Chapter 41

Additional Fragments From A Commentary On The Verses Of Stanza XII.The MS. from which these additional explanations are taken belongs to the group calledTongshaktchi Sangye Songa, or the“Records of the Thirty-five Buddhas of Confession,”as they areexotericallycalled. These personages, however, though called in the Northern Buddhist religion Buddhas, may just as well be called Rishis, Avatâras, etc., as they are“Buddhas who have preceded Shâkyamuni”only for the Northern followers of the ethics preached by Gautama. These great Mahâtmâs, or Buddhas, are a universal and common property; they arehistoricalSages—at any rate for all the Occultists who believe in such a Hierarchy of Sages, and who have had its existence proved to them by the learned ones of the Fraternity. They are chosen from among some ninety-seven Buddhas in one group, and fifty-three in another,989mostly imaginary personages, who are really the personifications of the powers of the first-named.990These“Baskets”of the oldest writings on“palm leaves”are kept very secret. Each MS. has appended to it a short synopsis of the history of that sub-race to which the particular Buddha-Lha belonged. The one special MS. from which the fragments which follow have been extracted, and then rendered into more comprehensible language, is said to have been copied from stone tablets which belonged to a Buddha of the earliest days of the[pg 442]Fifth Race, who had witnessed the Deluge and the submersion of the chief continents of the Atlantean Race. The day when much, if not all, of that which is given here from the Archaic Records, will be found correct, is not far distant. Then the modern Symbologists will acquire the certitude that even Odin, or the God Woden, the highest God in the German and Scandinavian mythology, is one of these thirty-five Buddhas; one of the earliest, indeed, for the Continent to which he and his Race belonged is also one of the earliest—so early, in truth, that in those days tropical nature was to be found, where now lie eternal unthawing snows, and one could cross almost by dry land from NorwayviâIceland and Greenland, to the lands that at present surround Hudson's Bay.991In similar fashion, in the palmy days of the Atlantean Giants, the sons of the“Giants from the East,”a pilgrim could perform a journey from what in our days is termed the Sahara Desert, to the lands which now rest in dreamless sleep at the bottom of the waters of the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea. Events which were never written outside the human memory, but which were religiously transmitted from one generation to another, and from race to race, may have been preserved by constant transmission“within the book volume of the brain,”and through countless æons, with more truth and accuracy than inside any written document or record.“That which is part of our souls is eternal,”says Thackeray; and what can be nearer to our Souls than that which happens at the dawn of our lives? Those lives are countless, but the Soul or Spirit that animates us throughout these myriads of existences is the same; and though“the book volume”of thephysical brainmay forget events within the scope of one terrestrial life, the bulk of collective recollections can never desert the Divine Soul within us. Its whispers may be too soft, the sound of its words too far off the plane perceived by our physical senses; yet the shadow of eventsthat were, just as much as the shadow of the eventsthat are to come, is within its perceptive powers, and is ever present before its mind's eye.[pg 443]It is this Soul-voice, perhaps, which tells those who believe in tradition more than in written history, that what is said below is all true, and relates to pre-historic facts.This is what is written in one passage:The Kings of Light have departed in wrath. The sins of men have become so black that Earth quivers in her great agony.... The Azure Seats remain empty. Who of the Brown, who of the Red, or yet among the Black [Races], can sit in the Seats of the Blessed, the Seats of Knowledge and Mercy? Who can assume the Flower of Power, the Plant of the Golden Stem and the Azure Blossom?The“Kings of Light”is the name given in all old records to the Sovereigns of the Divine Dynasties. The“Azure Seats”are translated“Celestial Thrones”in certain documents. The“Flower of Power”is now the Lotus; what it may have been at that period, who can tell?The writer proceeds, like the later Jeremiah, to bewail the fate of his people. They had become bereft of their“Azure”(Celestial) Kings, and“they of the deva-hue,”the moon-like complexion, and“they of the refulgent (golden) face”have gone“to the Land of Bliss, the Land of Fire and Metal”—or, agreeably with the rules of symbolism, to the lands lying North and East, from whence“the Great Waters have been swept away, sucked in by the Earth and dissipated in the Air.”The wise races had perceived“the black Storm-dragons, called down by the Dragons of Wisdom”—and“had fled, led on by the shining Protectors of the most Excellent Land”—the great ancient Adepts, presumably; those the Hindûs refer to as their Manus and Rishis. One of them was Vaivasvata Manu.They“of the yellow hue”are the forefathers of those whom Ethnology now classes as the Turanians, the Mongols, Chinese and other ancient nations; and the land they fled to was no other than Central Asia. There, entirely new races were born; there, they lived and died until the separation of the nations. But this“separation”did not take place either in the localities assigned for it by Modern Science, nor in the way the Âryans are shown to have divided and separated by Prof. Max Müller and other Âryanists. Nearly two-thirds of one million years have elapsed since that period. The yellow-faced giants of the Post-Atlantean day had ample time, through this forced confinement to one part of the world, with the same racial blood and without any fresh infusion or admixture in it, during a period of nearly 700,000 years, to branch off into the most heterogeneous and diversified[pg 444]types. The same is shown in Africa; nowhere does a more extraordinary variability of types exist, from black to almost white, from gigantic men to dwarfish races; and this only because of their forced isolation. The Africans have not left their continent for several hundred thousands of years. If to-morrow the continent of Europe were to disappear and other lands to reëmerge instead, and if the African tribes were to separate and scatter on the face of the Earth, it is they who, in about a hundred thousand years hence, would form the bulk of the civilized nations. And it is the descendants of those of our highly cultured nations, who might have survived on some one island, without any means of crossing the new seas, that would fall back into a state of relative savagery. Thus the reason given for dividing humanity intosuperiorandinferiorraces falls to the ground and becomes a fallacy.Such are the facts given in the Archaic Records. Collating and comparing them with some modern theories of evolution,minusNatural Selection,992these statements appear quite reasonable and logical. Thus, while the Âryans are the descendants of theyellowAdam, the gigantic and highly civilized Atlanto-Âryan race, the Semites—and the Jews along with them—are those of theredAdam, and thus both De Quatrefages and the writers of the MosaicGenesisare right. For, could chapter v of the First Book of Moses be compared with the genealogies found in our Archaic Bible, the period from Adam unto Noah would be found noticed therein, though of course under different names, the respective years of the Patriarchs being turned into periods, and the whole being symbolical and allegorical. In the MS. under consideration many and frequent are the references to the great knowledge and civilization of the Atlantean nations, showing the polity of several of them and the nature of their arts and sciences. If the Third Root-Race, the Lemuro-Atlanteans, are already spoken of as having been drowned“with their high civilizations and Gods,”993how much more may the same be said of the Atlanteans!It is from the Fourth Race that the early Âryans got their knowledge of“the bundle of wonderful things,”the Sabhâ and Mâyâsabhâ, mentioned in theMahâbhârata, the gift of Mâyâsura to the Pândavas. It is from them that they learnt æronautics, Vimâna Vidyâ, the“knowledge of flying in air-vehicles,”and, therefore, their great arts of Meteorography and Meteorology. It is from them, again, that the Âryans inherited their most valuable Science of the hidden virtues[pg 445]of precious and other stones, of Chemistry, or rather Alchemy, of Mineralogy, Geology, Physics and Astronomy.Several times the writer has put to herself the question: Is the story ofExodus—in its details at least—as narrated in theOld Testament, original? Or is it, like the story of Moses himself and many others, simply another version of the legends told of the Atlanteans? For who, upon hearing the story told of the latter, will fail to perceive the great similarity of the fundamental features? Remember the anger of“God”at the obduracy of Pharaoh, his command to the“chosen”ones to spoil the Egyptians, before departing, of their“jewels of silver and jewels of gold,”994and finally the Egyptians and their Pharaoh drowned in the Red Sea. Then read the following fragment of the earlier story from the Commentary:And the“Great King of the Dazzling Face”the chief of all the Yellow-faced, was sad, seeing the sins of the Black-faced.He sent his air-vehicles [Vimânas] to all his brother-chiefs [chiefs of other nations and tribes] with pious men within, saying:“Prepare. Arise, ye men of the Good Law, and cross the land while [yet] dry.“The Lords of the storm are approaching. Their chariots are nearing the land. One night and two days only shall the Lords of the Dark Face [the Sorcerers] live on this patient land. She is doomed, and they have to descend with her. The nether Lords of the Fires [the Gnomes and Fire Elementals] are preparing their magic Agnyastra [fire-weapons worked by Magic]. But the Lords of the Dark Eye [‘Evil Eye’] are stronger than they [the Elementals] and they are the slaves of the mighty ones. They are versed in Astra [Vidyâ, the highest magical knowledge].995Come and use yours[i.e.,your magic powers, in order to counteract those of the Sorcerers]. Let every Lord of the Dazzling Face [an Adept of the White Magic] cause the Vimâna of every Lord of the Dark Face to come into his hands [or possession], lest any [of the Sorcerers] should by its means escape from the waters, avoid the Rod of the Four [Karmic Deities], and save his wicked [followers, or people].“May every Yellow Face send sleep from himself to [mesmerize?] every Black Face. May even they [the Sorcerers] avoid pain and suffering. May[pg 446]every man true to the Solar Gods bind [paralyze] every man under the Lunar Gods, lest he should suffer or escape his destiny.“And may every Yellow Face offer of his life-water [blood] to the speaking animal of a Black Face, lest he awaken his master.996“The hour has struck, the black night is ready.“Let their destiny be accomplished. We are the servants of the Great Four.997May the Kings of Light return.”The great King fell upon his Dazzling Face and wept....When the Kings assembled, the waters had already moved....[But] the nations had now crossed the dry lands. They were beyond the water-mark. Their Kings reached them in their Vimânas, and led them on to the lands of Fire and Metal [East and North].Still, in another passage, it is said:Stars [meteors] showered on the lands of the Black Faces; but they slept.The speaking beasts [the magic watchers] kept quiet.The nether Lords waited for orders, but they came not, for their masters slept.The waters arose, and covered the valleys from one end of the Earth to the other. High lands remained, the bottom of the Earth [the lands of the antipodes] remained dry. There dwelt those who escaped; the men of the Yellow Faces and of the straight eye [the frank and sincere people].When the Lords of the Dark Faces awoke and bethought themselves of their Vimânas in order to escape from the rising waters, they found them gone.Then a passage shows some of the more powerful Magicians of the“Dark Faces,”who awoke earlier than the others, pursuing those who had“spoilt them”and who were in the rear-guard, for—“the nations that were led away were as thick as the stars of the milky way,”says a more modern Commentary, written in Sanskrit only.Like as a dragon-snake uncoils slowly its body, so the Sons of Men, led on by the Sons of Wisdom, opened their folds, and spreading out, expanded like a running stream of sweet waters ... many of the faint-hearted among them perished on their way. But most were saved.Yet the pursuers,“whose heads and chests soared high above the[pg 447]water,”chased them“for three lunar terms”until finally reached by the rising waves, they perished to the last man, the soil sinking under their feet and the Earth engulfing those who had desecrated her.This sounds a good deal like the original material upon which the similar story inExoduswas built many hundred thousands of years later. The biography of Moses, the story of his birth, childhood and rescue from the Nile by Pharaoh's daughter, is now shown to have been adapted from the Chaldæan narrative about Sargon. And if so, the Assyrian tiles in the British Museum being a good proof of it, why not that of the Jews robbing the Egyptians of their jewels, the death of Pharaoh and his army, and so on? The gigantic Magicians of Ruta and Daitya, the“Lords of the Dark Face,”may, in the later narrative, have become the Egyptian Magi, and the yellow-faced nations of the Fifth Race, the virtuous sons of Jacob, the“chosen people”! One more statement has to be made. There have been several Divine Dynasties—a series for every Root-Race beginning with the Third, each series according and adapted to its Humanity. The last seven Dynasties referred to in the Egyptian and Chaldæan records belonged to the Fifth Race, which, though generally called Âryan, was not entirely so, as it was ever largely mixed up with races to which Ethnology gives other names. It would be impossible, in view of the limited space at our disposal, to go any further into the description of the Atlanteans, in whom the whole East believes as much as we believe in the ancient Egyptians, but whose existence the majority of the Western Scientists deny, as they have denied, before this, many a truth, from the existence of Homer down to that of the carrier pigeon. The civilization of the Atlanteans was greater than even that of the Egyptians. It is their degenerate descendants, the nation of Plato's Atlantis, who built the first Pyramids in the country, and that certainty before the advent of the“Eastern Æthiopians,”as Herodotus calls the Egyptians. This may be well inferred from the statement made by Ammianus Marcellinus, who says of the Pyramids that:There are also subterranean passages and winding retreats, which, it is said, men skilful in the ancient mysteries, by means of which they divined the coming of a flood, constructed in different places lest the memory of all their sacred ceremonies should be lost.These men who“divined the coming of floods”were not Egyptians, who never had any, except the periodical rising of the Nile. Who were they? The last remnants of the Atlanteans, we maintain; those[pg 448]races which are dimly suspected by Science, and thinking of which Mr. Charles Gould, the well-known Geologist, says:Can we suppose that we have at all exhausted the great museum of nature? Have we, in fact, penetrated yet beyond its antechambers? Does the written history of man, comprising a few thousand years, embrace the whole course of his intelligent existence? or have we in the long mythical eras, extending over hundreds of thousands of years, and recorded in the chronologies of Chaldæa and of China, shadowy mementoes of pre-historic man, handed down by tradition, and perhaps transported by a few survivors to existing lands from others, which, like the fabled (?) Atlantis of Plato, may have been submerged, or the scene of some great catastrophe which destroyed them with all their civilization.998After this one can turn with more confidence to the words of a Master who wrote, several years before these words were penned by Mr. Gould:The Fourth Race had its periods of the highest civilization. Greek and Roman and even Egyptian civilizations are nothing compared to the civilizations that began with the Third Race [—after its separation].But if this civilization and the mastery of arts and sciences are denied to the Third and Fourth Races, no one will deny that between the great civilizations of antiquity, such as those of Egypt and India, there stretched the dark ages of crass ignorance and barbarism ever since the beginning of the Christian era up to our modern civilization, during which period all recollection of these traditions was lost. As said inIsis Unveiled:Why should we forget that, ages before the prows of the adventurous Genoese clove the Western waters, the Phœnician vessels had circumnavigated the Globe, and spread civilization in regions now silent and deserted? What Archæologist will dare assert that the same hand which planned the Pyramids of Egypt, Karnak, and the thousand ruins now crumbling to oblivion on the sandy banks of the Nile, didnoterect the monumental Nagkon-Wat of Cambodia; or trace the hieroglyphics on the obelisks and doors of the deserted Indian village, newly discovered in British Columbia by Lord Dufferin; or those on the ruins of Palenque and Uxmal, of Central America? Do not the relics we treasure in our museums—last mementoes of the long“lost arts”—speak loudly in favour of ancient civilization? And do they not prove, over and over again, that nations and continents that have passed away have buried along with them arts and sciences, which neither the first crucible ever heated in a mediæval cloister, nor the last cracked by a modern chemist, have revived, nor will—at least, in the present century.And the same question may be put now that was put then; it may be once more asked:How does it happen that the most advanced standpoint that has been reached in our times, only enables us to see in the dim distance up the Alpine path of knowledge[pg 449]the monumental proofs that earlier explorers have left to mark the plateaux they had reached and occupied?If modern masters are so much in advance of the old ones, why do they not restore to us the lost arts of our postdiluvian forefathers? Why do they not give us the unfading colours of Luxor—the Tyrian purple, the bright vermilion, and dazzling blue which decorate the walls of this place, and are as bright as on the first day of their application; the indestructible cement of the pyramids and of ancient aqueducts; the Damascus blade, which can be turned like a corkscrew in its scabbard without breaking; the gorgeous, unparalleled tints of the stained glass that is found amid the dust of old ruins and beams in the windows of ancient cathedrals; and the secret of the true malleable glass? And if Chemistry is so little able to rival even the early mediæval ages in some arts, why boast of achievements which, according to strong probability, were perfectly known thousands of years ago. The more Archæology and Philology advance, the more humiliating to our pride are the discoveries which are daily made, the more glorious testimony do they bear in behalf of those who, perhaps on account of the distance of their remote antiquity, have been until now considered ignorant flounderers in the deepest mire of superstition.Among other Arts and Sciences, the Ancients—ay, as an heirloom from the Atlanteans—had those of Astronomy and Symbolism, which included the knowledge of the Zodiac.As already explained, the whole of Antiquity believed, with good reason, that humanity and its races are all intimately connected with the Planets, and these with the Zodiacal Signs. The whole world's history is recorded in the latter. In the ancient temples of Egypt there is an example in the Dendera Zodiac; but except in an Arabic work, the property of a Sûfî, the writer has never met with a correct copy of these marvellous records of the past—and also of thefuture—history of our Globe. Yet the original records exist, most undeniably.As Europeans are unacquainted with the real Zodiacs of India, and those they do happen to know of they fail to understand, as witness Bentley, the reader is advised, in order to verify the statement, to turn to the work of Denon999in which the two famous Egyptian Zodiacs can be found and examined. Having seen them personally, the writer has no longer need to trust to what other students—who have examined and studied both very carefully—have to say of them. The assertion of the Egyptian Priests to Herodotus, that the terrestrial Pole and the Pole of the Ecliptic had formerly coincided, has been corroborated by Mackey, who states that the Poles are represented on the Zodiacs in both positions.[pg 450]And in that which shows the Poles [polar axes] at right angles, there are marks which show, that it was not the last time they were in that position;but the first[—after the Zodiacs had been traced]. Capricorn, is, therein, represented at the North Pole; and Cancer is divided, near its middle, at the South Pole; which is a confirmation that, originally they had their winter when the Sun was in Cancer. But the chief characteristics of its being a monument commemorating thefirst timethat the Pole had been in that position, are the Lion and the Virgin.1000Broadly calculated, it is believed by Egyptologists that the Great Pyramid was built 3,350b.c.;1001and that Menes and his Dynasty existed 750 years before the appearance of the Fourth Dynasty—during which the Pyramids aresupposedto have been built. Thus 4,100 yearsb.c.is the age assigned to Menes. Now Sir J. Gardner Wilkinson's declaration that all the facts lead to the conclusion that the Egyptians had already—Made very great progress in the arts of civilizationbefore the age of Menes, and perhaps before they immigrated into the valley of the Nile—1002is very suggestive, as destroying this hypothesis of the comparatively modern civilizing of Egypt. It points to a great civilization inpre-historictimes, and a still greater antiquity. The Schesoo-Hor, the“servants of Horus,”were the people who had settled in Egypt; and, as M. Maspéro affirms, it is to this“pre-historic race”that—Belongs the honour of having constituted Egypt, such as we know it, from the commencement of the historic period.And Staniland Wake adds:They founded the principal cities of Egypt, and established the most important sanctuaries.1003This wasbeforethe Great Pyramid epoch, and when Egypt had hardly arisen from the waters. Yet:They possessed the hieroglyphic form of writing special to the Egyptians, and must have been already considerably advanced in civilization.As says Lenormant:It was the country of the great pre-historic sanctuaries, seats of the sacerdotal dominion, which played the most important part in the origin of civilization.What is the date assigned to this people? We hear of 4,000, at the utmost of 5,000, yearsb.c.(Maspéro). Now it is claimed that it is by[pg 451]means of the Cycle of 25,868 years (the Sidereal Year) that the approximate year of the erection of the Great Pyramid can be ascertained.Assuming that the long narrow downward passage leading from the entrance was directed towards the pole-star of the pyramid builders, astronomers have shown that in the year 2,170b.c.the passage pointed to Alpha Draconis, the then pole-star.... Mr. Richard A. Proctor, the astronomer, after stating that the pole-star was in the required position about 3,350b.c., as well as in 2,170b.c., says:“either of these would correspond with the position of the descending passage in the Great Pyramid; but Egyptologists tell us there can absolutely be no doubt that the later epoch is far too late.”1004But we are also told that:This relative position of Alpha Draconis and Alcyone being an extraordinary one ... it could not occur again for a whole Sidereal Year.1005This demonstrates that, since the Dendera Zodiac shows the passage of three Sidereal Years, the Great Pyramid must have been built 78,000 years ago, or in any case that this possibility deserves to be accepted at least as readily as the later date of 3,350b.c.Now on the Zodiac of a certain temple in far Northern India, the same characteristics of the signs as on the Dendera Zodiac are found. Those who know the Hindû symbols and constellations well, will be able to find out from the description of the Egyptian, whether the indications of time are correct or not. On the Dendera Zodiac, as preserved by the modern Egyptian Coptic and Greek Adepts, and explained a little differently by Mackey, the Dion stands upon the Hydra and his tail is almost straight, pointing downwards at an angle of forty or fifty degrees, this position agreeing with theoriginalconformation of these constellations. But adds Mackey:In many places we see the Lion [Sinha], with his tail turned up over his back, and ending with a Serpent's head; thereby, shewing that the Lion had beeninverted: which, indeed, must have been the case with the whole Zodiac, and every other Constellation, when the Pole had been inverted.Speaking of thecircularZodiac, which is also given by Denon, he says:There ... the Lion is standingonthe Serpent, and his tail forming a curve downward, from which we find that,though six or seven hundred thousand yearsmust have passed between the two positions, yet they had made but little or no difference in the Constellations of Leo and the Hydra; while Virgo is represented very differently in the two—in the circular Zodiac, the Virgin isnursing her child: but it seems that they had not had that idea when the Pole was first within[pg 452]the plane of the Ecliptic; for inthisZodiac, as given by Denon, we see three Virgins between the Lion and the Scales, the last of which holds, in her hand, an ear of wheat. It is much to be lamented that, there is in this Zodiac a breach of the figures in the latter part of Leo and the beginning of Virgo, which has taken away oneDecanout of each sign.1006Nevertheless, the meaning is plain, as the three Zodiacs belong to three different epochs; namely, to the last three family races of the fourth sub-race of the Fifth Root-Race, each of which must have lived approximately from 25,000 to 30,000 years. The first of these, the“Âryan-Asiatics,”witnessed the doom of the last of the populations of the Giant Atlanteans1007(the Ruta and Daitya Island-Continents) who perished some 850,000 years ago, toward the close of the Miocene Age.1008The fourth sub-race witnessed the destruction of the last remnant of the Atlanteans—the Âryo-Atlanteans in the last island of Atlantis, namely, some 11,000 years ago. In order to understand this, the reader is asked to glance at the diagram of the Genealogical Tree of the Fifth Root-Race—generally, though hardly correctly, called the Âryan Race—and the explanations appended to it.Let the reader remember well that which is said of the divisions of Root-Races and the evolution of Humanity in this work, and stated clearly and concisely in Mr. Sinnett'sEsoteric Buddhism.1. There are seven Rounds in every Manvantara; this Round is the Fourth, and we are in the Fifth Root-Race, at present.2. Each Root-Race has seven sub-races.3. Each sub-race has, in its turn, seven ramifications, which may be called“branch”or“family”races.4. The little tribes, shoots, and offshoots of the last-named are countless, and depend on Karmic action.Examine the Genealogical Tree hereto appended, and you will[pg 453]understand. The illustration is purely diagrammatic, and is only intended to assist the reader in obtaining a slight grasp of the subject, amidst the confusion which exists between the terms which have been used at different times for the divisions of Humanity. It is also here attempted to express in figures—but only within approximate limits, for the sake of comparison—the duration of time through which it is possible to definitely distinguish one division from another. It would only lead to hopeless confusion if any attempt were made to give accurate dates to a few; for the Races, sub-races, etc., down to their smallest ramifications, overlap and are entangled with each other until it is nearly impossible to separate them.Illustration: Genealogical Tree of the Fifth Root-Race.The Human Race has been compared to a tree, and this serves admirably as an illustration.The main stem of a tree may be compared to the Root-Race (a).Its larger limbs to the various sub-races; seven in number (b1,b2, etc.).On each of these limbs are seven“branches,”or“family”races (c).After this the cactus-plant is a better illustration, for its fleshy“leaves”are covered with sharp spines, each of which may be compared to a nation or tribe of human beings.Now our Fifth Root-Race has already been in existence—as a Racesui generisand quite free from its parent stem—about 1,000,000 years; therefore it must be inferred that each of the four preceding sub-races[pg 454]has lived approximately 210,000 years; thus each family race has an average existence of about 30,000 years, and thus the European“family race”has still a good many thousand years to run, although the nations or the innumerable spines upon it, vary with each succeeding“season”of three or four thousand years. It is somewhat curious to mark the comparative approximation of duration between the lives of a“family race”and a Sidereal Year.The knowledge of the foregoing, and the absolutely correct divisions of time, formed part and parcel of the Mysteries, where these Sciences were taught to the Disciples, and where they were transmitted by one Hierophant to another. Everyone is aware that the European Astronomers assign—arbitrarily enough—the date of the invention of the Egyptian Zodiac to the years 2,000 or 2,400b.c.(Proctor); and insist that the date of this invention coincides with that of the erection of the Great Pyramid. This, to an Occultist and Eastern Astronomer, must appear quite absurd. The Cycle of the Kali Yuga is said to have begun between the 17th and 18th of February in the year 3,102b.c.Now the Hindûs claim that in the year 20,400 before Kali Yugam, the origin of their Zodiac coincided with the Spring Equinox—there being at the time a conjunction of the Sun and Moon—and Bailly proved by a lengthy and careful computation of that date, that, even if fictitious, the epoch from which they had started to establish the beginning of their Kali Yuga wasvery real. That“epoch is the year 3,102 before our era,”he writes.1009The lunar eclipse arriving just a fortnight after the beginning of the Black Age—it took place in a point situated between the Wheat Ear of Virgo and the star Θ of the same constellation. One of their most esoteric Cycles is based upon certain conjunctions and respective positions of Virgo and the Pleiades (Krittika). Hence, as the Egyptians brought their Zodiac from Southern India and Lankâ,1010the esoteric meaning was evidently identical. The“three Virgins,”or Virgo in three different positions, meant, with both, the record of the first three“Divine or Astronomical Dynasties,”who taught the Third Root-Race; and after having abandoned the Atlanteans to their doom, returned, or redescended rather, during the third sub-race of the Fifth, in order to reveal to saved humanity the mysteries of their birth-place—the Sidereal Heavens. The same symbolical record of the human Races and the three Dynasties (Gods, Manes—Semi-divine Astrals of the Third and Fourth—and the Heroes of the Fifth Race) which preceded[pg 455]the purely human kings, was found in the distribution of the tiers and passages of the Egyptian Labyrinth. As the three inversions of the Poles of course changed the face of the Zodiac, a new one had to be constructed each time. In Mackey'sSphinxiadthe speculations of the bold author must have horrified the orthodox portion of the population of Norwich, for he says, fantastically enough:But, after all, the greatest length of time recorded by those monuments [the Labyrinth, the Pyramids and the Zodiacs]does not exceed five millions of years:1011which falls short of the records given us both by the [esoteric] Chinese and Hindoos: which latter nation has registered a knowledge of time for seven or eight millions of years:1012which I have seen upon a talisman of porcelain.1013The Egyptian priests had the Zodiacs of the Atlantean Asura Maya, as the modern Hindûs still have. As stated inEsoteric Buddhism, the Egyptians, as well as the Greeks and“Romans”some thousand years ago, were“remnants of the Atlanto-Âryans”—the former, of the older, or the Ruta Atlanteans; the last-named, the descendants of the last race of that island, whose sudden disappearance was narrated to Solon by the Egyptian Initiates. ThehumanDynasty of the older Egyptians, beginning with Menes, had all theknowledgeof the Atlanteans, though there was no longer Atlantean blood in their veins. Nevertheless, they had preserved all their Archaic Records. All this has been shown long ago.1014And it is just because the Egyptian Zodiac is between 75,000 and 80,000 years old that the Zodiac of the Greeks is far later. Volney has correctly pointed out that it is only 16,984 years old, or up to the present date 17,082.1015

The MS. from which these additional explanations are taken belongs to the group calledTongshaktchi Sangye Songa, or the“Records of the Thirty-five Buddhas of Confession,”as they areexotericallycalled. These personages, however, though called in the Northern Buddhist religion Buddhas, may just as well be called Rishis, Avatâras, etc., as they are“Buddhas who have preceded Shâkyamuni”only for the Northern followers of the ethics preached by Gautama. These great Mahâtmâs, or Buddhas, are a universal and common property; they arehistoricalSages—at any rate for all the Occultists who believe in such a Hierarchy of Sages, and who have had its existence proved to them by the learned ones of the Fraternity. They are chosen from among some ninety-seven Buddhas in one group, and fifty-three in another,989mostly imaginary personages, who are really the personifications of the powers of the first-named.990These“Baskets”of the oldest writings on“palm leaves”are kept very secret. Each MS. has appended to it a short synopsis of the history of that sub-race to which the particular Buddha-Lha belonged. The one special MS. from which the fragments which follow have been extracted, and then rendered into more comprehensible language, is said to have been copied from stone tablets which belonged to a Buddha of the earliest days of the[pg 442]Fifth Race, who had witnessed the Deluge and the submersion of the chief continents of the Atlantean Race. The day when much, if not all, of that which is given here from the Archaic Records, will be found correct, is not far distant. Then the modern Symbologists will acquire the certitude that even Odin, or the God Woden, the highest God in the German and Scandinavian mythology, is one of these thirty-five Buddhas; one of the earliest, indeed, for the Continent to which he and his Race belonged is also one of the earliest—so early, in truth, that in those days tropical nature was to be found, where now lie eternal unthawing snows, and one could cross almost by dry land from NorwayviâIceland and Greenland, to the lands that at present surround Hudson's Bay.991In similar fashion, in the palmy days of the Atlantean Giants, the sons of the“Giants from the East,”a pilgrim could perform a journey from what in our days is termed the Sahara Desert, to the lands which now rest in dreamless sleep at the bottom of the waters of the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea. Events which were never written outside the human memory, but which were religiously transmitted from one generation to another, and from race to race, may have been preserved by constant transmission“within the book volume of the brain,”and through countless æons, with more truth and accuracy than inside any written document or record.“That which is part of our souls is eternal,”says Thackeray; and what can be nearer to our Souls than that which happens at the dawn of our lives? Those lives are countless, but the Soul or Spirit that animates us throughout these myriads of existences is the same; and though“the book volume”of thephysical brainmay forget events within the scope of one terrestrial life, the bulk of collective recollections can never desert the Divine Soul within us. Its whispers may be too soft, the sound of its words too far off the plane perceived by our physical senses; yet the shadow of eventsthat were, just as much as the shadow of the eventsthat are to come, is within its perceptive powers, and is ever present before its mind's eye.

It is this Soul-voice, perhaps, which tells those who believe in tradition more than in written history, that what is said below is all true, and relates to pre-historic facts.

This is what is written in one passage:

The Kings of Light have departed in wrath. The sins of men have become so black that Earth quivers in her great agony.... The Azure Seats remain empty. Who of the Brown, who of the Red, or yet among the Black [Races], can sit in the Seats of the Blessed, the Seats of Knowledge and Mercy? Who can assume the Flower of Power, the Plant of the Golden Stem and the Azure Blossom?

The“Kings of Light”is the name given in all old records to the Sovereigns of the Divine Dynasties. The“Azure Seats”are translated“Celestial Thrones”in certain documents. The“Flower of Power”is now the Lotus; what it may have been at that period, who can tell?

The writer proceeds, like the later Jeremiah, to bewail the fate of his people. They had become bereft of their“Azure”(Celestial) Kings, and“they of the deva-hue,”the moon-like complexion, and“they of the refulgent (golden) face”have gone“to the Land of Bliss, the Land of Fire and Metal”—or, agreeably with the rules of symbolism, to the lands lying North and East, from whence“the Great Waters have been swept away, sucked in by the Earth and dissipated in the Air.”The wise races had perceived“the black Storm-dragons, called down by the Dragons of Wisdom”—and“had fled, led on by the shining Protectors of the most Excellent Land”—the great ancient Adepts, presumably; those the Hindûs refer to as their Manus and Rishis. One of them was Vaivasvata Manu.

They“of the yellow hue”are the forefathers of those whom Ethnology now classes as the Turanians, the Mongols, Chinese and other ancient nations; and the land they fled to was no other than Central Asia. There, entirely new races were born; there, they lived and died until the separation of the nations. But this“separation”did not take place either in the localities assigned for it by Modern Science, nor in the way the Âryans are shown to have divided and separated by Prof. Max Müller and other Âryanists. Nearly two-thirds of one million years have elapsed since that period. The yellow-faced giants of the Post-Atlantean day had ample time, through this forced confinement to one part of the world, with the same racial blood and without any fresh infusion or admixture in it, during a period of nearly 700,000 years, to branch off into the most heterogeneous and diversified[pg 444]types. The same is shown in Africa; nowhere does a more extraordinary variability of types exist, from black to almost white, from gigantic men to dwarfish races; and this only because of their forced isolation. The Africans have not left their continent for several hundred thousands of years. If to-morrow the continent of Europe were to disappear and other lands to reëmerge instead, and if the African tribes were to separate and scatter on the face of the Earth, it is they who, in about a hundred thousand years hence, would form the bulk of the civilized nations. And it is the descendants of those of our highly cultured nations, who might have survived on some one island, without any means of crossing the new seas, that would fall back into a state of relative savagery. Thus the reason given for dividing humanity intosuperiorandinferiorraces falls to the ground and becomes a fallacy.

Such are the facts given in the Archaic Records. Collating and comparing them with some modern theories of evolution,minusNatural Selection,992these statements appear quite reasonable and logical. Thus, while the Âryans are the descendants of theyellowAdam, the gigantic and highly civilized Atlanto-Âryan race, the Semites—and the Jews along with them—are those of theredAdam, and thus both De Quatrefages and the writers of the MosaicGenesisare right. For, could chapter v of the First Book of Moses be compared with the genealogies found in our Archaic Bible, the period from Adam unto Noah would be found noticed therein, though of course under different names, the respective years of the Patriarchs being turned into periods, and the whole being symbolical and allegorical. In the MS. under consideration many and frequent are the references to the great knowledge and civilization of the Atlantean nations, showing the polity of several of them and the nature of their arts and sciences. If the Third Root-Race, the Lemuro-Atlanteans, are already spoken of as having been drowned“with their high civilizations and Gods,”993how much more may the same be said of the Atlanteans!

It is from the Fourth Race that the early Âryans got their knowledge of“the bundle of wonderful things,”the Sabhâ and Mâyâsabhâ, mentioned in theMahâbhârata, the gift of Mâyâsura to the Pândavas. It is from them that they learnt æronautics, Vimâna Vidyâ, the“knowledge of flying in air-vehicles,”and, therefore, their great arts of Meteorography and Meteorology. It is from them, again, that the Âryans inherited their most valuable Science of the hidden virtues[pg 445]of precious and other stones, of Chemistry, or rather Alchemy, of Mineralogy, Geology, Physics and Astronomy.

Several times the writer has put to herself the question: Is the story ofExodus—in its details at least—as narrated in theOld Testament, original? Or is it, like the story of Moses himself and many others, simply another version of the legends told of the Atlanteans? For who, upon hearing the story told of the latter, will fail to perceive the great similarity of the fundamental features? Remember the anger of“God”at the obduracy of Pharaoh, his command to the“chosen”ones to spoil the Egyptians, before departing, of their“jewels of silver and jewels of gold,”994and finally the Egyptians and their Pharaoh drowned in the Red Sea. Then read the following fragment of the earlier story from the Commentary:

And the“Great King of the Dazzling Face”the chief of all the Yellow-faced, was sad, seeing the sins of the Black-faced.

He sent his air-vehicles [Vimânas] to all his brother-chiefs [chiefs of other nations and tribes] with pious men within, saying:

“Prepare. Arise, ye men of the Good Law, and cross the land while [yet] dry.

“The Lords of the storm are approaching. Their chariots are nearing the land. One night and two days only shall the Lords of the Dark Face [the Sorcerers] live on this patient land. She is doomed, and they have to descend with her. The nether Lords of the Fires [the Gnomes and Fire Elementals] are preparing their magic Agnyastra [fire-weapons worked by Magic]. But the Lords of the Dark Eye [‘Evil Eye’] are stronger than they [the Elementals] and they are the slaves of the mighty ones. They are versed in Astra [Vidyâ, the highest magical knowledge].995Come and use yours[i.e.,your magic powers, in order to counteract those of the Sorcerers]. Let every Lord of the Dazzling Face [an Adept of the White Magic] cause the Vimâna of every Lord of the Dark Face to come into his hands [or possession], lest any [of the Sorcerers] should by its means escape from the waters, avoid the Rod of the Four [Karmic Deities], and save his wicked [followers, or people].

“May every Yellow Face send sleep from himself to [mesmerize?] every Black Face. May even they [the Sorcerers] avoid pain and suffering. May[pg 446]every man true to the Solar Gods bind [paralyze] every man under the Lunar Gods, lest he should suffer or escape his destiny.

“And may every Yellow Face offer of his life-water [blood] to the speaking animal of a Black Face, lest he awaken his master.996

“The hour has struck, the black night is ready.

“Let their destiny be accomplished. We are the servants of the Great Four.997May the Kings of Light return.”

The great King fell upon his Dazzling Face and wept....

When the Kings assembled, the waters had already moved....

[But] the nations had now crossed the dry lands. They were beyond the water-mark. Their Kings reached them in their Vimânas, and led them on to the lands of Fire and Metal [East and North].

Still, in another passage, it is said:

Stars [meteors] showered on the lands of the Black Faces; but they slept.

The speaking beasts [the magic watchers] kept quiet.

The nether Lords waited for orders, but they came not, for their masters slept.

The waters arose, and covered the valleys from one end of the Earth to the other. High lands remained, the bottom of the Earth [the lands of the antipodes] remained dry. There dwelt those who escaped; the men of the Yellow Faces and of the straight eye [the frank and sincere people].

When the Lords of the Dark Faces awoke and bethought themselves of their Vimânas in order to escape from the rising waters, they found them gone.

Then a passage shows some of the more powerful Magicians of the“Dark Faces,”who awoke earlier than the others, pursuing those who had“spoilt them”and who were in the rear-guard, for—“the nations that were led away were as thick as the stars of the milky way,”says a more modern Commentary, written in Sanskrit only.

Like as a dragon-snake uncoils slowly its body, so the Sons of Men, led on by the Sons of Wisdom, opened their folds, and spreading out, expanded like a running stream of sweet waters ... many of the faint-hearted among them perished on their way. But most were saved.

Yet the pursuers,“whose heads and chests soared high above the[pg 447]water,”chased them“for three lunar terms”until finally reached by the rising waves, they perished to the last man, the soil sinking under their feet and the Earth engulfing those who had desecrated her.

This sounds a good deal like the original material upon which the similar story inExoduswas built many hundred thousands of years later. The biography of Moses, the story of his birth, childhood and rescue from the Nile by Pharaoh's daughter, is now shown to have been adapted from the Chaldæan narrative about Sargon. And if so, the Assyrian tiles in the British Museum being a good proof of it, why not that of the Jews robbing the Egyptians of their jewels, the death of Pharaoh and his army, and so on? The gigantic Magicians of Ruta and Daitya, the“Lords of the Dark Face,”may, in the later narrative, have become the Egyptian Magi, and the yellow-faced nations of the Fifth Race, the virtuous sons of Jacob, the“chosen people”! One more statement has to be made. There have been several Divine Dynasties—a series for every Root-Race beginning with the Third, each series according and adapted to its Humanity. The last seven Dynasties referred to in the Egyptian and Chaldæan records belonged to the Fifth Race, which, though generally called Âryan, was not entirely so, as it was ever largely mixed up with races to which Ethnology gives other names. It would be impossible, in view of the limited space at our disposal, to go any further into the description of the Atlanteans, in whom the whole East believes as much as we believe in the ancient Egyptians, but whose existence the majority of the Western Scientists deny, as they have denied, before this, many a truth, from the existence of Homer down to that of the carrier pigeon. The civilization of the Atlanteans was greater than even that of the Egyptians. It is their degenerate descendants, the nation of Plato's Atlantis, who built the first Pyramids in the country, and that certainty before the advent of the“Eastern Æthiopians,”as Herodotus calls the Egyptians. This may be well inferred from the statement made by Ammianus Marcellinus, who says of the Pyramids that:

There are also subterranean passages and winding retreats, which, it is said, men skilful in the ancient mysteries, by means of which they divined the coming of a flood, constructed in different places lest the memory of all their sacred ceremonies should be lost.

These men who“divined the coming of floods”were not Egyptians, who never had any, except the periodical rising of the Nile. Who were they? The last remnants of the Atlanteans, we maintain; those[pg 448]races which are dimly suspected by Science, and thinking of which Mr. Charles Gould, the well-known Geologist, says:

Can we suppose that we have at all exhausted the great museum of nature? Have we, in fact, penetrated yet beyond its antechambers? Does the written history of man, comprising a few thousand years, embrace the whole course of his intelligent existence? or have we in the long mythical eras, extending over hundreds of thousands of years, and recorded in the chronologies of Chaldæa and of China, shadowy mementoes of pre-historic man, handed down by tradition, and perhaps transported by a few survivors to existing lands from others, which, like the fabled (?) Atlantis of Plato, may have been submerged, or the scene of some great catastrophe which destroyed them with all their civilization.998

After this one can turn with more confidence to the words of a Master who wrote, several years before these words were penned by Mr. Gould:

The Fourth Race had its periods of the highest civilization. Greek and Roman and even Egyptian civilizations are nothing compared to the civilizations that began with the Third Race [—after its separation].

But if this civilization and the mastery of arts and sciences are denied to the Third and Fourth Races, no one will deny that between the great civilizations of antiquity, such as those of Egypt and India, there stretched the dark ages of crass ignorance and barbarism ever since the beginning of the Christian era up to our modern civilization, during which period all recollection of these traditions was lost. As said inIsis Unveiled:

Why should we forget that, ages before the prows of the adventurous Genoese clove the Western waters, the Phœnician vessels had circumnavigated the Globe, and spread civilization in regions now silent and deserted? What Archæologist will dare assert that the same hand which planned the Pyramids of Egypt, Karnak, and the thousand ruins now crumbling to oblivion on the sandy banks of the Nile, didnoterect the monumental Nagkon-Wat of Cambodia; or trace the hieroglyphics on the obelisks and doors of the deserted Indian village, newly discovered in British Columbia by Lord Dufferin; or those on the ruins of Palenque and Uxmal, of Central America? Do not the relics we treasure in our museums—last mementoes of the long“lost arts”—speak loudly in favour of ancient civilization? And do they not prove, over and over again, that nations and continents that have passed away have buried along with them arts and sciences, which neither the first crucible ever heated in a mediæval cloister, nor the last cracked by a modern chemist, have revived, nor will—at least, in the present century.

And the same question may be put now that was put then; it may be once more asked:

How does it happen that the most advanced standpoint that has been reached in our times, only enables us to see in the dim distance up the Alpine path of knowledge[pg 449]the monumental proofs that earlier explorers have left to mark the plateaux they had reached and occupied?If modern masters are so much in advance of the old ones, why do they not restore to us the lost arts of our postdiluvian forefathers? Why do they not give us the unfading colours of Luxor—the Tyrian purple, the bright vermilion, and dazzling blue which decorate the walls of this place, and are as bright as on the first day of their application; the indestructible cement of the pyramids and of ancient aqueducts; the Damascus blade, which can be turned like a corkscrew in its scabbard without breaking; the gorgeous, unparalleled tints of the stained glass that is found amid the dust of old ruins and beams in the windows of ancient cathedrals; and the secret of the true malleable glass? And if Chemistry is so little able to rival even the early mediæval ages in some arts, why boast of achievements which, according to strong probability, were perfectly known thousands of years ago. The more Archæology and Philology advance, the more humiliating to our pride are the discoveries which are daily made, the more glorious testimony do they bear in behalf of those who, perhaps on account of the distance of their remote antiquity, have been until now considered ignorant flounderers in the deepest mire of superstition.

If modern masters are so much in advance of the old ones, why do they not restore to us the lost arts of our postdiluvian forefathers? Why do they not give us the unfading colours of Luxor—the Tyrian purple, the bright vermilion, and dazzling blue which decorate the walls of this place, and are as bright as on the first day of their application; the indestructible cement of the pyramids and of ancient aqueducts; the Damascus blade, which can be turned like a corkscrew in its scabbard without breaking; the gorgeous, unparalleled tints of the stained glass that is found amid the dust of old ruins and beams in the windows of ancient cathedrals; and the secret of the true malleable glass? And if Chemistry is so little able to rival even the early mediæval ages in some arts, why boast of achievements which, according to strong probability, were perfectly known thousands of years ago. The more Archæology and Philology advance, the more humiliating to our pride are the discoveries which are daily made, the more glorious testimony do they bear in behalf of those who, perhaps on account of the distance of their remote antiquity, have been until now considered ignorant flounderers in the deepest mire of superstition.

Among other Arts and Sciences, the Ancients—ay, as an heirloom from the Atlanteans—had those of Astronomy and Symbolism, which included the knowledge of the Zodiac.

As already explained, the whole of Antiquity believed, with good reason, that humanity and its races are all intimately connected with the Planets, and these with the Zodiacal Signs. The whole world's history is recorded in the latter. In the ancient temples of Egypt there is an example in the Dendera Zodiac; but except in an Arabic work, the property of a Sûfî, the writer has never met with a correct copy of these marvellous records of the past—and also of thefuture—history of our Globe. Yet the original records exist, most undeniably.

As Europeans are unacquainted with the real Zodiacs of India, and those they do happen to know of they fail to understand, as witness Bentley, the reader is advised, in order to verify the statement, to turn to the work of Denon999in which the two famous Egyptian Zodiacs can be found and examined. Having seen them personally, the writer has no longer need to trust to what other students—who have examined and studied both very carefully—have to say of them. The assertion of the Egyptian Priests to Herodotus, that the terrestrial Pole and the Pole of the Ecliptic had formerly coincided, has been corroborated by Mackey, who states that the Poles are represented on the Zodiacs in both positions.

And in that which shows the Poles [polar axes] at right angles, there are marks which show, that it was not the last time they were in that position;but the first[—after the Zodiacs had been traced]. Capricorn, is, therein, represented at the North Pole; and Cancer is divided, near its middle, at the South Pole; which is a confirmation that, originally they had their winter when the Sun was in Cancer. But the chief characteristics of its being a monument commemorating thefirst timethat the Pole had been in that position, are the Lion and the Virgin.1000

Broadly calculated, it is believed by Egyptologists that the Great Pyramid was built 3,350b.c.;1001and that Menes and his Dynasty existed 750 years before the appearance of the Fourth Dynasty—during which the Pyramids aresupposedto have been built. Thus 4,100 yearsb.c.is the age assigned to Menes. Now Sir J. Gardner Wilkinson's declaration that all the facts lead to the conclusion that the Egyptians had already—

Made very great progress in the arts of civilizationbefore the age of Menes, and perhaps before they immigrated into the valley of the Nile—1002

is very suggestive, as destroying this hypothesis of the comparatively modern civilizing of Egypt. It points to a great civilization inpre-historictimes, and a still greater antiquity. The Schesoo-Hor, the“servants of Horus,”were the people who had settled in Egypt; and, as M. Maspéro affirms, it is to this“pre-historic race”that—

Belongs the honour of having constituted Egypt, such as we know it, from the commencement of the historic period.

And Staniland Wake adds:

They founded the principal cities of Egypt, and established the most important sanctuaries.1003

This wasbeforethe Great Pyramid epoch, and when Egypt had hardly arisen from the waters. Yet:

They possessed the hieroglyphic form of writing special to the Egyptians, and must have been already considerably advanced in civilization.

As says Lenormant:

It was the country of the great pre-historic sanctuaries, seats of the sacerdotal dominion, which played the most important part in the origin of civilization.

What is the date assigned to this people? We hear of 4,000, at the utmost of 5,000, yearsb.c.(Maspéro). Now it is claimed that it is by[pg 451]means of the Cycle of 25,868 years (the Sidereal Year) that the approximate year of the erection of the Great Pyramid can be ascertained.

Assuming that the long narrow downward passage leading from the entrance was directed towards the pole-star of the pyramid builders, astronomers have shown that in the year 2,170b.c.the passage pointed to Alpha Draconis, the then pole-star.... Mr. Richard A. Proctor, the astronomer, after stating that the pole-star was in the required position about 3,350b.c., as well as in 2,170b.c., says:“either of these would correspond with the position of the descending passage in the Great Pyramid; but Egyptologists tell us there can absolutely be no doubt that the later epoch is far too late.”1004

But we are also told that:

This relative position of Alpha Draconis and Alcyone being an extraordinary one ... it could not occur again for a whole Sidereal Year.1005

This demonstrates that, since the Dendera Zodiac shows the passage of three Sidereal Years, the Great Pyramid must have been built 78,000 years ago, or in any case that this possibility deserves to be accepted at least as readily as the later date of 3,350b.c.

Now on the Zodiac of a certain temple in far Northern India, the same characteristics of the signs as on the Dendera Zodiac are found. Those who know the Hindû symbols and constellations well, will be able to find out from the description of the Egyptian, whether the indications of time are correct or not. On the Dendera Zodiac, as preserved by the modern Egyptian Coptic and Greek Adepts, and explained a little differently by Mackey, the Dion stands upon the Hydra and his tail is almost straight, pointing downwards at an angle of forty or fifty degrees, this position agreeing with theoriginalconformation of these constellations. But adds Mackey:

In many places we see the Lion [Sinha], with his tail turned up over his back, and ending with a Serpent's head; thereby, shewing that the Lion had beeninverted: which, indeed, must have been the case with the whole Zodiac, and every other Constellation, when the Pole had been inverted.

Speaking of thecircularZodiac, which is also given by Denon, he says:

There ... the Lion is standingonthe Serpent, and his tail forming a curve downward, from which we find that,though six or seven hundred thousand yearsmust have passed between the two positions, yet they had made but little or no difference in the Constellations of Leo and the Hydra; while Virgo is represented very differently in the two—in the circular Zodiac, the Virgin isnursing her child: but it seems that they had not had that idea when the Pole was first within[pg 452]the plane of the Ecliptic; for inthisZodiac, as given by Denon, we see three Virgins between the Lion and the Scales, the last of which holds, in her hand, an ear of wheat. It is much to be lamented that, there is in this Zodiac a breach of the figures in the latter part of Leo and the beginning of Virgo, which has taken away oneDecanout of each sign.1006

Nevertheless, the meaning is plain, as the three Zodiacs belong to three different epochs; namely, to the last three family races of the fourth sub-race of the Fifth Root-Race, each of which must have lived approximately from 25,000 to 30,000 years. The first of these, the“Âryan-Asiatics,”witnessed the doom of the last of the populations of the Giant Atlanteans1007(the Ruta and Daitya Island-Continents) who perished some 850,000 years ago, toward the close of the Miocene Age.1008The fourth sub-race witnessed the destruction of the last remnant of the Atlanteans—the Âryo-Atlanteans in the last island of Atlantis, namely, some 11,000 years ago. In order to understand this, the reader is asked to glance at the diagram of the Genealogical Tree of the Fifth Root-Race—generally, though hardly correctly, called the Âryan Race—and the explanations appended to it.

Let the reader remember well that which is said of the divisions of Root-Races and the evolution of Humanity in this work, and stated clearly and concisely in Mr. Sinnett'sEsoteric Buddhism.

1. There are seven Rounds in every Manvantara; this Round is the Fourth, and we are in the Fifth Root-Race, at present.

2. Each Root-Race has seven sub-races.

3. Each sub-race has, in its turn, seven ramifications, which may be called“branch”or“family”races.

4. The little tribes, shoots, and offshoots of the last-named are countless, and depend on Karmic action.

Examine the Genealogical Tree hereto appended, and you will[pg 453]understand. The illustration is purely diagrammatic, and is only intended to assist the reader in obtaining a slight grasp of the subject, amidst the confusion which exists between the terms which have been used at different times for the divisions of Humanity. It is also here attempted to express in figures—but only within approximate limits, for the sake of comparison—the duration of time through which it is possible to definitely distinguish one division from another. It would only lead to hopeless confusion if any attempt were made to give accurate dates to a few; for the Races, sub-races, etc., down to their smallest ramifications, overlap and are entangled with each other until it is nearly impossible to separate them.

Illustration: Genealogical Tree of the Fifth Root-Race.

The Human Race has been compared to a tree, and this serves admirably as an illustration.

The main stem of a tree may be compared to the Root-Race (a).

Its larger limbs to the various sub-races; seven in number (b1,b2, etc.).

On each of these limbs are seven“branches,”or“family”races (c).

After this the cactus-plant is a better illustration, for its fleshy“leaves”are covered with sharp spines, each of which may be compared to a nation or tribe of human beings.

Now our Fifth Root-Race has already been in existence—as a Racesui generisand quite free from its parent stem—about 1,000,000 years; therefore it must be inferred that each of the four preceding sub-races[pg 454]has lived approximately 210,000 years; thus each family race has an average existence of about 30,000 years, and thus the European“family race”has still a good many thousand years to run, although the nations or the innumerable spines upon it, vary with each succeeding“season”of three or four thousand years. It is somewhat curious to mark the comparative approximation of duration between the lives of a“family race”and a Sidereal Year.

The knowledge of the foregoing, and the absolutely correct divisions of time, formed part and parcel of the Mysteries, where these Sciences were taught to the Disciples, and where they were transmitted by one Hierophant to another. Everyone is aware that the European Astronomers assign—arbitrarily enough—the date of the invention of the Egyptian Zodiac to the years 2,000 or 2,400b.c.(Proctor); and insist that the date of this invention coincides with that of the erection of the Great Pyramid. This, to an Occultist and Eastern Astronomer, must appear quite absurd. The Cycle of the Kali Yuga is said to have begun between the 17th and 18th of February in the year 3,102b.c.Now the Hindûs claim that in the year 20,400 before Kali Yugam, the origin of their Zodiac coincided with the Spring Equinox—there being at the time a conjunction of the Sun and Moon—and Bailly proved by a lengthy and careful computation of that date, that, even if fictitious, the epoch from which they had started to establish the beginning of their Kali Yuga wasvery real. That“epoch is the year 3,102 before our era,”he writes.1009The lunar eclipse arriving just a fortnight after the beginning of the Black Age—it took place in a point situated between the Wheat Ear of Virgo and the star Θ of the same constellation. One of their most esoteric Cycles is based upon certain conjunctions and respective positions of Virgo and the Pleiades (Krittika). Hence, as the Egyptians brought their Zodiac from Southern India and Lankâ,1010the esoteric meaning was evidently identical. The“three Virgins,”or Virgo in three different positions, meant, with both, the record of the first three“Divine or Astronomical Dynasties,”who taught the Third Root-Race; and after having abandoned the Atlanteans to their doom, returned, or redescended rather, during the third sub-race of the Fifth, in order to reveal to saved humanity the mysteries of their birth-place—the Sidereal Heavens. The same symbolical record of the human Races and the three Dynasties (Gods, Manes—Semi-divine Astrals of the Third and Fourth—and the Heroes of the Fifth Race) which preceded[pg 455]the purely human kings, was found in the distribution of the tiers and passages of the Egyptian Labyrinth. As the three inversions of the Poles of course changed the face of the Zodiac, a new one had to be constructed each time. In Mackey'sSphinxiadthe speculations of the bold author must have horrified the orthodox portion of the population of Norwich, for he says, fantastically enough:

But, after all, the greatest length of time recorded by those monuments [the Labyrinth, the Pyramids and the Zodiacs]does not exceed five millions of years:1011which falls short of the records given us both by the [esoteric] Chinese and Hindoos: which latter nation has registered a knowledge of time for seven or eight millions of years:1012which I have seen upon a talisman of porcelain.1013

The Egyptian priests had the Zodiacs of the Atlantean Asura Maya, as the modern Hindûs still have. As stated inEsoteric Buddhism, the Egyptians, as well as the Greeks and“Romans”some thousand years ago, were“remnants of the Atlanto-Âryans”—the former, of the older, or the Ruta Atlanteans; the last-named, the descendants of the last race of that island, whose sudden disappearance was narrated to Solon by the Egyptian Initiates. ThehumanDynasty of the older Egyptians, beginning with Menes, had all theknowledgeof the Atlanteans, though there was no longer Atlantean blood in their veins. Nevertheless, they had preserved all their Archaic Records. All this has been shown long ago.1014And it is just because the Egyptian Zodiac is between 75,000 and 80,000 years old that the Zodiac of the Greeks is far later. Volney has correctly pointed out that it is only 16,984 years old, or up to the present date 17,082.1015

Back to Index Next