Supersight, or the Third Eye




Supersight, or the Third Eye

   The subject of supersight falls under three divisions:

first, tradition--the stories and legends which refer to a Third Eye,

or a supersight of man; second, the anatomical and physiological

possibilities of the existence of such an organ; third, the function or

purpose of the organ.

   Of all our sense perceptions or objective faculties, sight seems to

be the most dominant and important to us.  This is particularly so in 

the number of qualities which sight assigns to objects.  Sight and 

touch alone of the five faculties convey the idea of dimensions.  Sight,

of course, has its forms, or the shapes and proportions it confers upon

things.  Touch also has its qualities, such as hard, soft, cold, hot, 

et cetera.  However, sight makes possible, at the same time, through

suggestion and association of ideas, the varied other qualities of our

objective senses, without bringing them to bear.  For example, if we 

see beautiful flower at some distance from us, we not only perceive its

form and colouring, but by suggestion we recall other beautiful flowers,

the fragrance of which we have experienced.  We then think of this

particular flower as pleasant smelling as well.  If we look upon an

ingeniously made wax apple, without knowing it is a model, we not only

see its form and its colouring, but the sight sensations recall memory

experiences of the sweet taste of a similar real apple.  Sight, there-

fore, gives the objects we perceive, directly or indirectly, more

qualities than do the sensations coming to us through the medium of our

other senses.

   Likewise, we know that in the human certain of our basic instincts

are more easily aroused through sight than through any of our other 

peripheral faculties.  On the other hand, a dog will not rely upon his

sense of sight to determine whether an individual is a friend or foe,

but will resort to his sense of smell, especially if there is something

visually unfamiliar in the person's appearance.  Since human emotions

are aroused more easily through sight, the ancients considered the sight

organs, or eyes, as direct channels to the soul, because the soul was 

thought to be the seat of emotions.  In fact, Democritus declared, in 

his doctrine of images, that our visual perceptions were caused by

external objects casting off images or shells of themselves, which 

entered organs to accomodate them.  These images, Democritus contended,

after entering the eyes, caused the soul to become shaken, and in

consequence man had the sensations or sense experiences.  With little

modification, this doctrine of images lasted until the time of Locke.

The eyes were thought to be windows of the soul, as Leonardo da Vinci 

said in his now classical expression.  They were not only considered

by the ancients to be orifices to admit external objects or influences,

but permitted the exit of forces or strange powers from the soul.

   In antiquity, centuries before the doctrines of Mesmer, telesthesia,

or mental telepathy were known, it was held that thoughts which 

engendered intense feeling or emotion created an ethereal, invisible

substance, which was transmitted from the mortal.  Thus certain senti-

ments and passions were said to be projected through the eyes.  Out-

standing among these transmitted passions was hatred.  There is still

the common phrase: "If looks could kill," implying that the glance

was malevolent.  In Italy, to this day, one of the most common terms 

used is "malocchio" which means "evil eye."  This phrase was not just

a simile to the ancient Egyptians, nor is it even today to superstitious

peoples of the Oriental lands.  The eyes of a hateful or evil man were

conceived to be destructive to all who came within their range of

vision.  To have such eyes look upon you was to become accursed with

ill fortune.  After death, these "evil eyes" separated themselves from

the body, it was believed, and continued to exist.  The superstitious
 
were in constant terror that the evil eye might look upon them.  In 

accordance with theurgical or magical practices of the time, amulets

and fetishes thought to attain supernatural properties, were worn or 

carried about to ward off the "evil eye."   Even a colour was selected

to provide immunity.  In many of the Islamic countries, the traveller 

will see today upon the outer surface of the tents of the nomads, or

painted upon roof tops, stripes of a particular shade of blue.  This 

colour is the guardian against the "evil eye."  Camels of the caravans

have beads of the colour suspended from their necks to protect them and

their burdens from the dire effects of a glance from the "evil eye."

   All of the influences of the eye were not nefarious, however, for

the eye could be an instrument of good, a constructive factor as well.

Especially the eyes of the gods or of the wise ones.  The Egyptian god,

Horus, of the early Egyptian religion, according to their mythology, 

was the son of Isis and Osiris.  He had eyes which radiated a tremendous

power, it is related.  The right one was especially efficacious.  So

respected and awesome became this right eye of Horus that if finally

was separated from the figure of the god, and apotheosized, that is, 

it became worshipped itself, not as a god, but as a symbol of the 

omniscience and omnipresence of God.  The all-seeing eye, as we

term it, is therefore one of the oldest symbols of man, still in 

constant use and with a meaning that has remained almost continuous for

centuries.  It is even included in the theological symbolism of some of

the present-day Christian sects.  To the mystics it means the ever-

pervading consciousness, the all-embracing, encompassing Divine sight

of God, outside of which nothing exists.

   Concomitant with these powers attributed to the eye were the tales

and legends of uni-eyed and multi-eyed beings that were said to have

once roamed the earth.  Most of us are familiar with the Greek Mytho-

logical characters, the Cyclopes.  According to ancient Greek cosmology,

Eros, the spirit of love, brought together pairs of many things, when

the world was formed.  Two of these brought together were Uranus

(heaven) and Gaea (earth).  They in turn peopled the earth with hosts

of beings.  Some of these were Titans, and Cyclopes.  Cyclopes were

three in number--Brontes, with his thunder; Steropes, with his light-

ning; and Arges, with his stream of light.  They were reported as 

having one eye, placed at a juncture between the nose and brow. 

It was, however, a large, flashing eye, as became beings who were

personifications of the storm cloud, with its flahses of destructive

lightning, and peals of thunder.  Early paintings depict a beam of light

emanating from this sole eye.  This revealed that this eye not only

could perceive, but was able to radiate a power.  The tales of the

Third Eye are related as well to the ancient Lemurians.  We are

told that this Third Eye was a big knob-like protrusion, just 

above the bridge of the nose, by which the individual was capable of

discerning the existence of things not visible to the other two eyes.

   The term eye would thus not really apply, if such an

organ as described immediately above existed, for though the organ would

have the power of perception, it would not be sight as we ordinarily

understand the word.  For example, suppose the faculty of imagination 

were confined in an organ about the size of a small hen's egg, and 

protruded from the centre of the forehead.  By means of it we wouldBR>
have the mental pictures or images associated with the imagination.  It

would be quite understandable how, through confusion, this organ

could be identified as an eye, and yet in the physiological sense it 

would not be.  That such a third organ as an actual eye, or an extra

perceptive faculty existed, there is much evidence.

   Let us digress for a moment to consider primitive eyes, or the eyes

of simple animals or organisms.  Under the term eyes we include

those organs, or in the simplest cases, those sensory cells, which are

especially adapted to the perception of light.  Nevertheless,

sensitiveness to light can frequently be established for animals in 

which eyes are not demonstrable.  In such instances, we must 

assume that the entire surface of the skin is either sensitive to light

or that single sensory cells which are very inconspicuous in their

structure, and are bearers of the sense of light perceptions, are 

scattered in the skin.  There are also what are called eye spots

which exist in many species, and are perhaps the simplest form of eye. 

These eye spots are really photo-sensitive cells.  Nature places

them in a pit-like depression, thus forming an eye cup (optic cup)

for them.  These simple cells are perhaps already prepared for 

perception of direction.  By that is meant that they are able to direct

the organism of which they are a part to the light.  Medusae, star fish,

and some anelid worms have these eye cups, the little depression in 

which the sensitive cells are located.  In other species of living

things, which have more complex organs of sight, there are still 

vestiges of these early eye cups to be found.  The photo-sensitive

cells which once occupied them have been discarded by nature, in the

process of evolution.  Man, too, then, in his physical development, may

have been given a special third eye at one time, which 

especially served him, when his brain was not adequate to protect him

through reason.  Since this other kind of organ was commonly used, it

may have protruded and could be as easily discerned as our present ears

and eyes.  It does not mean, however, that such an eye was

sensitive to light or consisted of photo-sensitive cells.  It was,

it is reasonable to believe and to know, sensitive to other 

external and internal agencies which affect man.

   Have you ever wondered why you have eyes?  To see, you say.  Yes, 

but why must we see?  Only because light makes possible to our

consciousness the existence of manifestations of nature essential to our

existence, whether they are to be acquired or avoided.  There are,

however, different kinds of sights, which serve living things in

various ways.  Most lower animals enjoy what is known as perception

of movement only.  They do not recognize or have cognition of an

object, unless it moves.  A thing which is motionless is not perceived 

at all by some animals.  A hare will display no alarm in the presence

of a huntsman, if he remains still.  If he moves, the hare detects the

motion and is off.  There are insects that have eyes so constructed

as not to be affected, except by the perception of motion.  A light may

can be switched on and off in their presence, apparently without their

perceiving it.  

   Visual perception of direction is possible with most animals.  They

are able to follow in the direction of their perception and are thus 

able to avoid going around in circles.  The principle of man's

perception of direction is known.  He selects an object ahead, in 

the path of his visual perception, makes toward it, and when he has 

reached it, selects another still farther.  Most lower animals,

particularly many insects, do not follow objects, but paths of light.
They keep to the right or left of light, and travel parallel to it.

Some insects are positively phototactic; they are drawn to the light.

For example, a bee will fly in a direct line to an open window.  On the

other hand, a cockroach is negatively phototactic.  He will avoid light

by travelling away from it.

   There exist in this universe many factors that are important to our

welfare, as physical beings and as beings of spiritual origin.  We have

not been left destitute by the Cosmic of a means to utilize these

factors.  The endocrine glands and psychic centres are some of the

instruments, in addition to our usual sense faculties, given us as part

of ourselves to direct and control those forces necessary to our health,

mentality, and spiritual understanding.  One of these is the pineal

gland.  It is near the centre of the brain, and on a line with the

centre of the forehead, above the root of the nose.  When we expand 

it in ways which we are taught, we have physical sensations of the

expansion such as a pulsation, a little throbbing, and a feeling of

warmth.  These sensations are often transferred to a region in the

front of the head, or about between the eyes.

   Before men actually knew, through the means of surgery and later

and later the X-ray, the exact location of the pineal gland, they 

imagined that it was in the anterior portion of the cortex, about the

the centre of the forehead.  It is a very small organ, about the size

of a grain of wheat, and yet it is a most vital one.  It is like a 

transformer of the Cosmic Consciousness, of the intelligence of the 

Cosmic, into rates of vibration, into an energy which is discernible

by our objective minds.  The pineal gland is like a radio receiver

that reduces high frequency electrical radiations to sound waves to 

which our ears respond and which can be conveyed to our brain where we

can interpret them.  It is a bridge across which the Divine 

consciousness passes from the Cosmic to the mortal mind of man.

   This, then is the Third Eye.  It gives us vision of the 

Cosmic, a perception of God, and an insight into those divine realms,

far removed from the physical.  It is the true eye of the soul.

The philosopher, Descartes, and the school which followed from his

thoughts (the Cartesians), declared that the pineal gland was the seat

of the interaction between mind and body.  Upon occasion, it was

declared, the soul, through the pineal gland, affected the fine 

particles of the blood, which in turn caused the mechanical motions

or physical actions of the body.






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