CHAPTERXXIVSOLAR INFLUENCE
The Sun as the centre of the universe is the gravitational focus of all the forces of the cosmos. It stands to us as the symbol of Deity, or of that Logos which is the manifestation to us of the Inscrutable and Omnipresent. So far as we are concerned it is the source of Light and Heat to the world, and these two properties are the ultimate expressions of the Wisdom and Love of the Creator. When we speak of light and heat we mean those forces which, when they impinge on the Earth’s atmosphere and are sensed by us, produce the sensations of light and heat. The Sun is thus rather the source of the cause of heat and light than of heat and light themselves. It is we who are the interpreters. Even so is it with regard to the Divine principles of Wisdom and Love. These in expression are manifest as Truth and Charity, as Knowledge and Affection, as Thought and Feeling, as Speech and Action. This gives us the following gradient of differentiation—
Thus we see how through the various planes of life the Divine principles filtrate, as do the forces we know as Light and Heat through the various ethers, until they manifest in our physical life. For the Spirit of Truth is the manifestation of the Hidden Wisdom of the Father, and its Bride is the Spirit of Charity. Manifesting in the human they are seen as Knowledge and Affection on the Intellectual plane, and on the Psychic or emotional plane as Thought and Feeling, these being derived from the former, and ultimately finding expression as Speech and Action. Thus all the life of man is linked up with the Divine, as all the universe is with its cosmic centre the Sun.
The Sun shines upon all and illumines all when there are no clouds of doubt interposing themselves between us and the open canopy of heaven. These clouds arise by evaporation from the ferment of the lower nature.
As the cosmic centre, the Sun represents the Heart or seat of vitality in the Microcosm. Astrologically it has its seat in the sign Leo which corresponds with the Cardiac zone, including the heart and solar plexus. It is thus related to the vital principle in man. Its position and aspects in a horoscope will determine the stability of the Constitution and hence the natural duration of life. Its sign, position and aspects in the world are the chief cause of the variations of season and the nature of the weather. These season changes are, of course, related to the climate in different zones. The effects that are due in the British Isles to solar aspects with the variousplanets have already been scheduled. Saturn and Uranus are found to be magnetic and cold producing, while Jupiter and Mars are electric and heat producing. Venus acts to produce condensation resulting in drizzle or fine rain. Mercury brings fresh winds; Neptune fine weather. Saturn in the same way brings northerly and easterly winds, Venus westerly winds, Jupiter south-westerly and Mars south-easterly winds. Uranus brings winds from the north-west, and generally frequent showers with intermittent spells of sunshine.
Thus we may set the compass as follows—
Figure 27.Figure 27.
Figure 27.
Figure 27.
These observations apply only to the British Isles, and more particularly to England, where the observations were made. Everybody will recollect that the Coronation Day of King GeorgeVwas a wet day. At that time the Sun was in semisquare aspect to both Venus and Saturn. Those resident in England will also recall the exceptionally hot days during the end of July and the beginning of August.The Sun was then passing from the quartile of Jupiter to the quartile of Mars, both heat-producing planets. The positions are necessarily geocentric, as we are considering the effects of the planetary modifications of solar energy so far as this Earth is concerned.
In just similar manner as the solar conditions act upon the Earth so they act upon the physical constitution of man. For if at his birth the Sun is affected by the rays of negative planets there will be less vitality and force, while positive heat-producing planets, such as Jupiter and Mars, will give great vitality, strong muscular development, a great fund of energy and a sound constitution.
The Sun represents the organic constitution in the same way that the Moon represents the functional powers. Hence it is that the Sun, when afflicted by malefic aspects of the planets at a birth, gives warning of organic disorders of an inherent or hereditary nature, while the Moon similarly afflicted denotes functional disorders of an acquired nature. For many reasons we may regard man as in the same relations with his cosmic environment as is the Earth itself. Compounded as he is of cosmic elements, he responds at all points to changes that are continually taking place in the system. But he does so in terms of his radical constitution or root nature, which, of course, varies as the individual concerned. For all sidereal and planetary forces, while possessing their respective properties and expressing their own several natures, are differently received and transmuted according to the constitutionof the recipient body. Hence the planets only affect us in terms of ourselves. The same white solar ray falling upon an emerald and a ruby will be differently reflected by each of them, appearing as green in the one case and red in the other. So it is with men. They each reflect the Wisdom and Love of the Universal Being in a variety of forms of knowledge and affection, expressed in speech and action, which is the common life. This fact should save us all from the error of bigotry and dogmatism. It is only the Diamond Heart that can reflect the pure ray of the Divine. It is comforting to know that the diamond is the mature carbo-hydrate. Given the conditions and the time, the soul that is as black as coal can become, by evolutional processes, as clear and pellucid as the diamond. We begin as fragments of gross earth and end as suns in the galaxy of heaven.
It is customary for astrologers to refer to the various planets as good, evil and neutral. Thus Saturn, Uranus and Mars are regarded as malefic, while Jupiter and Venus are called Benefics. This is not the truth, however convenient it may be to retain these ascriptions for purposes of delineation. Every planet has two aspects, and these aspects are referred to the higher and lower natures of our being. Mars, for instance, is merely Energy, the focussed or specialized vitality of the Sun. It answers to the red ray. Operating in a person of low mental and moral calibre, it will produce a Free-thinker, a Firebrand and Anarchist, and a man of violence and lawlessness. The same planet, when expressingitself through a highly evolved nature, will manifest as zeal, fervour, intensity, enthusiasm, enterprise, ambition and moral courage. Venus in the same way may indicate self-indulgence, idleness, pleasure-seeking, vanity, frailty and licence in a person of low nature, while in one of greater moral fibre and higher standard of life, the same planet will manifest as gentleness, kindness, charity, pure affection, orderliness and refinement. There is a whole cycle of evolution between the sordid, money-grubbing propensities of “the man with the muck-rake” and the provident carefulness and circumspection of the man who is under the influence of the higher Saturnine ray. It is all a question of personal colouring. It is not that the planets rule us and compel us to be that which we are, but that we transmute and corrupt the natures of the planets and abuse the energies and powers which they confer on us. We can never hope to be lords of the Universe, but we can be rulers of ourselves. Self-government is at the root of the matter. We attain to it through experience and suffering. It is not born with any man, but there are those among us who remember their lessons well and speedily get themselves into touch with their environment, and their faculties and powers under control. It is not altogether a truth that “The wise man rules his stars and the fool obeys them.” It is rather the fact that the wise man ruleshimself, all else the stars compel. True, a number of oppositions and squares in a horoscope of birth will certainly give a man a full share of experience, but the uses ofadversity are sweet. Evolution does not wholly consist in getting all we can out of life, but also of reading into it as much as we can. We all know how much we are affected by our environment. Our business is to find out how much our environment can be affected by us. And by environment we have to include that which presses us most nearly in the form of our own personality. To get this under our control is very largely to annihilate the adverse aspects of the planets.
All this is possible, because all planetary influences are modes of the One life, and that which animates the physical body is the solar ray, while that which animates the mind of man is the Spiritual Sun.
Life has no qualities of its own, it gets them by use or function. The same energy that is expended in rioting and bloodshed could as readily be used for purposes of constructive enterprise. Extravagance is only a morbid generosity, a philanthropy gone astray. The Sun that shines alike on the just and the unjust cannot be credited with all the abuses to which we submit our vital powers. Why, then, should we ascribe to the planets all those evil influences which in truth have no existence except in ourselves, who are both receivers and transmitters of their influence? This truth has been finally stated by the great Interpreter, who said: The good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is good, and the evil man out of his evil treasure brings forth that which is evil.
So far as their cosmic functions are concernedthe planets are organic interpreters, the Sun being the source of Vitality or Life. The Sun, therefore, holds chief place in the consideration of astrologers and is the foundation principle of the horoscope, all calculations and all measures of time having regard to the Sun’s position and to its postnatal motion.
No wonder that the ancients gave to the Sun a place in Cosmic Symbolism which embraced a whole mythology and gave rise to the use of its symbol in all religious services, seeing that it is the source of all physical life and illumination. The ancient Aryans and the Persians regarded it as the physical presentation of the Supreme Being, and even at this day it is retained as a divine symbol in the ordinances of the Catholic Church. Some idea of the divine attributes ascribed to the Day-star may be gathered from the Vedic Hymns, one of which I have endeavoured to represent in the following lines—
Invocation to the Vernal Sun.O quickening Fount of life,Sun-soul supernal;Impenetrating streamOf light, whose every beamInstinctive is and rifeWith Love eternal:Lord of the Stars and Skies,King of the Earth and Sea,List while our anthems riseIn praise of Thee!Greatest of all great gods in all seven spheres,Regent of Space and Lord of countless years,Who first did spring from out eternal night,Piercing its ebon veil with thy swift light;Thou who didst live when Time was yet unborn,The spirit, soul and substance of primeval morn,That roused the gods from out their lengthen’d sleep,What time thy Spirit self had brooded o’er the deep:Then, from thy heart, ethereal, unalloyed,The seven great worlds sevenfold refulgent sprang,The gods did shout, the heavens were overjoyed,And all the stars of heaven together sang!Thy living beams, infilling all the scene,Burned in each orb and knit the space betweenTo ether vault and circumambient air,That breathed thy life and shed it everywhere;Whose power, pervading all, attracts, unites,Binds with a lasting link, sustains, enhances,And adds to all a beauty that invitesThe liquid light of thy love-lingering glances!Come! glorious Power! and from thy golden tressesShake down on us the blossoms of the Spring;Lo! how the earth responds to thy caresses,And how in praise of thee the wild birds sing!Look down on us from thy so lofty sphere,Wrap and enfold us in thine ardent rays:Yea, glorious God, we hail thy presence here,Soul of the Sun, we yield thee thanks and praise!Lord of the Stars and Skies,King of the Earth and Sea,List while our anthems rise,In praise of Thee!
Invocation to the Vernal Sun.O quickening Fount of life,Sun-soul supernal;Impenetrating streamOf light, whose every beamInstinctive is and rifeWith Love eternal:Lord of the Stars and Skies,King of the Earth and Sea,List while our anthems riseIn praise of Thee!Greatest of all great gods in all seven spheres,Regent of Space and Lord of countless years,Who first did spring from out eternal night,Piercing its ebon veil with thy swift light;Thou who didst live when Time was yet unborn,The spirit, soul and substance of primeval morn,That roused the gods from out their lengthen’d sleep,What time thy Spirit self had brooded o’er the deep:Then, from thy heart, ethereal, unalloyed,The seven great worlds sevenfold refulgent sprang,The gods did shout, the heavens were overjoyed,And all the stars of heaven together sang!Thy living beams, infilling all the scene,Burned in each orb and knit the space betweenTo ether vault and circumambient air,That breathed thy life and shed it everywhere;Whose power, pervading all, attracts, unites,Binds with a lasting link, sustains, enhances,And adds to all a beauty that invitesThe liquid light of thy love-lingering glances!Come! glorious Power! and from thy golden tressesShake down on us the blossoms of the Spring;Lo! how the earth responds to thy caresses,And how in praise of thee the wild birds sing!Look down on us from thy so lofty sphere,Wrap and enfold us in thine ardent rays:Yea, glorious God, we hail thy presence here,Soul of the Sun, we yield thee thanks and praise!Lord of the Stars and Skies,King of the Earth and Sea,List while our anthems rise,In praise of Thee!
Invocation to the Vernal Sun.
Invocation to the Vernal Sun.
O quickening Fount of life,Sun-soul supernal;Impenetrating streamOf light, whose every beamInstinctive is and rifeWith Love eternal:Lord of the Stars and Skies,King of the Earth and Sea,List while our anthems riseIn praise of Thee!Greatest of all great gods in all seven spheres,Regent of Space and Lord of countless years,Who first did spring from out eternal night,Piercing its ebon veil with thy swift light;Thou who didst live when Time was yet unborn,The spirit, soul and substance of primeval morn,That roused the gods from out their lengthen’d sleep,What time thy Spirit self had brooded o’er the deep:Then, from thy heart, ethereal, unalloyed,The seven great worlds sevenfold refulgent sprang,The gods did shout, the heavens were overjoyed,And all the stars of heaven together sang!Thy living beams, infilling all the scene,Burned in each orb and knit the space betweenTo ether vault and circumambient air,That breathed thy life and shed it everywhere;Whose power, pervading all, attracts, unites,Binds with a lasting link, sustains, enhances,And adds to all a beauty that invitesThe liquid light of thy love-lingering glances!Come! glorious Power! and from thy golden tressesShake down on us the blossoms of the Spring;Lo! how the earth responds to thy caresses,And how in praise of thee the wild birds sing!Look down on us from thy so lofty sphere,Wrap and enfold us in thine ardent rays:Yea, glorious God, we hail thy presence here,Soul of the Sun, we yield thee thanks and praise!Lord of the Stars and Skies,King of the Earth and Sea,List while our anthems rise,In praise of Thee!
O quickening Fount of life,
Sun-soul supernal;
Impenetrating stream
Of light, whose every beam
Instinctive is and rife
With Love eternal:
Lord of the Stars and Skies,
King of the Earth and Sea,
List while our anthems rise
In praise of Thee!
Greatest of all great gods in all seven spheres,
Regent of Space and Lord of countless years,
Who first did spring from out eternal night,
Piercing its ebon veil with thy swift light;
Thou who didst live when Time was yet unborn,
The spirit, soul and substance of primeval morn,
That roused the gods from out their lengthen’d sleep,
What time thy Spirit self had brooded o’er the deep:
Then, from thy heart, ethereal, unalloyed,
The seven great worlds sevenfold refulgent sprang,
The gods did shout, the heavens were overjoyed,
And all the stars of heaven together sang!
Thy living beams, infilling all the scene,
Burned in each orb and knit the space between
To ether vault and circumambient air,
That breathed thy life and shed it everywhere;
Whose power, pervading all, attracts, unites,
Binds with a lasting link, sustains, enhances,
And adds to all a beauty that invites
The liquid light of thy love-lingering glances!
Come! glorious Power! and from thy golden tresses
Shake down on us the blossoms of the Spring;
Lo! how the earth responds to thy caresses,
And how in praise of thee the wild birds sing!
Look down on us from thy so lofty sphere,
Wrap and enfold us in thine ardent rays:
Yea, glorious God, we hail thy presence here,
Soul of the Sun, we yield thee thanks and praise!
Lord of the Stars and Skies,
King of the Earth and Sea,
List while our anthems rise,
In praise of Thee!
The Sun and Moon are universally regarded as the symbols of the Male-female unity of Nature. The Sun is the father, the Moon the mother, of all mundane events. Astrologers refer these orbs to the organs of sight, giving the Sun dominion over the right eye and the Moon over the left. When the Sun and Moon are afflicted, especially in certain parts of the zodiac, they indicate blindness or defective vision. It has been stated by Dr. Fearon that there is an affinity between the right eye and the male line of heredity, and between the left eye and the female line, and that defects inherited from one line or the other are incidental to the correspondingorgan. That there is a great connection with the state of the eye and the general health is a proved fact of which medical men frequently avail themselves in their diagnosis. We have already considered the Sun and Moon as the luminaries of the day and night, and we find this idea associated with the visual power in theSayings of Jesus: “If thine eye be good thy whole body shall be full of light, but if thine eye be evil thy whole body shall be full of darkness.” In effect we find that when the iris of the eye is firm and clear and of a single unbroken colour, the health is good. But when it is split up and discoloured by green streaks the health is imperfect, while red spots in the iris, giving a patchy appearance, are a sure sign of some organic disease, and most likely of a growth. It is only when we come to admit the psychic origin of disease that we can fully apprehend the value of the Scripture statement. It is an inductive argument which regards the eye as the index of the general health of the body, itself standing as a symbol of intelligence. Conformity with the spiritual law of being would undoubtedly result in perfect integrity of soul and body. The natural has no life apart from the spiritual. The basis of all things is Spirit, and matter as we know it is its ultimate expression. The Sun, which is the most active form of matter, is thus the concrete symbol of Spirit. Among all symbolical forms of worship, that of the Sun-worshippers is the most rational. Human science may avail much to institute artificial conditions of life, but it will never succeed in dethroning the Sun.