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vol. title: Vol Four of The Theosophical Society of The Arya Samaj of Arya-wart vol. period: Sept 1878 – Sept 1879 pages in vol.: 350 |
The "Lark" About Arya Somaj
To the Editor of the Journal:
The article which appeared in your paper over the signature of E. K. C., though very entertaining, is calculated in a measure to mislead the reader; please allow me therefore to notice it somewhat critically. With all due courtesy my remarks are tendered.
Madam Blavatsky, of whom E. K. C. writes, I have known intimately for several years. In 1848, I dined with her sister in Tiflis, under the shadow of the Caucasian mountains, and as she was then young (and beautiful withal) I cannot but think there may be some mistake respecting Mme. B.’s age as recorded by E. K. C.
Mme. Blavatsky is a granddaughter of the Princess Dolgorouky, is a proficient in music and the master of many languages, has had the advantage of a vast amount of travel and an acquaintance with very many nationalities, and if any one in the wide universe has a right to judge of manners, customs and religions, it is this distinguished Russian. To say that she is a heathen, (she using the term derisively, in view of the Christian signification,) can in no degree, with the intelligent, detract from her merits as a lady, a writer, a philosopher; if so, then Hypatia,* who in culture, purity and wisdom, Mme. B. much resembles, should not receive those exalted encomiums which fourteen centuries have lavished upon her. Then the “heathen,” as I have myself known them in India, I should prefer as companions, and much sooner trust, than modern Christians; and, I would go further, and say that from what I have seen in the Orient of filial respect and piety, of goodness, truthfulness, virtue, I should rather educate my children among them than among Protestant bigots or Catholic Jesuits. In confirmation of my prejudices, if you will, I can say that a lady missionary remarked to me a few days since (what she had heard from another missionary) that “the heathen could be trusted till they were converted;” and a young man who was in the medical college with me, and who had been converted to Christianity in Asia Minor, also said to me, that his people were more virtuous than the Christians. Again: Dr. Peebles, who has just completed his second voyage around the world, has published that: “The tone of morality is higher, and the practice of charitable deeds far more prevalent in Buddhist than in Christian countries;” and, “murder is comparatively unknown; theft is uncommon; and profanity prevails only so far as Oriental people have mingled with the Christian nations of the West;” while Bishop Bigaudet testifies, “not only to the general chastity and morality of Buddhists, but to the ameliorating influence of the system upon women.” Further, of the faith producing these noble results, the celebrated orientalist, Max Müller, writes: “It has been praised by all, and everybody, for its elevated, pure and humanizing character;”† and, “even the attention of those who are indifferent to all that concerns religion must be arrested for a moment, when they learn from statistical accounts that no religion, not even the Christian, has exercised so powerful an influence on the diminution of crime as the old, simple doctrine of the Ascetic of Kapilavasta.”§
This praise of a religion and people called “heathen” might be indefinitely extended; but the above will serve my purpose; and when our missionaries learn to write about them with a non-sectarian bias, our people at home will have views far different from their present, though a paragraph in E. K. C.’s article on “the opinion of a Brahmin pundit” might lead us to think otherwise; for he says, (of the Bible), “There is nothing to compare with it in all our sacred books for goodness,” &c.; and, “where did the English-speaking people get their intelligence, cleverness, power? It is their Bible that gives it to them.” True in part, for their war-god, Jehovah, marching to exterminate nations, massacring men, women and children, having “Slaughter” above all other words inscribed upon His banner, has seemed emphatically as an inspirer of the English nation. How many Americans did the English murder for the simple, foolish ambition of governing more territory? and how many millions of India’s rightful owners of the soil have they cruelly, brutally massacred for the same selfish, ungodly, inhuman purpose? And here I would ask that clever “pundit,” if the Romans to obtain their surprising “power” required the Bible? Did the Greeks and Etruskans require a Bible to create those models in literature and art that have been the admiration of the whole world? The “pundit’s” remark evinc the bias of a new convert; and what he states has been refuted by Sir Wm. Jones, and by the larger, broader intelligence of Mme. Blavatsky and many more eminent scholars. E. K. C. “went to New York,” she says, “for larks.” As I understand the term “larks,” she made a mistake in calling upon that eminent lady, Mme. Blavatsky. Mme. B. reads character and sifts motive with almost unerring accuracy, and she would be little disposed to display any of her powers to, or gratify the idle curiosity of, any one looking for “larks.” When seated in my parlor, in quiet, social conversation, some phenomena have taken place in her presence and through her influence as an “adept,” that were equal to any of the miracles we read of in Moses’s time.
E. K. C. uses the phrase “degrading superstition of Christianity” as the opinion of the members of the Arya Samaj. I cannot speak with authority upon this; yet, as I am acquainted with several persons who belong to said society, I think I may safely say that these words convey a wrong meaning. As an Essenian, as an Initiate, as an Egyptian occultist, Jesus has a hold upon Oriental thought that His lying, cheating, blood-thirsty, beef-eating followers (afar off), cannot eradicate; and when, as Sir Wm. Jones says, His (Jesus’) purest and most sublime doctrines or sayings are to be found word for word in the Sanscrit, it is plainly evident that the Buddhists cannot consider His teachings wholly at variance with their own. But the Buddhists can recognize no “atoning blood”—the shedding of blood being prohibited (most mercifully and to the greatest of moral influence) among them; but “sin will come back,” they say, “upon the sinful, like fine dust thrown against the wind. An evil deed does not turn suddenly like milk; but smouldering follows the fool, like fire covered by ashes.”* It may be well to quote here a little more from the pamphlet just cited—produced by a discussion in Ceylon between the Rev. Mr. Silva and Rev. Mohattiwatte Gunauda, who proved himself to be “Buddhism face to face with Christianity.” p. 11. far superior to his Christian antagonist. The Rev. Gurranda said that the “Christians commenced propagating their religion by giving the object of their worship the name of a being already held in veneration by the nations amongst whom they intended preaching the gospel; for instance, in Calcutta, Christ is called the Son of Iswara—so called to enlist the sympathies of the Hindoos, who held the god Iswara in great reverence. In Ceylon, Jehovah went by the name of Dewiyanwahanse, as this term existed among the Singhalese to denote the gods in whom they believed.” And the words “jealous God,” translated into the Singhalese Bible is jevalita, which means glittering or luminous, for who would have believed in an envious or “jealous” God?** In Rev. Mr. G.’s rejoinder to Mr. Silva’s reply, he said: “If the Christian’s God was Iswara, had Jehovah a wife, as Iswara is said to have?” And again, in answering Mr. S.’s sneering remark about the “circumlocutory genesis of Buddhism,” Mr. G. said: “As Mary, the mother of Christ, was created by Jehovah, Jehovah was her father, and Mary His daughter; but because the Holy Ghost was conceived in Mary’s womb, Jehovah becomes her son, and Mary, Jehovah’s mother; and as Christ is Jehovah’s son, Jehovah becomes Mary’s husband, and Mary his wife . . . So it was to the Trinity notion connected with the birth of Christ, and not to the reasonable Paticcasamuphada,” that the “round about” theory of Mr. S. could be applied.
E. K. C. says in referring to a suggestion made by Mme. B. regarding her health: “I do not know the trick.” Here again is an objectionable word. “Trick” seems quite applicable to what in modern times is termed a conjurer, but has not the remotest connection with a veritable theurgist, an “initiate,” like Mme. B., of one of the most ancient of the mystic “Brotherhoods,” the “Magi,” as we venerate them in “Holy Writ.”
Again: E. K. C. states that Mme. B. is not in good odor with Spiritualists and gas meters, and that she, E. K. C., “quite agrees with her estimate of spirits and meters.” Mme. B. has, indeed, created some hard feelings against her on the part of the less enlightened Spiritualists, because she will not credit every “spirit tramp” that appears and calls himself Shakspeare, Moses, Goethe; but she not only believes that the spirits of our departed loved ones can, but do, manifest themselves to us. She would not discredit the teaching of Socrates, of Plato, of Pythagoras, if she did of Abraham, Saul and the “centurian” of Cæsaria; and she has in her great work, “Isis Unveiled,” at least a score of passages, I think, where modern Spiritualism is fully sanctioned. I will take a few at random: “The priests were taught the art of calling up the spirits of the dead;”†† “The two eternal spirits come and go everywhere;”§§ “The vacant carcass may be entered and inhabited by the astral form of an adept sorcerer, or an earth-bound disembodied human soul;”‡‡ “There Shamanism is practiced to the utmost limits of intercourse allowed between man and the spirit.” And, “were the skeptics of Europe permitted to consult the accounts printed daily at Moru and in the City of Spirits,” of the business-like intercourse which takes place between the lamas and the invisible world, they would certainly feel more interest in the phenomena described in the Spiritualistic journals.”††† “Probably,” says Prof. Wilder, “they (magic, astrology, &c.,) were but forms of a Spiritualism which was generally extant in all ages of human history.”(a) “Men of science say that ancient and modern Spiritualism, magic and mesmerism, are charlatanry and delusion; but there are 800 millions on the face of the ...
In conclusion permit me to say, and with all due courtesy to your fair contributor, that if she has read “Planchette,” by the eminent scholar Epes Sargent, (and which is only one among hundreds of valuable works on modern spiritualism), she would hardly have written so flippantly about it; and if she should feel a little ashamed of the company she might fall into by adopting our faith, I will name a few who profess to believe in it: Messrs. Alfred R. Wallace, William Crookes and C. F. Parley, Fs. R. S.; Professors Maxim’n Pertz and Zöllner, J. H. Fichte, (“the illustrious son of an illustrious father”); the physicists N. Wagner and Dr. A. Butluof, of the University of St. Petersburg, Dr. F. Hoffman, of the University of Wurtzburg; the astronomer Flammarion; Prof. De Morgan; Prince Wittgenstein; another Prince of the Imperial Family, and Chancellor Aksakoff; Lady De Morgan; the Queen of England and her late beloved friend, Lady Van de Weyer, grand-daughter of an American; Lady Gregory, and literally thousands in the United States, Mexico and South America, hardly less distinguished in the walks of science, art, literature, medicine, law, politics, religion. I receive more than twenty magazines, all in foreign languages, devoted to the holy cause, spiritualism.
Member of the Theosophical Society, and Arya Somaj.
Albany, N. Y., Jan. 9th, 1879.
* In view of the fatal mistake of too much intelligence which history accords to Hypatia and la Pucelle of Orleans, E. K. C. should be cautious of her powers.
† “Lecture on Buddhist Nihilism,” p. 4.
§ id. id.
** id. p. 33.
†† “Isis Unv.” II. 568.
§s id. 412.
‡‡ id. 569.
††† id. 616. (a) id. I. 502.
Nécrologie
La nouvelle de la mort du prince Émile de Sayn-Wittgenstein, dit le Journal de Saint-Pétersbourg, cause des regrets universels.
Le défunt a accompli au Caucase, après 1850, un grand nombre d’exploits héroïques, il en a été récompensé par des distinctions nombreuses, un sabre d’or avec l’inscription « pour le courage » et la décoration de St-Georges, de la 4e classe.... En 1878 il a été nommé aide-de-camp général de l’empereur. Il occupait dans la région de la Vistule un poste où la responsabilité était très-grande, la direction d’une des subdivisions militaires, et il a su se faire estimer et respecter de chacun. Il a pris part l’année dernière à quelques combats et a reçu l’ordre de St-Vladimir de 4e classe avec glaives, et l’ordre de Ste-Anne de la 1re classe également avec glaives.
Ce que le Journal de Saint-Pétersbourg a oublié de mentionner, procédé auquel, du reste, nous sommes habitués,— c’est que le prince de Wittgenstein était, depuis nombre d’années, un sincère et zélé partisan du spiritisme, comme le prouve sa collaboration aux journaux spirites et spiritualistes.
Le prince Émile avait, chose encore assez rare, le courage de son opinion, et il a toujours confessé sa foi en dépit du « qu’en dira-t-on » et avec la même ardeur généreuse qu’il apportait sur les champs de bataille.
Lors du procès dit « des spirites » en 1875, il écrivit à notre frère M. Leymarie une lettre remarquable dont nous rappellerons ici les derniers passages.
« Prenez, en attendant, cher M. Leymarie, bravement votre parti d’une situation qui ne peut être que passagère et qui ne nuira ni à votre réputation ni aux progrès d’une doctrine que les falsificateurs des préceptes de notre divin Sauveur ne pourront plus enrayer. Ils ont condamné au bûcher Galilée, brûlé vif des milliers de victimes, béni les poignards de la Saint-Barthélemy, et déclaré œuvre-pie les dragonnades ; et ils n’ont pourtant empêché, ni la terre de graviter autour du soleil, ni le protestantisme de se libérer du joug de ceux qui veulent, comme le Daleï-Lama, se déclarer les égaux de Dieu.
Nous sommes aujourd’hui dans le même cas que les homœopathes, à qui les apothicaires font la guerre, parce qu’ils nuisent au débit de leurs drogues.... »
Qui de nous ne se rappellera cet homme de bien, cet homme d’esprit dont on était fier de serrer la main ; ce départ d’un ami, perte réelle pour tous ceux qui ont pu apprécier la délicatesse d’une belle âme, devient une force pour la cause, puisque, dégagé des liens de la matière, Émile de Wittgenstein s’occupera de sa diffusion dans les masses : nous comptons sur lui.
Editor's notes