Note 140 — INDEX. (continued 7)

A proof how our theosophical teachings have taken root in every class of Society and even in English literature may be seen by reading Mr. Norman Pearson’s article “Before Birth” in the “Nineteenth Century” for August, 1886. Therein, theosophical ideas and teachings are speculated upon without acknowledgment or the smallest reference to theosophy, and among others, we see with regard to the author’s theories on the Ego, the following: “How much of the individual personality is supposed to go to heaven or hell? Does the whole of the mental equipment, good and bad, noble qualities and unholy passions, follow the soul to its hereafter? Surely not. But if not, and something has to be stripped off, how and when are we to draw the line? If, on the other hand, the Soul is something distinct from all our mental equipment, except the sense of self, are we not confronted by the incomprehensible notion of a personality without any attributes.”

To this query the author answers as any true theosophist would: “The difficulties of the question really spring from a misconception of the true nature of these attributes. The components of our mental equipment—appetites, aversions, feelings, tastes and qualities generally—are not absolute but relative existences. Hunger and thirst for instance are states of consciousness which arise in response to the stimuli of physical necessities. They are not inherent elements of the soul and will disappear or become modified, etc.,” (pp. 356 and 357). In other words the theosophical doctrine is adopted, Atma and Buddhi having culled off the Manas the aroma of the personality or human soul—go into Devachan: while the lower principles the astral simulacrum or false personality void of its Divine monad or spirit will remain in the Kama-loka—the “Summerland.”