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(p.109)
CHAPTER IV
THE
ANTAGONISATION
EVEN had we been disposed, which happily we were not, to
exalt ourselves on the strength of the loftiness of our mission, the constant
proofs afforded us of the paucity of our knowledge in comparison with what
remained to be known, would have effectually restrained us. But as it was, we
were from the first penetrated by the conviction that only in so far as we
succeeded in subordinating the individual to the universal, the personal to the
divine, could the work be successfully accomplished. The man must make himself
nothing that the God may be all. This was the burden of the injunctions enforced
on us throughout; the failures of others through self-exaltation being adduced
in illustration. For, as we were plainly given to understand, "many are called
but few are chosen"; the weak point in their system, the "Judas" by whom they
are betrayed and fail, being generally vanity. They are as instruments which
mistake themselves for the mind and hand which wield them.
Humility and Love, the violet and the red, these are the two extremes of the prism which comprise between them all the Seven Spirits of God. Blended, they make the royal purple; but the hue of that purple depends on the spiritual states of the individuals themselves whose tinctures they are. They were, we were told, the tinctures of our own souls as indicated by the colours of our
(p. 110)
respective auras. "Mary's" was the "blood-red ray of the
innermost sphere," the sphere of the "first of the Gods," wherein "love and
wisdom are one." "For the Hebrews Uriel, for the Greeks Phoibos, the Bright One
of God." Mine was the violet of the outermost sphere, that of the "last of the
Gods," the "Spirit of the Fear of the Lord," and therein of Reverence and
Humility; for the Greeks Saturn, and for the Hebrews Satan, the "Angel unfallen
of the outermost sphere." Only when man is built up of all the Gods, and bears
upon him the seal of each God, having climbed the ladder of his regeneration
from circumference to centre, from "Saturn" to the "Sun," is the "week" of his
new and spiritual creation accomplished. Similarly the co-operation of all these
divine potencies was indispensable to our work. And we were emphatically warned
of the dangers both to it and to ourselves, that would come of the lack of the
divine presence in respect of any of them. Hence the necessity of maintaining
the necessary conditions in ourselves, and the caution addressed to us by
"Hermes," in view of the liability of mortals to appropriate to themselves the
importance appertaining to their mission when this transcends the ordinary. To
this end, in the following Exhortation, he disclosed to us the heights yet to be
ascended, saying –
He whose adversaries fight with
weapons of steel, must himself be armed in like manner, if he would not be
ignominiously slain or save himself by flight.
And not only so, but forasmuch as
his adversaries may be many, while he is only one; it is even necessary that the
steel he carries be of purer temper and of more subtle point and contrivance
than theirs.
(p. 111)
I, Hermes, would arm you with such,
that bearing a blade with a double edge, ye may be able to withstand in the evil
hour.
For it is written that the tree of
life is guarded by a sword which turneth every way.
Therefore I would have you armed
both with a perfect philosophy and with the power of the divine life.
And first the knowledge; that you
and they who hear you may know the reason of the faith which is in you.
But knowledge cannot prevail alone,
and ye are not yet perfected.
When the fulness of the time shall
come, I will add unto you the power of the divine life.
It is the life of contemplation, of
fasting, of obedience, and of resistance.
And afterwards the chrism, the
power, and the glory. But these are not yet.
Meanwhile remain together and
perfect your philosophy.
Boast not, and be not lifted up; for
all things are God's, and ye are in God, and God in you.
But when the word shall come to you,
be ready to obey.
There is but one way to power, and
it is the way of obedience.
Call no man your master or king upon
the earth, lest ye forsake the spirit for the form and become idolaters.
He who is indeed spiritual, and
transformed into the divine image, desires a spiritual king.
Purify your bodies, and eat no dead
thing that has looked with living eyes upon the light of Heaven.
For the eye is the symbol of
brotherhood among you. Sight is the mystical sense.
Let no man take the life of his
brother to feed withal his own.
But slay only such as are evil; in
the name of the Lord.
They are miserably deceived who
expect eternal life, and restrain not their hands from blood and death.
(p. 112)
They are miserably deceived who look
for wives from on high, and have not yet attained their manhood.
Despise not the gift of knowledge;
and make not spiritual eunuchs of yourselves.
For Adam was first formed, then Eve.
Ye are twain, the man with the
woman, and she with him, neither man nor woman, but one creature.
And the
The
knowledge of the "Seven Spirits" whereby Deity operates in the universe, has
been completely dropped out of sight by the Christian world. It is necessary,
therefore, if only in vindication of the importance attached to them by our
illuminators, to recite the instruction received by us concerning them, which is
as follows. It is a chapter from the recovered Gnosis (2):
–
"In the bosom of the Eternal were all the
Gods comprehended, as the seven spirits of the prism, contained in the Invisible Light.
*
*
*
*
*
By the Word of Elohim were the Seven Elohim
manifest:
(p. 113)
even, the Seven Spirits of God in the order
of their precedence:
The Spirit of Wisdom, the Spirit of
Understanding, the Spirit of Counsel, the Spirit of Power, the Spirit of
Knowledge, the Spirit of Righteousness, and the Spirit of Divine Awfulness.
All these are coequal and coeternal.
Each has the nature of the whole in
itself: and each is a perfect entity.
And the brightness of their
manifestation shineth forth from the midst of each, as wheel within wheel,
encircling the White Throne of the Invisible Trinity in Unity.
These are the Divine fires which
burn before the presence of God: which proceed from the Spirit, and are one with
the Spirit.
He is divided, yet not diminished:
He is All, and He is One.
For the Spirit of God is a flame of
fire which the Word of God divideth into many: yet the original flame is not
decreased, nor the power thereof nor the brightness thereof lessened.
Thou mayest light many lamps from
the flame of one; yet thou dost in nothing diminish that first flame.
Now the Spirit of God is expressed
by the Word of God, which is Adonai.
For without the Word the Will could
have had no utterance.
Thus the Divine Will divided the
Spirit of God, and the seven fires went forth from the bosom of God and became
seven spiritual entities.
They went forth into the Divine
Substance, which is the substance of all that is."
As already stated,
Hermes is the Greek name for the Second of the creative Elohim above enumerated.
Hence his special relation to the New Gospel of Interpretation, the appeal of
which is to the Understanding.
(p. 114)
Being shown
one day in vision the path we had to traverse for the accomplishment of our
work, "Mary" exclaimed: –
"What a dreadfully difficult thing
it is to steer one's way amidst such numbers of influences! I see a fine,
bright-shining thread. It is our own path, and it is a pathway of light. But,
oh! so narrow, so narrow, and all around are spirits trying to lure us from it.
Here is Hermes, shining like a silver light. My Genius says that the way to get
the utmost vitality on the spiritual plane is to abandon the plane of the body,
and keep it quite low, by not indulging it. The time for bodily indulgence is
passed with us. Abstinence, we have been told, and watchfulness and fasting are
needful. And the time for the first of these has come. Nothing is gained without
labour or won without suffering. Fasting and Watching and Abstinence, these are
Beads and Rosary. It is a hard way and a long way, and it makes one wishful to
turn back. We are not to be misled by the story, so much dwelt on to you by the
Astrals, of Moses and Aaron (1). They both were failures, who entered not into the
So far as I
was concerned, there was yet another rule that was made absolute: this was the
rule of Poverty. Desiring at one time to mitigate the rigour of my enforced
economies by working with a commercial intent, and to that end endeavouring to
finish a tale some time before commenced, I found myself baffled by a complete
withdrawal of power. I was well aware that no romance I could
(p. 115)
devise would compare with
the romance I was living, and that any incidents I could invent would be tame
before those of my actual life; but it was not this that withheld me. It was
made clear to me that there was now only one direction and one plane in which I
was accessible to ideas and in which therefore I could work, and this a
direction and plane altogether incompatible with mundane ends. But I had not
fully reconciled myself to the loss of my earning power, or resolved to refrain
from further efforts in that behalf, when I received the following experience.
I had gone to bed, but not to sleep, for thinking over the
matter, when I became aware of the presence of a group of spiritual influences,
one of whom, speaking for them all, said to me, in tones audible only to the
inner hearing, but distinct, measured and authoritative –
"We whom you know as the Gods –
Zeus, Phoibos, Hermes, and the rest – are actual celestial personalities, who
are appointed to represent to mortals the principles and potencies called the
Seven Spirits of God. We have chosen you for our instrument, and have tried you
and proved you and instructed you; and you belong to us to do our work and not
your own, save in so far as you make it your own. Only in such measure as you do
this will you have any success. For you can do nothing without us now: and it is
useless for you to attempt to do anything without our help."
By this and
manifold other experiences, we had practical demonstration of the existence of a
celestial hierarchy consisting of souls perfected and divinised, divided into
orders corresponding to the "Seven Spirits of God," and having for their
function the illumination of those souls of men
(p. 116)
still on earth who are
accessible by them; and to whom they manifest themselves in the forms recognised
in the mysteries in which such persons have formerly been initiated.
We
had also manifold proofs of their power to arrest utterance before persons unfit
to be entrusted with the mysteries. The first instance occurred to myself, and
was in this wise. I was reading some passages in illustration of our work to an
old clerical friend who came to see me in
Not thinking
that "Mary" was liable to err in the same way, or caring to tell her of my
trespass, I kept silence respecting this experience. But a few weeks later it
was repeated for her. She was speaking of our work to a spiritualist friend with
whom we were spending the evening, and, in her eagerness, got upon topics which
I recognised as forbidden. But before I had time to remind her, she suddenly
stopped short and rose from her seat, gasping and dazed, and insisted on
returning home forthwith, to our hostess's great amazement and disappointment.
Divining what had occurred, I refrained from questioning her until we were
outside and alone, when in reply to me she described
(p. 117)
exactly what had happened
to me, using the words, "I did not want to be choked!" There were other
occasions on which I was cut short under like circumstances, by having all that
I meant to say suddenly and completely obliterated from my mind.
Being
desirous to know more of the adverse influences against which we had been
warned, and from which we suffered, "Mary" consulted her illuminator respecting
their origin and nature, when the following colloquy ensued: –
"They are," he said, "the powers
which affect and influence Sensitives. They do not control, for they have no
force. (...) They are Reflects. They have no real entity in themselves. They
resemble mists which arise from the damp earth of low-lying lands, and which the
heat of the sun disperses. Again, they are like vapours in high altitudes, upon
which, if a man's shadow falls, he beholds himself as a giant. For these spirits
invariably flatter and magnify a man to himself. And this is a sign whereby you
may know them. They tell one that he is a king; another, that he is a Christ;
another, that he is the wisest of mortals, and the like. For, being born of the
fluids of the body, they are unspiritual and live of the body."
"Do they, then," I asked, "come from within the man?"
"All things," he replied "come from within. A man's foes are they of his
own household."
"And how," I asked, "may we discern
the Astrals from the higher spirits?"
"I have told you of one sign; – they are flattering spirits. Now I will
tell you of another. They always depreciate Woman. And they do this because
their deadliest foe is the Intuition. And these, too, are signs. Is there
anything strong? They will make it weak. Is there anything wise? They will make
it foolish. Is there anything
(p. 118)
sublime? They will distort and travesty it.
And this they do because they are exhalations of matter, and have no spiritual nature. Hence they pursue and
persecute the Woman continually, sending after her a flood of vituperation like
a torrent to sweep her away. But it shall be in vain. For God shall carry her to
His throne, and she shall tread on the necks of them.
"Therefore the High Gods will give through a woman the Interpretation which
alone can save the world. A woman shall open the gates of the Kingdom to
mankind, because Intuition only can redeem. Between the Woman and the Astrals
there is always enmity; for they seek to destroy her and her office, and to put
themselves in her place. They are the delusive shapes who tempted the saints of
old with exceeding beauty and wiles of love, and great show of affection and
flattery. Oh! Beware of them when they flatter, for they spread a net for thy
soul."
"Am I, then, in danger from them?"
I asked. "Am I, too, a Sensitive?'' And he said, –
"No, you are a Poet. And in that is your
strength and your salvation. Poets are the children of the Sun, and the Sun
illumines them. No poet can be vain or self-exalted; for he knows that he speaks
only the words of God. 'I sing,' he says, 'because I must.' Learn a truth which
is known only to the sons of God. The Spirit within you is divine. It is God.
When you prophesy and when you sing, it is the Spirit within you which gives you
utterance. It is the 'New Wine of Dionysos.' By this Spirit your body is
enlightened, as is a lamp by the flame within it. Now, the flame is not the oil,
for the oil may be there without the light. Yet the flame cannot be there
without the oil. Your body, then, is the lamp-case into which the oil is poured.
And this – the oil – is your soul, a fine and combustible fluid. And the flame
is the Divine Spirit, which is not born of the oil, but is conveyed to it by the
hand of God. You may quench this Spirit utterly, and thenceforward you will have
no immortality; but when the lamp-case breaks, the oil will be spilt on the
earth, and
(p. 119)
a few fumes will for a time arise from it, and then it
will expend itself and leave at last no trace. Some oils are finer and more
spontaneous than others. The finest is that of the soul of the poet. And in such
a medium the flame of God's Spirit burns more clearly and powerfully; and
brightly, so that sometimes mortal eyes can hardly endure its brightness. Of
such an one the soul is filled with holy raptures. He sees as no other man sees,
and the atmosphere about him is enkindled. His soul becomes transmuted into
flame; and when the lamp of his body is shattered, his flame mounts and soars,
and is united to the Divine Fire. Can such an one, think you, be vainglorious or
self-exalted, and lifted up? Oh no; he is one with God, and knows that without
God he is nothing. I tell no man that he is a reincarnation of Moses, of Elias,
or of Christ. But I tell him that he may have the Spirit of these if, like them,
he be humble and self-abased, and obedient to the Divine Word."
So far from our being sufficiently advanced to escape molestation from the
sources thus indicated, there were times when we suffered much from their
incursions, even to the hindrance, for the time being, of the work on which our
whole hearts were set. Knowing that everything depended on our unanimity, they
sought to make division between us, and what they lacked in force was more than
made up for by subtlety. (1) Despite all our vigilance, they would insinuate themselves
like barbed and poisoned arrows between the joints of our armour, there to
rankle and envenom, so insidious were their suggestions. They did not flatter,
but
(p. 120)
attacked us. So that it
was a satisfaction to be assured that they attack those only who are worth
attacking. The very nature of our work was such as to invite attack from them,
being what they were.
Meanwhile, no experience was withheld that would serve to qualify us for what
proved to be an essential part of our work, the "discerning of spirits" in the
sense, not merely of perceiving them, but of distinguishing their nature and
character. And always was the lesson given in a form which combined with its
other features that of total unexpectedness. Especially important was it for us
to be able to distinguish between the spirits of the astral, against
which we were warned, and spirits in the astral, namely, souls which
had not yet accomplished their emancipation, but were in course of doing so. But
while as regarded the former we were left to fight the battle for ourselves, as
regarded the latter there was a control exercised, and none were permitted to
approach us save such as had a message of service which would minister to the
solution of a present problem. Of this the following experience was an instance.
It helped us to a yet fuller comprehension, both of the reasons which had
dictated our association, and of the liabilities to be guarded against.
It was
evening (1), and we were occupied in our respective tasks, and so
entirely engrossed by them as to be disposed to resent any interruption, when
"Mary" bent across the table, and speaking in a low tone, said to me, "There is
a spirit in the room who wants to speak to us. Shall I let him?" I
(p. 121)
assented on the condition that he had something
to tell us really worth hearing. She then became entranced, being magnetised by
his presence; and after telling me that he spoke with a strong American accent
and professed to be a "metaphysical doctor" – meaning, she supposed, a doctor in
metaphysics – repeated the following after him; for I could neither see nor hear
him: –
"You two have been put together for
a work which you could not do separately. I have been shown a chart of your past
histories, containing your characters and your past incarnations. She is of a
highly active, wilful disposition, and represents the centrifugal force. You,
Caro, are her opposite, and, being contemplative and concentrated, represent the
centripetal force. Without her expansive energy you would become altogether
indrawn and inactive in deed; and without your restraining influence she would
go forth and become dissipated in expansiveness. So extraordinary is her outward
tendency that nothing but such an organism as she now has could repress it and
keep it within bounds. It is for the work she has to do that she has been placed
in a body of weakness and suffering. She is the man and you the woman-element in
your joint system. I can see only her female incarnations, but she has been a
man much oftener than a woman; while you have generally been a woman, and would
be one now but for the work you have to do. Even as a woman she has always been
much more man than woman, for her wilfulness and recklessness have led her into
enterprises of incredible daring. Nothing restrained her when her will prompted
her. She would wreck any work to follow that, and only by combination with your
centripetal tendency can she do the present work. As a man she has been
initiated, once, a long time ago, in
(p. 122)
do not hold the existence of moral evil. All things are
allowed for good ends; but this is a difficult truth to express."
Here she
spoke in her own person, having under his magnetism recovered her own vision and
recollection, saying –
"O Caro! I can see your past. You have been – no, it is all wiped out. I cannot
see it now. I am not allowed to see it. Why is this? I see my own past. I see
Here she
returned to her normal consciousness, our visitor having taken his departure.
Subsequently, in March, 1881, under the influence of a higher illuminative
power, she found herself as one of a group of initiates making solemn procession
through the aisles of a vast Egyptian temple, and chanting in chorus the rituals
which compose the marvellous "Hymn to the
Planet-God, lacchos". (1) For, long as it is, she
(p. 123)
was able to reproduce it
afterwards. It was thus, by her recovery of the memory of knowledges acquired in
past existences, that the divine originals were recovered from which the
Bible-writers largely derived at once their doctrine and their diction. This is
not to say that these were mere borrowers and unilluminate. It is to say only
that they recognised the divinity of a prior revelation, and regarded it as a
common heritage. The truth is one.
Among the
uses of the painful experience we were now undergoing (1) was this one. It put
me on a track of thought of high value in enabling me to determine our
respective positions in regard to our work. It was clearly the endeavour of the
astral influences by which we were being assailed – the "haters of the
mysteries" as our Genii called them (2) – to break down our
work by destroying that perfect harmony between us which was the first condition
of it. And all my endeavours failing to discover in myself the weak point which
rendered us accessible to them, carefully as I sought there for it, I was forced
to look for it in her, and was disposed to ascribe it to the survival from the
far past of some defect of the affectional nature. For, as we were now learning,
man has a dual heredity, that of his physical parentage and that of his
spiritual selfhood. From the former
(p. 124)
of which he derives his
outward characteristics; and from the latter his inward character. The
experience just, recited served to confirm the surmise, but it did something
else besides. It suggested to me the following explanation of the situation as
growing out of the exigencies of our work. That work had for its purpose the
accomplishment of the prophesied downfall of the "world's sacrificial system."
It meant war to the knife against all the orthodoxies at once, religious,
social, scientific. It meant a death – "wrestle, not against flesh and blood,
but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness
of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places."
[T.N.: Ephesians 6:12]
It meant, in short, the destruction foretold by the prophets of "that great
city," the world's materialistic system in Church, State, and Society, wherein
the "Lord," the divinity in man, is ever systematically crucified, and its
replacement by the "Holy City" or system which comes down from the heaven of a
perfect ideal.
What, then,
I asked myself, was the foremost moral need for the instruments of such a work?
Surely it was Courage. But courage subsists under two modes. There is the
courage which manifests itself in action and aggression, and there is the
courage which manifests itself in endurance and resistance. The former is its
masculine mode, the latter its feminine mode. The former connotes Will, the
latter connotes Love. And these were the parts assigned respectively to us in
our joint system. Will and Love united had made the world; disunited, they had
ruined the world; reunited, they would redeem the world. As He and
(p. 125)
She, King and Queen,
positive and negative, centrifugal and centripetal, they are the dual powers of
all things, the constituent principles at once of God and of
The tension
of feeling induced by the situation had for me reached a pitch at which I had
cause for serious apprehension lest my organism prove unequal to the strain.
For, resolute though I myself was to endure to the end, come what might, the
effort involved had so greatly affected my organic system as nearly to double
the number of the heart's pulsations, to the imminent risk of a rupture fatal to
life or reason. Such was the emergency when, longing for light and aid, I
received at night (1) the following experience, which I reproduce as recorded at
the time: –
It seemed to me that I was sole spectator in some circus or hippodrome.
And in the arena were some horses, seven in number, harnessed to a common
centre, but all facing in different directions like the spokes of a wheel, and
pulling frantically, so that the vehicle to which they were attached remained
stationary between them, through their counterbalancing each other; while at the
same time
(p. 126)
it seemed as if it must presently be dragged asunder
into pieces. On looking at it more closely, the vehicle seemed to become a
person who was attempting to drive the horses, but was unable to get them into a
line; and, strange to say, the driver was one and identical both with the horses
and the vehicle, so that it was a living person who was in danger of being torn
asunder by creatures who were in reality himself. While wondering what this
meant, some one addressed me and said that if I would do any good, I must help
to control and direct the animals which were thus pulling their owner asunder.
And that the only way to do this was by so disposing myself that I should be at
one and the same time in the centre with the driver, to help him to curb and
direct his steeds, and outside at their heads in order to compel their
submission. And not only must I be indifferent to their ramping and chafing, I
must even suffer myself to be struck and wounded and trampled upon to any extent
without flinching; for only when I was so unconscious of self as to be
indifferent as to what might happen to me, would they cease to have power
against me. And the reason why I must be also in the centre was that only there
could I effectually co-operate with the driver to enable him to do his part in
directing what in reality wore the forces, as yet unbroken in, of his own
system, into the road it was necessary for us both to follow. We were destined
to be fellow-travellers, and our journey was to be made together and with that
team. It could not be made by one of us without the other, and the failure to
effect a complete conjunction and co-operation would bring certain ruin to the
hopes of both of us and of all who looked to us. The owner of the horses, I was
assured, could not of himself control them, and I could only enable him to do so
by an absolute surrender of myself.
Applying
this vision to the situation, the moral was obvious so far as I was concerned,
and I wondered whether "Mary" would receive anything
(p. 127)
equally suggestive for
herself. In the morning, after remaining unusually late in her room, she
silently handed me the following account of an experience which had similarly
and simultaneously been received by her: –
"I was shown two stars near each
other, both of them shining with a clear bright light, only that of one the
light had a purple tinge, and of the other a blood colour; and a great Angel
stood beside me and bade me look at them attentively. I did so, and saw that the
stars were not round, but seemed to have a piece cut out of the globe of each of
them. And I said to the Angel, ‘The stars are not perfect; but instead of being
round, they are uneven.' He told me to look again; and I did so, and saw that
each globe was really perfect, but that in each a small portion remained dark so
as to present the appearance of having a piece out; and I noticed that these
dark portions of the two stars were turned towards each other. Upon this I
looked to the Angel for the explanation.
And the Angel said to me, 'These stars derive their light not only from
the sun but from each other. If there be darkness in one of them, the
corresponding face of the other will likewise be darkened; and how shall either
reflect perfectly the image of the sun if it be dark to its companion star? For
how shall it respond to that which is above all, if it respond not to that which
is nearest?’
And I said, 'Lord, if the darkness in one of these stars be caused by the
darkness in its fellow, which of them was first darkened?'
Then he answered me and said, 'These stars are of different tinctures;
one is of the sapphire, the other of the sardonyx. Of the first the atmosphere
is cool and equable; of the other it is burning and irregular. The spirit of the
first is as God towards man; the spirit of the second is as the soul towards
God. The first loves; the second aspires. And the office of the spirit which
loves is outwards; while the office of the spirit which aspires is upwards. The
light
(p. 128)
of the first, which is blue, enfolds, and
contains, and embraces, and sustains. The light of the second, which is red, is
as a flame which scorches, and burns, and troubles, and seeks God only, and his
duty is not to the outward, for it is not given to him to love. God, whom he
seeks, is love; and therefore
is he drawn upward to God only. But the spirit of his fellow descends. She
indraws, and blesses, and confers; and hers is the office which redeems.
Wherefore if she fail in her love, her failure is greater than his who hath no
love; and to be perfect she must forgive until the seventy times seven, and be
great in humility. For the violet, which is the colour of humility, is of the
blue. And if she seek her own, or yield not in outward things, her nature is not
perfected, and her light is darkened. Let Love, therefore, think not of herself,
for she hath no self, but all that she hath is towards others, and only in
giving and forgiving is she rich. If, on the contrary, she make a self
withinwards, her light is withdrawn and troubled, and she is not perfect, and if
she demand of another that which he hath not, then she seeketh her own, and her
light is darkened. And if she be darkened towards him, he also will darken
towards her, in respect, that is, of enlightenment. And thus her failure of love
will break the communion with the Divine, which is through him. He cannot darken
outwardly first; for love is not of him. If he darken of himself, it must be
within towards God. But that which he receives of God, he gives not forth
himself. But he burns centrally and enlightens his fellow, and she gives it
forth according to her office. And if she darken in any way outwardly, she
cannot receive enlightenment, but darkens the burning star likewise, and so
hinders their inter-communion.'
Having thus spoken, the Angel looked upon me and said, 'Ye are the two
stars, and to one is given the office of the Prophet, and to the other the
office of the Redeemer. But to be Prophet and Redeemer in one, this is the glory
of the Christ.'"
(p. 129)
Here again
was an intimation that on one plane at least of our respective systems she was
of masculine and I of feminine potency, with functions to correspond. That these
functions were capable of being described in the terms employed was, we felt, no
reason for arrogating high places to ourselves. Rather did we consider that
everything is according to its degree; and that, as for persons, if the Gods
were to wait until they found perfect instruments, or at least perfect persons
for their instruments, they would never begin. And this also, that if the world
were in a condition to produce such persons, it would have no need of
redemption. Had not even Jesus Himself been "crucified through weakness"?
In view of
the intensity of the distress undergone in this connection, I found myself
recalling the remark of Plato, "Many begin the mysteries, but few complete
them." My only wonder was that any should survive the ordeals, if they
approached ours in severity. Meanwhile it was said to us by way of
encouragement, "Be sure there is trouble in store. No man ever got to the
Promised Land without first going through the wilderness."
The
instruction to "Mary" had not only
justified my surmise, it also met and corrected her in respect of the chief
cause of our trouble. This was her disposition, at astral instigation, to
withhold from me the products of her illuminations, and even to refrain from
writing them down (1), on the specious pretext that they were meant for her own
(p. 130)
exclusive benefit, and
were too sacred to be given to the world, or even to me; and she had failed to
discern the source and motive of these suggestions. So effectually had what were
really spirits of darkness disguised themselves as angels of light.
The
importance attached to the occult significance of our "tinctures" received
illustration in this wise. Permission had been given us to make an exception to
the rule of secrecy imposed with regard to certain of the Scriptures received by
us, in favour of a friend who took so warm an interest in our work as to be
eager to render it material aid in the future should occasion arise. It was her
mission, she declared, to do so. But when the day appointed for the reading
came, "Mary" was so ill that her going
seemed to be impossible, and the question accordingly arose as to whether I
might go alone and read them without her. We had no sooner begun to consider the
point than she became entranced, and was shown a large open volume, the book of
the Greater Mysteries to which our Scriptures belonged, surrounded by an Iris
composed of all the colours of the rainbow. She was then shown the following
lines, which I wrote down as she repeated them: –
"The one in Red guards his privileges, and claims to be present whatever
is read.
For the air is filled with the haters of the Mysteries.
Therefore for your sake the chain must be complete;
And the Light must be refracted round you seven times.
He who is Red stands within the holy circle.
And the Violet guards the outermost.
(p. 131)
For the Word is a Word of Mystery,
and they who guard it are Seven.
Beware that nothing you hear be told
unless the circle be perfect.
And this charge we lay upon you
until the work be accomplished.
Fire and sword and war are against
you; you walk in the midst of commotion.
And your life is in peril every hour
until the words be completed."
Up to the
latest moment of the interval before the appointment it seemed impossible for
her to go. She then suddenly recovered as by miracle, and was able to attend the
reading.
The
liabilities of our position subsequently (1) received this further
illustration. "Mary" was introduced in sleep, by her Genius, into an apartment
in the spiritual world which purported to be the laboratory of William Lilly,
the famous astrologer who had foretold the great plague and fire of
"You also have these Scriptures !" she exclaimed. "Yes," said he, "but I
keep them for myself alone."
"And why so," she
asked, "since, if you have them, they are for the learning of others likewise?
Will you not rather communicate these saving truths to thirsty souls?"
(p. 132)
"I will communicate
them," said he, fixing his eyes on her intently, "when I can find Seven Men who
for forty days have tasted no flesh, whose hands have shed no blood, and whose
tongues have tasted of none."
"But if you find not Seven?"
"Then, mayhap, I shall find Five."
"And if not Five?"
"Then, maybe, I shall
meet with Three."
"But even this may be
hard to find, and if you should not meet with Three, what then will you do?"
"One Neophyte would
not be able to protect himself."
In
communicating to her the results of his calculations, he had said that owing to
the propensities indulged in certain of her former lives, she had made for
herself a destiny which ensured suffering and failure, except when living in a
similar manner; doing which she would have a life of unbounded success. "But,"
he continued, "your horoscope has nothing for you but misfortune so long as you
persist in a virtuous course of life, and, indeed, it is now too late to adopt
another. I speak herein according to your Fortune, not in regard to your Inner
life. With that I have no concern. I tell you what is forecast for you on the
material and actual planisphere of your Nativity. (...) I see nothing but
misfortune before you. Yea, if you persist in virtue, it is not unlikely that
you may be stript of all your worldly goods, and of all you possess, and this
evil fortune will follow your nearest associates."
To her
enquiry, "Can I never overcome this evil prognostic?" he replied that she could
do so
(p. 133)
only by outliving the
time appointed for her natural life in the career indicated, and added this
advice, "Steel yourself; learn to suffer; become a Stoic; care not. If
Misfortune be yours, make it your Fortune. Let Poverty become to you Riches. Let
Loss be Gain. Let Sickness be Health. Let Pain be Pleasure. Let Evil Report be
Good Report. Yea, let Death be Life. Fortune is in the Imagination. If you
believe you have all things, they are truly yours.” He concluded with an
explanation reconciling destiny with free will, and vindicating the divine
justice, in a manner which removed all our difficulties on those points, and, as
we later came to learn, was entirely in accordance with the Hindu doctrine of
"Karma," of which at this time we had never heard. (1)
There was no
exaggeration in the terms of the warning of danger. We were constantly made
aware of the presence of the malignant entities above described focusing their
influences on us to prevent the accomplishment of our work, and requiring the
utmost vigilance on our part, as well also as on the part of our illuminators,
to thwart their purpose. And we had good reason to believe that our difficulties
and dangers were enhanced through "Mary's" attendances at the schools and
hospitals, owing to the evil nature of the influences there dominant under a
regimen grossly materialistic, and her liability to be fastened upon and
accompanied home by them. The outer walls of her spiritual system – it was
explained to us – were not yet completed, owing to the vastness of
(p. 134)
the circuit of her
selfhood; and hence her accessibility to the incursion of noxious influences
from without. The treatment of the patients by men trained in the physiological
laboratory, and bent upon turning the hospital ward also into a laboratory with
the patients themselves for the victims of cruel and wanton experimentation,
would send her home boiling with indignation and wrath, to the destruction of
the serenity and self-control requisite for our spiritual work.
It was clear
to us that no experience was to be wanting to exhibit the contrast between the
world's actual and the world's possible. The overthrow of "the world's
sacrificial system" meant salvation for man and beast. The condition of all
really redemptive work is a "descent into hell." The following instruction to us
is a typical one: –
"Teach the doctrine of the Universal
Soul and the Immortality of all creatures. Knowledge of this is what the world
most needs, and this is the keynote of your joint mission. On this you must
build; it is the key-stone of the arch. The perfect life is not attainable for
man alone. The whole world must be redeemed under the new gospel you are to
teach."
The
following "Counsel of Perfection" which was received (1)
by "Mary," is an exquisite expression of the same theme: –
I dreamed that I was in a large room, and there were in it seven persons,
all men, sitting at one long table; and each of them had before him a scroll,
some having books also; and all were greyheaded and bent with age save one,
(p. 135)
and this was a youth of about twenty,
without hair on his face. One of the aged men, who had his finger on a place in
a book open before him, said:
"This spirit, who is of our order,
writes in this book, – 'Be ye perfect, therefore, as your Father in heaven is
perfect.’ How shall we understand this word 'perfection'?" And another of the
old men, looking up, answered, "It must mean Wisdom, for wisdom is the sum of
perfection." And another old man said, "That cannot be; for no creature can be
wise as God is wise. Where is he among us who could attain to such a state? That
which is part only, cannot comprehend the whole. To bid a creature to be wise as
God is wise would be mockery."
Then a fourth old man said: – "It
must be Truth that is intended; for truth only is perfection." But he who sat
next the last speaker answered, "Truth also is partial; for where is he among us
who shall be able to see as God sees?"
And the sixth said, "It must surely
be Justice; for this is the whole of righteousness." And the old man who had
spoken first, answered him: – "Not so; for justice comprehends vengeance, and it
is written that vengeance is the Lord's alone."
Then the young man stood up with an
open book in his hand and said: – "I have here another record of one who
likewise heard these words. Let us see whether his rendering of them can help us
to the knowledge we seek." And he found a place in the book and read aloud: –
"Be ye merciful, even as your Father is merciful." And all of them closed their
books and fixed their eyes upon me.
That it was
possible at all for her to study medicine in a school in which vivisection was
an all prevailing practice, was only because she set her face resolutely against
it, by refusing to attend any place or occasion where or on which it took place,
and relying for her own education chiefly on
(p. 136)
private tuition. It was
an essential part of her plan to prove that such experimentation was not
necessary for a degree. And this she effectually demonstrated by accomplishing
her student-course with rare expedition and distinction, despite her many and
severe illnesses and her frequent change of professors. For one after another
resigned the office on account of her refusal to allow them to experiment on
live animals at her lessons. Not until she had secured her diploma did she enter
a physiological laboratory. And then only in order to qualify herself by
personal experience to denounce the practice. For herself it was not necessary,
she declared, to see a murder or a robbery committed to know that it is a crime.
The
following incident shows how adverse the conditions of modern life were to our
spiritual work: –
Being in
"Do not ask me such deep
questions just now, for I cannot see clearly, and it hurts me to look. The
atmosphere is thick with the blood shed for the season's festivities. The Astral
Belt is everywhere dense with blood. My Genius says that if we were in some
country where the conditions of life are purer, we could live in constant
communication with the spiritual world. For the earth here whirls round as in a
cloud of blood like red fire. He says distinctly and emphatically that the
salvation of the world is impossible while people nourish themselves on blood.
The whole globe is like one vast
(p. 137)
charnel-house. The
magnetism is intercepted. The blood strengthens the bonds between the Astrals
and the Earth. (...) This time, which ought to be the best for spiritual
communion, is the worst, on account of the horrid mode of living. Pray wake me
up: I cannot bear looking; for I see the blood and hear the cries of the poor
slaughtered creatures." Here her distress was so extreme that she wept bitterly,
and some days passed before she fully recovered her composure.
Our first
acquaintance with any literature kindred to our special work took place toward
the close of our sojourn in
(p. 138)
Neoplatonists,
Hermetists, Rosicrucians, and other orders of initiates, to Boehme, Swedenborg
and "Eliphas Levi," and to see what the various spiritualistic schools of the
present day had to say for themselves.
The
following recognition of Hermes by one of the greatest of the Neoplatonists,
Proclus, who lived in the fifth century of our era, was especially gratifying to
us as proving the continuity of our experiences with those of past ages. Proclus,
it must be remembered, was so eminent for his wisdom and powers as to be
regarded by his contemporaries with a veneration approaching to adoration. Says
Proclus, "Hermes, as the messenger of God, reveals to us His paternal Will, and
– developing in us the Intuition – imparts to us knowledge. The knowledge which
descends into the soul from above, excels any that can be attained by the mere
exercise of the intellect. Intuition is the operation of the soul. The knowledge
received through it from above, descending into the soul, fills it with the
perception of the interior causes of things. The Gods announce it by their
presence, and by illumination, and enable us to discern the universal order."
Here was exactly the doctrine received by us, and the manner of it, only that
the Intuition was further disclosed to us as due to interior recollection, as
declared by Plato, as well as to perception.
The results
of the investigations thus begun, and afterwards continued in the library of the
(p. 139)
who had the witness to
the truth in themselves, and this one and the same truth, it was also made clear
that whereas others had received it in limitation, and beheld it as "through a
glass darkly," we were receiving it in plenitude and "face to face," to the
realisation of the high anticipations of the sages, saints, seers, prophets,
redeemers, and Christs of all time; and this, too, at the period, in the manner,
and under the conditions declared by them as to mark and make the "time of the
end."
For in the
illuminations vouchsafed to us the key had been restored which unlocked the
meaning of the symbols in which the doctrines of all the churches, pre-Christian
as well as Christian, had been at once concealed and revealed, to the
elucidation of all the problems which have so sorely perplexed the world, and
the verification, by actual experience, of the truth contained in them. No
longer now was there for us any doubt as to the meaning of allegories such as
the Fall, the Deluge, the Exodus, and others were now shown us to be; or of
prophecies such as those of the crushing of the serpent's head by the Woman and
her seed; the return of Astrea with her progeny of divine sons; the fall from
heaven of Lucifer and Satan; the Return of the Gods; the reign of Michael, "that
great prince who standeth for the children of God's people"; the breaking of the
seals, and opening of the books; the recognition of the abomination of
desolation standing in the holy place; the budding of the fig-tree, and the end
of that "adulterous generation"; the revelation of "that wicked one, the mystery
of iniquity and son of perdition, whom the Lord, at His coming in the clouds of
(p. 140)
heaven with power and
great glory, shall consume with the spirit of His mouth, and destroy with the
brightness of His coming"; the two Witnesses, their resurrection from the dead,
and their ascent into heaven; the drying up of the great river Euphrates, and
the coming of the kings of the East by the way thus prepared; the binding of
Satan, and the acceptable year of the Lord to follow; the exaltation to heaven,
and clothing with the sun, of the mystic "Woman" of the Apocalypse; the advent
of the angel flying in mid-heaven, having an eternal gospel to proclaim unto
every nation, and tribe, and tongue, and people; the coming of many from the
East, and the West, and the North, and the South, to sit down with Abraham,
Isaac, and Jacob, in the kingdom of heaven; and the battle of Armageddon, and
the end of the world. To all these, and other sacred enigmas of like nature, the
key had been given us. And they one and all proved to be prophecies of one and
the same event, the restoration of the faculty of inward understanding, and of
the divine knowledges which only through it are possible. And whereas this was
the faculty, the corruption and loss of which had made the Fall, which was that
of the original Church, so was it the faculty, the purification and restoration
of which was to reverse the Fall, accomplishing the Redemption. For by it man
will regain his mental balance, in virtue of which he was "made upright," and
become again sound, whole, and sane, and be by condition that which he has been divinely declared from the
first to be by constitution, – an
instrument of understanding, competent for the comprehension of all truth. For
only thus is he really
(p. 141)
man, and made in the
divine image; seeing that he is not really man, but infant only, until he
attains his spiritual majority and is able to understand. And that which thus
makes him man on the plane mental and spiritual, is that which makes him man on
the plane physical. It is his recognition and appropriation of the "Woman" of
that plane, the mystic "Woman" of Holy Writ, the mind's feminine mode, the
Intuition. It is of her first identification by us, as the key to the whole
mystery of the Bible, that the manner will now be recounted.
FOOTNOTES
(112:1) The occasion of the
receipt by A.K. and E.M. of the above was one of peculiar interest. It was given
in reference to a visit from the late Laurence Oliphant, an account of which
will be found in Life A.K. It will
suffice to say here that, having heard of their work, Oliphant came to them as
an emissary from his chief in
(112:2) See note p. 70.
(114:1) The above reference is
to an experience of mine which does not call for relation here. E.M.
(119:1) Says E.M. in Life
A.K – "The subtlety with which my most sensitive places were searched
out, and the mercilessness with which they were probed by the influences which
had now obtained access to us, seemed to me to belong altogether to the
infernal." (Life A.K. Vol. I. p. 318.) S.H.H.
(120:1) The date was 27th March,
1880. S.H.H.
(122:1) The Hymn
to the Planet-God has been referred to on p. 79. It is given in full in the
P.W.
pp. 341-349: a portion of it concerning the passage of the Soul, and concerning
the Mystic Exodus, are given on pp. 169-173
post. The method of the recovery by A.K. of this most important Hymn “was
such as to constitute it a proof positive of the great doctrine set forth in it,
the doctrine of Reincarnation; for it was as one of a band of initiates, making
solemn procession through the aisles of a vast Egyptian temple, chanting it in
chorus, that 'Mary,' being asleep, recollected it." (Life A.K. Vol. I. p. 456.)
S.H.H.
(123:1) That is, the "strained
conditions" under which their association was then maintained and their work
carried on. (Life A.K. Vol. I. p. 374.) S.H.H.
(123:2) See p. 130.
(125:1) On the night of the 23rd
June, 1880. This vision was received by E.M. as he pondered and while he was
awake. (Life A.K. Vol. I. pp. 376-377.) S.H.H.
(129:1) Some of A.K.'s
illuminations have thus been lost to the world. (Life A.K. Vol. I. p. 374.)
S.H.H.
(130:1) Lady
(131:1) On the 13th-14th
January, 1881. (Life A.K. Vol. I. p. 435.) S.H.H.
(133:1) A full account of this
interview with William Lily is given in Life A.K. Vol. I. pp. 435-441.
(134:1) On the 9th April,
(136:1) Christmas Day, 1880. (Life
A.K. Vol. I. p. 430.)
(137:1)
the time referred to was September, 1878. Life A.K. Vol. I. pp. 285-385.
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