A Treatise on Cosmic Fire Page 20

  Extend this idea from man, an individualised unit of [232] consciousness, to the great Heavenly Men, in one of Whose bodies a man forms a cell. The body of expression of each Heavenly Man is one of the sacred planets, and They aim at the same goal as man—the attainment, on Their own levels, of full expression, and the development of Their vehicles of consciousness to a point where the Spirit may blaze forth as light divine, and as heat. This heat radiates consciously and with intense magnetic attraction between all the seven systemic groups, or planetary schemes. Their magnetic field of action will include the planetary radius of one and all. Carry this thought still further to include the Son, and the entire solar system which He animates; His attempt is to find full expression therein, so that eventually and consciously His light may be seen and His heat, or magnetic radiation, may be felt beyond His immediate sphere of influence, the logoic ring-pass-not. Both the light of the Son and the heat of the Son must be felt by the opposite cosmic pole, that constellation which is our system’s magnetic opposite.

  2. The objective of the units of consciousness.

  Thus, the thought of union and of fusion underlies the entire scheme of evolution; Man, the Heavenly Men, and the cosmic Man (the Son of the Father and the Mother) have to

  a. Radiate occult heat beyond their own individualised ring-pass-not.

  b. Occultly blaze forth and demonstrate light or fiery objectivity.

  c. Expand so as to include that which lies beyond their own immediate spheres.

  d. Fuse and blend the two fires so as to produce perfectly the central fire, solar fire.

  e. Blend Spirit and matter so that a body is produced that will adequately express Spirit.

  f. Merge the essence within the form, which is occultly [233] qualified during evolution, with the essence in all form—humanly, in a planetary sense, and cosmically.

  g. Attain human, systemic and cosmic manhood.

  h. Achieve mastery on three planes of the solar system, humanly speaking.

  i. Achieve mastery on five planes of the solar system, when speaking of a Heavenly Man.

  j. Achieve mastery on three cosmic planes when speaking of the cosmic Christ, the Son, or the Logos manifesting objectively.

  3. The Manifesting Units of Consciousness. (94)

  If these stated aims are carefully considered, it will be seen how each has its place within the plan, and how [234] evolution is but a term used to express the gradual development in time and space of the inherent capacity of a human being, of a Heavenly Man, and of the Grand Man of the Heavens. The place and position of one and all to each other must be borne in mind, for no one can develop without the other. What, therefore, have we?

  a. The Son, the Grand Man of the Heavens. He manifests through the Sun and the seven sacred planets, each of whom embodies one of His seven principles, just as He in His totality embodies one of the principles of a greater cosmic Entity.

  b. A Heavenly Man. He manifests through a planet, and embodies one of the principles of the Son, the Logos. He Himself is likewise developing through seven principles, which are the source of His essential unity with all other Heavenly Men. Cosmically considered, the Son is developing the principle of a greater cosmic Being, that principle which we call love-wisdom. That is the fundamental characteristic He has to develop during His life cycle. Each Heavenly Man, therefore, embodies predominantly a subsidiary principle of the fundamental one. In like manner He Himself has six subsidiary principles, as has the Son.

  c. A Human Being, Man. He manifests on the physical [235] plane through form, and has also seven principles; in each life cycle he works at their development. He likewise has His primary coloring, dependent upon the fundamental principle embodied by the Heavenly Man, Who is his originating source. Thus we have:

  THE LOGOS

  Father-Spirit . . . . . . . . . . . .Mother-Matter.

  producing

  The Son or the Grand Man of the Heavens,

  the conscious logoic Ego

  evolving through

  The Sun and the seven sacred planets

  each embodying a

  Cosmic principle, in six differentiations

  by method of

  a. Expansion, vibratory stimulation, magnetic interaction, or the law of attraction and repulsion.

  b. Cyclic progress, rotary repetition, coupled to spiralling ascension, and developing

  a. The quality of love-wisdom, through the utilization of form by the means of active intelligence.

  b. Full self-consciousness.

  c. A perfected solar system, or the form, adequate to the needs of the indwelling spirit.

  Here a similar tabulation may be worked out to demonstrate the similarity of the process in the case of a Heavenly Man and a human being. If we ask why ten schemes, and in effect ten planets (seven sacred and three concealed) [236] it is because the seven sacred planets are eventually merged into the three, and finally the three are blended into the one. This can be traced along the line of analogy as we consider the seven Rays. These seven Rays, which in manifestation are diverse, are eventually synthesised. The minor four are blended, we are told, into the third major ray, and the three major rays are finally merged into the one synthetic ray, the Love-Wisdom Ray (the Dragon of Wisdom, the occult serpent swallowing its tail) (S. D., I, 704; II, 531). This has been pointed out by H. P. B. We have, therefore, the three crowning rays, but seven seen during the evolutionary process. In connection with the Heavenly Men, functioning through the planets, there are, therefore, three planets which might be considered as synthesising planets, and four which are blended eventually, until the three have absorbed the essence of the four; finally the one absorbs the essence of the three, and the work is completed. This process lies many millennia ahead, during the inevitable period of the gradual obscuration of our system. Four of the Heavenly Men find Their magnetic opposites, and fuse and blend. First this takes place between Themselves, the negative and the positive rays merging and fusing, forming then the two from the four. Again the two merge, producing a united whole, and the one thus produced blends with the major third ray, the intelligence aspect,—the ray represented in our planetary Hierarchy by the Mahachohan. So the fusion will proceed until ultimately unity is reached in the system, and the Son has accomplished His purpose. He is perfected love-wisdom; his light shines forth cosmically; His magnetic radius touches the periphery of His cosmic opposite, and the marriage of the Son is effected. The two cosmic units merge.

  If we here naturally ask which is the cosmic unit that is our solar opposite, we shall be told that that question [237] lies hid for the present, though it is hinted at in the Secret Doctrine, and in other sacred books. A hint lies concealed in the relationship of the Pleiades to our earth, but not until a further precession of the equinoxes will it be more fully seen what is the exact relationship involved. (96)

  III. WHY IS THIS SOLAR SYSTEM EVOLVING ALONG THE LINES OF DUALITY?

  1. The Problem of Existence.

  The third question involves one of the most difficult problems in metaphysics, and covers in its consideration the whole perplexing mystery of the reason why there is objectivity at all.

  It is one that has been asked under different forms by men of every school of thought—by religious people who enquire:—”Why did God create at all? Why is existence forced upon one and all?”; by scientists in their search for the ultimate truth and in their endeavor to find out the motivation of all that is seen, and to account for sensuous life; by philosophers in their equally diligent search for that animating subjectivity that is expressing itself through all the moral and ethical sciences in every civilisation and among every people; by the biologist in his persistent application to search for the discovery of the source of life, and in his strenuous endeavour to account for the principle of life that is seen ever to evade his investigations; by the mathematician, who, dealing with the form side of manifestation in all the grades of mathematics, decides that God geometrises, that law and rule perv
ade universally, that the one exists by means of the many, and who yet is unable to solve the problem as to who that geometrising [238] identity may be. So the problems persist, and all the many lines of approach (in the endeavour to find the solution) end in the cul-de-sac of hypothesis, and in the recognition of an ultimate something of such an elusive nature, that men are forced seemingly to predicate a source of energy, of life, of intelligence, and to call it by diverse names according to the trend (religious, scientific or philosophical) of their minds. God, the Universal Mind, Energy, Force, the Absolute, the Unknown,—these terms and many others are forced from the lips of those who, by means of the form side, seek the Dweller within the form, and cannot find Him as yet. This failure to find Him is due to the limitations of the physical brain, and to the lack of development in the mechanism whereby the spiritual may be known, and whereby He may, and eventually will, be contacted.

  The problem of duality is the problem of existence itself, and cannot be solved by the man who refuses to recognise the possibility of two occult facts:

  1. That the entire solar system embodies the consciousness of an Entity, who originates on planes entirely without the solar ring-pass-not.

  2. That manifestation is periodical and that the Law of Rebirth is the method that evolution takes in dealing with a man, a planetary Logos, and a solar Logos. Hence, the emphasis laid in the Proem of the Secret Doctrine on the three fundamentals, (I, 42-44)

  a. The Boundless Immutable Principle and

  b. The periodicity of the Universe.

  c. The identity of all souls with the Oversoul.

  When scientists recognise these two facts then their explanations will take a different line and the truth, as it is, will begin to illuminate their reason. Few men are yet ready for illumination, which is simply the light of the [239] intuition breaking through the barriers that the rational faculty has erected. The duality of the solar system will eventually be recognised as dependent upon the following factors:

  a. Existence itself.

  b. Time and space.

  c. The quality of desire or necessity.

  d. The acquisitive faculty inherent in life itself. This faculty, by the means of motion, gathers to itself the material whereby it achieves its desire, whereby it fabricates the form through which expression is sought, and whereby it confines itself within the prison of the sheath in order to gain experience.

  The supposition is correct that this theory takes for granted a mighty Intelligence who works thus through an ordered plan, and Who consciously takes shape and incarnates in order to carry out specific purposes of His own. But this hypothesis is but the rock bottom fact underlying the eastern teaching, and is one that is largely accepted, though diversely expressed and viewed by thinkers of all schools of thought throughout the globe. Even this conception is but a partial presentation of the real Idea, but owing to the limitations of man at this stage of evolution, it is sufficient as a working basis on which he may erect his temple of truth.

  This Entity, Whom we call the solar Logos, is in no sense the same as the personal God of the Christian, who is no more nor less than man himself, expanded into a being of awful power, and subject to the virtues and vices of man himself. The solar Logos is more than man, for He is the sumtotal of all the evolutions within the entire solar system, including the human, which is an evolution standing at a middle point in relation to the other evolutions. On one side of him are ranged hosts of beings who are more than human, and who, in [240] past kalpas, reached and passed the stage where man now is; on the other side are hosts of the subhuman evolutions who in future kalpas will achieve the stage of humanity. Man stands midway between the two, and is at the point of balance; herein lies his problem. He does not partake wholly of the material side of evolution, nor is he wholly the expression of the third Logos, the Brahma aspect of the Deity, Who is an expression of pure energy or intelligence, motivating that tenuous something which we call substance. He is not wholly Spirit, the expression of the first Logos, the Mahadeva aspect, which is an expression of pure will or necessitous desire, impelling to manifestation. It is the fundamental motive itself or the great will to be. Man is a product of the union of the two; he is the meeting place of matter or active intelligent substance, and of Spirit or the basic will. He is the child born of their marriage or at-one-ment. He assumes objectivity in order to express that which is in each of the two opposites, plus the result of their merging in himself.

  2. Its Nature and Duality.

  In terms of quality what have we? Active intelligence at one with will or power produces that “Son of necessity” (S.D., I,74) (as H. P. B. expresses it) Who embodies intelligence, will or desire, and their united latent demonstration, love-wisdom.

  In terms of Fire how might we express an analogous thought? The fire latent in matter—itself a product of an earlier manifestation of the same cosmic Identity, or the relatively perfected quality worked out by Him in a previous cosmic incarnation—is set in motion again by the desire of that same Identity to circle once more the wheel of rebirth. That “fire by friction” produces heat and radiation and calls forth a reaction from its [241] opposite “electric fire” or spirit. Here we have the thought of the Ray striking through matter, for the action of electric fire is ever forward, as earlier suggested. The one Ray “electric fire” drops into matter. This is the systemic marriage of the Father and the Mother. The result is the blending of these two fires, and their united production of that expression of fire which we call “solar fire.” Thus is produced the Son. Active Intelligence and Will are united and love-wisdom, when perfected through evolution, will be the outcome.

  Electric fire or Spirit, united to fire by friction (heat) produces solar fire or light.

  Hence, when the cosmic Entity takes form, there is added to the active intelligence which is the product of His earlier incarnation, a further quality, which is inherent and potential, that of love-wisdom. This is the ability to love that which is objective or the not-self, and ultimately to use with wisdom the form. Pure will is as yet an abstraction, and will only be brought into full development in another incarnation of the Logos. Mind or Intelligence is not an abstraction; it is something that IS. Neither is love-wisdom an abstraction. It is in process of development or bringing into manifestation, and is the aspect of the Son.

  What is above stated is in no way new, but these thoughts on essential duality are gathered together, in order to convey to our minds the necessity of viewing these things from the standpoint of their place in the cosmic scheme, and not from the point of view of our own planetary evolution and of man himself. Humanity is that evolution through which the Son aspect is to express itself most perfectly in this cosmic incarnation. Man blends the pairs of opposites, and the three fires meet in him. He is the best expression of the manasic principle and might be considered, from one very interesting [242] standpoint, the chef-d’oeuvre of Brahma. He is the sheath for the life of God; he is the individualised consciousness of the Logos, manifesting through the seven divine Manasaputras, or Heavenly Men, in Whose bodies each unit of the human family finds place. He is the Vishnu aspect in process of development through the intelligence of Brahma, impelled by the will of Mahadeva. Therefore, in a peculiar sense man is very important, as he is the place of at-one-ment for all the three aspects; nevertheless, he is very unimportant for he is not the apex of the triangle, but simply the middle point, if we view the triangle thus:

  Spirit-Father.

  The Son or man.

  Matter-Mother.

  The evolution of the Son, or the cosmic incarnation of the Christ, is of immense importance in the plans of the Being greater than the solar Logos, HE ABOUT WHOM NAUGHT MAY BE SAID. The animating principles of allied constellations and systems watch the progress of the evolution of the Son with keenest attention.

  Just as the planet called the earth is regarded as the turning point or the battle-ground between Spirit and matter, and is therefore, from that very consideration,
of great importance, so our solar system holds an analogous place in the cosmic scheme. The cosmic man, the solar Arjuna, is wrestling for His individualised perfected self-consciousness, and for freedom and liberation from the form, and from the not-self. So man on this planet battles for similar ideals on his tiny scale; so battle in heaven Michael and His Angels, or the divine Heavenly Men, Whose problem is the same on the higher scale.

  Duality, and the interplay between the two produces: [243]

  a. Objectivity, or the manifested Son or Sun.

  b. Evolution itself.

  c. The development of quality.

  d. Time and space.

  The questions we are now engaged in answering embody certain fundamental aspects of manifestation, viewed principally from the subjective or psychic angle.

  IV. WHAT IS CONSCIOUSNESS? WHAT IS ITS PLACE IN THE SCHEME OF THINGS?

  Consciousness might be defined as the faculty of apprehension, and concerns primarily the relation of the Self to the not-self, of the Knower to the Known, and of the Thinker to that which is thought about. All these definitions involve the acceptance of the idea of duality, of that which is objective and of that which lies back of objectivity. (99)

  Consciousness expresses that which might be regarded as the middle point in manifestation. It does not involve entirely the pole of Spirit. It is produced by the union of the two poles, and the process of interplay and of adaptation that necessarily ensues. It might be tabulated as follows, in an effort to clarify by visualisation: [244]