THE OCEAN
OF
THEOSOPHY

A Definitive Work on Theosophy

By

William Quan Judge

 

William Quan Judge

1851 - 1896

 

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CHAPTER 11

 

 

Karma

 

 

Karma is an unfamiliar word for Western ears. It is the name adopted by Theosophists of the nineteenth century for one of the most important of the laws of nature. Ceaseless in its operation, it bears alike upon planets, systems of planets, races, nations, families, and individuals. It is the twin doctrine to reincarnation. So inextricably interlaced are these two laws that it is almost

impossible to properly consider one apart from the other. No spot or being in the universe is exempt from the operation of Karma, but all are under its sway, punished for error by it yet beneficently led on, through discipline, rest, and reward, to the distant heights of perfection. It is a law so comprehensive in

its sweep, embracing at once our physical and our moral being, that it is only by paraphrase and copious explanation one can convey its meaning in English.

 

For that reason the Sanskrit term Karma was adopted to designate it. Applied to man's moral life it is the law of ethical causation, justice, reward and punishment; the cause for birth and rebirth, yet equally the means for escape from incarnation. Viewed from another point it is merely effect flowing from cause, action and reaction, exact result for every thought and act. It is act and the result of act; for the word's literal meaning is action. Theosophy views the Universe as an intelligent whole, hence every motion in the Universe is an action of that whole leading to results, which themselves become causes for further results.

 

Viewing it thus broadly, the ancient Hindus said that every being up to Brahma was under the rule of Karma. It is not a being but a law, the universal law of harmony which unerringly restores all disturbance to equilibrium. In this the theory conflicts with the ordinary conception about God, built up from the Jewish system, which assumes that the Almighty as a thinking entity, extraneous to the Cosmos, builds up, finds his construction inharmonious, out of proportion, errant, and disturbed, and then has to pull down, destroy, or punish that which he created. This has either caused thousands to live in fear of God, in compliance with his assumed commands, with the selfish object of obtaining reward and securing escape from his wrath, or has plunged them into darkness which comes from a denial of all spiritual life. But as there is plainly, indeed painfully, evident to every human being a constant destruction going on in and around us, a continual war not only among men but everywhere through the whole solar system, causing sorrow in all directions, reason requires a solution of the riddle. The poor, who see no refuge or hope, cry aloud to a God who makes no reply, and then envy springs up in them when they consider the comforts and opportunities of the rich. They see the rich profligates, the wealthy fools, enjoying themselves unpunished.

 

Turning to the teacher of religion, they meet the reply to their questioning of the justice which will permit such misery to those who did nothing requiring them to be born with no means, no opportunities for education, no capacity to overcome social, racial, or circumstantial obstacles, "It is the will of God."

Parents produce beloved offspring who are cut off by death at an untimely hour, just when all promised well. They too have no answer to the question "Why am I thus afflicted?" but the same unreasonable reference to an inaccessible God whose arbitrary will causes their misery. Thus in every walk of life, loss,

injury, persecution, deprivation of opportunity, nature's own forces working to destroy the happiness of man, death, reverses, disappointment continually beset good and evil men alike. But nowhere is there any answer or relief save in the ancient truths that each man is the maker and fashioner of his own destiny, the

only one who sets in motion the causes for his own happiness and misery. In one life he sows and in the next he reaps. Thus on and forever, the law of Karma leads him.

 

Karma is a beneficent law wholly merciful, relentlessly just, for true mercy is not favor but impartial justice.

 

  "My brothers! each man's life

  The outcome of his former living is;

  The bygone wrongs bring forth sorrows and woes,

  The bygone right breeds bliss. . . .

  This is the doctrine of Karma."

 

How is the present life affected by that bygone right and wrong act, and is it always by way of punishment? Is Karma only fate under another name, an already fixed and formulated destiny from which no escape is possible, and which therefore might make us careless of act or thought that cannot affect destiny?

 

It is not fatalism. Everything done in a former body has consequences which in the new birth the Ego must enjoy or suffer, for, as St. Paul said: "Brethren, be not deceived, God is not mocked, for whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reap." For the effect is in the cause, and Karma produces the manifestation of it in the body, brain, and mind furnished by reincarnation. And as a cause set up by one man has a distinct relation to him as a center from which it came, so each one experiences the results of his own acts. We may sometimes seem to receive effects solely from the acts of others, but this is the result of our own acts and thoughts in this or some prior life. We perform our acts in company with others always, and the acts with their underlying thoughts have relation always to other persons and to ourselves.

 

No act is performed without a thought at its root either at the time of performance or as leading to it. These thoughts are lodged in that part of man which we have called Manas -- the mind, and there remain as subtle but powerful links with magnetic threads that enmesh the solar system, and through which various effects are brought out. The theory put forward in earlier pages that the whole system to which this globe belongs is alive, conscious on every plane, though only in man showing self-consciousness, comes into play here to explain how the thought under the act in this life may cause result in this or the next birth. The marvellous modern experiments in hypnotism show that the slightest impression, no matter how far back in the history of the person, may be waked up to life, thus proving it is not lost but only latent. Take for instance the case

of a child born humpbacked and very short, the head sunk between the shoulders, the arms long and legs curtailed. Why is this? His karma for thoughts and acts in a prior life. He reviled, persecuted, or otherwise injured a deformed person so persistently or violently as to imprint in his own immortal mind the deformed picture of his victim. For in proportion to the intensity of his thought will be the intensity and depth of the picture.

 

It is exactly similar to the exposure of the sensitive photographic plate, whereby, just as the exposure is long or short, the impression in the plate is weak or deep. So this thinker and actor -- the Ego -- coming again to rebirth carries with him this picture, and if the family to which he is attracted for birth has similar physical tendencies in its stream, the mental picture causes the newly-forming astral body to assume a deformed shape by electrical and magnetic osmosis through the mother of the child. And as all beings on earth are indissolubly joined together, the misshapen child is the karma of the parents also an exact consequence for similar acts and thoughts on their part in other lives. Here is an exactitude of justice which no other theory will furnish.

 

But as we often see a deformed human being -- continuing the instance merely for the purpose of illustration -- having a happy disposition, an excellent intellect, sound judgment, and every good moral quality, this very instance leads us to the conclusion that karma must be of several different kinds in every individual case, and also evidently operates in more than one department

of our being, with the possibility of being pleasant in effect for one portion of our nature and unpleasant for another.

 

Karma is of three sorts:

 

First -- that which has not begun to produce any effect in our lives owing to the operation on us of some other karmic causes. This is under a law well known to physicists, that two opposing forces tend to neutrality, and that one force may be strong enough to temporarily prevent the operation of another one.

 

This law works on the unseen mental and karmic planes or spheres of being just as it does on the material ones. The force of a certain set of bodily, mental, and psychical faculties with their tendencies may wholly inhibit the operation on us of causes with which we are connected, because the whole nature of each person is used in the carrying out of this law. Hence the weak and mediocre furnish a weak focus for karma, and in them the general result of a lifetime is limited, although they may feel it all to be very heavy. But that person who has a wide and deep-reaching character and much force will feel the operation of a greater quantity of karma than the weaker person.

 

Second -- that karma which we are now making or storing up by our thoughts and acts, and which will operate in the future when the appropriate body, mind, and environment are taken up by the incarnating Ego in some other life, or whenever obstructive karma is removed.

 

This bears both on the present life and the next one. For one may in this life come to a point where, all previous causes being worked out, new karma, or that which is unexpended, must begin to operate.

 

Under this are those cases where men have sudden reverses of fortune or changes for the better either in circumstances or character. A very important bearing of this is on our present conduct. While old karma must work out and cannot be stopped, it is wise for the man to so think and act now under present circumstances, no matter what they are, that he shall produce no bad or prejudicial causes for the next rebirth or for later years in this life.

 

Rebellion is useless, for the law works on whether we weep or rejoice. The great French engineer, de Lesseps, is a good example of this class of karma. Raised to a high pitch of glory and achievement for many years of his life, he suddenly falls covered with shame through the Panama canal scandal. Whether he was innocent or guilty, he has the shame of the connection of his name with a national enterprise all besmirched with bribery and corruption that involved high officials. This was the operation of old karmic causes on him the very moment those which had governed his previous years were exhausted. Napoleon I is another, for he rose to a very great fame, then suddenly fell and died in exile and disgrace. Many other cases will occur to every thoughtful reader.

 

Third -- that karma which has begun to produce results. It is the operating now in this life on us of causes set up in previous lives in company with other Egos. And it is in operation because, being most adapted to the family stock, the individual body, astral body, and race tendencies of the present incarnation, it exhibits itself plainly, while other unexpended karma awaits its regular turn.

 

These three classes of karma govern men, animals, worlds, and periods of evolution. Every effect flows from a cause precedent, and as all beings are constantly being reborn they are continually experiencing the effects of their thoughts and acts (which are themselves causes) of a prior incarnation. And thus

each one answers, as St. Matthew says, for every word and thought; none can escape either by prayer, or favor, or force, or any other intermediary.

 

Now as karmic causes are divisible into three classes, they must have various fields in which to work. They operate upon man in his mental and intellectual nature, in his psychical or soul nature, and in his body and circumstances. The spiritual nature of man is never affected or operated upon by karma.

 

One species of karma may act on the three specified planes of our nature at the same time to the same degree, or there may be a mixture of the causes, some on one plane and some on another. Take a deformed person who has a fine mind and a deficiency in his soul nature. Here punitive or unpleasant karma is operating on his body while in his mental and intellectual nature good karma is being experienced, but psychically the karma, or cause, being of an indifferent sort the result is indifferent. In another person other combinations appear. He has a fine body and favourable circumstances, but the character is morose, peevish, irritable, revengeful, morbid, and disagreeable to himself and others.

 

Here good physical karma is at work with very bad mental, intellectual, and psychical karma. Cases will occur to readers of persons born in high station having every opportunity and power, yet being imbecile or suddenly becoming insane.

 

And just as all these phases of the law of karma have sway over the individual man, so they similarly operate upon races, nations, and families. Each race has its karma as a whole. If it be good that race goes forward. If bad it goes out -- annihilated as a race -- though the souls concerned take up their karma in

other races and bodies. Nations cannot escape their national karma, and any nation that has acted in a wicked manner must suffer some day, be it soon or late. The karma of the nineteenth century in the West is the karma of Israel, for even the merest tyro can see that the Mosaic influence is the strongest in

the European and American nations.

 

The old Aztec and other ancient American peoples died out because their own karma -- the result of their own life as

nations in the far past -- fell upon and destroyed them. With nations this heavy operation of karma is always through famine, war, convulsion of nature, and the sterility of the women of the nation. The latter cause comes near the end and sweeps the whole remnant away. And the individual in race or nation is warned by this great doctrine that if he falls into indifference of thought and act, thus moulding himself into the general average karma of his race or nation, that national and race karma will at last carry him off in the general destiny. This is why teachers of old cried, "Come ye out and be ye separate."

 

With reincarnation the doctrine of karma explains the misery and suffering of the world, and no room is left to accuse Nature of injustice.

 

The misery of any nation or race is the direct result of the thoughts and acts of the Egos who make up the race or nation. In the dim past they did wickedly and now suffer. They violated the laws of harmony. The immutable rule is that harmony must be restored if violated. So these Egos suffer in making

compensation and establishing the equilibrium of the occult cosmos.

 

The whole mass of Egos must go on incarnating and reincarnating in the nation or race until they have all worked out to the end the causes set up. Though the nation may for a time disappear as a physical thing, the Egos that made it do not leave

the world, but come out as the makers of some new nation in which they must go on with the task and take either punishment or reward as accords with their karma. Of this law the old Egyptians are an illustration. They certainly rose to

a high point of development, and as certainly they were extinguished as a nation. But the souls -- the old Egos -- live on and are now fulfilling their self-made destiny as some other nation now in our period.

 

They may be the new American nation, or the Jews fated to wander up and down in the world and suffer much at the hands of others. This process is perfectly just. Take, for instance, the United States and the Red Indians. The latter have been most shamefully treated by the nation. The Indian Egos will be reborn in the new and conquering people, and as members of that great family will be the means themselves of bringing on the due results for such acts as were done against them when they had red bodies. Thus it has happened before, and so it will come about again.

 

Individual unhappiness in any life is thus explained:

 

(a) It is punishment for evil done in past lives; or

 

(b) it is discipline taken up by the Ego for the purpose of eliminating defects or acquiring fortitude and sympathy. When defects are eliminated it is like removing the obstruction in an irrigating canal which then lets the water flow on. Happiness is explained in the same way: the result of prior lives of goodness.

 

The scientific and self-compelling basis for right ethics is found in these and in no other doctrines. For if right ethics are to be practised merely for themselves, men will not see why, and have never been able to see why, for that reason they should do right. If ethics are to be followed from fear, man is degraded and will surely evade; if the favor of the Almighty, not based on law or justice, be the reason, then we will have just what prevails today -- a code given by Jesus to the west professed by nations and not practised save by the few who would in any case be virtuous.

 

On this subject the Adepts have written the following to be found in the Secret Doctrine:

 

"Nor would the ways of karma be inscrutable were men to work in union and harmony instead of disunion and strife. For our ignorance of those ways -- which one portion of mankind calls the ways of Providence dark and intricate, while another sees in them the action of blind fatalism, and a third simple chance

with neither gods nor devils to guide them -- would surely disappear if we would but attribute all these to their correct cause. With right knowledge, or at any rate with a confident conviction that our neighbours will no more work harm to

us than we would think of harming them, two-thirds of the world's evil would vanish into thin air. Were no man to hurt his brother, Karma-Nemesis would have neither cause to work for nor weapons to act through. . . .

 

We cut these numerous windings in our destinies daily with our own hands, while we imagine that we are pursuing a track on the royal high road of respectability and duty, and then complain of those ways beings so intricate and so dark. We stand

bewildered before the mystery of our own making and the riddles of life that we will not solve, and then accuse the great Sphinx of devouring us. But verily there is not an accident in our lives, not a misshapen day or a misfortune, that could not be traced back to our own doings in this or another life. . . .

 

Knowledge of Karma gives the conviction that if --

 

 'virtue in distress and vice in triumph Make atheists of Mankind',

 

it is only because that mankind has ever shut its eyes to the great truth that man is himself his own saviour as his own destroyer; that he need not accuse heaven and the gods, fates and providence, of the apparent injustice that reigns in the midst of humanity. But let him rather remember and repeat this bit of

Grecian wisdom which warns man to forbear accusing That which

 

 'Just though mysterious, leads us on unerring

  Through ways unmarked from guilt to punishment'

 

-- which are now the ways and the high road on which move onward the great European nations. The western Aryans had every nation and tribe like their eastern brethren of the fifth race, their Golden and their Iron ages, their period of comparative irresponsibility, or the Satya age of purity, while now several of them have reached their Iron age, the Kali Yuga, an age black with horrors. This state will last . . . until we begin acting from within instead of ever following impulses from without . . . Until then the only palliative is union and harmony -- a Brotherhood in actu and altruism not simply in name."

 

 

 

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THE OCEAN
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The Occult World

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The Occult World is an treatise on the

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Preface to the American Edition  Introduction

 

Occultism and its Adepts   The Theosophical Society

 

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Theosophy Cardiff Cancels its Affiliation

to the Adyar Based Theosophical Society

and becomes an independent body within

the Worldwide Theosophical Movement

 

Theosophy Birmingham (England)

The Birmingham Annie Besant Lodge

 

Theosophy Sidmouth

Sidmouth, Devon, England

 

Theosophy Utah

Theosophy Cardiff has links with the

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Theosophy Avalon

Guide to the

Theosophy Wales King Arthur Pages

 

 

Arthur draws the Sword from the Stone

 

King Arthur

Fact or Myth

 

King Arthur &

The Knights of The Round Table

 

Arthur’s Table

The Roman Amphitheatre at Caerleon,

Gwent, South Wales.

 

Kings Arthur’s Round Table

Eamont Bridge, Nr Penrith, Cumbria, England.

 

King Arthur’s Round Table

At Winchester

 

Isle of Avalon

 

The Holy Grail

A Brief Overview

 

The Holy Grail and

the Celtic Tradition

 

The Lady of the Lake

 

Geoffrey of Monmouth

(?- 1155)

Historia Regum Britanniae

(History of the Kings of Britain)

The reliabilty of this work has long been a subject of

debate but it is the first definitive account of Arthur’s Reign

and one which puts Arthur in a historcal context.

 

The Arthur Story according to

Geoffrey of Monmouth

and his version’s political agenda

 

Geoffrey of Monmouth

His Life & Works

 

King Arthur’s Family Tree

According to Geoffrey of Monmouth

 

Nennius

Historia Brittanum

History of the Britons

800 CE

The first written mention of Arthur as a heroic figure

The British leader who fought twelve battles

against the Anglo Saxons

 

Where were Arthur’s Twelve

Victories against the Saxons?

 

King Arthur’s ninth victory at

The Battle of the City of the Legion

Chester

 

The Battle of Badon Hill

King Arthur ambushes an advancing Saxon

army then defeats them at Liddington Castle,

Badbury, Near Swindon, Wiltshire, England.

King Arthur’s twelfth and last victory against the Saxons

 

The Battle of Camlann

Traditionally Arthur’s last battle in which he was

mortally wounded although his side went on to win

 

Taliesin

The 6th century Welsh bard

No contemporary writings or accounts of his life

but he is placed 50 to 100 years after the accepted

King Arthur period. He refers to Arthur in his inspiring

poems but the earliest written record of these dates

from over three hundred years after Taliesin’s death.

 

The Elegy of Uther Pendragon

From the Book of Taliesin

 

Pendragon Castle

Mallerstang Valley, Nr Kirkby Stephen,

Cumbria, England.

A 12th Century Norman ruin on the site of what is

reputed to have been a stronghold of Uther Pendragon

 

Merlin

His origins and development

over centuries

From wise child with no earthly father to

Megastar of Arthurian Legend

 

The Prophecy of Merlin

From Geoffrey of Monmouth’s

History of the Kings of Britain

 

Merlin’s Vision

on Pendle Hill

Near Burnley Lancashire

 

Excalibur

Drawn from the Stone or received from the Lady of the Lake.

Sir Thomas Malory’s Le Morte d’Arthur has both versions

with both swords called Excalibur. Other versions

have two different swords.

 

Chronology of Britain

in the 5th Century CE

 

Celtic Kingdoms Prior to the

Anglo – Saxon invasion

 

The Saxon Invasion of Britain

 

Where did the 

Angles, Saxons & Jutes

Come from?

 

5th & 6th Century Timeline of Britain

From the departure of the Romans from

Britain to the establishment of sizeable

Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms

Glossary of

Arthurian Legend

 

Constans

Arthur’s uncle:- The puppet ruler of the Britons

controlled and eventually killed by Vortigern

Circa 440 -445CE

 

Hengist & Horsa

 

The Massacre of Amesbury

Amesbury, Wiltshire, England. Circa 450CE

An alleged massacre of Celtic Nobility by the Saxons

at a “Peace” conference

 

Caer-Anderida (Pevensey)

Falls to the Saxons 491 CE

 

King Arthur is Crowned

at Silchester

From Geoffrey of Monmouth’s

History of the Kings of Britain

 

King Arthwys of the Pennines

Born Circa 455 CE

Ruled the Kingdom of Ebrauc

(North Yorkshire)

 

Athrwys / Arthrwys
King of Ergyng

Circa  618 - 655 CE
Latin: Artorius; English: Arthur

A warrior King born in Gwent and associated with

Caerleon, a possible Camelot. Although over 100 years

later that the accepted Arthur period, the exploits of

Athrwys may have contributed to the King Arthur Legend.

He became King of Ergyng, a kingdom between

Gwent and Brycheiniog (Brecon)

 

King Morgan Bulc of Bernaccia

Angles under Ida seized the Celtic Kingdom of

Bernaccia in North East England in 547 CE forcing

King Morgan Bulc into exile.

Although much later than the accepted King Arthur

period, the events of Morgan Bulc’s 50 year campaign

to regain his kingdom may have contributed to

the King Arthur Legend.

 

 

Vortigern

Old Welsh: Guorthigirn; Anglo-Saxon: Wyrtgeorn;

Breton: Gurthiern; Modern Welsh; Gwrtheyrn;

Latin; Vertigernus:

*********************************

An earlier ruler than King Arthur and not a heroic figure.

He is credited with policies that weakened Celtic Britain

to a point from which it never recovered.

Although there are no contemporary accounts of

his rule, there is more written evidence for his

existence than of King Arthur.

 

How Sir Lancelot slew two giants,

And made a castle free.

From Sir Thomas Malory’s Le Morte d’Arthur

Published 1485

 

How Sir Lancelot rode disguised

in Sir Kay's harness, and how he

smote down a knight.

From Sir Thomas Malory’s Le Morte d’Arthur

Published 1485

 

How Sir Lancelot jousted against

four knights of the Round Table,

and overthrew them.

From Sir Thomas Malory’s Le Morte d’Arthur

Published 1485

 

The Passing of Arthur

Alfred, Lord Tennyson

 

 

 

 

The Theosophy Cardiff

Glastonbury Pages

 

Chalice Well, Glastonbury.

The Theosophy Cardiff Guide to

Chalice Well, Glastonbury,

Somerset, England

 

The Theosophy Cardiff Guide to

Glastonbury Abbey

 

Theosophy Cardiff’s

Glastonbury Abbey Chronology

 

The Theosophy Cardiff Guide to

Glastonbury Tor

 

The Labyrinth

The Terraced Maze of Glastonbury Tor

 

Glastonbury and Joseph of Arimathea

 

The Grave of King Arthur & Guinevere

At Glastonbury Abbey

 

Views of Glastonbury High Street

 

The Theosophy Cardiff Guide to

Glastonbury Bookshops

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Tekels Park

Camberley, Surrey, England GU15 2LF

 

Concerns about the fate of the wildlife as

Tekels Park is to be Sold to a Developer

 

Concerns are raised about the fate of the 

wildlife as The Spiritual Retreat, 

Tekels Park in Camberley, Surrey, 

England is to be sold to a developer.

 

Tekels Park is a 50 acre woodland park, 

purchased for the Adyar Theosophical 

Society in England in 1929.

 

In addition to concern about the park, 

many are worried about the future 

of the Tekels Park Deer as they 

are not a protected species.

 

Confusion as the Theoversity moves out of 

Tekels Park to Southampton, Glastonbury & 

Chorley in Lancashire while the leadership claim

that the Theosophical Society will carry on using 

Tekels Park despite its sale to a developer

 

Anyone planning a “Spiritual” stay at the

Tekels Park Guest House should be aware of the sale.

 

 

Future of Tekels Park Badgers in Doubt

 

Party On! Tekels Park Theosophy NOT

 

Tekels Park & the Loch Ness Monster

A Satirical view of the sale of Tekels Park

in Camberley, Surrey to a developer

 

The Toff’s Guide to the Sale of Tekels Park

What the men in top hats have to

say about the sale of Tekels Park

to a developer

__________________________

 

An Outline of Theosophy

Charles Webster Leadbeater

 

Theosophy - What it is   How is it Known?

 

The Method of Observation   General Principles

 

The Three Great Truths   Advantage Gained from this Knowledge

 

The Deity   The Divine Scheme   The Constitution of Man

 

The True Man   Reincarnation   The Wider Outlook

 

Death   Man’s Past and Future   Cause and Effect

 

What Theosophy does for us

 

______________________________

 

H P Blavatsky’s Heavy Duty

Theosophical Glossary

Published 1892

A B C D EFG H IJ KL M N OP QR S T UV WXYZ

 

Complete Theosophical Glossary in Plain Text Format

1.22MB

 

Theosophy Cardiff’s

Instant Guide to Theosophy

Quick Explanations with Links to More Detailed Info

 

 

What is Theosophy ?  Theosophy Defined (More Detail)

 

Three Fundamental Propositions  Key Concepts of Theosophy

 

Cosmogenesis  Anthropogenesis  Root Races

 

Ascended Masters  After Death States

 

The Seven Principles of Man  Karma

 

Reincarnation   Helena Petrovna Blavatsky

 

Colonel Henry Steel Olcott  William Quan Judge

 

The Start of the Theosophical Society

 

History of the Theosophical Society

 

Theosophical Society Presidents

 

History of the Theosophical Society in Wales

 

The Three Objectives of the Theosophical Society

 

Explanation of the Theosophical Society Emblem

 

The Theosophical Order of Service (TOS)

 

Ocean of Theosophy

William Quan Judge

 

Glossaries of Theosophical Terms

 

Worldwide Theosophical Links

 

 

 

Index of Searchable

Full Text Versions of

Definitive

Theosophical Works

 

 

H P Blavatsky’s Secret Doctrine

 

Isis Unveiled by H P Blavatsky

 

H P Blavatsky’s Esoteric Glossary

 

Mahatma Letters to A P Sinnett 1 - 25

 

A Modern Revival of Ancient Wisdom

Alvin Boyd Kuhn

 

Studies in Occultism

(Selection of Articles by H P Blavatsky)

 

The Conquest of Illusion

J J van der Leeuw

 

The Secret Doctrine – Volume 3

A compilation of H P Blavatsky’s

writings published after her death

 

Esoteric Christianity or the Lesser Mysteries

Annie Besant

 

The Ancient Wisdom

Annie Besant

 

Reincarnation

Annie Besant

 

The Early Teachings of The Masters

1881-1883

Edited by

C. Jinarajadasa

 

Study in Consciousness

Annie Besant

 

 

A Textbook of Theosophy

C W Leadbeater

 

A Modern Panarion

A Collection of Fugitive Fragments

From the Pen of

H P Blavatsky

 

The Perfect Way or,

The Finding of Christ

Anna Bonus Kingsford

& Edward Maitland

Part1

 

The Perfect Way or,

The Finding of Christ

Anna Bonus Kingsford

& Edward Maitland

Part2

 

Pistis Sophia

A Gnostic Gospel

Foreword by G R S Mead

 

The Devachanic Plane.

Its Characteristics

and Inhabitants

C. W. Leadbeater

 

Theosophy

Annie Besant

 

The

Bhagavad Gita

Translated from the Sanskrit

By

William Quan Judge

 

Psychic Glossary

 

Sanskrit Dictionary

 

Fundamentals of the Esoteric Philosophy

G de Purucker

 

In The Outer Court

Annie Besant

 

Dreams and

Dream-Stories

Anna Kingsford

 

My Path to Atheism

Annie Besant

 

From the Caves and

Jungles of Hindostan

H P Blavatsky

 

The Hidden Side

Of Things

C W Leadbeater

 

Glimpses of

Masonic History

C W Leadbeater

 

Five Years Of

Theosophy

Various Theosophical

Authors

Mystical, Philosophical, Theosophical, Historical

and Scientific Essays Selected from "The Theosophist"

Edited by George Robert Stow Mead

 

Spiritualism and Theosophy

C W Leadbeater

 

Commentary on

The Voice of the Silence

Annie Besant and

C W Leadbeater

From Talks on the Path of Occultism - Vol. II

 

Is This Theosophy?

Ernest Egerton Wood

 

In The Twilight

Annie Besant

In the Twilight” Series of Articles

The In the Twilight” series appeared during

1898 in The Theosophical Review and

from 1909-1913 in The Theosophist.

 

Incidents in the Life

of Madame Blavatsky

compiled from information supplied by

her relatives and friends and edited by A P Sinnett

 

The Friendly Philosopher

Robert Crosbie

Letters and Talks on Theosophy and the Theosophical Life

 

 

Obras Teosoficas En Espanol

 

La Sabiduria Antigua

Annie Besant

 

Glosario Teosofico

1892

H P Blavatsky

 

 

Theosophische Schriften Auf Deutsch

 

Die Geheimlehre

Von

H P Blavatsky

 

 

 

 

Try these if you are looking for a local

Theosophy Group or Centre

 

UK Listing of Theosophical Groups

 

Worldwide Directory of 

Theosophical Links

 

International Directory of 

Theosophical Societies

 

 

 

 

Cardiff Theosophical Society in Wales

Theosophy House

206 Newport Road,

Cardiff, Wales, UK. CF24 – 1DL

theosophycardiff@uwclub.net

 

 

 

Quotes from the Writings of

Helena Petrovna Blavatsky

 

Blavatsky Quotation

 

That which is to be shunned is pain not yet come. The past cannot be changed or amended; that which belongs to the experience of the present cannot and should  not be shunned; but alike to be shunned are disturbing anticipations or fears of  the future, and every act or impulse that may cause present or future pain to ourselves or others.

Practical Occultism, Page 87

 

Blavatsky Quotation

 

Perfection, to be fully such, must be born out of imperfection, the incorruptible must grow out of the corruptible, having the latter as its vehicle and basis and contrast

The Secret Doctrine , Volume 2, Page 100

 

Blavatsky Quotation

 

It is only by the attractive force of the contrasts that the two opposites — Spirit and Matter — can be cemented together on Earth, and, smelted in the fire of self-conscious experience and suffering, find themselves wedded in Eternity.

The Secret Doctrine , Volume 2, Page 108

 

Blavatsky Quotation

 

Strength to step forward is the primary need of him who has chosen his path. Where is this to be found? Looking round, it is not hard to see where other men find their strength. Its source is profound conviction.

Practical Occultism, Page 67

 

Blavatsky Quotation

 

It is the motive, and the motive alone, which makes any exercise of power become black, malignant, or white, beneficent Magic. It is impossible to employ spiritual forces if there is the slightest tinge of selfishness remaining in the operator .... The powers and forces of animal nature can equally be used by the selfish and revengeful, as by the unselfish and the all-forgiving; the powers and forces of spirit lend themselves only to the perfectly pure in heart — and this is Divine Magic.

Practical Occultism, Page 7

 

Blavatsky Quotation

 

Finite reason agrees with science, and says: “There is no God”. But, on the other hand, our Ego, that which lives and thinks and feels independently of us in our mortal casket, does more than believe. It knows that there exists a God in nature, for the sole and invincible Artificer of all lives in us as we live in Him. No dogmatic faith or exact science is able to uproot that intuitional feeling inherent in man, when he has once fully realised it in himself.

Isis Unveiled, Volume 1, Page 36

 

Blavatsky Quotation

 

It may be a pleasant dream to attempt to conceive of the beauties of the spirit world; but the time can be spent more profitably in a study of the spirit itself, and it is not necessary that the subject for study should be in the spirit world.

Modern Panarion Page 70

 

Blavatsky Quotation

 

Physical existence is subservient to the spiritual, and all physical improvement and progress are only the auxiliaries of spiritual progress, without which there could be no physical progress.

Modern Panarion Page 78

 

Blavatsky Quotation

 

Mankind — the majority at any rate — hates to think for itself. It resents as an insult the humblest invitation to step for a moment outside the old well-beaten tracks and, judging for itself, to enter into a new path in some fresh direction.

The Secret Doctrine , Volume 3, Page 14

 

Blavatsky Quotation

 

Even ignorance is better than Head-learning with no Soul-wisdom to illuminate and guide it.

The Voice of the Silence, Page 43

 

Blavatsky Quotation

 

Many theosophists have had slight conscious relations with elementals, but always without their will acting, and upon trying to make elementals see, hear or act for them, a total indifference on the part of the nature spirit is all they have got in return. These failures are due to the fact that the elemental cannot understand the thought of the person; it can only be reached when the exact scale of being to which it belongs is vibrated, whether it be that of colour, form, sound, or whatever else

Annotation - The Path, May, 1888

 

Blavatsky Quotation

 

Parabrahman is not “God” because It is not a God. “It is that which is supreme, and not supreme”. ....It is supreme as cause, not supreme as effect.

The Secret Doctrine , Proem [Volume 1], Page 35

 

Blavatsky Quotation

 

The ancients ..... fully realised the fact that the reciprocal relations between the planetary bodies is as perfect as those between the corpuscles of the blood, which float in a common fluid; and that each one is affected by the combined influence of all the rest, as each in its turn affects each of the others.

Isis, Volume 1, Page 275

 

Blavatsky Quotation

 

Strength to step forward is the primary need of him who has chosen his path. Where is this to be found? Looking round, it is not hard to see where other men find their strength. Its source is profound conviction.

Practical Occultism, Page 67

 

Blavatsky Quotation

 

There are two kinds of magnetic attraction: sympathy and fascination; the one holy and natural, the other evil and unnatural.

Isis Unveiled, Volume 1, Page 210

 

Blavatsky Quotation

 

In the phenomenal and Cosmic World Fohat is that occult, electric, vital power, which, under the Will of the Creative Logos, unites and brings together all forms, giving them the first impulse, which in time becomes law.

The Secret Doctrine , Volume 1, Page 134

 

Blavatsky Quotation

 

Oaths will never be binding till each man will fully understand that humanity is the highest manifestation on earth of the Unseen Supreme Deity, and each man an

incarnation of his God; and when the sense of personal responsibility will be so

developed in him that he will consider forswearing the greatest possible insult to himself, as well as to humanity. No oath is now binding, unless taken by one who, without any oath at all, would solemnly keep his simple promise of honour.

Isis Unveiled, Volume 2, Page 374

 

Blavatsky Quotation

 

It is the motive, and the motive alone, which makes any exercise of power become

black, malignant, or white, beneficent Magic. It is impossible to employ spiritual forces if there is the slightest tinge of selfishness remaining in the operator .... The powers and forces of animal nature can equally be used by the selfish and revengeful, as by the unselfish and the all-forgiving; the powers and forces of spirit lend themselves only to the perfectly pure in heart — and this is Divine Magic.

Practical Occultism, Page 7

 

Blavatsky Quotation

 

Woe to those who live without suffering. Stagnation and death is the future of all that vegetates without change. And how can there be any change for the better without proportionate suffering during the preceding stage?

The Secret Doctrine , Volume 2, Page 498

 

Blavatsky Quotation

 

The person who is endowed with this faculty of thinking about even the most trifling things from the higher plane of thought has, by virtue of that gift which he possesses, a plastic power of formation, so to say, in his very imagination. Whatever such a person may think about, his thought will be so far more intense than the thought of an ordinary person, that by this very intensity it obtains the power of creation.

Lucifer, December, 1888

 

Blavatsky Quotation

 

Finite reason agrees with science, and says: “There is no God”. But, on the other hand, our Ego, that which lives and thinks and feels independently of us in our mortal casket, does more than believe. It knows that there exists a God in nature, for the sole and invincible Artificer of all lives in us as we live in Him. No dogmatic faith or exact science is able to uproot that intuitional feeling inherent in man, when he has once fully realised it in himself.

Isis Unveiled, Volume 1, Page 36

 

Blavatsky Quotation

 

Our voice is raised for spiritual freedom, and our plea made for enfranchisement  from all tyranny, whether of Science of Theology.

Isis Unveiled, Volume 1, I2.

 

Blavatsky Quotation

 

If through the Hall of Wisdom thou wouldst reach the Vale of Bliss, Disciple, close fast thy senses against the great dire heresy of Separateness that weans thee from the rest.

Voice of the Silence, Page 23

 

Blavatsky Quotation

 

From strength to strength, from the beauty and perfection of one plane to the

greater beauty and perfection of another, with accessions of new glory, of fresh

knowledge and power in each cycle, such is the destiny of every Ego, which thus

becomes its own saviour in each world and incarnation.

The Key to Theosophy, Page 105

 

Blavatsky Quotation

 

The assertion that “Theosophy is not a Religion” , by no means excludes the fact that “Theosophy is Religion” itself. A religion in the true and only correct sense is a bond uniting men together — not a particular set of dogmas and beliefs. Now Religion, per se, in its widest meaning is that which binds not only all Men but also all Beings and all things in the entire Universe into one grand whole.

Lucifer, November, 1888

 

 

 

 

 

Cardiff Picture Gallery

 

Cardiff Millennium Stadium

 

 

 

 

The Hayes Cafe

 

 

 

 

Cardiff Bay

 

 

 

Outside Cardiff Castle Circa 1890

 

 

Church Street

 

 

 

Cardiff View

 

 

 

Royal Arcade

 

 

 

 

Cardiff Castle

 

 

 

The Original Norman Castle which stands inside

the Grounds of the later Cardiff Castle Building

 

 

 

Inside the Grounds at Cardiff Castle

 

 

 

 

Cardiff Street Entertainment

 

 

Cardiff Indoor Market

 

 

Cardiff Theosophical Society in Wales

206 Newport Road

Cardiff, Wales, UK. CF24 1DL

theosophycardiff@uwclub.net