"The transcendent world is therefore open to whoever has sufficient Will (or even artificial impulsion) to triumph over the forces which guard it; but woe to that man who approaches it with a passionate and selfish heart; with lowered head he will fall back into the current of decomposition, where he will be dissolved. Nature destroys all Evil; it is the law of selection!"-The Tarot of the Bohemians, Papus, 266. The meaning of number 16 must be largely derived from a consideration of the digits of which it is composed, the ten of Completion and the six of the Christ-force and the six Days of Labor. Here we find the One Life of the Father (1), supporting the struggle of the Christ-force (6) to manifest in matter, here so united (16=1+6=7) that they are able to manifest Perfection (7) on earth in physical nature. This indicates that in 16 the first victory has been won. The Christforce has worked up through the lower kingdoms and reached into the human. The great unrest of number six has, through its constant activity of destroying, rebuilding and perfecting, gained its first victory and the "Word" has become flesh or is embodied in man. Henceforth man must consciously embody the number six of the Christ-force in himself and permit it to repeat the cycle of unrest in him. Wescott calls 16 Felicity, while others regard it unfavorably, but as usual the true meaning lies in the middle. Number 16 is called the Number of Victory, yet it is by no means the complete and final Victory. Another aspect of 16 is one little understood hence seldom alluded to, namely, the connection between it and the elementals. In The Key of the Universe1 we explain that all Nature Sprites bear the impress of number six, just as man does number five, in their makeup. Now since 16 is 1+6=7 1 Page 204, it is natural to find it in some way connected with the elementals. This is quite true, but the connection is with the rulers of the different tribes of elementals, or their kings. In these elemental kingdoms a king or a ruler is one only because such an one is a synthesis of the elemental forces of that kingdom of nature, hence can be used as a tool we might say under the great Hierarchies who are working to form and develop nature and bring it to perfection. Just so man when he has reached a certain step in evolution must become an instrument of or a co-worker with the Divine. One great difference between man and the elementals is that the elementals, because without free-will, obey automatically the will of those using them, but man having the gift of free-will, must obey because he himself has decided it is best. Quite naturally such synthetic elemental entities agree with 16, for six, the number of nature, has been wedded to the ten which has perfected its expression in that kingdom. As number six is the mysterious aspect of the One Life filling all nature and as the nature elementals are the living atoms in the stream of that Life in nature, so number 16 represents a state of development where the One Life is far more definitely organized and entitized. A most remarkable corroboration of this has recently been brought to our attention in an article in The Occult Review of London, of November, 1917. "Here it was that I met with a girl who had more knowledge of elementals than any one I have since met. Half-witted she was, so the schoolmaster told me; it had been utterly impossible to teach her anything at school; he doubted whether she could even read or write intelligibly, but he was a Lowlander from the Border country, and rather fancied himself on a certain intellectual agnosticism. Any how this girl had a certain sweet wisdom of her own, which was perhaps beyond anything that was taught in the school. She told me that whenever any of the Kings of the Elementals came across the island, any one who knew could see their footprints, and know what was coming. "One day she showed me a mark in the soft ground at the edge of a peat moss. 'That's the foot of the Sea King,' she said. 'He is going up to the heights of the Coolins. There will be a rain storm tonight.' The mark, whatever it was, was perfectly distinct, six crescents arranged round a circle, quite unlike the track of any beast I am acquainted with. It was a blue and cloudless day with never a hint of rain, but sure enough at sunset ominous black lurid clouds piled themselves on the peaks of the Coolins, and before midnight there came such a deluge of rain as I have seldom seen." The unfavorable side of 16 is derived from the fact that this number is associated with what is known as spells or bewitchments. The reason for this is quite plain, for spells, bewitchments and witchcraft can only be effective when the elementals are called to the aid of a powerful will, for as we have said, all nature forces are living elementals commanded by certain conscious entities. They are without free-will yet eager to work out the will of any being whose will is strong enough to command them. They are utterly without responsibility hence obey a strong will and accomplish evil quite as readily as they accomplish good, but karmic retribution is brought upon those who invoke them as their servants to accomplish evil, in that these elemental forces once started upon a destructive path go on blindly until turned into a different path by a stronger will, hence will ultimately destroy the one thus using them. It is like starting a forest fire which if unchecked will destroy the home of the one starting it. It is through the elementals working out in nature the evil thoughts and creations of man that he has fulfilled the curse, "Cursed is the ground for thy sake. Thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee." Therefore the only sense in which the spells or bewitchments can achieve any real force is when, either by the conscious use of the Will or through selfish ignorance, the one desiring to influence another, either for their hurt or as often happens for what the ignorant one thinks is for their good, calls forth the mighty potency of the Creative Power, the Christ-force or the brilliant Light of the Vast Countenance-a call all elementals must obey-and strives by the power of his Will to pervert it for his own selfish ends. To use this terrible power to destroy rather than create must ultimately destroy the one so using it, even though the power is evoked ignorantly to destroy the free-will of another or bend it to his. If the Will is used through a selfish and willful determination to bring to oneself power, health, wealth and happiness the perversion is just as disastrous in the end, for this divine power is the eternal unrest and constant effort of number six to destroy all evil and make way for perfection that man like nature may express the perfect pattern of God-hood. Therefore to so use the Will as to make this power work for our own selfish ends, rather than to use all our Will to make our personality work with it to bring about peace, harmony and perfection, is like focusing an oxy-hydrogen flame or an electric current, both of which might be very useful to cut through steel and accomplish useful work, but dangerous to play with and criminal to use for burglarious purposes. In kabalistic language number 16 is the sixth day, while the number six kabalistically considered would be the sixth hour of the day. The Vast and Lesser Countenances of Macroprosopus and Microprosopus plainly mean that the Vast Countenance is the perfect expression of the Christ-force on high, all shining brilliancy and perfection, while the Lesser Countenance is its reflection in matter through the zodiac. Therefore if in the sixth hour the mystical power of this mighty Countenance of God shines down and reflects itself in matter, struggling to make a perfect image, how much more mystical and powerful must be the symbol of the interlaced triangles, which represent number six, when considered from the standpoint of 16 instead of six. Here we have the fullness of the command "Six days shalt thou labor and do all thy work." We stand at 16 as it were on an eminence and see the Christ-light struggling with the darkness and inertia of matter, yet see that it has accomplished a definite amount of work, hence we can go on in the assurance that its mystical power is all potent and must conquer, for it has already gained a victory over nature. In the Thirty-two Paths of Wisdom, the "Sixteenth Path is the Triumphal or Eternal Intelligence, so called because it is the pleasure of the Glory, beyond which is no other Glory like to it, and it is called also the Paradise prepared for the Righteous." Thus when man walks to the end of this sixteenth Path he will indeed be filled with the Glory of the Eternal Intelligence, for then the Christ-life will express itself in man even as it does in nature, and no longer can it be said of the lilies of the field that, "Solomon in all his glory is not arrayed as one of these," for when Solomon, the man of Wisdom, is clothed in the Christ Glory at the completion of the sixteenth Path, in his kingdom he will be just as perfect an expression of God's handiwork, and there will be no Glory like unto it. Kabalistically 16 is called the Solar Light, and is sacred to the Sun, which is the eye of the world. Claud de Saint Martin the Unknown Philosopher states in his book, Livre des Rapports, that the primitive alphabet was composed of 16 signs. Also Lacour in his book on the Elohim has inductively determined the existence of a primitive alphabet composed of 16 signs. Still another author, Barrols, reached the same conclusion as to the existence of 16 primitive signs on which the twenty-two letters of the Hebrew alphabet were built. Another meaning often ascribed to number 16 is the Fall of Satan's Kingdom. This is deduced from the meaning given by Apollonius who calls number 16 the seventh hour of Initiation, i. e., the hour when the Neophyte rests for a period in the Hall of Realization-Apollonius calls it The Lightning Struck Tower, and says of it "Fire comforts every living creature, and if some priest, himself a pure man, purloin and use it, if he blend it with holy oil, consecrate it and then 2 Sepher Yetzirah, 30. |