PROEM.

23 than useless to make the subject still more difficult by introducing the archaic phraseology of the original, with its puzzling style and words. Extracts are given from the Chinese Thibetan and Sanskrit translations of the original Senzar Commentaries and Glosses on the Book of Dzyan —these being now rendered for the first time into a European language. It is almost unnecessary to state that only portions of the seven Stanzas are here given. Were they published complete they would remain incomprehensible to all save the few higher occultists. Nor is there. any need to assure the reader that, no more than most of the profane, does the writer, or rather the humble recorder, understand those forbidden passages. To facilitate the reading, and to avoid the too frequent reference to foot-notes, it was thought best to blend together texts and glosses, using the Sanskrit and Tibetan proper names whenever those cannot be avoided, in preference to giving the originals. The more so as the said terms are all accepted synonyms, the former only being used between a Master and his chelas (or disciples).

Thus, were one to translate into English, using only the substantives and technical terms as employed in one of the Tibetan and Senzar versions, Verse i would read as follows:—"Tho-ag in Zhi-gyu slept seven Khorlo. Zodmanas zhiba. All Nyug bosom. Konch-hog not; ThyanKam not; Lha-Chohan not; Tenbrel Chugnyi not; Dharmakaya ceased; Tgenchang not become; Barnang and Ssa in Ngovonyidj ; alone Tho-og Yinsin in night of Sun-chan and Yong-grub (Parinishpanna). &c., &c.," which would sound like pure Abracadabra.

As this work is written for the instruction of students of Occultism, and not for the benefit of philologists, we may well avoid such foreign terms wherever it is possible to do so. The untranslateable terms alone, incomprehensible unless explained in their meanings, are left, but all such terms are rendered in their Sanskrit form. Needless to remind the reader that these are, in almost every case, the late developments of the later language, and pertain to the Fifth Root-Race. Sanskrit, as now known, was not spoken by the Atlanteans, and most of the philosophical terms used in the systems of the India of the post-Mahabharatan period are not found in the Vedas, nor are they to be met with in the original Stanzas, but only their equivalents. The reader who is not a Theosophist, is once more invited to regard all that which follows as a fairy tale, if he likes; at best as one of the yet unproven speculations of

dreamers; and, at the worst, as an additional hypothesis to the many Scientific hypotheses past, present and future, some exploded, others still lingering. It is not in any sense worse than are many of the so called Scientific theories; and it is in every case more philosophical and probable.

In view of the abundant comments and explanations required, the references to the footnotes are given in the usual way, while the sentences to be commented upon are marked with figures. Additional matter will he found in the Chapters on Symbolism forming Part II., as well as in Part III., these being often more full of information than the text.

PART I.

COSMIC EVOLUTION.

SEVEN STANZAS TRANSLATED WITH COMMENTARIES

FROM THE

SECRET BOOK OF DZYAN.

"Nor Aught nor Nought existed; yon bright sky

Was not, nor heaven's broad roof outstretched above.
What covered all? what sheltered? what concealed?
Was it the water's fathomless abyss ?

There was not death—yet there was nought immortal,
There was no confine betwixt day and night;
The only One breathed breathless by itself,
Other than It there nothing since has been.
Darkness there was, and all at first was veiled
In gloom profound—an ocean without light—
The germ that still lay covered in the husk
Burst forth, one nature, from the fervent heat.

Who knows the secret? who proclaimed it here?
Whence, whence this manifold creation sprang?
The Gods themselves came later into being—
Who knows from whence this great creation sprang?
That, whence all this great creation came,
Whether Its will created or was mute,

The Most High Seer that is in highest heaven,
He knows it—or perchance even He knows not."

THE SECRET DOCTRINE.

COSMIC EVOLUTION.

In Seven Stanzas translated from the Book of Dzyan.

27

STANZA I.

1. THE ETERNAL PARENT WRAPPED IN HER EVER INVISIBLE ROBES HAD SLUMBERED ONCE AGAIN FOR SEVEN ETERNITIES.

2. TIME WAS NOT, FOR IT LAY ASLEEP IN THE INFINITE BOSOM OF

DURATION.

5. UNIVERSAL MIND WAS NOT, FOR THERE WERE NO AH-HI TO CON

TAIN IT.

4. THE SEVEN WAYS TO BLISS WERE NOT. THE GREAT CAUSES OF

MISERY WERE NOT, FOR THERE WAS NO ONE ΤΟ PRODUCE AND GET ENSNARED BY THEM.

5. DARKNESS alone Filled The Boundless All, For Father, Mother

And Son Were Once More One, And The Son Had Not Awakened Yet For The New Wheel, And His Pilgrimage Thereon.

6. The Seven Sublime Lords And The Seven Truths Had Ceased to Be, And The Universe, The Son Of Necessity, Was Immersed In ParaNISHPANNA, To Be Outbreathed By That Which Is And Yet Is Not. Naught Was.

7. The Causes Of Existence Had Been Done Away With; The Visible That Was, And The Invisible That Is, Rested In Eternal Non-being— The One Being.

8. ALONE THE ONE FORM OF EXISTENCE STRETCHED BOUNDLESS, INFINITE, CAUSELESS, IN DREAMLESS SLEEP; AND LIFE PULSATED UNCONSCIOUS IN UNIVERSAL SPACE, THROUGHOUT THAT ALL-PRESENCE WHICH IS SENSED BY THE OPENED EYE OF THE DANGMA.

9. But Where Was The Dangma When The Alaya Of THE WAS In Paramartha And The Great whEEL WAS ANUPADAKA ?

UNIVERSE