Principle of Correspondence

Definition

Pronunciation: PRIN-sih-pul ov kor-eh-SPON-dens

Also spelled: Law of Correspondence, Hermetic Correspondence, Second Hermetic Principle

The second of seven Hermetic principles as codified in the Kybalion (1908): 'As above, so below; as below, so above.' Holds that there is a consistent correspondence between the laws and phenomena of the various planes of existence — what operates on the physical plane has analogues on the mental and spiritual planes, and vice versa.

Etymology

From Latin correspondentia (mutual relationship, agreement), derived from com- (together) + respondere (to answer, match). The term 'correspondence' entered esoteric vocabulary through Emanuel Swedenborg (1688-1772), who used it to describe the systematic relationship between spiritual causes and natural effects. The Kybalion authors adopted the term to name the principle already implicit in the Emerald Tablet and the Corpus Hermeticum. As a named 'Principle of Correspondence,' it dates to the Kybalion's 1908 publication, though the concept it names is far older, traceable to the earliest Hermetic and Neoplatonic texts.

About Principle of Correspondence

The Kybalion, published in 1908 by the Yogi Publication Society of Chicago under the pseudonym 'The Three Initiates,' presents the Principle of Correspondence as the second of seven Hermetic laws: 'As above, so below; as below, so above. This Principle embodies the truth that there is always a Correspondence between the laws and phenomena of the various planes of Being and Life.' The Kybalion identifies three primary planes — Physical, Mental, and Spiritual — and asserts that each operates according to the same underlying laws, expressed differently according to the density and nature of each plane.

The Kybalion did not invent this principle. It codified and named something that had operated implicitly in Hermetic, Neoplatonic, and Kabbalistic thought for centuries. The Emerald Tablet's second verse — 'That which is above is like that which is below, and that which is below is like that which is above' — is the classical source. The Kybalion's contribution was to extract this from its alchemical context and present it as a universal philosophical law applicable to any domain of inquiry.

The Neoplatonic foundation for the Principle of Correspondence was established by Plotinus (204-270 CE) in the Enneads. Plotinus described reality as a hierarchy of emanations from the One (to Hen), descending through Nous (Intellect), Psyche (Soul), and Physis (Nature). Each lower level is an image or reflection of the level above it — not a degraded copy but a genuine expression of the same principles at a different degree of manifestation. The sensible world is therefore a mirror of the intelligible world, and studying either reveals the structure of the other.

Proclus (412-485 CE), the last major Neoplatonic philosopher, systematized the emanation hierarchy into a rigorous logic of correspondence. In his Elements of Theology, Proclus demonstrated that every effect contains the power of its cause in diminished form, and every cause contains the nature of its effect in amplified form. This bidirectional relationship — cause present in effect, effect prefigured in cause — is the metaphysical basis for Hermetic correspondence. It explains why reading the stars can reveal information about terrestrial events (downward correspondence) and why manipulating terrestrial substances can influence subtle forces (upward correspondence).

In practical application, the Principle of Correspondence structured the system of planetary-metal-organ correspondences that governed both alchemy and astrological medicine from antiquity through the Renaissance. The Sun corresponded to gold and the heart; the Moon to silver and the brain; Mars to iron and the gallbladder; Venus to copper and the kidneys; Jupiter to tin and the liver; Saturn to lead and the spleen; Mercury to quicksilver and the lungs. These were not arbitrary assignments but expressions of the conviction that a single formative principle manifested as a celestial body at one level, a metal at another, and an organ at another.

Paracelsus elevated correspondence to a medical methodology. His Doctrine of Signatures held that God had marked every natural substance with a visible sign (signatura) indicating its therapeutic use. Walnuts, which resemble the brain, treated brain ailments. Eyebright (Euphrasia), with flowers resembling eyes, treated eye conditions. Bloodroot (Sanguinaria), with its red sap, treated blood disorders. While modern pharmacology has abandoned the Doctrine of Signatures as a theoretical framework, some of these specific correspondences proved pharmacologically active — a fact that raises questions about whether systematic correspondence-thinking occasionally captures real relationships that reductive analysis would miss.

The Kabbalistic Tree of Life provides the most elaborate systematic application of the Principle of Correspondence. The ten Sefirot — Kether, Chokmah, Binah, Chesed, Geburah, Tiphareth, Netzach, Hod, Yesod, Malkuth — structure reality at every level simultaneously. Each Sefirah corresponds to a divine name, an angelic order, a planet, a body part, a color, a sound, a Hebrew letter, a psychological faculty, and a stage of spiritual development. The Tree is not a metaphor; it is a map of correspondences that the practitioner can traverse through meditation, ritual, and contemplative study.

Emanuel Swedenborg, the Swedish scientist-turned-mystic, developed the most systematic modern theory of correspondence in his theological writings (1749-1771). Swedenborg argued that every natural object and event is a correspondence — a material expression of a spiritual cause. The sun corresponds to divine love. Water corresponds to truth. Animals correspond to affections. His system was exhaustive and internally consistent, influencing William Blake, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and the Symbolist poets, and feeding back into the occult tradition through the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn.

The Kybalion's treatment, while less metaphysically rigorous than Plotinus or Swedenborg, has proven more culturally influential because of its accessibility. The text argues that the Principle of Correspondence allows the thinker to reason from the known to the unknown — if a law operates on the physical plane where it can be observed, the same law must operate on mental and spiritual planes where direct observation is difficult. This use of correspondence as an inferential tool (reasoning by analogy across planes) distinguishes the Kybalion's treatment from the older emanationist frameworks and gives it practical epistemological value.

Critiques of the Principle of Correspondence center on the question of falsifiability. If any apparent counter-example can be explained away by invoking a different level of correspondence, the principle becomes unfalsifiable and therefore, by Popperian standards, unscientific. Defenders respond that correspondence is a heuristic, not a hypothesis — a way of organizing inquiry that generates productive questions rather than testable predictions. Whether this defense is adequate depends on one's philosophy of knowledge, which is itself one of the questions the Principle of Correspondence raises.

Significance

The Principle of Correspondence is the operational engine of the Hermetic tradition. Without it, the other six Kybalion principles remain abstract philosophical claims. With it, they become tools for practical investigation: if the same laws operate at every level, then observing any level provides information about every other level. This principle is what makes astrology, alchemy, and sympathetic medicine internally coherent — they fail or succeed as practices based on whether correspondence is a real feature of reality.

The principle also carries epistemological implications that extend beyond esotericism. The scientific method itself relies on a form of correspondence — the assumption that laws discovered in laboratory conditions apply to the universe at large. The physicist who studies subatomic particles in a collider and draws conclusions about stellar processes is reasoning by correspondence, though they would not use that term. The Hermetic principle is broader (it includes mental and spiritual planes), but the underlying logic — that patterns at one scale reveal patterns at another — is shared.

In psychological and spiritual practice, the Principle of Correspondence means that inner work produces outer results and outer conditions reflect inner states. This bidirectional relationship is the foundation of practices ranging from Jungian active imagination to Buddhist mindfulness to ceremonial magic. It is the principle that makes self-knowledge consequential — not merely interesting but world-altering.

Connections

The Principle of Correspondence directly expresses the axiom As Above, So Below from the Emerald Tablet. It is the second of seven principles attributed to Hermes Trismegistus and codified in the Kybalion.

In the Kabbalistic tradition, the Tree of Life is the most systematic map of correspondences, connecting divine, cosmic, and human levels through the Sefirot. In Jyotish, the natal chart operates as a correspondence map — planetary positions at birth corresponding to life patterns. In alchemy, the planetary-metal correspondences that structure laboratory work depend entirely on this principle.

The Principle of Mentalism provides the metaphysical foundation for correspondence (all is mental, so all levels are expressions of mind), while the Principle of Vibration explains the mechanism (different rates of vibration produce different planes that nonetheless share structural patterns).

See Also

• As Above, So Below
• Emerald Tablet
• Principle of Mentalism
• Principle of Vibration

Further Reading