Quotes:Massey, Charles Carleton

Zirkoff, Boris

Massey, Charles Carleton. English Barrister and Writer, b. Dec. 23, 1838 at Hackwood Park, Basingstoke, the residence of his granduncle, Lord Bolton; died of heart failure March 29, 1905. His father, an MP, was Under Secretary for the Home Office and Chairman of Committees during the administration of Lord Palmerston, and later Minister of Finance for India. C. C. Massey was educated at Westminster School. He studied law, was called to the bar and quickly gained a flourishing practice; however, he threw it over, to devote himself to the study of philosophy and psychology, especially the investigation of psychic phenomena. Only once did he return to the bar in later years, and it was to take up the defense of Dr. Henry Slade at his famous trial in London; he did so without fee when he became convinced that the medium had been treated unfairly by Prof. Ray Lankester. Massey never married and most of his work was of a literary kind. He translated into English Prof. Zollner’s report on his experiments with Slade and published it under the title of Transcendental Physics (London, 1880), a work which was reviewed at length by H.P.B. in The Theosophist (Vol. II, Feb., 1881, pp. 95-97). He also translated E. von Hartmann’s Spiritism, and translated and annotated Baron Carl du Prel’s learned work on The Philosophy of Mysticism (London, Redway, 1889, 2 vols.).

Massey became in 1882 one of the Founders of the Society for Psychical Research. Sir William F. Barrett who convened the meeting at which the Society was organized says: “...It was in his rooms we used to meet for consultation and Committee work, and to his generous hospitality and ungrudging expenditure of time we were constantly indebted. [Massey was] a profound student of philosophy and psychology, and one of the most original and suggestive thinkers I have ever known...” (S.P.R. Journal, Vol. XII, pp. 95-96). Although Massey was on the first Council of the S.P.R. in 1882, he resigned from it in October, 1886, remaining, however, a member of the S.P.R. until a couple of years before his death. He contributed a number of important papers to the publications of the Society. As to his own ideas, Massey was convinced that the phenomena of Spiritualism neither afforded nor could ever afford evidence of what we mean by immortality. He believed that self-realization can be attained only through what he called the “process of the Cross,” self-surrender and spiritual realization.

Massey was also one of the chief organizers of the British Theosophical Society, which held its first meeting at 38, Great Russell St., London, on June 27, 1878. Massey was chosen as President and Miss E. Kislingbury as Secretary.

As is evidenced from a number of letters written by H.P.B. to various people, she had a very high regard for C. C. Massey and his sterling qualities, even though they did not always see eye to eye with each other.

(Consult: Thoughts of a Modem Mystic. A Selection from the Writings of the late C. C. Massey. Ed. by Prof. W. F. Barrett, London, 1909.)

Source: Boris de Zirkoff, «H. P. Blavatsky Collected Writings», vol. 1, pp. 497-498

Massey, Charles Carleton (1838-1905). See Vol. I, pp. 497-99, for biographical data.

Source: Boris de Zirkoff, «H. P. Blavatsky Collected Writings», vol. 4, p. 657