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H. P. BLAVATSKY
A GREAT BETRAYAL
BY
ALICE LEIGHTON CLEATHER
One of Her Pupils
PRICE
_One Rupee, Fifty cents, or
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PUBLISHED BY
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CALCUTTA
1922
WORKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR.
=H. P. Blavatsky:=--_Her Life and Work for Humanity._ CALCUTTA: THACKER,
SPINK & CO., 1922.
=In Collaboration with Mrs. Laura Langford:=--_Helena Petrovna
Blavatsky. Personal Recollections by Old Friends._ New York, 1922.
=In Collaboration with Mr. Basil Crump:= _Richard Wagner's Music
Dramas._ Embodying Wagner's own interpretations based upon his studies
of Oriental Philosophy.
LONDON: METHUEN & CO., 4 VOLS.
H. P. BLAVATSKY
"Behold the truth before you! a clean life, an open mind, a pure heart,
an eager intellect, an unveiled spiritual perception, a brotherliness
for one's co-disciple, a readiness to give and receive advice and
instruction, a loyal sense of duty to the Teacher, a willing obedience
to the behests of TRUTH, once we have placed our confidence in, and
believe that Teacher to be in possession of it; a courageous endurance
of personal injustice, a brave declaration of principles, a valiant
defence of those who are unjustly attacked, and a constant eye to the
ideal of human progression and perfection which the secret science
(_Gupta Vidya_) depicts--these are the golden stairs up the steps of
which the learner may climb to the Temple of Divine Wisdom. Say this to
those who have volunteered to be taught by you."
Letter to H. P. B. from her Master
(concerning her E. S. students.)
H. P. BLAVATSKY
A GREAT BETRAYAL
BY
ALICE LEIGHTON CLEATHER
_One of Her Pupils_
_Published by_
THACKER, SPINK & CO
CALCUTTA
1922
"Tell them ...; As pure water poured into the scavenger's bucket is
befouled and unfit for use, so is divine truth when poured into the
consciousness of a Sensualist.... Observe, that the first of the steps
of gold which mount towards the Temple of Truth is--A CLEAN LIFE. This
means a purity of body, and a still greater purity of mind, heart and
spirit."
Letter to H. P. B. from her Master
(concerning her E. S. students.)
CONTENTS.
PAGE
FOREWORD vii
INTRODUCTORY 1
MR. WILLIAM KINGSLAND ON THE CRISIS OF 1906 7
M. M. SCHURÉ AND LÉVY ON THE CRISIS OF 1913 11
MRS. BESANT'S "RETURN OF THE CHRIST" 15
FUNDAMENTAL CAUSES: SOME OCCULT METHODS 23
H. P. BLAVATSKY ON TRUE OCCULTISM 31
MRS. BESANT'S RESPONSIBILITY AND THE MADRAS LAW-SUITS 39
THE CENTRAL HINDU COLLEGE: AN INDIAN CRITICISM 43
MRS. BESANT'S LATEST ASSERTIONS AND CLAIMS EXAMINED 51
TAMPERING WITH H. P. BLAVATSKY'S WRITINGS 71
"ANNIE BESANT'S CORRUPTION OF THE SECRET DOCTRINE" 76
THE TRUTH ABOUT THE E. S. COUNCIL AND THE INNER GROUP 83
CONCLUSION 89
ADDENDUM.
THE AUSTRALIAN CRISIS 92
AN INDICTMENT OF MRS. BESANT BY A RESIGNING MEMBER OF
HER E. S. 95
BIBLIOGRAPHY 97
"There is a very, very ancient maxim, far older than the time of the
Romans or the Greeks.... It is a maxim all of them ought to
remember--and live accordingly ... a sound and pure mind requires a
sound and pure body. Bodily purity every adept takes precautions to
keep.... Most of them know this.... But though they have been repeatedly
told of this _sine qua non_ rule on the Path of Theosophy and
_Chelaship_, how few of them have given attention to it.... Behold, how
many of them are ... debauchees, GUILTY OF SECRET IMMORALITY in more
than one form.... Though such a person with any of the faults as above
declared [others are named] should fill the world with his charities,
and make his name known throughout every nation, he would make no
advancement in the practical occult sciences, but be continually
slipping backward. The 'six and ten transcendental virtues,' the
Paramitas[1], are not for full grown Yogis and priests alone, but for
all those who would enter the 'Path.'"
Letter to H. P. B. from her Master
(concerning her E. S. students.)
FOOTNOTES:
[1] _See "The Voice of the Silence," by H. P. Blavatsky._
FOREWORD.
This Protest has been undertaken at the earnest and repeated requests of
Theosophical friends of long standing. They feel strongly that the time
has come for one of H. P. Blavatsky's old pupils, who was a member of
her Inner Group, to demonstrate as clearly as possible that the
teachings promulgated for nearly twenty years past by the present
leaders of the "Theosophical Society" have departed more and more from
H. P. B.'s, and are now their direct antithesis, particularly on the
fundamental question of sex morality.
Since Mr. G. R. S. Mead, one of my fellow-members of the Inner Group,
spoke out at the Leadbeater Inquiry of 1906, and resigned, no other
surviving member, so far as I have been able to ascertain, has attempted
to stem the awful and ever increasing tide of horror and delusion, that
is, engulfing--one might almost say _has_ engulfed--Mrs. Besant's
Society. If Mr. Mead could say in 1906;--"We stand on the brink of an
abyss," what is to be said now? The enquiries and researches I have
undertaken to enable me to write this pamphlet have revealed the present
state of things to be far worse than I could have imagined possible.
From the time I left Mrs. Besant in 1895 and Mrs. Tingley in 1899, I
have been out of touch with these two movements, each calling itself
"theosophical" and each leader claiming to be H. P. B.'s "successor."
This is the reason why I have hitherto kept silent; in fact, it was not
until I came to live in India in 1918, after spending some years on the
Continent, and met some of the members--both Indian and European--who
had left Mrs. Besant in more recent years, that I learnt of the
appalling developments since she became President and installed the sex
pervert Leadbeater as supreme esoteric teacher.
I feel that I should be failing in my duty, and false to the solemn
Pledges I have taken, if I did not now do my utmost to clear H. P. B.'s
name from these horrible associations, and demonstrate that they have
nothing whatever to do with her Masters (the Trans-Himâlayan
Brotherhood) or Their Esoteric doctrine.
I therefore PROTEST with all my strength, and _in Their sacred Names_,
against what is to me a desecration and a blasphemy.
_September, 1922._
A. L. C.
_Whom the gods would destroy they first make mad._
INTRODUCTORY.
For the past fifteen years, despite repeated scandals, exposures, and
even the damning evidence produced in various court cases, Mrs. Besant
still persists in her blind and fanatical support of the sex pervert and
pseudo-occultist C. W. Leadbeater, and the promulgation of his delusive,
immoral, and poisonous teachings among the members of the Theosophical
Society she rules, and the public at large, to whom she is known chiefly
as an able speaker and an astute politician. Goaded by a revival of the
well-known evidence against Mr. Leadbeater, and a severe criticism of
her own actions, Mrs. Besant published in her official organ
(_Theosophist_, March, 1922.) an article entitled "Whom Will Ye Serve?"
and a long Supplement addressed to the members, reiterating her support
of Mr. Leadbeater, and making statements in justification of him and
herself that call imperatively for a dispassionate review of the history
of this ill-omened partnership, and the strongest possible protest
against the complete stultification and perversion of H. P. Blavatsky's
life-work and teaching that it involves.
I have no personal quarrel with Mrs. Besant, whose brilliant
intellectual gifts we all so much admired in the early days, and who
accomplished such splendid work for the Cause during H. P. Blavatsky's
lifetime. I had already been a member of the Society for four years when
Mrs. Besant joined in 1889; and as we both subsequently became members
of the Inner Group of H. P. B.'s personal pupils, I feel I am in a
position to review the facts, and entitled to utter this protest. In
fact, I can no longer remain silent in the face of so much that is
abhorrent to every true Theosophist, to every devoted follower of H. P.
Blavatsky, her Masters, and Their teachings.
In a private letter to Mr. Judge, in or about 1887, H. P. B. writes: "I
am the mother and creator of the Society; it has my magnetic fluid....
Therefore I alone and to a degree ... can serve as a lightning conductor
of Karma for it. I was asked whether I was willing, when on the point of
dying--and I said 'Yes'--for it was the only means to save it. Therefore
I consented to live...." Obviously, the only possible conclusion to be
drawn from this is that, when in 1891 H. P. Blavatsky passed away (or
rather was "recalled") nine years before the limit of time within which
the Masters' help could be given,[2] it was because They saw that the T.
S. had definitely failed, that it could no longer be kept alive.
A long and, in this connection, very important letter was written by H.
P. Blavatsky in 1890 "To my Brothers in Aryavarta," giving the real
reason why she did not return to India. Among other significant
statements which she makes (_Theosophist_, January, 1922.), there is one
which shows that she must clearly have foreseen the ultimate
disintegration of the Society, which occurred in 1895. Writing of the
shameful way in which she was thrown overboard, like a second Jonah, by
Colonel Olcott and the T. S. Council at Adyar in their cowardly panic
during the crisis of 1884-85, H. P. B. says: "It was during that time
... that the seeds of all future strifes, and--let me say at
once--_disintegration of the Theosophical Society_ [Italics mine.--A. L.
C.] were planted by our enemies.... In a letter received from Damodar in
1886 [He had been called by his Master to Tibet the previous year.--A.
L. C.] he notified me that the Masters' influence was becoming with
every day weaker at Adyar." Further on in the letter H. P. B. again
refers to Adyar, and to an invitation to return to India which "came too
late ... nor can I, if I would be true to my life-pledge and vows, now
live at the Headquarters _from which the Masters and Their spirit are
virtually banished. The presence of Their portraits will not help; They
are a dead letter._" [Italics mine. Yet Mrs. Besant asks us to believe
that They returned when she was elected President in 1907, and even
nominated her!--A. L. C.]
In the same letter H. P. B. says that she was pledged never to reveal
"the whole truth" about the Masters to anyone, "excepting to those who
like Damodar, had been finally selected and called by Them." She also
speaks of him as "that one future Adept who has now the prospect of
becoming one day a Mahatma, Kali Yuga notwithstanding." It is he again
of whom she spoke four years earlier, when she wrote: "During the eleven
years of the existence of the Theosophical Society I have known, out of
the seventy-two regularly accepted _chelas_ on probation and the
hundreds of lay candidates--only _three_ who have not hitherto failed,
and _one only_ who had a full success." ("The Theosophical Mahatmas."
_Path_, December, 1886.) Damodar is the only _chela_ she ever spoke of
as a "full success" in her lifetime; and it is worthy of special note
that he was a high caste Brahmin who did not hesitate to give up caste
and become a Buddhist (so Colonel Olcott states).
In the late spring Mrs. Besant paid a hasty visit to Australia, whither
her "brother-initiate" had to flee from India some time since, as
previously from London, Paris, and America. The cause is always the
same; scandals inevitably arise, and Australia has proved no exception.
Mr. Leadbeater is a "Bishop" of the "Liberal Catholic Church," an
anomalous body warmly supported and encouraged within and without the T.
S. by Mrs. Besant. Other of its bishops have incurred similar odium and
a "priest" has quite recently confessed in writing and implicated the
"Presiding Bishop" and others. It has been stated that all these men are
being watched by the police, who are only waiting to secure enough
evidence. Matters cannot go on much longer like this; and a pamphlet
published at New York last February says that "with difficulty a delay
of a few months has been obtained in a pending arraignment and exposure
in the Public Press in America." When it comes it will be a far graver
indictment than that which precipitated the 'Besant _v._ Judge' crisis
in 1894-95, and rent the T. S. in twain. _Then_ Mrs. Besant accused her
colleague Mr. Judge of "giving a misleading material form to messages
received psychically from the Master in various ways ..." (_Enquiry_ at
London, July, 1894); but _now_ she is deliberately condoning, if not
actually supporting, something far worse which was investigated and
found true by a T. S. committee of enquiry in 1906.[3]
For those unfamiliar with the events succeeding H. P. Blavatsky's death
in 1891, I must add that those of us who supported Mr. Judge against
Mrs. Besant's charges came under the sway, after his death a year later,
of an equally masterful, able, and ambitious woman having very similar
characteristics and methods. This was Mrs. Katherine Tingley, formerly a
New York professional psychic and trance medium, from whose organisation
("The Universal Brotherhood") I resigned in 1899. Her activities are now
mainly confined to a colony in California.
A point to which I think attention has not hitherto been drawn is the
striking similarity in the fate which befell Mrs. Besant and Mr. Judge
respectively after the death of H. P. Blavatsky. Being left as the most
obvious leaders of the European and American Sections respectively
(neither of them were in England when she died), the E. S. Council
decided that they should carry on the Esoteric School as joint Outer
Heads in place of H. P. B., oblivious of the fact that one of them (Mrs.
Besant) was untrained, and both were unfit to fill such a high occult
office (see _post_ p. 86). This soon became evident when each in turn
fell an easy prey to external influences which first separated them, and
then disrupted the Society and E. S.
Among the old T. S. and E. S. papers now lying before me I find not a
few which throw a most illuminating light on Mrs. Besant's activities in
recent years. Before dealing with her latest statements I will quote
extracts from these papers in support and elucidation of the points I
wish to make, _viz_:--
(_a_) That under Mrs. Besant's guidance the T. S. has long
ceased to represent H. P. Blavatsky's teaching, or the thought
of its Founders.
(_b_) That it is now completely dominated by the deluded,
impure, and poisonous ideas of an acknowledged sex pervert, to
whom this unhappy and misguided woman believes and openly
declares herself to be bound by indissoluble and age-long ties.
(_c_) That in adopting and conniving at the promulgation of the
teachings of this man, and allowing him virtually to control
her Society, Mrs. Besant most impiously gives out that she is
acting under the orders of the Trans-Himâlayan Masters of
Wisdom, and H. P. Blavatsky's directions.
This last point (_c_) is the real gravamen of my Protest. It would be of
relative unimportance--Mrs. Besant having already wrecked the Society in
1895--that it had descended to the level of any existing sect, Christian
or other (as much a close corporation as the Adventists or New
Jerusalemites), had its two present leaders dropped the _title_, and
ceased to claim any connection with the "real Founders." But, on the
contrary, Mrs. Besant and Mr. Leadbeater use Their sacred names and
declare themselves to be under Their direct guidance. Such proceedings
merit the sternest possible moral condemnation in view of the facts.
FOOTNOTES:
[2] " ... there remain but a few years to the last hour of the
term--namely, till December the 31st, 1899. Those who will not have
profited by the opportunity (given to the world in every last quarter of
a century) ... will advance no further than the knowledge already
acquired. No Master of Wisdom from the East will himself appear or send
anyone to Europe or America after that period.... Such is the law, for
we are in _Kali-Yuga_--the Black Age--and the restrictions in this
cycle, the first 5,000 years of which will expire in 1897, are great and
almost insuperable." (H. P. Blavatsky in the "Book of Rules, E. S. T."
1888.)
[3] For later and fuller particulars from Australia, see Addendum.
Mr. William Kingsland on the Crisis of 1906.
The first of the old papers I shall quote from is by my old friend and
fellow-Councillor Mr. William Kingsland, author of _The Esoteric Basis
of Christianity_ and kindred works. He was one of the leading members in
the early days under H. P. B. who, when Mrs. Besant on securing the
Presidency after Colonel Olcott's death in 1907 reinstated Mr.
Leadbeater, resigned their membership. Mrs. Besant had reviewed a new
book by Mr. Kingsland, and took the opportunity to refer to his
resignation. Replying in "An Open Letter to Annie Besant" dated
December, 1909, he tells her:
You have dragged in a perfectly irrelevant, uncalled-for and
untrue statement which I cannot allow to pass unchallenged...."
The words I refer to are these: "We have here a very excellent
Theosophical book, with an evasion of all recognition of the
source whence the ideas are drawn. When Theosophy becomes
fashionable, how those who refuse to walk with her in the days
of scorning will crowd to claim her as theirs when she walks in
the sunshine amid applause!" Now these words convey the
implication, in the first place, that there is a connection
between the form in which my book is presented, and recent
events in the Theosophical Society which have led me as well as
many others, to sever our connection with that Society; and, in
the second place, that we now "refuse to walk with her"
because, forsooth, she is not now "fashionable," but "in the
days of scorning." Neither of these statements is true, and the
implication is most unworthy of you.... That, however, is a
small matter compared with the implication that I and others
have turned our backs on Theosophy for so unworthy a reason.
Let me ask you to look at the names of the old and tried
workers whom you have forced out of the Society by your
disastrous policy, and then ask yourself in the Great Presence
whether it is true that any of them have deserted Theosophy--or
rather the Theosophical Society--because it is less
"fashionable" now than it was in the old days when you and I
and these others stood side by side and fought the battle for
H. P. Blavatsky. Did any of us shirk obloquy then, and do you
really think we are less ready to face it now? It is one thing,
however, to incur obloquy for the sake of Truth, and quite
another thing to be asked to do it _in support of immoral
teachings_.... What I want to point out now more particularly,
and in the interest of true Theosophy, is, that you are now
making the grand mistake--one never made by H. P. Blavatsky--of
thinking, writing, and speaking as if Theosophy and the
Theosophical Society were one and the same thing, absoutely
identical; and that there can be no Theosophy in the world
without the Theosophical Society, and no Theosophists outside
of it.... You must know that in leaving the Theosophical
Society, the great majority of us at all events have not given
up Theosophy, even if we may feel compelled to teach it under
another name, and though we can no longer work with or through
the Theosophical Society, we are none the less carrying on the
great work which H. P. Blavatsky initiated.
But in the old days we did at least think that the Theosophical
Society stood for pure Theosophy and pure Morality. _We cannot
think or say this any longer._ The "Theosophy" of the
Theosophical Society is now a definite creed and dogma based
upon authoritative psychic pronouncements, from which those who
dare to differ are first of all squeezed out of office by the
President, and finally compelled to leave the Society, being
denounced in the strongest language as "persecutors" and
"haters." I am quite aware that all the time you are preaching
freedom of opinion; but that is one of the farcical aspects of
the _régime_ which you inaugurated.... Whatever you may preach,
it is now notorious that your practice has been the exact
reverse. You commenced by turning out the Vice-President for
daring to hold a different opinion from your own as to the
inception of the Society; and you then proceeded so to
manipulate matters that several old and tried officials who had
been in opposition to your pronouncements and policy, were
ousted from their positions as General Secretaries of
Sections.... Well, you succeeded in getting your own supporters
appointed--and in losing many hundreds of old members.
Doubtless you will now have complete control and be able to
mould the Society to your own will and liking, and train it to
"obedience" to your psychic authority and visions. At what
expense and sacrifice of principles you have already done this,
we all know. But let none imagine that this is the basis on
which H. P. Blavatsky founded the Society; or that it will thus
fulfil the mission for which it was intended; or that it can
thereby become other than _a narrow and exclusive sect_. And if
perchance your statement is true that the Theosophical
Sciety--which you so mistakenly identify with Theosophy--is now
"in the days of scorning," possibly even more than it was in
the old days; What and who is it that has made it so?
Is it not because the President and General Council have set
their seal and official condonation to a "theosophy" _which
countenances the grossest immorality_, and which can
advocate--as a means of "discharging [_sic_] thought-forms"
(see Van Hook's pamphlet)--a practice which you yourself once
characterised as being "when taught under the name of Divine
Wisdom, essentially earthly, sensual, devilish?" Yet it is thus
taught and justified--with an appeal to the laws of
reincarnation and _karma_--in Van Hook's pamphlet, which you
and the General Council have refused to repudiate, and have
thereby condoned.
And now, since you have had your own way, and have cleared the
Society of the elements of the so-called "hatred and
persecution"; can you not at least refrain from hitting behind
our backs? Nothing is sadder for your old friends and comrades
than to see you stoop to veiled insinuations, and even direct
untruths; missing no opportunity--not even in the review of a
book--of striking unjustly and falsely at those who have
recently been your opponents, and who have now no direct means
of answering you, or of refuting your statements within the
Society itself.
I have italicised a few passages which seem to be of special importance
as showing that, _thirteen years ago_, Mr. Leadbeater's sinister hand
had already grasped the Society and its infatuated President, and that
his vile and immoral teachings, supported by her, had driven out some of
the oldest and most clear-headed and clear-sighted of H. P. Blavatsky's
friends and pupils; among them Mr. G. R. S. Mead, one of the Leadbeater
Committee of Inquiry, who also resigned at the time Mrs. Besant became
President for the same reasons as those stated by Mr. Kingsland. The
"practice" to which he alludes in his Open Letter is of course now well
known to be that taught and advocated by Mr. Leadbeater, who claims that
in so doing he is acting on the advice and under the authority of one of
the Masters of Wisdom. Could a more terrible infamy be perpetrated!
M. M. Schuré and Lévy on the Crisis of 1913.
Let us see, however, what others have to say seven years later on the
state of the T. S. In 1913 another violent crisis convulsed this
miserable travesty of a Society that once stood for the highest
principles and ideals, but which even a Lake Harris might blush now to
be associated with. As before, it centred round the shocking perverter
of morals who had obtained complete ascendancy over Mrs. Besant. A book
entitled _Mrs. Besant and the Present Crisis in the Theosophical
Society_ was published in 1913 by M. Eugène Lévy, "with a Prefatory
Letter by M. Edouard Schuré," the well-known author of _The Great
Initiates_ and other mystical works. Writing to M. Charles Blech,
General Secretary of the French T. S., M. Schuré states that he feels
"compelled to retire officially from the T. S." and that it is his
"duty" to give his "reasons straightforwardly." After alluding to the
date (1907), when M. Blech had offered and he had accepted the honorary
membership in the Society, M. Schuré goes on to speak of Mrs. Besant, as
she had then appeared to him, in high terms, expressing the hope that
"the nobility of her past career" was an augury "that the T. S. would
continue in the broad way of tolerance, impartiality, _and veracity_
which forms an essential part of its programme." M. Schuré then
continues:--
Unfortunately things turned out otherwise. The primary cause of
this deviation lies in the close alliance of Mrs. Besant with
Mr. Leadbeater, a learned occultist, but of an unsettled
disposition and doubtful morality. After Mr. Leadbeater _had
been found guilty_ by an advisory Committee of the T.S. Mrs.
Besant publicly announced her reprobation of the educational
methods with which he was charged.... By an inconceivable
change of front she soon afterwards declared her intention of
bringing Mr. Leadbeater into the T.S. again and she
succeeded.... The excuses she gave for this recantation were
charity and pardon. _The real reason was that the President
needed Mr. Leadbeater for her occult investigations_, and that
this collaboration appeared to her necessary to her prestige.
To those who have followed her words and acts from that time
onwards, it is clearly manifest _that Mrs. Besant has fallen
under the formidable suggestive power of her dangerous
collaborator, and can only see, think and act under his
control_. The personality henceforward speaking through her is
... the questionable visionary, the skilful master of
suggestion who no longer dares to show himself in London,
Paris, or America, but in the obscurity of a summer-house at
Adyar governs the T. S. through its President. The ill-omened
consequences of this influence were soon to appear before the
world through the affair of Alcyone and the founding of the
Order of the Star in the East.... If a real Indian initiate, a
Brahmin or otherwise, of ripe age, had come to Europe on his
own responsibility or in the name of his Masters to teach his
doctrines, nothing would have been more natural or
interesting.... But it was not in this form that we beheld the
new apostle from Adyar. A young Indian, aged thirteen,
_initiated by Mr. Leadbeater_ ... is proclaimed and presented
to the European public as the future teacher of the new era.
Krishnamurti, now called Alcyone, has no other credentials than
his master's injunctions and Mrs. Besant's patronage. His
thirty-two previous incarnations are related at length, the
early ones going back to the Atlantean period. _These
narrations_, given as the result of Mr. Leadbeater's and Mrs.
Besant's visions, _are for the most part grotesquely puerile_,
and could convince no serious occultist. They are ostensibly
designed to prove that for twenty or thirty thousand years the
principal personages in the T. S. have been preparing for the
"Great Work" which is soon to be accomplished. In the course of
_their incarnations, which remind one of a newspaper novel_,
these personages are decorated with the great names of Greek
mythology, and with the most brilliant stars in the firmament.
During a meeting at Benares, Krishnamurti presenting
certificates to his followers, received honours like a divine
being, many persons present falling at his feet. He does not,
however, utter a word, but only makes a gesture of benediction,
prompted by Mrs. Besant. In reporting this scene Mr. Leadbeater
likens it to the descent of the Holy Ghost at Pentecost.
For this dumb prophet is founded the Order of the Star in the
East, which the whole world is invited to join, and of which he
is proclaimed the head ... this passive young prodigy, who has
not yet given the world the least proof of having any mission
at all [this is as true in 1922 as it was in 1913.--A. L. C.],
becomes henceforth the centre and cynosure of the T. S., the
symbol and sacred ark of _the orthodox faith at Adyar_. As to
the doctrine preached by Mrs. Besant, it rests on a perpetual
equivocation. She allows the English public at large, to whom
she speaks of the coming Christ, to believe that he is
identical with the Christ of the Gospels, whereas to her
intimates she states what Mr. Leadbeater teaches, and what he
openly proclaims in one of his books, _The Inner Life_--namely,
that the Christ of the Gospels never existed, and was an
invention of the monks of the second century. Such facts are
difficult to characterise. I will simply say that they are
saddening for all who, like myself, believed in the future of
the T. S., for they can only repel clear-sighted and sincere
minds.... In my eyes, one can no longer be an actual member of
the T. S. without implicitly approving the deeds and words of
the President, which flagrantly contradict the essential
principle of the Society--I mean _scrupulous and absolute
respect for truth_. For these reasons I regret that I must send
you my resignation as a member of the Theosophical Society.
The italics throughout the foregoing quotations are mine, and serve
again to emphasise essential points; points almost exactly similar to
those raised by Mr. Kingsland, the most serious being the condonation by
Mrs. Besant of immoral practices in a colleague whose collaboration, as
M. Schuré shrewdly adds, has become a necessity to her, and under whose
"formidable suggestive power" she has now completely fallen. If this was
true in 1913, what may not be said in 1922, when the intervening nine
years have given time for the growth and development of this deadly Upas
Tree? I use the simile advisedly, for this teaching _is_ a "deadly"
poison, not only from the ordinary moral standpoint, but especially from
that of the esoteric teaching of H. P. B. and the Trans-Himâlayan
Brotherhood, under whose authority it is falsely and blasphemously given
out; I do not hesitate to declare it.
M. Schuré also emphasises an important and vital point which Mr.
Kingsland seems to have felt equally deeply, _viz._--That Mrs. Besant
has no use for any but those who accept everything she says and does
with blind subservience, even when, in the eyes of such men as M.
Schuré, Mr. Mead, Mr. Kingsland, and others, it merits strong
condemnation as "untrue" and "misleading." In the pages of the recent
numbers of the _Theosophist_ the talk about "freedom of opinion" within
the Society is still repeated, although in actual practice, as I have
shown, the exact opposite obtains. Much that emanates from this tainted
source is so fantastic and puerile that ridicule ought long since to
have killed it, as it did Oscar Wilde's Æsthetic movement.
Mrs. Besant's "return of the Christ."
To return to M. Lévy's book; it deals with "Mrs. Besant's Proceedings"
under various headings. In the one entitled "Mrs. Besant's Return of the
Christ" is to be found some of the most amazing balderdash--given out as
serious teaching!--it has ever been my lot to encounter. For instance, a
book called _Man: Whence, How, and Whither_, written by Mrs. Besant and
Mr. Leadbeater in collaboration, is quoted from by M. Lévy at
considerable length. He explains that "the substitution of a "false
Christ" for the "Christ of the Gospels" is here supported by "_a new
order of evidence_" (Italics mine). Specimens of this "evidence" follow,
and I will here give some of it in order to show the almost unbelievably
low level of intelligence to which this whole mischievous
movement--miscalled Theosophical--has descended, and the sort of
elements in human nature to which such an ill-conceived and fantastic
production is designed to appeal. M. Lévy writes:--
In the course of their investigations these two occultists look
up on the one side, the past incarnations of him whom Mrs.
Besant calls the "Master Jesus," that is, of the "Jesus" born
105 B.C.; and on the other side, the past lives of the being
whom she calls the "Lord Maitreya, the present Bodhisattva, the
Supreme Teacher of the World"; whose ego at a given moment
replaced that of "Jesus," this being the last incarnation of
the Christ whose immediate return she is announcing.
Let us first quote from their account of the incarnations of
the "Supreme Teacher" ... In the chapter headed "Early Times
on the Moon Chain," p. 34, we read:--
"There is a hut in which dwell a Moon-Man, his wife and
children; these we know in later times under the names of Mars
and Mercury, the Mahaguru and Surya. A number of these
monkey-creatures live round the hut, and give to their owners
the devotion of faithful dogs; among them we notice the future
Sirius, Herakles, Alcyone, and Mizar, to whom we may give their
future names for the purpose of recognition, though they are
still non-human."[4]
In the Fourth Root Race we again find the personage supposed to
be "Maitreya" as the husband of the ego claimed by these
authors as that of "Master K. H." Mrs. Besant is again
incarnated in the family as daughter, the eldest sister of the
"Master M."; "Maitreya," the future World-Teacher, being at
this time the head of the tribe (p. 113)....
We have thus reached to somewhere about the year 15,000 B.C.,
and then--incredible as it seems--they give no further
incarnations of him whom they nevertheless claim to have been
the World-Teacher at the beginning of our era.
They give us his incarnations as husband, as father, as
counsellor and priest, and are silent as to the only
incarnation of fundamental and vital importance to the whole
world.
Let us see if the incarnations of their "Jesus" will fill this
gap in our knowledge, if they will throw light on this
essential point, thus left in obscurity.
We meet this "Jesus" for the first time at the beginning of the
Fifth Root Race, as daughter of Alcyone (Krishnamurti) and
sister of "Maitreya" (p. 252.)
Then, on p. 328, as the wife of Julius Cæsar 18,878 B.C., he,
or rather she, being at this time the widow of Vulcan (Known in
his last incarnation as Sir Thomas More)....
He is later identified as daughter of Alcyone-Krishnamurti (his
father) and Fabrizio Ruspoli (his mother),[5] parents at the
same time of the future "World-Teacher, Maitreya," their young
daughter. These incarnations took place 72,000 B.C., on the
shores of the Lake of Gobi, we are told on p. 490.
In 15,910 B.C., we find "Jesus" as grandson of "Maitreya," and
as father and grandfather of a large family composed, as in all
cases investigated by these two authors, of _present_ members
of the Theosophical Society _only_, and including the faithful
friends of Adyar _to the exclusion of all others_.[6]
" ... In 12,800 B.C. the "Jesus" of these investigations again
forms part of a very extensive family composed as usual of the
selfsame elements, and including amongst the names known in the
theosophic world that of Mme. Marie Louise Kirby (an Italian
theosophist recently at Adyar) who was his sister. "Jesus" was
then the father of Mrs. S. Maud Sharpe (General Secretary of
the English Section), of Julius Cæsar, and of T. Subba Rao;
the Teshu Lama being at that time his daughter, etc., etc. (p.
499)....
Once more have our hopes been betrayed, for an absolute silence
broods over the Incarnations of "Jesus" later than this date of
13,500, as it reigned over those of the "World-Teacher"....
We cannot, however, conceive that this information gathered
from occult investigation will be felt to be indispensable by
anyone. Now that we know that Mrs. Besant's "World-Teacher" is
an ordinary man of the lunar chain (to whom Mrs. Besant was
first domestic animal and then sister, and who, in the early
period of our earth, was daughter of the young Krishnamurti (or
of M. Ruspoli), who could be found still to imagine that there
could be here any question, save a mad or impious joke"....
Incredible as it may appear to those who know anything of H. P.
Blavatsky's teachings, their comprehensive grandeur and sublimity,
especially as given in _The Secret Doctrine_, this extraordinary mixture
of clumsy fairy-tale and extravagant and even malicious mumbo-jumbo is
apparently swallowed whole by the blind and credulous followers of this
grotesque "Neo-Theosophy." Not so much for them do I write as for those
who, while interested in these subjects, have neither the inclination
nor the leisure to examine, for instance, such published Records as
these from which I quote, for themselves. Such would naturally accept on
their face value Mrs. Besant's own account of herself and of her
Society, unaware that she is no longer anything but a "blind leader of
the blind," incapable of distinguishing light from darkness, truth from
falsehood. We have direct testimony to the truth of this statement in
Mr. T. H. Martyn's now famous letter to Mrs. Besant.[7] In it he tells
her:--"You have been relying upon C. W. L. as _sole intermediary between
the Hierarchy_ [the Trans-Himâlayan Brotherhood, the Masters of Wisdom.
Italics mine.--A. L. C.] and yourself for many years.... C. W. L.'s word
is final and his seership infallible to you." The quality of this
supposed "seership" bears a very close resemblance to a stupid and
vulgar hoax. This is clearly shown by Mr. Martyn, who says:--"In 1919 I
went to America. Young Van Hook was in New York. He talked freely of C.
W. L.'s immorality and about _faking the 'lives' of people_" (Italics
mine.) Mr. Martyn then puts together various pieces of evidence against
this man, and tells Mrs. Besant that he finds "staring me in the face
the conclusions that _Leadbeater is a sex pervert_, his mania taking a
particular form which I have--though only lately--discovered, is a form
well known and quite common in _the annals of sex criminology_."
(Italics mine.) This sex criminal, then, is the creature whom Mrs.
Besant has accepted "for many years" as "sole intermediary between"
herself and--_the Masters of Wisdom_!! One almost hesitates to draw the
obvious inference; for this is the man whom she has for years held up to
and imposed upon their followers as a model of all the virtues--"a
saint"--a person "on the threshold of divinity." (See also footnote
_post_, p. 56.)
Why has it always been necessary for Mrs. Besant to have an
"intermediary"? Before Mr. Leadbeater it was her Brahmin guide, and
before him it was Mr. Judge. To each in turn she gave implicit belief in
the matter of "messages" and directions from the Masters, while
outwardly claiming "direct" communication. The fact is that, as I have
come to believe, the plain psychology of the thing is--sheer femininity.
With all her intellectual talents, her once clear brain, Mrs. Besant is
(in her personality) just simple _woman_, relying upon male guidance and
authority as instinctively as any of her humbler sisters. And what
student of human nature will fail to recognise in her that purely
feminine trait of blind and fanatical "obedience" which loves to receive
and obey "orders" even though the result should be "a world in ruins"?
The existence of this fundamental and essential quality in female human
nature is the real reason why even the most broad-minded men shrink from
giving women equality of power with themselves in wordly affairs.
Let me here declare what I believe to be the real truth; namely, that
after H. P. Blavatsky's death in 1891, neither Mrs. Besant, nor Mr.
Judge, nor Colonel Olcott, nor anyone else, could "communicate," because
_H. P. B.'s withdrawal meant the withdrawal of her Masters as well_. It
has always seemed strange to me that this was never realised by anyone,
for in this pamphlet I have quoted quite enough from H. P. B. to make it
perfectly clear. Does she not say in the 1890 letter to the Indians (see
p. 2) that after she had to leave India in 1885 the Masters' influence
at Adyar became a dead letter? Did not the Masters Themselves write as
early as 1884 that they could only communicate through her or in places
previously prepared magnetically by her presence? How, then, could They
be expected to continue to communicate or direct the affairs of the T.
S. (as They did in India until 1885), or the E. S. (as They did from
1888 to 1891), after They had withdrawn the Agent They had so carefully
prepared and subjected to the severest trials and initiations in Tibet?
Barely three years after this withdrawal the fatal "Split" took place
owing to Mr. Judge giving out what purported to be "direct"
communications, but which, as I discovered after working for a time
under his inspirer and successor, Mrs. Tingley, _were obtained from
her_. Mrs. Besant, in accusing him, did precisely the same, for she
stated in her _Case against W. Q. Judge_ that she had received her
orders direct from the Master, whereas (as I relate elsewhere, _post_,
p. 56) she admitted to the Inner Group that they came "through" her
Brahmin guide.
This, then, was the great and fundamental error committed by the leaders
of the movement, after H. P. B. was withdrawn. It is responsible for all
the subsequent troubles, and the appalling situation with which we are
faced to-day. A great and world-wide organisation is being used to
promulgate blasphemous, poisonous and absolutely anti-Theosophical and
anti-Occult doctrines as emanating direct from the Masters who
definitely withdrew Their chosen Agent in 1891. (See _ante_ p. 2.)
In any case, even had she lived, H. P. B. told the E. S. that the "last
hour of the term" was December 31st, 1899, after which "no Master of
Wisdom from the East will himself appear or send anyone to Europe or
America." (See footnote, _ante_ p. 2.) She also said that the next
Messenger would be sent out in 1975. Yet the fiction that the Masters
are still directing the leaders and the movement is kept up, not only by
Mrs. Besant, but also by Mrs. Tingley, 22 years after "the last hour of
the term."
It is the same with all this wild talk about the imminent advent of a
"World-Teacher." Is this in the least probable, in view of the above
pronouncements? H. P. B. definitely states in _The Secret Doctrine_ the
exact opposite; but all the Neo-Theosophists seem to prefer the Besant
and Leadbeater books. H. P. B. says, with reference to this very
Maitreya whose name they so lightly take in vain, that He is not due
until the Seventh Sub-Race, _i.e._, several thousand years hence; and
that, in any case, "it is not in the _Kali Yug_, our present
terrifically materialistic age of Darkness, the 'Black Age,' that a new
Saviour of Humanity can ever appear." (S. D. Third Ed., Vol. I, p. 510
_et seq._ See also _Theosophical Glossary_, "Kalki Avatar" and "Maitreya
Buddha.") If we accept H. P. B.'s authority there is no evading this
issue, and we must reject the Besant-Leadbeater pretensions _in toto_,
for their absurdity is patent. Yet they claim to have been specially
taught and prepared by her to carry on her message! (_Vide_ Mrs. Besant
in the _Theosophist_, March, 1922; and also _post_ p. 68.)
FOOTNOTES:
[4] In these incarnations such names are used as; Mars for the "Master
M."; Mercury for the "Master K. H."; Surya, the Lord Maitreya, the
present Bodhisattva, the Supreme Teacher of the World"; Sirius for Mr.
Leadbeater; Herakles for Mrs. Besant; Alcyone for Krishnamurti; Mizar
for his young brother, etc. A list of these names and those to whom they
apply is given in the Foreword of the book. [Italics mine. Here we see
the bald and unabashed appeal to the personality and its ambitions and
desires which is characteristic of this kind of charlatanism.--A. L. C.]
We shall here substitute the names of the real persons as given in this
list for the fancy names used to distinguish them in the body of the
book, _Man: Whence, How and Whither_.
[5] M. Ruspoli is an Italian theosophist recently living at Adyar, with
whom Mr. Leadbeater stayed in Italy.
[6] It is a remarkable fact that outside this little circle not a single
being in our great world has ever entered into these family communities
to whom the honour is given of being the pioneers of every civilisation
of the past. Even though we are invited to assist at marriages running
into thousands, _ever_ the same names appear and _all_ the members of
_all_ the families are identified. This singular oligarchy of friends
and devotees of Adyar perhaps merited to be signalised throughout the
evolution of our earth, the more so that Mr. Leadbeater, writing in his
bird's-eye view of the twentieth century and of the pioneers of the
future sixth race, remarks maliciously: "We know who will _not_ be
there." He puts in italics the word _not_; desirous doubtless to
indicate the unworthiness of other theosophists.
[7] Mr. Martyn is the President of the Sydney Lodge, Australian Section
T. S., a member of thirty years' standing. See Addendum.
Fundamental causes: Some Occult Methods.
Under this heading M. Lévy deals with what he calls "the pitiful climax
of this parody":--
What a contrast to the great traditions of the Theosophical
movement, formulated by H. P. Blavatsky in _The Key to
Theosophy_ (Third Edition, p. 191);--"As for our best
Theosophists, they would also far rather that the names of the
Masters had not been mixed up with our books in any way." And
later, on p. 192;--"I say again, every earnest Theosophist
regrets to-day, from the bottom of his heart, that these sacred
names and things have ever been mentioned before the public."
And this would be the moment to say with Mme.
Blavatsky;--"Great are the desecrations to which the names of
two of the Masters have been subjected." ... But when all is
said and done, what _is_ this occultism which produces _such
disregard of truth, such calumny in daily life, such diastrous
confusion in the domain of clairvoyance_, and finally, _advice
of such a kind as to arouse universal disgust_? [Italics
mine.--A. L. C.]
This occultism has its methods, as all schools of occultism
have; for occultism consists in a methodical training and the
awakening of consciousness to superior worlds; and where a
method produces such results, may we not regard it as
legitimate to ask what is the source of such serious and such
numerous aberrations?... On this question, as on all those that
we have examined, we will cite as witnesses original documents,
the appraisements of those who teach their own methods. It is
well known that Mr. Leadbeater is the inventor and manipulator
of the Adyar occultism. In the _Inner Life_ (Vol. I, p. 450),
in speaking of the centres, the awakening of which, as we
know, developes clairvoyance, he expresses himself in these
terms;--"I have heard it suggested that each of the different
petals of these force-centres represents a moral quality, ... I
have not yet met with any facts which confirm this ... _their
development seems to me to have no more connection with
morality than has the development of the biceps_." [Italics
mine. A little later I shall quote some very definite
pronouncements of H. P. Blavatsky's which teach the exact
opposite.--A. L. C.]
Further, it is of interest to find Mrs. Besant and Mr.
Leadbeater, in the first lines of the Preface to _Man; Whence
How, and Whither_, expressing the same view as regards the
connection between morality and clairvoyance--"It is not
generally accepted, nor indeed is it accepted to any large
extent ... [clairvoyance] is a power latent in all men ... it
can be developed by any one who is able and willing to pay the
price demanded for its forcing, ahead of the general
evolution."
Mrs. Besant is no less positive. A price is demanded for the
"forcing" of clairvoyance, but this price is neither "high
spirituality" nor "lofty intelligence," nor even "purity of
character" ... she fully shares the views of Mr. Leadbeater....
Thus the calumny, sectarianism, the disregard of truth in daily
life, the increasingly serious aberrations in the spiritual
life, have gradually revealed the main source of all these
facts, _i. e._, the defect of the method.