Yet while the study of character and environment from the point of view of Astrology is in every way satisfactory to those who take it seriously in hand, it does not in itself afford that degree of evidence that is looked for by people newly acquainted with its claims and teachings. For human character is a very complex thing, and universally shows the admixture of elements that are common to all in a greater or less degree. It is rather in the specialization of some one characteristic that persons become distinguished. It is sometimes in the suppression of some prevailing characteristic that others attain distinction. Thus we see that the selfless devotion of one man to the needs of others draws him away from the mass of commonly selfish people. Accentuation and abnegation may thus both claim their hold upon the public esteem, yet always it is thoroughness that makes its mark in the world, and by that I mean the steadfast adherence to a plan of life which wins its way through in the end. So then, we see that the evolution of the unit from the mass, the specialization of faculty in the individual, is the law of Nature, and it hardly needed the philosophy of Nietzsche or the cult of the Superman to enforce the fact upon our minds. And yet, after all, there is no individual evolution possible for man apart from the race to which he belongs, and when all is done that self-effort can accomplish, when we have specialized and perfected to the highest possible degree, what remains but that we must perforce acknowledge our indebtedness to the world and find our whole destiny to consist in the service of mankind. Thus Bulwer Lytton makes Zanoni to say: After all I perceive that the common lot of mankind is its greatest and its sweetest blessing! Astrology at all events has no higher doctrine than this: Study how best to serve.
CHAPTER XXVII
THE LAW OF SEX
Synthetic Philosophy and Comparative Theology have sought wisely to establish a common basis for human thought and aspiration. From the complex of life and thought they have argued to fundamental unity. It has been well said that the foolish and superficial look for differences in things about them, but the wise seek for the underlying identity. In the last analysis of things animate and inanimate, we are faced by the insoluble fact of sex distinction.
When we speak of chemical affinity, of magnetism, of polarity, we are really speaking in terms of sex. However far we push back our investigations along the lines of evolution we come at length to the distinction which separates one-half of nature from the other, and which is seen to be at the root of all natural attractions and to be the source of generation. Sex, as considered by itself and apart from function and organism, may be the result of a mode of vibration. We cannot say. We may go right back to the first principles of our conception of Life and we find the active and passive principles of Force and Matter, Heat and Moisture, Fire and Water, penetrating through the various philosophies and schools of thought, but always a duality. Even in the Theological conception we have the divine principles of Wisdom and Love in apposition, but united for the purpose of Creation and Preservation of the Universe. It is a mystery that cannot be solved. We cannot in fact, determine whether sex distinction is temporary or eternal. We have reason to regard it as radical and not accidental. For whereas in the process of evolution it appears from time to time to merge in various forms and to become hermaphroditic, we find it continually emerging again, persistent and irrepressible.
From the occult point of view it appears to be impounded in the very elements of our being. It has been shown in these pages that the Microcosmic Man is an epitome of the universe, compounded of universal elements, and responsive at all points to the laws controlling the cosmos. It has also been shown that the Moon, so far as this earth is concerned, is the cosmic factor which represents variability. It has also been shown that it exercises first influence in the process of generation, and, therefore we may expect to find it intimately connected with the question of sex. It is, in fact, found to be the factor which determines the astral forces towards the evolution of sex function and organism.
By an empiricism based on an occult law and proved by the application of this law to hundreds of cases of well-authenticated births, it has been established that the determination of sex follows a definite course from a certain point of time bearing a mathematical and astronomical relationship to the moment of birth. Thus, given the moment at which a birth took place in any locality, it is possible to at once indicate the sex without the fact being communicated. By this I do not mean that sex production is voluntary in human or animal generation. That is a problem which the Eugenists should consider in the light of the law of sex I am now concerned with.
The four cardinal points of the zodiac, Aries 0°, Libra 0, Capricorn 0 and Cancer 0, are the generating points of the circle or Wheel of Life. These points are not artificial. They are natural. They mark the stages at which the Sun in its apparent course about the earth cross the equator, and attain the maximum and minimum degrees of elevation. By analogy they are related to the Dawn, Noon, Sunset and Midnight of the daily circle; to the Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter of the year; and to the periods of Childhood, Manhood, Maturity and Senility in the life of man. It is this consent of Nature to the universal paradigm that enables us to trace the course of mundane events from astral conditions in force at these several points of the year, as Kepler allowed from his own experience, and as Astrologers find continually to be the case.
Taking these four points of the zodiac, then, as the starting-points for the determination of cosmic forces ultimating as sex, we find that Aries 0 is female, Capricornus 0 male, Libra 0 male and Cancer 0 female. They follow the lines of the segmentation of the cell in the animal organism. Thus—
Figure 28.