Theos-Talk Archives (January 2005 Message tt00430)

Jan 14 2005



HPB said:

Come to the S.D. (HPB says) without any hope of getting the final Truth of
existence from it, or with any idea other than seeing how far it may lead
TOWARDS the Truth. 

See in study a means of exercising and developing the mind never touched by
other studies. 

Observe the following rules: 



1. No matter what one may study in the S.D. let the mind hold fast, as the
basis of its ideation to the following ideas 

(a) The FUNDAMENTAL UNITY OF ALL EXISTENCE. 

This unity is a thing altogether different from the common notion of unity
-- as when we say that a nation or an army is united; or that this planet is
united to that by lines of magnetic force or the like. The teaching is not
that. It is that existence is ONE THING, not any collection of things linked
together. 

Fundamentally there is ONE BEING. 

This Being has two aspects, positive and negative. 

The positive is Spirit, or CONSCIOUSNESS. 

The negative is SUBSTANCE, the subject of consciousness. 

This Being is the Absolute in its primary manifestation. 

Being absolute there is nothing outside it. It is All-Being. It is
indivisible, else it would not be absolute. If a portion could be separated,
that remaining could not be absolute, because there would at once arise the
question of COMPARISON between it and the separated part. Comparison is
incompatible with any idea of absoluteness. Therefore it is clear that this
fundamental One Existence, or Absolute Being must be the Reality in every
form there is. 

I said that though this was clear to me I did not think that many in the
Lodges would grasp it. "Theosophy," she said, "is for those who can think,
or for those who can drive themselves to think, not mental sluggards."
H.P.B. has grown very mild of late. "Dumskulls!" used to be her name for the
average student. 

The Atom, the Man, the God (she says) are each separately, as well as all
collectively, Absolute Being in their last analysis, that is their REAL
INDIVIDUALITY. It is this idea which must be held always in the background
of the mind to form the basis for every conception that arises from study of
the S.D. The moment one lets it go (and it is most easy to do so when
engaged in any of the many intricate aspects of the Esoteric Philosophy) the
idea of SEPARATION supervenes, and the study loses its value. 

(b) The second idea to hold fast to is that THERE IS NO DEAD MATTER. Every
last atom is alive. It cannot be otherwise since every atom is itself
fundamentally Absolute Being. Therefore there is no such thing as "spaces"
of Ether, or Akasha, or call it what you like, in which angels and
elementals disport themselves like trout in water. That's the common idea.
The true idea shows every atom of substance no matter of what plane to be in
itself a LIFE. 

(c) The third basic idea to be held is that Man is the MICROCOSM. As he is
so, then all the Hierarchies of the Heavens exist within him. But in truth
there is neither Macrocosm nor Microcosm but ONE EXISTENCE. Great and small
are such only as viewed by a limited consciousness. 

(d) Fourth and last basic idea to be held is that expressed in the Great
Hermetic Axiom. It really sums up and synthesises all the others: 

As is the Inner, so is the Outer; 
as is the Great so is the Small; 
as it is above, so it is below; 
there is but One Life and Law; 
and he that worketh it is ONE. 
Nothing is Inner, nothing is Outer; 
nothing is Great, nothing is Small; 
nothing is High, nothing is Low, in the Divine Economy.

No matter what one takes as study in the S.D. one must correlate it with
those basic ideas. 

I suggested that this is a kind of mental exercise which must be excessively
fatiguing. H.P.B. smiled and nodded. One must not be a fool (she said) and
drive oneself into the madhouse by attempting too much at first. The brain
is the instrument of waking consciousness, and every conscious mental
picture formed means change and destruction of the atoms of the brain.
Ordinary intellectual activity moves on well beaten paths in the brain, and
does not compel sudden adjustments and destructions in its substance. But
this new kind of mental effort calls for something very different -- the
carving out of new "brain paths," the ranking in different order of the
little brain lives. If forced injudiciously it may do serious physical harm
to the brain. 

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Best wishes,



Dallas





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