The question then arises as to whether that part of the earth’s aura where the Sun is at any moment should not always be taken as the positive maximum answering to noon and the colour red. If so, then it follows that the time of birth becomes a very important factor in the constitution of what may be called the magnetic constitution of a person. The whole subject is full of suggestions of the utmost significance, but hardly at this date in a condition to admit of dogmatic statement. The subject is therefore better left for future consideration. CHAPTER XVIII VULCAN THE CHAIN MAKER There is an aspect of Mars which has an interest for us as prisoners in this house of flesh. Vulcan or Hephæstus, son of Jupiter and Juno, is the artificer of human bonds. By some he is thought to be allied to Pluto, the god of the Infernos, and in the Kabalistic conception, Malcuth, or the Earth, is the lowest of the heavens and the highest of the hells, being in fact in a state of equilibrium between the Superior and Inferior worlds and therefore, as Swedenborg suggests, it is in a state of freedom from that circumstance. But can so much be said of those that dwell therein? I doubt it. The Oriental doctrine of Samsara pictures man as a mere “Butterfly on the Wheel,” bound by the chains of his own desires to the wheel of cyclic rebirth into a world of suffering. “Ye suffer from yourselves, none else compels, None other holds you that ye lag and stay, And whirl upon the wheel, and hug and kiss Its spokes of agony, its tyre of tears, Its nave of nothingness!” The law of moral causation, as well as that of affinity, impels man to rebirth while there are any unexhausted desires in him. These unexhausted tendencies are called _skandhas_. It does not matter what we call them, we are all conscious of their existence and of the terrible strife they cause in us. These desires are in the Adamic nature, they are in the human blood, and Mars is their cosmic symbol. They are the chains of Vulcan. The number of Mars is nine and the magic of the number nine haunts us from our birth to the very last day of our existence in this world. In the Kabala of Numbers I have shown the connection between the Adamic race and the number nine. This is the Iron Age, the Kali Yuga, and the horoscope of the world shows the sign Aries, ruled by Mars, in the ascendant. In the age of Saturn men sought virtue and distinction in obscurity. Now there is but one way to recognition and success, Force and Self-assertion. Let those take it who will. What is said of those who willingly take to the sword may be applied to the slaves of every other form of human passion. Mars will lay them by the heel and bring them back to retribution.