Now what says the learned President of the Chemical Society of Great Britain, in that same lecture, which has any reference to, or bearing upon, our above-mentioned doctrine? Very little; only this—and nothing more:
In the Birmingham address already referred to I asked my audience to picture the action of two forces on the original protyle—one being time, accompanied by a lowering of temperature; the other, swinging to and fro like a mighty pendulum, having periodic cycles of ebb and swell, rest and activity, being intimately connected [pg 601]with the imponderable matter, essence, or source of energy we call electricity. Now, a simile like this effects its object if it fixes in the mind the particular fact it is intended to emphasize, but it must not be expected necessarily to run parallel with all the facts. Besides the lowering of temperature with the periodic ebb and flow of electricity, positive or negative, requisite to confer on the newly-born elements their particular atomicity, it is evident that a third factor must be taken into account. Nature does not act on a flat plane; she demands space for her cosmogenic operations, and if we introduce space as the third factor, all appears clear. Instead of a pendulum, which, though to a certain extent a good illustration, is impossible as a fact, let us seek some more satisfactory way of representing what I conceive may have taken place. Let us suppose the zigzag diagram not drawn upon a plane, but projected in space of three dimensions. What figure can we best select to meet all the conditions involved? Many of the facts can be well explained by supposing the projection in space of Professor Emerson Reynolds' zigzag curve to be a spiral. This figure is, however, inadmissible, inasmuch as the curve has to pass through a point neutral as to electricity and chemical energy twice in each cycle. We must, therefore, adopt some other figure. A figure of eight (8), or lemniscate, will foreshorten into a zigzag just as well as a spiral, and it fulfils every condition of the problem.
A lemniscate for the evolution downward, from Spirit into Matter; another form of a spiral, perhaps, in its reinvolutionary path onward, from Matter into Spirit; and the necessary gradual and final reabsorption into the laya state, that which Science calls, in her own way, “the point neutral as to electricity,” or the zero point. Such are the Occult facts and statement. They may be left with the greatest security and confidence to Science, to be justified some day. Let us hear some more, however, about this primordial genetic type of the symbolical Caduceus.
Such a figure will result from three very simple simultaneous motions. First, a simple oscillation backwards and forwards (suppose east and west); secondly, a simple oscillation at right angles to the former (suppose north and south) of half the periodic time—i.e., twice as fast; and thirdly, a motion at right angles to these two (suppose downwards), which, in its simplest form, would be with unvarying velocity. If we project this figure in space we find on examination that the points of the curves, where chlorine, bromine, and iodine are formed, come close under each other; so also will sulphur, selenium, and tellurium; again, phosphorus, arsenic, and antimony; and in like manner other series of analogous bodies. It may be asked whether this scheme explains how and why the elements appear in this order? Let us imagine a cyclical translation in space, each evolution witnessing the genesis of the group of elements which I previously represented as produced during one complete vibration of the pendulum. Let us suppose that one cycle has thus been completed, the centre of the unknown creative force in its mighty journey through space having scattered along its track the primitive atoms—the [pg 602]seeds, if I may use the expression—which presently are to coalesce and develop into the groupings now known as lithium, beryllium, boron, carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, fluorine, sodium, magnesium, aluminium, silicon, phosphorus, sulphur, and chlorine. What is most probably the form of track now pursued? Were it strictly confined to the same plane of temperature and time, the next elementary groupings to appear would again have been those of lithium, and the original cycle would have been eternally repeated, producing again and again the same 14 elements. The conditions, however, are not quite the same. Space and electricity are as at first, but temperature has altered, and thus, instead of the atoms of lithium being supplemented with atoms in all respects analogous with themselves, the atomic groupings which come into being when the second cycle commences form, not lithium, but its lineal descendant, potassium. Suppose, therefore, the vis generatrixtravelling to and fro in cycles along a lemniscate path, as above suggested, while simultaneously temperature is declining and time is flowing on—variations which I have endeavoured to represent by the downward sink—each coil of the lemniscate track crosses the same vertical line at lower and lower points. Projected in space, the curve shows a central line neutral as far as electricity is concerned, and neutral in chemical properties—positive electricity on the north, negative on the south. Dominant atomicities are governed by the distance east and west from the neutral centre line, monatomic elements being one remove from it, diatomic two removes, and so on. In every successive coil the same law holds good.
And, as if to prove the postulate of Occult Science and Hindû philosophy, that, at the hour of the Pralaya, the two aspects of the Unknowable Deity, “the Swan in darkness,” Prakriti and Purusha, Nature or Matter in all its forms and Spirit, no longer subsist but are absolutely dissolved, we learn the conclusive scientific opinion of the great English Chemist, who caps his proofs by saying:
We have now traced the formation of the chemical elements from knots and voids in a primitive, formless fluid. We have shown the possibility, nay, the probability that the atoms are not eternal in existence, but share with all other created beings the attributes of decay and death.
Occultism says amen to this, as the scientific “possibility” and “probability” are for it facts, demonstrated beyond the necessity for further proof, or for any extraneous physical evidence. Nevertheless, it repeats with as much assurance as ever: “matter is eternal, becoming atomic (its aspect) only periodically.” This is as sure as that the other proposition, which is almost unanimously accepted by Astronomers and Physicists—namely, that the wear and tear of the body of the Universe is steadily going on, and that it will finally lead to the extinction of the Solar Fires and the destruction of the Universe—is quite erroneous on the lines traced by men of Science. There will be, as there ever were in time and eternity, periodical dissolutions of [pg 603] the manifested Universe, such as a partial Pralaya after every Day of Brahmâ; and a Universal Pralaya—the Mahâ-Pralaya—only after the lapse of every Age of Brahmâ. But the scientific causes for such dissolution, as brought forward by exact Science, have nothing to do with the true causes. However that may be, Occultism is once more justified by Science, for Mr. Crookes said:
We have shown, from arguments drawn from the chemical laboratory, that in matter which has responded to every test of an element, there are minute shades of difference which may admit of selection. We have seen that the time-honoured distinction between elements and compounds no longer keeps pace with the developments of chemical science, but must be modified to include a vast array of intermediate bodies—“meta-elements.” We have shown how the objections of Clerk-Maxwell, weighty as they are, may be met; and finally, we have adduced reasons for believing that primitive matter was formed by the act of a generative force, throwing off at intervals of time atoms endowed with varying quantities of primitive forms of energy. If we may hazard any conjectures as to the source of energy embodied in a chemical atom, we may, I think, premise that the heat radiations propagated outwards through the ether from the ponderable matter of the universe, by some process of nature not yet known to us, are transformed at the confines of the universe into the primary—the essential—motions of chemical atoms, which, the instant they are formed, gravitate inwards, and thus restore to the universe the energy which otherwise would be lost to it through radiant heat. If this conjecture be well founded, Sir William Thomson's startling prediction of the final decrepitude of the universe through the dissipation of its energy falls to the ground. In this fashion, gentlemen, it seems to me that the question of the elements may be provisionally treated. Our slender knowledge of these first mysteries is extending steadily, surely, though slowly.
By a strange and curious coincidence even our Septenary doctrine seems to force the hand of Science. If we understand rightly, Chemistry speaks of fourteen groupings of primitive atoms—lithium, beryllium, boron, carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, fluorine, sodium, magnesium, aluminium, silicon, phosphorus, sulphur and chlorine; and Mr. Crookes, speaking of the “dominant atomicities,” enumerates seven groups of these, for he says:
As the mighty focus of creative energy goes round, we see it in successive cycles sowing in one tract of space seeds of lithium, potassium, rubidium, and cæsium; in another tract, chlorine, bromine, and iodine; in a third, sodium, copper, silver, and gold; in a fourth, sulphur, selenium, and tellurium; in a fifth, beryllium, calcium, strontium, and barium; in a sixth, magnesium, zinc, cadmium, and mercury; in a seventh, phosphorus, arsenic, antimony, and bismuth [which makes seven groupings on the one hand. And after showing] ... in other tracts the other elements—namely, aluminium, gallium, indium, and thallium; silicon, germanium, and tin; carbon, titanium, and zirconium ... [he adds] while a natural position [pg 604]near the neutral axis is found for the three groups of elements relegated by Professor Mendeleeff to a sort of Hospital for Incurables—his eighth family.