{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_40224/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_40224","id":"gutenberg_40224","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/40224","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Category: Science - Biology","Evolution","Life -- Origin","Theosophy"],"text":"EVOLUTION OF LIFE AND FORM\n\n  _Four Lectures delivered at the Twenty-third Anniversary Meeting\n  of the Theosophical Society at Adyar, Madras, 1898._\n\n  BY\n\n  ANNIE BESANT\n\n  SECOND EDITION\n\n\n  LONDON: THEOSOPHICAL PUBLISHING SOCIETY\n\n  BENARES: THEOSOPHICAL PUBLISHING SOCIETY\n\n  1900\n\n\n\n\n             CONTENTS.\n\n\n                              PAGE\n\nANCIENT AND MODERN SCIENCE      5\n\nFUNCTIONS OF THE GODS          46\n\nEVOLUTION OF LIFE              90\n\nEVOLUTION OF FORM             124\n\n\n\n\n[FIRST LECTURE.]\n\nANCIENT AND MODERN SCIENCE.\n\n\nMy Brothers:--The subject on which I am to address you this morning, and\nthe three mornings that follow, is one of considerable complexity and\ndifficulty. I do not apologise to you for the difficulty of my theme.\nWhen we meet here in our Anniversary Meeting, we meet as students and\nnot simply as superficial men and women of the world. We try to prepare\nourselves, by study, for the exchange of thought which in these\ngatherings takes place, and although the subject is a difficult one,\nalthough it is not possible to make it clear and intelligible without\nthe use of certain technical terms, yet, to the student technical\nterms--being precise--are really the easiest to understand, and inasmuch\nas, in a great majority at least, we are students, I who speak, and you\nwho listen, we may be content to treat the subject in a somewhat formal\nand technical way. Roughly, my outline is this. I want to lay before you\nan intelligible conception of evolution, taking it on its two sides,\nthat of the evolving life and that of the developing forms. I begin by\nlaying before you a sketch of the methods of \"Ancient and Modern\nScience,\" the direction in which each has worked, and is working, the\nultimate union that, we hope, may take place between them. For what\ncould more fully presage the good of the whole world, what could promise\nmore happily for the relationship between the different races of\nhumanity, than to draw together on the plane of mind the science of\nantiquity and of modern days, the science of the East and of the West,\nand, by wedding them to each other, draw together the nations that are\nnow divided, and make objective that brotherhood of humanity of which we\ndream.\n\nDealing first with ancient and modern science in this broad and general\nway, and taking that as my subject for this morning, I shall pass on\nto-morrow to speak on the \"Functions of the Gods,\" meaning by that\nphrase the activities of that invisible side of nature on which the\nwhole of the visible depends. Whether we use here the name \"Devas\" to\nrepresent those developed spiritual intelligences, or whether with the\nchild of Isl\u00e2m, with the Hebrew or the Christian, we speak of the\n\"Angels\" and \"Archangels,\" the name matters nothing; the conception is\ncommon to every faith of man. We shall study their functions in the\nuniverse, and try to understand how they act as the ministers of the\nDivine Will. Then we shall pass on to treat of that \"Evolution of Life\"\nwhich lies underneath the evolution of forms. Finally, we shall treat\nthe \"Evolution of Forms,\" and see how, in that evolution, is the promise\nof final perfection, how all is working to a perfect ending, how the\nbest that we can dream of is less than the performance of God.\n\nThat is the outline of our work. Let us at once begin the first section\nof the subject--Ancient and Modern Science.\n\nNow, in the olden times, in those times to which in this land our thought\nturns back most fondly with reverence and with pride, in those times,\nhere, as in every other ancient land, Religion and Science were wedded\ntogether, and there was no discord between the intelligence and the\nspirit. It matters not whither you wander amid the ancient nations of the\nworld: you may travel through the whole of Chaldea; you may study the\nremains of ancient Egypt; you may go through Persia and search amid her\nmonuments; you may cross the Atlantic to America, and unbury the cities\nthat were lost ere yet the Aztecs had made the mighty State which fell\nunder the blows of the Spaniards; you may go into China and, in the vast\nrecesses of that well-nigh unknown land, you may search for what has been\nleft there from ancient days; or without going outside the limits of your\nown land, you may take the literature that is our pride, the mighty books\nwritten by the \u1e5aishis of the past; and everywhere antiquity speaks with a\nsingle tongue. Religion reveals the spirit, the spiritual truth which is\none. Intelligence studies that truth in its manifold manifestations, and\nits work; science, studying the phenomena which are images of aspects of\nthe Divine, is the handmaid, is the sister, of religion, and between them\ndiscord is unnatural and fatal to progress. That is the ancient view; but\nwhen we come to our own century a new phenomenon presents itself to our\ngaze--religion on the one side suspicious of science in its progress,\nscience on the other hand apt to be proudly contemptuous of religious\nclaims. How has the divorce arisen? Why this discord between two of the\ngreat helpers of human evolution? The reason is not far to seek. In the\nwestern world the science of the elder time, the science of antiquity,\ndisappeared in the great flood of barbaric invasions, underneath the\nwhirlpool caused by the ruins of the Roman Empire, and later on,\nunderneath the wreckage of that same Empire with its new centre in\nConstantinople. The invasions of barbarians, both from the East and the\nNorth, sweeping over the European continent, brought ignorance in the\nwake of barbaric conquest. The result was that night came down upon\nknowledge and thick darkness enveloped the lands which were to be the\nnursery of a new civilisation. When the Sun of science again began to rise\nupon the Western world, it presented itself in a form which was alien,\nnay, which was more than alien, which was hostile to the dominant religion\nof the time. It came from the children of Isl\u00e2m. It came from those who\nrecognised Muhammed as their Prophet. From the Muslim schools of Arabia\ncame the first teachers of modern science to Europe. True, they were\nreally by their intellectual ancestry descended from the thought of\nGreece. They drew their inspiration from the school of Plato through the\nNeo-Platonists; they reproduced the ideas of Porphyry and Ptolemy, and of\nother Grecian and Egyptian thinkers, Neo-Platonic and even Gnostic. But\nthey threw over it the garb of Isl\u00e2m, they presented it in the form of\nArabic thought. The result of this was that, as it made its way into Spain\nin the wake of the conquering Moors, as it came with those who drove out\nof the Southern Peninsula the rule of the Spanish Christian monarchy, so\nthe first aspect of science to Christians was an aspect of hostility. It\ncame as an invading enemy and not as an illuminant to all. Hence conflict\narose; some who were within the limits of the mighty Church of Rome,\ntouched by a longing for the new learning, stretched out their hands to\ntake the gifts that science was bringing. These men were regarded with\nsuspicion, nay, with more than suspicion, with hatred that broke out in\nbitter persecution. Who can read the history of Roger Bacon, the wondrous\nmonk; who can picture Copernicus on his death-bed as his immortal work is\nbrought to him ere yet his eyes are closed, he having shrunk from earlier\npublication, lest the stake should be his portion; who can stand in the\nField of Flowers in Rome, and see there the statue erected where he was\nburned to death, who dying in one century, lives for all centuries to\ncome--Giordano Bruno; who can listen to Galileo, as with faltering lips he\ndenies the truth he knows and utters the falsehood that he knows not; who\ncan follow these martyr-steps, led on by bitter memories of blood and\nfire, without understanding the reason for the hostility of science to\nreligion, without confessing with shame and sorrow that that hostility was\ncaused and was justified by the cruelties wreaked by religion on science,\nwhen science was young and feeble? Every one of us who stands upon the\nside of religion should recognise that we are reaping the bitter harvest\nof our own past errors, and that the law is just which brings upon us the\ndifficulties and opposition we encounter in our modern days. For as\nscience grew strong, she grew strong with the sword in her hands. She\nfought for every inch of the ground on which she stood, and only so far as\nshe could guard herself was she safe from the flame or from the prison.\nHence she searched for everything in nature that could serve as a weapon\nagainst the foe that attacked her. Hence she welcomed eagerly everything\nwhich seemed to show that materialism was the true philosophy of life. If\nwe go back twenty-five years, to the time when I and some of you were\nyoung, we shall find that over western science there hung the shadow of\nmaterialism, and that stronger and stronger grew the scientific tendency\nto \"see in matter the promise and the potency of every form of life.\" You\nremember those famous words of Professor Tyndall, no materialist in his\nthought and a religious man in his aspirations, but wellnigh driven by\ndespair to claim fair field for science, and to fling back the claims of\nreligion, because among them was included the right to gag, the refusal to\nallow thought to be honestly uttered by the thinker. But things are\nchanging more and more; as religion has been growing more liberal and more\nrational, science is becoming less materialistic and less aggressive; and\nwe shall see presently that the most modern of modern science--not quite\nthe science that you get in your textbooks, for that is practically\nout-of-date in the rush of thought which comes from the West, but the\nscience of the leaders of thought, the science of the first men in the\nscientific camp--is more and more approaching the domain where scientists\nwill recognise religion as helper and not as enemy. In fact, speaking from\nthe same chair from which Tyndall had uttered his famous phrase that \"in\nmatter he saw the promise and potency of every form of life,\" his\nsuccessor, Sir William Crookes, a member of our own Theosophical Society,\ndeclared, reversing those words of his predecessor, that \"In life I see\nthe promise and potency of all forms of matter.\"\n\nSuch is the great change. Let us now examine in detail. The fundamental\ndifference between ancient and modern science is that ancient science\nstudies the world from the standpoint of life which is evolving, while\nmodern science studies the world by observing the forms through which\nthat life is manifesting. The first studies life, and sees in forms the\nexpressions of life. The second studies forms, and tries, by the process\nof induction, to find out if there be an underlying principle by which\nthe multiplicity of forms may be explained. The first works from above\ndownwards, the second from below upwards, and in that very fact is the\npromise of a meeting place where the two will join hand in hand. But\nthis fundamental difference carries with it very important results. If\nwe are to study the world from the standpoint of forms, our study will\nbe almost endless in its multiplicity. Think of a tree; the one trunk\nthrough which the life is pouring, innumerable leaves in which that life\nis ultimately expressed; it is an image of the tree of life, that great\nAshvattha, the tree of which we have heard, whose roots are in the\nheavens and whose branches spread out over the earth. If we are to study\nit where its trunk is, the trunk of life, we have the unity of purpose\nand can trace why we have multiplicity of forms; but if we are to start\nat the parts where the leaves are growing, leaf by leaf we must examine,\nevery difference of outline we must record, each little variety in shape\nwe must carefully note and study. Science studies the leaves in modern\ndays--the old science studied the life. There is the fundamental\ndifference. There is also the reason of the difference of methods by\nwhich the study must be carried on. What is the method of modern\nscience? The use of clear observation, keen judgment, power of placing\nlike things together, and seeing the differences that divide the\nclasses of the like from the classes of the unlike. But in order that\nthis may be done, inasmuch as nature is infinite both in the vast and in\nthe minute, man demands, to supplement his limited senses, instruments\nand apparatus of the most exquisite and delicate character; so that it\nhas been even said that the progress of science is the progress of the\nexquisite nature of the apparatus which science uses, and scientific men\nwill devise a more delicate balance, a more dainty way of adjustment,\ninstrument after instrument, until perfection seems well-nigh to be\nreached; the modern man of science, to carry on his researches, demands\na vast array of apparatus that he must use for his work, for according\nto the delicacy of his apparatus is the extent of his observation of the\nforms to which his attention is directed. But the man of science of the\nancient type does not ask for instruments; he is not studying the\nevolution of forms; he has to study life, not form; and for such study\nhe must evolve himself, the life that is within him, for only life can\nmeasure life, only life can respond to the vibrations of the living; his\nwork is to unfold himself, to bring out of the depths of his own nature\nthe divine powers that lie hidden therein, not in the senses but in the\nSelf. His investigations can only be carried on by means of these\npowers, and only as he develops the divine within him will he be able to\nunderstand and measure the divine without him. Now this is only possible\nbecause, in essence, the natures of God and man are identical. This\nsounds a bold statement, but it is the fundamental truth of all\nreligions. Need I quote to you the famous saying, \"Thou art That\"? Shall\nI take an equivalent phrase from the Hebrew Scripture, accepted by the\nwhole Christian world: \"God created man in His own image, in the image\nof God created He him\"? The teaching is identical as all great truths\nare identical in the various religions; but what does it mean? God is\nmanifest in His universe. Would you understand His work, you must\ndevelop the God within yourself, else will He for ever be veiled from\nyour eyes. Not by the eyes of sense may you behold Him, not by the\nvision of intellect may you see that Form, invisible even to the\nintelligence. Only as the Self that is God is unfolded within you, will\nthe Self that is the God without you manifest to you the full glory of\nHis life. That is the ancient starting point. Thus what the man of old\nhad to do, if indeed he were to be a man of science, was to become\ndivine; he was to be a saint before he could be a sage. No man could be\nwise until he was pure, for how should impure eyes behold the Pure?\nThere is the hall-mark of the man of science of the ancient days: he is\ndeveloped within before he can be learned without. But from the modern\nman of science is not demanded this condition. He must indeed lead a\nlife that is self-restrained, orderly, and fairly clean; were he to\nyield to the riot of the senses, his intelligence would become clouded.\nHe must have keen power of observation, balanced strength of judgment,\nstrong patience, unwearied industry, clear insight for differences and\nsimilarities. All these are demanded from him, if he is to be great, and\nthese are among the noblest powers of intelligence. But all he asks of\nreligion is to leave him alone. Of old, religion opened the gateway to\nscience; now-a-days science asks nothing from religion save to stand\naside. That is the difficulty in our way. We have to show that life\ncannot be understood until the student lives that which he seeks. That\neven the understanding of forms is very imperfect until the life\nexpressed through them is recognised and partially understood. That\nfundamental difference of method then, will cover the whole field, and\nwill enable us to comprehend the difference of the results.\n\nNow let us try to understand more clearly why it was that the ancient man\nof science was taught that the first step to true knowledge, or wisdom,\nwas the unfolding of the Self. What is life or consciousness--for the two\nterms are synonymous? It is the power to answer to vibrations, the power\nto respond--that is consciousness. Evolution is the unfolding of a\ncontinually increasing power to respond. The whole universe is full of\nthe vibrations of \u00cdshvara, of God. He sustains and moves the whole.\nConsciousness is the power in us to answer to those vibrations. All powers\nlie hidden within us as the oak tree lies hidden in the acorn. But it is\nin the process of evolution that the sapling slowly grows out of the seed.\nIn Eternity, in the Now, all is existent, perfect; in Time only is there\nsuccession, the unfolding of one thing after another. In the changeless\nPoint everything is present: Space is but the field for diverse sequences.\nHence Time and Space are the basic illusions, and are yet the fundamental\nconditions of thinking. Keep, I pray you, that definition of consciousness\nin mind, for it will govern the remainder of our study.\n\nThe Self in man, being in the image of God, is triple as the Self, the\nDivine, is triple. I need not stop to argue this. You know it from that\ngreat literature which lies at the foundation of all Hindu Philosophy.\nWhether you speak in abstract terms and say with the Upanishad that\nBrahman is threefold, whether you speak of Him as Sat-chit-\u00e2nanda, or\nwhether, instead of using philosophical, abstract terms, you say He is\nmanifest as \u00cdshvara in the Trim\u00fbrti as Mah\u00e2deva, Vishnu and Brahm\u00e2, it\nmatters not. You may take the concrete form or the abstract, the\nfundamental idea is the same: that the Divine Self in manifestation is\ntriple, and therefore in every great religion God is spoken of as a\nTrinity. If this were not so, the relationship between God and man would\nremain for ever unintelligible, for man shows a triplicity as he\nevolves. The human reflection of that triple Divine Self is the triple\nSelf in man.\n\nOne by one are the Divine aspects unfolded as manifestation proceeds.\nThe lowest, if I may dare to use such a term, is the aspect which is\nfirst brought into activity for the building of the universe. So also in\nman the intelligence awakens and becomes active, the lowest aspect of\nthe human Self. That is the reflection of Brahm\u00e2, of the Universal Mind,\nthe creative energy from which all comes forth; and you may find in\nyourselves, as you evolve, that creative faculty of imagination which,\nworking at present in subtle matter, will, when man is perfect, work in\ngrosser matter as well; for the imaginative power in man is the\nreflection of the power that in God created the universe. Brahm\u00e2\nmeditated, and all forms came forth; and in the creative power of mind\nlies every possibility of form. So in man is later evolved the next\naspect, that of A'nanda, where unity is recognised instead of diversity.\nChit, in man, is the intelligence that _knows_, that separates and\ndivides and analyses, and it has to do with the multiplicity of forms\nand with their inter-relations; A'nanda is the wisdom that realises the\nunity of all things, and that accomplishes union, thus finding the joy\nthat lies at the very heart of life; last of all in human evolution, is\ndeveloped the third and highest aspect of Deity, Self-Existence, the\nUnity that lies beyond union, and this can be developed in man only\nbecause man is one with the Eternal in his nature. By this evolution, in\nages to come, through the countless kalpas that lie in front, \u00cdshvara\nafter \u00cdshvara arises, each as the fruitage of a universe, to carry on\nstill more mightily the will of the \"One without a second,\" and to\nmanifest something of that perfection to the whole of the then\nmanifested nature. Such, very roughly, is the course of human evolution\ninto divinity, and this is carried on by races succeeding one another;\nas we come to the higher Root-races of man, to those that we speak of as\nthe Fifth, in which we are, the Sixth, that shall succeed us, and the\nSeventh that finishes this cycle of human evolution, we learn that the\ncharacteristic of each of these three Root-races is that each gradually\ndevelops that aspect of God which belongs to it in the due sequence of\nevolution. The Fifth is developing the aspect of Chit, Intelligence, the\nmind is being evolved, and all the progress of modern science, so marked\nin our own days, is but part of the fruitage of that evolution, of that\ngrowth of intelligence which looks on the outer world as not itself--as\nthe Not-Self--and seeks to study and understand it. The characteristic\nattributes belonging to the evolution of the two following races are\neven now to be reached by special methods, by individuals who are\nwilling to take the pains to make the required sacrifices. That which we\nknow as Yoga is the method by which evolution is quickened in the\nindividual, and all the powers of the Self, up to the threshold of\ndivinity, may by it be brought into manifestation in the man of the\npresent. That is why Yoga training was necessary for the ancient\nscientist; he must develop in himself the three aspects of God, if he\nwere to understand them as manifested in the universe around him.\n\nNow, at our own stage of evolution, it is specially the life of\nBrahm\u00e2--or the Brahm\u00e2 aspect of God--with which the human mind is coming\ninto touch, because the mind in man is the reflection of the universal\nmind in Kosmos. That life is the life that is the force in the atom,\nthat vivifies every atom, nay, that brings the atom into existence, as\nwe shall see, and remains during the whole of the growth of the universe\nas the fundamental life that keeps those atoms as active particles\nbuilding up innumerable forms. Only as the life of Brahm\u00e2, the aspect of\nBrahm\u00e2, is developed in the human Self will man be able to study the\nworkings of that life in the atomic forms that are filled by it; and it\nis very significant that some of the greatest problems of modern science\nare now turning on the nature of the atom, and that scientists are\nasking, what is it? Is it matter or force? Is it a particle or a vortex?\nNever will that question be answered with certainty until man has\ndeveloped in himself the power to respond to the life that thrills in\nthe atom, until, developing intelligence within himself to the fullest\npoint, he is able to answer by that intelligence to the vibrations of\nthe atomic life outside him. We have defined consciousness as the power\nto answer to vibrations, and if man is to measure life, if he is to know\nthe underlying causes of phenomena, he must develop in himself the power\nto respond to that life outside him; and in the perfection of human\nintelligence--the reflection of the Brahm\u00e2 aspect of God--lies the only\npossibility of solution for this much debated problem in science. I said\nit was significant, for this problem belongs to the Fifth race, and the\nWestern world is at present peopled largely by the fifth sub-race of the\ngreat Fifth. Thus it takes to the very highest point the concrete mind\nof man, that marvellous activity of the intellect, that swift and yet\npatient study, bringing about the achievements that modern science is\nperforming. All these are a testimony of the truth of the ancient\nteaching that sub-race after sub-race arises, each one with its own work\nto do, and we should look on the work of each sub-division of humanity\nas good in itself: each should not be regarded as an isolated and\nhostile expression, but as part of the Divine manifestation, expressing\nthat portion which it is destined to express.\n\nLooking thus, then, on the problem of the life that exists in the atom,\nwe find that in order to understand it, we must develop the pure\nintellect in man; but to understand the life that clothes itself in\norganic forms, to unravel the secrets which will explain to us why one\nis formed thus and another thus, the next great aspect of the Self must\nbe developed within us--that of the all-pervading life of Vishnu, that\nsustains the world as the mighty supporter of everything, the basis, the\nfoundation of the whole. There alone is unifying energy and there the\nroot from which all divisions have arisen; only as we realise this\naspect of unifying energy in the Self will the secrets of organised\nforms in nature unravel themselves before our eyes. This work is that of\nthe Sixth Root-race, and those who would ante-date their evolution must\ndevelop Sixth-race powers in themselves by Yoga. Remains one mightier\nproblem, subtlest and most difficult of all, that of the life of the\nhuman spirit, of man evolving into God. The mysteries of that life may\nonly be understood when the human Self, which comes forth from the\nFather of all--from the mighty One who is sometimes the Destroyer,\nsometimes the Creator, but always the Regenerator, the name that\nincludes them both, Mah\u00e2deva, the mighty God who is Sat, Existence--has\ndeveloped the aspect of Sat, of pure Existence, thus becoming the triple\nUnity, a Logos, an \u00cdshvara. That is the work of the Seventh Root-race,\nand when that is accomplished, then only will the final problems of the\nhuman spirit lie open before our gaze.\n\nThe scientific man of antiquity, then, began by that self-attention,\nunfolding in himself one by one all those potentialities under a\nsuitable Guru, passing from step to step till he reached the highest,\nand ever worshipping the Mah\u00e2guru, the Guru of the universe. Having\nunfolded his highest powers, he began to study life, life in its\noutpouring, not life in its manifold and veiled manifestations in the\nlower worlds. Hence the lofty point at which he started, no less than\nthe arising of \u00cdshvara enveloped in M\u00e2y\u00e2.\n\nWhat is \u00cdshvara? What is M\u00e2y\u00e2? There is the first great problem. Let us\nreverently address ourselves to it. The philosophers of India have\nanswered these questions in different ways, each one containing part\nof the eternal truth. \u00cdshvara is that mighty centre of consciousness\nthat exists unchanged in the bosom of the One Existence. There are\ninnumerable such Centres of Consciousness, of which you may remember\nyour own Sv\u00e2mi Subba Rao wrote as existing in the bosom of the One\nExistence. \u00cdshvara in manifestation is like a lamp, a light enclosed in\na shade. \u00cdshvara, enveloped in M\u00e2y\u00e2, brings forth a universe and is\nenclosed, as it were, in the universe of which He is the Light. Breaking\nthe shade, the light shines forth in every direction. Dissolving the\nuniverse, He still remains. The centre remains, but the circumference\nthat circumscribed it is gone. So is that mighty centre when the\nuniverse vanishes; He alone remains, holding His centre unshaken in the\nvery act of merging in, expanding into, the Infinite, the Absolute, the\nSuper-Consciousness, the One. Let us think of Him as an eternal centre\nof self-consciousness, able to merge in super-consciousness and to\nagain limit Himself to self-consciousness.\n\nWhat, then, is M\u00e2y\u00e2? M\u00e2y\u00e2 is prepared in every case by the merging in\n\u00cdshvara of the whole of the universe which is come to its ending. As one\nloka rolls up and merges in the one above it, all forms in the loka thus\nmerged disappear, but the consciousness that ensouled those forms does not\nvanish; a modification of consciousness remains, a modification expressing\nitself by a vibratory power--not a vibration, but a power to vibrate in a\nparticular way; and though the form vanishes as the loka is merged in the\none above it--because the matter disappears, being disintegrated into\nfiner matter--in consciousness there remains the power to vibrate in the\nway in which it had vibrated in the grosser matter, and power persists\nalthough the forms caused by such vibrations disappear, for lack of\nmaterial sufficiently coarse to respond to such vibrations. As one region\npasses into the next, this process is repeated over and over and over\nagain, and loka after loka vanishes. The forms are gone, the vibrations\nare gone, only the modifications in consciousness capable of giving rise\nto similar vibrations remain until finally, when \u00cdshvara--whose\nconsciousness was the one consciousness in the universe, whose life was\nthe one life, who supported every form, who made the possibility of every\nseparated existence--gathers up His universe into Himself ere He merges\nHimself in the ONE, everything has vanished that we know as form, nothing\nremains save the centre of consciousness. There remains in \u00cdshvara the\npower of vibrating in particular fashions, resulting from the evolution of\nHis universe, in endless multiplicity of vibrations; when He merges\nHimself in the One Existence all has vanished as form, but powers remain\nin these subtle modifications, preserved in that unchangeable centre in\nthe mightiness of the One Life. Is that only a dream?\n\nThere was a great teacher, V\u00e2si\u1e63htha. He taught R\u00e2m\u00e2, as you will\nremember, and in the record of his teaching there are hints on some of\nthe mysteries of life. If you keep what I have now said in mind, if I\nhave succeeded by the clumsy words which are all that the human tongue\ncan utter on these great problems, in clarifying at all your thoughts,\nthen just listen to that same thought as expressed by S\u00fbryadeva, when he\nwas speaking of the same thing--the ending and the new beginning of a\nuniverse. We have only to add to what I have already said, that when\n\u00cdshvara arises in order that a new universe may be formed, He throws His\nlife into these modifications that had apparently disappeared, and the\nM\u00e2y\u00e2 in which He arises, enveloped and circumscribed, is His own\nre-vivified memory, which can never be separated from Himself; He draws\nin His consciousness, under the impulse of the Great Breath, limiting it\nto self-consciousness, and turning His attention to the contents of that\nself-consciousness, its powers start into activity, and that is M\u00e2y\u00e2. So\nit is written: \"Thereafter, Thou, O Lord, intent on [maintaining] the\nreign of night, fixed within the Self, having indrawn that order of\nthings, [or universe.]... To-day, Thou hast awakened, and art most\njoyfully desirous of again throwing out [manifesting] the universe in\nmighty gradations [hierarchies of beings].\" [_Yoga V\u00e2si\u1e63htha_, lxxxvii,\n7, 8.] These nights and days are the \"Nights and Days of Brahm\u00e2,\" the\ninbreathing and outbreathing of the One Existence, and M\u00e2y\u00e2 is this\nindrawn \"order of things\" that remains fixed through the Night, and\nstarts forth as \u00cdshvara awakens at the coming of Day. That is M\u00e2y\u00e2 and\nif you take up the definitions given in the different schools, you will\nfind that this includes and illumines every one of them, that it shows\nyou what is meant by illusion, and explains to you what is implied in\ndreaming. The joyful throwing out into manifestation of all the powers\nthat are remembered by \u00cdshvara the moment His attention is turned to\nHis own Self, that memory-prompted \"desire\" which arises in the bosom of\nthe Eternal, is the root of the coming universe. Now this thought will\nprove to you the key of much ancient teaching. You have, in the\nUniversal Mind full of ideas which are not yet concreted into phenomena,\nthe world of ideas of Plato, the invisible world of the Hebrew Kabbalah;\nin every great teaching you find the same thought expressed. If, instead\nof being fettered by words, as for the most part we are, and if, instead\nof repeating phrases that carry with them no idea in the mind of the\nrepeater, we would try to read the thought that underlies the words, we\nshould find the Hindu philosophy in every modern philosophy that is\nworthy of the name, and see the traces of ancient India in Greece and in\nRome, in Germany and in the England of to-day.\n\nWhat is the next stage? The Life-Breath goes forth. \u00cdshvara, the Centre\nof all, enveloped in M\u00e2y\u00e2 sends forth His breath; as that vibrating\nbreath falls on the enveloping M\u00e2y\u00e2, M\u00e2y\u00e2 becomes Prakriti, or\nMatter--rather, perhaps, M\u00fblaprakriti, the root of matter. As that\nbreath, with its triple vibratory force falls on this matter, it throws\nit into three modifications, or \"attributes\"--Tamas, inertia, or better,\nstability; Rajas, activity, vigour; Sattva, a difficult word to\ntranslate: I am inclined to translate it as Harmony; for this reason,\nthat wherever there is pleasure, Sattva is present. Without harmony no\npleasure can anywhere exist. All pleasure is due to harmonious\nvibration, and that quality of harmonious inter-related vibrations is\nthe quality that Sattva gives to matter. These three fundamental\nqualities of matter--answering to three fundamental modifications in the\nconsciousness of \u00cdshvara--inertia, activity, and harmony, these are the\nfamous three Gunas without which Prakriti cannot manifest. Fundamental,\nessential, and unchangeable, they are present in every particle in the\nmanifested universe, and according to their combinations is the nature\nof each particle.\n\nThen comes the seven-fold division. In a moment I will tell you why we\nspeak of it as seven-fold instead of five-fold, which is the more familiar\ndivision to you. The seven-fold division, what is this? Here is matter\nwith its three Gunas, now ready to receive another impulse from the\nLife-Breath; that breath comes forth from Brahm\u00e2, for \u00cdshvara has unfolded\nHis triple nature into its three aspects, and it comes forth in seven\ngreat waves. Each one modifies matter, and evolves and ensouls those that\nfollow it. The first two are absolutely beyond our knowing, and belong\nnot to our present stages of evolution at all; therefore they are\nordinarily left out, and only the five that make up the evolution of our\nuniverse are spoken of in the sacred books. Here and there the seven are\nmentioned, but only rarely. You may remember the seven tongues of fire,\nfor instance, and one or two other similar phrases. But generally\nfive-fold is Pr\u00e2na, the five-fold evolving life. First, in every case, is\na modification of consciousness sent forth as a power by \u00cdshvara. Turn to\nthe _Vishnu Pur\u00e2na_ and you will see exactly the stage that I am pointing\nout to you in more modern phrases. \u00cdshvara Himself, as Brahm\u00e2, sends forth\na power, due to a modification of His consciousness, called in the _Vishnu\nPur\u00e2na_ a Tanm\u00e2tra. In the English translation the word rudiment is used.\nYou remember the rudiments of sound, of touch, of colour, and so on. All\nthese rudiments are the tanm\u00e2tras. These tanm\u00e2tras are the powers due to\nmodifications in consciousness or life, without which no modification in\nmatter can be. The consciousness first, then the form. The first great\nvibration that goes forth is the vibration that gives rise to what we\nspeak of here as sound--all our terms being drawn from the lowest, or\nphysical, manifestations; the form that it brings into manifestation is\nA'k\u00e2sha, the mighty element of Ether; not the ether of modern science, of\ncourse, although that is its physical representative. Then into that the\nnext tanm\u00e2tra, the next power due to a modification of consciousness, is\nsent forth; the A'k\u00e2sha, with the primary vibration within it, receives\nthe second vibration sent out by \u00cdshvara, and this, pervading the matter\naround it, brings about the next modification of matter, the element V\u00e2yu,\nor Air. V\u00e2yu, permeated, ensouled and enveloped in A'k\u00e2sha, receives a\nfresh impulse from \u00cdshvara, the third tanm\u00e2tra, or power resulting from a\nmodification of consciousness; this tanm\u00e2tra, working on V\u00e2yu, produces\nthe modification of matter called the element Agni, or Fire, and this\nfire-matter is permeated, ensouled, and enveloped in V\u00e2yu, as V\u00e2yu in\nA'k\u00e2sha. A similar process brings into manifestation the elements Apas and\nPrithiv\u00ee. The \"magnetic field\" of an atom is composed of all the tanm\u00e2tras\nand elements above it. Try to realise this process if you can, though I\nknow the conception is difficult. What has occurred? A modification of\nlife or consciousness in \u00cdshvara, manifested as a power, a vibration;\neverything depends on vibration; ancient and modern science speak alike on\nthis. The universe is made up of vibrations, the vibrations which are the\nmodifications of the Divine out-pouring of life. These clothe themselves\nin fundamental forms of matter, out of which all multiplicity is\ndeveloped. These modifications in matter, these great, or primary,\nelements are also called tattvas. Tanm\u00e2tras, then, are the powers sent out\nby modifications of consciousness, and these are awkwardly translated by\nthe word rudiments; we have next the modifications in matter, the great\nelements, the primary elements, or tattvas. The first of the tattvas is\ncalled A'k\u00e2sha; then V\u00e2yu, then Agni, then Apas, then Prithiv\u00ee, the five\nfollowing one after the other; the keynote of this evolution is that the\nmodification of the previous higher tattva is reproduced within the lower,\npervades it and expands outside it. If you will take the _Vishnu Pur\u00e2na_,\nthe second chapter, and read over again the evolution of the five tattvas,\nyou will find that the Sanskrit word which is used comes from a root which\nmeans to pervade as well as to enclose, giving the idea of permeation as\nwell as of expanding around to form an envelope. And you must understand\nthat the central life of each tattva is the preceding tattva with its\ntanm\u00e2tra; that, with the new tanm\u00e2tra, makes up the life; and the outer\nform is the new tattva that by that productive action comes into\nexistence.\n\nNow leaving that, for I cannot go into further details, let me just say\nto you one word about the seven and the five, because that has been a\nsource of great dispute between some of our Hindu Pandits and some of\nour Theosophists. In the universe, taken as a whole, seven-fold is the\nlife of \u00cdshvara. Beyond the tattva that we know as A'k\u00e2sha, there is\nthat tattva which has been called Anup\u00e2daka, and beyond that A'ditattva,\nthe first. Those are far beyond our knowing; we cannot think so far. For\nour life-evolution, the five mark the limit; and only the five,\ntherefore, as a rule, are given in the books which are to be studied to\nshow you how to evolve.\n\nRapidly we must pass onward, then, to these tattvas as, modifying\nthemselves by aggregations, and by disintegrations and re-combinations\nof these, they make innumerable forms. The fundamental conception is\nthat there are as many basic forms of atoms in the universe as there are\ntattvas. The tattva of ancient science is the atom of modern science,\nbut modern science makes the mistake of supposing that there is only one\nfundamental atom. The truth is that modern science is only seeking to\nget hold of the Prithiv\u00ee Tattva, the lowest, or physical, atom, and it\nhas not yet recognized even the existence of the four (or six) higher\natoms that stretch beyond. These atoms form the regions of the universe.\nAll that is physical is made up from the Prithiv\u00ee Tattva. Not only is\nthis so, but within the limits of this physical region, correspondences\nof all the higher six atomic forms are reproduced. The sub-divisions of\nthe physical region, due to combinations of the Prithiv\u00ee Tattva, show\nforth the characteristics of the great regions which make up the\nuniverse; so that we have here in our solid, liquid, gas, three ethers\nand atoms, correspondences of the six higher tattvas, but we have them\nall in their Prithiv\u00ee form; they are the modifications of Prithiv\u00ee,\nreproducing on a lower plane the great primary elements. We might\ncall them Prithiv\u00ee A'ditattva, Prithiv\u00ee Anup\u00e2dhakatattva, Prithiv\u00ee\nA'k\u00e2shatattva, Prithiv\u00ee V\u00e2yutattva, Prithiv\u00ee Agnitattva, Prithiv\u00ee\nApastattva, Prithiv\u00ee Prithiv\u00eetattva. Above the region of Prithiv\u00ee comes\nthe great realm of Apas, with similar sub-divisions, all of the\nApastattva, and so again another seven above that in the higher realm of\nAgni, and above that the same in the still higher realm of V\u00e2yu, and\nabove that again in the A'k\u00e2sha, and then the highest two unknown\nrealms. When you remember that all these regions interpenetrate the one\nthe other, you will gain some glimpse of a complexity dizzying to think\nof, the vast complexity of the universe in which the One Life is\nworking. Yet that complexity is simplified by thus working downwards,\nand there is the line of the study of the ancient science. Working out\nfrom this originally simple life into the endless multiplicity of forms,\nwe may trace the One among the many, and see the Self in all things, and\nall things in Him.\n\nAt the ending of a universe, the tattvas merge in each other by\ndisintegration; Prithiv\u00ee Tattva, having disintegrated into atoms, these\natoms are themselves broken up, and the tanm\u00e2tra that formed them, being\nno longer able to express itself for lack of suitable material, ceases\nto be a power, and remains only represented by a modification in\nconsciousness--a permanent possibility. Thus Apas Tattva becomes the\nlowest manifestation, and, by a repetition of the above process, ceases\nto exist. In like fashion each successively vanishes. Hence, Mah\u00e2deva is\nrepresented as saying in the _Shiv\u00e2gama_: \"The universe proceeded from\nthe tattvas; it goes on through the tattvas; it vanishes into the\ntattvas.\"\n\nSuch is the grandiose conception of the kosmos given by the science of\nantiquity; one life, pulsing into innumerable vibrations, and these\nthrowing matter into forms. On this was based the Pythagorean system of\nnumbers; on this mathematics and music were founded; on this the \"Great\nScience,\" or Magic, of long-perished nations was built up. That science\nonly survives in its purity in the Great White Brotherhood, but its\ntraces may yet be seen in the scriptures and the religions of the world.\n\nWe take up modern science, and pass into a different atmosphere. Now\nphenomena are to be studied, forms are to occupy our attention. But as\nwe look at modern science we find that it is beginning to transcend the\nstudy of forms; we find the efforts of its greatest men are turned to\nseek unity amid diversity. Do not think that, in speaking of modern\nscience as studying forms, I am indifferent to the mighty achievements\nthat it has made, or that I would say one word in derogation of the\nability of the leading men of science, and the priceless value of the\nwork that they are doing for humanity. Their achievements during the\npresent century are achievements that are worthy of the very deepest\nrespect, not only for the \"sublime patience of the investigator,\" of\nwhich William Kingdon Clifford so rightly spoke, but also for the\nself-abnegation with which many of them have given their lives to follow\ntruth, to study in the innermost recesses of the phenomena of nature\nwhat secrets she has hidden, what may be underneath the \"Veil of Isis.\"\nI do not, then, speak a word against modern science, but I point out\nto you this fact, that the greatest work of science has been the\ngeneralisations that have been suggested in the attempt to reach\nsimplicity, to reduce multiplicity to unity. How far has science gone\nfrom that generally accepted view of the materialistic school of thirty\nyears ago, that the universe is made up of an indefinite number of\natoms, the atoms being our chemical elements! A phrase from one of the\nmost famous of the then leading men of science, Dr. Ludwig B\u00fcchner, will\nmark the greatness of the change: he declared that the carbon atom will\nalways remain a carbon atom, and has been a carbon atom from all\neternity; that the hydrogen atom from all eternity has been a hydrogen\natom, and to all eternity a hydrogen atom it will remain; for atoms with\ntheir properties are indestructible, and are therefore eternal. What man\nof science would dare to allege that to-day, knowing that he would be\nlaughed to scorn by all his scientific brethren; who would say that\nthese atoms are eternally of the same nature as they have till now been\nmade out to be? What is science in fact, doing as to the atom? It is\nfinding in what is called the atom a composite body, a compound, not an\nelement. This discovery is chiefly due to the researches of Sir William\nCrookes, who is guided in his investigations by a deeper philosophy of\nthe universe than is common among scientists. It is gradually finding\nout that these atoms are things that are built up gradually, and that\nthe qualities of atoms are not fixed, but are properties that change\nwith every difference of conditions. Late investigations have shown that\nwhen chemical bodies are submitted to extraordinary conditions of\ncold--such cold as makes the air into a liquid and solidifies hydrogen\nand oxygen--they suffer the destruction of their supposedly permanent\nproperties. It is proved that, as these conditions are changed, and as\nlower and lower ranges of temperature are brought to bear upon these\nchemical elements, one by one their eternal properties disappear, and\nthey lie there changed in their activities, and lose the characteristic\ntraits which enabled them to be discovered as parts of the moving world.\nDownward and downward falls the temperature, property after property\ndisappears, until science asks, bewildered, what will happen when we\nreach the absolute zero, what will then become of the properties of\nmatter, what will remain of the characteristics of the elements? Is\nthere not but one Matter, and are not all chemical elements but\nmodifications, aggregations, of this one ultimate matter? Similarly with\nForce, modern science has made the magnificent generalisation that all\nthe forces that we know are modifications of one Force, and are\nidentical in their essential nature; that heat, and light, and all the\nvarious forces around us, electricity, magnetism and the rest, that all\nthese are but vibrations of varying lengths and activities in a subtle\nmedium, and that they may be transmuted the one into the other. They are\nnot fundamentally different, but are one and the same in their root. But\nif this be so, if there be but one Matter, if there be but one Force,\nthen science is now tending towards unity; and as that unity is traced\nor aimed at, science will have to pass out of the grosser realm of dense\nmatter into the realm of forces working in subtle media; and we find\nthis wondrous change that, whereas in old days the existence of force\nwas argued for inductively, by studying the changes in matter, now\nscience is beginning to posit the existence of force and to question\nwhether matter is anything more than the action of force. Instead of\nregarding an atom as a solid indivisible particle, the tendency is to\nregard it as a vortex of energy, a centre of force. One writer even goes\nso far as to suggest that an atom is a source \"through which an\ninvisible fluid is pouring into three-dimensional space.\" Other atoms,\n\"anti-atoms,\" may be \"sinks\" through which the fluid pours out. If these\nunite, may not inertia be neutralised as well as gravity? May there not\nbe potential matter, and may there not be such in space, without any of\nthe attributes which characterise matter, but ready to be vivified and\nform a system of worlds? Here we have H. P. B.'s atoms and laya centres,\nput forward tentatively as a scientific problem. Science is mounting\ninto the invisible world and is trying to measure and to weigh that\nwhich therein it finds. Now this tendency to unity is the testimony to\nthe One that underlies all manifestation; only one Force, only one\nMatter; endless diversity of forces, transmutable into each other;\nendless diversity of forms, which break up again to recombine; only one\nForce under all forces, one Matter under all forms. It is seen that the\nvery fact of harmony and of evolution points to a root unity, and that\neternally independent self-moving particles would only perpetuate a\nchaos.\n\nAs science travels along this most hopeful line, we find great changes\nare arising in the nature of the studies that are being carried on, and\nwe have that wonderful theory of Sir William Crookes of the genesis of\nthe elements. He takes protyle as a starting-point, which is really V\u00e2yu\nin its form on this physical plane--Prithiv\u00ee V\u00e2yu--and out of that\nbuilds one atom after another, making all the chemical elements to be\nbodies aggregated together by the action of a positive and a negative\nforce. Let me just remind you of this, because some amongst you go so\neagerly after modern science and despise your own literature. If you had\nread your _Vishnu Pur\u00e2na_, with your brain, and not merely with your\neyes through modern spectacles, you might have learnt that theory of Sir\nWilliam Crookes long, long before he gave it. He has drawn a picture,\nand the picture shows an immovable axis, and around it a spiral coil,\nand at points in that coil are atoms of the chemical elements, generated\nby that coil which represents a swinging and cooling force. That spiral\nis in the great ocean of protyle, or primeval matter, and, as that\nspiral goes round and round the immovable axis, it generates chemical\nelements one after another, and so brings into existence the materials\nout of which the world is to be formed. That is the dry scientific\nstatement summarised from his own address. But I have read in an ancient\nbook of a mountain--which is the emblem of stability, of an axis round\nwhich everything is to revolve--thrown into a mighty ocean; and I have\nread of a great serpent turned round that mountain in spiral coils; on\nthe one side the Suras are pulling and on the other side the Asuras are\nequally busy. Between the two--the positive and negative of modern\nscience--evolution is started and the serpent spiral begins to turn and\nturn round that axis. They call the axis Mount Mandara, and they call\nthe spiral coil the serpent V\u00e2suki while the axis rests on Hari as a\npivot; they call the positive and the negative forces the Gods and\nDemons, and their churning of the ocean gives rise to the materials of\nthe universe. Aye! That is from the seer, who, looking at the ocean of\nmatter, described pictorially what the eyes of the spirit beheld there;\nwhile the other is the dry scientific statement of the modern thinker,\nwho works out his magnificent generalisation as the result of his study\nof the forms. The seer and the scientist have met.\n\nI shall show you, when I come to deal with life, that modern science is\ncoming towards our view of life. I shall give you, from the latest\ndeclarations of our modern scientific teachers, points which will show\nyou how they are climbing towards the ancient view which is found in our\nsacred books; and I will now finish this first part of our subject this\nmorning by one plea addressed to all of you, which I would pray you to\nthink over at your leisure.\n\nThere is but One Life, the Life of God, within everything in His universe.\nNo life save His life, no consciousness save His consciousness, no\nthought save His thought. This is our glory; for inasmuch as we are in\nHis image, we can answer to the vibrations of His thinking, and can\nreproduce in our minds that which He has initiated in order that we may be\nevolved. In all the different parts of this universe, different lines of\nevolution are going on; the sun is doing part of it, the vegetable world\nanother part, the animal world another, the world of man another; but in\nthe world of man there is more diversity, because there Self-consciousness\nis arising. The final image of the Supreme on earth is man; in man alone\nis the highest life; the others are climbing towards it, but in them it\nhas not yet evolved. Therefore in man there is more difference; therefore\nin man, for the time, more separation; therefore in man the great danger\nof antagonism that the lower kingdoms know not, because they are not\nsufficiently evolved. Then comes the conflict: I take my own poor\nreflection of one tiny bit of thought of \u00cdshvara, and I say: \"This is\n\u00cdshvara Himself,\" and not my poor thought of Him; \"Worship this as I see\nit,\" that is, \"Worship me instead of \u00cdshvara, and my thought of Him\ninstead of Him.\" So man after man puts up his idea of God as God, and we\nsee all the world divided into many forms of thought and of worship. Then\na man imagines that his brother men are worshipping other Gods, and he\nbecomes anxious and troubled, not realising that Gods are many because we\nare worshipping our own thoughts of God instead of God, our own limited\nrepresentations instead of the Universal Self. Nay more--I, perhaps, not\nonly say to you that you must worship my conception of God instead of your\nown, that my knowledge is the limit of manifestation, that my small\nfancies make up the universe instead of the infinite diversity that alone\ncan represent His might; but perhaps I go further and say: \"If you do not\nworship my idea of God, you are outcaste, you are alien, you belong to a\ndifferent faith, you belong to a different creed; stand outside; for I am\northodox, you are heretic and blasphemous your faith.\" So speaks religion\nafter religion, fanatic after fanatic; so one man after another makes his\nown reflection the God of the universe, and hence antagonises his\nbrethren, whose representations of the divine image are as necessary to\nits completeness as his own.\n\nThat is what I ask you to realise. God cannot be expressed wholly in you\nor in me, in our miserable limitations, in our poverty of thought, in\nour wretchedness of impudent assumption. He can only be even partially\nexpressed by all the worlds together; His whole universe is His mirror,\nand every fragment in the universe gives back to Him, in part His own\nperfections. Is it not nobler, greater, more glorious, to be a fragment\nof a perfect whole, making a part of the whole unity itself, subserving\nit in mirroring \u00cdshvara, than to be shut in with our own fragment of a\nlooking glass, trying vainly to make it perfectly reflect the whole, and\nrefusing any partial reflection of the perfect in our brethren on every\nside? That is the thought which these lectures will embody, and they\nwill fail in their purpose if they do not carry it home to your minds.\nFor \u00cdshvara, who is Existence and Intelligence, is also A'nanda, Joy,\nBliss inexpressible, and that Bliss is only realized when union is\nconsciously accomplished, when the whole is known as one. May I but help\nyou to see the Self in all things: what better service may man do for\nman?\n\n\n\n\n[SECOND LECTURE.]\n\nTHE FUNCTIONS OF THE GODS.\n\n\nMy Brothers:--Those of you who are familiar with your own sacred\nliterature will know how great a part is played therein by those\nspiritual Intelligences who are spoken of as the Devas, or Gods. As I\nsaid yesterday, the existence, the presence, and the working of these\nIntelligences in the administration of nature, in the carrying out of\nthe will of \u00cdshvara, are recognised in every great faith that the world\nhas known. The Hindu speaks of them sometimes as Suras, sometimes as\nDevas; the Hebrew, the Christian, the Mussulman, speak of them as Angels\nand Archangels, making the distinction between the higher and the lower;\nthe Zoroastrian also recognises their work, speaking of them as\nFeristhas; and so, in each of the great religions, we find the presence\nof these workers in the Kosmos recognised, and we see their functions\ndefined. Now it is exceedingly important, especially perhaps for the\nHindu, to understand how wide is the area of their working, how general\ntheir functions, for no subject perhaps is more often made a subject for\nattack by those who desire to injure the ancient religion of India, than\nthe actions of the Gods as detailed in the sacred books. You will\ncontinually find that those actions are being misunderstood or\nmis-represented. The mis-representation, one may always hope, is not\ndeliberate and conscious. It is due to the general materialism of the\nage. It is due to the fact that men who believe in a religion nominally\ndo not realise the effect of that religion in their consciousness. So\nthat while a man may say that he believes in Angels and Archangels and\nso on, he leads his life as though they did not exist. Among our\nChristian brothers there is considerable difference of opinion with\nregard to these Angels. In the different sections of the great Christian\ncommunity, the vast majority of those that profess Christianity--making\nup the old Greek Church, sometimes called the Eastern Christian Church,\nand those who are numbered in the Roman Communion, the Roman Catholic\nChurch, the two ancient Churches which have preserved an unbroken\nantiquity and an unbroken tradition from the time of Christ and His\nApostles--have maintained and maintain, uninjured and complete, the\nancient belief in the ministry of angels. They really lead their lives\nas recognising the part that is played in the world by the angelic\nhosts, and not only do they regard the Archangels as the great rulers of\nanimated nature--the seven chief Archangels taking the place of the\nseven Gods in other faiths--but they also recognise the lower host of\nangels as concerned continually in administering natural laws, in\nguiding human evolution; and indeed they go so far as to say that every\nindividual man is in special charge of a guardian angel, who ministers\nto him from the cradle to the grave, who tries to help him in danger, to\nadvise him in temptation, to protect him in peril, to ward off all the\nevils levelled against him, and who, helping him through the gateway of\ndeath, accompanies him on the other side through the invisible world,\nuntil he surrenders up his charge into the hands of Christ Himself. The\nProtestant communities, however, breaking off as they did, roughly and\nabruptly, from the ancient tradition, full of occult truth, have lost,\namong many other valuable things, this real belief in the work of the\nangels. Most members of the Protestant communities, while they\nacknowledge the existence of the angels and vaguely regard them as\n\"ministers of God,\" have no very definite idea of the part that they\nplay in the world. They do not address them, as do the Roman Catholics\nand the Greeks. They do not pay them reverence and homage day by day,\nor look on them as helpers, as intelligences superior to themselves,\nalways willing to render assistance. Practically the angels have passed\nout of their lives, so far as any conscious realisation of their\npresence is concerned; and I cannot help thinking that the loss is a\nvery serious loss when you are dealing with spiritual evolution; the\nwhole idea of the Supreme tends to become degraded and anthropomorphised\nwhen the intermediate agents are forgotten, and when every petty concern\nof human life is, as it were, thrown directly under the immediate\nsuperintendence of the Supreme. We must not, of course, in recognising\nthe working of the Gods, or the Devas, as I shall call them for the rest\nof the lecture, lose sight of the unity of the Supreme Deity. We do not,\nin Hinduism, deny or ignore the existence of \u00cdshvara because we\nrecognise the hosts of the Devas; we do not cloud our belief in the One\nbecause we recognise the innumerable hosts of the ministers of His will;\nthere is nothing more against the unity of God in the recognition of the\nhosts of the Devas, than there is in recognising the diversity of men,\nyet it is not pretended that we are clouding the unity of the Divine\nExistence when we recognise the hosts of individuals who make up the\nwhole of humanity. It is mere prejudice or ignorance that makes any one\nthink that because the Hindu recognises the action of the Devas,\ntherefore he has lost his belief in the One Existence beyond even\n\u00cdshvara Himself, in the fundamental unity that underlies diversity. What\nhe does is, that instead of regarding the world as superintended by an\nextra-kosmic God, separated as it were from His universe, with a mighty\ngulf existing between Him and it, he sees in \u00cdshvara the manifestation\nof the one Life that pervades and sustains all, he sees in \u00cdshvara the\none Root out of which all separated existences spring; and he sees,\nstretching between himself and that Supreme, innumerable hosts of\nIntelligences, step after step, rank after rank, and he looks to\nclimbing up that celestial ladder until he also stands at its very top;\nfor he knows that he also is divine, although as yet in an early stage\nof evolution, and he recognises the more highly evolved divinity above\nhim, as he recognises the divinity in the stone beneath his feet, in\neverything that exists in this universe of God.\n\nWith that beginning, so that our study may not lead to a misconception,\nlet us pass on to ask what are the functions of these Devas, of these\nIntelligences, who work in the world. You will at once realise that the\nfunctions must be very different, according to the grade of the Devas\nthat we may happen to be studying. Through the whole of the Kosmos they\nare working. Some are very lofty, some are very little evolved above the\nlevel of humanity. One great difference there is between us and them,\nthat whatever may be the grade of their mental, emotional, and spiritual\nlife, they do not, normally, use a physical body. That is a clear mark\nor line of separation. The being functioning as man, while spiritual,\nintellectual and emotional, uses a physical body, in order to carry on\nthe activities connected with the physical world. All the hosts of Devas\nare without that physical covering or vehicle; they normally use as\ntheir vehicle a body which belongs to the particular region in the\nuniverse in which their normal activities lie. Suppose, for instance,\nthat a Deva belongs essentially to the spiritual world, he will normally\nuse a spiritual body; if he wants to function on the m\u00e2nasic plane, he\nwill create for himself a temporary m\u00e2nasic body, drawing together for\nthis purpose the matter of that plane and holding it as his vehicle\nduring the period of his functioning thereupon; if he wants to function\nin the k\u00e2mic region, he will draw together the material of that region\nand make of it for himself a temporary body; if he wants to function\nvisibly in the world of man, he will draw round himself the matter of\nthe physical plane, and make for himself a body suitable to the\nimmediate purpose that he has in view. So with every other grade. The\nDevas of the m\u00e2nasic world use normally the m\u00e2nasic body, and create the\nk\u00e2mic or physical body as they may want a temporary vehicle. Those of\nthe k\u00e2rmic region use the k\u00e2rmic body normally, and create a physical\nvehicle when they require it. Thus, in every case, the Deva's ordinary\nbody is composed of the matter of the region of the universe to which he\nbelongs; but he has always the power to create any vehicle that he needs\nfor carrying out any purpose with which he is charged. This will perhaps\nsuggest to you one reason for the great variety of forms which a single\nGod may assume. Those whose inner sight is developed, who can see in the\nregions which to ordinary men are invisible, say that the Gods use many\nforms. And some of their forms have come down traditionally, described\noriginally perhaps by a great \u1e5aishi, preserved by his disciples, then\nthrown into some form of earth, or stone, or metal, painted or\nsculptured as the case may be; then such an image of the God is handed\ndown generation after generation, and represents that Deva under that\nparticular form to his worshippers. We find many forms for one Deva,\njust because of the fact that the God makes the form he wants for the\nparticular work he has upon hand, and that none of those forms bind him.\nThey are merely transitory vehicles created for a definite purpose. Some\nof these forms are indeed relatively permanent, partly because of the\nworship which is addressed to them. For the Deva will often graciously\nuse a particular form in order to meet the thought of his worshippers.\nSuppose for instance, taking a lofty example, that Shr\u00ee K\u1e5bi\u1e63h\u1e47a willed\nto reveal Himself to some Bhakta of His, in order that that devotee\nmight have the joy of consciously realising the presence of his Lord, He\nthen most certainly would clothe Himself in the form which that Bhakta\nwas in the habit of worshipping and which drew up the deepest emotions\nof his heart. For these forms are taken for the very purpose of\nstimulating devotion, for the very object of attracting the heart by\npresenting the illimitable Deity in some conditioned form which the\nconcrete mind of man is able more or less to grasp, to understand, to\nadmire and to worship. You cannot love the void of space. You cannot fix\nyour heart on the depths of infinity; you deceive yourself if, with your\nlimited intelligence, untrained even in the lowest forms of Yoga, you\nthink that you can realise Brahman, the Supreme. Too often when we speak\nof THAT, no real thought responds to our speaking; the lips speak, not\nthe intelligence or the heart. Step by step we have to climb from the\nmanifested to the unmanifested, and, in His compassionate love, God\nveils Himself in forms of beauty to attract the human heart, in order\nthat the human heart may rise adoringly to His Feet, and that some\nportion of His life, pouring down thereinto, may enable the Self of the\nworshipper to realise even partially its unity with Him.\n\nThe Devas, then, in their many ranks and divisions, perform functions\naccording to their grade. Speaking generally, their work in the world is\nto guide evolution according to the design of \u00cdshvara. That really sums\nup their functions, although we are going to study them in detail. I say\nnothing of the vast functions of the higher Devas that lie beyond our\nknowing, beyond the teaching that \u1e5aishis have given. I deal only with\nthose lower functions that are concerned with our world, and with the\nsolar system of which our world is part. Taking that limitation,\nsuitable to our ignorance, we can study some of the functions of the\nGods within the limits of our solar system.\n\nSpeaking generally, as I said, that function is to guide evolution, to\nadapt, to correlate, to carry out the living will of the Supreme, and to\ncarry out that will by bringing together in time and space all the\nagents and conditions necessary for carrying it out. There is only one\nsupreme Will that guides the universe, and that Will points steadily to\nprogress, to the goal set forth for the universe, the goal towards which\nit is evolving. Unchangeable, stable, perpetual, that Will knows no\nswerving; to use a Christian phrase, \"there is no shadow of turning\" in\nthat immutable Will. The universe rolls along the road traced out by the\nDivine Will. It cannot be diverted from that road; it cannot change its\npath; that is the law of the universe, the law on which we rest with\nfaith unshakable. But in the working out of the law in this universe\nwhere men are evolving--men in whom is the germ of that same sovereign\nand imperial Will of God, man being made in the Divine image and\ncontaining within himself the germ of the Divine powers--in this\nuniverse, as man evolves, wills also evolve which are separate,\npersonal, individual. All the confusion in the world of man is due to\nthis evolution of the separated wills that do not recognise their root\nin God, but try to follow their own diverse ways, and want to move after\ntheir own separated fashions; so that in the world of man, as nowhere\nelse in nature, you have discord instead of harmony, clash instead of\npeace, struggle and war instead of tranquillity. The world of minerals\nobeys the compulsion of the law; the world of vegetables obeys the\ncompulsion of the law; the world of animals obeys the compulsion of the\nlaw; but when man arises, man in whom the Supreme is to be developed\nafter he has climbed through the lower stages, in man there awakens the\ngerm of the will, and the separated wills bring about the discord which\nwill yet end in something greater and richer than the harmony of the\nstones, of the vegetables, of the animals. For when human evolution is\nover, millions of separated wills will join in one mighty chord of\nharmonious union, and that union of the wills that voluntarily give\nthemselves is mightier in its powers, more beautiful in its expression,\nthan compelled obedience can ever be. The music that humanity sends up\nto God, in all its varied melody, is a far more perfect expression of\nDivinity than can be drawn from the monochord that we find in the lower\nkingdoms of nature; but you will readily understand that when these\nwarring wills arise, something, some one, is wanted in order to adapt,\nto correlate, to bring about equilibrium among the contending forces, so\nthat the one purpose may be steadily subserved. Let me take a concrete\nillustration. Suppose I had here a ball which I want to move. That ball\ncan be moved along a straight line in innumerable ways. I might give it\na single impulse in the direction in which I want it to move; and it\nwould move straight on in that direction following my primary impulse.\nSo would the universe move if it contained only minerals, vegetables and\nanimals, if there were no clashing wills within it, if it were within\nthe iron grip of compulsion, which never in any fashion could be\nresisted. But I can equally well drive my ball along that straight line,\nif I know enough of physics, by correlating different and opposed\nforces. I may send two forces against it at a particular angle, and if\nmy angle be properly measured according to the strength of the forces,\nthen the ball will travel along the same line by the interaction of the\ntwo forces as well as by the impact of the one; and I may bring three,\nor four, or five, or a million forces, to bear upon that ball, and still\nit will move along that one definite line, if only the forces are\ncalculated and balanced so that their resultant shall always be a force\nalong that straight line. That balancing is one of the functions of the\nGods. They take these warring wills, these different directions that are\nbeing impressed, as it were, on the rolling world that is going along\nthe road of evolution; they balance, adapt, and correlate them, and thus\nalways keep the world travelling along the straight line, always\nbringing about the same resultant, the accomplishment of the Will of the\nSupreme; without them, these wills of ours would work infinite\nconfusion, and the world would never complete its evolution, would never\nroll upwards to its place at the Feet of God.\n\nWe find the Gods discharging other functions which subserve the same\npurpose. They mould the forms in which the growing life is to express\nitself. Evolution depends upon the growing power of the unfolding life,\nbut it needs forms whereby that growth shall be carried on. These forms\nare moulded by the Devas, so that the life, which breaks by expansion\nits containing form that is out-worn, may have another form into which\nto go fitted for the capacity that was evolved in the form it has\nout-grown. We shall find also that they break up forms as well as build\nthem; being always fixed on the one object of serving the evolution of\nthe life. Then again they act as teachers, as guides, as councillors, to\nthose that have gone beyond the normal evolution, that are the first\nfruits of the human race. Not acting as teachers directly to the masses,\nthey take the more advanced human beings in charge, directly instruct\nthem, test them and try them, as presently we shall see. So that while\nthe general purpose is the helping forward of evolution, this help is\nrendered in a million ways, according to the needs of the time.\n\nNow, in the past, this working of the Gods was recognised, and the\nsacred books are full of it. They showed themselves continually among\nmen, they carried on their work, as it were, in the full blaze of day.\nBut now no longer do they show themselves to men at large, and many have\nforgotten even their existence, and very many people, even in India,\nmaterialised by the thought in which they have been trained, are half\nashamed to say that they believe in the existence and the working of the\nDevas. The unbelief makes no difference, save to those who disbelieve.\nThe working of the Gods remains ever the same. They are ever busy in\ncarrying out the Supreme Will. Only they do not show themselves, and to\nthose alone who recognise their existence and their work will they\nmanifest themselves. If in the old days they showed themselves as they\ndo not now, it was because men then had reverence and love and were\nwilling to bow down to those who were wiser and greater than themselves;\nbecause then democracy was not reigning; because then the ignorant did\nnot think themselves equal to the learned, nor did man deem himself\nequal to the Gods. In those days, because they could help they came to\nthe helping; but they will never come visibly again to earth until men\nhave learnt to reverence once more what is above them, and to understand\ntheir place in the Kosmos, to worship as well as to command. The Gods\nwork all the same. They are not deprived of their functions by our\nfolly, by our conceit, by our ignorance. Only they work unseen, and we\nforfeit the sweet comfort of their visible presence, the strength and\njoy of the old heroic days, the dignity of conscious companionship with\nthe Immortals, the ever-renewed assurance of super-physical life. Not\none death that happens on our earth, but a God has struck away that body\nwhose work is over; not one \"natural catastrophe,\" but a God has guided\nit to the happening; not one help given to a man in need, but a God is\nthe agent behind the visible helper; not one answer to the cry of man in\nhis distress, that is not the response of a God to human sorrow.\nEverywhere they are working. Everywhere they are bringing about what we\nsee as dead mechanical nature. Every phenomenon is the veil of a God,\nand there is nothing done in which an Intelligence does not take part.\n\nSeven are the great Gods below the Trinity, below the Trim\u00fbrti. Every\nreligion, again, acknowledges these Seven. The Christian speaks of the\n\"Seven Spirits that are before the throne of God.\" The Zoroastrian\ntells us of the seven Ameshaspendas who rule the world. The Chaldean\nspoke of the seven great Gods. Five only are working and two are\nconcealed, for the universe is in process of evolution and only five\nstages of it have been reached. Therefore only with regard to five can\nwe definitely speak as to working. The two concealed are beyond our\nknowing; they are related to future stages of the evolution of the\nKosmos. But the five we will now consider. Their names in connection\nwith their functions you know well enough. They are connected with the\ntattvas of which we were speaking yesterday--the Lord of A'k\u00e2sha, Indra;\nthe Lord of Air, V\u00e2yu; the Lord of Fire, Agni; the Lord of Water,\nVaruna; the Lord of Earth, sometimes called Kshiti (various names are\nused for him); each of these great Gods has what we may call one region\nmarked out for his working. The matter of that region is the matter in\nwhich he works; but in addition to that, each one is represented in the\nrealms of the others by a sub-division on which his impression is\nespecially made. These are the great kosmic planes that I have spoken of\nmarked off from each other by the tattvas. But if we come down to the\nphysical plane, dealing only with Prithiv\u00ee Tattva, we shall then find\nthat that is also seven-fold in division and that we have physical\nsolid, physical earth or Prithiv\u00ee, physical water or Apas, physical fire\nor Agni, physical air or V\u00e2yu, physical ether or A'k\u00e2sha. Each of these\ngreat Gods works on each plane through the medium that corresponds to\nthe region which belongs to him in the Kosmos as a whole. How often we\nsee those correspondences as it were printed in physical nature. We have\nlight with its seven sub-divisions as seen in the solar spectrums\nshowing the seven colours, and the scale with its seven notes. Colours\nand notes alike result from vibrations, and are determined by the number\nof vibrations occurring in a unit of time. As the universe is built by\nvibrations, colour and sound are factors of the universe at large, and\nevery region is said to have its own colour; the God of that region has\nhis colour--dependent on his vibratory force--which he imprints on the\nregion over which he rules; so that if a \u1e5aishi looks at the solar system\nfrom a higher plane, he not only hears the seven fundamental notes of\nmusic, making \"the harmony of the spheres,\" but he sees a gorgeous\ndisplay of colours, as the sphere of every great Deva with his own\ncolour interpenetrates the others, yielding an iridescent splendour of\ninterfering radiances, the marvellous \"rainbow that is round the throne\nof God.\" Such mystic expressions have lost their meaning for the\nmajority, because the sight of those who wrote them is but little\ndeveloped in these days, and few are they who can see as the seer saw of\nold.\n\nEach of these great Gods has under him a host of subordinate Gods who\ncarry out his decrees. The constitution of an ordinary state will give\nyou a very good picture of the government of the solar system. We have\nat the head an Emperor or an Empress; then the officers who represent\nthat supreme authority in separate divisions of the realm; there is the\none central authority over the whole, and the officers who wield it in\ndifferent areas of the Empire. Then these officers are graded in rank,\nand we have higher and subordinate Ministers, Judges, Magistrates,\nin descending order, each with a smaller and smaller district to\nadminister, the functions of each becoming more limited as you descend\nthe official ladder; and each responsible to his official superior. That\nis really a very good picture of the government of the solar system; the\nhead of all is \u00cdshvara Himself; His Viceroys are the great Gods, each\nwith his own vast area over which he rules, and each with his official\nhierarchy under him, until you come down to the lowest Devas, who carry\non the work in the limited area of a village of the solar system.\n\nSuch is the outline, then, of the functions. The next thing to grasp\nis, that, when we see on this plane in which our consciousness is\nworking--the physical plane--any one of these fundamental forms of\nmanifestation, we should try to realise the presence of the God behind\nthe material phenomenon. Not a fire that burns upon the earth, whether\nthe fire of the volcanic mountain, whether the fire ranging through the\nvast forest, whether the fire burning on the household hearth, or on the\nsacrificial altar, that is not Agni in manifestation, with the\npossibility of his powers coming into visibility. They were not\ndreamers, they who bade you of old keep safe the fire, the household\nfire which husband and wife at the bridal kindled, and which, when the\nlife of the married was over in the home, they still carried out into\nthe forest; they carried with them the fire, and it took with them the\npresence of the God, who through the household life had blessed, had\nguided, had given prosperity and made the final withdrawal from the\nhousehold life possible and desirable. That is one of the many truths\nwhich modern India is losing.\n\nBut when these things were believed in, and the ceremonies connected with\nthem were carried on, then nature worked in a definite order, and there\nwere not the same continual irregularities that we have in our modern\ndays. By that harmonious working between man and the Gods, nature answered\nto man as man answered to nature; while man did his duty, nature in her\nturn did her duty also; the failure of rain, the failure of crops, the\nfailure of sunshine, the presence of plague, or of any other form of human\nmisery, was seen as having its root in the failure of humanity; and man\nturned dutifully to that which he had neglected, and thus readjusted the\nbalance which his irregularity had displaced. Let us try and see, as an\nexample, one concrete working in what we call natural evolution. We will\nturn to the great God Varuna. He works through water; every manifestation\nof water is his, whether on the physical or on any other plane, in any of\nthe forms that it may take, for what we call \"water\" is naturally the\nlowest, coarsest manifestation, his physical body, as it were. He works\nwith it in nature in endless ways--to dissolve, to combine, to dissociate.\nWhen we take the greater workings, how very grand is the conception we may\ngain of the might of the God. Come back with me, far back, into the past,\nere humanity had taken form; there see the world as it then was; see how,\nas fire and water, Agni and Varuna are working on every material to fit\nthe world to be the birthplace of the yet unborn humanity. See how Varuna\nis working in order to prepare what is wanted of mountain and of valley,\nof river and of plain; see the might of his work as well as that of his\nbrother Agni, in apparent clash but really in harmony; fire and water\nmeet, explode, and toss up a mountain-chain where before there was none;\nsee how he gathers snow on the mountain peaks, and gradually fills with\nmasses of this snow, frozen into ice, the mountain ravines made by the\ncombined volcanic action; see how the slow ploughing begins; ploughing,\nploughing and ploughing again, as the mighty God works onward in the form\nof glaciers, grinding his furrow through the earth, and preparing for the\nfuture; see, ages later, how the channel cut out by the glacier is filled\nby the tumbling cataracts from melted snow, and a turbulent torrent rolls\ndownwards, and against its resistless waves nothing is able to stand; the\nvalley dug out by the plough of the ice is filled with water, and from it\nthe soil is gradually deposited, which in the future will make fertile\nland for crops in order that man may live. Then Varuna binds his waters\ninto a narrower and narrower channel, until there is mountain range and\nvalley and a river flowing through it: and he carries his river downwards\nand pours it into the sea and his brother Agni draws it up again to form\nthe clouds. There has come by that mighty action, destructive as it seems\nin appearance, the building of the plain and the valley where men shall\nlive and love, where children shall be playing, where horses shall graze,\nwhere corn shall grow and ripen in the sunshine, and where, on the\npeaceful banks of the river, men shall worship the God who made possible\ntheir happy life.\n\nWe talk about the \"cruelty of nature.\" Let us try and understand what\nthis cruelty means. The world now is inhabited. Crowds of men are here,\nand lo! the river, that made the habitation of the valley possible and\nkeeps it fruitful, now overflows its banks and the mighty flood sweeps\naway village and town, men, women, children, and cattle, and only\ndesolation is left behind. What is this? Is this horror a divine\nworking? What is this that Varuna has done? Varuna is working for\nevolution. His thought is not fixed on the forms in which the life is\ncabined, but on the life that is evolving within them, which can make\nfor itself new forms. When those men are swept away, it is only the\nbreaking of the forms that happens; the life up-springs uninjured and\nset free; for the body is the prison-house of the evolving life, and if\nthe prison doors were never thrown open, we should be in jail all our\nlives and make no progress for the future. The God to whom form is\nnothing and life everything, to whom form is but a changing, convenient\nvehicle, and the life that moulds the form is the one thing that is\nworthy of thought, he strikes away the form when its purpose is\ncompleted; to him such destruction is the act of mightiest charity; it\nis the deed most helpful to evolution. We err, my brothers, when we look\non death with eyes that are full of tears, with hearts that are\nbreaking. Death is he who brings us to a higher birth, and who sets free\nthe imprisoned soul; it is the liberation of the bird confined within\nthe limits of a cage, enabling it to soar upwards into the heavens,\nsinging, as it goes, with joy at the freedom it has recovered. Does that\nseem strange? Let us take an illustration from the _Mah\u00e2bh\u00e2rata_:--\n\nThere was a council among the Gods in Svarga, how some of them would\ntake incarnation upon earth for the sake of helping men at a great\ncrisis in the world's history. Great men were needed, and the question\narose whether some of the Gods were willing to bind themselves within\nthe limits of human form, in order to give special help to human\nprogress; among those who were needed for the work that was coming was\nthe son of Soma Deva, Varchas, as he was called, and the Gods desired\nthat this Deva should be born on earth. Soma Deva hesitated. He was not\nwilling that his son should leave him and the heavenly life, and\nalthough he finally consented that he should be born as Abhimanyu, the\nson of Arjuna, it was only on the condition that he should live but for\nsixteen years, and be killed in the great battle of Kurukshetra. You\nsay, what a strange view of life! What an extraordinary condition for\nlove to make, that this youth should die at the age of sixteen, in the\nvery flower of his dawning manhood, should die a death of violence. Yet\nthat was the will of the one who loved him best, for heaven sees with\ndifferent eyes from earth. Soma saw the life, and cared not for the\nform; to a God the form is a prison, death is the gaoler that liberates;\nhence the condition was made that only for sixteen years might the\ndivine youth live a human life, and then \"my son of mighty arms shall\ncome back to me,\" and that from a battle field, dying gloriously in the\nmidst of the fight.\n\nDo you know that sometimes the swamping of a civilisation by a natural\nconvulsion--such as the going down of Atlantis below the waves of the\nocean that we now call the Atlantic, the wiping out of the whole nation\nor race--is the best proof of love that the Supreme \u00cdshvara through\nHis intermediate agents can show to the lives therein embodied. For\nthere are stages in the world's story where man is so passionately set\non a line of action that is against his real progress, when he so\ndeterminately sets his desires on objects that hold him back and delay\nhis evolution, that the only mercy that the Gods can show him is to\nbreak his form in pieces, and give him as it were a new start for the\nevolving of himself--the life. Sometimes I have felt, as I have gone\nthrough some of the miseries of our great cities in the West, when, in\nthe pursuance of my duty, I have gone with breaking heart through the\nslums of eastern and southern London, or through those of Glasgow, or\nEdinburgh, or Sheffield, as I have noted the types of men and women\naround me, as I have seen the human almost veiled by the brute, and\nhumanity degraded well-nigh beyond possibility of recognition, that no\nappeal for help was fitting save one that would set free that imprisoned\nlife. I have felt that nothing save the destruction of the forms could\ngive any hope for those imprisoned within them; that for those men and\nwomen, as they were, degraded, brutal, drunken, profligate, their very\nforms with the impress of the animal, the best mercy that God could show\nthem would be an earthquake that would swallow the whole great city and\nset free the lives pent hopeless within it. For not one life would be\nlost, not one life would pass away, but they would be set free to go\ninto somewhat less unplastic forms and give scope for that divine\nworking towards evolution, which is in extreme cases only possible when\nthe forms, forms of evil, are gone. We speak sometimes of the training\nof children being easier than that of grown-up people, because they are\nmore plastic. So also the Gods want oftentimes the child-ego in the\nplastic form instead of in the prison-house grown rigid by age; and they\ntherefore break that environment in order that the young life may grow.\n\nAnother great function of the Gods is the dealing with the karma of\nnations, \"collective karma,\" as it is sometimes called. Suppose a nation\nis acting in its collective capacity--I am not now thinking of the\nindividuals brought into it by their individual karma but of the nation\nacting as a unit--and suppose it commits a crime against another nation.\nThere has been one working of karma so tremendous during the last year,\nthat I will take it as an illustration--Spain. Some centuries ago Spain\nwas at the summit of her power; mighty was she among the western\nnations. There was sent to her, in order to help her forward, the gift\nof new knowledge. It came truly in a somewhat unacceptable guise, for it\ncame from Arabia, with the stamp of Muhammed upon it; it was brought by\nthe children of Isl\u00e2m; they brought the light of science with them,\nand, as they established themselves in southern Spain, they gave that\nlight to Spain. Universities were established. Large classes were\nformed. From every part of Europe men come crowding to the Schools of\nCordova, and there they learnt the beginnings of the Science that has\nsince grown into so mighty a tree in western lands. What did Spain do?\nSpain called up against these Moors, and against the Hebrews--who also\nwere learned in the learning of the East--the frightful weapons of the\nInquisition, the stake, the rack, the dungeon, the torture of exile. Who\ncan count the hundreds of thousands driven out from home, the broken\nfamilies, the miseries, the poverty and starvation intolerable, which\nmarked the expulsion of the Jews and of the Moors from Spain? Still her\nkarma of success was not complete. Across the Atlantic ocean she sped,\nItaly lending one of her sons for the glory of the Spanish Empire. In\nthe wake of the ships of Columbus there followed the ships of the\nconquerors of America, full of Spanish soldiers. I cannot dwell on the\nstory of the conquest of Mexico, and the still more terrible conquest of\nPeru; I have no time to wring your hearts, as I might, with the tale of\nthe destruction of a great civilisation, of the killing out of the last\nexquisite traces in Peru of one of the most perfect civilisations that\nour world has ever known, of the crushing of the gentle Indian race\nthere by chains, by imprisonment, shut out from the glorious Sun whose\nchildren their Incas were. Too gentle to struggle, accustomed only to a\nlife of flowers, of music, and of sunshine, they were crammed into caves\nthat they were made to dig in ancient cliffs, dying by thousands upon\nthousands in the digging out of the gold and silver which their Spanish\nconquerors demanded, until the very name of the ancient nation perished,\nand only a few scattered Peruvian Indians remained to represent what was\none of the fairest civilisations of the world. Such was the karma made\nby Spain in the days of her glory, and the horror of her conquests sank\ninto the oblivion of the past. But do the Gods forget? Nay, their memory\nis perfect. They are the administrators of the divine law, and give the\nharvest to the sowers. From the very country which they outraged, from\nthe very land that they conquered, a new nation springs up as the\ncenturies go on to take up the old struggle between the two hemispheres,\nand to-day we have seen America and Spain closing again in the\ndeath-grip, but the scale of balance is now weighed down on the other\nside, and America becomes the karmic agent for working out the woes of\nthe Aztecs and the Peruvians, and for driving from the western\nhemisphere the nation that there outraged humanity in the centuries\ngone by. Thus the Gods are needed to bring nations together to balance\nup these accounts between the races, and so to restore equilibrium once\nagain. Thus they work, using men as their agents, and they bring about\nthese national results. Partly they do it by bringing to birth, at a\nparticular time, men whose individual karma fits them to be the agents\nof the collective karma of the nation. What was more striking in the\nSpanish war which has just closed, than the absolute incapacity shown by\nthe men who were the rulers of Spain? Whence came they? They were men\nwho in the past by their individual karma had fitted themselves for the\nsorry fate of incapable rulers, and they were guided by the Gods to take\nbirth in the families which give rulers to Spain, in order that, by\ntheir weakness and ineptitude, by their cowardice and their want of\nforesight, they might serve as men to lead their nation to destruction,\nthe fitting instruments for the working out of Spain's evil karma. See\nalso how at the fit time great men arise to lead a nation to victory.\nThese men are also chosen by the Gods beforehand because of their\nindividual karma, and they are brought to birth in the place and at the\ntime when they are wanted for the working out of the collective karma\nof a nation. Not by chance is a man brought into the world, not by the\ncompulsion of a dead law, or of a blind necessity; the Gods are working\nhere with an intelligence that foresees and guides, and they choose for\nthe accomplishment of their ends the men whose own karma fits them to be\ntheir agents for the work in hand, and then guide them to take birth at\nthe place where that karma can subserve the collective karma of their\npeople.\n\nThis also is true in a much more limited way with regard to the working\nof individual karma. Sometimes you must have wondered how, with all the\ninterfering activities of men, the karmic law could work out with\nundeviating justice; it is because the Gods are guiding the working. You\nsee somewhere a man who is starving and if you misunderstand karma--as\ntoo many of you do, to the shame of India, in a land where this teaching\nis of immemorial antiquity--you turn aside from that starving man and\nsay that it is his karma to starve and perish; in those hardened hearts\nof yours you use the will of God as a cover for your own selfishness,\nfor your indifference and your lack of love. That man's karma to starve?\nAye, and therefore he is starving! But if a Deva guides you to the place\nwhere your brother is starving, it is because he would make you the\nagent of his beneficence to that man whose evil karma of the present\nmoment has been exhausted by his suffering; the Deva thus says to you:\n\"Man, your brother man is starving, give him the relief it is his karma\nto receive, and be my agent in carrying out the law.\" But if you refuse\nthe God, if, blinded by ignorance or indifference, you turn aside and\nwill not carry his message to your brother, he will not for that be\nthwarted, he will find some other agent, or, as a last resource, he will\ndo it himself by some act that may seem miraculous in the eyes of the\nblind, for the purpose of the God may not be blocked; but for those who\nhave refused to act as his agents, who have refused to act as his\nmessengers, they have made for themselves the karma of being left\nunassisted when the hour of their own need shall strike in the future.\nFor the administrators of the good law forget not; every debt is\ncollected, every creditor is paid in full. But you may say that it does\nnot follow that a man's karma is exhausted when you meet him; true, but\nthat is not your business, it is the business of the guiding God, and he\nwill frustrate the physical aid if the karma be still evil. If you have\nthat opportunity given you of making good karma, you have all the merit\nof your willingness to act, you have all the virtue of your readiness to\nsacrifice; but if it is not yet his time to be relieved, you will not\nfind the object of your charity; by circumstances, as you will say, he\nwill have been taken outside your reach. Leave you the Gods to do the\nwork of the Gods, the administration of the law; do you that charity,\nthat love and compassion, which it is ever their will that man should\nshow to man. We cannot break the law; we cannot change their purpose;\nbut we have the choice of co-working or refusing, and on that our\nindividual karma depends.\n\nThen we find further that Devas bring people together and carry them\napart, always for the working out of their individual karmas; that men\nare guided to places and positions at definite times, according to those\ncircumstances which, by their karma, they must meet.\n\nNow men are related especially to one or other of the great Gods, by the\nconstitution of their bodies visible and invisible. That gives them a\nspecial affinity for one Deva rather than for another. For instance, the\nlower hosts of Devas who, we will say, belong to Agni, build into a\nman's invisible and visible bodies, the kind of matter in which that God\nnormally works. That gives the man a relationship to that particular\nGod. Every man is connected with a special manifestation of God, to whom\nby his constitution and evolution he should turn. Unhappily ignorance\nhas so widely taken the place of knowledge, that it is difficult for a\nman to discover to which Deva he is thus related. I have not time to\nwork that out but you will see how thoroughly it supports the ancient\nidea that men rightly worshipped different manifestations of the Divine,\nand profited by such worship.\n\nBut we must hurry on with this outline, for we have yet to deal with the\nmore highly evolved souls, and on your understanding this last part of\nour subject will depend your power to defend our sacred literature when\nit is attacked by those who do not understand it. Therefore I will ask\nyou to follow it carefully, and you can apply the principles that I will\nillustrate by special stories in a hundred other cases.\n\nThe Devas, in their relationship to the more advanced human lives, have\nthat function of teaching that I have alluded to, and also the function\nof testing and trying them, to see how far they are worthy and reliable,\ntesting all their weak points in order that those weak points may be\ngotten rid of, trying them, where there is a germ of vice still\nremaining, in order that that germ of vice may be eradicated. Let us try\nto realise the nature of that working. Suppose we see a man who has made\ngreat progress. He is approaching the end of his births. In that man\nthere is some germ of evil still remaining that has not been brought out\nyet into manifestation by the working of karma. He is going to be\nliberated, but he cannot be liberated while that germ remains. What\nshall be done with him? That germ of evil must be hastened to its\nripening. It must be made to grow more quickly than otherwise it would\ngrow. It must be gotten rid of, at any cost of pain, of anguish, and of\ntemporary degradation, and the God will take such action as will ripen\nthat germ and bring it to fruitage; so that, the man acting as he would\nact when that germ had been ripened by evolution, may suffer the results\nwhich would follow from the error, and by such suffering may get rid of\nthat evil in his nature, which would otherwise have prevented him from\nattaining liberation.\n\nLet me give you a story for each of these to make the action clear. You\nsee that a man is strong; well and good; but that strength must be\ntested to see if there be a flaw anywhere; if there is a rope on which\nthe life of a man is going to depend, he holding it and descending a\nprecipice, that rope must be pulled and tested to see if there be any\nweak point in it which might break when the man's body is hanging upon\nit, so that he would fall. There may be a flaw in the rope, and not\ntill it has been tested will the man risk his life upon it. How much\nless then will the Deva risk the progress of an advanced man on a virtue\nnot strong enough to bear every strain? He will test it with every\npossibility of strain, until it has proved itself strong enough to bear\nthe weight which it may be called upon to hold up. We will take our\nstories from the _Mah\u00e2bh\u00e2rata_, which you all know, or ought to know.\nArjuna was seeking to get divine weapons; he was to be a great leader in\na battle still in the future. We are at the time of the thirteen years'\nexile, and you may remember that he spent many of these years in the\nsearch for these weapons. During his search, he sought Maheshvara, who\nhad promised to give him His own weapon, and he performed many\nausterities in order that he might come pure into the presence of God.\nOne day as he was performing worship, a wild boar came along; at the\nsame time a hunter appeared, a hunter of a very low caste, a hunter of\nthe hills. Now you remember that Arjuna was a Kshattriya, and he\naccordingly caught up his bow to shoot at the wild boar; the hunter also\nraised his bow to shoot at the wild boar. Two arrows went from the two\nsides and the boar was struck dead. Arjuna was very angry at the\ninterference of this low-caste hunter, and cried: \"How dare you shoot at\nthe wild boar which was mine?\" and he began to quarrel and to threaten\nto slay him. Said the hunter: \"If you wish to fight, fight\"; at that,\nArjuna showered his arrows on the hunter but they all fell off from him.\nThe hunter, laughing, said: \"Excellent! Excellent! go on! go on!\"; and\nArjuna hurled at him weapon after weapon, but everything failed. Arrows\nfell off him, everything broke against him--trees, rocks, everything; he\nremained untouched and uninjured, until at last He showed Himself as\nMah\u00e2deva, and praised the man who had held his own against the God. Thus\nHe tried Arjuna's strength; could he be sent to Kurukshetra with\ncelestial weapons if his strength were too little for the fight? Try him\nagainst the Divine potency, limited in order to be faced and fought;\nwhen his courage is found to be dauntless and his strength sufficient,\nthen send him to Kurukshetra tried and proved, able to lead his men to\nvictory.\n\nTake another case, more difficult. Yudhishthira is sad at heart; he\nis struggling, has failed, and is in danger. Drona is there, leading\nthe hosts of his enemies, and he has been driven by him from the\nbattle-field. No one is able to stand against Drona; every one flies\nbefore the face of that mighty warrior; he turns back every attack. What\ncan be done? Yudhishthira is in despair. Is he to be conquered? A\nstainless king was this son of P\u00e2ndu, one of the noblest and most\nblameless figures that ancient literature paints; but with a strain of\nweakness in him which in critical times would sometimes show a too great\nreadiness to yield, too little of the Kshattriya's power of standing\nalone against any force that might be brought to bear against him; a\nlittle germ of weakness was there, that had in it the possibility of a\nfatal fall. Shr\u00ee K\u1e5bi\u1e63h\u1e47a is there, the great Avat\u00e2ra, and Bh\u00eema comes\nrushing up from the battle-field saying that he has slain an elephant,\nwhose name is the same as the name of the son of Drona. If Drona hear\nthat his son Ashvatth\u00e2m\u00e2 is dead, he will drop his weapons, he will let\ngo his enemy; no further will he fight when his beloved is gone. \"I told\nhim that Ashvatth\u00e2m\u00e2 was dead, but he would not believe me; he sent me\nto you saying that Yudhishthira is a devotee of truth, he will not tell\na lie for the sovereignty of the three worlds. If he says Ashvatth\u00e2m\u00e2 is\ndead, I will believe.\" Terrible is the strain; mighty the force brought\nto bear against the man who has a weakness in him; and Shr\u00ee K\u1e5bi\u1e63h\u1e47a,\nstanding by him, watching him steadfastly, advises him to utter that\nwhich is not true. God advises this almost blameless man to tell a lie?\nHow strange the scene! Yudhishthira, yielding to Shr\u00ee K\u1e5bi\u1e63h\u1e47a, tells\nthe falsehood, and Drona lets fall his weapons and is killed. If the\nstory stopped there, we might well be puzzled. If Yudhishthira's life\nwas no further told, we might well ask: what is this that we have\nstudied? But when we remember that one of the great functions of the\nTeacher, the Gurudeva, is to bring out any weakness inherent in His\npupil, because otherwise that weakness will keep the man tied, and he\nwill not be fit to be liberated, we pause and read on. When that lie was\nspoken, the chariot of Yudhishthira sank downwards to the ground, no\nlonger able to support itself, truth having been violated. And as years\nwent on, the bitterness of that memory of a falsehood remained; the\nsorrow of the slaying of the preceptor by a lie ate deep into the heart\nof the king; he never recovered from it, he never got rid of its effect;\nover and over again, he breaks from his repose in anguish; \"I have slain\nmy Guru.\" The sorrow worked and the shame, till the anguish purified\nthat noble soul from the last stain of weakness; and when the Great\nJourney is over, when wife and brothers lie dead behind him and he\nutters not a word of protest against the death of his beloved, when he\nstands ready to ascend to heaven, when only one living creature remains\nwith him, the dog who had followed after him faithfully through all his\nwanderings since he left his capital, when that dog remained his sole\ncompanion, trusting his master's love faithfully unto death, then comes\ndown a mighty God and stands beside him. \"Your time has come; mount on\nmy celestial chariot, and ascend in your body unto the heaven where you\nhave won the right to sit and reign.\" Will he now yield to the\ninvitation of the God? He said: \"This dog is here; he has trusted to my\nprotection and I cannot leave him alone; I must take him with me.\" The\nGod answered: \"Dogs have no place in heaven; dogs are unclean, no place\nfor them is there; you have left your dead brothers behind, and your\nwife when she perished; why should you remain still with this dog?\"\n\"They are all dead,\" he answered \"for the dead, the living can do\nnothing. This creature is still living and has sought my protection; I\nwill not abandon him.\" \"Nay,\" the God said, \"be not so foolish; leave\nthe dog there.\" But Yudhishthira stood firm; he was strong enough to\nstand against the God, and to show righteousness and fidelity to the\npoor brute that had placed his love in him; unless he might take the dog\nwith him, he would stay on the earth and do his duty. Such lesson had he\nlearnt from his fall; such is the result of the working of Shr\u00ee K\u1e5bi\u1e63h\u1e47a\non his evolution. We can see this same working throughout the whole of\nthat struggle. Trace Shr\u00ee K\u1e5bi\u1e63h\u1e47a through the pages of the\n_Mah\u00e2bh\u00e2rata_, and you will find that He never deviates from one steady\npurpose--to bring the great struggle to a foreseen ending, where justice\nshall triumph and the Kshattriyas of India shall disappear; He was at\nonce destroying injustice and preparing for the future of India,\nbreaking down the iron wall of her warring caste that ringed her around\nwith safety. There is a particular aim in everything that He does, and\nyou will see that His purpose is immovable, if you study carefully. He\nis working towards its accomplishment the whole way through. Look at the\nway in which He steps in when His strength or protection is needed; see\nhow He tries to stimulate the P\u00e2ndavas to do their duty, and only takes\ntheir place when they fail. See the case where Shr\u00ee K\u1e5bi\u1e63h\u1e47a having\npromised that he would do no battle, Arjuna falters before the face of\nBh\u00eeshma and has no heart to strike; you remember how sad was the\nstruggle. Arjuna was not able to strike harshly at Bh\u00eeshma, the greatest\nof all men and all warriors, perfect in Dharma, the grandsire and the\nteacher of all. \"How can I slay him?\" insisted Arjuna; \"I remember when\nas a child soiled with dust, I climbed on to his knees and throwing my\narms around him called him 'Father,' and he said to me, 'I am thy\nfather's father.' How can I bring myself to slay him?\" And you will\nremember how Shr\u00ee K\u1e5bi\u1e63h\u1e47a Himself told him not to shrink, 'bade him slay\nhim.' Hard was the task; Arjuna's memory was too strong for him; he only\nfought in appearance with restrained might, not with vigour, until at\nlast Shr\u00ee K\u1e5bi\u1e63h\u1e47a saw that He must stimulate this man to do his duty,\nand to fight, though it were against his old teacher himself; He throws\ndown the reins of His horses, takes the whip, and leaps down from the\nchariot, and with the whip He rushes through the brunt of the battle to\nattack Bh\u00eeshma Himself. Ah! that sight is hard for Arjuna; it appeals to\nhim as Kshattriya, and duty is remembered instead of emotion; throwing\nhis arms round Shr\u00ee K\u1e5bi\u1e63h\u1e47a to stop him he says, \"Go back! Go back! and\ndrive me yet again, and I will do my duty even to the slaying of\nBh\u00eeshma.\" Now what does that mean? It means that the purpose of the God\nwill be accomplished, whether or not a man is found to do it; that\nevolution will proceed, no matter who may falter or who may hinder; that\nwhile evolution will go on under the Will of God, individual progress\ndepends on individual co-operation with that Will; that God evolves His\nagents by setting them to His work, and that their progress depends on\nthe extent to which they are able to receive the impulse that He\nimparts. Only one other case I will take to show you how Shr\u00ee K\u1e5bi\u1e63h\u1e47a\nworked when the force was too great for Arjuna to meet, when He saw\nArjuna could do nothing with all the valour at his command, that no\nforce of appeal, no stimulus, could enable him to defend himself. One\nweapon was thrown that might not err in its aim, one weapon a celestial\nweapon that He had given as a boon, when He waked from His thousand\nyears of sleep. That weapon was cast against Arjuna. Arjuna could not\navert it. Alone of all the weapons in earth and heaven, that weapon must\ngo to its ending, and Arjuna would have been slain in the midst of the\nbattle. What can be done? He could not cut it with the arrows from\nG\u00e2nd\u00eeva, he could not use against it any of the mighty weapons that the\nGods had given him. This was the weapon of the Supreme, which nothing\nwas able to oppose. Shr\u00ee K\u1e5bi\u1e63h\u1e47a then, at that last moment, as the\nweapon flies straight at the breast of the warrior throws Himself in\nfront, and, as it strikes His bosom, it knows its Master and is changed\ninto a garland of flowers. So also with the chariot on which He drove.\nHe bade Arjuna first get down. He bade him take his weapons, and until\nArjuna had left it, Shr\u00ee K\u1e5bi\u1e63h\u1e47a stood there immovable, He would not\nstir; and the moment He left it the whole chariot burst into flames, for\nonly His presence had kept it together, He who was the Lord of fire, as\nwell as the Lord of all else. You see, my brothers, how fruitful is the\nstudy of this subject, when you are dealing with the sacred literature;\nhow you may be able to explain it to men of your own faith, and defend\nit against the attacks of men of other creeds. Do not defend it with\nbitter words, do not defend it with harsh language, do not defend it\nwith wrath in your mind, and indignation making your tongue poisonous;\nbut remember that where ignorance attacks, it is the duty of knowledge\nto defend; and that when that which ignorance attacks is the spiritual\nfood of millions, every man of knowledge should spring forward to defend\nit, lest the ignorant of that faith should swerve, when they see the\ntruths in their books assailed by those who do not understand.\n\nThat then is the outcome of this lecture. I ask you to remember that in\nevery stage of your life, Gods are around you. No karma that you make,\nthat they will not remember; no appeal that you utter, that they will\nnot answer. If for a moment no answer seems to come, or if sorrow that\nyou shrink from falls upon you, remember that the hand of love allows it\nthus to fall, and that in bearing that sorrow bravely, you are swiftly\nworking out your own deliverance. You are to be men, not children, in\nthe future; men-sons of the living \u00cdshvara whose image you are, and not\nbabies that He must for ever carry in His arms. He asks from you the\nstrength of men to help the Gods. He is evolving you as the agents for\nHis future universe. You may delay, if you will. You may lose time, if\nyou will. Kalpa after Kalpa, you may remain at a low stage. If so you\nchoose, He will not force your will; but your wisdom lies in letting His\nWill work in you to your swift and perfect evolution, that you may have\nthe joy of carrying out that Will in other worlds, of consciously being\nHis agents under other conditions; for men are Gods in the making, and\nwe are preparing to discharge the functions of the Gods.\n\n\n\n\n[THIRD LECTURE.]\n\nEVOLUTION OF LIFE.\n\n\nMy Brothers,--We have reached a point in our study from which we may\nbegin to trace the Evolution of Life in our own system that evolution\ntakes place on the various planets, but it is similar in its general\noutline, though modified in its details on the different globes. We\nshall chiefly confine ourselves to our own world and our own humanity at\nthe outset we shall be obliged to go somewhat further afield, but for\nthe greater part of our study we may confine ourselves to the evolution\nof life on our earth. Now we are seeking in our study to find a common\nground of agreement on which co-operation may arise between peoples of\ndifferent faiths and of different schools of thought. If we are trying\nto find a meeting-place for western and for eastern Science, if we are\nseeking in the light of Religion to understand some of the mysteries of\nlife, it is right and fitting that we should remember that no one\nreligion has a monopoly of truth, and that any one who is seeking to\nexpound the truth should be able to fortify his position from the\ndifferent religions of the world, and to show that on all great,\nessential, and fundamental truths they speak with a single voice, they\nteach an identical lesson. Therefore in dealing with my subject this\nmorning, I shall, as before, draw your attention on the main points\nwhere challenge might arise to the consensus of religious opinion, to\nthe definite statements of the world's Teachers; so that the tendency\ntowards unity, on which the future evolution of life depends, may be\nhelped to develop amongst us. And there is a special reason for that\njust now. We shall see, as we trace out the evolution of life, that we\nare in the very crisis of the intellectual evolution, and we shall find\nthat the characteristic of that stage of evolution is division and\nseparation, and the placing of the individual apart from, and somewhat\nin conflict with, other individuals. And we shall find that the next\nstage in the evolution of life is the seeking for union amid the\nindividualised units; that the next divine aspect that man has to\ndevelop in the Self within him is the aspect of union and not the aspect\nof diversity; and it is of importance that those who are seeking the\nlight, those who are striving to co-operate with nature by understanding\nher hidden ways, should realise the next step of evolution as well as\nthe present, in order that they may co-operate with nature by themselves\ntaking that step, thus quickening the possibility of similar taking for\nall mankind.\n\nNow with regard to life in its relation to forms, change at the present\ntime is coming over the thought of western Science. I pause on this for\na moment in order to substantiate that assertion, for it is important in\nthe search for the means of drawing together the two kinds of science,\nancient and modern, to notice how much the position of the leading\nscientists of the West has been modified with regard to life and form\nduring the last ten years. I take as a declaration on this subject of\nlife, issued some years ago, the article on Biology in the last edition\nof the _Encyclop\u00e6dia Britannica_, written, as all the articles in that\n_Cyclop\u00e6dia_ are written, by a prominent man in the scientific world. In\ndealing then with life, the writer of the article in question distinctly\nstates that \"a mass of living protoplasm is simply a molecular machine\nof great complexity, the total results of the working of which, or its\nvital phenomena, depend, on the one hand, upon its construction, and on\nthe other, upon the energy supplied to it and to speak of 'vitality' as\nanything but the name of a series of operations is as if any one should\ntalk of the 'horologity' of a clock.\" That is to say, that to regard\nlife as being in any sense a common existing principle, as anything more\nthan a mere succession of phenomena in connection with a particular\napparatus of matter, is as foolish and unreasonable as if, looking at a\nclock, you should separate its going property from the mechanism of the\nclock itself. A purely mechanical view of nature is thus taken, and\nlife-processes are regarded as being due to the unstable equilibrium of\nprotoplasm; the series of these life-processes is brought about merely\nby mechanical and chemical changes, the actions called vital being thus\nmechanical in their character. But at the last meeting of the British\nAssociation, the President of the Chemical Section--chemistry having\nbeen the very science to lead the scientific world towards materialism\nin this respect--has taken up an entirely different standpoint, a point\nthat brings the question into a line with ancient thinking, and that\nstarts the investigations of western Science along a road whereon the\nmost fruitful results are likely to be encountered. Dr. Japp, the\nPresident of that Section, compares the action of life to the action of\nan operator who is deliberately working with a purpose, using knowledge\nand will in order to bring about a definite result. \"The operator,\" he\nsays, \"exercises a guiding power which is akin, in its results, to that\nof the living organism,\" and, going on to explain in very technical\nlanguage the ground on which this view is based, he concludes by saying:\n\"Every purely mechanical explanation of the phenomenon must necessarily\nfail. I see no escape from the conclusion that at the moment when life\nfirst arose a directive force came into play--a force precisely of the\nsame character as that which enables the intelligent operator, by the\nexercise of his will, to select one crystallised enantiomorph and reject\nits asymmetric opposite.\" That is the declaration: that with the arising\nof life there is an arising of consciousness which exercises a directive\nforce in nature, as we see it exercising a directive force in the choice\nexercised by men. Put those two statements side by side, see the entire\nreversal of the attitude, and then you will be able to measure to some\nextent the change that has come over western thinking--the recognition\nof life as identical with consciousness, a position which has ever been\ntaken in the hoary Science of the East.\n\nNow let me, before going into details, suggest to you the path that we\nare to follow. From the One Existence, that One without a second,\narises, as we saw in our first study--\u00cdshvara, God in His creative and\nmanifested aspect, \u00cdshvara clothed in M\u00e2y\u00e2, out of which a new universe\nis to be builded. Threefold we found Him to be in His manifestation,\nthreefold in the aspect that He showed forth; so that a Trim\u00fbrti, or\nTrinity, is the aspect towards this universe of the manifested God; His\nworking will show this triple character, and the evolution of life is\nthreefold, whether we study it in nature or in man. I know the thought\nthat arises in many of you, accustomed to the broad statements in\neastern literature. You think of the building, the sustaining, and the\ndisappearing of a universe. Perfect, you say, is the One Existence,\ninfinite, unchangeable; perfect in the ending is the universe, as\nperfect in the beginning; why then this long evolution of life with all\nits struggles, with all its imperfections gradually and slowly\ntranscended. Why from the perfect should the imperfect come forth? Why\nshould it be trained into perfection, and then return into that\nperfection whence it came? That question is based on a fundamental\nmisunderstanding which it is necessary to correct; a misunderstanding\nwhich never could have risen amongst you if the Scriptures had been read\nin the light of the Yoga-developed consciousness, and if the broad\noutline which is presented had been followed out carefully in thought so\nthat its stages might be marked. You will remember how it is written in\nthe _Chh\u00e2ndhogyopanishad_ that the One willed to multiply; and the\nmoment you grasp the idea of multiplication, if you think of what it\nmeans instead of merely repeating the word, you will realise that\nmultiplication must necessarily mean division and therefore limitation,\nand that limitation necessarily implies imperfection. But having gone so\nfar, you would then have proceeded to ask: By what words is the universe\ndescribed, and what idea is hidden beneath the words? And you would find\nthat when God is spoken of as a Fire, the universe is not spoken of as a\nFire, but as a spark, and the lives of men are described as millions of\nsparks that come from the illimitable Fire. Not only is that word\n\"spark\" used, showing you the limitation that comes with manifestation,\ngiving you the idea that the spark, fed by suitable fuel is to be\ndeveloped into the likeness of the Flame whence it came; but as the\nspark is of the same nature as the flame, so we are told \"Thou art\nThat,\" the Self in man is identical in nature with the Self that gave it\nbirth. You will remember another word which is constantly used to\ndescribe alike the universe as a whole, and also the parts of which it\nis composed--the word germ or seed. Let me ask you to turn to the\n_Bhagavad G\u00eet\u00e2_ so familiar to every student amongst you, and to listen\nfor a moment to the words chosen by Shr\u00ee K\u1e5bi\u1e63h\u1e47a when He desires to\nconvey the idea of the nature of the universe, and its relation to the\nSupreme What does He say?\n\n    Mama yonir Mahad Brahma tasmin garbham dad\u00e2myaham.\n    Sambhava sarva bh\u00fbt\u00e2n\u00e2m tato bhavati Bh\u00e2rata.\n\n\"I place the germ in the womb of Mahad Brahma.\" What do these words\nimply? for the whole turns on our understanding of that word \"germ.\"\nMahad Brahma is the matter of the universe, vivified by Brahman in His\nthird aspect--that which Theosophists call the Third Logos, which in the\nTrim\u00fbrti is spoken of as Brahm\u00e2. Looking on Brahman as the _One_, Mahad\nBrahma is the third aspect of His revealing, which vivifies and makes\natomic the matter of the universe, the womb of the seed of the Eternal\nLife. In that, brought into manifestation by Brahm\u00e2, or the Third Logos,\nthe Second, the generating Father, Vishnu, places that germ of life that\ntherein it may develop; not Himself in all the might of His Deity, not\nHimself in the force of His unfolded powers, but the seed of His\nlife--capable of evolution, containing everything within it potentially,\nbut showing forth nothing in manifestation at the beginning of the\nuniverse. True, the child is the father revived; true, the child is the\nsame as the father. None the less, the life which the father gives is\nthe seed containing the power of development, and the universe is but\nthe seed of Deity, with every power involved within it, and capable by\nits evolution of becoming the image of the Supreme: none the less is\nevery power germinal, not developed, potential, not actual; only at the\nending will that seed, grown into perfect manhood, show forth the image\nof its generating Sire, and give a new \u00cdshvara to the future from whom\nfurther universes may evolve. That is the answer to the question: Why\nthis long evolution? It is this evolution that we are to trace from the\ngerm to the perfect, life given as germ to grow to the God.\n\nLet us look first at the matter in which this life is to be clothed--not\nin detail, that is to-morrow's work--but just as to the principle involved\nin the evolution of the matter through which the life is to express\nitself. We heard the first day about tattvas. We found that they were\nmodifications of Prakriti, the primary matter, brought out one after the\nother as the regions of the universe were builded. All that we need for\nour purpose this morning is to remember that five of these are concerned\nwith the present evolution, that the highest of these is the A'k\u00e2sha in\nthe highest sense of the term, then V\u00e2yu, then Agni, then Apas, then\nPrithiv\u00ee; all these are kosmic and they represent vast planes in the\nuniverse, but have their correspondences in the physical globe--ether,\nair, fire, water, earth, these being only the reflections in miniature of\ntheir great prototypes in the system at large. The only other thing we\nneed to remember this morning with regard to matter, is that the whole of\nthese are animated by the life of the _third_ aspect of God. Here is a\npoint where we may pause for a moment and look at other religions, and we\nshall find that they all tell us exactly the same. Not only do we find in\nHinduism, in such a book as the _Vishnu Pur\u00e2na_ that the Divine creation\nwas from Mahat--the third manifestation--that these great tattvas were\nevolved by modifications from the principle of individuality which is the\ncharacteristic of that aspect; but if we turn to the Hebrew teachings we\nshall find that it is distinctly stated that the \"Spirit of God,\" the\nthird aspect, or Wisdom, moved on the face of the waters. Translating the\nsymbol of water we have matter; it is so used in every great religious\nscripture, and when it is said that the Spirit of God moved on the face of\nthe waters, we have the picture of a brooding life, brooding over and\npermeating the ocean of primeval matter, giving to it the life that will\nenable it to serve as the womb for a higher life; the divine energy that\nthus vivifies matter comes from the third Person of the Christian\nTrinity. That Hebrew statement dominates the whole of Christendom,\ninasmuch as the Christian Churches take the older part of their scriptures\nfrom the hands of the Hebrew people; and in quoting that, I am not quoting\nit only as an authority from the Hebrews but as including the authority of\nthe whole of Christendom, bound by that Hebrew teaching. I might show you,\ndid time permit, that other great Teachers have spoken in the same sense;\nthe outcome being that the matter in which evolution is to take place--of\nwhich our world of organisms, including our own bodies, is to be\nformed--that matter is permeated by the Divine life, and the aspect of\nDivine life that permeates it is that of the third manifestation of God.\nThat is the fundamental reason why Brahm\u00e2 is no longer worshipped. That is\nwhy no temples are raised to Him and why worshippers do not throng to His\nshrines. His work was dominant in the earlier stages of the universe, but\nis now overshadowed by the working of another aspect of the mighty God,\nVishnu as Preserver, as Sustainer, and as Organiser. He is the life which\nis active in all organisms; and the life which animates the atoms of\nmatter having been given and partially evolved, the continuing aspect of\nthat work is hidden at the present stage of the universe; the main\nevolution of life that is now occurring is carried on and directed by\nother aspects of God.\n\nSometimes in theosophical literature, that vivification and building up\nof matter is spoken of as the work of the first great life-wave in the\nsolar system; as a wave rolling forth so does the life of God go forth\nfor the building of the atoms whereof the system is to be composed. The\ncritical point is this: that the life is veiled over and over again in a\nfive-fold involution; we find it said that Pr\u00e2na five-fold divides\nitself, for five are the types of the atoms, five are the great\ndivisions of the materials, and in each successive type, the previous\ntype permeates and encloses it, as we found we could read in the _Vishnu\nPur\u00e2na_, dealing with the building up of the tattvas. (It will be\nremembered that the types are really seven, but that two are concealed.)\nOne important result comes from this which I will deal with more fully\nto-morrow, that the form--being built up from matter containing within\nit this involved and concealed life--has the power of unfolding to the\nhighest possibility of the life thus concealed. Sheath after sheath is\nmade in order that sheath after sheath may be brought into activity as a\nvehicle of the Self, and that five-fold ensheathing for the human Self\nis wrought in order that it may have a vehicle capable of responding to\nevery vibration that it sets up or that it receives. As the vibrations\nbecome subtler and subtler in their character, sheath after sheath\nbecomes active and responsive, and enables the life to function\nexternally by means of the sheath. Let us however turn--for that will be\nfully worked out to-morrow--to the next great life-wave with which we\nare concerned; it is the life of the second aspect of Deity, spoken of\nin Hinduism as the life of Vishnu, spoken of in Christianity as the life\nof the Son of God by whom all things were made. As that life outpours\ninto the universe prepared to receive it, as that life begins to draw\ntogether the matter which, vivified by the first out-pouring, is now\nready to respond to the vibrations of the life that organises and\nsustains, vibrations are sent out by this Divine Life into the higher\nregions of the universe, beginning the task of drawing the matter\ntogether into forms. The earliest stages of these are the ante-types of\nwhat shall be in evolution--not such forms as we speak of in the lower\nworld, concrete objects which can give rise to concrete ideas, but that\nwhich dimly we are trying to reach in the mind to-day, when we abstract\nfrom a great class of concrete objects its uniting quality, its common\ncharacteristic, and formulate this apart from the objects themselves. I\nhave sometimes taken the triangle as the very simplest image which\nthought can form. You may have triangles of any size, you may have\ntriangles of almost any shape, provided only three lines are used,\nand those lines are right lines, or unbent. What is the governing\ncharacteristic of the triangle? That its three angles, formed by the\nmeeting of enclosing sides, must be equal to two right angles. Now\nsupposing that you have the power of brain, the power of abstraction, to\ntake ten, twenty or thirty concrete triangles and hold them in the mind\nas though you were looking at them in outer form, to create their mental\nimages so that every form is present in your mind, you directing your\nattention to them all at the same time, then--if out of these many\nconcrete objects that have the particular properties in common of the\nthree right lines that enclose and the sum of the three angles equalling\ntwo right angles--if you can draw out the idea of that common property,\nseparated from every concrete triangle, and make it an object in\nconsciousness, then you will have risen from the concrete to the\nabstract, and will have some idea of what is meant by an archetype in\nthe higher world. The earliest actions of the Deity in evolving a system\nare of this nature; He generates certain types or archetypes, and by the\nsub-division and multiplication of these the whole universe of concrete\nobjects is formed; each one of them is capable of generating innumerable\nforms that reproduce its own characteristic amid endless diversities of\nsubsidiary properties.\n\nIt is not without interest that some of our scientific men have tried to\nfind unity amidst diversity, and to discover the types of the animal\nkingdom amid the innumerable diversities of the separated animal forms.\nOne of the most famous of those men, Sir Richard Owen, tried to\nformulate an archetype which should represent every fundamental\ncharacteristic of the vertebrate, like no particular vertebrate but\nshowing forth the qualities present in every vertebrate; he worked this\nout from a study of vertebrates, setting aside the characteristics in\nwhich they differ and synthesising into a single form the qualities\npossessed by all. The reverse process is what really occurred; the\narchetype which came forth from the Divine Mind generated in the world\nof matter myriad different types in each of which it is itself\nexpressed. That gleam of genius which illuminated the mind of the modern\nscientist is interesting as a ray from the conception of creative action\ngiven in our sacred literature; and you will find, if you study\ncarefully, that the earliest forms are not concrete objects but\ngenerative powers, and that these coming forth from God make models for\nthe future types, each type being related to its ante-type, each\nconcrete object to its abstract idea. Thus also the Greeks taught,\nPythagoras and Socrates and Plato; thus also many of the Hebrews taught,\nthe doctors of the Kabala; and both the Greek Philosopher and Hebrew\nKabalist have declared that the visible world of objects could never\nhave come into existence had not the invisible world of Ideas preceded\nit, so that the objects repeated in multitude what an Idea presented in\nunity. That Idea thus coming forth from God and drawing to itself forms\nin subtle matter, produces the types of forms that are gradually to be\nworked out in evolution; and those of you who have studied the _Secret\nDoctrine_ of Madame Blavatsky may remember that the archetypal world is\ntherein spoken of as the first which is created, and as that on which\nthe whole of the evolution of denser worlds depends. It is made of the\nA'k\u00e2sha which contains within itself the possibility of all forms as we\nare told, and these Ideas are drawn forth and reproduced in greater\ndetail by the Builder on the A'k\u00e2shic correspondences of Agni. Life is\nevolved by the modifications in consciousness which \u00cdshvara brings\nabout; the modification in the consciousness of \u00cdshvara preceding the\nmoulding of the matter. As that life-wave descends into denser and\ndenser matter, it draws together more and more separate forms, that\nbecome denser in their nature, until at last, through kingdom after\nkingdom, it comes down to the mineral forms, where life is most\nrestricted in its operations, where consciousness is most limited in its\nscope. This is the process of the involution of life in matter, the\ndescending arc. From this lowest point the life ascends, revealing more\nand more of its powers, and ordinary western \"evolution\" begins here,\nthe earlier process being ignored.\n\nHow did that Divine life and consciousness, in the first upward stage of\nevolution, evolve in the germinal life the power to respond? The life\nwithin the stone has the capacity to respond, but in a very limited\nfashion, partly owing to its germinal nature, partly owing to the\nrigidity of its surrounding vehicle; therefore the brooding life of\nVishnu, nourishing this germ, at once stimulates it by impacts from\nwithout and gradually modifies the rigidity so as to make progress\npossible. Long, long remains the life imbedded in this rigid material,\nworking from within outwards, as all life works, playing upon and thus\nsoftening the rigidity, and slowly giving the form more plasticity in\nresponse; we can sum up the whole of the working of the life, as the\nreceiving of vibrations from matter without and the answering of\nvibrations from itself within. Notice in the earliest stages how\ntremendous are the impacts; if you go back to the time when the world\nknew not humanity, how gigantic are the operations of nature showing\nherself in her mineral forms; earthquakes, eruptions, crushing and\ngrinding of materials, disintegration and reconstruction, all on the\nmightiest and most gigantic scale; under all that, the life, trying to\nmake the matter more plastic and able to answer more readily; and\ninasmuch as there is life, there is consciousness, _i.e._, the power to\nrespond, that power is developed within it, stimulated by the brooding\nlife of \u00cdshvara. He dwelling within, and enveloping and permeating all\nobjects, makes the seed of life extend and grow by his nourishing\nwarmth, that it may become finally an independent centre. We see the\nlife within the stone beginning to vibrate more actively as these\ntremendous blows come upon it from without; and mass is thrown against\nmass, and mountain is piled upon mountain, until at last these mineral\nmaterials gain larger power of transmitting impulses to the life within;\nthe impulse coming through more strongly because of the lessened\nopposition from the form, the life responds more actively and begins to\nevolve, developing more definitely the power of response. As this\nprocess is repeated over and over again, the life within the minerals\nvibrates with ever increasing rapidity, and the matter yields to it with\never greater readiness, until a stage of plasticity is reached at which\nthe beginnings of the vegetable world can be brought into existence.\nBetween mineral and plant in the lowest stages no definite dividing line\ncan be drawn by science. So general is this absence of dividing lines in\nnature that a separate kingdom has been recognised as including low\ntypes of both vegetable and animal, and between the vegetable and\nmineral kingdoms a class is recognised in which the rigid crystal which\nbelongs to the mineral kingdom has become the plastic crystalloid that\nbelongs to the vegetable; maintaining the outline of the mineral form,\nbut showing the plasticity of the vegetable, and thus yielding far more\nreadily to the moulding influences of the life within. The life thus\nencased in more plastic material receives vibrations from without\nmore easily and responds more strongly, until in the ascent that it\nis beginning to make, it adds the early beginnings of a power of\nconsciousness that in the mineral was not present. We call it sensation:\nthe power of feeling pleasure and pain, the power of responding to the\noutside impact by a feeling within the life. After the life in the\nmineral has developed the power of response, then the next stage in\nevolution is that the response takes on the sensations of pleasure and\npain, appearing as that within the life which responds severally to\nharmonious or discordant impact from without. As the life develops this\npower of sensation, progress becomes more rapid. The animal kingdom is\ngradually builded and the power of sensation is the great characteristic\nwhich is developed through that kingdom, until--the animal forms having\nbeen rendered plastic through many ages by the impulse of life, and the\nlife having formed and strengthened the power of responding by pleasure\nand pain to harmonious and discordant vibrations--the next stage is\nready to be taken, the building of the vehicle for man.\n\nThat outer body in which man is to dwell resembles closely in its\nnature, in some of its fundamental characteristics, the animal bodies\nwhich the life had vivified before man was called into existence. \"Out\nof the dust of the ground,\" says the Hebrew scripture, God formed the\nbody of man, a symbolic way of saying that out of the material that had\nmade the lowest forms of life, was also to be made the outer coating of\nthat vessel, into which a new flood of Divine life was to be outpoured,\nforming the human Self, or Spirit. We learn, when we study occultism,\nthat this third outpouring of Divine life comes neither from the Third,\nnor from the Second, but from the First Logos, therefore called\nMah\u00e2deva, the Great God, the Supreme. From Him comes the third impulse\nwhich is to complete evolution, the third outpouring of life, that only\naccomplishes its final evolution in this age by methods of Yoga;\ntherefore is He often represented as the great Yog\u00ee, the great Guru,\nunder whose instructions the latest stages of evolution are to be\ncarried out. When that life-force comes down, and the human Self is sent\nforth to occupy its tabernacle, the ancient process is again repeated,\nand it is only the germ of the highest life that is given and not the\ncompleted life. Round it are vehicles that are able to respond, round it\nare vehicles that have the power of developing more highly, that are\nalready capable of sending in vibrations arousing feeling in the life\nthat they enclose, and now--enwrapped by the life of Vishnu--this germ\nof the Divine Self begins to stir and live as man.\n\nAt first there comes from it very little response to the life that is\ntransmitted, very little answer to that which is outside; but what are\nthe characteristics of this infant Self, this spark of the Eternal Fire?\nTriple in aspect is the life in man as it is triple in the Deity, and\nits characteristics are the same, Sat, Chit, Ananda. We speak thus of\nBrahman, and if we study the human Self we shall find these three\naspects present also in that human Self; and the first to develop in\nman, as in the Kosmos, is Chit or knowledge. All the earliest stages of\nhuman evolution have to do with the evolution of Intelligence; it is\nthat with which we are now concerned, as we climb this mighty ladder. We\nare evolving intelligence or intellect, and if we trace its stages from\nthe earliest germs as they appear in the primeval races of the humanity\nof our globe, and as fostered in those races by the Great Ones who came\nto us as Teachers from other worlds, we shall find that the dawning\nintellect in man was but very slightly responsive to anything that came\nto it from without, and that at first every effort of the intelligence\nwas stimulated by the promptings of the animal nature, by the sting of\ndesire, by the passions which belong to the animal part of man. Consider\na savage. When is a savage active? Only when some animal desire awakens\nwithin him. If he is hungry, yes, then he will begin to think, \"where\ncan I find food?\" If he is thirsty, he will ask, \"where shall I find\nliquid?\" Any animal prompting that arises within him, his dawning mind\napplies itself to satisfy; and the germ of mind is stimulated by the\npromptings of animal desire. In that stage he knows not right from\nwrong; right and wrong for him have no existence; hunger and thirst,\nsexual desire, and the need for sleep, these are the things that make up\nhis life and that move his dawning consciousness; these only are strong\nenough to stir it into activity; it cannot yet initiate activity from\nwithin. But as these play upon it, life after life, birth after birth,\ncentury after century, in successive incarnations of this germinal but\ngrowing life, as these vibrations continually arouse, awaken the life of\nthe intelligence, which is the third aspect of the Self, these repeated\nvibrations, repeated over and over and over again a thousand times, by\nthat very repetition bring about an internal tendency to repeat it again\nwithout a fresh stimulus from outside; and we find in the next stage of\nthe evolution of intelligence, still in the savage, that the savage does\nnot wait for hunger in order to search for food, but that the memory of\nhunger and the memory of food are enough to send him out, before the\nhunger strikes him, in search of the meal that to-morrow he will require\nto satisfy the needs of the body. But what a change is there if we\nconsider it, small as it is in appearance. The man is no longer\nstimulated by an outer impulse coming from the animal nature; he is\nstimulated by a mental image, a connected picture of the painful state\nof the body wanting food and of the food which is able to change that\nstate into one of pleasure; that is, he is now able to form mental\nimages, and these stimulate him into activity. How great the change! No\nless than a change of the centre of consciousness from the animal to the\nhuman, one of the most significant changes in the evolving life. Now,\nfor the first time, he does not wait to be pushed from without. He\nbegins action from within, and the body obeys the impulse that comes\nfrom the centre, instead of the impact that strikes the centre from\nwithout. Now evolution becomes more rapid, for as this great change, one\nof the hardest of changes, is made, the intellect in man begins to\ncognise itself, and Self-consciousness begins to arise. Separation is\nrecognised between its own centre, that thinks, and the things outside\nthat make it think; the \"I\" and the \"Not-I\" arise, and the centre begins\nto shape itself and to be capable of growth.\n\nHow shall the growth go on? By conflict. This is the characteristic of\nthe intellect. It has to make the \"I\" a strong centre, a separate\ncentre, otherwise no further evolution is possible. You may say that\nthis looks like going downwards; nay, it is the germ of a new centre of\nlife in which Divinity itself shall unfold when evolution is complete.\nThere must be a clearly defined centre of consciousness, else how shall\nit work onward to perfection? And that centre grows by struggle. All\nstrength comes by struggle of one kind or another. If you want your arms\nto become strong, it is no good to lie on a sofa and leave the muscles\nto grow merely by the nourishment that you give them. They want more\nthan nourishment, they want exercise; and it is the law of all growth of\nform that the life must be drawn into the form, for only then can the\nform expand and become capable of receiving a further impulse of life;\nif the muscles are to grow, the cells that compose them must be\nstretched by exercise, and the life must flow into the expanded cell;\nonly then does it become capable of multiplication, so that there may be\nmany cells where before there was only one. The difference between the\nweak man and the strong man, the man who is feeble and the man who is\nathletic, is the difference brought about by exercise and struggle, by\npulling against resistance, by taking up a weight and whirling it round\nand making the muscles strain against the weight. That is a picture of\nthe way in which all life is working for development of form; the\nimpulse of life leads to the exercise of the form, the exercise makes it\nplastic and increases the form, through which the life is thus enabled\nto flow more largely. That is as true in the mental world as in the\nphysical world; for the mental world is also a world of phenomena. It is\nnot the One; its characteristic is diversity, each being standing by\nhimself, and regarding other things as separate. I know an object. How?\nBy its differences from some objects and its likenesses to others;\notherwise I could not know it. You cannot think of unity until you have\nseen variety; you cannot recognise likeness until you have seen\nunlikeness. The characteristic of intellectual evolution is the\ndiscrimination of differences followed by the recognition of likenesses;\nthus the intellect recognises object after object, each of them by its\nown characteristic marks. Analysis precedes synthesis. Differences are\nseen before an underlying unity is recognised.\n\nAs this intelligence develops, we find the recognition of the Self and\nthe Not-Self giving rise to struggle all over the world, social struggle\nas well as mental struggle. In every civilisation in which the intellect\nis developing from its earlier stages, you must have struggle without in\norder to stimulate the evolution within; it is a necessary stage,\nalthough it be a passing one, and it need not distress us, who see its\nend, in a world guided by the Gods. All the stages through which a\nnation passes are necessary for its growth, and need not be condemned\nmerely because of their being limited and imperfect. In practical\npolitics condemnation is useful as a stimulus, as one of the agents for\nbringing about the evolutionary changes, but the philosopher should\nunderstand, and, understanding, he cannot condemn. The worst struggle\nthat we may see, the most terrible poverty, the most shocking misery,\nthe strife of man against man and nation against nation--all these are\nworking out the Divine purpose, and are bringing us towards a richer\nunity than without them we could possibly attain.\n\nLet me take one instance which seems to be the most hopeless of all--the\ninstance of war. What can be more inhuman than war, what more brutal and\nmore terrible, stirring the angriest passions of man and making him like\na wild beast in his rage? Aye, but that is not all. Let us look at the\nlife within a soldier which has been evolved by this terrible discipline\nwithout. What is that life learning as its vehicles are plunged into\nstrife, into blood-shed, into mutilation, into death? It is learning\nlessons that without that stern experience it could not learn, without\nwhich its evolution would be checked and be unable to proceed it is\nlearning that there is something greater than the body, something\ngreater than the physical existence, something higher, more noble, more\ncompelling, than the guarding of the physical vehicle from injury and\neven from death; and the poorest soldier who goes out on a campaign, who\ngoes through hardship after hardship, who finds himself frozen with cold\nor burnt up with heat, who plunges through frozen river or toils across\nsandy desert, who learns to preserve discipline and submission under\nhardship, who learns to keep cheerful under difficulty, so that his\ncomrades may not be depressed, who is moved, not by the thought of the\nbody which is suffering, but by the great ideal of the military renown\nof his regiment, and the safety of the country which he is serving, who\nis learning thus to sacrifice himself for an ideal, is developing\nthereby qualities invaluable in lives to come. Need I say this to you,\nwho know the place of the Kshattriya in human evolution? Did Manu when\nhe described these different castes demarcate a caste that had not its\nplace in the evolution of life, that had not something to teach? Was not\na man kept in the Kshattriya vehicle until he had learned that life was\nnot dependent on the body, that life was to be held at the service of\nthe ideal, at the service of the mother-land that gave him birth, of the\nking who ruled him, and who to him stood, as to every Hindu the king\nshould stand, as an Avat\u00e2ra of God? He learned that when that king\ncalled him to the battle-field, he had to give his body to mutilation\nand to death, because the life that was in him recognised the service of\nthe ideal as evolving the real life, and the body as a mere garment to\nbe thrown aside when duty called? Without that training, no Br\u00e2hmana\ncould be; no man could come into the caste of the Br\u00e2hmana, save as he\nhad gone through that discipline in the ranks of the Kshattriya; because\nuntil he had learned that life was everything and form nothing--and that\nis the lesson which war teaches when it is rightly understood--until\nthat lesson was learned, he was not prepared for the far harder\nevolution of the life, which is to master the lesson of unity beneath\ndiversity, of love beneath antagonism, of being the friend of every\ncreature and the foe of none.\n\nWhen the intelligence has developed, when it has reached a fairly high\nstandpoint, the germs of the next aspect of Deity begin to show\nthemselves in man and that aspect is A'nanda, Joy or Bliss. But in what\ndoes A'nanda really consist? It is in the drawing together of separated\nobjects and uniting them into one. That is the essence of Bliss, that\nthe very core and heart of the next stage of evolution. In the old days\nof Hinduism, this was called the life of the Br\u00e2hmana, when the Br\u00e2hmana\nwas really a Br\u00e2hmana and had no further birth before him on the wheel\nof births and deaths. In the Christian symbology it is called the\nChrist stage, that of Divine Sonship, and you will find in a great\nprayer of Jesus, called the Christ, that in praying for His disciples He\nasked that \"they may be one in me,\" in union with each other and\nHimself. There is a grander unity yet, the unity between the Son and\nFather, a unity of nature not a union of the erst-separated; but before\nthat unity can be reached, man must have realised the union with his\nbrother men, must see humanity as united, and not as separate; that is,\nhe must have changed his centre of consciousness--that responds to the\nimpacts from without--from the vehicles in which the intellect and the\nfeelings were developed to the life itself, which is one and the same in\nall. No longer is he to think himself as separate, inasmuch as the \"I,\"\nthe separated self, is now to be transcended, is to be merged in the\nuniting aspect of the Deity, the Vishnu or the Christ. That is to be\ndeveloped as the life of man, with all its wonderful beauty and power,\nwith its unifying force. Therefore did Shr\u00ee K\u1e5bi\u1e63h\u1e47a come as an Avat\u00e2ra\nto this Eastern world to show forth the life of Love; for the life of\nA'nanda, or Bliss, is ever the life of Love, and by Love alone may we\nevolve it within ourselves. The aspect of God that is Bliss shows itself\nas Love; and in word and in action, in simile and in parable, did the\nBeloved and the Lover of man reveal that Divine aspect to the longing\nhearts of his Bhaktas. That was His special work, to show out the Love\npower of God; and only as that is developed within us can the life take\non this lofty unfoldment that knits all selves in the One Self, that\nsees all lives in Him. Now, in evolution, the Self knows itself as the\nLife, and is no longer deluded by the ignorance that made it identify\nitself with the Form; it is life which realises itself as Life. When\nthis stage is reached by the evolving life, the man who was separated\nbecomes Humanity, and is one of the Saviours of the world. There is\nnothing apart from him, nothing separate to him. He stands in the very\nLife itself, and sheds his light in every direction into whatever\nUp\u00e2dhi, or vessel, may be in need of it; wherever there is want or cry\nfor his aid, thereto flow his powers. As the sun shines forth in heaven,\nand may shine unto a million houses, the only condition of his rays\nentering being that the houses shall lay themselves open to the\nsunshine, so is the man who has become the second aspect of Deity, in\nwhom that perfection of Divine Sonship is revealed. Man, as the Son of\nGod in Heaven, is above all the distinctions that you find on Earth. He\nsends down his rays into the waiting hearts of men, and the only\ncondition necessary for his entrance, the one thing that ensures his\ncoming, is that his brother will open his heart to receive him. For he\nwill not break his way in, he will only come where he is welcome. Thus\nthis great life of God shows itself forth now in the man who has become\nthe Saviour, the Son, the Initiate, as a deep compassionate love for\nall. Every man who reaches that stage is a new force for the uplifting\nof humanity. Every man who develops that aspect of life is one more wing\nwith which to lift everything upwards. If a man be weak, his life can go\nto him to strengthen him; if a man be sorrowful, his life can go to him\nto make him glad; if a man be sinful, his life can go to him to make him\npure from sin. To all men he says: \"Wherever a man is there will I meet\nhim, and there will I accept him.\" That is Shr\u00ee K\u1e5bi\u1e63h\u1e47a in\nmanifestation, that the love that shines forth from the bliss aspect of\nthe Human Self.\n\nOne step remains, the last, of evolution for this rapidly perfecting\nlife. Again I take up my Christian symbol and venture the quotation:--\n\"As Thou, Father, art in Me and I in Thee, that they also may be\none in Us.\" The Son becomes in fact what he has ever been potentially,\none with the Father. He enters into the mighty realm of Self-Being,\nwhere God, in the Christian phrase, is \"all-in-all.\" Do not let the\nnarrower presentations of Christianity that here meet you blind\nyou to these fundamental identities of the deeper and more spiritual\nChristianity with our own ancient faith. Shall these pettinesses, or\neven outer divergencies, separate those whom the living Spirit would\nunite? We learn, as we study the Hindu Scriptures, that man after having\nreached the second stage rises by Yoga, until he attains the last, and\nbecomes one with the Deity Himself in full power of eternal Self-Being.\nIt was because your own Sv\u00e2mi T. Subba Rao knew this occult truth, which\ntoo many know not, that he spoke, as I before mentioned, of the\ninnumerable Centres, or Logoi, in the One, every one of which could be\nthe beginning of a new universe, of a new out-pouring of life. The\nbuilding of those Centres is a purpose of Life-evolution. The building\nthem up stage by stage is done as the life passes from form to form; and\nend or ending there is none in the infinite series of the future. What\nthat life holds for us we cannot tell; how should we imagine that far\noff land, those distant reaches? But this we know: that no will of the\nEternal is ever frustrate, no purpose of the Eternal lacks its fruit or\nmisses its goal; and if our eyes fail us in the dazzle of the light\nwherein we see our unity with the Eternal Father--that unity that\ntranscends our dreaming, when we shall know ourselves to be one with\nHim--it is enough that at last the evolution of all lives leads into\nthat unimaginable splendour, known only to \u00cdshvara Himself, who pours\nout His life that we may know it also. And Mah\u00e2deva shall return to It\nwith all the centres that His life has brought into existence, with all\nthe new lives and joys that His imprisonment in His universe has made.\nThat is enough for us to give us the hope--hope, do I say? it is too\nfeeble a word--the joy inexpressible and the certainty which are founded\non the very Life of God; for is He not the Truth, the Foundation of the\nUniverse? And when we enter into SAT we shall know the future as we see\nthe past, for we shall be not only immortal but Eternal.\n\n\n\n\n[FOURTH LECTURE.]\n\nEVOLUTION OF FORM.\n\n\nMy Brothers,--We are now to concentrate our attention on the phenomenal\nside of the universe, that is, on the varied appearances that surround\nus, whether those appearances be visible to the physical eyes or not;\nfor we must remember that the principle of form is to be found in every\nstage of the manifested universe, and that when the phrase \"the formless\nworld\" is used, the word \"formless\" is only true in relation to the\nworlds below the one so spoken of. All higher worlds are \"formless\"\nregarded from below, that is, regarded by the organs of perception which\nare fitted for exercise in the lower world; but if a person has\ndeveloped the capacity to respond to the vibrations in any given world\nof manifestation, then that world to him is a world of form and not of\nformlessness. Everywhere manifestation implies form, however subtle may\nbe the matter which composes it; and you may remember that it is said in\nthe _Vishnu Pur\u00e2na_ that the one characteristic of matter which is\nalways present is extension, that is, the capacity of taking form, of\nbeing shaped in a definite way.\n\nNow before we take up the details of evolution, there are one or two\ngreat principles that I want to ask you to keep in mind; for we shall\nnever be able to understand the complexity of detail, if we take it as a\nseries of isolated details; we need to classify these under certain\nfundamental principles and then, those principles being clear in the\nmind, we can easily, as it were, pack every detail into its appropriate\npigeon-hole in our thought. I shall not trouble you this morning at all\nwith that threefold division of the evolving life with which we dealt\nyesterday. We can, for our work now, treat life as a unit, speaking of\nthe Divine Life as \u00cdshvara, and of the reflection of that life in man as\nthe Self. We will keep these two terms to avoid confusion: \u00cdshvara as\nthe Divine Life which is the source of evolution; the Self as the human\nlife which is gradually evolving. And we need these two distinguishing\nnames, without going into any of the sub-divisions that we dealt with\nyesterday in connection with life, in order that we may be able to see\nhow forms are shaped, and to which principle, if I may say so, we are to\nrefer the special modifications.\n\nThe next thing that we must realise is the respective functions of these\nsources of life; one working through the whole kosmos, and therefore\ncoming to man as a part of that kosmos, the other working in man as an\nindividual through the early stages and transcending individuality at the\nclose. The great life of \u00cdshvara as it rolls outwards, building the\nuniverse of forms, expresses itself, as we have seen, by a certain series\nof vibrations, and every modification in the form is the result of an\nimpulse coming by way of vibrations from the ensouling life. Now the point\nthat strikes us most in this manifestation of \u00cdshvara, as we study it, is\nthe unutterable patience of it. We are impatient for results, He never. We\nare impatient for results, because, limited by time, we crave to see the\noutcome of our action; He being the eternal is unspeakably patient, set\nupon perfection and careless of the time which that perfection may take in\nevolving. For the evolution of forms this patience is absolutely\nnecessary; when we come to think, we see that any impatience in the\nevolution of forms would mean the over-rapid breaking up of the forms. The\nform is comparatively rigid as compared with the life. If the life\nvibrates too rapidly for the form which it is evolving, the form will\nshatter under the stress of those vibrations. Let me give you a very\ncommon illustration to show you what I mean; a tube of glass, or an\nordinary lamp-glass if you like, has a certain note to which it vibrates;\nand if that note be sung near the lamp-glass, you will hear the note sound\nout independently from the lamp-glass, as though the lamp-glass were\nsinging; the glass has vibrated in answer to the vibrations of the sound\nsung to it, it having the capacity of that vibration in it, and thus it\nreproduces the note. If you increase the force of that note, if you\ncontinue vibration after vibration, beyond the point at which the glass is\nable to respond, your glass will shiver into pieces, shivered by the force\nof the effort to respond to vibrations beyond its limit of rigidity. I\nonly take that as an illustration, as a picture; it is true in every world\nof form; and if \u00cdshvara were to send forth vibrations too swift, too\nsubtle for the form which He is ensouling to respond to, that form would\nbe shivered into pieces, and its evolution would be stopped; nature would\nhave again to begin to build a similar form in order to again reach the\npoint which it had already reached. This patience of \u00cdshvara is the thing\nthat strikes us first as we study the evolution of forms. How slow are the\nchanges, how gradual the modifications, what thousands of successive forms\nare worked in, how wellnigh imperceptible are the changes in their\nminuteness, although so great when we look at them in the mass; that is\none great principle to bear in mind.\n\nAnother great principle is the double and parallel action of \u00cdshvara and\nof the evolving Self. \u00cdshvara is present in the Self of man that is\nformed within Him. Every evolutionary impulse in the earliest stages\ncomes directly from the life of \u00cdshvara, and as He moulds the form\nwithout, He gradually strengthens the centre that He is building up\nwithin. His object is to make that centre the image of Himself,\nself-sustaining; but enormous reaches of time are needed for the\nbuilding; as He shapes the forms, He builds the centre; and as He builds\nthat centre, and it becomes more and more active, answering to the\nvibrations that He transmits to it from the outer world, it begins to\ntake on a little action of its own and to send out vibrations, as we may\nsay, on its own account. As this double action goes on within the form,\nmore and more does that evolving centre begin to control the form within\nwhich it is developed. As this power of control develops and increases,\nHe withdraws more and more of His directive energy as \u00cdshvara; the\nenergy drawn from Him is now beginning to work _quasi_-independently in\nthe separated centre that He has been building, until at last that\ncentre reflects Himself, and is able to be self-existent by the very\nlife that it has drawn from Him. If this conception be a little\nabstract, let me give it again in a concrete form. There is one symbol\nthat the sages have used over and over again, in order to express this\nwonder of the brooding life of \u00cdshvara making an image of Himself and\ngiving to that image the possibility of independent life. It is the\nsymbol of the mother and the child within the womb. As the life of the\nmother passes into the child that is building within her, transmitting\nto that new form all the nourishment which is necessary for its growing\nlife, the whole life of the child is dependent on the mother and the\nlife-streams that nourish it are drawn from her own life. The building\ngoes on, and on, and on, till the new centre of life has grown strong,\nbut not until that centre can hold itself together amid the vibrations\nof the outer universe, is the new form with its ensouling life sent\nforth on its own independent course. So does the brooding mother-life of\n\u00cdshvara envelope the children of His love, and so does He nourish them,\nbuilding them within Himself as the ages pass, until they are able to\nhold their own centres in the illimitable life of the One, the Supreme.\nThat is another principle which you have to remember throughout the\ndetails of the evolution of form.\n\nOne other that has two divisions and then the statement of our main\nprinciples will be sufficiently complete. There are three aspects, we\nrecollect, which the evolving Self has to unfold. We must add to this a\ncomprehension of the nature of these aspects, when externalised; for we\ndid not yesterday, for lack of time, glance quite precisely at the in\ncharacteristic outer mark of each aspect of life. As these aspects\nmodify the evolution of form, the form cannot be understood unless its\nrelations to the aspects of life be realised. We have, as we know, to\nshow forth Knowledge, Bliss, and Being. These will come out as powers\ninto the world of form as evolution reaches its later stages, and the\nform will be able to express those powers of the evolving life.\nKnowledge, showing forth through form, has as its power Intelligence;\nBliss, shown forth through form, has as its power Love; Being, shown\nforth through form, has as its power Existence; so that the fundamental\naspects may be said severally to manifest as the powers of intelligence,\nof love, of existence. Otherwise put, the nature of intelligence is\nknowledge, the nature of love is bliss, the nature of existence is\nbeing. The intelligence, love and existence of our worlds are the\nmanifested Knowledge, the manifested Bliss, and the manifested Being of\nthe Self. That is the outward aspect of the Self as the other is the\ninner aspect, and these characteristic natures seek their expression in\nform. This expression is sought cosmically and individually, alike by\nthe life of \u00cdshvara and the life of the Self. Cosmically they make the\nplanes of the manifested universe, the five planes on which we are\nevolving. That which manifests as existence, the power of Being, has as\nits form the Ak\u00e2sha of the higher realm; that which manifests as love,\nthe power of Bliss, has as its form of matter V\u00e2yu; that which manifests\nas intelligence, the power of Knowledge, has as its material Agni. These\nare the three fundamental manifestations in form. The other two are\nreflections: That which is love, reflecting itself in the lower form of\nmatter--the denser matter of Varuna--takes on the aspect of desire and\npassion, and becomes k\u00e2ma. That which is existence, reflecting itself on\nthe yet grosser form of Prithiv\u00ee, shows forth what we call objective\nreality. See how the planes correspond, the one with the other. Try and\nmake a picture of a mountain reflected in a lake; and if you have that\nin your mind, you will follow exactly the way the reflection takes\nplace. There is no reflection of intelligence because it is the central\nquality; the intelligence is the centre of the five, two are above it\nand two are below it. It is the central region, the pivot on which the\nwhole has to turn. If you look above to the higher regions, we find love\nand existence showing themselves forth as the powers of Bliss and\nBeing. That is as it were, the mountain. Now look at your reflection in\nthe lake; the middle part of the mountain is reflected half-way down in\nthe water. The shore is the dividing line between object and image, and\nrepresents the intelligence; below that, half-way down, will come the\nreflection of love showing itself as emotion and desire; then we see the\nhighest peak reflected in the deepest depth of the lake, the existence\nabove, the power of the real Being, reflected below in the plane of\nphysical matter as that illusory existence which man calls real. Try and\nkeep that picture, for the principle of reflection from above to below\nis one of the keys to understanding both above and below. It helps you\nto see why emotional love passes into devotion, and how, in the passing\nfrom emotion into the higher love which is devotion, it passes from\nthe k\u00e2mic plane to the buddhic, where bliss is the distinguishing\ncharacteristic; and you will understand why action, the most illusory of\nthings, has to us the sense of reality. It gives that peculiarly\ndefinite sense of reality to us because it is the reflection of the\nreal, of the existence of which it is the lower form.\n\nNow these are the principles. Let us try to carry them out in our\nevolutionary study; for if you hold firm to the principles, the study\nof detail, of forms, will seem less confusing, less complex and less\ndifficult; you will not lose your way among the trees, when once you\nhave looked down on the forest as a whole; that is a simile I once heard\nfrom Professor Huxley, as illustrating principles and details, and it is\na suggestive one.\n\nWe begin then the detailed evolution of form; it is like a great circle\ntraced downwards and upwards. There is a great difference between the\ndownward arc, the one-half of the circle, and the upward arc, the other\nhalf of the circle. In the one case, coming downwards, \u00cdshvara imparts\nqualities and attributes; in the other half, going upwards, He builds\nthe qualities and attributes into vehicles. These are the two great\ndifferences between the downward and upward arcs. In the downward,\nmatter takes up qualities; in the upward, matter is formed into\nvehicles, or sheaths, or bodies, whatever may be the term we prefer. A\nprocess of specialisation goes on, up to a certain point. After a time\nthe specialised materials are drawn together and combined into a\nvehicle, an organised unity, serving as a tabernacle for the Self. First\ncomes differentiation, and the first step to that is to impart qualities\nto matter. Let me remind you, as the subject is so difficult a one, what\nis meant by tattvas, the fundamental forms of matter, and recall once\nmore that passage in the _Vishnu Pur\u00e2na_ where their evolution is\ndescribed, and where it is stated that the tanm\u00e2tra of sound produces\nA'k\u00e2sha; that is, a modification of the consciousness of \u00cdshvara\nproduces the form of matter that we call the atom of A'k\u00e2sha; that atom\nhas a mere film of subtlest matter for its envelope, and the vibrating\nlife of \u00cdshvara for the force within. Then we are told that A'k\u00e2sha\ngenerates another tanm\u00e2tra which is touch, and that, enveloped,\npermeated by A'k\u00e2sha, produces the film of denser matter which is called\nV\u00e2yu, the two tanm\u00e2tras and the A'k\u00e2sha being the generating force.\n\nThis goes on through the whole of the five stages, so that when we get\ndown to the physical plane, we find an atom showing a wall of denser\nmatter, within it the involved life and without it the magnetic field,\nmade up of the higher tanm\u00e2tras and their atomic sheaths. The Prithiv\u00ee\natom hence consists of its own tanm\u00e2tra plus the matter and the life of\nApas; the matter and life of Agni; the matter and life of V\u00e2yu; the\nmatter and life of A'k\u00e2sha: so that on the physical plane, the physical\natom is a mass of five interpenetrating spheres in which is present as\nlife the whole of the matter and the life of the worlds above it, the\nenvelope, or wall, of the physical atom alone showing forth any\ncharacteristics of the physical world--a fact inexpressibly important\nfor evolution. For, each of those sheaths or koshas--as the student of\nVed\u00e2nta calls them, and there is no better word--every one of them is\nlatent in and around the physical atom; and in the upward evolution,\nevery one of them becomes active and strong as evolution proceeds,\nsheath after sheath being vitalised. How could these koshas, or sheaths,\nof ours learn to respond to the vibrations of the evolving life, unless\nevery one of them was latently present in us, waiting to be brought into\nactivity? The root of that possibility lies in the atom itself, with all\nits interpenetrating spheres of life and matter, the sheaths that are\nwithin it and around it. That is not the only thing which we understand;\nas this conception grows clear, we understand a phrase that had often\npuzzled us in the old days, that \"the spirit is senseless on the plane\nof matter.\" What does that mean? The spirit, the very essence of\nconsciousness, senseless and helpless on the plane of matter! Why?\nBecause if you take spirit as pure spirit, the intermediate sheaths are\nnot there by which the matter-vibrations are able to reach it, and\nwithout these sheaths it is unable to receive and respond to the\nvibrations of physical matter. It remains unconscious of their very\nexistence, there being no bridge by which they can pass over and affect\nthat life. This is really a perfectly simple statement of Madame\nBlavatsky's, but it is one that I have heard challenged over and over\nagain as entirely meaningless, as conveying no idea, for how could\nconsciousness be unconscious in any region? A little more knowledge\nwould make us less rapid in our condemnation of our betters. That idea,\nthen, we will take to help us in the first conception of how evolution\ncan take place.\n\nNow let us look how, in the downward arc that we spoke of, \u00cdshvara is\nimparting qualities. According to the nature of the vibrations that He\nsends and of the matter that answers to them will be the quality imparted.\nAs to the idea that difference of vibrations implies a difference of\nmanifestation, let me buttress myself on the great reputation of Sir\nWilliam Crookes. He issued, two or three years ago, I don't remember the\nexact date, in 1896 I think, a table of vibrations, confined of course to\nthe physical world; a very interesting table, giving a series of\nclassified vibrations and pointing out which were known to science, and\ngave rise to what we call sound, light, electricity, and so on, the\ndifference of vibratory frequency, and the subtlety of the matter in which\nthe vibration was set up, giving rise to a particular impression, received\nand answered by a sensation in us.\n\nThat is the principle which I am now applying to our system as a whole.\nAccording to the density of the matter will be the rapidity of the\nvibrations which that matter is capable of expressing; \u00cdshvara sends out\nvibrations, and the m\u00e2nasic matter, we will say, is thrown into\ncorresponding vibrations or waves of a frequency identical with those of\nthe life-impulse sent out from Him, so far as it is capable of\nresponding, a limit being set by its fineness on the one side and by its\ndensity on the other. Its limit of fineness is the atom of the plane.\nIts limit of density is the coarsest aggregation of these atoms in the\ndensest solid of the plane. If we take the physical plane for a moment,\nwe have solid, liquid, gas, ether, finer ether, finest ether, and atoms.\nThe lower five are related to the five senses in man as they are at\npresent developed on the physical plane. These five correspond to the\nsense-organs and the senses that work through them, as is suggested in\nthe names of the tanm\u00e2tras. The Solid is related to the sense of Smell;\nLiquid to the sense of Taste; Fire to the sense of Sight; Air to the\nsense of Touch; and A'k\u00e2sha to the sense of Sound. Nov these are not\nstated in the order given by the western scientist, but I have no time\nto go into the reason for the difference and to show you where his outer\nobservation fails, because he is not able to trace beyond the limits of\nhis senses into a finer working; in dealing with our V\u00e2yu and A'k\u00e2sha,\nhe classes them together, and his air is our Agni. These senses and\ntheir evolution belong to the upward arc. Coming downwards, \u00cdshvara\nonly gives the power to matter to respond to these particular vibrations,\nand these vibrations are connected on the physical plane with the\nsub-divisions that I have just mentioned, the different sub-divisions of\nmatter, solid, liquid, gas, and so on, corresponding in the sense-organs\nto the senses.\n\nComing downwards, beginning on the mental plane with Intelligence--missing\nthe two higher ones of Existence and Love--He sends out vibrations to make\nthe matter of the mental plane answer, and the vibrations with which that\nmatter answers, that is, a certain range of vibrations, are called mental\nor intelligent. You may say, Why? Just for the same reason that in Sir\nWilliam Crookes' tables definite names are given to the different classes\nof vibrations, which produce sound, light, etc., names are given in order\nto express a certain limit of vibratory force; within one set of limits\nthe vibrations affect the ether, give \"light,\" and the eye receives them.\nSimilarly, vibrations that fall between certain limits of vibratory\nfrequency affect the matter of the third plane, and when they are\nreceived by an organ fitted to focus them in a centre, thus giving rise to\nself-consciousness, we call that organ Mind, and the action through that\nMind, Intelligence. The mere name is as arbitrary as any other name, and\nwe class these under mental, just as a certain range of etheric vibrations\nis classed as light, is received by an organ fitted to focus them that we\ncall the eye, and the action through that eye is vision. If we are to talk\nat all, we must have names to describe different classes of phenomena, and\nwe use the word mental or intelligent to describe the range of vibrations\nworking in the particular kind of matter of which, in the upward\nevolution, an organ is builded that we call the Mind. So, again, to the\nvibrations that He sends out into the next coarser form of matter, called\nApas, or astral, we give the name Sensory. He imparts to them the quality\nof responding to pleasure and pain, and as He makes this downward sweep He\nbrings into renewed existence on each plane Devas, or beings which have as\ntheir characteristic manifestation the quality of their own plane; thus\nthe Devas of the mental plane have the quality of intelligence as their\nchief peculiarity, and the Devas of the next lower plane have as their\nchief quality feeling, or the power of sensation, and those of the lowest\nplane have as their chief quality action, activity. Each Deva class shows\nout specially the quality of its plane, and inasmuch as these Devas draw\ninto their own bodies the matter of the plane in which they live, they\nhelp on its evolution; for they draw it in, use it and thus develop it,\nand throw it out again into the general reservoir, just as man draws in\nphysical matter, uses it in his body, and again throws it out into the\nphysical world. As that process goes on and on and on through the ages,\nthe whole of that kind of matter we call mental passes through the bodies\nof these Devas, takes on to itself the habit of responding readily to the\nvibrations of intelligence, and thus becomes ready for building into the\nmental body of man. The matter of the astral plane is builded into the\nbodies of the Devas of that plane until it takes up this habit of more and\nmore definitely responding to pleasure and pain, when impacts are made on\nit, and thus can be used for the building up of the sensory bodies of the\nlower world. On each plane this downward sweep brings into activity these\nclasses of Devas, making the intermediate links which are to work in the\nbuilding of forms. The essence of the building of forms by a Deva is that\nhe builds them of the matter of which his own body is composed. Prepared\nby that earlier evolution, qualities being developed in the downward\nsweep of the life of \u00cdshvara, matter is, in the upward arc, gathered into\ndefinite forms, the bodies of plant, animal and man: thus definite\nvehicles are made, by which the highest consciousness can communicate\nwith, and receive vibrations from, the lowest world.\n\nLet us now, having taken this very rapid sweep downwards, begin to climb\nupwards. Each kind of matter is now seen to possess certain qualities.\nEvery physical atom has a number of sheaths interpenetrating and\nsurrounding it, the sheath of astral matter with its power of responding\nto sensation, the sheath of mental matter with its power of responding\nto intelligence, as well as the sheaths, if they may be called so, of\nthe two higher, Love and Existence, that will not be brought into\nactivity for a long, long time. All is there. \u00cdshvara now begins the\ngreat stage of brooding action that I spoke of the building up of a\ncentre, and it is His first work to build physical forms out of this\nprepared material, all the Devas of the physical plane being ready to\nact as His agents, working under His impulse and under the direction of\nthe Lord of the Devas of the physical plane. All these innumerable\nintermediate agents are wanted; for innumerable are to be the forms, and\nevery one of them has to be builded.\n\nThe building of the physical bodies begins with the formation of the\nminerals. As a mineral body is formed, perhaps some crystal, the crystal\nof an element or a salt, a definite form is built up by a Deva of the\nphysical plane. He takes up the material of his own body and such material\nof the physical plane as is of similar nature to himself, and he begins\nshaping these crystalline forms. He builds them on the lines of the\nlife-energy sent out by \u00cdshvara Himself, those lines which Science calls\nthe axes of the crystal, \"imaginary\" lines; \"imaginary\"--aye; but they are\nfrom the creative imagination of \u00cdshvara, that is far more potent than the\nlower matter in which He builds. That lower matter follows the creative\nimagination of the Lord, and these imaginary lines govern the shaping of\nthat crystal that is builded by the Deva. Tyndall believed not in the\nworking of the Devas, yet when he was lecturing on crystals to a popular\naudience in Manchester he declared that as he pictured to himself the\nbuilding of a crystal, he found himself imagining tiny architects at work,\nplacing every atom with exact precision, with all the intelligence and\nskill of a human architect, employed in making a building. Tyndall was\nspeaking better than he knew. His imagination was answering to the truth\nmore keenly than he realised. For it is the privilege of the man of\ngenius who loves truth as Tyndall did--who was willing to break up every\nfetter of dogma rather than be a traitor to his conception of truth--to\nunconsciously intuit the truth that he seeks, so that his words give out a\nhigher meaning than he dreamed of. Tyndall was wise in recommending what\nhe called the scientific flight of the imagination, for that power of\nimagination is a most useful thing. Never clip the wings of your\nimagination when you are employed in your scientific work; for it may\noften give you glimpses of truths that without its aid you would never\nfind. Thus the Devas work and build crystals, and those crystals have some\nremarkable properties. Professor Japp tells us that some crystals turn a\npolarised beam of light in a particular way; and he declares that in some\nof these forms there is a power which is directive and somewhat akin to\nthe intelligence of man. Truly is it akin to human intelligence, inasmuch\nas it is the parent of human intelligence, the latter being the child that\nis developing the parental powers. This building goes on through stages on\nwhich we must not tarry, through the whole of the mineral world, gradually\ngiving to matter the power to change shape between larger and larger\nlimits without losing cohesion. This is what is called plasticity, the\npower of changing shape without disintegration. Matter also gains that\nwhich science speaks of as elasticity. Now what is elasticity? Not, as\npeople generally think the mere power of elongation, calling a thing\nelastic that can be pulled out like a piece of India-rubber. An elastic\nbody in the popular sense is not an elastic body from the scientific point\nof view, and, strange as it may sound, glass is much more elastic than\nIndia-rubber. Yet the glass does not elongate and is brittle. The proper\ndefinition of elasticity is the power of recovering the original form\nafter distortion, and matter gradually acquires this power. As life\ndevelops, the equilibrium of the compounds that make up the form becomes\nmore and more unstable, while at the same time the general cohesion of the\nform increases; when we come to the higher forms, such as the body of man,\nwe find a power of maintaining the central position greater than we find\nin any other form, together with an increased plasticity and elasticity;\nso that a man can adapt himself to the cold of the polar regions, and to\nthe heat of the tropics and of the equatorial zone, without losing his\nbody, in a way that no lower animal can match, that is, he has the power\nof adapting his physical body to surrounding conditions to a greater\nextent than is the case with any other form. Coming back to the mineral\nkingdom we left, let us take the next stage; \u00cdshvara can now expand and\nmodify His material a little more than was originally possible without\nbreaking it up. He begins the moulding of the vegetable kingdom, and there\nalso he sets axes of growth, as \"imaginary\" and as real in their\ncontrolling force as in the crystal, though they are not always quite as\neasy to trace, they are nevertheless there. All the vegetable matter is\nbuilt in according to these axes, and the natural classification of plants\nis largely determined by the numerical relations of the parts; thus the\nlaw of number shapes the form. As the matter becomes more plastic and\nyields more readily to the indwelling life, the higher members of that\nkingdom begin to show the dawning of sensation. That is due to the\nbeginning of the vivification of the next sheath above the physical,\ncomposed of what we call astral matter, that which goes to make part\nof the manomaya kosha of the Ved\u00e2ntin. We see in that a growing\nsusceptibility, an increasing sensory power, very slight in the vegetable\nworld, but still present, and developed much more largely where the\nvegetable has a long experience of separated life. Take for instance a\ntree that has endured for centuries, and let me just trace the stages in\nwhich the dawning sensation is found, and even a dawn, though I hardly\nventure to use the word, a dawn of mental quality. That life in the tree\nresponds to the vibrations received from outside, of cold and heat, of\nwind and rain, of sunshine and storm, and as the physical sheath is built\nup and developed by the action of the Devas working upon it, the etheric\nmatter in it is continually thrown into vibration by the changes in\ntemperature, light, and electrical conditions. The vibrations in the\nethers that enter into the physical body are passed on to the atomic\nsub-plane, and as the atoms of the physical plane have their spirals made\nof the coarsest matter of the plane of Apas, or astral matter, a slight\nquivering is caused in that coarsest matter of the astral plane, and that\nsets up a little movement in the tree, responded to by the indwelling life\nby sensation, a massive and general feeling of pleasure or pain.\n\nHave you never walked through a forest, and felt as though all nature\nwere enjoying the sunshine? This sensation of pleasure is shown still\nmore strikingly when the hot season comes to its ending, and the first\nrains fall on the thirsty ground, and the well-nigh withering vegetation\nsends out a conscious thrill of joy and life renewed. The very trees and\nbushes rejoice as the rain comes down upon them with its message of life\nand of hope. At such moments we recognise that the vegetable world is\nsensitive, although the sensation be widespread, that which is called\nmassive in character.\n\nForgive me if for a moment I here digress, to say that this fact is one\nof the reasons why we owe a duty to the vegetable world, not needlessly\nto cause sensations of dawning suffering. We live too carelessly, my\nbrothers, in this world which is all-living, where there is no atom that\nis dead, and especially is this sad here in India, where once there was\nso strong a reverence for life. That is now, alas, beginning to pass\naway. You are forgetting that all life is \u00cdshvara, that according to the\nstage of His lower self-evolution is the power of response that is given\nto the form. In the old days, I remember how, when man took his food, he\nmet the food with gracious greeting because it was sacrificing its life\nin order to build, through that sacrifice, his own. Though it did not\npossess the higher powers of sensation as we find them in the animal,\nbut only the lesser sensation powers of the vegetable world, still, even\nthen, he met it with reverence, as a sacrifice which was being made to\nhim, and took it with gratitude and with love; that lower life was\nyielding itself up to him for his up-building. But to-day, so lost is\nthat gentle grace in many of our Hindu people, that they not only\ndisregard the sacrificed lives of the vegetable kingdom, but also those\nof the far more sentient forms which \u00cdshvara has developed in the animal\nkingdom of His world. We find men who wear the outer shape of the Hindu,\nwho have his colour, his form, his face, who boast themselves of their\ndescent from antiquity, who hold themselves therefore in thought above\nthe western nations, forgetting the life of the Self in this sentient\ncreation, and nourishing their bodies with the bodies of their lower\nbrethren, without showing any sense of the sacrifice made, or feeling\neven a passing gratitude for the life which is given for them.\n\nLet us come back to the tracing of our forms. \u00cdshvara, brooding over the\nevolving forms, continues His patient work--patient, that the form may\nnever be broken by an overstrain, but may be slowly developed into a\nvehicle of the life that ensouls it. In every form He lives, evolving\nit, but He limits with illimitable patience His manifestation of life to\nthe poor capacities of the form, that it may grow and not be destroyed.\nDo you remember an old story of the ancient days, in which most of you\nwould be ashamed to acknowledge belief, for are you not graduates and\nmen of western knowledge? Though descendants from the old time, you have\nnaught to do with it, but I, who was trained in the West, I have no\nfeeling of shame in acknowledging my belief in the strange things that\ncome down to us from the times when truth was less veiled than it is\nnow. So I dare to recall the story to you, although you may think that\nit is but a fable or legend. There was a boy who believed in Vishnu or\nHari, in whom his father believed not, Prahl\u00e2da he was named; and that\nboy went through many trials, but in all his faith in the Supreme\ndefended him; at last his father, scoffing, said, turning to a pillar in\nhis room: \"You tell me that Hari is everywhere: is He in that pillar?\"\n\"O Hari, Hari!\" cried the boy, and forth from the pillar in the form of\na Lion burst an avat\u00e2ra of Vishnu and the pillar was shivered into\npieces. Truly is He everywhere, in every particle of matter; there is no\none particle from which He cannot come forth in all the might of His\nGodhood, in all the majesty of His Deity. But He will not, because if He\ndid, the form could not bear that revealing, and would shiver into\npieces as the God appeared. A profound truth, even if you regard the\nstory as an allegory, a truth which teaches us what evolution means.\n\nThus \u00cdshvara worked on age after age and \u00e6on after \u00e6on, with that\nmarvellous patience of which I spoke, until matter was made sufficiently\nplastic to build it into the form in which His highest life was to begin\nits development, the form of man; building that form, He begins also to\nstrengthen very much the centre which the form is for a while to\nprotect. Let me say in passing one thing that I have omitted, that\nwhenever a form has reached its highest possible point, its limit of\nexpansion, He breaks it, in order that, in a new form better adapted,\nthe ensouling life may continue to grow; for He knows when to break as\nwell as when to hold; He knows when to destroy as well as when to\npreserve; and the moment that the limit of a form has been reached, and\nits matter can yield no further, He bursts the form asunder, that its\nmaterials may recombine themselves, under the impulse of life, into a\nmore plastic organism, and that the life may thus gain further\nevolution, ensouling a higher form more fitted for the expression of its\nincreasing powers. We call this breaking of the form death, and we fear\nand shrink from it, and if people talk to us of death, in the flush of\nour life, it comes as a jar and a shock. But, as I told you in the\nbeginning, you may see very plainly that death is that beneficent aspect\nof \u00cdshvara, which breaks a form that has become a prison, in order to\ngive the life a new form in which it may continue to grow; He breaks the\nrigid form when it can develop no further, and gives the life the\nplastic form of a baby, that may be shaped more easily by the moulding\nforces of the life within it, yielding itself to every impulse from\nwithin. It seems then, that when we see things rightly, we should hail\ndeath as birth rather than as death. For looked at from the side of\nlife, every death is a being born into the higher possibilities of a new\nshape that will adapt itself to the growing life.\n\nWhen man begins his long pilgrimage, a form is ready for his ensouling,\nprepared to receive and to respond to the impulses which come to it from\nthe physical, astral and--to a small extent--from the mental planes. His\nphysical atoms are considerably evolved, the sensory sheath is working\nactively, and there is a very imperfect lower mental sheath; these have\nbeen built up through the evolution of the animal realm. Do not fall\ninto the mistake of the western way of thinking, and say that man\ndescends from the animal; that is not true. It is only a fragment of\ntruth half seen and thereby distorted. What is true is this: that the\nmatter of his lower vehicles has been prepared by evolving through the\nstages of the elemental, mineral, vegetable and animal kingdoms, in\norder that it may be builded into the form of man; that _in previous\nkalpas_ forms had been evolved that might fairly be described as\nhalf-ape, half-human, that were never occupied by the triple Self, and\nthat therefore belonged to the animal, not to the human kingdom; that\nin the present cycle the human form evolved, as a f\u0153tus evolves, passing\nrapidly through the lower stages on the way to the human, as in\npre-natal life, and it therefore has stamped upon it the stages through\nwhich it has passed. I have been going over, roughly and swiftly, those\nstages through which the matter of which the body is composed has gone\nin the past, and you will see that the true theory of evolution is\ndifferent from the somewhat crude view that there is a regular\nsuccession of births from the animal into the man. The matter has been\nmade plastic in the animal, but man in his form is the result of a\nhigher working; the germ of his life can never develop into the animal,\nbut only into the human, because more has been infolded into it, and\nthat germ must unfold along a line which is that of direct human growth.\nRemembering that, to prevent a possible misconception, we turn to the\nhuman centre that is now definitely formed. We speak of its encircling\nform as the causal body, or Karana Shar\u00eera, the form by which the Self\nis limited; the Karana Shar\u00eera is not the Self, remember, but is the\ncontaining vehicle of the triple Self, and the organ of one aspect of\nthat Self, the aspect of knowledge, shown forth as intelligence. This\nsheath is important, being relatively of a permanent nature, and it goes\non from birth to birth; death cannot touch it, birth cannot modify it;\nit is the treasure-house or receptacle of all the qualities acquired by\nexperience through human evolution, and passes through the whole cycle\nof re-incarnations; it is the special _human_ characteristic. The form\nbegins to adapt itself more and more to the life, and here comes in a\ngrowing difficulty. The characteristic of the life of man is the life of\nthe intellect; this the specifically human part of evolution; but the\nlife of sensation is far more vivid and tumultuous in the beginning, and\nthe earlier stages of form are adapted to answer to these impulses. You\nmay ask, why not give the man at once a mental body only, in which to\nwork out his evolution, why must he struggle through the evolution of\nthis body of sensation? Because, if he misses that stage, he will not be\nable to make up the links which are necessary for the continuity of his\nconsciousness. At a later time the perfect man is conscious on all\nplanes from Nirv\u00e2na downward to the physical, from the physical upwards\nto Nirv\u00e2na. On every plane in unbroken continuity of consciousness the\nJ\u00eevanmukta lives and works. There is no link lacking. If, then, the man\ndoes not establish, in the building of his body of sensation, certain\ncentres or, as they are called, chakras--that drawing into centres\nwhich is the work of the upward arc, as giving qualities is the work of\nthe downward arc--if he does not draw the powers of sensation into\ndefinite centres in the sheath of his astral body, he will not have the\nlinks which he requires to receive impacts from the astral plane, and\nthrough which he can send out thrills of consciousness in order to\nimpress it, rule it and guide it. That is why there is so much delay in\nthe savage condition, where the life of sensation is supreme; these\nastral chakras are being builded up as centres of the senses, and they\nare built firm and strong; the outer organs, the eye, the ear, the nose,\nthe tongue, the skin, these are merely the necessary organs in the\nphysical body for the expression of consciousness through these chakras.\n\nIf we take, for a moment, a swift survey of the evolution of forms, we\nshall find that the building of organs follows the exercise of\nlife-functions; in the earliest forms there are no organs, but the\nfunctions of life are present and active; the creature breathes and\nassimilates, circulation goes on; but there are no organs for digestion,\nno organs for breathing, no organs for circulation; the whole body does\neverything. But as evolution proceeds and definite organs are formed in\nthe physical body, in the nervous system, and as later, in the astral\nbody, chakras or astral centres of sensation are formed--as this goes\non, we find a more specialised being developed with definite organs.\nAlways the organ comes after the function, and through the organ the\nfunction expresses itself more and more perfectly. That is a fundamental\nprinciple. And do not forget that in this you are on what is thought the\nsafer ground of western science. You do not find an organ appearing\nbefore the development of its function. You always find the life-impulse\nfirst, and then the moulding of the matter into a shape which enables\nthat impulse to express itself more perfectly. If we trace evolution\nfrom the am\u0153ba upwards we find differentiation and specialisation\nbecoming more marked the whole way through, yet man himself turns round,\nand with the very brain which has been formed under the vibrations of\nintelligence he reverses the whole process, and asserts that thought is\nproduced by the brain; but every organ is formed as the organ of a\nfunction, it is produced by life, and is not its creator.\n\nThis process goes on until the necessary organs are made and the nervous\nsystem is linked to the chakras in the astral body, chiefly through what\nis called the sympathetic system. There are certain nervous cells of a\npeculiar kind in that system, of which modern science does not say\nmuch, beyond giving you the forms and contents, and these are the links\nbetween consciousness in the physical body and in the sensory body. Then\ncome the chakras already spoken of as the centres for the working of\nconsciousness in the astral body. A similar process goes on in the\nmental body under the action of thought-impulses, and there we have also\nan organised body able to respond to different kinds of thought, and\nthus to serve consciousness as its organ for expression in the mental\nworld. As we grow mentally we build our organs for consciousness.\n\nComing to this building of form practically, we learn that we organise\nthe body of sensation to higher purposes by checking the life-impulse as\nit runs out to the object of the senses. These objects gradually turn\naway from the abstemious dweller in the body, it is written, and as the\nlower world ceases to attract, the higher world begins to use the form\nfor nobler ends. If we desire to increase mental power, we must practise\nsteady thinking, and check the rovings of intelligence over the\nphenomenal world. As a matter of fact, many people never really think at\nall; what they call their thoughts are nothing more than the reflections\nof other people's thoughts to which their consciousness responds; their\nminds are looking-glasses, not productive organisms; most men's minds,\nI fear, are looking-glasses reflecting objects that are before them, and\ncontemplating these reflections a man says to himself: \"See! how I am\nthinking!\" when he is only repeating the thoughts of others. Now we are\nnot to be mere looking-glasses; when the objects of the outer world give\nrise to images, the mind is to work on them, analyse, re-arrange,\ncombine; thinking is the work of the mind itself on the mental images\nsupplied through sensation, the working on the materials which have been\ngradually gathered by experience. As soon might you call a loose heap of\nbricks that you see in the compound of a house, a building, as call the\nreflection of other people's thoughts, your thinking. That is only the\nmaterial for thought. Thinking is the work of the architect, of the\nbuilder that builds these bricks into a definite edifice, and until we\nhave built up thoughts in our minds, we have no right to arrogate to\nourselves the name of thinkers. Practise then this independent thinking;\nit is hard; you will not know how hard until you try it. Never let pass\na day without reading something that gives you material for thought. No\nmatter if the book be not religious; if it be only intellectual, that\nwill make you stronger in intellect. Even leaving spirituality aside\nwith its nobler possibilities, take some great book worthy of being\nthought over, not a newspaper, not a sensational novel, not a child's\nbook, but a BOOK--an original book, on a real topic; what Charles Lamb\ncalled a book. Read, but do not read much, perhaps not more than a dozen\nor twenty lines; think these lines over and over and over for at least\nthrice as long as you have taken to read them slowly. Do that every day\nregularly, and do not miss it. You find time for your dinner; why, if\nyou can find time to feed your body and to talk, can you not find time\nto feed your mind? Then your mind would grow. If you do that as an\nexperiment, say for three months only, never missing a day--for if you\nmiss a day, you will slip back and lose the value of the automatic\naction of your mind--do that for three months as an experiment, as a\nscientific man makes an experiment, and thus train yourselves for three\nmonths in power of close attention and thought, and at the end of the\nthree months, you will be startled to find how much these powers have\ngrown. When you have put yourself through this experiment, then you will\nnot want a lecturer to tell you about the value of such self-discipline,\nfor you yourself will have proved it to be good. Take one faculty after\nanother to train; train your reasoning faculty, your memory, your power\nof comparison and contrast. Take up a faculty, just as any one takes up\na study that he is working at, and work at it until you are an artist\nin that particular faculty.\n\nThat is how form is builded, when the human Self is beginning to\nco-operate with the work of \u00cdshvara, when the centre is beginning to\ntake the control of its vehicles. It rationalises its workings, and\nbuilds and modifies them step by step. When this has been done for many\nlives, then comes the life for Yoga; then the man may be taught how to\nmake more rapid progress, and how to vivify the inner and subtler\nsheaths of his being by certain practices, that will be taught him the\nmoment he is ready--but that will never be taught him until he _is_\nready, nay though he range the world over in search of a Guru, or live\nthe life of an ascetic in the cave or in the jungle. That is not enough,\nso long as his desire is unconquered, so long as his mind is still\nrestless. When the senses are dominated, when the mind is controlled,\nand not before--but then, as certainly as before there will not be the\ncoming--a Guru will appear who will take that man by the hand and lead\nhim along the path that is narrow as the edge of a razor, that may only\nbe trodden by the controlled in sense and by the steady in mind, for the\nfall either to the one side or to the other means delay for many a birth\nto come. Then is developed that aspect of Bliss which shows itself\noutwardly as love; a faint reflection of that bliss is felt in many\nstages of meditation, and joy has birth within you, wells up within you,\nenwraps you fold by fold, until you in yogic trance reach the true\nA'nanda, which is the essence of beauty, and makes you quiver under its\nsubtle vibrations of ineffable delight. And later, later still, at a\nstage that you may reach, when all is purified through long evolution,\nthere comes the rising into the highest, where the subtlest matter\nbecomes the vehicle of that developed centre, now no longer a\ncircumference restraining and necessary, but an obedient vehicle which\nwill serve when it is wanted and fall away when wanted it is not. As it\nis written that in the A'k\u00e2sha there is every possibility of form, so\nthe life that has reached Self-existence is a being that garbs itself in\nany form by gathering the A'k\u00e2sha around it. Thus it may develop vehicle\nafter vehicle until the whole of the human series is builded for use,\nbut none of them is prison for limitation; then we say that the man is a\nJ\u00eevanmukta, He is free, and all matter has become His servant, to use\nwhen He has need of it, to cast aside when He needs it not; every region\nof the world is His to use, no region of the world is its own to bind\nHim; He is liberated, and as the liberated Self He may, if He will,\nstill work for His brother men, remaining, as Shr\u00ee Shankar\u00e2ch\u00e2rya\ntaught us, until the end of His age, in order to lift humanity more\nrapidly on its upward climb. Thus are formed Those who are the\nco-workers of \u00cdshvara in the helping of humanity, who, having gone\nthrough all suffering, throw everything they have gained at the feet of\nthe Lord, who turn back to the world, never again to be bound by it, but\nstill responding to the compassion which is the very life of \u00cdshvara\nHimself. As long as \u00cdshvara wills to remain in manifestation, so long\ndoes He whose will is one with that of \u00cdshvara, will also to remain. He\nhas nothing to gain, nothing to learn, nothing to take that any world\ncan give Him; but He stands beside His Lord as an organ of the\nexpression of the highest life, existing no longer for anything that He\ntakes, but as the channel of the life of God. That is the prize of our\ncalling, that the goal on which our hearts are fixed.\n\n\nWomen's Printing Society, Limited, 66, Whitcomb Street, W.C.\n\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n\nTRANSCRIBER'S NOTES\n\nThe following variants appear in this text: \"A'k\u00e2sha\" and \"Ak\u00e2sha\",\n\"A'nanda\" and \"Ananda\", \"Kabbalah\" and \"Kabala\", \"k\u00e2rmic\" and \"karmic\",\n\"out-pouring\" and \"outpouring\", \"Self-existence\" and \"Self-Existence\",\n\"wellnigh\" and \"well-nigh\".\n\nThe spelling \"Brahm\u00e2\" appears to be standard, but \"Brahma\" also appears,\nin the phrase \"Mahad Brahma\".\n\nThe phrase \"may by\" in \"may by it be brought\" on p. 20 should possibly be\n\"may be\" but has been left unchanged.\n\nWords in italics are indicated by underscores, _like this_.\n\nThe following amendments to spelling and punctuation have been made:\n\n1) \"hierachies\" amended to \"hierarchies\" on p. 27.\n\n2) \"philosphy\" amended to \"philosophy\" on p. 28.\n\n3) \"man\u00e2sic\" amended to \"m\u00e2nasic\" on p. 52.\n\n4) Period added after \"tato bhavati Bh\u00e2rata\" on p. 97.\n\n5) \"Av\u00e2tara\" amended to \"Avat\u00e2ra\" on p. 119.\n\n6) Comma added after \"kingdom\" on p. 119.","title":"Evolution of Life and Form: Four lectures delivered at the twenty-third anniversary meeting of the Theosophical Society at Adyar, Madras, 1898","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":36938}