In this article Blavatsky explains the
reasons why there cannot be initiatory esoteric schools that are accessible to
the public, and warns about fraudulent organizations that claim to be.
LODGES
OF MAGIC
"When fiction rises pleasing to the eye. Men will believe, because
they love the lie; But Truth herself, if clouded with a frown. Must have some
solemn proofs to pass her down."
(Churchill)
One of the most esteemed of our friends in occult research propounds the
question of the formation of "working-Lodges" of the Theosophical
Society, for the development of adeptship. If the practical impossibility of
forcing this process has been shown once in the course of the Theosophical
movement, it has scores of times. It is hard to check one's natural impatience
to tear aside the veil of the Temple.
To gain the divine knowledge, like the prize in a classical tripos, by a
system of coaching and cramming, is the ideal of the average beginner in occult
study. The refusal of the originators of the Theosophical Society to encourage
such false hopes has led to the formation of bogus Brotherhoods of Luxor
(and Armley Jail?) as speculations on human credulity. How enticing the bait
for gudgeons in the following specimen prospectus, which a few years ago caught
some of our most earnest friends and Theosophists.
« Students of the occult science, searchers after
truth, and Theosophists who may have been disappointed in their expectations of
Sublime Wisdom being freely dispensed by Hindi Mahatmas, are cordially invited
to send in their names to . . . ., when, if found suitable, they can be
admitted, after a short probationary term, as Members of an Occult Brotherhood,
who do not boast of their knowledge or attainments, but teach freely" (at
£1 to £5 per letter?) and without reserve (the nastiest portions of P. B.
Randolph's "Eulis") "all they find worthy to receive"
(read: teachings on a commercial basis; the cash going to the teachers, and the
extracts from Randolph and other "love-philter" sellers to the
pupils!) » (1)
(Cid's note:
what is in parentheses in the text above are comments added by Blavatsky.)
If rumor be true, some of the English rural districts, especially
Yorkshire, are overrun with fraudulent astrologers and fortune-tellers, who
pretend to be Theosophists, the better to swindle a higher class of credulous
patrons than their legitimate prey, the servant maid and callow youth.
If the "lodges of magic", suggested in the following letter to
the Editors of this Magazine, were founded without having taken the greatest
precautions to admit only the best candidates to membership, we should see
these vile exploitations of sacred names and things increase an hundredfold.
And in this connection, and before giving place to our friend's letter,
the senior Editor of Lucifer begs to inform her friends that she has never had
the remotest connection with the so-called "H(ermetic) B(rotherhood) of
L(uxor)", and that all representations to the contrary are false and
dishonest.
There is a secret body — whose diploma, or Certificate of Membership, is
held by Col. Olcott alone among modern men of white blood — to which that name
was given by the author of Isis Unveiled for convenience of designation (2),
but which is known among Initiates by quite another one, just as the personage
known to the public under the pseudonym of "Koot Hoomi" is called by
a totally different name among his acquaintance.
What the real name of that Society is, it would puzzle the "Eulian"
phallicists of the "H. B. of L." to tell. The real names of Master
Adepts and Occult Schools are never, under any circumstances, revealed
to the profane; and the names of the personages who have been talked about in
connection with modern Theosophy are in the possession only of the two chief
founders of the Theosophical Society. And now having said so much by way of
preface, led us pass on to our correspondent's letter. He writes:
« A friend of mine, a natural mystic, had intended
to form, with others, a Branch T.S. in his town. Surprised at his delay, I
wrote to ask the reason. His reply was that he had heard that the T.S. only met
and talked, and did nothing practical.
I always did think the T.S. ought to have Lodges in which something
practical should be done. Cagliostro understood well this craving of humans for
something before their eyes, when he instituted the Egyptian Rite and put it in
practice in various Freemason lodges.
There are many readers of Lucifer in . . . shire. Perhaps in it
there might be a suggestion for students to form such lodges for themselves,
and to try, by their united wills, to develop certain powers in one of the
number, and then through the whole of them in succession. I feel sure numbers
would enter such lodges, and create a great interest for Theosophy.
A. »
In the above note of our venerable and learned friend is the echo of the
voices of ninety-nine hundredths of the members of the Theosophical Society:
one hundredth only have the correct idea of the function and scope of our
Branches.
The glaring mistake generally made is in the conception of Adeptship and
the path thereunto. Of all thinkable undertakings that of trying for Adeptship
is the most difficult. Instead of being obtainable within a few years or one
lifetime, it exacts the unremittent struggles of a series of lives, save in
cases so rare as to be hardly worth regarding as exceptions to the general
rule.
The records certainly show that a number of the most revered Indian
Adepts became so despite their births in the lowest, and seemingly most
unlikely, castes. Yet it is well understood that they had been progressing in
the upward direction throughout many previous incarnations, and, when they took
birth for the last time, there was left but the merest trifle of spiritual
evolution to be accomplished, before they became great living Adepts.
Of course no one can say that one or all of the possible members of our
friend A's ideal Cagliostrian lodge might not also be ready for Adeptship, but
the chance is not good enough to speculate upon: Western civilization seems to
develop fighters rather than philosophers, military butchers rather than
Buddhas.
The plan "A" proposes would be far more likely to end in
mediumship than Adeptship. Two to one there would not be a member of the lodge
who was chaste from boyhood and altogether untainted by the use of intoxicants.
This is to say nothing of the candidates' freedom from the polluting effects of
the evil influences of the average social environment. Among the indispensable
pre-requisites for psychic development, noted in the mystical Manuals of all
Eastern religious systems, are a pure place, pure diet, pure companionship, and
a pure mind.
Could "A" guarantee these?
It is certainly desirable that there should be some school of
instruction for members of our Society; and had the purely exoteric work and
duties of the founders been less absorbing, probably one such would have been
established long ago. Yet not for practical instruction on the plan of Cagliostro,
which, by-the-bye, brought direful suffering upon his head, and has left no
marked traces behind to encourage a repetition in our days.
"When the pupil is ready, the teacher will be found waiting",
says an Eastern maxim. The Masters do not have to hunt up recruits in special.
. . . . . shire lodges, nor drill them through mystical non-commissioned
officers: time and space are no barriers between them and the aspirant; where thought
can pass they can come.
Why did an old and learned Kabalist
like "A." forget this fact?
And let him also remember that the potential Adept may exist in the
Whitechapels and Five Points of Europe and America, as well as in the cleaner
and more "cultured" quarters; that some poor ragged wretch, begging a
crust, may be "whiter-souled" and more attractive to the Adept than
the average bishop in his robe, or a cultured citizen in his costly dress.
For the extension of the Theosophical movement, a useful channel for the
irrigation of the dry fields of contemporary thought with the water of life,
Branches are needed everywhere; not mere groups of passive sympathisers, such
as the slumbering army of church-goers, whose eyes are shut while the
"devil" sweeps the field; no, not such. Active, wide awake, earnest,
unselfish Branches are needed, whose members shall not be constantly unmasking
their selfishness by asking "What will it profit us to join the
Theosophical Society, and how much will it harm us?", but be putting to
themselves the question "Can we not do substantial good to mankind by
working in this good cause with all our hearts, our minds, and our
strength?"
If "A." would only bring his . . shire friends, who pretend to
occult leanings, to view the question from this side, he would be doing them a
real kindness. The Society can get on without them, but they cannot afford to
let it do so.
Is it profitable, moreover, to
discuss the question of a Lodge receiving even theoretical instruction, until
we can be sure that all the members will accept the teachings as coming from
the alleged source?
Occult truth cannot be absorbed by a mind that is filled with
preconception, prejudice, or suspicion. It is something to be perceived by the
intuition rather than by the reason; being by nature spiritual, not material.
Some are so constituted as to be incapable of acquiring knowledge by the
exercise of the spiritual faculty; e.g. the great majority of
physicists. Such are slow, if not wholly incapable of grasping the ultimate
truths behind the phenomena of existence.
There are many such in the Society; and the body of the discontented are
recruited from their ranks. Such persons readily persuade themselves that later
teachings, received from exactly the same source as earlier ones, are either
false or have been tampered with by chelas, or even third parties Suspicion and
inharmony are the natural result, the psychic atmosphere, so to say, is thrown
into confusion, and the reaction, even upon the stauncher students, is very
harmful.
Sometimes vanity blinds what was at first strong intuition, the mind is
effectually closed against the admission of new truth, and the aspiring student
is thrown back to the point where he began. Having jumped at some particular
conclusion of his own without full study of the subject, and before the
teaching had been fully expounded, his tendency, when proved wrong, is to
listen only to the voice of his self-adulation, and cling to his views, whether
right or wrong.
The Lord Buddha particularly warned his hearers against forming beliefs
upon tradition or authority, and before having thoroughly inquired into the
subject.
An instance. We have been asked by a correspondent why he should not
"be free to suspect some of the so-called 'precipitated' letters as being
forgeries", giving as his reason for it that while some of them bear the
stamp of (to him) undeniable genuineness, others seem from their contents and
style to be imitations.
This is equivalent to saying that he has such an unerring spiritual
insight as to be able to detect the false from the true, though he has never
met a Master, nor been given any key by which to test his alleged
communications. The inevitable consequence of applying his untrained judgment
in such cases would be to make him as likely as not to declare false what was
genuine, and genuine what was false.
Thus what criterion has any
one to decide between one "precipitated" letter, or another such
letter?
Who except their authors, or those
whom they employ as their amanuenses (their chelas and
disciples), can tell?
For it is hardly one out of a hundred "occult" letters that is
ever written by the hand of the Master in whose name and on whose behalf they
are sent, as the Masters have neither need nor leisure to write them; and that
when a Master says, "I wrote that letter", it means only that every
word in it was dictated by him and impressed under his direct supervision.
Generally they make their chela, whether near or far away, write (or
precipitate) them, by impressing upon his mind the ideas they wish expressed,
and if necessary aiding him in the picture-printing process of precipitation.
It depends entirely upon the chela's state of development how accurately
the ideas may be transmitted and the writing-model imitated. Thus the non-adept
recipient is left in the dilemma of uncertainty whether, if one letter is
false, all may not be; for, as far as intrinsic evidence goes, all come from
the same source and all are brought by the same mysterious means.
But there is another and a far worse condition implied. For all that the
recipient of "occult" letters can possibly know, and on the simple
grounds of probability and common honesty, the unseen correspondent who would
tolerate one single fraudulent line in his name would wink at an
unlimited repetition of the deception. And this leads directly to the following.
All the so-called occult letters being supported by identical
proofs, they have all to stand or fall together. If one is to be
doubted, then all have, and the series of letters in the Occult World, Esoteric
Buddhism, etc., etc., may be, and there is no reason why they should not be
in such a case — frauds, "clever impostures", and
"forgeries", such as the ingenuous though stupid agent of the
"S.P. R." has made them out to be, in order to raise in the public
estimation the "scientific" acumen and standard of his
"Principals".
Hence, not a step in advance would be made by a group of students given
over to such an unimpressible state of mind, and without any guide from the
occult side to open their eyes to the esoteric pitfalls. And where are such
guides, so far, in our Society?
"They be blind leaders of the blind", both falling into the
ditch of vanity and self-sufficiency. The whole difficulty springs from the
common tendency to draw conclusions from insufficient premises, and play the
oracle before ridding oneself of that most stupefying of all psychic
anesthetics — Ignorance.
Footnotes
1. Documents on view at Lucifer's Office, viz., Secret MSS. written
in the handwriting of (name suppressed for past considerations),
"Provincial Grand Master of the Northern Section". One of these
documents bears the heading, "A brief Key to the Eulian Mysteries," i.e.
Tantric black magic on a phallic basis. No; the members of this
Occult Brotherhood "do not boast of their knowledge". Very sensible
on their part: least said soonest mended.
2. In Isis Unveiled vol. ii. p. 308. It may be added that
the "Brotherhood of Luxor" mentioned by Kenneth Mackenzie 'vide
his Royal Masonic Cyclopaedia as having its seat in America, had, after
all, nothing to do with the Brotherhood mentioned by and known to us, as was
ascertained after the publication of Isis from a letter written by this
late Masonic author to a friend in New York. The Brotherhood Mackenzie knew of
was simply a Masonic Society on a rather more secret basis, and, as he stated
in the letter, he had heard of, but knew nothing of our Brotherhood,
which having had a branch at Luxor (Egypt), was thus purposely referred to by
us under this name alone. This led some schemers to infer that there was a
regular Lodge of Adepts of that name, and to assure some credulous friends and
Theosophists that the "H. B. of L." was either identical or a branch
of the same, supposed to be near Lahore! — which was the most flagrant untruth.
(Lucifer, October
1888)
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