Theos-Talk Archives (January 1997 Message tl00773)

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        People say that they get thrills and encouragement and uplift out of
psychic experience, but after much observation I have come to the conclusion
that these are essentially of the same nature as the thrills and
encouragement and feeling of well-being and elevation that others obtain
physically from the cocktails preceding dinner.  There is something in man
which is struggling for birth, but it is surely not to be liberated by
stimulating the emotions and the mind, any more than by over-feeding the
stomach.

        As to devotion to the Masters - whatever their true form may be it
is not logical that they should want that, either for direct personal
purposes or for setting up a new authority to govern this playground of
human fancies and desires.  Nor does a thing improve by being dressed in a
halo of its origin; we can admire and love children without waiting to be
guided in the matter by knowledge of their ancestry, and without thinking of
the incidents which preceded their material births.

        Sometimes in the mix-up of occult experiences the error can refute
itself, as when in America I had been wanting to set my thought beside that
of the Master and find out by feeling whether an action of mine was right,
and I thought I saw that Master and heard him say: "You must not do that.
You are spoiling our unity.  What you do I do." With that somewhat cryptic
utterance I may have been talking to myself, from the subconscious to the
conscious mind.  I accepted the proposition - because it was logically
sound.  One must not look to God or Masters to do one's work or to make
one's decisions.  Could one do it to perfection one would not only miss the
benefit of effort, but would become an imbecile, as so many religious
fanatics do - "0 God, shall I wear my blue dress or my green to this party ?
Which will have the best influence on the auras of the people?" The same
tendency destroys intellectual brotherhood, for you cannot converse with a
man who has his thoughts and ideas ready-made from above, and quite
unchangeable.

        As the new tendency in the theosophical movement increased it
offended me more and more.  My object all along had been to sift the gold
from the ore, but now it seemed that the ore was growing more and the gold
less.  Theoretically there was freedom of thought and opinion, and the
Society was a truth-seeking body, and our truth-seeking was to be done as a
brotherhood, without distinction of race, sex, creed, caste or colour.  In
this spirit we were to study and investigate for the promotion of knowledge
of the truth, especially about man, his relation to his environment and his
destiny.  But in practice there was more than a tendency to give the
platform to the believer and to squeeze out the critic or the independent
thinker.  Instead of the subjection of all doctrines to a co-operative
inquisition, "You must respect the faith of your fellow-members."

        By 1925 prayers of all the materially powerful religions were
introduced on the Society's official platform, and the movement definitely
degenerated into a brotherhood of creeds.  Criticism of other people's ideas
became "unbrotherly!" And besides, it "spoiled the work," and the work was
largely a conveyance of blessings and forces by those who were admitted to
the systems of organized access to these things.  On these grounds offices
were filled, and invitations were issued to leaders to preside and lecture
at the Society's gatherings nearly all over the world.

        Bishop Leadbeater was one of the worst politicians in this respect
especially as he grew older.  He detested argument and criticism - such a
waste of time; such a dissipation of energy.  He said to me: "We must try to
get our own people in as General Secretaries in as many countries as
possible." He wrote many letters hinting that certain persons were the best.
I did not question his earnestness and sincerity, but I thought that he
ought to have gone out and started a new society on his own lines, which
were quite different from those for which the Theosophical Society was
intended.  But he won his way, on account of his extraordinary persistence.

        Bishop Leadbeater and his agents were eminent in the theosophical
weakness of wanting things both ways at once, though that was quite
illogical.  The Society must be quite without dogma, and yet its councils
must be governed and its platforms occupied by those who were eager to
promote certain beliefs, leaderships and objectives, and members who opposed
these must be kept in the background.

        There was no question but that the Society must be neutral, just as
a good scientific society is neutral, though providing a platform for
professors and investigators to discuss and publish the results of their
researches.  The difference between a church and a society is that the
latter does not give its support to any one professor or doctrine in particular.

        I remember a meeting at which someone wanted to pass a resolution
against capital punishment, but a delegate, a young Indian lady who was
sitting beside me, got up and said she would consider the advocacy of the
death penalty more in accordance with brotherhood, for she herself would
prefer to be hanged and on the way to a new incarnation rather than to be
kept in a degrading prison for a long term of years!

        The chairman decided that the meeting could not rightly pass the
resolution, but there was such a body as " The Theosophical Order of
Service," which could do so.  That body met immediately afterwards, passed
the resolution and sent it to the newspapers.  So they had it both ways.
But the public could not distinguish between the Theosophical Society and
the Theosophical Order of Service.  The Society was in the anomalous
position of sponsoring the Order and lending to it all its conveniences.  In
the same way there was the Eastern or Esoteric School of Theosophy,
constantly being referred to on the Society's platform as "the heart of the
Society." In that heart there were dogmas, beliefs and mediation, but not in
the Society!

        In 1927 Dr.  Besant was in America with Krishnamurti.  He had now
become very active and independent.  He wrote charming poetry at that time,
full of sympathetic feeling and penetrating thought.  Dr. Besant announced
that the World Teacher had definitely come, not as she had expected by the
occasional stepping out of Krishnamurti and stepping in of the Lord, but by
a constant mingling of the consciousness of the Lord and that of his
disciple.  To this belief she adhered to the end of her life, and she made
it the topic of her greatest enthusiasm, as can be seen in all her
subsequent annual presidential addresses to the Society.  In 1928 she closed
the Eastern School, as the Lord had come, and it was his guidance that the
people should now seek, not hers.  But it was soon strongly represented to
her by Bishop Leadbeater and his close adherents that many of its members,
released from the discipline of the School, were becoming slack in their
personal conduct, and in consequence of this pressure she opened it again a
year later for those who felt that they could not discipline themselves and
wanted a routine laid down for them.

        Meantime, the intensive production of disciples and initiates
continued. In Australia I was occasionally present at the selections for
recommendation.  The following was not untypical: Bishop Leadbeater would
say: "So-and-so has been an accepted disciple for more than seven years.  I
think it is about time for her to take a further step." His companions would
reply: "Why not?  "Within a few days she was an initiate - quite a useless
person from the external point of view, but very faithful to the Church and
perhaps therefore useful for the radiation of forces.  This "force" was the
dominating thought in the later part of Bishop Leadbeater's life.  The
office of Secretary for the Order of the Star fell vacant in Melbourne, and
he asked me to suggest a name.  I did so, and he said: "But do you not think
that the Lord would prefer to have one of his priests in that position?  And
the priest was put in.  He carried the force.


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