The Kybalion

The Kybalion is a book first published in 1908 under the name Three Initiates, although it is often attributed to William Walker Atkinson.

Its teachings blend Hermetic terminology with ideas associated with the New Thought movement and are presented as seven principles attributed to the tradition of Hermes Trismegistus.

The book is organized around seven principles or axioms. They are the following:

The principle of mentalism: The All is mind; the universe is mental.

The principle of correspondence: As above, so below; as below, so above. The principle is presented as operating across the physical, mental, and spiritual planes.

The principle of vibration: Nothing is still; everything moves; everything vibrates.

The principle of polarity: Everything is dual; everything has two poles and its pair of opposites. Like and unlike are the same in nature but different in degree; extremes meet; all truths are half-truths; and all paradoxes may be reconciled.

The principle of rhythm: Everything ebbs and flows; everything has its periods of advance and retreat; everything ascends and descends; everything moves like a pendulum.

The principle of cause and effect: Every cause has its effect; every effect has its cause; everything happens according to the law; luck or chance is nothing more than the name given to the unrecognized law; there are many planes of causality, but nothing escapes the Law.

The principle of gender: Gender exists everywhere; everything has its masculine and feminine principle; gender manifests itself on all planes. On the physical plane, it manifests as sex.

“So, we need not dwell upon the feature of illusion. Rather let us, recognizing the real nature of the Universe, seek to understand its mental laws, and endeavor to use them to the best effect in our upward progress through life, as we travel from plane to plane of being.”