CHAPTER VI

UNITY OF CONSCIOUSNESS.

1. CONSCIOUSNESS A UNIT.

IN studying the very varied manifesta­tions of consciousness, we are apt to forget two important facts: first, that the consciousness of each man is a Unit, however separate and different from each other its manifestations may appear to be; secondly, that all these Units themselves are parts of the consciousness of the Locos, and therefore re-act similarly under similar conditions. We cannot too often remind ourselves that consciousness is one; that all apparently separate consciousnesses are truly one, as one sea might pour through many holes in an embankment. That sea-water might issue from the holes differently coloured, if the embankment were composed of [134] differently coloured earths; but it would all be the same sea-water; analysed, it would all show the presence of the same characteristic salts. So are all consciousnesses from the same ocean of consciousness, and have many essential identities. Enveiled in the same kind of matter, they will act in the same kind of way, and reveal their fundamental identity of nature.

The individual consciousness appears to be a complexity instead of a unity, when its manifestations are concerned, and modern psychology speaks of dual and treble and multiplex personality, losing sight of the fundamental unity among the confusion of the manifold. Yet truly is our consciousness a Unit, and the variety is due to the materials in which it is working.

The ordinary waking-consciousness of a man is the consciousness working through the physical brain at a certain rate imposed by it, conditioned by all the con­ditions of that brain, limited by all its limitations, baulked by the varying obstructions it offers, checked by a clot [135] of blood, silenced by the decay of tissue. At every moment the brain hinders its manifestations, while at the same time it is, on the physical plane, its only enabling instrument of manifestation.

When the consciousness, turning its attention away from the external physical world, ignores the denser part of the physical brain, and uses only the etheric portions thereof, its manifestations at once change in character. The creative imagi­nation disports itself in etheric matter, and drawing on its accumulated contents, obtained from the external world by its denser servant, it arranges them, dis­sociates, and recombines them after its own fancies, and creates the lower worlds of dream.

When it casts aside for a while its ethereal garment, turning its attention away completely from the physical world, and shedding its fetters of physical matter, it roams through the astral world at will, or drifts through it unconsciously, turning all its attention to its own contents, receiving many impacts from that astral world, which it ignores or accepts according to its stage [136] of evolution, or its humour of the moment. If it should manifest itself to an outside observer - as may happen in trance-con­ditions - it shows powers so superior to those it manifested when imprisoned in the physical brain, that such an observer, judging only by physical experiences, may well regard it as a different con­sciousness.

Still more is this the case when, the astral body being thrown into trance, the Bird of Heaven shows itself soaring into loftier regions, and its splendid flight so enchants the observer that he deems it a new being, and no longer the same entity as crawled in the physical world. Yet truly is it ever one and the same; the differences are in the materials with which it is connected, and through which it works, and not in itself.

As to the second important fact stated above, man is not yet sufficiently developed to appreciate any evidence as to the unity of consciousness in its workings above the physical plane, but its unity on the physical plane is being demonstrated. [137]

2. UNITY OF PHYSICAL CONSCIOUSNESS.

Amid the immense varieties of the mineral, vegetable, animal, and human kingdoms, the underlying unity of physical consciousness has been lost sight of, and broad lines of cleavage have been set up which do not, in reality, exist. Life has been wholly denied to the mineral, grudged to the vegetable, and H. P. Blavatsky was ridiculed when she declared that one Life, one Consciousness vivified and informed all.

“With every day, the identity between the animal and the physical man, between the plant and man, and even between the reptile and its nest, the rock, and man, is more and more clearly shown, the physical and chemical constituents of all being found to be identical. Chemical Science may well say that there is no difference between the matter which composes the ox, and that which forms man. But the occult doctrine is far more explicit. It says: Not only the chemical compounds are the same, but the same infinitesimal invisible Lives compose the atoms of the [138] bodies of the mountain and the daisy, of man and the ant, of the elephant and of the tree which shelters it from the sun. Each particle - whether you call it organic or inorganic - is a Life.”[46]

If this be true, it should be possible to obtain from such living minerals, vegetables, animals, and men, evidence of an identity of life, of sentiency, of response to stimuli; and while we may freely admit that we should expect to find gradations of sentiency, that as we ascend the ladder of life we should expect the manifestations to become fuller and more complex, yet some definite manifestations of sentiency should be found in all who share one life. The evidence for this was lacking when H. P. Blavatsky wrote; it is available now; and it is from an eastern scientist, whose rare ability has ensured his welcome in the West, that the evidence appropriately comes.

Professor Jagadish Chandra Bose, M.A., D.Sc., of Calcutta, has definitely proved that so-called “inorganic matter” is responsive to stimulus, and that the [139] response is identical from metals, vege­tables, animals, and - so far as experiment can be made - man.

He arranged apparatus to measure the stimulus applied, and to show in curves, traced on a revolving cylinder, the response from the body receiving the stimulus. He then compared the curves obtained in tin and in other metals with those obtained from muscle, and found that the curves from tin were identical with those from muscle, and that other metals gave curves of like nature but varied in the period of recovery.

[140]

(a) SERIES OF ELECTRIC RESPONSES TO SUCCESSIVE MECHANICAL STIMULI AT INTERVALS OF HALF A MINUTE, IN TIN. (b) MECHANICAL RESPONSES IN MUSCLE.

Tetanus, both complete and incom­plete, due to repeated shocks, was caused, and similar results accrued, in mineral as in muscle.

EFFECTS ANALOGOUS TO (a) INCOMPLETE AND (b) COMPLETE TETANUS IN TIN. (a’) INCOMPLETE AND (b’) COMPLETE TETANUS IN MUSCLE.

Fatigue was shown by metals, least of all by tin. Chemical re-agents, such as drugs, produced similar results on metals with those known to result with animals - [141] exciting, depressing, and deadly. (By deadly is meant resulting in the destruc­tion of the power of response.)

A poison will kill a metal, inducing a condition of immobility, so that no response is obtainable. If the poisoned metal be taken in time, an antidote may save its life.

(a) NORMAL R&SPONSE; (b) EFFECT ON POISON; (c) REVIVAL BY ANTIDOTE.

A stimulant will increase response, and as large and small doses of a drug have been found to kill and stimulate respec­tively, so have they been found to act on metals. “Among such phenomena,” asks Professor Bose, “how can we draw a line of demarcation and say: Here the physical process ends, and there the physiological begins? No such barriers exist.”[47] [142]

Professor Bose has carried on a similar series of experiments on plants, and has obtained similar results. A fresh piece of cabbage stalk, a fresh leaf, or other vege­table body, can be stimulated and will show similar curves; it can be fatigued, excited, depressed, poisoned. There is something rather pathetic in seeing the way in which the tiny spot of light, which records the pulses in the plant, travels, in ever weaker and weaker curves, when the plant is under the influence of poison, falls into a final despairing straight line, and - ­stops. The plant is dead. One feels as though a murder had been committed - ­as indeed it has.[48]

These admirable series of experiment have established, on a definite basis of physical facts, the teaching of occult science on the universality of life.

Mr. Marcus Reed has made micro­scopical observations which show the [143] presence of consciousness in the vegetable kingdom. He has observed symptoms as of fright when tissue is injured, and further he has seen that male and female cells, floating in the sap, become aware of each other’s presence without contact; the circulation quickens, and they put out processes towards each other.[49]

More than three years after the publica­tion of Professor Bose’s experiments, some interesting confirmation of his observations arose in the course of M. Jean Becquerel’s study of the N-rays, communicated by him to the Paris Academy of Sciences. Animals under chloroform cease to emit these rays, and they are never emitted by a corpse. Flowers normally emit them, but under chloroform the emanation ceases. Metals also emit them, and under chloroform the emanation again ceases. Thus animals, flowers, and metals alike give out these rays, and alike cease to emanate them under the action of chloroform.[50] [144]

3. THE MEANING OF PHYSICAL CONSCIOUSNESS.

The term “physical consciousness” is used in two distinct senses, and it may be useful to pause a moment, in order to define these. It is often used to indicate what is above termed “ordinary waking­-consciousness”, i.e., the consciousness of the man, of the Jivatma -or, if the phrase be preferred, of the Monad working through the Jivatma, and the lower triad of permanent atoms. It is also used in the sense in which it is used here, as consciousness working in physical matter, receiving and responding to physical impacts, unconcerned with any transmis­sion of impulses onward to the higher planes, or with any impulses sent to the physical body from those planes.

In this more restricted and accurate sense, it would include (a) any out-thrill­ings from the atoms and molecules ensouled by the life of the Third Logos; (b) any [145] similar out-thrillings from organised forms ensouled by the life of the Second Logos; and (c) any similar out-thrillings from the life of the Monad, proceeding from the permanent atoms, in which the spirillae are not directly concerned. When the spirillae are active, the “ordinary waking­consciousness” is affected. For instance ammonia sniffed up by the nose shows two results; there is a rapid secretion; that is the response of the cells in the olfactory tract; there is also a “smell”; that is the result of a vibration running up to the sense-centres in the astral body, and there recognised in consciousness; the change in consciousness affects the first set of spirillae in the atoms of the olfactory tract, and thus reaches the “waking-consciousness” - consciousness working in the physical brain. It is only through the spirillae that changes in consciousness on the higher planes bring about changes in the “waking-conscious­ness”.

It must be remembered that as the Solar System is a field for the evolution of all the developing consciousnesses [146] within it, so are there smaller areas within it, serving as smaller fields. Man is the microcosm of the universe, and his body serves as a field of evolution for myriads of consciousnesses less evol­ved than his own. Thus the three activities mentioned above under (a), (b), and (c) are all present in his body, and all enter into the physical conscious­ness working therein; that in which the atomic spirillae are concerned does not enter it; that belongs to the conscious­ness of the Jivatma. The workings of physical consciousness do not now directly affect the “waking-consciousness” in the higher animals or in man. They affected it in the earlier part of the embryonic life in the Group-Soul, while the consciousness of the Second Logos was “mothering” the dawning conscious­nesses derived from it. But physical consciousness has now sunk below the “threshold of consciousness”, while showing itself as “the memory of the cell”, as the selective action in glands and papillae, and generally in the carrying on of functions necessary for the support [147] of bodies. It is the lowest activity of consciousness, and as consciousness func­tions more and more actively on the higher plane, its lowest workings no longer attract its attention, and they become what we call automatic.

Now it is physical consciousness that is appealed to in Professor Bose’s ex­periments, and it is the response of this consciousness in the tin and in the animal that is the same, and is shown in the pulse indicated by the curves; the animal will feel the stimulus while the tin will not­ - that is the result of the additional working of the consciousness in astral matter.

We may thus allege that consciousness, working in physical matter, responds to various kinds of stimulation, and that the response is the same, whether it be obtained from mineral, vegetable, or animal. The consciousness shows the same characteristic workings, is the same. The differences which, as already said, we observe as we ascend, lie in the improve­ment of the physical apparatus, an appa­ratus which enables astral and mental­ - not physical - activities of consciousness [148] to manifest themselves on the physical plane. Men and animals feel and think better than minerals and vegetables, because their more highly evolved con­sciousness has shaped for itself on the physical plane this much improved appa­ratus; but even so, our bodies answer as the lower bodies answer to the same stimuli, and this purely physical con­sciousness is the same in all.

Now in the mineral, the astral matter connected with the permanent astral atom is so little active, and consciousness is sleeping so deeply therein, that there is no perceptible working from the astral to the physical. In the higher plants there seems to be a sort of forth-shadowing of a nervous system, but it is too little developed and organised to serve any­thing but the simplest purposes. The added activity on the astral plane improves the astral sheath in connexion with the plant, and the vibrations of the astral sheath affect the etheric portion of the plant, and thus its denser matter. Hence the forth-shadowing of a nervous system above alluded to. [149]

When we come to the animal stage, the much greater activity of the consciousness on the astral plane causes more powerful vibrations, which pass to the etheric double of the animal, and by the etheric vibrations thus caused, the nervous system is builded. The shaping of it is due to the Logos through the Group-Soul, and to the active assistance of the Shining Ones of the Third Elemental Kingdom, directing the work of the ethereal Nature­-Spirits. But the impulse comes from the consciousness on the astral plane working in the permanent atom and the sheath of astral matter attracted by it, roused to activity by the Group-Soul. As the first very simple apparatus is formed, more delicate impacts from without can be per­ceived, and these impacts also help in thy evolution. Action and reaction succeed each other, and the mechanism continually improves in receptive and transmitting ability.

Consciousness does not do much building on the astral plane at this stage, and works there in an unorganised sheath; the organising is done on the [150] physical plane by the efforts of conscious­ness to express itself - dim and vaguely groping as these efforts are - aided and directed by the Group-Soul and the Shining Ones. This work has to be completed to a great extent before the Third Life-Wave pours down, for animal man has evolved, with his brain and nervous systems, before that great out­pouring comes which gives the Jivatma a working body, and makes possible the higher evolution of man. [151]