The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1891-03-22
AN AWAKENING.
THEOSOPHY.

Theosophy proclaims the solidarity Of
man and Of nature, and therefore it bases
its religious conceptions On the universal
brotherhood of man, and expands its teach
ings into natural science which embraces
the universe. Having no creed, and pro-
Tossing allegiance to no religious sect, it
simply processes to be the light thrown
from the sparkling wavelets of the stream
of life; and consequently its teachings are
drawn from the contemplation Of that
which lies around US and within US.
During the ages of progress which our
planet has passed through, man has gradu-
ally evolved spiritual and psychic individ-
uality, which has become the home of
central will power. His body is, owing to
the presence of this inner Deity, sensitive
instrument on which the activities of life
outside US play countless tunes. These
currents generated by human strife and
natural changes sweep through the body;
which, owing to the presence of this cen
trail power, vibrates with answering pas
sions and emotions. Theosophy teaches
man to know this inner God, too often but
slave to these wild awakenings of nature,
and shows him how to free the captive, so
that the sensitiveness which lies at the
back of human perception may be controlled
by free will.
To this end we become, in our persons,
the battlefield on which the forces of the
world contend with the might of our CEN
trail God, for the mastery over our passions
and our desires. The races of mankind
have evolved to their present intellectual
sensibility through the blind activity of the
natural will, called in esoteric parlance the
Great BREATHE and this same basic en-
ergy, this essence of life, becomes our
teacher as soon as we have developed suf-
ticient quantity of conscious power to en-
able US TO appreciate the inner meaning of
that which first appeals to matter simply as
motion.
AS with individuals, so with nations, at
the back of whose national and social eX-
istence is ever flowing the vivifying stream
of life, whose waters reflect different de-
greeS of spiritual light, according as their
ceaseless motion animates denser or more
sensitive minds These latter are most
susceptible to spiritual promptings, and be-
come conductors for the influx of a spirit
uality which manifests its presence on the
plane of Our everyday life by those religi-
time shaken the social fabric of the ancient
and the modern world.
Many of these revivals have been evane-
scent, and were due to what may be called
secondary currents, set up by the interac-
ton of religious and psychic feelings al
ready active in the world. Others have
left deep impression on humanity, and
these may be termed primary currents -
being direct infiuxes of conscious power
into that whirl of life which we generate
by our actions. Now it is these primary
currents of spiritual thought which we call
| theosophical. And they cease to be theo-
sophical. and become ecclesiastical, so soon
as they have been assimilated by man. 1t
follows from this that something similar to
the present theosophical movement has al
ready been abroad in the world many times
| before: and surely, therefore, it is not
strange that we Theosophists should seek
and find, in the literature of bygone times
a systematiZed train of thought containing
and explaining those outbursts of conscious
activity which we recognize as now being
once more active amongst US. Reincarna.
ton, karma, ETC., are ideas as old as human
ity, and form no creed. but simply repre-
sent the cream of the experiences of ages
laid by for the use of man; when, ceasing
for while to dogmatize about himself il
real earnest and try to learn the lesson.
taught by this transitory hfe.-Thoma!
Williams, Fellow Theosophical Society.