From the book
The Kybalion
Three Initiates · Diotimos Editions · 2026
Browse this book’s lexicon →Orientation
At a Glance
- The wordThe chessboard represents a life governed by interacting causes.
- In The KybalionII introduces the image while summarizing cause and effect.
- In this editionChessboard and chess-board are attested spelling variants.
- A place to readII.22: … “and other outward causes moving them about like pawns on the Chessboard of Life. But the” …
Meaning
The chessboard represents a life governed by interacting causes. A pawn is moved by influences it does not direct; a player or mover understands more of the situation and acts more deliberately.
Use in the book
II introduces the image while summarizing cause and effect. The contrast is between being carried along by circumstances and participating more consciously in the game. XII develops the practical claim through mastery of moods, character, and surrounding influences.
XV names some of those influences: opinions, emotions, habits, inherited tendencies, and the wills of other people. It also preserves the qualification that the advanced person remains subject to higher causes. Playing more intelligently does not place the player outside the board's governing order.
Places to read
- II The Seven Hermetic Principles · Block 22… “and other outward causes moving them about like pawns on the Chessboard of Life. But the Masters, rising to the plane above, dominate their moods, characters, qualities, and powers, as well” …
- XII Causation · Block 12… “the exercise of the Will. Moved like the pawns on the checkerboard of life, they play their parts and are laid aside after the game is over. But the Masters, knowing” …
- XV Hermetic Axioms · Block 14… “which tend to move them about on the chess-board of life like mere pawns. By rising above these influencing causes, the advanced Hermetists seek a higher plane of mental action, and” …
In this edition
Chessboard and chess-board are attested spelling variants. Player and mover are interpretive role names here; the occurrence list records only the forms actually supplied by the text.
Reading the argument
The image compresses a difference of degree into a vivid opposition between two roles. Read with the qualifications about higher laws, it does not support absolute independence or the assumption that other people may be treated as disposable pieces.
pawns
“pawns” — 6 occurrences in 3 text blocks: II.22; XII.12; XV.14.
Chessboard
“Chessboard” — 1 occurrence in 1 text block: II.22.
chess-board
“chess-board” — 1 occurrence in 1 text block: XV.14.
Movers
“Movers” — 2 occurrences in 2 text blocks: II.22; XII.12.
PLAY
“PLAY” — 6 occurrences in 6 text blocks: II.22; VIII.19, 25, 28; XII.12; XV.14.