The Equinox (Volume III, Number I)

THE VOICE OF THE SILENCE 16. When waxing stronger thy Soul glides forth from her secure retreat; and breaking loose from the protecting shrine, extends her silver thread and rushes onward; when beholding her image on the waves of Space she whispers, “This is I’’—declare, O Disciple, that thy Soul is caught in the webs of delusion. An even more advanced instruction, but still connected with the question of the Ego and the non-Ego. The phe- nomenon described is perhaps Atmadarshana, which is still a delusion, in one sense still a delusion of personality; for although the Ego is destroyed in the Universe, and the Uni- verse in it, there is a distinct though exceedingly subtle ten- dency to sum up its experience as Ego. These three verses might be interpreted also as quite ele- mentary; v. 14 as blindness to the First Noble Truth “Everything is Sorrow”; v. 15 as the coward’s attempt to escape Sorrow by Retreat; and v. 16 as the acceptance of the Astral as SAT. 17. This earth, Disciple, is the Hall of Sorrow, wherein are set along the Path of dire probations, traps to ensnare thy EGO by the delusion called “Great Heresy.” Develops still further these remarks. 18. This earth, O ignorant Disciple, is but the dismal en- trance leading to the twilight that precedes the valley of true light—that light which no wind can extinguish, that light which burns without a wick or fuel. “Twilight” here may again refer to Atmadarshana. The last phrase is borrowed from Eliphas Levi, who was not (I believe) a Tibetan of antiquity. [Madame Blavatsky hu- 15