Dion Fortune - The Cosmic Doctrine.pdf

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MILLENIUM PREFACE
The Cosmic Doctrine is a condensed blueprint outline of God’s manifestation in this creation.
Complex indeed! But what has tended to bother some about the Cosmic Doctrine teaching has been
the almost total emphasis in explaining evolution simply as being the psychic nuts and bolts of
God. Leaving one with the impression that God may be reduced from a Great and Infinite Being to
a kind of mechanical
Newtonian clockwork. However there is much more to it than that. The higher up the planes you
go, although esoteric theory tends to describe it as all more abstract, in actual fact things become so
much more complex, vibrant, vivid, bursting, and brimming with life in incredible profusion. It is
another form
of experience however. The broadest, though simple, analogy would be to liken the existence on the
higher levels as something after the order of a Bach fugue - which could indeed seem to some a
rather dry abstraction, but which to the attuned and educated ear is a revelation of divinity, harmony
and
celestial order. The reality is not easy to describe in concepts, let alone in words. How best to
describe a rainbow to a blind man?
CONTENTS.
Introduction By Dion Fortune
Section I.
THE EVOLUTION OF THE COSMOS.
Chapter 1. The First Manifestation
Chapter 2. The First Trinity.
Chapter 3. The Building of the Atom.
Chapter 4. The Evolution of the Atom.
Chapter 5. The Genesis of a Solar System.
Chapter 6. Cosmic Influences on a Solar System.
Section II.
THE EVOLUTION OF THE LOGOS AND HIS REGENTS.
Chapter 7. The Evolution of a Great Entity.
Chapter 8. The Relation of a Great Entity to the Cosmos.
Chapter 9. The Projection of the Concept of the Universe.
Chapter 10. The Relation between the Projected Image and the Logoidal Consciousness.
Chapter 11. Auto-reactions and Cosmic Memory.
Chapter 12. The Birth of consciousness in the Universe.
Chapter 13. The Beginnings of Mind and Group Consciousness.
Chapter 14. The Seed-atom Building a Seventh Plane Body.
Chapter 15. Evolution of the First Planetary Form.
Chapter 16. Evolution of the Lords of Flame, Form and Mind.
Chapter 17. The Influence of the Regents upon the Globes.
Chapter 18. The Goal of Evolution of a Life Swarm.
Section III.
INFLUENCES UNDER WHICH THE EVOLUTION OF HUMANITY IS CONDUCTED.
Chapter 19. Tabulated Summary of Influences.
Chapter 20. Cosmic Influences.
Chapter 21. The Logoidal Relation to the Manifested Universe.
Chapter 22. Influences of the Manifested Universe.
Chapter 23. Teaching Concerning Other Evolutions inhabiting a Planet Simultaneously.
Chapter 24. Influences which Humanity exerts upon Itself.
Chapter 25. The Law of Action and Reaction.
Chapter 26. The Law of Limitation.
Chapter 27. The Law of Seven Deaths.
Chapter 28. The Law of Impactation, or the Transmission of Action from one Plane to another.
Chapter 29. The Law of the Aspects of Force, or Polarity.
Chapter 30. The Law of the Attraction of Outer Space.
Chapter 31. The Law of the Attraction of the Center.
Section 1.
Chapter I.
The First Manifestation.
Knowledge falls into two divisions - the record of facts and the explanation thereof. Knowledge can
only consist of that which is present in the mind. That which does not enter the mind cannot be
known. Therefore you can only know that which you have senses to
interpret to you. As new senses open up, more planes of existence can be known. There is, however,
a limit to the knowledge of the finite. Perception ceases at the barrier of manifestation. Of that
which lies beyond we can only know by analogy.
The Unmanifest is pure existence. We cannot say of It that it is Not. Although it is not manifest it
Is. It is the source from which all arises. It is the only `Reality’. It alone is substance. It alone is
stable. All else is an appearance and a becoming. Of this Unmanifest we can only say IT IS. IT is
the verb `to be’ turned back upon itself. IT is a state of pure `being’ without qualities and without
history. All we can say of IT is that it is not anything that we know, for if we know anything it must
be in manifestation for us to know it, and if it is in manifestation it is not unmanifest. Therefore the
very fact that we can know it proves that it is not unmanifest. The Unmanifest is the Great
Negation; at the same time it is the infinite potentiality which has not occurred. It is best conceived
of under the image of inter-stellar space.
In the occult teachings you have been given certain images, under which you are instructed to think
of certain things. These images are not descriptive but symbolic, and are designed to train the mind,
not inform it. Therefore you may think of the Unmanifest as inter-stellar space; and of the Logos as
a Sun surrounded by His Solar System of Planets and of the emanations of the Logos as Rays. The
Unmanifest is the only Unity. Manifestation begins when duality occurs. The prime duality is
`Space’ and `Movement’. The first manifestation was a current in space. The metaphor I must use
may convey nothing to your mind. All I can say is that space was moving. You will find these clues
are a clue to much.
Now when space moves it has this peculiar quality - being frictionless it never loses momentum but
continues to flow.
When space moves two forces are at work:- (a) The force which causes it to move, being the desire
of space for momentum.(b) The force which had hitherto caused it not to move,
being the desire of space for inertia. These two factors are present in all motion , but the
desire for movement, being the stronger, overcomes the desire for inertia, and the desire for inertia
continues as a check upon the movement. Therefore the movement is pulled upon slightly. That is
why there is no such thing as a straight line in the Cosmos. All movement therefore has a slight
curve in its projection, therefore eventually it returns to the spot whence it started, and forms a
spinning ring.
Now the prime movement is just a flowing of space that returns after long eons whence it started,
and then renews its journey. This sets up a spinning belt of enormous circumference. This belt spins
on one plane for immense eons of time; spins with a changeless spinning. But its tendency is to
communicate its motion to the space about it, which leads more space to flow into the spinning (all
this, remember, is metaphor). The spinning in one plane continues until the stresses which it
generates evoke a new movement, and a second current in space is set up at right angles to the first,
and the same process is repeated. These spinning planes of force may be conceived of as resembling
the Rings of Saturn. We have now two spinning planes which, at two points cut each other, and it is
worthy of note that the second plane forms outside the first and is therefore larger in diameter. For
countless eons these planes spin at right angles to each other, and the whole of evolution turns upon
the difference in size between the planes. When the larger has got up to the same speed as the
smaller and older, it commences to attract one aspect of it, the consequence being that the older
circle is drawn towards the newer.
Now the first circle must be conceived of as having an upper and a lower surface. The upper surface
of the outflowing arc may be conceived of as positive and the lower as negative. The reverse being
the case in the inflowing arc. Likewise with the second circle to arise. These circles are mutually
attracting and repelling each other; so that you conceive the upper surface of the outflowing arc of
the first circle, being positive, rising up towards its corresponding aspect in the second circle, and
the lower circle in the returning arc pressing downwards, so that you get a second movement
imparted to the spinning disc. When this secondary movement has completed its first circuit and set
up its steady revolution, the new Cosmos is in being. That is the prime beginning of a Cosmos
expressed in the nearest approximate metaphor.
The secondary spin of the first circuit is the Ring-Pass-Not, and the circuit of the second formation
is that sphere which sets a bound to Chaos. On the outer sphere there is a secondary derivation, and
though a spinning circle of motion, represents for that Cosmos, the prime stillness, - the immobility
in which it is rooted; - it is the thrust-block of the force of the Cosmos, that which resists, which
alone enables momentum to be achieved and you may call it the Ring-Chaos the prime evil. It is
evolved from the reaction of the prime force in order to take its thrust. It spins at right angles to the
prime spin. It counteracts it. It was the attraction of the Ring-Chaos inducing a secondary spin in the
Ring-Cosmos which forms the Ring-Pass-Not.
Now that movement in the Ring-Cosmos, spinning in one plane and rotating while it spins as if
upon an axis, sets the bounds beyond which the creatures of that universe cannot pass, even in
thought. But this universe is a sphere encircled by two lines of force - the Ring-Cosmos and the
Ring Chaos - rotating at right angles to each other. The momentum of the Ring-Cosmos is the
source of force from which evolution draws its momentum; and the rotation of the Ring-Chaos is
the source of force from which dissolution draws its power.
Evolution is a thrust from the surface towards the center. Devolution, or Dissolution is a suction
into outer space. The Ring-Chaos does not belong to the universe it encircles, but to outer space.
That is an important point in connection with it. The Ring-Cosmos has its desires turned towards
the sphere it encircles.
The Ring-Chaos has its desires turned towards the space that encircles it. The Ring-Cosmos seeks to
extend the center. The Ring-Chaos seeks to expand the circumference. The Ring-Cosmos tends to
solidify by contraction. The Ring-Chaos to return to the Unmanifest, whence it arose, and therefore,
if its influence were unchecked, to reduce the universe it encircles to nothingness. The Ring-
Cosmos, if its influence were unchecked, would be static in the immediate present. These two
influences are the source of all the force in the Cosmos - The Ring-Cosmos because it concretes -
builds up. The Ring-Chaos because it diffuses - never grows.
Now these two Rings we will call Good and Evil; Life and Death; Light and Darkness; Spirit and
Matter; Being and Not-Being; God and Devil; because each of these potencies has its root in its
respective Ring. But let it be clearly conceived that the Ring “Good” and the Ring “Evil” are not
good and evil as you understand them, but merely spinning circles of force at right angles to each
other, and therefore in opposition, and it is merely the angle of the first to arise which is called
“good” and the angle in opposition to the prime plane is called “evil” and it might well be that in
another Cosmos the first plane would begin to spin at another angle - the angle of your ”evil”, it
would still be ”good” to its Cosmos, because “good” and “evil” do not depend upon any plane or
angle, but are simply relative to each other. The first force to arise is called “good” because, from it
arises the line of force called evolution. All subsequent secondary forces are measured by that
standard. In so far as they move in the same angle they are reckoned to be ”good”. In so far as they
approach to a right angle they are reckoned to be in opposition and are called “evil”. Evil is simply
that which is moving in the opposite direction to evolution. Evil is that which approaches the plane
of movement of the Ring-Chaos and therefore tends to revert to the Unmanifest. All evil that builds
up with a universe is attracted towards the Ring-Chaos and is self- destroyed, because the very
name ”evil” means a force which tends to non-existence.
So you can conceive of evil under two aspects:- (a) That which enables you to lock up the forces of
good by opposition, and so secure stability - a foot-hold. Evil enables you to get a purchase on
space. (b) Evil, if allowed to function unopposed, is the `Scavenger of the Gods’ therefore said the
Great One, our Master, “resist not evil”. When you resist evil you lock up good. You lock up
the force of good which holds the evil inert. This serves no useful purpose, unless you have a
superabundance of good which shall stand upon the platform thus formed and leap up from it to
greater heights. Therefore it is not enough to meet hate with love - evil with good. This is the course
of the ignorant and the reason why esoteric religion has made so little impression in the world. You
must hate with hate sufficiently to cause a locking up of the force. You must hate the hate and,
having rendered evil inert by opposition, the love can take its stand upon the firm platform and use
it as a thrust-block.
Therefore you only oppose evil when you wish to do constructive work - when you wish to make
something new. You never oppose the evil when you wish to destroy. You make a vacuum round it.
You prevent opposition from touching it. Then, being unopposed, it is free to follow the law of its
own nature, which is, to join the motion of the Ring-Chaos. It, therefore, passes out to the periphery
of the universe until it meets the spin of the Ring-Pass-Not which it cannot get through, but it has
gone to a place of such primitive simplicity that it is resolved into its own elements, and these
elements are drawn into the attraction of the nearest motion, which is the nature of the Ring-
Cosmos, which is the nature of good.
Therefore evil, when unopposed, resolves itself into the undifferentiated raw material of existence -
the first form of manifestation. It ceases to be organized. It ceases to have qualities. It starts afresh
at the beginning, transmuted through neutrality into good. It is the spin of these two Rings which
give the influences that play upon creation. You are now in a position to know why the mystery of
evil is the secret of the initiates, because when you understand evil it is exceedingly useful. But the
undisciplined man, if he knew the usefulness and goodness of evil, would use it dynamically on the
positive side of its manifestation, not statically by availing himself of its negative qualities as does
the Initiate.
You see, it is a matter of geometry. That is why numbers are so important, and remember, numbers
in occultism refer to the degrees of angles. The degrees of the numbers of White occultism are
marked in the Ring-Cosmos. The degrees of the numbers of evil are marked in the Ring-Chaos.
Always think of the number in referring to the degree of an angle of two intersecting lines of force,
and remember that when you operate on more than one plane you get the angles of the intersecting
of the planes. You will have more instruction about that. Every plane has three Rings, like the
Cosmos. Also you can get intersections between different types of movement like
Time and Space. These things will be studied later.
Chapter II.
The First Trinity.
You have found, no doubt, that the teaching is abstruse and unfamiliar. Believe me it is more
difficult to give than to receive, for that which is described so greatly transcends the condition upon
which language has been built up, that the very images have to be built in your consciousness
before they can be evoked by any spoken word.
You have to conceive of the Cosmos, in its primal aspect, as consisting of three spinning
movements. All that is nothing but movement - movement in space - pure movement. For the prime
movement which gives rise to all that is, commences before there is anything to move. The Cosmos
then, is bounded by that movement which is called the Ring-Pass-Not. But besides the Ring-Pass-
Not there are movements in two directions. There are the Ring Cosmos and Chaos - good and evil,
and they are the sources of the forces which are known to you by these names. But though these
forces influence that which is within the Ring-Pass-Not, they cannot pass beyond it.
These three Rings are the three `primaries’ of the Cosmos - the first Trinity, that is why the
Supreme Being is always conceived of as a Trinity; and three is the fundamental number.
Everything in the end is reducible to these three influences. Whatever subsequent stresses arise may
be analyzed into the balancing of these three forces:-
(a) The force of the Ring-Cosmos which tends towards the center.
(b) The force of the Ring-Chaos which tends towards outer space.
(c) The force of the Ring-Pass-Not which holds the balance between them and prevents either of
these forces from going to extremes.
The Ring-Pass-Not, however, is derived from the Ring Cosmos and therefore partakes of its nature
rather than of that of the Ring-Chaos.
The Ring-Chaos must always be thought of as having its affinity with the outer space of the
Unmanifest, and a tendency to return to unmanifestation. It looks towards the past, and
ever seeks the conditions of the past. The Ring-Cosmos endeavors to focus, as the Ring-Chaos
endeavors to diffuse. The tendency of the Ring-Cosmos is towards the future.
The Ring-Chaos can never build anything, because whatever forces it may originate diffuse,
unconfined, into outer space, but the Ring-Cosmos, in conjunction with the Ring-Pass-Not conserve
its forces. For the forces which the Ring-Cosmos radiated into that space within its circumference
cannot pass out again because they are confined by the influences of the Ring-Pass-Not. Therefore
they act and interact among themselves producing ever greater and greater elaboration of
influences.
Let us now return to the point in Time when the Ring-Pass-Not had completed its first revolution
and the Cosmos is in being. Any form of force, when it has reached the maximum momentum of its
type of movement, gives rise to the secondary movements which serve to carry off the excess of
force which it is generating, for force begets force when moving under frictionless conditions.
The prime activity is MOVEMENT.
The secondary activity is LIGHT.
The third activity is SOUND.
The movement of the Ring-Cosmos sets up secondary swirls within the area of its influence, its
tendency is to draw more and more space into its spin. It cannot extend itself externally because it is
limited by the sphere of the Ring-Pass-Not, it therefore extends itself internally, so that the spinning
belt finally becomes a spinning disc with the center immobile.
The spinning disc, being rotated by the secondary movement, which is the Ring-Pass-Not, becomes
the spinning sphere. The interaction of the two forms of movement is naturally neutralizing,
consequently there is a break-up of the simple movement of the disc into a series of compromises.
The chief point of activity ceases to be the circumference and becomes the center. Although the
Ring-Cosmos, the Ring-Chaos and the Ring-Pass-Not each continue on one plane, and spin in their
own place, the synthesis of their movements give rise to a series of revolving radii. These radii are

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