Interface administrators, Administrators (Semantic MediaWiki), Curators (Semantic MediaWiki), Editors (Semantic MediaWiki), Suppressors, Administrators, trusted
17,091
edits
HPB-SB-14-77: Difference between revisions
незначительные правки
(незначительные правки) |
(незначительные правки) |
||
| Line 6: | Line 6: | ||
}} | }} | ||
{{Style P-Align center|1=LIGHT.<br>November 18, 1882.}} | |||
{{Style P-HPB SB. Title continued|Letters on Theosophy. No. III.|14-76}} | {{Style P-HPB SB. Title continued|Letters on Theosophy. No. III.|14-76}} | ||
| Line 17: | Line 15: | ||
{{Style P-Signature custom|A. P. S.|1 style=plain}} | {{Style P-Signature custom|A. P. S.|1 style=plain}} | ||
{{Style P-Align center|1=''(To be continued.)''}} | |||
{{ | |||
{{HPB-CW-separator}} | |||
{{HPB-SB-item | {{HPB-SB-item | ||
| Line 45: | Line 43: | ||
{{Style P-Quote|1=“I was ill with rheumatism, and in the midst of the storm I fell asleep in my cabin, having lain down over the coverlid. In sleep I was transported to my native place, but instead of the heavenly air of Nice, where everything bore a smiling aspect, I found myself in the gloomy atmosphere of a cemetery. In the distance I perceived a melancholy procession of women carrying a bier, and they advanced slowly towards me. I felt a fatal presentiment, and struggled to approach the funeral train, but I could not move. I seemed to have a mountain upon my chest. The cortège reached the side of my couch, laid down the bier, and vanished. I sought in vain to raise myself on my arms. I was under the terrible influence of a nightmare; and when I began to move, and feel beside me the cold form of a corpse, and recognise my mother’s blessed face, I was awake, but on my hand there remained the impression of an ice-cold hand. The mournful howling of the tempest, and the groans of the poor ‘Carmen’ beaten unmercifully against the shore, could not entirely dissipate the effects of my terrible dream. On that day, and in that hour, I lost my parent, the best of mothers.”—''From Guizoni’s Life of Garibaldi.''}} | {{Style P-Quote|1=“I was ill with rheumatism, and in the midst of the storm I fell asleep in my cabin, having lain down over the coverlid. In sleep I was transported to my native place, but instead of the heavenly air of Nice, where everything bore a smiling aspect, I found myself in the gloomy atmosphere of a cemetery. In the distance I perceived a melancholy procession of women carrying a bier, and they advanced slowly towards me. I felt a fatal presentiment, and struggled to approach the funeral train, but I could not move. I seemed to have a mountain upon my chest. The cortège reached the side of my couch, laid down the bier, and vanished. I sought in vain to raise myself on my arms. I was under the terrible influence of a nightmare; and when I began to move, and feel beside me the cold form of a corpse, and recognise my mother’s blessed face, I was awake, but on my hand there remained the impression of an ice-cold hand. The mournful howling of the tempest, and the groans of the poor ‘Carmen’ beaten unmercifully against the shore, could not entirely dissipate the effects of my terrible dream. On that day, and in that hour, I lost my parent, the best of mothers.”—''From Guizoni’s Life of Garibaldi.''}} | ||
{{ | |||
{{HPB-CW-separator}} | |||
{{HPB-SB-item | {{HPB-SB-item | ||
| Line 69: | Line 67: | ||
{{Style P-Title|THE DIVINING ROD.}} | {{Style P-Title|THE DIVINING ROD.}} | ||
{{Style P-Align center|1=''To the Editor of'' “Light.”}} | |||
{{Style S-Small capitals|Sir}},—May I narrate, briefly as I can, my experience with the divining rod? When I was twelve years old, I saw one day a man in my father’s field walking about with a crotched stick in his hands, which, at times, bent down slowly towards the earth. Of course I asked him what he was doing, when he explained the process of finding water. Being a born experimenter, I went into the next pasture and cut a witch-hazel crotch, and on walking about found that it behaved in my hands as it did in those of the water-finder. I followed the water-vein a quarter of a mile to the river bank, and found an outflowing spring. Led blindfold around wells, I tracked the water-courses to and from them. Then I tried similar experiments as to metals. In a wood yard, covered with chips, I repeatedly found a silver dollar hidden under a chip. I did the same when blindfolded. I had no doubt that very deep veins of water, and nearer metals, for I tried iron as well as silver, acted in some way upon me or the rod I held in my hands. Having satisfied myself of the fact, I have never since repeated the experiment. | {{Style S-Small capitals|Sir}},—May I narrate, briefly as I can, my experience with the divining rod? When I was twelve years old, I saw one day a man in my father’s field walking about with a crotched stick in his hands, which, at times, bent down slowly towards the earth. Of course I asked him what he was doing, when he explained the process of finding water. Being a born experimenter, I went into the next pasture and cut a witch-hazel crotch, and on walking about found that it behaved in my hands as it did in those of the water-finder. I followed the water-vein a quarter of a mile to the river bank, and found an outflowing spring. Led blindfold around wells, I tracked the water-courses to and from them. Then I tried similar experiments as to metals. In a wood yard, covered with chips, I repeatedly found a silver dollar hidden under a chip. I did the same when blindfolded. I had no doubt that very deep veins of water, and nearer metals, for I tried iron as well as silver, acted in some way upon me or the rod I held in my hands. Having satisfied myself of the fact, I have never since repeated the experiment. | ||
| Line 77: | Line 75: | ||
{{Style P-Signature custom|1=<div style="display:table; margin-right:auto; text-align:left;">32, Fopstone-road, Earl’s Court, London, S.W.<br><span style="display:inline-block; padding-left:3em;">November 11th, 1882.</span></div>|1 style=plain|align=left}} | {{Style P-Signature custom|1=<div style="display:table; margin-right:auto; text-align:left;">32, Fopstone-road, Earl’s Court, London, S.W.<br><span style="display:inline-block; padding-left:3em;">November 11th, 1882.</span></div>|1 style=plain|align=left}} | ||
{{ | |||
{{HPB-CW-separator}} | |||
{{HPB-SB-item | {{HPB-SB-item | ||
| Line 130: | Line 128: | ||
There are therefore these two questions to be distinguished and dealt with separately. I will state the first in my own way as follows: Can the modes of personal consciousness, including memory, sentiment, and habitual intelligence, be so organised as to become independent of their originating principle, automatically responsive to appropriate excitants, and subsisting for a time by the coherence and momentum imparted to them? | There are therefore these two questions to be distinguished and dealt with separately. I will state the first in my own way as follows: Can the modes of personal consciousness, including memory, sentiment, and habitual intelligence, be so organised as to become independent of their originating principle, automatically responsive to appropriate excitants, and subsisting for a time by the coherence and momentum imparted to them? | ||
Now I must first pre-suppose the admission of an ethereal or psychic body or form, the Kama Rupa, which I used to call the Linga Sarira. I entirely accept the opinion of Hinton and Mr. Noel, that all the phenomena of force we call “matter,” whether physical or ethereal, are presentations to us of a real life and consciousness behind. And I find my argument greatly facilitated by that idea. For I infer from it that the more ethereal and subtle the form of “matter,” the more evidently is it a manifestation of life and living powers. And an ethereal body will thus be far more plastic, and far more tenacious of the impressions it receives from our thought and intelligence, than are our present physical bodies. The living forces of nature in this more sensitive and responsive state, will be more easily mesmerised, as it were, and combined by our personality into a perfect, enduring, and reactive representation of it. In accordance with Hinton’s theory, I follow Mr. Noel in conceiving organism as an immense number of rudimentary cell consciousnesses or wills in strict and absolute subordination to the functional purposes of a higher life principle or formative idea. And that seems to me also quite in conformity with what Koot Hoomi tells us | Now I must first pre-suppose the admission of an ethereal or psychic body or form, the Kama Rupa, which I used to call the Linga Sarira. I entirely accept the opinion of Hinton and Mr. Noel, that all the phenomena of force we call “matter,” whether physical or ethereal, are presentations to us of a real life and consciousness behind. And I find my argument greatly facilitated by that idea. For I infer from it that the more ethereal and subtle the form of “matter,” the more evidently is it a manifestation of life and living powers. And an ethereal body will thus be far more plastic, and far more tenacious of the impressions it receives from our thought and intelligence, than are our present physical bodies. The living forces of nature in this more sensitive and responsive state, will be more easily mesmerised, as it were, and combined by our personality into a perfect, enduring, and reactive representation of it. In accordance with Hinton’s theory, I follow Mr. Noel in conceiving organism as an immense number of rudimentary cell consciousnesses or wills in strict and absolute subordination to the functional purposes of a higher life principle or formative idea. And that seems to me also quite in conformity with what Koot Hoomi tells us* of the living energy of our thoughts after they have passed out of our present consciousness. As to this I shall have something more to say by-and-by, in dealing with Mr. Noel’s objection to the “astral light,” and the pictures or images therein. Now as regards the power of lower forms of life to combine for a common purpose of which they are individually unconscious, it matters not whether the purpose or function is the representation of human intelligence and the reproduction of its phenomena, or of merely animal life. I am not for a moment losing sight of Mr. Noel’s great objection, which is after all only that which presents itself to everyone in a less philosophical form. But until we have clearly before our minds what organism implies, and to how much it is applicable, I cannot shew how, and under what limitations, its survival may be asserted. Now I start with this principle, which, I believe, no psychologist of any school will at the present day deny, ''that organism is the basis of all spontaneity.'' I call spontaneity the organic consciousness. But in so speaking be it understood that I advance nothing necessary to make out my case, which would be satisfied by a wholly ''unconscious'' automatic reproduction of the phenomena of life. A theory much stronger than this—viz., human automatism—that consciousness is altogether a collateral and unessential fact—not long ago engaged the attention of some scientific men in this country. But believing with Mr. Noel that all phenomena of every kind result from conscious energies, I say that what we call our spontaneous acts and thoughts—that is to say, acts and thoughts which, by habitual repetition, have become independent of our voluntary {{Style S-HPB SB. Continues on|14-78}} | ||
{{Footnotes start}} | {{Footnotes start}} | ||