"UNIVERSAL BROTHERHOOD".
VOLUME XIII. NO. 10.

JANUARY, 1899.

Universal Brotherhood
·A·MAGAZINE
Devoted To The
Brōtherhōōd·of·Humanity
The·Theōsōphical·Mōvement
Philōsōphy·Science·And·Art
FOUNDED·IN·1886·UNDER·THE·TITLE·OF ·THE·PATH·BY
·Wᵐ·Q·JUDGE

VOLUME XIII. No. 10.

CONTENTS.

Mrs. Katherine A. Tingley, Mr. E. A. Neresheimer, Editors.

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"Universal Brotherhood"

DEVOTED TO
The Brotherhood of Humanity, the Theosophical Movement, Philosophy, Science and Art.

Founded in 1886 under the Title of "The Path," by WILLIAM Q. JUDGE.

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The Editors are not responsible for signed or unsigned articles in this Magazine, to which neither of their names are attached.

ANNOUNCEMENT.

UNIVERSAL BROTHERHOOD is a Magazine devoted to the promulgation of the principles of the Brotherhood of Humanity in the widest sense. It is an organ whose aim is to show that the Unity or Brotherhood of Mankind it an actual fact in nature. If this principle were better understood by the multitude or even by certain classes of Society there would be less strife and competition and more sympathy and co-operation.

The demonstration of these broad ideas from the Ethical, Scientific and Practical points of view will prove that there is much agreement between these systems on this topic, and that it is an underlying ground-work by means of which all Religions and all Philosophies agree also.

This magazine will endeavor to show the great similarity between the Religions of the world, in their fundamental beliefs and doctrines as also the value of studying other systems than our own.

A sound basis for ethics should be found.

Those who would assist the cause of Brotherhood should realize that it is of the first importance to discover as much as possible concerning the nature of man and man's relation to the world around him. The laws that govern his physical, mental, moral and spiritual being should be studied and investigated.

It is hoped that every sympathizer with the cause of brotherhood will endeavor to assist us in enlarging the circulation of this magazine. Subscribers will greatly oblige by sending us the names and addresses of individuals known to them as willing to investigate liberal ideas.

All writers who are interested in the above objects are invited to contribute articles.

It is in the hands of our readers to push the circulation of Universal Brotherhood to an almost unlimited extent. All profits arising from the publication of this magazine, or from the business conducted by the Theosophical Publishing Co., are devoted to propaganda of Brotherhood. All who assist us in this work are directly helping the great cause of humanity.

Please mention UNIVERSAL BROTHERHOOD when you write advertisers.

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A HAPPY NEW YEAR.

Universal Brotherhood

Vol. XIV. JANUARY, 1899. No. 10.

A HAPPY NEW YEAR.

Once more we enter upon a new year, and the Greetings of our hearts rise spontaneously and go out to our loved ones and comrades throughout the world, to all the people of the earth, and to all creatures. We look back through twenty-three years and we see that lion-hearted pioneer H. P. Blavatsky standing alone, proclaiming her message to the world. Then a few gather around her and among them is our beloved Chief, William Q. Judge. A little later, H. P. B. leaves America for Europe and India, and the picture comes before us of W. Q. Judge meeting in New York, night after night, often alone, sometimes with but one or two. We know now what he was doing. We can see now how faithfully he tended the seed that has grown to a tree which is for the healing of the nations, and how he watched the spark that is now bursting into flame, a beacon of Truth, Light and Liberation for discouraged humanity.

How small a beginning! How glorious the result even now! But could I show you the picture of a few years hence you would say it is beyond belief. But it is not. The tide has turned. The sorrow and suffering which have oppressed Humanity for ages are nearing their end, the day of hope has already dawned, the new age and the new year of Universal Brotherhood has begun.

How glorious then is the opportunity of all to-day, and how great the responsibility of each one to help and not obstruct or hinder this work for humanity. Success cannot be attained without effort. The evil in the world and in man's own nature cannot be overcome without a struggle. But is it not a glorious thing to fight on and still fight? Some, perhaps, may fall, some have fallen in the struggle, but the victory is certain, and if all, when they are sore-pressed, would but remember the words of H. P. B., they would take new courage and new strength to go ever forward.

"Trials you must pass through or you will not be purified."

"Twenty failures are not irremediable if followed by as many undaunted struggles upward! Is it not so that mountains are climbed?"

And can we not see already how glorious is the work that has been accomplished. But two short years to the end of the Century and we shall see the Sun shining gloriously. The battle is already won, the darkness is already fast disappearing before the light of day. The work of H. P. B. and W. Q. J. has spread around the world and with each New Year the note of Brotherhood resounds more clearly and the Happy New Year shall be realized.

What a Greeting the Chief would, and {528} I know, does send to all. This Universal Brotherhood Magazine is the outgrowth of The Path in which year after year he sent out his Greetings to the members and once again that our new members and friends may become as familiar with him as those of us who knew him personally and worked with and loved him we send his portrait as a New Year's Greeting.

COMRADES; GREETING!

Universal Brotherhood, the keynote of the coming cycle! Let its melody be diffused to the four points of the compass from the very depths of our hearts at this important hour at the closing of the year 1898, that it may reach the hearts of other men and women. The time is opportune and propitious, for the whole race has already been touched by the virtue of compassion.

Our organization, firmly founded on this high ideal, has sent its tendrils from the bosom of love and sympathy to discouraged humanity through its many channels of dissemination of the sublime philosophy of solace and happiness.

This greatest movement for the redemption of all mankind has been led through the initial stages of development with great success by the Master-hand of Wisdom; all brethren in the work may now take heart and strength from the certainty that the possibility of accomplishment is in sight. Signs are not wanting that the truths of our ideals are breaking through the strong crust of conventionality, and that the world has already been brought nearer to the realization of it by the efforts of this organization. Love to all workers!

ALPHONSE DE LAMARTINE.

BY ALEXANDER WILDER, M.D.

III. EARLY MANHOOD.

Goethe, has pictured Faust as having first acquired the learning of the schools, philosophy, medicine, jurisprudence and theology; then as going forth with Mephisto in quest of excitement, to which comes a tragic ending. The shock of this paralyzes him for a time from further endeavor. In the Second Book of the drama, he again rises up with strong resolve to begin an active career in the busy world.

Somewhat in analogy with this is the history of every one who leaves adolescence behind and attempts without the discipline of experience, to find a place and engage in the future work of life. Too often, however, it is more the varied wanderings of a Jung-Stilling, requiring the vicissitudes of years of preparation.

Lamartine desired to enter upon a military life, but it was repugnant to the wishes of his family that he should take service, either in the army of Bonaparte, or of any country that might be opposed to France. His father retained his royalist sentiments with characteristic stubbornness, and his older uncle, the recognized head of the family, though a former friend of Mirabeau, had refused the office of Senator when offered to him by the Emperor. Young Lamartine was thus handicapped and forced to idleness.

He spent some winters in Paris, and mingled with the gaieties and dissipations which young men encountered at the metropolis. The result was self-abasement. He incurred debts at the gaming table, which his limited allowance though eked out by secret contributions from his mother, were insufficient to meet; and he formed acquaintances that were a serious drawback to him in later years.

Perhaps he, like Bunyan, depicted himself in darker colors than there was really occasion. "There was not," says he, "air enough in the sky, fire enough in the sun, or space enough on the earth for the want of breath, excitement and burning that consumed me. I was a living fever; I had the delirium and inquietude of it in every part. The sober habits of my years of study, and the tranquil piety of my mother and our teachers, have been put far away from me. My friendships were as unworthy as my feelings. I had become intimate with the most giddy and turbulent young men of my country and period."

Nevertheless while he was going forward so readily in disorderly ways he was actually repelled by them. Indeed, he was only imitating others, and not really following his own natural disposition. When he came to be alone, the solitude purified him.

In 1813 he again visited Italy. His first opportunity for activity now came.

Paris having surrendered and Napoleon having abdicated, the Allied Powers of Europe placed Louis XVIII. on the throne of France. This prince had always been liberal in his views, and he now proclaimed a constitutional government. This conciliated all parties, royalists and republicans alike. Lamartine was enrolled in the Royal Guard, and was of the force that marched against Bonaparte upon his return from Elba.

The statement has been generally accepted and believed that the reception of the Emperor on this occasion was of the nature of a triumph. Lamartine declares {530} that this was unqualifiedly untrue. The enthusiasm, he affirms, was confined entirely to the soldiers and to the dregs of the population. France, itself, the real France, had become utterly weary of this fighting for the aggrandizement of this one man. It had welcomed Louis XVIII., but not as the king of a counter-revolution. It did not contemplate any going back to former conditions. The king was received as the king of the Liberal Constitution.

"All the movement of the Revolution of 1789 which had been interrupted was commenced anew by us after the fall of the Imperial Government. The entire France,—the France that thought and not the France that clamored—was perfectly conscious that the return of Bonaparte meant the return of the military régime and tyranny. Of this it stood in dread. The Twentieth of March [1815] was a conspiracy of the army and not a movement of the nation. If there had not been an army organized in France that was ready to fly under the eagles of its Emperor, the Emperor would never have reached Paris."

Nevertheless Lamartine was confounded by what took place. In the brief space of eight days apart, he saw one France ready to rise up in mass against Bonaparte, and then another France prostrate at his feet. From that day he despaired of the omnipotence of opinion and believed even more than he ought in the power of bayonets.

Louis XVIII., the Count d'Artois and son, with Marshal Marmont and the royal forces left Paris the night before Bonaparte made his entry. As they passed the cities on their retreat, the citizens brought them food, execrating the "Pretorians" who had overturned the institutions and peace of the country. Royalists and Republicans alike participated in this denunciation of the treason of the army.

At Arras the king left the troops and went on by himself to Belgium. The Count d'Artois and Marshal Marmont, the commander of the forces, followed soon afterward, after having issued a proclamation absolving the men from their oath. Thus abandoned, the question arose, what was next to be done. After a desultory discussion, a musketeer declared that the true and safe course was to leave France and take service abroad.

Lamartine opposed this proposition. Though but twenty-four years of age, he had won the respect of his comrades. Stepping on the wheel of a wagon he addressed them. It was his first attempt to speak in public. He referred to the significant fact that his family had been loyal to the monarchy, but had not emigrated during the Revolution. He had been nurtured in such sentiments. Louis XVIII. had now given France a representative government. The cause of Republican Liberty and the cause of the Bourbons had thus become united. If now the two parties should continue to act together, the reign of Bonaparte would be short and his fall complete. But if the royalists should now emigrate, they would, by so doing abandon the Republicans to the army. The blood of the Republicans would smother all resistance to the Empire. The duty, therefore, of those now present, both to their country and to their families, forbade that they should follow the king out of the French territory.

Most of the men voted to remain; a few rode away. Being now without officers, a temporary organization was effected, posts established around Bethune and a patrol provided. Four days later a capitulation took place, by which they were permitted to go to their families, but excluded from Paris.

Lamartine, however, put on the dress of a citizen and went in a cabriolet to Paris. A few days later he was present at a review of the troops.

The Emperor, he observed, exhibited none of that ideal of intellectual beauty {531} and innate royalty, which writers had so often depicted. He seemed to be conscious that the ground was not solid under his feet. His movements indicated distrust and hesitation. As the troops defiled before him they cheered with "a concentrated accent of hopelessness."

Lamartine went home with renewed confidence.

The Imperial conscription filled the Chevalier, his father, with dismay. Lamartine declared to him that he would in no case enter the ranks himself or procure a substitute. He would sooner be shot to death. Leaving home, he put on the dress of a peasant laborer, and eluding the videttes on the frontier, crossed into Switzerland.

For some weeks he was the guest of the Baron de Vincy, an emigrant nobleman whose property had been confiscated. Himself almost without money and his entertainers impoverished, he could not bring himself to burden them longer. Leaving them abruptly, he made his way to Geneva. He was actually considering the project of applying to be a tutor in a Russian family and travelling to the Crimea, Circassia and Persia, when the final overthrow of Bonaparte called him back to France.

He became again a member of the military household of the king. Here he found his oldest and most beloved of friends, the Count Aymon de Virieu. They had been in college together, had travelled in Italy, their fathers had shared danger together in the Royal Guard on the fatal Tenth of August. They were ever after as two brothers, one in thought, one in soul, one in purse. They continued members of the Guard till it was disbanded.

Some years afterward Virieu made Lamartine acquainted with several persons of distinction whose good offices indirectly facilitated Lamartine's entry into public life.

Virieu was boisterous, full of jest, and a skeptic in religion. He was through his mother, descended from Montaigne, and he had inherited that author's disposition. He quoted him incessantly.

Lamartine, on the contrary, had inherited from his mother, a melancholic temperament, quiet, serious and religious. He could not bear Montaigne's skepticism, nor his salacious utterances. "Man is born to believe," he declared. "To believe in nothing is the way to accomplish nothing, and impurity in speech is a soiling of the soul."

He spent a summer with Virieu and his family in Dauphiné. Their way of living was a reflection of his boyhood life at home, and brought calm and repose to his mind.

Virieu afterward became serious like his mother and withdrawing from public life on account of his health, died some years later. "In him," says Lamartine, "I lost the living witness of the first half of my own life. I felt that death had torn out the dearest page of my history, and that it was enshrouded with him."

Another fellow-student whom Lamartine repeatedly mentions, was the baron Louis de Vignet, of Chambery, in Savoy. They were often competitors for the prizes. Vignet gave up the profession of law and accepted a life of poverty for the sake of his mother and sister. He had been a skeptic and scoffer in religion and repulsive in temper, but watching with his dying mother, he became changed and was modest, pensive, gentle and melancholy.

He had hesitated to renew his acquaintance with Lamartine during the latter's wild career in Paris, but now, meeting accidentally, the two were drawn together at once. Vignet greeted Lamartine more as a father than as a comrade, and they quickly formed a compact of friendship. As if to seal it they went together to Charmettes to visit the house where Rousseau had lived, and afterward went to Servolex together.

{532} Vignet was a nephew of the Counts de Maistre, two of whom were distinguished in the political arena and world of letters. Lamartine was received by the elders as a son, and the younger members of the family as a brother. He remained with them during the summer. The wholesome influence took his mind away from the philosophy of the guardhouse and the effeminate literature then current in France. It was indeed an important epoch in his history. Time, death, difference of country and opinion afterward separated them, but he always vividly remembered that summer at the house of Colonel de Maistre and Louis de Vignet.

A diversion of the household consisted of recitations of verse. Vignet had collected a large number of effusions which were current among the Savoyards. Lamartine also ventured to recite his own verses before Colonel de Maistre and his daughters. The old man admired his pure French diction and predicted to his nephew that Lamartine would become distinguished.

Another summer found Lamartine at home in Milly. The family had gone away; the father and uncles to a hunting party in Burgundy, the mother on a journey, and the sisters on visits to friends, or to the convent. He was left alone with no companionship but an old servant-woman, his horse and his dog. The silence, the loneliness of the garden, and the empty rooms reminded him of the tomb. It was in keeping with his state of mind. He felt himself, or rather he desired to feel himself dead.

In this mood he again resumed familiar relations with the Abbé Dumont, his former schoolmaster at Bussières. The abbé had himself become the parish priest. There had been a tragedy in his life before he gave up his place in the world to take orders. He was the original of Jocelyn in Lamartine's little poem.

Lamartine rode daily to the parsonage. The two discoursed on topics more or less abstruse, such as the state of man on the earth, the vanity of ambition, the religions, philosophies and literature of different peoples, the esteem bestowed on one great man over another, the superiority of certain authors to their rivals, the greatness of spirit in some and littleness in others. To set forth their views they quoted authors of every age, like Plato, Cicero, Seneca, Fénélon, Bossuet, Voltaire, Rousseau.

Poetry was more severely handled. Dumont appreciated only the sense of language, and did not care for the musicalness of what was uttered. They both agreed that in the study of rhythm and the mechanic consonance of rhyme there was a puerile attempt to associate a sensual delight of sound to some grand thought or manly sentiment. Versifying pertains to the speech of a people's infancy, prose to that of its maturity.

Lamartine conceived that poetry does not consist in the mere sensuousness of verse, but in the ideas, the sentiment, the image. "To change an utterance into music does not perfect it, but materializes it. The simple sentence justly and forcibly expressing the pure thought or naked sentiment without a dream as to the sound or form of phrase, is the genuine style, the expression, the WORD."

These conversations naturally drifted to the supreme questions of the time—to politics, philosophy and religion. Dumont was that contradictory character, found so often in many countries—a royalist although a democrat, and opposed to the Revolution, although he detested the ancient régime and actually accepted the very aims and doctrines which the Revolution contemplated. Both he and Lamartine had been "fed with the marrow of Greek and Roman literature." They adored Liberty as a well-sounding term before they came to consider it as a holy thing and as the moral quality in every free man.

Dumont was philosophic, like the century in which he was born. In his house {533} there was no token to show that he was a priest—neither breviary, nor crucifix, nor image of a saint, nor priestly garment. All these he relegated to the sacristy. He considered the mystic rites of Christianity which he performed as belonging to the routine of his profession, to be little else than a ritual of no importance, a code of morals illustrated by symbolic dogmas and traditional practices, that did not encroach on his mental independence and reason. He spoke of God to an infantile people, using the dialect of the sanctuary. But when he returned home he discoursed in the language of Plato, Cicero and Rousseau. His mind was incredulous, but his soul, softened by his sad fortune, was religious. His great goodness of heart enabled him to give to this vague piety the form and reality of a precise faith. He constrained his intelligence to bow under the yoke of Catholicism and the dogmas of religion. He read and admired the writings of Chateaubriand and others of the time, but he was not convinced; he did not believe what they taught.

Lamartine, on the other hand, was influenced by the religion of his infancy. Piety always came back to him when he was alone; it made him better, as though the thought of man when he is isolated from others was his best counsellor. It was not so much a matter of conviction, as a wish that it should be true. The poetry and affectionateness of religion swayed his will. He could contemplate the mystery of the Incarnation as filling, or at least bridging over, the unmeasurable space between humanity and God. If he did not quite admit this as actual fact, he revered it as a wonderful poem of the soul. He embellished it with the charms of his imagination, he embalmed it with his desires, he colored it with the tints of his thought and enthusiasm; in short,—he subordinated his rebellious reason to this earnest desire to believe, so that he might be able to love and pray. He put away from him, as by force, every shadow of doubt and repugnance, and almost succeeded in producing the illusions for which he was so eager, and in conforming the habit of his soul to the current sentiment of the epoch. If he did not really worship his mother's God as his own God, he at least carried him in his heart as an idol.

The cordial relations of the two friends were maintained for years. The priest continued to minister in his little church and gave much assistance to the mother of Lamartine in her charities. Above his grave in the cemetery is a stone with a brief epitaph, and beneath it the words: "Alphonse de Lamartine à son ami."

The mental depression under which Lamartine labored, seriously affected his health. The family physician was alarmed. Plainly enough it was from causes outside of the province of medicine and so instead of prescribing medicines he ordered the young man to go to Aix in Savoy, to the hot sulphur springs. He borrowed money from a friend of the family and went. Vignet procured a room for him, and paid him several visits during his sojourn. It was early Autumn. October had just begun, and the leaves on the trees had put on their colors. The bathing season was over, and the usual guests had gone away, leaving the place solitary.

There was another patient in the house. This was a lady from Paris. She was in a decline and had been at Aix several months. Lamartine, however, had no inclination to see her.

An accident on the lake brought them together in which he rescued her from imminent peril of life. The acquaintance thus begun became at once an ardent attachment. Lamartine describes it as "repose of the heart, after having met with the long-sought and till then unfound object of its restless adoration; the long-desired idol of that vague, unquiet adoration of supreme beauty which agitates the soul till the divinity has been discovered."

{534} This lady, the "Julie" of his story, was the wife of an old man, a friend of the Emperor Napoleon. He had first seen her at the convent where she was receiving her education. She was a native of the island where the Virginia of the romance was said to have been born, and had been brought to France. She was without friends to protect her or the necessary dowry to attract proposals of marriage. The old gentleman in pity for her friendless condition, had married her, receiving her as a daughter and not as a wife. Her health had given way, and he sent her to Aix in hope that the mountain air and bathing might restore her.

She had no liking for gallantry. Yet she did not affect prudery or reserve. She declared her understanding of their peculiar relations in terms the most forceful: "Eternity in one instant and the Infinite in one sensation." Then she said further: "I do not know whether this is what is called love; nor do I wish to know; but it is the most supreme and entire happiness that the soul of one created being can draw from the soul, eyes and voice of another being like herself—a being who, till now, was wanting to her happiness, and whose existence she completes."

She had lived among philosophers of the French school, and did not have views like those of the women of Europe who bowed before another criterion than their conscience. "I believe," said she, "in the God who has engraved his symbol in Nature, his law in our hearts, his morality in our reason. Reason, feeling and conscience are the only revelation in which I believe." She then asked that this their mutual affection should remain "like a pure thought" and so be in no way blended with any other relations.

In this way six weeks passed by. They adhered strictly to their line of action, yet she fretted jealously at the thought that Lamartine would love another after her death, and even attempted suicide; but presently yielded the point, and even predicted that he would yet find another like and as dear as herself.

Winter drew near and they left Savoy for their respective homes. Unknown to her, Lamartine followed her travelling coach to Paris, and then went to Milly where Vignet was awaiting him.

He remained at home till January. He had exhausted his allowance of money. His mother observed his restlessness and attributed it to want of diversion. She presented him with a diamond, the last jewel which she had retained from her young girlhood, and bade him go to Paris. "It is the last token of my love," said she,—"and I stake it in the lottery of Providence."

This gift had a wholesome influence. He became thenceforth more prudent in the expending of money, and never parted with the gem till his other resources were exhausted. He no more affected to be engaged in study while actually spending his time in dissipation. He directed his days to reading in history, science, political economy and diplomacy. The Count de Virieu was in Paris and received him to share his modest lodgings.

Nevertheless, his money though now carefully managed, was finally exhausted. He was called upon by old creditors to pay the "debts of honor" that he had incurred in former years. He had renewed his intimacy with Julie, and her husband gave him the warmest of welcomes. Her health was failing fast, and he took frequent excursions with her about Paris in the hope of benefit. At the end of the winter the alternative was presented to support himself or go back to Milly.

When in college he had written verses which his friends there greatly admired. He continued to do so at different times, and had brought a collection of them to Paris. He now offered them to publishers but without success. He was obliged to submit. He made a farewell excursion {535} with Julie to St. Cloud, and left Paris the next morning.

That summer was for him more terrible than ever. He saw no hope of emerging from poverty and obscurity. Crops failed that year and the resources of the family were straitened to actual penury. His health suffered and serious results were apprehended. He was again ordered to go to Aix. His mother procured the money for him by surreptitiously selling trees that were growing on their little farm.

A note from Julie informed him that her husband was ill, but told him to go to Aix and wait for her. When he arrived there, there came a package forwarded from Chambery enclosing letters from Paris. One of these was from Julie[1] containing a lock of hair and bidding him farewell. It had been herself and not her husband, that was ill and dying. She had given up her former disbelief. "God will send you another sister," she wrote, "and she will be the pious helpmate of your life. I will ask it of him."

A letter from the husband asked Lamartine to continue to him as a son.

The shock almost bereft him of reason. He wandered for months over the mountains of Savoy and Switzerland, as he describes, "like a darkened soul that had lost the light of heaven and had no mind for that of earth." His mother secretly procured money for him in the hope that travel would alleviate his condition, the cause of which she did not imagine. Autumn was passing, however, and she could no longer frame excuses for his absence. He must return home.

As he was returning in the boat from Lyons, he contemplated the prospects before him. He had chafed for an active life, and destiny was compelling him to fold his wings in the nest from which he had been eager to escape. Now, in his exhaustion, he was willing to give up, hoping soon to die. "I was convinced," says he, "that in those months of love, of delirium and of grief, my heart had exhausted all the delights and bitternesses of a long life; that I had nothing more than for some months more to bury the memory of Julie under the ashes of my heart; and that the angel whose steps I had followed in thought into another life would soon call me to shorten my absence and begin the eternal love. The feeling that this was sure, now gave me comfort and enabled me to accept with patience the interval which I believed would be a short one between the parting and the reunion."

When the boat arrived at Mâcon, Lamartine saw nobody at the landing to welcome him. But as he picked up his valise he found himself suddenly embraced and almost smothered by the caresses of a dog. It was Azor, the same that had so abruptly broken up his Ossianic interview, seven years before, with Lucy, on the terrace. It was necessary to give him a strap of the valise to hold to keep him from getting under the feet of other travellers.

The Chevalier, his father, however, was only a little way off. He was watching with an opera-glass to see whether the dog had found his son. He now conducted him home by the most frequented streets, as if to show him to those whom he met. The dog had already gone to announce him, and Lamartine found his mother and sisters at the door.

The house had been recently purchased for a winter residence. The mother had besought this outlay for the sake of her five daughters, to be able to provide them with tutors and governesses and to introduce them advantageously into society. The Chevalier lost no time in showing his son the various rooms and conveniences and bringing him to the apartment for himself.

{536} Lamartine had retired for the evening when his mother came into the room. She had noted his profound depression and now silently caressed him.

"Who would have told me," said she, "that in twenty-two years I would see my child blighted in the vigor of his soul and heart, and his countenance enshrouded in a secret grief?"

Then, forbearing to enquire further, she explained the embarrassed condition of the family. Their property, always small, had been greatly reduced by the expenses of his education, travels, and wayward adventures. "I do not mention this to reproach you," said she; "you know that if my tears could have been changed into gold for you, I would have put it into your hands."

The purchase of the house, the saving of money to furnish dowries for his sisters, and bad harvests had narrowed their circumstances. His father had worried at the thought of leaving his children without a patrimony; and though he had taken great delight in them in their tender years, he reproached himself now for their existence.

What she could do to help, she had done. In their various exigencies she had been generously helped by Madame Paradis, their neighbor. This lady had done this from affection, only stipulating that their father should not know. She had furnished the money for Lamartine's expenses.

"I had hoped," she continued, "that your father's family would perceive the craving for activity which is wasting your youth, and be prompted to the outlay necessary to enable you to enter and go through with the preparatory course for an administrative or diplomatic career. I have reasoned with them, prayed, conjured, wept, humbled myself before them as it is glorious and agreeable for a mother to humiliate herself for her son. It is in vain."

As he was to be the heir to their estates, they saw no necessity for him to desire or be ambitious for an active career beyond their sphere of life. Hence her pleading had only brought harsh words and unkind feeling toward herself without doing him any service.

If Providence had granted her wish she would have made use of every opportunity to open for him a larger horizon, and a career worthy of him. But he must wait. She also asked him to make her his only confidant. A complaint to his father would drive him to despair, because he could not help. "Accept this obscure and unoccupied life for a few years," she pleaded. "I will pray God to move the hearts of your uncles and aunts, and to open for my son that field of activity, extent, glory and happy fortune, which he has permitted a mother to desire for such a son as you."

To such an appeal Lamartine could only acquiesce. The life upon which he thus entered has had many counterparts. The older uncle gave law to the whole family as its recognized head. He and his nephew had many angry encounters. The mother would endeavor anxiously to reconcile them. The Chevalier, bearing in mind the interest of all his children, remained neutral.

The uncle, regarding Alphonse as his prospective successor, desired him to remain quietly at home, cultivate science, apply himself to agriculture and domestic economy, and in time become the head of a family in the province. Lamartine acknowledged that such a career would have been the most natural and happy. "But," he adds, "everyone when coming into the world has his allotment marked out in his nature. This career was not for me, and my uncle had not been able to read the fact in my eyes."

His life at Mâcon that winter was as monotonous as that of monks in a cloister. He spent the forenoons in his room with his books and dog. Dinner was at noon; and after that all assembled at the mansion of the uncle. This was a {537} season to be dreaded. His mother was then subjected to reproaches and remonstrances from every one for every trifling fault of her children. The aunts seemed to regard them as their own, and actually loved their brother's wife; but they desired to exercise the rights of motherhood without the burdens. Sometimes she would repel their attacks, but oftener she only wept. Then would follow explanations, excuses and caresses; and so it would go, only to be resumed the next day.

She was a woman superior to them all, high-spirited and dignified; but the future interest of her children depended on their good-will, and for this reason she was submissive. "We called this the Hour of Martyrdom," says Lamartine, "and we sought to make it up to her by redoubling our tenderness after we came out."

In the afternoon, she helped the tutors with her daughters, or herself received visitors. Her house and discourse were to her neighbors an attraction far exceeding that of the majestic austerity at the great house, the Hotel de Lamartine. The Chevalier would go out to visit some former comrade, or one of the older inhabitants, when they would amuse themselves with playing at checkers, backgammon or "Boston."

Lamartine himself would repair to his room, or walk out with his dog in the paths that intersected the fields behind the Alms House. There were grand views in the distance, but he only gazed on the Alps as the prisoner looks on the wall beyond which he has tasted of sunshine, love and freedom.

He also visited a comrade of his father's at the place. The man was unable to use his limbs, and kept himself cheerful by working as a jeweler and repairer of watches. Lamartine helped him and became daily a welcome visitor.

The leading families of Mâcon cultivated social relations, and there was a drawing-room party somewhere every night. Lamartine accompanied his mother and sisters, but made his escape before diversions began.

At his uncle's, however, it was different. The visitors included the most eminent men of the district, diplomats, scholars and others of distinction. Ten of these, with his uncle, organized the Academy of Mâcon. It held meetings in the library which were usually attended by thirty or forty members. Papers were presented on subjects of importance, social, industrial or scientific.

Lamartine was admitted to membership despite his youth at the proposition of his uncle. He delivered his first discourse upon the Advantages Derived from Interchange of Ideas between Peoples by Means of Literature. Years after he burned this paper in disgust at its commonplace character.

One of the most interesting members of this Academy, M. de Larnaud, he describes as "a Universal Dictionary in a human form, all the ashes of the Alexandrian Library contained in the skull of a living man." M. de Larnaud, he declares, "knew everything and impassioned everything." He had engaged in the Revolution in 1789 with the ardor of a delirium, but after the massacre of the Tenth of August, he turned his sympathies to the victims. He was intimate with the Girondins,—above all with Madame Roland and Vergniaud—and he accepted heartily their doctrine of a free Republic which should be wise and pure. He did not mourn their fate on the scaffold which was their pedestal for history, but he mourned that vote which they gave "for the death of the king to save the people." Although a nation is often saved by a martyrdom, he knew that it is never saved by a crime.

M. de Larnaud had no less enthusiasm for poetry and literature than for politics. He was a comrade of Rouget de Lisle, the author of the Marsellaise {538} Hymn; he had taken part at sittings of the Academies; he was a member of all the Cercles; he followed all the Courts, visited all the Salôns, attended all the theatres, absorbing all that was knowable, all that pertained to the two orders of things. He remembered everything and would tell it with a manner and gesture that made the hearer understand and behold it all. Everything—antiquity, past history and present—was to be learned from him.

He was quick to perceive the bent of Lamartine. He visited the young man in his chamber and discoursed familiarly with him, as though both were of the same age and plane of intelligence. He did not venture, however, to speak with like freedom in the drawing-room in presence of the uncle, the pious aunts, and the various classes of visitors. But in young Lamartine's chamber he would display his old-time enthusiasm for the great men and great achievements at the beginning of the Revolution before the period of the ascendancy of the populace, the Commune of Paris, and the Terror. The philosopher was again manifest in him under the simulacrum of the man of the world, and he denounced the Imperial régime of Bonaparte with fierceness.

From him Lamartine derived the conception of the scenes, the men and characters which he set forth so admirably in the History of the Girondists. His friendship remained constant till his death.

One day as Lamartine was walking in the street his dog made the acquaintance of another dog belonging to a physician of the place. The owner was M. de Ronot, who had been a fellow-student at College. Warm friendship now sprang up between them. Lamartine pays him this tribute: "I was often absent from the land of my birth, especially after death had blighted all the roots of my family; but I knew that there was one who watched for my return, who followed with his eye my adverse fortunes, who fought against the envies, hatreds and calumnies that grovelled on the soil of our homestead—alas, about our gravestones, and who received with delight everything in my life that was good fortune, and with grief everything that was sad."

He died many years afterward with the name of Lamartine on his lips. It was at the period when Lamartine was in deepest adversity, and abandoned by the many who in brighter times had ardently professed their friendship.

When the time came in spring for the family to go back to Milly, the whole family welcomed this modest abode as an asylum. The mother resumed the instructing of her daughters, and her visits to the sick and poor. Lamartine often went with her. He always found living in a city to be intolerable, but he brought his melancholy with him. He renewed his intimacy with the Abbé Dumont at the garden of the parsonage, and gradually recovered health and spirits.

Translations of Byron's poems appeared that season in French journals. Lamartine was prompted to endeavors of similar character. That autumn he wrote several of his Meditations, and read portions of them to his father. The old Chevalier, who knew nothing of the new school of poetry, was deeply affected, but feared to utter praise, lest it should be from parental partiality.

The second winter at the new house in Mâcon was passed like the first. Lamartine had no liking for the social entertainments. When Lent came, he left home and spent the spring and summer with his other uncle, the Abbé Lamartine, at D'Urcy in Upper Burgundy.

This uncle had been compelled, by the accident of having been a second son, to take priest's orders. Thus interdicted from having a family of his own he bestowed his affection richly upon his younger brother and children. He considered {539} them as his own, and Lamartine was recognized as his heir. They spent the summer and autumn in their younger years, at his patriarchal mansion, and he took an actual part in their education. It was here that Lamartine acquired his passion for life in the country.

The abbé had spent his noviciate at Paris, and mingled in society in the time of Louis XV. He was a man of the world rather than of the Church. Relinquishing the priestly functions at the Revolution, he now lived by himself on his share of the paternal estate, a Homeric life, hermit-like, as a philosopher and cultivator of the soil.

His housekeeper, herself formerly a nun, persuaded him to purchase dogs and a horse for his nephew. Lamartine had always been beloved by all the domestics, and his uncle, who was the most affectionate of men, treated him as a personal friend rather than as a kinsman.

One afternoon in the latter part of July, he was riding back from a jaunt in the neighboring forest when a letter-carrier delivered him a note from two Roman ladies at an inn at Pont-de-Pany. His uncle, in whom humor was a prominent quality, demanded at once to know the mystery.

"There must be no mystery with me," said he. "The heroes of a romance always need a confidant, and I have known both parts in my time."

He continued his badinage, promising to be discreet as well as faithful; but Lamartine, unable to endure it, protested that he could not form any new attachment.

"That linden-tree is older than you," the uncle replied. "I have cut it five times in twenty years, and it has more sap and branches now than when I came here."

"Burn it at the root," Lamartine retorted in desperation, "and then see whether it will spring up again."

It was an adventure of a new character. The two ladies, the princess Regina di —— and her aunt, had been commended to his good offices by the Count Saluce de ——, a Breton nobleman belonging to an emigrant family, then living at Rome. He had come temporarily to France and took service in the Royal Guard, there forming an intimate friendship with Lamartine. The princess was a maiden wife of sixteen who had been forced against her will into a marriage ceremony with an elderly kinsman, and had fled with her aunt to France. The count was her lover, and had been arrested as he was about to accompany her. Lamartine had been apprised of all this before by letters from his friend, and now complied faithfully with his wishes by finding the two fugitives a residence at Noyon near Geneva. Meanwhile a suit was in progress for an annulment of the marriage.

Some days afterward a letter came from the count apprising Lamartine that this would not take place. The princess was liable, therefore, to forfeit her property, and upon her return to Italy, to be imprisoned in a convent. The prince, her husband, who was old and infirm, had desired the marriage only for the purpose of assuring her estate to his heirs. He now offered, if Count Saluce would not press the suit, that he would cast a veil over what had passed, and let her live with her grandmother in future. This would spare her reputation and social position. But Saluce must go far away.

He decided to comply with the conditions, and had already left Italy for Spain to join his uncle's regiment and embark for the Philippine Islands.

Lamartine deplored the fatal necessity but felt himself obliged to approve the course taken by his friend. Yet Regina had not been consulted, and perhaps she would have chosen exile with him before freedom and fortune elsewhere. Certainly, the count had constituted himself judge and sacrificing priest without consulting the victim, but the sacrifice {540} was commended by delicacy of sentiment, by honor, virtue, even by love itself.

When Lamartine met Regina she read all in his face. As she perused the letter she was seized with fury. She denounced her lover as savage and cowardly, not worthy of the least token of regard. Hurrying to her room, she threw his letters and keepsakes out of the window and commanded her nurse to go and sink them in the lake; that thus six months of love and delirium might be swallowed up. The nurse fully reciprocated the sentiments of her mistress. She saw no merit in such generosity as Saluce had exhibited. A Roman would have gone to every extreme, knowing love and nothing else.

Three days passed before the young princess made her appearance. She had become more calm. She told Lamartine that she was now undeceived; what she had thought she loved was a phantom that had vanished.

She was turning her regard upon him. His unflagging kindness and assiduity had affected her. But susceptible as he might be, the memory of his own lost one, and his friendship for Saluce, were intervening. Finally, however, upon learning that Lamartine would be in Paris the coming winter, she declared her purpose to be there likewise.

Her uncles had come for her, and she returned with them to Rome. One of them afterward accompanied her and her grandmother to Paris, and Lamartine met them there the coming winter.

He had now resolved to try his fortune once more. It was declared by Charles Fourier, that when God implanted a desire in a human soul it was his promise of its fruition. Lamartine was now to realize its verity.

POINT LOMA AND ITS LEGEND.

BY FRANK M. PIERCE.

How describe its indescribable beauties: the broad expanse of ocean; land-locked bay, with craft of war and commerce riding on its peaceful bosom; nestling city; sunlit, fruitful valleys, cut by sparkling, snow-fed streams; majestic mountain range with snow-capped peaks, like giant fingers heavenward pointing—all touched by soft and vitalizing breezes—one vast Titanic picture, overwhelming self, while "Soul," in fitting raiment stands visible, a God.

In retrospective thought, seated on its rock-ribbed, element-defying battlements, I muse upon the Legend:

That here the wise ones of Lemuria—now ocean-covered—reared a stately edifice, a temple dedicated to the Gods of Light, wherein they taught her worthy youth the simple laws of life eternal:

That here the gods touched hands with men and gave to them rich stores of knowledge and of wisdom in such measure as they could use unselfishly:

That here men living for the soul of things made earth a heaven, themselves gods, conscious of their oneness with the Father (like their modern prototype, the fearless Nazarene):

That from the temple-dome-crowned Point, standing like mystic virgin, old yet ever young—never yielding to the dark waters' fond embrace when all to Westward sank in one vast cataclysm—shone to all the world a quenchless, pure, white flame to light the way for mariners on ocean's waters, and on the sea of thought, that all might see and live:

That once, when darkness filled the earth and men went blindly searching for the light and found it not, then the great Teacher from the temple—filled with pity and compassion—went forth to save the lost,—leaving the temple and its sacred light in care of trusted ones, charged on their lives to keep and hold its precincts inviolate till her return; their inspiration gone—careless and faithless to their sacred trust—the light went out and they in darkness perished; the temple—refuge for the good and wise—was sacked and leveled to the earth from sight of men:

But caverned underneath (the Legend runs) stand guarding genii, giants grim, fairies, gnomes and sprites, to hold the portals closed by pitfalls, ocean tides, dire calamities and death, 'gainst venturous ones and the faithless guardians lingering near the whispering, moaning caverns by the sea—till their Queen returns to their release:

That in some coming age when men, grown weary, heartsick, hopeless, wandering in the trackless waste, shall face again the rising Sun in search of ancient Wisdom and the Truth, then the great Teacher will again appear in human guise, among her own—welcomed by the wise-grown, faithful watchers, rejected and reviled by those who faithless in the past have been—to rear upon the ruins of the old, a new and grander Temple, dedicated to all that lives; and in its pure white marble dome to fix a light—symbolic of regenerate man—whose penetrating rays shall reach to lowest depths to light the ceaseless upward march of evolution to the Heaven on Earth—the Universal Brotherhood of Peace and Good-Will, made perfect through the travail, agony and blood of man, redeemed from SELF.

EVOLUTION AND INVOLUTION.

BY H. A. FREEMAN.

Metaphysically considered, evolution is Nature's process of unfolding and bringing about her changes and developments. It goes on its way irresistibly and taken as a whole moves in orderly routine. This is not always obvious, but the exceptions are only apparently such. The fault lies in our lack of ability to observe all the facts and conditions. If we could investigate fully we should find that all apparent hitches are balanced or offset by an advance in some other direction and that there has been and can be no check or disorder in the process of evolution.

Whatever deflects the course or changes the character of an evolution does not necessarily hinder it, and if it seems to stop still that is only a question of the point of view.

The people of a race, or nation, or a community may deteriorate physically, intellectually, or in their commercial activity, but that does not prove that their development has come to an end. It only marks a cessation of progress along certain special lines. The American Indians are practically extinct, and it may appear that their race evolution has stopped. But that would be taking note of only one aspect of their condition. If we observe that they have decreased in ferocity, diminished in numbers and sunk to the commonplace grade of hard working farmers we must agree that their evolution does not proceed along romantic lines as it did in the days of Fenimore Cooper. But the few that remain may be more useful for the world's upbuilding than were all the savage hordes that ever started out on the war path to exterminate each other.

Numbers are not essential to a healthy evolution. China with its starving myriads is not a high example of progress.

The variations and fluctuations that make themselves visible in evolution are like ripples. We should never notice them if we took a broader view.

Evolution does not go stiffly and solidly forward like a self-propelled wall of masonry. It is more like the resistless ebb and flow of the incoming tide.

One ripple overwhelms or effaces another and a curling breaker leaps up from behind them and sprays the shore far in advance of the main body of invading waters.

Evolution reaches out similarly, now advancing, now retreating in unconsidered wavelets, always gaining, always effacing the old with the new, and inevitably dominating the entire situation at last.

The ebb tide affords a symbol of Involution which lays bare the way for another era of flood, so that every drop in the ocean taking its turn may ultimately rise to its highest mark of attainment.

Involution is usually described as a sort of compensatory process, coördinate with evolution, though not co-incident with it. It is regarded as a return swing of the pendulum of evolution and is sometimes crudely illustrated by comparing the two to the corresponding halves of a circle matched together so as to form a completed ring or hoop. But this symbol though impressive is misleading, for involution matched with evolution can not bring about any condition of finality.

If that were possible evolution would {543} end in extinction—and extinction is unthinkable.

The pairing of the two processes does not complete a circle. One does not match the other and neither can undo the other's work. If there could be a counter-action between them, each would efface the results of the other, as soon as its hour of activity began.

For illustration one may consider the progress of a bud which in due course of evolution unfolds into a rose fully expanded. That rose does not refold and become again a bud.

And if it did, that would not be involution. It would be only retrogression. Involution does not follow upon the heels of evolution to match its movements with opposing influences. It doesn't interfere at all. If it did there would be no unfolding of Nature's plans, for all her efforts would cancel each other.

Doubtless the two processes work towards the same result in obedience to a systematic divine idea and purpose, and, not leading up to any finality, they form a cycle rather than a circle and may be best pictured as a continuous spiral and not as a completed hoop.

It would then be seen that involution and evolution succeed each other in rotation as the night follows day and the day gives place to night. Each period of one followed by the other forms a coil in the spiral. And the spiral is continuous, being itself only one coil in a greater cycle which, in its turn, forms part of a still more extensive series of coils. And thus they go on to infinity, for they can never reach a limit. And the processes of our involution and evolution are only coils of a cycle that has gone on forever and they will continue to form new coils to all eternity.

But the contemplation of the present coil in which we find ourselves involved is quite confusing enough for it extends back farther than our comprehension can grasp and is still very far from finished. It will never be complete until we have all reached our limit of attainment, and that is yet a long way ahead of us.

It is obvious that these mighty processes lead to some ultimate object, and that they could never have been started into operation without a reason.

The ultimate object is easily found. It is quite evidently progress. And the reason seems by analogy to be similar to that which dominates every living thing in the Universe—the desire to expand, to create, to perpetuate. This desire seems to have impelled that incomprehensible Power which is back of all life and expression to make itself manifest. A Breath of itself took the form of matter and in obedience to the immutable law of compensation sought at once to return to its original exalted condition.

That descent into matter was Involution. The regeneration, the re-ascent to the original purity is Evolution.

The creative Consciousness awoke to a desire for manifestation and produced from its thought, substance. Then were set in motion the forces through whose operations substance took on form and living organisms appeared.

The degradation of that Spiritual Essence into a condition of matter was Involution. It was a degradation or descent because it was a change. No change could have exalted it, so the altered condition was a descent. The process of regeneration, the work of purification from the stain of material existence began at once and still goes on. And that is evolution.

When man began to assume domination over the other products of evolution and became a reasoning, responsible creature, that was evidence that he is the medium through which matter is to be uplifted to its former spiritual condition. In other words, it is a certainty that matter reaches its highest development in man and that the next step beyond {544} the physical man is the divine man—the man of pure spirituality practically unsullied by matter. All the processes of evolution lead to the supremacy of the physical man over all other material development, and as he continues to advance he will inevitably reach a condition so exalted as to be virtually divine while still living in the flesh. Such men exist even to-day and have been known in all ages.

They are those who occasionally appear as Saviours and Messiahs. They are the pioneer wavelets which spray the shore in advance of the incoming tide.

When man reaches that point of perfection that will free him from the material or physical life forever, his evolution is complete and involution may begin again upon a new world as it has done countless millions of times before and will continue to do to all eternity.

We cannot of course comprehend why the Divine Consciousness has arranged all this stupendous machinery for the mere sake of becoming manifest. We cannot assume that it is for any reason that we could understand even though it were revealed to us. But we may wonder less perhaps when we consider that time and space are nothing in actual fact, and the immensity of our universe and the tremendous stretches of time that paralyze all thought of reckoning are but trifles not to be considered in contemplating the Infinite.

Our entire solar system doesn't make a speck in space and the age of the world cannot be reckoned, for time has no value, no existence in the super-material world.

It is frequently urged by sceptics that to an all powerful consciousness it should be easy to assume a personal character without employing the complicated process of producing mankind and awaiting humanity's slow growth to a divine perfection. But when it comes to preparing plans and specifications for a better and simpler method they have never shown ability superior to the divine thought.

Leaving out the consideration of time and the immensity of the finite world, which are of no importance to the Supreme Architect, the plan seems simple enough. There was a divine desire for expression. The Supreme was alone and unmanifest. There was consciousness but no knowledge, for there was nothing to know. The impulse to Be, produced the world, every atom of which is part of the Creator that produced it. The world is synthesized in man, for man holds in his physical body the essence of everything that is in the world. There is nothing, mineral, vegetable, animal, solid, fluid or gaseous that has not its place in man's organization. Man is pressing forward, evolving to a condition of purity that shall make him perfect and divine, a God enriched with the knowledge gained from numberless lives on earth. He becomes again a spark of the Supreme, but individualized and omniscient. And thus is the divine purpose accomplished and the divine impersonal self made divinely manifest.

Whether this be the true theory or not cannot be determined by any process of reasoning. The Finite mind is unable to comprehend the Infinite. We cannot analyze the act of the super-mundane power or find a reason that we can understand and prove by mental progress.

So therefore we can not trace involution even as we can evolution, for it is not of this plane. Whatever we note that seems to us to be involution is only some variation of the other. It has to do with our material progress while involution is a product of the impulse of a consciousness beyond our comprehension.

We may then consider involution briefly as the descent of spirit into a material condition and evolution as the refinement of matter into spirit. We may safely believe that under this stupendous plan the present is not the first and {545} will not be the last cycle, but that they stretch their never ending spirals in both directions without limit. Whether or not there ever was a beginning to this endless coil of cycles of involution and evolution is beyond our feeble comprehension.

Logic and reason are but the dull weapons of conquest over problems of the Finite, and are entirely too crude to be used with confidence in giving battle to the mysteries of the Infinite.

Only the intuitions can help us beyond the boundaries of the super-material world and they tell us that there never was a beginning to the things which are and that there will never be an end. This condition of Being, without ever a time of actual commencing, is paradoxical and confusing to the mind and we cannot easily realize that although apparently impossible it is true. But it is only one of many similar contradictions that attend upon the Contemplation of Infinity.

We cannot even comprehend a beginning to the present cycle of our existence. The birth of this world is lost in the misty obscurity of the infinite Past and is as hopelessly beyond us as is the record of the countless myriads of similar creations which preceded it. It is therefore of little value to attempt to fix an era from which to begin tracing the evolution of man from the irresponsible, mindless monster that archaic teachings describe him to have been before he assumed conscious domination over the other creatures of this world. And it is equally vain to seek for information regarding the various changes through which he arrived at even that primitive condition of being only a mass of inert semi-conscious matter. Perhaps in this as in the other aspects of the transmigration of the Divine into the Finite, there never was any beginning.

The Vedanta, which is that phase of Indian Philosophy that treats specially on this subject, says that the world proceeded from an inscrutable principle, darkness, neither existent nor non-existent and from "one that breathed without afflation, other than which there was nothing, beyond it nothing."

According to the Vedanta there is but one substance or reality immutable and eternal, the supreme spirit, the impersonal Self, the spiritual absolute atman—and that of course is summed up in the idea of Deity.

Science, which professes to reject all theories that cannot be proven, suggests tentatively that all of nature's innumerable products have evolved from the result of a fortuitous combination of unconscious causes that produced a beginning.

But there should be something beyond mere accident in the movements of non-intelligent forces. There must always be a first cause even for a beginning and that first cause cannot be an accident.

That should be an uncomfortable theory for those who are scientific enough to believe it, for they have no guarantee against other accidents of Nature. They can never feel secure against some awkward occurrence that might counteract that initial commingling of forces and restore this world to its original condition of nothingness.

We read of various vibrations that shiver into the production of light, color, heat, sound, power, electricity and even the life principle, but these vibrations are not even said to be self-produced. There has never been a theory satisfactory to the intuitions—which are the most accurate of all our truth finders, except that of an universal, Conscious Self, impersonal but all pervasive, that is the Cause, the Beginning and the ultimate Attainment of everything.

The only theory that agrees with the intuitions without offending the reasoning perceptions should offer the safest foundation upon which to build a philosophy. It is therefore not remarkable that ages ago the sages of the Orient, {546} men who were fitted by training and inherited faculties for metaphysical contemplation, elaborated a philosophy based upon the belief in an impersonal First Cause that seeks personality only through involving Spirit in matter and evolving back to Spirit. Tinted with the results of that experience, Spirit, they believe, becomes self-conscious and individualized by its contact with a life or lives of manifestation. Evidently it can never be absolutely stainless again. It has exchanged entire purity for knowledge and self-consciousness. Therefore, man, who is the highest attainment of this evolution, can never be infinitely perfect, but can ever more and more approximate to perfection. He can never again be absorbed and swallowed up and engulfed in absolute divinity. He will never become entirely Divine in the sense of being re-absorbed into the unrecognizable All-consciousness, for that would extinguish all the effects of his earth experiences and his long pilgrimage would be a profitless waste of time and toil. He has become an individualized conscious being, less than Deity, but by reason of his completed evolution he is relatively a God to us.

He may therefore reach up to the Infinite even now, and can also extend a hand down to Earth to help us on our upward climb. Innumerable divine men have been reborn and have dwelt among us to teach us how to live. Even in comparatively modern times we have a line of such whose example and teachings have helped forward our evolution and made it easier for us.

From Zoroaster and Buddha and Jesus and others have come revelations that justify the theory of man's perfectibility through evolution and as we can trace the growth of all matter up to its culmination in humanity, the divine plan seems to stand revealed, and our ultimate destiny is plainly outlined. The method of evolution, like everything else in Nature, seems entirely a process of compensations. We gain and renounce; we take on higher qualities and drop the meaner characteristics. We advance by such methods as we can command as we go along. Higher ideals being reached, we look upward for still loftier points of attainment.

In the prehistoric stages of our development, while pure physicality dominated us, we asserted our supremacy by superior strength or speed. Further along a cunning mentality gave us a wider range of power. Still later we have grown into wisdom, and as we near the end we shall discard all the physical desires, the tastes and appetites, the hopes and ambitions, the affections and passions that tie us to the earth life, and take on instead the finer spiritual attributes that are inseparable from the higher planes of existence.

The severing of the earth desires marks the end of the process of evolution of spirit from matter. What follows that we may infer from analogy. The process of unfolding doubtless continues on planes of which we have no conception, but obviously need not dread to encounter.

Of course we have moved slowly forward in our various stages of development from whatever we were before we took on human qualities up to our present degree of attainment. It is not hard to believe that we have developed superior understanding and the other higher attributes of humanity only as our growing needs and opening opportunities have called for them.

The evolution of species and the laws governing the development of physical organs as they became necessary for the growth and preservation of the infinite variety of living things have been a favorite study for materialistic scientists for the past century. More than that, long ago the learned Jean Baptiste Lamarck formulated four propositions that are now accepted as self-evident.

First. Life, by its proper forces, tends {547} continually to increase the volume of every body possessing it, and to enlarge its parts up to a limit which it brings about. This covers the phenomenon of growth to maturity.

Second. The production of a new organ in an animal body results from the supervention of a new want continuing to make itself felt, and a new movement which this want gives birth to and encourages.

This is shown in the long neck of the giraffe, which enables him to feed on the tender top leaves of tall tropical plants, and in the camel's hump which supplies him with vigor during long intervals without feeding, and the receptacle for water, which enables him to traverse long stretches of barren and streamless lands.

Third. The development of organs and their force of action are constantly in ratio to the employment of those organs.

The kangaroo, a large animal carrying its young for safety in a natural pouch, stands erect and never uses its fore legs in walking. It leaps forward in prodigious bounds, propelled by the muscular power of its tail, which has grown and developed beyond even the hind legs in strength; while the fore legs have dwindled to insignificant size and importance.

Fourth. All which has been laid down or changed in the organization of individuals in the course of their life, is conserved by generation and transmitted to the new individuals which proceed from those which have undergone these changes.

This is because evolution carries us constantly beyond certain needs and progress does not let us go back to those needs, neither in our own persons nor in those of our posterity. Man and beast alike have only and always such organs as they require and no others. The laws of heredity are not whimsical or recalcitrant, and the changes brought about by evolution are carried forward by them in strict obedience to its demands. Recognizing this fact, but building from a false premise, the followers of Darwin search for a link to connect humanity with the tailless apes of earlier periods, assuming that man was developed from them, and that the ape is the link between mankind and the next lower order of being. There is absolutely nothing in support of this theory beyond a resemblance in the physical conformation. And that is far more likely to result from the ape being a descendant of prehistoric man.

All these speculators stop short at any valuable foundation on which to build theories. They see in evolution only the generation and development of living organisms and the reason or cause of the infinite variety of form, color and habits.

Kant and Laplace theorized vaguely on the formation of the solar system from a gaseous condition to its present character, but they shared the perplexity of all biological thinkers when they endeavored to peer behind the mechanical beginning in search of a First Cause. It is probable that even the mechanical beginning had never a first hour or day or year or era. And so Science, bound and boxed up in materialism, observes the growth and development of species and placidly stops at that, having begun with a guess and ended with—a bundle of axiomatic conclusions.

But the philosophy of the ancients, backed up by the teachings of the divine men who from time to time have come back to us, and endorsed by our own inner convictions, tells us that evolution is the concerted effort of all the atoms that comprise the Universe to return to a condition not recognized by science—the condition of spirit which is the ultimate aim of everything.

And every infinitesimal atom is alive and has a consciousness of its own. They cluster together and form living organisms, {548} developing and progressing in even pace with those organisms, flying off into space as their work goes on and rushing together to build up some other organism. Had we ultra-microscopic vision we could see them streaming from us continually and being replaced by corresponding streams of new atoms. And each one of these has its own divine spark. It is a living entity.

They abide with us according to our attraction, some shunning us, others preferring us. Evil people attract such atoms as have just come from others of like disposition and leave their impress upon them and gain nothing good from them. Every evil thought taints every atom of the stream that we contact with at the time. They advance in their evolutions no faster than does humanity and reach spirituality when we do and not sooner or later. Man arrives finally at this condition clothed in the "spiritual body" of which theologians speak without any idea or comprehension of its true nature.

All who would shun contact with the particles that emanate from vile people must live the life that repels such atoms. Those who live a life of pure thought and fraternal consideration draw towards them atoms of such quality as makes their personality pleasant and attractive and their bearing gracious. No pure life builds up a vile personality. There are other ways to recognize traits of character besides the mere facial expression. Even scientists know that.

It is therefore evident that every one should shun evil thought just as he would any other deadly and destructive infection. It rests with every man to carry forward with him on his upward journey all the material that goes toward his own physical composition.

There is no one who has not attracted all grades of atoms to him, and it is well to bear in mind that they are the very same that have formed the bodies of all the population of the world, man and beast, since life first was. There has been no addition, no diminution. Nothing in nature is ever destroyed. Nothing ever ceases to be. There is no place to banish material. It must be spiritualized and we must be the medium.

And, therefore, it is no poetic fancy to say that we are of one common clay and that humanity is all one. Every man, at every moment, is building and rebuilding himself of the same materials, particle for particle as have built up every other man. Prince or pauper, saint or demon, society flower or foul tramp, we are all of the very same dust and we can determine which sort we shall use for our own bodies. It is not a question of proximity. It is entirely one of sympathy and character and affinity. We evolve as fast as our thoughts and conduct permit, and we purify our souls and our bodies alike and together.

If we recognize the brotherhood of humanity we need no reminding to see that it is our duty to ourselves—to our personal selves as well as to our spiritual selves, to help to make cleaner and sweeter the whole world through our own mental, moral and the resultant spiritual cleanness. That will not hurry evolution much in each separate instance, but by the contagion of sympathy and the dynamic power of thought these beneficent, physical atoms can be attracted to us and we can carry about with us their gentle influence for good.

That is the secret of the curative influence of sweetsouled people upon those who are sick in mind or body, and if people could understand these influences as they are and value them justly we should soon see a happier world with less sorrow, less injustice, less sickness and a far wider recognition of the material as well as spiritual truth that brotherhood is an universal fact in Nature, and that our evolution can never be complete until all realize it and live accordingly.

THE CYCLE OF LIFE.

BY MARY KONOPNITSKY.

TRANSLATED FROM THE POLISH BY V. A. H.

PRELUDE.

In the new morn, that dawns above the world, I put aside the black and sombre harp, that plays and sings so sadly. For, from the ocean's farthest shore, with the first daybreak blushes, with the golden arrows of the sun, there comes on rosy wings, all radiant with fiery auroras, a new song, a bird of the arriving spring.

In the new morn, that dawns above the world, I stretch the golden strings, I weave them from the day-beams, I paint them with the iris dew. For through the mould of sorrows, there breaks the music of mountain waterfalls; their vernal voice and chime now reach me from every rock and rill, and a new flowery raiment is again woven for the earth.

In the new morn, that dawns above the world, I tie fresh golden cords of sound,—not for the pain, not for the longing in the gloom, not for the old complaint of the lonely heart. I send them into the blue infinitudes unrestrained, I launch them from globe to globe, into the farthest space. From star to star there glistens of my strings the golden grate.

I.

I am a ray. The fount of Light I cannot circumscribe. And yet I fly. Through the dark nights I fly, through stars and pallid moons; I kindle ephemeral scintillations, I send out my trembling light towards infinity's eternal flame, from which shines forth the sun of all the suns. And now I darken, totter, pale; I lose my breath, my hope, I smoulder like a spark.

And lo! again I energize my rays, cast into endless skies; again I illume myself and burn; I reach forth, I fly in space as a fiery ribbon from the spindle of the spirit. Now my tiny ray approaches the great sun; it is already burning with eternity's first blush. As an arrow I sling myself into the bright path, illuminated by the rosy dawn. I am a ray—the fount of Light I cannot circumscribe. Let me, then, be encompassed by its dome.

II.

I am a spark of eternity; and I am a pilgrim. Even to-day shall I pass away, after a while, after an hour's stroke, together with the smoke of the shepherd's fire, which writhes in blue strands over the forest in the eve, and disappears in the tears of dew before the night. Even to-day shall I be divorced from that power, which holds me here from the twilight to the twilight, and the sun shall not see me more with his golden eyes.

I am a spark of eternity. Beyond the cold ashes I shall exist even to the dawn, ... And then in my own embers shall I wax in brightness, glow as gold and burn as ruby; I shall pass through the grayness of the dust of this my bed, and before the rosy dawn shall have bathed herself in dew, before the sun shall have lifted his golden gaze from beyond the sea, I shall strike into the flames of life.

III.

How many dawns, how many twilights have I passed? Do I know it myself? Through how many gates of {550} body and of soul have I entered into life, as an eternal voyager, who is born daily, now here, now there, from the sleep of death, in the earliest morn.

And then, exhausted, I departed to the West, through the great twilight dusk, which, all blazing with gold and red as blood, led me into the silent fields of blue, upon the dreamy meadows of the moon, all heaving with the beating of the wings of Psyche-butterflies, where I sought my sleep, and my head leaning on eternity's great bosom, I rested after a life and before a life.

IV.

Myself—the gate, and myself—the path, once only in this cycle have I issued from the Divine Light. Once only blew its breath for all bodies and souls, once only has it in the morning of Day opened its bosom of luminous archetypal thought,—and all subsequent myriads of forms, before and now, were sculptured by myself.

Lo! I emerge from the conflagration of blood; I come in the likeness of a child, I who am a lion, crouching for the powers of the heavens and of the earth. And I depart into the night, through the blood and through the pain, crouching as a shadow, for the dawn and for the day. After a time, after a moment I increase in strength, I spring up in the dust. My germ of existence now feels hunger of life; it attracts life's forces and lifts green blades above the grave. The sun now warms it for a new day of its immortal labor.

V.

With no gift am I favored in my early hour. All my radiance have I spun myself through many nights and shadows. And all my powers upon the earth and in the heavens have I obtained from my own mystic depths. Every form I have, it is of ages' toil, it is an effort of many births, a battle of many darkling deaths.

What light have I, by a promethean labor, through thousand lives, spark by spark have I stolen it from the sun, spark by spark have I seized it from the blushes of the morning. The rosy coral of the dawns, and lilies' whiteness have I plucked unseen in the gardens of the night from the silvery stars. There is no color and no sound upon the waving meadows, among the nests of eagles or of nightingales, which through the ages, in ruins' coldness and scorching heat of life I have not worked out from a laughter to a groan,—alive by my own self.

VI.

And my right is to upwards grow through all the worlds. And my right is to expand my heart through all the worlds. In storms, in silence I burst the bars of death's prisons, and strike the metal of the all-awakening bell!

Lightning of life, and thunderbolt of life I let into the dark camera of death, into the house of dust. And touched by a spark of the spirit the dust explodes with life, the soil opens, waving the flowers of new spring, and again breathes joyous in the splendor of the day.

VII.

The soul-bird builds her cage herself,—with songs and flapping of her wings,—and enters then its gates all fascinated with the life.

But soon the winged guest, from the infinity, newcomer, striking her prison's trellis-wall, reddens her golden pinions with the ruby blood.

She hushes then in the dusky shadows of her house; a longing eats her heart away for the freedom of the dawn.

Till overcome with pain she strikes her breast against the walls and breaks the cage herself.

With songs and flapping of her wings, from the dusk, called life, she flies away near to the gates of the eternal light.

VIII.

Upon the dark and stormy roads I walk, bare-footed, poor; I onward pass, {551} naked and hungry, through life's cold and night; only one light can brighten there my way and feed my strength,—the light of daring, burning in my breast; it helps me more than stars and more than moons. No sun in heaven can kindle it in me, but I must get it from myself, striking my spirit against the hard experiences of life, that the breast might catch the spark as does dry tinder when the steel strikes the flint.

IX.

With me do I carry the enemy, whether I leave my threshold, or return back to my home.

With me do I bring the traitor, and he is my heart's shadow,—the thunderbolt striking me.

With its storm it will scatter the roof of my dwelling, set fire to my house.

And then suddenly stopping, the sails of my boat will be folded, and down will it sink.

(To be continued.)

GODS, HEROES AND MEN.

BY AMOS J. JOHNSON.

According to Theosophy every man is a God incarnate. In his real nature, each man is a spark from the Divine Flame, which descends from the Infinite Fountain of Life and courses through Eternity on a pilgrimage, the purpose of which we can but faintly conceive.

Great mystics have said that "the universe exists for the sake of the soul's experience," and that the purpose of life is that the soul may reach perfection. The term embraces infinity, perfect virtue, wisdom, power, perfect altruism. Each department of Nature must be carried on to a full completeness and the soul may not rest content with achieving merely its own perfection, but must labor for the perfection of the great Whole.

Reaching from the One White Light of Absolute Being down to the tiniest atom of matter, each plane of existence is governed by Divine Intelligences. All one can say is that after reaching to the highest conception possible to us of the Divine Intelligences that rise above us and to the highest knowledge attainable of the Divine Worlds, still stretching far beyond the highest, beyond the utmost reach of human thought, there exists: What? "An omnipresent, eternal, boundless and immutable Principle, on which all speculation is impossible, since it transcends the power of human conception and can only be dwarfed by any human expression or similitude. It is beyond the reach and power of thought, unthinkable and unspeakable."

This is the postulate of sublime and everlasting Deity. As far as we may go in endless Eternity, yet above and beyond all there reigneth absolute Law.

Recognizing then, that the great unknowable Deity is beyond our ken, our study must be confined to the lesser Deities, though some of these seem unknowable; but we may partially learn the relation they bear to men.

All the great religions present a series of divine Presences, and generally a triune Godhead stands as the primal object of all adoration. The Hebrew Bible traces {552} three Deities, the highest of these being the Most High God, supreme ruler over all, and synonymous with Law; the second Deity is God, the Elohim, a great hierarchy, or rather a series of hierarchies of Gods, who formed the earth and filled it with living creatures and endowed man with his human nature; while the third in rank among the ancient Hebrews was Jehovah, who stands as their tribal Deity. The distinction between the Most High God and Jehovah is clearly shown in Deuteronomy (32: 8-9), where it says: "When the Most High divided the nations, their inheritance, when He separated the Sons of Adam, He set the bounds of the people.... The Lord's [Jehovah's] portion is his people, Jacob is the lot of His inheritance."

The New Testament also gives a triple Godhead in the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Among the Brahmins, Brahma is the Creator, Vishnu the Preserver and Siva the Destroyer; with the Greeks it was Uranos, Kronos and Zeus; and with the Egyptians, Osiris, Isis and Horus. These were not necessarily the most powerful Gods in the Pantheon, but those most popularly known. The Hindus, for instance, are said to call their chief Deity, Zyaus—which bears a close resemblance to the Greek Zeus; and the Egyptians called their Unknown God, Amen or Ammon. All religions tell also of lesser divinities, as archangels and angels.

Theosophy, the Wisdom Religion, shows the three Logoi which have proceeded from the Unknowable Principle; these Logoi are respectively the First Cause, the Spirit of the Universe, and the Universal World-Soul. From the Manifested Logos, the Universal Oversoul, spring hundreds of classes of divine beings, and these in their turn are the progenitors of the lower classes of beings. From God down to the lowest mineral monad, there is a direct chain of heredity, binding all of existence into one great universal whole. Humanity is the child of the Gods and traces its heredity through all the divine hierarchies to the Unknowable Root of all.

The traditions of all old nations tell of a Golden Age when Gods and Demigods lived among men. Greek mythology gives the following account of the formation of the Earth and heavens: "Before earth and sea and heaven were created, all things wore one aspect, to which we give the name Chaos—a confused and shapeless mass, in which, however, slumbered the seeds of things. Earth, sea and air were all mixed up together; so the earth was not solid, the sea was not fluid, and the air was not transparent. God and Nature at last interposed and put an end to this discord, separating earth from sea, and heaven from both. Then one of the Gods gave His services in arranging the Earth. The air being cleared, the stars began to appear, fishes took possession of the sea, birds of the air and beasts of the land. But a nobler race was wanted, and Prometheus and his brother Epimetheus made man in the image of the Gods. Then Prometheus went to heaven and lit his torch at the chariot of the Sun, and brought down fire to man. He taught him to make weapons to subdue the animals, tools to cultivate the ground, and introduced arts and commerce."

The "fire" which Prometheus brought, refers not to a physical flame, but to "mind." Prometheus stands for the hierarchy which endowed physical man with his mental faculties, and it is related that when mankind was supplied with the "divine fire" the Gods became jealous of the new race, and in revenge they chained Prometheus to a rock where a vulture feasted on his liver, which was renewed as fast as devoured. He thus stands forth as the first Saviour of humanity, and his sufferings represent the first crucifixion.

Mythology is written in glyph and symbol, but if one stops to analyze these {553} mystic tales, volumes may be found hidden beneath the outer husk. Perhaps it was not revenge—but Law—which caused Prometheus to be chained to the rock. He assumed the task of raising man to Godhood and incarnated in the animal form that the lower entity might be better aided. Thus the rock to which he was chained becomes humanity itself, and the vulture represents the desires and passions of the lower man.

Humanity has always had divine Teachers. Schools of Magi or Wise Ones were established on the old Lemurian continent, and were open to all who were worthy. These schools or temples were known to the public down to a period as late as 2000 years ago, when they closed to the world at large. But the light has been kept burning in hidden places even to the present day. The Great Lodge has maintained a continuous existence ever since its establishment millions of years ago, and it is from this Lodge that all the great Teachers of the world have come—Krishna, Buddha, Jesus, and all others. A recent Messenger from the Lodge was H. P. Blavatsky, who founded the Theosophical Society and Universal Brotherhood. Through this channel the archaic teachings are again being presented to the world at large. All who desire to learn the mysteries of life, all who desire to advance along the Path which leads from manhood to Godhood are welcome to the archaic wisdom.

If the applicant for divine knowledge will purify his nature and be brotherly to his neighbor, then he may gain the greatest profit by a study of Theosophy, for then its teachings will be illuminated by a greater light than intellect itself can ever shed. The true men of to-day are those who are able to subdue their lower nature and make it obedient to the behests of the spiritual man. It is a heavy task, but in the end will lead to a higher life.

The course of training at first is very simple, being concerned with the commonest of daily duties. If one is irritable, quick-tempered, censorious, lazy, selfish or unjust, his first steps upon the Path will consist in correcting these faults. One must make a persistent struggle to become industrious, self-controlled and sweet tempered, and not until these qualities are developed need one be anxious for anything beyond. If one fails in some respects or in all respects he need not be discouraged, but should try again, and keep on trying until he does succeed.

The evolution from man to Hero or Seer, and from Seer to Perfection can not take place in a single life, for one life is not sufficient to furnish either time or environment for the many lines of development that are required. Before the man can become one of the company of the great Helpers of Humanity, he must be purged of every weakness and defilement. He does not need Their learning, but he must have Their purity.

THE PHILOSOPHY OF SUICIDE.

BY T. B. WILSON.

There is a very much deeper meaning than some people suppose, to what Paul said to the Romans, "None liveth to himself, and no man dieth to himself." In inflicting a wound upon himself, the suicide wounds all there is, and his death shocks every living thing. That is so because of the oneness, the solidarity, the interdependence of all that is. Hence it is that the atom is as necessary to the universe as a world. It is a very old philosophy, but it is a demonstrable cosmological and psychological fact, for we know that man necessarily lives and moves and has his being under the same law of growth and maintenance that supports and sustains every other entity, even from the atom subdivided into a million parts away to the mightiest god. It is just as incumbent upon the bowlder that it fulfill its destiny as it is that man should fulfill his. Hence, it is a violation of the law of being to purposely or unnecessarily retard the unfoldment of one's self or any other thing. The wrong done to the thing hindered reflects back upon the doer in force, in addition to the injury done to that which was wronged.

The divinity which shapes the course of a man's journey through the worlds of existence is his own thoughts and acts, and, furthermore, every thought and act exerts an influence for good or for evil everywhere. It is true, altogether true, that every man is more or less his brother's keeper, and that no one can escape the consequences of his acts and thoughts upon his own life, nor of the influence they exert upon the lives of others. The interdependence of all things and the universality of being is seen in all things. This is a principle of existence which to know the full meaning of, one must know one's self.

Existence as a personality and individuality, with power to reason and understand, is at once the most sublime and most fearful stage of unfoldment. It is sublime when considered as evidence of individual possibilities, and fearful when, in the presence of God in manifestation, the responsibility which the realization of the universality of being and the interdependence of all things imposed upon the individual is felt. The law of being makes a relationship to exist between individuals as a whole which transcends the ties of consanguinity. You may call it universal brotherhood, if you like, but any way, the relationship imposes tasks of toil and burdens of duty upon everyone, and to wilfully make the burden of duty or the task of toil harder for one's self or for another is to defy the power of the universe and invite the wrath of the source and maintainer of being.

But somehow or some way the average man and woman finds in the so-called philosophy of suicide a most bewitching theme for conversation and discussion, and it is just possible that not a few are persuaded to try the realities of it by letting their minds dwell upon the subject too much. That there is a certain fascination in the problem of life and death, no one will deny, but the thoughtful person would not seek its solution in self-destruction. The better a man understands the law of his being the clearer he sees that in ratio to his obedience to the laws of nature is he in harmonious relation with all things, and that when in such harmony, existence in the body is altogether desirable, whether he be {555} sick or well, rich or poor.

But what constitutes suicide or self-murder? We are accustomed to call that an act of suicide which hurls one into death at once, when death follows the act instantly. Now, as a matter of fact, we all are almost sure to occupy a suicide's grave. There is a difference between the man who burns out his stomach in twenty seconds with prussic acid and the man who burns out his stomach in twenty years with whisky, but can you tell me just what the difference is? That thought might be carried into the conduct of our life throughout. The natural end of a man's pilgrimage in each incarnation is when the spiritual man has so spiritualized his physical body that the spirit can no longer function in it.

Death, then, is surely the spirit walking out of the body by its own free will, just as we lay aside a garment when it is worn out. All other deaths come of violation of nature's laws, and they are premature. It is because we indirectly, at least, commit what is almost the equivalent of what we are wont to call suicide that, in my opinion, we have to come back so often. It is impossible for disease and death, as we understand and feel them, to lay hold upon one who lives in harmony with nature's laws. So as a matter of fact, practically all deaths are the penalty for wrong living. We come back time and again because we need certain other experiences, but the purpose of experience is to teach us to live right, and the reason why we need new experiences is because we have not hitherto, or are not now, living in harmony with nature's laws. Karma makes us go to school until we have mastered the lesson. It is for us to say how many lives we will devote to it, but every moment we turn away from the lesson we drink down poison which kills.

To seek death by one's own hand is not a new method to overcome the ills that relentlessly chase their victims through briar patch and over flint hill. It is a right that has been claimed by very many in all ages, and some of the world's most distinguished personages committed self-murder to escape impending trouble. The crime—for it is a crime—has been defended by such famous writers as Gibbon, Hume, Von Hartman and Schopenhauer. Strangely enough, as civilization advances and universities multiply, the roll of self-murderers seems to increase. It can not be said, therefore, that the spread of culture and knowledge, of discoveries in the field of science, and the adoption of higher codes of commercial and social ethics, educate or influence the world away from the old-time philosophy that a man's highest right is to quit living by his own hand when he is tired of life. Indeed, it would seem that the wider the range of personal liberty, and the more extended the opportunities for intellectual expansion and experiment, the incentive to self-destruction is intensified.

At a recent meeting of the American Medico-Legal congress it was held by not a few members that not only was suicide justifiable in cases where there appeared to be no other way for one to relieve one's misery, but that a physician would be justifiable in ending the life of his patient under certain circumstances. I think we all will agree that such a sentiment is unworthy of a manly man.

When a man assumes to be a law unto himself he is certain to come in contact with forces which will sweep him out of the current of the river of individual progress into whirls and eddies, which agitate the waters fearfully but do not move onward. He will realize, too, that God, the universe and himself are one stupendous whole—absolutely inseparable—and that when he quits any sphere of existence by his own act in violation of the law of his being he is still a necessary part of the whole, and that in severing the cord of earthly life he not only fails of his purpose, but he himself {556} will feel the jar more severely than any other entity in all the worlds of God, and not only so, but he shall continue to live amid distracting discord until he voluntarily readjusts himself to that system of law and harmony from which he essayed unlawfully to break away. Certainly he will find pain and sorrow in returning, but not to return is to be without rest eternally. Nevertheless, all men appoint their time to die by their conduct of life, which in nearly all cases is a form of suicide.

There are those who advocate suicide as a proper means of escape from tiresome environment who deny that any unpleasant consequences could follow, because there is no consciousness after death, but it is incumbent upon them to prove that there is such a state as "death" in the sense they speak of it. It would seem that if there is no consciousness in what is called the state of the dead—if the memory of man is annihilated by what is called death—it should be annihilated by sleep or trance, for they are states in which the body is dead for the time. Of course, the advocate of suicide fortifies his position by denying that there is memory where there is no brain life and action, and that when the brain ceases to be active, memory perishes, but that theory is untenable, because the brain is entirely renewed every seven years or such a matter. A man remembers incidents in his childhood, although meanwhile his brain has changed completely a dozen times. It must be, therefore, that there is something in man which is impervious to the influences which time exerts over the physical body. The "tablets of the memory" continue throughout. There is a natural body and there is a spiritual body.

The advocate of suicide as the better way to rid one's self of trials and tribulations is necessarily a materialist. He preaches the doctrine of immortality of matter and the mortality of spirit, which is a ridiculous absurdity. But he will discourse learnedly about the milliards of bacilli—separate, distinct, individual, living entities—which float about, live, move and have their being nearly everywhere, but if he were asked to catch a few that they might be seen and handled he would promptly say they were altogether invisible to the naked eye, that they are almost sub-microscopic. He would admit that these invisible creatures have existence under the same law that peoples the forest with trees, the earth with animals, and the channels of commerce with men, but he would not admit that any living thing could have life separate from its visible organism; hence, when the physical organism becomes ill, or is subjected to any other uncomfortable conditions of existence, it is its right to escape by quitting life.

But materialists are too few and far between to bother with; besides, there never was a materialist who did not hope that his philosophy was in error, and that he should continue to live as an individual, retaining memory and affections after what he calls death. Having that hope he is deprived of the right to advocate suicide, because if he is to live after the death of the body he must admit that he will be a substantial, thinking being, for it is impossible to think of substance without form, and of either without ascribing power to it.

But there is a phase of the philosophy of suicide which can be seen only from the occult or metaphysical side of life. It has been said that it is the cowardly and unmanly man who wilfully destroys his own life, but for all that a great deal of mental strength and bravery may be required to become too great a coward to combat even little annoyances. And again, the psychological influences which gradually prepare a man during the long days of a protracted illness to calmly, gladly no doubt, welcome death as a friend come in the hour of need, may come with such force upon the man contemplating {557} self-slaughter that he is as much nerved to meet death as he whose mental acquiescence came after weeks or months of bodily pain and wasting away. The stoics knew of this occult force which nerves a man to destroy his life, and they called it a "sympathetic friend," but science has never been able to analyze or define it, and hence we can know nothing of it except what we gather from the lesson its effects upon the soul of man teaches. It is not true, though, that the suicide leaps from darkness of despair here into the bright light of peace and joy "over there."

The occult force which nerves a man to murder himself, the would-be suicides should bear in mind, is not spent when the man dies. It is a force which is also an immutable law, albeit the influence of its operation is confined to the spiritual man. If it nerves a man to deal with himself harshly it is because the free will of the man cannot be disputed. Were it to paralyze his mind and cripple his purpose the man would be little more than a human machine subject to the whims or caprice of a force or power higher than he. It is the recognition of his free agency by the eternal cause that makes a man a free moral agent, but the same force that sustains him in the exercise of his rights as a free agent follows him beyond the grave and all through the process of unfoldment if he elects to progress, or through the process of retrogression if he inclines to travel to the left.

In quitting this sphere or plane of existence the suicide by no means escapes duty. The environment from which he fled must be met and overcome, and in trying to escape he only strengthens the opposing forces and weakens his own powers of resistance. Nevertheless, the battle must be fought and the victory must be won if he would be free from the hurtful influences which prompted him to avoid learning the lesson of life, and whatever the environment is, it is to be overcome for the good to him there is in the victory. This is the law of compensation, and it is the law of all laws, for it commands that whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.

The suicide, therefore, not only fails to escape the ills he flees from—but he intensifies the distress which burdens him. Moreover, no occult or spiritual force ever influenced him to burden himself with the consequences of hateful environment, but it aided in the exercise of his free will. And, again, whatever a man's burden may be it is the harvest of his own sowing. If it be of love and sweet memories it is his by natural right, so also it is his by natural right if it be greed and cowardice. The suicide runs from the presence of trouble to the arms of many troubles, and the occult force that aids him in the exercise of his free will holds him to account for committing self-murder with the same firm hand of justice that it would had he murdered his neighbor instead of himself. There is no escape from the consequences of one's acts. The grave is no hiding place. It is the door rather which opens into a court of justice beyond—into a place where the ethical debits and credits of the individual await him that a balance may be struck. Those things which he planted in the field of life will be there as debits and credits. Nothing will be omitted, be they the fruit of omission or of commission, and that which he owes he must come again into the field of the activities of physical environment and pay to the uttermost farthing. This, too, the law of Karma demands, and this it exacts.

THE ETHICS OF SEX.

BY GRACE G. BOHN.

The destiny of each soul is reunion with the Absolute from which it emanated. But this reunion may be accomplished only through yielding the claims of the personal self to the greater Self, the Christos which exists within each personality. A single word gives us the key to the process,—brotherhood.

To this goal there is one royal road and many that are long and terrible. But the royal road may be travelled only by those who are immune from temptation because their consciousness is not centred in the self which may be tempted. Understanding the law, they obey it, for only by obedience may the law be transcended and the soul become free. That is a royal road, indeed. But it is only for the few.

The other, cyclic and steep as the pathway that winds to the summit of the Purgatorio mountain, must for ages be travelled by the multitudes; for it is they who cannot as yet answer the questions, "Whence came I? wherefore do I exist, and whither do I go?"

Spirit, when first differentiated from the Absolute, is simple, not complex, undifferentiated, pure and good because it has not become conscious of evil. To gain the experiences by which alone it may expand its consciousness to infinity and become inclusive of all differentiation, it becomes individualized and embodied. And this earth is the scene of the experiences which the spirit needs and which it can gain only by means of an embodiment of personality.

Cycle after cycle, life after life, the soul tests all the conditions of earthly pleasure and pain by its own standard and measure. If that standard be self, alienation will be swift and certain, and slow and terrible will be the return to the divine. If the measure be brotherhood, service, ministry to others, the soul remains one with God and spiritual consciousness is by so much expanded.

Since brotherhood is the ideal, our very institutions, church, state, and particularly the home, exist for no higher purpose than to develop within the soul of humanity a conscious desire to live for others. It is only because the soul manifests itself as two forces, in two sexes, man and woman, that the institution of the home, as we know it, is made possible. We fancy that these dual forces, incomplete and fluctuating, become completed and stable only through marriage. The novelists have threshed over this old straw for many weary years, for the view commonly taken is superficial and untrue.

Marriage, in its deeper aspect, is a means by which the soul prepares itself, through the joys of limited service, for that wider ministry which includes the world. Emerson expresses it better when he says "the lover ascends to the highest beauty, to the love and knowledge of Divinity, by steps on this ladder of created souls." Marriage opens the shortest way by which men and women, self-centred and egotistical, may be compelled, against their will if need be, to become conscious of the joy of sacrifice and the beauty of service.

The child, like the childish race, is, in some respects, very much of a savage. {559} He has neither intellectual nor ethical ideas and, as Froebel expresses it, "the first circle of a child's life is physical nature bound by necessity." The baby cares only to be kept physically comfortable, and he proposes to be kept so at the expense of others as far as possible. He is a little egotist. The world is his oyster. Selfishness, if he be not guided, is far more native to him during the earliest period of his life, than altruism. And it is significant that a large proportion of children grow into manhood and womanhood, particularly in these days of ferment and individualism, with the firm belief that, first of all, they must look out for themselves. They do not voluntarily accept the path of brotherhood, but the law, the wise law, forces them, by few or many hard experiences, to finally see the wisdom of choosing it. By refusing to obey the law they place themselves within the sweep of its mighty arm and are struck down.

We are all one; we minister to ourselves only as we minister to others. We must first sacrifice self, else all the rest will not be added unto us and even that which we have will be taken away. But before we are capable of the wider ministry, we must prove ourselves by the narrower service, and nature, with her wise economy, leads us into a field wherein service and sacrifice are inevitable, and its gateway is marriage.

Emerson gives us the key to this mystery when he says: "The man is only half himself; his other half is his expression." The true expression is service, the ideal which leads us to accept it is brotherhood, and to that expression the other sex is only the embodied opportunity. To that expression marriage is the guardian and the gateway only as husband and wife accept all its culture and all its sacrifices, patiently, joyfully, completely. That signifies, ordinarily, that both husband and wife must lose their personal selves in their children, and if, for selfish reasons, they refuse this service, they are missing the culture of this incarnation. If they refuse it for reasons that are unselfish, for the opportunities of a wider ministry, that is, as Kipling would say, "another story." That is the supreme sacrifice.

It is, in most cases, wiser for husband and wife to fill their home with little children for two reasons. In the first place, through the care of children (the care of their minds and souls not less than of their bodies), each forgets self and learns the A B C of that great lesson in ministry which alone will make universal brotherhood possible upon the face of the earth. Because these sacrifices are more inevitable to the mother than to the father, she is likely to learn this lesson more speedily, and perhaps that is one reason why the Ego clothes itself now in one sex and now in another in the course of its earthly experiences. Perhaps it is that we may learn this lesson of sacrifice well that the newly embodied soul inflicts upon the builders of its physical body such agonies, sacrifices, and anxieties, that their souls seem to be torn up by the very roots, only to be planted, when quiet comes again, upon a higher plateau and in an atmosphere less dense. Emerson has said truly, "Infancy conforms to nobody; all conform to it."

Under existing conditions the lesson of selflessness will have to be learned by most of us through this very differentiation of sex, and we may make as much ado about it as we please. We may learn it through the agony and the terror of a Hetty Sorrel or a Margaret, both of whom were examples of extreme selfishness; we may accept it gracefully, as do the average man and woman, with a very faint comprehension of what it all means; or we may welcome and glorify parenthood as the Madonna glorified it, prophesy of that future time when every child shall be the child of an immaculate conception. "Help nature and work on with her, and nature shall regard thee as {560} one of her creators and make obeisance."[2]

The second reason why the selfish person is delaying his own advancement by refusing to fulfill the duties that he tacitly accepts by marriage is very prosaic. We all like to assure ourselves that we are rays of the Infinite, channels through which alone the God-message may be brought to mankind. That is very inspiring. But it is not so inspiring to reflect that we are also the gateways, self-appointed by the very estate of marriage, through which other souls, more advanced than ourselves perhaps, may come into the physical embodiment which they need for future experience. That is quite another thing, and all the old self which binds our souls rebels. For this means, to a great degree, the sacrifice of our social pleasures, our recreations, time, money, physical ease, perhaps health; it means broken rest, disorderly rooms, the washing of bedaubed little hands, and the kissing of, oh, such dirty little mouths. It means that we have to shut our Æschylus and shelve our Faust and our Homer for a few years at least, and many a father and mother look back with something like longing upon the old days when they lived with these great souls and when their cherished books were not smeared as to bindings and torn as to leaves.

Was it an accident that Froebel called the system of education that he gave to the world "the science of motherhood"? Was it accidental that he should dedicate the deepest and truest philosophy of which I have any conception to the end that the father and the mother, and through them, the child, might become able to look beneath the visible for the invisible which conditions it; beneath the outer phenomena to the spirit which gives it birth; beyond the transitory to the permanent. Such a philosophy makes one very patient with physical duties and sacrifices when they are regarded as only a means to an end that is higher than physical. Such a philosophy makes it somewhat easier to "step out from sunlight into shade to make more room for others."

That is, to me, the ethical side of the now-existing relationship of the sexes about which the reformers are making so much ado. It is these who lament with such vigor the large families of the very poor. Looked at from the standpoint of the eternal, the growing number of childless families among the better classes is a much more serious state of affairs. Large and half-cared for families of children prove nothing more than ignorance on the part of the parents, of both spiritual and physical laws. And the suffering that this ignorance entails will inevitably lead the soul to a higher consciousness. But the other state of affairs is—with exceptions—the result of selfishness; and the more conscious the soul, the greater the alienation resulting from a selfish course of action. Says H. P. B., "The selfish devotee lives to no purpose. The man who does not go through his appointed work in life has lived in vain."

It is very noble to slay the appetites but that may occasionally be only a more subtle phase of selfishness. Besides that, desires that are slain for selfish comfort's sake do not free us from the law. That is why it is such nonsense to seek the solution of this old problem by placing the caprice or whim of the individual man or woman above the law of the universe. As long as men and women are selfish, as long as marriages are made from selfish motives, I bow before the rampant desires that shall force the soul into sacrifices until the self has disappeared. But when the law is obeyed, and when old Karmic debts are paid, woman and man will rise superior to it, the will of the individual become one with the universal will, and the spirit have gained her freedom.

Please do not mistake me. I do not {561} believe that marriage is the only circumstance through which the sexes can become self-poised, completed and stable. I do not believe that those who marry should always accept the limited service that little children demand of them. I do not believe that the sacrifices of fatherhood and motherhood are the highest sacrifices. Nothing of the kind. Marriage is simply a means by which the less advanced souls, the feeble, the selfish, may rise out of feebleness into strength, out of self into God. Susan E. Blow, in her "Study of Dante," has defined the Inferno as the soul filled with self, the Purgatorio as the soul emptied of self, and the Paradiso as the soul filled with God. Dante himself, with his divine insight into the nature of sin, places the jealous souls (become so through selfishness extreme) in icebound Cocytus, at the very pit of the Inferno. To most of us marriage is indeed the gateway leading out of an Inferno of selfishness, and it is marriage that places upon our backs the precious burdens which we must carry up the Purgatorio mountain. "The more we climb the less it hurts until we seem to fly."[3] But climb we must until the burdens have all fallen and the self has disappeared. By the light of "the dim star that burns within" the cyclic path must be ascended. But when the top has been reached "its light will suddenly become the infinite light." We shall have entered the Paradiso.

Advanced souls, those who are capable of wider and better service, need not to complete themselves in marriage nor to find their expression in the opportunities it gives them. They are strong enough to find it voluntarily in a cause. They do not marry on the physical plane, but truly wedded are they on the spiritual plane and in that marriage to the needs of the world they find the other half, their expression. They cease their hovering between opposites and are stable.

Such souls were Michael Angelo and Raphael, who found complete expression in art. Socrates needed no wife. He found his expression in loafing on the street-corners and plying his mystic questions. Xantippe was clearly a superfluity and we do not blame her for scolding him when we remember that she had none of his philosophic insight to carry her over the desert of his neglect. Dorothea Dix, Florence Nightingale and hundreds of other souls have found their appropriate expression in ministry to physical suffering. H. P. B., great loving heart, forgot self in a sublime service of the mind and of the spirit. Such souls do not drift nor waver; they need none of the experiences of physical fatherhood or motherhood; they are wedded to the needs of the world, they become spiritual fathers and mothers to its children, they find their expression in brotherhood, they are self-poised, completed, and at rest.

THE SOKRATIC CLUB.

BY SOLON.

(Continued.)

At our next gathering an address was given by Mr. Knowlton on Art as an Educational Factor, with special reference to the Drama. After the formal address a very interesting conversation arose on the subject in which the Professor, Mr. Knowlton, and Dr. Roberts took part, and which I will relate here as far as I am able to remember it. The other members took the part of listeners.

Dr. Roberts.—"I can well understand, Mr. Knowlton, that Art plays an important part in life and should be cultivated, and that no one's nature is complete who lacks appreciation of the artistic and beautiful, but even granting this, I do not agree with you that the training of the artistic faculties should be given so much prominence, but should be secondary to that training which fits a man for work in the world. To put it in another way; for the man of the world, art is all very well for his leisure hours and for his relaxation and enjoyment but can have no place in his active everyday life."

Mr. Knowlton.—"I take an entirely opposite view, Doctor, as you know from what I have said, and I maintain that it is just because we have put Art in a secondary place that our civilization is characterized by so much unrest and skepticism; the finer, inner side of man's nature has been subordinated to the grosser and external. What is the criterion of success in the world to-day? That should be sufficient argument in support of my claim. And the man who has achieved success, acquired wealth, position, fame, has not thereby attained to happiness but in nearly every case is still the victim of the unrest of the age. He may use his wealth in the patronage of art, in collections of paintings and sculpture, in support of Grand Opera and what not, but tell me, do you honestly think that he truly appreciates these?"

Dr. Roberts.—"No, I think not. Indeed, in nine cases out of ten, he affects a patronage of art, has his private picture gallery and a box at the opera because it is the fashion. No doubt by doing so he is useful in a way to the Art world, but I must confess that if I wanted a true appreciation of a work of Art, I would not go to such a one."

Mr. Knowlton.—"No, the enthusiasm and the true love of art which is the great incentive in making all life beautiful and harmonious would be lacking. Well, what is the reason of this? I should say it is because Art was made entirely subordinate if not almost neglected in his education, and because it has held a subordinate place throughout his life."

The Professor.—"I do not think we can rightly say what position Art should occupy in education and life unless we can first determine what is truly man's work in the world and what is the object of life."

Dr. Roberts.—"That is just the position I take. Life is a serious matter and a man cannot afford to spend his time and energy on what after all is more a matter of the imagination than anything else. Although I certainly think the æsthetic faculties should not be neglected but that they should receive a certain amount of training; yet, at the same time, except in the case of those who follow art as a profession, they play very little part in a man's life work. In fact, I have known of more than one {563} case where æsthetic sensitiveness has positively unfitted men for the keen competition of life. After all, the beautiful must give place to the useful, and, for my part, I say, give me the cold facts of science and I will make life successful, whereas the man whose artistic faculties have been trained as Mr. Knowlton says they should be, would have his life made miserable by the discords and inharmonies that he must inevitably meet. But put science and the appreciation of facts as a basis, then a little æsthetic training is all very well as an embellishment."

The Professor.—"Doctor, I fear you have completely backslided to your old materialistic position which you formerly used to hold."

Dr. Roberts.—"If I have I certainly think I have reason and fact on my side this time. Let us get to the bottom of this question. Mr. Knowlton proposes to make education of the æsthetic and artistic faculties of the first importance, but what would be the effect among the masses of the people? I fully agree with providing high class entertainments for the masses—picture-galleries, good music, etc. But to give an education such as suggested would but make them more discontented with their lot and increase their unhappiness. What they need is plain scientific teaching and trade schools where they can be trained to become more useful members of society and more competent to earn a livelihood, but not music or art save as a recreation and which I think ought to be provided for them in the shape of public concerts and art galleries by the cities. With the exception of a little singing and drawing when at school to enable them to appreciate this recreation when they grow up, it would be waste of time for them to develop an appreciation of the artistic. Their lot is too hard and all their energies are needed for the stern realities of life."

The Professor.—"That is all very well, and very well put from your standpoint in regard to man's work in the world, but possibly there is another standpoint from which the matter may be viewed."

Mr. Knowlton.—"And perhaps the very discontent which you fear, Doctor, would be just what is needed to lift the masses from their present almost hopeless condition. The discontent from which they suffer now will never cease through mere material means or scientific education, or the making and enforcing of new laws."

The Professor.—"They don't know the cause of their discontent. They think that if they could have money and material comforts they would be happy, but we know very well that these things do not bring happiness. It is the insanity of the age, this pursuit of the phantom of material prosperity, it is this that breeds all the selfishness, all the greed and lust of possession. By regarding physical life as all important, humanity has got off the track, has lost the way that leads to happiness. Material happiness, physical existence, as an end, is a veritable bottomless pit—the more it is sacrificed to, the more insatiable it becomes, the more it demands. The physical life and physical needs must not be neglected, but so long as these are regarded as an end and their gratification as the summum bonum, just so long will ever new needs arise, new forms of poverty, new distress."

Dr. Roberts.—"Professor, you startle me! I hardly know what to say. I cannot conceive how social reform can take place on any other lines than the material."

The Professor.—"It certainly requires courage, it requires first of all philosophy as a basis, to deliberately turn around and put physical existence and material comfort in a secondary place while aiming to develop man's inner faculties. Yet I maintain that this is the only way to bring hope and happiness to humanity. It will, as you say, {564} make them discontented with their lot, but this will be but temporary. It will open for them a door to a higher life which alone through its reaction on the collective mind of humanity will make possible and bring about that active brotherliness which will ultimately remove poverty and distress wherever found."

Mr. Knowlton.—"Isn't it a law of Nature that the problems of one plane can ultimately only be solved by rising to the next higher plane? And it seems to me that this is one of Nature's methods in evolution, to create discontent with the lower by awakening that which is higher, thus creating a craving for the higher and a consequent output of energy to attain it."

The Professor.—"And, it should be added, ultimately making the lower of greater service and a more useful instrument."

Dr. Roberts.—"Granting all this for the sake of argument, how will you proceed to bring it about, for as I have said, this artistic appreciation is more a matter of the imagination than anything else and applies to a realm of which there is, so far as I know, no scientific knowledge and concerning which, consequently, there will be as many opinions and methods of procedure as there are teachers? Look for instance, at the many methods of voice training and all the schools of Art. Where is there any recognized starting point?"

The Professor.—"These are all very pertinent questions, Doctor. But before discussing them let me refer to your remark about imagination. Isn't it worth while to cultivate the imagination? Where would have been all the great discoveries in Science had not our scientific men used their imaginations? The pity is that there has been no training of this faculty, it is almost a terra incognita. But to come to your questions proper. How shall we proceed to awaken and train the love of the beautiful that it may work this miracle of regenerating the human race, for such I believe it will accomplish."

Dr. Roberts.—"One moment, Professor, let me interrupt you here. A little time ago we spoke of the lack of true appreciation of art among many of the so-called patrons of art, but surely that must to some extent be passing away, for nearly all the wealthy and even those of moderate means provide that their children shall have some education in art or music. Even in the public schools an important feature is made of drawing and class singing. Surely all this ought to bring about what you desire if your theory is correct, but for my part I cannot see that it will cause any appreciable change, or in any great degree affect the condition of the masses. I simply wanted to say this before you go further, in order that we might not overlook what is already being done and because I think this supports my position that art and music are all very well for recreation and pleasure but that the main thing to help the people is along what I call practical, material and scientific lines. Only in this way can they be fitted for their work in the world."

Mr. Knowlton.—"You have stated your position very clearly, Doctor, and I now see there were many points I did not cover in my address though some of your objections I certainly did anticipate. However, in the first place it comes down to this. What answer is to be given to the question which the Professor asked and which you have again raised? What is a man's work in the world? What is man? What is his nature? In what does education consist? We have often discussed these questions, Doctor, so now we needn't go into them at any length, for you know very well my position in regard to them, but they come up in a slightly different aspect in relation to the subject in hand. Let us for the moment, then, grant the existence of the inner man, the real {565} man, the man of high imaginations, high feelings, with keen appreciation of harmony and beauty, that something within us which prompts to a deed of self-sacrifice, which feels the joy of helping another and relieving distress. The outer man lives on material food, but for health needs also pure air and sunshine—all these are necessary to animal existence. But the inner man needs something more. There are other states of feeling besides that of physical well-being. There are other powers besides the physical or even the mental. It is no mere effect of the imagination that beautiful music or harmony of form and color awaken in response certain harmonies in the soul and it is just in this way that true art may be made a vital educative factor."

The Professor.—"A man's true work in the world is the soul's work, and true education is that which enables the soul to fulfil its destiny and make manifest its own nature. True education is therefore that which will draw out the soul's own powers. If this were done the rest of our life would all fall into its proper place."

Dr. Roberts.—"But as I have said, even granting that, it is all vague. Where and how will you begin? Have you any science of the soul's powers and how to awaken them? What more would you have than is already being done in the way of art education?"

The Professor.—"It is just because there is a science of the soul's powers that more should be done, and lovers of art have sought and striven for this for centuries. But the time had not come. It has come now and this renaissance of the soul's powers is already heralded by the Revival of the Lost Mysteries of Antiquity."

Dr. Roberts.—"What! do we have to go to the ancients for this? I acknowledge all the culture and art of the Greeks, but I am not one of those who puts Greek civilization above ours."

The Professor.—"It is not a question of giving the palm to either ancient or modern civilization. Our civilization marks one stage of development but in it we have lost something that the ancients had. There is something lacking from our lives. We have developed our physical senses and physical and mental powers to a marvellous degree but there are not that harmony and serenity in our lives which alone can give true happiness. The key to these was in the Mysteries whereby man was brought face to face with the essences of things and his own inner nature."

Dr. Roberts.—"How can these Mysteries be revived—so little is known of them and you yourself speak of them as lost."

The Professor.—"Lost only to the world at large, but they have never been wholly lost. There have always been some in the world to whom has been entrusted the sacred wisdom and through whom it has been handed down from age to age."

Here some of the members began to make a move towards departure and as it was quite late it was decided to resume the discussion at the next meeting when it was expected Madam Purple would be present.

FRAGMENT—OMNISCIENCE.

BY ADHIRATHA.

In the "Key to Theosophy" of H. P. B. there are some allusions to the omniscience of the real man within everybody. Not grasping the meaning, I once had a conversation with Madame Blavatsky on the subject, and I must confess that at the time I was not any wiser for it. I thought what a good thing it would be if instead of passing hours and hours on the solution of a problem, one might simply ask the real man, who knowing all, would tell you at once all about it. I must confess that I had some doubt about the real man knowing all, and I asked Madame Blavatsky to explain. I am sure that she tried to awake my understanding, but at that time it was all a beginning, and young Theosophists felt then (as they do sometimes even now) proud, when they knew the Sanskrit names of the seven principles and a few more strange sounding words.

I thought: Omniscience is knowing all, which of course must comprise everything and every problem, and the hardest mathematical nut will be child's play for the real man to crack—if H. P. B. is right!

Now if we but change intonation and instead of knowing all, say knowing all, we shall get a little step nearer the standpoint from which the question looks more attackable. The question turns first about that much abused word "knowledge." We generally think it to mean the conviction or even certainty, that under given conditions of things some unavoidable result took place, and will take place anew when those conditions will re-occur. A doctor knows that for a certain illness, the name of which implies a certain condition of the human body, a certain remedy will reëstablish other conditions called health. An engineer knows by experiment and calculation, that a certain form of structure under given loads will have to resist such and such forces in its divers parts, and then he lodges his material in such a way, that no part gets too much and no material gets too little anywhere, which he can only do approximately. But all this is not real knowledge and neither the doctor nor the engineer knows what that thing is he is dealing with and how its molecules feel.

Real knowledge has nothing to do with apparent knowledge, and it is useless to ask the real man within to write out the development of a mathematical problem for you. But when it comes to the application of such a mathematical solution whereby one tries to get a certain insight into nature, then it may be said that the real man has that insight into nature without passing by the tedious way of a mathematical investigation.

What science tries to find out, that the real man is already, and he knows without a shade of doubt that which science strives at but never reaches. That essence which constitutes the real man, which has passed through all the kingdoms below man, which we find specified in every human being as the monad, clothed in different garbs so as to appear distinct, that essence knows all about everything we can think of, and that part of the Universe which we can think of constitutes the omnia for man. Having had the experience of all the kingdoms below us, the monad knows them, and our all, as far as human nature is concerned, is that of which we are able {567} to think; therefore it is right to say, that the real man knows that which the ordinary man comprises under the term "all," and even more, because the all for the man of the present day is less than the all of those who served to clothe the monad at some earlier periods. It thus seems to me that the object of the development of the thinking principle is not to arrive at a better knowledge of nature, but to arrive at some knowledge in a certain way, which way has to be learnt during certain periods of evolution. Discrimination has to be learnt, and if one will learn how to avoid a wrong way, he must pass it first, or else it would remain unknown to him. It seems a strange thing that man has to incarnate so many times during millions of years in order to develop the thinking principle, and after having developed it, abandon it as a wrong way. But is it not the same with the evolution of all the principles in Cosmos? Has not all to be gone through? Has not every plane of consciousness to give way to another? We call them higher or lower—but what about such terms? This is no loss, it is a momentary necessity for a certain purpose of divine law, and although less in one sense we gain and go forward in another, and pass where we have to pass. This must not be misunderstood, and we must not say: Very well, I have to develop intellect, and I shall do it, and shall not care for real knowledge which will all come in time. This is sophistry. Through our will and endowed with the thinking principle we have to regain that knowledge which gradually has become latent while Manas had to be developed, or else we shall never regain it. Thus we have to work with ardent aspiration towards our highest ideals along the lines of nature and divine law; thus we keep balanced, and while doing every one of our daily duties, we inwardly live a life of spirituality and in consciousness divine.

FORM OR MATTER.

BY W. E. GATES.

From the old darky who preferred a railway wreck to one at sea, because in the former "you'se thar," to the leaders of science, the earth has been the symbol and type of permanence and solidity. Science has yielded one of these characteristics to force, in positing the conservation of energy, but it has never felt quite sure just where to place force in the ultimate analysis of things. Of matter however it has always felt sure—matter was a fact, there has always been just so much in the universe, and always will be just that much and no more or less. Of this matter, to whatever extent its mechanical subdivision or chemical dissociation might be carried, certain fundamental characteristics have been ever alleged—it occupies space and has weight. Weight is a general term, used to denote the attractive force between two bodies of matter, commonly called gravitation. These two may be regarded as primary, certain other familiar properties being only expressions of these under varying conditions. We thus speak of matter as solid and impenetrable, and say that two bodies cannot occupy the same place at one time. We also speak of the chemical affinities of different atoms and of the cohesiveness of masses of matter, both forms of attractive force.

We also say that this matter possesses, or more strictly is, substance—that is, it is self-caused and self-sustaining. That it is objectively real—indeed the most real conception we have.

We have finally one very important concept, that of form, whose relation to matter is most clearly expressed by the statement, matter displays form. Form is a limitation of, or in, space, and may be conceived of apart from matter, but the latter is required for its manifestation to the senses, by, in the little boy's words, "drawing a line around your thinks." We thus, since all aggregations of matter are perpetually changing as to their forms, do not attribute reality to form, but for this so-called impermanence, think of it as the least real thing we know, the very opposite of matter, an incident only of the latter and a very non-entity.

It is worthy however of remark that of these two, matter and form, both absolutely dependent on space for their existence (although not an attribute of this in any way), matter cannot be thought of without form, but form can be thought of apart from matter, as a mere limitation of emptiness. In other words, the idea of form must come before that of matter, and is pre-essential to this. By a purely deductive process this should lead us to question whether essential reality does not lie rather in the concept "form" than in the concept "matter." And a notable confirmation of this is given when we consider a common error of speech. We say "all forms change," and naturally therefore attribute non-essentiality to form; but we really mean to say "matter is continually changing in form"—leaving one form and entering into another. This statement is a correct one, and fully accords with the last word of physics to-day.

Evolution has made it abundantly clear that the most lasting, changeless, adamantine thing in the manifested world is form. Nature grinds the rocks to powder and turns metals to gases in infinitely quicker time and with less effort than she modifies ever so little the forms of manifestation. Form ever recurs {569} and matter—as we know it—again and again obediently fills the outlines.

But as if the deductive argument for the superiority of form over matter in its eternal existence were not enough, inductive science as well is day by day dissolving so-called matter to nothingness, or more strictly, to a mere incident of form, produced to meet the conditions of sense-perception. A physical universe is daily becoming a less proven fact. Gravitation is laid down as a universal material law, notwithstanding that certain facts attendant on cometary bodies had to be thereby incidentally slurred over, but from the Lick telescope we now hear that late observations indicate some other force than gravitation as the dominating one in certain nebulæ. But a blow at the nebular hypothesis rocks the very citadel of the physical theory.

Scientists some time ago postulated and have since by sheer necessity regarded the ether of space as proven to exist. Yet so difficult is it for us to modify the method or form of our apprehension of the world around us that the majority still prefer to work on through the paradox of a material universe, which includes an ether lacking in the fundamental characteristics ascribed to matter. All known matter has weight and obeys gravitation; the ether, by the very theory on which it rests, does neither. The transmission of material phenomena requires a material vehicle, as is not only demonstrated by every day experience, but is necessarily involved in a system holding that all phenomena are but incidents of matter, the one only reality. Nevertheless any material vehicle, however rarified, gives rise to some friction when bodies pass through it, retarding them; the ether does nothing of this. The relative distances between the molecules in the rarest gas are enormous; the ether of science is said to fill all space homogeneously. Science indeed seems to have restored the worship of "Pater Aither," a god outside the material universe, yet within every part of it and supporting it. But they have new names for it all, and in view of the peculiar opaqueness, materiality, which the expressions and forms wherein we do our so-called thinking seem to possess before the Perceiver, they may be forgiven for not recognizing their teaching in Hesiod and Lucian and the Vedas.

The most illuminating suggestion in this whole matter we owe, among physicists, to Lord Kelvin, in his vortex-ring theory of matter. Taking the rings of smoke puffed by a locomotive or a pipe, and making allowances for the friction of the medium in which they revolve, Lord Kelvin found a complete identity in behavior, at every point of comparison he was able to institute, between these rings and the individual atoms into which all matter is held to be divisible. One most significant fact so demonstrated is that such a vortex-ring, once brought into existence, and being free from frictional or any other outside interference to break up its circuit of motion, is eternal and indestructible, an entity in itself. The theory then is that an atom of matter is a vortex-ring in or of ether, set up by some underlying force, and that all the attributes displayed by material atoms are incidents of this vortex mode of motion. Its hardness is the same as the impenetrability of a whirlpool through which a swimmer cannot pass. Its stability is of the same sort as that of the tops, held contrary to gravity by a cord on one end of the axis, so long as they revolve rapidly—a principle utilized to give absolute rigidity to the steering gear of torpedoes. And it is the simplest explanation of atomic affinities to suggest that it is the rate, or coefficient, of vibration (vibration being another name for circuit of activity) which determines the attractive or repellant force we see manifested.

And there is a most curious resemblance {570} in all this to John Worrell Keeley's last theory—that each individual has a dominant coefficient of vibration, which gives rise to and explains all our happy and unhappy associations in life, so that as the newspapers hastened to say, if we only knew how to find this note, scientific inquests beforehand would drive the divorce courts out of business.

The music of the spheres, the thought of individuals as notes in a universal concord are very poetic, but inasmuch as music is the art of harmonic expressive vibrations manifested to sense as sound, there is, if Lord Kelvin, and some others, are right, at least as much hard scientific fact in it all as imagery.

In short, the leading fact of science to-day is plainly, that Nature draws forms which outline and illustrate the underlying realities of evolutionary progress, and these forms are grasped by our sense-perceptions as endowed (by virtue of the self-persistent and destruction-resisting nature given to them by the force that causes them) with the attributes of hardness or impenetrability and mutual attraction. Differently stated, what we call matter is in no sense substance, and the attributes by which we describe it are only the effects produced upon our senses by contact with force-forms, manifesting the life in nature. So that the really substantial thing in life is seen to be form, of which so-called matter is but an incident, apparitional only, and of little reality and no substantiality whatever—a term to express the condition of manifestation.

And what of all this, some one may say. The nature of atoms has only a remote interest to the problems of daily life, save as medicine may be aided by chemical research or stronger ship armor invented by the metallurgist. And as for music and poetry, they are for our entertainment when serious affairs are laid aside. To such there are two answers.

First of all, a world made up of small, hard, ponderable atoms, by some unshown causes arranged in an infinite variety of forms, is a rather hopeless and uninspiring subject of research. It meets admirably the type of mind which delights in dissection, classification and labeling, but if one should be interested to know what it is all about, he might be readily pardoned for the conclusion that it is probably not about anything, and has achieved the purpose of its being in the world when it has been properly catalogued.

But once the substance of things physical is found to consist in units of force, conditioning space—force-forms as we have called them—of diverse characters, the whole universe of matter becomes a wonderful study, radiant with inspiration, for its solution and meaning are enfolded in its every atom, and in the very attributes by which they are manifested to our sense perceptions they hold and declare their message to the Perceiver within. And if each atom is the expression of a unit of force, then so must every composite form be the expression of a harmony of forces, else it could not stand, and so must every event, every scene in our lives and in the history of peoples, every record of the earth, every alphabet, be a harmonic formula, eloquent of the underlying truth, the cause and meaning of life on earth.

Form is the essentiality, reality within gross matter, so-called, manifesting the divine thought, which it sub-serves, while the pseudo-matter of science is left to the place which that, at last approaching the occult teaching, assigns it—but sense illusion.

One other deeply important lesson lies in this recognition of Form as the real of Matter. The bondage of the Soul in matter, its prison-house, takes on a new meaning, and the true nature of the great foe is revealed. For if Form is the great Manifester, so is it also, once we {571} forget that truth, the great Deluder. Just how the soul might get entangled in a world of small hard, material atoms could never be quite clear to us, nor could we see any relation between matter such as this and Soul, which we understood as Consciousness, Wisdom, Thought. The fact of the entanglement was too evident to be denied, but why the soul should fiat itself such a prison house was another inscrutable bit of Providence.

But if the real nature of material substance is seen to be form, the manifester of ideas, it is very clear wherein our bondage lies, for the images produced by our lower minds, the vehicles of the Soul, unless seen in their true light, in very fact bind us tighter than any conceivable matter could do. The children of our thoughts and of the thoughts of the race, in this as in past lives, the formulated ideas, the mental habits, are our prisons, and the only prisons the soul knows. But once this thought-form is given birth to, invested with force from ourselves, it persists a veritable material wall, harder far than one of rocks and iron. We are educated to the use of a certain phraseology, and it is the hardest thing in the world for us to recognize the identical ideas, differently clothed. The idea of separateness, crystallized into a form, a habit (garment, clothing) of thinking, is what stands between us and an actual direct perception of an existing brotherhood and unity. Forms of mental activity are all that prevent our recognizing the meaning of facts when we see them. Scientific discoveries come by nothing in the world but the momentary freeing of the observer's mind from his preconceived views concerning the fact before him, and events are happening in the world every day attention to which would make prophets and gods of every one, if we did not know so much—superannuated rubbish—already.

STUDENTS' COLUMN.

CONDUCTED BY J. H. FUSSELL.

"No one can intelligently pursue the path of Brotherhood without frequent and heavy condemnation of acts, and of persons as revealed in their acts."

"Judge no man."

"Judge the act, not the person."

Is there a reconciliation between the three policies thus indicated? In trying to follow the path of Brotherhood and promote the best interests of our fellows, we make a series of critical judgments. Seeing a cause about to come into operation, we make a judgment as to whether its effects will promote Brotherhood. The usual "causes" are the acts of persons; we judge whether their effects will be satisfactory; deciding No, we condemn such acts, saying, "I regard Smith as acting against the interests of Brotherhood." That is not to say "The motive of Smith in those acts is self-interest." The chief point to be observed in my attitude is that I shall not injure Smith's evolution. Our final judgment concerning most things is compound, and the factors that enter into it are two. These are (1) MY self-originated judgment, (2) the judgment of others, expressed in words, or, more potently, silently, and in the last case subtly infusing itself into my mind and blending with my own proper judgment. The resultant of these two factors is my final judgment. The judgment that Smith arrives at respecting his acts is, therefore, a blend of his opinion and of my opinion respecting their tendency, and it is none the less true even if after consideration of my opinion he rejects it and leaves his own, as he thinks, unmodified. But suppose I strongly think that Smith acts from motives of self-interest. I have made a judgment respecting Smith as well as his acts. Am I wrong? Not necessarily. My mind will become a mirror wherein Smith may see himself and reform. It will induce a self-examination that must be beneficial in tendency. But if my judgment to that effect respecting Smith is consciously or unconsciously colored with personal feeling, that is, if I consciously or unconsciously feel that Smith's self-interestedly based actions may interfere with my personal interests or comfort, then that feeling of potential or actual anger or irritation will tend, not only to darken my judgment but that of Smith, and to excite similar detrimental emotions in him.

No human being can avoid making such judgments as to another. The right counsel of perfection would be, not to avoid them, for the higher we go the more numerous are the people we have to help, and, therefore, preliminarily to judge that intelligent help may be given; but to aim at the exclusion of the personal self from the judgment, making it as lofty as possible. To judge should be to sympathize, that is, to feel like. To judge Smith is to understand him, that is, for a moment to feel as he feels. To compare what I have thus sympathetically ascertained to be his feeling with my ideal of the highest feeling of a judgment on Smith.

Let us throw away fear; learn to know ourselves and others, and unhesitatingly compare with an ideal. That men act wrongly is always from ignorance of even their own real welfare. No judgment should, therefore, contain anger, irritation, {573} or any similar feeling. Bearing that in mind as an ideal, criticism and judgment become duties.

Universal Brotherhood does not necessarily imply either of these. For the purposes of this question we may define Brotherhood as acting towards others in such a way as to help them in their life and development, at the same time regarding them as inseparable units of humanity. Now there may be and are times in the lives of all of us when the condoning of a fault, i. e., the pardon or overlooking of a fault, may be the greatest help. Then again there are times when the outspoken condemnation of a fault—not of a person—may be the one thing needed to help that person.

But Brotherhood is not sentimentality, it is justice as well as compassion, it is that love for the real inner man that is not afraid of hurting the personal man when this is for the sake of principle and actuated by true love. The sentimental condoning of a fault does not help and those who follow a sentimental idea of Brotherhood too often swing to the other extreme and indulge in wholesale and unfounded condemnation, not simply of a fault, but of persons.

Brotherhood is not extreme in either direction. The middle path is the path of Brotherhood, this above all is the path of principle—the path of the principle of love and the principle of justice. If we apply to our conduct the injunction: "do unto others as ye would they should do unto you," we shall not go far wrong.

True it is that our responsibility increases as our knowledge increases and as the knowledge of the physician and surgeon may require him to amputate a limb or give temporary pain in order to save the patient's life, so every true man is a physician and surgeon, first in his own life and then in the lives of others. On the other hand, the true physician will often draw away the mind of the patient from his sickness or disease, and how often can we not help a failing brother by apparently ignoring a fault and calling out the nobler side of the nature!

If we are true to the better side of our own natures we shall soon learn in what true Brotherhood consists. But no one can be a true Brother to another who is afraid to apply the knife to his own failings, or who is not honest in his own endeavors. We students may make mistakes in our acts of Brotherhood, but if we keep in the light of the soul and keep our motives pure the realization of Brotherhood will not be far distant.

Whence arises the sense of duty? In what does it originate?

It is above all things requisite that the expression of great ethical or moral or religious principles should be universally applicable. That is to say, they should take the simplest form. Most of our religious divisions are the result of an endeavour to make a local or special condition a standard to which all must conform. Great moral principles are as adaptable and as elastic (and no more) in their own sphere, as great physical principles. The laws of gravitation, cohesion, and the other great forces set duties for material objects to which the perfection of their evolution enables them to respond. But circumstances alter cases. A piece of ice will fall to the ground if dropped; if released at the bottom of a pail of water it will rise to the top; no further. The duty of the ice in one case is to fall; in the other, to rise.

In the region of the soul duty is understood usually to be the sense of moral obligation.

We are told that duty is what we owe. It is to be remembered that when we have done all we are unprofitable servants. The talent hid in a napkin was duteously safe. But there is a higher duty to Him who gathers where He has {574} not scattered. What is due is, in fact, greater than what we owe. The educative and evolutionary quality of our experience depends upon this. And it is here that the distinction between the higher and lower duty may be found. It is a principle in chancery law that he who seeks equity must do equity. Similarly those who desire to ascend or progress must fulfil all the lower stages of growth and be free of what they owe before they can undertake the rendering of their due. Renunciation also begins here. The old story of the servant, forgiven a large debt, and turning on his fellow and debtor illustrates this. The ceremonial law of the Jews for example, was an educative force in the direction of insuring the recognition of those in authority, crude symbols of the divine. Our modern taxes and tariffs have precisely the same educative effect as the tithes and offerings of old, the modern method reaching a more practical result.

There is a Principle or Power in the Universe which provides for all creatures. It is generally known as Providence. It is called God and Karma and the Law. When men consciously ally themselves with this Power they also become Providers. They learn that it is more blessed to give than to receive. They also learn which is the river, the water or the banks that confine the water. The promptings of evolution, of the Kumara, the immortal One that ensouls a man and makes him divine, carry him forward along the line of least resistance. It is the business of the river to reach the ocean, not to break down the banks. All this implies action, and the formation of character. While Fohat is in manifestation, duty means to act, to do. To do justice, to love mercy, to walk humbly before the inner god. To love that Holy One with all the heart and mind and strength, and to see in one's brothers the same object of devotion is to conform to the will of the Higher Self. Duty on the lower levels of life is a means for the development of the lower manas or brain mind.

Let us dissect away certain overgrowths which obscure this point. Obedience to duty is often only conscious, half conscious, or unconscious fear of the consequences of neglect. A child who has burned his finger thereafter dreads the flame, and the dread persists when the memory of the burn has died out of his practical consciousness. Many honest people do not steal because they retain an unconscious memory of the disgrace attending a revealed theft in childhood or in a previous incarnation. Fear, hope of reward or commendation, these two, whether conscious or existing in their effects as the fixed habit of performance, must be eliminated as inspirers of action before we can see how much remains. It is possible that with most of us not much of the pure golden sense of duty would remain in the bottom of the crucible.

Actions whose performance is a duty are not always unpleasant. For instance, to eat is a duty, because at a proper time the Law, manifesting as hunger, demands it.

The Law arises twofold; outwardly it manifests as circumstance, presenting at every moment a tangled maze of paths of which any one may be selected; internally as the impulsion to select one particular path of these many. In his spiritual thought, the inner man has already traversed that path. In outer fact it remains for the terrestrial man to imitate in the concrete. The sense of duty is the reflection in the outer consciousness of this picture of action existing in the inner, which picture, in the inner world, is action. It may be dimly or brightly mirrored, the sense of duty weak or strong; its concrete imitation may be effected or not, duty done or not.

YOUNG FOLKS' DEPARTMENT.
A CHRISTMAS STORY.

BY M. S. L.

It was a big toy shop in West Twenty-third Street. There were crowds of people hurrying by, for to-morrow would be Christmas Day and all those who had children to love were busy buying presents. The shop windows looked very gay indeed.

There were all sorts of toys you could imagine. Lots of new mechanical toys, steam engines that ran on a real track, dancing bears and a cat which played the fiddle. In the middle of the window was a tiny fir tree all lit up with colored lights and its boughs covered with gay ornaments. Santa Claus was there, too, and on his back he carried a pack from which came a stream of candy and toys.

All these things pleased the little boys and girls very much. There were a number of them out shopping with their parents. The boys admired the mechanical toys, but the little girls went straight to the other shop window where there were oh, such a lot of dolls! China dolls and wax dolls; dolls from Germany and dolls from France; dolls that could say "Mamma," "Papa," and others that could even sing a little song and say "Now I lay me." The finest doll was a young lady who had just arrived from Paris. Mademoiselle Fifine had brought with her a trunk of fine costumes and some of these were spread out beside her in the window, to the great admiration of the other dolls. There were pink silk frocks and blue satin ones; hats and bonnets trimmed with real lace and ostrich feathers, and, in fact, all sorts of nice clothes for evening wear and morning wear, and all occasions.

Away down in a corner of the big window were two little dolls that nobody noticed at all, and this was strange, for they were really very pretty; but I suppose they were unnoticed in such a crowd of fashionable dolls. One of these two was a little lady straight from Japan, and the other was a New York District Messenger Boy. The Japanese doll was dressed in a lovely gown of purple silk all covered with yellow butterflies. Her hair was done up in a shining black coil on the back of her head and was all stuck through with tiny jewelled pins. In her tiny hand she carried a paper fan. The little messenger boy stood very proudly beside her. He wore a suit of dark blue clothes and on his head was a little cap such as the New York boys wear; he carried a black book in his hand and looked very alert, as though he were just about to deliver a telegram to you.

These two from the corner of the window all day had watched the people passing up and down the busy street. That is, the Japanese doll had watched the passers by, but the Messenger Boy had watched her more than anything else. He thought she was the oddest and prettiest little lady he had ever seen; her eyes were so black and shiny, her cheeks so rosy and her tiny mouth just like a round red cherry. And then she sat up so gracefully and held her fan with such an air! "She isn't a bit stiff," thought the Messenger Boy, "I believe I will try to make friends with her." So he cleared his throat and said "ahem!" The Japanese Lady gave a tiny jump. You see, she was so surprised! Then she gave a shy look at {576} the Messenger Boy and twirled her little fan. She saw that the Messenger Boy was about to speak to her and this pleased her very much, for the other dolls in the window had treated her with contempt and snubbed her because she was a foreigner. Even the French Doll had refused to be friendly, and this was rather odd, because she was also a foreigner. But she said the Japanese Doll was outlandish and had no style about her. The Japanese Lady was too polite to make any rude remarks in answer, so she had just remained silent.

She now began talking to the Messenger Boy and they soon became fast friends. So satisfied were they with each other's society that they quite forgot the rude dolls.

It began to grow late in the afternoon and now very few children passed by. But there were more big people than before; they passed into the shop and soon the dolls began to go from the window. Mademoiselle Fifine went and most of the pretty dolls followed. Nobody seemed to want the Japanese Lady or the Messenger Boy, but they did not mind that at all, for they were quite content to be together. The Japanese Lady had described to the Boy all the beautiful things she had seen in far away Japan, while the Boy had told her in return of some of the wonderful sights to be seen in the big city. They grew very confidential, and at length their affection became so firm that they vowed to remain true friends as long as they were dolls, which was another way of saying as long as they lived.

I have said that almost all the children had gone home because it was getting late, and now the electric lamps were lighted, but there were still four little girls who were looking in the gay window on Twenty-third Street. Two of them were nicely dressed and their bright faces peeped out from warm furs. They looked so full of joy that it made your own face beam in return. Their nurse was with them and they were out doing their Christmas shopping.

"We've bought most all the presents we mean to give to-morrow, and now we can each spend our very own two dollars," said Bessie.

"Yes," answered her sister Alice, "Wasn't it nice in Uncle Frank to give us each two dollars to spend. It's much nicer to buy your own present, I think."

They were looking in the window of the toy shop as they spoke and both little girls at once spied our two friends in the comer of the window.

"I am going to buy that dear little Japanese doll," said Bessie.

"And I want that cute little Messenger Boy," said Alice.

The Japanese Lady and the Messenger Boy looked very happy at this, for they thought it would be very nice to go to live with two such dear little sisters. So they smiled and nodded at Bessie and Alice, but the little girls never saw it. This was not strange, for they had never heard that all the dolls come to life on Christmas Eve.

Now all the time the two small sisters had been admiring the dolls, there were two other children who were looking at them just as eagerly, but who were very different in appearance from Bessie and Alice. For these children were very poor indeed and did not expect to have any doll at all on Christmas morning. They lived away down in East Fourteenth Street with their big sister. Their mother and father were dead and the only one they had to take care of them was this good big sister who loved her two little sisters very dearly and did all she could for them. They all lived together in two little rooms, and Maggie, who was ten, did all the housekeeping, while Annie, who was eight, helped her as much as she could. They had just been to the great department store where the big sister worked and had left some supper for her, because this night she would have to work until half-past eleven.

{577} They were now on their way home, but although they were very cold and shivered through the thin garments they wore, they had to stop to see the beautiful dolls.

"Oh, jest look at this little doll in the purple dress, ain't she grand! See the little yeller butterflies all over her! I wisht I could have her for Chrissmus," said Maggie.

"I'd ruther have the little boy in the blue suit," answered Annie. "He looks jest like a fair messenger boy. Ain't he cute?"

And the two children pressed their faces against the window in profound admiration of the wonderful dolls. After a while they moved away.

In the meanwhile Bessie and Alice with their nurse had entered the toy shop. After admiring the various things each purchased the doll she liked best. These were carefully done up by the salesman and the two children started for home.

They were at the corner of Broadway and about to cross for a cable car when Bessie caught sight of our two little Fourteenth Street children.

"Oh, nursie, do let us see those two poor little girls. They don't look as though they were going to have any Christmas at all!"

"Never mind them, Miss Bessie, it's time you were home."

But Bessie would not be persuaded and Alice seconded her. "Mother likes to have us kind to our poor little brothers and sisters," said she, "please nurse, let us speak to those little girls." So the nurse rather reluctantly consented and the two children hurried and soon caught up with Annie and Maggie.

"How do you do," said Bessie, all out of breath. "Please, wouldn't you like to have a Christmas present? We are going to have a whole lot of presents to-morrow and we bought these with our very own money. Please take mine," and she thrust her package into surprised little Maggie's arms.

"And please do take my present," said Alice, going to Annie. "Indeed, I will have a lot more," and she handed her package to the astonished little girl.

"We wish you a happy Christmas," said the little girls in one voice, and before Maggie and Annie could speak, they had both hurried away.

To say that our children were astonished, hardly expresses it. They hugged their bundles and stood on the sidewalk staring after the two little girls as though bewildered. Maggie was the first to recover.

"Oh, aint it too good to be true, we'll have a real Chrissmus, now, won't we?" What kind little girls them was, wasn't they? They wasn't a bit stuck up!"

"No, indeed!" answered Annie. "I'm so s'prised I don't know what to do."

But it was growing cold and the two children were forced to hurry along. They did not say much as they hastened through the crowded streets but their hearts were dancing with joy. When they at last reached home they rushed up the long tenement stairs and stopped in the hall before their door. "Let's go to bed right now without opening our bundles," said Maggie, "and then to-morrow morning we can wake up and have a s'prise jest like we wuz rich children!" Annie agreed to this and the two children were soon fast asleep in their small bed in the cold dark room.

On Christmas morning two children in a beautiful home on Madison Avenue were dancing around their nursery full of happiness over the lovely presents that had been made ready for them during the night. They had so many gifts that they never missed the two presents they had given to the poor little sisters the night previous, until suddenly Bessie clasped Mademoiselle Fifine in her arms and said:

"Oh, you dear French dollie, you are very beautiful, but I do not think you {578} are nicer than the sweet little Japanese doll I saw in the shop window last night!" How Mademoiselle Fifine would have liked to turn up her tiny aristocratic nose at this, but she couldn't.

And Alice said, "Do you know, sister, it seems to me that this is the loveliest Christmas we have ever had."

"I think it must be because we know that somewhere in this city there are two little girls who are having a Christmas treat because of us."

"It is quite true what mother taught us, that 'It is more blessed to give than to receive.'"

Down in East Fourteenth Street two little sisters had slept all night cuddled close together for warmth. Bright and early they waked up on Christmas morning and Maggie's first words were:

"Annie, do you know I dremt that the little Japanese doll we saw in the toy store wus in my bundle."

"That's queer, for I dremt that the messenger boy was in my package!"

Then Maggie got her package and sat up in bed, carefully undoing the wrappings of paper, until, at last, smiling before her lay the little Japanese Lady!

And Alice opened her parcel, and, when the last paper had carefully been removed, there was the Messenger Boy all ready to say "How do you do!"

How very happy our two little girls were! They got out of bed very softly, so as not to disturb big sister, who was very tired from her night's work, and they danced around the cold room, hugging their dollies and kissing each other and the dollies indiscriminately.

"This is the very bestest Chrissmus I ever had," said Maggie, at last.

"I only hope the two little rich girls have as nice a one," added Annie.

"I'm very glad we came here, aren't you?" softly called out the Messenger Boy to the Japanese Lady.

"Yes, indeed," replied she. "I'm sure these dear little girls will love us very much."

"And we are not separated," said the Messenger Boy.

The Japanese Lady did not reply to this, but she smiled very sweetly and twirled her little fan.

BROTHERHOOD ACTIVITIES.

UNIVERSAL BROTHERHOOD ORGANIZATION.

Universal Brotherhood or the Brotherhood of Humanity is an organization established for the benefit of the people of the earth and all creatures.

This organization declares that Brotherhood is a fact in nature.

The principal purpose of this organization is to teach Brotherhood, demonstrate that it is a fact in nature and make it a living power in the life of humanity.

The subsidiary purpose of this organization is to study ancient and modern religion, science, philosophy and art; to investigate the laws of nature and the divine powers in man.

This Brotherhood is a part of a great and universal movement which has been active in all ages.

Every member has the right to believe or disbelieve in any religious system or philosophy, each being required to show that tolerance for the opinions of others which he expects for his own.

The Theosophical Society in America is the Literary Department of Universal Brotherhood.

The International Brotherhood League is the department of the Brotherhood for practical humanitarian work.

The Central Office of the Universal Brotherhood Organization is at 144 Madison Avenue, New York City.[4]

THE INTERNATIONAL BROTHERHOOD LEAGUE.[5]

(Unsectarian.)

"Helping and sharing is what Brotherhood means."

I.B.L.

This organization affirms and declares that Brotherhood is a fact in Nature, and its objects are:

1. To help men and women to realize the nobility of their calling and their true position in life.

2. To educate children of all nations on the broadest lines of Universal Brotherhood and to prepare destitute and homeless children to become workers for humanity.

3. To ameliorate the condition of unfortunate women, and assist them to a higher life.

4. To assist those who are, or have been, in prison, to establish themselves in honorable positions in life.

5. To endeavor to abolish capital punishment.

6. To bring about a better understanding between so-called savage and civilized races, by promoting a closer and more sympathetic relationship between them.

7. To relieve human suffering resulting from flood, famine, war, and other calamities; and generally to extend aid, help, and comfort to suffering humanity throughout the world.

It should be noted that the officers and workers of the International Brotherhood League are unsalaried and receive no remuneration, and this, as one of the most binding rules of the organization, effectually excludes those who would otherwise enter from motives of self-interest.

{580} None of the officers hold any political office, the League is not connected with any political party or organization, nor has it any political character, it is wholly humanitarian and unsectarian.

The alterations referred to in last issue of Universal Brotherhood as about to be made in Headquarters are now nearly completed. The offices of the different departments have all been renovated presenting a very bright and cheerful appearance.

The rooms formerly used by the Theosophical Publishing Company have been fitted up for the private office of our Leader and for the Reference Library and Reading Room and for the office of the Literary Department of the Universal Brotherhood Organization.

The Theosophical Publishing Company has moved downstairs to the front basement and to the front office on the main floor (in the front part of Aryan Hall) which hitherto was used by our Leader for her private office.

In every way the new arrangements will greatly facilitate the work of the various departments.

We are all delighted to have with us now as Mother of the household, Mrs. L. E. Kramer, who with her husband, J. O. K. Kramer, and her son Ernest Kramer have brought such a home feeling into Headquarters that we are like a happy, united family.

On December 15, 16, 17, the H. P. B. Lodge, U. B. No. 10, held a bazaar in Aryan Hall. It was throughout very successful and the entertainments on Thursday and Saturday evenings were much enjoyed. The members of Aryan Lodge united with the H. P. B. members in helping with the preparations and during the Bazaar. A large hamper of goods was sent from Meriden, Conn., which had been contributed by members in Meriden, Hartford and New Britain; a contribution of articles was also sent from Buffalo; these were very much appreciated.

The H. P. B. Lodge is now entirely free from debt and enters upon the New Year with fine prospects of success. Lately several new members have joined the Lodge; these are active young workers and are enthusiastic to help the Cause.

Several of the small articles left over from the Bazaar were sent down to the East Side Mission where a Christmas Tree is to be given to the children. Mrs. Kramer, Mrs. Deen Hunt, and Bros. Leonard and Hecht are busy making preparations for this, and it is being looked for to with great expectations by the children.

A Bazaar was also held December 15 and 16 by the U. B. Lodges in Boston in one of the largest and best halls, centrally located on Tremont Street, the main business street of the city. It was one of the most successful events of the kind held this year in Boston and has brought excellent financial results.

In accordance with suggestions made some months ago by our Leader in this magazine, the Sioux City Lodge of U. B. held a Bazaar with excellent results. Part of the proceeds were taken for local work and part sent to the Central Office for the general work of the organization. If all Lodges would carry out work of this kind, how they could build up their local work and also help the Centre! Some of the other Lodges have reported work in this direction, but we have not yet received details.

A concert was recently given in Providence, R. I., for the benefit of the War Relief Fund of the I. B. L. It was well attended and successful.

Frank C. Berridge of Victoria Lodge, B. C., writes Dec. 13th:

"We are having a Brotherhood concert here to-night and think it will be a great success. We have started a Lotus Circle here at last and have ten children already. We are to give them a Christmas Tree on New Year's Day. The Sunday evening public lectures are well attended and we are getting along nicely in Victoria."

Lodge 70, U. B. (Chicago), held an entertainment Dec. 14th and realized a good sum for the War Relief Fund. Bro. A. M. Smith writes: "Everything moves along well here. Our members are very united and have fullest confidence in and sympathy with the Leader. Our meetings are very well attended."

Letters from Dr. J. A. Anderson and Bros. Griffiths and Johnson give favorable accounts of Lodge work in San Francisco, and of both the U. B. and the I. B. L. meetings. Several new members have recently joined. The whole coast is looking forward to the U. B. Congress at Point Loma.

{581} Bro. Beckett sends good news from Toronto. All the members are active and desire to still further aid the work and add to the success and solidarity of the movement.

The members of Universal Brotherhood will remember that soon after the last Convention of February 18th some of the members of the Narada Branch of the Theosophical Society in America, Tacoma, Wash., who did not accept the Universal Brotherhood Constitution brought suit against the Tacoma U. B. Lodge to obtain possession of the property of the Lodge. The case was non-suited and dismissed. They then carried the case to the Supreme Court of Washington, and we have just received copy of the judgment as follows:

Per Curiam:—

"The parties to this action were all, prior to March 3, 1898, members of the Narada Theosophical Society of Tacoma, a branch of a national organization known as the Theosophical Society in America. This local branch was an independent body, controlling its own property and governing itself subject to the right of appeal to the executive committee of the national body upon any disputed questions arising between the members. The object of the present suit was to recover possession of certain property of the local society, the appointment of a receiver and other relief, the action being mainly based upon an alleged interference with the property rights of the plaintiffs as members of that Branch, and their rights as members in various respects. At the close of plaintiffs' case, on the evidence, a judgment of non-suit and dismissal was granted and the present appeal is from that order and judgment.

We think the order was properly made. Section 18 of the By-Laws of the National Society is as follows: "The Executive Committee shall be the Court of final appeal in disputed questions arising between members or in and between branches." It is not pretended that any effort was made by the plaintiffs to have the questions involved in the present dispute determined by the committee mentioned in that section, and it is a well-established principle applicable to controversies like the present that until the members have exhausted their remedy within the society the Courts will not assume jurisdiction of the controversy.

Oliver v. Hopkins, 10 N. E., 776;

Lafond v. Deems, 81 N. Y., 507;

Chamberlain v. Lincoln, 129 Mass., 70;

Watson v. Jones, 13 Wall, 679.

Appellants seek to justify their failure to resort to the committee contemplated by section 18, supra, upon the ground that that section was in effect abolished by the action of the national convention at a meeting in Chicago in February, 1898, which practically adopted a new constitution. We think the argument advanced does not meet the objection. Plaintiffs are contending that the action of the national convention was invalid, and if they are right in that respect the constitution and by-laws of the old body are still in force. They have no standing if such is not the fact, and if it is, then the remedy provided by section 18 would appear to be ample. But it does not appear that any effort has been made to obtain within the Society a determination of the grievances, and even were it admitted that the effect of the action of the national convention was to abolish the old constitution, it in nowise follows that the by-laws theretofore adopted would also become ineffectual. Section 18, supra, having been adopted for the government of the national body and its branches, must be given effect until it is repealed either expressly or by necessary implication. So that we think the learned trial judge was right in concluding that the Court should not take jurisdiction of the case.

We think that we are right, too, in concluding that plaintiffs' evidence was insufficient to establish any interference with their rights as members to the enjoyment of the property, books, records, etc., of the local branch. In other words, plaintiffs failed to show that their rights as members had been invaded. There was evidence by the officers of the local branch tending to show that a conclusion had been reached by them not to enforce the obnoxious resolutions previously passed, and that they construed {582} them to be invalid. For these reasons we must conclude that the judgment was right and we do not deem it proper to attempt at this time to determine whether the action of the national convention was in effect an amendment of the old constitution and invalid because adopted without previous notice to the local branches, or the adoption of a new constitution which retained the spirit and essence of the old and included no new provisions inconsistent with it and therefore within the right of the convention. At present an opinion upon that important question would be at most mere dictum."

On December 23d we were very glad to welcome back to America Brother A. E. S. Smythe, of Toronto. Brother Smythe has been for some time in Ireland and brings excellent and most encouraging reports of the work there and in England. Arrangements have been made for him to take a lecturing tour and visit the Universal Brotherhood Lodges, reaching Point Loma at the time of the annual Universal Brotherhood Congress. He will be in New York about January 1st and will stay at Headquarters for a week or so and then start on his tour. Brother Smythe is so well known throughout the country as Editor of the Lamp and by his work in Toronto that he needs no introduction to the members. Many have already heard him lecture and will remember him at the annual conventions. Those Lodges who desire him to visit them should write at once to the central office, so that the route can be laid out and all arrangements made.

It was originally intended and hoped that Bro. D. N. Dunlop would have made a lecture tour, but as he would not be able to start until later, other arrangements had to be made.

Letters from Liverpool report a very large Bazaar being held there by the members. It is confidently expected that it will meet with much success and much interest has been aroused in it. Bro. Herbert Crooke has been indefatigable in pushing forward the preparations and Mrs. A. L. Cleather and Bro. Basil Crump who have just completed their Home Crusade visit to Dublin will be there to help. A very beautiful and attractive programme has been arranged.

Bro. Parsons in Vancouver, B. C., writes that the members are expecting a big step forward for the work as a result of the U. B. Congress at Point Loma next April.

At Buffalo on the occasion of the performance of "Eumenides," some of the Headquarters Staff had the pleasure recently of meeting Dr. and Mrs. McAlpin of Warren, Pa. Their energies and interest in the work are unabated, and on his way back Bro. McAlpin lectured in several places.

The Greek Play "Eumenides" was given in Buffalo in the Music Hall, Dec. 3d, in the afternoon and evening. Both performances were very successful. There were large and very appreciative audiences, many well-known educationalists being present and afterwards expressing their appreciation. After the performance our Leader was waited upon by several prominent people and congratulated on the work of the Isis League of Music and Drama. Since returning to New York our Leader has received a personal letter from one of the Ministers of Buffalo expressing his pleasure at witnessing the performance which he said was characterized by moral uplifting force and of more value than a sermon.

A very interesting letter has been received from Bro. St. Clair of New Zealand in regard to work among the Maories. These people have made a great advance during the past two years. The different tribes have united under their king and are reviving the ancient customs of the race. Many are becoming interested in Brotherhood work and evidence on every hand is perceived that the race is awakening to a new life.

STANDARD THEOSOPHICAL LITERATURE.

BROTHERHOOD
NATURE'S LAW.
BY
BURCHAM HARDING.

DIRECTORY OF UNIVERSAL BROTHERHOOD LODGES.

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