[Transcriber’s Note: The above cover image was produced by the submitter at Distributed Proofreaders, and is being placed into the public domain.] Ἡ ἐμὴ διδαχὴ οὐκ ἔστιν ἐμή, ἀλλὰ τοῦ πέμψαντός με. My doctrine is not mine, but his that sent me. JOHN vii. 16. Modern Science insists upon the doctrine of evolution; so do human reason and the Secret Doctrine, and the idea is corroborated by the ancient legends and myths, and even by the _Bible_ itself, when it is read between the lines. We see a flower slowly developing from a bud, and the bud from its seed. But whence the latter, with all its predetermined programme of physical transformation, and its invisible, therefore _spiritual_, forces which gradually develop its form, colour, and odour? The word _evolution_ speaks for itself. The germ of the present human race must have preëxisted in the parent of this race, as the seed, in which lies hidden the flower of next summer, was developed in the capsule of its parent flower; the parent may be but _slightly_ different, but it still differs from its future progeny. The antediluvian ancestors of the present elephant and lizard were, perhaps, the mammoth and the plesiosaurus; why should not the progenitors of our human race have been the “giants” of the _Vedas_, the _Voluspa_, and the _Book of Genesis_? While it is positively absurd to believe the “transformation of species” to have taken place according to some of the more materialistic views of the Evolutionists, it is but natural to think that each genus, beginning with the molluscs and ending with monkey‐man, has modified from its own primordial and distinctive form.—ISIS UNVEILED, I. 152‐3. PRELIMINARY NOTES ON THE ARCHAIC STANZAS, AND THE FOUR PRE‐HISTORIC CONTINENTS. Facies totius universi, quamvis infinitis modis variet, Manet tamen semper eadem.—SPINOZA. The Stanzas, with the Commentaries thereon, in this Volume, are drawn from the same Archaic Records as the Stanzas on Cosmogony in Volume I. As far as possible a verbatim translation is given: but some of the Stanzas are too obscure to be understood without explanation, and therefore, as in Volume I, they are first given in full as they stand, and then, when taken verse by verse with their Commentaries, an attempt is made to make them clearer, by words added in foot‐notes, in anticipation of the fuller explanation of the Commentary. As regards the Evolution of mankind, the Secret Doctrine postulates three new propositions, which stand in direct antagonism to Modern Science as well as to current religious dogmas. It teaches: (_a_) the simultaneous evolution of seven human Groups on seven different portions of our globe; (_b_) the birth of the _astral_, before the _physical_ body, the former being a model for the latter; and (_c_) that man, in this Round, preceded every mammalian—the anthropoids included—in the animal kingdom.(1)