THE COMMUNICATION.
A striking feature for us was the exquisite tenderness and poetic
delicacy, both in matter and manner, which characterised all that we
received. Nor was there the intrusion of anything to suggest feelings
such as are described by Daniel when he says, "I saw this great vision,
and there remained no strength in me, neither was there breath left in
me." And not only was the element of terror so completely absent as to
make us feel as if we had entered on the dispensation of that "perfect
love which casteth out fear," but there was occasionally an element of
playfulness, and this on the part of our chiefest illuminators, the Gods
themselves. While their instructions were replete with every graceful
and delicate adornment such as could not but delight the poet and the
artist, and this without abatement of profundity or solemnity. By these
things it was intimated to us that the religion of the future was indeed
to be one of sweetness and light, and for the severe and gloomy spirit
of the Semite would be substituted the bright and joyous spirit of the
Greek. All this, we learnt, was because the new dispensation was to be
that of the "Woman," and in accord therefore with woman's nature and
sentiments. It was moreover to be introduced by means of the Woman's
faculty, the Intuition, and this as subsisting in _a_ woman.
The following exquisite little apologue, which was given us in the early
days of our novitiate, is an instance in point:--
A blind man once lost himself in a forest. An angel took pity on
him, and led him into an open place. As he went he received his
sight. Then he saw the angel, and said to him, "Brother, what doest
thou here? Suffer me to go before thee, for I am thine elder." So
the man went first, taking the lead. But the angel spread his wings
and returned to heaven. And darkness fell again upon him to whom
sight had been given.
Here was a parable which, slight as it seemed, was truly Biblical for
the depth and manifoldness of its signification. For while it applied to
ourselves both separately and jointly, and to our work, it was also an
eternal verity applicable alike to the individual, the collective, and
the universal. For as the angel was to the man, so is the intuition to
the intellect, which of itself cannot transcend the sense-nature, but
remains blind and dark and lost in the wilderness of illusion. And as
she, my colleague, had supplemented me, so were we each to supplement in
ourselves intellect by intuition, in order to become capable of
knowledge and understanding. It was, moreover, a parable of the Fall and
of the Redemption, an epitome in short of man's spiritual history. And
it had been spelt out for us by the tilting of a table in one of our
earliest essays in spiritualism! So carefully guarded and daintily
taught were we from the outset.
The charming allegory of "The Wonderful Spectacles" which was given in
London on the 31st January, 1877, to my colleague in sleep, was not only
an instruction concerning the nature of her faculty and its
indispensableness as an adjunct to mine for the work assigned to us; it
was also a prophetic intimation of the character of that work, and of
the nature of the influences controlling it, which at the time was
altogether unsuspected by us. This is the account which she sent to me
by letter, for we were not then together:--
I dreamt that I was walking alone on the sea-shore. The day was
singularly clear and sunny. Inland lay the most beautiful landscape
ever seen; and far off were ranges of tall hills, the highest peaks
of which were white with glistening snow. Along the sands by the
sea towards me came a man accoutred as a postman. He gave me a
letter. It was from you. It ran thus:--
"I have got hold of the rarest and most precious book extant. It
was written before the world began. The text is easy enough to
read; but the notes, which are very copious and numerous, are in
such very minute and obscure characters that I cannot make them
out. I want you to get for me the spectacles which Swedenborg used
to wear; not the smaller pair--those he gave to Hans Christian
Andersen--but the large pair, and these seem to have got mislaid. I
think they are Spinoza's make. You know he was an optical-glass
maker by profession, and the best we have ever had. See if you can
get them for me"[29].
When I looked up after reading this letter, I saw the postman
hastening away across the sands, and I called out to him, "Stop!
how am I to send the answer? Won't you wait for me?"
He looked round, stopped, and came back to me.
"I have the answer here," he said, tapping his letter bag, "and I
shall deliver it immediately."
"How can you have the answer before I have written it?" said I.
"You are making a mistake."
"No," said he, "In the city from which I come, the replies are all
written at the office and sent out with the letters themselves.
Your reply is in my bag."
"Let me see it," I said. He took another letter from his wallet and
gave it to me. I opened it, and read, in my own handwriting, this
answer, addressed to you:--
"The spectacles you want can be bought in London. But you will not
be able to use them at once, for they have not been worn for many
years, and they want cleaning sadly. This you will not be able to
do yourself in London, because it is too dark there to see, and
because your fingers are not small enough to clean them properly.
Bring them here to me, and I will do it for you."
I gave this letter back to the postman. He smiled and nodded at me;
and I saw then to my astonishment that he wore a camel's-hair tunic
round his waist. I had been on the point of addressing him--I know
not why--as _Hermes_. But I now saw that it was John the Baptist;
and in my fright at having spoken with so great a saint, I awoke.
This was the second suggestion of a Greek element in our work, the first
having been the slight allusion to Phoibos Apollo in the illumination
concerning the Marriage in Cana of Galilee[30]. The signification of the
connection between Hermes and John the Baptist remained unintelligible
to us until the key to it was given us in a revelation of the method of
the Bible-writers explaining their practice of representing principles
as persons. We then found that by the baptism or purification, physical
and mental, practised by John, was meant the course of life and thought
whereby alone man develops the faculty of the understanding of spiritual
things. And Hermes is the Greco-Egyptian name for the "second of the
Gods," called by Isaiah the Spirit of Understanding. Hence the adoption
of this name by the formulators of the Hermetic, or sacred books of
Egypt; and the favourite motto of the Hermetists:--
"Est in Mercurio quicquid quoerunt sapientes,"
All is in the understanding that the wise seek,--Mercury being the Latin
equivalent for Hermes.
The mention of Swedenborg and Andersen implied their possession of the
faculty indispensable to our work, that of mystical insight, of which
they were the most notable recent representatives.
A larger part was played by Hermes in another instruction received a few
months later[31]. This was also given in sleep, the vision taking the
form of a "Banquet of the Gods" in which the seeress received the
following exhortation from him, in enforcement of the necessity of pure
and natural habits of life for the perfectionment of the faculties
requisite for full spiritual perception, when, having put into her hands
a branch of a fig-tree bearing upon it ripe fruit, he said:--
"If you would be perfect, and able to know and to do all things,
quit the heresy of Prometheus. Let fire warm and comfort you
externally: it is heaven's gift. But do not wrest it from its
rightful purpose, as did that betrayer of your race, to fill the
veins of humanity with its contagion, and to consume your interior
being with its breath. All of you are men of clay, as was the
image which Prometheus made. Ye are nourished with stolen fire, and
it consumes you. Of all the evil uses of heaven's good gifts, none
is so evil as the internal use of fire. For your hot foods and
drinks have consumed and dried up the magnetic power of your
nerves, sealed your senses, and cut short your lives. Now, you
neither see nor hear; for the fire in your organs consumes your
senses. Ye are all blind and deaf, creatures of clay. We have sent
you a book to read. Practise its precepts, and your senses shall be
opened."
Then, not recognising him, I said, "Tell me your name, Lord." At
this he laughed and answered, "I have been about you from the
beginning. I am the white cloud on the noon-day sky." "Do you,
then," I asked, "desire the whole world to abandon the use of fire
in preparing food and drink?"
Instead of answering my question, he said, "We show you the
excellent way. Two places only are vacant at our table. We have
told you all that can be shown you on the level on which you stand.
But our perfect gifts, the fruits of the Tree of Life, are beyond
your reach now. We cannot give them to you until you are purified
and have come up higher. The conditions are GOD'S; the will is with
you"[32].
The allusion to Prometheus, and the fact that Hermes had been
represented in the Greek tragedy of that name as the executor of the
vengeance of the Gods upon Prometheus, as well also as the significance
of the fig-branch and the fact of its being the symbol of Hermes as the
Spirit of Understanding,--all these things were beyond her knowledge at
the time, some of them indeed having been long lost. But all were made
clear as our education for our work proceeded, and we learnt the
intention and recognised the necessity of restoring the Greek
presentment of the Sacred Mysteries in explanation of the Hebrew, and in
correction of the ecclesiastical presentment of Christianity. The
restoration was to be twofold, of faculty and of knowledge, the
knowledge to be recovered through the faculty by which it was originally
obtained. Hence the insistance on our adoption of the pure regimen of
the Seers of all time. Hence, too, the presentation to her by Hermes of
the fig-branch bearing ripe fruit. The parable of the cursing of the
barren fig-tree was explained to us as denoting the loss by the church
of the inward understanding, the Intuition. In the Seeress it was
restored; she was the appointed representative of it. The "time of the
end" was at hand, of the approach of which the budding of the fig-tree
was to be the sign. And here it was not merely budding and blossoming,
but bearing mature fruit to signify that in her the faculty was restored
in its perfection.
In an instruction subsequently given to me by her Genius, he said of
her, "I have fashioned a perfect instrument," implying that the process
of her preparation under his tuition had extended over numerous lives.
And again, "The Gods have given to their own a perfect ear."
Being desirous once to test the powers of a medium to whom she was
totally unknown even by name, she asked his controlling spirit about
herself and her faculty. "You are not a trance-medium at all!" the
spirit exclaimed in reply. "My medium is a trance-medium. You are far
beyond that. You are a spiritual lens. You are a mirror in which the
highest spirits--the Gods--can reflect their faces. You take the light
of the whole universe and divide it so that it can be understood, as it
has never been understood yet. Your gift is very extraordinary. You are
a glass to reflect the highest and the greatest to the world." This was
in 1877, before she was known in connection with the spiritual movement
of the age.
The description given of himself by Hermes as "the white cloud in the
noon-day sky," proved to be a quotation from an ancient ritual,
subsequently recovered by her, in which the "Hymn to Hermes"[33] opens
thus:--
As a moving light between heaven and earth: as a white cloud
assuming many shapes;
He descends and rises: he guides and illumines; he transmutes
himself from small to great, from bright to shadowy, from the
opaque image to the diaphanous mist.
Star of the East, conducting the Magi; cloud from whose midst the
holy voice speaketh; by day a pillar of vapour, by night a shining
flame.
All these are symbolic expressions for the Understanding, especially in
respect of divine things, so that Hermes is no individual soul or
spirit, but the divine spirit Itself operating as the second of the
Creative Elohim, and as a function therefore of man's own spirit when
duly unfolded and purified, in token whereof it is said in the recovered
hymn[34] to the Planet-God Iacchos--
Within thee, O Man, is the Universe; the thrones of all the Gods
are in thy temple....
And the Spirits which speak unto thee are of thine own kingdom.
In the hymn of invocation summoning the Seeress to her mission in the
name of the two first of the "Holy Seven," the Spirits of Wisdom and
Understanding, both of whom were wont to manifest themselves to her,
Hermes is referred to as "the God who knows"; the other being
personified as Pallas Athena. "In the Celestial," we were informed, "all
things are Persons."
"Wake, prophet-soul, the time draws near,
'The God who knows' within thee stirs
And speaks, for His thou art, and Hers
Who bears the mystic shield and spear.
A touch divine shall thrill thy brain,
Thy soul shall leap to life, and lo!
What she has known, again shall know,
What she has seen, shall see again.
The ancient past through which she came...."[35]
As the Spirit of Understanding, the name of Hermes signifies both Rock
and Interpreter. Hence the significance of the saying of Jesus, "Thou
art the Rock, and upon this Rock I will build My Church," which He
addressed not to the man Peter, but to the Spirit of Understanding whom
He discerned as the prompter of Peter's confession of faith. By this
Jesus implied that the only true and infallible church is that which is
founded on the Understanding, and not on authority whether of book,
tradition or institution. The utterance of Jesus was a citation from the
proem to the hymn to Hermes[36] recovered by us:--
"He is as a rock between earth and heaven, and the Lord God shall
build His Church thereon.
As a city upon a mountain of stone, whose windows look forth on
either side."
As our education proceeded we found indubitably that in excluding from
its curriculum the whole range of the knowledges represented by the term
"Hermetic," Ecclesiasticism has ignored the chief source of information
concerning the Christian _origines_. Doing which it has incurred the
reproach uttered by Jesus against those who took away the key of
knowledge, neither entering in themselves, nor suffering others to enter
in. And it was to restore this Gnosis, suppressed by the priests, that
the new revelation was promised, with the reception of which we found
ourselves charged, the prophecies pointing to a restoration both of
faculty and of knowledge.
Besides the Fig-branch of Hermes, there is another symbol of the
intuitional understanding which was disclosed to us as having special
and peculiar relation to the work set us. This symbol is Woman herself.
She had already, in the instruction concerning the marriage in Cana[37],
been shown to us as the inspirer and prompter. She was now shown to us
as the interpreter. The reason why the fig-tree was the emblem of the
inward understanding will be found in the citation presently to be
given; which is a portion of an instruction received in interpretation
of the prophecy of Daniel, re-enunciated by Jesus, concerning the
recognition of the "abomination of desolation standing in the holy
place"[38], as making and marking the time of the end of that generation
which, for its materialisation of spiritual things, was called by Him an
"adulterous," meaning an idolatrous, generation. It will be seen that in
the Scripture symbology, as the soul is the feminine principle in man's
spiritual system, and is called therefore the "Woman," the spirit being
the masculine principle; so in man's mental system the intuition as the
feminine mode of the mind is called the "Woman," and the intellect, as
the masculine mode, the "Man." The following is the citation in
question:--
Behold the FIG-TREE, and learn her parable. When the branch thereof
shall become tender, and her buds appear, know that the day of God
is upon you."
Wherefore, then, saith the Lord that the budding of the Fig-Tree
shall foretell the end?
Because the Fig-Tree is the symbol of the Divine Woman, as the Vine
of the Divine Man.
The Fig is the similitude of the Matrix, containing inward buds,
bearing blossoms on its placenta, and bringing forth fruit in
darkness. It is the Cup of Life, and its flesh is the seed-ground
of new births.
The stems of the Fig-Tree run with milk: her leaves are as human
hands, like the leaves of her brother the Vine.
And when the Fig-Tree shall bear figs, then shall be the Second
Advent, the new sign of the Man bearing Water, and the
manifestation of the Virgin-Mother crowned.
For when the Lord would enter the holy city, to celebrate His Last
Supper with His disciples, He sent before Him the Fisherman Peter
to meet the Man of the Coming Sign.
"There shall meet you a Man bearing a pitcher of Water."
Because, as the Lord was first manifest at a wine-feast in the
morning, so must He consummate His work at a wine-feast in the
evening.
It is His Pass-Over; for thereafter the Sun must pass into a new
Sign.
After the Fish, the Water-Carrier; but the Lamb of God remains
always in the place of victory, being slain from the foundation of
the world.
For His place is the place of the Sun's triumph.
After the Vine the Fig; for Adam is first formed, then Eve.
And because our Lady is not yet manifest, our Lord is crucified.
Therefore came He vainly seeking fruit upon the Fig-Tree, "for the
time of figs was not yet."
And from that day forth, because of the curse of Eve, no man has
eaten fruit of the Fig-Tree.
For the inward understanding has withered away, there is no
discernment any more in men. They have crucified the Lord because
of their ignorance, not knowing what they did.
Wherefore, indeed, said our Lord to our Lady:--"Woman, what is
between me and thee? For even _my_ hour is not yet come."
Because until the hour of the Man is accomplished and fulfilled,
the hour of the Woman must be deferred.
Jesus is the Vine; Mary is the Fig-Tree. And the vintage must be
completed and the wine trodden out, or ever the harvest of the Figs
be gathered.
But when the hour of our Lord is achieved; hanging on His Cross, He
gives our Lady to the faithful.
The chalice is drained, the lees are wrung out: then says He to His
Elect:--"Behold thy Mother!"
But so long as the grapes remain unplucked, the Vine has nought to
do with the Fig-Tree, nor Jesus with Mary.
He is first revealed, for He is the Word; afterwards shall come the
hour of its Interpretation.
And in that day every man shall sit under the VINE and the
FIG-TREE; the Dayspring shall arise in the Orient, and the Fig-Tree
shall bear her fruit.
For, from the beginning, the Fig-leaf covered the shame of
Incarnation, because the riddle of existence can be expounded only
by him who has the Woman's secret. It is the riddle of the Sphinx.
Look for that Tree which alone of all Trees bears a fruit
blossoming interiorly, in concealment, and thou shalt discover the
Fig.
Look for the sufficient meaning of the manifest universe and of the
written Word, and thou shalt find only their mystical sense.
Cover the nakedness of Matter and of Nature with the Fig-leaf, and
thou hast hidden all their shame. For the Fig is the Interpreter.
So when the hour of Interpretation comes, and the Fig-Tree puts
forth her buds, know that the time of the End and the dawning of
the new Day are at hand,--"even at the doors."
On handing me the first portion of the instruction of which the
foregoing is the conclusion, "Mary"--to use the name which meanwhile had
been bestowed on her by our Illuminators in token of her office as
representative of the Soul and Intuition--confessed to some perplexity.
Her usual Illuminator for revelations of this order was Hermes, whose
Hebrew equivalent is Raphael. But on this occasion it had been a Hebrew
one, Gabriel. Her surprise and delight were great on being reminded that
Gabriel was Daniel's own inspirer in respect of the prophecy in
question, and that he had prophesied his return, saying, "Go thy way,
Daniel, for the words are closed up and sealed till the time of the
end.... Thou shalt rest and stand in thy lot at the end of the days."
The explanation given us was that both Daniel's own spirit and his
illuminating angel had come to her, the former serving as the vehicle of
the latter. As with all our other results similarly obtained, we judged
it entirely by its own intrinsic merits, and not by its alleged
derivation. We knew too well the propensity of low influences to
appropriate to themselves great and even divine names, and the liability
of the recipients to be deceived and to make the names the criterion
instead of the communication itself. But in no instance did it happen to
us that we had any cause to distrust the genuineness either of messenger
or of message, even when both claimed to be divine.
* * * * *
The difference between the two interpretations or applications given us
of the incident at the "Marriage in Cana of Galilee," was explained to
us as an instance of the manifoldness of the sense of Scripture. The
parables have a separate meaning for each of the four planes of
existence[39].
We wondered much whether there were any parallels in history to our work
and to the manner of it; and especially as to how far an association
such as ours coincided with the ideas of the Hebrews. It was true that
they had both prophets and prophetesses, but did they work like us in
supplement and complement of each other? As regarded the recovery of
knowledge acquired in a previous life, Ezra also had ascribed his
recovery of the long lost Law to intuitional recollection occurring
under special illumination, saying, "The Spirit strengthened my memory."
But no mention is made of a female coadjutor. Nor does it appear that
the Vestal Virgins were similarly supplemented, except to be thrown into
the magnetic trance-state. In her zeal for her sex and her corresponding
distrust of men--sentiments which seemed to be inborn in her--"Mary" was
disposed to think that most of the prophesying of old had been done by
women, but that the credit had been appropriated by men. The answer to
these questionings was of a kind altogether unexpected by us, both as
regarded its manner and its matter. For neither of us had the smallest
suspicion that the book referred to was capable of the interpretation
given us of it. This was the book of Esther. The incident was as
follows:--
The occasion was an Easter Sunday[40], and we were at Paris. Electing
to remain indoors rather than encounter the crowds of holiday makers,
"Mary" was moved during the afternoon to sit for some communication by
joint writing. But we were no sooner seated than it was written,--
"Do you, Caro[41], take a pencil and write, and let her look
inwards, and we will dictate slowly."
"Mary" then became entranced, and delivered orally, repeating it slowly,
without break or pause, after a voice heard interiorly, the following
exposition of the book of Esther, an exposition entirely novel, as I
have said, to us, and, we believed, to the world. Some divines have
called the book a romance, but none have discovered that it is a
prophecy in the form of a parable. Luther, indeed, pronounced both it
and the Apocalypse to be so worthless that their destruction would be no
loss.
The most important book in the Bible for you to study now, and that most
nearly about to be fulfilled, is one of the most mystic books in the Old
Testament, the book of Esther.
This book is a mystic prophecy, written in the form of an actual
history. If I give you the key, the clue of the thread of it, it will be
the easiest thing in the world to unravel the whole.
The great King Assuerus, who had all the world under his dominion,
and possessed the wealth of all the nations, is the genius of the
age.
Queen Vasthi, who for her disobedience to the king was deposed from
her royal seat, is the orthodox Catholic Church.
The Jews, scattered among the nations under the dominion of the
king, are the true Israel of God.
Mardochi the Jew represents the spirit of intuitive reason and
understanding.
His enemy Aman is the spirit of materialism, taken into the favour
and protection of the genius of the age, and exalted to the highest
place in the world's councils after the deposition of the orthodox
religion.
Now Aman has a wife and ten sons.
Esther--who, under the care and tuition of Mardochi, is brought up
pure and virgin--is that spirit of love and sympathetic
interpretation which shall redeem the world.
I have told you that it shall be redeemed by a "woman."
Now the several philosophical systems by which the councillors of
the age propose to replace the dethroned Church, are one by one
submitted to the judgment of the age; and Esther, coming last,
shall find favour.
Six years shall she be anointed with oil of myrrh, that is, with
study and training severe and bitter, that she may be proficient in
intellectual knowledge, as must all systems which seek the favour
of the age.
And six years with sweet perfumes, that is with the gracious
loveliness of the imagery and poetry of the faiths of the past,
that religion may not be lacking in sweetness and beauty.
But she shall not seek to put on any of those adornments of dogma,
or of mere sense, which, by trick of priestcraft, former systems
have used to gain power or favour with the world and the age, and
for which they have been found wanting.
Now there come out of the darkness and the storm which shall arise
upon the earth, two dragons[42].
And they fight and tear each other, until there arises a star, a
fountain of light, a queen, who is Esther[43].
I have given you the key. Unlock the meaning of all that is
written.
I do not tell you if in the history of the past these voices had
part in the world of men.
If they had, guess now who were Mardochi and Esther.
But I tell you that which shall be in the days about to come[44].
On consulting the Bible-dictionary, we found this relation between
Esther and Easter. The feast of Purim, which was instituted in token of
the deliverance wrought through Esther, coincides in date with Easter.
And it was on Easter day that this was given us, by way of enhancing the
correspondence between the parts assigned to us and those of Mordecai
and Esther. Later it was shown us that the parts assigned to Joseph and
Mary were, in one aspect, also identical with those of Mordecai and
Esther. This is the aspect in which Joseph represents the mind, and Mary
the soul in the regenerated human system.
Besides "Hermes," "Mary" received much of her illumination from her
"Genius," her relations with whom far surpassed not only my relations
with mine, but any that are recorded in history, the experiences of
Socrates, the chief instance on record, being insignificant both in
quantity and in quality as compared with hers. It is important,
therefore, to give an account of the nature and office of this order of
angels, which shall be rendered in his own words.
Every man is a planet, having sun, moon, and stars. The Genius of a
man is his satellite; God--the God of the man--is his sun, and the
moon of this planet is Isis, its initiator or Genius. The Genius is
made to minister to the man, and to give him light. But the light
he gives is from God, and not of himself. He is not a planet but a
moon, and his function is to light up the dark places of his
planet.
The day and night of the microcosm, man, are its positive and
passive, or protective and reflective states. In the projective
state we seek actively outwards; we aspire and will forcibly; we
hold active communion with the God without. In the reflective state
we look inwards; we commune with our own heart; we indraw and
concentrate ourselves secretly and interiorly. During this
condition the "Moon" enlightens our hidden chamber with her torch,
and shows us ourselves in our interior recess.
Who or what, then, is this moon? It is part of ourselves and
revolves with us. It is our celestial affinity,--of whose order it
is said--as by Jesus--"Their angels do always behold the face of My
Father."
Every human soul has a celestial affinity, which is part of his
system and a type of his spiritual nature. This angelic counterpart
is the bond of union between the man and God; and it is in virtue
of his spiritual nature that this angel is attached to him....
It is in virtue of man's being a planet that he has a moon. If he
were not fourfold, as is the planet, he could not have one.
Rudimentary men are not fourfold, they have not the Spirit.
The Genius is the moon to the planet man, reflecting to him the
Sun, or God, within him. For the Divine Spirit which animates and
eternises the man, is the God of the man, the Sun that enlightens
him.... And because the Genius reflects, not the planet, but the
Sun, not the man (as do the astrals), but the God, his light is
always to be trusted....
The memory of the soul is recovered by a threefold operation--that
of the Soul herself, of the Moon, and of the Sun. The Genius is not
an informing spirit. He can tell nothing to the soul. All that she
receives is already within herself. But in the darkness of the
night, it would remain there undiscovered, but for the torch of the
angel who enlightens. "Yea," says the angel Genius to his client,
"I illuminate thee, but I instruct thee not. I warn thee, but I
fight not. I attend, but I lead not. Thy treasure is within
thyself. My light showeth where it lieth."...
The voice of the Genius is the voice of God; for God speaks through
him as a man through the horn of a trumpet. Thou mayest not adore
him, for he is the instrument of God, and thy minister. But thou
must obey him, for he hath no voice of his own, but sheweth thee
the will of the Spirit.
We noted that the inspiring angel of the Apocalypse had twice similarly
spoken when the seer was about to worship him;--"See thou do it not; for
I am thy fellow-servant, and of thy brethren the prophets, and of them
which keep the sayings of this book: Worship God."
The like positive injunctions were given us also against according
divine honours to Jesus.
Besides Socrates, there is another notable historical "Spiritualist" of
whom our experiences vividly reminded us. This was Joan of Arc. The
correspondence between her and "Mary," in gifts, experiences, and
personal characteristics, was of the closest. We had no difficulty in
believing her history. Each of them, moreover, had a mission of
deliverance, the one political and national, the other spiritual and
universal.
Although we had learned to trust our Illuminators implicitly long before
the receipt of the above instruction, we were still without assurance as
to the source and method of the revelation. Be the knowledges received
by us as new as they might to our external selves, they never failed to
be familiar as recovered memories, excepting in such cases as they were
couched in terms of which the sense, being mystical, was not at once
recognised. But such difficulties were soon overcome, and the doctrine,
when fully apprehended, was always to us as necessary and self-evident
truth, and such as to excite wonder at the potency of the glamour which
had hitherto withheld it from the world's recognition. In every detail,
the revelation represented for us Common-Sense in its loftiest mode. For
the agreement it represented was not that of all men merely, but that of
all parts of Man: of mind, soul and spirit, intellect and intuition, and
these purified and unfolded to the utmost, and perfectly equilibrated.
Whatever the manner of its communication, whether heard by the interior
ear, seen by the interior eye, flashed on the mind as vivid ideas,
whether acquired waking or sleeping, or in the intermediate state of
trance-lucidity, or given in writing, it always seemed that we knew it
before, and did not require to be told it, but only to be reminded of
it.
The problem specially exercised myself. "Mary" had other work than the
analysis of our spiritual experiences. That was my special function. I
learnt to see in her a soul of surpassing luminousness and variousness,
who had been entrusted to my charge expressly in order that by my study
of her I might recover for the world's benefit the long-lost knowledge
of the soul's being, nature, and history. And so many and various were
her spiritual states, that she seemed to me to represent in turn every
stage of the soul's evolution, and to be "not one, but all mankind's
epitome."
This also used to occur so frequently as to be observed by both of us
and discussed between us. When in the process of my endeavour to find
the solution of some problem, such as the meaning of a parabolic or
otherwise obscure passage in Scripture, I had exhausted my stock of
tentative hypotheses, but, through consideration for her other and
engrossing work, refrained from imparting my need to her, she would
receive in sleep the desired solution, which she wrote down on waking,
and which invariably proved satisfactory beyond my highest imaginings.
And besides showing intimate acquaintance with the course of my thought,
it was couched in language which, for simplicity, dignity, purity, and
lucidity, was without an equal in literature; the English being that of
the best period of our literature, and better than the best even of that
period. She herself had a remarkable mastery of English, but these
compositions reduced her to despair, causing her to exclaim, "Why cannot
I write as well when I am awake as I do in my sleep!" Of course the
explanation lay in the limiting influence of the physical organism.
The frequency of this occurrence led me, in the absence of authoritative
explanation, to try the following, as an hypothesis purely tentative.
The revelations generally came to her when, through my inability to
find the interpretations which satisfied me, my work required them, and
they came independently of any desire or knowledge on her part. Might it
not be, then, that it was my own spirit who knew them and gave them to
her, finding her more sensitive to impression than myself? The
explanation was not one that either pleased or satisfied me, one reason
being that I took a delight in recognising the primacy accorded to her.
The idea occurred to me one night, and I pondered it the next day, but
did not divulge it. What happened on the evening of that day led me to
suspect that our Genii had suggested it to me in order to make it the
occasion of imparting to me the knowledge in question, namely, that of
the real source and method of the revelation.
For the experience to be properly appreciated it must be remembered that
"Mary" had no knowledge of the explanation suggested to me, and neither
of us had as yet entertained the idea of past lives as the key to our
present work. The question of Reincarnation itself had not come before
us, and far less the possibility of recovering the memory of the things
learnt in previous existences, much as we had been puzzled to account
for our experiences in the absence of some such explanation.
The proposal to sit for a written communication came from her, having
evidently been prompted by our illuminators. The method was one which
both they and we disliked, and it was adopted only when they desired to
address us both at once. So we sat for writing.
The result confirmed my surmise. We had scarcely seated ourselves when
the writing began, as if we were being waited for. And this is what was
written:--
"We are instructed to say several things to-night. We are your
Genii.
"(To CARO.) In the first place, you entirely misconceive the
process by which the Revelation comes to Mary. The method of this
revelation is entirely interior. Mary is not a Medium; nor is she
even a Seer as you understand the word. She is a Prophet. By this
we mean that all she has ever written or will write, is from
within, and not from without. She knows. She is not told. Hers is
an old, old spirit. She is older than you are, Caro, older by many
thousand years. Do not think that spirits other than her own are to
be credited with the authorship of the new Gospel. As a proof of
this, and to correct the false impression you have on the subject,
the holy and inner truth, of which she is the depositary, will not
in future be given to her by the former method. All she writes
henceforth, she will write consciously. Yes, she must finish the
new Evangel by conscious effort of brain and will."
Coming from a source which we had learnt to trust implicitly, and
according with our own highest conceptions, this message was supremely
satisfactory, and was welcomed accordingly. But it was followed
forthwith by another which excited feelings of a very different
character. For, as if expressly in order to prevent her from being made
vain-glorious and uplifted by it, they added--
"(To MARY.) It may serve to exhibit the path by which you have
come, and to suggest the nature of some ancient tendencies which
may yet tarnish the mirror of a soul destined to attain perfection,
to learn that you dwelt within the body of ----."
Here were given the name and character of a certain Roman dame of some
seventeen centuries ago, one of high station, but of a repute so evil as
to cause an immense shock to both of us. It does not come within the
design of this book to disclose the particular personalities with whom
we had been identified in the past[45]. Concerning this one it must
suffice to state here that, omitting from account one whole side of
"Mary's" character, we both recognised in the other side traits strongly
resembling those which had been indicated. And she subsequently
recovered distinct recollections of scenes in the life in question which
served to assure her on the point. Our discussions on the matter tended
to conclusions of which fuller knowledge brought the verification. It
was not one of those lives in virtue of which she was directly qualified
for her present work; but it was one of those lives of which the sin and
the suffering may well be conceived of as indispensable elements in the
education of a soul called to a lofty work and destiny in the future, in
accordance with the principle which finds expression in the sayings,
"The greater the sinner the greater the saint," and "_Pecca Fortiter_."
This also we discerned clearly, that, supposing it to be indeed a truth
that man is "made perfect through suffering," the experiences in the
course of which the suffering is undergone must imply sin as well as
pain and sorrow; since otherwise there would be a whole region of his
nature, namely the moral, in which he would remain unvitalised. The
lesson of which is that a man is alive only so far as he has lived.
There was yet another reflection that was prompted by the occasion in
question, and one which crowned and glorified the rest. This was the
assurance implied that none need despair. If the soul which had dwelt in
the body of the person named, could nevertheless become within
measureable time what "Mary" was now, and be "destined to attain
perfection," there is hope for all, and the doctrine of Reincarnation is
indeed a gospel of salvation. And herein we discerned a lesson hitherto
unsuspected so far as we were aware, in the parable of the Prodigal Son.
It is not the "elder brother" who stays at home that can best appreciate
the divine order; but the prodigal who has gone forth into the world of
experience to acquire knowledge for himself at first hand. They who have
been the most fully satiated with the husks of materiality, can--when
their time arrives for coming to their true selves--best estimate the
fare provided in the "Father's House." "He loveth most to whom most has
been forgiven.
While sitting alone one day and pondering these things, and particularly
the difficulty which people often find in correcting in themselves even
the faults which they deplore, this pregnant sentence was spoken audibly
to my inner hearing by a voice which I recognised as that of my
Genius:--"Tendencies encouraged for ages cannot be cured in a single
lifetime, but may require ages."
This further reflection also was suggested to me: that souls of
exceptional strength are reincarnated in bodies of exceptionally strong
passional natures, expressly in order to obtain the discipline which
comes of the effort to subdue them. All of which reflections tended to
exhibit the rashness of judging outward judgment in respect of others.
In order to judge righteous judgment it is necessary to know the
strength of their temptations, and of their efforts to resist them. And
these can be known only to God. The attainment of perfection, and
therein of salvation by conquest and not by flight,--this is the
principle of reincarnation. It is the _condition_ of Regeneration, which
is _from out of_ the body.
In due time we were able to recognise the whole plan of our work as so
ordered as to make the work itself a demonstration of the doctrine of
reincarnation. When once this doctrine had become a practical question
for us, it assumed a prominent place both in our teachings and in our
experiences. One instruction given us was no less striking in itself
than in the circumstances of its communication. The messenger was one
with whom we had never anticipated coming into relations, for, besides
not courting intercourse with the souls of the departed, we had not paid
to the writings of the person concerned the heed that would entitle us
to count him among our cordial sympathisers; and still less as among our
possible visitants. This was the famous Swedish Seer, Emmanuel
Swedenborg. In the course of what we afterwards found to be a strikingly
characteristic communication from him, he informed us that owing to the
difficulty our angels had in approaching us just then, through the
condition of the spiritual atmosphere, they had charged him with a
message to us, in which "Mary's" Genius had spoken to him of her as "A
soul of vast experience, who under his tuition had so painfully
acquired the evangel of which she was the depositary"; adding that he,
her Genius, "had been promised help to recover for her, in this
incarnation, the memory of all that was in the past"; and--which was the
point of the message--that it was to be put forward, not as we were then
contemplating putting it forward, but "as fragmentary specimens of such
recollection occurring to one now a woman, but formerly an initiate, who
is beginning to recover this power."
It will be interesting to remark on this experience, that to this day
the followers of Swedenborg set their faces against the doctrine of
reincarnation, expressly on the ground that their master denied it in
his lifetime. Whether Swedenborg really denied it is uncertain. There is
grave cause to doubt whether his writings on the subject have been
rightly understood or fairly represented. It has been maintained with
much show of reason that Swedenborg denied only the reincarnation of the
astral soul, not of the true soul; in which case he would be right.
Having once obtained access to us, his visits were for a time frequent,
the manner of them being various. For he came to us jointly and
separately, in waking and in sleeping--the latter to "Mary" only--and
audibly and visibly--the latter also to "Mary" only. He alluded to a
recent incarnation of mine, of which I have since had full and
independent proof. And he recognised our work as not only a confirmation
and continuation of his own, but also as a correction. For, as he gave
us to understand, he had been too much under the influence of the
current orthodoxy to be able to transmit the revelation given to him in
its proper purity, and unbiased by his own preconceptions. The doctrine
in respect of which he was chiefly desirous of being set right was that
of the Incarnation, the orthodox presentment of which he now saw to be
wrong, by reason of its deification of Jesus. In referring to the
perversion of the truth by the formulators of the Christian orthodoxy,
he said to us, with much emphasis, "Do not be too kind to the
Christians."
This allusion to an experience which belongs to the category of
"spiritualism" rather than to that of our special work, may with
advantage be followed by some account of our other experiences of the
same order, partly for the sake of testifying to the genuineness of the
experiences relied on by spiritualists, and partly in order to show the
distinction between the two orders of experience, as discerned by
persons whose familiarity with both qualified them to institute
comparison between them. For, having once become sensitised in the inner
and higher regions of the consciousness, we had become sensitised also
in the intermediate regions, and were able therefore to hold palpable
converse with the denizens of these also. And the converse thus held was
of the most satisfactory character, on the ground both of the certainty
of its reality and its intrinsic nature. Father, mother, wife, brothers,
sundry dear friends, and others interested in our work, all came to me,
and some of them to my colleague, and this several times, and in a
manner impossible to be distrusted. For my mother more than once spoke
to me aloud in her own unmistakeable voice, and in tones that anyone
might have heard, as I sat alone in my study. My wife came repeatedly to
both of us, jointly and separately, audibly, visibly, and tangibly;
giving us timely warnings of dangers unsuspected by us but proving to be
real. And one of my brothers cleared up a mystery which had hung over
his death. No mere attenuated wraiths or soulless phantoms were they who
thus visited us from "beyond the veil," they were strong, distinct,
intelligent individualities, veritable souls, palpitating with vitality,
and eager to render loving service. But they came spontaneously and
unevoked, for we never sought to compel their presence. Our quest was
purely and simply for truth, not for persons. But we considered that,
when these also came, as they did come, to ourselves directly and
without intervention of any third party, to refuse to receive them on
the ground that they had put off their bodies, would be equivalent to
repulsing our friends in the flesh on the ground that they had put off
their overcoats.
The spirit in which alone such intercourse is permissible will be seen
by the following citations from the instructions received by us. Terms
from the Hebrew, Greek, and Oriental Scriptures were used indifferently
by our illuminators. The word _Ruach_ in the following--which is Hebrew
for Spirit--is here used in a kabalistic sense to denote the astral soul
or ghost, as distinguished from the divine soul, the _Psyche_ or
_Neshamah_, and from the _Nephesh_ or mere phantom. The following is
from an instruction given to "Mary" in sleep, in direct solution of
certain perplexities.
"Thou knowest that in the end, when Nirvana is attained, the soul
shall gather up all that it hath left within the astral of holy
memories and worthy experience, and to this end the Ruach rises in
the astral sphere, by the gradual decay and loss of its more
material affinities, until these have so disintegrated and
perished that its substance is thereby lightened and purified. But
continual commerce and intercourse with earth add, as it were,
fresh fuel to its earthly affinities, keeping these alive, and
hindering its recall to its spiritual ego. Thus, therefore, the
spiritual ego itself is detained from perfect absorption into the
divine, and union therewith. For the Ruach shall not all die, if
there be in it anything worthy of recall. The astral sphere is its
purging chamber. For Saturn, who is Time, is the trier of all
things; he devoureth all the dross; only that escapeth which in its
nature is ethereal and destined to reign. And this death of the
Ruach is gradual and natural. It is a process of elimination and
disintegration, often--as men measure time--extending over many
decades, or even centuries. And those Ruachs which appertain to
wicked and evil persons, having strong wills inclined
earthwards,--these persist longest and manifest most frequently and
vividly, because they _rise not_, but, being destined to perish
utterly, are not withdrawn from immediate contact with the earth.
They are all dross; there is in them no redeemable element. But the
Ruach of the righteous complaineth if thou disturb his evolution.
'Why callest thou me? disturb me not. The memories of my earth-life
are chains about my neck; the desire of the past detaineth me.
Suffer me to rise towards my rest, and hinder me not with
evocations. But let thy love go after me and encompass me; so shalt
thou rise with me through sphere after sphere.'
"For the good man upon earth can love nothing less than the divine.
Wherefore that which he loveth in his friend is the divine, that
is, the true and radiant self. And if he love it as differentiated
from God, it is only on account of its separate tincture. For in
the perfect light there are innumerable tinctures. And according to
its celestial affinity, one soul loveth this or that splendour more
than the rest. And when the righteous friend of the good man dieth,
the love of the living man goeth after the true soul of the dead;
and the strength and divinity of this love helpeth the purgation
of the astral soul, the psychic ghost. It is to this astral soul,
which ever remaineth near the living friend, an indication of the
way it must also go,--a light shining upon the upward path that
leads from the astral to the celestial and everlasting. For love,
being divine, is _towards_ the divine. 'Love exalteth, love
purifieth, love uplifteth.'"
And this also, which was similarly obtained, represents a further
restoration of the original, pure, undistorted and unmutilated doctrine
of Christianity concerning the communion of souls.
* * * * *
So weepest thou and lamentest, because the Soul thou lovest is
taken from thy sight.
And life seemeth to thee a bitter thing: yea, thou cursest the
destiny of all living creatures.
And thou deemest thy love of no avail, and thy tears as idle drops.
Behold, Love is a ransom, and the tears thereof are prayers.
And if thou have lived purely, thy fervent desire shall be counted
grace to the soul of thy dead.
For the burning and continual prayer of the just availeth much.
Yea, thy love shall enfold the soul which thou lovest: it shall be
unto him a wedding garment and a vesture of blessing.
The baptism of thy sorrow shall baptize thy dead, and he shall rise
because of it.
Thy prayers shall lift him up, and thy tears shall encompass his
steps: thy love shall be to him a light shining upon the upward
way.
And the angels of God shall say unto him, "O happy Soul, that art
so well-beloved; that art made so strong with all these tears and
sighs.
"Praise the Father of Spirits therefor: for this great love shall
save thee many incarnations.
"Thou art advanced thereby; thou art drawn aloft and carried upward
by cords of grace."
For in such wise do souls profit one another and have communion,
and receive and give blessing, the departed of the living, and the
living of the departed.
And so much the more as the heart within them is clean, and the way
of their intention is innocent in the sight of God....
Count not as lost thy suffering on behalf of other souls; for every
cry is a prayer, and all prayer is power.
That thou willest to do is done; thine intention is united to the
Will of Divine Love.
Nothing is lost of that which thou layest out for God and for thy
brother.
And it is love alone who redeemeth, and love hath nothing of her
own[46].
But precious as is the communion of souls when thus conditioned, it was
not to them that we looked for light and guidance in our work. Nor,
indeed, to any persons at all in the sense in which the term is
ordinarily used. We looked steadfastly and directly to the Highest,
confidently leaving to the Highest the appointment both of the Messenger
and of the Message, but never failing to submit both manner and matter
to the keenest scrutiny of faculties which we had striven to the utmost
to attune to divine things. We were, moreover, emphatically warned from
the outset against allowing any intrusion into our work of the
influences accessible to the ordinary sensitive, the two planes being
absolutely distinct. Herein lay the significance of the saying of
"Mary's" Genius, that he had been "promised help to enable her to
recover in this incarnation the memory of all that is in the past." The
Genii themselves, although of the celestial, belong to its
circumferential and lowest sphere. They touch the astral, but do not
enter it. The help spoken of was to come from the innermost and highest
spheres. And the charge was accordingly given us, "Do not, then, seek
after 'controls.' Keep your temple for the Lord God of Hosts; and turn
out of it the money-changers, the dove-sellers, and the dealers in
curious arts, yea, with a scourge of cords if need be."
The manner in which we received the first full and particular account
respecting the method of revelation, was as follows. I was pondering to
myself with much intentness the nature and source of inspiration, and
desiring a test whereby to distinguish between true and false
inspiration. But I refrained for various reasons from consulting my
colleague, at least until I should have exhausted my own resources. And
she was still without any intimation of my need when she received the
instruction concerning inspiration and prophesying of which the
following is a portion. It was received in sleep, and the date was
shortly before we were told that her knowledges were due to experiences
undergone in previous lives[47]. When I had read it she said, referring
to the first verse, "But I did not ask." In reply to which I told her
that I had asked. It was addressed equally to both of us, as making
together one system.
"I heard last night in my sleep a voice speaking to me, and
saying--
"You ask the method and nature of Inspiration, and the means
whereby God revealeth the Truth.
"Know that there is no enlightenment from without: the secret of
things is revealed from within.
"From without cometh no Divine Revelation: but the Spirit within
beareth witness.
"Think not that I tell you that which you know not: for except you
know it, it cannot be given to you.
"To him that hath it is given, and he hath the more abundantly.
"None is a prophet save he who knoweth: the instructor of the
people is a man of many lives.
"Inborn knowledge and the perception of things, these are the
sources of revelation: the Soul of the man instructeth him, having
already learned by experience.
"Intuition is inborn experience; that which the soul knoweth of old
and of former years.
"And Illumination is the Light of Wisdom, whereby a man perceiveth
heavenly secrets.
"Which Light is the Spirit of God within the man, showing unto him
the things of God.
"Do not think that I tell you anything you know not; all cometh
from within: the Spirit that informeth is the Spirit of God in the
prophet.
* * * * *
"Inspiration may indeed be mediumship, but it is conscious; and the
knowledge of the prophet instructeth him.
"Even though he speak in an ecstasy, he uttereth nothing that he
knoweth not."
Then followed this apostrophe to the Prophet:--
"Thou who art a prophet hast had many lives: yea, thou hast taught
many nations, and hast stood before kings.
And God hath instructed thee in the years that are past, and in the
former times of the earth.
By prayer, by fasting, by meditation, by painful seeking, hast thou
attained that thou knowest.
There is no knowledge but by labour: there is no intuition but by
experience.
I have seen thee on the hills of the East: I have followed thy
steps in the wilderness: I have seen thee adore at sunrise: I have
marked thy night watches in the caves of the mountains.
Thou hast attained with patience, O prophet! God hath revealed the
truth to thee from within."
Thus, for the first time known to history, was given a definition
of the nature and method of inspiration and prophecy, at once
luminous, reasonable, and inexpugnable, to the full and final
solution of this stupendous problem; and comporting with and
explaining, as it did, all our own experiences, we felt that we
could bear unreserved testimony to its truth. But, vast as was the
addition thus made to the New Gospel of Interpretation, it did not
exhaust the treasures revealed and communicated on that wondrous
night; for it was followed immediately by a prophecy of the meaning
of the new dispensation on which the world is entering, and of
which our work is the introduction. At once Biblical in diction and
character, it reached in loftiness the highest level of Biblical
prophecy and inspiration, demonstrating the same world celestial
and divine as the source of both. For which reason, and the
crushing blow administered by it to the superstitions which have
made of Christianity a by-word and a reproach by their gross
materialisations of mysteries purely spiritual, it is reproduced in
full here. The heading is of our own devising:--
A Prophecy of the Kingdom of the Soul, mystically called the Day of the
Woman.
"And now I show you a mystery and a new thing, which is part of the
mystery of the fourth day of creation.
The word which shall come to save the world, shall be uttered by a
woman.
A woman shall conceive, and shall bring forth the tidings of
salvation.
For the reign of Adam is at its last hour; and God shall crown all
things by the creation of Eve.
Hitherto the man hath been alone, and hath had dominion over the
earth.
But when the woman shall be created, God shall give unto her the
kingdom; and she shall be first in rule and highest in dignity.
Yea, the last shall be first, and the elder shall serve the
younger.
So that women shall no more lament for their womanhood; but men
shall rather say, "O that we had been born women!"
For the strong shall be put down from their seat, and the meek
shall be exalted to their place.
The days of the Covenant of Manifestation are passing away: the
Gospel of Interpretation cometh.
There shall nothing new be told; but that which is ancient shall be
interpreted.
So that man the manifesto shall resign his office: and woman the
interpreter shall give light to the world.
Hers is the fourth office: she revealeth that which the Lord hath
manifested.
Hers is the light of the heavens, and the brightest of the planets
of the holy seven.
She is the fourth dimension; the eyes which enlighten; the power
which draweth inward to God.
And her kingdom cometh; the day of the exaltation of woman.
And her reign shall be greater than the reign of the man: for Adam
shall be put down from his place; and she shall have dominion for
ever.
And she who is alone shall bring forth more children to God, then
she who hath an husband.
There shall no more be a reproach against women: but against men
shall be the reproach.
For the woman is the crown of man, and the final manifestation of
humanity.
She is the nearest to the throne of God, when she shall be
revealed.
But the creation of woman is not yet complete: but it shall be
complete in the time which is at hand.
All things are thine, O Mother of God: all things are thine, O Thou
who risest from the sea; and Thou shalt have dominion over all the
worlds[48].
FOOTNOTES:
[29] A.K. knew nothing of Spinoza at this time, and was unaware that he
was an optician. Subsequent experience made it clear that the spectacles
in question were intended to represent her own remarkable faculty of
intuitional and interpretative perception. (See Life A.K. Vol. I. pp.
150-1.) S.H.H.
[30] Page 525
[31] The 22nd September, 1877.
[32] The book referred to was a treatise entitled "Fruit and Bread,"
which had been sent to her anonymously the previous day. E.M.
[33] The "Hymn to Hermes" was received by A.K. in 1878, "under
illumination occurring in sleep." She remembered it so perfectly that on
waking she wrote it without hesitation or error. Representing knowledges
long lost, by no amount of mere scholarship could it have been
reproduced. It is given at length in the P.W. pp. 357-358, and in "The
Life of A.K." Vol. I. p. 287. S.H.H.
[34] As to the recovery by A.K. of the Hymn to the Planet-God, see p.
122-3.
[35] These dream-verses are from "Through the Ages," a poem received by
A.K., "in sleep," in 1880. In this poem, "some of her earliest
incarnations" are referred to. (D. and D-S. p. 77.) S.H.H.
[36] See p. 122 note.
[37] See pp. 51-52-53 ante.
[38] That is, in the place of God and the Soul.
[39] The four planes being, from without inwards, those of the body,
mind, soul, and spirit. S.H.H.
[40] The 28th March, 1880. S.H.H.
[41] The name by which I was thus addressed had been given me by our
illuminators as an initiation name, as that of "Mary" to her. It denoted
love as the dominant note of our work, and was an equivalent for "John
the Beloved," who--we were given to understand--is one of the two
controlling "angels" of the new illumination--Daniel being the other--in
accordance with the intimations given by Jesus, one to His disciples and
the other to the Seer of the Apocalypse himself, that John should tarry
within reach of the earth-plane to bear part in the event which was to
constitute the second advent of Christ. These names had a further
correspondence in the Greek parable of Eros and Psyche, which denotes
love as the vivifying principle of the soul. E.M.
[42] Materialism and Superstition.
[43] The name Esther denotes a star or fountain of light, a dawn or
rising.
[44] The spelling of the names is that of the Douay Version, the
Protestants having relegated the second part of the book of Esther, in
which the latter part of this narrative occurs, to the Apocrypha. As
also that of Ezra above cited. E.M.
[45] These are disclosed in "The Life of A.K." The personality referred
to on this occasion was "Faustine, the Roman," the Empress of Marcus
Aurelius. (Life A.K. Vol. I. pp. 353-354.) S.H.H.
[46] The "Hymn of Aphrodite," including the "Discourse of the Communion
of Souls, and of the Uses of Love between Creature and Creature; being
part of the Golden Book of Venus," from which latter the above is taken,
is given in full in the P.W. pp. 350-356.
[47] The instruction concerning inspiration and prophesying was received
by A.K. in Paris on the 7th February, 1880. S.H.H.
[48] P.W. pp. 311-314. Life A.K. Vol. I. pp. 344-345.