself. Civilized humanity, however carefully guarded by its invisible Watchers, the Nirmânakâyas, who watch over our respective races and nations, is yet, owing to its collective Karma, terribly under the sway of the traditional opposers of the Nirmânakâyas—the “Brothers of the Shadow,” embodied and disembodied; and this, as has already been told you, will last to the end of the first Kali Yuga cycle (1897), and a few years beyond, as the smaller dark cycle happens to overlap the great one. Thus, notwithstanding all precautions, terrible secrets are often revealed to entirely unworthy persons by the efforts of the “Dark Brothers” and their working on human brains. This is entirely owning to the simple fact that in certain privileged organisms, vibrations of the primitive truth put in motion by the Planetary Beings are set up, in what Western philosophy would term innate ideas, and Occultism “flashes of genius,” * [See “Genius,” Lucifer. Nov., 1889. p.227] Some such idea based on eternal truth is awakened, and all that the watchful Powers can do is to prevent its entire revelation.

Everything in this Universe of differentiated matter has its two aspects, the light and the dark side, and these two attributes applied practically, lead the one to use, the other to abuse.

It is incorrect to think that there exists any special “powder of projection” or “philosopher’s stone,” or “elixir of life.” The latter lurks in every flower, in every stone and mineral throughout the globe. It is the ultimate essence of everything on its way to higher and higher evolution. As there is no good or evil per se, so there is neither “elixir of life” nor “elixir of death,” nor poison, per se, but all this is contained in one and the same universal Essence, this or the other effect, or result, depending on the degree of its differentiation and its various correlations. The light side of it produces life, health, bliss, divine peace, etc; the dark side brings death, disease, sorrow and strife. This is proven by the knowledge of the nature of the most violent poisons; of some of them even a large quantity will produce no evil effect on the organism, whereas a grain of the same poison kills with (Page 490) the rapidity of lightning; while the same grain, again, altered by a certain combination, though its quantity remains almost identical, will heal. The number of the degrees of its differentiation is septenary, as are the planes of its action, each degree being either beneficent or maleficent in its effects, according to the system into which it is introduced. He who is skilled in these degrees is on the high road to practical Adeptship; he who acts at haphazard—as do the enormous majority of the “Mind Curers,” whether “Mental” or “Christian Scientists”—is likely to rue the effects on himself as well as on others. Put on the track by the example of the Indian Yogis, and of their broadly but incorrectly outlined practices, which they have only read about, but have have no opportunity to study—these new sects have rushed headlong and guideless into the practice of denying and affirming. Thus they have done more harm than good. Those who are successful owe it to their innate magnetic and healing powers which very often counteract that which would otherwise be conductive to much evil. Beware, I say: Satan and the Archangel are more than twins; they are one body and one mind—Deus est Demon inversus.

Now the Tattvas being simple, the substratum of the seven forces of Nature, how can this be? There are seven forms of Prakriti, as Kapila’s Sânkhya, the Vishnu Purâna, and other works teach. Prakriti is Nature, Matter (primordial and elemental); therefore logic demands that the Tattvas also should be seven. For whether Tattvas mean, as Occultism teaches, “forces of Nature,” or, as the learned Râma Prâsad explains, “the substance out of which the universe is formed” and “the power by which it is sustained,” it is all one; they (Page 492) are Force, Purusha, and Matter, Prakriti. And if the forms, or rather planes, of the latter are seven, then its forces must be seven also. In other words, the degrees of the solidity of matter and the degrees of the power that ensouls it must go hand in hand.

The Universe is made out of the Tattva, it is sustained by the Tattva, and it disappears into the Tattva,

says Shiva, as quoted from the Shivâgama in Nature’s Finer Forces. This settles the question; if Prakriti is septenary, then the Tattvas must be seven, for, as said, they are both Substance and Force, or atomic Matter and the Spirit that ensouls it.

This is explained here to enable the student to read between the lines of the so-called Occult articles on Sanskrit Philosophy by which they must not be misled. The doctrine of the seven Tattvas (the principles of the Universe and also of man ) was held in great sacredness and therefore secrecy, in the days of old, by the Brâhmans, who have now almost forgotten the teaching. Yet it is taught to this day in the Schools beyond the Himâlayan Range, though now hardly remembered or heard of in India except through rare Initiates. The policy has, however, been changed gradually; Chelâs began to be taught the broad outlines of it, and at the advent of the T.S. in India, in 1879, I was ordered to teach it in is exoteric form to one or two. I now give it out Esoterically.

Knowing that some students try to follow a system of Yoga in their own fashion, guided only by the rare hints they find in Theosophical books and magazines, which must naturally be incomplete, I chose one of the best expositions upon ancient Occult works, Nature’s Finer Forces, in order to point out how very easily one can be misled by their blinds.

The author seems to have been himself deceived. The Tantras read Esoterically are as full of wisdom as the noblest Occult works. Studied without a guide and applied to practice, they may lead to the production of various phenomenal results, on the moral and physiological planes. But let anyone accept their dead-letter rules and practices, let him try with some selfish motive in view to carry out the rites prescribed therein, and—he is lost. Followed with pure heart and unselfish devotion merely for the sake of experiment, either no results will follow, or such as can only throw back the performer.

The “Seven Principles” (Page 493) But woe to the selfish man who seeks to develop Occult powers only to attain earthly benefits or revenge, or to satisfy his ambition; the separation of the Higher from the Lower Principles and the severing of Buddhi-Manas from the Tantrist’s personality will speedily follow, the terrible Karmic results to the dabbler in Magic.

In the East, in India and China, Soulless men and women are as frequently met with as in the West, though vice is, in truth, far less developed there than it is here.

It is Black Magic and oblivion of their ancestral wisdom that lead them thereunto. But of this I will speak later, now merely adding: you have to be warned and know the danger.

Meanwhile, in view of what follows, the real Occult division of the Principles in their correspondences with the Tattvas and other minor forces has to be well studied.