The consequences to our children and youth are a thing that should surely move our hearts. Parents and teachers alike are by their own confession unable to cope with the evils becoming so rampant among the young. Noted headmasters have given up in despair the attempt to stop unnatural vice among the boys entrusted by loving parents to their care. Most mothers are sublimely ignorant of what goes on in the inner life of their boys and girls, who in secret and in ignorance are all the time sowing in their constitution the soil of debility in which the poison seeds so ruthlessly sown can sprout.
In fact there is no visible power competent to deal with this evil. It lies beyond the reach of any criminal or judicial procedure. Religion is powerless before it; science can find no cure. So the conclusion remains that unless something is done, the evil will continue to grow and spread unchecked, involving in its decay the very powers that should check it, until the fabric of society is altogether loosened and our civilization comes to a premature end.
In the past whole nations probably have been swept away by this cause. Our own race has reached a point in its development where the same fate threatens it. Unless we are to experience a general outburst of libertinism, a welter of disease and insanity, a universal strife, we must find some means of restoring a knowledge of the immutable laws of life and an adherence thereto, such as taught by Theosophy. Passion can never be overcome by being indulged; it has to be subdued by self-knowledge.
Those unfortunately afflicted with unlawful desires should not seek to make society their victim in the hope of thus saving their miserable selves. Let them patiently and loyally bear their burden until unremitting effort at last brings the meed of success. Such infirmities must perish at last if they are not fed by the mind; but as they took a long time in the acquiring, they may take a long time in the undoing. Disease is thrown off by building surely, if slowly, a healthy foundation. We conclude with a few quotations from H. P. Blavatsky:
Do not believe that lust can ever be killed out if gratified or satiated, for this is an abomination inspired by Mâra [delusion]. It is by feeding vice that it expands and waxes strong, like to the worm that fattens on the blossom's heart.—The Voice of the Silence
* * * * *
Occultism is not Magic. It is comparatively easy to learn the trick of spells and the methods of using the subtler, but still material, forces of physical nature; the powers of the animal soul in man are soon awakened; the forces which his love, his hate, his passion, can call into operation, are readily developed. But this is Black Magic—Sorcery.... The powers and forces of animal nature can be used by the selfish and revengeful, as much as by the unselfish and the all-forgiving; the powers and forces of Spirit lend themselves only to the perfectly pure in heart—and this is Divine Magic.—Practical Occultism
* * * * *
There are not in the West half-a-dozen among the fervent hundreds who call themselves "Occultists," who have even an approximately correct idea of the nature of the Science they seek to master. With a few exceptions, they are all on the highway to Sorcery. Let them restore some order in the chaos that reigns in their minds, before they protest against this statement. Let them first learn the true relation in which the Occult Sciences stand to Occultism, and the difference between the two, and then feel wrathful if they still think themselves right. Meanwhile, let them learn that Occultism differs from Magic and other secret Sciences as the glorious sun does from a rush-light, as the immutable and immortal Spirit of Man—the reflection of the absolute, causeless, and unknowable All—differs from the mortal clay, the human body.—Occultism versus the Occult Arts
A MAGIC BOAT: by D. F.
IN the Scandinavian saga the vessel Ellida one day quietly sailed into harbor and dropped anchor, without a living creature on board. This performance seems at first to be surpassed by that of an electric launch on Lake Wann, Berlin, which though carrying no human freight effected the following feats at the behest of a distant but controlling intelligence: steering; starting, stopping, or reversing of engines; firing of signal guns, fireworks, mines, or torpedoes; ringing of bells; lighting or extinction of electric lamps; and other operations. Of course the agency is an ingenious extension and adaptation of wireless telegraphic methods, said to be applicable also to airplanes, railroad trains, life-boats, etc. But the Ellida had some excellent qualities, too, for work in all weather on the high seas.