Theos-Talk Archives (March 1996 Message tl00084)

OCEAN17.TXT (The Ocean of Theosophy - W.Q.Judge)

CHAPTER XVII

IN THE HISTORY OF PSYCHICAL phenomena the records of so-called
"spiritualism" in Europe, America, and elsewhere hold an
important place. Advisedly I say that no term was ever more
misapplied than that of "spiritualism" to the cult in Europe and
America just mentioned, inasmuch as there is nothing of the
spirit about it. The doctrines given in preceding chapters are
those of true spiritualism; the misnamed practices of modern
mediums and so-called spiritists constitute the Worship of the
Dead, old-fashioned necromancy, in fact, which was always
prohibited by spiritual teachers. They are a gross materializing
of the spiritual idea, and deal with matter more than with its
opposite. This cult is supposed by some to have originated about
forty years ago in America at Rochester, New York, under the
mediumship of the Fox sisters, but it was known in Salem during
the witchcraft excitement, and in Europe one hundred years ago
the same practices were pursued, similar phenomena seen, mediums
developed, and seances held. For centuries it has been well
known in India where it is properly designated "bhuta worship,"
meaning the attempt to communicate with the devil or Astral
remnants of deceased persons. This should be its name here also,
for by it the gross and devilish, or earthly, parts of man are
excited, appealed to, and communicated with. But the facts of
the long record of forty years in America demand a brief
examination. These facts all studious Theosophists must admit.
The theosophical explanation and deductions, however, are
totally different from those of the average spiritualist. A
philosophy has not been evolved in the ranks or literature of
spiritualism; nothing but theosophy will give the true
explanation, point out defects, reveal dangers, and suggest
remedies.

As it is plain that clairvoyance, clairaudience, thought
transference, prophecy, dream and vision, levitation,
apparitional appearance, are all powers that have been known for
ages, the questions most pressing in respect to spiritualism are
those relating to communication with the souls of those who have
left this earth and are now disembodied, and with unclassified
spirits who have not been embodied here but belong to other
spheres. Perhaps also the question of materialization of forms
at seances deserves some attention. Communication includes
trance speaking, slate and other writing, independent voices in
the air, speaking through the physical vocal organs of the
medium, and precipitation of written messages out of the air. Do
the mediums communicate with the spirits of the dead? Do our
departed friends perceive the state of life they have left, and
do they sometimes return to speak to and with us?

The answers are intimated in foregoing chapters. Our departed do
not see us here. They are relieved from the terrible pang such a
sight would inflict. Once in a while a pure-minded, unpaid
medium may ascend in trance to the state in which a deceased
soul is, and may remember some bits of what was there heard; but
this is rare. Now and then in the course of decades some high
human spirit may for a moment return and by unmistakable means
communicate with mortals. At the moment of death the soul may
speak to some friend on earth before the door is finally shut.
But the mass of communications alleged as made day after day
through mediums are from the astral unintelligent remains of
men, or in many cases entirely the production of, invention,
compilation, discovery, and collocation by the loosely attached
Astral body of the living medium.

Certain objections arise to the theory that the spirits of the
dead communicate. Some are:

(1) At no time have these spirits given the laws governing any
of the phenomena, except in a few instances, not accepted by the
cult, where the theosophical theory was advanced. As it would
destroy such structures as those erected by A.J. Davis, these
particular spirits fell into discredit.

(2) The spirits disagree among themselves, one stating the
after-life to be very different from the description by another.
These disagreements vary with the medium and the supposed
theories of the deceased during life. One spirit admits
reincarnation and others deny it.

(3) The spirits have discovered nothing in respect to history,
anthropology, or other important matters, seeming to have less
ability in that line than living men; and although they often
claim to be men who lived in older civilizations, they show
ignorance thereupon or merely repeat recently published
discoveries.

(4) In these forty years no rationale of phenomena nor of
development of mediumship has been obtained from the spirits.
Great philosophers are reported as speaking through mediums, but
utter only drivel and merest commonplaces.

(5) The mediums come to physical and moral grief, are accused of
fraud, are shown guilty of trickery, but the spirit guides and
controls do not interfere to either prevent or save.

(6) It is admitted that the guides and controls deceive and
incite to fraud.

(7) It is plainly to be seen through all that is reported of the
spirits that their assertions and philosophy, if any, vary with
the medium and the most advanced thought of living
spiritualists.

 From all this and much more that could be adduced, the man of
materialistic science is fortified in his ridicule, but the
theosophist has to conclude that the entities, if there be any
communicating, are not human spirits, and that the explanations
are to be found in some other theories.

Materialization of a form out of the air, independent of the
medium's physical body, is a fact. But it is not a spirit. As
was very well said by one of the "spirits" not favored by
spiritualism, one way to produce this phenomenon is by the
accretion of electrical and magnetic particles into one mass
upon which matter is aggregated and an image reflected out of
the Astral sphere. This is the whole of it; as much a fraud as a
collection of muslin and masks. How this is accomplished is
another matter. The spirits are not able to tell, but an attempt
has been made to indicate the methods and instruments in former
chapters. The second method is by the use of the Astral body of
the living medium. In this case the Astral form exudes from the
side of the medium, gradually collects upon itself particles
extracted from the air and the bodies of the sitters present,
until at last it becomes visible. Sometimes it will resemble the
medium; at others it bears a different appearance. In almost
every instance dimness of light is requisite because a high
light would disturb the Astral substance in a violent manner and
render the projection difficult. Some so-called materializations
are hollow mockeries, as they are but flat plates of electrical
and magnetic substance on which pictures from the Astral Light
are reflected. These seem to be the faces of the dead, but they
are simply pictured illusions.

If one is to understand the psychic phenomena found in the
history of "spiritualism" it is necessary to know and admit the
following:

(1) The complete heredity of man astrally, spiritually, and
psychically, as a being who knows, reasons, feels, and acts
through the body, the Astral body, and the soul.

(2) The nature of the mind, its operation, its powers; the
nature and power of imagination; the duration and effect of
impressions. Most important in this is the persistence of the
slightest impression as well as the deepest; that every
impression produces a picture in the individual aura; and that
by means of this a connection is established between the auras
of friends and relatives old, new, near, distant, and remote in
degree: this would give a wide range of possible sight to a
clairvoyant.

(3) The nature, extent, function, and power of man's inner
Astral organs and faculties included in the terms Astral body
and Kama. That these are not hindered from action by trance or
sleep, but are increased in the medium when entranced; at the
same time their action is not free, but governed by the mass
chord of thought among the sitters, or by a predominating will,
or by the presiding devil behind the scenes; if a skeptical
scientific investigator be present, his mental attitude may
totally inhibit the action of the medium's powers by what we
might call a freezing process which no English terms will
adequately describe.

(4) The fate of the real man after death, his state, power,
activity there, and his relation, if any, to those left behind
him here.

(5) That the intermediary between mind and body, the Astral
body, is thrown off at death and left in the Astral light to
fade away; and that the real man goes to Devachan.

(6) The existence, nature, power, and function of the Astral
light and its place as a register in Nature. That it contains,
retains, and reflects pictures of each and everything that
happened to anyone, and also every thought; that it permeates
the globe and the atmosphere around it; that the transmission of
vibration through it is practically instantaneous, since the
rate is much quicker than that of electricity as now known.

(7) The existence in the Astral light of beings not using bodies
like ours, but not human in their nature, having powers,
faculties, and a sort of consciousness of their own; these
include the elemental forces or nature sprites divided into many
degrees, and which have to do with every operation of Nature and
every motion of the mind of man. That these elementals act at
seances automatically in their various departments, one class
presenting pictures, another producing sounds, and others
depolarizing objects for the purposes of apportation. Acting
with them in this Astral sphere are the soulless men who live in
it. To these are to be ascribed the phenomenon, among others, of
the "independent voice," always sounding like a voice in a
barrel just because it is made in a vacuum which is absolutely
necessary for an entity so far removed from spirit. The peculiar
timbre of this sort of voice has not been noticed by the
spiritualists as important, but it is extremely significant in
the view of occultism.

(8) The existence and operation of occult laws and forces in
nature which may be used to produce phenomenal results on this
plane; that these laws and forces may be put into operation by
the subconscious man and by the elementals either consciously or
unconsciously, and that many of these occult operations are
automatic in the same way as is the freezing of water under
intense cold or the melting of ice under heat.

(9) That the Astral body of the medium, partaking of the nature
of the Astral substance, may be extended from the physical body,
may act outside of the latter, and may also extrude at times any
portion of itself such as hand, arm, or leg and thereby move
objects, indite letters, produce touches on the body, and so on
ad infinitum. And that the Astral body of any person may be made
to feel sensation, which, being transmitted to the brain, causes
the person to think he is touched on the outside or has heard a
sound.

Mediumship is full of dangers because the Astral part of the man
is now only normal in action when joined to the body; in distant
years it will normally act without a body as it has in the far
past. To become a medium means that you have to become
disorganized physiologically and in the nervous system, because
through the latter is the connection between the two worlds. The
moment the door is opened all the unknown forces rush in, and as
the grosser part of nature is nearest to us it is that part
which affects us most; the lower nature is also first affected
and inflamed because the forces used are from that part of us.
We are then at the mercy of the vile thoughts of all men, and
subject to the influence of the shells in Kama Loka. If to this
be added the taking of money for the practice of mediumship, an
additional danger is at hand, for the things of the spirit and
those relating to the Astral world must not be sold. This is the
great disease of American spiritualism which has debased and
degraded its whole history; until it is eliminated no good will
come from the practice; those who wish to hear truth from the
other world must devote themselves to truth and leave all
considerations of money out of sight.

To attempt to acquire the use of the psychic powers for mere
curiosity or for selfish ends is also dangerous for the same
reasons as in the case of mediumship. As the civilization of the
present day is selfish to the last degree and built on the
personal element, the rules for the development of these powers
in the right way have not been given out, but the Masters of
Wisdom have said that philosophy and ethics must first be
learned and practiced before any development of the other
department is to be indulged in; and their condemnation of the
wholesale development of mediums is supported by the history of
spiritualism, which is one long story of the ruin of mediums in
every direction.

Equally improper is the manner of the scientific schools which
without a thought for the true nature of man indulge in
experiments in hypnotism in which the subjects are injured for
life, put into disgraceful attitudes, and made to do things for
the satisfaction of the investigators which would never be done
by men and women in their normal state. The Lodge of the Masters
does not care for Science unless it aims to better man's state
morally as well as physically, and no aid will be given to
Science until she looks at man and life from the moral and
spiritual side. For this reason those who know all about the
psychical world, its denizens and laws, are proceeding with a
reform in morals and philosophy before any great attention will
be accorded to the strange and seductive phenomena possible for
the inner powers of man.

And at the present time the cycle has almost run its course for
this century. Now, as a century ago, the forces are slackening;
for that reason the phenomena of spiritualism are lessening in
number and volume; the Lodge hopes by the time the next tide
begins to rise that the West will have gained some right
knowledge of the true philosophy of Man and Nature, and be then
ready to bear the lifting of the veil a little more. To help on
the progress of the race in this direction is the object of this
book, and with that it is submitted to its readers in every part
of the world.
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The final chapter of:
The Ocean of Theosophy by William Quan Judge

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