by Sax Rohmer
“The time came when I was blessed with a visit from one of these Mahatmas in my own room at New York — a visit from him, not in the physical body, but in the f double,’ or Mayavi-rupa... from that moment I had a motive to live for, an end to strive after. That motive was to gain the Aryan wisdom; that end to work for its disse ruination.”
One cannot wonder that such a meeting led to great things. Madame Blavatsky was said recently to have completed a course of occult study extending over a period of seven years, “in a Himalayan retreat”; but the remarkable knowledge there imparted to her nevertheless unfitted her for the affairs of the mundane world. In Colonel Olcott she found an ideal partner, and the Theosophical Society was founded. Its objects were as follows:
(1) — To form the nucleus of a Universal Human Brotherhood.
(2) — To study Aryan literature, religion, and science.
(3) — To vindicate the importance of such inquiry.
(4) — To explore the mysteries of nature and the latent powers of man.
These views met with a ready acceptance in America, and branches of the Society were also formed successfully in England and elsewhere. Thereupon Madame Blavatsky repaired to India, in order to establish lodges among the natives. Here, many grave blunders were committed.
Unfamiliar with the peculiar social conditions of British India, she found English residents looking askance at her by reason of the fact that she openly courted native society. Furthermore, her nationality led the authorities to suspect that she was an agent of the Russian Government! She discovered herself subjected to a galling system of espionage.
Madame Blavatsky’s indignation was very great and very real. One can sympathize with this daughter of the Russian ruling class — of the class wont to direct, rather than to suffer, political surveillance. She made public protest, thereby but intensifying the European dislike for her methods. The sympathy of the natives alienated that of the residents. In short, by reason of her nationality, her temperament, and her American views, she daily transgressed that code of good form which, iron-bound, governs Anglo-Indian society. Whilst no longer suspected of political motives, she was voted “impossible,” which is the sigil of social leprosy.
Recently, American ideas have changed, and the bonhomie of the United States citizen has lost something of its catholicity. He has recognized the dangerous kinship of the yellow races; and to-day American society is as exclusive to the yellow as it has ever been to the black. The inner significance of caste is as keenly appreciated in New York as in Calcutta.
But, since 1879, thirty-five years have left their mark upon history; and a nation may grow wise in thirty-five years. It was not until 1880, when Madame Blavatsky visited Simla, that she began to reconcile her American training with her Indian environment. One assumes that the wisdom of Tibet does not concern itself with social conditions.
She now re-approached her task in the right spirit and from the right direction. At last, the real woman was recognized; but such a ban as that which, earlier, had been put upon her, is not shortly broken down. European sympathy was not wholly withheld, yet the fighting spirit of the woman kept her eternally under arms. Capitulation was foreign to her nature; she must ever be duelling.
Real enemies she had in plenty, led by the press; but she was cursed with that failing common to all of her temperament, an inability to distinguish friend from foe. So she needs must wound one truly devoted to her, while bestowing the kiss of friendship upon another who carried a knife in his bosom.
“No... Columbus in chains for discovering a new world,” says A. P. Sinnett, “or Galileo, in prison for announcing the true principles of astronomy, is more remarkable for those who know all the bearings of the situation in India, as regards the Theosophical Society, than the sight of Madame Blavatsky, slandered and ridiculed by most of the Anglo-Indian papers, and spoken of as a charlatan by the commonplace crowd, in return for having freely offered them some of the wonderful fruits — as much as the rules of the great occult association permit her to offer — of the life-long struggle in which she has conquered her extraordinary knowledge.”
III. INDIAN PHENOMENA
Some of the phenomenal feats recorded of Madame Blavatsky during her sojourn in Allahabad and elsewhere are worth recalling. Due recognition of our own ignorance is the first essential step toward wisdom, for only he who knows himself a fool can hope to become a wise man. Any consideration of such a career as this, or as those dealt with in earlier chapters, can be nothing but a feckless waste of time on the part of one who is already determined that his views are inexpansible. The marvels recorded of Madame are chiefly of interest to me because (unlike those of the Arabian romancers) they may have been performed; I must confess that I have encountered no really acceptable evidence disproving their authenticity.
Her explanation, that the Masters were governed by certain natural laws just as lesser men are governed, and that some of the miracles demanded by sceptics were as much above the power of Koot Hoomi as they were above her own, I regard as reasonable. That the Adepts had no wish to attract candidates for initiation by an exhibition of wonders is also an acceptable statement, I think. I shall ask you to bear these points in mind; for, as Mr. A. E. Waite has said, theosophy “is certainly worthy of study — and they are wise who suspend their judgment till the time for judgment arrives.”
The mysterious rapping, which, apparently, she had power to control, was a phenomenon trivial enough in character, but far from trivial if produced as she claimed it to be produced. The “singing” of a kettle is not a sensational happening, but it demonstrates the existence of a force which has revolutionized the world!
Unlike the rapping which is heard at the spiritualistic séance, these raps could be produced at will, in any place, and at any time. She could produce them upon a table, a window-pane, a door, or even upon a person’s skull.
“Another very satisfactory way of obtaining the raps — one frequently employed in the evening — was to set down a large glass clock-shade on the hearthrug, and get Madame Blavatsky, after removing all rings from her hands, and sitting well clear of the shade, so that no part of her dress touched it, to lay her hands on it. Putting a lamp on the ground opposite, and sitting down on the hearthrug, one could see the undersurface of the hands resting on the glass, and still, under these perfectly satisfactory conditions, the raps would come, clear and distinct, on the sonorous surface of the shade.”
But even more satisfactory was her production of raps upon a table which she did not touch in any way and which no one else was touching. The latter experiment, we are told, was performed a number of times and with a number of tables which could not possibly have been prepared by the operator. I find myself in agreement with the writer who says:
“Her conversation and her book, Isis Unveiled, disclosed a view of things which we naturally desired to explore further; and it was tantalizing to feel that she could, and yet could not, give us the final proofs we so much desired to have, that her occult training really had invested her with powers over material things of a kind which, if one could but feel sure they were actually in her possession, would utterly shatter the primary foundations of materialistic philosophy.”
A picturesque demonstration of Madame’s powers is related of her during her stay at Benares, in a house belonging to the Maharajah of Vizianagram. The party were seated in the central hall one evening after dinner, when suddenly three or four roses fell in their midst! We perceive the possibility of trickery, of course, at once; but in the absence of proof must also concede the possibility of the phenomenal.
Here I may refer to the “astral bell” which occasioned so much comment. This was a clear, silvern note, or succession of notes, which sounded in the air around and about the High Priestess of Theosophy. It was said to be a mode of communication between Madame and the “Brothers.” Whilst the sound was sometimes produced under conditions which by no means excluded the possibility of deception, at other times the bell
was heard under circumstances which, examine as closely as we may, defy explanation. Thus, in the Occult World, we read how Madame Blavatsky was, on one occasion, leaning on a balustrade, “and looking over the wide sweep of the Simla Valley; she remained for a few minutes perfectly motionless and silent... and the night was far enough advanced for all commonplace sounds to have settled down, so that the stillness was perfect. Suddenly, in the air... there sounded the clear note of an occult bell.”
I shall not deal here with the letters from the Mahatma Koot Hoomi phenomenally delivered to Mr. A. P. Sinnett. His path is strewn with split infinitives, but, saving this slaughter of the innocents, I have no particular fault to find with the correspondence of the Mahatma. Transcriptions may be found in Mr. Sinnett’s book, to which I shall also refer inquirers for the account of the famous recovery of Mrs Hume’s lost brooch. Mr. Sinnett writes as a disciple of Madame Blavatsky, and I prefer to take my facts from a more hostile chronicler, for, strangely enough, her enemies have done more to show her as she claimed to be than have her friends.
IV. “A MODERN PRIESTESS OF ISIS”
In 1884 Madame Blavatsky left India and came to Europe. She lived for a time in the Rue Notre Dame des Champs, Paris, and amongst those whom she attracted to her at this time was a compatriot, Μ. V. S. Solovyoff — her harshest critic, and the man who seems to have been directly instrumental in breaking up the French Theosophical Society (the “Société Théosophique dOrient et dOccident”).
I cannot hope to portray Madame as she was at this period so skilfully as M. Solovyoff has portrayed her. His articles originally appeared in the Russky Vyestnik, and were translated for and published by the Society for Psychical Research, under the title A Modern Priestess of Isis. Let us accompany him to his first audience at the Rue Notre Dame des Champs.
“The door opened,” he says, “and she was before me; a rather tall woman, though she produced the impression of being short, on account of her unusual stoutness. Her great head seemed all the greater from her thick and very bright hair, touched with a scarcely perceptible grey, and very slightly frizzed — by nature and not by art, as I subsequently convinced myself.
“At the first moment her plain, old, earthy-coloured face struck me as repulsive; but she fixed on me the gaze of her great, rolling, pale blue eyes, and in these wonderful eyes, with their hidden power, all the rest was forgotten.
“I remarked, however, that she was very strangely dressed, in a sort of black sacque, and that all the fingers of her small, soft, and as it were boneless hands, with their slender points and long nails, were covered with great jewelled rings.”
Following some conversation touching the Masters, Madame quitted the room for a few minutes, in order, she said, to tell Babula, her Hindu servant, to prepare her dinner. Upon her return, M. Solovyoff was treated to a manifestation of the astral bell, and it is interesting to compare his account with that of Mr. Sinnett:
“She made a sort of flourish with her hand, raised it upwards, and suddenly, I heard distinctly, quite distinctly, somewhere above our heads, near the ceiling, a very melodious sound like a little silver bell or an Æolian harp.”
I am not aware that any explanation, covering all the facts, anent this bell device has ever been advanced. Even if a purely mechanical trick, it was a trick difficult to explain. And what does M. Solovyoff say? He inquires: “Why was the sound of the silver bell not heard at once, but only after she had left the room and come back again?”
With all deference I submit that a conjurer so clever as he would have us believe Madame to have been was the last person in the world to have forgotten to wind up her apparatus!
On the same occasion, M. Solovyoff made the acquaintance of Mohini, a “chela” of the Mahatma (or Master) Koot Hoomi.
“He seemed to be not more than from twenty-five to twenty-seven years of age. His figure, which was narrow-shouldered and not tall, was clad in a black cashmere cassock; his thick, blue-black wavy hair fell to his shoulders. The upper part of his bronzed face was strikingly handsome — a wise forehead, not very high, straight eyebrows, not too thick, and most magnificent velvety eyes, with a deep and gentle expression.... It was only his nose, straight but too broad, and his thick, dark blue lips, projecting through a not over-abundant growth of moustache and beard, which prevented his being perfectly beautiful. In any case his appearance might be considered very attractive, and several female hearts in Asia and Europe could tell tales of the beauty of this young apostle of the newest theosophy.”
M. Solovyoff returned to his rooms with a somewhat confused impression. His various ideas refused to become reconciled. “As for her silver bell,” he says, “that looked like a trick....” Yet two days later he enrolled himself in the theosophical ranks and was initiated there and then. The initiation over, he shortly departed, experiencing “a longing to get out at once into a purer atmosphere.”
These being his sentiments, I should like to ask, if the question be permissible, with what object M. Solovyoff joined the organization.
The Paris lodge would seem to have met with but little success. Charles Richet came to inquire, as did Camille Flammarion, but neither would appear to have been deeply impressed. Colonel Olcott joined Madame Blavatsky in France, and M. Solovy off has given us the following sketch of him, fine in its lines as a Toledan blade, double-edged, too, and cruelly sharp as any scimitar ever swung within the Alcazar.
“And I saw the ‘colonel,’ Madame Blavatsky’s trusty companion and fellow-labourer, the president of the Theosophical Society. His appearance produced on me at once a very favourable impression. He was a man of fully fifty years of age, of medium height, robust and broad, but not fat; from his energy and vivacity of movement he looked anything but an old man, and showed every sign of great strength and sound health. His face was handsome and pleasant, and suited his bald head, and was framed in a full and perfectly silver beard. He wore spectacles, somewhat concealing thereby the one defect of his appearance, which none the less was a real ‘spoonful of tar in a barrel of honey!’ The fact is that one of his eyes was extremely disobedient, and from time to time used to turn in all directions, sometimes with startling and most disagreeable rapidity. As long as the disobedient eye remained still, you had before you a handsome, agreeable and kindly, but not particularly clever man, who won you by his appearance and inspired you with confidence. Then suddenly something twitched, the eye got loose and began to stray suspiciously and knavishly, and confidence vanished in a moment.”
Although I hold no instructions on behalf of Colonel Olcott, and am innocent of any desire unjustly to pillory M. Solovyoff, I feel constrained to mention that I have never before met with a case of paralysis of the motor oculi adduced as evidence of moral turpitude!
V. THE MAHATMA MORYA
During the second half of this eventful summer, Madame Blavatsky having gone to London, we find M. Solovyoff “flooded with... rarities, curiosities, and unexpected finds” in mystic literature, from the bookshops of the Quartier Latin and the stalls on the Quai-de-Louvre.
He read Isis Unveiled, and considered it to be a huge sack, into which the writings of Eliphas Lévi, SaintIves, Franck, and others had been thrown haphazard. Then, apparently as a relief from overwork, “on a hot August day, the 24th, new style,” he left Paris to join Madame in Elberfeld, whence she had proceeded from London.
At Brussels he broke his journey, and met Miss A., a proselyte of the new theosophy. From this hour to that of their arrival at Elberfeld, they were subjected to certain manifestations which at the time neither seem to have doubted to proceed from some source controlled by Madame. M. Solovyoff’s sleep was disturbed, and at about eight o’clock on the following morning he received a note from Miss A. saying that she, too, had passed a sleepless night; “a sort of invisible struggle had been going on about her... and all her keys were lost.”
“Send for a locksmith,” suggested M. Solovyoff.
“I have sent.”
In due
course the locksmith appeared, and opened the lady’s portmanteau. “In the portmanteau was a bunch of keys, and on the bunch the key of the portmanteau itself!”
Having decided to catch the one o’clock train, M. Solovyoff “suddenly began to feel an unusual weakness, and a desire to sleep.... I begged Miss A. to excuse me,” he writes, “went to my own room, and threw myself on the bed. However, I did not fall asleep, but lay with my eyes closed — and there before me, one after the other, passed, quite clear and distinct, various landscapes which I did not know.
This was so new to me, and so beautiful, that I lay without stirring, for fear of interrupting and spoiling the vision. At last all became misty, little by little, then grew confused, and I saw no more.”
He opened his eyes. The sensation of weakness, together with the desire for sleep, had passed; and, returning to Miss A., he described in detail, with all the accompanying circumstances, his vision or series of visions.
They proceeded to the station and took their seats in a coupe of the train. The journey had but just commenced when the lady, looking out of the window, exclaimed:
“See! Here is one of your landscapes!”
“The effect,” says the writer, “was almost painful. There could be no doubt about it, just as I could not doubt that this was the first time I had ever travelled by this line or been in this region. Until it grew dark, I continued to gaze in reality upon all that I had seen... as I lay on the bed with my eyes closed.”
