We know matter in three states - solid, liquid, and gaseous; and the experiments of Prof. Crooke prove a fourth state - that of "radiant matter" - as demonstrable to our senses. If beyond this fourth, or radiant, state we could imagine, if ever so dimly, the three following and still higher states, recognized and taught by Theosophy, we would have a dim conception of that original Substance out of which the material portion of this universe is fashioned, when the dawn of a manvantara awakens it once more to sentient life.

The Infinite Universe, then, is filled, from a material standpoint, with that which holds both the potency and potentiality of matter. It also holds the potentiality and potencies of spirit, or consciousness; being, besides, in its aspect of ever-present, indestructible space, the arena of that force which we know to be equally eternal under its objectivized aspect of motion. Thus, at the dawn of differentiation, at the beginning of the "out-breathing of Brahm," or the manvantaric activity following the "inbreathing" or universal pralaya, three hypostases of the Absolute - potential Matter, potential Thought, and potential Force - are held concealed, in some inconceivable way, within the bosom of Space, as our salt was also concealed within the solution which we have used as a symbol. And the material side of the Unknowable Triad is probably concealed in a precisely similar manner, or by the rate of its vibration. For Theosophy accepts the matter of science, and its force, or motion, also; but it avers, most uncompromisingly, that the former is molded and shaped by the latter through a third eternal predicate, Intelligence, under the aspects of Consciousness and Ideation. Hence, when one great rhythm of the Universe has expended its original impetus in a manvan- taric objectivization, and has returned into the Silence and Darkness of Non-Being until again at the initial moment of another outward flow of the never-ceasing Motion - at this point Intelligent Beings assume control, and, by ideative Will, guide the vibrations of the eternal motion, so that matter capable of exhibiting form appears as a consequence of this modification or change of vibration in the eternal Motion. Yet, as Absolute Force or Motion can not be added to nor diminished, so this modification of vibration must eventually be overcome, and the Universe return to its original condition, to again re-emerge in form when the reactionary swing of the pendulum of eternity has described its arc, and so permits of another effort on the part of these Creative Intelligences. Thus the law of cycles controls even this inconceivable period which measures the duration of an Universe. Like the intermittent glow of a firefly to one who watches the flight of the insect must appear even these vast successions of Universes to Intelligences behind the Veil of Isis, who remain forever untouched by any dissolution of form.

At the outward flow of the eternal Motion, for them, nebulae, suns, and systems blaze into a fleeting existence; at the "inbreathing of Brahm" all disappear; and this in an eternal succession of exact cycles. These cycles, so transitory in eternity, are so vast in time that reason reels in the effort to conceive of them. The nature of the initiatory impress of these Formless Creative Intelligences from its conscious aspect is seen in the unerring selective "affinities" of atoms; from its Force Aspect it is undoubtedly a modification or change of vibration.

As the result of this primal modification of vibration, matter throughout the Universe assumes a state which the Book of Dzyan quoted in the Secret Doctrine, describes as resembling "milk-white curds." These curds, which must be conceived of as infinitely more attenuated than the ether of science, are next brought by the agent through which cosmic intelligence acts upon cosmic matter, known in Eastern Occultism as Fohat, into forms described as "fiery whirlwinds," or that in which magnetic attraction alone is controlling the vibration. Gravitation, representing a response to much lower rates of vibration and coarser aggregations of particles, only acts after the finer magnetic forces have prepared the necessary conditions permitting this form of attraction and repulsion to obtain a foothold among the sentient atoms. This stage in the evolution of matter up through the domain of that force we hazily describe as "magnetic," into the field where the lower activity of gravity obtains, may be traced in the form of some nebulae, whose arrangement of matter still shows evidences of the original "whirlwind" force in the magnetic disposition of their contents. *

From the time of the evolution of matter into the nebulous condition, the after processes are comparatively easy to trace. Indeed, many of the subsequent evolutionary strides of Fohat are plainly visible within the limits of our own little solar system. The differing degrees of density from Neptune to Mercury; the state of matter in the sun; the dead moon, now in a minor pralaya, or rest; the comets which occasionally visit our region of space - all illustrate degiees of differentiation, and different states of that which, known to us only by its external attributes and not by its inner essence, we term matter.

Yet this Material Aspect of evolution is incomplete, and indeed incomprehensible, except in the light of its Conscious Aspect. This brings us to the direct consideration of those High Intelligences from whom proceed the wisdom to plan and the energy to stamp that original impress upon the plastic "root of matter" which remains an indelible and unalterable law for it throughout all its subsequent transformations and evolutionary processes. Here we approach the real problem; and here, in common with all religious and philosophical systems, we have to postulate a

* One of the first discoveries made by means of the Lick telescope, at Mt. Hamilton, California, was this "whirlwind" disposition of the matter of some of the nebulae. Prof. Holden, in an article contributed to a San Francisco journal, announced that " the arrangement of matter in some of these nebulas was such as to indicate that some other force than gravitation had been concerned in its production." Science thus most unexpectedly confirmed the assertion, made some time previously by Madame H. P. Blavatsky, to the effect that if scientists had instruments sufficiently powerful to penetrate and resolve certain nebulas they would discover that gravitation was not the universal force they suppose it to be.