The Golden Star

VISION 9

Cosmic Consciousness

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“How often does it happen that a Teacher gives forth a particle of Truth? As long as he is speaking his listeners will Hear and Realize, if they blend their Minds with the Mind of the Teacher whilst he speaks. During that time they are illuminated, and Mind mingles with Mind in perfect understanding. But the moment the Teacher ceases, or a few moments, or days, weeks or months afterwards, the other Minds begin to reason, as they imagine. They use their intellect, which ever deceives; and instead of the Light of Illumination, they draw unto themselves the Twilight of Doubt, or even retreat into the Darkness of Ignorance. The material always stretches out its greedy tentacles and endeavours to drag down again that principle of the human mind which, on perceiving a Ray from the Divine, unfolds its spiritual wings in order to rise upwards; away from the nether abodes of earth towards the Light. The wings of very few are strong enough to attempt the flight, and whilst they hesitate the powers of the lower regions take hold, and with a fluttering sigh the attempt is over. Thus many times must the mortal Mind receive that Ray before it can raise itself up and achieve release from the heavy shackles that drag it ever down.

“Ignorance; the dawn of reason; intellect; the dawn of real understanding, or initiation; and finally Wisdom: these are the five steps which raise the man from brute to spirit. There are many intermediate stages, such as fear, doubt, superstition, dogma, fanaticism; each and every one of which has to be fought and overcome before the Light is reached. But to those who succeed in the end the reward is great, and the struggle is worthwhile, for it gives experience and strength.

“Immanuel Kant has said: ‘I confess I am much disposed to assert the existence of immaterial natures in the world, and to place my own soul in the class of these beings. It will, hereafter—I know not where, or when—yet be proved that the human Soul stands even in this life in indissoluble connection with all immaterial natures in the spirit world, that it reciprocally acts upon these and receives impressions from them.’

“Here again we must read ‘mind’ instead of ‘soul.’

“Both Kant and Laplace had the idea that, at the origin of things, all that Matter which now enters into the composition of planetary bodies was spread over all the Space comprised in the Solar System—and even beyond.

“In your last vision you have seen how that matter was brought to sentient life.

“Plutarch taught that an Idea is a Being incorporeal, which has no subsistence by itself, but gives figure and form unto shapeless matter, and becomes the cause of the manifestation. We see a realization of this in Descartes’ ‘Plenum’ ‘of matter differentiated into particles’; in Leibnitz’s ‘ethereal fluid’; in Kant’s ‘primitive fluid’ dissolved into its elements, and in Kepler’s ‘solar vortex’ and ‘systemic vortices.’

“And Leibnitz shows a metaphysical intuition in the structure of his divisions—however incomplete they are and faulty from the standpoint of Occult Science—which no other scientist, not even Descartes or Kant, has equalled.

“Besides—although the sum of knowledge increases daily in mankind, intellectual capacity does not grow with it. We only need compare the intellect, if not the physical knowledge, of such men as Euclid, Plato, Socrates, Pythagoras, and other giants of the past with modern science, to know that this is true.

“Science itself has proved that the brain-volume of Polynesians is considerably greater than that of Europeans; even of the French, who rank highest in this respect. Not only that, but the average measurements of the men living in the Stone Age in the North, in England, and in Wales, are larger than the average European of today. Strangely enough, perhaps, the Stone Age men of France had a slightly smaller average than even the modern European, whilst the Hottentots’ skulls measure still less. This shows two things: The size of the brain of the earliest human beings known is not such as to place them on a lower level than the present-day man. Secondly, it shows that it is not a question of brain-quantity, but quality that counts. Yet modern science states that neither matter, nor even the number of convolutions of the brain, make a definite difference in the mental capacity of a man. Nor does the breadth of the brain, as the index of breadth among Scandinavians is at 75; among the English at 76; among some of the German groups at 77 to 80; Schiller’s skull showed an index of breadth of 82—but, the Madurese tribe also show an index number of 82! Wherein, then, lies the basis of intellectual capacity? And what about the much-vaunted modern progress of the intellect? In the presence of these facts the Occult Scientist can but smile when in our learned age the Wisdom of the Ancients is ascribed to Fables!

“They did not rely on intellect, but knew that there is a higher rate of illumination, the revelations of which can never be attained or grasped by material thinking.

“There are men of these latter days, however, apart from such well-known names as Kant, Herbert Spencer, du Bois-Reymond, and Tyndall—to name a few at random—who do have this realization; and Tyndall has stated that: ‘The passage from the Physics of the brain to the corresponding facts of consciousness is unthinkable. Were our minds and senses so . . . illuminated as to enable us to see and feel the very molecules of the brain; were we capable of following all their motions, all their groupings, all their electric discharges . . . we should be as far as ever from the solution of the problem . . . The chasm between the two classes of phenomena would still remain intellectually impassable!’ It is the same with the realization which accompanies Cosmic Consciousness, as with the question of the possibility of life on other planets than the Earth. Those who know it can never be shaken in their acceptance of these two facts; the rest do not matter yet; their time will come later. That there is life on other planets is proved—if we must have proof of a material nature—by the fact that in some meteorites has been found graphite; a form of carbon known to be invariably associated with organic life on Earth. This presence of carbon was not due to any action occurring within the Earth’s atmosphere, as it has been found in the very centre of the meteorites when analyzed. And in 1857 at Argueil, in the South of France, there fell a meteorite, which, upon being split and analyzed, was found to contain water and decomposed vegetable matter.

“Here are facts which even science can understand; yet the question as to the possibility of life on other planets is still doubted. But that which can be fully realized by our reason and senses is but the superficial; they can never reach the true inner substance of things. Thus taught Kant, who must be admitted to be one of the greatest Philosophers of modern times.

“One must first be able to see one’s Self—and this can only be done by means of Cosmic Consciousness; for once we see—or know—ourselves as we are, the secrets of the Kosmos are revealed also.

“In the Mysteries, the third part of the sacred rites was called Epopteia, or revelation, reception into the secrets. It means the highest state of clairvoyance—the divine. The word means ‘overseer’, ‘inspector’, and ‘master-builder.’

“When St. Paul states that: ‘According to the Grace of God which is given unto me, as a wise master-builder, I have laid the foundation,’ he refers to these rites. Incidentally, it is the only time that this term is used in the Bible.

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