SECTION THREE

Chapter XVI

THE KINGDOMS OF NATURE

Mention has already been made of the ten classes of Monads which we are accustomed to grouping together as 1) the three Dhyâni-Chohanic Kingdoms, 2) the second or intermediate group comprising the Human, Animal, Plant and Mineral Kingdoms, and finally 3) the three Elemental Kingdoms.  As a necessary transition from the study of Monads to a consideration of Atoms (or Life-Atoms, to be precise), we must now inquire into the wonderful relationships that exist between these kingdoms and the planet on which they flourish.

We meet with certain difficulties at the outset because so far as our everyday experience is concerned, there are but three kingdoms which properly deserve the name, to wit: the Human, the Animal, and the Vegetable Kingdoms.  What, indeed, do we mean when we speak of the Mineral Kingdom, the three Elemental Kingdoms, and, most mysterious of all, the three Kingdoms of the Dhyâni-Chohans?

Well, we must begin at the beginning.  We have referred to the Tattvas as the stuffs or materials of which the worlds are formed; and true as this statement is, it is nevertheless only the beginning of the story.  We must understand that everything is alive — everything, and this includes even the materials which are the substances of the Tattvas themselves.

It would be more accurate for us to think that these materials are continually being produced by a process of emanation; for there is an inexhaustible supply, and because everything is atomic by nature, there must exist many grades or levels of life-atoms.  Each of the seven Tattvas produces its own life-atoms; thus there are seven families of these.  And since they are commencing their ages-long evolutionary journey as life-atoms, we say quite correctly that they start out in the most elementary grade of evolution.  In other words, they are all Elementals.

It might appear at this point that we are allowing ourselves to become confused.  We study about the three Elemental Kingdoms, yet we have just indicated that there are really seven types of Elementals.  Are there then seven Elemental Kingdoms?

We can best answer this by quoting from G. de Purucker's Studies in Occult Philosophy, page 50:

“The kingdoms are aggregates or families or groups of monads.  The cosmic elements are the essential stuffs in which they live and move and have their being and evolve.”

And then on page 51:

“What relation, then, have the three elemental kingdoms, kingdoms of the elementals, to the cosmic elements?  Now in the first place, I will say that this phrase ‘three elemental kingdoms’ is an easy and graphic way of saying the seven kingdoms of the elementals, or the seven sub-kingdoms of the generalized kingdom of elementals; just as in a man we often generalize his constitution by saying spirit, soul, body, knowing all the time that the constitution is divisible into seven parts.

The three kingdoms of elementals in their first or original appearance in manifested manvantara, spring forth from the stuffs of the original cosmic elements; and therefore these baby-entities, which are as it were ensouling parts of life-atoms, are called elementals.  This is the original and if you wish highest kingdom of the elementals, not highest here in the sense of evolution, but highest in schematic diagram.  The so-called lower kingdoms of  elementals are lower merely because they are farther from the spiritual part or nature of the cosmic elements, but being more evolved in that sense they stand higher.  So that the lowest class of elementals, which is beneath the minerals, actually is the most evolved of all the elemental kingdoms.  But they have not yet even reached the point where they can be classed as minerals or pass into the mineral kingdom.

Now the reason why there are really seven elemental sub-kingdoms, is because each such elemental kingdom springs from its own particular cosmic element.  As there are seven cosmic elements, each cosmic element gives birth to its own elemental kingdom.  Thus when all these elemental kingdoms are classed together, we say seven elemental kingdoms, each one such coming from its own different cosmic element.

As a final thought, it is to be noted that in occult or esoteric phraseology, the elementals are so called because whatever their class and whatever the cosmic element or tattva from which each elemental class springs, it springs directly from this tattva or cosmic element without intermediary.  Thus, the elements are, as it were, the denizens or inhabitants of the cosmic elements, because they spring forth immediately and without intermediary from the latter.”

There is a need at this point to make a distinction between the seven classes of monads, which differ from one another by reason of their different origins from the Tattvas, on the one hand, and the various phases they must pass through on their long cosmical journey from the condition of unself-consciousness to the eventual condition of full self-consciousness, the state of Godhood, on the other.  Their several origins give them their own types of Svabhâva which they retain from first to last.  And although each one follows its own pathway of evolution, nevertheless it retains the essential characteristics of the Tattva from which it sprang at the very beginning of its journey as an Elemental.

The various phases through which they must pass merely indicate the changing degrees of unfoldment of their essential Svabhâvas.  In the first phase, they are Elementals in the truest sense of the word, and as such they are the insouling life-sparks of the atoms, and this is the reason that there are several kinds of life-atoms.

We are approaching a study of the life-atoms per-se, but there are some final points of teaching about the Monads which must be covered first.

Illustrations taken from life often serve a good purpose in clarifying these fine points of teaching, and we shall use here again the illustration of the schools.  In our educational system, there are many grades of learning, and while in each grade there may be pupils of many nationalities, yet they all study together and learn the same lessons which will equip them for life.  They nevertheless retain their national characteristics throughout their years of learning.  So we might think of the various classes of monads as though they were the various cosmical nationalities; although they are all evolving together, passing through all the phases of life offered by Nature, they nevertheless do so with their own essential characteristics, which they never lose.  And of all these phases are grouped together under the term the Kingdoms of Nature.

The first three such phases (or seven, according to the degree of study being undertaken) are known as the three Elemental Kingdoms.  They represent three stages of unfoldment of the growing consciousness which must be passed through before they can qualify for promotion into a higher condition.  When they have evolved the monadic consciousness to the required degree, they are ready for identification with the next phase, which is the Mineral Kingdom.

However, for the reason that, while still in the Elemental Kingdoms, they retain their essential Svabhâvas — which are what they are by reason of the Tattvas from which they originally sprang — they naturally form themselves into classes; and while passing through the first of these Elemental Kingdoms, these classes may be identified by naming them after the seven kinds of life-atoms which they ensoul.

At a later stage, when they have evolved their consciousness to a quasi-individuality and a quasi-intelligence, they may be identified as the several types of “nature spirits,” and may be named after the Cosmical Elements from which they sprang, and which are named, as we remember from our earlier studies, after the elements known as Earth, Water, Air and Fire.

Fairy tales have always been popular with people of all ages and of all nationalities.  Some, like the Celtic races, seem to have been especially disposed toward the folklore that ideals with the “little people,” such as the brownies of Scotland, or the leprechauns of Ireland; and in these countries we often hear of people with “second sight” who firmly believe that they have seen and talked with these nature-spirits.  Then there are the nature-spirits well known in other countries, and the mischievous poltergeists known in all lands.

Many people who ridicule such ideas nevertheless do enjoy fanciful stories or plays which deal with the “supernatural”; and it seems quite likely that there is actually a close connection between us humans and the denizens of other planes of life.  Although these things are not really as they appears to our senses, their impact upon us is translated into the terms that will appeal to our minds and imaginations.  Thus has arisen all of the folklore of virtually every nation.

It would be best to express a word of caution before proceeding further.  Lest it be thought that a theosophical student believes in fairies, let me assure you most emphatically that he does not in the sense of the “little people” of folklore.  The impression that he does believe in such things comes about because of the great difficulty of explaining such matters as they really are.  Yet, one cannot help but point out that the people who would be the first to laugh at anyone believing in the nature-spirits would in all probability accept quite seriously the existence of the angels.  Actually, although in this last instance it is a part of their religious belief and as such would be considered to be quite defensible, nevertheless it comes to the same thing.  For the nature-spirits are on one side of the group of Kingdoms familiar to us, and the higher beings represented by the angels are on the other.  It is only a matter of degree.

To enumerate then: The nature elementals which belong to Earth are often known as the Gnomes; those belonging to Water are the Undines; those that belong to, because they were emanated from, that cosmical Element we call Air, are the Sylphs; and lastly, those that belong to the cosmical Element we call Fire are the Salamanders. 

All of these, including the three higher classes for which we do not have popular names, start out as Elementals of their own type yet retain their Svabhâva or essential characteristics throughout the long evolutionary journey through all of the Kingdoms of Nature.  This is because they retain the essential characteristic of the Tattva from which they originally sprang and to which they therefore belong.

We meet with a problem in further explanations because we are trying to condense the various stages of elemental growth into three, whereas in reality there are seven such stages.  However, since we do not have available all the teachings which would complete a sevenfold picture, we can cover the point by explaining that, after passing through the “nature spirit” phase of their growth, the Elementals attach themselves to and become a part of the living constitution of entities in higher kingdoms.  In this phase of their growth they have a very important work to do.  Many of the functions of our own bodies, for example, are carried out by elementals of certain types; and this is equally true of the bodies of the animals, and even of the plants.  Nevertheless we must endeavor to understand that even though elementals attach themselves to monads in higher kingdoms, they are still elementals and do not yet belong to the kingdoms that they serve.  They re striving upwards, to be sure, and in time will become members of these kingdoms in their own right.

Thus we may learn that these elemental monads, having at last graduated from the highest of the three Elemental Kingdoms, pass on into the Mineral Kingdom; thence, after inconceivably long periods of time, they evolve from within themselves the plant consciousness, enabling them to build their appropriate vehicles, and they then graduate into the Plant Kingdom.  Again, after a long evolutionary growth in the Plant Kingdom, they evolve forth from themselves those faculties and qualities of consciousness which place them in the Animal Kingdom.  Eventually, thereafter, they evolve forth from themselves the human consciousness and they take their place in the Human Kingdom.  Then, after long periods of evolutionary growth, when they make the grade, they evolve into the first of the three Dhyâni-Chohanic Kingdoms, and so on to the second, and then to the third and highest.  Having successfully run the race they have become full-blown Gods.

It is easy to fall into the error of saying that a mineral becomes a plant, a plant becomes an animal, an animal becomes a human, and so forth.  That is why we stress the concept that it is the evolving monad which brings forth from within itself the ever-increasing degree of consciousness which places it progressively in ever higher Kingdoms of Nature.  In each step, as it attains to the Kingdom to which it belongs, it follows the example of the Tattva from which it first emanated; that is to say, in its turn it emanates its own family of life-atoms with which it is to clothe itself in such vehicles as will best fill its ever-increasing needs.

Thus we return to the important thought that it is the Tattvas from which the Kingdoms of Nature are brought forth, each and every one of the monads comprising these Kingdoms having started out a s “an unself-conscious god-spark” — to use a phrase given to us by G. de Purucker — and each retaining to the last the essential characteristics of the Tattva from which it originally sprang while progressing through the Kingdoms to eventual self-conscious godhood.

Now when we spoke of the Principles and Elements of which the worlds are formed, we are leading up to a most important concept, to wit, that these various kingdoms of nature are actually the Principles of the Globe Chain.  When we presented the several paradigms representing the various Tattvas as they contributed toward the building of a Globe Chain, and later in a similar format when we showed how the various Principles of the human constitution were developed during the seven Rounds of the Earth Chain, we were most careful not to imply that the Globes of the Chain are its Principles.  This would have been inaccurate and misleading.  The Globes are not the seven Principles of the Earth Chain; they are the Lokas and Talas.   Appearing as they do, two by two on the various planes of consciousness (excepting the highest and the lowest, which contain but one Globe each for reasons already explained), these Lokas and Talas are essentially the Monads of the Planetary Chain, ranging from the divine to the physical in their own dual aspects.  The case is similar to that of the human constitution.  (We may call it the Human Chain, if we like).  A man has his own Monads, ranging from the divine to the physical, and each one of these is dual in nature forming thus his human Lokas and Talas.  He also has his seven Principles; these Principles in Man's constitution are themselves living entities, each one composed of hosts of life-atoms, and they may be said to be the “Kingdoms of Nature” on a microcosmic scale.  That is what they are to him, and it is reasonable to suppose that they make their own microcosmic peregrinations throughout his inner constitution in a manner paralleling what the Kingdoms of Nature do on the Earth Chain in pursuing their own Rounds and Races.

1.      The twelve Globes are the Lokas and Talas of the Earth Chain.  As such, existing on the seven Cosmical planes of consciousness, they constitute its Monads.  The Kingdoms of Nature at its Principles, and they can and do function on all the Globes of the Chain in the course of the Rounds and Races.

2.      The Monads in Man are his own Lokas and Talas.  His seven Principles function throughout his Monads, and they are thus for him the offspring of his own Tattvas, all of these producing their own hosts of life-atoms, “baby-monads” in their own right, already starting out on their age-long evolutionary journey throughout their own universe, which is Man himself.  This microcosmic universe is as great to these “baby monads” as our own macrocosmic universe is great to us.  And this is to say that Man is already a universe — on a lesser scale to be sure — but containing within himself all that the macrocosmic universe contains.

By way of further explanation, we may consider a word picture given to us by G. de Purucker (see Studies in Occult Philosophy, p. 113) in which he likens the development of the seven Principles to the unrolling of a scroll.  That which has been unrolled and which can be seen is the manifested.  That which lies within the portion not yet unrolled is there but it is the unmanifested.  Thus, when Âtman is first “unrolled” it nevertheless contains within itself, in unmanifested form, all the other Principles, from Buddhi on down to Sthula-sarira.  Similarly, when Âtman and Buddhi have been developed, they still contain within themselves all the other five Principles, from Manas on downwards; and the process is carried on to the final unrolling of the scroll, when all the principles have been emanated or brought into manifestation.

Another thought of value here is that whereas it was pointed out that these seven principles do exist (because they are repeated) on all the planes of consciousness, that is to say throughout all the Lokas and Talas, nevertheless Âtman on the highest of these Lokas, Satya-Loka, is inconceivably higher in quality than the Âtman on the lowest or Bhur-loka.  Even the Sthula-sarira on Satya-loka is inconceivably lofty by nature; the only thing on Earth with which to compare it is light which, we are taught, is the Sthula-sarira of Spirit.

A further elucidation is in order on the statement made earlier that all of the life-atoms produced by the Tattvas must pass through all the kingdoms of Nature, because they all start out as unselfconscious god-sparks.  Whereas this is true enough as a simple statement of fact, it is actually an over-simplification.  To clarify the picture still further, we must remember that, when speaking of the Earth Chain, only the Globes from A to G were considered; we have left for another time a discussion of the five higher globes on the three highest cosmical planes.  The reason for this might be more apparent if we show a certain similarity of pattern between the Planes of Consciousness, the Cosmical Principles, the Monads, and the Human Principles.  In every instance we may correctly differentiate between the higher triad and the lower quaternary.  The following chart shows it.

As a closing note to this chapter, let us recall that the three higher Principles of Man were derived from the three Logoi.  These have been given in the terms of the philosophy of the Mahayana School of Buddhism thus:

We may think of these three Logoi collectively as the omnipresent Heart of the Universe.  They are not remote and unreachable.  Beauty can be found everywhere, and wherever there is the beauty of Nature, be it in the colors of the flowers, the wonder of the stars, the glory of the sunlight, the graceful movements of the animals, and, grander still, wherever there is beauty in the life of a human being, there is Avalokitesvara.  Its very nature is joy and compassion, and as it is to be found in abundance in Nature, so also it takes its rise in the heart of Man.

We have only to see it and to ally ourselves with it in order to understand the grandeur and beauty of life.  Pain and sorrow do indeed exist, but as an ancient saying has it: “For him who faces the sun, his shadow lies behind him.”  This does not mean that we turn away from suffering humanity.  It means that the more we see of the sunlight, the more of it we have to share with others.  And the man who has found the light is the more fortunate if he can learn to share it with others, because it belongs to all.