What are the major cosmic laws that the Fourth Way studies? The Law of Three and the Law of Seven can be studied both outside oneself, in external phenomena, and within. The enneagram symbol is a representation of both these two cosmic laws.

Ouspensky writes in In Search of the Miraculous:

Cosmic Law of Three

There are ideas which could stop all quarrels; such an idea is the law of three. 
~P. D. Ouspensky

Every action is really performed by the gunas (The Law of Three). Man, deluded by his egoism, thinks: “I am the doer.” But he who has the true insight into the operations of the gunas and their various functions, knows that when senses attach themselves to objects, gunas are merely attaching themselves to gunas. 
~Bhagavad Gita

The Vedic system of knowledge is based on a tripartite approach to the universe where connections exist in triples in categories of one group and across groups: sky, atmosphere, earth; object, medium, subject; future, present, past; and so on. Beyond the triples lies the transcendental “fourth”. Three kinds of motion are alluded to in the Vedic books: these are the translational motion, sound, and light which are taken to be “equivalent” to earth, air, and sky. The fourth motion is assigned to consciousness; and this is considered to be infinite in speed. 
~Unknown

“In right knowledge the study of man must proceed on parallel lines with the study of the world. And the study of the world must run parallel with the study of man. Laws are everywhere the same, in the world as well as in man. Some laws are more easily observed in the world, others are more easily observed in man.

“This parallel study of the world and of man shows the fundamental unity of everything.

“The number of fundamental laws which govern all processes both in the world and in man is very small. Different numerical combinations of a few elementary forces create all the seeming variety of phenomena.

“In order to understand the mechanics of the universe it is necessary to resolve complex phenomena into these elementary forces.

“The first fundamental law of the universe is as it is often called, the law of three. Every phenomenon in all worlds, is the result of a simultaneous action of three forces—the positive, the negative, and the neutralizing.

Cosmic Law of Seven

“The next fundamental law of the universe is the law of seven or the law of octaves.

“In order to understand the meaning of this law it is necessary to regard the universe as consisting of vibrations. These vibrations proceed in all kinds, aspects, and densities of the matter which constitutes the universe. From the finest to the coarsest. They issue from various sources and proceed in various directions, crossing one another, colliding, and so on. ..

“This law shows why straight lines never occur in our activities, why, having begun to do one thing, we in fact constantly do something entirely different. Although we do not notice this and continue to think that we are doing the same thing that we began to do.

“All this and many other things can only be explained with the help of the law of octaves. Also with an understanding of the role and significance of ‘intervals.’ [Intervals] cause the line of the development of force constantly to change, to go in a broken line, to turn round, to become its ‘own opposite’ and so on.

“Such a course of things, that is, a change of direction, we can observe in everything. After a certain period of energetic activity or strong emotion or a right understanding a reaction comes. Work becomes tedious and tiring; moments of fatigue and indifference enter into feeling; ..thought becomes dogmatic, literal.”

Ascending and Descending Octaves

“The law of octaves explains many phenomena in our lives which are incomprehensible.

“First is the principle of the deviation of forces.

“Second is the fact that nothing in the world stays in the same place, or remains what it was. [E]verything is going somewhere, is changing, and inevitably either develops or goes down, weakens or degenerates, that is to say, it moves along either an ascending or a descending line of octaves.

“And third, that in the actual development itself of both ascending and descending octaves, fluctuations, rises and falls are constantly taking place.

“[There is] either ascent or descent in every line of development of forces, and also the periodic fluctuations, that is, rises and falls, in every line whether ascending or descending.

“Nothing can develop by staying on one level. Ascent or descent is the inevitable cosmic condition of any action. We neither understand nor see what is going on around and within us. Either because we do not allow for the inevitability of descent when there is no ascent, or because we take descent to be ascent. These are two of the fundamental causes of our self-deception.”

Further Reading on these Cosmic Laws

For the complete chapters on these cosmic laws in In Search of the Miraculous, see: www.amazon.com/Search-Miraculous. For another article in FourthWayToday.org, see https://fourthwaytoday.org/octaves-and-intervals/.