One day is with the Lord as a thousand years. II Peter 3:8. In the light of the Arcane Wisdom, we perceive many interpretations of these quoted words of Peter. For instance, a Day of the Lord is the period of the sun's passage from one sign to the next in the equinoctial procession. Our Earth has experienced an immense number of these days. Each of them may be called a new age, at the beginning of which the progressing Earth Spirit takes on a higher condition; one that should result in the betterment of the human race, provided it be in a receptive condition which, however, is not always the case.

Whoever has mastered the intricate law of cycles, can determine very nearly the life period of our Earth. A man's death may be a lingering one, but, at the last, life ceases suddenly; and so it is to be with the Earth after the end of its final round which terminates with the close of the seventh Great Day of the Lord. In "The Revelation of John," a Day of the Lord, is fixed at 2160 ordinary years, and not at 1260 days or years, for this period is only a blind.

While 2160 years - whose condensed number is nine - are not precisely one-twelfth of the great equinoctial cycle, John chose these years because divisible without a remainder by nearly every number appearing in Revelation. These numbers are 2, 3, 3 1/2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 12, 24, 144, 360, and 1600. The exceptions are 3 1/2, 7, and 1600. Now while 1260 can be divided by 3 1/2 and 7, 1260 years are only seven-twelfths of the approximate years of the great cycle.

To one who delves deep into the symbolism of Revelation, it is evident that the thousand millenial years mentioned in Chapter xx:4, are contained in that Day of the Lord the cycle from Aquarius to Capricornus; but much special knowledge is necessary to determine the period of travail ere the birth of the thousand years which, after all, are not necessarily what are commonly understood to be a thousand years.

Even as the Earth, man has his Days of the Lord. Each of these may be said to begin at his conception, and to continue until the conception preceding his next birth. Now, whereas, the physical body of man disintegrates during his day, the body of the earth endures seemingly unaffected throughout its day. This to ordinary observation; but to the great planetary rulers, our earth, and all other earths, each seems to lose something of vitality toward the end of its day - which for this world approximates 2160 years - and to renew its energy almost suddenly at the opening of its New Day, which for us began early in 1920.

As for man; that he may gain rounded perfection during his Days of the Lord, he often must traverse the twelve Zodiacal signs beginning with Aries and, again and again in twenty-four normal births, averaging 1080 years apart, complete the cycle which should be a spiral. Having circled the Zodiac six times, he may then - if always progressive - become one of the 144,000 mentioned by the Revelator; those whose great Day of the Lord is indicated approximately by the figures 155,520. By renouncing its Devachan, an advanced soul may much shorten this period. Often an unprogressive life, or a premature death, is followed by birth into the same sign, because the experience of a sign must to a certain extent be assimilated before it can be abandoned for the next.

Despite his births under all signs, every man is by nature affiliated with a certain sign, wherefore, the outcome for mankind will be twelve classes of super-men embodying twelve kinds of excellences, or, to be exact, if Virgo, Libra, and Scorpio are deemed to be one sign, then this culminating world shall have produced ten classes of beings expressing ten perfections.

Finally, to be in full harmony with the quoted words of Peter, we should say that all the Days of Man upon the Earth, and indeed all the Days of the Earth itself, are but a Day of the Lord, "The Lofty One that inhabiteth Eternity."

H.