The idea of meaning, cause and being underlies the symbology or the significance of the formula with which we are concerned in this instruction. I have pointed out to you before the difficulty of putting these ancient symbols or symbolic writings into such form that they can convey meaning through language. This difficulty is well-nigh insurmountable in connection with this third formula. The reason for this is that this formula has been preserved as sounds or (if I may use so ambiguous a phrase) as trumpeted words. It has not been committed to inscription as have the two previous symbolic formulas which you have already received. All that I can do is to give you a meaning (as far as I myself can understand and you can grasp) of these great sounds or chords, massed together and interspersed with certain very ancient phrases. You know yourselves how difficult it is to express the significance of the sound 0M. This is a still more difficult task; little human thinking has been applied as yet to this Formula but much has been given to the Sacred Word. Until some thought has been applied to what I shall now attempt [284] to give you, it is no easy matter to find the words to express the underlying idea - the idea you can contact at your present point of development.

To the initiate who uses this formula, creating the necessary sounds and enunciating the ancient words in due place (and these I may not give you), the following six thoughts are emphasized in his consciousness; these six thoughts will give you the intent of the formula as clearly as is possible. It is not possible to convey to you the true beauty of the concepts, but if you will have in mind the thought of meaning as light on life, of cause as the breath of experience, and of Being as the initiator of all that is, then some vision may come, some dream arise in your consciousness, and some power of accomplishment pour in. The Masters use this formula when faced with death in some form or another (and these words must be used literally). I refer not to death as it may affect them, but to death as it affects God's created universe, producing release or finality, or opening the door to new life and closing the door on a cycle of manifestation, a civilization, or a race or nation.

Each phrase out of the six has its own symbol at the close of each unit of thought, if I may call it that. These I may not give you or the chords upon which the phrases go forth. I have tried to indicate one of the meanings of the formula, but have not given a translation or a paraphrase. Bear this in mind and as you ponder these six sentences, try to give them an interpretation which will come to you from the world of meaning, producing a practical application, from the world of causes, producing an enlightened understanding, and (if you are far enough along) from the world of being, producing inclusiveness. These formulas have naught to do with personalities or with souls in deep incarnation, identified with form in the three worlds; they concern world movement, great and universal developments, and human progress (as a whole) towards the divine. You cannot yet think in those terms, but you can at least attempt to do so and grow thereby.