THE SECRET DOCTRINE:

THE SYNTHESIS
OF
SCIENCE, RELIGION, AND PHILOSOPHY.

by H. P. BLAVATSKY

X.
THE COMING FORCE.

ITS POSSIBILITIES AND IMPOSSIBILITIES.

Shall we say that Force is "moving matter," or "matter in motion," and a manifestation of energy; or that matter and force are the phenomenal differentiated aspects of the one primary, undifferentiated Cosmic Substance?

This query is made with regard to that Stanza which treats of FOHAT and his "Seven brothers or Sons," in other words, of the cause and the effects of Cosmic Electricity, the latter called, in Occult parlance, the seven primary forces of Electricity, whose purely phenomenal, and hence grossest effects are alone cognizable by physicists on the cosmic and especially on the terrestrial plane. These include, among other things, Sound, Light, Colour, etc., etc. Now what does physical Science tell us of these "Forces"? SOUND, it says, is a sensation produced by the impact of atmospheric molecules on the tympanum, which, by setting up delicate tremors in the auditory apparatus, thus communicate themselves to the brain. LIGHT is the sensation caused by the impact of inconceivably minute vibrations of ether on the retina of the eye.

So, too, we say. But this is simply the effect produced in our atmosphere and its immediate surroundings, all, in fact, which falls within the range of our terrestrial consciousness. Jupiter Pluvius sent his symbol in drops of rain, of water composed, as is believed, of two "elements," which chemistry dissociates and recombines. The compound molecules are in its power, but their atoms still elude its grasp. Occultism sees in all these Forces and manifestations a ladder, the lower rungs of which belong to exoteric physics, and the higher are traced to a living, intelligent, invisible Power, which is, as a rule, the unconcerned, and exceptionally, the conscious cause of the sense-born phenomenon designated as this or another natural law.

[[H. P. Blavatsky, Vol. 1, Page]] 555 DIVINE, INFERNAL, OR TERRESTRIAL FORCE?

We say and maintain that SOUND, for one thing, is a tremendous Occult power; that it is a stupendous force, of which the electricity generated by a million of Niagaras could never counteract the smallest potentiality when directed with occult knowledge. Sound may be produced of such a nature that the pyramid of Cheops would be raised in the air, or that a dying man, nay, one at his last breath, would be revived and filled with new energy and vigour.

For Sound generates, or rather attracts together, the elements that produce an ozone, the fabrication of which is beyond chemistry, but within the limits of Alchemy. It may even resurrect a man or an animal whose astral "vital body" has not been irreparably separated from the physical body by the severance of the magnetic or odic chord. As one saved thrice from death by that power, the writer ought to be credited with knowing personally something about it.

And if all this appears too unscientific to be even noticed, let Science explain to what mechanical and physical laws known to it, is due the recently produced phenomena of the so-called "Keely motor?" What is it that acts as the formidable generator of invisible but tremendous force, of that power which is not only capable of driving an engine of 25 horse-power, but has even been employed to lift the machinery bodily? Yet this is done simply by drawing a fiddle-bow across a tuning fork, as has been repeatedly proven. For the etheric Force, discovered by the well-known (in America and now in Europe) John Worrell Keely, of Philadelphia, is no hallucination. Notwithstanding his failure to utilize it, a failure prognosticated and maintained by some Occultists from the first, the phenomena exhibited by the discoverer during the last few years have been wonderful, almost miraculous, not in the sense of the supernatural* but of the superhuman. Had Keely been permitted to succeed, he might have reduced a whole army to atoms in the space of a few seconds as easily as he reduced a dead ox to the same condition.

The reader is now asked to give a serious attention to that newly-discovered potency which the discoverer has named "Inter-Etheric Force and Forces."

In the humble opinion of the Occultists, as of his immediate friends,

[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------

* The word "supernatural" implies above or outside of nature. Nature and Space are one. Now Space for the metaphysician exists outside of any act of sensation, and is a purely subjective representation; materialism, which would connect it forcibly with one or the other datum of sensation, notwithstanding. For our senses, it is fairly subjective when independent of anything within it. How then can any phenomenon, or anything else, step outside of or be performed beyond that which has no limits? But when spacial extension becomes simply conceptual, and is thought of in an idea connected with certain actions, as by the materialists and the physicists, then again they have hardly a right to define and claim that which can or cannot be produced by Forces generated within even limited spaces, as they have not even an approximate idea of what those forces are.

[[H. P. Blavatsky, Vol. 1, Page]] 556 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.

Mr. Keely, of Philadelphia, was, and still is, at the threshold of some of the greatest secrets of the Universe; of that chiefly on which is built the whole mystery of physical Forces, and the esoteric significance of the "Mundane Egg" symbolism. Occult philosophy, viewing the manifested and the unmanifested Kosmos as a UNITY, symbolizes the ideal conception of the former by that "Golden Egg" with two poles in it. It is the positive pole that acts in the manifested world of matter, while the negative is lost in the unknowable absoluteness of SAT -- "Be-ness."* Whether this agrees with the philosophy of Mr. Keely, we cannot tell, nor does it really much matter. Nevertheless, his ideas about the ethero-material construction of the Universe look strangely like our own, being in this respect nearly identical. This is what we find him saying in an able pamphlet compiled by Mrs. Bloomfield-Moore, an American lady of wealth and position, whose incessant efforts in the pursuit of truth can never be too highly appreciated: -- "Mr. Keely, in explanation of the working of his engine, says: 'In the conception of any machine heretofore constructed, the medium for inducing a neutral centre has never been found. If it had, the difficulties of perpetual-motion seekers would have ended, and this problem would have become an established and operating fact. It would only require an introductory impulse of a few pounds, on such a device, to cause it to run for centuries. In the conception of my vibratory engine, I did not seek to attain perpetual motion; but a circuit is formed that actually has a neutral centre, which is in a condition to be vivified by my vibratory ether, and, while under operation by said substance, is really a machine that is virtually independent of the mass (or globe),** and it is the wonderful velocity of the vibratory circuit which makes it so. Still, with all its perfection, it requires to be fed with the vibratory ether to make it an independent motor . . . ."

"All structures require a foundation in strength according to the weight of the mass they have to carry, but the foundations of the universe rest on a vacuous point far more minute than a molecule; in fact, to express this truth properly, on an inter-etheric point, which requires an infinite mind to understand it. To look down into the depths of an etheric centre is precisely the same as it would be to search into the broad space of heaven's ether to find the end, with this difference: that one is the positive field, while the other is the negative field . . . ."

[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------

* It is not correct, when speaking of idealism, to show it based upon "the old ontological assumptions that things or entities exist independently of each other, and otherwise than as terms of relations" (Stallo). At any rate, it is incorrect to say so of idealism in Eastern philosophy and its cognition, for it is just the reverse.

** Independent, in a certain sense, but not disconnected with it.

[[H. P. Blavatsky, Vol. 1, Page]] 557 AN UNCONSCIOUS OCCULTIST.

This, as easily seen, is precisely the Eastern doctrine. His inter-etheric point is the laya-point of the Occultists, which, however, does not require "an infinite mind to understand it," but only a specific intuition and ability to trace its hiding-place in this world of matter. Of course, the laya centre cannot be produced, but an inter-etheric vacuum can -- as proved in the production of bell-sounds in space. Mr. Keely speaks as an unconscious Occultist, nevertheless, when he remarks in his theory of planetary suspension: --

"As regards planetary volume, we would ask in a scientific point of view, How can the immense difference of volume in the planets exist without disorganising the harmonious action that has always characterised them? I can only answer this question properly by entering into a progressive analysis, starting on the rotating etheric centres that were fixed by the Creator* with their attractive or accumulative power. If you ask what power it is that gives to each etheric atom its inconceivable velocity of rotation (or introductory impulse), I must answer that no finite mind will ever be able to conceive what it is. The philosophy of accumulation is the only proof that such a power has been given. The area, if we can so speak, of such an atom, presents to the attractive or magnetic, the elective or propulsive, all the receptive force and all the antagonistic force that characterises a planet of the largest magnitude; consequently, as the accumulation goes on, the perfect equation remains the same. When this minute centre has once been fixed, the power to rend it from its position would necessarily have to be so great as to displace the most immense planet that exists. When this atomic neutral centre is displaced, the planet must go with it. The neutral centre carries the full load of any accumulation from the start, and remains the same, for ever balanced in the eternal space."

Mr. Keely illustrates his idea of "a neutral centre" in this way: --

"We will imagine that, after an accumulation of a planet of any diameter, say, 20,000 miles, more or less, for the size has nothing to do with the problem; there should be a displacement of all the material, with the exception of a crust 5,000 miles thick, leaving an intervening void between this crust and a centre of the size of an ordinary billiard ball, it would then require a force as great to move this small central mass as it would to move the shell of 5,000 miles thickness. Moreover, this small central mass would carry the load of this crust for ever, keeping it equidistant; and there could be no opposing power, however great, that could bring them together. The imagination staggers in contemplating the immense load which bears upon this point of centre, where weight ceases. . . . This is what we understand by a neutral centre."

And what Occultists understand by a "laya centre."

The above is pronounced "unscientific" by many. But so is everything that is not sanctioned and kept on strictly orthodox lines by physical science. Unless the explanation given by the inventor himself is accepted -- and his explanations, being, as observed, quite orthodox from

[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------

* "By Fohat, more likely," would be an Occultist's reply.

[[H. P. Blavatsky, Vol. 1, Page]] 558 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.

the spiritual and the Occult stand-points, if not from that of materialistic speculative (called exact) Science, are therefore ours in this particular -- what can science answer to facts already seen which it is no longer possible for anyone to deny? Occult philosophy divulges few of its most important vital mysteries. It drops them like precious pearls, one by one, far and wide apart, and only when forced to do so by the evolutionary tidal wave that carries on humanity slowly, silently, but steadily toward the dawn of the Sixth-Race mankind. For once out of the safe custody of their legitimate heirs and keepers, those mysteries cease to be occult: they fall into the public domain and have to run the risk of becoming in the hands of the selfish -- of the Cains of the human race -- curses more often than blessings. Nevertheless, whenever such individuals as the discoverer of Etheric Force -- John Worrell Keely -- men with peculiar psychic and mental capacities* are born, they are generally and more frequently helped than allowed to go unassisted; groping on their way, though, if left to their own resources, falling very soon victims to martyrdom and unscrupulous speculators. Only they are helped on the condition that they should not become, whether consciously or unconsciously, an additional peril to their age: a danger to the poor, now offered in daily holocaust by the less wealthy to the very wealthy.** This necessitates a short digression and an explanation.

Some twelve years back, during the Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition, the writer, in answering the earnest queries of a theosophist, one of the earliest admirers of Mr. Keely, repeated to him what she had heard in quarters, information from which she could never doubt.

It had been stated that the inventor of the "Self-Motor" was what is called, in the jargon of the Kabalists, a "natural-born magician." That he was and would remain unconscious of the full range of his powers, and would work out merely those which he had found out and ascertained in his own nature -- firstly, because, attributing them to a wrong source, he could never give them full sway; and

[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------

* The reason for such psychic capacities is given farther on.

** The above was written two years ago, at a time when hopes of success for the "Keely Motor" were at their highest. What was then said by the writer proved true, in every word, and now only a few remarks are added to it with regard to the failure of his expectations, so far, which has now been admitted by the discoverer himself. Though, however, the word failure is here used the reader should understand it in a relative sense, for as Mrs. Bloomfield-Moore explains: "What Mr. Keely does admit is that, baffled in applying vibratory force to mechanics, upon his first and second lines of experimental research, he was obliged either to confess a commercial failure, or to try a third departure from his base or principle; seeking success through another channel."
. . And this "channel" is on the physical plane.

[[H. P. Blavatsky, Vol. 1, Page]] 559 THE FIRST-BORN OF ETHER.

secondly, because it was beyond his power to pass to others that which was a capacity inherent in his special nature. Hence the whole secret could not be made over permanently to anyone for practical purposes or use.*

Individuals born with such a capacity are not very rare. That they are not heard of more frequently is due to the fact that they live and die, in almost every case, in utter ignorance of being possessed of abnormal powers at all. Mr. Keely possesses powers which are called "abnormal" just because they happen in our day to be as little known as blood circulation was before Harvey's time. Blood existed, and it behaved as it does at present in the first man born from woman; and so does that principle in man which can control and guide etheric vibratory force. At any rate it exists in all those mortals whose inner selves are primordially connected, by reason of their direct descent, with that group of Dhyan-Chohans who are called "the first-born of Ether." Mankind, psychically considered, is divided into various groups, each of which is connected with one of the Dhyanic groups that first formed psychic man; (see paragraphs 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 in the Commentary to Stanza VII.) Mr. Keely being greatly favoured in this respect, and moreover, besides his psychic temperament, being intellectually a genius in mechanics, may thus achieve most wonderful results. He has achieved some already -- more than any mortal man, not initiated into the final mysteries, has achieved in this age up to the present day. What he has done is certainly quite sufficient "to demolish with the hammer of Science the idols of Science" -- the idols of matter with the feet of clay -- as his friends justly predict and say of him. Nor would the writer for a moment think of contradicting Mrs. Bloomfield-Moore, when in her paper on "Psychic Force and Etheric Force," she states that Mr. Keely, as a philosopher, "is great enough in soul, wise enough in mind, and sublime enough in courage to overcome all difficulties, and to stand at last before the world as the greatest discoverer and inventor in the world."

And again she writes: -- "Should Keely do no more than lead scientists from the dreary realms where they are groping into the open field of elemental force, where gravity and cohesion are disturbed in their haunts and diverted to use; where, from unity of origin, emanates infinite energy in diversified forms, he will achieve immortal fame. Should he demonstrate, to the destruction of materialism, that the universe is animated by a mysterious principle to which matter, however perfectly organized, is absolutely subservient, he will be a greater spiritual benefactor to our race than the modern world has yet found in any man. Should he be able to substitute, in the treatment of disease,

[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------

* We learn that these remarks are not applicable to Mr. Keely's latest discovery; time alone can show the exact limit of his achievements.

[[H. P. Blavatsky, Vol. 1, Page]] 560 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.

the finer forces of nature for the grossly material agencies which have sent more human beings to their graves than war, pestilence and famine combined, he will merit and receive the gratitude of mankind. All this and more will he do, if he and those who have watched his progress, day by day for years, are not too sanguine in their expectations."

Writing in the T. P. S. ("Theosophical Publication Society") series (No. 9), the same lady, in her pamphlet, "Keely's Secrets," brings forward a passage from an article, written a few years ago by the writer of the present volume, in her journal, the Theosophist, in these words: --

"The author of No. 5 of the pamphlets issued by the Theosophical Publication Society, 'What is Matter and What is Force,' says therein, 'The men of science have just found out "a fourth state of matter," whereas the Occultists have penetrated years ago beyond the sixth, and therefore do not infer, but know of, the existence of the seventh, the last.' This knowledge comprises one of the secrets of Keely's so-called 'compound secret.' It is already known to many that his secret includes 'the augmentation of energy,' the insulation of the ether, and the adaptation of dynaspheric force to machinery."

It is just because Keely's discovery would lead to a knowledge of one of the most occult secrets, a secret which can never be allowed to fall into the hands of the masses, that his failure to push his discoveries to their logical end seems certain to Occultists. But of this more presently. Even in its limitations this discovery may prove of the greatest benefit. For: --

"Step by step, with a patient perseverance which some day the world will honour, this man of genius has made his researches, overcoming the colossal difficulties which again and again raised up in his path what seemed to be (to all but himself) insurmountable barriers to further progress: but never has the world's index finger so pointed to an hour when all is making ready for the advent of the new form of force that mankind is waiting for. Nature, always reluctant to yield her secrets, is listening to the demands made upon her by her master, necessity. The coal mines of the world cannot long afford the increasing drain made upon them. Steam has reached its utmost limits of power, and does not fulfil the requirements of the age. It knows that its days are numbered. Electricity holds back, with bated breath, dependent upon the approach of her sister colleague. Air ships are riding at anchor, as it were, waiting for the force which is to make aerial navigation something more than a dream. As easily as men communicate with their offices from their homes by means of the telephone, so will the inhabitants of separate continents talk across the ocean. Imagination is palsied when seeking to foresee the grand results of this marvellous discovery, when once it is applied to art and mechanics. In taking the throne which it will force steam to abdicate, dynaspheric force will rule the world with a power so mighty in the interests of civilization, that no finite mind can conjecture the results. Laurence Oliphant, in his preface to 'Scientific Religion,' says: 'A new moral future is dawning upon the human race -- one, certainly, of which it stands much in need.' In no way could this

[[H. P. Blavatsky, Vol. 1, Page]] 561 ETHERIC WAVES.

new moral future be so widely, so universally, commenced as by the utilizing of dynaspheric force to beneficial purposes in life. . . . ."

The Occultists are ready to admit all this with the eloquent writer. Molecular vibration is, undeniably, "Keely's legitimate field of research," and the discoveries made by him will prove wonderful -- yet only in his hands and through himself. The world so far will get but that with which it can be safely entrusted. The truth of this assertion has, perhaps, not yet quite dawned upon the discoverer himself, since he writes that he is absolutely certain that he will accomplish all that he has promised, and will then give it out to the world; but it must dawn upon him, and at no very far distant date. And what he says in reference to his work is a good proof of it: --

"In considering the operation of my engine, the visitor, in order to have even an approximate conception of its modus operandi, must discard all thought of engines that are operated upon the principle of pressure and exhaustion, by the expansion of steam or other analogous gas which impinges upon an abutment, such as the piston of a steam-engine. My engine has neither piston nor eccentrics, nor is there one grain of pressure exerted in the engine, whatever may be the size or capacity of it.

"My system, in every part and detail, both in the developing of my power and in every branch of its utilization, is based and founded on sympathetic vibration. In no other way would it be possible to awaken or develop my force, and equally impossible would it be to operate my engine upon any other principle. . . . . . .This, however, is the true system; and henceforth all my operations will be conducted in this manner -- that is to say, my power will be generated, my engines run, my cannon operated, through a wire.

"It has been only after years of incessant labour, and the making of almost innumerable experiments, involving not only the construction of a great many most peculiar mechanical structures, and the closest investigation and study of the phenomenal properties of the substance 'ether,' per se, produced, that I have been able to dispense with complicated mechanism, and to obtain, as I claim, mastery over the subtle and strange force with which I am dealing."

The passages underlined by us, are those which bear directly on the occult side of the application of the vibratory force, or what Mr. Keely calls "sympathetic vibration." The "wire" is already a step below, or downward from the pure etheric plane into the terrestrial. The discoverer has produced marvels -- the word "miracle" is not too strong -- when acting through the inter-etheric Force alone, the fifth and sixth principles of Akasa. From a "generator" six feet long, he has come down to one "no larger than an old-fashioned silver watch;" and this by itself is a miracle of mechanical (but not spiritual) genius. But, as well expressed by his great patroness and defender, Mrs. Bloomfield-Moore, "the two forms of force which he has been experimenting with, and the phenomena attending them, are the very antithesis of each other." One was generated and acted upon by and

[[H. P. Blavatsky, Vol. 1, Page]] 562 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.

through himself. No one, who should have repeated the thing done by himself, could have produced the same results. It was "Keely's ether" that acted truly, while "Smith's or Brown's" ether would have remained for ever barren of results. For Keely's difficulty has hitherto been to produce a machine which would develop and regulate the "force" without the intervention of any "will power" or personal influence, whether conscious or unconscious of the operator. In this he has failed, so far as others were concerned, for no one but himself could operate on his "machines." Occultly this was a far more advanced achievement than the "success" which he anticipates from his "wire," but the results obtained from the fifth and sixth planes of the etheric (or Astral) Force, will never be permitted to serve for purposes of commerce and traffic. That Keely's organism is directly connected with the production of the marvellous results is proven by the following statement emanating from one who knows the great discoverer intimately.

At one time the shareholders of the "Keely Motor Co." put a man in his workshop for the express purpose of discovering his secret. After six months of close watching, he said to J. W. Keely one day: "I know how it is done, now." They had been setting up a machine together, and Keely was manipulating the stop-cock which turned the force on and off. "Try it, then," was the answer. The man turned the cock, and nothing came. "Let me see you do it again," the man said to Keely. The latter complied, and the machinery operated at once. Again the other tried, but without success. Then Keely put his hand on his shoulder and told him to try once more. He did so, with the result of an instantaneous production of the current. This fact, if true, settles the question.

We are told that Mr. Keely defines electricity "as a certain form of atomic vibration." In this he is quite right; but this is electricity on the terrestrial plane, and through terrestrial correlations. He estimates --

Molecular vibrations at 100,000,000 per second.
Inter-molecular vibrations at 300,000,000 per second
Atomic vibrations at 900,000,000 per second
Inter-atomic vibrations at 2,700,000,000 per second
AEtheric vibrations at 8,100,000,000 pper second
Inter-AEtheric vibrations at 24,300,000,000 per second

This proves our point. There are no vibrations that could be counted or even estimated at an approximate rate beyond "the realm of the fourth son of Fohat," using an occult phraseology, or that motion which corresponds to the formation of Mr. Crookes' radiant matter, or lightly called some years ago the "fourth state of matter" -- on this our plane.

[[H. P. Blavatsky, Vol. 1, Page]] 563 A PREMATURE DISCOVERY.

If the question is asked why Mr. Keely was not allowed to pass a certain limit, the answer is easy; because that which he has unconsciously discovered, is the terrible sidereal Force, known to, and named by the Atlanteans MASH-MAK, and by the Aryan Rishis in their Ashtar Vidya by a name that we do not like to give. It is the vril of Bulwer Lytton's "Coming Race," and of the coming races of our mankind. The name vril may be a fiction; the Force itself is a fact doubted as little in India as the existence itself of their Rishis, since it is mentioned in all the secret works.

It is this vibratory Force, which, when aimed at an army from an Agni Rath fixed on a flying vessel, a balloon, according to the instructions found in Ashtar Vidya, reduced to ashes 100,000 men and elephants, as easily as it would a dead rat. It is allegorised in the Vishnu Purana, in the Ramayana and other works, in the fable about the sage Kapila whose glance made a mountain of ashes of King Sagara's 60,000 sons, and which is explained in the esoteric works, and referred to as the Kapilaksha -- "Kapila's Eye."

And is it this Satanic Force that our generations were to be allowed to add to their stock of Anarchist's baby-toys, known as melenite, dynamite clock-works, explosive oranges, "flower baskets," and such other innocent names? Is it this destructive agency, which, once in the hands of some modern Attila, e.g., a blood-thirsty anarchist, would reduce Europe in a few days to its primitive chaotic state with no man left alive to tell the tale -- is this force to become the common property of all men alike?

What Mr. Keely has already done is grand and wonderful in the extreme; there is enough work before him in the demonstration of his new system to "humble the pride of those scientists who are materialistic, by revealing those mysteries which lie behind the world of matter," without revealing it nolens volens to all. For surely Psychists and Spiritualists -- of whom there are a good number in the European armies -- would be the first to experience personally the fruits of such mysteries revealed. Thousands of them would find themselves (and perhaps with the populations of whole countries to keep them company) in blue Ether very soon, were such a Force to be even entirely discovered, let alone made publicly known. The discovery in its completeness is by several thousand -- or shall we say hundred thousand? -- years too premature. It will be at its appointed place and time only when the great roaring flood of starvation, misery, and underpaid labour ebbs back again -- as it will when happily at last the just demands of the many are attended to; when the proletariat exists but in name, and the pitiful cry for bread, that rings throughout the world unheeded, has died away. This may be hastened by the spread of learning,

[[H. P. Blavatsky, Vol. 1, Page]] 564 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.

and by new openings for work and emigration, with better prospects than exist now, and on some new continent that may appear. Then only will "Keely's Motor and Force," as originally contemplated by himself and friends, be in demand, because it will be more needed by the poor than by the wealthy.

Meanwhile the force discovered by him will work through wires, and this, if he succeeds, will be quite sufficient in the present generation to make of him the greatest discoverer of this age.

What Mr. Keely says of Sound and Colour is also correct from the Occult stand-point. Hear him talk as though he were the nursling of the "Gods-revealers," and had gazed all his life into the depths of Father-Mother AEther.

In comparing the tenuity of the atmosphere with that of the etheric flows, obtained by him from his invention for breaking up the molecules of air by vibration, Keely says that: --

. . . "It is as platina to hydrogen gas. Molecular separation of air brings us to the first sub-division only; inter-molecular, to the second; atomic, to the third; inter-atomic, to the fourth; etheric, to the fifth; and inter-etheric, to the sixth sub-division, or positive association with luminiferous ether.* In my introductory argument I have contended that this is the vibratory envelope of all atoms. In my definition of atom I do not confine myself to the sixth sub-division where this luminiferous ether is developed in its crude form as far as my researches prove.** I think this idea will be pronounced by the physicists of the present day, a wild freak of the imagination. Possibly, in time, a light may fall upon this theory that will bring its simplicity forward for scientific research. At present I can only compare it to some planet in a dark space, where the light of the sun of science has not yet reached it. . ."

"I assume that sound, like odour, is a real substance of unknown and wonderful tenuity, emanating from a body where it has been induced by percussion and throwing out absolute corpuscles of matter, inter-atomic particles, with velocity of 1,120 feet per second; in vacuo 20,000. The substance which is thus disseminated is a part and parcel of the mass agitated, and, if kept under this agitation continuously, would, in the course of a certain cycle of time, become thoroughly absorbed by the atmosphere; or, more truly, would pass through the atmosphere to an elevated point of tenuity corresponding to the condition of sub-division that governs its liberation from its parent body." . . .

"The sounds from vibratory forks, set so as to produce etheric chords, while disseminating their tones (compound), permeate most thoroughly all substances that come under the range of their atomic bombardment. The clapping of a bell in vacuo liberates these atoms with the same velocity and volume as one in the open air; and were the agitation of the bell kept up continuously for a few millions of centuries it would

[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------

* This also is the division, made by the Occultists, under other names.

** Quite so, since there is the seventh beyond, which begins the same enumeration, from the first to the last, on another and higher plane.

[[H. P. Blavatsky, Vol. 1, Page]] 565 THE SECRETS OF SOUND AND ODOUR.

thoroughly return to its primitive element; and, if the chamber were hermetically sealed, and strong enough, the vacuous volume surrounding the bell would be brought to a pressure of many thousands of pounds to the square inch, by the tenuous substance evolved. In my estimation, sound truly defined is the disturbance of atomic equilibrium, rupturing actual atomic corpuscles; and the substance thus liberated must certainly be a certain order of etheric flow. Under these conditions, is it unreasonable to suppose that, if this flow were kept up, and the body thus robbed of its element, it would in time disappear entirely? All bodies are formed primitively from this highly tenuous ether, animal, vegetable, and mineral, and they are only returned to their high gaseous condition when brought under a state of differential equilibrium." . . .

"As regards odour, we can only get some definite idea of its extreme and wondrous tenuity by taking into consideration that a large area of atmosphere can be impregnated for a long series of years from a single grain of musk; which, if weighed after that long interval, will be found to be not appreciably diminished. The great paradox attending the flow of odorous particles is that they can be held under confinement in a glass vessel! Here is a substance of much higher tenuity than the glass that holds it, and yet it cannot escape. It is as a sieve with its meshes large enough to pass marbles, and yet holding fine sand which cannot pass through; in fact, a molecular vessel holding an atomic substance. This is a problem that would confound those who stop to recognize it. But infinitely tenuous as odour is, it holds a very crude relation to the substance of sub-division that governs a magnetic flow (a flow of sympathy, if you please to call it so). This sub-division comes next to sound, but is above sound. The action of the flow of a magnet coincides somewhat to the receiving and distributing portion of the human brain, giving off at all times a depreciating ratio of the amount received. It is a grand illustration of the control of mind over matter, which gradually depreciates the physical till dissolution takes place. The magnet on the same ratio gradually loses its power and becomes inert. If the relations that exist between mind and matter could be equated and so held, we would live on in our physical state eternally, as there would be no physical depreciation. But this physical depreciation leads, at its terminus, to the source of a much higher development -- viz., the liberation of the pure ether from the crude molecular; which, in my estimation, is to be much desired." -- (From Mrs. Bloomfield-Moore's paper, "The New Philosophy.")

It may be remarked that, save a few small divergencies, no Adept nor Alchemist could have explained the above any better, in the light of modern Science, however much the latter may protest against the novel views. This is, in all its fundamental principles, if not details, Occultism pure and simple, yet withal, modern natural philosophy as well.

This "New Force," or whatever Science may call it, the effects of which are undeniable -- admitted by more than one naturalist and physicist who has visited Mr. Keely's laboratory and witnessed personally its tremendous effects -- what is it? Is it a "mode of motion," also, "in Vacuo," since there is no matter to generate it except Sound -- another "mode of motion," no doubt, a sensation caused like

[[H. P. Blavatsky, Vol. 1, Page]] 566 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.

colour by vibrations? Fully as we believe in these vibrations as the proximate -- the immediate -- cause of such sensations, we as absolutely reject the one-sided scientific theory that there is no factor to be considered as external to us, other than etheric or atmospheric vibrations.*

There is a transcendental set of causes put in motion -- so to speak -- in the occurrence of these phenomena, which, not being in relation to our narrow range of cognition, can only be traced to their source and their nature, and understood by the Spiritual faculties of the Adept. They are, as Asclepios puts it to the King, "incorporeal corporealities" -- such as "appear in the mirror," and "abstract forms" that we see, hear, and smell, in our dreams, and visions. What have the "modes of motion," light, and ether to do with these? Yet we see, hear, and smell, and touch them, ergo they are as much realities to us in our dreams, as any other thing on this plane of Maya.

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* In this case the American "Substantialists" are not wrong (though too anthropomorphic and material in their views to be accepted by the Occultists) when arguing through Mrs. M. S. Organ, M.D., that "there must be positive entitative properties in objects which have a constitutional relation to the nerves of animal sensations, or there can be no perception. No impression of any kind can be made upon brain, nerve, or mind -- no stimulus to action -- unless there is an actual and direct communication of a substantial force." ("Substantial" as far as it appears in the usual sense of the word in this universe of illusion and MAYA, of course; not so in reality.) "That force may be the most refined and sublimated immaterial Entity (?). Yet it must exist; for no sense, element, or faculty of the human being can have a perception, or be stimulated into action, without some substantial force coming in contact with it. This is the fundamental law pervading the whole organic and mental world. In the true philosophical sense there is no such thing as independent action: for every force or substance is correlated to some other force or substance. We can with just as much truth and reason assert that no substance possesses any inherent gustatory property or any olfactory property -- that taste and odour are simply sensations caused by vibrations; and hence mere illusions of animal perceptions. . . ."

from The Secret Doctrine, by H. P. Blavatsky

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