{"collection":"Theosophy","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/archive_org_vol.351938/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/archive_org_vol.351938","id":"archive_org_vol.351938","license":"http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/","rights_basis":"archive_org_open:open_license:http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/","source":"archive_org","source_url":"https://archive.org/details/vol.351938","summary":"In Europe, single copies may be obtained from and subscriptions may be sent to John \nM. Watkins, 21 Cedi Court, Charing Cross Road, London, W. C.","tags":["Theosophy"],"text":"In Europe, single copies may be obtained from and subscriptions may be sent to John \nM. Watkins, 21 Cedi Court, Charing Cross Road, London, W. C. 2, England; or to \nMr. E. H. Lincoln, 9 Beaconsfield Road, Low Fell, Gateshead-on-Tyne, England, from \nwhom all back numbers may be obtained. Annual subscription price, $2.00, postpaid. \n\n\n. \n\nCONTENTS OF VOL. XXXV, NO. 1 \nJanuary, 1938 \n\nPAGE \n\n\nNOTES AND COMMENTS. 5 \n\nFRAGMENTS. 18 \n\nWAR. \n\nCYCLIC LAW IN BIOLOGY. 24 \n\nTHE EMPEROR AKBAR. 32 \n\nWITHOUT CENSOR, XI. 45 \n\nPRAYER-WHEELS OR POWER?. 55 \n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME. 62 \n\nREVIEWS. 74 \n\nCORRESPONDENCE. 8 3 \n\nQUESTIONS AND ANSWERS: Notice . 87 \n\n\nEntered as second-class matter September 5 . 1923. at the Post Office at New York, N. Y., under the \nAct of March 3, 1879. \n\nCopyright, 1938, by The Theosophical Soriety \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nthe theosophical society \n\nThe principal aim and object of this Society is to form the nucleus of a \nUniversal Brotherhood of Humanity, without distinction of race, creed, sex. \ncaste or colour. The subsidiary objects are : The study of ancient and modern \nreligions, philosophies and sciences, and the demonstration of the importance \nof such study: and the investigation of the unexplained laws of nature and \n\n\n\nThe Theosophical Quarterly is the official organ of the original \nTheosophical Society founded in New York by H. P. Blavatsky, \nW. Q- Judge and others, in 1875. . . \n\nWe have no connection whatsoever with any other organization \ncalling itself Theosophical, formerly headed by Mrs. Besant, nor \nwith similar bodies, the purposes and methods of which are wholly \nforeign to our own . \n\nEditors, The Theosophical Quarterly. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nJANUARY, 1938 \n\n\nin thic 7 V '\u2019 \u2019 w responsible Jor any opinion or declaration \n\nUS ma \u00a3 azme < b y whomsoever expressed, unless contained in an official document. \n\n\nE CONOMICS or political economy has been defined as \u201cthe science \nwhich investigates the production, distribution and consumption of \n, \u00b0 r t ie matenal means of satisfying human desires\u201d. It has \n\nfvin n v C h ^ d \u2019 S \" al SCienCe \u201d\u2019 bUt the Study \u00b0 f \u201c the material -eans of satS \nfying human desires can become an affair of absorbing interest. Let no one \n\n\u201chiVher rf S Th V?*? 1S t0 \u00b0 S \u00b0 rdid t0 concern an aspirant towards some \ngher life . The light of the firefly is one with the light of the sun. Nature \n\ncannotT* 6 AS a banker recentl y remarked, economic principles \n\nsatisfy huTn d ^ *** to \u201c ^ ****\"\u25a0 ^ ^tempL \n\nsatisfy human desires uncloses many possibilities of strange and dangerous \n\nadventure, for some desires cannot, and others ought not, to be satisfied \n\nMoreover, the laws of eternal Nature operate as inexorably in the commerce \n\nof mankind as m the harmony of the spheres, or the interaction of physiological \n\nfunctions, or the communion of the heavenly host. Long experience has re- \n\n! ea . edC \u00ae \" Cementary economic Principles upon which the existence of any \nsocial order depends. In so far as we understand them, we are helped to an \nunderstanding of cosmic and spiritual principles to which these correspond. \n\nAt the present time, men everywhere are throwing overboard the accumulated \nexperience of centuries and are devising schemes to circumvent the \u201cnatural^ \naw the jus gentium of the Roman jurists, which is indispensable and common^ \n\nraT s^nd The ^ ft T 656 deViCeS haVC b6en tfied before with lamentable \n\nresults, and they cannot fail to bring disaster again \nIt is the duty of the student of Theosophy to face realities, to combat error \nto seek truth. Nowhere is the distinction between truth and error more clearly \nseen than in the economic domain, where men are constantly forced to choose \nbetween honest commerce and one or another form of brigandage. The student \nof Theosophy who is indifferent to the phenomena of the market-place is \nneglecting an opportunity to acquire knowledge. \n\n\n\n5 \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n6 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nThe Law of Supply and Demand \n\n\u201cHonest commerce\u201d implies the right of the individual to hold and to transfer \nproperty. If A possess something which B wants, B can steal it; or he can \nbeg for it; or he can barter, offering in exchange for it something which he him\u00ac \nself possesses. Under normal conditions, the exchange of goods or capital or \nlabour, according to the rules of honest commerce, is regarded as a more re\u00ac \nspectable enterprise than banditry or mendicancy. \n\nBut what is honest commerce? According to a venerable standard, it is \ncommerce which is regulated by the law of supply and demand. This law \nmerely affirms the simple fact that the natural price of a commodity is de\u00ac \ntermined by the varying ratio between the quantity which is offered for sale \nand the quantity which is wanted by buyers: when the supply is greater than \nthe demand, the price falls; when the demand is greater than the supply, the \nprice rises. The price thus determined at any given moment is said to be a fair \nbasis of exchange. \n\nThe law of supply and demand functions in conjunction with the maxim, \nCaveat emptor , \u201cLet the buyer beware\u201d. This is not an invitation to sharp \npractice on the part of the seller. It merely affirms that the purchaser should \nexamine what he buys, and that he acts on his own judgment and at his own \nrisk. It is the duty of the seller not to deceive the buyer, but he is free to sell \nor not to sell at his own discretion and on his own terms,\u2014as the buyer is free \nto buy or not to buy. \n\nThe law of supply and demand is not properly appreciated by people who \nwant to get something for nothing or for less than it is currently worth. It \nhas always been defied, more or less openly, by nations and groups and indi\u00ac \nviduals with predatory instincts. But it cannot be defied with impunity. The \nfinancial and social convulsions of the contemporary world are due, in no small \nmeasure, to the desperate attempts of nations and organized mobs to outwit \nthe law of supply and demand, and to take what does not belong to them by \nmethods which are not those of honest commerce. Frederick the Great said \nthat one could always find a \u201cphilosopher\u201d to justify any villainy. Our insti\u00ac \ntutions of learning are not without doctors of economics who call banditry and \nmendicancy by other names, and then plead their cause. \n\nThe Labourer and His Hire \n\nIntellectuals and demagogues are fond of contrasting what they call \u201chuman \nrights\u201d and \u201cproperty rights\u201d. It is argued that labour is not a commodity; \nthat labour has a right to a living wage; that labour is entitled to a larger share \nin the proceeds of capital, etc., etc. It might be suggested that labour leaders \nare almost the only people to-day who treat the labouring man like a commod\u00ac \nity. However, whether an individual be a bank president, or a clerk in a grocery, \nor a founder in a steel mill, he is employed and paid, not because he has a \u201chuman \nright\u201d to employment and a \u201cliving wage\u201d, but because he renders certain \nservices which deserve a certain recompense. If he fail to perform those ser\u00ac \nvices, his employer has no obligation to keep him. \u201cThe labourer is worthy of \n\n\nNOTES AND COMMENTS \n\n\n7 \n\n\nhis hire.\u201d When the law of supply and demand operates without too much \nhuman meddling, the hire is, as it were, automatically proportioned to the \nemployer\u2019s need for an individual labourer. A wise employer is willing, even \neager, to divide a larger share of his profits with any employee who is helping \nhim to improve his business. If the employee be really receiving less than his \ndue, he can demand and get better terms from his employer\u2019s competitors, or \nhe can set up in trade for himself. If a man\u2019s work be mediocre, no one will \nvoluntarily pay him more than he is worth. If his work be valueless, no one \nwill voluntarily employ him at all. This may sound disagreeable to modem \nears; but it is in accordance with the natural law, to which Darwin so forcibly \ncalled attention, that existence is a struggle which only the fit and worthy sur\u00ac \nvive. \u201cCompetition is the life of trade.\u201d Emulation, the desire to equal or \nexcel, is a mighty stimulus. In a higher form, it would seem to be indistinguish\u00ac \nable from the disciple\u2019s aspiration to grow in likeness to the Master. In the \nlife of the ordinary man, the sense of honest rivalry quickens effort and makes \nhim work hard and cheerfully. It is probable that there would be fewer \u201cmental \ncases\u201d and fewer \u201cunemployables\u201d, if employers were more free to deal with \nlabouring men as individuals and were not so often compelled to bargain with \nthem as a class or a group. \n\nThe facts are that the superior members of any group or class are necessarily \nand invariably in a minority, and that, in the field of Labour, it is the more \nskilled and responsible minority who suffer, both financially and morally, by their \nforced association with, and domination by, the lazy and less skilled but bully\u00ac \ning majority. The avowed aims of Labour (or Trade) Unionism are to abolish \ncompetition between workmen; to slow down production to the average per\u00ac \nformance\u2014which means inclination\u2014of the majority, and to prohibit special \nrewards for special service or ability. That these aims were given practical \neffect in Soviet Russia, with the result that production fell to zero, compelling \nthe Soviet dictators to reverse their policy, and to introduce a harsher form of \ncompetition than any which capitalism had imagined,\u2014is taboo as a subject \nof conversation in Labour circles. \n\nThe intellectuals and sentimentalists attempt to meet these facts on the \nground that it is the average, the \u201cforgotten\u201d man, who needs protection, and \nthat it is their duty, as the saviours of mankind, to see that he gets^ regard\u00ac \nless, presumably, of the industrial and racial deterioration involve<^ r But the \ntruth is that the keen competition between employers to secure the best type \nof labour, affords abundant protection for the average workman, because this \ncompetition covers the entire scale of wages, and, in addition, the \u201cworking \nconditions\u201d in one plant as compared with those in another. Thus, thousands \nof dollars are spent by relatively small corporations to supply iced water during \nthe summer, and, during the winter, the stifling heat which the American work\u00ac \nman loves, in order to make working conditions competitively attractive. In \nthe same way, and irrespective of possible gratitude, an employer will create \nwork for an old employee for long after the employee has ceased to be of com\u00ac \nmercial value, knowing that consideration of that kind will tend to attract \n\n\n8 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nfirst class men from neighbouring plants. In brief, whenever the law of supply \nand demand is allowed to take its unimpeded course, it can be relied on to \ncounteract the effects of man\u2019s inherent selfishness. \n\nSome of the confusion which exists under this head is due to the misleading \nuse of the term, Labour. The so-called labouring class includes a noisy element \nwho have no intention of working except under dire compulsion. It is an insult \nto common sense to speak of \u201cthe workers\u201d, as if they were all alike, as if they \ndid not differ widely as regards skill, industry, thrift and honesty. \u201cCollective \nbargaining\u201d has not only become a means of sacrificing the superior individual \nto the mob, but also frequently disrupts the whole economic order by imposing \nupon the employer a wage-scale which is entirely disproportionate to the ser\u00ac \nvices rendered by the employees. His only chance of remaining in business is \nthen to raise the price of his goods to absorb the increased cost of production \nand distribution. This may mean that he can no longer meet the prices of his \ncompetitors, while, if they are similarly situated, and prices become higher \nthan customers are willing to pay, trade stops, and the over-paid employees \nare no longer paid at all. The extreme depression of the building industries in \nNew York illustrates how trade can be paralyzed by the demands of labour \nleaders who respect no laws, human or divine. \n\nA Natural Economy \n\nThe term, Laissez jaire , is misinterpreted to-day to mean an easy-going toler\u00ac \nance of evils, but to the school of eighteenth century economists who originally \nused it, it stood for the proposition that \u201cit is the function of the state so to \ngovern as not to interfere with the natural processes of society and industry\u201d. \nIt was based on the theosophic principle that law operates everywhere, and \nthat man\u2019s well-being lies in recognizing and obeying natural law, not in trying \nto contravene it. The idea was developed in protest against \u201cmercantilism\u201d, \nthe \u201cplanned\u201d economy of the time. The governments of the eighteenth \ncentury regarded the \u201crationalization\u201d of trade and the control of markets as \npart of their function; and, as always happens under such conditions, the course \nof prices had become arbitrary and incalculable. Quesnay and his followers \nheld to the truth, demonstrated by experience, that if prices were left freely to \nshift for themselves in accordance with actual supply and demand, \u201cnatural \nprocesses\u201d would automatically tend to diminish an excessive supply, and to \ncheck an excessive demand. If the price of a commodity were too high, it \nwould stimulate sellers to produce and to offer it in increasing quantity; if the \nprice were too low, production would cease. Thus a \u201cnatural economy\u201d would \nbalance itself. \n\nThe most cursory observation of Nature justifies this conclusion. Biologists \nhave noted that under natural conditions no species of plant or animal can \nmultiply unduly in a locality, without a corresponding increase in the number \nof its natural enemies. If there be too many rabbits or squirrels in our fields \nand woods, we shall witness an invasion of hawks and owls. On the other \nhand, it is part of the function of hawks and owls, in the biological economy, to \n\n\nNOTES AND COMMENTS \n\n\n9 \n\n\nwander from place to place in search of a region where rabbits and squirrels \nare excessively abundant. \n\nIt is a theosophical hypothesis that, on the higher planes of Nature, supply \nattracts demand and demand attracts supply. Man could not imagine, much \nless aspire towards a superior consciousness, if there were not in the world an \naccumulation of spiritual energy to inspire him,\u2014the \u201cdeposit of faith\u201d left \nby all who have attained knowledge and sanctity. The disciple who effectively \ndemands the Master\u2019s aid, finds at his disposal an inexhaustible treasure of \nwisdom and power. \n\nThe economic activities of men would, indeed, be simplified, if there were no \ninterference with \u201cnatural processes\u201d. But alas, man ceased to be \u201cnatural\u201d \nages before the beginning of what we call history,\u2014which is thus largely the \nrecord of his efforts to substitute his own for the Divine will, and of the dis\u00ac \nasters which he suffers in consequence. \n\nBusiness Cycles \n\nWhether they like it or not, men are still constrained to live under the dominion \nof natural laws. Economic processes cannot be isolated from cosmic processes. \nIn economic writings, for example, there is frequent reference to \u201cbusiness \ncycles . Every known economic order has been subject to fluctuations of \nfortune, to alternations of good times and bad, which recur with a certain \nregularity. There exists a notion to-day that these undulations point to de\u00ac \nfects in the order itself; that a properly planned econo ly would be perma\u00ac \nnently stable; that there would be no business cycles in a commonwealth where \nproduction and credit were controlled by science. No one will deny that the \nnormal effects of the business cycle are aggravated and modified by human \nfolly and dishonesty; but the cycle itself is part of Nature and depends upon \ncauses, both psychic and physical, far removed from scientific restraint. \n\nNot only the functions of our bodies but the moods of our consciousness \nchange periodically, for we live in a universe which is always in a state of rhythmic \nmotion. Cyclic law governs every detail of our inner and outer existence. In\u00ac \ndeed, this is a cause, not for complaint, but for thanksgiving. If it were no^ \nso, we should not be compelled to keep awake, to put forth effort. The retm^ \ning cycles provide the only possible opportunity to learn and profit from mis\u00ac \ntakes, to test judgment, to grow strong. \n\nOne immediate physical cause of instability in any economic order, is the \ncyclic increase and decrease of agricultural production. Within certain limits, \nman has been able to reduce the menace of repeated famines, but he cannot \nprevent the fundamental alternation of abundance and scarcity. This rhythm \nis determined by cosmic agencies. \n\nFor instance, meteorologists are at last convinced that there is a connection \nbetween weather changes and the sunspot cycle. We quote from an article in \nthe Scientific American , November, 1937, by Dr. Harlan T. Stetson of the \nMg^rchusetts Institute of Technology: \n\n\n\n\n\n\n10 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nH. Helm Clayton, who has spent many long years in the Weather Bureau service, \n... is a firm believer that changes in the sun are accompanied by the fundamental \n. changes in the earth\u2019s atmosphere, and has found definite indications that changes in \nthe earth\u2019s atmosphere in different parts of the world accompany the appearance \nand disappearance of sunspots throughout the n-year cycle. He has not only shown \ncertain definite relations between temperature and sunspots over definite parts of the \nglobe, but he has shown why many investigators have failed to find such a relationship. \n\n. . . Dr. Abbot\u2019s long investigations of solar variations and weather at the Smithsonian \nInstitute have convinced him that the sunspot period is an important factor in untangling \nthe vagaries of the weather. He finds that the variations in the sun\u2019s heat and in the \nweather really appear to comprise 12 or more regular periods, the most conspicuous of \nwhich is a period of 23 years, equal to twice the average sunspot cycle. Observations \nshow that when we are concerned with the electrical nature of sunspots, 23 years really \nelapse between the recurrence of sunspot cycles of the same kind. The examination of \nweather records at strategic points, Dr. Abbot says, shows very definitely this long \nperiod of weather variation covering 23 years. \n\nObviously this branch of meteorology is in its infancy, but enough informa\u00ac \ntion has already been tabulated to support Jevons\u2019s theory that the expansions \nand contractions of trade and credit are affected by the course and intensity \nof cyclones on the sun. As sunspots change, so changes the weather, and as \nthe weather changes, crops become abundant or deficient and the buying power \nof the average mortal increases or declines. While both the farmer and the \nbusiness-man should prepare in advance for \u201cbad years\u201d, nothing can be done \ndirectly to alter the situation, for no scientist is likely to discover a way of \nregulating sunspots; nor should we conclude that sunspot periods are the only \ncosmic cycles connected with the rise and fall of human fortunes. Man\u2019s moods \nand faculties are no less susceptible than his physical life to all the great tides \nof Nature. \n\nThe immediate point is that business cycles are as natural and as inevitable \nas the alternation of day and night, winter and summer, waking and sleeping. \nThe law of periodicity is incessant and universal. \u201cThe appearance and dis\u00ac \nappearance of Worlds is like a regular tidal ebb of flux and reflux.\u201d We do \nnot begin to suspect the manifold ways in which man affects and is affected \nby the succession of the cycles, great and small, of the universe. As an Eastern \nMaster has written: \u201cEven simple muscular contraction is always accom\u00ac \npanied with electric and magnetic phenomena, and there is the strongest con\u00ac \nnection between the magnetism of the earth, the changes of the weather and \nman , who is the best barometer living, if he but knew how to decipher it prop\u00ac \nerly.\u201d \n\nBooms and Panics \n\nBusiness cycles come and go, testing courage and endurance and faith. If \nwe were all as wise and as provident as the Patriarch Joseph, we should be \nable to bear the lean years without undue strain and worry. But men have a \nfatal capacity for turning success into a South Sea Bubble, and depression \ninto a Black Friday. During the past decade, we have had the privilege of \nobserving and even of participating in a gigantic boom followed by a gigantic \npanic. It is impossible to blame the weather or any physical variable for what \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nNOTES AND COMMENTS \n\n\nii \n\n\nhas happened. At least during the early phase of the panic, Mother Earth \nwas more than usually generous and bountiful. The seat of the trouble was \nand is unregenerate human nature. Too many people failed, first to stand the \nstrain of pleasure, and then to stand the strain of pain. \n\nAs has been said, there was a crisis of spiritual unemployment before physical \nunemployment became epidemic. The economic collapse reflects a world-wide \nmoral break-down. The law of supply and demand was so outrageously vio\u00ac \nlated by the overproduction of luxuries and by the reckless extension of credit \nduring the era of post-war speculation, that men lost confidence, not only in \nthe stability of values, but in the ability or willingness of individuals to pay for \nanything which they bought. Even so, the ensuing depression might have \ncured itself, and confidence might have revived, if there had been a general \nrecovery of ethical standards. Such a recovery has occurred before during \nperiods of financial calamity, and has marked a real turning-point. But where \nare the signs that a moral renaissance is taking place? \n\nWithout doubt, there are individuals who have grown in wisdom and in \nvirtue during these years; but with few exceptions they are not leaders of public \nopinion. In many respects, the efforts to recover from the depression are more \ndepressing than the depression itself, for they are largely based upon the de\u00ac \nlusion that prosperity can be restored and made permanent by intensifying, \nthrough a \u201cplanned economy\u201d, those violations of natural law which destroyed \nit. The resulting incoherence and confusion have weakened still further the \ncitizen\u2019s confidence in himself and in others. \n\nPlanned Economy \n\nIt is everyone\u2019s duty to plan his own economy and, sometimes, that of others \nfor whom he is responsible; but he must do this in obedience to law. Joseph \nwas an \u201ceconomic manager\u201d, in the best sense of the term. Let it be noted, \nhowever, that he did*not prescribe how much com the farmers of Egypt should \nplant each year. He let Nature and Providence determine the size of the \nharvest. He stored and did not destroy any annual surplus. He did not inflate \ncredit to raise prices. \n\nAs a matter of fact, the prototype of the contemporary \u201ceconomic manager\u201d \nis not Joseph, but the French King, Philippe le Bel, who sought to fill an en^ty \ntreasury by robbing the Templars, the bankers of his time, and by de\u00aeRng \nthe currency. This is not the first era which has experimented with managed \nmoney and unbalanced budgets, with controlled production and fixed prices, \nwith trade restrictions and confiscatory taxation, etc., etc. If a Roman banker \nor merchant of the Empire were suddenly to appear in our midst, he might \nfancy that he was continuing the same old nightmare. \n\nNightmares can end, for not infrequently the natural forces working for \nrecovery triumph, in spite of all the \u201cplans\u201d of mortal men. But this can \nhappen only when there is a sufficient realization that it is in the long run less \njpainful to co-operate with natural laws than to treat them with indifference \nfebr contempt. Recent events in the United States should have awakened many \n\n\n\n\n12 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nfrom their dreams. The Wall Street \u201cpanic\u2019' of 1937 may serve as an example. \nDoubtless, there were many reasons why stocks should have begun to decline \nduring the late summer; but it has been evident enough to observers with \npractical experience that the violence and abruptness of the break were due \nprimarily to the artificial limitation of normal market operations. In theory, \nthe regulation of the Stock Exchange by the Federal Government was intended \nto protect the investor from the speculator, but in practice it made impossible \nany normal interaction of supply and demand. As a result the unpleasant \nexperiences of 1929 were repeated. However, this time \u201cit happened that \nway\u201d, not because of the mania of private bankers and speculators, but because \nlegislators and administrators without practical knowledge had so restricted \nthe buying and selling of securities that even prudent investment carried an \ninordinate risk. As a commentator remarked, \u201cYou cannot possibly get more \nwisdom out of a head than is actually there. A little more humility and a little \nless arrogance are suggested.\u201d \n\nThe Case for Individualism \n\nNot many years ago, at least in England and France and America, the average \ncitizen would have vigorously resented the idea that a group of professors or \nyoung intellectuals could plan his life and manage his business more wisely \nand successfully than himself. It is easy to argue that the average citizen is so \nincapable of administering his own affairs that he should be glad to put them \nin the hands of anyone who claims superior knowledge. Of course, he should \nseek and welcome all the help that he can get. But this scarcely implies that \nit is the proper function of the state to treat all of its citizens alike as if they \nwere wards or incompetents. \n\nIt is significant that the laissez faire theory, the faith and reliance upon natural \nlaw which is to-day so scorned, prevailed during a period when great stress \nwas laid upon the rights and responsibilities of individuals. The nineteenth \ncentury was, in particular, an age of great individuals, of genius, not only in \ncommerce and empire-building, but in the arts and sciences, and in the domain \nof religious experience and pure thought. The individual who malingered or \nshirked was not regarded with favour by our grandparents, nor would they \nhave found acceptable the doctrine that industry and thrift should be taxed to \nthe limit in order to care for the shiftless and inept. \n\nTo-day it is fashionable to accuse the leaders of the nineteenth century of \nindifference to the needs of the majority of mankind. It is possible that they \noverestimated the capacity of the ordinary individual to care for himself; \nthat some of them\u2014not all, by any means\u2014did not worry much about the fate \nof the \u201cunderprivileged\u201d. Nevertheless, it is invigorating to recall two truths \nfor which the nineteenth century stood, and for which Theosophy stands be\u00ac \ncause they are based upon Nature and common-sense. There is the truth that \ntheory must be confirmed and tested by experience. The best judge of the \ncandle business is not someone who writes a doctor\u2019s dissertation upon the \nsubject, but a candle-merchant who has grown up and lived with the business; \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nNOTES AND COMMENTS \n\n\n13 \n\n\nas the best judge of spiritual values is the man who daily and hourly seeks to \nembody them in his life. There is also the truth that individual consciousness \nis so precious in itself that, in its perfected form, it may well be described as \nthe supreme end of evolution. \u201cThe Universe exists for purposes of Soul.\u201d \nSociety exists for the sake of the individuals who compose it. It is their duty \nto learn to co-operate, to recognize that in essence their several selves are un\u00ac \ndivided fragments of One Self. But the fact remains that no group can become \nsuperior unless it produce individuals who are superior themselves, and who, \nby the force of their example, evoke the superior qualities of others. There \ncan be no Grande Arm6e unless there be a Napoleon to lead it. Christianity \nbecomes a confused mass-phenomenon, perverting truth, whenever it is sepa\u00ac \nrated from the living reality of the Christ. \n\nIt would seem, therefore, that our economic managers persistently work \nagainst Nature, in so far as they suppress both individual initiative and the \nopportunities for the development of individual responsibility. In economics, \nas in every department of life, the words of the Bhagavad Gita may be taken \nas a guide: \u201cBetter one\u2019s own duty without excellence than the duty of another \nwell followed out. Death in one\u2019s own duty is better; the duty of another is \nfull of danger.\u2019\u2019 \n\nThe state has its own duties which are arduous enough to kill out political \nambition in anyone who has some awareness of his limitations; but it is not \nmore difficult \u201cso to govern as not to interfere with the natural processes of \nsociety and industry\u201d, than to attempt to govern on the theory that natural \nprocesses are immoral and must be reversed. It is the evident duty of the state \nto frame and enforce laws which are concordant with natural laws; to guard \nthe lives, the property and the honest commerce of its citizens from the mur\u00ac \nderer and the thief; to prevent the selfish and reckless exploitation of natural \nresources; to organize and maintain a system of national defence; etc., etc. \nBut, in every instance, these duties are fundamentally concerned with the \nprotection of the individual citizen from injustice and rapine, and, pr^erly \nperformed, would leave him free to work out his own salvation with a fuPKnse \nof responsibility for the outcome. A country thus governed would produce a \nrace of men,\u2014instead of parasites. \n\nCollective Banditry \n\nIndeed, in practice if not in theory, a state-planned economy is most often \nmerely a system of organized banditry whereby, to curry favour with a group \nor class, politicians give them a sort of franchise to rob and plunder the rest \nof the community, or cause the government to do the plundering for them \nLunder the guise of taxation. This is manifestly the case in Soviet Russia, where \nthe process of burglary has proceeded so far that the burglars possess all the \nproperty and are resorting to the expedient of robbing one another. But the \nsymptoms of collective greed can be observed in nations and groups much \nnearer home. \n\n\n14 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nClass consciousness is, of course, not reprehensible in itself. A man cannot \nand should not forget that he belongs by birth and nurture to a certain level in \nthe social scale. However, classes, like individuals, fulfil their respective func\u00ac \ntions by co-operating, by complementing one another. The class war is a dis\u00ac \nease of society. Like planned economy, it is not new. There were uprisings \nof the masses in Athens and Rome; mediaeval Europe had its jacqueries and \npeasants\u2019 revolts. Then, as now, these mob movements were not spontaneous, \nbut were fomented by dreamers and agitators, and by the tribe of those who \nfish in troubled waters. \n\nThe present epidemic of class envy is none the less distinguished by its scope \nand virulence. One can suggest various reasons for its rapid spread,\u2014the \ngrowth of democracy, the materialistic trend of education, the ease of modem \ncommunications, the over-development of city life, the substitution of the \nmachine for the artisan, the recurrent crises of unemployment, etc., etc. But \nthere is evidence that a more subtile force is at work. Modem mass move\u00ac \nments, in Russia and Germany and elsewhere, are comparable to the great \nwaves of emotional mania and hysteria, often assuming a religious mask, which \nhave from time to time swept over the globe, changing the course of races and \npeoples. One recalls, in particular, the torrent of Mohammedan conquest \nwhich almost engulfed Europe. \n\nThe typical contemporary fanatic is the devotee of some scheme for dividing \nthe property of the \u201chaves\u201d among the \u201chave nots\u201d. He has his \u201cscriptures\u201d \nand his \u201ccreed\u201d and his \u201chigh priests\u201d, his conceptions of orthodoxy and heresy. \nLike every fanatic, he hates the heretic more than he hates the infidel. Thus \nthe Fascists and Communists\u2014to mention an outstanding example\u2014are as \nirreconcilable as the Catholics and Protestants who devastated Europe with \ntheir wars three hundred years ago. But what are the fundamental differences \nbetween them? As far as the individual is concerned, he is almost equally \nenslaved under either system, although he may perhaps live longer and less \nuncomfortably under a fascist regime. In any case, there is essential identity \nof motive,\u2014to appropriate what does not belong to them. Perhaps, as Mr. \nWalter Lippmann suggests, the fascist powers \u201chave converted the struggle \nbetween Haves and Have Nots at home into a struggle between Haves and \nHave Nots in international affairs\u201d, while the Communists still concentrate on \nthe fomenting of class strife within each nation. \n\nHowever, whatever may be the various phases of collective greed, the modem \ncivilized order is threatened in its very life by a \u201crevolt of the masses\u201d delib\u00ac \nerately incited by \u201cintellectuals\u201d, and by politicians seeking their own aggran\u00ac \ndizement. As Gustave Le Bon has made clear, the individual incorporated in \na mob, is capable of crimes which he would not commit in his normal \u201cisolated\u201d \nstate. To-day there are multitudes who seem to have surrendered what little \nindividual character they may have had, and who have, as it were, blended \ntheir identity with that of the mob to which they belong. There are thousands \nof such mobs, or \u201cpressure groups\u201d, loose in the world, mobilized for plunder. \nWhen they attain their ends through political agents, the result is, as we have \n\n\n\n\nNOTES AND COMMENTS \n\n\niS \n\n\nnoted, most frequently called a \u201cplanned economy\u201d. One is reminded of a \ncomment in Petrie\u2019s Revolutions of Civilization: \n\nWhen democracy has attained full power, the majority without capital necessarily \neat up the capital of the minority, and the civilization steadily decays, until the inferior \npopulation is swept away to make room for a fitter people. The consumption of all the \nresources of the Roman Empire, from the second century when democracy was dominant, \nuntil the Gothic kingdom arose on its ruins, is the best known example in detail. \n\nThe Mediaeval Conception of Society \n\nThe Goths were themselves not averse to loot and plunder when they entered \nthe Roman domain. But after they had become settlers there, they revealed \na capacity for hard work which must have astonished the natives who had \nbeen living for generations upon the savings of others. The same phenomenon \nwas repeated in many parts of the stricken empire, notably in Gaul after the \narrival of the Franks. Thus a new civilization, the mediaeval, was born from \nthe ashes of the old, in many ways copied from ancient models, but still essen\u00ac \ntially sui generis and unique. It grew through the accumulation of capital, \nthat is, of goods produced by labour and sacrifice, and used to promote the \nproduction of other goods instead of being consumed on the spot. \n\nThe Middle Ages had plenty of defects and disadvantages, nor was mankind \nmore immune then than now to vice and brutality and stupidity. But under\u00ac \nlying and supporting mediaeval civilization, even in its debased forms, was a \nmagnificent idea, a conception of Nature, which lives in its religion and philos\u00ac \nophy and art, and which had a profound influence upon the organization of its \nsociety. \n\nAccording to this conception, Nature is a hierarchy comprising all beings \nin a graduated order from the highest to the lowest. It is the proper function \nof each being to serve those above it in the hierarchy, and to protect those \nbelow. At the summit of this host is the Divinity, the Eternal God, who pro\u00ac \ntects all and whom all should serve; and because the life of all creatures emanates \nfrom Him, the least manifestation of that life has a certain dignity, a certain \nnobility of ultimate origin, which commands wonder and respect. \n\nIt is this majestic view of the universe which is reflected in the sculptures of \nthe cathedrals, as it is also mirrored in the constitution of mediaeval society \nwhich represents an attempt\u2014in part, at least, a conscious and inspired attempt \n\u2014to imitate in the social order the divine order of Nature. One remembers \nthe words of a Master of the Great Lodge during the last century: \u201cBut you \nmust know and remember one thing\u2014we but follow and servilely copy Nature \nin her works.\u201d This sentence might have served as a motto expressing the \nideal which the mediaeval genius sought to embody. \n\nThe guild system, the orders of craftsmen, the feudal hierarchy with the \nconsecrated monarch at its head, were intended to be as interdependent, as \ncomp\u00aeientary, as the divisions of the heavenly host. The extraordinary \nfact is that although the Middle Ages had what might be called a planned \neconomy, it was an economy planned in subordination, not to personal envy \n\n\ni6 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nand fancy, but to a vision of the fundamental nature of things. The primary \ncharacteristic of the whole construction is that a place was reserved for every\u00ac \none who was willing to work and, first of all, to prepare himself for better work \nby a long apprenticeship. The individual was free to exercise his profession \nin the state to which it had pleased God to call him. But whether he were a \ncoppersmith or a knight, he was expected to exercise his right to work in con\u00ac \njunction with his duty to serve his superiors and to protect his inferiors. \n\nThe religious order, embodied in the Church, completed the secular order. \nThe ideal, as Dante and others conceived it, was that, by the force of con\u00ac \ntemplation and consecrated action, the religious order should transmit and make \nexplicit to men the design of Divine Nature. The Church failed, partly because \nit lost faith in its own mission, partly because its leaders were distracted by \nworldly ambitions. The secular order of the Middle Ages could not survive \nthe collapse of the religious order, for the spectacle of the Divine Hierarchy \nwhich had inspired it, faded away. \n\nMoral Rules and Natural Laws \n\nA student of Theosophy can conceive of only one conclusion: men must \nlive by certain fundamental principles, if they are to live at all. There is a \n\u201cscientific basis of ethics\u201d. Moral rules, in so far as they are really efficacious, \ncorrespond to natural laws, which are absolute, implacable and immutable. \n\u201cThe things which give birth to harmony and peace\u201d, said Spinoza, \u201care those \nwhich have reference to justice, equity and honourable dealing.\u201d Nothing \nwhich is persistently unjust, inequitable, dishonourable, can endure in the \nuniverse. \n\nCertainly there is a distinction between the justice of men and the justice \nof God. The moral rules which prevail at any time or place, are incomplete, \nimperfect, subject to constant amendment and improvement. But the basic \nrules and customs which endure from generation to generation, have the sanc\u00ac \ntion of experience and experiment. They have what biologists call \u201csurvival \nvalue\u201d. Their very persistence testifies to their validity, and measures their \nconformity to the eternal standards prescribed by Nature for the human king\u00ac \ndom. The modern mind is too often educated to believe that our conceptions \nof good and evil can be changed at will to suit convenience and expediency. \nA man can become more just and honourable to-morrow than he is to-day, \nbecause he is capable of expanding infinitely his understanding of the ideal of \njustice. However, the growth of understanding is an organic process, including \nin each successive increase, the essence of all past discoveries of truth. The \ngentleman has a more refined standard of honesty than the ordinary man; \nbut he does not reject what is worthy in the ordinary man\u2019s standard; he does \nnot regard petty larceny as justifiable merely because his ideal of honour does \nnot condone modes of behaviour which seem to others innocent and harmless. \n\nAn individual or a society, which deliberately despises the laws of Nature \nrevealed by experience, must repent or perish. If our civilization finally lapse \ninto such chaos that no endeavour of God or man can save it, it will be de- \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nNOTES AND COMMENTS i 7 \n\nstroyed, and a new civilization will take its place. But let us have no illusions. \nThis \u201cnew world\u201d, if it come, will not be a \u201cnew deal\u201d. The natural law of all \nworlds is the same, without change or turning, now and for ever. \n\n\nThe Firm Establishment of the Law \n\nThere are the words of Krishna in the Gita: \u201cWhenever there is a withering \nof the law, O son of Bharata, and an uprising of lawlessness, then I manifest \nmyself. For the salvation of the righteous, and the destruction of such as do \nevil, for the firm establishment of the Law I come to birth in age after age.\u201d \n\nAccording to a universal tradition, the \u201cGods\u201d intervene actively in the \naffairs of men when there is a grave crisis of civilization. Theosophy identifies \nthese \u201cGods\u201d with the Masters of the Great Lodge, the <ffite of humanity, \nthe assemblage of those who, like the Buddha and the Christ, have conquered \nunwisdom and mortality, and who labour, century after century, to lift man\u00ac \nkind towards their own state of freedom and enlightenment. But they labour \nin vain, unless individuals living in the world respond to them. It is the theme \nof the scriptures of all races and ages, that the \u201cLords of Compassion\u201d are in \ndesperate need of helpers on the plane where we live. \n\nIf a sufficient number of individuals answer the call of the Great Lodge \nto-day, the mediaeval dream of a spiritual order within and above the secular \norder can be realized, in a degree which Dante himself could scarcely have \nimagined as possible. The vision of the Divine Hierarchy, the model for all \nearthly societies, would be renewed and clarified. But one may suggest that \nbetween the mediaeval dream and the reality, there must be this distinction: \nthe members of a real spiritual order are\u2014if we understand correctly\u2014not \nnecessarily recognized as such by the world, nor are they necessarily with\u00ac \ndrawn, save in the freedom of their spirit, from the world, nor do they, in any \nsense, constitute a \"vested interest\u201d like the medieval Church. The outer \nactivities of the \u201cspiritual man\u201d may frequently be indistinguishable from \nthose of the \u201csecular man\u201d. It is part of his purpose to touch the commerce \nof mankind, even in its humblest and most commonplace details, with the^ \nspirit of consecration. Nothing that can become just, equitable and honour-^ \nable, not even our daily business of buying and selling, can possibly be a matter \nof indifference to the soul. How can there be a \u201cfirm establishment of the \nLaw\u201d, unless the soul, the Higher Self, be in command of all the inner and \nouter activities of the human being? \n\nSomeone will say: \u201cBut there is so little that I can do\u201d. There is something \nwhich everyone can do. Surrounded by false ideas, he can seek and find true \nideas and embody them. He can begin almost anywhere, even with economics, \nas we have tried to show. \u201cThere is no Religion higher than Truth.\u201d What \ncan limit the power of a true idea, firmly held in the mind, to affect the thought \ncurrents of a century ? A glorious opportunity to work for and with the powers \nof thqgjpirit is open to anyone who loves truth and righteousness more than \nhe loves his life. \n\n\nFRAGMENTS \n\n\nT HERE are dark days, saith one, days of an intolerable sadness; days of \nexhaustion both of mind and body, the exhaustion of a ceaseless conflict, \nof a steadily losing battle. The whole nature becomes numb, steeped \nin an overwhelming gloom. There is need for swift, decisive action, and no \nleast idea what that action should be; or all the mistakes and blunders of the \npast seem tied in inextricable knots about one\u2019s feet, making the required \naction appear impossible. And when in answer to the desperate cries of our \nhearts only the mocking echoes of them return to us, we are tempted to despair. \n\nWho has not known the bitterness of such hours! None, save those who \nhave never lived. \n\nBut, 0 soul, be not deceived! Here lies thine hour of glorious opportunity; \nin it is wrapped the answer to all thy prayers', the gift of gifts thou so long hast \ncoveted, the priceless pearl thou knowest well to be worth all other possessions. \n\nLook for the Warrior, eternal and sure; let him fight in thee. He is thyself , \nthough he has been buried hitherto beneath the rubbish of thine ordinary life. \nThis is his hour\u2014his hour to awake and live; therefore thine hour also to live. \n\nThus thinking of him, dost thou not feel him stirring within, girding on his \narmour; does not thy pulse begin to beat with his, full of ardour for the con\u00ac \nflict, full of power to conquer\u2014the power of the Grace of God? He beholds \nthe legions of angels that support him, he sees the Great Commander who \nsmiles triumphantly and beckons. Go thou with him, confident, unafraid. \nGo to victory by his side remembering that he is thyself, even while the mists \nof life, like blinding tears, obscure thine eyes, and the truth is hidden from \nthem. He is eternal truth, and that truth shall make thee free. So at the day \nof the great peace, the peace that comes when thou hast \u201centered\u201d, thou shalt \nknow, in joyous certainty, that which perhaps is only faith to-day,\u2014his oneness \nwith thee; for all faith in Reality brings its sure reward in realization. \n\nJoin step beside him as the swinging ranks march forward radiant in the \nlight that shines from the Master\u2019s face. Thy conflict is the Warrior\u2019s conflict, \nand his conflict is the Master\u2019s. To that thou must go with heart aflame to \nwin for Him the Day of His Great Peace. Cav\u00a3. \n\n\n18 \n\n\n\nWAR \n\n\nThe Lord is a Man of War \n\n\nEITHER war nor religion can be understood unless it be recognized \n\n\n\nthat the human spirit seeks and serves values dearer to it than com- \n\n\n^ fort, or life, or any personal gain. The decline of religion and the in\u00ac \ncrease of pacifism are twin phenomena, each arising from the mind\u2019s failure \nto hold to the spirit\u2019s loyalties, and the consequent mental deification of ease \nand security. Good and kindly people are particularly prone to such perverted \nhumanitarianism, which belies the essential and deepest characteristic of hu\u00ac \nmanity, and it has become one of the definite occupational diseases of pro\u00ac \nfessional social workers. But even those who shun sentimentality, and whose \npacifism is anything but cowardice, either for themselves or for those they \nlove, still indulge in very wishful thinking regarding war; and from this, move\u00ac \nment after movement arises, all of them admirably intentioned, but all of them \ninviting, by their declared unwillingness to fight, the very evils they are designed \nto avoid. Their proponents argue that as men have outgrown personal, physical \ncombat, so nations should do the same, learning to settle their \u201cdisputes\u201d as \ndo private individuals. They would have everything settled by reason and \nlaw, by courts and conference, commissions and compromise. They refuse to \nface the ugly facts of the existence of evil and lunacy, which will recognize \nreason only as it may be made to further their unreasoned ends, and which, \nhaving in heart and will broken the moral law, will respect no other, nor be \nrestrained by any pacts, nor anything but force. Those who have once faced \nthese facts, whether in their own nature or in the world around them, can \nnever again use the language of pacifism. The warfare between good and evil, \nmadness and sanity, in which all that the soul values is assailed and put in \nmortal jeopardy, cannot be viewed as a \u201cdispute\u201d\u2014the word loved of pacifists \n\u2014that can be hushed by \u201cgetting together\u201d around a tea table, reconciled by \nconference, or compromised by concessions. It is war. \n\nAnd there was war in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon; \nand the dragon fought and his angels, and prevailed not: neither was their place found \nany more in heaven. And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the \nDevil and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world; he was cast out into the and \n\nhis angels were cast out with him. And I heard a loud voice saying in heaWi, Now \nis come salvation and strength and the kingdom of our God and the power of his Christ; \nfor the accuser of our brethren is cast down, . . . and they loved not their lives unto \nthe death. \n\nBlessed are the peacemakers. But it is only so that peace can be made. \nIt can exist only in the heart that has warred against the hosts of evil in itself, \nuntil it has cast them out as something other than itself. Then, when their \nplace is no more in the heart but outside it, when the warfare is externalized as \nwith a recognized and foreign foe, then in the heart of the warrior is peace. \n\n\n\n\n\n20 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nSo long as there is evil in my own nature, there must be war there. So long \nas selfishness, for example, makes me prefer my own good to another\u2019s, so \nthat I am willing to seek advantage for myself at the expense of others, there is \nsomething in me which is in rebellion against the divine Law, something which \nwars against my divine nature and violates the sanctities of my soul. Against \nit my soul must war, or stultify itself. This being the inner reality, its inverted \nimage must be projected upon the screen of outer manifestation. There must \nbe occasions prompting me to selfishness, which array, in sharp conflict, the \ngood and evil in me. And if the evil triumph habitually, silencing conscience, \nso that I identify myself with my selfishness and follow its promptings, it is \nonly that which hurts my selfishness that can restrain me. I will listen only to \nfear or force; for my whole attitude proclaims my rejection of morality. \n\nThis, which is so clearly obvious in the individual, is equally true of nations. \nSo long as there is the selfishness that prefers what it deems self-interest to \ndivine Law, it will not be held back by any theoretical respect for human law. \nIt will take what it wants for itself, callous to the harm it works to others, \nunless it be restrained by fear or force,\u2014fear prompted by the show of force. \nThe exertion of that force is war; and the choice is restricted to it, or to sub\u00ac \nmission to evil, unless the force on the side of the Right be so overwhelming \nand at hand that the mere show of it commands surrender. \u201cWhen a strong \nman armed, keepeth his palace, his goods are in peace.\u201d But when a stronger \ncome upon him, or one who thinks himself such, then there is war. There can \nbe no escape from war, no substitute for force, in the life of the Spirit. \u201cThe \nLord is a man of war.\u201d \n\nLet us assume that there is a lunatic at large. Selfishness, that is willing \nto go the lengths of robbery and oppression and murder to gain its supposed \ngood, is in itself a kind of lunacy. There is no use arguing with a lunatic. He \nmay be but temporarily insane, but while his lunacy is on him, there is but \none thing to do: you must restrain him. You must capture and confine him, \nfor the protection of those he would victimize, and for his own protection against \nhimself. After he has been restrained you may try to cure him. You may \nget the best of doctors\u2014and it may be hoped they will be something more \nthan vague sentimentalists\u2014but while he is mad you will not put trust in his \nwords, unless you, too, are mad. He is mad so long as he is bent on breaking the \nmoral law. While he will contravene that, he will contravene everything but force. \n\nConsider Mussolini. Having done much for Italy, his accomplishments and \nposition went to his head. It was inevitable that they should have; for he was \nnever consecrated, and the sequence he followed has been the course of un\u00ac \nconsecrated power through all of history,\u2014ambition growing with achieve\u00ac \nment. Partly from an innate and ardent patriotism, in the belief that it would \nbe for Italy\u2019s good, in providing raw materials, the ability to expand, and an \nopportunity for needed economic recovery; partly to take the country\u2019s thought \nfrom its internal difficulties, and thus to safeguard his party position; partly \nconfusing self with country,\u2014he starts his raid on Ethiopia, to see how far \nhe can go. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nWAR \n\n\n21 \n\n\nEngland, which has a sense of justice (when her own self-interest does not \nlead her to abandon or deny it), made her gesture in the Mediterranean. But \nin doing it, she revealed both to herself and to Italy that she was not ready, \nwas not prepared, either in her armament or in the temper of her people, actually \nto fight. Geneva considered and conferred and voted, but even more than \nEngland made it clear that Italy need fear nothing from the League. And \nMussolini, seeing these things, called England\u2019s bluff, and pressed on to a \ncomplete conquest, far beyond what he had at first deemed possible. Ethiopia \nwas slaughtered, while Eden shuttled back and forth, and Geneva talked. \n\nMussolini was not restrained by pacts. Italy had signed the Briand-Kellogg \npact outlawing war, and had pledged herself at Locarno, and to the League, \nand in many \u201cgentlemen\u2019s agreements\u201d. Germany was not restrained in 1914 \nby her pledges to Belgium. Japan is not restrained to-day in China. No country, \ndominated by a selfishness that is exalted above justice and the moral law, \nhas ever been, or ever will be, restrained by written agreements or formal \ntreaties, for the only authority of these is in the moral law which is itself \ndefied. The only restraint the lunatic recognizes is that of force. \n\nThe lesson has been written too large to be misread. It was the pacifism \nthat dominated Geneva, the ghastly pretence that words could be substituted \nfor deeds, the inability or unwillingness of England and France to resort to \nforce in the Mediterranean, that caused Ethiopia\u2019s overthrow. Ethiopia trusted \nin law, in pacts, in the League, in covenants, in avoidance of offence, in justice \nand sanity,\u2014in all that the pacifists rightly maintain should rule the dealings \nof men and nations; but which never will, while justice and sanity seek \u201cpeace\u201d \nwith militant evil and lunacy. Similarly, in China, Japan knows that no force \nwill be brought against her, save China\u2019s own; and Japan deems herself stronger \nthan China because better armed and better prepared. So notes are exchanged \ninterminably, and Japan presses on. Had England and France been armed \nand ready, had the Mediterranean been stiff with their warships, the sky black \nwith their air-planes, Egypt garrisoned, Malta impervious, and the French \nand English people equally prepared in spirit and ready to fight, there would \nhave been no need to fight. Before such a show of force, and the conviction \n\n\nthat, if need be, it would be used, Mussolini would have withdrawn. ThtfB \nwould have been no war, either in Africa, or the Mediterranean, or in Europe^jli \nall probability not even in China. Ethiopia would have been saved, the Le^ue \nsaved, justice and respect for pacts and the given word, saved. \n\nFrom it all, one good thing has come, since even evil is turned by the great \nLords of Karma ultimately to its own undoing and the service of the good. \nEngland, in her humiliation, has learned, or at least begun to learn, her lesson, \nand has started to arm. By this she has done something to atone for Italy; \nfor it was Italy that taught her, and the good Karma of this gain in England\u2019s \nwisdom is therefore Italy\u2019s. \n\nThus over the whole world it has been written that so long as there is evil \nin the hearts of men and nations, it will work its way, unless there be force \ntypist it, and the willingness to employ that force. It is a mistake to think \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n22 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nthat in their individual relations men have outgrown the need for force\u2014the \ntacit, if not explicit, premise upon which so many pacifist arguments are based. \nBehind the courts and the law there stand the police, the militia, the army, \nand without these to enforce the law, the courts, and the law itself, would be \nuseless and impotent. And the police, let it be remembered, must not only \nbe ceaselessly vigilant, but must be ready at any instant to meet force with \nforce, to put duty before anything of self, and, if need be, to take the lives of \nothers or to lay down their own, that the law may be preserved inviolate. Some \ntalk as though an international police force could be armed with night sticks, \nor merely with white gloves as a symbol of \u201cauthority\u201d. They must be an \narmy, ready at any moment for war, better armed, more powerful, more ready \nto exercise force, than the army of any nation, so that no nation could stand \nagainst them. \n\nThere are two kinds of preparedness and force, material and spiritual. Both \nare needed. There must be both arms and the willingness to use them, to \nkill and to be killed when necessary. It is useless to be armed if you advertise \nto all men that you are unwilling to use your arms, that they are no more than \na show, and that when faced by one who will respect nothing but force, you \nwill \u201cback down\u201d, seek compromise, resort to many words and pretexts for \ndoing nothing. \n\nThis brings us to the Christian pretexts, which so belie Christ\u2019s life and char\u00ac \nacter, taking from their context his teaching to his disciples for their conduct \ntowards each other. But even so, it is the soldier, rather than the pacifist, \nwho interposes his cheek to the blow of evil, that it may not fall upon the \ninnocent. It is rare that the soldier fights primarily in defence of himself. If \nit be his own safety and welfare that dominate him, the chances are large \nthat he would never have enlisted, or that he will run away, and will fight \nonly when, like a rat, he is cornered and can run no further. The soldier does \npresent his own cheek to be smitten, rather than let the blow fall on women \nand children, the helpless and the wronged. And if he be not willing to do this, \nit will be sensed by others, most directly and surely by those whom he should \noppose, and no matter how powerful be his material armament it will avail him \nnothing. He is not \u201cprepared\u201d; his spirit is a coward spirit; he will be brushed \naside, and evil will pass on and triumph, as though he were not there. \n\nIf we are still in any doubt of this, we need do no more than look back over \n\u2022our own diplomatic correspondence of the past months. On September 5th, \nthe headlines of the New York Times proclaimed our foreign policy with regard \nto Japan\u2019s continued invasion of China. \u201cFirm Tone is Taken. Far Eastern \nPolicy Aims to Impress Japan, Reich and Italy. Pacts\u2019 Sanctity Backed. \nWashington Would Show the Militarists They Can\u2019t Win Objectives by \nDefault. But Resolute Attitude Does Not Seek to Lead This Country One \nInch Toward War.\u201d In view of that last sentence, just what does all the \nrest mean? What attention should be paid to a \u201cfirm tone\u201d, a \u201cresolute \nattitude\u201d, a \u201csterner purpose\u201d (as set forth in the text from Washington), which \nit is proclaimed, with most unmistakable sincerity, will under no circumstances \n\n\n\n\n\nWAR \n\n\n23 \n\n\nbe backed by force? Japan\u2019s answer was, none at all: and so was Italy\u2019s, and \nGermany\u2019s. \n\nIt can, at least, be said of England that she was stung by her humiliation. \nSo far, we have remained serenely oblivious of ours. The shining self-compla\u00ac \ncency of Washington continues to beam, unspotted and undimmed, upon the \nworld. \n\nAt basis, therefore, outer war will be necessary just so long as there is inner \nwar between good and evil; for the outer world is but the projection of the \ninner. The soldier is he who subordinates safety, comfort, self-interest, to the \nfurtherance of a good he puts above self, and for which he is willing to die. If \nhe is willing to die for it, he will not turn from it for any pleading of self. If \nhe be not willing to die for it, the enemy will sense the existence of his limits, \nand, pushing him to them, will triumph over him. If England arms merely in \nself-interest, Mussolini has but to manoeuvre properly to gain once more his own \nway, making it seem to England\u2019s advantage as well as to Italy\u2019s. \n\nWar, as we set forth in the beginning, thus compels man to face the fact \nthat there are spiritual values that transcend all material values\u2014things dearer \nand of greater moment to him than his own existence. He can fight only in \nthat realization, and that realization and temper are an essential part of arma\u00ac \nment and preparedness. No man can achieve the triumph of right who sets \nlimits to what he will suffer in defence of it. To realize that war is of this char\u00ac \nacter is to be lifted for ever beyond the contemptible futility and cowardice of \nthe pacifists\u2019 \u201cneutrality\u201d and effort to reduce all conflict to the level of \u201cdis\u00ac \nputes\u201d. The \u201cdispute\u201d between the gangsters and the bank they shoot up \nand loot; the \u201cdispute\u201d between the kidnapper and the baby or his tortured \nparents; the \u201cdispute\u201d between the criminal lunatic and the child he attacks \nand murders. It is not the teaching of Christ that other children be offered the \nmadman as another cheek, to appease his murderous lust. \n\nTo expect suffering, hardship, loss, difficulty, death, for oneself and for \nthose we love, to face this and to go forward without fear or anxious foreboding, \ncheerful and happy and enjoying to the full the good we meet, resolved taiieal \nrightly and manfully with whatever we encounter, but by nothing to be 4Brned \naside\u2014this is the temper in which life should be approached and lived. It is \nthe temper of the ch&a, and of the soldier. It is the temper of the soul that \nhas been forged in the Master\u2019s warfare. G.B. \n\n\nHe who runs away from one cross will meet a bigger one on his road .\u2014 Philip \nNeri. \n\n\n\nCYCLIC LAW IN BIOLOGY \n\n\nHERE is an aspect of the theosophical teaching which, in view of the \n\n\n\npresent condition of the world, has, I am sure, occupied a prominent \n\n\nplace in our thoughts of late. It is the doctrine of cycles. Almost at \nthe beginning of the Movement we find it assuming a leading position in the \nTheosophical philosophy. Sinnett had questioned one of the Masters about \nthe curious uprush of civilization which seemed so remarkable in the recent \nhistory of the West, and the query called forth a highly interesting explanation \nof the law of cycles as it applies to changing civilizations. Later came the \nfuller teaching about rounds and races. We know too, that various scholars, \nnotably Flinders-Petrie, Spengler and Berdyaev, have offered a similar inter\u00ac \npretation of the rise and decline of nations, which, like organic beings, appear \nto traverse a natural cycle of birth and growth to be followed by decline and \n\n\nsenility. \n\n\nFor us the subject receives an added and poignant interest from a definite \nremark made by Mr. Judge in The Ocean of Theosophy where, in a general dis\u00ac \ncussion of cyclic law, he pointed out that a cycle was ending in 1898, and that \nthe new one destined to succeed it would be marked by social or geological \nchanges, or perhaps by both. There are hints in Madame Blavatsky\u2019s writings \ntoo, of ominous things waiting for humanity around the comer of the Century \nto come: things that might be measurably warded off if the theosophical phil\u00ac \nosophy, and above all the theosophical life, could become widespread, breaking \nthe grip of materialism, ameliorating the moral atmosphere, and giving men a \nrational basis for ethics. \n\nTo-day we are living in the world which our leaders saw approaching, and \nwhile it would be rash to say that their hopes have not and cannot be realized, \nyet, on the other hand, nothing is to be gained by refusal to face the facts, or by \nadopting a fatuous optimism in regard to what is going on to-day in Western \ncivilization. It hardly looks now as though that civilization were destined to \nbe a heaven in the twenty-first century compared to what it was in the nine\u00ac \nteenth, as Madame Blavatsky had hoped that it might be. \n\nOur Theosophical body is a small one\u2014betrayals and traitorous attacks have \nseen to that. The organism bom of the Lodge was weakened, and was not able \nto do the work it might have done otherwise. But, weak or strong, The Theo\u00ac \nsophical Society faces the future, and assuredly anything which can help its \nmembers to a clearer understanding will be so much to the good. \n\nAt the outset let us ask if Mr. Judge\u2019s words are in process of fulfilment. \nWhat about the impending geological changes? Is there any evidence that \nsuch are in action about us? Floods? We have had them before, all through \nour history. Open winters? There is nothing particularly new about that. \nHowever, there is one meteorological fact that may possess significance in this \n\n\n24 \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCYCLIC LAW IN BIOLOGY \n\n\n25 \n\n\nconnection. I refer to the recurrent droughts and dust storms in the West. \nIn itself it may seem a phenomenon merely temporary and local, but taken in \nconnection with a note which recently appeared in the journal, Asia , it con\u00ac \nceivably takes on another colour. For it is reported there that rainfall has been \nincreasing in the Gobi Desert to such an extent of late years that the nomad \ninhabitants are thinking of agriculture. Quite possibly the two details are \nrelated\u2014perhaps the wind currents are shifting, so that the drought of our \nWestern country is counterbalanced by increasing precipitation in Asia. Me\u00ac \nteorologists begin to suspect that comparable climatic shifts are rather frequent. \nFor example, the Arizona-New Mexico region, as attested by the remains of \naboriginal settlements, must have borne a much denser population in quite \nrecent historical times than it could now possibly support, and Yucatan, at \npresent a place of pestilent swamps and strangling jungle, could hardly have \ndeveloped a vigorous and healthy people if its climate in earlier centuries had \nbeen that of the same region to-day. \n\nBut without stressing the geological phase any further, let us pass to the \nother aspect of Mr. Judge\u2019s words. Do I need to bring forward evidence to \nprove the fact that social changes of enormous magnitude have appeared since \nthe century opened? Nations are falling under ruthless dictatorships and re\u00ac \nverting to paganism; they are carrying on bloody civil wars, and flaming out \ninto struggles between employers and employed. We see a bewildering chaos \nwhere the lines between good and evil are often so vaguely drawn that one\u2019s \nsympathies are tossed back and forth. We are distressed by the vacillation \nwhich marks the official policies of those whose duty it is to carry the banner \nof the White Lodge. The children of evil so often seem to be wiser than the \nchildren of light. They at least know what they want and go after it. \n\nSo the great social change which Mr. Judge predicted is in process of ac\u00ac \ncomplishing itself. Do we possibly discern also the grim outline of the Terreur \nto which Madame Blavatsky referred? \n\nMr. Johnston used to call H. G. Wells a psychic. Now a psychic often senses- \nmore strongly than other people just the sort of storm which is now raging, \nand in recent book reviews we are notified of Mr. Wells\u2019s latest lucubration. \nHe has discovered that fear is invading the world\u2014a fear that drives mtftfto \nmadness because they have finally realized that they cannot chain the '^ive \nman\u201d, and that the Terreur is approaching. As the reviewer shrewdly says: \nwhat matter whether we call it the cave man with science, or the old Adam of \ntheology\u2014the fact remains a fact. Mr. Wells has been pretty accurate before \nnow in catching wireless waves from the particular region of space on which he \n\u201ctimes in\u201d, and we may add his testimony to what our own healthy senses report. \n\nIf this be true, if civilization, indeed, is disintegrating under our eyes, it will \nprofit us in the first instance to learn what we can about the laws under which \nsuch movements occur, and, in the second place, to examine the means by \nwhich a rout may possibly be converted, at least in part, into a final victory. \n\ni cannot hope to cover the subject exhaustively. I have not the time, and \nw less, the knowledge requisite for such a task. But I can, perhaps, bring x \n\n\n26 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nsmall contribution from the field of biology to bear on the problem; and so I \npropose that we should examine the principles which underlie other organic \ncycles where the curve of development is more fully and more clearly revealed. \nFor the law of cycles is universal; it pertains to all organic systems. One and \nall, they rise from small beginnings, increase in power to their maturity, and then \ndecline into old age and death. The upcurve involves active assimilation and \ngrowth; the downcurve is characterized by dissimilation and dispersal of energy. \n\nNow when we speak of organic systems, we do not refer to plants and animals \nonly. It is becoming increasingly apparent that the concept of organism must \nbe extended to include the totality of manifestation. The manifestation may \nbe physical or metaphysical; it may compass a solar system or a sunflower or \nthe genius of a nation. All existences, everything which can be seen and touched, \neverything which can be thought of as formed or unformed, are living and organic. \nIf we allow the expression, \u201corganic evolution\u201d, to apply specifically to the \nphyletic development of plants and animals, it is only a concession to an un\u00ac \nfortunate historical accident which led our scientific predecessors to draw an \nunwarranted distinction between the realms of the living and the non-living. \nSuch, then, is our first proposition: that all systems are living and organic, and \nthat all systems are in process of evolutionary development. \n\nTo this proposition we must add the concept of \u201cholism\u201d. All organic sys\u00ac \ntems are multiple in their structure, yet within the multiplicity lies an over\u00ac \nruling unity. As we often phrase it: \u201cThere is a unity behind the manifested \ndiversity.\u201d So a man\u2019s body or a plant\u2019s body is a diversity of functioning \nparts, harmonized, integrated and ruled over by a governing centre. And these \nparts in their turn are wholes. The hand\u2014a part of the body\u2014is an elaborate \ncombination of muscles, bones, nerves and blood vessels, all effectively serving \nthe function of prehension. Moreover, though they may be definitely subordi\u00ac \nnated to the higher whole, each one of them possesses a peculiar autonomy and \nis relatively independent in its rate of evolution. \n\nTwo familiar tendencies express themselves in every organic system. One is \ncentripetal; it is the urge toward sloth and the continued repetition of a familiar \nactivity along well-worn grooves of habit. It comes out of the past; it rests in \nlife already experienced; it resists the expansive pressure of the life-impulse. \nIt may come into almost complete control, whereupon life stagnates and con\u00ac \nsciousness sinks into automatism. There are numerous examples of delayed \nraces among the plants and animals. The brachiopod Lingula , for instance, has \nbeen repeating itself in the mudflats of Chesapeake Bay since the Cambrian \nPeriod. The molluscs, the Crustacea, the starfishes, and dozens of other such \nminor races still run their weary cycles but appear to go nowhere. \n\nBut the centripetal tendency is matched by its opposite which constitutes \nthe other pole of the dualism. This is the centrifugal tendency; it moves into \nthe future; it drives the organism toward the new and the untried. Western \ncivilization to-day is suffering from a highly explosive excess of this power, \nwhich reveals itself in an abnormal tendency of the elements to escape from \nholistic control and to drive apart. It is here that we come face to face with \n\n\n\n\n\nCYCLIC LAW IN BIOLOGY \n\n\n27 \n\n\na certain theory of government which is now centred in Washington. The \nTheosophical Society does not enter into politics, but it has a perfect right to \nexamine political systems from the basis of the principles upon which they \nrest. The present movement in government is hailed by the so-called liberals \nas progress. I do not believe that it is truly such, and I think it can be shown \nthat upon a strictly biological, holistic basis, the movement parallels a phe\u00ac \nnomenon which generally appears when organisms are undergoing racial \nsenescence. At such times the higher centre appears progressively to lose its \ncontrol, and the lesser microcosms of the body start forward into abnormal \ndevelopment without reference to the good of the associated systems. The \nIrish elk offers an illustration. Its enormous horns, developed beyond all rea\u00ac \nson, must have conduced to its speedy decline and death. A second example \nis seen in the saber-tooth tiger, unable to close its jaws over its terrible canine \nteeth. The later trilobites and the modern fishes both assume strange forms \nand exhibit overdeveloped and disproportionate appendages; the dinosaurs of \nthe closing Mesozoic were homed and hooded monsters. In all these instances \na part of the organism starts out on a career of \u201cself-expression\u201d, becoming, as \nit were, a parasite upon the whole in which it should be a co-operative unit. \n\nIt needs no particular insight to recognize in certain current and widespread \npsychological and social ills, a striking parallel to these zoological facts. Our \nasylums are crowded with pathetic, tormented creatures whose psychic life \nhas broken into fragments, while the constituent elementals, released from cen\u00ac \ntral control, proceed to wage war in the field of the inner nature. Long nour\u00ac \nished by their creators, these creatures, grown strong, have assaulted the re\u00ac \nstraining soul, each seeking to carry out the purpose\u2014all too often a sinful one \n\u2014which was originally laid upon it. These are they of whom Tennyson speaks: \n\nHe seemed like one that all in later time \nBegins to war against ill uses of a life, \n\nBut these from all his life arise and cry: \n\nThou hast made us lords and canst not put us down. \n\nApplying the same analysis to a theoretically declining civilization, we might \ndeduce certain facts and expect to witness just what we are witnessin^the \nloss of the sense of national unity, self-assertion of parts against the whole and \nagainst one another, struggles for special privileges, malicious accusations and \ncivil war. \n\nThe very thought has been set in poetic form by Macaulay, who contrasts \nthe older integrated, organic Rome with the declining senile State, tom by \nfactional strife: \n\nThen none were for a party; \n\nThen all were for the State; \n\nThen the great man helped the poor, \n\nAnd the poor man loved the great: \n\nThen lands were fairly portioned; \n\nThen spoils were fairly sold: \n\nThe Romans were like brothers \n\nIn the brave days of old. \n\n\n28 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nNow Roman is to Roman \nMore hateful than a foe, \n\nAnd the Tribunes beard the high, \n\nAnd the Fathers grind the low. \n\nAs we wax hot in faction, \n\nIn battle we wax cold; \n\nWherefore men fight not as they fought \nIn the brave days of old. \n\nIn all these instances we are dealing with the destruction of a holistic system \nwhich occurs when its lord is departing. The organism has either rejected its \nown soul, or it is rejected by the soul. In either case the work of its incarnation \nhas to be done all over again. Moreover, we cannot fail to see that its fate is \nsimilar to that of the physical body and the psychic nature at death. It is the \nsoul, the function, the purpose, the integrating self, which always holds the \nsystem together. When it departs, confusion overtakes the household, and the \nbuilding falls in ruins. \n\nThe small book, Through the Gates of Gold , has set forth the law as it applies \nto civilizations. Through the use of striking metaphors it makes clear how \nwith united efforts men have repeatedly rolled the stone of civilization up the \nhill of difficulty, only to see it slip back again into the valley. Or again, a ma\u00ac \ntured culture is compared to a full-blown flower with the petals but slackly held \ntogether. Either metaphor sets forth the law of disintegration which we have \nbeen considering; the soul withdraws, and the centrifugal forces tear the vehicle \nin pieces. A dark picture, and one that is haunting many a humanitarian as it \nis haunting Mr. H. G. Wells at this moment. \n\nMost happily, though this is the whole picture for Mr. Wells, it is not the \nwhole picture for The Gates of Gold. Mr. Wells is a materialist, and the real \nauthor of The Gates of Gold is \u201canything but\u201d! For wherever the doctrine of \ndeath and rebirth is taught, there also is taught the doctrine of liberation. \nEvolution is not a little up-and-down affair of the material world only; in its \nhighest expression it is a mighty cosmic process which sweeps the life-wave \naround a circle of seven globes which are \u201cin coadunation but not in consub- \nstantiality\u201d. It is not enough that organisms should whirl repeatedly through \ncycles of birth and death upon a single plane. The time must come when a \ncertain mode of manifestation must give way to a new life differing in kind \nfrom its predecessor. And though the masses are swept to their death along \nthe declining arc of their cycle, we know that the fittest survive. It is left then \nfor the individual at the apex of the wave of culture to resist the downpull of \nthe curve, and, identifying himself with the imperishable soul, to break the \ncycle and to set out on the path of the gods toward the spiritual kingdom. \nHere is no democracy, no whining sentimentalism about the \u201cunderprivileged\u201d. \nHere is a warrior doctrine for aristocrats! \n\nBut this doctrine is high and difficult for us; we find it a hard saying, though \nwe dimly perceive that it is truly the burden of the message of all wise men, and \nthe very heart of the Christian teaching. \n\n\n\n\nCYCLIC LAW IN BIOLOGY \n\n\n29 \n\n\nMoreover it has left its witness likewise among the lower organisms. For \nwhat is the keynote of evolution but the glorious truth that life has, indeed, \nperpetually escaped the net of death and outstripped its former records. De\u00ac \ncline of life and renewal of life in perpetual cycles on the same level\u2014that is \nnot the story. The song of Easter morning has been ringing for a hundred \nmillion years over this old earth! \n\nAccording to our present biological understanding, the line of plants and \nanimals started with the unicellular races\u2014the protozoans and the protophytes. \nIt was their destiny to pass to the multicellular state; they were to be lifted up \nto higher holistic systems: to enter upon a mode of life qualitatively different \nand far richer in content than anything which had gone before, anything offered \non the archaic level. They were to subordinate their small lives to a greater \nlife, to throw their lesser wills into vigorous co-operation with a mightier will. \nBut how few accomplished it! The majority were caught by the tendency to \ninertia and remained unicells. To be sure, they entered upon strange ways \nand evolved into extravagant and peculiar forms, but they preferred an increase \nin quantity to a change in quality, and, though they linger through the ages, they \nare failures of nature, fit only to be devoured by their advanced brethren. \n\nThe development of a multicellular Volvox -sphere was, on the contrary, a \nfact of high spiritual import. This little organism, a ball of ciliated cells, all \nmoving under a central control, is a revelation of spiritual law. Paraphrasing \n\u2022certain familiar words, we may say in very truth: Among those bom of the \nProtozoa there hath not arisen a greater than Paramecium, yet he who is least \namong the Volvocales is greater than he. The meaning is identical with the \noriginal thought which relates to John the Baptist. \n\nIn a slightly different way the miracle appeared again when plant and animal \nlife abandoned the water for the air. The water-world and the air-world stand \nto organisms in their evolution as a pair of superposed planes. The biologist \nbelieves that ages of aquatic life preceded the transfer from water to land. Life \nhad attained the level of the seaweeds and the fishes in the respective kingdoms. \nIt had accomplished all that was necessary to be accomplished at that lev^ \nAhead lay senseless repetition or\u2014a breath-taking adventure (literally). Am4^ \nthe primitive ganoid fishes arose certain individuals endowed with the spirit of \ngenius. They were tired of living in the water; already they tasted in their \nimaginations the sweet fruits which grew on the trees by the shore. They de\u00ac \nsired and willed ardently, and so striving, they sprouted out lungs from their \ngullets, dropped their gills, turned their fins into legs, and behold! a race of \nthree-eyed Stegocephalia crawling on their bellies in the marshes. But their \nfish relatives missed the chance; their time of opportunity had come and gone, \nand they remained in future ages water animals, unborn and without power,\u2014 \nruled by the ancient mode of life. Some, indeed, sought the dark and cold \nabuses of the ocean to become little else than terrible devouring mouths\u2014a \ndetail whose analogy it is not necessary to follow. \n\nIt is ever left for the individual to make the transition from plane to plane. \nFor what was The Theosophical Society founded? To make mild and lovely \n\n\n30 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\ncharacters \u201ctoo sweet for earth but not for heaven\u201d, as the New England tomb\u00ac \nstones have it? Well, that sort of an ideal may produce \u201ca fair atmosphere and \na happy future\u201d and a Devachan full of rosy dreams, but who wants to remain a \nfish, no matter how many iridescent fins and tails one may develop? We know \nthat our deeper Theosophy scorns such idle dreams. Our true ideal is to pass \nfrom the world of Caesar to the Kingdom of the Heavens, from a three-dimen\u00ac \nsional, temporal world to a four-space continuum where there shall be time no \nlonger. Use whatever illustration we may, one and all they carry the idea of \na complete transformation, a rejection of the old structure devised for life \nunder the old conditions, and the assumption of a new morphology adapted to \nlife in a world which is qualitatively different. \n\nTwo paths lie before us: along one of them modem science is urging us. If \nwe accede to that urge we shall do what the timid unicells and the stupid fishes \ndid: remain under the familiar conditions of our material and psychic worlds, \nseeking to remould them nearer to the heart\u2019s desire. Such is (or was) the \ndream of Mr. Wells, who formulated thereby the unexpressed ideal of almost \nevery modem learned man. In a recent cinema adaptation of one of his popular \nUtopias, where cities of glass rise to dizzy heights, where horrendous wheels \nand levers clang and clash and roar, we are allowed to witness the apotheosis \nof the Wellsian dream\u2014a young man and woman about to be shot into space \nfrom a great gun\u2014the first daring attempt at the conquest of other worlds. \nOr, to take another example from that popular book, Lost Horizons: a Chris\u00ac \ntian priest finds a favoured spot in Tibet where men do not die, but where life \nmay be prolonged through the centuries. Realizing all too painfully the im\u00ac \npending decline of Western civilization, he makes his monastery a repository \nfor all beautiful and precious things: porcelains, statuary, music\u2014hoping \nthereby to save at least this much from the universal ruin which is to come. \nI have heard men say that the book provoked nostalgia. But it is only the \nWellsian formula tricked out in finer clothes. It reveals a desperate desire to \ncling to things , and it matters not a whit that the things represent matter in \nits more aesthetically pleasing forms. Do not mistake me: we all value beauti\u00ac \nful things in a world which has become very ugly, not for themselves, but as \nrevelations of the Divine Beauty. For, back of the shadows thrown on the \nwall of the Cave, are the Divine Originals. So powerful in beauty are they \nthat even their reflections have strength to move us strangely. The porcelains \nand brocades must all perish in the cycles of the ages, but in our Father\u2019s House \nthey are preserved eternally in their noumenal realities. \n\nThe scientific dream is but a dazzling Maya \u2014just little fish dreaming about \nbigger fish with swifter fins and larger appetites. We are all familiar with \npictures in which a replica of the same scene is repeated again and again to \ninfinite regression. It may be a picture of a room on whose wall hangs a pic\u00ac \nture of the same room, on whose wall hangs ...\u00bb etc. Science is caught in \nthis kind of scheme. Probing with the microscope it follows the pictured re\u00ac \nflections inward; probing with the telescope it follows them outward, and \nit calls the journey scientific progress. Well, it is progress of a sort\u2014better \n\n\nCYCLIC LAW IN BIOLOGY \n\n\n3 i \n\n\nthan clinging to a single picture for ever. But a child playing with blocks is \nstill playing with blocks, even though it build up a cube measuring ten feet \non a side: volume is still volume and cubicity is still cubicity. If we might \nonly prevail upon science to leave its flat picture-world and turn its eyes to\u00ac \nward the real room. Its boasted wisdom is sciosophy (shadow knowledge), \nbut it controls the governmental, educational, economic, social, and well-nigh \nall the religious life of America. Its triumphs mean the progressive failure \nof evolution to bring to manifestation the truer and deeper life of the soul. \n\nBut there is another way\u2014the way those brave fishes took, and a human \nbeing is worth more than many fishes. It is the Way of chGlaship, the Way of \nLiberation. We may well close with the biological parallel which Oliver Wen\u00ac \ndell Holmes gave us in the fine lines of the \u201cChambered Nautilus\u201d: \n\nYear after year beheld the silent toil \nThat spread his lustrous coil; \n\nStill, as the spiral grew, \n\nHe left the past year\u2019s dwelling for the new, \n\nStole with soft step its shining archway through, \n\nBuilt up its idle door, \n\nStretched in his last-found home, \n\nAnd knew the old no more. \n\nThanks for the heavenly message brought by thee, \n\nChild of the wandering sea, \n\nCast from her lap, forlorn! \n\nFrom thy dead lips a clearer note is born \nThan ever Triton blew from wreathed horn! \n\nWhile on mine ear it rings, \n\nThrough the deep caves of thought \nI hear a voice that sings\u2014 \n\nBuild thee more stately mansions, 0 my soul, \n\nAs the swift seasons roll! \n\nLeave thy low-vaulted past! \n\nLet each new temple, nobler than the last, \n\nShut thee from heaven with a dome more vast, \n\nTill thou at length art free, \n\nLeaving thine outgrown shell \nBy life\u2019s unresting sea! \n\n/ \n\n\nR.E.T. \n\n0 \n\n\nThere is no virtue , properly speaking , without victory over ourselves ; and in \ngeneral that which costs nothing is worth nothing. \u2014J. de Maistre. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nTHE EMPEROR AKBAR \n\n\nSEEKER FOR TRUTH \n\n\nBAR, Emperor of India from 1556 to 1605, brought about the triumph \n\n\n\nof a fundamental principle of Theosophy,\u2014religious tolerance, in an \n\n\nintolerant age and nation. In this, consciously or unconsciously, he \nundoubtedly did the work of the Great Lodge. He is particularly interesting to \nmembers of The Theosophical Society, whose motto is \u201cThere is no religion \nhigher than Truth\u201d, because, though one of the greatest rulers that ever lived, \nhis dominant interest was inner, not outer; his passion was the search for \ntruth, which he sought ardently and in all ways throughout his life. He is also \ninteresting in himself, for he was a great man in every respect, just, generous, \nrecklessly courageous, chivalrous, high-minded, doing well whatever he put his \nhand to, and some things supremely well. Vincent Smith, who cannot be ac\u00ac \ncused of partiality toward Akbar, closes his history of him with the words: \u201cHe \nwas a bom king of men, with a rightful claim to rank as one of the greatest \nsovereigns known to history. That claim rests securely on the basis of his ex\u00ac \ntraordinary natural gifts, his original ideas, and his magnificent achievements.\u201d \nOur main interest, however, lies in him as a seeker for truth. Akbar was by \nnature a mystic, but, like such great Christian mystics as St. Teresa of Avila, \nSt. Ignatius Loyola, St. Catherine of Siena, and many others, he lived a life of \nintense outer activity, one which changed the face of history. \n\nFrom his early youth, Akbar dreamed a splendid vision of what he wished to \naccomplish for India. In place of a land tom by internal strife, divided into \nmany petty, hostile states constantly warring against one another, the weak \nalways in peril of conquest by the strong, the adherents of each religion regard\u00ac \ning as enemies to be persecuted those whose creed differed from their own,\u2014he \npictured an India at peace, a great confederation of states united under one \nEmperor as Overlord, but with each race and nation developing its own genius \nunder its own rulers, each man, Mahometan, Hindu, Sikh, Jain, Parsee, free to \nworship and to seek the truth as his own conscience might dictate. Religious \ntolerance was not an ideal widely held in either India or Europe in the sixteenth \ncentury. There had been bitter religious persecutions in India, as there had \nbeen the burning of heretics in Spain, the massacre of St. Bartholomew\u2019s Day \nand religious wars in France. Henry IV and the Edict of Nantes ended it for \nthe time being in France, and Akbar ended it for the time being in India, in both \ncases as the result of hard-won victories on the field of battle. \n\nThe death of his father Humayun, in January, 1556, left Akbar, at only thir\u00ac \nteen, as nominal sovereign of all Hindustan. Actually, however, he did not even \ncontrol the capital, Delhi. All he had was a precarious hold on a few districts \nof the Punjab, a small army of doubtful loyalty, and last but not least, a brilliant \ngeneral, Bairam Khan. There were three other claimants to the throne, one of \n\n\n32 \n\n\n\nTHE EMPEROR AKBAR \n\n\n33 \n\n\nwhom promptly occupied both Delhi and Agra. Akbar, though only a boy in \nyears, was already a skilful and experienced warrior, trained through the stormy \nperiod of his father\u2019s strife and exile to face adversity and superior forces with \ncourage and boldness. On this occasion, the enemy\u2019s forces were vastly superior, \nso much so that Akbar\u2019s advisers, with the important exception of Bairam Khan, \nurged him to give up the fight and retire to Kabul. Bairam Khan was strongly \nin favour of fighting it out, advice that accorded entirely with Akbar\u2019s own \ncourageous nature. Heavily outnumbered though they were, they advanced to \nmeet the opposing forces and gained a decisive victory. In less than two years, \nAkbar had reconquered his entire realm and was established on the throne. \n\nThe next few years were occupied with getting the reins of authority firmly \ninto his own hands. Against the violent opposition of the bigoted Mahometans \nat his court, he adopted a policy of conciliation toward the Hindus, and admitted \nthem to the high offices of state on a basis of equality. He also remitted the \npoll tax levied on Hindu, but not on Mahometan pilgrims, a tax which had been \nbringing in a very large revenue, but which seemed to Akbar grossly unjust. \nHe regarded a tax on devotion as an outrage. His own house put in order, he \nwas in position to attempt to realize his vision for India. That vision is the \nkey to his policy throughout his life. He had no love of conquest in itself, but \nhe could not carry out his plans without it, so he conquered most of India before \nhe died. W e do not mean that he shared the modem feeling about wars of \naggression. He felt as his age felt, as his great ancestors Genghis Khan and \nTimurlane had felt, that such wars were quite normal. \u201cA monarch\u201d, he said, \n\n\u2018 should ever be intent on conquest, otherwise his neighbours rise in arms against \nhim. The army should be exercised in warfare, lest from want of training they \nbecome self-indulgent. 1 He treated his beaten foes with the utmost generosity. \nChivalrous and loyal by nature himself, he recognized those qualities in others \nand trusted them accordingly. The Rajputs whom he conquered, he restored \nto their thrones, requiring only that they yield him allegiance. They responded \nto his trust, gave him their loyalty, and became the stanchest supporters of his \nrule. Without their aid, he could not have carried out his plans. At his death, \nhis empire extended from the Hindu Kush on the north to the Deccan on the \nsouth. Where he ruled, justice, security, peace, and religious tolerance pre\u00ac \nvailed. In so far, at least, as his dream for India went, he had not been dis\u00ac \nobedient unto his heavenly vision. \n\nWe cannot go into his many reforms, such as the abolition of the practice of \nenslaving prisoners of war, his strictly enforced orders against molestation of \nthe women and children of conquered foes, his attempts to discourage child \nmarriage, the ending of compulsory suttee , and many more. Great as a general, \nhe was, like Napoleon, still greater as an administrator. Again like Napoleon, \nhe combined a mind capable of grasping broad and novel general principles \nwith an extraordinary capacity for laborious attention to detail. His adminis\u00ac \ntrative reforms still form the basis of government of a great part of the land he \nruled. Elphinstone sums up his reign with the words: \u2018\u2018It is to his internal \n\n\n1 Abul Fazl, Ain-i-Akbari, \"Happy Sayings of His Majesty\", p. 399. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n34 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\npolicy that Akbar owes his place in that highest order of princes whose reigns \nhave been a blessing to mankind.\u201d 2 \n\nAny man bom with a noble vision who lives to carry it out in action, leaving \nthe world better than he found it, any man whose life has been \u2018\u2018a blessing to \nmankind\u201d, is sure to have had during his life the backing, support and guidance \nof the Lodge. To what extent he may have been aware of being aided, whether \nhe was or was not a conscious agent in the great work that he did, what his \nLodge connection may have been, what the degree of his spiritual attainment, \nhis occult rank, 3 are questions on which it is interesting to speculate but dan\u00ac \ngerous to dogmatize. As we have said, the passion of Akbar\u2019s life was not \nconquest, not power, not even his dream for India; his passion was the search \nfor truth. Only a man whose soul had seen and preserved some memory of its \nvision, could yearn for truth as Akbar yearned for it. We do not know just \nwhat that soul\u2019s connection with the Lodge may have been, but we may be \nreasonably sure that that for which the exile longs is his true home. \n\nWhat kind of man was he? His boyhood had been spent with his father in \nexile, in a long series of conflicts, headlong flights with a handful of loyal fol\u00ac \nlowers, a victorious foe in hot pursuit, followed by triumphant returns and the \nrecovery of lost territory. It gave the boy a marvellous training in the warrior \nqualities, and developed his physique to an extraordinary extent. He was quick, \nactive, endowed with great strength, a good shot, a brilliant swordsman, and a \nremarkable horseman. There are many stories of his physical prowess. He \nonce rode two hundred and sixty miles on horseback in two days. He would \noften walk thirty or forty miles a day. He swam his horse across the Ganges in \nfull flood. On one occasion, he and a small group of friends were returning on \nfoot from a hunt, when a tigress with five cubs suddenly emerging from the side \nof the narrow path, blocked their way. The friends shrank back. Akbar sprang \nforward alone and killed the tigress with a single blow of his sword. \n\nHis manners were charming, and his innate dignity such that it was said that \n\u201canybody even at a first glance would recognize him as a king\u201d. One of his \nJesuit visitors wrote of him that \u201cto his own family he was most dear; to the \ngreat he was terrible; to the lowly, kind and affable. With small and common \npeople he was so sympathetic and indulgent that he always found time gladly \nto hear their cases, and to respond graciously to their requests. Their little \nofferings, too, he used to accept with such a pleased look, handling them and \nputting them in his bosom, as he did not do with the most lavish gifts of the \nnobles.\u201d The Jesuits at his Court speak of the zeal and watchful conscientious\u00ac \nness which he showed in the administration of justice. What he said of himself, \n\n* Elphinstone, History of Indio, p. 520. \n\n* Since writing this article, the author\u2019s attention has been called to a statement of Madame Blavatsky\u2019s in The \nBonner of Light, Oct. 18th, 1879, reprinted in A Modern Panarion, p. 221, in which she speaks of \u201cthe great \nEmperor-Adept, Akbar\u201d. \n\n(Editors' Note: In 1879, theosophical terminology was still very loosely defined. The term, Adept, was used \nby H.P.B. much as Mackenzie used it in his Royal Masonic Cyclopcedia (1877). where we read of \"adepts in al\u00ac \nchemy\", \"an adept among astrologers\u201d, etc. It was not until much later that H.P.B. limited the title to high \nInitiates. In The Theosophical Glossary, published in 1892, she says of Akbar: \"The great Mogul Emperor of India, \nthe famous patron of religions, arts, and sciences, the most liberal of all the Mussulman sovereigns. There has never \nbeen a more tolerant or enlightened ruler than the Emperor Akbar. either in India or in any other Mahometan \ncountry.\" This is high praise, but it does not imply Adeptship, or Initiation in the Great Lodge.) \n\n\n\nTHE EMPEROR AKBAR \n\n\n35 \n\n\n\u201cIf I were guilty of an unjust act, I would rise in judgment against myself\", \nwas not a boast but simple truth. He was by nature humane, gentle and kind, \nbut his anger, though short-lived, could be terrible. \n\nHe was as chivalrous as his grandfather, Babur. One instance of this is worth \nrelating. A rebellion broke out in a part of his dominions and the rebels gath\u00ac \nered an army of twenty thousand men. Akbar was far away. On hearing of it, \nhe assembled swiftly a force of two thousand horse, and rode the intervening \nsix hundred miles in eleven days. So rapid had been his movements that he \ntook the rebels completely off their guard. \u201cIt is a shame\", said Akbar, \"to \nattack an unprepared foe\". He sounded his trumpets, and waited for his ene\u00ac \nmies, though they outnumbered him ten to one, to arm and form their line. \nThen he charged, and after a bitter fight in which the issue was for some time \nin doubt, he scattered them in wild rout. \n\nBoth his grandfather, whose memoirs are famous, and his father, were schol\u00ac \nars. Akbar himself as a boy had had the best of tutors before and after he came \nto the throne, but, for some reason, he stedfastly refused to learn either to read \nor to write. Extraordinary as it may seem, this did not in the least interfere \nwith his becoming a man of unusually wide culture and learning. Apparently \nhe preferred to learn by his ear rather than his eye. He was very fond of listen\u00ac \ning to reading aloud, and at his death had a library of some twenty-four thousand \nmanuscripts, most of which were beautifully illuminated and bound, and which \nwere valued at over six million rupees. He had a remarkable memory which \nretained what was read to him. He studied the great Sanskrit writings, and had \nmany of them, including the Bhagavad Gita , translated into the vernacular. He \nwas a patron of science and of the arts,\u2014painting, architecture, poetry, music, \nliterature, all of which flourished during his reign. \n\nAkbar was by nature a mystic who, like the Sufis, with whose poetry he had \nsaturated himself from his early youth, sought earnestly all his life to attain to \nthe ineffable bliss of union with the Divine. There is good reason to believe \nthat at times and in some measure, he succeeded. The first such experience, of \nwhich we have any record, occurred when he was fourteen, about a year after \nhe came to the throne. He was afflicted with a sudden disgust for the life around \nhim, and found the presence of \u201cshort-sighted men\", men whose thoughts were \nall of this world, intolerable. Sending for his horse Hairan, a high-spirit^but \nparticularly vicious steed which only one with his extraordinary abilitj^rith \nanimals could have ridden, he galloped away unescorted into the desert to be \nalone. He rode for many miles, how far he did not know, and then dismounted \n\u201cto commune with God\". The horse galloped away and disappeared. Akbar \nfell into an ecstasy. After a time, his \u201cheart eased and refreshed\", he came to \nhimself, alone, on foot, and far out in the desert. For a while he hesitated, \nuncertain what to do. Then he saw a riderless horse in the distance, galloping \ntoward him. It proved to be Hairan, who came up and stood beside him, wait\u00ac \ning for him to mount. The incident made a deep impression on Akbar, who \nregarded it as a Divine intimation that he take up his work in the world. \n\n^ All his life he sought earnestly to learn the Divine will, and often spoke of the \n\n\n\n\n36 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\ngreat difficulty of doing so. Some of his methods were strikingly original. \nShortly after the incident just mentioned, he engaged in a series of the most \nrecklessly daring adventures. One will serve as a sample. One day he met a \nparticularly savage elephant that had just killed its mahout, mangled other \nmen, and become a general source of terror. Akbar walked up to him smiling, \nput his foot on the elephant\u2019s tusk and mounted to his back. Then he set him \nto fight another quarrelsome elephant. At the height of the fight, Akbar saw \nthat the driver of the other elephant had lost control. The young Emperor \nimmediately leapt from his own elephant to the back of the other. Later in life, \nAkbar stated that his reason for risking his life in these dare-devil escapades \nwas that he wished to learn the will of God for him, to test whether or not he \nhad in truth been entrusted with a divine mission. If God were displeased \nwith him, he would make it easy for his life to be taken away. If he were pre\u00ac \nserved, it would be a sign that there was work in the world that he was intended \nto do. Akbar probably had never heard of the second of the temptations in the \nwilderness, and this seemed to him a simple way of learning God\u2019s will. \n\nAnother experience, of which we have only meagre and confused accounts, \noccurred some years later. Akbar had ordered a huge hunt, after the Mogul \nfashion. For ten days, many thousands of beaters had been driving the game \nin a huge semi-circle preparatory to slaughter on a great scale. Then, while \nresting under a tree, a vision came to Akbar. \u201cA sublime joy took possession of \nhis bodily frame. The attraction of cognition of God cast its ray.\u201d \u201cThe \nprimacy of the spiritual world took possession of his holy form. . . . What the \nchiefs of purity and deliverance [Sufi seers] had searched for in vain, was re\u00ac \nvealed to him.\u201d He had a vivid sense of union with God. One of its immediate \neffects was to fill him with a strong revulsion against the world, the pomp and \nsplendour of his throne, and all his outer activities, so that for the moment he \nseems even to have thought of abdicating and becoming a hermit. That mis\u00ac \nunderstanding passed at once, and he attacked his duties with renewed activity. \nBut in his vision he had seen all life as one, in the Creator\u2019s eyes. The slaughter \nof unoffending animals appeared as a crime, and he instantly gave orders that \nthe hunt was to be abandoned and \u201cnot a feather on a finch hurt\u201d. Every animal \nwas to escape \u201caccording to its habits\u201d. He had been very fond of hunting, but \nfrom that time on he gave it up. Even when his enjoyment of it had been at its \nkeenest, he had often in the past broken off in the midst of a hunt, if he chanced \nto see a hermit or \u201choly man\u201d, in order to talk with him in the hope of gaining \na new insight into truth. He also gave up meat-eating for at least six months \nof every year. He did not wish, he said, to \u201cmake his body a tomb for animals\u201d. \n\nVigorous and highly successful man of action though he was, he spent many \nentire nights in religious discussion, and many whole mornings in solitary prayer \nand meditation on a stone bench in a little bare room. \u201cHe was\u201d, wrote his son \nJehangir, \u201calways with God\u201d. He never missed an opportunity to gain light \nfrom anyone he thought might have something to contribute to his knowledge \nof truth. Early in his reign, he instituted religious discussions every Thursday \nnight. His methods bore a close resemblance to those of a Theosophical So- \n\n\nTHE EMPEROR AKBAR \n\n\n39 \n\n\nTHE EMPEROR AKBAR 37 \n\nciety Branch meeting. Holders of the most divergent views were invited to \nspeak, and a general discussion followed. At first the debates were between \nthe different sects of the Moslems, but later on the representatives of other \nreligions were invited to explain and defend their beliefs. Akbar himself usually \npresided and did his best to enforce courtesy and the theosophical ideal of \naccording that tolerance to the opinions of others that one desires for one\u2019s \nown. The various Moslem sects disgusted and at times angered him by their \nintolerance and violent abuse of all who disagreed with their own narrow views. \n\nWhen he heard of Christianity, he wrote to the Jesuit Mission, at the Portu\u00ac \nguese settlement of Goa, asking them to send back with the ambassador who \nbore his letter \u201ctwo of your learned men, who should bring with them the books \nof the law, and above all the Gospels, because I truly and earnestly desire to \nunderstand their perfection; and with great urgency I again demand that they \nshould come with my ambassador aforesaid, and bring their books. From their \ncoming I shall obtain the utmost consolation; they will be dear to me, and I \nshall receive them with every possible honour. As soon as I shall have become \nwell instructed in the law, and shall have comprehended its perfection, they \nwill be able, if willing, to return at their pleasure, and I shall send them back \nwith great honours, and appropriate rewards.\u201d 4 \n\nAfter a good deal of discussion, three Jesuit fathers were selected in response \nto this invitation, Ridolfo Aquaviva, a younger son of the Duke of Atri, one of \nthe most influential nobles of the Kingdom of Naples, Antonio Monserrate, a \nSpaniard who had shown extraordinary courage and devotion during an out\u00ac \nbreak of the plague in Lisbon, and Francesco Enriquez, a converted Mahome\u00ac \ntan. Immediately on their arrival, Akbar, dressed in Portuguese costume as a \ncourtesy to them, had them brought into his presence, and, so great was his \neagerness to learn of Christianity, kept them talking until two o\u2019clock in the \nmorning. Then, seeing their weariness, he dismissed them, but renewed the \naudience the next day, at which time he accepted from them the gift of a mag\u00ac \nnificently bound copy of the Bible. He received the Bible with the ^Bost \nreverence, a reverence which he invariably showed toward the objects of devo\u00ac \ntion of any religion, an instinctive courtesy which some of his biographers have \nmisunderstood, and which has led them to accuse him of hypocrisy. He in his \nturn, offered the fathers a large sum of money, which they refused, accepting \nonly enough for bare subsistence. They were given permission to seek converts, \nto preach publicly, and were invited to the weekly discussions in the House of \nWorship. Unfortunately, as has happened with other missionaries, their zeal \nand courage were more to be commended than their tact or their tolerance, and \nAkbar had to intervene to save them from bodily harm. \n\nHe was much disappointed to find the Christians as fiercely intolerant as the \npdahometans. Nevertheless, he invited the Jesuits to live in the palace, and \nwould often spend half the night in discussing Christianity with them. He found \nso much with which he could agree that for a time they had high hopes of con\u00ac \nverting him. These were increased by his putting the education of his second \n\n\n4 Vincent Smith, Akbar, p. 169. Quoted as translated from the Italian of Bartoli. \n\n\n\n38 THEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\nson, Murad, in their charge, and by his personal affection for them. He often \n\u201cconversed with them without ceremony, and would pace up and down with \nhis arm around Aquaviva\u2019s shoulder\u201d. The doctrines of the Virgin Birth and \nof the Trinity were stumbling blocks. Akbar was undoubtedly attracted to \nChristianity, but he was no less attracted to other religions. A month after the \narrival of the Jesuits, Akbar began the Zoroastrian custom of prostrating him\u00ac \nself publicly before the rising sun. Binyon says that it would seem that Akbar, \n\u201cin his restless seeking for a faith that should satisfy his inner nature, never \ncontented himself with abstract inquiries, but, as if determined to put on the \nwhole habit of a creed, adopted with each its outward ceremony and ritual, and \nused its symbols, all apparently with a like sincerity of approach\u201d. \n\nThe Jesuits took Akbar roundly to task for certain practices which he per\u00ac \nmitted in his kingdom, gladiatorial shows and the custom of suttee among them. \nFar from resenting this, Akbar refused thereafter to attend a suttee , and later \ndefinitely prohibited the practice, to the great anger of the Brahmins and some \nof his other Hindu subjects. His determination to break up the custom came \nwithin an ace of costing him his life. A cousin of the Rajah of Amber died, and \nhis young widow, a daughter of the Rajah of Malwaf, refused to become suttee. \nHer step-son, backed by the Brahmin family priest, decided to force her to do \nso, in violation of the imperial edict. At the last moment the Emperor, prob\u00ac \nably through one of the young Rajputnis in his harem, heard what was hap\u00ac \npening. Instantly mounting the swiftest horse in his stable, without waiting \nfor his escort, he galloped alone at top speed to the scene of the suttee. The \nyoung widow had already taken her place on the funeral pyre, and the flames \nhad almost reached the long bridal garment she was wearing, when Akbar \ndashed up at a furious pace, charged through the circle of chanting priests and \narmed Rajputs, and himself lifted the princess from the pyre. The infuriated \nRajputs drew their swords, and for a moment the Emperor\u2019s life was in grave \ndanger. Then two of his devoted Rajput officers came up and the crisis passed. \nThe princess was safely placed under the protection of her own family. 5 \n\nThe Jesuit mission had arrived in February, 1580. Some months before, \nAkbar had taken a step of great importance. Under the Moslem law, great \npower was vested in the Ulema, the assemblage of \u201cdoctors learned in the law\u201d. \nThe administration of justice was in their hands, and while their power remained \nunbroken it was useless for Akbar to attempt to carry out his policy of universal \nreligious toleration, which appeared to their bigoted minds as sacrilege and a \ndirect violation of the teachings of the Prophet. They further had the right \nunder the Moslem law to issue a fetva , or religious decree, declaring the Emperor\u2019s \npolicy of tolerance to be contrary to the Koran, a decree which would have had \nthe result of absolving all Moslems from the duty of obedience to the Emperor. \nIt was the old story of a clash between a powerful priestcraft and a strong ruler. \nCompromise never appealed to Akbar. He forced the issue by having his friend, \nthe Shaikh Mubarak, a Sufi mystic, and father of his two closest friends and \nadvisors, Feizi and Abul Fazl, prepare and circulate a document proclaiming \n\n\n*Abul Fazl, Akbarnama, iii, p. 395. \n\n\n\nTHE EMPEROR AKBAR \n\n\n39 \n\n\nAkbar a Sultan-i-Adil, or Just Ruler, which the Ulema dared not refuse to sign. \nThe decrees of a Sultan-i-Adil, under the law of Islam, took precedence over \nany Ulema, and reduced the latter to impotence. The effect of the proclamation \nwas to make Akbar virtual Pope as well as King, and to set him free to carry \nout the dream that had dominated his policy from the first,\u2014the establishment \nthroughout India of religious equality for all faiths. \n\nOne of his first steps was to throw open the discussions in the House of Wor\u00ac \nship to all faiths. Akbar was convinced, as are students of Theosophy to-day, \nthat there is truth at the heart of all of the nobler religions, and he set himself to \nfind it. Hindus, Jains, Sikhs, Parsees, and the Jesuits when they arrived, were \nall invited to the discussions, and, in addition, Akbar spent many hours in \npersonal conversation with the most eminent representatives of the different \nfaiths. A learned Brahmin, who presumably feared pollution if he entered the \nabode of an unbeliever, but who was unwilling to refuse a sincere inquirer, was \ndrawn up in a basket by a rope outside the palace walls until he was opposite \nAkbar\u2019s window, and \u201cspent many nights instructing the Emperor in the esoteric \ndoctrines of the Upanishads\u201d. Curiously enough, there is no record of his \nhaving been in touch at any time with Buddhism. He was deeply impressed by \nthe symbolism of the Zoroastrians, and established the sacred fire in his palace, \nwhere his friend Abul Fazl was charged with the duty of seeing that it never \nwent out. The sun, as the symbol of the Divine, made a particular appeal to \nhim. In the evening when the lamps were lighted, the whole court was required \nto rise in reverence at the coming of the light, \u201cin commemoration of the sunrise\u201d, \nAkbar said. Those who would criticize him for this, might well be asked to find a \nbetter symbol for the Divine. One of his historians describes him as \u201ca Sufi \nmystic at heart and a Zoroastrian by practice\u201d. He also adopted certain Brah- \nminical customs and wore the sacred thread at times. For a week at the new \nyear, he wore a robe of a different colour each day, the colour corresponding to \nthat of the sacred planet for that day of the week. The Jain influence resulted \nin edicts governing and restricting the slaughter of animals. Akbar himself in \nthe last years of his life abstained almost wholly from meat. \n\nAkbar always attended the discussions in the House of Worship, which some\u00ac \ntimes ran to appalling length, beginning on Thursday evenings and occasionally \ncontinuing until noon on Friday. It is not altogether surprising that tempers \nwere frequently rasped. The meetings were held regularly for a number of \nyears. Then, perhaps because they had served their turn, or perhap^R dis\u00ac \ncouragement at the intolerance and closed minds of those who debated there, \nAkbar discontinued them. \n\nThe debates had been held in a special building in the new capital which \nAkbar had built, Fathpur Sikri, \u201cCity of Victory\u201d. All trace of that building \nhas disappeared, and there is reason to believe that it was pulled down by order \nof Akbar himself. Fathpur Sikri, in Akbar\u2019s mind, seems to have been a symbol \nof his great dream of unity, even its architecture being a beautiful and har\u00ac \nmonious mingling of the Hindu and the Moslem. It was over the entrance to \nthe great Mosque there that the Emperor, after an inscription recounting his \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n4 o THEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\nvictories, had inscribed in conclusion the famous words: \u201cSaid Jesus, on whom \nbe peace: \u2018The world is a bridge. Pass over it. Do not build on it \u2019 . This was \nadded only a few years before his death, after he had already abandoned the city, \nwhich still stands empty and deserted. \n\nIn 1581, Akbar promulgated the Din-i-Ilahi, \u201cDivine Faith\u201d, which some \nhistorians call a new religion, but which was actually a new religious and philo\u00ac \nsophical Order. The name, \u201cDivine Faith\u201d, seems very like \u201cDivine Wisdom . \nIt would be interesting to know exactly what the difference in meaning is be\u00ac \ntween \u201cDin\u201d, translated as \u201cFaith\u201d, and the Greek word \u201cSophia\u201d, Wisdom.\u00ae \nA part at least of Akbar\u2019s motive in promulgating it, was to supply a bond of \nunion for the different races of his Empire. \u201cThe Emperor did not promulgate \nthe new faith in the spirit of a missionary, zealous for obtaining new recruits. \nHis object was not proselytization, but a new synthesis of the warring creeds. \nHe approached the whole question in what we might call a theosophical spirit, \nand inculcated no rigid formulae.\u201d * * * * 7 The Din-i-Ilahi upheld no dogmas and \nrecognized no prophets. The only authority it did recognize was that of each \nman\u2019s own soul. Elphinstone says: \n\nIt seems to have been pure deism; in addition to which some ceremonies were per\u00ac \nmitted in consideration of human infirmity. It maintained that we ought to reverence \nGod according to the knowledge of him derived from our own reason, by which his unity \nand benevolence are sufficiently established; that we ought to serve him and seek for our \nfuture happiness by subduing our bad passions, and practising such virtues as are bene\u00ac \nficial to mankind; but that we should not adopt a creed or practise a ritual on the au\u00ac \nthority of any man> as all were liable to error like ourselves. If it were absolutely \nnecessary for men to have some visible object of adoration, by means of which they \nmight raise their soul to the Divinity, Akbar recommended that the sun, the planets, \nor fire should be the symbols. He had no priests, no public worship. 8 \n\nThe Din-i-Ilahi was \u201cfor the few\u201d. It is probable that at no time were there \nmore than a few thousand members at the most. The names of only eighteen \nhave been preserved, including but one Hindu, Rajah Birbal. Refusal to join \nmade no difference in Akbar\u2019s confidence and friendship. It was a matter for \neach man\u2019s conscience. The Din-i-Ilahi, as we have said, had no creed. Its \nspirit is expressed in the following verses written by Abul Fazl, and inscribed by \nthe Emperor\u2019s order over the gate of a building dedicated to it: \n\nO God, in every temple I see people that seek Thee, \n\nAnd in every language I hear spoken, people praise Thee I \nPolytheism and Islam feel after Thee, \n\nEach religion says, \u201cThou art one without equal\u201d. \n\nIf it be a mosque, people murmur holy prayer, \n\nAnd if it be a Christian Church, people ring the bell from love to Thee, \n\nSometimes I frequent the Christian cloister and sometimes the mosque, \n\nBut it is Thou whom I search from temple to temple. \n\n8 Din, although developed from different roots, means religion, faith, in both Persian and Arabic. In Arabic its \n\nbasal meaning is \u2018\u2018submission to Divine judgment\". In Persian it developed from \"faith by (inward?) sight\". \n\nThe Persian meanings are given as \"religion, wisdom, inner being, spiritual ego, individuality\". Ilahi is Arabic. \n\nAkbar was, of course, at home in both languages. \n\n7 Prasad. A Short History of Moslim Rule in India, p. 371. \n\n\u2022 History of India, p. 324. \n\n\n\nTHE EMPEROR AKBAR \n\n\n4 i \n\n\nThy elect have no dealings with either heresy or orthodoxy; for neither of them stands \nbehind the screen of Thy truth. \n\nHeresy to the heretic, and religion to the orthodox, \n\nBut the dust of the rose petal belongs to the heart of the perfume-seller. \n\n\u201cFour degrees of sacrifice\u201d are mentioned. They consisted of the readiness \nto sacrifice property, life, reputation, and religion. \n\nWhile the Din-i-Ilahi had no dogmas, many regulations have been ascribed \nto it, which have been a source of much misunderstanding both of Akbar and \nof the \u201cDivine Faith\u201d. This is in large measure due to the scantiness of our \nknowledge. Apart from a few letters from Jesuits, there are only two main \nsources of information. First and by far the most important are the writings \nof Akbar\u2019s friend, confidant, and panegyrist, Abul Fazl. Writing unfortunately \nin a style of fulsome praise, distasteful to Western ears, Abul Fazl gives a val\u00ac \nuable but brief account of the Emperor\u2019s faith, and says that he is going to write \na separate volume dealing with that and with Akbar\u2019s methods; but Abul Fazl \nwas murdered before it saw the light. The other source is Badaoni, a bigoted, \nnarrow-minded, orthodox Mahometan, who believed Akbar to be engaged in \nundermining the true faith, and who was bitterly jealous of the influence of the \nHindus with the Emperor, and of the fact that all the offices at court had been \nthrown open to them. His work contains scores of pages of the most violent \ndenunciation. It is full of hearsay and of statements that carry their own refu\u00ac \ntation on their face. Nevertheless, in the absence of other sources of informa\u00ac \ntion, many of his assertions have been accepted as facts by some historians, and \nhave affected unfavourably their view of Akbar. \n\nThe official account of the Din-i-Ilahi is given very briefly by Abul Fazl in \nAin 77 of the Ain- 4 -Akbari. He says that a people seeking guidance to truth \nwill naturally look to their king, for a king possesses, independent of men, \u201ca ray \nof divine wisdom\u201d. The king is the spiritual guide of the nation, \u201cand sees in \nthe performance of this duty a means of pleasing God. He has now opened the \ngate that leads to the right path, and satisfies the thirst of all that wander about \npanting for truth. But whether he checks men in their desire to become dis\u00ac \nciples, or admits them at other times, he guides them in each case to the realms \nof bliss. Many sincere inquirers, from the mere light of his wisdom, or his hol^ \nbreath, obtain a degree of awakening which other spiritual doctors could nW \nproduce by repeated fasting and prayers for forty days.\u201d \n\nThe ceremony of initiation was performed by Akbar in this manner: \n\nWhen a novice bears on his forehead the sign of earnestness of purpose, and he be daily \ninquiring more and more, His Majesty accepts him, and admits him on a Sunday, when \nthe world-illuminating sun is in its highest splendour. Notwithstanding every strict\u00ac \nness and reluctance shown by His Majesty in admitting novices, there are many thou\u00ac \nsands, men of all classes, who have cast over their shoulders the mantle of belief, and look \nupon their conversion to the New Faith as the means of obtaining every blessing. \n\nAt the above-mentioned time of everlasting auspiciousness, the novice with his turban \nin his hands, puts his head on the feet of His Majesty. This is symbolical, and expresses \ntha^the novice, guided by good fortune and the assistance of his good star, has cast from \nhisfead conceit and selfishness, the root of so many evils, offers his heart in worship, and \n\n\n\n42 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nnow comes to inquire as to the means of obtaining everlasting life. His Majesty, the \nchosen one of God, then stretches out the hand of favour, raises up the suppliant, and \nreplaces the turban on his head, meaning by these symbolical actions that he has raised \nup a man of pure intentions, who from seeming existence has now entered into real life. \nHis Majesty then gives the novice the Shast y 9 upon which is engraved \u201cthe Great Name\u201d, \nand His Majesty's symbolical motto, Allahu Akbar. This teaches the novice the truth \nthat \u201cthe pure Shast and the pure sight never err\". \n\nThe inquiry as to \u201cthe means of obtaining everlasting life\u201d\u2014the inquiry of \nthe young man in the Gospels\u2014is interesting as showing the perception of a truth \nthe world has lost\u2014that everlasting life must be won by a man\u2019s own effort. \n\nAbul Fazl gives a description of certain ordinances to be observed by mem\u00ac \nbers of the Order. They are entirely outer and trivial. Members are to greet \neach other with Allahu Akbar , God is great, and the response, Jalla Jalaluhu , \nMay His glory shine forth. They are to give feasts at certain times, to abstain \nas far as possible from meat, never to eat anything which they themselves have \nslain, not to use the same vessels as butchers, etc., etc. There are very few of \nthese rules. A later passage gives a special rule governing the funerals of \u201cdar- \nsaniyyah disciples\u201d 10 which concludes: \u201cBut this order is based on a fundamental \nrule which His Majesty indicated, but which I cannot here mention.\u201d * 11 \n\nBadaoni, who had apparently quarreled with Akbar, and had become the \nleader of the orthodox Mahometan party which bitterly opposed the Emperor, \npictures him as persecuting the Mahometans, insulting their faith, promulgating \ninnumerable oppressive and silly regulations, and setting himself up as divine. \nMany of his statements are obviously malicious and rather stupid slander, and \nmost of the pretended regulations which he gives are puerile. He states, for \nexample, that the Emperor ordered dogs and swine to be kept in the harem \n\u201cand regarded the going to look at them every morning as a religious service\u201d. 12 \nWhatever else Akbar was, he was not childish. His worst detractors grant \nhim an extraordinarily keen intellect and a sound judgment. Yet in spite of \nits obvious unreliability, Badaoni\u2019s picture has led Vincent Smith and some \nother historians to the conclusion that \u201cthe whole scheme [of the Din-i-Ilahi] \nwas the outcome of ridiculous vanity\u201d, \u201ca monument to Akbar\u2019s folly\u201d, and \nhave accused him of persecuting the Mahometans. \n\nMadame Blavatsky evidently did not share that view or she would not have \ndescribed Akbar in the Theosophical Glossary as the most tolerant and enlight\u00ac \nened ruler that India or any other Mahometan country has ever had. The \nonly evidence in support of Badaoni\u2019s tirade is contained in a few of the letters \nfrom the Jesuits. Prasad says that they got their information from the same \nbitterly prejudiced source, the \u201corthodox\u201d party which had declared war on the \nEmperor. It is easy to understand how the bigoted adherents of the religion \nthat had been dominant to the extent of persecuting all others, should regard \ntolerance and equality as an infringement of their rights and an insult to their \nfaith. For Akbar to persecute the adherents of any religion, let alone the one \n\n\u2022 \"Shast means aim : secondly, anything round, either a ring or a thread.\" Blochmann. \n\n10 From darsan, to have seen. \n\n11 Blochmann, Ain-i-Akbar i, i, p. 207. \n\n11 Badaoni, p. 314. \n\n\n\nTHE EMPEROR AKBAR \n\n\n43 \n\n\nin which he was bom, would have been to go against his entire character, his \nfirmly held opinions and his life-long work. His own words, just after he had \nabolished the tax on Hindu pilgrims, show the principle to which he steadfastly \nadhered in all his actions. \u201cAlthough\u201d, he said, \u201cthe tax fell on a vain super\u00ac \nstition, yet as all modes of worship are designed for one great Being, it is wrong \nto throw an obstacle in the way of the devout, and to cut them off from their \nmode of intercourse with their Maker.\u201d 13 Members of The Theosophical Society, \nwhich endured for years the most violent abuse based on complete misappre\u00ac \nhensions of its character and purposes, ought to have no difficulty in under\u00ac \nstanding the bitter contemporary attacks on the Din-i-Ilahi. They might ask \nthemselves what posterity would think of The Theosophical Society, if its sole \nsource of information were an account written by the member of their family \nmost vehemently opposed to their interest in Theosophy. \n\nBadaoni\u2019s slanders we can dismiss. The triviality of the regulations published \nby Abul Fazl is, at first glance, harder to understand. There is, however, a \nsimple possible explanation. We have already referred to the special order \nabout funerals which closes with the statement that it is based on \u201ca funda\u00ac \nmental rule which His Majesty indicated but which I cannot here mention\u201d. \nThis is a plain statement that a part at least of the Din-i-Ilahi was secret, an \nobvious possibility which seems to have been entirely overlooked by historians. \nWe know that there was a ritual of initiation, and that Akbar accepted some \ncandidates and refused others. It is hard to see why anyone should have been \nrefused admission to an Order with only the beliefs and requirements that have \nbeen made public. On the other hand, in all ages and religions there have been \nthose who, having really attained to some knowledge of truth, have realized \nthat it could not safely be given to the multitude. This is not a popular doctrine \nto-day, but the truth rarely is popular. Charles Johnston, in one of his articles, \nimplies that the failure of Greece was due in part to the fact that Plato violated \nan age-old rule, in giving to the unprepared masses, truths that should only \nhave been imparted to those pledged to secrecy and to a strict moral discipline. \nThat Akbar attained to a number of theosophical truths we know. He may \nwell have grasped that one, and hence have taken care to see that others were \nnot unwisely revealed. \n\nThe Din-i-Ilahi kept its secrets inviolate, as no doubt Akbar kept his. W^ \ndo, however, know some of his beliefs. He believed in one Supreme Spirit, in \nthe unity of the Universe, and hence that all things that are, partake to some \ndegree of the Divine nature. He believed in reincarnation and that the soul \ncomes from the Supreme, and, after many ages, attaining to complete purifica\u00ac \ntion, gains re-union with the Divine. He was a mystic, and was convinced, of \nhis own knowledge and experience, that it is possible for the soul here and now, \nin incarnation, to attain to communion and some measure of union with God. \nWe have already spoken of two of these experiences. He himself refers briefly \nto others. There is also a Hindu tradition that in 1573, he beheld a \u201cmarvellous \nvision\u201d at the Brindaban temples, the reputed home of Krishna. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n44 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nSome of Akbar\u2019s own statements, quoted by Abul Fazl in \u201cHappy Sayings \nof His Majesty\u201d, are illuminating: \n\n\u201cThe smallest details are mirrors capable of reflecting a comprehensive outline. \n\n\u201cTrue greatness, in spiritual and worldly matters, does not shrink from the minutiae \nof business but regards their performance as an act of Divine worship.\u201d \n\n\u201cThere is no need to discuss the point that a vacuum in nature is impossible. God is \nomnipresent.\u201d \n\n\u201cThere exists a bond between the Creator and the creature which is not expressible in \nlanguage.\u201d \n\n\u201cThat which is without form cannot be seen whether in sleeping or waking, but it is \napprehensible by force of imagination. To behold God in vision is, in fact, to be under\u00ac \nstood in this sense.\u201d \n\n\u201cEach person according to his condition gives the Supreme Being a name, but in \nreality to name the Unknowable is vain.\u201d \n\n\u201cWho can sever the attachment of the rational soul to the Supreme Being?\u201d \n\n\u201cAlthough I am the Master of so vast a kingdom, and all the appliances of government \nare at my hand, yet since true greatness consists in doing the will of God, my mind is \nnot at ease in this diversity of sects and creeds; and apart from this outward pomp of \ncircumstances, with what satisfaction, in my despondency, can I undertake the sway of \nempire? I await the coming of some discreet man of principle who will resolve the diffi\u00ac \nculties of my conscience.\u201d \n\nEven in those distant days, Akbar was evidently longing for the coming of a \n\u201cGod-instructed man\u201d. \n\nOne statement of Badaoni\u2019s which, being his, may or may not be true, is \ninteresting. He says that Akbar \u201cgave habitation to the Yogis, visiting the \nmath almost unattended, and holding scientific and religious conversations with \nthem. They initiated him into all their knowledge and practices, so that he \nsometimes showed gold which he pretended was of his own making.\u201d 14 \n\n\u201cSeek and ye shall find\u201d has been true in all ages. Akbar sought ardently \nand, as we have tried to show, unquestionably attained to knowledge of certain \ntheosophic truths. The heart of the theosophic doctrine is that ch\u00a3laship, the \npassionate, complete devotion to one\u2019s Master, whoever that Master may be, \nis a present possibility and fact. Akbar spoke much of discipleship. He called \na group in the Din-i-Ilahi \u201cch\u00a3las\u201d. We do not know what he meant by it, or \nwhether he himself found his own Master and gained the intimate, personal \nrelationship that is involved in ch\u00a3laship. That he served the Lodge seems clear, \nbut we have no way of telling whether or not he did so consciously. Unfor\u00ac \ntunately, we know nothing of his inner life during his last ten years. His friend, \nhistorian, and co-worker in the Din-i-Ilahi, Abul Fazl, was murdered by Akbar\u2019s \nown son in 1602. Akbar himself died in 1605. The \u201cDivine Faith\u201d and what\u00ac \never of truth it may have held, passed with him to the other world. \n\n_. J. F. B. Mitchell. \n\n14 Wilson\u2019* translation, Collected Works, ii, p. 384. Compare also Lowe\u2019s translation, Badaoni, ii, p. 334. \n\n\n\nWITHOUT CENSOR \n\n\nXI. \n\n\nHE parallel between the military life, the military order, and the spiritual \n\n\n\nhierarchy, or the life and order of the spiritual world, raised above the \n\n\nmere consideration of the similarity of the qualities necessary to excel \nin each, and expanded to include the strategy and tactics of the inner spiritual \nwarfare\u2014the conscious and deliberate use and ordering of those qualities of \nheart and mind and will, in which the individual has to some degree attained, \nto further the progress of his inner campaign and advance\u2014all this, from that \nmidnight in the quiet room at First Army Headquarters when I sensed some\u00ac \nthing of the ordered direction of large units in actual war, became for me more \nand more a subject of frequent thought, and has been so in the years that \nhave intervened. Yet, always, consideration of the strategy and tactics of the \ninner life, the right handling for constructive purposes of attributes of character \nalready formed, or partially formed, brings one back again to those fundamentals \nof character which are the basis, the foundation setting for the individual \nsoldier. It is not possible to consider either aspect of the inner warfare sepa\u00ac \nrately; they are always inter-related, interwoven. What a man is, what he has \nmade himself with the help of his superiors in that inner world, what he con\u00ac \ntinues to be, determines the extent to which he is able consciously to make use \nof this inner strategy and tactics, in order to further his spiritual advance. \nWhatever military parallels one uses in order to emphasize similarity, points of \nlikeness between the inner warfare and the outer, the need of definite and \npermanent attainment in certain inner ways, of having tried troops to use, is \nparamount and essential. My thinking along these lines received a powerful \nstimulus at about that time from a letter which I received from my friend in \nthe Movement in New York, in which he said: \u201cWe have been reading aloud \nThe Principles of War , by General Foch. . . . Just because Foch really deals \nwith principles and has thought deeply, his book might easily be paraphrased \nas a treatise on \u2018the spiritual combat\u2019. Expressed in terms of force instea^( 4 t \nin terms of consciousness, it appeals more directly to the modem mind than \nsuch books as that by Scupoli. It is really a profound book. But you, poor \nman, have no chance for luxuries such as that,\u2014though, in compensation, you \nwitness what Foch wrote about, and can at all times translate and re-translate \nfrom one set of terms to the other,\u2014the battle of the soul to that of the Allies, \nand vice versa.\u201d There was no opportunity, then, for reading that book; in\u00ac \ndeed, my chances at that time for any reading at all were few and far between. \nBut what that letter meant, beyond peradventure, was that I was on the right \nk in the line of thinking which had opened out for me, and that I must \nue it, brood over it, until I had so made the principles involved a definite \n\n\n\n45 \n\n\n\n46 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\npart of my being, that they would manifest themselves in outer life and living, \nand so, perhaps, would come to mean something to others. \n\nMuch has been said in regard to the initial necessity for implicit and instant \nobedience; emphasis has been laid upon the fact that it is the fundamental \nbasis of all things, whether in the case of the man who enlists as a soldier, or \nin that of the aspirant for ch\u00a3laship at the beginning of the Way. I had received \nvery early an object lesson in this respect at the Officers Training Camp at \nPlattsburgh, when, as related in an earlier article, vociferous hand-clapping at \na mass-meeting of the candidates for commissions had been rudely interrupted \nby the Regular Army, with the explanation that in the Army it was not cus\u00ac \ntomary to evince either approbation or disapprobation, and with the command \nthat thereafter it would not be done. Why not? That is easy to see. If you \nare to have among soldiers the quality of obedience, that basis of the military \nlife, immediate, unquestioning, you cannot have men expressing themselves \nas to whether or not they like the thing which they have been commanded to \ndo. Nor, when a man has started on the road to chelaship, can there be obedi\u00ac \nence on his part to the laws of the spiritual world, expressed for him through \nthe suggestions or orders of those who are his superiors in that world, if he \nallows his lower nature continually to approve or to disapprove of the advice \nwhich he has received; if he permits it to chatter to him that this is good, that \nthe other cannot be right and that there must be a mistake somewhere. But \nfor the aspirant, as well as for the soldier, there is an additional and \nhighly important reason for absolute and unquestioning obedience, for it is \nonly through such obedience that there will come to either that quality of \nunderstanding obedience which sees, in part at any rate, the reason and the \npurpose which lie behind an order; which glimpses something, at least, of its \nnecessity and meaning; which brings increased vision, greater trustworthiness \nand the possibility of an enlarged sphere of effort. \n\nBoth receive their orders in much the same way. To the aspirant they come, \nbased on spiritual and universal law, down through the hierarchy, through \nthose in advance of him in all ways of inner progress, until, through his im\u00ac \nmediate superior he is told those things which have a bearing on his inner prob\u00ac \nlems of the moment, and is thus helped to meet the situation as it exists on his \nfront. For the soldier in the battle line, orders originate with the Army High \nCommand, which knows the larger plan of the whole. Down through army \ncorps, through division, through brigade they come, constantly adapted at \neach stage to cover the narrowing exigencies of the local situation, until finally \nthey reach his regiment. Again, the orders are contracted in scope and are \nmodified to conform to the conditions which obtain in that regimental sector. \nThey go from regimental headquarters to the battalion, then to the company \ncommander, who, finally, makes the appropriate dispositions of his platoons \nto conform to the order which he receives, and which by this time contains \nlittle, if any, suggestion of the larger purpose and mission at stake, which had \nconcerned the Army High Command. By the time that the individual soldier \nin the line has received his instructions from his platoon commander, they \n\n\nWITHOUT CENSOR \n\n\n47 \n\n\nhave to do only with the immediate circumstances and surroundings in which \nhe finds himself, with how he is to handle himself, in conjunction with those \nclose to him, during the next few hours or days. That, at the moment, is all \nthat he needs to know, as it is all, in similar circumstances, that the aspirant \nfor ch\u00a3laship at a like moment requires. It would be impossible for either of \nthem to comprehend at the moment the larger issues involved, to understand \nanything of the greater plan and purpose in which they are playing their part. \nIf a somewhat wider range of vision, partial and incomplete as it would be, \nwere possible for either of them at the point at which they find themselves, \nit would only tend to blur and to obscure their understanding of the scope of \ntheir immediate duties, and to take the edge off the quality of their present \neffort. To do what is right, to the uttermost of their ability, in the surround\u00ac \nings in which they are placed, asking for such help from above as they may \nneed, is the present clearly defined duty of both; a united effort of heart and \nmind and will. But, when the immediate duty is over, when their obedience \nof the moment is complete, then it is possible for them to make effective use in \nretrospect of their powers of observation, to try to trace cause and effect, to see \nreasons, to understand purposes, to learn from experience, so that there may be, \nin their next test of obedience, an admixture of intelligent co-operation and \nunderstanding. In this way the quality of their obedience improves, and their \nability to serve increases, until the point is reached at which they are able to \nimpart to others not only some knowledge of how to obey, but also something \nof the purpose and the meaning behind and beyond obedience itself; and then \ntheir promotion comes. If, however, either the aspirant or the soldier fails \nto obey at his particular point of the battle line, he jeopardizes far more than \nhis own personal situation. If he fails to obey through stupidity, it is bad \nenough, but not hopeless; but if it is through a feeling of disapprobation, if \nit is because he does not like that which he has been told to do, his personal \nsituation is desperate indeed. In each case he has endangered, through a pos\u00ac \nsible miscarriage at the point at which he is responsible, the success of the \nentire plan of the High Command. \n\nThe infrequency with which praise is awarded in the Army was so string, \nthat it seemed inevitable that, back of this disinclination to commend^there \nmust lie some principle to which a parallel could be found in the life and order \nof the spiritual world. It is true that decorations were awarded for valour \nand for distinguished service, that meritorious performance was commended \nin citations and in orders. It seemed to me, however, that always in such \ncases it was the purpose, not to reward the individual in question, but to re\u00ac \nward the act itself, which of necessity must be far beyond the ordinary line of \nduty. Attention was directed to exceptional performance in order to stimulate \nothers to similar acts, and so to raise the general level of the morale of the \nArmy as a whole. It was almost as if the harm which might be done to the \nindividual in question was deliberately risked, for the greater good of the larger \nlumber. That harm might be done by praise and approbation was clearly \nrecognized, for ordinary, and even extraordinary performance of duty passed \n\n\n48 THEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\nusually without comment. It was a commonplace that the best thing that \ncould happen was to hear nothing at all from one\u2019s superiors; that meant in\u00ac \nevitably that one was doing one\u2019s job all right; if one was not, one was perfectly \ncertain to hear about it. The reason, the underlying principle, in this matter \nof withholding commendation, is not hard to find, and it is valid in the inner \nlife as well. Most men simply cannot stand praise, just as the great majority \ncannot stand up under prosperity, and for the same reasons. Praise unloosens \nvanity, and, after a little, after the recipient has had time to think about the \ncommendation which he has received and to become thoroughly complacent, \nup surge self-reference and self-will and self-love, and before very long the \nfact that a man is working for a Cause\u2014whether military or spiritual\u2014is lost \nsight of, and lower nature is in complete command of the situation. A decora\u00ac \ntion for valour might well change the whole nature of the man who has received \nit; that for which he has been rewarded, formerly no more than the thing at \nhand to do, has become for him instead a great deed, something magnified \nout of all due proportion, and he himself has become in his own eyes a figure \nof supreme importance. For the aspirant for chelaship, the faintest stirring of \na desire for commendation might well be the warning signal that vanity was \nat work, and that careful self-examination was an immediate necessity, in order \nto arrive at a thorough understanding of the reactions of his lower nature, and \nto prevent any outward expression in word or deed of those latent concomitants \nof vanity, self-will and self-love. The Army, and that life which has as its \nmotive spiritual growth and attainment, are run on the same principle,\u2014with \nthis difference, that one who is really dedicated to the inner life does not want \npraise. The Cause comes first. If praise be awarded, it should serve merely \nas sign and signal that the particular effort which called it forth has been, for \nonce in a way, rightly made; that the results are, for a wonder, satisfactory; \nthat, perhaps, the lesson which that particular incident was designed to teach \nhas been sufficiently well learned to make it possible to move forward and to \nlearn the next. Praise, a signal to advance, not to rest content. For only as we \nadvance, only as we attack, can the plan of the High Command go through. \n\nIt has been pointed out that the strategy and tactics of the Allied Armies \nin the closing days of the war, in operations against an enemy who was at last \non the defensive, called for the driving of salients into the enemy line, which \nwould have the effect of exposing his flanks, and thus of rendering him so vulner\u00ac \nable that he would be forced to retire at those points, and thus constantly to \ngive ground. Frontal attacks at strong points of resistance, in the effort to \ndemolish them first, were not contemplated. Indeed, throughout all the Ameri\u00ac \ncan operations of the summer, the principle had been constantly reiterated of \nalways attacking strong points by envelopment, and never directly; of \u201csqueez\u00ac \ning-out\u201d a position by passing it on both flanks, and thus forcing its defenders \nto retire in order to save themselves, after which the position was mopped up \nfrom the rear by the attacking forces and the gain consolidated. The reasons \nfor this were, of course, that the waste of time, of life and of effort in a frontal \nattack was out of all proportion to the success gained, which could usually \n\n\nWITHOUT CENSOR \n\n\n49 \n\n\nbe better secured by the other method. There is a close parallel here with a \nfamiliar inner problem. How often we persist in the frontal attack, resolved \nto overcome some particular fault, in order that we may go forward all along \nthe line, until, through our sheer obstinacy and opinionatedness as to the neces\u00ac \nsity of gaining this objective first , before further progress is possible, our entire \ninner advance is held up. Our inner enemy may be on the defensive, and we \nmay be full of the spirit of the attack, but we are not using our intelligence \nwhen this happens, we are not utilizing the more aggressive qualities within us, \nnor handling them as the commander of an army corps marshals his divisions \nin an offensive, using one to reinforce the position of another. \n\nThe commander of an army corps sees, perhaps, in the centre of his corps \nfront, a strong enemy resistance point which is beginning to hold back the \nadvance of his entire line of attack of three divisions. He knows that, if he \nconcentrates upon a frontal attack at this point, not only will his line on both \nsides be forced to check still further until success is gained, but that the enemy, \nat the first sign of that check, will counter-attack in force, and will throw him \nfrom the offensive to the defensive. He presses the attack, therefore, with his \ntwo flank divisions, ordering them to go as far forward on each side of that \ncentral enemy resistance point as they can, exploiting his superiority on each \nflank in an enveloping attack; with the result that the enemy, within that \nposition, seeing that he is being passed on both sides by the advancing troops, \nand that he is in imminent danger of being surrounded and captured, retires \nwithout delay. Then the centre attacking division at once moves forward, \nthe attacking line becomes uniform again in advanced territory, and the of\u00ac \nfensive proceeds. What that army corps commander accomplished by this \noperation, by pushing his advantage at the points at which he had superiority, \nwas to pull up into line, with his most advanced elements, the forces at his \ndisposal which were being checked and which were most backward. That, \ntoo, is exactly what we can do in our inner warfare, if only we do not persist \nin a frontal attack against some besetting sin or weakness,\u2014which, too oft^, \ndegenerates into merely sitting down in front of it, obsessed with the idea tnat \nwe cannot make progress elsewhere until this resistance point of our inner \nenemy has first been overcome. Suppose, for instance, that a man is impatient. \nInstead of concentrating upon trying to conquer impatience, let him cultivate \nsympathy and understanding. Gradually, as he acquires these qualities, as \nhe forges forward at these points, passing the old resistance point of the enemy, \nhe will find that impatience is no longer on the front of his attack. Suppose \nthat he is afraid. Concentration upon freeing his entire nature from the thought \nof self, upon putting first the thought of others, or of a Cause, will drive out \n%ar He may already feel sympathy and understanding, he may already \ndesire courage, he may already long to be free of self, to be truly selfless. If so, \nhe is already bringing more positive forces into being within himself. There\u00ac \nfore, as he presses forward on all sides in the effort to strengthen further those \nqualities which are the opposites of his faults, his hatred of impatience, his \nloathing of fear follow up as the old enemy gives ground, in the same way \n\n\n5 \u00a9 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nthat the centre division does in the attack of the army corps commander, \nhelping him to pull all his forces forward to a unified line from which his further \ninner advance may proceed. The dangers and the effort inherent in this kind \nof an attack, in our inner warfare, are nothing in comparison with those which \nwe run in our persistence in a frontal effort, for once our inner enemy has held \nus up, once he sees that our forward movement has ceased, he will counter\u00ac \nattack on all sides without delay. Old temptations will arise then, old weak\u00ac \nnesses will recur, and we shall be driven back; for we cannot remain stationary, \nand the ground that we thus lose we shall have to win again. \n\nOn no account, of course, must we allow our enemy to break through at our \nweak points: that would be fatal. Whenever we are attacked at those points\u2014im\u00ac \npatience, timidity, what not\u2014we must resist to the death, both directly, and by \nspecial effort to dominate by means of the opposite virtue. \n\nAs the Meuse-Argonne operation progressed, the pressure upon the Message \nCentre increased, until it was functioning upon a permanently higher level \nof activity. It handled at that time as many as three thousand messages and \ndespatches a day, although, of course, many of these were routed together, \nand went out by the same courier. The work that the motor-cycle drivers \ndid was superb; their efforts were too little known, the part that they played \nin the War was too little understood, not nearly enough has been said or written \nabout them. Often a rider would fall behind his schedule, and then we would \ntry to pick up his location, so as to send another rider after him if necessary, \nin case he had been knocked out, for the despatches could not be delayed; we \nwould telephone from point to point along his known route, over the military \nwires, in the effort to check up his arrivals and departures, and so to narrow \ndown his probable position. Usually the delay was caused by the rider running \ninto heavy shelling on the forward roads; when this happened, he would take \nrefuge with his machine in some shell crater, and would remain there until \nthe shelling was over, which might be a matter of twenty minutes or of two \nhours. Indeed, whenever there was heavy artillery fire in the forward areas, \nwe knew that our service would be delayed, and when, in these circumstances, \na Corps Message Centre would ring up to complain that our courier had not \narrived, and to ask when he might be expected, we would reply that it would \nbe just as soon as their Corps Artillery got on the job and put down the Ger\u00ac \nman batteries. It would never do, in the Army (beware of this in spiritual \nwarfare!), to allow the suspicion to arise that delay had originated through any \nfault of one\u2019s own; the thing to do was to \u201cpass the buck\u201d like lightning \nto someone else, in this case the Corps Artillery. Sometimes a courier would \nbe delayed by temporary illness. The constant pounding on a motor-cycle \nover roads that were full of holes and pits gradually came to have serious and \nchronic effects upon the internal organs of the riders, producing constant dis\u00ac \ncomfort and often real physical anguish. Often, when the activity was at its \nheight, I have seen one of my riders lifted off his machine when he came in, \nhis face twisted with pain, unable to stand, and I have had to tell him, as he \nstood there supported by two mechanics, that I was sorry, but that he would \n\n\nWITHOUT CENSOR \n\n\n5i \n\n\nhave to go out again in twenty minutes, as there was no one else who could be \nused. Invariably he would smile and reply, \u201cAll right, Captain\u201d. He would \nlie down, be dosed with strong, hot coffee, and at the end of twenty minutes \nbe lifted on to his machine again and, with his jaw set, be off. They were a \nsplendid lot, and their individual courage and tenacity had far more to do with \nthe successful functioning of the First Army Staff, and indeed of the First \nArmy itself, than was ever generally realized or appreciated. \n\nAbout half-way through the Meuse-Argonne offensive, I made a survey of \nthe transport under my command, and realized that, if my rolling-stock continued \nto depreciate at the rate it was doing, at the end of two weeks more the Message \nCentre would not be able to function properly. Something had to be done. \nOf course, I should be held responsible; but that was not the point; the main \nthing was, we simply must not break down. In order, therefore, to forestall \nany such contingency, and to place myself officially on record as having fore\u00ac \nseen this danger, I addressed a letter, according to military procedure, to the \nCommanding General First Army, in which I outlined the situation in detail, \ndrew my conclusions, and asked for certain specified additional transportation. \nThe Army Commander never saw the letter, of course; it was endorsed over \nto the Colonel in charge of G-4, the Supply Section of the General Staff, whom \nI had never met, for his information and action. This letter was too much \nfor the Colonel, who was driven to death and hard pressed, and he went com\u00ac \npletely up in the air, and dictated in reply a full-page endorsement consisting \nof five paragraphs, the gist of which was, who in blazes is this Captain, and \nwhy in blazes does he think that he should be given any new transportation, \nwhen there are such things as spare parts. I was dumbfounded, and thoroughly \ndiscouraged. I had to have that transportation, and, besides, it was the first \nserious trouble I had ever had with a superior, and I felt badly about that. \nBut, after I had reread the letter several times, I thought that I saw the light. \nThere were no such things as spare parts. A wise and beneficent Government \nat home, although it had sent to France any amount of motor transport, had \nnever had the foresight to send consignments of spare parts, and, when motor \ntransport broke down, the only way in general in which it could be repaired \nwas to strip other motor transport, taken from active service, of th^fcrts \nneeded. There was, obviously, a limit to the extent to which this sy^Pn of \nrepairing would work. But the mention of spare parts was a weak spot in this \nreply, and it made a point of departure for a further effort; I was bound to \nhave that transportation. Plunged, however, in deep gloom, I went to General \nDrum\u2019s office, only to find that he was absent that day, up at the front lines. \nThe Deputy Chief of Staff was in charge, a Colonel, whom, fortunately, I had \nonce known in civil life before the War, and with whom I had recently had \nseveral friendly passages. I showed him the correspondence, outlined my \nsituation again, and asked him what, in the circumstances, I should do next. \nTo my immense relief, he laughed immoderately when he had read the endorse- \n^pent of the Colonel in charge of G-4, and said to me, \u201cDon\u2019t you pay any \nattention to him. He is tired out from trying to make bricks without straw. \n\n\n52 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nI know that you need more motor transport. You leave the correspondence \nwith me, and I will see what I can do.\u201d I departed with a feeling of greater \ncheer, which turned to distinct elation a few days later, when I received all of \nthe additional transportation for which I had asked. \n\nAlways, not only in the Seventy-seventh Division, but at First Army Corps \nHeadquarters, and in my work at Headquarters First Army, I was fortunate \nin having the backing of someone higher up to bolster my lack of rank, and I \nwas always, as it were, clothed with a mantle of delegated authority, and able \nto speak either as representing my Colonel, or as a direct subordinate of the \nArmy Chief of Staff. It worked very well as far as attaining results was con\u00ac \ncerned, as my superiors were always generous in their support. \n\nThere is, I think, another parallel here between the way in which things are \nactually handled in the Army in wartime, and the manner in which the spiritual \nhierarchy utilizes those far down the line in their grades of rank and of attain\u00ac \nment, in furthering that inner and unseen warfare which it is carrying on. I \nhad entered the Army, an entirely new field, straight from civil life. I had no \nprevious military experience or background whatever. All that I did have \nwas a very real desire to serve, and to serve as efficiently and as loyally as I \ncould. Probably my superiors, in succession, had recognized this. Possibly \nthey had realized also that there were potentialities of performance in me \nwhich might be further developed, which did not warrant increase in rank \nwhile this attempt at development was in progress, but which could in the \nmeanwhile be utilized for practical purposes under skilled direction. So, in \nsuccessive instances, I was clothed with an authority delegated from above, \nbeyond that of my actual rank, and was told to go ahead, while watchful eyes \nwere kept upon my progress. Certainly that is exactly what happens in the \ninner life, in the life and order of the spiritual world, when there is real devotion \nand self-giving, when there is a real desire truly to serve, when trial has been \nmade and a certain degree of trustworthiness has been proved. At that low \nlevel of the spiral of spiritual ascent, one can of oneself do nothing. But if \nsuch qualities are present, it is possible for those superior in rank in the hier\u00ac \narchy, to use such an aspirant to further in the world the purposes of the Lodge \nitself. Under direction, undeveloped inner abilities are utilized, growing per\u00ac \nception and discrimination are increased, devotion and understanding are \nstrengthened. The status of the individual, his rank in the hierarchy, do \nnot change; he must be tested, perhaps for long years, before promotion can \ncome. But he is given, in advance of his qualifications for actually holding \nthat rank, opportunities for work which properly belong to a higher grade \nthan he has yet proved himself capable of functioning in consistently and \npermanently,\u2014work, not of his own choosing, but of theirs; work pre-eminently \nadapted to further his inner growth and his development; work which he can \ndo effectively at the point at which he finds himself, by virtue of an authority \ndelegated to him from above. \n\nIt should be easy to see from this narrative that my work at the Message \nCentre had now become almost entirely of a confining and administrative \n\n\n\nWITHOUT CENSOR \n\n\n53 \n\n\nnature, requiring constant application and watchfulness. I rarely left Souilly, \nmy peregrinations consisting of only three or four motor trips upon occasions \nwhen I had to go personally; usually I sent one of my subordinates, as I felt \nthat, to be most effective, I must keep myself uninterruptedly in a position in \nwhich I could maintain my perspective, not only of details, but of the whole \npicture. I was usually able to secure enough sleep, for my organization had \nbecome efficient, and the officer whose turn it was for night duty was almost \nalways able to carry on alone until morning without help or consultation. \nMy faithful striker always awakened me early, shut my window, and lit the \nsmoky stove in my room, for that autumn it rained constantly and the air was \nunbelievably chill and penetrating. He then retired outside, to clean and \npolish my leathers. His retirement was the signal for me to cover my head \nwith the blankets, until the smoke from the stove had penetrated sufficiently \nwithin my covering to make me cough. I then shouted, and my striker returned, \nand opened the window again to let out the smoke. By this simple method, \nenough heat was finally retained in the room to make it possible to wash and \ndress without one\u2019s fingers becoming absolutely numb. If any extended lull in \nofficial duties occurred during the day, I took a short walk, my favourite ob\u00ac \njectives being the aviation field, where it was possible to converse with the \nfliers, and the hospital, where I got to know some of the sick and wounded, \nand made friends with several of the doctors. It was not much in the way of \nvariety, but it was all that offered. \n\nNo official Tables of Organization for a Message Centre at the headquarters \nof a field army were in existence, as it was an entirely new affair as far as our \nArmy was concerned. The First Army Message Centre had evolved, over a \ncomparatively short period of time, to the going concern which it then was. As \nI had probably had as much to do with that evolution as anyone else, I was \ntold to draw up tentative general Tables of Organization, and to submit them \nin the form of a report, with suggestions and recommendations based upon \nexperience. I spent much time over this monumental work, adding to its \ntheoretical paper strength everything which I needed myself at the moment \nto round out my own picture, and duly turned it in. I never heard anything^ \nmore about it, and I imagine that, if it is still in existence, it is probably lying^ \nin the basement of some building in the War Department at Washington, \nsafely buried. When the Headquarters of the Second American Army was \norganized, however, I was able to labour somewhat more effectively, for the \nofficer who was to be in charge there was sent over to Souilly to study my \norganization; he spent a couple of days with us, if I remember correctly, and \nI heard later on that the Second Army Message Centre was modelled directly \non ours. \n\nSome weeks after the event I heard that General Craig, when he had become \nChief of Staff of our Third Army, had asked for me to go with him to Germany \nto take charge of his Army Message Centre, but that General Drum had refused \nto let^ne go. That refusal was a direct interposition of divine providence. \nWithout it, I should have spent the winter and the following spring on the \n\n\n54 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nRhine, and I should never have been able to return to the United States as \nsoon as I did. But it was satisfactory to know that I had been wanted. \n\nOften at Souilly, when I was returning from mess after dark to my evening s \nwork, I would stop at the village church for the service which was held there \ntwo or three nights each week. The church was a large one, and the congre\u00ac \ngation, always small, seemed tiny in that edifice and in the semi-total dark\u00ac \nness, for the only illumination came from two or three candles at the foot of the \nchancel steps, the light from which was not sufficiently bright to cast any \nbeam upon the ground outside, especially as the windows were high up on the \nchurch walls. A few American soldiers were usually there, a few French, either \nwounded or en permission , and invariably each man sat alone, where it was \ndarkest, a little way back in the pews. The remainder of the congregation \nwas composed entirely of women and children. The rays from the candles, \nfeeble as they were, reached to the Cross upon the altar and illumined it; some\u00ac \ntimes, it seemed to me, that Cross shone with a special effulgence, with a dis\u00ac \ntinct radiance of its own, towering above that small gathering, as the Figure \nhanging there looked down in compassion. The organ\u2014a parlour-organ we \nshould have called it at home\u2014had been moved to the floor of the church at \nthe foot of the chancel steps, and the women and children grouped themselves \naround it on little chairs. When the service and the singing were over, the \ncurd came down, and stood on the bottom step and preached. No, he just \ntalked; talked heart to heart with them, as he stood in the midst of his little \nflock. He was tall and thin, with a crown of white hair; always he made me \nthink of Cardinal Mercier. Perhaps it was because he was doing, in his small \nway, the same thing that the great Cardinal was then doing. He was holding \nthings together. He talked quite simply of the necessity for fortitude and \nfor endurance, perhaps for still a long time to come; of continued sacrifice, \nreminding them that the spirit in which they made their own denials had its \npart in reinforcing the spirit of France; of the absolute certainty of ultimate \nvictory, of the need for final perseverance, of enduring to the end. All in the \nsimplest possible words, in terms that they could all easily understand. As \nhe stood there, pausing in his talk, his hand on the head of a child, other \nchildren sitting on the step at his very feet, the silence unbroken save for some \nwoman\u2019s sobs, there came to me, again and again, a further realization of the \ndeathless spirit of France. No enemy from without can ever break that spirit. \nHer own enemies, from within, may perhaps warp it, but never for long, for it \ncomes direct from the spiritual world, a living force that is tempered and true. It \nis rooted and grounded in Reality itself. It is based upon a love and a devotion \nthat are divine in their essence, upon a faith that knows that to it there will \nbe granted more than it is possible to ask or to desire. \n\n\n(To be continued) \n\n\nCenturion. \n\n\nPRAYER-WHEELS OR POWER? \n\n\nD O theosophists believe in prayer? In reply, said Madame Blavatsky \nin The Key to Theosophy , . . not in prayer taught in so many \n\nwords and repeated externally, if by prayer you mean the outward \npetition to an unknown God as the addressee.\u201d Through the years since the \nbook was published, such newcomers to the Society as cherished a long-standing \naversion to prayer, have had a triumphant conviction that a Daniel had come \nto judgment and that their scepticism was thereby justified. The subsequent \nportions of the chapter were easily passed over\u2014too enigmatic, too occult, \nperhaps, to hold the attention. But what, for instance, is the \u201cwill-prayer\u201d \nreferred to later? If it is, as stated, an internal command, whom do we com\u00ac \nmand? How is it done? What is its purpose? What effect does it have? \n\nPrayer is a subject which can be discussed, except by those who are far- \nadvanced on the path, only at the risk of finding oneself, without warning, where \nangels fear to tread. The purpose of the present article, however, is not to \ndiscuss but simply to bring together\u2014without apology for almost continual \nquotation\u2014certain long-ago writings from a school of thought other than \nTheosophy, on the chance that their rather surprising relationship to the chap\u00ac \nter in the Key } and the hints they afford, may prove of use to someone. Those \nwho are familiar with manuals on the subject will doubtless recall the enumera\u00ac \ntion they give of the various purposes of prayer: the prayer of petition (for \noneself or for others, both living and dead); the prayer of thanksgiving, the \nprayer of praise, and so on. It is a vast subject, with many aspects and many \npossible angles of approach; and to bring it within the scope of an article, the \nquotations here brought together have been chosen chiefly for their bearing \non the rather limited aspect of the effect of prayer on the one who prays. \n\nDiscussing the widespread scepticism toward prayer to-day, a modem writer, \nE. Herman, in the book Creative Prayer , blames in large measure the extemal- \nism with which most public praying is done\u2014perfunctorily in some gatherings, \nemotionally in others, with a conventional religiosity which tragically preju\u00ac \ndices those who confuse it with real religion. \n\nTo put it bluntly, for the average person of to-day, the term \u201cspiritual\u201d is equivalent \nto unpractical, if not illusory. Throughout the Church there are sincere, earnest, thought\u00ac \nful people, sensitive to the finest issues and honestly striving to serve God, who 1 ook upon \nmuch praying with undisguised suspicion, as based upon a crude and childish cdraption \nof God. . . . For generations we have, to all practical intents and purposes, regarded \nprayer in a deplorably mechanical way, as a process of importunate pleading and beg\u00ac \nging. I am not referring to our deliberate theories of prayer\u2014the best mind of the \nChurch in all ages has held a noble theory of prayer\u2014but to our practice. As a matter \nof fact, we have proceeded as if prayer consisted in asking for various temporal and \nspiritual blessings with reiterative intensity, implying that, provided we asked earnestly \nenough and persistently enough, God would surely respond to our cry. . . . Prayer has \n\n\n55 \n\n\n\n\n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\n56 \n\nbecome to hundreds of men and women who have outgrown the traditional conception \nof God either a mere pious sentiment or an outworn superstition. We suffer in fact from \narrested development in prayer. \n\nOne might go further and say that a large majority of people have no idea \nwhat prayer is\u2014could not know, for they never have lived in that part of their \nnatures, never have used the faculties which make real prayer a possibility. \nYet they do not hesitate to scoff. For information regarding any subject, the \nmodem world always seeks a \u201cspecialist\u201d, and specialists in prayer are the \nproduct, not of our modem age, but of a different spirit, a different attitude \ntoward life. Several centuries ago, there were many of them, and they used a \nterminology which often compels us to do a certain amount of translating; yet \nfrequently it is but a step from one to the other. When we read in the Key , \n\u201cGrant us our postulate that God is a universally diffused, infinite principle, and \nhow can man alone escape from being soaked through by, and in, the Deity?\u201d \n\u2014there is no great distance between that and the statement from John of the \nCross, \u201cThere are three ways in which God is present in the soul. The first is \nhis presence in essence, not in holy souls only, but in wretched and sinful souls \nas well, and also in all created things; for it is by this presence that he gives life \nand being, and were it withdrawn, at once all things would return to nothing. \nThis presence never fails in the soul. ...\u201d \n\nIn the realm of prayer, Teresa of Avila, the 16th century Spanish nun, canon\u00ac \nized by the Church, went farther, perhaps, than anyone else in the western \nworld whose experience has been recorded. Her analyses of her experience, \nnotably in her Autobiography and the book known as The Interior Castle; also, \nin a different way, her chapters on the Lord\u2019s Prayer in The Way of Perfection ,\u2014 \nthrow invaluable light both on what prayer is and on what it is not, and above \nall, on how it is to be done. On one point she was in entire accord with the \nKey, and her statement of it might well be placed in large letters before every \nchurch congregation: \n\nIf it is prayer at all, the mind must take part in it. ... If a person neither considers \nto Whom he is addressing himself, what he asks, nor what he is who ventures to speak \nto God, although his lips may utter many words, I do not call it prayer. The custom of \nspeaking to God Almighty as freely as with a slave\u2014caring nothing whether the words \nare suitable or not, but simply saying the first thing that comes to mind from being \nlearnt by rote by frequent repetition\u2014cannot be called prayer: God grant that no \nChristian may address Him in this manner. \n\nAs for what does constitute prayer, The Scale of Perfection , the 14th century \nmanual by Walter Hilton, expresses it: \n\nWhen thy desire and mind is gotten up, and as it were set free from all fleshly thoughts \nand affections, and is much lifted up by spiritual power unto spiritual favour and delight \nin Him and of His spiritual presence; hold thou therein much of thy time of prayer, so \nthat thou have no great mind of earthly things, or if they come into thy mind that they \ndo but trouble or affect thee little. If thou canst pray thus, thou prayest well, for prayer \nis nothing else but an ascending or getting up of the desire of the heart into God by \nwithdrawing of it from all earthly thoughts. Therefore it is likened to a fire which, of \nits own nature, leaveth the lowness of the earth and always mounteth up into the air, \n\n\nPRAYER-WHEELS OR POWER? \n\n\n57 \n\n\neven so desire in prayer, when it is touched and kindled of the spiritual fire, which is God, \nis ever aspiring up to Him that it came from. \n\n\nA radiant outgoing to infinite Being is an expression given it in theosophical \nwritings. \n\nAll of the early mystical writers agree on a certain classification: first vocal \nprayer (any that is spoken); higher than that, mental prayer (expressed only in \nthe mind or the heart), then several degrees, each more interior, more elevated, \nmore close to Reality than the one preceding. Vocal prayer, though lowest in \nthe scale, has its value, serving as a crutch, so to speak, in certain circum\u00ac \nstances, and also being a necessity for beginners, not yet accustomed to dwell \nwith spiritual things. Hilton, discussing several kinds of vocal prayer and the \nneed for it, writes: \n\nHe that cannot run easily and lightly by spiritual prayer, his feet of knowledge and \nlove being feeble and sick by reason of sin, hath need of a firm staff to hold by, which \nstaff is set forms of vocal prayer ordained by God and Holy Church for the help of men's \nsouls; by which the soul of a fleshly man that is alway falling downward into worldly \nthoughts and sensual affections shall be lifted up above them, and holden up as by a \nstaff, and fed with the sweet words of those prayers as a child with milk, and guarded \nand held up by them that he fall not into errors or fancies through his vain imaginations. \n\n\nLikewise vocal, but a very different type of prayer, is the expression of deep \nfeeling, a sudden outpouring, as when \u201che crieth with desire of heart and speech \nof mouth to our Lord for succour and for help\u201d, or \u201cat other times there appears \nto him to be so much goodness and grace and mercy in God that it delighteth \nhim with great affection of heart to love Him, and thank Him\u201d. \n\n\n\u201cThe third sort of prayer\u201d, says the same writer, \u201cis only in the heart with\u00ac \nout speech, with great rest and quietness both of soul and body. A pure heart \nit behoveth him to have that shall pray after this manner; for such only attain \nto it who by long travail both of body and soul, or else by such sharp touches \nor motions of love, as I have before mentioned, have arrived to rest of spirit, \nso that his affections are turned into spiritual savour and relish, that he is able \nto pray continually in his heart.\u201d There is scarcely a phrase in this passage \nwhich might not well be italicized. It gives in a few words what probably was \nthe fruit of a lifetime of experience in praying. \n\nFor the stages above this, no certain rule can be set, \u201cfor they are th^ee \ngift of the Lord, according to divers dispositions of chosen souls\u201d. These ri^Jier \nstages, which of course are the ones which St. Teresa analysed most fully, Hilton \ncalls meditation, and this is the point where the subject becomes a vital one to \nmany students of Theosophy, for it is safe to assume that practically all serious \nstudents of Theosophy are interested in the subject of meditation, have experi\u00ac \nmented with it to some extent, perhaps for many years, and have found it, in \nmany cases, baffling and discouraging. The testimony of these mediaeval \nwriters would seem to be that prayer of the right sort is a necessary preliminary \nto successful meditation, one of the lower steps in a ladder. St. Teresa makes \nthe statement in her Autobiography: \u201cIt is necessary to remark (and I speak \nof this fact, because I know the truth of it by experience), that a soul which \n\n\n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\n58 \n\nbegins to walk in this way of mental prayer, with a firm determination not to \nmake much account whether she receive many consolations or none at all [that \nis, whether she perceive results or no] such a soul has already passed over the \ngreater part of the road, and she need have no fear of going back again, what\u00ac \never obstacles she may meet with, for the building is placed on a solid founda\u00ac \ntion.\u201d In the same volume, referring to certain of the high degrees of medi\u00ac \ntation and contemplation to which she attained, she says that they came \u201calmost \nalways after a long exercise of mental prayer\u201d. The general testimony is that \none degree grows out of another: prayer, meditation, contemplation. Those \nwho attained greatly, often did so only after years of hard labour in the lower \ndegrees, and even those far advanced returned to them at times, as a means of \nstarting the springs to flowing. The raw recruit cannot become a soldier ex\u00ac \ncept by long drill. To try to dispense with the lower degrees and begin midway, \nwould seem to be courting difficulty. \n\nIt goes almost without saying that Madame Blavatsky was not condemning \nreal prayer in the sentence already quoted. She came to attack shams, to \nexpose falsity, to sweep away the outworn and lifeless. She condemned empty, \nperfunctory lip-prayer and laid herself open to misunderstanding, just as she \nincurred the charge of atheism by her attack on an outgrown and lifeless con\u00ac \nception of God. \u201cWe reject the idea of a personal, or extra-cosmic and anthro\u00ac \npomorphic God, who is but the gigantic shadow of man, and not even of man \nat his best. The God of theology, we say\u2014and prove it\u2014is a bundle of contra\u00ac \ndictions and a logical impossibility.\u201d Instead, \u201cwe believe in a Universal Divine \nPrinciple, the root of All, from which all proceeds, and within which all shall be \nabsorbed at the end of the great cycle of Being.\u201d Here as always, in sweeping \naway the old, she replaced it with a bigger, nobler concept, vibrant with life. \nIt will be remembered that the Key, after questioning whether there is any \nother kind of prayer than words or petitions, replies: \u201cMost decidedly; we call \nit will-prayer , and it is rather an internal command than a petition.\u201d \n\nThis sentence, puzzling and perhaps misleading to many, finds an unexpected \ncommentator in the unknown author of the mediaeval treatise, The Divine \nCloud or The Cloud of Unknowing. His system, already outlined in an earlier \nQuarterly, required long training and discipline, until, through complete \nwithdrawal from the sense of selfhood and intense concentration on the simple \nBe-ness of the Deity, one learned to pray \u201cin the silence of pure spirit\u201d,\u2014a \ndegree of \u201cinnemess\u201d that is difficult for the lower mind to do more than dimly \nsense. None but the trained disciple could have practised either this type of \nprayer, or that which seems to correspond to the will-prayer of the Key. The \nlatter type the author outlines, explaining that it must be reduced to the fewest \nwords possible, preferably one-syllable words\u2014and uses a quaint analogy to \nmake clear the reason: \n\nA man or a woman, being made afraid of some sudden chance of fire, or of the killing \nof a man, or of any other vehement accident, is driven, by reason of the suddenness of \nthe thing, and of his necessity, to cry or to pray for help. And how doth he cry? For\u00ac \nsooth, not in many words, nor yet in one word of two syllables. And why? Because he \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nPRAYER-WHEELS OR POWER? \n\n\n59 \n\n\nthinketh it overlong to tarry about the declaring of his necessity, and of the agony of \nhis spirit; and therefore he bursteth out vehemently and crieth out with some one word, and \nthat of one syllable, as is this word \u201cFire!\u201d or else this word \u201cHelp!\u201d or such like. Now, \nlike as this little word \u201cFire!\u201d pierceth the ears of the hearers sooner, and stirreth their \naffection more effectually than a longer discourse doth, even so doth a short word of one \nsyllable sound in the ears of Almighty God; not only when it is spoken or thought, but \nalso when it is inwardly meant in the deepness of spirit. \n\nWhy, he asks, should this prayer of one syllable have such efficacy? \u201cFor\u00ac \nsooth, because it is prayed with a full spirit, to wit, in the height and depth, in \nthe length and breadth of his spirit that prayeth.\u201d \n\nAnd remembering that we pray either to acquire a good or to rid ourselves of \nan evil,\u2014then since \u201call good things are comprehended in God, and all evils \nin sin . . . let us when we mind intentively to pray for the removing of evil, \neither say or think or mean only this little word \u2018sin\u2019, and no more. And like\u00ac \nwise, if w r e mean intentively to pray for the obtaining of good things, let us cry \neither with word or with thought, or else with desire, only this short word \u2018God\u2019 \nand no more; for in God are all good things, both as in their cause, as also in \ntheir essence or being.\u201d \n\nIf some other word be preferred, well and good, but whatever the word chosen, \nit should be dwelt upon until one\u2019s spirit is filled with its meaning\u2014not thinking \nof this or that special kind of \u201csin\u201d, but \u201cThou must have such an estimate of \nsin, that thou feel it to be a lump thou wotest not what; but surely none other \nthing than thine own self. And feeling it so, cry out upon it only, and say, \n\u2018Sin, sin, sin, out, out, out\u2019. Now, like as thou hast done with this word \u2018sin\u2019, \neven so do with this word \u2018God\u2019.\u201d \n\nTo modem ears it sounds strange, cold perhaps, and lacking the fire which \nthe author evidently felt; but within it is at least a clue to the rationale of will- \nprayer. The written word is cold as a medium of expression for living inner \nexperience, unless the reader intend upon and enter into the idea until it be\u00ac \ncomes a living thing for him as well. Hilton is speaking in an age of faith, to \nthose who had given themselves to a life of prayer and had had long exigence, \nand his urgent message is that to crown their effort, to make their prajlr \u201crise \nsuddenly unto God\u201d, they must throw into it all the force of every atom of their \nbeing. There is a footnote in The Secret Doctrine which has bearing on this \nmethod: \u201cThe words \u2018whosoever shall say to this mountain be thou removed \nand cast into the sea, and shall not doubt , that thing will come to pass\u2019, are no \nvain words. Only the word \u2018faith\u2019 ought to be translated by will. Faith with\u00ac \nout Will is like the wind-mill without wind \u2014barren of results\u201d (Vol. II, p. 59, \nEd. 1888). It will be remembered, too, that the opening sentences of the Lord\u2019s \nPrayer\u2014\u201cThy Kingdom come\u201d, and so on\u2014are phrased as commands, and \nobviously involve will . \n\nWill-power becomes a living power as a result of prayer, says the Key, a state\u00ac \nment at once suggestive of those enigmatical sentences in The Secret Doctrine \nabout Kriy&shakti, the mysterious power of thought enabling it to produce \nexternal, perceptible, phenomenal results by its own inherent energy (a mys- \n\n\n6o \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nterious and divine power latent in the will of every man),\u2014which, coupled with \nIchchMshakti, the power of the will, works miracles. \n\nReal prayer is a mystery, the Key continues, \u201can occult process by which \nfinite and conditioned thoughts and desires, unable to be assimilated by the \nabsolute spirit which is unconditioned, are translated into spiritual wills and the \nwill; such process being called \u2018spiritual transmutation\u2019.\u201d Then those lines, \nperhaps the most important in the whole chapter: \u201cThe intensity of our ardent \naspirations changes prayer into the \u2018philosopher\u2019s stone\u2019, or that which trans\u00ac \nmutes lead into pure gold. The only homogeneous essence, our \u2018will-prayer\u2019, \nbecomes the active or creative force, producing effects according to our desire.\u201d \n\nHere lies the essential difference between prayer as usually practised and \nprayer in accordance with Theosophy: the fact that, according to the latter, \nprayer creates, and the fact (made clear in many theosophical writings) that it \nreacts on ourselves, that it is ourselves we are creating. The great mystics \nexperienced this, discovered it, for themselves. By praying greatly, they came \nto love greatly, and in loving, they grew into conformity of will with the Beloved, \nand then gradually into conformity of their entire being. They were made over, \nwere bom anew, as a result of the creative power of prayer. In the process, \nthey developed occult faculties, acquired in some cases certain of the powers of \nthe ch\u00a3la, and learned by experience some of the most esoteric teachings of \nTheosophy. They did this simply and naturally without a planned advance, \njust as an explorer presses forward into unknown country. Theosophy teaches \nthat it may be done, can be done, by planned effort, with the sure knowledge \nthat if certain steps be taken, certain results will follow. \n\nThis creative aspect of prayer, has not been glimpsed by the world at large, \nor by the average man who prays, yet actually it involves little more in the be\u00ac \nginning than a matter of emphasis, a difference in centre of gravity: the dif\u00ac \nference between obtaining and being or becoming. In some respects, the dis\u00ac \ntinction is rather elusive, and it may be made clearer by an illustration,\u2014that \nof a young woman who had been reduced to despair by a serious estrangement. \nHaving tried every outer means to undo the past, and being devout both by \nnature and training, she turned to prayer as the only remedy left. She would \npray with all her might for a year, that the break be mended. The year passed \n\u2014without visible result. With hope and faith alike gone, and feeling that she \nhad done her full part, she declared she was \u201cthrough with religion for life\u201d. \nTo those who knew her, it was an illuminating experience. She was headstrong, \nselfish and indolent. Had the high gods granted her prayer, a repetition of her \ndifficulties in no long time would have been inevitable. Yet her instinct was \nright and true. Continued prayer, with the right emphasis\u2014not on obtaining \nan outer thing, but on creating, on becoming \u2014would have rid her of the defects \nwhich caused the trouble and could equally have developed qualities with which \nto win and hold those she loved. \n\nAs so often happens, a difference which seems trifling in its beginnings leads \nto final results which are poles apart. Madame Blavatsky in the Key , just as \nshe says little of the preparatory stages, merely hints at the way that lies ahead, \n\n\nPRAYER-WHEELS OR POWER? \n\n\n61 \n\n\nleaving it for the seeker to discover for himself. Quoting the biblical verse, \n\u201cWhatsoever ye shall ask in my name [that of the Christos] that will I do,\u201d \nshe writes,\u2014 \n\nIf we accept it [the quotation] esoterically, A with the full knowledge of the meaning \nof the term Christos, which to us represents Atma-Buddhi-Manas, the Self, it comes \nto this: the only God we must recognize and pray to, or rather act in unison with, is that \nSpirit of God of which our body is the temple, and in which it dwelleth. . . . We believe \nin \u201ccommunion\u201d and simultaneous action in unison with our \u201cFather in secret\u201d; and, \nin rare moments of ecstatic bliss, in the mingling of our higher soul with the universal \nessence, attracted as it is towards its origin and centre; a state called during life Samadhi, \nand after death, Nirvana. \n\nIt is really this concept of prayer in its larger sense (prayer-meditation- \ncontemplation as a creative process) which gives the other main tenets of \nTheosophy their practical significance and makes them more than a splendid \ntheory. In the light of this concept, the teaching of the fundamental Unity \nof all things takes on vital significance as making possible the at-one-ment \nof the individual with the Divine above and about him. In its light, the \ndoctrine of Karma shows that our circumstances are merely the field in which \nwe work; that they point the way; that they are self-made, the effect of past \nright- or wrong-creation, and that the only way to change them essentially is by \nthis process of re-creating ourselves, and thereby producing a new chain of \neffects. In its light, the doctrine of Reincarnation affords time, through life \nafter life, in which to carry forward the work. And finally this concept coupled \nwith the teaching of the \u201cFather in secret\u201d (as the Key calls it), the Master \nas he is referred to elsewhere, supplies the Instructor, the Guide, the Way by \nwhich man shall advance, in ever-growing consciousness, through a future that \nknows no end,\u2014shall win immortality. \n\nP. \n\n\nm \n\n\nDeath to ourselves is the teaching wrapped in the mystery of the Nativity. Could \nwe but understand this as the Saints have understood it , with what ardour we should \nplunge ourselves into that death to nature , which brings forth the Soul into divine \nlife !\u2014 Anon. \n\n\n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME \n\n\nT HE Recorder had explained to his friends as they assembled, that, a \nfew days before, he had met one of the younger members who had asked \nhim questions which he, the Recorder, believed would be of general \ninterest, and that consequently he had invited his questioner to their meeting \nthat afternoon. The younger member arrived promptly, and after a word or \ntwo from the Recorder, began, by general request, to state his difficulties. \n\n\u201cIt is good of you\u201d, he began, \u201cto let me discuss my problems with you. I \nam always afraid that I may be making mountains out of mole-hills, but the \ntruth is that I find myself in a state of muddle, trying to reconcile the views \nof older students of Theosophy, whose absolute rightness it seems almost dis\u00ac \nloyal to question, with the views of other friends, who are not interested in \nTheosophy, but who think idealistically, and who are unselfish and sincere in \ntheir aims.\u201d \n\n\u201cForgive me if I interrupt you so soon\u201d, said the Philosopher, \u201cbut please \nat once get rid of the idea that it can be disloyal to question the rightness of \nany student of Theosophy from H.P.B. and Judge, down to its exponents of \nto-day. Absolute rightness does not exist in this world, and even if it did, it \nis a fundamental principle of Theosophy that another person\u2019s perception of \nTruth can at best serve us as a working hypothesis, until we have tested it, \nnot only intellectually, but in the laboratory of life itself, that is, in the light \nof universal experience, and, above all, by setting it to work, by trying it out, \nin our daily contact with the world. It is the lazy man who persuades himself \nthat he \u2018knows\u2019 something merely because he has heard it stated \u2018authori\u00ac \ntatively\u2019, and because, off-hand, he sees no reason why it shouldn\u2019t be true.\u201d \n\n\u201cMay I also suggest\u201d, added the Historian, \u201cthat it takes two to tell the \ntruth: one to speak it, and the other to hear it. A dozen Adepts, one after the \nother, might expound the same truth to a man, each in a different way\u2014and \nhe might completely misunderstand their meaning, and pass on that misunder\u00ac \nstanding to others as the ultimate expression of Wisdom. Particularly is this \nlikely to happen when theosophical principles are in question, because most \nminds are wooden in their interpretation and application of principles of any \nkind; in addition to which my own experience is that, in the most ordinary \nmatters, real understanding of our thought, wishes, and even of what we imagine \nto be our explicit directions, is astonishingly rare; and of course we misunder\u00ac \nstand others at least as much as they misunderstand us.\u201d \n\n\u201cI see all that\u201d, said our friend, with a perhaps justifiable shade of impatience. \n\u201cNone the less it is difficult to shake off the feeling that someone w'ho has studied \nTheosophy for more years than I have lived, must have a better grasp of the \nsubject than I have, and that to question his interpretation would be pre\u00ac \nsumptuous.\u201d \n\n\n62 \n\n\n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME \n\n\n63 \n\n\n\u201cStop, think, look, listen!\u201d exclaimed the Philosopher, laughing. \u201cYou have \nbeen to college; you have listened to lectures. You would indeed have been \nfoolish to imagine that you knew more about chemistry or botany or anatomy \nthan your old Professor; but all he could do or could attempt to do was to \ngive you the result of his own study and experience, while insisting that, by \nrepeating the experiments or dissections he described, you must verify for \nyourself the truth of his instruction. Nothing would have pleased him better, \nafter you had done that, than intelligent questioning of his results.\u201d \n\n\u201cBut Theosophy is not only a science; it is an art, a philosophy,\u2014an inter\u00ac \npretation and explanation of life and its causes, seen and unseen!\u201d \n\nThis pleased the Philosopher. \u201cTrue\u201d, he said; \u201cbut once more return to \nyour experience at college. There were teachers and teachers, some good, some \nbad; and you realize now that the best were not those who taught you most, \nby rote, at the moment, but those who filled you with love of their subject \nand an ardent and lasting desire to learn more, always more, about it. What\u00ac \never your reaction at the time, looking back on your experience you probably \nsee that while one Professor was using his lectures on literature as an oppor\u00ac \ntunity to advocate Communism, or to ventilate his hatred of religion, another \ndevoted his energies to belittling the Victorians in favour of the Elizabethans \nor perhaps of ultra-modems, while a third was a mere grammarian. You were \nfortunate if you encountered one who dealt primarily with underlying principles, \nand who tried to give you the intellectual background, and especially the appre\u00ac \nciation of content, form, atmosphere, which would make you a discriminating \nlover of literature for the rest of your life. \n\n\u201cApply that to those who expound Theosophy. Think of the materialistic \ninterpretations of Mrs. Besant, the psychic perversions and perversities of Lead- \nbeater, the pontifical attitude of so many others. R&manathan came from \nthe East as an exponent of Theosophy, and, in a New York drawing-room, to \na group of students, suddenly announced: \u2018Now I will tell you all about God\u2019! \nNot a flicker of a smile: he imagined he was being kind and generous in thus \nopening the flood-gates of his wisdom. That was many years ago, and I doubt \nif anyone would be so crudely dogmatic and untheosophical to-day; but human \nnature still remains the same, and the upshot of it all is that, as Judge so rilen \nwarned us, we must use discrimination always, and must never be sadmed \nwith any statement about Theosophy until reason and intuition and experience \ncombine to convince us of its truth.\u201d \n\n\u201cDoes that mean that we should think things out for ourselves, without the \naid of others? Was I wrong, perhaps, in asking for this opportunity to submit \nmy problems to you, who are older students?\u201d \n\n\u201cIt certainly does not! Think again: is a practising physician, puzzled by \nthe symptoms of a patient, wrong to seek whatever light he can gain by con\u00ac \nsultation with his elders? On the other hand, if he were blindly to accept some \nproffered opinion, without thought, without reference to his own experience \nmr to his first-hand knowledge of the case; if he were to wash his hands of responsi\u00ac \nbility because an opinion was backed by a great reputation,\u2014he would not be \n\n\n64 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nacting theosophicaUy, even though the ethics of his profession, outwardly at \nleast, were to justify such an attitude. . . . But, may I ask, what is your \nspecific problem ? \u2019 * \n\n\u201cI have more than one\u201d, was the reply. \u201cMy first is the question of social \nresponsibility. Granted that the universe exists for purposes of the soul, and \nthat making people\u2019s bodies comfortable may not help their souls,\u2014does that \nexonerate us from responsibility in trying to better the appalling conditions \nwhich exist around us at any point at which we come into contact with them.\"\u201d \n\nThe questioner seemed to turn to the Student rather than to the Philosopher \nfor reply; so the former, keenly interested, did not hesitate. \u201cThere is confusion \nof thought in your statement\u201d, he said. \u201cWho are \u2018us\u2019; who are \u2018we\u2019? Get \nrid of that indefinite \u2018we\u2019; make it \u2018I\u2019 and then \u2018he\u2019,\u2014and you will almost have \nsolved your problem. \u2018The duty of another is full of danger\u2019; your duty may \nbe entirely different from the duty of your neighbour, even though his educa\u00ac \ntion, circumstances and age may be very like your own. \n\n\u201cA man\u2019s natural duty, or path through life, is laid out for him, prior to in\u00ac \ncarnation, by Karma, or the Divine Law, and throughout incarnation his higher \nself tries to keep him to that path, while his lower nature frequently incites him \nto depart from it. It would be legitimate, I think, to say that every man has a \nvocation, using that term in the religious, not in the secular sense,\u2014using it as \ncovering \u2018my duty towards God and my duty towards my Neighbour\u2019 as defined \nin the Catechism, with emphasis on the oft-quoted conclusion: \u2018And to do my \nduty in that state of life unto which it shall please God to call me.\u2019 Very few, \nof course, think of life in those terms. The fact remains that if we omit from our \ncalculations the divine plan and purpose, not only for the world, but for every \nindividual in it, we can never so much as formulate the problem of individual \nduty, nor understand why two men may rightly follow totally different paths, \nnor realize that a man\u2019s divinely appointed path is determined far more by the \nsort of experience he needs for his development than by what he may be able \nto accomplish outwardly. In other words: God can get along quite well with\u00ac \nout my contribution, if only for the reason that I cannot as yet appreciably \ncontribute; but, because I am his child, my education, in the most comprehen\u00ac \nsive sense, concerns him vitally. \n\n\u201cNecessarily, in direct though restricted reply to your question, it must be \ninherent in every man\u2019s vocation to do what he can to relieve the distress with \nwhich he comes into contact,\u2014not only bodily distress, please note, but, if he \nbe able, the far more \u2018appalling\u2019 distress of heart and mind which our present \ncivilization engenders: that bitterness which lack of faith and understanding \nleaves in the natural and inevitable wounds caused by death and disaster. \u2018To \nvisit the fatherless and widows in their affliction\u2019, and to give comfort where \nwe can, subject to our fundamental vocation, must always be included as part \nof the Divine Will for us.\u201d \n\n\u201cWhat do you mean by: \u2018subject to our fundamental vocation\u2019?\u201d \n\n\u201cI mean that if a man\u2019s real vocation be that of a soldier, or a woman\u2019s, that \nof wife and mother, it would be wrong for either of them to neglect their very \n\n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME \n\n\n65 \n\n\nexacting primary duties by seeking or creating opportunities, outside their \nimmediate environment, to change conditions in the world around them. They \nshould leave wholesale reform, if there be such a thing, to those whose special \nvocation that is.\u201d \n\n\u201cWill you please illustrate just what you mean by \u2018vocation\u2019,\u2014actual ex\u00ac \namples? They would help me, I think, to understand.\u201d \n\n\u201cA man may be \u2018called\u2019 to be a soldier, like Kitchener or Foch, both of whom \nwere keenly aware that that was their vocation; or he may be \u2018called\u2019 to be a \nmonk, like St. Francis or St. Benedict; a statesman, like Sully; an artist, like \nRembrandt (you will remember that, the son of a miller, he began his career as \nan etcher and painter at the age of twelve); a philanthropist, like that Earl of \nShaftesbury who devoted his life to the better treatment of lunatics and of all \nwho were down-trodden and oppressed; or it may be his vocation\u2014none the \nless real, none the less God\u2019s call to him, and therefore just as important a part \nof the divine economy\u2014humbly to follow in the footsteps of his forebears as a \ntiller of the soil. \n\n\u201cSimilarly, it may be the vocation of a woman to serve as a wife and mother, \nwhile her sister may be \u2018called\u2019 to become a nun, \u2018contemplative\u2019 or \u2018active\u2019 as \nthe case may be. Another woman\u2019s vocation may be in^ the sphere of art or \nliterature,\u2014even of science, as we see in the case of Madame Curie, whose mar\u00ac \nriage appears to have been a scientific partnership more than anything else.\u201d \n\n\u201cWhat, then, should be my attitude toward an acquaintance, perhaps younger \nthan I am, who feels drawn toward social reform? Should I do what I can to \nencourage or discourage him?\u201d \n\n\u201cLet me ask you a question: I once heard of a girl whose mother was a \nchronic invalid and bed-ridden. The girl decided that she had a vocation for \nnursing, but that to give her vocation free scope (perhaps get away from the \nboredom of nursing her mother), she must become a trained nurse in some \nhospital. Was that girl\u2019s decision right or wrong? And why?\u201d \n\n\u201cDid the girl have to contribute to the support of her mother?\u201d \n\n\u201cNo.\u201d \n\n\u201cI should suppose, in that case, that her first duty would be to her motheijfl \n\n\u201cExactly; which helps to make it clear that we must not confuse vocatiw \nwith inclination. To abandon duty in order to follow inclination, is to indulge \nselfishness. So, in the case of your acquaintance who feels drawn toward social \nreform, the first question is, whether he is free to follow his inclination. I have \nmet plenty of young men in the Latin Quarter of Paris, studying art, who were \nconfident they had the vocation of a Rembrandt, but who ought to have been \nhelping in the family grocery or drug store in some small town in the Middle \nWest, instead of eating up the family savings in Paris,\u2014only to end as pavement \nartists or taxi drivers. However, assuming independent means and no home \nduties, a young man is surely at liberty to devote himself to social reform in \nany way he prefers, if he believes that to be his vocation, and I do not see why \nyoJfcould either encourage or discourage him, unless he should seriously con- \nsulfyou. In that case, as a student of Theosophy, you might well help him to \n\n\n* \n\n\n1 \n\n\n\n\n66 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nclarify his own aims, which, in all probability, are hazy: the result of emotion \nunchecked by reason,\u2014a well-meaning but uninformed desire to be \u2018useful. \nHelp him to define his aims, and then to gauge the means by which he hopes to \nattain them. Without any thought of turning him into a Theosophist, see if \nyou can interest him in a study of the underlying instead of the superficial \ncauses of human suffering.\u201d \n\n\u201cThe case I have actually in mind\u201d, said the younger student, \u201cis that of an \nacquaintance who is obliged to earn his own living, and who is thinking of \ndoing so by means of his interest in social welfare.\u201d \n\n\u2018\u2018He had better imitate St. Paul, and earn his living as a tent-maker\u201d, the \nStudent answered. \u2018\u2018If St. Paul had accepted a salary from the group in Jeru\u00ac \nsalem, he would have sold half his freedom. A vocation is not necessarily the \nactivity by means of which a man earns his living. He may be a doctor, or Wall \nStreet broker, or a mechanic, with discipleship, in the theosophic sense, as his \nvocation. In that case he would use his outer activities as opportunities for \ninner discipline and creative work, while his spare time would be devoted to \nhis major purpose. As always, it is the motive that counts, and motives range \nall the way from selfishness to the most complete self-giving. Think of the \ndifferent motives that may actuate a school-teacher: to inculcate a creed, to \nearn an honest living, to support an aged mother, to earn a living while striving \nto raise the level of education either for humanitarian or for spiritual ends.\u201d \n\n\u2018\u2018A friend of mine is in trouble because his father, who is an officer in the army, \nis intensely anxious that his son shall follow in his footsteps, while the son hates \nthe idea and longs to become an architect.\u201d \n\n\u2018\u2018Most architects nowadays are starving, and the father may know it! But \nI realize, of course, that that is no answer to your question. Parents often are \nunwise in their desire that the children they love should do as they have done. \nThis is as true of parents who are students of Theosophy as of any others, though \nit ought not to be. It is only natural, however, that a father, or mother, who \nhas found the solution of life\u2019s problems, and the compensation for life\u2019s suffer\u00ac \nings, in the pursuit of discipleship, should long for the same blessing for a be\u00ac \nloved child,\u2014only natural and right; but experience has fully demonstrated \nthat not one person in a million is \u2018called\u2019 to that high and splendid effort, and \nno greater mistake can be made than to attempt to push young people in that \ndirection. It is another matter if they declare their desire for such a life, and \nappeal to their parents to support their resolution; but, ordinarily, it is the \nduty of parents to help their children to find their true vocation, whatever that \nmay be, and then to help them to recognize its higher levels and to work for \ntheir attainment.\u201d \n\nAt this stage the Engineer stepped into the arena. \u2018\u2018It comes to this,\u201d he said. \n\u201cFirst, what is your own vocation? The answer is: that is for you to decide; \nyou must thrash that out with your God; you may profitably consult others, \nbut you alone, in the last analysis, can hear and follow. Second, do not con\u00ac \nfuse yourself by thinking of \u2018the young people of your age\u2019. No two of them \nare alike, or can possibly have quite the same vocation. Deal with them one \n\n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME \n\n\n67 \n\n\nat a time, as they consult you, and confine your efforts to helping each one to \nhear his own \u2018call\u2019; help him to use both his head and his heart for this purpose, \nand then to interpret it on as high and as practical a level as he is capable of \nreaching,\u2014and no higher.\u201d \n\n\u201cWell\u201d, said the younger student, \u201cthat does seem to make sense, and will \nprobably make clearer sense when I have had time to think it over. I am \nvery grateful to all of you. May I ask another question,\u2014this time on behalf of \na girl friend?\u201d \n\nAs there was ready consent, he continued: \u2018\u2018It is about women taking part \nin public life. Obviously that is not their true field, and yet with this topsy\u00ac \nturvy world, is it not wise to make the best of things, and encourage girls to \nfit themselves for some sort of useful work, and to uphold standards in the \neducational and business worlds, since uncertain conditions and other things \nmake marriage less and less of a probability,\u2014as a career for educated women ? \n. . . That, as I understood her, is a summary of my friend\u2019s problem, which I \ndiscussed with her at some length, neither to her satisfaction nor my own.\u201d \n\n\u2018\u2018What was your difficulty?\u201d \n\n\u2018\u2018It has been removed to a considerable extent by what has been said already \nin regard to vocations. Talking with my friend some weeks ago, I found myself \nin the position of a house divided against itself, one part of me agreeing with \nwhat I believed to be the ideal point of view as taught by Theosophy, and another \npart of me, especially in specific and practical cases, leaning strongly in favour \nof views held by liberal friends. The result was a fuzzy state of partial agree\u00ac \nment with everyone, and no conviction of my own.\u201d \n\nThe candour of this, appealed to all of us; but the Engineer had to get some\u00ac \nthing out of his system before continuing the discussion seriously. \n\n\u201cPlease tell your friend\u201d, he said, \u201cthat I will concede her a free hand in any \nbranch of public life on condition that she does not go into training for the \nSecretaryship of Labour.\u201d \n\nThe younger student saw the point and chuckled. \u201cNo danger of that in \nthis case\u201d, he said. \u201cHer father is a manufacturer, and has suffered,\u2014which \nmeans that she has too!\u201d \n\n\u201cGlad to hear it\u201d, the Engineer replied unsympathetically. \u201cThe more \nwide-spread the suffering, the sooner it will be over. We have had a dc^pwhich \nwill not easily be forgotten. Never again, pray heaven! Why di<Wt they \nmake her Secretary of the Navy while they were about it? It would have \nbeen just as suitable.\u201d \n\n\u201cBack to the point, please\u201d, interposed the Recorder. \n\n\u201cVery well\u201d, the Engineer agreed; \u201cI have had my say, and should like the \nStudent to resume.\u201d \n\n\u201cBriefly\u201d, responded the Student, \u201cthe \u2018fuzzy state\u2019 was due to lack of under\u00ac \nstanding. Once the doctrine of vocation is understood, there is no conflict \nbetween \u2018the ideal point of view as taught by Theosophy\u2019, and the views de\u00ac \nscribed as liberal. In fact, Theosophy provides the only view that is liberal.\u201d \n\nHe paused, and looked at his junior. \u201cAre your liberal friends\u201d, he asked, \n\n\n\n68 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\n\u201cprepared to recognize and respect the vocation of a contemplative nun, or of \na Trappist monk, or of a Hindu sannyasi , or of a soldier, or of an expert in ex\u00ac \nplosives who devotes himself heart and soul to perfecting depth-charges?\u201d \n\n\u201cPerhaps not\u201d, replied the younger student. \u201cBut are you prepared to \nrecognize and respect the vocation of a woman who devotes herself heart and \nsoul to the enactment of laws for the abolition of slums?\u201d \n\n\u201cCertainly we are\u201d, was the reply. \u201cA butterfly may perform a useful and \nnecessary function in the fertilization of certain plants, and in that sense has \nbeen \u2018called\u2019 to that service. The custodians of our National Parks have learned \nthat the depredations of wolves and coyotes are essential to the well-being \nof herds of deer, and that, without these \u2018scourges\u2019, the unfit survive, and at \nlast outnumber the fit. In all sincerity, however, I am not comparing your \nreformers to wolves,\u2014or to butterflies: I am trying to emphasize and widen \nthe application of a fundamental principle of Theosophy. In the human king\u00ac \ndom we must consider, first, the stage of evolution an individual has reached. \nYou ask, in effect, whether it can be a man\u2019s (or a woman\u2019s) vocation to relieve \ndistress, not only in his immediate environment, but on as large a scale as \npossible. My answer is, Yes; and he will (and should) do so according to his \nstate of development, which means, according to his power of perception. He \nmay do it in the hope of serving the divine purpose, which is the Cause of his \nMaster; or he may do it for humanitarian and materialistic reasons. If, in his \neyes, bodily suffering is the greatest of evils, he must necessarily be \u2018called\u2019 to \nrelieve that, and may decide to become a doctor, or a charity worker, or a very \nunusual type of politician. It would be a crime to discourage him, or to try \nto divert his efforts into what, for others, would be higher channels. Naturally, \nhowever, if we think he is pursuing his end, in any of these directions, by wrong \nor foolish means, and our relations with him should warrant the expression \nof an opinion, we might properly criticize his procedure and suggest methods \nmore likely to achieve his ends\u2014his own ends, please note. And I have found \nin this connection that historical illustration has more weight than philosophical \nargument. For example (if you will pardon a moment\u2019s digression), the very \npractical experience in the eighteenth century of that strange American, Ben\u00ac \njamin Thompson, more widely known as Count Rumford of the Holy Roman \nEmpire, is particularly instructive in these days of doles and governmental \nrelief. Founder of The House of Industry in Munich, when, as Chief of Police, \nit became his duty to abolish the organized beggary which there had become a \nscourge, he proceeded on the principle, which he announced, that no one could \nbe happy who was not industrious. Further: \n\nIt is most certain that all sums of money or other assistance given to the poor in \nalms, which do not tend to make them industrious, never can fail to have a contrary \ntendency, and to operate as an encouragement to idleness and immorality. \n\n\u201cThose, therefore, who had never learned to work, must be taught how to do \nso. You have probably read of his extraordinary success: that he not only \nabolished mendicancy, but won the gratitude and affection of those who had \nonce been professional beggars.\u201d \n\n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME \n\n\n69 \n\n\nThe Student paused. It was now the turn of the Philosopher to interject a \nthought which obviously had been worrying him. \u201cThe muddle of which you \nhave accused yourself\u201d, he said, turning to the younger member, \u201carises in part, \nI think, from confusing a means of livelihood, with a vocation in the sense in \nwhich that word has been used here. Trying to state your friend\u2019s problem\u2014 \nabout women taking part in public life\u2014you asked if girls should not be encour\u00ac \naged to fit themselves for some sort of useful work, and \u2018to uphold standards \nin the educational and business worlds\u2019. If a girl enters the world of business, \nnot because she must, in order to earn her living, but as a missionary enterprise, \nmy belief is she will have mistaken her vocation. She may hate the idea of \ngoing into business, and may try to console herself with the hope that she may \nbe able \u2018to do some good\u2019 in such uncongenial surroundings; but she ought not \nto deceive herself by regarding this as a vocation: if she does, she will fail both \nin business and as a missionary. We must be honest and clear-cut in the recog\u00ac \nnition of our motives. It comes to this: Has a girl independent means? Will \nher parents be able to provide for her when they die? If not, she should of \ncourse prepare herself to earn her own living, taking into account her capaci\u00ac \nties and limitations, consulting her friends, and basing her decisions upon \ncommon sense. We should remember that the right performance of our duty, \nwhatever that may be, is our real vocation, no matter how unromantic, insig\u00ac \nnificant, and devoid of public usefulness, the performance of our duty may \nseem to us to be. We should remember also that we can use the performance of \nany duty (though this is for the very few) as the best means to attain to union \nwith the Divine. \n\n\u201cThe girl who is and will be provided for sufficiently, can afford to ask herself \nif she is specially \u2018called\u2019 to do some outer work in the world, in the educational \nor any other field, regardless of the monetary results. Or she can afford to \u2018go \nin\u2019 for painting, writing, music, as she may desire; but I feel strongly that any \ngirl, rich or poor, in addition to her other occupations, should prepare herself \nto take care of a home, seeing that the probabilities point to marriage sooner or \nlater, and that for the man\u2019s sake as well as her own, the more she knows about \nhouse-keeping the better.\u201d \n\n\u201cMany girls marry nowadays\u201d, someone remarked, \u201cwho cannot sew on a \nbutton, much less dam a stocking, while all they know about providing a n\\ml \nis to go or send for some cooked meats and perhaps a salad. This is ju^Wis \ntrue of the poor as of the well-to-do, because the city girl who works in a \nfactory or office, leaves it to her mother to do the cooking and mending, with \nthe result that, if she marries, her husband often goes through a period of \ndigestive misery before his wife learns that marriage is not just a spree.\u201d \n\n\u201cThe Philosopher spoke just now of girls who are and will be provided for \nfinancially, presumably by their parents\u201d, the Economist now volunteered. \n\u201cMay I say that in my opinion no such condition exists, either for girls or boys. \nThe whole financial structure is being attacked so persistently, not any more \nby individuals only, but by governments with vast resources, that, in twenty \n^grs from now, all savings may have been swept away. If I had a million \n\n\n\u00ab \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n70 \n\n\nTHE0S0PHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\ndollars, and a daughter, I should want to provide for her by seeing to it that, \nif the worst came to the worst, she could earn her own living as a craftsman of \nsome kind,\u2014and I am not at all sure that old-fashioned sewing would not prove \nas safe a form of insurance as any other. I am told that fine sewing is almost \na lost art, though the demand for it still exists and probably always will. But \nwhat are known as \u2018home industries\u2019 cover a wide field, and a boy can learn how \nto repair watches, or to mend and make furniture, or to do any one of fifty \nthings that would provide him with a living in an emergency. The fate of so \nmany Russian refugees from Bolshevist persecution, especially the women \namong them, as they found themselves penniless in the streets of Constanti\u00ac \nnople or Paris, ought to be sufficient warning. Further, it is distinctly wholesome \nfor young people to learn how to use their hands profitably.\u201d \n\n\u2018\u2018You had other questions\u201d, said the Recorder, turning to the younger student. \n\n\u2018\u2018I have\u201d, was the answer; \u2018\u2018but these I may find have been answered already \nwhen I come to think things over. There is this, however: I have wondered \nwhether my feeling that Theosophy always pulls counter to the world is mis\u00ac \ntaken. All that tends towards goodness and unselfishness, on whatever plane, \nmust be part of the work of the White Lodge, and any real effort to discover \nthe Right must prove itself in action to be either erroneous or correct. Some\u00ac \nhow I feel that the White Lodge could use all the strivings towards good of \neven the most misguided souls, and yet I know that it is often the best inten- \ntioned people who do the greatest harm. It is in talking and mingling with peo\u00ac \nple of this type that I find myself hard put to it to know what attitude to take. \nOught I, in brief, to fight the world wherever and whenever it fails to come \nup to the high ideals of Theosophy, or should I try to serve as a point of contact \nbetween the world in which my life is lived and the wonderful teaching which \nI love? In considering the latter possibility, I seem to stand on the edge of a \ngreat undiscovered country, which is waiting for us younger T.S. members to \nexplore. \n\nSaid the Philosopher: \u2018\u2018First in regard to the Lodge: it can and does use, \nand is thankful for all honest strivings towards the Good, as towards the True \nand the Beautiful. Such strivings, however, as you say, are often very blind, \nresulting sometimes in far more harm than good, that is, if we were to judge \nby outer effects alone,\u2014which is what the Lodge never does, seeing that, with \nthem, it is the motive that counts not the outer result. A clear understanding \nof this is essential if you would find answers to the questions you have raised. \nA German Nazi, who is self-sacrificingly devoted to his cause, and who sees in \nit the expression of all that is noble in life, may, in spite of his bad cause, be \ndoing far better work for the White Lodge than a student of Theosophy who \ntalks and writes about it self-seekingly. Look deeper still, and you will find \nthat if the German Nazi\u2019s motive is good, his self-sacrifice will tend to destroy \nhis bad cause, and that if the motives of a student of Theosophy are bad, his \nactivities will tend to destroy his good cause. None the less, no matter how good \nthe motive, a blundering method could not be encouraged by the Lodge, be\u00ac \ncause, at best, such a method would involve waste of energy and time, even \n\n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME \n\n\n7i \n\n\nif it did not result in positive injury to others. Very little can be done about \nit, however, unless people ask for advice, which is unusual. You may be able \nto interfere by force with the boy who thinks he can learn music by taking \nto pieces the family piano; but if, in Chicago, you encounter a stranger on his \nway to San Francisco who is actually heading for New York, while it would be \nbut kind to warn him, the probability is he will be darkly suspicious of your \nintentions, will feel for his purse, and will wait till you are out of sight before \ncontinuing on his way. \n\n\u201cAs a general rule, when you meet other young people who are working \nenthusiastically for one or another cause,\u2014leave them alone; do not feel that \nbecause you are a student of Theosophy it is necessarily any part of your function \neither to encourage or discourage them. Opposition usually confirms their \ninfatuation; and remember that in America as elsewhere in the world, you \nare likely to find among Collegians a considerable percentage of socialists, \naesthetes, atheists, devil-worshippers, Bahaists, Bolshevists, and that these\u2014 \nas Sir Ronald Storrs points out in his recently published Memoirs \u2014are but \n'pleasant and harmless phases through which many future pillars of the Church, \nof the State and even of the Stock Exchange have made their early way\u2019. \n\n\u201cI shall risk being frank with you: think less of what you can do to help \nothers; think more of how you can best fit yourself to help others. At your \nage, I, too, was imbued with the idea that I must be \u2018up and doing\u2019. I was \nold before I realized how infinitely little one can actually do for others, and, \nnow older, I am still trying to convince myself that that infinitely little is in\u00ac \nfinitely worth the doing,\u2014as I know in my heart it is. One of the most painful \ndiscoveries in life is that we cannot make even those whom we love, happy. \nWe can give them momentary pleasure, but happiness is something which \neach man can create for himself alone, as it is an attitude toward life, and all \nthat life brings, of pain as of pleasure, of beauty as of ugliness. Not even a \nMaster can give us happiness, no matter how greatly he may long to do so.\u201d \n\n\u201cI should like to repeat what the Philosopher has been saying, but in some\u00ac \nwhat different form\u201d, the Historian now remarked. \u201cWe were asked, in effect, \nwhether Theosophy always pulls counter to the world. The answer, as I see it, \nis that if by \u2018the world\u2019 we mean Mammon in the Biblical sense, then Theosophy \nis everlastingly, immovably opposed to it; but if we mean by \u2018the world\u2019, the \ntendency of the world\u2019s thought at any particular period, the answer will not \nbe intelligible unless based on an understanding of the theosophicjdjfctrine \nof cycles, which is, as you know\u201d (and he turned to the younger studenff; \u201cthat \nthe entire universe and everything in it moves rhythmically,\u2014not forward in \na straight line, and not for ever repeating its performance as \u2018the eternal return\u2019, \nbut after the fashion of a swinging pendulum slowly drawn upwards. If men \nwere content to move with the oscillations of Nature, Theosophy could and \nwould move with them. The trouble is that so many men are bitten with the \nidea that they can improve upon Nature, and can over-ride the laws of Nature \nfor their own benefit, while the more ambitious and temperamental among \nthem, strive to outdo the normal reactions of the herd, and in that way to shine \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n72 \n\n\n. THEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nas advanced thinkers and leaders. This means that the initiators of thought \nand action are nearly always extremists,\u2014at one period, violent reactionaries, \nat another, red-hot radicals; and as extremes of any kind are unwholesome and \ndangerous, the Lodge and its agents throw their weight, first in one direction, \nthen in the other, in an effort to trim ship and restore the balance. Thus, if \nH.P.B. were alive and were to write a third volume of Isis Unveiled , the result \nwould probably impress some people as a reversal of her earlier effort. It \nwould not be a reversal, but she would undoubtedly redirect her emphasis. \n\n\u201cFinally\u2014so far as I am concerned\u2014every student of Theosophy should \nserve as a point of contact between the world in which his life is lived, and \nthe teachings of the Masters,\u2014not by talk about those teachings, which are \nfor the very few (hardly any in these days, in my opinion), but by using the \nclear light of Theosophy to help others to see their own objectives more clearly. \nIf Judge, as he travelled, conversed with a stranger and thought well of him, \nhe would not mention Theosophy or any of its doctrines, but would wait his \nopportunity to ask, \u2018What is your purpose in life?\u2019 That was enough, regardless \nof the immediate answer, for he had started that man thinking for himself,\u2014 \nand thinking seriously, because of the immense background of understanding \nand sympathy which Judge put into his question.\u201d \n\nThen the Historian: Behind, beneath, and above everything you people \nhave been saying, rests the eternal truth that the purpose of life, the real problem \nof human existence, is being rather than doing. I am aware how impossible \nit is for the vast majority to understand or to believe this; how useless and worse \nthan useless even to suggest it as true; but if we, as students of Theosophy, \nshould ever forget it, we should lose ourselves in a morass of irrelevant con\u00ac \nfusions, and should certainly fail, among other things, to see the unimportance \nof the outer activity in comparison with the inner purpose and attitude. I \nagree with what was said in regard to the improbability of any girl having a \nmission to raise the tone of business, although all of us, to the last and least, \nhave been entrusted with a mission to raise the tone of any environment in \nwhich we find ourselves, not, as a rule, by preaching, but by example, by \nbeing. \n\n\u201cWhat was the Way of the Master Christ? Thirty years of preparation,\u2014 \nof doing nothing, from the worldly point of view; then three years of work. \nBut we know, if we know anything, that the preparation was as strenuous, \nthat it involved as much effort, as any public event in his suffering life. As a \nrace, we have an astonishing belief in our ability to do things, and to do them \nefficiently, without preparation. We do not even prepare to die! We learned \nnothing from the Great War, coming out of it with the cheerful feeling that \nwe had done \u2018mighty well, considering\u2019,\u2014totally unwilling to face the fact \nthat thousands of lives were thrown away for lack of trained officers and a \ntrained staff, as well as for lack of the necessary armament. How dare we at\u00ac \ntempt to help others solve the problems of their lives without years of prepara\u00ac \ntion and training! Can we not leave that sort of crazy blundering to the \nuntrained deacons and curates let loose upon the world by our Theological \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME \n\n\n73 \n\n\nSeminaries, boys who know nothing of life, nothing of history or literature, \nnothing of universal experience, nothing of business, but who do not hesitate \nto interpret Christ as a Social Reformer of the modem type. Too many people \nas it is, helping others, instructing others, guiding others: do not let us add to \ntheir number. Think what a peaceful world it would suddenly become if all \nreformers, all innovators, all instructors, all lecturers, most of our clergy and \nall our politicians were suddenly struck dumb. Peace, perfect peace! I would \ngladly be struck dumb myself, if poor deafened, bewildered, stupefied humanity \ncould thus be saved from the multitudinous roarings of the host I have named. \nAnd when they whisper they are sometimes more deadly than when they roar. \n\nThis, my young friend, is not addressed to you, but to the universe at large. \nI know quite well that it is no part of your thought to join the ranks of such \n\u2018helpers\u2019. I sympathize keenly with your problems, which I hope, however, \nhave now in some measure been unravelled. What I am trying to emphasize is \nthe Way of Christ as an example all of us should follow. I wish I had realized \nits significance when I was younger. But different epochs and periods bring \ndifferent duties, and to-day there is greater need than ever for outer silence, \nand\u2014I speak now exclusively to serious students of Theosophy\u2014and for that \nkind of hushed, expectant indrawal which we read of in the New Testament, \nwhen the apostles were waiting for the coming of the Holy Ghost; or, if that \nbe too much to ask for, let us in any case remember what Judge wrote to a \npupil in days of storm and stress when the life of the Society itself was in jeop\u00ac \nardy: \u2018Sit still in the midst of all that may be said, inclining only to your \nduty.\u2019 You, personally, may have a vocation unlike that of the older members; \nbut all vocations must be tested in the same way, in the light of the same princi\u00ac \nples. One and all of us must look to our spiritual Father in Heaven, and obey \nhis call, if we would tread the way of usefulness and peace; and one and all \nof us must hear that call for ourselves; for while friends may help us to dis\u00ac \ncriminate between the \u2018still small voice\u2019 and the voices of earth, no one can do \nall our hearing for us, or relieve us entirely of the burden of decision. Beware \nof the \u2018wind\u2019 and of the \u2018earthquake\u2019 and the \u2018fire\u2019, for they are of the emotjtaial \nnature and quickly pass. \u2018In returning (the Hebrew says, \u2018In sitting iM'\u2014 \nJudge\u2019s phrase!) and rest shall ye be saved; in quietness and in confidence \nshall be your strength.\u2019 \u201d \n\n\u201cMay I add verses which follow yours\u201d, said the Ancient, \u201cusing, as you did, \nthe Jewish translation from the Hebrew: \u2018He will surely be gracious unto thee \nat the voice of thy cry; when he shall hear, he will answer thee. And though \nthe Lord give you bread sparingly and scant water, yet shall not thy Teacher \nhide himself any more, but thine eyes shall see thy Teacher; and thine ears \nshall hear a word behind thee, saying: \u2018\u2018This is the way, walk ye in it.\u201d \u2019 \u201d And, \ncuriously, as we sat and listened, the voice of the Ancient seemed to come \nfrom behind us, full of longing, as though it echoed a plea to turn, that we \n\u00bbight see once more the promise of our heart\u2019s desire. T. \n\n\n\nPlato To-day , by R. H. S. Crossman, Fellow and Tutor of New College, Ox\u00ac \nford; George Allen and Unwin, Ltd., London, 1937; price, 7 s. 6 d. \n\nThe title of this book is misleading. Mr. Crossman imagines Plato suddenly \nappearing in the modern world, and commenting upon fascism and communism \nand British society. But Mr. Crossman\u2019s \u201cPlato\u201d is a sadly amputated replica \nof the original. His ruling passion seems to be politics. Even a casual study of \nthe real Plato reveals what was his deepest concern. The great philosopher \ndevoted his life to the search for what is divine and immortal within the nature \nof man. We shall never understand him, unless we recognize that he was funda\u00ac \nmentally a mystic. The famous \u201ctheory of ideas\u201d represents an attempt to \nexplain in mental terms the basic datum of universal mystical experience,\u2014 \nthat human nature is a blending of divine and animal elements; and that it \ntransfigures or immortalizes itself, in the rpeasure that it embodies its divine \nprototype, and converts the force within its animal proclivities into aspiration \nand spiritual energy. Until we grasp something of the meaning of the \u201ctheory \nof ideas\u201d, Plato\u2019s political speculations in The Republic and The Laws will be \nessentially unintelligible. Indeed, during the centuries, they have been worse \nthan unintelligible. Plato started the fashion for Utopias. Doubtless, his in\u00ac \ntention was merely to construct in theory the constitution of a state founded \nupon the \u201cnatural law\u201d that the wise and the good should rule, and, incidentally, \nprotect the stupid and the weak. Unfortunately, few of his readers have had \nenough sense of humour to realize that Plato was a master of irony, and did \nnot intend everything that he said to be taken in the most literal sense; unfor\u00ac \ntunately also, Plato himself seems to have lost his own sense of humour and \nproportion on at least one occasion, when\u2014if we are to credit history\u2014he \nattempted, with disastrous and bloody results, to reform the government of \nSyracuse. \n\nMr. Crossman may be regarded as part of Plato\u2019s \u201cbad karma\u201d for having \nwritten The Republic for public consumption; for the sum and substance of Mr. \nCrossman\u2019s argument is that Plato was a sort of glorified \u201cuniversity teacher\u201d, \nthe first \u201cbrain-truster\u201d. It is not that Mr. Crossman blames Plato for his \n\u201cUtopianism\u201d per se. That would be most unfair, for Mr. Crossman is a Utopian \nhimself. Indeed, what he objects to is Plato\u2019s \u201crealism\u201d. Plato was an un\u00ac \ncompromising adherent of the aristocratic principle. He could conceive of no- \n\n\n74 \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nREVIEWS \n\n\n75 \n\n\nreason why the arduous art of public government should be entrusted to any\u00ac \none who had not been trained from birth, by an aristocratic code, in the no less \narduous art of governing himself. There are interesting resemblances between \nthe \u201cphilosopher-kings\u201d of The Republic and the \u201csuperior man\u201d of Confucius. \nAs Mr. Crossman points out, Plato would not admire the efforts of fascists \nand nazis and communists to make over the modem world; but it is equally \ncertain that he would be most unfavourably impressed by the theory and prac\u00ac \ntice of modem democracy. And Mr. Crossman\u2019s Utopianism is of the demo\u00ac \ncratic order. It is instructive to quote his statement of what he means by \ndemocracy, because it illustrates how even a clear and brilliant thinker can \nsurround a word with such a glamorous haze that its original sordid meaning is \nutterly eclipsed in his mind. After all, democracy really means nothing but \ngovernment by the demos , that is, by or in the name of the mob. \n\nDemocracy (because it is founded upon the infinite possibilities of human nature) \nmust always be on the attack, always on the side of social change against the forces of \n\u201claw and order\u201d, always critical of established institutions and social codes. It knows \nthat without the dynamic of its faith, human society will fall back into oligarchy and \ninjustice. Where faith in the impossible dies, Plato\u2019s estimate of human nature becomes \ncorrect. But democracy is not a mere ideal, mystically envisaged by a few dreamers; \nfor the belief in the infinite value of human personality is also the belief in human reason , \nand at this point the ideal of Jesus is fused with that of Socrates. . . . This appeal to \nthe common sense and to the critical faculty of the ordinary man against the formidable \nstructures of established orthodoxy is the vital force of democratic philosophy. . . . Only \nwhen Western civilization has shaken off the shackles of the past and created a new social \norder worthy of the human dignity of the common man, will democracy and religion be \nonce more realized in human society. Till then both must remain faiths, filled with \nprophetic anger at the sight of the nations and societies which use their name in vain, \nand, because they are grounded in the heart of the common man, powerful enough to \nremove mountains. \n\nIt would seem that this panegyric can be boiled down to one \u201croot-idea\u201d, \nthat human personality has infinite value. There is a sense in which this is \ntrue and there is a sense in which it is false. Like Socrates and the Master \nChrist, Plato taught that all human nature, in so far as it is truly human , is of \ndivine essence. But we do not need the testimony of the sages to know that in \ntoo many of its moods and manifestations the \u201cpersonality\u201d is not human but \nbestial. This may be deplorable, but it is none the less a fact in Nature, and as \nhistory and experience prove again and again, we disregard it at our peril^dRiat \nis why the democratic \u201cideal\u201d is, in the last analysis, dangerous nonseflBnmd \nno amount of paint and varnish can disguise its essential ugliness. Even in a \ndebased form, an aristocratic standard at least recognizes some distinction \nbetween man\u2019s actual state and his nobler possibilities. The \u201chuman dignity \nof the common man\u201d becomes apparent when he voluntarily respects superiority \nand endeavours to emulate it. How otherwise can the \u201ccommon man\u201d himself \never evolve to the state of the \u201csuperior man\u201d? Meanwhile there is a place in \nthe great hierarchical system of Nature, both for the common and for the \nsuperior. One hastens to add that forms of government merely reflect the \ndominant states of consciousness in the body politic. When a society is moved \n\n\n76 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nfrom within by a powerful and co-ordinated aristocratic nucleus, sooner or \nlater its constitution will become aristocratic. Meanwhile, to try by external \nmeans alone to change democracy into something more rational, would be as \nfutile as Plato\u2019s alleged effort to convert the politicians of Syracuse into a group \nof gentlemen, merely by lecturing to them. S.L. \n\n\nThe Science of Prayer , by Michael Bruce, B.Sc.; London, S.P.C.K.; New York, \nThe Macmillan Company, 1937; price, Si.10. \n\nThis excellent little book (it can be read in a couple of hours) is brimful of \npractical and invigorating thought on prayer, by a man who believes to his \nfinger tips that: \u201cPrayer is the most practical thing in life\u2014the most vivid living \nthing we can do. It is our contact with the Architect of our lives; the power\u00ac \nhouse from which the energy for all our activities springs.\u201d \n\nThe Preface states that the book was written originally for Chinese students, \nand that \u201cOut here [in Shanghai] most educated people still have the exag\u00ac \ngerated reverence for science which was so common in Great Britain a few \nyears ago\u201d. The author, who has himself had scientific training, accordingly \nbegins with the statement that: \u201cIn the course of six years of study in biological \nlaboratories, I never found any conflict between modem science and prayer. \nOn the contrary, I found that my scientific studies led me to a deeper under\u00ac \nstanding of prayer and drove me to pray more.\u201d He then gives the reasons on \nwhich he bases his reconciliation of the two points of view (the scientific and the \ndevotional); and explains that his book aims to treat prayer as a science, but \nwith the hope that some of its readers may thereby gain a sufficient grasp of \nthe underlying principles, to go further and, first-hand, to study prayer as an \nart. \n\nAs a framework, he uses these different kinds of prayer: Confession and For\u00ac \ngiveness; Petition; Thanksgiving; Guidance; Adoration; Intercession; and then \na section on corporate prayer, and another giving examples of the various \nmethods. So many passages have unusual value that it is better, perhaps, in \nthe limited space of a review, to omit comment and let the book speak for itself \n\u2014quoting without consecutive plan. \n\nPrayer not only has a reasonable basis in reality, it is also a growth of mind into truth. \n... All life should be prayer; we want every moment of our lives to be lived in com\u00ac \nmunion with God. . . . \n\nWe have seen that the vision of God leads to action. When we realize what God is \nlike, we must throw our lives into fervent co-operation with His will, for there is nothing \nelse in life which is worth doing. We are called to enter into the glory of God, into the \nmagnificence of His creative activity in the universe, and above all into the unfailing \nlove of Jesus. In the face of such a high calling our minds reel. As our vision of God \ngrows clearer, the more awe-inspiring it becomes. . . . \n\nIt is well to remember that God\u2019s guidance is not given to save us the trouble of hard \nthinking, nor to encourage us in intellectual laziness; on the contrary he guides us in \nand through our thinking. ... It is valuable sometimes to relax our minds in God\u2019s \npresence and allow them to wander where He leads us. . . . If we make time so to wait \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nREVIEWS \n\n\n77 \n\n\nupon God, we shall not smother voices through which He might speak to us, and we \nshall open our minds to new areas over which He may reign. \n\nAdoration, he says, is the centre of prayer and the centre of our life. It is \nthe highest activity of which man is capable. There is nothing in life so real, \nso utterly true, so tense and active, so clear and illuminating. \n\n1 o adore a picture of God, of our own making, which is not the true God, is to warp \nand distort our whole being. We dare not adore if we will not take the trouble to study \nto know what God is like. We dare not adore unless we have the courage to give every \nmoment of our lives to God. Since God is Love, our adoration, if it be truly adoration \nof God, will of necessity send us back to sacrifice and service. . . . \n\nWe have to choose between being men privileged to be fellow workers with God, and \nmen whose assistance God does not need. It is certain that, if we do not unite our wills \nwith His, He will not need us; but if we do give ourselves to co-operate with His will \nHe will use us, and our intercession will bear fruit under His guidance and according \nto His will. \n\nImmortality, communion, prayer to the saints, the proper attitude toward \nand in Church services, corporate worship and so forth, are discussed, all with \nthe basis of his simple, cogent reasoning, which has genuine value whatever be \nour personal attitude toward those topics. For the most part, the fact of the \nauthor\u2019s first-hand experience of his subject, while unmistakable, is only im\u00ac \nplicit in what he writes; but occasionally there is a passage such as the following: \n\nNeedless to say, personal and social problems are always coming into my meditations, \nbut I rarely allow them to be my starting point; for, if I do, I frequently find that instead \nof offering myself to God to do His will, I am instead asking God to give me His assist\u00ac \nance in solving my problems. There is to me a constant danger of becoming problem- \nridden and losing that sense of certainty and victorious confidence which is the true \nmark of a Christian. In consequence, I find it better to leave problems of all kinds out \nof my consideration until I have first steeped my intellect and my imagination in the \nspirit of Jesus. I go out from His presence to the difficulties of life as a soldier from the \npresence of a victorious general going to the assault of His enemies, under His command, \nsupported by His strength. I try to see Christ first and problems second: and to see \nthem not as problems, but as the setting in which I am to do His will. \n\nAnd finally,\u2014 \n\nPrayer is to me the very essence of life. From it there flows into everything IiJ^he \njoy of communion with God, a sense of unity with the heart of the universe, and ^ense \nof the loving companionship of Jesus. I have scarcely got my feet planted on the first \nrung of the ladder of prayer, but from what I already know I can say that living prayer \ntransfigures the whole of life and makes it significant and purposeful. \n\nR. \n\n\nUnflinching: A Diary of Tragic Adventure , by Edgar Christian, with an Intro\u00ac \nduction and Conclusion by B. Dew Roberts and a Preface by Major Hon. J. J. \nAstor, M. P.; John Murray, London, 1937; price 65. \n\nEdgar Christian, a youth of eighteen, fresh from an English public school and \nfcager for adventure, went with his cousin, Jack Hornby\u2014\u201cHornby of Hudson \nBay\u201d\u2014to winter in the North-West Territory of Canada. The third member \nof their party was Harold Adlard, a young man of twenty-eight. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n78 THEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\nThey were to explore a new route from Great Slave Lake to Chesterfield Inlet \non Hudson Bay. Young Christian\u2019s letters, sent during the early stages of their \ntrip, while letters still could be dispatched, and his diary, the record of their \nwinter\u2019s isolation, tell the story of the fatal expedition up to a few days before \nChristian\u2019s lonely death, he being the last of the three to perish from weakness \nand starvation. The diary was found by a patrol of Mounted Police who dis\u00ac \ncovered and buried their bodies. \n\nJack Hornby, the leader of the expedition, was the youngest son of the famous \nLancashire captain and All-England cricketer. Hornby had won the Military \nCross in the Great War. He was a seasoned explorer. He knew the wilds and \nbelieved he knew the Barren Lands better than any other white man. \n\nTo him they were a refuge from the encroaching civilization which he hated. His \nalmost inhuman love of solitude and hardship for its own sake made him an exacting \ncompanion on the trail. ... A deep reserve, which hid a cultured mind and a generous \nnature, made him silent among strangers and most at his ease in the company of the \nIndians, Eskimos and trappers among whom his real life had been passed. ... To him \nthe snow of the North was his native element . . . not an ordeal to be endured in order \nto add to human knowledge or wealth (Introduction). \n\nThe winter after Edgar Christian left school, Hornby was in England. He \nrecognized the boy\u2019s fine mettle. To young Christian, Hornby, in turn, was a \nhero. The boy\u2019s devotion never wavered but steadily grew stronger during the \nlast, long months of cruel testing. One of his first letters sent home from Canada, \n\nproudly quoted an old friend of Hornby\u2019s, \u201c-any one who is with J. Hornby \n\ncan never go wrong\u201d. \n\nAdlard, third of the triad, had served in the Air Force during the War. He \nwas of less finely tempered steel than the other two, yet he, also, at the end, \nwon Edgar\u2019s respect, and after Hornby\u2019s death, became \u201cHarold good pal\u201d. \n\nHornby\u2019s intention had been to \u201clive on the land\u201d. He knew the country \nand trusted to find their food supply by hunting, trapping, fishing. He knew \nthat risk was involved. \u201cHe knew that every adventure worth the name holds \na possibility of disaster.\u201d The disaster came. Game was scarce, the traps often \ncovered deep with snow, the nets dropped through holes in the ice produced \nbut little catch. \n\nHornby had been defeated by the incalculable factor which upsets all reckoning be\u00ac \ntween man and the forces of nature. Here it had been some mysterious change in the \nnormal migration of the caribou; a winter exceptionally long even for those regions, \ndriving beast and bird elsewhere and making meat scarce where it should have been \nplentiful (Introduction). \n\nThe quiet sentences of Edgar\u2019s diary give the record of their almost hopeless \nsearch for food, and of their brave endurance. Only Alvard flinched. At the \nend of five months, Edgar writes: \n\nApril 7th: Jack intended to go out on the Barrens to-day but the wind got up and he \ncould not go. Very warm all day really, but we are so weak and feeble that the slightest \nwind stops us moving about to hunt. Harold not normal to-day, and thinks he is very \nbad, but if he would only use some will power to pull through and be more cheery it \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nREVIEWS \n\n\n79 \n\n\nwould be better for Jack. I cut wood and got water and Jack rested up. Harold cooked \nbones, etc., and complained all day. \n\nApril 8th: Our grub to-day has been pounded bones to make a little soup. . . . We \nhave enough for to-morrow\u2019s breakfast and then we might have to eat Wolverine hide \nif we can get nothing. \n\nApril 9th: Jack can hardly move from his bed without pain. I rub his legs and body \nat times to relieve him. Harold is an awful worry continually saying how bad he is. As \nfar as looks go, the fittest of the bunch of us, but he is too damned afraid of himself and \nconsequently plays another out. I am feeling all right but weak of course to do heavy \nwork and walking. \n\nThen the last brave entry, written, probably, a week or ten days before his own \ndeath and after a month of solitary existence: \n\n9 a. m. Weaker than ever. Have food on hand but heart petering? Sunshine is \nbright now. See if that does any good to me if I get out and bring in wood to make fire \nto-night. Make preparations now. . . . \n\nGot out, too weak and all in now. Left things late. \n\nEdgar\u2019s parents now publish his diary, in the hope, his father, Lieut.-Colonel \nW. F. Christian, writes, \u201cthat it may reach some of the rising generation and \ninspire them with courage, loyalty and endurance. If this hope is realized, he \nwill not have died in vain.\u201d \n\nIt sets a noble standard for youth. Yet it should not be restricted to youth. \nWherever men and women battle for existence, in a metropolis or on the near \nside of the Arctic Circle, Edgar Christian\u2019s simple, self-forgetful heroism estab\u00ac \nlishes a code of living, a way of meeting, without whining or complaint, the \ngrim facts of the daily struggle. \n\nTo those who undertake more, who have started on the soul\u2019s adventure, it \nhas equal, if not greater, worth. No parallel can be exact, but the three who \nfaced the hardships on the Thelon, are not unlike the triad who start on the \ngreatest of all adventures,\u2014the adventure which has no real end save through \nthe initiation of death. It is the neophyte\u2019s task to win in that last conflict, as \nwe believe Edgar Christian must have won in his lonely battle with physical \ndeath; his leader no longer present to show the way; when, the self-pity of the \nlower nature in the triad for ever stilled, he, the soul, having had his first ardour \ntempered by rigorous trial, and made strong in loyalty, in love, in courage, \nmeets\u2014and conquers\u2014Death. J.L.M. \n\n\nOn the Way to Perignan, by Jennings C. Wise (author of The Longnrm of \nLee; The Turn of the Tide; The Great Crusade , etc.); The Paisley Press, Inc., \nNew York, 1937; price, $2.50. \n\nThis is a novel. It is impossible for the reviewer to write of it with impar\u00ac \ntiality or detachment. Its author is a personal friend. All of it, therefore, was \nread with great interest, sympathy, and enjoyment. We should be delighted \nif it were to become a \u201cbest seller\u201d; we ask our many readers to inquire for it \nat the Libraries and at the book shops they patronize. S. S. McClure, founder \nand editor of McClure's Magazine , says of it: \n\n\n\nSo \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nPictures from the book are constantly coming back to my mind. It is filled with little \nmasterpieces. There are certain pictures that seem to me perfect. ... I remember \nmany of the characters and events just as if they had actually occurred. . . . The book \nhas become in a sense, a part of my experience with people. \n\nThe author introduces two Sages, who guide the intellectual and spiritual \ndevelopment of the young man who is the central character of the story. On \none occasion the youth, in our opinion, showed himself far wiser than the Sage, \nby not following the Sage\u2019s advice (pp. 159-161); but that is a detail,\u2014and in \nany case the other Sage compensates for this by presenting him with a copy of \nCharles Johnston\u2019s translation of the Gita , which is quoted approvingly at some \nlength. So it goes. There are vivid sketches of persons and places\u2014an old- \ntime Southern Colonel, a New England schoolmaster, a Parisian grisette. A \nrunning commentary on public events as the story unfolds, distinctly adds to \nthe interest, although some critics will doubtless object to such comment as \nsuperfluous and even as intrusive in a novel. Yet what is an author to do \nnowadays when his real purpose is to bring certain ideas to public attention? \nPeople will not read essays or similar forms of serious literature; they will read \nnovels: so, to reach the many, into the form of a novel ideas must be cast. We \nrecommend the book to the attention of English publishers as well as to American \nreaders. T. \n\n\nHandicaps: Six Studies , by Mary MacCarthy; Longmans, Green & Co., New \nYork; price, $2.40. \n\nThe author of this charming little book says in her preface that she does not \npretend to write full biographies of the six persons here studied, but only to \ndescribe them in relation to their infirmities, with the hope that their heroic \nqualities may inspire others who are struggling against handicaps. The six \npersons are Mary Lamb, Beethoven, Arthur Kavanagh, Henry Fawcett, W. E. \nHenley and Robert Louis Stevenson. \n\nThe trials and tribulations of Mary Lamb, Beethoven and Stevenson must be \nfamiliar to most readers, though it must always be helpful to be reminded of \nthem. Mary Lamb was afflicted with spells of violent madness during which \nshe had to be incarcerated. When she felt a fit coming upon her, she and her \nbrother would walk together to the asylum. Beethoven, after years of poverty \nand strain, became deaf, and could no longer hear music. Stevenson suffered \nfrom tuberculosis. Henley, also, the author of the well-known poem Invictus, \nhad tuberculosis of the foot and endured great pain. \n\nThe life of Arthur Macmorrough Kavanagh (1831-1889) was an extraordinary \none. He was born without hands or feet. He soon grew up to be such a charm\u00ac \ning child that every one loved him. One of his childhood friends writes: \u201cEven \nas children we could not but wonder at his cheerful submission to his many \nannoyances and discomforts; but he had a fine unselfish nature, and was grandly \nsubmissive in his sense of privation.\u201d He learned to ride, strapped to a chair \non horseback, and became an intrepid horseman and hunter. He had a steel \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nREVIEWS \n\n\n81 \n\n\nhook attached to his arm and learned to do everything for himself with it. He \neven managed to write a clear and beautiful script, which very few people with \ntwo good hands take the trouble to do. Kavanagh\u2019s mother seems to have been \nan unusual woman. She refused to let him stay sheltered at home, but took \nhim and his elder brother with their tutor, on long journeys to the Continent, \nto Egypt and to Palestine. Arthur learned Arabic in Egypt. His brother says: \n\u201cAt Damascus, when riding through the Bazaars, Arthur encountered a number \nof Bedouin and Arab sheiks whom he got acquainted with in the desert and \nwith whom he is a great favourite. As soon as they saw him they all ran up, and \nkissed him on both cheeks.\u201d \n\nLater, the two boys went from Russia through Kurdistan into Persia and \nIndia. They were the first western travellers, up to that time, to come out of \nKurdistan alive. In Persia, Arthur contracted a fever and was nursed back to \nhealth in the Harem of the Prince Mirza, quite an Arabian Night\u2019s Tale. In \nIndia, Tom fell ill and was sent to Australia for his health. Arthur had spent \nall his money on his brother\u2019s passage, and, as no money came to him from \nIreland, he was penniless until he obtained a post as carrier of dispatches from \none Indian station to another. He remained in India for two years, when, owing \nto the death of his two brothers, he became head of his family and returned to \nIreland. There, he married a charming young woman and became the model \nof a country gentleman and landlord, and a Member of Parliament. \n\nHe was deeply religious and possessed all his life that sense of spiritual unity which \nis the essence of faith; a mystical sense that this life is but a part of something greater \nthan itself was constantly present with him. He had a gift of silent prayer that all his \nlife seemed to bring a particular harmony to him at difficult times when he was in sore \nneed of comfort. \n\nHenry Fawcett (1833-1884) was a brilliant and ambitious young student at \nCambridge, when he was instantaneously blinded by a charge of shot fired acci\u00ac \ndentally by his father. \u201cThe idea came to him, ten minutes after the accident, \nthat he would do, as far as lay in his power, everything he had set himself to do \nin life, in spite of blindness.\u201d He learned to ride, skate, swim and fish, and \nwent on with his studies at the university, by listening to reading and by di& \ntating. *At the age of thirty, he was elected Professor of Political Economy m \nthe University of Cambridge. Two years later, he became a Member of Par\u00ac \nliament, and at the age of forty-six, he was made Postmaster-General of Eng\u00ac \nland. He married a young woman who said that she \u201cenjoyed the whole of her \nmarried life\u201d. \n\nNo one can read these little studies of handicaps without being moved by \nadmiration or without being inspired to bear his own trials, whatever they may \nbe, with more fortitude. The author says: \u201cAll these characters coming out of \nthe past, express themselves each in the manner of their own time; but disaster \ntothe human frame never goes out of fashion, and my hope certainly was that \ni^hight be an encouragement to read about some, who, in various ways, accord\u00ac \ning to their powers, managed to make the best of a bad business. Their courage \nis for all time.\u201d St.C. LaD. \n\n\n82 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nBiological Time , by P. Lecomte du Nouy, Chief of the Division of Molecular \nBiophysics, Pasteur Institute, Paris; with Foreword by Alexis Carrel, M. D.; \nthe Macmillan Company, New York, 1937; price, S2.00. \n\nTime is a fact which most of us take for granted without reflection. If the \nman in the street were asked what it really is, he would probably reply that it \nis \u201csomething\u201d measured by clocks. However, the more thoughtful man soon \nbegins to realize that there is more than one kind of time. There is, of course, \nthe time of our clocks which is based upon the observation of the cycles of the \nheavenly bodies and depends upon the various motions of the earth. There is \nNewton\u2019s \u201cabsolute, true, and mathematical time conceived as flowing at a \nconstant rate, unaffected by the speed or slowness of the motions of material \nthings\u201d. There is Minkowski\u2019s geometrical time conceived as the \u201cfourth \ndimension\u201d. There is Bergson\u2019s theory of time as duration in consciousness \nand as inseparable from memory and from creative effort. There is Plato\u2019s \nmystical definition that time is a \u201cmoving image of eternity\u201d. \n\nThe \u201cbiological time\u201d which is the subject of this book, seems to correspond \nmost nearly to Bergson\u2019s \u201cduration\u201d. We know that our sense of time is not \nconstant. A dream lasting five minutes may seem interminable to the dreamer. \nA year may seem three times longer to a child than to an adult. M. Lecomte \ndu Nouy correlates these subjective experiences with the changing velocity of \nphysiological processes, as the physical organism ages. He invented during \nthe Great War a method of calculating the ratio between the speed with which \nwounds heal and the age of the patient. There can be no doubt that this ratio \nexists, and that there is an equivalent ratio between ageing, and the accumula\u00ac \ntion of poisons in the blood-serum. This change in the velocity of living reflects \na similar change in the velocity of thought and emotion. As Dr. Carrel remarks: \n\u201cParents and children live in different temporal worlds. They are separated \nby a gap that often is too large to be bridged, even by illusions.\u201d The signifi\u00ac \ncance of the author\u2019s experiments is manifest. Unfortunately, he obtained \nmuch of his information by animal vivisection, and even under complete anaes\u00ac \nthesia and the most favourable conditions, vivisection is an incipient form of \nthe \u201cblack art\u201d and, morally, wholly illegitimate. \n\nM. Lecomte du Nouy is singularly free from the cut-and-dried mechanism \nwhich is so fashionable to-day in biological circles. He has the lucidity and the \nbreadth of vision which are typical of the French savant at his best. \n\nEven to a superficial observer, our internal physiological time does not seem to flow \nat a constant rate within the frame of external sidereal time. Real age, as we have seen, \ncan differ from legal age. From a psychological point of view, the value of a day is not \nidentical for ephemeral insects and for animals that live to be sixty years old. Even for \none individual, this value seems to vary during the course of life. Our duration would \ntherefore be, in a certain measure, independent of sidereal time. Each human being con\u00ac \nstitutes a universe in a state of continuous transformation. It is the rate of this trans\u00ac \nformation which can be considered as characteristic of our brief specific duration, of our \nphysiological time itself, inseparable from our consciousness. . . . Time in its essence, \nimplies memory and thought, or in other words: consciousness. In reality consciousness \ncould be defined as the power to perceive things separately in succession. From this \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCORRESPONDENCE \n\n\n83 \n\n\nstandpoint, time has been called an internal mode of perception. . . . \u201cIn truth it is \nimpossible to distinguish between duration no matter how short, which separates two \ninstants, and a memory which binds them together, for duration is essentially a con\u00ac \ntinuation of what is no more in what is. This is the true time, I mean the time perceived \nand lived. It is also every kind of conceived time, for it is impossible to conceive time \nwithout depicting it as perceived and lived. Duration, then, implies consciousness, and \nwe put consciousness into things by the very fact that we attribute to them a time which \nlasts.\u201d One might almost say that these ideas of Bergson are contained implicitly in \nDescartes\u2019 phrase: \u201cI think; hence I am.\u201d \n\nOne notes with astonishment the phenomenon of a \u201cmolecular biophysicist\u201d \nquoting Bergson with approval. It measures the extent of the revolution which \nhas displaced so many of the dogmas of scientific materialism during the past \ntwenty-five years. It may be suggested that if all the implications involved in \nthe concept of biological time were realized, biologists would be obliged to admit \nthe universality of consciousness. If duration be inseparable from conscious\u00ac \nness, it should follow that anything which endures in Nature, even for an in\u00ac \nfinitesimal fraction of a second, must be conscious in some way and degree. \nIn other words, the whole Universe can be reduced, in the last analysis, to an \ninconceivably vast congeries of states of consciousness; for we cannot imagine \nany existing thing which is without the attribute of duration. Not without \nreason the Magi of Persia symbolized the Absolute Consciousness of God by \nthe name, Zeroana Akerne, or \u201cBoundless Time\u201d. L.V. \n\n\nCORRESPONDENCE \nGerman Atrocities \nTo the Editors of the Theosophical Quarterly: \n\nAs the result of skilful propaganda persistently carried on since the Armistice \nby Germans and pro-Germans, but especially by those who hate France and \nEngland on general principles, the impression is wide-spread in America, and \neven in England, that the Bryce Report and other proofs of German atrocities \nduring the Great War, were the result of deliberate invention. As I happen to \nknow that some of the worst of the German atrocities have never been \npublic, and that those, such as the Dinant massacre, revealed in the Bryce \nReport, actually happened, I ask you to publish, in the interest of truth, a \nfootnote from My New World (pages 93, 94, 95), the latest book by the Abbd \nErnest Dimnet, so well and favourably known to English-speaking readers as \nthe author of France Herself Again , The Art of Thinking , What We Live By , \nand other works. \n\nSome of your readers may wish to know that My New World is a continua\u00ac \ntion of the Abba\u2019s My Old World , and consists for the most part of a delightful \nand appreciative account of his several visits to America, during the second of \nwfeich, after many initial rebuffs, he succeeded in raising over one hundred \ntfft^sand dollars on behalf of the University of Lille, the laboratories and dis- \n\n\n\n\n\n\n8 4 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\npensaries of which the Germans had gutted when they were finally driven out \nof northern France in 1918. This is the footnote: \n\n\u201cOn August 16th and 17th, 1914, no fewer than six hundred and seventy- \nfour men and women, citizens of the charming summer-resort of Dinant (Bel\u00ac \ngium], as well as several children, were shot by the Germans against a wall \nwhich I pass almost every year and never can see without a feeling of horror. \nThere are still alive in the pretty little city several thousand people who wit\u00ac \nnessed the gruesome scene. The German soldiers broke into the houses and \ndragged out whomever they found there. Immediately after, the terrified \nprisoners were driven to the wall and shot down without even an appearance \nof judgment. The Germans admit the facts but account for them by the re\u00ac \npeated assertion that civilians shot at them, a statement which all Dinant \npeople indignantly contradict. I have always been surprised that some Amer\u00ac \nican searcher, less likely than his European confreres to bring into such an in\u00ac \nvestigation a partisan spirit, should not have collected the evidence which can \nstill be easily gathered both from Dinant citizens and from German veterans. \nA reference to this massacre in the last edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica \nis so casual that the reader wonders if the writer of the Dinant article believed \nin the actuality of the facts he relates. People in England and in America have \nbeen made so sceptical by conflicting propagandas that they have adopted an \n\u2018it-may-be-so-but-it-also-may-not\u2019 attitude which is the greatest achievement of \nthe propagandist. One is rather surprised to find the same even in serious \nbooks by real historians. In the early editions of The Epic of America , Mr. \nJames Truslow Adams wrote (page 370): \u2018The French executed two war nurses \nunder almost the identical circumstances of the German execution of Nurse \nCavell, but we were not told.\u2019 This is a typical statement revealing the state \nof mind I was alluding to above. The natural reaction of a French reader who \nnever heard of this shooting of two German nurses was to ask: \u2018But where could \nthe French get hold of two German nurses to shoot?\u2019 I wrote to Mr. Adams \nasking for his authorities. Let me say at once that the correspondence which \nfollowed was entirely to the credit of Mr. Adams. He had found the two Ger\u00ac \nman nurses\u2019 story on page 32 of Propaganda Technique in the World War by \nProfessor H. D. Lasswell, of Chicago, and he had not questioned it till a letter, \nwritten shortly before mine, by former Ambassador Jusserand, raised doubts in \nhis mind. He had then written Professor Lasswell asking him about his sources. \nProfessor Lasswell had replied regretting \u2018that Mr. Adams\u2019 letter had not \nreached him a fortnight sooner as he had just returned to the University from \nGermany and his evidence for his statement was there.\u2019 This letter was dated \nDecember 7th, 1932. I wrote immediately to Professor Lasswell asking him to \ngive me the address of any German information bureau as the shooting of the \nGerman nurses, if it had really taken place, must be well-known in Germany. \nMy letter did not reach Professor Lasswell. After waiting a few months I wrote \nto him again and received the following answer (dated June 2nd, 1933) which \nI communicated at once to Mr. James Truslow Adams: \u2018The story, as related \nin my Propaganda Technique in the World War , is practically a verbatim quota- \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCORRESPONDENCE \n\n\n85 \n\n\ntion from Mr. Karl von Wiegand, a German-American. He was head of one of \nMr. Hearst\u2019s news-gathering organizations, the Universal Service, who was on \nclose terms with the Germans. He referred to Oberst Nicolai.\u2019 Mr. Adams did \nnot think that evidence of this kind, ultimately based on the obiter dictum of an \nOberst about whom nobody ever heard, was sufficient to satisfy the require\u00ac \nments of history, and he acted as a real scholar was sure to act. He not only \ndeleted the allusion to the German nurses from the new editions of The Epic of \nAmerica , but he added a note without which the suppression might have been \nunnoticed. Unfortunately he could not send an erratum to the hundreds of \nthousands who had previously read his book, and I still meet Americans who, \nbelieving that the French shot two defenceless German women, feel like con\u00ac \ndoning such things as the Dinant massacre, because \u2018in war everything is \nhorrible.\u2019 So it is, but there are degrees in horror and it behoves history to \nestablish such degrees. The moment an historian seeks to give the contrary \nimpression he falls to the rank of propagandist. I hope I have not more than \nthe inevitable amount of racial prejudices. Many people who are violently in \nfavour of, or antagonistic to, some foreign nation substitute emotions for rea\u00ac \nsons and can have no intellectual standing. I am only telling what I saw, and \nI saw with my own eyes the effects of Schrecklichkeit. The terrorized Belgians \nwho, in August, 1914, made such a ghastly entrance into my native town were \nthe victims of a system of frightfulness which Germany openly defended at the \ntime and practised ruthlessly. I know scores of other instances less striking \nthan the Dinant slaughter but equally shocking. To deny is not to delete \nthem.\u201d Old Member. \n\n\nThe Marines at Chateau-Thierry \nTo the Editors of the Theosophical Quarterly: \n\nIn \u201cThe Screen of Time\u201d, October, 1936, one of the speakers remarks: \u201cYes. \nThe American marines were the first unit to take the aggressive,\u2014at Ch&teau- \nThierry (Belleau Wood) in June, 1918.\u201d This statement is frequently found in \ncurrent publications, the fair inferences being that the American marines con\u00ac \nstituted a combat unit; that the active participation of American troops in \noffensive operations began with the action of the marines; and that what took \nplace at Belleau Wood and at Chateau-Thierry in June, 1918, constituted one \nand the same episode. This chain of misunderstanding is the outgrowth of \nwidespread propaganda during the early days of our participation in^pe War \n\u2014many readers will remember the popular myth that Paris had been saved \nfrom the Germans by a few marines; may remember also a narrative entitled, \n\u201cWith the Help of God and a Few Marines\u201d, published by a Colonel of marines \nwho had been wounded at Belleau Wood. \n\nIn fairness to the Allies with whom we served and also to the American regu\u00ac \nlars with whom the marines were associated, it seems well to keep in remem\u00ac \nbrance certain of the facts. Two regiments of marines, the 5th and 6th, were \nassigned to the 2nd U. S. Division which sailed for France in December, 1917. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n86 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nWith them in that division were the 9th and the 23rd infantry, three artillery \nregiments, also engineers and auxiliary units. Little mention has been made \nof any but the marines, though they constituted only a fourth of the Division. \nIn November, 1917, the 1st U. S. Division (the first combat unit to reach France \nand one that included no marines) had entered the trenches in the Vosges for \ninstruction by the French. This 1st U. S. Division, supported by a large mass \nof French artillery and backed up by French reserves, delivered what was in \nfact the first attack ever made by American troops upon the enemy. Skilfully \nconducted, it was entirely successful. Moreover, some American engineer \ntroops had already displayed great tenacity in the fighting on the British front. \nIn the operations about Ch 4 teau-Thierry and Belleau Wood, the 1st, 2nd and \n3rd U. S. Divisions were all employed, and without belittling the part played \nby any one unit, it is most desirable to keep each in its proper perspective: to \nrealize that they were used to assist the French to stabilize a new line of re\u00ac \nsistance along the Marne; that over thirty reserve divisions of seasoned French \ntroops were interposed at the time between Ch&teau-Thierry and Paris; and \nthat while to our men it seemed (as it practically always seems to troops ad\u00ac \nvancing into a strange country) that they were acting alone with no one on \ntheir flanks,\u2014in reality, they were but part of a great and ordered whole, no \npart of which could claim the distinction of having stood solely between Paris \nand disaster. Finally, no marines were employed at Ch&teau-Thierry, and \nwhen they did go into action at Belleau Wood, it was after the infantry units \nhad become involved. F.T.S. \n\n\nThere is a choice in books as in friends , and the mind sinks or rises to the level \nof its habitual society .\u2014 Lowell. \n\n\nRead the best books first , or you may not have a chance to read them at all .\u2014 \nThoreau. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nQuestion No. 405 .\u2014How does one know when one is functioning in the inner, instead of in \nthe outer , world? Where is the boundary between the two? A re there really two separate and distinct \nworlds, the inner and the outer? Or, are these simply two aspects of the One World\u2014the spiritualf \n\nAnswer. \u2014We are never out of the Spiritual world,\u2014it is the One World. It is only a \nquestion as to whether we are consciously functioning there, or whether we are not. We may \nbe immersed in outer events and activities, and lose all consciousness of the Spiritual world. \nOr, instead of living amidst outer events, we may be living within them, and be finding at their \nheart their true meaning, and Reality. C.R.A. \n\n\nAnswer. \u2014Scarcely anyone can fail to have had, at some time and in one way or another, \nthe experience of functioning in the inner world. His failure to recognize it, as such, is due to \nlack of awareness at that point. If he had used his intelligence properly to analyze his ex\u00ac \nperience, he would have known, self-consciously, the nature of that experience. The boundary \nline between the two worlds\u2014so designated to make the distinction clear in words\u2014surely \nmust be within his own Manas, or mind. We do not move in space from the outer to the \ninner world. The transition is in consciousness. Though the detail of the experience differs \nwith different persons, in essence it is similar: response to the spirit within. There are those, \nfor instance, who have passed from depression to joy, from boredom to sudden wonder and \nrapture, at the song of a bird, or the vision of the delicate tracery of green leaves in early \nspring. We do not move out of the physical world in order to experience what lies at its heart. \nThe song of the bird, the leafage of the trees, are outer aspects, if you will, of the spirit within. \nThe moment of joy, of wonder and rapture, is the moment of entrance into the inner world. \nThe extent to which we can penetrate into that world, is infinite in its reaches. On the strength \nof our imagination in reiterating the experience, on the force of our will in living a life that will \npurify the heart, on our love of the Good, the True, and the Beautiful, depends our progress. \nIf the imagination and the will remain sustained and right-pointed, a time will come when \nwe shall live in both worlds, so called, at once: acting in the outer, while actuated by the love \nand loyalty which unite us to those of the inner realm. Then, we shall see the inner and the \nouter, not falsely, as two separate and distinct worlds, but truly, as two aspects of theQne,\u2014 \nthe Spiritual, or Real, world. ( \u2022 \n\nAnswer\u2014 Broadly speaking, the universe is divided into two worlds\u2014the world of Idea \n(the higher), and the world of Matter (the lower). The lower world is formed on its prototype\u2014 \nthe higher world; and everything in the lower is but an image, or reflection, of the higher. \n\u201cAs above, so below.\u201d Theosophy stresses unity, and holds that, in essence, the universe is \none. But in manifestation there is duality\u2014two aspects of the One Reality. The material \nworld is but the outer rind, so to speak, of the spiritual. The Kabalists call the material \nuniverse the World of Shells. The materialist lives, moves and has his being in matter; he \nmistakes the shadow for the substance. \n\nTheosophy opens doors to the spiritual world\u2014the world of Causes, of Ideation, of Divine \nPurpose. The materialist deals only with effects. At our 1937 Convention, it was stated that \n\n87 \n\n\n\u2014 \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n- : * 9 + \n\n'/ \\ \n\n\n88 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nperhaps the greatest need of the Society is a clearer realization of the inner world as the worl o \nreality; that thoughts are things, that they are things of tremendous power; and that invariab y \nthroughout the universe the unseen is more powerful than the visible. How many of us give \nmore than intellectual assent to that truth? How many act upon it? The secret of knowing \nin which world one is functioning lies in consciousness. Where are our thoughts centred? \nDo we, in going about our daily tasks, undertake them as part of the Divine plan for us, with \nthe motive of offering up every thought, every act, upon the altar of the heart? Or, are our \nthoughts centred in self? \n\n\u201cFragments\u201d, in the Quarterly for July, 1935, offers a key for the discovery of the boundary \nbetween the two worlds: \n\n\u201cWho knows where earth begins and heaven ends; who can fix the boundary of that inner \nworld and this, determine what is seen and what unseen? \n\n\u201cWhy grant a boundary between ourselves and heaven? What boundary can there be, \nsave sin? \n\n\u201cLiving in heavenly-mindedness, we shall make earth one with heaven, remove the veil, \nnor know which pavement, whether clay or gold, we tread.\u201d G.H.M. \n\nAnswer. \u2014The inner world is the world of purpose, and the spiritual world is the world \nof Divine purpose. Whatever is carrying out the Divine purpose, whatever is living in accord\u00ac \nance with the laws of its being, striving to carry out to the best of its ability the purpose for \nwhich it was created, is in the spiritual world. A tree or a flower, growing as it was meant to \ngrow, is in the spiritual world. Part of the Divine purpose must surely be the manifestation on \nearth of the Platonic trinity, Beauty, Truth and Goodness; whatever manifests them is helping \nto carry out this purpose, and is, to that extent, in the spiritual world. On the other hand, \ndisobedience removes automatically from that world whatever disobeys. It ceases to be \nconnected with the purpose that created and constitutes it. \n\nIn speaking of such a subject as the spiritual world, we must be careful to make clear that \nwe are dealing with only one aspect. That world transcends description. It is as if a man \nwho had seen one little corner of Devonshire, were asked to describe England, and faithfully \ndescribed his little spot. From one point of view, he would be right in calling it England, \nbut as a portrayal of the country, it would, to say the least, be inadequate. The same thing \nis true of any attempt to say what the spiritual world is, or is not. In so far as we are honestly \nstriving to carry out the Divine purpose, the will of the Masters, we are functioning in the \ninner, spiritual world. In so far as we are self-indulgent, we exile ourselves from that world \nIt is love that is back of all purposes of the Divine. It follows, therefore, that love love of \nsomething other than self, is the only motive that will enable us to enter the spiritual world. \n\nJ.F.B.M. \n\n\nNOTICE \n\nThe regular meetings of the New York Branch of The Theosophical Societv are held on \nalternate Saturday evenings, at 64 Washington Mews, which runs from the east side of Fifth \nAvenue, midway between Eighth Street and Washington Square, North. No 64 is the W \n\nstudio east of Fifth Avenue, on the north side of the Mews. The meetings bevintt half * \neight, and close at ten o\u2019clock. meetings begin at half-past \n\nDuring the present Quarter, there will be meetings on,_ \n\nJanuary 15th and 29th \nFebruary 12th and 26th \nMarch 12th and 26th. \n\nOut-of-town members of the Society are invited to attend these meeting \nare in New York. Visitors who may be interested in Theosophy are always welcome^' ^ \n\n\n-I \n\n\nSTANDARD BOOKS \n\n\nBlavatsky H P. Isis Unveiled, Vols. I and II. \n\nDiavatsKy, n. r. Complete in one book.cloth, 7.50 \n\nKey to Theosophy...\u2022... 17 50 \n\nSecret Doctrine, The, Vols. I and II and Index..... \u2019 \u2022 \n\nCOMPLETE in one book, without subject-index volume, 7.50 \n\nTheosophical Glossary... c \\ ot V \u00ab 25 \n\nTransactions of the Blavatsky Lodge. \n\nVoice of the Silence.... \n\nCave. Fragments, Volume I.. ;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;:;; boards\u2019, 1.50 \n\nVolume III.'.'. \u2022 \u2022 \u2022 .. boili *\u2019 HJ \n\nGerard. John. Letters to Friends... .... \u2022. \n\nHillard Katharine. Abridgment of The Secret Doctrine. ...doth, 3.0 \n\n. , , * Phoplpc BhagaVAD GIta .Translated, annotated; doth, 1.25 \n\nJohnston, Charles, bhagavad uha. ii mp leather, 1.75 \n\nCrest Jewel of Wisdom, The. ...cloth\u2019 i so \n\nGreat Upanishads, The, Volume I. c '\u00b0 h / \u2018 \n\nParables of the Kingdom, The . \u2022\u2022\u25a0\u2022 \u2022\u2022\u2022\u2022.j' p , \n\nPATANjALl\u2019s Yoga Sutras .Translated, annotated; doth 1.25 \n\nJudgeTwmiam F Q. BhagaVAD GIta .Edited; doth, 1.25; leather, 1.50 \n\nCulture of Concentration . p p \u2019 \u2019 25 \n\nEchoes from the Orient. \u2022\u2022\u2022\u2022\u2022\u2022\u2022 \u2022 \u2022 .. i a it rim-h 1 oo \n\nLetters That Have Helped Me, Volumes I and II, each.. .coth, 1. \n\nOcean of Theosophy. JJ* J*J \n\nPatanjali\u2019s Yoga Aphorisms .'\u2018 ot e h ; ^ \n\nMitchell, S Henryedinger!\u00b0*M editation, Special edition, .20; paper, .so \nTheosophical Society and Theosophy, The. ... \u2022\u2022-\u2022\u2022\u2022\u2022 \u25a0 pap \u2019 \nMitchell, J. F. B. Collegiate Education and Standards of^^ ^ \n\nSinnett'A. P.' Esoteric' Buddhism'.'. .\u2022 \u2022 \u2022; \nTorrey CU Ray E^Science and its Function in Education .... paper, .50 \n\nIdyll of the White Lotus. \u2022 \u2022 , eather> g5 \n\nLight on the Pay 1 \\v: \u2022 .doth, 1.20 \n\nThrough the Gates of Gold. . \n\n\nTHE QUARTERLY BOOK DEPARTMENT, \n\nP. O. Box 64, Station O, New York. \n\n\nI sssaassxEssfiss \n\n. f Secret Doctrine; Isis Unveiled; Key to Theosophy, \nK^\u00ab\u00abe 1 ^et Doctrine; Theosophical Glossary; Transactions of \nthe Blavatsky Lodge; Patanjali\u2019s Yoga Sutras. ,,,. \n\nThe'bcrn^Th^sophy; \n\nI The Theosophical Society and Theosophy. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n^fjc tKfjeosiopfjical Society \n\nFounded by B. P* Blavatsky at new Vork in 1$75 \n\n\nT \n\n\nHE Society does not pretend to be able to establish \nat once a universal brotherhood among men* but \nonly strives to create the nucleus of such a body* \nMany of its members believe that an acquaintance \nwith the world's religions and philosophies will \n\n_reveal, as the common and fundamental principle \n\nunderlying these, that \u201cspiritual identity of all Souls with the \nOversoul'*which is the basis of true brotherhood! and many \nof them also believe that an appreciation of the finer forces \nof nature and man will still further emphasize the same idea* \nThe organization is wholly unsectarian, with no creed# \ndogma# nor personal authority to enforce or impose} neither \nis it to be held responsible for the opinions of its members# \nwho are expected to accord to the beliefs of others that \ntolerance which they desire for their own* \n\nThe following proclamation was adopted at the Conven* \ntion of the Society# held at Boston* April# 1895* \n\n\u201cThe Theosophical Society in America by its delegates and \nmembers in Convention assembled, does hereby proclaim \nfraternal good will and kindly feeling toward all students of \nTheosophy and members of Theosophical Societies wherever \nand however situated* It further proclaims and avers its \nhearty sympathy and association with such persons and \norganizations in all theosophical matters except those of \ngovernment and administration# and invites their cor* \nrespondence and co-operation* \n\n\u201cTo all men and women of whatever caste#creed*race#or \nreligious belief# who aim at the fostering of peace# gentleness# \nand unselfish regard one for another# and the acquisition of \nsuch knowledge of men and nature as shall tend to the eleva* \ntion and advancement of the human race# it sends most friendly \ngreeting and freely proffers its services* \n\n\u201cIt joins hands with all religions and religious bodieswhose \nefforts are directed to the purification of men's thoughts and \nthe bettering of their ways* and it avows its harmony that* \nwith* To all scientific societies and individual searchers after \nwisdom upon whatever plane, and by whatever righteous \nmeans pursued* it is and will be grateful for such discovery \nand unfoldment of Truth as shall serve to announce and con\u00ac \nfirm a scientific basis for ethics \u2022 \n\n\u201cAnd lastly* it invites to its membership those who* seek\u00ac \ning a higher life hereafter, would learn to know the path to \ntread In this.\" \n\n\n\n\nApplications for membership should be addressed to the \nSecretary T. S., P JO. Box 64, Station O, New York. \n\n\n\n\n\nVOL XXXV* No. 2 \n\n\nAPRIL 1938 \n\n\n1 PUBLISH \n\nI THE THEOSOPf \n\n1ED BY \n\n1ICAL SOCIETY \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nThe Theosophical Quarterly \n\n\n\n\nSubscription price, $2.00 per annum; single copies, 50 cents \n\nPublished by The Theosophical Society \nat 64 Washington Mews, New York, N.Y. \n\nJanuary; April; July; October \n\nAddress all communications to P. O. Box 64, Station O, New York \n\n\nIn Europe, single copies may be obtained from and subscriptions may be sent to Tohn \nM. Watkins, 21 Cecil Court, Charing Cross Road, London, W. C. 2, England; or to \nE - H. Lincoln, 9 Beaconsfield Road, Low Fell, Gateshead-on-Tyne, England from \nwhom all back numbers may be obtained. Annual subscription price, $2.00, postpaid \n\n\nCONTENTS OF VOL. XXXV, NO. 2 \nApril, 1938 \n\nNOTES AND COMMENTS PAGE \n\nFRAGMENTS. 91 \n\nINSPIRATION.. i...! . 102 \n\nON HAVING A PURPOSE IN LIFE... X \u00b0 3 \n\nHEAD, HEART, AND HAND 113 \n\nGEORGE WASHINGTON: A Standard'for To-dav. \" 7 \n\nWITHOUT CENSOR, XII (Concluded) 122 \n\nNOURISHMENT.... I2 9 \n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME . \u2022\u2022... 142 \n\nHELENA PETROVNA BLAVATSKY (Reprint) . 146 \n\nCORRESPONDENCE. i6 3 \n\nQUESTIONS AND ANSWERS . *73 \n\nT.S. ACTIVITIES: Notices... . *74 \n\n. 176 \n\n* -3. a. the Po \u00ab 0ffic , at New Yofk . N y ^ ^ \n\nCopyright, 193 8, by The Theosophical Society \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\\ \n\n\nre li8iowphao^\u201ehi.,,nJ s riJnJ.\u2018!,\": T \n\n\n\n\u2022 uuu uiners, \n\n11 6 have no connection whatsoever imih . \n\nadlmg tedf Theosophical, formed,, headed by Mr\u201d 7hZ7t \u201c\u201cZ \n\n\u2014\u2022 * -** - -5 \n\nEditors, The Theosophical Qcarterlt. \n\n\n0 \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\\ \n\n\n\nAPRIL, 1938 \n\nThe Theosophical Society , as such , is not responsible Jot any opinion ox declaration \nin this magazine , by whomsoever expressed , unless contained in an official document . \n\nThe Power of Choice \n\nM ATHEMATICIANS and metaphysicians treat with respect the idea \nthat in some abstract \u201crealm of essences\u201d there is an infinite number \nof possible worlds, of which our cosmos is the only specimen that has \nattained existence. At first sight, nothing could seem more futile than such a \nline of speculation. A \u201crealm of essences\u201d is as tenuous as the dream of a \ndream. However, philosophical concepts are not always as void of sense as they \nappear to be. When Leibniz, for instance, postulated that we live in the best \nof all possible worlds, the world most perfectly adapted for the edification of \nall beings, this was his way of saying that the universe is not a fortuitous con\u00ac \ncourse of atoms but is the production of a Divine Mind, a Logos, which selects , \namong many alternatives, the theme and keynote of its creation. The inference \nis unavoidable if the root and origin of Nature be in the \u201cThought of God\u201d. \n\nA Divine Mind which could not pick and choose its ideas would be neither a \n\u201cMind\u201d nor \u201cDivine\u201d. \n\nThe great is mirrored in the small; the unknown is shadowed forth by the \nknown. The power of choice is inseparable from consciousness. We cannot \nconceive one without the other. The most humdrum event in the humblest^ \nlife brings an opportunity to choose between the better and the dearer. Do w* \nrealize that at every instant we stand at the cross-roads of destiny and that we, \nand only we, can elect our course? For every man there is an infinite number \nof possible lives which he can bring into being, and it should be his undivided \npurpose to discover and to select the life which in the deepest sense belongs to \nhim and which is therefore the best of all that are possible. \n\nThe Soul in Bondage \n\nIf we examine our experiences with any attention, we shall obtain the certi\u00ac \ntude that all life is a process of selection. At the same time, however we shall \nbe^pe aware of another fact which is not pleasant to contemplate. The proc- \n\n9i \n\n\n* \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n92 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\ness of selection is not always conducted by the real Self, by the Soul. Much \nof the time\u2014to say the least\u2014we ineffectively watch our habits and passions \nchoose for us. Action and inaction are dictated by an elemental complex which \nis not the Soul, but to which in our infatuation we have delegated an authority \nwhich is the rightful heritage of the Soul. \n\nConsider what happens when the ordinary man consults a bill of fare. He \ncannot eat unless some selection be made. Why does he finally order one soup \ninstead of another? Probably, in most instances, he does not know himself: \nhe just orders something, anything, as soon as possible. But a selection is made, \neven if he be virtually unconscious. It is enforced upon him by habit, by the \n\u201csubconscious\u201d, by the interplay of submerged desires. If he be really hungry, \nhe may be aware of a battle within himself. He wants beefsteak but remembers \nthe doctor\u2019s orders. Perhaps he renounces the beefsteak, congratulating him\u00ac \nself upon his self-restraint. But the Soul need not intervene, by an act of will, \nto settle the struggle between desire and fear. Fear can win the day by its own \nforce. To-morrow the cycle may change, and the victor may be desire. The \npoint is that the average man\u2014which means anyone in his average moments\u2014 \ndoes not always or even often behave like a free agent. His Soul, his proper \nnature, is in bondage to a host of appetites and aversions, partly conscious but \nmostly subconscious, whose strength is proportionate to the measure and fre\u00ac \nquency of his past self-identification with them. His conduct is thus largely \nshaped by the particular complex which is dominant at the moment. If it \nwere possible to measure the relative amount of energy which has been put into \neach of his complexes, and to calculate their cycles or periodicities, as physiolo\u00ac \ngists calculate the rhythms of vital functions, we could doubtless predict the \ngeneral outline of his future. Incidentally, this suggests why future events \nmay be prefigured in dreams with extraordinary accuracy of detail. \n\nFree Will and Determinism \n\nThe doctrines of fatalism and mechanism and determinism cannot be \nbrusquely dismissed as of no account. What do we mean by freedom and by \nfate? In so far as anything has a unified character or being, in so far as it is \nan actual entity, it may be said to \u201cbehave\u201d infallibly and \u201cfreely\u201d, according \nto its nature, whether it be an atom, a plant, an animal, a man, or a god. But \nwhen a \u201cthing \u2019 is not a unit but a \u201cmechanical mixture\u201d, an unorganized con\u00ac \ngeries of many units, it has no real \u201cnature\u201d or, at best, only the rudiments of \na real \u201cnature . It is not \u201cfree\u201d. Its actions and reactions are determined \nfor it, since these are hut the effects of the actions and reactions of a miscellany \nof elements. There are analogies between a mechanical mixture and the \u201cper\u00ac \nsonality\u201d which the ordinary man thinks of as his \u201cself\u201d, but which is in itself \nonly an amalgamation of elementals. The \u201cpersonality\u201d is, indeed, the \u201cself\u201d \nwhose instability and essential non-being are so persistently stressed in the \nBuddhist scriptures. \n\nScientists have specialized so long in the study of the unorganized, mechani\u00ac \ncal aspect of Nature, that they have almost lost the ability to imagine what real \n\n\n\n\n\nNOTES AND COMMENTS \n\n\n93 \n\n\nfreedom must be like. This was exemplified in an address by Dr. Edwin Grant \nConklin, Professor of Biology at Princeton, before the \u201cParliament of Science\u201d \nat Indianapolis. He distinguished between the \u201cdeterminism of inanimate \nnature\u201d and the \u201cworld of human experience\u201d. He even made a noble effort \nto affirm the reality of free will as an irreducible item of human experience. \nBut his exposition of human freedom might be more adequately described as \nan exposition of human bondage; for the only freedom which he seems to con\u00ac \nceive is the \u201cfreedom\u201d to do what we are \u201cbiologically\u201d compelled to do. \n\nFreedom does not mean uncaused activity. The will is not a \u201clittle deity encapsuled \nin the brain\u201d, but instead it is the sum of all those physical and psychical processes, in\u00ac \ncluding especially reflexes, conditioning and remembered experiences, which act as \nstimuli in initiating or directing behaviour. The will is not undetermined, absolutely \nfree, but is the result of the organization and experience of the organism, and in turn it \nis a factor in determining behaviour. Therefore we do not need to import from sub\u00ac \natomic physics the uncertain principle of uncertainty to explain free will. 1 he fact that \nman can control, to a certain extent, his own acts as well as phenomena outside himself, \nrequires neither a little daemon in the electron nor a big one in the man. . . . Novelty, \ncreativity and freedom, wherever their origin has been traced, are found to be caused by \nnew combinations of old elements and processes, whether these be atoms, molecules, \ngenes, chromosomes, cells, organs, functions, or even sensations, memories and ideas. \nBy such new combinations of old elements there emerge all the new properties of chemical \ncompounds, and by new combinations of genes and chromosomes and environmental \nstimuli, all the novelties of heredity and development arise. There is evidence that even \npsychical properties, such as consciousness, intelligence and will, emerge in the process \nof development because of specific combinations of physical and psychical factors. 1 his \nis, indeed, the whole philosophy of evolution, namely, that the entire universe, including \nman and all his faculties and activities, are the results of transformation rather than of \nnew formation, of emergence rather than of creation de novo. \n\nProfessor Conklin remarked that the future of civilization is gravely en\u00ac \ndangered because \u201cneither in human nature nor in social relations has progress \nkept pace with science\u201d. He means, of course, that man understands and con\u00ac \ntrols physical processes much more effectively than he understands and con\u00ac \ntrols himself. But for this condition \u201cscience\u201d itself is, in large measure, re\u00ac \nsponsible. The present is a case in point. Professor Conklin\u2019s manifest \nsincerity and love of truth are a living proof of the presence of an active spirit\u00ac \nual power in human nature. But the biological dogmas and materialistic \npreconceptions which have been instrumental in shaping his thought, impel \nhim to describe human nature as if it could only be moved by animal impulses \nand instincts,\u2014\u201creflexes, conditioning and remembered experiences\u201d. Why \nshould not the average man lose faith in spiritual law and in his own Soul, \nwhen their existence is constantly treated as an absurdity by men of science \nwhom he regards as wiser than himself? \n\nLet us make the issue as clear as possible. The \u201cwill\u201d of the \u201cpersonality\u201d is \ndoubtless a \u201csum of physical and psychical processes\u201d, but this is not the \u201cfree \nwill \u201d of the individual Soul; the \u201cpersonality\u201d as such operates like a mechanism, \nand it is folish to pretend otherwise. Freedom is merely a \u201cname\u201d, not a \n\u201cthing\u201d, utoss it be the exercise of an independent transforming power. The \n\n\n\n94 THEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\nindividual will is a daemon, a \u201ctutelary genius\u201d\u2014 not, however, \u201cencapsuled in \nthe brain\u201d\u2014or it is nothing. \n\nThe Interaction of Spirit and Matter \n\nThe Indian doctrine of Karma and of the twelve Nid&nas also emphasizes the \ntyranny imposed by reflexes and complexes upon human lives. As it is some\u00ac \ntimes formulated, it seems beyond possibility that man can ever escape from \nthe web of passion and fancy and habit. He is caught, as it were, in an endless \nchain of cause and effect, each effect becoming a cause in its turn. But the \ntrue significance of Karma is that liberation from illusion is possible; the Gor\u00ac \ndian knot can be cut; the wheel of necessity which makes us repeat the same \nfollies again and again, can be brought to a dead stop before the Soul is crushed \nout of existence. Indeed, are not the revolutions of this wheel designed to bring \nsuch pressure upon the Soul that it is at last aroused by pain to resist \u201cneces\u00ac \nsity\u201d, and thus to declare its freedom? \n\nTheosophy offers this solution,\u2014that the real Self of man is not the confused \nmass of physical and psychical elements which we call the \u201cpersonality\u201d, but \nis an integral part of Divine and Eternal Nature and participates in all the \npowers of the Heavenly Host. As man attains consciousness of that which he \nessentially is, he attains freedom in the only possible sense of that term, the \nfreedom to make manifest his own essence. God alone is truly free, as a great \nmystic has said, because He alone can express His Nature in its plenitude. Ac\u00ac \ncording to the theosophical version of evolution, the final aim of existence is \nto raise the consciousness of creatures towards that perfect freedom which is \nthe natural attribute of the \u201cHeavenly Man\u201d, of God. \n\nEvery form on earth and every speck (atom) in Space strives in its efforts towards \nself-formation to follow the model placed for it in the \u201cHeavenly Man\u201d. ... Its (the \natom\u2019s) involution and evolution, its external and internal growth and development, have \nall one and the same object\u2014man; man, as the highest and ultimate form on this earth; \nthe Monad, in its absolute totality and awakened condition\u2014as the culmination of the \ndivine incarnations on earth (The Secret Doctrine , ed. 1888, I, 183). \n\nEvolution, both universal and individual, is thus conceived as an interaction \nbetween the two great poles of Nature, between the positive and the negative, \nbetween spirit and matter. When will scientists ever come to recognize clearly \nand simply, that spirit or consciousness is as veritably a part of Nature as mat\u00ac \nter or substance or objective form ? Evolution cannot be described as a function \nof matter alone, any more than magnetism can be explained by the study of \niron filings, without reference to a magnet. Spirit has been compared to a mag\u00ac \nnet, from which emanates the fohatic force which vitalizes the universe and lifts \nmatter from the level of non-being. This is the descent of spirit into the world > \nof which all scriptures have left some record: \u201cThe Word was made flesh, and \ndwelt among us . . . and of his fulness have all we received, and grace for \ngrace.\u201d \n\nEven our limited experience shows that spirit cannot contact matter without \nchanging the constitution of matter. Doubtless all \u201cnovelties\u201d, from a chemical \n\n\n\nINSPIRATION \n\n\n107 \n\n\nNOTES AND COMMENTS 95 \n\n\ncompound to a work of human genius, are new combinations of old elements. \nThe creative power in Nature and man uses whatever material is available, \nwhatever already exists. But how can we doubt that it infuses into that material \nsomething new and altogether unique, something which the analysis of past \nevents and old elements can never wholly explain? The properties of water \ncannot be imagined by adding together the properties of hydrogen and oxygen. \nNo formula of bio-chemistry can resolve the mystery of a flower or a bird\u2019s \nsong or a poem or an heroic life. \n\n\nReal and Illusory Freedom \n\nThe deep-seated sense that we are somehow free to select our destiny cannot \nbe dissociated from the immediate intuition of our being. It is one with con\u00ac \nsciousness itself and is present in all experience. But we deceive ourselves, if \nwe pretend that our actions are necessarily free merely because they ought to \nbe and can become free. We choose and select continuously, but not in the \nways which we commonly imagine. \n\nLet us return to the man in the restaurant. We have assumed that being an \naverage person, he did not really order his dinner; that his habits and appetites \nand aversions ordered it for him. However, as a matter of fact, he did make a \nfundamental choice when he refused to choose for himself. A superior person \nwould not refuse to choose for himself, because he holds in consciousness an ideal \nof conduct which he recognizes as always superior to his actual mode of living, \nand to which he intends to conform himself more and more completely. Since \nthis ideal implies complete self-control, no activity of body or mind can be \nexcluded from his programme of self-discipline, not even the act of ordering a \ndinner. Therefore, if he order meat or fish, it is not primarily under the com\u00ac \npulsion of reflexes or the memories of past sensations, but because he intends \nsuch a selection to be the best and the wisest that he can make. \n\nWe can use our spiritual will, or not use it; we can express our real nature, \nor not express it. In either event, we make a choice and cannot help making \nit. But when the spiritual will is inactive, \u201cself-will\u201d, the uncontrolled force \nof passion and habit, takes its place. Misery and calamity are the only possible \nconsequence of this inner abdication, this \u201crefusal to create\u201d. \n\nGenius and Freedom \n\n\nThe existence of transformation implies the existence of a transforming \nagency. If we trust our experience, small though it be, it becomes apparent \nthat in man the power which transforms is identified with the individual will. \nWhen that will is set free, it is indistinguishable from genius. The will, the \nSoul, and the genius of man are fundamentally one. \n\nIn a scientific periodical there recently appeared this editorial pronounce\u00ac \nment: \u201cTo only a few individuals does Nature happen to grant unusual abili\u00ac \nties, a matter evidently of genetics, and one that lies beyond the responsibility \nand control of the individual.\u201d In other words, genius is a happy combination \nof genes and chromosomes. It is likely enough that the Soul finds it easier to \n\n\ng6 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nwork through some physical organisms than others; but it is an insult to human \ndignity to assume that physical heredity can be solely or chiefly responsible \nfor the appearance of a Confucius or a Newton or a Napoleon. It is the Soul \nwhich transforms the cells of the brain, not the cells which transform the Soul. \nThe ancient philosopher interpreted genius more rationally when he ascribed \nits origin to the incarnation of a divine entity. Incidentally, he did not mean \nthereby that a being different from the Soul entered the body, displacing its \nnormal occupant. The \"inner god\u201d was conceived as the man himself in a \ntruer guise than that which he usually assumes. The man of genius carries out \nenterprises which seem impossible to the ordinary man: he sees and helps others \nto see perspectives to which the average eyes are blind. But he is of one blood \nwith the rest of us. His superiority is the reward of protracted labour and self- \ndiscipline extending, as Theosophy teaches, over many lives. What he has done, \nwe can do, but we must begin here and now to exercise the power of choice \nwhich we share with the gods, in order to vivify the free will which is our most \nintimate and precious possession. \n\nThe Paranoid Personality \n\nThere have been many \"debunking\u201d biographies of great men in recent years. \nWith the aid of certain psychiatrists, the authors have done their utmost to \nmake their public believe that genius is associated with mental and moral dis\u00ac \norders, in particular, with paranoia. In fact, any personality which exhibits \nconceit or suspicion reveals paranoid symptoms. Let it be admitted at once \nthat the \"old Adam\u201d in all of us is an incipient paranoiac. When the paranoid \nqualities develop beyond measure, conceit passes into \"delusions of grandeur\u201d \nand suspicion into \"delusions of persecution\u201d. The boundary of sanity is \ncrossed. Unless the victim be segregated from society, he becomes a menace \nto anyone whom he meets. To defend his fancied rights, he is capable of any \ncrime. Most political assassins seem to have been paranoiacs. \n\nWithout doubt, many great individuals upon the stage of history have com\u00ac \nbined remarkable ability, in one direction or another, with some extremely \ndisagreeable personal characteristics. It is evident that conceit and suspicion \nhave sometimes bulked large in their consciousness. But it is a myth of popular \npsychology, that paranoia is a normal attribute of any form of genius. We must \nlearn to discriminate between paranoiacs, who have become famous for one rea\u00ac \nson or another, and men of real genius, who have suffered from some of the ills \ncommon to all human nature in its unregenerate condition. If they suffered \nmore than most of us, it may have been because their characters were built on a \nlarger scale. Even their weaknesses seem enormous by comparison with those \nof lesser men. In any event, their genius is one thing; their \"lower nature\u201d is \nanother. \n\nHarmonious Proportion \n\nConfucius remarked that the sage in all his thoughts and acts shows forth \n\"harmonious proportion\u201d. The man of genius who is not a sage, is not so for\u00ac \ntunate; but he should be given full credit for such self-control as he has, since \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nNOTES AND COMMENTS \n\n\n97 \n\n\nhis whole organism is obliged to endure abnormal stresses and strains. In the \nfullest sense, only a Master of life and wisdom can be called a man of genius, \nbecause only in a Master is the genius, the daemon, the spiritual will, the Higher \nSelf, fully embodied, in conscious and unrelaxing control of all reflexes and \ncomplexes which come \u201cfrom below\u201d. It is less appropriate to say that he has \ngenius than that he is genius. \n\nThere is a factor here upon which we can meditate with profit. The disciple \nardently desires to increase his powers of vision and action, to become free, that \nhe may serve his Master more effectively. But in the words of Light on the Path , \n\u201cThat power which the disciple shall covet is that which shall make him appear \nas nothing in the eyes of men.\u201d One ventures to suggest one of the many mean\u00ac \nings of this sentence. The disciple does not aim at a lop-sided development. \nHe does not wish to be known by the sharp angles and projections of his per\u00ac \nsonality, by eccentricities and abnormalities which make him obtrude from the \nmass. His ideal is an harmonious proportion of all his faculties, the example of \nwhich is continuously set before him by the being of his Master. It is his con\u00ac \nstant purpose to do all things well, not to confine his genius in a single talent, \nnot to become a specialist. \u201cEach man is to himself absolutely the way, the \ntruth, and the life. But he is so only when he grasps his whole individuality \nfirmly, and by the force of his awakened spiritual will recognizes this individual\u00ac \nity as not himself, but that thing which he has with pain created for his own \nuse, and by means of which he purposes, as his growth slowly develops his intel\u00ac \nligence, to reach to the life beyond individuality.\u201d \n\n\nVital Force and Its Vehicles \n\n\u201cEvery man\u201d, says the Eastern scripture, \u201cis potentially a Buddha\u201d. A \ngreat step forward in a man\u2019s inner progress is taken, when he realizes that the \nattainment of genius does not chiefly depend upon such things as genes and \nchromosomes, but upon his ability to incarnate the life of the Spirit, without \nbeing consumed by it, as Semele was reduced to ashes by the apparition of \nZeus. As Theosophy affirms, the vital force which brings all things into being, \nis omnipresent upon all planes. But it can wound and kill as easily as it can \nheal and create. One of the immediate undertakings of the disciple must be to \nmake himself a fit vehicle for the reception of an increasing measure of vital \nforce of ever higher intensity. \n\nWe may observe in the lower kingdoms the operation of this law that tire \nindividual organism is adjusted to a certain pressure of the life-force. Until \nquite recently, however, biologists have not understood how great that pressure \ncan be. Indeed, few of them have had any belief that a real life-force exists, so \neager have they been to explain all physiological phenomena in terms of known \nchemical and mechanical principles. In an address before the American Associa\u00ac \ntion for the Advancement of Science, Dr. Philip R. White of the Rockefeller \nInstitute for Medical Research described a discovery which \u201crevolutionizes \nbotanical theory, overturning one of the most widely accepted hypotheses in \nthe whole field of plant science\u201d. His experiments have demonstrated that \n\n\n\ng8 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\n\u201cthe force within the roots of living plants, hitherto believed to be very small, \nis actually of a gigantic nature, capable of overcoming with ease counterpres\u00ac \nsures of 125 pounds to the square inch, the equivalent of a pressure of eight \natmospheres\u201d. No purely mechanistic theory can account for this phenomenon, \nand Dr. White feels obliged to postulate the actuality of an unknown \u201cvital\u201d \nforce. We quote from The New York Times , December 29, 1937: \n\nThe existence of root-pressure was first shown early in the eighteenth century by \nStephen Hales, who measured pressures up to 1.4 atmospheres. Nobody had been able \nto equal that record since. As such a pressure is not nearly enough to account for the \nrise of sap in tall trees and long vines, the theory was given up for the leaf-suction theory. \nDr. White attached growing \u201corphan\u201d tomato roots to narrow tubes in which the sap \npressure could be balanced against the pressure of a column of mercury. With no ap\u00ac \nparent difficulty, Dr. White observed, the roots balanced 90, then 100, then 125 pounds \nof pressure to the square inch. At that point the apparatus failed, but the roots still \nseemed to be ready to accept the challenge of even greater pressures. \u201cThe old pressure \ntheory of Hales\u201d, Dr. White said, \u201chas been disparaged by modern plant physiology \ntexts because it did not provide sufficient force and because of the suspicion that it might \nbe an artefact. I think that these experiments show pretty conclusively that both these \nobjections are invalid. Root-pressure is certainly a very real phenomenon going on in \nuninjured, normally metabolizing roots and showing a striking diurnal rhythm that is \nreminiscent of many vital processes. . . . Six atmospheres of pressure is sufficient to \nsustain a 200-foot water column. This is far higher than any tomato plant ever grows. \nYet such a column appears to be insignificantly small in comparison with what the lifting \npower of tomato roots is capable of sustaining. That is a force to be reckoned with.\u201d \nThe early plant physiologists all attributed sap movement to some form of \u201cvital\u201d ac\u00ac \ntivity, at least in major part. With the rise of mechanistic theories in all branches in the \nlast half of the nineteenth century, plant physiology did not escape the trend. . . . His \nexperiments, Dr. White added, showed that the arguments against root-pressure as a \nfactor in sap movement no longer held, that the process once more appeared to be a \nvital one, rather than purely mechanistic. \n\n\nThe Life in the Heart \n\nAs Dr. White infers, the implications of his discovery are very important. If \nbiologists as a class were not the most stubborn of materialists, they would be \ninstantly impressed by this revelation that living beings are really endowed \nwith a living power. Life itself remains an eternal mystery, but it is at least \nan aid to coherent thought, if we no longer assume that the tremendous force \nexerted by living bodies and the immortality of the germ-plasm are as easy to \nexplain as the motive power of an old-fashioned steam-engine. The laws of \nthermodynamics do not account for the versatility with which every organism \nadapts itself to changing conditions. For example, what is the source of the \nconstant pressure which enables the growing plant to split a rock? \n\nIt is an accepted biological doctrine that all the higher organisms depend for \ntheir sustenance upon the carbohydrates manufactured by the chlorophyll, the \ngreen colouring matter in plants, during exposure to sunlight. Physical life is, \nin a literal sense, an embodiment of the radiant energy which proceeds from and \nthrough the sun. There is no conceivable limit to the amount of radiant energy \nwhich is available for vital ends. It is the constitution of any particular body \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nINSPIRATION \n\n\n107 \n\n\nNOTES AND COMMENTS 99 \n\nwhich limits the amount which can be received and assimilated; when the \n\u201csaturation-point\u201d is passed, prana is transformed into an agent of death. \n\nThere seems to be a correspondence between the life-force in the plant- \nroot and the \u201clife in the heart\u201d, to which such frequent reference is made in \nEastern scriptures. This inner life is also described as emanating from the sun, \nfrom the real sun, of which the physical image that we see is the shadow. \nThere is the Vedic verse: \n\nThe all-formed, the golden, the all-knowing. \n\nThe final goal, the one light, the fervent, \n\nThousand-rayed, hundredfold turning, \n\nThe Life of beings, this sun rises. \n\nThe theme of the Upanishads is that, by conscious self-identification with the \nRay joining the individual to this \u201cUniverse of Light\u201d, the soul of man becomes \nfree and divulges its latent genius. This act of union is said to take place in \nthe \u201cheart\u201d, where is the root of the consciousness of the spiritual man. \n\nFrom the Divine Self, verily, this Life is bom. As the shadow extended beside a man, \nso is it with this. Through the power of Mind it comes into the body. Like as a king, \nverily, enjoins his lords, saying, Rule over these villages and these villages! thus, verily, \nthe Life disposes hither and thither the lesser lives. ... In the heart is the Self. Here \nare the hundred and one channels, from each of these a hundred. . . . According to his \nthinking he comes to life; his life being linked by the radiance with the Self, leads him \nto the world that he has moulded for himself. ... He who knows the origin, the en\u00ac \ntrance, the dwelling and the lordship of Life fivefold, he reaches the immortal; knowing \nthis, he reaches the immortal (Prashna Upanishad). \n\nThe Grandeur and the Misery of the Mind \n\nIt is a sobering but encouraging thought, that mind alone imposes limitations \nupon our capacity to absorb the radiance which streams from the Divine Self, \nthe Holy Spirit, as it is called in Christian terminology. \u201cAs a man thinly so \nhe is.\u201d It is possible to change, to improve the mind. The power of imdjffna- \ntion which bind^tis, can also set us free. \n\nHowever, to be real, the transformation of the mind must proceed pari passu \nwith the transformation of character. It obviously cannot proceed at the same \nvelocity for all beings. All minds are not large; some are pitifully small. Why \nare the asylums for the insane so crowded to-day? Not merely because con\u00ac \ngenital feeble-mindedness may be commoner now than in the past. Too \nmany people have learned to read and write. There is too much incoherent \n\u201ceducation\u201d. If they had been left in peace, multitudes of poor creatures might \nhave preserved what little mentality they received at birth, or even, through \nthe ministrations of Nature and normal experience, have added to it. The mind, \nlike the body, cannot bear more than it can carry. One cannot pour more into \na bowl than it can contain. Social and political upheavals are inevitable prod\u00ac \nucts of mental over-feeding, for there are not enough asylums to hold more \nthan a small minority of the victims of our schools and colleges. \n\n\nIOO \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nService of the Eternal \n\nThere is really only one way in which thought can be changed for the better \nand the horizons of the mind be widened. Modem education takes little ac\u00ac \ncount of it, but it has been pointed out by every wise teacher since the dawn of \nhuman life. It is the service of the Eternal, the service of values which are \neverlasting. In so far as a man is free, in so far as he is superior, he is dedicated \nto an end, a cause, an ideal, which he knows to be more enduring and more \nprecious than himself, and which he loves and obeys without thought of reward \nor recognition. Thus some men in all ages have loved and served their highest \nconception of truth or beauty or honour or liberty, and they have loved and \nserved those who most completely embodied the ideal which they themselves \nyearned to realize. \n\nRecently an American correspondent made a trip to Palestine. In Jerusalem \nhe met some of the better-class Arabs, men of gentle birth. He was impressed, \nalmost overwhelmed, by their urbanity and courtesy. But what seemed to \nimpress him the most, was that they obviously rated honour higher than life. \nThey did not talk about it, but it was clear that they regarded honour, as the \nGreek sage regarded it, as the one treasure from which a man cannot be sep\u00ac \narated against his will. The correspondent admired them, but he was bewil\u00ac \ndered also. It was all so remote from Broadway and Forty-Second Street! How \ncould such things be? Perhaps, he half suggested, it was because the Arabs \nfind life so painful and disagreeable, so devoid of modem improvements, that \nthey welcome any excuse to end it with dignity. We venture to remark that if \nhe meant this, it would signify that he has never really lived. Life in the human \nkingdom does not truly begin until it becomes an object of sacrifice. The Arabs \nhave many terrible shortcomings, but dislike of living is scarcely one of them. \nThe best of them enjoy life more than most newspaper reporters, precisely be\u00ac \ncause they are ready to lay it down when the demands of their code exact this \nof them. They are good soldiers, as the West learned in past centuries. \n\nThe Christian Occident has its good soldiers also, as would be clearly shown \nif by some means the conscience of the West could be awakened, as it was awak\u00ac \nened during the Great War. We know now, if we did not know before, that the \nGreat War was ended before real victory was achieved; that the Dark Powers \nwere wounded but not slain, and are now at least as strong on the outer plane \nas they were in 1914. The Allies lacked final perseverance. But the fact re\u00ac \nmains that for four years millions of civilized men and women gave all that \nthey had, in defence of their code, and to save Europe from barbarism and \ndesolation. That great collective devotion to a sacred cause is part of the his\u00ac \ntory of the West. The \u201cgood Karma\u201d which it has sown, cannot fail to ger\u00ac \nminate and someday to bear fruit. The present role of France and England in \nthe international tragedy is ignominious and painful to behold. Neither nations \nnor individuals can escape from the consequences of their past actions, good and \nbad. This is the hour of \u201cbad Karma\u201d, but the \u201cgood\u201d must have its day. \nDebout , les morts! The armies of the illustrious dead have not deserted France \n\n\nINSPIRATION \n\n\nI \n\n\nNOTES AND COMMENTS ioi \n\nand England, nor have they laid down their arms like too many of those who \nsurvived. Their intervention could at any moment turn the tide. \n\nIt has been\u2014and so far as we know, still is\u2014the custom of a certain company \nof French grenadiers to pay daily tribute to the memory of La Tour d\u2019Auvergne, \na noble of the ancien regime, who served as a private during the Wars of the \nRevolution. He refused all promotion, even at the hands of Bonaparte, but a \nspecial title was created for him, that of Premier Grenadier de France. When\u00ac \never the roll-call of his company is called, the oldest grenadier answers \nfor La Tour d\u2019Auvergne: \u201cPresent. Mort an champ d\u2019honneur.\" Does not this \nmoving ceremony, repeated day after day, illustrate the law of the growth of \nthe soul, the spiritual will, the immortal genius, the \u201cHigher Self\u201d within man? \nNo one can sacrifice himself \u201con the field of honour\u201d, wherever that \u201cfield\u201d \nmay be, without increasing his power to serve what he loves and to animate \nthe souls of others. \n\nThe Service Which Is Perfect Freedom \n\nOne recalls the austere and magnificent figure of Cato of Utica, the Warden \nof Purgatory in the Divine Comedy , the Roman who preferred death to loss of \nliberty. The historical Cato was celebrated in antiquity, because in the midst \nof change and revolution he remained steadfastly faithful to the code of honour \nbequeathed by his ancestors. He identified Roman liberty and \u201crepublican \nvirtue\u201d with loyalty to that code. This loyalty was the nucleus of his life. It \nwas his genius, and at certain moments it became so incandescent that it set \naflame the hearts of multitudes. There is an example of this in Plutarch: \n\nBefore one of the battles at Dyrrhachium, when Pompey himself made an address to \nthe soldiers, the men listened coldly and in silence. But Cato came forward, and in the \nlanguage of philosophy, spoke to them, as the occasion required, concerning liberty, \nmanly virtue, death and a good name; upon all which he delivered himself with strong \nnatural passion, and he concluded with calling upon the gods, to whom he directed his \nspeech, as if they were present to behold the soldiers fight for their country. And at this \nthe army gave such a shout and showed such excitement that their officers led them on \nfull of hope and confidence to the danger. \n\nFortunate is the man who, like Cato of Utica, can be inspired by some aspect \nof immortal truth and can inspire others by the radiance of his love! Blessed is he \nwho has discovered the Eternal personified in a spiritual Father, a living being, \nthe Master \u201cat the head of his Ray\u201d, to whom he can devote all that he is and \nall that he can become. This is the service which is perfect freedom. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nFRAGMENTS \n\n\n4 g HE Master speaks: \n\n\u00a3 When I enter the garden of your thoughts, have you no flowers for \nme? Why are the paths untended where I walk, why are the beds \nunplanted, the lilies and the roses drooping on their stalks for lack of moisture \nand of cultivation? \n\nIt was I that made this garden, sending streams of living water through it, \nhedging it about. I planted the flowering shrubs, and put the bulbs in the \ncool, dark earth. By now it should have been a place of loveliness, perfumed \nwith devotion, full of the singing of birds, an Eden for my delight. What have \nyou done with my garden? \n\nHere I was to find coolness and shade, and refreshment when I was weary; \nhere the presence of angels; the sound of the fountains and of the birds was \nto be a hymn of adoration to the Father, and the incense of prayer arise to him \nfrom the cup of every blossom. What have you done with my garden? \n\nWhen the Brothers come to visit me, where shall I invite them? The seats \nare broken and lying on the ground, the leaves on the trees have withered, there \nis no protection from the noonday sun when Satan wanders abroad; and where \nare you, to receive us and bid us welcome? \n\nYou are hiding, as well you may, behind the rubbish of your multitudinous \noccupations,\u2014your \u201cduties\u201d, your \u201cinterests\u201d, even your \u201ccares\u201d\u2014anything \nwhatever to serve as a screen between me and my interests and your duties \ntoward me, neglecting the one thing needful. \n\nWhat have you done with my garden, and with yourself, secreted in the midst \nof its desolation? you who are flinging away your birthright for the mere illu\u00ac \nsion of a mess of pottage. \n\nWhat have you done with my garden? \n\nCave. \n\n\n102 \n\n\n\nINSPIRATION \n\n\n\u25a0 \n\n\u00ab \n\n\nINSPIRATION 1 \n\n\n4 T THIS opening meeting of the season, it has been our habit to refer \nbriefly to what The Theosophical Society is, and is not. We wish it \nto be clear that each of us who speaks here speaks for himself, so that \nhe is neither committing the Society nor asking his hearers to accept some \northodox doctrine which, if they prefer to reject it, will leave them suspect and \npersona non grata amongst us. The Society maintains a free and open plat\u00ac \nform. It has no creed nor dogma to set up as a criterion for good standing. \n\nBut this freedom and absence of official formulas does not mean that after \nall these years of study and discussion and grave experiment, after all that has \nbeen handed down to us from our predecessors, we feel that we have nothing \nto offer others, nor that we think all views, however courteously we may wel\u00ac \ncome them, are of equal moment and of equal truth. It is not at all that we \nhave found nothing of Divine Wisdom to justify our name. We think we have \nfound something of it, and our absence of dogma is due to the fact that what \nwe have found is seen as too large and many-sided to be wrapped up in some \nlittle parcel of words. Truth is something greater than definitions, and we \ndeem no description of reality can properly be substituted for the Real. Rather \nwould we lead all men, were we able, to look directly at life itself. \n\nIt has been said that instead of offering a creed, the activities of the Society \ntend to inculcate what is intellectually an attitude, practically a method, \nethically a spirit, and religiously a life. Our intellectual attitude is set forth \nin the motto on our seal: \u201cThere is no religion higher than truth.\u201d We seek \nthe truth, really desiring to find it, whatever it may be or wherever it may lead. \nOne cannot seek truth without striving to turn from error; and yet if one love \ntruth, it must be regarded as of far more moment than error. Therefore, in \nthe Society\u2019s discussions, we think it more fruitful to try to understand one \nanother\u2019s truths, than to carp at one another\u2019s errors. It is probable that \neverything which is said at our meetings will have in it some measure of truth \nand some of error. To gain the greater measure of truth, we are prepared, if \nwe must, to accept something of error, which, later, we may be able to winnow \naway. Thus we look for agreements, rather than differences, in the belief that \nthe common part of men\u2019s views of life is more likely to be the true and funda\u00ac \nmental part than where they diverge, so that our attitude involves a looking to \nthe centre, and our procedure is centripetal rather than centrifugal. \n\nOur practical method is a natural derivative of this intellectual attitude. It \nrests, ultimately, upon the unity which underlies all diversity of manifestation, \nand which, of course, alone makes possible any understanding of the universe. \nThis fundamec^l unity is implied in all three of the Society\u2019s stated objects: \nto form the nuOTus of a universal brotherhood; to study the great religions of \n\n1 From an address before the New York Branch of The Theosophical Society. \n\n\n103 \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n104 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nmankind; and to investigate the finer forces of nature and the psychical powers \nlatent in man. Brotherhood is a word that has been used to cover much of \nevil\u2014-there are Brothers of Darkness as well as of Light\u2014but the Brotherhood \nof which we would form the nucleus, is based on the recognition of a Divine \nFatherhood, to which all religions point, so that the essential being of all men \nis seen as the divine ray which they embody, and in which, latent and potential, \nare all the powers and attributes of the Divine. Man is the microcosm of the \nMacrocosm. \n\nThis was one of the points most emphasized by Madame Blavatsky in the \nrestatement of Theosophy, the ancient Wisdom, which she brought to the So\u00ac \nciety\u2019s open platform, and it leads directly to the theosophic method and doc\u00ac \ntrine of Correspondences. We should call it the scientific method were it not \nfor the fact that science to-day seems strangely to distrust the breadth of its \nown foundations, and, leaving man and consciousness out of its consideration, \nlimits itself to the world it deems it can measure. Yet when Newton, if the \nstory be not too apocryphal, saw in the fall of an apple the universal laws which \ngovern all matter and motion, from the greatest to the least, or when the physi\u00ac \ncist in the laboratory studies the action of lightning by observing the discharge \nof a Leyden jar, the basic assumptions implicit in their procedure are those \nwhich Theosophy makes explicit in its doctrine of Correspondences. It is the \nunities of being which alone make science possible; and man, and the soul of \nman, share in these unities. All the great religious teachers have, for this rea\u00ac \nson, taught through parables and stories, always pointing to life to illustrate \nlife. So Christ likened the Kingdom of Heaven to a grain of mustard seed, and \nbade us consider the lilies of the field, or the love of a father for his son. So \nSt. John opens his gospel by likening the creation of the manifested universe to a \nspoken word. Life is itself the revealer of Life, and all that is, mirrors for us \nthe Life of All. By this we are enabled to read within the little the secret of the \ngreat, and in the familiar facts of our experience to see the workings of divine \nand universal laws. \n\nI propose that we consider this evening a fact that is so commonplace and \nfamiliar that its significance is usually overlooked. That fact is the fact of \ninspiration. \n\nIt may seem strange to speak of inspiration as commonplace. It is a word \nthat is, in general, rightly reserved for something rare and high, which lifts \nmen above the commonplace, and the normal level of their consciousness and \npowers. A profound disservice is done to truth and to us all when such words \nare lowered or cheapened. Yet that which is transcendent may also be im\u00ac \nmanent. Light is light whether it come from a firefly, or a shred of cotton wick \ndipped in oil, or from a flaming sun; and we are not lowering or belittling the \nfirmament of the heavens when we realize that the light and heat of the stars \nare the same as that by which we see, and warm ourselves, and cook our food. \nThe little and the great are one, as the Universe is One. There is nothing so \nlittle that God cannot enter it; and because we ourselves are little, it is to the \nlittle that we must look in order to understand the great. \n\n\n\nINSPIRATION \n\n\n107 \n\n\nto our consciousness, and throueh us to others, in a vesture which it weaves \n\n\nINSPIRATION 105 \n\n\u201cIn all ages entering into holy souls, she [Wisdom] maketh them friends of \nGod and prophets.\" \n\nThe fact of inspiration, which lights the history of mankind and lifts to \ngrandeur the seers and saints and heroes of the race, is demonstrated, in little, \nin the familiar fact of your everyday experience, that you did not have an idea, \nand now you have it; that your courage was low, and now is higher; that you \nwere despondent, and now have hope. \n\nThe question is, how did it happen, and what is its significance? Where did \nyou get that greater courage, that new view of truth, that inspiration as to \nwhat was the wise thing to do in the puzzling circumstances that confronted \nyou? Did you have them latent somewhere about you? If so, you did not \nknow it. Did you eat them? Are they distillations of carrots and cabbage? \nOf course there are those who will tell you that cabbage and carrots have a \ngreat deal to do with the matter, for if you do not eat, you will have neither \ncourage nor hope nor any vision of what is wise. There is truth in this, for to \nreceive is not the negative and passive thing sometimes supposed. It is an act \nof power. You are working when you listen to someone speak, as perhaps you \nrealize. Really to understand and follow anyone talking to you, requires the \nrehandling of many varied elements of your personal history,\u2014the rearrange\u00ac \nment, under the guidance of the speaker\u2019s words, of the patterns left in the \nsediment of past hopes, desires and experience. As in a dance, one leads, one \nfollows; but each must move and carry his own weight. From our food, our \nbodies gain the energy requisite for such motion, so that the brain and nervous \nsystem can register and transmit the impressions they receive. By our food, \ntoo, if it disagree with us, the whole functioning of our organism may be so de\u00ac \nranged that nothing can reach us. But no matter how important a part food \nmay play, I do not think any of us really believes that any spiritual values, any \nvision of truth or will to right, have their origin in, or are distillates of, merely \nphysical substance or action. \n\nTherefore the question persists, where do we get the new ideas that arise in \nus, our new hope and our new spirit? Whence comes our inspiration? I know \nof no more important question; but I shall not now attempt any further answer \nto it than the negative comment we have just made. It is not drawn from the \nworld of visible substance and physical force. But from somewhere, out of a \nregion that has been to us formless and invisible, something takes form and \nvisibility, something comes to us as new thought, new spirit, new power or new \nbeauty. Let us say it comes from \u201cthe other world\u201d, since it does not come \nfrom what we can recognize as this one. Or let us say from \u201cthe inner world\u201d, \nor from some world that transcends in dimensionality the world of our normal \nconscioua^ss, since it arises and takes form within us, rather than coming already \nformed frOTi without, through some avenue of the senses. In some of the \nEastern scriptures, it has been described in Sanscrit phrases that have been \ntranslated as \u201cthe causal world\u201d, and the world \u201cof formless power\u201d; and any\u00ac \none who watches his own inspiration, the birth of clearer thought or new ideas \nor firmer purpose, which become the causes of his actions, will recognize what \n\n\n0 \n\n\n% \n\n\nio6 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nthe phrase is meant to convey,\u2014that something of power which was before \nformless to us has taken form, and what we could not see has now become \nvisible. But we should be misled if these words suggested to us that the inner \nworld is amorphous or nebulous or inchoate. Rather is it the matrix of all \nforms; the field and focus of all the formative forces. How to describe it, and \nthe passage which inspiration effects from the unconscious to the conscious, I \ndo not know. Perhaps the words of St. Augustine come as near to it as any we \ncan find. \u201cWhen I first knew Thee Thou liftedst me up, that I might see there \nwas somewhat for me to see, and that I was not yet such as to see.\u201d They \nconvey the characteristic sense of the action of a power other than ourselves; \nthe perception that there is something to see which we do not see; and that the \nreason we do not see it, is an inadequacy in us, not in it. \n\nThere is an old and beautiful mystical treatise whose name, The Cloud of \nUnknowing , is suggestive in this connection, for the process by which thought \nis bom, and inspiration received, seems often such a pressing up, and being \ndrawn up, into this cloud of unknowing, as the treatise describes, and, with \nthis, the steadfast intending of our attention upon something which we dimly \nsense to exist there, though what it is we do not know. We fasten our attention \nupon it until, little by little, it takes form in the mist. Little by little it draws \nto itself from out of our memories and experience, things similar to or contrast\u00ac \ning with itself. In a kind of subconscious questioning, our whole being is passed \nin review before it; and as a magnet draws iron from all other substances, so \nour inspiration draws from the storehouse of all that we have felt or known, the \nthings of its own kind. They cluster around it, as iron filings around the magnet, \nuntil they become a medium or vehicle for the manifestation of this new and \nunknown truth in terms familiar to our consciousness. They are like the visible \ndrapery which reveals the form of the invisible body that it clothes. So our \ninspiration clothes and reveals itself to us through the vehicle which we our\u00ac \nselves furnish it. \n\nIt would be absurd to suppose that all ideas come, and all inspiration acts, \nin the same way, but I believe that what has just been outlined is so common \nand typical that its essential elements can be recognized in all our intellectual \nactivity,\u2014even in trivial conversation, and whenever ideas have to be found \nand clothed in words. Such strangeness as may appear in our description is, I \nthink, due to the fact that the process, except in purposed meditation, is in \ngeneral largely subconscious and very rapid. To analyze and attempt to follow \nit in detail, therefore, yields an effect similar to that of showing a moving pic\u00ac \nture at only a fraction of the speed with which it was taken. Everything is \nslowed down. A succession of steps is substituted for the continuous flow of \nmovement, and rapid transition stages, which the eye itself never notices, seem \nawkward and curious when recorded as though they were permanent. \n\nIt is sufficient for our present purpose, however, if it be clear that we are \nall constantly receiving from some \u201cinner world\u201d or source other than the vis\u00ac \nible, physical world about us, an influx that acts upon us behind the mental \nmachinery of expression, and which thereupon clothes itself, and presents itself \n\n\n\nINSPIRATION \n\n\n107 \n\n\nto our consciousness, and through us to others, in a vesture which it weaves \nfrom elements that we ourselves supply. In one, its vehicle may be colour. In \nanother, music. In another, the magical images that we call words, with their \npower to evoke our past and make it live again,\u2014so that no one ever knows all \nthat the word he utters may mean to him who hears it. But in each of us our \ninspiration can use only the media that we can supply. In us, its vocabulary is \nlimited to ours. You will remember the little English boy, who, taken to church \nin Paris, asked his mother, \u201cDoes God talk French?\u201d How can Life, or the \nUniverse, or the Spirit, talk to you, save in your own language? How can any\u00ac \nthing be significant to you, save as it has significance in terms that you under\u00ac \nstand? Wherever inspiration acts, through whatever form of nature or of being, \nit clothes itself in that form. So in the Bhagavad Gita , Krishna tells Arjuna, \n\u201cIn whatever way men approach me, in that way do I assist them; but what\u00ac \never the path taken by mankind, that path is mine.\u201d \n\nFrom all the foregoing, one fact emerges unmistakably. Our whole sentient \nlife is supported by, and evidences, the working of a formative power, which, \nacting from the unseen to the seen, is constantly bringing us new vision of truth \nor beauty or holiness (or, alas, since we are open below as well as above, of their \nperversions and opposites); constantly forming within us new images of reality; \nconstantly making new moulds for a new will and a new spirit. Our physical \nsenses tell us of an outer world made up of things already formed, individual \nand separate,\u2014separate, individual stars and men and women, insects and \ntrees and grains of sand. Our inner world is no less rich in individual and sep\u00ac \narate forms,\u2014formed and separate thoughts, feelings, desires and emotions. \nBut as we look inward and watch our inner life, we see that these separate things, \ncreated in the past, are of chief moment to us now as being the sole medium \nwhich we can offer for the present action of the inflowing and in-forming spirit. \nThese two aspects of Being, the formed and the formative, are never, and can \nnever be separated. \n\nNow, surely, our initial observation that we do, somehow, get new ideas, has \nled us a long way, and opened far horizons upon snow-clad mysteries. For here \nwe are looking out upon the ageless mystery of the Trinity,\u2014the fact that the \nOne Reality, the Father of all, ever reveals itself in manifestation under the \ndual aspects of the formed and the forming; of the Son, who is one with the \nFather and manifests his image; and of the Holy Spirit, which, proceeding from \nthe Father and the Son, ceaselessly acts to impress that image upon all that is, \nand to fill with itself the moulds that it creates. We use the Christian terms \nnot merely because they have been familiar\u2014and perhaps incomprehensible\u2014 \nto many of us from infancy, but particularly in order that it may be the more \nnoticeable that The Theosophical Society, imposing no creed upon its members, \nnevertheless gives them, in Theosophy, a practical method and guiding prin\u00ac \nciple which lead to the interpretation and validation of all the creeds, so that, \nthough the realities with which they deal stretch far beyond our utmost vision, \nwe sd^clearly ways in which they apply also to us, even in the lowlands where \nwe live. \n\n\nio8 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nThough we began with the very small, we have now been led to the very \ngreat, and face the penalty of having chosen such a theme for our evening\u2019s \ndiscussion. For we cannot consider the action of the Holy Spirit apart from the \nother aspects of the Trinity, and though the way lies open before us, looking \nout upon so vast a scene, we know how presumptuous would be the attempt to \ntraverse it. We must return again to the little, and to the theosophic method \nof seeking there the understanding of the great. As Lao-Tze tells us in the \nTao-Teh-King , The Book of the Path of Virtue: \u201cFinding the great in what is \nsmall, and the many in the few, . . . effecting difficult things while they are \neasy, and managing great things in their beginnings,\u2014this is the way of Tao. \nAll difficult things have their origins in those that are easy, and great things in \nwhat are small. Therefore the wise man can accomplish great things without \never attempting them.\u201d Theosophy would, if it could, make us wise. We turn \nback, therefore, to look again at the way inspiration comes to us through \u201cthe \ncloud of unknowing\u201d. \n\nI doubt whether there are many men who have not felt as though, separated \nfrom them only by a veil which sometimes seems thin, there were an inner \nworld of consciousness, rich and radiant with the full perfection of all the things \nwith whose imperfections we are struggling in our outer life. There, just beyond \nthat veil of mist, or even pressing toward us through the mist that shadowed it, \nwas the wholeness of Truth that unified the broken fragments which were all we \nheld. There was Beauty, glowing in form and colour, though our eyes lost them \nbefore they could be registered. Music and Poetry were there, whose rhythm \nremained, though words and harmonies died from memory in the very moment \nthey were bom. And there, perhaps in some way different from all the rest, in \nthat, however dimly seen, it never wanes, could be sensed the presence of No\u00ac \nbility of Soul. \n\nI doubt, as I said, whether there can be many who have not had such a feel\u00ac \ning; but whether the recognition be as common as I believe or not, of one thing \nI am confident. If it be the type of experience to which I wish to point, if it be \ngenuine and not some psychic counterfeit, it carries with it unquestioning con\u00ac \nviction that whatever it be which we sense beyond the veil, it is, in itself and of \nits own kind, perfect and complete. It is only our perception or translation of \nit that is imperfect and incomplete,\u2014due to the inadequacy of what we bring \nto it as materials for its expression. Whenever we succeed in tracing inspiration \nback to its source, we always find this sense of perfection inherent in its \norigin. \n\nTo establish this point, from which we wish to draw certain inferences, we \nhave entered upon very dangerous ground, and should pause to post warnings. \nIf, instead of speaking of a \u201ccloud of unknowing\u201d, we had called it plainly our \ndense stupidity and crass ignorance, and an impurity and lack of holiness that \nmade us responsive to every voice of vanity and passion, it would scarcely be \nnecessary to say that what we encountered in it might be something less than \nperfect, and other than the True, the Good and the Beautiful. A cloud zone \ncan reflect an incendiary and destructive conflagration on earth, while it dims \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nINSPIRATION \n\n\n109 \n\n\nthe sun or stars; and very much of what conceit mistakes for inspiration from \non high, is a psychic reflection from beneath. Ideas that are misty are not \nthereby made true; nor is everything veiled either beautiful or good. Few \nthings are more corrosive to such sense and judgment as a man may possess, \nthan to think that he has touched perfection in any particular. But let it be \nobserved that in the process of inspiration, as we have described it, we do not \nthink that we have touched perfection, but only that we have become aware of \nits existence, and have striven to open ourselves to its in-forming, trans-forming \nradiance in order that we may be changed in little and in big, in nature and in \nlife, nearer to its likeness. We are not saying that men are not victims of their \nown silliness and vanity; nor that there are not evils and deceits to which they \nare open and endlessly succumb. But we do say that above all imperfection is \nthe Perfect; above all evil the Good; and that to these, also, man is open,\u2014 \nthat Theosophy, Divine Wisdom, exists, and can to-day as \u201cin all ages\u201d enter \ninto and irradiate the soul. Some time since, we borrowed a sentence from St. \nAugustine. The one with which he followed it is not less pertinent: \u201cAnd \nThou didst beat back the weakness of my sight, streaming forth Thy beams of \nlight upon me most strongly, and I trembled with love and awe: and I perceived \nmyself to be far off from Thee, in the region of nnlikeness , as if I heard this Thy \nvoice from on high: \u2018I am the food of grown men; grow, and thou shalt feed \nupon Me; nor shalt thou convert Me, like the food of thy flesh, into thee, but \nthou shalt be converted into Me.\u2019 \u201d It has been quoted more than once from \nthis platform, for it records a perception that marks the beginning of the Way. \n\nWith proper warnings, thus duly posted, of the quicksands that fringe the \nway we have come, we may now compare the observations it has yielded us with \nthose we made earlier from a different point of view. We saw first that in the \nbirth of new ideas\u2014in the commonplace phenomena of our everyday thought \nand speech\u2014inspiration came to us as the influx of a creative, formative power \nwhich acted upon us from within (or behind or above, use what word you will) \nthe whole mental machinery of expression, and set that machinery to work; \nso that, if we were attentive to the process, we could watch the heretofore un\u00ac \nknown idea reveal itself to our consciousness by donning such clothes as it could \nfashion from what it found in us. As a man, needing to outfit himself from a \nready-made clothing shop, tries on and rejects garment after garment which \nthe salesman hopefully hands him, but must ultimately take the nearest fit \nand least objectionable patterns and colours which the shop affords, so our \ninspiration has to dress itself from what we may have in stock. It does not \ncome \u201call dressed up\u201d, but gives the impression of having stooped to us from \na world where our kind of vesture is not needed, though now, like a well-bred \nguest, it accommodates itself to the limitations of our hospitality. That was \nwhat we saw at first. But in what we noted later, of the world that we some\u00ac \ntimes glimp^d \u201cjust beyond the veil\u201d, there was no sense of looking into the \nunmanifest, %>of touching unclothed essences that would stoop to fill such \nforms as we could offer. All that reached us from that inner world told of the \nexact opposite. It told, not of the beginnings of things, but of their full flower- \n\n\nno \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\ning; not of the germ of individuality, but of its attainment; not of the unex\u00ac \npressed, but of an utter perfection of expression of every form and kind,\u2014a \nperfection so complete and ultimate that in having become absolute it had \nbecome eternal. To it nothing could be added, nor anything taken away; for \nit was what it was, and mirrored the Supreme. Its concern was with what was \nabove, not with what was below; and therefore it could not stoop, nor accom\u00ac \nmodate itself to our limitations so as to incarnate in us. But if we were attuned \nand very still, beams from its radiance might enter our heart and mind; and if \none had any faculty or instrument, sensitive and trained, a response might rise, \nnot as the Perfect it sought to reflect, but yet as great poetry or art or music. \nAnd even those of us who, lacking any instrument, are incapable of utterance, \nnevertheless know that, in what has touched us, virtue has passed into us and \ninspiration been received. The vision of the Perfect, however dim and broken, \nquickens a nostalgia which will not rest, and leaves in our memories something \nwhich, if too vague to be a mould, is yet the matrix of moulds which later in\u00ac \nspiration may in-form and fill. \n\nThus inspiration comes to us from two sources which yet are One\u2014from both \ndirections along the great arc of our evolution\u2014from what stands to us for the \nUnmanifest, and from the manifested Perfect,\u2014the Master who reveals it. \nOnce again, in the little, we come upon the Great. \n\n\u201cAnd I believe in the Holy Ghost, the Lord and Giver of Life, who proceed\u00ac \ned from the Father and the Son, who with the Father and the Son together, is \nworshipped and glorified, who spake by the Prophets.\u201d \n\nThis doctrine of the Holy Ghost, or, to pass from Christian to theosophic \nterminology, the doctrine of Fohat, is the essential complement of the existence \nof Masters. It points to the creative action of the Spirit, which both \u201ccon\u00ac \nceives\u201d the Perfection of Humanity that the Masters embody, and \u201cproceeds\u201d \nfrom that Perfection to inspire and uplift all lower levels. Madame Blavatsky \nspeaks of it in The Secret Doctrine as the link between Spirit and matter, \u201cthe \nbridge by which the Ideas existing in the Divine Thought are impressed on \nCosmic substance as the \u2018laws of Nature\u2019. Fohat is thus the dynamic energy \nof Cosmic Ideation, . . . the guiding power of all manifestation, . . . trans\u00ac \nmitted and made manifest by the Dhyan Chohans, the Architects of the visible \nworld. Thus from Spirit, or Cosmic Ideation, comes our consciousness; from \nCosmic Substance the several vehicles in which that consciousness is indi\u00ac \nvidualized.\u201d Later, she refers to it as \u201cthe key in Occultism\u201d to all the world\u2019s \nreligions and mythologies. It invites our study, in its universal as well as in \nits personal aspect, but here we must return to the little and the personal, to \nnote another factor in us, that constantly limits and thwarts our inspiration. \n\nWe may approach it by an analogy and a question. Throw a stone into a \npond. The still surface breaks into circular and concentric ripples. Throw a \nstone into a sheet of glass, or into the same pond when thin ice has formed on it. \nThe glass or ice will be shattered into jagged lines and angles. Let a fact (and \nremember that facts are spiritual things, as are all truths) be thrown into your \nattention, breaking the surface of your consciousness. What kind of pattern \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nINSPIRATION \n\n\nhi \n\n\ndoes it make there? What is the character of the thoughts, the emotions, the \nfeelings, that are prompted by facts or inspiration of any kind? \n\nThe first, and common-sense, answer would probably be that it depended \nupon the fact or inspiration. But does it? Of course to a certain degree it does; \nftist as the character of the splash, caused in the pond, depends in part upon \nthe shape of the stone. But to a far greater extent, as we have just seen, it \ndepends upon the surface and the substance into which the stone falls. So it is \nwith you. The effect which facts\u2014above all, the effect which inner facts and \ninspiration\u2014have upon you, depends chiefly upon you. \n\nI draw near to three friends, holding a telegraph form in my hand. One of \nthem laughs, for no obvious reason, and calls, \u201cHello, are you playing Mercury? \nWhat\u2019s the good news now?\u201d Another, looking up quickly, his whole body \ntense, asks, \u201cWhat\u2019s the matter? Is anything wrong?\u201d The third, silent, \nsimply watches and waits. Here are three different reactions, and reactions \nnot to a specific fact (it was not known what, if anything, that telegraph form \ncontained), but to any interrupting and possibly important fact,\u2014to fact as \nfact, not to the quality of fact, and so to Reality and Being itself. The first \nresponse, doubtless intended to be gay, and perhaps seeming so to the one who \nmade it, was, instead, personal and trivial. The second revealed scar tissue. \nIn some way life had hurt the speaker, so that his reaction to any unexpected \nintrusion of fact was one of anxious foreboding, or of fear. The third does not \nadmit of sure interpretation. Such unmoved, silent waiting may be the result \nof a mere bovine lack of imagination. Or it may indicate such a response to \nReality as the great of heart have attained: that calm, level-eyed facing of \nwhatever may come, prepared to deal with it as it comes, and to leave the re\u00ac \nsult in quietness to Karma and the Masters. \n\nWhat we see thus clearly in others, is true also of ourselves. Each of us \npresents to Reality, to Divine Inspiration, to Life and Theosophy, an attitude \nand a surface whose pattern we have made characteristic of ourselves. It may \nbe a fearful attitude, or a cheaply jocular attitude, or a bovine attitude, or one \nthat is faithful and heroic. But whatever it may be, we must take it into ac\u00ac \ncount. Break a steel bar, and the surface of fracture follows and reveals the \ncrystallization of the steel. Different minerals are distinguished by the dif\u00ac \nferent types of crystals which they present, and which determine the angles at \nwhich they reflect or transmit light. It is the same with us. The inspiration \nthat comes to us all, the new life and light from the Causal World of Wisdom, \nis reflected and refracted in different individuals at different angles, so that the \nexpression it is given, and, indeed, whether it can penetrate beneath the surface \nof our consciousness, depend upon the crystallizations that have taken place in \nour natures, and which characterize our minds and hearts. Do we not all know \npeople who, no matter what is said to them, will hear and remember only what \naccords with their own preconceptions and predilections? They will quote \nback to you, as your own, phrases which they have thus taken out of their \ncontext and have made to convey the exact opposite of your plainly stated \nmeaning^But let us take courage and hope from the knowledge that our type \n\n\n\n\n\nI 12 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nof crystallization is something we can change. It exists in us, determining our \ninstinctive, automatic reactions to-day, only because we have made those re\u00ac \nactions our habit in the past. Little by little, as we grow in self-knowledge and \ngain consciousness of them, we can correct them, as we can correct any habit. \n\nOr, to see from a little different view-point these same limitations, let us ask \nourselves: What kind of vocabulary do we put at the service of our inspiration ? \nHow do we express new ideas when we get them? Our vocabulary is of words, \nbut it is\u2014or should be\u2014of far more than words. It consists also of our will and \nemotions and instincts, our fears and desires and whole nature. We have to \noffer all these things, all that we are, to our inspiration as the material from \nwhich the Holy Spirit is to make in us its vehicle. As Light on the Path tells us, \n\u201cthe whole nature of man must be used wisely by the one who desires to enter \nthe way\u201d. The Creative Power, working through the soil, can draw up fruits \nof the soil, grain and trees and flowers, that it cannot draw from rock. Wherever \nit acts, its result is dependent upon, and limited by, the substance through which \nit acts. In us, it can only act on and through what we are. It can only in-form, \nand express itself through, such stuff as we supply, and through such patterns \nas that stuff is capable of taking. Therefore it behoves us to learn to bring \nmore to our inspiration, to extend our vocabulary, dissolve our old crystalliza\u00ac \ntions and hard and fast patterns, that we may make ourselves pliable where \nnow we are rigid, responsive on higher planes where now we are inert. \n\nThis is another thing that the Society does, and can do more and more for us. \nThere is no one of us, in the Theosophic Movement, who is not in contact with \nothers who are, in some way, wiser than we are, whose response to life, and \ntherefore whose inspiration, is truer and holier and more beautiful than our \nown, though it came from the same source, and fell upon us even as it fell upon \nthem. From their example, we can learn how to alter the surface of fracture \nwe expose when some fact or truth of the inner world breaks our sleeping con\u00ac \nsciousness, learn how to open ourselves more fully to the ethical spirit of Theos\u00ac \nophy, and give ourselves more truly and completely to its religious life. \n\nHenry Bedinger Mitchell. \n\n\nWe cannot kindle when we will \nThe fire that in the heart resides; \n\nThe spirit bloweth and is still; \n\nIn mystery our soul abides . \n\nBut tasks in hours of insight willed \nCan be through hours of gloom fulfilled. \n\n\u2014Matthew Arnold. \n\n\n\nON HAVING A PURPOSE IN LIFE \n\nand flaming spirit of love that mad<- if r... \n\n\nON HAVING A PURPOSE IN LIFE \n\n\nS TUDENTS of Theosophy are told that Mr. Judge used often to ask: \n\u201cWhat is your purpose in life?\u201d Ardent lover of his Master, grieved at \nunresponsiveness, deadness, or aimless drifting, his challenge calls to mind \nthe vision of the Hebrew prophet, Ezekiel, in the valley of dry bones; and how, \nwhen he \u201cprophesied, there was a noise, and behold a shaking, and the bones \ncame together, bone to his bone. . . And so, when this call to a purpose \nin life rings out at every meeting of our Branch, and above all at the Conven\u00ac \ntion, there follows a stirring, an awakening, to our divine privilege and \nopportunity. \n\nWith this thought in mind it is inspiring to hear of a woman of our day who \nhad a purpose in life. Her name was Hannah Riddell. She was bom in 1855 \nat Barnet, near London, the only child of her parents, and would have gone as \na missionary to India because of her father\u2019s great interest in that country. \nBut her wish for India was frustrated by the death of her parents, one soon \nafter the other. Later she heard what she believed to be God\u2019s call: the Church \nMissionary Society asked her to go to Japan. \n\nNow she had always thought Japan must be \u201ca dreadful place to live in\u201d, \nbecause of the frequent earthquakes; but, as one sees all through the story of \nher life, 1 her ruling desire was to further her Master\u2019s cause, without any thought \nof self. The story reveals clearly also the secret of her marvellous success: \nshe understood so absolutely St. Paul\u2019s reiterated teaching that, while by her\u00ac \nself she could do nothing, yet with the Master she could do whatever he might \nrequire of her. \u201cWe have this treasure in earthen vessels\u201d, says St. Paul, \u201cthat \nthe excellency of the power might be of God.\u201d \n\nSo, in this dependence, she arrived at Osaka, studied the language, and was \nsoon working at Kumamoto, a city of Northern Japan. One day a friend in\u00ac \nvited her to see the cherry trees lining the approach to Hommyoji Temple. It \nwas a beautiful morning, and under a clear blue sky the cherry blossoms were a \nlovely sight. But as she reached the Temple her delight was suddenly changed \nto horror. She had never before seen a leper, and there, thronging the steps, \nand all about the grounds, were these awful sufferers. The day was an anni\u00ac \nversary occasion: three hundred years before, Kato Kyomasa, a great general \nand statesman, who had become a leper, was healed at this Temple and later \nwas buried there. \n\nMiss Riddell was overwhelmed with compassion and dismay. Each leper \nwas pleading for alms, it being indeed by alms alone\u2014as she learned\u2014that \nthey could exist, since their families cast them out, and no one took thought \nfor ther^fcven the Government paying no heed to them whatever. \n\nThat night Miss Riddell never closed her eyes, meditating on the awful scene. \n\n1 For further particulars, see Hannah Riddell, Known in Japan as The Mother of Lepers , translated from the \nJapanese of Jingo Tobimatsu, I937* \n\n\n113 \n\n\n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\n114 \n\nAs the hours passed the conviction grew that God must mean her to give her \nlife to the lepers; then, when morning dawned, she felt there was not an hour \nto be lost, and arming herself with lotions and bandages she hastened back to \nthe Temple. \n\nEveryone knows that leprosy is the most loathsome disease that afflicts \nhumanity. For hundreds of years it had been called in Japan \u201cThe Punish\u00ac \nment of God\u201d, so that lepers felt themselves to be accursed. All of which drove \nthis noble woman from the Temple to the slums of the city, where she washed, \nanointed and bound their wounds and, above all, poured hope and faith into \ntheir despairing hearts. The work was so vast she decided to establish a clinic, \ntrying all the while to interest people, and especially the Government, and \ngiving her entire private means to the cause. Then her horizon widened. She \nsaw she must build a hospital, but how,\u2014with indifference around her, and \nEngland so far away? Still she urged and wrote and strove, while some said \nshe was mad. It was not until 1895, five years after her visit to the Temple, \nthat the Hospital was opened. Here let me quote her biographer: \n\nIn the northern part of the city of Kumamoto, at the foot of the green-clad Mt. Tat- \nsuta, surrounded by a beautiful trimmed hedge, we see a group of several buildings. \nAscending a gently rising gravelled path, we come to a white gate, within which are to \nbe seen numbers of large camphor trees and newly trimmed shrubs. Contemplating \nthis one feels a peaceful and holy atmosphere pervading the whole scene. This is \nthe quiet home for spiritual and bodily help where the leper patients are housed. This \nhospital is known as \u201cThe Hospital of the Resurrection of Hope\u201d. \n\nMiss Riddell had been greatly concerned in choosing a name for her hospital. \n\u201cThe idea\u201d, she said, \u201cthat patients enter because of a disease which is loathed \nby the world is abhorrent, and must be removed from their minds.\u201d This is \none example of her intense sympathy, and her ability to enter into the conscious\u00ac \nness of others. But there are many more. In a group discussing means of \nsecuring funds for erecting the Hospital, someone suggested newspaper pub\u00ac \nlicity. After a pause, she said: \u201cI am doing my work in the spirit of a Japanese \nmyself,\u2014I certainly should not like to see the papers report that a foreigner is \ndoing relief work for miserable, unhappy beings whom people and society here \nhave neglected. For the sake of Japan I should not like to see such reports in \nthe Japanese and foreign press.\u201d When a patient entered the hospital Miss \nRiddell said: \u201cYou are welcome here; this is your home; do not worry about \nyourself any longer; be free from anxiety.\u201d \n\nMarquis Toshitaka Okubo, who wrote an introduction to the biography, says: \n\nWhen Miss Riddell spoke at a special meeting held at the Governor\u2019s residence, men \nlistened to her plans and to her description of the work she was doing with tears in their \neyes. She had a very wide vision of her aims. It was not only to have lepers well treated, \nbut also to eradicate leprosy from the land. She moved towards this goal step by step, \nmaking use of every opportunity as it arose. \n\nAnd from Kehchi Suzuki, Governor of Kumamoto Prefecture: \n\nIt was really Miss Riddell\u2019s noble character that people admired. It was by her \nearnest religious faith that people were drawn to her, and it was her indomitable will \n\n\nON HAVING A PURPOSE IN LIFE \n\n\nUS \n\nand flaming spirit of love that made it possible for her to reach her ideal. It is generally \nrecognized that we may rightly say that God sent her here, and she truly delivered God\u2019s \nmessage to our people. \n\nMiss Riddell\u2019s modesty was such that she deprecated any praise. She said: \n\u201cI am not a social-service worker, but am only working in accordance with the \nwill of God.\u201d \n\nIn 1898 Miss Riddell went to England and explained to her friends and rela\u00ac \ntives what she was doing. At that time she decided to resign from the Church \nMissionary Society and to work independently. \n\nShe was anxious about the hospital in its relation to the law. She insisted \nthat the relief of lepers should be a national undertaking, so that the govern\u00ac \nment and the people should work together for that end. As the hospital was \ngradually completed, she thought it should no longer be a personal property \nand asked permission to have it registered. In 1906 it received its charter from \nthe Minister for Home Affairs. The Japanese people everywhere now began \nto appreciate what was being done, and Miss Riddell received many grateful \nletters, and contributions came from various sources. Later a group of friends \nin England, and also in America, formed themselves into a committee for \nfurnishing information about the work. \n\nBut to return to our description of the Hospital. As time went on many \nnecessary buildings were added, in all sixteen, and the most important, the \nchurch. It is of Japanese architecture, and all its interior arranged for the \ncomfort as well as the edification of the patients, and an inclined entrance pro\u00ac \nvided for wheel chairs. It is called the Church of the Advent, and over the \ndoor are the words: \u2018\u2018My House shall be called the House of Prayer.\u201d Beyond \nand among the buildings are gardens; a kitchen garden cared for by the pa\u00ac \ntients, and many garden patches for those well enough to work in them. And \ngreat is the delight of these gardeners at planting the seeds, seeing the delicate \nshoots come up and then the beautiful flowers. \n\nAfter the service of dedicating the church, someone remarked how perfect \nthe upkeep of the hospital was and how expensive it must be. \u201cYes\u201d, a friend \nreplied, \u201cperhaps so; but all the money in the world could never result in making \nthe atmosphere what we all feel it to be: nothing but the tireless, consecrated \npersonal attention and loving care of the founder herself could accomplish this. \nThe Hospital of the Resurrection of Hope is the creation of a consecrated per\u00ac \nsonality. It is the spiritual, as well as the material expression of a great soul \ndevoted to the service of God and her fellow men.\u201d \n\nBut her work extended far beyond this hospital. Kusatsu, one thousand miles \nfrom Kumamoto, is a place with hot sulphur springs, and of great natural \nbeauty, where rhododendrons and lilies of the valley abound, and where lepers \ncongregated in hope of benefit from the waters. Often, however, in their dis\u00ac \nappointment, they became desperate, and sought oblivion in drink, and thence \nsank into the depths of vice. So Kusatsu was \u201ca town of darkness\u201d. When Miss \nRiddell saw it she wept; yet, instead of drawing back in despair, she thought of \nthe despair of the lepers, and of the power of Christ. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nn6 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nFor this great undertaking she had untold help in the person of her niece, \nMiss Ada Wright, who for some years had been associated with her in the hos\u00ac \npital. So a little group was formed, of Miss Wright, the native chaplain, and \nother workers from the hospital. Of course, progress was slow, especially \nbecause their arrival was at first entirely misunderstood. After a while, how\u00ac \never, timid smiles began to appear on the wan faces, and gratitude, and later \ncame praise and thanksgiving to God. So great was the change effected that \nthe police of the region were puzzled by the transformation. \n\nTo the Loochoo Islands, another centre of lepers, and to many other similar \nplaces, Miss Riddell sent native workers, with medicines and comfort and in\u00ac \nspiration. Meanwhile, Leper Asylums were established in many parts of the \nEmpire, and in 1930 The National Leper Prevention Society was organized. \n\nAfter forty years of this strenuous life her health began to wane. Still she \nworked on, going about in a wheel chair. Then, in February, 1932, she breathed \nher last, and her ashes were placed, in accordance with her well-known wishes, \nin the mausoleum she had erected for the ashes of \u201cher children\u201d,\u2014Miss Ada \nWright, her niece, carrying on the work. \n\nOne of her patients says: \u201cMiss Riddell put great stress on religion, not \nurging us, but by her own character and love we were influenced. She comforted \nus and always emphasized the spiritual side, so we lived in love and freedom, \nand were joined one to another by mutual friendship, service, and gratitude. \nWe lived in an atmosphere . . . which money could not buy.\u201d \n\nIt is at the Hospital of the Resurrection of Hope that the following hymn is \nsung every evening,\u2014a hymn which, it has been said, expresses the essence of \nChristianity: \n\nAll through the day this thought has been the dearest, \n\nThat I hy beloved Hand is laid on me; \n\nThat Thou of all hast deigned to come the nearest \nAnd marked me with the sign of Calvary. \n\nWhat if 1 suffer, so Thou grantest only \nThat I fall not from Thee in my last hour; \n\nSo that Thou leave me not to suffer lonely, \n\nBut wilt uphold me with Thy touch of power? \n\nThou givest joy so deep to those in sadness, \n\nThat though Thy pierced Hand may be downprest, \n\nThere is within a hidden well of gladness, \n\nFor which I thank Thee, knowing I am blessed! \n\nTruly the founder of this hospital had a purpose in life! And if her achieve\u00ac \nment seems to some of us, in our quieter lives, too vast to be an inspiration, let \nus remember we are repeatedly told that the Masters look on motives and not \non results, and that we are no judges of what they can do with the smallest \nhonest effort made for their Cause. 2 Z. \n\n* Let us remember also, the Editors would suggest, that while current events continually remind us of the extent \nto which the West has corrupted the East, the influence of the West has in some ways proved a marvellous bless\u00ac \ning, as this article so clearly shows.\u2014 Editors. \n\n\n\nHEAD, HEART, AND HAND \n\n\nY OU will need to consider often the nature of this \u201cscience\u201d about which \nwe hear so much to-day, and which enters into our lives at a thousand \nplaces, bringing to our attention a wealth of strange phenomena of \nwhich our ancestors had no least notion. Our age, in fact, is distinguished \nfrom other historical periods by the dominance of this great power to which \nmen have transferred much of the allegiance which, in an earlier day, they \ngave to religion. We are about to start upon the study of one of the sciences, \nand certainly we want to know how science differs from other kinds of knowl\u00ac \nedge. Well, we discovered at the outset that the men who study science begin \nby drawing an arbitrary line about one set of facts: Things that can be touched, \ntasted, seen, smelled, and heard\u2014these alone are the matters with which science \ndeals. Most of us were, I think, surprised to learn that science is so limited. \nNobody had ever told us that before. In the schools we had been led to believe \nthat science was a wise and wonderful guide to the whole of life, and that the \nancient nations, lacking this wonderful guide, had been subject to idle specula\u00ac \ntions and superstitious beliefs about natural events. Now we begin to realize, \nperhaps, that we have to keep an eye on this cock-sure giant of science. He \ncan\u2019t possibly know everything which is necessary to our happiness, because \nhe refuses to consider at all so very many matters that lie closest to our hearts. \n\nThere are certain people in the world who say that scientific knowledge is \nthe only kind that is real, is the only kind that matters, and that every single \nfact which is true must come to us through the sense organs. They look upon \neverything else as fanciful dreaming. You hear such people say: \u201cThat idea \nisn\u2019t scientific\u201d, which seems to imply that, in their opinion, the idea is not a \nsound one. \n\nBut we can see easily how biassed and foolish such a view really is. For every \nmother\u2019s son and mother\u2019s daughter of us is perfectly familiar with a set of \nnormal, everyday experiences which are wholly real but which cannot be touched \nor tasted, seen, smelled or heard. For instance: we can imagine the old dog \nat home sitting on the back porch and scratching fleas. An inelegant picture, \nperhaps, but it is perfectly real as a picture in the mind, and yet it is utterly \nunscientific. Tell me: where is that picture of the dog? If I should open \nyour brain and dissect it down to the last cell and nerve fibre, could I see or \ntouch or otherwise detect the picture of that dog? Of course not. Yet that \npicture-dog is a fact\u2014just as much a fact as the flesh-and-blood dog on the \nback porch. But it is not a physical fact, not a scientific fact; it belongs to \nanother sort of fact-world which, using the term broadly, we may call the spiritual \nworld. Let\u2019s take another example. What are your affection for your parents, \nyour loyalties to your friends, your admiration for those examples of noble \n\n\n1 Notes of a lecture recently given to College Freshmen. \n\n\n\n\n\n118 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nmen and women who have fought and died in defence of high ideals? None \nof these glorious things is scientific; not one of them could possibly be studied \nby the scientific method. Yet we surely realize that such matters lie at the \nvery core of our lives, and that to omit them from consideration would leave \nus starved and crippled. If the terrible choice were forced upon us of giving \nup some of our outer senses or of being crippled in our inner life, I am sure \nwe should all say: Yes, take away my sight or my hearing but leave me my \nimagination, my power of affection and worship and love. \n\nHow foolish it is, then, to imagine that science and the world with which \nit deals, is all that is needful to solve the problem of human life. Why science \ncannot even solve the simple problem of a picture-dog in my mind. \n\nOf course we are going to give science its due. What we object to is giving \nit more than its due. Within its limited field of facts it has done a magnificent \nwork, and I hope your hearts may come to feel the beauty and the wonder of \nthe world which it reveals to us. Only we must not forget that the beauty \nand wonder which we feel before the revelations given us by science, are not \nthemselves of any scientific importance whatever. Strange, is it not, that the \nspiritual beauty hidden in the heart of the world, and which is the source of \nlife and joy and gladness, is no concern of science? \n\nNow of course science has a perfect right to stake out any sort of limited \nclaim it wishes. If a group of men wishes to limit its field to a one-acre meadow, \nthat is its affair. But we shall enter a decided protest when such people insist \nthat their limited province embraces all that can be known, and then try to \nforce upon us an interpretation of the big world in the terms of a one-acre \nmeadow. One is reminded of a story based on an old saying that, \u201cIn the \ncountry of the blind the one-eyed man is king\u201d. A young man with two sound, \nshining eyes finds a mountain valley shut away from civilization, where for \nages the inhabitants have all been blind. Only hollow eye-sockets remain in \ntheir faces. Touched by pity, the traveller begins to tell them about the beau\u00ac \ntiful world of form and colour from which they are shut out. Does he become \ntheir king, this young man with his completer senses? Not a bit of it. The \npeople listen; they whisper together: \u201cA poet and a dreamer\u201d, says one; \u201cMad\u00ac \nness\u201d, says another. Finally the scientists of the land learn of this monster \nwho is among them. After a physical examination they aver that two tumours \nare pressing on the young man\u2019s brain and are causing strange hallucinations. \nThey recommend the use of the surgeon\u2019s knife. Fortunately our hero escapes \nsuch a terrible fate and finds his way back to his own sort of people. Now \nthere are men of parallel blindness among the scientists. They aver that only \nmaterial things are real; their spiritual eyes are darkened, and in dreadful \nlikeness to the scientists of our story, they consider themselves normal human \nbeings and regard as diseased, such men as believe in the spiritual world. Of \ncourse not all scientists are like that. Many of them see clearly that the field \nof science is only a limited and partial one. \n\nNow it is evident that science concerns itself wholly with what we familiarly \ncall \u201chead knowledge\u201d. But when we glance through a college catalogue we \n\n\nHEAD, HEART, AND HAND \n\n\n119 \n\n\nmay see, perhaps, a statement to the effect that the college gives training in \n\u201csciences, humanities and arts\u201d. What, then, are humanities and arts? \n\nWell, we are human beings, and there are subjects which appeal to us just \non that account. Literature, history, painting, sculpture and music\u2014such \nsubjects make up the humanities, and it is evident that a strong element of \nhuman feeling goes with them. We might call it the \u201cheart-element\u201d. It is \nclear, too, that a race of intelligent dogs or cats would show small interest in \nour humanities. Perhaps they would prefer to study \u201cdogmatics\u201d and \u201ccate\u00ac \ngories\u201d. Possibly old bones, ash-cans and the natural history of woodchucks \nwould bulk heavily in the curriculum of dogdom. There would, however, be \none \u201cdogmatic\u201d which we humans might well add to our \u201chumanities\u201d and \nconsider with deep attention. That is the subject of dog-loyalty. The dog \ntoo often puts his master to shame in his mastery of that quality which we like \nto think is such a splendid human trait. \n\nFinally, our college catalogues offer the arts, and the arts are only applied \nsciences, or sciences in action. When we study the arts we learn how to do \nthings: to build churches and chicken-coops, to pull teeth and raise tomatoes. \nThose are arts. The fine arts possess the element of beauty. The study and \nappreciation of true and beautiful human works belongs to the humanities. \nTheir actual production, however, is an art, and since the art of their production \ncalls for scientific knowledge, we can see that the activities of head, heart and \nhand are interblended with one another and work together to produce the final \neffect. So every perfect work whether it be a poem, a painting, a majestic \nbridge or a whirring dynamo, embodies and makes manifest the three qualities. \nBut the perfect human body or the perfect oak tree reveals the same three \nblended qualities, as though the Creative Activity which builds the universe \nwere the Pattern according to which man\u2019s smaller powers were moulded. \n\nHere on the blackboard let us draw the familiar symbol of the equilateral \ntriangle and label the three comers: \u201chead\u201d, \u201cheart\u201d and \u201chand\u201d, respectively. \nAs we ponder the matter we see that it symbolizes our everyday nature, though \nI doubt very much if any one of us is so finely balanced, with head, heart and \nhand so nicely adjusted to one another, that an equilateral triangle is truly \nrepresentative. Most of us are unfortunately highly scalene. For when the \n\u201chead gets to swelling\u201d, the head angle of the triangle becomes obtuse, the \nother two angles necessarily become acute, and the whole figure becomes skewed. \nA man whose symbol is that sort of triangle may be a learned and brilliant \nfellow; he may be a great scholar capable of spinning thoughts into tenuous \npatterns and drawing up elaborate blue-prints for Utopias in which other \npeople are to live, but his heart is shrunken, and he is a bungler in the world of \npractical affairs. It is a danger to which the brilliant student is exposed, though \nafter considerable experience with Freshmen I do not believe the danger to \nthem is^unediate and I do not lie awake nights worrying about it. \n\nBut if men sometimes go wrong on the \u201chead corner\u201d, the women are likely \nto get impaled on the comer directly opposite. Have you ever heard the word \n\u201cgush\u201d, or, what is worse, been exposed to a \u201cgusher\u201d? Have you ever opened \n\n\n120 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\na book or a magazine and started an article about plants which commenced \nwith the \u201cdarling little blossoms lifting their sweet baby-faces to the sky\u201d? \nThat is gush an indication of a triangle gone all askew on the \u201cheart angle\u201d. \nOh yes, we rather expect a bit of it from the ladies and we get used to it, but if \na man gets going that way the only thing to do is to shoot him! \n\nTinally comes the lower or \u201chand angle\u201d, and it is perfectly clear that the \nover-development of the \u201cpractical\u201d leads to a highly undesirable type of human \nbeing. For here stand those who measure life by the quantity of things they \ncan get, men who sneer at high thought and noble feeling and spend their \nshrunken lives in \u201cgrubbing for edible roots\u201d. \n\nBut the triangle can teach us still more about ourselves and about others. \nU hat will happen if two angles are given values of more than sixty degrees \nrespectively, while the third angle necessarily becomes exceedingly acute? \nOr, to interpret the symbol in human terms: what will be the effect on char\u00ac \nacter if one aspect of the triune nature be starved at the expense of the other \ntwo.' There are three possible combinations of such undesirable possibilities: \n(i), head and heart may dominate the hand; (2), head and hand may dominate \nthe heart; and (3) heart and hand may dominate the head. It does not take \nus long to fit these various combinations to actual human types. Many evils \nin our society arise from just such unbalanced natures. The heart-hand combi\u00ac \nnation is back of many of the ill-devised schemes for social betterment. It \nmeans that well-meaning sentimentalists rush into social action without a \nbalance wheel of sound thinking. Here are the pacifists and \u201cuplifters\u201d who \nfill the world with their silly blather. To put the same thought in the senten\u00ac \ntious words of another day: \u201cFools rush in where angels fear to tread\u201d. The \nhead-hand distortion is seen terribly at work in Russia, where a logical, dog\u00ac \nmatic, materialistic doctrine is put into action with the help of the firing squad \nand exile to Siberian lumber-camps. \n\nFor our immediate purpose the lesson is clear. Let us try to keep a healthy \nbalance, so far as we may, between our sciences, humanities and arts. Let us \nlearn to think clearly, to feel keenly, and to act swiftly, silently and effectively \nwith a passion for perfection. \n\nBut we know ourselves to be so weak. So often we have tried and failed, \ntill we begin to doubt the possibility of ever conquering our faults of head! \nheart and hand. Yes, it is clear that the human triangle stands on its point \nand that it is a poor, wobbly thing quite unable to keep its balance unless it is \nshored up and stabilized. What we need to do is to draw another and reversed \nnangle through it. There, now we have a firm, strong figure which, I am sure \nis familiar to most of us. It is found in the Christian Church, in the Jewish \nSynagogue, and even in the temples of Eastern peoples. We note, too, that \nthe angles of the first triangle are only reflections of those of the second and \nstable one, just as though we had held them successively before a mirror. Can \nit be that our head, heart and hand\u2014our sciences, humanities and arts\u2014are \nlikewise only the reflections of parent realities? Did we not see, at the beginning \nof this lecture, that the works we do, seem curiously to follow the Pattern \n\n\nHEAD, HEART, AND HAND \n\n\nI 2 I \n\n\nset by the Creative Activity which built the world? Suppose we write the \nwords: \u201cWisdom\u201d, \u201cLove\u201d, \u201cWill\u201d, at the appropriate comers of the new \nand stable triangle. Then the sciences which our minds have attained with \nsuch vast labour, are seen to be the reflection of Wisdom; our humanities mirror \nthe mighty Love which strives ever to bind the human race into a Brotherhood; \nand our arts picture for us the Will which made the worlds. We may call this \nmajestic stable Trinity, the Powers of God, or, if we prefer, we may term it \nour Higher Self or our Deeper Nature. We see that it is entwined with our \nown poor powers of head, heart and hand, and we see further, that it is the \nsource of these powers which are, indeed, but reflections, and have no being \napart from their great Parent. \n\nSo the sciences, the humanities and the arts which we are to study as we \ngo forward in our college course, are the mirrors in which we see \u201cas in a glass \ndarkly\u201d the reflection of the Divine Trinity. We begin to understand how \ncramped and limited is the materialistic view which would for ever confine us \nto the shadow-world revealed by the five poor human senses. \n\nHave we been disheartened as we faced the giant task of conquering, not \nonly the field of knowledge, but, what is harder, the field of our own imperfect \nnatures? But now we know where the Power is to be sought which can accom\u00ac \nplish all things for us. Within each one of us is the Light which shows us the \nway, the Love which reveals all mysteries, and the Power \u201cwhich made the \nrocks and rivers, the stars and the ever-moving sea\u201d. But only as we yoke \nourselves with that Lord of Joy who is our Higher Self can we ever hope to \nclimb the steeps of high accomplishment. \n\nSuch is the meaning of the double triangle for us as we stand at the thresh\u00ac \nold of our college course. R.E.T. \n\n\nThe man who cannot wonder , who does not habitually wonder {and worship) \n... is but a Pair of Spectacles behind which there is no Eye .\u2014 Carlyle. a \n\n\nAll beauty that to human sight is given \nIs but the shadow , if we rightly see , \n\nOf Him from whom man's spirit issueth .\u2014 Michael Angelo. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nGEORGE WASHINGTON \n\nA STANDARD FOR TO-DAY \n\n\nIf I were to be called upon to draw a picture of the times and of men, from what \nI have seen , heard , and in part know, I should in one word say, that idleness , dis\u00ac \nsipation, and extravagance seem to have laid fast hold of most of them ; that specula\u00ac \ntion, peculation, and an insatiable thirst for riches seem to have got the better of \nevery other consideration, and almost of every order of men, that party disputes and \npersonal quarrels are the great business of the day; whilst the momentous concerns \nof an empire, a great and accumulating debt, ruined finances, depreciated money , \nand want of credit, which, in its consequences, is the want of everything, are but \nsecondary considerations, and postponed from day to day, from week to week, as if \nour affairs wore the most promising aspect .\u2014 George Washington: Letter to \nHarrison. \n\n\nil 4 PICTURE of the times and of men\u201d: the first thought Washington\u2019s \npicture suggests is its striking applicability to our own day, and then \ncomes a realization of the fact that against such a background, and \nwith such unpromising material, Washington and a small group of right-minded \ncitizens moulded what was to become a mighty empire. In the century or so \nsince then, the country, both in spirit and in government, has fallen away from \nthe lines originally laid down, and many to-day recognize the urgent need for \nreturning to the first principles of Americanism\u2014realizing that the fate of \nthe nation, now as in 1776, depends on the proportion of its citizens who \nare capable of embodying the ideals of the early patriots and serving as \u201cthe \nlittle leaven\u201d. \n\nIn any such consideration, of course, Washington is pre-eminently the first \nAmerican\u2014though estimates of him vary all the way from those who try to be\u00ac \nlittle his greatness, up to the occasional devotee who regards him as a Lodge \nMessenger, sent to strike the keynote for the great experiment made in the \nwestern world. His ideals comprise the simple virtues open to emulation by \nevery right-thinking American\u2014unselfish service, self-control, prudence, magna\u00ac \nnimity, a big outlook on life\u2014though many of them he possessed to a degree \nthat only a great man could attain. Gouverneur Morris said of him: \u2018\u2018His \nfirst victory was over himself. To each desire he had taught moderation\u201d\u2014a \nsignificant comment, in view of the quiet forcefulness which characterized every\u00ac \nthing that Washington did. There is another contemporary estimate of him, no \nless significant, coming this time from Jefferson: \u2018\u2018His integrity was sure, his \njustice the most inflexible I ever knew, no motives of interest or consanguinity, \nof friendliness or hatred being able to bias his decision. He was, indeed, in \nevery sense of the word, a wise, a good and a great man.\u201d A modern biographer \n\n\n122 \n\n\n\nGEORGE WASHINGTON \n\n\n123 \n\n\nadds another quality which is noteworthy, terming him \u201cthe most supremely \nsilent of the great men of action that the world can show\u201d. \n\nPerhaps the three words which associate themselves most closely with him, \nas characteristic, are justice, honour and dignity. They were the touchstones \nwhich he himself used in many and varying circumstances: is it just, is it hon\u00ac \nourable, is it fitting? The first two are, of course, a part of the code of the \ngentleman of whatever time. The third is less often stressed, in our own day, \nyet it will be remembered that Confucius declares the sense of \u201charmonious \nproportion\u201d to be one of the requisites of nobility\u2014by which he means a sense \nof appropriateness, a sense of what is fitting, of what is in good taste. This \nidea is included in Washington\u2019s use of the word dignity. We may recall, as \none instance of it, the account given in our histories of his refusal to accept a \nletter from Lord Howe, representing the English Government,\u2014because it was \naddressed, \u201cMr. Washington\u201d. A second time the letter came, the address \nchanged to, \u201cGeorge Washington, Esq., etc., etc.\u201d When the General rejected \nthis too, the bearer explained that the \u201cetc., etc. implies everything\u201d, but \nWashington replied that it might also mean anything. No insistence on personal \nrecognition was involved in this, but, instead, a realization of the fact that, in the \neyes of the world, he represented the Republic, and the dignity of its cause; \nthat form and ceremonial, rank and title have a reality behind them. Henry \nCabot Lodge, in his highly laudatory biography, calls attention to the fact that \nWashington, at the beginning of the Revolution, had achieved, overnight as it \nwere, a national feeling and a national outlook\u2014the viewpoint of a national \nleader as contrasted with that of the colonial planter\u2014claiming that no one else \nat that time, with the exception of Hamilton, was capable of such a swift trans\u00ac \nformation, and that it is difficult for us, after a century of national life, to realize \nall that it involved. \u201cHe felt to the very core of his being the need of national \nself-respect and national dignity. ... It was the personal dignity of the man, \nquite as much as his fighting capacity, which impressed Europe. Kings and \nministers, looking on dispassionately, soon realized that here was no ordinary \nagitator or revolutionist, but a great man on a great stage with great \nconceptions.\u201d \n\nMere personal ambition, the desire for personal recognition, personal honour \nand glory, were no part of his nature. Many instances of this fact could be given; \nit is sufficient to recall the simplicity of his comment on the military operajtfbs \nwhich included the famous crossing of the Delaware, and the battles of Trenton \nand Princeton. Frederick the Great is said to have characterized this as the \nmost brilliant campaign of the century; Washington referred to it merely as \n\u201ctwo lucky strokes at Trenton and Princeton\u201d. \n\nIn the experiences of his early years\u2014his Indian fighting, his work in the \nwilderness, and so on\u2014he developed an indomitable will to victory, and the \npower in an eminent degree to set self aside, sinking personal considerations in \ndevotion to duty, to a principle, to a cause or to his country, as the case might \nbe. This steady adherence to principle is notable throughout his life. In the \nfcarly days he had written: \u201cIf it is in my power to avoid going to the Ohio again, \n\n\n\n\n124 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nI shall; but if the command is pressed upon me by the general voice of the \ncountry, and offered upon such terms as cannot be objected against, it would \nreflect dishonour on me to refuse it.\u201d It was in the same spirit that he accepted \nthe command of the Revolutionary forces. A man of wealth, living in all ways \nas an English gentleman of the time, he was little affected personally by the \npolitical disturbances between the colonists and the Crown. He could well \nhave viewed the matter as did the Tories, or remained au dessus de la nielte. \nBut he saw it as a question of right and wrong, a question of justice, and he \nthrew everything into the balance,\u2014refusing all pay for his services, pledging \nhis estates to raise money and men, and placing his reputation, his future, his \nliberty and his life at stake, in becoming the leader of the rebel cause. \n\nA minor instance of the same characteristic adherence to principle was shown \nwhen the English troops marched up the Potomac, and a member of the family, \nleft in charge at Mt. Vernon, tried to conciliate them by serving refreshments. \nWashington wrote to him: \u201cIt would have been a less painful circumstance to \nme to have heard that, in consequence of your non-compliance with their re\u00ac \nquest, they had burnt my house and laid the plantation in ruins. You ought \nto have considered yourself as my representative, and should have reflected \non the bad example of communicating with the enemy, and making a voluntary \noffer of refreshments to them, with a view to prevent a conflagration.\u201d \n\nTo one of his officers who was dissatisfied with his commission and considered \nresigning because of it, Washington wrote, \u201cIn the usual contests of empire \nand ambition, the conscience of a soldier has so little share that he may very \nproperly insist upon his claims of rank, and extend his pretensions even to \npunctilio; but in such a cause as this, when the object is neither glory nor extent \nof territory, but a defence of all that is dear and valuable in private and public \nlife, surely every post ought to be deemed honourable in which a man can serve \nhis country.\u201d \n\nProfiteering and similar dishonest practices during the Revolution moved \nhim to hot indignation. Quoting a remark made by the English on this point, \nto the effect that we should destroy ourselves if left free to do so, he wrote 1 : \n\nCannot our common country, America, possess virtue enough to disappoint them? \nIs the paltry consideration of a little pelf to individuals to be placed in competition with \nthe essential rights and liberties of the present generation, and of millions yet unborn? \nShall a few designing men, for their own aggrandizement, and to gratify their own ava\u00ac \nrice, overset the goodly fabric we have been rearing, at the expense of so much time, blood, \nand treasure? And shall we at last become the victims of our own lust of gain? Forbid \nit, Heaven! Forbid it, all and every State in the Union, by enacting and enforcing effica\u00ac \ncious laws for checking the growth of these monstrous evils, and restoring matters, in \nsome degree, to the state they were in at the commencement of the war. Our cause is \nnoble. It is the cause of mankind, and the danger to it is to be apprehended from \nourselves. Shall we slumber and sleep, then . . . ? \n\nAnd a little later (December, 1778), in a letter to Reed: \n\nIt gives m e sincere pleasure . . . that the assembly is so well disposed to second your \n\n> Quotations that follow are taken from: Life of George Washington, by Washington Irving; George Washington, \nby Henry Cabot Lodge; Maxims of Washington, collected by J. F. Schroeder, and from other sources including \nWashington\u2019s Correspondence. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nGEORGE WASHINGTON \n\n\n125 \n\n\nendeavours in bringing those murderers of our cause, the monopolizers, forestalled, and \nengrossers to condign punishment. It is much to be lamented that each State, long ere \nthis, has not hunted them down as pests to society and the greatest enemies we have to \nthe happiness of America. I would to God that some one of the most atrocious in each \nState was hung in gibbets upon a gallows five times as high as the one prepared by \nHaman. No punishment, in my opinion, is too great for the man who can build his \ngreatness upon his country\u2019s ruin. \n\nThat last sentence might well be used as a slogan for the present day. \n\nThe history of his heroic struggle to build an army, to supply money, uniforms, \nammunition; to awaken patriotism and the fighting spirit; to induce the country \nto send more able men to Congress, and to stir Congress (ignorant of the needs \nand details of war) to effective action\u2014all are a matter of history, too well \nknown to need mention. But the selflessness and sacrifice and suffering involved, \nwere a grilling test of devotion to a cause, the long-drawn agony of which is not \nalways taken into account. It was after two of his brigades broke and ran \nbefore fifty British soldiers, leaving him to choose between capture or flight, \nthat he wrote: \n\nSuch is my situation that if I were to wish the bitterest curse to an enemy on this side \nof the grave, I should put him in my stead. I see the impossibility of serving with repu\u00ac \ntation, or doing any essential service to the cause by continuing in command; and yet I \nam told that if I quit the command, inevitable ruin will follow, from the distractions \nthat will ensue. In confidence I tell you that I never was in such an unhappy, divided \nstate since I was born. \n\nOne other instance is too striking to omit,\u2014though all of them, of course, are \nmatters of history, more or less familiar, and only their significance as showing \nthe measure of the man, warrants their inclusion. We refer to his attitude when \na certain group in the Army, aroused by the inefficiency of Congress, planned \nto make of the country a monarchy, and to offer him the crown. His letter in \nreply reads: \n\nWith a mixture of surprise and astonishment, I have read with attention the senti\u00ac \nments you have submitted to my perusal. Be assured no occurrence in the course of \nthe War, has given me more painful sensations, than your information of there being \nsuch ideas existing in the army, as you have expressed, and I must view with abhorrence, \nand reprehend with severity. \n\nI am much at a loss, to conceive what part of my conduct could have given encourage\u00ac \nment to an address, which to me seems big with the greatest mischiefs that can befall \nmy country. If I am not deceived in the knowledge of myself, you could not have found \na person, to whom your schemes are more disagreeable. \n\nAt the same time, in justice to my own feelings, I must add, that no man possesses a \nmore sincere wish to see ample justice done to the army, than I do; and, as far as my \npowers and influence, in a Constitutional way, extend, they shall be employed, to the \nutmost of my abilities, to effect it, should there be any occasion. \n\nAt the absent time, when a thousand dollar prize has been offered for a song \nthat shalfropplant the National Anthem\u2014a song that is \u201cnot martial\u201d and has \n\u201cno bombs bursting in air\u201d\u2014Washington is being quoted as authority for keep\u00ac \ning our country safely out of war! George Washington, used to bolster up the \npacifist cause, is an anomaly indeed. Such detractors ignore entirely the nature \n\n\n126 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nof the man. They seize on one incident of his Administration: the fact that a \nlarge part of the population, impelled by an entirely justifiable gratitude for all \nthat France had done for the new Republic, were determined to reciprocate by \njoining her in her war against England; and that Washington saw it as a matter \nof necessity to maintain a policy of strict neutrality. It will be remembered \nthat he issued a proclamation, forbidding any participation in the war on the \nsea, or the carrying of contraband. Public opinion ran high, and Washington\u2019s \nprestige suffered. The proclamation, Washington Irving tells us in his monu\u00ac \nmental work, was stigmatized as a royal edict, a daring assumption of power, a \nmanifestation of partiality for England and hostility to France. \n\nBut the circumstances must be taken into account: a nation in embryo, so to \nspeak, with no proved ability to stand on its own feet, no national credit, no \ndefinitely national sentiment\u2014in short, sure to be an encumbrance rather than \nan aid. Washington wrote on this subject: \u201cWith me a predominant motive \nhas been, to endeavour to gain time to our country to settle and mature its \nrecent institutions, and to progress, without interruption, to that degree of \nstrength and consistency which is necessary to give it, humanely speaking, the \ncommand of its own fortunes.\u201d \n\nThere was nothing of the pacifist or the neutral in the man who exclaimed in \nyouthful enthusiasm that he \u201cloved to hear bullets whistle\u201d; who, in one en\u00ac \ngagement where the Revolutionary troops wavered, rode to the front and reining \nhis horse within thirty yards of the enemy, ordered his men to advance; who, in \nanother engagement, where his men broke and ran, dashed in among them \nurging them to rally, and then, drawing sword and pistol, fought them furi\u00ac \nously, determined to stop their flight, until finally saved from capture himself \nby one of his officers, who seized his bridle and dragged him almost from the \nhands of the oncoming British. Lodge, who bases his estimate on a minute \nstudy of details, writes: \n\nThere was one thing which he could never appreciate nor realize. It was from first to \nlast impossible for him to understand how any man could refuse to fight, or could think \nof running away. When he beheld rout and cowardly panic before his very eyes, his \ntemper broke loose and ran uncontrolled. His one thought then was to fight to the last, \nand he would have thrown himself single-handed on the enemy, with all his wisdom and \nprudence flung to the winds. The day when the commander held his place merely \nby virtue of personal prowess lay far back in the centuries, and no one knew it better \nthan Washington. But the old fighting spirit awoke within him when the clash of arms \nsounded in his ears, and though we may know the general in the tent and in the council, \nwe can only know the man when he breaks out from all rules and customs, and shows the \nrage of battle, and the indomitable eagerness for the fray, which lie at the bottom of the \ntenacity and courage that carried the war for independence to a triumphant close. \n\nIt is true that Washington\u2019s policy regarding neutrality developed later into \nthe Monroe doctrine; but there is nothing to suggest that he expected it to hold \nin sternum , nor, above all, that he dreamed of its taking precedence over prin\u00ac \nciples of justice and honour. His letters give proof of this. \n\nThe United States ought not to indulge a persuasion, that, contrary to the order of \n\n\nGEORGE WASHINGTON \n\n\n127 \n\n\nhuman events, they will for ever keep at a distance those painful appeals to arms, with \nwhich the history of every nation abounds. \n\nThere is a rank due to the United States among nations, which will be withheld, if not \nabsolutely lost, by the reputation of weakness. \n\nIf we desire to avoid insult, we must be able to repel it. \n\nIf we desire to secure peace, one of the most powerful instruments of our rising pros\u00ac \nperity, it must be known that we are, at all times , ready for war. (Italics his.) \n\nIt has been, very properly, the policy of our Government to cultivate peace. But, in \ncontemplating the possibility of our being driven to unqualified war, it will be wise to \nanticipate, that, frequently, the most effectual way to defend is to attack. (Again, italics \nhis.) \n\nThere is nothing which will so soon produce a speedy and honourable peace as a state \nof preparation for war. \n\nThe Revolution had little more than ended when the insurrection, known as \nthe Shays Rebellion, broke out in Massachusetts. An investigator, sent to \ndetermine the facts of the matter, reported: \n\nTheir [the insurgents\u2019] creed is that the property of the United States has been pro\u00ac \ntected from the confiscation of Britain by the joint exertions of ally and therefore ought \nto be the common property of all, and he that attempts opposition to this creed, is an \nenemy to equity and justice, and ought to be swept from off the face of the earth. . . . \nThey are determined to annihilate all debts, public and private, and have agrarian laws, \nwhich are easily effected by means of unfunded paper, which shall be a tender in all cases \nwhatever. \n\nWashington, in retirement at Mt. Vernon at the time, was playing an im\u00ac \nportant part, by means of an extensive correspondence, in moulding public \nopinion. His comments left no doubt as to how he would handle such a situa\u00ac \ntion. To Lee he wrote: \n\nYou talk, my good sir, of employing influence to appease the present tumults in Mas\u00ac \nsachusetts. I know not where that influence is to be found, or, if attainable, that it would \nbe a proper remedy for the disorders. Influence is not government. Let us have a govern\u00ac \nment by which our lives, liberties, and properties will be secured, or let us know the \nworst at once. \n\nIn another letter on the same subject, he wrote: \n\nThere is a call for decision. Know precisely what the insurgents aim at. If they have \nreal grievances, redress them, if possible; or acknowledge the justice of them, and your \ninability to do it at the moment. If they have not, employ the force of government \nagainst them at once. . . . Let the reins of government then be braced and held with a \nsteady hand, and every violation of the constitution be reprehended. If defective let \nit be amended; but not suffered to be trampled upon whilst it has an existence. \n\nFrom this point on, there is much in his conduct of public affairs that suggests \nwhat his approach would have been to certain major problems of our own day. \nThe firm policy just outlined for the handling of popular unrest, was put to the \ntest in his second term as President, by a rebellion which broke out in western \nPennsylvania over a tax on liquor\u2014a most delicate situation, since it came at a \ntime when he could not be sure to what extent the country was with him, or \nwhether, if he called out the militia, the States were yet capable of rising above \nState-considerations and acting as a Federation, with the sole good of the union \n\n\n\n\n128 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nin view. It was one of the first real tests of the efficacy of the new government \nand the Constitution, and Irving\u2019s account of it is worth reading for the picture \nit gives of Washington\u2019s insight and ability through several difficult years, and \nof the sagacity with which he chose just the right time to strike and strike hard, \n\u2014to the complete and final confusion of the insurgents. A letter from Washing\u00ac \nton on the subject tells of the notable response evoked from the best element in \nthe country: \u201cThere are instances of general officers going at the head of a \nsingle troop, and of light companies; of field officers, when they came to the \nplace of rendezvous, and found no command for them in that grade, turning \ninto the ranks and proceeding as private soldiers, under their own captains; \nand of numbers possessing the first fortunes in the country, standing in the \nranks as private men.\u201d \n\nThe lessons learned from his eight years as President, Washington embodied \nin his Farewell Address,\u2014combining them with a keen foresight as to the diffi\u00ac \nculties that lay ahead. He made no claim of perfection for the governmental \nsystem which he was so largely instrumental in drawing up,\u2014having written \nearlier concerning it: \u201cThere are some things in the new form, I will readily \nacknowledge, which never did, and I am persuaded never will, obtain my cordial \napprobation, but I did then conceive and do now most firmly believe that in the \naggregate it is the best Constitution that can be obtained at this epoch, and \nthat this or a dissolution of the Union awaits our choice, and is the only alterna\u00ac \ntive before us.\u201d But once adopted, there could be, in his estimation, no excuse \nfor failure to adhere to it. He saw clearly the dangers that lay in departing \nfrom it unadvisedly, and his Address is devoted largely to warning and admoni\u00ac \ntion: warning against innovations in government (an insidious means of under\u00ac \nmining that which could not be overthrown by direct attack); warning against \nallowing one department of government to encroach upon another (destroying \nthe balance of power as between legislative, judicial and executive-functions, \nwhich alone insures liberty); warning against the extremes to which party spirit \nwill lead; warning that in each case there lie hidden, inevitably, the seeds of \ndespotism, the jeopardizing of the liberty for which the nation had paid so \ndearly. In reading certain clauses of the Address, his foresight appears almost \nprophetic, so closely is it applicable to conditions both at present and in the \ncentury that has passed. In this our day of little men, blindly sowing the wind, \nit is certain that some measure of the whirlwind might still be averted if more \ngeneral heed were given to this great Address, the fruit of wise experience, and \nif more general adherence were given to the ideals and principles of the nation\u2019s \nfounder,\u2014so far the greatest public character the country has produced. \n\nJ.C. \n\n\nWITHOUT CENSOR \n\n\nXII. \n\nB Y the latter part of October, 1918, the First Army was feeling the effects \nof the severe fighting in which it had been engaged. Losses had been \nvery heavy, especially in the best attack units, and our offensive power \nhad been lowered. These losses were made up by replacements, but often these \nwere only partially trained, and in some cases had had practically no training \nat all. Several different Colonels told me that they had received new men \ninto their organizations who had not been in the military service for more \nthan six weeks, who had never fired a rifle, and who had never worn a gas mask. \nOften, too, their equipment was inadequate. The regiments assimilated these \nmen as rapidly as possible, until they were again at full war strength; the train\u00ac \ning and the equipment of the replacements was completed in the field and \nunder combat conditions. Stragglers, of whom there were now many, had to \nbe collected and returned to their organizations. The weather conditions had \nbeen bad, with cold and continuous rain, and the attacking troops were entirely \nwithout means of shelter, and often without sufficient supplies. Transport \nwas difficult, owing to the fact that there were only three worn-out roads, \none for each Army Corps, leading up to the front, and these roads were often \nalmost impassable because of congestion and shell holes. Forage for the animals \nwas scarce, for ammunition and supplies for the men were sent up first, and \nwhen the congestion was at its worst our horses died in great numbers, impairing \nthe mobility of our artillery. So acute did this problem in regard to the animals \nbecome, that I heard some discussion among the First Army Staff as to whether \nor not it would be possible, then and there in the middle of the offensive, to \nchange over the artillery and make it tractor-drawn. It was under conditions \nsuch as these that the work of reorganizing and of rehabilitating those divisions \nwhich had been in the line for days went forward, while at the same time an \nunrelenting pressure was maintained against the enemy, and preparations for \nthe final co-ordinated drive forward were completed. There was nothing particu\u00ac \nlarly unusual about these conditions; there was no doubt whatever that they \ncould be met and overcome, and they were. We had gained ground, against \nsevere opposition, and we had greatly impaired the enemy\u2019s strength. Our \npositions were being improved daily through local operations, while the tempo\u00ac \nrary lull in the proceedings encouraged the Army and raised its morale. \n\nThe final phase began on November 1st, and proceeded rapidly. A great \nchange in the direction of the First Army attack had taken place, from facing \nnorth touting east; the Fourth French Army was not always able to keep \nabreast o^ir left flank, so that the First Army relied for flank protection upon \nour own First Army Corps on the left of our advance. The attack gained \n\n129 \n\n\n\n\n\n\n130 \n\n\nTHE 0 S 0 PHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nmomentum as it proceeded, as did also the enemy\u2019s retreat; it was necessary \nin some instances to use motor trucks to carry our infantry forward and enable \nthem to regain contact. The enemy\u2019s lines were completely broken through. \nIn seven days he was driven back twenty-four miles on the First Army front, \nand his main line of communications was within close striking distance. In \nthe last three days before the Armistice the Second American Army on our \nright, with three Army Corps in line, advanced in its initial army offensive \nalong its entire front in the direction of the Briey iron basin. But it was the \nresults of the final drive of the First American Army which were significant, and \nwhich were felt along the entire Western Front. The enemy could not survive \nthe loss of those positions which we had taken, with the resulting paralysis of \nhis railroad system of supply and communication. The break through rendered \ncompletely impossible any further orderly withdrawal of his forces, and he \npressed for an Armistice. \n\nAs this last phase progressed, and as our attacking troops surged further \nand further away from Headquarters First Army at Souilly, the difficulty of \ncommunicating with the Headquarters of our Army Corps became very serious. \nThey were too far away then to be reached rapidly by courier, and the greater \ndistance rendered the telephone wires weak, and made it practically impossible \nto hear continuously or distinctly. So bad did these conditions become that \nfinally the Chief of Staff directed me to take two officers and to go forward to \nCh 4 tel-Ch\u00a3h 6 ry and to establish there a relay post of the Message Centre. \nIt was a mid-way point, at which our Signal Corps had established a telephone \ncentral, and my mission was to take down the more urgent messages emanating \nfrom First Army Headquarters, and to relay them afresh to their destinations \nover a shorter wire on which the current was stronger. It was, of course, the \nstart of a new Army Advance Command Post, necessitated by the exigencies \nof the situation; and when I arrived there, after having bumped slowly over \nunspeakable roads for a couple of hours, I found that a number of officers from \nother sections of the Staff were already on the spot. But I was not destined \never to function there as intended, for I was met upon my arrival by the Secre\u00ac \ntary of the General Staff, who informed me that he had just received a message \nfrom Lieutenant-General Liggett, to the effect that the Herman delegates \nseeking an Armistice had crossed our lines, and that he was not going to do \nanything more about establishing an Advance P. C. until he knew what had \ntaken place at their conference with Marshal Foch. I was told to return at \nonce to Souilly, so that I was not in the place for more than twenty minutes. \nJust as I was about to step into the car for the return journey, having left my \ntwo officers behind in case plans should again be changed, I happened, by \nsome singular piece of good fortune, to glance into the forward part of the \ncar where the driver sat. I saw there some foreign objects rolling about as he \nmanoeuvered the car to a standstill. I looked again, more closely, and found \nthat they were unexploded hand grenades, which my chauffeur had collected \nfrom the adjoining battle-field during his short period of waiting, and which \nhe had hoped and expected to take back with him as souvenirs. I deferred my \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nWITHOUT CENSOR \n\n\n131 \n\ndeparture until they had been safely removed and placed by the side of the \nroad. I had no wish to try bumping about on those rough roads, with a load \nof hand grenades rolling about the floor of the car. It would have made our \narrival too problematical. \n\nDuring those last days before the Armistice there had been a constant stream \nof cipher messages, received through the Code Room of the Message Centre, \nannouncing the defection one by one of the German Allies, until Germany at \nlast stood alone. There had come, in rapid succession, message after message \ndescribing the victories which were being gained daily by the French and the \nBritish Armies, and the rolling back of the long German line from the Meuse \nto the Sea. We who were at the pivot, at the hinge of the door that was open\u00ac \ning, knew how things were going there, knew that our pressure at that key \npoint was assisting in forcing the enemy retirement. From the military point \nof view, that German retreat was one of the most masterly tactical operations \nof the War. Time and time again, on the great map of the Western Front at \nFirst Army Headquarters, it seemed inevitable that whole enemy army corps \nwould be hemmed in and captured; time and time again the enemy slipped \nthrough just before the pincers had time to close. Events were taking place \nwith such extraordinary rapidity that it was difficult to keep track of them; \nto gauge the speed at which they would move; to attempt to forecast future \nhappenings. One could foresee what was likely to occur, in the light of things \nthat were then taking place, but only in a general way; the outcome depended, \nin that rapidly moving panorama on the map, upon which thing happened \nfirst; accuracy of forecast was impossible. But the ultimate result was no \nlonger in doubt, nor should there be any doubt to-day in the minds of those \nwho criticize the Armistice, who regret that the advance was not continued \nthen to German soil, and that the final fruits of victory were not gathered, as \nto the completeness of the success at that moment, as to the thoroughness \nof the defeat, the utter rout. There are many to-day who were in the Allied \nArmies, who whole-heartedly agree with such criticisms, who admit their justice \nand their truth. But they do so with, shall I say, almost a feeling of regret \nthat they must, because they realize that, in the bitterness of disappointment \nthat prompts them, what was really accomplished from a purely military stand\u00ac \npoint has been under-estimated, undervalued, unappreciated, even that it \nhas never been understood. That bitterness of disappointment, that feeling \nthat the Peace was lost, seem, in retrospect, to have completely overshadowed \nappreciation of actual military accomplishment. It is not fair, this, to those \nwho brought about these final military successes; it is not fair to those who \nlaid down their lives in countless thousands over four long years in order that \nthose final results might be at last achieved. They had nothing to do with the \nmachinations of politicians in high places, with the expediencies and the subter\u00ac \nfuges i\u00abMiplomacy, with the give and take of conferences. Nor is it fair to the \nofficers^tnd men of the American Expeditionary Forces, who, entering the \nwar late through no fault of theirs, developed with extraordinary rapidity a \nmilitary machine, which, in those last days, compared favourably, I believe, in \n\n\n\n\n\n132 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nefficiency and in accomplishment with any of the other Allied Armies; which \nconducted operations on a scale to which there is no parallel in the military \nhistory of our country, a scale which has never been understood or realized \nby those who stayed at home. \n\nIt was after one had actually arrived home, that the realization of this came. \nIt was a shock, then, to realize that, practically without exception, the people \nwith whom one talked did not have the slightest conception as to where on \nthe map those towns and villages were, the names of which are immortal in \nour military history. When they thought at all along military lines, it was in \nterms of companies and of regiments; we had been thinking and acting over \nthere in terms of army corps and of field armies. But they did not seem to be \nparticularly interested in the purely military aspect; they did not want, appar\u00ac \nently, to try to understand the scale upon which things had been done. They \nwould let one talk\u2014a returning officer was entitled to do that\u2014but they were \nquite obviously glad, when an opportunity came, to break in, and to tell about \nwhat they themselves had done in the Red Cross or in selling Liberty Bonds. \nThey seemed, especially those who should have known or should have wanted \nto know, to be sound asleep. They had been too far away, too safe. They had \nread literature of the war to \u201cany\u201d extent, and they could talk of things more or \nless fluently, if not with accuracy, but they did not know , they had no real \nconception of what they were talking about. What interest they did show \nbecame rapidly less as time went on, and as they relapsed into their old pre\u00ac \nwar occupations and ways of living. How I longed then, in the feeling of un\u00ac \nsettlement and of discouragement which this apparent lack of interest caused, \nfor Mr. Griscom. It would not have been a case of one talk with him; there \nwould have been many. He would have questioned me, would have gone to \nthe heart of things, inquired into reasons, pointed out hitherto unrealized \nreactions, as he had after my two experiences at the Military Training Camps \nat Plattsburgh. It was just another way, an additional way, in which I missed \nhim, upon my return. \n\nMuch has been said from time to time, and by many different people, in \nregard to the attitude of the American soldier. In the minds of many, he is \nsupposed to have been insufferably arrogant, to have gone about explaining to \nthe British and to the French that, now that they had failed, he and his buddies \nhad come over to show them how to win the War. Indeed, there are those \nto-day in whom that idea is so strongly ingrained that, when our participation \nin the War is mentioned, this supposed attitude of the American soldier is the \nfirst thing that seems to come into the forefront of their minds in that con\u00ac \nnection, and they are inclined, as a rule, to drag it out and to speak of it with \nsomething that almost approaches a sneer. Usually, one finds that such people \nwere not on the other side of the water during the War, that they have formed \ntheir impressions from a distance or from hearsay. This critical attitude of \ntheirs is undoubtedly caused, in part, by that same bitterness of disappoint\u00ac \nment, of which I have already spoken, over an Allied victory which turned \nout, in the light of the Peace, to have been no victory at all in the real sense. \n\n\nWITHOUT CENSOR \n\n\ni33 \n\n\nBut their attitude is not fair to the American soldier; they are magnifying \nout of all due proportion something which, while it unquestionably existed, \nwas entirely devoid of the significance which they have attached to it. One \nmust know the soldier mind to understand it; when one does, one does not take \nit seriously. I do not for one minute believe that our soldiers really thought \nthat they were superior to their comrades in the Allied Armies. They did \nnot mean, in the remarks which they made, to belittle or to ignore. Far from \nit. When they spoke of themselves as the best little performers ever, and \nurged somewhat startled French citizens to keep their eyes on them when \nthey once got going, they did not mean themselves to be taken seriously. Part \nof that brag and bluster came from natural talkativeness and a perverted \nsense of humour. Part of it was a smoke screen, for, at heart, they were dif\u00ac \nfident; they were horribly afraid that they might not perform well when the \ntime came. They were mere boys, most of them, and when they found that \nthe other fellow was annoyed by what they said, they were delighted, and \nthey proceeded to rub it in some more. The very exuberance of youthful \nspirits which inspired this kind of talk was, in a sense, an indication of the \nhigh morale which our troops possessed. What they said at times was un\u00ac \nquestionably in the worst possible taste, thoughtless, regrettable for the wrong \nimpression which it might cause and for its possible effect. But it came from \nno real feeling of superiority, and was mostly pure and simple \u201chot air\u201d. Need\u00ac \nless to say, nothing was ever said or done, as far as I was able to observe, by \nany officer on the Staffs of those larger units with which I was associated, \nwhich conveyed the idea of any feeling of superiority, of any wish to show \nanyone else how to win the War. Those men, the great majority of them, \nwere the pick of our old Regular Army. They were under no illusions what\u00ac \never as to how much they knew. Their one thought was to learn, from those \nwho had had experience in what they themselves were then doing, and to learn \nfast. Their one idea was, not that they should win the War, but that the War \nshould be won. \n\nThe coming of the Armistice brought with it two extraordinary experiences. \nOne was the total cessation of that terrific noise to which we had been accustomed \nfor so long, and the sudden reappearance of lights at night; there was something \nunreal about both of these things, and it took quite a long time to become \nused to them again. The other was a sudden influx of women into the front \nareas, all of whom were in some kind of uniform or other, and all of whom \nwere bent on doing good of some kind to someone. Incidentally, they did not \nneglect themselves at times, if the extent to which they rode about in Staff \ncars was any criterion. I had, of course, seen nothing whatever of the work \nwhich women had done in French civilian relief, and so had been unable to \nform any im*pssion of those organized activities. I had, however, seen nurses \nworking in equation hospitals, under terrific stress and strain, and, later on, \nI saw them at their duties in several of the base hospitals, and it is impossible \nto speak in too high terms of their efficiency and devotion, of their courage \nand self-sacrifice. This lot, however, which was unloosed upon us, was a new \n\n\n\n\n\n134 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\ntype. As I observed them, and as I gained light in regard to their activities \nbefore the Armistice through what I heard from others, I came reluctantly to \nthe conclusion that there were too many women of the wrong kind going about \nin uniform, and not enough of the right kind. By the wrong kind, I do not \nmean those whose influence was positively harmful. Not at all. But the \nbest of them were afflicted with curiosity. They wanted to be taken about \nand shown things which they had no business to see, the seeing of which ful\u00ac \nfilled no useful purpose whatever and was entirely outside the line of their \nduty. Almost invariably, they were eager to be taken to see the front line \ntrenches, and whenever they could, they pulled wires to bring this about. \nMore than one unfortunate officer, detailed to conduct such a joy-ride in person, \ntold me afterwards of his experience, in language that cannot be printed. They \nnever seemed to have the remotest conception of the unnecessary danger in \nwhich they placed, not only their own party, but also all the troops in that \nimmediate area, through their desire to gratify mere curiosity. They never \nin the least realized that, even in a quiet sector, every yard of the territory \nthrough which they passed was under perpetual enemy observation; that the \nslightest abnormal circulation at an unusual hour in that area, such as the \narrival of their motor half a mile in the rear, would be noted; that any extraor\u00ac \ndinary activity in the trenches, caused by the advent of their party, would \nbe spotted. The Boche, on the chance of being able to interfere with some\u00ac \nthing which was going on that might possess military significance, was ex\u00ac \ntremely likely to start a bombardment on general principles. The visiting \nparty might escape without injury, after a thrilling experience which made a \ngood story to tell later on, but there might well be several casualties after their \ndeparture among the troops holding that part of the line, as a result of this \ndisplay of feminine interest. Again, these uniformed women were inclined \nto be over-talkative, to talk from insufficient knowledge. A traffic jam in the \nforward areas would attract their attention, and they would speak about it \nto some long-suffering junior officer; there must be inefficiency somewhere, \nthey thought, and someone in authority ought to be told. They could not \nknow that the plan for some offensive had been advanced in point of time, \nand that what they saw was a superhuman effort to accomplish in four or five \ndays that which it had been planned to do over a period of two weeks. Paren\u00ac \nthetically, to the civilian eye, the movement of military traffic almost always \nseemed to betoken confusion; it always looked worse than it really was; there \nwas always order and purpose behind the seeming chaos. But I became more \nand more convinced that, outside of trained and efficient nurses, women had \nno place in the battle areas. \n\nThe Armistice brought with it another experience which caused intense dis\u00ac \nsatisfaction in the American Expeditionary Forces. Indeed, it is not over\u00ac \nstating it to say that it caused an incipient spirit of revolt, so keen was the dis\u00ac \nappointment, so acute was the sense of injustice which it inspired. Three or \nfour days after the Armistice it was announced in General Orders from G. H. Q. \nthat all promotion had been suspended in the American Expeditionary Forces. \n\n\n\n\nWITHOUT CENSOR \n\n\ni35 \n\n\nThe impelling force had, of course, been Washington, where a thrifty but short\u00ac \nsighted Congress, appalled at the cost of the War, had determined, in view \nof the cessation of hostilities, to shut down at once on unessential expenditures, \nand had decided that a desirable first step would be to avoid the increased \nexpense which a large number of promotions in France would automatically \nbring about. Many recommendations for promotion had already been sub\u00ac \nmitted to G. H. Q. by commanding officers, and had been awaiting action \nfor some time. Many others would have been submitted, based upon efficient \nor heroic performance in the days and weeks immediately preceding the Armis\u00ac \ntice. There had simply not been time, in the pressure of rapidly moving events, \nto send forward the customary papers in these cases; it was one of the things \nthat could wait. This ruling was particularly hard on the younger line officers, \nfor in many instances, owing to casualties, lieutenants had for days been in \ncharge of companies, and captains had been commanding battalions, and they \nhad shown themselves worthy of the higher rank which they had temporarily \nheld. This edict was like a douche of cold water on the morale and on the \nspirits of all ranks. Indeed, it was more like a blow in the face. With the \nmeanness always characteristic of a democratic form of government, our Con\u00ac \ngress had, in effect, said that the show was now over, and as the best efforts \nhad already been obtained from all concerned, there was no use rewarding \nanyone for what had been done; that it was all on a cash basis anyway; that \neveryone had been paid up to date and would be paid as long as it was abso\u00ac \nlutely necessary, but that the views of constituents at home in regard to further \nwar expenses, and future political careers, were now the controlling factors. \nAs a matter of fact, the total additional expense that would have been involved \nby even wholesale promotions in France, made immediately, would have been \nrelatively small, and it would have been money well spent, looking at it only \nfrom that rather sordid standpoint. The immediate recognition of merit would \nhave infused into men, worn out physically and mentally, who had been giving \nall that they had in them, a new gratitude and pride, a new patriotism, a new \nardour and zeal. As it was, they felt, exhausted as they were, that the people \nat home did not care; that they had been \u201clet down\u201d; defrauded of something \nwhich should have been theirs. It was the way this official action made men \nfeel about our country and our Government that did incalculable harm, when \nit would have been so easy to have produced such an entirely different effect. \nPromotion was resumed in the American Expeditionary Forces several months \nlater, towards the end of the winter, and many men came into their own; but \nit was too late then, and the real opportunity which our Government had had, \nwas lost. \n\nI was amazed, in those days, to see how profoundly affected many officers \nwere by this drastic edict. I suppose, in many cases, it was because they had \nnothing by which to measure for themselves the real quality of their performance \nexcept the degree of the outer recognition. But, even with the War over, \nthere ^ no time to dwell for very long on all this; there was too much to be \ndone, ana it was just a case of \u201cbeing out of luck\u201d, as the Army has it. Activity \n\n\n136 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nwas concentrated on withdrawing the divisions from the former front lines, \nand in starting them on their way, some to the Rhine, where they became \npart of the Third American Army, our Army of Occupation, others to the \narea adjacent to General Headquarters at Chaumont, where they settled down \nin billets to wait until there was ocean transport available to take them home. \nAt the end of two weeks, First Army Headquarters was ready to move back \nto Bar-sur-Aube, between Troyes and Chaumont, and to settle down for the \nwinter, and on November 25th the Message Centre packed itself up in its own \ntransportation, and started from Souilly to the rear, so as to be on the spot \nand functioning, by the time the rest of the Staff arrived. Major General \nMcNair, who had been Chief of Artillery of the First Army, was left in com\u00ac \nmand of the old First Army area, to supervise the work of tidying-up and of \nsalvage. But once the activity of the move was over, and once we had settled \nourselves in billets at Bar-sur-Aube, life was dreary in the extreme. It rained \nall the time; the Aube overflowed its banks and spread over the adjoining \nfields; the dampness pervaded everything with a chill that cut like a knife. \nOccasionally, a watery looking sun would come out for an hour or two, take a \nlook at the dismal scene, only to disappear again, and then it would rain some \nmore. I sloshed about in mud and water, in a sort of treadmill, going from \nbillet to mess, to Headquarters and back again, over the same route, lingering \nwhere there was a stove or some other form of warmth. Everyone at Head\u00ac \nquarters wrote up the history of the War in so far as their respective depart\u00ac \nments of the Staff were concerned. This was a monumental work for the Opera\u00ac \ntions and Intelligence Sections and for the Chief of Staff\u2019s office, but it did \nnot take me personally very long, as there was not a great deal of ground to \ncover, and after that there was literally nothing at all for me to do. Upon two \noccasions I was sent back to Souilly by General Drum as his personal repre\u00ac \nsentative, to inquire into certain aspects of the work of salvage and of policing \nthe old First Army Sector which were unsatisfactory. I was received by Gen\u00ac \neral McNair at his mess, and conducted my inquiries, and made my suggestions \nand my report, with such tact as I could muster. These two trips were welcome \nbreaks in the monotony, but they only accounted for a few days. The routine \nwork of the Message Centre was now so light that I left one of the juniors in \ncharge as a rule, and only spent three or four hours a day in my office. In\u00ac \nfluenza, of varying degrees of severity, induced by the constant rain and damp\u00ac \nness, gave most of us something to think about for a while. I remember that \non the night before my final departure from Bar-sur-Aube, I dined with General \nLiggett\u2019s Aide in the very superior house in which they were billeted. Waited \non by two \u201cstrikers\u201d and fed by the General\u2019s cook, we had the place to our\u00ac \nselves, for, upstairs, General Liggett and General Drum were both in bed \nwith the \u2019flu. My pleasant relations with the General\u2019s Aide had been resumed; \nhe confided to me that he felt suffocated at times by the constant atmosphere \nof high rank in which he had to live, although he was now a Lieutenant-Colonel \nhimself. Often, when the weather permitted, we would take walks together \nin the evening. It was the thought of the approach of Christmas which made \n\n\nWITHOUT CENSOR \n\n\ni37 \n\n\nme resolve to get away at all costs from my watery surroundings, even if only \nfor a few days, and I applied for a week\u2019s leave in Paris. \n\nLeave for Paris was not easy to secure; one had to have a good reason for \nwanting to go there. Knowing this, I thought that I would make assurance \ndoubly sure by having several. In my application I stated that I must have \nmy eyes examined and my glasses changed; that I must see one of my family \nwho was on the Staff of the Chief of Air Service in Paris, in order to discuss \nwith him some matters of importance; that another relative was with the \nPeace Conference, and that I must talk over some more family affairs with \nhim. Assistant Secretary of War Stettinius had suddenly appeared in my \noffice at Souilly one night on a visit to his son at the front, and had been so \npolite as to say that he hoped to see me later in Paris; I implied in my applica\u00ac \ntion for leave that the Assistant Secretary of War was simply marking time \nthere until I arrived. I do not know which of these reasons did the trick. Cer\u00ac \ntainly, the combination of them proved irresistible, for my application was \nreturned, approved, and I went to Paris, where it was at least fifteen degrees \nwarmer than in the provinces in spite of the constant rain, and where I spent \na week in a servant\u2019s room at the top of one of the hotels, the very last accom\u00ac \nmodation, I think, that was available in the city. The Peace Conference was \nall over the place, but the underlings whom I saw did not know anything, and \nI could not get to any of the \u201chigher-ups\u201d. I gave it up as a bad job, therefore, \nand spent the mornings visiting many of the churches, and the afternoons \nin driving about with a wounded friend who had been so fortunate as to secure \na car for his private use (all motors, including many cars from Army units, \nhad been commandeered for the Peace Conference, which, as can be seen, \nhad already started to make trouble), and the evenings in dining with officer \nfriends. Two events of that visit stand out in my memory. I dined one night \nat the apartment of a French Major General who had commanded an army \ncorps; his wife was an American, who had been given the Legion of Honour \nfor her war work. There were a number of people at dinner, both army and \npolitical, among them old Madame Waddington, whose Letters of a Diplomat's \nWife I had read long before and enjoyed. I told her so, when I found myself^ \nnext to her at table, and discovered that she had known some of my peopHF \nin the older generations, and we, or rather I, had a perfectly delightful evening. \n\nFar advanced in years then, her mind was as keen and as accurate as ever. \nHer questions and her comments were acute and trenchant. She took part \nin all the table talk, both military and political, and I learned more from her \nin an hour of what was actually taking place at the Peace Conference than I \nshould have discovered by hanging about Paris for a month. She was au courant \nwith everything, and I left immensely stimulated, not only by the atmosphere \nwhich was so different from that in which I had recently been, but by contact \nw^ this remarkable old lady, so prodigal of her vitality although already \nin mu and frail. \n\nI shall never forget the Christmas Service which I attended at the church \nof St. Germain-l\u2019Auxerrois. It was one of those things which can never be \n\n\ni3\u00ab \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nforgotten. The church was thronged; it would have been impossible for another \nperson to have entered; the crowds were massed in the aisles, and extended \nforward to the altar itself. The numbers were impressive, but it was the atmos\u00ac \nphere, the feel of that great congregation, that clutched at the heart, that made \none\u2019s breath come short. Black, of course, predominated; there were few, if \nany, there who had not lost those who were near and dear. But the War was \nover, the enemy at their gates had been driven back after long years, France \nhad been saved. Nothing else mattered. They had come there, in a spirit of \nutter thankfulness, to give thanks, to adore. All else was forgotten, or, if it \nwas not forgotten, they had come to give thanks that personal sorrow and \nsacrifice and loss had been possible, that they had thus been able to give. De\u00ac \nvout, with a reverence and a consecration that could be felt, they took their \npart in the service and in the responses. It was when the choir began the \n\u201cVenite, Adoremus\u201d, that the climax came. A wave of feeling swept over \nthat vast throng that brought one to one\u2019s knees. Everyone sang. Some \nstanding, heads thrown back, faces illumined; others, kneeling and bowed, \nprostrate in utter humility; but all sang. Tears were running down the faces \nof men and women; they wept openly and unashamed. They were tears of joy, \noblations. As that swelling volume of sound rose and fell, one could sense, \nas it were, all of the elements of which it was composed, one could almost catch \nthe notes of individual heart-break; of unendurable longing for those who \nwere gone; of inexpressible regret that they, too, could not, as they would \nhave wished, give thanks there for the preservation of all that they had died \nto save. But the individual note was blended, was drowned, in the universal \nmotif of thanksgiving, in a spirit of adoration such as must animate the choirs \nof angels when they sing in the Presence. As verse succeeded verse, a new \nnote was struck, struck again and again, and finally held, until it became the \npredominant tone in the symphony. A note of courage and of hope, of supreme \nconfidence for the future, based upon certain assurance. They knew , those \npeople, carried out of themselves, looking down, momentarily, from the heights. \nIt was as if those high in the spiritual hierarchy, drawn to Reality, present in \nperson because Reality was there, had in their divine compassion infused into \nadoring hearts this new hope, this fresh courage, until it sounded forth. Sacrifice \nand heart-break and sorrow had been transmuted and changed. All things \nhad become new, by virtue of that wave of selfless adoration, of instinctive \nthanksgiving. The deathless Spirit of France was looking forward again. The \nformer things had passed away. \n\nI returned to Bar-sur-Aube on December 30th. On that same day, as I \nwas to learn two days later from a cablegram which I received late in the night, \nMr. Griscom had died. I could hardly believe that it was possible. I had not, \nof course, even known that he was ill. I sat up most of the rest of that night, \nthinking things out. I knew that I must get home, and at once. It was not \nthat anyone, least of all any of the younger ones, could take his place. But \nI knew what a great gap his going would leave, that it would be necessary \nto close ranks, and I hoped that, perhaps, if I were on the spot, I might be \n\n\nWITHOUT CENSOR \n\n\ni39 \n\n\nallowed to assist in assuming some of the minor burdens which the older ones \nin the Movement were carrying, so that they could to that extent be free to \ncarry on those phases of the work to which Mr. Griscom had devoted himself. \nHis death seemed to me, without any doubt, to be a sign that the work which \nI had come to France in the hope of doing, was over. From the military point \nof view, it was clearly over. There would be no more fighting. Later on, if I \nremained in France, it was likely that new work might be found for me, perhaps \nsimilar to my two return visits to Souilly, when I had represented the General \non special missions of inquiry; possibly there would be in this new work oppor\u00ac \ntunity for personal advancement. But all that was of no importance whatever \nnow; anyone could do that sort of thing acceptably; the real work, the real \nduties, were done. It became a question as to how I could arrange an early \ndeparture for home. \n\nFortunately, I had developed a minor physical ailment, which I thought \nmight profitably be exaggerated. This meant assuming the status of an in\u00ac \nvalid, and I did not feel in the least like one, but it was as good a way as any \nto get home, I thought, and I decided to try it. Success appeared doubtful \nfor some time, as I became thoroughly entangled in the red tape of the Medical \nCorps. Finally it was decided that my medical status would depend upon \nwhat an authority at the Base Hospital at Chaumont thought. He turned \nout to be a doctor from New York, an attendant at one of the large hospitals \nthere, who knew some members of my family; and, without relaxing any of \nthe Army medical etiquette, he assured me that I could count upon his getting \nme past the examining Board of Officers and upon my being marked for home. \nI took nothing for granted in the Army any more. I moved over to the Hospital \nat Chaumont, but I arranged with the Adjutant General First Army that I \nshould not be dropped from the Roster at Headquarters until I had telephoned \nhim from Chaumont that I had been safely passed. I spent several pleasant \ndays at that Hospital, suffering no inconvenience whatever, paying calls \non officers whom I knew at General Headquarters, and taking my meals \nat the officers\u2019 mess. Finally, my specialist was as good as his word, and I was \nticketed to be returned to the United States as physically disabled, which \nmade me want to laugh. It took some time, however, to get home. It was \nseveral days before the hospital train went out, on which I must travel, wh^frher \nI liked it or not. I felt that I was there under false pretences, among ^^hc \nseriously wounded on that train. There were men on board whose legs had \nrecently been amputated, the stumps of which were still so painful that they \ncould not bear the touch of a blanket; they could not feed themselves, and the \nmedical attendance was inadequate, so I joined hands with several other officers, \nall \u201cwalking cases\u201d, and we passed food around at meal hours, and held tins \nof fluids to their lips while they drank. It took thirty-six hours for that hospital \ntrain to reach Nantes, a distance of about two hundred miles, I think, during \nwhich time the sick men were without proper medical care; fortunately, no \n^ one died en route. I spent two weeks at an Officers\u2019 Hospital at Nantes, which \nwas run with such negligence and inefficiency, by one of the Regular Army \n\n\n\n\n\n140 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nMedical Corps, that a Lieutenant-Colonel, with whom I had made friends en \nroute, and I, seriously discussed the advisability of preferring charges against \nthe Commanding Officer and of remaining in France for the Court Martial; we \nfinally relinquished the idea as being impracticable. Nantes was a pleasant \ntown, with an opera and a good picture gallery, but its resources were exhausted \nlong before the two weeks were up. Another week was spent in a Hospital at \nSt. Nazaire, where there was nothing whatever to do. Finally, on January \n31st, 1919, I embarked on the SS. \u201cFinland\u201d, which had been converted into a \nhospital ship, and was full of sick and wounded, and, after a rough and stormy \npassage,\u2014I arrived safely in New York on the 14th of the following month. \n\nAt the end of the third week in October, 1918, Marshal Foch had drawn up \na special instruction for the General Commanding the American Army and \nfor the General Commanding the Centre Group of French Armies, with the \nobject of assuring close co-operation between the American First Army and the \nFrench Fourth Army in their joint offensive, and particularly in that last phase, \nthat final drive which had as an objective, unblocking the line of the Aisne \nfrom the east. The enemy had for long been on the defensive, he showed signs \nof giving way, his retreat was in sight. It seemed to Marshal Foch that, in the \ncircumstances, the preliminary plans \u201cindicated a return to the method of attack \nwhich consisted in marking beforehand on the map successive lines to be reached, \nand betrayed an exaggerated solicitude in the matter of alignment\u201d. Accord\u00ac \ningly, the following directive was issued: \n\nImportant results such as we are pursuing in the present stage of the war, when we \nare confronted by an enemy whose exhaustion increases every day, can only be achieved \nby progress as rapid and as deep as possible. \n\nTroops launched into an attack need not think of anything except the direction of their \nattack. In that direction they must go as far as they can, attacking and manoeuvring \nagainst the resisting enemy with no pre-occupation as to alignment,\u2014units which have \ngot the farthest forward working for the advantage of those temporarily delayed. They \nmust operate, not against lines indicated a priori and suggested by the nature of the \nground, but against the enemy; and once they have seized him they must never let go \ntheir grip. \n\nThe strategy and the tactics of the inner spiritual warfare are not for the \nbeginner; they are not for him who stands at the very commencement of the \nWay. For him, it is a case of first proving himself in single hand-to-hand \nconflict with individual faults and sins and weaknesses. He must first with\u00ac \nstand counter-attack after counter-attack; he must be tempered and tested \nand tried, until he can control the elements of his lower nature, until he has \nhis higher forces\u2014partially developed, partially trained, it may be\u2014under his \ncommand. Not until he has met successfully test after test of this nature; \nnot until he is able, in some measure at least, consciously to direct those higher \nforces, can he avail himself of the strategy and the tactics of the inner life. \nHe cannot do this while still defending himself from an attacking inner enemy, \nwho can choose the point of his attack. He can only do so when that inner \n\n\n\nWITHOUT CENSOR \n\n\n141 \n\nenemy is on the defensive, when he shows signs of giving way, when his retreat \nis imminent. This much accomplished, he can marshal his inner forces, as a \ngeneral moves his divisions in battle, deliberately choosing, not the ground \nupon which he will stand on the defensive, but the point at which he will him\u00ac \nself attack, and how he will do it. Then, and then only, does the parallel be\u00ac \ntween the inner spiritual warfare and the outer conduct of modern war become \nclear to him, and, translating from one set of terms to the other, he seeks skilled \ndirection, he seeks those facts which have been proven in actual outer experience, \nby those who speak with authority, that he may apply them within. \n\nWe have been told that, because Marshal Foch really dealt with principles, \nexpressed in terms of force instead of in terms of consciousness; because he \nhad thought deeply; because he was profoundly religious, his writings may \neasily be paraphrased as a treatise on the spiritual combat. In terms of that \ninner warfare, what exactly is the hidden meaning for us in the extract above \nfrom a purely military directive? He is telling us, I think, that we must stop \nappraising and measuring our inner progress; that we must cease being satisfied \nwith the attainment of a minor inner objective which we have laid out for our\u00ac \nselves in advance. He is saying that there is no such thing as finality in inner \ngrowth, that there is no limit whatsoever to that to which we may attain in \ninner ways, or to that to which we should aspire. He is pointing out that, as \ninner effort continues and is pressed, latent weaknesses of character\u2014the \nthings which we still have to \u201cmop-up\u201d, to overcome\u2014grow less strong daily; \nthat, when the growing exhaustibn of our inner enemy becomes apparent, \nwe must press forward in attack\u2014always the attack!\u2014giving no consideration \nwhatever to anything save to the attack itself. We must not be concerned \nwith our weaknesses, with our known faults; we must not be afraid that they \nwill impede our progress or hold us back. We must utilize our tried qualities \nin attack and in manoeuvre, forcing their further growth and development \nto the fullest possible extent, in the realization that they, farthest advanced \nas they are, will work always to the advantage of our most backward char\u00ac \nacteristics. We must know where we are going, where it is we want to go, and, \nonce we know this, we must go as far as we can, where we can. If we will do \nthis, never faltering, never wavering, never letting go, we may be sure that \nwe shall find back of us, reinforcing us, the High Command. \n\nThis, I think, is what a master of outer warfare is telling us, in terms of the \ninner spiritual combat. We shall do well, I think, to apply it, always basing \nthe action we take upon the fundamental qualities of the true soldier, of which \nthe greatest, perhaps, is humility. It is humility which makes initial obedience \npossible. It is the habit of obedience, the instinctive recognition of higher \nauthority, of the hierarchy, which, in turn, reinforces humility, and which \nleads to other things. \n\n\n{The End) \n\n\nCenturion. \n\n\nNOURISHMENT \n\n\n0 avoid possible misconception, perhaps it is well to state now that \n\n\n\nthis article does not recommend specialization, on the one hand, nor \n\n\nexpansiveness, on the other; at least according to the connotation \noften given those words to-day. In discussing, recently, some of the more \nblatant bewilderments current in the world, two acquaintances, neither of whom \nis a student of Theosophy, made the following salient comments. One of them \nsaid, \u201cThere are too many specialists. A specialist is a man who knows more \nand more about less and less, and everything about nothing.\u201d The other \nacquaintance took the opposite view. He remarked, \u201cHow about the multi\u00ac \nfarious number of expansive ideas? The world literally is choked with them. \nThey are tumbling over each other, in constant conflict and debate; some \ngoing so far as to take issue with God because God does not seem to agree \nwith them.\u201d So, the subject matter of this article advocates neither of these \ntwo extremes: narrowing knowledge down to ascertain the diameter and the \ncircumference of a pin head; nor reaching out broadside, as it were, to take \nhold of some idea which, momentarily, has popular appeal. \n\nInstead, our theme is man\u2019s use of his whole nature wisely; that is, in ac\u00ac \ncordance with the natural law of evolution; which is divine law. Our theme \nis transformation; exfoliation. \n\nDuring a past winter, several meetings of the New York Branch were \ndevoted to a discussion of man\u2019s power to receive and to use inspiration. It \nwas pointed out that inspiration is a divine gift; yet man can help to prepare \nthe way to receive this gift more abundantly. Also, it was shown that inspi\u00ac \nration is dangerous. So is any divine gift, for it is a two-edged sword, cutting \nboth ways. Nevertheless, man can take measures to lessen, if not entirely to \neliminate, the danger of the misuse of that which comes from the spiritual \nworld. Man is a creature of dual nature. He has a higher and a lower nature; \na Higher Self and a lower self, with which latter he, now, for the most part, \nassociates his centre of consciousness, his sense of I am I. The problem is for \nhim to raise his centre of self-identification, inward and upward, so that it \nbecomes conjoined, at one, with the Higher Self. That Self, in man, is the \nindividualized vehicle of spirit, with the power, the capacity, to receive and to \nuse divine gifts. \n\nThere is the goal; but, that man is far from any such state of perfection, is \napparent from the general confusion rife in the world at present. Wherever \none looks, are to be found false prophets crying, \u201clo here, lo there\u201d; each with \nhis own pet panacea offered as a cure-all. Among these, there are some who, \nin a sincere search for truth, have found a small fragment of it; and, because \nit has helped them, they have wrapped it around with creed and dogma, and, \nwith the best of intention, offer the formula to others as the only sure way \n\n\n142 \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nNOURISHMENT \n\n\ni43 \n\n\nout. With their motive one can have sympathy, even while recognizing a \nmisuse of divine gifts. On the other hand, there are those who premeditatedly \nhave concocted selfish schemes, dressed them in a cloak having mob appeal, \nand who deliberately use their schemes, either to place themselves in power, \nor to retain their power if they have it. Recently, in America, much has been \nheard about \u201cthe forgotten man\u201d, and thousands rallied to that phrase because \nof its appeal to the lower emotions. In reality, there is no such thing. Those \nwho have the slightest familiarity with the Christian Bible should be able to \nrecall the words of the Master Christ on this subject: \u201cBehold the fowls of \nthe air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into bams; yet \nyour heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they?\u201d \n\nIt is man who has done the forgetting. He has forgotten his relationship \nwith, and his indebtedness to, the Fatherhood, and so fails to see that with\u00ac \nout true recognition of the Fatherhood there can be no brotherhood. \n\nThe misuse of divine gifts by man is a national problem, a world problem, \nand a universal problem; for it has direct bearing on the ultimate salvation of \nmankind. Nevertheless, it resolves itself into an individual problem as ex\u00ac \npressed in the age-old maxim: \u201cMan know thyself\u201d. To that problem this \narticle addresses itself in terms of nourishment, as illustrated in the law of \nCycles, the doctrine of correspondences, and the seven principles of man. \n\nWestern man takes himself too much for granted. The peoples of the East \nare not so inclined. By nature they are more contemplative, and are more \ndisposed to ask, \u201cWho am I; whence come; whither bound?\u201d\u2014and to seek \nthe answer by retreating quietly within themselves. Westerners, on the other \nhand, are given to action rather than to contemplation, to regarding externals \ninstead of looking beneath, or behind, the surface. Superficial action, spring\u00ac \ning from a wrong, or lower, centre, often results in producing a sense of \nsuperiority. Hence, we of the West have made the mistake of trying to occi- \ndentalize those of the East, ignorantly, perhaps arrogantly, assuming that our \nmethod is superior. Yet it would be as much of a mistake if Easterners tried \nto orientalize us; nor should we attempt to follow their system in its entirety, \nespecially as it has become perverted in certain Eastern cults of to-d^y. \nNevertheless, we can apply with profit the philosophy which lies bajffd \nthe Eastern mode of life. That philosophy is based on the truths held and \nlived by the sages of old; truths which have survived the surface flux and \nflow of the centuries; the truths which Madame Blavatsky\u2014the Lodge Mes\u00ac \nsenger of the nineteenth century\u2014revived for the Western world as Theosophy. \n\nTheosophical philosophy shows that manifestation is not a continuous pro\u00ac \ncess; but is periodical, recurring, cyclic. At the beginning of a Manvantara, \nor Great Cycle of manifestation, lasting some trillions of years, Light, or Life, \nissues from the Source, the One, courses outward and downward from plane \nto plane, setting all in motion, vivifying, vitalizing, unifying; somewhat as we \nfcnight imagine a giant electric spark infusing the entire universe. As the \nradiant energy descends, each plane is a projection, or reflection, of the plane \nnext above; Light, or Life, diversifying more and more, until, on our plane, \n\n\n144 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nit manifests in heterogeneous ways and forms that it, the incomprehensible, \nmay become comprehensible to our finite minds. Hence, it is said of a Great \nCycle of manifestation, that the fructifying and energizing genius proceeds \nfrom Unity, through diversity, and back to Unity; for, when the descending \nimpulse has spent itself, the life current turns inward and upward and starts \nits ascent back toward the One, the Source. As the indrawal proceeds, the \nreverse of the outward movement occurs, for, now, each plane is nourished by \nthe plane next below; that nourishment\u2014the fruit of experience gained during \nmanifestation\u2014ultimately being carried up to enrich the Source. \n\nThe doctrine of correspondences shows the same process taking place in \nnature, in the way in which the mineral kingdom nourishes the vegetable, and \nthe vegetable, in turn, the animal and the animal man. The seed, and, \nlater, the roots of the plant, draw nourishment from the minerals in the earth. \nWhen the plant has reached its ripeness, it is used to nourish the kingdom \nnext above, the animal. This is a perfectly natural process in nature, a normal \nfunction of life; so normal, in fact, that we hardly think of the sacrificial aspect \nof it. Should it not be just as natural, as normal, for man to sacrifice the lower \nwithin himself that the higher may be nourished; the lower self in favour of \nthe Higher Self? Yet, man hesitates at taking the step; he shrinks from it as \nthough it were suicidal. He sees it as loss through sacrifice, instead of as gain \nby transformation, exfoliation. He remains smug in his wrong self-identification. \n\nIt is not that nourishment ceases to come from above, any more than the \nsun stops nourishing the plant; but man must cease to pervert it to his own \nselfish uses. All nourishment originally came from above, and it is with \nthat which he has perverted that man must gain his immortality. As the \nplant grows, it meets, and, in its way, uses, at a higher level, the rays coming \nto it from the sun. Likewise, man, turning inward and upward the force he \nhas misused, can receive and use divine gifts at a higher level of conscious\u00ac \nness. Not only that, but there are tides in the affairs of men, which, if taken \nat the flood, lead on to \u201cfortune\u201d. Within the Manvantara there are many lesser \ncycles, one of which is the one hundred year or century cycle. At present, \nwe are passing through the indrawal phase of this cycle. It is a period particu\u00ac \nlarly pertinent to the thesis of this article; a time when man, by drawing in\u00ac \nward and upward the force he has perverted, can put himself en rapport with \nthe present cyclic current. \n\nWestern theologians point to no such road to immortality. Having dwarfed \nand perverted the teaching of the Master Christ, and failed to discern the \nresemblance between it and the teaching of the Buddha, they would have \nman believe that an anthropomorphic God in some way confers immortality, \nafter one brief, and, usually, haphazard, existence on earth. The philosophy \nof the Eastern mode of life, on the other hand, shows that everything in nature, \nincluding man, must use effort to survive, and not at haphazard, but an effort \nthat is pointed and purposeful; shows, moreover, that individual immortality \nis for him who gains it through his own courageous work and aspiration, \nsustained during a senes of incarnations, and not just for one short corporeal \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nNOURISHMENT \n\n\ni45 \n\n\nspan. This philosophy emphasizes the necessity of transferring the centre of \nconsciousness from the transient personality to the enduring individuality, if \nwe would gain immortality. To help towards an understanding of the way in \nwhich this transfer may be effected, it shows man, as well as the Universe and \nall in it, to be sevenfold: man as a creature of seven principles. \n\nA brief consideration of three of these principles will be sufficient to indicate \nthe method of the transfer in question. To use the English equivalents of the \nSanskrit names, these three principles are: at the upper pole of man\u2019s nature, \nDivine Will, pure and eternal; at the lower pole, its perversion, personal desire, \nessentially selfish and transitory; and, oscillating between the two, Mind or \nSelf-consciousness\u2014the sense of I am I. The transfer is made by drawing \ninward and upward the force that is now behind personal desire, starving per\u00ac \nsonal desire, as such, and using the force, thus turned, to nourish Divine Will. \nAs this force, originally divine but perverted by man, is raised, Mind or Self- \nconsciousness is carried inward and upward, from level to level, as it were, \nuntil, ultimately, it is transferred from the selfish and transitory personal \ndesire, to the pure and eternal Divine Will. Thus the sense of I am I becomes \nconjoined with the immortal element in man. \n\nTo accomplish this, meditation and, its advanced step, contemplation, are \nnecessary. Meditation, however necessary, is but part of the process. There \nmust be accompanying action. In this regard, Western man has a precious \nheritage in that he is a creature of action, once his acts spring from, and are \ncontrolled by, a centre which is one-pointed and high-pointed; once his sense \nof I am I has been raised to a level where the feeling of superiority has given \nway to the quality of humility. The doctrine must be lived, acted out in daily \nlife; the impulse of the meditation put into practice, so that each successive \nmeditation is enriched by the fruits of experience. The transfer of self-identi\u00ac \nfication from the lower to the Higher Self is a definitely practical matter, in\u00ac \nvolving man\u2019s seemingly trivial and mundane, yet infinitely important, every \nthought and act. Why does he cross the street? Why does he eat corned \nbeef and cabbage? Why does he keep a certain book on the table beside his \nfavourite chair? As in the Great Life Cycle, spirit descends into matter, mani\u00ac \nfests in the particular, and carries the nourishment of the experience tlum \ngained, from plane to plane, back to enrich the Source; so man, no mat^^ \nhow obscure his place in the world may appear to be, by his every thought and \nact, not only can nourish the god within himself, but, so doing, can benefit \nhis nation and the race: more than that, he can help to bring fonvard the ulti\u00ac \nmate salvation of the whole of mankind. \n\nIn the revolution of the Manvantaric Cycle, and in the evolution of the \nsoul, the Universal translates itself in the particular, and the particular assumes \nuniversal significance. \n\n\nG.M.W.K. \n\n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME \n\n\nHE promise to speak on the subject of what happens after death was \n\n\n\nbeginning to worry one of our number. As soon as we assembled \n\n\nhe said so, determined to pick the brains of his friends, whose sug\u00ac \ngestions he was prepared to adopt or reject with entire impartiality. He would \nin any case make them work for him; they would liberate some energy, perhaps \nincluding his own. His name, for the Recorder\u2019s immediate purpose, may as \nwell be Smith. \n\nSaid Smith: \u201cHow shall I begin? With a lot of quotations from Madame \nBlavatsky and Judge?\u201d \n\n\u201cNo!\u201d, the Philosopher exclaimed. \u201cDo not rely on authority; begin with a \nbrief statement of the problem, followed by an equally brief statement of the \nsolutions which the public is offered, on the one hand by materialism, on the \nother, by orthodox religion, and show that both are unsatisfactory.\u201d \n\nSmith laughed. \u201cOrthodox religion! Do you mean the Hell, Purgatory, \nHeaven of the Roman Catholics, or the \u2018Hope for the Best\u2019 of the Protestants?\u201d \n\n\u201cMention both\u201d, the Philosopher replied, undaunted. \n\n\u201cWhat next?\u201d \n\n\u201cAfter showing that the Protestant solution is hopelessly inadequate, and that \nthe R. C. solution is cut-and-dried, and that it excludes the large majority of \nthe human race, go on to-.\u201d \n\n\u201cExcuse me: but whom does the R. C. doctrine exclude?\u201d \n\n\u201cEveryone except themselves and a few Protestants whom they smuggle \ninto Purgatory by pretending that they would have been Catholics except for \n\u2018invincible ignorance\u2019. They make no provision for a good Pagan; they deprive \nthe Indian of his \u2018happy hunting ground\u2019; they would leave Buddha, Shankara, \nand the great adepts and saints of other religions, past and present, shivering \nin the cold, not fit for Hell as they have to admit, and, in their eyes, equally \nunfit for Heaven, while Purgatory is impossible because only those who desire \nChristian salvation can go there.\u201d \n\n\u201cPlease continue.\u201d \n\n\u201cGo on, as I was saying, by presenting the theosophical solution, basing this \nupon what we know of universal laws of growth.\u201d \n\n\u201cWhy don\u2019t you give my talk?\u201d asked Smith. \n\n\u201cI shall before we get through\u201d, the Philosopher answered cheerfully. \n\n\u201cNo such luck\u201d, said Smith; \u201cbut what of these universal laws of growth? \nWhy start there?\u201d \n\n\u201cOn the principle of working from the known to the unknown, and because \n\u2018Man is the mirror of the Universe\u2019.\u201d \n\n\u201cI never knew anything quite so pat\u201d, said Smith. \u201cYou must have been \ngiving this talk all your life.\u201d \n\n\n146 \n\n\n\n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME \n\n\ni47 \n\n\n\u201cNo\u201d, said the Philosopher, \u201cbut you are forcing me to take the trouble to \nthink.\u201d \n\n\u201cSorry\u201d, said Smith; \u201cbut please keep it up. What comes next?\u201d \n\n\u201cReally\u201d, said the Philosopher, \u201cthat ought to be obvious.\u201d \n\n\u201cI wish it were. It\u2019s not.\u201d \n\n\u201cAfter explaining very briefly\u2014for you must not exceed your thirty minutes \n\u2014the law of alternating periods of expansion and contraction, of exfoliation \nand indrawal, and using sleeping and waking, summer and winter, and the life- \ncycle of a bulb or a tree to illustrate this, you should point out how useless it is \nto speculate about man\u2019s condition or nature after death, until we have solved \nthe problem of his nature or constitution while alive on earth. For example, \nif man were merely a body; if, as Buchner said, the brain secretes thought as \nthe liver secretes bile, death would be the end of consciousness and there would \nbe no future life. Instead, what we now are, we shall be,\u2014minus only the \nphysical body, and the grosser elements of the astral or etheric body.\u201d \n\n\u201cI think that would be misleading, or in any case that it begs the question, \nwhich is: how much of our present consciousness will be left behind when the \nbody dies? In other words, what, if any, will be the difference between the \nstate of consciousness which we enter, and the state we leave behind us when \nwe die? People want to know: Shall I be the same person?\u201d \n\n\u201cThe two questions are not the same, for the same person is in many different \nstates of consciousness during every day and night of his life. However, the \nstate of consciousness which we first enter when we die, must necessarily be the \nresult of our state at the time of death. Thus, if a man dies in great discomfort \nor pain, his first reaction on the other side would be one of immense relief: the \nphysical pain would have ceased. If he were killed instantly in battle, and the \nwhole force of his nature had been concentrated on what he was doing, he would \nat first continue doing it,\u2014except in those rare cases when a man has acquired \nsufficient detachment to see himself as the spectator of his own actions, ancj^fl \nkeep in touch, while fighting, with his Master and the spiritual world. In that \ncase he would know instantly that he had been killed, and would find himself \nwith his Master, in Paradise. By some means or other you will have to make \nit clear to your audience that our first state of consciousness after death is the \nresult of our dominant thought and feeling when we die, and then of our habitual \nthinking and feeling.\u201d \n\n\u201cEasier said than done\u201d, commented Smith. \n\n\n\u201cQuite easy\u201d, was the reply, \u201cif you will explain that death is like waking \nfrom a nightmare: in some cases the awakening is immediate and complete; in \nothers, the impression of the nightmare persists for an appreciable time. In \n\n\n\nthat in death as in life, no two persons have the same experience. You must \nrub this in: a thunder-storm will terrify one person and exhilarate another; \nthat what is a temptation for some men will repel and disgust others of different \n\n\n148 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\ncharacter. Character is the determining factor, there as here; so even the first \nreaction to death varies enormously as between different individuals.\u201d \n\n\u201cAt this rate\u201d, said Smith, \u201cI shall need two hours instead of thirty minutes.\u201d \n\n\u201cYou can\u2019t have two hours. If you had them you would cause death, instead \nof explaining it.\u201d \n\n\u201cThank you\u201d, said Smith, beaming. \u201cThat possibility was beginning to \nworry me. Now for what corresponds to the \u2018Day of Judgment\u2019,\u2014I mean that \nsummation of a man\u2019s deeds and experience, as seen by his higher self, which \nsome have remembered when resuscitated from drowning.\u201d \n\n\u201cYou can\u2019t cover everything\u201d, vouchsafed the Philosopher, as a concession, \nperhaps, to Smith\u2019s limitations; \u201cyou might leave that to be brought up by \nsome questioner.\u201d \n\n\u201cAnd if it should be brought up?\u201d \n\n\u201cMy answer would be that the summation of a man\u2019s life, and of the lesson \nto be drawn from it, ought to take place before death, and does when he has \nacquired the habit of self-examination and of regular review of his days and \nyears. In other cases it happens when life has left all parts of the body except \ncertain centres in the brain, and in yet other cases, such as sudden death by \naccident, it happens as soon as a man wakes up to the realization that he is \ndead. But, once more, if people want a cut-and-dried programme of this in\u00ac \nfinitely varying process which is known as Death, no true student of Theosophy \nwill attempt to supply it. From beginning to end, death varies as much as life \nvaries. How can it be otherwise! Suppose someone were to ask: \u2018What hap\u00ac \npens when you are bom into this world?\u2019 \n\n\u201cBut there are certain fundamentals you will have to cover, even if you omit \nall else. First, you must make it clear that Time, as we know it, is a concept \nderived solely from the limitations of our physical senses. You must remind \nyour audience of what all of them should know from their experience of dreams, \n\u2014that in three minutes or less of waking time, we can dream of events which \nseem to last for years, while, on the other hand, if a man be waked at six and \nat once goes to sleep again, to be waked again an hour later, he may be ready \nto swear that he had shut his eyes for less than a second. Time is an illusion. \nStates of consciousness which, as it were, incorporate a sense of time, are still \n\u2018earth-bound\u2019, that is to say, are still controlled to a great extent by the residue \nof earthly experience, or, in the case of an Adept, are deliberately accepted as \npart of his sacrifice. People always want to know: How soon shall I reincar\u00ac \nnate? H.P.B., pushed to the wall by the persistence of this question, answered \nthat the average interval between lives on earth, for the average of the human \nrace, is about fifteen hundred years; but apart from many well-known cases of \nreincarnation within a very few months or years after death, the soul that \nreturns quickly may feel as if he had been away for ages, while one who exceeds \nthe average may feel like the man who has just shut his eyes, only to be wakened \nagain. \n\n\u201cAnother fundamental truth you will have to emphasize is that \u2018We find \nwhat we bring\u2019,\u2014when we die, just as while we are on earth: for that is a law \n\n\n\n\n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME \n\n\n149 \n\n\nof consciousness. If an old peasant, a prize-fighter, an artist, go through an \nart gallery, each of them finds what he brings, and cannot see more than his \nnature, his past experience, his education, and his spiritual perception (if any), \nmake possible. Another aspect of the same law is that we find what we seek, \nfor our desire, often mixed, expresses what we are; but it may take time to find \nwhat we seek, while we find what we bring, instantly.\u201d \n\n\u201cExplain yourself\u201d, said Smith. \u201cI do not want to make my audience dizzy.\u201d \n\n\u201cWhy not?\u201d was the reply. \u201cIf you explain everything, you will give them \nnothing to think about.\u201d \n\n\u201cYou leave that to me\u201d, said Smith. \u201cIt is in any case your business for the \nmoment not to make me dizzy. Explain yourself.\u201d \n\n\u201cReally you ought to supply something\u201d, the Philosopher protested. \u201cHow\u00ac \never: ex nihilo nihil fit. I was of course referring to expectation, which is part \nof what we bring, but often is different from what we desire. H.P.B. is reported \nto have said that when Bradlaugh, the avowed materialist and atheist, died \nexpecting the annihilation of consciousness, his expectation would control, and \nthat, until he reincarnated, he would remain in a state of stupefaction or \nlethargic sleep. But his was an extreme case, and, properly to understand what \nhappens, we must again turn to our own experience. You meet someone, ex\u00ac \npecting to dislike him intensely, having been told by your friends that he is \nconceited, arrogant, insufferable; and you do dislike him, until slowly it dawns \nupon you that he is not what he seems to be, and that his bad manners are a \ndeplorable artifice to conceal his lack of self-confidence and his timidity. His \nvanity, you discover, is of the negative, not of the positive type,\u2014and there\u00ac \nafter pity, and a sort of sympathy, take the place of your earlier dislike. The \nsame thing is true of places: you may have been prejudiced against them, only \nto find that first-hand acquaintance reveals them as most attractive. Expecta\u00ac \ntion governs at first; it is part of what we bring to the encounter of any situa\u00ac \ntion; but if there be stronger elements at work, these soon gain the ascendancy, \nand we begin to find what we seek,\u2014what we really desire. \n\n\u201cIncidentally, expectation in its creative aspect, is a very interesting subject. \nWithout expectation, faith is a mere figure of speech. You might enlarge on \nthis if you have time.\u201d \n\n\u201cTime!\u201d exclaimed Smith. \u201cFirst you annihilate ft, then you fill it to the \nbursting point, and now expect me to have some of it to spare. Time! The \nlast of it disappeared several paragraphs ago.\u201d \n\n\u201cTo return to our muttons\u201d, said the Philosopher blandly; \u201cif a man dies, \neither fearing or desiring a life hereafter, but not expecting it, he will find \nwhat he brings, and, like Bradlaugh, may at first pass into unconsciousness; \nbut in most cases this will not last: his desire, whether for good or evil, will \nwal^jjim,\u2014and then he will find what he seeks. In other words, he may go \nto TM 1 , or he may go to some kind of Heaven.\u201d \n\nThis was too much for one of our visitors. \u201cHell!\u201d he said; \u201cyou don\u2019t mean \nto say that you people believe in hell!\u201d \n\n\u201cI never met anyone\u201d, replied the Philosopher, \u201cwho did not believe in hell \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\n150 \n\non earth; and if in the body, why not out of the body ? Hell on earth is a state \nof consciousness, is it not? We speak of a man as in hell because he is consumed \nwith envy, hatred, malice, or some other devilish feeling. Why should this \ncease at death ? Are you assuming that because a man sheds his physical body \nhe suddenly becomes a saint, or that he leaves his dominant desires and obses\u00ac \nsions behind him? Once more let us examine our experience. If a man who is \npossessed by some feeling of resentment, goes to sleep praying with all his heart \nto be delivered from it, there is every likelihood that he will wake up in the \nmorning, morally cleansed at that point. He has escaped from his hell. But if, \nas so often happens, instead of hating the evil that is in him, and praying for \ndeliverance, he clings to it, and goes to sleep justifying and fostering it, he \nmust inevitably wake up in the same if not in a worse condition. You must \nsurely have known someone who lived on his grievances\u2014whether real or \nimaginary makes no difference\u2014and who brooded on them incessantly, cursing \nhis fate, and imagining, perhaps, with what eloquence he will accuse his enemies \n\u2018before the judgment seat of God\u2019. He was in hell if ever a man was, and, when \nhe dies, will naturally remain in the same state of consciousness until he rein\u00ac \ncarnates. He will then bring his sense of grievance with him, instinctively \nseeking those whom formerly he regarded as his enemies, and also seeking to \nrevenge himself on society in general, possibly as an anarchist, more likely, as \nthings now are, as a communist.\u201d \n\n\u2018\u2018But where is this place, with its burning pit and devils with barbed tridents?\u201d \n\n\u2018\u2018Nowhere\u201d, was the reply. \u2018\u2018In the first place, your suggested furnishings \nare not in line with modem expectation. In the second place, have you ever \nhad a nightmare, asleep perhaps in New York or London, but dreaming that you \nwere tottering on the very edge of a precipice, with a wild torrent in the gorge \nbelow you, drawing you down, down, down? Where was that \u2018place\u2019? You \nknow that in terms of waking consciousness it was not a place, though, in the \nworld of dream, it was as vividly real as any experience of earth.\u201d \n\n\u2018\u2018Do you mean that life hereafter is just a dream?\u201d \n\n\u2018\u2018Begin, if you will, by deciding to what extent our present existence is real, \nand to what extent it is made up of fancies,\u2014some painful, as when we dread the \nfuture, some agreeable, as when a girl thinks she is marrying a hero or a mil\u00ac \nlionaire who is actually nothing of the kind. Then try to realize that some \npeople are closer to reality than others, depending upon the stage of evolution, \nthat is, the degree of spiritual perception they have attained. Discrimination \nbetween the real and the unreal is, as Shankara said, the first step on the \npath of attainment.\u201d \n\n\u2018\u2018But what has that got to do with life after death?\u201d \n\n\u201cEverything; because if we seek reality here, we shall find it there, while \nthose who now cling to their fancies, to their illusions\u2014illusions about them\u00ac \nselves, or about the source of happiness\u2014will carry their dreams with them.\u201d \n\n\u201cReality\u201d, said our visitor, \u201cstrikes me as out in the cold, and lonely.\u201d \n\nWe laughed; but the Philosopher by this time was too busy to laugh. \u201cWould \nyou feel that way about it\u201d, he asked, \u201cif beauty as we know it here, were merely \n\n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME \n\n\ni Si \n\nthe shadow cast by the transcendent beauty of things in the real world? If \nreality meant the perfection of all that you, in your better moments, truly love \nand desire?\u201d \n\n\u201cI suppose not\u201d, our visitor replied; \u201cbut I should like to think it over.\u201d He \nseemed uneasy. \u201cWhat are these illusions you were talking about?\u201d \n\n\u201cTheir name is Legion\u201d, the Philosopher answered. \u201cEven the wise man, \nwho knows them for what they are, has to fight them, in some form or other, \nto his dying day. There is the illusion of Time, of which I have already spoken, \n\u2014if only he had more time! There is the illusion of results, of judging his past \nefforts by visible results. But we need not worry about his illusions. Our con\u00ac \ncern is with our own. We have outgrown, let us hope, the idea that a plentiful \nsupply of \u2018wine, women, and song\u2019 would insure our happiness, or that unlim\u00ac \nited opportunity for playing golf or bridge or even for reading, would content \nus. But have we rid ourselves of other illusions,\u2014do we still desire popular \nacclaim, or exalted position? Do we think that money alone, or ample leisure, \nor bodily health, or any other of the world\u2019s \u2018good things\u2019, would make us \nhappy? Finally (for this afternoon!) do we attribute our failures to \u2018bad luck\u2019, \nor to the enmity or stupidity of others, and do we imagine that we love when \nactually, though unconsciously, we are self-seeking and selfish? All these and \ninnumerable other illusions, depending upon the hold they have on us, will \ntend to create the character of our life hereafter, because, once more, we find \nwhat we bring: our present life, made up, as it is, of states of consciousness, \nwill be continued \u2018in our next\u2019, except for those states which are entirely physi\u00ac \ncal in origin,\u2014and it would be a great mistake to suppose that \u2018the lusts of the \nflesh\u2019 are necessarily left behind, seeing that, in so many cases, they are the \noff-spring of a diseased imagination and inhere in the psychic nature.\u201d \n\n\u201cBut they cannot be satisfied apart from the body!\u201d \n\n\u201cExactly; that is why one definition of hell is,\u2014a state of burning, unsatis\u00ac \nfied, evil desire.\u201d \n\nSmith by this time was restless. \u201cAll very interesting no doubt, but you are \nforgetting my talk; the thread of it is in such a tangle that-.\u201d \n\n\u201cIn that case the sooner you untangle it the better\u201d, the Philosopher inter\u00ac \nrupted; \u201cthat is, unless you prefer to leave it to your audience to do so for you.\u201d \n\n\u201cNot a bad idea\u201d, said Smith. \u201cAfter all, an audience ought to do something \nbesides listen. You suggest, as I understand you, that a certain amoujAof \nmuddle stimulates thought.\u201d \n\n\u201cIam suggesting nothing of the kind. You should be crystal clear.\u201d \n\n\u201cThat is just what I want to be\u201d, said Smith. \u201cPlease proceed. Where did \nyou leave off?\u2014with me, I mean.\u201d \n\n\u201cI did not leave off with you. Our visitor asked about hell, partly on your \nbehalf, because voicing a question any audience would ask.\u201d \n\n\u201cBut in that case you left me with no reply to other questions, inevitably \nresulting from what you said. Is hell everlasting? If not, how can you get \nout of it?\u2014and so forth.\u201d \n\n\u201cHow can hell be everlasting? Nothing is everlasting which involves separa- \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n152 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\ntion from divirfe unity. The Greek word means aeon-ian, or age-long. It has \nbeen mistranslated,\u2014although to anyone in that state of consciousness it may \nseem everlasting. How escape from it? Dante explained that: by reversing \nthe polarity of desire. How absurd you are! How many times in your life \nhave you said to yourself,\u2014this is hell! Examine your own experience.\u201d \n\n\u201cNo\u201d, said Smith. \u201cI am here as a questioner, and while that involves some \nthought, and no little worry in this case, it is part of the understanding that \nyou are to do the bulk of the thinking for me. Please proceed. Examine your \nown experience. How did you escape?\u201d \n\n\u201cNo\u201d, said the Philosopher in his turn; \u201cbut I will tell you how you did: \nsometimes by realizing, at last, that the torment was of your own creation; \nthat you alone were responsible both for its origin and continuance. Then, by \neffort of will, you forced yourself to pray that you might see things truly, and \nwhen that prayer was answered, as it always is, you prayed for forgiveness,\u2014 \nand escaped. In that case you entered temporarily a sort of heaven-world \n(still speaking in terms of states of consciousness). More often, however, in\u00ac \nstead of fighting to escape, your emotional and mental obsession merely wore \nitself out, in which case, instead of entering a higher state, you just drifted back \ninto your less insane, but very ordinary selfhood.\u201d \n\n\u201cThanks awfully\u201d, said Smith. \u201cWhat next?\u201d \n\n\u201cMake it clear, even if you have to repeat yourself, that none of this is new \ndoctrine, but is simply the less exoteric explanation of the teaching of Christ \nand of all the Avatars. When Christ said, \u2018In my Father\u2019s house are many \nmansions\u2019, and when he told the story of the rich man, and of Lazarus in Abra\u00ac \nham\u2019s bosom,\u2014he revealed in a few marvellous sentences, the substance of all \nthat Theosophy has to say on the subject of what happens after death. The\u00ac \nosophy, as the common source of all the great religions, explains and elaborates \nthe symbolism and parables which the Avatars employed when they addressed \n\u2018them that are without\u2019. And how few, even to this day\u2014even among the clergy \n\u2014see and rejoice in the significance of those words: \u2018I go to prepare a place for \nyou\u2019. Truly, heavenly death is also well provided for!\u201d \n\n\u201cWhat next?\u201d asked Smith. \n\nThe Philosopher laughed. \u201cDon\u2019t be absurd\u201d, he said. \u201cIn one breath you \ncomplain that I have filled your thirty minutes to bursting point; in the next, \nask for more. Is the thread still in a tangle?\u201d \n\nSmith stared into the fire; then, ruminatively: \u201cThe newspapers recently \nannounced that there had been a bad earthquake in Poland, particularly in \nPlszkhowski. Someone asked what was the name of the town before the earth\u00ac \nquake. I feel rather like that too.\u201d \n\n\u201cCheer up!\u201d was the reply. \u201cYou\u2019ll feel better when you set your own brains \nto work. What is that about \u2018in the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread\u2019? \nSo far as I am concerned, it is The End.\u201d \n\n\u201cWhat comes next?\u201d the Recorder now asked, turning from one to another \nof his contributors. \u201cHave you anything on your mind?\u201d \n\n\u201cA protest\u201d, the Student volunteered. \u201cThe American Museum of Natural \n\n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME \n\n\ni53 \n\n\nHistory in New York is supported, in large measure, out of city funds, that is, \nby those who pay municipal taxes. To this, there can be no possible objection, \nbut I do object when an institution of that kind assumes the function of public \neducator, especially when the instruction it fathers is not only grossly material\u00ac \nistic, but when it proclaims surmises, and the speculations of a sect of scientists, \nas unquestionable facts. On the cover-page of the March issue of Natural \nHistory , which is the official magazine of the Museum, there is a picture of a \nrat-like animal with a tuft at the end of its tail. Beneath this is the description. \n\u2018Your Rat-Like Ancestor\u2019. An article in the same issue tells you all about him, \nand supplies a pictorial genealogical tree showing the same creature as the \ncommon ancestor of monkeys, orang-outangs, gorillas, chimpanzees, and men. \nThe creature is known as Ptilocercus. The article states: \u2018At the foot of the \nladder leading up through monkeys and apes to man, this first ancestor of \nours, however reluctant we may be to admit it, looks much like a rat. 1 he \narticle itself will be read by very few. The trouble is that it repeats the lesson \ninculcated throughout the Museum, and especially, of course, in its biological \ndepartments, where the exhibits are designed to demonstrate the animal descent \nof man. Troops of children from the Public Schools of the city schools in \nwhich the teaching of religion in any form is prohibited\u2014are marched through \nthe Museum that they may be impressed by pictures, or the stuffed forms, of \ntheir alleged ancestors, and may thus be imbued with the doctrine that they \nthemselves are merely little animals. \n\n\u201cThis is a monstrous misuse of taxpayers\u2019 money; it is deliberately anti- \nreligious, only one degree removed from the exhibits in Soviet Russia, the \navowed purpose of which is to bring religion into contempt by ridicule and \n\u2018demonstration\u2019; and it is inherently dishonest and unscientific, seeing that \nthere is no proof whatever that the theories advanced as facts are true, while \nall the evidence tending to disprove those theories is carefully suppressed. \n\n\u201cThose who are responsible for this sort of subversive propaganda have \ndoubtless persuaded themselves that their motive is above suspicion, the \nenlightenment of the human race; but the truth is that there are hidden motives \nin a great many cases, sometimes known though not acknowledged; sometimes \nsubconscious. The dictum of Karl Marx, the prophet of Socialism, that \u2018Reli\u00ac \ngion is the opiate of the People\u2019, accounts for much of what is being do^lo \nundermine religion surreptitiously, as a preliminary to the establishmen^uy \nforce if necessary, of the Socialist State. \u2018Parlor pinks\u2019, though they would \nprefer to avoid the use of force, share the same dreams as those of the red \nvariety. \n\n\u201cThe motive which actuates others, sometimes subconsciously, is the desire \nto justify their own conduct, and to lead their acquaintances into the same \nhabit of giving free rein to their rat-like and other animal propensities. We \nare only one stage removed from apes\u2019, they say; \u2018therefore what is natural and \n\n( right for apes, cannot be wrong for us: all this talk about the moral law is super\u00ac \nstition, from which it is our duty to escape. Do what you feel like doing; express \nyourself and your \u201cnatural urge\u201d,\u2014and you can\u2019t go wrong.\u2019 I repeat: such \n\n\n\n\n\n\ni 5 4 THEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\nefforts to justify self-indulgence, account for much of this animal-descent \npropaganda. \n\n\u201cFor all of which reasons, and because the teaching in itself is false in prem\u00ac \nise as in conclusion,\u2014I protest against the use of museums supported by public \nfunds, not only in New York but throughout the country,\u2014I protest against \ntheir use for purposes which at best are sectarian, and which, in their re\u00ac \nsults, cannot fail to be demoralizing/* \n\n\u201cI second the motion\u201d, said the Engineer, \u201cbut with this addendum: that \nwhenever Ptilocercus or some other Lemuroid is displayed in Museums as the \nancestor of man, the notice shall in no circumstances read, \u2018Your Rat-like An\u00ac \ncestor\u2019, but \u2018My Rat-like Ancestor\u2019, and that this shall be signed by the Curator \nwho is responsible for the exhibit. After all, as opinions not facts are at issue, \nthe way to settle things amicably is to agree with our adversaries quickly that \nthey are the descendants of rats, toads, or any other animal, with the manners \nand morals of which they feel particularly in sympathy, or of which, in any \ncase, they believe themselves to be the kin. On the other hand, those of us \nwho are convinced that we can trace our descent to man as he was before the \nFall\u2014before the animal kingdom materialized\u2014and who have not forgotten \nour birthright, must necessarily infer that we are of a different and vastly better \nbreed than our animally-inclined opponents.\u201d \n\n\u2018\u2018Well\u201d, concluded the Recorder, \u2018\u2018having settled that matter to our satisfac\u00ac \ntion, if not to theirs, what, may I ask, have you been reading,\u2014less ex cathedra \nin tone, perhaps, than the finalities of Museum and similar scientists?\u201d And \nthe Recorder turned to the Historian, who is always reading something. \n\n\u2018\u2018I thought you would be asking me that question\u201d, was the response, \u2018\u2018so I \nbrought with me a book, Twenty Years as Military Attache, by Colonel T. Bentley \nMott (U. S. A.), which, in addition to much that is entertaining, contains re\u00ac \nminders of truths which most people either try to forget, or have refused even \nto recognize. If I may, 1 will read an extract as an illustration of what I mean.\u201d \nWhereupon the Historian read aloud as follows: \n\nOn my way to Fayolle\u2019s H.Q. at Saarbriicken, during this trip, I passed through \nMorhange, now once more French territory. At this place Robert Bacon and I had \nspent a horrible night while travelling to join General Pershing for the solemn entrance \ninto Strasburg, and the memory of what we had then seen arose to poison my present \nsatisfaction. The vast military hospital appeared like a charnel house; for immediately \nupon getting news of the Armistice, the Germans had smashed all the radiators, cut \nthe water-pipes and the toilet-drains, taken their food, medicines, doctors and nurses, \nand left the poor English and French prisoners that filled the place to die at their leisure. \nBefore help could arrive many of these weakened men were beyond revival, and the \nhorror of the spot, the very stench of it, remains with me to this day. \n\n1 could not but remember this spectacle of useless cruelty when I lunched with General \nMcLaughlin on the Rhine a few days later. He occupied part of a large house in a smil\u00ac \ning German town and he told me of his efforts to defend himself from abasing politeness on \nthe part of the inhabitants. The owners of tl e house and their daughters were sending \ndelicacies to his table and manifesting their friendly spirit in various ingenious ways. \nFinally McLaughlin had been compelled to send for them. \u2018\u2018We are still at war with \nyour country\u201d, he told them. \u201cI am occupying a part of your house in consequence of \n\n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME \n\n\ni55 \n\n\nthis situation. I desire to cause you the least possible annoyance, but our personal inter\u00ac \ncourse must be limited to what is strictly necessary. I thank you for your presents but \nI beg you to send no more.\u201d \n\nMcLaughlin went off the next day to watch the Christmas sports of his command. \nOn returning for dinner he found the table decorated with little Christmas trees and a \nnote from the lady of the house! I feel sure that had the situation been reversed, these \nsame persons would have taken keen delight in doing to McLaughlin\u2019s men what their \nbrethren had done to the poor devils in Morhange six weeks before. These are things \nthat decent people the world over ought to keep in mind, even though their rulers are \nimpelled by policy not to refer to them publicly. The German has an innate love of \ncruelty which creeps out whenever he is in the saddle, just as his cringing in the presence \nof superior force seeks to soften the blows which he naturally anticipates will be handed \nhim. That his people in the Rhine Provinces were not kicked about by the Allied troopers \nsurprised him completely. He knew what his soldiers would have done had the shoe \nbeen on the other foot. \n\n\n\u201cThere would be no need to remind the world of such things\u201d, the Historian \ncontinued, \u201cif it were not for the obstinate incredulity of some people, and the \nceaseless propaganda of others whose purpose it is to show that the English \nand French were just as bad as the Germans. The Irish in this country over\u00ac \nflow with that sort of poison, and even in England there are Pro-Germans and \nPacifists who adopt a similar attitude.\u201d \n\n\u201cI am not sure that Colonel Mott has diagnosed the German psychology \ncorrectly\u201d, the much-travelled Engineer now remarked. \u201cSomebody once \nsaid that senseless atrocities are usually committed by people who are trembling \nwith fear, in order to reassure themselves. Germans differ greatly. Prussians \nare one type; Hanoverians and the people of the Rhine Provinces are another; \nand the Prussians dominate. We know in any case that all peoples are inclined \nto judge others by themselves, and as it is indisputable that Germans believe in \na policy of schrecklichkeit \u2014in terrorization\u2014in times of war, and even in times \nof peace within their own borders, it is a fair inference that they know the treat\u00ac \nment which would be effective if employed by other nations against themselves; \nthat, in other words, the German General Staff, realizing the native timidity \nof most of their own people, infer that the English, Belgians, French and Ame \nicans must be similarly constituted. However, there can be no question \nColonel Mott\u2019s facts, while the question I raise is more or less academic/ \none thing I am positive: that the Germans, throughout the War, behaved like \nfiends in Belgium and Northern France, and that, because of England\u2019s attitude \nof \u2018Forgive and Forget\u2019, and of American indifference, Germany is determined, \nwhen she breaks loose again, to employ even worse forms of \u2018frightfulness* \nthan before.\u201d \n\n\u201cI agree with you under that head\u201d, said the Historian. \u201cThe worst of it is \nthat England, France and America have learned no more than Germany as a \nresult of their War-time and subsequent experience. There will be no peace \n\nS the world until someone of the stuff of Genghis Khan outdoes the Germans \n*their own game,\u2014in Germany. No Armistice then!\u201d \n\n\u201cI am sorry for the Lodge\u201d, the Student commented. \u201cWhat with its \nstupid but well-meaning children\u2014nations and individuals\u2014and its cunning, \n\n\nAmer- \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\n156 \n\nunscrupulous and self-assertive children, shouting their contempt of God and \nman, it must still be a case of \u2018the Son of man hath not where to lay his head\u2019.\u201d \n\n\u201cYou are right\u201d, said the Ancient. \u201cThe best of us are stupid in many ways, \nbut we need not let our stupidity go so far as to lead us to forget that faith and \nlove and aspiration are gifts which the least of us can offer, and which the Lodge \nwill not only accept with gratitude but can use for the salvation of the race. \nI do not mean that we ought to accept our stupidities as inevitable, for clearly, \nby study and thought we should do our utmost to draw the lesson from each \nday\u2019s experience, that we may learn the laws of life, and the difference between \nthe real and the unreal, between right and wrong in their wider reaches and \ndeeper significance; clearly, too, we should pray for common sense and for the \nelements of wisdom: but, meanwhile, let us rejoice that, in spite of our limita\u00ac \ntions, we can look up and believe and trust,\u2014and give thanks. It must seem \nto us, often, that our love and gratitude are so thin as to be almost invisible; \nbut in that case, if you are dealing with the Master Christ, remind him of the \nWidow\u2019s Mite; say to him: \u2018Master, you accepted her gift, next to nothing \nthough it was, because it was her all, and if we give all the love of which we are \nnow capable, you will accept that too, and perhaps will multiply it, as you \nmultiplied the loaves and fishes, and will turn it into something strong and \nbeautiful.\u2019 \n\n\u201cWe are still deceived by the god of the western world,\u2014Success, though in \nno department of life is success attainable, seeing that it for ever recedes. Suc\u00ac \ncess is a step towards success,\u2014or failure: it is never a finality. This is as true \nof spiritual attainment as it is of money, worldly position, or human love. \nTherefore, as Judge used to say, let us offer up the results of all our efforts, \nrealizing that the effort alone concerns us, and that the Lord will take care of \nresults. \n\n\u201cIt is of such things that our annual Convention reminds us,\u2014and we need \nto be reminded of them, living as we do in a world which sees only the fleeting \nas real, and which would persuade us, if it could, that our ideals are both un\u00ac \nattainable and impotent. Unattainable they may be in this life, if only for the \nreason I have already suggested,\u2014that the nearer we approach them, the greater \nthe heights which become visible; but impotent, No! The very fact that we \nrecognize the ideals which the Lodge has revealed to us\u2014the ideals of ch\u00a3laship \nand of all to which that may lead\u2014the life of the unconquerable Warrior and \nMaster\u2014that recognition alone is a power in the world which makes evil trem\u00ac \nble; and if to recognition there be added honest effort to be and do as the ideal \ndemands, we shall be serving the Lodge as it is given to few to serve it; we shall \nbe making ready the way for the coming of a Kingdom on earth, which already \nis, thank God, in heaven.\u201d T. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nHELENA PETROVNA BLAVATSKY \n\nI understand , Socrates. It is because you say that you always have a divine sign. \nSo he is prosecuting you for introducing new things into religion. And he is going \ninto court knowing that such matters are easily misrepresented to the multitude, \nand consequently meaning to slander you there .\u2014 Plato. \n\n\nI FIRST met dear old \u201cH.P.B.\u201d, as she made all her friends call her, in the \nspring of 1887. Some of her disciples had taken a pretty house in Norwood, \nwhere the huge glass nave and twin towers of the Crystal Palace glint above \na labyrinth of streets and terraces. London was at its grimy best. The squares \nand gardens were scented with grape-clusters of lilac, and yellow rain of la\u00ac \nburnums under soft green leaves. The eternal smoke-pall was thinned to a \ngray veil shining in the afternoon sun, with the great Westminster Towers \nand a thousand spires and chimneys piercing through. Every house had its \nsmoke-wreath, trailing away to the east. \n\nH.P.B. was just finishing her day\u2019s work, so I passed a half-hour upstairs \nwith her volunteer secretary, a disciple who served her with boundless devotion, \ngiving up everything for her cause, and fighting her battles bravely, to be \nstormed at in return, unremittingly for seven years. I had known him two \nyears before, in the days of Mohini Chatterji, the velvet-robed Brahman with \nglossy tresses and dusky face and big luminous eyes. So we talked of old times, \nand of H.P.B.\u2019s great book, The Secret Doctrine , and he read me resonant stan-< \nzas about Universal Cosmic Night, when Time was not; about the Luminous \nSons of Manvantaric Dawn; and the Armies of the Voice; about the Water Men \nTerrible and Bad, and the Black Magicians of Lost Atlantis; about the Sons of \nWill and Yoga and the Ring Pass-Not; about the Great Day Be-With-Us, when \nall shall be perfected into one, re-uniting \u201cthyself and others, myself and thee.\u201d \n\nSo the half-hour passed, and I went downstairs to see the Old Lady. She \nwas in her writing-room, just rising from her desk, and clad in one of those \ndark blue dressing-gowns she loved. My first impression was of her rippled \n\n> B^Charles Johnston, from The Theosophical Forum, Vol. 5. No. 12, April, 1900, page 221; and Vol. 6, No. 1, \nMay^^po, page 2. \n\n\n157 \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\ni 5 8 THEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\nhair as she turned, then her marvellously potent eyes, as she welcomed me. \n\u201cMy dear fellow! I am so glad to see you! Come in and talk! You are just in \ntime to have some tea!\u201d And a hearty handshake. \n\nThen a piercing call for \u201cLouise\u201d, and her Swiss maid appeared, to receive a \nvoluble torrent of directions in French, and H.P.B. settled herself snugly into \nan armchair, comfortably near her tobacco-box, and began to make me a \ncigarette. The cuffs of a Jaeger suit showed round her wrists, only setting off \nthe perfect shape and delicacy of her hands, as her deft fingers, deeply stained \nwith nicotine, rolled the white rice-paper round Turkish tobacco. When we \nwere comfortably alight, she told me a charming tale of Louise s devotion. She \nhad got away from her base of supplies somewhere, in Belgium I think, and \nthings were rather tight for awhile. A wealthy gentleman called to see the \nfamous Russian witch, and tipped her maid munificently. As soon as he was \ngone, Louise appeared, blushing and apologizing: \u201cPerhaps madame will not be \noffended\u201d, she stammered, \u201cbut I do not need money; enfin\u2014madame consen- \ntira ...\u201d and she tried to transfer the douceur to her mistress. \n\nLouise\u2019s entry cut short the story, and H.P.B. turned with a quizzically \nhumorous smile to another theme: \u201cOf course you have read the S.P.R. Report? \n\u2014The Spookical Research Society\u2014and know that I am a Russian spy, and the \nchampion impostor of the age?\u201d \n\n\u201cYes, I read the Report. But I knew its contents already. I was at the \nmeeting when it was first read, two years ago.\u201d \n\n\u201cWell\u201d, said H.P.B., again smiling with infinite humour, \u201cand what impres\u00ac \nsion did the frisky lambkin from Australia make upon your susceptible heart?\u201d \n\n\u201cA very deep one. I decided that he must be a very good young man, who \nalways came home to tea; and that the Lord had given him a very good conceit \nof himself. If he got an opinion into his head, he would plow away blandly, \nand contrary facts would be quite invisible. But your case was not the first \non the list. They had a paper on modem witchcraft, at which another of your \naccusers proved that pinches and bums could be sent by thought-transference \nto a person miles away. It was quite gruesome, and suggested ducking-stools. \nThen you came on. But as far as I could see, the young Colonial had never \nreally investigated any occult phenomena at all; he simply investigated dim \nand confused memories about them in the minds of indifferent witnesses. And \nall that Mr. Sinnett says in the Occult World seems to me absolutely unshaken \nby the whole Report. The Poet, the third of your accusers, came down among \nus after the meeting, and smilingly asked me what I thought of it. I answered \nthat it was the most unfair and one-sided thing I had ever heard of, and that \nif I had not already been a member of your Society, I should have joined on the \nstrength of that attack. He smiled a kind of sickly smile, and passed on.\u201d \n\n\u201cI am glad you think so, my dear\u201d, she answered in her courtly way, \u201cfor \nnow I can offer you some tea with a good conscience.\u201d Louise had laid a white \ncloth on the comer table, brought in a tray, and lit the lamp. The secretary \nsoon joined us, receiving a tart little sermon on being unpunctual, which he \nwas not. Then we came back to her friends, the Psychical Researchers. \n\n\nHELENA PETROVNA BLAVATSKY \n\n\ni59 \n\n\n\u201cThey will never do much\u201d, said H.P.B. \u201cThey go too much on material \nlines, and they are far too timid. That was the secret motive that turned them \nagainst me. The young Colonial went astray, and then the bell-wethers of the \nflock followed in his wake, because they were afraid of raising a storm if they \nsaid our phenomena were true. Fancy what it would have meant! Why it \nwould practically have committed Modem Science to our Mahatmas and all I \nhave taught about the inhabitants of the occult world and their tremendous \npowers. They shrank at the thought of it, and so they made a scapegoat of \nthis poor orphan and exile.\u201d And her eyes were full of humorous pity for \nherself. \n\n\u201cIt must have been something like that\u201d, I answered, \u201cfor there is simply \nno backbone in the Report itself. It is the weakest thing of the kind I \nhave ever read. There is not a shred of real evidence in it from beginning to \nend.\u201d \n\n\u201cDo you really think so? That\u2019s right!\u201d cried H.P.B.; and then she turned \non her secretary, and poured in a broadside of censure, telling him he was \ngreedy, idle, untidy, unmethodical, and generally worthless. When he ven\u00ac \ntured an uneasy defence, she flared up and declared that he \u201cwas bom a flap\u00ac \ndoodle, lived a flapdoodle, and would die a flapdoodle\u201d. He lost his grip, and \nnot unnaturally made a yellow streak of egg across her white tablecloth. \n\n\u201cThere!\u201d cried H.P.B., glaring at him with withering scorn, and then turn\u00ac \ning to me for sympathy in her afflictions. That was her way, to rate her dis\u00ac \nciples in the presence of perfect strangers. It speaks volumes for her, that they \nloved her still. \n\nI tried to draw a red herring across the track,\u2014not that there were any on \nthe table. We were limited to tea, toast and eggs. \n\n\u201cThe funny thing about the Psychical Researchers\u201d, I said, \u201cis that they \nhave proved for themselves that most of these magical powers are just what \nyou say they are, and they seem to have bodily adopted, not to say, stolen, \nyour teaching of the Astral Light. Take the thing that has been most made \nfun of: the journeys of adepts and their pupils in the astral body; you knj \nhow severe they are about poor Damodar and his journeys in his astral \nfrom one part of India to another, and even from India over to London, \nthey themselves have perfectly sound evidence of the very same thing. I know \none of their Committee, a professor of physics, who really discovered thought- \ntransference and made all the first experiments in it. He showed me a number \nof their unpublished papers, and among them was an account of just such astral \njourneys made quite consciously. I think the astral traveller was a young \ndoctor, but that is a detail. The point is, that he kept a diary of his visits, and \na note of them was also kept by the person he visited, and the two perfectly \ncoincide. They have the whole thing authenticated and in print, and yet when \n^>u make the very same claim, they call you a fraud. I wonder why?\u201d \n\n\u201cPartly British prejudice\u201d, she answered; \u201cno Englishman ever believes \nany good of a Russian. They think we are all liars. You know they shadowed \nme for months in India, as a Russian spy? I don\u2019t understand\u201d, she went on \n\n\ni6o \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nmeditatively, yet with a severe eye on her secretary, \u201cI don\u2019t understand how \nthese Englishmen can be so very sure of their superiority, and at the same time \nin such terror of our invading India.\u201d \n\n\u2018\u2018We could easily hold our own if you did, ventured the patriotic \n\nsecretary, pulling himself together, but evidently shaky yet, and avoiding her \neye. She was down on him in an instant: \n\n\u2018\u2018Why!\u201d she cried, \u2018\u2018what could you do with your poor little army? I tell \nyou, my dear, when the Russians do meet the English on the Afghan frontier, \nwe shall crush you like fleas!\u201d \n\nI never saw anything so overwhelming. She rose up in her wrath like the \nwhole Russian army of five millions on a war footing and descended on the \npoor Briton\u2019s devoted head, with terrific weight. When she was roused, H.P.B. \nwas like a torrent; she simply dominated everyone who came near her; and \nher immense personal force made itself felt always, even when she was sick and \nsuffering, and with every reason to be cast down. I have never seen anything \nlike her tremendous individual power. She was the justification of her own \nteaching of the divinity of the will. \u2018\u2018But H.P.B.\u201d\u2014hesitated the secretary. \nBut she crushed him with a glance, and he desperately helped himself to more \nbuttered toast only to be accused of gluttony. \n\nAgain I attempted a diversion: \u2018\u2018There is one thing about the S.P.R. Report \nI want you to explain. What about the writing in the occult letters?\u201d \n\n\u2018\u2018Well, what about it?\u201d asked H.P.B., immediately interested. \n\n\u2018\u2018They say that you wrote them yourself, and that they bear evident marks \nof your handwriting and style. What do you say to that?\u201d \n\n\u2018\u2018Let me explain it this way\u201d, she answered, after a long gaze at the end of \nher cigarette. \u2018\u2018Have you ever made experiments in thought-transference? If \nyou have, you must have noticed that the person who receives the mental pic\u00ac \nture very often colours it, or even changes it slightly, with his own thought, \nand this where perfectly genuine transference of thought takes place. Well, \nit is something like that with the precipitated letters. One of our Masters, who \nperhaps does not know English, and of course has no English handwriting, \nwishes to precipitate a letter in answer to a question sent mentally to him. \nLet us say he is in Tibet, while I am in Madras or London. He has the answer\u00ac \ning thought in his mind, but not in English words. He has first to impress that \nthought on my brain, or on the brain of someone else who knows English, and then \nto take the word-forms that rise up in that other brain to answer the thought. \nThen he must form a clear mind-picture of the words in writing, also drawing \non my brain, or the brain of whoever it is, for the shapes. Then either through \nme or some Chela with whom he is magnetically connected, he has to precipi\u00ac \ntate these word-shapes on paper, first sending the shapes into the Chela\u2019s mind, \nand then driving them into the paper, using the magnetic force of the Ch\u00a3la \nto do the printing, and collecting the material, black or blue or red, as the case \nmay be, from the astral light. As all things dissolve into the astral light, the \nwill of the magician can draw them forth again. So he can draw forth colours \nof pigments to mark the figure in the letter, using the magnetic force of the \n\n\nHELENA PETROVNA BLAVATSKY \n\n\n161 \n\n\nCh61a to stamp them in, and guiding the whole by his own much greater mag\u00ac \nnetic force, a current of powerful will.\u201d \n\n\u201cThat sounds quite reasonable\u201d, I answered. \u201cWon\u2019t you show me how it \nis done?\u201d \n\n\u201cYou would have to be clairvoyant\u201d, she answered, in a perfectly direct and \nmatter-of-fact way, \u201cin order to see and guide the currents. But this is the \npoint: Suppose the letter precipitated through me; it would naturally show some \ntraces of my expressions, and even of my writing; but all the same, it would be \na perfectly genuine occult phenomenon, and a real message from that Mahatma. \nBesides, when all is said and done, they exaggerate the likeness of the writings. \nAnd experts are not infallible. We have had experts who were just as positive \nthat I could not possibly have written those letters, and just as good experts, too. \nBut the Report says nothing about them. And then there are letters, in just \nthe same handwriting, precipitated when I was thousands of miles away. Dr. \nHartmann received more than one at Adyar, Madras, when I was in London; \n\nI could hardly have written that.\u201d \n\n\u201cThey would simply say Dr. Hartmann was the fraud, in that case.\u201d \n\n\u201cCertainly\u201d, cried H.P.B., growing angry now; \u201cwe are all frauds and liars, \nand the lambkin from Australia is the only true man. My dear, it is too much. \nIt is insolent!\u201d And then she laughed at her own warmth, a broad, good- \nhumoured Homeric laugh, as hers always was, and finally said: \n\n\u201cBut you have seen some of the occult letters? What do you say?\u201d \n\n\u201cYes\u201d, I replied; \u201cMr. Sinnett showed me about a ream of them; the whole \nseries that the Occult World and Esoteric Buddhism are based on. Some of them \nare in red, either ink or pencil, but far more are in blue. I thought it was pencil \nat first, and I tried to smudge it with my thumb; but it would not smudge.\u201d \n\n\u201cOf course not!\u201d she smiled; \u201cthe colour is driven into the surface of the \npaper. But what about the writings?\u201d \n\n\u201cI am coming to that. There were two: the blue writing, and the red; they \nwere totally different from each other, and both were quite unlike yours. I \nhave spent a good deal of time studying the relation of handwriting to char\u00ac \nacter, and the two characters were quite clearly marked. The blue was evi\u00ac \ndently a man of very gentle and even character, but of tremendously strong \nwill; logical, easy-going, and taking endless pains to make his meaning cle^p \nIt was altogether the handwriting of a cultivated and very sympathetic matl^ \n\n\u201cWhich I am not\u201d, said H.P.B., with a smile; \u201cthat is Mahatma Koothoomi; \nhe is a Kashmiri Brahman by birth, you know, and has travelled a good deal in \nEurope. He is the author of the Occult World letters, and gave Mr. Sinnett \nmost of the material of Esoteric Buddhism. But you have read all about it. \n\n\u201cYes, I remember he says you shriek across space with a voice like Sarasvati\u2019s \npeacock. Hardly the sort of thing you would say of yourself.\u201d \n\n\u201cOf course not\u201d, she said; \u201cI know I am a nightingale. But what about the \n\n\u00ab er writing?\u201d \n\n_ The red? Oh that is wholly different. It is fierce, impetuous, dominant, \nstrong; it comes in volcanic outbursts, while the other is like Niagara Falls. \n\n\n162 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nOne is fire, and the other is the ocean. They are wholly different, and both \nquite unlike yours. But the second has more resemblance to yours than the \nfirst.\u201d \n\n\u2018\u2018This is my Master\u201d, she said, \u201cwhom we call Mahatma Morya. I have his \npicture here.\u201d \n\nAnd she showed me a small panel in oils. If ever I saw genuine awe and \nreverence in a human face, it was in hers, when she spoke of her Master. He \nwas a Rajput by birth, she said, one of the old warrior race of the Indian desert, \nthe finest and handsomest nation in the world. Her Master was a giant, six \nfeet eight, and splendidly built; a superb type of manly beauty. Even in the \npicture, there is a marvellous power and fascination; the force, the fierceness \neven, of the face; the dark, glowing eyes, which stare you out of countenance; \nthe clear-cut features of bronze, the raven hair and beard\u2014all spoke of a tre\u00ac \nmendous individuality, a very Zeus in the prime of manhood and strength. I \nasked her something about his age. She answered: \n\n\u201cMy dear, I cannot tell you exactly, for I do not know. But this I will tell \nyou. I met him first when I was twenty,\u2014in 1851. He was in the very prime \nof manhood then. I am an old woman now, but he has not aged a day. He is \nstill in the prime of manhood. That is all I can say. You may draw your own \nconclusions.\u201d \n\n\u201cHave the Mahatmas discovered the elixir of life?\u201d \n\n\u201cThat is no fable\u201d, said H.P.B. seriously. \u201cIt is only the veil hiding a real \noccult process, warding off age and dissolution for periods which would seem \nfabulous, so I will not mention them. The secret is this: for every man, there \nis a climacteric, when he must draw near to death; if he has squandered his \nlife-powers, there is no escape for him; but if he has lived according to the law, \nhe may pass through, and so continue in the same body almost indefinitely.\u201d \n\nThen she told me something about other Masters and adepts she had known, \n\u2014for she made a difference, as though the adepts were the captains of the occult \nworld, and the Masters were the generals. She had known adepts of many \nraces, from Northern and Southern India, Tibet, Persia, China, Egypt; of \nvarious European nations, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, English; of certain races \nin South America, where she said there was a Lodge of adepts. \n\n\u201cIt is the tradition of this which the Spanish Conquistadores found\u201d, she \nsaid, \u201cthe golden city of Manoah or El Dorado. The race is allied to the an\u00ac \ncient Egyptians, and the adepts have still preserved the secret of their dwelling- \nplace inviolable. There are certain members of the Lodges who pass from \ncentre to centre, keeping the lines of connection between them unbroken. But \nthey are always connected in other ways.\u201d \n\n\u201cIn their astral bodies?\u201d \n\n\u201cYes\u201d, she answered, \u201cand in other ways still higher. They have a common \nlife and power. As they rise in spirituality, they rise above difference of race, \nto our common humanity. The series is unbroken.\u201d \n\n\n(To be continued.) \n\n\n\nMake Life Worth Living , by the Rev. Dr. Joseph R. Sizoo; The Macmillan \nCo., New York, 1938; price, $1.75. \n\nWe cannot too highly recommend this book as a defence of religious prin\u00ac \nciples against the irreligion and materialism of to-day. Dr. Sizoo, who is of \nFrench Huguenot extraction and of Dutch parentage, is at present the minister \nof the well-known Collegiate Church of St. Nicholas in New York. He is also \nVice-President of the Federal Council of the Churches of Christ in America,\u2014 \nwhich is, incidentally, the only good thing we know of that Council. How he \ncan get along with his associates, considering the difference between his phi\u00ac \nlosophy and theirs, is not easy to imagine; for his philosophy, though not mys\u00ac \ntical, is in most respects theosophical, while theirs seems to be: Give them \nplenty to eat, and lots of leisure, and religion will take care of itself. \n\nThe following extracts will give some idea of Dr. Sizoo\u2019s attitude: \n\n[The church] does not stop with social justice, but with divine justice. It does not \nput man, but God, in the centre. It is not concerned with the distribution of wealth, \nbut with the stewardship of wealth, which is infinitely higher and more difficult. \n\nIt is the function of the church to establish an order in which men shall see more than \nthe eye can see, hear more than the ear can hear, feel more than the hand can touch. \nIt is something that begins on earth, but does not end here. It is born in time but will \ntake eternity to unveil and unfold. It is something that begins with God and ends \nwith God. Its goal is neither political, social nor economic reform, but the redemp\u00ac \ntion of man from sin through the cross of Christ. . . . \n\nThe causes of God are never lost causes. The great moral ventures men make, the \nholy aspirations to which they cling, the unrequited love through which they live, ai^ \nthe high dreams for which they agonize, are never in vain. \n\nLike most Protestants, Dr. Sizoo has no respect for the purely contemplative \nlife of certain Roman Catholic religious orders,\u2014an attitude with which it is \ndifficult for a student of Theosophy to sympathize, considering what we know \nof the contemplative side of the Lodge, and of the creative power of prayer \nwhen really spiritual. But he is liberal in his outlook, and, after pleading that \nthe church should make it easy for people to find God, and hard for them to \nforget Him, and that \u201cit must increasingly develop a technique which will foster \nthat sense of reverence\u201d,\u2014does not hesitate to add: \u201cThe Catholic Church \nmade that contribution, and all too often has the Protestant Church failed \nmiserably in that respect.\u201d \n\n163 \n\n\nI \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n164 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nThe chapters entitled, \u201cWe shall Live and Meet Again\u201d, and \u201cStanding up \nto Life\u201d, are particularly valuable. The only blemishes on the book, as we see \nit, are that the author is too much inclined to \u201cwrite down\u201d to the level of his \nreaders, and descends at times to ordinary journalese (as we have done, in the \nuse of that word!), while, in one instance, he is distinctly misleading in his his\u00ac \ntorical summary, implying, as he does, that St. Augustine introduced Chris\u00ac \ntianity into England (a.d. 596), thus ignoring the successful labours of St. \nPatrick in Somerset and elsewhere, of St. Columba in the north, the evidence of \nthe early chronicles of the Roman, Eastern, Gallic and Spanish churches that \nJoseph of Arimathea established a congregation of Christians at Glastonbury \nnot long after the Crucifixion, and the narratives of William of Malmesbury \nand others, which show that in the second century, under the great-grandson \nof Caractacus, a large part of England had accepted Christianity. But these \nare trifles in comparison with the merits of a book which, once more, we cannot \npraise too highly as a counterblast, within Protestantism, to the materialistic \nhumanitarianism which is reducing our churches to the equivalent of social \nwelfare clubs. T. \n\n\nSouvenirs d\u2019un Journaliste , in three volumes, by Lucien Corpechot; Librairie \nPlon, Paris, 1936; price, 13.50 francs a volume. \n\nFigures de Chefs , by Henry Bordeaux; Librairie Plon, Paris, 1937; price, 20 \nfrancs. \n\nSome of us love France. We love her so much that her present desperate \nplight bears down upon us like a nightmare. We are deeply troubled in our \nhearts and minds by the spectacle of a great and noble nation reduced to ap\u00ac \nparent impotence by the experiments of ideologues , the intrigues of demagogues, \nand the self-seeking of politicians. No American can afford to throw the first \nstone, after what has happened here, but there are some Americans who are \npeculiarly distressed by the French \u201cnew deal\u201d, because they expected better \nthings of France. \n\nHowever, those who truly love the genius and inner life of France have not \nlost faith in the destiny reserved for her, nor in the recuperative power which \nhas saved her so many times in the past and which must save her again. She \nhas the \u201ckarma\u201d of many errors which must be exhausted, but so much spiritual \nforce has been poured into her very soil, that we can conceive of no war and \nno revolution which will destroy her before her appointed work is done. The \nLodge does not lightly abandon its \u201cinvestments\u201d. It can provide those who \nwill restore the values which seem to be utterly lost. Let us remember Jeanne \nd\u2019Arc, Henri IV, Richelieu, Napoleon, and the multitudes who have rallied \nagain and again, to convert the appearance of complete disaster into certain \nvictory and peace. \n\nThe latest of the saving \u201cmiracles\u201d of France, as has been often said, was the \nBattle of the Marne, although in truth this \u201cmiracle\u201d began before the Great \nWar and lasted until the Armistice. It is this \u201cmiracle\u201d which is the real sub- \n\n\n\nREVIEWS \n\n\n165 \n\nject of these books. M. Corpechot writes, in particular, of the group of men of \nletters and men of science, who laboured without rest, during the two decades \nbefore the War, to awaken the conscience of the nation. He was an intimate \nfriend of Marchand (of Fashoda fame), Quinton, Barr\u00a3s, Bourget and many \nothers. Some of us may have become so cynical, that it is not easy to under\u00ac \nstand how public opinion could at any time or in any place be inspired \nand directed by men of such culture and temper, but, in that case, all the more \nreason for recalling, in these dark times, how before the War, the way of sacrifice \nand death in the cause of civilization was prepared, in a certain sense, by a group \nof truly civilized people whose love for la doulce France was so intense, so vital, \nthat it revitalized the heart of the nation by a sort of \u201ccontagion of conscious\u00ac \nness\u201d. Who will measure the degree in which these enlightened souls made \npossible the glories of the four \u201cterrible years\u201d? Incidentally, as Marchand \nand Quinton\u2014to mention only two\u2014amply proved, they were eager and ready \nto practise the doctrine of sacrifice and selfless devotion which they preached. \nQuinton on the battlefield was as magnificent as a hero of Homer or Plutarch, \nor a figure from a romance of chivalry. \n\nQuinton often said: \u201cWar is a passion of the soul.\u201d He experienced this passion with \nthe ardour which he carried into all his feelings. There can be no doubt. He loved war. \nHe spoke of this love to me when he was dying. He loved war, \u201cbecause he loved risk, \ndanger and effort, because he felt the need of spending himself for others, because he \nheld in horror a life of ease, the life which kills the gods.\u201d He knew the fatigue which is \nsometimes \u201cso great on the battle-field, that it makes us desire the release of death\u201d; \nhe knew privations, cold, extreme danger, wounds, illness. But he loved all that be\u00ac \ncause \u201chunger, combat, sleeplessness raise to the highest degree the moral force of the \nman who serves, because a divine soul inhabits the harassed body, because the soul is \npurified when the body is exhausted.\u201d \n\nLet us not confuse this heroic version of war, which makes explicit\u2014as it \nwere\u2014the spirit of the true warrior caste of France, with the blood-lust of the \n\u201cmilitarist\u201d, nor with the pompous boasting of the adventurer. The hero is \nneither a murderer nor a clown. \n\nOne very real value of M. Corpechot\u2019s book is that it brings consolation and \nhope. The human race is not always and necessarily governed by \u201cmorons\u2019ll \nand barbarians. Barr&s actually sat in the Chamber of Deputies! Such things \nhappened before: they can happen again. Meanwhile, if the student of The\u00ac \nosophy really believes in re-incarnation and in the abiding union of souls who \nhave loved and worked for the same cause, he cannot doubt that the devotion \nof these men to France is a living power in the world beyond death, and that it \nwill lead them to incarnate again, when cyclic law makes this possible, to defend \nthe land to which they have dedicated their service. Can we imagine that the \nMaster, whom they served in serving France, would deny them this privilege? \n\nM. Bordeaux\u2019s work, in a sense, supplements M. Corpechot\u2019s, for it is an \nadAtaable and sober study of the military leaders whose strategy, and whose \nchanrcter, even more than their strategy, guided France through crisis after \ncrisis, during the War. He has devoted special attention to Joffre, Fayolle, \nMaistre and Serret. All these commanders illustrated qualities which mark \n\n\ni66 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nthe traditional French officer. These cannot be easily defined, because what is \nparamount but undefinable is the individuality which makes each of them real. \nM. Bordeaux, excellent artist as he is, makes manifest the characters of his \nheroes by telling the story of their trials and aspirations. Each of them was \nan individual, a unique personage, but the foundation of their prestige was the \nsame for all,\u2014fortitude, vigilance, the will to command and the desire to serve, \nuncompromising rigour towards the foe conjoined with paternal kindness \ntowards all those, even the humblest, who were in their charge. One recalls \nthe fact that the French military unit is, in a very real sense, a \u201cfamily\u201d; that \nthe relation of the captain and the private is that of father and child. \n\nThe last chapter of this book contains one of the most beautiful passages to \nbe found in any account of the Great War. Bordeaux quotes from the diary \nof the sous-officier Chambri&res, the account of the death of General Serret on \nthe scarred and blasted slope of Hartmannsvillerkopf in Alsace. Chambri&res \nwas devoted heart and soul to the General, whose \u201cstandard-bearer\u201d he was. \nHis simple narrative has the poignant quality of an ancient ballad. We quote \na few sentences, although it is impossible in translation to preserve the moving \nforce of the original: \n\nFrom the moment when the General was struck until we found shelter in the shell- \nhole, he lost much blood. His trench-helmet served as a pillow and I covered his head \nwith my dragoon\u2019s casque. I said to him: \u201cGeneral, you must be suffering a great deal.\u201d \nHe replied: \u201cThere is a noble thought in the Imitation of Christ: \u2018If you cannot suffer \nwith joy, suffer at least without complaint.\u2019 \u201d And he did not complain. His eyes were \nclosed; I kissed his hand. He opened his eyes and said to me: \u201cI have faith, I am at \npeace.\u201d . . . We arrived at last at the dressing-station. The General\u2019s helmet had \nfallen on the stretcher; an orderly replaced it. The General said to him: \u201cNot like that, \nthe stars in front, always.\u201d \n\nLes etoiles en avant toujours. As M. Bordeaux remarks, those words, among \nthe last which the General spoke, are an inspiration to the lovers of France, \nwho only in their weaker moments ever lose faith in her destiny and her im\u00ac \nmortal genius. S.V.L. \n\n\nDesign in Nature , by James Ritchie, M.A., D.Sc., Professor of Natural His\u00ac \ntory in the University of Edinburgh; Charles Scribner\u2019s Sons, New York, and \nCountry Life Limited, London, 1937; price, $2.50. \n\nProfessor Ritchie uses as an epigraph a sentence from the writings of Sir \nThomas Pope Blount: \u201cThe deeper insight any Man hath into the affairs of \nNature, the more he discovers of the Accurateness, and Art, that is in the \ncontexture of things.\u201d These words sound the key-note of this delightful book. \nWe recommend it to all lovers of country life, to all who find the society of birds \nand flowers more restful and more entertaining than the society of not a few of \ntheir \u201cfellow-humans\u201d. Professor Ritchie says that his object is \u201cto explain \nin simple language the ways in which the living world has been moulded by some \nof the forces in inanimate nature\u2014the all-prevailing influence of the sun, the \nsuccession of the seasons, the rhythm of day and night\u201d. He has been \n\n\n\nREVIEWS \n\n\n167 \n\n\nsuccessful, not only because he has mastered his subject, but because he writes \nwith a clarity and wit which distinguish him from the vast majority of the \npopularizers of science. \n\nHe states his thesis as follows: \n\nStudy any example you like\u2014here for variety we have taken as examples, life in a \nwasp\u2019s nest, the spring migration of birds, the significance of song, life in a pond, and so \non, and the impression grows that an understanding of the lives of plants and animals \ncan be gained only through an understanding of the designs which the rhythms of nature \nhave imposed upon them. \n\nThis is confirmed by observation and experience. All the cycles of the Uni\u00ac \nverse collaborate in the shaping of every creature, including man himself. \nRecollection of this central fact in Nature should never leave us, for constant \nreference to it will illumine much that would otherwise be unintelligible in ex\u00ac \nistence. And it is pleasant to witness, in our contacts with our humble brethren \nof the fields and forests, countless illustrations of the \u201cAccurateness and Art\u201d \nwhich distinguish the operations of cyclic law. We can take advantage of an \nexcursion into the country to strengthen our too feeble faith in the deep wisdom \nand fitness of the nature of things. \n\nProfessor Ritchie is careful to point out that the living creature does not play \na wholly passive r 61 e in the shaping of its destiny. The voice of creative Nature \nis lost in the void, unless the creature reply to it. As he remarks, \u201cLife is a \nresponsive thing\u201d, and its responses are infinitely varied. It is as if Nature, in \nall her processes, sought above all to produce a race, not of slaves, but of \ncollaborators. \n\nNatural selection cannot make an animal fitter, any more than an eliminating round \nof a golf tournament makes a man a better golfer, unless it be that, since failure here does \nnot bring annihilation, fortunately for us, a man may benefit from his experience of the \ntest. And perhaps in that sense, in impressing the lessons of experience, natural selection \ndoes help to make animals fitter. Even so, and this is the point I wish to be at, the \nanimal or the golfer is not made fitter by any outside condition; it is himself or itself, the \nliving creature, which makes the change. There can be no selection unless there are \ndifferences to select, and it is part of the unique character of living matter that it sup\u00ac \nplies the differences or variations, some of which lead to increased fitness and so to \nsurvival. \n\nIt is interesting to note that The Secret Doctrine defines Kundalini Shaktig \nthe \u201cuniversal life-principle\u201d, as the power which brings about both \u201cthe conJ \ntinuous adjustment of internal relations to external relations\u201d, and the \u201ccon\u00ac \ntinuous adjustment of external relations to internal relations\u201d. When the \ngreat mystic, Meister Eckhart, affirmed, \u201cGod has need of me\u201d, he was stating \na principle which is effective wherever there is life,\u2014which means, according \nto Theosophy, everywhere. It is the law that the creature, in order to sur\u00ac \nvive, must become in some degree a creator, a co-worker with Nature. \n\nB.D. \n\n\nLost Horizon , by James Hilton; William Morrow & Company, New York. \nTJ|g novel of adventure in the East has been a best-seller for four years. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\ni68 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nHowever, there would be no reason for reviewing it here, if it had not become a \ncause of some confusion of thought. It is an excellent \u201cmystery\u201d story; but \nthere is no evidence whatsoever that its author intended to emulate Bulwer \nLytton and to write an \u201coccult novel\u201d. Nevertheless, undisceming readers \nhave read into it \u201coccultness\u201d, \u201cspirituality\u201d, and a host of other qualities \nwhich are not there. \n\nIt is an original story. A British official and a small group of nondescripts \nare kidnapped in an Indian frontier station and transported by aeroplane to \nShangri-La, an earthly paradise in the wilderness of Tibet. Here they find a \ncommunity of cultivated men and women of many races, who have solved the \nproblem of human well-being, and who still appear youthful at the age of a \nhundred. The Grand Lama of this happy valley is a French priest who arrived \nfrom Pekin in 1734! \u201cIt was his way to accept from native life all that it of\u00ac \nfered which he found harmless and pleasant, and to give in return the spiritual \ntreasure of the West. . . . He even embarked upon the study of certain mystic \npractices that the Indians call yoga , and which are based upon various methods \nof breathing.\u201d He has kept himself and his disciples alive, by means of \u201cdrug\u00ac \ntaking and deep-breathing exercises\u201d. However, Nature imposes limits, even \nin this Tibetan Utopia, and his body finally wears out, though not before he \nhas time to choose the English hero as his successor. Unfortunately or for\u00ac \ntunately, according to the point of view, the Englishman feels constrained by \nhis sense of duty to run away; but he returns to civilization only to disappear \nagain, for the call of Shangri-La is too strong. He wants peace and quiet, a \nhaven of refuge from a storm-tossed world. Not a few people in real life cherish \nsimilar desires,\u2014which may partially explain the popularity of the book. \n\nIt would be idiotic to complain that all this is a tissue of impossibilities. Fic\u00ac \ntion does not have to be the servant of the possible. But it would be worse \nthan idiotic to take the plot seriously. It does not give the prescription for the \n\u201celixir of life\u201d. \u201cDrug-taking and deep-breathing exercises\u201d are not the basis \nof the true Indian yoga. Shangri-La may resemble some views of Devachan; \nit is not, in the remotest sense, a vision of the Trans-Himalayan Lodge. Some\u00ac \nthing more than narcotics and a misconceived yoga and a lovely climate, is \nrequired to make the actual physical body of man outlive the centuries. No \none, in the present cycle, can grow fabulously old and, at the same time, live \ncomfortably, his mind and senses constantly soothed by every delicate pleasure \nwhich nature and art can contrive. Candidates for occult training are not \nconscripted at random; nor is it reasonable to expect even a British empire- \nbuilder to fit himself by a few days\u2019 residence in a luxurious lamasery to head a \ncommunity of centenarian sages. These propositions are so elementary, so self- \nevident, that the reader is justified in wondering whether the reviewer who \nrepeats them has any sense of humour. Certainly it is not Mr. Hilton\u2019s fault \nthat such an analysis has seemed necessary. He does not pretend to be a mystic \nand seer. He is an entertaining novelist who happened to choose Tibet as the \nbackground of one of his tales. \n\nMany who did not read the book, have seen the \u201cmovie\u201d with the same \n\n\nREVIEWS \n\n\n169 \n\n\ntitle. The less said about this, the better. There are some magnificent pano\u00ac \nramas of mountain scenery; but no amount of landscape can redeem the \nbanality and vulgarity of the characters and their actions. An incredibly silly \nlove-story has been added to maintain intact the Hollywood tradition. If any\u00ac \none has seen the movie \u2019 and has liked it, let him look up in any standard \ndictionary the definition of \u201cglamour\u201d. y g \n\n\nThe Citadel, by A. J. Cronin; Little, Brown and Co., Boston, 1937; price, \n$2.50. \n\nThis reviewer dislikes novels. At best they are but psychic reflections of a \npsychic reflection of life. But partly because most people will read nothing else; \npartly because a good novel broadens the mental outlook, especially of those \nwho have not seen much of the world, and partly because The Citadel has be\u00ac \ncome a best-seller both in England and America, and is avowedly a novel with \na purpose, we read it, and on the whole are glad to have done so. The author, \nwith an established reputation as a novelist, is an M.D., M.R.C.P., and, in this \nnovel, shows himself as a man with a mission, and manages, while doing this, \nto add to, instead of detracting from, the interest of his story. It is the story \nof a young doctor with high ideals of his profession, who marries a girl with \nideals as high as his, and whose character is far more stable. She loves him \ndevotedly, with the whole of her nature, he loves her, but loves himself better. \nDesire for success and for money\u2014at first they are very poor\u2014gradually turns \nhim from his original purpose; he compromises with his conscience and adopts \nthe unscrupulous professional practices which formerly he had condemned. His \nwife realizes this; pleads with him and is roughly rebuffed. She is heart-broken \n\u2014for his sake; he resents this against her, and becomes bitterly unkind. It \nwould not be fair in a review to tell of his awakening and repentance, nor of \ntheir renewed but brief happiness together. She, through her suffering, saves \nhis soul. \n\nThe story is full of dramatic incidents, well told, and, morally, is the cleanest \nmodem novel we have read in English (there are outstanding French novelists, \nsuch as Henry Bordeaux, who put all our authors to shame in this respect). \nBut why does Dr. Cronin, who handles matters of sex with such unusual and \nwelcome refinement, use words in other connections which are needlessly, offen\u00ac \nsively vulgar? Once more in these columns we protest: the photography of \nhard, sharp outline is not art; it is not even artistic photography. Why should \ndecent women-readers be affronted by the language of dirty little school\u00ac \nboys? \n\nNone the less, the book will do good. The character of Christine, the wife, \nis in many ways beautiful; and the author\u2019s exposure of commercialized medi\u00ac \ncal practice, with its tricks for extracting extra fees, its superficial knowledge, \nits intense narrow-mindedness, should be illuminating to those who were not \ndisillusioned long ago. He does not condemn the profession as a whole. To do \nthat 'vo^ be both unfair and absurd. There are many doctors whose motives \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n170 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nand ethical ideals are beyond reproach. Even they, however, are terribly handi\u00ac \ncapped by the instruction they received when passing through the medical \nschools, for that instruction was based upon a purely materialistic if not mech \nanistic philosophy, and as that philosophy is false, darkness, not light, flows \nfrom it. And because this is something which Dr. Cronin, with all his learning, \nevidently does not realize, his criticisms are less fundamental than he thinks \nthey are,\u2014except when he upholds honesty, fearlessness, and intellectual in\u00ac \ntegrity against their prevailing opposites. There, of course, he is on safe ground, \nand we are heart and soul with him; but we cannot follow him in his respect \nfor \u201cthe latest\u201d in scientific development, believing, as we do, that a very small \npercentage of \u201cthe latest\u201d, whether in theory or method, will survive the expe\u00ac \nrience of the next ten years; believing also as we do, that the percentage of \nsuperstition in the medical theory and practice of ancient China, India, Egypt, \nor, in later times, of Paracelsus, the two Van Helmonts and other \u201cmystics\u201d, \nwas probably lower than the percentage of superstition in the orthodox text\u00ac \nbooks of to-day. Wonderful progress has been made in certain directions, but \nin other and perhaps more important directions the movement has been retro\u00ac \ngrade,\u2014and the medical profession is too conceited to be able or willing to \nadmit this. Girolamo Cardano, the Milanese, knew much that the modern \nphysician does not know (his autobiography is fascinating reading), even as the \nmodem physician knows a thousand things of which Cardano knew nothing; \nbut where is the modem physician or medical student who is capable of turning \nwith respect to the recorded experience of that sixteenth-century celebrity, \nexpecting to learn from him, and remaining open-minded when the doctrine \nof that day conflicts with the orthodoxy of our present schools? Where is the \nmedical student of six months\u2019 standing who does not look with pity or mild \namusement upon the \u201cblind gropings\u201d of his predecessors of five hundred or a \nthousand years ago? It is not the student\u2019s fault; it is the fault of his instruc\u00ac \ntors, whose acquaintance with superficial phenomena is astonishing, but who \nfail utterly to grasp the significance of the principle that the cause of all visible \nthings is in the invisible. So long as they ignore the medium between mental \nand emotional states and nerve reactions, they will remain blind leaders of the \nblind. A right philosophy is their greatest need, and they will never accept \nthis if thrust upon them. They can acquire it only by slow assimilation result\u00ac \ning from a study of ancient authors, whom they must approach, not for the \npurpose of increasing their own sense of superiority as at present, but with an \nhonest desire to discover as much truth as possible in the recorded experience \nof those who thought more, even though they read less, than we do to-day. \n(When will people learn that reading without intelligent and deep thought, is a \nhindrance rather than a help to the attainment of understanding!) \n\nIn brief, the basis of a sound medical education is not now provided. It will \nconsist of a study of the history of medical philosophy, which must be taught \nby those who will honestly try to help their students to think for themselves, \nand to revere the principle: \u201cThere is no religion higher than Truth.\u201d Obe\u00ac \ndience to that principle will in time lead to the conviction that man is a soul, \n\n\nREVIEWS \n\n\n171 \n\nfunctioning through psychic, astral, and nervous bodies of which the physical \nis merely the rind or casing,\u2014the outermost expression of the inner, and im\u00ac \nportant as the means of contact and communication with the outer world, and \nas the instrument through which alone the soul can gain experience and con\u00ac \ntrol of objective existence. Only when that conviction has been gained by the \nmajority of those who practise medicine, will Dr. Cronin\u2019s true aims become \npossible of attainment. T. \n\n\nReturn from the U.S.S.R., by Andr6 Gide; translated from the French by \nDorothy Bussy; Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 1937; price, $1.00. \n\nM. Andr6 Gide is considered one of the greatest living novelists by some \ncritics, and his opinions carry much weight with the intelligentsia. He is also \na member of the Communist Party. This is the opening paragraph of his book \non his visit to Soviet Russia: \n\nEntering into direct contact with a people of workers in factories, workshops and \nyards, in gardens, homes of rest, and \u201cparks of culture\u201d, I had moments of intense joy. \n1 felt the establishment of a sudden sympathy between these new comrades and myself; \n1 felt my heart expand and blossom. This is why I look more smiling\u2014more laughing \neven\u2014in the photographs that were taken of me out there, than 1 am often able to be \nin France. \n\nIf the reader can bring himself to go on after this exhibition of Gide\u2019s egotism \nand lack of humour, he can probably live through the rest of the book. Why \nwas Gide unable to view French workmen with an equal sympathy and joy, or \nwith such a beaming countenance? The reader will ask himself this question \nnot only at the beginning but at the end of the book. We suspect that \nCommunism is a disease which destroys the faculty of logic as well as the sense \nof humour. \n\nM. Gide was full of enthusiasm for the \u201cunprecedented experiments\u201d being \ncarried out in Soviet Russia. On his return, he ventured to criticize a few of \nthe results of these experiments\u2014not that he is out of sympathy, of course, \nwith the principles of Communism, but, because, like many people who approve \nof any experiment until it affects themselves, he suffered pain when he came \ninto contact with the restraints laid upon his own profession, that of Letters. \n\nI believe that a writer\u2019s value is intimately linked to the force of the revolutionary \nspirit that animates him\u2014or to be more exact (for 1 am not so mad as to believe, ypat \nonly left-wing writers have artistic value), to the force of his spirit of opposition.IrT. \nFor the question arises: what will happen if the transformation of the Social State de\u00ac \nprives the artist of all motive for opposition? What will the artist do if there is no reason \nfor him to go against the current, if all he need do is to let himself be carried by it? \n\nEvidently M. Gide\u2019s idea of revolution is to keep on dancing and shouting \nin the same spot, as in a squirrel cage. He does not seem to realize that if \nsomeone who always opposes the government, starts out as a Communist, \neventually he will \u201crevolute\u201d to extreme \u201cultra-bourgeois\u201d conservatism. \nThere seem to be signs of this even in the Russian Utopia. \u201cWe cannot doubt, \n^las, that bourgeois instincts, degraded, greedy, self-centred, slumber in many \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n172 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\npeople\u2019s hearts, notwithstanding any revolution (for many can hardly be re\u00ac \nformed entirely from the outside); it disquiets me very much to observe, in the \nU.S.S.R. to-day, that these bourgeois instincts are indirectly flattered and \nencouraged by recent decisions that have been alarmingly approved of over \nhere.\u201d \n\n\u201cComrade\u201d Gide\u2019s logic is sometimes positively weird. In one place he says \nof Soviet Russia: \u201cI doubt whether in any other country in the world, even \nHitler\u2019s Germany, thought be less free, more bowed down, more fearful \n(terrorized), more vassalized.\u201d Later on, in a lucid moment, he admits: \u201cAnd \nas it always happens that we recognize the value of certain advantages only \nafter we have lost them, there is nothing like a stay in the U.S.S.R. (or of \ncourse in Germany) to help us appreciate the inappreciable liberty of thought \nwe still enjoy in France\u2014and sometimes abuse.\u201d He does not explain how \nFrance could have developed this liberty of thought during the rule, for a \nthousand years, of Capetian \u201ctyrants\u201d. However, he cheers up, and ends \nwith this thought: \u201cThe help that the Soviet union is giving to Spain shows \nus what fine capabilities of recovery it still possesses. The Soviet Union has \nnot yet finished instructing and astonishing us.\u201d \n\nThe descriptions of parks of culture and state farms drip with sentimentality. \nGide even achieves an unconscious humour when he tells us of the beauties of \nBolshevo, a large town inhabited entirely by criminals, now all reformed char\u00ac \nacters! He attended a meeting where some of them spoke, and says: \u201cIt all \nreminded me oddly of the series of edifying confessions that I heard at Thun \ntwo years ago during a great meeting of adepts of the Oxford Group.\u201d \n\nUnfortunately, the sentimental and false maunderings of M. Gide\u2019s mind \nare those of too many people who ought to know better. The test of our present \nera would seem to be that of discrimination between the false and the true, a \ndiscrimination rendered infinitely difficult by the scrambled state of men\u2019s \nminds and all national affairs. M. Gide\u2019s book will scarcely carry any illumina\u00ac \ntion, but it may well serve as a horrible example. St.C. LaD. \n\n\nGreat Contemporaries , by Winston S. Churchill; Thornton Butterworth, Lon\u00ac \ndon, 1937; price, 215.; Putnam, New York; price, $4.00. \n\nWinston Churchill\u2019s peculiarities as a politician have been mentioned more \nthan once in the pages of the Quarterly; often brilliantly right, he is as often \nglaringly wrong, both practically and ethically. But he writes as few can, with \nperfect clarity, with humour, in a style ideally adapted to his subject. There \nis not a dull or superfluous paragraph in these 300 pages, which are delightful \nand stimulating reading, and which might well serve as an example to the mul\u00ac \ntitude of contemporary writers whose utter lack of refinement and poverty of \nimagination lead them into the vulgarities, impudicities, and what seems to be \na preference for coarse words, which decent people find revolting, and against \nwhich the Quarterly will never cease to protest. In his most bitter invective \n\n\n\nCORRESPONDENCE \n\n\ni 73 \n\n\n\u2014and Churchill does his best in Great Contemporaries to rend Trotsky limb \nfrom limb\u2014there is not an expression which offends the canons of good taste. \n\nThe portraits of the Earl of Rosebery, of Asquith, of F. E. Smith (first Earl \nof Birkenhead), of Curzon, of Clemenceau, all based on close contacts, are \nmasterpieces of character-drawing. His passing references to Kitchener are \nunfair and prejudiced; but this was to have been expected, as Kitchener was \nseveral sizes too big for Churchill\u2019s comprehension. Kitchener, for one thing, \nwas extraordinarily impersonal and detached, while Churchill is nothing if not \nvividly personal, without a notion, we suspect, of what detachment means. \n\nThat, however, is incidental. We strongly recommend the book to those of \nour readers who are interested in men who helped to make European history \nduring the past fifty years. H. \n\n\nCORRESPONDENCE \n\nEngland and Germany \n\nTo the Editors oj the Theosophical Quarterly: \n\nAs a comment on what is going on between England and Germany to-day, \nmay I remind your many English readers of something which doubtless they \nlearned when at school, but which they may have forgotten? I refer to the \nprocedure of Ethelred, sumamed the \u201cUnready\u201d (a significant name), who \nattempted to buy off the incursions of the Danes, and who, for that purpose, \ninstituted, in 991 a. d., the tax known as Dane-geld,\u2014with the inevitable re\u00ac \nsult that the Danish pirates, finding how profitable their demands, threats, and \nravages were, renewed these with increasing success until, in 1017, the Danes \nbecame supreme throughout the greater part of the country. \n\nMay those of us who are of English descent, venture to hope that Hitler- \ngeld, or Deutsch-geld, will not now be levied for a similar purpose? \n\nA suggestion of this kind from America may seem ungracious, if not im\u00ac \npertinent; but the Theosophical Quarterly, although published in New York, \nis an international magazine, and may well claim that its repeated condemna\u00ac \ntion of the selfishness of the United States in matters of foreign policy\u2014a self^ \nishness as short-sighted and inexpedient as it is morally wrong\u2014should \nsufficient evidence of your impartiality to justify the insertion of my reminder. \n\nOld Member. \n\nMarch 9th , 1938. \n\n\nTry first thyself , and after call in God; \n\nFor to the worker God Himself lends aid .\u2014 Euripides. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nQuestion No. 406. \u2014What is the difference between a saint, a disciple, and a chUa? \n\nAnswer. \u2014There are various grades of saints, disciples and chfilas. Often, a saint\u2019s de\u00ac \nvelopment, though truly splendid, is along one main line, that of holiness. A disciple\u2019s devel\u00ac \nopment is more rounded, and leads to a better balanced and clearer idea of his Master\u2019s \nrequirements of him. The chfila must develop his whole nature wisely, putting it, in toto, at \nthe disposal of his Master; becoming at one with him in mind, in heart, in strength, so that \nhe instinctively, and with understanding, carries forward the plan and purpose of his spiritual \nFather. G.M.W.K. \n\nAnswer. \u2014The lives and writings of the saints reveal an almost overwhelming sense of their \nown sinfulness and unworthiness, thereby displaying great humility, which is the basis of all \nthe virtues. Another outstanding characteristic of the saint is intense love and devotion to his \nMaster. These qualities are essentials to discipleship and to ch&aship, but are by no means \nall that are needed by the aspirant to either. The disciple has these qualities of the saint, \nplus others, chief among which is a certain degree of understanding, but minus the limitations \nof creed and dogma which narrow the vision of the saint. Discipleship has been described as \nthe preliminary step to ch&aship, which is the completion of discipleship. The disciples of \nthe Master Christ, in spite of their close association with him, failed for the most part, during \nhis lifetime, to understand his nature and mission. St. Paul and St. John, on the other hand, \nare said to have been initiated chSlas; and it is clear that there was a great change in all the \ndisciples following Pentecost. Discipleship means self-surrender, and many who think they \ndesire it fail to realize that they have not surrendered their own wills, which in many cases is \ndue to inability to judge their motives correctly through lack of self-knowledge. \n\nThe chdla becomes; he is not made. The process of becoming involves growth in self- \nknowledge, which enables him to use his entire nature wisely, and also growth in understanding \nof the laws of Nature, of the Universe, and of the spiritual world, which are, in reality, one \nand the same. He also grows in likeness to his Master, until he becomes an \u201caccepted chfila\u201d, \nwhen his mind and heart and will are united with his Master\u2019s. G.H.M. \n\nAnswer. \u2014A saint is one who has attained to a certain degree of holiness. A disciple is one \nwho has attained that, and also a certain degree of understanding. One description of chfila- \nship is as follows: \u201cChfila (literally \u2018child\u2019) is usually translated \u2018disciple\u2019, but the word means \nmuch more than this. The steps of the evolutionary scale between man as we know him, and \nMasters, are filled by ch\u00a3las of various grades, lay-ch\u00a3las, probationary chfilas, accepted \nchSlas, etc. Its higher grades are said to involve a closeness, a degree of union with the chela\u2019s \nMaster beyond anything in our experience. Such ch\u00a3laship, in addition to the attainment of \nfirst-hand knowledge of the Divine, implies a higher, richer and more selfless state of con\u00ac \nsciousness, a 'change of polarity\u2019 in which the centre of the chela\u2019s interest is transferred from \nhimself to his Master and his Master\u2019s work. It is not an outer condition and cannot be \nconferred, but must be attained by the man himself as the result of his own inner develop\u00ac \nment. The rules governing this development constitute the scientific basis for ethics. Its \nattainment is possible in any outer circumstances. ... It is the next step in human \nevolution.\u201d J.F.B.M. \n\n\n174 \n\n\nQUESTIONS AND ANSWERS \n\n\ni 75 \n\n\nQuestion No. 407 .\u2014When in doubt as to what course to follow, and when one honestly seeks \ninspiration or guidance and cannot find it, what is wrong? \n\nAnswer. \u2014When we seek, do we at the same time ask? If we have asked, do we then listen? \nIf we listen, do we continue to listen, intently and with faith, or do we become impatient and \nself-centred, and so impair and dull our true power of hearing? What kind of an answer do \nwe await? Do we expect to see, in a blinding flash, our entire future course mapped out for \nus in the most minute detail? Or are we content and satisfied to go step by step, acting upon \nsuch guidance as we are able to recognize, first at one point and then at another, until, as we \nslowly build, we finally realize that each separate act is becoming part of an harmonious and \nordered whole? Let us ask ourselves as well whether it is that we want to do the right thing, \nor whether what we really desire is, that the right thing should be done and that we may \nmerely do our part in it aright. C.R.A. \n\nAnswer. \u2014Those above us are always eager to give all the inspiration and guidance we \nneed, and which we have made ourselves capable of receiving. Our failure to find guidance \nmay be due to many different causes. Perhaps the answer to our problem is written clearly \nin our own experience, and what we are wanted to do is to examine that experience to learn \nits neglected lessons. Good teachers help a pupil, but do not solve his problems for him. \nLife sets us problems to teach us how to live. \n\nIt is not generally recognized that to perceive truth is supremely difficult,\u2014as difficult as \nto live rightly. In fact, perception depends on right living, for only those who live the life \ncan know the doctrine. Every fault we have, obscures or distorts our perception of truth. \nNo vain man, for example, can ever give a true, justly proportioned account of any incident \nin which he himself was concerned. The skill of the mind in altering and colouring its picture of \nevents for reasons of vanity or self-justification, is a matter of every-day observation. Guid\u00ac \nance from above is received from a much higher level than that of our mental processes, and \nmust be interpreted to our every-day consciousness by the mind. To the extent to which \nthe mind is \"impure\u201d, is under the habitual domination of self-love, self-will, self-indulgence, \netc., there is danger that the guidance will be distorted or perverted. Failure to recognize \nthe difficulty of interpreting divine guidance through polluted human minds, is one of the \ngreat errors of Buchmanism. The probability of misinterpretation must often make it impos\u00ac \nsible for Masters to supply the guidance they long to give. One essential is a genuine desire \non our part for the truth, irrespective of vanity, hurt feelings, personal predilections, or any\u00ac \nthing else. A test is the way we receive criticism. When we have learned to welcome it, we \nhave gone a long way toward earning guidance. J.F.B.M. \n\nAnswer. \u2014The trouble may be lack of practice. Spiritual faculties, like physical and \nmental ones, require development and cultivation and constant use. If one habitually ide^k \ntifies himself with his personality, obeys the commands of self-love, self-indulgence, and sa|^ \nwill, and is guided by worldly wisdom rather than desire for Truth, his intuitive powers hfWe \nlittle opportunity to manifest themselves. He does not recognize or value them. Is it surprising \nthat when, in time of trouble, he does seek guidance, he finds only uncertainty? C.M.S. \n\nAnswer. \u2014It is questionable if one who honestly seeks guidance, will fail to find it. We \nhave the promise: \"Seek, and ye shall find\u201d. The lower nature employs many wiles to keep \nus from our goal: over-scrupulousness may be used to screen timidity and vanity; laziness \nand mental inertia may cause us to wait for someone else to solve our problems. A motto in \nan office reads: \"He who never makes a mistake, never does anything.\u201d G.H.M. \n\nAnswer. \u2014Our understanding is not sufficiently awakened to grasp what is before us, for \n^tepiration and guidance are always at hand. Doubtless our blindness at this point is a result \n^previous disobedience, our refusal to follow and act on light that was revealed. To regain \nour lost estate, and to quicken our awareness, we can be humbly and meticulously obedient \nto such spiritual truth as we can see. It is said that obedience invariably brings understanding. \n\nG.M.W.K. \n\n\n\n\n\nNOTICE OF CONVENTION \nThe Theosophical Society \n\n\nTo the Branches of The Theosophical Society: \n\n1. The Annual Convention of The Theosophical Society will be held at 64, Washington \nMews, New York, on Saturday, April 30th, 1938, beginning at 10:30 a. m. \n\n2. Branches unable to send delegates to the Convention are requested to send proxies. \nThese may be made out to the Secretary T. S., or to any officer or member of the Society \nwho is resident in New York or is to attend the Convention. These proxies should state the \nnumber of members in good standing in the Branch. \n\n3. Branch Secretaries are asked to send their annual reports to the Secretary T. S. These \nreports should cover the significant features of the year\u2019s work and should be accompanied \nby a complete list of officers and members, with the full name and address of each; also a \nstatement of the number of members gained or lost during the year; also a record of the place \nand time of Branch meetings. These reports should reach the Secretary T. S. by April 1st. \n\n4. Members-at-large are invited to attend the Convention sessions; and all Branch mem\u00ac \nbers, whether delegates or not, will be welcome. \n\n5. Following the custom of former years, the sessions of the Convention will begin at 10:30 \na. m. and 2:30 p. m. \n\n6. On Sunday, May 1st, at 4 p. m., tea will be served at 64, Washington Mews, to dele\u00ac \ngates, members, and their friends. \n\nI. E. Perkins, \n\nSecretary , The Theosophical Society , \n\nP. 0 . Box 64, Station 0 , New York, N. Y. \n\nFebruary 15th, 1938. \n\n\nNOTICE OF MEETINGS \n\nThe regular meetings of the New York Branch of The Theosophical Society are held on \nalternate Saturday evenings, at 64, Washington Mews, which runs from the east side of Fifth \nAvenue, midway between Eighth Street and Washington Square, North. No. 64 is the first \nstudio east of Fifth Avenue, on the north side of the Mews. The meetings begin at half-past \neight, and close at ten o\u2019clock. There will be meetings on,\u2014 \n\nApril 9th and 23rd, May 7th. \n\nOut-of-town members of the Society are invited to attend these meetings whenever they \nare in New York. Visitors who may be interested in Theosophy are always welcome. \n\n\n176 \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\ntKf)t GTfjeojSopfjtcal ^ocietp \n\nFounded by P. Blavatsky at Dew Vork in 1875 \n\n\nHE Society does not pretend to be able to establish \nat once a universal brotherhood among: men, but \nonly strives to create the nucleus of such a body* \nMany of its members believe that an acquaintance \nwith the world's religions and philosophies will \nreveal, as the common and fundamental principle \nunderlying: these, that \u201cspiritual identity of all Souls with the \nOversoul '\"which is the basis of true brotherhood; and many \nof them also believe that an appreciation of the finer forces \nof nature and man will still further emphasize the same idea* \nThe organization is wholly unsectarian, with no creed, \ndogma, nor personal authority to enforce or impose; neither \nis it to be held responsible for the opinions of its members, \nwho are expected to aceord to the beliefs of others that \ntolerance which they desire for their own* \n\nThe following: proclamation was adopted at the Conven\u00ac \ntion of the Society, held at Boston, April, 1895: \n\n\u201cThe Theosophies 1 Society in America by its delegates and \nmembers in Convention assembled, does hereby proclaim \nfraternal good will and kindly feeling: toward all students of \nTheosophy and member* of Theosophical Societies wherever \nand however situated* It further proclaims and avers its \nhearty sympathy and association with such persons and \norganisations in all theosophical matters except those of \ngovernment and administration, and invites their cor\u00ac \nrespondence and co-operation* \n\n\u201cTo all men and women of whatever caste, creed, race, or \nreligious belief, who aim at the fostering: of peace, gentleness, \nand unselfish regard one for another, and the acquisition of \nsuch knowledge of men and nature as shall tend to the eleva\u00ac \ntion and advancement of the human race, it sends most friendly \ngreeting and freely proffers its services. \n\n\u201cIt joins hands with all religions and religious bodies whose \nefforts are directed to the purification of men's thoughts and \nthe bettering of their ways, and it avows its harmony there\u00ac \nwith* To all scientific societies and individual searchers after \nwisdom upon whatever plane, and by whatever righteous \nmeans pursued, it is and will be grateful for such discovery \nand unfoldment of Truth as shall serve to announce and eoa-. \nfirm a scientific basis for ethics . \n\n\u201cAnd lastly, it invites to its membership those who, seek* \nfng a higher life hereafter, would learn to know the path to \ntread in this,\u201d \n\n\nApplications for membership should be addressed to the \n\u2022 Secretary T. S., P .O. Box 64 , Station O, New York. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nXXXV, No. 3 JULY, 1938 \n\n\nPUBLISHED BY \n\nTHE THEOSOPHICAL SOCIETY \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nTHE THEOSOPniCAL SOCIETY \n\n\nThe principal aim and object of this Society is to form the nucleus of a \nUniversal Brotherhood of Humanity, without distinction of race, creed, sex, \ncaste or colour. The subsidiary objects are: The study of ancient and modern \nreligions, philosophies and sciences, and the demonstration of the importance \nof such study; and the investigation of the unexplained laws of nature and \nthe psychical powers latent in man. \n\n\n\nThe Theosophical Quarterly is the official organ of the original \nTheosophical Society founded in New York by II. P. Blavatsky , \nW. Q. Judge and others , in 1875. \n\nWe have no connection whatsoever with any other organization \ncalling itself Theosophical , formerly headed by Mrs. Besant, nor \nwith similar bodies , the purposes and methods of which are wholly \nforeign to our own. \n\n\nEditors, Tiie Theosophical Qcarterlt. \n\n\nJULY, 1938 \n\n\nThe Theosophical Society , as such , is not responsible for any opinion or declaration \nin this magazine , by whomsoever expressed , unless contained in an official document. \n\n\nOmne Vivum Ex Ovo \n\n\n\n0 science would be possible, if the universe were not one , a cosmos, in \n\n\nwhich all events are linked together and somehow correspond to one \n\n\n^ 1 another. There are many planes and modes of existence, and each \nbeing regards the Whole from a different point of view; but there is no contra\u00ac \ndiction between various aspects of the one and indivisible Truth. Natura \nnon facit saltum: Nature does not proceed by leaps and bounds. If the future \nwere not continuous with the present and the present with the past, we could \ntrust no calculation and plan no action. When something unexpected, like \na \u201cmiracle\u201d, seems to disrupt the natural order, its occurrence merely proves \nthat we do not understand Nature as completely as we may have assumed. \nThe unexpected is as normal as the expected; and the wise man, admitting \nthe vastness of his ignorance, ceases to be surprised by anything which hap\u00ac \npens. Moreover, reasoning from the known to the unknown, he comes to the \nconclusion that everything which seems ordinary by dint of repetition, must \nhave at one time appeared extraordinary. The laws of Nature are consent, \nbut the laws of Nature are also laws of growth. The extraordinary iarfon- \ntinually growing out of the ordinary. The process is as natural and also as \nmysterious as the leafing of a tree in May. \n\nIt is sufficiently extraordinary that anything whatsoever should exist. How\u00ac \never, materialistic habits of thought are so ingrained to-day, that many find \nit easier to imagine the normal order of existence as lifeless rather than as \nliving. A stone or a lump of clay, which is rashly assumed to be \u201cdead matter\u201d, \nappears to be more \u201cnatural\u201d than a plant or an animal or a man. Indeed, the \napparition of what is called organic life on this planet, literally offends the \nmajority of scientists, because it does not fit into their ideas as to what ought \nto take place in a neat and tidy universe. \n\nf The trouble is that organic life cannot be manufactured, like steel or soap, \nin a laboratory. Omne vivum ex ovo; everything living is bom from an egg or \n\n\n179 \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\ni8o \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\ngerm; life alone can produce life. Thus the biologist is faced with a variant \nof the old riddle: Which came first, the hen or the egg? And as so often hap\u00ac \npens in the case of riddles, he has given up the attempt to answer it and has \nchanged the subject. What else can he do, as long as he persists in the notion \nthat life is nothing but an abnormal conjunction of chemical and physical \nfactors? Following, in imagination, the lines of evolution backwards, he ap\u00ac \nproaches a point in time when the physical state of the earth must have been \nradically different from what it is to-day. The organisms which exist now, \ncould not have existed then. How then did life originate, when there could \nbe no \u201chen\u201d and no \u201cegg\u201d? As can be easily seen, this riddle is even more \nexasperating than the one which it has displaced; for ex nihilo nihil fit: nothing \ncan be created out of nothing. All that is left for the biologist to do is to as\u00ac \nsume that life is virtually nothing at all, since it is merely the \u201cepiphenomenon\u201d \nof a preposterous chemical accident. More than one scientist has not hesi\u00ac \ntated to affirm that Nature herself has never duplicated this \u201caccident\u201d; that \nour little earth must be the only life-bearing orb in space. Thus it has become \nconventional to represent life as so utterly insignificant that, in any compre\u00ac \nhensive description of the Universe, it can be completely ignored, as even \nthe most meticulous housewife takes no account of an infinitesimal speck of \ndust on an otherwise spotless surface. \n\nLife Alone Can Produce Life \n\nThe age of blind and stubborn dogmatism did not come to an end, as some \nhave fondly supposed, when modem science superseded mediaeval theology as \nthe supreme arbiter of human opinions. No schoolman ever clung more tena\u00ac \nciously to his preconceptions than does the typical modern biologist. The \nbiologist does not reason from the known to the unknown, for wherever he \nbas studied life, he knows that it has proceeded from something living. No \n\u2022one can propound a just theory of organic evolution, unless he accept this \nattested truth as his starting-point. The difficulties of the scientist arise, \nbecause he arbitrarily defines life as the unique attribute of the \u201corganic\u201d \nkingdoms, of vegetables and animals and the human species; because he de\u00ac \nclaims against the possibility of any forms of life under conditions different \nfrom those which accompany the formation of terrestrial physical organisms. \nThe idea of living beings with spiritual or astral bodies, dwelling upon planes \nwhere our consciousness is not at present objective, is of course wholly mean\u00ac \ningless to him; the worlds inhabited by angels and nature-spirits, by the Gods, \nDemi-Gods and Heroes of ancient mystagogy, are for him as incredible as \n\u25a0\u201cAlice in Wonderland\u201d. But he finds almost equally fantastic the theory \nthat there may be life on other planets, like Venus or Mars. How can this \nbe, he asks, if their climatic conditions are evidently unlike ours, and carbon, \noxygen, hydrogen and nitrogen do not occur there in the same proportions as \non earth? What is even more to the point, he recognizes no evidence of living \nactivity, that is to say, of purposeful activity, in the mineral kingdom, in spite \nof the behaviour of crystals, in spite of the fact that the study of filterable \n\n\nNOTES AND COMMENTS \n\n\n181 \n\n\nviruses proves how difficult it is to draw the boundary between the inorganic \nand organic realms. \n\nThe student of Theosophy ventures to suggest that physical, terrestrial or\u00ac \nganic life is only one of the infinite number of the \u201cforms\u201d of life in the great \nUniverse; that life is co-extensive with Nature; that life is as omnipresent as \nBeing and is identical with Being. Wherever there is any \u201corganization\u201d of \n\u201cmatter\u201d in any kingdom, in any dimension, on any plane, there the universal \nlife-force is at work, building for itself some vehicle through which it can attain \nsome measure of expression, some degree of what Leibniz called \u201capperceptive \nconsciousness\u201d. Thus the aphorism, onine vivum ex ovo, has universal meaning, \napplying not only to the birth of individuals but to that of species and classes \nand kingdoms: each \u201cform\u201d necessarily emerges from a germ developed within \nthe matrix of another \u201cform\u201d. \n\nDoubtless, at one time, when the earth was young, \u201corganic\u201d life \u2014as we \nunderstand it \u2014did not exist. Then, to use the jargon of contemporary biology, \na \u201cmutation\u201d or \u201cemergence\u201d presumably occurred, and something which \nmight be described as an \u201corganism\u201d was bom. But why do we assume that \nsuch an event must have been an outlandish and unheard-of thing? We are \nconstantly experiencing \u201cmutations\u201d in our own lives, whenever, in fact, our \nconsciousness is impressed by any new or unfamiliar sensation or idea. If \nthe \u201corganic\u201d developed out of the \u201cinorganic\u201d, this must have been because \nthe promise and potency of the \u201corganic\u201d was present in the \u201cinorganic\u201d. \n\nThe Possibilities of Life Cannot Be Exhausted \n\nIf life be as universal as Nature, it is as beginningless and as endless as Na\u00ac \nture, proceeding\u2014as Theosophy teaches\u2014through cycles of Pralaya and Man- \nvantara, alternately exfoliating from unity to multiplicity and indrawing \nfrom multiplicity to unity. It would seem that the path of life is figured by \nan endless climbing spiral, not by a straight line that either stops or continues \nindefinitely in one direction. Its possibilities cannot be exhausted, as the \nbiologist pretends, by a single \u201corganic\u201d evolution which terminates in the \nproduction of physical man. If the mineral contain the germ or potentiality \nof all plant and animal life, we may logically infer that the animal maiyn \nturn contains the germ or potentiality of a superior form of being, the spir^hl \nman. \n\nSome scientists have suggested that physical organic evolution has spent \nits force. There is evidence that the tendency to multiply species has been \ndecreasing in intensity since the early Tertiary; that in a certain sense the \nfauna and flora of our globe have approximated to their definitive forms in \nthe present great cycle. In spite of their eagerness to find their ape-like an\u00ac \ncestors, anthropologists are obliged to testify that the physical appearance \nof man has scarcely changed during a period of more than a million years. \nNot unnaturally the spectacle of a world in which evolution has stopped, does \n^ot provide a reassuring outlook for the future. What will happen to man? \nMost of those who speculate upon this problem are quite ready to admit that \n\n\n182 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nthey do not know, but many are inclined to expect the worst. It is fashion\u00ac \nable to offer an alternative between two prospects: either Nature herself will \ndestroy man by a series of catastrophes, or man by his ineradicable folly will \ndestroy himself. \n\nThe student of Theosophy sees no reason for indulging in a blind optimism; \nbut he does not share the notion that the creative force of life on this planet \nis diminishing. Evolution has not stopped. It has changed its direction. \nThere is a theosophical hypothesis that many millions of years ago evolution \npassed a \u201cmid-way point\u201d, when the human kingdom became definitely es\u00ac \ntablished as part of the physical order. At that moment, it is said, the major \ntide of the life-force turned, and, after flowing downwards and outwards into \n\u201cmatter\u201d for aeons, began to indraw upwards, to return, as it were, to Spirit. \nIt created physical man at the climax of the \u201cdescent into matter\u201d; but the \nphysical man, the mortal, was designed to be the matrix from which could \nbe born the spiritual man, the immortal. According to the theosophical teach\u00ac \ning, the next stage of evolution is, or should be, the emergence and growth of \nnew and higher forms of human or \u201csuperhuman\u201d life. \n\nWe know how absurd this must sound to the scientific ear. But there is \nample testimony that such new and higher forms have already appeared. The \nqualities of mind and heart which we regard as most distinctively human\u2014 \nsuch as self-sacrificing love for values that are neither personal nor physical\u2014 \ncannot be adequately described as specializations of ordinary animal qualities. \nNor can we explain, as a mere by-product of animal evolution, the nature \nof the Slite of mankind, of those who, like the Buddha and the Christ, have \ncompletely proved that it is possible for the human being to transcend him\u00ac \nself, to immortalize himself, to liberate consciousness from the personal and \nphysical limitations that are so familiar to us. Since the universe is one, the \n\u201cspiritual\u201d is doubtless foreshadowed and prepared by the \u201canimal\u201d, but \nthe \u201cspiritual\u201d is not a \u201cspecies\u201d of the \u201canimal\u201d. Although a spiritual being \nmay be said to come into manifestation through a transformation or transmu\u00ac \ntation of animal nature, it grows and evolves in its own distinct \u201ckingdom\u201d. \n\nTheosophy therefore proposes the doctrine that the cycle of evolution has \nturned inwards from multiplicity towards unity, from the phenomenal to\u00ac \nwards the noumenal world. The emphasis of creation has been shifted from \nthe outer to the inner world, and this transfer would seem to be intimately \nconnected with the development of man as a self-conscious, responsible indi\u00ac \nvidual, whose first mission is to co-operate with Nature in the creation of him\u00ac \nself as a living soul. \n\nThe Mystery of Transformation \n\nIf the laws of transformation and growth be consistent and constant, the \npassage from potentiality to realization in every kingdom must illustrate the \nsame fundamental principles. When we observe the growth of a plant from \na seed, we are witnessing the way in which every potentiality unfolds, the way \nin which all that is invisible in Nature exfoliates into a visible form. \n\nThe study of vegetable growth should make clear one simple fact. The \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nNOTES AND COMMENTS \n\n\n183 \n\n\nseed will never grow of itself; it must receive a stimulus from external forces. \nThe potential plant will remain potential for ever, unless the life within it be \nquickened. There must be contact with earth and water and air, and there \nmust be enough heat to start and maintain organic action. Above all, the \ngrowing plant must be placed where there is light; for without light it cannot \nbuild its body, it cannot convert \u201cinorganic\u201d into \u201corganic\u201d substance, it \ncannot \u201cdiligently separate the subtile from the gross\u201d. To recapitulate, in \norder that a plant may come to maturity, three factors are indispensable. \nThere must be the seed, containing potentially the form of the plant and the \nspark of life; there must be the substances of earth and air and water which \nare integrated into the form as it develops, and which constitute the elements upon \nwhich the spark of life feeds; and there must be the immaterial agencies of \nlight and heat, directly or indirectly derived from the Sun, the cosmic energies \nwhich ignite the spark\u2014so to speak\u2014drawing it out of its latent condition \nand interacting with it. However we may explain it, it is by virtue of this \ninteraction between the active force of radiation and the potential force within \nthe seed and the growing plant, that the essential vital organic activities are \ncarried on. \n\n\nTheosophy points to one underlying cause of the dependence of organic life \nupon radiant energy. \u201cThe Sun is the store-house of Vital Force, which is the \nNoumenon of Electricity; and it is from its mysterious, never-to-be-fathomed \ndepths, that issue those life-currents which thrill through Space, as through \nthe organisms of every living thing on Earth\u201d (The Secret Doctrine , ed. 1893, \nI* 579 )- Elsewhere it is suggested that from or through the Sun proceeds \u201cthat \nvital and intelligent Force which informs the seed and develops it into the \nblade of grass, or the root and sapling. It is the germ which becomes the Upadhi \nof the seven principles of the thing it resides in, shooting them out as the latter \ngrows and develops\u201d (op. cit. } I, 311). It may be assumed that in its aspect \nas the reservoir of life or prana , the Sun is not simply the shining orb which \nwe see in the sky, but is the body of its radiance filling the solar system in its \nentirety; and that the planets and all their creatures live within it, as tissues \nor cells of that body. That is why for any organism on earth, insulation from \nradiant energy is equivalent to death. \n\n\nPotentiality and Realization \n\n\n\nAccording to an old definition of the mystics, matter is \u201ccrystallized spirit\u201d.' \nIt is, as it were, spirit without the clear consciousness that it is spirit. But \nbecause it is still spirit, as Plotinus says, there is always, even in the deepest \nabyss of material existence, an essence which is an \u201cobscure contemplation\u201d \nand which dimly yearns towards the Good. It would seem that it is this in\u00ac \nherent quality of yearning or contemplation, which expresses one aspect of \nwhat is called the Monad in theosophical literature. The presence of a Monad, \nor \u201catom\u201d of spirit, if one may so describe it, endows a thing of matter with such \nreality as it possesses; and this reality appears to be, in part at least, identical \nwith the potentiality of the thing of matter to be transformed into something \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n184 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nsuperior to that which it now is, whatever that may be. Thus, the real man\u2014 \nas defined, for example, by the Upanishads\u2014is not his \u201cself\u201d as it exists, but \nthe Higher Self which he can become. \n\nOne begins to understand why, in so many mythologies, the Sun-God is rep\u00ac \nresented as a sacrificial victim, like the \u201cAll-seeing Vishvakarma\u201d of the Rig \nVeda , who \u201csacrifices himself to himself\u201d, in order that the \u201cSpiritual Egos\u201d \nof mortals who are of one essence with him, may be released from their prisons \nof flesh and, through conscious union with him, participate in his freedom. \nThe Monad, the potentiality of the growing plant, realizes itself, according \nto its measure and degree, by its response to the outpouring of life from the \nSun, which may be not inappropriately called its \u201cFather in Heaven\u201d. But \nthis vitalization of the plant is surely a sign and symbol of the universal sacrifice \nof the higher to the lower in every kingdom and department of Nature, the \nsacrifice which alone endows the lower with the power to transcend itself. So \nthe Master, the Perfected Man, spends himself endlessly to bring life and \nlight to his children, to all who exist within his \u201cbody of radiance\u201d. \n\nLower Nature Unaided Fails \n\nThere is a passage from The Secret Doctrine which refers to an early dis\u00ac \nturbed period in the earth\u2019s history when our Mother, the Earth, \u201cwould call \nno Sons of Heaven, she would ask no Sons of Wisdom. She created from her \nown bosom. She evolved Water-Men, terrible and bad.\u201d To some this may \nsound senseless or rather quaint, like an episode from a fairy-story; but Ma\u00ac \ndame Blavatsky\u2019s comments are singularly pertinent to the present day, which \nis producing its own breed of \u201cWater-Men, terrible and bad\u201d. \n\nThus Physical Nature, when left to herself in the creation of animal and man, is shown \nto have failed. She can produce the first two kingdoms, as well as that of the lower \nanimals, but when it comes to the turn of man, spiritual, independent and intelligent \npowers are required for his creation, besides the \u201ccoats of skin\u201d and the \u201cbreath of animal \nlife\u201d. 1 he human Monads of preceding Rounds need something higher than purely \nphysical materials with which to build their personalities, under the penalty of remain\u00ac \ning even below any \u201cFrankenstein\u201d animal (II, 55 , 59 ). \n\nOne may deduce this general law, that no being in the Universe, no matter \nwho or what it may be, can transcend its actual state by its own efforts alone. \nIt must call to its aid the \u201cSons of Heaven\u201d; it must invoke the aid of potencies \nhigher than itself. As we are told, this is the law obeyed by Masters. How \nmuch easier it should be to recognize that it is the law prescribed for the mortal \nand unregenerate man! Yet it is the law which he most persistently distrusts \nand defies, both collectively and individually. Every good and perfect thing \nin the long annals of human history has indeed come down from above, for \nthere have always been in existence individuals and groups capable of some \nreal response to the radiance from Heaven. But every civilization has suc\u00ac \ncumbed to decay and death, because after the peak of each cycle has been \npassed, the ruling classes, those who really mould public opinion, have lost \nfaith and interest in their \u201chigher selves\u201d and in Divine Powers, and have \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nNOTES AND COMMENTS 185 \n\nbecome absorbed in the concerns and passions of the body and of the \u201cper\u00ac \nsonality\u201d that haunts it. \n\nUnder such conditions, as should be obvious, the Monad or divine poten\u00ac \ntiality in man, that which in response to the radiance from above can become \nthe conscious Higher Self, must be virtually incapable of growth and exfolia\u00ac \ntion. According to Theosophy, once the human stage of evolution is reached, \nthe Monad can only respond and become active in the measure that its \u201cve\u00ac \nhicle\u201d, the conscious, thinking, \u201cfree-willing\u201d human Ego itself, obeys and \nconforms to the intimations of man\u2019s divine destiny. Not until the human \nEgo has learned in completeness the lesson that in the Divine Will is its peace, \nwill the \u201cspiritual man\u201d be capable of growing \u201cas the flower grows, uncon\u00ac \nsciously, but eagerly anxious to open its soul to the air\u201d. \n\nThe Building of a City \n\nOne may illustrate the tragedy of man\u2019s \u201cself-will\u201d by reference to a recent \nbook, which is none the less interesting because one may disagree with many \nof its conclusions ,\u2014The Culture of Cities , by Mr. Lewis Mumford. The author \nis concerned with the terrible paradox that no civilization can grow and flourish \nwithout a highly developed urban life, although it is the horrible corruption \nof urban life which infects and destroys civilization. \u201cHere in the city\u201d; as \nhe says, \u201cthe goods of civilization are multiplied and manifolded; here is where \nhuman experience is transformed into viable signs, symbols, patterns of con\u00ac \nduct, systems of order.\u201d But in what measure does the typical city of the \nmachine age realize such an ideal? Mr. Mumford describes the growth of \nthese \u201curban masses\u201d: \n\nThe brakes of tradition and custom were lifted from the exploitation of land; there \nwas no limit to congestion; ... no standard of order or decency or beauty to dictate \nthe division and layout and building of urban structures. . , . The two main elements \nin the new urban complex were the factory and the slum. By themselves they consti\u00ac \ntuted what was called the town. . . . Such urban masses could and did expand a hun\u00ac \ndred times without acquiring more than a shadow of the institutions that characterize a \ncity in the sociological sense\u2014that is, a place in which the social heritage is concentrated, \nand in which the possibilities of continuous social intercourse and interaction raise to a \nhigher potential the activities of man. \n\nIt is evident that the tone and quality of a city are ultimately determined \nby the dominant motives which draw men to live together. Doubtless, that \nexplains why a city like Paris has an \u201catmosphere\u201d wholly unlike Detroit, in \nspite of the fact that both may become famous for \u201csit-down strikes\u201d. Of \ncourse, most people probably live in a given place because they were bom \nthere, but why were they bom there and not elsewhere? A student of Theos\u00ac \nophy would suggest that for good or bad reasons they wanted to be bom \nthere, and that such was the karma of their past acts and desires. We greatly \ndoubt^fhether many sociologists will be impressed by this argument, but \nthey will probably admit that when the average man migrates from the coun\u00ac \ntry to the town, it is most frequently because he wants to make more money \n\n\ni 86 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nand to find more amusement and excitement. Greed and the love of pleasure \ncan certainly be numbered among the \u2018\u2018dominants\u201d which determine the des\u00ac \ntiny of the average modem town. There have been other dominants , as \nthe evidence assembled by Mr. Mumford makes clear. There have been cities \ndesigned primarily to glorify their builders. There was the mediaeval city \nwhich he seems to prefer to most others, and which was certainly partly founded \nin response to the natural need of the surrounding countryside for a centre \nof protection from marauding barbarians and for a regional market-place. \nAlso, even to-day, there are those who settle in great metropolitan centres \nbecause they seek an intelligent society and hope to improve their minds, if \nnot their characters. \n\nHowever, none of these motives can suffice to build a real city or to pre\u00ac \nserve the community which they establish from convulsions and ultimate \nruin. The earth is a graveyard of \u2018\u2018urban masses\u201d, most of which have not \neven left a name. Ancient Babylon and Rome were probably not very un\u00ac \nlike modern New York and Chicago. Only a city literally founded and con\u00ac \ntinuously governed with the aid of \u2018\u2018Sons of Wisdom\u201d can permanently prevail. \nWhat does that mean? Madame Blavatsky suggests an answer in a quota\u00ac \ntion from Ragon\u2019s Magonnerie Occulte: \n\nDo we not know that the ancient initiated poets, when speaking of the foundation of a \ncity , meant thereby the establishment of a doctrine? Thus Neptune, God of reasoning, \nand Apollo, God of hidden things, presented themselves as masons before Laomedon, \nPriam\u2019s father, to help him to build the city of Troy\u2014that is to say, to establish the \nTrojan religion {The Secret Doctrine , II, 840). \n\nIn brief, the only true human community is one that is animated by a com\u00ac \nmon service and worship of the Eternal. The only real city is a centre of the \nMysteries, because it alone is capable of a real growth, of a real unfoldment \nof its potentialities, in response to the inspiration which comes to it from a \ncentre of yet Greater Mysteries, from the Lodge, from Masters of Wisdom. \nVery seldom, indeed, has this condition been approached by mortal man, \nperhaps never more closely during our historical period than at certain mo\u00ac \nments, in certain places, during the Middle Ages. This may, indeed, account \nfor a certain charm and harmonious proportion which Mr. Mumford admires \nin the mediaeval town and which is so painfully absent from its modem successor. \nThe mediaeval town was not \u2018\u2018planned\u201d in the deadly contemporary sense \nof that term. Its design was not arbitrarily imposed upon an unwilling or \nindifferent population. Its outer form was, in greater or lesser degree, the \nexpression of an inner religious life which was almost universally accepted \nas the ideal \u2018\u2018pattern of conduct\u201d for the citizen. Its \u2018\u2018master-builders\u201d brought \nto a focus the aspirations and inspirations of a multitude. Its veritable nucleus \nwas not the market-place but the cathedral. \n\nMental Revolt and Physical Disease \n\nThe building of a personality is analogous to the building of a city. As \ncertain physicians are at last beginning to recognize clearly, there is a direct \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nNOTES AND COMMENTS \n\n\n187 \n\n\nrelationship of cause and effect between states of consciousness and the func\u00ac \ntions of the body. It seems too good to be true, but there are actually some \n\u201corthodox\u201d medical practitioners who now practically affirm that a particular \ndisease is often caused by a particular idiosyncrasy of character,\u2014which ex\u00ac \nplains why each individual is more susceptible to some diseases than to others. \n\nWe quote from The New York Times , April 23, 1938: \n\nEmotional and mental activities of everyday life play an important part in physical \ndisease, and in extreme cases may actually induce changes in the structure of the human \nbody, according to six of the nation\u2019s neurologists and pathologists who yesterday took \npart in a symposium on neuropsychiatry at the Academy of Medicine. An adverse \nenvironment can no longer be considered as the sole cause of disease, and destructive \ncauses within man may reduce the environment to secondary importance as a factor in \nmaintaining health, it was pointed out. . . . Dr. George Draper [of the College of Physi\u00ac \ncians and Surgeons] asserted that although man has had sixty million years to adapt \nhimself to space and time, it is only within recent years that \u201cwe have begun to ration\u00ac \nally face the humiliating realization that even the camouflage of an outraged Deity is no \nlonger sufficient to obscure the truth that man\u2019s most destructive forces are within his \nown soul\u201d. Dr. Draper explained that a person\u2019s susceptibility to a particular disease may \nbe determined by his individual make-up. Gradations in differences of personal identity \noften paralleled the varying severity of an attack of infantile paralysis in each child, he \npointed out. Two entirely different types of mankind are susceptible to the two diseases \nof cataract and peptic ulcer, he said. . . . Dr. Oscar Dietheim [of Cornell University] \nurged the need of studying the philosophical, religious and ethical aspects of both normal \nand sick persons in order to guide medical and psychiatric treatment. There is increasing \nrecognition of the importance of considering the integrated personality as a whole in \nprescribing treatment, he declared. \n\nThis seems like plain common-sense to a layman. Our only quarrel is with \nthe assumption that the human race has had to wait \u201csixty million years\u201d for a \nrational science of self-knowledge to be bom. Unless some psychiatrists take \ncare, they will themselves catch one or another of the diseases which are pro\u00ac \nduced by an excess of self-satisfaction. Century after century there have \nbeen wise men who have proclaimed the simple truth, that a physical disease \nis primarily an extemalization of a mental or emotional disorder; that the \nhuman will and imagination can both heal and kill the organism. To mention \na single example, the Indian doctrine of Karma, in one of its aspects, is nothings \nbut a formulation of the working hypothesis that Nature moves from withii^ \noutwards, and that her method of purging the human soul of sin is to make \nits consequences felt in some malady of the human body. By sin is meant \nany act, great or small, which is instigated by self-will or sensuality. It was not \na modern psychiatrist who devised the axiom: mens sana in cor pore sano: a \nsound mind in a sound body. Deus non fecit mortem: God did not create death. \nDeath is the handiwork of the creature which separates itself in imagination \nfrom the Divine Radiance, and which disintegrates, since without the con\u00ac \nstant reinforcement of that Radiance it is incapable of that constant self- \ntransformation which is the essence of real life. \n\nGood and Evil in Art \n\n\u201cLeft-wing intellectuals\u201d often profess admiration for M. Andr6 Gide. M. \n\n\n188 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nGide is a novelist of exceptional talent, but his work has been vitiated by a \ntendency to champion many subversive and immoral causes. In recent years \nhe has become an avowed communist of the sentimental atheistic type. It \nis quite probable that his works have done incalculable harm, if only because \nthey are in large part dedicated to the doctrine that any effort towards moral \nor spiritual betterment is useless and a waste of human energies that should \nbe devoted to \u201cself-expression\u201d and physical pleasure. \n\nM. Claudel, who believes that only the Spirit has \u201csurvival-value\u201d, made a \nterse and caustic comment upon the counterfeit quality of all immoral art. \nLe mal ne compose pas: evil does not create. M. Henri Massis undertook the \nalmost impossible task of explaining to M. Gide what this sentence means. We \nparaphrase a few sentences from his letter (La Revue Universelle , January i, 1938): \n\nFor a Catholic, like Claudel, evil is a pure deficiency, a privation, a lack y and can there\u00ac \nfore have no positive existence. Human evil is, indeed, nothing else but the lack of one \nor many of the factors which condition the presence of good, together with the conscious\u00ac \nness of this lack. Man must remain in the order of the Good, in order to be, in order to \ndevelop according to his nature; if he commit evil, he diminishes himself, he ceases even \nto be really a self, he robs himself, even while he imagines that he is adding something to \nhimself. It is not in so far as it is itself that a being, issued from God, is the source of \nevil; but in so far as it is limited, in so far as it is \u201cnon-being\u201d. \n\nIt is interesting to apply these considerations to art, to the works of man\u2019s \nheart and brain and hands. It is as if there were a rigorous law of \u201cnatural \nselection\u201d which determines the \u201csurvival-value\u201d of each work. To take \nliterature for instance; it is a fact that only the scriptures and the classics \nreally survive in the memory of humanity from generation to generation. \nNot only do they survive, but in some way they seem to contrive to illumine \nconsciousness, even when they are not read. How many people read little \nor nothing except trash, and yet some uncorrupted instinct causes them to \nthrow the trash away, while they keep the Bible and Shakespeare in the book\u00ac \ncase! So it appears that the durability of a particular work is actually pre\u00ac \nscribed, not by its \u201cpublic\u201d which may be always small and at certain intervals \nactually non-existent, but by the purity of the motive which impelled its author \nto compose it. If the motive be primarily a \u201cconsuming need of order and \nlove\u201d, something will be brought into being that will continue to exist as an \ninspiration to others. In our opinion, it will continue to exist as an inspira\u00ac \ntion, even if the composition itself be engulfed in the ocean of physical time. \nAfter all, time is an illusion, and any creation, great or small, eternally is, as \na life-giving fact in the real world. Let us not think with despair of all the \nmonuments of man\u2019s spirit which have disappeared from the earth. What \nis real in them has not vanished from the Universe, for that reality is of the \nspirit and not of matter. \n\nWhat we have sufficient cause to bewail to-day is the multiplication of trash. \n\u201cEvil\u201d may seem to be a big word to apply to the average \u201cbest-seller\u201d in any \ndepartment of letters. But there is no other word to apply, if we think of evil \nas privation and non-being, for these works are as empty of substance as the \n\n\nNOTES AND COMMENTS \n\n\n189 \n\nreflection of a reflection. Moreover, although evil is non-being \u201cunder the \nform of the Eternal\u201d, on the planes of illusion it can take on the semblance of \na powerful force which attracts and fascinates. The most miserable of literary \nconcoctions, in so far as it stimulates and justifies the lower nature of the reader \nand denies the reality of any higher Nature, contributes to the work of Satan \nand all his host. \n\nEvil cannot create, but on the planes where it is active it can destroy. That \nis the supreme danger at this moment. Nations and multitudes have been \npersistently instructed by both \u201cart\u201d and \u201cscience\u201d in the doctrine that man \nhas no reality apart from his body and the so-called \u201cself\u201d which depends for \nits existence upon the body. Is it any wonder that this age is not rich in the \nproduction of classics? A classic is not produced by the author alone. It is, \nso to speak, the fruit of a collaboration of the author with potencies higher \nthan himself and which he draws to himself from the \u201ccausal world\u201d by the \nforce of faith and strong desire. In the arts, as in every phase of existence, \n\u201clower nature unaided fails\u201d. Nothing can make any work a classic\u2014neither \ntechnical skill nor the most accomplished craftsmanship\u2014if it be not illumined \nby a light from on high. \n\nThe Creation of Living Souls \n\nThe supreme art, of which all others are reflections, is the art of creating a \nreal self, the fashioning from one\u2019s own being of a living soul. This is the task \nwhich sooner or later every man must set himself to fulfil, or perish. There \ncan be no escape from the tyranny of evil and illusion, until the human being \nrecognizes his \u201cindividuality as not himself, but that thing which he has with \npain created for his own use, and by means of which he purposes, as his growth \nslowly develops his intelligence, to reach to the life beyond individuality\u201d. \nThat recognition can only come in its fulness as the effect of a love which at\u00ac \ntracts the fire from Heaven. The human ego must turn away from itself as an \nobject of contemplation towards the Divine Power which gave it birth and \nto which it belongs. Or, to state the same idea less abstractly, joy and peace \nand power will come to him who sets forth with an indomitable will to find \nhis Master, his spiritual Father, in the real world. \n\nTo the world, as at present constituted, such words must doubtless seem \nunintelligible or, at best, mere \u201ccounsels of perfection\u201d. However, students \nof Theosophy have no longer the least excuse for doubting the \u201cdivine possi\u00ac \nbilities\u201d in man. Living souls can be created within the matrix of our physical \nexistence. The way to ch\u00a3laship, to the Great Lodge, is open; and it is seen \nto be the normal way for man, the continuation of the road along which Divine \nNature has guided the \u201cPilgrim\u201d, the Monad, throughout the long aeons of \nevolution and involution. As the plant grows by responding to the rays of the \nphysical or pranic sun, so the Higher Self, which is potential in mortal man, \ncan become active and conscious if the human being respond without reserva\u00ac \ntion to the radiance of the Divine Sun, streaming down upon each soul from and \nthroughthe Master on whose ray it is. \n\n\n\n\nCONVENTION, 1938 \n\n\nW E HAVE all come from a Convention that was vibrant with a call \nto ch\u00a3laship. I have considered what the reactions, in the weeks \nthat have followed, may have been. \n\nThe stimulation of those hours having passed, the great wave of force that \nswept through that assembly-room having gone forth into the world beyond, \nwhere are we? And how is it with us, as we look back on those hours, reflecting \non what was said, and on our impressions and response? \n\nTo that question each will make his own reply. \n\nThere must be those, I fancy, to whom it now seems like a beautiful dream, \ntoo lovely, too iridescent with the lights of heaven, to last upon this drab and \nweary earth,\u2014at least to last for such as they (they say). Yet in some inner \nshrine, where are treasured sweet and sacred things, they cherish its memory,\u2014 \nthe memory of a moment when they seemed to touch the heights, and hear \nthe music of the very spheres. 0 friends, cherish those memories for ever\u00ac \nmore, since in that winged moment you really lived. It contains the promise \nof a future, which a stronger faith, to be won some day, please God, will give \nyou. Remember it, remember it: do not let the noise and rush of ordinary life \nput it from your minds. It is well for a man to have really lived, if only for \nan hour; well for him to have discovered his true longing, to have had a glimpse \nof that for which he exists. \n\nThere will be others too\u2014though one turns with sadness from the thought\u2014 \nwho have rather a sense of shame when they remember. They fancy they \nwere carried away, beyond the level of their normal common sense, in a mo\u00ac \nmentary excitement, permitting their feet to be lifted from the safe, firm ground \nof rational behaviour. Maybe we can say that was a natural reaction, es\u00ac \npecially in such of them as were young and inexperienced, still under the glamour \nof the notion that the world is balanced, and that the earth is firm. They will \nneed to live longer, much longer, many incarnations probably; but the fulness \nof the time having come, when the burden of their experience will be crushing \nthem, there will be for them also the memory of a call. Then, we shall dare \nto hope, they will turn from the emptiness of what they have sought and found, \nto the richness of life immortal. \n\nFor, if ch\u00a3laship means anything, it means the beginning of immortality. \nNo wonder that a man faces it awe-struck and trembling. Like one bom in a \n\n190 \n\n\n\nCONVENTION, 1938 \n\n\n191 \n\ncavern, he stands dazed and frightened at the revelation of a noon-day sun, \nand shrinks back into the accustomed darkness with a sense almost of relief. \nWhen the Divinity within him stirs, claiming its birthright, he sees himself \nabout to launch upon a perilous sea. And so in truth he is. \n\nBut then, 0 then is the test of him,\u2014whether he be a man , with a man\u2019s \nlove of adventure and glad willingness to strive and risk for a coveted goal, \na man\u2019s wish to step up and out from the commonplace into wider fields and \nhigher positions; or whether he merely be the ghost of a man, that, under an \nappearance of such feelings, seeks the well-beaten paths and the safety of old \nways. It is all a question of vision, of realization, of his point in evolution, \nand whether he be pressing forward or slipping back. \n\nUntold millions to-day are refusing to evolve\u2014for this is a crucial time, \nthe new race is forming; and in ages to come their masses will be rotting on the \nshore, where the tide of life and spiritual progress left them. \n\nIn all justice we cannot expect that there could be many for whom chelaship \nwould have the least attraction. It is in fact meaningless, save to the very few. \n\nThere are those, however, to whom chelaship means everything,\u2014the call of \nit, the lure of it, commands whatever they are; and this by no outer compulsion, \nbut as the flaming desire of the heart. The \u201csmall, old path\u201d leads on from \none prospect, to another still more lovely; and all that nourishes the heart \nand enriches the mind and exalts the whole nature, floods over it. Danger, \nyes; struggle and sacrifice, yes; sharp conflicts and suffering, yes. What of it? \nFor the Radiance is there, and the Glory just beyond. Above all, one Presence \nis to be found there\u2014there only in completeness\u2014whose beauty is worth any \nprice, and who makes the music and the meaning of the world. \n\n******* \n\nMany times has this call been sounded, notably in 1922. Must that Voice \nonce more call in vain? \n\nIn God\u2019s name come over and help us. The need is so great. \n\n\nK. \n\n\nFORCE AND ITS MOULDS \n\n\nNE of the most common and one of the most unnecessary causes of \n\n\n\nunhappiness in the world is the sense of life as purposeless and futile, \n\n\na meaningless, dull routine. Everyone knows how the presence or \nabsence of purpose completely alters the aspect of identical actions. Set a boy \non a summer\u2019s day to digging a ditch the reason for which he cannot under\u00ac \nstand, and the shovel will weigh a ton. Set him to digging for buried pirate \ngold, and the earth will fly. A mother will go without sleep for night after \nnight with a joyful heart, if thereby she is enabled to help her sick child. Take \naway the motive, and the sleeplessness would be unrelieved torture. Our pur\u00ac \npose\u2014or lack of it\u2014determines the spirit in which we approach all things. In \nfact, to find one\u2019s soul is, among other things, to find one\u2019s purpose in life, the \nreason why one incarnated. \n\nOne of the glad messages of Theosophy is that no life need be purposeless, \nthat any and all circumstances, no matter how narrow and restricted they \nappear, can be used both for the benefit of the world and for the personal spirit\u00ac \nual growth of the individual concerned. A bed-ridden invalid who never leaves \nher sick-room, a hard working farmer on an isolated farm, a woman living alone \nin a cottage, may all be, if they will, powerful centres for good in the world. Few \nthings would do more to transform their lives than the realization of their \nopportunity. \n\nEver since the time of Zoroaster, some ten thousand years ago, life has been \ndescribed as a battle, a never-ending warfare between the powers of righteous\u00ac \nness and the powers of evil, with every man, whether he be aware of it or not, \na soldier on one side or the other. This fight goes on, not only in the world \naround him, but inside each man, a constant struggle between what he knows \nhe ought to do and what he thinks he wants to do, the better against the dearer, \na battle a great deal older than the hills. In view of his centimes of experience \nwith it, it is extraordinary how little man knows of the nature of the fight, or of \nthe weapons with which it is waged on his behalf. For, fortunately for him, it \nis waged not only by him but also for him by those far greater than he, else he \nhad long ago been overwhelmed. \n\nWeapons are two-edged, and so long as men fight as often or oftener for evil \nthan for good, it is not hard to see why they have not been permitted to know \nmore of spiritual weapons and of the way they may be used. Nevertheless, \nthere are hints in theosophical writings that enable us to get a glimpse of what \nis going on, and of how those who wish to do so may take their part in the battle. \nBehind all life and all cosmic processes, Theosophy sees, in place of chaos and \nthe play of blind forces in the universe, a plan designed by infinite love, wisdom \nand compassion, a plan overseen and carried out by a hierarchy of great spiritual \nBeings, a hierarchy stretching all the way from the Supreme to man. Man \n\n\n192 \n\n\n\nFORCE AND ITS MOULDS \n\n\ni93 \n\n\nhimself is, or ought to be, a part of this hierarchy, with his own function to per\u00ac \nform in the evolution of the universe. The leaders in the battle against evil are \nthe Masters of Wisdom, the \u201cjust men made perfect\u201d. In that battle, every \nman is given, with fine courtesy, the opportunity to help those above him, and \nso to repay some tiny part of all they have sacrificed for him throughout the \nages. Consciously or unconsciously, every one helps or hinders, for it is eter\u00ac \nnally true that \u201che who is not with Me is against Me\u201d. \n\nIn \u201cWar Seen from Within\u201d (Theosophical Quarterly, January, 1915). \nMr. Griscom, writing under the pen name of Men-Tek-Nis, pictured each act \nof nobility, self-sacrifice or devotion, as providing force which the Masters of \nthe White Lodge can use in their ceaseless warfare against the powers of dark\u00ac \nness. Masters may draw on limitless power from above, but, under the law for\u00ac \nbidding any interference with man\u2019s free will, this force can be used on earth \nonly at the risk of dangerous reactions, since, if rejected or perverted, it releases \nan equal amount of energy for the use of the evil powers. Force of the right \ntype, created by men themselves through faithfulness, devotion or sacrifice, \ncan be used and multiplied many times with safety and without reactions. In \nthis law that men must themselves provide at least a portion of the force needed \nfor their salvation, would seem to lie the answer to a number of problems, among \nthem to the question that has puzzled so many people: \u201cWhy pray for others \nwhen surely a loving God will give them all that would be for their good with\u00ac \nout prayers from us?\u201d The fact that man must attain by his own efforts, must \nearn his own advance in evolution, is fundamental in the universe, and the \nMasters do not interfere with that law. But vicarious atonement is also a fact \nin the universe. Power provided by one man through prayer, one of the most \npotent of forces, may be used to help another over a hard time. Doubtless it has \nto be repaid in the course of the ages, just as in double figure-skating each of \ntwo partners provides his own momentum, yet each is able to give his partner \nsupport at the weak point of his stroke, receiving support at his own weak \npoint later. \n\nThat prayer is a force is difficult for many people to realize, as their idea of \nforce is too often limited to the tangible, with no conception at all of different \nkinds. They may grant the existence of mental force, but probably feel that \nthe word is being used figuratively. To understand life, it is essential to grasp \nthe truth of the theosophical tenet that force, substance and consciousness are \nall aspects of the same unity, that there is no force without some kind of con\u00ac \nsciousness, and no consciousness without its own form of force and its own \nvehicle of matter. The type of consciousness determines the type of force. \nAnger evokes one kind of force, compassion another, and so on. What we might \ncall the raw material of force in the store-house of the universe is constantly \nbeing transmuted by man into higher or lower forms and sent out into the \natmosphere of the world, for good or evil, as the case may be. The letters of \nthe Master K. H. in the Occult World are illuminating on this point: \n\nIn conformity with exact science you would define but one cosmic energy, and see \nno diffeiL jnce between the energy expended by the traveller who pushes aside the bush \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n194 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nthat obstructs his path, and the scientific experimenter who expends an equal amount \nof energy in setting a pendulum in motion. We do; for we know there is a world of \ndifference between the two. The one uselessly dissipates and scatters force, the other \nconcentrates and stores it. And here please understand that I do not refer to the relative \nutility of the two, as one might imagine, but only to the fact that in the one case there \nis but brute force flung out without any transmutation of that brute energy into the \nhigher potential form of spiritual dynamics, and in the other there is just that. Please \ndo not consider me vaguely metaphysical. The idea I wish to convey is that the result \nof the highest intellection in the scientifically occupied brain is the evolution of a subli\u00ac \nmated form of spiritual energy, which, in the cosmic action, is productive of illimitable \nresults; while the automatically acting brain holds, or stores up in itself, only a certain \nquantum of brute force that is unfruitful of benefit for the individual or humanity. \n1 he human brain is an exhaustless generator of the most refined quality of cosmic force \nout of the low, brute energy of Nature; and the complete adept has made himself a \ncentre from which irradiate potentialities that beget correlations upon correlations \nthrough Aeons of time to come. \n\nParenthetically, we have here the answer to the theories of modem science \nin regard to \u201cEntropy\u201d and the \u201crunning down\u201d of the universe. Left to itself, \nthe \u201crandom element\u201d does tend to increase, and force tends to return to the \nlow, brute potential of nature. These tendencies are constantly being coun\u00ac \nteracted by the purposeful and selective action of life in its various manifesta\u00ac \ntions. The soil around the roots of a tree, for example, is a more or less random \nmixture of a number of elements. From these the living roots of the tree select \nthe nitrogen, the carbon or the moisture which the tree desires and which are \nthen built into the highly complex structure of the wood, reducing the \u201crandom\u201d \nelement and raising the potential of force correspondingly. All life does this to \na greater or less extent. \n\nIntellection, as Master K. H. points out, refines energy to a high degree, and \nlove, \u201cthe only power that moves the spiritual world\u201d, raises it to its supreme \nform. If scientists would abandon the quite arbitrary limitations which they \nplace on the existence of life and consciousness in the universe, and adopt, as a \ntentative hypothesis, the theosophic viewpoint, they would obtain the answer \nto a number of the problems that now baffle them. Why, for instance, can the \nsun radiate energy at the rate of billions of ergs per second, and yet suffer \nno diminution of its mass ? Regard it as living and the problem is greatly simpli\u00ac \nfied or disappears altogether. But to return to our main point. \n\nThe letter goes on to speak of the \u201cvast difference between the two qualities \nof two equal amounts of energy expended by two men, of whom one, let us \nsuppose, is on his way to his daily quiet work, and another on his way to de\u00ac \nnounce a fellow-creature at the police station. . . . Still less does exact science \nperceive that while the building ant, the busy bee, the nidifacient bird, accumu\u00ac \nlates each in its own humble way as much cosmic energy in its potential form \nas a Haydn, a Plato, or a ploughman turning his furrow, in theirs; the hunter \nwho kills game for his pleasure or profit, or the positivist who applies his intel\u00ac \nlect to proving that + X + = \u2014, are wasting and scattering energy no less \nthan the tiger who springs on his prey. They all rob nature instead of enriching \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nFORCE AND ITS MOULDS \n\n\ni95 \n\n\nNot only does each action, in accordance with the motive that actuates it, \nrefine and store, or coarsen and scatter, energy, but nature is also enriched or \nrobbed by every thought of man, for each thought \u201cupon being evolved passes \ninto the inner world, and becomes an active entity\u201d, enduring for a longer or \nshorter period in accordance with the original intensity with which it was \ngenerated. \u201cThus a good thought is perpetuated as an active, beneficent \npower, an evil one as a maleficent demon.\u201d \n\nThe fact that men on their way to their quiet daily work, and, in truth, birds, \nants and bees as well, are all in their way and degree storing force and enriching \nnature, alters one\u2019s entire picture of life, and reveals something of its possibili\u00ac \nties and significance. It further deprives the most obscure of any excuse for \nfeeling that his life is futile and purposeless. There is no life that does not give \nits opportunity to \u201cstore force and enrich nature\u201d, thereby leaving the world a \nlittle better than it found it. All that is needed is right motive and desire, doing \nwhatever ought to be done, because it ought to be done, offering it, as Mr. Judge \nwrote, \u201con the altar of the heart\u201d, for love of one\u2019s Master and the enrichment \nof the world. \n\nImagine, for example, a grey-haired New England woman living alone in a \nlittle house in an elm-shaded village street. She had, perhaps, nursed an invalid \nfather until his death left her, at fifty, with no relatives, few neighbours, no \napparent duties, and just enough money to live with rigid economy in the old \nhouse. There are thousands of women in situations like that, and many, per\u00ac \nhaps most of them, feel that they have little or nothing to live for. It would \ntransform their lives to realize their opportunity, and that the quiet perform\u00ac \nance of their daily work, if done with a right motive, in itself enriches the world. \nBut they can do far more than that. One of the purposes of life is to incarnate \nspirit in matter, taking spirit as the Platonic trinity of truth, beauty, goodness. \nEvery man who speaks the truth, every noble action, every creation of true \nbeauty, is to that extent an incarnation of the spirit. Something is drawn down \nfrom heaven and made manifest on earth. When a woman turns a neglected \nfront yard into an orderly, beautiful garden, she may make it an act of far- \nreaching spiritual effect. What is needed is love, an intensity of desire to serve, \nand a clear realization of why she is doing it. \n\nIt is very difficult for us to realize the power of such acts, yet we have analo\u00ac \ngies. It does not matter where a poem is written, or on how small or old a piece \nof paper. A printer can reproduce it, and it may move millions through cen\u00ac \nturies of time. Our thoughts, desires and actions make moulds in the astral \nlight, and endure according to the intensity put into them. Like the loaves \nand the fishes with which a small boy provided the Master Christ, they can be \nreproduced and used to feed, or to harm, thousands. Every time a man plays \nwith a temptation, even though he knows that he will not yield to it, he is adding \nto the power of that temptation in the atmosphere of the world, and may be \nadc^g just the additional force to push over the brink a waverer who other- \nwisS^ould have stood firm. Conversely, every temptation resisted, every \nright thought and action, adds to the power of resistance in the world, and pro- \n\n\n196 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nvides a fund on which others in need may draw. Just as with the radio, so \nminds pick up and are influenced by thought waves from other minds tuned to \nthe same level, high or low, as the case may be. \n\nThe subject of astral moulds is a fascinating field for speculation. The world \nin its present confusion and blindness, desperately needs models for right action. \nThe originals, the ideal manner in which given circumstances should be met, \nmust be made by the Masters themselves, but it would seem that to be effective \nwith men on earth, these moulds must be incarnated, as it were, must be repro\u00ac \nduced in the outer world by men acting in accordance with them. Each such \nreproduction on earth has tremendous spiritual potentialities. One can imagine \nthat, when the world needs such moulds, ch\u00a3las may incarnate for the express \npurpose of making them, by living through experiences planned to call forth \nthe exercise of the particular qualities needed, in the particular way desired. \nThese can then be impressed on the consciousness of men, leading them to emu\u00ac \nlation. In their lesser degree, aspirants for chelaship may be given similar \nopportunities more often than they realize. Let us suppose, for example, that \na great nation is about to pass through a period of hard times and difficult \nreadjustments. Suppose, too, that there are those whose ardent desire is to \nserve. It might well be that the outer circumstances of their lives would be so \narranged as to bring them in advance through great financial strain and critical \nsituations that call for the exercise of the high courage, the quiet poise, the \nindomitable energy, and the faithful reliance on eternal principles, with which \nthe Lodge desires the nation to meet its crisis later on. Of course, no voice \nfrom heaven tells them of their privilege and opportunity. They must find \nthat out for themselves. \n\nIt is essential to realize that it is the type of force, and not the apparent outer \nimportance of the occasion, that is controlling, and that the type is determined \nby the motive with which the act is done. \u201cA little leaven leaveneth the whole \nlump.\u201d It is a right spirit that the world needs, not a violent rearrangement \nof outer circumstances, which, after all, are only a reflection of the inner atti\u00ac \ntude. The spirit may be the same irrespective of the scale of the action that \ndraws it down from heaven. Something is wrong in the Masters\u2019 world, and, \nwith high resolve to make it right, Sir Gareth rides forth from King Arthur\u2019s \ncourt, Saint Louis leads a crusade to the Holy Land, or a New England woman \nscrubs her kitchen floor. It may be the angels see little difference between the \nthree acts. If the motive be love, love of right and hatred of wrong, love of the \nMaster at the head of one\u2019s ray and passionate desire to carry out his will, that \nis the spirit that is brought into the world, no matter whether it takes one form \nor another. The form passes, the spirit remains. The scale of an act is of no \nimportance to the universe,\u2014that is, scale as we measure it. Logically, it \ncannot matter to the universal creative forces whether it be a galaxy of stars, \nmillions of light years across, or the exquisite, microscopic texture of a gnat\u2019s \nwing that they are moulding. Perhaps the true scale is determined by the \nintensity and purity, in the occult sense, of the motive, its nearness to the \ncentral light of love, the heart of the Eternal Rose. Even in the physical world, \n\n\ntHF> SCREEN \n\n\n199 \n\n\nOF TIME \n\n\u2014\u2022 -r Urt+Vl USC \n\n\nFORCE AND ITS MOULDS 197 \n\nthe size of the shadow is determined, not by the object, but by its nearness to \nthe light. \n\nIt follows from what has been said, that anyone, in any circumstances, can \nsupply force that may be multiplied and used in the age-long battle of the \nWhite Lodge against the Black. If that be true, there is no life that need be \ndull or futile or purposeless. Our New England woman, never stirring from \nher village, can supply power that may turn the scale and affect the history of \nnations. She perhaps refuses to countenance one known to be guilty of shame\u00ac \nful immorality, and, in doing so, helps to make a mould in accordance with \nwhich, later on, a great nation rejects an unworthy king. The potency of such \nan act is determined by the degree of understanding and selfless love with which \nit is done. Neither the understanding nor the love is easy to acquire or often \nfound. If they were, the world had long ago been made the paradise it is des\u00ac \ntined to become. Nevertheless, they can be acquired. It takes faith to begin, \nperseverance to continue, and whole-heartedness to succeed. One of the chief \ndifficulties is that we ourselves rarely see results from what we try to do. Re\u00ac \nsults must be left to Masters. Yet we may be certain that no sincere effort \never fails to bear fruit. It has been said that one ch\u00a3la, meditating alone in \nhis room, can change the atmosphere of a great city. One beginner, honestly \nstriving, will assuredly accomplish far more than he realizes or believes pos\u00ac \nsible, and each effort will bring greater power, and its own reward. \n\nJ. F. B. Mitchell. \n\n\nGod demands rather our effort than our success; provided that ue labour for \nhis glory , the result is his affair .\u2014 Gouraud. \n\n\nA little lifting of the heart suffices; a little remembrance of God , one act of inward \nworship , though upon a march and sword in hand , are prayers which , however short, \nare nevertheless acceptable to God .\u2014 Brother Lawrence. \n\n\n\n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME \n\n\nHE Convention: all of us were full of it when we next assembled. \n\n\n\nThere could be no question as to the remarkable response of those who \n\n\nhad been present in the Studio; great demands had been made on their \ndevotion to the cause of Theosophy and the Lodge, and, with very few excep\u00ac \ntions, they had adopted a Resolution which embodied those demands in the \nmost explicit and binding terms. While the Resolution in no way committed \nthe Society or the members who did not vote, all of us felt that the way in \nwhich it had been received should prove a turning-point in the history of the \nMovement,\u2014\u201cshould\u201d, but not necessarily \u201cwould\u201d; for the real result, in the \nnature of things, would depend upon its unseen effect later, when members had \nresumed the ordinary tenor of their lives. The Convention had lifted us to high \nlevels of endeavour; would the reaction be recognized as the inevitable protest \nof lower nature, and be brushed aside, or would the reaction come to be regarded \nas more reasonable\u2014more real\u2014than that which had caused it? \n\nWe discussed this question at some length, agreeing, finally, on the safe \nbasis of \u201cwho lives will see\u201d. One of us, who had so often seen enthusiasm \nevaporate in cheers, found promise in the fact that the intense feeling of the \nConvention had been quiet and self-contained: he could not imagine, he said, \nanything more satisfactory. \u201cHow wonderful it will be\u201d, he added, \u201cif the \ndynamics, the underlying occultism, of what members undertook to do, is \nunderstood,\u2014the creation of a reservoir, a pool, of endeavour, fed from many \ndifferent sources, in many different ways, by members widely scattered physi\u00ac \ncally, but each of them \u2018offering up\u2019 the fruit of his efforts\u2014yes, and the fruit \nof his failures\u2014wholly without self-seeking, for the common purpose which \nthe Resolution sets forth: the flowering of chelaship in our midst. Masters \nwould be able to do almost anything with such a reservoir to draw upon, fed \nlike that from below.\u201d \n\n\u201cWhat do you mean by \u2018fed from below\u2019?\u201d asked a younger student. \n\n\u201cI mean that a prayer from hell is worth many prayers from heaven, seeing \nthat in heaven it is impossible not to pray, while in hell it is very difficult,\u2014 \nexcept for personal ends. I mean that the Lodge can supply unlimited spiritual \nforce from above, but that the lower the level from which force ascends to \nthem, and is placed unreservedly in their hands, the more they can accom\u00ac \nplish on the planes where chelaship starts , that is, on the planes of worldly \nexistence.\u201d \n\n\u201cIt is not easy to believe that an unregenerate like myself can supply the \nMasters with force\u201d, objected the younger student. \n\nThe Philosopher now broke in, partly from exasperation, but not without \namusement. \u201cO faithless and perverse\u201d, he began, half laughing, \u201cwhat do \nyou do when you walk upstairs, when you dress in the morning, when you \n\n\n198 \n\n\n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME \n\n\n199 \n\n\nmasticate your food (if you do masticate it, which I doubt)? You both use \nand generate force, and do so without any thought of its ultimate destination. \nGive it a destination in your mind and heart; say, in effect, \u2018May this energy, \nor the fruit of this act, or this effort to do my duty, go into the \u201cpool\u201d for T.S. \nchelaship, and be used by the Lodge for that purpose\u2019,\u2014and you will be sup\u00ac \nplying the Masters with force that they can use, but which they cannot gener\u00ac \nate because they are not low enough down, as it were, in the world of matter.\u201d \n\n\u2018\u2018If that be true, and the gulf between them and myself be so great, how \ncan they make contact with my offering?\u201d \n\nThis question evidently pleased the Philosopher. \u2018\u2018You have got the idea\u201d, \nhe said, \u2018\u2018or in any case an important part of it. The answer to your question \nis that the point of contact will be the unselfishness of your motive. And that \nwill be one of the magical features of the Convention Resolution if it be really \nlived. Efforts for individual chGlaship are so often tainted with elements of \nself : the desire to shine, or to be superior, or to gain the Masters\u2019 recognition \nand favour, or to derive the satisfaction of having attained,\u2014all wrong, and \nnot only wrong, but complete barriers to ch&laship and to any sort of spiritual \nprogress. Efforts on the other hand, such as the Resolution requires\u2014efforts \nwhich involve sacrifice, not that you may attain, but that someone, anyone \namong us, may be helped to reach that stage of love and self-forgetfulness at \nwhich chelaship begins,\u2014such efforts almost of necessity will spring from \npure charity; and we know what St. Paul said of that. \n\n\u2018\u2018I ask myself whether it has ever happened before: that so many men and \nwomen, living in the world, amidst the inevitable trials, tribulations and \ndistractions of earthly life, have collectively affirmed their belief in the exist\u00ac \nence of Masters and the Lodge, and in chelaship as an immediate possibility, \nand then, setting self aside, have promised to do their utmost to dedicate their \nlives, and to give their hearts and minds, to the purposes of the Lodge, \u2018while \nalways praying that some among us, by the completeness of their self-giving, \nmay make themselves acceptable as ch\u00a3las, and may thus become able to \ncomplete the Work begun by H.P.B. and Judge\u2019 as Lodge agents. If it has \nbeen done before, history does not record it so far as I am aware: recognition, \nfollowed by the surrender of personal attainment for the sake of a collective \ngood,\u2014a gift of pure love. The idea itself, of course, is as old,as the hills. Ther^ \nwas Judge in the Letters That Have Helped Me: \u2018Never, never desire to get \nknowledge or power for any other purpose than to give it on the altar.\u2019 But \nnow we have an opportunity consciously to work together\u2014not just the few, \nbut the relatively many\u2014not merely as a private, limited endeavour, but \nas the avowed purpose of most of our members\u2014to offer the fruit of all their \nefforts on that altar which is the heart of the Lodge. The marvel is that the \nrank and file of our membership responded with such obvious intensity of de\u00ac \nsire. Will it last? you say. Naturally, everything depends upon that. There \nwill be forgetfulness and \u2018backsliding\u2019 of course; but I believe that these will \nbeiollowed by determined struggle to recover what ground has been lost, es- \npe<Sfcy when it is realized that the slackness of one will be a drag on the effort \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n200 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nof others. Members should mark any passage in the Convention Report that \nparticularly appeals to them, and should re-read those passages at fixed inter\u00ac \nvals as part of their resolution. No matter what we undertake to do or strive \nfor, weariness is certain to prove an obstacle, for lower nature quickly tires, \neven of its pleasures. It is only charity (which means love) that never faileth \n\u2014which \u2018beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth \nall things\u2019. We should, therefore, anticipate weariness, and fortify ourselves \nagainst it in advance, just as a man would do if training for a race or when \nundertaking any task requiring perseverance.\u201d \n\n\u201cDiscouragement\u201d, said the Historian, \u201cis likely to prove as serious an obstacle \nas forgetfulness. We need to remember that it springs from looking for re\u00ac \nsults, and, behind that, from vanity. Are we so superior that we expect never \nto fail! \u2018Jumpin\u2019 at it belongs to me; gettin\u2019 through it belongs to the Lawd\u2019, \nas the darkie said of the stone wall. And while on that subject, let me quote \nfrom Jacques D\u2019Amoux. Some of you read his Paroles d'un Revenant , an \nextraordinary book, published in 1925. He appears to have devoted the \nintervening years to the study of heroism, particularly in its religious as\u00ac \npects, for he has now written a book of even greater value, entitled Les Sept \nColonnes de I'H&roisme , the Seven Columns of Heroism, which shows immense \nerudition and, better than that, prolonged experiment, meditation, experi\u00ac \nence. It will doubtless be reviewed in the Quarterly in due course. I refer \nto it now because of something he says which bears directly on discourage\u00ac \nment,\u2014that defeat invariably begins in the imagination; that once you are \nin a fight (he is speaking of inner warfare), the man who stops to measure his \nadversary, to calculate the chances of success, is already half defeated; that, \nunless he shuts \u2018with violence\u2019 his inner eye against all the phantoms of dis\u00ac \naster\u2014if he so much as considers them with the idea of driving them away\u2014 \nhe lays himself open to his enemy. If \u2018angels of evil\u2019, he says, can deprive \nyou of the hope of victory by exhausting you through the anticipation of troubles \nyet to come, they will have gained their objective. Discouragement is often \nthe failure of future courage. \u2018The way of triumph is long; but he who follows \nit from minute to minute, and never permits himself to measure its distance, \nwill not be crushed by it.\u2019 Finally, this very helpful warning: Make ready \nto do with the fire of your will, everything that you dreamed of doing with the \nfire of enthusiasm. . . . D\u2019Amoux\u2019s advice is based on universal experience, \nand therefore is purely theosophical.\u201d \n\n\u201cBut how can you prepare for battle if you do not \u2018measure your adversary\u2019 ?\u201d \nasked the younger student. \n\n\u201cYou prepare for battle before you come to grips; once at grips, it is fatal \nto think of defeat as possible. Think of yourself as fighting a burglar, or a \nlunatic: you will realize that the moment you question the outcome, you are \nnearly done for,\u2014that is, unless the thought of it arouse in you a fury of determi\u00ac \nnation, a greater fury than that of the lunatic. The spiritual combat is not \nfor weaklings, who (to quote D\u2019Arnoux once more), slaves of instinct and \nfancy, may be recognized infallibly by their inability to say, No.\u201d \n\n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME \n\n\n201 \n\n\n\u201cMay I suggest\u201d, the older Student now volunteered, \u201cthat a simple method \nof keeping the Resolution we are discussing, will be to act upon the principle \nsummarized years ago as a \u2018Filler\u2019 in the Quarterly in these words: \u2018Really \nto serve and to please Him, we must perform not merely the minimum re\u00ac \nquired, but the maximum that loving zeal can discover.\u2019 The individual who \nwrote that, let me add, was one who knew what he was talking about, and \nif it were adopted as a rule of life, and were acted upon in the performance of \nour ordinary duties\u2014the extra attention and effort involved being offered up \non behalf of the Resolution s objective\u2014I do not know how the \u2018reservoir\u2019 \ncould more effectively be kept filled.\u201d \n\n\u201cWe should not forget either,\u201d said the Philosopher, \u201cthat all efforts for \nan unselfish and spiritual end, will of necessity be reinforced by the Spiritual \nPowers. Those who really make this Resolution their own, are likely to re\u00ac \nceive inner help such as they have never experienced before.\u201d \n\n\u201cBoth the Convention and the Resolution were expected to serve more \nthan one purpose\u201d, the Ancient now said; \u201conly Masters know how many. \n\\ ou have been discussing the appeal to the gratitude and generosity of mem\u00ac \nbers to contribute, not money, but their desire, thought and will to a common \nspiritual fund. They did not bind themselves to try to become ch\u00a3las, but \nto make sacrifices that ch\u00a3las might become. None the less, much that was \nsaid at the Convention, and that some of you have elaborated this afternoon, \nbears directly on the Four Qualifications for chSlaship of which so much is \nsaid in Shankara s Crest Jewel of Wisdom: Discernment between the real \nand the unreal, between the eternal and non-eternal; Freedom from self-in\u00ac \ndulgence in the fruits of works; Quietude, Control, Cessation, Endurance, \nFaith, Concentration; and Desire for Liberation from self. \n\n\u201cOn the understanding that this does not necessarily apply in the least to \nthose who adopted the Resolution, but only to chSlaship itself, I want to em\u00ac \nphasize the importance of Cessation among Shankara\u2019s Qualifications, partly \nbecause it is so little understood. Shankara explains it as \u2018the condition of \nrefusing to lean on external things\u2019. Translating that into terms of Western \nthought, it means (as Ignatius of Loyola phrased it) not counting the cost; it means \nwhole-hearted, uncalculating indifference to any risk which others see, but which \nthe aspirant himself does not even think of unless his attention be called to it; \nit means\u2014once an opportunity to serve is recognized, with the belief that our \nMaster is willing for us to attempt it\u2014it means care-free indifference to all the \nhazards involved, a sort of divine (not human) recklessness. It is not the spirit \nof a gambler, because a gambler anticipates his gains. The ch\u00a3la thinks neither \nof gain nor loss, of life nor death; he simply hurls himself into the fray. \n\n\u201cToo many, in the spiritual combat, instinctively keep one eye on a \u2018safe\u2019 \nplace somewhere\u2014a place of solid earth\u2014to which they can retire in case of \nneed, and thus unconsciously refuse to detach themselves from the anchorage \nwhich is their bane. Love is the remedy; love of one\u2019s Master, and the com\u00ac \nplete self-giving which that love alone achieves.\u201d \n\n\nT. \n\n\n\n\n\nREPORT OF THE ANNUAL CONVENTION OF THE \nTHEOSOPHICAL SOCIETY \n\n\nMorning Session \n\nThe Annual Convention of The Theosophical Society was called to order at \n64, Washington Mews, New York, at 10.30 a.m., on Saturday, April 30th, 1938, \nby Mr. Hargrove, Chairman of the Executive Committee, who served as Tem\u00ac \nporary Chairman of the Convention. A Committee on Credentials was ap\u00ac \npointed, consisting of Mr. H. B. Mitchell, Miss Perkins, and Mr. Kobb\u00a3, to \nconfer and report. \n\nAddress of the Chairman, Executive Committee \n\nMr. Hargrove: As Temporary Chairman it is my great privilege once more \nto welcome you to a Convention of The Theosophical Society. That I do so \nwith all my heart, you will believe I am sure,\u2014welcoming those who are \npresent, and the many others whose hearts are with us so completely that their \nphysical absence hardly counts. Collectively we welcome and greet also those \nwho have passed to a life of greater intensity\u2014Clement Griscom, Charles John\u00ac \nston, Archibald Keightley, General Ludlow, Julia Keightley, Katharine Hillard \nand a host of others\u2014whose love of Masters and the Work unites them in\u00ac \nseparably with the Society and with us. Masters would see to it that they are \nin communion with us to-day. \n\nThen, speaking for those members who believe in the Great Lodge, we rev\u00ac \nerently salute and greet those of the Masters who, from the beginning, have been \nwith us,\u2014Masters who, after launching the frail bark of the Society in 1875, have \nnot only steered its course from that day to this, but, by their continued sacrifice, \nhave brought it through stormy seas with timbers strengthened and masts \nrenewed. We owe everything to them, and perhaps at this Convention as never \nbefore, we shall have an opportunity to show that we are grateful. \n\nBecause it is as Chairman of the Executive Committee that I greet you, it \nhas been thought best that I should make my report in that capacity at this \ntime instead of later. You will hear of the Society\u2019s outer activities from the \nreport of the Secretary, from the Letters of Greeting, and from the speeches of \ndelegates. I shall confine myself to the Society\u2019s inner work, and should like to \n\n\n202 \n\n\n\n\nREPORT OF THE ANNUAL CONVENTION \n\n\n203 \n\n\nremind you that our annual Conventions are the synthesis, the culmination, of \nthe work done, both inner and outer, by Branches and members during the \nprevious twelve months. Now, that work, since the last Convention, has been \none of indrawal in the true sense,\u2014that is to say, both members and Branches \nhave tried harder than ever to find and to work from their real centre: and we \nto-day must crown that effort; we must enter, so far as we can, the world of the \nReal, our true home; we must breathe, so far as we can, its rarefied atmosphere; \nwe must feel as much as we can of its joy, must see something of its beauty, must \ndraw as close as we can to its spirit and to those Great Ones who are that spirit \nand who reveal it; and, instead of losing ourselves in a \u201ccloud of unknowing\u201d, \nmust check the present manner of our lives by what ought to be; must test our \nworking Table of Values by the Table of Values which is changeless, and which \nall denizens of the Real world accept. \n\nThe Real world! Deep in the hearts of all men who are not spiritually dead, \nthere persists a blind longing which they do not understand, and which, as a \nrule, they try to forget because it lies so close to tears. It is the longing for our \ntrue home, the home we forfeited,\u2014to lead us back to which is the purpose of \nlife, and of all joy and sorrow. So many songs that have gripped the hearts of \nmen\u2014songs often trivial in themselves\u2014have done so because they aroused \nechoes of the soul\u2019s desire. Sometimes the music has done this; sometimes the \nimagery of words. Think, for instance, of the war-time favourite, \u201cIt\u2019s a long, \nlong way to Tipperary\u201d: how few if any of the millions who sang it, had any \nthought of the Irish county or its Golden Vale. The secret of the song\u2019s appeal \nwas that in those days of war, it served to bring to the surface the submerged \nbut ceaseless yearning of the human soul for Paradise. Think of that other song, \nof greater and more enduring worth (some of you should remember it better than \nI can): \u201cBut we are exiles from our fathers\u2019 land. . . . Mountains divide us, \nand the waste of seas. . . . Yet we in dreams behold the Hebrides.\u201d Yes, \nbehold ,\u2014which is what this Convention should make possible. \n\nI purpose to use the help of Gautama Buddha to lift us from our present \nworld of shadows to that world of the real, that \u201cland 0\u2019 the leal\u201d, that place of \npeace and light and refreshment of which I have been speaking, and which, prav \nheaven, some of us will never leave interiorly again. \n\nIt was not long before the Buddha died, and Ananda, the beloved disciple, \nwas urging him not to die in the insignificant village where they then were, but \nto move to some important city like Benares, where the Buddha had many \nfollowers, some of them rich, and where fitting honours could be paid him after \nhis decease. Those of you who have read the Sutta (the Mahd-Sudassana Sutta) \nwill remember that the Buddha rebuked Ananda for this, telling him that what \nwas then a village had once been the capital of a great Kingdom, and that he, \nthe Buddha, had been its King, known to his subjects as the Great King of Glory. \nHe told Ananda something of the life, both inner and outer, of that long-dead \nKing, and described, among other things, the King\u2019s habitual method of in- \nm\u2019awal to the Real world,\u2014described, in effect, the first step of your indrawal \nas you entered the Studio not many minutes ago, and your still further indrawal \n\n\n204 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\ninto that world as this Convention will proceed. Follow, please, here and now,, \nthe path of the Great King of Glory. \n\nNow the Great King of Glory, Ananda, ascended toward the inner chamber, and when \nhe had come there, he stood at the door, and there he broke into a cry of intense emotion:: \n\n\u201cStay here, O thoughts of worldly craving! \n\n\u201cStay here, O thoughts of ill-will! \n\n\u201cStay here, O thoughts of hatred!\u201d \n\nAnd when, Ananda, the Great King of Glory had entered the inner chamber, having \nput away all unrighteousness, he passed into, and remained in, a state of joy and ease, \nborn of seclusion, full of reflection, full of inner seeking,\u2014self-possessed, a state of intense \nelevation of mind and heart. \n\nAnd then, Ananda, there appeared to him the heavenly Treasure of the Wheel; and \nthe Great King of Glory, holding in his left hand a pitcher, with his right hand reverently \nsprinkled water up over the Wheel, as he said: \n\n\u201cRoll onward , 0 my Lord> the JVheel! 0 my Lord f go forth and overcome /\u201d \n\nYou, as you entered this inner chamber\u2014this chamber of your heart\u2014did \nnot say, I imagine, what the Great King of Glory cried out with such emotion: \nthere was no need, because your eager expectation in itself was magical, and \nbrought about the same result. You were looking forward, expectant, and \ndropped without effort the cares, temptations and evils of the world and lower \nnature, thus making it possible for you to find something at least of what the \nGreat King of Glory found: a state of joy and ease, a state of intense elevation \nof mind and heart. And you are realizing already, I think, that you are sharing \nthat state of mind and heart with others, with all your fellows; that you are ex\u00ac \nperiencing unity as perhaps you have never experienced it before,\u2014unity of will \nand purpose, reinforcing marvellously your own determination (because this \nConvention would be a failure indeed, if it did not condude with an indomitable \ndetermination). Then, as you enter more and more into the spirit, into the being \nof this Convention, as you partake of its substance and its gifts, I hope and \npray that you will discover for yourselves how truly Masters are present with \nus. You may even feel their aura surrounding and containing this assembly; \nmay even discover for yourselves that within that aura this place sings and \nthrobs with prayer,\u2014with the prayers of those present, and of those absent, \nand with prayers inherent in the Movement itself. Imagine, if you will, what \nthose prayers are. It will in any case need no psychic or spiritual power, and \nbut little imagination, to hear the prayers going forth from here, whether you \nare aware of the response or not. \u201cSend us fire from heaven, 0 my brothers! \nSend us fire from heaven!\u201d And you can imagine, if you choose, that some \nmember of the Lodge, perhaps fighting his way over the Andes, pauses as he \nhears that cry for reinforcement, and turns to look, and sees this assembly, \nand hears the same cry repeated,\u2014\u201cSend fire from heaven, 0 my brothers; \nsend fire from heaven!\u201d And like an arrow from the bow he sends a shaft \nof himself, of his Kundalini, to set our hearts on fire, to give us something of \nhis courage, that we may go forward as he went forward, to victory. \n\nThen, if you will listen again, I am certain you will hear a prayer for final \nperseverance,\u2014a cry far-reaching, insistent: \u201cGive us final perseverance, oh \n\n\nREPORT OF THE ANNUAL CONVENTION \n\n\n205 \n\n\nyou who have overcome, you who are compassionate, you who are strong \nthrough suffering; give us the power to fight, unwavering to the end!\u201d \n\nThere are other prayers, part of the life of the Movement, part of its fibre, \nwhich we have inherited from the distant past, and which a Convention such as \nthis makes present and immediate,\u2014vibrant in our united aura: the prayers of \nBuddhist Arhats, of Hindu sannydsis, of Sufi mystics, of Christian saints and \nmartyrs, and of Adepts of every nation and period. All these prayers are yours, \nif you will make them yours; they are yours through your membership in the \nSociety which is the link the Lodge has established with the world. Many of \nthese prayers you will remember. \n\nThis day we have a Father, who from His ancient place rises, hard-holding His course, \ngrasping us that we stumble not in the trials of our lives. ... If it be well, we shall \nmeet, and the light of Thine eyes make mine glad. . . . This much I make prayer to \nThee: Go Thou on Thy way! \n\nThe prayer of a Stoic, some would say; yet, though in Zuni Indian form, it is \nthe prayer of the Christian Master, \u201cThy will be done\u201d. \n\nPerhaps, however, of all the prayers that belong to us by right of inheritance \n(if we will claim our inheritance), that which best epitomizes the spirit and pur\u00ac \npose of our Convention is the heart-broken cry of St. Rose of Lima, \u201cAh Love, \nthou art not loved, thou are not loved!\u201d\u2014the cry of all those who, having been \nbrought to their knees by some sense of their Master\u2019s love, and having felt in \ntheir hearts the abiding sorrow and humility of those terrible words of the prophet, \n\u201cOh my people, what have I done unto thee? Wherein have I wearied thee?\u201d\u2014 \nhave risen from their knees possessed by one desire, one determination: This \nshall no longer be! Fie must and shall be loved. He, the Beloved, who has given \nall things, forgiven all things, endured all things for love of us, can no longer \nbe left to beg the leavings of our lives and hearts; hereafter he must and shall \ncome first, must and shall be King in fact as well as in name,\u2014King, to begin \nwith, of our own small kingdom, of all we have and are; and then, working from \nthat reconquered centre, we must go forth to live and labour to bring his King\u00ac \ndom to him,\u2014to make him King for ever of that vast domain which to-dajd \nrejects him. \n\nTo make our wills steadfast at that point, and to understand once for all \nthat the obstacles in our path are of our own making, to be swept aside with \ncomparative ease, once we recognize their origin,\u2014these two steps forward will \nbe taken by all of us, I pray, before this Convention ends. Further, as a result \nof that better understanding and more resolute will, and because of our united \nand vivid realization that the spiritual world is our true home, that it is here \nand now\u2014surrounding us, penetrating us, lifting us, blessing us\u2014a realization, \nlet us hope, never to be lost again\u2014there should arise from this Convention \nsuch unity of purpose, such one-pointed aspiration, such invincible determina\u00ac \nte^ that H.P.B.\u2019s last prayer on earth will be answered\u2014that we keep the \nlink unbroken; answered because it will no longer be her prayer only, nor ours, \nbut yours ; answered in the one way possible,\u2014by the flowering once more of \n\n\n4 \n\n206 THEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\nch\u00a3laship in our midst, for the salvation of the Society and for the salvation of \nthe race. \n\nThe Report of the Committee on Credentials was then called for, presented, \nand accepted, after which, Mr. H. B. Mitchell was elected Chairman of the Con\u00ac \nvention, and Miss Perkins and Miss Chickering, Secretary and Assistant \nSecretary. \n\nAddress of the Chairman \n\nThe Chairman: It is significant of the guidance that has been given the \nSociety from its inception, that we find, year after year, as we listen to what is \nsaid in these Conventions, that we have all been moved by a common inspira\u00ac \ntion. It is so to-day. What I had planned to lay before you is in essence the \nsame as what we have just heard, and what, doubtless, will be repeated later,\u2014 \nthe same needs and truths being reflected from different minds, so that they \nstand out boldly in being thus viewed from such varying angles. \n\nAll that I have to say may be summed in a single question, though to its \nimplications I can set no limit. Can we, members of The Theosophical Society, \nto whom has been given a vision of Theou Sophia , Divine Wisdom,\u2014can \nwe respond to it with love? For love is the only response that is effective. \nThe root of all other powers, and able to generate them from within itself, it is \nthe only one that can meet our need. The question is, therefore, Can we \nlove the Divine Truth and Beauty and Goodness that have been shown us \nthrough the years? \n\nThat is all; but it will be found far-reaching. It is not a new question. We \nhave heard it voiced with steadily increasing insistence at Convention after \nConvention. It is voiced with even greater insistence to-day. And the reason \nfor this is, that, year by year as the cycles advance, the issues involved in this \nquestion become more momentous. It becomes more pressing, more impos\u00ac \nsible to postpone. \n\nWe all remember what H.P.B. wrote of the hundred-year cycle, in accord\u00ac \nance with which The Theosophical Society was founded by the Masters, the \ncyclic law permitting them to make a special effort, in the last quarter of each \ncentury, to bring to mankind knowledge of its true heritage and divine poten\u00ac \ntialities. She told us that that outgoing and outgiving from the Lodge had to \ncome to an end with the close of the century, and that the Masters could not \nsend again, in the same way into the world, until the last quarter of the next \ncentury. Some of our members gave considerable study to tracing these cyclic \noutgivings from the Lodge; and in the old volumes of the Quarterly we shall \nfind a number of articles by Mr. Griscom dealing with the history of the Move\u00ac \nment in past centuries, and showing how dominating was the cyclic law. \n\nIt required no study to recognize the action of the law in our own Society and \nexperience. Precisely as foretold, there came the crisis at the end of the cen\u00ac \ntury, between 1898 and 1900. But for the first time in the age-long history of \nthe Movement, the shattering force of the crisis was met by a greater power of \nlove, which, holding fast to the Lodge, carried the Movement over the close \n\n\nREPORT OF THE ANNUAL CONVENTION \n\n\n207 \n\n\nof the cycle, so that it entered ground it had never entered before. It did not \ndisintegrate as in the past, when the direction of the cyclic current changed, \nbut, maintaining the link unbroken, gave to the Lodge what it had never before \nhad in our western civilization, a focal point in the world from which to work in \nthe in-breathing phase of the cycle. \n\nFrom 1900 on, therefore, our continued existence has created wholly new \nconditions. Year has been added to year, each a unique achievement, keeping \nopen the door of opportunity and a path from the world to the Masters. How\u00ac \never thin our line of connection may at times have been, we have still kept it \nunbroken, and still pressed forward into unexplored territory. Seventy-five years \nseparated us from the time when we might expect a new Messenger or group \nfrom the Lodge to take over the work that has been ours. Do we realize that \nto-day half of that seventy-five years has passed ? A full twenty-five year cycle \nand half of another ? Our Society was founded in November, 1875. The twenty- \nfive years of its \u201cexpectation of life\u201d brought it to November, 1900. To May, \n1938, is just thirty-seven and a half years more, and brings us to the dead- \ncentre of our course. \n\nIt is easy to see how crucial this point must be for us, when we think of the \nway in which an engine works. The expanding power of the steam or gas, within \nthe cylinder, drives the piston back and forth, and by means of a connecting \nrod and crank, this back and forth motion is turned into circular motion, im\u00ac \nparted to the wheel. But when the piston is at the extreme limit of its stroke \nin either direction, at the point where it ceases, let us say, to move forward and \nturns back,\u2014at the point where the piston-rod and the connecting rod and the \ncentre of the wheel are all in one line,\u2014there the engine can exert no force upon \nthe wheel to turn it. If the wheel were to stop at that point, neither push nor \npull of the piston, no matter how powerful, could move it. Over that point it \ncan be earned only by a force acting from a different angle, or by its own mo- \nmen turn. That is why single-acting engines are built with heavy fly-wheels, to \nincrease the momentum, and to take care of sudden shocks and variations in load. \nThe analogy shows clearly the nature of the test our Society is now facing: Are \nwe of sufficient weight, have we of ourselves enough momentum, to carry us \npast this dead centre, so that the great engine of the Lodge force may again \nenergize and move us? \n\nThe Theosophical Society was founded to be a bridge between the inner \nworld and the outer, or, in the words of Light on the Path } \u201ca link between man \nand his divine part, . . . between the stir of the market place and the stillness \nof the snow-capped Himalayas\u201d. Throughout the year we invite to our meet\u00ac \nings all those, in the world, who, for any reason, even the most trivial \nmay be interested to come. On this day only, in its annual Convention, the \nSociety meets alone. The door which has been open to the knock of the world, \nis to-da^opened only to our own members. We withdraw from the world \nthat, as clamour is silenced, we may hear more clearly the voice of the \nSociety\u2019s own Soul, and the will for it of its \u201cFather in the Heavens\u201d. To-day \nwe meet and concern ourselves only with our own. \n\n\n208 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nWho are our own? What do we find as we enter here? Again Mr. Hargrove \nhas answered for us. We see the faces of old friends and new; those who have \nbeen our comrades through the years, and those whose tests and battles still \nlie before them. But I think there can be very few of us who are not seeing \nalso, with the inner eyes of memory and gratitude and love, comrades whom we \ncan no longer greet physically, but whose presence we none the less feel, whose \nlives, given to the Work, still live in it. There can be few of us who can speak \nof our Society, or our work, or our philosophy, and not be keenly conscious of \nthose from whose hands these came to us; who kindled with their own flame \nsuch fuel as we could bring, and who are, whether in life or death, an indis\u00ac \nsoluble part of our Movement. Mr. Hargrove called the names of some, per\u00ac \nsonally closest and dearest to us, whose pictures are here upon our walls. \nBut back of them, back of Judge and H.P.B., are those who sent them forth,\u2014 \nrank upon rank of flame-bearers, the endless hierarchy of the servants of Divine \nWisdom and Divine Compassion, the Great Lodge of Masters and their ch\u00a7las. \n\nWe all know that The Theosophical Society has no dogmas nor official beliefs, \nnot even belief in the great Masters who founded it, and who have maintained \nand guarded it through all the years of its life. But here, where we meet to \nplan for the Society\u2019s needs, in fulfilment of the trust that has devolved upon \nus, each of us must base what he says upon the facts as he himself knows or sees \nthem. To very many of us the primary facts are these which I have just stated: \nthat our Society owes its being to the Great Lodge of Masters; that it was \nfounded at their direction, to serve as an instrument for their work, a link \nbetween them and the world. There was nothing in the world capable of form\u00ac \ning that link. It had to be made from above, from the Lodge, and be and remain \npart of the Lodge. \u201cAll the road to heaven is heaven.\u201d \u201cI am the Way, the \nTruth, and the Life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me\u201d, can be said \nonly by the Master. It is true only of \u2018\u2018man\u2019s divine part\u201d, of what pertains to \nthe Lodge and the Spirit, never of the personality or of anything of the world. \nThus the T.S. is a bridge, but the two piers of the bridge are not equal, nor do \nthey fulfil an equal function. We can, as to-day, shut out the world; and in that \nexclusion find ourselves the more whole and complete. But to shut out the \nLodge would be to shut out all that has made, and that makes us what we are. \nShutting out its \u201cdivine part\u201d, it would shut out the Society\u2019s very Self. Our \nConventions bring this truth close home to us. \n\nI do not think that any of us can put into words the vision that Theosophy \nhas brought him, but it is only as we realize something of the profound differ\u00ac \nence it has made in our whole outlook, that we can understand the nature of our \nresponsibility. The recognition, of which I have just spoken, that our Move\u00ac \nment emanates from the Great Lodge of Masters, involves the recognition, also, \nthat the true being of man, as man, stretches out to the Lodge, and includes \nlimitless divine potentialities of which the modem world has lost all conscious\u00ac \nness. There is, for us, \u201cno bar or wall\u201d separating man from the Divine, and this \nperception gives to human life a splendour of opportunity and purpose which is \nin sharpest contrast to the despairing pessimism of material philosophy. \n\n\nREPORT OF THE ANNUAL CONVENTION \n\n\n209 \n\n\nThrough the twin doctrines of Karma and Reincarnation, we see justice and \nmercy and love, where others can see only injustice and cruelty; and to us \ndeath is no more the end, than is the sleep that separates our active days. How \nare we to tell of these gifts which Theosophy has brought us, and of the new \nlife to which they lead? We have heard \u201cunspeakable words\u201d, and of their \ntruth have become the custodian. \n\nI think of the opening of St. John\u2019s Gospel: \u201cIn the beginning was the Word.\u201d \nIt was so with us. In the beginning was the \u201cWord\u201d which H.P.B. brought us, \ntelling us of the theosophical philosophy, and of the laws of the inner world and \nthe soul,\u2014intellectual doctrines that changed all our thinking, and opened long \nvistas into unimagined possibilities. But that is not all. St. John goes on: \n\u201cAnd the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, \nthe glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.\u201d Per\u00ac \nhaps we recognize in that phrase, \u201cthe only begotten of the Father\u201d, the mys\u00ac \ntery characterization of accepted ch\u00a3laship. \n\nIt is not only the Word that has been given us; it is the incarnating Word, \nand we have seen it incarnating. As we look back to our companions in the \npast, our predecessors in the Movement, have we not a clear remembrance of \nhow, despite the veil of the personality, they showed us \u201cgrace and truth\u201d, and \nthe transforming power of the theosophical doctrines that had been taught to \nthem and to us? Have we not had proof, in them, of the power and the beauty \nof the incarnating spirit of Theosophy, of faith and courage, and the self-giving \nto a Cause that swallowed up all thought of self? And have we not each felt, \nin his own way and in his own nature, that same power of Theosophy contend\u00ac \ning against all the meannesses and littlenesses in his personality,\u2014the power of \nthe Perfect seeking incarnation in the imperfect, striving to make of it an in\u00ac \nstrument it can use, struggling to lift it from unlikeness to likeness? We cannot \nhave knowledge and escape responsibility for its use. From such vision as is \nours, the question must inevitably arise that confronts us to-day. To us has \ncome light. Are we to prove that we prefer the darkness? Or can we genuinely \nlove the light, and turn to it with whole-hearted self-giving? \n\nThis is the crisis to which the cycle has brought us, where none can help us \nbut ourselves, since none can answer this question for another. I used thaj \nmechanical analogy of an engine, as the stroke of the piston came to its deaa \ncentre. But living analogies are better and truer; for this is no mere mechanical \nmatter, but a question that goes to the heart of the individual life. Mr. Har\u00ac \ngrove spoke of the prayers that arise from these Conventions. You remember \nhis words: \u201cSend fire from heaven.\u201d I suspect that very few of us have ever \ncome to these Conventions without some such prayer in our hearts. Yet as I \ncame here this morning, I realized that what was uppermost in my mind, and \ndominant in my desires for the day, was not something that I could pray that \n\n* reat Lodge might give us, but something which I prayed that we ourselves \n; give the Lodge. Do we know how to ask more than they have given us? \nIs there more of beauty that they can show us? More of holiness, more of \ntruth? Is there anyone who feels he has reached the limit of what was offered, \n\n\n210 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nrather than the limit of his own ability or willingness to receive ? Is there more \nof fire to kindle us, that they can send us? More than they have sent through \nthese sixty-two and a half years? \n\nIt is like the crisis in an illness, where doctor and nurse have done all that \nmedical skill can do until the patient himself makes some response, and the \nissue rests with him, dependent upon his inner vitality and will to live. Or like \na General, in battle, who has thrown in his last reserves. The issue is now with \nhis men; in their past training; in their response to the present demand; in their \nwill to victory; and the ability to hold that will the minute longer than the \nenemy, which achieves victory. \n\nSo, it has seemed to me, the issue of this day does not rest with the Lodge. \nIt rests with us. \n\nBut though great issues hang upon the answer, let us not complicate the \nquestion itself. It is simply whether we really love the loveliness we have been \nshown. The response asked is the response of love; that is all. If we love what \nthe Great Lodge loves, then we take our place with them. Otherwise we cannot \ndo the work which now must be done to maintain the link. It can be done only by \nthose who love what Theosophy stands for, and who have given themselves to it. \n\nIt is no question of our virtues or powers. We are not called to great acts of \nheroism beyond our small capacities. We are not asked to be perfect. Our \nquestion is not one of statics but of dynamics. We are asked only whether we \ncannot love the Perfect. If we can, then we shall seek union; and desiring to \nmove toward what we love, we shall move. Drawn by what we have seen, \nconsciously and purposefully we shall move in accordance with it, pressing on, \nin forgetfulness of all lesser things, to the reality and supreme worth which \nTheosophy has shown us. \n\nNevertheless, as I have said, simple as the question is, great issues hang upon \nthe answer. The reason is that, in it, we are dealing with the inner, primal \nand central powers of the Universe, so that a small effect, accomplished here, \nbecomes enormously magnified as it radiates through the outer world. Dante, \nreaching the Ninth Heaven, beyond which is only the Empyrean, eternally \nabove all mutation, sees the Primum Mobile of all the worlds in the motion of \nthe Seraphim, responding with love and adoration to their vision of God, as the \nDivine Light falls upon them. By that movement of love, which makes God its \ncentre, the whole universe is drawn in sweeping circles, that rise and narrow as \nthey revolve. And in this, Dante is shown the origin of all other forces and \nmotion,\u2014the cause of evolution and of cyclic law, and the roots of time, which \nmeasures them,\u2014so that the entire system of Nature is revealed as one vast \nmovement of love and desire for union with God, as its final rest. There is more \nthan one lesson here that it would profit us to learn, but we are immediately \nconcerned to note that it is not the Seraphims\u2019 own power that moves creation, \nbut the Light of God reflected in their love. So with us. It is not we that can do \nthe work, but the light of Divine Wisdom itself, the vision of Theosophy which \nis ours, reflected in our love of it. \n\nSometimes I wonder whether the casual reader of the reports of our \n\n\nREPORT OF THE ANNUAL CONVENTION \n\n\n2 11 \n\n\nConventions in the Quarterly, must not think that we take ourselves with an \nabsurd seriousness. Does it seem like the delusion of grandeur to say, as we \ndo say, that the whole world may be altered by what is done in our small So\u00ac \nciety? It is not so. We have no illusions about ourselves. Indeed, from one \npoint of view, the more commonplace and unimportant we are as individuals, \nthe more important might be our actions. For if we be a \u201crun-of-the-mine\u201d \nsample of humanity, our present response to the light we see may predicate the \nfuture response of all mankind. Moreover, the size of a shadow is not de\u00ac \npendent alone upon the size of the object which casts it. It depends also upon \nthe closeness to the light, and to the light of Theosophy we have been drawn \nclose. Again, if we believe that the Society was founded by the Great Lodge, \nwe cannot avoid the corollary that all it does will prove archetypal, making \nmoulds which the future will fill. Or, to use another simile, we are like the \nhandful of earth into which a seed has fallen. The sower sows his seeds, and \nthey fall here and there. Until they have fallen, one handful of earth is little \ndifferent from another; but afterwards, the earth where the seed has lodged \nbecomes charged with all the potentialities of the seed itself. Not because of \nanything of our own, but because of what has been given us, we, and what we \ndo, have become of vast significance. It is we who have been given the vision \nof Theosophy; it is we alone who can respond to it. \n\nWe do not give the heed we should to the fragility of consciousness, nor com\u00ac \nmonly realize how easily it may lose its hold upon any realm of being. You \nvery rapidly cease to be conscious of what does not interest you, and of which \nyou do not intend to make any use. Even in physical sight, experiments in \ncamouflage suggest that we \u201csee\u201d only what has significance for us, and this \nis far more true of mental and spiritual sight, in the inner world of ideas and \nideals. Thus if we do not respond to such vision as we have, we lose it; and if \nwe lose it, it is lost to the world,\u2014for in the world, we arc its custodians. If the \nvision is lost, the possibility of realizing it is lost. \n\nOnce this truth comes home to us, we see it illustrated on every side. Wherever \nwe look in our civilization, we see the consequences of man\u2019s loss of conscious\u00ac \nness of spiritual realities, a loss that has been due to disregard. Religion is no \nlonger taught in our schools. It is beyond the pale of our science. In many of \nthe churches its name has been prostituted to a sentimental humanitarianism \nthat worships only material comfort. Everywhere it is ignored; and disregard soon \npasses into denial. Without faith or knowledge of his spiritual heritage, man \nturns his desires back to the mere animal gratifications that can never satisfy him; \nand retrogression and disintegration spread through his nature and his works. \n\nIt was not for ourselves that Theosophy was given us, but that we should \npreserve its truths for the need of the world. Our responsibility lies in this: \nthat truth can live only where it is lived. It is useless to enthrone it and lock \nit away in the strong-room of dogma. When the need comes, and the door is \nopen^^the throne is found empty. \n\nThere is curious testimony that this is not a mere figure of speech. In his \nTerry Lectures on Psychology and Religion , recently published, Professor Jung \n\n\n212 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nadduces the evidence of the subconscious, revealing, through dreams, the his\u00ac \ntoric symbols of the seat of Deity, but revealing that seat now as empty, or as \noccupied only by an image of the man himself (p. 96). \u201cAs soon\u201d, Professor \nJung comments, \u201cas a god ceases to be an overwhelming factor, he becomes a \nmere name. His essence is dead, and his power is gone.\u201d Earlier, he points \nout that our civilization has forgotten that man\u2019s life, by its very nature, must \nbe sacrificial, offered up in service of something greater than itself,\u2014failing \nwhich it must inevitably disintegrate. His testimony here is the more note\u00ac \nworthy in that we can seldom share his point of view, but indeed no testimony \nis needed to a truth we see exemplified on every side. \n\nThe value of the bodily organism is its ability to subordinate its own impulses \nto the dictates of the will; and this same principle runs through all the person\u00ac \nality, which, as Light on the Path says, each of us has \u201cwith pain created for his \nown use\u201d. Its value is never in itself, but only in its union with what is above \nit,\u2014a union that is realized through the utter self-giving which is love\u2019s deepest \ndesire, but which, without love, can be seen only as self-sacrifice. The worth \nof the Spirit is in the Spirit, realized, actual and active. But the worth of our \npersonal life is in its potentiality,\u2014in our ability to respond and to give our\u00ac \nselves to the light and truth of the Spirit so as to become its vehicle. If this \npotentiality cease, if the response be finally refused, nothing of value remains, \nand the useless organism is swept away. Therefore in its deepest sense, the \nquestion which we face to-day is quite literally one of life and death, for our \nSociety and for ourselves. \n\nIt is, I think, the form in which we face the supreme question that Being \nitself poses to all creation. Scientists talk of entropy and the Second Law of \nThermodynamics, in which they have postulated that what we can all observe \nin the flow of energy around us, is the manifestation of a universal law. As \nwater flows down hill, as heat spends itself in radiation, so the natural flow of \nenergy is from higher to lower potential, from above down. For a generation \npast, physicists have spoken of this law as the death sentence of the universe; \nfor to such a ceaseless giving from what has to what has not, the only end must \nbe a dead level of neutrality, where all heat has cooled, all power been lost, all \ndifference obliterated, and all life become impossible. \n\nNo student of Theosophy can accept this doctrine of the physicists as more \nthan a half truth; but we cannot deny that wherever we look we see it illus\u00ac \ntrated. In our own Society we have seen it through all the years of its existence \n\u2014the unstinted, unmeasured giving from the Lodge to us and to the world, from \nthe high to the low. Nor can we escape the conviction that this must ifievitably \nspell death, if there be no giving back. In this proviso, all Being faces the ques\u00ac \ntion that we face, and in it is involved the mystery of the life of the soul. \n\nThat which proceeds from the Spirit must return to the Spirit. As there has \nbeen descent, so must there be ascent; and it is with this ascent, the return \nmovement of love and self-giving from what is below to what is above, that true \nreligion and true occultism are alike concerned. To the soul, the Master that \nhath, must be given; from the personality, the self, that hath not, must be taken \n\n\nREPORT OF THE ANNUAL CONVENTION \n\n\n213 \n\n\naway even that which it hath; and he who surrenders his life shall find it. By \nsuch laws as these, are the laws of physics counter-balanced, and the sentence \nof death transmuted into the eternal, majestic procession of the cycles. \n\nIt is against this background, and into this frame, that we may place the \nsuperb words that have been quoted: \u201cRoll on, my Lord the Wheel,\u2014go forth \nand overcome.\u201d May that be our prayer, and be answered in our response. \n\nWe have long since had to realize that it is very far from safe to adduce the \nnewspaper science of the day in support of any philosophical conclusion, for \nto-morrow the scientific fashions will probably have changed. Yet in the New \nYork Times of three days ago there was a despatch from Washington, reporting \na paper read before the National Academy of Sciences, which is both pertinent \nand suggestive. Doctors Osterhout and Murray, of the Rockefeller Institute \nfor Medical Research, described \u201ca chemical model which imitates in many \nimportant respects the behaviour of the mysterious, invisible fluid wall sur\u00ac \nrounding all living cells, and gives the appearance of \u2018perpetual motion\u2019 that \ncan go on for months\u201d. It was added that \u201cstrange phenomena, observed in \nthe apparatus, indicate that life itself defies, to a certain extent, the second law \nof thermodynamics\u201d, as the flow, instead of being from high potential to low, \nwas reversed and moved from lower to higher activity. It was inferred that \nonly within such sacrificial walls, where the lower responds to the higher by \nrising to it, could the cell continue to live. \n\nI shall not need to point out the bearing this has upon our question. We \nremember The Voice of the Silence , and the Guardian Wall, formed by the \nMasters, by whose protection we, and the Society, and all mankind, have been \npreserved. Can we so guard the life that has been entrusted to us? Can we \nbecome, by our response to the Truth which we have seen, the Guardian Wall \nthat will enable that Truth to live? \n\n\nThe Chairman, having been duly authorized, appointed the following three \nstanding committees: \n\nCommittee on Resolutions: Mr. Hargrove; Dr. Torrey; Dr. Hohnstedt. \nCommittee on Letters of Greeting: Mr. J. F. B. Mitchell; Dr. Clark; Mrs. Regan. \nCommittee on Nominations Mr. Miller; Mr. LaDow; Mr. Mullinax. \n\nThe Report of the Executive Committee having been accepted with thanj^^ \nthe Report of the Secretary was next called for. \n\nReport of the Secretary T. S. \n\n\nMiss Perkins: I have the honour to submit the following Report: \n\nBranch Activities \n\nThe Branches report excellent meetings in which their younger members \nhave manifested a new sense of responsibility. They also record increased \nunity, and better understanding of the mission of the Society at this critical \nstage in world affairs. Believing that only the cure supplied by Theosophy \nbring order out of chaos, they have undertaken to infiltrate its principles \nand standards into the world by devoting themselves to living the \u201ctheosophic \n\n\n214 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nlife\u201d, confident that use can be made of this unseen effort. While not intent, \ntherefore, on bringing recruits into the Society, the Branches are delighted to \nwelcome any newcomers who are fired by T. S. ideals and who desire to share \nin its present endeavour. Since each Branch chooses material for its meetings, \nthere may be significance in the fact that a number have been studying the \nChristian Bible, and, in the light of Eastern scriptures, discovering deeper \nmeanings and evidence of its harmony with other Lodge teachings. \u2018\u2018This \nserves\u201d, one Secretary writes, \u201cto emphasize for our members the identity of \nthe Mystery teaching and of the immemorial Wisdom religion, and reminds \nthem that Theosophy is always Wisdom-in-action.\u201d The accomplishments and \nhopes of each Branch are outlined in the reports, but instead of attempting \nany summary of my own, I would refer you to the account of their stewardship \ngiven in the \u201cLetters of Greeting\u201d, which are always a moving and inspiring \nfeature of our Conventions. \n\nIn Europe, the Branches have again contributed to some Allied Relief Fund \nthe amount they paid the Society in dues prior to 1929, and it has again received \nfrom one of its American members a special donation that more than reim\u00ac \nburses the Treasury for the sum thus diverted from it. \n\nThe Theosophical Quarterly \n\nWere each member asked to what extent his thought and actions had been \ninfluenced by reading the Quarterly, we may readily imagine, with our own \nexperience as guide, that there would be numerous tributes to its value,\u2014but \nhow form an impression of what it is doing for readers outside our ranks ? There \nis an increasing number of them in the libraries all over the world. Occasionally \nthey write, telling, perhaps, of having read the magazine for many years until \nit has become intimately associated with their lives,\u2014and suddenly realizing \nhow much they owe to it; or the writer may give thanks for \u201cconversion\u201d to \nthe religion of his own country and race, through the deeper view of it gained \nfrom theosophic interpretation. Thus preparation is being made\u2014possibly for \nactive participation in the next \u201cincarnation\u201d of the Movement. \n\nContributors to the Quarterly, who put us under deep obligation by giving \nthere the results of their study, experiments and experience, frequently respond \nto our thanks by declaring that in this giving their own rewards are great,\u2014 \none being the editorial assistance received: comment on some unconsidered \naspect of their subject which enables them to round out the treatment of it; \nor the editorial pencil may insert, for their consideration, sentences that clear \nup some obscure point and disclose its intimate connection with another fact \nnot before recognized as the key-stone of that particular arch. This is a side\u00ac \nlight on the inestimable service done the Movement by those older members \nwho both edit the magazine and contribute generously to every issue. \n\nBook Department \n\nSince the \u201cStandard Books\u201d on Theosophy listed in each Quarterly provide \nan excellent student\u2019s library, the publication of additional titles has not yet \nbeen thought desirable. Mastery of those listed would throw much light on \narticles in our magazine, particularly those bearing on the devotional side of \n\n\nREPORT OF THE ANNUAL CONVENTION \n\n\n215 \n\n\nTheosophy which is so little understood. Our books by Charles Johnston and \nby \u201cCav6\u201d are noteworthy in their exemplification of Theosophy as related to \nMysticism and the religious life; new editions of several of these have been \nprinted during the past year. \n\nSecretary's Office \n\nThe Society necessarily has rooms equipped with facilities for filling book \norders, supplying the magazine, etc., but there are no longer, as in early days, \ncentralized quarters where officers carry on their work and local members \nattend to such details as may be assigned to them. Consultation and co-ordi\u00ac \nnation are never overlooked, but at present each individual does his portion \nof the work in his own home or office,\u2014a method that is time-saving, and also \none that gives training of a highly desirable kind. At their request, I have \nceased to mention the names of those who assist in the activities here, but it is \na pleasure to report that the organization of them this year has been improved, \nand that all who participate do so with the feeling that to serve the Society \nin any way is the greatest privilege. The two younger members who volun\u00ac \nteered their time last year have shown such interest and capacity that the \nnumber of their assignments has been steadily increased. Others are \u201con call\u201d \nwhenever there is pressure of extra work; and the Assistant Secretary T. S., to \nwhom we owe so much for her full report of Convention proceedings, is always \nhelpful. The Society has occasion to thank these various members who give \nliberally of their time, and to its thanks I should like to add my own. \n\nNotwithstanding the increased labour that has devolved upon the older mem\u00ac \nbers with the death of those who once shared the responsibility, and in spite \nof the unceasing pressure of this tumultuous era, they have exercised even \ncloser oversight of all that concerns the Movement. For example, many a \nletter that goes out from the Secretary\u2019s Office, in response to some appeal for \nhelp, is based upon their perception of the querent\u2019s real difficulty, and how \nhe can be given a clue that may enable him to discover for himself its cause \nand cure. Their readiness to give aid is as unfailing as is their adherence to \nMr. Judge\u2019s principle of action which he stated in the words of the Gita, \u201cThe \nduty of another is full of danger\u201d,\u2014\u201cdanger\u201d for the one who begs to be told \nhow to handle some problem that has arisen in his personal relations, and also \nfor the one who might venture to give such advice, because both of them would \nbe acting against spiritual law, and in ignorance of the plan of the Lor^pf \nKarma. From this, and from many another tangent that might vitiat^^ur \nefforts, the older members rescue unwary workers, patiently pointing out the \nerror, and the course that should have been taken. Only those who are the \nfortunate beneficiaries of such supervision can realize how much they and the \nSociety owe to those who thus stand behind the Movement, and, as it was \nput last year, make us lower links in that great hierarchical chain that stretches \nupward beyond our boldest imagining. \n\nRespectfully submitted, \n\nI. E. Perkins, \n\nSecretary , The Theosophical Society. \n\n\n2l6 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nThe Chairman, remarking that it is always one of the pleasantest moments \nof the Convention when we thank our Secretary and her helpers for their un\u00ac \nfailing work, invited the Convention to vote the acceptance of the Secretary\u2019s \nReport, which was done unanimously and with sincerest thanks. The Treasurer \nthen submitted his Report, which was accepted with thanks to him and the \nAssistant Treasured. \n\nReport of the Committee on Nominations \nMr. Miller, for the Committee, nominated Mr. J. F. B. Mitchell and Mr. \nAuchincloss to succeed themselves on the Executive Committee; as Secretary \nand Assistant Secretary, Miss Perkins and Miss Chickering; as Treasurer and \nAssistant Treasurer, Mr. H. B. Mitchell and Mr. Kobb6. The Secretary of the \nConvention was instructed to cast one ballot for the election of the officers as \nnominated. \n\n\nReport of the Committee on Letters of Greeting \nMr. J. F. B. Mitchell: It will not be possible to read all of the letters \nreceived, but I should like to say that members of the Executive Committee \nhave read all of them, with the greatest interest and appreciation. The follow\u00ac \ning are selections. \n\nLetters, messages and telegrams from Branches and from individual mem\u00ac \nbers all over the world, were listened to with deep attention and frequent \napplause. The Chairman then spoke of these Greetings as focussing the aspira\u00ac \ntion, desire and will of those whose hearts were with us throughout the \nConvention. The Report of the Committee having been accepted with an \nexpression of appreciative thanks to the writers of the letters, the Convention \nadjourned until 3 p. m. \n\n\nAfternoon Session \n\nReport of the Committee on Resolutions \nMr. Hargrove: As the Chairman of this Committee, I ask that Dr. Torrey \nspeak first on our behalf,\u2014and I am going to give away a secret. One of the \noldest, if not the oldest member of the Society (not in terms of age but of mem\u00ac \nbership) has more than once said that she can listen to Dr. Torrey with delight. \nNo such remark has ever been made about my speaking, or Professor Mitchell\u2019s, \nor Mr. Miller\u2019s speaking! And strange as it may seem, we are not jealous,\u2014for \nthe very simple reason that we agree. Why do I say this in the presence of Dr. \nTorrey? I have a motive, and the motive is that once in a while, when he is \nin the mood and tired, he is inclined to say: \u201cWhat\u2019s the use, I can only echo!\u201d \nIn these moods, he forgets that if any one of us con echo, we are doing pretty \nwell! I suspect that that is the utmost we can do anyway. Now we shall \nhave the pleasure of listening to him. \n\nDr. Torrey: There is probably no member of The Theosophical Society \nwho is not watching with keen interest the events of the world drama so rapidly \nunfolding before us, and trying, at the same time, to understand them in the \n\n\nREPORT OF THE ANNUAL CONVENTION \n\n\n217 \n\n\nlight of the great principles which his studies have revealed to him. Therefore \nany book which can aid him in his comprehension is always welcome. It need \nnot necessarily be a book written by theosophists. We have learned that \nevery man who intends his mind honestly and fearlessly upon a subject, will \ndiscover something of value and of truth about it which we can use to com\u00ac \nplete our own truth, or to link together certain fragments whose connection \nmay have eluded us heretofore. \n\nSo it is that this afternoon I would speak of a book which I have recently \nread with pleasure and profit. It is a volume of Gifford Lectures given at the \nUniversity of Glasgow in 1935-37 by W. McNeile Dixon, and entitled The \nHuman Situation. Already it is in a second edition, a fact which suggests that \nit is being read. \n\nThe conditions of the Foundation under which the lectures are given appear \nto preclude the appeal to revelation, and the philosophic and scientific material \nmust, so to speak, stand on its own human feet. \n\nBefore we have read very far we become aware that the author is dealing \nwith the present and most perplexing situation in which the human race finds \nitself as regards its philosophical and religious beliefs. \n\nNow I must confess that my first reaction, after a rather hasty reading, was \none of some surprise. I asked myself: Is this man living in the nineteenth \ncentury or in the twentieth? For there, buttressed by space-time, quantum \nmechanics, genes, hormones and fruit flies, is set forth the old, stark agnosticism \nof the last century with its accompaniment of darkness and despair for the \nsensitive soul and all represented as the preponderant testimony of science. \n\nDixon writes: \n\nThe worst is that the world, life, all things, should be wholly senseless, without mean\u00ac \ning, and the worst has happened. For if you ask what is this power everywhere through- \n\u00b0 U j t i! le ur V verse the answer is, \u201cIt is doing nothing: it is a lunatic energy making \n\nand breaking, building up and knocking down endlessly and aimlessly\u201d. \n\nTo be sure, Professor Dixon quotes this cheerful scientific sentiment (and \nthe book bristles with parallel passages) only to combat it, but it appears to \nme that his defence is none too strong or convincing. In fact the cumulative \npower of the arguments drawn from the physical and biological sciences consti\u00ac \ntutes a formidable indictment of the world and of life. He is hampered in his \ndefence by his own temperament. He is all for Elizabethan gusto and adven\u00ac \nturous living. The heaven of his choice, he tells us, \u201cwould contain but few \nsaints or examples of moral perfection\u201d. \n\nIndeed I am not sure that it would contain any. It would be mainly peopled by \nagreeable sinners, not too unlike myself for companionship. How sad are the virtuous, \nand how cheerful and light-hearted so often the profane. . . . Holiness is a strong per\u00ac \nfume and a little of it goes a long way in the world. I have never been very clear whether \nit was compatible with laughter. . . . \n\nAfter this revealing self-portrait we can understand how the Eastern faiths, \nChristianity included, are to him only \u201cescape mechanisms\u201d and anemic asceti\u00ac \ncisms. He finds Christianity singularly useless in the present world because it \n\n\n\n\n2 l8 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nhas nothing definite to say about financial and labour troubles, social and \npolitical problems, education, criminology and the thousand and one other \nmatters that agitate us. He admits that Christianity was an other-worldly \nreligion, anyhow, and was never intended to deal with Caesar\u2019s realm; that it \nconquered the West only by making concessions, and now, when the folly of \nthe mesalliance has been exposed, we may not justly blame Christianity. All \nof which is a mixture of irritating half-truths, though it probably represents \nthe prevalent academic view of the matter. But with blind spots like that, \ncan we wonder that Mr. Dixon is considerably tasked to prove a universe of \nspiritual values? His Tennysonian faith that \u201cgood shall be the final goal of \nill\u201d, and that a spiritual monadology of the Leibnizian pattern fits the facts \nof the world as we know them, better than the alternative theory of materialism \npropounded by science, is all to the good, though without the twin doctrines of \nKarma and Reincarnation we ourselves should be hard put \u201cto justify the ways \nof God to man\u201d. \n\nI have said that science seems to have made small progress in its philosophy \nof the world in the last century. Let us glance back to the year 1881 when \nthere appeared in the November Nineteenth Century a poem by Tennyson en\u00ac \ntitled \u201cDespair\u201d, with a caption which tells us that a man and wife, beaten \ndown by suffering and full of the current agnosticism of the time, had resolved \nto drown themselves. The wife dies but the man is rescued. He tells of his \nthoughts as they faced the waves. A single stanza suffices: \n\nAnd the suns of the limitless Universe sparkled and shone in the sky, \n\nFlashing with fires as of God, but we knew that their light was a lie\u2014 \n\nBright as with deathless hope\u2014but, however they sparkled and shone, \n\nThe dark little worlds running round them were worlds of woe like our own\u2014 \nNo soul in the heaven above, no soul on the earth below, \n\nA fiery scroll written over with lamentation and woe. \n\nThat was written nearly sixty years ago, yet it appears to be in complete \naccord with the generally accepted doctrine of the day. Strange, is it not, that \nafter sixty years of the most intense and laborious physical research which the \nworld has ever known, the agnostic doctrine is more firmly fixed in the saddle \nthan ever before? Surely in sixty years, if a theory had proved untenable, if it \nhad failed to accord with the later findings of science, it would have been quietly \ndiscarded to take its place with the wrecks of other abandoned hypotheses. \nCan it be possible that science has really discovered the final truth? Is the \nworld, indeed, a meaningless mechanism? Lord [Bertrand] Russell writes: \n\u201cMan is the product of causes which had no prevision of the end they were \nachieving: his origin, his growth, his hopes and fears, his loves and beliefs, are \nbut the outcome of accidental collocations of atoms.\u201d \n\nTo which our irrepressible Mr. Dixon replies: \u201cWherever he got his informa\u00ac \ntion, he seems to know more about it than I do, or than any other man has \never known.\u201d \n\nSimilar dogmatic affirmations were in circulation in Tennyson\u2019s day, but \nthey were used by college boys to shock the deacons of the church. To-day \n\n\nREPORT OF THE ANNUAL CONVENTION \n\n\n219 \n\n\nthey carry a more sinister ring. This is no callow, bad-boy philosophy; it is a \nmatured, reasoned doctrine of nihilism, because to-day the problem is more \nsubtly apprehended than it was in Tennyson\u2019s time. Scientists have been \nforced to become metaphysicians, and, in my opinion, granting their premises, \ntheir position would appear to be impregnable. \n\nThe man of Tennyson\u2019s \u201cDespair\u201d was a sensitive soul brought up in the \nconventional religion of the period which, for generations, had provided him \nand his ancestors with convenient lighthouses to guard their barks from ship\u00ac \nwreck on hidden reefs. The great wave which rose at the Renaissance had \nswept away the lighthouses, and man was left unguided and crying in the \nnight. God, the heaven just above the clouds, with its streets of gold and its \ngates of pearl, were gone, and science had set in their place its miles and miles \nof empty space sown thinly with stars. Instead of a living soul, precious in \nthe sight of God, man saw himself as only a brute beast endowed by evolution \nwith a swifter intelligence and a greater capacity for suffering than his brothers \nthe anthropoids. \n\nIt was at this critical period, when the choice seemed forced between the \nextremes of irrational superstition and rational agnosticism, that, in the opinion \nof many of us, the White Lodge took a hand in the matter. \n\nWe who are gathered here to-day are living witnesses to the fact that the \nuniverse revealed by expanding science might have been and should have been \ngreeted with enthusiasm and joy\u2014not as destructive of faith and optimism, \nbut as revealing and confirming and fulfilling the deepest aspirations of the \nhuman soul. But the learned world in its haughty self-sufficiency thought \ndifferently; it rejected the Masters, preferring to walk its own various ways to \nconfusion. Left to itself, science became snared in the fatal and false natural- \nsupernatural antithesis from which it might have been saved by the ancient \nteaching that the Natural is the all-inclusive, though the natural to which the \nsenses have access is only the outermost shell of the All. \n\nEven as late as the first decade of the twentieth century the issue between \nthe forces of good and evil still hung in the balance. The work of the Masters \nthrough Madame Blavatsky and Mr. Judge had told, and the beam was slo\\^ \nswinging toward the positive side. One who will re-read the earlier voluiws \nof the Quarterly cannot fail to catch the sense of expectancy and of happy \nanticipation with which the editor and the contributors sift the world\u2019s move\u00ac \nments and winnow the good grain from the chaff. A New Theology had ap\u00ac \npeared and, likewise, a New Science was coming to birth. But the shadow \nwhich follows all innovations lurked in the background. Already in 1907 an \narticle entitled \u201cLights and Shadows of the New Theology\u201d is given promi\u00ac \nnence. A Summer School of the movement had just been concluded in Wales. \nAfter indicating the various \u201cLights\u201d, such as a growing realization of the im- \n\nC inence of God, a tendency to identify the self of man with the Self of the \n_ iverse, the teaching of emanation, a deepening understanding of the nature \nand meaning of inspiration, the writer goes on to say: \n\nThere is another side of this movement, or we had rather say, an overgrowth of the \n\n\n220 \n\n\nTHE0S0PHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nmovement, of which we must now say something. We find one of the speakers, whom \nwe have already quoted with high admiration, expressing himself thus: \u201cThe land of the \nearth was given by the Father for the use and delight of all men\u2014not for the few, who, \nby any means, legal or illegal, may secure private possession thereof for their private \nprofit. The Divine Presence did not store the cellars of the earth full of coal and oil \nand iron in order that when opened in the twentieth century, coal barons and steel mag\u00ac \nnates and oil billionaires should control these treasure-vaults of the earth, enslaving the \nchildren of men in the mines, and then bleeding the nations by monopoly sale of these \ngifts of God in nature.\u201d \n\nOne speaker uses the phrase, \u201cpolitical economy of the Sermon on the Mount\u201d, \nand the writer comments sharply: \u201cThe Sermon on the Mount has no more to \ndo with economics than with astronomy\u201d,\u2014not at this stage of evolution, in any \ncase. \n\nThus we can see that a promising religious movement was already being \nundermined by sentimentalists, and as the years passed it ran off into the \npresent Protestant confusion. The writer of the Quarterly article points \nout very simply and clearly to these muddled theologians the issues which \nmake either for life or death: \n\nTo those who would promote spiritual life by social revolution, it may be said: Do \nyou think the Father rules his kingdom so ill, that all these his children sin in vain or \nsuffer in vain? Are you not unconscious followers of those who held that, in wide realms \nof life, the Devil veritably ruled? Think you there is any corner or crevice where the \nFather\u2019s will is not instantly done? Increase your faith. Make your victory over Mam\u00ac \nmon a victory of the heart and not of the tongue. Lose your life, that you may keep it to \nlife eternal. Then will you see these things in a new and clearer daylight. Then will you \nseek to increase love and aspiration and sacrifice. Then will you seek to minister to the \nwell-being of souls, to the new birth from above, knowing certainly that these, earthly \nconditions are but shadows of the things that truly are; and no more seeking to deprive \nthe \u201crich\u201d of his wreath of mist than to give the \u201cpoor\u201d a heritage of moonbeams. Cease \nto deal with shadows. Awake, arise, and deal with real life! \n\nTurning to the New Science we quickly discover that, in contrast with the \nNew Theology, its sins were of the intellect rather than of the emotions. Thin, \ncold, hard intellectualism has banished genius and enthusiasm, and substituted \na barren regimen of extreme analysis. In choosing the sensuous world of natural \nphenomena for its portion, science, at the very outset, had cast in its lot with \nthe intellect. Science was to be \u201corganized common-sense\u201d. Now, just in so \nfar as any matter is confined to the province of the intellect, any organization \nso effected must of necessity be an artificial one. For the intellect cannot \nformulate or understand a true unity. If it is to work at all it can only dis\u00ac \nintegrate. It can shatter; it can violently break a natural whole into fragments, \nresolving unity into an artificial multiplicity, the better to deal with it. This \nis the well-known separatist tendency of the mind. \u201cThe mind is the slayer \nof the real.\u201d \n\nAware that it has reduced a complex system to more easily comprehended \nunits, the mind is willing, at a later stage, to re-effect a synthesis if it is per\u00ac \nmitted to do so upon its own terms. Thereupon it proceeds to palm off its own \nspurious creation upon us as just as good as the original unity. In fact it even \n\n\nr* r\\ 'K r T r 17 XT' T TO \\T \n\n\n993 \n\n\nREPORT OF THE ANNUAL CONVENTION 221 \n\n\ndeceives itself, and will fiercely repel the insinuation that an apprehension of \ntrue unities lies quite outside its province. If we need evidence of this basic \nflaw in mental activities, we may find it in the reception which the scientific \ncamp accords to Bergsonism. \n\nScience, then, intellect in excelsis, cannot deal with life, and its reconstruc\u00ac \ntion of the organism, or of any other living whole, accords with the pattern of \nmechanism. It is obsessed with the analytical tendency, and, in the words of \nJacques Loeb, science can never reach its goal till it has resolved the world \ninto a series of points under mathematical relations to one another\u2014which is \nmerely another way of saying that science turns the world into a series of pointer \nreadings. \n\nMany of us will recall the masterly way in which Mr. Johnston dealt with \nthis matter, and showed us that the practical outcome of the philosophy of \ndematerialized science is sheer sensualism. Rank hedonism is, therefore, the \noutcome of the philosophy of science. It is the kind of life that is lived to-day \nby the great majority of educated men; it is the kind of philosophy that is \ntacitly and unquestioningly accepted as true in our universities, preached in \nthinly disguised form in our churches, and fostered by our governments. \n\nBut the wind begins to blow from another quarter. There are plenty of \nminor scientists who still see in dead matter the source of life and conscious\u00ac \nness\u2014a doctrine which Schopenhauer once said is \u201cwell suited to barbers and \napothecaries\u2019 apprentices\u201d. But in turning metaphysician the subtiler brethren \nhave been forced to recognize the axiomatic truth that the world of each one \nof us is indubitably subjective and psychological. Now if there be no objective \nground of truth, no outer, unchanging, independent standard to which experi\u00ac \nence can be referred, no common denominator which factors both your truth \nand mine, and if the very nature of science forbids the appeal to a transcendental \nUnity which, failing an objective groundwork of truth, might play the same \npart of independent witness (but which the intellect could not admit or under\u00ac \nstand anyhow, since a true unity is outside its comprehension), then we are \nleft in the charming situation of having to admit that experience is entirely \nrelative to the experiencer and is valid to him alone. There is no independent ( \nstandard of truth at all to validate our separate truths. \n\nThis sort of debased relativity is running loose in the world and is particu\u00ac \nlarly popular among those who love to call themselves the \u201cintelligentsia\u201d. \nCodes of morals and ethics? Dear me, how very mediaeval! Standards in art? \nIf I splash red paint on a piece of canvas and then cover it with yellow spots, \nthe thing is \u201cart\u201d. It may, for all you can tell, express a deep, esoteric signifi\u00ac \ncance to me. It is my truth and, in consequence, it must be accepted as a \nrevelation of a unique genius. Here we have the last wretched perversion of \nthe principle which Mr. Johnston sets forth in The Song of Life. The work of \nthe^pe Genius is, indeed, unique\u2014\u201cno more to be imitated than the fire in \nthe rubys heart or the different glory of the stars\u201d. True Genius is a facet of \nthe central Jewel of Truth, and finds its completion and its other selves in the \nUnity of the Whole. That the personality should finally lay claim to genius, \n\n\n* \n\n\n\n222 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nbasing its rubbishy argument on the metaphysics of the many in opposition \nto the metaphysics of the One, is in character with its whole lying nature. \nWhereas, so far as I can see, if, in very truth, the One did not support and \nunderlie the many, it would be impossible for two men to converse intelligibly \nwith one another (which, by the way, is the complete reductio ad absurdum \nwhich logic forces these pseudo-philosophers to take). It is the One alone \nwhich validates the separate truths we utter. \n\nThis, then, has come to pass. In the nineteenth century science rejected \nthe Way, the Truth and the Life, and chose Satan, or multiplicity, or Maya , \nor the shadow world, for its portion. Metaphysically all these terms amount \npretty much to the same thing. Science in our day has found the truth it set \nout to find, and that truth\u2014the inescapable, final, unpalatable logic of its \nposition\u2014is philosophical Nihilism: the doctrine that denies the existence of \nany ground for truth at all, and leaves the psyche an independent stream of \nconsciousness in a vast nothingness. \n\nIf we have understood these things, if our feelings have been moved by what \nwe have heard to-day, it is fitting that, as a member of the Committee on \nResolutions, I should try to add a third link so that the Trinity of Mind, Feel\u00ac \ning and Will may be complete. What are we going to do about it? The Theo- \nsophical Society appears to represent about the last stand of sanity in a world \nfast going crazy. The least we can do, therefore, is to stand to our guns, keep\u00ac \ning the banner of the White Lodge flying and making no concession to the \nworld\u2019s miserable ideals. \n\n[As I review these notes several days after Convention and in its Light, it \nbecomes so clear that in the power of the transcendent Will alone can we con\u00ac \nquer. It is a power which the world cannot give; it cannot be found in scientific \nmachinery, in hatreds and compulsions, in much shouting and gesticulating, \nin planned economies and social rehabilitations. These pitiful things dissipate \npower endlessly and fruitlessly. But who can measure or set limits to the \npower of wills united in terms of a mighty resolution? Then is bom an Organ\u00ac \nism far greater than the sum of its parts\u2014a mighty Genius through whose \nbody Power, Wisdom and Joy may flow in undiminishing splendour till each \nsmallest cell, ever perfecting itself in service and sacrifice, may in time come \nto know that it \u201cis an inlet to the same and to all of the same\u201d. To that we \nhave been called with no uncertain voice.\u2014R. E. T.] \n\nMr. Hargrove: I cannot imagine a better introduction to what I shall \ntry to say than Professor Torrey\u2019s address, because he has made it so clear \nthat if ever, at any time, The Theosophical Society had a mission, it has one \nto-day; that in view of the trend of science and of so-called scientists, The \nTheosophical Society has a message which it is our paramount duty to keep \nalive in the world and to carry forward into the next century. \n\nFrankly, I am not sure where to begin; therefore, I shall begin with a text,\u2014 \nwhich is always helpful to the speaker. My text is an old Sanskrit Proverb: \n\u201cYou cannot take one part of a fowl for cooking, and leave the other part to \n\n\nREPORT OF THE ANNUAL CONVENTION \n\n\n223 \n\n\nlay eggs.\u201d The immediate application of it, is our half-heartedness. We may \nnot believe it, but the large majority of us expect to be able to do that which \nthe Sanskrit Proverb says is impossible. In terms of our mental, emotional \nand will-energy, we expect to be able to give, let us say, half of it to the Cause \nof the Masters and the other half to our personal interests in the world. We \nmake the fatal mistake of imagining that of necessity there is some conflict \nbetween the two. In spite of everything that has been said for many years, \nexplaining over and over again that the duties of life are means to a spiritual \nend, people are ^till inclined to say: \u2018\u2018Well, look at my duties\u2014I have no time\u201d. \nBut what are their duties there for, I should like to know! \n\nThis morning, Professor Mitchell used the very illuminating analogy (speak\u00ac \ning of The Theosophical Society and of the Movement) of the crank shaft \nand its dead centre. I should like to call your attention to the fact that when \nthe crank shaft is near the dead centre, a thousandth of an inch makes all the \ndifference. We see from this that in the life of the Society and in our own \nlives, there has come a time when we must call on our reserves of capacity \nand momentum if we would keep the wheel moving,\u2014as it will move if we \nsupply the necessary thousandth of an inch of greater effort and of drive. You \nwill have understood already that it is really about ch\u00a3laship that I want to \nspeak. I am not suggesting that everyone in this room (far from it) can become \na chela. The real question is, whether the Movement is going to produce \nchelas, and this will depend to a very large extent upon the real desire and \neffort of the membership as a whole. Buddha attained Nirvana on the shoulders \nof a million men. No one ever got into heaven alone, through his own unaided \nefforts. \n\nWhat are the obstacles? I want to consider these obstacles under two main \nheads. First, there are certain intellectual misunderstandings. I am not refer\u00ac \nring to the class of individuals about whom Professor Torrey was telling us; I \nam speaking of the membership of The Theosophical Society. There are, \neven now, certain intellectual misunderstandings, some of them derived, I \nthink, from that early, orthodox Christian training which most of us received. \nThis does not imply criticism of orthodox Christianity. The time for that \nhas long since passed. We have learned that almost any form of religious \nfaith is better than none. Further, as many others have remarked, true Chris\u00ac \ntianity has never been tried, and therefore cannot be criticized. When, how\u00ac \never, it comes to its orthodox interpretation, it would be well for us to recojjjBe \nthese facts: \n\nThe Master Christ gave out the Truth, stark and unadulterated, even when \nspeaking in Parables; but he knew that his immediate followers would dilute \nit, and he accepted that as necessary. He was using the human nature and the \nhuman weaknesses of his followers for the benefit of the world. Take, for in\u00ac \nstance, the Master\u2019s teaching, \u201cTake up thy cross daily and follow me\u201d, and \ncompare that with St. James\u2019s dictum that pure religion and undefiled is to \nvisit the fatherless and the widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself un\u00ac \nspotted from the world. Christ demanded everything (St. Paul too, in my \n\n\n4 \n\n\n_ \n\n\n\n\n\n224 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nopinion); St. James, on the other hand, appears to have said to himself (in \nthe light of disillusioning experience): \u201cIf I can keep these people from deadly, \ncarnal sin, it is about all that can be hoped for\u201d. So instead of \u201cTake up thy \ncross\u201d, his hope was reduced to keeping his followers out of mischief by means \nof \u201cgood works\u201d. \n\nDo not complain because Christianity has been materialized. If it had not \nbeen materialized, there would not be any of it left; at best, it would be the \nsecret study of a few score of mystics. You have to talk to people according \nto their condition, and the Lodge has seen to it that the needs of all kinds of \npeople are met. Consider the crudest kind of Catholicism, and ask yourself: \nDoes it do more harm than good ? The answer will be that it does far more good \nthan harm. Take the religion of the uncivilized among the inhabitants of \nSouth America and Mexico\u2014extremely crude in many ways, with aboriginal \ngods all mixed up with the Virgin Mary, and so forth. But that is all those \npeople are capable of, and to deprive them of it is a sin. The alternative is \nanarchy. \n\nAs students of Theosophy, we must shake ourselves free from the material\u00ac \nistic coverings of that which the Christian Master revealed. One of the ways \nin which the ancient Wisdom Religion, as that Master taught it, has been \nperverted, is where he himself is concerned. We need to remember that Chris\u00ac \ntianity was not given out to empty minds, was not written (as it were) on blank \npaper. It was taught to Jews and to Gentiles, and among those Gentiles were \npeople who had been brought up on echoes of the Mysteries, or in the atmos\u00ac \nphere of Nordic mythology or Druidism. Their minds were already occupied \nby certain mental pictures of God and the ways of God, the result being that \nthe popular conception of God soon became a strange blend of \u201cthe Father\u201d, \nas revealed by Jesus, and of Jehovah, Zeus, Mithras, Wotan, and others; while \nChrist, whom St. Paul had described as \u201cthe first bom among many brethren\u201d, \nwas relegated to a sort of heavenly Olympus, sitting at the right hand of this \ncomposite God, and interceding with Him for sinful men. It was crude, but \nit was simple and graphic, and served to introduce to a savage world the idea \nof compassion as a divine attribute,\u2014an idea which did finally take root here \nand there among peoples not too completely given to the worship of them\u00ac \nselves,\u2014and of Wotan. In spite of this gain, however, the general result was, \nas has so often been stated here, an increasing tendency throughout the cen\u00ac \nturies to exile Christ from the world in which we live; and some of us, in spite \nof our Theosophy, may still be labouring under misapprehensions derived from \nthat source. We need to realize that Masters, though perfect, are human, and \nthat Masters are in our midst. The immediate importance of this, lies in its \nbearing upon ch\u00a3laship, especially when the aspirant strives to reach and serve \nthe Master Christ, because, if that Master be thought of as far off, and if his \nhuman nature be regarded as of the past only, during the incarnation in Pales\u00ac \ntine,\u2014a barrier is created which makes intimate, inner intercourse almost im\u00ac \npossible, not to speak of outer intercourse. \n\nIt is true that many Roman Catholic saints have recorded their experience \n\n\nREPORT OF THE ANNUAL CONVENTION \n\n\n225 \n\n\nwith and of that Master,\u2014and, incidentally, I doubt if students of Theosophy \nappreciate sufficiently the record of such experience, the trouble being that it \nis so often plastered over with psychic images, psychic \u201ctrimmings\u201d, for which \nallowance needs to be made with the understanding that the Christian Master \nnever attempts to break the moulds of minds, directly. For instance, if he is \nspeaking to a Roman Catholic saint, he does not tell that saint that his or her \ninterpretation of the Eucharist has turned the truth upside down: he will not \ndo violence to that soul. Instead, he takes things as they are, takes us as he \nfinds us,\u2014for what applies to the saint, applies equally to us. He takes our \nmental content\u2014our preconceptions and so forth\u2014and meets our condition. \nThat ceases to be true only when he is dealing with a pledged ch&la, because \nthe pledged ch&la has asked him, unconditionally, for light and guidance. The \ntruth is, we are greatly indebted to the Roman Catholic Church in many ways. \nFor one thing it clings to the old and better moral code, and then, like Masonry, \nit has preserved at least the form of certain occult truths (as in the Eucharist), \nand also definite evidence of contact with the Master, speech with the Master, \nas being possible. So many of the Protestant sects, alas, have thrown that \nbelief overboard. They really have exiled him; they regard him as remote \nfrom human affairs. The proof of it, as Dr. Torrey has said, is that so-called \nChristians, many who believe they are religious, would never dream of going \nto Christ for light on economic or scientific or similar questions: he is supposed \nto be concerned solely with dangers threatening the individual, and with the \nultimate fate of the soul. \n\nThere are exceptions, of course. Among them is the experience of a woman \nwhich she recorded in a book entitled The Great Conjecture: Who Is This Jesus ?\u2014 \na book which ought to be helpful to students of Theosophy, because she set \nout, with an open mind, to determine by experiment whether Christ was a \nreality or not, and she proceeded on the theory that he was, though treating \nthis solely as a working hypothesis. To her amazement she found that her \nefforts met with a response which became clearer and clearer, more and more \nvivid, until she would claim to-day to be in conscious hourly contact with him. \nShe has, however, preconceptions and mental moulds as hard-set as those, for \ninstance, of St. Gertrude, who, in her visions, saw St. John, St. Peter and others \nin heaven, celebrating Holy Communion, and who describes their gorgeous \nvestments and jewelled array. Like St. Gertrude, the modem Protestant \nwriter colours essential verities, but in modem fashion; instead of gorgeous \nraiment and priestly celebrations, she sees Jesus as a young Jewish carpenter, \na good democrat and ardent pacifist, who, like herself, regards war as the greatest \nof evils. In her case also, it would seem that the Master, instead of forcing \nthe truth upon her, leaves her to outgrow such illusions, which, after all, do not \naffect the fundamental value of her contribution to religious experience, or the \nfact that she has done what too few members of the Society have done, that is, \nmade it their chief purpose in life to gain first-hand knowledge of their own \nMaster, and to pursue that purpose with inflexible determination. Let us, as \nstudent^fcO Theosophy, at least rid ourselves, once for all, of inherited mis- \n\n\n\n\n\n226 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nunderstandings as to the nature of Masters and the immediate possibility of \nchelaship, and set ourselves free to that extent to serve the Lodge without \nneedless hindrance. \n\nSo we draw closer to the real question by asking ourselves: Do we really \nbelieve? Are we really convinced, not only of the existence of Masters in a \ngeneral way, but do we believe in their interest\u2014their interest in this Conven\u00ac \ntion\u2014in your individual reactions to what is being said? Do you believe that \nthey watch with the greatest concern how each one present responds?\u2014watch\u00ac \ning intently, not the speaker, but you,\u2014watching with burning hope that the \nefforts and sacrifices of all these years will not be thrown away\u2014will at last be \ncrowned with success. \n\nWhat are the barriers? Self! There is no other. Self, in its myriad forms: \nself-concern, self-love, self-hatred, self-excuse: self the centre, if not the circum\u00ac \nference, of all our thinking. Here are the Masters pouring out upon us their \nlove, and their blessing, and their power; and what do we do with their gift? \nWe take it and we turn it toward self. Someone may say, \u201cWell, at least I \ndo not love myself\u2019 \u2019. Yes, but do you hate yourself ? And what is the difference ? \nThe point is that self is the centre. The man or woman who takes it all in \nterms of self-love is in a bad way; but, on the other hand, those who take that \ndivine gift, and go through life revolving around their sins and weaknesses, \nare just as bad, for they are stealing and perverting the energy thus consumed. \nThe feeling that goes into it, the emotions that go into it\u2014all are perverted \nfrom the use which that man\u2019s Master intends. Our obstacles are of our own \nmaking; there are no others. All we have to do is to sweep them aside. Stop \ncalculating, too. What of it that, in the past, there may have been failure, \nor that you lack one or all of the qualifications. No one is suggesting that any \none of you should say, \u201cI will be a ch61a\u201d. Leave that to your Master. All \nyou have to do is to learn to love him. If you do that, the rest will take care \nof itself. \n\nIn view of all that has been said this morning, and again this afternoon, of \nthe desperate need if this work of Masters is to continue in the world, imagine \nthat you were to see someone whom you love, drowning, and were to stand \nthere and say, \u201cThis is terrible! I am a bad swimmer and therefore can do \nnothing!\u201d If you see someone you love drowning, there is at least one thing \nyou can do\u2014jump in and drown with them; do not stand on the shore in safety \nand watch them drown. Is it not clear that in the last analysis this is a ques\u00ac \ntion of manhood and not of piety or anything else? Not, heaven knows, that \na man can drag his sins along with him; if he is doing that, he is discarded; \nnobody turns him out, but he goes,\u2014as a light weight is thrown off a rapidly \nrevolving table. \n\nWhat I am speaking of is the need to get away from self, to forget self. For\u00ac \nget your miserable virtues and idiotic faults, and forge ahead. That does not \nmean that if you are shooting at a target, you just shoot,\u2014because if a man \nshoots at a target he takes into account the velocity of the wind, the character \nof his rifle, its trajectory, and so forth,\u2014he uses all his intelligence, all the \n\n\nREPORT OF THE ANNUAL CONVENTION \n\n\n227 \n\n\ninformation he can get, in order to hit the mark. It is not reckless, blind jump\u00ac \ning that is needed. But do not waste the rest of your life in preparation! Let \nthe practice, the being, serve as preparation. \n\nI am going to tell you, because personal things sometimes help, that when \nword came that we must once more appeal for ch\u00a3las, my first reaction was: \nOh! Again! In justice I must say that that lasted only for a moment. Yet at \nevery age, there are temptations peculiar to that age. Youth has its tempta\u00ac \ntions; age has its temptations. And one of the temptations of age is the out\u00ac \ncome of disillusionment, namely, the grave danger that it results in waning \nenthusiasm, waning zeal, which must be recognized at once as springing solely \nfrom lower nature; and lower nature must be treated as of no account whatever. \nIt is the man who takes his lower nature seriously, who never gets anywhere. \nDisillusionment should not have such results, and will not, if love be sufficient. \nOne need only think of Masters. Do you suppose they suffer from illusions? \nWhat has been their experience?\u2014in spite of which, because they love, their \nzeal is inexhaustible. Unlike us, they see not only the faults and limitations, \nbut the divine possibilities, the divine in every one of us, and, fixing their \nvision and their faith on that, they work for ever and ceaselessly with a zeal \nand a devotion and energy of which we are utterly incapable, even of imagining. \n\nLet us consider a typical illustration of their experience, which would be \nheart-breaking if they were not Masters. A few of you will remember that \nsome twenty-five years ago, a young man, an American, who had spent some \nyears in India as a missionary, visited us on his way through New York. He \nhad had a magnificent idea, a genuine inspiration, which already, to some \nextent, he had put into effect. The idea was that the only way to reach the \nHindu religiously (and many of them need reaching, in that sense, at least \nas badly as any people of the west), is to do, in the name of Christ, as their \nown holy men do,\u2014to live a life of absolute poverty and humility; to live among \nthem without possessions of any sort; to live, in short, as a Sannyasi lives. \nHe was a High Church Protestant. With the consent of his Bishop in India, \nhe had founded a religious Order, with a Rule similar in spirit to that of the \nFranciscans. He, with two or three associates, had taken the three vows, \nincluding the vow of celibacy, and had set to work, meeting with considerable \nsuccess. When he visited New York he was looking for recruits, and we, tho^h \nour vocation was very different, fully recognized his \u201ccall\u201d as genuine, tmd \nwished him well. The Christian Master had met him more than half way: \nthat was evident. On one occasion, when this young man had been tramping \nthe roads of northern India, almost exhausted and greatly discouraged, his \nMaster appeared to him. Quoting the words of a well-known English clergy\u00ac \nman who was Warden of one of the Colleges at Cambridge, and who wrote an \nIntroduction to a small volume of poems by the young man of whom I speak: \n\nThe author of this little volume is by birth an American, aged twenty-six, who, having \nseen whether in the body or out of the body God knows, but in any case with con\u00ac \nvincing clearness a vision of the Lord Jesus, toilworn and travel-stained, trudging on \nfoot along an Indian high road, has found in that vision a call to give his life, from love \n\n\n228 THEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\nof his Master, to the service of his Indian brothers, in literal imitation of the poverty, \nhumility, and self-sacrificing devotion of the earthly life of Jesus. \n\nIn one of his poems, the author attempts to describe his experience. Many \nof you are familiar with it. I will not weary you with a long quotation. \n\nFrom out the dark a voice came clear and calm, \n\nQuite low, and yet so full of melody, \n\nSo full of pathos, ringing so with love, \n\nThat my poor soul, all thrilled and dazed with joy, \n\nCould scarce make out the meaning of the words. \n\n\u201cO little lamb, I came to seek thee here. \n\n\u201cThou askest who I am and where I dwell. \n\n\u201cI am thy Shepherd; though thou knewest not, \n\n\u201cI have been seeking thee the whole world o\u2019er, \n\n\u201cAye, calling, but thou would\u2019st not answer me. . . . \n\n\u201cThou soughtest peace below, but thou hast found \n\u201cIt is not there, so I have come to help, \n\n\u201cAnd give thee what thou long hast sought in vain.\u201d \n\nThe Master had sought him out,\u2014and no Master can do that without pay\u00ac \ning for it. What was the result? (I wonder whether our response differs so \ngreatly from that young man\u2019s.) In some three or four years, the recipient \nof so wonderful a blessing, turned from his vocation, forgot his vows, and mar\u00ac \nried a hill-woman, to become the father of half-caste children. The Order he \nhad founded, which seemed so full of promise, and which might and should \nhave accomplished great things for India, was wiped out of existence. \n\nSuch is the response the Masters meet with, time after time, as self-pity or \nsome other form of self-indulgence destroys the seed which they have sown. \n\u201cLord, I will lay down my life for Thy sake\u201d, is more easily said than made \nan hour by hour practice. Yet they never lose hope, nor faith, nor charity. \nThey see the weakness, but never cease to cling to the divine possibility. Must \nnot we profit, so far as we are able, by their example? Can we hesitate to \nvoice their appeal again? More than that, can we forget what they have said \nfrom the very beginning of the Society,\u2014that the neophyte must develop \nthrough his contact with the world, in business, and through the performance \nof all his duties, \u201cthe indomitable resolution to succeed\u201d,\u2014as a Master, then \nknown as \u201cSerapis\u201d, wrote in 1874, and as Light on the Path repeats with added \nemphasis: \u201cOnly he who is untamable, who cannot be dominated, who knows \nhe has to play the Lord over men, over facts, over all things save his own di\u00ac \nvinity\u201d, is fit to tread the path of ch\u00a3laship. \n\nTherefore, in so far as, even remotely, we are able to speak for those great \nones, it is our duty to persist until we die, that this Society shall produce ch\u00a3las, \nmust produce chelas. Everything is at stake. There can be no question of \ntelling this, that or the other person that he should become a ch\u00a7la. That is \nnot the way things are done; it would be worse than folly. What we need is \nunion of determination, so that, from within our ranks (no matter in whom), \nthere shall arise this flower of ch\u00a3laship for the Lodge. What appeal can be \nmade, in the name of heaven, if not the appeal of Masters! They are not going \n\n\nrpport OF THE ANNUAL CONVENTION \n\n\n23 \n\n\nREPORT OF THE ANNUAL CONVENTION 229 \n\nto talk about their need. We can talk about their need, and we shall! That \neveryone here present shall leave this place determined to do all that he can\u2014 \nto make some small sacrifice that he has not made in the past; to give some \ntime to spiritual reading, to think, and pray\u2014that ch\u00a3laship shall develop \nthat somebody\u2014or more than one\u2014shall prove acceptable as victim: for \nMasters have never promised rewards; always they have sought out those who \nwill be victims gladly; who are capable of the deepest joy if they can suffer \nfor love\u2019s sake. \n\nThinking this over, two days ago, it seemed that it might be possible to \nword a Resolution that could be passed\u2014not by the Society but by individual \nmembers\u2014covering the prayer of this Convention, the hope of Masters for this \nConvention. I am going to read it to you, and if you do not like it, please say \nso. Anybody can be and remain a member in good standing, and can rightly, \nproperly, if he choose, declare that this Resolution is not for him. \n\nWhereas , We, members of The Theosophical Society, founded by Masters, \nrealize to some extent the dire need of the world for help and guidance which \nMasters of the Great Lodge alone can give; and \n\nWhereas, We realize also the imperative need of the Society to produce ch\u00a3las \nfrom within its ranks if our link with the Lodge is to be kept unbroken, and if \nthe Society is to continue to serve as a bridge between the Lodge and the world; \ntherefore be it \n\nResolved , That we, members present at this Convention [not necessarily all \nthe members], humbly but unreservedly offer ourselves, individually and col\u00ac \nlectively, for service, promising to do our utmost to dedicate our lives, and to \ngive our hearts and minds, to the purposes of the Lodge, while always praying \nthat some among us, by the completeness of their self-giving, may make them\u00ac \nselves acceptable as cMlas, and may thus become able to complete the Work \nbegun by H.P.B. and Judge. \n\nIt was only possible, before this meeting, to confer briefly with the other \nmembers of the Committee on Resolutions, but both Dr. Torrey and Dr. Hohn^ \nstedt favoured it, naturally on the condition that it be explained that it does \nnot commit the Society. One of our By-Laws, as you may remember, reads \nas follows: \n\nA copy of all resolutions affecting the policy, principles, or platform of The Theo\u00ac \nsophical Society, which are to be voted upon at the Annual Convention, shall be sent to \nthe Executive Committee three months before said Convention, whereupon due notifi\u00ac \ncation of the proposed resolutions shall be given to all Branches by the Executive \nCommittee. \n\nI have read that By-Law to you because I do not want anyone to say or to \nthii^^hat we have forgotten it. We have not forgotten it. Further, I repeat \nthaWio one, on the basis of his T.S. membership, is under any obligation to \napprove of that Resolution. But there is a thousand times more power and \nmore appeal in the united resolution of a group than in the separate resolutions \n\n\n230 \n\n\nTHE0S0PHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nof individuals. Speaking for myself, and for myself only, I am convinced that \nif a resolution of that kind is, as it were, offered up, it will at least be some \ncomfort to those who, as I said this morning, have given everything and for\u00ac \ngiven everything throughout all these years, and who never lose hope of us, \neven when we lose hope of ourselves (and to lose hope of ourselves is one of \nthe worst of sins). Once more, treat self and its defects as of no account. Forget \nit! Then it will cease to trouble you; will cease to get in your way. Up and \nonward for evermore\u2014doing what you can\u2014doing your utmost\u2014finding your \ngoal in each moment, leaving the future to divine compassion. \n\nMr. Chairman, I think that enough has been said for the time being, and \nperhaps other members of the Committee would care to express themselves on \nthis subject. Or may I suggest that it be thrown open to discussion, for and \nagainst ? \n\nThe Chairman: You have heard the Report of the Committee on Resolu\u00ac \ntions. You have heard the Resolution that they suggest might well be adopted \nby members present here. It should be unnecessary to say that not even the \nexistence of the Masters to whom this Resolution refers, is an official belief of \nour Society, or that this Resolution cannot in any way commit the Society. \nIt is an opportunity that is offered to the members present, to express them\u00ac \nselves individually and collectively, in regard to what they wish to do for The \nTheosophical Society and the Theosophical Movement. The subject is thrown \nopen for discussion, with the request that it be full and frank and free. \n\nThe Resolution was then read a second time. \n\nMrs. Bell: Mr. Chairman, is there anything more to be said, any argu\u00ac \nment to be entered into about that Resolution? It does not seem as though \nanybody here could want to do anything but adopt it. \n\nDr. Hohnstedt: Out West, along the highways, you often cross railroad \ntracks, and as you do so, you will see signs: \u201cStop\u2014Look\u2014Listen\u2014Danger\u201d. \n\nIt occurred to me, a couple of weeks ago, that it would be a good policy for \nus to keep that sign in mind, daily. Are we following a dangerous path in our \ndaily conduct, our daily thoughts, and our daily acts? Is our attitude neutral? \n\nIf so, let us adopt a positive attitude for good. This Resolution provides a \nspecial opportunity to do so. The Masters need our help. Will not the force \nthat you throw out as a result of your thought and desire, help to charge the \nspiritual storage battery from which the Masters can draw to illuminate the \nworld? That is all they ask of us. They ask us to do our part. If we believe \nin Masters, why not help them? If you believe in Masters and think you \ncan help them, it is for you to vote for that Resolution. It does not bind the \nSociety. It only binds you to try to do the best you can to help the Masters. \n\nDr. Torrey: This is a serious matter. It means a great deal, or else it \nmeans nothing. Let no one be rushed off his feet. Some of our younger mem\u00ac \nbers might be in danger of this. Be sure! If it only means that we are going \nto try \u2014but I think it means something deeper than that. \n\n\nREPORT OF THE ANNUAL CONVENTION \n\n\n231 \n\n\nMr. J. F. B. Mitchell: I should like to express my appreciation of the \nmarvellous privilege that is offered us to do our utmost to further the pur\u00ac \nposes of the Lodge for the good of mankind. If giving everything can advance \nthe purpose of the Lodge by a fraction of an inch, surely there is not a person \nin the room who does not want to do it. \n\nDr. Clark: With everything in me, I think we should respond to this ap\u00ac \npeal. We are asked to do something entirely within our power. All obstacles \nfall before real desire. If a man desires a very fine diamond that is in Australia, \nthough he may not have a dollar in his pocket, if his desire be sufficiently \nstrong and sufficiently lasting, that diamond will ultimately become his. \n\nMr. LaDow: I have just recalled a story which I had forgotten since school\u00ac \ndays, the story of Xenophon\u2019s Anabasis. There was a small body of Greeks \nwho had enlisted in a Persian army that met defeat in a civil war. They set \nforth for home, and their captains led them across mountains in winter, through \nburning deserts, on and on. One day, they came out upon a mountain top \nfrom which they looked down upon the sea. The way home was revealed \nto them! They fell on their knees, and embraced one another with tears of \njoy streaming down their faces, crying out: \u201c Thalassa , Thalassa; the Sea, the \nSea!\u201d \n\nThis resolution simply states that we have been led to a mountain top, from \nwhich we have a vision of the Great Sea, the Ocean of Theosophy? the way \nhome. Can anyone refuse to follow that way? \n\nMr. Miller: The question was raised this morning as to whether we have \nthe ability, the power, to respond to the call of the Lodge that was made anew \nto-day. The answer to that depends upon what part of us is to do the de\u00ac \nciding. . . . Surely, no member, young or old, if he will apply the test as to which \npart of his nature is being quickened, will hesitate a moment for his answer to \nthis Resolution. \n\nMr. Auchincloss: I do not see how we can be grateful enough for this \nopportunity which has been offered us, and for the call to meet this tremendous \nneed, of which we have had to be reminded. It is a time for us, at whatever \npoints we are still sound asleep, to find out what those points are, and to wake \nup; at whatever points we are still holding back, to find out what they are, \nand to go forward; to give ourselves all over again, completely; to put om will \ninto it, and our back into it; to make ourselves able to co-operate as ou^rearts \ndesire to do. \n\nMr. Kobb\u00a3: Mr. Chairman, I am whole-heartedly in favour of the Reso\u00ac \nlution, but disappointed that it was not instigated by some of us who are younger \nas students of Theosophy, so that it could have come from the ranks of the \nSociety, so to speak, instead of being handed to us,\u2014as things have been, \nyear after year, on silver platters, with spoons,\u2014or, now and then, with cups, \nif we seemed able to quaff larger draughts. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n232 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nBe that as it may; we now have our individual and collective and immediate \nobjective before us in concise form: that new ch\u00a3laship must be bom within \nthe ranks of the Society, if that body is to continue as a healthy, vigorous \nentity in the world. If each of us who considers himself a real member does \nnot contribute to this end, I go so far as to say that we shall have failed in the \npurpose for which we incarnated this time, and shall have betrayed a Lodge \ntrust. \n\nHowever, there is no need to fail. We are part and parcel of a time-honoured \nLodge movement, not some spiritually-orphaned beings who are here for an \nisolated span of twenty-five or fifty years. What can we do to bring new chela- \nship to birth? One simple way is to cease to bury ourselves under our duties, \nto cease to identify ourselves with them, no longer to be self- busy. Our duties \nare staves in our hands if used aright, the very implements by means of which \nwe can contribute directly towards bringing about this great birth. Let us, \nthen, get from under our duties and into the atmosphere of the Lodge,\u2014or of \nour own Master, if we know who he is; for, in the final analysis, it is he who \nwill bestow this mysterious birth,\u2014and upon the one who makes this choice \npossible. \n\nMr. Brush: This Resolution, as I see it, simply objectifies and epitomizes \nwhat all of us in our hearts, have been trying to work toward. It is now given \nto us to proceed from that stage and to objectify it still further. The fact that \nit is a collective formulation means that each of us will be on his honour to \nincarnate it, as much as possible, in his personal life. \n\nMr. Saxe: I, also, find myself with mixed emotions,\u2014joy and gratitude \nthat we should have this wonderful opportunity, but shame and deep regret \nthat such an appeal should again be necessary. Year after year, on many \noccasions, the older members have made strong appeals to us, and we know \nthat we have not done nearly as well as we could have done in response. \nProfessor Mitchell once pointed out that the essence of the religious life is \ncourageously attempting the impossible, and then achieving the impossible. \nHave we really tried, each day, to do the impossible? \n\nYou will remember that the Master Christ often spoke to his disciples about \nlack of faith, \u201ca faithless generation\u201d. He wanted them to have a far higher \nideal of faith, saying that if they had faith as a grain of mustard seed, they \ncould move mountains. And Light on the Path says that faith is a great engine, \nan enormous power. These are lessons for us. I think we flatter ourselves \nthat we have faith merely because we are not unbelievers; we are blind to the \nfact that we really have hardly any faith at all. \n\nMr. CarXs: Surely we believe in a universe, the essential and ultimate \npurpose and trend of which is toward the Good. I should think that we must \nwant to believe this, whether it is the Masters who tell us so or not. That \nbeing so, it would seem to me that this Resolution offers us an opportunity to \ndo now what we ultimately must; to do now, what we surely will ultimately \nand essentially want to do. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nREPORT OF THE ANNUAL CONVENTION \n\n\n233 \n\n\nDr. Dewey: I feel that the opportunity to join in this Resolution is the \ngreatest privilege offered to us during the few years I have been connected \nwith this Society. Mr. Hargrove took pains to make clear that this is indi\u00ac \nvidual action, though it does not show on the face of the Resolution taken by \nitself. I wonder if the insertion of the word \u201cindividual\u201d in two places: \u201cWhereas \nwe individual members\u201d, and \u201cNow therefore be it resolved, we individual \nmembers\u201d, would give a greater sense of individual responsibility to each \nmember who concurred. \n\n\nThe Chairman: The Chairman would like to make it wholly clear, in \nresponse to that suggestion, that the resolution does not commit the Society \nas such. He sympathizes with the purpose of the suggestion, but would be \nsorry to see the wording changed so as to lose the added power which, as Mr. \nHargrove pointed out, could be realized through collective action. \n\n\nMr. Politella: In this Resolution, submitted for our endorsement in \nheart and mind and will, the Cause of the Masters and the Society which is \nits embodiment, are placed before us for judgment. By our verdict, by the \nwhole-heartedness of our endorsement, we may make it once more clear that \nTheosophy is not a mere philosophical doctrine, but a life to be lived in meas\u00ac \nurable completeness by all of its adherents. And even more, Theosophy is \nthe Cause of the Masters, for which, when the call comes, all must be sacrificed. \nBy our own verdict, therefore, by the measure of our devotion, Theosophy \nand what it represents, stands or falls in the heart of each of us. \n\nIn this summons, we of the younger generation find once more made tangi\u00ac \nble the call to keep the link unbroken. In this solemn hour, by the force of our \nunited aspirations and the help of those whose life-blood is in the Society, \nthe very gate of Heaven seems to have been forced open. Now we can see \nthe meaning and significance of this, our united and also individual act of \ndevotion, with undimmed sight and also with a perspective from which\u2014 \nif only for a moment\u2014the veil of Maya has been lifted. I am sure that it must \nbe the feeling of many of us, that in this awesome moment we are closer to \nthe mountain top, and have a clearer view from there of the sunshine of life, \nthan we have ever had before. In this interval our petty little \u201cself\u201d is so \nstunned by the sacred demands made upon the true Man, the Higher Nature \nof each of us, which desires to adopt this Resolution, that it can not jp- \nportune us with advice about caution and moderation and its infernal, \u201c\\VTOt \nwill become of me?\u201d At this invocation, so magically prepared, our united \nwill has the potency of a vision gained from the mountain-peak far above \nthe clouds; to-morrow we become valley-dwellers again, and the height and \nwhat we have seen from there, may once more seem inaccessible. Now we \nseem to be face to face with the speaker whose call rings out: \u201cIn God\u2019s name \ncome over and help us. The need is so great!\u201d To-morrow we may hesitate \nand weigh the pros and cons and ask, \u201cMaster, is thy need so great that I \n^pust sacrifice my all?\u201d \n\nV In this Resolution is embodied all for which the Society stands, as the spirit - \n\n\n\n\n\n\n234 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nual organ of humanity. The Society is a living organism for the production \nof ch\u00a3las, and if it fulfils not its function, its fate must be that of the barren \nfig tree. The magnificent opportunity is granted us now to aspire to and make \nconcrete that which for years we have subscribed to with our lips. \u201cBut if \nI fail?\u201d Failure is an illusion, and like all others, a snare of Mara. In the \nLodge, acts are not judged by success or failure; its aspirants do not stand \nor fall by human standards. Here, \u201cnot failure, but low aim, is crime\u201d. To \nthe timid one who seeks the things of the earth, the poet has given the advice: \n\u201c\u2019Tis better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all\u201d. These \nare good, but for the would-be ch\u00a3la, words of even deeper import are written: \nThe power which the disciple shall covet is that which shall make him appear as \nnothing in the eyes of men. . . . Thy right is to the work , and never to its fruits. \n\n. . . The first and only right of the neophyte is\u2014to be tried. \n\nBy the life-force with which we endow this united Resolution, and seek \nindividually to answer the call, by that measure does the cause of the Masters, \nthe attempt to redeem a dying world, gain or lose in strength. Now each of \nus is being tested: how much do we understand? how much do we love? what \nis the measure of our love? We have been given this afternoon the only test \nby which love can ever be measured\u2014by the completeness of its sacrifice. \nAnd the Masters ask for the sacrifice of this mole-eyed demon of self, the slayer \nof the real who keeps us from the object of our love. \n\nLet us enter freely, with hearts aflame, that glorious warfare of the soul; \nlet us make instant use of that fire which we have demanded from Heaven \nand which must be returned to its source. Face to face with all that is good \nand true and beautiful in the whole wide world, with our own supreme selves, \nwhat does it matter what becomes of us, so long as the Cause of the Masters \ntriumphs? \n\nMr. Mullinax: I have long wanted to attend a Convention, and it is grati\u00ac \nfying to me to be here in such unusual circumstances. Something has been \nbrought up which, as I see it, is of the utmost importance to the Society and \nto every one of its members. We can talk till our minds become numb, but \nit will not get us anywhere. Sooner or later, each one must do something \nabout it. I think it should be done now. I would whole-heartedly subscribe \nto that Resolution and I hope the Masters will help us all to do the same. \n\nMr. W. E. Smith: I am a very young member in service, and very unworthy \nto voice any opinion here. I have less knowledge than faith and hope, but \nI feel we are confronted with a great opportunity. If, as Dr. Torrey suggests, \nsome of us who are young, change and fail, it would be deplorable; and there \nis always the possibility that we shall change and fail. But if some of us fall, \nand have to go forward on our hands and knees, and yet one of us reaches the \ngoal,\u2014it will be worth it. \n\nMr. John Mitchell: I think the Resolution is in the nature of a pledge \nof one\u2019s life. I think that for someone to take this pledge and fail later would \n\n\nREPORT OF THE ANNUAL CONVENTION \n\n\n235 \n\n\ndo much more harm than good. It would be preferable for an individual like \nthat, not to vote on it. I am whole-heartedly in favour of the purpose behind \nthe Resolution, but I think it would be harmful for one to fail. \n\nMiss Husby: In answer to that, I should say that perhaps we should feel \nthat the personal Karma of failure is not so important as what we may be \nable to accomplish collectively. A collective pledge is not the same as a per\u00ac \nsonal pledge. If we contribute, individually, to what would help the rest to \ngo forward with a united purpose\u2014to produce a chela\u2014our individual failure \nwould not be important. \n\nMr. Ganson: It is to me the most marvellous thing that has happened \nin any Convention that I can remember: to have a call voiced to us from the \nMasters in such definite and ungamished language. It means the opening \nup of our nature to the Master\u2019s nature, so the heart touches his heart and \nthe fire comes in to us. It does not make any difference whether you or I be\u00ac \ncome that ch\u00a3la. It is the collective work that will count. \n\nMrs. Bell: It seems to me that in all this talk about failure, we leave out \nall that the Masters are going to do to help us keep this Resolution. \n\nMr. Jimenez: I think this may be a turning point, an opportunity offered \nby the Masters. They know what they are doing. I think the adventure is \nworth all the possible losses. \n\nMr. Hargrove: Personally, I am grateful to those who have spoken, to \none and all. I should like to include Mr. John Mitchell,\u2014because it takes \ncourage to voice a solitary objection. But of course the truth of the matter \nis that the failure of the individual, lamentable though that be, is of no conse\u00ac \nquence whatever in comparison with the possible success of the group of which \nhe is a part. Think of a regiment of soldiers\u2014a man can go forward with his \nregiment, or he can stay behind. If he goes forward, he may be killed. That \nwould be unfortunate, but at least he will have the honour of having gone \nforward. If he says, No, the risk is too great and he might be killed,\u2014he may \nsave his life, but I am not sure that he will find it. \n\nI am completely in accord with Dr. Torrey\u2019s warning. Keep out of it, if \nyou do not want it, because we do not want you in it. \n\nAt the same time, do not act on a wave of emotion, and then go oAide \nthe door and feel that you made a fool of yourself. I do think, howevl^hat \nit is only fair to those who have made up their minds, that they should have \nan opportunity to go on record. If anyone disapproves of the Resolution, \nhe can vote against it; or, if some have not grasped its meaning\u2014in spite of \nthe fact that it has been read twice\u2014they can (and should) abstain from voting. \nMay I ask, therefore, that those who are in favour of the Resolution, signify \nthis by holding up their right hand. [Very few abstained from expressing \nimmediate and enthusiastic approval.] Those against should have an oppor\u00ac \ntunity to register their disapproval in the same way. [None did so.] I do \n\n\n\n\n\n236 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nnot believe that I should be saying anything unwarrantable if I were to express \nthe belief that the Masters thank you. \n\nThe Chairman: The next business of the Convention would be, in regular \nprocedure, to hear from the delegates present; but I am wondering whether it \nis true that there was nothing more to say after Mr. Hargrove sat down. There \nis, at least, something I should like to add, and that is an expression of our \ngratitude to the Theosophical Movement, to its members, living and dead, \nto its founders and the Great Lodge of Masters, that by their divine compassion \nthey have brought us to the point where we can take this Resolution, and \nmake it the conscious purpose of our lives. \n\nMiss Hohnstedt was then asked to speak for the Cincinnati Branch. \n\nMiss Hohnstedt: I do not want to say much about our work in Cincinnati, \nbut I should like to say how glad I am that this Resolution was brought before \nus. It occurs to me that parents never ask children to do anything that is \nimpossible; and the Masters are our parents on the spiritual plane, and they \nwould not ask us to do anything impossible; and if we all make up our minds \nto live up to it, we shall have their help. \n\nMr. Oberlander: I can only say that I am glad that I am here to par\u00ac \ntake of the inspiration, the guidance and strength that a Convention like this \ngives us for the following year. \n\nMrs. Regan: It is very hard to remember what you had planned to say \nas a delegate, because our hearts are so full of the Resolution. \n\nWhen I first began coming to our Conventions, I remember that as we greeted \neach other, year after year, invariably one of us would say: \u201cI am so glad \nI could come to Convention\u2014I get so much from it.\u201d As the years go by, \nour attitude changes. We begin to think, \u201cWhat can I give to Convention?\u201d \nAnd all that we can give is ourselves\u2014what we are, or at least what we have \nbeen struggling for through the years. But at this Convention, we have had \nan opportunity that we have never had before, an opportunity to pledge our\u00ac \nselves to stand by the Masters, to fight for them, and I thank God with all \nmy heart that we have had that opportunity. \n\nMiss Gorich: My gratitude to Theosophy and to the older members is \nsomething which I cannot express. I know that everything that I am is due \nto what I have learned through Theosophy. I bring greetings from the Branch \nin Denver. I am hoping to take back to them much of the inspiration I re\u00ac \nceived at this Convention. I am heart and soul in sympathy with the Reso\u00ac \nlution, and am glad to have the opportunity to serve the Masters in that way. \n\nMr. Mullinax: This is the keenest pleasure that I have ever had, in this \nroom to-day. It is perfectly marvellous. I have wanted to come here for a \nvery long time, and it just did not seem that I could. I have never had any \nconception of what it would actually be like. I am proud to stand in your \n\n\nREPORT OF THE ANNUAL CONVENTION \n\n\n237 \n\n\npresence. It is an honourable company, and it is a very great privilege. It \nis this wonderful feeling in the heart, of unity,\u2014that we are part of that greater \nlife which rules all nations and which is ours if we will make it so. It is not \npossible for me to express, with any degree of adequacy, my sense of grati\u00ac \ntude to those who have done so much for me and for the Masters\u2019 Cause. I \nthank you. \n\nMr. Gonzalez Jimenez then read the following message on behalf of the \nBranch in Venezuela. \n\nTo the members of the T.S. in Convention assembled: Another benediction; \nanother gathering of men and gods; another Convention! How shall we re\u00ac \nspond? We have been told again and again: by subjecting our lower nature \nto the higher; by living as a soul; through re-ligion , the binding of ourselves \nto the Father in Heaven. \n\nOur Society was conceived and formed by Masters of the Lodge, whose \nPatron is the Heavenly Father, for the purpose of re-linking us, through the \nspecific and personal devotion of the Head of our spiritual genealogy, to the \nPerfect and Universal Father. To arouse this filial devotion in us, is the es\u00ac \nsential mandate of all the Emissaries of the Lodge. \n\nThe most striking and dynamic definition of Theosophy, as we understand \nit, is \u201cto live the life\u201d (a platitude, intellectually). But nowadays it ought \nto be a life of combat, waged as never before, with the ceaseless, growing joy \nof the celestial companionship. After its 63 years of existence as a body, it \nseems to us that the Society is more and more concerned with this inner atti\u00ac \ntude and less and less with simple formalism. We feel that it has transcended \nthe interest of Branch routine. You all, and much more, indeed, our Masters, \nwho we believe are in our midst to-day, are more avid of the invisible aroma \narising from the censer of hearts set afire, than of descriptions of exterior activ\u00ac \nities. How we wish we had, instead of a written Report, the incense distilled \nfrom the bark of our Kama, to be burned in the censer of this Convention! \nWe surely would co-operate if we could, humbly, unknown, with the Masters \nin their perpetual holocaust for the healing and deification of the race! H.P.B. \ncalled this co-operation the pinnacle of art'. \u201cIs it not\u201d, she says, \u201cthe greate^ \nart of all; this which affects the very atmosphere in which we live? That it^K \nthe most important is seen at once, when we remember that every person \nwho draws the breath of life affects the mental and moral atmosphere of the \nworld, and helps to colour the day for those about him.\u201d \n\nThis is not a benevolent counsel to be heard lightly. Is this call to be wasted \non the deafness of our desert? Never! must be our response. It is the im\u00ac \nplicit pledge of our membership; the summons to our sense of decency, or fit\u00ac \nness, but in any case, to our filial gratitude, which confronts us with a dilemma \nthat we cannot elude: to be or not to be; to conquer or perish, to people the \nHeavens or to fill the cemeteries. Thus, H.P.B. proceeds: \u201cThose who do \n^t help to elevate the thoughts and lives of others must of necessity either \njwalyze them by indifference, or actively drag them down. When this point \n\n\n238 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nis reached, then the art of life is converted into the science of death; we see \nthe black magician at work. And no one can be quite inactive.\u201d In other \nwords, if we do not co-operate with the Guardian Angel of our Higher Self, \nor Master, in the divine re-making, we, by the open door of the Theosophy \nwe have assimilated, lend ourselves of necessity to ten demons of our lower \nnature for the undoing of the race. An angel sufficed to save Tobias, but ten \nfiends were sent to kill Sensa. \n\nYou all know that living the life involves a twofold process: a demand and \na supply. Inconceivable is the effort of evolution without the recompense of \ninvolution, just as \u201cbelow\u201d is inconceivable without \u201cabove\u201d, or a shadow \nwithout a form that projects it. For, after all, what we call personal evolution \nis but the silhouette of spiritual involution. \n\nIt is not an easy task in an easy environment; but have we not been told \nthat the theosophical life is for those who have courage and common sense, \nbrain and resolution, feeling and understanding? And, on the other hand, \nin the eternal law of compensation, we must remember that extremes meet: \nthe greatest help comes to the maximum need. Let us hear what Judge says : \n\u201cThere is one thing peculiar to the present Kali-Yuga that may be used by \nthe student. All causes now bring about their effects much more rapidly than \nin any other or better age. Thus by bearing all the manifold troubles of this \nage and steadily triumphing, the object of his efforts will be more quickly \nrealized, for, while the obstacles seem great, the powers to be invoked can be \nreached more quickly.\u201d Infallibly, when in the storm we admit our insuf- \nficience, and self resigns as pilot; when, submissively and with faith, we send \nout the S.O.S. evoking divine guidance,\u2014Krishna appears on deck, and takes \nthe helm of our tossing boat. \n\nThe humble work of our Branch has been an effort to commence to live \nthis kind of life that the Masters ask of us; and, by their gracious inspiration \nand direct help, we hope our commencement will be definite, in keeping the \nlaw of our Lord, for we are longing for the day when, like the oriental devotee, \nwe can say: \u201cI take my refuge in the Buddha, in his Law, in his Sangha\u201d. \n\nMiss Husby: After this afternoon, I think that, first of all, I should like \nto express my gratitude for being a member of this organization, through which \nI have such an opportunity. I could not have it otherwise. Life suggests a \nparallel with our collective effort. In the world of art, there are creative artists, \nand art appreciators. The appreciator is seldom thought of as a creative artist, \nbut I think he may well consider that when he looks upon a thing of beauty, \nand recognizes its beauty, he has helped to create it; that he can thank the \nartist for doing the work, for being a creator in one sense, but that he is also \na creator, because he has loved the beauty. \n\nMr. Cross then spoke of his experiences in the Biological Department \nof an American University, deploring the fact that only the husks of life are stud\u00ac \nied there. He had found the teachers devoted to their tasks but obsessed \nwith the notion that the accumulation of facts was the goal of research. \n\n\nREPORT OF THE ANNUAL CONVENTION \n\n\n239 \n\n\nThey were uninterested in the possibility that principles lay behind the facts. \n\nThis did not seem to be so true of the older generation of biologists in whose \nwritings we find evidence that they held certain convictions and broad ideas \nwhich they were not afraid to defend, though their defence often grew to heated \nargument and led to intense personal animosities and notorious academic \nsquabbles. \n\nThe theosophical doctrine of tolerance has now penetrated society to some \nextent, yet the forces of darkness have worked to pervert this very truth, for \nwe now find that it is considered bad form to object to anything. \n\nThe older biologists were trained in classics and philosophy as well as in \nscience. Consequently they had a set of criteria based upon knowledge of \nrecorded human thought and experience by which to distinguish between \ntruth and falsehood. To-day, with our intense specialization, this broader \nbackground has been lost and, as a result, the basis for sound judgment has \nlargely disappeared with it. The younger biologists are no longer interested \nin evolution or the other great principles. Hence many old fallacies reappear \nunder the guise of new opinions which a perverted sense of tolerance, as well \nas general ignorance, put into circulation. This is particularly true of mechan\u00ac \nistic doctrines, which are once more popular. \n\nSo it is that a few students welcome the broader outlook which Theosophy \nprovides. They feel that it takes up biological work where the greater students \nof the nineteenth century left it, and carries it forward along the lines to which \ntheir researches pointed, and along which it ought normally to have moved. \n\nThe Chairman: We have always felt that this part of the Convention, \nwhen we hear from our distant members, is one of special pleasure and in\u00ac \nterest. We have enjoyed it no less to-day; yet as several speakers have said, \nit has seemed that the Convention reached its climax with the Report of the \nCommittee on Resolutions, and that all which has been said since has been \nimportant only as it bore upon the aim that we could now consciously set \nourselves. This note has been sent to me: \u201cPlease, won\u2019t you say just a word \nbefore we close, of our joy and gladness, inner and outer, that we have been \ngiven this glorious opportunity?\u201d It shows where our thoughts are centred. \nIt may well be that our New York members, upon whom I shall call next, had \nintended to say something else to us, but perhaps what had been plannee^ \nis not so important as that we should get back to the central truths and pur\u00ac \nposes which are now in all our minds. What is it that The Theosophical So\u00ac \nciety has to do? What is the opportunity offered us? \n\nMr. J. F. B. Mitchell: The opportunity offered to us is one found only \nin The Theosophical Society. It is too big to put into words. One could de\u00ac \nscribe one aspect as magnificent courtesy. Through their great generosity \nand courtesy, we are offered the supreme privilege of helping the Great Ones \nof all time; of serving our own highest ideal, embodied in the Masters of the \nGreat Lodge. We, as we are\u2014little and poor\u2014are offered the chance to help \nth^p in carrying out their great purposes for mankind. If we could choose, \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n240 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nfor what more splendid destiny could we ask than the opportunity to have a \npart, no matter how small, in that Cause, the greatest of all causes, under \nthe most superb of all leaders? \n\nHow can we keep alive in our hearts the fire that that thought always ought \nto light? It is easy to feel the fire here. It is not easy to keep it burning through\u00ac \nout the year\u2014not easy to keep it from being overlaid by worldly matters, by \nabsorption in one\u2019s business, in one\u2019s duties. To keep the fire alive, we must \nuse our imaginations to see what the true facts are, and to bring realization \nof them home to our hearts. And we must keep it alive by will, by offering \nall that we do, with the intention that it will help in the Masters\u2019 Cause, leaving \nresults to them. \n\nMr. La Dow: It seems to me that one way of expressing our experience \nto-day is that, in greater or lesser degree, but in the most concrete sense, we \nhave come into contact with the real world. That sense of reality has doubt\u00ac \nless come in many forms. For example, there has been a sense of real time, \nwherein past and present and future are all seen as one, \u201cunder the form of the \nEternal\u201d. In particular, I think we have all had some sense of real space. A \ngreat mystic said that in real space in the real world, souls are separated not \nby physical distance but by difference of purpose. And just because, to-day, \nwe have been drawn by a compelling power, by the magnet of a single purpose, \n\nI believe that we have been aware of a unity greater than many of us had im\u00ac \nagined to be possible. And all this has happened surely because we have been \nin the presence of real people , in the presence of members of the Lodge. As \nMr. Mitchell has just said, we can feel these things here\u2014it is not even a \nquestion of belief, but of conviction\u2014but when we go out on Fifth Avenue, \nas we soon must, we are going to live and move once more among \u201cwalking \ncorpses\u201d; we are going to be plunged back into the world of the unreal. And \nevery day of the year which is before us, we shall have to face that unreal aspect \nof existence. But in so far as we hold fast to the certainty that here to-day \nwe have had immediate consciousness of the true and the real, in so far as we \npractise continuous recollection , we shall actually help the Masters (the real \npeople of the world) in their efforts to turn men\u2019s attention from the unreal \nand false to the real and true. \n\nAll of us must have heard of Adept Kings. What is an Adept King? In one \nsense, the Adept King of a nation is the real, the natural leader of that na\u00ac \ntion. He is a fact in Nature. He is not elected, is not presented with a certifi\u00ac \ncate or with anything of that sort. A certain nation belongs to him. He may \nbe an exile from his people, but he is no less their true king. To bring the \nLodge nearer to the world, what can we do? If we make ourselves the loyal \nand devoted subjects of our Adept King (of the Master to whom we belong), \nthat will mark at least a beginning of his return from exile. It seems to me \nthat in no other way than by first a few, and then more, and then still more \nof his children turning to him,\u2014in no other way can the Master\u2019s exile be \nended and can he return to earth. \n\n\nREPORT OF THE ANNUAL CONVENTION \n\n\n241 \n\n\nThe Chairman: I am again in a quandary. There are others from whom \nwe should like to hear; but a question has been twice repeated: Can more be \nsaid? Talk for talk\u2019s sake, when all that is needful has been said, is definitely \nimmoral,\u2014a waste of force which none can afford, least of all we, who face \nan undertaking requiring all we can command. I do not myself think we \nshould gain by prolonging our discussion. Rather do I believe that we have \ncome to the point where we should act, and that the first steps toward the \nrealization of our purpose, were indicated to us in the note struck in opening \nthe Convention,\u2014the note of indrawal to the Real. The true Self of the Move\u00ac \nment, as the true Self of our own souls, is to be found in silence. To-day the \nparade of the World\u2019s Fair has passed within a stone\u2019s throw of our door. It \nwas not from it that we could learn either of our own or of the world\u2019s needs. \nInstead, we shut out the world, and sought to look back to the source of in\u00ac \nspiration and the touchstone of reality, that we might learn how to deal both \nwith the world and with ourselves. That was the note which was struck clearly \nat the beginning, and which has run through all our deliberations. The bridge \nbetween the inner and the outer worlds, between man and his Elder Brothers, \nthe bridge which The Theosophical Society was founded to form and to main\u00ac \ntain, cannot be maintained if it rest upon the shifting sands of glamour and \nopinion. It must reach and contact the outer world, but it cannot rest upon \nit. It must rest solidly upon spiritual reality. Therefore we, the custodians \nof the bridge, entrusted with its maintenance, must reach that spiritual reality \nourselves. We can maintain the link unbroken in the Movement, only as we \nmaintain it unbroken in ourselves. The link with our \u201cdivine part\u201d, which \nour individual, sentient lives should be, must be so strengthened by use, so \nquickened by our response to what comes to us from above, that it develops\u2014 \nin some among us at least\u2014into chelaship, becoming a conscious link with the \nLodge, between the man and his own Master. \n\nThis purpose has been brought clearly into consciousness to-day, and has \nbeen recognized and recorded as our own. To be achieved, it must be pur\u00ac \nsued by each within his own thought and acts. It will not be furthered by \novermuch talk with our fellows; nor by overmuch attention being paid to the \nstate, good or bad, of our outer personalities, for it is not what these are ngw, \nbut what we can make of them, which is of moment to us. They are of^Tue \nonly for their potentialities, for what they can become, as instruments in the \nwork. We do not realize potentialities by crystallizing them in their present \nundeveloped stage\u2014by thinking of our present capacities or sins or virtues, \nas though they were something fixed and permanent; but rather by looking \nsteadfastly to what we want accomplished, and by insisting upon accomplishing \nit. Our experience, as we listened to our Branch Reports, and found ourselves \nconsidering them only in the light of the Resolution we had taken, is typical \nof what should be our attitude toward all our characteristics and affairs,\u2014their \nsignificance for us should be in their bearing upon our central purpose. \n\nI think, therefore, that our Convention has reached its culmination. This \nmorning I asked whether there was anything the Masters could do for us that \n\n\n242 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nthey had not done, more of fire they could send to kindle us than they had \nsent; and now we must answer those questions differently. By some miracle \nof their grace they have sent us far more, as all of us must be well aware. It \nonly remains, therefore, to register your gratitude, as well as my own, for the \nopportunity this day has brought us to engrave upon our consciousness and \nwills the true purpose of our lives. \n\nBy request, the Resolution was re-read, after which the Committee on Reso\u00ac \nlutions was discharged, and the Convention adjourned. \n\nIsabel E. Perkins, \n\nSecretary of Convention. \n\nJulia Chickering, \n\nAssistant Secretary of Convention. \n\n\nLETTERS OF GREETING \n\nNewcastle-on-Tyne, England. \n\nTo the Members of The Ttieosophical Society in Convention Assembled: On behalf of the \nmembers of the Newcastle-on-Tyne Branch, I have much pleasure in conveying to you our \nheartiest greetings and good wishes. We are glad that this home-coming is made possible \nonce again, for we feel that as the years go by, these Conventions increase in value and sig\u00ac \nnificance. They are a source of strength to the members, as a whole, and a gleam of light to \nthe outside world. \n\nWe shall therefore be with you in heart and mind on this great day, and may you feel the \nspirit of our presence and our never-flagging interest. We feel that we must have something \nto give, something to contribute to this Great Cause, and not be like young birds merely \nwaiting to be fed. We feel that our best gift, our best contribution, will be that of ourselves. \nBut it must be whole-hearted giving\u2014not partial\u2014where something is kept back. This im\u00ac \nplies vision, resolution, effort, sacrifice. And what a rallying to the standard such a realiza\u00ac \ntion would be! The valour of the dauntless warrior would strike like Vulcan on the hearts \nof men, and the waiting Messenger would find a vehicle to his hand. We, therefore, at this \ntime, give what we have\u2014what we are\u2014and consecrate ourselves anew to more efficient, \nmore worthy service. \n\nWe would particularly express our gratitude and thankfulness for the Wanderer\u2019s comments \non the international situation in October last. With force, because of embodiment and, hence, \nunderstanding, he states clearly and convincingly, that \u201cRight, not might, always triumphs \nin the end.\u201d And is it not our Work at the present time to stand boldly and fearlessly for the \nRight, no matter at what cost? To resort to no expedient or compromise where a principle \nof righteousness is at stake? Is it not for us to follow the example of H.P.B. to the very ut\u00ac \nmost? Mr. Johnston says of her:\u2014\u201cWith unparalleled force, she asserted the Soul; with \ntranscendent strength she taught the reality of Spirit, by living the life, and manifesting the \nenergies of an immortal. She cast herself with torrential force against the dark noxious clouds \nof evil that envelop and poison human life. The rift in their leaden masses through which, \nhigh above, we catch a glimpse of the blue, bears testimony to the greatness of the power \nthat rent them asunder.\u201d \n\nWe are told that \u201clove is the power that moves the world, the only power that moves the \nspiritual world\u201d. So, as long as that \u201cnucleus\u201d which has been formed, is maintained and \ncarried forward, Brotherhood, based on no mere sentimentality, but on real love, on the \nspiritual unity of mankind, will continue to be a living factor in the world. \n\n\n\nANNUAL CONVENTION \n\n\n245 \n\n\nREPORT OF THE \n\n\nREPORT OF THE ANNUAL CONVENTION 243 \n\nWe feel that it is still on these lines that the Work of the Masters has to proceed, and we \ntrust that your deliberations to-day, may be fraught with renewed vigour and insight to \nthat end. \n\nE. Howard Lincoln, \n\nPresident. \n\n\nOslo, Norway. \n\nTo the Secretary T.S.: I have been requested by our Chairman\u2014who is ill\u2014to send Greet\u00ac \nings on behalf of the Oslo Branch to Members of The Theosophical Society assembled in \nConvention and elsewhere. \n\nKnowing from personal experience what it is to be present, and also what these Annual \nConventions mean to the many members who for divers reasons are prevented from attend\u00ac \ning, I doubt if there exists any other Society\u2014with members spread all over the World\u2014 \nwhere all are so united in heart and mind on Convention Day. \n\nBelieving in the power of thought, this \u201ctuning in M is assuredly registered by those present, \nthe knowledge of it strengthening still further the inspired impulses which from there again \ngo forth into the world,\u2014and which we believe are of greater importance and have a more \nfar-reaching effect and influence than can be accounted for. The condition of the World \nto-day, the complexity of the political constellations, and the constant threat of War, make \none feel that guidance and true perception are needed more than ever by all nations, and by \ntheir leaders and rulers in particular, to enable each and all to see the real issues and thereby \nknow how to choose rightly. To this end, too, we are grateful that a Convention again is \ntaking place, our gratitude extending to the Elders, who by their presence, their loyalty to \nthe Cause, by their self-sacrificing labour, give light and life to the proceedings, to the Society \n\u2014year after year: the nucleus of the nucleus. \n\nTo the editors of the Quarterly, to all who contribute to it, we likewise again wish to \nexpress our heartfelt thanks, for this link which enables us to keep in contact with Head\u00ac \nquarters\u2014no matter what distance separates us in body. \n\nFor the Oslo Branch T.S., \n\nH. Knoff. \n\n\nNorwich, England. \n\nTo the Secretary T.S.: Every year we hope that the Convention will be stronger, nobler, \nmore inspired than any of the others, great though they have been, and so, both personally \nand as President of our Norfolk Branch, I send my warmest greetings and heartiest good \nwishes to all our fellow members assembled in New York. \n\nWe are living through difficult and dangerous days; I suppose that there have been times \nas bad in the long history of mankind, but what strikes one most is that all the old landmarks! \nthat appeared so stable\u2014things that one could cling to in days of danger\u2014are being rapidly \nswept away; all moral standards are vanishing, and it seems as if the very foundations of \ncivilization are being destroyed, in an oncoming wave of chaos and anarchy. It is not an \nencouraging prospect, and yet reflection shows that it holds great possibilities and opportuni\u00ac \nties, for history proves that it is precisely in such times of chaos that some great man has \nappeared, some noble faith has arisen that has been called forth by the suffering and the long\u00ac \ning of that part of humanity in which at least a remnant of faith and devotion survived. \nKrishna told Arjuna that when there was decay of truth and faith, and exaltation of igno\u00ac \nrance and evil, \u201cHe himself came forth\u201d; and such a statement is one to stay all our hope on, \nand to prevent any tendency towards discouragement. In the turmoil of the present day, \nwhat alone is stable and unshakable is the Theosophical Movement and the Lodge of Masters, \nwho can see far beyond what is now occurring and are guiding the destinies of mankind and \nThe \u2022fcosophical Society which is the instrument of the Lodge in the world, to which we \nhave Ine! immense privilege of belonging. . . . The whole world appears to be locked at \npresent in the deadliest of conflicts, and unfortunately some of the great nations, which should \nbe fighting whole-heartedly for the right, have become tainted with the spirit of compromise, \nof defeatism, which is sapping all their energy, paralysing the good that is in them. \n\n\n\n\n244 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nWe know that in the great fight that is now being waged no one can be neutral, and it seems \nto me that our chief duty, as members of the T.S., is to prove this in our own lives and so to \ninfect others with the same spirit. We have been told over and over again that the Lodge \nneeds ch\u00a3las, that the T.S. should be able to provide them. What are we doing about this? \nAre we all doing our best and utmost to answer the call of the Lodge for them? These are \nquestions that become more insistent as Convention draws nearer, and we meditate on it. \nOn our answers to them may depend more than we can possibly imagine. Great military \nstrategists have said that the best method of defence is to attack, and that is what we are \nasked to do to-day. \n\nEspoir Bagnell, \n\nPresident , Norfolk Branch . \n\n\nNorwich, England. \n\nTo the Secretary T.S.: Once again our thoughts turn towards Convention, in this month of \npreparation, while we look forward with hope towards that assembling of the Powers, with \nthankfulness that once again a Convention may be held, with prayer in our hearts that we \nmay respond aright to the outpouring of power which is given at that time. \n\nThose of us who are not free to attend in person, come to understand with the passage \nof the years, that it is our privilege to listen, in stillness and silence, for the note, or vibra\u00ac \ntion, which resounds at Convention-time; the challenge to us is to keep rightly attuned, and \nthis demands all our powers of concentration, steadfastness, self-forgetfulness. \n\nIt is of the utmost interest, when the July Quarterly reaches us, to read the Conven\u00ac \ntion report, to note how the thought of the different speakers exemplifies that \u201cunity in di\u00ac \nversity\u201d which is the hall-mark of the Society. In this connection, I was thinking of the \nwords of H.P.B., the Pioneer\u2014\u201cFollow the Path I show, the Masters who are behind, do \nnot follow me or my path.\u201d It is interesting to remember that the diversity must ever lead \nback to the central Unity, even as the seven Rays seen through the prism are but diverse \naspects of the white Light of the Real. As to that, it was also written by another of the Pio\u00ac \nneers\u2014\u201cThe Masters and the Light within are not different.\u201d \n\nWith sincere good wishes to all \u201cin Convention assembled\u201d, whether present in the Studio, \nor closely united, from their own homes, in heart and intention. \n\nHope Bagnell, \n\nSecretary, Norfolk Branch. \n\n\n' Toronto, Canada. \n\nToronto Branch sends Greetings to the Convention. \n\nThe study by the Branch of the New Testament has shown the necessity of studying it \nin the light which Theosophy brings. So much of its meaning is obscure, so much of it mis\u00ac \nunderstood, that it is small wonder so many have lost their faith in its teaching. Studying \nit in the light of Theosophy is like bringing a bright light into a dark cavern, and we see, \nit seems for the first time, the figure of a Master of Compassion, full of love and sympathy, \nseeking his lost sheep. \n\nThe gratitude or lack of it expressed by individuals or nations for such love and sacrifice, \nis a criterion as to whether they are worthy of continued life, or the destruction that awaits \nall evil. \n\nThis is the only time when it is possible for us to express publicly what we feel privately,\u2014 \nour deep appreciation of the Quarterly and our gratitude to its Editors and contributors. \n\nAlbert J. Harris, \n\nSecretary , Toronto Branch. \n\n\nWhitley Bay, England. \n\nTo the Members of The Theosophical Society in Convention Assembled: The members of \nthe Whitley Bay Branch send heartiest good wishes, and sincere fraternal greetings. \n\nGreat changes are taking place in the ideas and thoughts of men and nations, but there \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nREPORT OF THE ANNUAL CONVENTION \n\n\n245 \n\n\nare two fundamentally opposing ideas which can be summed up in a few words. On the one \nhand they say \u201cMight is Right\u201d, whereas all who understand the doctrine of the moral law \nknow that only \u201cRight is Might\u201d. Here is the old story of physical might casting the shadow \nof darkness on the minds of men in the effort to dim the light of spiritual values. The shadow \ncast by the desires of men to make might prevail, is indeed very dark, but may not the depth \nof this shadow indicate that the shining light of the warrior who stands behind righteousness, \nis drawing nearer, and that truth may soon stand revealed? \n\nMay we therefore by a united effort put forth the whole strength of our conviction of the \nexistence of the moral law, so that right may prevail, and the existing turmoil and strife be \nended. \n\nFredk. A. Ross, \n\nPresident , Whitley Bay Branch. \n\n\nPondich\u00a3ry, French India. \n\nI wish to send greetings to my fellow members of the T.S. as they are all gathered once \nagain in the friendly, deep, strong atmosphere of the little room in the Mews. I too will \nbe there in my thoughts, and as I sit at meditation with the disciples of the Ashram, I shall \nfeel the spiritual energy which you have drawn to yourselves. It will reach me also here on \nthe opposite side of the earth in circumstances also entirely different from yours. For here \nall is at peace. Away from strife, rush, greed and noise, away from all mechanization and \nartificialities, sheltered from any anxiety, the disciples of the Ashram also seek the Divine \nLife. As I see them daily going about their labours, looking much like angels that have never \nknown incarnation, I think of you all, the fighters, the warriors, who must reach the Divine \nthrough sweat and blood. I know then what Theosophy gives of confidence and power, \nand know too that nowhere else could we find a guidance so true and so complete, ranging \nfrom the field of pure Spirit to world politics, from problems of personal conduct to problems \nof the Soul. \n\nSurely you will come away from Convention renewed, rebuilt, and with a new sword which \nthe Masters will have given you for the fight that is coming. \n\nI join you in your prayers for strength, and fortitude, and your prayers of gratitude for \nall that has been done for us. \n\nI send the scent of jasmine with my greetings. \n\nNo6mi P. Raymond. \n\n\nLetters of Greeting were received by delegates and members with the greatest interest \nand with frequent applause. In addition to the foregoing, the letters included greetings \nfrom Mr. W. H. Box (Los Angeles); Miss Anne Evans, President, and Miss Wallace, Secre\u00ac \ntary, Virya Branch (ColQrado); Miss Eleanor Evans (England); Miss Anna Fjaestad, Presi\u00ac \ndent of the Arvika Branch (Sweden); Mrs. A. Good (Nova Scotia); Mrs. Maughan, Secretary, \nKrishna Branch (England); Miss Maria G. Reyes, Secretary, Venezuela Branch; Mr. W. G. \nRoberts, President, Middletown Branch (Ohio); Mr. and Mrs. Schoch (Brazil); Mr. A. Valeddn \n(Venezuela); Mr. P. W. Ward, Secretary, Gateshead Branch (England); telegram from Captain \nand Mrs. Hamlen (Maine); cablegrams from Mrs. and Miss Bagnell (England); Mr. K^bto \n(V enezuela); Mrs. Vaile (France), and from the Venezuela Branch. Many other ^dKrs, \nand another cablegram, from abroad were read, and were received with much sympathy \nand interest, but, to our regret, cannot be acknowledged or quoted in the open pages of the \nQuarterly for the reason that conditions in some parts of the world would make this in\u00ac \nconsiderate and inexpedient. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nHELENA PETROVNA BLAVATSKY \n\n\nII. \n\n\u201c 4 DEPTS are a necessity in nature and in supemature. They are the \n\nlinks between men and the gods; these \u2018gods\u2019 being the souls of \ngreat adepts and Masters of bygone races and ages, and so on, up to \nthe threshold of Nirvana. The continuity is unbroken.\u201d \n\n\u201cWhat do they do?\u201d \n\n\u201cYou would hardly understand, unless you were an adept. But they keep \nalive the spiritual life of mankind.\u201d \n\n\u201cWhat does it feel like, to go sailing about in your astral body? I sometimes, \ndream I am flying, and I am always in the same position; almost lying on my \nback, and going feet foremost. Is it anything like that?\u201d \n\n\u201cThat is not what I feel\u201d, she said; \u201cI feel exactly like a cork rising to the \ntop of water, you understand. The relief is immense. I am only alive then. \nAnd then I go to the Master.\u201d \n\n\u201cCome back to what you were saying. I ought not to have interrupted \nyou. How do the adepts guide the souls of men?\u201d \n\n\u201cIn many ways, but chiefly by teaching their souls direct, in the \nspiritual world. But that is difficult for you to understand. This is quite intel\u00ac \nligible, though. At certain regular periods, they try to give the world at large \na right understanding of spiritual things. One of their number comes forth to \nteach the masses, and is handed down to tradition as the Founder of a religion. \nKrishna was such a Master; so was Zoroaster; so were Buddha and Shankara \nAcharya, the great sage of Southern India. So also was the Nazarene. He \nwent forth against the counsel of the rest, to give to the masses before the time, \nmoved by a great pity, and enthusiasm for humanity; he was warned that the \ntime was unfavourable, but nevertheless he elected to go, and so was put to \ndeath at the instigation of the priests.\u201d \n\n1 By Charles Johnston, from The Theosophical Forum, Vol. 6, No. 2, June, 1900, page 22; and Vol. 6, No. 3, \nJuly, 1900, page 44. \n\nIn this instalment, which completes the Reprint, Mr. Johnston continues the account of his conversation withi \nH.P.B. at \u201cMaycot\u201d, Norwood, near London, in the spring of 1887. \n\n246 \n\n\n\n\n> \n\nI \n\n$ \n\n' i \n\n\u00a3 \n\n/ J \n\nI \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nHELENA PETROVNA BLAVATSKY \n\n\n247 \n\n\n\u201cHave the adepts any secret records of his life?\u201d \n\n\u201cThey must have\u201d, she answered; \u201cfor they have records of the lives of all \nInitiates. Once I was in a great cave-temple in the Himalaya mountains, with \nmy Master\u201d, and she looked at the picture of the splendid Rajput; \u201cthere were \nmany statues of adepts there; pointing to one of them, he said: \u2018This is he whom \nyou call Jesus. We count him to be one of the greatest among us.\u2019 \n\n\u201cBut that is not the only work of the adepts. At much shorter periods, they \nsend forth a messenger to try to teach the world. Such a period comes in the \nlast quarter of each century, and the Theosophical Society represents their \nwork for this epoch.\u201d \n\n\u201cHow does it benefit mankind?\u201d \n\n\u201cHow does it benefit you to know the laws of life? Does it not help you to \nescape sickness and death? Well, there is a soul-sickness, and a soul-death. \nOnly the true teaching of Life can cure them. The dogmatic churches, with \ntheir hell and damnation, their metal heaven and their fire and brimstone, have \nmade it almost impossible for thinking people to believe in the immortality of \nthe soul. And if they do not believe in a life after death, then they have no life \nafter death. That is the law.\u201d \n\n\u201cHow can what people believe possibly affect them? Either it is or it isn\u2019t, \nwhatever they may believe.\u201d \n\n\u201cTheir belief affects them in this way. Their life after death is made by their \naspirations and spiritual development unfolding in the spiritual world. Ac\u00ac \ncording to the growth of each, so is his life after death. It is the complement \nof his life here. All unsatisfied spiritual longings, all desires for higher life, all \naspirations and dreams of noble things, come to flower in the spiritual life, and \nthe soul has its day, for life on earth is its night. But if you have no aspirations, \nno higher longings, no beliefs in any life after death, then there is nothing for \nyour spiritual life to be made up of; your soul is a blank.\u201d \n\n\u201cWhat becomes of you then?\u201d \n\n\u201cYou reincarnate immediately, almost without an interval, and without re\u00ac \ngaining consciousness in the other world.\u201d \n\n\u201cSuppose, on the other hand, you do believe in heaven, say the orthodox \nEl Dorado?\u201d \n\n\u201cYour fate after death is this. You have first to pass through what we call \nKama Loka, the world of desire, the borderland, in which the soul is purged pf \nthe dross of animal life; of all its passions and evil desires. These grad \nwork themselves out, and having no fresh fuel to keep them burning, \nslowly exhaust themselves. Then the soul rises to what we call Devachan, the \nstate which is distorted in the orthodox teaching of heaven. Each soul makes \nits own Devachan, and sees around it those whom it most loved on earth, en\u00ac \njoying happiness in their company. If you believed in the orthodox heaven, \nyou see the golden city and the gates of pearl; if you believed in Shiva\u2019s paradise, \nyou find yourself in the midst of many-armed gods; the Red-man sees the happy \nhunting grounds, and the philosopher enters into the free life of the soul. In all \ncases, your spirit gathers new strength for a fresh incarnation.\u201d \n\n\n\n\n248 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\n\u201cMust you come back? Is there no escape?\u201d \n\n\u201cIf your material desires are unexhausted at death, you must. Desires are \nforces, and we believe in the conservation of force. You must reap the seed of \nyour own sowing, and reap it where it was sown. Your new life will be the \nexact result of your deeds in your preceding life. No one can escape the pun\u00ac \nishment of his sins, any more than he can escape the reward of his virtues. That \nis the law of Karma. You must go on being reborn till you reach Nirvana.\u201d \n\n\u201cWell, it seems to me that all that is more or less contained in the orthodox \nbeliefs, only a good deal distorted.\u201d \n\n\u201cYes\u201d, she answered; \u201cthat is just it. The orthodoxies do contain the truth, \nbut their followers do not understand it; they put forth teachings which no \nintelligent man can accept, and so we are all drifting into atheism and material\u00ac \nism. But when we Theosophists show them how to interpret their teachings, it \nwill be quite different. Then they will see how much truth they had, without \nknowing it. The stories in Genesis, for instance, are all symbols of real truths; \nand the account of the Creation there, and of Adam and Eve, has far more real \ntruth than Darwinism, once you understand it. But that can only be done by \nTheosophy.\u201d \n\n\u201cHow would you, as a Theosophist, set about it?\u201d \n\n\u201cWell\u201d, she answered, \u201cin two ways; first, by giving out the truth, as it is \ntaught to-day in the occult schools, and then by the comparative method; by \nsetting people to study the Aryan and other Eastern scriptures, where they will \nfind the other halves of so many things that have proved stumbling-blocks in \nthe Bible.\u201d \n\n\u201cFor instance?\u201d \n\n\u201cTake that very teaching of heaven and hell and purgatory. The sacred \nbooks of India light up the whole of it, and make it a thoroughly philosophic \nand credible teaching. But you must study the Oriental religions before you \ncan fully understand what I say. Remember that in the Old Testament there \nis absolutely no teaching of the immortality of the soul, while in the New Tes\u00ac \ntament it is inextricably confused with the resurrection of the body. But the \nUpanishads have the real occult and spiritual doctrine.\u201d \n\n\u201cWell, I can thoroughly understand and sympathize with that; and to put \nforth any such teaching at a time like this, when we are all drifting into ma\u00ac \nterialism, would seem a big enough work for any school of adepts and Masters. \n\nI can see how the teaching of rebirth would make life far more unselfish and \nhumane, and therefore far happier. What else do you teach, as Theosophists?\u201d \n\n\u201cWell, Sir! I am being cross-examined this evening, it would seem\u201d, she \nanswered with a smile, and rolled me another cigarette, making herself one also, \nand lighting up with evident relish. \u201cWe teach something very old, and yet \nwhich needs to be taught. We teach universal brotherhood.\u201d \n\n\u201cDon\u2019t let us get vague and general. Tell me exactly what you mean by \nthat.\u201d \n\n\u201cLet me take a concrete case\u201d, she said; and glanced meditatively at her \nsecretary, who had been listening quietly and with serious and sincere interest \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nHELENA PETROVNA BLAVATSKY \n\n\n249 \n\n\nto all she had been saying, even though he had heard much of it from her, time \nand again. He began to grow a little uneasy under her gaze, and she noticed it \nand instantly fastened upon him. \n\n\u201cTake the English\u201d, she said, and looked at him with those potent blue eyes \nof hers, as though he in his own person must answer for the sins of his race. \n\n\u201cH.P.B.\u201d, he said, rising with a sigh from the table; \u201cI think I had really \nbetter go upstairs and go on copying out the manuscript of The Secret Doctrine\" \\ \nand he disappeared. \n\n\u201cDo you think he will?\u201d said H.P.B. with a smile of infinite good-humour. \n\u201cNot he; he will cuddle into his arm-chair, smoke endless cigarettes, and read \na blood and thunder novel.\u201d She was mistaken, however. When I went up\u00ac \nstairs to say good-bye, he was in the arm-chair, serenely smoking, it is true; \nbut it was a detective story. He sat upon it, and said something about getting \nto work. \n\n\u201cTake the English\u201d, she repeated. \u201cHow cruel they are! How badly they \ntreat my poor Hindoos!\u201d 2 \n\n\u201cI have always understood that they had done a good deal for India in a \nmaterial way\u201d, I objected. \n\n\u201cIndia is a well-ventilated jail\u201d, she said; \u201cit is true they do something in \na material way, but it is always three for themselves and one for the natives. \nBut what is the use of material benefits, if you are despised and trampled down \nmorally all the time? If your ideals of national honour and glory are crushed \nin the mud, and you are made to feel all the time that you are an inferior race\u2014 \na lower order of mortals\u2014pigs, the English call them, and sincerely believe \nit. Well, just the reverse of that would be universal brotherhood. Do them \nless good materially\u2014not that they do so very much, besides collecting the \ntaxes regularly\u2014and respect their feelings a little more. The English believe \nthat the \u2018inferior races\u2019 exist only to serve the ends of the English; but we \nbelieve that they exist for themselves, and have a perfect right to be happy \nin their own way. No amount of material benefit can compensate for hurting \ntheir souls and crushing out their ideals. Besides there is another side of all \nthat, which we as Theosophists always point out. There are really no \u2018infttior \nraces\u2019, for all are one in our common humanity; and as we have all hadffn- \ncamations in each of these races, we ought to be more brotherly to them. They \nare our wards, entrusted to us; and what do we do? We invade their lands, \nand shoot them down in sight of their own homes; we outrage their women, \nand rob their goods, and then with smooth-faced hypocrisy we turn round \nand say we are doing it for their good. There are two bad things: hypocrisy \n\n* It was part of H.P.B s mission to \"break up the moulds of minds\". Talking to a devotee of Science, she \nwould expose its ignorance and berate its dogmatism; talking to an orthodox Protestant, who would be unlikely \n-to approach her except from curiosity, she might expatiate on the greater liberality of her own, the Russian \nChurch, or pour contempt upon the then current conceptions of heaven and hell. Speaking to Charles Johnston, \nat that time twenty years old, she will doubtless have had in mind that he was preparing for the Indian Civil \nI Service, and that his father was a prominent Orangeman (Johnston of Ballykilbeg, M. P.). Naturally, therefore, \nshe used her opportunity to excoriate British rule in India.\u2014much to Mr. Johnston\u2019s amusement when he recalled \nthe incident in later years, for his service in India had filled him with admiration for the spirit and methods of \nBritish rule and he thoroughly understood H.P.B.\u2019s motive in abusing it as she did to him.\u2014 The Editors. \n\n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\n250 \n\nand cruelty; but I think if I had to choose, I would prefer cruelty. But there \nis a just law\u201d, she went on; and her face was as stem as Nemesis; \u201cthe false \ntongue dooms its lie; the spoiler robs to render. \u2018Ye shall not come forth, \nuntil ye have paid the uttermost farthing\u2019.\u201d \n\n\u201cSo that is what the adepts sent you forth to teach?\u201d \n\n\u201cYes\u201d, she answered; \u201cthat and other things;\u2014things which are very im\u00ac \nportant, and will soon be far more important. There is the danger of black \nmagic, into which all the world, and especially America, is rushing as fast as \nit can go. Only a wide knowledge of the real psychic and spiritual nature of \nman can save humanity from grave dangers.\u201d \n\n\u201cWitch-stories in this so-called nineteenth century, in this enlightened age?\u201d \n\n\u201cYes, Sir! Witch-stories, and in this enlightened age! What do you call \nit but a witch-story, that very experiment you told me of, made by my friend \nthe Spookical Researcher? Is it not witchcraft, to transfer pinches and bums, \npain and suffering, in fact, though only slight in this case, to another person \nat a distance? Suppose it was not as an experiment, but in dead earnest, and \nwith dire malice and evil intent? What then? Would the victim not feel it? \nCould he protect himself? And would not that be witchcraft in just the sense \nthat sent people to the stake and faggot all through the Middle Ages? Have \nyou read the famous witchcraft trial at Salem? Yes, Sir! Witchcraft in this \nvery enlightened age,\u2014the darkest, most material, and unspiritual that the \nworld has ever seen.\u201d \n\n\u201cOh, but sending pinches by thought-transference can do no great harm?\u201d \n\n\u201cYou think not? Well, you don\u2019t know what you are talking about. That \nis the privilege of the young! Once the door is open for that sort of thing, \nwhere do you think it is going to be shut? It is the old tale; give the devil \nan inch, and he will take an ell; give him your finger, and he will presently \ntake your whole arm. Yes, and your body, too! Do you not see the tremendous \nevils that lie concealed in hypnotism? Look at Charcot\u2019s experiments at the \nSalp\u00a3tri6re! He has shown that a quite innocent person can be made to per\u00ac \nform actions quite against his or her will; can be made to commit crimes, even, \nby what he calls Suggestion. And the somnambule will forget all about it, \nwhile the victim can never identify the real criminal. Charcot is a benevolent \nman, and will never use his power to do harm. But all men are not benevolent. \nThe world is full of cruel, greedy, and lustful people, who will be eager to seize \na new weapon for their ends, and who will defy detection and pass through the \nmidst of us all unpunished. \n\n\u201cYes, Sir! Witch-tales in this enlightened age! And mark my words! You \nwill have such witch-tales as the Middle Ages never dreamt of. Whole na\u00ac \ntions will drift insensibly into black magic, with good intentions, no doubt, \nbut paving the road to hell none the less for that! Hypnotism and suggestion \nare great and dangerous powers, for the very reason that the victim never \nknows when he is being subjected to them; his will is stolen from him, and \nmark my words: these things may be begun with good motives, and for right \npurposes. But I am an old woman, and have seen much of human life in many \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nHELENA PETROVNA BLAVATSKY \n\n\n251 \n\n\ncountries. And I wish with all my heart I could believe that these powers \nwould be used only for good! Whoever lets himself or herself be hypnotized,, \nby anyone, good or bad, is opening a door which he will be powerless to shut; \nand he cannot tell who will be the next to enter! If you could foresee what \nI foresee, you would begin heart and soul to spread the teaching of universal \nbrotherhood. It is the only safeguard!\u201d \n\n\u201cHow is it going to guard people against hypnotism?\u201d \n\n\u2018\u2018By purifying the hearts of people who would misuse it. And universal \nbrotherhood rests upon the common soul. It is because there is one soul common \nto all men, that brotherhood, or even common understanding is possible. Bring \nmen to rest on that, and they will be safe. There is a divine power in every \nman which is to rule his life, and which no one can influence for evil, not even \nthe greatest magician. Let men bring their lives under its guidance, and they \nhave nothing to fear from man or devil. And now, my dear, it is getting late, \nand I am getting sleepy. So I must bid you good-night!\u201d And the Old Lady \ndismissed me with that grand air of hers which never left her, because it was a \npart of herself. She was the most perfect aristocrat I have ever known. \n\nIt was long after that, before we came back to the question of magical powers. \nIn August, 1888, H.P.B. had a visit from her old chum, Colonel H. S. Olcott. \nHe was writing, at a side table. H.P.B. was playing Patience, as she did nearly \nevery evening, and I was sitting opposite her, watching, and now and then \ntalking about the East, whence Colonel Olcott had just come. Then H.P.B. \ngot tired of her card game, which would not come out, and tapped her fingers \nslowly on the table, half unconsciously. Then her eyes came to focus, and \ndrawing her hand back a foot or so from the table, she continued the tapping \nmovement in the air. The taps, however, were still perfectly audible\u2014on the \ntable a foot from her hand. I watched, with decided interest. Presently she \nhad a new idea, and turning in my direction, began to send her astral taps \nagainst the back of my hand. I could both feel and hear them. It was some\u00ac \nthing like taking sparks from the prime conductor of an electric machine; or, \nbetter still, perhaps, it was like spurting quicksilver through your fingers. That \nwas the sensation. The noise was a little explosive burst. Then she changed \nher direction again and began to bring her taps to bear on the top of my head. \nThey were quite audible, and, needless to say, I felt them quite distinctly. I \nwas at the opposite side of the table, some five or six feet away, all through \nthis little experiment in the unexplained laws of nature, and the psychics \npowers latent in man. \n\nNo experiment could have been more final and convincing; its very simplicity \nmade it stand out as a new revelation. Here was a quite undoubted miracle, \nas miracles are generally understood, yet a miracle which came off. But at \nour first meeting, Mme. Blavatsky did not even approach the subject; none \nthe less, she conveyed the sense of the miraculous. It is hard to say exactly \nhow, but the fact remains. There was something in her personality, her bear\u00ac \ning, the light and power of her eyes, which spoke of a wider and deeper life, \nnot needing lesser miracles to testify to it, because in itself miraculous. That. \n\n\n\n\n252 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nwas the greatest thing about her, and it was always there; this sense of a bigger \nworld, of deeper powers, of unseen might; to those in harmony with her potent \ngenius, this came as a revelation and incentive to follow the path she pointed \nout. To those who could not see with her eyes, who could not raise themselves \nin some measure to her vision, this quality came as a challenge, an irritant, a \ndiscordant and subversive force, leading them at last to an attitude of fierce \nhostility and denunciation. \n\nWhen the last word is said, she was greater than any of her works, more \nfull of living power than even her marvellous writings. It was the intimate \nand direct sense of her genius, the strong ray and vibration of that genius \nitself, which worked her greatest achievements and won her greatest triumphs. \nMost perfect work of all, her will carried with it a sense and conviction of im\u00ac \nmortality. Her mere presence testified to the vigour of the soul. \n\n\nThat where the safe ways end , \nknown and unknown divide , \n\nGod's great uncharted passes upward tend , \n\nand the spirit of man undaunted is undenied , \n\nand beyond the last camp-fire man has Faith for friend , \n\nand beyond all guidance the courage of God for guide .\u2014 Horace Shipp. \n\n\nThere is an inmost centre in ourselves \nWhere truth abides in fullness . . . \n\n. . . and to know \n\nRather consists in opening out a way \nWhence the imprisoned splendour may escape , \nThan in effecting entrance for a light \nSupposed to be without .\u2014 Robert Browning. \n\n\n\n\n\nLes Sources Occultes du Romantism: Illuminisme \u2014 Thtosophie, 1770-1820 , \nby Auguste Viatte; Librairie Ancienne Honors Champion, Paris, 1928, 2 volumes; \nprice, 80 francs. \n\nThis book was published ten years ago, but we have selected it for review \nat this late date because its contents suggest certain lessons singularly ap\u00ac \npropriate at the present time. We doubt whether the author will appreciate \nthe nature of our interest. The \u201ctheosophy\u201d of which he speaks is eighteenth \ncentury \u201cilluminism\u201d, and he tries to prove that it influenced the Romantic \nSchool in nineteenth century French literature,\u2014a highly artificial subject \nworthy of a \u201cdoctor\u2019s thesis\u201d in an American university. With few exceptions, \nhe regards the personages whom he dissects as charlatans or visionaries. \nHowever, he has assembled with much skill an extraordinary amount of ma\u00ac \nterial. Although this material is drawn from many sources, some of which \nare in no sense \u201cillumined\u201d nor \u201ctheosophical\u201d, much of it is valuable and \nquite unavailable in original form to the average student. \n\nH.P.B. said that during the last quarter of each century a \u201cmessenger\u201d, assisted \nby agents of various degrees, is sent by the Great Lodge to awaken the con\u00ac \nsciousness and conscience of mankind. According to cyclic law, the Masters \nare able at this time to work in the outer world and on the public stage. The \nprimary effort in every century has been the same, must have been the same,\u2014 \nto form the nucleus of a Universal Brotherhood on earth, by establishing a \ndevoted group of disciples or chelas , who can carry on the work of the Great \nLodge, after the turn of the century, when Masters no longer act direct^ \nin the world. The present situation is unique, since the Theosophical Mo^ \nment was actually carried over the end of the nineteenth century, this being \nthe first time in history when such an event has occurred. \n\nAt the end of the eighteenth century, so far as the major objective was con\u00ac \ncerned, there was failure. Some of the causes of that failure are made apparent \nby reflection upon the \u201csources\u201d quoted by M. Viatte. There was the treachery \nand misconduct of Cagliostro, for instance. But whatever may have been the \ndelinquencies of those who were sufficiently advanced to work under the direct \nguidance of the Comte de Saint-Germain, the insurmountable barrier to suc- \n^pss during the eighteenth century seems to have been the lack of true followers, \nof candidates for discipleship, who sincerely, whole-heartedly and unselfishly \n\n\n* \n\n\n253 \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n254 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\ndesired to serve Truth for its own sake. What were the dominant motives \nof those who attached themselves to Saint-Germain or Cagliostro or Mesmer or \nMartines de Pasqually or Saint-Martin? M. Viatte makes the answer very \nclear. Primarily, as it appears, people were stirred by idle curiosity, by the \nthirst for psychic excitement, by the appetite for strange experiences on some \n\u201castral plane\u201d, by the desire for power or wealth or personal security, by the \ncraving to know more than others and to be able to influence the destinies \nof others, by simple hatred of the established order of Church and State, etc., \netc. All of these motives have figured in the history of The Theosophical \nSociety which has triumphed so far in spite of them, in spite of the fact that \nsome, if not all, of them are still more or less prevalent among members to-day. \nThat is why it is salutary to study what happened to the Movement in the \neighteenth century and how it happened, for a similar destiny even now may \novertake the T.S., if the rank and file of its members cannot respond anew \nto the Lodge\u2019s appeal for disinterested helpers, as a few responded forty years \nago. \n\nThere is an apparent correspondence between certain aspects of the eight\u00ac \neenth century Movement during the period from about 1790 to 1800 and \nthe period of indrawal which characterizes the Movement to-day. The sudden \nexplosion of the French Revolution seems to have forced the Great Lodge\u2014 \nprematurely, as it were\u2014to withdraw its energies and its agents. Only one of \nthe leading characters remained on the stage, Louis-Claude de Saint-Martin. \nIt is most interesting to follow M. Viatte\u2019s account of his behaviour. \n\nSaint-Martin began his work under the guidance of Martines de Pasqually \nwho apparently taught a doctrine of the \u201creintegration\u201d of fallen human nature \nby theurgic processes that recall some Neo-Platonic references to the Mysteries. \nPasqually seems to have understood certain aspects of \u201cceremonial magic\u201d, \nand to have given special instruction in the evocation of \u201cspirits\u201d and \u201cele- \nmentals\u201d. But in 1775 Saint-Martin informed his \u201cBrothers\u201d that he was \nleaving this \u201cexterior path\u201d. He abandoned the \u201coccult arts\u201d, which he de\u00ac \nnounced as full of dangers for the beginner. The true way to \u201creintegration\u201d, \nhe affirmed, is by aspiration and meditation and self-discipline. He became \nactive in search of possible disciples among the French aristocracy to which \nhe belonged by birth. He was admired and even adulated in the salons , but \nas his correspondence reveals, met with nothing but failure. When the Revolu\u00ac \ntion came, he withdrew increasingly both from his masonic associations and \nfrom the social world, and, in outward appearance became immersed in the \nstudy of Jacob Boehme, upon whose work he corresponded with a few friends. \nBut the real nature of Saint-Martin\u2019s activity became apparent towards the \nend of the century. After 1790 he definitely \u201cindrew\u201d, following the \u201cinterior \npath\u201d, moving towards the opposite pole from his starting-point under Pas\u00ac \nqually. His writings testify to a deep and abiding mystical experience. He \nleft his experience on record, for such must have been part of his duty. It \nshould be a source of inspiration to-day to think of this lonely occultist seeking \nand finding union , turning his whole soul inw r ards, keeping still amid the din \n\n\nREVIEWS \n\n\n255 \n\n\nof a great holocaust. We may believe that this was indeed the task which was \nset him to do, and that he fulfilled it. And though no real disciple was ready \nto take over his work, one man of genius was at least deeply stirred. We are \ngrateful to M. Viatte for his revelation of the indebtedness of Joseph de Maistre \nto Saint-Martin. \n\nM. Viatte, whose admiration for Saint-Martin is sincere, cites a passage \nfrom Le Ministkre de I'homme esprit on the \u201cineffable Victory\u201d of the crucified \nMaster,\u2014a passage which, as he says, is like \u201ca cry of love and gratitude\u201d. \n\nIt is the only sacrifice which has ever been terminated by those words, at once so con\u00ac \nsoling and so terrible, consummatum est; consoling by the certitude they give that the \nwork is accomplished, and that our enemies shall be under our feet, whenever we will \nto follow the footsteps of Him who has conquered; terrible, because if we make them \nnull and void for ourselves by ingratitude and lukewarmness, no more resources are left \nus, since we can expect no other God, nor hope for any other Liberator. \n\nThere are those who believe that Saint-Martin reincarnated as W. Q. Judge. \n\nV. \n\n\nWinged Pharaoh , by Joan Grant: Harper and Brothers, New York and London, \n1938; price, $2.50. \n\nFor those seeking good books for light summer reading, we heartily recom\u00ac \nmend this novel. It is simply and beautifully written, and accomplishes what \nfew books are able to do,\u2014that is, it makes us feel that we have lived among \nand known people who lived long ages ago. The setting is in the First Dynasty \nof the Two Lands, when men still believed the gods were near the earth and \nwere interested in it, and when life in the body was thought of as a necessary \nperiod of exile from our true home. Justice and mercy prevailed in the laws \nof the land, but there was no compromise with evil, and the laws of Karma \nwere considered and obeyed in the judgments pronounced by Pharaoh. \n\nThe story is told in the first person by Sekeeta, daughter of the Pharaoh \nZa-Atet, and tells of her life as a child, in the palace, playing with her pets, \ngetting into mischief, and growing up in the companionship of her parents and \nher brother whom she loved, and with whom she later ruled as Co-Pharaoh. \nNext we see her enter the temple for years of training as a seer and one \u201cstrong \nof will\u201d, culminating in Initiation and return to the world, to be crowned Pharaoh. \nThere are splendid battle scenes, when the neighbouring people of Zuma invade \nthe country and are driven out. There is a trip to Crete, with descriptions \nof the life there and its contrast with that of Egypt. In their shallowness and \nlove of their bodies and a \u201cgood time\u201d, the Cretans are described as \u201cnot evil, \nthey are young. And when they are older they will be reborn into a land like \nours.\u201d There is a slight love story which seems unworthy of the brave and \ncontrolled Egyptian princess, and which is totally inconsistent with her sup\u00ac \nposed Initiation, although the author treats it as a bagatelle for a Co-Pharaoh \nand for one who was merely the ceremonial wife of her brother. Her last years \nand death are briefly described, and her final return to her \u201cdear companions, \nin the Light\u201d. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n256 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nSekeeta is a lovable person, human and wise, with a courageous spirit which \nis very moving. As one follows the events of her life, she becomes a real friend \nand an inspiring companion. \n\nThis reviewer is not able to say whether or not the book is historically accu\u00ac \nrate, but that is not important in comparison with the remarkably consistent \nfeeling it gives of the reality and nearness of the spiritual world. The author \nmust have steeped herself, with love and understanding, in the religious teach\u00ac \nings of the Egyptians, in order to make them seem so alive and natural. Stu\u00ac \ndents of Theosophy will recognize the doctrine of the seven principles of man, \nand of reincarnation as a means of training and of eventual perfection. Readers \nunfamiliar with such teachings might be slightly bewildered at the ease with which \nSekeeta leaves her body to meet her loved ones in sleep, or to go about the \ncountry to watch for approaching danger. The invasion from Zuma is de\u00ac \nscribed as led by great ones of the Dark Powers, and the ensuing struggle is \nbetween the Light and Dark forces. On page after page the author\u2019s flashes of \nunderstanding will delight the theosophical reader. \n\nThe book is a real oasis in these days of cheap and degrading novels, and \none must be grateful to Joan Grant for writing it, and to Harpers for the vision \nand optimism which prompted them to give it to the public. H. M. \n\n\nChinese Gardens: Gardens of the Contemporary Scene; An Account of their \nDesign and Symbolism , by Dorothy Graham; Dodd, Mead & Company, New \nYork, 1938; price, $5.00. \n\nDespite the chaos in which China is plunged to-day, the peace of her old \ngardens still persists, and, reading of them, one is transported for a while out \nof our frightful turmoil into the atmosphere of high civilization which created \nthem, and into the loveliness of Nature itself. \n\nThe philosophy, if one may call it such, behind the European garden is very \ndifferent from that which produced the gardens of China. Our garden design \ncomes to us from the Romans, and probably the Pincian is not unlike what it \nwas when Sallust owned it. The mediaeval garden, as we see it in illuminated \nmanuscripts or in the background of paintings, laid out within the castle walls, \nwas a place of geometric order. The pleasances of French chateaux or Eliza\u00ac \nbethan houses were set with beds of \u201cknots\" and clipped hedges. It would \nseem that the European sought to make himself a place as unlike the wilder\u00ac \nness as possible, a refuge of formal design, a disciplined nature, a safe haven. \nLet the dark forests with their wolves, said they, and the grain fields which the \nenemy may bum, stay outside where they belong, but let us have a snug little \nparterre with no straying flower, with a restrained fountain and a comfortable \nbench or a bank of herbage. We are only easy when we have tamed nature \nand feel ourselves its master. Not until the eighteenth century, under Chinese \ninfluence, did the Jar din Anglais , the \u201cnatural\u201d garden, come into fashion. \n\nThe Chinese, on the contrary, felt themselves one with all Nature, and ven\u00ac \nerated the divine spirit which informs it. In their gardens they desired to re- \n\n\n\n\n\n\nREVIEWS \n\n\n257 \n\n\nproduce the effects of Nature, or to emphasize certain of its aspects: not, of \ncourse, that their gardens were without design, for order is the essence of Art, \nand a garden is Art. \n\nTo the Chinese the making of a garden is the effort of the individual to attain unity \nwith the universe. The planning transforms ordinary existence into an art; one per\u00ac \nceives that change is the eternal law, that from disintegration springs new being, life \nfulfilling itself in satisfying stability. From the deep repose comes enlightenment, a \ncommunion in which understanding transcends fact and becomes revelation. \n\nOne would like to quote all of Mrs. Graham\u2019s first chapter, which is on garden \ndesign. One can only urge everyone interested in gardens to read the book for \nhimself, that he may enjoy all of its delights. Mrs. Graham gives a history \nof Chinese gardens throughout the ages. Gardens, doubtless, date back from \nthe very beginning. Were not Adam and Eve placed in Eden and told to take \ncare of it? \n\nBut for an unfortunate remark of Confucius, a meticulous record of Chinese gardens \nmight have been kept. One day, the Sage was questioned by a persistent pupil. \u201cMas\u00ac \nter\u201d, inquired the youth, \u201cwhat have you to say about gardens?\u201d Confucius was occu\u00ac \npied in codifying a troublesome point in his scheme for human conduct; he disliked \nhaving his train of thought interrupted. With devastating indifference he dismissed \nany theme on which he could not discourse with authority. As for gardens , he said \nsharply, \u201cleave such things to gardeners.\u201d 1 his pronouncement paralysed scholars for \nmore than two thousand years. No member of an intelligentsia based on Confucian \ndogmatism dared to find this subject worthy of attention. I hen, too, there was another \nobstacle. Tomes were compiled on herbs and flowers, yet no one wrote on the theory of \ndesign, because the planning of a garden was conceded to be a matter of inspiration, the \nexpression of individual personality. \n\nHowever, descriptions of gardens have come down to us, and paintings, and \nsome of the gardens themselves. There are the lovely water-gardens of Hang\u00ac \nchow, the city described so glowingly by Marco Polo. Their names are en\u00ac \nchanting; The Island of the Three Pools of the Moon\u2019s Reflection, The Pavilion \nfrom which the Cranes went forth, The Pavilion of the Lake\u2019s Heart, etc. There \nare the gardens of Soochow and of Pekin, and there are famous old monastery \nand temple courts and parks. The Emperors laid out magnificent gardens, and \nso did the officials and merchants. Everyone who could have a garden had \none, even if he were so poor that he could only contrive a miniature scene in a \nbowl. Her enemies said that the late Dowager Empress used the funds appro\u00ac \npriated for the navy in making the Garden of Smiling Harmony at the Simmer \nPalace. Mrs. Graham has visited many of these gardens, and she desses \nthem so well that one feels their charm, and is filled with a great longing to visit \nthem. Her book is profusely illustrated with photographs which increase one\u2019s \ndesire. \n\nThe Fourth Moon, The Month of Peonies, the Chinese make pilgrimages to Tung \nHsiao Ssu, to view these arrogant splendid blossoms. 1 here are more than two hundred \nvarieties at this temple, planted in raised terraces of marble that are called \u201cmountains\u201d \nbut look like ancient Roman sarcophagi filled with earth. ... A withered monk, ascetic \nand lean, takes the visitors through the courtyards, naming the different varieties. There \nis the rose-tinted peony with double and single blooms on the same plant. 1 he deep \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\n258 \n\nred rnoutan , the male vermillion, which is the most highly prized. Another plant, he \nde vin in the sun, becomes in the shade a velvety black. Others are pearly white, white \ntinged with yellow, or the palest of yellow, like a faint gleam of candlelight. The most \ncurious specimen, one evolved from long experimentation, is the green peony. The flower \nis as effulgent as the others. It is actually a delicate green, like that of willow buds on \nthe point of opening. \n\nThe old monk, astonishingly agile, runs towards a pond and scoops out water with a \ngourd. This he throws in long splashes on the ground before the peonies, so that the \nvapour may refresh them. In the evening, of course, the roots will be wet and the leaves \nsprinkled; but throughout the heat of the day they are given this supplementary care. \n\nProudly fondling the flowers, the monk tells their histories. One plant with a stalk \nlike that of a young sapling, is two hundred years old. Others have been praised by \nfamous men or have some association with events of the past. \n\nThe Abbot of Tung Hsiao Ssu has received so many visitors that he has developed an \ninstinct for hospitality. He takes the guests inside to offer tea. He removes a foreign- \nstyle clock from the table and, as if to arrest time, sticks a toothpick into its mechanism. \nIts ticking stops and with it all sound ceases. ... \n\nThis supremely tactful gesture of hospitality also abolishes space for us, and \nwe too listen intently for the message of that silence. Where there is neither \ntime nor space there is eternity. St.C. LaD. \n\n\nChina Hand , by James Lafayette Hutchison; Lothrop, Lee and Shepard Co., \nBoston, 1936; price, $3.50. \n\nThe author, as a very young man, found employment with the American \nTobacco Company as a salesman of cigarettes in China. This was in 1911. \nChina was still an Empire under the rule of the Manchus. The Dowager Em\u00ac \npress, the \u201cOld Buddha\u201d, was dead, but the boy Emperor, Pu I, was on the \nthrone, with his cousin, the Prince Regent, acting as guardian. The young \nAmerican salesman found much that was attractive in the Chinese, and it \nspeaks well for him that he especially admired the cultivated and charming \nmanners of the Chinese-educated classes, and the great respect of all classes for \nscholarship. He learned Mandarin Chinese, and studied the Chinese classics \nand Chinese art. The more he learned, the more he found to admire. There \nwere many signs of disintegration and degeneracy, particularly in government \ncircles; but the Confucian tradition still had an immense influence for good, \nand wherever that controlled, the author found a civilization more real than, \nand in many ways superior to, that of London or Paris,\u2014although the character \nof the civilization was so different that comparison can only be based on per\u00ac \nsonal preference. Unfortunately, the influence of the Confucian tradition was \nnot strong enough to withstand the encroachment of western ideas, of which \nSun Yat Sen was the leading proponent. These ideas had been propagated \noriginally by English and American missionaries who had misunderstood their \nChristianity, and then by the younger Chinese who had been educated in \nAmerica,\u2014ideas of \u201cliberty, equality, fraternity\u201d, of \u201cgovernment of, by and \nfor the people\u201d,\u2014ideas which soon became definitely socialistic and then com\u00ac \nmunistic. The result was that the Manchus were turned out, and that China \n\n\n\nREVIEWS \n\n\n259 \n\n\nbecame a Republic,\u2014greatly to the delight of all European and American \nliberals, though not to the delight of Mr. Hutchison, the man on the spot, who \nobserves that: \n\nThe Chinese who have taken on Western culture have become neither fish nor fowl\u2014 \nthey are sorry hybrids\u2014with their innate aesthetic sense smothered under a veneer of \nWestern shrewdness, business and political cunning, that make of them self-conscious \ngigolos posing as men of the world. \n\nHe ends his book thus: \u201cFarewell to Eastern culture! Hail to Western jazz!\u201d \n\nWe sympathize; but the truth is that if China had been loyal to the best as \nshe knew it\u2014which means loyal to the Confucian tradition\u2014none of this would \nhave happened. Disloyal to that, with the worm of corruption gnawing at her \nvitals, she had lost all power of resistance, and could take to herself only the \nworst in western civilization instead of the best. \n\nChina Hand , though too long, is of real interest for more reasons than one. \nIts author draws no parallels with conditions in America, but it is difficult for \nus not to do so. For instance, when he visited Mukden after an absence of \nseveral years, he was anxious to learn all he could of the effect of the \u201cYoung \nMarshal\u2019s\u201d administration; so he called at a number of shops (stores), always \nasking the question, \u201cHow\u2019s business?\u201d At every shop he received the same \nanswer: \u201cVery bad. Before have plenty money. Now, very bad.\u201d \u201cWhy no \nbusiness?\u201d \u201cTax\u2014all the time more tax.\u201d That was in Manchuria. In China \nproper, conditions were just as bad. In Kiukiang, and along the Yangtze Val\u00ac \nley, formerly so prosperous,\u2014no business. He learned that at Nanchang, long \nfamous for its pottery, the makers \u201conly turn out rotten stuff now, and only just \nenough to pay for food from day to day. If they turn out any good work, or \ntry to accumulate any money, the bandits take it away from them.\u201d Ah me! \nIf not one kind, then another! D.A. \n\n\nIn Search 0] the Mahatmas of Tibet , by Edwin G. Schary; Seeley, Service & \nCo., London, 1938; price, 155. \n\nThis book is not about the Mahatmas, though a desire to meet them was \nresponsible for journeys which would have killed most men, and which are a \nwonderful testimony to the author\u2019s courage, endurance, and perseverance. \nA young Californian, a wanderer by instinct, his imagination was fired by \nwhat he read of Mahatmas in Tibet, and he made up his mind to find tliaf \nThree times he earned his way from San Francisco to Calcutta, and from tlWe \nthrough India to Kashmir, on one occasion travelling through Tibet from \nLake Manasarowar as far as Shigatse, often at an elevation of well over 20,000 \nfeet, when breathing became a torment. He believed that if he could find \nthe Mahatmas, they would be able to explain to him the mysteries of life and \ndeath. In the course of one of his journeys, he had a vision of a canyon in \nthe Himalayas, and of a finger pointing to a cave. He became convinced that \nhe would find the Mahatmas in that cave. Many months afterwards, he sud\u00ac \ndenly found himself in the place he had seen in his vision. After a difficult \n\n\n\n\n\n\n26 o THEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\nclimb he reached the mouth of the cave and entered it: there were no Ma\u00ac \nhatmas. \n\nI had been living in expectation so long that at last, upon arriving here, I had no \nheart to continue. ... So here I lay until the sun passed over the cave three times \nin its wide arc. Many were the strange experiences I went through in those three days; \nmany the troubled visions and dark forebodings. If I learned anything at any time in \nall my travels, I learned this lesson in that cave\u2014a lesson read somewhere before in \none of the writings of an Eastern sage, but never until that time wholly understood: \n\u201cfVithin thyself deliverance must be sought. Each man his prison makes. ...\u201d I knew, \nat the end of those three days of barrenness, that, though not finding the Mahatmas \nin the flesh, I was understanding them better in another way, and the magnitude of \ntheir work, but even then I did not give up hope of some day meeting one of them. . . . \n\nThere is an element of pathos in the author\u2019s continued blindness. As Judge \nso often said, you must be able to recognize a Master interiorly before you \ncan recognize him in (or through) his outer form; only the soul can recognize \nthe soul. Further than that, suppose you had a friend in whose spiritual in\u00ac \nsight you believed, and suppose this friend were to introduce you to someone \nwhose appearance was the embodiment of all your dreams of what a Master \nwould be like, and suppose your friend were to assure you that this man was \na Master: what next? Do you suppose he could explain to you \u201cthe mys\u00ac \nteries of life and death\u201d? It would be impossible unless your inner eye were \nopen. An artist cannot explain the mysteries of his art to a man who has never \nstudied painting, nor an Einstein the mysteries of relativity to a clodhopper. \nMasters would have met the author of this book\u2014in spite of the fact that, \nunknown to himself, the motive prompting his search had much in it of curiosity \nand self-seeking\u2014if it would have done him any good. Such a meeting could \nonly have done him harm. The open sesame to their presence is not the ability \nto endure even the worst of hardships in order to meet them, but devotion to \ntheir Cause, unselfish service, and\u2014the Four Qualifications. C.B.D. \n\n\nCORRESPONDENCE \n\nThe Medical Profession \nTo the Editors of the Theosophical Quarterly: \n\nThere was old Mary and her husband. When his last moments seemed \nto have come, after a pause the doctor said very kindly to her, \u201cYour poor old \nman is gone.\u201d \u201cNo, I ain\u2019t\u201d, piped up a voice from the bed in injured tones. \n\u201cHush, John\u201d, replied Mary firmly; \u201cdoctor knows best.\u201d \n\nBorrowed from 7 he Countryman , an English quarterly review, that incident \nfrom life is almost sufficient comment in itself on the review of The Citadel \nin your April issue; for while I agree with your reviewer\u2019s suggestions regarding \nthe reformation of the medical profession, it seems to me that the attitude \nof the public toward the profession needs reforming at least as much as the \nprofession itself. That attitude is one of rank superstition. Humanity\u2019s blind \nfaith in religious dogmas, and in priests and their ritualistic practices, has now \n\n\n\nCORRESPONDENCE \n\n\n261 \n\n\nbeen transferred to \u201cscience\u201d and its representatives. What \u201cscience\u201d pro\u00ac \nclaims is so, \u2014regardless of the fact that it changes its dogmas semi-annually. \nThe result, under that head, is a philosophy of \u201cLet us eat, drink, and be merry \n(so long as the money holds out), for to-morrow we die\u201d; and the result of that \nphilosophy naturally is\u2014a call, if not many calls, on the doctor, who is \u201cscience\u201d \npersonified. \n\nNow, just as in all religions there were good priests as well as bad, so there \nare both kinds of doctors,\u2014charlatans who trade on the public\u2019s demand for \ninfallibility, and honest men who either starve, or whose clientele is limited \nto the more enlightened few who realize that good doctors may be known, \nat least in part, in the same way that good priests were known, that is, by their \nhumility. The general public is, in the first place, incapable of realizing this; \nin the second place, it insists upon being able to put implicit faith in its medical, \nas formerly in its religious fetich. This means that if the honest medical prac\u00ac \ntitioner allows it to be perceived that he does not know everything, his patient \nlooks for the man who, with sufficient positiveness, suggests that he does; and \nas doctors must live, extended experience often drives the least pretentious \namong them to adopt the dogmatic attitude which the credulity of the public \ndemands. \n\nIn brief, what is true in the field of economics and in all other departments \nof life, is true also in the domain of medical practice: the law of supply and \ndemand governs; doctors as a class, like newspapers and lawyers, are the \nnatural response to the requirements of a credulous, sensation-loving, \u201cget- \nme-out-of-this mess\u201d public. The profession will never be reformed until \nthe majority of patients demand better service, higher ethical standards, more \nopen minds, a less mercenary spirit, and a broader culture from those to whom \nhey turn for healing. Constant Reader. \n\n\nCapitalists and War \n\nTo the Editors oj the Theosophical Quarterly: \n\nIn view of the wild statements, constantly repeated, that capitalists and \nbankers either instigated, or favoured England\u2019s participation in the Great \nWar, and that in all countries it is they who are responsible for international \nconflicts, the following extract from Lord Riddell's War Diary is of value, es\u00ac \npecially when it is remembered that he was President of the official Press Com\u00ac \nmittee, and was on terms of intimacy with the leading politicians of all parties. \n\nLord Riddell says (p. 2) that on Friday, July 31st, 1914 (England declared \nwar on August 4th), Mr. Lloyd George, at that time Chancellor of the Ex\u00ac \nchequer, \u201ctold me that he was \u2018fighting hard for peace\u2019 \u201d, and that Lloyd George \nhad adjkd: \u2018\u2018All the bankers and commercial people are begging us not to \ninterve* The Governor of the Bank of England said to me with tears in his \neyes, \u2018Keep us out of it. We shall all be ruined if we are dragged in!\u2019 \u201d \n\nHistorian. \n\n\n\n\nQuestion No. 408 .\u2014Does the Convention appeal and Resolution supersede or abrogate what \nhas been said on the subject of indrawal? \n\nAnswer. \u2014It does not. In the first place, it remains to be seen whether the Resolution \nwill bear fruit as well as leaves. In the second place, if it should bear fruit, indrawal of the \nright kind would be insured, while, if it should bear no fruit\u2014that is, if ch\u00a3laship should not \nresult\u2014withdrawal rather than indrawal would be inevitable, for while some measure of \nindrawal would still be possible for the individual, the Society itself would have-failed to keep \nthe link unbroken. It would have been carried further into the century than has ever been \ndone before, but, while this would be a great and lasting gain, continued existence on this \nplane, without the inner link, would be as objectionable as the continued life of a man who \nhad lost his unifying soul. T. \n\nQuestion No. 409 .\u2014How can T.S. members keep alive and renew the inspiration that Con\u00ac \nvention brought , and in what concrete and practical ways can they help to bring about the \u201cflower \nof chUaship\"? \n\nAnswer. \u2014An adequate answer to this question would cover the whole religious life. There \nis nothing more important for any man than to discover how to keep alive and to renew the \ndeepest inspiration that comes to his soul, how to increase his love for his Master and the \nthings of the spiritual world. For this, attention, imagination and will are always essential. \nIf we wish to grow spiritually, we must desire and give our attention to spiritual things. Man \ntends to grow into the likeness of that to which he gives his attention. In so far as he gives \nit to gross or worldly things, he becomes gross or worldly; in so far as he gives it to spiritual \nthings, he becomes, to that extent, spiritual. The reading of spiritual or inspiring books is \none helpful method. Alertness in seeking the inner meaning of outer events, is another. The \nway to gain renewed inspiration is to deserve it by acting on what we have. This means to \nuse one\u2019s will to force oneself to live up to the resolutions made in times of inspiration, no \nmatter how dull, cold, or \u201cdry\u201d one feels. Imagination should be used freely and boldly, not \nto fancy this or that, but as you would use it if, for example, you wanted to get a heedless \nboy to write home to a loving and long-neglected mother. You would surely try to arouse \nhis imagination to picture his mother\u2019s love, her grief and disappointment at his silence, her \ndelight if he wrote. We must use our imaginations to bring home to our dull hearts the reali\u00ac \nzation of certain truths, of Masters, of their cause, of their love for us, their children, of their \nneed, and, most marvellous of all, of our power to help them. \n\nAny one who wishes to help, can help. He can help by prayer, by desire, by little sacrifices, \nby doing his best and offering all he does with the intention that someone may attain. \n\nJ.F.B.M. \n\nAnswer. \u2014Such inspiration should be cherished in the silence of one\u2019s inner being, brooded \nover, not dissipated in useless talk. Tt should be used to energize the higher will. Acting \n\n\n262 \n\n\nQUESTIONS AND ANSWERS \n\n\n263 \n\n\nupon inspirations helps to keep them alive. \"The Gods are nourished by sacrifice.\u201d If inspira\u00ac \ntion illumines and clarifies some truth previously only partially understood, one should act \nupon this new light. Any and all \"right efforts\u201d may be \"offered up\u201d for the success of the \nCause. One might resolve to be more kind or more calm, more cheerful or more prompt, with \nthat intention. C.M.S. \n\nAnswer. \u2014One great incentive would be realization of the power of united effort and team\u00ac \nwork. in the concluding chapter of the Key to Theosophy , stated that if the Society \n\nsucceeds better than its predecessors have done, the next impulse from the Lodge \"will find a \nnumerous and united body of people ready to welcome the new torch-bearer of Truth\u201d. H.P.B. \nconcluded this chapter by stating: \"If the T.S. survives and lives true to its mission, . . . \nearth will be a heaven in the twenty-first century in comparison with what it is now.\u201d \n\nThe import of H.P.B.\u2019s words has been appreciably increased by the fact that, for the first \ntime, the Movement has been carried over the end of the century. The vastness of the oppor\u00ac \ntunity enhances the grave responsibility which is ours that \"the link be kept unbroken\u201d. \nFurthermore, how trivial, how utterly unimportant, all else is in comparison with the glorious \nopportunity offered at Convention to enlist in the great Cause of the Masters! Thoughts \nsuch as these should keep alive the inspiration of Convention, and will surely do so if acted \nupon with persistence and courage. Such an attitude and such action will develop the ability \nto recognize new and more effective ways in which each individual can best do his part. \n\nG.H.M. \n\nQuestion No. 410. \u2014What do you say, think, do, when you \"offer up \u201d your faults, or when \nyou \"offer up the fruits of works \u201d as advised in the Bhagavad Gita? What is the mental process \ninvolved? What is gained by it? \n\nAnswer. \u2014You may say, from a heart that has surrendered itself, \"Please take my faults, \nand make of them positive forces which can be used for the purposes of the Real World.\u201d If \nthe surrender be complete, if the desire be whole-hearted and unselfish, you will at the same \ntime have begun to offer up the fruits of works, in the sense that you will not be watching for \nresults, but will be content to leave them entirely in the hands of the Masters. You intend \nyour mind upon this prayer which you have made, upon this help which you have evoked. \nYou deliberately set yourself to think of ways in which you can do your part, to understand \nthe obligations which you have imposed upon yourself. You keep asking for help, and you \narouse your will and swing it, away from the desire for petty selfish attainments, to co-opera\u00ac \ntion with those unseen forces with which you have aligned yourself. The mind becomes more \nand more, not something to which you refer decisions, but a controlled instrument, surren\u00ac \ndered with your other faculties, and now consciously used to further your purpose and to gain \nyour objective. C.R.A. \n\nAnswer.\u2014 This question deals with our most vital problem: how to get rid of our inverted \npoint of view. We have two natures,\u2014two selves: a Higher, or Real, Self, and a lower, or \nfalse self, which latter we have created, and with which for the most part we identify our\u00ac \nselves. Usually, we look at everything from this false centre, and we refer everything to it. \nIt is a usurper, and thoroughly selfish. So, as a rule, when we speak, or think, of offering up \nanything\u2014faults or fruits of works\u2014we tie a string to the offering, the nether end of which \nis held fast by \"self\u201d, so that we can pull back the offering if \"self\u201d is not satisfied with the \nresults. From this inverted point of view, the more we speak and think of any offering up, the \nmore calculating we become as to its possible effects, and, consequently, what we do about it, \nis little better than half-hearted. Lower self always is calculating, and to carry such self- \nreference into the offertorium, definitely is a hindrance. \"Be solicitous for my interests\u201d, said \nthe ^stcr Christ to St. Teresa, \u201cand I will take care of thine.\u201d Nothing could be clearer \nthai^mat. \n\nIn terms of consciousness, then, the answer to the question is a definite and complete change of \n\n\n264 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nthe polarity of our nature, a cessation of what, at best, is divided interest, and a throwing of the \nentire weight of the imagination and the will over to the side of the Higher Self; an insistence \nthat we are that Self. Then, we shall begin to think, to speak and to act from and as that \nHigher, Divine Centre; from which and by which all is offered up: faults, fruits of works, \nlimitations, imperfections,\u2014everything. As we become acclimated to dwelling in the atmos\u00ac \nphere of that Self, neither seeking nor retaining anything for ourselves, we shall know, at \nfirst hand, something of that rebirth from above, which Nicodemus found so difficult to \ncomprehend. G.M.W.K. \n\nAnswer.\u2014 One might say: Master, I offer you this act in its entirety, whatever its faults \nor merits. May it help the coming of your Kingdom. Having offered it up, one relinquishes \na personal interest in the act, desiring no thanks, praise, or other reward, detaching one\u2019s \nself entirely from it. CMS \n\nAnswer.\u2014 \u201cTo offer up the fruits of works\u201d, is consciously to do what we do because it \nought to be done, with the prayer that it may be used to help the Masters\u2019 cause, abandoning \nall desire for reward and all personal interest in that which we offer. It means that while \nworking to our utmost to achieve a given end, we must nevertheless ceaselessly desire that \nwhether we succeed or fail in our efforts, the result will be best for the purposes of the Lodge' \n\nIt is a process of detachment, and a transfer of one\u2019s centre of interest from the lower per\u00ac \nsonality to the Masters and their cause. The practice is a most valuable one in many ways. \n\nIt strengthens and clears the channels from the soul to the personality. It is a great help \ntoward quietude and peace of heart, toward impersonality, understanding and mental clarity. \n\nThe elimination of self-interest, and the purification of the motive with which the work is \ndone, means, moreover, that finer, more potent forces are evolved and, by the act of offering \nare made available for the use of the Lodge on this plane. This type of service is open to any \nonejho desires to serve, no matter how undeveloped or full of faults he may feel himself \n\nOne way to offer one\u2019s faults is to offer one\u2019s self, faults and all, for service, and then to \nforget the faults in the service. Most faults are due to some form of thinking about self and \nto forget self in work for a cause, cuts their roots. j p ^ d \n\nAnswer, What is \u201coffering up\u201d? It is a free-will offering of one's self, one's thoughts \nwords, acts everything we have and are-to something or someone greater than self The \n\nIriff tak7 ntS \"'If 5 US ' w 1 We , are ' inC ' Uding \u00b0 Ur faU ' t5 and ^Perfections, which they \nWill take care of and use. We must leave that to them. Our great concern y \n\nduty, is to give ourselves, without thought of reward and \n\nG.H.M. \n\n\nIN MEMORIAM. \n\nDR. THOMAS LATHROP STEDMAN. \n\nA faithful and honoured member of the Society \nDied, May 26th, 1938. \n\n\nstandard books \n\nBlevatsky, H. F. X \n\n.. ... cloth, 17.50 \n\nKey to Theosophy. \u2022 \u2022 * x and XI and ind \u2022 \u2022 , volume, 7.50 \n\nSecret Doctrine, T S^ l \u00b0 ete in one boot, without sublet.. doth> 2 . 25 \n\ndoth, 2.25 \n\nTheosophical GlossaRY^v atsky Lodge . .fabric, l.oo \n\nTransactions ofth ..boards, 1.50 \n\nVoice of the S , j ..boards, 1-50 \n\nCave. Fragments, Vdume \u201e. '. ... . boards, WJ \n\nGerard, John. The \\fo \n\ngStfSSS: . T \u201d \u2014\u2018nK: S \n\nCrest Jewel 01 f t\u201ce ' vXme ' \u2022 \u2022 . . .V.XX \n\nEchoes ^^Have Helped Me, Volumes 1 and ,. loth , 100 \n\nI ETTERS 1HAT rlAv fabric, 1-00 \n\nPatanjali S Yoga r hm g f Life . .paper, .20 \n\nKeightley, Archibald. of . . . pap er .so \n\n- r*^.v.v.\u00ab - \n\nrrrrr. >\u2022\u00bb \n\n\n40 \n\n\nThe Great Upani- \n\n> ggSSa- \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nOCTOBER, 1938 \n\n\nVOL. XXXV, No. 4 \n\n\nFounded by f>. P. Blavatsky at llcw York in 1875 \n\n\nHE Society does not pretend to be able to establish \n\n\nat once a universal brotherhood among men, but \nJL only strives to create the nucleus of such a body, \nj gg SSg Many of it* members believe that an acquaintance \nwith the world's religions and^ philosophies will \nreveal, as the common and fundamental principle \nunderlying these, that \u201cspiritual identity of all Souls with the \nOversoul\u201d which is the basis of true brotherhood I and many \nof them also believe that an appreciation of the finer forces \nof nature and man will still further emphasize the same idea. \nThe organization is wholly unsectarian, with no creed, \ndogma, nor personal authority to enforce or impose; neither \nis it to be held responsible for the opinions of its members, \nwho are expected to accord to the beliefs of others that \ntolerance which they desire for their own. \n\nThe following proclamation was adopted at the Conven\u00ac \ntion of the Society, held at Boston, April, 1895: \n\n\u201cThe Theosophical Society in America by its delegates and \nmembers in Convention assembled, does hereby proclaim \nfraternal good will and kindly feeling toward all students of \nTheosophy and members of Theosophical Societies wherever \nand however situated. It further proclaims and avers its \nhearty sympathy and association with such persons and \norganizations in all theosophical matters except those of \ngovernment and administration, and invites their cor* \nrespondence and co-operation, \n\n^To all men and women of whatever caste, creed, race, or \nreligious belief, who aim at the fostering of peace, gentleness, \nand unselfish regard one for another, and the acquisition of \nsuch knowledge of men and nature as shall tend to the eleva\u00ac \ntion and advancement of the human race, it sends most friendly \ngreeting and freely proffers its services. \n\n\u201cIt Joins hands with all religionsand religious bodies whose \nefforts are directed to the purification of men's thoughts and \nthe bettering of their ways, and it avows its harmony there* \nwith. To all scientific societies and individual searchers after \nwisdom upon whatever plane, and by whatever righteous \nmeans pursued, it is and will be grateful for such discovery \nmid unfoldment of Truth as shall serve to announce and con* \n\n\nPUBLISHED BY \n\nTHE THEOSOPHICAL SOCIETY \n\n\nApplications for membership should be addressed to the \nSecretary T. S., P .O. Box 64, Station O, New York. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS OF VOL. XXXV, NO. 4 \nOctober, 1938 \n\nPAGE \n\nNOTES AND COMMENTS. 26? \n\nFRAGMENTS. 2?7 \n\nLIVING PICTURES. 2?9 \n\nREFLECTING ON A NEIGHBOUR. 29Q \n\nTHE UNDERSTANDING OF PARTICULAR THINGS. 295 \n\nTHEOSOPHY IN SERMONS. \n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME. \n\nPSYCHIC AND NOETIC ACTION. 6 \n\nREVIEWS. \n\n. 342 \n\nQUESTIONS AND ANSWERS. \n\n. 349 \n\nNEW YORK BRANCH NOTICE. \n\nINDEX. 5 \n\n. 3Si \n\nAct of Ma'rc r ^3 M .8 7 r nd \u2018 ClaM Septra,b \u00ab 5. .913, at the Poet Office at New York. N. Y.. under the \n\nCopyright, 1938, by The Theosophical Society \n\n\nTHE THEOSOPHICAL SOCIETY \n\nThe principal aim and object of this Society is to form the nucleus of a \nUniversal Brotherhood of Humanity, without distinction of race, creed, sex, \ncaste or colour. The subsidiary objects are: The study of ancient and modern \nreligions, philosophies and sciences, and the demonstration of the importance \nof such study; and the investigation of the unexplained laws of nature and \nthe psychical powers latent in man. \n\n\n\nThe Theosophical Quarterly is the official organ of the original \nTheosophical Society founded in New York by H. P. Blavatshj, \nW. Q. Judge and others, in 1875 . \n\nWe have no connection whatsoever with any other organization \ncalling itself Theosophical, formerly headed by Mrs. Besant, nor \nwith similar bodies, the purposes and methods of which are wholly \nforeign to our own . \n\nEditors, The Theosophical Quarterly. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nOCTOBER, 1938 \n\nThe Theosophical Society, as such, is not responsible for any opinion or declaration \nin this magazine, by whomsoever expressed, unless contained in an official document. \n\n\nThe Faculty of Mental Memory \n\n\nM EMORY has been described as \u201cthe faculty of the mind by which it \nretains, and reproduces at will, past events\u201d. The inventor of this \ndefinition must have been an optimist. Most of us know, to our sor\u00ac \nrow, that our minds retain only scattered fragments of the past, and that even \nthese poor rags and tatters are deformed almost beyond recognition. How \nmany can \u201creproduce at will\u201d any episode, exactly as it occurred? The mind is \nalways dredging images out of the chasms of the subconscious, but how often \ndo we exercise the least conscious control over this operation? If we really try \nto remember anything, how often do we succeed? \n\nThe faculty of mental memory may be regarded as a specialized instrument, \nprimarily devised to preserve and to make available, to our personal conscious\u00ac \nness, the lessons of past experience. To take a classical example, the child who \nremembers what happened when he touched a red-hot stove, will refrain from \nrepeating the experiment. He retains, and reproduces at will, a past event, \nbecause he has assimilated his experience of that event. In the course of time, \nif the assimilation be complete enough, it will be unnecessary to recall the expe\u00ac \nrience by a mental effort. Whenever he has to choose between touching and \nnot touching a hot stove, his normal, spontaneous, automatic reaction will be \nnot to touch it. A habit\u2014in this case, a good habit\u2014will have been established. \n\nUnfortunately we do not always or often learn the lessons of life as easi ly^ \nthe child learns the lesson inculcated by the hot stove. Experience is, or shJffd \nbe, the food of the soul. However, it is not enough that we should swallow it; \nit must be subjected to an inner metabolism, before it can be assimilated and \nbecome part of our nature. Our inner health, moreover, depends upon the par\u00ac \nticular ingredients of experience which are assimilated. Every experience, as \nThrough The Gates of Gold informs us, yields either a grain of poison or a drop \nof the elixir of life. We can assimilate the poison and reject the elixir. In \n\n\n267 \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n268 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nsuch circumstances, it is no wonder that our memories, like our dreams, so often \nassume the pattern of a crazy-quilt. The dregs of the subconscious are charged \nwith toxins which act upon the mind, as a putrefying substance acts upon the \nbody, as \u201cthe vile emanations of the earth (moral and physical) upon which the \nAstral Light is fed, are all converted into their subtlest essence, and radiated \nback intensified, thus becoming epidemics\u2014moral, psychic and physical\u201d \n(Theosophical Glossary , p. 35). \n\n\nOrganic Memory \n\nThe references to the Astral Light in theosophical literature suggest that \nmemory is not merely a mental faculty limited to man and a few of the higher \nanimals on this planet; that wherever there is any existence, macrocosmic or \nmicrocosmic, in any kingdom, upon any plane, experience of some kind is being \nassimilated by some process of consciousness, which in some way corresponds \nto what we call memory. Thus the Cosmos has a \u201cmemory\u201d, and so has every \natom within the Cosmos; and there is a \u201cmemory\u201d of the earth, distinct from, \nthough including, the \u201cmemories\u201d of all its denizens, visible and invisible, \u201cfrom \nmineral and plant, up to the holiest Archangel\u201d. \n\nBy analogy, in the human being, there is not only the memory of the mind, \nbut also there are the \u201cmemories\u201d of all his other principles and sub-principles, \nfrom the lowest to the highest. Every organ, as well as every cell of his physical \nbody, of all his \u201cbodies\u201d, contributes its quota of assimilated experience to the \nwhole. His entire organism is indeed charged with \u201cmemories\u201d which are in \none sense not his personal property, coming to him, as they do, from the inter\u00ac \nminable line of his ancestors. To such an order belong the \u201castral moulds\u201d of \nthe physiological habits and instincts which he shares with the animals. He is \novershadowed, sometimes possessed by subconscious impulses, derived both \nfrom his family and from the skandhas , the seeds of the \u201cmemories\u201d of past \nbirths. According to the degree of his development, he is influenced, consciously \nor \u201csuperconsciously\u201d, by the \u201cmemories\u201d of the soul. \n\nThe sum-total or synthesis of all these \u201cmemories\u201d has been called \u201corganic \nmemory\u201d, to distinguish it from ordinary \u201cmental memory\u201d. Some psycholo\u00ac \ngists identify it with the so-called \u201csubconscious\u201d, but as we have suggested, it \nis much more than that. It might be described as a composite faculty which, \nfor the most part without our conscious knowledge, has stored up and utilizes \nthe manifold experiences of every conceivable order, garnered during countless \naeons along innumerable lines of evolution. But in its immediate activities, it \nmay be the cause of many disasters. Like the Astral Light, it may be said to \n\u201cgive out nothing but what it has received\u201d, and in the course of our wander\u00ac \nings, recent and remote, in space and time, we have retained many \u201castral \nmoulds\u201d which are unpleasant, and others which are ghastly to behold. \n\nThe Control of Habit \n\nThere is an old axiom: \u201cNature loves to repeat herself.\u201d The underlying \nprinciple seems to be that it is only by constant repetition that the average \n\n\nNOTES AND COMMENTS \n\n\n269 \n\n\nexperience can be adequately assimilated. We can observe the usefulness of \nrepetition in the evolution of reflexes and instincts in the animal kingdom. \nHow can any human aptitude or efficiency be acquired, if not by constant and \nunremitting practice, by doing the same thing over and over again, until a \nparticular series of actions has become habitual and virtually automatic? This \nrule applies equally, whether we be learning dancing or singing or mathematics \nor the art of holiness. In each instance, memory-images are deliberately \nstrengthened by repetition, so as to establish the mould of a habit. \n\nIt has been said that whenever we put force into a thought, it \u201ccoalesces with \nan elemental\u201d, becoming a semi-independent entity, living with our life, and \nrenewing its vitality by prompting us to repeat the experience through which \nit was bom. But many of our thoughts and deeds do not bear repetition; and \nthe continued presence of certain \u201cdynamic mind-images\u201d below the \u201cthreshold \nof consciousness\u201d, implies that we shall be instigated to commit the same follies \nagain and again. \n\nAre we aware of the degree to which we have become \u201ccreatures of habit\u201d? \nThe faculty of organic memory\u2014doubtless serving the demands of Karma\u2014 \ntakes advantage of any sensation, even of a muscular contraction, to re-vivify \nan \u201castral mould\u201d, a \u201chabit\u201d, to which we are still attached by some secret or \navowed desire or fear. The tyranny of habit is often visibly manifested by some \n\u201corganic trick\u201d to which the body is subject, by a tic or nervous reflex or habitual \ngesture or cliche, which is an ever-present source of annoyance to our friends. \nThere is truth in the modem psychiatric theory that disease symptoms can be \ncaused by obsessions of consciousness, that is to say, by psychic habits over \nwhich even a semblance of control has been lost. \n\nTo conserve sanity and bodily health, it is necessary to control our habits \nand to anticipate their recurrence, whenever this is possible, as a skilful driver \nmust not only understand the idiosyncrasies of his horse but must know when to \nexpect their manifestation. This means that we must set to work to liberate \nthe force which in the past we imprisoned in the \u201cdynamic mind images\u201d, the \nmemories, that are the basis of our bad or useless habits. Certainly the past \nmoment cannot be erased; it is engraved upon the \u201ctablets of the Astral Light\u201d. \nBut our whole attitude towards the past moment can be changed. How can we \nmake any real progress towards the realization of our divine destiny, until we \nlearn how to transform the meaning of past experience? \n\nThe Transformation of Memory-Images \n\nFor example, let us imagine a man who is a coward. Time after time he has \nfled his enemies, real and imagined, and as a result his mind is haunted by \ndread and apprehension, haunted above all by the persistent image of himself \nin flight from every battlefield. But he is finally brought to the point where he \nrealizes, at least intellectually, that his soul is by its very nature courageous, \nbecause his soul, being a ray or spark of his Master\u2019s life, must participate in \nthe superlative courage of the Master. He understands that if he persevere \nand trust in his Master\u2019s power, he will be able to make that potential courage \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n270 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nof the soul manifest in every department of his personal life. Let us suppose \nthat he succeeds. Must there not be a complete transformation of his memory- \nimages? The past events which formerly terrorized him, no longer suggest \nepisodes in a drama of defeat. What was once seen as cowardice, impelling \nhim to fresh acts of cowardice, now appears as an enemy which he has over\u00ac \ncome. He thinks of his unhappy past, as a mountaineer, standing on the sum\u00ac \nmit, thinks of the deadly perils of the ascent as obstacles which he has passed, \nas episodes which enhance the value of his victory. \n\nThe Memory of the Heart \n\nThere is a memory of the heart, of the soul. As Napoleon remarked, it is the \nonly form of memory which can really preserve past experience without defor\u00ac \nmation. Las Cases notes in the Memorial de Sainte-H&lhne: \u201cThe Emperor said \nthat his memory was of the heart, and that it preserved the faithful remem\u00ac \nbrance of all that was dear to him.\u201d \n\nEveryone must have experienced, in some degree, the power of the memory \nof the heart. The remembrance of a person, of a dog, even of an inanimate \nobject, which we have loved and still love, does not fade away. Thus a long- \nforgotten scene, a landscape which has deeply moved us, can be suddenly evoked \nby some magical suggestion conveyed by the most casual incident, by a perfume \nor the sound of a distant bell. We open a damp old wardrobe, and the odour \nof musty wood transports us across the years to a little inn at Barbizon. Once \nmore we look out into the green twilight of the forest, and hear the dripping of \nthe rain and the song of the chaffinch. \n\nThe Memory of the Immortal \n\nIn the heart, as the Upanishads teach, dwells the Immortal. The real mem\u00ac \nory of the heart is a sacred and intimate treasure, the unique possession of the \nindividual soul, for it is the gift of the Master, part of the memory of the Im\u00ac \nmortal who is the father of that soul. By love and aspiration, it is said, the \nmemory of the ch\u00a3la can be purified, transmuted, actually as well as potentially \nmade one with the memory of the Master; in so far as he attains union, the \nch\u00a3la remembers what his Master remembers. This would seem to be the clue \nto Plato\u2019s meaning when he spoke of the soul\u2019s innate power to recollect the \nDivine Ideas. Many saints and mystics have testified to the experience of \nre-living an episode of their Master\u2019s life as intensely, as personally , as if they \nhad themselves physically experienced it. The Passion and Resurrection of the \nMaster Christ are not regarded by the disciple merely as historical episodes; they \nare part of his own true biography. \n\nHave we often considered what the memory of a Master may be like? It \nmust be a memory of joy, for it is a memory of love, even though it preserves \nthe experience of all the wounds which love has suffered in a warfare which is \nwithout beginning or end. It must be a memory which can \u201creproduce at will\u201d, \nwithout any dimming effect by time, the real form of a past event; the Master \nsees time sub specie ceternitatis . In the world where the Masters live, according \n\n\nNOTES AND COMMENTS \n\n\nNOTES AND COMMENTS 271 \n\nto the testimony of those who have dwelt there, the past is as living and as \nimmediate as the present; in one sense, it is inseparable from the present (and \nthe future). As an Eastern Master wrote many years ago: \u201cI feel even irritated \nat having to use these three clumsy words\u2014Past, Present and Future. Miser\u00ac \nable concept of the objective phases of the subjective whole, they are about as \nill-adapted for the purpose, as an axe for fine carving\u201d ( The Occult World , p. 145). \n\nThe Balance-Sheet of a Lifetime \n\nIt may be suggested that when the balance-sheet of a lifetime is presented to \nthe \u201cRecording Angels\u201d, they are primarily concerned with the memories which \nhave settled in the heart. They are probably much less interested than we \nsuppose in our successes and failures, in our achievements and deficiencies, even \nin our virtues and vices. That which really matters is what we have stored up \nin our hearts, the things which we remember most spontaneously because they \nare most dear to us. If the soul has grown any wiser in its affections, if it has \nlearned anything from its mistakes, it can scarcely matter in the Eternal how \nmany mistakes it may have made. The whole life may have been a \u201ccomedy of \nerrors\u201d, but if the lesson of even one error be learned, it ceases to be a stimulus \nto continued defeat, and becomes instead an incentive to victory. \n\nA Famous American Becomes a Philosopher \n\nThese last reflections are suggested by an interview with Mr. Henry Ford, \npublished in honour of his seventy-fifth birthday by the New York Times Maga\u00ac \nzine , July 24, 1938. Mr. Ford has done many strange and outlandish things in \nthe course of a long and active life. The too famous \u201cpeace-ship\u201d is only one of \nmany examples. He has deluded himself and others by the doctrine that the \nmultiplication of cheap automobiles, bought on credit, has immeasurably in\u00ac \ncreased the happiness of the human race. The casual observer of his activities \nmight easily infer that they had been little likely to lead him to any true per\u00ac \nception of spiritual values. Perhaps, he is a bundle of contradictions. In part \nof his nature, at any event, he now reveals an affinity with the tragically small \ngroup of mankind who seek and find some meaning in the events of their lives, \nand who can, in consequence, profit from errors and defeats. He may hq^e \nsaid that \u201chistory is bunk\u201d, but no disciple of Confucius could speak \nrespectfully of experience. It is not enough to say that he has succeeded where \nothers failed, because when others dreamed he acted. The real point is that he \nhas recognized many mistakes and has learned from them. He learned, as it \nseems, for the simple reason that he has always been ready to test the validity \nof his oddest theories by actual experiment. What is more, he has undertaken \nfull responsibility, paying for his experience with his own money. Unlike many \nof his contemporaries, he has not experimented at others\u2019 expense. It would seem \nthat few men in public life to-day have been as consistently sincere as Mr. Ford. \n\n\n\u201cThe Most Valuable Thing in the World\u201d \n\nMr. Ford was an intimate friend of Thomas Edison, who was at one time a \n\n\n272 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nmember of The Theosophical Society. This may account in part for his ref\u00ac \nerences to Reincarnation and Karma; but it is evident that the philosophy of \nlife which he outlines is his own, the product of his own meditations. \u201cIn the \nevening of the day comes quietude, and with quietude wisdom.\u201d \n\n\u201cDo your own work, don\u2019t indulge in controversies\u201d, Mr. Ford said. \u201cDon\u2019t let argu\u00ac \nment lead to quarrels; if the matter is one you can do something about\u2014do it; if not, \nwait until you can. I can honestly say that in my case money has been a by-product. \nI never kept it in my mind. But I think I always had a subconscious belief that anyone \nwho does anything useful will not go unpaid. There\u2019s a higher law that looks after that. \nFrom the time I worked on the farm . . . the best pay I ever got was experience, which \nI think is still the most valuable thing in the world. That\u2019s what we are put in the world \nfor, to get experience and to help others get it. It is the one thing no one can take away \nfrom us. No, I\u2019ve never laid out a system of life. Just go ahead, and do the job that \none is called upon to do\u2014that is system enough. How can anyone say how he will act \nto-morrow when he doesn\u2019t know what will happen to-day?\u201d . . . \n\n\u201cWhat is instinct?\u201d Mr. Ford was asked. \n\n\u201cProbably the essence of past experience and knowledge stored up for future use.\u201d \n\n\u201cTransmitted to us by our forebears?\u201d \n\n\u201cNot necessarily. Little is known about inheritance. Suppose we inherit from our\u00ac \nselves\u2014from our own past? There are many, you know, who think this life journey \nthrough the world is not the first one we have made. Haven\u2019t you ever come across \nchildren who knew things which it was impossible for them to have learned? Have you \never gone to a place for the first time and felt sure that you had been there before?\u201d . . . \n\nMr. Ford said that, if he had the opportunity of living his life over again, there are \nfew things he would do differently from the way that he had done them. \u201cI couldn\u2019t \neven if I wanted to. There are some things we must do in order to be true to ourselves. \nEven a mistake may turn out to be the one thing necessary to a worth-while achieve\u00ac \nment.\u201d It is for that reason that Mr. Ford does not believe in what is ordinarily called \nluck; he thinks that often what is regarded as hard luck is an experience which, if prop\u00ac \nerly judged, can react to advantage. \n\nThe Art of Being True to Oneself \n\nThe general truth of Mr. Ford\u2019s message is self-evident. With one of his \nstatements, as he has phrased it, we are, however, constrained to disagree. Who \nwould not do many things differently, if he had the opportunity of living his \nlife over again? The great consolation which the doctrine of Reincarnation \nbrings, is that we do have this opportunity, with added experience. Our errors \nare not irreparable. There will be ample opportunity to correct them in the \nfuture. Furthermore, we are only true to ourselves in the measure that we do \ncorrect them and learn from them. We are not living in accordance with the \nreal nature of things so long as we regard it as inevitable that we must make \nthe same mistakes time after time, and learn nothing. Mr. Ford may have \nprofited more than most men from the observation of his own follies, but he \nsurely would not claim that he has profited to the utmost. And that is what \nsooner or later must be done by every soul. The maximum profit must be \nextracted from every experience. When that blissful state is reached, it would \nseem that the soul stands indeed upon the threshold of Nirvana, for there would \nscarcely be any further necessity for incarnation, as we understand it. But \nuntil this art of being true to oneself is thoroughly mastered, nothing is gained \n\n\nNOTES AND COMMENTS \n\n\n273 \n\n\nby a feeling of more or less complete satisfaction with our actual attainment. \nPerhaps Mr. Ford has not that feeling, but his words are unhappy in suggesting it. \n\n\u201cOptimum Conditions of Growth\u201d \n\nMr. Ford has had one advantage. He has spent his life in contact with facts; \nfor machines may be soulless, but at least they are concrete and actual things. \nMany university professors are not so fortunate, for they are in daily contact, \nnot with facts but with notions about facts. \n\nThis may partly explain some of the things which are said at congresses of \nlearned men. For instance, at the recent meeting of the American Association \nfor the Advancement of Science, in Ottawa, Professor Frank S. Freeman made \nsome generalizations about \u201cpublic education in a democracy\u201d. The present \nfad is to regard heredity as less important in the fashioning of character than \nenvironment, and this provided Professor Freeman with the subject-matter for \na thesis: \n\nThis revised concept of the development of mental abilities has far-reaching educa\u00ac \ntional implications. It means that an individual\u2019s possibilities of development cannot be \nknown and realized until optimum conditions of growth are provided practically from \nbirth; that social and economic factors and all that they imply are at least as significant \nin the determination of ability differences as are genetic factors, and that much potential \ntalent goes undeveloped for want of proper nurture, both physical and psychological. \nPublic education in a democracy that seeks to develop and foster all its human resources \nwill have to look forward to providing pre-school education for all in respect to both \nmental and physical development. It is not enough to urge that talented boys and girls \nof whatever economic stratum should have opportunity for higher education. \n\nLike so many of the pronouncements of \u201cintellectuals\u201d, this sounds amiable \nand innocent at first reading. Then we stop and wonder what Professor Free\u00ac \nman means by \u201coptimum conditions of growth\u201d. Whatever he may mean, it is \nquite certain that every other professor would mean something else. As a mat\u00ac \nter of fact, various political groups and their leaders have already decided the \nquestion for themselves. Mussolini, Hitler and Stalin have very definite views \nabout \u201coptimum conditions of growth\u201d, and they lack patience with anyone \nwho disagrees. \n\nIt is impossible to say into what shapes the \u201cpotential talent\u201d of Italy, Ger\u00ac \nmany and Russia will develop. God only knows, in any case, what is the \n\u201cpotential talent\u201d of anybody. In the deepest of all possible senses, every soul \nis doubtless \u201can inlet to the Over-Soul, and to all of the same\u201d, but that does \nnot imply that God expects every child to become at once a Buddha or a PMb. \n\nTheosophy iterates and re-iterates one simple hypothesis, that whereverwle \nis placed by Nature and Karma, one finds the \u201coptimum conditions of growth\u201d \nfor the soul. The physical and psychic environment will inevitably change, as \nthe needs of the soul change. The valorous and determined individual does \nnot remain in bondage to any set of circumstances. The self-made man whom \nAmericans formerly delighted to honour, grew often to gigantic proportions, \nwithout any \u201csocial and economic advantages\u201d, sometimes with nothing but \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n274 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nthe bare rudiments of a primary school education. He made himself what he \nbecame, because he was instructed by his own experience and by observing the \nexperience of others. \n\nNo man can be made to become anything, if he be a man. A \u201cscientific\u201d \nsystem of nurture might conceivably produce a nation of creatures which would \ndo and say what it was told to do and say, but it would be a nation of automata \nand robots, not of human beings. It is so much simpler to do one\u2019s own duty as \nbest one can, and to leave to Nature at least part of the burden of developing \nand fostering \u201call the resources\u201d of everybody else. If a man\u2019s talents need \ndevelopment, as surely as Justice rules the world, he will be given a chance to \nsucceed, and if his aspirations be real, opposition, difficulty, even poverty (that \nterrible spectre of the modem mind) will not daunt him but will only temper \nthe steel of his will. \n\nFailure \n\nIt may be suggested in this connection that failure is as misunderstood as \npoverty, in the modern world. So much failure is not failure at all. If a man \ncannot see for himself the beauty of the \u201cVictory of Samothrace\u201d, why blame \nhim? He is simply as yet incapable of experiencing the beauty, as a dog would \nbe incapable. His \u201cfailure\u201d is as much an illusion as, in a different sense, is \nthat of the artist struggling to bring some creation to birth, who rejects his \nfirst production because it inadequately expresses his idea. There is yet another \nkind of \u201cfailure\u201d which should indeed awaken intense sympathy, although it \nmust be sent by the Good Law, by a Divine Compassion. Many are bom into \nthe world with certain obvious talents which they cannot develop, in spite of all \ntheir efforts and in spite of every favourable condition. If we really believe in \nReincarnation and Karma, we can recognize the possibility that in other lives \nthis particular talent had been over-developed at the expense of other qualities \nnecessary to the soul, and that the use of it is denied in the present life to pro\u00ac \nvide an opportunity for a fuller and better rounded growth. \n\nThere is only one certain failure,\u2014the deliberate refusal to conform action to \na standard which one knows to be beautiful and true. \n\nOne Purpose of Education \n\nAs history reveals, a civilization exists as long as it can transmit to the future \nwhat it has learned in the past. Each generation should add to the sum-total \nof knowledge, but it must build upon foundations already laid. \u201cA nation loses \nits life\u201d, said Marshal Foch, \u201conly when it has lost its memories\u201d, that is, its \ntraditions. \n\nCertainly one purpose of education is to ensure the preservation of the ac\u00ac \nquired knowledge (spiritual, moral, intellectual and physical) of the race. But \nvery few citizens have the capacity to assimilate more than a small fraction of \nthat knowledge. Formerly, when primary education at least was a function of \nthe Church and the family, the principal object was to impress upon the child\u2019s \nmind and heart certain elementary truths concerning good and evil, right and \nwrong. Like the Ten Commandments and their counterparts in other religions, \n\n\nNOTES AND COMMENTS \n\n\n275 \n\n\nthese truths are the fruit of a mass of experience dating back to the infancy of \nhumanity. They must be made part of the child\u2019s habitual consciousness, if he \nis to become even a potential human being. They are incomparably more \nnecessary and more important than reading and writing and arithmetic, not to \nmention economics, sociology, aesthetics and \u201ctap-dancing\u201d. We venture to \nsuggest that if the modem educator would lay aside some of his theories and, \nespecially in the primary grades, would concentrate upon the teaching of the \nindispensable principles of ethics, the \u201cpotential talents\u201d of the infants entrusted \nto him would take care of themselves. In any event these principles are needed \nequally by the man of genius and by the humblest entity in human shape. \n\nThe Pivotal Doctrine of the Esoteric Philosophy \n\nIt is too easy to lose sight of the mountain-peaks which we must climb to \nattain our true human heritage. We are not invited by the Logos to a light \nand frivolous undertaking. Consider the far vistas opened to vision by the \nthird \u201cfundamental proposition\u201d of The Secret Doctrine: \n\nThe fundamental identity of all Souls with the Universal Over-Soul, the latter being \nitself an aspect of the Unknown Root; and the obligatory pilgrimage for every Soul\u2014a \nspark of the former\u2014through the Cycle of Incarnation, or Necessity, in accordance with \nCyclic and Karmic Law, during the whole term. In other words, no purely spiritual \nBuddhi (Divine Soul) can have an independent conscious existence before the spark \nwhich issued from the pure Essence of the Universal Sixth Principle\u2014or the over-soul \n\u2014has (a) passed through every elemental form of the phenomenal world of that Man- \nvantara, and (b) acquired individuality, first by natural impulse, and then by self-induced \nand self-devised efforts, checked by its Karma, thus ascending through all the degrees of \nintelligence from the lowest to the highest Manas. . . . The pivotal doctrine of the \nEsoteric Philosophy admits no privileges or special gifts in man, save those won by his \nown Ego through personal effort and merit throughout a long series of metempsychoses \nand reincarnations (ed. 1888, I, 17). \n\nAll states of consciousness, all talents potential or realized, all experiences, \nall \u201cmemories of the heart\u201d are significant, in so far as they reveal some aspect \nof the Eternal and enlighten the way to the Eternal. For the aspirant to ch\u00a3la- \nship this specifically signifies that his life and its powers exist for one purpose, \nas a bridge leading him to immediate knowledge of the Master at the head of \nhis Ray, who has already attained \u201cindividual conscious existence\u201d, in ujMpn \nwith the Over-Soul, with the Spirit of the Lodge. \n\nMemory and Self-realization \n\nAs one indispensable means to this true Self-realization, there must be a pro\u00ac \ngressive transformation of our \u201cdynamic mind-images\u201d, a progressive change \nof attitude towards the past. This is a\u2019task which can be begun here and now, \nthe sooner the better. Certain things which can be done are self-evident. \n\nWe can quicken the processes of self-examination, in a whole-hearted at\u00ac \ntempt to understand and to overpower the elemental lives and forces animating \nthe bad habits of mind and body, and inciting us to repeat the foolish and vicious \nj^cts of the past. We can train the mind to associate the image of what we ac- \n\n\n276 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\ntually did on some particular occasion, with the ideal of what we should have \ndone, so that we cannot recall the former without simultaneously recalling the \nlatter. M. Jacques d\u2019Amoux refers to this aspect of recollection: \n\nThe memory of heroes is not only the guardian of the sacred fire. It should not only \nbe filled with glowing coals. It is also a watch which should remain ceaselessly on the \nalert, and which should never forget the reefs and the shipwrecks. If it does not each \nday register your weaknesses, you will never reform yourself completely. \u201cA life without \nself-examination is not a life\u201d, said the philosopher. Certain weaknesses are so habitual \nfor you, that you yield to them without being aware of it. It is only by the tenacious \nrecollection of these weaknesses that, little by little, you become conscious of them and \nwill finally react at the right time (Les Sept Colonnes de l*Heroism*, p. 305). \n\nWe can face each experience as it happens, with the conviction that it is a \nsentence in the Book of Life, a sentence placed there by Nature, by Karma, by \nour Master for our edification. This conviction, firmly held, will link the re\u00ac \nmembrance of the experience with the thought of a spiritual purpose informing \nall events, and with the idea of the Masters\u2019 constant intervention in the affairs \nof men. \n\nSuch an association of memories and images is not hard to imagine, for it \ninvolves the use of a faculty with which we are thoroughly familiar. If we have \nvisited a place with someone we love, our pleasure in bringing back its image is \ninextricably identified with the feeling that we share the pleasure and the re\u00ac \nmembrance with another. \n\nThis suggests what may be described as the highest state of consciousness \nattainable by man, the state which in mystical treatises is called Union, when \n\u201cthis corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall have put \non immortality\u201d. The true occultism teaches the art of sharing the conscious\u00ac \nness of the Masters, of participating in their experience and their memory. In \nevery religion, there have been those who attained some degree of perfection in \nthis art. Thus the follower of Osiris in ancient Egypt became the \u201cOsirified\u201d; \nthus the bhakti yoga of India united the devotee with the Lord Krishna or with \nsome other manifestation of the Supreme, and the Christian saints have par\u00ac \nticipated in the Agony and Passion of the Master Christ. \n\nMany students of Theosophy have pledged themselves to work for the preser\u00ac \nvation of chSlaship as a living fact in the world. Reflecting upon the gifts of \nthe Lodge to The Theosophical Society since its inception, some students would \nconsider it disgraceful to believe that what has been possible for others is im\u00ac \npossible for them. \n\n\nFRAGMENTS \n\n\nT O THE disciple there is but one way in which any action, even the \nmost insignificant, can be performed, and that is the Master\u2019s way. \nEvery motion, every word, every thought, must be cast in this mould, \nand bear the stamp of its exalted origin and pattern. Thus the disciple\u2019s life \nbecomes a sanctified life, and all that he breathes or touches bears his Master\u2019s \nseal. \n\nYet for each of his children the Master will have a special way, since each \nwill represent a particular colour of the spectrum in the group to which the \nMaster has seen fit to assign him. Therefore the disciple will never demand \nthat his way must be followed by others, for, if so blind as to make the attempt, \nhe may find that he has been contravening the Master\u2019s will, and become a \nforce of disruption, not of cohesion. \n\nWhat he must look for, and insist upon finding, in his brother\u2019s way, is the \nMaster\u2019s hall-mark. If this be discovered he will rest content, however dif\u00ac \nferent in expression that way may appear from his own. Without that hall\u00ac \nmark, however, no course of procedure, no postulate of life, will any disciple \nendure or condone, since to do so would involve the infraction of fundamental \nspiritual principle; and such tolerance is no real tolerance, but moral laxity and \nlicense, and destroys the integrity of the soul. \n\n\nHumility is a fundamental of discipleship, since without it all other virtues \nare spurious. No virtue is so little understood, and its psychic counterfeits \nmore often seen than the reality. A genuine humility does not create weakl^gs, \nnor impair true dignity. It represents a detachment and impersonality so com\u00ac \nplete, that the disciple\u2019s stature is raised, not lowered. By it he is set apart \nfrom other men because so ennobled above them. Humility transfigures. It \nalone can make a man sublime. \n\n\nNo day has been lived as by a disciple, unless at its close there is some sacri- \n\n277 \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n278 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nfice that can be offered, as the result of which that much of self has been lost, \nand that much of the Master acquired. \n\n\nWhen the disciple receives a grace he imparts it. If it be not imparted, by \nhis mere presence, it has never really been received. The light has been shed \nupon him. but he has failed to become incandescent. \n\n\nWhen the day is ending, its work completed, and the mind and body are \nweary, fold the hands, close the eyes, turn inward. In every heart there is a \nlittle wicket gate,\u2014open it, pass through. It is another world. An atmosphere \nof quiet pervades it which is full of healing. When you have bathed in it for a \nspace, the cares and the griefs slip off and melt away in the shadows. There is \na path leading on through the fragrant coolness. It winds and turns. Some one \nis waiting beyond there. With a prayer on your lips, go on. Perhaps, 0 heart, \nperhaps you will meet Him! \n\n\nCav\u00a3. \n\n\n\n\nLIVING PICTURES \n\n\nI F YOU think you can jump a fence, you may fail when you try. But if \nyou are convinced you cannot jump it, you will certainly fail. Indeed you \nwill not even try. You may, of course, be shamed into something you would \nlike to have look like trying. You may run at it with a grim face, but at the \nlast moment you will balk, or at best make a feeble little spring that does not \nemploy any appreciable fraction of your real muscular power,\u2014and this though, \nin feet and inches, the fence be lower than many others you jump with ease. \nDominated by the notion that it is too high for you, you cannot \u201csee yourself\u201d \nclearing it, and in the absence of such a picture, you have no chart for the re\u00ac \nquired action. With the exception of the automatic jerkings that are the merely \nmechanical reaction of our nerves to external stimuli, we never act save upon \nsome previously conceived, or perceived, picture of the act; and if anything \nprohibits the formation of the picture, the act itself becomes impossible. A \nlack of confidence can thus paralyze your powers by first paralyzing your im\u00ac \nagination. But, as here, it can go further, and instead of merely immobilizing \nyour imagination, it may mobilize it against you. In place of a picture that \nyou wish your jump to fulfil, your mental conviction that it is impossible con\u00ac \njures up a horrid presentment of your tripping on the top bar, and plunging \nheadlong into whatever lies beyond,\u2014a picture which you definitely do not \nwish to fill, and which therefore reduces your jump to what may be counted \nupon not to fill it, but to leave you safe on the near side. You fail because your \nimagination betrays you, supplying pictures to your fears and not to your will. \n\nFrom this we may record the following general observation: Our purposes \nand desires are brought to material fulfilment only through the intermediary \nof immaterial pictures, and if the right pictures be not supplied, the right actions \nwill not be performed. \n\nThere is more than this, however, which it should profit us to note. Whether \nyou took your fence, or, balking at it, found some break through which you \ncrawled, the incident is not over with the mere material fact. It remains with \nyou as an immaterial picture, which you now call, not imagination, but memory. \nIf you took the fence gallantly in your stride, the memory is pleasing. If you \nfunked it, the picture is not pleasing, but so painfully at variance with the way \nin which you wish to see yourself, so unassimilable to your self-esteem, that mi \nfeel something must be done about it. If you have the courage to look atf^e \npicture squarely, you may see what ought to be done, and set your will to its \ndoing thereafter. But as your fears captured your imagination before, so may \nthey again,\u2014though now their concern is for your vanity. If so, you will, meta\u00ac \nphorically, again seek a hole through which to crawl. After one sidelong, pro\u00ac \ntesting glance at the record as it stands, you will look away; and while your \nback is thus ostentatiously turned, your imagination feverishly smudges the \n\n\n279 \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n28 o \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\noutlines and redraws and embroiders the picture, until its ugliness is overlaid \nand concealed. The fence is sketched so high that, obviously, no one could have \njumped it,\u2014quite justifying your original conviction, and showing ^ hat the \nreal problem was to find just such a break in the barrier as you, very ^leverly, \ndiscovered. Or you \u201cremember\u201d that, as you were about to spring, your foot \nslipped and your ankle turned,\u2014indeed, when you think about it, it is still \npainful, and you may even limp a little. Or, etc., etc. By one subterfuge or \nanother, the picture is made bearable, and thereafter, consciously or uncon\u00ac \nsciously, your effort is to accept the revised version as true. The worst of it is \nthat you may succeed, at least in part. \n\nIf you do succeed, a long line of most undesirable consequences will be en\u00ac \ntailed, with only one of which, however, do we need to concern ourselves imme\u00ac \ndiately. Refusing to face your failure at the fence, fleeing from fact to fiction, \nwhatever lesson of self-knowledge it might have taught you will not have been \nlearned, and you will, instead, have both deepened your self-deception and \ncorrupted your will to its defence. \n\nFrom this we may draw a second general observation, to put alongside the \nfirst: Our actions can yield us self-knowledge, and material events can be dis\u00ac \ntilled into the wisdom of experience, only through the intermediary of imma\u00ac \nterial pictures; and if the pictures be spurious, they entrench us in error. \n\nThese two observations together indicate the course followed by our actions. \nFrom whatever inner centre they originate\u2014whether in duty, or reason, or de\u00ac \nsire\u2014they pass outward through a surrounding belt or zone of pictures, which \nboth separates these inner centres from, and connects them with, the outer \nphysical world. In this picture-zone is formed the model which the physical \naction is to copy. And this copy, perfect or imperfect, as it has been impressed \nupon the outer world by the act, is reflected back, with its results and conse\u00ac \nquences, into the picture-zone, serving as the carrier through which the harvest \nof the act is returned to the centre that initiated it. The picture-zone, through \nwhich our actions thus make a double passage, is part of what, in theosophical \nliterature, has been called the \u201castral\u201d plane, the name simply meaning starry, \nor self-luminous. This points to the characteristic ability of the pictures, not \nmerely to reflect what they represent, but actually to embody it, so that they \nare truly \u201cliving pictures\u201d, luminous from within, as are the stars and sun, and \nnot merely shining with borrowed light, as does the moon. And as the light of \nthe sun is fraught with the energies of heat, and subtile, quickening forces, which \nwork upon all that its rays touch, so the light from each of these astral images, \nbearing the contagion of its inhabiting life, affects all upon which it falls. The \nmost cursory glance at our daily experience is sufficient to show the tremendous \npower\u2014too often virulent\u2014of this astral contagion. \n\n\u201cInjuries\u201d, cried Bishop Joseph Hall three hundred years ago, \u201churt not \nmore in the receiving than in the remembrance. A small injury shall go as it \ncomes; a great injury may dine or sup with me; but none at all shall lodge with \nme. Why should I vex myself because another hath vexed me? Grief for things \npast that cannot be remedied, and care for things to come that cannot be pre- \n\n\nLIVING PICTURES \n\n\n281 \n\n\nvented, may easily hurt, can never benefit me. I will therefore commit myself \nto God in both, and enjoy the present.\u201d \n\nWhi 1 of us, making that resolve, has not, again and again, met defeat in it, \nas grie. and care pressed upon him, and the light of the astral images incarnat\u00ac \ning them, shone through his closed eyelids? Or which of us has not found, as \nSocrates warned Xenophon, that the images of desire are more formidable than \ntarantulas? For the tarantula can bite only on contact, whereas the distant \nvision of such images, the mere light that shines from them, may be sufficient \nto instil their poison and deprive men of their senses. If we are to be the masters \nof our own actions, therefore, and understand, as we should, the forces which \nconstantly contend against us for that mastery, we shall do well to consider \nhow we deal with the pictures and forces of the astral plane. \n\nTo make our inquiry specific we may continue to use the regrettable incident \nat the fence, and note, first, the part played in it by the desire to \u201csave face\u201d,\u2014 \nthat is, the desire to preserve intact the face, or picture, which we present to \nothers and which we wish to believe ourselves. The more closely we examine \nit, the more apparent it becomes that the chief cohesive force, which holds \ntogether the bundle of contradictions that make up our lower nature, is this \npicture of ourselves which our wishful thinking creates. So long as we iden\u00ac \ntify ourselves with our lower nature, anything which threatens it, appears to \nthreaten us; and therefore in this part of our being\u2014the part that is native to \nthe lower astral plane\u2014the desire to preserve our picture of ourselves corre\u00ac \nsponds to, and is as strong and as instinctive as the animal instinct of self- \npreservation. We can recognize the operation of both of these instincts in the \nincident before us. It is through the first that one can be \u201cshamed\u201d into pre\u00ac \ntence\u2014into running at the fence to avoid confessing unwillingness to attempt it \nand the belief that it is beyond one\u2019s powers. And it is the second that causes \none to balk at the last moment, when faced with the picture of physical disaster. \n\nVery clearly, also, it was the desire to \u201csave face\u201d in one\u2019s own eyes, that led \nto the pretence and falsification of memory which marked the second phase of \nthe incident. As in the first phase, the pretence was dictated by fear,\u2014not \nfear of the facts, which were beyond change and which there was no attempt to \nsupplement, but fear of the picture of the facts, lest, if it were admitted to con\u00ac \nsciousness, it should shatter with its incongruity the astral image which \nself-esteem had formed and which held your sense of self-identity. It seen \nstrange paradox that any stratum of our human nature should prefer to \nagain and again in the same way, rather than to admit to itself that it had ever \nfailed in that way\u2014prefer to descend anew to cowardice and deceit, rather than \nto acknowledge that it had once been afraid. Yet we find it illustrated every \nday; and the reason for it is that our actions in the physical world, as we have \nnoted, can bear their harvest back to consciousness only by traversing the \nastral zone, and only through the medium of astral images. To that part of a \nman\u2019s nature, therefore, which, like his vanity, is concerned chiefly with the \nimpact of such images upon his picture of himself, the physical facts seem of \nrery minor importance in comparison with their reflections,, and it seems easy \n\n\nyojlfc \n\n;o fail \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n282 THEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\nto believe that, if only the pictures can be shut out or made harmless, the facts \ncan be safely ignored. \n\nWe have come to a point where we must change the form of our discourse. We \nare no longer willing to refer to the depraved object we are dissecting, as \u201cyou\u2019 . \nNor are we willing to cover it with a collective \u201cwe\u201d. It is neither \u201cyou\u201d nor \n\u201cI\u201d, neither your real self nor mine, and it is more than time that this should be \nrecognized. It is something other than either of us; it is an \u201cit\u201d. Indeed it is not \neven an \u201cit\u201d, it is a \u201cthey\u201d,\u2014a congeries of astral images, inhabited and animated \nby elemental impulses and desires and the raw stuff of the qualities of nature, all \nheld together, despite their internecine warfare, by the use you have made and \ncontinue to make of them, by your extending to them your sense of self-identifi\u00ac \ncation and including them in the astral picture you have made of yourself. It \nmay seem strange to say this, when we have seen how desperately a man may \nstruggle to exclude from that picture everything he thinks shameful. But his \nvery effort to exclude it, testifies to his awareness of its presence. His denials \nnever wholly convince him; his self-deception is never complete; and in resort\u00ac \ning to it he renews and engraves more deeply the very lines of shame he wishes \nto erase. What they depict is, truly, not himself, save as he has made it him\u00ac \nself by using it. But having used it, he must answer for it. All that we employ \nin our service dons our livery; and we are in pawn to our servants until their \nwages are paid. As the folk-lore of all races has recorded, there is but one bar\u00ac \ngain that the devil will make with man. Evil will work for him only in return \nfor the pledge of his soul. Its wage is the extension to it of man\u2019s own sense of \nself. Man cannot lie and seek refuge in pretence, without being forced, sooner \nor later, to see himself as a liar and a cheat. It is against this that he fights as \nlong as he can; but in it is his salvation. For when he sees and owns himself \ncheat and liar, in that act he ceases to lie and cheat. In it he pays the devil \nhis wage, and can dismiss and be free of him. He loses his life\u2014the picture he \nhas treasured of it lies in shattered fragments\u2014but in the loss of the false he \nfinds the way to the true. The bundle of incongruities, no longer held together \nby his will, falls apart; and from its contents he may choose anew what he will \nretain. \n\nWe are not wise, therefore, in struggling, as we so often do, to postpone pay\u00ac \nment of whatever may be the devil\u2019s bill against us. It is far better to pay as \nwe go. Wherever we fail, there we need the lessons which an honest fronting \nof our failure should teach us, and which we miss when we try to blind ourselves \nto it. We shall not reach our goal by trying to persuade ourselves that we are \nalready there; nor improve, by insisting that we have nothing to correct. As \nthe roots of a tree draw from the mulch of its own fallen leaves, so man\u2019s most \nvigorous growth springs from a soil fertilized with the purified purgations of \nhis failures. \n\nSo much for the part played by the desire to \u201csave face\u201d. But the self- \nreference and self-picturing which underlies it, entered into the incident at the \nfence in yet another way. We noted that our hero (we must call him some\u00ac \nthing) could not \u201csee himself\u201d clearing it. That, then, had been his effort\u2014as \n\n\nLIVING PICTURES \n\n\n283 \n\nit is so common and unfortunate a habit, in men\u2019s undertakings, for them to \nvisualize themselves as the actor, rather than to view impersonally the action \nto be performed. They try to look at several things at once, instead of at only \none, and in consequence what they do is not clean cut, nor directed to a single \nend, but is at best a compromise between different, and not infrequently dia\u00ac \nmetrically divergent, aims. So here, the man tried to look (1) to his habitual \npicture of himself and his powers; and (2) to the action which the jump required; \nand (3) to his own safety. This was only prudent of him, if no duty necessi\u00ac \ntated the jump and no decision regarding it had been made. It was but prudent, \ntoo, that judging these pictures incompatible, he should be loth to attempt the \nleap. But once it had been decided upon, his whole attention should have been \nfocussed upon the action demanded, leaving no room for anything else. \nInstead, he continued to look at his pictures of himself, and in the resulting \ndivision and diversion of his will, his action was reduced to mere futility or pre\u00ac \ntence. The factor which became dominant, was, as we saw, his instinct of self- \npreservation. But even where no question of personal safety is involved, any \nthought of oneself, any self-consciousness bringing before our inner eyes a pic\u00ac \nture of self with its familiar characteristics, aptitudes and limitations, must \ninevitably hamper us in situations foreign to our habitual routine. For such \npictures are moulds which our actions tend automatically to fill, and which \ntherefore restrict the flexibility and freedom of our powers, inhibiting the evoca\u00ac \ntion of latent abilities, and confining both imagination and action to the bounds \nwhich custom has made familiar. Many a man has been held all his life in this \nhypnosis to the mediocrity of his past, until overwhelming need, in some sharp \ncrisis, released him from it, and he found, to his own later amazement, how \nsimply and easily he had done what he would have declared wholly beyond him. \n\nWe are too deeply immersed in \u201cthe great heresy of separateness\u201d. The uni\u00ac \nverse is one. Life is one. As has been quoted in these pages again and again, but \ncannot be too constantly emphasized, \u201cthere is no bar or wall where man, the \neffect, ceases, and God, the cause, begins\u201d. No picture of ourselves can be com\u00ac \nplete, or true, therefore, which does not in some way include or foreshadow the \nwhole spiritual hierarchy, rising in endless rank upon rank to the Supreme. Man \nis not separated from the Whole; and all the powers of the divine, as well as of the \nhuman nature lie before us, for us to take what we can. What we did yesterday, \nwe did with yesterday\u2019s abilities. What we are to do to-day is for the as yet \nunplumbed capacities that may to-day be ours. We pray for daily bread. Why \nshould we constantly content ourselves with the stale and mouldy leaving* \nof the past,\u2014look only into our scanty cupboards, and not to the infinite grana^ \nof which we have been made free? Or why should we think, when we have \nfilled the little cup we bring, that that is all there is for us? Are there no larger \nvessels we can offer to be filled ? Or can we not come anew as often as we have \nneed? \n\nLet us cease to look at the little man weighed down, before his fence, with \nthe burden of \u201chuman respect\u201d and the sense of his inadequacy to his little \ntasks, fearing the opinion of others, fearing his opinion of himself, fearing for \n\n\n\n\n\n\n284 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nhis \u201cface\u201d and for his neck, crawling through holes, pretending, cheating, futile. \nLet us look to a wide stage, and to a superb, heroic figure, and see that he be\u00ac \ncame such, and carried through one of the most audacious achievements which \nhistory records, only through being freed from the pictures of himself as actor, \nwhich first came before his mind and held him back. The details of the pro\u00ac \ncedure are instructive. \n\nNow when Pharaoh heard this thing, he sought to slay Moses. But Moses fled from \nthe face of Pharaoh, and dwelt in the land of Midian. . . . And the Angel of the Lord ap\u00ac \npeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush. . . . And Moses hid his face; \nfor he was afraid to look upon God. And the Lord said, 1 have surely seen the affliction \nof my people which are in Egypt; ... for I know their sorrows. . . . Come now, therefore, \nand I will send thee unto Pharaoh, that thou mayest bring forth my people, the chil\u00ac \ndren of Israel, out of Egypt. \n\nAnd Moses said unto God, Who am I, that I should go unto Pharaoh, and that I should \nbring forth the children of Israel out of Egypt? \n\nIt must be granted that Moses had grounds for his question. If ever there \nwere incompatible pictures of the actions to be performed and the actor to per\u00ac \nform them, they are presented to us here. Moses, the detected murderer, self- \nbanished from the land, in flight from the king\u2019s justice and anger, is to return \nand stand before him, and wrest from him the release of the large body of la\u00ac \nbourers and skilled artisans engaged upon the royal works. And looking to \nthe other side of his task, to the people whom he was to make leave their homes \nand livelihood, and follow him out of the country, neither he nor they know\u00ac \ning where\u2014had he not been most pointedly asked who had made him a prince \nand judge over them? What was he to say to them? And the Lord answered: \n\nCertainly I will be with thee. . . . Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, The \nLord God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, \nhath sent me unto you. . . . And they shall hearken to thy voice; and thou shalt come, thou \nand the leaders of Israel, unto the king of Egypt, and ye shall say unto him, The Lord \nGod of the Hebrews hath met with us; and now let us go (we beseech thee). . . . And I am \nsure that the king of Egypt will not let you go, no, not by a mighty hand. And I will \nstretch out my hand and smite Egypt with all my wonders, . . . and after that he will \nlet you go. \n\nThis was better. He was not to be the actor, after all. And as for Pharaoh\u2014 \nto whom, even when he was persona grata at Court, protected by the favour of \nthe Princess, he would never have dared to suggest any change in a royal edict \n\u2014he was not expected to succeed with him. The plan assumed that he would \nfail; and then God himself\u2014the same God that was speaking to him\u2014would \ntake over the failure and make it a success. That part of it seemed all right; \nGod, and not he, being responsible for the result. But as for the Hebrews, he \nstill could not \u201csee himself\u201d convincing them; they would not believe that the \nLord had appeared to him. The Lord has, therefore, to assure Moses that this, \nalso, is provided for, and that evidence will be produced to assure credence. \nBut Moses is still unsatisfied. He still sees himself incongruous with his r 61 e. \nHe has to talk, both to Pharaoh and to the Hebrews, as he has never talked in \nhis life. \n\n\nLIVING PICTURES \n\n\n285 \n\n\nAnd Moses said unto the Lord, O my Lord, I am not eloquent, neither heretofore, nor \nsince thou hast spoken unto thy servant; but I am slow of speech, and of a slow tongue. \n\nAnd the Lord said unto him, Who hath made man\u2019s mouth?. . . Now therefore go, and \nI will be with thy mouth, and teach thee what thou shalt say. \n\nThat ought to have been enough. One by one, the Lord has answered each \nof Moses\u2019s objections, assumed responsibility and taken over the action, so that \nMoses\u2019s pictures of himself have no longer any pertinence. Moses would have \ndone better to acknowledge this, and dismissing his hesitancies then and there, \nto have given himself wholeheartedly to carrying out the plan. But there still \nclings to him the last fear our human nature is able to dispel, the haunting \ndread that though Divine Omnipotence control all else, we ourselves may con\u00ac \ntrive to defeat it, and God\u2019s plan fail because we fail God. \n\nAnd the anger of the Lord was kindled against Moses, and he said, Is not Aaron the \nLevite thy brother? I know that he can speak well. And also behold he cometh forth \nto meet thee: and when he seeth thee, he will be glad in his heart. And thou shalt speak \nunto him, and put words in his mouth: and I will be with thy mouth, and with his mouth, \nand will teach you what ye shall do. And he shall be thy spokesman unto the people, \n. . . and be to thee instead of a mouth, and thou shalt be to him instead of God. And \nMoses went. \n\n\nHe might, as we suggested, have done better had he gone earlier. But we \nshould be the poorer, in the lack of a perfect pattern of how to deal with our \nlast fears when we face a task that seems too great for us. When we have taken \neach doubt to Him who speaks to us from the Burning Bush and whose voice \nappoints our undertakings, and have listened to His answers and have seen that \nit is with His power, and not our own, that the work is to be done, then if there \nremain some point where self still intrudes, and we fear that there we shall fail \nand betray Him, we may call a comrade to our aid. Have we not, also, some \nbrother, who, the Lord knows, \u201cspeaks well\u201d where we are \u201cof a slow tongue\u201d, \nand whose heart will be glad to go with us as our spokesman, to say the thing \nthe Lord commands us? \n\nNote now how changed are the pictures at which we look. Three stages have \nbeen indicated. First, where the pictures of self are so dominant as to inhibit \nall action that is incompatible with them. Second, where, as sometimes in a \ncrisis, these pictures are all swept away, and the outer need alone is se^| \nand the man acts swiftly and unconsciously to meet it directly. And third, \nstage to which Moses now comes, the stage that leads to ch\u00a3laship. There, \nbeyond and within the outer need, the man sees the movement of Divine Powers \nresponding to it. The pictures of self grow dim, as the pictures of the Heavenly \nHierarchy grow clearer and stronger, until at last, in ch\u00a3laship itself, it is to the \nMaster alone that the ch\u00a3la looks. Though he fights, not he bttt the Master is \nthe Warrior. Through him, no longer blocked or hampered by the crystalliza\u00ac \ntions of self, the Master\u2019s will is done, and the power of God works the wisdom \nof God. I live, wrote Paul, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me. Christos theou \n\nt namis theou sophia. No great or lasting work was ever done by any man in \ny other way, but only as he looks beyond his separate self to something he \n\n\n\n286 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nsees as greater than himself, and of which he makes himself the instrument. \nAnd this is true whether the results of the work be good or ill. For what man \ndoes of his separate, mortal self, must partake of his separateness and mortality. \nThe lie that he tells, he must himself support; and when the burden grows too \ngreat and crushes him, his works fall with him. But where he tells the truth, \ntestifying \u201cnot of himself\u201d but \u201cof the Father\u201d, the Truth itself upholds his \ntestimony. Though you crucify him, his word remains untouched. \n\nThe reversal between the first and third of these stages is therefore complete. \nInstead of futility has come efficiency. Instead of absorption in self, and the \nbundle of irreconcilables that the man has, by main force, held together as him\u00ac \nself, his eyes have opened upon the Hierarchy and brotherhood of the Spirit, \nand he has let his bundle fall apart. Instead of fear of himself and of others, \nhave come faith in the divine powers of the universe, and trust in his comrades. \nWhere he sought to enlist familiar demons in his service, pledging them his soul \nin payment, and clothing them in his livery, he now seeks to enlist himself in \nthe service of the Great Lodge, and, as his wage, something of the Masters\u2019 \nspirit is extended to him. Little by little, these new pictures, which he holds \nbefore him and upon which he acts, flood his aura with their living light. Little \nby little, there gather and may be seen around him the colours of his Master\u2019s \nlivery. \n\nIt is worth while to look back to how this transformation was achieved, and \nto see that the laws which can govern the tumultuous forces and images of the \nastral plane, are the mechanical parallels of the spiritual and ethical principles \nthat all religions teach. Humility, honesty, courage, purity of mind and heart \nand singleness of aim, forgetfulness of self in love of another or in devotion to a \ncause,\u2014they are all easily traceable in their astral effects. The humble man, \n\u201cthe poor in spirit\u201d, is not troubled by the need to \u201csave face\u201d. He is not thrown \ninto a panic by the thought that some imperfection may be discovered in his \ncharacter, nor are his pictures of himself such that he wishes to spend his time \ncontemplating them. Where there is singleness of aim, there is no crowding of \nconflicting images, all striving to clothe themselves in the same act. So with \nall the other virtues; they can be known by their fruits. \n\nAs the forms of all physical things are astral forms, it is equally true that \nthe mechanics of the astral plane parallels that of the physical plane, thus, like \nthe plane itself, furnishing a link between the spiritual and the physical; and it \nmay be that the astral phenomena we have been considering may be clarified \nby comparison with the corresponding physical phenomena exhibited in \noptics by refraction and reflection, the interference of light waves, and the super\u00ac \nposition of images. It is interesting that, whereas the ethical parallel serves \nbest to show how the astral images may be purified and the astral forces co\u00ac \nordinated to smoother action, it is the physical parallels that best explain their \nconfused conflicts and deceptiveness. \n\nWe noted at the outset that, corresponding to the double passage of each of \nour acts through the astral plane, astral images are formed in two different \nways: first, by the direct projection of the act\u2019s purpose, as it presses outward \n\n\nLIVING PICTURES \n\n\n287 \n\n\nto material fulfilment; and, second, by reflection back from whatever expres\u00ac \nsion it attains. Both sets of pictures are, as we saw, subject to distortion, \ncontradiction, and even suppression and erasure, by the impact and dom\u00ac \nination of conflicting pictures. But in the one set the distortion may be likened \nto the foreshortening and elongation, the displacement and interference of \nimages, which may be caused by refraction, while in the other set both refrac\u00ac \ntion and reflection are operative. It is characteristic of reflection that it always \nproduces a reversal, either, as in a vertical mirror, turning right into left, or, as \nin the horizontal surface of a pool, showing the picture upside down. It is by \nno means easy, in looking at an astral image, to know how it was formed, and, \nin consequence, there is often no knowing how it should be interpreted. Dreams, \nthe proverb should read, may go by contraries; but whether they do or not, we \nusually cannot tell. Assuming there were no other distortion, the interpreta\u00ac \ntion would depend upon whether the reflection were from an odd or an even \nnumber of surfaces, and upon how these surfaces were placed. We hold a \nprinted page before a mirror, and the reversal from right to left makes it il\u00ac \nlegible. But use two mirrors and it can again be read. Thus the introduction \nof another reflecting element may alter the whole picture; and a further source \nof difficulty is that, whereas a right and left reversal might be likened to a mere \nchange in emphasis, the turning a thing upside down may make it the direct \ncontrary to what it was. In addition to all else, no two reflecting surfaces, if they \nbe living surfaces, ever yield exactly the same picture. \n\nA dog, for example, sees himself very differently when he looks at his master \nand when he looks at a cat. Let us suppose that, as in a child\u2019s primer, a caption \nhad to accompany each of our pictures. One might read: \u201cA boy takes a dog \non a chain for a run\u201d. The dog spies a cat. The caption must be reversed:\u2018\u2018A \ndog takes a boy on a chain for a run\u201d. But if the cat were out of the range \nof the camera, a snap shot of the one scene might well be taken for the other,\u2014 \nthough to both dog and boy the significant content of the picture has been \nstartlingly altered by the change in emphasis. Or consider how essential it is to \ngraciousness that it should not be self-conscious. The moment a man sees him\u00ac \nself as gracious he ceases to be so, but becomes its opposite, and his act, instead \nof being welcomed, is resented. The content of the picture has been tiuyd \nupside down by its reflection, though, to the casual observer, the opposites ri^ht \nappear outwardly much the same. \n\nBut perhaps, of all the sources of confusion, the most prolific is the super\u00ac \nposition of images, particularly in the combining of direct and reflected images \nto form one composite picture. It is thus that glamour arises and deceives us, \nthe inner light of desire being projected upon some outer object, in which it \ncannot incarnate, but to which the light is thereafter attributed. Which of us \ndoes not know that deceitful composite, and the bitterness of disillusionment \nwhen it is resolved,\u2014when, after long striving, we have attained our craved- \n^for goal, only to find ourselves in the dead valleys and airless mountains of the \n^moon, with the sun as far distant as before? \n\nYet in little and in big we are always making such composite pictures. In- \n\n\n288 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\ndeed, it is the only way that anything is ever made. As Mr. Johnston used to \nquote to us, Maya is the one Shakti of Atma; and The Secret Doctrine makes \nclear that it is from the Chhaya , the images created and left by the past, that the \nvehicle is fashioned for the incarnation of the new. If we watch the formation \nof the astral images, we see that there is always this combination of solar and \nlunar elements: hope and purpose moving to a future end, and drawing, from \nthe memories of former efforts, the elements which, remoulded and recombined, \nmay serve as means. It is the one universal process of creation and incarnation, \nand by it man does all his works. But by it, too, he has wrought, again and again, \nhis own undoing; and it permits him to create pictures that are most astounding \ncomposites in their contradictions. The astral plane is full of them, for there \nman creates what he wills. It is there, in consequence, that he is in greatest \nperil. Fortunately for him, in the physical world his freedom is checked and \noverruled by the unyielding and ineradicable integrity of nature, that will suffer \nno violation of divine law, and which, sooner or later, dooms to death whatever \ndoes not conform to it. \n\nHere we may see why it is that college professors and other theorists often \nmake the most dangerous guides, not only in social and moral affairs, but in all \ndepartments of conduct and government. They have habituated themselves to \ndealing exclusively with astral images, instead of with physical realities; with \nabstract groupings and generalities instead of with concrete individuals; and \ninstead of moving vertically through the astral plane, from inspiration to physi\u00ac \ncal action, and from physical results back to increased wisdom of experience and \nrenewed inspiration, their thought moves horizontally along the picture-zone, \nnever escaping from it, and in consequence never encountering any corrective \nto their imaginative entities and assumptions. No small part of the peril and \nmisery of the world to-day is due to this. Labour, Capital, Class Consciousness, \nSocial Security, Collective Bargaining, Aryan, Democracy, Woman\u2019s Rights, \nSelf-Determination,\u2014who knows what concrete realities correspond to these \nwords, or to a hundred others, which are dinned ceaselessly in our ears? What \nare their astral images? How many self-contradictions do they exhibit? How \nmuch of glamour? From how many and from what kind of reflecting surfaces \nhave they come to us? And are they to be interpreted directly or by contraries? \nThe world is in process of finding out; but may have to discover, too, how ex\u00ac \nplosive certain composites may be. \n\nLet us think of a great room, filled with glowing, flashing shapes of glass, of \nevery imaginable form and colour, beautiful and horrible, fascinating and ter\u00ac \nrifying. Some of these shapes, when we lift them, are heavy; and we then \nnotice that these are filled with clear water. Others are light, and empty. \nThese flashing, glowing moulds, whether filled or empty, might be likened to \nastral forms, and the water, which some contain, to physical matter. It might \nbe very difficult to tell, just by looking at them, which forms were filled. But \nhowever much these might differ among themselves, in shape and size and \ncolour, and all the rich variety of nature, the filled forms would all have one \ncommon property, of which we could be sure, even without looking. They \n\n\nLIVING PICTURES \n\n\n289 \n\n\nwould all be such as to \u201chold water\u201d. That self-consistency, we may thank the \nHigh Gods, is the indispensable requisite for physical life. The physical world \nwill fill no bottomless forms, none whose opposite sides do not join, none in \nwhich wide gaps are left. \n\nIt is fatally easy to compose fancy pictures of what we should like to have \ntrue. We can lie back in our chair, and from the angel of Rheims or a statue of \nSt. Michael we can take the wings, and affix them, in imagination, to our own \nshoulders. We can see ourselves with a gleaming sword in our hand, and a \nCrusader\u2019s cross upon our breast,\u2014in all, a noble picture of a soldier in the \narmy of heaven, enlisted for the overthrow of all human ills and the heralding \n\nof a new era. But next morning, at breakfast-? And when we lift our \n\nphysical hand and feel our physical shoulder-blades, they are still of bone, and \nnot of feathers, and their only resemblance to wings is due, not to our nobility, \nbut to our not standing straight. \n\nThe astral plane gives us no short cut to our goal; and perhaps there is noth\u00ac \ning in physical life for which we have deeper cause for gratitude, than for the \nunyielding \u201cNo\u201d which it opposes to the astral\u2019s facile \u201cYes\u201d. \n\nEvery day and every moment of the day we have to deal with the forces and \nthe pictures of the astral plane; and few things can be more important for us \nthan to learn so to deal with them that we shall control, and not be controlled \nby them, and shall create such as will help and not hinder the Masters\u2019 work \nand our own growth and sanity. But this control is not, and cannot be, exer\u00ac \ncised from within the plane, but only from above or below it,\u2014from above, \nwhere our actions should have their origin, through our adherence to those \nspiritual and ethical principles which, as we saw, reach down into the astral \ndynamics; and from below, in the physical world, from which the results of our \nacts are reflected, by paying more heed to order and punctuality and finish in \nour work, making it better and more faithful. As The Voice of the Silence warns \nus, our business with the astral plane is to pass through it to what lies beyond, \nnot to linger or wander in it; and no student of Theosophy can afford to ignore \nthis warning. \n\nH. B. Mitchell. \n\n\nThe world is a mirror of infinite beauty , yet no man sees it. It is a Temple of \nMajesty , yet no man regards it. It is a region of Light and Peace , did not men \ndisquiet it. It is the Paradise of God .\u2014 Thomas Traherne. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nREFLECTING ON A NEIGHBOUR \n\n\nROM the base of the cliff, a thousand feet below, the water stretches \n\n\n\naway, vast, unruffled, \u201can everywhere of silver\u201d, to its far-distant blend- \n\n\ning with opalescent sky. Daisies carpet the ground about me\u2014not \nhere and there a clump, seeking, unwelcome, to gain a doubtful foothold, but \na far-flung glory of them, petal to petal, till the fields are white with bloom, \nand a white in which all the rainbow tints seem delicately veiled. For hours \nwe have driven through them, alternating here and there with a field equally \nbrimful of buttercups, or the paler yellow of wild mustard, reflecting back the \nsun\u2019s rays in a mantle of dazzling brightness. Behind me the spruce forest \nrises sharply,\u2014the front ranks of an inland wilderness known only to the hunter \nor the woodsman. In the stillness of the late afternoon, the slender, pointed \ntrees seem standing at attention, in hushed expectancy,\u2014perhaps awaiting, \nlike sentinels, that change of angel guardians which the poet tells us comes at \nclose of day. \n\nIt is a land suggestive of permanence, this little comer of French Canada. \nThe St. Lawrence is one of the most ancient of rivers, and the massive \npromontories at its mouth, their rock cliffs stained purple and green and deep \nred, have battled the ocean surges since the beginnings of time. As the sun \nsinks toward the far horizon, its light changing slowly through faint pink to a \ndeep rose glow that fills the vast depths of space till it seems almost palpable, \none has a sense of the long aeons through which that majesty has been reflected \nback in exactly the same way by the green-clad hills with their wine-coloured \nsoil and their unexpected misty waterfalls. Doubtless even the attenuated \nheron standing in the shallows (or at any rate innumerable past incarnations \nof him), has always meditated on one leg in just that way, as he waited for the \nreceding tide to uncover a bit of sand. \n\nHow the bigness of Nature dwarfs the concerns of our little selfhood! Mo\u00ac \nmentarily at least, the struggle of life, the baffling obstacles, the blows which \nseem so crushing, are seen for what they really are\u2014little graded lessons set a \nchild; each requiring all his powers; each developing in him new powers (if he \nwills it so) with which to meet the next bigger task, one step nearer to the \nmeasure of a man. Our own natures, too, are so much more spacious than we \nrealize. So much of our life is spent in two small lower rooms, drably furnished, \n\u2014one with our interests, our pleasures, likes and ambitions, the other with our \nconcerns, worries, dislikes and difficulties. While, if we will but learn the way \nwe can step out and up into spacious apartments, and galleries and terraces of \nrare delight and inimitable prospect. But\u2014 \n\n\nHis table\u2019s spread too high for us \nUnless we dine on tip-toe. \n\n\n290 \n\n\n\nREFLECTING ON A NEIGHBOUR \n\n\n291 \n\n\nAlong the water\u2019s edge, by the road linking the scattered fringe of fisher \nhamlets, a bullock cart plods slowly homeward, mute evidence that life as well as \nlandscape here is little touched by time. It was on these shores, four centuries \nago, that a handful of sailors from St. Malo landed, and set up \u201ca faire high \nCross of the height of thirty foote ... in the middest whereof we hanged up \na Shield with three Floure de Luces in it, and in the top was carved in the wood \nwith Anticke letters this posie, Vive le Roy de France.\u201d There is constant \nreminder of that event to-day, for an anniversary celebrated in recent years, \ndecorated the highways with the old emblem of the blue shield with its white \nfleur de lys. The \u201cposie\u201d to the French King is gone, and in its stead are in\u00ac \nscriptions to the honour of Jacques Cartier, the Master Pilot who then claimed \nthe land for France. Fisher folk from the Norman and Breton coasts were the \nfirst to come, as many as twelve hundred tiny craft at a time, returning to their \nnative land at the end of each season\u2019s catch. Gradually they took root and \nstayed on, joined at a later date by men from the islands of Jersey and Guernsey. \nFishermen they were in those days and fishermen they are to-day. And you \nwho think of fishing as merely a matter of dropping a line and drawing in a \nwriggling victim, have much to learn. It is an art, and every detail of it, even \nto the way the cod is split and the arrangement of the beach on which the drying \nracks or flakes are placed\u2014all is done to-day as it was done long-ago. \n\nThose who know well the French peasant and his ways would doubtless dis\u00ac \ncover many another point at which manners and customs, qualities and char\u00ac \nacteristics have seen but little change as the centuries passed. Even to the \nuninitiated there are suggestions of it, especially, perhaps, among the old peo\u00ac \nple: the little old woman beside her antiquated, out-door, clay oven; or the old \nmen bending over their nets. It is said that as recently as fifty years or so ago, \nthere were old men and women in remote parts of the province who would greet \na stranger with an inquiry as to the King of France. The characteristic traits \nof a people are elusive, intangible,\u2014the glance of an eye, a certain air of self- \nrespecting independence, a quick responsiveness, a cheerful contentment with \nsmall things. You see it in the family who pour unexpectedly from a lonely \ncabin when your car is in difficulty; at first merely round-eyed with interest, \nbut quick to understand the need, instant in their response, their pleasur^in \nfinding their language understood almost equal to their delight in the |u^l- \nearned pourboire. Or again the line of men enjoying their ease acrossThe \nverandah of the little native inn: idlers? by no means!\u2014they are the entire \nman-power of the hamlet, congregated to lend the innkeeper voluble support \nin answering your question, and then to wave you a gay farewell. You find \nmany evidences of it, of a Sunday morning, when the entire countryside drives \nto Mass, a queue of ten or a dozen ancient, high-wheeled buggies, jogging along \nthe wine-coloured road toward each little town,\u2014the horses built for dignified \nproceeding rather than for speed. Perched on their high seats, Jeanne and \nJacques drive by twos, as they have done since the world began, in stiff Sunday- \nbest, demurely erect, and shyly happy (proof in itself of their remoteness from \n^ir day). Next come the elders, father and mother\u2014and over their shoulders, \n\n\n292 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nso many little pairs of brown eyes, peeping pleasantly, that one marvels as to \nwhat legerdemain squeezed their small owners into so minute a space, and what \nprevents their spilling over with each jerk of the buggy. \n\nBy contrast, the natives of our New Jersey pine belt suggest themselves, with \ntheir look of starved ignorance and stony indifference\u2014or the natives of some \nof our isolated mountain districts where the stranger meets nothing but surli\u00ac \nness or open hostility. These people of \u201cNew France\u201d are equally shut off \nfrom the world, it would seem, perhaps equally acquainted with toil and poverty, \nyet they are alert and alive, their eyes telling of interests and pleasures, con\u00ac \ntentment and good will. Another evidence of a national trait living on, one may \nsay in explanation; it is evidently a difference in animating power, a difference \nin the springs from which they draw sustenance. \n\nPerhaps there is further explanation of it in the frequent reminders of the \ninvisible world, with which they surround themselves. In the early days, Car- \ntier, Champlain and many another of the pioneers planted the cross in places of \nprominence (an island promontory, a mountain top), and to-day, like seed \ncarried by the wind, it has come to bloom in unexpected spots, wherever Canada \nis French,\u2014in the calvaires, the wayside shrines. What treasure there might \nbe in a pilgrimage to these shrines, if the story of each could be known. This \nlittle simple cross, with the well-tended bed of gay flowers at its base\u2014was it \nplaced there by the woman working in the nearby field, a widow\u2019s mite, per\u00ac \nhaps? Here a dead-end road, marked by an up-to-date government with the \ninevitable danger signal, but above it an unusually beautiful crucifix, the \nfigure gleaming white against a cross of black. Who placed that, and what \nheights or depths of experience does it perhaps commemorate? Next a busy \ntown, its central feature a little park of flowers and shrubs, with a noble bronze \nfigure of the Christ, hands outstretched as if in welcome, a great golden nimbus \nreflecting the rays of the sun. And the churches, little and big: one in particular \nwill stand out long in my memory for its depth of stillness, its atmosphere of \nadoration, its sense of an immanent Presence. Who are the worshippers whose \ndevotion draws influences so beneficent? Continual reminder of the unseen: \nand as one quickly realizes on returning to a land which takes its religion dif\u00ac \nferently, it cannot but have its uplifting effect\u2014 \n\nThe soul should always stand ajar, \n\nThat if the heaven inquire, \n\nHe will not be obliged to wait, \n\nOr shy of troubling her. \n\nIt would seem to be only in occasional and remote spots that French traits \nare outwardly and noticeably present; yet those who know, claim that the spirit \nof France lives on throughout French Canada. The Canadian miracle, more \nthan one writer has called it, this fact that in spite of change of rule, the lapse \nof years, and their affiliation with a nation having different customs and char\u00ac \nacteristics and faith,\u2014the continued imprint of France lives on to-day in these \npeople as a strong force. It has been claimed that it is no accident of nature, \nbut a willed thing: that when they changed their allegiance, a* necessity re- \n\n\nREFLECTING ON A NEIGHBOUR \n\n\n293 \n\n\nquired, they firmly resolved not to change in essence. \u201cThey were animated \nby that will to live which manifests itself in a people as in an individual, by \nthe tendency to persist in its own being, that is to say to remain that which it \nis, or rather to develop in its own direction, conformably to its nature and to \nits tradition.\u201d Certain among their leaders to-day are making every effort \nto foster that spirit, to develop pride in the past, to encourage the use and the \nperfecting of their own tongue, and to arouse or to strengthen desire for a more \ndistinctively French future. \n\nMiracle it may be, and yet in a sense it is only fitting and natural, because \nof what went into the making of French Canada. There is profound meaning \nin that old story of the great Chinese bell, which could not be cast with a per\u00ac \nfect tone until the bell founder\u2019s daughter threw herself into the molten metal, \na willing human sacrifice. Human sacrifice, often unseen and unsung, is exacted \nfor every human achievement\u2014one might say it is the measure of the achieve\u00ac \nment, on one plane or another. Such sacrifice as that of the early pioneers \ncould not fail to have its effect. Foremost in this connection, perhaps, are the \nJesuit Fathers who came ready for martyrdom, and whose utter self-immola\u00ac \ntion in their lonely missions through the wilderness, must have contributed \nincalculably to the inner heritage of the country. But among the laymen as \nwell were men consecrated to an ideal, animated by high courage. Yes, there \nwere the usual number of adventurers, the usual number looking only for \nwealth, but certain of the leaders combined the finest qualities of the grand \nseigneur with the spirit of the ascetic and the saint,\u2014to say nothing of the \nhumbler colonists, every day of whose lives called for courage and endurance, \nand quiet heroism of the kind that brings neither fame nor fortune. \n\nThese little coves, indeed nearly every foot of ground along the river banks, \ncould tell a tale of the dauntless courage of that long-ago time. It was on the \nfar shore, no great distance up the river, that Champlain and his little group of \nsettlers won a victory that was unique. A terrible winter had decimated their \nranks; disease had taken its toll; their food was gone\u2014a few ounces of peas \ncould be rationed out daily, but nothing more except an occasional scrap begged \nfrom the Indians; fifty pounds of gunpowder still, and then not even ammuni\u00ac \ntion would remain to them. Day by day, they waited in agonized suspensi \ndeath, or the longed-for ships and supplies from France, which would it bi \nSuddenly a ship! But it was an enemy ship, there to do battle, assuring tha \nthat succour had been cut off, and demanding surrender. And to their mes\u00ac \nsenger, Champlain returned that proud answer: \u201cHaving still some com, beans, \npeas and other products which make as good flour as the best wheat in the \nworld, and knowing that to surrender our fort in the condition in which it now \nis would make us unworthy to appear before our king, I think that you will \nhave a greater regard for our courage if we meet force with force than if we \ncravenly surrendered what is so dear to us, without first seeing what your can\u00ac \nnon can do. Come on. We wait the moment to receive you and to disprove, \nif we can, any pretension you may have to put your hands on this place.\u201d The \ns|^ndid gesture of a brave man\u2014nothing more. And to the amazement both \n\n\nse^ \n\nt \n\n\n\n\n\n294 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nof that man and his followers, the enemy weighed anchor and sailed down the \nriver. It was Champlain who once used the phrase, \u201cAvec la langue frangaise, \nun coeur et un courage frangais.\u201d \n\nIn these waters, too, though at a later date (just after the death of Mont\u00ac \ncalm) occurred the naval engagement which placed the name of Vauquelin \nhigh in the lists of unsung heroes. Fighting against terrific odds, and realizing \nthat his little ship was doomed, he ran her aground as near the shore as possible, \nhoping that some of his men might be landed to serve in later fighting. Two \nenemy frigates closed in, and for two hours poured a close-range cannonade \ninto her hull. As the tide receded and she began to lean, Vauquelin, still fight\u00ac \ning desperately, cut first the main mast and then the mizzen, sending them \ncrashing into the water, to leave the decks level as long as possible and climbed, \nhimself, to nail the flag of France to the broken stump. Through great gaps in \nthe hull, water pouring in around the last four barrels of gunpowder, effectually \nsilenced the guns. Seizing their muskets, the men fought on till the final round \nof ammunition was spent. When at length all resistance ceased, a boarding \nparty approached from the enemy frigates. Vauquelin, wounded, sat by the \nmainmast stump, surrounded by the dead and the living (five un wounded \nofficers and six of the crew). His sword he tossed overboard, determined never \nto surrender it. Above them the flag was still flying. \n\n\u201cHaul down your flag\u201d, shouted the approaching officer. \n\n\u201cBut for lack of ammunition\u201d, cried Vauquelin, \u201cmy guns would be speaking \nfurther with you. If my flag is to be lowered, it is for you to take it down!\u201d \n\nSuch is the spirit behind these people of French Canada, and this they share \nwith all mankind, whenever mankind wants it; for there is no restriction\u2014 \nnobility, honour, devotion to duty are part of the common treasure on which \nall men may draw. Timeless, belonging to yesterday and to-morrow as well as \nto-day, it lives on in the undercurrents of life, reinforcing all that is akin to it \n(a part of our \u201cDaily Bread\u201d all too often unrecognized). Indeed, in the simple \nlives of these people, it is easy to see an epitome of the experience of the race. \nAre we not all exiles from a far-off homeland, custodians of a splendid tradition, \nwith the same open question as to the use we shall make of it, the justification \nwe may afford ? Are we not heirs of an age-old heritage on which we draw cease\u00ac \nlessly for our very being,\u2014the heritage suggested in that passage from \nFragments \u2014 \n\nThe Soul speaketh: Out of the far past I come to you, bridging the distance you have \nplaced between us, in the majesty of my power, in the effulgence of my glory, in the \nsternness of my displeasure. \n\nI am He whom you have denied and turned against; you have crucified me between \ntwo thieves. Yet am I also mighty in my compassion, and therefore turn I not away \nfrom you\u2014Oh! reflection of myself. \n\nFor though you have soiled the divine image in which you were made, preferring to \nherd with the animal in you rather than to walk the starry spaces of the sky; yet I, who \nam yourself, return again and yet again, and so for ever will return, until at last you \nsee and follow me. \n\n\nJ.c \n\n\nTHE UNDERSTANDING OF \nPARTICULAR THINGS \n\n\nThe more we understand particular things , the more do we understand God \nSpinoza. \n\n\nT RUTH, spelled with a capital T, is a noble word, but like most abstract \nnouns, it is likely to suggest something very shapeless and very hazy. \nTruth only appears concrete and actual when we realize that we are \nin personal contact with it at every instant of our lives. he One Eternal \nTruth is made manifest through the manifold forms of particular \u201ctruths\u201d \nwhich we can assimilate and comprehend. \u201cThe more we understand particular \nthings, the more do we understand God.\u201d Our love and knowledge of Truth is \nmeasured by our loyal acceptance and recognition of the facts of daily experi\u00ac \nence. \n\nFrom one point of view the whole of existence may be described as a con\u00ac \nspiracy to compel us to seek and to discover things as they are. We are always \nbeing bombarded by facts. All that we have to do is to look at them. But for \nsome inscrutable reason\u2014because of \u201cunwisdom\u201d or 4 original sin mortal \nman dreads the sight of a fact. We have indeed cultivated self-deception so \npersistently that most people could not imagine life without it. Thus between \nourselves and the world as it is, we have interposed a glamour, a picture of the \nworld as we should like it to be. It is as if we looked out upon the universe \nthrough an iridescent veil or film, discolouring and refracting every ray of light \nwhich reaches us, altering real perspectives, making the beautiful seem drab \nand the ugly seem beautiful. Many psychiatrists argue that most of the activi\u00ac \nties of the average man are inspired by the desire to escape from realities. We \nfear that the diagnosis is correct. And the worst feature of the whole matter is \nthat Karma holds us strictly responsible for the manufacture of the various \n\u201cescape mechanisms\u201d which we employ. Nature has not bombarded us with \nfacts for countless centuries without some effect. We have learned a greaJj^ \nmany truths, in spite of ourselves, and our worst offences against Truth xW \ncommitted without the excuse of ignorance. \n\nNo man can evade with impunity the obligation to seek and to obey the \ntruths which he knows or firmly believes. When an example of evasion is crude \nenough, we see clearly what consequences must follow. The drunkard wrecks \nhis home; the gambler squanders his capital. Why? Not because they know \nno better. They know, in their more lucid moments, that they are behaving \nlike lunatics or worse; but they lack the courage to forsake the glamour of folly \n\nS j the clear, cold atmosphere of realities. For our part, although we do not \nopt the drunkard\u2019s technique as a means of numbing our sense of the Real, \n\n\n295 \n\n\n\n296 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nour behaviour corresponds to his whenever we refuse to look at things as they \nare and seek refuge in dreams. \u201cThere is no Religion higher than Truth.\u201d \nWhatever else these words may denote, they at least mean this,\u2014that we should \nreverence and contemplate facts, and act accordingly. Where there is fact, \nthere is Truth. Our knowledge of Truth comes to us, not through wishful \nthinking, but through contact with what is real, and through inferences firmly \nbased upon observation and experience. \n\nWhat do we mean, when we say that an idea is true? We mean that it ac\u00ac \ncurately reflects or symbolizes some fact of experience, and thus enables us to \nrecognize or identify that fact whenever we meet it in Nature. It is by this \nmeans that we find our way, without too many disasters, in our daily meander- \nings through the labyrinth of physical existence. It is by this means that we \ndistinguish oranges from apples and cows from horses. But a true idea is always \nan image of an experience, or a sound inference from an experience. Experience \nand true knowledge are one and inseparable. This is what wise men have been \nsaying since the beginning of history. We live and grow by the assimilation of \nexperience. Moreover, because the potential expansion of our experience is \ninfinite, the potential expansion of our knowledge is infinite also. He who lives \nthe life, shall know the doctrine. The wisdom of a sage is not theoretical but \nexperimental. In the vivid phrase of the Buddha, the enlightened Arhat \u201csees \nand knows the Universe face-to-face\u201d. As Plotinus expressed the same funda\u00ac \nmental thought: \u201cThe Higher Self knows by its power of vision, which is itself, \nthe Eternal which is likewise itself.\u201d According to the universal testimony of \nthe mystics, we cannot really understand a thing until we experience it, for \nwhen we experience it we become one with it: so the Divine Mind experiencing \nall things, is immanent in all things. He who has attained conscious union with \nthe Divine Mind, \u201cknows what is passing in the mind of the ant\u201d. \n\nThe mystic dwells in the same world as the rest of us. By effort and sac\u00ac \nrifice, he has earned the advantage of being more aware of certain aspects of \nBeing than we are; but the elements of our experience correspond to his. We \ncannot help realizing that the only sure knowledge is the knowledge which is \nlived. For example, no amount of reading or speculation could make us under\u00ac \nstand what the taste of a strawberry is like; there is only one way of knowing \nthat taste, and that is by actually tasting a strawberry. When that immediate \nintuition occurs, we no longer think of ourselves as subject and of the straw\u00ac \nberry as object, for the taster and the tasted have, in the most literal sense, \nbecome one. This is a lowly and modest experiment, but it illustrates what is \nmeant by the identity of knowledge and experience. A truth is not known until \nit becomes part of our experience or corresponds to part of our experience. \n\nWe can never learn anything about Nature or about ourselves, unless we face \nfacts. Without doubt some facts are more important than others. Facts may \nbe beautiful or ugly, good or evil, great or small. Moreover a thing may be \n\u201creal\u201d in one sense and not in another. The great art of discernment between \nthe Real and the unreal is, in one aspect, the technique of distinguishing just how \nseriously we should take any particular item of consciousness. As Light on the \n\n\nTHE UNDERSTANDING OF PARTICULAR THINGS \n\n\n297 \n\n\nPath points out, our knowledge of physical matter, as a result of aeons of experi\u00ac \nence, has become intuitive. We distinguish without effort between physical \nthings and psychic or mental images. In our waking hours, we assume without \nargument that a mountain, which we see with our bodily eyes, is one thing; that \nthe mountain, which we see in our mind\u2019s eye, is another. A physical mountain \nis a concrete and impersonal fact; it continues to exist, regardless of our con\u00ac \nvenience or inconvenience. A psychic mountain is a \u201cfact\u201d also, in the sense \nthat it is a datum of consciousness; but it is tenuous and evanescent: it is not a \n\u201cself-existent\u201d entity, like a physical mountain. There is no need of labouring \nthe point. Anyone who confuses material objects with the furniture of his \nmind is obviously a candidate for an asylum. \n\nIt is painfully apparent, however, that when we are concerned with facts of a \nslightly more subtile order, we do not always or easily make an instinctive \ndistinction between our little private worlds of fantasy, and the great and com\u00ac \nmon world. There is the League of Nations, for example. The League, as an \n\u201cideal\u201d, is a confused dream about some sort of world where all nations are \nbrothers. On the physical plane, in this cycle of history, no such brotherhood \nexists or can exist, partly because all the great nations are more or less self- \nseeking and some are positively evil; partly because the vast majority of nations \nhave only the most shadowy kind of existence. Most nations are geographical \ndesignations, and little else; and a brotherhood of geographical designations \ndoes not make sense. Thus as a physical entity the League of Nations has the \nstatus of a nebulous debating society which costs in time and money and exas\u00ac \nperation far more than it is worth. When we pretend that it is as real as we \nshould like it to be, we are deliberately misusing our imagination. We substi\u00ac \ntute a glamour for a fact. We try to escape from reality. We refuse to look at \nthings as they are. \n\nAs Woodrow Wilson and others failed to discern between their dreams of \ninternational brotherhood and the state of the world as it is, so the average \nhuman being constantly makes trouble for himself and his fellows, by con\u00ac \nfusing that which he pretends to be with that which he actually is. The \u201cele- \nmentals\u201d which make up his \u201cpersonality\u201d and populate the field of his habitual \nconsciousness, are as disunited and as shadowy as the bulk of the world\u2019s n^j \ntions. However, he persists in the delusion that this inorganic aggregate^ \ndreams and moods and passions is a united \u201cself\u201d which commands considera\u00ac \ntion and esteem from God and humanity. \n\nAn immediate problem for everyone is, therefore, to separate actuality from \nillusion, truth from fancy, in our relations with our own natures. As the Bud\u00ac \ndhist sage remarked, we must learn that our little pictures of ourselves are \nneither more nor less real than a \u201crabbit with horns\u201d. Homed rabbits have no \nexistence beyond the boundaries of our alleged minds. Their \u201cpresence\u201d is \napparent only to the dreamer who invents them. By a blessed dispensation, \nthe rest of us are not obliged to participate in his \u201cvision\u201d. So it is that no \nmortal man sees his personality as others see it. He is, indeed, like a rabbit \ndreaming that he is a fox, and always suffering from lacerated feelings because \n\n\n298 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nhis companions continue to treat him like a rabbit. The thing which he fancies \nhimself to be is not a fact in Nature. \n\nNevertheless, it is the purpose of each human soul to become real, to become \na fact in Nature, a fact more concrete and lasting than anything in the physical \nworld. Let us dive briefly into very deep waters, in order to examine a little \nwhat is meant by a \u201cfact in Nature\u201d. The great mystics have testified, with \none voice, from time immemorial, that there is, in the last analysis, one supreme \nFact in Nature, and that Fact is Nature itself, the One Reality, the Divine \nEssence, the Eternal Be-ness, which underlies and makes possible all forms and \nall beings. This ineffable substance has been remotely symbolized by many \nnames. Whatever we may presume to call it, it is pre-eminently the \u201cWorld of \nTruth\u201d. This one supreme Fact, as a \u201cthing in itself\u201d, is absolutely beyond the \ncomprehension of the human intellect, although our highest power of intellec\u00ac \ntion is the certain intuition that the \u201cWorld of Truth\u201d is the only thing that \nreally is or can be. According to the mystical tradition, it is approached and \nfelt, not by meditation upon its Absoluteness, which can only appear to us as an \ninfinite vacuum, but by seeking the gleam of the Real, the purpose of Divine \nNature, within every experience, within every event, within our own hearts. \nAs Pascal said, repeating an ancient aphorism of the Mysteries, \u201cGod is a circle \nwhose circumference is nowhere and whose centre is everywhere.\u201d The pleni\u00ac \ntude of Divine Nature is present everywhere, potentially if not actually. Exist\u00ac \nence on any other terms is impossible. The \u201cWorld of Truth\u201d is reflected, \nhowever infinitesimally and confusedly, in the humblest detail of existence. \nEven the most obscure iota of life partakes, in its own degree, of the nature of \nthe Real. \n\nObviously, the degrees of the manifestation of the Real in the world vary \ninfinitely. \u201cThe Breath becomes a stone; the stone becomes a plant; the plant \nbecomes an animal; the animal becomes a man; the man becomes a god.\u201d Even \nthe dimmest dream-image has a certain reality on its own plane; there is the \nmuch greater reality of a physical fact; there is the incomparably greater reality \nof the inner or transcendental fact, the essence, the Idea\u2014as Plato called it\u2014 \nwhich the outer form mirrors more or less adequately or, too often, perverts. \nIt is of the utmost importance that our vision of physical facts should be clear \nand distinct; but let us not make the mistake of the typical man of science who \nconceives of the physical as the one and only reality. The Universe is a Great \nDeep; we have not begun to fathom the true \u201cwaters of space\u201d. Astronomy, \nchemistry, zoology and the rest have only deciphered a few words in a sen\u00ac \ntence of a chapter of one of the numberless volumes of the Book of Nature. \nAccording to occult science, there is not one point of space where some form of \nlife and consciousness is not present. Space is crowded with beings, with devas \nand angels and archangels, thrones, dominions, principalities and powers, \nnature-spirits and elementals of every description, some vaguely conceivable \nto us, some wholly inconceivable,\u2014and Space has at least \u201cseven dimensions\u201d. \nBut there is not one point of space from which the Soul is permanently exiled. \nUniversal experience is the inheritance of the spiritual man. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nTHE UNDERSTANDING OF PARTICULAR THINGS \n\n\n299 \n\n\nHowever, we need not wait until our inner senses awaken to the splendour of \nthe inner worlds. We can begin by seeking the deepest reality that can be \nfound within the experiences which are now available to us. A particular \nphysical fact, for instance, is like a phrase in a sentence. Isolated from the \nwhole to which it belongs, it is meaningless. But as a phrase can recall a sen\u00ac \ntence to memory, so a fact when clearly seen can awaken, by a sort of induction, \nan intuition of a larger reality of which it is a partial expression. In the degree \nthat we thus sense the inner purpose within the outer form, we see a fact sub \nspecie ceiernitatis , \u201cunder the form of Eternity\u201d. Artists and poets have often \nseen things more distinctly \u201cunder the form of Eternity\u201d than ordinary men, \nand by the force of genius and ardour, have enabled others to share their vision. \nDoes this not explain why even a simple piece of pottery, made with love by an \nindividual artisan, has a value which can never be equalled by a machine-made \nimitation? In the Louvre, there is a painting by Peter Brueghel the Elder, the \ngreat Flemish artist. It is a winter scene in a farm-yard. Any traveller in \nnorthern France or Flanders passes hundreds of farms like that which Brueghel \nused as a model. Anyone can photograph a similar scene. But between any \nphotograph and the painting, there is a difference corresponding to that be\u00ac \ntween a plane and a solid. The winter light reflected from an old wall awakened \nin the artist\u2019s heart some nostalgia for the Light which \u201cshineth in darkness; \nand the darkness comprehended it not\u201d. Brueghel glimpsed, if only for an \ninstant,'a commonplace aspect of physical nature \u201cunder the form of Eternity\u201d. \n\nDoubtless this sounds vague and \u201csubjective\u201d. But it is quite irrelevant \nwhether others agree or not with our comments upon Brueghel\u2019s picture. The \npoint is that everyone who is approximately human must have had some reali\u00ac \nzation of an inner and superior truth and beauty to which some form of art or \nnature has directed his attention. We can prove the genuineness of such in\u00ac \ntuitions by continuous experiment. We should never content ourselves with \nthe notion that we know all that there is to be known, when we have examined \nand analyzed the surface of an event. In the words of the Buddha, we must \nlearn how to \u201clook through things\u201d. Nothing can be more pertinent to our \ndestiny than to develop the faculty of seeing things in a perspective which is \nmore veritable, more real, than the perspectives in which we now see them. \nBy no other means can we ever hope to gain power and peace. \n\nWe can begin anywhere. However, sooner or later, we shall have to \ncarefully at our own selves. What is it that we think we are? What is it that \nwe really are, \u201cunder the form of Eternity\u201d? \n\nThose who have seriously set themselves the task of answering those ques\u00ac \ntions have replied with extraordinary unanimity that the \u201cself\u201d which man \nfancies himself to be, is an illusion, a phantom, a \u201csurface appearance\u201d; that \nthe Self which he is in Truth and Nature, is an undivided fragment of the \nEternal. For example, we read in the Theologia Germanica: \n\nWhat did the Devil do else, or what was his going astray and his fall else, but that \nhe claimed for himself to be also somewhat, and would have it that somewhat was his, \nthat somewhat was due him? This setting up of a claim, and his I and Me and Mine, \n\n\n\n\n\n300 \n\n\nTHE 0 S 0 PHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nthese were his going astray and his fall. And thus it is to this day. What else did Adam \ndo but this same thing? It is said, It was because Adam ate the apple that he was lost \nor fell. I say, It was because of his claiming something of his own, and because of his \nI and Me and Mine, and the like. Had he eaten seven apples, and yet never claimed \nanything for his own, he would not have fallen. \n\n\u201cI and Me and Mine.\u201d Only he who has identified himself with the \u201cUnited \nSpirit of Life\u201d, and who speaks as its representative, can thus express himself \nwith wisdom and truth. How can we be brought to realize that as the superla\u00ac \ntive fact? One thing we can do at once: we can tear aside the iridescent veil \nwhich we have suspended between ourselves and realities. We must not only \nschool ourselves to face facts, but go forth in quest of them, searching them \nout, ever broadening and deepening the zone of our experience. And we must \ndo this, because the \u201cUnited Spirit of Life\u201d makes its will known to us by \npresenting one fact after another to our attention. \u201cThe more we understand \nparticular things, the more do we understand God.\u201d \n\nIt is significant that the Buddha insisted so persistently upon the disciple\u2019s \nimminent need to augment his awareness of what is going on in the world and of \nwhat is going on within himself. He did not leave his injunctions in the ab\u00ac \nstract; he made them as concrete and as detailed as possible. A primary duty of \nthe aspirant is to conform imagination, desire and will to the real. This theme \nis indeed the specific theme of one of the most famous of his sermons, \u201cThe \nFour Intent Contemplations\u201d. \n\nBrethren, there is but one way open to mortals for the attainment of purity, for the \novercoming of sorrow and lamentation, for the abolition of misery and grief, for the \nacquisition of the correct rule of conduct, for the realization of Nirvana, and that is the \nway of the Four Intent Contemplations. \n\nAnd what are the four? \n\nWhenever, O Brethren, a disciple lives, as respects the body, observant of the body, \nstrenuous, conscious, contemplative, and has rid himself of lust and grief; as respects \nsensations, observant of sensations, strenuous, conscious, contemplative, and has rid him\u00ac \nself of lust and grief; as regards the mind, observant of the mind, strenuous, conscious, \ncontemplative, and has rid himself of lust and grief; as respects the elements of being, \nobservant of the elements of being, strenuous, conscious, contemplative, and has rid him\u00ac \nself of lust and grief. . . . \n\nFor example, a disciple, in walking thoroughly comprehends his walking, and in stand\u00ac \ning thoroughly comprehends his standing, and in sitting thoroughly comprehends his \nsitting, and in lying down thoroughly comprehends his lying down, and in whatever state \nhis body may be, thoroughly comprehends that state. . . . \n\nHow does a disciple, O Brethren, live as respects the mind, observant of the mind? \nHe thoroughly comprehends to what state his mind is predisposed and how it is behaving \nat each instant, whether it be passionate or free from passion, full of hatred or free from \nhatred, infatuated or free from infatuation, intent or distracted, exalted or unexalted, \nconcentrated oi unconcentrated, free or attached. . . . \n\nWe have quoted only a few fragments of the discourse, but the lesson is mani\u00ac \nfest. The disciple must gain full control of his powers of perception and action; \nhe must know what he is doing, and how and why he is doing it. What is his \nreward? Not only does he acquire facility in discernment between the real and \nthe unreal, and between various grades of reality; he ceases also, as a result, \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nTHE UNDERSTANDING OF PARTICULAR THINGS \n\n\n301 \n\nto imagine, to desire, to will the impossible. Moreover, he grows into the reali\u00ac \nzation of truths whose existence he had hitherto surmised, but which he had \nbeen unable to imagine clearly because he had not known them by direct in\u00ac \ntuition, by contact. Such is the testimony of those who have brought mankind \nliving proof that a knowledge more extensive and more profound than ours \nexists and is attainable. But how can we expect the inner senses and an inner \nmind to develop, until we have mastered the right use of the senses and of the \nmind which we already have? \n\n\u201cThe individual soul is the Eternal\u201d, said Shankara Acharya. \u201cFrom the \nworld to the atom, all is the Eternal, the Eternal alone and secondless.\u201d Within \nour inmost being, there is the certainty that these words are true. All that is \nneeded is \u201cto bring that knowledge to consciousness in the self\u201d, displacing the \nfancies and delusions which usurp the place of fact and truth. To encourage \nourselves to undertake that great act of purification, let us recall the doctrine \nof Theosophy, that the Eternal when \u201cseen face-to-face\u201d does not appear as \nan abstract and empty space. It is a plenum, a pleroma, containing the Host of \nHeaven, radiating wisdom and compassion and power. More immediately \nstill, according to Theosophy, it is made manifest to us in the Great Lodge of \nMasters, the united brotherhood\u2014the one true international league\u2014of living \nmen who have found the Truth which we seek, and who have conquered as we \ncan conquer. Most immediately of all, the Eternal is \u201cpersonified\u201d for the \nindividual disciple by an individual Master, his spiritual Father, from whom \nor through whom he receives the germ of imperishable genius, the unique spark \nof the Eternal, which is his true Self and the paramount fact in his life. \n\nS.V.L. \n\n\nThe wise man is in his smallest actions great: the fool is in his greatest actions \nsmall .\u2014 The Talmud. \n\n\nWisdom is radiant and fadeth not away. . . . Her true beginning is desire of \ndiscipline; and the care for discipline is love of her .\u2014 Wisdom of Solomon, vi. \n12, 17. \n\n\n\n\nTHEOSOPHY IN SERMONS \n\n\nThere is one distinction in the world's geography which comes immediately to \nour minds when we state the different thoughts and desires of men concerning their \nreligion. We remember how the whole world is in general divided into two hemi\u00ac \nspheres upon this matter. One half of the world , the great dim East , is mystic. \nMake any one of the great ideas of life distinct and clear , and immediately it seems \nto the Oriental to be untrue. He has an instinct which tells him that the vastest \nthoughts are too vast for the human mind , and that if they are made to present them\u00ac \nselves in forms of statement which the human mind can comprehend , their nature is \nviolated and their strength is lost. \n\nOn the other hand , the Occidental , the man of the West , demands clearness and is \nimpatient with mystery. He insists on knowing what the eternal and infinite forces \nmean to his personal life , how they will make him personally happier and better , almost \nhow they will build the house over his head , and cook the dinner on his hearth. This \nis the difference between the East and the West , between man on the banks of the \nGanges and man on the banks of the Mississippi. Each misunderstands , distrusts , \nand in large degree despises the other. But the two hemispheres together , and not \neither one by itself , make up the total world (November 17, 1889). \u2014 Phillips \nBrooks, Sermons , Vol. 6, p. 279. \n\nI N the volume, Platonic Tradition in English Religious Thought , Dean Inge \nsays that in the Church, \u201cthere is and always has been a living tradition \nwhich constitutes the true Apostolical Succession; we may call it the \nPlatonic tradition, a stream of spiritual vitality\u201d. Platonism being one mani\u00ac \nfestation of the ever old, ever new Wisdom Religion, it would seem natural to \nfind theosophical truths expressed in sermons, since sermons are a medium \nthrough which much teaching is conveyed. \n\nTheosophical truths are indeed found in a multitude of sermons, not from \nsome particular \u201cschool\u201d of theologians, but through century after century, in \nan apostolical succession of the spirit that is without distinction of conformity \nor creed. Many a man of the various churches has penetrated beneath the \nsurface of theological rust, and touched the dynamic centre of truth. In con\u00ac \nsequence, spiritual laws radiating from that centre\u2014organic and universal \nlaws\u2014have vitalized his sermons which, after the passage of a hundred, or two \nhundred, or three hundred years, contain lessons quite pertinent to the present \nday. Thus, Dr. Robert Wilberforce writes: \u201cUnion with Christ is not merely \nimitative, visionary, metaphorical; it is not only that we feel in our minds as \nthough we put ourselves under His guidance and took part with Him; but there \nis a real action of Christ\u2019s purified, upon our impure, humanity. Hence is He \nstyled that new Adam, from whom we have as true descent as from our natural \nparent. . . . Thus may men recover that image of God, in which our first \nparent was created. The very purpose of the Gospel covenant was to give it \n\n\n302 \n\n\n\nTHEOSOPHY IN SERMONS \n\n\n303 \n\n\nback. The New Man was to bestow in its perfection whatsoever the first Adam \nhad lost. As real as our union with the one, must be our communion with the \nother. ... By union we mean not the compacting of an external framework, \nbut the real diffusion of a spiritual presence\u201d (Sermons on the New Birth , pp. 15 ff.)* \n\nIt is true that those sermons do not use a theosophical vocabulary, but it is \nas easy to perceive their meaning as to translate from English to French. Spe\u00ac \ncific theosophical tenets are occasionally referred to, directly or indirectly, but \nsuch reference is exceptional. Thus John Donne (1573-1631) refers to Rein\u00ac \ncarnation because in Donne\u2019s Renaissance environment, Platonism had given \nsome currency to the idea. Further, Donne\u2019s wife was of the family of Sir \nThomas More, and More had translated the writings of the celebrated Italian \nPlatonist, Mirandola. Early in the present century, Dr. Basil Wilberforce \n(1841-1916), Archdeacon of Westminster, preached, in the Abbey, upon The\u00ac \nosophy and upon Reincarnation. Those sermons show an acquaintance, but \nvery imperfect, with theosophical teachings, and express some appreciation. \n\nHe writes: \n\n\u2018\u2018The one attraction in this system, and it is a great attraction, lies in the \nassurance it professes to give to man of his essential union with the source of \nhis own and of universal life, and its recognition of one all-pervading substance, \none all-controlling force in the universe; and the narrow, limited, unphilosophic \nconception of conventional Christianity is the secret of the power of Theosophy.\u201d \n\n\u2018\u2018Ancient Theosophy has found different expression in different religions and \nphilosophies down the ages, and nowhere in so clear a realization as in the \nancient Upanishads of India, which have powerfully taught the Eternal one\u00ac \nness of the human and Divine nature, and the essential unity of the human \nsoul with the Universal Soul\u201d (Sermon on Theosophy, in The Hope that is in \nme, p. 236). Archdeacon Wilberforce was, however, a man of devotion and \nspiritual insight. After condemning Theosophy, in those particular sermons, \nin many others he eloquently interprets Christianity as an evolution of the \nspirit, and his presentation rings like the true gold of Theosophy. \n\n\u201cAs with the atoms of the planet, so with every conceivable department of \ncreaturely life, \u2018the voice of the Lord\u2019 is pleading with the instinct implanted \nin the earthly to evolve into the heavenly; to nations, governments, communi\u00ac \nties, social movements, moral reforms; to art, science, literature, religion, sani^A \ntation, just as to the cosmic dust, from which all things came, the unceasing^ \ncommand from the Eternal righteousness is, \u20180 earth, earth, earth, hear the \nvoice of the Lord\u2019; develop, exercise, unfold, perfect, purify, Christianize. It is \nthe same \u2018voice of the Lord\u2019, the same Word of the Father, the same pressure \nfrom without stimulating the power within, which kindles into evolution dust \nlife, earth life, plant life, animal life, man life, spirit life\u201d (Sermon on \u201cCosmic \nConsciousness\u201d, in Power with God, p. 133). \n\nBishop Phillips Brooks used the text: \u201cWith whatsoever measure ye mete, \ni^hall be measured to you again\u201d, to prove that there is a universal \u201cLaw \n^Return\u201d. \u201cThe Law of Return\u201d! That is not a misleading definition, is it, \nof the Law of Karma? Bishop Brooks wrote: \n\n\n3\u00a94 \n\n\nTHE0S0PHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\n\u201cIt is a law of vast extent and wonderful exactness. The world is far more \norderly than we believe; a deeper and truer justice runs through it than we \nimagine. We all go about calling ourselves victims, discoursing on the cruel \nworld, and wondering that it should treat us so, when really we are only meeting \nthe rebound of our own lives. What we have been to things about us, has made \nit necessary that they should be this to us. As we have given ourselves to them, \nso they have given themselves to us. This is the law I want to trace with you, \nonly begging you again to keep your minds clear of any materialism which would \nthink that in mere earth itself resides this power of just and discriminating \nreply. It is as we and all things exist together in the great embracing and per\u00ac \nvading element of God, that all things give themselves to us as we give ourselves \nto them. So all the phenomena of life are at the same time divine judgments if \nwe are only wise enough to read them\u201d {Sermons, Vol. 3, p. 268). Such reference \nor mention as that made by Donne, Wilberforce, and Brooks very seldom oc\u00ac \ncurs. As a rule, the sermons are confined to Christian topics, and use Christian \nvocabulary. \n\nThus, setting forth no novel or sensational doctrine, but strictly Christian \nteaching, the preachers of these sermons\u2014a long line of them\u2014incurred little \nor no suspicion of heresy, but continued \u201cin good standing\u201d with their authori\u00ac \nties. In England, the friends with whom Thomas Arnold, Pusey, and Jowett \nassociated themselves bandied the word \u201cheresy\u201d back and forth, but \u201cparty \npolitics\u201d had much to do with their unfortunate disagreements. In New Eng\u00ac \nland, Horace Bushnell\u2019s interpretation of Christianity as an expression of uni\u00ac \nversal truth and law, stirred questions among people schooled to sermons that \nwere designed to reach the intellect by a logical sequence of dogma. Dr. Bush- \nnell\u2019s parish heartily approved his views, and wished him to be unhampered in \nhis expression; by withdrawing from the association of Congregational Churches, \nand continuing as an independent parish, it forestalled any ecclesiastical in\u00ac \nquiry. Around Phillips Brooks, also, there were heard whispers about a \u201ccreed\u00ac \nless\u201d bishop. His dynamic preaching of universal, spiritual laws was beyond \nthe understanding of those who were accustomed only to dogma, rigid as in \ndeath. The envy of \u201cparties\u201d, too small to contain his greatness, was responsi\u00ac \nble, perhaps, for those whispers. \n\nMystical sermons have been persistent. Those who thirsted for instruction \nin the inner life could always find it, no matter how dead the age might seem. \nThe continuity of the stream through the period following the Reformation is \nnarrated in a valuable book that has a misleading title, Dr. John Tulloch\u2019s \nRational Thought in England in the XVIIth Century. The word, \u201crational\u201d in \nthat title really means \u201cmystical\u201d. After the seventeenth century, preacher \nafter preacher handed on the torch. A great ecclesiastic who followed chrono\u00ac \nlogically the group of Cambridge Platonists was William Beveridge, chaplain \nto the royal family (William and Mary), and Bishop of St. Asaph. Dr. Bev\u00ac \neridge died in 1708, and his sermons were published a few years later. Those \nsermons were closely studied by the Wesley brothers, John and Charles, during \nstudent days at Oxford. Later, when the Wesleys began to preach, it was no \n\n\nTHEOSOPHY IN SERMONS \n\n\n305 \n\n\nnew doctrine that they put forth, but such teaching as Dr. Beveridge had \ndelivered, year after year, in royal chapels and cathedrals. John Wesley took \nto the demonstrative crowd of the streets and mines what the bishop had \npreached to less emotional congregations. \n\nAfter John Wesley\u2019s death in 1791, there followed a dreary period of reli\u00ac \ngious deadness that has been many times described, by Newman and Ruskin \namong others. The childhood and youth of Carlyle lay in that period. It is \nsaid to be reflected in the novels of Jane Austen, whose clerical personages are \nuntouched by religion. Yet even in that period, the stream of true religion \nstill flowed. Newman mentions Dr. Daniel Wilson (1778-1858), who became \nBishop of Calcutta, and says the Oxford students listened with wide open ears \nto his forceful sermons. The following passages from a sermon on the Char\u00ac \nacter of Christ fairly represent Dr. Wilson. \n\n\u201cNothing is so rare or so difficult as the combination of the various duties \nand graces which constitute the Christian character; and yet it is in this com\u00ac \nbination that the evidence of a real change of heart principally lies. There are \nsome dispositions of mind and some duties which are, from our natural tempera\u00ac \nment, our age, our station, and our circumstances, so natural and easy to us, \nas scarcely to be deemed distinct marks of our regeneration. In fact they are \noften little more than apparent virtues; they vanish with every change of cir\u00ac \ncumstances, they give way to selfish and excessive passions, and even decline \ninto the positive correspondent vices, unless they are checked and balanced by \nthe opposite, and to us more difficult, graces and duties, which should accom\u00ac \npany and guard them. \n\n\u201cNow, in our divine Master, there was the most perfect combination of every \nexcellency. He reconciled the most remote and discordant qualities. When \nasserting his authority and summoning all the world to his tribunal, he spake \nwith an inexpressible dignity and majesty: on other occasions he was the most \nhumble and meek of men. Even under all his sufferings and ignominy, there \nshone forth a superiority and greatness of mind, which confounded his enemies. \nHe displayed also the utmost tenderness and mildness, and yet the most un\u00ac \nyielding boldness and fortitude. His meekness did not degenerate into apathy. \nNor did his boldness become fierce and ungovernable. There was in him \nunion of opposite virtues, which constitutes a perfect character: whilst othws \nhave virtues of one description only. All was in order, all in proportion, all \nfrom principle, all in harmony. \n\n\u201cHe combined, in like manner, the most outgoing compassion to sinners with \nthe greatest hatred of sin; the most exquisite sensibility, with a perfect command \nof his feelings; the purest spirituality of mind, with a consideration of all the \nminute wants and circumstances of his hearers; the highest love to the souls of \nmen, with the most affectionate regard to their bodies; the most complete su\u00ac \nperiority to the world, with a respectful submission to authorities ecclesiastical \nand civil; an entire separation from the follies and sins of mankind, without a \n%ait of austerity or misanthropy. \n\n\u201cChristians can readily follow their Master in some one branch of these graces. \n\n\n3\u00b06 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nWe can be compassionate; but then we are so candid as to countenance sin. We \ncan show a lively sensibility of affection; but then we fall under its power and \nare subdued. We can be spiritually minded; but then we are not so willing to \nattend to the minor details of ordinary duty. We can express great tenderness \nfor the bodies of men, but we leave their souls, comparatively speaking, to \nperish. Or we may profess a love to their souls, but we contribute sparingly \nand reluctantly to relieve the pains and sufferings of our common nature. We \ncan express a contempt for the world; but then we at the same time fall into \nsin by doing it in a cynical, inconsistent, covetous, censorious, pharisaical spirit. \nWe can defend the truth; but with the zeal of a partizan, and without sufficient \nrespect for the persons or opinions of our adversaries. \n\n\u201cWe lean with all our weight on one side. We think it some excuse that our \ninclination and turn of mind has a peculiar bias; whereas we should study our \nLord\u2019s character in order expressly to copy those parts of it to which our natural \ndispositions would least attract us. In this way we shall unite, as our Lord did, \nall the milder virtues with all the more firm and intrepid ones; we shall display \nthe graces of the contemplative life with the efforts of the active,\u2014a union \nwhich may be said to comprise the whole compass of our obedience to God\u201d \n(,Sermons , p. 390 ff.). \n\nNor was it the stream of sermons only that was guided; there were also devo\u00ac \ntional books. A Scotch rector, Henry Scougal (1650-1678), published before \nhis early death, a short treatise on The Life of God in the Soul of Man. The \nargument of this mystical writing is that \u201creligion is a union of the soul with \nGod, a real participation of the divine nature, the very image of God drawn \nupon the soul, or in the apostle\u2019s phrase, \u2018It is Christ formed within us\u2019.\u201d That \nlittle book made an impression upon its generation, and a copy of it was taken \nby an emigrant to Virginia, where it fell into the hands of the local vicar. Rec\u00ac \nognizing its unusual value, the vicar prevailed upon Benjamin Franklin to \nreprint it in 1799. A copy of the Philadelphia reprint came into the possession \nof the youthful Emerson, whose marginal notations testify to its value to him. \n\nMention has been made of Dr. William Beveridge (1637-1708), Bishop of St. \nAsaph. After Keble\u2019s memorable sermon in 1833 had started a revival of reli\u00ac \ngion at Oxford, the six volumes of Bishop Beveridge\u2019s sermons were republished. \nPusey, Newman, and Keble looked with pride and gratitude to Beveridge as one \nof their vital links with the past. He was a spiritual ancestor who had passed \non the old inner interpretation of religion which the materialist Liberalism of \n1830 was threatening to extinguish. In his own day, Beveridge was called \u201cthe \ngreat restorer and reviver of primitive piety\u201d. Extracts from a sermon on the \ntext, \u201cSet your affections on things above\u201d, will give an indication of the depth \nand breadth of his preaching, and of the saturation of his mind with the ideas \nof Platonism (Sermons, Vol. 6, p. 169 ff.). \n\n\u201cMan being a perfect microcosm, composed of two essential parts, a soul and \na body, whereof the one was taken from the superior, and the other from this \ninferior world: hence it necessarily follows, that although both these parts do \nequally concur unto the constitution of a man, yet that which is of the purest \n\n\nTHEOSOPHY IN SERMONS \n\n\n307 \n\n\nnature, and most noble extract, must needs be designed at first to govern and \nrule the whole, and by consequence that man, according to his constitution, was \nalways to live and act according to the dictates and commands of his rational \nsoul, and not according to the inclinations of his sensitive part: but by the \ndegeneracy of our first parents, in hearkening to their senses rather than to their \nreason, our souls have ever since been subject to the tyranny of our rebellious \nsenses: and that part which at first was placed at the stem, to sway and order \nthe whole man, according to those principles of reason which were infused into \nit upon that account, is now debased so low as to become a slave to every one \nof these senses which it was made to govern. And therefore, our great care in \nthis world should be to restore our souls to their throne and kingdom again; \nso that our flesh may not any longer usurp any power and dominion over them, \nas heretofore it hath done, and still will do, unless we keep a strict eye upon it. \n\n\u201cNow, as it was in the first Adam that our souls lost their power, though not \ntheir right, to govern, so it is only by the second that they can ever recover it \nagain. But our comfort is, that as in Adam we fell from Heaven to earth, so \nin Christ we rose again from earth to Heaven; as the Apostle intimates in the \nforegoing verse, \u2018If ye then be risen with Christ\u2019. For when Christ rose, all \nthose that by a true faith were united to Him, could not but rise with Him; \nyea, so rise with Him in our souls, as to live with Him in Heaven, even whilst \nour bodies are upon the earth. . . . \n\n\u201cSo although we are in the world, and converse with the things of it, yet we \nare not to concern ourselves about them, any further than to do our duty in \nthe station wherein God hath set us, and prepare ourselves as well as we can \nfor our going into the other world, our hearts hanging loose and indifferent as \nto all things here below, being fixed only upon God, and those glories that are \nabove. . . . \n\n\n\u201cFor tell me seriously, you that expect ere long to bathe yourselves in those \nrivers of pleasure which are at God\u2019s right hand for evermore, can it become \nyou to drown yourselves in a deluge of carnal pleasures and sensual delights? \nYou that have such plenty of bread and heavenly manna in your Father\u2019s house, \nis it not below you to feed like the prodigal upon husks, with the swine of this \nworld? You that hope ere long to trample upon the moon, and to be advanced \nabove the stars themselves, is it fitting for you to lie under a clod of earth? In \na word: You that expect ere long to be invested with all the bliss and happine^^ \nthat a creature is capable of, is it a comely thing for you in the meanwhile to \nspend your time in running after shadows, and in playing with childish gew\u00ac \ngaws? in raking in the dirt, or treading in the mire? Is this proper work for \nthe heirs of Heaven to be employed in? . . . \n\n\u201cFor the things of this world have no other existence but in our thoughts and \nfancies: abstract but the imagination, and they presently vanish and disappear; \nso that you may easily wink the greatest beauty into blackness and deformity, \nearth\u2019s greatest light into darkness and obscurity. Think gold dirt, and it is \nso: think the pomp and grandeur of this transient world vanity, and it is so. \nAiid can such things, or rather nothings, which have no other existence but \n\n\n\n308 THEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\nonly in the roving fancies of deluded mortals; can they, I say, ever satisfy an \nimmortal soul ? . . . \n\n\u201cYou have an expression in Job, \u2018Hast thou entered into the treasures of the \nsnow?\u2019 What is here meant by treasures of snow? St. Gregory tells you, the \n\u2018treasures of snow are worldly riches, which men take a great deal of care and \npains to gather together, as children do snow, with no small hazard of their \nlives; and having rolled it together into heaps, and fashioned them into the \nshapes of horses, or giants, and towers, they begin to fancy use, and power and \nsafety in them: but whilst they are mightily applauding and pleasing themselves \nin what they have gotten, there comes a shower and washeth it all away, leaving \nnothing in the room of it but dirt and mire. And this is all they get for what \nthey have done, even to be vexed and troubled for the loss of what they had \ngot\u2019. . . . \n\n\u201cNay, the things of this world are so far from making us happy, that we can \nnever be completely happy, until we leave them. For, where can you expect \nto be happy, but in Heaven? But in Heaven, although you will have glory in \nits lustre, happiness in its perfection, yet not one dram of any earthly enjoy\u00ac \nment. There is infinite light, and yet neither sun nor moon; there are glorious \nrobes, and yet neither silks nor satins: there are rivers of pleasures, and yet \nneither wine nor water: there are most delicate banquets, feasts of fat things, \nand yet neither meat nor drink; there are large possessions, and yet neither \nhouse nor land: there is most ravishing beauty, and yet neither red nor white: \nthere are rich treasures indeed, and yet neither gold nor silver. In one word; \nthere is all of Heaven, and yet nothing at all of earth: so little of happiness is \ncouched under this clod of earth, that it keeps us from it, rather than helps us \nto it. \n\n\u201cAnd then, as the things on earth cannot make us happy themselves, so \nneither can they conduce to our being made so. For who ever yet could swim \nto Heaven in a deluge of carnal pleasures, or was blown thither by the breath \nof popular air? Whom did you ever hear of, that purchased an inheritance \nin the land of Canaan out of his revenues in this wilderness? or transported \nhis goods from this city into that which is above, so as to exchange them there \nfor crowns of glory, and sceptres of eternal righteousness? If this was feasible, \nthen I should not wonder that men are so eager for the world, so covetous for \nthe greatness of it. But do not deceive yourselves, you are never the nearer \nHeaven for standing higher upon earth; nor in more likelihood to be rich to \neternity, because you are so in time. . . . \n\n\u201cFrom whence you cannot but conclude, the world, and all the glory of it, \nto be but a mere piece of pageantry that is still passing away from one to an\u00ac \nother, and presently is out of sight: all things upon earth being in continual \nmotion, constant in nothing but inconstancy. . . . \n\n\u201cThere are all our brethren, the Saints of the living God; yea, our Elder \nBrother Himself, even Jesus Christ, Who is called \u2018the First-born among many \nbrethren\u2019; for thither it was that He ascended when He left these lower regions \nof the world: \u2018I ascend\u2019, saith He, \u2018unto My Father and your Father; and to \n\n\nTHEOSOPHY IN SERMONS \n\n\n309 \n\n\nMy God and your God*. . . . There are the ancient Patriarchs, Prophets and \nApostles: there are all Martyrs and Saints of God, even all that ever lived and \ndied in the faith of Christ, they are now in Heaven, with one heart and voice \nsinging forth the praises of the Most High God, and of the Lamb that sitteth \nupon the throne for evermore. . . . These and ten thousand times ten thou\u00ac \nsand more, are now in Heaven, there solacing themselves in the enjoyment of \nthe chiefest good, whilst we, their younger brethren, not being yet fully come \nto age, are still in this lower world, grappling with its lusts, and striving against \nthe temptations of it. But, howsoever, though our Father Which is in Heaven \ndoth not yet see good to admit us into that blessed society \u2018of the spirits of just \nmen made perfect\u2019, not being as yet fitted and qualified sufficiently for it; yet \nit is His will and pleasure that our hearts be amongst them, although our per\u00ac \nsons cannot; and that we still be thinking of them, and longing to come unto \nthem, and to be made partakers with them of their celestial glories. In short, \nour affections should be with them in Heaven, even whilst our bodies are upon \nthe earth, so as to be every moment preparing ourselves for that blessed time \nwhen we shall bid adieu to all things upon earth, and go up to take possession \nof our inheritance in Heaven. . . . \n\n\u201cWhilst others are busying themselves about the impertinences of this tran\u00ac \nsient life, the soul that is truly pious employs its thoughts and studies about \nthe happiness of Heaven, and the way that leads unto it; his body may be with \nhis friends below, but his head and his heart are with his God above. . . . \n\n\u201cFor which end it is necessary that you often retire from the cares and bustles \nof this tumultuous world, and bid your earthly thoughts farewell, commanding \nthem to stay below, while your aspiring souls go up to take a view of what is \nabove; where, having fixed yourselves amongst the choir of Saints and Angels, \ncast your rolling eyes about, and take an exact survey of the land of Canaan \nthat flows with milk and honey. Look well that you cannot but behold such \ntranscendent light and glory, that your eyes will be dazzled, and your hearts \nastonished at it. And if you do but listen with an attentive and believing ear, \nyou cannot but hear such melodious music and celestial concert, as will be sure \nto ravish and transport your spirits beyond themselves. And do but rightly \nweigh and consider what is there, and you will find that there is not only the \nblessed company of the spirits of just men made perfect, together with Angels,^^ \nArchangels, Cherubims, and Seraphims, with the rest of the celestial hierarchy/^ \nbut there is Christ and God Himself; Whom to know, is the only wisdom: \nWhom to serve, is the only freedom; and Whom to enjoy, is the only happi\u00ac \nness that any creature is capable of. And who would not dwell in the ravishing \ncontemplations of such rare perfections as these?*\u2019 \n\n\nc.c.c. \n\n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME \n\n\nHE heat had been unusually trying. There was some excuse for feeble\u00ac \n\n\n\nmindedness. But the Philosopher rebelled against it. \u201cCan you \n\n\nimagine anything more humiliating\u201d, he exclaimed, \u201cthan the realiza\u00ac \ntion that a difference of a few degrees in temperature and humidity can almost \nparalyze one\u2019s mental energies!\u201d \n\n\u201cWhy humiliating?\u201d said the Engineer. \u201cAfter all, the body and brain are \ninstruments. What happens to a violin if exposed to the same conditions? \nEven a Paganini would find himself crippled. More than once recently my \nsympathies have gone out to the English schoolboy who got things twisted,\u2014 \nas I have, in other directions. You remember the story perhaps. The poor \nchild was being examined on a cruelly hot day, and was asked what he knew of \nOliver Cromwell. At first his mind was a complete blank; then slowly, very \nslowly, came the answer: \u2018He was the man who said when he was dying, \u201cIf I \nhad served my God as I served my King, I should not be in this state now\u201d.\u2019 \nIt was such a gallant, and such a happy effort to produce something out of noth\u00ac \ning, that if I had been the examiner I should have been tempted to give him \ntop marks.\u201d \n\nWe liked that story. It was invigorating, and therefore highly moral. In \nany case it served as an introduction, whether logical or not, to the subject \nwhich all of us had at heart: the appeal of the Convention, some four months \nbehind us, with the inevitable question which the Student now voiced: \u201c \u2018Watch\u00ac \nman, what of the night?\u201d\u2019 No one was willing, however, to accept the implied \ncommission, so the Recorder asked the Ancient for his personal opinion. \n\n\u201cI believe there was genuine response, and that the average effort of members \nhas distinctly improved\u201d, was the answer. \u201cIn other words, so far, good, \nthough not nearly enough. The flower has not bloomed, and never will until \nthe desire to love and serve the Master, as a ch\u00a3la alone does, becomes an ob\u00ac \nsession, or, rather, a consuming determination, obliterating all the other pur\u00ac \nposes of life. Think of a mother, obliged to leave her home during the daytime, \nbut whose only child lies desperately ill at their home. She works that she may \nprovide her child with food and medical care; and she works as she never worked \nbefore: but what is her motive? where is her heart? That , in the inner life, is \nthe spirit that breaks through every obstacle, and that literally flies to the out\u00ac \nstretched arms of the father who, be it remembered, saw him \u2018when he was yet \na great way of . . . and had compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and \nkissed him.\u2019 Is there lack of the Prodigal\u2019s sense of sin? I doubt if there can be \nexcuse for it! \u2018Riotous living\u2019 and waste of substance take many forms, but the \nrealization of our infidelities and wasted opportunities, and of our long and \nshameful immersion in self, if deeply repented, can provide a spring-board from \n\n\n3 10 \n\n\n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME \n\n\n3 ii \n\nwhich we may take the leap from this world to the other. Or is it that love is \nlacking?\u2014the more basic need of the two. The cure for that has been known \nand taught since religious instruction began. All of you are familiar with the oft- \nquoted and beautiful passage from the Bhdgavata Purdna which bears directly on \nthis subject; but I should like to read it, if you (turning to our host) have a copy \nwithin reach, as it is some time, I think, since it was quoted in the Quarterly.\u201d \n\nThe volume was promptly produced; whereupon the Ancient read aloud: \n\nIn a former Age, O Saint, I (Narada) was born, in a past incarnation, as the son of a \ncertain serving woman, in the service of maintainers of the Veda, and I was engaged in \nboyhood in attendance upon some yogis, who desired to remain together during the rainy \nseason. These yogis, even if regarding everything equally, were compassionate to me, a \nchild, who had passed beyond all fickleness, was docile, who had never held a plaything, \nwho was willing, attentive in service, and of little speech. . . . There, day by day, I \nheard heart-ravishing stories of Krishna, by the favour of those yogis who used to sing \n[intone] them. And so hearing these, word by word, through my reverence, my intense \nlove arose for Him-Whose-Glory-is-Loving. \n\nThen arose in me, who had gained a passionate longing for Him-the-Glory-of-Love, \nthe unshaken conviction- \n\n\u201cAnd so forth; no need to read more, because the age-old \u2018cure\u2019 of which I \nwas speaking is made more than sufficiently clear. In default of yogis chanting \nheart-ravishing stories of Krishna, the modem aspirant, to kindle and increase \nhis love, should read heart-ravishing stories of the Master, should read the \nscriptures, or devotional books, or anything likely to increase his love for his \nMaster; and, above all, must think and meditate upon what he reads. He must \nwin through to the \u2018passionate longing\u2019 of N&rada if he would get anywhere in \nthe real sense,\u2014remembering always that if he will provide the wick and the \noil, the attention and the desire, his Master will provide the fire.\u201d \n\n\u201cYou are asking a great deal\u201d, lamented our visitor. \n\n\u201cThe Master asks everything\u201d, was the reply; \u201cand, when it comes to ch\u00a3la- \nship, he cannot and will not accept less. Do not forget that a Master makes \nhimself responsible for his chela\u2019s life and soul, not only in time but in eternity. \nThere was nothing new in,\u2014Let the dead bury their dead. Follow me.\u201d \n\n\u201cConsidering the appeal of the Convention from a different angle\u201d, the \nPhilosopher now said, \u201cit seems to me of great significance that the T.S. as a \nwhole was given an opportunity to adopt in some measure what always have \nbeen the purposes and obligations of its more earnest members. It was a recog\u00ac \nnition of the sincerity and devotion of the rank and file, while the response lifted \nthe Society closer to the heart of the Movement and to the Lodge. It was a \nstep toward indrawal in the real sense. We do not yet know what will come of \nit in terms of personal development, of \u2018flowering\u2019; but that the general level \nwas raised, cannot, I think, be doubted.\u201d \n\n\u201cI agree with you\u201d, said the Ancient. \u201cFurther, I believe that many mem\u00ac \nbers became convinced, as never before, that their supreme task in life, their \noutstanding opportunity, is to become conscious of the Master at the head of \ntheir Ray,\u2014of his nearness to them, of his fatherhood, of his intense interest in \nthekkwelfare, of his ceaseless desire to help them in all their righteous efforts, \n\n\n\n312 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nof their own ability to please and to serve him. Some of us realized long ago \nthat there is nothing else in life that really counts, that really matters; and that \nwe shall not have lived in vain if, even at the eleventh hour, we may be instru\u00ac \nmental in bringing others to the same realization. We are compelled, therefore, \nto be hopeful as we think of what the last Convention, and many previous \nConventions, and all the work of all the years, may still bring forth. We know \nthat the divine Gardener watches and labours with infinite care and skill; the \nquestion is whether those whom he nurtures will open their hearts and sur\u00ac \nrender their lives unreservedly to his treatment, for, unlike the plants of our \ngardens, we have free will. Plants know when a gardener loves them, and give, \nin their way, love for love. Men, having minds, think about it, questioning \nwhether it can be so, and thus, for lack of simplicity, and of true perception, \nshrivel instead of grow. ... In any case, it is not yet too late. Qui vivra , \nvena.\" \n\nNow the Recorder, not expecting that brains would strike sparks in such \nhumid weather, had asked the Philosopher and the Historian to bring books \nwith them which they had read during the summer, and which would be likely \nto prove of general interest. So at this point he asked the Philosopher to report. \n\n\u201cI have been reading all kinds of books\u201d, was the response, \u201cbut the two that \nI found the most significant and encouraging were: The Gates of New Life , by \nthe Rev. James S. Stewart, pastor of a Presbyterian church in Edinburgh\u2014a \ncollection of sermons published in New York by Scribner; and St. John of the \nCross: an Introduction to his Philosophy , Theology and Spirituality , by Father \nBede Frost, of the Order of St. Benedict, published in New York by Harper. \n\n\u201cI read the first of these books with intense pleasure and thankfulness, for \nit proves that the spirit of Theosophy has had a more far-reaching influence \nthan I should have thought possible. Imagine, say at the time of H.P.B.\u2019s \ndeath,\u2014imagine reading a book of Scotch Presbyterian sermons and finding in \nthem not only religious fervour, but breadth of religious sympathy. So often, \nalas, as breadth increases, depth of feeling and conviction is reduced to a mere \nfilm. So often, also, books of this kind, from Protestant sources, even when they \nshow genuine devotion to the Christian Master, and a far broader interpretation \nof religious dogma than would have been tolerated years ago, are ruined by \nsentimental humanism and by a horror of suffering which leaves no room what\u00ac \never for a horror of sin. I read this book, fearing on every page to find Pacifism \nset up as the inevitable outcome of obedience to Christ\u2019s teaching and example. \n\nI found nothing of the sort. \n\n\u201cDr. Stewart lays especial emphasis on the (theosophical) doctrine that mere \nacceptance of a belief is not religion; that, instead, religion is essentially an \nexperience. But it will be best to let him speak in his own words. In his sermon \nentitled \u2018Hearsay or Experience\u2019, he says: \n\nWhat, in our religious life, are we founding on\u2014mere hearsay, rumour blown down the \ncenturies from apostolic days, other men\u2019s thoughts of Jesus caught and put in cold \nstorage and preserved and handed out to us\u2014is that it? Or are we founding not on that, \nbut on this\u2014a Christ we have spoken to and can speak to daily, face to face and heart to \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME \n\n\n3i3 \n\n\nheart; an experience of Jesus thrilling and throbbing and glorious because vve can say of \nit, \u201cThis is my own, my very own\u201d; something that has come to us not on the authority \nof any Church or creed, not on the authority of our forefathers, not even on the authority \nof all the millions of believers who have ever lived, but on the authority of God and our \nown souls? \n\n\u201cThose who call themselves Christians, he says, owe it to their Master and \nto themselves to find him in as real a sense as Andrew and Peter and others \nfound him. But how? By obeying three simple maxims, is his answer. \u2018The \nfirst is\u2014keep following. . . . The second rule is\u2014keep praying. . . . Finally \nthere is this\u2014keep loving.\u2019 \n\n\u201cUnder the head of \u2018keep following\u2019, Dr. Stewart\u2019s advice is that which has \nbeen given in the Quarterly, scores if not hundreds of times, though his \nexpression of it is well worth quoting: \n\nSurrender your will to His moral ideal: for whatever else may be dark in your religion, \nthis at least is clear, that the purity Jesus stands for, the honour, the manliness, the love, \n\u2014all that is far more worth having than any of the allurements of the world. Get your \nfeet on to that road, for it is down that road somewhere that Jesus is always to be found, \nand no one who has sought Him there has ever failed to find Him. Therefore, keep \nfollowing. \n\n\u201cPassage after passage from almost any of these sermons could be quoted \nwith pleasure. \u2018A Modern Substitute for the Gospel\u2019 might be an echo (though \nit certainly is not an echo) of what genuine Theosophy has preached for many \nyears. \n\nA new religion has appeared on the field. A substitute for the gospel is offering itself. \nIt is the worship, not of God, but of man. This is the most serious rival which Chris\u00ac \ntianity [and Theosophy] in this generation is facing. \n\n\u201cThat the author refers to Theosophy disparagingly is not surprising, for all \nhe can know of it is one or more of the several varieties so widely advertized in \nEngland, and which differ from the Theosophy of H.P.B. and Judge as the Black \nMass differs from the Last Supper. How far from narrow he is, however, can \nbe inferred from this passage: \n\nWiden your horizons! There are others, thank God, working for Christ in totally \ndifferent ways from yours or mine. There are gates into the kingdom of heaven, sayaj \nRevelation, from every point of the compass. There are scores of paths up the hill of\" \nthe Lord. It does not matter who does the work, as long as the work is done. \n\n\u201cFinally, disregarding terminology, could there be a simpler or better state\u00ac \nment of the spiritual combat, in the theosophic sense, than this? \n\n... In every one of us at this moment there is something of self, and something of \nChrist. And what God wills is this, that that bit of self in me, the \u201cego\u201d as we call it, \nthe thing which says \u201cI\u201d, \u201cmine\u201d, \u201cme\u201d, is progressively to contract and be superseded; \nwhile the other thing, the God principle, is to expand and grow and take control. He\u2014 \nthe indwelling Christ\u2014must increase; and I\u2014the self\u2014must decrease. \n\n* hat a thousand pities that while we, as students of Theosophy, can appre- \nand profit by the sermons of Dr. Stewart, he, in spite of his liberality, and \nin spite of all that Theosophy could do to clarify and rationalize and elevate \n\n\n314 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nhis faith, has been so prejudiced by misrepresentations and perversions of the \nAncient Wisdom, of the theou sophia of St. Paul, that it would be practically \nimpossible for him to consider its great message with an open mind. \n\n\u201cThis is true to an even greater extent of the author of my second choice\u2014 \nthe study of St. John of the Cross; for he is a Roman Catholic, wedded to the \nSacraments as his Church explains them, and although broad-minded in com\u00ac \nparison with many of his fellow-churchmen, is none the less as rigid as a ramrod \nin matters concerning \u2018the Faith\u2019. In spite of this\u2014and always making allow\u00ac \nance for wide difference in terminology\u2014his closely reasoned and highly philo\u00ac \nsophical study of some four hundred pages, cannot fail to impress a student of \nTheosophy as remarkably akin in its spirit and conclusions to our own teachings. \nEven the Church of Rome has been influenced by H.P.B.\u2019s mission to the world, \nthough such a statement would be regarded by all Catholic expositors as \npreposterous\u2014and perhaps as exacerbating. \n\n\u201cListen, for instance, to this: \n\nIt is this end, the seeing of God in a \u201cface to face\u201d manner, without the intervention of \nany creature, notion or idea, about which the whole of the Christian religion is con\u00ac \ncerned, and with which, indeed, the best minds not only of the Jewish but of the pagan \nworld were occupied. To seek God\u2019s face, to appear before Him, \u201cto behold the fair \nbeauty of the Lord\u201d, \u201cto awake up after His likeness and to be satisfied with it\u201d, to \nbelieve, with Job, \u201cthat my redeemer liveth . . . and though worms destroy this body, \nyet in my flesh shall I see God: whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold, \nand not another\u201d, all this Old Testament faith and desire puts to shame much of that \nmodern, debased Christianity which reduces it to a bourgeois morality, treats it as an \naccessory to present happiness and even to success in business and national prosperity. \nWe have seen, too, how deeply the mind of the pagan philosophers was steeped in the \nsame belief and desire, many more examples of which might be given. \n\n\u201cThe state of Divine Union attainable in this life, says Father Frost, inter\u00ac \npreting St. John of the Cross, means: \n\n. . . The total possession of the soul by God in so Divine a manner that \u201cwhile neither \nof them changes its being, each appears to be God\u201d, in which the flame of Divine Love \nwhich is the Holy Spirit [Buddhi active], bums within and transforms the soul, as fire \ntransforms a log of wood into itself (The Living Flame of Love , I, 3). For \u201clove unites \nthe soul to God\u201d, and now the soul has \u201cattained to Him according to the whole capacity \nof its being\u201d, so that the Divine Love, once purifying and illuminating for the burning \naway of all the imperfections of the soul, now so enkindles it that it is enraptured, im\u00ac \nmersed and wholly converted into Love itself, knowing nought but love, having no other \nexercise but love, whether in doing or suffering, in engaging in affairs temporal or spiritual, \n\u201cfor its work is to love, and of this work, which is love\u201d the soul has now come to its \nconsummation and perfection, that which is \u201cthe whole desire and aim of the soul, and \nthat of God in all the works of the soul\u201d. \n\n\u201cAll of which is an elaboration and elucidation of St. Paul\u2019s statement: \u2018I am \ncrucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me.\u2019 \n\n\u201cIf only these Christian theologians, philosophers, mystics, could realize that \nthe last word on their own subjects is to be found, clearly set forth, in such \n\u2018heathen\u2019 treatises as the Bhagavad Gita ,\u2014when read in the light of Theosophy . \nKrishna\u2014the Master, or the Higher Self, or the \u2018light within\u2019 (for, as Judge \n\n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME \n\n\n3i5 \n\n\nwrote, \u2018the Mahatmas and the light within are not different\u2019)\u2014Krishna again \nand again reveals what is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. \n\nOnly by fullest service, perfect faith, \n\nAnd uttermost surrender am I known \nAnd seen, and entered into, Indian Prince! \n\nWho doeth all for Me; who findeth Me \n\nIn all; adoreth always; loveth all \n\nWhich I have made, and Me, for Love\u2019s sole end, \n\nThat man, Arjuna! unto Me doth wend. \n\n. . . Nay! but once more \nTake My last word, My utmost meaning have! \n\nPrecious thou art to Me; right well-beloved! \n\nListen! 1 tell thee for thy comfort this. \n\nGive Me thy heart! adore Me! serve Me! cling \nIn faith and love and reverence to Me! \n\nSo shalt thou come to Me! I promise true, \n\nFor thou art dear to Me! \n\n. . . But, if in this \n\nThy faint heart fails, bring Me thy failure! . . . \n\nFly to Me alone! \n\nMake Me thy single refuge! I will free \nThy soul from all its sins! Be of good cheer! \n\n\u201cHowever, we must not expect too much, too soon, and can afford to be \nthankful meanwhile for all that is of value\u2014and there is much\u2014in the exclu\u00ac \nsively orthodox approach of such writers as Father Frost. There is so much \nin his book that is worth quoting that it is difficult to select outstanding pas\u00ac \nsages; but I think this is of special interest: \n\n\u201cGrowth in the spiritual life, he says, is an interior growth,\u2014\u2018a development \nof the \u201cinner man\u201d under the influence of the Divine life of grace, a growing up \nfrom spiritual childhood \u201cunto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of \nthe fulness of Christ\u201d, the growth of a life which at every stage needs its proper \ntreatment, food and care, just as does our physical life.\u2019 \n\n\u201cI was glad also to find that he emphasizes a truth which so many Protestants \nforget, that the Christian life in itself is \u2018distinct from its manifestation in pr^^ \ntice, with which it is often confounded, as if doing was being instead of the c^> \nsequence of being\u2019\u201d. \n\nThe Recorder, fearing that some of our readers might find the atmosphere of \nSt. John of the Cross a shade too rarefied for comfort, now turned to the His\u00ac \ntorian, asking him to give us the benefit of his summer reading. The Historian \nlaughed. \u201cI hope\u201d, he said, \u201cthat the benefit was greater than the little I have \nto say about it. To tell you the truth, all I did in preparation for this meeting, \nafter you had asked me to make ready, was to mark a couple of passages which \nmay provide material for those who pursue the third object of the T.S.,\u2014\u2018the \ninvestigation of the unexplained laws of nature and the psychical powers latent \nimman . I have seldom found anything either interesting or convincing in books \not^Jports sponsored by specialists in psychic phenomena. Even amateur col\u00ac \nlectors, such as the late Lord Halifax, of stories and evidences of an unseen \n\n\n\n\n3 l6 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nworld, leave me unimpressed. But constantly I have found in the autobiogra\u00ac \nphies of soldiers, statesmen, and of those whose interest in such matters is purely \nincidental, the recital of perhaps just one experience which has convinced them \nthat there are \u2018more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of\u2019 in their \nphilosophy, and which would arouse the same conviction in anyone with an \nopen mind. \n\n\u201cMy first extract relates a case of psychic prevision, taken from Memorials of \nthe Military Life , a recent book by Thomas Washington Metcalfe, published in \nEngland by Ivor Nicholson and Watson. You will notice that the author\u2019s \nexperience is typical of many if not most purely psychic visions, inasmuch as it \ncontains no instruction, no guidance, nor the least glimmer of spiritual enlighten\u00ac \nment. Its value lies in the fact that it cannot be explained on any materialistic \nbasis, and that it tends to upset the rigid conception of time and space to which \nthe average man clings,\u2014partly, I think, for fear of losing his sense of personal \nreality. The story in any case is well suited for hot-weather consumption. I \nwill read it to you if I may. \n\nIt was then that at last I faced the problem of the future, and came to a settlement \nwith myself. That I did this was mainly due, undoubtedly, to what may have been a \nborderland-dream, since perhaps I had dozed while seated huddled-up on the bollard. I \ndon\u2019t know; but I do not think so. I am inclined to believe it an example of pre-cognition, \na vision such as had occasionally been granted me before, and has been since, during \nmoments of stress. \n\nTo leave, or not to leave the army? that was the question. I cast up the years. Look\u00ac \ning forward a score, my age being then seven-and-twenty, one could not see that they \nheld the prospect of much. Promotion was slow; the great war with Germany, that a \nminority held was bound to come, was regarded as unlikely by the best civilian minds, \nbecause of commercial and financial considerations; whatever one\u2019s other qualifications \nmight be, the doors of the Staff College were likely to remain closed to a candidate ut\u00ac \nterly incapable of passing the simplest examination in mathematics\u2014that was a very \nsore point with me, by a fortunate education something of a specialist in languages; \nfurthermore, though keen enough on some of the details of soldiering, drill, tactics, and \nfield-work in general, ambitious as regards superior command, there was much that \nirked one, and would continue to irk one for the rest of those years, if remaining, as \nseemed most probable, a regimental officer. \n\nHut more than that: music had always been the very breath of life to me, literature \nI loved almost as well; I had begun to burn with the desire for a greater freedom wherein \nto indulge these tastes. (As a youngster I had been trained as an organist by two very \neminent masters of the instrument, but, as regards writing, had made no published ven\u00ac \nture as yet.) And I had often rather hankered after the public-schoolmaster\u2019s life, with its \nfacilities for the blending of the arts and athletics. The army, I think, is no bad training- \nground for teaching, supposing the possession of some natural gift\u2014which I fancied one \nhad. To this I proposed to turn, as to a crutch, being pretty certain that for a while, at \nleast, I should forfeit the generous allowance from an outraged father, who had more \nthan once given me his views on \u201cOrgan-grinders and creeping Ushers\u2019\u2019. In addition to \nthe above reasons for wanting to go, there was another. I think now that it bulked more \nlargely in my mind than I then realized. My intimate life had been dealt a shattering blow \na couple of years before. Much of my joy in living had gone; I was an old man before my \ntime, much older in spirit than I am now, for all that Fate has since then again crept \nunder the shield to strike at the heart; I was often lonely, riding or tramping the country\u00ac \nside with my wretched thoughts for company, despite the kindly attempts of my brother- \n\n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME \n\n\n3i7 \n\n\nofficers to hearten and console. (It goes ill with a man when he screws the neck of his \nsense of humour.) So not unnaturally there was an impulse to quit the stage on which \nmy little tragedy had been played. \n\nAnd just before dawn silvered the sky above the sharp-cut edge of the sullen hills, \nthere came that flash of what I call prevision. Just one electric moment, in which details \nstood out in a clear light, and then almost instantaneously dissolved. ... I saw, as it \nwere, a picture suspended half-way between me and the lead-dark background. It had \na gloss, as though lit by an intense light, and was a composite design, combining portions \nof an interior and an exterior. Between pillars, high in its loft on a gothic screen of stone, \nstood an organ. The pipes were of white metal, the seventeenth-century woodwork was \nof an ebony richness, elaborately fretted, and carved with the date of its erection. I had \nnever seen that organ, not even a photograph of it, that I can remember. But three \nyears later, freed from the military life, I was to walk into a cathedral transept, and look \nup at and recognize that very instrument, and its date as the same. It was not showed \nme then, as I sat on the hard iron bollard by the waterside, that the time was to come \nwhen I should look down from my seat at that organ for many Sundays, while gunners in \nred and blue and infantrymen in scarlet bawled the set psalm for their service, \u201cThe \nLord is my Shepherd\u201d. \n\nThe lower part of the picture, that to the left, disclosed a massive stone buttress and a \npath bounded by close-cut turf. A man came round the buttress, and smiled at me; a \nlittle elderly man, who wore a hat like a parson\u2019s, though he was not a clergyman, and a \nshort grey beard. I had never seen him before, did not know his name, nor that he ex\u00ac \nisted. Yet, three years after, I met him. We became as father and son; I honoured \nand respected my actual father; but this man I loved as I have loved none other. For \nonly two years did I observe that smile which so often had in it the puckishness of a \nhappy child\u2019s, see the hands that shook so as they poised over the manuals cease their \ntrembling as they touched the keys. It is sixteen years since he died. But to me he is \nnot dead. Of that I have something amounting almost to proof; though not as a dabbler \nin spiritualistic practice, neither by trumpet nor trance. However, that can wait: it is \nthe military life with which I deal. \n\nIf what is designed to be must be, and I was shown a glimpse of that fact then, no \ndoubt my determination dates from it. \n\n\u201cAll that I said of that story is equally true of my second: it is typical of \nthe purely psychic realm,\u2014an experience apparently purposeless, as it ex\u00ac \nplained nothing and led nowhere, though of course we do not know its effect \non the man who relates it. His reaction to it, however, was eminently sensible \nand open-minded, as you will see. I found it in The India We Served , byjSpr \nWalter Roper Lawrence, Bart., G.C.I.E., G.C.V.O., C.B. The author wafltt \nthat time in charge of a District in Rajputana (Merwdra). His book, which is \nof unusual value and interest, was published in England by Cassell and Co. \n\nOne day I experienced a curious illusion. It was in the break of the rains, and I went \nout in the evening by myself to shoot. The ground was familiar to me, but it was all \nchanged. There was a large lake where I had formerly walked, and on the lake was a \npunt with a paddle. I got in and paddled by the high bank of the lake to a little green \npromontory. On it, by the edge of the lake, sat a most lovely girl. I asked her what \nthe name of the lake was, and where her village was. But she laughed and shook her \nhead and said nothing. I paddled on, landed on the opposite bank and walked home. \nJwas quite well, and had no fever. I could remember every detail of the place, the dress \nthe face of the girl, and a few days later I went back to the lake. But there was no \nlake and no sign of a punt, and no one had ever seen a lake or a punt in the neighbour\u00ac \nhood. Hallucination? I do not think so. I have seen so much in India of what we in \n\n\n3*8 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nEngland would call the supernatural, that I have an open mind, and I think that if we \nlived with the Hindus, apart from the influence of our own people, we should soon find \nthat in that land of enchantment there is indeed more than is dreamt of in our philosophy. \n\n\u201cIf I am not mistaken\u201d, the Recorder remarked, \u201cthat story has appeared \nin the Quarterly before. Haven\u2019t you a third, in reserve, to take its place?\u201d \n\nOne of our editors interrupted: \u201cIt must have been some years ago\u201d, he said, \n\u201cand it will bear repetition in any case. Coming from such a source, no one \ncould reasonably question its genuineness, and it is very striking. I hope you \nwill include it in the \u2018Screen\u2019.\u201d \n\n\u201cI have no third story in reserve\u201d, the Historian now said, in reply to the \nRecorder. \u201cThere is another book, however, of which I should like to speak, \nthough for a totally different reason. It is called Victorious Living , and is by \nE. Stanley Jones, well known as the author of The Christ of the Indian Road \nand of other similar books. Victorious Living consists of a series of meditations \nfor every day in the year, each meditation concluding with a short prayer. The \nsubjects dealt with cover a wide range, from \u2018How can I find God?\u2019 to \u2018The \nKingdom of God is Nigh\u2019; and most of them are admirable in their simplicity \nand sincerity of treatment. But like another missionary, C. F. Andrews, author \nof What I Owe to Christ and of Christ in the Silence , who also has won a host of \nfriends and admirers among Hindus and Moslems in India by reason of his \nundeniable devotion to Christ as a living Master, combined with great gifts of \nsympathy and an exceptionally broad outlook in some directions,\u2014like \u2018Charlie\u2019 \nAndrews, Stanley Jones is pitifully blind as to his Master\u2019s nature in one vitally \nimportant respect; for both these men are ardent, even rabid Pacifists, which, \nwhatever they may say or think, the Master Christ is not. Their attitude is so \nutterly illogical and lacking in common sense, that it is difficult to explain in \nmen of their gifts. Their first-hand experience of their Master I could \nnot question, but their ability to \u2018hear\u2019 (to receive from him) is distressingly \nlimited by their preconceptions and prejudices, and, perhaps, by the excessive \ndevelopment of some of their virtues at the expense of others,\u2014of feminine \ngentleness, it may be, at the expense of that intense virility which is so char\u00ac \nacteristic of the \u2018Lion of Judah\u2019 who is also the Lion of the Western world. \n\n\u201cMr. Jones writes: \u2018There is nothing left to do but to renounce all war. And \nthat I do. And I\u2019ll tell you why. My chief reason is that war causes men to \nsin.\u2019 \n\n\u201cYes, it does cause some men to sin; but it causes other men to leave their \nsins for heights of self-sacrifice and nobility of which they would have been \nincapable except for the terrible demands which war makes upon them. For \nwar is both a test and an opportunity; it turns some men into devils, others \ninto saints. War does that which life itself does\u2014the most peaceful of lives\u2014 \nbut war, that fiery trial, concentrates the experience of a life-time into a few \nmonths or years, and brings to the surface whatever was latent in a man\u2019s \nnature, with either the best or the worst in control. War does not create evil \nany more than it creates good; it evokes that which already exists. As Emerson \nsaid, \u2018We find what we bring\u2019. \n\n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME \n\n\n3i9 \n\n\n\u201cWar, says Mr. Jones, \u2018stands against everything that Christ stands for. It \nsins against Christ. If war is right, Christ is wrong; and if Christ is right, war \nis wrong\u2019. But if Mr. Jones had been a Frenchman of military age in 1914, \nwould Christ have wished him to refuse to fight, and to leave his wife and \nchildren to the mercy of the Hun invader? If Mr. Jones lived in one of our \nwestern towns, and a gang of armed desperados began to \u2018shoot things up\u2019, \nand to kidnap women that they might hold them for ransom or worse,\u2014would \nChrist wish him to stand placidly by, inactive, or to do as I hope we should do, \nthat is, seize any weapon within reach, and try to rid the world of these devils \nlet loose? And what is the difference between our gangsters and Germany at \nthe present time? \n\n\u201cThe truth is that both Mr. Jones and Mr. Andrews are thoroughly material\u00ac \nistic in their philosophy, in spite of their religious beliefs. They would not \nadmit it, but their attitude toward war, and all their reasons for \u2018renouncing\u2019 \nit, prove that they regard death and suffering as the greatest of human ills. \nThis is the essence of materialism, and therefore is as unchristian as any view \nof life can be. They would claim, I imagine, to be orthodox in their beliefs. In \nthat case they must regard Christ as a member of the Trinity, and the Trinity as \nomnipotent; but if the death and suffering caused by war are inherently evil, \nwhy does God permit earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and other natural phe\u00ac \nnomena, at least as destructive and causing quite as much suffering as war? \nFor these natural phenomena, as they see it, are not caused by man, and must \nbe under God\u2019s control. Does not this imply, logically, that they should include \nGod in their condemnation? \n\n\u201cIt is strange, indeed, that men who have so much light up to a certain point, \nshould fail to distinguish between the killing of a gangster or kidnapper \nin order to save a woman or child from his clutches, and the killing by the \ngangster of anyone who opposes his evil purpose; should fail to distinguish be\u00ac \ntween a war of aggression for greed, dominion and envy, and that waged in self- \ndefence against the invader, or on behalf of the invaded,\u2014in other words, that \nthey should fail to realize that it is the motive that counts. They are devoted \nto their Indian converts and friends; they \u2018renounce war\u2019: logically they should \nadvocate the withdrawal of all British troops from the North West frontier. \nAre they willing to leave their Indian friends, and their own families, defenceless^ \nagainst the murdering, pillaging inrush of Afridis and Afghans which would ^ \nfollow any such withdrawal within a few hours? It is ungrateful to accept \nprotection and to exist because of it, and then to damn the protectors, or in \nany case their function, as standing \u2018against everything that Christ stands for\u2019. \nThey hate war, they say. I should like to tell them something: Christ hates \ningratitude. \n\n\u201cBut my quarrel with them goes further and deeper than that, for they are \ngrossly unfair to the Master they claim to serve. They too often drive real men \naway from him,\u2014and one of his greatest needs is for real men. I came prepared \nfor this, and I am going to read to you an extract from the biography of Sir \nMortimer Durand, by Brig.-General Sir Percy Sykes. Durand, the most eminent \n\n\n\n\n\n\n320 \n\n\nTHE0S0PHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nmember in his generation (1850-1924) of the great Indian Civil Service, was a \nsincere Christian. This is an entry he made in his diary while still a young \nman: \n\nI often think Christians dwell too little on the chivalry of Christ\u2019s nature. There is \ntoo much talk of meekness and submission. I should like to stand in the pulpit and say: \n\u201cThe Christ whom I preach to you was no coward\u2019s God. Never let that idea be yours. \nHe was the God of the soldier, brave and ready and strong, gentle and courteous withal, \nas every true soldier must be. The man who can wield the sword does not war with the \ntongue. Brave and independent as none of you would be in times of danger\u2014morally \nand physically brave\u2014scornfully silent before the highest court of his nation\u2014unflinch\u00ac \ning under pain\u2014cool and deliberate in face of murderous mobs. Without blasphemy, a \nperfect ideal of a gentleman in word and thought and deed\u2014fearless as Bayard, sans \npeur et sans reprochc , pure and loving towards women as the purest always are.\u201d If only \nmen would preach Him out boldly for what He was, there would be fewer taunts at Chris\u00ac \ntianity and contempt for Christians. They strip off all the attributes for which men have \nan innate admiration\u2014which He possessed albeit to a marvellous extent\u2014and then hold \nup a miserable apology for a God to the eyes of their flock\u2014and tell them to be meek \nand gentle and take a kicking on all possible occasions. No wonder men recoil. \n\n\u201cThat is splendid\u201d, exclaimed the Student. \u201cWould to heaven there were \nmore clergymen and ministers with the understanding of Durand, a layman!\u201d \n\n\nThere had been an intermission of several weeks. When we next assembled, \nthe Philosopher reminded us that the subject we had last discussed was Pacif\u00ac \nism, and suggested that this led directly to the present international situa\u00ac \ntion,\u2014the world\u2019s immediate problem. Asked to comment, he pointed out that \nwith events moving so rapidly, it would be futile to deal with more than certain \nunderlying principles. \u201cThe news to-day [September 17th] is that Chamberlain \nhas returned to London after an interview with Hitler. We know nothing, so \nfar, of what was said. I am glad of that visit. It will give Chamberlain a \nchance to show the stuff he is made of, and it cannot fail to bring Hitler\u2019s \npurposes and methods still further into the open,\u2014which is important, consider\u00ac \ning the illusions under which some people still labour, especially in England, \nwhere Hitler, even to-day, is said to have supporters: think of it! \n\n\u201cAfter the Great War, badly wanting peace, and as usual judging others by \nherself, England supposed that Germany must want peace as badly, and there\u00ac \nfore encouraged German revival in ways that drove some of us almost to dis\u00ac \ntraction. Not only this, but, as everyone knows, England, under a distressing \nwave of Pacifism, and blindly believing in Germany\u2019s good faith\u2014the honest \nman unable to conceive that all other men are not equally honest\u2014came to \nlook upon her army and navy as expensive ornaments, and grudged every penny \nspent on their maintenance. It was not until the Abyssinian affair had shown \nEngland her helplessness, and until Hitler and Mussolini had howled threats \nat her, that she at last woke up to the need for self-protection. Even so, she \nlearned nothing as to the fundamental difference between races, and Chamber\u00ac \nlain\u2019s approach to Hitler will, I fear, show the same old weakness of guileless \ntrust in an unscrupulous adversary. As a result, Hitler will be too much for \n\n\n\n\n\n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME \n\n\n321 \n\n\nhim, and will gain the time he needs to be entirely ready for the accomplishment \nof his purposes (rumour says he will be ready by September 25th). If I am \ncorrect in this general supposition\u2014I do not mean the date, which is of no im\u00ac \nportance\u2014the interview will have been barren of results, save to Hitler\u2019s ad\u00ac \nvantage,\u2014that is, unless Chamberlain proves himself a bigger man than I have \nfound reason to suppose. My guess in any case would be that Hitler will \u2018do \nhim up\u2019, and will use him for his own ends without Chamberlain being in the \nleast aware of it. However, we shall see. \n\n\u201cThe truth of course is that Hitler is a wild man, a German intoxicated by \nhis own fiercely shouted words, mad with egotism, hopelessly irrational,\u2014a dan\u00ac \ngerous lunatic at large, though, like so many dangerous lunatics, with a streak \nof cunning, of calculating foresight, which amounts almost to genius. Hitler, \nwithout doubt, is trying to get all that he wants by means of bluff, threats, \nterrorism\u2014without war; but he is determined to get it even at the cost of war. \nAnd the trouble is that he wants the earth: the German people are so superior \nin culture, civilization, fortitude, and in every other respect, to all other peo\u00ac \nples, that if there be any sort of a God anywhere, that God necessarily looks to \nthe German nation, ever extending its boundaries, to bring the rest of the world \nunder its dominion. Americans for the most part refuse to take this seriously, \nthinking it \u2018silly\u2019. It is silly; it is worse than that, it is lunatic: but Germany, \nled by a lunatic who voices to perfection her own wildest desires, and who \nflatters her vanity and drowns her fears by hammering it into her that these \nwild desires are attainable,\u2014Germany, the most easily intoxicated of nations, \nhas accepted that as its Solar-god-given mission: Deutschland , Deutschland iiher \nalles. As an aim it is not new, of course; but the former German Emperor was \na weakling behind his sabre-rattling, and was never entirely trusted by his \npeople, who feel, in comparison, that Hitler, having killed so many of his former \nbosom friends, must be \u2018the real thing\u2019,\u2014 echt deutsch. \n\n\u201cNow what Hitler wants he has made sufficiently evident,\u2014explicitly so, in \nmany directions. He wants all the territory within reach, the inhabitants of \nwhich he regards as \u2018Nordic\u2019. This includes a valuable slice of Czecho-Slovakia, \nthe Polish Corridor, Memel, and will include Holland, and the Flemish-speaking \nsections of Belgium, as well as Alsace-Lorraine. Further, regardless of racial \norigins, he wants the oil-fields of Rumania, and the wheat-fields of Hungary \nand the Ukraine. He wants all the Colonies that Germany owned before the \nGreat War. As I'appttit went en mangeant , this will be only the beginning of \nhis ever-increasing requirements; and America will soon discover that instead^ \nbeing comfortably out of it, as she now imagines, the many Germans in Scrcun \nAmerica are already organized to precipitate a crisis there, whenever Hitler is \nready to go to their \u2018rescue\u2019, and to absorb as much of South American territory \nas seems to him expedient. \n\n\u201cIn his eyes, and in the eyes of his followers, none of this will be wrong; it \nwill not even be \u2018irregular\u2019: it will be the fulfilment of Germany\u2019s \u2018manifest \ndestiny\u2019. Unless that be understood, well-meaning but stupid people every\u00ac \nwhere will continue to bray or bleat\u2014as the case may be\u2014that Germans are \n\n\n\n\n322 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nkindly people who would not dream of injuring their neighbours, or of appro\u00ac \npriating what does not belong to them. It does belong to them, is the sincere \nconviction of hypnotized Germany, and anyone who tries to stand in her way, \nas Dr. Dollfuss and Kurt von Schuschnigg tried to stand on behalf of Austria, \n\u2014is a devil worthy of death. \n\n\u201cThe question is, then, to what extent Chamberlain\u2019s eyes were opened to \nthese truths as a result of his visit to Berchtesgaden. He claims to be a realist. \nDoes he understand at last that no concession will keep Hitler quiet for longer \nthan a brief interval; that history repeats itself, and that the payment of \u2018Dane \ngelt\u2019 in any form, merely increases the appetite of those who are in fact black\u00ac \nmailers? In other words, does the Prime Minister realize at last that he must \nbe prepared to concede whatever Hitler demands, not only now but contin\u00ac \nuously, and that he must choose between that and\u2014War? This does not mean \nthat, if he accept war as inevitable, he ought of necessity to fight at once, but it \ndoes mean that he should consult his military advisers, who in their turn should \nconsult their French colleagues, and thus put himself in a position to decide \nwhen and where it would be wisest to allow hostilities to begin.\u201d \n\nThe Student interrupted: \u201cIn this morning\u2019s paper\u201d, he said, \u201cin a dispatch \nfrom Paris, it is stated that, while there is no war party in France, \u2018there is \nstrong army sentiment that if there is to be war, it must be now or never.\u2019 \u201d \n\n\u201cI noticed that\u201d, was the reply, \u201cbut was not convinced, thinking that news\u00ac \npaper correspondents are more likely to be in touch with retired Colonels and \nWar Department clerks, than with men like General Gamelin who are in com\u00ac \nmand. My point is, however, that realism demands a steady, detached facing \nof the facts, and action, at the right time and place, as those facts may determine. \nIf it were not for the sentimentality of public opinion in democratic countries, \nthe obvious thing to do would be to strike first. You do not wait for the gang\u00ac \nster to shoot you or your friends before trying to plug him as full of holes as a \nsecond\u2019s start makes possible. Surprise, and the first blow, count for much in \nany sort of combat. \n\n\u201cIt is to be hoped also that England, still playing and praying for peace \n(which is all to her credit), will not make the ghastly blunder of allowing Hitler \nto bite off one cherry at a time, until, as it were, the tree has been stripped,\u2014 \nfirst Austria, then Czecho-Slovakia, and so forth, in each case adding military \nstrength and great manufacturing and natural resources to those which Germany \nalready possesses, the total increase to be used finally for the conquest and \nenslavement of England herself. So long as Czecho-Slovakia exists with her \npresent frontiers intact\u2014these frontiers possessing many strategic advantages \nbesides being well fortified\u2014she can offer stiff resistance to German aggression, \nthus diverting German troops from the French, Belgian and Dutch frontiers. \nTo weaken Czecho-Slovakia, therefore, in an effort to preserve peace, by in\u00ac \nsisting upon the surrender to Germany of the Sudeten area as the price of \nfurther British \u2018moral\u2019 support, would be as foolish as to stand aside altogether. \nEngland must either throw up her hands now, with full realization that this \nmeans, before long, the end of an independent England and of the British Em- \n\n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME \n\n\n3 2 3 \n\n\npire, or England must make up her mind to fight, superficially on behalf of a \nsmall republic in central Europe, but actually for the preservation of civilized \nconditions in Europe and, above all, of her own existence.\u201d \n\n\u201cIt is a terrible situation\u201d, the Historian commented, \u201cand a terrible Karma \nfor England, which she has brought upon herself, and others, through her own \nfatuous refusal to recognize Germany\u2019s real nature and intentions,\u2014intentions \nwhich Germany did not try to conceal, but flaunted in the eyes of the entire \nworld. I love England, and fear that the penalty she will have to pay for her \nwilful blindness, and for her jealousy of French influence in Europe\u2014the in\u00ac \ngrained desire to preserve \u2018the balance of power\u2019, and to strengthen Germany \nwith that in view\u2014is likely to involve suffering far greater than anything she \nhad to endure during the Great War.\u201d \n\n\u201cIf Neville Chamberlain had been a different kind of man\u201d, the Engineer \nnow said, \u201cI believe the interview at Berchtesgaden might have resulted in \nsomething better than his own partial enlightenment, which seems to be all the \nPhilosopher dares hope for. I am reminded of a recent incident in business: a \nrelatively small manufacturing company received an order for some apparatus \nfrom a large and powerful corporation, a \u2018valued customer\u2019. The apparatus \nwas fabricated and shipped. Shortly afterwards word came that it was defec\u00ac \ntive, with loud complaints from the customer\u2019s chief engineer. The Works \nManager of the smaller company, having learned that the apparatus in ques\u00ac \ntion had been subjected to tests which he considered utterly unfair and un\u00ac \nreasonable, arranged for an interview with this chief engineer, and at once told \nhim what he thought of these tests. The chief engineer was furious. He jumped \nfrom his chair and, with upraised arm, shouted his anger and resentment: he \nwas \u2018through\u2019 with a company which dared to criticize his, the purchaser\u2019s, \nmethods. The Works Manager was equal to the occasion. Instead of apol\u00ac \nogizing for what he had said; instead of trying to placate this important cus\u00ac \ntomer, he shouted back\u2014pointing to his opponent\u2019s vacant chair: \u2018When you \ncome back to earth, we will discuss this question as engineer with engineer. \nTime enough after that, to consider the matter as between buyer and seller.\u2019 \nHis force of character and fearlessness, and the sincerity of his indignation, \nstruck the other man like a blow in the face. He subsided into his chair; dis\u00ac \ncussed the subject rationally, and finally agreed to a settlement which \\vaa< \nentirely in favour of the Works Manager\u2019s company. \n\n\u201cHitler is a bully (he can be charming, I am told, when he wants to be), and \nthe only way to handle a bully is to face him down with a force greater than his \nown. If, in reply to Hitler\u2019s tirade\u2014for Hitler begins every interview with a \ntirade\u2014Chamberlain had shown genuine anger, and had barked at him in the \ntone of a commanding officer that if he dared to touch Czecho-Slovakia \u2018we \nwill wipe you and Germany off the map\u2019, it is quite possible that Hitler would \nhave collapsed, and would have become sufficiently rational to discuss terms of \ns^ement which would have been acceptable to Czecho-Slovakia.\u201d \n\n^Possible, but not probable\u201d, said the Philosopher. \u201cDo not forget that \nHitler has so deeply committed himself to his programme of expansion, both \n\n\n324 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nin his book, Mein Kampf, and in his speeches, that it would be out of the \nquestion for him to maintain his ascendancy in Germany without putting that \nprogramme into effect. Do not forget either that he is a fanatic. More than \nthat. In a book which I have not yet had time to read, but at which I have \nglanced \u2014Insanity Fair , by Douglas Reed\u2014the author, who witnessed what he \ndescribes, writes of Hitler\u2019s reception in Vienna in March of this year, and of \nhow frantically he was acclaimed by the people he had conquered. Reed then \nsays: \n\nIt went to his head. It intoxicated him. Endless suffering for Europe was born on \nthis day. Though his conquest of Austria had been relatively bloodless, Hitler then \ntasted blood. His demeanour, as he strode about on the balcony of the old Imperial \nPalace with the delirious multitudes shrieking below him, his voice as he spoke to them, \nwhich was that of a man possessed with some ungovernable Berserk rage, all betokened \nthe man who was coming to think himself a God, all-powerful, invincible, all-avenging. \nIt was a fearful scene. . . . The Austrians, like the Germans, had been won for race\u00ac \nhatred, foreigner-hatred, and the lust of conquest. \n\n\u201cAmerica thinks she can stand aloof. What madness! Wait until New York \nand Boston, Philadelphia and Washington are bombed from the air, with the \nultimatum that unless our gold reserves are surrendered, the dose will be re\u00ac \npeated indefinitely. \n\n\u201cSome people would think this, and much else that I have been saying, \nextravagant; but Hitler is extravagant; it is the brazen, the unprecedented, the \nmonstrous that appeal to him. Would America have believed, in 1918, that \nin twenty years England and France would be threatened by a Germany whose \nmilitary force may prove greater than theirs combined? America too will have \nto fight for her life, and can do so now, with allies, or can do so in a few years \nfrom now, alone, unaided, against a Germany made ten times as strong by the \nconquest and absorption of nations she regards as her rightful prey,\u2014France \nincluded.\u201d \n\n\u201cSurely not France!\u201d our visitor protested. \u201cHas not Hitler said that he \nwishes to maintain friendly relations with France?\u201d \n\n\u201cHe has\u201d, was the reply; \u201cbut this is what he wrote in Mein Kampf: \n\nNot until the Germans have realized that they must engage in an active and final \nconflict with France, will it be possible to bring the fruitless struggle to a conclusion\u2014on \ncondition, however, that Germany sees in the extermination of France a means of pro\u00ac \nviding her people with the necessary room for expansion. \n\n\u201cA copy of Mein Kampf is given to every newly married couple in Germany. \nIt is the Bible of all Nazis.\u201d \n\n\u201cIs civilization doomed?\u201d someone asked. \n\n\u201cIt may be so\u201d, was the reply. \u201cThat may be the only way to insure a fresh \nstart on a better, truer basis. It may be the only way in which the guidance of \n\u2018God-instructed men\u2019 can be made possible; for only when people are desperate, \nand know at last that of themselves they are helpless, will they be willing to \naccept the guidance of those who know, and whose desire to help, fortunately \nfor us, is unending. One thing is sure: the fate of the world, and of America as \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nON THE SCREEN OF TIME \n\n\n325 \n\n\npart of the world, now hangs in the balance. Without, there is confusion and \ndarkness and terror; within, it is for us to maintain, each in his own heart, an \nimmovable centre of faith and confidence in the ultimate triumph of Right. \nMasters are. That is enough.\u201d \n\n\u201cYes\u201d, said our oldest Member, \u2018\u2018and even if Europe were reduced to the \ndesolation that followed the collapse of the Roman Empire (the fate indicated by \nFerrero), out of that waste and misery would arise a fairer civilization, a nobler \nart, a higher and purer thought and life. Whatever betide, let us keep our \nfaith and courage undimmed. \u2018God\u2019s in his heaven: All\u2019s right with the world.\u2019 \nNothing that is true and beautiful can ever die. It may pass from sight with \nthe winter\u2019s frost, but it will bloom again in added loveliness when \u2018spring\u2019 re\u00ac \nturns once more. We must remember what we were told,\u2014to take \u2018long views\u2019.\u201d \n\nT. \n\n\n. . . And the seventh child went into his closet , and kneeled upon the floor , and \ncovered his face with his hands. And he cried aloud saying: Oh Lord, how long shall \nthe wicked triumph! And the cloud of the Lord enveloped him, and he heard a \nstern voice from the cloud saying unto him: When the weakling disdains his weak\u00ac \nness, and the coward arises from his cowardice; when he is no longer in terror for \nthe loss of his possessions, but is in terror for the loss of his soul; when the cause \nof the weak and downtrodden constraineth him, and not the shouting of the oppressor; \nwhen he loves righteousness and justice for their own sakes, and not as a cloak \nfor his self-seeking; then the Lord shall be with him, to defend and uphold him, and \nto save him from all his enemies. For no man ever trusted in the Lord from his \nheart, and was deceived. Behold, the day of trial is always the day of the Lord. \nTurn , therefore, ye people, turn to the Lord , and follow his ways .\u2014 The Book op \nthe Seven Children. \n\n\n\n\n\nPSYCHIC AND NOETIC ACTION \n\n\n... I made man just and right, \n\nSufficient to have stood, though free to fall, \n\nSuch I created all th } ethereal powers \n\nAnd spirits, both them who stood and them who fail'd, \n\nTruly, they stood who stood, and fell who fell .... \n\n\u2014Milton. \n\n.... The assumption that the mind is a real being, which can be acted upon by \nthe brain, and which can act on the body through the brain, is the only one com\u00ac \npatible with all the facts of experience. \u2014 George T. Ladd, in the \u2018\u2018Elements of \nPhysiological Psychology\u201d. \n\nI \n\nA NEW influence, a breath, a sound\u2014\u2018\u2018as of a rushing mighty wind\u201d\u2014has \nsuddenly swept over a few Theosophical heads. An idea, vague at first, \ngrew in time into a very definite form, and now seems to be working \nvery busily in the minds of some of our members. It is this: if we would make \nconverts, the few ex-occult teachings, which are destined to see the light of \npublicity, should be made, henceforward, more subservient to, if not entirely at \none with modern science. It is urged that the so-called esoteric 2 (or late esoteric) \ncosmogony, anthropology, ethnology, geology\u2014psychology and, foremost of all, \nmetaphysics\u2014having been adapted into making obeisance to modern (hence \nmaterialistic) thought, should never henceforth be allowed to contradict (not \nopenly, at all events) \u2018\u2018scientific philosophy\u201d. The latter, we suppose, means \nthe fundamental and accepted views of the great German schools, or of Mr. \nHerbert Spencer and some other English stars of lesser magnitude; and not \nonly these, but also the deductions that may be drawn from them by their more \nor less instructed disciples. \n\n1 By H. P. Blavatsky. reprinted from Lucifer, vol. vii, October and November. 1890. \n\n1 We say \u201cso-called\u201d, because nothing of what has been given out publicly or in print can any longer be termed \nesoteric. [This, and all following footnotes are by H.P.B.] \n\n326 \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nPSYCHIC AND NOETIC ACTION \n\n\n327 \n\n\nA large undertaking this, truly; and one, moreover, in perfect conformity \nwith the policy of the mediaeval Casuists, who distorted truth and even sup\u00ac \npressed it, if it clashed with divine Revelation. Useless to say that we decline \nthe compromise. It is quite possible\u2014nay, probable and almost unavoidable\u2014 \nthat \u201cthe mistakes made\u201d in the rendering of such abstruse metaphysical tenets \nas those contained in Eastern Occultism, \u201cshould be frequent and often impor\u00ac \ntant\u201d. But then all such have to be traced back to the interpreters, not to the \nsystem itself. They have to be corrected on the authority of the same Doctrine, \nchecked by the teachings grown on the rich and steady soil of Gupta Vidya , not \nby the speculations that blossom forth to-day, to die to-morrow\u2014on the shifting \nsands of modem scientific guess-work, especially in all that relates to psychology \nand mental phenomena. Holding to our motto, \u201cThere is no religion higher \nthan truth\u201d, we refuse most decidedly to pander to physical science. Yet, we \nmay say this: If the so-called exact sciences limited their activity only to the \nphysical realm of nature; if they concerned themselves strictly with surgery, \nchemistry\u2014up to its legitimate boundaries; and with physiology\u2014so far as the \nlatter relates to the structure of our corporeal frame, then the Occultists would \nbe the first to seek help in modem sciences, however many their blunders and \nmistakes. But once that, over-stepping material Nature, the physiologists of \nthe modem \u201canimalistic \u201d 1 * 3 school pretend to meddle with, and deliver ex cathedrd \ndicta on, the higher functions and phenomena of the mind, saying that a careful \nanalysis brings them to a firm conviction that no more than the animal is man \na free-agent , far less a responsible one\u2014then the Occultist has a far greater right \nthan the average modem \u201cIdealist\u201d to protest. And the Occultist asserts that \nno materialist\u2014a prejudiced and one-sided witness at best\u2014can claim any \nauthority in the question of mental physiology, or that which is now called by \nhim the physiology of the soul. No such noun can be applied to the word \u201csoul\u201d, \nunless, indeed, by soul only the lower, psychic mind is meant, or that which \ndevelops in man (proportionally with the perfection of his brain) into intellect, \nand in the animal into a higher instinct. But since the great Charles Darwin \ntaught that \u201cour ideas are animal motions of the organ of sense\u201d, everything \nbecomes possible to the modem physiologist. \n\nThus, to the great distress of our scientifically inclined Fellows, it is once more \nLucifer's duty to show how far we are at logger-heads with exact science, or \nshall we say, how far the conclusions of that science are drifting away from \ntruth and fact. By \u201cscience\u201d we mean, of course, the majority of the men of \nscience; the best minority, we are happy to say, is on our side, at least as far as \nfree-will in man and the immateriality of the mind are concerned. The study \nof the \u201cPhysiology\u201d of the Soul, of the Will in man and of his higher Conscious - \nness from the standpoint of genius and its manifesting faculties, can never be \n\n\n* \n\n\n1 \"Animalism\u201d is quite an appropriate word to use (whoever invented it) as a contrast to Mr. Tylor\u2019s term \n\"animism\", which he applied to all the \" Lower Races\" of mankind who believe the soul a distinct entity. He find* \nthat the words psyche, pneuma, animus, spiritus . etc., all belong to the same cycle of superstition in \"the lower \nstages of culture\", Professor A. Bain dubbing all these distinctions, moreover, as a \"plurality of souls\" and a \n\"double materialism\". This is the more curious as the learned author of Mind and Body speaks as disparagingly of \n\nDaHM[s \"materialism\u201d in Zoonomia, wherein the founder of modern Evolution defines the word idea as \"contract- \ningWIbtion. or configuration of the fibres which constitute the immediate organ of sense\" ( Mind and Body. p. \n\n190. Note) \n\n\n\n328 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nsummarized into a system of general ideas represented by brief formulae; no \nmore than the psychology of material nature can have its manifold mysteries \nsolved by the mere analysis of its physical phenomena. There is no special organ \nof will , any more than there is a physical basis for the activities of self- \nconsciousness. \n\nIf the question is pressed as to the physical basis for the activities of self-consciousness, \nno answer can be given or suggested. . . . From its very nature, that marvellous verify\u00ac \ning actus of mind in which it recognizes the states as its own, can have no analogous or \ncorresponding material substratum. It is impossible to specify any physiological process \nrepresenting this unifying actus; it is even impossible to imagine how the description of \nany such process could be brought into intelligible relation with this unique mental \npower . * 4 * \n\nThus, the whole conclave of psycho-physiologists may be challenged to define \nConsciousness correctly, and they are sure to fail, because Self-consciousness \nbelongs alone to man and proceeds from the Self, the higher Manas. Only, \nwhereas the psychic element (or Kama-manas) b is common to both the animal \nand the human being\u2014the far higher degree of its development in the latter \nresting merely on the greater perfection and sensitiveness of his cerebral cells\u2014 \nno physiologist, not even the cleverest, will ever be able to solve the mystery \nof the human mind, in its highest spiritual manifestation, or in its dual aspect \nof the psychic and the noetic (or the manasic ), 6 or even to comprehend the in\u00ac \ntricacies of the former on the purely material plane\u2014unless he knows something \nof, and is prepared to admit the presence of this dual element. This means that \nhe would have to admit a lower (animal), and a higher (or divine) mind in man, \nor what is known in Occultism as the \u201cpersonal\u201d and the \u201cimpersonal\u201d Egos. \nFor, between the psychic and the noetic , between the Personality and the Indi\u00ac \nviduality , there exists the same abyss as between a \u201cJack the Ripper\u201d, and a \nholy Buddha. Unless the physiologist accepts all this, we say, he will ever be \nled into a quagmire. We intend to prove it. \n\nAs all know, the great majority of our learned \u201cDidymi\u201d reject the idea of \nfree-will. Now this question is a problem that has occupied the minds of thinkers \nfor ages; every school of thought having taken it up in turn and left it as far \nfrom solution as ever. And yet, placed as it is in the foremost ranks of philo\u00ac \nsophical quandaries, the modern \u201cpsycho-physiologists\u201d claim in the coolest and \nmost bumptious way to have cut the Gordian knot for ever. For them the \nfeeling of personal free agency is an error, an illusion, \u201cthe collective hallucina\u00ac \ntion of mankind\u201d. This conviction starts from the principle that no mental \nactivity is possible without a brain, and that there can be no brain without a \nbody. As the latter is, moreover, subject to the general laws of a material world \nwhere all is based on necessity, and where there is no spontaneity, our modern \npsycho-physiologist has nolens volens to repudiate any self-spontaneity in human \naction. Here we have, for instance, a Lausanne professor of physiology, A. A. \n\n4 Physiological Psychology, etc., p. 545, by George T. Ladd, Professor of Philosophy in Yale University. \n\n4 Or what the Kabalists call Nephesh, the \"breath of life\". \n\n\u2022The Sanskrit word Manas (Mind) is used by us in preference to the Greek Nous (nofitic) because the latter \n\nword having been so imperfectly understood in philosophy, suggests no definite meaning. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nPSYCHIC AND NOETIC ACTION \n\n\n329 \n\n\nHerzen, to whom the claim of free-will in man appears as the most unscientific \nabsurdity. Says this oracle:\u2014 \n\nIn the boundless physical and chemical laboratory that surrounds man, organic life \nrepresents quite an unimportant group of phenomena; and amongst the latter, the place \noccupied by life having reached to the stage of consciousness, is so minute that it is ab\u00ac \nsurd to exclude man from the sphere of action of a general law, in order to allow in him \nthe existence of a subjective spontaneity or a free will standing outside of that law . 7 \n\nFor the Occultist who knows the difference between the psychic and the \nnoetic elements in man, this is pure trash, notwithstanding its sound scientific \nbasis. For when the author puts the question\u2014if psychic phenomena do not \nrepresent the results of an action of a molecular character, whither then does \nmotion disappear after reaching the sensory centres?\u2014we answer that we never \ndenied the fact. But what has this to do with free-will? That every phenome\u00ac \nnon in the visible Universe has its genesis in motion, is an old axiom in Occult\u00ac \nism; nor do we doubt that the psycho-physiologist would place himself at \nlogger-heads with the whole conclave of exact scientists were he to allow the \nidea that at a given moment a whole series of physical phenomena may dis\u00ac \nappear in the vacuum. Therefore, when the author of the work cited maintains \nthat the said force does not disappear upon reaching the highest nervous centres, \nbut that it is forthwith transformed into another series, viz., that of psychic \nmanifestations, into thought, feeling, and consciousness, just as this same \npsychic force when applied to produce some work of a physical (e. g., muscular) \ncharacter gets transformed into the latter\u2014Occultism supports him, for it is \nthe first to say that all psychic activity, from its lowest to its highest manifesta\u00ac \ntions, is \u201cnothing but\u2014motion\u201d. \n\nYes; it is Motion but not all \u201cmolecular\u201d motion, as the writer means us to \ninfer. Motion as the Great Breath ( vide \u201cSecret Doctrine,\u201d vol. i, sub voce )\u2014 \nergo \u201c sound\" at the same time \u2014is the substratum of Kosmic-Motion. It is be\u00ac \nginningless and endless, the one eternal life , the basis and genesis of the subjec\u00ac \ntive and the objective universe; for Life (or Be-ness) is the Jons et origo of \nexistence or being. But molecular motion is the lowest and most material of \nits finite manifestations. And if the general law of the conservation of energy \nleads modem science to the conclusion that psychic activity only represents a \nspecial form of motion, this same law, guiding the Occultists, leads them alsa \nto the same conviction\u2014and to something else besides, which psycho-physiologp \nleaves entirely out of consideration. If the latter has discovered only in this \ncentury that psychic (we say even spiritual) action is subject to the same general \nand immutable laws of motion as any other phenomenon manifested in the ob\u00ac \njective realm of Kosmos, and that in both the organic and the inorganic (?) \nworlds every manifestation, whether conscious or unconscious, represents but \nthe result of a collectivity of causes, then in Occult philosophy this represents \nmerely the A,B,C, of its science. \u201cAll the world is in the Swara ; Swara is \nthe Spirit itself\u201d\u2014the One Life or motion , say the old books of Hindu \nOccult philosophy. \u201cThe proper translation of the word Swara is the current \n\n\nichophysiologic Gtntrale. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n330 THEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\nof the life wave \u201d, says the author of Nature's Finer Forces , 8 and he goes on to \nexplain: \n\nIt is that wavy motion which is the cause of the evolution of cosmic undifferentiated \nmatter into the differentiated universe. . . . From whence does this motion come? \nThis motion is the spirit itself. The word atma (universal soul) used in the book ( vide \ninfra), itself carries the idea of eternal motion, coming as it does from the root, AT, or \neternal motion; and it may be significantly remarked that the root at is connected with, \nis in fact simply another form of, the roots ah, breath, and as, being. All these roots \nhave for their origin the sound produced by the breath of animals (living beings). . . . \nThe primeval current of the life-wave is then the same which assumes in man the form \nof inspiratory and expiratory motion of the lungs, and this is the all-pervading source \nof the evolution and involution of the universe. . . . \n\nSo much about motion and the \u201cconservation of energy\u201d from old hooks on \nmagic , written and taught ages before the birth of inductive and exact modern \nscience. For what does the latter say more than these books in speaking, for \ninstance, about animal mechanism , when it says: \n\nFrom the visible atom to the celestial body lost in space, everything is subject to motion; \n\n. . . kept at a definite distance one from the other, in proportion to the motion which \nanimates them, the molecules present constant relations, which they lose only by the \naddition or the subtraction of a certain quantity of motion . 9 \n\nBut Occultism says more than this. While making of motion on the material \nplane and of the conservation of energy, two fundamental laws, or rather two \naspects of the same omnipresent law\u2014 Swara , it denies point blank that these \nhave anything to do with the free-will of man which belongs to quite a different \nplane. The author of Psychophysiologie Gtntrale, treating of his discovery that \npsychic action is but motion, and the result of a collectivity of causes\u2014remarks \nthat as it is so, there cannot be any further discussion upon spontaneity\u2014in the \nsense of any native internal proneness created by the human organism; and \nadds that the above puts an end to all claim for free-will ! The Occultist denies \nthe conclusion. The actual fact of man\u2019s psychic (we say manasic or noetic) \nindividuality is a sufficient warrant against the assumption; for in the case of \nthis conclusion being correct, or being indeed, as the author expresses it, the \ncollective hallucination of the whole of mankind throughout the ages , there would \nbe an end also to psychic individuality. \n\nNow by \u201cpsychic\u201d individuality we mean that self-determining power which \nenables man to override circumstances. Place half a dozen animals of the same \nspecies under the same circumstances, and their actions, while not identical, \nwill be closely similar; place half a dozen men under the same circumstances \nand their actions will be as different as their characters, i. e. } their psychic \nindividuality. \n\n8 TheTheosophist, Feb- 1888. p. 27s. by Rama Prasad, President of the Meerut Theosophical Society. As the \nOccult book cited by him says: \u201cIt is the Swara that has given form to the first accumulations of the divisions of \n\nuniverse; the 5woro causes evolution and involution; the Swara is God, or more properly the Great Power itself \n(Maheshwara ). The Swara is the manifestation of the impression on matter of that power which in man is known \nto us as the power which knows itself (mental and psychic consciousness). It is to be understood that the action \nof this power never ceases. ... It is unchangeable existence\"\u2014and this is the \u201cMotion\" of the Scientists and the \nuniversal Breath of Life of the Occultists. \n\n\u2022 Animal Mechantsm. a treatise on terrestrial and aerial locomotion, by E. J. Marey, Professor at the College of \nFrance, and Member of the Academy of Medicine. \n\n\n\nPSYCHIC AND NOETIC ACTION \n\n\n33 i \n\n\nBut if instead of \u201cpsychic\u201d we call it the higher Self-conscious Will, then \nhaving been shown by the science of psycho-physiology itself that will has no \nspecial organ , how will the materialists connect it with \u201cmolecular\u201d motion at \nall? As Professor George T. Ladd says: \n\nThe phenomena of human consciousness must be regarded as activities of some other form \nof Real Being than the moving molecules of the brain. They require a subject or ground \nwhich is in its nature unlike the phosphorized fats of the central masses, the aggregated \nnerve-fibres of nerve-cells of the cerebral cortex. This Real Being thus manifested im\u00ac \nmediately to itself in the phenomena of consciousness, and indirectly to others through \nthe bodily changes, is the Mind [manas). To it the mental phenomena are to be attrib\u00ac \nuted as showing what it is by what it does. The so-called mental \u201cfaculties\u201d are only the \nmodes of the behaviour in consciousness of this real being. We actually find, by the only \nmethod available, that this real being called Mind believes in certain perpetually recur\u00ac \nring modes: therefore, we attribute to it certain faculties. . . . Mental faculties are not \nentities that have an existence of themselves. . . . They are the modes of the behaviour \nin consciousness of the mind. And the very nature of the classifying acts which lead to \ntheir being distinguished, is explicable only upon the assumption that a Real being called \nMind exists , and is to be distinguished from the real beings known as the physical mole\u00ac \ncules of the brain's nervous mass . 10 \n\n\nAnd having shown that we have to regard consciousness as a unit (another \noccult proposition) the author adds: \n\nWe conclude, then, from the previous considerations: the subject of all the states of con- \nsciousness is a real unit-beings called Mind; which is of non-material nature , and acts and \ndevelops according to laws of its own y but is specially correlated with certain material mole\u00ac \ncules and masses forming the substance of the Brain . 11 \n\n\nThis \u201cMind\u201d is manas , or rather its lower reflection, which whenever it discon\u00ac \nnects itself, for the time being, from kama t becomes the guide of the highest \nmental faculties, and is the organ of the free-will in physical man. Therefore, \nthis assumption of the newest psycho-physiology is uncalled for, and the ap\u00ac \nparent impossibility of reconciling the existence of free-will with the law of the \nconservation of energy is\u2014a pure fallacy. This was well shown in the \u201cScientific \nLetters of \u201cElpay\u201d in a criticism of the work. But to prove it finally and set \nthe whole question definitely at rest, does not even require so high an inter\u00ac \nference (high for us, at any rate) as the Occult laws, but simply a little common \nsense. Let us analyze the question dispassionately. \n\nIt is postulated by one man, presumably a scientist, that because \u201cpsychi^^ \naction is found subject to the general and immutable laws of motion, there is, \ntherefore, no free will in man\". The \u201canalytical method of exact sciences\u201d has \ndemonstrated it, and materialistic scientists have decreed to \u201cpass the resolu\u00ac \ntion\u201d that the fact should be so accepted by their followers. But there are \nother and far greater scientists who thought differently. For instance, Sir Wil\u00ac \nliam Lawrence, the eminent surgeon, declared in his lectures 12 that:\u2014 \n\nThe philo sophical doctrine of the soul, and its separate existence, has nothing to do \n\n\nand the voluntar >' \"\u201ccrificial victim\": \n\nand E^xpe^rimerftal^Poin^o'f < View^ f pp^\u00b06o6 and^\u201d \u00b0' th ' a \" d natUre \u00b0 f th ' mind ' fr0m thc Physical \n\n\u201c W - Lawrence: Lectures on Comparative Anatomy. Physiology. Zoology, and the Natural History of Man, London, \n\n\n1848, p. 6. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n332 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nwith this physiological question, but rests on a species of proof altogether different. \nThese sublime dogmas could never have been brought to light by the labours of the anat\u00ac \nomist and physiologist. An immaterial and spiritual being could not have been dis\u00ac \ncovered amid the blood and filth of the dissecting room. \n\nNow, let us examine on the testimony of the materialist how this universal \nsolvent called the \u201canalytical method\u201d is applied in this special case. The \nauthor of the Psychophysiologie decomposes psychic activity into its compound \nelements, traces them back to motion, and, failing to find in them the slightest \ntrace of free-will or spontaneity, jumps to the conclusion that the latter have no \nexistence in general; nor are they to be found in that psychic activity which he \nhas just decomposed. \u201cAre not the fallacy and error of such an unscientific \nproceeding self-evident?\u201d, asks his critic; and then argues very correctly that: \n\nAt this rate, and starting from the standpoint of this analytical method, one would \nhave an equal right to deny every phenomenon in nature from first to last. For, do not \nsound and light, heat and electricity, like all other chemical processes, once decomposed \ninto their respective elements, lead the experimenter back to the same motion, wherein \nall the peculiarities of the given elements disappear, leaving behind them only \u201cthe vibra\u00ac \ntions of molecules\u201d? But does it necessarily follow that for all that, heat, light, electricity \n\u2014are but illusions instead of the actual manifestations of the peculiarities of our real \nworld? Such peculiarities are not, of course, to be found in compound elements, simply \nbecause we cannot expect that a part should contain, from first to last, the properties of \nthe whole. What should we say of a chemist, who, having decomposed water into its \ncompounds, hydrogen and oxygen, without finding in them the special characteristics of \nwater, would maintain that such did not exist at all nor could they be found in water? \nWhat of an antiquary who upon examining distributed type and finding no sense in every \nseparate letter, should assert that there was no such thing as sense to be found in any \nprinted document? And does not the author of Psycho-physiology act just in this way \nwhen he denies the existence of free-will or self-spontaneity in man, on the grounds that \nthis distinctive faculty of the highest psychic activity is absent from those compound \nelements which he has analyzed? \n\nMost undeniably no separate piece of brick, of wood, or iron, each of which \nhas once been a part of a building now in ruins, can be expected to preserve the \nsmallest trace of the architecture of that building\u2014in the hands of the chemist, \nat any rate; though it would in those of a psychometer , a faculty by the by, which \ndemonstrates far more powerfully the law of the conservation of energy than any \nphysical science does, and shows it acting as much in the subjective or psychic \nworlds as on the objective and material planes. The genesis of sound, on this \nplane, has to be traced back to the same motion, and the same correlation of \nforces is at play during the phenomenon as in the case of every other manifesta\u00ac \ntion. Shall the physicist, then, who decomposes sound into its compound ele\u00ac \nment of vibrations and fails to find in them any harmony or special melody, \ndeny the existence of the latter? And does not this prove that the analytical \nmethod, having to deal exclusively with the elements, and nothing to do with \ntheir combinations , leads the physicist to talk very glibly about motion, vibra\u00ac \ntion, and what not, and to make him entirely lose sight of the harmony produced \nby certain combinations of that motion or the \u201charmony of vibrations\u201d ? Criticism, \nthen, is right in accusing Materialistic psycho-physiology of neglecting these \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nPSYCHIC AND NOETIC ACTION \n\n\n333 \n\n\nall-important distinctions; in maintaining that if a careful observation of facts \nis a duty in the simplest physical phenomena, how much more should it be so \nwhen applied to such complex and important questions as psychic force and \nfaculties? And yet in most cases all such essential differences are overlooked, \nand the analytical method is applied in a most arbitrary and prejudiced way. \nWhat wonder, then, if, in carrying back psychic action to its basic elements of \nmotion, the psycho-physiologist, depriving it during the process of all its essen\u00ac \ntial characteristics, should destroy it; and having destroyed it, it only stands to \nreason that he is unable to find that which exists in it no longer. He forgets, in \nshort, or rather purposely ignores the fact, that though, like all other phenomena \non the material plane, psychic manifestations must be related in their final \nanalysis to the world of vibration (\u201csound\u201d being the substratum of universal \nAkasa ), yet, in their origin, they belong to a different and a higher World of \nHarmony. Elpay has a few severe sentences against the assumptions of those \nhe calls \u201cphysico-biologists\u201d which are worthy of note. \n\nUnconscious of their error, the psycho-physiologists identify the compound elements \nof psychic activity with that activity itself: hence the conclusion from the standpoint of \nthe analytical method, that the highest, distinctive specialty of the human soul\u2014free\u00ac \nwill, spontaneity\u2014is an illusion, and no psychic reality. But as we have just shown, \nsuch identification not only has nothing in common with exact science, but is simply \nimpermissible, as it clashes with all the fundamental laws of logic, in consequence of \nwhich all these so-called physico-biological deductions emanating from the said identi\u00ac \nfication vanish into thin air. Thus to trace psychic action primarily to motion, means \nin no way to prove the \u2018\u2018illusion of free-will\u201d. And, as in the case of water, whose specific \nqualities cannot be deprived of their reality although they are not to be found \nin its compound gases, so with regard to the specific property of psychic action: its spon\u00ac \ntaneity cannot be refused to psychic reality, though this property is not con\u00ac \ntained in those finite elements into which the psycho-physiologist dismembers the activity \nin question under his mental scalpel. \n\nThis method is \u201ca distinctive feature of modem science in its endeavour to \nsatisfy inquiry into the nature of the objects of its investigation by a detailed \ndescription of their development 1 \\ says G. T. Ladd. And the author of The \nElements of Physiological Psychology adds:\u2014 \n\nThe universal process of \u201cBecoming\u201d has been almost personified and deifie^fD \nas to make it the true ground of all finite and concrete existence. . . . The attest \nis made to refer all the so-called development of the mind to the evolution of \nthe substance of the brain, under purely physical and mechanical causes. This attempt, \nthen, denies that any real unit-being called the Mind needs to be assumed as undergoing \na process of development according to laws of its own. ... On the other hand, \nall attempts to account for the orderly increase in complexity and comprehensiveness of \nthe mental phenomena by tracing the physical evolution of the brain are wholly unsatis\u00ac \nfactory to many minds. We have no hesitation in classing ourselves among this number. \nThose facts of experience which show a correspondence in the order of the development \nof the body and the mind, and even a certain necessary dependence of the latter upon the \nformer, are, of course, to be admitted; but they are equally compatible with another \n\u00bbiew of the mind\u2019s development. This other view has the additional advantages that it \nflakes room for many other facts of experience which are very difficult of reconciliation \nwith any materialistic theory. On the whole, the history of each individual 1 s experiences is \nsuch as requires the assumption that a real unit-being (a Mind) is undergoing a process of \n\n\n334 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\ndevelopment , in relation to the changing condition or evolution of the brain y and yet in accord\u00ac \nance with a nature and laws of its own (p. 616). \n\nHow closely this last \u201cassumption\u201d of science approaches the teachings of \nthe Occult philosophy will be shown in Part II of this article. Meanwhile, we \nmay close with an answer to the latest materialistic fallacy, which may be sum\u00ac \nmarized in a few words. As every psychic action has for its substratum the \nnervous elements whose existence it postulates, and outside which it cannot \nact; as the activity of the nervous elements is only molecular motion, there is \ntherefore no need to invent a special and psychic Force for the explanation of \nour brain work. Free Will would force Science to postulate an invisible Free- \nWilier , a creator of that special Force. \n\nWe agree: \u201cnot the slightest need\u201d, of a creator of \u201cthat special\u201d or any other \nForce. Nor has any one ever claimed such an absurdity. But between creating \nand guiding , there is a difference, and the latter implies in no way any creation \nof the energy of motion, or, indeed, of any special energy. Psychic mind (\\n \ncontradistinction to manasic or noetic mind) only transforms this energy of the \n\u201cunit-being\u201d according to \u201ca nature and laws of its own\u201d\u2014to use Ladd\u2019s felici\u00ac \ntous expression. The \u201cunit-being\u201d creates nothing, but only causes a natural \ncorrelation in accordance with both the physical laws and laws of its own ; hav\u00ac \ning to use the Force, it guides its direction, choosing the paths along which it \nwill proceed, and stimulating it to action. And, as its activity is sui generis , and \nindependent, it carries this energy from this world of disharmony into its own \nsphere of harmony. Were it not independent it could not do so. As it is, the \nfreedom of man\u2019s will is beyond doubt or cavil. Therefore, as already observed, \nthere is no question of creation, but simply of guidance. Because the sailor at \nthe wheel does not create the steam in the engine, shall we say that he does not \ndirect the vessel? \n\nAnd, because we refuse to accept the fallacies of some psycho-physiologists as \nthe last word of science, do we furnish thereby a new proof that free-will is an \nhallucination ? We deride the animalistic idea. How far more scientific and \nlogical, besides being as poetical as it is grand, is the teaching in the Katha Upani- \nshad } which, in a beautiful and descriptive metaphor, says that: \u201cThe senses \nare the horses, body is the chariot, mind ( kama-manas) is the reins, and intellect \n(or free-will) the charioteer.\u201d Verily, there is more exact science in the less im\u00ac \nportant of the Upanishads , composed thousands of years ago, than in all the \nmaterialistic ravings of modern \u201cphysico-biology\u201d and \u201cpsychophysiology\u201d put \ntogether! \n\nII. \n\n.... The knowledge of the past , present , and future , is embodied in Kshetrajna \n{the \u201cSelf\u201d). \u2014Occult Axioms. \n\nHaving explained in what particulars, and why, as Occultists, we disagree \nwith materialistic physiological psychology, we may now proceed to point out \nthe difference between psychic and noetic mental functions, the noetic not being \nrecognized by official science. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nPSYCHIC AND NOETIC ACTION \n\n\n335 \n\n\nMoreover, we, Theosophists, understand the terms \u201cpsychic\u201d and \u201cpsychism\u201d \nsomewhat differently from the average public, from science, and even theology, \nthe latter giving it a significance which both science and Theosophy reject, and the \npublic in general remaining with a very hazy conception of what is really meant \nby the terms. For many, there is little, if any, difference between \u201cpsychic\u201d \nand \u201cpsychological\u201d, both words relating in some way to the human soul. Some \nmodern metaphysicians have wisely agreed to disconnect the word Mind \n{pneuma) from Soul {psyche), the one being the rational, spiritual part, the \nother\u2014 psyche \u2014the living principle in man, the breath that animates him (from \nanima , soul). Yet, if this is so, how in this case refuse a soul to animals ? These \nare, no less than man, informed with the same principle of sentient life, the \nnephesh of the 2nd chapter of Genesis. The Soul is by no means the mind, nor \ncan an idiot, bereft of the latter, be called a \u201csoul-less\u201d being. To describe, as \nthe physiologists do, the human Soul in its relations to senses and appetites, \ndesires and passions, common to man and the brute, and then endow it with \nGod-like intellect, with spiritual and rational faculties which can take their \nsource but in a supersensible world\u2014is to throw for ever the veil of an impene\u00ac \ntrable mystery over the subject. Yet in modern science, \u201cpsychology\u201d and \n\u201cpsychism\u201d relate only to conditions of the nervous system, mental phenomena \nbeing traced solely to molecular action. The higher noetic character of the Mind- \nPrinciple is entirely ignored, and even rejected, as a \u201csuperstition\u201d by both \nphysiologists and psychologists. Psychology, in fact, has become a synonym \nin many cases for the science of psychiatry. Therefore, students of Theosophy \nbeing compelled to differ from all these, have adopted the doctrine that under\u00ac \nlies the time-honoured philosophies of the East. What it is, may be found \nfurther on. \n\nTo understand better the foregoing arguments and those which follow, the \nreader is asked to turn to the editorial in the September Lucifer (\u201cThe Dual \nAspect of Wisdom\u201d, p. 3), and acquaint himself with the double aspect of that \nwhich is termed by St. James in his Third Epistle at once\u2014the devilish, terres\u00ac \ntrial wisdom, and the \u201cwisdom from above\u201d. In another editorial, \u201cKosmic \nMind\u201d (April, 1890), it is also stated that the ancient Hindus endowed every \ncell in the human body with consciousness, giving each the name of a God or \nGoddess. Speaking of atoms in the name of science and philosophy, Profes^fl \nLadd calls them in his work \u201csupersensible beings \u201d. Occultism regards eve^ \natom 13 as an \u201cindependent entity\u201d and every cell as a \u201cconscious unit\u201d. It \nexplains that no sooner do such atoms group to form cells, than the latter be\u00ac \ncome endowed with consciousness, each of its own kind, and with free-will to \nact within the limits of law. Nor are we entirely deprived of scientific evidence \nfor such statements as the two above named editorials well prove. More than \none learned physiologist of the golden minority, in our own day, moreover, \nis rapidly coming to the conviction, that memory has no seat, no special organ \nof its own in the human brain, but that it has seats in every organ of the body. \n\n^No good ground exists for speaking of any special organ, or seat of memory\u201d, \n\nHbne of the names of Brahmft is anu or \u201catom\u201d. \n\n\n\n336 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nwrites Professor J. T. Ladd. 14 \u201cEvery organ indeed, every area, and every \nlimit of the nervous system has its own memory\u201d (p. 553 loc. cit.). \n\nThe seat of memory, then, is assuredly neither here nor there, but everywhere \nthroughout the human body. To locate its organ in the brain is to limit and \ndwarf the Universal Mind and its countless Rays (the Manasa putra) which \ninform every rational mortal. As we write for Theosophists, first of all, we \ncare little for the psychophobian prejudices of the Materialists who may read \nthis and sniff contemptuously at the mention of \u201cUniversal Mind\u201d, and the \nHigher noetic souls of men. But, what is memory, we ask. \u201cBoth presentation \nof sense and image of memory, are transitory phases of consciousness\u201d, we are \nanswered. But what is Consciousness itself?\u2014we ask again. \u201cWe cannot define \nConsciousness \u201d, Professor Ladd tells us. 15 Thus, that which we are asked to do \nby physiological psychology is, to content ourselves with controverting the \nvarious states of Consciousness by other people\u2019s private and unverifiable \nhypotheses; and this, on \u201cquestions of cerebral physiology where experts and \nnovices are alike ignorant \u201d, to use the pointed remark of the said author. Hy\u00ac \npothesis for hypothesis then, we may as well hold to the teachings of our Seers, \nas to the conjectures of those who deny both such Seers and their wisdom. The \nmore so, as we are told by the same honest man of science, that \u201cif metaphysics \nand ethics cannot properly dictate their facts and conclusions to the science of \nphysiological psychology, ... in turn this science cannot properly dictate to \nmetaphysics and ethics the conclusions which they shall draw from facts of \nConsciousness, by giving out its myths and fables in the garb of well ascertained \nhistory of the cerebral processes\u201d (p. 544). \n\nNow, since the metaphysics of Occult physiology and psychology postulate \nwithin mortal man an immortal entity, \u201cdivine Mind\u201d, or Nous , whose pale \nand too often distorted reflection is that which we call \u201cMind\u201d and intellect in \nmen\u2014virtually an entity apart from the former during the period of every \nincarnation\u2014we say that the two sources of \u201cmemory\u201d are in these two \u201cprin\u00ac \nciples\u201d. These two we distinguish as the Higher Manas (Mind or Ego), and the \nKama-Manas , i. e. t the rational, but earthly or physical intellect of man, in\u00ac \ncased in, and bound by, matter, therefore subject to the influence of the latter: \nthe all-conscious Self, that which reincarnates periodically\u2014verily the Word \nmade flesh!\u2014and which is always the same, while its reflected \u201cDouble\u201d, chang\u00ac \ning with every new incarnation and personality, is, therefore, conscious but for \na life-period. The latter \u201cprinciple\u201d is the Lower Self, or that which, mani\u00ac \nfesting through our organic system, acting on this plane of illusion, imagines \nitself the Ego Sum , and thus falls into what Buddhist philosophy brands as the \n\u201cheresy of separateness\u201d. The former, we term Individuality, the latter \nPersonality. From the first proceeds all the noetic element, from the second, the \npsychic , i. e. } \u201cterrestrial wisdom\u201d at best, as it is influenced by all the chaotic \nstimuli of the human or rather animal passions of the living body. \n\nThe \u201cHigher Ego\u201d cannot act directly on the body, as its consciousness be- \n\n1 * Professor of Philosophy at Yale University. \nu Elements of Physiological Psychology. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nPSYCHIC AND NOETIC ACTION \n\n\n337 \n\n\nlongs to quite another plane and planes of ideation: the \u201clower\u201d Self does: and \nits action and behaviour depend on its free will and choice as to whether it will \ngravitate more towards its parent (\u201cthe Father in Heaven\u201d) or the \u201canimal\u201d \nwhich it informs, the man of flesh. The \u201cHigher Ego\u201d, as part of the essence of \nthe Universal Mind, is unconditionally omniscient on its own plane, and only \npotentially so in our terrestrial sphere, as it has to act solely through its alter ego \n\u2014the Personal Self. Now, although the former is the vehicle of all knowledge \nof the past, the present, and the future, and although it is from this fountain\u00ac \nhead that its \u201cdouble\u201d catches occasional glimpses of that which is beyond the \nsenses of man, and transmits them to certain brain cells (unknown to science in \ntheir functions), thus making of man a Seer , a soothsayer, and a prophet; yet \nthe memory of bygone events\u2014especially of the earth earthy\u2014has its seat in \nthe Personal Ego alone. No memory of a purely daily-life function, of a physi\u00ac \ncal, egotistical, or of a lower mental nature\u2014such as, e. g., eating and drinking, \nenjoying personal sensual pleasures, transacting business to the detriment of \none\u2019s neighbour, etc., etc., has aught to do with the \u201cHigher\u201d Mind or Ego. \nNor has it any direct dealings on this physical plane with either our brain or \nour heart\u2014for these two are the organs of a power higher than the Personality \n\u2014but only with our passional organs, such as the liver, the stomach, the spleen, \netc. Thus it only stands to reason that the memory of such-like events must \nbe first awakened in that organ which was the first to induce the action re\u00ac \nmembered afterwards, and conveyed it to our \u201csense-thought\u201d, which is \nentirely distinct from the \u201c super sensuous*' thought. It is only the higher forms \nof the latter, the superconscious mental experiences, that can correlate with the \ncerebral and cardiac centres. The memories of physical and selfish (or personal) \ndeeds, on the other hand, together with the mental experiences of a terrestrial \nnature, and of earthly biological functions, can of necessity, only be correlated \nwith the molecular constitution of various Kamic organs, and the \u201cdynamical \nassociations\u201d of the elements of the nervous system in each particular organ. \n\nTherefore, when Professor Ladd, after showing that every element of the \nnervous system has a memory of its own, adds:\u2014\u201cThis view belongs to the \nvery essence of every theory which considers conscious mental reproduction as \nonly one form or phase of the biological fact of organic memory\u201d\u2014he must \ninclude among such theories the Occult teaching. For no Occultist could ex\u00ac \npress such teaching more correctly than the Professor, who says, in winding \nhis argument: \u201cWe might properly speak, then, of the memory of the end-orgsm \nof vision or of hearing, of the memory of the spinal cord and of the different \nso-called \u2018centres\u2019 of reflex action belonging to the cords of the memory of the \nmedulla oblongata, the cerebellum, etc.\u201d This is the essence of Occult teaching \n\u2014even in the Tantra works. Indeed, every organ in our body has its own mem\u00ac \nory. For if it is endowed with a consciousness \u201cof its own kind\u201d, every cell \nmust of necessity have also a memory of its own kind, as likewise its own psychic \nand noetic action. Responding to the touch of both a physical and a metaphysical \nForce, 16 the impulse given by the psychic (or psycho-molecular) Force will act \n\n\n\u00ab We \n\n\nfondly \n\n\ntrust \n\n\nthis very \n\n\nunscientific term \n\n\nwill throw no \n\n\n\"Animalist\u201d into hysterics beyond recovery. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n338 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nfrom without within ; while that of the noetic (shall we call it Spiritual-dynamical?) \nForce works from within without. For, as our body is the covering of the inner \n\u201cprinciples\u201d, soul, mind, life, etc., so the molecule or the cell is the body in which \ndwell its \u201cprinciples\u201d, the (to our senses and comprehension) immaterial atoms \nwhich compose that cell. The cell\u2019s activity and behaviour are determined by \nits being propelled either inwardly or outwardly, by the noetic or the psychic \nForce, the former having no relation to the physical cells proper. Therefore, \nwhile the latter act under the unavoidable law of the conservation and correla\u00ac \ntion of physical energy, the atoms\u2014being psycho-spiritual, not physical units \u2014 \nact under laws of their own , just as Professor Ladd\u2019s \u201cUnit-Being\u201d, which is our \n\u201cMind-Ego\u201d, does, in his very philosophical and scientific hypothesis. Every \nhuman organ and each cell in the latter has a key-board of its own, like \nthat of a piano, only that it registers and emits sensations instead of sounds. \nEvery key contains the potentiality of good or bad, of producing harmony or \ndisharmony. This depends on the impulse given and the combinations produced; \non the force of the touch of the artist at work, a \u201cdouble-faced Unity\u201d, indeed. \nAnd it is the action of this or the other \u201cFace\u201d of the Unity that determines the \nnature and the dynamical character of the manifested phenomena as a resulting \naction, and this whether they be physical or mental. For the whole life of man \nis guided by this double-faced Entity. If the impulse comes from the \u201cWisdom \nabove\u201d, the Force applied being noetic or spiritual, the results will be actions \nworthy of the divine propeller; if from the \u201cterrestrial, devilish wisdom\u201d (psychic \npower), man\u2019s activities will be selfish, based solely on the exigencies of his \nphysical, hence animal, nature. The above may sound to the average reader \nas pure nonsense; but every Theosophist must understand when told that there \nare Manasic as well as Kamic organs in him, although the cells of his body \nanswer to both physical and spiritual impulses. \n\nVerily that body, so desecrated by Materialism and man himself, is the temple \nof the Holy Grail, the Adytum of the grandest, nay, of all the mysteries of nature \nin our solar universe. That body is an iEolian harp, chorded with two sets of \nstrings, one made of pure silver, the other of catgut. When the breath from the \ndivine Fiat brushes softly over the former, man becomes like unto his God\u2014 \nbut the other set feels it not. It needs the breeze of a strong terrestrial wind, \nimpregnated with animal effluvia, to set its animal chords vibrating. It is the \nfunction of the physical, lower mind to act upon the physical organs and their \ncells; but it is the higher mind alone which can influence the atoms interacting \nin those cells, which interaction is alone capable of exciting the brain, vid the \nspinal \u201c centre \u201d cord, to a mental representation of spiritual ideas far beyond \nany objects on this material plane. The phenomena of divine consciousness \nhave to be regarded as activities of our mind on another and a higher plane, \nworking through something less substantial than the moving molecules of the \nbrain. They cannot be explained as the simple resultant of the cerebral physio\u00ac \nlogical processes, as indeed the latter only condition them or give them a final \nform for purposes of concrete manifestation. Occultism teaches that the liver \nand the spleen-cells are the most subservient to the action of our \u201cpersonal\u201d \n\n\n\n\n\nPSYCHIC AND NOETIC ACTION \n\n\n339 \n\n\nmind, the heart being the organ par excellence through which the \u201cHigher\u201d \nEgo acts\u2014through the Lower Self. \n\nNor can the visions or memory of purely terrestrial events be transmitted \ndirectly through the mental perceptions of the brain\u2014the direct recipient of \nthe impressions of the heart. All such recollections have to be first stimulated \nby and awakened in the organs which were the originators, as already stated, \nof the various causes that led to the results, or, the direct recipients and par\u00ac \nticipators of the latter. In other words, if what is called \u201cassociation of ideas \u201d \nhas much to do with the awakening of memory, the mutual interaction and con\u00ac \nsistent inter-relation between the personal \u201cMind-Entity\u201d and the organs of \nthe human body have far more so. A hungry stomach evokes the vision of a \npast banquet, because its action is reflected and repeated in the personal mind. \nBut even before the memory of the personal Self radiates the vision from the \ntablets wherein are stored the experiences of one\u2019s daily life\u2014even to the mi\u00ac \nnutest details\u2014the memory of the stomach has already evoked the same. And \nso with all the organs of the body. It is they which originate according to their \nanimal needs and desires the electro-vital sparks that illuminate the field of \nconsciousness in the Lower Ego; and it is these sparks which in their turn awaken \nto function the reminiscences in it. The whole human body is, as said, a vast \nsounding board, in which each cell bears a long record of impressions connected \nwith its parent organ, and each cell has a memory and a consciousness of its \nkind, or call it instinct if you will. These impressions are, according to the \nnature of the organ, physical, psychic, or mental, as they relate to this or another \nplane. They may be called \u201cstates of consciousness\u201d only for the want of a \nbetter expression\u2014as there are states of instinctual, mental, and purely ab\u00ac \nstract, or spiritual consciousness. If we trace all such \u201cpsychic\u201d actions to brain- \nwork, it is only because in that mansion called the human body the brain is the \nfront-door, and the only one which opens out into Space. All the others are \ninner doors, openings in the private building, through which travel incessantly \nthe transmitting agents of memory and sensation. The clearness, the vividness, \nand intensity of these depend on the state of health and the organic soundness \nof the transmitters. But their reality, in the sense of trueness or correctness^ \nis due to the \u201cprinciple\u201d they originate from, and the preponderance in th^ \nLower Manas of the noetic or of the phrenic (\u201cKamic\u201d, terrestrial) element. \n\nFor, as Occultism teaches, if the Higher Mind-Entity\u2014the permanent and \nthe immortal\u2014is of the divine homogeneous essence of \u201cAlaya-Akasa\u201d, 17 or \nMahat,\u2014its reflection, the Personal Mind, is, as a temporary \u201cPrinciple\u201d, of \nthe Substance of the Astral Light. As a pure ray of the \u201cSon of the Universal \nMind\u201d, it could perform no functions in the body, and would remain powerless \nover the turbulent organs of Matter. Thus, while its inner constitution is \nManasic, its \u201cbody\u201d, or rather functioning essence, is heterogeneous, and leav- \n\n\u00bb d with the Astral Light, the lowest element of Ether. It is a part of the \n_fcion of the Manasic Ray, gradually to get rid of the blind, deceptive element \nwhich, though it makes of it an active spiritual entity on this plane, still brings \n\n\nit Another name for the universal mind. \n\n\n\n34 o THEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\nit into so close contact with matter as to entirely becloud its divine nature and \nstultify its intuitions. \n\nThis leads us to see the difference between the pure noetic and the terrestrial \npsychic visions of seership and mediumship. The former can be obtained by \none of two means; (a) on the condition of paralyzing at will the memory and the \ninstinctual, independent action of all the material organs and even cells in the \nbody of flesh, an act which, once that the light of the Higher Ego has consumed \nand subjected for ever the passional nature of the personal, lower Ego, is easy, \nbut requires an adept; and (6) of being a reincarnation of one who, in a previous \nbirth, had attained through extreme purity of life and efforts in the right direc\u00ac \ntion almost to a Ytfgz-state of holiness and saintship. There is also a third pos\u00ac \nsibility of reaching in mystic visions the plane of the higher Manas; but it is \nonly occasional and does not depend on the will of the Seer, but on the extreme \nweakness and exhaustion of the material body through illness and suffering. \nThe Seeress of Prevorst was an instance of the latter case; and Jacob Boehme \nof our second category. In all other cases of abnormal seership, of so-called \nclairaudience, clairvoyance and trances, it is simply\u2014 mediumship. \n\nNow what is a medium? The term medium, when not applied simply to \nthings and objects, is supposed to be a person through whom the action of \nanother person or being is either manifested or transmitted. Spiritualists be\u00ac \nlieving in communications with disembodied spirits, and that these can manifest \nthrough, or impress sensitives to transmit \u201cmessages\u201d from them, regard me\u00ac \ndiumship as a blessing and a great privilege. We Theosophists, on the other \nhand, who do not believe in the \u201ccommunion of spirits\u201d as Spiritualists do, \nregard the gift as one of the most dangerous of abnormal nervous diseases. A \nmedium is simply one in whose personal Ego, or terrestrial mind ( psuche ), the \npercentage of \u201castral\u201d light so preponderates as to impregnate with it their \nwhole physical constitution. Every organ and cell thereby is attuned, so to \nspeak, and subjected to an enormous and abnormal tension. The mind is ever \non the plane of, and quite immersed in, that deceptive light whose soul is \ndivine, but whose body\u2014the light waves on the lower planes, infernal; for \nthey are but the black and disfigured reflections of the earth\u2019s memories. \nThe untrained eye of the poor sensitive cannot pierce the dark mist, the dense \nfog of the terrestrial emanations, to see beyond in the radiant field of the eternal \ntruths. .His vision is out of focus. His senses, accustomed from his birth, like \nthose of a native of the London slums, to stench and filth, to the unnatural dis\u00ac \ntortions of sights and images tossed on the kaleidoscopic waves of the astral \nplane\u2014are unable to discern the true from the false. And thus, the pale soulless \ncorpses moving in the trackless fields of \u201cKama loka\u201d, appear to him the living \nimages of the \u201cdear departed\u201d ones; the broken echoes of once human voices, \npassing through his mind, suggest to him well co-ordinated phrases, which he \nrepeats, in ignorance that their final form and polish were received in the inner\u00ac \nmost depths of his own brain-factory. And hence the sight and the hearing of \nthat which, if seen in its true nature, would have struck the medium\u2019s heart \ncold with horror, now fills him with a sense of beatitude and confidence. He \n\n\nPSYCHIC AND NOETIC ACTION \n\n\n34i \n\n\nreally believes that the immeasurable vistas displayed before him are the real \nspiritual world, the abode of the blessed disembodied angels. \n\nWe describe the broad main features and facts of mediumship, there being no \nroom in such an article for exceptional cases. We maintain\u2014having unfor\u00ac \ntunately passed at one period of life personally through such experiences\u2014that \non the whole, mediumship is most dangerous; and psychic experiences when \naccepted indiscriminately lead only to honestly deceiving others, because the \nmedium is the first self-deceived victim. Moreover, a too close association \nwith the \u201cOld Terrestrial Serpent\u201d is infectious. The odic and magnetic cur\u00ac \nrents of the Astral Light often incite to murder, drunkenness, immorality, and, \nas Eliphas L\u00a3vi expresses it, natures not altogether pure \u201ccan be driven head\u00ac \nlong by the blind forces set in motion in the Light' \u2019\u2014by the errors and sins \nimposed on its waves. \n\nAnd this is how the great Mage of the XIXth century corroborates the fore\u00ac \ngoing when speaking of the Astral Light: \n\nWe have said that to acquire magical power, two things are necessary: to disengage \nthe will from all servitude, and to exercise it in control. \n\nThe sovereign will (of the adept) is represented in our symbols by the woman who \ncrushes the serpent's head, and by the resplendent angel who represses the dragon, and \nholds him under his foot and spear; the great magical agent, the dual current of light, the \nliving and astral fire of the earth, has been represented in the ancient theogonies by the \nserpent with the head of a bull, a ram, or a dog. It is the double serpent of the caduceus , \nit is the Old Serpent of Genesis , but it is also the brazen serpent of Moses entwined around \nthe tauy that is to say, the generative lingha. It is also the goat of the witch-sabbath, \nand the Baphomet of the Templars; it is the Hyle of the Gnostics; it is the double-tailed \nserpent which forms the legs of the solar cock of the Abraxas: finally, it is the Devil of \nM. Eudes de Mirville. But in very fact it is the blind force which souls (1. e. t the lower \nManas or Nephesh) have to conquer to liberate themselves from the bonds of the earth; \nfor if their will does not free \u201cthem from this fatal attraction> they will be absorbed in \nthe current by the force which has produced them, and will return to the central and \neternal fire\u201d. 1 * \n\nThe \u201ccentral and eternal fire\u201d is that disintegrating Force, that gradually \nconsumes and bums out the Kama-rupa , or \u201cpersonality\u201d, in the Kama-loka, \nwhither it goes after death. And verily, the Mediums are attracted by the \nastral light; it is the direct cause of their personal \u201csouls\u201d being absorbed \u201cby \nthe force which has produced\u201d their terrestrial elements. And, therefore, as \nthe same Occultist tells us: ^ \n\nAll the magical operations consist in freeing one\u2019s self from the coils of the Anci^| \nSerpent; then to place the foot on its head, and lead it according to the operator's \n\u201cI will give unto thee\u201d, says the Serpent, in the Gospel myth, \u201call the kingdoms of the \nearth, if thou wilt fall down and worship me.\u201d The initiated should reply to him, \u201cI will \nnot fall down, but thou shalt crouch at my feet; thou wilt give me nothing, but I will \nmake use of thee and take whatever I wish. For I am thy Lord and Master!\u201d \n\nAnd as such, the Personal Ego , becoming at one with its divine parent, shares \nin the immortality of the latter. Otherwise. . . . \n\nEnough, however. Blessed is he who has acquainted himself with the dual \npowers at work in the Astral Light; thrice blessed he who has learned to dis\u00ac \ncern the Noetic from the Psychic action of the \u201cDouble-Faced\u201d God in him, and \nwho knows the potency of his own Spirit\u2014or \u201cSoul Dynamics\u201d. \n\nDogme et Rituel de la Haute Magie, quoted in Isis Unveiled. \n\n\n\n\n\nfxV \n\n\nREVIEWS \n\n\n\n\nChinese Women: Yesterday and To-Day , by Florence Ayscough; Houghton \nMifflin Company, Boston, 1937; price, S3.50. \n\nFlorence Ayscough has written several extremely interesting books on China, \nand her work, with Amy Lowell, on the translation of Chinese poetry, is well \nknown. Her latest book is somewhat disappointing. It is well written and full \nof information, but surprisingly lacking in discrimination. \n\nChinese women, enclosed in their secluded court yards, theoretically occu\u00ac \npied a position of equality with men, although their sphere of action was en\u00ac \ntirely different. \u201cThe theoretical position of women is clearly set forth in the \nancient learning: Chinese philosophy, based on belief in the interaction of the \nprinciples of Yin and Yang [Negative and Positive], which by this interaction \nproduce everything in the visible palpable world, postulates equal importance \nof the functions pertaining to each.\u201d Mrs. Ayscough quotes a chapter of the \nBook of Rites: \n\nHearken to the Son-of-Heaven regarding tenets for men. Hearken to Her-who-is- \nequal-to-the-Sovereign regarding compliance required of women. * Son of Heaven directs \ninherent principle of Yang essence; She-who-is-His-equal regulates Yin qualities. Son \nof Heaven rules all without; She-who-is-His-equal directs all within. If tenets of men be \nnot cultivated, functions of Yang essence will not evolve, their opposition will be mani\u00ac \nfest in the sky, sun will suffer eclipse as though consumed by a living creature. If com\u00ac \npliance of women be not cultivated, Yin qualities will not develop, their opposition will \nbe manifest in the sky, moon will suffer eclipse. When the sun vanishes, Son of Heaven \nputs on plain robes of raw silk, rectifies government within Six Palace Halls, purifies \n\\ ang essence in All-below-the-sky. When the moon is consumed, She-who-is-equal-to- \nthe-Sovereign dresses in plain robe of raw silk, regulates administration of Six Palace \nHalls, purifies Yin qualities in All-below-the-sky. Son of Heaven is to His Consort as \nsun to moon, as Yang to \\ in. Each essential to the other, she perfects the whole. \n\nIn every civilization and nation, whatever the customs regulating society, \nthere are seemingly horrible injustices and suffering. Whether behind the \n\u201cbaton door\u201d, in the harem, or in the department store or office, the lot of count\u00ac \nless women is unfortunate; but so is that of men. As Mephistophilis remarks \nin Marlowe s Faustus , This is Hell, nor am I out of it\u201d. However, women, at \nall times, are not without resources, and are generally able to adjust conditions \nmore or less to their satisfaction. The Chinese women are no exception. \u201cIn \ntalking once with a Japanese gentleman regarding women of different countries \n\n\n342 \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nREVIEWS \n\n\n343 \n\n\nand their characteristics, I mentioned the Chinese. An expression of terror \ncame over his face. \u2018But they\u2019, he said, \u2018are very fierce\u2019.\u201d \n\nMrs. Ayscough gives most interesting descriptions of the life of women in \nformer times, and contrasts it with conditions since the Revolution. She quotes \nfrom old books and ballads. She has chapters on \u2018\u2018Girlhood: Then and Now\u201d, \n\u2018\u2018Marriage: Then and Now\u201d, \u201cEducation\u201d, \u201cProfessions\u201d, etc. She writes a \nshort history of the three Soong sisters, Mrs. H. H. Rung, Mrs. Sun Yat-sen, \nand Mrs. Chiang-Kai-Shih. These ladies, the daughters of a Chinese missionary \nconvert to Christianity, were all educated in America. Mrs. Chiang Kai-Shih \nis well known to readers of the daily Press, and is a horrible example of the \nexuberant vulgarity of modem publicity. Mrs. Ayscough, by some legerde\u00ac \nmain, is able to extend her admiration for the virtues of the ancient Chinese \nladies\u2014modesty, discretion, good taste\u2014to the blatancy of her contempo\u00ac \nraries. \n\nPart Two of the book contains just such an amazing antithesis. The first \npart is given to the life of a revolutionary heroine, Ch\u2019iu Chin, Gem of Autumn. \nCh\u2019iu Chin devoted herself to overthrowing the Manchu dynasty, and to the \nmodern education of women. She was decapitated by the Manchu authorities. \nTo-day, a monument has been raised to her memory. She undoubtedly pos\u00ac \nsessed many heroic qualities, and was actuated by a zeal for what she considered \nto be the liberation of her country. It would be unjust to minimize the courage \nand spirit of self-sacrifice which she displayed, but one is filled with a profound \nsadness when one considers its mistaken* application. What benefits has the \ndownfall of the imperial system conferred on China? What advantages has \nmass-education to offer in place of real, racial culture? The great women, whom \nMrs. Ayscough considers to have formed the atavistic ancestry of Ch\u2019iu Chin, \nand whose lives are described after hers, would not acknowledge their progeny. \nThe V amor Maiden Hua Mu-lan, who fought for twelve years in the wars \nagainst the barbarians, disguised as a man, did so only to save her old father \nfrom military service. Pan Chao, the historian, the \u201cmost famous woman of \nChina\u201d, who wrote the still popular book Precepts for Women in about the year \ni\u00b06 A.D., would have been unutterably shocked by the actions and theories of \nGem of Autumn. Mrs. Ayscough gives a translation of Pan Chao\u2019s charming \nbook, \u201cPeople of old had a saying: \u2018Is perfect virtue far away? I seek ardently \nfor perfect virtue; ... it descends, a bird, to earth.\u2019 This saying may be< \napplied to the qualities of Woman.\u201d \n\nThe great-aunt of Pan Chao, Pan chieh-yu, is also celebrated in Chinese \nhistory: \n\nThe Emperor, in his infatuation, once requested her to drive with him in his \u201cchariot\u201d. \nWith sensitive regard for what rulers should and should not do, she refused, saying that \nit was the place of courtiers, not ladies, to accompany the Son of Heaven in public. This \nincident is depicted on the famous scroll by Ku K\u2019ai-chih in the British Museum. The \nlady, with flowing scarlet streamers, her lacquer black hair dressed high in an elaborate \nhead-dress, gently reproves the Monarch for his suggestion. \n\nLater, she incurred his displeasure, and retired to live with the Dowager \n\n\n\n\n344 THEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\nEmpress, sending him the well known poem on the Autumn Fan, entitled \u201cA \nSong of Grief\u201d: \n\nNewly cut, stretched, argent, white, \n\nPure white as frost, as snow, \n\nA fan: perfectly formed\u2014the circle of happiness. \n\nRound, round, a bright moon. \n\nTreasured in sleeve, taken out, put back, \n\nMoved, waved, it wafts a gentle breeze. \n\nOften fear, when Autumn Season comes, \n\nWhen cold wind, whirling, dispels fiery heat, \n\nDiscarded, laid by, it will be left in bamboo box. \n\nFavour, passion, midway through life are severed. \n\nPart Three contains a condensed version of another famous book for the in\u00ac \nstruction of women, a collection of biographies of out-standing examples of \nfeminine virtue. They are charming stories. Everyone who loves China will \nbe interested in Mrs. Ayscough\u2019s book, but the discriminating reader will ask \nhimself how much of the old China still exists. Looking upon the breakdown \nof its ancient ethics, upon its present anarchy, one may well despair, and fancy \nit lost for ever. Surely, nothing real is ever lost. The power and virtue which \nChina possessed are preserved, and will incarnate again. Do not the Masters \nof Wisdom say, \u201cTake long views\u201d? St.C. LaD. \n\n\nLes Grands Cimitibres sous la Lune , by Georges Bemanos; Librairie Plon, \nParis, 1938; price, $1.25. \n\nM. Bernanos is perhaps best known as the author of the powerful novel, Sous \nle Soleil de Satan. He is a Catholic, and his sympathies are definitely royalist \nand traditionalist; but he is temperamentally a \u201cfree-lance\u201d. We doubt whether \nhe finds it easy to co-operate with anyone. He has the terrible gift of seeing \nclearly the shortcomings of his compatriots, especially of those who belong to \nhis own caste; and he has the even more terrible gift of exposing those short\u00ac \ncomings with mordant irony. He has the virtues and the vices of the satirist. \nHe can speak the truth fearlessly, but he is sometimes very unjust. Possibly \none trouble with France to-day is that she has too many \u201cfree-lances\u201d, too \nmany satirists. As more than one historian has remarked, the French have \nseldom co-operated voluntarily unless they have been driven to unite under the \nrelentless pressure of a foreign foe. Few great nations have suffered more from \nthe ravages of civil war; few, if any, have been capable of such a \u201csacred union\u201d \nin times of real extremity. \n\nTo be fair to M. Bemanos, however, his sardonic humour does not conceal \nthe deeper motives which impel him to write. He sympathizes with the poor \nand the down-trodden, with the victims of oppression and hypocrisy in all lands. \nIt is his abiding love of France which stirs his rage against those who profess to \nspeak in her name, but whose primary concern, as he firmly believes, is the pres\u00ac \nervation of their personal privileges. He is unable to free himself from the \nsense of impending doom, as he contemplates the series of catastrophes which \nare threatening the very foundations of Christian civilization. \n\n\n\nREVIEWS \n\n\n345 \n\n\nIn this book M. Bemanos describes his immediate contact with some of the \nworst horrors and barbarities of the Spanish Revolution. As it happened, his \npoint of contact was the island of Majorca, and the \u201cbarbarians\u201d who com\u00ac \nmitted the atrocities were not the so-called Loyalists but adherents of the In\u00ac \nsurgent cause. The disgust and righteous indignation which M. Bemanos felt, \nhas been increased by the efforts of many conservatives and Catholic ecclesias\u00ac \ntics to represent the Insurgents as the heroes of a \u201cHoly War\u201d. He literally \ncannot contain himself when he hears General Franco described as a preux \nchevalier , and his \u201calliance\u201d with Mussolini and Hitler as a \u201cCrusade\u201d. He \nholds no brief whatsoever for the Loyalists or their radical sympathizers in \nother countries, but he is oppressed by the thought that the \u201cdefenders of civili\u00ac \nzation\u201d can apparently imagine only one way of suppressing the communists, \nand that is by largely adopting their aims and tactics. Many citizens of the \ncontemporary world sympathize with his equal condemnation of the rival ideolo\u00ac \ngies of fascism and communism, which are supposed to be so different but which \nare fundamentally so very much alike. \n\nM. Bernanos is convinced that what is at stake is the preservation of any \nsort of Christian civilization. It is not a question merely of maintaining the \nright to hold, transmit and exchange personal property, for the totalitarian \nstate\u2014whether it be controlled by the \u201cright\u201d or by the \u201cleft\u201d\u2014absorbs the \nmost elementary rights and liberties of the individual, including the most fun\u00ac \ndamental of all, the right of practising the faith which he has inherited from his \nfathers. M. Bemanos insists upon the fact that Christian civilization cannot \nbe successfully defended by methods which would disgrace a savage. But he \nargues that this is the actual programme of many who are the most vociferous \nin the claim that they are custodians of the Master\u2019s word: \n\nIn my opinion, to practise freely my faith, in the spirit of the Gospel\u2014pardon me\u2014 \nit is not only necessary to permit me to practise it;.it is also necessary that I be not con\u00ac \nstrained to practise it. We cannot be driven to the love of God by threat and menace. \nThe clergy have sometimes forgotten this fact. . . . Two thousand years ago there were \npronounced against the Pharisees the most severe words of the Gospel, words of a sever\u00ac \nity which astounds the heart, and to-day this race is not yet near extinction. Which of \nyou can boast that he has not in his veins a single drop of the blood of those vipers? li \nyou cannot defend your parishes [from Pharisaism], we have the right to fear that^c \nwill make the law in your armies. ... I should like to express myself more simply, with \nsimpler words. We shall not leave the sword of Christian France in such hands. We \nshall face the worst, if need be with Samaritans, publicans, thieves and adulterers as our \ncomrades, following the example given us by the Master whom we serve. \n\nThese are hard words, and they are typical of the spirit of the book. The \ngentle reader may find them provocative, if not excessive. The fact is that the \nproblems which impose themselves upon the nations to-day, drive men to im\u00ac \nagine desperate remedies. In 1914 the division between good and evil was \nclear-cut; no superlative wisdom was required to recognize that the Allies were \nfighting on the side of the Angels. But at present, both in politics and war, it \n\u2022not always easy to decide which is the side of the Angels, or whether they are \non any side. Many of us feel that if we were Spaniards, we should support the \n\n\n346 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nInsurgents; but it is painfully evident that we should be serving what M. Ber- \nnanos calls \u201cGeneral Lesser-of-Two-Evils\u201d rather than a positive Good. Not \nonly in Spain, but in many other regions, where there is a better cause, the \nwrong people too often uphold it; where there is a worse cause, it is too often \ndefended by men of good will. \n\nM. Bernanos does not pose as a physician with a ready eure for the evils which \nhe denounces. However, he seems to hope that it may yet be possible to \nmobilize in a last defence of honour and truth those who, like Cato of Utica, \nlove true liberty more dearly than they love their lives. We believe that this \nis indeed the only hope. The Roman Empire was sacked by barbarians, but \nthe essence of civilization was preserved, because throughout the dark centuries \nthere were always a few who never forgot the ancient virtues, or that honour \nand truth and spiritual liberty are more important than life itself. \n\nStudents of Theosophy have a special and glorious opportunity to make such \na belief an effective power, a power which may yet save humanity from a \nDark Age far more desolate than its predecessor. But this power will not be \ngained by trying to force one more ideology upon a world already overburdened \nwith \u201cideas\u201d, which it cannot understand and which only enflame its elemental \npassions. One makes honour and truth and liberty manifest to others, by be\u00ac \ncoming oneself honourable and true and free. Y.L. \n\n\nThe Occult Way , by P. G. Bowen; Rider & Co., London, 1938; price, 105. 6 d. \n\nIt would have been difficult to out-do the pretensions of Mrs. Besant and \nLeadbeater to occult attainment,\u2014pretensions continued on their own behalf \nby those (\u201cBishop\u201d Arundale among them) upon whom Mrs. Besant and her \ntutelary genius conferred \u201cArhatship\u201d. But Adyar now has a rival, Mr. P. G. \nBowen, author of The Sayings of the Ancient One , published a few years ago, and, \nquite recently, of the book under review, The Occult Way. On the title-page of \nthis book Mr. Bowen is described as President of The Hermetic Society, Dublin, \nwhich was formed by George W. Russell (\u201cA.E.\u201d) when the latter, at one time \nan ardent supporter of Judge, lost his bearings, in the theosophic sense, after \nthe schism of Mrs. Tingley. It is claimed that, \u201cThis book was written in ful\u00ac \nfilment of a task laid upon the author by the late A.E.\u201d We doubt, however, \nif George Russell would at any time have countenanced its contents. So far as \nwe are aware, he never went astray in his fidelity to the standards of H.P.B. \nand Judge in matters of sex, while one of our most serious objections to Mr. \nBowen\u2019s occult claims is that his teaching under this head would have been \nrepudiated by H.P.B. and Judge with all the vigour of which they were capable. \nIn these matters they were absolutely uncompromising, as every representative \nof the Great Lodge must be. It is an infallible test, which Adyar notoriously \nhas not survived, and which Mr. Bowen not only discards but reverses, going so \nfar as to class celibacy with \u201cunnatural practices\u201d in sex as conducive \u201cto \nmediumship and other undesirable psychic states\u201d, declaring further that \u201ca \ncompletely celibate life, except for a few exceptional persons, is a definite bar to \nadvance beyond the scope of Lesson IV\u201d (an elementary stage). Judge would \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nREVIEWS \n\n\n347 \n\n\nhave stigmatized this as monstrous, and as proof in itself of Black, not of White \nLodge origin. \n\nMr. Bowen claims for The Sayings of the Ancient One, and for the teachings \nof his Occult Way, that he owes them to ancient manuscripts, written in \u201can \narchaic form of Bantu [Zulu] unknown to Philology\u201d, and explained to him by \nadepts of an African school. Such claims are not original, and may be distorted \npsychic echoes, although, on the other hand, schools of that nature\u2014survivals \nfrom Atlantean days\u2014are known to exist, and are known to be regarded as evil \nby the Masters served by H.P.B. and Jurjge. \n\nThis warning is all the more necessary because the author refers to The Secret \nDoctrine , Light on the Path, Letters that have Helped Me, and to translations by \nCharles Johnston, with approval, and because, without acknowledging his in\u00ac \ndebtedness, he obviously derives enough from those sources to serve as a cloak \nfor the objectionable features of his teaching. T. \n\nMaster Kung: The Story of Confucius, by Carl Crow; Harper & Brothers, \nNew York and London, 1938; price, $3.50. \n\nIt is not easy to write the biography of a sage, for the simple reason that \nwisdom can only be understood truly by the wise. \u201cWe find what we bring.\u201d \nThus every great religious leader has been persistently misrepresented by his \nso-called followers. Some apprehension of this fact seems to have impelled Mr. \nCrow to write this book. He likes and admires Chinese civilization, and gen\u00ac \nuinely reveres the memory of Confucius who so completely embodied the noblest \nqualities of the Chinese nature. But he is convinced that the Chinese them\u00ac \nselves have lost the sense of the philosopher\u2019s real genius by converting him \ninto a pious legend. Mr. Crow is determined to rescue Confucius from the arid \nspeculations of the Confucian literati. \n\nAll the world has heard of the great Chinese sage Confucius, but few know of Master \nKung, though the two characters are embodied in the same person. Master Kung is the \nsincere, lovable, entirely human scholar and gentleman who was born in the sixth century \nbefore Christ, lived a blameless life, suffered more disillusionments and disappointments \nthan usually fall to the lot of men, and died feeling that his life had been a failure. Con\u00ac \nfucius was the creation of generations of later scholars who deified the man, interpreted \nhis acts and sayings by methods which would justify this deification, and so created an \nintellectual Frankenstein monster, a fleshless creature conceived and born between the \ncovers of a text-book. \n\nIn brief, Mr. Crow has tried to reconstruct the story of Confucius from the \navailable sources, letting the simple facts speak for themselves. We do not \nquestion his excellent intentions, nor do we seriously object to his rather liberal \nuse of the imagination to fill in the spaces where the sources provide little or no \nmaterial. But Mr. Crow cannot evade the universal law. He too has found \nwhat he has brought. Inevitably he has interpreted the facts to suit himself. \nHe has followed the profession of journalism, and brings to his subject the pre\u00ac \nconceptions of a newspaper correspondent who instinctively looks everywhere \nfor evidences of \u201cpolitics\u201d. His \u201cMaster Kung\u201d is, in the last analysis, a poli\u00ac \ntician. To be sure, he regards Confucius as that rarest of phenomena, a genuine \n\n\n\n\n\n348 \n\n\nTHEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\n\nidealist and reformer; but an unwary reader of this book might easily be con\u00ac \nvinced that Confucius conceived his mission to be primarily that of a political \nlegislator and administrator. \n\nWe believe that meditation upon the sources enforces a very different inter\u00ac \npretation. Confucius was, in our opinion, essentially a mystic to whom had \ncome a revelation that the principles of justice and true happiness are not man\u00ac \nmade, but are rooted in Universal or Absolute Nature, in that which his con\u00ac \ntemporary, Lao-Tse, called the Tao. He observed that the people had fallen \ninto evil ways, because they had ceased to plan their lives in accordance with \nthe laws of \u201charmonious proportion\u201d which govern all relationships in Heaven \nand upon earth. The natural hierarchical order which supports all beings, had \nbeen disregarded and ruptured, both in the family and the state. The father \nno longer protected the child, and the child did not serve and honour the father. \nThe prince who should have recognized his responsibility to Heaven for the \ncontentment and virtue of his subjects, in fact thought of them as victims to be \ntaxed to the limit for his personal glory and pleasure. To heal the maladies \nwhich were consuming China twenty-five hundred years ago, Confucius first of \nall strove without remission to show forth in his own life the eternal virtues, \nand then to form a body of disciples who would fortify and transmit the tradi\u00ac \ntions of the Golden Age which he had revived. It was evidently part of his \npurpose to convert or at least to influence the ruling caste; for he was convinced \nthat if the upper classes could be cured of their worst delusions, the entire social \norder would begin to recover. This explains his interest in the political develop\u00ac \nments of his epoch. \n\nMr. Crow occasionally glimpses these deeper implications of Confucius\u2019s \ncareer. He says that \u201cin his teachings to his disciples, as well as in the example \nof his life, he had set up a standard of ethics and conduct which would be handed \ndown from father to son and from teacher to disciple through many genera\u00ac \ntions\u201d. There is frequent reference to the sage\u2019s life-long study of music and \nceremonial and the forms of human courtesy. But Mr. Crow\u2019s emphasis is \nupon politics. He seems to be most comfortable when he is \u201creconstructing\u201d \nthe intrigues of princes and ministers or tracing his hero\u2019s alleged efforts to \nobtain office without sacrificing his principles. \n\nWhen Confucius completed his edition of the ancient ballads, he expressed \nthis simple judgment: \u201cThe three hundred odes may be summed up in one \nsentence: thought without depravity.\u201d Mr. Crow comments that \u201cMaster \nKung established a literary standard which has placed all Chinese literature on \na plane of its own, characterized by an austere morality.\u201d The general tone of \nthis book is relatively high, if judged by conventional modern standards, but \nMr. Crow would have been wise to adopt the rigorous standards of Confucius \nhimself. Wit and humour are indispensable allies of common-sense; but it is \nnot necessary to call them into action whenever the subject of sex is mentioned. \nHis innuendoes upon this subject are comparatively mild, but they are none the \nless tiresome and irrelevant and improper. They have no place in the biography \nof a pure and exalted soul. S.L. \n\n\nQUESTIONS \n\n\ntest** \n\n\nANSWERS \n\n\ntSW/ \n\n\nQuestion No. 41 i. \u2014IIow can one use one's belief in Reincarnation in a practical way in every\u00ac \nday life? \n\n\nAnswer. \u2014Theosophy teaches that the purpose of life is conscious union with the Divine. \nThis stage in evolution is reached through chdlaship, for which the vast majority of mankind \nis not yet ready, but is a goal towards which they should be aiming and striving. In the years \nsince H.P.B. brought to the West, knowledge of the Eastern Wisdom, reincarnation has be\u00ac \ncome familiar, in name at least, and a perceptibly larger number of people in the West profess \nbelief in it. Many, however, regard it merely as an interesting subject of speculation, and \nthrough indifference or sloth do nothing about it. Others use it as a means of flattering their \nvanity in various ways, such as imagining that in a past life they were some noted persons or \naccomplished wonderful deeds. Others use it as an excuse for making no attempt to reach \nthe ultimate goal of humanity on the ground that they have any number of lives in which \nto accomplish that purpose. \n\nOne way of looking at the subject of reincarnation is to attempt to realize the truth of the \ntheosophical statement that past, present and future are one, and that time is an illusion. \nWhat we are to-day is the result of what we have been in past incarnations,\u2014our faults, weak\u00ac \nnesses and sins, also our good qualities, such as they are. What we shall be in the future will \ndepend upon what we accomplish in this incarnation, and every thought, every word, every \nact in the present has a direct and important bearing upon our next incarnation. It has been \nsaid that one reason why most people cannot remember past incarnations is that they are \nunable to remember the happenings of their present lives. A helpful practice would be to \ntry to recall at the end of each day the events of the day and every thought, word and act. \nIf we were to adopt the practice of making a daily resolution, and of examining ourselves to \nlearn wherein we have failed to carry it out, and the reasons therefor, we should be aided \ngreatly in recollection, and enabled in time to become conscious of every thought that passes \nthrough our minds, and our reaction to it. G.H.M. \n\n\nAnswer. \u2014What is needed is conviction of the truth of reincarnation. Many people believe \nin reincarnation, but do next to nothing about it. To students of Theosophy, however, reii \ncarnation should be a dominant fact of life, about which at present there is one very practia \nand all-important thing to be done: to contribute, each in his own way, towards the birth of \nchGlaship from within the ranks of the Society. We know that century after century, during \nthe last quarter, the Lodge has tried unsuccessfully to gather together a comparatively small \ngroup of people whose unselfishness and devotion would make it possible to keep the outer \nexpression of the Movement alive in the world over the turn of the century. This time, how\u00ac \never, the Society\u2014founded by the Lodge Messenger, Madame Blavatsky, and by Mr. Judge \nand others, in 1875, as the present outer expression of the Movement\u2014has been carried over \nthe turn of the cycle and into the second quarter of the twentieth century. In other words, \nthe reincarnation of the Movement has reached a \"dead centre\u201d, a point at which chMaship is \nnecessary if the T.S. is to continue actively in the world. Theosophical philosophy makes \n\n\nve^fc \n\nn w \n\n:al \n\n\n349 \n\n\n\n350 \n\n\n* THEOSOPHICAL QUARTERLY \n\nclear that we do not reincarnate at random, but are drawn back into the world, time after \ntime, in groups. With the help of the Masters, we can succeed this time, if we act in whole\u00ac \nhearted unison with the age-old comrades of our corps. It is said that chfilas work together as \nthe fingers of one hand. G.M.W.K. \n\nAnswer.\u2014A conviction of the truth of reincarnation transforms one\u2019s entire scale of values. \nThose who regard each life-time as only a day in the pilgrimage of an immortal soul, who \nrealize that their own past actions, desires and thoughts have made them what they now \nare, that they can change these as they change themselves, their future being absolutely in \ntheir own hands to make or mar, and that the qualities they win may be theirs for all eternity, \n\u2014have every incentive to fight and fight hard. If you were packing a spiritual suit-case, \nwhat qualities would you want to take with you for your next life? What kind of man do \nyou want to be\u2014indolent, self-indulgent, boorish in manner, cowardly in action, vain, self- \ndeceived? Or valorous, resourceful, hard-working, clear-sighted, with a sense of humour, an \naristocrat at heart whatever the outer circumstances? To make a list of the qualities one \nwould want, is illuminating. What a man desires and works for\u2014or desires and yields to\u2014 \nto-day, determines what he will become \u201cnext time\u201d. \n\nIt is helpful to look forward; it is also helpful to look back, imagining ourselves in our next \nincarnation to be remembering this one. In that light, how does a contemplated course of \naction appear? What should we like to remember having done? There are few better ways \nof attaining to detachment. A belief in reincarnation may also be a great aid to contentment \nof heart. There is so much, in this rich and varied world, that one would like for oneself and \nfor those one loves, and that one knows will not be attained in this life. Never mind. There \nwill be many other lives and many other opportunities. \n\nTo those who are seeking discipleship, seeking to fit themselves to aid in the work of Mas\u00ac \nters for the world, the belief in reincarnation gives significance to every event. Masters are \ninterested not only in religion, but in every department of human activity\u2014in music, art, \nstatecraft, diplomacy, business\u2014in whatever affects the souls and characters of men. Those \nwho would aid them, must be prepared to work in any sphere and must seek to fit themselves \nto do so. They must desire all abilities and all talents, and to eliminate all weaknesses. Every \nevent then becomes an opportunity to gain or to strengthen some quality they would wish to \nhave, to be able to place it at the service of their Master, to widen the field in which they can \nbe used, and to make their service more efficient. J.F.B.M. \n\n\nNOTICE \n\nThe regular meetings of the New York Branch of The Theosophical Society will be held \nthroughout the winter and spring at 64, Washington Mews (between Washington Square and \nEast Eighth Street), on alternate Saturday evenings, beginning at half-past eight and closing \nat ten o\u2019clock. Branch members will receive a printed announcement giving the dates. The \nsame announcement will also be mailed to non-members who send their names to the Secre\u00ac \ntary T.S., P. O. Box 64, Station O, New York. Out-of-town members of the Society are in\u00ac \nvited to attend these meetings whenever they are in New York, and visitors who may be \ninterested in Theosophy are always welcome. \n\n\n\nINDEX TO VOLUME XXXV \n\n\nBlavatsky, Helena Petrovna, I, \nBlavatsky , H. P \n\nG.B ... \n\nCavd . \n\nCenturion . \n\nConvention, 1938; K . \n\nCorrespondence. \n\nCyclic Law in Biology* RET \n\nc.c.c . \n\n\nEmperor Akbar, The; J. F. \n\nForce and Its Moulds; J. F \nFragments; Cav 6 . \n\nHead, Heart and Hand; R. \n\nInspiration; Henry Bedinger \nIn Memoriam: Dr. Thomas \n\nJohnston, Charles . \n\n\nG.M.W.K . .... \n\nLiving Pictures; H. B. Mitchell . \n\n\u2022S'. V. L. \n\nMitchell, Henry Bedinger. . \n\nMitchell, J.F.B .. \n\nNotes and Comments \nNourishment; G. M. W. K. \n\nOn Having a Purpose in Life; Z \nOn the Screen op Time; T \n\nPrayer-Wheels or Power?; P. \n\nPsychic and Noetic Action; H. P. Blavatsky \nQuestions and Answers. \n\nReflecting on a Neighbour; J. C. . \nReprints: Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, I, H \nPsychic and Noetic Action* H. P \n\n\nJohnston. \n\n\nBlavatsky \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nINDEX TO VOLUME XXXV \n\n\nSTANDARD BOOKS \n\n\nReviews: \n\nBiological Time; P. Lecomte de Noiiy . \n\nChina Hand; James Lafayette Hutchison . \n\nChinese Gardens; Dorothy Graham . \n\nChinese Women: Yesterday and To-Day; Florence Ayscough \n\nCitadel, The; A. J. Cronin . \n\nDesign in Nature; James Ritchie . \n\nFigures de Chefs; Henry Bordeaux . \n\nGrands Cimiti&res sous la Lune, Les; Georges Bernanos . \n\nGreat Contemporaries; Winston S. Churchill . \n\nHandicaps; Mary MacCarthy . \n\nIn Search of the Mahatmas of Tibet; Edwin G. Schary . \n\nLost Horizon; James Hilton . \n\nMake Life Worth Living; Rev . Dr. Joseph R. Sizoo . \n\nMaster Kung: The Story of Confucius; Carl Crow . \n\nOccult Way, The; P. G. Bowen . \n\nOn the Way to Perignan; Jennings C. Wise . \n\nPlato To-day; R. H. S. Crossman . \n\nReturn from the U.S.S.R.; Andre Gide . \n\nScience of Prayer, The; Michael Bruce . \n\nSources Occultes du Romantism, Les; Auguste Viatte . \n\nSouvenir d\u2019un Joumaliste; Lucien Corpechot . \n\nUnflinching; Edgar Christian . \n\nWinged Pharaoh; Joan Grant . \n\nTheosophy in Sermons; C.C. C . \n\nT. S. Activities.88 , \n\n\nBlavatsky, H. P. Isis Unveiled, Vols. I and II.cloth, $i: \n\nComplete in one book.cloth, \\ \n\nKey to Theosophy .cloth, I \n\nSecret Doctrine, The, Vols. I and II and Index... .cloth, i< \n\nComplete in one book, without subject-index volume, : \n\nTheosophical Glossary .cloth, : \n\nTransactions of the Blavatsky Lodge .cloth, : \n\nVoice of the Silence .fabric, 1 \n\nCave. Fragments, Volume I.boards, l \n\nVolume II.boards, 1 \n\nVolume III.boards, 1 \n\nGerard, John. Letters to Friends .boards, : \n\nHillard, Katharine. Abridgment of The Secret Doctrine -cloth, : \n\nJohnston, Charles. BhaGAVAD GIta .Translated, annotated; cloth, 1 \n\nimitation leather, \n\nCrest Jewel of Wisdom, The .cloth, : \n\nGreat Upanishads, The, Volume I.cloth, \n\nParables of the Kingdom, The .paper, \n\nPATANJALl\u2019s Yoga Sutras .Translated, annotated; cloth, ! \n\nSong of Life, The .paper, \n\nJudge, William Q. Bhagavad GIta . fabric > \n\nCulture of Concentration .P a P er * \n\nEchoes from the Orient .P a P er \u00bb \n\nLetters That Have Helped Me, Volumes I and II, each.. .cloth, \n\nOcean of Theosophy . cloth > \n\nPatanjalFs Yoga Aphorisms . fabr ic, \n\nKeightley, Archibald. Rhythm of Life .paper, \n\nKeightley, Mrs. A. Unity of Religions .paper, \n\nLaDow, Stanley V. Plotinus . ..paper \n\nMitchell, Henry Bedinger. Meditation, Special edition, .20; paper, \n\nTheosophical Society and Theosophy, The .paper, \n\nMitchell, J. F. B. Collegiate Education and Standards of \n\nValue .P a P\\ r - \n\nSinnett, A. P. Esoteric Buddhism .cloth, \n\nOccult World, The .cloth, \n\nTorrey, Ray E. Science and its Function in Education -paper, \n\nWalker, E. D. Reincarnation .cloth, \n\nIdyll of the White Lotus. c,oth > \n\nLight on the Path.leather, \n\nThrough the Gates of Gold.cloth, \n\nTHE QUARTERLY BOOK DEPARTMENT, \n\nP. O. Box 64, Station O, New York. \n\n\nUnderstanding of Particular Things, The; 5. V. L. \n\nWar; G.B . \n\nWashington, George; J. C . \n\nWithout Censor, XI, XII; Centurion . \n\n\nDevotional: Bhagavad Gita; Crest Jewel of Wisdom; Fragments; The Great Upani\u00ac \nshads- Letters That Have Helped Me; Letters to Friends; Light on the Path; The Par\u00ac \nables of the Kingdom; The Song of Life; Through the Gates of Gold; Voice of the Silence. \n\nPhilosophical: Abridgment of the Secret Doctrine; Isis Unveiled; Key to Theosophy; \nPlotinus; Reincarnation; The Secret Doctrine; Theosophical Glossary; Transactions of \nthe Blavatsky Lodge; Patanjali\u2019s Yoga Sutras. \n\nIntroductory: Culture of Concentration; Echoes from the Orient; Esoteric Buddhism; \nIdyll of the White Lotus; Meditation; The Occult World; The Ocean of Theosophy; \njhe Theosophical Society and Theosophy. \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nFounded by flf# P* Blavatsky at Hew York In IS75 \n\n\nIE Society does not pretend to be able to establish \nat once a universal brotherhood among men# but \nonly strives to create the nucleus of such a body# \nMany of its members believe that an acquaintance \n\n\nunderlying these, that \"spiritual identity of all Souls with the \nOversoul\" which is the basisof true brotherhoods and many \nof them also believe that an appreciation of the finer forces \nof nature and man will still further emphasize the same idea. \n\nThe organization is wholly unsectarian, with no creed, \ndogma, nor personal authority to enforce or impose; neither \nis it to be held responsible for the opinions of its members, \nwho are expected to accord to the beliefs of others that \ntolerance wnich they desire for their own# \n\nThe following proclamation was adopted at the Conven* \ntion of the Society# held at Boston, April, 1895 s \n\n\"The Theosophical Society in America by its delegatesland \nmembers in Convention assembled, does hereby proclaim \nfraternal good will and kindly feeling toward all students of \nTheosophy and members of Theosophical Societies wherever \nand however situated# It further proclaims and avers its \nhearty sympathy and association with such persons and \norganizations in all theosophical matters except those of \ngovernment and administration, and invites their cor\u00ac \nrespondence and co-operation# \n\n\"To all men and women of whatever caste, creed, race, or \nreligious belief, who aim at the fostering of peace, gentleness, \nand unselfish regard one for another, and the acquisition of \nsuch knowledge of men and nature as shall tend to the eleva\u00ac \ntion and advancement of the human race, it sends most friendly \ngreeting and freely proffers its services# \n\n\"It joins hands with all religions and religious bodies whose \nefforts are directed to the purification of men's thoughts and \nthe bettering of their ways, and it avows its harmony there\u00ac \nwith# To all scientific societies and individual searchers after \nwisdom upon whatever plane, and by whatever righteous \nmeans pursued, it is and will be grateful for such discovery \nand unfoldment of Truth as shall serve to announce and con\u00ac \nfirm a scientific basis for ethics \u2022 \n\n\"And lastly# it invites to its membership those who, seek\u00ac \ning a higher life hereafter, would team to know the path to \ntread in this,\" \n\n\nApplications (or membership should be addressed to the \nSecretary T.S., P. O. Box 64, Station O, New York.","title":"The theosophical quarterly. Vol. 35","tradition":"Theosophy","translated_text":null,"word_count":196487}