# Echoes from the Orient

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> ECHOES FROM THE ORIENT
> 
> A BROAD OUTLINE OF THEOSOPHICAL DOCTRINES
> 
> BY
> WILLIAM Q. JUDGE
> [OCCULTUS]
> 
> SECOND POINT LOMA EDITION
> 
> THE THEOSOPHICAL PUBLISHING COMPANY
> POINT LOMA, CALIFORNIA
> 1910
> 
> Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1890,
> in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C.
> BY WILLIAM Q. JUDGE.
> 
> [Illustration: Logo]
> 
> THE ARYAN THEOSOPHICAL PRESS
> Point Loma, California
> 
> DEDICATED TO
> 
> HELENA PETROVNA BLAVATSKY
> 
> WITH LOVE
> 
> AND GRATITUDE
> 
> BY
> 
> THE AUTHOR
> 
> TO THE READER
> 
> Echoes from the Orient was written by Mr. Judge sixteen years ago (1890)
> as a series of papers for a well known periodical. The author wrote
> under the name of "_Occultus_," as it was intended that his personality
> should be hidden until the series was completed. The value of these
> papers as a popular presentation of Theosophical teaching was at once
> seen and led to their publication in book form. As Mr. Judge wrote in
> his "Antecedent Words" to the earlier edition:
> 
> "The restrictions upon the treatment of the subject growing out of the
> popular character of the paper in which they were published precluded
> the detail and elaboration that would have been possible in a
> philosophical or religious periodical. No pretense is made that the
> subject of Theosophy as understood in the Orient has been exhaustively
> treated, for, believing that millions of years have been devoted by the
> sages who are the guardians of Theosophical truth to its investigation,
> I think no one writer could do more than to repeat some of the echoes
> reaching his ears."
> 
> The reader should remember that the scope and influence of the
> Theosophical Movement have since that time (1890) greatly expanded, the
> work of THE UNIVERSAL BROTHERHOOD AND THEOSOPHICAL SOCIETY now reaching
> nearly every country in the world.
> 
> Point Loma, California, 1906
> 
> ECHOES FROM THE ORIENT.
> 
> I.
> 
> What appears to the Western mind to be a very strange superstition
> prevails in India about wonderful persons who are said to be of immense
> age, and who keep themselves secluded in places not accessible to the
> ordinary traveler. So long has this been current in India that the name
> applied to these beings is well known in the Sanskrit language:
> "Mah'tma," a compound of two words, _maha_, great, and _'tma_, soul. The
> belief in the existence of such persons is not confined to the ignorant,
> but is shared by the educated of all castes. The lower classes look upon
> the Mah'tmas as a sort of gods, and think most of their wonderful powers
> and great age. The pundits, or learned class, and educated Hindus in
> general, have a different view; they say that Mah'tmas are men or souls
> with unlimited knowledge of natural laws and of man's history and
> development. They claim also that the Mah'tmas--or Rishees, as they
> sometimes call them--have preserved the knowledge of all natural laws
> for ages, not only by tradition among their disciples, but also by
> actual records and in libraries existing somewhere in the many
> underground temples and passages in India. Some believers assert that
> there are also stores of books and records in secluded parts all over
> that part of Thibet which is not known to Europeans, access to them
> being possible only for the Mah'tmas and Adepts.
> 
> The credence given to such a universal theory grows out of an old Indian
> doctrine that man is a spiritual being--a soul, in other words--and
> that this soul takes on different bodies from life to life on earth in
> order at last to arrive at such perfect knowledge, through repeated
> experience, as to enable one to assume a body fit to be the
> dwelling-place of a Mah'tma or perfected soul. Then, they say, that
> particular soul becomes a spiritual helper to mankind. The perfected men
> are said to know the truth about the genesis of worlds and systems, as
> well as the development of man upon this and other planets.
> 
> Were such doctrines held only in India, it would be natural to pass the
> subject by with this brief mention. But when it is found that a large
> body of people in America and Europe hold the same beliefs, it is
> interesting to note such an un-Western development of thought. The
> Theosophical Society was founded in New York in 1875, with the avowed
> object of forming a nucleus for a Universal Brotherhood, and its
> founders state that they believe the Indian Mah'tmas directed them to
> establish such a society. Since its foundation it has gained members in
> all countries, including people of wealth as well as those in moderate
> circumstances, and the highly cultured also. Within its ranks there
> flourish beliefs in the Mah'tmas of India and in Reïncarnation and its
> twin doctrine, Karma. This last holds that no power, human or divine,
> can save one from the consequences of acts performed, and that in this
> life we are experiencing the results due to us for all acts and thoughts
> which were ours in the preceding incarnation.
> 
> This has brought out a large body of literature in books and magazines
> published in the United States, England, India, and elsewhere.
> Newspapers are published in the interest of the new-old cult in the
> vernacular of Hindūstan and also in old Ceylon. Even Japan has its
> periodicals devoted to the same end, and to ignore so wide-spread a
> movement would bespeak ignorance of the factors at work in our
> development. When such an eminent authority as the great French savant,
> Emile Burnouf, says that the Theosophical movement must be counted as
> one of the three great religious influences in the world to-day, there
> is no need of an excuse for presenting its features in detail to readers
> imbued with the civilization of the West.
> 
> II.
> 
> In my former paper I merely hinted at the two principal doctrines
> promulgated by the Theosophical Society; it is well now to notice the
> fact that the Society itself was organized amid a shout of laughter,
> which at intervals ever since has been repeated. Very soon after it
> launched forth it found a new member in a Bavarian gentleman, Baron
> Henry Louis de Palm, who not long thereafter died and obligingly left
> his body to be cremated.
> 
> The funeral was held at Masonic Hall, New York city, and attracted
> widespread attention from both press and public. It was Theosophical in
> its character, and while conducted with befitting dignity in view of the
> solemnity of the occasion, was along distinctly original lines. All this
> of course, drew forth satire from the press, but served the purpose of
> gaining some attention for the young Society. Its history since then has
> been remarkable, and it is safe to say that no other similar body in
> this century has drawn to itself so much consideration, stirred up such
> a thinking among people on mystical subjects, and grown so rapidly amid
> the loudest derision and against the fiercest opposition, within the
> short space of fifteen years.
> 
> While the press has been sneering and enemies have been plotting, the
> workers in the Society have established centers all over the world, and
> are to-day engaged persistently in sending out Theosophical literature
> into every nook and corner of the United States. A glance at the
> Theosophical map shows a line of Branches of the Society dotting a strip
> of this country which reaches from the city of New York to the Pacific
> Coast; at either end this belt spreads out to take in Boston and New
> Orleans in the East and San Francisco and San Diego in the West; while
> near the middle of the continent there is another accumulation of
> centers. This is claimed to be strictly and mystically Theosophical,
> because at each end of the magic line of effort and at its central point
> there is an accumulation of nucleï. It is a fact that the branches of
> the Society in America are rapidly running up into the first hundred.
> For some little time there existed in Washington a Branch of the Society
> called the Gnostic, but it never engaged in any active work. After it
> had been once incontinently dissolved by its president, who thereafter
> withdrew, leaving the presidency in the hands of another, the governing
> body of the American Theosophists formally dischartered the Gnostic, and
> its members joined other Branches. There is, however, to-day a
> Washington Branch named boldly after the much lauded and belittled Mme.
> H. P. Blavatsky, while the Theosophical map shows an accumulation of
> influences in Washington that point to an additional Branch, and inquiry
> in official quarters discloses the fact that the matter is already
> mooted.
> 
> The Theosophical map of which I have spoken is a curiosity, an anomaly
> in the nineteenth century. Few of the members are allowed to see it; but
> those who are say that it is a register of the actual state, day by day,
> of the whole United States Section--a sort of weather map, with areas of
> pressure and Theosophical humidity in all directions. Where a Branch is
> well founded and in good condition, the spot or sensitive surface shows
> clearness and fixity. In certain places which are in a formative
> condition there is another appearance symptomatic of a vortex that may
> soon bring forth a Branch; while, wherever the principle of
> disintegration has crept into an existing organization, there the
> formerly bright and fixed spots grow cloudy. By means of this map, those
> who are managing the real growth of the movement can tell how it is
> going and aid it intelligently. Of course all this sounds ridiculous in
> our age; but, whether true or false, there are many Theosophists who
> believe it. A similar arrangement would be desirable in other branches
> of our civilization.
> 
> The grand theories of the Theosophists regarding evolution, human races,
> religions and general civilization, as well as the future state of man
> and the various planets he inhabits, should engage our more serious
> attention; and of these I propose to speak at another time.
> 
> III.
> 
> The first Echo from the burnished and mysterious East which reverberated
> from these pages sounded the note of Universal Brotherhood. Among the
> men of this day such an idea is generally accepted as vague and utopian,
> but one which it will do no harm to subscribe to; they therefore quickly
> assent, and as quickly nullify the profession by action in the opposite
> direction. For the civilization of to-day, and especially of the United
> States, is an attempt to accentuate and glorify the individual. The
> oft-repeated declaration that any born citizen may aspire to occupy the
> highest office in the gift of the nation is proof of this, and the
> Mah'tmas who guard the truth through the ages while nations are
> decaying, assert that the reaction is sure to come in a relapse into the
> worst forms of anarchy. The only way to prevent such a relapse is for
> men to really practice the Universal Brotherhood they are willing to
> accept with the tongue. These exalted beings further say that all men
> are--as a scientific and dynamic fact--united, whether they admit it or
> not; and that each nation suffers, on the moral as well as the physical
> plane, from the faults of all other nations, and receives benefit from
> the others also even against its will. This is due to the existence of
> an imponderable, tenuous medium which interpenetrates the entire globe,
> and in which all the acts and thoughts of every man are felt and
> impressed, to be afterward reflected again. Hence, say the Adepts, the
> thoughts or the doctrines and beliefs of men are of the higher
> importance, because those that prevail among people of a low character
> are just as much and as easily reflected upon the earth as are the
> thoughts and beliefs of persons occupying a higher plane of culture.
> 
> This is a most important tenet, if true; for, with the aid of the
> discoveries just now admitted by science respecting hypnotism, we are at
> once able to see that an enormous hypnotizing machine is about. As this
> tenuous medium--called by the men of the East "Akāsa" and by the
> mediæval philosophers the "Astral Light"--is entirely beyond our
> control, we are at the mercy of the pictures made in it and reflected
> upon us.
> 
> If to this we add the wonderfully interesting doctrine of Reïncarnation,
> remembering also that the images made in the Astral Light persist for
> centuries, it is at once seen that upon returning again to earth-life we
> are affected for good or evil by the conduct, the doctrine and the
> aspirations of preceding nations and men. Returning here now, for
> instance, we are moved, without our knowledge, by the impressions made
> in the Astral Light at the time when the Indians, the Spaniards and the
> harsh Puritans lived upon the earth. The words of the immortal
> Shakspere--
> 
>      The evil that men do lives after them;
>      The good is oft interred with their bones,
> 
> receive a striking exemplification under this doctrine. For, as the evil
> thoughts and deeds are the more material and therefore more firmly
> impacted into the Astral Light, while the good, being spiritual, easily
> fade out, we are in effect at the mercy of the evil done. And the Adepts
> assert that Shakspere was, unconsciously to himself, inspired by one of
> their own number. I shall refer again to this branch of the subject. The
> scheme of evolution put forth by these beings and their disciples is so
> broad, deep and far-reaching as to stagger the ordinary mind. It takes
> in with ease periods of years running up into trillions and
> quadrillions. It claims that man has been on earth for millions of years
> more than science yet is willing to admit. It is not bound by the narrow
> scheme of biblical chronologists, nor startled by the magnificent age of
> civilizations which disappeared long ago. The keepers of this doctrine
> say that they and their predecessors lived in those older times, and
> have preserved not only the memory of them, but also complete records.
> These records, moreover, are not merely on perishable paper and palm
> leaf, but on imperishable stone. They point to such remains as the
> statues twenty-seven feet high found on Easter Island; to rows of
> gigantic statues in Asia, that by their varying heights show the gradual
> diminution of human stature, which kept pace with other degenerations;
> and, to crown all, they say that they possess to-day in the East the
> immense and well guarded collections of records of all sorts. Not only
> are these records said to relate to the physical history of man, but
> also to his astral and spiritual evolution.
> 
> Before closing this paper, I can only indicate one of their basic
> doctrines in the scheme of evolution. That is, that the evolution of the
> inner, astral form of man came first in order, and continued for an
> immense number of years before his physical structure was built up
> around it. This, with other portions of the doctrine, is vital and will
> aid much in an understanding of the complex questions presented to us
> by the history of the human race, both that which is known and that
> which is still resting on conjecture.
> 
> IV.
> 
> The records to which in my last paper I referred, as having been kept by
> the Adepts and now in the possession of their present representatives
> and successors--Adepts also--relate not only to the birth of planets in
> this solar system, but also to the evolution and development of man,
> through the various kingdoms of nature, until he reaches the most
> perfect condition which can be imagined. The evolution of the human
> being includes not only the genesis of his mortal frame, but, as well,
> the history of the inner man, whom they are accustomed to call the real
> one.
> 
> This, then, brings us to a very interesting claim put forward for the
> Wisdom Religion, that it pretends to throw light not only upon man's
> emotions and mental faculties, but also upon his pre-natal and
> post-mortem states, both of which are of the highest interest and
> importance. Such questions as, "Where have I come from?" and, "What
> shall be my condition after death?" trouble and confuse the minds of all
> men, ignorant or cultured. Priests and thinkers have, from time to time,
> formulated theories, more or less absurd, as to those pre-natal and
> post-mortem states, while the Science of to-day laughs in derision at
> the idea of making any inquiry into the matter whatever. Theologians
> have offered explanations, all of which relate only to what they suppose
> will happen to us after death, leaving entirely out of view and wholly
> unanswered the natural question, "What were we before we were born
> here?" And, taking them on their own ground, they are in a most
> illogical position, because, having once postulated immortality for the
> soul--the real man--they cannot deny immortality in either direction.
> If man is immortal, that immortality could never have had a beginning,
> or else it would have an end. Hence their only escape from the dilemma
> is to declare that each soul is a special creation. But this doctrine of
> a special creation for each soul born upon the earth, is not dwelt upon
> or expounded by the priests, inasmuch as it is deemed better to keep it
> discreetly in the background.
> 
> The Wisdom Religion, on the other hand, remains logical from beginning
> to end. It declares that man is a spiritual being, and allows of no
> break in the chain of anything once declared immortal. The Ego of each
> man is immortal; "always was existent, always will be, and never can be
> nonexistent;" appearing now and again, and reappearing, clothed in
> bodies on each occasion different, it only appears to be mortal; it
> always remains the substratum and support for the personality acting
> upon the stage of life. And in those appearances as mortal, the
> questions mooted above--as to the pre-natal and post-mortem states--are
> of vital interest, because knowledge or ignorance concerning them alters
> man's thought and action while an actor on the stage, and it is
> necessary for him to know in order that he may so live as to aid in the
> grand upward sweep of the evolutionary wave.
> 
> Now the Adepts have for ages pursued scientific experimentation and
> investigation upon those lines. Seers themselves of the highest order,
> they have recorded not only their own actual experiences beyond the veil
> of matter, on both sides, but have collected, compared, analyzed and
> preserved the records of experiences of the same sort by hundreds of
> thousands of lesser seers, their own disciples; and this process has
> been going on from time immemorial. Let Science laugh as it may, the
> Adepts are the only true scientists, for they take into account every
> factor in the question, whereas Science is limited by brain-power, by
> circumstance, by imperfection of instruments, and by a total inability
> to perceive anything deeper than the mere phenomena presented by matter.
> The records of the visions and experiences of the greater and lesser
> seers, through the ages, are extant to-day. Of their mass, nothing has
> been accepted except that which has been checked and verified by
> millions of independent observations; and therefore the Adepts stand in
> the position of those who possess actual experimental knowledge of what
> precedes the birth of the Ego in a human form, and what succeeds when
> the "mortal coil" is cast away.
> 
> This recording of experiences still goes on; for the infinity of the
> changes of Nature in its evolution permits of no stoppage, no "last
> word," no final declaration. As the earth sweeps around the sun, it not
> only passes through new places in its orbit, but, dragged as it is by
> the sun through his greater orbit, involving millions of millions of
> years, it must in that larger circle enter upon new fields in space and
> unprecedented conditions. Hence the Adepts go farther yet and state
> that, as the phenomena presented by matter to-day are different from
> those presented a million years ago, so matter will in another million
> of years show different phenomena still. Indeed, if we could translate
> our sight to that time, far back in the past of our globe, we could see
> conditions and phenomena of the material world so different from those
> now surrounding us that it would be almost impossible to believe we had
> ever been in such a state as that then prevailing. And the changes
> toward the conditions that will prevail at a point equally remote in
> advance of us, in time, and which will be not less than those that have
> occurred, are in progress now. Nothing in the material world endures
> absolutely unchanged in itself or its conditions, even for the smallest
> conceivable portion of time. All that _is_, is forever in process of
> _becoming_ something else. This is not mere transcendentalism, but is
> an old established doctrine called, in the East, "the doctrine of the
> constant, eternal change of atoms from one state into another."
> 
> V.
> 
> The ancient doctrine of the constant, eternal change of every atom from
> state to state, is founded upon, or rather grows out of, another which
> postulates that there is no such thing as dead matter. At every
> conceivable point in the universe there are lives; nowhere can be found
> a spot that is dead; and each life is forever hastening onward to higher
> evolution. To admit this, we must of course grant that matter is never
> perceived by the eye or through any instrument. It is but the phenomena
> of matter that we recognize with the senses, and hence, say the sages,
> the thing denominated "matter" by us is an illusion. Even the protoplasm
> of the schools is not the original matter; it is simply another of the
> phenomena. This first original matter is called by Paracelsus and others
> primordial matter, the nearest approach to which in the Eastern school
> is found in the Sanskrit word _mulaprakriti_. This is the root of
> matter, invisible, not to be weighed, or measured, or tested with any
> instrument of human invention. And yet it is the only real matter
> underlying all the phenomena to which we erroneously give its name. But
> even it is not dead, but full of the lives first referred to.
> 
> Now, bearing this in mind, we consider the vast solar system, yet vast
> only when not compared with the still greater aggregation of stars and
> planets around it. The great sidereal year covered by the sun in going
> through the twelve signs of the zodiac includes over 25,000 mortal years
> of 365 days each. While this immense circuit is being traversed, the sun
> drags the whole solar system with him around his own tremendous orbit,
> and we may imagine--for there are no observations on the point--that,
> while the 25,000 years of travel around the zodiac have been passing,
> the solar system as a whole has advanced along the sun's own orbit only
> a little distance. But after millions of years shall have been consumed
> in these progresses, the sun must bring his train of planets to stellar
> space where they have never been before; here other conditions and
> combinations of matter may very well obtain--conditions and states of
> which our scientists have never heard, of which there never has been
> recorded one single phenomenon; and the difference between planetary
> conditions then and now will be so great that no resemblance shall be
> observed.
> 
> This is a branch of cyclic law with which the Eastern sages are
> perfectly familiar. They have inquired into it, recorded their
> observations, and preserved them. Having watched the uncountable lives
> during cycles upon cycles past, and seen their behavior under different
> conditions in other stellar spaces long ago left behind, they have some
> basis upon which to draw conclusions as to what will be the state of
> things in ages yet to come.
> 
> This brings us to an interesting theory offered by Theosophy respecting
> life itself as exhibited by man, his death and sleep. It relates also to
> what is generally called "fatigue." The most usual explanation for the
> phenomenon of sleep is that the body becomes tired and more or less
> depleted of its vitality and then seeks repose. This, says Theosophy, is
> just the opposite of the truth, for, instead of having suffered a loss
> of vitality, the body, at the conclusion of the day, has more life in it
> than when it waked. During the waking state the life-waves rush into the
> body with greater intensity every hour, and, we being unable to resist
> them any longer than the period usually observed, they overpower us and
> we fall asleep. While sleeping, the life waves adjust themselves to the
> molecules of the body; and when the equilibrium is complete we again
> wake to continue the contest with life. If this periodical adjustment
> did not occur, the life current would destroy us. Any derangement of the
> body that tends to inhibit this adjustment is a cause of sleeplessness,
> and perhaps death. Finally, death of the body is due to the inequality
> of the contest with the life force; it at last overcomes us, and we are
> compelled to sink into the grave. Disease, the common property of the
> human race, only reduces the power of the body to adjust and resist.
> Children, say the Adepts, sleep more than adults, and need earlier
> repose, because the bodily machine, being young and tender, is easily
> overcome by life and made to sleep.
> 
> Of course, in so short an article, I cannot elaborate this theory; but,
> although not probably acceptable now to Science, it will be one day
> accepted as true. As it is beginning to be thought that electricity is
> all-pervading, so, perhaps, ere long it will be agreed that life is
> universal even in what we are used to calling dead matter.
> 
> As, however, it is plain to any observant mind that there seems to be
> more or less intelligence in the operations of this life energy, we
> naturally approach another interesting Theosophical doctrine as to the
> beings and hierarchies directing this energy.
> 
> VI.
> 
> While studying these ancient ideas, we may as well prepare ourselves to
> have them clash with many long-accepted views. But since Science has
> very little save conjecture to offer when it attempts to solve the great
> problems of genesis and cosmo-genesis, and, in the act of denying old
> dogmas, almost always starts with a hypothesis, the Theosophist may feel
> safe. In important matters, such as the heat of the sun or the history
> of the moon there is no agreement between scientists or astronomers.
> Newton, Pouillet, Zöllner, Secchi, Fizeau, Waterston, Rosetti, and
> others all differ about the sun, the divergence between their estimates
> of its heat being as high as 8,998,600 degrees.
> 
> If we find the Adepts stating that the moon is not a mass thrown off
> from the earth in cooling, but, on the contrary, is the progenitor of
> this globe, we need not fear the jeers of a Science that is as uncertain
> and unsafe in many things as it is positive.
> 
> Had I to deal only with those learned men of the schools who abide by
> the last utterance from the mouths of the leaders of Science, I should
> never attempt the task of speaking of the beings and hierarchies who
> guide the lives of which I wrote in my last. My pen would drop from a
> hand paralyzed by negations. But the spiritual beliefs of the common
> people will still be in vogue when the learned materialist has passed
> away. The great Immanuel Kant said: "I confess I am much disposed to
> assert the existence of immaterial natures in the world, and to place my
> own soul in the class of these beings. It will hereafter, I know not
> where nor when, yet be proved that the human soul stands, even in this
> life, in indissoluble connection with all immaterial natures in the
> spirit world, that it reciprocally acts upon these, and receives
> impressions from them." And the greater number of men think so also.
> 
> That there are hierarchies ruling in the universe is not a new idea. It
> can be easily found to-day in the Christian Church. The early fathers
> taught it, St. Paul spoke of it, and the Roman Catholic Church has it
> clearly now in the Book of Ritual of the Spirits of the Stars. The four
> archangels who guard the four cardinal points represent the groups of
> rulers in the ancient system, or the heads of each group. In that system
> the rulers are named Dhyan Chohans. Although the Theosophical philosophy
> does not postulate a personal God, whether extra- or intra-cosmic, it
> cannot admit that Nature is left unaided in her work, but asserts that
> the Dhyan Chohans aid her, and are constantly occupied in directing the
> all-pervading life in its evolutionary movement. Mme. Blavatsky,
> speaking on this subject in her _Secret Doctrine_, quotes from the old
> _Book of Dzyan_ thus:
> 
> "An army of the Sons of Light stands at each angle, the Lipika in the
> middle wheel."
> 
> The four angles are the four quarters, and the "middle wheel" is the
> center of space; and that center is everywhere, because as space is
> illimitable, the center of it must be wherever the cognizing
> consciousness is. And the same author, using the _Disciple's Catechism_,
> writes:
> 
> "What is it that ever is? Space, the Anupadaka. What is it that ever
> was? The germ in the Root. What is it that is ever coming and going? The
> great Breath. Then there are three eternals? No, the three are one. That
> which ever is is one; that which ever was is one; that which is ever
> being and becoming is also one; and this is space."
> 
> In this parentless and eternal space is the wheel in the center where
> the Lipika are, of whom I cannot speak; at the four angles are the Dhyan
> Chohans, and doing their will among men on this earth are the
> Adepts--the Mah'tmas. The harmony of the spheres is the voice of the
> Law, and that voice is obeyed alike by the Dhyan Chohan and the
> Mah'tma--on their part with willingness, because they are the law; on
> the part of men and creatures because they are bound by the adamantine
> chains of the law which they do not understand.
> 
> When I said that nothing could be spoken about the Lipika, I meant that,
> because of their mysterious nature and incomprehensible powers, it is
> not possible to know enough to say anything with either sense or
> certainty. But of the Dhyan Chohans and the Adepts we may know
> something, and are often given, as it were, tangible proof of their
> existence. For the Adepts are living men, using bodies similar to ours;
> they are scattered all over the earth in all nations; they know each
> other, but not according to mere forms and Masonic signs of recognition,
> unless we call natural, physical, and astral signs Masonic. They have
> times when they meet together and are presided over by some among their
> number who are more advanced in knowledge and power than the rest; and
> these higher Adepts again have their communications, at which that One
> who presides is the highest; from these latter begins the communication
> with the Dhyan Chohans. All in their several degrees do that work which
> pertains to their degree, and although only to the Highest can be
> ascribed any governance or guidance of nature and mankind, yet the very
> least occupies an important place in the whole scheme. Freemasons and
> the numerous mock-Rosicrucians of the day will probably not unanimously
> accept this view, inasmuch as these Adepts have not submitted to their
> ritual; but that there has always been a widespread--and, if you please,
> a sometimes sneaking--belief in such beings and orders, is not difficult
> to discern or prove.
> 
> VII.
> 
> An old argument for the existence of an extra-cosmic--a personal--God,
> is this very intelligence that appears to pervade nature, from which the
> conclusion is drawn that there is a being who is the intelligent
> director. But Theosophy does not admit any such God, for he is neither
> necessary nor possible. There are too many evidences of implacability in
> the operations of nature for us to be able for very long to cherish the
> notion of a personal God. We see that storms will rage and overwhelm
> good and bad together; that earthquakes have no respect for age, sex or
> rank, and that wherever a natural law has to act it will do so
> regardless of human pain or despair.
> 
> The Wisdom Religion in postulating hierarchies such as those I have
> previously referred to, does not thereby outline a personal God. The
> difference between the personal God--say Jehovah for one--and the Lipika
> with the hosts of the Dhyan Chohans, is very great. Law and order, good
> sense, decency and progress are all subservient to Jehovah, sometimes
> disappearing altogether under his beneficent sway; while in the Wisdom
> Religion the Dhyan Chohans can only follow the immutable laws eternally
> traced in the Universal Mind, and this they do intelligently, because
> they are in fact men become gods. As these eternal laws are
> far-reaching, and as Nature herself is blind, the hierarchies--the hosts
> at the angles--have to guide the evolutionary progress of matter.
> 
> In order to grasp the doctrine better, let us take one period of
> manifestation such as that we are now in. This began millions of
> millions of years ago, succeeding a vast period of darkness or
> hibernation. It is called Chaos in the Christian scheme. And preceding
> that period of sleep there were eternally other periods of activity or
> manifestation. Now, in those prior periods of energy and action the same
> evolutionary progress went on, from and out of which came great
> beings--men perfected and become what to us are gods, who had aided in
> countless evolutions in the eternal past. These became Dhyan Chohans and
> took part in all succeeding evolutions. Such is the great goal for a
> human soul to strive after. Before it the paltry and impossible rewards
> of the Christian heaven turn to dross.
> 
> The mistake must not be made of confining these great evolutionary
> periods and the beings spoken of, to our miserable earth. We are only in
> the chain. There are other systems, other spaces where energy,
> knowledge and power are exercised. In the mysterious Milky-Way there are
> spots vast in size and incomprehensibly distant, where there is room for
> many such systems as ours; and even while we now watch the assemblage of
> stars, there is some spot among them where the vast night of death is
> spreading remorselessly over a once fair system.
> 
> Now these beings, under the sway of the law as they are, seem perhaps to
> be sometimes implacable. Occasions are met where to mortal judgment it
> would seem to be wise or just to save a city from destruction, or a
> nation from decay, or a race from total extinction. But if such a fate
> is the natural result of actions performed or a necessary step in the
> cyclic sweep, it cannot be averted. As one of the Masters of this noble
> science has written:
> 
> "We never pretended to be able to draw nations in the mass to this or
> that crisis in spite of the _general drift of the world's cosmic
> relations_. The cycles must run their rounds. Periods of mental and
> moral light and darkness succeed each other as day does night. The major
> and minor yugas must be accomplished _according to the established order
> of things_. And we, borne along on the mighty tide, can only modify and
> direct some of its minor currents. If we had the powers of the imaginary
> personal God, and the immutable laws were but toys to play with, then,
> indeed, might we have created conditions that would have turned this
> earth into an Arcadia for lofty souls."
> 
> And so in individual cases--even among those who are in direct relations
> with some Adept--the law cannot be infringed. Karma demands that such
> and such a thing should happen to the individual, and the greatest God
> or the smallest Adept cannot lift a finger to prevent it. A nation may
> have heaped up against its account as a nation a vast amount of bad
> Karma. Its fate is sure, and although it may have noble units in it,
> great souls even who are Adepts themselves, nothing can save it, and it
> will "go out like a torch dipped in water."
> 
> Such was the end of ancient Egypt, of whose former glory no man of this
> day knows aught. Although to us she appears in the historical sky as a
> full-risen sun, she yet had her period of growth, when mighty Adepts sat
> upon the throne and guided the people. She gradually reached a high
> point of power and then her people grew material; the Adepts retired;
> pretended Adepts took their place, and gradually her glory waned until
> at last the light of Egypt became darkness. The same story was repeated
> in Chaldea and Assyria and also upon the surface of our own America.
> Here a great, a glorious civilization once flourished, only to disappear
> as the others did; and that a grand development of civilization is
> beginning here again is one of the operations of the just and perfect
> law of Karma to the eye of the Theosophist, but one of the mysterious
> workings of an irresponsible providence to those who believe in a
> personal God who giveth the land of other men to the good Christian. The
> development of the American nation has a mysterious but potent
> connection with the wonderful past of the Atlanteans, and is one of
> those great stories outlined in the book of fate by the Lipika to whom I
> referred last week.
> 
> VIII.
> 
> Among the Adepts the rise and fall of nations and civilizations are
> subjects which are studied under the great cyclic movements. They hold
> that there is an indissoluble connection between man and every event
> that takes place on this globe, not only the ordinary changes in
> politics and social life, but all the happenings in the mineral,
> vegetable and animal kingdoms. The changes in the seasons are for and
> through man; the great upheavals of continents, the movements of immense
> glaciers, the terrific eruptions of volcanoes, or the sudden
> overflowings of great rivers, are all for and through man, whether he be
> conscious of it or present or absent. And they tell of great changes in
> the inclination of the axis of the earth, past and to come, all due to
> man.
> 
> This doctrine is incomprehensible to the Western nineteenth century, for
> it is hidden from observation, opposed to tradition and contradicted by
> education. But the Theosophist who has passed beyond the elementary
> stages knows that it is true nevertheless. "What," says the worshipper
> of Science, "has man got to do with the Charleston earthquake, or with
> the showers of cosmic dust that invade our atmosphere? Nothing."
> 
> But the Adept, standing on the immeasurable height where centuries lie
> under his glance, sees the great cycles and the lesser ones rolling
> onward, influenced by man and working out their changes for his
> punishment, reward, experience and development.
> 
> It is not necessary now to try to make it clear how the thoughts and
> deeds of men effect any changes in material things; that I will lay down
> for the present as a dogma, if you please, to be made clear later on.
> 
> The great subject of cycles has been touched upon, and brings us close
> to a most fascinating statement made by the Theosophical Adepts. It is
> this, that the cycles in their movement are bringing up to the surface
> now, in the United States and America generally, not only a great glory
> of civilization which was forgotten eleven thousand or more years ago,
> but also the very men, the monads--the egos, as they call them--who were
> concerned so many ages since in developing and bringing it to its final
> lustre. In fact, we of the nineteenth century, hearing of new
> discoveries and inventions every day, and dreaming of great advances in
> all arts and sciences, are the same individuals who inhabited bodies
> among the powerful and brilliant as well as wicked, Atlanteans, whose
> name is forever set immortal in the Atlantic Ocean. The Europeans are
> also Atlantean monads; but the flower, so to speak, of this revival or
> resurrection, is and is to be on the American continent. I will not say
> the United States, for mayhap, when the sun of our power has risen
> again, there may be no United States for it to rise upon.
> 
> Of course, in order to be able to accept in any degree this theory, it
> is essential that one should believe in the twin Theosophical doctrines
> of Karma and Reïncarnation. To me it seems quite plain. I can almost see
> the Atlanteans in these citizens of America, sleepy, and not well aware
> who they are, but yet full of the Atlantean ideas, which are only
> prevented from full and clear expression by the inherited bodily and
> mental environment which cramps and binds the mighty man within. This
> again is Nemesis-Karma that punishes us by means of these galling
> limitations, penning up our power and for the time frustrating our
> ambition. It is because, when we were in Atlantean bodies, we did
> wickedly, not the mere sordid wicked things of this day, but high deeds
> of evil such as by St. Paul were attributed to unknown spiritual beings
> in high places. We degraded spiritual things and turned mighty powers
> over nature to base uses; we did _in excelsis_ that which is hinted at
> now in the glorification of wealth, of material goods, of the individual
> over the spiritual and above the great Man--Humanity. This has now its
> compensation in our present inability to attain what we want or to
> remove from among us the grinding-stones of poverty. We are, as yet,
> only preparers, much as we may exalt our plainly crude American
> development.
> 
> Herein lies the very gist of the cycle's meaning. It is a preparatory
> cycle with much of necessary destruction in it; for, before
> construction, we must have some disintegration. We are preparing here in
> America a new race which will exhibit the perfection of the glories
> that I said were being slowly brought to the surface from the long
> forgotten past. This is why the Americas are seen to be in a perpetual
> ferment. It is the seething and bubbling of the older races in the
> refining-pot, and the slow coming up of the material for the new race.
> Here, and nowhere else, are to be found men and women of every race
> living together, being governed together, attacking nature and the
> problems of life together, and bringing forth children who combine, each
> one, two races. This process will go on until in the course of many
> generations there will be produced on the American continents an
> entirely new race; new bodies; new orders of intellect; new powers of
> the mind; curious and unheard-of psychic powers, as well as
> extraordinary physical ones; with new senses and extensions of present
> senses now unforeseen. When this new sort of body and mind are
> generated--then other monads, or our own again, will animate them and
> paint upon the screen of time the pictures of 100,000 years ago.
> 
> IX.
> 
> In dealing with these doctrines one is compelled now and then to greatly
> extend the scope and meaning of many English words. The word "race" is
> one of these. In the Theosophical scheme, as given out by the sages of
> the East, seven great races are spoken of. Each one of these includes
> all the different so-called races of our modern ethnology. Hence the
> necessity for having seven great root-races, sub-races, family races,
> and countless offshoot races. The root-race sends off sub-races, and
> these divide into family groups; all, however, being included in the
> great root-race then undergoing development.
> 
> The appearance of these great root-races is always just when the world's
> development permits. When the globe was forming, the first root-race was
> more or less ethereal and had no such body as we now inhabit. The
> cosmic environment became more dense and the second race appeared, soon
> after which the first wholly disappeared. Then the third came on the
> scene, after an immense lapse of time, during which the second had been
> developing the bodies needed for the third. At the coming of the fourth
> root-race it is said that the present human form was evolved, although
> gigantic and in some respects different from our own. It is from this
> point--the fourth race--that the Theosophical system begins to speak of
> man as such.
> 
> The old book quoted by Mme. Blavatsky has it in this wise:
> 
> "Thus two by two on the seven zones the third race gave birth to the
> fourth;" and,
> 
> "The first race on every zone was moon-colored; the second, yellow, like
> gold; the third, red; the fourth, brown, which became black with sin."
> 
> Topinard, in his _Anthropology_, gives support to this, as he says that
> there are three fundamental colors in the human organism--red, yellow
> and black. The brown race, which became black with sin, refers to the
> Atlantean sorcerer race of which I spoke in my last; its awfully evil
> practices, both mental and physical, having produced a change in the
> color of the skin.
> 
> The evolution of these seven great races covers many millions of years,
> and it must not be forgotten that when the new race is fully evolved the
> preceding race disappears, as the monads in it have been gradually
> reïncarnated in the bodies of the new race. The present root-race to
> which we belong, no matter what the sub-race or family we may be in, is
> the fifth. It became a separate, distinct and completely-defined race
> about one million years ago, and has yet many more years to serve before
> the sixth will be ushered in. This fifth race includes also all the
> nations in Europe, as they together form a family race and are not to
> be divided off from each other.
> 
> Now, the process of forming the foundation, or great spinal column, for
> that race which is to usher in the sixth, and which I said is now going
> on in the Americas, is a slow process for us. Obliged as we are by our
> inability to judge or to count except by relativity, the gradual coming
> together of nations and the fusion of their offspring over and over
> again so as to bring forth something new in the human line, is so
> gradual as to seem almost without progress. But this change and
> evolution go on nevertheless, and a very careful observer can see
> evidences of it. One fact deserves attention. It is the inventive
> faculty displayed by Americans. This is not accorded much force by our
> scientists, but the Occultist sees in it an evidence that the brains of
> these inventors are more open to influences and pictures from the astral
> world than are the brains of the older nations. Reports have been
> brought to me by competent persons of children, boys and girls, who were
> born with most abnormal faculties of speech, or memory or otherwise, and
> some such cases I have seen myself. All of these occur in America, and
> many of them in the West. There is more nervousness here than in the
> older nations. This is accounted for by the hurry and rush of our
> civilization; but such an explanation really explains nothing, because
> the question yet remains, "Why is there such hurry and push and change
> in the United States?" Such ordinary arguments go in a circle, since
> they leave out of sight the fundamental reason, so familiar to the
> Theosophist, that it is human evolution going on right before our eyes
> in accordance with cyclic laws.
> 
> The Theosophical Adepts believe in evolution, but not that sort which
> claims an ape as our ancestor. Their great and comprehensive system is
> quite able to account for rudimentary muscles and traces of organs
> found complete only in the animal kingdom without having to call a
> pithecoid ape our father, for they show the gradual process of building
> the temple for the use of the divine Ego, proceeding ceaselessly, and in
> silence, through ages upon ages, winding in and out among all the forms
> in nature in every kingdom, from the mineral up to the highest. This is
> the real explanation of the old Jewish, Masonic and archaic saying that
> the temple of the Lord is not made with hands and that no sound of
> building is heard in it.
> 
> X.
> 
> It is well now to say, more definitely than I have as yet, a few words
> of the two classes of beings, one of which has been much spoken of in
> Theosophical literature, and also by those on the outside who write of
> the subject either in seriousness or in ridicule. These two classes of
> exalted personages are the Mah'tmas and Nirm'nak'yas.
> 
> In respect to the Mah'tmas, a great many wrong notions have currency,
> not only with the public, but as well with Theosophists in all parts of
> the world.
> 
> In the early days of the Theosophical Society the name Mah'tma was not
> in use here, but the title then was "Brothers." This referred to the
> fact that they were a band of men who belonged to a brotherhood in the
> East. The most wonderful powers and, at times, the most extraordinary
> motives were attributed to them by those who believed in their
> existence.
> 
> They could pass to all parts of the world in the twinkling of an eye.
> Across the great distance that India is from here they could precipitate
> letters to their friends and disciples in New York. Many thought that if
> this were done it was only for amusement; others looked at it in the
> light of a test for the faithful, while still others often supposed
> Mah'tmas acted thus for pure love of exercising their power. The
> Spiritualists, some of whom believed that Mme. Blavatsky really did the
> wonderful things told of her, said that she was only a medium, pure and
> simple, and that her Brothers were familiar spooks of séance rooms.
> Meanwhile the press in general laughed, and Mme. Blavatsky and her
> Theosophical friends went on doing their work and never gave up their
> belief in the Brothers, who after a few years came to be called
> Mah'tmas. Indiscriminately with Mah'tma the word Adept has been used to
> describe the same beings, so that we have these two titles made use of
> without accuracy and in a misleading fashion.
> 
> The word Adept signifies proficiency, and is not uncommon, so that, when
> using it, some description is necessary if it is to be applied to the
> Brothers. For that reason I used Theosophical Adepts in a previous
> paper. A Mah'tma is not only an Adept, but much more. The etymology of
> it will make the matter clearer, the word being strictly Sanskrit, from
> _mah'_, great, and _'tm'_, soul--hence Great Soul. This does not mean a
> noble-hearted man merely, but a perfected being, one who has attained to
> the state often described by mystics and held by scientific men to be an
> impossibility, when time and space are no obstacles to sight, to action,
> to knowledge or to consciousness. Hence they are said to be able to
> perform the extraordinary feats related by various persons, and also to
> possess information of a decidedly practical character concerning the
> laws of nature, including that mystery for science--the meaning,
> operation and constitution of life itself--and concerning the genesis of
> this planet as well as the races upon it. These large claims have given
> rise to the chief complaint brought forward against the Theosophical
> Adepts by those writers outside of the Society who have taken the
> subject up--that they remain, if they exist at all, in a state of cold
> and selfish quietude, seeing the misery and hearing the groans of the
> world, yet refusing to hold out a helping hand except to a favored few;
> possessing knowledge of scientific principles, or of medicinal
> preparations, and yet keeping it back from learned men or wealthy
> capitalists who desire to advance commerce while they turn an honest
> penny. Although, for one, I firmly believe, upon evidence given me, in
> all that is claimed for these Adepts, I declare groundless the complaint
> advanced, knowing it to be due to a want of knowledge of those who are
> impugned.
> 
> Adepts and Mah'tmas are not a miraculous growth, nor the selfish
> successors of some who, accidentally stumbling upon great truths,
> transmitted them to adherents under patent rights. They are human beings
> trained, developed, cultivated through not only a life but long series
> of lives, always under evolutionary laws and quite in accord with what
> we see among men of the world or of science. Just as a Tyndall is
> greater than a savage, though still a man, so is the Mah'tma, not
> ceasing to be human, still greater than a Tyndall. The Mah'tma-Adept is
> a natural growth, and not produced by any miracle; the process by which
> he so becomes may be to us an unfamiliar one, but it is in the strict
> order of nature.
> 
> Some years ago a well-known Anglo-Indian, writing to the Theosophical
> Adepts, queried if they had ever made any mark upon the web of history,
> doubting that they had. The reply was that he had no bar at which to
> arraign them, and that they had written many an important line upon the
> page of human life, not only as reigning in visible shape, but down to
> the very latest dates when, as for many a long century before, they did
> their work behind the scenes. To be more explicit, these wonderful _men_
> have swayed the destiny of nations and are shaping events to-day.
> Pillars of peace and makers of war such as Bismarck, or saviors of
> nations such as Washington, Lincoln and Grant, owe their elevation,
> their singular power, and their astonishing grasp upon the right men
> for their purposes, not to trained intellect or long preparation in the
> schools of their day, but to these very unseen Adepts, who crave no
> honors, seek no publicity and claim no acknowledgment. Each one of these
> great human leaders whom I have mentioned had in his obscure years what
> he called premonitions of future greatness, or connection with stirring
> events in his native land.
> 
> Lincoln always felt that in some way he was to be an instrument for some
> great work, and the stray utterances of Bismarck point to silent hours,
> never openly referred to, when he felt an impulse pushing him to
> whatever of good he may have done. A long array of instances could be
> brought forward to show that the Adepts have made "an ineffaceable mark
> upon diverse eras." Even during the great uprising in India that
> threatened the English rule there, they saw long in advance the
> influence England and India would have in the affairs of the world
> through the very psychic and metaphysical changes of to-day, and often
> hastened to communicate, by their own occult and wonderful methods, the
> news of successes for English arms to districts and peoples in the
> interior who might have risen under the stimulus of imaginary reports of
> English disasters. At other times, vague fears were spread instantly
> over large masses of the Hindūs, so that England at last remained
> master, even though many a patriotic native desired another result. But
> the Adepts do not work for the praise of men, for the ephemeral
> influence of a day, but for the future races and man's best and highest
> good.
> 
> XI.
> 
> For an exhaustive disquisition upon Adepts, Mah'tmas and Nirm'nak'yas,
> more than a volume would be needed. The development illustrated by them
> is so strange to modern minds and so extraordinary in these days of
> general mediocrity, that the average reader fails to grasp with ease the
> views advanced in a condensed article; and nearly everything one would
> say about Adepts--to say nothing of the Nirm'nak'yas--requiring full
> explanation of recondite laws and abstruse questions, is liable to be
> misunderstood, even if volumes should be written upon them. The
> development, conditions, powers, and function of these beings carry with
> them the whole scheme of evolution; for, as said by the mystics, the
> Mah'tma is the efflorescence of an age. The Adepts may be dimly
> understood to-day, the Nirm'nak'yas have as yet been only passingly
> mentioned, and the Mah'tmas are misconceived by believers and deniers
> alike.
> 
> But one law governing them is easy to state and ought not to be
> difficult for the understanding. They do not, will not, and must not
> interfere with Karma; that is, however apparently deserving of help an
> individual may be, they will not extend it in the manner desired if his
> Karma does not permit it; and they would not step into the field of
> human thought for the purpose of bewildering humanity by an exercise of
> power which on all sides would be looked upon as miraculous. Some have
> said that if the Theosophical Adepts were to perform a few of their
> feats before the eyes of Europe, an immense following for them would at
> once arise; but such would not be the result. Instead of it there would
> be dogmatism and idolatry worse than have ever been, with a reaction of
> an injurious nature impossible to counteract.
> 
> Hypnotism--though by another name--has long been known to them. The
> hypnotic condition has often aided the schemes of priests and churches.
> To compel recognition of true doctrine is not the way of these sages,
> for compulsion is hypnotism. To feed a multitude with only five loaves
> would be easy for them; but as they never act upon sentiment but
> continually under the great cosmic laws, they do not advance with
> present material aid for the poor in their hands. But, by using their
> natural powers, they every day influence the world, not only among the
> rich and poor of Europe and America, but in every other land, so that
> what does come about in our lives is better than it would have been had
> they not had part therein.
> 
> The other class referred to--Nirm'nak'yas--constantly engage in this
> work deemed by them greater than earthly enterprises: the betterment of
> the soul of man, and any other good that they can accomplish through
> human agents. Around them the long-disputed question of Nirv'na
> revolves, for all that they have not been distinctly considered in it.
> For, if Max Müller's view of Nirv'na, that it is annihilation, be
> correct, than a Nirm'nak'ya is an impossibility. Paradoxically speaking,
> they are in and out of that state at one and the same time. They are
> owners of Nirv'na who refuse to accept it in order that they may help
> the suffering orphan, Humanity. They have followed the injunction of the
> _Book of the Golden Precepts_: "Step out from sunlight into shade, to
> make more room for others."
> 
> A greater part is taken in the history of nations by the Nirm'nak'yas
> than anyone supposes. Some of them have under their care certain men in
> every nation who from their birth are destined to be great factors in
> the future. These they guide and guard until the appointed time. And
> such protégés but seldom know that such influence is about them,
> especially in the nineteenth century. Acknowledgment and appreciation of
> such great assistance are not required by the Nirm'nak'yas, who work
> behind the veil and prepare the material for a definite end. At the same
> time, too, one Nirm'nak'ya may have many different men--or women--whom
> he directs. As Patanjali puts it, "In all these bodies one mind is the
> moving cause."
> 
> Strange, too, as it may seem, often such men as Napoleon Buonaparte are
> from time to time helped by them. Such a being as Napoleon could not
> come upon the scene fortuitously. His birth and strange powers must be
> in the order of nature. The far-reaching consequences going with a
> nature like his, unmeasurable by us, must in the eastern Theosophical
> philosophy be watched and provided for. If he was a wicked man, so much
> the worse for him; but that could never deter a Nirm'nak'ya from turning
> him to his uses. That might be by swerving him, perchance, from a path
> that would have plunged the world into depths of woe and been made to
> bring about results in after years which Napoleon never dreamed of. The
> fear of what the world might think of encouraging a monster at a certain
> point never can deter a sage who sees the end that is best. And in the
> life of Napoleon there are many things going to show at times an
> influence more powerful than he could grapple. His foolhardy march to
> Moscow was perhaps engineered by these silent campaigners, and also his
> sudden and disastrous retreat. What he could have done had he remained
> in France, no present historian is competent to say. The oft-doubted
> story of the red letter from the Red Man just when Napoleon was in a
> hesitating mood, may have been an encouragement at a particular
> juncture. "Whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad." Nor will
> the defeat at Waterloo be ever understood until the Nirm'nak'yas give
> their records up.
> 
> As a change in the thought of a people who have been tending to gross
> atheism is one always desired by the Sages of the Wisdom Religion, it
> may be supposed that the wave of spiritualistic phenomena resulting now
> quite clearly in a tendency back to a universal acknowledgment of the
> soul, has been aided by the Nirm'nak'yas. They are in it and of it; they
> push on the progress of a psychic deluge over great masses of people.
> The result is seen in the literature, the religion and the drama of
> to-day. Slowly but surely the tide creeps up and covers the once dry
> shore of Materialism, and, though priests may howl, demanding "the
> suppression of Theosophy with a firm hand," and a venal press may try to
> help them, they have neither the power nor the knowledge to produce one
> backward ripple, for the Master hand is guided by omniscient
> intelligence propelled by a gigantic force, and--_works behind the
> scene_.
> 
> XII.
> 
> There have been so many secret societies during the Christian era, by
> whom claims were made to knowledge of nature's secret laws, that a
> natural question arises: "In what do the Theosophic Eastern Sages differ
> from the many Rosicrucians and others so often heard of?" The old
> bookshelves of Germany are full of publications upon Rosicrucianism, or
> by pretended and genuine members of that order, and to-day it is not
> uncommon to find those who have temerity enough to dub themselves
> "Rosicrucians."
> 
> The difference is that which exists between reality and illusion,
> between mere ritualism and the signs printed by nature upon all things
> and beings passing forever up the road to higher states of existence.
> The Rosicrucian and Masonic fraternities known to history rely upon
> outward signs and tokens to indicate the status in the order of their
> members, who, without such guarantees, are only uninitiated outsiders.
> 
> But the Sages we speak of, and their disciples, carry with them the
> indelible mark and speak the well-known words that show they are beings
> developed under laws, and not merely persons who, having undergone a
> childish ordeal, are possessed of a diploma. The Adepts may be called
> rugged oaks that have no disguise, while the undeveloped man dabbling in
> Masonic words and formulas is only a donkey wearing a lion's skin.
> 
> There are many Adepts living in the world, all of whom know each other.
> They have means of communication unknown to modern civilization, by
> using which they can transmit to and receive from each other messages at
> any moment and from immense distances, without using any mechanical
> means. We might say that there is a Society of Adepts, provided that we
> never attach to the word "society" the meaning ordinarily conveyed by
> it. It is a society which has no place of meeting, which exacts no dues,
> which has no constitution or by-laws other than the eternal laws of
> nature; there are no police or spies attached to it and no complaints
> are made or received in it, for the reason that any offender is punished
> by the operation of law entirely beyond his control--his mastery over
> the law being lost upon his infringing it.
> 
> Under the protection and assistance and guidance of this Society of
> Adepts are the disciples of each one of its members. These disciples are
> divided into different degrees, corresponding to the various stages of
> development; the least developed disciples are assisted by those who are
> in advance of them, and the latter in a similar manner by others, until
> the grade of disciple is reached where direct intercourse with the
> Adepts is possible. At the same time, each Adept keeps a supervisory eye
> upon all his disciples. Through the agency of the disciples of Adepts
> many effects are brought about in human thought and affairs, for from
> the higher grades are often sent those who, without disclosing their
> connection with mysticism, influence individuals who are known to be
> main factors in events about to occur.
> 
> It is claimed that the Theosophical Society receives assistance in its
> growth and the spreading of its influence from the Adepts and their
> accepted disciples. The history of the Society would seem to prove this,
> for unless there were some hidden but powerful force operating for its
> advantage it would have long ago sunk into obscurity, destroyed by the
> storm of ridicule and abuse to which it has been subjected. Promises
> were made, in the early history of the Society, that assistance would at
> all times be rendered, and prophecies were hinted that it would be made
> the target for vilification and the object of opposition. Both
> prophecies have been fulfilled to the letter.
> 
> In just the same way as a polished diamond shows the work which gives it
> value and brilliancy, so the man who has gone through probation and
> teaching under the Adepts carries upon his person the ineffaceable
> marks. To the ordinary eye untrained in this department, no such
> indications are visible; but those who can see describe them as being
> quite prominent and wholly beyond the control of the bearer. For this
> reason that one who has progressed, say, three steps along the way, will
> have three marks, and it is useless to pretend that his rank is a step
> higher, for, if it were, then the fourth mark would be there, since it
> grows with the being's development. Now, as these signatures cannot be
> imitated or forged, the whole inner fraternity has no need for
> concealment or signs. No one can commit a fraud upon or extract from
> them the secrets of higher degrees by having obtained signs and
> pass-words out of a book or in return for the payment of fees, and none
> can procure the conferring of any advancement until the whole nature of
> the man exactly corresponds to the desired point of development.
> 
> In two ways the difference between the Adept fraternity and the worldly
> secret societies can be seen--in their treatment of nations and of
> their own direct special disciples. Nothing is forced or depends upon
> favor. Everything is arranged in accordance with the best interests of a
> nation, having in view the cyclic influences at any time prevailing, and
> never before the proper time. When they desire to destroy the chains
> forged by dogmatism, they do not make the error of suddenly appearing
> before the astonished eyes of the people; for they know well that such a
> course would only alter the dogmatic belief in one set of ideas to a
> senseless and equally dogmatic adherence to the Adepts as gods, or else
> create in the minds of many the surety that the devil was present.
> 
> XIII.
> 
> The training of the disciple by the teachers of the school to which the
> Theosophical Adepts belong is peculiar to itself, and not in accord with
> prevailing modern educational ideas. In one respect it is a
> specialization of the pilgrimage to a sacred place so common in India,
> and the enshrined object of the journey is the soul itself, for with
> them the existence of soul is one of the first principles.
> 
> In the East the life of man is held to be a pilgrimage, not only from
> the cradle to the grave, but also through that vast period of time,
> embracing millions upon millions of years, stretching from the beginning
> to the end of a Manvantara, or period of evolution, and as he is held to
> be a spiritual being, the continuity of his existence is unbroken.
> Nations and civilizations rise, grow old, decline and disappear; but the
> being lives on, spectator of all the innumerable changes of environment.
> Starting from the great All, radiating like a spark from the central
> fire, he gathers experience in all ages, under all rulers, civilizations
> and customs, ever engaged in a pilgrimage to the shrine from which he
> came. He is now the ruler and now the slave; to-day at the pinnacle of
> wealth and power, to-morrow at the bottom of the ladder, perhaps in
> abject misery, but ever the same being. To symbolize this, the whole of
> India is dotted with sacred shrines, to which pilgrimages are made, and
> it is the wish of all men in that so-called benighted land to make such
> a journey at least once before death, for the religious duties of life
> are not fully performed without visiting such sacred places.
> 
> One great reason for this, given by those who understand the inner
> significance of it, is that the places of pilgrimage are centers of
> spiritual force from which radiate elevating influences not perceptible
> to the pig-sticking, wine-drinking traveller. It is asserted by many,
> indeed, that at most of the famous places of pilgrimage there is an
> Adept of the same order to which the Theosophical Adepts are said to
> belong, who is ready always to give some meed of spiritual insight and
> assistance to those of pure heart who may go there. He, of course, does
> not reveal himself to the knowledge of the people, because it is quite
> unnecessary, and might create the necessity for his going elsewhere.
> Superstitions have arisen from the doctrine of pilgrimages, but, as that
> is quite likely to come about in this age, it is no reason why places of
> pilgrimage should be abolished, since, if the spiritual centers were
> withdrawn, good men who are free from superstition would not receive the
> benefits they now may have. The Adepts founded these places in order to
> keep alive in the minds of the people the soul idea which modern Science
> and education would soon turn into agnosticism, were they to prevail
> unchecked.
> 
> But the disciple of the Adept knows that the place of pilgrimage
> symbolizes his own nature, shows him how he is to start on the
> scientific investigation of it and how to proceed, by what roads and in
> which direction. He is supposed to concentrate into a few lives the
> experience and practice which it takes ordinary men countless
> incarnations to acquire. His first steps, as well as his last, are on
> difficult, often dangerous places; the road, indeed, "winds up hill all
> the way," and upon entering it he leaves behind the hope for reward so
> common in all undertakings. Nothing is gained by favor, but all depends
> upon his actual merit. As the end to be reached is self-dependence with
> perfect calmness and clearness, he is from the beginning made to stand
> alone, and this is for most of us a difficult thing which frequently
> brings on a kind of despair. Men like companionship, and cannot with
> ease contemplate the possibility of being left altogether to themselves.
> So, instead of being constantly in the company of a lodge of
> fellow-apprentices, as is the case in the usual worldly secret society,
> he is forced to see that, as he entered the world alone, he must learn
> to live there in the same way, leaving it as he came, solely in his own
> company. But this produces no selfishness, because, being accompanied by
> constant meditation upon the unseen, the knowledge is acquired that the
> loneliness felt is only in respect to the lower, personal, worldly self.
> 
> Another rule that this disciple must follow is that no boasting may be
> indulged in on any occasion, and this gives us the formula that, given a
> man who speaks of his powers as an Adept or boasts of his progress on
> the spiritual planes, we can be always sure he is neither Adept nor
> disciple. There have been those in the Theosophical Society who gave out
> to the world that they were either Adepts in fact or very near it, and
> possessed of great powers. Under our formula it follows that they were
> mere boasters, with nothing behind their silly pretensions but vanity
> and a fair knowledge of the weakness as well as the gullibility of human
> nature; upon the latter they play for either their profit or pleasure.
> But, hiding themselves under an exterior which does not attract
> attention, there are many of the real disciples in the world. They are
> studying themselves and other human hearts. They have no diplomas, but
> there resides in them a consciousness of constant help and a clear
> knowledge of the true Lodge which meets in real secrecy and is never
> found mentioned in any directory. Their whole life is a persistent
> pursuit of the fast-moving soul which, although appearing to stand
> still, can distance the lightning; and their death is only another step
> forward to greater knowledge through better physical bodies in new
> lives.
> 
> XIV.
> 
> Looking back into the past the nineteenth-century historian finds his
> sight speedily striking a mist and at last plunging into inky darkness.
> Bound down in fact by the influence of a ridiculous dogmatism which
> allows only some six thousand years for man's life on earth, he is
> unwilling to accept the old chronologies of the Egyptians or Hindūs,
> and, while permitting the assumption of vast periods for geological
> changes, he is staggered by a few millions of years more or less when
> they are added to the length of time during which humanity has peopled
> the globe. The student of Theosophy, however, sees no reason why he
> should doubt the statement made by his teachers on this subject. He
> knows that the periods of evolution are endless. These are called
> Manvantaras, because they are between two Manus, or, two men.
> 
> These periods may be called waves whose succession has no cessation.
> Each grand period, including within it all the minor evolutions, covers
> 311,040,000,000,000 human years; under a single Manu the human years
> come and go, 306,720,000 in number, and the lesser yugas--or ages--more
> immediately concerning us, comprise of solar years 4,320,000. During
> these solar revolutions the human races sweep round and round this
> planet. Cave-dwellers, lake-dwellers and those of a neolithic or any
> other age appear and disappear over and over again, and in each of those
> we who now read, write and think of them were ourselves the very Egos
> whose past we are trying to trace.
> 
> But, going deep into geological strata, the doubt of man's existence
> contemporaneously with the plesiosaurus arises because no fossil _genus
> homo_ is discovered in the same stratum. It is here that the theories of
> the Theosophist come in and furnish the key. Those hold that before man
> developed any physical body he clothed himself with an astral form; and
> this is why H. P. Blavatsky writes in her _Secret Doctrine_: "it teaches
> the birth of the _astral_ before the _physical_ body, the former being
> the model for the latter." At the time of the huge antediluvian animals
> they absorbed in their enormous bodies so much of the total quantity of
> gross matter available for frames of sentient beings that the astral man
> remained without a corporeal frame, as yet unclothed "with coats of
> skin." For this reason he could exist in the same place with those huge
> birds and reptiles without fear. Their massive proportions inspired him
> with no terror, and by their consumption of food there was no lessening
> of his sustenance. And, therefore, being of such a composition that he
> left no impression upon mud or plastic rock, the death of one astral
> body after another left no fossil and no mark to be unearthed by us in
> company with the very beasts and birds which were his contemporaries.
> 
> Man was all this time acquiring the power to clothe himself with a dense
> frame. He threw off astral bodies one after another, in the ceaseless
> pursuit, each effort giving him a little more density. Then he began to
> cast a shadow, as it were, and the vast, unwieldy animal world--and
> others as well--felt more and more the draughts made upon it by the
> coming man. As he thickened they grew smaller, and his remains could not
> be deposited in any stratum until such time as he had grown to
> sufficient hardness. But our modern anthropologists have not yet
> discovered when that was. They are ready enough to make definite
> statements, but, learned as they are, there are surprises awaiting them
> not so far off.
> 
> While, therefore, our explorers are finding, now and then, the remains
> of animals and birds and reptiles in strata which show an age far
> greater than any assigned to the human race, they never come upon human
> skeletons. How could man leave any trace at a stage when he could not
> press himself into the clay or be caught by soft lava or masses of
> volcanic dust? I do not mean, however, to say that the period of the
> plesiosaurus is the period of the man of astral body devoid of a
> material one. The question of exact period may well be left for a more
> detailed account; this is only to point to the law and to the
> explanation for the non-appearance of man's remains in very early
> geologic strata. But the Theosophic Adepts insist that there are still
> in the earth bony remains of man, which carry his first appearance in a
> dense body many millions of years farther back than have yet been
> admitted, and these remains will be discovered by us before much time
> shall have rolled away.
> 
> One of the first results of these discoveries will be to completely
> upset the theory as to the succession of ages, as I may call it, which
> is given and accepted at the present time, and also the estimation of
> the various civilizations that have passed from the earth and left no
> trace except in the inner constitution of ourselves--for it is held that
> _we are those very persons_, now in different bodies, who so long ago
> lived and loved and died upon the planet. We began to make Karma then
> and have been under its influence ever since, and it seems fitting that
> that great doctrine should be taken up at another time for a more
> careful examination.
> 
> XV.
> 
> The Oriental doctrine of reward and punishment of the human Ego is very
> different from the theological scheme accepted throughout Christendom,
> since the Brahmins and Buddhists fix the place of punishment and
> compensation upon this earth of ours, while the Christian removes the
> "bar of God" to the hereafter. We may not profitably stop to argue upon
> logic with the latter; it will be sufficient to quote to them the words
> of Jesus, St. Matthew, and the Psalmist. "With what measure ye mete, it
> shall be measured unto you again," said Jesus; and Matthew declares that
> for every word, act, and thought we shall have to answer, while David,
> the royal poet, sang that those who serve the Lord should never eat
> beggar's bread. We all know well that the first two declarations do away
> with the vicarious atonement; and as for the Jewish singer's notion, it
> is negatived every day in any city of either hemisphere.
> 
> Among the Ceylonese Buddhists the name of the doctrine is Kamma; with
> the Hindūs it is Karma. Viewed in its religious light, it "is the good
> and bad deeds of sentient beings, by the infallible influence or
> efficacy of which those beings are met with due rewards or punishment,
> according as they deserve, in any state of being."[A] When a being dies,
> he emits, as it were, a mass of force or energy, which goes to make up
> the new personality when he shall be reïncarnated. In this energy is
> found the summation of the life just given up, and by means of it the
> Ego is forced to assume that sort of body among those appropriate
> circumstances which together are the means for carrying out the decrees
> of Karma.
> 
> Hence hell is not a mythical place or condition after death in some
> unknown region specially set apart by the Almighty for the punishment of
> his children, but is in very truth our own globe, for it is on the
> earth, in earth-lives experienced in human bodies, that we are punished
> for bad deeds previously done, and meet with happiness and pleasure as
> rewards for old merit.
> 
> When one sees, as is so common, a good man suffering much in his life,
> the question naturally arises, "Has Karma anything to do with it, and is
> it just that such a person should be so afflicted?" For those who
> believe in Karma it is quite just, because this man in a previous life
> must have done such acts as deserve punishment now. And, similarly, the
> wicked man who is free from suffering, happy and prosperous, is so
> because in a previous existence he had been badly treated by his fellows
> or had experienced much suffering. And the perfect justice of Karma is
> well illustrated in his case because, although now favored by fortune,
> he, being wicked, is generating causes which, when he shall be reborn,
> will operate then to punish him for his evil-doing now.
> 
> Some may suppose that the Ego should be punished after death, but such a
> conclusion is not logical. For _evil deeds committed here on the
> objective plane could not with any scientific or moral propriety be
> punished on a plane which is purely subjective_. And such is the reason
> why so many minds, both of the young and old, have rejected and rebelled
> against the doctrine of a hellfire in which they would be eternally
> punished for commission of sin on earth. Even when unable to formulate
> the reason in metaphysical terms, they instinctively knew that it would
> be impossible to remove the scene of compensation from the very place
> where the sin and confusion had been done and created. When the
> disciples of Jesus asked him if the man who was born blind was thus
> brought into the world for some sin he had committed they had in mind
> this doctrine of Karma, just as all the Hindūs and Buddhists have when
> they see some of their fellows crippled or deformed or deprived of
> sight.
> 
> The theory above hinted at of the person at death throwing out from
> himself the new personality, so to speak, ready to await the time when
> the Ego should return to earth seeking a new body, is a general law that
> operates in a great many other instances besides the birth or death of a
> being. It is that which is used by the Theosophists to explain the
> relations between the moon and the earth. For, as the moon is held by
> them to be the planet on which we lived before reaching the earth and
> before there was any such earth whatever; and that, when our so-called
> satellite came to die, all the energy contained in it was thrown out
> into space, where in a single vortex it remained until the time came for
> that energy to be again supplied with a body--this earth--so the same
> law prevails with men, the single units in the vast aggregate which is
> known among advanced Theosophists as the great Manu. Men being, as to
> their material envelope, derived from the moon, must follow the law of
> their origin, and therefore the Buddhist priest says, as quoted: "At the
> death of a being nothing goes out from him to the other world for his
> rebirth; but by the efficacy--or, to use a more figurative expression,
> by the ray--of influence which Kamma emits, a new being is produced in
> the other world very identical with the one who died away," for in this
> "new being" is held all the life of the deceased. The term "being," as
> applied to it may be taken by us with some qualification. It is more
> properly a mass of energy devoid of conscience and crowded with desires
> of the person from whom it emanated; and its special province is to
> await the return of the individuality and form for that the new body in
> which it shall suffer or enjoy. Each man is therefore his own creator
> under the great Cosmic laws that control all creations. A better term in
> place of "creation" is "evolution," for we, from life to life, are
> engaged in evolving out of the material provided in this _Manvantara_
> new bodies at every turn of the wheel of rebirth. The instruments we use
> in this work are desire and will. Desire causes the will to fix itself
> on objective life; in that plane it produces force and out of that comes
> matter in its objective form.
> 
> FOOTNOTE:
> 
> [A] The Rev. T. P. Terunnanse, High-Priest at Dodanduwa, Ceylon.
> 
> XVI.
> 
> Very many Western people say that this Oriental doctrine of Karma is
> difficult to understand, being fit only for educated and thoughtful
> persons. But in India, Ceylon and Burmah, not to mention other Asiatic
> countries, the whole mass of the people accept and seem to understand
> it. The reason for this lies probably in the fact that they also firmly
> believe in Reïncarnation, which may be said to be the twin doctrine to
> Karma. Indeed, the one cannot be properly considered without keeping the
> other in view, for Karma--whether as punishment or reward--could have no
> actual or just operation upon the Ego unless the means for its operation
> were furnished by Reïncarnation.
> 
> Our deserts are meted out to us while we are associating in life with
> each other, and not while we are alone, nor in separateness. If being
> raised to power in a nation or becoming possessed of wealth is called a
> reward, it would lose all value were there no people to govern and no
> associated human beings with and upon whom we could spend our wealth and
> who might aid us in satisfying our manifold desires. And so the law of
> Reïncarnation drags us into life again and again, bringing with us
> uncounted times the various Egos whom we have known in prior births.
> This is in order that the Karma--or causes--generated in company with
> those Egos may be worked out, for to take us off separately into an
> unknown hell, there to receive some sort of punishment, or into an
> impossible serio-comic heaven to meet our reward, would be as impossible
> as unjust. Hence, no just-hanged murderer absolved by priest or praising
> Jesus can escape. He, together with his victim, must return to this
> earth, each to aid the other in adjusting the disturbed harmony, during
> which process each makes due compensation. With this doctrine we restore
> justice to her seat in the governance of men, for without it the legal
> killing of the murderer after condemnation is only a half remedy, since
> no provision is made by the State for the being hurled out of the body
> nor for the dependants he may have left behind, and, still further,
> nothing is done for those who in the family of the murderer survive him.
> 
> But the Theosophical sages of all ages push the doctrine of Karma beyond
> a mere operation upon incarnated men. They view all worlds as being
> bound together and swayed by Karma. As the old Hindū book, the
> _Bhagavad-Gīt'_, says, "all worlds up to that of Brahm' are subject to
> Karma." Hence it acts on all planes. So viewing it, they say that this
> world as it is now conditioned is the actual result of what it came to
> be at the beginning of the _pralaya_ or grand death which took place
> billions upon billions of years ago. That is, the world evolves just as
> man does. It is born, it grows old, it dies, and it is reïncarnated.
> This goes on many times, and during those incarnations it suffers and
> enjoys in its own way for its previous evolutions. For it the reward is
> a greater advance along the line of evolution, and the punishment is a
> degraded state. Of course, as I said in a former article, these states
> have man for their object and cause, for he is the crown of all
> evolution. And, coming down from the high consideration of great cosmic
> spaces and phenomena, the Theosophist is taught to apply these laws of
> Karma and Reïncarnation to every atom in the body in _especial_ and
> apart from the total Karma. Since we are made up of a mass of lives, our
> thoughts and acts affect those atoms or lives and impress them with a
> Karma of their own. As the Oriental thinkers say, "not a moment passes
> without some beings coming to life in us, acquiring Karma, dying, and
> being reïncarnated."
> 
> The principal divisions of Karma are three in number. One sort is that
> now operating in the present life and body, bringing about all the
> circumstances and changes of life. Of this we see illustrations every
> day, with now and then strange climaxes which throw upon the doctrine
> the brightest light. One such is immortalized in India by a building
> erected by the favored son of fortune, as we would say, and thus it came
> about. A Rajah had a very strange dream, so affecting that he called
> upon his soothsayers for interpretation. They said that their horoscopes
> showed he was required next day to give an immense sum of money to the
> first person he should see after awaking, their intention being to
> present themselves at an early hour. Next day the King arose unusually
> early, stepped to his window, threw it open, and there before him was a
> chandalah sweeping up the dirt. To him he gave a fortune, and thus in a
> moment raised him to affluence from abject poverty. The chandalah then
> built a huge building to commemorate his sudden release from the
> grinding chains of poverty.
> 
> Another class of Karma is that which is held over and not now in
> operation because the man does not furnish the appropriate means for
> bringing it into action. This may be likened to vapor held in
> suspension in the atmosphere and not visible to the eye, but which will
> fall as rain upon the earth the moment conditions are ripe.
> 
> The last chief class is that Karma which we are making now, and which
> will be felt by us in future births. Its appropriate symbol is the arrow
> shot forward in the air by the archer.
> 
> XVII.
> 
> The spirit is not affected by Karma at any time or under any
> circumstances, and so the Theosophical Adepts would not use the terms
> "cultivation of the Spirit." The Spirit in man, called by them
> _Ishwara_, is immutable, eternal and indivisible--the fundamental basis
> of all. Hence they say that the body and all objects are impermanent and
> thus deluding to the soul whenever they are mistaken for reality. They
> are only real on and for this plane and during the time when the
> consciousness takes them up here for cognition. They are therefore
> relatively real and not so in an absolute sense. This can easily be
> proved from dreams. In the dream state we lose all knowledge of the
> objects which while awake we thought real and proceed to suffer and
> enjoy in that new state. In this we find the consciousness applying
> itself to objects partaking of course of the nature of the experiences
> of the waking condition, but at the same time producing the sensations
> of pleasure and pain while they last. Let us imagine a person's body
> plunged in a lethargy extending over twenty years and the mind
> undergoing a pleasant or unpleasant dream, and we have a life just of
> that sort, altogether different from the life of one awake. For the
> consciousness of this dreamer the reality of objects known during the
> waking state is destroyed. But as material existence is a necessary evil
> and the one in which alone emancipation or salvation can be obtained, it
> is of the greatest importance and hence Karma which governs it and
> through whose decrees emancipation may be reached must be well
> understood and then be accepted and obeyed.
> 
> Karma will operate to produce a deformed or deficient body, to give in a
> good body a bad disposition or _vice vers'_; it will cause diseases,
> hurts or annoyances, or bring about pleasures and favorable situations
> for the material frame. So we sometimes find with a deformed or
> disagreeable body a most enlightened and noble mind. In this case the
> physical Karma is bad and the mental good.
> 
> This leads us to the sort of Karma that works upon the mental plane. At
> the same time that an unfavorable Karmic cause is showing forth in the
> physical structure another and better sort is working out in the mind
> and disposition or has eventuated in conferring a mind well balanced,
> calm, cheerful, deep, and brilliant. Hence we discover a purely physical
> as compared with an entirely mental Karma. Purely physical would be that
> resulting, say from a removal from the ground of fruit peel which might
> otherwise cause some unknown person to fall and be hurt. Purely mental
> might be due to a life spent in calm, philosophical thought and the
> like.
> 
> There is in one of the Hindū books a strange sentence respecting this
> part of the subject, reading: "Perfection of body or superhuman powers
> are produced by birth or by herbs or by incantations, penances, or
> meditations."
> 
> Among mental afflictions esteemed as worse than any bodily hurt or loss
> is that Karma from a preceding life which results in obscurity of such a
> character that there is a loss of all power to conceive of the reality
> of Spirit or the existence of soul--that is, materialism.
> 
> The last field of operation for this law may be said to be the psychical
> nature. Of this in America we have numerous examples in mediums,
> clairvoyants, clairaudients, mind-readers, hysteriacs, and all sorts of
> abnormal sensitives. There could be no clairvoyant according to the
> Oriental scheme if the person so afflicted, using as I think the proper
> term, had not devoted much of previous lives to a one-sided development
> of the psychical nature resulting now in powers which make the possessor
> an abnormality in society.
> 
> A very strange belief of the Hindūs is that one which allows the
> possibility of a change of state by a mortal of such a character that
> the once man becomes a _Deva_ or lesser god. They divide nature into
> several departments, in each of which are conscious powers or entities
> called _Devas_, to put it roughly. Yet this is not so far apart from the
> ideas of some of our best scientific men who have said there is no
> reason why in each ray of the spectrum there may not be beings to us
> unseen. Many centuries ago the Hindū thinker admitted this, and pushing
> further on declared that a man might through a certain sort of Karma
> become one of these beings, with corresponding enjoyment and freedom
> from care, but with the certainty, however, of eventually changing back
> again to begin the weary round of birth over again.
> 
> What might be called the doctrine of the nullification of Karma is an
> application in this department of the well-known law in physics which
> causes an equilibrium when two equal forces oppose each other. A man may
> have in his Karmic account a very unpleasant cause and at the same time
> a cause of opposite character. If these come together for expression at
> the same time they may so counteract each other as that neither will be
> apparent and the equilibrium is the equivalent of both. In this way it
> is easy to understand the Biblical verse: "Charity covereth a multitude
> of sins," as referring to the palliative effect of charitable deeds as
> opposed to deeds of wickedness, and giving a reason for the mediæval
> knight devoting some of the years of his life to almsgiving.
> 
> In the _Bhagavad-Gīt'_, a book revered by all in India, the highest
> place is given to what is called _Karma-Yoga_ or the Religion of the
> Performance of Works and Duty, and there it is said: "He who, unattached
> to the fruits of his actions, performs such actions as must be done, is
> both renouncer and devotee; not he who kindles no sacrificial fires and
> performs no ceremonies. He who remains inert, restraining the organs of
> action, and pondering with his heart on objects of sense, is called a
> false pietist of bewildered soul. But he who, restraining his senses by
> his heart and being free from interest in acting, undertakes active
> devotion through the organs of action, is praiseworthy."
> 
> XVIII.
> 
> That the doctrine of Karma is unjust, unsympathetic, and fatalistic has
> been claimed by those who oppose it, but such conclusions are not borne
> out by experience among those races who believe in it, nor will the
> objections stand a close examination. The Hindūs and Buddhists
> thoroughly believe in Karma, convinced that no one but themselves
> punishes or rewards in this or any life, yet we do not find them cold or
> unsympathetic. Indeed, in the relations of life it is well known that
> the Hindū is as loving and tender as his American brother, and there are
> as many instances of heroic self-sacrifice in their history as in ours.
> Some go further than this and say that the belief in Karma and
> Reïncarnation has made the Hindū more gentle in his treatment of men and
> animals than are the Europeans, and more spiritual in his daily life.
> Going deeper into their history, the belief in Karma is found side by
> side with material works of great magnitude, and whose remains to this
> day challenge our wonder, admiration, and respect; it is doubtful
> whether we could ever show such triumphs over nature as can be seen at
> any time in the rock-cut temples of Hindustan. So it would appear that
> this doctrine of ours is not likely to produce bad or enervating effects
> upon the people who accept it.
> 
> "But," says an objector, "it is fatalism. If Karma is Karma, if I am to
> be punished in such and such a manner, then it will come about so
> whether I will or not, and hence I must, like the Turk, say 'Kismet,'
> and do nothing." Now, although the Mohammedan doctrine of Kismet has
> been abused as fatalism, pure and simple, it was not so held by the
> Prophet nor by his greatest disciples, for they taught that it was law
> and not fate. And neither is Karma amenable to this objection. In the
> minds of those who, having vaguely apprehended Karma as applying to one
> life only, do not give the doctrine its true majestic, endless sweep,
> fatalism is the verdict. When, on the other hand, each man is seen as
> the fashioner of the fate for his next fleeting earth personality, there
> can be no fatality in it, because in his own hand is the decree. He set
> in motion the causes which will inevitably have certain results. Just as
> easily he could have made different causes and thus brought about
> different results.
> 
> That there are a repellant coldness and want of tenderness in a doctrine
> which thus deals out inflexible justice and compels us to forever lose
> our friends and beloved relatives, once death has closed the door, is
> the feeling of a few who make sentiment their rule in life. But while
> sentiment and our own wishes are not the guiding laws of nature, there
> is no reason even on the sentimental ground for this objection; it is
> due to a partial knowledge of the doctrine which, when fully known, is
> found to be as full of opportunity for the exercise of what is dear to
> the heart as any other theory of life. The same law that throws us into
> life to suffer or enjoy, as may be deserved, decrees that the friends
> and the relatives who are like unto each other must incarnate together,
> until by reason of differentiation of character they cannot under any
> law of attraction remain in company. Not unless and until they become
> different do they separate from each other. And who would wish to be
> eternally tied to the side of uncongenial relatives or acquaintances
> merely because there was an accident of birth!
> 
> For our aid also this law works well and ceaselessly. "Those whom you
> help will help you in other lives," is the declaration. In ages past
> perhaps we knew those who long since have passed up to greater heights.
> The very moment in the long series of incarnations we come near to where
> they are pursuing their pilgrimage, they at once extend assistance,
> whether that be on the material or moral planes. And it makes no
> difference whether one or the other is aware of who is assisting or who
> is being assisted. Inflexible law guides the current and brings about
> the result. Thus the members of the whole human family reciprocally act
> on one another, forced into it by a law which is as kind as it is great,
> which turns the contempt we bore in the past into present honor and
> opportunity to help our fellows.
> 
> There is no favoritism possible in nature; no man has any privilege or
> gift which he has not deserved, either as a reward or a compensation.
> Looking at the present life spread before our limited vision, we may see
> perhaps no cause why there should be any such reward to an unworthy man,
> but Karma never errs and will surely repay. And it not only rewards, but
> to it solely belong those compensations which we with revenge attempt to
> mete out. It is with this in view that the holy writ of the Christians
> says, "Vengeance is mine; I will repay," for so surely as one hurts
> another so is the certainty of Karma striking the offender;--but let
> the injured one beware that he does not desire the other punished, for
> by Karma will he be punished also. So from all this web of life and
> ceaselessly revolving wheel, Karma furnishes the escape and the means of
> escape, and by reïncarnation we are given the time for escape.
> 
> XIX.
> 
> In the Egyptian _Book of the Dead_, chapter x describes the place where,
> after death, disembodied souls remain in different degrees of
> perfection. Some are shown as taking wheat three cubits high, while
> others are only permitted to glean it--"he gleaned the fields of
> Aanroo." Thus some enjoy the perfection of spiritual bliss, while others
> attain only to minor degrees in that place or state where divine justice
> is meted out to the soul.
> 
> Devachan is the land of reward; the domain of spiritual effects. The
> word spiritual here refers to disembodiment; it must only be used as
> relative to our material existence. The Christian demonstrates this fact
> by the material _entourage_ of his heaven. In the _Secret Doctrine_, H.
> P. Blavatsky says: "Death itself is unable to deliver man from it
> [Karma], since death is simply the door through which he passes to
> another life on earth, after a little rest on its threshold--Devachan."
> Devachan, then, is the threshold of life. In the Hindū system it is
> etymologically the place of the gods, Indra's heaven. Indra is the
> regent of heaven, who gives to those who can reach his realm
> long-enduring gifts of happiness and dominion. The _Bhavagad-Gīt'_ says:
> "After enjoying felicity for innumerable years in the regions of Indra,
> he is born again upon this earth."
> 
> For the purpose of this article, we assume that the entire man, minus
> the body, goes into Devachan. This, however, is not so. The
> _post-mortem_ division of our sevenfold constitution given by Theosophy
> is exact. It exhibits the basis of life, death and reïncarnation. It
> shows the composite being, man, in analogy with that other composite
> being, nature. Both are a unity in diversity. Man, suspended in nature,
> like her, divides and reunites. This sevenfold division will be treated
> in a future article.
> 
> Devachan, being a state of prolonged subjective happiness after the
> death of the body, is plainly the heaven of the Christian, but with a
> difference. It is a heaven made scientifically possible. Heaven itself
> must accord with the divine laws projected into nature. As sleep is a
> release from the body, during which we have dreams, so death is a
> complete separation and release, after which in Devachan we dream until,
> on being again incarnated in a new body on earth, we come once more into
> what we call waking existence. Even the human soul would weary of the
> ceaseless round of rebirths, if some place or state were not provided in
> which rest could be obtained; in which germinating aspirations,
> restricted by earth-life, could have their full development. No energy
> can be annihilated, least of all a psychic energy; these must somewhere
> find an outlet. It is found in Devachan; this realization is the rest of
> the soul. Its deepest desires, its highest needs are there enjoyed.
> There every hope blooms out in full and glorious flower. To prolong this
> blissful state, Hindū books give many incantations and provide
> innumerable ceremonies and sacrifices, all of them having for end and
> aim a long stay in Devachan. The Christian does precisely the same. He
> longs for heaven, prays that he may go there, and offers up to his God
> such propitiatory rites and acts as seem best to him, the only
> difference being that he does not do it half so scientifically as the
> Hindū. The Hindū is also more vivid in his conception of this heaven
> than the Christian is. He postulates many places or conditions adapted
> to the energic and qualitative differences between souls. Kama-loka and
> other states are where concrete desires, restricted by life in the body,
> have full expression, while in Tribūvana the abstract and benevolent
> thinkers absorb the joys of lofty thought. The orthodox heaven has no
> such proviso. It also ignores the fact that a settled monotony of
> celestial existence would exhaust the soul--would be stagnation, not
> growth. Devachanic life is development of aspiration, passing through
> the various stages of gestation, birth, cumulative growth, downward
> momentum and departure to another condition, all rooted in joy. There is
> nothing in the mere fact of death to mould a soul anew. It is a group of
> psychic energies, and heaven must have something in common with these,
> or why should it gravitate there? Souls differ as men do. In Devachan
> each one receives that degree of bliss which it can assimilate; its own
> development determines its reward. The Christian places all the snuffy
> old saints as high as other holy souls, sinking genius to the level of
> the mediocre mass, while the Hindū gives infinite variety of occupation
> and existence suited to grave and gay, the soul of genius or of poetry.
> No one sits in undesired seats, nor sings psalms he never liked, nor
> lives in a city which might pall upon him if he were forever compelled
> to walk its pearly streets. The laws of cause and effect forbid that
> Devachan should be monotonous. Results are proportionate to antecedent
> energies. The soul oscillates between Devachan and earth-life, finding
> in each conditions suited to its continuous development, until, through
> effort, it reaches a perfection in which it ceases to be the subject of
> the laws of action and reaction, becoming instead their conscious
> co-worker.
> 
> Devachan is a dream, but only in the sense in which objective life can
> be called such. Both last until Karma is satisfied in one direction, and
> begins to work in the other. The Devachanee has no idea of space or
> time except such as he makes for himself. He creates his own world. He
> is with all he ever loved, not in bodily companionship, but in one to
> him real, close and blissful. When a man dies, the brain dies last. Life
> is still busy there after death has been announced. The soul marshals up
> all past events, grasps the sum total, the average tendency stands out,
> the ruling hope is seen. Their final aroma forms the keynote of
> Devachanic existence. The lukewarm man goes neither to heaven nor hell.
> Nature spews him out of her mouth. Positive conditions, objective or
> subjective, are only reached through positive impulsion. Devachanic
> distribution is governed by the ruling motive of the soul. The hater
> may, by reaction, become the lover, but the indifferent have no
> propulsion, no growth.
> 
> XX.
> 
> It is quite evident to the unprejudiced inquirer that Christian priests
> for some reason or other studiously ignore the composite nature of man,
> although their great authority, St. Paul, clearly refers to it. He spoke
> of body, soul, and spirit, they only preach of body and soul; he
> declared we had a spiritual body, they remain misty as to the soul's
> body and cling to an absurd resurrection of the material casket. It
> became the duty of Theosophists to draw the attention of the modern mind
> once more to the Oriental division of man's constitution, for through
> that alone can an understanding of his state before and after death be
> attained. The division laid down by St. Paul is threefold, the Hindū one
> is of a sevenfold character. St. Paul's is meant for those who require
> broad outlines, but do not care to inquire into details. Spirit, soul,
> and body, however, include the whole seven divisions, the latter being a
> more complete analysis; and it is suspected by many deep thinkers that
> Paul knew the complete system but kept it back for good reasons of his
> own.
> 
> An analysis of body discloses more than mere molecular structure, for it
> shows a force or life or power that keeps it together and active
> throughout its natural period. Some writers on Theosophical subjects,
> dealing more or less accurately with the Eastern system, have called
> this _Pr'na_ or _Jīva_; others, however, call it _Pr'na_ alone, which
> seems more appropriate, because the human aspect of the life force is
> dependent upon _Pr'na_, or _breath_.
> 
> The _spirit_ of St. Paul may be taken for our purposes to be the
> Sanskrit _Ātm'_. Spirit is universal, indivisible, and common to all. In
> other words, there are not many spirits, one for each man, but solely
> one spirit which shines upon all men alike, finding as many
> souls--roughly speaking--as there are beings in the world. In man the
> spirit has a more complete instrument or assemblage of tools with which
> to work. This spiritual identity is the basis of the philosophy; upon it
> the whole structure rests; to individualize spirit, assigning to each
> human being his own spirit, particular to him and separate from the
> spirit of any other man, is to throw to the ground the whole Theosophic
> philosophy, will nullify its ethics and defeat its object.
> 
> Starting then with _Ātm'_--spirit--as including the whole, being its
> basis and support, we find the Hindū offering the theory of sheaths or
> covers of the soul or inner man. These sheaths are necessary the moment
> evolution begins and visible objects appear, so that the aim of the soul
> may be attained in conjunction with nature. In this way, through a
> process which would be out of place here, a classification is arrived at
> by means of which the phenomena of life and consciousness may be
> explained.
> 
> The six vehicles used by the spirit and by means of which the Ego gains
> experience are:
> 
> _Body_, as a gross vehicle.
> 
> _Vitality_, or _Pr'na_.
> 
> _Astral Body_, or _Linga Sharīra_.
> 
> _Animal Soul_, or _K'ma Rūpa_.
> 
> _Human Soul_, or _Manas_.
> 
> _Spiritual Soul_, or _Buddhi_.
> 
> The _Linga Sharīra_ is needed as a more subtle body than the corporeal
> frame, because the latter is in fact only stupid, inert matter. _K'ma
> Rūpa_ is the body, or collection, of desires and passions; _Manas_ may
> be properly called the mind, and _Buddhi_ is the highest intellection
> beyond brain or mind. It is that which discriminates.
> 
> At the death of the body, _Pr'na_ flies back to the reservoir of force;
> the astral body dissipates after a longer period and often returns with
> _K'ma Rūpa_ when aided by certain other forces to séance-rooms, where it
> masquerades as the deceased, a continual lie and ever-present snare. The
> human and the spiritual soul go into the state spoken of before as
> _Devachan_ or heaven, where the stay is prolonged or short according to
> the energies appropriate to that state generated during earth-life. When
> these begin to exhaust themselves the Ego is gradually drawn back to
> earth-life, where through human generation it takes up a new body, with
> another astral body, vitality, and animal soul.
> 
> This is the "wheel of rebirth," from which no man can escape unless he
> conforms to true ethics and acquires true knowledge and consciousness
> while living in a body. It was to stop this ceaselessly revolving wheel
> that Buddha declared his perfect law, and it is the aim of the true
> Theosophist to turn his great and brilliant "Wheel of the Law" for the
> healing of the nations.
> 
> XXI.
> 
> High in the esteem of the Hindū stands the serpent, both as a symbol and
> a creature. Moving in a wavy line, he figures the vast revolution of the
> Sun through eternal space carrying the rapidly whirling Earth in her
> lesser orbit; periodically casting his skin, he presents a visible
> illustration of renewal of life or reïncarnation; coiling to strike, he
> shows the working of the law of Karma-Nemesis which, with a basis in our
> actions, deals an unerring blow. As a symbol with tail in mouth, forming
> a circle, he represents eternity, the circle of necessity, all-devouring
> Time. For the older Initiates he spoke to them also of the astral light
> which is at once devilish and divine.
> 
> Probably in the whole field of Theosophic study there is nothing so
> interesting as the astral light. Among the Hindūs it is known as Ak'sa,
> which can also be translated as Æther. Through a knowledge of its
> properties they say that all the wonderful phenomena of the Oriental
> Yogis are accomplished. It is also claimed that clairvoyance,
> clairaudience, mediumship, and seership as known to the Western world
> are possible only through its means. It is the register of our deeds and
> thoughts, the great picture gallery of the earth, where the seer can
> always gaze upon any event that has ever happened, as well as those to
> come. Swimming in it as in a sea are beings of various orders and also
> the astral remains of deceased men and women. The Rosicrucians and other
> European mystics called these beings Sylphs, Salamanders, Gnomes,
> Undines, Elementals; the Hindū calls them Gandharbhas or celestial
> musicians, Yakshas, Raksh'sas and many more. The "spooks" of the
> dead--mistaken by Spiritualists for the individuals who are no
> more--float in this Ak'sic substance, and for centuries have been known
> to the mystical Hindū as Bhūta, another name for devil, or Pis'cha, a
> most horrible devil; neither of them any more than the cast-off
> soul-body nearest earth, devoid of conscience and only powerful for
> evil.
> 
> But the term "astral light," while not new, is purely of Occidental
> origin. Porphyry spoke of it when referring to the celestial or
> soul-body, which he says is immortal, luminous, and "star-like;"
> Paracelsus called it the "sidereal light;" later it grew to be known as
> astral. It was said to be the same as the _anima mundi_ or soul of the
> world. Modern scientific investigators approach it when they speak of
> "luminiferous ether" and "radiant matter." The great astronomer, Camille
> Flammarion, who was a member of the Theosophical Society during his
> life, speaks of the astral light in his novel _Uranie_ and says: "The
> light emanating from all these suns that people immensity, the light
> reflected through space by all these worlds lighted by these suns,
> _photographs_ throughout the boundless heaven the centuries, the days,
> the moments as they pass.... From this it results that the histories of
> all the worlds are travelling through space without dispersing
> altogether, and that all the events of the past are present and live
> evermore in the bosom of the infinite."
> 
> Like all unfamiliar or occult things the astral light is difficult to
> define, and especially so from the very fact that it is called "light."
> It is not the light as we know it, and neither is it darkness. Perhaps
> it was said to be a light because when clairvoyants saw by means of it,
> the distant objects seemed to be illuminated. But as equally well
> distant sounds can be heard in it, heavy bodies levitated by it, odors
> carried thousands of miles through it, thoughts read in it, and all the
> various phenomena by mediums brought about under its action, there has
> been a use of the term "light" which while unavoidable is none the less
> erroneous.
> 
> A definition to be accurate must include all the functions and powers
> of this light, but as those are not fully known even to the mystic, and
> wholly _terra incognita_ for the scientist, we must be content with a
> partial analysis. It is a substance easily imagined as imponderable
> ether which, emanating from the stars, envelopes the earth and permeates
> every atom of the globe and each molecule upon it. Obeying the laws of
> attraction and repulsion, it vibrates to and fro, making itself now
> positive and now negative. This gives it a circular motion which is
> symbolized by the serpent. It is the great final agent, or prime mover,
> cosmically speaking, which not only makes the plant grow but also keeps
> up the diastole and systole of the human heart.
> 
> Very like the action of the sensitive photographic plate is this light.
> It takes, as Flammarion says, the pictures of every moment and holds
> them in its grasp. For this reason the Egyptians knew it as the
> Recorder; it is the Recording Angel of the Christian, and in one aspect
> it is Y'ma, the judge of the dead in the Hindū pantheon, for it is by
> the pictures we impress therein that we are judged by Karma.
> 
> As an enormous screen or reflector the astral light hangs over the earth
> and becomes a powerful universal hypnotizer of human beings. The
> pictures of all acts good and bad done by our ancestors as by ourselves,
> being ever present to our inner selves, we constantly are impressed by
> them by way of suggestion and go then and do likewise. Upon this the
> great French priest-mystic, Éliphas Lévi, says: "We are often astonished
> when in society at being assailed by evil thoughts and suggestions that
> we would not have imagined possible, and we are not aware that we owe
> them solely to the presence of some morbid neighbor; this fact is of
> great importance, since it relates to the manifestation of
> conscience--one of the most terrible and incontestable secrets of the
> magic art.... So diseased souls have a bad breath, and vitiate the
> moral atmosphere; that is to say, they mingle impure reflections with
> the astral light which penetrates them, and thus establish deleterious
> currents."
> 
> There is also a useful function of this light. As it preserves the
> pictures of all past events and things, and as there is nothing new
> under the sun, the appliances, the ideas, the philosophy, the arts and
> sciences of long buried civilizations are continually being projected in
> pictures out of the astral into the brains of living men. This gives a
> meaning not only to the oft-recurring "coïncidence" of two or more
> inventors or scientists hitting upon the same ideas or inventions at
> about the same time and independently of each other, but also to other
> events and curious happenings.
> 
> Some self-styled scientists have spoken learnedly of telepathy, and
> other phenomena, but give no sufficient reason in nature for
> thought-transference or apparitions or clairvoyance or the hundred and
> one varieties of occurrences of an occult character noticed from day to
> day among all conditions of men. It is well to admit that thought may be
> transferred without speech directly from one brain to another, but how
> can the transference be effected without a medium? That medium is the
> astral light. The moment the thought takes shape in the brain it is
> pictured in this light, and from there is taken out again by any other
> brain sensitive enough to receive it intact.
> 
> Knowing the strange properties of the astral plane and the actual fate
> of the sheaths of the soul spoken of in another article, the
> Theosophical Adepts of all times gave no credit to pretended returning
> of the dead. Éliphas Lévi learned this well and said: "The astral light
> combining with ethereal fluids forms the astral phantom of which
> Paracelsus speaks. This astral body being freed at death, attracts to
> itself and preserves for a long time, by the sympathy of likeness, the
> reflection of the past life; if a powerfully sympathetic will draws it
> into the proper current it manifests itself in the form of an
> apparition." But with a sensitive, abnormally constituted person
> present--a medium, in other words, and all of that class are nervously
> unbalanced--the strong will is not needed, for the astral light and the
> living medium's astral body recall these soulless phantoms, and out of
> the same reservoir take their speech, their tones, their idiosyncrasies
> of character, which the deluded devotees of this debasing practice are
> cheated into imagining as the returned self of dead friend or relative.
> 
> Yet all I have referred to here are only instances of a few of the
> various properties of the astral light. So far as concerns our world it
> may be said that astral light is everywhere, interpenetrating all
> things; to have a photographic power by which it grasps pictures of
> thoughts, deeds, events, tones, sounds, colors, and all things;
> reflective in the sense that it reflects itself into the minds of men;
> repellant from its positive side and attractive from the negative;
> capable of assuming extreme density when drawn in around the body by
> powerful will or by abnormal bodily states, so that no physical force
> can penetrate it. This phase of its action explains some facts
> officially recorded during the witchcraft excitement in Salem. It was
> there found that although stones and other flying objects came toward
> the possessed one they always fell as it were from the force of gravity
> _just at the person's feet_. The Hindū Yogi gives evidence of a use of
> this condensation of the astral light when he allows arrows and other
> projectiles to be thrown at him, all of them falling at his feet no
> matter how great their momentum, and the records of genuine
> Spiritualistic phenomena in the United States furnish similar
> experiences.
> 
> The astral light is a powerful factor, unrecognized by science, in the
> phenomenon of hypnotism. Its action will explain many of the problems
> raised by Binet, Charcot and others, and especially that class in which
> two or more distinct personalities seem to be assumed by the subject,
> who can remember in each only those things and peculiarities of
> expression which belong to that particular stratum of their experience.
> These strange things are due to the currents in the astral light. In
> each current will be found a definite series of reflections, and they
> are taken up by the inner man, who reports them through speech and
> action on this plane as if they were his own. By the use of these
> currents too, but unconsciously, the clairvoyants and clairaudients seem
> to read in the hidden pages of life.
> 
> This light can therefore be impressed with evil or good pictures, and
> these are reflected into the subconscious mind of every human being. If
> you fill the astral light with bad pictures, just such as the present
> century is adept at creating, it will be our devil and destroyer, but if
> by the example of even a few good men and women a new and purer sort of
> events are limned upon this eternal canvas, it will become our Divine
> Uplifter.
> 
> _There is no Religion Higher than Truth_
> 
> THE UNIVERSAL BROTHERHOOD AND THEOSOPHICAL SOCIETY
> 
> _Established for the benefit of the people of the earth and all
> creatures_
> 
> OBJECTS
> 
> This BROTHERHOOD is a part of a great and universal movement which has
> been active in all ages.
> 
> This Organization declares that Brotherhood is a fact in Nature. Its
> principal purpose is to teach Brotherhood, demonstrate that it is a fact
> in Nature and make it a living power in the life of humanity.
> 
> Its subsidiary purpose is to study ancient and modern religions,
> science, philosophy and art; to investigate the laws of Nature and the
> divine powers in man.
> 
> THE UNIVERSAL BROTHERHOOD AND THEOSOPHICAL SOCIETY, founded by H. P.
> Blavatsky at New York, 1875, continued after her death under the
> leadership of the co-founder, William Q. Judge, and now under the
> leadership of their successor, Katherine Tingley, has its Headquarters
> at the International Theosophical Center, Point Loma, California.
> 
> This Organization is not in any way connected with nor does it endorse
> any other societies using the name of Theosophy.
> 
> THE UNIVERSAL BROTHERHOOD AND THEOSOPHICAL SOCIETY, welcomes to
> membership all who truly love their fellow men and desire the
> eradication of the evils caused by the barriers of race, creed, caste or
> color, which have so long impeded human progress; to all sincere lovers
> of truth and to all who aspire to higher and better things than the mere
> pleasures and interests of a worldly life, and are prepared to do all in
> their power to make Brotherhood a living energy in the life of humanity,
> its various departments offer unlimited opportunities.
> 
> The whole work of the Organization is under the direction of the Leader
> and Official Head, Katherine Tingley, as outlined in the Constitution.
> 
>                          *       *       *
> 
> Do not fail to profit by the following:
> 
> It is a regrettable fact that many people use the name of Theosophy and
> of our Organization for self-interest, as also that of H. P. Blavatsky
> the Foundress, to attract attention to themselves and to gain public
> support. This they do in private and public speech and in publications,
> also by lecturing throughout the country. Without being in any way
> connected with the UNIVERSAL BROTHERHOOD AND THEOSOPHICAL SOCIETY, in
> many cases they permit it to be inferred that they are, thus misleading
> the public, and many honest inquirers are hence led away from the truths
> of Theosophy as presented by H. P. Blavatsky and her successors, William
> Q. Judge and Katherine Tingley, and practically exemplified in their
> Theosophical work for the uplifting of humanity.
> 
> THE INTERNATIONAL BROTHERHOOD LEAGUE
> 
> Founded in 1897 by Katherine Tingley
> 
> ITS OBJECTS ARE:
> 
> 1. To help men and women to realize the nobility of their calling and
> their true position in life.
> 
> 2. To educate children of all nations on the broadest lines of Universal
> Brotherhood, and to prepare destitute and homeless children to become
> workers for humanity.
> 
> 3. To ameliorate the condition of unfortunate women, and assist them to
> a higher life.
> 
> 4. To assist those who are, or have been, in prisons, to establish
> themselves in honorable positions in life.
> 
> 5. To abolish capital punishment.
> 
> 6. To bring about a better understanding between so-called savage and
> civilized races, by promoting a closer and more sympathetic relationship
> between them.
> 
> 7. To relieve human suffering resulting from flood, famine, war, and
> other calamities; and, generally, to extend aid, help and comfort to
> suffering humanity throughout the world.
> 
> For further information regarding the above Notices, address
> 
> KATHERINE TINGLEY
> 
> INTERNATIONAL THEOSOPHICAL HEADQUARTERS,
> POINT LOMA, CALIFORNIA
> 
> BOOKS RECOMMENDED TO INQUIRERS
> 
> For _complete_ BOOK LIST write to
> 
> THE THEOSOPHICAL PUBLISHING CO., Point Loma, California
> 
> ISIS UNVEILED (H. P. Blavatsky). 2 vols., royal 8vo, about 1400 pages;
> cloth; with portrait of the author. _Point Loma Edition, with a
> preface._ Postpaid 7.00
> 
> KEY TO THEOSOPHY, THE (H. P. Blavatsky). _Point Loma Edition, with
> Glossary and exhaustive Index. Portraits of H. P. Blavatsky and W. Q.
> Judge._ 8vo, cloth, 400 pages. Postpaid 2.25
> 
> _A clear exposition of Theosophy in form of question and answer._ THE
> BOOK FOR STUDENTS.
> 
> SECRET DOCTRINE, THE (H. P. Blavatsky). The Synthesis of Science,
> Religion, and Philosophy. New Point Loma Edition, 2 vols., royal 8vo,
> about 1500 pages; cloth Postpaid 10.00
> 
> VOICE OF THE SILENCE, THE (For the daily use of disciples). Translated
> and annotated by H. P. Blavatsky Pocket size, leather .75
> 
> LIGHT ON THE PATH (M. C.), with comments, and a chapter on Karma;
> leather .75
> Embossed paper .25
> 
> MYSTERIES OF THE HEART DOCTRINE, THE. Prepared by Katherine Tingley and
> her pupils. Square 8vo, cloth 2.00 Paper 1.00
> 
> A SERIES OF EIGHT PAMPHLETS, comprising different articles in above,
> paper, each .25
> 
> BHAGAVAD GĪTĀ (Recension by W. Q. Judge, American Edition) Pocket size,
> morocco, gilt edges 1.00
> 
> _The pearl of the Scriptures of the East._
> 
> YOGA APHORISMS (translated by W. Q. Judge). Pocket size, leather .75
> 
> EPITOME OF THEOSOPHICAL TEACHINGS, AN (W. Q. Judge) 40 pages .15
> 
> CONCENTRATION, CULTURE OF. (W. Q. Judge) .15
> 
> INCIDENTS IN THE HISTORY OF THE THEOSOPHICAL MOVEMENT (Joseph H.
> Fussell). 24 pages, royal 8vo .15
> 
> LIFE AT POINT LOMA, THE. Some notes by Katherine Tingley, Leader and
> Official Head of the UNIVERSAL BROTHERHOOD AND THEOSOPHICAL SOCIETY. .15
> 
> Reprinted from _Los Angeles Post_, Dec., 1902
> 
> KATHERINE TINGLEY, HUMANITY'S FRIEND; A VISIT TO KATHERINE TINGLEY (by
> John Hubert Greusel); A STUDY OF RĀJA YOGA AT POINT LOMA (Reprint from
> the San Francisco _Chronicle_, January 6th, 1907).
> 
> The above three comprised in a pamphlet of 50 pages, published by the
> Woman's Theosophical Propaganda League, Point Loma .15
> 
> ECHOES FROM THE ORIENT (W. Q. Judge); cloth .50
> Paper .25
> 
> 21 valued articles, giving a broad outline of the Theosophical
> doctrines, written for the newspaper-reading public.
> 
> ERRORS OF CHRISTIAN SCIENCE, SOME OF THE. Criticism by H. P. Blavatsky
> and W. Q. Judge .15
> 
> HYPNOTISM: THEOSOPHICAL VIEWS ON. (40 pp.) .15
> 
> NIGHTMARE TALES. (H. P. Blavatsky). _Newly illustrated by R. Machell._ A
> collection of the weirdest tales ever written down. They contain
> paragraphs of the profoundest mystical philosophy. Cloth .60
> Paper .35
> 
> THE PLOUGH AND THE CROSS. A Story of New Ireland (William Patrick
> O'Ryan); 12mo, 378 pages, illustrated, Cloth 1.00
> 
> OCCULTISM, STUDIES IN
> 
> (H. P. Blavatsky). Pocket size, 6 vols., cloth; per set 1.50
> 
> Vol. 1. Practical Occultism. Occultism _vs._ the Occult Arts. The
> Blessing of Publicity. .35
> 
> Vol. 2. Hypnotism. Black Magic in Science. Signs of the Times .35
> 
> Vol. 3. Psychic and Noetic Action .35
> 
> Vol. 4. Kosmic Mind. Dual Aspect of Wisdom .35
> 
> Vol. 5. Esoteric Character of the Gospels .35
> 
> Vol. 6. Astral Bodies. Constitution of the Inner Man .35
> 
> THEOSOPHICAL MANUALS
> 
> ELEMENTARY HANDBOOKS FOR STUDENTS
> 
> Price, each, paper .25; cloth .35
> 
> No. 1. Elementary Theosophy.
> 
> No. 2. The Seven Principles of Man.
> 
> No. 3. Karma.
> 
> No. 4. Reincarnation.
> 
> No. 5. Man After Death.
> 
> No. 6. K'maloka and Devachan.
> 
> No. 7. Teachers and Their Disciples.
> 
> No. 8. The Doctrine of Cycles.
> 
> No. 9. Psychism, Ghostology, and the Astral Plane.
> 
> No. 10. The Astral Light.
> 
> No. 11. Psychometry, Clairvoyance, and Thought-Transference.
> 
> No. 12. The Angel and the Demon. (2 vols., 35c. each)
> 
> No. 13. The Flame and the Clay.
> 
> No. 14. On God and Prayer.
> 
> No. 15. Theosophy: the Mother of Religions.
> 
> No. 16. From Crypt to Pronaos. (An Essay on the Rise and Fall of Dogma)
> 
> No. 17. Earth. (Its Parentage; its Rounds and Its Races)
> 
> No. 18. Sons of the Firemist. (A Study of Man)
> 
> THE PATH SERIES
> 
> SPECIALLY ADAPTED FOR INQUIRERS IN THEOSOPHY
> 
> ALREADY PUBLISHED
> 
> No. 1. THE PURPOSE OF THE UNIVERSAL BROTHERHOOD AND THEOSOPHICAL SOCIETY
> .05
> 
> No. 2. THEOSOPHY GENERALLY STATED (W. Q. Judge) .05
> 
> No. 3. MISLAID MYSTERIES (H. Coryn, M. D.) .05
> 
> No. 4. THEOSOPHY AND ITS COUNTERFEITS .05
> 
> No. 5. SOME PERVERTED PRESENTATIONS OF THEOSOPHY (H. T. Edge, B. A.) .05
> 
> Thirty copies $1.00; 100 copies $3.00
> 
> LOTUS GROUP LITERATURE
> 
> LOTUS LIBRARY FOR CHILDREN
> 
> _Introduced under the direction of Katherine Tingley_
> 
> 1. THE LITTLE BUILDERS AND THEIR VOYAGE TO RANGI (R. N.) .50
> 
> 2. THE COMING OF THE KING (Machell); cloth, gilt edges .35
> 
> LOTUS SONG BOOK. Fifty original songs with copyrighted music .50
> 
> LOTUS SONG--"The Sun Temple"--_with music_ .15
> 
> THEOSOPHICAL PERIODICALS
> 
> CENTURY PATH. Illustrated weekly, Edited by Katherine Tingley
> 
> A Magazine devoted to the Brotherhood of Humanity, the Promulgation of
> Theosophy, and the Study of Ancient and Modern Ethics, Philosophy,
> Science, and Art
> 
> Year $4.00 Single copy .10
> 
> Write for a sample copy to
> 
> NEW CENTURY CORPORATION
> 
> Point Loma, California, U. S. A.
> 
> RĀJA YOGA MESSENGER. _Illustrated._ Monthly. Yearly subscription .50
> 
> Unsectarian publication for Young Folk, conducted by a staff of pupils
> of the R'ja Yoga School at Lomaland. Address Master Albert G. Spalding,
> Business Manager, RĀJA YOGA MESSENGER, Point Loma, California.
> 
> INTERNATIONAL THEOSOPHICAL CHRONICLE. _Illustrated._ Monthly. Yearly
> subscription, postpaid 1.00
> 
> The Theosophical Book Co., 18 Bartlett's Buildings Holborn Circus,
> London, E. C.
> 
> THEOSOPHIA. _Illustrated._ Monthly. Yearly subscription, postpaid 1.50
> 
> Universella Broderskapets Förlag, Box 265, Stockholm 1, Sweden.
> 
> UNIVERSALE BRUDERSCHAFT. _Illustrated._ Monthly. Yearly subscription,
> postpaid 1.50
> 
> J. Th. Heller, Vestnertorgraben 13, Nürnberg, Germany
> 
> LOTUS-KNOPPEN. _Illustrated._ Monthly. Yearly subscription, postpaid .75
> 
> A. Goud, Steentilstraat 40, Groningen, Holland
> 
> Subscriptions to the above four Magazines may be secured also through
> the Theosophical Publishing Co., Point Loma, California.
> 
> Neither the editors of the above publications, nor the officers of the
> UNIVERSAL BROTHERHOOD AND THEOSOPHICAL SOCIETY, or of any of its
> departments, receive salaries or other remuneration.
> 
> All profits arising from the business of the Theosophical Publishing
> Co., are devoted to Humanitarian Work. All who assist in this work are
> directly helping that Cause.
>
> — *Echoes from the Orient (Public Domain)*