Old W.R. - The Law of Cycles

One of the most important aspects of Theosophic study and that which seems to afford the most available proof of the inherent truth of its teachings in regard to cosmogenesis, the creation and destruction of worlds, the out-breathing and in-breathing of the Universal Life, and the orderly array of phenomena which constitute the working out of the design of the Great Architect, is the law of Cycles, or as it is more familiarly known in natural science, the law of periodicity. Wherever we turn, or in whatever direction our studies may take us, we are met with innumerable facts which seem to be so intimately connected with one another, and yet each to be exercising such an appreciable influence upon the course of events in the universe, as to be each and all indispensable to the constitution and sustentation of our very being, and equally so as regards the progress and perfection which the healthy mind contemplates as the heritage of the human race, if not indeed as the natural result of the out-working of a fixed law. And in view of all this we are led to enquire how so many indispensable factors, often found in such fierce conflict with one another, can find each one its place and line of progress in the economy of nature. The chemist sees us surrounded by, and dependent upon, a number of universally diffused elements, a slight modification of whose conditions would render them the powerful and speedy agents of Death. The physiologist has determined by his researches, that our bodies are the playground as well as the workshop of countless little lives, all of which have their laws of being, their rights and privileges, their little loves and pet aversions, their tribal feuds and class distinctions; and what is more important to us, that it needs but a very little interference on our part to make them rise in fierce rebellion and convert our bodies into a field of carnage and distress.

The astronomer can bring within the definition of his lens a revelation of infinitely vaster magnitude. He can point you to worlds and systems in formation, and to others in process of destruction; great systems mightier far than ours, falling into chaos and disappearing from the screen of nature. Nearer to view he can show you how the very earth we live on depends for its continuance upon the exquisite adjustment of each of the planetary bodies as regards orbit, bulk, gravity and motion, in respect to a common centre. Indeed, every department of natural science bears witness to the fact that the constant 464 interplay of forces in nature, and the inter-dependence of the laws which govern them, are responsible for the changes constantly taking place in the condition of all bodies, and thus far the modifications of human life and thought, as well national as individual. But what a field of enquiry is opened up by the word “change”!

How inclusive of all that makes up the happiness or misery of human life on earth is that word! So important indeed does it become to us upon reflection, that our first thoughts of it are mingled with a sense of something akin to fear and uncertainty; for upon first perception of its universal and persistent presence, it seems allied to hope only in proportion as our condition is poor and miserable. But we are reassured when, upon enquiry, we learn that all we see around us is the outcome of the working of changeless laws. But even this assurance does not extend further than the eye can reach, or history chronicle. Up to a certain point in the scale of phenomena change is a correlative of natural law, but once we go beyond the short range of observed and orderly happenings, orderly merely because consistent with all else in our brief experience, the law of change becomes chance, and the repetition of change, coincidence! In short, all that is observed as in process of happening is scientific, and agreeable to the law of change in nature; but all that happens unforeseen is chance, and when repeated, coincidence. And so we find excuses for our ignorance, words for our dictionaries, and stuffing for our craniums. But then we are nothing if not consistent, and if we are “wise in our generation” let it be our excuse that the generation is “scientific”!

The Theosophist views the entire procession of events (whether occurring in the mental, psychic, or physical universe), which makes up the life of humanity, as an unbroken chain of graduated series of links, carried from one eternity to another by a complex but orderly interplay of wheels; he sees that the links are human lives, that the eternities which they bridge over are the past and the future, that the main-spring of action is the pulsing of a hidden Life, and that the wheels by which the two are bound together are the laws of cyclic impulse. For him there is no chance, but all is measured and orderly progression, the working out of a mighty and beautiful design in a universe of Embodied Thought. From the great Manvantara and Pralaya, the outbreathing and inbreathing of the Universe, down to the pulsing of the minutest creature that has life, the cyclic law is in constant operation; and whatever changes take place in human life and consciousness, individual, national, or racial, are due to the conformity of all natural action to this which is primarily the very heart-beat of the Universe.

Some of the more important cycles treated of in Theosophic literature may be brought to our notice in witness of the old Vedic, and later of the Pythagorean statement, that the world is formed and maintained by number. Pythagoras averred that number was the principle of everything, and that 465 nothing but intentional design, regularity, correspondence, beauty, proportion, and harmony, could be perceived in the creation and preservation of the universe. To begin then with the largest cycle treated of in occult philosophy, viz., the Mahâ Kalpa, which includes one hundred days and nights of Brahmâ. It is said to consist of a period of our time represented by a series of fifteen figures – viz., 311,040,000,000,000 (three hundred and eleven billions, and forty thousand millions) of years. At first sight these figures may appear fanciful, but upon resolving them into their constituents they will be found to have a basis in natural phenomena. The least common multiple of the number of days required by the planets Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Earth, Venus, Mercury and the Moon to perform their revolutions round the sun, is 4,320,000 years. At the end of this period they are all in conjunction. This period is called a Mahâ Yuga, the sum of four Yugas or ages known in Western mythology as the Golden, Silver, Copper and iron ages. Now let us see how this is made up. Every complete cycle has its period of activity and latency, its flow and its ebb, represented numerically by the figures 1 and 0, the perfect number 10. One tenth part of the Mahâ Yuga = 430,000 years, which is the duration of the iron age or Kali Yuga. From this as a unit quantity we derive the other ages by an arithmetical progression of 2, 3, 4, thus twice 432,000= 864,000, the length of the copper age or Dvâpara Yuga; 3 times=1,296,000 years, the silver age; and 4 times=1,728,000 years, the golden age. The series of 1, 2, 3, and 4 make up the number 10 again, represented symbolically by the triangle of the ten yods or the ten tens; thus showing the periods we have given to be aliquot parts of a perfect cycle, viz., the Mahâ Yuga. Let us look at it now from another astronomical standpoint. The year of any celestial body is the time it takes to complete its orbit or path round the centre or sun. Modern astronomical researches have shown that our sun, far from being a fixed and independent centre, as supposed by Newton and others, performs an orderly revolution around a point apparently identical with the fixed star Alcyone. The period required for the sun's revolution around this centre is 25,920 years as given by Sûrya Siddhânta, and corresponds to the precession of the Equinoxes, which phenomenon is indeed the direct result of the sun’s motion. The signs of the Zodiac, therefore, will pass the Equinoctial points once in every 25,920 years, which period, when divided by twelve, the number of signs in the Zodiac, gives 2,160 years for each sign. By multiplying this period by an arithmetical progression of twice 10 viz. 8, 6, 4, and 2=20 we shall again obtain the figures for the four Yugas, which, multiplied by 100, 10×10, will give the full period of a Mahâ Yuga. Now the period for the precession of the Equinoxes is ¹/₁₀₀ of that required for the polar revolution of the earth, quite a modern discovery in Western astronomy, though mentioned by the great Hindu astronomer above referred to, and involved 466 in all his calculations of the major cycles. The declination of the earth’s axis is found to be decreasing at the rate of 50″ per century, or half a second per year, which gives for one revolution of the earth’s axis 2,592,000 years. This means that some 240,000 years ago the axis of the earth was in the plane of its orbit, days and nights having a continuous duration of six months in alternation. Out of this great terrestrial period arise the cycles of 7,200 years and 600 years; the latter being the famous Naronic cycle. The first of these is obtained by dividing the period of 2,592,000 by 360, the number of degrees in a circle; the Naronic cycle being derived from this when further divided by twelve, the number of signs in the Zodiac. At the end of this latter period it is said that a great change in the religious movements of the world takes place. It is well worthy of notice that this period has intervened between the great religious revivors, for instance, between Zoroaster, Buddha, Lao-tse, Mohammed, Khenghis Khan. Now having shown that the Mahâ Yuga has an astronomical basis not only in the motions of the planets but also in the precession of the Equinoxes, we may go forward with the computation and complete the figures for the Mahâ Kalpa, 1,000 Mahâ Yugas=a Kalpa, i.e., one day of Brahmâ; the night is of the same duration, viz., 4,320,000,000; these making together 8,640,000,000 years. 360 of such days and nights=one year of Brahmâ, i.e. 3,110,400,000,000 – 3 billions, 110 thousand and 4 hundred millions of mortal years. One hundred such years make an age of Brahmâ, i.e., the Mahâ Kalpa. It will thus be seen that the enormous age we have been considering is a direct numerical product of the periodic times of the solar system. From this great rhythmical breathing of the Logos, universal nature is persuaded to a response in a thousand different ways, moving in perfect harmony throughout her silent walk, with the life-pulse that thrills in her sacred heart.

In the Secret Doctrine it is said: “The One Life is closely related to the one law which governs the world of Being – Karma”. Consequently we may expect to find the cyclic law in similar relations to the life of humanity on earth; and indeed this is stated as a fact of esoteric teaching by H.P.B., for she says:

“The events of humanity do run co-ordinately with the number forms, since the single units of that humanity proceed one and all from the same source – the central and (its shadow) the visible sun. For the equinoxes and solstices, the periods and various phases of the solar course, astronomically and numerically expressed, are only the concrete symbols of the eternal living verity, though they do seem abstract ideas to uninitiated mortals. And this explains the extraordinary numerical coincidences with geometrical relations, as shown by several authors.”

Winchell, in his World Life, says:

“There is a method in the succession of events, and in the relation of co-existent things, which the mind of man seizes hold of; and by means of this as a clue, he runs back and forth over æons of material history of which human experience can never testify. Events germinate and unfold. They have a past which is connected with 467 their present, and we feel a well-justified confidence that a future is appointed which will be similarly connected with the present and the past.”

This cyclic repetition of events is well worth showing, and I shall therefore submit some instances already on record in illustration of the fact.

Dr. E. Zasse has shown that if we divide the old world into six parts, viz.: Eastern, Central and Western Asia; Eastern and Western Europe; and Egypt, we shall find that each of these areas is in succession subject to a cyclic wave of intense activity every 250 years; the wave beginning in the East and proceeding towards the West, passing successively from one to the other of these divisions. The first of these waves began in China 2,000 years b.c., the age of philosophy, of discovery, and reform in that country.

“In 1750 b.c. the Mongolians of Central Asia established a powerful empire. In 1500 Egypt rises from its temporary degradation and extends its sway over many parts of Europe and Asia; and about 1250 the historical wave reaches and crosses over to Eastern Europe, filling it with the spirit of the Argonautic Expedition, and dies out in 1000 b.c. at the siege of Troy.”

At this time the second historical wave appears in Central Asia.

“The Scythians leave their steppes, and inundate towards the year 750 b.c. the adjoining countries, directing themselves towards the South and West; about the year 500 in Western Asia begins an epoch of splendour for Ancient Persia; and the wave moves on to the East of Europe, where about 250 b.c. Greece reaches her highest state of civilization and culture – and further on to the West, the Roman Empire finds itself in the apogee of power and greatness at the dawn of the Christian era.”

Again at this period we find the rising of a third historical wave at the far East, where in China a revival of arts, science, and commerce is made. Then 250 years later we find the Huns emerging from the depths of Central Asia; in the year 500 a.d. a new and powerful Persian kingdom is formed; in 750, in Eastern Europe, the Byzantine Empire; and in the year 1000 on the Western side springs up the second Roman Empire, that of the Papacy. At the same time the fourth wave approaches from the Orient. China is again flourishing; in 1250 the Mongolian wave in Central Asia overflowed in the direction of Europe, covering an enormous territory. About 1500 in Western Asia the Ottoman Empire rises in all its might, and conquers the Balkan peninsula; and in 1750 the Russian Empire, which had thrown off the Tartar yoke, rises to unexpected grandeur during the reign of Empress Catharine, and covers itself with glory. The wave thence sweeps over Europe, coining with the tide further West in each cycle, and here, in the year 1875, at the half period of the cycle, we passed the middle point of a period of culture and progress which will find its climax about the year 2000. It has also been shown that the wars and revolutions of the world are subject to this law of cycles, those of the European nations being strikingly regular in their periodicity. Thus in review of the last two centuries we have a thirty years’ period, 1710, 1740, 1770 – then a 468 twenty years’ period, 1790, 1810, 1830 – then a twenty-five years’ period, 1855, 1880. A general summary of the war cycle covered by these dates, will show a central wave from 1768 to 1812, three wars of seven years’ duration each, and at both ends wars of two years. Thus it is certain that a general cyclic law regulates the ebb and flow of activity in nations; and following the line of impulse successively operating in the spiritual, mental, psychic and physical worlds, we may trace the unbroken chain of causation that binds them together, making them inseparable and seemingly one.

Similar calculations to the above have been extended in the direction of meteorological and seismic phenomena and with similar results, variability appearing only within certain limited periods and disappearing entirely when the full cycle is known. A modern German Professor has published a chart, indicating by two wave-lines the rise and fall of the barometer and thermometer during each day for successive periods of 69 years, which chart, after eliminating local influences such as altitude, coast line, &c., is found to have a general application in the latitude to which it is adjusted. These observations will also admit of a division into cycles of 10 and 13 years each, following in triple groups, and marking years of highest and lowest temperature.

The Kabalists have a method of determining the time of events simply from the date of any great epoch in the life of an individual, the history of a nation, or the reign of a dynasty. Of the latter class one or two instances may be given: –

The History of France affords an epoch, of the kind referred to, in the fall of Robespierre in 1794. The total of the integers of this number is 21 which, added to 1794 gives 1815, the date of the Fall of Napoleon; from this date we get a total of 15, which added to 1815 gives 1830, the date of the Fall of Charles X., from which, by adding 12, the sum of its integers, we get 1842, the date of the Death of the Duc D’Orleans, the heir apparent.

The House of Brunswick is similarly treated. The date of its accession to the English throne in the person of George I., was 1714. Sum of its integers=13, which added gives 1727; accession of George II. Add 17, the total of its figures=1744; the date of the Scotch Rebellion for the object of replacing the House of Stuart. 1+7+4+4=16, which added gives 1760 and the accession of George III. Proceeding in the same way we obtain successively the dates of the American War; the Revolution of France; the war with France, culminating in the Battle of Waterloo; and the death of the Duke of York, heir presumptive to the throne.

If it should be argued that these are but coincidences, we should not dissent, providing the argument goes far enough to show what a coincidence is in itself. A graduated series of events are shown to be coincident with a graduated series of figures, representing periods of time, as so many branches from a common radix. This, if it shows anything, surely illustrates coincidence of cause and effect. Events grow out of a single 469 cause, as numbers grow from number, and periods out of Time. “The future is but an unfolded present.” To this point I may quote the advance thought of modern science as embodied in that remarkable address of Prof. Oliver Lodge to the Mathematical and Physical Section of the British Association at Cardiff in the present year, where he says: –

“If once you grasp the idea that past and future may be actually existing, we can recognise that they may have a controlling influence on all present action, and the two together may constitute the higher plane or the totality of things, after which, as it seems to me, we are impelled to seek, in connection with the directing of force, or determinism, and the action of living beings consciously directed to a definite and preconceived end.”

Yes, truly, the end is preconceived – but we, who see events only in relation with our conceptions of time and place, are but tracking homewards through the circling maze of time, with nothing to guide us but the footprints we ourselves have made in ages long gone by.

“This continuity and unity of history,” says the author of The Cycles of Matter,^[1] “repeat themselves before our eyes in all conceivable stages of progress. The phenomena furnish us with the grounds for the generalization of two laws which are truly principles of scientific divination, by which alone the human mind penetrates the sealed records of the past and the unopened pages of the future. The first of these is the law of evolution, or to phrase it for our purpose, the law of correlated successiveness or organized history in the individual, illustrated in the changing phases of every single maturing system of results. These thoughts summon into our immediate presence, the measureless past and the measureless future of material history. They seem almost to open vistas through infinity, and to endow the human intellect with an existence and a vision exempt from the limitations of time and space and finite causation, and lift itself towards a sublime apprehension of the Supreme Intelligence whose dwelling-place is Eternity.”

This “law of correlated successiveness” is in all respects agreeable to the Theosophic conception of the unfolding of events in the gradual process of human evolution. Theosophy holds that all future time, or rather the succession of events by which the idea of time is induced upon the mind, are already in the astral light, waiting the conditions of development under which they will pass into objective reality. The past and future are but extensions of the present, and when it is said that the future, not only of races and nations, but also of individuals, is already in the Astral Light, and pre-determined, as to sequence of event, by its dependence on the past, we are not arguing for predestination in a theological sense, or fatalism in a natural sense, but for a proper conception of the orderly unfoldment of events, in relation to the gradual development of human faculty along pre-conceived and determined lines. And this statement impels upon me a 470 repetition of thought, for I have to show, in accordance with the law of the periodical recurrence of events, that the whole course of human evolution is but a repetition of pre-existent conditions. This indeed it is in the sense that at a certain point in the circle of progression, nature folds into herself, action is followed by reaction, the outbreathing becomes an inbreathing and the universe passes into Pralaya. What then does this future mean, to which we are for ever impelled, but the retracing of footsteps, and a realization of pre-existent types and self-evolved ideals? In order to get a proper view of the subject we have to consider the human Ego in its descent into matter, as all along creating the prototypes to which it will eventually attain in the course of its upward progress in association with physical evolution. No two Egos in the universe are progressing along the same lines; but each is fulfilling some special function and thereby gathering a set of experiences necessary to the complete upbuilding of a perfected humanity. If two Egos were functioning alike and under the same conditions, there would be a waste of energy, and nothing gained for humanity when considered as a unit. Each is adding a separate quantity to the sum total of experiences, which, when fully worked out, and realized in the consciousness of each, will constitute collectively the “mass-chord” of the whole Manvantara, destined finally to manifest as the Logos of the next creation. Viewed from this standpoint the lines of progress pursued by individuals, and hence the whole series of events thereby included, are those along which the incarnating Ego had elected to function, when (as says the Secret Doctrine) “the Sons of Wisdom, the Sons of Night, ready for rebirth, came down”: “We can choose,” said the Lords, “for we have wisdom.” Thus the future becomes only a realized past, and our freedom of choice, for which we clamour so loudly, does not lie with the perishable personality whose interests are vested in things equally evanescent and perishable, but with the immortal Ego whose choice was long since made, and whose purpose, linked as it is with that of the Divine and Changeless Law, is fixed and immutable. The law of Karma is the law of progress; and we, who from this embodied standpoint take note of the passage of events, can, if we will, see therein the working out of the Karmic law only by means of their cyclic recurrence. The astronomer sees only a natural law in the return of the planets and comets in their respective orbits, and the succession of phenomena attaching thereto is found to be continually repeating itself. Hence he is able to predict the return of comets, and the moment of an eclipse, centuries in advance of their actual occurrence; and the Occultist and astrologer, taking note of the cyclic repetition of events, is by the same law enabled to predict the times of their occurrence. There is nothing supernatural in this once we come to know the recording nature of the Astral Light, and the power of man to read its impressions; a fact illustrated to us in a minor degree by the phenomena of hypnotic or induced clairvoyance, the records of natural seers, and even by the 471 daily occurrence of the localization of memory; and by psychometric impressions.

Now without introducing the cyclic law of rebirth, which seems to offer so many attractions in this connection, I must bring these remarks to a close. What I have been able to say is very limited in its scope, and I am conscious of having purposely avoided a hundred different sets of phenomena which might have been drawn from our daily life in support of the main idea of this brief treatise. Their importance, however, as proofs near to hand, is so great, that nothing short of the sense of strangulation induced by attempting this subject in so short a time, would compel me to omit them. I think it will be seen, however, from what has been said, that the occult doctrine of the cyclic law has its basis in natural phenomena, and is therefore capable of a critical and exhaustive study, which, considering its importance in relation to the ordering of human life and thought, I venture to say it merits.

W. R. Old, F.T.S.

Footnotes

↑ Winchell.

[1] Winchell.

[1]