By Gerald B. Bryan
THE “MASTER” BOOK-SELLING RACKET
For five years a “Master” book-selling racket has been
under way in America. No other series of books in the history of America has
had such astonishing claims made for them.
“In those precious books there are no human concepts or
opinions . . . They contain the answer to anything and everything . . . Never
was there such a thing written on earth . . . They will remain the glory of the
land for hundreds of years.”
And so on in ever-increasing hyperbolic utterances, all
to be quoted accurately from the Ballard literature.
The Ballard flare for hyperbole is most manifest in their
efforts to sell these books. To this end they brought forth mighty “Masters.”
They had great “Cosmic Beings” institute sales campaigns. They said the covers
of those “marvelous books,” as seen from the “Ascended Master’s Octave Light,”
were made of “precious jewels.” That each successive book of the series was
“more magnificent” than the first — a veritable “stairway” to the blessed
students’ “glorious freedom.”
And there are still more blessings to be dispensed to the
proud possessor of those priceless books:
Through a special process, known only to the “Ascended
Masters, mighty “Cosmic Radiations” exude from each book. These “Radiations”
are charged into the books sometime during their manufacture or sale. Mighty
Ascended Masters come forth from cosmic space to attend to this. They sweep
through the four walls of the commercial print shop where these books are
manufactured. They invade the so-called “Saint Germain Press.” They enter the I
AM Temples where these books are sold. All for the purpose of charging their
“Ascended Master Radiations” into these books, for no book is complete without
it!
In addition to this, the great Saint Germain himself
gives a very special Radiation at the time his senior Messenger autographs any
of the books. This is as it should be. The sale has been made; the cash is in
the “I AM” strong box — or, as the saying is, “sent back into the work;” and
the fortunate student has the book.
This is the way it is done: A crowd forms in the lobby
for the special ceremony of having one or more of those precious books
autographed. They must be new ones — freshly purchased. The old ones are
refused an autograph.
Guy Ballard, chief autographer, sits serenely at his
desk. Surrounding him is his bodyguard of “Minute Men,” whose job it is to keep
process servers and other “vicious” individuals away. Saint Germain, chief
“charger,” stands at Ballard’s right elbow. The voltage for each book is never
stated, but is said to be high. The current flows down Ballard’s right arm and
into his autographing fingers. Then somehow it spreads out into the book — which
is never the same afterwards.
The book has, of course, as we have said, been charged at
the factory, but this “special” charge given cooperatively by the
Germain-Ballard combination is different. It is “transcendent.” So much so,
that Saint Germain is never absent when this autographing ceremony is to be
performed. European matters wait. Important conferences at Washington hold
their fire. The important thing is the autographing and “charging” of those
precious books. Charge accounts, however, are not accepted. The terms are cash.
It is sufficient to “charge” the books!
On occasions, “St. Germain” as chief electric-charger for
the Ballard organization, is ably assisted by “Lady Ascended Masters.”
When the latest of the large bound books came out, the
“Goddess of Purity” came forth to celebrate the occasion and stimulate book
sales. She made her own announcement (through Mr. Ballard of course) on the
stage of the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles on January 1, 1939 — a sort of New Years gift to prospective buyers
of the new Ballard opus.
“Henceforth,” she
said, “I shall join your Beloved Saint Germain in charging My Purity into every
book that the Messenger autographs.” (p. 8, Feb., 1939, V.)
She urged the fortunate purchasers to “place the books
out of handling of other,” for the reason that these individually-charged
Radiations should not be mixed with the lower-octave emanations from other people.
Each I AM student is urged to buy and keep an individual set of books for his
own personal use and not lend them to others — a beautiful system of increasing
book sales! Five of their regularly bound books sell at $2.50 to $3.00 each,
the total amounting to $13.75. Each student is urged to buy all these books by
the great Saint Germain himself.
“If you have not the FULL SET of those books,” says this
book-selling Ascended Master, “do not let another thirty days go over your head
before you have them.” (p.2, Sept. 20, 1938, G.L.) The Ballards claim “over one
million earnest students.” Therefore, if they can psychologize these students
sufficiently to have a million of them buy a full set of books, there will flow
into the Ballard strong box to be “used in the work” the startling sum of
Thirteen Million, Seven Hundred Fifty Thousand good American dollars!
Their students make supreme efforts to own these books,
and pathetic stories have come to the writer of sacrifices made to purchase
them, some going without material food for days in order to secure the
“spiritual” sustenance supposed to be contained in them. Then there is the
Ballard monthly magazine, The Voice of the I AM, which also must net them quite
a tidy sum of money. The subscription rate is $3.00 per year, or 35¢ per copy.
When the first issue came out in February, 1936, they also brought forth
“Jesus” (!) to boost its circulation.
“We shall endeavor to make the Voice of the I AM,” says
this false Christ, “the most sought after periodical of the day . . . It is My
wish and that of the Host of Ascended Masters that all students of the I AM
firmly decree this . . .” (p. 9, Feb., 1936, V.)
The result was a “Circulation Decree,” which the poor
students shouted and shouted until they were hoarse:
“We decree that
the circulation of the magazine, The Voice of the I AM, exceed ONE MILLION
subscribers in 1937!”
Then there is in addition to this a miscellaneous lot of
other articles of Ascended Master merchandise to be sold at good prices over
the counter in the various I AM Temples scattered throughout the nation. There
are pins, rings, emblems, bookmarks, seals, folders, flags, booklets, trinkets.
There are songs, phonograph records, and transcription rentals.
Songs —and there are many of them— sell for $1.00.
Phonograph records —and there have been dozens— bring $2.50. “I AM” pins sell
at $1.00. I AM rings command $12.00. Books for the blind $5.25 to $7.75 each,
or $26.75 for the set of four. Jesus’ picture sells for $2.00 and up; likewise
the bearded Saint Germain. “The Old Man of the Hills” brings $2.25 postpaid;
and large pictures of the Beloved Messenger, Guy W. Ballard, are tops at $25.00
each, express collect.
A small “Chart of the Presence” sells at $1.00; a larger
one for $15.00; and their de luxe chart a bargain at $200.00! Their “Violet
Consuming Flame” another bargain at $200.00! But express extra, and no discount
to dealers and group leaders!
The brain grows weary in computing the possible income
which might result from these articles of Ascended Master merchandise sold in I
AM Temples and spread among “one million earnest students.”
The Ballard radio broadcasts are not only paid for almost
exclusively by the students, but they also have to rent Mrs. Ballard’s
transcription records at $20.00 per record, cash in advance.
“Money cannot be spent in any better manner,” says the
great God Himalaya, who came all the way from India to say it, and adds: “There
is no thing in the world which would render such transcendent blessing as money
used in the broadcasting of the ‘I AM’ to the world.” (p. 311, A.M.L.)
The hard-pressed students do their best to meet the
demands of these “Master” salesmen, as will be seen from the following notice
which was passed out at one of the I AM Temples in New York:
“Word has been received that Mrs. Ballard would like at
least seven nights (ten, if possible) over WMCA Broadcasting Station. The cost
is about $185 a night. The Great Arcturus said that the blessing of those who
make possible the broadcasting of this Mighty Truth shall know no bounds.”
Naturally, to secure Great Arcturus’ blessing, the
students got busy at once to secure the $1850.00. An appropriate decree was
selected, and the students began to work on getting this money with a
vengeance. An informant writes:
“This decree was given in unison at all the meetings in
New York, Connecticut, and New Jersey, and repeated at the meeting I attended
thirty times, until toward the end the whole crowd was shouting and indeed some
of the women were screaming it, bordering on hysteria.”
(Psychic Dictatorship in America, chapter 15)
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