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THE AMERICAN THEOSOPHIST CRUSADERS IN BERLIN by Franz Hartmann


Katherine Tingley, Alice Leighton Cleather, Claude Falls Wright and Ernest Hargrove formed the “American Crusaders” who traveled around the world from June 1896 to February 1897 to promote Theosophy.


And on their stay in Berlin, Franz Hartmann wrote the following:

The first Convention of the Theosophical Society in Germany was a tremendous success and surpassed all previous expectations. The arrival of the “American Crusaders” created a great sensation and the halls of meeting were filled on each occasion with an appreciative audience. You will undoubtedly be informed through other sources of the proceedings that took place, and I will therefore confine myself to my personal experiences in regard to this matter.

Everyone acquainted with my way of thinking knows that I heartly dislike all vain pretence, bombast and show; and certain rumors, starting from a well-known source, but which it is not necessary to mention, having reached me, that the American Crusaders were in the habit of marching about the streets in procession with trumpets and flags, and doing all sorts of extravagant things, even surpassing those which I ridiculed in my book "Talking Image of Urer,"

I had no desire to go to Berlin to participate in such a performance. Nevertheless on September 26th, an hour before the train started, the firm conviction that I would have to go to Berlin became settled in my mind, and after telegraphing to Mr. Z. in Berlin the time of my arrival, I left for that city.

When I arrived in Berlin, there was neither Mr. Z. nor any other person of my acquaintance, nor could I find any one I knew or any one who knew where the Crusaders were. Getting impatient, I made up my mind to return to Hallein, and happening to be near the Potsdam R. R. station, I stepped into the telegraph office, to telegraph to Hallein, so that no letters would be forwarded to me at Berlin.

On coming out of the telegraph office I met Mr. Claude Falls Wright at the door, who to my astonishment told me, that Mrs. Tingley had requested him just then, to go to the Potsdam R. R. station without a moment's delay, although she did not give any particular reasons for making such a request. This may have been a “co-incidence;” but I am more inclined to think that it was a result of Mrs. Tingley's being in possession of clairvoyant powers.

At all events it was the means of giving me the great pleasure of meeting the “Crusaders,” on which occasion all my evil anticipations were at once destroyed; because I have never met in my life more amiable and unpretentious people than the American Crusaders.

During an hour of private conversation which followed, I was often struck with the great resemblance between this occasion and the olden times, when I used to sit alone with H. P. Blavatsky. More than once it seemed to me as if the aura of H. P. Blavatsky were surrounding Mrs. Tingley and penetrating her person; in fact I often felt as if I were talking with H. P. Blavatsky herself in a rejuvenated state. Not that I fancy that Mrs. Tingley is a reincarnation of my old friend H. P. B.; but I recognize the power that spoke to me through Mrs. Tingley's personality, as being the same that spoke to me through the person of H. P. B.

I would perhaps rather call such a state a “transfiguration” or “transubstantiation,” and having been repeatedly in similar states myself, such a condition is not to my mind either incredible or supernatural.

My object is not to mystify or astonish the reader, but merely to give a few interesting facts from my own observation. I will therefore not enter deeper into a revelation of occult mysteries, which might give rise to misunderstandings, but merely say that I found the representations which had previously been made to me by certain persons who claim that to worship the true, were false and that no words will be strong enough to express my appreciation of the high character of Mrs. Tingley and her companions.



Unfortunately there was no short-hand writer present to take down the excellent speeches delivery in English by Crusaders and it is therefore impossible for me to render them and do them the justice they deserve, but the following is a translation of the substance of what I said in German:

« Ladies and Gentlemen,

All who are acquainted with my writings know that I do not sympathize with the mania prevailing in this country of forming exclusive sects and societies. The link of union in such societies is usually the narrow mindedness of their members. They crystallize around some petty opinion or theory, in which, for some reason or other, they are putting their faith, and they then fight against everybody who does not subscribe to their articles of belief, and in the majority of cases they quarrel and dispute among each other on minor points of differences, each one trying to prove the other to be an ignoramus and himself to be wise.

An exception to this class of societies, and the only exception I know, is the “Theosophical Society” which was founded twenty-one years ago in the United States of America, and which I joined in the year 1882, in New York, while General Doubleday was President, W. Q. Judge, Secretary, and H. P. Blavatsky, Corresponding Secretary; travelling then with Colonel Olcott in India for the purpose of investigating the philosophies of the East.

To this Society I still belong and fully sympathize with its principles, because this Society has no theory or opinion which any one is asked to accept, or which it as a Society has to defend. Its members may know or believe whatever they please; they may be Christians, Buddhists, Jews, Mohammedans, Brahmins, theists, pantheists, materialists, spiritualists, agnostics or even atheists, they may exchange their opinions among themselves; their religious views do not concern the Society as such, any more than their views in regard to botany, chemistry, astronomy or mineralogy.

I do not care whether this or that member is a Catholic, a Protestant, a Baptist, a Methodist, a Presbyterian, Congregationalist or anything else, whether he believes in the Pope, in the Archbishop of Canterbury, in Mrs. Besant, William Q. Judge or in any other person. Self-knowledge has nothing to do with any belief in authorities, nor with the respectability of any other person than one's self.

Even the personal opinion or belief of the President or any officer of the Society is his own affair and does not concern the Society as such. The “Theosophical Society,” as a body, has no other aim than the recognition of truth. Its object is to outgrow all narrow minded dogmatism and to rise above sectarianism of any kind. It is a Society granting the utmost freedom of thought, and its fundamental purpose is expressed in its constitution, namely:

-      “To form a nucleus around which the (already universally theoretically recognized) theories of universal brotherhood may crystallize and be practically carried out.”

To this no sane person can possibly object. Objections may be raised against this or that view held by this or that member of the Society; but the Theosophical Society as such has no dogma to defend, and thus all disputes that may arise against the opinions held by the Theosophical Society are without an object and without any foundation.

Thus the foundation upon which the Theosophical Society is builded is not a theory, but a true principle of universal divine love, and this love is not a dream nor a product of the imagination, but is identical with the recognition of the eternal truth, which shows that all mankind, and even all creatures, are a unity in their essence, even if that one essence appears in a variety of forms or appearances, each having its own individual qualities.

Here an explanation will be useful, and it may be said, that in proclaiming the essential oneness of the All, while being a representative of the Theosophical Society, I am already establishing a dogma for the Theosophical Society. I must therefore ask you to regard all that I may say concerning any particular theory, not as an official declaration of that Society as such, but only as my own personal view, which I have as much right to express as any other member of the Theosophical Society.

My views regarding the oneness of God in the All are identical with those which are held by the greatest philosophers of all ages and the German mystics of the middle ages, and which are perhaps found best expressed in the writings of the great Indian sage Sankaracharya. According to this view all is spirit (Atma). Spirit is the very essence of everything. It is one and indivisible; but it manifests itself in a multitude of varied appearance. I will not enter here into lengthy philosophical speculations, but try to illustrate this theory by an example, however inadequate that example may be to describe the whole truth

I find that there is only one universal soul, the soul of the world. The individual souls therein do not differ from each other in their innermost essence. As in a great ocean every particle is water, and all the particles together represent the ocean, so in the great soul of the world all the individual souls consist of only one essence, and the sum of these individual souls constitutes the soul of the world.

Let us now imagine one great ocean, in which through the influence of the cold, icicles, ice fields and icebergs are forming, and we find that they also essentially consist of nothing but water, although they may differ from each other greatly in regard to size, form or shape, in regard to purity and in the way of crystallization.

They differ from their liquid surrounding only in so far as they are in a frozen state, and if the heat of the sun acts upon them, they melt, their individual qualities disappear and they are again what they never ceased to be, namely, water. Neither do they then continue to exist as separate particles of water, but each particle together with the rest is itself the ocean.

In a similar way the one universal spirit, the great soul of the universe, the one great Self of all beings may be regarded as an ocean, in which in consequence of the desire for separate existence innumerable individual “selves” spring into existence. They are all one in their essence, but as one image in a broken mirror appears reflected in many forms, so each individuality now appears as something different from the rest. So as one ice block in the ocean differs from another, so each personality has its own individual qualities.

There are “blocks” that are learned and others that are ignorant; some good, others bad, some beautiful, others ugly; some virtuous, others wicked, and so forth; but essentially they are all one. Their separatedness is not in essence, but only in appearance, and due to the non recognition of their own real nature.

As the cold freezes the water, so the delusion of self causes a hard crust of egotism to surround the human heart, so that it no longer recognizes its oneness and harmony with the all, but fancies itself to be a central point around which the universe turns. But within each is latent the energy of divine love. Under the influence of divine wisdom the hard crust becomes dissolved, and when the delusion of self has entirely disappeared, man recognizes himself no longer as a thing separated from God, but one with the God of all beings.

This is not annihilation, but an expansion of consciousness. Universal consciousness becomes manifest in the place of limited knowledge. The more man loses his own self-conceit and recognizes the divine Self of himself and of all, the more will he be happy and the more will there be happiness and peace upon this earth. This is not an imaginary but a logically proven fact, and the foundation of every true system of religion.

Religion itself is based upon the recognition of truth. The various forms and systems of religion which serve as a vehicle for the truth may have their origin in different traditions or belief; they are only forms, which are subject to changes, as is shown by the religious history of the world; they are born and they die, but the truth itself cannot be limited by any system, it is universal, eternal and free. Without the recognition of truth there can be no true religion nor a true science; the more a system of religion represents the truth, the more is it true itself.

This recognition of truth is called theosophia or “the hidden wisdom of God” (I Cor., II, 7). It is called “hidden,” because it is beyond the grasp of the human-animal intellect, it can only be grasped spiritually with the heart. It does not consist in knowing the qualities of a great many things, nor is it the product of learning, but it is due to nothing else than to the manifestation of truth in the heart of man.

It consists in an awakening of the inner spiritual consciousness, which enables man to know the truth intuitively and without regard to any external information, and to enter deeper into the divine mysteries of nature, not by means of artificially induced trances or hypnotism, but by means of the truth revealing itself to his internal under standing.

All mankind possess this spiritual energy, but not in every person has it become developed. Each human being has in his or her soul a spark of divinity, which by the influence of divine love may become a flame. The seat of that spark of divine life is not in the brain, but in the heart; but when it begins to burn in the heart, its light illumines the mind. The reason why so few people are illumined by the light of divine wisdom is because the majorities know nothing of any interior life and therefore they do not desire it.

The world is full of clever intellectual reasoners, people with heads but without hearts, living so to say all the time outside of their own self. Many dream only that they live, but do not know real life. Some revel in their sentiments and imagine a sickly sentimentalism to be wisdom. Two things are necessary for the true understanding, heart and head, soul and spirit, feeling and understanding.

The old Rosicrucians used to compare the light of wisdom within the heart with the sun, the light of the intellect with the moon. We know that the moon has no light of her own, she borrows it from the sun; her light is a reflection of the sunlight upon the surface of the material moon; it is superficial and uncertain, while the light of the sun comes from the centre of his sphere.

Thus an intellect without that love which comes from the heart is without life and without spirit, uncertain, superficial and without true understanding. Nevertheless the intellect is as necessary for man as the moon is for the solar system. When the sunlight is absent, the moonlight will be of service; where wisdom is absent, science steps to the front. The heart should perceive the truth and the intellect weigh it upon the balance of reason; then would we arrive at a true knowledge of truth.

Thus real knowledge is not a product of dreaming or of argumentation, but a spiritual awakening, which can take place only when the delusion of self, which keeps the soul imprisoned in a state of torpor, disappears. The power which destroys that shell of selfishness is that divine and universal love which springs from the recognition of the oneness of all life. To cultivate this love which is not merely “unselfish,” but exalted beyond the conception of self, is the object of the “Theosophical Society.”

It can only be cultivated by works; good intentions alone are not sufficient. We do not wish to follow the sectarian, who believe it their duty to continually preach about love without ever practicing it themselves. The ideal does not become realized by merely being looked at and admired; it can only be realized by practice.

This is the message of love which Theosophy teaches and which is to be carried around the world by our “American Crusaders.” Their dogma is:

-      "Seek to attain real knowledge of your own self, by letting the power of truth become manifest in your soul."

In this doctrine there is nothing to be proved or to be disputed about. It is a self-evident truth that requires no proof, but needs only to be understood. It only teaches an universal principle, which every one may grasp, if lie is able to rise above the narrow conception of self.

Let us therefore rise above the sphere of selfishness, personality, dogmatism and the adulation of authorities and open our hearts to the influence of the holy spirit of love and truth. If we accomplish this, others will follow our example and the world will be come wiser and happier. Thus will be fulfilled the mission of the Theosophical Society and the mission of the American Crusaders. »

(Theosophy, October 1896, vol. 11, p.221-224, “Letter from Germany”)









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