REVIEW TH EOSOPH ICAL THE ON THE WATCH-TOWER. Vol. XXXVI MAY, 19o5 No In the March number of Der Vdhan, our ably conducted

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1 THE TH EOSOPH ICAL REVIEW Vol. XXXVI MAY, 19o5 No. 213 ON THE WATCH-TOWER In the Mrch number of Der Vdhn, our bly conducted Germn contemporry, the editor, Herr Richrd Bresch, of Leipzig, hs " somewht ginst " us, even s the writer in Der LMXyS8tj nd die Reveltions hd ginst the Churches. There, he thinks, something rotten somewhere in the stte of Denmrk. Fs est b hoste doceri, much more then should we py ttention to the criticm of friend nd collegue. The occsion for h remrks fforded by questioner who, fter stting tht n edition de luxe of Angelus Silesius hs just ppered in Germny, sks indignntly : Wht hs Mysticm to do with " dem Luxus "? Our collegue in h reply rejoices tht he hs met with sympthetic soul ; protest, he grees, should be mde ginst the degrdtion of such high mtters ; Mysticm should be presented in simplicity, should be homely in " homely surroundings. Der cherubinche Wndermnn " out of plce in slon. But why? Surely if Angelus Silesius we nd techer of wdom he should be s much t home in plce s in

2 194 THB THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW cottge ; s much t h ese in the grments of prince s in the grb of mendicnt. Why should not beutiful thoughts be cld beutifully? In our opinion the very best rt of printer nd binder should be bestowed upon just such works. Wht better use of luxury cn there be? It its very redemption nd highest consecrtion. * * * Is not, however, the point t sue somewht obscured by the use of mleding terms? The opposites re not Luxury nd Mysticm ; but Luxury nd Simplicity? Is Tm6 t ider Mysticm synonym of Simplicity? Is Mys ticm interchngeble with Asceticm? We think not. It true tht Mysticm often confounded with the ides of Simplicity nd Asceticm ; but does th limittion do justice to Mysticm? Surely right Mysticm should be blnce ; it should include both simplicity in complexity nd complexity in simplicity. There right Luxury nd wrong Luxury, right Simplicity nd wrong Simplicity. If it in sted tht Mysticm n opposite, nd tht the Mystic should withdrw himself into tht opposite, then the gol of the Mystic n bstrction nd not fulness. In th sense Mysticm will once more be set over " ginst Pro-fnity," nd we shll fll bck into the ncient limittions which were, s we believe, once for ll bolhed for the Western world by the teching of the Chrt. Though the brillincy of th teching hs been obscured by the clouds of ncient prejudice which hve since gthered round it, the spirit of it breks through in mny pssge. The Mster seems to hve done nd tught just exctly wht the Phrees thought He should not hve sid nd done. He wsj friend of " publicns nd sinners " ;He tught the " people " openly. If we would then escpe the reproch of the " Phrees," we of the Simple Life should not refuse to et with the " publicns nd sinners " of the Luxurious Life. We should void the error of mteriltic interprettion of the Gld Tidings. Unless we re deceived the Spirit tht nimted them ws Potent Force of understnding which struck new key-note for the West ;the old lndmrks of custom nd prejudice nd cste were to be not

3 ON THE WATCH-TOWER 195 so much bolhed s trnsformed ; new vlues were to be ssigned to ncient fctors. Tht Spirit ws Living nd Continuing Power of Ever-Renewing ; of ever giving new interprettions to old forms of belief nd prctice. It ws to be perpetul regenertion. So tht if mn fter ttining to the ide of simplicity finds himself divorced from the complexities of life, he should not stnd proudly loof, procliming h own righteousness, s did the Phrees of old, but should strive rightly to use these complexities for the still greter intensific tion of the whole nture of mn. If he would be still further regenerted, nd born to still higher destiny, he should bring the purity of h simplicity into new contct with the com plexities of things, nd so be born of himself into Gnos of things s they re, out of the ignornce of things s he would hve them be ccording to the limittions of h simplicity nd purity. * Whether or not th idel should be clled Mysticm, of course, open to question ; but it certinly wht we believe to be the Spirit of Theosophy. For in Theosophy The Idel of proper use must be found for everything, luxury nd simplicity, festing nd fsting, mysticm nd "profnity " included. If you withdrw yourself it only to give yourself more fully; if you deny yourself it but for the "indulgence " of yourself in nother sense ; the withdrwl nd giving should, however, be simultneous, if they re to be truly efficcious, for the inbrething nd outbrething of the Gret Breth re one nd the sme ct. If we re not hugely mtken the present incrntion of the Spirit of Theosophy not intended to be mechnicl the old tboos nd sectrin revivl of mrks of dtinction, but progress towrds deeper reltion of life on vster scle thn hs ever been ttempted before. The old brriers of belief nd prc tice re not to be insted on s eternl necessities ; they re to be treted s pssing conveniences for the instruction of pupils t certin stges. They pply neither to those below nor to those bove such stges. The right use of ll things nd the right bstention use t the right times re the complementry from their ctivity of the truly

4 1g6 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW we mn ; eqully necessry smeness in difference nd difference in smeness re to him, if he would brethe to the bottom of h lungs. As Theosophy in its highest sense, the Wdom of God, perpetully mkes use of ll things for its own purposes, so in h smll wy should Theosopht endevour to mke proper use of ll mens for the reltion of h high purpose. An edition de luxe of The Voice of tjie Silence thus in its proper plce s ludble Theosophicl ctivity s 6d. edition in pper covers. * But, sys our collegue, the rel trouble not tht some bookseller Theosophicl or other profnes the simplicity of Angelus Silesius by tricking him out in n edition de luxe, but tht Theosophts themselves re eqully profne. There re, for instnce, certin Theosophts who mke lucrtive business out of the sle of Theosophicl books. Who these " certin " re we re not told. But let us consider the mtter s question of principle. Wht would our collegue hve? Are Theosophts to be debrred from deling in their own literture, except on the condition of going bnkrupt? As mtter of fct, probbly no Society cn show lrger record of Quixotic ttempts t book-publhing nd bookselling thn our own. If, with the derly-bought experience of yers, some Theosophicl publhers hve t length lerned the lesson tht they must mke right use of the conditions of trde to void bnkruptcy, who shll blme them? Tht ny Theo sophicl publher hs mde fortune, cr nything more thn living wge, out of h undertking, we entirely refuse to believe. But why should he not mke living wge? Are Theosophi cl books to be given wy? Is no Theosopht to del in Theosophicl literture but those who hve n independent income? If so, Theosophicl publhers must put up their shutters, nd Theosophicl writers must use their pens for some other purpose, nd wit for n incrntion when they my be born with golden spoon in their mouths. most As mtter of fct, of our writers write for nothing, or their books bring in so little tht it not enough for pin-money. We ourselves

5 ON THE WATCH-TOWER I97 sincerely hope tht Der Vdhn finncil success, nd tht it my ever continue to be so. *** Tlking of " success," however, Herr Bresch hs " some thing ginst " us on th score s well. Thof Numbers " He regrets tht in recent number of The Vdhn, in notice relting to t^e fortncommg Congress, nxiety ws shown tht it should be numerously ttended, so s to ensure its " success," s though, exclims our collegue, th could depend upon such " externls "! Here we grnt him " hit," to certin extent ; but it not, fter ll, somewht of question of phrsing? Mny of our members think gret del of th " Coming together." For them the more people come together the greter will be the " success " of the Congress. th they men tht the " coming together " the most desirble thing in the whole undertking, nd tht th personl intercourse fr outweighs the ltening to ddresses, no mtter how excellent the fre of th kind provided my be. It certinly qulity nd intensity tht should be imed t in ll our meetings, rther thn quntity nd superficility. But the mny hve to be regrded s well s the few, nd the wys of the mny hve to be considered s well s the methods of the few. * * * But our criticl collegue hs not yet done. He next proceeds to tke us personlly to tsk. By Our offence tht we hve, from time to time, llowed the insertion of n The Morlity of our dvertement which offers tril horoscope- Advertements r. reding for shilling, the dverter under tking to refund the money if stfction not given. Herr Bresch thinks tht th dvertement must be highly pid for or otherws it would not be inserted. We re sorry not to be ble to inform Herr Bresch of the sum pid for the dvertement, we hve not the smllest ide of wht the chrge for ny of the dvertements which pper in the Review ; but we will wger tht no dditionl chrge hs been mde for th specil nnounce ment. the dverter, Why do we not suppress it, he sks nd re quite convinced tht the offer entire good fith, nd tht the mking of money out of? s Becuse we know mde in it the

6 I98 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW very lst thing tht hs entered our good strologer's hed. It the very smllest sum tht hs, to our knowledge, ever been sked for the lbour of csting horoscope, nd it mde in wht believed to be the interests of n ncient rt tht deserves serious investigtion. Th t ny rte, the firm conviction of our dverter, whose one thought the good of Theosophy nd the redcovery of the higher strology, nd whose one effort the mking of wy to the best of h bility, h good will bck it, known in h own specil Why then should the editors cst upon him with contempt? The editors re responsible for nothing in the Review, except unsigned pr grphs; they dtinctly refuse ll responsibility for the opinions of their contributors ll tht ;nd they insert in the spce t their dposl not contrry to good morls. Is shilling horoscope contrry to good morls? Our pges re open to H err Bresch to give h reconsidered views on the mtter. So fr he hs simply stted tht he personlly dlikes to see such n dver tement, nd cn only imgine tht it owes its insertion to the money-mking proclivities of our mnger nd of the dverter. We re sorry to hve to convince our collegue publicly of n un generous suspicion of other people's motives, but the publicity of h criticm hs left us no other choice. A Theosophicl editor hs to endevour h best to conduct h periodicl from the stndpoint of n imprtil judgment, to the exclusion prejudices nd predilections. The mnger of of h own Theosophicl mgzine hs to try to do the sme with regrd to the insertion of dvertements. As editor nd s mnger both re holders of n office rther thn propgndts of their own specil views. But Heir Bresch relentless. He next turns to the Centrl Hindu College Mgzine nd its dvertements of ll sorts of quck medicines, nd sks why such "skn- " s,k^ d,l?fe dlose Unerehorigkeiten " re tolerted. Here Ungehorigkeiten we think he going beyond wht our proper "... field of criticm in the Theosophicl Society. The Centrl Hindu College Mgzine Mngement of the College ;nd in llowing the insertion into under the control of the Committee of if Hindus see no impropriety very populr mgzine of the

7 ON THE WATCH-TOWER 199 sme kind of dvertements s pper in ll Indin ppers, it not for us to protest. It Hindu mgzine for Hindus We of the Theosophicl Society, it true, tke n interest in it becuse some of our collegues re devoting their lives specilly to help Indi by mens of the College ; in their chosen work we wh them every success nd do not presume to interfere. We, therefore, gin cnnot feel the pious horror professed by Herr Bresch becuse the " Snow-bll " system dopted to increse the circultion of the College Mgzine; no one mking penny out of nd most of our collegues re giving their entire services for nothing. In Germny, the " Schnee-bll it, Verkufssystem, of Ynkee invention," so sys the editor of Der Vdhn, " strfbr verboten." How very terrible reds yet how innocent the thing itself in the hnds of our enthustic collegues it!ny, worse thn th, there re money prizes in the College itself. We hve no doubt tht th lso could be explined stfctorily by the Bord of Mngement. In country so poor s Indi, these smll prizes correspond to our smll exhibitions nd scholrships they re for the purchse of books, or pying of the bsurdly modest fees of the College. **. Still Herr Bresch hs not finhed h tle of woe. At the Europen Federtion Congress, held lst yer in Amsterdm, there ws n exhibition of Arts nd Crfts. Theosophicl Mny of the exhibits were offered for sle, nd Congresses nd. Sles of Work the sle went ll the merrier becuse of the ; Theosophicl symbols engrved or worked on the objects. Such sles so recommended should not tke plce t Theosophicl Congress, Yerly Mrket estblhed suggestion) sys our collegue for the purpose ( ; ;there might be not very prcticl ;but such buying nd selling should be debrred from meeting for Theosophicl purposes. But surely th Puritnm run riot. We hve pondered the question to the best of our bility, nd still the evil, which Herr Bresch, remins hidden from our eyes. so sun-cler Perhps it for tht we re not keen on dcovering potentil wickedness where none intended. If there n exhibition, why should not people buy the exhibits if they re for sle?should they go home, sy

8 200 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW to Pr or Berlin, nd then write to the exhibitor t h privte ddress, sy in Brussels or London, nd so quixoticlly pile Pelion of unnecessry trouble on n Oss of dditionl expense? And ll for fer of violting the snctity of the tmosphere of the Congress! If the snctity of our Gtherings so esily pro fned, it surely stops short t our skins, nd does not enter our herts. ** It should, however, be understood tht we hve not gone out of our wy to reply to the strictures of Herr Bresch, but tht they hve been forced upon our ttention by the The Fuente circultion of specilly mrked copies of Der Vhn, one of them being ddressed to our selves. A reply of some kind ws evidently desired, nd courtesy hs thus required tht we should put forwrd some considertions tht seem to hve escped the notice of our collegue. Doubtless mny more could be dded by those whom these ^things 'concern fr more immeditely thn ourselves ; we spek for ourselves lone. On turning over the remining pges of Der Vhn, however, we find tht we hve not come to the end of it ; for in publhing trnsltion of the notice of the Fuente Bequest, the editor expresses doubt whether the divion of th Bequest between the Adyr Librry nd the Centrl Hindu College quite in the sense of the testtor's intention. Herr Bresch seems to think tht the money ws left to the Theosophicl Society in the persons of the President- Founder nd Mrs. Besnt, simply becuse the Society not legl body, nd tht our collegues hd liberty to decide how the money should be pportioned. But th not the fct ; it ws speci ficlly left for the specil purposes to which it hs been pplied. Colonel Olcott nd Mrs. Besnt hd no choice in the mtter. (For the'rest of our remrks nd Jetsm ") on th subject see under " Flotsm Editoril Chnge of Address On nd fter My t, the ddress of tbe Editoril Deprtment of th Review, nd tht of Mr. nd Mrs. G. R. S. Med, will be chnged from 59 to : 42, Cheyne Court, Chelse, S.W.

9 201 PYTHAGORAS AND HIS SCHOOL When we chnce on the nme of Pythgors nd her of h school, it nturl to enquire who he ws towrds whom so mny eyes turned in the pst, re turning to-dy. The dust of h Golden Verses lies scttered, s Wlter Pter puts it, ll long Greek literture. Pythgors hs brillint glxy of the best thinkers the world hs seen following in h trin ;Plto nd Plotinus, with the lesser lights, Imblichus nd Porphyry, nd mny nother who hs been forgotten, nme of their gret predecessor still venerted. One of the mountin-men he, round whom the moss of trdition ;so much fungus indeed, tht while the hs gthered it becomes well-nigh impossible to get the true outlines of h grnd figure. Like Chrt, he wrote nothing. H techings were orl, nd hnded down by word of mouth ;nd, just s the books con cerning our Chrtin beliefs re mny, nd hve incresed in volume through the centuries, so Pythgoren literture hs become n ever-brodening strem. Follow the strem sourcewrds, nd little silver runlet fr bck in erly dys ;no uthentic relible biogrphy, not syllble of writing over which it lerned men do not cvil, finlly sweeping wy every vestige s simply cretions of lter ge. Yes, the mn must hve been gret, for h dciples were numbered by the thousnd, nd the Pythgoren school ws lrge nd influentil for mny dy. The best men of the time were drwn within its borders, nd busy pens wrote much concerning its founder nd h syings. It then surely worth while to exmine for little wht hs been sid of him, even though we cnnot vouch for its truth. Do we not hve biogrphies of the Chrt, do we not her Sundy by Sundy reputed syings of h for which we cn dduce little or no proof?

10 202 THB THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW The min biogrphy tht of Imblichus, but s the deth of Pythgors hs been plced t 500 B.C., while tht of Imbli chus ws 330.d., it obvious tht trdition hd hd time to evolve in so mny yers. Zeller plces no relince on the lborious tle of Imblichus ; but Zeller one of the iconoclsts, nd with h hevy Germn hmmer leves little or nothing stnding. Indeed, it mtter for wonder tht he does not vote Pythgors, like Orpheus, entirely mythicl. The world in the sixth century B.C. ws very different from tht of to-dy; the centres of civiltion hve chnged. Egypt ws then t the zenith of her power. Twenty thousnd cities, villges, nd hmlets studded the mrgin of her gret river, nd her commerce went fr nd ner, in the Mediterrnen Se nd the Indin Ocen. The lnds of the ^gen were busy, prosperous centres of trde. Greece ws the home of rt nd science ; while Bbylon the Gret ws the London of tht dy, n enormous city, the plce where ll ntionlities met, the mrket of the world where might be bought the merchnde of Est nd West, of North nd South. It ws into such world s th tht Pythgors ws born. Imblichus sys of him : " A greter good never cme, nor ever will come to mnkind, thn tht which ws imprted by the gods through th Pythgors." A student under mny msters, wnderer in mny lnds, dremer of drems during h erly yers, mn of ffirs in h lter dys, Pythgors shows bright nd strenuous him to be the leder of thought he becme. life, fitting Son of welthy merchnt of Smos, he hd every dvntge tht money could give. The best of msters in Smos ; then the old mn Thles t Miletus ; next lessons from Phoenicin hierophnts s he sojourned t the temple on Mount Crmel ; best of ll geometring nd str-gzing with the Egyptin priests t Heliopol, t Memph, t Thebes. No sying how long Egypt would hve held him, for he spent twenty-two yers there ; but the Persin invders under Cmbyses crried him off to Bbylon, nd it ws the Chlden mysteries tht next engged h serching mind. He returned to Smos fter twelve yers in tht gret nd

11 PYTHAGORAS AND HIS SCHOOL 203 wonderful city ; nd, being fifty-six yers of ge, he whed to imprt some of the knowledge he hd so lboriously cquired. But where to find the pupils? The Smins hd no desire to mount the difficult stirwy of knowledge in Pythgoren methods, nd the techer ws fin to bribe young gymnst to lern h fvourite dciplines, rithmetic nd geometry. For every step mstered, Pythgors gve him three oboli (three-pence three-frthings) ; nd the pln proved eminently successful, for the pupil grew enmoured of h tsks, so much so tht when h mster put him to the test by pretending inbility to py him ny longer, the pupil expressed willingness to become pymster, nd himself give the three oboli for every figure. Pythgors' wnderings in quest of truth were not ended, however, for he mde tour of the chief Orcles, nd for time sojourned in Crete nd Sprt to study their lws. Tht done, he gin returned to Smos, nd must hve found section, t lest, of the Smins more plstic thn formerly, for he estblhed there school which even in the time of Imblichus (800 yers lter) ws used s plce of consulttion concerning public ffirs. H own fixed plce of residence ws cvern outside the town, in which he lived contempltive life for the greter prt of h time. But the intellectul tmosphere of Smos ws not congenil to him. The Smins were not sufficiently well dposed to lerning, nd he felt ttrcted towrds wht ws then the lnd of intellect, Itly. So it we find him migrting thither, followed by six hundred dciples. The noblest city in Itly ws then Croton in Lucni, on the Gulf of Trentum, nd there he settled nd tught. The city ws lrge, hving wlls twelve miles in circumference, nd htory tells us tht it enjoyed five centuries of prosperity. The modern town of Cotrone, with between 8,000 nd 10,000 inhbitnts, stnds ner the site of the ncient city, some of the ruins of which my coins hve been picked up there. When still be seen, nd few fine Greek Pythgors first took up h bode in Croton, the

12 204 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW inhbitnts hd strong lenings to the luxurious wys of their neighbours of Sybr ; but the dvent of the philosopher ws like breth of wholesome ir in mmtic tmosphere. How it ws ccomplhed we re not told ; the currents of life begn to flow in better chnnels. Once more the young men worshipped t the temple of Apollo, nd the women returned to their llegince t the temple of Juno. Vnity nd dsiption were scorned, nd virtue once more enthroned. But the power of Pythgors wkened the jelousy of the council, who clled him before them to explin how he cme by th influence which ws swying their town. Th gve Pyth gors the opportunity for which he sought, to dvocte the building of school in which h principles might be tught nd prcted. He won over the council, perhps by h noble presence nd winsome ddress, perhps by the morl influence gined in yers of severe mentl nd physicl dcipline. So, on hill outside the town, surrounded by grdens nd overlooking the blue wters of the gulf, rose the fmous school. Long since fllen to ruin, destroyed even in the lifetime of its founder, it holds plce nd hs renown tht few buildings of ntiquity cn bost ; never-dying hlo. for the spirit of the mster invested it with The school ws brotherhood of ly initites who were tught physicl, psychicl, nd religious sciences, grdully leding up to union with the divine. It consted of n outer (Acusmtici) nd inner (Cenobite) circle those who cme merely to her, nd those who entered the order. The ltter gve up their fortunes into the hnds of curtor, much s would be done on entering religious order in Englnd. It ws lwys in their power to return to the world if it ws their wh, nd in such cses their goods were restored to them. If ny dciple reveled ught of the teching, he ws expelled, nd rther curious ceremony ws celebrted. A tombstone ws erected to the deprted one nd he ws lwys lluded " to s ded ; for, sid the mster, he ded s

13 PYTHAGORAS AND HIS SCHOOL 205 the decesed re not, since he hs returned to n evil life ; h body still dwells mong men, but h soul ded. Let us weep for him." Admsion to the inner school ws extremely difficult ; for, s Pythgors sid, " ll wood ws not suitble to mke Mer cury " ; he himself criticed the fce, the git, the mnners, the tlk, nd especilly the lughter of the spirnt, who ws of set purpose put t h ese in order tht he might be so exmined unwres. He hd to spend night lone in cvern reputed to be hunted, nd should he shrink from the drkness nd solitude t the outset, or flee from the plce before dqulified. There ws nother yet more severe test. morning dwn, he ws With no previous wrning, the novice ws put into bre gloomy cell, nd slte thrust into h hnd, on which ws written one of the Pyth goren problems, for " exmple, Wht signifies the tringle inscribed within circle "? or, " Why the dodechedron enclosed in sphere the imge of the universe? " To th he ws told to write n nswer. Bred nd wter were put beside him ; he ws left in complete solitude for twelve hours ; then he ws liberted mong the ssembled novices, who were under orders to chff him mercilessly, hiling him s the new philosopher, nd gibing him s to the results of h mentl chievement. Some were stung to fury by these tunts, others nswered cyniclly, some even flung down their sltes nd dshed out, clling out busive lnguge bout the school nd ll ppertin ing thereto. In some cses, notbly tht of Cylon, formidble enemies were so mde ; nd it ws through Cylon's nimosity tht the school ws eventully destroyed. He who bore ll with unflinching front, who replied by declring h willingness to undergo the ordel mny times if thereby he might gin some glimmering of truth, ws lone judged successful, nd welcomed into the brotherhood. After dmsion into the inner school, there were four degrees through which the novice must pss : first, Prepr tion ; second, Purifiction ; third, Perfection ; fourth, Epiphny.

14 206 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW In the first, Preprtion, Pythgors, knowing tht it ws the morl tht led to the philosophicl, nd tht he who best fulfilled the duties to which he ws born ws best fitted to ttin to deptship, gve the pupil generl morl mxims ; to honour h prents ; to remin fithful to h friends, nd such like. Th stge lsted for two yers, nd might be prolonged five. During tht time silence ws enforced. The pupil might not question or dcuss, sve with h compnions ; he hd merely to lten ; for Pythgors tught tht the sense of truth must develop before the power of dilectics, which if cquired first served only to render youth vin. A Pythgoren dy begn t sunre ; nd the initite intoned to the sounds of musicl instrument some of the Golden Verses, such s : Render to the immortl Gods the consecrted dortion. Then defend thy fith. Reverence the memory Of the hero benefctors, of the spirits hlf-divine. to Did the spiritul vion of the neophyte grow clerer s he chnted? Did he see the vt open before h wondering eyes? Did he rele the gol of the rduous pth on which he hd set h " " feet? Spirits hlf-divine! Did the phrse shed ny light on tht pth? ws not s yet dtinctly tught. The truth tht mn but god in the mking Hbits of right living must first be gined, pssion must be conquered, tempernce in ll things cquired. The scetic life ws not enjoined, but, " sid the mster : Only give in to plesure when you shll be willing to be inferior to yourself." And he dded : " True joy like concert of the Muses, which leves in the soul hevenly hrmony." Of the women initites for there were both sexes in the school Pythgors hd high opinion, but of womn in generl it could not hve been very lofty, for when dciple once sked him when should womn be pproched, he sid to hve " nswered : When you re tired of your pece." The good hbits inculcted in the first degree, which were bsolutely necessry before further dvnce ws mde, were

15 PYTHAGORAS AND HIS SCHOOL 207 ttined by ttention to hygienic lws, by erly ring, by rigorous blutions, by dietry from which flesh nd wine were bsent, consting chiefly of bred, honey, nd olives. The dietry enjoined hs given re to much dcussion, just s flesh-eting versus vegetrinm does to-dy. Imblichus tells us tht Pythgors hd mny refinements of rule which re certinly interesting. Some men might et of nimls, but there were prts such s the hert nd brin to be voided. All vegetble food ws not to be commended. He specilly denounced bens, but esteemed millet very highly. Food generlly ws to be judged by its effects, nd he rejected ll nutriment tht ws fltulent or the cuse of perturbtion, ny tht would withdrw from "fmilirity with the gods." Another gret fctor which mde for helth ws music, nd s different foods hd widely different effects, so hd vrying kinds of music ; some soothing, some exciting, some dpted for use in the morning, some in the evening. Curiously enough, within the sme century, the sme ides concerning music were being tught in Chin by Confucius. uses when suitbly dpted. Dncing, too, hd its So we find tht the Pythgoren dy begn with music, nd the chnting either of some of the mster's own verses, or hymn to Apollo, followed by mnly Dorin dnce. Music too ended the dy, s the strs shone out in the blue vult overhed. The gymnsium ws ptroned in the fternoon, when throwing the jvelin, nd quoits, nd other gmes, might be indulged in. Wrestling, however, ws prohibited, s hrdly seemly exerce for the budding philosopher, for it ws prone to rouse the lower nture. Perfect courtesy nd gentle mnners were lwys expected. Once well grounded in mnners nd morls, once good hbits were secured, the second degree ws ttined ; nd Pythgors received the novice in h dwelling, ccepting him s one of h dciples. The rel initition now begn. The teching of the Mthemtici, s they were clled, ws given in the circulr Temple of the Muses, which contined the mrble sttues of the Nine, nd the scred rts of which they were the gurdins were inscribed on the wlls behind them.

16 208 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW The veiled Hesti stood in the centre, her left hnd protecting the scred fire, her right hnd pointing upwrds. The Mthemtici were instructed, s the nme implies, in the science of numbers ; nd th, to put it vulgrly, ws the Pythgoren hobby. It true tht ll rods led to Rome, but there re vrieties of directness ; nd Pythgors hd found tht in the study of numbers mny truths ly embedded. For him, it ws the key to the universe, to the hrmony of the spheres. The gret Mond, Infinite Unity, worked through the Cretive Dud, the Fther nd Mother God ; nd the perfect imge of God mn nd womn. The Mond the essence ot God, the Dud the reproductive fculty, the numbers one nd two. But it the number three, the Trid, the ternry lw, tht the true key of life, the body, soul nd spirit of mn ; the cretive thought, the receptive fluid, the evolving worlds of God ; Fther nd Son, nd Holy Spirit ; Brhm, Vhnu nd Shiv ; nd so on endlessly. The number four ws lso ll-importnt ; for in the four primry numbers re contined ll the essentil principles, since in the ddition or multipliction of these, ll the others re to be found. The Pythgoren oth recogned th gret symbol ; " I swer by tht which engrven on our herts, the scred Tetrd, gret nd pure symbol, source the Gods." of nture nd pttern of Then the numbers seven nd ten tke high rnk ; seven, being mde up of three nd four, signifies the union of the humn nd divine, while ten, formed by dding seven nd three, pr excellence the perfect number. The mster concluded by pointing to the nine Muses, who stood round in mrble silence, presided over by the gurdin of the scred fire, Hesti, thus forming the perfect Ten. The student, now rmed with knowledge of the occult lws of numbers, ws, in the third degree, shown their workings. The skeleton hving been set up, it ws clothed with flesh, given circultory nd cerebro-spinl systems, nd becme veritble body of truth.

17 Th teching PYTHAGORAS AND HIS SCHOOL 209 ws preferbly given t night on the terrces of the Temple of Ceres, where the rhythmic wsh of the wves sounded in the ers, or in the crypts, where the nphth lmps shed soft light. It ws bold ttempt, nd we cn well imgine tht Pythgors entrusted th degree to no one else. Other msters could undertke the trining up to th point, but it not likely tht ny of them were sufficiently dciplined to dre the heights to be scled by the techer t th stge. The evolution of the soul through the worlds, the depths from which it hs come, the pinncles to which it hs right to spire, its dys of erth-life, its nights of heven-rest, with its pssge to nd fro ; in fine, the htory of the Psyche. The stronomy tught in th degree ws so much dvnced compred with the ordinry conceptions of the time tht it ws never divulged. But it seems to hve been in no we behind our modern stronomy except in respect of mesurements. Pythgors tught the double movements of the erth ; tht the plnets, sprung from the sun, moved round it ; tht the dtnt strs were themselves suns nd centres of other universes ; finlly tht these ll were the pssing World. frgments bodies of the Soul of the Wht seems to be the Ptolemic system found in Pythgoren ws relly symbolic description of the secret philo sophy, of the life of souls, nd not the science of stronomy tht ws tught. Indeed, much of the teching ws veiled, even fterwrds by Plto, who did so much towrds populring the doctrines. To initites it opens fr-reching vts of thought, nd brethes divine consoltions. But most men re s the dciples of Chrt ; the truths wit them, but they re not dciplined enough to receive them ; they hve not evolved strength sufficient to ber them. The mster tught tht the soul evolved on other plnets, nd on ech descent becme more nd more enmeshed in mtter, till on th erth the lowest rung of the ldder ws"reched. Spiritulity hd been lost, though not entirely ; yet were there enormous gins to reson, intelligence, of erth life. nd will in the struggles

18 210 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW Th fll into mtter hs been described by Moses s the closing of the gtes of Eden, by Orpheus s the descent into the sublunry circle. After the struggles of erth cesed, the soul ws seprted from the body, nd its sty in the Unseen ws described t some length by Pythgors. Life in Hdes ws s infinite in vriety s the life round us. It the Horeb of Moses, the Purgtory of Chrtins, the Erebus of Orpheus. From th intermedite stte, Pythgors tught tht the soul rrived in celestil regions, which words fil utterly to describe. All the evil ws plunged in the wters of Lethe nd ws forgotten ; ll the good, ll the results of erthly effort, were multiplied hundredfold. To quote Edourd Schure : " The mn who hs lived but one hour of enthusm or self-scrifice will repet in the beyond, in mrvellous progressions nd in eonin hrmony, tht single pure note torn from the dsonnt gmut of h erthly life." But not for ever could th bls be enjoyed. By n in exorble lw, the soul hd to return, nd tke up the burden flesh gin ; chieve more ; lern new lessons. Thus birth-nddeth nd celestil life lternted, until such time s the school of erth could dvnce its pupil no further ; the individul hd ttined, nd rose to the heven-world to go no more out. Mn in h retrogression ws lso trced by the mster, nd mn in h further progress through more spiritul conditions. But it self-evident fct tht to follow the techings of Pythgors there needed time nd study, nd it only possible to give the veriest glnce in pper like th ; of we must ccordingly now pss to brief considertion of the teching of the fourth degree. From following the flight of the Psyche through supernl worlds, the descent ws rpid. As the morning sun shed its rys on the upturned, wondering fces of the pupils, fter night of such teching, so did the light of common dy dwn for them in tht next degree termed Epiphny, or Mnifesttion. Now hd they to mnifest in themselves the dcipline of the School. Life's duties hd to be the more ernestly tken up, now tht the purpose nd end of being hd been reveled. The intelligence illumined, there remined the hrdest tsk

19 of ll, the conquest of the will ; PYTHAGORAS AND HIS SCHOOL 211 nd tht ws the work of those who hd ttined deptship. Should they possess sufficient energy, occult powers were now bestowed. gift, could red minds They hd the heling t glnce, dtnt events were known to them. Instnces of such clirvoynce were not uncommon, nd one biogrpher of Pythgors cites the cse of Apollonius of Tyn witnessing the ssssintion of Domitin t Rome, he himself being then t Ephesus. The initition of the women bore chiefly on their peculir duties s wives nd mothers, nd they were instructed s to the upbringing of children. For thirty yers Pythgors worked nd spred h influence in nd round Croton ; ll the surrounding towns felt the uplift of h presence in greter concord, purer lws. H influence extended throughout ll southern Itly ; but there cme rection. Six hundred exiles hd fled from Sybr nd crved n sylum in Croton. The Sybrites demnded their extrdition; but by the dvice of Pythgors th ws refused. Wr ws declred. The Sybrites, lthough fr outnumbering the Crotonins, were defeted, nd it to the events tht followed tht we my trce the downfll of the fmous school. The democrtic section, who hd never looked on the school with entire fvour, demnded chnge in the government of the city, involving the widening of the frnche nd the reduction of the number of the council from 1,000 to 300. Th chnge the Pythgorens opposed, for its results would hve been lowering of the stndrd of rule, nd the prcticl exclusion the council of members of the order. from But populr jelousy hd been roused, nd Cylon, who hs been lredy mentioned s self-dmsed cndidte of the erly dys, found it only too esy to inflme the pssions of the demgogues. enemy to liberty, he declred, ws himself tyrnt; Pythgors ws n there would be no freedom in Croton while he nd h dciples lived. Feeble protests were drowned ; proposl tht the Pythgorens should first be publicly tried met with no support, nd n ttcking prty ws formed. On their pproch nd their hostile intentions becoming

20 212 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW known, the building ws brricded ; but, infurited mob tried nother, foiled in one wy, the nd set the plce on fire, nd the doomed inmtes mostly perhed in the flmes ; only two, Archippus nd Lys, escping. One ccount numbers Pyth gors mong the victims, others sy he escped to Metpontum, nd there died ; but we cn be certin tht the school cme to n untimely end, minly from politicl resons. So sys Zeller : nd we my ccept h sttements, for he emerges from h explortions mong dusty old Pythgoren literture with be grimed fce, nd wiping the swet from h brow. H notes ttest h huge lbours. The exct dte of the gret mster's deth shrouded in mystery, but ws probbly somewhere bout 500 B.C. ; h ge vriously stted by different chroniclers, nd rnges from 70 to 104. In some ccounts, he mrried beutiful inmte of the school, Theno, dughter of Crotonin, nd hd two sons nd one dughter. It sid tht no cult persts in constnt sun shine. Like the pine tree, " the firmer he roots him the ruder it blows," nd the blood of the mrtyrs hs singulrly fertiling effect. So it ws with the techings of Pythgors ; they took firm hold in southern Itly nd in Greece. As lte s the sixteenth century, two thousnd yers fter, Giordno Bruno ws nmed the second Pythgors. He, too, found the outer world no redier for h teching thn it hd been for h mster's, witness h mrtyrdom t Rome. Mny schools hve been formed since the dys of Pythgors, nd numbers still ext ; but htory shows none sve tht of Croton which essyed so much, ws so ll-embrcing. Imgine such community s the Pythgoren school within our own borders! Is it to be expected tht we should show ny dvnce on the spirit of the Crotonins? The mills of God grind very slowly, nd we hve still fr to go on the evolutionry pth. But we cn surely echo the opinion of Imblichus when he tells us of the infinite good Pythgors hs done. brethe purer ir s we consider h lbours, Verses? Do we not or red h Golden Through him nd such s he does the thinking world gird up its loins nd press forwrd to the mrk of its high clling. Mry Cuthbertson.

21 213 THE ETERNAL NEW YEAR The dys of youth hve quickly sped, Another yer begins, Wht fitter time thn th, I sid, To wen me from my sins. I wery of the Pst, its fret Of foolh het nd noe, The Future holds redemption yet When lo! hidden voice : " My brother, hth the morning sun Fixed dys of purple stte? Resolve no more, thy deed begun Shll be the noblest dte. " The wheeling orb renews her youth, The order'd cycles roll, No times re set for love nd truth, No sesons hth the soul. " Mourn not the wsted Pst, the prize No pryers cn now recll ; Wer he tht flls to re Undunted by h fll. " Vst though the heights to be ttin'd, Fr peks of sunlit snow, He only knows how much gin'd Who dres to look below. " Dre to hve sinn'd ; ech purg'd desire, The shme tht rnkles still, My live to fn the spirit's fire, And spur the fgging will. " So shlt thou rep the brren yers ; And step by step t lst Thy feet shll climb the crowning stirs Tht lift thee from the Pst." Montgu Lomx. " (From Frondes Cduc")

22 214 PHILO: CONCERNING THE SACRED MARRIAGE* But the chief of ll the mysteries for Philo ws, pprently, the Scred Mrrige, the mystic union of the soul, s femle, with God, s mle (Deo nubere). In th connection he refers to Gen., iv. 1 : " And Adm knew h wife. And she conceived nd bre Cin. And she sid : / hve gotten mn by mens of the Lord. And He cused her lso to bring forth Abel h brother."t We re, of course, not concerned with the legitimcy or constency of Philo's llegoring system, whereby he sought to invoke the uthority of h ntionl scriptures in support of h chosen doctrines ; but we re deeply concerned with these doc trines themselves, s being the fvourite dogms of h circle nd of similr circles of llied mystics of the time. H views on the subject re clerly indicted, for he tells us in the sme pssge tht he speking of secret of initi tion, not of the conception nd prturition of women, but of virtues, tht, of the virtuous soul. Accordingly he continues in 13 : " But it not lwful for virtues, in giving birth to their mny perfections, to hve prt or lot in mortl husbnd. And yet they will never bring forth of themselves, without conceiving their offspring of nother. " Who, then, He who soweth in them their glorious [progeny], if not the Fther of ll universl things, the God beyond ll genes, who yet Sire of everything tht? For, for Himself, God doth crete no single thing, in tht He stnds in need of nught ; but for the mn who prys to hve them [He cretes] ll things." See in the lst number " Philo of Alexndri on the Mysteries." t De Cherub., 12; M. i. 146, P. 115 (Ri. i. 208).

23 CONCERNING THE SACRED MARRIAGE 21 5 And then, bringing forwrd Srh, Leh, Rebecc, nd Sepphor, s exmples of the virtues who lived with the gret prophets of h rce, Philo declres tht " Srh " conceived, when tion, nd God looked upon her while she ws in solitry contempl so she brought forth for him who egerly longed to ttin to wdom, nmely for him who clled " Abrhm." And so lso in the cse of " Leh," it sid " God opened her womb," which the prt plyed by husbnd ; nd so she brought forth for him who underwent the pins of lbour for the ske of the Beutiful, nmely, for him who clled " Jcob," " so tht Virtue received the divine seed from the Cuse [of ll], while she brought forth for tht one of her lovers who ws preferred bove ll other suitors." So lso when the " ll-we," he who clled " Isc," went s supplint to God, h virtue, " Rebecc," tht Stedfstness, becme pregnntin consequence of h suppliction. Wheres " Moses," without ny suppliction or pryer, ttined to the winged nd sublime virtue " Sepphor," nd found her with child by no mortl husbnd.* Moreover, in 14, in referring to Jeremih, Philo writes : " For I, hving been initited into the Gret Mysteries by Moses, the friend of God, nevertheless when I set eyes upon Jeremih, the prophet, nd lerned tht he not only mystes, but lso n dept hierophnt, I did not hesitte to go to him s h dciple. " And he, in tht in much [he sys] he inspired by God, uttered certin orcle [s] from the fce of God, who sid unto the virtue of perfect pece : ' Hst thou not clled Me s 'twere House nd Fther nd Husbnd of thy virginity? 't sug gesting in the clerest [possible] fshion tht God both Home, the incorporel lnd of incorporel ides, nd Fther of ll things, in tht He did crete them, for the rce of mnkind the seed of blessedness nd Husbnd of Wdom, sowing into good virgin soil. " For it fitting God should converse with n undefiled, n * Ibid., 13 ; M. i. 147, P. 116, 117 (Ri. i. 209). t Jer., iv. 3, where A.V. trnsltes : " Wilt thou not from th time cry unto me, My fther, thou rt the guide of my youth? "

24 216 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW untouched nd pure nture, with her who in very truth the Virgin, in fshion very different from ours. " For the congress of men for the procretion of children mkes virgins women. But when God begins to ssocite with the soul, He brings it to pss tht she who ws formerly womn becomes virgin gin. For bnhing the foreign nd degenerte nd non-virile desires, by which it ws mde womnh, He substitutes for them ntive nd noble nd pure virtues.... " But it perhps possible tht even virgin soul my be polluted by intemperte pssions, nd so dhonoured. " Wherefore the orcle hth been creful to sy tht God husbnd not of ' virgin,' for virgin subject to chnge nd deth, but of ' virginity ' [tht of] the ide which ever ccording to the sme [principles], nd in the sme mode. " For wheres things tht hve qulities, hve, with their nture, received both birth nd dsolution, the [rchetypl] potencies which mould them hve obtined lot trnscending dsolution. " Wherefore it not fitting tht God, who beyond ll genertion nd ll chnge, should sow [in us] the idel seeds of the immortl virgin virtues, nd not those of the womn who chnges the form of her virginity? "* But, indeed, s Conybere sys : " The words, virgin, virginity, ever-virginl, occur on every other pge of Philo. It indeed Philo who firstt formulted the ide of the Word or idel ordering principle of the Cosmos being born of n ever-virgin soul, which conceives, becuse God the Fther sows into her H intelligible rys nd divine seed, so begetting H only well-beloved son, the Cosmos."J Thus, speking of the impure soul, Philo writes : " For when she multitude of pssions nd filled with vices, her children swrming over her, plesures, ppetites, folly, intempernce, unrighteousness, injustice, she wek nd sick, nd lies t deth's door, dying ; but when she becomes sterile, Ibid., 14, 15 ; M. i. 148, P. 116, 117 (Ri. i. 210, 211). t In th, however, I venture to think tht Conybere mtken ; it ws common dogm of the Hellentic theology of the time. } Op. sup. cit., pp. 302, 303.

25 CONCERNING THE SACRED MARRIAGE 217 nd ceses to bring them forth, or even csts them from her, forthwith, from the chnge, she becometh chste virgin, nd, receiving the divine seed, she fshions nd engenders mrvellous excellencies tht nture prizeth highly, prudence, courge, tempernce, justice, holiness, piety, nd good dpositions."* nd the rest of the virtues So lso, speking of the Therpeutrides, he writes : " Their longing not for mortl children, but for dethless progeny, which the soul tht in love with God cn lone bring forth, when the Fther hth sown into it the spiritul lightbems, by mens of which it shll be ble to contemplte the lws of wdom."t (Oeupeiv) And s to the progeny of such virgin-mothers, Philo else where instnces the birth of" Isc," "which could not refer to ny mn," but " synonym of joy, the best of the blessed sttes of the soul, Lughter, the spiritully conceived ( V8i0eTos)J Son of God, Who bestoweth him s comfort nd mens of good cheer on souls of perfect pece. " And little lter on he dds : " And Wdom, who, fter the fshion of mother, brings forth the self-tught rce, declres tht God the sower of it." And yet, gin, elsewhere, speking of th spiritul progeny, Philo writes : " But ll the Servnts of God (Therpeuts), who re lwfully begotten, shll fulfill the lw of [their] nture, which commnds them to be prents. For the men shll be fthers of mny sons, nd the women mothers of numerous children."1t So lso, in the cse of the birth of Joseph, when h mother, Rchel, sys to Jcob: "Give me children!" "the Supplnter, dclosing h proper nture, will reply : ' Thou hst wndered into deep error. For I m not in God's plce, who * De Execrt., 7 ; M. ii. 435, P. 936 (Ri. v. 254). See " Myth of Mn in the Mysteries," S. 25 J. t D.V.C., 8 ; M. ii. 482, P. 899 (Ri. v. 318, C. 108). { Elsewhere n epithet of the Logos. $ DcMut. Norn., J 23 ; M. i. 598, P (Ri. iii. 183). Ibid., 24 ; M. i. 599, P (Ri. iii. 184). Ii De Prm, et Pn., 18 ; M. ii. 425, P. 927 (Ri. v. 241).

26 2l8 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW lone ble to open the wombs of souls, nd sow in them virtues, nd mke them pregnnt nd mothers of good things.' "* So, too, gin, in connection with the birth of Isc, refer ring to the exultnt cry of Srh " : The Lord hth mde me Lughter; for whosoever hereth, rejoiceth with me,"t Philo bursts forth : " Open, then, wide your ers, ye myste, nd receive the most holy mysteries. ' Lughter ' Joy, nd ' hth mde ' the sme s ' hth begotten ' ; so tht wht sid hth the following ' mening : The Lord hth begotten Isc,' for He Fther of the perfect nture, sowing in the soul nd generting blessedness."j Tht ll of th ws mtter of vitl moment for Philo him self, my be seen from wht we must regrd s n intensely interesting utobiogrphicl pssge, in which our philosopher, speking of the hppy child-birth of Wdom, writes : " For some she judges entirely worthy of living with her, while others seem s yet too young to support such dmirble nd we house-shring ; these ltter she hth permitted to solemne the preliminry inititory rites of mrrige, holding out hopes of its [future] consummtion. " ' Srh,' then, the virtue who mtress of my soul, hth brought forth, but hth not brought forth for me, for tht I could not, becuse I ws too young, receive [into my soul] her offspring, wdom, nd righteousness, nd piety, becuse of the brood of bstrd brts which empty opinions hd borne me. "For the feeding of these lst, the constnt cre nd incessnt nxiety concerning them, hve forced me to tke no thought for the legitimte children who re the true citizens. " It well, therefore, to pry Virtue not only to ber children, who even without prying brings her fir progeny to birth, but lso to ber sons for us, so tht we my be blessed with shre in her seed nd offspring. " For she wont to ber to God lone, with thnkfulness Leg. Alleg., iii. 63 ; M. i. 122, 123, P. 94 (Ri. i. 175). I in God's sted? " Cf. Gen., xxx. 2 : "Am t Gen., xxi. 6. A.V. " : God hth mde me to lugh, so tht ll tht her will lugh with me." J Leg. Alleg., iii. 77 ; M. i P. 1o1 (Ri. i. 187). M. i. 147, P. 115 (Ri. i. 209). Cf. lso De Cherub., 13 :

27 CONCERNING THE SACRED MARRIAGE 219 repying unto Him the first-fruits of the things she hth received, [to Him] who, Moses sys, womb.' "* ' doctrine, ' hth opened ' her ever-virgin But, indeed, Philo never weried of reiterting th sublime which for him ws the consummtion of the mysteries of the holy life. Thus, then, gin he sets it forth s follows : " We should, ccordingly, understnd tht the True Reson (Logos) of nture hs the potency of both fther nd husbnd for different purposes, of husbnd, when he csts the seed of virtues into the soul s into good field ; of fther, in tht it h nture to beget good counsels, nd fir nd virtuous deeds, nd when he hth begotten them, he nourheth them with those refreshing doctrines which dcipline nd wdom furnh. " And the intelligence likened t one time to virgin, t nother to wife, or widow, or one who hs not yet husbnd. " [It likened] to virgin, when the intelligence keeps itself chste nd uncorrupted from plesures nd ppetites, nd griefs nd fers, the pssions which ssult it ; nd then the fther who begot ssumes the ledership thereof. " And when she (intelligence) lives s comely wife with it, comely Reson (Logos), tht with virtuous Reson, th self-sme Reson himself undertkes the cre of her, sowing, like husbnd, the most excellent concepts in her. " But whenever the soul bereft of her children of prudence, nd of her mrrige with Right Reson, widowed of her most fir possessions, nd left desolte of Wdom, through choosing blmeworthy life, then, let her suffer the pins she hth decreed ginst herself, with no we Reson to ply physicin to her trnsgressions, either s husbnd nd consort, or s fther nd begetter."t Referring to Jcob's drem of the white, nd spotted, nd ringstrked, nd speckled kine, Philo tells us tht th, too, must be tken s n llegory of souls. re " white." " The mening The first clss of souls, he sys, tht when the soul receives the divine tde Spec. Leg., 7 ;M. ii. 275, P. 774 (Ri. v. 15, 16). ;M. 2 i. J Gen., xxix. 31. Cong. End. Grt., 52o, P. 425 (Rl. Hi. 72).

28 220 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW seed, the first-born births re spotlessly white, like unto light of utmost purity, to rdince of the gretest brillince, s though it were the shdowless t noon."* With th it of service ry of the sun's bems from cloudless sky to compre the Vion of Hdes seen by Thespesius (Aridseus), nd relted by Plutrch. Thespesius' guide in the Unseen World drws h ttention to the " colours " nd " mrkings " of the souls s follows : " Observe the colours of the souls of every shde nd sort : tht gresy, brown-grey the pigment ness ; tht blood-red, inflmed of sordidness nd selfh shde sign of svge nd venemous nture ; wherever blue-grey, from such nture in continence in plesure not esily erdicted ; innte mlignity, mingled with envy, cuses tht livid dcolortion, in the sme wy s cuttle-fh eject their sepi. " Now it in erth-life tht the vice of the soul (being cted upon by the pssions, nd re-cting upon the body) pro duces these dcolortions ; while the purifiction nd correction here hve for their object the removl of these blemhes, so tht the soul my become entirely ry-like nd of uniform colour. "t Agin, in giving the llegoricl mening of the primitive culture story of Tmr,t Philo not only interprets it by the cnon of the Scred Mrrige, but lso introduces other detils from the Mysteries. Thus he writes : " For being widow she ws commnded to sit in the house of the Fther, the Sviour ; for whose ske for ever bndoning the congress nd ssocition with mortl [things], she bereft nd widowed from [ll] humn plesures, nd receives the divine quickening, nd, full-filled with the seeds of virtue, con ceives, nd in trvil with fir deeds. And when she brings them forth, she crries off the trophies from her dversries, nd inscribed s victor, receiving s symbol the plm of victory." De Som., i. 35; M. i. 651, P. 595 (Ri. Hi. 257). t DeSer. Num. Vind., 565 c; ed. Bern. iii See for trnsltion of the whole Vion my "Notes on the Eleusinin Mysteries," Theosophicl Review (April, My, June, 1898), xxii. 145 ff., 232 ff., 312 ff. J Gen:, xxxviii. 11 ff. Quod Deus Immut., J 29 ; M. i. 293, P. 313 (Ri. ii. 94).

29 EVOLUTION AND RELATED MATTERS 221 And every stge of th divine conception but the shdow of the gret mystery of cosmic cretion which Philo sums up s follows : "We shll, however, be quite correct in sying tht the Demiurge who mde ll th universe, lso t the sme time Fther of wht hs been brought into extence ; while its Mother the Wdom of Him who hth mde with whom God united, though not s mn [with womn],nd implnted the power of genes. And she, receiving the seed of God, brought forth with perfect lbour H only beloved Son, whom ll my perceive,* th Cosmos." t it, G. R. S. Med. EVOLUTION AND RELATED MATTERS FROM THEOSOPHICAL POINT OF VIEW A A Lecture before Womn's ClubJ We re to endevour to mke n inquiry into the nture of evolution, in spirit scientific nd reverent, rtionl nd religious. In these dys Religion seeking Science s friend nd codjutor, nd Science, hving grown beyond rrognce, on its knees. The humn spirit hs in th er gthered such momentum tht the scientt mystic, nd ll in the devotee. ll but merged in the poet, the philosopher in the Our subject outlines itself in quite nturl fshion under three questions :Wht tht evolves?how does evolve?to wht end does evolve?one word nswers these three questions God. it it The highest demnd of the humn mind it for oneness for monm. Under the uthority of th montic conception, the pex of humn thought, I sy tht God the thing evolved, God * Lit., " sensible." tde Ebriit., JIn the U.S.A. ;M. 8 i. 361, P. 244 (Ri. i. 189).

30 222 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW the process of evolution, God the end or gol of it. there nought but God nd nothing outside Since of Him, it follows tht He evolves Himself within Himself, Himself the object of such evolving. He the Author nd Finher ; He the Life tht evolved ; the Wy by which it evolved, the Truth con cerning tht Life nd tht Wy. He the Wy, the Truth nd the Life. energes. The study of evolution begins with th postulte : God The energy of God, which the evolving substnce, pours itself forth into the evolutionry field, which within God, under two spects, the spects of Life nd Form. Sys Goethe : Here t the endless loom of Time I ply, And weve for God the grment thou seest Him by. Life nd Form re the wrp nd woof of th grment, which more fitly clled body, for it the universl incrntion of God. Ech life requires form to express itself in, nd ech form "requires life which it my express. Everything in the universe hs th two-fold, dultic jiture, dulm which for th enquiry indicted by the following correltives or pirs of opposites : Life Form; Spirit Mtter; Good Evil; Construc tion Destruction; Positive Negtive; Active Pssive; Cuse Effect ; Subjective Objective. These correltives re lwys the sme thing under two different conditions ; nd it the interply of these two con ditions tht brings their common force into opertion. Two illustrtions will suffice ; one from physics, one from humn experience. The mgnet hs two poles, positive nd negtive. They re opposite ends of the sme thing, nd by the complementry use of both we get their common force mgnetm. The positive not superior to the negtive. Only in their perfect equlity cn they demonstrte the power. If we brek th mgnet into thousnd pieces, ech frgment will show positive nd negtive pole, proving tht ll mgnets hve positive pole in which the negtive implicit or ltent, nd negtive positive implicit or ltent. pole in which the The second illustrtion th : in the mn we hve the

31 ctive, EVOLUTION AND RELATED MATTERS 223 inititive, positive msculine principle, expressing itself in strength nd intellect ; in the womn we hve the pssive, recep tive, negtive feminine principle, expressing itself in gentleness or ffection. In the union of the two, union of perfect equlity, we hve the child, or children. As ech frgment of the mgnet shows both positive nd negtive poles, so ech of these children both msculine nd feminine. In the mn's form the msculine expressed nd the feminine principle implicit or ltent ; in the womn's form the feminine expressed nd the msculine ltent. As evolution proceeds, ech to bring out into evidence tht which ltent, without scrificing tht which expressed. Th will give us the whole individul, who sums up in himself, not merely hlf but ll the humn ttributes the true imge nd likeness of God, the divine prototype, the Fther-Mother. Approching the subject in th wy it impossible to hold ny other view of the reltions of mn nd womn thn tht they re essentilly divine the scrment of mrrige. Here lso the inner mening, the esotericm of the Womn's Movement, including suffrge, higher eduction, etc. Fulty nd repellent s it, it the surfce ripple of gret rce undercurrent, the priml force feminine, pushing nd forcing its wy to the surfce, to tke its turn in the objective life of the rce. When the mtkes nd blunders hve subsided nd womn hs brought out her ltent intellectul, inititive nture, blnce will be restored, nd her feminine principle will be finer nd stronger thn ever before. Cretive genius will then express itself in womn. Art, science, philosophy nd religion will pour into the world through women s well s through men. These illustrtions from physics nd from humn life help us to see tht when we find two things which re perfect opposites, they re simply two conditions of the sme thing. The positive nd negtive re two different spects of the mgnetic force, the mscu line nd feminine re two different spects of the humn being. Now, the Divine Energy, s we hve sid, pours itself forth into the evolutionry field from stte of one-ness, synthetic stte, into stte of two-ness or dulity, n nlyticl stte. dtributes its one-ness into myrids of seprte expressions ; its It

32 224 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW one-ness becomes mny-ness, or mnifold-ness. Life must hve form, nd lives must hve forms, the positive must hve the negtive, for, s the Bible " quintly sys, it not good for mn to be lone." At th point it becomes necessry to dwell upon the problem of good nd evil, spirit nd mtter, or the constructive nd the destructive. Spirit nd mtter re two spects of the sme thing tht the evolving energy. They re eqully divine, eqully essentil., by which it Spirit evolves nd crystlltion of spirit to spirit s ice the life which ;spirit to wter. evolving itself lwys evolving. ;mtter the solvent of mtter. Mtter the form Mtter the Apply het to ice, you hve wter. Apply cold to wter, you hve ice. Apply synthetic, bstrct thought to mtter, you hve spirit thought to spirit, you hve mtter. Mtter which fter deposited the gem spirit. the life principle becuse it ;pply nlyticl, concrete the mtrix in Biologts fil in their serch so close, so ner tht they cnnot see it. They re looking for life s dtinct from mtter, but they will never find which sys : It it, for the two ext only in reltion fter ll identity. In h poem " Brhm," Emerson They know not well the subtle wys They reckon ill who leve me out When they fly, I And s though I m the wings ; m the doubter nd the doubt I : " I ; the hymn the Brhmn sings. I ; keep, mn born blind, suddenly receiving sight, should exclim see men nd trees nd houses, but where " tht wonderful light hve herd so much bout And ll the time the light I ll bout him nd? the very condition by which he perceives ll other objects. The mterilt sees the form nd fils to see the life repudites the form, like one who sees the objects in tht light. ;the idelt perceives the life nd The true biologt only the light nd ignores he who perceives both life nd form nd knows both to be the divine energy. Correspondent with life nd form, spirit nd mtter, re the two universl principles good nd evil. Hving found tht evolu tion proceeds by the co-opertion of opposite forces, we pply th lw to the cse of good nd evil, nd find them to be two

33 EVOLUTION AND RELATED MATTERS 225 different conditions of the sme thing, s re the poles of the mgnet, the two humn principles, spirit nd mtter, life nd form, wter nd ice. Evil form of good. It the noun evil, the bstrct or universl ide evil, which becomes the djective evil in concrete experience. Good exts in combintion with evil s vein of gold exts in mss of ore, nd to be mined s the gem spirit the residuum in both cses out from to be extrcted from its mtrix of mtter. it, not exhusted of its products, but just As worked over nd over, lwys giving forth more products ;so evil the producer of endless good. Evil the mens to n end which we know s good the mens end wrpped up in the mens s essentil s the end, the ;the mens finds its full develop ment, its climx in the end. They re the sme divine energy under two different spects ;evolution proceeding by series of choices between them. If we choose the good or constructive spect, quite cler tht we re thereby crried forwrd in ethicl evolution. If we choose evil, the destructive But th merely seeming. In br of music you my hve it spect, we seem to stop tht progress. qurter nd rest, qurter nd rest. The qurters re the ccent, the positive, good principle ;the rests re the puses, the negtive, evil princi ple. But where would be your metre were puses? So, in the rhythmic experience it or we puse to suffer, nd th sinning nd suffering not for those of life, we puse to sin re but the necessry contrst, the puse in the rhythm. In physicl nture th evil, destructive principle ppers in storm, flood, violent winds, erthqukes, ctclysms, night, winter, drkness, the burying of the seed in the erth. Ech nturl force my lso burn both constructive nd destructive. Fire wrms, but ;wter slkes thirst, but it it my lso drown. In ech constructive the destructive lurks, but eqully in ech destructive the ltent constructive. We ll know tht good crried too fr becomes n evil. To reverse the terms, to rele tht evil crried too fr becomes good, hrder problem to fce. It cn be fced, however, nd in th wy. Action nd rection re equl in opposite directions. When

34 226 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW evil ction crried to extremes it exhusts itself in ction. We thus hve rection, or good, in exctly equl mesure. In sociologicl studies we see clerly the working of th lw. The evils of competition, greed, nd dhonesty set up n ctive force. Our min hope of relief in their being crried so fr tht they will exhust their evil possibilities, when rection equl in the opposite direction will set in. Evil becomes so evil, so destructive, tht it destroys itself. Conditions preceding the French Revolution becme so evil tht they becme selfdestructive in the Revolution. Often tht which ppers evil to one person seen by nother with further vion to be good. The child sees s evil the destructive principle which the prent uses in governing nd restrining him. Mrioltry, the worship of the Virgin Mry, which to mny seems n t unqulified evil, ws, during the medievl period, the drk ges, min fctor in preserving the idel of womnhood to the rce, nd, on the prcticl side of life, in sving womn from complete submergence. The Bible full of recognitions of th principle, in such phrses s these " : 1 will dsh him in pieces like potter's vessel " " ; Though he sly me yet will I trust him " " ; Our God consuming fire " " ; Moreover, the lw entered tht sin might bound " " ; It must needs be tht " offences come ; "I come to bring not pece but sword." Also, " Mke unto yourself friends of the mmmon of unrighteousness," tht, so use wht ever of sorrow nd evil your life contins, tht out of it you will develope chrcter nd wdom, mking unrighteousness fter ll serve you s friend. The words " Rest not evil but overcome evil with good " hve been minterpreted by some very ernest seekers. Some of Tolstoi's dmirers, whether munderstnding him or not I do not know, think tht we re to ccept evil, tking no mesures ginst it. Th mtke. We re not to rest becuse resting not strong enough. To rest mens only to stnd ginst. It not enough to stnd ginst evil, s the dykes of Hollnd rest or stnd ginst the se ; th too negtive. must do the positive thing, we must go ginst evil ; to quote Browning " ' : Nor sit, nor stnd, but go.' We

35 EVOLUTION AND RELATED MATTERS 227 So we re not merely to rest but to oppose. Perfect oppo sition cn be mde only with perfectly opposite force ; so we re to overcome evil with good. A very vigorous, positive, ctive, scientific proposition, nd infllible in result, becuse ction nd rection re equl in opposite directions. By th method none of the originl force lost, but its direction chnged ; evil trnsmuted into good. The point seems mde tht there divine, destructive, universl principle of evil, which we re not to evde, but to meet, understnd nd use, developing from it the constructive good which inheres in it. Here the Chrtin Science cult logiclly becomes mtter for brief considertion. Th movement fctor in rce evolution, but it itself subject for evolution, s ll efforts fter ttin ment re. It needs to evolve wy from certin mtkes with which it involved. Its better prt its psychology, which contins s much truth s psychology ssocited with n unsound philosophy cn contin. I cnnot in the present pper exmine th psychologicl side, but will mke few remrks on its philosophy, though in relity the divion merely convenience, Chrtin Science nd the two re forms of the sme thing. the Western reincrntion of Vedntic subjectivm ; tht the extreme subjective interprettion of the superb orientl system of philosophy known s the Vednt. There the sme spirit of denil, the sme expression of hlftruth, the postulte of illusion* on the prt of the subjectivts, the denil of mtter on the prt of Chrtin Scientts, the sme hlf-concept of Deity. Both these sects try to get rid of mtter by denying it. Chrtin Science tries to get rid of evil in the sme wy. The scientific wy to do wy with evil to ffirm good, nd in so fr s Chrtin Scientts use ffirmtions their philosophy sound; but their denils of mtter, evil, suffering nd sin, re unscientific nd unphilosophicl s well s inopertive, becuse they only rest (negtive), nd do not oppose (positive). Affirmtions of spirit re sound, denils of mtter re un sound. Spirit gives us the synthetic, inclusive point of view, Denil of the extence of the mnifested universe. It does ext s Whole which we do not rele, our perceptions reveling only prts to our consciousness.

36 228 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW mtter gives us the nlyticl, dtributive point of view. There fore, when we sy : " All spirit," we spek truly, for mtter s the form of spirit one with it. But if we sy: "All spirit ; there no mtter," we hve wiped out hlf the truth. In n Arctic region, fr from lnd, mid hlf-frozen ses, we might fitly exclim : " All wter! " for the ice-floes nd bergs re forms of the wter. But should we sy : " All wter ; there no ice," gin denil wipes out hlf the truth. In both cses we hve emptied our synthes of its contents hve negted it. The pirs of opposites, some of which hve been given, re the pillrs of the universe. As well try to support temple's roof with one row of pillrs, s try to understnd universl lw with one set of principles. As well conceive mgnet with one pole, humnity with one sex, life without form, cuse with out effect, s spirit without mtter. The ide lcks symmetry, roundness, sphericlness ; it only hemphericl. By n rtificil method of evsion nd exclusion, it leps t monm. True monm or one-ness, however, reched by the nturl method of reconcilition, Froebel's method of the medition of opposites. Froebel finds mong geometricl forms sphere or bll which will roll nd will not stnd still, nd cube which will Stnd still nd will not roll. He reconciles these two opposite cpcities by combining or uniting them in the cylinder, which will both roll nd stnd still. Chrtin Science, however, uses no mediting, reconciling, unifying principles. It explins mtter by denying it. It recog nes God s the Whole but not s the prts ; it cknowledges the Trnscendent God nd denies the Emntive God ; for the Emntive God not only God in mtter but God s mtter. It postultes tht spect of God in which there no vrible ness, neither shdow of turning ; it ignores Him s Ancient of Dys. It understnds God s infinitely gret ; it does not see tht if He infinite He must lso be infinitely smll ; tht smllness which not only numbers the very hirs of our heds, but the hirs of our heds, tht not only notes the sprrow's fll, but *s the sprrow.

37 EVOLUTION AND RELATED MATTERS 220, Chrtin Scientts do truly know God s the Life, they still hve to know Him s the Wy. Knowing Him in only one of H spects they cnnot know the whole truth concerning Him. The perfect formul th : God the Whole, God the Prts, therefore God All. Or, God Spirit, God Mtter, therefore God All. The mystic mind, whether found mong Ctholics, Chrtin Scientts, Theosophts or elsewhere, very prone, in its new found psychologicl delight, to hold for time th unsound mentl ttitude. It feels dtste for the detil of life, the nlyticl side, nd desires to be let lone in its synthetic joy. Th subsides s the ego evolves ; God hs ptience with detil, tht detil Himself. The true* seer he who loves best neither the bstrct spects of God. nor the concrete, but both eqully, s equl Three geniuses who show comprehensive ide of the nture of God nd the universe re, Lo Tze, the Chinese philosopher, who sys : " Between the extent nd the non-extent there no difference sve in nme " ; Johnn Scheffler the Germn mystic, who sys : Time nd Eternity re one, The difference in thee ; nd Wlt Whitmn, the Americn poet, who sys : (Angelus Silesius), I believe in you, oh my soul the other I m must not bse itself to you, And you must not be bsed to the other. Strnge nd hrd tht prdox true I give, Objects gross nd the_unseen soul re one. In our dy nd rce the rection ginst prtil conception of the Deity, no mtter how spiritul it my be nor how prcti clly it my work, focussed in Whitmn. H genius, virile yet tender, msculine yet feminine, rejecting ll polhed, redymde forms, cretes for itself form so direct nd undorned to some it seems no form t ll. those sttely thoughts, tht Yet to h kindred mong men, following the lw of their own being, re cst in mesures no less sttely. So much of the divine energy s God pours forth within Himself, into evolution, becomes the Immnent God, or better, I hink, the Emntive God. Tht, so much s God the Whole

38 230 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW pours forth into expression becomes God the Prts. " Out of the Silence comes the Word." Th divine energy God's con sciousness, which to be unfolded in self-consciousness, item by item, ech item, ech tom, ech object, ech being, mens of such unfoldment. The energy t first in mss or volume, slightly differentited, crude, simple, not complex, undeveloped. It then forms the elementl kingdoms not delt with by science, but which form prt of the sub-conscious, pre-ntl, cosmic life. Of th erly morning of the world we know tht the first conditions were chotic, tht drkness ws over ll, tht the erth ws without form nd void ; tht lter the Spirit of God moved upon the fce of the wters nd dry lnd ppered, nd tht the rhythmic periods of dy nd night were evolved. Plnt nd niml life were embryonic. The evolutionry experience of th whole period sometimes res to the level of rce-consciousness, depositing strtum of the mrvellous, the fbulous. In th strtum re found the myths nd firy-lore of ll rces. Especilly th deposit found in obscure, quiet plces, where the pce tht kills hs not begun ; for instnce, mong the Scotch Highlnds, the forests of Brittny, lonely prts of Irelnd, nd some of the wilder Austrin provinces in the Crpthin mountins. In such dtricts there still credence in the fbulous, belief in firies, goblins, elves, gnomes of the erth, undines of the wter, sylphs of the ir, slmnders of " " the fire, little people of ll descriptions. Poets, nd other, ordinry people, hve unnmeble subjective experiences, wftings of old hppenings, wriths of the pst, phntom mts of memory, stirrings of buried instincts, senstions feebly vibrnt, whperings nd murmurings of hushed voices, " the horns of elflnd fintly blowing." Those who know the " Sunken Bell " nd " Lnd of Hert's Desire " will understnd. These things, thoughts bred of fncy, re doubtless born of fct, for it certin tht while, nd fter, the solid conditions were evolved which mde the minerl kingdom possible, entities of kind unknown to us, sub-humn entities, the fun, so to spek, of tht ge, occupied the cosmic stge, nd were prt of the sub-humn kingdoms of th grey old erth ; powers tht hve

39 EVOLUTION AND RELATBD MATTERS 23I become so ltent in us tht we hve forgotten in free expression. their use, were then The Slem witchcrft phenomen, nd certin fetures ttending delirium tremens, re mong the irruptions from th universl sub-consciousness. As lter development we hve the primevl experience of nimls nd pre-htoric humn rces both grotesque nd heroic, in the gret rce poems nd mythologies, the Druidic legends, Brdic trditions, the Sgs, the Edds, the Niebelungenlied, the Homeric stories, Greek mythology, Egyptin Book of the Ded, the Bible, the Veds, etc. These nd other old-world books re full of the heroic, the psychic, the mysticl. The phoenix, gorgon, gryphon, chimer, the drgon, centur nd minotur, nd gods nd heroes innumer ble, re blurred records in the rce mind of very old nd prtly sub-conscious life. Art drws bundntly from th source of inspirtion, witness certin fetures of the Itlin Rensnce, The Tempest nd other prts of Shkespere, Meriejkowski's Life of Leonrdo d Vinci.* Shkespere, though he seems self-criticl regrding h use of th sportive, prnkh, ghostly nd mysticl element, obeyed true instinct in so doing, nd, I feel sure, " builded better thn he knew." Willim Butler Yets, with h enthustic, finely wrought nd imgintive temperment, fitting gent for the renewl nd reinforcement of phse of th old-world consciousness which finding its wy out to the surfce through the Celtic revivl ; nd there re others. Florence Wymn Richrdson. (to bk continued) * The Forerunner. It ws my Reson led me to give up the Church (Dogm not Chrtinity). My Reson led me to Theosophy nd greeted its teching with joy nd welcome. To give up tht Reson would seem to me impossible nd wrong. Clifford Hrron.

40 232 THE NEW BIRTH Let us try to get definite ide of th New Birth tht to, or tht should, shine out in our minds with such cler light tht it even illumines its hunting opposite the drk pole of ctivity typified by deth (for, to the rel thinker, birth nd deth re both ctive opertions). We know tht there re mny menings to words. The crudest thinker cn embrk upon one word into se of bstrctions ; or, dictionry in hnd, he cn dms it with literl brevity. Neither process, by itself, likely to stfy n eger mind, or strving soul. Unite them s, in relity, they re united nd you my rrive somewhere, nd do something! Which brings us to the pprent prdox of the universe : nmely, tht to become consciously whole you must seprte ; seprte sfely you must never forget the wholeness to which you re fitting your seprted prts. Now the literl mening of birth " the ct of coming into life." On its objective side tht cler to us to certin degree. We re wre of the long, slow, ptient processes of Nture by which form fter form built, ech form n epitome of the ct we re dcussing. For, though we spek of form nd life in their seprte spects, they re two fcets of the one Relity ; nd every form instinct with the pulsings of life, brought to objectivity by myrid births, births in minerl, in vegetble, in niml, in humn kingdoms, births of toms, of molecules, of orgns, of ll the vst rnge of seeming utomt. These utomt re before us to study ; they re in our possession to use ; they re to be moved hither nd thither by the vrying intelligences inhbiting nd trnscending them ; whilst they, in turn, if not curbed, will rule, with rod of iron, nything below their own scle in the phenomenl universe. Hence we hve them fighting despertely for utocrtic to

41 THE NEW BIRTH 233 sovereignty over their lesser prts. Becuse, s yet, they mnifest only one side of being, the dense, the drk, the mteril side, they bitterly resent the intrusion of their fore ordined, pre-exting Ruler, tht Flming Spirit, whose mnifold Lights pper s the Individulities of the Cosmos. Those Lights shine out ; nd our foolh utomt scurry wy into the fmilir drkness, creting dese nd wr by the friction of their bckwrd movements, dying, nd dying, nd dying becuse they will not welcome their Kingly Vitnt ; becuse they cnnot see Him s the Greter Prt of themselves. Nevertheless He behind them even s He before them ; they turn bck only to meet H Force, H Irrestible Love, driving them forwrd gin ; nd every deth mens new birth' with its ttendnt experience flshing long to the still Invible Ruler. Sooner or lter the ignornt servnts become obedient, nd cese to suffer ; the King t lst finds entrnce to every crnny of their structure, lighting up one corner fter nother, coxing one prt fter nother to fresh beuty, fresh use, fresh helth, returning to them the experiences they yielded Him, until their number less series of births culminte in New Birth tht the wonder of them who hve ers to her, eyes to see, speech whereby testify. The Tberncle redy for the King, nd He loves infinitely every tom of its form, becuse, by the slow, slow, ptient lchemy of evolution He hs trnsmuted every tom into dwelling for the mnifested World- Sviour. Truly we might meditte long upon such mrvellous building ere we ventured to spek of the objective dvent of Chrt. Thus briefly I hve touched upon side of Birth tht, in detil nd in generl, beyond power of speech dequtely to describe ; only uncesing experience, observtion nd study through life fter life will tech us its mysteries nd its simplicities. If th be true regrding objective births, in how much deeper sense it true of the interpenetrting, vitling subjective births. Here we must del with principles, with feelings, with thoughts, with ll the more or less hidden springs of to

42 234 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW life, pying constnt heed to the fct tht these re the King's builders whilst He living in H forms. And they re not only the builders of H hbittions ; they re lso the soil wherein H consciousness grows, nd expnds. To understnd them, nd to utile them, we must hve our myrid births into their relms; even s bodies hve their myrid births into the objective worlds. The mn who knows wht he bout, whose chrcter lredy mnifests sufficient ll-round development to enble him pproximtely to judge of h outer reltionship to th inner world, of h inner reltionship to the outer world such mn definitely tbultes both h experience nd h inexperience. He wnts no birth tht not new birth ; he knows tht to be re-born into stte lredy conned nd ssimilted mens deth, not life ; it mere counting over of one's possessions insted of using them to cquire newer nd better ones; it lso consummtes tht crowning sin to the subtle mind, wste of energy. On the other hnd he creful nd observnt in dcrimint ing between tempttions nd opportunities. Mny excellent persons hve got into crude wy of thinking tht most plesnt things re bd for the soul, nd most unplesnt things slutry dcipline for tht m-used member of the cosmos. Th not necessrily true ; it merely vgue nd hsty conclusion bsed on inexperience, nd desire to be on the sfe side of the fence. To be true to ourselves, nd to others, we should hve the courge to tke the legitimte joys of life, s well s the potent sorrows, llowing neither to be despotic rulers over us. How, then, would firly cler-sighted mn view h sitution in the world to-dy? In considering th we must, perforce, put side the thought-lggrds of our times. We should mke smll progress nywhere if we stopped to rgue with people who refuse to believe in subjective nd objective evolution, in the potency of thought, in the science of religion, in the religion of science, in ll the mply proven nd ever-widening brnches of humn knowledge nd endevour. The intelligent individul might stte h cse like th : First, tht he possesses certin development of chrcter, esily plced in its reltive position with regrd to the rest of the

43 THE NEW BIRTH 235 chrcters in the universe, nd with regrd to the universe itself ; secondly, tht he hs potentil development of chrcter little more difficult to plce, nd ttention ; thirdly, tht he hs illimitble possibilities of chrcterdevelopment gret del more instent upon h tht re, t present, subjects for contempltion, but ttinble only by understnding h first postulte, nmely cquired chrcter, nd by devotion to, nd study of, h second the trnsitionl chrcter. Thus, whilst recogning tht, from deductive point of view, the third subject, the Divine Chrcter, inclusive of the other two, trnscends the other two, in some degree permetes them, whilst recogning th he knows tht, from the inductive side, viewed from tht importnt working principle of life nd growth, the trnsitionl chrcter hs first clim upon him, himself in the throes of birth plus himself lredy born. He hs, then, the essence of h pst s vluble possession s strong, firm ground beneth h feet ; he hs the contemplted future s n inspirtion for ll h dys; nd he hs the pre sent, the one bridge over n otherwe impssble river, for immedite moulding, for uncesing effort towrd perfection. Th definite knowledge, proved in the cquiring, not to be proved otherwe, even if every uthority in the lnd thundered it into h ers, mkes him mrshl h forces, nd see to their efficiency. The cquired wr with ech other. life side of extence ; nd the trnsitionl chrcter re ofttimes t When llied they mrch micbly on the when seprted one goes towrd deth, the other towrd birth ; which process veritbly sundering of the mn himself. To vert th dunion he must keep h eyes open ; he dre not be slothful ; he must not rest on h lurels, or len upon excuses of weknesses. Here re h subjective builders, emotions, mentlities, nd spiritul perceptions ; every dy they re hmmering t h chrcter, turning it one wy or nother, towrd birth or deth. How he going to control these workmen of h? Th question opens up nother field of mentl opertions. Hving decided upon the reltive positions of the three most

44 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW importnt fcets of chrcter, he nlyses little more closely to find how one hs been, how the other being, nd how the third will be developed. Th lunches him into se of study nd prctice mid host of everydy, yet subtle nd hidden, forces. Agin he tbultes: Love nd Hte; Activity, Lethrgy; Order, Dorder; Virtue, Vice; Power, Wekness; Stbility, Instbility; Selfhness, Unselfhness; nd so on through the long lt of opposite qulities tht mke up h subjective field of evolution. He my, or my not, believe in reincrntion ; it imm teril to h immedite deductions, though such belief gives opportunity of wider nd more sequentil vion ; still he cn logiclly drw from observtion of one life certin workble hypotheses concerning the trend of h lesser births nd deths, keeping, of course, n open-minded ttitude s to there hving been dequte pre-exting cuses, s to there being dequte provion for the working out of future effects. From th observtion of inner qulities s mnifesting bout him, nd in him, he hs lernt tht gret scle in the hrmonies ech one represents or dhrmonies of life, nd tht every individul hs h position upon tht scle. For instnce, he himself hs cquired Love to the point of selfhness s regrds h immedite fmily, but not s regrds the strnger t h gte ; he hs conquered the feelings of nger nd htred s ginst h friend, but not s ginst h enemy. He sees round him, moreover, persons who re below nd bove these positions on the scles of Love nd Hte ; nd he drws the obvious conclusion tht there must be continuous progression or retrogression long the endless lines of those qulities. The sme fct becomes obvious lso bout every one of such vitl undercurrents. At first, perhps, he cnnot grsp the full mening of these kleidoscopic inequlities ; but s he gins in yers nd experience, nd cn look bckwrd to find coherence insted of the chos tht seemed to be, he dcovers mrvellous " rounding-out " force t work the force of Birth, nd its creeping shdow nd subsequent co-worker Deth.

45 THE NEW BIRTH 237 Before th understnding rrived t, however, he must run the gmut of uncertinties, h feet. of ll negtions. Perhps he born into gret joy nd he lets it crry him off nd vried spects ; He does not tke it up nd try to rele its wonderful he does not look t its prts to see how it ws built, how he himself, hour fter hour, dy fter dy, yer fter yer sent out nticiptory thoughts of ech thought probbly followed by doubt. He hs not yet penetrted sufficiently to the hert of things to know tht these thoughts nd these doubts does he rele tht ll mnifesttion it, ;form the birth nd deth vibrtions of h invible world neither preceded by its due con servtion of energy, nd tht these forces hve been gthering nd gthering bout the nucleus of h joy, forcing its growth nd forming its constituents. In short, insted of recogning fmilir blossom of h own growing, h own tending, he looks upon s new strnge birth, nd elted becuse mircle hs hppened. Th eltion blsts h flower, csting over its shining rdince the purblind selfhness tht sees nothing but it personl possession, tht mses the three- fourths of spiritul glory hidden in every birth tht comes to mn, whether he be born to ters or to lughter, objective show or subjective potency. Then fter mny, mny fir-seeming turned to twdry, commonplce to n joys hve, in h hnds, shms, fter he hs blmed the universe, blmed h ntion, h friends, h reltions, stnces, h circum fter he hs impotently broken himself ginst ll these, he becomes still, nd lerns, through weriness of spirit, nd the humility of self-recogned ignornce, wht he ws incpble of lerning otherwe. He lerns to tke nothing by right of possession ;he tkes ll things tht come s uses, s the outcome of vst evolutionry processes, s the germs of vster processes in the future, tresures of God. s the The Lw dels similrly with him in mny other directions, pruning off h vices, cultivting h virtues, teching him to stnd on h feet nd open h eyes, until he recognes d tinct pln in chrcter-building, nd sees tht the smllest s well s the lrgest deprture from tht pln results in its corre

46 238 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW sponding loss turning from life, insted of coming into life. Just think wht tht mens in ll its berings! Or, rther, let us consider it s comprehensively s we re ble ; we shll still ms gret del of its mening, being, s yet, only prtilly wke on ny plne of nture. We see people suffering from melncholi, from nervous prostrtion, from lck of vitlity, from th nd tht nerve nd brin ffliction ; just s we see others (more seldom, unfortu ntely) who re constntly supplying the vitl deficiencies cused by these complints, who re giving of their best in n effort to vert the wnt they re more or less conscious of in the situtions bout them. A number of cuses re commonly lleged for th stte of ffirs in which we re ll prticipting. One person hs bd heredity, nother overworked, nother hndicpped by crush ing circumstnces ; whilst nother nturlly of cheerful dposition, nd so on, d infinitum. We know the things tht re sid ; they re ll prtilly true ; therein lies their dnger. Humn nture hs tendency to dig t prtil truths, nd burrow fr enough into them to become mentlly buried ; it rrely conserves sufficient energy to crry it right through into the glorious dylight upon other side. I think it Srh Corbett who sys tht nervous deses re confession of inherent wekness of chrcter ; presumbly their bsence eloquent of reverse stte of chrcter ; but we need hrdly be depressed or flttered either wy ; becuse most of us re only struggling from one position, nd pinfully ttin ing the other ; we re still conscious of dordered nerves, even whilst we lern to control them. However, the point to rele how the inherent wekness, or the inherent strength, relly does come bout ; nd tht mens t lest glnce beyond our prtil truth. Grnted tht we hve certin physicl the heredity, grnted we re born mid circumstnces tht, sooner or lter, led us to overstrin our nervous system, grnted some other person more fortunte in these respects ; grnting ny of the superficil

47 THE NEW BIRTH 239 truths, nd grnting lso the immedite trgedy of them, still must we look further to find the greter reson of our strength wekness. Of course Theosophic student lws of krm nd reincrntion of continuity or hs h conception of the of cuse nd effect, nd continuity of births to help him in understnding the sitution. But I wnt, t the moment, to nrrow those lws, or rther, nrrow our view of them ; I wnt to void the dnger of lrge, vgue, procrstinting ides concerning them ; I wnt to focus ttention upon their subjective workings in the infinitesiml period of time tht clled one erth life. Th crries us somewht wy from the predominnt nd generl understnding of re-birth s of the soul's entrnce, t stted intervls, into new forms. We must rele other spects of birth thn tht, if we re to yield full mesure of mening to the word ; we must look upon those more obvious births, if we believe in them, merely s culmintions of vst series of like previous ctivities. Every moment these previous ctivities re coming under, nd pssing out of, individul control ; they re under control when choice being mde, out of control when choice mde ; mny nmes re given them, mking up the gret scles of qulities mentioned before, nd ny honest personl study will convince us tht they re under similr nturl lws to those under which objective life. They re preserved nd conserved by their ffinities, neutr led by opposing forces of corresponding energy, forced to return to their centre of grvity, rendered dynmic by concentrtion nd direction, nd subject to ll other evolutionry purposes. who negtive People these fcts cnnot hve consciously experimented with them, lthough they do so unconsciously ll the time. Well then, if there so much brod, cler government of our emotionl, intellectul, nd intuitive ctivities, we cn surely become friends nd not foes of tht government ; we cn surely be members of its dmintrtion ; we cn surely see tht it the ruler, nd heredity, environment, nd so forth, merely its lesser gents, engged by it s biliffs in our houses until such time s we dchrge our debts to it.

48 240 THE THBOSOPHICAL REVIEW Herein lies the importnce of recogning immedite powers simultneously with wider lws nd possibilities. To dchrge debts does not necessrily tke s much time s ws tken in contrcting them ; but it does tke s much energy s ws spent in tht direction ; we my, nd occsionlly do, get rid of ges of heredity in one life, simply through grsping the obstcles under our noses, nd being brve enough to dregrd excuses. right trditionl The moment with us the gret birth period ; ll others re subservient to it. Our own conversion of th moment into deth dil wht mkes us nervous wrecks ; it mens terrible ccumultion of unconsidered trifles, odds nd ends of negtive thoughts nd emotions, returned, in the fulness of time, to their centre of grvity ; it were we to find out whether ny excuse, true or untrue, not nother of these bleful the lredy hevy burden. thoughts dded to The question, shll we begin to unlod ourselves t once, or shll we len little while longer on the queer jumble of ides tht t every stge mrk our munderstnding of lw? The mn who reles h trnsitionl chrcter, nd refuses to live nd bury himself in previously cquired one, will wnt to begin h unloding on the instnt ; he looks t h moments s they come nd go ; he mkes use of h neutrling, conserving, nd dynmic powers ; nd grdully he lerns to py due heed to the myrid cuses, sides, shdes, effects, surrounding the simplest ctivities of every-dy extence. qulities, By experiencing, in h own chrcter, the evolution of nd judging of their effects, even during three or four score yers, he rrives t gret nlogies. He begins to know h brother, erstwhile strnger to him ; he begins to prophesy the Coming Chrt, hitherto the vinest of vin humn drems. Becuse through h mind flshes signl fter signl, connecting the Pst with the Present, the Present with the Future, uniting their subjective Trinity in the everlsting Now becuse of th insight he cnnot help prtly understnding, prtly reling the Divine Symphony of Life ; he cnnot help hering its music through personl struggle, triumph, defet, gony, or joy ; imginble ttribute of chrcter, every on its presenttion,

49 THE NEW BIRTH immeditely djusted by him to the Gret Whole tht permeting h consciousness. The New Birth to him hs cesed to be fortuitous hppen ing in the middle of Time. It insted child of pst builders, prent of future ones ; it ushers into our notice ll the kingdoms whereof science, nd philosophy, nd religion do tell ; Angel before nd behind the portl of deth ; it the it the Herld of the King Who to enter the Tberncle the Mnifested World-Sviour, for Whom ll th building. Thus, lso briefly nd indequtely, I hve suggested the subjective side of our study. But it most importnt to remember tht Birth single lw interpenetrting the two inseprble spects of our lives of ll lives the subjective nd objective. Yet I hve been deling with it s working in them seprtely. Th becuse we re looking t it with our reson. Before we resoned we lived in both worlds t once, nd reson ws not violted ; fter we hve finhed resoning we shll live by intui tion in both t once ; nd still we shll not violte our reson. It mtter of progressive experience ; nd humn reson forms bridge between instinct nd intuition, controlling one nd reching out towrd the other helping, other. in its wy, to build tht Therefore, unless we wh to shut off nd cese building our intuition, we should regrd Birth in its interpenetrtive ctivities. If we try permnently to wrest prt the subjective nd objective principle we merely mke two imginry countries, divided by gulf, where we ourselves drift helplessly, blown hither nd thither by breezes from either shore ; or, if we only recogne one spect, refusing ny relity to the other, we re in still worse stte. If we believe only in the objective we inevitbly become mterilts; if we believe exclusively in the subjective we re in imminent dnger of becoming imprcticble dremers. Just now the world does not yern prticulrly for the presence of either clss. Of course we never do succeed in living n entirely subjective or n entirely objective life ; though t periods we observe one, nd fil to observe the other. But insmuch s the bstrct 4

50 242 THE THBOSOPHICAL REVIEW the rchitect of the concrete, nd the concrete, in turn, clrifies, defines, nd expnds our knowledge of the bstrct, nd ech bound up in the other in long chin of cuse nd effect, effect nd cuse, we must hve our mnifested life in both. If we forget it we rob our individul consciousness to the extent of tht forgetfulness. Now think of our hving subjective nd objective births nd deths t the sme time ; which the truth. For forms re be ing built upon qulities, nd qulities developed through forms, with every breth we drw, with every vibrtion of our being. Unless we rele th stupendous interction, nd grsp its detils, s well s glimpse t its outcome, we re only entering hlf wy, or less, into ech new birth, nd perhps withdrwing gin through fer or lziness. We do th every time we hve good impulse nd fil to ct upon it ; we do it every time we see n ction, nd fil to note its results ; we do it in studying book without nlysing its sttements, nd experimenting with its precepts ; we do it in thinking of socil problems without keen sympthy ; we do it when we tke hppiness without trying to spred it brod ; we do it in postulting n Inclusive Deity without meditting upon Him. Such instnces might be multiplied by every one of us ; they re clogs in the wheels of birth, nd we must untiringly remove them. The Theosophicl Society hs so synthesed the truths of religion, nd science, nd philosophy s to give every ernest student cler nd intelligible theory of the universe ; but it n individul duty to prove tht theory, step by step. We cnnot tke wild evolutionry leps just becuse we hppen to hve n intellect cpble of grsping cosmicl lws. Wht use were it to be ble to pply krm nd reincrn tion to whole lives, nd fil to mrk their working in the seconds composing those lives? We must cquire energy nd will to enter these seconds positively, with keen consciousness of their cumultive powers. And we cnnot do tht unless we rele tht the seprtion of the dul principle of mnifesttion only for purposes of study, for trining our nlytic fculties, which re ultimte constituents of intuitive knowledge.

51 THE NEW BIRTH 243 Until intuition perfected, until we hve immedite nd complete understnding of nything we my turn our ttention to, s we re told Msters hve, we re under n obligtion to live thoroughly in th dul world, not in one prt of it lone. We cnnot go bout crelessly nd inobservntly nd think tht we shll be born into the light. It we ourselves who perform the ct of coming into life ; wht we hve not wnted very much. And if we wnt knowledge root of sympthy, we must the lw only sees tht we do not get of humnity, the only lsting needs notice how people wlk, nd tlk, nd dress, nd ct, nd think, nd feel ; we must needs weigh nd compre, nd nlyse these things, their reltion to ech other, their plce in the universl scheme; if we wnt knowledge of God we must look for Him in the tom s well s in the plnet, in qulity s well s in n object ; if we wnt knowledge of thought-systems we must note their effects in the world of men nd women, s well s their exposition between the covers of book ; if we wnt to deduct correct conclusions we must lern the pln of induction ; if we wnt our inductions to led us to the heights we must see how they fit into our deduc tions; which only sying tht we re ment to mster the nture of prticulrs s well s universls, to hve ultimtely thorough knowledge of both, to rele, nd consummte their unity. Then shll we hve trnscended even the poet's intuition, when he wrote : Flower in the crnnied wll, I pluck you out of the crnny, Hold you here in my hnd, root nd ll, And ll in ll! If I could know wht you re, root nd ll, And ll in ll, I should know wht God nd Mn re! Then there will be no more births nd deths, s we under stnd the words. For the New Birth will be the crowning ct of Coming into Life ; the expnsion of individul consciousness into the All-Consciousness! Alice Rose Eyton.

52 344 "BODY" AND "MIND" IN PSYCHOLOGY Principles of Physiologicl Psychology. By Wilhelm Wundt, Professor of Philosophy, Leipzig. Trnslted by Professor Titchener. Vol. I. (London : Swn Sonnenschein & Co. ; 19o4. Price 12s.) Why the Mind hs Body. By C. A. Strong, Professor of Psychology in Columbi University. (London: Mcmilln & Co. ; 1903.) In tking these two books together my im to bring out more clerly the curious position in which mny of the workers in psychologicl investigtion find themselves t present. On the one hnd we hve uthorities s weighty s Professor Wundt of Leipzig, devoting the whole of th, the first volume of h clssicl work upon psychology, to wht relly selective nd highly speciled form of nerve nd brin physiology ; while, on the other, Professor Strong devotes the whole of h work to the dcussion of the problem of the reltion of mind nd body in its generl form. Both books re vowedly intended s contribu tions to the science of psychology, but nything more widely different thn their respective contents nd tmospheres it would be indeed difficult to find. Professor Wundt's work chrctered by ll tht thorough ness nd dmirble workmnship for which its uthor fmous ; but no smll pre nd thnks re due to its trnsltor for the unusully perfect nd dmirble mnner in which he hs crried out h tsk. The originl work hs long been well known in French s well s Germn ; the present trnsltion, indeed, though the first complete trnsltion into Englh, mde from the fifth Germn edition (19o2) the ; nd the fct of the work itself being so well known renders it unnecessry for us to enter upon its detiled considertion here. It hs, needless to sy, been brought well up to dte nd owes not little to its trnsltor, Professor

53 " BODY " AND " MIND " IN PSYCHOLOGY 245 Titchener, for h cre in tht direction. covers only the Introduction The present volume nd Prt I. of the Germn work, nd, s lredy remrked, wholly devoted to the tretment of the Bodily Substrte of the Mentl Life. The Introduction sets out very clerly nd plinly Wundt's own position in regrd to h subject-mtter Physiologicl Psychology ; nd indictes dequtely the scope nd importnce he ssigns to it. But Englh reders of philosophicl inclin tions will, I think, be specilly grteful to Professor Titchener for reprinting the section on Pre-psychologicl Concepts in th connection from the fourth Germn edition, though Wundt omitted it from the ltest Germn one. These pges re not only interesting nd useful but serve vluble purpose in helping to clrify the reder's mind. Chpter i. of Prt I. devoted to the Orgnic Evolution of Mentl Function, nd the first section dels with the Criteri of Mind nd the Rnge of the Mentl Life. I must dmit dp pointment t wht seems to me the indequcy of th dcussion. It constitutes relly one of the most fundmentl nd, s Wundt dmits, most difficult of the problems we re concerned with. Hence one would expect thorough nd extensive tretment in plce of the very megre nd nrrowly restricted pges here devoted to it. Indeed, I think most students would willingly exchnge for such dcussion considerble proportion of the detiled physiology which fills up the subsequent pges. But fter ll Wundt delibertely hs working long physiologicl lines, so perhps we hve no right to complin ; nd indeed ought rther to be grteful for the wonderful industry nd cre with which such very lrge volume of relevnt physiologicl mteril here brought together, nd its bering nd significnce elucidted. There re six chpters, besides the Introduction, in th volume, nd everyone of them pcked full of sifted, co-ordinted worked-up mteril. Not of course tht there re not mny points nd numerous views dopted by Professor Wundt bout which much controversy will still rge ; but tht very circum stnce will be the finest possible tribute to the thoroughness ernest cre with which the work hs here been done. nd

54 246 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW especilly It obvious tht ny detiled dcussion of such work, of th portion of it, would only be of interest specilts, nd well-red ones too. To the generl reder such points re too unfmilir nd too obscure to rouse h ttention. Further, generl dcussion of the mny brod problems involved would be inpproprite in th connection without fr too lengthy exposition of the dt themselves. I must to therefore content myself with observing tht while on the whole Wundt's position would seem to be tht of psycho-physicl prllelm, t lest in nme, rther think tht the chief emphs in h I thought flls upon the ltter hlf of the term, nd tht he regrds the purely " psychologicl " elements s relly dependent on, or t ny rte " " epiphenomenl to, the physicl. Tht, however, does not lessen the vlue of the work he hs done nd but it renders fce of the shield. For lthough stndpoint ll the more needful it presentment doing ; of the other should be clerly recogned tht Wundt's throughout truly psychologicl, nd though the psychologicl motif domintes everywhere nd determines both h selection nd h presenttion of the physiologicl mteril he hs so bly brought together, yet on the whole one gets the impression tht he thinks nd resons under the influence of ides in the min mechnicl, or t most chemico-vitl. And while of course tion th point of view true tht in the volume t present under consider it both necessry nd inevitble, yet in lter portions of h work, when he comes to del with the series of psychologicl problems proper, one cnnot but feel tht th ttitude will seem unwrrnted nd, s lredy remrked, led him to tret tht prt of [the subject fr too much s must sort of epiphenomenl ccompniment of the chnges occurring in the bodily substrte. perhps No doubt th ttitude of mind hs certin dvntges, it nd in the interest of true psychologicl science tht the mechnicl, or more ccurtely the mechntic, hypothes should be pressed to its utmost limits, so tht it my come to shre, beyond ny doubt, the fte of its nturl prent, the cruder mterilm of the middle nd end of lst century. But sooner or lter the time will come, indeed it stnds lredy t the door,

55 BODY AND " MIND IN PSYCHOLOGY 247 when first strict descriptive prllelm will be rigidly observed in exposition, nd then will be finlly replced by some definite nd fertile conception s to the nture of the reltion relly involved in the ssocition of Mind nd Body. It to th problem tht the second work we hve to consider here exclusively devoted. And though the problem essentilly metphysicl rther thn strictly psychologicl one, it ppers pproprite to del with it in th connection, becuse the uthor not only writes more s psychologt thn s metphysicin, but lso pproches nd dels with it lmost wholly from the ground of psychology, even though the second nd lrger hlf of h book expressly termed metphysicl. Prt I. thereof bers the heding " Empiricl," nd consts of two books ; the first setting forth the fcts of the cse, the second devoted to the question of the Cusl Reltions between Mind nd Body. The Introduction opens with direct nd cler sttement of the problem s the uthor finds it presented in contemporry thought, nd of the vrious leding vrieties which the two con trsted conceptions of Interctionm nd Automtm hve ssumed in vrious hnds, nd then explins the procedure which the uthor proposes to dopt. Th certinly presents some decided dvntges, but lbours under one lmost ftl ddvntge, nmely, tht it involves the uthor in frequent repetition nd renders h book somewht wordy nd often tedious defect so common in work in th field, tht one comes to regrd it s lrgely responsible for the wnt of generl pprecition which dcussions of th kind often encounter. But, t ny rte, he gives us, on the whole, very full nd fir ccount of both the Interctiont nd the Automtt theories, nd wht more importnt lso of the fcts, experimentl nd observtionl, s well s the rguments upon which ech view bsed. Thus even though greter conceness nd condenstion of exposition, long with incresed terseness nd precion of criticm on the uthor's prt, re certinly to be desired, th first prt of h book will furnh very useful outline of the subject to those who re interested in it. The finl outcome of the study of the empiricl rguments

56 248 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW upon the nture of the mind-body reltion, in Professor Strong's opinion, tht they re ll like insufficient to justify decion. He considers tht severl of those often dvnced hve been shown by h nlys to be fllcious from the purely empiricl bs ;while of the sound ones the cusl rgument would prove the prllelt thes, were not tht its vlidity hypotheticl, since it it rests upon the ssumption tht mentl events re simultneous with their cerebrl correltes. The rgu ment from the principles of biology in brief tht the mind must somehow hve prcticl importnce since it hs been evolved the struggle for extence seems to prove the mind to be efficient," tht, to.be " true cuse of bodily ction ;but subject to the difficulty tht no explntion cn be found of the origin of consciousness. On the other hnd, the rgument from the principle of the conservtion of energy res strong pre sumption, which however does not mount to proof, tht the contrry it the cse. And thus we find physics nd biology rryed ginst one nother, in nd re quite unble to rrive t ny definite conclusion fter the most creful exmintion of the empiricl fcts nd rguments. So Professor Strong next proceeds to dcuss the mtter from the stndpoint of metphysics, nd s he hs thus to go over gin much of the ground lredy trversed, the outcome good del of repetition. Here nd there re some illumintive nd striking remrks, suggestive nd useful, but h tretment fr from exhustive nd t times even superficil. Indeed one feels it to be rther own metphysicl stndpoint, for pity tht he hs not delt more fully with h cl position, such s one encounters here, certinly does not conduce thought. He vows himself t present rther dcredited to kind of hlf-stted metphysi pt to mled nd cler understnding of h rel believer in the often ridiculed nd doctrine of " things in themselves," by which he evidently mens something rther different from wht Knt, the introducer of the term, understood by it. By " things in themselves," Professor Strong tells us tht he under stnds "relities externl to consciousness of which our perceptions the symbols." In th one brief phrse we hve the implictions nd foundtions of re whole system of metphysic, which

57 "body" nd "mind" in psychology 249 certinly it would be highly interesting to see worked out, but which we re left to grope fter s best we my. Anyhow " things in themselves," s thus denned, re the key to h posi tion, nd, s he remrks, it perfectly obvious tht the reltion of mind nd body will evidently be n essentilly different thing ccording s the body the symbol of relity externl to consciousness, or only phenomenon within consciousness. We shll see presently little more Strong thinks s to the nture clerly wht Professor of these " things in themselves." Menwhile it to be noted tht he hs got cler grsp of certin points which re quite ftl to the theory of pure phenomenlm, one of which, t ny rte, I hve not seen so employed before, nmely the fct of memory, nd much more difficult point the fct of perception itself. At ny rte, the whole structure of our dily lives, no less thn the chievements of science, constitute stnding proof tht somehow we ctully do possess wht techniclly clled " trnscendent" knowledge, tht, knowledge of something over nd bove our own sttes of consciousness. A number of chpters re devoted to the dcussion of the " extence " of " things in themselves," to the dproving of Knt's rguments s to their bsolute " unknowbility," nd to the positive "proofs" which cn be dduced for their extence nd knowbility. With regrd to the nture of these " things in themselves " Professor Strong's view seems to be tht they re, in reltion to our perceptions, comprble to three-dimensionl persons whose shdows re thrown upon curtin conception obviously remincent of the Pltonic " cve." Further, he concludes tht these " things in themselves " must possess nture like tht which ll forms of mentl life hve in common ; nd tht either Berkeley's Divine Mind or Professor Clifford's Mind-stuff would like stfy the requirements of the cse. Finlly, he regrds the fct tht individul minds re out of these " things in them selves " by evolution, s conclusive reson for holding them to be mentl in their nture. In other words, " things in them selves " re, in h view, essentilly of spiritul chrcter, nd tht, roughly speking, the sum of h conclusions.

58 250 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW Our uthor then goes on to show how th theory of " things in themselves," essentilly spiritul or mentl in their nture, furnhes wht he regrds s n dequte nd stfctory solution of the problem of Mind nd Body, nd how it reconciles nd syntheses ll the other nd opposing views nd resolves the pprent contrdictions which both empiricl nd metphysicl enquiry hd brought to light. To sum up. Th, undoubtedly, vluble s well s suggestive book, nd it forms one more ddition to the ever incresing volume of fresh, living, nd vitl metphysicl con struction, which in the present century, I believe, destined to culminte in remrkble proven metphysicl insight. nd positive dvnce of sound, stble, Bertrm Keightley. THE TRUE INWARDNESS OF KARMA (CONCLUDED FROM p. IJO) The true inwrdness of Krm will revel itself by the considertion : 1. Of Krm from the point of view of Origins : 2. Of Krm from the point of view of Ends : 3. Of Krm from the point of view of Process. The sttement just given of the lw on its bstrct side will hve pved the wy for the difficult considertion of Krm from the point of view of Origins. In its outermost spect Krm the lw tht djusts from fruit, effect from cuse. sequences, nd which brings seed Tken higher, it my be thought of s the sequences themselves. If ll tht hppens be the result of previous hppening, then Krm will not only be, s Sir Edwin Arnold hs the " sum totl of soul," but the it, sum totl lso of the Cosmic Soul, nd of the Universe in ll its complex prts, spects, threds, nd linkges. Krm the web, nd the weving of the web. My we go both step higher,

59 THE TRUE INWARDNESS OF KARMA 25I nd sy it lso the Wever? If so, we hve come to Origins ; we hve come lso to the plce of the true inwrdness. I wnt now to justify th ssocition of Krm with ll the stges of the world-process, up to the Ultimte Itself. I wnt to mke th point cler for it very importnt to our rgument tht nothing cn be presented to the mind s definite fctor in the world-process which not specificlly involved nd presupposed in the One Antecedent of the process. Whether you regrd the world s series of relted sequences, or s series of effects unfolding from previous cuses, immteril, for under either conception the sme truth holds. Look t the world, for moment, s relted series of cuse nd effect. Now n origin cuse nd its product, the thing cused, cn be seprted only in bstrction. It incorrect to spek of cuse nd effect s though they were two dtinct conceptions, insted of one conception under two spects. To quote Mr. Hldne once more : "The cuse, in point of fct, psses into the effect, nd the effect just the cuse in nother form : tht to sy, the mind mkes dtinction which turns out to be vnhing one s the purpose chnges." Agin " : The nture of the mind to posit its dtinctions, nd then to resolve them, nd the result tht every one of its conceptions involves every other." He illustrtes th by gunpowder explosion of which, he sys, the cuse lies not only in the mtch which brought bout the ignition, but lso in the peculir chemicl ffinities of the toms of gunpowder, nd in the thousnd nd one combintions of minor events of which the explosion ws just the lst term. Now th unity which Philosophy dcovers to underlie things so pprently diverse s cuse nd effect explicble only on the hypothes tht there but one Cus Cusns who present in, nd who lends n element of cuslity to, ll the minor nd s we think more immedite cuses which weve the web of humn life. The truth tht one link of cuslity presupposes ll other links, nd the One Cuse immnent in, nd ntecedent to, the whole. In other words, every one of the hppenings of life involves every other. Effects re only cuses

60 252 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW in nother form, since ech effect becomes in its turn cuse in remoter sequence. Or, if you regrd the world merely s series of relted sequences, nd leve out the ide of immedite cuslity, s so mny do, the result the sme. For it not sufficient to refer bck events to the preceding link in the sequence ; you must trce ech link to its ntecedent, nd so to the strting of the chin. For the chin of sequences we cll Krm logicl chin, in which the first link presupposes the lst, nd the lst its presupposition nd its truth. "It would be possible," sid Bhop Westcott, "with powers no different in kind to our own, to red bckwrds in the succes sion of physicl chnges the htory of our erth, to her gin the lst cry of the murdered slve cst into the se, nd to look gin t the lst ripple of the wter tht closed over him. Ech ct of mn obviously goes on working nd working fter its kind, in the doer nd h children's children." The deth of the Grnd Duke Sergius, for exmple, ws cused neither by the bomb nor by the ssssin, but by the long course of oppression nd mgovernment culminting t th definite point. To find the origin of tht event we should hve to trce, on the one hnd, ll the sequences of Europen htory to their strting-point ny, the sequences of the Rce's htory s whole, nd, on the other, the personl threds of the innumerble individulities who hve mde tht htory ; nd even th would not be fr enough, for the whole Universe hs conspired to the mking of Sergius, nd to the killing of him. We should see, too, tht the culminting event of th prticulr life ws but one of mny converging points of n infinity of threds which the One Cuse hd been ceselessly weving through th instrument since the first moment of H self-expression therein. And we will sy hopefully of Sergius tht from wht he hs become t th erly stge of h creer, it doth not yet pper wht he shll be, otherwe the plight of the evil mn were drk indeed. The one Cus Cusns in him, nd ceselessly evolving the web, regrdless sint. To return now to our strting-point. of whether the shuttle be sinner or Krm, we hve sid,

61 THE TRUE INWARDNESS OF KARMA 253 the sum-totl of soul. Wht you re you hve been. You re the result of the thinkings nd doings of yesterdy ; ll re stored in the you of th moment, nd the self which you hve been yer go link in the krmic chin tht connects with the self of your infncy with the self of your previous you incrntion with the self of your erliest incrntion with the One Self beyond which there nothing. becuse it hs been infolded bck into its Source. There the chin lost, Do you not see it now s wondrous letting down of link upon link of rolled-up series of vitl sequences of interrelted effects, if you will in ech of which the One Cuse the presupposition nd the truth? You, the individul now summing up nd embodying the Krm of n infinite pst, re the One Cuse in process of becoming explicit. God unfolding Himself in you, nd Krm but nother nme for God unfolding Himself. Th perhps, why, in the subtle Buddhtic metphysic, custion denied to Krm nd rebirth. " No God of Heven, or Brhm-world doth cuse the endless round of birth," becuse tht not cused which itself the cuse. Krm God in ction, nd God in ction uncused, in the sense of being n extence depending on higher will. Here the hert of Krm. In the slow, unerring growth of sequence from sequence, link from link, we re wtching the grdul unfolding of ll tht in God. In ech mesh of the web the Wever present, nd voluntrily enmeshing Himself in the product of H ceseless ctivity. Is th utomtm so, it the utomtm of n invincible Purpose becoming uto mtic from there being but one wy in which evolution cn pro ceed. For no course sve the west possible to the All-we. Omnipotence limited by omncience. I hve sid enough to show tht the lw of sequences commonly nmed Krm cn only find its completion nd its true inwrdness in the Ultimte of the sequences the One Antecedent in whom ll sequences inhere. Seeing Krm, then, s God in mnifesttion, we re prepred for the inerrncy the bsolute justice of its decrees. To bow to Krm the west thing the All-we soul cn do, for in ech frgment? If perhps of Krm expressing Himself. The " tit-for-tt " concep

62 254 THE THBOSOPHICAL REVIEW tion now imbued with dignity it hd not before. Insted of mechnicl rebound, we hve intelligent djustment ; Krm not only retributory, but reformtory. God being like present in the ignornt nd hlf-we offender s in the lw tht retlites on the offence, the retlition cn but contribute to the highest ends of the individul. For n offender one in whom the Divine hs but prtilly come into self-expression, nd suffer ing the consequences of ctions performed ginst Right ; the God within clled out of ltency by the merciful relentlessness of the God without. Retribution thus the prtner nd the gent of beneficent nd reformtory purpose. Which thought leds us to our second spect of the subject Krm s reveled in Ends. "Ends," sys Hldne, "nd not cuses, fshion the Universe." But we my go step further nd ffirm tht Ends re Cuses. The cuse tht mde me write th pper the end for which I wrote it. The cuse of ll ction tht intelligent the end for which the ction plnned. Wht sent us into the infnt-school, the high-school, the university, but the end of cquiring the knowledge dpted to our stge in growth? Wht sent us into bodies sve the end of more nd more perfect selfreltion? Who nd wht the cuse of my present erthexperience, with its seemingly insignificnt detils? of ll the previous erth-experiences of which the present the logicl outcome? I nswer : the End I m to fulfil by just these experiences, nd in no other wy. For the web of sequences which my Ego hs been spinning out of itself since time ws my Krm nothing less thn the End developing itself. Krm, the soul's sum totl, both the End nd the mens to the End. Think you tht th strnge medley of incident which men cll humn extence not live with purpose, nd stble with lw? Wht ever life my be, there re three things which it clerly not : It not piece of mechnm exclusively controlled by utomtic ction nd rection, cuse nd effect. It not chos of chnce hppenings, of which the soul the victim rthe* thn the cretor.

63 THE TRUE INWARDNESS OF KARMA 255 It not the rbitrry product of n externl Providence, Himself unffected by the events He somehow " rrnges," b extr. Life rther the self-conditioning nd unfoldment of Purpose which moves sequentilly, nd by strict lw, to n ppointed fulfilment. Krm the gret process of th unfoldment in the humn soul which tkes plce inwrdly by the growth of chrcter nd cpcities, nd outwrdly by the exct correspondence of chr cter with circumstnce. To the non-believer in rebirth, or the crrying forwrd of the soul's sum-totl to the next pge of the ledger, the intimte ssocition of chrcter with circumstnce will not be pprent, for in th life circumstnces nd chrcter do not lwys pper to correspond. But it hrd indeed to rele how the Divine sequen tilly moving to Ends in humn souls unless these sequences re referble to ntecedents in remoter pst thn usully ttri buted to them. For there n element in th considertion which thinkers usully overlook, viz., tht I m the importnt fctor in my own life, precely becuse self-consciousness in me. Now if you, in compny the One Self hs come to with the vst mjority of thinkers, seek to explin me by trcing my origins bck to the beginning of things in time, s bsolutely necessry if you would under stnd how I cme to be, you re still leving very little room for the development of the " me " fctor in the problem. I must hve pre-exted, becuse the One Self hs pre-exted in me. I wnt room nd scope for H ge-slow unfolding. I desire to hve hd prt in my previous evolution, s I know I hve prt in the present, nd by impliction in the future s well. But if I m mere product of sequences converging t definite point in time, wht I my be will be due to no exerce of my immortl individulity tht spect of me which eternlly uncrete but to the ply nd interply of forces so remote s to be lmost inconceivble. It will be of course conceded tht from now onwrds I shll hve free use of my now emerged individulity ; nevertheless,

64 256 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW I desire to hve initited some of those sequences of which, on the " one life " hypothes, I m but the unconscious product. And tht my conception of Krm s the Logos moving to Ends bsolutely demnds the compnion conception of rebirth, I think, too obvious to need further elucidtion. But of th one Cus Cusns wht shll we sy? Rther, wht shll we not sy? If the end or purpose of things the Cuse becoming fully explicit, nd utterly self-expressed, we hve ll the ssurnce tht needed s to the nture of the End of which Krm the expression nd the mens. Even now we know by experience of working with Lw tht We dre, therefore, The soul of things sweet : The hert of Being Celestil Rest. Stronger thn woe will : tht which good Doth pss to better best. to trust in the ultimte perfectibility of things if we my be prdoned for two mleding expressions : to believe in ends s well s in processes, even though the ends become but strting-points for further processes, the serpent entering into itself. For we my sy philosophiclly tht Krm neither the end, the process, nor the beginning ; it the complete circle of eternl self-unfolding. Hving spoken of Krm in its reltion to Origins nd to Ends, we hve finlly to spek of it s Process. How Krm mde? Up to now we hve ttempted universl nd bstrct red ing of the lw. We hve endevoured to define Krm s the Cuse of things working to ends becoming explicit in the experiences of the humn soul. But in deling with the Process of th expliction, or self-unfolding of the One, we re brought to the more concrete nd prticulr spect of our subject. I hve desired to keep the two plnes s dtinct s possible in thought, nd there should be no confusion in the chnge of stnd point when we come very briefly to the considertion of Krm on fmilir text-book lines. But I must first touch on probble objection. It my be urged tht the foregoing considertions conduct to spiritul Ftlm which, by understting the undenible dtinction

65 THE TRUE INWARDNESS OF KARMA 257 between the divine nd the individul wills, hs deprived mn, n evolving being, of ll responsibility for h own evolution. But little reflection t th point will show us tht the finite will but the Infinite Will tinder voluntry limittions. It my hve independent ction to the extent of its finitude, nd yet be one, in the lst resort, with the Purpose by which the limittion ws imposed. In other words, the finite, nd ll tht involved in finitude, God in process of self-utternce, lbeit s finite it in eternl contrst with the Infinite within which it flls, nd which t once its presupposition nd its end. Without entering to ny extent on the problem of Freedom nd Determinm one my suggest tenttively line of thought which, if followed out, will go fr to reconcile the pprent con flict between humn responsibility nd divine over-rule. Let me then stte just how I understnd reltion of the One Cuse to the minor cuses humn spirit. the reltion of God to mn, the initited by the Strting from the postulte of one Universl Mind in ll things, we hve to observe tht the very essence of mind tht it shll be self-conscious. " But in self-consciousnesses," sys Mr. Hldne, " we d tinguh the self from something else : we imply in the fct of self-consciousness n object." If, then, the Universl Mind must hve n object, it cler tht tht object cn only be Itself. Now th not so difficult s it seems. Wht cn the Universl Mind think except Itself? Wht re Its origintions, but spects of Itself spects which re from the Universl Mind turning on Itself, s it were, the Subject becoming Its own Object, nd becoming it in finite forms. Now one step further. The very essence of Mind to be present to Itself in forms of finitude, becuse the nture of the Universl Mind tht It shll be ctive, nd ctivity implies the positing of dtinctions, the movement of unity into difference. But otherness, difference, dtinction wht re these but qulities of the finite? The finite one of the stges t which the Universl Mind knows its own content, nd without finitude there cn be no mind-ction. Nevertheless, the finite does not belong to the Universl Mind s such, but to the Universl Mind

66 258 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW s object to itself. Now we cn see better how He goes out into, or expresses Himself in dtinctions, without which He would hve no content, nd how He yet remins the sum nd the unity of those dtinctions. We, the finite selves, re the One Self becoming finite tht He my hve content ; nd s finite selves we hve mesure of H freedom, nd mesure, too, of H knowledge. We, too, s minds re ctive, positing ourselves in difference. We think. We re ever projecting nd reproducing mind-energy which, being of the one essence, eternl, nd self-reproductive. Our thoughts re replics microcosms of ourselves, prtking of our essence, incrnte with our selfhood. Ech miniture self s it put forth tkes body, nd persts the mentl plne ; s mentl imge on it lso built into the Universl Mind s prt of H imperhble content, H never-dying Memory. These mentl imges re virtully the mkers of Krm. They form prt of the consciousness of the Ego ; they re h inlienble possession, the outcome of h mentl life, h stock-intrde, remining in h deeper consciousness throughout the whole of the life in which they were generted. They re crried with him through h present incrntion, forming the definite tone of h personlity ; they ccompny him through the gte wy of deth ; they ccompny him into the regions beyond deth, nd such imges s re unble, by reson of their denser nture, to survive the rrefied ir of the Heven-world, leve behind their grosser vesture on the threshold of tht plne, nd pss into temporry ltency. In Devchn the Ego hs before him the vst mss of the thought-contents of h consciousness, which re now to be worked into the ctul texture of h being. Those mentl imges which re cpble of direct trnsmuttion into cpcity, die out s mentl imges, though they perst in their fruits. Those of the grosser sort which hve pssed into temporry ltency during Devchn re thrown out gin by the Ego on its return to erth life, nd re literlly worked into the strl body of the next incrntion, the process of throwing them into con sciousness utomticlly ttrcting the strl elements, which provide them with clothing nd substnce. The physicl body

67 THE TRUE INWARDNESS OF KARMA 259 being built upon the strl model, it no exggertion to sy tht the entire substrtum of mn composed of the mentl imges of the pst. He wht he hs thought, nd the fruition of thought Krm. Wht do we see in ll th? Simply tht thought, being of the essence of the Universl Mind, eternlly self-fulfilling. The most trivil thinker using something of the eternl thoughtenergy tht built the worlds, nd plying with the most dngerous, becuse the most intimte, of the powers of God Himself. The ceseless, self-reproductive nture of thought one of the gret things tht Theosophy hs brought to the West, nd the explntion of the fct lies in the essentil unity of the mind with the Universl Mind. But trce th self-fulfilling spect of thought still further. The mn who hs just stepped into h new, self-built body given n environment, prentge, line of heredity in strict ccordnce with h pst thinkings. They hve to be worked out these thought-seeds. They re lives, microcosms, frgments of the Eternl Mind ; for good or ill they must hve their ppro prite field of development. The outwrd detils of our lives will therefore be the expression in terms of circumstnce of inner forces, self-generted. So Krm mde, nd so the world moves to its ppointed course built of the thoughts of men. But now recurs the gret considertion which t the root of th trete. Are we not now bck gin on our tredmill? Is not the Universe moving in groove hewn by pst thinking, nd incessntly deepening, s pst thinking gives birth to future tendencies? In other words, not the Universe t the mercy of the inchote mss of rudimentry mentl imges which represent the rce's thinking powers t the present stge? Now I hve sid tht the Rce not only in the mind of God ; it the Mind of God clothing Itself in finite forms. I hve purposely prepred for th difficulty by showing something of the philosophy of the outbirth of humnity how humnity God in H spect of otherness, Himself becoming H own object, nd so reling H own content, or something of H own content. We thus see the necessity of the Rce to God. He must know us, or He could not know Himself. He must know

68 26o THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW us, too, nd need us, too, t every stge through which we, evolving beings, re destined s to pss, though we re bffled to ccount for the usefulness of some of the stges, from our present point of view. Their usefulness, however, my be supported by reson. The voluntry self-conditioning of the One for ends. Therefore every consequence of th self-condi tioning provided for, nd every phse of every life finds its right plce in the rich mosic of the Whole. Or look t it from nother point of view. In the memory of the Logos, we re told, persts throughout Eternity the record of humn detils ; not one lost. But evil nd vnity re mong the humn elements tht will thus secure seemingly useless nd undesirble immortlity. By remembering evil for ever, the Logos endows it with vitl, perstent force tht frustrtes our belief in its essentilly phenomenl chrcter. Our only conclusion, therefore, unless we dms the doctrine s ultimtely untenble, to regrd the Logic Memory of evil s evil in its necessry contrst with good, nd so s evil no longer. In the " Book of the Lipik" the Universl Memory ll exts, but exts in blnce. The right rtio of things there. So tht wht men think, within the limits of their prtil freedom, wht, in the long run, nd from the highest stndpoint, they re destined to think. Ftlm? yes, but the Higher Ftlm which but nother nme for the working out of the One Free Will. I suffer for my offences through the lw of love tht wills not tht I shll remin n offender for ever, but the " needs be " of offences provides for tht sin by clculted contrst with its opposite. My evil thoughts, the sequentil outcome under strict lw of my previous sttes of being, re countercted t every moment by your wer thinking ; my frivolity blnced by your spirtion ; my vicious inclintions by your holiness. It only in bstrction tht sin nd holiness emerge s eternlly wrring dtinctions. On the highest plne the plne of the kshic records the mentl imges of sinner nd of sint, of sint when he ws sinner, nd of sinner when he shll become sint, co-ext ech s mutully-blnced spects of higher unity. For t tht height time not ; there re no successive

69 THE TRUE INWARDNESS OF KARMA 261 nd unrelted strnds, but the finhed pttern ; unity of Mny in the One ; gret Now. Thus we hve climbed by slow nd tiring steps to the plce of the true inwrdness of Krm, which my be stted in phrse to be the Logos mking explicit wht implicit in Himself. First, I hve delt with the incompleteness of the " mechnicl rebound " theory, the " tit-for-tt " conception, which mkes of the Universe gme of bttledore nd shuttlecock whose ending s indefinite s its beginning ws unnecessry. Then, by deling with Krm from the point of view of Origins, we showed how the One Cus Cusns must find H own self-expression in every thred of the sequences men cll life. And pssing from Origins to Ends we sw tht Ends were but nother nme for Cuses become explicit ; in other words, tht the lw which from one stndpoint ws the wever, from nother ws the weving, nd the completed work. Finlly we exemplified our bsl thought by study of Krm in Process, showing it to be the fruitge of humn thought ; showing, too, tht the humn thinker none other thn the Divine Thinker under voluntry limittions, nd tht h con tribution to the development of the Universe must, therefore, in the long run, nd from very high stndpoint, be in hrmony with the purposes of things. And if to some we seem but to hve exchnged mechnicl utomtm for spiritul ftlm which ppers on the surfce to vitite morl dtinctions, nd to sweep wy humn responsi bility, we hve in relity, nd on closer exmintion, but exchnged lower truth for higher. For to recogne One Will in ceseless mnifesttion in ll things not in some things seems to me greter thn to emphse the seprted wills in their lck of the consciousness of unity. And to recogne One Purpose stedily unfolding through the series of relted thoughtctivities of men higher truth thn the ccentution of hrdnd-fst morl dtinctions. Behind the shllows of the personl consciousness the Purpose known, nd th knowledge, which to the outer mn now but vgue nd intermittent intuition, shll one dy illumine the whole field of vexed nd pinful problems. Chrlotte E. Woods.

70 262 FROM MANY LANDS Contributors of mtter under th heding re requested kindly to ber in mind tht not only ccounts of the generl ctivities of the vrious sections or groups of tlit Theosophicl Society re desired, but bove ll things notes on the vrious spects of the Theosophicl Movement in generl. It should lso be borne in mind by our reders tht such occsionl ccounts reflect but smll portion of wht ctully going on in the Society, much less in the Theosophicl Movement throughout the world. Eds. From Furthest South The following re extrcts from chtty letter tht ws not written for publiction, but which precely on th ccount runs with greter freedom nd swing. It s it were the " snp-shot " of moment in the life of very busy collegue. I m just bck from n extended tour in our Northern provinces. I ws t the Convention s vitor.... Convention ws for me thing of joy. Some tke Theosophy nd the Theosophicl Society nd ll its doings seriously ; I men in the wy our critic ment when he sid our ntion took its plesures sdly. I like things with hop nd skip nd jump! " Hertesing Mirth " surely Theosophts should be dmitted of her crew? Surely the living in joy prt of our msion in the world? I ws nerly killed with kindness by our der Brnch folk. In N I ws set to work. I gve two public lectures nd we hd two dcussion evenings ; nd the locl folk ssure me tht " solid work " ws done. As fr s I cn size things up, there much work to do there in quiet, stedy wy not unlike ours here in D, where we dd log t times to the stedily burning pyre, but hve no fireworks! N hs for its size firly numerous leured clss nd number of well-to-do business folk. Among these the work must go on silently. The stmp N.Z.T.S. must not be seen on their shoulders, even if T.S. be relly engrved upon their herts. Books, constnt circultion of Brnch Librry, occsionl public lectures, nd

71 FROM MANY LANDS 263 quiet socil work in drwing-room nd office ; tht the one side of the need. As for the ones who join t once, hving fewer ties nd less necessity for delibertion the need Brnch Room, centre of ctivity. The privte house rrngement very plesnt, nd to certin point, of rel use. But it limits work, trociously. Cste questions will re ; sensitive ntures tke offence, or will not tke dvntge of their opportunity lest they should be thought to pre sume, nd so on, nd so on. A Brnch Room must be found ; the privte houses then of such s cn entertin the brethren, will form fine dditionl buttressing ctivity. With the Room open, things will move. Every dy I hd enggements two, three nd four deep. All dy long it ws Theosophy ; not little chts, but deep dives, hours together. It ws my wh to see, if possible, every member of the Brnch, nd 1 did cover good del of the field lid out. On one night, by request, I held clss-night, like my work t home ; nd lrge clss I hd fifty I think, t lest Brnch members nd picked friends. I knew tht mny of the folk were " drefful " tngled over the question of the Mond, nd couldn't for the life of them nswer the pertinent question of " Who's 'who? " (They red the lesser books, nd never tckle the Secret Doctrine. They get sidelights, never the blze!) So I took the Mond s my theme tking A. B.'s recent useful digrm, nd referring bck to H. P. B.'s cler sttements of yers nd yers go. We hd two hours nd qurter of it! Questions, of course, wherever needed. I told them not to ms point nd not to pss over one hlf-grsped detil. I need hrdly tell you it ws sport! The point of it ll just th. They wnt food nd wnt it bdly. conservtive nd rdicl like, re frnkly Both Brnch nd public re n hungered. Young nd old, richer nd poorer, wre of their own ignor nce nd seek to know. I think their entirely frnk nd unffected ttitude, the bsence of ll prigghness nd foolh self-esteem, singulrly beutiful. Good Lord! wht hd I, t my best, to give them? How little frther on thn they ws I! And yet, becuse I hd something to give ; becuse I ws tht little frther thn they, they begged of me, nd took wht I ws ble to offer nd were deep down grteful! I sy Brnch tht built like tht will go fr, when the Gods send them the Cptin they need. Force nd to spre, there. If we cn only mke the chnnel, wht force must run long it! Q.

72 264 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW From Hollnd The following the text of recent ddress by Dr. W. H. Denier vn der Gon, the Librrin of the Dutch Section, to h fellow members : " ' Our librrin! ' If we would rele wht these two words express for us we hve first of ll to consider the mening of ' librrin.' Librrin the opposite of non-librrin. A nonlibrrin my be physicin or chrwomn, or thousnd other things ; in short some one who hs much knowledge bout one thing nd only scnt knowledge bout other things. Wheres relly ' librrin ' should know mzingly much bout ll things, nd of him it should be sid, s of Vossius, tht ' ll tht ws stored wy in books hs pssed into h hed.' " He who hs no gret knowledge bout one thing tht very stupid nd insignificnt person ' our librrin.' " Now go nd sit quietly in corner nd submerge yourself for time in the conception tht we members of th Section my hence forth spek of ' our librrin.' Repet th dy fter dy until you cn sy tht th new nd wonderful ide hs been ssimilted. And then pss on. Pss on, I sid, becuse you re not yet, by long wy, where you should be. Did you ever during ll these dys surpre yourself once speking or thinking bout ' my librrin '? No? I'll wger you did not, nd yet tht wht we hve to rrive t, so the erlier we do it the better. " Between yourself nd him there must be mde bond, nd s he cn scrcely begin such work, becuse he would hve to mke hundreds nd hundreds of ties ll t once, he expects tht ech of you will begin th work, nd tht in t lest hundred wys. " One wy s follows : You first sunter long your shelves, those shelves on which your books re rnged, nd you see whether there re ny mongst them tht you rrely or never consult nd tht would be gin for the Section Librry. I m not thinking of purely theosophicl books but lso of works on trvel, on theology, on philosophy, of mny work on htory, on ethnogrphy, on nthro pology, etc. Then, hving found such works, you do not sy : ' I'd rther keep wht I hve,' or I my, fter ll, t some time need th book,' but wht you do to tke sheet of note-pper nd... well, the rest needs no explntion. " The second wy to come nd fetch bck with usurer's

73 interest wht you hve given. FROM MANY LANDS 365 For it not true tht you wnt to gther more knowledge thn hs thus fr been yours? You wnt to do some more study on th or tht brnch of Theosophy? Perhps fter ll you wnt to do very much more study on Theosophy thn on other brnches? And now it ' your librrin ', who must dve you, show you the wy, must ferret out informtion for you, serch in ll librries nd ctlogues rechble on foot or wheel, must bring you into reltionship with those who my help you on, must cht with you on books when you hppen to drop into the librry. Your intelligence knows, of course, t lest nother hundred wys to mke ' our librrin ' 'your librrin.' " I know of still nother wy nd I would tht it hd no ron d'etre, becuse th which begn in comedy must, ls! end in trgedy. You must know then but it remins between ourselves tht when our librrin ws still unofficil he sid to himself t lest hundred times, 'knowledge comes with the office.' But now when th expecttion hs entirely filed of reltion, he just gives little gesture of irresponsibility ech time informtion sked of him nd ' sys: Well, for tht I hve my books. Tht wht my books re here to supply.' " In th he not ltogether in the wrong, nd we hve lredy mde up our minds to bombrd him with books. But by books lone he does not get there. He must lern to find h wy in them. So some will perhps be ptient with him nd not ngry when, fter hving spent some money nd mny weeks of crmming we rrive t, the conviction tht he hs set us to work on just the wrong books. We will rejoice rther tht h ction enbles us to tech him better, so tht he t lest grdully gets n inkling of wht books do not tret of some mtters. And who knows if it my not be t lst sid of him : He who once for short time ws ' our librrin,' nd who for long time hs been librrin '? " ' my librrin,' ctully becoming ' From Germny Theosophicl work in Germny being prosecuted with vigour, the Brnches dplying incresed vitlity. New Brnches hve been estblhed in Berlin nd Stuttgrt, being in ech cse the second to be formed in those towns. Dr. Steiner trvelling continully from plce to plce, mny of the Brnches hve invited him to give courses of lectures t regulr intervls, nd he vits smller centres en route. A lecture tht in gret demnd " Goethe nd Theo

74 266 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW sophy." Twenty yers' study of Goethe nd severl yers' work mong the rchives of Weimr, fter the deth of the poet's lst surviving grndson, hve mde Dr. Steiner well-qulified interpreter of the genius of Goethe. Much Theosophic teching to be extrcted from th gret writer, not only in essence, but even in minute detil, expressed in occult scientific terminology, nd only covered with light veil, esily uplifted by cunning hnd. Thus we find it in the firy-tles, " The Green Snke nd the Beutiful Lily," " Pr," nd " The Fir Melusin," nd it gives, of course, the key to the second prt of " Fust." Th initition in occultm gives Goethe h profound knowledge of nturl science, nd mkes him, in wy, the predecessor of Lmrck nd Drwin, nd pioneer in the true science of colour. So tht Dr. Steiner's lectures with their bundnt proofs nturlly strike those who would be other we ntgontic to Theosophy. Th yer of festivities in commemortion of our other gret ntionl poet, nd ll over Germny lectures re given upon Schiller. Those delivered by Dr. Steiner in the Freie Hochschule dclose the deep sources of spiritulity tht fed the genius of th gret mn, whose rt cnnot be seprted from the gret problems of life nd soul, fte nd freedom, nd whose rel worth cn only be pprecited by humnity freed from the shckles of mterilm. In fct one hs only to strike the rock of Germn thought in the pst to cuse the strems of spiritulity to well up. But in the present dy, the drought of mterilm hs lmost dried up the source. Here nd there some professor in university puts forth h opinion tht the ide of reincrntion, fter ll, credible one, but he shrinks bck in rther frightened wy, when it ssumed tht he possibly in sympthy with the techings of Theosophy, nd... well, the generl nswer tht the doctrine of reincrntion only resonble when expressed s he puts it in h book. An ttempt being mde to form group of University students for the study of Theosophy. It hoped tht series of lectures to be delivered in My nd June by Dr. Steiner nd deling with the following subjects : " Die theologche Fkultt und die Theosophie," "Die jurtche Fkultt und die Theosophie," "Die medizinche Fkultt und die Theosophie," nd " Die philosophche Fkultt und die Theosophie," my help towrds its reltion. In Munich smll nucleus hs begun its work, nd in Jen Dr. Steiner hs been sked to lecture before the Philosophicl Society.

75 FROM MANY LANDS Lectures in Bonn hve met with some response from intellectul people, in spite of the stubborn Protestntm of the plce. Some of our efforts re directed to the Rhine-lnd, for surely the lnd once inhbited by those who clled themselves the " Friends of God " should give fvourble response to Theosophy? In booklet clled Weltuntergng, by Dr. Meyer, of the Urni Observtory, Berlin, we come cross, now nd gin, pssges tht hve quite Theosophic ring, hinting t ides fmilir to us under the nmes Prly, Mnvntr, Lw of Scrifice, etc. Tke the following instnce. Dr. Meyer hs been dcussing the theory, supported by number of circumstnces, tht the erth once possessed second moon, which, being precipitted upon it, brought bout ll the chnges of the Tertiry Period. He then goes on to sy :" Th sme thing must tke plce s regrds the Sun nd its plnets. One fter nother they will become merged in it," nd then, when the lst degree of wrmth engendered by th process hs been dsipted, ll the mtter, once " upbuilding the richly-endowed system," will be " reduced spce t tremendous speed." to Nevertheless the nnihiltion solr terribly cold mss, whirling through pprent rther thn rel. My not Nture mke use of the long intervls of, perhps, thousnds of millions of yers, during which these cold worn-out msses, formed by the re-union of system of world-bodies, wnder through spce before encountering nother gret mss ble to effect their re-vitltion My not these enormous intervls be utiled for the purpose of " inwrdly prepring such msses for the new cycle of the worlddevelopment towrds which they re dvncing " There " n impulse towrds ceseless development which ensouls everything, even tht which clled lifeless." In the opening pges of h little book, Dr. Meyer plys round the ide tht the whole erth nothing but single being. " The bone structure of the erth the globe itself, nd?? round bout th re plced living beings s singly exting cells which, especilly since mn ppered, re more nd more tending to unite into orgnm." In the concluding prgrph he writes self-dependent :" We thus come bck to our first point of view when we compred worlds with living orgnms. We hve seen tht they re subject to development, re born, grow up, yield seed nd mhps nd perhps unnturl deth fruit, fight for their extence, suffer ; tht Nture nevertheless

76 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW exerces for them motherly cre nd protects them, by ll possible methods of precution, ginst untimely mhps. We hve further recogned, hving before us the condition of our erth, tht hevenly body bers within itself ll the conditions conducive to necessry development, to peceful up-growth, even generting elements, mny ctstrophe from outside constntly occur... becuse the erth if, in the strife of unvoidble. Attcks not creted for itself lone. Just s surely do we lern tht, lthough well-orgned world like our erth cnnot esily fll victim to ny destructive blow, nevertheless in the norml course of things n end stnds before ll worlds.. living orgnms, deth.but, here lso, s in the world of not complete ; the toms only giving up the form of union in which their force hd been used in order to build nother kind of union. All deth t the sme time resurrection, nd out of the grve blossoms life..everything serves everything. Even mfortune, nd in its highest mesure, deth, something necessry, slutry, serviceble to the upwrd development of the whole. In th higher knowledge we should be ble, more nd more, to divest deth of its horrors." S. From Sweden The work going on in the sme ernest mnner s usul, nd the public lectures drw ever-incresing udiences. Amongst the subjects of the Sundy Lectures in Stockholm the following trns ltions my be mentioned " The Secret of Evolution " ;" The Necessity for Reincrntion " ;nd " When Mn dies shll he live gin?" At the Brnch Meetings the Generl Secretry hs given series of lectures on the Eleusinin Mysteries. " Technicl progress : in the light of Theosophy," nd " The Building of Chrcter," re lso mong the subjects lectured upon. The following books hve recently been trnslted into Dnh nd Krm. : Some Problems of Mrs. Sjostedt, of Gothenburg, hs recently mde Life, In the Outer Court, lecturing tour in Southern Sweden, shortly fterwrds going to Flun, where she gve two lectures, one of them deling with the dogm of Eternl Punhment from the Theosophicl stndpoint. The udience ws rge nd pprecitive, nd the principl locl pper hd good leder upon the next dy. In the sme pper bitter opponent of Theosophy mde n ttck upon its techings, to which our it

77 THE HOUSES OF RIMMON 269 Generl Secretry sent suitble reply. Replies were lso forth coming from members of the Brnch, the result being still more ntgontic communiction. It mny yers since such ttcks hve ppered in ny Swedh pper. It seems s though the Scndinvin clergy were ning to wke up to the " dnger " of hving Theosophy t lst begin so generlly proclimed. A Dnh minter hs publhed book entitled Cn Mm Live on Superstition? The uthor, the Rev. Skovgrd-Petersen begins with n expose of Positivm nd Spiritm, s preceding the more dngerous form of " superstition," Theosophy, of which very good nd correct ccount given, tht my be of interest to mny who hve not herd of Theosophy before. Then comes Hermeticm nd its chief modern chmpion, Ann Kingsford, of whom the uthor drws quite sympthetic picture, though deeply deploring the " insne extrvgnces " her " flse specultions " drove her into. The book well written nd with the best intentions. The uthor tkes the mtter very seriously, nd from h stndpoint of limited Chrtinity he convinced tht ll other beliefs nd conceptions will only drive people to despir, so tht he hs felt it h duty to utter these of wrning, tht they my tke heed in time nd return to doctrine of the Church, where lone slvtion to be found. words the true Not ll our minters, however, re eqully impervious to more dvnced ides ; in Copenhgen, for instnce, there re two young clergymen who hve dopted the doctrine of reincrntion nd prech it from the pulpit. W. THE HOUSES OF RIMMON I will hve no scruples, no melncholy in my house. S. Philip Neri. A rich vein of theurgic lore lwys close t hnd when enter the field of Ctholic Mysticm to look up the life of ny Sint or the mening of ny Fest tht being commemorted during the current month. Tht th mine of mteril with so much we of the records nd evidences of exctly those very fculties, either quite supernorml or verging on the bnorml, which we now wnt vilble for reference, should be lying unsorted under so much overgrowth of

78 27o THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW medievl superstition, to be deeply deplored, nd stte of ffirs which few energetic students might esily remedy by combining to collect from the Lives of the Sints ll the most pposite necdotes, with view to their being re-edited in the light nd lso in the phrseology of modern psychicl reserch. S. Philip Neri, whose festivl occurs on My 26th, brings up such ides with prticulr force ; he one of those gret workers whose lives deserve most creful nd imprtil study from Theosophicl stndpoint. H gret lerning nd culture res undoubted s h sintly chrcter, nd s h bnorml powers not only of heling, but lso of reding the minds nd chrcters with, nd, it sid, even of foretelling the future. biogrphies of those he hd to del But in writing of him the Romn Church uses the old irritting phrseology which exposes the nrrtives to ridicule in the eyes of the Protestnt nd relegtes them to the relms of romnce for the Sceptic. Yet since the Sint lived s lte s the XVIth century the fcts of h life re well ttested, nd s the nturl nd the so-clled supernturl fcts rest on the evidences of the sme witnesses, they re so closely connected nd interwoven, tht if we ccept only wht we re plesed to cll nturl nd reject the rest, we shll find ourselves in very difficult position. We re now nering the time when the strnge phenomen connected with the life of sintliness could nd should be more " scientificlly expressed thn by such pious phrses s : H life ws continuous mircle, h hbitul stte n ecstsy.... After childhood of ngelic beuty the Holy Spirit drew him wy from Florence,... nd then s by second Pentecost cme down in vible form nd filled h soul with light " ; for these re merely mouth-filling phrses. About h genil chrcter nd winning mnners, nd h quint sense of humour, there re mny good stories. H morning pryer, which he composed for himself, ws short nd sweet but to the point : " Oh Lord, keep Thy hnd over Philip th dy, for if not Philip will betry Thee "! He hd, however, no ptience with fsts nd mortifictions.

79 THE HOUSES OF RIMMON 271 which he considered were mens of mking oneself interesting when other wys hd filed. As to h psychic powers, there n unusul number of detiled ccounts by contemporry eye-witnesses ; the most peculir being the phenomenon of levittion. With the evidence of Sir Willim Crookes nd others before us, we hve no longer ny right to hoot t the bre ide of such thing s the movement of objects without vible mens of contct. Anyone with time nd money nd little ordinry criticl cumen cn see such phenomen for himself, nd thus prove for himself the extence of these psychic forces which the sint frequently possesses in common with others so of highly strung nd delicte nervous orgntion. I dmit tht in Englnd, not only becuse of the lws of the country nd the timidity or pthy of scientific men, but lso becuse of the climte nd the specilly impure ir of London, certin phenomen re more difficult to see thn in the brillint electric ir of the U.S.A. Still, there re t lest hundred recorded instnces of the levittion of D. D. Home. Sir W. Crookes " sys : To reject the recorded evidence on th subject to reject ll humn testimony whtever ; for no fct in scred or profne htory supported by stronger rry of proofs... It gretly to be desired tht some person whose evidence would be ccepted s conclusive by the scientific world if indeed there lives person whose testimony in fvour of such phenomen would be tken would seriously nd ptiently exmine these lleged fcts." The itlics re h. It pthetic remrk nd I think could only hve been written in n tmosphere of Brith fogs fogs mentl s well s physicl. It sid tht S. Philip used " to veil h mircles with gentle jest," which suggests to me tht he knew thing or two bout himself, nd did not believe tht it required the entire Trinity ssted by the Blessed Virgin to cuse one of h levittions. In fct he ws prticulrly nnoyed when one of these mnifesttions took plce in the middle of Mss, wheres h dmiring friends were hystericl with joy bout it. In contrst to th unwilling victim of h bnorml gifts,

80 272 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW we hve the modern possessor of psychic force exerting himself to produce phenomen, often under very unfvourble conditions. And insted of the speechless we of S. Philip's eye-witnesses we hve the spectcle of well-known scientific mterilt d covered on ll fours under the tble, holding on to the medium's legs while the tble res serenely bove him! Scepticm nd superstition gin! It hrd to sy which of the two mkes mn most ridiculous. Echo. FLOTSAM AND JETSAM (Continued from "On thb Wtch-Tower") Herr Bresch my regret money tht Sefior Fuente did not leve the to the furthernce of the work of the Sections of the Society throughout the world. Tht my Men not Money be nturl enough, nd perhps mny my shre in h regret ; but, s fct, our lte collegue left it to the Adyr Librry nd the Centrl Hindu College. Sefior Fuente doubtless thought tht these two under tkings were more deserving of endowment thn ny other ctivities of Theosophicl nture known to him. It, there fore, gin none of our business. Sefior Fuente hs left the money of h own good will, nd Colonel Olcott nd Mrs. Besnt hve fithfully crried out h whes. We re generous enough to be gld tht the Adyr Librry nd the Centrl Hindu College re so munificently benefited ; confident enough to believe tht if the Sectionl work of the Society to be dependent upon money, the money will come ; nd philosophicl enough to go on working without regret, whether it comes or does not come. Wht we wnt men, not money ; money will do the Adyr Librry no good till it hs men to mke it of use ; money will not mke the Hindu College success without the continunce of the devoted service of its present workers.

81 FLOTSAM AND JETSAM 273 On reding over wht we hve written bove nd reconsidering the criticms mde by our collegue in Germny, we hope it will not pper tht we hve merely delt The ^ Vf'i^1 ^e extern' indequcies of h protest Society* nd voided the min burden of h contention. There he sys, something rotten in the stte of Denmrk. He, feels something wrong, nd he tells us wht in h opinion re the ppernces which hve led to h conclusion. H conclu sion work. tht monetry considertions re stining the purity of our If tht relly the cse, no protest cn be too strong ginst the evil. It would men our spiritul ruin. We hve endevoured to show tht h fers re so fr groundless. Tht, however, it gret dnger cnnot be doubted, nd even h own remrks on the Fuente Bequest show how creful we should be to leve ll considertions of money severely lone. Money we my be sure will lmost invribly be given to the furthernce of some specil piece of work, nd not to the generl upkeep of the Society. The Society must support itself, so tht my be independent, nd live by the lbour of its own hnds. No one hs so fr formulted n orgned scheme for the work of the Society s whole, nd could be formulted, it it difficult to see how ny such scheme for the work must necessrily be conditioned by environment nd the needs of ntions, cities, groups nd indi viduls. To the furthernce of impersonl work few will leve bequests ; it too vgue too spiritul. People wnt something definite, something concrete, to induce them to open their pursestrings. If the Sections would orgne sectionl librries on lrge scle, or endevour to turn their Hedqurters into " Theosophicl Colleges," doubtless money would come in for such purposes. If every librrin were s enthustic for h librry s Colonel Olcott for the Adyr Librry, there would be the sme results; if we hd greter enthusm for lerning nd teching nd mutul intercourse we should soon hve to enlrge our Hedqurters nd our Brnch Rooms, nd they would begin to ssume the form of orgned " Collegi " " proper, Thi " in the true sense, communities of good thoughts, good words nd good deeds.

82 274 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW A scientific collegue hs sent us the following exceedingly instructive extrcts from the Annul Reports of the Progress of Chemtry, for 1904, sued by the Chemicl A Chemicl Society. They occur on p. 31 under the hed- * Conception of the... 7, Ether ing " Inorgnic Chemtry, nd re tken from recent work by the fmous chemt Mendel6eff, trnslted by G. Kmensky, entitled An Attempt towrds Chemicl Conception of the Ether. Mny of our reders will be ble to pprecite more fully thn ordinry lymen the high importnce of these most recent nd brillint specultions of Mendel^eff s owing to the rticles by our collegue, G. Dyne, which ppered lst yer in our pges. They come most oppor tunely s further corrobortion tht the ltest inductions of physicl science re with every yer drwing closer nd closer to the deductions which hve been enuncited by our own collegues who re working from the intr-physicl side of things. To the groups in the periodic system, in the first plce, Mendeleeff pro poses to dd zero group in front of group I. In th zero group re plced those elements, helium, neon, rgon, krypton, nd xenon, with the oltion nd properties of which the reserches of Sir W. Rmsy nd h pupils hve mde us fmilir ; group of elements chrctered by their chemicl inctivity, for which, therefore, vlence reduced to zero, nd further substnces whose molecules re montomic. Helium belongs to the second series commencing with lithium nd ending with fluorine, whilst the first series represented only by hydrogen, homologue of lithium, tht, belonging to the sme group. The element in the first series of the zero group represented by "y," substnce which must hve the properties chrctertic of the rgon gses. It clculted from the reltion of the tomic weights of the elements in the neighbouring group tht th element hs n tomic weight of less thn 0.4. The reltive density of " y " in relltion to hydrogen would be o"2, nd it my be identified with the substnce " coronium," whose spectrum ws first observed by Young nd Hrkness in the coron during the eclipse of Nsini, Anderlini, nd Slvdor, considered tht they hd found trces of coronium in their exmintion of the spectr of volcnic gses (1893). The molecules of "y " would not be sufficiently light, nor would their velocity be gret enough, to identify th element with ether. To complete the series of elements, therefore, zero series dded, nd in th series in the zero group plced our element " *," which Mendel6eff regrds " (1) the lightest of ll the elements, both in density nd tomic weight ; () s the most mobile gs; (3) s the element lest prone to enter into combintion s

83 FLOTSAM AND JETSAM 275 with other toms ; nd (4) s n ll-permeting nd penetrting substnce." Th element " x," it suggested, the ether, the prticles nd toms of which re " cpble of moving freely everywhere throughout the universe nd hve n tomic weight nerly one-millionth with velocity of bout 2,250 kilometres per second." * tht of hydrogen, nd trvel Such title s " The Greek Mysteries nd the Gospel Nrr tive" cnnot fil to ttrct the ttention of Theosophts. But when we red Mr. Slde Butler's rticle thus " The Greek entitled in The Nineteenth Century for Mrch, Mysteries nd the J Gospel Nrrtive " we must confess tht we re sorry he hs limited h reserches There re indubitbly points of contct, to the Eleusini only. but the Mysteries, on the one hnd, re by no mens best represented by the Politicl Mystery Institution of ncient Athens, nd on the other the form of the Chrtin Mysteries hs for the purpose of propgnd been torn into s mny frgments by the cnonicl gospel writers s ws the Body of Osir by the forces of dintegrtion. A frgment here nd there, technicl verblm, now nd gin, however, permit us to recogne once common body nd common lnguge. Th.body of doctrine nd th lnguge re to be recovered from pocryphl, poclyptic nd extr-cnonicl documents, in the domin of Chrtinity, nd on the side of the Mysteries, from Egypt, nd Chlds nd Phrygi, more thn from Greece. Still, Mr. Butler hs done well in h tretment of the most irreconcilble elements, nd h contribution to the subject welcome one. * * We would drw the ttention of students to remrkble rticle by Mr. Newmn Howrd in the Jnury number of The Hibbert Journl, entitled " The Wrp of the World." Concerning Treting of hrmony nd cdences in the "Music" ' gret world, Mr. Howrd, who, though tret ing the mtter from strictly scientific point of view, cnnot prevent himself from letting h true nture be seen in sturdy prophetic diction, writes, s to the lw underlying th worldorder nd world-beuty : To tht question we ddress ourselves, probing to th end those hrd

84 276 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW ribs nd vertebre of things, the lw of numbers nd geometry ; not however mtking the bones', for the life, or overleping in unscientific hste tht centrl fct tht outweighs ll fcts the conscious life, which neither number nor 'mtter in ny we explins. Of which more herefter, the intent menwhile being to suggest, not to ssert in science to point to some proming lines of ^reserch, in philosophy to ccentute the certitudes of intuition in dy when rtiocintion lone hs respect. Tht written in the spirit of one of the " men of Pyth gors," s indeed the whole rticle, nd we re plesed to see tht Mr. Howrd links himself on to the pper on the " Re covered Cnon of Proportion " red before the Hellenic Society in 1902, nd the pper on hrmonies in The Athenczum of April 30th, 1904, to both of which we hve lredy drwn our reders' ttention. * * There pssge in recently publhed book which we might quote for the benefit of ll who hve not deeply pondered the sin " De Protund " nd suffering the pssion of mn. The nme of Oscr Wilde stnds for the trgedy of brillint lifejruined by excess, yet in tht very ruin it my hve tught deeper lesson thn hd it been other we. In tht intensely humn document which he penned in pron fter he hd drined the cup of bitterness to the dregs, he tells us how he found comfort in the Story of the Chrt. true tht the portriture of the Mster tht pleses him most, s one might hve expected for one of h rttic nture, rther the Chrt of Renn thn of ny of the Gospels ; yet s it illumined h hour of drkness, who shll sy tht tht portriture not fir nd good nd suitble to even the most poignnt needs? Thus we find Wilde writing in h cell in Reding Gol : But it when he dels with sinner tht Chrt most romntic, in the sense of most rel. The world hd lwys loved the sint s being the nerest possible pproch to the perfection of God. Chrt, through some divine instinct in him, seems to hve lwys loved the sinner s being the nerest possible pproch to the perfection of mn. H primry desire ws not to reform people, ny more thn h primry It desire ws to relieve suffering. To turn n interesting thief into tedious honest mn ws not h im. He would hve thought little of the Proners' Aid Society nd other modern movements of the kind. The conversion of publicn into Phree would not hve seemed to him gret chievement. But

85 in mnner FLOTSAM AND JETSAM 277 not yet understood of the world he regrded sin nd suffering s being in themselves beutiful holy things nd modes of perfection. It seems very dngerous ide. It ll gret ides re dngerous. Tht it ws Chrt's creed dmits of no doubt. Tht it the true creed I don't doubt myself. Of course the sinner must repent. But why? Simply becuse otherwe he would be unble to rele wht he hd done. The moment of repentnce the moment of initition. Red ccording to its under-mening th goes ner to the soul of the mystery; red on the surfce it, s Wilde sys, dngerous, most dngerous. In Memorim C. C. M. With the deth of C. C. Mssey on the 29th of Mrch lst, ws broken the erliest link, sve tht of Col. Olcott, with H. P. B. nd the beginning of the Theosophicl Society in Europe. In 1876, Mr. Mssey went to Americ to witness the " mteriltions " of the Eddy brothers in their home in Vermont, nd returning thence to New York, he mde the cquintnce of Mdme Blvtsky, nd ws enrolled in the newly-constituted Theosophicl Society. He kept up constnt correspondence with H. P. B., nd the following yer the writer of th notice brought to Englnd the chrter of the Brith Brnch, of which J. Storer Cobb ws ppointed Secretry, nd C. C. Mssey the President. Three other members were enrolled t the first meeting, including Mr. Stinton Moses nd Dr. C. Crter Blke. These were shortly fterwrds joined by Dr. Wyld, Mrs. Ell, nd Mme. de Steiger, Dr. Wyld lter becoming President in plce of Mr. Mssey, whose retiring nture lwys mde office dtsteful to him. H mind ws more inclined to mysticm thn to occultm, nd he remined to the lst the student nd friend of mystics. H gentle dposition endered him to ll who knew him, nd h highly cultured nd philosophic mind drew round him those of like clibre. He trnslted Du Prel's Philosophy of Mysticm ; nd Zollner's Trnscendentl Physics. were h constnt study, nd he contributed Frnz von Bder nd Jcob Boehme mny vluble fcts to the Psychic Reserch Society, h trining s brrter mking him relible observer nd cpble of sifting evidence. H pssing wy dtinct loss to h mny friends. E. K.

86 278 REVIEWS AND NOTICES A Useful Thkosophic Study in French L'Evolution de l Vie et de l Conscience, du Regne Minerl ux Regnes Humin et Surhumin. Pr L. Revel. (Pr : L. Bodin; 19o5. Prix 3/r.) We hve to be grteful to our esteemed French fellow-worker for very vluble trete on the foundtions of the Theosophicl system. Its gret chrm to us tht it furnhes something more nd better thn mere rehsh of wht hs been sid by our leding uthorities nd repeted over nd over gin; tht its uthor hs relly thought out nd studied the mtter in h own wy, nd brings to it mss of erudition, some of which (s for exmple the references to the Sint- Simonin writers) quite new to us, nd profoundly interesting. The fundmentl ide of the book tht ll the difficulties, both of religion nd science, re from the hbit of treting life nd conscious ness s two independent fctors, insted of recogning tht they re not, nd never cn be, dsocited one from the other ; tht they must be studied together, nd not prt. In h first chpter the uthor trces out the effect of th mtke upon the Old nd New Testment conceptions, on the one side, nd the philosophicl conceptions on the other. After chpters upon Universl Energy, Life ccording to the physiologts, the necessity of specil Atom for ech plne of extence, nd the Nirvnic Life, we hve the detiled exmintion of the trditions s to Life contined in the philosophico-religious doctrines of the Est nd West. The vlue of the references to the Sint-Simonins my be judged by h first quottion, from Enfntin. " God ll tht. All in Him. All by Him. None of us re outside Him ; but none of us Him ; ech of us lives by H life. We re ll one in Him, becuse He everything which exts." The working out of th definition brings out n exceedingly close pproximtion to our own doctrine, most beutifully expressed. We should like to quote mny pges from M. Revel's extrcts, but cn only press our reders to refer to the book for themselves.

87 REVIEWS AND NOTICES 279 After th, we turn to the Theosophicl conceptions of life nd of the physicl evolution of mnkind, n interesitng compron of the Mond of Leibnitz, the Hindu Jiv, nd the Theosophicl Mond, which brings us to the finl dcussion of the evolution of conscious ness, the conditionl immortlity of the soul, nd the bering of the whole on the Pnthetic doctrine. From the uthor's Conclusion we tke h summry of results. " (1) To ll mnifesttion of life there corresponds mnifes ttion of consciousness ; or, in other words, life nd consciousness re identicl. (2) The foundtion of life resides in the tom. But, in order to the formtion of the tom, three elements re necessry : () Directing Principle which cts ; (b) the Life ; substrtum which permits the Life to express itself. " evident tht the preliminry process of the divion of It primordil mtter into toms hs to be completed by nother process of forming these toms into specil groups. The cohesion, the order, the hrmony, the union, thus obtined, chrctere the development of forms nd operte their trnsformtions. For these forms, subjected to violent rections in the world-lbortory, evolve nd become more nd more perfect. Th evolution, however, will pper bsurd nd incomprehensible if (c) we do not recogne beneth ll forms something which slowly expnds under the strokes of outer vibrtions nd tkes cognnce of the world. The development of th forms the third process ;nd the three resolve themselves into the One Life from which ll spring, s the Trinity into the unity." Such mking it brief outline of not very useful work ;nd our object in so much to critice the book s to recommend very ernestly to ll our reders whose cquintnce with the lnguge sufficient to enble them to pprecite the interest of its contents nd the elegnce nd persusiveness of its rguments. And, in its own country, we hope interest in subject which, it if it most interesting which cn be presented it will be red by everyone who hs ny interests t ll, must surely be the An Apology for Spiritm to the humn mind. A. A. W. Objections to Spiritulm. By H. A. Dlls. (London Allince ; 19o5. Price 15.) The fundmentl dogm of the Spiritultic regrd s n exmple of fllcy which I religion :Spiritult one which we should unhesittingly cl

88 280 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW unphilosophicl but for the wkwrd fct tht ll Englh philosophers fll into it; the ssumption tht when we hve cuse of seme of the phenomen presented dcovered possible by our subject, we re thereby entitled to enforce it s the only llowble explntion of ll of them. We entirely gree tht certin phenomen ext which nturlly suggest tht in the invible world round us there ext beings who, in previous extence, hve been humn beings like ourselves ; we entirely refuse to dmit the unproved nd improbble ddition tht no other beings cn ext there, which supposed to be deduction from it. The nturl conclusions of n interested nd unprejudiced observer re those given in Mrs. Browning's Letters (vol. ii.) : First tht there certinly something in it ; but second " tht Deth does not tech ll things. Foolh John Smith who died on Mondy on Tuesdy still foolh John Smith. If people who on Mondy scorned h opinions prudently will on Tuesdy receive h lest words s orcles...," they re, in short, foolh themselves ; nd finlly, "tht the drwbck tht without ny sort of doubt the spirits personte flsely." Mr. Stinton Moses, who knew wht he ws tlking bout, re cogned these fcts, much to the nnoynce of the orthodox round him ; nd it not unworthy of note tht it still to him, who died yers go, tht our uthor hs to turn for presenttion of the Fith which cn be expected to ppel to thinking men. As n Apology for Spiritulm the book well nd crefully done, mended nd my be recom to those who require it ; the difficulties re not entirely pssed over, though the tretment of them very fr from dequte, from controversil point of view, s might, indeed, be expected. Wht cn be sid sid, modestly nd well ; nd such mtters s persontion by the " spirits " re given just so much mention s not to dturb the fvourble impression which the book intended to give. One remrk we will permit ourselves to mke. For long time the evidence for Spiritulm hs been llowed prcticlly to reduce itself to Dr. Hodgson's privte opinion of Mrs. Piper's impersontions of G. P. nd the rest. But whether it be the fct tht, s declred by writer once reviewed by us in these pges, Dr. Hodgson hs simply been hypnoted by " Mrs. Piper nd her gng," or tht, on the con trry, he nd she re ll tht climed for them, it must be cler tht th one cse not sufficient to support the fbric of Spiritulm ll lone. If, during ll the yers Mrs. Piper hs been on the field, no second cse which cn stnd scientific investigtion hs been d

89 REVIEWS AND NOTICES 281 covered, it would seem to me tht the probbilities re rther ginst the correctness of the one supposed fct. It esier, to me t lest, to believe tht in th cse lso Dr. Hodgson hs llowed himself to be mled, thn to believe Mrs. Piper the one sole possible mens of communiction between the two worlds ; tht, s our Americn friends would sy, " piling it up ryther too mountinious! " A. A. W. Prediction Soul-Culture: Self-Development, Wht it, nd How it Done. By R. Dimsdle Stocker. (London : L. N. Fowler & Co. ; Price ii.) Th the second of series of Psychic Mnuls, nd will probbly hve considerble circultion for better resons thn its chepness. It divided into three sections : (1) Life's Inequlities : Their Cuse nd Cure (Pst) ; (2) The Mystery of Being : The Remedy of Yog (Present) ; (3) The Predictive Art : The Rtionle of Fortunetelling (Future). The lst chpter hs especilly interested us. There re mny things in modern civiltion indicting tht concern to foreknow the future innte in the humn rce. Grnting the bundnt deception in prediction, th not nything like enough to explin wy the bulk of the evidence tht mn under certin conditions cpble both of delving into the pst nd of predetermining the future. Do we under stnd wht " Pst," " " Present nd " Future " relly men? The terms re illusory. They represent phenomen or ppernces, func tions of the senses, not relities. It well known tht ll sensory knowledge reltive. We cogne no relity. Tbe Sirius which the stronomer sees to-dy the light which left it twenty-two yers go. So with the reports of ll our senses. These orgns muffle us from tht rel world Tht lies bout us. Thus it comes bout tht wht we cll " Time " our perception of ppernces only, in other words our perception of such effects in respect to durtion s our limited senses dmit into our conscious ness, nd hs no bs whtever in the inherent nture of things. Insmuch then s objects of the senses, hppenings to us of ny kind, re not things in themselves, they re merely the effects of unperceived cuses t work behind the scenes. And to tke fmilir illustrtion just s photogrpher, during the process of

90 282 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW developing h plte more thn h own nked eye could detect, in drk room, finds tht the cmer hs seen so we ourselves frequently find in our innermost experience tht our unconscious mind hs tken in from the hppenings to which it hs been exposed, mny ides nd fcts tht our wking mind hs not cogned t ll. The subliminl consciousness regters for ever in its own substnce whtever vibr tions rech it ; nd, directly or indirectly, whether in longer or shorter time, there re no vibrtions tht do not rech it. Th power of regtrtion, s we hve clled the preliminry condition of prediction. It implies responsiveness to the vibrtions it, of whtsoever exts; nd whtsoever exts does so either s the Present Germ, or s the Future Blossom, or s the Pst Fruit of some object or event. Whtsoever hs been still, in its fruit or results ;whtsoever shll be lredy in its Present Germ. The Ego or subliminl consciousness responds to both. So tht the infnt, even in its pre-ntl stte, brnded with the pst in its con stitution, nd with the future in the very plms of its hnds. As Professor Lodge sys, Pst nd Future lredy re. Both hve controlling influence on ll prcticl ction, nd the two tken together constitute the higher plne or totlity of things ;" towrds which, s seems to me," he " sys, we re compelled to seek, in it connection with the directing (given us) by our form, nd in connection with the ction of living beings who re consciously directed to definite nd preconceived end." Souls, however, some erlier, some lter, come to possess, in ddition to the secret writing on the inner leves of subconscious knowledge, the power of publiction, nd prediction. It hppens in th wy the Divine One, the All in All, tht impels us onwrds to : think nd sy nd do wht we ourselves know not, continully knows nd foreknows the whole ;nd there re souls in the world tht even lredy hve climbed ner enough to Him to ctch n occsionl glem, nd get word here nd there of H Cosmic Will. predict. Such re prophets, men nd women, who hve lerned to Mind-Desiring Mind-Concentrtion nd How to Prcte it. By K. T. Anderson. (London :L. N. Fowler Co. Price 6i. net.) Very probbly, ny lmost certinly, the uthor did not men it, but " Mind-Concentrtion nd how to prcte it," little sermon on & C.

91 REVIEWS AND NOTICES 283 " Ask nd it shll be given to you," since it points out, though with out sying so, tht pryer n instinct ring, like our other instincts, out of the nturl powers of the humn constitution, nd still more, becuse it shows tht, provided men understnd wht the method of " sking " which the lws of nture prescribe, the obtining of wht thus " sked " for s infllible lw s ny other. The dvice of th little book mounts to th. Let your thought be definite, nd clen cut. Let it tke the form of desire. Let th desire find explicit utternce in the briefest possible form of words. Let th form of words be ernestly nd incessntly repeted, for such n mount of time s will not be werome to you. Five minutes will do to begin with. Do it s frequently in the dy s you cn mke it convenient, nd s you will not find irksome. And the result will be such s t present only clerness you cnnot bring yourself to believe, not nd consecutiveness of thought, with the success which ccompnies them, but in process of time you will find tht you ctully get the things you sk for. The secret of getting ^business success, personl bilities, virtues, or nything else method s unlike s possible to tht in which you hve been in the hbit of prying in church. (Whtever strong desires mn hs re pro phecy of their own fulfilment ; where we fil ordinrily, tht we do not desire strongly enough. Now in cse we wh to weken our desire for ny object the method simple : Rttle off series of dconnected petitions for number of different objects t ny indefinite time ; while, on the other hnd, in cse you wnt to strengthen your desire, nd mke it force in nture tht shll win, the method no less simple nd no less sure, viz., precely the reverse. There's only one cution tht must be crefully borne in mind : Be despertely creful in using th method not to desire the wrong things, for you will be sure to get them! Rel " sking," remember, ccording to the lws of one's mentl constitution, not thing to ply with, but force of nture. Politics Biologiclly Considered The Biology of Brith Politics. By Chrles H. Hrvey. (Swn, Sonnenschein & Co. ; 19o5.) Th interesting nd useful little book, lying down s found tion principle tht our present divion of prties completely out of dte, nd tht there s yet no Science of Politics to guide men in their judgments, proceeds to formulte method s follows. It C.

92 284 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW consts, sys the uthor, of: (1) the observtion of fcts concern ing ntions ; (2) the hypothes of ntions s orgnms ; (3) the ppliction of the lws of biology to explin the growth nd develop ment of ntions. The two fundmentl lws in the htory of sttes re sid to be : (1) the limittion of the internl struggle ; (2) the substitution of combintion for competition. And the conclusion tht " Politicl Science hs for its unit the stte. It will tret of the individul mn, but of him only s section." The study of pst htory Dd the dcussion of the present circumstnces of the world, which.form the body of the work, re of much vlue, nd should be crefully red by ll who cn recogne tht the world's movements re not limited to the ides (or wnt of ides) of Whig nd Tory, Free Trde nd Protection. But our uthor's collection of fcts sdly incomplete, nd the " orgn tion " of ntions very fr from ctully exting. To the mible optimm of such pssges s the following, we cn but nswer " Open your eyes nd see! " He sys : " The creful observer of the life of th group of Western ntions cnnot fil to see in them the growth [of common life... So rel th, so ctul nd tngible the interests tht unite them (!), tht they hve, in fct, become in slight but true nd infinitely potentil sense, dtinct orgnic body." Contrriwe, it needs no creful observtion it lies on the surfce tht never since the time of primitive svgery hve Europen governments been crried on with so cynicl d regrd of morlity (interntionl or other), with so little feeling of " interests tht unite them," s since the old order ws broken up by the Frnco-Prussin wr. A good illustrtion ws furnhed only few weeks go, when Prussi professed serious pprehension tht, in time of profound pece, with bsolutely no cuse of qurrel, Englnd ws bout to send her fleet to nnihilte the Prussin nvy! The ide to us ludicrous one ; but wht not ludicrous tht Prussin sttesmen should regrd such n ction ginst friendly stte s possible, nd even (pprently) nturl. To spek of Europe t the present dy s, in ny sense, " dtinct orgnic body ", indeed, prdox pproching to n bsurdity. Is it much otherwe with the single ntions? The future Science of Politics must rest upon much more creful nd complete " observtion of fcts " thn Mr. Hrvey gives us. But in wht he does give us there mtter for very serious thought for ll who desire the welfre of their country. A. A. W.

93 REVIEWS AND NOTICES 285 Mgzines nd Pmphlets Tkeosopht, Mrch. "Old Diry Leves" th month continue Colonel Olcott's experiences in Pr nd London, W. A. Myer's thoughtful pper on " Erly Chrtinity ; Its Reltion to Jewh nd Grecin Thought nd Culture " concluded. H result tht " Between the humnt nd mysticl thought of Jesus, flot ing in n tmosphere of universl love, nd the rigid nd scholstic system of Pul, there brod line of severnce lmost reching to gulf" will commend itself to mny reders. Of the Gnostics he sys " : Their idels eventully proved to be beyond the intellectul nd spiritul evolution of the ge, or Chrtinity in their hnds would hve thus erly become universl religion. They filed for lck of sufficiently evolved humn mteril to work upon. Eighteen centuries must run their chequered course before our Western rces were prepred by the slow evolutionry process for the cceptnce of universl Gospel built upon the inner spiritul techings nd the simple ethicl precepts of the gret Founder of the Chrtin Religion." Mr. Ledbeter's most vluble lecture upon " Ancient nd Modern Buddhm " follows ; then we hve the conclusion of Knnoo Mi's " Philosophicl Jinm viewed in the Light of Hindum nd Modern Science." A very curious nd suggestive nrrtive of the obsession of ntive youth by the spirit of " No. 2034, Corporl George Hrvey, B. Co., Norsex Regiment," very unprogressed spirit indeed, from whom we re told tht " no secrets of the herefter were glened," follows ; then " The Stff of Zoroster," nd very interesting pper on " The Hindu Joint Fmily," from the Indin Mirror ; nd the number concludes with the report of Mrs. Besnt's third nd fourth lectures t the Benres Convention. Theosophy on Religion nd Eduction," in Indi, Mrch, opens with " A Frgment of Thought nd n exceedingly good rticle from the Rngoon Times on " Msion Work in the Est," which defines the true religion nd the true msion work s " tht which seeks to uplift humnity, irrespective of cste nd creed ; one which recognes the Divine source of ll religions." K. Venkt Ro's " Vhtdvitic Philosophy " the most importnt of the remining contents. Centrl Hindu College Mgzine, Mrch, keeps up the level of its contents, nd supplies recent portrit of our President-Founder. Jheosophic Glener, Mrch, presents its reders with useful Chrt, showing the different Geologicl Strt of the Erth, Corresponding Life, Rces of Mnkind, etc., founded on the Tble in the Story of

94 286 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW Atlnt, nd enlrged from the Secret Doctrine nd the Pedigree of Mn. P. B. Vcch's " Thoughts on ' " Glimpses of Occultm,' nd D. D. Writer's " The Tming of the Brute in Mn," re the most noteworthy of its originl contents. Our collection of other Indin mgzines includes The Dwn, with n interesting ccount of the Muhmmdn popultion of Bengl; The Mysore Review, Vol. I., No. 3, new mgzine which deserves word of pre ; well written nd well printed, nd exceed ingly outspoken. In wht minly defence of Lord Curzon's fmous speech, the Editor " sys : In th lrge conception of truth every mother's son of Indi found wnting. Our society lie, our customs re lie, our religiousness frce, nd our professions ll skin-deep. In no other civiled country does womn, the noblest ssocite of mn, obtin t the hnds of the ltter the ignoble tret ment we mete out to her.... And yet we get speechless with stonhment, nd re in horror our hnds to heven blsphemy of our bold mentor "! Indin Opinion ; Est nd West, which would firly tke to witness the its plce with the best of the Englh mgzines without its specilly Indin interest ; nd The Indin Review. The Vdhn, April, gives much spce to the forthcoming Inter ntionl Congress. Dr. Hubbe-Schleiden writes on " Spce Pro blems," nd the " Enquirer " dels frther with the question of the gulf between Modern Chrtinity nd the Esoteric Chrtinity of Mrs. Besnt, nd gives nswers on Telepthy, H. P. B.'s met-eting, smoking nd other cpitl sins ccording to the New Lights, nd the results of compnionship in previous lives. Lotus Journl, April. Th month we hve pretty coloured picture illustrting the third portion of Mr. Ledbeter's Trvels in Cliforni. The serious prt of the number the Editoril on the method of forming " Lotus Circle " nd mnging the meetings. Th time it A. R. Orge who furnhes the story; H. Whyte dcourses upon " Ester," nd Ms Mllet's " " Outlines re con tinued by study of " The Building of Chrcter." My we venture to hint our own view tht for children ll th premture tering open the budding flower? There n innocence of childhood which even the techer should respect ; it seems to me too much like trying to get them " converted," s foolh Sundy-School techers do. Surely, child should not be thinking of " building its chrcter "! Bulletin Theosophique, April, reproduces in full the letter which hs

95 REVIEWS AND NOTICES 287 red so much dcussion. It well worth crefully reding ; nd though we do not dmit the ppliction of much which sid ginst us, the opportunity of seeing ourselves s others see us, of knowing how our speech nd ction impress not unsympthing outsider, one we should not lose. Our brod nswer must be tht of the Apostles in like cse : " It not meet we should leve the work of God to serve tbles " ; nd yet, how much more could we not do, nd not leve the other undone! Revue Theosophique, Mrch. Mrs. Besnt nd Mr. Ledbeter furnh the mteril for th number. The Editor, in speking of the Welsh Revivl, sys: "The veritble origin of the movement possi bly the ction of powerful Helper who hs mde of Evn Roberts nd others chnnel for the outpouring of spiritul force." Th seems resonble ; nd s no spiritul force thus poured out upon them cn do more thn enhnce put more life into wht they re by nture, we need not wonder tht, though t lest for the time red nd glorified, they remin Welsh Methodts still. It power they hve received, not light ; De Tkeosofche for tht they re not yet ripe. Beweging, April, in ddition to its officil contents, hs n ccount of Mr. Ledbeter's movements in Americ, nd n interesting pper by Dr. Vn der Gon, " A Vit to the Reding Room of the Netherlnds Section." Theosophi, Mrch. From the " Outlook " we lern tht the storm in the tepot red mongst the orthodox by Dr. Behler's boldness still rges the higher the better! The rticles re few, but long nd importnt. Dr. Vn Deventer sums up h ppers on Plto's Timus, with generl study of the doctrinl views it expresses ; C. J. Schuver concludes "The Trechery of Juds," nd Mrs. Besnt's Pedigree of Mn furnhes the reminder. Specil mention deserves Dr. Vn der Gon's plesnt nd redble rticle upon our mgzines, contining much interesting detil s to their foundtion nd erly dys. Der Vdhn, Mrch. The min contents of th number re lecture on " Theosophy nd Chrtinity " nd study of Wgner's erly work Jesus of Nzreth. Teosofk Tidskrift, Mrch, contins " Medittion on Determin m " by H. Sjostrom, nd chpter from Schur6's Les Grnds Inities. Theosophic Messenger, Mrch, in ddition to the questions from the Vdhn, hs lso originl questions nd nswers, to one of which, deling with the trnsmsion well-known initils C J. of the Veds, we re gld to see the >.

96 288 THE THEOSOPHICAL REVIEW Theosophy in Austrlsi, Februry. In good number we must single out for specil mention prticulrly vluble pper, " How Krm works," under the initils E. H. H. New Zelnd Theosophicl Mgzine, Mrch, nnounces Mr. Ledbeter's rrivl t Aucklnd. Mr. K. Hrron's " Brotherhood " worthy of creful study. Also Theosofch Mndbld, nd Lotus. With regrd to th lst we re in some difficulty. The Editor suggests tht we should give specil notice of but wht cn we sy lrge nd well-got-up mgzine, dting from " Prze " which we re given to understnd it,? It wht we cll Prgue, nd we think we mke it out to be the seventh number of the tenth volume. The sender hs kindly pencilled tht the first rticle from Mrs. Besnt's Evolution Life nd Form, nd the second "Tom," nd there you re!there does not seem to be single word which hs the slightest resemblnce to ny lnguge we re cquinted with sincere plesure tht Theosophy mgzine in Bohemi, nd wh it of ;so we cn only express our cn mintin so dignified-looking every success. But why should we be clled upon thus publicly to confess our shortcomings nswer Of other mgzines the first plce!? Let Echo due to Brod Views, April, for the very importnt rticle by Mr. Sinnett himself on " Life in the Next World," which should be red by every Theosopht. every difficulty Whether clered wy by simply speking of the " crudity " of the erlier teching my, we think, be questioned doubt tht he gives suggestions which go ;but there fr to hrmone the con flicting views ltely stted in our pges on th most interesting sub ject. Also, L Nuov Prol Review which tkes ;Modem Astrology; Mind ; no The Occult high plce mong our contemporries, nd con tins contributions by Mr. Andrew Lng ;Mr. St. George Lne Fox- Pitt nd Mrs. Cmpbell-Pred ;Notes nd Queries, in which the lt of " Arcne Societies in the United Sttes," s good s pntomime for exmple, we lern tht the Essenes died out in the Middle Ages, but the Order ws revived only few yers go. " The work prtly militry, nd presents good opportunities for drmtic dply." Mystic Mgzine ; The Humnitrin)-.nd The the Psycho-TJterpeutic Journl W. Printed by tie Womkk's Primtihc Society Limited, M * M, Whiteomb Street, W.C