(_a_) That which is meant by the qualification the “Fourth,” is explained as the Fourth Round, only on the authority of the Commentaries. It can equally mean Fourth Eternity as Fourth Round, or even our Fourth Globe. For, as will repeatedly be shown, the latter is the fourth sphere, on the fourth or lowest plane of material life. And it so happens that we are in the Fourth Round, at the middle point of which the perfect equilibrium between Spirit and Matter had to take place. It was, as we shall see, at this period—during the highest point of civilization and knowledge, and also of human intellectuality, of the Fourth, Atlantean Race—that, owing to the final crisis of the physiologico‐spiritual adjustment of the races, humanity branched off into two diametrically opposite paths: the _Right‐_ and the _Left‐hand_ Paths of Knowledge or Vidyâ. In the words of the Commentary: _Thus were the germs of the White and the Black Magic sown in those days. The seeds lay latent for some time, to sprout only during the early period of the Fifth [our Race]._ Says the Commentary explaining the Shloka: _The Holy Youths [the Gods] refused to multiply and create species after their likeness, after their kind. __“__They are not fit Forms [Rûpas] for us. They have to grow.__”__ They refuse to enter the Chhâyâs [Shadows or Images] of their inferiors. Thus had selfish feeling prevailed from the beginning, even among the Gods, and they fell under the eye of the Karmic Lipikas._ They had to suffer for it in later births. How the punishment reached the Gods will be seen in Volume II. It is a universal tradition that, before the physiological “Fall,” propagation of one’s kind, whether human or animal, took place through the _Will_ of the Creators, or of their progeny. This was the Fall of Spirit into generation, not the Fall of mortal Man. It has already been stated that, to become self‐conscious, Spirit must pass through every cycle of being, culminating in its highest point on earth in Man. Spirit _per se_ is an unconscious negative _abstraction_. Its purity is inherent, not acquired by merit; hence, as already shown, to become the highest Dhyân Chohan, it is necessary for each Ego to attain to full self‐consciousness as a human, _i.e._, conscious, being, which is synthesized for us in Man. The Jewish Kabalists, arguing that no Spirit can belong to the divine Hierarchy unless Ruach (Spirit) is united to Nephesh (Living Soul), only repeat the Eastern Esoteric teaching: _A Dhyâni has to be an Âtmâ‐Buddhi; once the Buddhi‐Manas breaks loose from the immortal Âtmâ, of which it (Buddhi) is the vehicle, Âtman passes into Non‐Being, which is Absolute Being._ This means that the purely Nirvânic state is a passage of Spirit back to the ideal abstraction of Be‐ness, which has no relation to the plane on which our Universe is accomplishing its cycle.