Is environment Karma or is it Reincarnation? THE LAW is Karma,

reincarnation is only an incident. It is one of the means which The Law

uses to bring us at last to the true light. The wheel of rebirths is

turned over and over again by us in obedience to this law, so that we

may at last come to place our entire reliance upon Karma. Nor is our

environment Karma itself, for Karma is the subtle power which works in

that environment.

There is nothing but the SELF—using the word as Max Müller does to

designate the Supreme Soul—and its environment. The Aryans for the

latter use the word _Kosams_ or sheaths. So that there is only this

Self and the various sheaths by which it is clothed, beginning with the

most intangible and coming down to the body, while outside of that and

common to all is what is commonly known as environment, whereas the

word should be held to include all that is not The Self.

How unphilosophical therefore it is to quarrel with our surroundings,

and to desire to escape them? We only escape one kind to immediately

fall into another. And even did we come into the society of the wisest

devotees we would still carry the environment of the Self in our own

bodies, which will always be our enemy so long as we do not know what

it is in all its smallest details. Coming down then to the particular

person, it is plain that that part of the environment which consists

in the circumstances of life and personal surroundings is only an

incident, and that the real environment to be understood and cared

about is that in which Karma itself inheres in us.

Thus we see that it is a mistake to say—as we often hear it said—“If

he only had a fair chance; if his surroundings were more favorable

he would do better,” since he really _could not_ be in any other

circumstances at that time, for if he were it would not be he but some

one else. It must be necessary for him to pass through those identical

trials and disadvantages to perfect the Self; and it is only because

we see but an infinitesimal part of the long series that any apparent

confusion or difficulty arises. So our strife will be, not to escape

from anything, but to realize that these _Kosams_, or sheaths, are an

integral portion of ourselves, which we must fully understand before

we can change the abhorred surroundings. This is done by acknowledging

the unity of spirit, by knowing that everything, good and bad alike, is

the Supreme. We then come into harmony with the Supreme Soul, with the

whole universe, and no environment is detrimental.

The very first step is to rise from considering the mere outside

delusive environment, knowing it to be the result of past lives, the

fruition of Karma done, and say with Uddalaka in speaking to his son:

“All this Universe has the Deity for its life. That Deity is the Truth.

He is the Universal soul. He Thou art, O Svetaketu!”[169]

HADJII ERINN.

TEA TABLE TALK.

Recently the tea-table was chatting about the Widow’s escape from the

Romish fold. She was nearly converted by the urbane Monsignor Capel,

but escaped at the critical moment, she said, “by reason of a sudden

preoccupation.” This turned out to be the death of her worthy husband.

The Widow is a pretty and amiable creature, approved even by the ladies

who say “she is a good little soul and mourns most expensively.” Hence

she never appears at the tea-table without an escort, and the most

frequent of these is one Didymus, lawyer by profession, good humored,

sceptic by nature, whose careless, semi-flippant manner makes it

difficult to know him, though he and I frequent the same clubs and

make our bows in the same drawing rooms. On the day in question the

lady said that she brought him often because she “wanted him converted

to Theosophy.”

“But, my dear Madam,” said I, “you know we don’t believe in converts.

Theosophy is simply an extension of previous beliefs and like Victor

Hugo it says, ‘in the name of Religion, I protest against religions.’

People have to grow into it. When they are ready for it a crisis of

some kind, now moral, now physical, seems to occur just before they

accept the Light from the East as a man receives back something he has

lost. It seems as if those elemental creatures, who attend man, foresaw

his determination and strove to frighten him away from the initial

moment of choice. Great momentum, even of misapplied energies, often

indicates the nearness of radical change.”

“Yes,” broke in Didymus quietly, “I believe that of the Elemental and

the astral world. I’ve been there myself, don’t you know!”

Imagine the feelings of Balaam upon a noted occasion! Unlike the

excellent but misunderstood animal of scripture, Didymus was urged to

continue.

“No,” said he, “I can’t profess to explain my experiences, but I’ll

tell them by way of illustrating Mr. Julius’ remark, as I find most

people do go through a climax of some kind before they round the

turning point of the Age.” The tea-table settled itself comfortably and

Didymus proceeded.

“I was in a good deal of trouble last winter, trouble of various kinds,

and needless to specify, and I had foolishly taken to a pretty lively

life. I don’t mind saying that one of the chief causes of my trouble

was the fact that I couldn’t believe in anything that made life worth

living; all my ideals were pretty well played out. One Sunday I awoke

with an overwhelming sense of terrible calamity, I recalled the events

of the previous day, but all was in due order from the matutinal

cocktail to the vesper toddy, so I finally concluded that my depression

was a hint that I had been living too hard and I resolved to stop it.

This resolve, by the way, I carried out from that hour, nor have I

ever touched liquor since. I passed the day otherwise as usual with

various friends and dined out with a glorious appetite. Returning to

my hotel, I was engaged in making notes of one of Herbert Spencer’s

works, when my attention was attracted by voices in the adjoining room,

and I was astounded to find that they were detailing with startling

accuracy, certain of my affairs which I not unnaturally supposed were

hidden from the world at large. Conquering my blank amazement I sprang

into the corridor, when the voices as suddenly ceased and I found my

neighbor’s door ajar and the room entirely empty. This rather took me

down, and I concluded to turn in, and was just falling asleep, when I

seemed to see two fellows in evening dress whom I somehow knew to be

jugglers. They advanced, bowed, and thereupon began a series of the

most fascinating and laughable tricks I ever saw. I looked on with

interest for what appeared to me a long time but at last the rapidity

and variety of the illusions produced a feeling of intense weariness,

and I said, ‘Gentlemen, thanks for your interesting performance, but

you will pardon my remarking that it is late, and I am very tired.’

They bowed, said nothing, and continued their performance which became

even more ludicrous. I repeated my request; again the bows and tricks

of increasing absurdity. Worn out I exclaimed angrily, ‘I consider this

a beastly imposition, you know, and if you persist I shall be obliged—’

but I never finished the sentence, for the two distorted their faces

into masks of indescribable comicality and were off while I laughed—and

awoke. As I did so, I was amazed to see a broad patch of vivid scarlet

light slide down the wall from ceiling to floor and before I could give

a second thought to this phenomenon, a big white cat sprang from the

foot of my bed and vanished in the darkness.

“This aroused me thoroughly, for though I had never experienced the

like before, I said to myself ‘Old Boy, you must have a touch of D. T.

though why the devil you should have with your seasoned head, I can’t

say.’ I got up and lit my gas; it was after midnight but I concluded

to go out and get some medicine. The halls were quite dark save for a

light in the front vestibule and I felt my way down by the balustrade.

Turning the corner of the staircase I became aware of a shape—I cannot

call it a form—which was distinguishable from the surrounding darkness

only by being more intensely black. It seemed about seven feet high,

the body was indistinct but in the sharply defined head two fiery eyes

glowed with a malice and menace that were truly appalling. The shape

stood directly before me and barred my way. I felt an icy chill down my

back, and I’d wager that my hair stood up, but summoning all my courage

I said,—‘Well; what do you want?’ The silent shape bowed mockingly and

the eyes became more malignant and threatening. My temper, which is

really hasty,” (cries of “Oh! no!” from the ladies,) “got the better

of my fears, and advancing in furious anger I cried; ‘Stand aside and

let me pass.’ The shape vanished and I reached the front door without

further incident.

“The cold night somewhat calmed me, but as I crossed Madison Square

I imagined that some one was following me. I turned sharply about;

the square was deserted. I resumed my walk; again the swift footsteps

ever coming closer: again I turned; nothing! By this time I began to

be alarmed. For visible foes a man cares little, but those ghastly

footsteps,—they curdled my very blood, by Jove! I walked on and

reaching Broadway, I was struck with the tumult of voices that filled

the air though there were but few people about. The street cars

seemed crowded with noisy men, laughing, swearing, telling more or

less questionable stories, and from every cab and wagon came similar

sounds: it was like the rumpus on the Stock Exchange on a field day.

The invisible footsteps, at first drowned in the noise recommenced, and

constantly turning, I found myself ever duped. By this time I began to

think the whole thing an illusion, but presently I saw a man just ahead

of me look out from a doorway. As I approached, he apparently drew

back, but getting opposite the door I found it closed by barred iron

shutters: this occurred over and over. Then as I would approach anyone,

pedestrian or driver, he would shout at me, mockingly, jovially,

profanely or inconsequently, yet I could see that his lips were closed

and that he was only mechanically aware of my presence.

“I now began to feel that there were two of me, so to speak. One

recognized that this was all a delusion; the other self was alarmed

and unstrung. I walked quietly but rapidly, attracting no attention.

Looking at myself in a chance mirror I saw that in outward appearance

I was the same as ever. Reaching the drug store by the Herald Office,

I sat down completely unstrung, but my voice was steady as I asked for

some Bromide of Potash, and the attendant gave me a dose in a glass of

soda water at my request without remark. Having no excuse for remaining

I reluctantly turned homeward, hoping that fatigue and the drug would

dissipate my delusions. In vain! I no longer heard the dogging steps

or saw the peeping men, but the voices were louder and more confusing

in a perfect chorus of commonplace talk, intensified in volume.

Arrived home, I took another dose of Bromide and threw myself on the

bed. Instantly it seemed to sink under me and then rose violently. I

rose, lit the gas and my cigar, but the voices began again in the next

room. Though tired out, I sought the street again. By this time the

sense of being ‘double’ was intensified, and I recognized with anger

that my higher self was under the control of a lower portion which it

ridiculed and reprobated. I walked up Broadway this time, and as I

passed the hotels from doors and windows came invitations to drink, to

dine, to play billiards and less innocent suggestions. A man and woman

came towards me, and I was amazed at the breadth, or depth of their

conversation, ranging over topics not whispered in general, much less

proclaimed on the highway, yet as I met them I saw that their lips

moved not; with heads bent slightly against the keen air of the winter

morning they sped silently on their way. Jeers and mockeries saluted me

from the cab stands, yet the cabbies dozed on their boxes. Hour after

hour I walked thus, ready to drop with hunger and fatigue but unable

to stop. At last in the cold grey of the morning I returned home, took

a tub and a meal, and went to my Doctor, having heard the irrational

tumult of voices all the while. The Doctor was vastly amused at some

points of my narration; he thought my cat might be D. T. but could

make nothing out of all the rest except a threatening of insanity, and

giving me some beastly powders, advised me to live quietly, and keep

out of doors as much as possible. I attended to my routine business,

all the time hearing the voices, except when someone addressed me.

Getting restless as the day wore on I walked down along the East River

piers, went on board vessels, into holds and engine rooms, climbed over

cargo and chatted with stevedores. No one saw anything unusual about

me; friends asked me to wine and dine, yet still the hateful voices

mingled with the real ones till I hardly knew them apart and feared I

should commit some noticeable indiscretion. The day passed in misery;

as I got to my bed at last, a red setter appeared by my side. An inmate

owned a dog of this species, and at first I thought this was he, but

my door was locked and as I turned to him he vanished, which upset my

nerves again. Again I sought my Doctor’s aid, and taking a second worse

prescription, passed another hideous night in desperate wandering, ever

with the voices at my ear. It was useless to try to sleep or even to

lie down; my bed heaved like a ship in a tempest. The next day I passed

at my office again or with any acquaintances I could muster, talking

as much as possible in the hope of a brief respite from the maddening

sounds. At last the medicines did their work; the next day found me

clear headed, the sights and sounds of the astral plane had vanished;

I don’t want to experience them again, but I believe in them, you

bet! Later I found out what they really were when my life had wholly

changed, and I had joined the Theosophical Society.”

The ladies turned on him with one voice. “_You!_ A Theosophist! and you

never told us!”

“Well,” said he humbly, “I tried hard, but—you never gave me a chance.”

Pretty Polly says that under cover of the laughter the Widow whispered

to Didymus that she had thought he was trying to tell her something

else. But I don’t believe it, for Didymus is still a bachelor; some say

he is a chela.

* * * * *

In answer to queries, I would say that all occurrences related in this

department are strictly true, as is the above experience of an F. T. S.

communicated since the published invitation to correspondents in our

last number. All such will be hospitably received by the Tea-Table. I

may add further that “Julius” is now the name of a department merely;

though it has at times sheltered groups of personalities of both sexes,

there has always been one fixed quantity directing these, and that’s he

who now signs

JULIUS.

* * * * *

“These sons belong to me; this wealth belongs to me:” with such

thoughts is a fool tormented. He himself does not belong to himself,

much less sons and wealth.—_Buddhaghosha Parables._

OM.

FOOTNOTES:

[167] The orthodox translation is “When the Most High divided to the

nations their inheritance, when he separated the sons of Adam, he set

the bounds of the people according to the number of the children of

Israel.”

[168] From _Leaves of Grass_.

[169] _Chandogya-Upanishad_, vi.

AUM

Let us adore the supremacy of that divine Sun, the Godhead who

illuminates who recreates all, from whom all proceed, to whom all must

return, whom we invoke: may he direct our understanding aright in our

progress toward his holy seat.—_The Gayatri._

The spiritual mind which by study hath forsaken the fruit of

works, and which by wisdom hath cut asunder the bond of doubt,

cannot be brought back to mortal birth by reason of any human

action.—_Bagavad-Gita_, ch. iv.

THE PATH.

VOL. I. MARCH, 1887. NO. 12.

_The Theosophical Society, as such, is not responsible for any opinion

or declaration in this magazine, by whomsoever expressed, unless

contained in an official document._

Where any article, or statement, has the author’s name attached, he

alone is responsible, and for those which are unsigned, the Editor will

be accountable.

A YEAR ON THE PATH.

The present issue of this Magazine closes the first year of its

publication. It was not started because its projectors thought that

they alone knew the true Path, but solely out of an intense longing to

direct inquiring minds towards a way which had seemed to many persons

who had tried it, to hold out the possibility of finding an answer to

the burning questions that vex the human heart.

The question is always naturally asked “What is the Path?” or “What is

the Philosophy?” which is the same thing, for of course the following

of any path whatever will depend upon the particular philosophy or

doctrines believed in. The path we had in view is held by us to be

the same one which in all ages has been sought by Heathen, Jew and

Christian alike. By some called the path to Heaven, by others the path

to Jesus, the path to Nirvana, and by the Theosophists the path to

Truth. Jesus has defined it as a narrow, difficult and straight path.

By the ancient Brahmins it has been called, “the small old path leading

far away on which those sages walk who reach salvation;” and Buddha

thought it was a noble fourfold path by which alone the miseries of

existence can be truly surmounted.

But of course mental diversities inevitably cause diversity in the

understanding of any proposition. Thus it happens that Theosophists

have many different views of how the path should be followed, but none

of them disagree with the statement that there must be _one_ Truth,

and that no religion can be called higher than Truth. We therefore

have pursued, as far as possible, a course which is the result of the

belief that the prevalence of similar doctrines in the writings and

traditions of all peoples points to the fact that _the true religion is

that one which will find the basic ideas common to all philosophies and

religions_.

We turned most readily and frequently to the simple declarations found

in the ancient books of India, esteeming most highly that wonderful

epic poem—the Bagavad-Gita. And in that is found a verse that seems to

truly express in powerful words what philosophers have been blindly

grasping after in many directions.

“It is even a portion of myself (the Supreme) that in this material

world is the universal spirit of all things. It draweth together the

five organs and the mind, which is the sixth, in order that it may

obtain a body, and that it may leave it again; and that portion of

myself (Ishwar) having taken them under his charge, accompanieth them

from his own abode as the breeze the fragrance from the flower.”[170]

To catch the light which gleams through this verse, is not for mortal

minds an easy task, and thus it becomes necessary to present as many

views from all minds as can be obtained. But it seems plain that in

every religion is found the belief that that part of man which is

immortal must be a part of the Supreme Being, for there cannot be two

immortalities at once, since that would give to each a beginning, and

therefore the immortal portion of man must be derived from the true and

only immortality.

This immortal spark has manifested itself in many different classes

of men, giving rise to all the varied religions, many of which have

forever disappeared from view. Not any one of them could have been

the whole Truth, but each must have presented one of the facettes of

the great gem, and thus through the whole surely run ideas shared by

all. These common ideas point to truth. They grow out of man’s inner

nature and are not the result of revealed books. But some one people

or another must have paid more attention to the deep things of life

than another. The “Christian” nations have dazzled themselves with the

baneful glitter of material progress. They are not the peoples who will

furnish the clearest clues to the Path. A few short years and they

will have abandoned the systems now held so dear, because their mad

rush to the perfection of their civilization will give them control

over now undreamed of forces. Then will come the moment when they must

choose which of two kind of fruit they will take. In the meantime it is

well to try and show a relation between their present system and the

old, or at least to pick out what grains of truth are in the mass.

In the year just passing we have been cheered by much encouragement

from without and within. Theosophy has grown not only in ten years, but

during the year past. A new age is not far away. The huge, unwieldy

flower of the 19th century civilization, has almost fully bloomed,

and preparation must be made for the wonderful new flower which is to

rise from the old. We have not pinned our faith on Vedas nor Christian

scriptures, nor desired any others to do so. All our devotion to Aryan

literature and philosophy arises from a belief that the millions of

minds who have trodden weary steps before ours, left a path which might

be followed with profit, yet with discrimination. For we implicitly

believe that in this curve of the cycle, the final authority is _the

man himself_. In former times the disclosed Vedas, and later, the

teachings of the great Buddha, were the right authority, in whose

authoritative teachings and enjoined practices were found the necessary

steps to raise Man to an upright position. But the grand clock of the

Universe points to another hour, and now Man must seize the key in his

hands and himself—as a whole—open the gate. Hitherto he has depended

upon the great souls whose hands have stayed impending doom. Let us

then together enter upon another year, fearing nothing, assured of

strength in the Union of Brotherhood. For how can we fear death, or

life, or any horror or evil, at any place or time, when we well know

that even death itself is a part of the dream which we are weaving

before our eyes.

Our belief may be summed up in the motto of the Theosophical Society

“There is no religion higher than Truth,” and our practice consists

in a disregard of any authority in matters of religion and philosophy

except such propositions as from their innate quality we feel to be

true.

WHAT IS TRUE “CHRISTIANITY”?

“Christianity” is a _religion_; but the word “religion” has evidently

three distinct meanings:

1. In the first place it signifies the practice of a certain kind of

spiritual training, by which the higher principles in the constitution

of man are developed and reunited (bound back) to the divine source

to which they belong. In this sense it is the same as _yogism_ (from

_yog_, to bind).

2. In the second aspect it implies the knowledge of the true relation

existing between microcosmic man as a part of the All and the macrocosm

of the spiritual and material universe. In this sense it is a science.

3. In the third and common acceptation of the term, “religion” means a

certain system of forms, ceremonies and usages, by which some supposed

eternal deity is worshipped or propitiated and his favor obtained, so

that the sinner may escape the deserved punishment and evade the law.

In this sense it is a superstition.

To become a “Christian” of the third order, it is merely necessary

to submit to a certain ceremony called baptism, whose mode of

administration varies in the different sects; but it seems that to

become a real Christian some other baptism is necessary, namely, the

baptism of the _water of Truth_, the baptism of _Blood_, and the

baptism of the _living Fire_ of the Spirit.

The first baptism, with the _water of Truth_, means the attainment of

spiritual knowledge, and corresponds to the first of the _four noble

truths_ taught by Buddha: “_right doctrine_.”

The second, or the baptism of _Blood_, is commonly supposed to mean

a shedding of blood by martyrdom, in the defense of a belief in a

historical Christ. But such a process would be a loss of blood and not

a reception of it, and could not properly be called a “baptism.” The

best way to obtain information in regard to this “baptism of blood,”

will be to ask those who have received it or who are receiving it at

present.

There is a certain class of “practical occultists,” whose inner senses

are opened to a great extent, and who have been taught by no one but

the spirit within themselves and their own experience. They say that

the “baptism of blood” means a penetration of the growing spiritual

germ in man, through the flesh and blood and bones of the physical

body, by which even the gross elements of the physical form are

attenuated and purified,[171] and that this process produces pains and

sufferings, typically represented by the suffering, crucifixion and

death of the man Jesus of Nazareth. They say that no one can be a true

follower of Christ, or a “real Christian,” who has not undergone this

baptism of blood, and experienced the pains of crucifixion,[172] but

that man having passed through that occult process becomes an Adept,

when only the highest baptism (or the last initiation)—the baptism

of _Fire_—will be necessary to enter the highest attainable state

(Spiritual Power), and to become a _Son of Light_.

But, it is asked, what has Jesus of Nazareth to do with that process?

How does the latter come to be typified by his suffering, and what is

the _rationale_ of it?

It is claimed that at the beginning of certain historical periods, when

old religious truths are about to be forgotten, and the idolatry of

form assumes the place of true religion, some great spirit (planetary)

appears upon the Earth, incarnated into a human form, and by his

word and _example_ impresses the old truths forcibly upon a number

of receptive minds, to communicate them to others, and thus lay the

foundation of a new religious system, embodying old truths in a new

form.

It is believed that the man Jesus of Nazareth was the mortal form in

which such a Spirit was embodied; the latter being no less than what

I believe every planetary spirit to be—an emanation of the Universal

_Logos_ or the _Word_.[173]

But what is the _Logos_? or, to express it better, how can we form a

conception of it? We can conceive of no other _God_ (or Supreme Good)

but the one which lives within ourselves, and which is said to be the

image of the Universal God reflected in the purified human soul, where

it (He) may attain self-consciousness and the knowledge of self. The

Universal God may be described as the incomprehensible centre from

which proceed the elements of _Love_, _Life_ and _Light_ in the various

modes of manifestation on the different planes. The whole of Nature is

a product of the _Spirit of God_, being poured out throughout the _All_

by the power of _The Word_, which is the _Life_—or _thought_ rendered

active by _will_.

The same process which took place in the eternal Macrocosm of the

Universe, takes place in the inner world belonging to the microcosm

of man. “No one can come to the _Father_, but through the _Son_;”

that is to say: No _God_ will take his seat in the interior temple of

Man, except through the power of the _Word_—in other words; by the

concentration of thought and good will upon the divine germ which

rests in the innermost centre of every human being. If we concentrate

our _Love_ upon that centre of _Good_, the divine germ will begin

its active _Life_, and the interior world will gradually become

illuminated by the _Light_ of the spirit. As this principle grows, it

will penetrate the soul and through the soul all the lower principles,

even the physical body, throwing off the impurities of soul and body,

and the more such impurities are present, the greater will be the

suffering, typically represented by Jesus, until finally the _baptism

of blood_ is completed, the soul purified, the animal _ego_ dead and

the man has become a “Christ” or an _Adept_,—that is to say one in whom

the (6th) _Christ_ principle has taken form.

It will readily be seen that this process is much more difficult to

accomplish, than merely to go to church, pay the dues to the priests,

attend to prayer-meetings and perform the prescribed ceremonies. To

accomplish this process requires a constant meditation of the highest

kind, and a continual employment of will power to keep away the

disturbing elements of evil, which in a person who strives for _light_

are still more boisterous than in one who is indifferent, for as

soon as the spiritual light kindled in the centre begins to radiate

its life-giving rays throughout our interior world, the “_dwellers

of the threshold_”—the evil _egos_, created by evil thoughts and

selfish desires, floating at the periphery of the soul-sphere like

clouds sailing through the atmosphere of our earth, begin to feel the

destroying influence of the central sun and battle for their existence.

Still this atmosphere of evil must be penetrated before we can reach

the luminous centre and the tranquil heaven within, and this is done by

clinging to the principle of Good and virtue whose rays radiate from

the centre. This principle will at first only be felt intuitionally but

as we feed it with good thoughts, it grows and the interior spiritual

senses become opened, so that we may _see_ and _hear_ its voice

distinctly and without any fear of misunderstanding its meaning.

The “below” is always in exact correspondence to and related with

the “above.” We are immersed in an all surrounding but invisible

ocean of life, whose waves pervade our psychic organization, in the

same sense as volumes of air enter our lungs, and as the latter

stimulates the life of the body, likewise the former stimulates the

growth of the elements of the spirit; which draw their substance from

the lower-animal-principles. In the same way the caloric rays of the

sun enter the bodies of plants and stimulate the assimilation of the

elements which are drawn from earth, water and air.

Those who have gone through that occult process, will require no proof

of the truth of these assertions: because they know it to be true

by experience; but the “exoteric Christian” and sceptic, having no

such experience to assist his faith, may arrive at a certain degree

of conviction by using his reasoning powers and logic in conjunction

with the teachings of the _Bible_. Christ is reported in the _New

Testament_ to have said: “Except Ye eat the flesh of the Son of Man

and drink his blood, ye have no life in You” (John vi, 53); and again:

“I am the living bread, which came down from heaven; if any man eat

of this bread, he shall live forever” (John vi, 51.) Now this seems

plain enough to every student of occultism, and if translated into

the scientific language of modern occultists, it would mean: “Unless

you absorb and assimilate within your psychic organization the sixth

principle (The Christ), which is the only permanent and immortal

principle in the constitution of Man, you will have no sixth principle

developed within you, and consequently possess no immortal life—at

least as far as Your personality is concerned (for the divine and now

unconscious germ within you cannot die, but will reincarnate again).

But if you absorb the principle or spiritual life and develop the

spirit within you, so that it grows through your flesh and blood,

then will you have drunk from the _Elixir of Life_ and received the

_Baptism of Blood_ and become a _Christian_, an _Adept_; for ‘Christ’

will have taken form in your body, and being himself immortal you will

be immortal through him.”

These views are corroborated by the great Christian mystic _Jacob

Boehme_, by _Jane Leade_, _Paracelsus_, the Rosicrucians, and I can

find nothing in them which would in any way conflict with the _Esoteric

Doctrine_, as taught by the Eastern Adepts. If any difference in

opinion could arise, it could be only, in regard to the person of

_Jesus of Nazareth_ or _Jehoshua_, and whether he lived exactly at the

time claimed by modern Christians. This question I must leave to some

one wiser than myself to settle; but it seems of no great importance to

me; for the existence of the Christ-principle is disputed by none, and

the man, Jesus—having died—can only be a Savior to us at present, if we

study his character and imitate his example.

F. HARTMANN, M. D.

PAPYRUS—THE GEM.

The roads were thronged with the people moving toward the great square,

for it was a feast of the Goddess. The temples were crowded, while long

lines of men and maidens in the robes of “The Sacred” wound in and out

toward the river.

Music and song rose and fell upon the evening breeze, like the pulse of

a throbbing heart. Here and there could be seen the Scribes, and seated

in an open space, the Tale-tellers. One of these, as I rested near him,

told the tale of

ONE WHO FOUND THE GEM.

“In the land of the Wise-men, there dwelt a young man. Many years

had he labored in a strange mine; the ‘Mine of the Priceless

Gems;’—hopefully, bravely, but fruitlessly. He had long known that he

who should find the Master Stone, would be free, be full of peace and

dig no more, for nothing better could be found. He also knew that he

who found the stone should seek to share it with all men.

“Many small stones had he found, but they were laid aside to be used

when the great stone was reached.

“Silently and steadily he worked on, until one gloomy day when he had

grown so weak that he could make but one more effort, that effort was

rewarded, and before him lay the great gem. Weary, weak, but joyful, he

gathered it into his bosom, and went forth to share it with others; for

he who told not of his gem, or shared it not with all men, must lose

the stone.

“Far he wandered, telling his wonderful story, the _finding of the

Priceless Stone_—the stone that made men greater, wiser, more loving

than all things living; the stone that no man could keep unless he gave

it away.

“Far he wandered in his own country, seeking to tell his story and give

of the Stone to each one he met. Silently they listened—gravely they

meditated and gently they said to him: ‘This is Kali-yuga, the dark

age. Come to us a hundred thousand years from now. Until then—the stone

is not for us. It is Karma.’

“Far into another land he wandered, ever trying for the same end.

Gravely they listened, quietly they spoke: ‘Peace be with you. When the

Lotus ceases to bloom and our Sacred River runs dry, come to us. Until

then we need not the stone.’

“Over the seas unto another land he went, for fully he believed that

there they would hear and share with him. The many days of wandering

and the long journey across the sea had made him thin and ragged. He

had not thought of this, but as he told his story he was reminded of it

and many other things, for here the people answered in many ways, and

not always gently.

“Some listened, for his story was new to them, but the gem was uncut,

and they wished it polished.

“Others paused and desired him to tell his story in their tents, for

that would make them exalted and famous, but they wanted not the gem.

As he did not belong to their tribe, it would bring discredit upon them

to receive anything from him.

“One paused to listen and desired some of the stone, but he desired to

use it to elevate his own position and assist him in overreaching his

fellows in bartering and bargaining. The Wanderer was unable to give

any of the stone to such as this one.

“Another listened, but inasmuch as the Wanderer refused to make the gem

float in the air, he would none if it.

“Another heard, but he already knew of a better stone, and was sure he

would find it, because he ate nothing but star-light and moonbeams.

“Another could not receive any of the stone or listen to the story, for

the Wanderer was poor and ragged. Unless he was dressed in purple and

fine linen and told his story in words of oil and honey, he could not

be the possessor of the gem.

“Still another heard, but he knew it was not the gem. As the Wanderer

had been unsuccessful before, surely he could not have found the stone.

Even had he found it, he could not have the proper judgment to divide

it. So he wanted none of the stone.

“Near and far went the Wanderer. Still ever the same. Some wanted it,

but the stone was too hard, or not bright enough. He was not of their

people, or was ignorant. He was too ragged and worn to suit their

ideas, so they wanted none of the stone.

“Saddened, aged and heart-sore, he wandered back to the land of the

Wise men. To one of these he went, telling of his journeyings and that

no man would share with him the magnificent stone, and also of his

sorrow that he too must lose it.

“‘Be not troubled, my son,’ said the Wise One, ‘the stone is for you,

nor can you lose it. He who makes the effort to help his fellow man

is the rightful owner and still possesses the entire stone, although

he has shared it with all the world. To each and every one to whom

you have spoken, although they knew it not, you have given one of the

smaller stones which you first found. It is enough. When the Master

Stone is cut and polished, then is the labor of the fortunate possessor

ended. The long journeying and weary wandering, the sorrow-laden heart

and tear-dimmed eyes, have cut and polished your gem. Behold, it is a

white and a fair stone!’

“Drawing it from his bosom, the Wanderer gazed into the wonderful light

of the stone while an expression of great peace stole over his face.

Folding the gem close to his bosom his eyelids closed, and he fell

asleep, a wanderer no more.”

RAMESES.

HERALDS FROM THE UNSEEN.

“Behold, I show you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall

all be changed.”—I Cor. xv, 51. “I have found the small old path

leading far away.”—UPANISHAD.

To him who without murmuring, confident in the perfect justice of the

law, waits and watches, there comes a herald from heights unseen. The

just man follows him and attains; the unwise may surprise him and

follow also. But when the fool has rushed unbidden in where angels

fear to tread, he meets a mailed Truth with a drawn sword, on whose

point he dies. Now there are two deaths. From the one he may rise,

“in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, * * * for the dead shall be

raised,”[174] and this by the vivifying power of truth, if so be he

have one identical incorruptible atom in his spiritual make up, or else

that rash being is dead forever, and the spirit monad creates another

in the dream of three thousand years.

The indivisible Truth in its entirety is incommunicable in the words

of our plane. A clue may indeed be given; it is the herald to those

who await him. It is useless to turn the page to see who this is that

offers the clue. Of myself I know nothing, yet through me may much be

made known. I am the trumpet; through it the herald may proclaim a

mystery.

It was in a night of silence that a Power bade me waken, and drew

me to a dark cave wherein It passed. Not so I, for the entrance was

narrow and I had encumbrances about me. Only many nights later, when I

had parted with effort, hope and fear, did I stand within. All of me

that was essential had entered; this was enough. Then a musical chord

breathed low, the darkness dispersed, and I saw the Unknown Land.

It was a circling land of streams, Light everywhere, flowing, flowing,

flowing. The flow was cadenced and welled from a mysterious Centre of

blackness at the edges of which spouted cataracts of flame. My thought

shrank with awe of the Darkness, but an unknown grasp of Might expanded

within me and drew me to that flaming verge. On the knees of the soul

I fall and am not. I become one with the All, and consciously resting

in Omniscience I know the whole. Yet _what_ forever dwells, wakeful

and brooding with that dark pavillion, nor man nor angel may discover.

Profounder than all Being, _It is_, girt about by unfathomed fires. “Ye

shall enter the light, but ye shall never touch the flame.”[175]

A stir was over that central Dark, a titanic breath, like the sighing

of myriad seas, measured, omnipotent. Where its harmonious friction

fretted the verges of space, the flames burst forth, and with fecund

pulsations gave birth to heat, light, motion and sound. The Centre felt

a boundless attraction for the circumference, pouring toward it with

inexhaustible energy, for “the heart of it is Love.” This was the force

centrifugal, which in a dazzle of starry scintillations thrusts the

universal glooms apart with a song. Were this all, Discord and Division

were the end. But the circumference trembled also with a vast yearning

toward the Centre, so that it ever tended to return there, as the

prodigal, enriched in experience, returns to the mystic house of the

Father. This was the centripetal force, and these two caused the double

vibration of the Astral Light, and they are all you shall know though

you blend with the infinite forever. “Whatever there is, the whole

world when gone forth trembles in His breath: that Brahman is a great

terror, like a drawn sword. They who know it become immortal.”[176]

Then a voice said—“The Absolute evolves thought from Himself, and the

vibration of this thought in the passive wells of space generates Light

and its correlated forces. The Thought is,—‘_Creation!_’ The singing

breath is the Word; the Light is the Absolute made manifest, and the

Universe begins.” At once I saw divergent lances of light pour their

serried splendors into the void, and the point of each spear displaced

the mist which curling backward from the centre of energy thus formed,

communicated the movement to sister vapors in turn. Activities shoot,

play back and forth, elongate, crystalize, and so great planets spring

into the arena, feel the first instinct of separate Being, struggle to

depart,—an estranged Self—in meteoric desolation, when the magnetic

impulse of the Centre streams along the creative ray, meets the

responsive principle, and lo! each chafing Orb, held in leash by Love,

wheels into the circle of attraction and obeys the Law. The astral

world has begun!

Thence presently the Light spreads afresh, reflected and repeated

from every facet of every star, till arrowy glories, vibrant with

each vibration sped forth by the primary pencils of light, in turn

create dull planetary masses in the luminous abyss; then ever renewed

coruscations quicken their dust with whose initial tremor shining

crystals sparkle out and glide together about a glistering ring whose

centre is ever a darkness ruffled by the outreaching current from that

first tinted Gloom. So new spheres form, these, repeating the parent

movement, with wide spreading auras touch and arouse their neighbors,

and interpenetrating, revolving, throwing off, taking on, converging,

diverging, modifying and modified, a world of forms is evolved whose

final expression of Being is Man. Thus further departing, the infinite

variations end in individuality and the greater the individuality, the

more it leans to the centrifugal force, and the lack of equilibrium in

the forces draws man further from the Eternal and he forgets the Law.

His aura, his rays are nerve currents centred in the personality, but

linked by star-beam and moon-ray to the quivering Source of all light,

so that each man vibrating, imparts to the Akasa about him his own

specific rate of vibration, and all men, all things, suspended as it

were in this fine ether which fills the universe, act and react each

on each, every one striving to modify the others to his own vibratory

ratio, while the Light in the same way attacks all, and the battle of

the giants is here. So the final expression of “evil” is inertia, and

the highest attribute of Spirit is the Thought which is Life.

Once again the Voice spoke then saying: “What gives Life?” Someone

answered: “Vibration.” And when It said, “Look back to the earth

world,” I obeyed. I saw the modern sage reducing all the great forces,

all the intoxicating play of colors and the bewildering tangle of

harmonies to this one source,—Vibration. I saw wondering students

bending over sensitive flames that danced or died at the mandate of

sound. I saw a child playing with iron filings on glass, and as he

drew a bow athwart the pane they marshalled into tiny mimicries of

the primitive crystalline creation. I saw the Frost spirit, tracing

his white wonders of tropical forests on vibrant surfaces, blazoning

symbols of summer on the grim escutcheon of the snow. I saw Sound

disintegrating granite and iron, taming wild beasts with a lure,

transforming brothers into demons at the sibilant hiss of a scathing

word.[177] I saw Light fecundating the soil, and the teeming battalions

of the underworld issuing from the palpitating spark in their germs;

the selective art of the flower, choosing the kindred color of her

tribe from all the flashing scale, gave up to me its secret of the

synchronous vibration of that hue with the astral soul within her

fragrant form. Passion I saw also, flaming in two breasts that for one

tumultuous moment became one, and knew it for an instant of similar

vibration. Aye, and saw that Love was a steadfast quality of motion

between loyal hearts, saw too that Anger and Hatred had their rise in

the same source, and mounting upward I saw that Faith was a similitude

of vibration with Truth itself. Again the Voice spoke; “Dost thou see

aught but Vibration anywhere?” I answered: “Such all life is, and from

such all proceeds. He who cons its secret laws and can institute its

musical numbers at will, is a God! He can create and destroy.” “Go

then, and by analogy learn what thou art,” said the Voice, and like

the rebel fraction of a star I fell from Glory, and found myself alone

in the Maya world again, with these words thrilling my brain. “But

He, that Highest Person, who wakes in us while we sleep, shaping one

lovely sight after another, He indeed is called the Light, He is called

Brahman, He alone is called The Immortal. All worlds are founded on It

and no one goes beyond. This is that.”[178]

It is rarely that a man gets the whole of his thought; often others

supply it. Analogy is the power of following a thought into all its

correlations, and I shall ask you to do this in a measure with mine.

These puny pages cannot contain the theme of cycles, and falling

short, it scarce matters by how many pen strokes I fail. Consider this

first; what are we? Look abroad over our Society, largely; we see each

member working on his own particular line. So it must be with man for

ages. When you shall have exhausted your special hobby, when through

astral perception, or mesmeric control or mental acumen, you shall

have attained high powers, the hour of your limitation will strike,

as its awful knell can strike, even from the towers of Futurity, and

you will know that you have not found that corner-stone on which alone

the Eternal rests,—your indivisible Self. “Great ones fall back, even

from the threshold, unable to sustain the weight of responsibility;

unable to pass on.”[179] Follow from the start that solitary beacon

which informs the ultimate goal: _Unity_. Make it your touchstone and

your guide; other stars are reflected lights only. The doctrine of

unselfishness is no sentiment, but of logical, practical utility. The

individual way lies from limited Being, through Becoming, to unlimited

Being, precisely as the universal way lies from sterile Unity, through

Division to fecund Unity, or from the one Life through Death to the

Life of the All. He who in final choice elects the path of Division,

chooses Death eternal. You may indeed wend homeward through the devious

tangle of reflected rays, but how long, how hard are such paths! I

would see your souls with eagle swoop make straight for the Central

Sun. Look then within you. Man! Woman! Are you what you seem? Till this

thought daily; it will bear the harvest of Life.

With analogy for our guide we observe that the first forms of life are

crystalline and have two poles. You man, are also a magnetic sphere

with physical and spiritual poles. On the physical side of the subject

we find modern scientists telling us that man is matter in a state of

low vibration, and thought, matter in a state of high vibration.[180]

In this ascertained view, Spirit is a higher state of vibration than we

at present cognize. “Does the fact look crass and material, threatening

to degrade thy theory of Spirit? Resist it not; it goes to refine and

raise thy theory of matter just as much.”[181] Nor do I say this is

all. Trust your highest ideal to the unconditioned causation lying back

of that primal vibration—Absolute Thought.

The vibrant tension of fixed thought must in time heighten the

vibratory ratio of the man, for tension excites increased pulsation.

This rarefies the density of all bodies, and the friction of

intensified chemical action establishes light, heat and odic force.

The increased porosity of the physical body tends to disengage the

atoms of the astral body, and the generation of a strong odic current

forces it out to the astral world, (always attracting it) all the

sooner because the intensified pulsation of thought-tension sends the

auric emanations further into space, thus draughting a larger portion

of the world-soul to the entity. All vibration being attended with

sound (which may or may not escape the ear) we proceed to examine

tones and find them varying from the lowest of eight vibrations per

second, to the highest known to western science of 24,000 per second.

Remember that the tones of anger, hatred, scorn are all deep notes,

those of cheerfulness, love, hope are treble. Here we discover the

apparently inexplicable effect of spoken words which raise or depress

our vibrations to their own by means of the etheric medium. To resist

the wildfire spread of passion or anger we have but to check the

vibration by holding steadily to our own; this maintained, may raise

that of others, precisely as the high musical note constantly sounded,

raises all lower ones at all related, to its own pitch. Tyndall says:

“Scientific education ought to teach us to see the invisible as well

as the visible in nature; to picture with the vision of the mind those

operations which entirely elude bodily vision; to look at the very

atoms of matter in motion and at rest, and to follow them forth without

once losing sight of them * * to see them integrating themselves in

natural phenomena.” So I shall ask you to imagine a tone at a high rate

of vibration, to see it striking the hearer’s brain at a certain focus,

creating there a centre of energy, which tending to crystallization,

fixes the thought in the mind. And the more permanent duration of

pleasant (which are high) thoughts and tones is evident if we glance

back over a long period of time and note how the joys stand out and

the griefs disappear; so we always forget physical suffering. Moreover

we may see this tone raising his vibratory ratio and glancing off at

an angle of reflection equal to that of incidence, reacting upon the

surrounding ether and upon all hearers. The magical success of eastern

mantras depends upon the exact intonation, which governs the vibratory

result, and the proper intonation of the sacred books, learned from

the priests, doubtless increased their effect. Turning to colors, we

find them varying in vibration from violet 1/60000 inch to red 1/38000

inch, and the violet has greater actinism; so it would seem to follow

that the more extended the undulation the greater the chemical action

and resultant odic force. Hence the tone of animals or man is not such

a poor test of their nature as we might suppose, and a certain clue to

character is given in a preferred color. The higher sounds thus create

greater akasic disturbance through increased undulation. Deleuze in

his work on magnetism says: “The word which indicates our will can

often exert an action. * * The very tones of the magnetizer, being

produced by the vital energy, act upon the organs of the patients.”

Reichenbach proved that all chemical action is a source of odic force,

and the transmertion of air being nothing less, additional witness is

born to the occult power of a word. All mesmerizers are now agreed that

motions and words are unnecessary; the will suffices; what is this

but the tension of fixed thought. Everything in Nature has its own

specific rate of vibration; if we know and can reproduce and heighten

it we can call the thing into existence or pass ourselves within its

consciousness. Hence the old saying that numbers are the names of

things. The “lost word” itself is, doubt it not, a sound of the highest

possible vibration, represented by the Aum, or sound of the eternal

outpour of Light, the Logos of the Christians. The ordinary ear may

not grasp this sound, but Tyndall tells us such are not dead because

they have passed from our ken.[182] When we remember that this astral

vibration can in time elevate that of all matter, we glimpse alike the

great factor of Evolution and of the use of Aum. The thought being

spiritually fixed, an unbroken vital current sets in between the man

and the “One eternal Thinker, thinking non-eternal thoughts. He though

one, fulfils the desire of many. The wise, who perceive Him within

their Self, to them belong eternal joy, eternal peace!”[183] Here we

perceive the force of the repeated injunction to be calm; how else

can the harmonious medium act upon us? “The man who is not calm and

subdued, or whose mind is not at rest, he can never obtain the Self,

even by knowledge.”[184]

Follow me now to the plane of soul. As all things from planet to

molecule have their mystic centre, that of man is found in the heart,

whose systole and diastole are regulated by the double movement of the

Astral Light. There, hemmed about by the light of the semi-material

soul, is the dusky centre, where the spirit may awaken and breathe.

“The self is smaller than small, greater than great, hidden in the

heart of the creature.” Air is breathed by the lungs; the soul breathes

the astral light. As that spiritual monad who is your own Augoides,

breathed first upon the plastic Akasa and drew together the principles

of a man, so It must again breathe upon this silent centre to create

the spiritual man. It does not inhabit him, It overshadows him. It

is his “Father in Heaven” to whom Jesus bade him pray; his Creator.

In each heart stands this shrouded altar to an unknown God. “Whom ye

therefore ignorantly worship, Him declare I unto you.” He has created

the physical man hundreds of times, for His mission is unfulfilled

until through Evolution, He shall have made “one higher than the

angels.” In that illimitable future which evades the mind, my soul sees

ultimate beings in their glory, raise the swelling tide of Being higher

still. So Divinity raises Itself by Itself and man expands God. Here is

the adhesion of Jesus to the destiny latent in Humanity. “Be ye perfect

as your Father in Heaven is also perfect.”

JASPER NIEMAND, F. T. S.

(_Concluded in April._)

THOUGHTS IN SOLITUDE.

II.

The votaries of Religions that preach salvation only through the

acceptance of their dogmas must inevitably be more or less animated by

the proselytising spirit, and the more pretentious the claims of power

to save by the inculcation of orthodox opinion, the more urgent must

appear the necessity to spread those opinions as widely as possible.

Indeed it seems imperative on one who holds such a faith in his heart

of hearts, that he should spend his life in trying to spread it.

But when the true philosophic thought is attained and the law of Karma

with its infinite ramifications realized as the all pervading power,

how vain will seem all attempts to control or even deeply affect the

destiny of others. Truly Occultism teaches the widest tolerance, and

though its student will doubtless as formerly try to influence all who

are brought into contact with him in his journey through life, and if

possible instil into them the thoughts that actuate him and give his

life a definite purpose, yet will he realize that over his own life

alone has he paramount power. He may exercise his worldly wisdom as the

sower of seed, may avoid what is most patently the rocky or the thorny

ground, but he will gradually learn to cease to look for results from

even the most promising, and will rise more and more on the wings of

devotion to the true giver of the increase.

While therefore it is a subject for satisfaction if the Theosophical

Society should indeed prove to be the dawn of that better hope

for mankind the nucleus of that Universal Brotherhood which shall

overspread all lands, and which shall plant in the hearts of men the

Science-Religion along whose lines will move the spiritual progress of

all future Humanity, yet as a Society it can scarcely be expected to be

free from the imperfections inherent in all organization, which being

of the earth is necessarily earthly—and after all it is a matter of

very small moment in what form truth is given to the world. This only

is certain that truth must advance that no man can stay the wheel of

evolution—that the Divine Wisdom which we believe animates us will one

day be recognized by all mankind as the only solution of the problem of

the Universe, and as the guide to Life Eternal.

And Destiny will not be hurried—spite of our impatience—any more than

she can be retarded. The evil Karma of the World must work itself out.

The unclean man let him be unclean still, let him measure every depth

of vice and taste of every spring of passion till the hour strikes for

him also and his painful upward progress has to begin. So have the

Rishis done who went before us, so have we done in past existences,

indeed we may have but extricated ourselves from the slough, and the

mire may still be clinging to our feet. For no man can transcend

experience, and all earthly places, foul and clean alike, must be

trodden by him. Nor when the words or acts of others come into direct

antagonism with our own personality, any more than when the cruelty

and injustice in the world at large are brought painfully before us,

shall we continue to blame the actors, or allow the old prejudices

“with their lurid colourings of passion” to dominate us any longer, for

the true philosophic thought will have taught us to recognize that all

acts are but the result of the “Three Qualities” blended in infinite

combination—the great Karma of the World working itself out.

The deeper one looks into this Western Civilization of ours, and the

more one realizes in what degrading depths its masses are sunk, in what

heartless frivolity so many of the more opulent spend their lives, and

in what superstitious intolerance its so-called Religious World moves,

it seems indeed a forlorn hope to attempt to carry conviction of the

Occult Truth or expect a widespread acceptance of it. But though this

age of Darkness may exhibit an appalling depth of materiality, yet in

all ages of the world, the blind multitude are many and the lovers of

Wisdom few. And indeed this love of Wisdom is no light attainment,

but one for which the soul has been educated through life times of

experience and paroxysms of pain, for while the gratification of any

of the senses still continues to give supreme satisfaction, there is

no room in the soul for Theosophic thought. Not until by the slow

education of repeated experience it is realized that the senses can

no longer satisfy, that even the higher joys of communion with ones

kind—though culminating in the ideal union of two souls—are but steps

in the ladder to the Supreme Thought, can any true idea of the Divine

Wisdom have been formed. Indeed a time will come for the student when

the gratification of the senses will actually cause pain. It may be

ushered in for one through the sense of sight, when the most beautiful

scenery of earth, and the most perfect combinations of mountain wood

and water only accentuate by their faint reflex the passionate desire

for that land which no eye hath seen, that land which no eye can see.

Or the symphonies of earthly music which once enthralled the soul may

raise the longing for the song of the celestial choir to that ecstatic

point where it becomes unrecognisable from pain. And so the student is

driven inward to find at last his refuge in pure Thought, and he begins

to perceive that the Eternal World of ideas is the only real World, the

only one in which pure Being is to be found, and that this phenomenal

existence is indeed but the circling of the nets of delusion, the

restless tossing of the false salt waves of sense which reward “with

droughts that double thirst” the deluded souls that float on them.

The more the student lives in this ideal world, the more will he find

that the association with those whose interests are exclusively centred

on earthly things becomes repugnant to him, and that even the calls of

duty to descend from the tranquil heights of Thought, to the jarring

discord of action in the world, are responded to with increasing pain,

though duty in such cases is likely to be in process of changing her

sphere of action. When the inner struggles of one still bound by ties

of earth suggest such thoughts as these, surely the isolation from

contact with the rude world of the most spiritual men, those who have

achieved the sublime heights of Mahatmaship, is no longer a thing to

wonder at, but becomes apparent as an absolute necessity.

The desires above referred to of seeing the invisible, and realizing

the divine, will probably if practised continuously enough, and with

sufficient intensity, be the prelude to some partial lifting of the

veil, when the ecstatic may reap in a moment of beatific vision more

than he ever dreamed of, and receive accretion of strength for the

coming years, though this is more likely to be the immediate reward

of some supreme self-devotion whether in act or thought, and when the

words of Krishna, “near to renunciation—very near—dwelleth eternal

peace” will flash upon the soul as truth that requires no word of

mortal man to give it authority.

But woe to the man who unduly cultivates his spiritual faculties

without being a complete master of his lower nature—the beast below

will turn and rend him some day—the little bit of lust unconquered may

be the means of his complete undoing. For as his astral consciousness

develops his whole being intensifies, including the small unconquered

part of his physical nature, which he will then have to fight upon

the Astral plane, in far more terrible struggle than had he conquered

on the physical. It becomes in fact what is symbolically known as the

“Dweller on the threshold” that has to be fought and conquered before

the neophyte can aspire to gain the first glimmering of vision on

the true spiritual plane. For it must always be remembered that our

nature is threefold, “body, soul and spirit” as the initiate St. Paul

expressed it, and until the personality has transferred all its forces

unto the soul plane, it cannot expect to attain to that of spirit.

From this it will be evident how necessary it is to live more and more

continuously in the Eternal Thought until all fleshly appetites and

desires of sense die off by sheer inanition.

The vague dreams with which life began, and which the child with

memories fresh from “that imperial palace whence he came” pictured

in a material way of a golden city with walls of jasper and with

gates of pearl, and into which no unclean thing was permitted to

enter, are lost for a while in the frenzied rush of youth and early

manhood, but maturer years bring them back with an added pathos and a

more spiritualized meaning. It is indeed the Golden city we all seek

for—“the city that hath foundations whose builder and whose maker is

God.”

PILGRIM.

[Illustration:]

HINDU SYMBOLISM.

IV.

AUM symbolized as in unison with the attributes of the Trimurti, as

the symbolic foundation of the elementary universe. This has a certain

connection with figures Nos. 1 and 2 and 3.

The idea is to represent the mystic body of Brahman (neuter) and the

ideal type of the Trimurti. The representation is of a four-handed

cloud picture. A wreath of clouds forms the outline of the head which

is without any tiara. Two suns indicate the eyes without lids, always

open. This symbolism is also found in the Hebrew books, _e. g._ the

Zohar. The nose and eyebrows are formed by a palm tree divided on the

top, in the centre. This tree was considered as androgynous. The mouth

is merely an opening in the clouds; from it emanate, four principal

rays, the four-worlds of the Kabbalah. AUM is winged, Brahman (neuter)

is not, for the latter is also AUM—Prana, the breath of the highest

life and mystic carrier of the Will of Brahman (neuter). AUM is the

bird of the Brahman Desire or Wish.

The four hands of AUM are holding the architypes of the four elements,

fire, water, air, earth, in their height and depth. The lower are

supporting the Himalayah Mountains, the mountains of the gods. From

which comes the German Himmel _i. e._ Heaven. The linga yoni is shown

as the symbol of all the creative and emanative powers which lie in

the mystic cloud garment of AUM. In this figure are nearly all the

principal symbols of the Brahmanical religious metaphysics.

The bond which unites Prakriti to Brahman (neuter) is Prana, the

subtile body of Brahman, the form of the Being, the divine breath, the

principle of the organism, the respiration so to say, of the Deity; in

Sanscrit it also means “breath of man,” more correctly it is AUM, the

first form of the creator, the Sun engendered before Time, the first

Word (the Logos) which went from Its mouth, the ‘Hokhmah or Wisdom of

the Kabbalah, when It prepared Its work, the creative Word. Prana and

AUM are confounded in Maya, and as it, they have formed the Cow. AUM is

the son of Maya as he is the son of Brahman (neuter), because Maya is

Brahman. AUM is the first born Word or Logos of the Deity, the Memrah

of the Jews, the Honover of the Persians, the origin of the Vedas. It

has revealed and manifested all the emanated things, the so-called

creation. It appeared before all things, and contains all qualities,

all the elements, and is the name and body of Brahman (neuter), and

consequently as infinite as It. The Will, Desire, Word is the master

architect and creator of all the things. Brahma meditating upon the

divine Word, therein found the primitive water, the common bond of

all the creatures, the primitive fire, and the Trimurti of the Vedas,

also the worlds and universal harmony of all the things. The image of

AUM is the Cow, which is also a symbol of the universe. The universe

was concealed and at first was hidden under the waters, and the waters

were in Atma. These waters are those without any shores, all that which

exists is water, and the water and AUM make but one; these primitive

waters are the sea of Maya, the celestial ocean of all existence.

There are to be found further in this symbolical picture many other

suggestions flowing from the Ancient Aryan or Hindu system. That system

is believed to contain in germ all the others which have since arisen,

as: the Hermetic, the Jewish, the Christian and others. Space, however,

forbids a more extended explanation at present, and the student is

recommended to study the four which have appeared in this magazine.

ISAAC MYER.

THROUGH THE GATES OF GOLD.

The most notable book for guidance in Mysticism which has appeared

since _Light on the Path_ was written has just been published under

the significant title of “Through the Gates of Gold.”[185] Though the

author’s name is withheld, the occult student will quickly discern that

it must proceed from a very high source. In certain respects the book

may be regarded as a commentary on _Light on the Path_. The reader

would do well to bear this in mind. Many things in that book will be

made clear by the reading of this one, and one will be constantly

reminded of that work, which has already become a classic in our

literature. Through the Gates of Gold is a work to be kept constantly

at hand for reference and study. It will surely take rank as one of the

standard books of Theosophy.

The “Gates of Gold” represent the entrance to that realm of the soul

unknowable through the physical perceptions, and the purpose of

this work is to indicate some of the steps necessary to reach their

threshold. Through its extraordinary beauty of style and the clearness

of its statement it will appeal to a wider portion of the public than

most works of a Theosophical character. It speaks to the Western World

in its own language, and in this fact lies much of its value.

Those of us who have been longing for some thing “practical” will find

it here, while it will probably come into the hands of thousands who

know little or nothing of Theosophy, and thus meet wants deeply felt

though unexpressed. There are also doubtless many, we fancy, who will

be carried far along in its pages by its resistless logic until they

encounter something which will give a rude shock to some of their old

conceptions, which they have imagined as firmly based as upon a rock—a

shock which may cause them to draw back in alarm, but from which they

will not find it so easy to recover, and which will be likely to set

them thinking seriously.

The titles of the five chapters of the book are, respectively, “The

Search for Pleasure,” “The Mystery of Threshold,” “The Initial Effort,”

“The Meaning of Pain,” and “The Secret of Strength.” Instead of

speculating upon mysteries that lie at the very end of man’s destiny,

and which cannot be approached by any manner of conjecture, the work

very sensibly takes up that which lies next at hand, that which

constitutes the first step to be taken if we are ever to take a second

one, and teaches us its significance. At the outset we must cope with

sensation and learn its nature and meaning. An important teaching of

_Light on the Path_ has been misread by many. We are not enjoined to

kill out sensation, but to “kill out _desire_ for sensation,” which

is something quite different “Sensation, as we obtain it through the

physical body, affords us all that induces us to live in that shape,”

says this work. The problem is, to extract the meaning which it holds

for us. That is what existence is for. “If men will but pause and

consider what lessons they have learned from pleasure and pain, much

might be guessed of that strange thing which causes these effects.”

“The question concerning results seemingly unknowable, that concerning

the life beyond the Gates,” is presented as one that has been

asked throughout the ages, coming at the hour “when the flower of

civilization had blown to its full, and when its petals are but slackly

held together,” the period when man reaches the greatest physical

development of his cycle. It is then that in the distance a great

glittering is seen, before which many drop their eyes bewildered and

dazzled, though now and then one is found brave enough to gaze fixedly

on this glittering, and to decipher something of the shape within it.

“Poets and philosophers, thinkers and teachers, all those who are the

‘elder brothers of the race’—have beheld this sight from time to time,

and some among them have recognized in the bewildering glitter the

outlines of the Gates of Gold.”

Those Gates admit us to the sanctuary of man’s own nature, to the place

whence his life-power comes, and where he is priest of the shrine

of life. It needs but a strong hand to push them open, we are told.

“The courage to enter them is the courage to search the recesses of

one’s own nature without fear and without shame. In the fine part, the

essence, the flavor of the man, is found the key which unlocks those

great Gates.”

The necessity of killing out the sense of separateness is profoundly

emphasized as one of the most important factors in this process. We

must divest ourselves of the illusions of the material life. “When

we desire to speak with those who have tried the Golden Gates and

pushed them open, then it is very necessary—in fact it is essential—to

discriminate, and not bring into our life the confusions of our sleep.

If we do, we are reckoned as madmen, and fall back into the darkness

where there is no friend but chaos. This chaos has followed every

effort of man that is written in history; after civilization has

flowered, the flower falls and dies, and winter and darkness destroy

it.” In this last sentence is indicated the purpose of civilization. It

is the blossoming of a race, with the purpose of producing a certain

spiritual fruit; this fruit having ripened, then the degeneration of

the great residuum begins, to be worked over and over again in the

grand fermenting processes of reincarnation. Our great civilization

is now flowering and in this fact we may read the reason for the

extraordinary efforts to sow the seed of the Mystic Teachings wherever

the mind of man may be ready to receive it.

In the “Mystery of Threshold,” we are told that “only a man who has

the potentialities in him both of the voluptuary and the stoic has any

chance of entering the Golden Gates. He must be capable of testing

and valuing to its most delicate fraction every joy existence has to

give; and he must be capable of denying himself all pleasure, and that

without suffering from the denial.”

The fact that the way is different for each individual is finely set

forth in “The Initial Effort,” in the words that man “may burst the

shell that holds him in darkness, tear the veil that hides him from the

eternal, at any moment where it is easiest for him to do so; and most

often this point will be where he least expects to find it.” By this we

may see the uselessness of laying down arbitrary laws in the matter.

The meaning of those important words, “All steps are necessary to make

up the ladder,” finds a wealth of illustration here. These sentences

are particularly pregnant: “Spirit is not a gas created by matter,

and we cannot create our future by forcibly using one material agent

and leaving out the rest. Spirit is the great life on which matter

rests, as does the rocky world on the free and fluid ether; whenever we

can break our limitations we find ourselves on that marvellous shore

where Wordsworth once saw the gleam of the gold.” Virtue, being of the

material life, man has not the power to carry it with him, “yet the

aroma of his good deeds is a far sweeter sacrifice than the odor of

crime and cruelty.”

“To the one who has lifted the golden latch the spring of sweet waters,

the fountain itself whence all softness arises, is opened and becomes

part of his heritage. But before this can be reached a heavy weight

has to be lifted from the heart, an iron bar which holds it down and

prevents it from arising in its strength.”

The author here wishes to show that there is sweetness and light in

occultism, and not merely a wide dry level of dreadful Karma, such as

some Theosophists are prone to dwell on. And this sweetness and light

may be reached when we discover the iron bar and raising it shall

permit the heart to be free. This iron bar is what the Hindus call “the

knot of the heart!” In their scriptures they talk of unloosing this

knot, and say that when that is accomplished freedom is near. But what

is the iron bar and the knot? is the question we must answer. It is the

astringent power of self—of egotism—of the idea of separateness. This

idea has many strongholds. It hold its most secret court and deepest

counsels near the far removed depths and centre of the heart. But it

manifests itself first, in that place which is nearest to our ignorant

preceptions, where we see it first after beginning the search. When

we assault and conquer it there it disappears. It has only retreated

to the next row of outworks where for a time it appears not to our

sight, and we imagine it killed, while it is laughing at our imaginary

conquests and security. Soon again we find it and conquer again, only

to have it again retreat. So we must follow it up if we wish to grasp

it at last in its final stand just near the “kernel of the heart”.

There it has become an “iron bar that holds down the heart”, and there

only can the fight be really won. That disciple is fortunate who is

able to sink past all the pretended outer citadels and seize at once

this _personal devil_ who holds the bar of iron, and there wage the

battle. If won there, it is easy to return to the outermost places and

take them by capitulation. This is very difficult, for many reasons.

It is not a mere juggle of words to speak of this trial. It is a

living tangible thing that can be met by any real student. The great

difficulty of rushing at once to the centre lies in the unimaginable

terrors which assault the soul on its short journey there. This being

so it is better to begin the battle on the outside in just the way

pointed out in this book and _Light on the Path_, by testing experience

and learning from it.

In the lines quoted the author attempts to direct the eyes of a very

materialistic age to the fact which is an accepted one by all true

students of occultism, that the true heart of a man-which is visibly

represented by the muscular heart—is the focus point for spirit, for

knowledge, for power; and that from that point the converged rays begin

to spread out fan-like, until they embrace the Universe. So it is the

Gate. And it is just at that neutral spot of concentration that the

pillars and the doors are fixed. It is beyond it that the glorious

golden light burns, and throws up a “burnished glow.” We find in this

the same teachings as in the Upanishads. The latter speaks of “the

ether which is within the heart,” and also says that we must pass

across that ether.

“The Meaning of Pain” is considered in a way which throws a great

light on the existence of that which for ages has puzzled many learned

men. “Pain arouses, softens, breaks, and destroys. Regarded from a

sufficiently removed standpoint, it appears as a medicine, as a knife,

as a weapon, as a poison, in turn. It is an implement, a thing which

is used, evidently. What we desire to discover is, who is the user;

what part of ourselves is it that demands the presence of this thing so

hateful to the rest?”

The task is, to rise above both pain and pleasure and unite them to

our service. “Pain and pleasure stand apart and separate, as do the

two sexes; and it is in the merging, the making the two into one, that

joy and deep sensation and profound peace are obtained. Where there is

neither male nor female, neither pain nor pleasure, there is the god in

man dominant; and then is life real.”

The following passage can hardly fail to startle many good people:

“Destiny, the inevitable, does indeed exist for the race and for the

individual; but who can ordain this save the man himself? There is no

clew in heaven or earth to the existence of any ordainer other than

the man who suffers or enjoys that which is ordained.” But can any

earnest student of Theosophy deny, or object to this? Is it not a

pure statement of the law of Karma? Does it not agree perfectly with

the teaching of the Bhagavat-Gita? There is surely no power which

sits apart like a judge in court, and fines us or rewards us for this

misstep or that merit; it is we who shape, or ordain, our own future.

God is not denied. The seeming paradox that a God exists within each

man is made clear when we perceive that our separate existence is an

illusion; the physical, which makes us separate individuals, must

eventually fall away, leaving each man one with all men, and with God,

who is the Infinite.

And the passage which will surely be widely misunderstood is that in

“The secret of strength.” “Religion holds a man back from the path,

prevents his stepping forward, for various very plain reasons. First,

it makes the vital mistake of distinguishing between good and evil.

Nature knows no such distinctions.” Religion is always man-made.

It cannot therefore be the whole truth. It is a good thing for the

ordinary and outside man, but surely it will never bring him to the

Gates of Gold. If religion be of God how is it that we find that same

God in his own works and acts violating the precepts of religion?

He kills each man once in life; every day the fierce elements and

strange circumstances which he is said to be the author of, bring on

famine, cold and innumerable untimely deaths; where then, in The True,

can there be any room for such distinctions as right and wrong? The

disciple, must as he walks on the path, abide by law and order, but

if he pins his faith on any religion whatever he will stop at once,

and it makes no matter whether he sets up Mahatmas, Gods, Krishna,

Vedas or mysterious acts of grace, each of these will stop him and

throw him into a rut from which even heavenly death will not release

him. Religion can only teach morals and ethics. It cannot answer the

question “what am I?” The Buddhist ascetic holds a fan before his eyes

to keep away the sight of objects condemned by his religion. But he

thereby gains no knowledge, for that part of him which is affected by

the improper sights has to be known by the man himself, and it is by

experience alone that the knowledge can be possessed and assimilated.

The book closes gloriously, with some hints that have been much needed.

Too many, even of the sincerest students of occultism, have sought

to ignore that one-half of their nature, which is here taught to be

necessary. Instead of crushing out the animal nature, we have here

the high and wise teaching that we must learn to fully understand the

animal and subordinate it to the spiritual. “The god in man, degraded,

is a thing unspeakable in its infamous power of production. The animal

in man, elevated, is a thing unimaginable in its great powers of

service and of strength,” and we are told that our animal self is a

great force, the secret of the old-world magicians, and of the coming

race which Lord Lytton foreshadowed. “But this power can only be

attained by giving the god the sovereignty. Make your animal ruler over

your self, and he will never rule others.”

This teaching will be seen to be identical with that of the closing

words of “The Idyll of the White Lotus”: “He will learn how to expound

spiritual truths, and to enter into the life of his highest self, and

he can learn also to hold within him the glory of that higher self,

and yet to retain life upon this planet so long as it shall last, if

need be; to retain life in the vigor of manhood, till his entire work

is completed, and he has taught the three truths to all who look for

light.”

There are three sentences in the book which ought to be imprinted in

the reader’s mind, and we present them inversely:

“Secreted and hidden in the heart of the world and the heart of man is

the light which can illumine all life, the future and the past.”

“On the mental steps of a million men Buddha passed through the Gates

of Gold; and because a great crowd pressed about the threshold he was

able to leave behind him words which prove that those gates will open.”

“This is one of the most important factors in the development of

man, the recognition—profound and complete recognition—of the law of

universal unity and coherence.”

CONSIDERATIONS ON MAGIC.

We hear a good deal nowadays and are likely to hear still more of

occult science. In this regard we may as well accept the inevitable.

All things have their day, and all things revolve in cycles; they come

and go, and come again, though never twice the same. Even our very

thoughts conform to this universal law. The life, the teachings, and

the fate of Pythagoras are involved in mystery, but the fate of the

schools which he established and of the followers who succeeded him

are matters of history. The slaughter of the Magi stands over against

the abuses and abominations which were perpetrated in their name, and

doubtless by many styling themselves Magicians.

It is not the object of this brief paper to attempt to define

magic, or elucidate occult Science as such, but rather to suggest a

few considerations which are of vital import at the present time,

equally important to those who utterly deny to magic any more than an

imaginative basis, as to those who convinced of its existence as a

science, are, or are to become investigators. In both the publications

and conversations of the day, frequently occur the expressions “black

magic,” and “white magic” and those who follow these studies are

designated as followers of the “_left hand path_,” or the “_right

hand path_“. It ought to be understood that up to a certain point all

students of magic, or occultism, journey together. By and by is reached

_a place where two roads meet_, or where the common path divides, and

the _awful voice from the silence_, heard only in the recesses of the

individual soul utters the stern command: ”_Choose ye this day whom ye

will serve._” Instead of black and white magic, read, black and white

_motive_.

The student of occultism is rushing on his destiny, but up to a certain

point that destiny is in his own hands, though he is constantly shaping

his course, freeing his soul from the trammels of sense and self, or

becoming entangled in the web, which, with warp and woof will presently

clothe him as with a garment without a seam.

If early in the race he finds it difficult to shake off his chains, let

him remember that at every step they grow more and more tyrannical,

and often before the goal is reached where the ways divide, the battle

is lost or won, and the decision there is only a matter of form. That

decision once made is irrevocable, or so nearly so that no exception

need be made. Man lives at once in two worlds: the natural and the

spiritual, and as in the natural plane he influences his associates,

and is in turn influenced by them, so let him not imagine that in the

spiritual plane he is alone. This will be a fatal mistake for the

dabbler in magic, or the student in occultism. Throughout this vast

universe, the good will seek the good, and the evil the evil, each will

be unconsciously _drawn to its own kind_.

But when man faces his destiny in full consciousness of the issues

involved, as he must before the final decision is reached, he will

be no longer unconscious of these influences, but will recognize his

companions: companions, alas! no longer, _Masters_ now, inhuman,

pitiless; and the same law of attraction which has led him along the

tortuous path, unveils its face, and by affinity of evil, the slave

stands in the presence of his master, and the fiends that have all

along incited him to laugh at the miseries of his fellow men, and

trample under his feet every kindly impulse, every tender sympathy,

now make the measureless hells within his own soul resound with their

laughter at him, the poor deluded fool whose selfish pride and ambition

have stifled and at last obliterated his humanity.

Blind indeed is he who cannot see why those who are in possession of

arcane wisdom, hesitate in giving it out to the world, and when in the

cycles of time its day has come, they put forth the only doctrine which

has power to save and bless, UNIVERSAL BROTHERHOOD, with all that the

term implies.

There may be those who have already in this new era, entered the

left-hand road. But now as of old, “by their works ye shall know them”.

To labor with them is in vain. Selfishness, pride and lust for power

are the signs by which we may know them. They may not at once cast

off disguise, and they will never deceive the true Theosophist. They

can nevertheless deceive to their ruin the ignorant, the curious, the

unwary, and it is for such as these that these lines are penned, and

the worst of it is, that these poor deluded souls, are led to believe

that no such danger exists, and this belief is fortified by the

so-called scientists, who are quoted as authority, and who ridicule

everything but rank materialism. Yet notwithstanding all this, these

simple souls flutter like moths around the flame till they are drawn

within the vortex. It is better a million times, that the proud, the

selfish and time-serving should eat, drink and be merry, and let

occultism alone, for these propensities unless speedily eradicated,

will bear fruit and ripen into quick harvests, and the wages thereof is

death, literally the “_second death_”.

The purpose of Theosophy is to eradicate these evil tendencies of man,

so that whether on the ordinary planes of daily life, or in the higher

occult realms, the Christ shall be lifted up, and draw all men unto him.

“Man’s inhumanity to man

Makes countless thousands mourn.”

The Christs of all the ages have preached this one doctrine: Charity

and Brotherhood of Man. To deny the law of charity is to deny the

Christ. The Theosophical Society is not responsible for unveiling to

the present generation the occult nature of man. Modern Spiritualism

had already done this; nor is the responsibility to be charged to the

Spiritualists, for these unseen forces had revealed themselves in the

fullness of time, and many millions had become convinced, many against

their wills, of the reality of the unseen universe. These things _are

here_, and neither crimination, or recrimination is of any use. The

responsibility therefore, rests entirely with the individual, as to

what use he makes of his opportunities, as to his purposes and aims,

and as he advances in his course, involved in the circle of necessity,

he influences whether he will or no, those whose spheres of life touch

at any point his own. _As ye sow, so shall ye also reap._ By and by the

cycle will close and both the evil and the good will return like bread

cast upon the waters. This is a law of all life.

Imagine not that they are weak and vacillating souls who enter the

left-hand road: Lucifer was once a prince of light, admitted to the

councils of the Most High. He fell through pride, and dragged downward

in his fall all who worshiped the demon pride. This is no foolish

fable, but a terrible tragedy, enacted at the gates of paradise, in

the face of the assembled universe, and reënacted in the heart of

man, the epitome of all. Only Infinite pity can measure the downfall

of such an one, only Infinite love disarm by annihilation, and so put

an end to unendurable woe, and that only when the cycle is complete,

the measure of iniquity balanced by its measure of pain. Occultism

and magic are not child’s-play, as many may learn to their sorrow, as

many visitants of dark circles have already and long ago discovered.

Better give dynamite to our children as a plaything, than Magic to

the unprincipled, the thoughtless, the selfish and ignorant. Let all

who have joined the Theosophical Society remember this, and search

their hearts before taking the first step in any magical formulary.

_The motive determines all._ Occult power brings with it unknown and

unmeasured responsibility.

If in the secret councils of the soul, where no eye can see, and no

thought deceive that divine spark conscience, we are ready to forget

self, to forego pride, and labor for the well-being of man, then may

the upright man face his destiny, follow this guide and fear no evil.

Otherwise it were far better that a millstone were hung about his neck,

and he were cast into the depths of the sea.

PYTHAGORAS.

TEA TABLE TALK.

The Tea Table has had a sensation!

Do you remember the case of “Chalanka”? He was the “Fallen Idol,” in

Anstey’s book of that name, and played the very deuce with people

and bric-a-brac alike. There’s a deal of truth in that clever little

satire, and the author shows up the elementals quite correctly without

in the least suspecting it.

The Chalanka of the Tea Table arrived very demurely one winter

afternoon, per Adams Express, in a promising box which bore the mark

of a great china firm and contained as well, securely moored in its

harbor of cotton wool, a tea-pot which the Tea Table pronounced

“Adorable” were it not smashed. Nothing else was near this brittle

loveliness save and except Chalanka. To all appearances he was a

pencil sketch of the head of a young Brahmin of high caste, folded in

the typical turban. The drawing is powerful and the subtle sidelong

glance of the eyes to the extreme left has one peculiarity, viz: if

you come round from behind the picture on the extreme right, the eyes

meet you equally, and so from any position. I cannot escape that dark

and searching gaze. Still, one would say there was nothing dynamic

about a sketch, and yet the tea-pot arrived literally crushed to

pieces within its perfect casing, and the indignant ladies, with the

acumen of their sex, soon spotted Chalanka and held him responsible.

Presently I noticed that everyone had a more or less sidelong glance

in return for his, towards where he glowered from an étagère on which

we had put him, and in the course of the social hour I collected these

remarks upon him.

_The Professor_, sauntering up.—“H-m. Who have we here? The fellow has

a beautiful face and—the devil’s in it!”

_Sue._ “Goodness! who’s that? Makes me feel like when I step down in

the dark.”

_The Mother._ “That man’s face is not human.”

_The Widow._ “I have it! I wondered what Chalanka made me think

of. Don’t you know that thing in the Bible about ‘the serpent that

listeneth not to the voice of the charmer, charm he never so wisely?’”

(The Widow was wiser than she knew.)

_The Student._ “You ladies always go in for poetry. Now he looks to

me as if he said,—‘Get me if you can, my boy; if you don’t, _I’ll get

you_!’” Great sensation and nervous shivers from the ladies, followed

by instant demands for the lamp. The maid who brings it being observed

to fix a fascinated gaze on Chalanka, is asked what she thinks of him.

After a little urgency she replies. “That gentlemaen’s so sad, ain’t

he? I do’n’ know, he’s unnatr’al like. Seems like there’s somethin’ he

can’t get over.” Flings her apron over her head suddenly, and breaks

from the room. Apologizes later and says “nerves is in her family” but

always thereafter calls Chalanka “that gentleman,” as for instance;

“I couldn’t bring meself to dust that gentleman.” Or, “I knocked that

gentleman down but he ain’t hurt.”

Now the curious fact about the above remarks is this: A fellow F. T.

S. felt impelled to draw one night. As he did so, a mist gathered near

him, and gradually this Brahmin stood plainly before him, just as the

sketch shows him, with his magnetic gaze which affects everyone who

sees him. Many callers come into the room where the 5 by 8 drawing

stands inconspicuously, surrounded by all the Heaven-only-knows-what,

of modern decoration, but the Tea Table has yet to see the person who

does not comment upon Chalanka with a baffled sense of mystery. The

artist, a student well up in such matters and a man of unimpeachable

veracity, knew his strange visitor for an elemental who assumed

that shape to attract attention, the artist knowing many Hindus and

thinking often of them.

What do you suppose it is that tells the story of this silent,

watchful face, even to the incurious? Does some odic fluid inhere

in it, or does the clue rest with the akasic vibrations from it? In

consequence of its arrival, conversation has turned to coincidences,

and from this I have collected the following items of interest:

A. “I dreamed the other night that I had a talk with a fellow student;

next day he told me he dreamed same night—that I came and said: ‘I’m

tired of your nonsense; you must get serious.’ That was just what I

dreamed I had said to him myself. So when Father died; four times my

Brother and I dreamed on the same night that we saw Father and talked

with him on the same subject.”

C. “Three times I dreamed of getting a letter in a blue envelope,

each time I received one such next day. Dreamed one night of reading

_Sun_ paragraph that a new gun shield had come out to shield artillery

men. Next morning’s _Sun_ had the exact paragraph. I had never

previously thought of gun shields. Another night I dreamed I was in a

town all on fire. Next morning’s _Sun_ had an account of the burning

of Little Rock, Ark.”

W. had some second sight in his family. One night when twelve years

old, in Roumania, as he lay down in his bed, on looking towards the

foot of the bed saw in the bright gaslight the head and shoulders of

a beautiful child. He was very much frightened: his brother, who was

with him saw nothing. A few years later W. emigrated to the U. S.,

married later in life, and his first child, a boy, grew up to be the

exact image of the vision which had gone out of his mind until the

developed features of the child reproduced it. The same lad when 11,

desired a dictionary, but could not find it after much search. The

same night he dreamed that he got up and took it from a certain other

shelf: looked the next morning and there it was.

Several curious instances of thought sent ahead have also been sent in

to the Tea Table, where persons seemed to see some one they knew and

in a few moments met a member of that family.

Some one suggested that the sketch might represent a black magician,

(Dugpa) and the mother asks me what such a man really was. I had just

been reading a Hindu MSS on this subject and I was able to explain,

vide its able pages, as follows: As the Yogi is a person busied in

converting his lower nature into higher, so the Dugpa endeavors to

sink all his higher elements and changes them gradually into lower

ones. He might remain in our earth life until the last spark of

ethical nature or kindly emotion had been transmitted into love of

evil for its own sake. He would then presumably go to any of the lower

states from the eighth to the thirteenth. We know well, as Sinnett has

put it for us, that “nature sets no trap for any of her creatures,”

and so it happens that having been long immersed in the lower spheres,

our Dugpa might once more ascend into the realms of light and begin

to develop his higher nature. Many will ask whence the impulse is

derived, if the ethical nature was completely destroyed. From the

great law-giver; from Karma! In such a case, if there remained but a

small balance of good Karma in his favor, even though it were at the

very moment of his descent, he could necessarily rise again, (sooner

or later,) until he had exhausted it, for the _lex parsimonae_ of

nature gives every possible chance for the recovery of lost ground.

These opportunities are said to occur whenever one or more items of

the balance of good Karma have ripened, and often when the momentum of

the lower nature was for the time exhausted, and he could no longer

descend. In this view it will be seen that we only receive from time

to time a part of our deserts. The whole bulk of our Karma does not

fall at once, but is distributed throughout the series of lives.

When a man goes into the extreme of occultism unadvisedly however,

the resistance he encounters is apt to draw down the whole weight of

Karma at once. If the balance is in his favor then great is the power

for his benefit, otherwise he is crushed and fails. He has then an

additional opportunity of choice along with his race, when the race

period of choice occurs, as it will in the next round, we are told. In

the fourth chapter of the Koran occurs a confirmation of the occult

teaching as regards this distribution of deserts. “Covet not that

which God hath bestowed on some of you preferably to others. Unto the

men shall be given _a portion_ of what they shall have gained, and

unto the women shall be given _a portion_ of what they shall have

gained.”

“Well, Sir,” said the professor, “I should like to know the exact

rationale of this Karmic process. Why does a student professing

chelaship draw down the bulk of his Karma?”

“There are many who want to know quite as much as you do,” I replied.

“All they have to do is to study the operations of cyclic law for

themselves. And mind, if you dig for ore, you bring down other things

in the debris, while if a miner hands you a lump, you’re not much

more of a miner than you were at the start. You will find these laws

represent perfect, equilibrated Justice.”

“Humph! I’m rather like the man in a recent novel, who said: ‘who am

I that should yearn to deal out strict Justice? I never got it, thank

God!’”

The fact is, Justice is a gun too heavily loaded for the use of man;

its backward kick is more than I like to think of.

JULIUS.

POETICAL OCCULTISM.

DEAR EDITOR: The following Poetical Occultism may be of interest.

FROM THE FIRST CHAPTER OF THE “BANQUET” OF DANTE.

“As the Philosopher (Aristotle) has said at the beginning of

“Metaphysics,” all men naturally desire to know. The reason of this

may be, that everything by an impulse of its own nature, tends towards

perfection; therefore, since knowledge is the ultimate perfecting of

our soul, in the which consists our ultimate felicity, we are all by

nature filled with this desire. None the less are many deprived of

this most noble perfection, by divers causes, which, acting upon man

from within and from without, remove him from the estate of knowledge

* * * Manifest is it, therefore, to him who considereth well, that

there are but few who can attain to that estate desired of all, and

that almost innumerable are they who are forever famishing for this

food. Oh! blessed are those few that are seated at the table where the

bread of the angels is eaten, and miserable are they who feed in common

with the sheep! But because every man is by nature a friend to every

other man, and because every friend is grieved by the necessities of

him he loves; so they who are fed at so lofty a table, are not without

compassion toward them whom they see wandering in the pastures of the

brutes, and feeding upon acorns. And because compassion is the mother

of benevolence, therefore always liberally do they who know, share of

their great riches with the truly poor, and are like a living fountain,

whose waters slack the thirst of nature before named, (for knowledge).

And I, therefore, who do not sit at the blessed table, but have fled

from the pasture of the herd, and at the feet of those who are seated

there, gather up what they let fall, and who know the miserable life of

those whom I have left behind me, moved to mercy by the sweetness of

that which I have gained little by little, and not forgetting myself,

have reserved something for these wretched ones, which I have already,

and for some time, held before their eyes, making them thereby all the

more desirous of it.”

Yours,

K. H.

ROME, ITALY, _Nov., 1886_.

UNIVERSAL UNITY.

[READ AT A MEETING OF THE FIRST THEOSOPHICAL SOCIETY OF CINCINNATI, O.]

’Tis said they who the starry heavens watch

Spending their time in silent contemplation

And view the worlds and systems moving round

Become so filled with peace and perfect trust

That unto them life, death, grief, care and fear

Are almost naught. So, I, a long time past

Having passed my time in watching night by night

The stare move in their orbits; and my days

In making out their past and future course

One August night, while that the quiet moon

Flooded tree and bush, and vale and hill-top

Stream, and bank and spire and roof with light

And whistling and rustling leaves added

Their voices to the myriad sounds

Of insect life, fell fast asleep. And then

I saw the moon swinging slowly to and fro,

And round our Sun the earth and other satellites

Revolving ceaselessly. And as they moved

I heard a sweet melodious sound

And felt a soft and mellow light

And still I saw our Sun with other suns

All circling round one common central point

All these centres round some other centre circling.

The sound increased till all things seemed but sound

The light increased till all things seemed but light

The heat increased till all things seemed but heat

And then I felt my soul beat rapturously

Against the throbbing pulsing central life.

From thence I felt the light, the heat, the sound,

The life, the love, the peace pass out unceasingly.

From thence I knew all life to flow. And passing out

I knew all life was part of it, and it of life;

I knew that I was it, and it was I;

That sound and light, and life, and I and it were one

That life and death and tree and bush and stream

And bank and flower and seed and it are one

Then there passed into my soul, a perfect,

Great content. And rising from my sleep,

I passed into my life a happy man.

HENRY TURNER PATTERSON.

Copyright, 1887.]

* * * * *

A delicious fragrance spreads from the Leaders of the World over all

quarters, a fragrance by which, when the wind is blowing, all these

creatures are intoxicated.—_Saddharma-Pundarika._

OM.

FOOTNOTES:

[170] _Bagavad-Gita, ch. 15._

[171] Compare the “Elixir of Life” in _The Theosophist_.

[172] This has nothing whatever to do with so-called “stigmatization”:

the latter being merely the result of a strong imagination upon a weak

body.

[173] “That which was from the beginning.” etc.—John. Epistle I, i.

[174] I Cor. xv.

[175] _Light on the Path._

[176] Vedanta.

[177] It is known that in Ireland and other places, many peasants

possess words whose sound can thrill a man and make a horse

unmanageable. [ED.]

[178] Vedanta.

[179] _Light on the Path._

[180] See Fiske, Stuart, _et al._

[181] Emerson.

[182] On sound, P. 54.

[183] Vedanta.

[184] Idem.

[185] Through the Gates of Gold: a Fragment of Thought. Boston: Roberts

Brothers. 1887. Price, 50 cents.