Theosophical Jewels: The Path of Action

Philaletheians UK · Constitution of Man Series · 1 page

The first of a matched pair, and best seen next to The Path of Renunciation. The beads run in a long curve that darkens as it travels: beginning at the right with clear amber and tortoiseshell stones and a bright banded red bead, then through orange and pink to deep green and blue-green, and closing at the left in near-black beads with two large white stones set among them.

The caption reads: The Path of Action, descending Arc of Consciousness, from Light to Darkness. The direction is what distinguishes it from its companion, and the distinction is one the section's prose keeps returning to — the descent of spirit into matter treated in The Voice of the Will as the Fall of Spirit into generation, and in Oedipus and Sphinx unriddled as the ray imprisoned in an impure body. The two white stones near the dark end are the visual point: even at the far end of the descending arc the light is not extinguished. The section list offers the plate both as a PDF and as a JPEG.

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