Theos-Talk Archives (April 2005 Message tt00091)

May 3 2005

Dear Friends:
Perhaps the following will assist in understanding the position of
THEOSOPHY 

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Chapter I
THE THEOSOPHICAL MOVEMENT (1875 - 1925)

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1.	CHANNELS OF THE THEOSOPHICAL MOVEMENT

In its larger aspect the Theosophical Movement is the path of progress,
individually and collectively. Wherever thought has struggled to be free,
wherever spiritual ideas, as opposed to forms and dogmatism, have been
promulgated, there the great Movement is to be discerned. Organized
religions, systems of thought, governments, parties, sects - all have their
origins in efforts for the better co-operation of men, for conserving energy
and putting it to use. They all in time become corrupted and must change, as
the times change, as human defects come out, and as the great underlying
Spiritual and Intellectual evolution compels such alterations.

LUTHER'S REFORMATION

Luther's Reformation must be counted as a part of the Theosophical Movement.
Masonry has played a great and important part in it, and still does to some
extent, for however restricted in application, however its great symbolism
may have been forgotten or obscured, Masonry none the less stands for
tolerance, for religious and intellectual liberty, for charity. 

THE AMERICAN REPUBLIC

The formation of the American Republic with its noble Declaration of
Independence, its equality of all men before the law, its ideals of
brotherhood and freedom from sectarian religious partialities must be
accounted a great forward step in the Theosophical Movement. And with the
abolition of human slavery in all the great Western nations during the
course of the nineteenth century, another great step in the emancipation of
the race must be acclaimed. The "divine right" of an orthodox God speaking
through [2] a vested clergy was rebelled against in every voice raised
against the Catholic hierarchy. 

THE DIVINE RIGHT OF KINGS OVERTHROWN

The "divine right" of kings was overthrown by the American and French
Revolutions. The "divine right" of one man or set of men to enslave another
or others was the real issue involved in the American Civil War, and the
emancipation of the serfs in Russia. Nationalism, socialism, universal
suffrage, struggles between classes, between labor and capital, are all
physical and metaphysical efforts toward freedom from bondage, however they
may be mistaken, misguided, misled, perverted to selfish and destructive
purposes and ends.

INTELLECTUAL FERMENTATION

The principle of an underlying Spiritual and Intellectual evolution
proceeding apace with its visible manifestation in physical effects, will
disclose unerringly that the formation of the Society and the injection of
the literature of Theosophy into the mind of the race must have been
preceded and accompanied by collateral efforts and resultants. Those
indirect preparations must necessarily be as varied as the varieties of
human experience and belief regarding fundamental things. And those
preparations do not issue in the first instance from any human invention or
discovery, although the characters of certain individual human beings can be
and must be the channels, conscious or unconscious, for the play of higher
forces and the inspiration of higher Intelligence. 

The course of all evolution is first Spiritual, then Mental, then Personal
to certain gifted individuals. From these latter it permeates gradually the
race mind, impelling the whole mass forward and upward, in however slow or
slight degree. "Evolution" appears as physical only to those who do not look
beneath the surface of events. The real process of Nature is ever cyclic:
from the highest to the lowest on the invisible side of Nature;
correspondingly from the lowest to the highest on the visible side, as human
vision is at present exercised in the fields of religion, philosophy and
science.

ORIENTAL RELIGIONS AND PHILOSOPHIES

Indirect but none the less potent and necessary concomitants of the
spiritual and psychical aspects of the Theosophical Movement should
therefore be looked for [3] in all directions. One of these was and is the
great tide of interest in Oriental religions and philosophies. Until the
work of Madame Helena Petrovna Blavatsky was well under way none but the
conqueror, the merchant, the missionary and the philologist, each immersed
in his own especial objects, had any concern with the Far East. The mass of
the populations of the Western world were farther removed from the living
East with its immense but alien wealth of metaphysical acquisitions, than
from the dead and by-gone stores of ancient Greece and imperial Rome.
Generally speaking, it was unknown and unsuspected that the great leaders of
early European civilization, no less than their modern successors, had in
fact derived their inspiration and their learning from the exhaustless
treasury of Oriental thought and practice.


BHAGAVAD GITA 

Beginning with Wilkins near the close of the eighteenth century, a series of
translations of the ancient and venerated "Bhagavad-Gita" had successively
been brought out in England, in Germany, in France and in the United States.
The riches of the Vedanta philosophy had thus to some extent become
accessible to aspiring minds in the West. Copies came into the possession of
Thoreau and Emerson. 

Emerson's fame as a lecturer and writer and the nobility of his character
made of him one of the most potent vehicles for the dissemination of the
great and timeless ideas of the East. Through his life and work countless
younger minds were given a freer range and truer basis, and by so much freed
from the sterile and narrow dogmas of sectarian Christianity. Religion was
seen by many not to be confined nor due to sects or special revelations. The
celebrated "Brook Farm Community" spread far and wide transcendental
aspirations and increased the thirst for freedom from the bondage of
prevailing ideas.

LIGHT OF ASIA - LIFE OF THE BUDDHA

Sir Edwin Arnold's "Light of Asia" was published in 1879, and read by
hundreds of thousands in Europe and America. Myriads of minds gained for the
first time, some true idea of the noble ethics and philosophy of Buddhism,
and were amazed to find that for centuries antedating the time of Jesus his
moral teachings had been [4] imparted in their plenitude, coupled with a
philosophy unknown to the Christian world at anytime. Scholarly men began to
give some heed other than purely scholastic to Oriental experience as
embodied in its age-old literary remains. 

Despite the general contempt for "heathen" people and the exclusiveness of
ignorance that had so long obtained, Western explorers began in earnest to
adventure in search of the hereditary metaphysical possessions of the
Orient, much in the same fashion as other Western adventurers had long
exploited by conquest or by theft the physical treasures of the sacred East.
Wilson's translation of the "Vishnu Purana" and Dr. Max Muller's edition of
the "Sacred Books of the East," were part of the fruitage thus made
accessible in the West.

DARWIN

When Charles Darwin's great work, "THE ORIGIN OF SPECIES BY MEANS OF NATURAL
SELECTION," appeared in 1859, a powerful voice was raised against the deeply
imbedded ideas of miracle and special creation by an omnipotent personal
God, as engraved by centuries of dogmatic theologies. Mr. Darwin's work was
not intended as an attack either on revealed religion or the dead-letter
creeds, but was limited to the presentation of an immense accumulation of
ascertained facts in natural history, and to the submission of inferences
drawn with inescapable logic from the facts thus far amassed. 

It was perhaps the most brilliant example in history of sustained inductive
reasoning. It showed and proved physical man to be no "special creation,"
but an evolutionary part of the "natural order of things." "THE ORIGIN OF
SPECIES," and its supplement, "THE DESCENT OF MAN," published in 1871, were
purely scientific works in the best sense of the term. The "Darwinian
theory" was received by the educated world with profound interest, followed
by a tidal wave of revulsion as its bearing and effects upon current
Christian dogmas and interpretations of the Bible were perceived. It was
attacked on every hand and its author was subjected to every form of
ridicule, slander and calumny that religious bigotry, ever the most fertile
in malice and malevolence, could invent. 

Nevertheless, [ 5 ] as scientific students verified its compilations of
physical facts and tried conclusions with its logic, the theory gained
headway in spite of all the storms of opposition. Its author lived to see
his facts admitted, his conclusions accepted and adopted in whole or in
part, even by his detractors. 

Corrupted and grotesquely distorted as the Darwinian theory has been in the
intervening years, and however limited in its view of "evolution" from the
standpoint of Occult philosophy, it none the less remains to this day the
greatest advance in scientific hypotheses since the time of Newton, and
aided largely in making possible the presentation of the triple evolutionary
scheme outlined in the "SECRET DOCTRINE." 

Whatever the defects of the Darwinian theory, they are due to no lack of
honesty, zeal nor industry on the part of its great author, but rather to
the limitations of his mode of research and to the inherent defect of all
inductive reasoning. So immense has been the effect of the Darwinian theory
of evolution on the ideas prevailing without question a generation ago, that
it is very difficult for the average mind of today to realize how this
theory of physical evolution could ever have been questioned, denied,
opposed, vilified.

ANTICIPATING THE FUTURE

In his "History of Civilization in England," a work foremost among the
contributory factors we are discussing, Mr. Henry T. Buckle sums up these
lessons of the past which, in our opinion, are equally a prophecy of the
future of Theosophy and the Theosophical Movement, however unconscious Mr.
Buckle may have been of the immense reach of the spiritual and intelligent
Agencies at work behind the scenes of human life. In the first volume of his
work, which appeared in 1857, Mr. Buckle writes (p. 257):

"Owing to circumstances still unknown there appear from time to time great
thinkers who devoting their lives to a single purpose are able to anticipate
the progress of mankind, and to produce a religion or a philosophy by which
important events are eventually brought about. [6]

But if we look into history we shall clearly see that, although the origin
of a new opinion may be thus due to a single man, the result which the new
opinion produces will depend on the condition of the people among whom it is
propagated. If either a religion or a philosophy is too much in advance of a
nation, it can do no present service, but must bide its time until the minds
of men are ripe for its reception.... Every science, every creed has had its
martyrs. According to the ordinary course of affairs, a few generations pass
away, and then there comes a period when these very truths are looked upon
as common-place facts, and a little later there comes another period in
which they are declared to be necessary, and even the dullest intellect
wonders how they could ever have been denied."

KARMIC CYCLES AND HUMAN THOUGHT -- ADEPTS

The student of Theosophy knows that the "circumstances still unknown" to Mr.
Buckle, but which he intuitively recognized to exist, are in fact due to the
Karmic provision of Spiritual and Intellectual evolution. Under Karmic Law,
at transitional periods in the cyclic progression of Humanity, great Adepts
restore to mankind through both direct and indirect channels some of the
Wisdom once "known," but which in the lapse of time has become lost or
obscured during the complexities of physical and personal evolution. For it
must not be overlooked by the student that these Elder Brothers are
themselves a part of the very stream of evolution in which we belong. As
such, They take an active, albeit undisclosed and but too often unperceived,
share in the government of the natural order of things. And although this
part of the operation of cyclic law is often delayed and defied by the
ignorance and prejudice of mankind in general, each rise and fall of
civilizations is succeeded by a regeneration and further progression.

GREAT ADVANCES IN DISCOVERY AND INVENTION

Other constructive factors in the preparatory work of the Theosophical
Movement in our time may be seen in the great and sudden leap (from the
standpoint of racial [7 ] and national cycles) in invention, discovery,
trade, the means and methods of transportation, manufacture, and utilization
of all the raw materials in Nature - all making in one way and another for
inter-dependence, inter-communication, inter-respect in the great human
family, and the consequent breaking down of the barriers of Nature, of human
insularity, and separateness: a harrowing of the soil, whether by the means
of war or peace, as a necessary prelude for once more sowing in that soil
the seeds of Brotherhood. And in the political field the great careers of
Abraham Lincoln, of John Bright, of Mazzini, and many others, all made for
the Rights of Man, as opposed to the forces of reaction.

ICONOCLASTIC IDEAS IN SOCIAL ORDER

In an iconoclastic sense an equally necessary and valuable pioneer work in
the breaking of the molds of fixed ideas into which human thought forever
tends to crystallize, can be discerned in the work of such men as Robert G.
Ingersoll in America, Charles Bradlaugh in England, and, in the church, by
such men as Charles Kingsley and W. E. Channing. Whether apparently pursuing
the path of agnosticism, of a purely socialistic and materialistic altruism,
or of a liberalized orthodoxy, the efforts of all these commanded a wide
following and broke to a large extent the hold of bigotry and intolerance. 

MODERN PHILOSOPHY AND INDIVIDUAL FREEDOM 

Philosophical speculations like those of Herbert Spencer, the esthetic
spirit of men like Ruskin, the rebellious mind of Carlyle, the
insubordination to the harrow of conventional ideas of writers like Dickens,
George Eliot, Balzac, Tolstoy, Walt Whitman, and many others, all aided in
the pioneer work of the Theosophical Movement. 

They may all be said to have fought for the unrestricted domain of the
individual conscience, the larger outlook upon human life and human duty, as
opposed to the ipse dixit of any "thus saith the Lord." All these individual
and collective factors, some, perhaps, dimly conscious of the germinal force
at work within themselves, others aware only of the travail without issue of
human existence - all were of value. 

CREEDS STIFLE INDIVIDUAL CONSCIENCE

All that in any way has made, or that makes, possible the arousal of serious
attention to the Second and Third Objects of the Parent Theosophical [8]
Society, all that facilitates the revolt of the mind and conscience from
creedal exclusiveness, all that might turn men from the sordid materialism
of a one-life existence devoted to the pursuit of physical well-being -- all
this is truly a concurrent part of the Theosophical Movement, and necessary
to any attempt at the, practical realization of its First Object --
Universal Brotherhood, the life of service as opposed to the life for self.

The ideas represented by such terms as revealed religion, a favored people,
a personal God, miracles, heaven gained by an "act of faith," a "vicarious
atonement," selfish personal salvation - the fetters forged by many
centuries of ecclesiastical usurpation of authority over the ignorant mind
and conscience: all these veritable Bastilles of moral and mental tyranny
were under assault or siege during a large part of the nineteenth century.
Their lettres de cachet no longer sufficed to imprison or outcast the
individual mind, to forfeit the reputable estate of the individual rebel
against the "established order." 

LIBERATING THE MIND

If the mind of the race could not be said to have been in revolution against
spiritual and mental intolerance, it was none the less true that everywhere
could be found sincere and reverent-minded men in outspoken rebellion
against the dominant and dominating ideas of centuries. The "millennium" of
sectarian religion was drawing to a close. 

Agnosticism, infidelity, bold questioning of the foundations hitherto
esteemed inviolate, were no longer branded with the brand of infamy by the
all-powerful sects, because the sects were no longer all-powerful. A spirit
of liberty, often of license mistaken for liberty, was abroad in Europe and
America. Even in India the Brahmo-Somaj of Ram Mohun Roy and his successors
had begun to undermine the ancient walls of creed and caste.

"SPIRITUALISM" AND LIFE AFTER DEATH

Spiritualism had perhaps more to do than any other single factor in
producing among millions that transitional state of mind into which the
granite ideas of centuries had begun to disintegrate. This Ishmael among
faiths, under many names and proscriptions, is as old as the history and
tradition of the race. In its modern [9] form it began with the mediumistic
manifestations of the Fox sisters at Rochester in New York State, U.S.A., in
1848. In the ensuing twenty-five or thirty years it spread, in spite of the
most relentless opposition of the orthodox Christian sects, despite the
ridicule of scientific students and the incredulity of the general public,
despite also the real or pretended exposures of many of the most noted
mediums, until its believers were numbered by millions in America, England,
France, and in lesser numbers in other countries. 

"MEDIUMS" -- CHANNELING

Most celebrated of the mediums following the Fox sisters were the Americans,
Andrew Jackson Davis, his disciple Thomas Lake Harris, P. B. Randolph,
Daniel Dunglas Home, the Davenport brothers, Henry Slade, Mrs. Emma H.
Britten, and the Eddy brothers. All these were accused of fraud times
without number, and some of them were made the victims of persecution.
Nevertheless, the genuineness, variety and extent of their phenomena were
attested by numbers of famous investigators of the highest character. 

NOTABLE INVESTIGATORS OF "PHENOMENA"

Notable among those who from sceptical experimenters became convinced
believers in the reality of the manifestations were Dr. Robert Hare of
Philadelphia, Epes Sargent, Judge Edmunds, the noted lawyer, Dr. Robert
Chambers, Col. H. S. Olcott, and many other men of mark in America. In
England Profs. William Crookes, Alfred Russel Wallace, Lodge, C. C. Massey,
Lord Borthwick, Lord Lindsay, Sergeant Cox, and other men of the highest
standing accepted the evidences after searching tests. In Germany the famous
Prof. Zollner held prolonged sittings with Slade and others and published
his conclusions and theories in the work, "Transcendental Physics," dealing
with the phenomena as a problem in the "fourth dimension." 

In France the Emperor Napoleon and his wife, and in Russia the Czar and his
consort became the firm friends and followers of Mr. D. D. Home. The Papers
of the Russian savant, Dr. A. Aksakoff, show how profound was his interest
in the new phenomena. Leon-Denizarth-Hippolyte Rivail, author of numerous
popular and educational scientific texts for French [10] schools, became so
interested in the phenomena and so convinced of their value in establishing
communication with discarnate intelligences, that he devoted his entire time
to study and experiments. In order that the prejudices thus aroused should
not interfere with his established writings and reputation he adopted the
pseudonym of "Allan Kardec," by which he is now almost universally known. 

Contrary to the general supposition, Allan Kardec was not himself a medium.
All his experiments were conducted at second hand. He published two books of
enormous circulation, the "Book of Spirits," and the "Book of Mediums," both
of which were translated into English. The French editions alone of "Le
Livre des Esprits" attained a circulation of more than one hundred and
twenty thousand copies in the twenty years following the publication of the
"revised edition" in 1857. It was Allan Kardec who, more than any other,
made systematic efforts to establish a philosophy of Spiritualism from the
communications he obtained through carefully chosen mediums.

The spread of Spiritualism was greatly facilitated by a number of factors.
It required no education, no study, no moral discipline, on the part either
of the medium or the believer. Its phenomena were not essentially
antagonistic to religion, and the communications received more often than
otherwise repeated the platitudes of the churches. In fact nearly every
noted medium or reputable proponent of the phenomena was still more or less
orthodox in his acceptance of the fundamental dogmas of the Christian
creeds. 

COMMUNICATION WITH THE "DEAD"

To the bereaved who might be more or less sceptical or indifferent to
orthodox teachings regarding after-death states, Spiritualism made a
profound appeal, for it offered the prospect of immediate assurance and
consolation. 
To the materialistic and the curious-minded it offered a fascinating subject
for facile experimentation. Nor can it be doubted that in the increasing
dilemma of many, due to the Darwinian theory of physical evolution,
Spiritualism offered an attractive middle ground of experimental evidence
that enabled them, without too great sacrifice of cherished religious [11]
convictions or logical common-sense, both to hold on to hereditary Christian
ideas and to accept the theory of "evolution." And in this compromise many
were doubtless moved by the example of Prof. Wallace, co-originator with Mr.
Darwin of his theory. Prof. Wallace was himself a Spiritualist and a
believer in Christianity, even if not altogether orthodox in his faith.

In a single generation Spiritualism, from being a pariah both as to its
phenomena and its many theories, became almost respectable. 

Modern science, hitherto deaf, dumb and blind towards everything but the
empirical acquisition of physical facts and hypotheses based on them, began,
reluctantly and suspiciously, but still began, to take note of the phenomena
of the metaphysical, which, if true, compelled the admission of other
factors than "force and matter" as the causative agencies of the phenomenal
world. 
But the general attitude of scientific students towards Spiritualism affords
a curious parallel to the attitude of the theologians toward Darwinism:
first derision and contempt, then wholesale denial and opposition, then
grudging acceptance in part.

THEOSOPHY ENTERS THE SCENE

Into this mighty arena of contending forces entered H. P. Blavatsky with her
Theosophical Society and her first public exposition of Theosophy. Looking
backwards from the safe distance of the intervening years, something of the
significance of the mighty struggle between orthodox Christianity and modern
materialistic science, between both these and the changeling, Spiritualism,
can now be discerned in the light of history - a light necessarily denied
all the active combatants except H.P.B. herself. 

That she saw and foresaw what was and was to be, and was herself under no
illusions, is very clearly indicated in the Preface of "ISIS UNVEILED"
alone, without going deeper into the abundant evidences. Bitterly as
theology and science might be opposed to each other with spear and trident,
each was, at the last quarter of the nineteenth century, equally hostile to
the new combatant, Spiritualism, armed with its net of weird phenomena and
strange theories. 

Alone, friendly to all the gladiators, but without a solitary [12]
understanding ally among them, H.P.B. came equipped with an unknown
knowledge and an unknown purpose which must serve her for both sword and
shield. 

It was too much for her to hope, however vast the reconstructive forces
loosed by her in the world of public opinion, that those forces, their
source, their scope and their significance, would be grasped by any but the
very few. Nor did she expect that their effect on the mind of the race would
be altogether and immediately constructive, however beneficent her purpose
might be. Nor could she look for other than a hostile and retardative
reception at the hands of vested and mercenary interests, the ignorant and
the dogmatic, the predantry and contentious. 
Although her aim was to elevate the mind of the race, her method could only
be to deal with that mind as she found it, by trying to lead it on, step by
step; by seeking out and educating a few who, appreciating the majesty of
the eternal Wisdom-Religion and devoted to "the great orphan-humanity,"
could carry on her work with zeal and wisdom; by founding a society which,
however small its numbers might be, would inject into the thought of the day
the ideas, the doctrines, the nomenclature of the Wisdom-Religion.
 
The T M (1875-1925) Pages 1 -- 12 
 
Chapter II

THE PARENT THEOSOPHICAL SOCIETY 


The Theosophical Movement of the nineteenth century was publicly inaugurated
with the founding of the Theosophical Society at New York City.

H. P. BLAVATSKY

By birth a Russian of noble family, Madame Blavatsky had been a wanderer for
more than twenty years in many lands, oriental and occidental. She had twice
or thrice been in the Americas, North and South, before coming to New York
in July of 1873. She lived in retirement there and in Brooklyn for more than
a year. In October of 1874 she journeyed to the Eddy farmhouse near
Chittenden, Vermont, and there made the acquaintance of Col. Henry S.
Olcott.

Col. HENRY S. OLCOTT

Colonel Olcott was an American and had acquired his title in the American
Civil War. He had been agricultural editor of the New York Tribune, had
written many articles for various publications on many subjects, had been
admitted to the bar, and was at the time a well-known lawyer, with a very
wide acquaintance among prominent men. 

For many years he had been a Spiritualist. Interested in an account he had
seen of the manifestations taking place through the mediumship of the Eddy
brothers, he had visited Chittenden in July and written an account of what
he had witnessed for the New York Sun. This article was copied and commented
on in many publications. In September [1874] Col. Olcott returned to the
Eddy place under commission to investigate the phenomena and report on them
to the New York Graphic. It was while he was engaged in this congenial work
that Madame Blavatsky arrived at Chittenden.

Although Madame Blavatsky apparently took no part in the proceedings other
than as a visitor and interested witness, Col. Olcott noted that the
phenomena [14 ] changed greatly in character and variety immediately after
her arrival. He was so impressed by what he saw and by his conversations
with Madame Blavatsky that he followed up the acquaintance after her return
to New York.

WILLIAM Q. JUDGE

At the request of Madame Blavatsky he introduced to her a young lawyer of
his acquaintance named William Q. Judge. Mr. Judge was of Irish parentage,
and had been brought by his family to America while still a boy. From his
earliest years he had been markedly religious in temperament, and, as he
grew older, had delved in religions, philosophies, mystical writings,
Mesmerism, Spiritualism, and kindred subjects. He was many years younger
than either Madame Blavatsky or Col. Olcott, who were born, respectively, in
1831 and 1832, while Mr. Judge's birth date was 1851. Both Col. Olcott and
Mr. Judge became pupils of Madame Blavatsky and passed all their available
time in her company.

DEFENCE OF GENUINE MEDIUMS

In the winter of 1874-5 Madame Blavatsky was in Philadelphia, where she made
the acquaintance of several noted Spiritualists. With them and Col. Olcott
she attended the seances of Mr. and Mrs. Holmes and others. Certain
sceptical investigators having attacked in the press the genuineness of the
Eddy and Holmes phenomena, and questioned the bona fides of any mediumship,
both Col. Olcott and Madame Blavatsky replied vigorously, defending the fact
of mediumship itself, and urging the necessity for impartial investigation
of the claims of Spiritualism, both as to its philosophy and its alleged
facts. This was Madame Blavatsky's first appearance in print in the English
language. The peculiarities of her style of expression, the boldness of her
statements, the apparent range of her knowledge on the subject, all
conspired to attract the attention of Spiritualists, investigators, and the
public generally.

In January, 1875, Col. Olcott's book, "PEOPLE FROM THE OTHER WORLD," was
issued, describing in detail the Eddy and Holmes phenomena, and giving a
curiosity-provoking account of Madame Blavatsky. 

	
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Best wishes,

Dallas
 
===========================
-----Original 
From: M. Sufilight 
Sent: Sunday, April 03, 2005 
To: 
Subject: Business as usual 

Wrote in part: --- "Theosophy is today called a Movement by scholars. And a
number of socalled Theosophist agree on this definition, and sometimes not
without a certain feeling of pride or awe. Theosophy today has since the
beginning in 1875 been divived into various branches. ...Most of them agree
on that Altruism is important. Their level of knowledge about it differs.

Judge writes shortly after Blavatsky's death:

"In the Key to Theosophy, in the "Conclusion," H.P.B. again refers to this
subject and expresses the hope that the Society might not, after her death,
become dogmatic or crystallize on some phase of thought or philosophy, but
that
it might remain free and open, with its members wise and unselfish. "
("Dogmatism in Theosophy" by W. Q. Judge, Path, January, 1892).

This is to me a KEY statement.

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