gyration through the Eternities of the Ever-Becoming; and also that every such speck individually, and Kosmos collectively, is an aspect and a reminder of that universal One Soul-which Philosophy refuses to call God, thus limiting the eternal and ever-present Root and Essence.

Why either the Ether of Space or "Nervous Ether" should "destroy the individuality of every sense," seems incomprehensible to one acquainted with the real nature of that "Nervous Ether" under its Sanskrit, or rather Esoteric and Kabalistic name. Dr. Richardson agrees that:

If we did not individually produce the medium of communication between ourselves and the outer world, if it were produced from without and adapted to one kind of vibration alone, there were fewer senses required than we possess: for, taking two illustrations only-ether of light is not adapted for sound, and yet we hear as well and see; while air, the medium of motion of sound, is not the medium of light, and yet we see and hear.

This is not so. The opinion that Pantheism "fails to be true because it would destroy the individuality of every individual sense" shows that all the conclusions of the learned doctor are based on the modern physical theories, though he would fain reform them. But he will find it impossible to do this unless he allows the existence of spiritual senses to replace the gradual atrophy of the physical. "We see and hear," in accordance (of course, in Dr. Richardson's mind) with the explanations of the phenomena of sight and hearing, afforded by that same Materialistic Science which postulates that we cannot see and hear otherwise. The Occultists and Mystics know better. The Vedic Aryans were as familiar with the mysteries of sound and colour on the physical plane as are our Physiologists, but they had also mastered the secrets of both on planes inaccessible to the Materialist. They knew of a double set of senses; spiritual and material. In a man who is deprived of one or more senses, the remaining senses become the more developed; for instance, the blind man will recover his sight through the senses of touch, of hearing, etc., and he who is deaf will be able to hear through sight, by seeing audibly the words uttered by the lips and mouth of the speaker. But these are cases that belong to the world of Matter still. The spiritual senses, those that act on a higher plane of consciousness, are rejected à priori by Physiology, because the latter is ignorant of the Sacred Science. It limits the action of Ether to vibrations, and, dividing it from air-though air is

THE SEVEN PHYSICAL SENSES.

583

simply differentiated and compound Ether-makes it assume functions to fit in with the special theories of the Physiologist. But there is more real Science in the teachings of the Upanishads, when these are correctly understood, than the Orientalists, who do not understand them at all, are ready to admit. Mental as well as physical correlations of the seven senses-seven on the physical and seven on the mental planes are clearly explained and defined in the Vedas, and especially in the Upanishad called Anugita:

The indestructible and the destructible, such is the double manifestation of the Self. Of these the indestructible is the existent [the true essence or nature of Self, the underlying principles], the manifestation as an individual (entity) is called the destructible.*

Thus speaks the Ascetic in the Anugitâ, and also:

Every one who is twice-born [initiated] knows such is the teaching of the ancients. . . . Space is the first entity.

the Noumenon of Ether] has one quality

. . Now Space [Âkâsha, or and that is stated to be sound only .. [and the] qualities of sound [are] Shadja, Rishabha, together with Gândhâra, Madhyama, Panchama, and beyond these [should be understood to be] Nishâda and Dhaivata [the Hindû gamut].+

These seven notes of the scale are the principles of sound. The qualities of every Element, as of every sense, are septenary, and to judge and dogmatize on them from their manifestation on the material or objective plane-likewise sevenfold in itself—is quite arbitrary. For it is only by the SELF emancipating itself from these seven causes of illusion, that we can acquire the knowledge (Secret Wisdom) of the qualities of objects of sense on their dual plane of manifestation, the visible and the invisible. Thus it is said:

Hear me ... state this wonderful mystery. . . . Hear also the assignment of causes exhaustively. The nose, and the tongue, and the eye, and the skin, and the ear as the fifth [organ of sense] mind and understanding,‡ these seven [senses] should be understood to be the causes of (the knowledge of) qualities. Smell, and taste, and colour, sound, and touch as the fifth, the object of the mental operation,

Ch. xiii; Telang's translation, p. 292.

+ Ibid., ch. xxxvi; p. 385.

The division of the physical senses into five, comes to us from a great antiquity. But while adopting the number, no modern Philosopher has asked himself how these senses could exist, i.e., be perceived and used in a self-conscious way, unless there were the sixth sense, mental perception, to register and record them; and-this for the Metaphysicians and Occultists-the seventh to preserve the spiritual fruitage and remembrance thereof, as in a Book of Life which belongs to Karma. The Ancients divided the senses into five, simply because their teachers, the Initiates, stopped at hearing, as being that sense which developed on the physical plane, or rather, got dwarfed and limited to this plane, only at the beginning of the Fifth Race. The Fourth Race already had begun to lose the spiritual condition, so preeminently developed in the Third Race.

and the object of the understanding [the highest spiritual sense or perception], these seven are causes of action. He who smells, he who eats, he who sees, he who speaks, and he who hears as the fifth, he who thinks, and he who understands, these seven should be understood to be the causes of the agents. These [the agents] being possessed of qualities (sattva, rajas, tamas), enjoy their own qualities, agreeable and disagreeable.*

The modern commentators, failing to comprehend the subtle meaning of the ancient Scholiasts, take the sentence, "causes of the agents," to mean "that the powers of smelling, etc., when attributed to the Self, make him appear as an agent, as an active principle" (!), which is entirely fanciful. These "seven" are understood to be the causes of the agents, because "the objects are causes, as their enjoyment causes an impression." It means esoterically that they, these seven senses, are caused by the agents, which are the "deities,” for otherwise what does, or can, the following sentence mean? "Thus," it is said, "these seven [senses] are the causes of emancipation”— i.e., when these causes are made ineffectual. And, again, the sentence, "among the learned [the wise Initiates] who understand everything, the qualities which are in the position [in the nature, rather] of the deities, each in its place," etc., means simply that the "learned" understand the nature of the Noumena of the various phenomena; and that "qualities," in this instance, mean the qualities of the high Planetary or Elementary Gods or Intelligences, which rule the elements and their products, and not at all the "senses," as the modern commentator thinks. For the learned do not suppose their senses to have aught to do with them, any more than with their SELF.

Then we read in the Bhagavadgitâ of Krishna, the Deity, saying: Only some know me truly. Earth, water, fire, air, space [or Âkâsha, Æther], mind, understanding and egoism [or the perception of all the former on the illusive plane], . . this is a lower form of my nature. Know (that there is) another (form of my) nature, and higher than this, which is animate, O you of mighty arms! and by which this universe is upheld. . . . All this is woven upon me, like numbers of pearls upon a thread. I am the taste in the water, O son of Kuntî! I am the light of the sun and moon. I am .. sound ("i.e., the occult essence which underlies all these and the other qualities of the various things mentioned"-Transl.), in space . . the fragrant smell in the earth, refulgence in the fire. . . etc.‡

Truly, then, one should study Occult Philosophy before one begins

Ibid., ch. x: pp. 277, 278.

+ Mundakopanishad, p. 298.

Bhagavadgitâ, ch. vii; ibid., pp. 73, 74.

to seek for and verify the mysteries of Nature on its surface alone, as he alone "who knows the truth about the qualities of Nature, who understands the creation of all entities is emancipated" from

error. Says the Preceptor:

Accurately understanding the great (tree) of which the unperceived [Occult Nature, the root of all] is the sprout from the seed [Parabrahman], which consists of the understanding [Mahat, or the Universal Intelligent Soul] as its trunk, the branches of which are the great egoism, in the holes of which are the sprouts, namely, the senses, of which the great [occult, or invisible] elements are the flowerbunches, the gross elements [the gross objective matter], the smaller boughs, which are always possessed of leaves, always possessed of flowers . . . which is eternal and the seed of which is the Brahman [the Deity]; and cutting it with that excellent sword-knowledge [Secret Wisdom]-one attains immortality and casts off birth and death.‡

This is the Tree of Life, the Ashvattha tree, after the cutting of which only, Man, the slave of life and death, can be emancipated.

But the men of Science know nought, nor will they hear of the "Sword of Knowledge" used by the Adepts and Ascetics. Hence the one-sided remarks of even the most liberal among them, based on and flowing from undue importance given to the arbitrary divisions and classification of Physical Science. Occultism heeds them very little, and Nature heeds them still less. The whole range of physical phenomena proceeds from the Primary of Æther-Âkâsha, as dualnatured Âkâsha proceeds from undifferentiated Chaos, so-called, the latter being the primary aspect of Mûlaprakriti, the Root-Matter and the first abstract Idea one can form of Parabrahman. Modern Science may divide its hypothetically conceived Ether in as many ways as it likes; the real Æther of Space will remain as it is throughout. It has its seven "principles," as all the rest of Nature has, and where there was no Æther there would be no “sound,” as it is the vibrating sounding-board in Nature in all its seven differentiations. This is the first mystery the Initiates of old have learned. Our present normal physical senses were, from our present point of view, abnormal in those days of slow and progressive downward evolution and fall into Matter. And there was a day when all that in our modern times is regarded as exceptional, so puzzling to the Physiologists now compelled to believe in them-such as thought-transference, clairvoyance, clairaudience,

* Ahamkâra, I suppose, that “Egoship," or "Ahamship," which leads to every error.

+ The Elements are the five Tanmâtras of earth, water, fire, air and ether, the producers of the grosser elements.

Anugiti, ch. xx; ibid., p. 313.

etc.; in short, all that is now called "wonderful and abnormal”—when all that and much more belonged to the senses and faculties common to all humanity. We are, however, cycling back and cycling forward; that is to say, that having lost in spirituality what we acquired in physical development until almost the end of the Fourth Race, we are now as gradually and imperceptibly losing in the physical all that we regain once more in the spiritual reëvolution. This process must go on, until the period which will bring the Sixth Root-Race on a line parallel with the spirituality of the Second Race, a long extinct mankind.

But this will hardly be understood at present. We must return to Dr. Richardson's hopeful, though somewhat incorrect hypothesis about "Nervous Ether." Under the misleading translation of the word as "Space," Âkâsha has just been shown in the ancient Hindû system as the "first born" of the One, having but one quality, "Sound," which is septenary. In Esoteric language this One is the Father-Deity, and Sound is synonymous with the Logos, Verbum, or Son. Whether consciously or otherwise, it must be the latter; and Dr. Richardson, while preaching an Occult doctrine, chooses the lowest form of the septenary nature of that Sound, and speculates upon it, adding:

The theory, I offer, is that the nervous ether is an animal product. In different classes of animals it may differ in physical quality so as to be adapted to the special wants of the animal, but essentially it plays one part in all animals, and is produced, in all, in the same way.

Herein lies the nucleus of error leading to all the resultant mistakon views. This "Nervous Ether" is the lowest principle of the Primordial Essence which is Life. It is Animal Vitality diffused in all Nature, and acting according to the conditions it finds for its activity. It is not an “animal product," but the living animal, the living flower and plant, are its products. The animal tissues only absorb it according to their more or less morbid or healthy state-as do physical materials and structures (in their primogenial state, nota bene)—and, from the moment of the birth of the Entity, are regulated, strengthened, and fed by it. It descends in a larger supply to vegetation in the Sushumnâ Sun-Ray which lights and feeds the Moon, and it is through her beams that it pours its light upon, and penetrates man and animal, more during their sleep and rest, than when they are in full activity. Therefore Dr. Richardson errs again in stating that:

The nervous ether is not, according to my idea of it, in itself active, nor an excitant of animal motion in the sense of a force; but it is essential as supplying the conditions