< The Views of the Theosophists (continued from page 4-137) >
the spiritual side of the universe; that the elementaries all finally become purified of sin.” Partly so. Pure spirits—judged by human standards—do deny that comprehensive doctrine of annihilation; they do say that few fail of final progress, though some do. So far as I know they affirm the doctrine of evolution, and impress on man the doctrine that he is the arbiter of his own destiny, that his evolution will be slow or rapid according as he works out his own salvation. The Gospel they proclaim seems to me to be one that needs no advocacy. Man, they say, makes his future, and is the arbiter of his own fate. He graves day by day a character which is permanent, and by virtue of it he goes to “his own place.” He works out his own salvation, and after his physical life is done with, he remedies often in sorrow and shame, the defalcations and sins of his life, and pays the penalty of his transgressions. Helps he has, and by their means he is led upward. But if, by a course of preferred vice, by ingrained preference for the “earthly, sensual, devilish” he chooses evil and refuses good, then, by the action of the same invincible law, he sinks lower and lower, till beyond hope. But these cases are few and far between.
But, says Col. Olcott, “who cares to offset the asseverations of such unverified and unverifiable witnesses against the accumulated experience of thousands of trained seers, not mediums, not controlled, but able to sound the profoundest depths of nature, and who have sounded it?”
Well, that is just one of the statements so freely made. Where are the seers? what are their records? and (far more important) how do they verify them to us? As to the unverifiable nature of statements made by spirits, admitting (for the sake of argument only) that such is the case, do not the spirit and the seer sail in the same boat? The spirit at any rate is in evidence; the seer as yet is not. We cannot fairly be expected to u find in the far East the proof” we ask for. We must at least have some ground for believing that all the wise men do come from that quarter.
Another curious statement, made as if it were perfectly familiar, is this—at birth a babe is but a duality, and becomes a trinity only when reason begins to manifest itself, usually at the age of seven years, but sometimes earlier.” This at any rate is new to me, and should be substantiated by some evidence. Shall I be wrong in saying that where Theosophy touches ground we have no difficulty in recognizing its beauty? We admit with all frankness that Spiritualism in some or many of its exoteric aspects is unlovely and of bad repute. We welcome the effort of the Theosophists to tell us how to remedy the blemishes which we have already seen, and which our “pure disembodied spirits” are never weary of dilating upon; and for which they also prescribe a plain remedy. In the midst of perplexities that beset us we are grateful to them for pointing out the sources of our bewilderment. But we would represent to them that they only increase our difficulty by the suggestion of unproven hypotheses. We want some rest for the sole of our foot, but we do not find it in rhetoric, or in supposition, or in mazes of hypothetical deduction. Before any hypothesis can seriously demand our attention it must either grow from previously ascertained fact as a deduction, or it must be an attempt to explain on a reasonable basis all observed facts of a particular class. It is here that we Spiritualists part company with Theosophists. We say that they import into the discussion a number of hypotheses and theories of which they offer us no proof. We say further that they do not make sufficient account of much evidence that we produce. And we say further still that, so far as their claims are proven or even vraisemblable, they are in no way incompatible with the truest Spiritualism which thus, as the greater, includes the less.
London, January 7th.
A Strange Visitation
One night in the month of October, 1875, I had retired to rest, and after a preliminary perusal of a book, as is my habit, I fell into a half-wakeful sleep. It was between the hours of ten and eleven, when all my faculties were becoming dormant, that I experienced a peculiar sensation as of something hovering about me. Whether it was a visitant from the land of spirits I cannot undertake to say, but I clearly observed two hands, with the fingers pointing towards me, and which were gradually passed along my body from head to foot. At every pause of this movement I experienced a soothing yet shooting sensation through me, as if I were the subject of an electrician. This feeling, moreover, was not confined to any particular part of my system, but was felt forcibly at the parts where the fingers pointed to during the pauses in their movement, as I have described. Fear I had none, but in its place a peculiar sort of pleasurable calm came over me, exercising a soothing influence over my senses, which, at this stage, were keenly sensitive. After this exercise of the digits over me, I imagined the figure had placed itself at my head, and in a voice of mellowness blended with power, commanded me in the English language, “Do not tell!” Although the mandate was, I may say, authoritative, yet its sternness was so mollified by the deep and sepulchral tones in which it was uttered, that with me to “hear was to obey.” After this I started up with indescribable feelings, and endeavoured to find some cause for this strange effect, but there was nothing apparent. As for my having been a victim to the trickery of some individual, it was simply impossible, for my bed was in an upper story, and no means of ingress were available, except the window. My wife was reclining by me in a sound sleep, nor was she disturbed in the least. Imputing the circumstance to an incipient attack of indigestion, which, we all know, gives rise at times to strange dreams, I thought no more of it; but, strange to relate, the same thing was repeated the following night, and seven successive nights about the same hour almost. My imagination was so worked upon, that I awoke on the eighth night with a start, which aroused my wife, who inquired what was the matter, and observed an undue beating of my heart. Bearing in mind (although placing no great stress upon) the strangely delivered mandate, I tried to pass it off until after much importunity I unburthened myself to my wife, and it is remarkable I have not experienced a recurrence of these sensations since. Very probably my violation of the command dissolved the “Fatal spell around me so entwined.” Yet, judging from the ill-luck that has since attended me in my mundane affairs, even in the most trivial items, I am forced to conclude (though not prone to superstition) that my having disobeyed the order by not keeping the affair locked up in my breast, has led to the misfortunes I have subsequently endured. In short almost every thing that I undertake proves a failure. There may be legitimate causes to account for my unsuccessfulness, but the coincidence is so strong, and above all, following immediately after the breaking of faith, that I can hardly wean myself from imputing my failures to the very cause.
It will be considered an obliging act if any one more enlightened would trace out the origin of this event, more so as it is generally supposed to have a strong leaning to mesmerism.
Hyderabad, Deccan, India, December 7th, 1877.
Editor's notes
- ↑ A Strange Visitation by Gomes E.A., London Spiritualist, No. 281, January 11, 1878, p. 18
London Spiritualist, No. 281, January 11, 1878, p. 18