Just so; but the "palæozoic fishes" are at the lower curve of the arc of the evolution of _forms_, and this Round began with Astral Man, the _reflection_ of the Dhyân Chohans, called the "Builders." Man is the _alpha and the omega_ of objective creation. As said in _Isis Unveiled_:
All things had their origin in Spirit--evolution having originally begun from above and proceeding downwards, instead of the reverse, as taught in the Darwinian theory.(390)
Therefore, the tendency spoken of by the eminent Naturalist above quoted is one inherent in every atom. Only, were one to apply it to both sides of evolution, the observations made would greatly interfere with the modern theory, which has now almost become (Darwinian) law.
But in citing the passage from Agassiz' work with approval, it must not be understood that the Occultists are making any _concession_ to the theory which derives man from the animal kingdom. The fact that in this Round he preceded the mammalia is obviously not impugned by the consideration that the latter follow in the wake of man.
25. HOW DID THE MÂNASA, THE SONS OF WISDOM, ACT? THEY REJECTED THE SELF- BORN.(391) THEY ARE NOT READY. THEY SPURNED THE SWEAT-BORN.(392) THEY ARE NOT QUITE READY. THEY WOULD NOT ENTER THE FIRST EGG-BORN.(393)
To a Theist or a Christian this verse would suggest a rather theological idea: that of the Fall of the Angels through Pride. In the Secret Doctrine, however, the reasons for the refusal to incarnate in _half- ready_ physical bodies seem to be more connected with physiological than metaphysical reasons. Not all the organisms were sufficiently ready. The Incarnating Powers chose the ripest fruits and spurned the rest.
By a curious coincidence, when selecting a familiar name for the continent on which the first Androgynes, the Third Root-Race, separated, the writer chose, on geographical considerations, that of "Lemuria," invented by Mr. P. L. Sclater. It was only later that, on reading Hæckel's _Pedigree of Man_, it was found that the German "Animalist" had chosen the name for his late continent. He traces, properly enough, the centre of human evolution to Lemuria, but with a slight scientific variation. Speaking of it as that "cradle of mankind," he pictures the gradual transformation of the anthropoid mammal into the primeval savage!! Vogt, again, holds that in America man sprang from a branch of the platyrrhine apes, _independently_ of the origination of the African and Asian root-stocks from the old world catarrhinians. Anthropologists are, as usual, at loggerheads on this question, as on many others. We shall examine this claim in the light of Esoteric Philosophy in Stanza VIII. Meanwhile, let us give a few moments of attention to the various consecutive modes of procreation according to the laws of Evolution.