As with all the other Planes, the Mental Plane is divided into distinct psychological strata and distinct cosmic planes, both along the "vertical" and "horizontal" (or "octave") axis of emanation.  This complexity has led to a lot of confusion, because most of the current esoteric systems of thought are not sufficiently elaborate to cope with all the divisions and subdivisions of being.  Thus the Adyar or Post-Blavtskyian Theosophists distinguish the Higher Mental (the Causal Plane or Abstract mind) from the Lower Mental (the Mental Plane or Concrete mind), but in the original sources (e.g. the writings of Leadbeater) there is clearly a mix-up with the psychic planes.  One Spiritualist-theosophical communication ["The Return of Authur Conan Doyle" ] speaks of three celestial planes, and beneath them three mental subplanes (see diagram at left) - Imagination, Psychic Intuition, and lower or hard Intellect.  These latter and this would seem to be a "horizontal" sequence within the Mental Plane itself.  The Hassidic Kabbalist Shneur Zalman and Sri Aurobindo had comparable hierarchical psychologies.

The schema I present here is not claimed to be any more "certain" or "true" than these other explanations, but because it is a little more elaborate it is better able to incorporate all the diverse dimensions that make up mental existence.

So there is first the Supercausal or Divine Mental octave; the Godhead of this plane; in the Gorakhnathian cosmology this is represented by the deity Ishwara, from whose perspective, as the Godhead of Buddhi, the Universe "is a magnificent Rational Order, in which the ideal of Truth is being progressively revealed and realised." [Banerjea, p.133].

The Higher Causal octave is represented in Buddhist cosmology by reference to the stages of dhyana or samadhi, each corresponding to one of the Pure Form or Formless Realm heavens and hierarchies of Gods, which are not totally transcendent and yet at the same time still beyond the form and nature of the lower gods and heavens.

With the Causal octave we find Mind-proper, and the Ideational hierarchies, consisting as they do of pure creative Thought and spiritual Imagination.

The Subtle Mental Octave is the level of intellect which is involved with emotional and psychic realities.  This is the level of what Jung called the Ego (the conceptual consciousness or sense of limited self).  In this respect, the four Jungian Ego-functions of Thinking, Feeling, Intuition and Sensation are different transformations of the same Mental nature.

The Gross Mental Octave is the level of intellect which is caught up in and affected by the physical level of the being, the "Concrete Mind" (in part) of Theosophy, and the "Externalising Mind" of Sri Aurobindo.

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