In this article, I am going to
compile the texts that Franz Hartmann wrote about Blavatsky, and to start I put
below what he commented in his autobiography about her:
« A great deal has already been
written about H. P. Blavatsky, and I might, perhaps, be excused from now adding
something to it, especially as I am quite certain that no one will ever be able
to judge her extraordinary character correctly, unless he has been intimately
acquainted with her. To an occultist,
capable of seeing “beyond the veil,” her personality was extremely
interesting. To me she always appeared
as a great spirit, a sage and initiate inhabiting the body of a grown-up
capricious child, very amiable on the whole but also at times very irascible, ambitious,
of an impetuous temper, but easily led and caring nothing for conventionalities
of any kind.
In her higher aspect she seemed
to be in possession of the highest occult wisdom and of a knowledge obtained
not by the reading of books or by ratiocination, but by interior illumination
and direct perception of truth. She
seemed to know everything without having ever read anything, and as if the
whole universe was to her like an open book.
She seemed to be at home on the astral plane as much as on the physical
plane. Nevertheless she did not claim to
be an adept, but only a conscious instrument of an intelligent power higher
than her own personality.
She used to say:
-
"My learning is my Master’s. I am nothing
but a reflector of some one else’s luminous light."
To me it seems that this “Master”
was her own higher self and that everybody has such a light hidden within his
own soul; but not everybody is conscious of it.
Men and women may be compared to lanterns in which such a light exists;
in some it is only a spark that has not yet been discovered, in others the wick
sheds but a dim glow, while in rare cases it gives a bright light that shines
through the crystal. Many of those who
presumed to judge the character of H. P. Blavatsky could only see the polish of
the “lantern,” but were blind to the light contained in it.
Thus Madame Blavatsky appeared to
be two or even more different persons manifesting themselves in one body, and I
have no doubt that her inner real or permanent self was in communication with
other higher intelligences existing on the same plane, and that they thus were
able to communicate their knowledge through her instrumentality or agency to
the outside world.
These intelligences, or “Masters,”
she claimed were certain adepts still living in Tibet and in possession of
great occult powers, such as impressing suitable minds at a distance by what is
now called “telepathy,” going out in their astral forms or thought bodies and
materializing themselves, using the organism of H. P. Blavatsky and other
disciples for the production of “occult phenomena,” etc.
All such things, which some years
ago appeared incredible, now appear quite possible in the light which recent
investigations in occult science have thrown upon that subject. My own experience in this line has convinced
me that such Masters exist. I have been
present on certain occasions when “the Master” appeared to her and she spoke
with him. I could not see him with my
eyes, but I felt his presence. His
influence pervaded my whole being and filled me with a sensation of
indescribable bliss which lasted for several days. This power, awakening within me a higher
state of consciousness made me feel on such occasions as if it were my own and
I the Master myself.
A great deal of nonsense has been
written about the "occult phenomena” produced by Madame Blavatsky, by her
enemies and others giving undue importance to them. She was not a “spiritual medium,” producing
phenomena under test conditions for the purpose of proving their reality,
neither did she receive any money for it.
All the phenomena which I
witnessed in her presence were undoubtedly genuine, but if it is true that she
occasionally “helped the spirits” or played some sleight of hand trick, I would
not criticize her too severely for it; because her only purpose was to induce
the people to study the higher laws of life, to raise them up to a higher
conception of eternal truth, and teach them to do their own thinking.
She wanted to call the attention
of the world by all means to the higher teachings which originated from the
adepts, and the phenomena were to her nothing else but the sweets, with which
one coaxes the children to come to school and to learn. It may also be stated that the demands made
upon her by ignorant and unspiritual people were often of an incredible absurdity
and extremely selfish.
There was one who insisted that
she should pray the holy saints of the Himalayas that they should provide that
his wife would give birth to a son, another that they should procure him a
paying appointment at a government office, another wanted to find a buyer for his
house, another a good location for opening a shop for selling cheese, etc., and
if such “searchers for truth” did not receive a favorable reply, they soon
became her enemies and would have nothing to do with the teachings of wisdom.
It is, therefore, not surprising
that H.P.B. sometimes amused herself by making fun of such fools. In fact her sense of humor was very great,
and one of her objectionable sides was that she loved to make sport even of her
best friends. Although she, as far as I
know, never had taken any lessons in drawing, she sometimes drew caricatures
that were not without artistic value and portraits that were easily
recognizable.
One such represents the
examination for initiation of a prominent member of the Theosophical Society. He is evidently unable to answer the
questions asked of him by K. H., and he looks with a wistful eye at a bottle of
champagne and a dancing girl, as if he were very loath to abandon the pleasures
of this life. An elemental holds a
candle, and in the distance is the Master M. and still further on Madame
Blavatsky herself sitting upon an elephant.
THE INITIATION
Caricature made by Madame Blavatsky
Already on the first day after my
arrival at Adyar I received through Madame Blavatsky an unsought and unexpected
test. I went to her room and found her writing.
Not wishing to disturb her, I sat down near the window and thought of a
lady friend of mine who had died at Galveston some years ago, wondering what
had become of her “principles.”
I noticed that Madame Blavatsky
turned her paper and seemed to play with her pencil in a state of
absent-mindedness with a far-away look.
She then handed me the paper. It
contained the answer to my question in a drawing, representing the corpse of my
friend extended upon the ground and an elemental standing by its side, watching
for the escape of the astral soul, while the passage of her spirit to higher
spheres was indicated by a rainbow.
Similar evidences of occult power
I often received through H. P. Blavatsky.
Sometimes it was direct writing produced by some invisible entity; whole
letters written in that way were found in my closed desk; but these phenomena
were nothing new to me, as I had seen them often in America. I did not look at them with suspicion of
trickery. Trick or no trick was all the
same to me, because I was interested only in the contents of the letters and not
in the way in which they were written and forwarded to me.
I have seen quite a number of
occult phenomena taking place in her presence; but the most surprising of all
phenomena was to me the fact that I found myself able to write articles on occult
subjects for The Theosophist and to
deliver without any previous preparation public lectures which found interested
and appreciative audiences in India and afterwards in America, Germany and
Italy, although I had never spoken in public before I arrived in India. »
(The
Occult Review, January 1908, p.18-23)
See
also:
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