Theos-Talk Archives (November 2004 Message tt00148)

 www.AnandGholap.net

" The world "spirit-matter" is used designedly. At implies the fact that there is no such thing as "dead" matter ; all matter is living, the tiniest particles are lives. Science speaks truly in affirming: "No force without matter, no matter without force." They are wedded together in an indissoluble marriage throughout the ages of the life of a universe, and none can wrench them apart. Matter is form, and there is no form which does not express a life ; spirit is life, and there is no life that is not limited by form. Even the LOGOS, the Supreme Lord, has during manifestation the universe as His form, and so down to the atom. 
10. This involution of the life of the LOGOS as the ensouling force in every particle, and its successive enwrapping in the spirit-matter of every plane, so that the materials of each plane have within them in a hidden, or latent condition, all the form and force possibilities of all the planes above them as well as those of their own - these two facts make evolution certain and give to the very lowest particle the hidden potentialities which will render it fit - as they become active powers - to enter into the forms of the highest beings. In fact, evolution may be summed up in a phrase: it is latent potentialities becoming active powers. 

11. The second great wave of evolution, the evolution of form, and the third great wave, the evolution of self-consciousness, will be dealt with later on. These three currents of evolution are distinguishable on our earth in connection with humanity ; the making of the materials, the building of the house, and the growing of the tenant of the house, or, as said above, the evolution of spirit-matter, the evolution of form, the evolution of self-consciousness.If the reader can grasp and retain this idea, he will find a helpful clue to guide him through the labyrinth of facts. 

12. We can now turn to the detailed examination of the physical plane, that on which our world exists and to which our bodies belong. 

13. Examining the materials belonging to this plane, we are struck by their immense variety, the innumerable differences of constitution in the objects around us, minerals, vegetables, animals, all differing in their constituents: matter hard and soft, transparent and opaque, brittle and ductile, bitter and sweet, pleasant and nauseous, coloured and colourless. Out of this confusion three subdivisions of matter emerge as a fundamental classification: matter is solid, liquid, gaseous. Further examination shows that these solids, liquids and gases are made up by combinations of much simpler bodies, called by chemists "elements," and that these elements may exist in a solid, liquid, or gaseous condition without changing their respective natures. 

14. Thus the chemical element oxygen is a constituent of wood, and in combination with other elements forms the solid wood fibres ; it exists in the sap with another element, yielding a liquid combination as water ; and it exists also in it by itself as gas. Under these three conditions it is oxygen. Further , pure oxygen can be reduced from a gas to a liquid, and from a liquid to a solid, remaining pure oxygen all the time, and so with other elements. We thus obtain as three subdivisions, or conditions of matter on the physical plane, solid, liquid, gas. Searching further, we find a fourth condition, ether, and a minute search reveals that this ether exists in four conditions as well defined as those of solid, liquid and gas ; to take oxygen again as an example: as it may be reduced from the gaseous condition to the liquid and the solid, so it may be raised from the gaseous through four etheric stages the last of which consists of the ultimate physical atom, the disintegration of the atom taking matter out of the physical plane altogether, and into the next plane above. 

15. In the annexed plate three gases are shown in the gaseous and four etheric states ; it will be observed that the structure of the ultimate physical atom is the same for all, and that the variety of the "elements" is due to the variety of ways in which these ultimate physical atoms combine. Thus the seventh subdivision of physical spirit-matter is composed of homogeneous atoms ; the sixth is composed of fairly simple heterogeneous combinations of these, each combination behaving as a unit ; the fifth is composed of more complex combinations, and the fourth of still more complex ones, but in all cases these combinations act as units . 

16. The third subdivision consists of yet more complicated combinations, regarded by the chemist as gaseous atoms or "elements," and on this subdivision many of the combinations have received special names, oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen, chlorine, etc., and each newly discovered combination now receives its name ; the second subdivision consists of combinations in the liquid condition, whether regarded as elements such as bromine, or as combinations such as water or alcohol ; the first subdivision is composed of all solids, again whether regarded as elements, such as iodine, gold, lead, etc., or as compounds, such as wood, stone, chalk, and so on. "


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