True and False Faculties

Only the Mask and Creative Mind can be True or False, presumably because Will is too subjective to be either true or false, its possible misdirection being represented in the Mask, while Body of Fate is too objective to be either true or false, since it is the product of external Fate and Necessity. However, all four Faculties are part of the synergy that creates the Truth or Falsehood of the Mask and Creative Mind.

It is, however, clearer to start with what the soul ought to do in a given Phase before going on to the True and False forms of the Mask and Creative Mind.

The Being’s Aim

The position of the Will determines whether a soul is in an antithetical or a primary incarnation, and the soul’s ‘true’ path is different in these two halves of the Wheel. It is worth bearing in mind that when the Will is in an antithetical incarnation, the Mask will be in a primary Phase (with opposite proportions of dark and light) and the Creative Mind in an antithetical Phase (with the same proportions of dark and light as Will), while in primary incarnations the Mask will be antithetical and the Creative Mind primary.

In an antithetical phase the being seeks by the help of the Creative Mind to deliver the Mask from Body of Fate.
In a primary phase the being seeks by help of the Body of Fate to deliver the Creative Mind from the Mask.   (AV B 91)

Effectively, therefore, the being’s aim in:

• a primary incarnation is to liberate the Creative Mind, its sense of universal values and apprehension of objective truth, from the self-made ideals of the Mask, through the help of external reality in the form of the Body of Fate. In short, to ‘get real’.
• an antithetical incarnation is to liberate the Mask, the self-made ideal values and sense of inner truth, from the claims of the mundane and oppressive Body of Fate, by the help of the Creative Mind’s sense of the universal and its realism. In short, to ‘follow its dream’.

Neither of these options is more valid than the other, but if the being tries to get real in an antithetical Phase or to follow its dream in a primary Phase, Yeats’s System sees this as being ‘out of phase’, and doomed to frustration and disappointment. Inevitably, also, no-one can be true to Phase all of the time, or at full pitch, and there is an oscillation between the various possible states and combinations, going through moments of greater truth and moments of greater falsity.

The soul at Phase 18, for example, the ‘emotional’ person, should seek to free ‘intensity through emotions’ from ‘enforced disillusion’ with the help of ‘emotional philosophy’, while the soul at Phase 24, the ‘end of ambition’, should seek to free ‘constructive emotion’ from ‘self-reliance’ by means of ‘objective action’. It should be remembered that these phrases are mnemonics for more complex ideas, but the fundamental tendency is clear: to objectify in primary Phases and to subjectify in antithetical Phases, and it underlines one reason why the two transitional Phases, 8 and 22, where neither Tincture is predominant, are so difficult, since the being’s aim is far less clear.

In this context, the True and False forms of Mask and Creative Mind become clearer, since the pairs are often a positive and negative form of a similar quality or point to an underlying intermediate term. Yeats generalises these ideas and forms in his treatment of the four Quarters.

The True and False Faculties in the Quarters

It is the defects of the ‘False Creative Mind which bring the False Mask’, and in the ‘primary phases these defects separate Mask from Body of Fate, in antithetical, Creative Mind from Body of Fate’ (AV B 103). In primary Phases, the Mask should be submerged into the Body of Fate, the ideal submitting to reality, while in antithetical Phases the Body of Fate should be understood by the Creative Mind, reality incorporated within the apprehension of truth. The natures of the False forms make this impossible, and Yeats enumerates the underlying defects by Quarter: in the First Quarter Creative Mind is prone to ‘Sentimentality’; in the Second, ‘Brutality (desire for root facts of life)’; in the Third, ‘Hatred’; and in the Fourth, ‘Insensitiveness’. The ‘Conditions of the Mask’ (True or False) are also determined by Quarter: that affecting the First Quarter is ‘Convention or systematization’; the Second, ‘Self-analysis’; the Third, ‘Intensity’; and the Fourth, ‘Tolerance’. In the First Quarter therefore, sentimentality imposes a conventional, unreflective set of responses on reality, making it impossible to find the Will’s natural instinct; in the Second Quarter, brutality submerges understanding in brute fact, and impedes self-analysis, without which, the Will’s true emotion is impossible; in the Third Quarter, hatred disables appreciation of the true situation, so that intensity is misdirected into the objects of hatred rather than the Will’s natural creativity; in the Fourth Quarter, insensitiveness turns tolerance into indifference, vitiating the moral perception of the Will’s natural bias.

Further modifications to the True and False Mask and Creative Mind develop the characterisation of each Phase with increasing subtlety. These modifications also vary by Quarter and Tincture, although the tables below, derived from Yeats’s rules, show that there is a clear and relatively simple pattern here again. The following section is slightly convoluted, and probably confusing for those who are just beginning to get to grips with the System or who have a distaste for this kind of systematisation; for those who would rather skip this, click here to go to the summary.

The True and False Mask and Creative Mind:
Subsidiary Influences

The True and False Mask: Subsidiary Influences

Yeats’s ‘rules’ are succinct, but opaque:

When the Will is in antithetical phases the True Mask is the effect of the Creative Mind of opposite phase [i.e. the Mask's phase] upon that phase; and the False Mask is the effect of Body of Fate of opposite phase upon that phase. . . . When Will is in primary phases the True Mask is the effect of Body of Fate of opposite phase upon that phase; and the False Mask is the effect of Creative Mind of opposite phase upon that phase.(AV B 90)

The examples that he gives clarify the situation slightly:

• Phase 17’s Mask comes from Phase 3.
• The True Mask is given as ‘simplification through intensity’ and
• this is modified by the Creative Mind of Phase 3, which comes from Phase 27, the ‘simplicity’ of the Saint’s Phase.
• The False Mask is given as ‘dispersal’ and
• this is modified by the Body of Fate of Phase 3, which comes from Phase 13, the ‘interest’ of the Sensuous person’s Phase.

Yeats comments that ‘interest’ ‘describes with great accuracy the kind of ‘Dispersal’ which weakens men of Phase 17 when they try to life in the primary tincture’.
However, it is also worth noting that:

• Phase 27 also contributes Phase 17’s own Body of Fate, from which the soul must try to free the Mask.
• Phase 13 also contributes Phase 17’s own Creative Mind, which should help the soul to free the Mask.

So a very complex interaction between the four Phases of the configuration emerges. The situation is similar in primary Phases.

• Phase 27’s Mask comes from Phase 13.
• The True Mask is given as ‘renunciation’ and
• this is modified by the Body of Fate of Phase 13, which comes from Phase 3, ‘enforced love of another’.
• The False Mask is given as ‘emulation’ and
• this is modified by the Creative Mind of Phase 13, which comes from Phase 17, ‘creative imagination through antithetical emotion’.

it is also worth noting that:

• Phase 3 also contributes Phase 27’s own Creative Mind, which the soul must try to free from the Mask.
• Phase 17 also contributes Phase 27’s own Body of Fate, which should help the soul to free the Creative Mind from the Mask.

The full extent of the interpenetration of the four Faculties within a single configuration is seen when the Creative Mind is also taken into account.

The True and False Creative Mind: Subsidiary Influences

The rules for the Creative Mind follow a similar pattern:

When the Will is in antithetical phases the True Creative Mind is derived from the Creative Mind phase, modified by the Creative Mind of that phase; while the False Creative Mind is derived from the Creative Mind phase, modified by the Body of Fate of that phase. . . . When the Will is in primary phases the True Creative Mind is derived from the Creative Mind phase, modified by the Body of Fate of that phase; while the False Creative Mind is derived from the Creative Mind phase modified by the False Creative Mind of that phase. (AV B 91-92)

The examples that he gives clarify the situation slightly:

• Phase 17’s Creative Mind comes from Phase 13.
• The True Creative Mind is given as ‘creative imagination through antithetical emotion’ and
• this is modified by the Creative Mind of Phase 13, which comes from Phase 17 itself, ‘subjective truth’.
• The False Creative Mind is given as ‘enforced self-realization’ and
• this is modified by the Body of Fate of Phase 13, which comes from Phase 3, ‘enforced love of another’.

In the primary version:

• Phase 27’s Creative Mind comes from Phase 3.
• The True Creative Mind is given as ‘supersensual receptivity’ and
• this is modified by the Body of Fate of Phase 3, which comes from Phase 13, ‘interest’.
• The False Creative Mind is given as ‘pride’ and
• this is modified by the False Creative Mind of Phase 3, which comes from Phase 27 itself, ‘abstraction’.

The same elements and terms keep reappearing within the treatment of each member of the configuration, and serve as variations upon the theme that one man’s meat is another man’s poison, or on Blake’s dictum that ‘One Law for the Lion and Ox is Oppression’ (The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, Plate 24).

The following rules of thumb emerge, though they point to the pattern rather than explaining it:

• The Mask is found in the Phase opposite to Will, where there are two forms, which are further coloured by Phases from the same configuration:
• True Mask for primary Phases: by the Body of Fate from the Phase where the Creative Mind is placed.
• False Mask for primary Phases: by the Creative Mind from the Phase where the Body of Fate is placed.
• True Mask for antithetical Phases: by the Creative Mind from the Phase where the Body of Fate is placed.
• False Mask for antithetical Phases: by the Body of Fate from the Phase where the Creative Mind is placed.
• The Creative Mind is found in the Phase where the proportions of primary and antithetical Tinctures are the same as the Will’s, but moving in the opposite direction (the Phase of Will reflected across the axis of the New Moon—Full Moon). There are two forms, which are further coloured by Phases of the same configuration:
• True Creative Mind for primary Phases: by the Body of Fate of the Phase where the Mask is placed.
• False Creative Mind for primary Phases: by the False Creative Mind of the Phase where the Will itself is placed.
• True Creative Mind for antithetical Phases: by the Creative Mind of the Phase where the Body of Fate is placed.
• False Creative Mind for antithetical Phases: by the Body of Fate of the Phase where the Will is placed.

Each Phase has its True and False Mask or Creative Mind from the Phase that supplies that Faculty, which are then modified. The table below sets out the subsidiary influences on that True or False Faculty. Note that, although Phases 8 and 22 do have True and False Masks and Creative Minds, they do not have any clear attributions for the subsidiary influences since these are the points of disjunction between primary and antithetical, and this further emphasises the difficulty of these Phases.

It will be seen that only the two primary Faculties, the Creative Mind and Body of Fate, modify the True and False forms of Mask and Creative Mind, and once the whole pattern is set out, a series of paradoxes emerges.

• the True Mask is always modified by the Creative Mind or Body of Fate deriving from primary Phases.
• the False Mask is always modified by the Creative Mind or Body of Fate deriving from antithetical Phases.

• the True Creative Mind is always modified by the Creative Mind or Body of Fate deriving from antithetical Phases.
• the False Creative Mind is always modified by the Creative Mind or Body of Fate deriving from primary Phases.

• The Creative Mind originating from primary Phases affects
  • the Mask of antithetical Phases positively, i.e. it helps the True Mask.
  • the Creative Mind of primary Phases negatively, i.e. it abets the False Creative Mind.
• The Creative Mind originating from antithetical Phases affects
  • the Mask of antithetical Phases negatively, i.e. it abets the False Mask.
  • the Creative Mind of antithetical Phases positively, i.e. it helps the True Creative Mind.
• The Body of Fate originating from primary Phases affects
  • the Mask of primary Phases positively, i.e. it helps the True Mask.
  • the Creative Mind of antithetical Phases negatively, i.e. it abets the False Creative Mind.
• The Body of Fate originating from antithetical Phases affects
  • the Mask of antithetical Phases negatively, i.e. it abets the False Mask.
  • the Creative Mind of primary Phases positively, i.e. it helps the True Creative Mind.

Summary

The System is complicated, and it is practically impossible to remember all the rules; Yeats himself noted that: ‘Even now after years of use I could not re-create [the characterisations] if the Table were lost’ (AV B 87). However, with a little patience, it is possible to construct a fairly full picture of how the System works, by working from the first principles of the Tinctures and Quarters, and then, with recourse to the Tables, seeing how the detail works.

Synthesising the True and False Mask, Creative Mind and Subsidiary Influences

• the Will is at the ‘Beginning of ambition’;
• the True Mask is ‘Innocence’ (from Phase 17) modified by ‘Loss’ (the Body of Fate from Phase 27), and
• the False Mask is ‘Folly’ modified by ‘Creative imagination through antithetical emotion’ (the Creative Mind from Phase 13);
• the True Creative Mind is ‘Simplicity’ (from Phase 27) modified by ‘impersonal action’ (the Body of Fate from Phase 17), and
• the False Creative Mind is ‘Abstraction’ modified by ‘Pride’ (the False Creative Mind of Phase 3);
• the Body of Fate, from Phase 13, is ‘Interest’.

So that, according to the rules, Phase 3, the ‘Beginning of ambition’ should try to free ‘simplicity’, modified by ‘impersonal action’, from ‘innocence’, modified by ‘loss’, through the help of ‘interest’, but is liable to be misdirected into ‘abstraction’, modified by ‘pride’, bringing ‘folly’, modified by ‘creative imagination through antithetical emotion’, separating it from ‘interest’. Yeats elaborates on this to comment that:

The primary Phase 3, when it attempts to live antithetically, gives itself up to inconsequence because it cannot be creative in the Mask. On the other hand, when it lives according to the primary, and is true to phase, it takes from its opposite phase [17] delight in passing things, sees ‘a world in a grain of sand, and a heaven in a wild flower’ and becomes a child playing, knows nothing of consequence and purpose. (AV B 90-19)

In the treatment of the individual Phase, this becomes:

Out of phase and copying the opposite phase, he gives himself up to a kind of clodhopper folly [folly], that keeps his intellect moving among conventional ideas [abstraction] with a sort of make-believe [creative imagination]. Incapable of consecutive thought and of moral purpose, he lives miserably seeking to hold together some consistent plan of life [abstraction], patching rags upon rags [interest] because it is expected of him, or out of egotism [pride]. If on the other hand he uses his Body of Fate to purify his Creative Mind of the Mask, if he is content to permit his senses and his subconscious nature to dominate his intellect [impersonal action], he takes delight in all that passes [interest]; but because he claims nothing of his own, chooses nothing, thinks that no one thing is better than another [simplicity], he will not endure a pang because all passes [innocence modified by loss]. (AV B 108)

Yeats’s example here, shows how the elements can, when treated with care and confidence, be developed into a plausible synthesis.

However, the following sentences try to put the various elements discussed here together, simply by agglomeration, relying entirely on the phrases supplied by Yeats. Adaptation might make interpretation slightly clearer, but would impose my reading on the material rather than leaving it to the individual reader here. Although the sense can be rather hard to create, these clumsy phrases are often the starting points for Yeats’s own synthesis, as above, especially in the cases where he cannot bring in an historical example to flesh the ideas out further. It is certainly instructive to read the descriptions that Yeats gives with these composites in mind, to see how he brings the elements into a coherent portrait.

The list here is provided for reference, and the same composite is found in each of the Phase descriptions.

The True and False forms are separated, in order to reduce the number of combinations, though within any life the two movements will be mixed to a greater or lesser extent, and at some points the True Mask may be sought, but with the False Creative Mind, and so on, though ultimately the product of the False Creative Mind will be the movement towards the False Mask.

In the case of Phase 8, the antithetical paradigm is chosen as the closer to the true form, since this is needed to move on to the next Phase, but the modifications are suspect. In the case of Phase 22, the primary bias is chosen as closer to the true form. In neither case, though, is there necessarily a clear or easy aim for the individual, hence the repeated rebirths that are often necessary at these Phases.