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(August 1891)
Publications:
- The Path, vol. VI, no. 5, August 1891, pp. 152-154
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CTD entry in Russian: Бак, Джира Дьюи - Лондонский центр
DATA
Title for references: Buck JD - The London Center
Short description: Signed "J. D. Buck, F. T. S." A letter describing the London Headquarters at 19 Avenue Road as he fo...
152
Correspondence.
The readers of the PATH may be interested and possibly benefitted by knowing something a little more definite about the London center of Theosophic work. It is true that Mr. Judge's letter in the July issue gives a very good picture of the headquarters at Avenue Road, and yet nothing that he has written, or that I shall be able to write, will be found adequate to give the reader the impression that one receives on the ground where H. P. B.153spent the last years of her eventful life. This impression involves three elements. First: the immense power and incomprehensible resources of the teacher. Second: the unbounded loyalty to that teacher and determination to push on her work entertained by those left by her at headquarters. Third: the results already apparent in arresting the public attention and interesting hundreds of intelligent people in the Theosophical Doctrines.
At one time H. P. B. expressed the thought that she might spend her last days, and the closing years of the great cycle, in America, and some of us were looking forward to such a possibility with hope and anticipation. She would have found America to-day a very different place from that of 1874-75. This, however, necessarily depended on circumstances. Not, as some have inferred, and even suggested—"circumstances over which she had no control"—but that she could not ignore or annul, and that she must necessarily always take into account. H. P. B.'s death was doubtless hastened by the extra tax put upon her vital powers as related to her already diseased body, by the necessity and the opportunity of both special and general work in London. She had predicted great interest in and activity of the T. S. in 1891. She had said the English people are a reserved and lethargic race in occult and spiritual things, but if these ideas were once admitted they would stick and prosper. The interest spread and deepened, and among all the chance comers and the really interested inquirers one after another remained at headquarters till she had nearly a score of well-educated, earnest, and receptive persons, men and women, upon whom she could rely and who relied upon her implicitly. To educate these for the work they were to do, and to answer the increasing demands of the general public and the T. S. at large, made great demands on the physical body, while the ripening of theosophical events all along the line, perhaps even more than she had hoped or expected, hastened the issue. It must be remembered that H. P. B.'s body was not only physical and mortal, but that it was tinged no less than endowed by ancestral heredity. It was like an imperfect building in which had been placed a powerful engine, which from its immense force and ceaseless activity shook the building to its very foundations. The tabernacle was carefully looked after and continually repaired. Diseases that the best physicians habitually declare incurable were cured, but breaks at other points would occur. Finally, with the special and increasing strain it required greater expenditure of energy to keep the body together and in working order than could be got out of it; a condition of things which she was known by many hints and signs to have anticipated for many months.
The little group in her immediate presence were carefully instructed154and as carefully watched and disciplined. Latent psychic powers were slowly unfolded, but as carefully guarded, and all artificial or hasty development by Hatha Yoga in any form clubbed out of sight. They were working for the whole Society and for humanity, not for self, and trained as one mind under the eye of a master. First, Harmony; next Solidarity; and finally, efficient, loyal, intelligent service. H. P. B. seemed thus to have prepared her pupils, and when she suddenly passed from outer sight she seemed also to have transfused her very life and spirit into the group. Never in my life have I seen so many persons inspired by one idea, so harmoniously and persistently carrying out that idea. There were no verbal protestations, more than there were tears or lamentations for the dead. Each seemed to have looked in the face of death after having been filled with a new life, and to have been awed into silence and a full realization of the Great Work set them to do by the Great Teacher. The circle extended. Others came and went who could only devote a part of their lives to the work, and these seemed to share in the influence and to catch the gentle but persistent flame. All personal considerations seemed to sink into utter insignificance beside this one aim, this all-absorbing motive. All incongruous elements had been fused in an alembic, and a compound had resulted in which the gold of the individual life had replaced the trivialities of the petty personalities. This is the nucleus, the Laya-center, to which the Great Teacher bequeathed her dying breath and her latest instructions. The effect is already manifest throughout England and her sister isles by the greatly increased audiences and the interest everywhere manifest in all Theosophic matters.
What this center is doing for England and the continent, Mr. Judge and the loyal helpers that gather around him are doing for America. No single member of the T. S. so long in the movement had so completely the confidence of H. P. B., had been so instructed by her, or is so well qualified to lead in every department of the work as W. Q. Judge. What the T. S. shall become, and the measure of good it may accomplish in America, depend, first and foremost, on the loyal support that centers on Mr. Judge, and the zeal and harmony with which we co-operate for the Great Work. There can be no divided interest, no conflicting lines, and yet success. This is no more an overweening regard for the personality known as W. Q. Judge than was entertained by loyal workers for the former personality known as H. P. Blavatsky. It is rather based on the fact that for sixteen years Mr. Judge has worked in season and out of season for the good of the T. S.; putting aside every other consideration, sacrificing every personal interest, he has never a thought or a desire that is not loyal to the Masters and to the T. S.
The work in America, as in England, is bound to prosper. No possible detraction or misrepresentation can put it down or long hold it back, provided the members of the Society work intelligently, harmoniously, and loyally for its success.
J. D. Buck, F. T. S.
Footnotes