A photographic portrait of Abbé Lacuria.

From the private collection of Suzanne Christoflour-Moiroud.

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With this post ‘fresh from the press’ of the Blue House of Via-HYGEIA, we resume our sharings and English translations at Via-HYGEIA-Bibliotherapy with Part I of a Sampler devoted to Paul François Gaspard Lacuria, commonly known as Abbé Lacuria, dubbed: ‘The French Pythagoras’, a leading figure of the nineteen century French esoteric and philosophic ‘Renaissance’. More to come soon.

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From ‘Les Harmonies de l’Etre‘, Paris_1847.

Volume 1- From page IX to XI. From the foreword.

About Numbers

‘The union of faith and science, this is where lies the future of mankind, it is towards there that every endeavor, every worthy and useful work must strive. Between spirit and matter, between the fact and the idea, between faith and science therefore, there is an intermediate sort of being; of which few until now have understood the mysterious existence. A conscious space between heaven and earth, a being that is neither limited nor infinite, but that facilitate the communication between both ends; a being that is at the same time immaterial and made of matter; that is like God eternal but could be divided like matter, that lies at the same time with the creator and in the least of the creatures; a being therefore that must play a important role in the union of spirit and matter, of faith and science that society wishes more than anything: This being is the number.’

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‘The number is the cause of nothing, but it is the expression of everything. The number distinguish everything; no knowledge without distinction: The number therefore is the form of everything, even of the intelligence, because it is through him that the intelligence can apprehend itself and be aware of itself; we can then consider it to be like a mirror in which the intelligence sees itself, recognizes itself and owns itself. The number is an universal mediator, in order to establish a relationship between the idea and the fact, between spirit and matter, between the absolute and the relative; once this relationship is known, each side shed a light unto each other: The number of matter shows me the number of the spirit, the number of the spirit gives me the reason of the number of matter, and from each other a growing light is produced thus allowing Being to unveil some of its mysteries.’

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From ‘Les Harmonies de l’Etre’, Paris_1847. 

From volume 2-From Page 348 to 351.

About The Number 40

‘When we have studied the seven attributes that compose the divine circle, we saw, almost every time, a number attaching itself to each of them like a specific seal. For instance, the number two, source of all division, cannot be separated from the idea of non-being. The idea of being cannot find its completion but through three separate terms; holiness manifests the number nine, the number 12 expresses the Holy Spirit-or the complete light. We have seen that life, deprived from intelligence, could only produce but six faculties; number six, therefore characterizes especially life; the number that seem to fit the best the idea of freedom is seven. In fact, it is freedom that manifests outwardly the seven attributes, it is freedom, that in the sacrament of confirmation, receives the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit, it is her that must choose between good that blossoms like seven bright flowers, and evil that spreads on its side seven hideous forms.

Unity manifests three time in God and always through the Father in which it has its root. The Father is the radical unity of being; when being has reached its full development, unity reappears a second time in this holiness that brings all this development to its primal unity, in bringing the idea of the form-being of the Father; finally, unity comes back to us again under a third dimension, when eternity brings back in unity all the duration of being in throwing it in the mold of the one and indivisible substance. Therefore we have three attributes expressing unity, life, holiness and eternity; but life and holiness are already manifested by other numbers, eternity will stay in our company. Is it not a singular thing that all these numbers that characterize the seven attributes, when added to each other, give exactly forty?

The number forty is repeated too many times in the Scriptures to not contain a mystery. The rain of the flood lasted forty days, Moses stayed forty days on the Sinai, the Israelites wandered forty years in the desert, Elias walked forty days without eating before arriving to Mount Horeb; Jesus-Christ fasted 40 days and taught his disciples during forty days after his resurrection. What meaning may have all these forties? We first see purification in the flood and in the fasting; we see the end of a journey and liberation in the reaching of the promised land and in the ascension of Jesus-Christ; finally, with Moses on the Sinai and Elias on the Horeb, we see the intimate communication with God and the manifestation of truth. All these things are they not the same at the end? Because, at first, it is truth that judges and punish: ‘ Sermo quem ego locutus sum, ille judicabit eum in novissimo die’ (The words that i have spoken, said Jesus-Christ, will judge him at the last of the days’ _John -12). ‘It is truth that purifies’ says Saint Peter at the first Church council. ‘Fide purificans corda eorum’ (God having purified their hearts by faith- Acts_13). ‘It is also truth that liberates…If the Son delivers you, then you will be really free.’ according to Jesus-Christ (Veritas liberavit vos…Si ergo vos filius libera verit vere liberi eritis_ John 8). Haven’t we seen that gluttony was the opposite of faith? Fasting, in separating man from matter, brings him to faith or truth; finally, the holy manna that the Jews ate for forty years is a symbol of truth, the heavenly food.

The number 40 must then express the degrees through which we arrive to the full knowledge of God; the path by which we climb towards God penetrates Him more and more, and through which He descends towards us, manifesting himself more and more. Then, haven’t we seen that the different degrees of the knowledge of God we have acquired are being characterized by different numbers? The number forty will be the re-union of all these numbers. And, in fact, if we add the numbers we have earlier attached to the divine attributes, to life 6, to freedom 7, to the light 12, to holiness 9, to wisdom 3, to justice 2, to eternity 1, we will get 40.

How remarkable this is! Following this order, these number are in a progression similar to the progression of light in the colors of the rainbow. In fact, in the rainbow, we see light grow first from red until yellow, symbol of the Holy Spirit, where it reaches its inmost intensity, and then decline until purple, the less luminous of the seven colors. The set of our numbers being 6, 7, 12 , 3 , 2, 1 , we see them grow from 6 to 12– representing the Holy Spirit, and decline until 1-which corresponds to purple and to eternity.

Therefore number 40 expresses, like Saint Augustine said before: ‘Our pilgrimage towards truth, our path to heaven, luminous trail where we learn successively to know nature and this immense life’ in which, according to Saint Paul: ’We live, move and be’. (In ipso enim vivimus, movemur et sumus_Acts-17). The infinite, of which the idea glows in the deepness of our soul, the distinction of the beings themselves inside the greater distinction of being and non-being, the sublime prerogatives and duties of freedom, the perfection of holiness, the marvels of light and love, all of this will find a rest in the great unity of eternity.

The angels come and go along this path to show us the way and assist our progression; they climb up and down this mysterious ladder, of which Jacob was only the symbol, and he must have counted 40 rungs, when he was seeing it so beautiful and so bright, uniting Heaven and Earth.’

To be continued…

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Full original French text

Tome I

here

and

Tome II

here

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Besides quoting from this master work, we will continue this  ‘A Little Paul François Gaspard Lacuria Sampler – Part I’ with Part II being a Via-HYGEIA English translation of rarely seen texts coming from Robert Amadou’s 3  Atlantis 1981 ground breaking publications 🥳.

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