FOOTNOTES:
[81] The fifth, or Aryan race, in theosophic nomenclature; the fourth was that of Atlantis; the third lived on the great southern continent, Lemuria; the two preceding ones were, so to speak, only the embryologic preparation for the following races.
[82] The "life-atoms," infinitesimal particles which by aggregation form the human body. Certain of these atoms are preserved, on the death of the body, as germs which will facilitate the reconstruction of the physical body at the next rebirth.
[83] The divine Essence which animates animals, and so, in another sense the astral bodies of men and animals, bodies whose particles transmigrate as do the physical atoms.
[84] H. P. Blavatsky, Secret Doctrine.
[85] These words are relative; they express differences in the evolution of souls.
[86] The atmosphere of subtle physical elements radiating round the human body and acting in a defensive rôle by preventing the penetration of unhealthy elements from the immediate surroundings.
[87] The "material sin" of Manu.
[88] One, here means the "life atoms" of a man's body.
[89] The word is here used in a generic sense; in the present work, it would be more precise to replace it by the word Resurrection.
[90] This "triad" comprises the visible matter of the body, the etheric substance, and the life (Prâna) which the human ether absorbs and specialises for the vitalising of the body. See Man and his Bodies, by A. Besant.
[91] H. P. Blavatsky, The Theosophist, Vol. 4, pages 287, 288.
[92] The finer elements invisible to physical eye. Their function is sensation, and by their association with the human mental body incarnated in them, they give birth to the emotions and passions, in a word, to the animal in man.
[93] The Umbra of the Latin races.
[94] The Kâma Rûpa of the Hindus.
[95] The purgatory of Christians, the astral plane of theosophists, and the Kâmaloka of Hindus.
[96] By the fire of purgatory, says the Catholic metaphor.
[97] See A. Besant's masterly work on Reincarnation.
[98] Dharma is a wide word, primarily meaning the essential nature of a thing; hence the laws of its being, its duty; and it includes religious rites, appropriate to those laws. This definition, as also the extracts quoted, are taken from A. Besant's translation of the Bhagavad Gîtâ.
[99] Human souls, not all of them, but only the pious ones, are daimonic and divine. Once separated from the body, and after the struggle to acquire piety, which consists in knowing God and injuring none, such a soul becomes all intelligence. The impious soul, however, remains in its own essence and punishes itself by seeking a human body to enter into, for no other body can receive a human soul, it cannot enter the body of an animal devoid of reason: divine law preserves the human soul from such infamy. Hermes Trismegistus, Book I, Laclé: Hermes to his son Tat.
[100] Bodies.
[101] The physical body with its etheric "double," and life (Prâna).
[102] The kâmic body.
[103] The causal body.
[104] History. Book 2, chap. 123.
[105] The causal body.
[106] The buddhic body, which, in ordinary man, is only in an embryonic stage.
[107] Generally called Prâna, in man. Jiva is the solar life which, on being transmuted by the physical body, becomes Prâna, the human physical life. Both Jiva and Prâna differ from each other in nature and in vibration.
[108] The mental body.
[109] The causal body. In annihilation—what has been called the loss of the soul—the kâmic principle (astral body) in the course of a rather long succession of lives, does not allow the mental body to become separated from it in purgatory; it keeps it imprisoned up to the time of its disintegration; the causal body reaps nothing from the incarnations, at each re-birth it loses the forces it is putting forth in order to form the new mental body. It gradually atrophies until the time comes when it is no longer fit to make use of the ordinary bodies of the race to which it belongs. Then it remains at rest, whilst the mental body gradually disintegrates; afterwards it takes up once again its series of incarnations in the imperfectly evolved bodies of primitive races. This will be understood only by those who have studied theosophy.
[110] In this passage, H. P. Blavatsky alludes to the few etheric, astral, and mental atoms which, at each disincarnation, are incorporated in the causal body and form the nuclei of the future bodies corresponding to them.
[111] History. Vol. 2, book 2, chap. 123 (already quoted).
[112] Of the elements of the personality—of the astral body, in all probability.
[113] The Ego (soul) also lives in the air (the symbol of heaven) and on the earth (whose symbol is water, dense matter)—in heaven, after disincarnation; on earth, during incarnation.
[114] The soul is immortal and needs no food.
[115] Its name, Khopiroo, comes from the root Koproo, to become, to be born again (H. P. Blavatsky).
Hartley says: "At the centre of the solar disk appears the Scarabeus as the symbol of the soul re-uniting itself with the body. The Scarabeus is called by Pierret the synthesis of the Egyptian religion—type of resurrection—of self-existence—of self-engendering like the Gods. As Tori, or Chepi, the Sun is the Scarabeus, or self-engenderer, and the mystery of God."
[116] Also called kâmic body, astral body, body of desire, etc.
[117] Reincarnation.
[118] Vol. 3, p. 124.
[119] The causal body illumined by the divine Essence, which theosophy names Âtmâ-Buddhi.
[120] He calls him "the prince of lying fathers and dishonest writers." (Egypt, vol. 1, p. 200).
[121] Eusebius even confesses this himself: "I have set forth whatever is calculated to enhance the glory of our religion, and kept back everything likely to cast a stain upon it." (Prœparatio Evangelica. Book 12, chap. 31).
[122] Namae-Sat Vakhshûr-i-Mahabad, also in the fourth "Journey" in chap. 4 of Jam-i-Kaikhoshru (see The Theosophist, p. 333, vol. 21).
[123] See Bardic Triads, by E. Williams. Translated from the original Welsh.
[124] "'Abred' is the circle of the migrations through which every animated being proceeds from death: man has passed through it." Triad 13.
"Transmigration is in 'Abred.'" Triad 14.
"There are three primitive calamities in 'Abred': the necessity of evolution (of rebirths), the absence of memory (of past incarnations) and death (followed by rebirth)." Triad 18 (the words in parentheses are our own).
"By reason of three things man is subjected to 'Abred' (or transmigration): by the absence of the effort to attain knowledge, by non-attachment to good, and by attachment to evil. As the result of these, he descends into 'Abred,' to the stage corresponding to his development, and begins his transmigrations anew." Triad 25.
"The three foundations of science are: complete transmigration through every state of being, the memory of the details of each transmigration, the power to pass again at will through any state, to acquire experience and judgment, (a) This comes to pass in the circle of Gwynvyd." Triad 36.
(a) The liberated being has power to call up the past, to tune his consciousness with that of every being, to feel everything that being feels, to be that being.
[125] In the poem Cad-Godden, quoted by Pezzani in La Pluralité des Existences de l'Âme, p. 93. Taliesin is a generic name indicating a function rather than the name of an individual.
[126] Gallic War (Book 2, chap. 6). Valerius Maximus relates that these nations lent one another money which was to be paid back in the other world, and that at Marseilles a sweet-tasted poison was given to anyone who, wishing to commit suicide, offered the judges satisfactory reasons for leaving his body.
[127] The Mystery of the Ages, by the Duchesse de Pomar.
[128] In Theologia or the Seven Adyta.
[129] The "Cycle of Necessity" extends from the time when the soul begins to evolve to the moment when it attains to liberation.
[130] Life of Pythagoras. Book 8, chap. 14.
[131] Ovid's Metamorphoses. Book 15.
[132] All that remained of the shield was the carved ivory ornamentation, the iron had been eaten away by rust.
[133] Philostratus, Life of Apollonius of Tyana.
[134] Philostratus, Life of Apollonius of Tyana.
[135] Marinas, Vita Procli.
[136] The Ego, the human soul properly so-called, what Egypt named the liberated intelligence which resumes its sheath of light, and again becomes a "daimon" (Maspero). In antiquity the name of daimon was given to the human soul or to higher intelligences.
[137] Hades; the Purgatory of Catholics; the Kâmalôka of Hindus.
[138] Allusion to the struggle which separates the mental from the astral body in Purgatory.
[139] Kâmalôka; Purgatory.
[140] The subterranean hell, the lowest world in Purgatory.
[141] Plato's Laws, Book 10.
[142] Plato's Republic, Book 10.
[143] They are in the causal body.
[144] Phædo.
[145] These considerations are taken from the writings of H. P. Blavatsky, and are also confirmed by modern criticism of biblical texts.
[146] Maimonides. Quoted in The Perfect Way, by A. Kingsford and E. Maitland.
[147] Galatians, chap. 4, verses 24, 25.
[148] Starli, part 4, p. 5.
[149] Deuteronomy, chap. 24, verses 1 to 4.
[150] Deuteronomy, chap. 17, verse 17.
[151] Exodus, chap. 21, verses 2 to 11.
[152] Exodus, chap. 21, verses 23, 24, 25.
[153] Genesis, chap. 9, verses 5, 6; also Leviticus, chap. 7.
[154] Exodus, chapters 6, 12, 14, 22, 32,
[155] Ecclesiastes, chap. 3, verses 18, 19, 20, 22.
[156] The souls of a race in its maturity are of a more advanced type than those of its infancy or old age.
[157] The Kabala is the secret teaching of the Jews; in it lie hidden doctrines that are too profound to be taught in public.
[158] Zohar, 2, 99, quoted in Myer's Qabbalah, p. 198.
[159] Evolution develops the soul, enabling it to reach its goal: the divine state.
[160] The force of evolution comes from God and ceases only when the soul is fully developed, and has reached the "promised land" at the end of its pilgrimage: the divine state.
[161] Franck, La Kabbale, p. 244, etc.
[162] The Hidden Wisdom of Christ, 1864, vol. 1, p. 39.
[163] De Bell. jud. 2, 11.
[164] One of the lowest sub-planes of Kâmaloka (Purgatory).
[165] The Christian Heaven (Devachan of theosophy).
[166] The earth, which is above when compared with Tartarus, but not so in relation to the Elysian Fields; versification imposes such strict limits on expression, that it must have the benefit of poetic licence.
[167] Fréret, Examen crit. des apologistes de la relig. chrét., pages 12 and 13, Paris, 1823.
[168] Faustus.
[169] And yet the Gospel of Saint John denies this (chap. 1, v. 21). The contradictions in the gospels are so numerous that they alone have created thousands of infidels.
[170] Stolberg expresses himself as follows on this matter: "This question was evidently based on the opinion that the disciples of Jesus had formed, that this man, whose punishment dated from his very birth, had sinned in a previous life." (Histoire de N. S. Jésus-Christ et de son siècle, Book 3, chap. 43).
[171] Revelation, chap. 3, v. 12.
[172] Revelation, chap. 2, v. 28.
[173] Revelation, chap. 22, v. 16.
[174] Revelation, chap. 2, v. 17.
[175] H. P. Blavatsky.
[176] "Taken literally, the Book of the Creation gives us the most absurd and extravagant ideas of Divinity."
[177] First Ennead, chap. I.
[178] The Universe, which can exist only through multiplicity.
[179] Second Ennead, chap. 3.
[180] Second Ennead, chap. 8.
[181] Third Ennead, chap. 4.
[182] Concerning Abstinence; Book 2.
[183] Egyptian Mysteries, Book 4, chap. 4.
[184] Here, reincarnation is meant.
[185] This philosopher was surnamed Peisithanatos (the death-persuader).
[186] Vie de Pythagore, vol. I, p. 28.
[187] Hist. de l'Ec. a'Alex., vol. I, p 588.
[188] In this work, he says:
"The winged tribe, that has feathers instead of hair, is formed of innocent but superficial human beings, pompous and frivolous in speech, who, in their simplicity, imagine that the sense of vision is the best judge of the existence of things. Those who take no interest whatever in philosophy become four-footed animals and wild beasts...."
[189] Commentaries on the Golden Verses of Pythagoras.
[190] Hermes, Commentaries of Chalcidius on the Timæus.
[191] Procli Diadochi in Platonis Timæum Commentaria.
[192] September, 1898, p. 3.
[193] The life of the animal to which it is bound.
[194] The instrument must be suited to the development of the artist; too highly developed a body would be bad for a man very low down in the scale of humanity. This will, in some measure, explain the paradoxical word here used; the advantage there may sometimes be in putting on a rudimentary body.
[195] G. R. S. Mead tells us that Justin believed in Reincarnation only whilst he was a Platonist; he opposed this teaching after his conversion to Christianity (See Theosophical Review, April, 1906).
[196] Does this obscure passage refer to the resurrection of the body?
[197] Adversus Gentes. "We die many times, and as often do we rise again from the dead."
[198] Hyeronim., Epistola ad Demetr....
[199] Book 2, quest. 6, No. 17.
[200] Ephesians, ch. 1, v. 4 ... he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world.
[201] Instit. divin., 3, 18.
[202] Confessions, I, ch. 6.
[203] On the Immortality of the Soul, chap. 12.
[204] Hist. de Manichée et du Manichéisme, vol. 2, p. 492.
[205] Stromata., vol. 3, p. 433. Edition des Bénédictins.
[206] The words in parenthesis are by the author.
[207] Cont. Cels. Book 4, chap. 17.
[208] [Greek: ti akolouthei].
[209] De Principiis, Book 3, chap. 5.
[210] Contra Celsum, Book 1.
[211] Contra Celsum, Book 1, chap. 6.
[212] De Principiis, Book 3, chap. 5.
[213] De Principiis, Book 4, chap. 5.
[214] Contra Celsum, Book 7, chap. 32.
[215] E. Aroux. Les Mystères de la Chevalerie.
[216] Quoted by I. Cooper Oakley in Traces of a Hidden Tradition in Masonry and Mediæval Mysticism, a very interesting work on the sects which connect the early centuries with modern times.
[217] See L'Islamisme et son Enseignement Ésotérique, by Ed. Bailly. Publications théosophiques, Paris, 1903.
[218] Chapter 18.
[219] Islam is now awaiting the coming of the Mahdi, its last prophet; prophecy says that he will be the reincarnation of Mohammed (Borderland, April, 1907).
[220] This is the reason Afghans still undertake pilgrimages to Mecca.
[221] Chap. 22, verses 5, 14, 15, 17, 18, 19, 20, 41. Quoted by Lady Caithness in Old Truths in a New Light.
[222] Chap. 23, verses 17, 26, 27, etc.
[223] By religion is here understood the devotional aspect and the scientific side of the teaching of Truth, i.e., the science of the divine Soul.
[224] Nirmânakâyas are beings who have become perfect, and who, instead of entering the Nirvâna their efforts have won, renounce peace and bliss in order to help forward their human brothers in their evolution.
O! genus attonitum gelidæ formidine mortis,
Quid Styga, quid tenebras, quid nomina vana timetis,
Materiam vatum, falsique piacula mundi?
Corpora sive rogus flammâ, seu tabe vetustas
Abstulerit, mala posse pati non ulla putetis
Morte carent animæ: semperque priore relictâ
Sede, novis domibus habitant vivuntque receptæ
. . . . . . . . .
Omnia mutantur, nihil interit ...
[226] S. John's Gospel, chap. 9, verse 2.
[227] The following passages are taken from three of C. Savy's works: Comment. du Sermon sur la Montagne (1818); Pensées et Méditations (1829); Dieu et l'Homme en cette Vie et Audelà (1838).
[228] De l'Humanité, vol. 1., p. 233.
[229] Théorie de l'Unité Universelle, vol. 2, p. 304-348.
[230] Vie Future au Point de Vue Socialiste, and Confession d'un Curé de Village.
[231] Destinées de l'Âme.
[232] Alluding to the complete renewing of the material molecules of the body, every seven years.
[233] Whose consciousness, however (along with memory), is at the summit of the hierarchy which is its origin.
[234] Molecules and atoms have a particular consciousness of their own which does not cease to function when, on the departure of the individual soul, the body, as such, ceases to function.
[235] If sufficiently developed, however, he can be made conscious of this in a higher vehicle.
[236] When man has barely entered the human stage—in primitive man.
[237] Consciousness begins in the physical body, its simplest instrument.
[238] There are other vehicles above the causal body.
[239] All the powers of the Universe are in the divine germ, as the tree is in its seed.
[240] Because it no longer has a dense physical body. There are exceptions to this rule, but there is no necessity to mention them here.
[241] The Christian Heaven, the Devachan of Theosophy.
[242] This character has already appeared on the astral plane, though not in so striking a fashion.
[243] Unity exists on the plane of the Ego, and the latter sends his thought into the forms made out of his vehicles; this will be understood only by the few, but an explanation cannot be given at this point, without writing a volume on the whole of theosophy.
[244] We are still dealing with the ordinary man.
[245] When liberation is attained. This can be effected rapidly by those who will to attain it.
[246] Only four of the seven atomic spirillæ are active in this our fourth planetary Round (one for each Round). They can be rapidly vitalised by the will.
[247] When the soul is "centred" in it.
[248] The vibrations, whether registered as they pass or not registered, continue their course through the substance of the Universe.
[249] Science even now recognises four of these dimensions.
[250] This is said in order to satisfy such as are of a metaphysical turn of mind, and frequently prone to criticism.
[251] When the inner senses are developed.
[252] A question will doubtless at once rise to the minds of many readers; how can the same atoms produce, at once and almost eternally, millions of different facts? We will reply briefly. Science has been able to conceive of an explanation of a fact apparently quite as absurd—the phenomenon of the balls of Russian platinum mentioned by Zöllner (Transcendental Physics, ch. 9) which pass through hermetically sealed glass tubes, and that of the German copper coins dropping through the bottom of a sealed box on to a slate—by accepting a fourth dimension of space. Who would affirm that the dimensions of space are limited to four? Or that the science of the immediate future will not be brought face to face with facts, and find, in a fifth or sixth dimension of space, a possible explanation of the phenomenon here mentioned, one which initiated seers can test whenever they please, because it is a real fact?
Still, as these seers say, the coarsest atoms generally register only one image, others register fresh images, so that in many cases there is quite a superposition of images which must be carefully examined to avoid errors.
[253] A psychometrist is a person endowed with a very fine nervous system, capable of repeating the delicate vibrations which act upon the inmost atoms of a body. In this way, by placing himself in presence of an object that has been in contact with some individual, he can clearly describe the latter's physical, moral, and mental characteristics. Hitherto, Buchanan and Professor Denton have been the most remarkable psychometrists; the experiments related in their works have been made before witnesses and permit of no doubt whatever as to the reality of this strange faculty.
[254] Instances of this are numerous in Professor Denton's The Soul of Things.
[255] This memory is preserved in the first "life-wave."
[256] This is instinct, i.e., a semi-conscious memory, located in the "life-wave" of the second Logos.
[257] The divine Essence incarnated in the matter of the lower planes of the Universe.
[258] When the "essence," after the destruction of the form to which it gives life, no more returns to the parent-block from which it came, it has become individualised, ready to enter into the human kingdom.
[259] The memory of the third life-wave, of the first Logos.
[260] Everything, for instance, that concerns the planes of the planetary system, on which it has finished its evolution.
[261] The passing of consciousness from the causal body to the nascent buddhic body.
[262] The buddhic plane (the one immediately above the mental) is one in which the forms are so subtle that they no longer limit the Life (the Soul of the World) animating them. This Life comes directly into contact with the Life which causes all forms to live; it then sees Unity: it sees itself everywhere and in everything, the joys and sorrows of forms other than its own are its joys and sorrows, for it is universal Life.
[263] This body is composed of physical matter, and therefore belongs to the physical plane. It has been given a special name, not only because it is made of ether, but because it can be separated from the physical body.
[264] The whole of the bodies: mental, astral, and physical.
[265] The Ego (soul) in the causal body.
Conclusion.
We have now come to the end of our study: a task to which we have certainly not been equal, so far is it beyond our powers. As, however, we have drawn inspiration from our predecessors, so have we also, in our turn, endeavoured to shed a few more rays of light on certain points of this important subject, and indicate fresh paths that may be followed by such as enter upon this line of investigation in the future.
It is our most ardent desire to see this fertile soil well tilled, for it will yield an abundant harvest. Mankind is dying in strife and despair; the torrent of human activity is everywhere seething and foaming. Here ignorance buries its victims in a noisome den of slime and filth; there, the strong and ruthless, veritable vampires, batten on the labour and drain away the very life of the weak and helpless; farther away, science stumbles against the wall of the Unknown; philosophy takes up its stand on the cold barren glacier of intellectualism; religions are stifled and struggle for existence beneath the age-long accumulations of the "letter that killeth." More now than ever before do we need to find a reason for morality, a guide for science, an Ariadne's thread for philosophy, a torch to throw light on religion, and Love over all, for if mankind continues to devote the whole of its strength to the pursuit of material benefits, if its most glorious conquests become instruments to advance selfishness, if its progress merely increases physical wretchedness and makes moral decadence more terrible than before, if the head continues to silence the appeals of the heart, then divine Compassion will have no alternative but to destroy beneath the waters of another flood this cruel, implacable civilisation, which has transformed earth into an inferno.
Amongst the most pressing and urgent truths, the most fruitful teachings, the most illuminating doctrines, the most comforting promises, we have no hesitation in placing the Law of Rebirths in the very front. It is supported by ethics, by reason, and by science; it offers an explanation of the enigma of life, it alone solves almost all the problems that have harassed the mind of man throughout the ages; and so we hope that, in spite of its many imperfections, this work of ours will induce many a reader to say: Reincarnation must be true, if could not be otherwise!