The Hawaiian star. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu]) 1893-1912, 1894-09-01
MRS. THIRDS LECTURE.
REINcARNATIoN A PRINCIPLE OF
THEOsOPBY.
Dependent Upon the Subject
Amaigamated,

ihi"oitd tty, ny Nhiidh WofusWOitn'
Our birth is but sleep and forgetting;
The soul that rises with us, our lifes star,
Hath had elsewhere its setting,
And comeih ON afar.
Not in entire forgetfulness
And not In utter nakedness
But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God who is our home.
Heaven lies about us In our infancy;
Shades Of the prison house begin to close
Upon the growing boy;
But he beholds the light, and whence 1t flows
He sees 1t in his joy.
The youth who daily farther from the East
Must travel, still is natures priest,
And by the vision splendid
Is on his way attended.
At lenet tn the man perceives II die away
And fade into the life Of common day.
After reading, Mrs. Thirds turned to
her large audience and said;
Wordsworth, in the few beautiful
lines just read, has but observed tn.
idea of one Of the oldest spiritual truths
known to the world. Mankind, FIR, m
time immemorial, in all ages of human
existence, has bowed acknowledgment
to the idea of reincarnation. The soul
was always supposed to come from II
higher being, the gift of God, coming
from above as an eternal faculty, ell
dowed with Immortality; and the idea
of the creation of soul, the birth of a
soul with the body, never entered the
minds of the ancients. They looked
upon it as a separate endowment, ever
existing and everlasting
In the Bible we trace the idea; we
find it approaching the light and becom-
ing apparent here and there. In the
oldest sanscrit lore we find the idea pre-
dominant. With the Chaldeans, the
Persians, the Indians of North America,
the Aborigines of Peru and of Mexico.
the identical impression has prevailed,
and in some measure does to-day. More
particularly is tins belief to be noticed
among the last races of America,
where the theory is and will DOUBTLESS
ever be held. 1t was accepted in the
earliest days as cardinal principle; no
one rejected it, no one denied its truth.
From then, onward to the present day,
it has existed, even though we have
moved away from the early teachings.
Therefore it is not presented tonight
as new theory. 1t is as old as human
ity. Indeed, there is nothing new in
Theosophy. Theosophy is itself re-
incarnation, or a bringing out of the
principles, the ideas, the wisdom of the
sages of the past. OF their sight we
attempt to use, their wisdom we strive
to learn, their experience we seek to
profit by.
If we turn to nature we find by anal
ogy the philosophy of reincarnation. Be
fore the chilling frosts and SHOWS OF
winter the forms in the vegetable king
dom turn yellow, fall to the ground and
decay. The plant, the twig, the bloom
fades away and we call it dead. But
has the life died? Is the force which
held the slender plant against the wind,
unfolded its leaves, opened its fornis
into the beautiful, fragrant flowers we
sowed before autumn came, dead? M,
indeed. The outward form, the materi-
alistic body Is dead, but the life has
merely departed into the one great life.
Await the Spring time and see. The
sun sheds Its soft, genial rays over the
land, the birds appear from their long
retreat to hidden places away from the
cold of Winter, the air becomes
redolent with the notes of myriad
songsters, and all is joy. And
with this bursting in of spring
comes life in the tender plant shooting
from the earth. We do not claim that
the new plant is thu same as the old,
but affirm that the life, the esstnce, is
the same. The plant dies or decays,
but the life thrown off departs into the
great life where it exists forever.
The same applies in the case of man.
There is a book, which was found in
the East, so very old that we have no
idea of its origin and which involves
this great idea.
Owing to its fitness and rare beauty,
Edwin Arnold has named it 1.-The Song
Celestial" 1t refers to the mind, the
intelligence, the life as eternal. The
thing within which evolves is the mind,
and it must come back to earth
In ordinary life man is subject to
changes. He frequently shifts for the
sake of experience or to reach higher.
One time he ia an Oihelo, later we find
him as King Lear, then he appears as a
clown, and later king again. Thus it
is with the immortal essence. From
place to place, from experience to
experience, the life finds the
perfect way. finds perfec-
ton. Man within never expresses.
Indeed it is impossible to express more
than the instrument of expression is
capable of doing. Evolution is con-
stantly developing better bodies, more
substantial materialistic things, But
the body ii not the great field OF work
1t Is the immortal essence within which
evolution is bringing out and helping
along.
Action to the Eastern mind would
also imply reaction. We would say
"the law of cause and effect; in thu
ethical world they say "ethicai causa
ton; the Bible says, whatsoever "
SOW, that shall We also reap" In India
they call it "Karma." AS we live anC
act do we make Karma. As physical
acts bring ply steal results, so thought'
bring spiritual results. Consequently
as we think, feel ana act, 81 our soul'
are drawn 10 expression. Everything
we think or do has its effect upon Oh.
inner planes. Each and everything IL
an act and is felt somewhere. Without
Karma we could not improve.
II = 4 4