Chapter XII: Preface (2)

When one comes to deal with this magnificent person in a practical
way, what is the result? Very curious and very disappointing. He
is so sure of his ground that he takes no trouble to ascertain
the interpretation which others put upon his facts. The wisdom
of the ages has concerned itself with the explanation of what he
rightly regards as proven; but he does not turn a passing glance
on its researches. He does not even agree altogether with his
brother Spiritualist. It is the story over again of the old Scotch
body who, together with her husband, formed a “kirk.” They had
exclusive keys to Heaven, or, rather, she had, for she was “na
certain aboot Jamie.” So the infinitely divided and subdivided
and resubdivided sects of Spiritualists shake their heads,
and are “na certain aboot” one another. Again, the collective
experience of mankind is solid and unvarying on this point that
union is strength, and disunion a source of weakness and failure.
Shoulder to shoulder, drilled and disciplined, a rabble becomes
an army, each man a match for a hundred of the untrained men that
may be brought against it. Organization in every department of
man’s work means success, saving of time and labour, profit and
development. Want of method, want of plan, haphazard work, fitful
energy, undisciplined effort—these mean bungling failure. The
voice of humanity attests the truth. Does the Spiritualist accept
the verdict and act on the conclusion? Verily, no. He refuses to
organize. He is a law unto himself, and a thorn in the side of his
neighbours.—_Light_, June 22, 1889.

ENQ. I was told that the Theosophical Society was originally founded to
crush Spiritualism and belief in the survival of the individuality
in man?

THEO. You are misinformed. Our beliefs are all founded on that immortal
individuality. But then, like so many others, you confuse
_personality_ with individuality. Your Western psychologists do
not seem to have established any clear distinction between the
two. Yet it is precisely that difference which gives the key-note
to the understanding of Eastern philosophy, and which lies at the
root of the divergence between the Theosophical and Spiritualistic
teachings. And though it may draw upon us still more the hostility
of some Spiritualists, yet I must state here that it is Theosophy
which is the _true_ and unalloyed Spiritualism, while the modern
scheme of that name is, as now practised by the masses, simply
transcendental materialism.

ENQ. Please explain your idea more clearly.

THEO. What I mean is that though our teachings insist upon the identity
of spirit and matter, and though we say that spirit is _potential_
matter, and matter simply crystallized spirit (_e.g._, as ice is
solidified steam), yet since the original and eternal condition
of _all_ is not spirit but _meta_-spirit, so to speak, (visible
and solid matter being simply its periodical manifestation,) we
maintain that the term spirit can only be applied to the _true_
individuality.

ENQ. But what is the distinction between this “true individuality” and
the “I” or “Ego” of which we are all conscious?

THEO. Before I can answer you, we must argue upon what you mean by “I”
or “Ego.” We distinguish between the simple fact of
self-consciousness, the simple feeling that “I am I,” and
the complex thought that “I am Mr. Smith” or “Mrs. Brown.”
Believing as we do in a series of births for the same Ego, or
re-incarnation, this distinction is the fundamental pivot of
the whole idea. You see “Mr. Smith” really means a long series
of daily experiences strung together by the thread of memory,
and forming what Mr. Smith calls “himself.” But none of these
“experiences” are really the “I” or the Ego, nor do they give “Mr.
Smith” the feeling that he is himself, for he forgets the greater
part of his daily experiences, and they produce the feeling of
_Egoity_ in him only while they last. We Theosophists, therefore,
distinguish between this bundle of “experiences,” which we call
the _false_ (because so finite and evanescent) _personality_, and
that element in man to which the feeling of “I am I” is due. It
is this “I am I” which we call the _true_ individuality; and we
say that this “Ego” or individuality plays, like an actor, many
parts on the stage of life.[8] Let us call every new life on earth
of the same _Ego_ a _night_ on the stage of a theatre. One night
the actor, or “Ego,” appears as “Macbeth,” the next as “Shylock,”
the third as “Romeo,” the fourth as “Hamlet” or “King Lear,” and
so on, until he has run through the whole cycle of incarnations.
The Ego begins his life-pilgrimage as a sprite, an “Ariel,” or a
“Puck”; he plays the part of a _super_, is a soldier, a servant,
one of the chorus; rises then to “speaking parts,” plays leading
_rôles_, interspersed with insignificant parts, till he finally
retires from the stage as “Prospero,” the _magician_.

ENQ. I understand. You say, then, that this true _Ego_ cannot return to
earth after death. But surely the actor is at liberty, if he has
preserved the sense of his individuality, to return if he likes to
the scene of his former actions?

THEO. We say not, simply because such a return to earth would be
incompatible with any state of _unalloyed_ bliss after death, as
I am prepared to prove. We say that man suffers so much unmerited
misery during his life, through the fault of others with whom he
is associated, or because of his environment, that he is surely
entitled to perfect rest and quiet, if not bliss, before taking up
again the burden of life. However, we can discuss this in detail
later.

WHY IS THEOSOPHY ACCEPTED?

ENQ. I understand to a certain extent; but I see that your teachings
are far more complicated and metaphysical than either Spiritualism
or current religious thought. Can you tell me, then, what has
caused this system of Theosophy which you support to arouse so
much interest and so much animosity at the same time?

THEO. There are several reasons for it, I believe; among other causes
that may be mentioned is, _firstly_, the great reaction from the
crassly materialistic theories now prevalent among scientific
teachers. _Secondly_, general dissatisfaction with the artificial
theology of the various Christian Churches, and the number of
daily increasing and conflicting sects. _Thirdly_, an ever-growing
perception of the fact that the creeds which are so obviously
self—and mutually—contradictory _cannot be true_, and that claims
which are unverified _cannot be real_. This natural distrust of
conventional religions is only strengthened by their complete
failure to preserve morals and to purify society and the masses.
_Fourthly_, a conviction on the part of many, and _knowledge_ by
a few, that there must be somewhere a philosophical and religious
system which shall be scientific and not merely speculative.
_Finally_, a belief, perhaps, that such a system must be sought
for in teachings far antedating any modern faith.

ENQ. But how did this system come to be put forward just now?

THEO. Just because the time was found to be ripe, which fact is shown
by the determined effort of so many earnest students to reach
_the truth_, at whatever cost and wherever it may be concealed.
Seeing this, its custodians permitted that some portions at
least of that truth should be proclaimed. Had the formation of
the Theosophical Society been postponed a few years longer, one
half of the civilized nations would have become by this time
rank materialists, and the other half anthropomorphists and
phenomenalists.

ENQ. Are we to regard Theosophy in any way as a revelation?

THEO. In no way whatever—not even in the sense of a new and direct
disclosure from some higher, supernatural, or, at least,
_superhuman beings_; but only in the sense of an “unveiling” of
old, very old, truths to minds hitherto ignorant of them, ignorant
even of the existence and preservation of any such archaic
knowledge.[9]

ENQ. You spoke of “Persecution.” If truth is as represented by
Theosophy, why has it met with such opposition, and with no
general acceptance?

THEO. For many and various reasons again, one of which is the hatred
felt by men for “innovations,” as they call them. Selfishness is
essentially conservative, and hates being disturbed. It prefers
an easy-going, unexacting _lie_ to the greatest truth, if the
latter requires the sacrifice of one’s smallest comfort. The power
of mental inertia is great in anything that does not promise
immediate benefit and reward. Our age is pre-eminently unspiritual
and matter of fact. Moreover, there is the unfamiliar character of
Theosophic teachings; the highly abstruse nature of the doctrines,
some of which contradict flatly many of the human vagaries
cherished by sectarians, which have eaten into the very core of
popular beliefs. If we add to this the personal efforts and great
purity of life exacted of those who would become the disciples
of the _inner_ circle, and the very limited class to which an
entirely unselfish code appeals, it will be easy to perceive the
reason why Theosophy is doomed to such slow, uphill work. It is
essentially the philosophy of those who suffer, and have lost all
hope of being helped out of the mire of life by any other means.
Moreover, the history of any system of belief or morals, newly
introduced into a foreign soil, shows that its beginnings were
impeded by every obstacle that obscurantism and selfishness could
suggest. “The crown of the innovator is a crown of thorns” indeed!
No pulling down of old, worm-eaten buildings can be accomplished
without some danger.

ENQ. All this refers rather to the ethics and philosophy of the T.S.
Can you give me a general idea of the Society itself, its object
and statutes?

THEO. This was never made secret. Ask, and you shall receive accurate
answers.

ENQ. But I heard that you were bound by pledges?

THEO. Only in the _Arcane_ or “Esoteric” Section.

ENQ. And also, that some members after leaving did not regard
themselves bound by them. Are they right?

THEO. This shows that their idea of honour is an imperfect one. How can
they be right? As well said in the _Path_, our theosophical organ
at New York, treating of such a case: “Suppose that a soldier is
tried for infringement of oath and discipline, and is dismissed
from the service. In his rage at the justice he has called down,
and of whose penalties he was distinctly forewarned, the soldier
turns to the enemy with false information,—a spy and traitor—as
a revenge upon his former Chief, and claims that his punishment
has released him from his oath of loyalty to a cause.” Is he
justified, think you? Don’t you think he deserves being called a
dishonourable man, a coward?

ENQ. I believe so; but some think otherwise.

THEO. So much the worse for them. But we will talk on this subject
later, if you please.

FOOTNOTES:

[6] An “attached member” means one who has joined some particular branch of the T.S. An “unattached,” one who belongs to the Society at large, has his diploma, from the Headquarters (Adyar, Madras), but is connected with no branch or lodge.

[7] We say that in such cases it is not the _spirits_ of the dead who _descend_ on earth, but the spirits of the living that _ascend_ to the pure Spiritual Souls. In truth there is neither _ascending_ nor _descending_, but a change of _state_ or _condition_ for the medium. The body of the latter becoming paralyzed, or “entranced,” the spiritual Ego is free from its trammels, and finds itself on the same plane of consciousness with the disembodied spirits. Hence, if there is any spiritual attraction between the two _they can communicate_, as often occurs in dreams. The difference between a mediumistic and a non-sensitive nature is this: the liberated spirit of a medium has the opportunity and facility of influencing the passive organs of its entranced physical body, to make them act, speak, and write at its will. The Ego can make it repeat, echo-like, and in the human language, the thoughts and ideas of the disembodied entity, as well as its own. But the _non-receptive_ or non-sensitive organism of one who is very positive cannot be so influenced. Hence, although there is hardly a human being whose Ego does not hold free intercourse, during the sleep of his body, with those whom it loved and lost, yet, on account of the positiveness and non-receptivity of its physical envelope and brain, no recollection, or a very dim, dream-like remembrance, lingers in the memory of the person once awake.

[8] _Vide infra_, “On Individuality and Personality.”

[9] It has become “fashionable,” especially of late, to deride the notion that there ever was, in the _mysteries_ of great and civilized peoples, such as the Egyptians, Greeks, or Romans, anything but priestly imposture. Even the Rosicrucians were no better than half lunatics, half knaves. Numerous books have been written on them; and tyros, who had hardly heard the name a few years before, sallied out as profound critics and Gnostics on the subject of alchemy, the fire-philosophers, and mysticism in general. Yet a long series of the Hierophants of Egypt, India, Chaldea, and Arabia are known, along with the greatest philosophers and sages of Greece and the West, to have included under the designation of wisdom and divine science all knowledge, for they considered the base and origin of every art and science as _essentially_ divine. Plato regarded the _mysteries_ as most sacred, and Clemens Alexandrinus, who had been himself initiated into the Eleusinian mysteries, has declared “that the doctrines taught therein contained in them the end of all human knowledge.” Were Plato and Clemens two knaves or two fools, we wonder, or—both?

III. THE WORKING SYSTEM OF THE T.S.[10]

THE OBJECTS OF THE SOCIETY.

ENQ. What are the objects of the “Theosophical Society”?

THEO. They are three, and have been so from the beginning. (1). To form
the nucleus of a Universal Brotherhood of Humanity without
distinction of race, colour, or creed. (2). To promote the
study of Aryan and other Scriptures, of the World’s religion
and sciences, and to vindicate the importance of old Asiatic
literature, namely, of the Brahmanical, Buddhist, and Zoroastrian
philosophies. (3). To investigate the hidden mysteries of Nature
under every aspect possible, and the psychic and spiritual powers
latent in man especially. These are, broadly stated, the three
chief objects of the Theosophical Society.

ENQ. Can you give me some more detailed information upon these?

THEO. We may divide each of the three objects into as many explanatory
clauses as may be found necessary.

ENQ. Then let us begin with the first. What means would you resort to,
in order to promote such a feeling of brotherhood among races
that are known to be of the most diversified religions, customs,
beliefs, and modes of thought?

THEO. Allow me to add that which you seem unwilling to express. Of
course we know that with the exception of two remnants of
races—the Parsees and the Jews—every nation is divided, not merely
against all other nations, but even against itself. This is found
most prominently among the so-called civilized Christian nations.
Hence your wonder, and the reason why our first object appears to
you a Utopia. Is it not so?

ENQ. Well, yes; but what have you to say against it?

THEO. Nothing against the fact; but much about the necessity of
removing the causes which make Universal Brotherhood a Utopia at
present.

ENQ. What are, in your view, these causes?

THEO. First and foremost, the natural selfishness of human nature. This
selfishness, instead of being eradicated, is daily strengthened
and stimulated into a ferocious and irresistible feeling by the
present religious education, which tends not only to encourage,
but positively to justify it. People’s ideas about right and wrong
have been entirely perverted by the literal acceptance of the
Jewish Bible. All the unselfishness of the altruistic teachings
of Jesus has become merely a theoretical subject for pulpit
oratory; while the precepts of practical selfishness taught in
the Mosaic Bible, against which Christ so vainly preached, have
become ingrained into the innermost life of the Western nations.
“An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth” has come to be the
first maxim of your law. Now, I state openly and fearlessly, that
the perversity of this doctrine and of so many others _Theosophy
alone_ can eradicate.

THE COMMON ORIGIN OF MAN.

ENQ. How?

THEO. Simply by demonstrating on logical, philosophical, metaphysical,
and even scientific grounds that:—(a) All men have spiritually
and physically the same origin, which is the fundamental teaching
of Theosophy. (b) As mankind is essentially of one and the same
essence, and that essence is one—infinite, uncreate, and eternal,
whether we call it God or Nature—nothing, therefore, can affect
one nation or one man without affecting all other nations and
all other men. This is as certain and as obvious as that a stone
thrown into a pond will, sooner or later, set in motion every
single drop of water therein.

ENQ. But this is not the teaching of Christ, but rather a pantheistic
notion.

THEO. That is where your mistake lies. It is purely _Christian_,
although _not_ Judaic, and therefore, perhaps, your Biblical
nations prefer to ignore it.

ENQ. This is a wholesale and unjust accusation. Where are your proofs
for such a statement?

THEO. They are ready at hand. Christ is alleged to have said: “Love
each other” and “Love your enemies”; for “if ye love them (only)
which love you, what reward (or merit) have ye? Do not even the
_publicans_[11] the same? And if you salute your brethren only,
what do ye more than others? Do not even publicans so?” These
are Christ’s words. But Genesis ix. 25, says “Cursed be Canaan,
a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren.” And,
therefore, Christian but Biblical people prefer the law of Moses
to Christ’s law of love. They base upon the Old Testament, which
panders to all their passions, their laws of conquest, annexation,
and tyranny over races which they call _inferior_. What crimes
have been committed on the strength of this infernal (if taken in
its dead letter) passage in Genesis, history alone gives us an
idea, however inadequate.[12]

ENQ. I have heard you say that the identity of our physical origin is
proved by science, that of our spiritual origin by the
Wisdom-Religion. Yet we do not find Darwinists exhibiting great
fraternal affection.

THEO. Just so. This is what shows the deficiency of the materialistic
systems, and proves that we Theosophists are in the right. The
identity of our physical origin makes no appeal to our higher and
deeper feelings. Matter, deprived of its soul and spirit, or its
divine essence, cannot speak to the human heart. But the identity
of the soul and spirit, of real, immortal man, as Theosophy
teaches us, once proven and deep-rooted in our hearts, would lead
us far on the road of real charity and brotherly goodwill.

ENQ. But how does Theosophy explain the common origin of man?

THEO. By teaching that the _root_ of all nature, objective and
subjective, and everything else in the universe, visible and
invisible, _is_, _was_, and _ever will be_ one absolute essence,
from which all starts, and into which everything returns. This is
Aryan philosophy, fully represented only by the Vedantins, and
the Buddhist system. With this object in view, it is the duty of
all Theosophists to promote in every practical way, and in all
countries, the spread of _non-sectarian_ education.

ENQ. What do the written statutes of your Society advise its members to
do besides this? On the physical plane, I mean?

THEO. In order to awaken brotherly feeling among nations we have to
assist in the international exchange of useful arts and products,
by advice, information, and co-operation with all worthy
individuals and associations (provided, however, add the statutes,
“that no benefit or percentage shall be taken by the Society or
the ‘Fellows’ for its or their corporate services”). For instance,
to take a practical illustration. The organization of Society,
depicted by Edward Bellamy, in his magnificent work “Looking
Backwards,” admirably represents the Theosophical idea of what
should be the first great step towards the full realization of
universal brotherhood. The state of things he depicts falls short
of perfection, because selfishness still exists and operates in
the hearts of men. But in the main, selfishness and individualism
have been overcome by the feeling of solidarity and mutual
brotherhood; and the scheme of life there described reduces the
causes tending to create and foster selfishness to a minimum.

ENQ. Then as a Theosophist you will take part in an effort to realize
such an ideal?

THEO. Certainly; and we have proved it by action. Have not you heard of
the Nationalist clubs and party which have sprung up in America
since the publication of Bellamy’s book? They are now coming
prominently to the front, and will do so more and more as time
goes on. Well, these clubs and this party were started in the
first instance by Theosophists. One of the first, the Nationalist
Club of Boston, Mass., has Theosophists for President and
Secretary, and the majority of its executive belong to the T.S.
In the constitution of all their clubs, and of the party they are
forming, the influence of Theosophy and of the Society is plain,
for they all take as their basis, their first and fundamental
principle, the Brotherhood of Humanity as taught by Theosophy. In
their declaration of Principles they state:—“The principle of the
Brotherhood of Humanity is one of the eternal truths that govern
the world’s progress on lines which distinguish human nature from
brute nature.” What can be more Theosophical than this? But it is
not enough. What is also needed is to impress men with the idea
that, if the root of mankind is _one_, then there must also be one
truth which finds expression in all the various religions—except
in the Jewish, as you do not find it _expressed_ even in the
Kabala.

ENQ. This refers to the common origin of religions, and you may be
right there. But how does it apply to practical brotherhood on the
physical plane?

THEO. First, because that which is true on the metaphysical plane must
be also true on the physical. Secondly, because there is no more
fertile source of hatred and strife than religious differences.
When one party or another thinks himself the sole possessor of
absolute truth, it becomes only natural that he should think his
neighbour absolutely in the clutches of Error or the Devil. But
once get a man to see that none of them has the _whole_ truth, but
that they are mutually complementary, that the complete truth can
be found only in the combined views of all, after that which is
false in each of them has been sifted out—then true brotherhood
in religion will be established. The same applies in the physical
world.

ENQ. Please explain further.

THEO. Take an instance. A plant consists of a root, a stem, and many
shoots and leaves. As humanity, as a whole, is the stem which
grows from the spiritual root, so is the stem the unity of the
plant. Hurt the stem and it is obvious that every shoot and leaf
will suffer. So it is with mankind.

ENQ. Yes, but if you injure a leaf or a shoot, you do not injure the
whole plant.

THEO. And therefore you think that by injuring _one_ man you do not
injure humanity? But how do _you_ know? Are you aware that even
materialistic science teaches that any injury, however slight,
to a plant will affect the whole course of its future growth and
development? Therefore, you are mistaken, and the analogy is
perfect. If, however, you overlook the fact that a cut in the
finger may often make the whole body suffer, and react on the
whole nervous system, I must all the more remind you that there
may well be other spiritual laws, operating on plants and animals
as well as on mankind, although, as you do not recognize their
action on plants and animals, you may deny their existence.

ENQ. What laws do you mean?

THEO. We call them Karmic laws; but you will not understand the full
meaning of the term unless you study Occultism. However, my
argument did not rest on the assumption of these laws, but really
on the analogy of the plant. Expand the idea, carry it out to
a universal application, and you will soon find that in true
philosophy every physical action has its moral and everlasting
effect. Hurt a man by doing him bodily harm; you may think
that his pain and suffering cannot spread by any means to his
neighbours, least of all to men of other nations. We affirm _that
it will, in good time_. Therefore, we say, that unless every man
is brought to understand and accept _as an axiomatic truth_ that
by wronging one man we wrong not only ourselves but the whole of
humanity in the long run, no brotherly feelings such as preached
by all the great Reformers, pre-eminently by Buddha and Jesus, are
possible on earth.

OUR OTHER OBJECTS.

ENQ. Will you now explain the methods by which you propose to carry out
the second object?

THEO. To collect for the library at our headquarters of Adyar, Madras,
(and by the Fellows of their Branches for their local libraries,)
all the good works upon the world’s religions that we can. To put
into written form correct information upon the various ancient
philosophies, traditions, and legends, and disseminate the same
in such practicable ways as the translation and publication of
original works of value, and extracts from and commentaries upon
the same, or the oral instructions of persons learned in their
respective departments.

ENQ. And what about the third object, to develop in man his latent
spiritual or psychic powers?

THEO. This has to be achieved also by means of publications, in those
places where no lectures and personal teachings are possible.
Our duty is to keep alive in man his spiritual intuitions. To
oppose and counteract—after due investigation and proof of its
irrational nature—bigotry in every form, religious, scientific, or
social, and _cant_ above all, whether as religious sectarianism
or as belief in miracles or anything supernatural. What we have
to do is to seek to obtain _knowledge_ of all the laws of nature,
and to diffuse it. To encourage the study of those laws least
understood by modern people, the so-called Occult Sciences, _based
on the true knowledge of nature_, instead of, as at present,
on _superstitious beliefs based on blind faith and authority_.
Popular folk-lore and traditions, however fanciful at times, when
sifted may lead to the discovery of long-lost, but important,
secrets of nature. The Society, therefore, aims at pursuing this
line of inquiry, in the hope of widening the field of scientific
and philosophical observation.

ON THE SACREDNESS OF THE PLEDGE.

ENQ. Have you any ethical system that you carry out in the Society?

THEO. The ethics are there, ready and clear enough for whomsoever
follow them. They are the essence and cream of the world’s ethics,
gathered from the teachings of all the world’s great reformers.
Therefore, you will find represented therein Confucius and
Zoroaster, Lao-Tze and the Bhagavat-Gita, the precepts of Gautama
Buddha and Jesus of Nazareth, of Hillel and his school, as of
Pythagoras, Socrates, Plato, and their schools.

ENQ. Do the members of your Society carry out these precepts? I have
heard of great dissensions and quarrels among them.

THEO. Very naturally, since although the reform (in its present shape)
may be called new, the men and women to be reformed are the
same human, sinning natures as of old. As already said, the
earnest _working_ members are few; but many are the sincere and
well-disposed persons, who try their best to live up to the
Society’s and their own ideals. Our duty is to encourage and
assist individual fellows in self-improvement, intellectual,
moral, and spiritual; not to blame or condemn those who fail.
We have, strictly speaking, no right to refuse admission to
anyone—especially in the _Esoteric Section_ of the Society,
wherein “he who enters is as one newly born.” But if any member,
his sacred pledges on his word of honour and immortal _Self_,
notwithstanding, chooses to continue, after that “new birth,”
with the new man, the vices or defects of his old life, and to
indulge in them still in the Society, then, of course, he is more
than likely to be asked to resign and withdraw; or, in case of
his refusal, to be expelled. We have the strictest rules for such
emergencies.

ENQ. Can some of them be mentioned?

THEO. They can. To begin with, no Fellow in the Society, whether
exoteric or esoteric, has a right to force his personal opinions
upon another Fellow. “It is not lawful for _any officer of
the Parent Society_ to express in public, by word or act, any
hostility to, or preference for, any one section,[13] religious
or philosophical, more than another. All have an equal right
to have the essential features of their religious belief laid
before the tribunal of an impartial world. And no officer of the
Society, in his capacity as an officer, has the right to preach
his own sectarian views and beliefs to members assembled, except
when the meeting consists of his co-religionists. After due
warning, violation of this rule shall be punished by suspension
or expulsion.” This is one of the offenses in the Society at
large. As regards the inner section, now called the _Esoteric_,
the following rules have been laid down and adopted, so far back
as 1880. “No Fellow shall put to his selfish use any knowledge
communicated to him by any member of the first section (now
a higher ‘degree’); violation of the rule being punished by
expulsion.” Now, however, before any such knowledge can be
imparted, the applicant has to bind himself by a solemn oath not
to use it for selfish purposes, nor to reveal anything said except
by permission.

ENQ. But is a man expelled, or resigning, from the section free to
reveal anything he may have learned, or to break any clause of the
pledge he has taken?

THEO. Certainly not. His expulsion or resignation only relieves him
from the obligation of obedience to the teacher, and from that of
taking an active part in the work of the Society, but surely not
from the sacred pledge of secrecy.

ENQ. But is this reasonable and just?

THEO. Most assuredly. To any man or woman with the slightest honourable
feeling a pledge of secrecy taken even on one’s _word of honour_,
much more to one’s Higher Self—the God within—is binding till
death. And though he may leave the Section and the Society, no man
or woman of honour will think of attacking or injuring a body to
which he or she has been so pledged.

ENQ. But is not this going rather far?

THEO. Perhaps so, according to the low standard of the present time and
morality. But if it does not bind as far as this, what use is
a _pledge_ at all? How can anyone expect to be taught secret
knowledge, if he is to be at liberty to free himself from all the
obligations he had taken, whenever he pleases? What security,
confidence, or trust would ever exist among them, if pledges such
as this were to have no really binding force at all? Believe
me, the law of retribution (Karma) would very soon overtake one
who so broke his pledge, and perhaps as soon as the contempt of
every honourable man would, even on this physical plane. As well
expressed in the N. Y. “Path” just cited on this subject, “_A
pledge once taken, is for ever binding in both the moral and the
occult worlds._ If we break it once and are punished, that does
not justify us in breaking it again, and so long as we do, so long
will the mighty lever of the Law (of Karma) react upon us.” (The
_Path_, July, 1889.)

FOOTNOTES:

[10] _Vide_ (at the end) the official rules of the T.S., Appendix A. _Nota bene_, “T.S.” is an abbreviation for “Theosophical Society.”

[11] Publicans—regarded as so many thieves and pickpockets in those days. Among the Jews the name and profession of a publican was the most odious thing in the world. They were not allowed to enter the Temple, and Matthew (xviii. 17) speaks of a heathen and a publican as identical. Yet they were only Roman tax-gatherers occupying the same position as the British officials in India and other conquered countries.

[12] “At the close of the Middle Ages slavery, under the power of moral forces, had mainly disappeared from Europe; but two momentous events occurred which overbore the moral power working in European society and let loose a swarm of curses upon the earth such as mankind had scarcely ever known. One of these events was the first voyaging to a populated and barbarous coast where human beings were a familiar article of traffic; and the other the discovery of a new world, where mines of glittering wealth were open, provided labour could be imported to work them. For four hundred years men and women and children were torn from all whom they knew and loved, and were sold on the coast of Africa to foreign traders; they were chained below decks—the dead often with the living—during the horrible ‘middle passage,’ and, according to Bancroft, an impartial historian, two hundred and fifty thousand out of three and a quarter millions were thrown into the sea on that fatal passage, while the remainder were consigned to nameless misery in the mines, or under the lash in the cane and rice fields. The guilt of this great crime rests on the Christian Church. ‘In the name of the most Holy Trinity’ the Spanish Government (Roman Catholic) concluded more than ten treaties authorising the sale of five hundred thousand human beings; in 1562 Sir John Hawkins sailed on his diabolical errand of buying slaves in Africa and selling them in the West Indies in a ship which bore the sacred name of Jesus; while Elizabeth, the Protestant Queen, rewarded him for his success in this first adventure of Englishmen in that inhuman traffic by allowing him to wear as his crest ‘a demi-Moor in his proper colour, bound with a cord, or, in other words, a manacled negro slave.’”—_Conquests of the Cross_ (quoted from the _Agnostic Journal_).

[13] A “branch,” or lodge, composed solely of co-religionists, or a branch _in partibus_, as they are now somewhat bombastically called.

IV. THE RELATIONS OF THE THEOSOPHICAL SOCIETY TO THEOSOPHY.

ON SELF-IMPROVEMENT.

ENQ. Is moral elevation, then, the principal thing insisted upon in
your Society?

THEO. Undoubtedly! He who would be a true Theosophist must bring
himself to live as one.

ENQ. If so, then, as I remarked before, the behaviour of some members
strangely belies this fundamental rule.

THEO. Indeed it does. But this cannot be helped among us, any more than
amongst those who call themselves Christians and act like fiends.
This is no fault of our statutes and rules, but that of human
nature. Even in some exoteric public branches, the members pledge
themselves on their “Higher Self” to live _the_ life prescribed by
Theosophy. They have to bring their _Divine Self_ to guide their
every thought and action, every day and at every moment of their
lives. A true Theosophist ought “to deal justly and walk humbly.”

ENQ. What do you mean by this?

THEO. Simply this: the one self has to forget itself for the many
selves. Let me answer you in the words of a true Philaletheian,
an F.T.S., who has beautifully expressed it in the _Theosophist_:
“What every man needs first is to find himself, and then take
an honest inventory of his subjective possessions, and, bad or
bankrupt as it may be, it is not beyond redemption if we set about
it in earnest.” But how many do? All are willing to work for their
own development and progress; very few for those of others. To
quote the same writer again: “Men have been deceived and deluded
long enough; they must break their idols, put away their shams,
and go to work for themselves—nay, there is one little word too
much or too many, for he who works for himself had better not work
at all; rather let him work himself for others, for all. For every
flower of love and charity he plants in his neighbour’s garden,
a loathsome weed will disappear from his own, and so this garden
of the gods—Humanity—shall blossom as a rose. In all Bibles,
all religions, this is plainly set forth—but designing men have
at first misinterpreted and finally emasculated, materialized,
besotted them. It does not require a new revelation. Let every man
be a revelation unto himself. Let once man’s immortal spirit take
possession of the temple of his body, drive out the money-changers
and every unclean thing, and his own divine humanity will redeem
him, for when he is thus at one with himself if he will know the
‘builder of the Temple.’”

ENQ. This is pure Altruism, I confess.

THEO. It is. And if only one Fellow of the T.S. out of ten would
practise it ours would be a body of elect indeed. But there are
those among the outsiders who will always refuse to see the
essential difference between Theosophy and the Theosophical
Society, the idea and its imperfect embodiment. Such would visit
every sin and shortcoming of the vehicle, the human body, on the
pure spirit which sheds thereon its divine light. Is this just to
either? They throw stones at an association that tries to work up
to, and for the propagation of, its ideal with most tremendous
odds against it. Some vilify the Theosophical Society only because
it presumes to attempt to do that in which other systems—Church
and State Christianity pre-eminently—have failed most egregiously;
others because they would fain preserve the existing state
of things: Pharisees and Sadducees in the seat of Moses, and
publicans and sinners revelling in high places, as under the
Roman Empire during its decadence. Fair-minded people, at any
rate, ought to remember that the man who does all he can, does as
much as he who has achieved the most, in this world of relative
possibilities. This is a simple truism, an axiom supported for
believers in the Gospels by the parable of the talents given by
their Master; the servant who doubled his two talents was rewarded
as much as that other fellow-servant who had received _five_. To
every man it is given “according to his several ability.”

ENQ. Yet it is rather difficult to draw the line of demarcation between
the abstract and the concrete in this case, as we have only the
latter to our judgment by.

THEO. Then why make an exception for the T.S.? Justice, like charity,
ought to begin at home. Will you revile and scoff at the “Sermon
on the Mount” because your social, political and even religious
laws have, so far, not only failed to carry out its precepts in
their spirit, but even in their dead letter? Abolish the oath in
Courts, Parliament, Army and everywhere, and do as the Quakers
do, if you _will_ call yourselves Christians. Abolish the Courts
themselves, for if you would follow the Commandments of Christ,
you have to give away your coat to him who deprives you of your
cloak, and turn your left cheek to the bully who smites you on
the right. “Resist not evil, love your enemies, bless them that
curse you, do good to them that hate you,” for “whosoever shall
break one of the least of these Commandments and shall teach men
so, he shall be called the least in the Kingdom of Heaven,” and
“whosoever shall say ‘Thou fool’ shall be in danger of hell fire.”
And why should you judge, if you would not be judged in your turn?
Insist that between Theosophy and the Theosophical Society there
is no difference, and forthwith you lay the system of Christianity
and its very essence open to the same charges, only in a more
serious form.

ENQ. Why _more_ serious?

THEO. Because, while the leaders of the Theosophical movement,
recognising fully their shortcomings, try all they can do to amend
their ways and uproot the evil existing in the Society; and while
their rules and by-laws are framed in the spirit of Theosophy, the
Legislators and the Churches of nations and countries which call
themselves Christian do the reverse. Our members, even the worst
among them, are no worse than the average Christian. Moreover,
if the Western Theosophists experience so much difficulty in
leading the true Theosophical life, it is because they are all the
children of their generation. Every one of them was a Christian,
bred and brought up in the sophistry of his Church, his social
customs, and even his paradoxical laws. He was this before he
became a Theosophist, or rather, a member of the Society of that
name, as it cannot be too often repeated that between the abstract
ideal and its vehicle there is a most important difference.

THE ABSTRACT AND THE CONCRETE.

ENQ. Please elucidate this difference a little more.

THEO. The Society is a great body of men and women, composed of the
most heterogeneous elements. Theosophy, in its abstract meaning,
is Divine Wisdom, or the aggregate of the knowledge and wisdom
that underlie the Universe—the homogeneity of eternal GOOD; and in
its concrete sense it is the sum total of the same as allotted to
man by nature, on this earth, and no more. Some members earnestly
endeavour to realize and, so to speak, to objectivize Theosophy in
their lives; while others desire only to know of, not to practise
it; and others still may have joined the Society merely out of
curiosity, or a passing interest, or perhaps, again, because some
of their friends belong to it. How, then, can the system be judged
by the standard of those who would assume the name without any
right to it? Is poetry or its muse to be measured only by those
would-be poets who afflict our ears? The Society can be regarded
as the embodiment of Theosophy only in its abstract motives; it
can never presume to call itself its concrete vehicle so long as
human imperfections and weaknesses are all represented in its
body; otherwise the Society would be only repeating the great
error and the outflowing sacrileges of the so-called Churches of
Christ. If Eastern comparisons may be permitted, Theosophy is the
shoreless ocean of universal truth, love, and wisdom, reflecting
its radiance on the earth, while the Theosophical Society is
only a visible bubble on that reflection. Theosophy is divine
nature, visible and invisible, and its Society human nature
trying to ascend to its divine parent. Theosophy, finally, is the
fixed eternal sun, and its Society the evanescent comet trying
to settle in an orbit to become a planet, ever revolving within
the attraction of the sun of truth. It was formed to assist in
showing to men that such a thing as Theosophy exists, and to help
them to ascend towards it by studying and assimilating its eternal
verities.

ENQ. I thought you said you had no tenets or doctrines of your own?

THEO. No more we have. The Society has no wisdom of its own to support
or teach. It is simply the storehouse of all the truths uttered
by the great seers, initiates, and prophets of historic and even
pre-historic ages; at least, as many as it can get. Therefore, it
is merely the channel through which more or less of truth, found
in the accumulated utterances of humanity’s great teachers, is
poured out into the world.

ENQ. But is such truth unreachable outside of the Society? Does not
every Church claim the same?

THEO. Not at all. The undeniable existence of great initiates—true
“Sons of God”—shows that such wisdom was often reached by isolated
individuals, never, however, without the guidance of a master
at first. But most of the followers of such, when they became
masters in their turn, have dwarfed the catholicism of these
teachings into the narrow groove of their own sectarian dogmas.
The commandments of _a_ chosen master alone were then adopted and
followed, to the exclusion of all others—if followed at all, note
well, as in the case of the Sermon on the Mount. Each religion is
thus a bit of the divine truth, made to focus a vast panorama of
human fancy which claimed to represent and replace that truth.

ENQ. But Theosophy, you say, is not a religion?

THEO. Most assuredly it is not, since it is the essence of all religion
and of absolute truth, a drop of which only underlies every creed.
To resort once more to metaphor. Theosophy, on earth, is like
the white ray of the spectrum, and every religion only one of the
seven prismatic colours. Ignoring all the others, and cursing them
as false, every special coloured ray claims not only priority,
but to be _that white ray_ itself, and anathematizes even its
own tints from light to dark, as heresies. Yet, as the sun of
truth rises higher and higher on the horizon of man’s perception,
and each coloured ray gradually fades out until it is finally
reabsorbed in its turn, humanity will at last be cursed no longer
with artificial polarizations, but will find itself bathing in
the pure colourless sunlight of eternal truth. And this will be
_Theosophia_.

ENQ. Your claim is, then, that all the great religions are derived from
Theosophy, and that it is by assimilating it that the world will
be finally saved from the curse of its great illusions and errors?

THEO. Precisely so. And we add that our Theosophical Society is the
humble seed which, if watered and left to live, will finally
produce the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil which is grafted on
the Tree of Life Eternal. For it is only by studying the various
great religions and philosophies of humanity, by comparing them
dispassionately and with an unbiased mind, that men can hope to
arrive at the truth. It is especially by finding out and noting
their various points of agreement that we may achieve this result.
For no sooner do we arrive—either by study, or by being taught by
someone who knows—at their inner meaning, than we find, almost in
every case, that it expresses some great truth in Nature.

ENQ. We have heard of a Golden Age that was, and what you describe
would be a Golden Age to be realised at some future day. When
shall it be?

THEO. Not before humanity, as a whole, feels the need of it. A maxim in
the Persian “Javidan Khirad” says: “Truth is of two kinds—one
manifest and self-evident; the other demanding incessantly new
demonstrations and proofs.” It is only when this latter kind
of truth becomes as universally obvious as it is now dim, and
therefore liable to be distorted by sophistry and casuistry; it is
only when the two kinds will have become once more one, that all
people will be brought to see alike.

ENQ. But surely those few who have felt the need of such truths must
have made up their minds to believe in something definite? You
tell me that, the Society having no doctrines of its own, every
member may believe as he chooses and accept what he pleases. This
looks as if the Theosophical Society was bent upon reviving the
confusion of languages and beliefs of the Tower of Babel of old.
Have you no beliefs in common?

THEO. What is meant by the Society having no tenets or doctrines of its
own is, that no special doctrines or beliefs are _obligatory_ on
its members; but, of course, this applies only to the body as a
whole. The Society, as you were told, is divided into an outer and
an inner body. Those who belong to the latter have, of course, a
philosophy, or—if you so prefer it— a religious system of their
own.

ENQ. May we be told what it is?

THEO. We make no secret of it. It was outlined a few years ago in the
_Theosophist_ and “Esoteric Buddhism,” and may be found still
more elaborated in the “Secret Doctrine.” It is based on the
oldest philosophy in the world, called the Wisdom-Religion or the
Archaic Doctrine. If you like, you may ask questions and have them
explained.

V. THE FUNDAMENTAL TEACHINGS OF THEOSOPHY.

ON GOD AND PRAYER.

ENQ. Do you believe in God?

THEO. That depends what you mean by the term.

ENQ. I mean the God of the Christians, the Father of Jesus, and the
Creator: the Biblical God of Moses, in short.

THEO. In such a God we do not believe. We reject the idea of a
personal, or an extra-cosmic and anthropomorphic God, who is
but the gigantic shadow of _man_, and not of man at his best,
either. The God of theology, we say—and prove it—is a bundle of
contradictions and a logical impossibility. Therefore, we will
have nothing to do with him.

ENQ. State your reasons, if you please.

THEO. They are many, and cannot all receive attention. But here are a
few. This God is called by his devotees infinite and absolute, is
he not?

ENQ. I believe he is.

THEO. Then, if infinite—_i.e._, limitless—and especially if absolute,
how can he have a form, and be a creator of anything? Form implies
limitation, and a beginning as well as an end; and, in order
to create, a Being must think and plan. How can the ABSOLUTE
be supposed to think—_i.e._, to have any relation whatever
to that which is limited, finite, and conditioned? This is a
philosophical and a logical absurdity. Even the Hebrew Kabala
rejects such an idea, and therefore makes of the one and the
Absolute Deific Principle an infinite Unity called Ain-Soph.[14]
In order to create, the Creator has to become active; and as
this is impossible for ABSOLUTENESS, the infinite principle had
to be shown becoming the cause of evolution (not creation) in an
indirect way—_i.e._, through the emanation from itself (another
absurdity, due this time to the translators of the Kabala)[15] of
the Sephiroth.

ENQ. How about those Kabalists, who, while being such, still believe in
Jehovah, or the _Tetragrammaton_?

THEO. They are at liberty to believe in what they please, as their
belief or disbelief can hardly affect a self-evident fact.
The Jesuits tell us that two and two are not always four to a
certainty, since it depends on the will of God to make 2 x 2 = 5.
Shall we accept their sophistry for all that?

ENQ. Then you are Atheists?

THEO. Not that we know of, and not unless the epithet of “Atheist” is
to be applied to those who disbelieve in an anthropomorphic God.
We believe in a Universal Divine Principle, the root of ALL, from
which all proceeds, and within which all shall be absorbed at the
end of the great cycle of Being.

ENQ. This is the old, old claim of Pantheism. If you are Pantheists,
you cannot be Deists; and if you are not Deists, then you have to
answer to the name of Atheists.

THEO. Not necessarily so. The term “Pantheism” is again one of the many
abused terms, whose real and primitive meaning has been distorted
by blind prejudice and a one-sided view of it. If you accept the
Christian etymology of this compound word, and form it of παν,
“all,” and θεος, “god,” and then imagine and teach that this means
that every stone and every tree in Nature is a God or the ONE
God, then, of course, you will be right, and make of Pantheists
fetish-worshippers, in addition to their legitimate name. But you
will hardly be as successful if you etymologise the word Pantheism
esoterically, and as we do.

ENQ. What is, then your definition of it?

THEO. Let me ask you a question in my turn. What do you understand by
Pan or Nature?

ENQ. Nature is, I suppose, the sum total of things existing around us;
the aggregate of causes and effects in the world of matter, the
creation or universe.

THEO. Hence the personified sum and order of known causes and effects;
the total of all finite agencies and forces, as utterly
disconnected from an intelligent Creator or Creators, and
perhaps “conceived of as a single and separate force”—as in your
cyclopædias?

ENQ. Yes, I believe so.