London Lectures of 1907 by Annie Besant (books to read for beginners txt) 📖

so far as it recommends itself to his reason and his intuition. And that is all the man need do--study. All this knowledge is spread out for you freely: you can take it, if you will. The Theosophical Society, which spreads it broadcast everywhere, claims in it no property, no proprietary rights, but gives it out freely everywhere. The books in which much of it is written are as free to the non-Theosophist as to the Theosophist. The results of Theosophical investigation are published freely that all who choose may read. Everything is done that can be done by the Society to make the whole thing common property; and nothing gives the true Theosophist more delight than when he sees the Theosophical teachings coming out in some other garb which gives them a different name, but hands them on to those who might be frightened perhaps by the name "Theosophy." And so, when we find a clergyman scattering broadcast to his congregation Theosophical teaching as Christian, we say: "See, our work is bearing fruit"; and when we find the man who does not label himself "Theosophist" giving any of these truths to the world, we rejoice, because we see that our work is being done. We have no desire to take the credit of it, nor to claim it as ours at all; it belongs to every man who is able to see it, quite as much as it does to anyone who may call himself "Theosophist." For the possession of truth comes of right to the man who can see the truth, and there is no partiality in the world of intellect or of Spirit. The only test for a man's fitness to receive is the ability to perceive; and the only claim he has to see by the light is the power of seeing.

And that, perhaps, may explain to you what some think strange in our Society--we have no dogmas. We do not shut out any man because he does not believe Theosophical teachings. A man may deny every one of them, save that of human brotherhood, and claim his place and his right within our ranks. But his place and his right within our ranks are founded on the very truths that he denies; for if man could not know God, if there were no identity of nature in every man with God, then there would be no foundation for our reception of him, nor any reason for welcoming him as a brother. Because there is only one life, and one nature, therefore the man who denies is God, as is he who affirms. Therefore each has a right to come; only the one who affirms knows why he welcomes his brother, and the one who denies is ignorant, and knows not why he has a right within our ranks. But those of us who try to be Theosophists in reality, as well as in name, we understand why it is that we make him welcome, and it is based on this sane idea, that a man can see the truth best by studying it, and not by repeating formulæ that he does not understand. What is the use of putting a dogma before a man and saying: "You must repeat that before you can come into my Church"? If the man repeats it not understanding it, he is outside, no matter how much you bring him in; and if he sees it, there is no need to make that as a portal to your fellowship. And we believe, we of the Theosophical Society, that just because the intellect can only do its best work in its own atmosphere of freedom, truth has the best chance of being seen when you do not make any conditions as to the right of investigation, as to the claim to seek. To us, truth is so supreme a thing that we do not desire to bind any man with conditions as to how, or where, or why, he shall seek it. These things, we say, we know are true; and because we know they are true, come amongst us, even though you do not believe them, and find out for yourself whether they be true or not. And the man is better worth having when he comes in an unbeliever, and wins to the knowledge of the truth, than is the facile believer who acknowledges everything and never gets a real grip upon truth at all. We believe that truth is only found by seeking, and that the true bond is the love of truth, and the effort to find it; that that is a far more real bond than the repetition of a common creed. For the creed can be repeated by the lips, but the seeing of truth as true can only come from the intellect and the spirit, and to build on the intellect and the spirit is a firmer foundation than to build on the breath of the lips. Hence our Society has no dogmas. Not that it does not stand for any truths, as some people imagine. Its name marks out the truth for which it stands: it is the Theosophical Society; and that shows its function and its place in the world--a Society that asserts the possibility of the knowledge of God; that is its proclamation, as we have seen, and all the other truths that grow out of that are amongst our teachings. The Society exists to spread the knowledge of those truths, and to popularise those teachings amongst mankind. "But," you may say, "if it be the fact that you throw out broadcast all your teachings, that you write them in books that every man can buy, what is, then, the good of being a member of the Theosophical Society? We should not have any more as members than we have as non-members." That is not quite true, but it may stand as true for the moment. Why should you come in? For no reason at all, unless to you it is the greatest privilege to come in, and you desire to be among those who are the pioneers of the thought of the coming days. No reason at all: it is a privilege. We do not beg you to come in; we only say: "Come if you like to come, and share the glorious privilege that we possess; but if you would rather not, stay outside, and we will give you everything which we believe will be serviceable and useful to you." The feeling that brings people into our Society is the feeling that makes the soldier spring forward to be amongst the pioneers when the army is going forth. There are some people so built that they like to go in front and face difficulties, so that other people may have an easier time, and walk along a path that has already been hewn out for them by hands stronger than their own. That is the only reason why you should come in: no other. Do not come to "get"; you will be disappointed if you do. You can "get" it outside. Come in to give, to work, to be enrolled amongst the servants of humanity who are working for the dawn of the day of a nobler knowledge, for the coming of the recognition of a spiritual brotherhood amongst men. Come in if you have the spirit of the pioneer within you, the spirit of the volunteer; if to you it is a delight to cut the way through the jungle that others may follow, to tread the path with bruised feet in order that others may have a smooth road to lead them to the heights of knowledge. That is the only advantage of coming in: to know in your own heart that you realise what is coming, and are helping to make it come more quickly for the benefit of your fellow-men; that you are working for humanity; that you are co-workers with God, in making the knowledge of Him spread abroad on every side; that you are amongst those to whom future centuries will look back, thanking you that you saw the light when all men thought it was dark, and that you recognised the coming dawn when others believed the earth was sunk in midnight. I know of no inspiration more inspiring, of no ideal that lifts men to greater heights, of no hope that is so full of splendor, no thought that is so full of energy, as the inspiration, and the ideal, and the hope, and the thought, that you are working for the future, for the day that has not yet come. There will be so many in the days to come who will see the truth, so many in the unborn generations who will live from the hour of their birth in the light of the Divine WISDOM. And what is it not to know that one is bringing that nearer? to feel that this great treasure is placed in your hands for the enriching of humanity, and that the bankruptcy of humanity is over and the wealth is being spread broadcast on every side? What a privilege to know that those generations in the future, rejoicing in the light, will feel some touch of thanks and gratitude to those who brought it when the days were dark, to those whose faith in the Self was so strong that they could believe when all other things were against it, to those whose surety of the divine knowledge was so mighty that they could proclaim its possibility to an agnostic world. That is the only reason why you should come into the vanguard, that the only reason why you should join the ranks of the pioneers. Hard work and little reward, hard words and little praise, but the knowledge that you work for the future, and that with the co-operation of Deity the final result is sure.


Part II


The Place of Phenomena in the Theosophical Society

Spiritual and Temporal Authority

The Relation of Masters to the Theosophical Society

The Future of the Theosophical Society

Four Lectures delivered to the Blavatsky Lodge, London, on 13th and 27th June, 4th and 11th July 1907.

The Place of Phenomena in the Theosophical Society

I have taken for these four lectures, confined to members of the Theosophical Society, four subjects of great interest to ourselves, and in dealing with them I propose to ask you to look at them from a wide standpoint rather than a narrow one, and to consider the Theosophical Movement and the Theosophical Society, not as an isolated movement or Society, not as a separate thing, but rather as one of a series of spiritual impulses, like to its predecessors in its nature, interested in the same questions, and subject to the same conditions as those that preceded it in time.

We find, looking back over the history of the past, that great spiritual impulses occur from time to time, and each of these in the past has founded a new religion, or stamped some marked change in a religion already existing. The spiritual impulse that brought to birth the Theosophical Society is to be thought of as of the same nature as those which founded one religion in the world after another. And if we regard it in this way we can sometimes, looking at the whole succession of such movements, recognise certain definite principles working in all of them, and then apply those principles to the movement of our own time. And this seems to me to be a wiser and saner way of regarding the Theosophical Society than looking upon it as unique and isolated. Certainly it is more easy to see our way in the solution of difficult problems of our own time, if we regard these problems as