"As no outward motion or change, when normal, in man's external body can take place unless provoked by an inward impulse, given through one of the three functions named, so with the external or manifested Universe"
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Blavatsky’s sentence moves like a lever: start with the supposedly obvious fact of bodily motion, then pry open the entire cosmos. The intent is classic Theosophical persuasion-by-analogy. If a human arm doesn’t lift without an inner signal, she suggests, then the universe itself cannot “move” without an interior principle. Physics becomes a parable. What looks like metaphysical speculation is framed as physiological common sense, a way to smuggle spirit back into a world increasingly impressed by mechanism.
The subtext is an argument against materialism that never names its opponent. By insisting that outward change is “normal” only when “provoked” inwardly, she implies that purely external causation is incomplete, even incoherent. The “three functions named” (elsewhere in her system: mental, psychic, and spiritual operations, or mind/soul/spirit) operate as a backstage crew. You’re meant to feel that the visible world is merely the front-of-house performance.
Context matters: Blavatsky is writing in the late 19th century, when Darwin, industrial technology, and positivist science were remapping what counted as knowledge. Theosophy offered a counter-modernity that still borrowed modern authority. Note the quasi-scientific phrasing - “functions,” “provoked,” “manifested.” She’s not rejecting science so much as annexing its language to argue that the universe has an interior life, and that meaning is not an ornamental afterthought but the hidden engine of motion.
The subtext is an argument against materialism that never names its opponent. By insisting that outward change is “normal” only when “provoked” inwardly, she implies that purely external causation is incomplete, even incoherent. The “three functions named” (elsewhere in her system: mental, psychic, and spiritual operations, or mind/soul/spirit) operate as a backstage crew. You’re meant to feel that the visible world is merely the front-of-house performance.
Context matters: Blavatsky is writing in the late 19th century, when Darwin, industrial technology, and positivist science were remapping what counted as knowledge. Theosophy offered a counter-modernity that still borrowed modern authority. Note the quasi-scientific phrasing - “functions,” “provoked,” “manifested.” She’s not rejecting science so much as annexing its language to argue that the universe has an interior life, and that meaning is not an ornamental afterthought but the hidden engine of motion.
Quote Details
| Topic | Wisdom |
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