The Theosophical Forum – October 1948

A BIRD'S-EYE VIEW — Elsa-Brita Bergqvist

"The Sun is the heart of our universe." "The circulations of the Cosmos are analogous to the circulation of blood, lymph and nervous fluids in a human body."

These are bald statements to be found scattered among Theosophical teachings in our books. What do they mean?

They mean that in infinite reaches Life abounds. The worlds of the vast spaces visible to us are merely a single aspect in an infinite range of material beings. Let us lose ourselves in the whole, in an effort to see our proportionate place in the scheme.

Throughout all Being pulsates unceasingly the flow of Nature's forces, classified in groups of numbers for our partial understanding, but infinite in fact; covering all planes of existence, known and unknown; vibrating in harmonious coordinations of the innumerable possible permutations, of which our known laws of music and mathematics give a fleeting glimpse. Flowing ceaselessly in groups of relative similarity, which form waves in cyclic motion, they conjoin in temporary unisons and disperse to re-combine again. Each wave or wavicle is a host of living consciousnesses, cosmic or atomic in magnitude, all equally the expression of infinite potentiality manifesting to the extent of the unfolded powers within. The unceasing flow of these waves of force throughout the hierarchical structure of nature is regulated by karmic attractions and repulsions generated in the infinite past and karmically forming infinite future correlations.

When the cyclic peak of each unfolding of potentiality is reached, the return to the infinite source within each center of consciousness begins and the temporary entity is slowly, in the spiral motion of life, sucked back into the great silence.

Mankind's place in this circulatory structure of forces is that of a wave of temporarily cohering droplets, rippling the surface of the river of life. As a hierarchy man is composed of the powers that he manifests. His nature is that of the existing forces in the whole that he, as a center of consciousness, has formed for his habitation out of the essence of his being. He manifests those of the infinite potencies of his essentially infinite nature that have become activated during an age-long cycle of experience. He is the expression of a stage of evolution. The peculiarity of this stage is the beginning of self-consciousness, the thinking capacity that enables man to know his place in nature and to cooperate of his own free will in the majestic design of life.

This awakening of mind is a two-edged sword, leading on the one hand to the willing activation of god-like qualities as yet asleep, which, when awakened, endow man with glories of consciousness as yet but feebly guessed; and, on the other, to the possibility of self-destruction as an entitative being, involving sufferings of consciousness but vaguely dreamed. The "human" stage is the turning-point.

Man as a self-conscious part of nature is in his infancy in the school of evolution. The prelude to this stage is a slow and laborious unfolding of consciousness, guided by the wisdom of nature, personified in the individual expressions thereof, the super-human beings of all stages, who supervise this growth. With the awakening of mind, self-consciousness begins to be. With it awaken free will and individual responsibility. It is a turning-point of life. No longer may the elemental forces run riot in man's constitution; they are under the control of the individualized focus of consciousness grown aware of itself. Throughout the range of his being the spiritual entity guides and controls the elementals it harbors, from the spiritual life-atoms, through the mental and emotional nature, the ethereal, sensual body and its expression, the crystallized atomic structure that appears solid to the physical senses adapted to our world.

At this point a struggle begins. Man, the thinking entity, is drawn magnetically towards the root of his being and would inevitably be drawn into the central focus of himself, partaking of the infinite which is the basis of existence, were it not for the illusory web of entanglements that he has formed about himself and which hold him captive in his responsibility towards the lesser entities of which he has composed himself. He is semi-conscious of this fact and tries mistakenly to unite with them in the innumerable disparate forms of life sprung from his experimental attempts at "creation," Thus is formed the "heresy of separateness."

Believing himself to be set apart and a creator in his own right, man forgets his place in nature, wherein he is but one aspect of divine life. The overcoming of this illusion of independence is the next step in evolution.

Those who have achieved this step see themselves in proportion, and sense the "fitness of all things." To them no hurt can ensue, for their feelings, thoughts and actions are consciously in accord with the laws of balance and harmony that bind all together in one vast whole. In accordance with this knowledge, they constitute themselves voluntary agents of natural law and become the law. In this capacity they are enabled to function as foci or centers, through which the solar rays of energy flow into the various kingdoms of life forming our earth, as an instance in point, and their conscious function is to distribute in the atmospheres of our earth on all planes the appropriate forces in strict accordance with karman. Man, the newly evolved thinker, is thus assisted by their work in his efforts to free himself from the bondage of his own making and to rise to a stage where cooperation in this work is possible.

The central Lodge of the Masters is therefore a natural fact, one to be accepted and aspired to, not to be dreamed of with miasmic sentimentality. As a life-wave, mankind is the necessary instrument through which the forces of the plane of mind must flow, and the efficiency of its function depends on the willing cooperation of men as individuals. We humans are the stepping-stone between the central lens receiving the solar forces and the lower kingdoms of nature that ultimately benefit from this influence. Each individual thinking mind is a minor facet receiving the cosmic influences and transmitting them over the world in prismatic array, depending for their purity on the purity of the individuals.

The Theosophical Society was formed with the purpose of instituting a nucleus of individual minds, willing to undergo the necessary purification to the end that the natural flow of divine energy might be transmitted in a relatively pure state. In the present crucial state of our world it is of great importance that this work be assisted in the greatest possible degree. Man, the thinking being, must consciously and with will array himself on the side of nature's divine forces and work for the evolution of all beings. It is in his power to do so to a great extent, and the only requisite is his desire to do so. "Behind will stands desire." We always ultimately do what we most desire and our will is the instrument which depends on our choice. With the assistance of the natural law of evolution, which tends towards spiritual growth, it is therefore possible for any one of us to be the deciding factor in the balance, as either a savior of the world or a destroyer.



Theosophical University Press Online Edition