Stanza VII
1. Behold the beginings of sentient formless life. First the Divine, the one from the Mother-Spirit; then the Spiritual; the three from the one, the four from the one, and the five from which the three, the five, and the seven. These are the three-fold, the four-fold downward; the “mind-born” sons of the first Lord; the shining seven. It is they who are thou, me, him, oh Lanoo. They, who watch over thee, and thy mother earth.
2. The one ray multiplies the smaller rays. Life precedes form, and lfe survives the last atom of form. Through the countless rays proceeds the life-ray, the one, like a thread through many jewels.
3. When the one becomes two, the threefold appears, and the three are one; and it is our thread, oh Lanoo, the heart of the man-plant called Saptaparna.
“Mr. Old: The first question this evening is: Jiva is sometimes used as synonymous with Prana, or simply “life”; but it appears also to be used in the plural as synonymous with the Monads, and in some other senses in the Commentary onscrofula this and the following sloka. Please throw a little more light on the meaning of the word “Jivas” in The Secret Doctrine.
Mme. Blavatsky: Well, I said many times that there are six schools of philosophy in India; each school has its own terms, and uses them sometimes in a different sense. What a Vedantin of the Vishishtadvaita sect will call “Jiva”, that, for instance, the Advaita, also belonging to the Vedantin school, will say is a great heresy, because they call “Jiva” “One”, which cannot be plural – that is to say, which is Parabrahm; it is the one universal principle.
Therefore, it is very difficult to know which to use, and you must know in the light of what philosophy you use it, otherwise there will always be confusion. “Jiva” is really the incarnating ego, the fifth principle, in our school, in the esoteric school.
Mr. Kingsland: Jivas in the plural are very often used for the Monads.
Mme. Blavatsky: No, you cannot use Monad, because Monad is one thing and Jiva is another. If you take Atma-Buddhi-Manas, then, it will be another thing; but, if you use them in distinction, it is impossible to say that, because Monad is Atma, what is Monad?
Mr. Kingsland: It appears often to be used there in the same sense.
Mme. Blavatsky: The Monad is from Greek, “One”, the unit, whatever it is; if we call it Monad, it is simply because it is with Buddhi; and that Atma in reality is not a unit, but the one universal principle, and it is simply a ray. That which uses Buddhi as a vehicle is a ray of that universal principle, therefore, in reality it is Buddhi which is the Monad, the one unit.
Mr. Kingsland: The Monad. But it is used in reference to the Monad in the lower forms of life.
Mme. Blavatsky: That is a different thing. Leibniz uses it in quite a different way.
Mr. Kingsland: But, is not it used there in the same sense as in The Secret Doctrine?
Mme. Blavatsky: The Monad is that which incarnated in {the} Chhaya, in the image, in the first image projected by the Lunar Pitris; but, it is perfectly senseless, because it has not got the cementing link, so to say, the Manas which comes after that, one comes in the First Race, and the other in the Third, so you see the difference.”
H. P. Blavatsky
The Mark Of God: Understanding Your "I AM Presence" 