The Reign of Quantity and The Signs of the Times

by René Guénon

  Cain is represented in Biblical symbolism as being primarily a farmer and Abel as a stockmaster, thus they are the types of the two sorts of peoples who have existed since the origins of the present humanity, or at least since the earliest differentiation took place, namely that between the sedentary peoples, devoted to the cultivation of the soil, and the nomads, devoted to the raising of flocks and herds.[75] It must be emphasized that these two occupations are essential and primordial in the two human types; anything else is only accidental, derived, or superadded, and to speak of people as hunters or fishers for example, as modern ethnologists so often do, is either to mistake the accidental for the essential, or it is to restrict attention to more or less late cases of anomaly or degeneration, such as can be met with in certain savages (but the mainly commercial or industrial peoples of the modern West are by no means less abnormal, though in another way).[76] Each of these two categories naturally had its own traditional law, different from that of the other, and adapted to its way of life and the nature of its occupations; this difference was particularly apparent in the sacrificial rites, hence the special mention made of the vegetable offerings of Cain and the animal offerings of Abel in the account given in Genesis.[77] As Biblical symbolism in particular is now being considered, it is as well to note at once in that connection that the Hebrew Torah belongs properly to the type of law appropriate to nomadic peoples. Hence the way in which the story of Cain and Abel is presented, for it would appear in a different light in the eyes of a sedentary people and would be susceptible of a different interpretation, although the aspects corresponding to the two points of view are of course both included in the profound meaning of the story; this is nothing more than an application of the double meaning of symbols, to which some allusion was made in connection with ‘solidification’, since this question, as will perhaps appear more clearly from what follows, is closely bound up with the symbolism of the murder of Abel by Cain. The special character of the Hebrew tradition is also responsible for the disapproval that is brought to bear on certain arts and certain trades specially appropriate to sedentary peoples, notably on everything connected with the construction of fixed dwellings; at any rate that was the state of affairs until the time when Israel actually ceased, at least for several centuries, to be nomadic, that is, up to the time of David and Solomon, and we know that it was even then necessary to resort to foreign workers for the building of the Temple in Jerusalem.[78]

  The agricultural peoples, just because they are sedentary, are naturally those who arrive sooner or later at the building of towns; indeed, it is said that the first town was founded by Cain himself; moreover its foundation did not take place till well after the time during which he is said to have been occupied in agriculture, which shows clearly that there are as it were two successive phases in ‘sedentarism’, the second representing a relatively more pronounced degree of fixity and spatial ‘constriction’ than the first. It could be said in a general way that the works of sedentary peoples are works of time: these peoples are fixed in space within a strictly limited domain, and develop their activities in a temporal continuity that appears to them to be indefinite. On the other hand, nomadic and pastoral peoples build nothing durable, and do not work for a future that escapes them; but they have space before them, not facing them with any limitation, but on the contrary always offering them new possibilities. In this way is revealed the correspondence of the cosmic principles to which, in another order, the symbolism of Cain and Abel is related: the principle of compression, represented by time, and the principle of expansion, represented by space.[79] In actual fact, both these two principles are manifested simultaneously in time and in space, as in everything else; it is necessary to point this out in order to avoid unduly ‘simplified’ identifications or assimilations, as well as to resolve occasional apparent oppositions; but it is no less certain that the action of the principle of compression predominates in the temporal condition, and of expansion in the spatial condition. Moreover, time uses up space, if it may be put so; and correspondingly in the course of the ages the sedentary peoples gradually absorb the nomads; this gives, as indicated above, a social and historical significance to the murder of Abel by Cain.

  Nomads direct their activities particularly to the animal kingdom, mobile like themselves; sedentary peoples on the other hand direct them in the first place to the two non-mobile kingdoms, the vegetable and the mineral.[80] Furthermore, it is in the nature of things that sedentary peoples should tend to the making of visual symbols, images made up of various substances, and these images can always be related back, in their essential significance, more or less directly to the geometrical viewpoint, the origin and foundation of all spatial conception. Nomads, on the other hand, to whom images are forbidden, like everything else that might tend to attach them to some definite place, make sonorous symbols, the only symbols compatible with their state of continual migration.[81] It is, however, remarkable that, among the sensible faculties, sight is directly related to space, and hearing to time: the elements of the visual symbol occur simultaneously, and those of the sonorous symbol in succession; so that there is in this respect a kind of reversal of the relations previously considered: but this reversal is in fact necessary so that some equilibrium may be established between the two contrary principles mentioned above, and so that their respective actions may be kept within limits compatible with normal human existence. Thus the sedentary peoples create the plastic arts (architecture, sculpture, painting), the arts consisting of forms developed in space; the nomads create the phonetic arts (music, poetry), the arts consisting of forms unfolded in time; for, let us say it again, all art is in its origin essentially symbolical and ritual, and only through a late degeneration, indeed a very recent degeneration, has it lost its sacred character so as to become at last the purely profane ‘recreation’ to which it has been reduced among our contemporaries.[82]

  Thus the complementarism of the conditions of existence is manifested in the following way: those who work for time are stabilized in space; those who wander in space are ceaselessly modified within time. And the antinomy of the ‘inverse sense’ appears as follows: those who live according to time, the changing and destroying element, fix and conserve themselves; those who live according to space, the fixed and permanent element, disperse themselves and change unceasingly. This must be so in order that the existence of each may remain possible, for in this way at least a relative equilibrium is established between the terms representing the two contrary tendencies; if only one or the other of the compressive and expansive tendencies were in action the end would come soon, either by ‘crystallization’ or by ‘volatilization’, if it be allowable to use symbolical expressions in this connection such as must recall the ‘coagulation’ and ‘solution’ of the alchemists; moreover these expressions do actually correspond to two phases in the present world of which the exact significance will be explained later.[83] Here indeed we find ourselves in a domain where all the consequences of the cosmic dualities show themselves with special clarity, those dualities being more or less distant images or reflections of the primary duality, that of essence and substance, of Heaven and Earth, or Purusha and Prakriti, which generates and rules all manifestation.

  To return to Biblical symbolism, the animal sacrifice is fatal to Abel,[84] and the vegetable offering of Cain was not accepted;[85] he who is blessed dies, he who lives is accursed. Equilibrium is thus broken on both sides; how can it be re-established except by exchanges such that each has its part in the productions of the other? Thus it is that movement brings together time and space, being in a way a resultant of their combination, and reconciles in them the two opposed tendencies just mentioned;[86] movement itself is moreover only a series of disequilibria, but the sum of these constitutes a relative equilibrium compatible with the law of manifestation or of ‘becoming’, that is to say with contingent existence itself. Every exchange between beings subject to spatial and temporal conditions is in effect a move
ment, or rather a combination of two inverse and reciprocal movements, which harmonize and compensate one another; in this case equilibrium is realized directly by virtue of the fact that this compensation exists.[87] The alternating movement of the exchanges may impinge on the three domains, spiritual (or pure intellectual), psychic, and corporeal, corresponding to the ‘three worlds’: the exchange of principles, of symbols, and of offerings — such is the triple foundation, in the true traditional history of terrestrial humanity, on which rests the mystery of pacts, alliances, and benedictions, basically equivalent to the sharing out of the ‘spiritual influences’ at work in our world; but these last considerations cannot be dwelt on, for they obviously belong to a normal state of affairs from which we are now very far removed in all respects, a state of which the modern world as such is in truth no more than the simple and direct negation.[88]

  22

  The Significance of Metallurgy

  We have seen that the arts or crafts that involve a direction of activity toward the mineral kingdom belong properly to the sedentary peoples, and that such activities were forbidden by the traditional laws of the nomadic peoples, of which the Hebrew law is the most generally known example; it is indeed evident that these arts tend toward ‘solidification’, and in the corporeal world as we know it ‘solidification’ in fact reaches its most pronounced form in minerals as such. Moreover, minerals, in their commonest form, that of stone, are principally used in the construction of stable buildings;[89] a town, considered as the collectivity of the buildings of which it is made up, appears in particular as something like an artificial agglomeration of minerals; and it must be reiterated that life in towns represents a more complete sedentarism than does agricultural life, just as the mineral is more fixed and more ‘solid’ than the vegetable. But there is something more: the arts applied to minerals include metallurgy in all its forms; now the evident fact that metal tends increasingly in these days to be substituted for stone in building, just as stone was formerly substituted for wood, leads to a supposition that this change must be a symptom of a more ‘advanced’ phase in the downward movement of the cycle; and this supposition is confirmed by the fact that in a general way metal plays an ever-growing part in the ‘industrialized’ and ‘mechanized’ civilization of today, and that from a destructive point of view, if it may be so expressed, no less than from a constructive point of view, for the consumption of metal brought about by modern wars is truly prodigious.

  This observation moreover is in accord with a peculiarity met with in the Hebrew tradition: from the beginning of the time when the use of stone was allowed in special cases, such as in the building of an altar, it was nevertheless specified that these stones must be ‘whole’, for ‘you shall lift up no iron tool upon them’;[90] according to the precise terms of this passage, insistence is directed not so much to the stone being unworked as to no metal being used on it: the prohibition of the use of metal was thus more especially strict in the case of anything intended to be put to a specifically ritual use.[91] Traces of this prohibition still persisted even when Israel had ceased to be nomadic and had built, or caused to be built, stable edifices: when the Temple of Jerusalem was built the stone was ‘prepared at the quarry; so that neither hammer nor ax nor any tool of iron was heard in the temple, while it was being built.’[92] There is nothing at all exceptional in this, and a mass of concordant indications of the same kind could be found: for instance, in many countries a sort of partial exclusion from the community, or at least a ‘holding aloof’, was practiced and even still is practiced so far as metal-workers are concerned, and more particularly blacksmiths, whose craft is often associated with the practice of an inferior and dangerous kind of magic, which has eventually degenerated in most cases into mere sorcery. Nevertheless, on the other side, metallurgy has been specially revered in some traditional forms, and has even served as the basis of very important initiatic organizations; it must suffice to quote in this connection the instance of the Kabiric Mysteries, without dwelling longer at this point on a very complex subject that would lead much too far afield; all that need be said for the moment is that metallurgy has both a ‘sacred’ aspect and an ‘execrated’ aspect, and that in their origin these two aspects proceed from a twofold symbolism inherent in the metals themselves.

  If this is to be understood, it must be remembered in the first place that the metals, by reason of their astral correspondences, are in a certain sense the ‘planets of the lower world’; naturally therefore they must have, like the planets themselves, of which they can be said to receive and to condense the influences in the terrestrial environment, a ‘benefic’ aspect and a ‘malefic’ aspect.[93] Furthermore, since an inferior reflection is in question, corresponding to the actual situation of the metallic mines in the interior of the earth, the ‘malefic’ aspect must readily become predominant; and it must not be forgotten that from the traditional point of view metals and metallurgy are in direct relation with the ‘subterranean fire’, the idea of which is associated in many respects with that of the ‘infernal regions’.[94] Nonetheless, if the metallic influences are taken in their ‘benefic’ aspect by making use of them in a manner truly ‘ritual’, in the most complete sense of the word, they are susceptible of ‘transmutation’ and ‘sublimation’, and are then all the more capable of becoming a spiritual ‘support’, since whatever is at the lowest level corresponds, by inverse analogy, to what is at the highest level; the whole mineral symbolism of alchemy is based on this very fact, and so is the symbolism of the ancient Kabiric initiations.[95] On the other hand, when nothing is in question but the profane utilization of metals, in view of the fact that the profane point of view as such necessarily brings with it the cutting off of all communication with superior principles, nothing is then left that is capable of effective action save the ‘malefic’ side of the metallic influences, and this will develop all the more strongly because it will inevitably be isolated from everything that could restrain it or counterbalance it; this particular instance of an exclusively profane utilization is clearly one that is realized in all its fullness in the modern world.[96]

  The point of view adopted so far has been mainly concerned with the ‘solidification’ of the world, having as its end-point nothing other than the ‘reign of quantity’, of which the use of metals is only an aspect, this being the point of view that has actually been most obviously manifested in all fields up to the phase at which the world has arrived today. But things can go further yet, and the metals, by virtue of the subtle influences attached to them, can also play a part in a later phase leading more directly to the final dissolution. During the course of the period that may be called ‘materialistic’, these subtle influences have undoubtedly passed more or less into a latent state, like everything else that is outside the limits of the purely corporeal order; but this does not mean that they have ceased to exist, nor even that they have entirely ceased to act, though in a hidden manner, of which the ‘satanic’ side of ‘mechanistic’ theory and practice, especially (but not solely) in its destructive applications, is after all but a manifestation, though naturally the materialists can have no suspicion of the fact. These same influences then need only wait for a favorable opportunity to assert their activity more openly, of course always in the same ‘malefic’ direction, because so far as ‘benefic’ influences are concerned the world has so to speak been closed to them by the profane attitude of modernity: moreover their opportunity may no longer be very far distant, for the instability that nowadays continues to increase in every domain shows clearly that the point corresponding to the greatest effective predominance of ‘solidity’ and ‘materiality’ has already been passed.

  It may facilitate the understanding of what has just been said if it is pointed out that, according to traditional symbolism, the metals are in relation not only with the ‘subterranean fire’ as already indicated, but also with the ‘hidden treasure’, all these matters being rather closely interwoven, for reasons that can
not possibly be developed here, but that can go some way toward explaining how it is that human interventions are capable of provoking, or more exactly of ‘releasing’, certain natural cataclysms. However that may be, all the ‘legends’ (using the language of today) about these ‘treasures’ show clearly that their ‘guardians’, who are none other than the subtle influences attached to them, are psychic ‘entities’ that it is extremely dangerous for anyone to approach who has not got the required ‘qualifications’ and does not take the necessary precautions; but what precautions could the moderns, completely ignorant of such matters, in fact be expected to take in this matter? They are all too obviously lacking in any ‘qualification’, as well as in any means of action in the domain in question, for it eludes them in consequence of the attitude they adopt toward anything and everything. True enough, they constantly boast about ‘conquering the forces of nature’, but they are certainly far from suspecting that behind these same forces, which they look upon as being exclusively corporeal, there is something of another order, of which the apparent forces are really but the vehicles and as it were the outward likenesses; it is this other thing that might well one day revolt and finally turn against those who have failed to recognize it.