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Legend
< From Across the Ocean (continued from page 4-38) >
“After all the flourish which attended his coming, all the expectations that had been aroused, all the secret apprehensions of the church and the anticipated triumph of the materialists, what did he teach us that was really new or so extremely suggestive? Nothing, positively nothing,”[1] the article states. “Of him it may be said, . . that what he said that was not false was by far not new; and that which was new was absolutely false.”[2]
Here, to prove her opinion about the false arguments cited by the lecturer, Mme. Blavatsky displays her extreme erudition. She turns to ancient heathen accounts of creation, refers to the Hindu and Brahmin faiths, their sacred books, and she proves that “the benighted Hindus, it seems, made the trifling improvement over modern science, of hooking a First Cause on the further end of the chain of evolution. . .”[3]
In those ancient fruits of human thought she finds confirmation of the utter triviality of ideas passed off by materialists as the latest scientific discoveries: “. . . the ancient Hindus many centuries before the Christian era taught the doctrine of evolution. Martin Haug, the Sanskrit scholar, asserts that the Vedas were already in existence 2,000 B.C.”
Further, Mme. Blavatsky proves that materialists have no grounds to charge them, Spiritists, with “false pretences” and portray them as being “lost to reason.” As for their “false pretences,” she mentions one of their fellows, medium Slade, who was arrested at the complaint of Duke Lancaster for cheating him and taking $5 for a sole séance, and she asks whether he is more guilty of false pretences than Huxley himself, a soulless person who wheedled not 5 but 5,000 dollars out of credulous New York residents for imparting them a very old hypothesis that man descended from an antediluvian four-toed horse?
“To be consistent he must show that while the horse was losing at each successive period a toe, man has in reversed order acquired an additional one at each new formation; and, unless we are shown the fossilized remains of man in a series of one-, two-, three-, and four-toed anthropoid apelike beings antecedent to the present perfected Homo, what does Huxley’s theory amount to? . . ”[4] What grounds do we have to believe such bold assumptions, undemonstrated by anything but the lecturer's authority,
From Across the Ocean
...
<... continues on page 4-40 >
Original text in Old Russian
„Послҍ всҍхъ громкихъ обьявленiй объ ожидаемыхъ съ такимъ волненiемъ лекцияхъ, послҍ опасенiй церкви и заранняго торжества гг. матерьялистовъ, что дали намъ эти лекции?...“ вопрошаетъ статья; „что новаго или особенно замҍчательнаго сказалъ намъ Т.Гексли? Ничего, положительно ничего! О немъ, по истинҍ, можно замҍтить, что все что онъ сказалъ не лживаго, было далеко не ново; а все новое имъ высказанное, было совершенно ложно“.
Здҍсь, чтобъ доказать справедливость своего мнҍнiя о лживости доводовъ лектора, г-жа Блаватская, вдается в крайнюю ученость. Она обращается къ древнейшимъ языческимъ легендамъ о сотворении мiра; ссылается на вҍрованiя индусовъ и браминовъ, на ихъ священныя книги и доказываетъ, что логика „этихъ непросвященныхъ свҍтомъ истины язычниковъ, все же превосходитъ логику современныхъ ученыхъ, хотя-бы тҍмъ, что сознаетъ верховное начало, – первую, причину – причинуъ всего мирозданiя...“
Въ этихъ-же древнейшихъ созданiяхъ мысли человҍческой она находитъ подтвержденiе крайней устарҍлости идей, выдаваемыхъ матерьялистами за новҍйшiя открытiя науки: „Индусскiя священныя книги, Веды, проповҍдовали ученiе самозарожденiя болҍе нежели за 2000 лҍтъ до Р.Х. (по указанiямъ ученаго изслҍдователя санскритской древности, Мартина Гауджъ)“
Далҍе г-жа Блаватская доказываетъ, что напрасно матерьялисты укоряютъ ихъ, спиритовъ, въ безумiи и корыстолюбiи. Что касается до корыстолюбiя, то неужели ихъ товарищъ, медиумъ Слэдъ, недавно арестованный въ Лондонҍ по жалобе герцога Ланкастера за то что, взявъ пять долларовъ за сеансъ, яко-бы хотҍлъ обмануть его, более повиненъ в корысти нежели самъ Гексли?... Бездушный выманившiй у легковҍрныхъ Нью-Iоркцев не 5 а 5000 дол. за сообщенiе ... весьма стараго предположенiя о происхожденiи человҍка отъ четырехпалой, допотопной лошади.
Чтобы быть послҍдовательнымъ, Гекслей долженъ былъ-бы наглядно показать намъ, что въ то время какъ эта баснословная лошадь постепенно съ каждымъ перiодомъ, теряла по пальцу; человекъ, напротив, при каждой новой трансформацiи прiобрҍталъ по одному лишнему. Ибо, если намъ не по ... ископаемыхъ остатковъ человека различныхъ перiодовъ, въ ...хъ одно-палаго, двухъ-палаго (...) состоянiй – состоянiй несо... ...ыхъ, предшествовавшихъ на... ...у совершенному его виду, – ...-же поведетъ насъ многоум... ...iя Гексли?..» Какое основа... ...мъ мы вҍрить такого рода, ... ничҍмъ кромҍ авторитета ...
Editor's notes
- ↑ Huxley and Slade: Who is More Guilty of “False Pretences”? Vide: H. P. Blavatsky, BCW, p. 226.
- ↑ Ditto. The quotation is not quite accurate. The correct text is as follows: “. . . what he said that was new was not true; and that which was true was not new.”
- ↑ Ditto, pp. 226-227.
- ↑ Ditto, p. 229.
- ↑ From Across the Ocean by Zhelikhovsky V.P., Tiflis herald, No.49-50. Original title in Old Russian: "Изъ-за Океана. Похороны өеозофа"