Word-Up!

~ Word-Up! ~ By ~ Dewin Nefol ~

~

We’d stayed all day within our glade,

Dappled sunlight between cool shade,

Sophia and I beneath warm sky,

Laid-out upon soft ground.

~

“Dewin,” she said, “a word in your ear,”

“A message for you from a Winged Seer,”

“Words he said of relevance,”

“Concerning Divine Intelligence.”

~

“Oh?” Said I with complete surprise,

“That sounds like flighty fun.”

“A message for me from Mercury,”

“Please do carry on.”

~

“He said he’d be gone for 88 days:”

“In quick orbit around our Sun,”

“And knew you would appreciate,”

“A little illumination.”

~

“What a guy!” Said I with a sigh,

“Refreshing as a mountain breeze!”

“A true Maverick across all time,”

“He knows just how to please.”

~

“Indeed agreed,” Sophia decreed,

“Though he’s a little head-strong,”

“I miss his congenial company,”

“Whenever he is gone.”

~

“Bless him,” she said turning red,

“My counsel throughout the ages,”

“Between you and me Lord Mercury,”

“Is my favourite of the Sages.”

~

“Your secrets safe,” I said to her,

“Ill not tell a soul,”

“Or squeal to reveal your human side,”

“Nor upset the apple bowl.”

~

She blushed once more before composed,

When then her words easily flowed,

“He was quite exact in what he said,”

“About words that led to gold.”

~

“Divine intelligence contains 5 elements,”

“All with relevance and meaning,”

“Master them all you’ll never fall,”

“And limitless will be your ceiling.”

~

“Metanoia,” said Sophia, “is the first idea,”

“The ability to renew your mind.”

“To boldly go beyond shadow:”

“To redefine your current thinking.”

~

Without breaking flow, Sophia unrelenting,

“Dianoia,” she said, “is new understanding,”

“Inspired dialogue sparking new insight,”

“Encourages one’s mind to reach new heights.”

~

“Then comes Epinoia and illumination:”

“Lighting up one’s imagination,”

“Luminous thinking guided consciously,”

“Leading one’s mind towards reverie.”

~

“Ennoia,” she continued with eloquence,

“The ability to focus Divine intelligence.”

“Is conscious intention and due-diligence:”

“The mother of all beneficence.”

~

“Last on his list came Enthymesis,”

“Heartfelt passion, burning desire.”

“A tricky one this: best defined as bliss,”

“When one’s consumed by Divine Fire.”

~*~

~ Photography/Artwork and Composition ~ By ~ Dewin Nefol ~

~*~

~ https://medium.com/@divineintel/what-is-divine-intelligence-601a15b9c212 ~

~*~

Psalm 94

~ Psalm 94 ~

~

1. O Lord God, to whom vengeance belongeth; O God, to whom vengeance belongeth; show thyself

2. Lift up thyself, thou judge of the Earth: render a reward to the proud.

3. Lord, how long shall the wicked, how long shall the wicked triumph?

4. How long shall they utter and speak hard things? And all the workers of iniquity boast themselves?.

5 They break in pieces thy people. O Lord, and afflict thine heritage.

6. They slay the widow and the stranger, and murder the fatherless.

7. Yet they say, The Lord shall not see, neither shall the God of Jacob regard it

8. Understand, ye brutish among the people, and ye fools, when will ye be wise?

9. He that planted the ear, shall he not hear? He that formed the eye, shall he not see?

10. He that chastieth the heathen, shall not he correct? He that teacheth man knowledge, shall not he know?

11. The Lord knoweth the thoughts of man, that they are vanity.

12. Blessed is the man whom thou chastenest, O Lord, and teachest him out of the law.

13. That thou mayest give him rest from the days of adversity, until the pit be digged for the wicked.

14. For the Lord will not cast off his people, neither will he forsake his inheritance.

15. But Judgement shall return unto righteousness: and all the upright in heart shall follow it.

16. Who will rise up for me against the evil-doers? Or who will stand up for me against the workers of iniquity?

17. Unless the Lord  had been my help, my soul had almost dwelt in silence.

18. When I said, My foot slippeth; thy mercy, O Lord, help me up.

19. In the multitude of my thoughts within me thy comforts delight my soul.

20. Shall the throne of iniquity have fellowship with thee, which frameth mischief by a law?

21. They gather themselves together against the soul of the righteous, and condemn the innocent blood.

22. But the Lord is my defence; and my God is the rock of my refuge.

23. And he shall bring upon them their own iniquity, and shall cut them off in their wickedness; the Lord our God shall cut them off.

~*~

~ Artwork/Composition ~ By ~ Dewin Nefol ~

~*~

Growing Pains

I am continuing  to blog a series of short posts penned by Jake Sweeny a long standing friend of Merlin and Archie who will now be travelling with the Fellowship to Camelot. Jake is presenting small snippets of news and gossip arising on our travels,, his personal perspective and commentary on the journey, poetry, short anecdotes, and details of any random/funny moments occurring en route to our destination.

In the meantime I am taking first steps setting out writing Book 2 of The Wizard of Wands (WoW). It’s a slow start whilst I take two steps back to hit the ground running but I’m pleased to report enthusiastic endeavour and progress. Curiously, for all the careful planning and consideration of the story my first impressions with the writing would suggest the tale is taking its own course and leading where it wants to go rather than where I had intended. I am not discouraged nor impeding the flow: I will be happy if the paths being laid-down carry the story to arrive at the key moments I had planned, but if not then I suppose that is a challenge to rise to and overcome. I am comfortable following the muses lead: the story must go on.

~~~

~ The Wizard of Wands ~ Jake’s Journal ~

~ 23rd June 5 A.D ~

~ Growing Pains ~ By ~ Jake Sweeny ~

~~~

Midnight with the lost and found.

Midnight upon this ancient mound.

The witching hour, or so they say.

When cast all around abound the spellbound

And those Earthbound spellbinding.

~

I’ve realised our camp is on Iron-Age ground.

Set upon the grave of a Villanovan Queen.

I can hear her breathing in the womb of her tomb

When my ear in sleep listens to her dream.

~

It’s profound, her breathing, the sound I mean,

stirring in that she weeps.

My heart fills with her sadness and woe.

Fairly aches with dark secrets she keeps.

~

For the record, I am an empath.

Near clairvoyant in fact.

It’s a gift, a hindrance too.

In that I have to use tact.

~

 You see, I get to see, almost immediately,

what is found within a heart.

Not the intimate details you understand, more

the motion of emotion, at least in part.

~

For example I will know why a heart feels woe,

but not intricacies of all involved.

I get fleeting impressions vague visions passing,

clues and riddles to be solved.

~

It’s how I scrounge and do well trading,

my craft is hidden in the unseen shading.

Between the space to know and know too much,

in a place they call The Fading.

~

You’ll understand me better for having mentioned,

my naturally occurring ways.

It’s reason why I seek solace, space alone

to be with people means busy days.

~

However Master Scribe is a curiosity to me.

He has heart and soul that can’t be breached.

I think it wise he be blessed with this shell,

I wonder if his mind is more easily reached…

~

Master Scribe is sat mindfully contemplating his navel again. He calls it meditation, I call it chin-stroking over self-indulgence, but we agree to disagree, he is the Soothsayer after-all and I merely a ragman with a pen. He tells me it’s what all poets do so to open up and be receptive to inspiration and finding words. I understand little of what he calls ‘metaphysics’ (another new word he taught me), but from what he describes, a decent flagon of mead seems to do much the same thing: it slackens my shackles and the tongue of my nib and gives impetus to writing my drivel.

Master Scribe is lost in his world. His countenance: the 1000-yard stare he wears, the blissful glint in his eyes suggests he is somewhere I have no knowledge of ever being whilst sober. He’s not noticed me at all being here for the past hour. I’ve even lit a small fire and have a rabbit dripping fat on the spit to serve as cold cuts tomorrow lunchtime.

I wanted to ask his thoughts about Fair Lady Veritas: to ask what he considered to be the essential nature of truth itself. She is someone I would dearly like to meet, greet, shake hands with and sense a little of her emotional inner world. I have progressed from squalor, lived in sin, wrestled with Gods and purified my skin…yet still I feel a need to ask, ‘Lady Veritas, when did truth begin?’ Master Scribe knows the answer, but will never describe her highest virtue through and through and Merlin has never met her. Archie has far too few clues to offer and remains tight lipped with gossip anyway: he is never one for tattle.

~

“Ah Jake, what a pleasant surprise.”

“Why not sit and join me?”

“There’s room for two on the crest of this rise.”

“Come and see what it is I see.”

~

Master Scribe was relaxed blissfully vacant

in the zone ‘on the Wizard’s stay’.

“Accuracy, certainty, precision” he stated,

sounding like an echo from far away.

~

I relinquished my spot next to the fireside,

gave-it it up for a Scarab beetle.

I found safe ground to rest my ash

as we sat to watch a Golden Eagle.

~

My ash I should mention is a pipe-smoker’s term.

A bad habit I’ll never shake.

I should’ve quit long years ago,

long after my last prison break.

~

But hey, a fella is permitted one mild extravagance,

at worst perhaps just two

But having any more than three or four, even

a scrounger would be rotten through and through!

~

“Master Scribe,” said I, “see how she flies.”

“She is Queen of the skies, of all she surveys.”

“What delight! Soaring at height in searing sunlight!”

“See her polish, her glaze, her feather tips blaze!”

~

“Why Jake you have entered my world after-all.”

“Merlin said it would take a few days.”

“I know you have sensitivity to almost ‘see’,

that you intuit another’s inner ways.”

~

“He told me I was protected by Fair Lady V.”

“That I was shielded magically.”

He said, “it’s needed to protect all that you know.”

“Merlin spoke quite emphatically.”

~

“Master Scribe,” said I, “you are a Soothsayer now,

a depository knowing truth of every born soul.”

“No other mortal shares that knowledge with you…”

“Full access to one’s Akashic scroll.”

~

Master Scribe sighed more loudly than intended,

paused to let it linger in the air.

“Whilst you’ll never know what lies within,” he said,

“Your stare is a stare to lay me bare.”

~

“You see what is unapparent, “the Soothsayer continued,

“What is hidden to the human eye.”

“I can’t deny knowing truth weighs heavily with me,

despite having these new wings to fly.”

~

Said I, “the gift you bare bares no weight of Grace.”

“It is your perception that needs to change.”

“I’m not sure I know what you mean,” said Master Scribe.

“My friend,” said I, “it is all about range.”

~

“Range?” he asked, “do you imply reach or scope?”

“No,” I said, “I mean the end of your rope.”

“You have a duty, a task, you are sailing full mast,

but must find focus with your ‘telescope’.”

~

“If one adds lenticular vision to your microscopic sight,

to the truth you know and to your insight.”

“I glimpse why you are overwhelmed by a loss of light.”

“It comes with knowing a soul’s darkest night.”

~

“It is as you describe Jake: their vulnerability, their plight.”

“Their fears, their dreams, their circumstances, their blight.”

“I pass beyond their darkness and onwards to their light.”

“I pass through many layers to watch their soul take flight.”

~

“I see the truth within them, their glorious splendour,

I see their Eagle caged behind bars.”

“I see everything they have ever been.”

“Since their first day born from the stars.”

~

“Focus,” I said, “on the matter in hand,

on the rationale for the destined meeting.”

“You must learn quickly how best to conclude,

why any encounter requires completing

~

“Merlin might say ‘fashion a mind that rises!”

“He is always one for witticism and tag.”

“He means you’ve to avoid unpleasant surprises,

by flying above the silt and drag.”

~

“My friend, you already know the truth within,

the revelation one’s heart keeps close.”

“It is not necessary to digest the entire soul,

only differentiate where it suffers most.”

~

“Master Scribe you prescribe for Veritas.”

“You are subject to a higher level of truth.”

“You’ve no need to dwell on the superfluous within.”

“Focus your mind on being the sleuth.”

~

“Sleuth,” the Soothsayer soothed out a sigh,

“Truth,” Jake replied rather subtly.

“I only need see what must be resolved,” he said,

“not what is growing old and dusty.”

~

“Exactly,” I said, “I knew you’d get it!”

I added, “being Merlin’s prodigy,”

“Thank you Jake,” said the Scribe facing me.

“For providing me with insightful company.”

~

“And Astrology, psychology, pathology, methodology,”

He paused for a smoke on his pipe.

“Also a nip of theology, borrowed terminology, and

friendly help with a moan and gripe.”

~

“Merlin is a great man Master Scribe.”

“Hg is simply out of this world.”

“But don’t imagine it was easy for either of them,

when their fledgling feathers were unfurled.”

~

“One forgets they started out by not ever knowing.”

“Yet arose as icons of legend and fable.”

“It is a matter of perspective my winged friend.”

“You must sharpen your focus as you’re now able.”

~

Master Scribe was moved by our timely chat.

He sat staring through me to the other side.

Beyond the hypnotic gaze, the penetrative stare,

There was only happiness in his eyes.

~

“You are a good man Jake,” he said to me.

“A good man through and through.”

“With solid foundations for your charming rogue.”

“And for the emerging nature of you.”

~

“Your question for Lady Veritas, when did Truth begin?”

He paused leaving me waiting for something more.

“Twas when you offered up your place by the fireside,

to the Scarab Beetle on the floor.”

~~~~~*~~~~~

Photography/Artwork by Dewin Nefol

 

 

Thoughts on Theosophy: As Above so Below

~ As above, so Below ~By ~ G. R. S. Mead ~

~ Originally appeared in ~ The Theosophical Review ~ Vol 34) ~

~~~

Heaven above, heaven below;
stars above, stars below;
all that is above, thus also below;
understand this and be blessed.

~~~

“As above, so below” — a “great word,” a sacramental phrase, a saying of wisdom, an aphorism, a mystic formula, a fundamental law – or a two-edged sword of word-fence, that will probably do the wielder serious damage if he is not previously put through careful training in its handling?

Whether this famous “word” is of Hermetic origin or no, we will not stay formally to enquire. In essence it is probably as old as human thought itself. And as probably, the idea lying underneath it has been turned topsy-turvy more frequently than any other of the immortal company.

“As above, so below” doubtless enshrines some vast idea of analogical law, some basis of true reason, which would sum up the manifold appearances of things into one single verity; but the understanding of the nature of this mystery of manifoldness from the one – all one and one in all—is not to be attained by careless thinking, or by some lucky guess, or by the pastime of artificial correspondencing. Indeed, if the truth must out, in ninety-nine cases of a hundred, when one uses this phrase to clinch an argument, we find that we have begged the question from the start, ended where we began, and asserted the opposite of our logion. Instead of illumining, not only the subject we have in hand, but all subjects, by a grasp of the eternal verity concealed within our saying, we have reversed it into the ephemeral and false proposition: “As below, so above,” Deus, verily, inversus est demon; and there’s the devil to pay. But fortunately there is some compensation even in this in an illogical age; for, as all the mystic world knows, Demon is nothing else but deus inversus.

Yes, even along our most modern lines of thought, even in propositions and principles that are, with every day, coming more and more into favour in the domain of practical philosophizing, we find our ageless aphorism stood upon its head with scantiest ceremony.

In the newest theology, in the latest philosophy, we find a strong tendency to revive the ancient idea that man is the measure of the universe – whether we call this concept pragmatism or by any other name that sounds “as sweet”. “As below,” then, “so above.” In fact we do not seem to be able to get away from this inversion. We like it thus turned upside down; and I am not altogether sure that, even for the keenest-minded of us, it is not an excellent exercise thus to anthropomorphize [In the sense of Anthropos of course, and not of his carcase.] the universe, and to fling the shadow of his best within on to the infinite screen of the appearance of the things without. For is not man kin really with all these – worlds, systems, elements, and spaces, infinitudes, and times and timelessness?

But this way of looking at the thing does not as a rule bother the beginner in mystic speculation. Fascinated with some little-known fact of the below, marveling at some striking incident that has come under his notice – striking, fascinating for him, of course – he usually puts a weight upon it that it cannot bear, exaggerates a particular into a universal, and with a desperate plunge of joy images that he has finally arrived at truth – taking his topsy-turvy “as below” for the eternal “as above”. He does not yet realize that, had he truly reached to that “above,” he would know not only the solitary below that has come dazzlingly into his cosmos, but every other “below” of the same class.

But again from this height of “philosophizing” let us come down to mystic commonplace. Of things physical we have certain definite knowledge, summed up in the accurate measurement and observations, and general mechanical art of modern science. Beyond this domain, for mechanical science there is ‘x’; for the ‘seeing” mystic there is not ‘x’, but an indefinite series of phases of subtler and subtler sensations. Now, as every intelligent reader knows, it is just the nature of these extra normal impressions that is beginning to be critically investigated on the lines of the impersonal method and justly belauded by all scientific workers.

In this domain, of such intense interest to many students of Theosophy, how shall we say our “as above” applies? And here let us start at the beginning; that is to say, the first discrete degree beyond the physical – the psychic or so-called “astral”. What constitutes this a discrete degree? Is it in reality a discrete degree? And by discrete I mean: is it discontinuous with the physical? That is to say, is there some fundamental change of kind between the two? “East is east, and West is west”; Astral is astral, and Physical is physical. But how? Sensationally only, or is it also rationally to be distinguished?

The first difficulty that confronts us is this: that, however keen a man’s subtler senses may be, no matter how highly “clear-seeing” he may have become – I speak, of course, only of what has come under my own personal observation and from the general literature of the subject, [Of vision and apocalyptic proper, of course, and not of the subjective seeing or recalling of physical scenes.] he seems unable to convey his own immediate experience clearly to a second person, unless, of course that second person can “see” with the first. Try how he may, he is apparently compelled to fall back on physical terms in which to explain; nay, it is highly probable that all that has been written on the “astral” has produced no other impression on non-psychic readers than that it is a subtler phase of the physical. And this presumably, because the very seer himself, in explaining the impressions he registers to himself, that is, to his physical consciousness, has to translate them into the only forms that consciousness can supply, namely physical forms. Indeed, there seems to be a gulf fixed between psychic and physical, so that those impressions which would pass from thence to us, cannot. In other words, they cannot, in the very nature of things, come naked into this world; they must be clothed.

Now if this is true, if this is an unavoidable fact in nature, then the very nature of the astral is removed from the nature of the physical by an unbridgeable gulf: “East is east, and West is west.” But is it really true? Is it only that, so far, no one is known who can bridge the gulf perfectly? Or supposing even that there be those who can so bridge it, is it that they are unable to make their knowledge known to others simply because these others cannot bridge the gulf in their own personal consciousness, and therefore cannot follow the continuum of their more gifted brethren?

But even supposing there is a continuity from physical to astral, it would seem that we must, so to speak, go there, and that it cannot come here. In other words, the astral cannot be precisely registered in the physical, the image cannot exactly reproduce the prototype; for if it could, the one would be the other. What then is the nature of the difference of quality or of degree? How, again, we ask, does astral really differ from physical? Can we in this derive any satisfaction from speculations concerning the so-called “fourth dimension” of matter?

This is a subject of immense difficulty, and I do not propose to enter into anything but its outermost court; in fact, I am incapable of doing so. All that I desire to note for the present is that all analogies between “flatland” and our three-dimensional space, and between the latter and the presupposed fourth-dimensional stage, are based upon the most flagrant petitio principii. It is a case of “As below, so above,” in excelsis. “Flatland – space of two dimensions, plus the further gratuitous assumption of two-dimensional beings who have their being and their moving therein – is inconceivable as matter of any kind. A superficies is – an idea; it is not a thing of the sensible world. We can conceive a superficies in our minds; it is a mental concept, it is not a sensible reality. We can’t see it, nor taste it, nor hear it, nor smell it, nor touch it. Our two-dimensional beings are not only figments of the imagination, they are absolutely inconceivable as entities; they can’t be conscious of one another, for in the abstract concept called a surface, there can be no position from the standpoint of itself and things like it, but only from the standpoint of another. Even the most primitive sense of touch would be non-existent for our “flatlanders,” for there would be nothing to touch. And so on, and so forth.

Therefore, to imagine how three-dimensional things would appear to the consciousness of a flatlander, and from this by analogy to try to construct four-dimensional things from a series of three-dimensional phenomena, is apparently a very vicious circle indeed. We can’t get at it that way; we have to seek another way, a very different “other way,” apparently, by means of which we may get out of three dimensions into – what? Into – two, either way or every way? Who knows?

Anyway, the later Platonic School curiously enough called the “astral” the “plane”; basing themselves on one of the so-called Chaldean Oracles: “Do not soil the spirit nor turn the plane into the solid”; where the “spirit” corresponds apparently to what modern Theosophical terminology calls the “etheric,” and the “plane” to the “astral”. As Psellus says, in commenting on this logion: “The Chaldeans clothed the soul in two vestures: the one they called the spirituous, which is woven for it (as it were) out of the sensible body; the other the radiant, subtle and impalpable, which they call the plane.” [See my Orpheus p 283 London 1896)

Higher than this were the “lines’ and “points,” all of which pertained presumably to the region of mind.

What, then, again we ask, is the “astral” proper as compared with the physical? How do things appear to themselves on the astral proper; for so far; in the very nature of things, whenever we talk “down here” of the astral we have to talk of it in terms of the physical? In what, to use a famous term of ancient philosophizing, consists its otherness”? Is “otherness” in this to be thought of and distinguished by a gulf in matter; a gap – which seems to be an absurdity, for “nature does not leap”; she also “abhors a vacuum,’ und so weiter, along this line of aphorism. Here again we are confronted with the other side of the shield, with the unavoidable intuition that there is a continuum in matter; that if it were possible magically to propel a human entity into space, he would successively leave his various “vehicles” [Or rather, to speculate more precisely, the molecules of some, the atoms of others, the electrons of others, and so on and so forth.] in the spheres of the atmosphere and elements, while, as in the case of John Brown, his soul would “go marching on” until it arrived at the last limit – whenever or wherever that may be, in a universe that ever at every point enters into itself.

However this may be, there is no doubt that the idea of a cosmic “stuff” or “matter ” – whatever such terms may mean – rolled up continuously into itself, as in the diagram of the atom so familiar to students of Modern Theosophy – is exceedingly illuminative, if thought of as a symbol of force-systems. All things, then, would appear to be solidified down here by the “sky’s being rolled up carpet-wise,” to paraphrase the Upanishat. The “above” has thus been “involved” into the “below”; and if we could only follow the process, perchance we should then be able faintly to understand the truth underlying our aphorism. Then, and then only, in the most serious and literal meaning of it, and not in the sarcastic sense of the writer, or rather singer, of the shvetâshvataropanishat:”when, carpet-wise, the sky, men shall roll up; then (only, not till then) shall end of sorrow be, without men knowing God,” [Shvetâshvataropanisht, vi, 20. See The Upanishats (Mead and Chatterji’s Trans) II, 97] for then, perchance, they would be God.

Now as a matter of fact this continuum of matter is the ground on which all scientific thinking is based; perpetual and continuous transformation, but no sudden leaps – orderly evolution, no miraculous or uncaused, spontaneous surprises. And if this be true, it follows that some day the direct line of “descent” from astral to physical will be controlled mechanically by human invention, and the astral would be made visible to even the most hopelessly profane from a psychic standpoint; and not only so, but the errors of human observation, which vitiate all present psychic investigation, will be obviated, in as marvelous a fashion as the errors of physical observation are now eliminated by the wonderfully delicate instruments already devised by human ingenuity.

This seems immediately to follow from the major premise of our present speculation; but somehow or other I am by no means satisfied that this will be the case. Is our salvation to be dependent upon machines? Dei ex mchinis indeed!

But what has all this to do with “As above, so below”? Why, this: If the sensible world rises by stages – from this gross state, familiar to us by our normal senses, through ever finer and finer grades of matter, we finally reach – ay, there is the rub; what do we reach? Where do we start? The truth of the matter is – be it whispered lowly – you can’t think it out in terms of matter. But take the “ever so thin” idea for the moment as sufficiently indefinite for any mystic who is not a metaphysician, using the latter term in the old, old way, where physis included all nature that is natura, the field of becoming.

“As above, so below”— how many stages above? Let us say seven, to be in the fashion. The “above” will then be very nebulous presumably, a sort of “spherical” “primitive streak,” from the within without – but a “primitive streak” in its own mode and fashion, and differing presumably toto coelo from the primitive streak that first appears in physical embryology. There may be “correspondence,” but that correspondence must be traced through numerous orders of “matter”; the very next succeeding order to the physical already acting as force, or energy, to the matter which falls beneath our normal senses. Here we are again, at the very outset, face to face with the “astral” ‘x’ — which, compared with the physical, should perhaps be regarded as a “system of forces,” rather than as a mould of the same fashion and form as the physical. And if this view is, at any rate, one stage nearer the reality than the interpretation of the astral by purely physical imagery and symbolism – what can possibly be the nature of our spherical “primitive streak” stage; when already at the first remove we beggar all our possibilities of description?

For we certainly do not get much “forrarder” by simply flinging the picture of the physical, as it were, on to a series of mirrors which differ from one another only in the distance they are removed one from another. At any rate, it seems so to the reflecting mind of man; though maybe it seems quite as natural to his subtler senses so to speak of their experience when he converses physically about them.

Let it be understood once for all that I have not the slightest pretension in any way to decide between these apparently eternal oppositions – the sense and the reason; indeed, I have a private belief that it would be most unseemly and disastrous to attempt to separate the eternal spouses of this sacred marriage; not only unseemly but sacrilegious to do so – perchance even the sin against the Holy Ghost. Hand in hand, nay, in the most intimate of all unions, must they ever go together, for ever giving birth to the true Man – who is their common source.

Still, it is ever of advantage continuously to keep before our minds the question: What is a prototype; what is a paradigm; what a logos — a reason; what an idea? What, for instance, is the autozôon, the animal itself, as compared with all animals; what the ever the “same,” as compared with all the “others”?

Here, to help us, the intuition of things that underlay the philosophizing of the Western world at its birth in conscious reasoning – from the time of Pythagoras onwards – comes forward with its setting of the noumenal over against the sensible or phenomenal – the mind over against the soul. The characteristic of the pure mind is that it “sees,” not another, but itself, and knows it ever “sees” itself. It is the “plane of truth” — wherever are the paradigms, and ideas, and reasons of all things — and when we say “where”” we do not mean that it is a place or space, for it is the everlasting causation of these, and is not conditioned by them, but self-conditions itself.

It would be too long, it would be too difficult, for me to attempt to write on such a sublime theme in these stray thoughts. One thing alone I have desired to call attention to; it is the careless translation of terms into consciousness, and the danger of falling too deeply into the habit of what Stallo calls the “reification of ideas”. For when you have “reified” your ideas, be it gravity, or atomicity, or vibration, you have only got the shadow and not the substance; the appearance, the phenomenon, and not the underlying truth, the noumenon.

It will be already seen that even in this short paper I have used the same words in totally different senses; for when I speak of the sacred marriage of mind and sense, I am using “mind” in a different sense from “the mind” of which I have just been speaking, which in this sense stands for the Self, the âtman of Hindu philosophy.

But no matter how we use our words – and who that loves wisdom is so foolish as to quarrel about words?—it seems to be an inexpugnable position in right reason, that that “sight” which reveals to man the “reasons” of things is a higher and more divine possession than that “sight” which sees the sensible forms of things, no matter how exquisitely beautiful and grandiose such forms may be. And when I say “sees” the “reasons” of things, do I mean the intellectual grasping of some single explanation, some formula, some abstraction? By no means; I mean by “reason” logos — I mean that when we “see” the “reasons” of things, we see our “selves” in all things; for our true selves are the true ground of our being, the that in us which constitutes us “Sons of God” – logoi as He is Logos, kin to Him.

“As above, so below.” What, then, is the “above” where there is no place, no direction, no dimension and no time? And is the “above” superior to the “below”? Ah, that is where the mind breaks down, unable to grasp it. Is Eternity greater than Time? Is the Same mightier than the Other? Of course it is, we say, as so many in so many schools have said before. But is it really so? Are we not still in the region of the opposites; neither of which can exist without the other, and each of which is co-equal with the other? We are still in the region of words — words in this case, not reasons; though the same word does duty for both in Greek — logos; showing yet once again that in verity demon est deus inversus.

No words indeed can tell of Him, or of That if you so prefer, though the neuter gender is as little appropriate as the masculine. “Thou that art to be worshiped in silence alone!” As Thou art above, so art Thou below; as Thou art in Thyself, so art Thou in Man; as Thyself is in Thee, so is Thy Man in Thyself – now and for ever.

~~~

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Base Matters

By the very nature of our capricious existence I think we are all uncertain and transient creatures. We live, we love, we elapse and sometimes we disappear altogether or die, but always we are fugitives of ephemeral and temporaral circumstance and our lives little more than a procession of fleeting moments of fugacious impermanence. That is the reality of being a single drop of evanescent life briefly distilled from an expansive ocean of potentiality rippling upon a ball of rock and iron called Earth hurtling at unprecedented speed through an unimaginably vast universe at the authoritative command of unseen and unknowable forces. I’ve no doubt that it is because we are as caught up within this unstable and flowing carnival of life as we are that few of us ever really find the opportunity to stop for long enough and reflect on the world and actually consider what it means to be a sentient human being persisting as the apex product of Nature’s evolution. In truth I’d go as far as to suggest that we are still just beginning to understand the miracle of living in a world already of an age that defies our comprehension, and evolutionary speaking, remain no more than needful infants still demanding sensationalism and gratification to supersede any degree of understanding and natural wisdom.

Of all the people we come to meet on our respective journeys through this constantly bewildering and contradictory life there are those in whom we find an immense feeling of brotherhood and deep spiritual connection that supports a totally agreeable and singularly unique outlook on the state of this temporal World. And more importantly, such a kinship is often revealed by the permanence and devotion of our endeavours to continually find a way to care about Life and the species we call Mankind who dwell upon our planet Earth.  It is in our individual efforts to persist in our duty to better the world we share which becomes the common denominator existing between like-minded souls. We persist in the same way as they persist. Such people are blessed with inspired hearts and deeply feeling souls because they have been assigned a duty to help lead Mankind forward once more in the true spirit of freedom, towards an engagement with the imagination and a more honest expression of humankind’s true values and unlimited worth.

It takes a brave man to remain true to achieving such personalised goals, and a braver soul still to maintain buoyancy in the man who delivers such truth to a remorseless world currently doing its best to dilute the gift of Life through perfidy, manipulation, deceit, lies despair,  scientific reductionism and cerebral dominance. All Warriors of Light who ride out to confront these anti-representational dogs of war, ride out together as a single voice under the one last remaining banner of freedom called Imagination that demands and promotes Creativity, Innovation, Ingenuity, Originality, Unorthodoxy, Nonconformity, and most important of all, Individuality and opportunity for uncensored Self-Expression. Without it humanity disappears under the veil of an imposed and wholly subjective appreciation of acceptability and artistic strangulation born from the despotic minds of the few with the power to dictate terms to the majority. Censorship must never fall foul to political ambition, financial prosperity, nor at the expense of silencing the voice of mankind’s consciousness. When Art is subordinate to the regimes that restrict it’s exhibition because it does not fit in with a governments agenda then realistically the last bastion of an individual’s right to freedom is removed with it. And that pretty much leaves only pay-by-the-hour taxation on the air we breathe and rental charges on the force of gravity.

I think there are thousands and thousands of Artists out there who have the mechanisms already in place by which to reach the wider world, and in utilising these widely available technological means just one man can reach in to the hearts, minds and souls of hundreds and thousands of other people and in so doing perpetuate the upsurge of positive change that has already started to gain weight and which will eventually lead mankind out of the darkness of his fading enlightenment and back in to the celestial spaces of his higher consciousness. Art has that power, as does Authorship, Photography, Illustration, Film and Animation, in fact ALL creative endeavours that express something about the human condition offer the opportunity to convey hugely powerful messages that can be easily absorbed and widely understood because they are archetypal and resonate within us all. Such outstandingly creative souls must do all they can to reach still further beyond the contrived conventions of our time in search of all possible means to depict an elusive future World called Earth that perpetually reminds civilization of the wonder of our once blessed innocence as it existed at the dawn of Mankind’s forgotten birth.

When the wings of an imaginative mind can carry a man on a flight out beyond the edges of visible Space to imagine brave new worlds thriving in infant galaxies, and when that same mind can then look back with tear filled eyes and realise what the shining green and blue stone of planet Earth really is: a beautiful heavenly body undifferentiated in its loving creation by disparity, inequality, inequity, or pain, and supporting an abundance of unique life forms, of which Humankind is but one temporary life force occupying its surface, then I truly believe from the bottom of my heart that the self-imposed structures of Life that we design, implement, naively encourage, and which we are born in to and so foolishly perpetuate on Earth would not even exist at all. Instead of the violence, hatred, bloodshed, and immense suppression of our species we would still be living in Milton’s lost paradise and already be journeying to other world’s by the power of just our own minds. After all, it is not the physical body that needs to move through time and space to arrive on the surface of a distant star, it is only our mind. And in much the same way, it is not our physical body which needs to change to accommodate a fresh new perspective on life either, it is also only our collective mind.

Michael Collins, the pilot of the Apollo mission carrying Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin to the surface of the Moon is one of the few men to have seen such a beautiful sight. He had this to say:

“I really believe that if the political leaders of the world could see their  planet from space, say from a distance of 100,000 miles above its surface, their outlook would be fundamentally  changed. That all-important border would be invisible, that noisy argument  silenced. The tiny globe would continue to turn, serenely ignoring its  subdivisions, presenting a unified façade that would cry out for unified understanding, for homogeneous treatment. The Earth must become as it appears: blue and white, not Capitalist or Communist; blue and white, not rich or poor; blue and white, not envious or envied.”

Coming from a man who has actually journeyed to another world, I find these words very powerful, and certainly humbling, and I think for anyone with the ability to hold onto a more positive vision of mankind’s future, such words should be spoken daily in reverence of who and what we all could be, and in shame and disgrace at what we have unwittingly become: a self-satisfying and parasitic species destroying our planet by inflating our bodies and our ego’s on convenience living, lust, greed, sloth, and easy virtue, and shrinking our minds by accepting so readily a never ending stream of imposed concepts, beliefs and contrived teachings that on many occasions form the basis of indoctrination and control of the masses. Michael Collins message longs to be disseminated amongst the World’s Powers as a reminder of just how small and intellectually wanting we truly are and how foolish our species is to remain so fixated on our base desires when in truth our supressed higher faculties could ultimately deliver us all from such unnecessary self-imposed bondage. When as a species we can be so insidiously manipulated into allowing our children to feel excited by the prospect of signing their name on the warheads of bombs and rockets that are destined to be dropped on other people’s children, then mankind has well and truly fallen from the grace of Love and there is literally no further we can descend in to depravity and moral wickedness. No other species on our planet is as gifted as human beings are gifted, no other species has the potential to influence and change this wondrous world and yet we are the only species on this one and only planet that chooses without guilt or remorse to accept the command of others to kill in the insidious name of personal wealth, lust and greed.

Millions of years ago, it was just one ‘seed of light’ that came forth from a sea of potential to create the One universe of Man. And just one Seed of Light can again be all that is needed to open up a fissure in the hearts and minds of our collective consciousness that is big enough for the superlative brilliance of mankind’s artistic imagination and creativity to burst through and offer a prophetic vision of hope and a certainty for the return of a state of balance, respect, and honour in our world which would be far more effective than any amount of Political hot air and contrived nonsense would ever be in ensuring the transformation of our human race. In carrying out such a vastly responsible undertaking, one imagines the Artists, Writers, Poets, Visionaries, and Seers unified as a single voice, marching together and carrying their craftsman’s tools like Staff’s of Redemption with the intention of heralding in a more beautifully inspired New World: one based on Beauty, Harmony, Spirituality, Compassion, Empathy, Feeling, Emotion, Equity, Equipoise, Equality, and most importantly Love. It would indeed be the greatest miracle in the world.

DN – 17/03/14