Literary Jottings
HYLO-IDEALISM versus “LUCIFER,” and the “ADVERSARY.”
Under the head of Correspondence in the present number, two remarkable letters are published. (See Text.) Both come from fervent Hylo-Idealists—a Master and Disciple, if we mistake not—and both charge the “Adversary,” one, of a “slighting,” the other, of a “hostile notice” of Hylo-Idealism, in the September number of “Lucifer.”
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Such an accusation is better met and answered in all sincerity; and, therefore, the reply is, a flat denial of the charge. No slight—nor hostility either, could be shown to “Hylo-Idealism,” as the “little stranger” in the happy family of philosophies was hitherto as good as unknown to “Lucifer’s” household gods. It was chaff, if anything, but surely no hostility; and even that was concerned with only some dreadful words and sentences, with reference to the new teaching, and had nothing whatever to do with Hylo-Idealism proper—a terra incognita for the writer at the time. But now that three pamphlets from the pens of our two correspondents have been received in our office, for review, and carefully read, Hylo-Idealism begins to assume a more tangible form before the reviewer’s eye. It becomes easier to separate the grain from the chaff, the theory from the (no doubt) scientific, nevertheless, most irritating, words in which it is presented to the reader.
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This is meant in all truth and sincerity. The remarks which our two correspondents have mistaken for expressions of hostility, were as justified then, as they are now. What ordinary mortal, we ask, before he had time (to use Dr. Lewins’ happiest expressions) to “asself or cognose”—let alone intercranialise[[121]] (!!)—the hylo-idealistic theories, however profound and philosophical these may be, who, having so far come into direct contact with only the images thereof “subjected by his own egoity” (i.e. as words and sentences), who could avoid feeling his hair standing on end, over “his organs of mentation,” while spelling out such terrible words as “vesiculo-neurosis in conjunction with medico-psychological symptomatology,” “auto-centricism,” and the like? Such interminable, outlandish, multisyllabled and multicipital, newly-coined compound terms and whole sentences, maybe, and no doubt are, highly learned and scientific. They may be most expressive of true, real meaning, to a specialist of Dr. Lewins’ powers of thought; nevertheless, I make bold to say, that they are far more calculated to obscure than to enlighten the ordinary reader. In our modern day, when new philosophies spring out from the spawn of human overworked intellect like mushrooms from their mycelium after a rainy morning, the human brain and its capacities ought to be taken into a certain thoughtful consideration, and spared useless labour. Notwithstanding Dr. Lewins’ praiseworthy efforts to prove that brain (as far as we understand his aspirations and teachings) is the only reality in the whole kosmos, its limitations are painfully evident, on the whole. As philanthropists and theosophists, we entreat the founder of Hylo-Idealism and his disciples to be merciful to their new god, the “Ego-Brain,” and not tax too heavily its powers, if they would see it happily reign. For otherwise, it is sure to collapse before the new theory—or, let us call it philosophy—is even half appreciated by that “Ego-Brain.”
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By speaking as we do, we are only pursuing a life-long policy. We have criticized and opposed the coinage of hard Greek and Latin words by the New York Pantarchists; laughed at Hæckel’s pompous tendency to invent thirty-three syllabled terms, and speak of the perigenesis of plastidules, instead of honest whirling atoms—or whatever he means; and derided the modern psychists for calling simple thought transference “telepathic impact.” And now, we tearfully beg Dr. Lewins, in the interests of humanity, to have pity on his poor readers: for, unless he hearkens to our advice, we shall be compelled, in dire self-defence, to declare an open war to his newly-coined words. We shall fight the usurper “Solipsism” in favour of the legitimate king of the Universe—Egoism—to our last breath.
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At the same time, as we have hitherto been ignorant of the latest philosophy, described by Mr. H. L. Courtney as “the greatest change in human thought,” may we be permitted to enquire whether it is spelt as its Founder spells it, namely, “Hylo-Idealism,” or as his disciple, Mr. Courtney does, who writes Hylo-Ideaism? Is the latter a schism, an improvement on the original name, a lapsus calami, or what? And now, having disburdened[disburdened] our heart of a heavy weight, we may proceed to give an opinion (so far very superficial), on the three Hylo-Idealistic (or Ideaistic) pamphlets.
Under the extraordinary title of “AUTO-CENTRICISM” and “HUMANISM versus THEISM,” or “Solipsism (Egoism)=Atheism” (W. Stewart & Co., 41, Farringdon Street, E.C.; and Freethought Publishing Co., 63, Fleet Street, E.C.)—Dr. Lewins publishes a series of letters on the subject of the philosophy of which he is the founder. It is impossible not to feel admiration for the manner in which these letters are written. They show a great deal of sincere conviction and deep thought, and give evidence of a most wide and varied reading. However his readers may dissent from the writer’s conclusions, the research with which he has strengthened his theory, cannot fail to attract their attention, and smooth their way through the somewhat tortuous labyrinth of arguments before them. But—
Dr. Lewins is among those who regard consciousness as a function of the nerve-tissue; and in this aspect, he is an uncompromising materialist. Yet, on the other hand, he holds that the Universe, God, and thought, have no reality whatever, apart from the individual Ego. The Ego is again resolvable into brain-process. We thus arrive at the doctrine that Brain is the workshop in which all our ideas of external things are originated. Apart from brain there is no Ego, no external world. What, then, is the Brain itself—this solitary object in a void universe? Hylo-Idealism does not say. Thus, the author cannot escape the confusion of thought which his unique working-union of materialism and idealism involves. The oscillation between these two poles is strikingly apparent in the subjoined quotations. At one point Matter is discussed as if it were an objective reality; at another, it is regarded as a mere “phantasm of the Ego.” The Brain alone survives throughout in solitary state. We quote from the two pamphlets—
Matter Asserted.
“Matter, organic and inorganic, is now fully known ... to perform all material operations.”
—Auto-Centricism, p. 40.
“Man is all body and matter.”
—Do, p. 40.
“Abstract thought [is] neuropathy ... disease of the nervous centres.”
—Humanism versus Theism, p. 25.
“What we call mind ... is a function of certain nerve structures in the organism.”
—Humanism v. Theism, p. 24.
Matter Denied.
“All discovery is ... a subjective phenomenon.”
—Humanism v. Theism, p. 17.
“All things are for us but modes of perception.”—[Mental figments].
The “celestial vault and garniture of Earth,” are “a mere projection of our own inner consciousness.”
—Humanism v. Theism, p. 17.
“We get rid of Matter altogether.”
—Humanism v. Theism, p. 17.
“The whole objective world ... is phenomenal or ideal.”
—Auto-Centricism, p. 9.
“Everything is spectral” (i.e., unreal).
—Ibid, p. 13.
Matter is at one time credited with a real being, and again resolved into a mere mental figment as circumstances demand. If Matter is, as the author frequently states, unreal, it is, at least clear that the brain, one of its many phases, goes with it!!
As to the learned doctor’s assertion that perception is relative, a theory which runs through his whole work, we have but one answer. This conception is, in no sense whatever, a monopoly of Hylo-Idealists, as Dr. Lewins appears to think. The illusory nature of the phenomenal world—of the things of sense—is not only a belief common to the old Brahminical metaphysics, and to the majority of modern psychologists, but it is also a vital tenet of Theosophy. The latter distinctly realises matter as a “bundle of attributes,” ultimately resolvable into the subjective sensations of a “percipient.” The connection of this simple truth with the hylo-idealistic denial of soul is not apparent. Its acceptance has, also, no bearing on the problem as to whether there may not exist a duality—within the limits of manifested being—or contrast between Mind and the Substance of matter. This Cosmic Duality is symbolised by the Vedantins in the relations between the Logos and Mulaprakriti—i.e., the Universal Spirit and the “material” basis (or root) of the objective planes of nature. The Monism, then, of Dr. Lewins and other negative thinkers of the day, is evidently at fault, when applied to unify the contrast of mental and material facts in the conditioned universe. Beyond the latter, it is indeed valid, but that is scarcely a question for practical philosophy.
To close with a reference this once to Dr. Lewins’ letter (see “Correspondence” in the text), in which he makes his subsequent assertion to the effect that God is the “functional (sic) image,” of the Ego, we should prefer to suggest that all individual “selves” are but dim reflections of the universal soul of the Kosmos. The orthodox concept of God is not, as he contends, a myth or phantasm of the brain; it is rather an expression of a vague consciousness of the universal, all-pervading Logos. It is because Self pinions man within a narrow sphere “beyond which mortal mind can never range,” that the destruction of the personal sense of separateness is indispensable to the Occultist.
“THE NEW GOSPEL OF HYLO-IDEALISM, or Positive Agnosticism,” (Freethought Publishing Co., 73, Fleet Street, E. C. Price 3d.), is another pamphlet on the same subject, in which Mr. Herbert L. Courtney contributes his quota to the discussion of the “Brain Theory of mind and matter.” He is, if we mistake not, an avowed disciple of Dr. Lewins, and, perhaps, identical with the “C. N.,” who watched over the cradle of the “new philosophy.” The whole gist of the latter may be summed up as an attempt to frame a working-union of Materialism and Idealism. This result is effected on two lines (1) in the acceptance of the idealistic theorem, that the so-called external world only exists in our consciousness; and (2) in the designation of that consciousness, in its turn, as a mere function of Brain. The first of these contentions is unquestionably valid, in so far as it concerns the world of appearances, or Maya; it is, however, as “old as the hills,” and incorporated into the Hylo-Ideal argument from anterior sources. The second is untenable, for the simple reason that on the premises of the new creed itself, the brain, as an object of perception, can possess no reality outside of the Ego. Hegelians might reply that Brain is but an i.e. of the Ego, and cannot hence determine the existence of the latter—its creator.
Metaphysicism will, however, find much to interest them in Mr. Courtney’s brochure, representative, as it is, of the new and more subtle phase into which modern scepticism is entering. Some expressions we may demur to—e.g., “That which we see is not Sirius, but the light-wave.” So far from the light-wave being “seen,” it is a mere working hypothesis of Science. All we experience is the retinal sensation, the objective counterpart to which is a matter of pure inference. So far as we can learn, Hylo-Idealism is chiefly based upon gigantic paradoxes, and even contradictions in terms. For, with regard to the speculations anent the Noumenon (p. 8.) what justification can be found for terming it “Matter,” especially as it is said to be “unknowable”? Obviously it may be of the nature of mind, or—something Higher. How is the Hylo-Idealist to know?
“LAYS OF ROMANCE AND CHIVALRY,” by Mr. W. Stewart Ross. (Stewart and Co., Farringdon Street.) In this neat little volume the author presents to the reader a collection of vigorous verse, mostly of chivalrous character. Some of these pieces, such as the “Raid of Vikings” and “Glencoe,” are of merit, despite an occasional echo of Walter Scott, whose style seems to have had a considerable modifying influence on the author’s diction. It is in the “Bride of Steel” that this feature is most noticeable—
“I love thee with a warrior’s love,
My Sword, my Life, my Bride!
Dear, dear as ever knighthood bore,
Though yet no gout of battle-gore
Thy virgin blade hath dyed!”
Apart from this unconscious influence of the great Scottish bard, the ring of originality and feeling which characterises Mr. Stewart Ross’s poetry is most refreshing. The little volume sparkles with the vein of romance, and after perusing it, in spite of occasional anachronisms and other literary errors, we are not surprised to hear of the favourable reception hitherto accorded to it.
In the Secular Review for November 26th, Mr. Beatty makes an attack upon a former article in Lucifer, entitled “The Origin of Evil.” We find, however, Mr. Beatty exhibiting crass ignorance of the ideas he criticises, as when, for instance, he speaks of the “Buddhistic” Parabram (sic). To begin with, every tyro in Oriental philosophy knows that “Parabrahm” is a Hindu Vedantic idea, and has no connection whatever with Buddhist thought. If Mr. Beatty wishes to become a serious critic, he must first learn the a, b, c, of the subject with which he professes to deal. His article is unfinished, but it seems only fair at the present stage to call his attention to so glaring an error.
THE GNOSTICS AND THEIR REMAINS, ANCIENT AND MEDIÆVAL. By C. W. King, M.A. Second Edition. David Nutt, 270 Strand, London, 1887. pp. 466, 8vo.
It would be unfair to the erudite and painstaking author of “The Gnostics and Their Remains” for a reviewer to take the title of his book as altogether appropriate, for it suggests too high a standard of criticism. Mr. King says in the introduction that his book is intended to be subsidiary to the valuable treatise of M. Matter, adding: “I refer the reader to him for the more complete elucidation of the philosophy of Gnosticism, and give my full attention to its Archæological side.” The italics are the author’s, and they disarm criticism[criticism] as far as the philosophical side of Gnosticism is concerned; for thus italicised, this passage is, at the outset, as plain a confession as could, in conscience, be expected of an author of a fact which the reader would probably have found out for himself, before he closed the volume: namely, that the work is chiefly valuable as an Archæological compendium of “Gnostic Remains.” Unfortunately, the most interesting point about the Gnostics is their philosophy, of which their Archæological remains are, properly speaking, little more than illustrations. But the fact is, that the hard-shelled Archæologist is the last man in the world to appreciate the real esoteric signification of symbolism. All true symbols have many meanings, and for the purposes of descriptive Archæology the more superficial of these meanings are sufficient. Ignorance of the deeper meaning may indeed be bliss for the Archæologist, for it necessitates an amount of ingenuity in the fitting together of “remains,” that commands the admiration of the public, and is productive in the Archæological bosom of that agreeable sensation known as “fancying oneself.” As a laborious collector and compiler, and an ingenious worker-up of materials into interesting reading, too much can hardly be said in Mr. King’s praise, and had he a greater intuitional power, and a knowledge of esoteric religion, his great industry and erudition would make his writings valuable even to students of Occultism.
Since the publication of the former edition of his work, twenty-three years ago, Mr. King has come across and read the Pistis Sophia. The discovery of this, the only remaining Gnostic Gospel, or rather, Gospel fragment, is attributed to Schwartze, and the Latin translation to Petermann (in 1853). But Mr. King does not seem to be aware that as far back as 1843, another and ampler copy than that in the British Museum was in the hands of a Russian Raskolnik (dissident), a Cossack, who lived and married in Abyssinia; and another is in the possession of an Englishman, an Occultist, now in the United States, who brought it from Syria. It seems a pity that in the interim Mr. King did not also read Isis Unveiled, by H. P. Blavatsky, published by Bouton in New York in 1876, as its perusal would have saved him a somewhat absurd and ludicrous blunder. In his Preface, Mr. King says:—“There seems to be reason for suspecting that the Sibyl of Esoteric Buddhism drew the first notions of her new religion from the analysis of the inner man, as set forth in my first edition.”[[122]] The only person to whom this passage could apply is one of the Editors, the author of Isis Unveiled. And this, her first publication, contains the same and only doctrine she has always, or ever, promulgated. Isis Unveiled has passed through eight editions, and has been read by many thousands of persons; and not only they, but everyone who is not strangely ignorant of the very literature with which it was Mr. King’s business to make himself conversant, are perfectly aware that the two large volumes which compose that work are entirely devoted to a defence of the philosophy, science, and religion of the ancients, especially of the old Aryans, whose religion can hardly be called a “new” one, still less—“Esoteric Buddhism.” If properly spelt, however, the latter word, or Buddhism, ought to be written with one “d,” as in this case it means Wisdom. But “Budhism,” or the wisdom-religion of the Aryans, was still less a religion, in the exoteric sense, than is Buddhism, but rather a philosophy. In that part of Isis Unveiled which treats of the Gnostics, Mr. King will find a few quotations from his writings side by side with quotations from other writers on the same subject; but he will find no “new religion” there, or anywhere else, in the works of H. P. Blavatsky. And, if anyone drew the “first notions” of their religion from his “analysis of the inner man,” it must have been the early Aryans, who, unfortunately, have neglected to acknowledge the obligation. What makes Mr. King’s self-complacency the more ridiculous, is that in his preface he himself accuses someone else of “the grave error of representing their (the Gnostics’) doctrines as novel, and the pure inventions of the persons who preached them.” And in another place he confesses that he owes to Matter the first idea which has now become a settled conviction with him, that “the seeds of the gnosis were originally of Indian growth.” If Matter “faintly discerned” this truth, on the other hand Bailly, Dupuis, and others had seen it quite clearly, and had declared it most emphatically. So that Mr. King’s “discovery” is neither very new nor very original.
Mr. King must be aware that of late years immense additions have been made to western knowledge of eastern philosophies and religions—a new region in ancient literature having, in fact, been opened up by the labours of Orientalists, both European and Eastern. A study of these Oriental systems throws a strong though often a false light upon the inner meaning of Gnostic symbolism and ideas generally, which Mr. King acknowledges to have come from Indian sources; and certainly the reader has a right to expect a little more knowledge in that direction from a writer of Mr. King’s pretensions, than is displayed. For example, in the section about Buddhism in the work before us: one is tempted sometimes to ask whether it is flippancy or superficiality that is the matter with the author—when he calls the ancient Indian gymnosophists “fakirs,” and confounds them with Buddhists. Surely he need hardly be told that fakirs are Mahomedans, and that the Gymnosophists he mentions were Brahmin Yogis.
The work, however, is a valuable one in its way; but the reader should not forget that “there seems reason for suspecting” that the author does not always know exactly what he is talking about, whenever he strays too far from Archæology, on which he is no doubt an authority.
THE JEWISH WORLD enters bravely enough (in its issue of the 11th November 1887) on its new character of professor of symbology and History. It accuses in no measured terms one of the editors of Lucifer of ignorance; and criticises certain expressions used in our October number, in a foot-note inserted to explain why the “Son of the Morning” Lucifer is called in Mr. G. Massey’s little poem, “Lady of Light.” The writer objects, we see, to Lucifer-Venus being called in one of its aspects “the Jewish Astoreth;” or to her having ever been offered cakes by the Jews. As explained in a somewhat confused sentence: “There was no Jewish Astoreth, though the Syrian goddess, Ashtoreth, or Astarte, often appears in Biblical literature, the moon goddess, the complement of Baal, the Sun God.”
This, no doubt, is extremely learned and conveys quite new information. Yet such an astounding statement as that the whole of the foot-note in Lucifer is “pure imagination and bad history” is very risky indeed. For it requires no more than a stroke or two of our pen to make the whole edifice of this denial tumble on the Jewish World and mangle it very badly. Our contemporary has evidently forgotten the wise proverb that bids one to let “sleeping dogs lie,” and therefore, it is with the lofty airs of superiority that he informs his readers that though the Jews in Palestine lived surrounded with (? sic) this pagan form of worship, and may, at times, (?!) have wandered towards it, they had nothing in their worship in common with Chaldean or Syrian beliefs in multiplicity of deities? (!!)
This is what any impartial reader might really term “bad history,” and every Bible worshipper describe as a direct lie given to the Lord God of Israel. It is more than suppressio veri suggestio falsi, for it is simply a cool denial of facts in the face of both Bible and History. We advise our critic of the Jewish World to turn to his own prophets, to Jeremiah, foremost of all. We open “Scripture” and find in it: “the Lord God” while accusing his “backsliding Israel and treacherous Judah” of following in “the ways of Egypt and of Assyria,” of drinking the waters of Sihor, and “serving strange Gods” enumerating his grievances in this wise:
“According to the number of thy cities are thy gods, O Judah, (Jer. ii. 28.).
“Ye have turned back to the iniquities of your forefathers who went after other gods to serve them (xi.) ... according to the number of the streets of Jerusalem have ye set up altars to that shameful thing, even altars unto Baal”[Baal”] (Ib.).
So much for Jewish monotheism. And is it any more “pure imagination” to say that the Jews offered cakes to their Astoreth and called her “Queen of Heaven”? Then the “Lord God” must, indeed, be guilty of more than “a delicate expansion of facts” when thundering to, and through, Jeremiah:—
“Seest thou not what they do in the cities of Judah, and in the streets of Jerusalem? The children gather wood, and the fathers kindle the fire, and the women knead their dough TO MAKE CAKES to the Queen of Heaven, and to pour out drink offerings unto the gods.” (Jer. vii. 17-18).
“The Jews may AT TIMES” only (?) have wandered towards pagan forms of worship but “had nothing in common in it with Syrian beliefs in multiplicity of deities.” Had they not? Then the ancestors of the editors of the Jewish World must have been the victims of “suggestion,” when, snubbing Jeremiah (and not entirely without good reason),they declared to him:
“As for the word that thou hast spoken unto us in the name of the Lord, we will not hearken unto thee. But we will certainly do whatsoever thing goeth forth out of our own mouth, to burn incense unto the Queen of Heaven[[123]] ... as we have done, we, AND OUR FATHERS, our kings, and our princes, in the cities of Judah, and in the streets of Jerusalem, for then had we plenty of victuals, and were well, and saw no evil. But since we left off to burn incense to the Queen of Heaven, and to pour out drink offerings unto her ... and (to) make her cakes to worship her ... we have wanted all things, and have been consumed by the sword and by the famine....”[famine....”] (Jer. xliv. 16, 17, 18, 19).
Thus, according to their own confession, it is not “at times” that the Jews made cakes for, and worshipped Astoreth and the strange gods, but constantly: doing, moreover, as their forefathers, kings and princes did.
“Bad history”? And what was the “golden calf” but the sacred heifer, the symbol of the “Great Mother,” first the planet Venus, and then the moon? For the esoteric doctrine holds (as the Mexicans held) that Venus, the morning star, was created before the sun and moon; metaphorically, of course, not astronomically,[[124]] the assumption being based upon, and meaning that which the Nazars and the Initiate alone understood among the Jews, but that the writers of the Jewish World are not supposed to know. For the same reason the Chaldeans maintained that the moon was produced before the sun (see Babylon—Account of Creation, by George Smith). The morning star, Lucifer-Venus was dedicated to that Great Mother symbolized by the heifer or the “Golden Calf.” For, as says Mr. G. Massey in his lecture on “The Hebrews and their Creations,” “This (the Golden Calf) being of either sex, it supplied a twin-type for Venus, as Hathor or Ishtar (Astoreth), the double star, that was male at rising, and female at sunset” She is the “Celestial Aphrodite,” Venus Victrix νιχηφόρος associated with Ares (see Pausanias i, 8, 4, 11, 25, 1).
We are told that “happily for them (the Jews) there was no Jewish Astoreth.” The Jewish World has yet to learn, we see, that there would have been no Greek Venus Aphrodite; no Ourania, her earlier appellation; nor would she have been confounded with the Assyrian Mylitta (Herod, 1, 199; Pausan., 1, 14, 7; Hesiod, Μυληταν την Ουρανιαν Ασσυριοι) had it not been for the Phœnicians and other Semites. We say the “Jewish Astoreth,” and we maintain what we say, on the authority of the Iliad, the Odyssey, of Renan, and many others. Venus Aphrodite is one with the Astarte, Astoreth, etc. of the Phœnicians, and she is one (as a planet) with “Lucifer” the “Morning Star.” So far back as the days of Homer, she was confounded with Kypris, an Oriental goddess brought by the Phœnician Semites from their Asiatic travels (Iliad, V, 330, 422, 260). Her worship appears first at Cythere, a Phœnician settlement depôt or trade-establishment (Odys., VIII. 362.; Walcker, griech. götterl. I, 666.) Herodotus shows that the sanctuary of Ascalon, in Syria, was the most ancient of the fanes of Aphrodite Ourania (I, 105): and Decharme tells us in his Mythologie de la Grèce Antique, that whenever the Greeks alluded to the origin of Aphrodite they designated her as Ourania, an epithet translated from a semitic word, as Jupiter Epouranios of the Phœnician inscriptions, was the Samemroum of Philo of Byblos, according to Renan (Mission de Phenicie). Astoreth was a goddess of generation, presiding at human birth (as Jehovah was god of generation, foremost of all). She was the moon-goddess, and a planet at the same time, whose worship originated with the Phœnicians and Semites. It flourished most in the Phœnician settlements and colonies in Sicily, at Eryax. There hosts of Hetairae were attached to her temples, as hosts of Kadeshim, called by a more sincere name in the Bible, were, to the house of the Lord, “where[“where] the women wove hangings for the grove” (II. Kings, xxiii, 7). All this shows well the Semitic provenance of Astoreth-Venus in her capacity of “great Mother.” Let us pause. We advise sincerely the Jewish World to abstain from throwing stones at other peoples’ beliefs, so long as its own faith is but a house of glass. And though Jeremy Taylor may think that “to be proud of one’s learning is the greatest ignorance,” yet, in this case it is but simple justice to say that it is really desirable for our friends the Jews that the writer in Lucifer of the criticised note about Astoreth should know less of history and the Bible, and her unlucky critic in the Jewish World learn a little more about it.
“Adversary.”
Theosophical
and Mystic Publications
THE THEOSOPHIST for October opens with the first of a series of articles on the “Elohistic Cosmogony.” The views put forward by the writer are certainly both striking and original, and, although Dr. Pratt diverges very considerably from the recognised standard of kabalistic orthodoxy, his interpretation of the Jewish version of cosmic evolution will assuredly excite considerable interest.
Following on Dr. Pratt’s learned article, come a few—unfortunately, too few—pages of extremely interesting notes on the Folk-lore of the Himalayan tribes, contributed by Captain Banon. The Theosophist has often been indebted to Captain Banon for similar notes respecting such little known tribes and people; and it is much to be regretted that the many members of the Theosophical Society who reside in or visit such out-of-the-way places, do not make it a rule to collect these traditions and send them for publication in the Theosophist or one of the other Theosophical magazines.
Dr. Hartmann continues his series of “Rosicrucian Letters,” with a number of extracts from the papers of Karl von Eckartshausen, who died in 1792. Dr. Hartmann deserves the gratitude of all students for rendering accessible these records and notes of past generations of “seekers after the Truth.”
Dr. Buck contributes a pithy and thoughtful article on “The Soul Problem,” and Mr. Lazarus continues his exposition of the kabalistic doctrine of the Microcosm. Besides these there are further instalments of two valuable translations from Hindu works of great antiquity and authority; the “Crest Jewel of Wisdom,” by Sankaracharya and the “Kaivalyanita.”[“Kaivalyanita.”] It is much to be desired that one of our Hindu brothers, who adds to a knowledge of his own mystic literature, an acquaintance with Western modes of thought and expression, would devote a series of articles to the exposition of the fundamental standpoint and ideas of such works as these. Such an article would add enormously to the value of these translations to the Western world.
In the November number, Dr. Pratt takes up the Jehovistic cosmogony, which he contrasts and compares with the Elohistic version already referred to. In his view, the Jehovistic teaching embodies the conception of the world as “created” and “ruled” by an extra-natural and personal deity, as opposed to the more philosophical and pantheistic conception of the earlier Elohistic writers.
Under the title of An Ancient Weapon, this issue contains an instructive account of the evocation of certain astral forces according to the ancient Vedic rites. As here described, the evil intention, with which the rite is performed, transforms it into a ceremony of Black Magic, but this does not render the account any less valuable.
This is followed by the first of a series of articles on The Allegory of the Zoroastrian Cosmogony, which promises to furnish much food for thought and study.
Rosicrucian Letters contains this time an extract from an old MS., headed The Temple of Solomon, which is well worthy of careful attention.
Besides these we have a sketch of the life and writings of Madvachary, the great teacher of Southern India, and some further testimonies to the fact of “self-levitation” from eye-witnesses. Rama Prasad gives some most valuable details of the “Science of Breathing,” one of the most curious branches of occult physics, while the remainder of the number is occupied by an article on “Tetragrammaton,” which may be interesting to students of the Kabbala, and continuations of the “Kabbala and the Microcosm,” and of the translations from Indian books mentioned in connection with the October number.
These two numbers contain much valuable matter and well maintain the reputation which the Theosophist originally gained for itself.
In THE PATH for October we notice especially the following articles:
Nature’s Scholar, a most poetically-conceived and well-worked-out Idyll, by J. C. Ver Plank, in which the underlying occult truth is presented to the reader in a most attractive form.
Following this is a much needed warning against the dangers of Astral Intoxication. Admirably expressed, it points out the true, and indicates the false, path with great clearness; and we desire to call the earnest attention of such of our readers as are engaged in psychic development to its importance.
“Pilgrim” contributes some further Thoughts in Solitude, the leading idea of which may be indicated by its concluding lines, which are quoted from Sir Philip Sydney of heroic fame:
“Then farewell, World! thy uttermost I see,
Eternal Love, maintain thy life in me!”
Tea-Table Talk is even more interesting and suggestive than usual, and, besides those above mentioned, this well-filled number contains Part IV. of the series of articles on The Poetry of Re-incarnation in Western Literature, which deals with the Platonic Poets.
The November number opens with an able continuation of Mr. Brehon’s article on The Bhagavat-Gita, commenced so long ago as last April, of which we hope to peruse a further instalment. Following this is a short article indicating the term “Medium” from the loathsome connotations which phenomenal spiritualism has attached to it. We then come to a paper on Goethe’s Faust, read before one of the branches of the Theosophical Society in America. It is of great interest to students of literature and will furnish a clue to the real meaning of much of the poet’s writing.
Mr. Johnston makes some most suggestive remarks on Cain and Abel; Harij speaks in no uncertain tones of Personalities and Truth, while Hadji Erinn points out the Path of Action, and warns the members of the T. S. that they must not expect their road to become easier and plainer before them, while yet the society is undergoing the trials of its education.
Zadok gives some able answers to questions on various points of practical occultism and Julius, in Tea-Table Talk, points out how many people are really entering on the path of Theosophy—even though unconsciously.
LE LOTUS, for October and November, is even more interesting than usual. In the October number are contained two very valuable articles. The first of these is a paper on Paracelsus from the pen of Dr. Hartmann, who is especially qualified to handle the subject by his profound study of the work, and especially the manuscripts, of that great occultist. M. “Papus” contributes a most lucid and able exposition of some Kabbalistic doctrines, the practical value of which has been hitherto but little realised even by professed students of mysticism.
The opening article in the November issue is headed, The Constitution of the Microcosm. It is written in a clear and attractive style, and contains a most thorough and complete explanation of the various classifications of the principles which enter into the constitution of man.
“Amaravella” has evidently studied the whole subject very deeply, and he shows the relation of these various classifications to one another in a way which will clear up many of the misconceptions which have arisen.
M. “Papus” writes on Alchemy in a manner which shows how conversant he is with this little-understood topic. We therefore look forward with great anticipations to the perusal of his book “Traité élémentaire de science occulte,” the fourth chapter of which contains the article referred to.
It is very evident that Theosophy is making great and rapid progress in France, and this is in great measure due to the untiring and unselfish devotion of the editor of Le Lotus, M. Gaboriau, whom we congratulate most warmly on the success which has attended his efforts.
L’Aurore for October contains an article on the so-called “Star of Bethlehem,” which repeats the assurance that the world is entering on a new and happier life-phase.
Unfortunately, it seems more than probable that before this amelioration takes place, the world must pass through the valley of the shadow of Death, and endure calamities far worse than any it has yet seen. Lady Caithness continues her erudite and interesting article on the lost ten tribes of Israel. Her thesis is put forward in admirable language, and supported by a great wealth of biblical quotations. Unfortunately, the task undertaken is an impossible one. There never were twelve tribes of Israel—two only—Judah and the Levites, having had a real existence in the flesh. The remainder are but euhemerizations of the signs of the Zodiac, and were introduced because they were necessary to the Kabalistic scheme on which the “History” of the Jews was written.
Lady Barrogill relates the well-known story of an English bishop and the ghost of a Catholic priest, who haunted his former residence in order to secure the destruction of some notes he had taken (contrary to the rule of the Church) of an important confession which he had heard.
Besides these articles we find the continuation of the serial romance, “L’amour Immortel,” and Lucifer has to thank the editor for the appreciative notice contained in this number.
[58]. S. Mark, iv. 11; Matthew, xiii. 11; Luke, viii. 10.
[59]. So medicine is, in the Shakespearian use of the word, and also from its Greek derivation, not to give drugs, but to cure or heal.
[60]. The discoverer of the new power now known as the Keeley-motor and inter-etheric force.
[61]. Co-operative, that is to say, in the sense that the various sections and individual members of society shall willingly co-operate, being fully conscious of their interdependance.
St. George Lane Fox.
[62]. Socialists who consider their Christianity to supply them with sufficient motives for their Socialism. They do not strictly form a sect either of Socialists or of Christians.
[63]. This word, of course, is employed in the general sense, without any reference to the physical character which the revolution may assume. It may be attended with violence, or it may be as peaceful as, for instance, the religious revolution accomplished by Constantine in the fourth century. All I am postulating is a more or less sudden transformation of the existing social order, effected by one of those impulses with which evolution seems to complete its periods, and of which Theosophy may some day afford the explanation.
[64]. The only kind to which T. B. H.’s remarks are in any way applicable.
[65]. I do not, of course, mean to predict that “sin” (or its Theosophical equivalent) would die out. It is, after all, a relative matter to the capacities and potentialities of the individual and his surroundings. Under Socialism, sensuality, social or plutocratic pride, and other sins fostered by the present order, would simply give way to ambition (to obtain popular distinction, e.g., as an artist or inventor) and perhaps to magic and other at present unfashionable vices.
[66]. It is somewhat difficult to follow the argument of this passage, unless the meaning of the words is explained. The Lion of the House of Judah is equivalent to “the Lord” and to “the Victor” mentioned below. In the writer’s phraseology “Victor is the symbol of the Trinity of Wisdom, Love, Truth.” Now the Lion is symbolical of Wisdom; but, as it is impossible to sever one element of the Trinity from another, it is necessary to remember that whenever the word wisdom is used it carries with it the other two as well. The above sentence would then seem to mean the conjunction of the male and female principles to effect the purpose of the manifestation of the Trinity above mentioned; by which manifestation all ignorance is dispelled. [Ed.]
[67]. Judah means praised; the true idea being the Lord be praised. Too much attention cannot be paid to the meanings of the words used in the sacred writings of all nations and peoples.
[68]. i.e. the Queen, on whose lands the Sun never sets; it must be remembered that—“neither is the woman without the man, nor the man without the woman in the Lord.”—(1 Corinthians xi, 11.)[11.)]
[69]. “And no man can say Jesus is Lord (i.e. Victor), but in the Holy Spirit.”—(1 Corinthians xii., 3, Revised Version.) It is especially necessary to remember that whenever allusion is made to Victoria, it is not Her Most Gracious Majesty who is meant but the unseen Victoria whose outward manifestation the Queen is alleged to be. It is as though the Queen is the mouth-piece of the intelligence behind, as the Foreign Secretary may be the mouth-piece of the Foreign policy of the Government. The language used is purely symbolical and by using words as symbols an esoteric meaning is attached to the most commonplace events in life. It is a truly occult argument, but one which matter-of-fact people will regard as nonsensical. [Ed.]
[70]. According to the explanations of the writer (v. supra), The World signifies a state of ignorance and darkness. Taken in this sense the above sentence becomes a truism. [Ed.]
[71]. Ignorance is the equivalent of the Body, which is the Cross. By this light the Wisdom means the life[life] of the Spirit. [Ed.]
[72]. To say that Man was created ignorant for a great purpose would argue the idea of a creator, according to orthodox ideas. But the writer is known to repudiate this idea entirely. It is difficult, therefore, to see what he means, unless it is that the man of flesh was ushered into existence by an evolution which he has not yet completed—ignorant, to acquire knowledge gradually. [Ed.]
[73]. This is a very optimistic view of the case, and we can only hope to see it realised. The article “Signs of the Times” agrees with the views of the writer of this article. There is a development going on, but the forces against which it has to contend are too dense for an early realisation of this dreamlike Golden Age. It is too good to be true; but that it is possible to help it is also true. The Kingdom of Heaven may be taken by violence, and an entrance effected in an instant, but the process of attaining the position whence the attack may be delivered, is one extending over years. No student of occultism needs to be told this. [Ed.]
[74]. David means beloved; he was the first King of Israel, chosen of the Spirit. Israel means one who strives with God—i.e. one who strives against ignorance in order that he may be blessed together with his posterity. It was a name given to Jacob when he wrestled with the Angel (Genesis xxxii., 28), and applies to all who contend on the side of the Deity.
[75]. In the writer’s phraseology, Judah is the equivalent of Erin in this case. It becomes exceedingly difficult to follow his meaning, for as everything is the equivalent of everything else, we are landed in a hopeless maze of paradox. On the principle that there is no truth without a paradox, there must be a great truth in this article (as there is), but its disentanglement is a matter of much labour and thought. The line of argument is the Judah meaning “be praised”—certain people who praised or followed the Lord (or Wisdom) were “oppressed and laid aside their harps.” There are people unjustly oppressed in Ireland, not by the outer troubles, but by the causes of the undoubted misery which prevails there. Consequently, the daughters of Judah and Erin are equivalent terms and interchangeable as symbols. The fact is that the author uses a peculiar cryptogram, as he himself states. [Ed.]
[76]. See “The Mother, the woman clothed with the Sun,” Vols. I. and II.; and also the celebrated picture of “The Woman clothed with the Sun,” by Carl Müller.
[77]. i.e., The Sceptre that endureth.
[78]. Revelation, xii.
[79]. The Queen of the South or Zenith (i.e. the most supreme point of the Heavens) who shall rise in judgment with this generation (see Matthew xii, 42), She’ba represents two Hebrew words (Shebhā and Shebhȧ). The first of these is an obscure term, compared by Gesenius with the Ethiopic for “man”; the second signifies an oath or covenant.
[80]. i.e., The Christ, the Messiah.
[81]. i.e., The man of “Sol” or the Sun. Hence, Christians worship on Sunday instead of on the Sabbath or on Saturday, as the Jews worship.
[82]. i.e., Theosophy, or the hidden outcome of the hidden wisdom of the ages.
[83]. The word χρεών is explained by Herodotus (7. 11. 7.) as that which an oracle declares, and τὸ χρεών is given by Plutarch (Nic. 14.) as “fate,” “necessity.” Vide Herod, 7. 215; 5. 108; and Sophocles, Phil. 437.
[84]. See Liddell and Scott’s Greek-Engl. Lex.
[85]. Hence of a Guru, “a teacher,” and chela, a “disciple,” in their mutual relations.
[86]. In his recent work—“The Early Days of Christianity,” Canon Farrar remarks:—“Some have supposed a pleasant play of words founded on it, as ... between Chréstos (‘sweet’ Ps. xxx., iv., 8) and Christos (Christ)” (I. p. 158, foot-note). But there is nothing to suppose, since it began[began] by a “play of words,” indeed. The name Christus was not “distorted into Chrestus,” as the learned author would make his readers believe (p. 19), but it was the adjective and noun Chréstos which became distorted into Christus, and applied to Jesus. In a foot-note on the word “Chrestian,” occurring in the First Epistle of Peter (chap. iv., 16), in which in the revised later MSS. the word was changed into Christian, Canon Farrar remarks again, “Perhaps we should read the ignorant heathen distortion, Chréstian.” Most decidedly we should; for the eloquent writer should remember his Master’s command to render unto Cæsar that which is Cæsar’s. His dislike notwithstanding, Mr. Farrar is obliged to admit that the name Christian was first INVENTED, by the sneering, mocking Antiochians, as early as A.D. 44, but had not come into general use before the persecution by Nero. “Tacitus,” he says, “uses the word Christians with something of apology. It is well known that in the N. T. it only occurs three times, and always involves a hostile sense (Acts xi. 26, xxvi. 28, as it does in iv. 16).” It was not Claudius alone who looked with alarm and suspicion on the Christians, so nicknamed in derision for their carnalizing a subjective principle or attribute, but all the pagan nations. For Tacitus, speaking of those whom the masses called “Christians,” describes them as a set of men detested for their enormities and crimes. No wonder, for history repeats itself. There are, no doubt, thousands of noble, sincere, and virtuous Christian-born men and women now. But we have only to look at the viciousness of Christian “heathen” converts; at the morality of those proselytes in India, whom the missionaries themselves decline to take into their service, to draw a parallel between the converts of 1,800 years ago, and the modern heathens “touched by grace.”
[87]. Justin Martyr, Tertullian, Lactantius, Clemens Alexandrinus, and others spelt it in this way.
[88]. Vide Liddell and Scott’s Greek and English Lexicon. Chréstos is really one who is continually warned, advised, guided, whether by oracle or prophet. Mr. G. Massey is not correct in saying that “... The Gnostic form of the name Chrest, or Chrestos, denotes the Good God, not a human original,” for it denoted the latter, i.e., a good, holy man; but he is quite right when he adds that “Chrestianus signifies ... ‘Sweetness and Light.’” “The Chrestoi, as the Good People, were pre-extant. Numerous Greek inscriptions show that the departed, the hero, the saintly one—that is, the ‘Good’—was styled Chrestos, or the Christ; and from this meaning of the ‘Good’ does Justin, the primal apologist, derive the Christian name. This identifies it with the Gnostic source, and with the ‘Good God’ who revealed himself according to Marcion—that is, the Un-Nefer or Good-opener of the Egyptian theology.”—(Agnostic Annual.)
[89]. Again I must bring forward what Mr. G. Massey says (whom I quote repeatedly because he has studied this subject so thoroughly and so conscientiously).
“My contention, or rather explanation,” he says, “is that the author of the Christian name is the Mummy-Christ of Egypt, called the Karest, which was a type of the immortal spirit in man, the Christ within (as Paul has it), the divine offspring incarnated, the Logos, the Word of Truth, the[the] Makheru of Egypt. It did not originate as a mere type! The preserved mummy was the dead body[body] of any one that was Karest, or mummified, to be kept by the living; and, through constant repetition, this became a type of the resurrection from (not of!) the dead.” See the explanation of this further on.
[90]. Or Lydda. Reference is made here to the Rabbinical tradition in the Babylonian Gemara, called Sepher Toledoth Jeshu, about Jesus being the son of one named Pandira, and having lived a century earlier than the era called Christian, namely, during the reign of the Jewish king Alexander Jannæus and his wife Salome, who reigned from the year 106 to 79 B.C. Accused by the Jews of having learned the magic art in Egypt, and of having stolen from the Holy of Holies the Incommunicable Name, Jehoshua (Jesus) was put to death by the Sanhedrin at Lud. He was stoned and then crucified on a tree, on the eve of Passover. The narrative is ascribed to the Talmudistic authors of “Sota” and “Sanhedrin,” p. 19, Book of Zechiel. See “Isis Unveiled,” II. 201; Arnobius; Elephas Levi’s “Science des Esprits,” and “The Historical Jesus and Mythical Christ,” a lecture by G. Massey.
[91]. “Christianus[“Christianus] quantum interpretatione de unctione deducitas. Sed ut cum perferam Chrestianus pronunciatus a vobis (nam nec nominis certa est notitia penes vos) de suavitate vel benignitate compositum est.” Canon Farrar makes a great effort to show such lapsus calami by various Fathers as the results of disgust and fear. “There can be little doubt,” he says (in The Early Days of Christianity) “that the ... name Christian ... was a nick-name due to the wit of the Antiochians.... It is clear that the sacred writers avoided the name (Christians) because it was employed by their enemies (Tac. Ann. xv. 44). It only became familiar when the virtues of Christians had shed lustre upon it....” This is a very lame excuse, and a poor explanation to give for so eminent a thinker as Canon Farrar. As to the “virtues of Christians” ever shedding lustre upon the name, let us hope that the writer had in his mind’s eye neither Bishop Cyril, of Alexandria, nor Eusebius, nor the Emperor Constantine, of murderous fame, nor yet the Popes Borgia and the Holy Inquisition.
[92]. Quoted by G. Higgins. (See Vol. I., pp. 569-573.)
[93]. In the days of Homer, we find this city, once celebrated for its mysteries, the chief seat of Initiation, and the name of Chrestos used as a title during the mysteries. It is mentioned in the Iliad, ii., 520 as “Chrisa” (χρῖσα). Dr. Clarke suspected its ruins under the present site of Krestona, a small town, or village rather, in Phocis, near the Crissæan Bay. (See E. D. Clarke, 4th ed. Vol. viii. p. 239, “Delphi.”)
[94]. The root of χρητός (Chretos) and χρηστος (Chrestos) is one and the same; χράω which means “consulting the oracle,” in one sense, but in another one “consecrated,” set apart, belonging to some temple, or oracle, or devoted to oracular[oracular] services. On the other hand, the word χρε (χρεω) means “obligation,” a “bond, duty,” or one who is under the obligation of pledges, or vows taken.
[95]. The adjective χρηστὸς was also used as an adjective before proper names as a compliment, as in Plat. Theact. p. 166A, “Ὁυτος ὁ Σωκράτης ὁ χρηστός;” (here[(here] Socrates is the Chréstos), and also as a surname, as shown by Plutarch (V. Phocion), who wonders how such a rough and dull fellow as Phocion could be surnamed Chréstos.
[96]. There are strange features, quite suggestive, for an Occultist, in the myth (if one) of Janus. Some make of him the personification of Kosmos, others, of Cælus (heaven), hence he is “two-faced” because of his two characters of spirit and matter; and he is not only “Janus Bifrons” (two-faced), but also Quadrifrons—the perfect square, the emblem of the Kabbalistic Deity. His temples were built with four equal sides, with a door and three windows on each side. Mythologists explain it as an emblem of the four seasons of the year, and three months in each season, and in all of the twelve months of the year. During the mysteries of Initiation, however, he became the Day-Sun and the Night-Sun. Hence he is often represented with the number 300 in one hand, and in the other 65, or the number of days of the Solar year. Now Chanoch (Kanoch and Enosh in the Bible) is, as may be shown on Kabalistic authority, whether son of Cain, son of Seth, or the son of Methuselah, one and the same personage. As Chanoch (according to Fuerst), he is the Initiator, Instructor—of the astronomical circle and solar year,”[year,”] as son of Methuselah, who is said to have lived 365 years and been taken to heaven alive, as the representative of the Sun (or god). (See Book of Enoch.) This patriarch has many features in common with Janus, who, exoterically, is Ion but Iao cabalistically, or Jehovah, the “Lord God of Generations,” the mysterious Yodh, or One (a phallic number). For Janus or Ion is also Consivius, a conserendo, because he presided over generations. He is shown giving hospitality to Saturn (Chronos “time”), and is the Initiator of the year, or time divided into 365.
[97]. Stauros became the cross, the instrument of crucifixion, far later, when it began to be represented as a Christian symbol and with the Greek letter T, the Tau. (Luc. Jud. Voc.) Its primitive meaning was phallic, a symbol for the male and female elements; the great serpent of temptation, the body which had to be killed or subdued by the dragon of wisdom, the seven-vowelled solar chnouphis or Spirit of Christos of the Gnostics, or, again, Apollo killing Python.
[98]. Even to this day in India, the candidate loses his name and, as also in Masonry, his age (monks and nuns also changing their Christian names at their taking the order or veil), and begins counting his years from the day he is accepted a chela and enters upon the cycle of initiations. Thus Saul was “a child of one year,” when he began to reign, though a grown-up adult. See 1 Samuel ch. xiii. 1, and Hebrew scrolls, about his initiation by Samuel.
[99]. Demosthenes, “De Corona,” 313, declares that the candidates for initiation[initiation] into the Greek mysteries were anointed with oil. So they are now in India, even in the initiation into the Yogi mysteries—various ointments or unguents being used.
[100]. Because he is cabalistically the new Adam, the “celestial man,” and Adam was made of red earth.
[101]. Hence the memorialising of the doctrine during the MYSTERIES. The pure monad, the “god” incarnating and becoming Chrestos, or man, on his trial of life, a series of those trials led him to the crucifixion of flesh, and finally into the Christos condition.
[102]. On the best authority the derivation of the Greek Christos is shown from the Sanskrit root ghársh = “rub”; thus: ghársh-ā-mi-to, “to rub,” and ghársh-tá-s “flayed, sore.” Moreover, Krish, which means in one sense to plough and make furrows, means also to cause pain, “to torture to torment,” and ghrsh-tā-s “rubbing”—all these terms relating to Chrestos and Christos conditions. One has to die in Chrestos, i.e., kill one’s personality and its passions, to blot out every idea of separateness from one’s “Father,” the Divine Spirit in man; to become one with the eternal and absolute Life and Light (Sat) before one can reach the glorious state of Christos, the regenerated man, the man in spiritual freedom.
[103]. The Orientalists and Theologians are invited to read over and study the allegory of Viswakarman, the “Omnificent,” the Vedic God, the architect of the world, who sacrificed himself to himself or the world, after having offered up all worlds, which are himself, in a “Sarva Madha” (general sacrifice)—and ponder over it. In the Purânic allegory, his daughter Yoga-siddha “Spiritual consciousness,” the wife of Surya, the Sun, complains to him of the too great effulgence of her husband; and Viswakarmâ, in his character of Takshaka, “wood cutter and carpenter,” placing the Sun upon his lathe cuts away a part of his brightness. Surya looks, after this, crowned with dark thorns instead of rays, and becomes Vikarttana (“shorn of his rays”). All these names are terms which were used by the candidates when going through the trials of Initiation. The Hierophant-Initiator personated Viswakarman; the father, and the general artificer of the gods (the adepts on earth), and the candidate-Surya, the Sun, who had to kill all his fiery passions and wear the crown of thorns while crucifying his body before he could rise and be re-born into a new life as the glorified “Light of the World”—Christos. No Orientalist seems to have ever perceived the suggestive analogy, let alone to apply it!
[104]. The author of the “Source of Measures” thinks that this “serves to explain why it has been that the Life of Apollonius of Tyana, by Philostratus has been so carefully kept back from translation and popular reading.” Those who have studied it in the original have been forced to the comment that either the “Life of Apollonius has been taken from the New Testament, or that New Testament narratives have been taken from the Life of Apollonius, because of the manifest sameness of the means of construction of the narrative.” (p. 260).
[105]. The[The] word שיה shiac, is in Hebrew the same word as a verbal, signifying to go down into the pit. As a noun, place of thorns, pit. The hifil participle of this word is [Hebrew] or Messiach, or the Greek Messias, Christ, and means “he who causes to go down into the pit” (or hell, in dogmatism). In esoteric philosophy, this going down into the pit has the most mysterious significance. The Spirit “Christos” or rather the “Logos” (read Logoï), is said to “go down into the pit,” when it incarnates in flesh, is born as a man. After having robbed the Elohim (or gods) of their secret, the pro-creating “fire of life,” the Angels of Light are shown cast down into the pit or abyss of matter, called Hell, or the bottomless pit, by the kind theologians. This, in Cosmogony and Anthropology. During the Mysteries, however, it is the Chréstos, neophyte, (as man), etc., who had to descend into the crypts of Initiation and trials; and finally, during the “Sleep of Siloam” or the final trance condition, during the hours of which the new Initiate has the last and final mysteries of being divulged to him. Hades, Schéol, or Patala, are all one. The same takes place in the East now, as took place 2,000 years ago in the West, during the Mysteries.
[106]. Several classics bear testimony to this fact. Lucian, c. 16, says Φωκίων ὁ χρηστὸς, and Φωκίων ὁ ἐπὶκλην (“λεγόμενος,”[“λεγόμενος,”] surnamed “χρηστος.”) In Phædr. p. 226 E, it is written, “you mean Theodorus the Chrestos.” “Τὸν χρηστὸν λεγεις Θεὸδωρον”. Plutarch shows the same; and Χρηστος—Chrestus, is the proper name (see the word in Thesaur. Steph.) of an orator and disciple of Herodes Atticus.
[107]. Mr. Keightley’s meaning (and it is difficult for the words to bear any other interpretation) was that the denial of harmony is evidence that, at some previous time, the man who denies has set himself in opposition to the law, in virtue of those very desires and instincts of his animal personality to which Mr. Beatty alludes later on. In this sense, Mr. Beatty is right in saying that a law of the universe cannot be broken; but its limits may be transgressed, and consequently an attempt made by man to make himself into a small, but rival universe. It is the old story of the china pot and the iron kettle, and the fact that china gets the worst of it is conclusive that the china is struggling against Nature.
[108]. Will Mr. Beatty explain the phenomenon of a comet flirting its tail round the sun in defiance of the “law of gravitation”?
[109]. Very little doubt that it does. Mankind is only very gradually developing its fifth sense on the intellectual plane. Intuition might have carried our critic over the difficulty, but in some parts of his criticism he seems hardly to have begun to evolute the intellectual sense.
[110]. “This Karma,” as Mr. Beatty expresses it, would not be quite so bewildering a subject if critics would bear in mind the context and not fall foul of a detached expression—not even a sentence. The “interest of the soul’s welfare in heaven” is concentrated by John Smith on John Smith as John Smith in heaven, and in order that the said John Smith may go on enjoying the things he loved on earth. As his earth life has ended, John Smith has changed and is “transient.” If he were not transient a very natural inference would follow, that progress, evolution, &c., on whatever plane of being does not prevail.
[111]. Mr. Beatty hardly maintains his position of consistent materialism here; and it is at least as vainglorious to deny as to assert.
[112]. Man has the “animal” in him of course, but he has also the power of judgment or discrimination. Mr. Beatty’s wish to be critically pessimistic seems here to run away with his power of discrimination.
[113]. No law of Nature can be set aside, but a man transgresses a law of his [mental] being when he deliberately places himself under the sway of certain “evil” forces. The gist of Mr. Beatty’s criticism is not quite evident here.
[114]. The phenomenal contrast is not denied, but it is representative of no fundamental want of harmony. In the same way the contrast of Subject and Object is essential to our present finite consciousness, although it has no basis of reality beyond the limits of conditional being. Moreover, even in this phenomenal Universe, equilibrium (harmony) is most certainly maintained by the very conflict of the contrasted forces alluded to.
[115]. Mr. Beatty asks how the Universe would come to a stand-still, if the law of Harmony was suspended. Now suppose, for instance, the law of “gravity” was not counterbalanced by the action of other “forces,” what would happen? Science assures us that everything would have long before gravitated to a common centre, and a universal dead-lock have ensued! Vice versa, if “gravity” were to lapse. Verb. Sap.
[116]. Yet, unless metaphysical speculation comes to the rescue of the new philosophy, and, completing, explains it on the old Vedantic lines, the “circle,” instead of being a “self-sustaining” one, is more than likely to become a—“vicious circle.”—Ed.
[117]. We know but two cases of married “chelas” being accepted; but both these were Brahmins and had child-wives, according to Hindu custom, and they were Reformers more than chelas, trying to abrogate child-marriage and slavery. Others had to obtain the consent of their wives before entering the “Path,” as is usual in India since long ages.
[118]. This rule 1. applies only to the “temple chelas,” who must be perfect.
[119]. Or one, if the other is dead.
[120]. See “[The Esoteric Character of the Gospels],” in this number.
[121]. “Auto-Centricism, or, The Brain Theory of Life and Mind,” p. 41.
[122]. This modest assumption is followed by the generous promise to furnish “investigators of the same order” as the supposed “Sibyl,” with “a still more profound theosophy.” This is extremely considerate and kind. But if it is Pistis-Sophia which the author had in his mind, then he had better apply to Theosophists for the explanation of the most recondite points in that gnostic fragment, while translating it, as he proposes doing from Latin. For though the world of the Orientalists “of the same order” as himself, may labour under the mistaken impression that no one except themselves knew or know anything about Pistis-Sophia till 1853—Theosophists know better. Does Mr. King really imagine that no one besides himself knows anything about the Gnostics “and their remains,” or what he knows is the only correct thing to know? Strange delusion, if so; yet quite a harmless one, we confess.
[123]. Astoreth-Diana, Isis, Melita, Venus, etc., etc.
[124]. Because the stars and planets are the symbols and houses of Angels and Elohim, who were, of course, “created,” or evoluted before the physical or cosmic sun or moon. “The sun god was called the child of the moon god Sin, in Assyria, and the lunar god Taht, is called the father of Osiris, the sun god ‘in Egypt.’” (G. Massey.)
LUCIFER
Vol. I. LONDON, JANUARY 15TH, 1888. No. 5.
1888.
People usually wish that their friends shall have a happy new year, and sometimes “prosperous” is added to “happy.” It is not likely that much happiness or prosperity can come to those who are living for the truth under such a dark number as 1888; but still the year is heralded by the glorious star Venus-Lucifer, shining so resplendently that it has been mistaken for that still rarer visitor, the star of Bethlehem. This too, is at hand; and surely something of the Christos spirit must be born upon earth under such conditions. Even if happiness and prosperity are absent, it is possible to find something greater than either in this coming year. Venus-Lucifer is the sponsor of our magazine, and as we chose to come to light under its auspices, so do we desire to touch on its nobility. This is possible for us all personally, and instead of wishing our readers a happy or prosperous New Year, we feel more in the vein to pray them to make it one worthy of its brilliant herald. This can be effected by those who are courageous and resolute. Thoreau pointed out that there are artists in life, persons who can change the colour of a day and make it beautiful to those with whom they come in contact. We claim that there are adepts, masters in life who make it divine, as in all other arts. Is it not the greatest art of all, this which affects the very atmosphere in which we live? That it is the most important is seen at once, when we remember that every person who draws the breath of life affects the mental and moral atmosphere of the world, and helps to colour the day for those about him. Those who do not help to elevate the thoughts and lives of others must of necessity either paralyse them by indifference, or actively drag them down. When this point is reached, then the art of life is converted into the science of death; we see the black magician at work. And no one can be quite inactive. Although many bad books and pictures are produced, still not everyone who is incapable of writing or painting well insists on doing so badly. Imagine the result if they were to! Yet so it is in life. Everyone lives, and thinks, and speaks. If all our readers who have any sympathy with Lucifer endeavoured to learn the art of making life not only beautiful but divine, and vowed no longer to be hampered by disbelief in the possibility of this miracle, but to commence the Herculean task at once, then 1888, however unlucky a year, would have been fitly ushered in by the gleaming star. Neither happiness nor prosperity are always the best of bedfellows for such undeveloped mortals as most of us are; they seldom bring with them peace, which is the only permanent joy. The idea of peace is usually connected with the close of life and a religious state of mind. That kind of peace will however generally be found to contain the element of expectation. The pleasures of this world have been surrendered, and the soul waits contentedly in expectation of the pleasures of the next. The peace of the philosophic mind is very different from this and can be attained to early in life when pleasure has scarcely been tasted, as well as when it has been fully drunk of. The American Transcendentalists discovered that life could be made a sublime thing without any assistance from circumstances or outside sources of pleasure and prosperity. Of course this had been discovered many times before, and Emerson only took up again the cry raised by Epictetus. But every man has to discover this fact freshly for himself, and when once he has realised it he knows that he would be a wretch if he did not endeavour to make the possibility a reality in his own life. The stoic became sublime because he recognised his own absolute responsibility and did not try to evade it; the Transcendentalist was even more, because he had faith in the unknown and untried possibilities which lay within himself. The occultist fully recognises the responsibility and claims his title by having both tried and acquired knowledge of his own possibilities. The Theosophist who is at all in earnest, sees his responsibility and endeavours to find knowledge, living, in the meantime, up to the highest standard of which he is aware. To all such Lucifer gives greeting! Man’s life is in his own hands, his fate is ordered by himself. Why then should not 1888 be a year of greater spiritual development than any we have lived through? It depends on ourselves to make it so. This is an actual fact, not a religious sentiment. In a garden of sunflowers every flower turns towards the light. Why not so with us?
And let no one imagine that it is a mere fancy, the attaching of importance to the birth of the year. The earth passes through its definite phases and man with it; and as a day can be coloured so can a year. The astral life of the earth is young and strong between Christmas and Easter. Those who form their wishes now will have added strength to fulfil them consistently.