Preface

A collection of articles from the Theosophy Magazine featuring Robert Crosbie as the Mentor, in dialogue with a family passing through everyday situations. These articles are replete with practical Theosophical wisdom. The following character delineation of the members of this family from the December 1916 article will afford the reader the necessary context:

Mother is strong on the side of "human nature"; Big Brother contributes the clever or satirical often it's politics; Student gives us enough of Yeats, or Masefield, or Galsworthy to make us want to read them in quiet; thanks to Spinster's choice bits we all pass for "well-informed" in music, art, and drama! As for Doctor and Mentor, they are quite likely to dig out some thread from the depths of the Secret Doctrine, and set us all dangling at their heels, in a veritable abyss of thought—though we can catch a glimmer of light now and then that keeps us hanging on, eager to touch the flame.

Additionally, Anna seems to be a kitchen maid and the narrator the 7^th person in the room, who witnesses but never interacts and with whom the 4^th wall is never broken.

It is unclear if these anecdotes are based on real-life events or are purely allegorical. However, the following internal evidence strongly suggest the former possibility: (a) the Mentor is undoubtedly Robert Crosbie and hence the stories are anchored in his real persona, (b) the names of certain personalities in April 1917 and March 1918 articles are redacted, which would only be done if they were real people, (c) the May 1917 article is by the Spinster herself, wherein consideration is given to whether a Doctor Ponder would read the reports about him and take umbrage, (d) contemporary events such as drafting for World War I, the Spanish Flu and the Armistice are interwoven into the narrative, (e) Robert Crosbie was himself the editor of the Theosophy Magazine when these articles were published and would not have countenanced fabrications, and (f) the series ended with the passing of Robert Crosbie in June 1919.

— Editor of the Electronic Edition (e-Ed), February 2026.

Contents

November 1916

THE Mentor came in unannounced, as he often does, while we are still sitting around the dinner table. Somebody made a place for him, and Mother poured him "just a small cup" of coffee.

"We've been arguing", said the Spinster, "about the 'movie' I saw this afternoon." (We call her the Spinster because she's not old enough to object—and because she still loves "the movies," and other frivolous pleasures.)

"Of all the absurd things," Big Brother continued patronisingly, "she says she heard the noise the papers made, when the villain tore them in two!"¹

"Imagination, of course," said the Student, beaming eagerly through her glasses. "We're studying psychology and making tests right now—and it's just one of Spinster's reactions. She didn't really hear a noise, because there wasn't one to hear."

Mother sighed and voiced her grievance then and there. "Making tests! I should say so! And the last time you came home from one, you were fit subject for the Doctor. Don't you think this modern psychology study ridiculous, Mentor? I don't object to her burning her clothes full of holes in the laboratory, but I don't want my little girl's emotions played on, just as an experiment—and with others looking on."

"Well, I think such methods are more false, than ridiculous," answered the Mentor. The light shone on his glasses and then off again, as he earnestly nodded and he looked more benevolent than ever, as he smiled at Mother and Daughter.

"You see, Student, it isn't in fact psychology that can be so studied—not real psychology. Such tests belong to a super-physiology of a sort, and not a desirable sort at that. It will never discover anything of real value. That kind of experimentation is really a form of vivisection—a vivisection even more brutal than that practised on the lower animals. I'm sorry to think that you have ever been a 'subject', my dear."

"Oh, it's all right enough," said Big Brother. "We used to do all sorts of stunts in psychology when I was in college, and nobody ever got hurt."

"How do you know they didn't?" asked the Mentor with quiet emphasis. "Have you followed the careers of all the 'subjects' who were made to blush, and to cry, and to laugh, and so on—just that a few of you young jackanapes might observe their 'reactions'? Ask the Doctor here what he has observed. How about your neurotics, Doctor? Anything there that is due to such forced excitation?"

The Doctor usually laughs when the Mentor begins on him and his science; but this time he was respectful enough, as he balanced a spoon speculatively on his capable fore-finger. Everybody waited; the Spinster daintily setting down her cup made the only sound.

"Why, yes, Mentor, since you ask me," said the Doctor. "There is a young girl in the hospital now with acute hysteria. She thinks she's a red disc, on a yellow field—and can't stop whirling. She'll be all right in a day or two, I fancy, but I'm afraid they'll have to take her out of school and away for a year." He went on with more animation. "Your phrase 'vivisection' is rather apt, Mentor. And do you know, by the way, that no results of value have ever accrued even to medical science from the practice of vivisection? Had an argument with my assistant only this morning about it. He claimed all sorts of results, but when I analyzed them for him, the boy was rather chopfallen."

"Indeed," Mentor nodded by way of approbation, "if modern science were not so essentially modern as to ignore all that past civilizations have accomplished, humanity would be saved many 'scientific' criminal errors. The knowledge of the ancient sages in regard to the human organism was complete; they came at it, neither by dissection nor vivisection, but by applying the laws of all growth, proceeding from cause to effect. They understood the dual nature of every kind of material, and its applicability according to condition and organism. Do you not see, that as the body is built up from the mineral, vegetable and animal kingdoms, there exists in nature a remedy for every possible derangement?"

"But, Mentor, please, you must tell me why I heard that paper tear!" The Spinster spoke very firmly, as is her wont, covering the interruption with a smile in her eyes. So, of course, Mentor smiled back again—everybody does.

"Oh, you make me admit you did hear it, you rascal?" said the Mentor. "Well, you did, and so did everybody else in the theatre—whether he knew it or not."

"You'll have to show me," said Big Brother, slangily.

"Yes, there's a great deal you have yet to be shown, young man," Mentor replied, amid the general laughter, and continued evenly: "I do not think that the sound you heard of tearing paper was due to imagination; the pictures you saw were records of persons in action made on a sensitive film; these pictures and motions are reproduced whenever proper conditions are supplied; we are so used to this fact that we do not realize all that the fact implies. That movements and expressions can be recorded upon a properly sensitized substance so as to be seen, should open our eyes to the fact that the sounds which accompanied those actions are capable of being recorded at the same time. Occult science states explicitly that they are so recorded, and can be heard whenever the proper conditions are supplied."

"Yes, but how about the sounds of the drunken revels, and heavy thuds that you didn't hear?" persisted Big Brother. "Weren't they recorded too? And if so, why didn't you hear them, Sis?"

"Maybe," answered Mentor for her, "the vibrations were too coarse and heavy to be recorded on that film. Certainly, if they were recorded, it was possible to get the sounds again. Some people present may have heard those sounds—having a greater range of hearing than ordinarily obtains. Naturally, sounds of a sharp and distinctive character are heard more readily, because they make a more definite impression upon the film. Sometime, no doubt, a combination of substance will be 'discovered' which will record simultaneously and equally all that goes on in any action and permit reproduction both to sight and hearing."

"Well, now," Mother put in as she led the way to the living-room, "it seems to me there is something of real psychology in that explanation. Or what would you call the true psychology, Mentor?"

"To be brief tonight, as I must be getting back to a letter now, I'll tell you to try out the ancients again there. Take Patanjali's Yoga Aphorisms for instance—(Wm. Q. Judge's rendering, by all means). It deals with the Soul or Thinker, apart from his thoughts or conditions, but responsible for them. True psychology shows the Thinker how to proceed in order to think right thoughts and perform right actions—in other words, to gain perfect control."

Student was already on her way to the book-case after "Patanjali" when the door latched after Mentor. Then the room settled down to its evening quiet.

MENTAL OBSTRUCTIONS TO MEDITATION*

What mental obstructions are in the way of meditation and most frequently present?

W. Q. Judge.—The greatest foe and that most frequently present is memory, or recollection. This was at one time called phantasy. The moment the mind is restrained in concentration for the purpose of meditation, that moment the images, the impressions, the sensations of the past begin to troop through the brain and tend to instantly and constantly disturb the concentration. Hence the need for less selfishness, less personality, less dwelling on objects and desiring them,—or sensation. If the mind be full of impressions, there is also a self-reproductive power in it which takes hold of these seeds of thought and enlivens them. Recollection is the collecting together of impressions, and so it constitutes the first and the greatest obstruction to meditation.

Theosophy, November, 1916

¹ Back in 1916, movies did not have a synchronized soundtrack. Sound was only introduced in movies from mid-to-late 1920s with the inauguration of the "talkies."—e-Ed.

* This answer by Mr. Judge to the question asked was first printed in The Theosophical Forum of July, 1895. The title used is our own.—[ED. THEOSOPHY.]

December 1916

IT is understood that whosoever gathers with the clan at night around our living-room table is liable to interruption, whether his book be diverting or profound. Mother is strong on the side of "human nature"; Big Brother contributes the clever or satirical often it's politics; Student gives us enough of Yeats, or Masefield, or Galsworthy to make us want to read them in quiet; thanks to Spinster's bits we all pass for "well-informed" in music, art, and drama! As for Doctor and Mentor, they are quite likely to dig out some thread from the depths of the Secret Doctrine, and set us all dangling at their heels, in a veritable abyss of thought—though we can catch a glimmer of light now and then that keeps us hanging on, eager to touch the flame.

Last evening Mother spoke up in no mild indignation:

"People, this is an October magazine. Do you mean to say you read it and failed to call my attention to this story of Willa Sibert Cather's? It's seldom one finds a magazine story worth reading, I know, but however satisfactory in other respects this story may be, here is a keenness of character analysis that is notable. The story is of Cressida, the one star in an otherwise obscure family. Just listen to this:

The truth was that all the Garnets, and particularly her two sisters, were consumed by an habitual, bilious, unenterprising envy of Cressy. They never forgot that, no matter what she did for them or how far she dragged them about the world with her, she would never take one of them to live with her in her Tenth Street house in New York. They thought that was the thing they most wanted. But what they wanted, in the last analysis, was to be Cressida. For twenty years she had been plunged in struggle, fighting for her life at first, then for a beginning, for growth, and at last for eminence and perfection. During those twenty years the Garnets had been comfortable and indolent and vastly self-satisfied; and now they expected Cressida to make them equal sharers in the rewards, spiritual, as well as material, of her struggle. They coveted the qualities which had made her success, as well as the benefits which came from it.

"Just hasn't she put her scalpel on envy and ingratitude, Doctor?"

"Yes, indeed," agreed Doctor, appreciatively. "A queer thing, isn't it, that those two always go together? People who have the qualities which enable them to give are never envious, no matter how much more others may do; they are too busy giving. Those who take most are usually even resentful that others have qualities, which they could put to so much greater advantage,—for themselves, of course. Yet they do miserably with the qualities they already have."

"Well," Mentor took it up, "we can see that these defects arise from ignorance—lack of soul-perception—lack of realization of the fact of Law in the universe. How can a man be envious of anyone, if he knows nothing can keep him from his own; that no one can have what does not belong to him? I suppose it is pride that makes us unready to acknowledge our poor deservings; and others' richer earnings indicate a quality which we have not. Their excellencies are a reproach to us. We want to appear before others better than they are. Short in the possession of qualities we would like to have, envy of them in others springs up, accompanied even by hate. There would be only joy in the grateful heart that another had earned such meritorious Karma. It resolves itself into a question of soul-quality, don't you think?"

"Well," Big Brother sat up a little. "Should you say that the ignorant day-laborer who is unenvious and grateful, has greater soul-quality than an educated man who is envious and ungrateful?"

"Indeed, I should!" warmly replied Mentor. "Another incarnation would show, if this one doesn't, a higher status even outwardly in that day-laborer. In his own class, in fact, you will find much envy and ingratitude. The lack of those qualities and the presence of their opposites in an individual indicate a moral elevation above the class."

"Do you know, Mentor," thoughtfully began Doctor, "I believe that gratitude is the very highest of qualities. At least we had good evidence of it as a quality of Masters, in the early days of Theosophy."

"Oh, you mean," Mentor took him up, "when Messrs. Sinnett and Hume thought they could run the Theosophical Society so much better than H. P. B. and Col. Olcott did? Yes, they had authority in letters and science! Against that authority, what were devotion and sacrifice alone? The world would take notice, if the Masters made them their agents! But the Masters calmly told them that ingratitude was not one of their vices."

"Will you not hear this other bit, too?" asked Mother, picking up her magazine again.

In her undertakings, in whatever she could lay hold of with her two hands, she was successful; but whatever happened to her was almost sure to be bad. She lived, more than most of us, "for others," and what she seemed to promote among her beneficiaries was indolence and envy and discord—even dishonesty and turpitude.

"Now Mother," Spinster teased, "you are always telling us that motive and motive alone fixes the quality of our acts. How does that square with what you have just read?"

Mother looked appealingly at Mentor, as she said, "Well, it did determine their quality, so far as Cressida was concerned."

"Yes," added Mentor. "As she saw the results, no doubt she saw where she made mistakes of judgment. That is how we grow discrimination, isn't it? And discrimination is the knowledge which enables us to do real good and not harm to those we would benefit. That "good" is very often not at all what people want, of course. I can imagine the very greatest brotherly kindness, on occasion, to be a club! If Cressida made mistakes in judgment with a good motive,—not for the smug satisfaction of being able to say—'See, what I have done!'—the good motive will lead her to right knowledge; nor is it concerned with the wrong use others make of it. Ah, but it's the saddest thing I know, that so few are able to be helped without weakening of the moral fibre."

"You are dealing with the individual problem in Cressida, Mentor," said the Doctor. We were wondering what Doctor would have to say—being on many Boards of charitable organizations.

"Yes, but that after all is the only problem there is. Curious how we arraign the nation, the government—and yet it's we, ourselves, as individuals who make up the nation and government. Precisely where organized charity fails is in its work of relief being given over to paid workers, who are dealing with cases, not souls—not individuals."

"Would you then do away with charitable organizations?" asked Doctor.

"Certainly not, so long as there are people in the world who can't see a better line of charitable work, and who will serve in that way. Good is done in any sincere effort."

"Well, Mentor," Mother suggested. "Isn't there any general safeguard against these hosts of individual failures of ours, while we are acquiring discrimination?"

"I was just thinking that perhaps most mistakes are made by going out of our way to hunt objects of benefaction, by looking after the dangerous duty of another. If the problem comes straight to us, the Law has brought it as our individual opportunity. After that, we can only do according to our best discrimination, but we can do that personally, as soul to soul."

"Do you mean you'd then hand out a tract, Mentor?" asked Big Brother bantering.

"Well, young man, there might be a case where that would be just the thing to do. Don't you believe for one moment in a hard and fast rule for any line of human conduct! But whatever I did in the way of food, or money, or clothes, I would realize was only a momentary palliative—and I'd look for the causes of the particular misery, before I could expect to give any real help."

"My experience is that it's mighty hard to cure causes, though," Doctor spoke with conviction. "The causes are up to the man himself—and he expects his physician to do his work for him!"

"Now, Doctor," nodded Mother, "isn't that corroboration of what Mentor always insists on? Of course, the hand that smites us is our own. We must acknowledge that 'the Law' is the law of our own being, and obey it. Instead of that, we are always trying to evade it!"

"And make someone else the scapegoat!" chuckled Doctor. "Well, for that we have to thank our old anthropomorphic outside God and that blasphemous atonement dogma."

No telling what other long-rolling terms of condemnation Doctor might have launched forth—we knew by his eye he had warmed to the subject—but the telephone for him broke in on us, and the tide was stemmed for the evening.

PREVALENT HABITS OF READING*

THERE are several hindrances to the doing of good work by individuals, with resulting loss to the movement. These are all surmountable, for hindrances that are insurmountable are nature's own limitations that can be used as means instead of being left as barriers. One of these surmountable and unnecessary hindrances is the prevalent habit of reading trashy and sensational literature, both in newspaper and other form. This stupifies and degrades the mind, wastes time and energy, and makes the brain a storehouse of mere brute force rather than what it should be—a generator of cosmic power. Many people seem to "read from the pricking of some cerebral itch," with a motive similar to that which ends in the ruin of a dipsomaniac: a desire to deaden the personal consciousness. Sensation temporarily succeeds in drowning the voice of conscience and the pressure that comes from the soul that so many men and women unintelligently feel. So they seek acute sensation in a thousand different ways, while others strive to attain the same end by killing both sensation and consciousness with the help of drugs or alcohol. Reading of a certain sort is simply the alcohol habit removed to another plane, and just as some unfortunates live to drink instead of drinking that they may live, so other unfortunates live to read instead of reading that they may learn how to live. Gautama Buddha went so far as to forbid his disciples to read novels—or what stood for novels in those days—holding that to do so was most injurious. People are responsible for the use they make of their brains, for the brain can be used for the noblest purposes and can evolve the most refined quality of energy, and to occupy it continually with matters not only trivial but often antagonistic to Theosophical principles is to be untrue to a grave trust. This does not mean that the news of the day should be ignored, for those who live in the world should keep themselves acquainted with the world's doings: but a fair test is that nothing not worth remembering is worth reading. To read for the sake of reading, and so filling the sphere of the mind with a mass of half-dead images, is a hindrance to service and a barrier to individual development.

Theosophy, December, 1916

* This extract formed a portion of an article entitled "The Screen of Time", written by Wm. Q. Judge, and first printed in Theosophy—successor to The Path, for April, 1896. The title given it is our own. [ED. THEOSOPHY]

January 1917

IT was a welcome diversion to have Student's teacher friend in to dinner this evening. Big Brother is not yet over the "glooms" from the last election, and really, you know, there are times when even our best friends won't stand for chaffing. Big Brother sees our noble U. S. A. going "straight to the dogs", nor has he yet the philosophy which can contemplate the picture of gathering up the fragments into a simpler and far better mechanism, than that now running with halts and squeaks and moans, until it can run no more. But the little Teacher, who reminds us of nothing more than a merry Robin Red-breast, with her glowing cheeks, bright eyes, and a saucy tilt of her head as she waits for an answer to her busy questionings, very nearly sent him back to the "glooms" again by wishing, à propos of a recent novel, that she had lived in the "days of '76".

"Yes," muttered Big Brother, "when there were patriots who fought for a principle!"

Oh, it's quite no use to tell him times weren't so different then—that George Washington and his poor army were miserably supported, that the self-sacrificing patriots were few then as now; then, as now, selfish considerations usurped attention before human freedom! He can see only the now, when politics, not policies, are in the place of power; when we are forced to skulk behind a selfish "Peace", and a still more selfish "Neutrality", instead of taking a bold stand in defense of human rights the world over. The rest of the Family are inclined to be more patient, since Mentor, the other evening, said something like this:

"It may well be that our present forms and methods shall fail to sustain our unity, as a people, and with our present commercial ideas, our civilization be doomed to failure. But I believe the lines already have been traced, and the work begun, which must eventually bring about a truer and more glorious Republic. It may also be that the true patriots at heart are helping to prevent catastrophe, while urging on a new order of the ages in higher and better ideals."

It was Student who established a more peaceful current again. She develops an unlooked-for sprightliness, in Spinster's absence, and knowing that Teacher is inclined to peck around the subject of reincarnation without really swallowing even the least morsel, she hit at poor Teacher squarely:

"You'd live in the days of '76, would you, Teacher dear? But how do you know you were not living then? How comes it, I wonder, that you so 'adore' Patrick Henry, and that you just as enthusiastically 'hate' Thomas Jefferson! Prove to me instantly that you did not live then!"

"Help, help!" cried Teacher, in mock distress. "But if I did live then, I don't remember now! You will have to show me how I can remember my past lives,—so as to recognize my friends, and especially my enemies, when I meet them," (Teacher can't have had an enemy for at least three incarnations) "before I shall take the back seat with becoming modesty."

"Far be it from me," said Student, with a twinkle showing through her glasses, "to say, that if you weren't a person of very bad habits, you would have known 'how,' long ago!"

Even Teacher looked startled at that, and turned a little appealingly to Big Brother, despite her highly emancipated sex.

"Oh, but I mean it!" Student went on relentlessly. "I know you can set yourself, as you think, one-pointedly at many tasks, but during the performance, how many times has your mind flown a thousand miles away, lighting first on an unpleasant thing, and then on a pleasant thing, until you have to bring yourself back with a jerk to reality?"

"Guilty! Peccavi," murmured Teacher.

"So say we all," Mother exclaimed feelingly, "more's the pity!" "Now that your bad habits are acknowledged," said Student, retiring gracefully where she must soon have floundered, "I'll leave it to Mentor to show you how to substitute good habits for the bad ones, which now keep you from the memory of past lives."

Teacher brightened perceptibly, for even she knows it is only Mentor who can go into the heart of a subject, and make us forget even our ignorance; it's, someway, as if he really knows, and for the time he is speaking, we actually share in his knowledge.

"The substitution of a good quality for a bad one is the greatest miracle there is, an old Sufi once said," began Mentor gently, "and that qualities grow out of habits, we very well know. The habit of letting our minds wander purposelessly from one circumstance to another, from one effect to another, from one condition to another, swayed by personal liking and disliking, is responsible for an absolute inability to get into the current of our own spiritual nature. The habit exists in default of a permanent basis of mind, from which to think and act. We must achieve a permanent basis before the 'one pointedness', which can alone look back over our countless pasts, is possible. But it sounds very simple—the statement that the only permanent basis, from which the mind can properly move in any and all directions, is a realization of the essential spiritual nature of all beings! People think it so obvious as to have no real meaning for them; yet were they to try out that basis for only a few days, they would discover it called for constant determination and ceaseless effort; with further persistence, they would begin to sense a 'miracle' at work."

"Are we to infer, Mentor," questioned Teacher eagerly, "that if we were to put our minds one-pointedly on gaining knowledge of past lives, the memory would come?"

"Yes, but remember that this memory is not what is called our brain memory: it is that of the real inner Man whose nature is spiritual rather than physical. It can be connected with our brain functions only by affirming and assuming our permanent spiritual nature, and acting in waking hours upon that basis. Immediately there arises responsibility for our thoughts, words and deeds, since they affect others for good or evil; then naturally follows gentle, discriminating service in every direction. So the powers and faculties of body and mind are attuned to the powers, faculties, and memories of the inner self."

Little Teacher was serious at last.

"Why, it's so much deeper and bigger than I've ever sensed it, Mentor. And it's logical, too—" she added, reflectively.

"I'll give you this much, for a pointer though, Miss Teacher," grinned Big Brother. "If you are taking that tack in earnest, there's an awful lot of trouble in store for you!"

"Don't let him frighten you, Teacher!" Mother hastened to say. "He is just thinking of his own stock-accounting! Besides, many of his most admired heroes and friends have failed to stand the acid test of this selfless philosophy."

"Oh, then, 'one-pointedness' is 'living the life', as Student often calls it?"

"Yes; and the wrench from the personal to the universal viewpoint is not unaccompanied by moans," added Student with eloquence. "If it were only the Ten Commandments we had to follow, we'd be fine folks! For they don't say anything about self-assertion, fault-finding, petty flashes of temper, condemnations, resentments, vanities, and insincerities!"

"Why, but it seems to me a person would be perfectly stupid without those ordinary human faults! I'd rather a person were wicked, than stupid!" said Teacher, tossing her pretty head.

"I almost agree with you there," Mentor unexpectedly answered. "A force turned to wickedness can be directed equally to good; but what can be done where there is no force at all? Once obstacles in a forceful nature are removed and rightly directed, untold beneficence flows; but it is not recorded that great wisdom gained on the spiritual basis was ever a concomitant of stupidity. In fact, clear-seeingness is the direct opposite of stupidity."

Student's eyes showed luminous behind her glasses, as she spoke softly:

"No, it couldn't be 'stupid' to be impersonal—like the sunshine, like the breeze from a field of new-mown hay, like the dew, refreshing the gardens—and yet, knowing its own beneficence! What bliss could compare with being one like that?"

Then the door clicked, and Doctor and Spinster came in together bringing the world with them.

"Some new music to-night. I command you to adjourn without delay!" said Spinster, crooking arms with Teacher and drawing us all after her with a smile.

Theosophy, January, 1917

February 1917

IT was one of those quiet evenings "around the table"—the reading table this time—when the family circle is complete, and in good spirits, but when each member seems to luxuriate in the silence of well being, and in that real companionship which requires no outward expression to explain itself. The smothered beating of the storm outside intensified the comfort of the bright, warm living room, with its glowing fire-place.

Mother had a magazine, but turned no page—and if you watched her closely you could see her looking now and then at all the Family, and feeling all their comfort—and the peace which comes to Mothers in having around them those whom they hold most dear. Big Brother worked at a chess problem. Student was at her books. Spinster wrote busily at a letter—to somebody; and the scratching of her pen was almost like a purr, as she crossed her "t's" in vigorous fashion. Mentor looked into the fire with his "past, present and future" look, as Big Brother calls it—Mentor seems to be the only one who can just sit still, and yet seem occupied. The Doctor, lucky to be at home on such a stormy night, and well aware of the fact, browsed over the file of medical journals which accumulate until he has time to read them.

It was his peculiar little grunt of incredulity at something he was reading that broke the spell and set the Family to its usual diversion of good-natured "give and take" this quiet evening.

"Let's have it, Dad," said Big Brother, sweeping his chess-men into the box.

"Huh," said Doctor, seemingly aware of companionship for the first time in an hour—"have what? Can't a man grunt unquestioned in the bosom of his own family?" He laid his paper down.

"That boy knows your ways almost as well as I do," said Mother, laughing. "Now tell us what displeased you, Doctor; for that kind of noise from you never means agreement or commendation."

The Doctor's eyes twinkled with fun. "Here's something that will 'start,' and startle the Family too, I guess." He indicated the paper he had dropped. "Here's a man, good man professionally too, I've always thought, who seriously claims that Napoleon's greatness and final ruin was due to abnormal functioning of the Thyroid Gland."

"I'll bet he is a vivisectionist," said Big Brother aggressively. "Or, more likely, a Eugenist," added Student.

"Oh maybe he is brother to the founder of the 'Joy Cult'," spoke Spinster, daintily sealing up her letter. "They think if we will pursue joy hard enough, we shall get a joy—reward of perfect bodily health! But whichever name he answers to, I'll tell you one thing," Spinster added emphatically, "he is only a reasoner from one effect to another worse one. A 'cause to effect' mind, such as Mentor admires, could never have worked out that stupid deduction, could it, Mentor?"

"Right you are, Child, just as usual," answered Mentor with the nod of approval that Spinster's declarations often get from him. "But tell us more about it, Doctor; what does your colleague base his reasoning upon?"

"Don't say 'colleague,' Mentor," said Doctor ruefully. "I'm not hand in glove with all these medicos. Fact is, more than one physician of my acquaintance is beginning to feel that I'm not altogether 'regular'—and I certainly am not. Well, the man reasons this way: that Napoleon's tremendous energy in early life was due to excessive thyroid production; that his later mental and physical peculiarities confirm this supposition; that to this fact, and the growth of the diseased condition caused by it, was due Napoleon's 'obession' in regard to 'his star'—and later, the decline and final failure of the great Corsican. Oh! the writer makes out a very good case—quite reasonable, and very interesting."

"That's all right," said Big Brother, "but if Napoleon was diseased, what caused that? It's just as Spinster suggests, the disease was itself an effect."

"Of course it was," answered Doctor. "Napoleon was a genius, and to attribute genius and its manifestations to disease, is to say that Man, the thinking, spiritual entity, is a product of body, instead of the body, with its characteristics, being a product of the man. It's just 'upside down reasoning,' wouldn't you say, Mentor?"

Mentor smiled, as he drew back from the fire. "Yes, Doctor, it's just 'upside down reasoning'—just the kind of thinking that a man gets into when he looks at life from a physical point of view only. I suppose that writer would attribute Napoleon's idea that he was a reincarnation of Charlemagne to 'pernicious anemia,' or some other strangely named bodily ill, wouldn't he?"

"Reincarnation!" Doctor threw up his hands. "Why, if I should seriously use that word to the average practitioner he'd say I had 'excessive thyroid production' myself, or something worse!"

"But supposing Napoleon did have that awful thyroid trouble," questioned Mother, interested in whatever interests the Family, "that would be Karma, wouldn't it?"

"Certainly," said Doctor. "Here's an entity of great power who has specialized along certain lines through many physical lives—military lines, government, and the like. Dazzled by success, he begins to misuse his attainments, and abuse the position he has gained, relaxing perhaps at times into unlawful sensuous and sensual bodily gratifications. He comes into incarnation again, as Napoleon this time, with tremendous nervous energy and great mental power. But his body, with its heredity and tendencies is just what his actions in other bodies had earned, in this Universe of Law; and his control of it is what one might expect—weakened by the relaxations and compromises of other lives."

"Then he brought forward his tendencies, as well as his Genius," said Big Brother soberly, "and that's why so many great men seem such contradictions to their familiars—so inconsistent." Big Brother has been something of a hero worshipper and his discoveries of the "feet of clay" of some of his idols have hurt him more than once.

"And that's why the 'Genius' is so often erratic," added Student, "isn't it, Mentor?"

"Yes," answered the latter. "Genius is the result of specialization in one line of human effort through many, many lives. Some time we will have an 'all around Genius' in this race, as have developed in races before this one—a fully conscious man, conscious of and completely expressing in every direction, through a 'perfect' body, his own inner divine nature. That would be real genius, for there would be no secrets in life for him, nothing that he could not easily understand, and express if he so desired."

"But the eugenists expect to develop that perfect body," queried Doctor.

"Yes, they believe they are bodies, and physical bodies at that," agreed Mentor. "But it's a significant fact that fine bodies have never made fine minds; nor beautiful bodies beautiful souls! What finer bodies are there than those of savages? Some of the poorest bodies have been wonderful instruments for the soul. The real ideal, and an ideal that can be made an actuality, is a body that will respond perfectly to the Soul's needs and uses; and a mind tuned like an instrument to the Soul's use. If we worked here in the world from the Soul basis, in the light of the larger basis of life, both mind and body would in time respond and become fitting vehicles for the Soul, the real entity within."

"Then Napoleon's diseased condition truly was an effect of wrong thinking, of a wrong basis, and not the cause of his wrong acts," said Spinster firmly.

"Now don't be too elated, Miss Intuition," laughed Mentor, "even if you were right."

"Well, I just knew his treatment of Josephine, for instance, had no 'thyroid' excuse, but was in the man himself"—Spinster waxed fairly eloquent. "If my husband—"

But Spinster's conclusion was lost in a shout of Family laughter—the effect of a cause set in motion by her own pretty self!

SIMILITUDES OF DEMOPHILUS*

It is the business of a musician to harmonize every instrument, but of a well educated man to adapt himself harmoniously to every fortune.

It is necessary that a well educated man should depart from life elegantly, as from a banquet.

Theosophy, February, 1917

* This article was first printed by H. P. Blavatsky in Lucifer for December, 1887.

March 1917

IT is seldom that the Family meets as a whole before dinner time. In fact it is considered a lucky night indeed when at least one chair is not vacant at that sacred evening meal. But this particular afternoon was unusual in many ways. Spinster's tea table, in service at a little function earlier in the afternoon, was still working at five o'clock, after her guests had left; Doctor was unaccountably present and had brought Student home with him in his car; Mother and Mentor were quietly discussing some matter of their own, over their fragrant cups—and who should stalk in about five-thirty but Big Brother, throwing down his coat in the hall as he swung into the quiet living room.

"Storm signals set," remarked Student, nudging the Doctor, as Big Brother strode into the room.

"Just in time for a cup of tea," exclaimed Spinster. "Now be careful as you can, Cyclone dear, or you'll break the pretty cup."

"Don't want any tea," growled Big Brother, taking the cup nevertheless and stirring its none too warm contents absently with his forefinger, "never drink it—just as soon drink soapy water. What's all the fuss over, Spinster, been having the Ladies' Aid Society?"

"Nonsense, you old growler," answered Spinster, with that ingratiating little smile of hers that would cause Jove himself to relax, and to which Big Brother responded with a sigh of relaxation, as he sank into a chair. "What's Dick been doing now to make you cross?" Spinster continued. Dick is Big Brother's law partner and quite often they seem to clash.

Big Brother's relaxation was gone in an instant. "I won't stand it—imposing on that youngster! Dick's got to stop!" Teacup and saucer came down with a bang that threatened their safety.

"Whoa Emma!" said Student slangily.

"Easy there, Boy," said the Doctor. "If there's going to be an explosion in this house, I'll attend to it myself."

Mother looked at Doctor in grieved surprise, just as she always does if he seems to criticise her son, and then turned to Big Brother with her soothing, "What's the trouble, Son?" That always brings out the story, and incidentally restores peace to troubled household waters.

"Well, I'll leave it to Mentor to judge," said Big Brother, aggrievedly. "Dick is studying some new psychological or willpower stuff, and practising 'suggestion' on the office-boy. I told him just exactly what I thought about it tonight," Big Brother's voice rose aggressively, "and he said he'd do just as he thought best, slammed down his desk and left—just like that!"

"Well, I hope you didn't use that tone of voice to Dick," said Mentor quietly. "Opposition merely begets opposition, you know. Why not talk with Dick quietly about it? But just what has he been doing, and what does 'suggestion' mean?"

Big Brother had the grace to look ashamed, and the decency to say he felt so. "I'm sorry for the explosion, and I apologize, Doctor," he said, looking at his Father, and then to Mentor.

"Why, I got thinking madder and madder all the way home—that's the way explosions come, isn't it? But about this 'suggestion' business," he continued, "it's sort of an experimental 'efficiency' idea Dick is carried away with—to make somebody do something for you without your speaking to him at all. And Dick is calling the office boy without even looking at him. Somehow I don't think it is right to the youngster. Why, first thing you know Dick will be trying it out on me! He already has attempted to use it in Court, and nearly got into a fight with opposing counsel. The fellow said Dick was trying to hypnotize a witness. Perhaps he was right," added Big Brother thoughtfully.

"Well it was something like that," agreed Mentor. "And for Dick, with his superficial information, to be trying it is something like a child playing with dynamite. We'll have to talk with that young man. So they call it 'Suggestion' nowadays," he continued musingly. "A few centuries ago it had another name—one we'd laugh at now: they used to call it 'Black Magic'!"

Doctor suddenly showed deep interest. "But what does the Boy do, Son? How does it affect him?" he asked.

Big Brother thought for a moment. "Why he just wriggled at first, Doctor; but now he comes when Dick wants him. Looked kind of scared at first, it seems to me—and as if he'd been crying. I didn't notice much; thought he had a cold, I guess."

It was Doctor's turn to explode this time, and he did so with a vengeance. "Silly donkey! I'll drop in tomorrow, see the boy, and give your fine Dick a piece of my mind!"

Big Brother started to defend his Partner with a "Dick means all right," but Doctor was off and going strong, and Mentor motioned to the Big One to say no more.

"Case just like it I'm treating now," declared the Doctor. "Fine young girl, delicate and well-bred, stenographer in lawyer's office—he's a great big beefy fellow, fine animal, lots of force. Her mother sent for me without the daughter's knowing it; seemed that the girl cried a good deal and was afraid to go to work. She thought people in the street cars were trying to 'influence' her, and acted more and more strangely all the time. This had been going on for some time when I first saw her. I gave her a tonic; got her to coming to the office. It was weeks before I really gained her confidence and, Mentor," the Doctor turned to him, "that girl was getting weaker and whiter and coarser, all the time!"

Doctor paused, picked up his cup and looked at it disinterestedly for a moment, and then set it down again. "Well, I got her story," he continued. "This big, clever, animalistic fellow was interested in 'Psycho-Analysis', or some similar stuff—never mind the name. He began just as Dick is beginning with his office boy—to call this young stenographer without speaking to her. Then it went on to silent dictation, and then to actual hypnosis—well, it was just about as bad as it could be. But do you know, I don't think that lawyer had any bad intentions at all in the first place? It was just an interesting experiment with him; but it got so 'easy,' as he himself confessed to me, that it was just like sliding down hill."

There was an uncomfortable silence in the room. Mother broke it at last. "What became of her, Doctor?"

"She's in a private asylum," he answered soberly. "He is paying the bills—Oh, I saw to that, you may be sure. He will marry her, if she ever gets well, he thinks. But, between us, if she ever does get well, I think she'll never have him, because then she'll fully understand. And that will add another tragedy, because now he has 'spoiled' her, the man himself loves her."

Student was openly wiping her eyes, when the Doctor finished speaking. Spinster, deep in thought, crumbled a bit of cake in her dainty fingers. "I wonder what Friend Dick would think of that story," she said at last, breaking her train of thought with a little shudder.

"Well, you were right, my Son," remarked Mother fondly, looking at Big Brother, "when you scolded Dick."

"Right in substance, but wrong in method," said Mentor. "Tell me, Boy, what made you think Dick was wrong; what was your own idea in the matter—can you formulate it?"

Big Brother turned to Mentor thoughtfully, and a puzzled frown came over his frank, kind face. "Why I don't know, Mentor," he said at last. "Dick talked about his theories, but I didn't pay any particular attention. When I got to noticing what he was really doing, I guess I pitied the boy—just as you pity anyone who is being overpowered by a stronger person. But there was something further," he added musingly, "it was a feeling, perhaps—I just felt that something wrong was going on."

"Exactly what I thought," said Mentor, smiling. "And feeling is often a true guide to right conduct. True feeling is really the highest intellection. We call it 'intuition', you know. It's actually the acquired knowledge of the Soul, through the long experience of many incarnations. Now Dick might have got something real from you, if your manner had been different when you talked with him about the matter. But there was some excuse for the violence of your protest—or rather some reason for it," Mentor hastened to add warningly. "You see we have all been through many conditions and many civilizations in our great past, and you have doubtless actually seen and felt the workings of 'suggestion', or rather, 'Black Magic' in other lives. Your feeling that 'something wrong was going on', as you phrase it, was in fact the memory from within of the past experiences of yourself."

"A kind of conscience, wasn't it!" interrupted Big Brother.

"Well, some people call it that," answered Mentor, "and that's a good enough name, if we know what it means. What have you got, Doctor?" Mentor added, for the Doctor had gone into a brown study as he finished his story, and apparently had not heard any of the talk that had followed it.

"Why, I was thinking," said the Doctor slowly, "what a tremendous field for the exercise of right and wrong influence this 'suggestion' idea opens up. It's hypnotism, you say? Well, I guess that's the name for it."

"Yes, it's a greater or less, a partial or more full hypnosis, as the case may be," answered Mentor. "The fascination that a snake exercises over its prey is an aspect of it. The curious ascendancy of one being over another, a sort of obsession that is sometimes evident, is another. The concurrent action of a crowd of people, sometimes called 'mob-consciousness', is another aspect of the same influence, a species of self-hypnosis this time. Whenever the integrity of an individual is broken down, or overborne, there the action of undue influence of some kind or another may be seen."

"But an individual might exercise this power for good," suggested the Doctor.

"Yes," answered Mentor, "he might; but in the present civilization, with our present individualistic and selfish ideas, it is very questionable if the conscious exercise of such power is safe in anybody's hands. Complete unselfishness, pure motive, and accurate knowledge form the basis of its right practice. Be honest with yourself and you will realize how few, if any, there are who could be trusted at all times with the exercise of such power."

"Does the hypnotizer transfer something of his own nature to the subject then?" asked Big Brother, thoughtfully.

"Certainly," said Mentor. "Whatever there is in him of good and evil enters into the influence, and affects his subject. And as we all have the seeds of all good and evil in us, ready to germinate if effective conditions are provided, you can make your own deductions as to the responsibilities the one who practises hypnotism, or 'suggestion', assumes.

"It comes to this," Mentor added, "the integrity of the being cannot be violated with impunity. Now think what it means when a person causes others to think, feel or act as he would have them without their will—without their even knowing it, as is sometimes the case! Think, too, of the incalculable harm engendered by the various 'schools of thought' which purport to teach men and women to exercise power, under one name or another, over their fellows; and think of the awful consequences that may follow the action of people who subject themselves knowingly to the influence of the many 'Healers' who try to cure diseases, physical and psychical, by the supposed 'power of mind'—or any name you will!"

"How about the 'suggestive salesmanship', with its schools?" asked Big Brother.

"It's the same sort of thing, on its own plane," answered Mentor positively. "Its object is to try to sell a man or woman something, regardless of whether that something is really needed or wanted. The result is usually brought about by arousing the victim's desire or cupidity. Of course, this would not be admitted by the 'schools', but it's a fact, nevertheless."

"Nice, sweet, brotherly idea, isn't it?" said the Doctor dryly. "Well, what's the basis of it all, Mentor; and what's the cure? Can you give us some idea of that?"

Mentor smiled and was silent a moment. Then he said: "It's not so easy, Doctor, as all that—to give your 'basis' and your 'cure'. People will take the one rather gradually, and the other will then come naturally. It's all going to require time, but the right result will surely come. The study of Theosophy will alone give the right basis," he added, looking about at the faces of the Family, all alight with interest. "And the practice of Theosophy will alone effect the right understanding and 'cure'.

"We are all the children of the past, as well as the present, and the many powers and tendencies gained in that past are beginning to express themselves in strange ways, as our race moves forward into new places in its evolution. In a strongly material civilization like ours where no real understanding of the purpose of life is widely held, men think of themselves as separate and so exercise these rising powers as against each other. But some men and women will step out of the ranks and move another way. Then understanding themselves, and thus understanding life itself—and all the other 'lives'—they will exercise their powers for the good of all, and add themselves to that 'Sacred Band of Heroes', from whose number have come, and will come, the 'Saviours of Humanity'. The old saying that 'a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump' is a true one. And some men will consciously choose to add their own 'leaven' to the 'little leaven', one by one, as their time comes.

"Meantime we can spread, as opportunity presents, the ideas of 'true philosophy and right conduct' which Theosophy presents; and the influence of our example—which is the only 'influence' we should seek to develop—will do its own work, a more and more perfect and powerful work as its unselfishness becomes apparent."

Spinster broke in, "Then you'll talk with poor Dick, won't you, Mentor? You go with Doctor when he makes the call."

"I'll think of it, Spinster," he answered. And then as he saw the trouble in her face, he added, "Yes, my Dear, of course, I will." Came the soft chime of the dinner gong, unexpectedly—floating into the living room; and tea things were pushed aside, as the Family moved toward the dining room, to gather "around the table" for the evening meal.

Theosophy, March, 1917

April 1917

"IT is better to do one's own duty, even though it be devoid of excellence, than to perform another's duty well. It is better to perish in the performance of one's own duty; the duty of another is full of danger."

Mentor's voice, as he quoted this famous passage from the Bhagavad-Gita, had that final, determining quality which carries conviction. But his eyes were so kindly and sympathetic as they rested on Spinster's troubled face that the sunshine began to break through where clouds had threatened before.

The Family was having what Big Brother facetiously calls an "experience meeting." But as only one "experience", that of warm-hearted, impulsive Spinster had been placed on the dissecting table, she insisted that the meeting was really an "autopsy". For Spinster had let her sympathies run away with her discrimination, "for the forty-leventh time", as she expressed it; and the result had been humiliating to herself, though, fortunately enough, no particular harm had been brought about.

The whole affair had been brought up by implication, rather than directly, through a chance remark from Big Brother, as the Family sat at dinner. The name of a famous actor was mentioned by some one, and as it is the same as that borne by an acquaintance of the Family, Big Brother was seemingly reminded of an incident of his day, remarking. "By the way, Spinster, what have you been doing to John ," naming the family acquaintance, who is a neighborhood resident as well.

"Why nothing," answered Spinster, with a sudden heightening of color. "Why do you ask?"

"Why, I met him on the car this morning, and he asked how you were. It wasn't what he said so much, though it seemed funny to me that he singled you out." Big Brother paused and wrinkled his forehead in a puzzled frown. "There was something queer about it—made me feel a wee bit hostile. It was as if John was laughing at you or about you—or rather, wanted to laugh, but didn't quite know how I would take it."

"A somewhat involved statement, my Son," remarked the Doctor, "and rather weak for a lawyer."

"I can feel just what he means, Doctor, if you can't," said Mother, rushing, as usual, to her big boy's defence.

"What have you been doing now, my Dear," asked Mentor, as Spinster blushing and protesting, pushed her chair back from the table as if about to run away from her prying Family.

"I'll wager you've been 'worked' again, Spinster dear," shouted Student, as she jumped up and laughingly put her hands on the pretty shoulders of her older sister, forcing her back into her chair again. "Let's have it—every dire word of the distressing details!"

"There, there, Student," warned Mother, "not so loud. Can't you see the poor child feels badly about something?"

"Let the Family go into Executive Session," declared Big Brother sonorously, rapping his knuckles on the table. "Let the experience meeting begin. Doctor, please be ready with the ether."

"I won't tell you a single thing," protested Spinster, "until you quiet down, and unless you promise not to laugh. I have been 'worked' again, as Student suspects; but you know my intentions are good, don't you, Mentor?" Spinster's curls bobbed vigorously, as she looked at Mentor, and then bravely swept the table with eyes that, despite their firmness, were very near to tears.

"Children, behave!" ordered Mother.

"I'll apply the ether to you, young man, if you don't dry up," said the Doctor, threatening Big Brother with uplifted finger.

"Order being once more restored, we will proceed to details," declaimed the latter in a machine-like voice. And as silence followed his remark, Spinster settled herself, glanced appealingly at Mentor, and began.

"I've just done the foolishest thing I can remember doing for a long time"—Student repressed a titter—"and I feel so cheap and humiliated I don't know what to do. It all came up through your Alice," Spinster continued, looking at Big Brother, as she named one of her own friends of whom he is very fond. "But I can't blame Alice," she added quickly, "for Alice doesn't know any better, and I do.

"They have been studying 'Child culture' at the Women's Club this winter, and Alice has become much interested. I guess they have been gossiping about the neighbors a little at the same time—nice, lady-like gossip, you know—and John 's family have come in for their share—you know how those two half-clad children roam the streets," said Spinster enquiringly.

The Doctor nodded vigorously as if he knew.

"Well, Alice talked about those two 'neglected children' every time I met her," Spinster went on. "The last time was one day when it was cold and rainy. She was having tea with me, and those two children were playing about on the lawns and in the street. They had no hats on, and no coats, and their knees looked so cold with those little short stockings.

"Alice said it was a disgrace, the way their Mother neglected them, and I agreed with her. She said that some of the Club women were talking about it; said they had hinted to Mrs. several times—that the children looked cold and oughtn't they to be wrapped up more—and that Mrs. had just smiled and answered that the youngsters liked it. Alice said that the women were talking of reporting the 'case' to the Children's Society, or the Health Bureau, or some 'authority'. She said that if she had it to do she would just go to Mrs. and have a 'straight talk' with her, and give her a piece of her mind.

"I looked out and saw those two children playing in the rain," continued Spinster, "and I agreed with everything she said."

Spinster stopped for a moment, patting and smoothing the table cloth in front of her. Then with a visible effort she went on.

"After Alice had gone, I sat down by the window with a book, but every little while I would look up and out, and every time I looked I saw those poor children. And every time I saw them the 'case' looked worse and worse to me; and I thought how disgraced Mr. and Mrs. would feel if the Club women did report them to the authorities. And then it seemed to me it was my duty to go myself and have the 'straight talk' with Mrs. , to save her the disgrace, and incidentally to help the children. And so I went—yesterday," confessed Spinster; "and that's why John wanted to laugh at me this morning," she added, looking at Big Brother. Her lips were trembling, as she struggled to keep back the tears.

"It's all right, Sis. I'll punch his head if he says anything to me," said the Big One soothingly.

"Oh, no you won't—for heaven's sake, no," Spinster fairly bounced in her chair. "I was all wrong, and it was an awful mess. I should think he'd want to shake me, instead of laughing at me!"

"Well, Daughter," said the Doctor gravely, "why didn't you come to me? I've had those two children in my care for a year or more, and the s are handling them just as I ordered. They have a fine pair of lusty youngsters in consequence, instead of the two anaemic tots of a couple of years ago. That family has an hereditary weakness and we are eliminating it in those children by a rugged 'back to nature' method, as carefully planned as if we were nursing a pair of hot-house orchids. Why didn't you come to me, you little silly?" The Doctor paused in his wrath and disgust, for Spinster was getting ready to cry.

"What did Mrs. say to you?" asked Mother gently.

"Oh, she was just as nice as she could be," answered Spinster, brokenly. "She said she knew there was a lot of gossip, but she and Mr. were bound they would do the right thing by their children, even if the whole neighborhood were up in arms. She told me the Doctor was advising them—imagine how cheap I felt! Then when I began to apologize she said she knew my intentions were all right. And then I guess I cried a little; and she made me a cup of tea, and I wiped up and came home—and went to bed."

"So that was the reason why you didn't 'show up' for dinner last night," said Student slangily.

"I don't wonder that John wanted to laugh at our little 'Sister of Mercy'," chuckled Big Brother.

"Please don't rub it in," groaned Spinster, who was beginning to see the ridiculous side of the incident.

"No, don't 'rub it in'," added Mentor. "We all of us want to attend to some other person's business, instead of our own, once in a while. And Spinster merely was carried away by her emotions, that is all. If she had 'slept' on her plan, she would never have done what she did do. Her intentions were good, but her discrimination was faulty, because obscured by emotion. The whole affair, so far as she is concerned, came from a full, sympathetic warm-heartedness—which does her credit."

"But there was no application of Theosophy on my part," said Spinster. "Every time I rush in where 'angels fear to tread' it is because I don't stop to think, don't apply what I know. Will I ever get over it, Mentor?"

Mentor laughed merrily. "Of course you will, Child," he said. "But let us hope this last unpleasant lesson will make the needed deep impression. Sometimes the learning and using of a phrase or a verse—and repeating it, at the psychological moment—is of the greatest help. Your last venture suggested to me this one from the Bhagavad-Gita"—and then Mentor repeated the words with which this article begins.

"I'll learn it now, and say it over every morning for a year," declared Spinster.

"Say it over at night too, my Dear," said Mentor, as the group around the table broke up and the Family moved toward the living room. "Say it the last thing before you go to sleep and think—think deeply—of what it means. Then it will go deep into your nature and will 'come up' of itself automatically next time your warm heart is carrying you away. A seed idea will sprout and grow, if you nurse it like that, until as the Gita says you will 'never again fall into error'."

Theosophy, April, 1917

May 1917

"IT'S easy enough to laugh at him, Boys and Girls, and I can't forbear a few chuckles on my own account," said Mentor. "But unless you youngsters get the lesson that lies behind our little experience of tonight, you will need some criticism yourselves."

"You're a great one to talk," laughed Big Brother, "I believe you knew he was a clergyman all the time."

There was a shout of laughter at this from the assembled Family, Mentor vigorously putting in his disclaimer.

"What's the joke, Folks?" asked the Doctor, just coming into the general hilarity, drawing off his gloves and throwing them, with his coat, into the nearest chair.

"The children have been out calling," answered Mother, "and going on like this ever since they got in, ten minutes ago. I haven't been able to get head or tail out of it yet; but I guess it's all right, because Mentor was with them."

"Tell us about it, won't you, Mentor?" she continued, looking over to her old friend who was wiping his eyes, spectacles in hand, "What have you children been up to?"

"Let him tell it," chuckled Mentor, pointing with his glasses at Big Brother, who delightedly grinned back at him.

"I should think you'd say so," said the latter, "for you were the worst one of us."

"Come, Son, unload the story," broke in Doctor. "It's getting late and I'm for bed; but if Mentor has been poking a little sweet fun at somebody, I want to take the tale with me for a nightcap."

The Family settled down in the shabby, comfortable old living-room, as Big Brother began:

"It's all Spinster's fault, as usual—one of her efforts to be 'brotherly,' or 'sisterly,' you know."

"Never mind the didactics, Son," interpolated Doctor, "proceed without trimmings; we will supply them."

"Well, she started it anyway," continued the Big One. "It seems that the Everetts are having an anniversary of something or other, and Eloise had invited her in to see the presents. Spinster thought it no more than courteous to go, said we ought not to be 'heathens, or 'hermits,' even if we are Theosophists. So she dragged us off—Student and me, with Mentor as special guard. We saw the presents and were having a pleasant chat, when the door-bell rang, and this man and his wife—a sweet, pretty woman—arrived on the scene.

"Eloise introduced them as 'Doctor and Mrs. Ponder.' He is a stout little man with a deep voice and an authoritative air; but I thought nothing of this last, having lived with a Doctor for so many years"—here Big Brother winked at his Mother—"never dreamed for an instant that he was a clergyman.

"Doctor Ponder was soon ably directing the discourse, with occasional deprecating halts as one of us mortals ventured to voice an opinion. Somehow he seemed always to be on the opposite side from us on almost every matter he spoke about. The good Doctor would sonorously outline the topic; Mentor would put in a quiet word or two, showing both sides of the question; the Doctor would insist that there really was no other side; Spinster would say something placatory; Mrs. Ponder would swing nobly into the breach in husband's defence.

"Meantime the Doctor got redder and redder, and madder and madder. The Everetts hung timorously and anxiously around the outskirts of the conversation, putting in an inoffensive, deprecating word now and then. Everybody was quite courteous—none of our own Family said or intimated the slightest thing that any normal person could take offense at—we were just free in our comments, as we always are, and expect others to be. I felt that something was wrong, but for the life of me couldn't tell what it was. I looked at Mentor; he was serene. I looked at Spinster and Student; they appeared to be ignorant of offence, but somehow unhappy.

"Somebody mentioned an encyclopaedia. I remarked how disappointed I had been in the new set we had purchased, on account of its seeming lack of comprehensive information on subjects I was most interested in. Doctor Ponder descanted on its great value. I remarked that there seemed to be little in it of sympathetic and understanding treatment of some of the modern ethical movements, but that pages were devoted to chronicling the lives and works of ancient English clergymen who had really never caused a ripple on the stream of time. Doctor Ponder almost choked, and then I knew that I had put my foot in it somehow—for there was a silence you could cut, all over the room.

"Mentor came to the fore with some matter that included Roosevelt's name. Doctor Ponder cut loose with a scorching arraignment of the Colonel. Mentor quietly presented another view—and you know Mentor never argues, and his smile is like the genial sunshine—but the good Doctor seemed astounded that anybody could hold a contrary opinion after he, the Doctor, had propounded his views. If he was red before, he was purple now; he hitched about in his chair; he opened and closed his hands vigorously on its arms.

"Mrs. Ponder launched into a panegyric on the Doctor's wonderful work in the prohibition agitation. She didn't say which side he was on—I suppose she thought there really was only one side—the Doctor's. Mentor remarked how unbrotherly and unchristian it is to try to force the ideas of a minority, or a small majority, on the rest of the people. Doctor Ponder is an ardent prohibitionist, it developed; and was aghast that a decent appearing man like Mentor could give utterance to such sentiments. I said something pleasant. Spinster said something sweet. Mrs. Ponder stubbornly supported her husband, who all but expired from apòplexy in his chair.

"Doctor Ponder noticed that there were smoking utensils on the table. He launched forth into a tirade against smoking. The Doctor declared that smoking on the streets should be penalized by law. He didn't like it—no one should be permitted to foul the air he had to breathe, with the vile, poisonous odor of the devilish weed. Mentor smiled gently and at last went into combat. He had listened with courtesy to Doctor Ponder's outpourings for nearly an hour, and let him roar unscathed.

"'Why, Doctor Ponder,' said Mentor quietly, 'I'm sure nobody would puff tobacco-smoke in your face, if he knew you didn't like it.'

"'Smokers are absolutely conscienceless that way,' declared the Doctor. 'They do it on purpose—and ought to be jailed.'

"'You don't wear your sign, Doctor,' said Mentor, 'as Smokers do, so it's hardly fair play.'

"'What do you mean, Sir?' asked Doctor Ponder.

"'Why, a Smoker wears his sign,' answered Mentor earnestly, without a quiver of a smile. 'The pipe, or cigar, or cigarette the Smoker carries is his sign, so when you meet him you will know what to expect, and what to avoid. To play fair with the Smoker, you ought to wear your sign—something neat and tasty, and easily read, across the breast—I DON'T LIKE TOBACCO-SMOKE—or something like that. Then the Smokers would know your position—and respect it, of course.'"

Big Brother paused for a moment, while his Father joined in the Family's laughter.

"Mentor was just as sober as a judge, all the time," remarked Spinster, "but Oh, how those Everetts did work to keep their faces straight!"

"What did Doctor Ponder say?" asked the Doctor.

"Just 'Good night,'" answered Big Brother. "He bounced out of the house like a red-hot coal. And then we learned, for the first time, that he was not a medical doctor, but a 'D. D.', the Everetts' Pastor."

"And of all the ashamed looking folks I ever saw," broke in Spinster, "those poor Everetts were the worst! They said they had never seen Doctor Ponder like that before; didn't know what ailed him, and so on."

"Yes," said Big Brother, "and it finally developed that they had never been with him before when anybody disagreed with him."

Mentor raised his hand for silence at this, saying, "There is your cue, Children, to poor, well-meaning Doctor Ponder's trouble; and from this cue you can get the lesson involved in the incidents of this evening. And there is something in it for you too, Doctor, if you ever feel yourself getting a bit 'infallible'—for have you ever noticed that physicians, as well as clergymen, are rather apt to be dogmatic in their expressions of opinion?"

Doctor smiled somewhat ruefully, and managed a confirmatory nod.

"Now, these professional men are often not so blameworthy for their attitude as the people who surround them are," continued Mentor. "The clergyman is looked up to, complimented, made much of; and he usually speaks from the platform from week to week, month to month, and year to year—without ever having his statements contradicted or brought into question. Is it any wonder that he soon begins to consider himself a 'fine fellow,' and an undoubted 'authority'? As for the physician, his patients look to him as the final arbiter of their physical destinies and, as a rule, follow without question whatever course he may indicate. Often this is due to a fine quality of gratitude; but the effect on the physician, unless he be a truly modest and well-balanced man, is not advantageous.

"Both clergymen and physicians are in difficult positions, and we must consider this, Boys and Girls, when passing judgment upon the attitude of Doctor Ponder. For myself, I consider we all owe the good Doctor something for this evening's lesson, as well as amusement. He is, in one sense, a vicarious atonement for every one of us, since he has shown us so clearly what not to do."

"Why, his attitude is no worse than that assumed by some of the present-day Theosophical 'leaders,' is it, Mentor?" asked Big Brother.

"Not nearly so bad, my boy," was the answer. "For one familiar with Theosophy, and the many warnings written down by H. P. B., should know better. But it is so easy to become pleased with ourselves—egotism grows so subtly—that we must be ever on guard against the encroachments of the personal idea. That is why the impersonal, the permanent, nature must ever be sought after. Assume it in thought. Then think, speak and act from that basis. 'That power which the disciple shall covet is that which shall make him appear as nothing in the eyes of men,' you remember. It is the power of Spirit—and praise or blame affects it not.

"Write out this evening's experience for the Magazine, Spinster, won't you, Dear? It will be valuable for many. Of course, nobody will believe it really happened just as it did; but tell it truthfully for Doctor Ponder will probably never see it, and it won't hurt him if he ever does."

June 1917

A late Spring rain was attending to the needs of the rose garden—had been gently but busily at the task, in fact, all day long. Now and then a little gust of wind, in imitation of the ruder, more vigorous outbursts of the winter storms, would splash the living-room windows and then drip audibly from the sills. The room itself had been cool enough to make a grate fire seem comfortable, a little blaze, which Big Brother had called a "one-alarm fire", as he laid and lighted it. "Not too warm to enjoy, but big enough to be genial", he continued—"and so much more human and companionable than the furnace, don't you think?"

A murmur of assent came from the Family, every one of them at home this evening by some stroke of rare good fortune—and all of them glad of it. Chairs were pulled up; cushions comfortably disposed; lights lowered to the twilight which makes for relaxation and restful conversation. But nobody seemed to want to break the spell of the purring flames, until Spinster yielded to her casual impulse to poke an already "perfectly good" fire, to use Student's phrasing; and the usual play of expostulation and advice as to the best methods of fire nurture began to come from an otherwise goodnatured and broad-minded Family.

"Why this sudden need for interference, Spinster?" asked Big Brother, who takes a curious pride in his ability as fire-maker.

"What difference does it make to you, Big Boy?" answered Spinster, calmly administering another quite useless poke to the fire-log, already correctly adjusted.

"Little children should not quarrel," sang Student, airily administering a pat of punishment on Big Brother's broad back, as he bent to readjust the disturbed log.

"Why not be quiet and just enjoy the fire?" asked Mother.

"I would, for my part," said Big Brother, "if Spinster would just leave it alone."

"That's right, my boy, always blame the woman," rumbled Doctor, who had been somewhat abstractedly watching the proceedings. "But it is true that Spinster started it—now just what makes you always want to poke fires, little girl?"

"Why, I guess I don't know," answered Spinster slowly. "Just an impulse, I presume."

"Automatic instinctive brain functioning—that's what it is," remarked Student, who studies psychology. The Doctor laughed.

"Certainly it isn't intellect," interpolated Big Brother, with unnecessary emphasis.

"My intuition tells me that the Big One is irritated," answered Spinster, "but I won't poke your perfectly good fire any more, since you don't like it."

"Who is this, using my 'four I's,'" demanded Mentor from his chair in the shadow.

"Four eyes," snorted Doctor. "I've heard of three, but never of four. What do you mean, Mentor?"

"It's the letter 'I' that I refer to, Doctor, not the organs of vision at all. Spinster mentioned 'Impulse'; Student spoke of 'Instinct'; the Boy used the word 'Intellect'; and then Spinster mentioned 'Intuition'. Those are the 'Four I's'; and to make it graphic, one might set them down this way"—and then Mentor described the diagram which, worked out on paper, would look something like this:

I

MPULSE NSTINCT NTELLECT NTUITION

The Four 'I's—

"Tell us something about them, Mentor," asked Spinster. "Yes, do," added the Family, in unanimity for once.

"Well, here's a bit of psychology for you, Student, that is real and valuable," began Mentor. "It's psychology from the Theosophical point of view, of course—the only correct and synthetic standpoint in fact.

"Impulse is the first 'I' to consider; it comes from the lower, or Kamic, nature—no intellectual or conscious brain action in it, though naturally the brain is engaged, even if we do not realize it. Moved by the lower Kamic desire-nature, the working of consciousness manifests itself in Impulse. And it is always for action, of course. One never has an Impulse to sit still!"

"Yes, but what causes it," demanded Student. "You have described the nature of the action, which is an effect, but not the cause."

"Good for you, Student," answered Mentor. "The cause lies in the being himself—in the Perceiver, in Consciousness. In Impulse, as in any other manifestation, we see the force of Consciousness in action. The more immediate cause—that which you are asking for I think—will be found in the phrase 'lack of self-control.' Does that satisfy you?"

Student nodded vigorously.

"Then my poking the fire was from lack of self-control?" asked Spinster aggrievedly.

"Yes, my dear," answered Mentor seriously, "due to that, and to habit formed by yourself unthinkingly, as we say, a little inconsiderateness coupled with a desire to move—and to poke."

Big Brother chuckled gleefully.

"Go on, Mentor," said Doctor. "What is the next 'I'?"

"It is Instinct," continued Mentor. "Didn't Student refer to that when she used those long words so glibly a little while ago? You little realized, young lady, what a field of study lies behind that term. Instinct is the acquired bodily or animal experience of the species—a sort of memory that acts 'automatically', as you suggested. It's the synthetic memory of the cells of the body of the individual, or of the cells that are presently used in the service of mankind in their bodily instruments. All have been used in human bodies over and over again, and the acquired experience through ages of incarnations in bodies is now stored as memory, which manifests as what we call Instinct. Animal Instinct, as shown in the animal kingdom is similarly acquired. A lamb, for instance, which has never encountered a wolf displays fear when the wolf makes its appearance. Nothing in the lamb's life up to that moment has given it cause for fearing a wolf—yet it shows fear. But the memory of the 'lamb cells', if we can call them such, telegraphs to the lamb's brain the results of experience with wolves in other lamb embodiments; and the little animal shows fear. We sum it all up in the word 'Instinct'. Why, even the minerals, in their selective affinities, show Instinct—the experience acquired by Consciousness while manifesting in the embodiments of any particular stage of evolution that is not yet self-conscious."

Mentor paused thoughtfully, and then remarked. "You will doubtless see the close relation between Impulse and Instinct. They are two of the 'I's'—one might say 'the two Eyes' of the lower kingdoms functioning in human bodies, or in lower forms."

"Where does Intellect come in, Mentor?" asked Big Brother.

"That was your word, young man", was the rejoinder. "and you depend on it too much, I fear. Intellect is cold and hard—yes, and materialistic, it must be admitted. Unless warmed by the spirit of Intuition, it leads to selfishness, and nowhere else. Intellect is the highest brain action, nothing more; and the brain, as you know, is merely the highest organ of the body, made up from the food we eat. There is nothing spiritual about mere intellection, no soul-wisdom in it. We associate the Intellect with the process of ratiocination, or reasoning from premises to conclusions. All beings have Intellect potentially, the higher animals manifest it rudimentally; man has developed it to a high point—and depends upon it too much, alas, as our intensely materialistic civilization demonstrates.

"And now for Intuition, the last and highest of the 'Four I's'."

"Do give us a short definition of it, Mentor," asked Mother. "I've never heard a good one."

"Well, one can call it 'Rationalized Instinct'," was the answer. "That is a short phrase which will sometimes serve, though really it is not a definitive one. Intuition is the acquired knowledge of the Soul, from experience through many incarnations—just as Instinct is the acquired knowledge of the embryonic souls of the cells, from experience in many embodiments. Man alone—together with Beings higher than man, of course—possesses Intuition. Lower classes of beings have it not, because with them self-consciousness has not yet been reached; and individual soul has not yet been acquired—for Soul is a growth, an acquirement, you know.

"Did we but take the position of Soul—thinking, speaking, acting and living from that basis—the action of Intuition would not be so rare with us as it now is. We all have the power and knowledge within, which has been acquired through thousands of incarnations as self-conscious human beings; but it rarely manifests directly, and is never at our command, if we think and act from the present personal basis we assume—as if this body, or these circumstances and surroundings, or this present life, were the whole of life, and represented the entirety of our experience."

Mentor paused for a moment, while the Family waited quietly for the application of the teaching that was sure to come.

"There are your 'Four I's'," he said at last—"expressed crudely enough, but sufficiently outlined to give us a basis for thinking and for application. Try to understand and restrain your Impulses; control your Instincts; use your Intellect wisely, but remember it is nothing more than brain action; listen for Intuition and follow it; but check it up by Intellect, and thus a wise balancing of the nature will be maintained.

"And now the class in psychology, real psychology—is finished, Student," Mentor added, with a smile.

"And I must go to bed and rest my 'Two Eyes', while I think over the 'Four l's'," chuckled Doctor.

And so the Family dispersed for the night, while Mentor sat silently by the dying fire, thinking back into the past—perhaps of one called in those days "The Greatest of the Exiles," from whose lips our friend and mentor had himself heard, for the first time in this incarnation, the story of the "Four I's".

Theosophy, June, 1917

July 1917

IT had been a very pleasant little dinner—with Mother presiding hospitably at one end of the snowy board and the Doctor rumbling comments and witticisms from the other; with Mentor quietly smiling and enjoying the chatter as he sat between Spinster and Student on one side of the table, and Big Brother assiduous in his attentions to the two fair guests whom his big bulk separated on the other side.

The talk continued unabated after finger-bowl time. Spinster prattled of a dream she had dreamed the night before—itself a vision of a dinner at which fruits were served.

"And I had such a wonderful pear," she continued, "one of those beautiful Bartlett pears that had perfectly ripened on the tree—it tasted so good!"

"Hold on there, Spinster dear," said Student. "Your imagination is running away with you. You didn't taste the pear in your dream, you know."

"Why I certainly did, Miss Psychology," answered Spinster, turning surprisedly to her younger sister. "I tasted it—and I smelled it, too, if you want to know—so there!"

"But the books say one almost never tastes in dreams, and very seldom smells," objected Student, laughing at her sister's earnestness.

"Yes, I know," broke in Big Brother, leaning forward over the table. "They say that as you tell the dream, after waking, your imagination gets to work and adds a whole lot that never happened in the dream itself."

"That sounds reasonable," said Doctor, nodding his head in agreement. "The organs of sense in the body are surely not engaged in the dream, so how could we get the differentiations they give us?"

Spinster is an emphatic little person—when she thinks she is right, at least. "But I didn't do any imaginative building about this dream at all, Doctor," she objected, "nor tell about it to anybody until just now. When I woke up this morning the whole thing was there in my head, all at once—details and all. You must tell them, Mentor," Spinster added, turning to her old friend who was quietly enjoying the engagement, "tell them what we were talking about the other day."

"Have you got your 'dream book' with you, Mentor?" chuckled Big Brother. "I didn't know you qualified as interpreter of dreams!"

"Not an interpreter," rejoined Mentor, amid the general laughter, "though I've been asked often enough by perplexed Theosophists. But Theosophy does give facts about dreams and the dreaming states that are considerably in advance of our modern psychologists, with their limited range of observation—and which anybody can check up for himself."

"Well, I did taste that pear, didn't I, Mentor?" broke in Spinster, tenaciously holding to her point.

"Yes, you stubborn child," answered Mentor, patting her arm paternally, "no doubt you did, for we have all the senses with us when we dream."

"Why, the organs are in the body, Mentor," said Doctor aggressively, "and the body gives us nothing when we are asleep. How then can the senses act?"

"Yes, the organs are in the body, Doctor," was the answer, "but organs are not senses. The nose, ears, tongue—and so forth—are physical centres through which we gain knowledge of the different characteristics of gross matter, but the real organs of sense are in the astral body, into which the cells which make up our physical body are builded. The very fact that we do have experience in dreams—as wide, and wider than when we are awake, although the body itself is giving us nothing is in itself evidence that the real organs of sense are not external, but within.

"Now every physical object has its astral counterpart, just as our physical bodies have theirs, and the objects that give us experience in dreams are astral objects, of course—subjective to us when we are awake, and acting on this plane of substance, objective to us when we dream, and are living and acting and experiencing on the astral plane."

"You speak with some assurance, Mentor," argued Doctor, "but it does sound reasonable, I must admit," he added thoughtfully.

"Why these things are known, Doctor," rejoined Mentor, "just as accurately and scientifically as you scientists know your laboratory tests—much more so in fact. You stop with physics, saying that metaphysics are out of your province—can't be 'scientifically demonstrated,' as your jargon has it. But have you ever thought that physics are born from metaphysics, so to speak; and if you expect truly to understand the former, you must pay attention first to the latter. Physics are the effects; in metaphysics alone will one find the causes—for the 'mysteries' which surround us, and which truly are 'mysteries' only to those who insist that they must remain such."

"Then dream happenings are real?" questioned Student.

"Of course they are real, child," answered Mentor, beaming at her through the spectacles that can never quite obscure the kindliness in his eyes. "Every experience of every kind is real—to the being experiencing it—no matter what plane he may be operating on. We all work in many states, on many planes of matter. Why, the dream state, generally speaking, is one of the grossest—almost as gross as this waking physical plane we value so highly, and which most of us think, more's the pity, constitutes the whole of life. There are states so high we cannot speak of them understandingly in words, into which we go every night of our lives, waking up in the morning none the wiser—though an accurate knowledge of them, in terms of waking consciousness, is possible for all. There are states of matter so fine that we would misrepresent them if we described them in the words, 'a breath'. We operate in all the states, every one of us—every twenty-four hours. But remember: we are not these states; nor the bodies, or 'sheaths of the soul', we use while operating in the states; nor any of the experiences we have anywhere—nor all of these put together. We are the Perceiver, who experiences all—the Thinker, the Knower—Consciousness itself. In any consideration of these subjects that is the point to be laid hold of and held to firmly—we must not identify ourselves with mere 'states', if we are to understand them. They are relative; we are absolute—the One Absolute—for the power to perceive, or Consciousness itself, is the same in all."

"Tell us some more about dreams, won't you, Mentor?" asked Big Brother, as he noted that the fair guests were getting uneasy under Mentor's metaphysics. The Family is more or less able to follow the flights, but the 'stranger within our gates' now and then is often left gasping for breath.

"No time now," replied Mentor, as he noted Mother's signal to leave the table—"not if we are to have the music Spinster planned for this evening. If you want something definite, and of fascinating interest, read what Madame Blavatsky said in regard to dreams. You'll find it in the 'Transactions of the Blavatsky Lodge', written down as She gave it years ago, in London.

**********

Student looked it up later, as may any reader of this magazine. It will be found in the "Appendix" of the "Transactions", of which Mentor spoke, which was reprinted in THEOSOPHY for October, 1916.

Theosophy, July, 1917

August 1917

THE Doctor had been telling about the courage shown by one of his patients that day, as the Family sat comfortably on the porch in the twilight. The careful placing of screens and a shrewd disposal of lights have made this delightfully retired porch a cool and refreshing room for reading and sewing after a hot summer day. And tonight the round wicker table was heaped with newspapers and magazines, and Mother's sewing-table looked very business-like indeed; but for once hands and eyes were resting, while the events of the day were being checked over, with the usual Family "give and take."

"It was a capital operation," continued the Doctor, "very serious indeed; but that boy—for he is only twenty-one—showed no fear whatever at the prospect."

"How do you account for it, Doctor?" asked Mother.

"Why, he's a Theosophist," was the answer. "You tell those people,' said the boy, 'how much Theosophy has meant to me in this trouble.'"

"Who did he mean by 'those people'?" asked Spinster, interestedly.

The Doctor smiled—"Why, Mentor and the rest of you who make the public meetings possible, I suppose."

"Not much like the man who came to me today," remarked Big Brother with a chuckle. Big Brother's law practice brings him into touch with many strange people. "My man was scared half to death, and my strongest assurances only half calmed him."

"What had he been doing, Son?" asked Mother, fondly looking over at her big kind-faced boy.

"Doing the right thing, Mother," answered Big Brother—"doing the right thing in the face of suspicion and hostility—and he is still scared of what will happen."

"Why didn't you talk Theosophy to him then?" asked Spinster—"it was a fine opportunity."

"Because he is a church-man," was the answer, "and thinks Theosophy is some 'crazy' belief, and that Theosophists are 'heathens'—so I had to keep quiet, I'm sorry to say," added Big Brother with a sigh.

"If he would trust the teachings of his own teacher, Jesus, he wouldn't be frightened," said Mentor, suddenly coming into the talk. "How could he expect harm to come to him when good and unselfish action had been taken? Why don't these church men practically apply the teachings they say they hold so dear?"

"Oh, they think the teachings are theoretically true, I guess," remarked Doctor, ironically, "but not practical in this day and age—at least I've heard some of them say so."

"Well, Theosophists are like that, too, aren't they?" asked Student, who had seemed far away from the talk and buried in thoughts of her own, "—or some of them, at least," she added virtuously.

"Why, Theosophists are just 'folks' like anybody else," laughed Spinster.

"And yet we've seen contrasts today," said Mentor quickly, "this boy of the Doctor's calmly and bravely facing death; and this frightened and distressed citizen Big Brother mentions. One relies on the Law of his own being, and the other, though he knows he has acted aright, fears the consequences."

"How do you account for it, Mentor?" asked Student.

"One has a living faith," was the answer, "the other a counterfeit one—and his fear really invites disaster for him, and half vitiates the results of the good he has done."

"What do you mean, Mentor, by that phrase 'the Law of his own being?" asked Mother. "I feel that I understand, but I couldn't put it into words to save my life."

"Well, it isn't an outside law, that is certain," answered Mentor, as the Family settled back to listen—"for there really is no outside law, nor any outside law-giver, in fact.

"This dependence upon an outside God, and an outside Law, is the greatest mistake the church-men make—a misapplication of the teachings of Jesus, who clearly taught that God is within.

"Law is inherent in the being; without beings there would be no Law—only the potentiality of it. 'There is no action unless there is a being to make it and feel its effects', says the old aphorism. Therefore the Law must be within the being himself.

"'Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap', said Saint Paul—and Jesus, too, in effect. This is a statement of Law, the one Law. The Scientist puts it this way: 'Action and re-action are equal, and in opposite directions'; the Philosopher says: 'Every cause produces its equal effect; every effect presupposes a sufficient cause'. These statements are one in fact—statements of the One Law. They show that it applies equally upon all planes—the physical, the mental or psychical, and the spiritual—that One Law rules throughout the universe, the nature its action takes depending upon the media, or planes, we see it acting in—though as a matter of fact every act shows its effects on every plane of being."

"Why, that is Karma, Mentor," said Mother, as if surprised. "I did not definitely associate the idea of Karma with the phrase, 'the Law of one's own being'."

"There is just the trouble with so many students," answered Mentor with a smile. "While they will not admit it, they really think of Karma as something outside themselves. It is not outside; it is within. The word Karma means 'action and re-action'. The best definition of Karma I know is this one, given by William Q. Judge: 'Karma is an undeviating and unerring tendency in the Universe to restore equilibrium, and it operates incessantly'. With every thought, word and deed we invoke the Law—set it in motion; and the re-action inevitably comes back to us, the point where the disturbance was initiated.

"No being implies no action; no action implies no re-action therefore, no being = no Law: and therefore the Law must be inherent in the being. It's as clear and logical—and as completely demonstrable—as a theorem in geometry.

"Your sick boy, Doctor, realized the reign of Law, even if he could not express it in words—and so he had no fear. Your righteous client, Big Brother, leans upon an 'outside God' whose ways are 'past finding out'—and so he was badly frightened, although he had unselfishly tried to do right. The man who recognizes that Law rules in everything and every circumstance can have no fear whatever under any circumstances. 'Whatever comes to me, from whatever apparent source is my own—the reaping of what I have sown in this or some previous life', he says to himself—'I cannot avoid it, nor do I want to avoid paying my just debts. But, knowing this, I will sow worthy seeds for future harvests—meantime reaping the fruits of past sowings with a steadfast realization of their justice, and a keen eye for the lessons the experiences will bring.' That is a sound, intelligent position to take; and, once assumed, fear will inevitably leave us and our wisdom and discrimination will grow."

"That makes clear your phrase, 'the Law of his own being'; and I thank you, Mentor," said Mother, gratefully.

"I suppose this 'looking outside' for God and Law is the result of our early theological training," thoughtfully remarked the Doctor.

"Yes, that is true," said Mentor. "If Theosophists would but study Mr. Judge's 'Aphorisms on Karma', as published in the old Path Magazine, they would no longer have mechanical ideas of Karma, nor place so much useless dependence upon outside entities—they would invoke the Law for themselves."

Somebody turned on the lights as Mentor finished speaking; and the Family group broke up—some to go out for the evening, others to attend to duties at hand.

******

Big Brother looked through the bound volumes of THEOSOPHY and found the "Aphorisms on Karma" in the December, 1912, issue of this magazine. And so may any other student who wants to clear up his conceptions of the workings of Law—from within.

Theosophy, August, 1917

September 1917

THE summer has been a strange one for our "Around the Table" Family. There has been no year before this one for the past decade when at some time or another during the heated term we have not all been together as a family at our mountain camp. But this season has been quite different. The camp has been open, to be sure, and always occupied; but some figure has been missing around the fire-place, where every evening the cool mountain air makes a snapping blaze most grateful. Another year the camp will not be opened at all perhaps; or perhaps, if opened, some figure that used to be will be gone forever from the cheerful blaze.

Big Brother is drafted.¹ The Doctor has forgotten approaching age and volunteered for medical service in France. Spinster will go with him, having brushed up her nursing knowledge. Mother and Student are deep in Red Cross work—in which, so far as may be, Mentor has also joined.

It was one evening in August, with Big Brother and Student absent, that "Fate and Free Will" were talked about before the fire-place—and perhaps something then said may be of help to the readers of THEOSOPHY.

"I thought you Theosophists were 'Pacifists'", said the owner of a neighboring camp who had stopped in on his way from the community mail box.

"Not in the sense in which the word is ordinarily used," answered Mentor.

"No more pacifists than we are jelly-fish," added the Doctor, with a chuckle. "The true Theosophist is first of all a man of action, isn't that so, Mentor?"

"Yes," agreed the latter. "He takes the basis of the Bhagavad-Gita which, as Mr. Judge so truly wrote, tends to arouse two great ideas—first, selflessness, and then, action. The real Theosophist—by whom I mean the man or woman who truly lives in accord with the teaching of the Wisdom-Religion, tries in every way to serve all the rest—and this implies action, and also wisdom in action. The Theosophist works for peace, not your peace, nor mine, but universal peace, and while so working, exercises his powers to protect the weak from the strong, the victim from his oppressor whether as between individuals or nations. His active propaganda for peace can be found expressed in the words of Krishna, 'I incarnate from age to age, for the preservation of the just, the destruction of the wicked, and the establishment of righteousness.'"

"But you're speaking of voluntary service," objected the neighbor. "Many who will go to war are drawn into it unwillingly. Fate has a hand in that, so what position can they take?"

"Just what do you mean by 'fate'"? asked the Doctor dryly. "Why, I hadn't thought," answered Neighbor slowly, "some compelling force, I fancy—call it the force of circumstances, if you like."

Mentor smiled and remarked, "But those circumstances presuppose a chain of circumstances and where, and where only in a Universe of Law, could that chain begin?"

Neighbor observed that the discussion was getting "too deep" for him, so Doctor answered, "It must have begun in the thought and action of those who find themselves enmeshed in that chain—always presupposing that this is a Universe of Law."

"Exactly," said Mentor—"in which case what becomes of this 'fate' idea that Neighbor has introduced into an otherwise sensible household?"

There was a laugh at this, in which Neighbor himself heartily joined. "Then you don't consider that the ideas implied in the word 'fate' are true ideas," he remarked, his eyes still twinkling at Mentor's briskness.

"Certainly not," answered the latter, "nor does the man who calls himself a fatalist consider them true ideas either, no matter what he may say about them. For a man's religion is what he actually does—not what he says; and you will find your 'fatalist' busy as a bee trying to extricate himself from an unpleasant chain of circumstances, or doing his utmost to avert an impending calamity. If he were truly a fatalist he would uncomplainingly submit.

"In fact, in the past seventy years I've met a great many people who called themselves 'fatalists,'" continued Mentor, with a smile, "and they all act in about the same way. Say a calamity impends: when they avert it, they at once claim the credit for the happy outcome—when they are unable to avert it, the calamity is always the workings of 'fate'—and not in the least due to anything done or left undone by a busy fatalist."

Neighbor nodded his head vigorously. "I believe you're right about that," he remarked. "My own experience tallies with yours."

"And isn't the position of the theological Christian, that some event takes place from 'the will of God' just the same in effect as that of the so-called 'fatalist'?" asked Doctor, thoughtfully.

"No different," agreed Mentor, "except that the Christian personifies his 'fate'. Nor does he really believe what he says,' continued Mentor, "any more than our 'fatalist' friend. He struggles to shape events—does his utmost in every direction. If he were truly convinced that the will of the God he assumes to worship was engaged in the matter, he could not logically struggle at all."

"Well, then," demanded Neighbor, "to get back to the original question: what is it that drives unwilling men into the war?"

"Their own thoughts and acts in the past," answered Mentor, gravely. "Man is a continuing entity. He has existed on this earth, as a human being, many times before this one; he will reappear as a physical man many, many times again. Whatever he sows in any incarnation, he reaps either in that life or a life to come. He sows his seeds right here on earth in a physical body; he reaps his harvest right here on earth in a physical body. These seeds are sown—or call them 'causes' set up, if you prefer—always with and through other human beings, or in relation to them; the harvest, or the effects, therefore, are always received from and with others.

"You will see, then, that wars are the effects of causes set in motion, by all the entities concerned, in previous incarnations. If that is clear, then we can at once realize that if any man or woman is, willingly or unwillingly, drawn into or affected by the present war, it is on account of the thoughts and actions of that one in the past."

"He makes his own 'fate,' then, doesn't he," remarked Neighbor, with a nod.

"Exactly," continued Mentor—"there is no outside force compelling us, no outside God. The compelling force is within, for within our own nature is the law which compels adjustment."

"Then the youngster who is drafted had better take his medicine cheerfully," said Doctor.

"Yes," agreed Mentor. "He can say to himself, 'In a Universe of Law the law must rule in every thing and every circumstance. That course which is now alone open to me is the result of my thought and action in the past. If I meet this condition cheerfully and willingly do my best under it, I will have made adjustment and not have to meet it again. If I kick against the pricks, I will be setting in motion a new cause of the same kind, and have to make further adjustment of the same nature.'

"You see, the Power of Choice is always present," continued Mentor—"if nowhere else than in the attitude assumed under the existing condition. 'Power of Choice' is the same thing as 'Free Will'. A man always has it under all conditions. In fact, that might be said to constitute what a man really is: he is the Power to Choose."

******

Neighbor went thoughtfully away with his mail. Mother picked up her writing tablet, while the Doctor turned to the medical book he had been studying.

"I wonder if Neighbor really understood and will hand on the true ideas to somebody else," said Spinster as she and Mentor drew closer to the waning fire.

"I wonder," repeated Mentor—and then, with a smile, "If I didn't think so, my Dear, if I didn't know that by explanation and repetition the true ideas would at last be understood, and spread and bear fruit in the lives of men—I wouldn't want to be staying here on earth much longer—and you know that I want to stay."

Theosophy, September, 1917

¹ American men aged 18 to 45 were drafted to fight in World War I as part of three registrations between June 1917 and September 1918.—e-Ed.

October 1917

IT was a golden afternoon in early September, one of the last the Family was to spend in its well-beloved mountain camp. The trunks of the spreading madrone trees fairly glowed in the warm sunlight, and the yellowing leaves which carpeted the ground where Spinster sat, blended most charmingly with the brown of her hair and eyes. Doctor leaned back at his ease against the grey logs of the cabin, looking down with an appreciative twinkle in his eyes at the picture of white-haired Mentor playing dominoes with this laughing brown wood-nymph. Mother, knitting steadily at a sweater that some soldier someday would wear, swung gently to and fro in the great cushioned chair which hung so comfortably from a nearby oak.

"Ten, sixteen, twenty-two, twenty-eight," counted Spinster triumphantly, after a surprising "domino." "If this was money, Mentor, I'd give it all away."

Mentor pretended great difficulty in adding the amount to Spinster's mounting score, and there was much good-natured argument as to proper methods of addition. Twenty-eight and seventy-nine at last were miraculously put together, and Spinster had won the game. "One hundred and seven," she remarked absently, putting the dominoes away in the box. "If it were only dollars, it would help the spread of Theosophy."

"Don't be mercenary, Daughter," objected the Doctor.

"Now, Doctor, you know Spinster doesn't want money for herself," defended Mother.

"Wish I had a million—I'd give every cent of it," said Spinster firmly.

"The question is, my Dear," remarked Mentor gently, "what are you doing with what you've already got?"

"Very theosophically put," said Doctor with an appreciative nod.

"She's giving herself, and that's all she has," added Mother placidly.

"Very true," remarked Mentor, patting the shoulder of his dearest "child." "She is doing her utmost—then why wish for something more? It's the point of view I refer to, not the actual facts. I have heard so many people." he continued, "talking and wishing in similar strain—for something they haven't got, to do something it's not their duty to do. Meantime, more often than not, they are proving very faulty stewards of what they already possess—have you not noticed it, Doctor?" turning gravely to his old friend.

"Indeed I have," agreed Doctor warmly. The Doctor is notoriously a "poor collector," and too warm-hearted ever to secure in full measure the fees that his skill and experience warrant. "In fact I've had patients come to me," he added somewhat ruefully, "dressed in the latest styles and gotten up regardless—and almost weep because they couldn't seem to pay the little bills they owed me. 'So grateful, and so sorry, but it costs so much to live'"!

Mother laughed over her knitting. "You couldn't be hard if you wanted to, Doctor."

"They come to me about Theosophy, too," said Mentor reminiscently. "Thousands of times people have said to me: 'this is a noble work; I wish I could help it; if I had wealth, you should have my greatest support.' Then they would shake hands warmly and eagerly and go away. I've often wanted to answer: 'Well, what are you doing with what you've got?'—but I never have," he added, "for people have to learn for themselves."

"Exactly," agreed the Doctor. "I know just what you mean. And it's using what we have in the right way that is the real road to knowledge, and that bespeaks the real gratitude. Why, five cents as a sacrifice from the man to whom every penny means much is a greater gift, or payment, than five hundred dollars from the man of wealth."

"Yes, and brings him more," added Mentor. "'Rain comes from sacrifice,' says the Bhagavad-Gita—but it is so hard to make the application to ourselves: we all want to learn some other way, some easy way, some way that won't sacrifice us. We all applaud the story of the 'widow's mite,' but to take the parable home seems beyond our powers."

"Then energy spent in wishing is so much energy lost," said Spinster, briskly coming into the conversation to which she apparently had not been listening.

"That's the idea, exactly," agreed Mentor. "A desire is not a condition. Furthermore our wishes are almost always personal, almost always an evidence that we are thinking too much about our personal selves. Better to think of what channels we can put our energy to work in, to best advantage, of how we can best give what we now have—and then give it."

"Seems to me," remarked Mother, looking up from her knitting, "that continual wishing for 'something different' is not only a deterrent to the effective performance of present duty, but a non-reliance on the Law as well."

Mentor smiled approvingly. "Now, there is a good application of the doctrine of Karma," he said. "Under the Law we earn whatever conditions we are presently undergoing. To accept them as such, do our very best under those conditions and thus earn better ones, is the true line to follow and really a working with the Law. But to fret and worry because our burden is not to our liking, to wish for better things, imagining what we would do if we had them—meanwhile neglecting present duties, as is usually the case—is a denial of the Law and a 'kicking against the pricks'. It merely works to continue the present conditions, and weakens the ability of the actor to overcome them.

"I have known young men and women, as well as older ones, who complained consistently and regularly of their employment and employers, for instance, and who wondered at and fretted over their slow advance in position and remuneration. They never seemed to understand for a moment that their own attitude and consequent influence was the very thing that was keeping them at a stand-still, or worse. Call it to their attention, and perhaps they will reluctantly admit it. But they find it difficult indeed to change a habit of mind, and usually revert to and maintain the old ruts of thinking and action they have worn for themselves."

"What's the cure, Mentor?" asked Doctor.

"An entire change in the basis of thinking," was the reply, "a throwing away of old false ideas in regard to life, and the substitution of a sound, synthetic philosophy—of Theosophy, in fact. And a mere believing of Theosophical tenets will not bring in the nature the desired results. The student must work, must study and apply the principles Theosophy enunciates to the affairs of his daily life. From such application conviction comes—and from conviction comes realization and knowledge, in the process of time."

***********

A cheery shout from down the trail announced the arrival of Neighbor and the mail; and in the mail was the letter that turned the Doctor's martial ardor to saner uses, and the Family's direction homewards, to remain there at its accustomed tasks—a letter that released Spinster from a line of action which had not seemed her true line; but taken from a sense of duty, that her Father might not need to go to France alone.

She looked at Mentor, as the Doctor read his letter, with an air half humorous, a mixture of enjoyment of the situation and of relief.

Mentor did not change countenance at all, but there was that in his expression which showed that the denouement was not unexpected by him. It was as if he and Spinster had known something which the others did not know, and sensed the direction that the general trend of the Family's life would doubtless take.

For the Doctor's letter was a frank, curt refusal of the service he had volunteered. "You are too old for effective work in France," it told him. "You could never endure the strain—it would be like throwing good ability away. You can serve your country best by remaining at home and doing what may be done here." There was more to it, but the Doctor read aloud no further.

He went up the trail alone, instead, seeking adjustment in the quiet of the trees. Mentor and Spinster shook hands without a word. Mother wiped her eyes from time to time—and kept on knitting.

"He'll be all right in a little while," said Mentor cheerfully. "The good, old Doctor lost his sense of proportion for a while, that is all. He will be all the better for the lesson, when he begins to get it—and perhaps we shall all be wiser for what has passed."

How Mentor outlined the lesson, and how the Doctor learned it, will be told next month.

Theosophy, October, 1917

November 1917

A FEW days after the Doctor received notice of the refusal of his proffered hospital service in France, the Family's journey home from the mountain camp was an accomplished fact; and in a few days more the Family life was flowing in its accustomed workaday channels.

The Doctor has two personal tendencies which are at once enjoyed and deprecated by the other members of the Family—for, strangely enough, it is often our purely personal idiosyncracies that seem to make us tolerable to our intimates, however much more homogeneous we might be without them. The Doctor makes strenuous efforts to improve, and great improvement is in evidence in his daily relations with his fellows. But still his two tendencies persist to some extent. He will no longer be "the Doctor," Mentor says, but someone far deeper and finer, when he at last eradicates his "precious pair", and the real man within can steadily shine through his "Doctor" mask.

One of these tendencies is toward a surface irritation, a sort of rumbling gustiness when matters do not move quite to suit him. The Family merely laughs at this when it occasionally shows itself. The Doctor now laughs too—evidence in itself of the change that has taken place in his control, and of the breaking of a vicious habit. For a tendency to irritation is a habit, and nothing more; and can be broken by the one who acquired it—merely by "tying" a habit of self-control to the old habit of giving way, as one can tie a new piece of string to an old piece, a string that is cleaner and of a fairer color.

The Doctor's second tendency, or fault, and a far more serious one, is to "bottle up", as Mentor calls it, when some person hurts or injures him, or when some event in the round of life places a real barrier in the way the Doctor thinks he wants to go. Then our Friend turns preternaturally quiet—unusually courteous even for a man whose every movement shows high breeding—but very silent and uncommunicative, more particularly in relation to the matter that has caused the stress. Sometimes hours only, and sometimes days elapse, before the Doctor is his usual self again. The Family respects these periods, and gives him a chance to "fight it out for himself," as Mentor calls the process. These periods are growing less and less frequent, as the Doctor applies Theosophy to daily life; but the curt refusal of his proffer of hospital service brought one on. And the Family was two weeks at home before the Doctor suddenly "unbottled" one evening. The fact that he voluntarily began to talk and to ask questions about his trouble, contrary to custom, is evidence that he is breaking his tendency and will have it completely conquered in the course of time.

The Family had finished dinner but was still at table. Mother was talking with Student over the furnishing of the latter's study room at the college dormitory. Mentor and Spinster were discussing the "Children's School of Theosophy", just starting its season's work. Big Brother is in an army training camp, of course, and his side of the table looks rather empty these days. The Doctor sat regarding this vacancy with unseeing eyes for a few moments; then his face took on a certain resolution and, lifting his eyes and encountering Mentor's friendly glance, he suddenly remarked:

"That notice hit me pretty hard, Mentor. Let's philosophize it out and see where I'm to blame. What do you say?"

Mentor's face fairly shone with sympathy, and a recognition of what the Doctor had gone through—to determine to uncover and dissect the trouble he was holding to himself, and to break a tendency so long established. "I say fine, Doctor", he answered, "let's get to work."

Mother and Student were just rising from the table when Doctor spoke, so they adjourned their discussion of rugs and pictures to the living room. Spinster, sensing the quality of the moment, motioned away the maid who was entering to clear the dining table. The "Triumvirate", as they are sometimes called was thus left alone "around the table"—Mentor, Spinster and the Doctor. And in twenty minutes the problem of our old friend was a problem no longer, and a light had been cast upon his difficulty that will illuminate many another in the years to come.

"Well, what was basically wrong with my action in volunteering, Mentor," asked Doctor. "If Law rules in every thing and every circumstance, there must have been a lack of discrimination in my action—to have it bring such a humiliating result," he added ruefully.

"There was—of course, must have been," answered Mentor smiling. "But cheer up, Doctor, and try to get the relativity of things. No world, not even your world, is coming to an end because you're not going to France. Now that events have determined the result, what difference does it make whether you like it or not"?

The Doctor looked at Mentor and then at Spinster, a trifle uncertain whether or not to take offense. Then the humorous aspect of himself acting like a sulky little boy, and the self-importance his position had implied, came home to him. The "Triumvirate" laughed like one person. Explanations and applications then began to come out.

"Your action in volunteering was perfectly logical from the basis of thinking you had taken, Doctor," said Mentor. "The fault was with the basis, that is all."

The Doctor looked perplexed. "But isn't patriotism a sound basis, Mentor?" he asked. "That's all I felt—it really is. Certainly there was no self-seeking in the decision to give up all this," looking around the luxurious room, "to serve in a French hospital."

"Yes, patriotism is a sound basis, so far as it goes," answered Mentor. "But that wasn't the basis of your action at all, my friend. No, it wasn't," he added, holding up his hand as Doctor started to interrupt. "I know you are sincere in thinking it was. But what was the reason behind all this show of patriotism, or love of humanity, which came to the surface so suddenly, and so aggressively? If you can discover that, you will get the real basis of your action, and find in it, doubtless, why you were refused—and yes, why you felt humiliated, Doctor, for the effect must be bound up in the cause."

Doctor looked thoughtful, went off into a brown study for a few minutes, digging his motives out mentally and inspecting them as he laid them bare. Mentor looked at Spinster with a twinkle in his eye. That young lady retained a sober face, though her own eyes danced delightedly.

At last the Doctor looked up, swallowed once or twice, and then shamefacedly remarked, "Well lots of the other Doctors were doing it, or talking about it"!

Then the "Triumvirate" laughed together again.

"It was like this, Doctor," Mentor began. "A whole lot of people declared it the duty of the profession to volunteer their services for the war. Many doctors agreed to this, and some began to volunteer. Your big warm heart got fired up and ran away with your head in consequence. 'I ought to be willing to sacrifice like anybody else', you reasoned. In that idea you were right; but in the method you were quite wrong. You just 'followed my leader' like the traditional sheep, never thinking of your age, physical ability, or the fitness of things. And so you got your reaction—in the refusal, and your own humiliation—that's the whole story, as I see it."

Doctor nodded vigorously. "No fool like an old fool," he snorted, returning for the first time in weeks to his own natural manner.

"Well, I wouldn't exactly say that," laughed Mentor merrily. "But here is the lesson—for the forty-'leventh time—at least it seems to me we've had it repeated among ourselves any number of times :

"Our duty is not what other people think we ought to do.

"Our duty is what we ourselves plainly see we ought to do.

"Do that.

"'The duty of another is full of danger.'"

"But how about this girl," said Doctor suddenly, turning to Spinster. "Why did she volunteer to go to France?"

Doctor rose from the table as he spoke, as if he now sensed something for the first time. He walked over to Spinster, putting his delicate, beautifully formed hand on her shoulder, and then, as he spoke, tenderly patting her smiling face.

"Did you get mixed in your motives too, Spinster dear—or did you want to go along and take care of your silly old Father"?

********

"Come, Children, are you going to sit out there all evening?" came Mother's voice from the living room. "Anna wants to go out this evening; you must let her clear away now."

"On our way, Mother," answered Doctor, somewhat huskily, but cheerfully for all that. "Better than going to France anyway!" he added, in Spinster's ear, as the "Triumvirate" arm in arm, marched out through the folding doors.

Theosophy, November, 1917

December 1917

IT was one of those hot evenings in the early autumn which often are so oppressive. A series of chilly nights, bringing a light touch of frost to the countryside, had preceded this "unusual" heat wave, and the audience at the Theosophical meeting in town, from which the Family had just returned to its suburban home, had seemed too "wilted" to make the usual half hour of "question and answer" toward the close of the meeting as crisp and interesting as usual.

"It's too warm to go to bed yet," remarked Spinster, as she dropped listlessly into a chair in the gratefully dim living room.

"That's right, Daughter," answered the Doctor, who is rarely able to attend the meetings but had been present at this one. "Can't we have a pitcher of water and some glasses?" Then turning to Mentor, "It must have been dry work talking tonight." The latter smiled a little as he answered, "The audience seemed to find it so."

"But not that man who kept asking those questions about the Masters," put in Mother quickly.

"Yes," said Doctor vigorously. "What was he driving at, Mentor?"

Spinster arrived at the moment with water, tray and glasses; and Doctor, taking them from her gently, with a "you sit down now, Dear," served her first, and then the rest.

"Why, that man was a doubter, Doctor," answered Mentor at last, as he placed his now empty glass on the tray.

"He looked sensible enough," mused the Doctor, sipping his water slowly in hygienic fashion.

Mentor laughed, "He was, or rather is, sensible, Doctor. You yourself were a doubter a few years ago. And then I remember you used to think it better to 'slip over' the existence of Masters, when talking with your friends about Theosophy—it was 'too much to swallow,' you used to say."

Doctor looked indignant, then pained, and then said slowly, "Well—I guess that's so, Mentor. It wasn't that I doubted, you know, but the idea was so foreign to the thinking of the average man I used to be afraid it would throw him off the philosophy . . . but I know better now," he added vigorously.

"Well, I often used to wonder," remarked Spinster reminiscently, "why Mr. Judge devoted the very first chapter of The Ocean of Theosophy to those direct statements about Masters. It used to seem to me not very wise in method—that a better way would have been to 'lead up to' the idea of Masters, treating the subject of their existence in a later chapter in the book."

"I used to feel the same way, Spinster," agreed the Doctor. "I used to hesitate to loan or recommend the book—guess I was afraid somebody would think I was superstitious," he added, with a chuckle.

"Well, why did he write of Masters in the very first chapter, Mentor?" asked Mother.

"To show where Theosophy comes from, of course," answered Mentor. "No Masters, no Theosophy—we ought to be able to see that. Theosophy purports to be knowledge; knowledge implies knowers—for there could be no knowledge unless it were actually known by beings. And who could know the facts of the evolution of our planet, and previous ones, except Those who have experienced and for themselves completed it?

"The existence of Masters is the great essential fact of Theosophy—the basic fact," he added earnestly. "Knowledge does not exist of itself, nor as an abstraction. If there is knowledge, it is something known by somebody, somewhere. And unless there are beings who actually know the Laws of the Universe and their applications. Theosophy is a mere guess, or speculation, like any religion or system of thought."

"Then the bold proclamation of Masters is the logical line to take in the presentation of Theosophy, isn't it, Mentor?" asked Doctor, "and that holds good all the time."

Mentor nodded. "It is at Theosophical meetings, that's sure, Doctor. For the people who come have come voluntarily to hear Theosophy explained. But we often have opportunities to present the philosophy, or some of its ideas, at other times and then discrimination should be used. Do you remember that old Bible saying," he added, turning to Mother, who has been a devoted student of the old book, "about 'milk for babes and meat for strong men'? Well, there's a cue for us in that—and in many another of the old Bible sayings. When people come to a Theosophical meeting, or ask directly for information about Theosophy, as such, it is our best method—in fact, our duty—to 'make the proclamation' of the Source, with all confidence and boldness. When we ourselves are trying to introduce the subject in order to interest and help a friend or acquaintance, we should utilize that discrimination we are trying to cultivate and develop to find the best method of approach."

"I can see that, Mentor," agreed Spinster, emphatically. "Why, I have known students who talked about Masters to all and sundry, in season and out—and in a very personal and familiar sort of way. It always made me feel sort of—well, funny," she added, unable to find her exact word.

"Yes, I know what you mean," said Mentor, looking as nearly disgusted as benignity ever can look. "It's the 'abuse of Sacred Names' of which H. P. B. herself wrote. Why, to hear some credulous and undiscriminating students talk, you would think that they and their 'teachers'—heaven save the mark—were the familiars of those great beings we call 'Masters' . . . that Their relation was a personal one with these talkers. To a really earnest and well-informed student such talk uncovers at once the delusion or rank pretence of the one who makes it; for he knows well the truth of that old saying of Mr. Judge: '. . . the true chela does not talk much of his Master and often does not refer to that Master's existence.'"

"Well, what did that man really get who asked the questions about Masters at the meeting, Mentor?" asked Doctor, looking up at the clock significantly.

"He got a copy of the Ocean, I know that!" said Spinster quickly, before Mentor could answer. "I loaned it to him myself after the meeting."

There was a general laugh, as Mentor remarked, "There's your answer, Doctor!" And he added seriously, "You see, he got enough to make him want to do some reading and thinking for himself; and if I am not mistaken, he is sensible enough, judging by his attitude and questions, to get the logic of the situation—to see the necessity of the existence of Masters, if Theosophy is the philosophy of life itself, as the teaching clearly purports to be—a synthetic philosophy."

******

"Come, children, it's almost twelve o'clock—you'll all be tired tomorrow, if you don't turn in now." said Mother in her practical and decisive way.

Doctor yawned guiltily, and there was a quiet smile of appreciation all around—which is a good way to end an evening.

"We seem to get about as much from these little talks after the meetings as we do from the meetings themselves," said Spinster, her voice trailing off into the distance as she went down the corridor toward her room.

"Do you remember that old passage in the Gita?" remarked Mentor to Doctor, as they were separating for the night:

"'. . . the wise gifted with spiritual wisdom worship me; their very hearts and minds are in me; enlightening one another and constantly speaking of me, they are full of enjoyment and satisfaction. To them thus always devoted to me, who worship me with love, I give that mental devotion by which they come to me.'"

EXTRACTS FROM BRIHADARANYAKA UPANISHAD*

After having subdued by sleep all that belongs to the body, he, not asleep himself, looks down upon the sleeping (senses). Having assumed light, he goes again to his place, the golden person, the lonely bird.

Guarding with the breath (prâna, life) the lower nest, the immortal moves away from the nest; that immortal one goes wherever he likes, the golden person, the lonely bird.

Going up and down in his dream, the god makes manifold shapes for himself, either rejoicing together with women, or laughing (with his friends) or seeing terrible sights.

People may see his playground, but himself no one ever sees. Therefore they say, "Let no one wake a man suddenly, for it is not easy to remedy, if he does not get back (rightly to his body)."

Now as a man is like this or like that, according as he acts and according as he behaves, so will he be:—a man of good acts will become good, a man of bad acts, bad. He becomes pure by pure deeds, bad by bad deeds.

And here they say that a person consists of desires. And as is his desire, so is his will: and as is his will, so is his deed; and whatsoever deed he does, that he will reap.

If a man understands the Self, saying "I am he", what could he wish or desire that he should pine after the body.

Whoever has found and understood the Self that has entered this patched-together hiding place, he indeed is the creator, for he is the maker of everything, his is the world, and he is the world itself.

* These Extracts were printed by H. P. Blavatsky in Lucifer for April, 1891. The title used is our own.-ED. THEOSOPHY.

January 1918

OWING to the fact that Student is in training for the educational field, she has constituted herself the "academic" member of our Family and considers she is doing her theosophical share by keeping us somewhat informed along present day philosophical and psychological trends, as epitomized in her required studies.

Assuredly she has done "her bit" in this direction. For more than once the requirements of modern class-room work have found our earnest Student submitting to an examination of her "reactions" by instructor and class, a sort of human vivisection that the Family at last put a stop to, so far as Student was concerned. But every Saturday evening—for Student forsakes the University regularly to spend her week-end with the Family—our dinner-table talk revolves about our Youngster's new experiences in academic halls. Always she is earnest, often she is interesting; and sometimes she turns up matters in themselves of profit, or which bring out talk of value, as Mentor looks them over in the light of his long experience with our human kind and the deep understanding his knowledge of Theosophy sheds upon it.

"Well, Student, what's the latest?" asked Doctor, as he slipped into his seat beside her the Saturday evening before Thanksgiving. "Found out how to make a 'synthetic turkey' for next week? For if present prices hold we'll have to do something miraculous," he added, looking around the table at the smiling Family.

This was a fling at Student's biological and chemical studies, and she enjoyed it as much as the Doctor did; for Student is well-informed. Theosophically speaking, and has little use for the theories of materialistic science, though the requirements of her work necessitate some knowledge of them.

"I'm afraid, Doctor, your little miracle-worker will be obliged to fail you this time," she answered airily. "But I've got a new and interesting psychological test that will appeal to you—and to you too, Mentor," she added, looking across the table to where the latter sat beside the smiling Spinster.

"Let's have it, Daughter—no more human experiments, I hope." said Doctor. "I've got too many paying patients on my hands at present to want to add one of the Family to my swelling free list."

"I do hope you've not being doing any thing foolish, Student," put in Mother anxiously.

"You know what Mentor said last time." added Spinster—"that you were not to let yourself be experimented with again."

"You wrong me, Family," answered Student calmly. "This new psychological test is different—and I think you'll say it's a fine idea, Mentor. It's just what Lurgan Sahib did for Kim and the little Hindu boy in Kipling's book—only he used jewels for it, if you remember. They lay out a lot of objects on a table and we look at them for a certain length of time; then they take table and all away and we have to write down what we can remember of the objects seen."

"Oh, is that all," said Spinster relievedly.

"Well, you just try it some time, and see for yourself whether it's easy or not," objected Student warmly. "You'll find some difficulty I'm thinking, young lady," she added, "in remembering even a third of the objects shown—at least I did on the first few trials."

"Now, Daughter, I don't think you ought to strain your brain and eyes that way," said Mother, with an anxious look. "Won't you tell her not to, Mentor—it can't be good for her."

"Best thing in the world for her just now," answered Mentor, with an assuring smile, "that is, if done in moderation," he added seriously. "Now I can see some sense in that kind of applied psychology," he went on, while the Doctor nodded a vigorous approval. "It is a method by which the faculty of attention can be aroused and stimulated; and if there is anything that thirty years of Theosophical work has taught me, it is the crying need among students of greater concentration, or attention."

"But some folks just can't seem to gain that power," remarked Mother, interested in the idea itself now that the worry about her enthusiastic young daughter's welfare had been relieved.

"The attitude of mind your very words imply is just what stands in their way, Mother," answered Mentor earnestly. "We all have the power—so it can't be gained in that sense," he continued. "What we have to do is to gain the use of it, and that can come only through exercise, of course."

"Fine training, I call it," interjected Doctor. "Wish I'd had it when I was a student . . . . . think how it would help the young physician . . . make his work less experimental . . . save the lives of lots of patients."

"It's good training for any line of work, and for students in every department, whether they're young or old," confirmed Mentor. "Why, think how much is lost by people who attend our theosophical meetings, for instance, because they do not give full attention, and thus get an understanding of what they hear."

"I should say so, Mentor," agreed Spinster, with a little laugh. "Only yesterday when I was in the Reading Room to look after things a young girl began to ask me some questions about Theosophy. 'Does it teach that consciousness survives after death?' she asked me quite seriously. I told her that it did, of course, and then she said she had attended a meeting at which you spoke Mentor, and that you had said that consciousness does not so survive! Exactly the opposite, you see, of what you did say repeatedly during the talk."

"Some lack of attention there—just a little," chuckled Doctor appreciatively.

"But she was not a stupid person at all," protested Spinster, "I should say she was an exceptionally bright and well-educated girl, judging by her appearance and conversation."

"Informed about a whole lot of things," commented Mentor somewhat sadly, "like so many of us; but I object to using the word 'educated' in such a foreign sense. It is derived from the Latin educo, as you know—meaning to draw out, from within of course. A truly educated person would therefore be one who has drawn out and gotten use of the powers that reside within himself and by exercise has learned to use them wisely in every direction."

"That's so, Mentor," agreed Doctor warmly. "But our so-called educational methods are just the contrary: the idea seems to be to cram into the mind the statements of other men—where's the knowledge in all that"!

"No knowledge at all," replied Mentor, "unless judgment is exercised, information tested by experience, and assimilation takes place.

"To consider this matter of attention again," he added, "I remember a story they used to tell about H. P. B.: one evening in London a group of students at Headquarters was clamoring to be shown some phenomena. H. P. B. as was her custom in later life, was loath to show anything—knowing full well that students must progress by 'philosophy and conduct,' to use Her own phrase—and that the thirst for phenomena, if gratified once, often became an obsession with the witnesses. However, She winked a twinkling eye at one quiet student present—not one of the clamorers—remarking to the company, 'Why, you wouldn't know a phenomenon if you saw it'—at the same time lighting Her cigarette without the use of a match or other external means. Now, not one of those present, except the quiet student mentioned, saw anything out of the ordinary. It was lack of attention—a lack which this young lady will not be guilty of I hope," he added, turning to Student with a smile, "if she continues the exercise her 'new' psychology has suggested.

"That method, by the way, is not new," he continued, "but as old as the hills. It was known and practised ages ago in the Ancient East. The Chela had to learn how to hold and concentrate his attention upon any object, for as long as he desired. Indeed, it is through this power—or rather, that power of which this is a small aspect—that the Adept is able to identify himself with the consciousness of another being, thus learning the very nature of that being and so understanding how to help the being, when, under Law, help may be given."

*******

"Come, Family, it's time to turn our attention to that new music, Student brought home with her," said Mother, touching the bell.

"Well, how did our Girls become such skillful musicians?" remarked Mentor as the Family left the table and moved towards the living room.

"I know," laughed Spinster—"by attention." And she added soberly, "by 'a firm position observed out of regard for the end in view, and perseveringly adhered to for a long time without intermission'—that's the way the Sage Patanjali puts it."

"And that's the way the 'music of the spheres' may be learned, my Dear," said Mentor softly—"if the concentration be rightly directed, in the light of sound philosophy and right conduct. Let us hope that Student herself will be ready to take up the real work some day."

SECRET DOCTRINE EXTRACTS*

One of the greatest, and, withal, the most serious objection to the correctness and reliability of the whole work will be the preliminary STANZAS: "How can the statements contained in them be verified?" True, if a great portion of the Sanskrit, Chinese, and Mongolian works quoted in the present volumes are known to some Orientalists, the chief work—that one from which the Stanzas are given—is not in the possession of European Libraries. The Book of Dzyan (or "Dzan") is utterly unknown to our Philologists, or at any rate was never heard of by them under its present name. This is, of course, a great drawback to those who follow the methods of research prescribed by official Science; but to the students of Occultism, and to every genuine Occultist, this will be of little moment. The main body of the Doctrines given is found scattered throughout hundreds and thousands of Sanskrit Mss., some already translated—disfigured in their interpretations, as usual,—others still awaiting their turn. Every scholar, therefore, has an opportunity of verifying the statements herein made, and of checking most of the quotations. A few new facts (new to the profane Orientalist only) and passages quoted from the Commentaries will be found difficult to trace. Several of the teachings, also, have hitherto been transmitted orally: yet even those are in every instance hinted at in the almost countless volumes of Brahminical, Chinese and Tibetan temple-literature.

However it may be, and whatsoever is in store for the writer through malevolent criticism, one fact is quite certain. The members of several esoteric schools—the seat of which is beyond the Himalayas, and whose ramifications may be found in China, Japan, India, Tibet, and even in Syria, besides South America—claim to have in their possession the sum total of sacred and philosophical works in Mss. and type: all the works, in fact, that have ever been written, in whatever language or characters, since the art of writing began; from the ideographic hieroglyphs down to the alphabet of Cadmus and the Devanagari.

Theosophy, January, 1918

* From the Original Edition Vol. I—Introductory—, pp. xxii–xxiii; see Vol. I—Introductory—, pp. 6–7 New Edition.

February 1918

IT had been a very quiet Christmas day for the Family. With Big Brother in Service, and Student banished to the mountains upon Doctor's orders for the length of her vacation recess, it didn't seem like Christmas at all", Mother remarked more than once as the day progressed. Christmas dinner was a very simple affair indeed, save for a real plum pudding, prepared out of regard for Mentor's Canadian ancestry.

"Let's sit and chat awhile", said Mother, when dessert was finished. "Anna is out for the evening, so there is no hurry to clear away".

"Well, the usual Christmas orgy is about over for this year, isn't it?" remarked Doctor, pushing back his chair and crossing his legs comfortably. "The down-town streets yesterday reminded me of nothing so much as an active mob scene".

"That's putting it rather strongly", said Mentor, with a smile, "but Christmas does seem to be made a time of strain and rush—and quite unnecessarily so."

"It's the indiscriminate giving, isn't it, Mentor, that makes most of the trouble?" asked Spinster thoughtfully.

"No doubt of it", was the answer.

"But we ought to remember there's a whole lot of kindness and good feeling behind much of the strain and effort," put in Mother, "even if it is perhaps misapplied."

"Good motive, but not much knowledge", answered Mentor, "that's true of many things done which were better left undone. You see, good motive is not enough", he continued earnestly. "The Inquisition used to burn men's bodies in order to save their souls The motive was good but the results were not—that is certain".

"It's all right, Mother, for you to look for the kindness and good feeling that animates the Christmas nonsense", said Doctor, shaking a playful finger at her across the table. "Of course you'd see that side of it because that's the way you yourself feel; but there are just as many, or even more, who do not feel that way. They give because they think they have to, or because they know others will give to them—or even in order to get a return, or because they want to be thought well of".

"What an arraignment of our human kind, Doctor"! exclaimed Spinster, with a little shiver.

"But isn't it true, Mentor?" persisted the Doctor, who enjoys an argument now and then, though his old-time aggressiveness of speech, and tenacity or obstinacy of opinion has been greatly toned down since he began sincerely to apply Theosophy to himself.

"Of course it's true," answered Mentor, with a whimsical wink for Spinster, "but Mother is right, too, you must remember. There are worthy motives in giving, and unworthy motives too. There are times and seasons in gift giving like anything else. And wisdom is needed in these things—a standard by which we can judge what we ought and ought not to do. Do you remember that passage in the Bhagavad-Gita," he added, turning to Spinster—"Seventeenth Chapter, I think?"

"Yes, and I wish everybody could know it, and know how to apply it too", she replied: "Those gifts which are bestowed at the proper time to the proper person, and by men who are not desirous of a return, are of the sattva quality, good and of the nature of truth. But that gift which is given with the expectation of a return from the beneficiary or with a view to spiritual benefit flowing therefrom or with reluctance, is of the rajas quality, bad and partaketh of untruth. Gifts given out of place and season and to unworthy persons, without proper attention and scornfully, are of the tamas quality, wholly bad and of the nature of darkness'".

"There you have it", said Mentor, with an approving nod for Spinster's good memory. "One needs knowledge if he is to give wisely; and it is only by knowing and applying the standard that Theosophy presents that such knowledge can be gained. It's a discrimination, an understanding of, as well as a compassion for, all others that is most sorely needed."

"Good old Gita," said the Doctor thoughtfully. "It always seems to hit the nail on the head, doesn't it?"

"It certainly does", answered Mentor vigorously. "Mr. Judge used to say it was the study of Adepts, and it is one of the most necessary books for the student who would acquire the wisdom in action which Krishna teaches."

"Would you say it was the "Theosophy' of its day, Mentor"? asked Mother.

"Yes, that would be correct in one sense", was the answer. "But it's equally for today and for all time—a portion of the old Wisdom-Religion given out by that Teacher, and coming down to us intact—whereas most of the pure old teachings reach us so mutilated as to be almost unrecognizable".

"Somebody at the Theosophical Rooms the other day said that the philosophy came from the Gita and other old writings, and was just 'put together' by H. P. B.", remarked Spinster rather aggrievedly, "and it was an old student at that. Of course I said it wasn't so, but I fear I didn't bring out the right idea very well. What would you say to such a statement, Mentor—just what is the Source?"

"It's a fact that people do have all sorts of notions about the Source of Theosophy", interrupted Doctor. "An old scholar I know told me the other day it came from the Vedas, and I have heard several students say that Theosophy came from India. What is the best way to meet such statements", he added, turning himself around in his chair so he could face his old friend.

"One at a time, please", answered Mentor with a smile. "You say, Spinster, that an 'old student' told you something as to the Source. What do you mean by the phrase 'old student', merely one who has been studying Theosophy for some years? In that sense the phrase is a misnomer. No one who was really an 'old student'—by which I mean an advanced student—would ever make the mistake the one you mention made. An 'old student' is not one who has just studied Theosophy for a number of years in this life, but a person who by his speech and example shows that he really knows something of Theosophy, though in this life he may have studied it but a relatively short time.

"And now as to the Source: the statements mentioned are not true", he continued. "And it is necessary that every sincere and grateful student should be able to meet them, and others of their kind, in an effective way. Questions like 'What is the Source' are often rather contemptuously considered 'elementary' by Theosophical students. Ask them about Karma or Reincarnation, the 'Sheaths of the Soul', or even the evolution of the earth and they might be able to give a somewhat lengthy, if not very logical, answer. But a question of the Source is too 'elementary' to interest them particularly—in fact many Theosophical students have not given it any special attention, though we can at once see, as soon as our notice is directed to it, that this 'primary concept' is of the utmost importance. For if Theosophy is the truth about life, both as a whole and in all its particularities of manifestation, we must have an idea of the reliability and worthiness of the Source, and a definite understanding of just what that Source is, if we are to present a logical and explainable answer to those who ask us reasons for the faith and conviction that are in us.

"Theosophy did not and does not come 'from India', though undoubtedly some of those who dwelt in what we now call India knew Theosophy, and some few now dwelling in that country know it today. There are in India some three hundred different and differing religious sects, with their doctrines, systems, priests and followers. There are likewise a few thousand students of Theosophy, and perhaps a few real Theosophists—that is, those who know and live in accordance with the teachings of Theosophy. But modern India is even more sectarian than the Europe or the United States of today. So it cannot truly be said that Theosophy 'comes from India'."

"Nor does Theosophy come from the old Vedas or the Gita, though both undoubtedly 'came from' the teaching that in our day we call Theosophy. These old writings are in effect that portion of the ancient Wisdom-Religion which was given out by the beings who knew it, at that time and to that people. Some part of this was transcribed by the teachers and students of that time, and this transcription we call the Vedas. One who really knows Theosophy would doubtless find it in the Vedas; but the enquirer unfamiliar with Theosophy might spend a lifetime upon the Vedas without ever becoming able to work out a synthetic philosophy of life such as Theosophy presents.

"Then what is the Source of Theosophy? The Source for us is the writings of H. P. Blavatsky, the Messenger of our day; and the writings of Wm. Q. Judge as well. For she presented the Philosophy, as a system, and he showed its practical application to everyday life. These two acted as the Agents of the Masters of Wisdom—conscious Agents, who themselves possessed the knowledge as is abundantly proved by the internal evidence of the writings. The ultimate Source is therefore the Masters Themselves—men who have learned through observation and experience in many lives and ages the meaning and purpose of life itself, and have so perfected Their instruments for contacting life upon any and all planes of being that nothing is hidden from Them and They know what there is to know. Through the Teachers named, Masters gave out to the world, under the name 'Theosophy', that portion of the Ancient Wisdom which They deemed assimilable by the minds of men in our day. 'It is wisdom about God for those who believe that he is all things and in all, and wisdom about nature for the man who accepts the statement found in the Christian Bible that God cannot be measured or discovered'; 'a knowledge of the laws which govern the evolution of the physical, astral, psychical, and intellectual constituents of nature and of man'. Therefore what could be the Source of Theosophy other than the statements of Those who Themselves have consciously acquired the knowledge.

"The Masters do not themselves reside in India. They are not Eastern nor Western, but Universal. That They exist is well known to some who, having proven for themselves the truth of the teachings of Theosophy, have complied with the conditions necessary for contact with such Beings. But belief and blind faith in Masters is not essential to the student or enquirer who would test out the philosophy of Theosophy and its Source. Abundant evidence as to the existence of beings wiser than man is to be found in all religions, in history,—and in myth and tradition which are in fact much more reliable than written 'history'. Furthermore, if one would really know, let him examine the philosophy merely from an intellectual point of view and in the light of cold reason; and the conviction will inevitably come home to him that here is a 'system', to use a word, that really agrees with itself and with the facts of life: that from self-evident bases through the balanced course of logical reasoning and objective proof 'checks up' in every particular. Once this is seen, the Source is implied. We cannot affirm the truth of the philosophy and deny the existence of Those who know it. The word 'knowledge' implies something known, and as knowledge does not exist of itself, there must always be KNOWERS.

"Then what is the Source of Theosophy? The Masters of Wisdom, the Knowers of Theosophy. Not any place, nor any book or books, but conscious, living men whose equally conscious Agents—H. P. Blavatsky and Wm. Q. Judge—have written down the very words and sentences by which we may come ourselves to know the book of life. Books are necessary to us in order that an intellectual grasp of the philosophy may be had; and so the books have been given us. They are the chart, but we must do the travelling. Recognition of the Source, and gratitude toward it, are the first steps in moving upon that Path."

*********

The Family sat quiet for a time after Mentor had finished; for when he speaks of the Teachers, and the Great Ones who are behind, there is in his voice a certain ring of conviction that seems to "bring home" to those who listen some sense of the reality of it all.

"Quite a lecture", he said at last, smiling a little; and then, more earnestly, "but in Theosophy everything depends upon the right 'approach'. If the Source is not recognized, the gain from the study of the philosophy is almost altogether intellectual and not spiritual at all, and the student will never sense the reality behind the written words. No man ever 'found himself' alone, nor can anybody acquire real knowledge without help; and how can he receive help if he does not know of whom or how to ask it? A grateful recognition of the living Source is really the first step—and students ought to know that, and dwell on the idea.

"But we started to talk of Christmas gifts and giving, didn't we, Family", he added, rising from his chair. "Let's go into the living-room and open the packages I saw Mother and Spinster laying out for us in there—when they didn't know I was looking. I left two or three myself after you went out, just so you wouldn't think I was getting to be a forgetful old man, Spinster dear . . . come on, I want to see you open them".

"I just know that the gifts you make are 'bestowed at the proper time to the proper person' and that you are 'not desirous of a return', Mentor", said Spinster softly as the Family moved through the folding doors. "I tried to make those I gave of that kind this year—of the sattva quality, good and of the nature of truth."

CANNED GOODS

The printing press may become a machine for destroying original thought, as well as our taste for fresh food. We live too much on canned goods. Our Libraries are stacked full of canned Science, canned Philosophy, canned Religion,—everything under the Sun is now canned. Lacking preservative much of the stuff is rotten and should be thrown out, and many cans have nothing in them—never had. The Art of intelligent discussion, of polite conversation, of connected reasoning, is being crowded out by trivialities. Yet the heavens and the earth, the seas and all that in them is, are as full of fresh meat today as they were before ever a line had been written about any thing in them.

Theosophy, February, 1918

March 1918

SHE is a very enthusiastic lady indeed, this good neighbor of ours. And she had maintained successfully a sprightly and accentuated monologue for more than an hour about the "welfare work" she is doing among the prisoners in the County Jail.

Doctor vented his feelings with a half-suppressed "Woof!" of relief, as the door closed upon her exit; to which Mother responded with a deprecating nod and a cautious, "Ssh! she'll hear you."

"That lady talks in italics," remarked Spinster with a sigh of relief, coming back to the room after accompanying our visitor to the door, "she might better save her energy for her convicts."

"Oh, she won't hurt them any, I guess," said Mentor. "She's as good as gold and thoroughly well intentioned, but a little more restraint and considerably more silence would conserve her powers and permit her to listen a little now and then."

"I won't have you say a word against Mrs. , Father," said good-hearted Mother, noting signs of an explosion in the Doctor's face.

"But what has become of our real 'home evening'," queried the latter, of the Family at large, after walking up and down the room to relieve his feelings. "Just about once a week that we can have it," he continued with a comic pantomime of grief, "and all broken up by the lady with the mission!"

"What better exercise would you want, Doctor, for your Theosophic patience?" returned Mentor, with a tolerant smile for the kindly but quick-spoken Doctor. "Remember," he added, turning to Spinster, "what Mr. Judge once said: even when you are busily studying the philosophy, if a bore comes in and claims your attention, lay down your book pleasantly, and attend to the visitor—we can make our application from this circumstance tonight."

"Yes, but I've never seen you turn to prison work," answered Doctor, turning skillfully from the point at issue.

The Family laughed at the subterfuge, and the Doctor, seeing himself discovered, laughed with them.

"I thought it was only ostriches that hid their heads in the sand, Father," mocked Spinster.

"Touché, my Dear—and I admit that I was peevish,' answered Doctor, ceasing to pace the floor and settling back comfortably in his chair. "But seriously, Mentor, what do you think of this prison work—is it advisable and does it do any real good?"

"I can speak only for myself—not for our good neighbor," Mentor answered seriously. "It's quite a large question and, generally speaking, cannot be disposed of so easily. There's a lot of false sentiment and misdirected energy put into that kind of philanthropy; but equally is there kindly intent, self-sacrifice—and some benefit accomplished." And he added with a smile, "I often think that the 'welfare workers' themselves get a whole lot more good from their efforts than the poor prisoners do, as a matter of fact."

"But to relieve distresses, isn't that doing good?" asked Mother.

"In some cases, yes; in others, no," was the reply. "If we can relieve distresses and at the same time supply the unfortunate the means by which his thought and action will be truer, thus enabling him to gather strength and get on his own feet, so to speak, the work performed is indeed worth while and noble. But," turning to Doctor, "the mere poulticing of a boil does not cleanse the blood, or remove the cause, as you medicos well know. Sometimes the unfortunate will learn only through his distresses—and then to relieve them is an ill service to him indeed."

"Then you don't approve of prison work, Mentor?" asked Mother.

"I didn't say that," was the quick rejoinder. "I have done some of it myself in the past and may well do my bit in that direction in the future for aught I know. But there are a great many more people out of jail than in it and just now I am trying to help some of them—they often need it more than the prisoners do, you know."

"And that's a fact," interrupted the Doctor heartily.

"Then each one of us has to find his own work, isn't that what you mean, Mentor?" asked Spinster.

"Exactly, my Dear, for if we will only all do what we find before us to do, and the best we know how to do it, we are in a way to discover larger and more comprehensive work and to become better fitted to do it. Mr. Judge used to say that there is no one method that is right for everybody; each must find for himself what is best for him.

"That which those of us who are 'prisoners' most need," he continued, "is a knowledge of the action of Law. Some are prisoners in jail, others prisoners to circumstance, still others prisoners to ideas. With all such the greatest need is an understanding of Law—not our human and errant, man-made statutes, but the great underlying spiritual Law of Karma. The most effective service to humanity therefore that anyone acquainted with the Law can perform for 'prisoners' of any and every kind is to add his energies to the work of those who are trying to spread a knowledge of Law, so that any who can receive it will have an opportunity to do so. Just now Theosophical work seems to me to be the best and most vital method—so my own energy goes to that."

"Theosophy goes primarily to causes and not to effects—isn't that a good way of putting it, Mentor?" asked Doctor thoughtfully.

"Exactly" was the answer. "The sooner men in general learn for themselves that the effects, pleasant or unpleasant, now being experienced by them, individually and collectively, are the exact return or reaction of the causes set in motion by themselves, the sooner they will accept the responsibility for present conditions and perceive the necessity for setting up a better and wiser line of causation for the future."

"How true that is, Mentor," confirmed Doctor, bringing down his hand on the chair arm with a hearty slap. "A man comes to me and says, 'I'm sick, Doctor, my digestion's all out of whack—fix me up, won't you,' and wants me to do it so that he can go right on committing those same errors of diet he has found so pleasureable. But when I examine him, put him on diet, dose him a bit perhaps, and at last get him into good condition again, I feel that I'm not doing my full duty unless I show him that he's been abusing his stomach, and lay down for him a more rational mode of procedure for the future. Now, if I can make him feel that he really is responsible—in short, bring home to him the reality of the action of the Law of cause and effect—I've done all I can for him because he sees his responsibility. But if I merely 'fix him up,' as he asks, by temporarily relieving his distress, the chances are he will only go to repeating his old courses and come back to me again worse off than ever—to be relieved and 'fixed up' once more."

"Just apply that, Doctor, to 'welfare work' for prisoners," remarked Mentor with a nod of approval. "It's a good illustration. Much of such work is an attempt to mitigate or relieve present distresses, without in the least giving the prisoner a rationale of his own responsibility for his present condition—nor pointing the real way out."

"But that doesn't mean we should not relieve distress anywhere if we can, does it, Mentor," broke in Spinster.

"Not at all, child," was the answer. "But let us never forget," he added impressively, "that real relief has to come from the own nature of the one who is distressed, and try to stimulate that to action. All other 'reliefs' are partial and temporary. It is true that one cannot talk philosophy to a hungry man, with much benefit to the man. But let the feeding be done with a view to making acceptable the greater help, and then a truer view of 'welfare work' will be had."

*******

"Well, Doctor, our talkative neighbor did not rob us of our theosophical evening after all, did she," said Mother with a little laugh.

"I guess I was a bit hasty, Mother," answered Doctor fondly, "she really helped us to it."

"And now you see, Doctor, why every circumstance supplies an opportunity, don't you," said Mentor.

"They seem to when you're around, Mentor," was the answer, "and no mistake."

"They ought to for all of us," said Mentor gravely. "No circumstance, no environment need be detrimental to right thought, right speech and right action—nor will they be if we are right. Everything in life, from large to small, presents an opportunity for experience and growth; looked at that way, even trivial events become of moment—and distresses and mistakes no longer break us down but are seen as aids to growth in strength and knowledge."

Theosophy, March, 1918

April 1918

DOCTOR was late for dinner that evening. This is nothing new in our Family—it happens with distressing regularity in fact. But this particular evening had been set apart for a "Family chat", for the reason that the Doctor himself had remarked at breakfast that he could come home early and would doubtless have the evening free. Mother had delayed dinner for a full half hour, but the Family had quite finished when Doctor's car rolled up the drive past the dining room windows. A moment or two later he was at table, and Anna was serving his belated meal.

"What kept you, Father?" asked Spinster. "You look all tired out—and there's a little smudge of mud on your right cheek, sir", she added mischievously.

"Don't make him talk now, child, let him eat his dinner in peace—he must be famished", said Mother, as the Doctor absently wiped his cheek with his napkin.

"That's a good word for it, Mother", he remarked a moment later, as Anna changed the plates. "I am hungry, and no mistake. Just drove in from San Fernando; called there on an accident case. It's a thirty mile run from here—and I didn't lose any time on the road."

"Now, Father, I am afraid that you do not realize how fast you drive at times", interrupted Mother anxiously. "You know you can't see very well at dusk—why did you do it?"

"To keep my promise to get home to you and the Family, my dear Madam", answered Doctor, with a ceremonious bow.

"It seems to me", interrupted Mentor, "that Doctor has a serious tale to unfold; suppose we stop questioning and listen to what he has to say."

"Well, I can't tell you why I was called", answered Doctor. "Guess they just heard I was in town and called me in consultation. But it certainly brought me into the most curious case I have met with yet." He paused, as if still studying in his mind over something, while the Family waited with some patience, knowing the Doctor's ways.

"It was like this", he continued, "I wasn't very busy this afternoon; got done about three o'clock and decided to run up to San Fernando and take the plaster cast off that little Smith boy's leg. Well, I fixed him up all right and was just leaving the house, when a hurry call came over their phone for me to go right down to the garage where the victims of an automobile accident back in the hills were being brought by the garage people's service car. I got there just as they arrived—one man dead, and another very badly crushed. We got him fixed up the best we could by the time the County ambulance had arrived, and sent him in to the hospital. Perhaps the poor fellow will pull through—I hope so", he added with a sigh.

"You said it was a curious case, Doctor", Spinster reminded him, as he settled back in his chair as if the story were all told.

"So I did", was the answer, "and so it is—for, Mentor," he continued, "here is one of the most interesting studies of Karma I have ever known. This accident occurred in the Newhall Pass, just this side of the tunnel—you remember the place. Well, two families of friends, each in its own car, were touring south on a pleasure trip. One car developed engine trouble on the north side of the Pass, so the other car was hooked on in front to tow the disabled car into town. They got to the crest of the Pass and stopped for a while to cool off the motor of the towing car. The driver of this tow car noted that his friend in the other car seemed nervous and, knowing how wearisome it is to be towed down a long grade—and dangerous too for a nervous person—proposed that all of the folks 'swap places'. After some argument pro and con this was done, and the cars went through the tunnel safely and were just starting down this side of the Pass when a great slide of earth and rock came rushing down one side of the Pass wall and practically buried the rear car. The man who was so thoughtful of his friend was killed outright and this other poor fellow who sat beside him was badly crushed. The two remaining people in the car were shocked, scratched and bruised, but not badly injured". The Doctor sat quiet for a moment and then added. "Why, they had only just changed seats a moment or two before—and if they hadn't, the other party would have met the slide. It's karmic action all right, but so remarkable it almost takes your breath away!"

The Family sat quiet for a few moments after Doctor finished his recital. Mother's hand shook a little as she poured the Doctor's coffee. Spinster played with a spoon absently. Mentor was in a brown study.

"Those poor people who changed places with their friends must be feeling dreadfully this evening", remarked Mother presently, a world of sympathy in her kindly face.

"Yes, but they weren't to blame, were they Mentor?", said Spinster. "It reminds me of that old Bible saying, 'the one shall be taken and the other left' ", she added softly as if speaking to herself.

"No, they weren't to blame, of course", answered Mentor slowly, rousing from his abstraction. "I was thinking", he added. "of some of the Aphorisms on Karma, printed long ago in The Path magazine by Mr. Judge. You see, it's only by an understanding of Karma and its application that one can explain such a happening as this one. It's just like a bolt from the blue, and without rhyme or reason, if one has no true philosophy of life—no knowledge of karma and reincarnation. Here is a man who, to help his friend, and unknowingly, places himself where he is killed, apparently in that friend's place. That was the precipitating cause, the spark that ignited the explosion—the final act that permitted the adjustment of effect for some far-reaching cause that must have been set in motion in a previous life—perhaps many lives before.

"The changing of seats was an insignificant matter in itself, but it is often just such insignificant events that precipitate heavy karmic retributions from other times. Witness this present world war, for instance, with the millions of souls involved—and apparently precipitated by the assassination of two relatively unimportant people by some obscure person or another."

"What particular Aphorisms did you have in mind, Mentor?" asked Doctor, rising from his chair, "I'd like to look them up again if you don't mind going over them."

The Family moved into the living room, and Spinster got the book (THEOSOPHY, Vol. I, December, 1912) from the book case.

"Well, all of these are good to study and think about", said Mentor, turning the pages slowly, but here are the two Aphorisms I had specially in mind—on page 51 he says:

"(30) Karma operates to produce cataclysms of nature by concatenation through the mental and astral planes of being. A cataclysm may be traced to an immediate physical cause such as internal fire and atmospheric disturbance, but these have been brought on by the disturbance created through the dynamic power of human thought.

"(31) Egos who have no Karmic connection with a portion of the globe where a cataclysm is coming on are kept without the latter's operation in two ways: (a) by repulsion acting on their inner nature, and (b) by being called and warned by those who watch the progress of the world."

"Now these two Aphorisms are the general statements", Mentor continued, "and we can make the particular applications of them to the unfortunate occurrence that Doctor has related. That landslide was a minor 'cataclysm of nature'. It was ripe for precipitation because the natural conditions and the beings concerned were brought together. The idea of 'changing seats' came from the inner nature of the man who suggested it—and inwardly the being undoubtedly knew that the time for the karmic adjustment was at hand, though the physical man recognized it not, nor understood rightly the impulse that caused him to act—and perhaps mercifully so", he added seriously.

"We all might get some sense of realization that we are continuous beings, Family", he continued, "from this true story the Doctor has brought home to us tonight. The past of each one of us is full of unexpended causes. Each one of us has many impulses—intuitions, rather—to act at times in ways that we cannot explain. If we studied these we might find out something that would enable us to live more wisely and fully, and learn more of this wonderfully complex nature of ours that we must master before our task is done".

************

"I must telephone the hospital", said Doctor, rising, "and learn how that chap we sent there is coming on. By the way, Spinster", he added, "there were three women in the party. I'm going to dress the bruises of one of them again tomorrow, and you may go with me, if Mentor thinks well of it. They're in great distress, of course, and perhaps you can find some words to help."

"Sympathy is the road, my Dear", said Mentor, as the Doctor left to do his telephoning. "Yes, go with him, and from simple human sympathy move on, as openings show themselves in the talk, to speak of the truer and deeper things. What was it that H. P. B. said in the Voice of the Silence:

"Give light and comfort to the toiling pilgrim, and seek out him who knows still less than thou; who in his wretched desolation sits starving for the bread of Wisdom and the bread which feeds the shadow, without a Teacher, hope, or consolation, and—let him hear the Law."

Theosophy, April, 1918

May 1918

THE Easter vacation brought into the Family circle again our bespectacled Student and one of her University friends. Both of them were vigorous out-of-door girls, and in consequence wind-blown and sleepy when night came and the snapping wood fire "just to take the chill off"—sent its grateful, flickering glow through the darkened living-room.

"No books this week, young ladies," was the Doctor's admonition when the pair arrived, looking somewhat the worse for wear after a strenuous social and study admixture of some weeks.

"No late hours, either, girls," added Mother—"just make your vacation a real resting time; you both need it, I can see that."

Our friends were agreed for once that parental advice was good, so the regular philosophic calm of our household was not to any considerable extent shattered by their advent. Family dinners were rather lively gatherings, however, as the young folks added their turns to the usual table talk; and it was at one of these somewhat protracted sessions that Doctor began to talk of one of his experiences as a young physician.

"We used to call it 'hallucination' in those days," he remarked after describing the condition of a former patient who had ultimately died in an asylum for the insane. "But that word is so general that it is hardly sufficiently descriptive nowadays," he continued. "This man suffered from 'delusions of greatness', or megalomania. He thought he was a great person and was constantly associating with angels, though nobody else could see what he himself said he saw."

"It's some kind of astral intoxication," said Mentor, "and as pitiable a condition as is the physical kind, but much more difficult to get rid of and of course, not generally understood by our alienists."

Student's friend, who is little interested in Theosophy, had been listening very closely to the conversation. "Why I knew a girl," she remarked, "who thought she had seen and talked with Jesus Christ. She told me about it the day after her 'vision', and nothing could shake her as to its reality."

"Was she a devoted Christian?" asked Mentor.

"Yes, apparently a very sincere one," was the answer.

"That accounts for part of it," said Mentor. "Just how did the experience occur?"

The Family settled back for the story, and Student's friend began:

"Well, I can't say that I can give all the details correctly. I used to go to school with her, but I rather lost sight of her when we moved to another part of the city a few years ago. Her parents were very religious people and Letty was much interested in church work. It was just after a series of revival meetings she had attended when she had her experience, and the event took place in the last surroundings you would expect such a vision to occur in—in a department store!"

There was a ripple of comment around the table. "Queer place to meet Jesus Christ in," rumbled the Doctor.

"Well, of all things!" ejaculated Mother.

"You're making it up, you shameless youngster," charged Spinster.

"Now children, let her go on," chided Mentor, "it's interesting—and very probable indeed," he added. "I don't for one moment doubt the girl saw something; the only question is, exactly what did she see?"

"Well, she said she was in the store shopping," continued our guest, "and was just pricing some hosiery when something 'went snap' in her head—that's the way she put it—and then there appeared Jesus himself in a shining blue robe, and then—snap! the vision was gone, and she was talking with the clerk about the hosiery again. I asked her how she knew it was Jesus, and she said it was just like the pictures of Him she had seen. 'But,' I said to her, 'those pictures of Jesus you've seen are not portraits, but merely the artists' conceptions of the Christ. If He exists, or ever did exist, He may not look like any of them.' That didn't make any difference to her: she said she just knew it was Jesus, and that my statements were irreverent and unchristian, and that I ought to be ashamed of myself."

"She didn't want to think it was anybody else, did she, Mentor?" remarked Doctor, as Student's friend finished her story.

"That's just it, Doctor," Mentor answered. "People who have 'visions' and see strange sights don't want to learn the rationale of them. That's part of their intoxication. This poor girl clothed what she saw with her own Christian ideas: result, the firm conviction of the living reality of her own conception of a Saviour. She saw just what she wanted to see, the reflection of her own ideas and conceptions."

"Then you think she really did see something, Mentor?" asked Student.

"Undoubtedly," was the answer, "but it may well have been subjective rather than objective, something within herself." He turned to Student's friend, "You see, Theosophy teaches that our planet is not merely this gross ball of earth we see, but something far more complex than that. It states, as science does, that all planets begin in a 'nebulous condition', and gradually cool, condense and harden until we have a gross, concrete earth such as we now know. But the old teaching adds that all these prior states still exist in and around the earth; that our planet has seven planes of substance in fact—not super-imposed on each other like the skins of an onion—but inter-blending and inter-penetrating at every point. The teaching further states that all human beings likewise are possessors of bodies, or 'sheaths of the soul', corresponding to the various states of substance of which the planet is composed—we all have them with us right now, whether we are aware of it or not. We are the Perceivers, the consciousness which is using the various sheaths or bodies, to contact the different planes of matter. What easier, then, than to realize that a slight temporary lack of co-ordination of these sheaths should give us a passing glimpse of some other plane of matter than this physical one, and that we, misunderstanding, and not knowing our nature, should be fascinated and deluded, and give some explanation in accordance with our previous fixed ideas."

Mentor paused for a moment, and looked at our guest inquiringly.

"It sounds reasonable and furnishes some basis for explanation of 'psychic experiences'", said the latter. "I had no idea Theosophy was as interesting as that."

"The next plane of substance to our gross material plane," continued Mentor, "is called the astral plane. It really is a 'finer physical', the real physical in fact. The matter of that plane is luminous, or radiant—science has come to recognize that there is such a thing as 'radiant matter'. The Astral plane has its own beings just as our physical plane has; but they are of their own kind, including many that are sub-human, and some that are inimical to man. Supposing that through abnormal 'religious' ecstasy or hysteria, or through 'auto-suggestion', or the intense concentration upon a fixed idea, I so disorganize my nature that I am no longer normal—my bodies, or sheaths, no longer in natural co-ordination; it is easy to understand that I might see some astral denizen; and that, not understanding my condition or the sevenfold nature of the planet and of myself, I should mistake the nature of the sight and of the being. Why, it is a fact that some of these beings can take on the coloring and qualifications that our own thinking suggests, and actually attach themselves to us if we are unwary and uninformed. Some spiritualistic phenomena and some of the old tales of 'hauntings' can be accounted for in this way."

"Didn't Madame Blavatsky and Mr. Judge both warn students of the dangers of the astral plane?" asked Spinster.

"Indeed they did," was the answer, "and yet some students have actually 'gone in' for astral experiences, trying in many ways to break into the astral plane. In fact, there are in the public eye today vain and self-deluded people who have constituted themselves 'leaders' and 'initiates'; who consult their 'Masters' and 'Teachers' and bring to their believing followers messages of various kinds, as the result of astral intoxication. Undoubtedly these astral 'topers' do see something: beings who seem glorious to the one viewing them, beings who reflect the very ideas and thoughts of the deluded seer, beings who tell him to do just exactly what he wants to do. 'Beware the Star Rishees', warned H. P. B. But warnings are of no use to those who will not heed them. Those who are 'caught in', astrally speaking, are sure they are right and on the high road to success. But," Mentor paused impressively, "their last state is worse, far worse, than the first, and often ends in mental and moral breakdown."

"What is the true line in these matters?" asked Doctor.

"It's the line the Teachers have shown," answered Mentor, "and no other. If strange experiences come, just note them—that's all, and go on with your duties. We are here in physical bodies, and by that token we can know that, in a universe of Law, we must be right where we belong. Let us do our duty by every duty, as physical beings. When that is fully done we will know it and find ourselves quite naturally in other fields, with other quite clear tasks before us. It's about as safe and proper for the average human being to try to break in to the astral plane as for a child to play in a dynamite storehouse. The child may come out unscathed; but the 'phenomena hunter', the 'psychic investigator,' the 'applied psychologist', or the vain—glorious and selfish student—all of these have much less chance of safety than the little child. For thirty years I have seen people trying to play with the 'astral fire', and for thirty years I have seen them burnt. Some few I have been able to help—many I have tried to help, but they thought that help was something else."

Mentor stopped speaking, and there was silence about the table for a few moments, until a telephone call for Doctor broke up the Family group.

"You must tell me what books to read, Student," said her friend as they moved out toward the living-room. "I never thought that Theosophy covered so much ground. I imagined it was just some kind of a religion, or sect."

"If religion is truth, then Theosophy is religion," Spinster suggested. "Theosophy puts us in the way of knowing truth wherever it may be found, but that isn't the usual conception of religion, is it ?"

"Why, I shouldn't mind being 'religious' on that basis," laughed Student's friend. "Ho to the bookcase, Student, I'm going to start right in!"

THE WARRIOR*

Seership is of the Self; actorship, of the powers. For, as the great King, even without being engaged himself, becomes the warrior, through his army as instrument, simply through sending them, by his command; so the steadfast Spirit, through seeing and other powers, becomes the beholder, the speaker, the willer, and takes on other powers like these, by being near only, by unison, by sending them forth, by a strong attraction, like that of the iron-loving lodestone, strong without exertion.¹

Theosophy, May, 1918

* Reprinted from the "Oriental Department" papers, May–June, 1896.

¹ Sankya Aphorisms of Kapila, Book ii, 29, with the Commentary of Vijnana Acharya.

June 1918

THE "Visiting Adept" has been with us for a few days upon one of his rare and exceedingly welcome sojourns. We have all had such a good time together that the members of the Family are finding it rather difficult to settle down to mundane, workaday affairs again. As Spinster regretfully remarked, "After one of Quammy's visits I always want to quote those lines from Whittier Maud Muller, I think:

". . . . took up the burden of life again, only
saying, 'It might have been'."

For "Quammy" and the "Visiting Adept" are one and the same person—the first phonetically representing Student's baby name for our old and well-loved Family friend, and the second a felicitous characterization by the Doctor, brought out in a whimsical argument one day years ago—and never forgotten. We all love Quammy for himself cultivated, genial, genuine and refreshing. But every one of the Family gives a different reason for the affectionate regard bestowed. Mother says she likes Quammy because his manners are so perfect. Spinster joys in his sympathetic knowledge of music and his still beautiful voice. Student loves him because he is "Quammy", and always will be "Quammy" to her. Doctor dotes on his contradictions, and Mentor is always interested because, as he puts it, "One never knows where old Quammy will break loose next."

For Quammy always has a new mystery on hand, occultly speaking. He is always and forever finding some new clue, or "Key", or person, or book, or system—by which he is at last to arrive on the heights of wisdom. To be sure, Quammy's "finds" always explode, or wither away, or turn out to be quite something else but that is a mere detail to Quammy, who always turns up smiling and eager with some new discovery.

"Mystery to me about Quammy," Doctor often remarks. "In everything else old Q. is as shrewd and clever as he can be—just look at the friends he has, at his business sagacity, at his genuine culture. But in matters 'occult' he is as credulous as a child; anybody can take him in. He has been 'done', and done brown, times without number—still believes all he hears or reads, along these lines, regardless of the source, or his own experiences. What do you call it, Mentor?"

And then Mentor sometimes answers, "Did you ever read Mr. Judge's allegory, 'The Wandering Eye'? Read it again, Doctor, and then you'll understand just what is the matter with Quammy—and get a fuller notion of how Karma sometimes works, too, Doctor; for Quammy must have been the same old 'Quammy' in other lives, and will be in lives to come, until he at last wakes up".

Quammy arrived for luncheon of a Tuesday and everybody was glad to see him. Doctor arranged his practice for a free afternoon and evening; Student "flew home" from the University, as she expressed it "too see her Quammy"; and there was a very merry dinner indeed. It was over the coffee, served in the living room that our "Visiting Adept" at last waxed confidential, and trotted out his latest hobby for the Family's delectation and lasting benefit. For Quammy declared that at last he had found the real thing—nothing less than a book that gave precise and definite information about the Masters.

"Just what I've been looking for all these years", he declared. "Oh, you needn't smile in that superior way, Doctor; it's based on Madame Blavatsky's teaching—some of it very esoteric, of course—the writer says so. It tells in a simple, straightforward way just the line of effort to which each of the ten Masters mentioned devotes himself; and gives a whole lot of information about Them—does away with a lot of this silly mystery".

"Ten"! gasped Spinster, open mouthed.

"Teachings of H. P. B."! snorted Doctor incredulously.

Mentor looked at our old Quammy delightedly for an instant, for the latter's perennial capacity for believing things is a never-ceasing source of amusement. Then his face turned very stern for a moment, softening into a pitying seriousness as he remarked, "Gently, Quammy, gently! The term 'Master' is a very sacred one to students—some of them, at least—and not to be bandied about in such a reckless way. Those who reverence Masters as ideals and facts in nature carry ever in their hearts the warning of H. P. B. regarding the 'Abuse of Sacred Names'. What is this book you speak of have you it with you?"

"Why it's from H. P. B.'s own teachings, I tell you", declared Quammy warmly, "and no offense or irreverence intended at all, I assure you . . . the book is on the table beside my bed. Student dear, will you get it for me, please?"

There was a tendency to silence around the table as Student left to get Quammy's book. Mother tactfully broke it by pouring a "wee bit" more coffee for Mentor, who was smiling by this time. Doctor gave vent to an almost soundless chuckle now and then. Spinster turned uneasily in her chair.

But Quammy was not in the least disturbed, grasped the book as Student brought it to him, and handed it triumphantly to Mentor, saying, "There you have it, Mentor, The Work of the Masters, tells about ten or so of them, based on the writings of H. P. B.—just read the introduction".

Mentor took the book and began to run it over, while Quammy continued to expatiate on the value of his find. "I just knew how much you'd want to get hold of this", our guest went on, "knowing how much you reverence H. P. B. and her teachings". And then he began to tell us where he found the book and something of what was in it and Quammy is so beautifully enthusiastic and tells things so delightfully that quite half an hour had passed in this way before the Family realized it. Mentor was still running over the book when a pause came in the talk. "Well, what do you think of it?" asked Quammy, looking over at his old friend.

"Seventy-eight pages", remarked Mentor quizzically, "printed on good paper and excellently bound, Quammy—that's the way Mr. Judge once 'reviewed' a book that was supposed to be very wonderful in his Path magazine. I'm not going to characterize this book, Quammy, for denunciation never yet got us anywhere, and is no part of our duty, except to say that perhaps one is better off to know very little than to have so much information about so many things 'that ain't so'. Let's talk about the book a bit and perhaps you will see more what I mean as we go along".

"But it's from H. P. B.", interrupted Quammy.

"Just hold on a moment", replied Mentor, opening the book. "Now, let's be fair: the writer says in the Introduction, 'I am merely offering my conceptions of these ideals as I have come to look upon them through reading the works of H. P. Blavatsky, and by the traditions which have been current among one group of esoteric students who look to her as their teacher'. And then he goes on to tell of different 'Masters', their 'differing ideals' and their 'work'. Of course, the implication here is that what he writes is in accord with Theosophy as set forth in the writings of H. P. B., and as such the book is a misrepresentation, whether the writer is conscious of that fact or not. For there is nothing in Her writings to justify, even by inference, what this writer imputes to Her works as authority for his statements. Nor is there any 'group of esoteric students', who really 'look to H. P. P. as their teacher', who would for one instant countenance the farrago of speculation and misconception that follows in the book. How any sane person could possibly expect to palm off this kind of mis-information upon anybody who is really familiar with H. P. B.'s writings is the greatest 'mystery' about the book."

"How about the ten Masters the book mentions?" asked Spinster, as Mentor paused for a moment.

Mentor laughed, in spite of himself.

"Ten fiddlesticks"! snorted Doctor. And then to Quammy, who was beginning to squirm uneasily in his chair, "Why, Quammy, you old innocent, only two Masters are specifically mentioned at all by H. P. B. and She gave mighty little of what you would call 'information' about them."

"That is so", confirmed Mentor. "She wrote somewhere of Adepts, I think three in all were mentioned in a specific way. One was a Copt, another a Venetian, and another—well, I don't remember, but it doesn't matter anyway. Two Masters, and two only, are specifically mentioned by Her. Adepts, you know, represent many degrees of development, but a Master is beyond all that. Why, what do you think a Master is, Quammy?"

But Quammy was not at all certain. He "supposed" and "presumed" rather weakly, and at last frankly admitted he really had no clear idea of what the term means.

"Neither has the writer of your remarkable book, Quammy", rejoined Mentor. "Just listen to this, for instance:

"'This ideal differs with the Master, and the perfect man in the consciousness of K. H. is not at all the perfect man in the consciousness of, say, Hilarion'.

"Or again: 'The Masters themselves are often bewildered'. What do you think of that, Doctor? Doesn't this writer know the Theosophical teachings at all"?

"Why, a Master is a full seven-principled being, as I understand it," replied Doctor. "His consciousness is universal so far as this solar system is concerned".

"Certainly, that will do for a working basis," said Mentor. "Now, fancy such a being 'often bewildered', as this writer puts it. Why, there is as great a gulf between our range of consciousness and that of a Master as there is between our own and that of an animal. And yet this writer proceeds to tell us quite definitely about Them and Their 'bewilderment' and Their 'work', and so on."

"It's like a bug trying to tell the other bugs about the basis and activities of human beings, isn't it?" remarked Student.

Quammy laughed. His "mystery" exploded, he was already beginning to enjoy the conversation, with that wonderful capacity to rebound that makes him "Quammy".

"What particularly interests me", said Doctor thoughtfully, "is where this writer could possibly have secured the matter out of which he made his book. In the light of H. P. B.'s writings, both exoteric and esoteric, it reads like sheer invention; but does it seem probable that anybody—let alone a decent and well-meaning man as this writer undoubtedly is—would knowingly make up something out of 'whole cloth'? Or does it seem likely either", he added, with a smile, "that he would use the names of H. P. B. and Mr. Judge so openly and casually in a book that hundreds of well-posted students of Their writings would see, unless he himself thought his statements were in line with these Teachers?"

"Guess you didn't get the full significance of that reference to a 'group of esoteric students', Doctor," replied Mentor. "This writer is gullible, that is all," he continued. "He has been fooled to the top of his bent by a lot of talkative students of some of the various Theosophical Societies. It is just the kind of thing that happens if one credits the various 'say-so's of the 'mysterious' type of student—especially those who were in the Movement when H. P. B. and W. Q. J. were alive and working. Why, I have heard the most impossible statements you can imagine attributed to Them—not only in disagreement with the Teachers' own writings, but quite out of character and completely ridiculous. Yet the 'old-time' student who repeats them gives them to you as serious facts, told to you as a special favor. The world is full of students who go about distributing their 'H. P. B. told me's, and 'Mr. Judge said that's—with the utmost confidence in the world. They expect to be believed, and they are believed by many hearers—who go their ways and repeat what has been told them, with their own conscious or unwitting variations, until quite a legend, or 'tradition' as this writer calls it, has been built up a farrago of mis-information, superstition, speculation and nonsense."

"What is the safeguard for the student in these matters, Mentor?" asked Spinster.

"The safeguard for the sincere student, his bulwark in fact, lies in the study and application of the Teachers' known writings'", was the answer. "Their writings give full directions and contain a synthetic, self-proving philosophy. We don't need to depend upon the statements of any living persons. We have the Teachers' own statements in black on white".

"And They enjoined no beliefs whatever", broke in Doctor emphatically, "not even in what They themselves gave out as Theosophy: They told us to test and prove for ourselves, reiterating that such a course was the only road to knowledge."

"But about the book, Mentor?" asked Student, bringing the talk back to the subject under discussion.

"To take up and comment upon the chapters seriatim", Mentor began again, "would be giving the book more attention than it deserves. But it may be interesting to say something—always bearing in mind that the writer imputes his statements to what he has gained from H. P. B.'s works!—

"Chapter I, about 'K. H.': he says this Master 'is the inspirer of all philosophers and scientists'. There is nothing anywhere in H. P. B.'s writings to support the statement. But the writer goes on to say, 'We may thus look upon the Scranton Correspondence schools and Cambridge University, . . . . Leipzic University . . . and Harvard University, as all parts and centres of the activity of K. H.' Can you well imagine a more gross materialization of even his own mistaken idea?

"Chapter II, about 'Morya': he says this Master 'is in the work of all diplomats whose energies are directed to the unity of nations, and many of these great diplomats and statesmen are his disciples and very close to his council'. Nothing of this in H. P. B.'s writings; and no evidence whatever that it is true.

"Chapter III, about 'Hilarion'. This personage, as a Master, was never mentioned in H. P. B.'s writings at all. Mr. Judge mentions the name incidentally just once—but doesn't call him a 'Master'.

"Chapter IV, about 'The Austrian'. The writer begins, 'H. P. Blavatsky and W. Q. Judge referred to this Master as the Austrian . . . '. He carefully refrains from giving book and page references, however.

"But what's the use"—continued Mentor, laying down the book, "Quammy, if you will go on believing and believing, nobody can stop you; but don't you come here and try to burden dear old H. P. B. with the responsibility of your fictions. We have all Her writings and we know them well."

There was a laugh at this, in which our "Visiting Adept" heartily joined.

"You'll have to sing for us now, Quammy", said Spinster, "just to take the taste out of our mouths, you know".

******

And so there was music—real music, for Quammy knows how—and reminiscence and story-telling, until it was late indeed.

But next morning at the breakfast table old Quammy was seen to note carefully in his address book something he took down from the classified advertising section of one of the newspapers.

"What have you there, Quammy?" asked Doctor innocently.

"Oh, just something I saw", answered our guest, "rather, an address I wanted", he corrected, looking almost sheepish—if Quammy can ever be said to look "sheepish". And then he added confidentially to Mentor, as if of course Mentor would sympathetically understand:

"These psychics and mediums are so interesting, you know!"

SECRET DOCTRINE EXTRACTS*

What says the esoteric teaching with regard to fire? "Fire." it says, "is the most perfect and unadulterated reflection, in Heaven as on Earth, of the ONE FLAME. It is Life and Death, the origin and the end of every material thing. It is divine 'SUBSTANCE'". Thus, not only the FIRE-WORSHIPPER, the Parsee, but even the wandering savage tribes of America, which proclaim themselves "born of fire," show more science in their creeds and truth in their superstitions, than all the speculations of modern physics and learning. The Christian who says: "God is a living Fire," and speaks of the Pentecostal "Tongues of Fire" and of the "burning bush" of Moses, is as much a fire-worshipper as any other "heathen." The Rosicrucians, among all the mystics and Kabalists, were those who defined Fire in the right and most correct way. Procure a sixpenny lamp, keep it only supplied with oil, and you will be able to light at its flame the lamps, candles, and fires of the whole globe without diminishing that flame. If the Deity, the radical One, is eternal and an infinite substance ("the Lord thy God is a consuming fire") and never consumed, then it does not seem reasonable that the Occult teaching should be held as unphilosophical when it says: "Thus were the Arupa and Rupa worlds formed: from ONE light seven lights; from each of the seven, seven times seven," etc., etc.

Theosophy, June, 1918

* From the Original Edition Vol. I, pp. 121–122; see Vol. I, pp. 146–147 Third Edition.

July 1918

PLEASANT to sit and talk this way", remarked Doctor, stifling a yawn, "but we ought to be asleep, every one of us, this very minute."

It was in fact getting a bit late for busy people to be unnecessarily awake. The Family had attended a theosophical meeting that evening, and now lingered in the comfortable living-room to "talk things over." Mentor was as alert as ever, for the clock never seems to exist for him. Mother had picked up her knitting, utilizing every moment as is her habit. Spinster was unusually bright-eyed, declaring that sleep had no immediate charms for her.

"Funny thing I heard tonight", remarked Doctor, with a reminiscent chuckle—"a pitiful thing, too", he continued more soberly. "One man I talked with after the meeting was an old-time student of the philosophy, he said, and came out to the West to join a certain group of students who have established a community here. He found things so different from what he expected, so completely out of line with the common-sense teachings of Theosophy that he at last left the community, poorer in health and purse."

"I don't see why you call that 'funny'," said Mother warmly, as the Doctor paused in his remarks. "For a man long past middle life to break away from his friends and old associations and then meet such a bitter disappointment seems to me anything but 'funny'."

"The amusing part comes later, Mother", resumed Doctor. "I gave you the pitiful part first. This man told me that the woman who was pointed to as the 'occult head' of this group of students, used to go into some sort of a trance now and then, and imitate what she supposed to be H. P. B.'s tone and manner. The implication was, of course, that this 'medium' was getting messages from H. P. B. And the students believed it, swallowed it as readily as a child takes candy. Can you credit such a thing among theosophical students in this day and age, Mentor?"

"I haven't the slightest doubt of it, Doctor", answered Mentor gravely. "For I have heard before of this particular case you mention. There are plenty of credulous people in the ranks of the Theosophical organizations today—this fact indeed keeps most of these societies in existence."

"But would you think that anything so crudely pretentious could possibly fool people intelligent enough to grasp even the simplest theosophical concepts?" insisted Doctor earnestly.

"The fact remains that it does", was the answer, "and students will thus permit themselves to be deceived as long as they continue to follow persons, and refuse to stand upon the philosophy itself as their basis.

"Somebody writes a few cryptic sentences, signs a pen name to them and prints them in a theosophical magazine", continued Mentor with a smile. "The matter itself is either a weak rearrangement of some of the true old writings, or perhaps a bit of twaddle of the 'sweetness and light' type. 'Ah! here is a message from the Master', cry some sentimental students, and no denial being made, all writings that appear thereafter over that pen name are accredited to some high and holy source."

"It's old human superstition coming to the surface, isn't it", remarked Spinster interestedly. "Why, I read something of the sort not long ago in a theosophical magazine. The implication was that the Masters had communicated the article through some personal channel, that They were struggling for the right in this world war, and so forth—all that silly kind of sentimentality, you know" she continued with a gesture of gushing words running on and on"quite out of line with H. P. P.'s and W. Q. J.'s teachings, direct and indirect, in regard to Masters. Why, you'd think to read it that They were actually struggling with 'dark powers' on the 'astral plane' it was almost as materialistic as some of Mr. Sinnett's later writings", she ended with a smile.

"What's the cause of that kind of nonsense, Mentor?" asked Doctor, earnestly.

"Two human tendencies", answered the latter briefly: "the desire of some people to appear as possessing high occult preferment; and the great capacity of average human nature to believe anything and everything read or heard. If students would only take to heart what Mr. Judge pointed out in regard to these various 'messages' utilize the same kind of good common-sense they employ in ordinary matters of life—there would be more real Theosophy, and less of 'astral gossip', in theosophical circles."

"Why, he said the message itself told its own story, didn't he, Mentor?" remarked Doctor briskly. "Seems to me I remember the advice he gave to students condenses to just about that."

"Well, I'll tell you a true incident", answered Mentor, with a reminiscent smile, "and you can draw your own deductions from it. I was myself present at the meeting I will describe, together with Mr. Judge and a half dozen or more students—their names do not matter. The place was Chicago; the year 1894, or thereabouts.

"A prominent member in Chicago", Mentor continued, "had received a 'message', and at the meeting I am speaking of asked Mr. Judge if he would say whether it was a genuine Master's message or not. Mr. Judge, after examining the paper, handed it to a lady sitting near him and asked her to state if the message were genuine. This lady was a very prominent theosophical worker whose writings had helped thousands of students and who was considered by many as very 'far advanced' in an occult way. She took the paper, held it against her solar plexus for a few moments, looking very intently off into space—quite with the air of a seeress—emerging from 'the silence' with an audible sigh and declaring the message 'genuine'.

"Mr. Judge then handed the paper to another student—a professional man of high standing who was devoting his life and fortune to theosophical work, was widely known as a lecturer, and who was considered by many a deeply versed 'esotericist'. This student placed the paper against his forehead, closed his eyes, looking very solemn and impressive for quite a few moments. He then declared the message not 'genuine'.

"Several other students were then asked to pronounce upon the matter; and each of them went through some sort of performance like those I have mentioned: one held the paper behind his back against his spine, I remember—please understand, Family, I am not romancing, but describing what went on before my own eyes— and Mr. Judge was as grave and serious through it all as you can imagine.

"Well, opinions were conflicting and about equally divided in regard to the paper, when Mr. Judge handed it to another student—this one a man of no pretentions but considerable common-sense. I remember he had a high, thin, piping voice, and I can hear him now as clearly as if he were presently speaking. He took the paper, read it, and handed it back to Mr. Judge. 'What do you say?' asked the latter. 'Why, I don't know', was the answer, 'but the advice in it seems excellent'. His thin piping voice fairly shrilled through the room.

"'That's good, Louie', said Mr. Judge—and went on talking about other matters, as if the question of the message were at last settled. He had been serious and unsmiling through all the psychic 'flip-flaps' and posturings of the students present, but I caught the glint of a twinkle in his eye now and then. A little later some of the students asked him if the message were indeed genuine. 'What difference does it make', was his answer, 'it may be or may not be: but as Louie has said, the advice in it seems excellent'; and with this remark the incident closed."

"I wonder how many of those students got the lesson", chuckled Doctor.

"Did Mr. Judge ask you, Mentor, to pass upon the genuineness of the message?" Mother enquired innocently.

Mentor laughed delightedly. "No, he did not, Mother—but 'Louie' had been doing theosophical work under my direction for some five or six years", he added, "if that information helps you any."

There was a general laugh at this, and the Family group broke up, to get some much needed rest.

"I never hear you 'giving out' any messages, Mentor", said Spinster, turning back at the door for a moment, with a little appreciative smile for her old friend.

"No, my dear", was the answer, "they're all given out—that is, the genuine ones. And you'll find them in the standard theosophical books—the writings of H. P. B. and W. Q. J. Full directions there for any and every student who wants to get on his own feet, theosophically speaking. We sure won't get any special 'messages' from Masters until we take full advantage of the general and easily accessible ones to be found in the printed words."

Theosophy, July, 1918

August 1918

BREAKFAST with the Family is usually anything but a household gathering. The exigencies of Doctor's profession seldom permit him to breakfast with the rest; and the other members of the Family are so busy these days that their orbits often do not touch until after mid-day. Doctor preaches hygienic eating, but his own morning habit is to "eat and run". This bright June morning, however, he was lingering over a newspaper before starting on his round of hospital patients; Mother, Spinster and Mentor, breakfasting together for once, were talking over their plans for the day. "Well, what's the news, Father?" asked Spinster, as Doctor laid his paper down on the table with a slap of decision.

"Most interesting, child, most interesting", chuckled Doctor, "a serious crisis is at hand! A lady from Hollywood writes a letter of protest because some folks out there are going to give a pageant on the 'Light of Asia': shouldn't be permitted in this Christian land and all that sort of thing."

"Really, Father?" asked Spinster. "But of course, you're joking", she smilingly added. "That kind of intolerance doesn't exist nowadays, especially in California."

Doctor picked up his paper again with a little snort of dissent. "Don't make any mistake, child", he remarked. "That kind of intolerance' does exist—and in California, too, as this letter proves. The ignorance and superstition that give birth to intolerance also exist, as the letter likewise demonstrates. For a lady who writes reasonably good English this correspondent seems about as ill-informed as is possible—and rather proud of it at that. Why will people rush into print, Mentor, in regard to matters they know nothing about?"

"Isn't it upon just such matters that human nature most plumes itself for its wisdom", answered Mentor with the utmost innocence of expression. "Seems to me I heard you declaring yourself quite emphatically last evening over modern methods of taxation and admitting before you finished that you had made no real study of taxation, further than to pay your rates."

There was a general laugh at this, in which Doctor heartily joined. "But I didn't rush into print over it", he declared, tapping the newspaper with his surgeon's fore-finger, "and advertise my ignorance to an appreciative world. Just let me read you this letter", he continued. "I've got a few minutes yet, and I'd like to hear your comments on it. Have I your permission, Mother?" with a glance at the head of the table. "All right, just listen to this"—and then he read the following:

THE "LIGHT OF ASIA."

Doctor paused a moment, and then added, "She signs her name and gives her address, wants to go on record evidently as 'a Christian woman' to show her Christian charity and Christ-like toleration and love, I suppose."

"That's not nice, Doctor", said Mother warmly. "The letter bespeaks a great deal of self-righteousness, of course, but she meant well enough and we've no right at all to criticise her personally, have we, Mentor?"

"Certainly not", was the answer. "That's the way with so many of us", turning to the Doctor, "we have such a personal way of criticising anything and everything. We might look on all these people as minds, and then we would find it easier to 'judge the act, and not the person'."

"That's right", agreed Doctor, with a regretful sigh. "I know these things, but I'm so apt to revert to the old habits of thought and speech. Almost glad I said it though", he added with a rueful smile, "for now I'll be on guard all day.".

"But we can consider the letter itself, can't we, Mentor", asked Spinster, "without violating the admonition 'judge not'? That would not be condemning any person, would it?"

"Certainly not, my dear", answered Mentor gently. "We can consider the statements and acts of individuals impersonally, as expressions of different minds, and thus gain further experience and discrimination. But passing judgment on persons, as such, or giving vent to personal condemnation, never will get us anywhere in the line of spiritual understanding or growth. Certainly it violates the ethics of Jesus, which are in no wise different from those enunciated by Buddha, or any other spiritual Teacher.

"But to consider the letter: this writer first seems to refer to 'Asia' as 'India'. Asia is a great continent of which India is only a single country—and the letter shows a misapprehension even in that minor detail. Again, the writer assumes that Buddhism is the religion of India when such is not the fact. The people of India have many theologies, almost as many as have the Christians' of America. In fact India contains something like three hundred different sects, among which the followers of the teachings of Buddha are almost as rare as actual followers of Jesus among Christians."

"But the letter calls our country a 'Christian Nation'", remarked Mother, as Mentor paused a moment. "Isn't that position quite unwarranted by the facts?"

"It certainly is", was the answer. "Why, the most casual consideration of the facts of our boasted civilization will prove that our nation is not Christian—in its social life, its politics, its laws or its commercial basis. We have taken the old Mosaic tradition of 'an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth', and made it the basis of our conduct, national and individual. That surely is not Christian, if 'Christianity' means the teachings of the Christ. This writer states that twenty-seven centuries of Buddhism in India have resulted in sorrow and hopelessness—meaning, I presume, the theologies and theological practices and customs of the peoples of India; but it is equally true that twenty centuries of theology among so-called Christians have not brought unity, happiness or freedom from crime and bloodshed. It is also true that practically all the 'Christian' nations of the world are now engaged in a war unequalled in history for its brutish cruelty and appalling ferocity—in fact Germany is a 'Christian nation'!"

"Again, the letter mentions the 'simple faith' of our forefathers. That 'simple faith', remember, instigated the Inquisition, drove the Pilgrims and Puritans to our shores, and then supplied the basis for even those fleeing refugees to establish their own cruel persecutions in New England for all who did not agree with them. It is interesting that the 'revelation' of 'Christianity' depends upon a number of isolated and conflicting manuscripts, writers unknown, and found by nobody knows whom. These were translated—often incorrectly, as repeated revisions demonstrate—and called the 'Bible' or 'Word of God'. And yet none of the Bible readers or believers really know anything about its truth or its origin; while if they believe all that is included in it, they are believing statements that are mutually contradictory. What kind of intelligence is that?"

"The phrase in the letter that amuses me most", said Doctor, with a chuckle, "is that 'ancient heathen cult'."

"Yes, that is amusing", agreed Mentor, "a naive touch of human nature. The Buddhists call us heathen, and we 'Christians' call them heathen. Everybody whose theology is different from our 'ology' is a heathen, of course—and that settles it! But, our 'sons and daughters', as this writer fears, are beginning to break the moulds of superstition and ignorance, are beginning to apply to matters religious the same keen intelligence that we give to other departments of life; and the great hope for America lies in this fact. We shall come to see that the teachings of Buddha and the teachings of Jesus are in no wise different; that all great Teachers down the ages have taught the same doctrine—the ancient Wisdom-Religion, the truth about all things. We will realize that our theological differences are due to the interpreters and their different interpretations that we have accepted—never to the Teachers, the many Christs, for these always taught and demonstrated the unity of all truth and of all beings. And then will we refuse interpreter and interpretation alike, and seek the Source, the God within. That is the 'Path' of Buddha and the 'Way' of Jesus—the quest of the great ones of all ages. 'The Kingdom of Heaven is within you'. 'Seek ye first the Kingdom of Heaven'. These words attributed to Jesus are the admonition of all true Teachers down the ages—Jesus, Those who preceded Him, Those who came after Him. These beings all have taught the same old Wisdom-Religion. It is called 'Theosophy' today; it was called by other names at other times; the teaching is always the same, whatever the language, the parables, the terminology, the name."

Doctor looked at his watch and hurried for the door, picking up his hat and bag en route for the garage.

"What do you think about this pageant anyway, Mentor", asked Mother, rising from the table.

"Oh, I don't think anything about it at all", said Mentor, with a smile. "It seems like a rather unnecessary expenditure of effort these days, when there is so much real work to be done, both outward and in the spreading of true ideas. But we have nothing to do with it, and it is none of our business."

"Isn't that just so", declared Spinster. "If we only attend to that which is distinctly our own business, we won't have any time or inclination to criticise others for doing what they see to do, will we?"

SECRET DOCTRINE TEACHINGS*

The idea of Absolute Unity would be broken entirely in our conception, had we not something concrete before our eyes to contain that Unity. And the deity being absolute, must be omnipresent, hence not an atom but contains IT within itself. The roots, the trunk and its many branches are three distinct objects, yet they are one tree.

Theosophy, August, 1918

* From the Original Edition Vol. I, pp. 58, 59; see Vol. I, p. 89, Third Edition.

September 1918

THE usual summer peregrination of our Family did not come off this year. As Mother remarked, "There is really too much to do I wouldn't feel right to run away from it;" and this was in fact the concensus of Family opinion—concretely expressed by the busiest summer we have known in years. There have been some notable "week-ends", however, when the mountain camp was opened on a Friday, perhaps, and closed again in time for Mentor to be rushed to town by automobile and train in order to look after the Theosophical Meeting on Sunday night.

Quammy, our "Visiting Adept," has been a feature of some of these well-earned "week-ends". Summer weather has no effect, one way or the other, on our genial old friend. And what an addition to a camping party Quammy always is—the very life of it, no less! Fancy stout and rubicund old Quammy swathed in one of the giggling Anna's aprons, broiling trout as he alone can broil them at our rustic fire-place! Quammy cooks; Quammy draws water; he sweeps, he fashions rustic seats, he hangs hammocks so the sunshine never strikes hot on your face. And in the evening Quammy sings, and sings wonderfully, to the strains of a sweet-toned and much battered guitar.

That he is the same old credulous Quammy—always "believing and believing", as Student put it one day—has been brought most amusingly to our attention more than once this summer. The "occult" has no small place in his attentions and he proposes to surmount it if the process costs him all he has. Doctor declares that Quammy rhymes with Swami, and proves it by the fact that our friend has found, and lost after some experience, several dark-skinned persons of Eastern extraction who needed what Quammy could supply. But Quammy always turns up serene and still searching no matter how grossly he has been swindled—he is made that way. He has found time this summer, in spite of his Liberty Loan and Red Cross activities, to buy and read the latest "occult" books, consult and "test" several mediums—meeting the incidental expenses without a quiver. He has attended seances, conventions where "communication was established with the astral bodies of the heroes of Pershing's forces who have died in France", practised psychology, gotten some "absent treatments" for a severe case of oak poisoning, which Doctor finally alleviated, purchased a sword for ceremonial magic experimentation—and broken it clearing brush one day up at the Camp—as well as a "magic mirror" and a "gazing crystal". In fact Quammy has had a lively and expensive summer, alternately enlivening and distressing his friends, as well as adding to their comfort and pleasure. Without Quammy some of our camp-fire talks could never have taken the turn they did. For instance:

"Oh, I see now why all you Theosophists come to California", Quammy remarked one evening as he was reading in the early twilight a newspaper he had brought up from town the evening before. "New race forming, and getting ready for the Manu—why have you never said anything about this, Mentor—never knew you to be so secretive before?"

Mentor for once looked puzzled. "What on earth have you got hold of now, Quammy?" he asked. Spinster, who had read the paper, glanced over to Doctor with a significant smile; the latter began to chuckle.

"Interview with a 'prominent Theosophist' in the Evening Herald, Mentor. Big head-lines, very important article—Hollywood, 'the cradle' of the new sub-race—here, you read it yourself," he continued, handing the newspaper over. Mentor took it, adjusted his position to the fading light, and this is what he read:

CLAIM L. A. TO CRADLE SUPER RACE TO FACE NEXT FLOOD
BOTTOM OF PACIFIC TO RISE AND FORM NEW CONTINENT, SAY THEOSOPHISTS
SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA TO BE PRESERVED
HOLLYWOOD CULT AWAIT COMING OF MANU TO LEAD THEM TO CHOSEN COLONY

"Now we know why we came to California, Mother", chuckled Doctor, in the pause that followed Mentor's reading.

Quammy took the bait as eagerly as a hungry trout strikes a fly. "Well, I suppose you didn't want to give out the truth; you know you've always said it was Mother's illness that brought you here, and her good health that kept you. I must follow this up right away", he added eagerly.

"It's complete, isn't it, Mentor?" queried Spinster, with a laugh, waving her hand at the paper which Mentor had quietly laid down.

"Yes, that is the word for it, my Dear", was the answer, "as complete a perversion and gross a materialization of theosophical teachings as it has been my misfortune to see in some time."

"Why, Mentor", expostulated Quammy, "you don't mean to say that! Doesn't Theosophy teach that a new race is forming and a new Teacher coming? I know I have read that in some theosophical book somewhere."

"Theosophy teaches a number of things, Quammy", answered Mentor sadly. "And theosophical students with an itch for publicity and a great deal of theosophical misinformation turn and twist those teachings until the world is bewildered as to what Theosophy really does teach; and sensible people conclude with some reason that 'theosophists' are rather irresponsible folks."

"Why is it that the Teacher, or Saviour, is always coming, Mentor", asked Doctor—and then reminiscently, "I remember, when I was a boy, of some neighbors of ours going up to the roofs of their houses to greet the coming Lord: but they came down again", he added with a chuckle, "and some of them caught the most terrible colds."

Mentor laughed. "I suspect it is just that purblind human desire for a change, for new things. People can't seem to give undivided attention to the present and its duties; and that is what is the matter with some of us. Some 'theosophical' students waste any amount of energy on the subject of a 'coming Christ'—not in the least realizing that the Teacher has come and gone, stated definitely when the next Teacher would come; and that the real work of present-day students is to spread the teaching—not to speculate about what will be—distorting meanwhile what the Teacher actually left."

"But about this article," demanded Quammy vigorously. "What is wrong with it?"

"Practically everything in it is incorrect, on the basis of H. P. Blavatsky's teaching, isn't it, Mentor?" asked Doctor.

"Well, let us see", was the answer. Mentor led the way into the Cabin where a reading light was available, and the Family went in after him, soon finding comfortable resting-places, Doctor stretching his tall frame out on one of Mother's skillfully woven "rag" floor rugs.

"The first statement", began Mentor, "is to the effect that California will not be submerged when the Pacific Ocean submerges America: Theosophy makes no such definite statement. The next statement, to the effect that Californians of 'super spiritual, mental and physical development' are being colonized to produce a new race, is unsupported by any evidence. People of such development would know too much to be caught in by the sort of delusion this article implies.

"The next statement affirms that 'the Manu' will be incarnated within the next 800 years. Theosophically speaking, this is nonsense. In fact the very phrase, 'the Manu', as here employed, implies a misunderstanding and gross materialization of Theosophical teaching for Manu is a humanity, rather than a being." Mentor went to the book-shelf and got down the little volume, "Transactions of the London Lodge." "Here is what H. P. B. says", he continued:

"Again", continued Mentor, in the Secret Doctrine She refers to Vaivasvata Manu as 'the one human being'.* Where this student got the idea implied in the phrase 'within 800 years' is also a mystery," continued Mentor. "A Manvantara, or the reign of one Manu―to use a phrase includes 308,448,000 solar years; and the number that have elapsed since the 'Vaivasvata Manvantara'—or the human period—is only some 18,000,000 years.* So the coming of the new Manu, even if a being and not a humanity is meant by the term, is not for about 289 million years from now—figure it out for yourself.

"Another point, there is nothing in the teachings of Theosophy to support the statement that America will be submerged within the next 1000 years. Why, the Sixth sub-race of our present Fifth Race will not be here for 16,000 years, according to The Secret Doctrine, so the submersions that precede the advancing race cycles are clearly thousands of years in the future."

"Isn't Lower California, by its very geological nature, itself likely to be one of the first sections to sink beneath the Ocean?" asked Doctor.

"Undoubtedly", was the answer.

"Guess you better not join the new colony then, Quammy", laughed Spinster, "we cannot afford to lose you that way."

"Well, we might go on, Quammy, and analyze these statements further", Mentor laid down the newspaper, "but what is the use: to a student who is really acquainted with Theosophy they are ridiculous and unworthy of serious consideration. The abuse of sacred names appears in this 'interview', of course," he continued sternly, "but what can be expected of people when 'they know not what they do'. Nothing is sacred to the present generation, and this 'prominent Theosophist' assuredly belongs to it. The Forerunners of the Sixth sub-race may be here now, but it is quite certain that they are not advertising themselves, or promoting colony schemes."

******

"Let's have some music, Quammy", said Mother, putting down her knitting.

"And let's go out-of-doors for it", added Spinster, gently prodding her prostrate Father with a dainty foot.

And so Quammy sung to the moon and the dusky pines, while the creek gave accompaniment to his sweet-toned guitar. His "new race" eagerness was forgotten, his soul was in the present. But who can say what Quammy will find in his newspaper tomorrow, or upon what he will next cast the restlessness of his "wandering eye"!

Theosophy, September, 1918

* See Secret Doctrine, Vol. II, p. 69, Original Edition; p. 72, Third Edition.

October 1918

IT was a Sunday evening during the belated heat wave that caught us late in September, and brought most forcibly to our attention the fact that even the "best climate in the world" can sometimes temporarily forget itself. When the Family reached home after the Theosophical meeting, the screened porch on the north side of the house was found to be a cooling refuge, where the air currents from the nearby mountains were stealing softly down with their pungency of crisp mountain odors for our refreshment. "An hour here will do us much more good than the same hour in bed", said Mother, dropping into her chair—a remark wordlessly endorsed by the rest of the Family as they found comfortable chairs and began to sip the iced tea that Anna had so thoughtfully provided.

Doctor had been the speaker at the evening meeting tonight. He has been called to this service rather often of late, since Mentor's frequent hoarseness from an obstinate summer cold has made public speaking somewhat of a strain for him. Doctor makes an excellent Theosophical talk—simple, earnest and practical. Yet in spite of the fact that he has done so much lecturing in connection with his profession, and even though he has been addressing Theosophical audiences each week for the past month, Doctor still dreads this duty and experiences a feeling of positive relief when the meeting is over. He says he feels the great responsibility of giving the teaching correctly and impersonally. Mentor agrees with this diagnosis, but adds, "If you would only forget yourself, Doctor, you would feel no such strain."

Tonight Doctor had done unusually well—"seemed all freed up", as Spinster had expressed it. For a naturally modest man he was quite elated. "Well, Mentor, I forgot all about myself tonight", he remarked with a chuckle, "and now I know just what you have meant all along, and realize how exactly right you were.

Mentor smiled as he noted the Doctor's satisfaction. "Yes, you showed great improvement, no doubt of that. Keep on in the same way", he added, "and you'll find the true and natural lines yet."

Now, Mother never "bridles", being far too well-bred to be guilty of such an untutored action; but these words coming from Mentor implied praise for her Doctor that was somewhat too faint. "Why, I thought he did beautifully, Mentor", she said almost sharply. And she looked over at Doctor, now considerably less "satisfied", with a protective sort of air.

"Hold hard, Mother", laughed Spinster. "your Baby isn't unappreciated." Mentor himself laughed delightedly, and even Doctor summoned a rather labored chuckle.

"Want me to hand him a wreath, Mother?" asked Mentor, with a merry look at her now beginning herself to smile. "Don't want to spoil our boy, do you, now that he's beginning really to take hold? He's already a bit too well-pleased with himself."

Big Brother used to say that the "saving grace" of our Family is its sense of humor. Certainly we are all able to laugh at and with one another, and each one of us is likewise capable of laughing at himself. It was with a sense of cheerful comradeship, therefore, that the Family settled down after Mentor's raillerie. Doctor and Mother glanced at each other fondly. Spinster dutifully refilled with tea her Father's empty glass. Mentor's eyes betokened a genuine inner enjoyment.

"Well, you both take it nicely, I'll say that for you", he remarked, smiling fondly at his old and loyal friends.

"How do you beat this self-satisfaction, Mentor?" asked Doctor earnestly. "I never saw you show it—don't believe you feel it. What's the cause and what is the remedy?"

"The mysteries of lower manas are subtle indeed, Doctor", answered Mentor thoughtfully. "One has to understand what is meant by this personal nature, if he would control and use it. Much more than physical body is implied, Theosophically speaking, by the term 'personality'. It includes what is ordinarily termed intellect, as well as all those likes and dislikes, and their bases in the nature, under the influence of which we usually operate. The disciple—and we are all disciples if we elect ourselves so to be—having corrected his most common and outstanding faults in some degree often begins to believe he is really attaining. In some measure this is quite true: but the fact that he is busily comparing what he was with what he now is proves that he is still operating from a personal basis, more subtle and deeply personal than before, perhaps.

"If we think of ourselves as any thing less than the Ego, the Higher Manasic Entity who moves from incarnation to incarnation, we are taking in some degree a 'personal' position. If we oscillate between like and dislike, satisfaction and dissatisfaction, happiness and depression, we may be very sure we are still quite 'personal', however much we control the outward expressions of personality and self-assertion.

"Tonight Doctor forgot himself when he spoke, and talked 'from the heart', as men call it, for a time. The personality was used as a channel for the expression of Higher Manas; and he did very well indeed, though the 'channel' will be freer and fuller, as the personality is made more persistently amenable and more fully in accord with the real man within. But as soon as Doctor stopped sneaking he stepped right down into lower manas and kama again—identified himself with the personality—became it in fact. Doctor was sensitive to praise or blame the real man never is sensitive.

"So you will see that our old friend 'Jim Personality' is a subtle fellow indeed, and often when we think that at last we have him in chains he turns up insidiously smiling, and perhaps so masked that we do not recognize him. Control of the personality may be had—never doubt it—by constant watchfulness, cheerful self-abnegation, and persistent effort."

Mentor paused for a few moments, and then continued reminiscently, "Many years ago my Father gave us boys these maxims:

—"Never ask another to do for you what you can do for yourself.

—"Know where your things are, and get them for yourself when you need them.

—"Do for others all you can in a nice way, but don't expect others to do for you.

—"You are valuable only when you are helpful, not when you require help.

"Why that is real occultism", said Spinster impulsively. "Where did he get those ideas, Mentor?"

"Not from the 'personality', Spinster, that is sure", answered Mentor. "We didn't know the word 'occultism' in that day. Father must have been a real thinker, however, and these maxims were the formulation of an internal perception." Mentor smiled over at his old friend, adding, "But they gave us boys a good start, Doctor."

"They ought to be hung on the walls of every nursery in the land", said Mother fervently.

"Yes", agreed Doctor,—"and for children of all ages. Just contrast ideas like those with present day methods so often employed with children—the constant effort to amuse, even to teach under the guise of amusement. What ideas of service or of responsibility can the youngsters gain?"

******

"Come Family", said Mother, rising, "our hour has galloped by long since, and we must be all cooled off by this time."

"Think I'll sleep on those maxims of yours, Mentor, and make them a part of my own mental furniture", remarked Doctor, as he turned out the porch lights and followed the Family into the house.

"I've found them good both to 'sleep on' and to wake with for more than sixty years", said Mentor. "And by the way, Doctor", he added, nodding to Mother, "your talk at the meeting tonight was admirable, let the good work go on! Only—remember always Krishna's warning. 'Be thou the agent, not the actor, O Arjuna!' It is thus that the impersonal may be achieved."

SECRET DOCTRINE TEACHINGS*

Let it be remembered that Fire, Water, and Air, or the "Elements of primary Creation" so-called, are not the compound Elements they are on Earth, but noumenal homogeneous Elements—the Spirits thereof.

Theosophy, October, 1918

* From the Original Edition Vol. 1, p. 218 (foot-note); see Vol. I. p. 239 Third Edition.

November 1918

THE Family were just home from a Theosophical Meeting and sitting around a little grate fire in the living-room, for the ride home through the lowering autumn night had been a trifle chilling. Doctor had been speaking of what he called the "interminable" questions and comments of one man in the audience, during the "question and answer" session that had followed Mentor's lecture. "Why, he could have said all he did say in twenty words, instead of consuming the better part of twenty minutes", declared Doctor, with an emphatic nod.

"Hold on now, Father," laughed Spinster. "That man didn't use up ten minutes in all, to say nothing of twenty. I know he was tiresome; but the fact that Mentor was so patient with him and gave him as much time as was given ought to show us that this questioner was sincerely trying to learn something. I notice", she added, with a little laugh, "that Mentor doesn't permit everybody all the time they want to 'show off' in"!

"Well, perhaps you're right, Spinster", chuckled Doctor. "But it seemed like a good full twenty minutes to me—how do you account for that, Mentor?" turning to his old friend who moved quietly back from the fire as Doctor spoke.

"Time is an illusion caused by the procession of events before our consciousness", quoted Mentor. And he added earnestly, "That is what H. P. B. said; and the proof of its truth may be found in the facts of our own daily experience. For example: the incident you and Spinster are discussing occupied just twelve minutes by the clock—I was facing it, and noted the time because I was afraid the folks might get tired if the affair continued too long".

"Then we both were wrong about the time", said Spinster—"both Doctor and myself".

"I should have said five minutes", remarked Mother from her corner close up to the fire. "The discussion seemed all too short to me".

"There you have it", declared Mentor, with a smile at Mother "—an incident that occupied twelve minutes of what we call time. Mother enjoyed every word of the discussion, and the time 'flew', as we sometimes say. Spinster was interested, got something from it, and places the length of the discussion as ten minutes. Doctor found it tiresome—we have been over that ground together more than once before—so he thought the affair 'interminable', and places 'interminableness' at twenty minutes!"

There was a laugh at this, Doctor heartily joining in, for he enjoys a rap at himself as much as at anyone else.

"Then time is the way we feel about things, isn't it?" asked Mother and that's why people sometimes say, 'I don't feel old', or again, 'I feel as old as the hills today'."

"Exactly", replied Mentor, with a nod. "That's just it. Of course, there is such a 'thing'—to use a word—as duration; but that is something quite different from our usual concept of 'time'. Time 'flies' or time 'drags' in accordance with the way we feel, or the point of view we take. When we are having a 'good time', the time flashes quickly by; when we are 'bored to death'—and I hope we never are—it seems as if the hours would never pass."

"Isn't that just so!" affirmed Doctor. And he added reminiscently, "I remember when I was a little boy how the long school vacations, much as I loved them, used to 'drag', as August came and slowly, Oh so slowly, passed away. But the last scholastic vacation I ever had—equally as long as the childish ones—was gone before I knew it, or had done half what I had planned to do."

There was a pause in the talk, while the fire murmured sleepily, and a vagrant puff of wind scratched a rose vine against a window. These vacations of a former day bring their memories to us all!

"Don't our experiences in dreams sometimes cast a light on this illusion of time, Mentor?" asked Spinster. "Seems to me we often experience many time-consuming affairs as dream, although our sleep may have been short indeed".

"Undoubtedly", was the reply. "We have all heard the stories of those who dreamed of years of travel in many lands, journeyings and experiences covering months and years of time in the dream—yet a few moments of sleep covered the whole affair. It's a relatively common experience", he added, "and in itself proof of the nothingness of 'time', as we know it.

"Man is the Eternal Pilgrim, beginningless and endless, always conscious and acting on some plane of being—of which this physical life is, in a sense, the smallest part. Yet we would take our petty measuring stick of personal 'time' as a standard by which to set limits to the infinite! How ridiculous, once we begin really to think at all!"

"Always NOW, isn't it, Mentor", said Doctor. "The past is made up of old, used—up 'nows', and the future depends upon our present use of 'now'."

"Yes, Doctor", broke in Mother quickly, looking up at the clock with a smile, "and right now it's eleven by the sentinel up there—and that is no 'illusion' I assure you."

"Maybe we'll dream our long journeys to foreign parts tonight", said Spinster, sleepily stifling a yawn, as the Family rose and prepared to depart bedward.

"Be sure to come back in the morning anyway", chuckled Doctor. "We need you to pour the coffee."

Theosophy, November, 1918

December 1918

SPINSTER had announced her intention of going town-ward that morning. "I'll go in on the street-car, Father," she said to Doctor, who was stretched out on the couch, drawn up before the open fire. "You really ought to rest right here all day; anyway an automobile in town is more of a nuisance than a help".

"Going to wear a mask, Spinster?" asked Mentor, with a whimsical smile.¹

"Oh, I guess Karma takes care of its own", returned Spinster airily. "But seriously, Father", she continued, turning to Doctor, "if I ride in the open part of the car, I needn't fear infection, need I?"

"Needn't fear anything", was the answer. "It's fear in large part that makes the influenza spread so rapidly. At least, that is my opinion", he continued, "based upon my experience of the last two weeks", and Doctor stretched with a sigh of comfort and turned luxuriously on the couch.

Night and day attendance upon patients for a fortnight or more had exhausted our old friend, who is "not as young as he used to be", in Mother's phrasing, and for whom she had ordered a full twenty-four hours of complete rest. "I find most of my patients frightened half to death", he continued, "and where the influenza spreads in families there has usually been a carefully cultivated, predisposing quality of fright".

"I notice that the children seem not to catch the influenza in any considerable numbers", remarked Mother, looking up from the newspaper she had been reading.

"Well, isn't that a verification of my own theory?" asked Doctor triumphantly. "They aren't afraid, not being wise enough—or rather, unwise enough to be thinking about the influenza and fearing it all the time".

"Yet children are often subject to other sorts of epidemics—whooping-cough, for instance", objected Spinster. Your conclusions seem partial to me, Father. What do you think about it, Mentor?" she asked, "is Doctor's theory correct?"

"It hardly seems to me that a categorical answer can be given in this case", replied Mentor, "for there are many things to be considered. Supposing we say, 'Yes, with certain qualifications'. There is a statement", he continued, "to this effect—one can have no attachment for that which he does not think about—but this applies only to present thinking, and does not take into consideration the thoughts of the past, nor their necessary future consequences".

"Let's have the qualifications, please, Mentor", said Doctor. "You said, 'with certain qualifications," he added, with a questioning chuckle.

"Why, your theory doesn't account in any way for the cause of influenza", was the answer. "You are merely theorizing about effects. You observe that fear seems to create in the one who fears a fertile field for the operation of the influenza 'germ'. But why the 'germ'? What is it? What the cause of its presence? Why is it here now, and not here at some other time? Does medical science, or your own experience, satisfactorily answer these questions?"

Doctor was obliged to admit, somewhat unwillingly, that he could not answer them; but was disposed to argue nevertheless, over-tired as he was by his strenuous fortnight of steady attendance upon influenza sufferers. Finally Mother broke in with a maternal, "Nonsense, Father! You're too tired to argue—and anyway, Mentor won't argue with you. Why don't you ask him to give us the Theosophical explanation of the epidemic, and then listen to what he says and consider it!"

Doctor was at once apologetic—"forgot myself", he explained shamefacedly.

Mentor smiled appreciatively, and forthwith began his explanation:

"As theosophical students, we have to consider the various fields in which effects are observed and experienced. These fields are, the body and its circumstances; the mind and intellect; the psychic and astral planes. The medical schools do not treat diseases from any other point of view than the physical one, generally speaking, and thus can apply only alleviative remedies at best, without destroying causes. The schools of mental healing ignore the bodily field, and place their reliance on prescribed modes of thinking, taking it for granted that the mental plane is the seat of causation.

"So far, none of the many schools has realized that Man is not his body, his mind nor his circumstances, but the Thinker within, who by his ignorance and desires is the cause of all the sorrow and suffering and disease which he experiences. Each one therefore suffers in any event from causes set in motion by himself, as well as from causes which he in common with others have set in motion. All this is under the law of Karma, or 'sowing and reaping. The Thinker or real man is the experiencer of the various effects produced, whether these be psychical, mental or physical.

"Theosophy shows that there is a state of subtle substance that surrounds our earth, as it does every other, an envelope as it were, which is the receiver and container of the moral and physical emanations of the earth and its inhabitants; these are all converted into their subtlest essence, and radiated back intensified, thus becoming epidemics—moral, psychic and physical. Persons subject to epidemics, or any disease, are the very people who had a hand in producing them, either in this or a previous life.

"Considering these facts, it would hardly be correct to assume that fear in itself is a predisposing cause. I think it will be found that many who fear and many who have no fear at all are overtaken by epidemics. Fear arises from doubt and ignorance, and it may be that those who fear disease or epidemic have a psychic perception of their liability under the law. Again, those who have no fear at all place their reliance entirely upon their supposed bodily immunity: yet the law works, regardless of fear, or the lack of it.

"Another angle to the question lies in the fact that every human being contains in germ every defect that exists anywhere in the race, any one of which may spring into activity under favorable conditions; in this the imagination or image-making power of the Thinker may at any given time fertilize a germ that otherwise would remain latent. When we study the question from every point of view, we will not be disposed to place our reliance on phrases, but rather upon the inexorable law of our own being, which, however we may presently think, desire or feel, will bring us weal or woe as we have earned them. Thus relying we really fear nothing, but accept what comes as our just deserts."

There was a silence when Mentor had finished speaking. Finally Doctor nodded his head—"something to think about there", he said meditatively—"always gets back to the action of Law, doesn't it, Mentor?"

"It must", was the reply, "if we are to do any straight and truly basic thinking. We spend our time considering effects, so often without looking deeper. Theosophical study—and application, of course is the only cure for this surface way of looking at things."

******

"Going to wear your mask, Spinster?" asked Mentor again, later on in the morning, as that young lady departed for the streetcar, and thence to town.

"Oh, Karma takes care of its own", she called back to him, with a merry laugh.

"Not a bad practice at that", remarked Doctor ruminatively from his couch.

"Not for those who think so", said Mentor.

FROM THE SECRET DOCTRINE*

While the Christian is taught that the human soul is a breath of God—being created by him for sempiternal existence, i.e. having a beginning, but no end (and therefore never to be called eternal)—the Occult teaching says, "Nothing is created, but is only transformed. Nothing can manifest itself in this universe—from a globe down to a vague, rapid thought—that was not in the universe already; everything on the subjective plane is an eternal IS: as everything on the objective plane is an ever becoming—because transitory."

Theosophy, December, 1918

¹ Los Angeles experienced the worst of the global influenza pandemic (called the "Spanish Flu") between October 1918 and February 1919. Quarantine measures were deployed by the city and people voluntarily wore masks in public places such as streetcars.—e-Ed.

* From the Original Edition, Vol. I, p. 570; see Vol. I, p. 622 Third Edition.

January 1919

THE news of Peace affected the various members of our Family deeply.¹ All felt and expressed a genuine joy and gratitude. But as the hours of that memorable day wore on, and more general feelings gave way to the particular, individual points of view showed themselves in ways as diverse as are the personalities concerned.

Mother went about all day "all happied up" as Spinster phrased it, and furtively wiping eyes that would fill and spill over. It was relief that Big Brother, hitherto unscathed, need no longer face the dangers and discomforts at the front.

Student, who was at home from the University on account of the influenza epidemic, tramped noisily about the house, hurrahing heartily at intervals as she deftly packed gift boxes to be sent to France.

Spinster and Mentor talked together for hours in a sunny corner of the living room, the latter having expressed any inner exuberance he may have felt by a spirited piano rendition of his repertory of Civil War songs, while Spinster hung out a large new flag. Their talk was upon the general bearings of the new situation, of its somewhat inconclusive nature, and of the great possibilities it presented—for wisdom or folly, or both—in the general development of humanity and of peoples. Both felt keenly the tremendously critical world condition and its great potentialities for good or evil.

When Doctor arrived for dinner that evening he was full of talk on the downfall of the Kaiser, dwelling continually on the blow to his pride. It was this feature of the news that seemed most singularly to engage Doctor's mind—not as a cause for exultation, but from a psychological point of view.

"But the Kaiser isn't the only one who suffers from pride", said Spinster with a laugh when Doctor's elaborations upon the idea had been somewhat too fully aired. "You suffer from pride, Father, and so do I, and all the rest of us—or rather, most of us", she added with a little smile for Mentor.

Doctor flinched like a spirited horse that has been flicked with the whip, started to speak impulsively, and then subsided as he caught Mentor glancing amusedly at him.

"Pride goeth before a fall", placidly remarked Mother, who had not noticed what was going on and was much surprised at the hearty laugh which greeted her remark. "Well, the saying may be old-fashioned", she said spicily and with a touch of what Student calls her grand manner, "but I don't see anything in it to laugh about". Whereupon there was another laugh in which Mother, somewhat mystified but seeing that Mentor was enjoying himself, rather dubiously joined.

"What is pride, Mentor?" asked Student, turning up her eyebrows to Spinster as she saw Doctor put an extra lump of sugar in his coffee, and remarking sotto voce to her Sister, "I don't see how he can like it so sweet—so wasteful too—now I never use but one lump".

"Just something that we all possess, little girl", answered Mentor benignantly, "and exhibit in such subtle little ways that we often don't know we have it, and even ask what it is. For instance", he continued, "within the last five minutes Doctor has been offended because his child, forsooth, says we all—including himself of course—have pride. Mother's pride was touched because she thought we laughed at her. Student compared herself, and her abstemiousness in the matter of sugar, with her Father, to her own self-satisfaction. Spinster is a little bit pleased with herself because she hasn't been caught; and I—I'm proud to be a member of such an interesting Family!"

Mentor ended this summation with a smile so compelling and all-inclusive that any fancied sting in his remarks was at once eliminated. The Family sat and looked at one another in silence. For the moment there really was not a thing to say!

"A pretty Family of Theosophical students, aren't we?" Doctor murmured at last half to himself. "And I had been feeling quite nicely, thank you, over my own 'progress' of late!"

"How did you know I was feeling a bit elated, Mentor?" asked Spinster, her cheeks flushing rosily.

"I'll never, never comment on your 'sweet tooth' again, Father", remarked Student fervently.

"But just why did you laugh at my old proverb, Children?" asked Mother curiously.

"One at a time please, Family", said Mentor, "—and it's quite unwise to say 'never, never', Student, unless you really mean it". Turning to Mother he continued, "Why, the Doctor was just taking a tumble when you repeated the phrase, Mother; we laughed, not at you but because your remark was so very timely, although you didn't know it." And then to Spinster, "Oh, I just guessed, my dear, remembering some feelings I have experienced myself".

"It isn't well to castigate ourselves before others, Doctor", continued Mentor, turning to Doctor with a very serious face. "Nor is it wise to include others in our own self-revilings. This 'Family of Theosophical students', as you call it, isn't in a bad way at all—quite the contrary. We have all been shaken up a little today by the news and its tremendous scope, and something of the inner personal natures we have been suppressing, instead of eradicating, has come out. Not a bad thing at that", he added musingly, "for it gives us a chance to see just where we are and effect some needed adjustments".

"But this pride is such a subtle thing, Mentor", said Spinster in a puzzled voice. "Can't you give us some definite statement, or some kind of a cue, that will help us get hold of it, and drag out the lurker within?"

Everybody had been prepared to get the lesson and all listened eagerly to what Mentor had to say:

"Pride, in some form or another, is the citadel of the personality. Pride and Ambition are handmaidens. Ambition has many phases from the desire to attain for one's self, to the ever-present desire to put one's self in evidence on every possible occasion.

"There are many expressions of the latter phase, among them: much talking, little thought; lack of consideration of others when they conflict with one's own habits or desires; making much of what one has to do, or has done; prompt refutation of any criticism, and condemnation of the critic; an attitude of self-defense and excuse; impressing upon others by speech, manner, or act, the idea of one's importance, knowledge or ability; impatience at interruption in what one has set out to do; an inability to listen to others and refrain from interjections; pride in one's possessions, whether family or material; easiness to take offence; internal irritation with abnormal reticence; a desire for appreciation and commendation; seeking to appear to be possessed of knowledge, or attainments, etc. All these, and others that could be mentioned, are based upon personal pride.

"When we have become constitutionally incapable of such attitudes and actions, there will be no question in our minds as to pride, or its absence.

"'Light on the Path' says: 'And that power which the disciple shall covet is that which shall make him appear as nothing in the eyes of men'."

FROM THE SECRET DOCTRINE*

All that which is, emanates from the ABSOLUTE, which, from this qualification alone, stands as the one and only reality—hence, everything extraneous to this Absolute, the generative and causative Element, must be an illusion, most undeniably. But this is only so from the purely metaphysical view. A man who regards himself as mentally sane, and is so regarded by his neighbours, calls the visions of an insane brother—whose hallucinations make the victim either happy or supremely wretched, as the case may be—illusions and fancies likewise. But, where is that madman for whom the hideous shadows in his deranged mind, his illusions, are not, for the time being, as actual and as real as the things which his physician or keeper may see? Everything is relative in this Universe, everything is an illusion. But the experience of any plane is an actuality for the percipient being, whose consciousness is on that plane: though the said experience, regarded from the purely metaphysical standpoint, may be conceived to have no objective reality.

Theosophy, January, 1919

¹ "News of Peace" likely refers to the November 11, 1918 Armistice signed between Germany and the Allies, bringing an end to hostilities on the Western Front of World War I in which American soldiers were involved as part of the American Expeditionary Forces.—e-Ed.

* From the Original Edition, Vol. I, pp. 295–296; see Vol. I, pp. 314–315 Third Edition.

February 1919

DOCTOR threw down his newspaper with an exclamation of despair. He had been reading the foreign despatches and their trend had stirred him to the depths. "Just a hopeless confusion—that's what it looks like", he muttered, rising from his chair and beginning to walk up and down the room. "No knowledge, no direction—just a herd of uneasy, 'milling' cattle! Will conditions ever get normal again? I don't see how they ever can!" And he continued pacing up and down, up and down the cheerful, well-worn living room, into which a warming sun was sending any amount of brightness and comfort that winter Sunday morning.

Mentor looked up from the Gita he was reading as he sat in his big chair by the crackling grate. "Further disturbance won't help very much, Doctor," he remarked with a kindly smile for his restless old friend. "Do sit down and get comfortable, and then we'll talk it over—just what do you mean by normal?" he added, as Doctor sank back comfortably into his chair again with a relieved chuckle, pushing the disturbing newspaper aside.

"Oh, I don't know", was the answer, and Doctor studied a bit before he continued, "normal conditions—why I suppose we mean an all around stabilizing of affairs in general, a return to the status that obtained before the war. Yet, that could never be, of course", he added with an expression almost of surprise on his thoughtful, well-lined face.

"Just waking up to it, are you, Father?" said Spinster, who had caught the play of his features as she looked up from her writing-desk in a sunny corner of the big room. "Or rather, just realizing the relativity of what we see taking place before our wondering eyes," she added musingly.

"No, the old normal conditions will never obtain again", said Mentor decisively. "What we have to find is a new 'normal', in this new cycle of human affairs; and that is some way ahead so far as time goes I'm thinking", he continued, "meantime confusion reigns abroad, and to some extent at home."

"A new cycle?" questioned Student from her magazine-strewn perch on the window-seat. "What special period have you in mind, Mentor? I thought the new cycle, Theosophically speaking, began in 1898, or thereabouts."

"So it did, Student", answered Mentor, "to speak from a more or less technical point of view, for about that time was a conjunction of three important cycles: the hundred year cycle, the Messianic cycle of about 2,000 years, and the ending of the first 5,000 years of the Kali Yuga. But cycles over-lap, you know, just as races do—and a race is a cycle of human activity. Really there has been, and in fact is now existent, a sort of 'twilight period' between the passing of the old times and the coming of the new, in which much Karma between nations, peoples and individuals is being adjusted."

"Like a clean-up of the physical earth before, or following, a minor pralaya, isn't it?" interjected Doctor interestedly.

"Very like indeed", agreed Mentor. "Surely there have been human cataclysms enough to sustain the analogy!"

Doctor nodded gravely, and there was silence for a few moments in the spacious, sun-swept room.

"But I said 'new cycle of human affairs'," Mentor went on, as if there had been no pause in his remarks, "for which a basis will necessarily be found sooner or later, adherence to which basis will constitute the new normal", with a nod for Doctor. "Some time will elapse before that basis discloses itself. It will be in advance of the old, the theological christian basis which has heretofore colored all the activities of 'christian lands'; but it will be far from ideal, though broader and better and more universal in its recognition and scope."

"These are really birth pains, then, that we are now undergoing as a civilization, aren't they, Mentor?" said Doctor reflectively. "Only one wonders what kind of a creature will issue from the turmoil!"

"If we as individuals could only help, how glorious it would be", said Spinster, her eyes glowing at the prospect. "But Theosophical students don't have the ear of the public to any marked degree", she added with a sigh of regret.

"We all can help", Mentor took up the idea with the utmost earnestness. "Thought itself can be one of the most powerful agents for good in this cycle of reconstruction. Students ought to realize the fact and act upon it. Much can be done by every sincere, unselfish Theosophist, if he only thinks so, in this crisis of human affairs when all the world is reaching out for relief and betterment.

"Do you remember something Mr. Judge once wrote", he continued, "in answer to a question: 'What can be done against Kali Yuga' (the black age)? He answered, "Nothing against it, but very much in it', or words to that effect. Let us see right now if we cannot get an application to the present situation: if Theosophical students themselves refuse to be shaken off their own sound basis by the general confusion; if they continue to study and apply the teaching in their own lives, and try to help others understand and use it; if they themselves watch the trend of world-events and try to see what immense betterments for all peoples the practical application of Theosophical principles would bring about—if Theosophical students will but steadily, sincerely and earnestly carry on in these ways, their thoughts will find lodgment in the minds and hearts of the leaders of men—those who are in the public eye and do have the public ear, and who are seeking and studying to find the best course to pursue and good will flow, inestimable good for all mankind.

"We are in no small place", Mentor continued gravely. "We have no small responsibility. As persons we are quite unimportant and quite unknown. But as Egos every one of us is necessary, and any one of us can do much. Individual students, realizing something of the truth of this great fact in nature, can by their unselfish and earnest thought inject that leaven into the thought of the world that will enable humanity to raise itself another step toward true freedom. It is a personal and selfish desire for freedom, based upon mistaken ideas of life and its great purpose, that makes all the conflict. Just consider, then, how great is the power of unselfish thought in a world almost smothered in the exhalations of selfishness, fear and ignorance!"

Mentor sat reflectively for a time, and then turned to Spinster with a loving smile. "So much for your despair, my dear, and our impotence in general. There is no room for the first and no reality to the second. Unconsciously to ourselves as persons, we are actually helping the world of men to solve its problems. Our task as students of high philosophy is to grow so that our help may be conscious, even to the present personality, and thus immensely more effective. Meantime let us think and in thinking try to take advantage of every opportunity that comes to spread the true ideas, and to embody them in our relations with our fellow-men—all souls, minds, thinkers, like ourselves.

"Now, here is a wise old book for you, Doctor", he continued, with a whimsical smile, as he turned back to the Gita he had been reading when the latter first began his pacing up and down the room. "This ancient writing has a bearing on the subject we have been talking about. All of it is helpful in human problems, but supposing we look just now at the Second chapter, and read:

"'One who is confirmed in this belief is not disturbed by anything that may come to pass'."

Theosophy, February, 1919

March 1919

READING the newspaper at the breakfast table is taboo in our Family. Mother insists that we ought to be awake, cheerful and visible at the morning meal, and maintains that no person can be truly visible when buried, metaphorically or otherwise, in the pages of the daily print.

The sound reasoning of this argument, together with a certain regard that the other members of the Family hold towards her, incline them to full acceptance of Mother's conclusions. Doctor has evolved the plan, however, of arriving on the scene some ten minutes in advance of the scheduled breakfast hour and employing this time in a hurried gathering of the morning's news over a cup of coffee. The result is seen in the timely character of our morning table talk and in the clear net gain to a certain professional man of a "second cup" that might otherwise be questioned.

"Well, the world do move", pronounced Doctor enthusiastically one morning recently as the Family seated themselves.

"It sure do", affirmed Student flippantly, "but why assault our intelligence with such a tremendous fact thus early in the morning, Father?"

"National prohibition's carried", went on Doctor, paying no attention to his saucy little daughter, who managed to remain cheerful even though ignored. "Who would have believed it possible?"

"They'll have their hands full in enforcing the law", remarked Spinster, who had once taught in a prohibition state and had fought the practice of some of her High School boys of carrying manfully their pocket flasks of whiskey.

"A great advance, isn't it?", said Mother hopefully. "Think how the women and children will benefit, with liquor out of the world!"

"Yes, it looks like a good move", agreed Doctor, "but at that it's a question", he added thoughtfully. "In my own experience as a citizen, and a physician too, 'prohibition' does not prohibit; and some of the most pitiful and truly awful cases I have met with were attributable indirectly to prohibitory laws, in causing confirmed drinkers to seek drugs and other substitutes in trying to satisfy uncontrollable cravings. As you all know", Doctor continued earnestly, "I have no use for liquor—haven't employed it in my practice for many years, and find plenty of other resources available if a patient requires a stimulant. In fact, medical practice in general has shown a great advance in these directions during the past twenty years" and then the Doctor paused uncertainly as if he were not quite so sure of the "advance", when he once began to cogitate upon it.

"Prohibition is impractical anyway", declared Spinster, with a positive shake of her head.

"But we don't know that", objected Mother, "because it's never really been tried before. We have had local prohibition and state prohibition, but this is national prohibition, getting right to the liquor producing sources of the whole country. What do you think of it, Mentor?" she added, turning to her old friend, who was observing Mother's warm earnestness with a loving if somewhat whimsical smile.

"I haven't thought of it at all as something epoch-making and momentous, if that is what you mean", answered Mentor. "But at least it will give folks a chance to test out thoroughly the value of prohibitory legislation—since we seem to think, as a people, we have not yet had that chance."

"Just what do you mean, please Mentor, by the last part of that remark?" asked Spinster, curiously.

"Merely this, my dear", was the answer, "that we already have all sorts of legal prohibitions in every direction, and that they do not, have not and will not prohibit anybody from doing what he has determined to do. We prohibit murder, but murders are committed; we prohibit theft, but thefts continue; we prohibit immorality, but immorality is everywhere; we prohibit dishonesty in various forms, but most of us are not even honest with ourselves."

"Then you would have no laws, Mentor", broke out Student, "why, that's anarchy!"

"Hold on now, young lady", said Mentor, laughing, "you are the one who said that! But isn't that which has been said quite true, and not in the least exaggerated? Our whole social and legal structure is full of 'thou shalt nots'—even our religions. What we need is fewer of these and more 'thou shalts'. Then the whole trend will be in the direction of affirmative action rather than in that of negative prohibition. We have not yet reached that stage of enlightenment as a people where we can live without laws, but at best many of these laws are mere crutches that we can abandon when crippled humanity gets healthily onto its own feet.

"So further prohibitions", continued Mentor, "are not acclaimed with unmixed joy by the deeper students of life. They always serve to entrench the false old negative doctrine of 'be good' of which we are so fond. To be good is no proper object in existence. If we will but strive to do good, there will be no question of the negative virtues they will take care of themselves."

"But Theosophy tells us not to use intoxicants", objected Student, somewhat illogically.

"With all due regard to your good intentions, Student", replied Mentor with a smile, "Theosophy tells nothing of the sort. Theosophy is not a system of diet, nor of prohibitions; it is a philosophy of life, a statement of the laws that govern all the constituents of man and nature. Among other things it shows that the use of intoxicants is prejudicial to the progress of the student, but it is the student himself who determines what he shall do, or shall not do. He learns of the philosophy and makes, or refrains making, his own applications. He must control and be responsible for his own volitions—thus he learns, and there is no other way."

"I think I see just what you mean, Mentor", said Mother with a sigh, "but how about the thousands of innocent women and children who suffer from the effects of the liquor traffic?"

Mentor looked at her earnestly. "Do you believe in Karma, Mother?" he asked her quietly; and upon noting her affirmative nod he continued, "The truly innocent do not suffer—that is taking a superficial view, you see. Law does rule in the universe, and we all do reap what we sow. The drunkard's wife earned that kind of a husband, and his child that kind of parent and environment. We are not here in physical existence for the first time—not any of us; and in this life with its environments and relationships we are meeting the effects of causes set in motion by ourselves in previous existences. We should try to relieve; we should feel pity and extend aid in every possible way; but we must not lack faith in the reign of law, nor doubt that Law is justice and mercy in one. As Mr. Judge once wrote, 'Your faith will know that all is provided for'—that is a good sentence for the sincere student of life to bear in mind."

"But what would you suggest in place of prohibition, Mentor?" asked Doctor, who had finished breakfast and was about to go.

"Education", was the answer.

"It's too slow", said Doctor.

"That's the individual's fault", replied Mentor. "He will learn by his mistakes."

"Then prohibition is no good!"

"Such a wholesale condemnation is not wise", answered Mentor. "It may be one of the steps through which we will learn better methods of teaching."

"But isn't the principle wrong?" asked Spinster thoughtfully.

"Exactly", was the answer, "a small majority forces a large minority to do something it doesn't want to do. Speaking largely, that way of doing things does not bring about the best results. But now we're getting into a talk on government, and the like, and that won't do at this early hour of a busy day", Mentor added, with a smile.

"Let us watch the course of events", he continued, "and try to learn something from them; and hope that good will flow from the experiment, and a better basis of conduct result. We must remember that the better the conditions provided, the higher the Ego to be attracted to them. Egos may be awaiting incarnation until this very step has been taken. Another generation will show the truth of this; but meantime let us learn, test for ourselves, and try to spread true and right ideas, so that open minds can catch them and use them as opportunity offers."

Theosophy, March, 1919

April 1919

BIG Brother is back in the Family circle and has gone to lawyering again. It all happened just as quickly as that. "No returning hero stuff for me," he remarked to an admiring Family as he came up the steps the day of his arrival. It was off uniform that night and into mufti and the office next day; since which time he has looked and acted like a great big happy boy—and shown behind the screen of boyish cheerfulness a mind and nature changed most mightily: more quiet, more mature, more reflective—a very thoughtful and sober person indeed.

Naturally enough the new element in our table talk has "brisked us all up," as Spinster happily phrased it. Big Brother meets a different public from any of the rest of us, including many young men, some of whom are like himself just out of service., His range of the application of Theosophy to daily life thus supplements our own and widens the Family field of observation and experience. For instance:

"Your old friend Billy was mooning around the office for an hour this afternoon, Student," said Big Brother at dinner a few evenings since. "Guess he'd be there yet if I had been willing to moon with him," he added with a deprecatory shake of the head.

"What's the matter with him now?" asked Student who still likes Billy, though army service did not benefit him.

"He's a passive Theosophist, or would like to be," was the answer. "At least, that's all I can make out of him," continued Big Brother, with a reflective frown.

"Nice phrase, Son—please elucidate," said Doctor briskly, looking over toward Mentor with an appreciative chuckle.

"Why, Billy wants to serve humanity so badly that it hurts him," said Big Brother slowly. "He can't talk about anything else except the urge he feels; wants to devote his life to it, you know. Unfortunately, as he thinks, Bill faces the necessity of getting a job in a cruelly cold and busy world that is not in the least interested in his 'urge' only in what he can do in a practical useful way. When I finally told him to jump in or starve to death, Bill said I was unsympathetic and didn't understand—that he was disappointed and sick because he had thought I was different from the rest." Big Brother paused reflectively. "And yet I had already found him a job," he added, "and offered to take him right down to it personally then and there. That's what I call a passive Theosophist, Father, if you want to know."

There was a silence around the table for a few moments. Then, "Poor Billy!" sighed Student with a sober shaking of the head.

"But doesn't the boy sense the fact," asked Doctor earnestly, "that he can 'serve humanity,' as he calls it, from and in whatever position he obtains? What on earth does he want anyway?"

"Wants to head some movement, so far as I can figure it," answered Big Brother. "Or to sit down in a chair in the Theosophical rooms somewhere and tell people all about it—while somebody else pays his board bill," he added with a rueful laugh. "Well, I'm done being his banker, though the experience has been worth all it cost me," and Big Brother applied himself to his dinner with all the appreciation for home cooking that a newly discharged campaigner can bring.

"Poor Billy!" again said Student gravely.

"Poorer than I thought," added Doctor who had always felt a fondness for the boy.

"What do you make of it, Mentor?" asked Spinster, turning to her old friend whose whimsical smile answered and brushed away the distress from her face.

"Oh, Billy will come out all right," he answered assuringly, "if folks will only let him get hungry enough—and after he's been home a little longer they probably will. Nothing like a little real hardship to knock the egotism and nonsense out of a youngster. We'll probably find this one quite amenable to common-sense suggestions again after he's held a 'job of work' for a month.

"There have been many 'Billys' among the various Theosophical organizations in this country in the last forty years. If I were a writer, we might have quite a volume entitled 'Billys I have met'—and it would be valuable as well as interesting to us all. The world is full of people who say they want to 'serve humanity.' If they could only have a suitable environment and proper conditions they would devote themselves to it, and to nothing else. The fact is that they are really not honest with themselves, otherwise each would be 'serving humanity' right where he or she is—and not saying much about it at that." Mentor's voice had a decided ring to it.

"Didn't Mr. Judge say somewhere, 'No environment is detrimental'?" remarked Spinster thoughtfully.

"Indeed he did," replied Mentor. "Furthermore he clearly indicated that the student who applies the 'service' idea in whatever circumstances he finds himself, adhering to the lines Theosophy shows, will find that the course pursued 'strengthens and improves even the circumstances of life.' How could this work out otherwise, if Law rules in the Universe?

"It is in our natural, necessary daily activities that we will find our own fields for service to humanity," Mentor continued vigorously. "And they are peculiarly our own—nobody else can fulfil these duties. Once we recognize that Law does rule, we quickly see that everybody is necessary to the whole, and that each, in performing his own duties fully and from the right basis, is really 'serving humanity' best. If we would but face the everyday facts of life with this idea in mind what a truly spiritual effect would flow from the smallest necessary act performed—to the benefit of all! But we so often want to 'serve humanity' in some other, some special way— not the way that naturally lies open before us! It is the 'false pietist of bewildered soul,' as the Gita phrases it, trying to perform the duty of another while his own clear natural task lies before him unattempted."

Big Brother nodded approval. "That is common-sense," he remarked with a chuckle. "And it brings the application of Theosophy right down where the man of the workaday world can understand and appreciate it."

"Theosophy really is common-sense—sanctified common-sense," replied Mentor. "And when our friend Billy adjusts himself to the exigencies of his situation and goes out to meet them squarely, he will find plenty of room for the exercise of his 'urge,' and a steady, satisfying opportunity for the application of it. Everywhere in the world are men and women who want the truth. Only a few of these read, or even know about, theosophical books. Still fewer can or will attend theosophical meetings. We have to talk with them in their own language, otherwise they cannot understand us. The first sound in that language, in many cases, is the evidence in our modes of life and work of a decent and competent self-respect—an evident ability to take care of ourselves and perform the practical tasks of life efficiently. If people find us eminently practical men and women, showing in our attitude toward life and its duties a sane point of view, an abiding and genuine confidence, and likewise exhibiting that wisdom in action and understanding of others which the application of the theosophical philosophy is bound to produce, then they will begin to ask questions—want to know how and where we get this wisdom—and opportunities to spread true ideas will discover themselves to us on every hand."

SECRET DOCTRINE EXTRACTS*

. . . . Matter is the vehicle for the manifestation of soul on this plane of existence, and soul is the vehicle on a higher plane for the manifestation of spirit, and these three are a trinity synthesized by Life, which pervades them all.

Theosophy, April, 1919

* From the Original Edition, Vol. I, p. 49; see Vol. I, p. 80, Third Edition.

May 1919

THE day had been useful and busy, and therefore a happy one for all the members of the Family. At supper the talk had been gay, as one and another had served some morsel from the platter of his experiences. At last, though, Student heaved a sigh:

"Ah me, where has my vacation gone. By the calendar I have been home nine heavenly days. I feel something of what Easter really means a veritable Resurrection in coming back to those I love. And to think that tomorrow I must go, go, go away to 'the other side of the world'."

The little grimace with which she accompanied the soft accentuation of the closing words, did not hide from Mother the swift comprehension which the heart gives.

"But, Student, think that we will be with you; you are our pioneer living there for all of us. We will still be togeth—"

"If you think so," interrupted Doctor, who is sometimes in such a hurry to prescribe that he takes his diagnosis for granted. "Concentrate on the home circle; it's a sure panacea for the mild psychological disturbance induced by loneliness in the midst of a college career."

"Even Devachan isn't far away you know", supplemented Spinster with an affectionate smile.

"Oh", brightened Student, "that reminds me. I hadn't spoken to the Family of my little visit the other afternoon with Aunt Sue. She says she just knows her husband is with her. She can hear him and see him. And Aunt Sue is no spiritualist, is she, Mentor, even if she isn't a learned book Theosophist?"

"No, she is not. She has brought forward from a previous life that extension of sight and hearing which we all possess internally. And it is not a 'gift'; it was acquired. For it comes from a soul bond made in other lives with the soul whose nearness she feels; and not necessarily when in the same physical relation as in this life, although that could very well be, too.

"All of us are primarily spiritual beings. The earth is not our origin, nor our permanent abiding place. We are born into bodies, live, form our relations as physical, psychic and spiritual beings, and return again to our more real and abiding states. Our 'home' is neither here, nor at school, and the deep solacing strength of Aunt Sue's feeling ought to be still stronger among the living, regardless of physical proximity or the absence of it. For the enduring bond between souls is that of unselfish love, the strongest power in the world."

"Mother is nearer the soul of things than all the books—and that's a fact." It was Doctor again, and as usual the current of his thought rushed him into speech.

"What a physician she would have made. Now, I can read these things and believe in them, but I so seldom really feel anything. And yet I know that if we are thinking of those we love, without thinking where they are, why, then, they're here. But does Aunt Sue really see and hear Uncle Fred?"

"Yes, and no. Any form of existence—waking, dreaming, sleeping or in devachan—is but one phase of our conscious immortal life. When we sleep, whether our consciousness is in the dream state or in inner and deeper ones, our real (subjective) relations with others continue.

"Uncle Fred carried with him whatever he felt or loved. As he, as well as those he had left in bodies, have the same interior states and forms, what he feels is felt by Aunt Sue, and carries the impress of Uncle Fred so as to be recognized."

"But, Mentor, she does not actually know that it is from him? The books say the dead in Devachan cannot communicate with the living." And Doctor looked as if he had detected a "heresy" in Mentor.

"The separation is not with the dead, but with the living. The dead live in their thoughts of their loved ones and the living seldom do that. But the living can go to the dead, if they will—if their love is deep enough, tranquil enough. Aunt Sue's feeling of nearness, her sense of receiving words, admonitions or encouragement is due to the inner relation and her love for her husband. He is not physically near, nor is he aware of her daily earthly experiences, but his love ever operates as a protection as well as a help to her. They are connected in their inner and higher natures, and in them we see, feel and understand, and as in Aunt Sue's case, translate that connection into terms of everyday life."

Mentor fell silent, his glance resting on Mother, whose fingers were laced with those of her youngest. After a pause Spinster rose, saying, "Mentor, I feel your chair is calling you."

Upon the word, the family slowly drifted into the living room. There the welcoming chairs and the vesper glow seemed to have been holding friendly converse of their own, in the fashion of familiar inanimate things. The speaking silence held them all for a time.

"I think," mused Student so softly that it seemed in the congenial transparent dusk of the unlit room merely that the silence had become audible. "I think that our Theosophy is too much a religion with us. It isn't our life. It's an afterthought. We are so engrossed with what we are doing that our thoughts are just shadows of our actions. It ought to be the other way around. Seems to me I just revert to Theosophy at intervals, like—like spiritual mealtimes; just put on my theosophical dress now and then.

"I know I have used a double metaphor," she added hastily, as Doctor moved uneasily, "and I didn't know I was speaking aloud—hardly. But Aunt Sue thinks she knows about Uncle Fred's 'busy life over there.'"

Mentor covered her retreat, as usual.

"Well, Student, we are all of us guilty of worse than double metaphors in our thinking. Our outward speech is usually a good deal more consistent than our mental operations. How can we take a spiritual view of things when we persist in viewing spiritual and psychic action from the basis of our waking life? What Auntie Sue takes to be recitals of his busy life over there is in that way. They are not actual actions, in our sense, for he is in a subjective state and is not in contact with other beings except in a subjective way. That is, he is thinking of them in various ways and relations. Aunt Sue perceives the subjects of his thought and feeling, and in the brain this is colored by the waking ideas, and appears to her as she says. But the fact is there. Just now you were 'thinking out loud' without yourself being aware of the fact, as you say. The two things are not dissimilar in nature.

"What Aunt Sue feels and only partly interprets exactly, might be known and experienced more accurately and more fully by attentive Theosophists, where this soul bond exists among the living. For we who are living, live at one and the same time in the three worlds, and might, if we would, be fully conscious of them all. We have the power to build the bridge that overpasses space and time, and might realize that there is no separateness at all, and that communion of soul does not depend on bodily presence. Rather, the roar of the senses and the waking brain mind are what prevent full communion even when we are physically near to those we love."

Student asked, perhaps a little defensively, "For a family that has been Theosophist so long we don't seem to have made much 'progress,' do we, Mentor?"

Before Mentor could reply, Doctor burst out.

"That is just what I meant a little while ago. It seems as if we all ought to be together, no matter where we are. That is what I try so hard to realize—and the others too, I fancy; but we don't seem to succeed."

"Perhaps," said Mentor, "we try too hard; or rather, spend our efforts too spasmodically. Persistent effort is what counts practically. Realization comes from dwelling on the thing to be realized. It is a matter of growth, not striving. It is not a problem. It is a life. Our trouble is that we are not able to draw at will, or unmixed, upon our inner store. Perhaps unconsciously to ourselves we take the attitude that we are to gain knowledge that we have not or that does not exist. Yet we say that all knowledge exists and that it is part and parcel of our inner, divine nature. If, instead of seeking it as an addition to the knowledge which our brain registers, we were to seek to change the character of our brain registration, we might have a better success from our efforts. If we are ever to come in contact with the knowledge which was ours in former births, as the Gita puts it, we have to make Theosophy a living power in our lives. It is because of the discordant and opposed nature of our daily thinking that we are shut out from our own higher nature. If our real existence is in thought, then the character of our mental action either opens or keeps the doors closed."

"Oh," said Mother. "That is what is implied in Mr. Judge's saying, 'if you think so.' If our thinking were theosophical in fact we would be all the time guiding our thoughts from the basis of continuing existence. If we did that, Theosophy would 'come natural' to us. I can see how our unnoticed preconceptions and preoccupations hide from us much of the meanings even in the clearest statements of the teachers."

"You aren't the only guilty party, Mother." Doctor once more, who is always ready to confess his sins when he has company.

"That is just it. Theosophy will never 'come natural' to us as long as we think of it as something else, as something injected from outside. Nor as long as our habitual thinking is from another basis altogether. Why, when Theosophy colors our every thought and feeling no matter what about—not till then will what the books say become our experience. For then we will be thinking as they think, feeling as they feel who wrote for us, and working as they worked who worked for us. Yes, I think so."

Spinster smiled.

"Well, if you think so, Doctor, and we all think so, we can all be around the table and part of an inseparable company whose companionship is not subject to the whim of circumstance—a truly Theosophical company.

Mentor gave his goodnight glance around the circle and then went up to his room to work. Doctor ruminated a few minutes and then—

"How empty and vacant the room seems with good old Mentor absent."

"If you think so," said Student demurely.

FROM ISIS UNVEILED*

A man's idea of God, is that image of blinding light that he sees reflected in the concave mirror of his own soul, and yet this is not, in very truth, God, but only His reflection. His glory is there, but, it is the light of his own Spirit that the man sees, and it is all he can bear to look upon. The clearer the mirror, the brighter will be the divine image. But the external world cannot be witnessed in it at the same moment. In the ecstatic Yogin, in the illuminated Seer, the spirit will shine like the noon-day sun; in the debased victim of earthly attraction, the radiance has disappeared, for the mirror is obscured with the stains of matter. Such men deny their God, and would willingly deprive humanity of soul at one blow.

Theosophy, May, 1919

* Original Edition, Vol. I (Before The Veil), p. xviii.