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The Secret Doctrine: The Synthesis of Science, Religion, and Philosophy (2-volume set)

Isis Unveiled: Both Volumes - A Master-Key to the Mysteries of Ancient and Modern Science and Theology (Illustrated)

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The Secret Doctrine: The Synthesis of Science, Religion, and Philosophy (2-volume set)

Continuously in print for over 100 years, the SD remains today the most comprehensive sourcebook of the esoteric tradition, outlining the fundamental tenets of the Secret Doctrine of the Archaic Ages. Challenging, prophetic, and strikingly modern, it directly addresses the perennial questions: continuity of life after death, purpose of existence, good and evil, consciousness and substance, sexuality, karma, evolution, and human and planetary transformation. Based on the ancient Stanzas of Dzyan with corroborating testimony from hundreds of sources, these volumes unfold the drama of cosmic and human evolution -- from the reawakening of the gods after a Night of the Universe to the ultimate reunion of cosmos with its divine source. Supplementary sections discuss relevant scientific issues as well as the mystery language of myths, symbols, and allegories, helping the reader decipher the often abstruse imagery of the world's sacred literature. This edition is a character-for-character, line-for-line reproduction of the two-volume 1888 first edition. It is set in new type which closely matches the Miller & Richard Old Style font used in the original. The Index at the end of Volume II is the version revised in 1925.

About the Author

Helena Petrovna Blavatsky was born August 12, 1831, at Dnepropetrovsk, Ukraine, daughter of Colonel Peter Alexeyevich von Hahn and novelist Helena Andreyevna (née de Fadeyev). In 1849 she married N. V. Blavatsky, and shortly thereafter began more than 20 years of extensive travel, which brought her into contact with mystic traditions the world over. She was the principal founder of The Theosophical Society in New York City in 1875, and devoted her extraordinary literary talents to its humanitarian and educational purposes until her death in London, England, on May 8, 1891.

Paperback: 1571 pages
Publisher: Theosophical Univ Pr; Unabridged Verbatim Edition (2-vol set) edition (December 30, 2014)

The Secret Doctrine

The Synthesis Of Science, Religion, And Philosophy.

Volume I: Cosmogenesis

by H.P. Blavatsky

[1888]

THE SECRET DOCTRINE TABLE OF CONTENTS

475

BOOK I. — PART III.

ADDENDA.

SCIENCE AND THE SECRET
DOCTRINE CONTRASTED.

"The knowledge of this nether world —
Say, friend, what is it, false or true?
The false, what mortal cares to know?
The true, what mortal ever knew?"

476

CONTENTS.

——————————————

I. Reasons For These Addenda

477

II. Modern Physicists Are Playing At Blind Man's Buff

482

III. An Lumen Sit Corpus Nec Non?

483

IV. Is Gravitation A Law?

490

V. The Theories Of Rotation Science

500

VI. The Masks Of Science

506

VII. An Attack On The Scientific Theory Of Force By A Man Of Science

523

VIII. Life, Force, Or Gravity?

XI. On The Elements And Atoms

566

XII. Ancient Thought In Modern Dress

579

XIII. The Modern Nebular Theory

588

XIV. Forces -- Modes Of Motion Or Intelligences?

601

XV. Gods, Monads, And Atoms

610

XVI. Cyclic Evolution And Karma

634

XVII. The Zodiac And Its Antiquity

647

XVIII. Summary Of The Mutual Position

668

477 MUTUAL POSITION DEFINED.

ADDENDA TO BOOK I.

——————————————

I.

REASONS FOR THESE ADDENDA.

Many of the doctrines contained in the foregoing Seven Stanzas and Commentaries having been studied and critically examined by some Western Theosophists, certain of the occult teachings have been found wanting from the ordinary stand-point of modern scientific knowledge. They seemed to encounter insuperable difficulties in the way of their acceptance, and to require reconsideration in view of scientific criticism. Some friends have already been tempted to regret the necessity of so often calling in question the assertions of modern Science. It appeared to them — and I here repeat only their arguments — that "to run counter to the teachings of its most eminent exponents, was to court a premature discomfiture in the eyes of the Western World."

It is, therefore, desirable to define once and for all the position which the writer, who does not agree in this with her friends, intends to maintain. So far as Science remains what in the words of Prof. Huxley it is, viz., "organized common sense"; so far as its inferences are drawn from accurate premises — its generalizations resting on a purely inductive basis — every Theosophist and Occultist welcomes respectfully and with due admiration its contributions to the domain of cosmological law. There can be no possible conflict between the teachings of occult and so-called exact Science, where the conclusions of the latter are grounded on a substratum of unassailable fact. It is only when its more ardent exponents, over-stepping the limits of observed phenomena in order to penetrate into the arcana of Being, attempt to wrench the formation of Kosmos and its living Forces from Spirit, and attribute all to blind matter, that the Occultists claim the right to dispute and call in question their theories. Science cannot, owing to the very nature of things, unveil the mystery of the universe around us. Science can, it is true, collect, classify, and generalize upon phenomena; but the occultist, arguing from admitted metaphysical data, declares that the daring explorer, who would probe the inmost secrets of Nature, must transcend the narrow limitations of sense, and transfer his consciousness into the region of noumena and the sphere of primal causes. To effect this, he must develop faculties which are absolutely

478 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.

dormant — save in a few rare and exceptional cases — in the constitution of the off-shoots of our present Fifth Root-race in Europe and America. He can in no other conceivable manner collect the facts on which to base his speculations. Is this not apparent on the principles of Inductive Logic and Metaphysics alike?

On the other hand, whatever the writer may do, she will never be able to satisfy both Truth and Science. To offer the reader a systematic and uninterrupted version of the Archaic Stanzas is impossible. A gap of 43 verses or Slokas has to be left between the 7th (already given) and the 51st, which is the subject of Book II., though the latter are made to run from 1 et seq. for easier reading and reference. The appearance of man on Earth alone occupies as many stanzas, which describe minutely his primal evolution from the human Dhyan Chohans; the state of the globe at that time, etc., etc. A great number of names referring to chemical substances and other compounds, which have now ceased to combine together, and are therefore unknown to the later offshoots of our Fifth Race, occupy a considerable space. As they are simply untranslateable, and would remain in every case inexplicable, they are omitted, along with those which cannot be made public. Nevertheless, even the little that is given will irritate any follower and defender of dogmatic materialistic Science who happens to read this.

Before proceeding to other Stanzas, it is proposed, therefore, to defend those already given. They are not in perfect accord or harmony with modern Science — this we all know. Had they been, however, as much in agreement with the views of modern knowledge as a lecture by Sir W. Thomson, they would have been rejected all the same. For they teach belief in conscious Powers and Spiritual Entities; in terrestrial, semi-intelligent, and highly intellectual Forces on other planes*; and in Beings that dwell around us in spheres imperceptible, whether through telescope or microscope. Hence the necessity of examining the beliefs of materialistic Science: of comparing its views about the "Elements" with the opinions of the ancients, and of analysing the physical Forces as they exist in modern perception before the Occultists admit themselves to be in the wrong. We shall touch upon the constitution of the Sun and planets, and the occult characteristics of what are called Devas and Genii, and are now termed by Science, Force, or "modes of motion," and see whether esoteric belief is defensible or not (Vide infra, "Gods, Monads, and Atoms)". Notwithstanding the efforts made to the contrary, an unprejudiced mind will discover

* Their intellection, of course, being of quite a different nature to any we can conceive of on Earth.

479 DUAL NATURE OF THE SUN.

under Newton's "agent, material or immaterial" (of his third letter to Bentley), the agent which causes gravity, and, in his personal working God, one finds just as much of the metaphysical devas and genii, as in Kepler's angelus rector conducting each planet, and the species immateriata by which the celestial bodies were carried along in their courses, according to that astronomer.

We shall have, in Book II., to openly approach dangerous subjects. We must bravely face Science and declare, in the teeth of materialistic learning, of Idealism, Hylo-Idealism, Positivism and all-denying modern Psychology, that the true Occultist believes in "Lords of Light;" that he believes in a Sun, which, far from being simply "a lamp of day" moving in accordance with physical law, and far from being merely one of those Suns, which according to Richter — ". . . . are Sun-flowers of a higher light" — is, like milliards of other Suns, the dwelling or the vehicle of a god, and a host of gods.

In this question, of course, it is the Occultists who will be worsted. They will be considered on the prima facie aspect of the dispute to be ignoramuses, and labelled with more than one of the usual epithets given to those whom the superficially judging public, itself ignorant of the great underlying truths in nature, accuses of believing in mediaeval superstitions. Let it be so. Submitting beforehand to every criticism in order to go on with their task, they only claim the privilege of showing that the physicists are as much at loggerheads among themselves in their speculations, as the latter are with the teachings of Occultism.

The Sun is matter, and the Sun is Spirit. Our ancestors — the "heathen," — along with their modern successors, the Parsis — were, and are, wise enough in their generation to see in it the symbol of Divinity, and at the same time to sense within, concealed by the physical Symbol, the bright God of Spiritual and terrestrial Light. Such belief is now regarded as a superstition only by rank materialism, which denies Deity, Spirit, Soul, and admits no intelligence outside the mind of man. But if too much of wrong superstition bred by "Churchianity" — as Lawrence Oliphant calls it — "renders a man a fool," too much scepticism makes him mad. We prefer the charge of folly in believing too much, to that of a madness which denies everything, as do Materialism and Idealism. Hence, the Occultists are fully prepared to receive their dues from Materialism, and to meet the adverse criticism which will be poured on this work, not for writing it, but for believing in that which it contains.

Therefore the discoveries, hypotheses, and unavoidable objections which will be brought forward by the scientific critics must be anticipated and disposed of. It has also to be shown how far the

480 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.

occult teachings depart from real science, and whether the ancient or the modern theories are the most logically and philosophically correct. The unity and mutual relations of all parts of Kosmos were known to the ancients, before they became evident to modern astronomers and philosophers. And if even the external and visible portions of the Universe and their mutual relations cannot be explained in any other terms than those used by the adherents of the mechanical theory of the Universe in physical science, it follows that no materialist, who denies that the Soul of Kosmos (which appertains to metaphysical philosophy) exists, has the right to trespass upon that metaphysical domain. That physical science is trying to, and actually does, encroach upon it, is only one more proof that "might is right," and no more.

Another good reason for these Addenda is this. Since only a certain portion of the Secret teachings can be given out in the present age, if they were published without any explanations or commentary, the doctrines would never be understood even by theosophists. Therefore they must be contrasted with the speculations of modern science. Archaic axioms must be placed side by side with modern hypotheses and comparison left to the sagacious reader.

On the question of the "Seven Governors," as Hermes calls the "Seven Builders," the Spirits which guide the operations of nature, the animated atoms of which are the shadows, in their world, of their Primaries in the astral realms — this work will, of course, besides the men of Science, have every materialist against it. But this opposition can, at most, be only temporary. People have laughed at everything and scouted every unpopular idea at first, and then ended by accepting it. Materialism and scepticism are evils that must remain in the world as long as man has not quitted his present gross form to don the one he had during the first and second races of this Round. Unless scepticism and our present natural ignorance are equilibrated by intuition and a natural spirituality, every being afflicted with such feelings will see in himself no better than a bundle of flesh, bones, and muscles, with an empty garret inside him which serves the purpose of storing his sensations and feelings. Sir Humphry Davy was a great scientist, as deeply versed in physics as any theorist of our day, yet he loathed materialism. "I heard with disgust," he says, "in the dissecting-rooms, the plan of the physiologist, of the gradual secretion of matter, and its becoming endued with irritability, ripening into sensibility, and acquiring such organs as were necessary, by its own inherent forces, and at last rising into intellectual existence." Nevertheless, physiologists are not the most to be blamed for speaking of that only which they can see and estimate on the evidence of their physical senses. Astronomers

481 THE SONS OF LIGHT.

and physicists are, we consider, far more illogical in their materialistic views than even physiologists, and this has to be proved. Milton's —

. . . . . . . . . . . . "Light
Ethereal, first of things, quintessence pure,"

has become with the materialists only —

. . . . . . Prime cheerer, light,
Of all material beings, first and best.

For the occultists it is both Spirit and Matter. Behind the "mode of motion," now regarded as "the property of matter" and nothing more, they perceive the radiant noumenon. It is the "Spirit of Light," the first born of the Eternal pure Element, whose energy (or emanation) is stored in the Sun, the great Life-Giver of the physical world, as the hidden Concealed Spiritual Sun is the Light- and Life-Giver of the Spiritual and Psychic Realms. Bacon was one of the first to strike the key-note of materialism, not only by his inductive method (renovated from ill-digested Aristotle), but by the general tenor of his writings. He inverts the order of mental Evolution when saying that "the first Creation of God was the light of the sense; the last was the light of the reason; and his Sabbath work ever since is the illumination of the Spirit." It is just the reverse. The light of Spirit is the eternal Sabbath of the mystic or occultist, and he pays little attention to that of mere sense. That which is meant by the allegorical sentence, "Fiat Lux" is,— when esoterically rendered — "Let there be the 'Sons of Light,' " or the noumena of all phenomena. Thus the Roman Catholics rightly interpret the passage as referring to Angels, and wrongly as meaning Powers created by an anthropomorphic God, whom they personify in the ever thundering and punishing Jehovah.

These beings are the "Sons of Light," because they emanate from, and are self-generated in, that infinite Ocean of Light, whose one pole is pure Spirit lost in the absoluteness of Non-Being, and the other, the matter in which it condenses, crystallizing into a more and more gross type as it descends into manifestation. Therefore matter, though it is, in one sense, but the illusive dregs of that Light whose limbs are the Creative Forces, yet has in it the full presence of the Soul thereof, of that Principle, which none — not even the "Sons of Light," evolved from its absolute darkness — will ever know. The idea is as beautifully, as it is truthfully, expressed by Milton, who hails the holy Light, which is the —

". . . . . Offspring of Heaven, first-born,
And of th' Eternal co-eternal beam;
. . . . . Since God is light,
And never but in unapproached Light
Dwelt from Eternity, dwelt then in thee
Bright effluence, of bright essence increate."

THE SECRET DOCTRINE TABLE OF CONTENTS

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Urantia Book, 44:0.11 - The Celestial Artisans

Never in your long ascendancy will you lose the power to recognize your associates of former existences. Always, as you ascend inward in the scale of life, will you retain the ability to recognize and fraternize with the fellow beings of your previous and lower levels of experience. Each new translation or resurrection will add one more group of spirit beings to your vision range without in the least depriving you of the ability to recognize your friends and fellows of former estates.
Princess Bride 1987 Wallace Shawn (Vizzini) and Mandy Patinkin (Inigo Montoya)

Vizzini: HE DIDN'T FALL? INCONCEIVABLE.
Inigo Montoya: You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
Urantia Book, 117:4.14 - The Finite God

And here is mystery: The more closely man approaches God through love, the greater the reality -- actuality -- of that man. The more man withdraws from God, the more nearly he approaches nonreality -- cessation of existence. When man consecrates his will to the doing of the Father's will, when man gives God all that he has, then does God make that man more than he is.
Urantia Book, 167:7.4 - The Talk About Angels

"And do you not remember that I said to you once before that, if you had your spiritual eyes anointed, you would then see the heavens opened and behold the angels of God ascending and descending? It is by the ministry of the angels that one world may be kept in touch with other worlds, for have I not repeatedly told you that I have other sheep not of this fold?"
Urantia Book, Foreword - 0:12.12 - The Trinities

But we know that there dwells within the human mind a fragment of God, and that there sojourns with the human soul the Spirit of Truth; and we further know that these spirit forces conspire to enable material man to grasp the reality of spiritual values and to comprehend the philosophy of universe meanings. But even more certainly we know that these spirits of the Divine Presence are able to assist man in the spiritual appropriation of all truth contributory to the enhancement of the ever-progressing reality of personal religious experience—God-consciousness.
Urantia Book, 1:4.3 - The Mystery Of God

When you are through down here, when your course has been run in temporary form on earth, when your trial trip in the flesh is finished, when the dust that composes the mortal tabernacle "returns to the earth whence it came"; then, it is revealed, the indwelling "Spirit shall return to God who gave it." There sojourns within each moral being of this planet a fragment of God, a part and parcel of divinity. It is not yet yours by right of possession, but it is designedly intended to be one with you if you survive the mortal existence.
Urantia Book, 1:4.1 - The Mystery Of God

And the greatest of all the unfathomable mysteries of God is the phenomenon of the divine indwelling of mortal minds. The manner in which the Universal Father sojourns with the creatures of time is the most profound of all universe mysteries; the divine presence in the mind of man is the mystery of mysteries.
Urantia Book, 1:4.6 - The Mystery Of God

To every spirit being and to every mortal creature in every sphere and on every world of the universe of universes, the Universal Father reveals all of his gracious and divine self that can be discerned or comprehended by such spirit beings and by such mortal creatures. God is no respecter of persons, either spiritual or material. The divine presence which any child of the universe enjoys at any given moment is limited only by the capacity of such a creature to receive and to discern the spirit actualities of the supermaterial world.
Urantia Book, 11:0.1 - The Eternal Isle Of Paradise

Paradise is the eternal center of the universe of universes and the abiding place of the Universal Father, the Eternal Son, the Infinite Spirit, and their divine co-ordinates and associates. This central Isle is the most gigantic organized body of cosmic reality in all the master universe. Paradise is a material sphere as well as a spiritual abode. All of the intelligent creation of the Universal Father is domiciled on material abodes; hence must the absolute controlling center also be material, literal. And again it should be reiterated that spirit things and spiritual beings are real.
Urantia Book, 50:6.4 - Planetary Culture

Culture presupposes quality of mind; culture cannot be enhanced unless mind is elevated. Superior intellect will seek a noble culture and find some way to attain such a goal. Inferior minds will spurn the highest culture even when presented to them ready-made.
Urantia Book, 54:1.6 - True And False Liberty

True liberty is the associate of genuine self-respect; false liberty is the consort of self-admiration. True liberty is the fruit of self-control; false liberty, the assumption of self-assertion. Self-control leads to altruistic service; self-admiration tends towards the exploitation of others for the selfish aggrandizement of such a mistaken individual as is willing to sacrifice righteous attainment for the sake of possessing unjust power over his fellow beings.
Urantia Book, 54:1.9 - True And False Liberty

How dare the self-willed creature encroach upon the rights of his fellows in the name of personal liberty when the Supreme Rulers of the universe stand back in merciful respect for these prerogatives of will and potentials of personality! No being, in the exercise of his supposed personal liberty, has a right to deprive any other being of those privileges of existence conferred by the Creators and duly respected by all their loyal associates, subordinates, and subjects.
Urantia Book, 54:1.8 - True And False Liberty

There is no error greater than that species of self-deception which leads intelligent beings to crave the exercise of power over other beings for the purpose of depriving these persons of their natural liberties. The golden rule of human fairness cries out against all such fraud, unfairness, selfishness, and unrighteousness.

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