Adventures of the Metaphysical Atom

Helena Petrovna Blavatsky · Secret Doctrine's Third Proposition Series · 127 pages

*One hundred and twenty-seven pages, the second largest file in this section, opened by a full abstract and train of thoughts with every position carrying its page number. A headnote gives the vocabulary the whole file depends on: atomon or atmeton* are the Greek words for indivisible; the atom may be described as a compact or crystallised point of divine energy and ideation; a molecule is an imprisoned force, existing periodically and, being divisible, regarded as illusion; and Monas is the Pythagorean name for Hermetic Fire, the quintessence of life.

The distinction between atom and molecule is the hinge of the argument, and it is metaphysical rather than chemical: the atom is treated as a point of ideation and the molecule as its imprisoned and divisible expression, so that what physics studies is the second while occultism speaks of the first. The Point in the Mundane Egg is said to represent matter in its abstract sense, and the file is careful to say what that does not mean — it must not be understood as applying to any particular point in space, since a germ exists in the centre of every atom and these collectively form the Germ. Fohat then carries the rest of the exposition. Described as cosmic electricity, Fohat is said to infuse energy into primordial matter, electrifying it into life and scattering it into atoms; it is through Fohat that the ideas of the Universal Mind are impressed upon matter. In its primary aspect Fohat is called the transcendental binding unity of all cosmic energies, on the unseen as on the manifested planes, whose action resembles that of a living force created by will — and its influence on our own plane is said to be felt in the magnetic and active force generated by strong human wishes. Because the file is so long and so fully indexed, it works better as something to consult than to read straight through; a reader wanting the same doctrine in short compass should start with "Blavatsky on the Force of the Mineral Monas" in this section instead.

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