I thought I should share these intricate, wise, and inspirational observations, from one of the last true alchemists, with all who have the patience to meditate on these truths in striving for balance. We are in and living through dark and unstable times in our human condition, facing our same old problems (that the majority of humans fail to truly identify—they merely pick at symptoms) on a global scale that we have never seen before, now in the “Digital Age”. One could spend a lifetime composing entire books of all of the bad news that has taken place in just the past year, most of which would be down-played, forgotten, or never covered by the mainstream media if not for citizen journalism and independent media outlets, which have allowed information to move around on a scale never before known to us. Great changes are upon us and we must grow together and adapt together, or we shall fade from this realm, separated in our fear, without even a memory of this stage that we just could not move beyond. Why settle for that? Why not try? Let us calcine together and rise anew. As much as the brutality of our environment has deformed us, I see beauty and potential in the human spirit. I still believe in us, as difficult as that is sometimes. Peace to you, for you are me and I am you. -Phoenix Excerpts from “Esoterism & Symbol” by R.A. Schwaller de Lubicz Chapter 2 There is in man a cerebral intelligence and also an innate intelligence called “intelligence-of-the-heart.” The latter comes into being through a fusion of the cosmic Cause which is contained in its materialization with the same Cause which is in us. This is possible because the nature of both Causes is identical.  As long as we are placed in duality before Nature, we judge it objectively. “Original sin” is the separation—hence the opposition—of complementary aspects whose merging makes for Unity, just as the superimposed colors red and green result in the “colorless.” In this Unity, our cerebral intelligence can no longer discern anything, and so has no further role to play. It needs opposition in order to function: we and the object, man and woman, yes and no, night and day, light and shade. Thus is every living organism constituted; a ceaseless oscillation between birth and death, increase and decrease. The red rods and cones in the retina of the eye intercept the color green, neutralize this color, and excite a complementary reaction of the optic nerve, which sees green as opposed to red. Thus the cerebral function is entirely based on a principle of crossing, as, for example, the right side of the brain generally controls the left side of the body. Likewise, a concrete image, the vision of an object, evokes its qualification or qualitative description. This is accomplished by abstract elements which are themselves the result of comparisons. Conversely, it is impossible for cerebral intelligence to conceive an abstraction without defining it by a concrete image. But here we must be aware of distinguishing moments of cerebral intelligence from moments of intelligence-of-the-heart. We will return to this later. The origin of the universe being one single and unique source of energy, there is, owing to this common paternity, a communion among all things in the world. There is a kinship between a certain mineral and a plant and an animal and a man: They are linked by being of the “same nature,” because in the final analysis, there is only a simple series of basic characteristics whence, by combinations, innumerable possibilities emerge. These can, however, be classified in a few large families and their subgroups. Despite the variety of the races of humanity, each consisting of a multitude of very diverse individuals, all men are organized in essentially the same way. What distinguishes one from another is his state of consciousness and hence his mental control, his particular psychic and sexual life, and consequently his affinities. The variable moment, therefore, is of an abstract order, but can be perfectly well observed and analyzed in its effects. On the other hand, the abstract cause in a state of genesis within the concrete—and apparently stable—scheme of man’s organic constitution, is beyond rational analysis. A totality of purely bodily experiences evidently maintains this genesis, but individual and group heredity play a part as well. Here again, one can speak of physiological adaptations transmitted by heredity, but the impulse toward this genesis must nevertheless be provided by an incomprehensible moment which, in sum, could be called formless concentration in the transmitting seed. Our common origin is by no means remote. It does not take us back into the primeval darkness: It is present and constant in that man feeds directly or indirectly on all the kingdoms, and thus enters into constant exchange with their particular natures and, finally, by way of the mineral origin, with the cosmic energy from which everything arises. It is completely impossible for our minds to conceive something which is not part of concrete Nature and which we have not experienced through our bodily becoming. The dog cannot understand man; it can be aware of him physically, insofar as he is physical, but it can no more understand him than the mollusk can understand the horse or the plant the mollusk. Is it because they lack the necessary cerebral organ? Most certainly. But what brings about this organ? Does the plant thrusting upward have the mentality to understand the sky? Yet it makes no mistake. There is an innate intelligence which is precisely the characteristic nature of the entity. And man possesses this innate nature himself in the mineral of his bones, in the vegetal matter of the tissues of his organs, which together make up his laboratory of assimilation and transformation as an independent being. We define this innate intelligence too glibly as “instinct.” We would do well to examine what comprises it and whence it comes. Chapter 3 Cerebral intelligence depends upon the senses, the recording of observed facts, and the comprehension of ideas. No element of cerebral intelligence is abstract, and every qualitative or abstract idea results from the comparison of concrete elements. The cerebral organ is formed by stages. For this, the organism must develop three faculties: that of the senses, that which records observations, and that which compares the recorded ideas, namely, memory. Reason, about which we shall speak later, is of a different order. For now, we are still speaking only of the human animal. The senses are the elements by which the “principial elements” are perceived. Touch, the tactile sense, is of the Earth, that is, of everything forming a material obstacle to the matter of the body. The body of the wind is Earth, as is the body of water, or stone. The senses are aware of an activity only by opposing it with a resistance of an identical nature. Taste is related to water, and nothing, be it a gas or a solid, can be tasted unless it be slightly dissolved. Thus there is a Water principle in everything. The sense of smell belongs to Air because nothing can be smelled unless it be volatile, or made so, as, for example, by heat. And so there is an Air principle in all things. Sight belongs to Fire: nothing can be seen without the radiance of Fire, just as a piece of iron, dark in the darkness, becomes dull red then dazzling white if heated by an invisible energy. The heat of ordinary fire belongs to touch and not to sight. Thus the Fire principle exists in all visible things. Hearing belongs to the quint-element, the Word, which becomes perceptible physically and tangibly through sound. The first four senses pass through the brain; the fifth sense, hearing, passes through the “heart” without speaking directly to the brain. It is the spiritual sense, the door to intelligence-of-the-heart. Each thing has its own sound. All things communicate with one another through the principial elements. The spheres to which our human genesis has not yet attained escape us, as long as we cannot transform them and reduce them to the principial element of the spheres of our inborn intelligence. All scientific instrumentation is but a reduction of this kind. There are aspects of Fire, Air, Water, and Earth which we have not yet experienced in the realms preceding us. It is therefore perfectly reasonable to admit the possible existence of a world interpenetrating the aspect of things now perceptible to us, a world composed of exactly the same principial elements, just as there are light waves which our eyes cannot perceive (infrared and ultraviolet). This still only concerns the possible expansion of the sensitivity of our senses, but the existence of the hearing faculty also allows us to believe in the existence of a principial or ideal state corresponding, like the principial elements, to principial forms. The fact that there is in man, once he has passed beyond the simple human-animal stage, the possibility of conceiving abstractions which the cerebral intelligence cannot understand as such, demonstrates the existence of a world parallel to ours in constitution but entirely different in aspect, extent, and genesis. This genesis would then be a genesis of return, just as, from the source to ourselves, there is a genesis of bodily becoming. Cerebral intelligence, which we see developed in the higher animal aspect of man, is strictly limited by the boundaries imposed on the senses. Intelligence-of-the-heart, to the contrary, is independent of them, and belongs to the great complex called life. The fundamental character of cerebral intelligence is that it is born of duality, the complementing which may also be called the sexualization of the universe. Quality is comprehensible only through this opposition of complementaries; moreover, the idea of quality exists in Nature only, that is, in the dualized universe. Quality defines quantity, and, inversely, quantity compared with another quantity defines quality. Any so-called abstract idea exists only if we can limit it by a quantity. We can be satisfied with words and say, for example, “horizon,” or “axis,” and construct sentences with these words, but as soon as we try to analyze their meanings, we are bound to make them objective: otherwise, our cerebral ability comes to a halt. An abstraction must be made concrete or else it will be impossible for us to understand. The word “axis” is a typical example, since this idea, which we qualify as imaginary, cannot be imagined, that is, made objective. Yet the axis (not to be confused with “axle”) is a fundamental characteristic of every rotating body. This again confirms the probability of an intelligence different from that of our cerebral possibilities since our corporeal world shows us the indisputable existence of functions and even of forms which unquestionably exist, and yet always have been and will remain entirely beyond the grasp of this single cerebral instrument alone. We have borrowed the term “intelligence-of-the-heart” from the ancient Egyptians in order to designate that other aspect of man which allows us to penetrate beyond our animal limits and which, in truth, makes for human man’s characteristic progression toward divine Man: the awakening of this original principle that lies dormant in every living human being.

I thought I should share these intricate, wise, and inspirational observations, from one of the last true alchemists, with all who have the patience to meditate on these truths in striving for balance.

We are in and living through dark and unstable times in our human condition, facing our same old problems (that the majority of humans fail to truly identify—they merely pick at symptoms) on a global scale that we have never seen before, now in the “Digital Age”. One could spend a lifetime composing entire books of all of the bad news that has taken place in just the past year, most of which would be down-played, forgotten, or never covered by the mainstream media if not for citizen journalism and independent media outlets, which have allowed information to move around on a scale never before known to us.

Great changes are upon us and we must grow together and adapt together, or we shall fade from this realm, separated in our fear, without even a memory of this stage that we just could not move beyond.

Why settle for that? Why not try? Let us calcine together and rise anew. As much as the brutality of our environment has deformed us, I see beauty and potential in the human spirit. I still believe in us, as difficult as that is sometimes.

Peace to you, for you are me and I am you.

-Phoenix

Excerpts from “Esoterism & Symbol”

by R.A. Schwaller de Lubicz


Chapter 2

There is in man a cerebral intelligence and also an innate intelligence called “intelligence-of-the-heart.” The latter comes into being through a fusion of the cosmic Cause which is contained in its materialization with the same Cause which is in us. This is possible because the nature of both Causes is identical. 


As long as we are placed in duality before Nature, we judge it objectively. “Original sin” is the separation—hence the opposition—of complementary aspects whose merging makes for Unity, just as the superimposed colors red and green result in the “colorless.” 

In this Unity, our cerebral intelligence can no longer discern anything, and so has no further role to play. It needs opposition in order to function: we and the object, man and woman, yes and no, night and day, light and shade. Thus is every living organism constituted; a ceaseless oscillation between birth and death, increase and decrease. 

The red rods and cones in the retina of the eye intercept the color green, neutralize this color, and excite a complementary reaction of the optic nerve, which sees green as opposed to red. 

Thus the cerebral function is entirely based on a principle of crossing, as, for example, the right side of the brain generally controls the left side of the body. Likewise, a concrete image, the vision of an object, evokes its qualification or qualitative description. This is accomplished by abstract elements which are themselves the result of comparisons. 

Conversely, it is impossible for cerebral intelligence to conceive an abstraction without defining it by a concrete image. But here we must be aware of distinguishing moments of cerebral intelligence from moments of intelligence-of-the-heart. We will return to this later. The origin of the universe being one single and unique source of energy, there is, owing to this common paternity, a communion among all things in the world. There is a kinship between a certain mineral and a plant and an animal and a man: They are linked by being of the “same nature,” because in the final analysis, there is only a simple series of basic characteristics whence, by combinations, innumerable possibilities emerge. These can, however, be classified in a few large families and their subgroups. 

Despite the variety of the races of humanity, each consisting of a multitude of very diverse individuals, all men are organized in essentially the same way. What distinguishes one from another is his state of consciousness and hence his mental control, his particular psychic and sexual life, and consequently his affinities. 

The variable moment, therefore, is of an abstract order, but can be perfectly well observed and analyzed in its effects. 

On the other hand, the abstract cause in a state of genesis within the concrete—and apparently stable—scheme of man’s organic constitution, is beyond rational analysis. A totality of purely bodily experiences evidently maintains this genesis, but individual and group heredity play a part as well. Here again, one can speak of physiological adaptations transmitted by heredity, but the impulse toward this genesis must nevertheless be provided by an incomprehensible moment which, in sum, could be called formless concentration in the transmitting seed. 

Our common origin is by no means remote. It does not take us back into the primeval darkness: It is present and constant in that man feeds directly or indirectly on all the kingdoms, and thus enters into constant exchange with their particular natures and, finally, by way of the mineral origin, with the cosmic energy from which everything arises. 

It is completely impossible for our minds to conceive something which is not part of concrete Nature and which we have not experienced through our bodily becoming. The dog cannot understand man; it can be aware of him physically, insofar as he is physical, but it can no more understand him than the mollusk can understand the horse or the plant the mollusk. Is it because they lack the necessary cerebral organ? Most certainly. But what brings about this organ? Does the plant thrusting upward have the mentality to understand the sky? Yet it makes no mistake. There is an innate intelligence which is precisely the characteristic nature of the entity. And man possesses this innate nature himself in the mineral of his bones, in the vegetal matter of the tissues of his organs, which together make up his laboratory of assimilation and transformation as an independent being. We define this innate intelligence too glibly as “instinct.” We would do well to examine what comprises it and whence it comes. 


Chapter 3


Cerebral intelligence depends upon the senses, the recording of observed facts, and the comprehension of ideas. 

No element of cerebral intelligence is abstract, and every qualitative or abstract idea results from the comparison of concrete elements. 

The cerebral organ is formed by stages. For this, the organism must develop three faculties: that of the senses, that which records observations, and that which compares the recorded ideas, namely, memory. Reason, about which we shall speak later, is of a different order. For now, we are still speaking only of the human animal. The senses are the elements by which the “principial elements” are perceived. Touch, the tactile sense, is of the Earth, that is, of everything forming a material obstacle to the matter of the body. The body of the wind is Earth, as is the body of water, or stone. The senses are aware of an activity only by opposing it with a resistance of an identical nature. Taste is related to water, and nothing, be it a gas or a solid, can be tasted unless it be slightly dissolved. Thus there is a Water principle in everything. The sense of smell belongs to Air because nothing can be smelled unless it be volatile, or made so, as, for example, by heat. And so there is an Air principle in all things. Sight belongs to Fire: nothing can be seen without the radiance of Fire, just as a piece of iron, dark in the darkness, becomes dull red then dazzling white if heated by an invisible energy. 

The heat of ordinary fire belongs to touch and not to sight. Thus the Fire principle exists in all visible things. 

Hearing belongs to the quint-element, the Word, which becomes perceptible physically and tangibly through sound. The first four senses pass through the brain; the fifth sense, hearing, passes through the “heart” without speaking directly to the brain. It is the spiritual sense, the door to intelligence-of-the-heart. 

Each thing has its own sound. 

All things communicate with one another through the principial elements. The spheres to which our human genesis has not yet attained escape us, as long as we cannot transform them and reduce them to the principial element of the spheres of our inborn intelligence. All scientific instrumentation is but a reduction of this kind. There are aspects of Fire, Air, Water, and Earth which we have not yet experienced in the realms preceding us. It is therefore perfectly reasonable to admit the possible existence of a world interpenetrating the aspect of things now perceptible to us, a world composed of exactly the same principial elements, just as there are light waves which our eyes cannot perceive (infrared and ultraviolet). This still only concerns the possible expansion of the sensitivity of our senses, but the existence of the hearing faculty also allows us to believe in the existence of a principial or ideal state corresponding, like the principial elements, to principial forms. 

The fact that there is in man, once he has passed beyond the simple human-animal stage, the possibility of conceiving abstractions which the cerebral intelligence cannot understand as such, demonstrates the existence of a world parallel to ours in constitution but entirely different in aspect, extent, and genesis. This genesis would then be a genesis of return, just as, from the source to ourselves, there is a genesis of bodily becoming. 

Cerebral intelligence, which we see developed in the higher animal aspect of man, is strictly limited by the boundaries imposed on the senses. Intelligence-of-the-heart, to the contrary, is independent of them, and belongs to the great complex called life. 

The fundamental character of cerebral intelligence is that it is born of duality, the complementing which may also be called the sexualization of the universe. Quality is comprehensible only through this opposition of complementaries; moreover, the idea of quality exists in Nature only, that is, in the dualized universe. 

Quality defines quantity, and, inversely, quantity compared with another quantity defines quality. Any so-called abstract idea exists only if we can limit it by a quantity. We can be satisfied with words and say, for example, “horizon,” or “axis,” and construct sentences with these words, but as soon as we try to analyze their meanings, we are bound to make them objective: otherwise, our cerebral ability comes to a halt. An abstraction must be made concrete or else it will be impossible for us to understand. 

The word “axis” is a typical example, since this idea, which we qualify as imaginary, cannot be imagined, that is, made objective. Yet the axis (not to be confused with “axle”) is a fundamental characteristic of every rotating body. This again confirms the probability of an intelligence different from that of our cerebral possibilities since our corporeal world shows us the indisputable existence of functions and even of forms which unquestionably exist, and yet always have been and will remain entirely beyond the grasp of this single cerebral instrument alone. 

We have borrowed the term “intelligence-of-the-heart” from the ancient Egyptians in order to designate that other aspect of man which allows us to penetrate beyond our animal limits and which, in truth, makes for human man’s characteristic progression toward divine Man: the awakening of this original principle that lies dormant in every living human being.

Tags: R.A. Schwaller de Lubicz Esoterism & Symbol esoterism alchemy philosophy Kemet Ancient Egypt heart balance sacred science elements spirituality science wisdom knowledge inspiration