Theos-Talk Archives (January 1997 Message tl00772)

====================Part 2 of 3 =======================

        I must now refer to Mrs. Besant as Doctor, as she had been given an
honorary doctorate by the Benares Hindu University, which she had done much
to promote.  Titles of all kinds were highly valued in the Theosophical
Society.  Notwithstanding allegiance to the teaching in Light on the Path:
"That power which the disciple shall covet is that which shall make him
appear as nothing in the eyes of men, it was thought wrong to hide one's
light under a bushel, as one could not then do so much good - an instance of
the peculiar habit of wanting things both ways at once.  Bishop Leadbeater
would urge his young men to secure a University degree, though he used to
say that more good was done by an initiate lecturing than by anyone else,
even if the matter and manner of the former was inferior.

        Dr. Besant was much pleased with her part of the large book entitled
Talks on the Path of Occultism.  She wrote me from Benares that she had no
idea that those old talks of hers had been so good.  Though an expert and
exacting editor, she had not found it necessary to make more than half a
dozen alterations - and those only typographical. One part of the work I had
had to write entirely myself, on account of the total absence of notes in
that section. As regards Bishop Leadbeater's portion, he gave up editing it
about half-way through and did not even trouble to read the remainder.

        Some amusing incidents occurred in connection with these writings.
When we were doing The Masters and the Path, I was reading to Bishop
Leadbeater a portion relating to some talks to young disciples.  Suddenly he
burst out: "Where did you get that drivel?" It was not his habit to
dissemble his feelings, whether of pleasure or the reverse. I traced out the
offending portions, and discovered that it consisted of some talks by one of
his colleagues which had been included among his notes by mistake.  However,
the material was adapted and put into the book.

        On another occasion he exploded to me with: " That's just like your
little mind!"  What had annoyed him was an opinion expressed to me by Mrs.
Besant about five minutes earlier - which I had happened to repeat! On
another occasion he threw down a bundle of manuscript in front of me and
cried out: "Can you do anything with this ranting stuff?" I boiled it down
to about half and linked it together a little, and it finally emerged as a
book dealing with nirvana - by another of his colleagues, who, however,
never knew anything of this portion of the history of his own book.

        There was an old member at Adyar who had been somewhat opposed to
Bishop Leadbeater's outlook.  When I returned to Adyar I found him quite
converted.  He told me with what joy he had read a portion of the "Talks"
dealing with Nirvana and liberation.  I had supplied the whole thing, both
ideas and words, but I did not mention this, as I thought it might devaluate
the ideas, since things had now reached the stage in the Society at which it
mattered very much who said a thing, not what that thing was.

        That had come about in the natural sequence of events.  There had
been a steady increase of literature in the nature of revelations and many
people had come to feel that study and thought were not essentially -
profitable, being too speculative, and that the important things were facts,
which were to be obtained with the aid of Psychical faculties rather than by
thought.  It was true that Mme Blavatsky's work of thirty years before,
especially The Secret Doctrine, was said to be derived from the Masters by
psychic means but that dealt with main principles forming a system, while
the later literature, due almost entirely to Bishop Leadbeater's researches,
was a vast mass of detail relating to objects or facts.

        While at Adyar in 1926 I had much talk with Dr. Besant about
initiations and similar matters.  Of occult recognition she gave me "all
that is in my power" and said that she was diffident about it because she
felt that "it was not good enough." She told me that my participation or non
participation in Masonic or other ceremonials would make no difference to
this recognition or to further progress - yet some years later when she was
ill and helpless, others cut my name out of the list when I ceased to take
part in those organized mysticisms!

        I returned to Sydney trailing some clouds of glory, and resumed my
work with Bishop Leadbeater.  To compose new chapters for a revised edition
of his book, The Other Side of Death, I read dozens of the latest books of
spiritualistic research, and found that such works as those of Dr. Geley,
the Rev.  Drayton Thomas and Dr. Crawford contained investigations of great
scientific value in that connection.  For another book, Chakras, I placed
before Bishop Leadbeater all the information on the subject available in
Sanskrit works known to me.  This book lagged for a long time, so I tried to
make some investigations myself.  Concentrating on the chakra between the
eyebrows, I became aware of a double rotation like that of two plates
revolving in opposite directions.  I put this idea before Bishop Leadbeater.
For several weeks he told me that he could not find it, but at last he did
find such a double rotation in all the chakras, and explained it in his book.

        There was no doubt in my mind that, whatever they may have been,
Bishop Leadbeater's psychic faculties were declining.  Shortly afterwards,
his principal helper on the astral plane died unexpectedly, but the Bishop
did not know it until informed by ordinary means, and actually wrote a
letter to him after he was dead.  His next important helper also died
unexpectedly.  He had been ill.  One day a friend asked Bishop Leadbeater
how he was.  Oh, yes, he had seen him; he was going on much the same.
Actually he had been dead for two days.

        During this time I had a little stream of psychic experiences which
I need not detail here.  I used to tell these to Bishop Leadbeater and ask
him about them, and he constantly replied: " I should advise you to take
them at their face value." They were very mixed.  Some had to do with
Masters and initiation; others fell to the level of the following.  One
morning I awoke with the sound of a cat mewing and in the half awake state I
heard a voice saying:

        You were Nathaniel; look it up in the Bible.  Promise that you will
remember." Why anybody on the astral plane or anywhere else should wish me
to believe that I had been Nathaniel in a former incarnation I am completely
at a loss to understand.  My wife was convinced that there was some kind of
hypnotic influence brooding over the Manor, to which she, however, refused
to yield in any degree.

        My own theory at present with regard to such experiences, whether
mine or occurring to others, is that there is a small foundation of fact in
them.  I had physical confirmation of some of them, as in the experiments on
thought-transference and some experiences with Indian yogis which I have
already related, and also there is a very convincing sediment of good
evidence in such works as those of Dr. Geley, where they record experiments
done under test conditions - more convincing on that account than one's own
psychic impressions.  But there is also a vast superstructure which is
completely false, being the product of that state of mind in which dreams
originate, dreams which become perfervidly important and take the rank of
truer visions in any atmosphere in which they are cultivated or encouraged
in connection with a mission, or strong interest in oneself as a person or a
character.

        Even the part which is true (which anyhow is impossible to
determine, except by other means than those of the visions themselves) is
not important.  If one's conduct improves as the result of such knowledge
there is no gain in character.  Virtue is spoiled by calculation.

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