Chapter IV.

Little heaps of paper activities piled themselves up, were added to,

diminished, and added to again, all the day long before Harvey at

his desk. He had returned to his work: there was an unusual press

of business, and night after night he was detained long beyond the

usual hours. The iron hand which he had foreseen was laid upon him:

it robbed him even of his right to sorrow, the time to grieve.

But within him at moments stirred memories of the past, poignant

anguish and fierce rebellion. With him everything transformed

itself finally into ideal images and aspects, and it was not so

much the memory of an incident which stung him as the elemental

sense of pain in life itself. He felt that he was debarred from

a heritage of spiritual life which he could not define even to himself.

The rare rays of light that slanted through the dusty air of the

office, mystic gold fallen through inconceivable distances from the

pure primeval places, wakened in him an unutterable longing: he

felt a choking in his throat as he looked. Often, at night, too,

lifting his tired eyes from the pages flaring beneath the bright

gas jet, he could see the blueness deepen rich with its ancient

clouds of starry dust. What pain it was to him, immemorial quiet,

passivity and peace, though over it a million tremors fled and

chased each other throughout the shadowy night! What pain it was

to let the eyes fall low and see about him the pale and feverish faces

looking ghostly through the hot, fetid, animal, and flickering air!

His work over, out into the night he would drag himself wearily--

out into the night anywhere; but there no more than within could

he escape from that power which haunted him with mighty memories,

the scourge which the Infinite wields. Nature has no refuge for

those in whom the fire of spirit has been kindled: earth has no

glory for which it does not know a greater glory. As Harvey passed

down the long streets, twinkling with their myriad lights fading

into blue and misty distances, there rose up before him in the

visionary air solemn rows of sphinxes in serried array, and starlit

pyramids and temples--greatness long dead, a dream that mocked the

lives around him, hoarding the sad small generations of humanity

dwindling away from beauty. Gone was the pure and pale splendour

of the primeval skies and the lustre of the first-born of stars.

But even this memory, which linked him in imagination to the ideal

past, was not always his: he was weighted, like all his race, with

an animal consciousness which cried out fiercely for its proper life,

which thirsted for sensation, and was full of lust and anger. The

darkness was not only about him, but in him, and struggled there

for mastery. It threw up forms of meanness and horrible temptations

which clouded over his soul; their promise was forgetfulness;

they seemed to say: "Satisfy us, and your infinite longing shall

die away: to be of clay is very dull and comfortable; it is the

common lot."

One night, filled with this intolerable pain, as he passed through

the streets he yielded to the temptation to kill out this torturing

consciousness: he accosted one of the women of the streets and

walked away with her. She was full of light prattle, and chattered

on and on. Harvey answered her not a word; he was set on his

stony purpose. Child of the Stars! what had he to do with these

things? He sought only his soul's annihilation. Something in

this terrible silence communicated itself to his companion. She

looked at his face in the light of a lamp; it was white, locked,

and rigid. Child of the Stars, no less, though long forgetful,

she shuddered at this association. She recoiled from him crying

out "You brute--you brute!" and then fled away. The unhappy man

turned homeward and sat in his lonely room with stupid, staring

eyes, fixed on darkness and vacancy until the pale green light of

dawn began to creep in upon him.

Into this fevered and anguished existence no light had yet come.

Drunken with wretchedness, Harvey could not or would not think;

and the implacable spirit which followed him deepened and quickened

still more the current of his being, and the GLOOM and the GLORY

of his dream moved still nearer to each other. Mighty and mysterious

spirit, thou who crownest pain with beauty, and by whom the mighty

are bowed down from their seats, under they guidance, for such a

crowning and for such agony, were coiled together the living streams

of evil and good, so that at last the man might know himself--the

soul--not as other than Thee!

The ways by which he was brought to that moment were unremembered;

the sensations and thoughts and moods which culminated in the fire

of self-consciousness could be retraced but vaguely. He had gone

out of the city one Sunday, and lying down in the fields under the

trees, for a time he grew forgetful of misery. He went once more

into the world of dreams. He, or the creature of his imagination,

some shadow of himself, lived in and roamed through antique forests

where the wonderful days were unbroken by sense of sorrow. Childhood

shared in an all-pervading exultation; through the pulses of youth

ran the fiery energy that quickened the world; and this shadow

of the dreamer dwelling amid the forests grew gradually into a

consciousness of a fiery life upon which the surface forms were

but films: he entered this kingdom of fire; its life became his

life; he knew the secret ways to the sun, and the sunny secrets

living in the golden world. "It was I, myself," rushed into Harvey's

mind: "It was I. Ah, how long ago!" Then for the first time,

his visions, dreams and imaginations became real to him, as memories

of a spirit traveling through time and space. Looking backwards,

he could nowhere find in the small and commonplace surroundings of

his life anything which could have suggested or given birth to

these vivid pictures and ideas. They began to move about swiftly

in his mind and arrange themselves in order. He seemed to himself

to have fallen downwards through a long series of lines of ever-

lessening beauty--fallen downwards from the mansions of eternity

into this truckling and hideous life. As Harvey walked homewards

through the streets, some power must have guided his steps, for

he saw or knew nothing of what was about him. With the sense of

the reality of his imaginations came an energy he had never before

felt: his soul took complete possession of him: he knew, though

degraded, that he was a spirit. Then, in that supreme moment,

gathered about him the memories of light and darkness, and they

became the lips through which eternal powers spake to him in a

tongue unlike the speech of men. The spirit of light was behind

the visions of mystical beauty: the spirit of darkness arrayed

itself in the desires of clay. These powers began to war within

him: he heard voices as of Titans talking.

The spirit of light spake within him and said--"Arouse now, and be

thou my voice in this dead land. There are many things to be spoken

and sung--of dead language the music and significance, old world

philosophies; you will be the singer of the sweetest songs;

stories wilder and stranger than any yet will I tell you--deeds

forgotten of the vaporous and dreamy prime.

The voice came yet again closer, full of sweet promise, with magical

utterance floating around him. He became old--inconceivably old

and young together. He was astonished in the wonders of the primal

world. Chaos with tremendous agencies, serpentine powers, strange

men-beasts and men-birds, the crude first thought of awakening

nature was before him; from inconceivable heights of starlike

purity he surveyed it; he went forth from glory; he descended

and did battle; he warred with behemeths, with the flying serpents

and the monstrous creeping things. With the Lords of Air he descended

and conquered; he dwelt in a new land, a world of light, where all

things were of light, where the trees put forth leaves of living

green, where the rose would blossom into a rose of light and lily

into a white radiance, and over the vast of gleaming plains and

through the depths of luminous forests, the dreaming rivers would

roll in liquid and silver flame. Often he joined in the mad dance

upon the highlands, whirling round and round until the dark grass

awoke fiery with rings of green under the feet. And so, on and

on through endless transformations he passed, and he saw how the

first world of dark elements crept in upon the world of beauty,

clothing it around with grossness and veiling its fires; and the

dark spirits entered by subtle ways into the spheres of the spirits

of light, and became as a mist over memory and a chain upon speed;

the earth groaned with the anguish. Then this voice cried within

him--"Come forth; come out of it; come out, oh king, to the

ancestral spheres, to the untroubled spiritual life. Out of the

furnace, for it leaves you dust. Come away, oh king, to old dominion

and celestial sway; come out to the antique glory!"

Then another voice from below laughed at the madness. Full of scorn

it spake, "You, born of clay, a ruler of stars? Pitiful toiler with

the pen, feeble and weary body, what shall make of you a spirit?"

Harvey thrust away this hateful voice. From his soul came the

impulse to go to other lands, to wander for ever and ever under

the star-rich skies, to be a watcher of the dawn and eve, to live

in forest places or on sun-nurtured plains, to merge himself once

more in the fiery soul hidden within. But the mocking voice would

not be stifled, showing him how absurd and ridiculous it was "to

become a vagabond," so the voice said, and finally to die in the

workhouse. So the eternal spirit in him, God's essence, conscious

of its past brotherhood, with the morning stars, the White Aeons,

in its prisonhouse writhed with the meanness, till at last he cried,

"I will struggle no longer; it is only agony of spirit to aspire

here at all; I will sit and wait till the deep darkness has vanished."

But the instruction was not yet complete; he had learned the primal

place of spirit; he had yet to learn its nature. He began to think

with strange sadness over the hopes of the world, the young children.

He saw them in his vision grow up, bear the burden in silence or

ignorance; he saw how they joined in dragging onward that huge

sphinx which men call civilization; there was no time for loitering

amid the beautiful, for if one paused it was but to be trampled by

the feet of the many who could not stay or rest, and the wheels

of the image ground that soul into nothingness. He felt every pain

almost in an anguish of sympathy. Helpless to aid, to his lips

came the cry to another which immemorial usage has made intuitive

in men. But It is high and calm above all appeal; to It the cries

from all the sorrowing stars sound but as one great music; lying

in the infinite fields of heaven, from the united feelings of many

universes It draws only a vast and passionless knowledge, without

distinction of pleasure or pain. From the universal which moves

not and aids not, Harvey in his agony turned away. He himself

could fly from the struggle; thinking of what far place or state

to find peace, he found it true in his own being that nowhere could

the soul find rest while there was still pain or misery in the world.

He could imagine no place or state where these cries of pain would

not reach him: he could imagine no heaven where the sad memory

would not haunt him and burn him. He knew then that the nature

of the soul was love eternal; he knew that if he fled away a

divine compassion would compel him to renew his brotherhood with

the stricken and suffering; and what was best forever to do was

to fight out the fight in the darkness. There was a long silence

in Harvey's soul; then with almost a solemn joy he grew to realize

at last the truth of he himself--the soul. The fight was over;

the Gloom and the Glory were linked together, and one inseparably.

Harvey was full of a sense of quietness, as if a dew fell from

unseen places on him with soothing and healing power. He looked

around. He was at the door of his lodgings. The tall narrow

houses with their dull red hues rose up about him; from their

chimneys went up still higher the dark smoke; but behind its

nebulous wavering the stars were yet; they broke through the smoke

with white lustre. Harvey looked at them for a moment, and went

in strangely comforted.

The End

--March 15-June 15, 1894

The Midnight Blossom

--"Arhans are born at midnight hour..... together with the holy

flower that opes and blooms in darkness."--The Voice of the Silence

We stood together at the door of our hut: we could see through the

gathering gloom where our sheep and goats were cropping the sweet

grass on the side of the hill: we were full of drowsy content as

they were. We had naught to mar our own happiness--neither memory

nor unrest for the future. We lingered on while the vast twilight

encircled us; we were one with its dewy stillness. The lustre

of the early stars first broke in upon our dreaming: we looked up

and around: the yellow constellations began to sing their choral

hymn together. As the night deepened they came out swiftly from

their hiding places in depths of still and unfathomable blue;

they hung in burning clusters; they advanced in multitudes that

dazzled: the shadowy shining of night was strewn all over with

nebulous dust of silver, with long mists of gold with jewels of

glittering green. We felt how fit a place the earth was to live on,

with these nightly glories over us, with silence and coolness upon

its lawns and lakes after the consuming day. Valmika, Kedar, I

and Ananda watched together; through the rich gloom we could see

far distant forests and lights--the lights of village and city in

King Suddhodana's realm.

"Brothers," said Valmika, "How good it is to be here, and not yonder

in the city where they know not peace, even in sleep."

"Yonder and yonder," said Kedar, "I saw the inner air full of a

red glow where they were busy in toiling and strife. It seemed to

reach up to me; I could not breathe. I climbed the hills at dawn

to laugh where the snows were, and the sun is as white as they

are white."

"But, brothers, if we went down among them and told them how happy

we were, and how the flowers grow on the hillside, and all about

the flocks, they would surely come up and leave all sorrow. They

cannot know or they would come." Ananda was a mere child though

so tall for his years.

"They would not come," said Kedar. "All their joy is to haggle

and hoard. When Siva blows upon them with his angry breath they

will lament, or when the Prets in fierce hunger devour them."

"It is good to be here," repeated Valmika drowsily, "to mind the

flocks and be at rest, and to hear the wise Varunna speak when he

comes among us."

I was silent. I knew better than they that busy city which glowed

beyond the dark forests. I had lived there until, grown sick and

weary, I had gone back to my brothers on the hillside. I wondered

would life, indeed, go on ceaselessly until it ended in the pain

of the world. I said within myself--Oh, mighty Brahma, on the

outermost verges of they dream are our lives; thou old invisible,

how faintly through our hearts comes the sound of thy song, the

light of thy glory! Full of yearning to rise and return, I strove

to hear in the heart the music Anahata had spoken of in our sacred

scrolls. There was silence, and then I thought I heard sounds,

not glad, a myriad murmur. As I listen it deepened, it grew into

passionate prayer and appeal and tears, as if the cry of the long-

forgotten souls of men went echoing through empty chambers. My

eyes filled with tears, for it seemed world-wide, and to sigh from

out many ages, long agone, to be and yet to be.

"Ananda! Ananda! where is the boy running to?" cried Valmika.

Ananda had vanished into the gloom. We heard his glad laugh below

and then another voice speaking. Presently up loomed the tall

figure of Varunna. Ananda held his hand and danced beside him.

We could see by the starlight his simple robe of white. I could

trace clearly every feature of the grave and beautiful face, the

radiant eyes; not by the starlight I saw, but because a silvery

shining rayed a little way into the blackness around the dark hair

and face. Valmika, as elder, first spake.

"Holy sir, be welcome. Will you come in and rest?"

"I cannot stay now. I must pass over the mountain ere dawn; but

you may come a little way with me--such of you as will."

We assented gladly--Kedar and I; Valmika remained. Then Ananda

prayed to go. We bade him stay, fearing for him the labour of

climbing and the chill of the snows, but Varunna said: "Let the

child come; he is hardy; he will not tire if he holds my hands."

So we set out together and faced the highlands that rose and rose

above us; we knew well the way even at night. We waited in silence

for Varunna to speak, but for nigh two hours we mounted without

words, save for Ananda's shouts of delight and wonder at the heavens

spread above us. But I was hungry for an answer to my thoughts,

so I spake.

"Master, Valmika was saying, ere you came, how good it was to be

here rather than in the city where they are full of strife, and

Kedar thought their lives would flow on into fiery pain and no

speech would avail. Ananda, speaking as a child indeed, said if

one went down among them they would listen to his story of the

happy life. But, Master, do not many speak and interpret the

sacred writings, and how few they are who lay to heart the words

of the gods! They seem, indeed, to go on through desire into pain,

and even here upon our hills we are not free, for Kedar felt the

hot glow of their passion and I heard in my heart their sobs of

despair. Master, it was terrible, for they seemed to come from

the wide earth over, and out of ages far away."

"There is more of the true in the child's hope than in your despair,

for it is of much avail to speak though but a few listen. Better

is the life which aids, though in sorrow, than the life which

withdraws from pain unto solitude. Yet it is not well to speak

without power, for only the knower of Brahma can interpret the

sacred writings truly. It is well to be free ere we speak of freedom;

then we have power and many hearken."

"But who would leave joy for sorrow, and who being one with Brahma

may return to give council?"

"Brother," said Varunna, "here is the hope of the world. Though

many seek only for the eternal joy, yet the cry you heard has been

heard by great ones who have turned backwards, called by these

beseeching voices. The small old path stretching far away leads

through many wonderful beings to the place of Brahma; there is

the first fountain, the world of beautiful silence, the light that

has been undimmed since the beginning of time--the joy where life

fades into being; but turning backwards, the small old path winds

away into the world of men, it enters every sorrowful heart, and

the way of him who would tread therethro' is stayed by its pain

and barred by its delusion. This is the way the great ones go;

they turn with the path from the door of Brahma the warriors and

the strong ones: they move along its myriad ways; they overcome

darkness with wisdom and pain with compassion. After many conquered

worlds, after many races of men, purified and uplifted they go to

greater than Brahma. In these, though few, is the hope of the world;

these are the heroes for whom, returning, the earth puts forth her

signal fires, and the Devas sing their hymns of welcome."

We paused where the plateau widened out; there was scarce a ripple

in the chill air; in quietness the snows glistened, a light

reflected from the crores of stars that swung with gay and

glittering motion above us. We could hear the immense heart-beat

of the world in the stillness; we had thoughts that went ranging

through the heavens, not sad, but full of solemn hope.

"Brothers! Master! Look, the wonderful thing! and another, and

yet another!" We heard Ananda calling; we looked and saw the holy

blossom--the midnight flower--oh, may the earth again put forth

such beauty--it grew up from the snows with leaves of delicate crystal,

a nimbus encircled each radiant bloom, a halo pale yet lustrous.

I bowed down before it lost in awe. I heard Varunna say:--"The earth,

indeed puts forth her signal fires, and the Devas sing their hymn;

listen!" We heard a music as of beautiful thought moving along the

high places of the earth, full of infinite love and hope and yearning.

"Brothers, be glad, for One is born who has chosen the greater way.

Now I must pass onwards. Kedar, Narayan, Ananda, farewell! Nay,

no further; it is long way to return, and the child will tire."

He went on and passed from our sight. But we did not return; we

remained long, long in silence, looking at the sacred flower.

Vow, taken long ago, be strong in our hearts to-day. Here where

the pain is fiercer, to rest is more sweet. Here where beauty

dies away, it is more joy to be lulled in dreams. Here the good,

the true, our hope, seem but a madness born of ancient pain.

Out of rest, dream, or despair, let us arise. Let us go the way

the Great Ones go.

--July, 1894

The Story of a Star

The emotion that haunted me in that little cathedral town would be

most difficult to describe. After the hurry, rattle, and fever of

the city, the rare weeks spent here were infinitely peaceful. They

were full of a quaint sense of childhood, with sometimes a deeper

chord touched--the giant and spiritual things childhood has dreams of.

The little room I slept in had opposite its window the great grey

cathedral wall; it was only in the evening that the sunlight crept

round it and appeared in the room strained through the faded green

blind. It must have been this silvery quietness of colour which

in some subtle way affected me with the feeling of a continual Sabbath;

and this was strengthened by the bells chiming hour after hour:

the pathos, penitence, and hope expressed by the flying notes

coloured the intervals with faint and delicate memories. They

haunted my dreams, and I heard with unutterable longing the astral

chimes pealing from some dim and vast cathedral of the cosmic memory,

until the peace they tolled became almost a nightmare, and I longed

for utter oblivion or forgetfulness of their reverberations.

More remarkable were the strange lapses into other worlds and times.

Almost as frequent as the changing of the bells were the changes from

state to state. I realised what is meant by the Indian philosophy

of Maya. Truly my days were full of Mayas, and my work-a-day city

life was no more real to me than one of those bright, brief glimpses

of things long past. I talk of the past, and yet these moments

taught me how false our ideas of time are. In the ever-living

yesterday, to-day, and to-morrow are words of no meaning. I know

I fell into what we call the past and the things I counted as dead

for ever were the things I had yet to endure. Out of the old age

of earth I stepped into its childhood, and received once more the

primal blessing of youth, ecstasy, and beauty. But these things

are too vast and vague to speak of; the words we use to-day cannot

tell their story. Nearer to our time is the legend that follows.

I was, I thought, one of the Magi of old Persia, inheritor of its

unforgotten lore, and using some of its powers. I tried to pierce

through the great veil of nature, and feel the life that quickened

it within. I tried to comprehend the birth and growth of planets,

and to do this I rose spiritually and passed beyond earth's confines

into that seeming void which is the matrix where they germinate.

On one of these journeys I was struck by the phantasm, so it seemed,

of a planet I had not observed before. I could not then observe

closer, and coming again on another occasion it had disappeared.

After the lapse of many months I saw it once more, brilliant with

fiery beauty--its motion was slow, rotating around some invisible

centre. I pondered over it, and seemed to know that the invisible

centre was its primordial spiritual state, from which it emerged

a little while and into which it then withdrew. Short was its day;

its shining faded into a glimmer, and then into darkness in a few

months. I learned its time and cycles; I made preparations and

determined to await its coming.

The Birth of a Planet

At first silence and then an inner music, and then the sounds of

song throughout the vastness of its orbit grew as many in number

as there were stars at gaze. Avenues and vistas of sound! They

reeled to and fro. They poured from a universal stillness quick

with unheard things. They rushed forth and broke into a myriad

voices gay with childhood. From age and the eternal they rushed

forth into youth. They filled the void with reveling and exultation.

In rebellion they then returned and entered the dreadful Fountain.

Again they came forth, and the sounds faded into whispers; they

rejoiced once again, and again died into silence.

And now all around glowed a vast twilight; it filled the cradle

of the planet with colourless fire. I felt a rippling motion which

impelled me away from the centre to the circumference. At that

centre a still flame began to lighten; a new change took place,

and space began to curdle, a milky and nebulous substance rocked

to and fro. At every motion the pulsation of its rhythm carried

it farther and farther away from the centre, it grew darker, and

a great purple shadow covered it so that I could see it no longer.

I was now on the outer verge, where the twilight still continued

to encircle the planet with zones of clear transparent light.

As night after night I rose up to visit it they grew many-coloured

and brighter. I saw the imagination of nature visibly at work.

I wandered through shadowy immaterial forests, a titanic vegetation

built up of light and colour; I saw it growing denser, hung with

festoons and trailers of fire, and spotted with the light of myriad

flowers such as earth never knew. Coincident with the appearance

of these things I felt within myself, as if in harmonious movement,

a sense of joyousness, an increase of self-consciousness; I felt

full of gladness, youth, and the mystery of the new. I felt that

greater powers were about to appear, those who had thrown outwards

this world and erected it as a place in space.

I could not tell half the wonder of this strange race. I could

not myself comprehend more than a little of the mystery of their

being. They recognised my presence there, and communicated with

me in such a way that I can only describe it by saying that they

seemed to enter into my soul breathing a fiery life; yet I knew

that the highest I could reach to was but the outer verge of their

spiritual nature, and to tell you but a little I have many times

to translate it, for in the first unity with their thought I touched

on an almost universal sphere of life, I peered into the ancient

heart that beats throughout time; and this knowledge became change

in me, first, into a vast and nebulous symbology, and so down through

many degrees of human thought into words which hold not at all the

pristine and magical beauty.

I stood before one of this race, and I thought, "What is the meaning

and end of life here?" Within me I felt the answering ecstasy that

illuminated with vistas of dawn and rest, it seemed to say:

"Our spring and our summer are unfolding into light and form, and

our autumn and winter are a fading into the infinite soul."

I thought, "To what end is this life poured forth and withdrawn?"

He came nearer and touched me; once more I felt the thrill of being

that changed itself into vision.

"The end is creation, and creation is joy: the One awakens out of

quiescence as we come forth, and knows itself in us; as we return

we enter it in gladness, knowing ourselves. After long cycles the

world you live in will become like ours; it will be poured forth

and withdrawn; a mystic breath, a mirror to glass your being."

He disappeared while I wondered what cyclic changes would transmute

our ball of mud into the subtle substance of thought.

In that world I dared not stay during its period of withdrawal;

having entered a little into its life, I became subject to its laws:

the Power on its return would have dissolved my being utterly. I

felt with a wild terror its clutch upon me, and I withdrew from the

departing glory, from the greatness that was my destiny--but not yet.

From such dreams I would be aroused, perhaps by a gentle knock at

my door, and my little cousin Margaret's quaint face would peep in

with a "Cousin Robert, are you not coming down to supper?"

Of these visions in the light of after thought I would speak a

little. All this was but symbol, requiring to be thrice sublimed

in interpretation ere its true meaning can be grasped. I do not

know whether worlds are heralded by such glad songs, or whether

any have such a fleeting existence, for the mind that reflects

truth is deluded with strange phantasies of time and place in

which seconds are rolled out into centuries and long cycles are

reflected in an instant of time. There is within us a little space

through which all the threads of the universe are drawn; and,

surrounding that incomprehensible centre the mind of man sometimes

catches glimpses of things which are true only in those glimpses;

when we record them the true has vanished, and a shadowy story--

such as this--alone remains. Yet, perhaps, the time is not altogether

wasted in considering legends like these, for they reveal, though

but in phantasy and symbol, a greatness we are heirs to, a destiny

which is ours, though it be yet far away.

--August 15, 1894

How Theosophy Affects One's View of Life

--A Paper Read Before the Dublin Lodge.

In asking you to consider with me the influence of the system of

thought called Theosophy upon one's view of all the things which

are included in the term Life, I have to preface my remarks by the

confession that I have not extracted my ideas from portly volumes,

or indeed, engaged in any great research; and I have further to

ask you to believe that what you will hear is the most unbiased

statement, as far as possible, on the subjects which will necessarily

come under notice.

The outlook of any individual mind is not a constant quantity; it

is to some extent determined by education, environment, and the

innate tendencies; but it is always subject to alteration; it is

constantly feeling the influence of subtle forces and circumstances,

and it changes with every fresh experience and every new sensation.

Still these influences seldom evince their presence by a great

reversal of the mental attitude, and we are best able to sense them

by seeing how the actions of the individual, which are very largely

the voluntary or involuntary expression of his standpoint, represent

at different times changes in that standpoint. Indeed, one's own

experience will supply plenty of material to work upon; for, I

daresay no one will insist that his present attitude towards the

rest of the universe is identical with that of ten or five years ago,

or even one year. A little examination will show that the mental

processes which precede some definite action are altered in some

important manner from those of 1890. The question which is of

importance is to find out how the change has come about, and whether

one is to allow extraneous events to mast his mental conclusions,

or one is to become, through wisdom acquired by effort, the conscious

master of his destiny.

Theosophy has for its leading tenet the absolute unity in essence

and correlation of all life, whether visible, invisible, material,

intellectual, spiritual, and this affords at once a clue to the

consideration of the present subject; for, according to the view

which the individual thinker takes of the powers and relations of

the mind itself will be his view of the duties and responsibilities

which these powers and relations involve; in other words, Ethics

or moral philosophy must be based upon metaphysics. Now, I wish

to be as brief as possible in pointing out the theosophic view of

the mind, and soul, and their powers and relations; and were it

not that it is necessary for the unity of my remarks, I would take

refuge in referring to the numerous able, intellectual, and forcible

expositions of this matter which you have heard in this room.

Theosophy, to put it as concisely as possible, accepts the universe

as "the unfolding of a Divine life, functioning in every form of

living and nonliving thing." Man is viewed as a compound being,

a spark of this divine universal spirit being clothed with the body.

The immortal indestructible part of man consists of this spark of

universal spirit, its vehicle the human spirit, and the mind or

intellectual faculties. It uses as a dwelling the body, with its

animal life, its passions and appetites, to which mankind is so

prone to attach tremendous importance. The connecting link is the

mind, which, being full of agitation, strong, and obstinate, senses

all the material existence, is moved by the hopes and fears, and

the storm of existence. The lesson, ever insisted on as having to

be learnt, is that the lower part of man, the body, and its attachments,

have to be conquered and purified; and the only way to teach it

its true functions is by suffering; and when this is done, we shall

have got somewhere nearer the goal, when we shall identify our

consciousness with our true self, not with the illusion. The powers

of the mind to sense all existence, and its relations towards the

rest of our being as the connecting link, bearing the contact with

external things towards the soul, and at times being the vehicle

of the Wisdom which is one of the attributes of that which has no

attribute: I say, then, these powers and relations of the mind,

which one finds everywhere treated of in Theosophical literature,

are the determining factors in the formation of our Ethics. And

since, from Socrates down, we are taught that self-knowledge is

necessary for guidance of one's conduct, the knowledge of the mind

and its capacities is at once shadowed forth as of immense value.

It has at least three elementary powers--viz., the power of knowing,

the power of feeling, and the power of acting. These powers, though

distinguishable, are not separable; but rather when we distinguish

knowledge, feeling, and action, what we call by these names will

be found, when accurately examined, to be combinations of the three

elements, differing only in respect to the element which preponderates.

Locke would have us suppose that when I say "I know," it means that

an object is inserted into my consciousness as into a bag. But no

bag could produce the phenomenon of knowledge. To produce it

requires the putting forth of an active power, which we call

intelligence. The knowledge of an object always produces in the

mind some emotion with regard to it: this emotion is normally

pleasure. Sometimes the difficulties which beset the acquisition

of knowledge are so great and cause such dissatisfaction and pain

that the mind is tempted to banish them, together with the object

which excites them, from its consciousness. Knowledge and the

emotions to which it gives rise induce those actions which are the

result of the inherent activity of the mind stimulated by them.

Thus we see that the antecedents of all action include intelligence

as an active power: and Ethics, more particularly Theosophical

Ethics, are seen to have practical value, and not merely a

speculative interest.

Having digressed thus far from my subject, the point to which I

proceed to address myself is, the working out on the individual of

the system of which I have tried to shadow forth the greater truths.

The first class I will deal with are the indifferent. To them,

Theosophy presents the widest possible field of, and reasons for,

activity that can be desired. It shows that no action is without

its direct permanent result, and that consequently the position of

the indifferent is absolutely untenable. No one who has studied

Theosophical literature can ever find there a justification for

mere laissez-faire. It points out the enormous value of what we

call trifles, and the comparatively trifling value of what the

indifferent would take most note. Theosophy always insists on

action in some direction, preferably conscious, well-directed action,

with pure motive.

The Agnostic is, as it were, Theosophy's special care--It shows

him at once the directions in which further, fuller, and greater

knowledge of every branch of science or philosophy can be gained.

It says to him "pursue your previous method of inquiry, and remember,

taking nothing for granted, do not accept other's authority. Seek

for knowledge: we can only point the way we have ourselves gone.

Investigate every nook and corner of your mind, and learn how to

control it and your sense perceptions. Then you will no longer

mistrust your results as possibly imperfect, but you will have

attained to some closer contact with Truth." To both the Agnostic

and the indifferent, the study of Theosophy will bring a consciousness

of the responsibility towards others, which is the basis of our

universal brotherhood. It will tend to remove the personal element

which has hitherto done so much to cloud and obscure one's

investigations; and it will gradually lead to the elimination of

the anxiety as to results, which will bring us (by the removal of

remorse or approval) to calmness of mind, in which condition great

work can be achieved.

The appeal of theosophy to the scientific investigator is practically

identical with the last. It will show him what so many of his

confreres are more or less tacitly recognizing, that the hopeless

and soul-deadening belief of the Materialist (that all the growth

of the race, the struggling towards a higher life, the aspirations

towards virtue shall absolutely vanish, and leave no trace), is a

crushing mental burden which leads to absolute negation; it will

show the spiritual nature of man in perfect consistence with the

true theories, and as dependent on fundamental laws and causes.

Coming from the region of unbelief to belief, to use these words in

their narrowest sense, let us consider what way Theosophy will

affect a believer in doctrines of some system of religious thought.

To take the ordinary Protestant first; Theosophy is apparently

likely to fail on account of its taking away the personality of the

Deity, and the habit of prayer: for to both of these doctrines the

earnest churchman is attached. But if it does do so, what does it

substitute? It puts forward an atonement, not an atonement of 1,861

years ago, but a daily atonement to be carried out in each one's life,

and having as great an influence on one's fellows; it suggests the

possibilities are within each one of us, if we but seek the true path.

Also, and this is a small point, it removes the horrible canker of

church government, which ministers so powerfully to the idea of

separateness and personality: and lastly, it offers, in place of

mouthing prayers to a God whom one is taught to fear ten times to

the once that love is insisted on, a union with that higher self

which, if pursued, brings peace, wisdom, an infinite compassion,

and an infinite love.

What has Theosophy to offer to the Roman Catholic? All that it

offers to the Protestant; with this addition, that not merely one

woman is exalted, but all womankind as being of the same essence

and spirit of all nature. It shows that there is no superiority,

but that by effort, by training, by aspiration, everyone, both man

and woman, shall be found worthy of being taken into heaven, and

joined again to the one source of life and being. It shows the

whole doctrine of saintliness and blessedness to have a source in

Truth, though overlaid and altered.

And what of the other sheep? What of that soul which, feeling

compelled by its intuitions to recognise the essential divinity of

man, yet find no expression in the churches which will fit into

its emotional nature? What of him whom, for want of a better word,

I shall call a Symbolist, who is always striving to express in some

form of art or thought, that divine energy which is wisdom,

consciousness, and energy all in one? Does not Theosoophy afford

the very best outlet for his soul force? Are not its ideas on a

level with, if not higher than, what his most sublime moments of

feeling can bring before him? Surely if anyone can find peace in

its bosom, the symbolist, ever struggling to express his sense of

the True, the Beautiful, which are, after all, but a second

reflection of the Higher mind, with its knowledge of the essence

of all life, can therein do his noblest work for Humanity in company

with those who, having previously done all they could for the race

through a sense of duty arising from intuitions they declined to

recognise, have found in the doctrines of Theosophy the broadest

possible field for such work, and the purest motive.

And now, changing from particular types, how do we look upon Theosophy

as a power in Ethics? We find the elimination of the selfish instinct

insisted upon as necessary for the progress of the Ego through its

material envelope to a full and complete knowledge of its higher self;

we find the doctrine of Brotherhood put forward in its noblest aspects;

we find as a necessary corollary that responsibility is increased

and widened with an accompanying sense of power to accept and carry

on that responsibility; with the growth of higher feeling within

us comes a sense of added strength; we learn gradually to work

without consideration or anxiety for results; we grow more tolerant

of our neighbor's shortcomings, and less so of our own; we find

that by disengaging ourselves from the objects of the senses, we

become indifferent to small troubles, and more free to assist our

neighbor when they press on him; with the knowledge of the causes

of present conditions lying in past action, and our present actions

going to be the causes of future conditions, we place ourselves in

a position to work to the full extent of our powers to set in motion

such causes as will bring about the happiest results for Humanity

as a whole; we learn to look upon death, not as the opening of the

spiritual life, but as a release from a weight which keeps under

the spiritual life, which is always with us, now as well as before

birth and after death; we learn to sense the methods by which the

universe works out its destiny; we find every day growing stronger

that sense of immortality, of absolute union with the universal soul,

which at first merely manifested itself in strange feelings and

emotions; we find the clues to the control of our physical and

mental faculties, and are not surprised to discover the ten-thousand-

fold increase in value these faculties then bear; we put ourselves

more and more in harmony with what we feel to be the source of all

Truth; we find ourselves gradually able to give expression to

those dumb feelings which we could not find words for, of its

grandeur and greatness; until finally we come, after many incarnations,

after suffering, after despair sometimes, to a knowledge which

transcends all human knowledge, to a bliss which is above our

present ideas, to a peace which the world cannot give, which

surpasseth all understanding, and are then ready to give up that

bliss and peace, and to use that knowledge for the divine compassion

towards our fellows who are following.

But how are we to hope for this progress? What are we to do to

realize these ideas? Is it by wishing for it that this state will

come about? Is there no everyday way of getting forward? These

are some of the questions which will rise naturally to the lips of

any here who are not thoroughly acquainted with Theosophical ideas:

and what have we to say in reply? Are we to confess Theosophy is

a doctrine only for the learned, the cultured, the wealthy? Are

we to acknowledge that Christianity or Agnosticism is more practical,

easier for the men in the street to grasp? Are we to say that

Theosophy is not a gospel for to-day? No: a thousand times no!

If there is one result of a study of Theosophy, it is the gaining

of Hope, a sure and certain Hope, which soon becomes Trust, and later,

knowledge. I affirm most strongly that there is no one to whom

Theosophy in some of its myriad aspects does not appeal, and appeal

strongly enough to cause it to be the ruling passion of his existence;

but I do also affirm as strongly, that in Theosophy, as in all other

things, what are necessary are, pure motive and perseverance. It

costs no one anything to spend an hour a day in meditation on some

aspect of life; in thinking of our eternal nature and striving to

place ourselves en rapport with our highest ideals of purity, nobility,

Truth. Then cannot we get the idea of universal brotherhood firmly

fixed in our consciousness as an actual reality to be attained, and

always act upon that basis. To me, the thought of the absolute

unity of all life, affords as high an ideal for putting into

practical shape as my deficient development allows me. Cannot we

get this ideal or some other ideal so essential a part of our

thought that it colours all our feelings, emotions and actions?

We will then be doing our part in the struggle. We will not be of

the Laodiceans, who were neither hot nor cold. Let us try this:

let us see whether it will have such an effect, and if we, by our

personal experience, have convinced ourselves of the reality of this,

let us progress further, and by further trial find out the greater

truths beyond. Reincarnation and Karma are essentially doctrines

for the poor and needy; mental and physical. Intellectual subtleties

are not needed in Theosophy: it is spiritual perception, and who will

dare say to the poor that they have less of this than their fellows?

The only region where the "exclusiveness" argument can have even a

momentary hold is with regard to Occultism. There is in most people's

mind a distrust of anything secret. But remember, believe only in

what your own test has shown you to be true: and learn not to

condemn those who have found some irresistible impulse urging them

forward to seek further. Besides, anyone who is not clear in his

motive in studying Occultism had better pause before he pledges

himself to anything, or undertakes that the result of which he does

not know even dimly.

And before passing from this digression, let me insist strongly

once again on the fact that true progress will come only to those

who seek to attain it.

They who would be something more

Than those who feast and laugh and die, will hear

The voice of duty, as the note of war,

Nerving their spirit to great enterprise,

And knitting every sinew for the charge.

Again, get rid of indolence, or its synonym, indifference. The

real hereditary sin of human nature is indolence. Conquer that,

and you will conquer the rest. We cannot afford to rest with what

we have done; we must keep moving on. In this, indeed, to stand

still is to go back--worse still, to keep others back.

In conclusion I may, perhaps, be permitted to give you a few remarks

as to the influence Theosophy has had upon myself. It has furnished

me with satisfactory reasons for living and working; it has infused

an earnestness in that work which I prize as one of the valuable

things of my life's experience. It has ministered to that inmost

sense of worship and aspiration which all of us possess; it has

shown me that by expanding one's consciousness in that of the universe,

one gains more knowledge and opportunity for helping on humanity;

and it has pointed out where the materials for a scientific basis

of ethics can be found, and also what will be the outlines of the

future building; and finally it has shown that if the objects of

our desires be changed, and many things we held dear are no longer

prized, it is owning simply to the acquirement of larger and

fuller interests.

--September 15, 1894

Comfort

We are continually called upon to give comfort, and it is a problem

to many what to say. For there are people who can see no outlet

from their pain other than this, that they shall obtain that which

they desire. The lover longs for the one who is absent or cold;

the poor demand wealth; the tortured cry out for relief from suffering;

and so on through all phases of human life we continually meet such

people. We, perhaps free from such afflictions, have schooled

ourselves into a heroic mood. These are not things to sorrow over,

we think; therefore, we are in a dilemma. We cannot aid them,

for their ideals often seem ignoble to us--their wish accomplished

would only bring on the renewal of old pain, and bind them closer

to the weary wheel. Yet we cannot be cold, we who would identify

ourselves with all life, for the soul must "lend its ear to every

cry of pain, like as the lotus bares its heart to drink the morning

sun." In the many cases where the suffering is unavoidable, and

cannot be otherwise received, what are we to do? Some, a little

above the ignoble view that the only relief is in the satisfaction

of desire, say reverently to those in pain: "It is God's will,"

and some accept it as such with dull resignation. But with some

the iron has entered the soul--the words are empty. "What have I

to do with God, or He with me?" they demand in their hearts.

They join in the immemorial appeal and fierce revolt which at all

times the soul of man makes against any external restraint. We

who are disciples of old wisdom may touch some chord in them which

may awaken eternal endurance.

It is not, we say, a pain imposed upon us by any eternal power;

but the path we tread is one which we ourselves very long ago determined.

To the question, "What have we to do with God?" we make answer that

we are the children of Deity--bright sparks born in the Divine flame,

the spirit in its primal ecstacy reflected in itself the multitudinous

powers that throng in space. It was nourished by divine love, and

all that great beauty thrilled through it and quickened it. But

from this vision which the spirit had, it passed to climb to still

greater heights--it was spiritual, it might attain divinity. The

change from the original transcendental state of vision to that

other state of being, of all-pervading consciousness, could only

be accomplished by what is known as the descent into matter where

spirit identifies itself with every form of life, and assimilates

their essences. This cyclic pilgrimage it undertook, foreseeing pain,

but "preferring free will to passive slavery, intellectual, self-

conscious pain, and even torture, 'while myriad time shall flow,'

to inane, imbecile, instinctual beatitude," foreseeing pain, but

knowing that out of it all would come a nobler state of life, a

divinity capable of rule, a power to assist in the general evolution

of nature. It is true in the experience of many that going deep

within themselves, an elemental consciousness whispers comfort;

it says all will be well with us; it is our primal will which so

orders. And so we justify the pain and hearts that break; and

that old appeal and fierce revolt we make dies out in the inner

light which shines from "the Goal, the Comforter, the Lord, the

Witness, the resting-place, the Asylum, the Friend." We can then

once more go forth with the old, heroic, Titan will for mastery,

seeking not to escape, but rather to meet, endure, and assimilate

sorrow and joy alike; for so we can permeate all life--life which

is in its essence one. This is the true centre on which all

endurance must rest; this is the comfort the soul may take to

itself; and beyond and after this we may say we struggle in a

chaos indeed, but in a chaos whose very disorder is the result of law.

That law is justice that cannot err. Out of confidence in this

justice may spring up immortal hopes; our motives, our faith shall

save us. We may dare more, give ourselves away more completely,

for is not the root of this law declared to be beauty, harmony,

compassion. We may trust that our acts shall have full fruition,

and remain careless of the manner, nor seek for such results. We

may look upon it if we will as the sweetest of the sweetest, the

tenderest of the tenderest; and this is true, though still it is

master of the fiery pain. Above all it is the law of our own being;

it is at one with our ancestral self. In all this lies, I think,

such consolation as we may take and offer for pain. Those who

comprehend, in their resignation, shall become one with themselves;

and out of this resignation shall arise will to go forth and fulfil

our lofty destiny.

--May 15, 1894

The Ascending Cycle

The teaching of the Secret Doctrine divides the period during which

human evolution proceeds upon this globe into seven periods. During

the first three-and-a-half of these, the ethereal humanity who

appeared in the First Race gradually become material in form, and

the psychic spirituality of the inner man is transformed into

intellectuality. During the remaining three-and-a-half periods,

there is a gradual dematerialization of form; the inner man by

slow degrees rises from mere brain intellection to a more perfected

spiritual consciousness. We are told that there are correspondences

between the early and later periods of evolution; the old conditions

are repeated, but upon higher planes; we re-achieve the old

spirituality with added wisdom and intellectual power. Looked at

in this way we shall find that the Seventh Race corresponds to the

first; the Sixth to the Second; and the Fifth Race (which is ours)

corresponds with the Third. "We are now approaching a time," says

the Secret Doctrine, "when the pendulum of evolution will direct

its swing decidedly upward, bringing humanity back on a parallel

line with the primitive Third Root Race in spirituality." That is,

there will be existing on the earth, about the close of Fifth Race,

conditions in some way corresponding with those prevailing when

the Third Race men began their evolution. Through this period may

be yet distant hundreds of thousands of years, still it is of

interest to forecast that future as far as may be, for the future

is concealed in the present, and is the outcome of forces working

to-day. We may find out from this enquiry the true nature of

movements like the Theosophical Society.

One of the most interesting passages in the Secret Doctrine is that

which describes the early Third Race. "It was not a Race, this progeny.

It was at first a wondrous Being, called the 'Initiator," and after

him a group of semi-divine and semi-human beings." Without at all

attempting to explain the real nature of this mysterious Being or

Race, we may assume that one of the things hinted at is the

consciousness of united being possessed by these ancient Adepts.

Walking abroad over the earth as instructors of a less progressed

humanity, their wisdom and power had a common root. They taught

truth from a heart-perception of life, ever fresh and eternal,

everywhere pervading nature and welling up in themselves. This

heart-perception is the consciousness of unity of inner being.

The pendulum of evolution which in its upward swing will bring

humanity backwards on a parallel line with the primitive Third

Root Race, should bring back something corresponding to this

primeval hierarchy of divine sages. We should see at the end of

the Kaliyuga a new brotherhood formed from those who have risen

out of material life and aims, who have conquered self, who have

been purified by suffering, who have acquired strength and wisdom,

and who have wakened up to the old magical perception of their

unity in true Being. "At the end of the Kali, our present age,

Vishnu, or the "Everlasting King,' will appear as Kalki, and

establish righteousness upon earth. The minds of those who live

at that time shall be awakened and become pellucid as crystal."

--(Secret Doctrine, II, 483)

Passing beyond the turning point of evolution, where the delusion

of separateness is complete, and moving on the that future awaiting

us in infinite distances, when the Great Breath shall cease its

outward motion and we shall merge into the One--on this uphill

journey in groups and clusters men will first draw closer together,

entering in spirit their own parent rays before being united in

the source of all light and life. Such a brotherhood of men and

women we may expect will arise, conscious in unity, thinking from

one mind and acting from one soul. All such great achievements

of the race are heralded long before by signs which those who study

the lives of men may know. There is a gestation in the darkness

of the womb before the living being appears. Ideals first exist

in thought, and from thought they are outrealized into objective

existence. The Theosophical Society was started to form the

nucleus of a universal brotherhood of humanity, and its trend is

towards this ideal. May we not justifiably suppose that we are

witnessing to-day in this movement the birth of a new race

corresponding to the divine Initiators of the Third; a race which

shall in its inner life be truly a "Wondrous Being." I think we

will perform our truest service to the Society by regarding it in

this way as an actual entity whose baby years and mystical childhood

we should foster. There are many people who know that it is possible

by certain methods to participate in the soul-life of a co-worker,

and if it is possible to do this even momentarily with one comrade,

it is possible so to participate in the vaster life of great

movements. There will come a time to all who have devoted themselves

to this idea, as H.P. Blavatsky and some others have done, when

they will enter into the inner life of this great Being, and share

the hopes, the aspirations, the heroism, and the failures which

must be brought about when so many men and women are working together.

To achieve this we should continually keep in mind this sense of

unity; striving also to rise in meditation until we sense in the

vastness the beating of these innumerable hearts glowing with heroic

purpose: we should try to humanize our mysticism; "We can only

reach the Universal Mind through the minds of humanity," and we

can penetrate into their minds by continual concentration,

endeavouring to realise their thoughts and feelings, until we

carry always about with us in imagination, as [wrote] Walt Whitman,

"those delicious burdens, men and women."

--November 15, 1893

The Mystic Nights' Entertainment

We went forth gay in the twilight's cover;

The dragon Day with his ruddy crest

Blazed on the shadowy hills hung over

The still grey fields in their dewy rest.

We went forth gay, for all ancient stories

Were told again in our hearts as we trod;

Above were the mountain's dawn-white glories;

We climbed to it as the throne of God.

We pitched our tents in a sheltered nook on the mountain side. We

were great with glee during the day, forecasting happy holidays

remote from the crowded city. But now as we sat round the camp

fire at dusk silence fell upon us. What were we to do in the long

evenings? I could see Willie's jolly face on the other side of

the fire trying to smother a yawn as he refilled his pipe. Bryan

was watching the stars dropping into their places one by one. I

turned to Robert and directed the general attention to him as a

proper object for scorn. He had drawn a pamphlet on some scientific

subject from his breast-pocket and was trying to read it by the

flickering light.

"Did you come up to the mountains for this," I asked, "to increase

your knowledge of the Eocene age? Put it by, or--we will send it

up as a burnt offering to the stars."

"Well," he said, looking rather ashamed, "one must do something,

you know. Willie has his pipe, Bryan is holding some mysterious

intercourse with the planets, and you have the fire to take care of.

What is one to do?"

This went to the root of the matter. I pondered over it awhile,

until an idea struck me.

"There is Bryan. Let him tell us a story. He was flung into life

with a bundle of old legends. He knows all mystery and enchantment

since the days of the Rishees, and has imagined more behind them.

He has tales of a thousand incarnations hidden away in secretness.

He believes that everything that happened lives still in the memory

of Nature, and that he can call up out of the cycles of the past

heroic figures and forgotten history, simply by his will, as a

magician draws the elemental hordes together."

"Have a dragon and a princess in it," said Willie, settling himself

into an attitude of listening.

"Or authentic information about Eocene man," suggested Robert.

"I could not tell a story that way," said Bryan simply. "I could

never invent a story, though all the characters, heroes and princess,

were to come and sit beside me so that I could describe them as

they really were. My stories come like living creatures into my mind;

and I can only tell them as they tell themselves to me. Today,

as I lay in the sunlight with closed eyes, I saw a haze of golden

light, then twilight trees appeared and moving figures and voices

speaking; it shaped itself into what is hardly a story, but only

an evening in some legendary existence."

We waited while Bryan tried to recall his misty figures. We were

already in sympathy with his phantasmal world, for the valleys

below us were dim-coloured and quiet, and we heard but rarely and

far away the noises of the village; the creatures of the mountain

moved about in secretness, seeking their own peculiar joys in

stillness amid dews and darkness. After a little Bryan began.

The Gardens of Twilight

I saw in my vision one of the heroes of the antique world. He

rode for many, many days, yet saw no kindly human face. After

long wanderings and toils he came to the Gardens of Twilight, the

rich and rare gardens of the primeval world, known by rumour to

the ancient Greeks as the Hesperides. He looked around with wonder;

the place was all a misty dazzle with light, a level light as of

evening that flowed everywhere about; the air was rich with the

scent of many blossoms; from each flower rose an odour that hovered

about it as a delicate vapour. While he gazed, one of the spirits

of the garden came nigh him in the guise of a beautiful human child.

"How came you here?"

"I wandered for many years," he said, "I fought with the dragons

that lie coiled in citron scales on the highways; I warred against

oppression; I made justice to prevail, and now that peace is on

the land I might have rested with peace in mine own heart, but I

could not yet. So I left behind the happy hearths and homes of

men and rode onward, a secret fire burning ceaselessly within me;

I know not in what strange home it will be still. But what gardens

are these?"

"They are the Gardens of Twilight," answered the child.

"How beautiful then must be the Gardens of Day! How like a faint

fine dust of amethyst and gold the mist arises from the enchanted

odorous flowers! Surely some spirit things must dwell within the

air that breaks so perpetually into hues of pearl and shell!"

"They are the servants of Zeus," the child said. "They live within

these wandering airs; they go forth into the world and make mystery

in the hearts of men."

"Was it one such guided me thither?"

"I do not know; but this I know, whether led by the wandering

spirits or guided by their own hearts, none can remain here safely

and look upon the flowers save those who understand their mystery

or those who can create an equal beauty. For all others deadly

is the scent of the blossoms; stricken with madness, they are

whirled away into the outer world in fever, passion and unending

hunger and torment."

"I do not care if I pass from them," said the wanderer. "It is

not here my heart could be still and its desire cease, but in the

first Fount."

They passed on and went deeper into the Gardens of Twilight, which

were ever-changing, opalescent, ever-blushing with new and momentary

beauty, ever-vanishing before the steady gaze to reveal beneath

more silent worlds of mystic being. Like vapour, now gorgeous and

now delicate, they wavered, or as the giant weeds are shadowing

around the diver in the Indian wave sun-drenched through all its

deeps of green. Sometimes a path would unfold, with a million

shining flowers of blue, twinkling like stars in the Wilky Way,

beneath their feet, and would wind away delicately into the

faery distances.

"Let us rest," said the child, leaning against a tree. She began

swaying a hand to and fro among the flowers; as her fingers touched

the bell-like blooms of burning amethyst they became stained with

the rich colour; she seemed to lose herself in dreams as one who

toils not for delight, living ever amid rich joys. He wondered

if she was as unreal as the gardens, and remembering her words,

they seemed familiar as if they were but echoes of the unuttered

thoughts that welled up as he moved about. While he watched the

flitting phantasmagoria with a sense expectant of music which never

came, phantasmagoria with a sense expectant of music which never

came, there arose before him images of peace, vanishing faster

than passion, and forms of steadfast purity came nigh, attired,

priestess-like, in white and gold; they laid their heads against

his breast; as he looked down, their eyes, eager and flamelike,

grew passionate and full of desire. He stretched out his hand to

pluck blossoms and twine wreaths for their beautiful heads.

"Do not! Do not!" cried the child. "See how every blossom has

its guardian!"

There were serpents coiling about the roots of every flower, or

amid the leaves, waiting with undulating head and forked tongue to

strike the uncautious hand. He shook off the drowsy influence of

the scents and o'er-burdened air; the forms vanished. He remembered

the child's words: "None can remain in safety an equal beauty."

He began to ponder over the meaning of the gardens.

"While we sit here, late lingerers in the glory of twilight, I will

tell you a story which my fancy brings me," he said. "I thought

one came here long ago and built himself a mighty world in a dream

of many hundred years."

"He had lived with kings and counselors; he had wrought in magical

arts, and the great and wise of the earth were his fellows. When

a time came for him to depart he turned away sadly from the towers

of men. He passed, without knowing it, through the strange defiles

which lead to these gardens; but the light did not break upon him

in iridescent waves foamy with flowers and sparkling with vanishing

forms; the light was hidden in the bosom of the twilight; it was

all-pervading but invisible; the essence of the light bathed his soul;

the light was living; the light was exhaustless; by it everything

was born; touched by it everything went forth in ecstasy, blind,

seeking for realization.

"The magician brought with him the seeds of human desire and wisdom

and aspiration. The light broke into his moody forgetfulness and

kindled long-forgotten fires. He awoke from his darkness and saw

before him in happiest vistas the island city of his lounging.

Around him were the men and women he knew; acting on his secret

wishes the multitudes hailed him as king, they bowed before him

as wise, they worshiped him as all-powerful.. It was not strange

to him, and rapt in royal imaginations for countless years he held

sway over the island city. He dreamed of it as a poet, and there

was no more beautiful city than this city of his dream. There

were places that shot up, pinnacle upon pinnacle, amid the jewel-

light of the stars; there were courts and porticoes full of

mysterious glory and gloom, magnificence and darkness; there were

fountains that jetted their pearly mists into the light; around

them with summer in their hearts lay the island inhabitants, each

one an angel for beauty. As the dream of the magician deepened

in rapture, the city wavered and changed more continually; its

towers pierced more daringly into the way of the stars; for the

darkness below he summoned birds of fire from the aerial deeps;

they circled the palaces with flaming wings; they stained the air

with richest dyes and rained forth emerald and blue and gold on

the streets and sculptured walls and the inhabitants in their

strange joys.

"His dream changed; he went forth no more but shut himself up in

his palace with his wisest princes, and as he took counsel with them,

the phantasmal and brilliant towers without faded and fell away

as a butterfly droops its wings. For countless years he lived in

the intoxication of thought; around him were sages who propounded

wisest laws, and poets who sang of love, humanity and destiny. As

his dream deepened still more in its rapture, they sang of mightier

themes; there was continual music and light; there was no limit

of glory or dominion which the human soul might not aspire to;

his warriors stepped from star to star in dreams of conquest, and

would have stayed the seraph princess of the wind and wave and fire,

to make more radiant the retinue of this magician of the Beautiful.

"Again his desire changed. He sought to hold no further sway over

these wide realms beyond him; he shut himself up in an inner chamber

in lonely meditation, and as he entered into a deeper being the

sages and poets, who were with him at his royal feasts, vanished

and were no more. He, the wise mind, pondered within himself,

finding joy in the continual inward birth of thought following

thought, as in lonely seas wave rolls upon wave. From all things

he had known or experienced he drew forth their essence and hidden

meaning, and he found that he had been no less a king in his old

unconsciousness than he now was, and that at all times nature had

been obeisant and whatever had happened had still been by his own

will. Through the light, thin fretted by the fire of his aspirations,

he sometimes seemed to see the shining Law in all things and the

movement through the thought-swept fields of heaven of the universal

imagination. He saw that this, too, had been a minister to him.

He drew nigh to himself--divinity. The last rapture of his soul

was his radiant self-conception. Save for this vesture the light

of illusion fell from him. He was now in a circle of whitest fire,

that girdled and looked in upon the movements of worlds within its

breast. He tried to expand and enter this flaming circle; myriads

of beings on its verges watched him with pity; I felt their thought

thrilling within me.

"He will never attain it!"

"Ah, the Beautiful Bird, his plumage is stained!"

"His glory will drag him down!"

"Only in invisible whiteness can he pass!"

"How he floats upwards, the Beautiful Bird!"

"These voices of universal compassion did not reach him, rapt in

aspiration and imperious will. For an instant--an eternity--the

infinitudes thrilled him, those infinitudes which in that instant

he knew he could never enter but as one with all on the days of

the great return. All that longed, all that aspired and dared,

all but the immortal were in that movement destroyed, and hurled

downwards from the highest heaven of life, the pilgrim spark began

once more as a child to live over again the round of human days."

"The spirit of the place o'ermastered you," said the child. "Here

may come and dream; and their dream of joy ended, out of each

dreaming sphere comes forth again in pain the infant spirit of man."

"But beyond this illusive light and these ever-changing vistas--

what lies? I am weary of their vanishing glories. I would not

wish to mount up through dreams to behold the true and fall away

powerlessly, but would rather return to earth, though in pain,

still eager to take up and renew the cyclic labours."

"I belong to the gardens," said the child; "I do not know what

lies beyond. But there are many paths leading far away."

Before them where they stood branched out paths of rich flowers.

Here a region of pinks lured on to vistas of delicate glory;

there ideal violet hues led to a more solemn beauty; here the

eyes were dazzled by avenues of rich, radiant, and sunny green;

another in beautiful golden colours seemed to invite to the land

of the sun, and yet another winded away through soft and shadowy

blues to remote spiritual distances. There was one, a path of

white flowers ending in light no eye could pierce.

"I will choose this--the path of white flower," he said, waving

farewell to the child. I watched the antique hero in my vision as

he passed into the light; he seemed to shine, to grow larger; as

he vanished from my eyes he was transfigured, entering as a god the

region of gods."

"Did you really dream all that?" said Willie. "How jolly it must be!

It is like stepping from sphere to sphere. Before the night of one

day you are in the morning of another. I suppose you have some

theory about it all--as wonderful as your gardens?"

"Yes!" said our sceptic, "I had an uneasy consciousness it was not

all pure story. I felt an allegory hiding its leanness somewhere

beneath the glow and colour."

"What I want to know is how these things enter the imagination at all!"

"With what a dreadfully scientific spirit you dissect a fantasy!

Perhaps you might understand if you recall what sometimes happens

before sleep. At first you see pictures of things, landscapes,

people you know; after a time people and places unknown before

begin to mingle with them in an ever-widening circle of visions;

the light on which these things are pictured is universal, though

everyone has around himself his own special sphere of light;

this is the mirror of himself--his memory; but as we go deeper

into ourselves in introspection we see beyond our special sphere

into the great of universal light, the memorial tablet of nature;

there lie hidden the secrets of the past; and so, as Felix said

a little while ago, we can call up and renew the life of legend

and tradition. This is the Astral Light of the mystics. Its

deeper and more living aspect seems to inflame the principle of

desire in us. All the sweet, seductive, bewitching temptations

of sense are inspired by it. After death the soul passing into

this living light goes on thinking, thinking, goes on aspiring,

aspiring, creating unconsciously around itself its own circumstance

in which all sweetest desires are self-fulfilled. When this dream-

power is exhausted the soul returns again to earth. With some

this return is due to the thirst for existence; with some to a

perception of the real needs of soul."

"Do you really believe all that?"

"Oh, yes! But that is only a general statement."

"I wonder at your capacity for believing in these invisible spheres.

As for me I cannot go beyond the world I live in. When I think of

these things some dreadful necessity seems heaped upon me to continue

here--or, as you might put it, an angel with a flaming sword keeps

everywhere the avenues to the Tree of Life."

"Oh!" said Willie, "it seems to me a most reasonable theory. After

all, what else could the soul do after death but think itself out?

It has no body to move about in. I am going to dream over it now.

Good-night!"

He turned into the tent and Robert followed him. "Well, I cannot

rest yet," said Bryan, "I am going up for a little to the top of

the hill. Come, Felix, these drowsy fellows are going to hide

themselves from the face of night." We went up, and leaning on a

boulder of rock looked out together. Away upon the dream-built

margin of space a thousand tremors fled and chased each other all

along the shadowy night. The human traditions, memories of pain,

struggle, hope and desire floated away and melted in the quietude

until at last only the elemental consciousness remained at gaze.

I felt chilled by the vacancies. I wondered what this void was

to Bryan. I wished to see with his eyes. His arm was around my

shoulder. How I loved him--my nearest--my brother! The fierce

and tender flame, comrade to his spirit, glowed in my heart. I

felt a commingling of nature, something moved before my eyes.

"Look, Bryan!" I whispered, "this is faery!" A slight upright

figure, a child, stood a little apart shedding a delicate radiance

upon the dusky air. Curiously innocent, primeval, she moved,

withdrawn in a world only half-perceived of gorgeous blossoms and

mystic shadows. Through her hair of feathery brown drifting about

her the gleam of dust of gold and of rich colour seemed to come

from her dress. She raised her finger-tips from the flowers and

dashed the bright dew aside. I felt something vaguely familiar

about the gesture. Then Bryan said, "It is one of the Children

of Twilight." It was a revelation of his mind. I had entered

into the forms of his imagination.

"This is wonderful Bryan! If I can thus share in the thought of one,

there can be no limit to the extension of this faculty. It seems

at the moment as if I could hope to finally enter the mind of

humanity and gaze upon soul, not substance."

"It would be a great but terrible power. As often as not we imagine

ourselves into demons. Space is thronged with these dragon-like

forms, chimaeras of the fearful mind. Every thought is an entity.

Some time or other I think we will have to slay this brood we have

brought forth."

But as we turned backwards I had no dread or thought of this future

contest. I felt only gay hopes, saw only ever-widening vistas.

The dreams of the Golden Age, of far-off happy times grew full of

meaning. I people all the future with their splendour. The air

was thronged with bright supernatural beings, they moved in air,

in light; and they and we and all together were sustained and

thrilled by the breath of the Unknown God.

As we drew nigh to the tent, the light of the fire still flickering

revealed Robert's face within. He was sleeping. the warmth of the

sun had not yet charmed away the signs of study and anxious thought.

"Do you know the old tradition that in the deepest sleep of the

body the soul goes into itself. I believe he now knows the truth

he feared to face. A little while ago he was here; he was in doubt;

now he is gone unto all ancient things. He was in prison; now

the Bird of Paradise has wings. We cannot call him by any name,

for we do not know what he is. We might indeed cry aloud to his

glory, as of old the Indian sage cried to a sleeper, 'Thou great one,

clad in raiment; Soma: King!" But who thinking what he is would

call back the titan to this strange and pitiful dream of life?

Let us breath softly to do him reverence. It is now the Hour of

the King,

"Who would think this quite breather

From the world had taken flight?

Yet within the form we see there

Wakes the Golden King to-night.

"Out upon the face of faces

He looked forth before his sleep;

Now he knows the starry races

Haunters of the ancient deep;

"On the Bird of Diamond Glory

Floats in mystic floods of song;

As he lists, Time's triple story

Seems but as a day is long.

"When he wakes--the dreamy-hearted--

He will know not whence he came,

And the light from which he parted

Be the seraph's sword of flame;

"And behind its host supernal

Guarding the lost Paradise,

And the Tree of Life eternal

From the weeping human eyes."

"You are an enchanter, Bryan. As you speak I half imagine the

darkness sparkles with images, with heroes and ancient kings who

pass, and jeweled seraphs who move in flame. I feel mad. The

distance rushes at me. The night and stars are living, and--speak

unknown things! You have made me so restless I will never sleep."

I lay down. The burden of the wonder and mystery of existence was

upon me. Through the opening of the tent the warm night air flowed in;

the stars seemed to come near--nearer--full of kindly intent--with

familiar whispering; until at last I sank back into the great deep

of sleep with a mysterious radiance of dream showering all about me.

Night The Second

The skies were dim and vast and deep

Above the vales of rest;

They seemed to rock the stars asleep

Beyond the mountain's crest.

Oh, vale and stars and rocks and trees,

He gives to you his rest,

But holds afar from you the peace

Whose home is in His breast!

The massy night, brilliant with golden lights enfolded us. All

things were at rest. After a long day's ramble among the hills,

we sat down again before our fire. I felt, perhaps we all felt,

a mystic unquiet rebelling against the slumbrous mood of nature

rolled round her hills and valleys.

"You must explain to us, Bryan, why it is we can never attain a

real quiet, even here where all things seem at peace."

"We are aliens here, and do not know ourselves. We are always

dreaming of some other life. These dreams, if we could only rightly

interpret them, would be the doors through which we might pass into

a real knowledge of ourselves."

"I don't think I would get much wisdom out of my dreams," said Willie.

"I had a dream last night; a lot of little goblin fellows dancing a

jig on the plains of twilight. Perhaps you could tell us a real dream?"

"I remember one dream of a kind I mean, which I will tell you. It

left a deep impression upon me. I will call it a dream of

The Northern Lights

I awoke from sleep with a cry. I was hurled up from the great

deep and rejected of the darkness. But out of the clouds and

dreams I built up a symbol of the going forth of the spirit--a

symbol, not a memory--for if I could remember, I could return

again at will and be free of the unknown land. But in slumber I

was free. I sped forth like an arrow. I followed a secret hope,

breasting the currents of life flowing all about me. I tracked

these streams winding in secretness far away. I said, "I am going

to myself. I will bathe in the Fountain of Life;" and so on and

on I sped northwards, with dark waters flowing beneath me and stars

companioning my flight. Then a radiance illumined the heavens,

the icy peaks and caves, and I saw the Northern Lights. Out of

the diamond breast of the air I looked forth. Below the dim world

shone all with pale and wintry green; the icy crests flickered

with a light reflect from the shadowy auras streaming over the

horizon. Then these auras broke out in fire, and the plains of

ice were illumined. The light flashed through the goblin caves,

and lit up their frosty hearts and the fantastic minarets drooping

above them. Light above in solemn array went forth and conquered

the night. Light below with a myriad flashing spears pursued the

gloom. Its dazzling lances shivered in the heart of the ice:

they sped along the ghostly hollows; the hues of the orient seemed

to laugh through winter; the peaks blossomed with starry and

crystalline flowers, lilac and white and blue; they faded away,

pearl, opal and pink in shimmering evanescence; then gleams of

rose and amethyst traveled slowly from spar to spar, lightened

and departed; there was silence before my eyes; the world once

more was all a pale and wintry green. I thought of them no more,

but of the mighty and unseen tides going by me with billowy motion.

"Oh, Fountain I seek, thy waters are all about me, but where shall

I find a path to Thee?" Something answered my cry, "Look in thy

heart!" and, obeying the voice, the seer in me looked forth no

more through the eyes of the shadowy form, but sank deep within

itself. I knew then the nature of these mystic streams; they

were life, joy, love, ardour, light. From these came the breath

of life which the heart drew in with every beat, and from thence

it was flashed up in illumination through the cloudy hollows of

the brain. They poured forth unceasingly; they were life in

everyone; they were joy in everyone; they stirred an incommunicable

love which was fulfilled only in yielding to and adoration of the

vast. But the Fountain I could not draw nigh unto; I was borne

backwards from its unimaginable centre, then an arm seized me, and

I was stayed. I could see no one, but I grew quiet, full of deep

quiet, out of which memory breathes only shadowiest symbols, images

of power and Holy Sages, their grand faces turned to the world,

as if in the benediction of universal love, pity, sympathy, and peace,

ordained by Buddha; the faces of the Fathers, ancient with eternal

youth, looking forth as in the imagination of the mystic Blake,

the Morning Stars looked forth and sang together. A sound as of

an "OM" unceasing welled up and made an auriole of peace around them.

I would have joined in the song, but could not attain to them.

I knew if I had a deeper love I could have entered with them into

unending labours amid peace; but I could only stand and gaze;

in my heart a longing that was worship, in my thought a wonder

that was praise. "Who are these?" I murmured? The Voice answered,

"They are the servants of the Nameless One. They do his bidding

among men. They awaken the old heroic fire of sacrifice in forgetful

hearts." Then the forms of elder life appeared in my vision. I

saw the old earth, a fairy shadow ere it yet had hardened, peopled

with ethereal races unknowing of themselves or their destinies and

lulled with inward dreams; above and far away I saw how many

glittering hosts, their struggle ended, moved onward to the Sabbath

of Eternity. Out of these hosts, one dropped as a star from their

heart, and overshadowed the olden earth with its love. Where ever

it rested I saw each man awakening from his dreams turned away with

the thought of sacrifice in his heart, a fire that might be forgotten,

but could never die. This was the continual secret whisper of the

Fathers in the inmost being of humanity. "Why do they not listen?"

I marveled. Then I heard another cry from the lower pole, the pit;

a voice of old despair and protest, the appeal of passion seeking

its own fulfilment. Alternate with the dawn of Light was the breath

of the expanding Dark where powers of evil were gathered together.

"It is the strife between light and darkness which are the world's

eternal ways," said the Voice, "but the light shall overcome and

the fire in the heart be rekindled; men shall regain their old

angelic being, and though the dark powers may war upon them, the

angels with their love shall slay them. Be thou ready for the battle,

and see thou use only love in the fight. Then I was hurried backward

with swift speed, and awoke. All I knew was but a symbol, but I

had the peace of the mystic Fathers in my heart, and the jeweled

glory of the Northern Lights all dazzling about my eyes.

"Well, after a dream like that," said Willie, "the only thing one

can do is to try and dream another like it."

--Oct. 15, 1894-Jan. 15, 1895

On the Spur of the Moment

I am minded to put down some intuitions about brotherhood and trust

in persons. A witty friend writes, "Now that I have made up my mind,

I intend looking at the evidence." A position like that is not so

absurd as at first it seems. It is folly only to those who regard

reason alone and deny the value of a deep-seated intuition. The

intuitive trust which so many members of the T.S. have in William

Q. Judge, to my mind shows that he is a real teacher. In their

deepest being they know him as such, and what is knowledge there

becomes the intuition of waking hours. When a clamour of many

voices arises making accusations, pointing to time, place and

circumstance; to things which we cannot personally investigate,

it is only the spirit within us can speak and decide. Others with

more knowledge may give answering circumstances of time, place

and act; but, with or without these, I back up my intuition with

the reason--where the light breaks through, there the soul is pure.

Says a brother truly:

"The list of his works is endless, monumental; it shows us an

untiring soul, an immense and indomitable will, a total ignoring

of himself for the benefit of his fellow-members. This is not the

conduct of the charlatan, not of the self-seeker. It is that of

one of those brave and long-tried souls who have fought their way

down through the vistas of time so that they might have strength

to battle now for those who may be weaker."

Others may have been more eloquent and learned, but who has been

so wise? Others may have written more beautifully, but who with

such intimations of the Secret Spirit breathing within? Others

have explained intellectually tattvas, principles and what not,

but who like him has touched the heart of a hidden nobility? Has

he not done it over and over again, as here?

"Do what you find to do. Desire ardently to do it, and even when

you shall not have succeeded in carrying out anything but some

small duties, some words of warning, your strong desire will strike

like Vulcan upon some other hearts in the world, and suddenly you

will find that done which you had longed to be the doer of. Then

rejoice that another has been so fortunate as to make such a

meritorious Karma."

Or he speaks as a hero:

"To fail would be nothing, but to stop working for Humanity and

Brotherhood would be awful."

Or as one who loves and justifies it to the end:

"We are not Karma, we are not the law, and it is a species of that

hypocrisy so deeply condemned by it for us to condemn any man.

That the law lets a man live is proof that he is not yet judged

by that higher power."

To know of these laws is to be them to some extent. "What a man

thinks, that he is, that is the old secret." The temple of Spirit

is inviolate. It is not grasped by speech or by action. "Whom

the Spirit chooses, by him it is gained. The Self chooses his body

as its own." When the personal tumult is silence, then arises the

meditation of the Wise within. Whoever speaks out of that life

has earned the right to be there. No cunning can stimulate its

accents. No hypocrisy can voice its wisdom. Whose mind gives out

light--it is the haunt of the Gods. Does this seem to slight a

guarantee for sincerity, for trust reposed? I know of none weightier.

Look back in memory; of the martyrdom of opposing passions, out of

the last anguish came forth the light. It was no cheap accomplishment.

If some one meets us and speaks knowing of that law, we say inwardly,

"I know you have suffered, brother!" But here is one with a larger

wisdom than ours. Here is one whose words today have the same clear

ring. "The world knows him not." His own disciples hardly know

him: he has fallen like Lucifer. But I would take such teaching

as he gives from Lucifer himself, and say, "His old divinity remains

with him still."

"After all you may be mistaken," someone says. "The feet of no

one are set infallibly on the path." It may be so. Let us take

that alternative. Can we reject him or any other as comrades while

they offer? Never. Were we not taught to show to those on whom

came the reaction from fierce effort, not cold faces, but the face

of friendship, waiting for the wave of sure return? If this was

a right attitude for us in our lesser groups, it is then right

for the whole body to adopt. The Theosophical Society as a whole

should not have less than the generous spirit of its units. It

must exercise the same brotherly spirit alike to those of good

or evil fame. Alike on the just and the unjust shines the Light

of It, the Father-Spirit. Deep down in our hearts have we not

all longed, longed, for that divine love which rejects none? You

who think he has erred, it is yours to give it now. There is an

occult law that all things return to their source, their cycles

accomplished. The forces we expend in love and anger come back

again to us thrilled with the thought which accepted or rejected

them. I tell you, if worse things were true of him than what are

said, if we did our duty simply, giving back in gratitude and

fearlessness the help we had received from him, his own past would

overcome the darkness of the moment, would strengthen and bear him

on to the light.

"But," some push it further; "it is not of ourselves, but of this

Society and its good name, we think. How can it accomplish its

high mission in the world if we seem to ignore in our ranks the

presence of the insincere person or fraud?"

I wish, my brothers, we could get rid of these old fears. Show,

form, appearance and seeming, what force have they? A faulty face

matters nothing. The deep inner attitude alone has power. The

world's opinion implicates none of us with the Law. Our action

many precipitate Karma, may inconvenience us for an hour; but the

end of life is not comfort but celestial being; it is not in the

good voice of the world today we can have any hope: its evil voice

may seem to break us for a little; but love, faith and gratitude

shall write our history in flame on the shadowy aura of the world,

and the Watchers shall record it. We can lose nothing; the

Society can lose nothing. Our only right is in the action, and

half the sweetness of life consists in loving much.

While I wrote, I thought I felt for a moment the true spirit of

this pioneer body we belong to. Like a diver too long under seas,

emerging I inhaled the purer air and saw the yellow sunlight. To

think of it! what freedom! what freshness! to sail away from old

report and fear and custom, the daring of the adventurer in our

hearts, having a reliance only upon the laws of life to justify

and sustain us.

--February 1895

The Legends of Ancient Eire

A Reverend and learned professor in Trinity College, Dublin, a

cynic and a humorist, is reported once to have wondered "why the

old Irish, having a good religion of their own, did not stick to it?"

Living in the "Celtic twilight," and striving to pierce backward

into the dawn, reading romance, tradition and history, I have

endeavoured to solve something of the mystery of the vast "Celtic

phantasmagoria," I can but echoe the professor. In these legends,

prodical of enchantment, where Gods, heroes and bright supernatural

beings mingle, are at league or war together, I have found not misty

but clear traces of that old wisdom-religion once universal. There

are indeed no ancient Irish Scriptures I am aware of, but they were

not needed. To those who read in the Book of Life, philosophy and

scripture are but as blinds over the spiritual vision. But we today--

lost children of the stars--but painfully and indirectly catch

glimpses of the bright spheres once our habitations, where we freely

came and went. So I will try to tell over again some of these old

stories in the light of philosophy spoken later. What was this

old wisdom-religion? It was the belief that life is one; that

nature is not dead but living; the surface but a veil tremulous

with light--lifting that veil hero and sage of old time went outwards

into the vast and looked on the original. All that they beheld

they once were, and it was again their heritage, for in essence

they were one with it--children of Deity. The One gave birth to

the many, imagining within itself the heaven of heavens, and the

heavens, and spheres more shadowy and dim, growing distant from

the light. Through these the Rays ran outward, falling down through

many a starry dynasty to dwell in clay. Yet--once God or Angel--

that past remains, and the Ray, returning on itself, may reassume

its old vesture, remains, entering as a God into the Ancestral Self.

Every real scripture and every ancient myth, to be understood truly,

must be understood in this light. God, the angelic hierarchies,

the powers divine and infernal, are but names for the mightier Adam

in whose image man was made and who is the forgotten Self in humanity.

Mystic symbolism is the same the world over, and applying it to

the old Celtic romances, phantasy and faeryland are transformed

into history and we are reading about the ancient Irish Adepts.

Ireland was known long ago as the Sacred Island. The Gods lived

there: for the Tuatha De Dannans who settled in Eire after conquering

the gigantic races of Firbolgs and Fomorians (Atlanteans) were called

Gods, differing in this respect from the Gods of ancient Greece and

India, that they were men who had made themselves Gods by magical

or Druidical power. They were preeminently magi become immortal

by strength of will and knowledge. Superhuman in power and beauty,

they raised themselves above nature; they played with the elements;

they moved with ease in the air. We read of one Angus Oge, the

master magician of all, sailing invisibly "on the wings of the cool

east wind"; the palace of that Angus remains to this day at New

Grange, wrought over with symbols of the Astral Fire and the great

Serpentine Power. The De Dannans lived in the heart of mountains

(crypts for initiation), and today the peasant sometimes sees the

enchanted glow from the green hills he believes they still inhabit.

Perhaps he believes not foolishly, for, once truly occult, a place

is preserved from pollution until the cycle returns, bringing back

with it the ancient Gods again.

The cycles of the Gods is followed in Irish tradition by the cycle

of the heroes. The Gods still mingled with them and presumably

taught them, for many of these heroes are Druids. Fin, the hero

of a hundred legends, Cuchullin, Dairmud, Oisin and others are

wielders of magical powers. One of the most beautiful of these

stories tells of Oisin in Tir-na-noge. Oisin with his companions

journeys along by the water's edge. He is singled out by Niam,

daughter of Mannanan, king of Tir-na-noge, the land of the Gods.

She comes on a white horse across the seas, and mounting with her

Oisin travels across the ocean; after warring with a giant Fomor

he passes into Tir-na-noge, where for a hundred years he lives

with Niam and has all that heart could wish for. But desire for

Eire arises within him and returning, he falls off the magic steed,

and becomes an old man weary with years. It is purely occult.

Oisin, Niam, her white steed, Tir-na-noge, the waters they pass over,

are but names which define a little our forgotten being. Within

Oisin, the magician, kindles the Ray, the hidden Beauty. Let us

call it by what name we will, so that we spare the terms of academic

mysticism or psychology. It is the Golden Bird of the Upanishads;

the Light that lighteth every man; it is that which the old

Hermetists knew as the Fair or the Beautiful--for Niam means beauty;

it is the Presence, and when it is upon a man every other tie breaks;

he goes alone with It, he is a dying regret, an ever-increasing joy.

And so with Oisin, whose weeping companions behold him no more.

He mounts the white horse with Niam. It is the same as the white

horse of the Apocalypse, whereon one sits called Faithful and True.

It is the power on which the Spirit rides. Who is there, thinking,

has felt freed for a moment from his prison-house, and looking

forth has been blinded by the foam of great seas, or has felt his

imagination grow kingly in contemplation--he has known its impelling

power; the white horse is impatient of restraint.

As they pass over the waters "they saw many wonderful things on

their journey--islands and cities, lime-white mansions, bright

greenans and lofty palaces." It is the mirror of heaven and earth,

the astral light, in whose glass a myriad illusions arise and fleet

before the mystic adventures. Haunt of a false beauty--or rather

a veil hung dazzling before the true beauty, only the odour or

incense of her breath is blown through these alluring forms. The

transition from this to a subtler sphere is indicated. A hornless

deer, chased by a white hound with red ears, and a maiden tossing

a golden lure, vanishes for ever before a phantom lover. The poet

whose imagination has renewed for us the legend has caught the true

significance of these hurrying forms:

"The immortal desire of immortals we saw in their eyes and sighed."