“3. THE HOUR HAD NOT YET STRUCK; THE RAY HAD NOT YET FLASHED INTO THE GERM; THE MATRI-PADMA (MOTHER LOTUS) HAD NOT YET SWOLLEN.
The ray of the “Ever Darkness” becomes, as it is emitted, a ray of effulgent light or life, and flashes into the “Germ” – the point in the Mundane Egg, represented by matter in its abstract sense.
But the term “Point” must not be understood as applying to any particular point in Space, for a germ exists in the center of every atom, and these collectively form, “the Germ”;
or rather, as no atom can be made visible to our physical eye, the collectivity of these (if the term can be applied to something which is boundless and infinite) forms the noumenon of eternal and indestructible matter.
One of the symbolical figures for the Dual creative power in Nature (matter and force on the material plane) is Padma, the water lily of India.
The Lotus is the product of heat (fire) and water (vapor of Ether); fire standing in every philosophical and religious system as a representation of the Spirit of Deity, the active, male, generative principle;
and Ether, or the Soul of matter, the light of the fire, for the passive female principle from which everything in this Universe emanated.
Hence, Ether or Water is the Mother, and Fire is the Father.
4. HER HEART HAD NOT YET OPENED FOR THE ONE RAY TO ENTER, THENCE TO FALL AS THREE INTO FOUR IN THE LAP OF MAYA.
The Primordial Substance had not yet passed out of its pre-cosmic latency into differentiated objectivity. But, as the hour strikes and it becomes receptive of the Fohatic impress of the Divine Thought (the Logos, or the male aspect of the Anima Mundi, Alaya) – its heart opens.
It differentiates, and the THREE (Father, Mother, Son) are transformed into four.”
H. P. Blavatsky
The Mark Of God: Understanding Your "I AM Presence" 