Let us turn to the C. H. C. to bring the narrative up to date. In March and April 1913 there came into the hands of another Manager and Trustee, a printed "letter," covering some three foolscap pages, bearing the signature of the gentleman who was then Princ.i.p.al of the C. H. C., the date October 25th, 1912, and the imprint of Mrs. Besant's _Vasanta Press_, Adyar, Madras, and not bearing any word like "private" or "personal," or "confidential." In this "letter" amazingly extravagant and fantastic statements are made as regards Mrs. Besant; she is hailed repeatedly as one who is "_to become one of the greatest Rulers of the World of G.o.ds and men_" [This is sheer insanity.--A. L. C.]; mention is made of the "recognition of the G.o.d without us, which made us members of this Group from which we draw our life to-day"; it is said "that her light to ours was and is as the rays of the sun at noon-time to the rays of a lamp at night, and we did not desire to examine the Sun to see under what conditions it might possibly ray forth a more dazzling brilliance." The members of the Group are reminded that "we pledged ourselves in our hearts that we should strive to become _her true and loyal servants ...,_" etc.

Thus complete was the hypnosis and surrender of reason which was sought to be effected amongst the votaries. It was a case of emotionalism run amuck...."

It is, unfortunately, "a case" of something infinitely more mischievous; of evil "magic" and "sorcery" (cf. H. P. B.'s definition, _ante_ p. 36.) Whether Mrs. Besant knows it or not, Mr. Leadbeater undoubtedly must be well aware that life and strength can be drawn, on inner planes of being, from the blind devotion of a solid body of fanatical votaries.

"Magicians" of a certain school--I need hardly specify which--thus prolong their lives through the magnetic and vita emanations of their nearest and most devoted followers. In a word, it is _Vampirism_, pure and simple, on the psychic plane. (I found that Mrs. Tingley well understood this form of Sorcery.) This, if true in Mrs. Besant's case is probably unconscious; but in Mr. Leadbeater's it is done consciously and with knowledge. That the secret acts and teachings of this man are far worse than most people have ever suspected is confirmed in a "Letter in reply to Mrs. Besant" by "Dreamer" which appeared in _The Theosophic Voice_ (Chicago), November, 1908, under the t.i.tle "India Speaks." This scholarly Hindu Theosophist writes:--

If we are to believe the stenographic report of the Inquiry in 1906, then instead of holding that Mr. Leadbeater denied the charges, we must come to the conclusion that not only did he teach the solitary vice, but further he did things which would have brought him within the pale of the criminal laws for the foulest and most indecent offence which brute man may commit.

This is our latter day saint who must be re-admitted, nay, invited back, into the Theosophical Society.

Note that this was written fourteen years ago! The subject is a revolting one, but in the interests of that public whom these people are still misleading and deceiving, and who have no idea of the extreme gravity of the menace, it is necessary to be explicit.

To return to the "Letter" mentioned by Mr. Das; he continues:--

The Trustee and Manager into whose hands a copy of the astonis.h.i.+ng doc.u.ment came, with the information that _it had been circulated_ amongst a number of the C. H. C. students, informed the secretaries of the College, and sent the letter with the comments on the same for publication in a daily paper, in order to show the public how the person-wors.h.i.+p-creeds of Mrs. Besant's "neo-theosophy" were being sown and grown within the C. H. C. despite the resolutions of the Trustees.

On publication of the rhapsody, a great outcry in the name of "injured innocence" was raised.... As to the "dishonourableness" of the publication, competent judges of such matters have p.r.o.nounced that it was dishonourable only if it be dishonourable to expose what cannot be called other than _gross treason_ to the Const.i.tution and ideals of the C. H. C., and to bring to light, and the bar of public opinion, underhand or half-concealed or openly defiant efforts to convert students to a grotesque person-wors.h.i.+p and demoralizing and soul-stunting blind obedience to Mrs. Besant.... The asking for, and the receiving of the pledges of obedience to herself, etc., is an act of over-weening presumption against the G.o.d in every man.... Ever since she encouraged and started them, her mind has worked less and less correctly and confusion has fallen ever worse and worse upon her work, losing to the T. S.

many thousands of old members, alienating from her all her old co-workers and co-founders of the C. H. C. and destroying the confidence in her of the Indian public.

Towards the end of his most illuminating pamphlet Mr. Das has occasion to speak of Mrs. Besant's "wildly reckless statements," some of which he quotes. They relate to the C. H. C. and he stigmatises them as "_all simply and utterly untrue_." "Her mind," he says a little further on, is working "incoherently." Finally, he writes:--

Let us conclude; when a person like Mrs. Besant, with a biography full of remarkable changes, full of fine work as well as bad blunders, having established herself, in her own belief, and that of her pledged band, as the present chief Spiritual Teacher and Saviour of Mankind, as "the G.o.d within us" now, and as the future "greatest Ruler of the World of G.o.ds and men,"

suddenly adds on the role of political saviour of India in particular, and pre-determined martyr in constant danger of a.s.sa.s.sination [strangely enough, this was also one of Mrs.

Tingley's obsessions] by anarchist miscreants ... and proclaims that those who differ from her are in league with those miscreants--when this happens, what explanation can be offered to their own minds by her old friends ...?

The only sad explanation that they can postulate is that she is suffering from mental delusions.

Alas! this lenient and charitable judgment by no means covers the ground as a complete explanation of Mrs. Besant's mischievous and almost irresponsible activities. Mr. Das fails to see as clearly as MM. Levy and Schure the sinister influence behind all these manifestations; the source and inspiration of all this evil.

Mrs. Besant's latest a.s.sertions and claims examined.

We now come to the examination of two articles in the _Theosophist_ for March, 1922, in which the President of the T. S. makes some attempt to deal with recent criticism. One is a Supplement, or Manifesto, addressed "To all Members of the Theosophical Society," and couched in Mrs.

Besant's present style--flamboyant, a trifle bombastic, often Biblical in phraseology, and running throughout it, her usual fervid and disingenuous appeal to sentimental emotionalism, instead of the instinctive sense of justice latent in all beings. This latter, a feature of her best days, she has entirely abandoned; it no longer serves her ends. What those "ends" are one almost hesitates to formulate, so impious and almost insane do they appear. Even taking into consideration the tangled ma.s.s of evasions, misstatements and hypocritical equivocations presented in this manifesto, these "ends"

emerge with sufficient clearness. But, in the first place, and before going further, one must ask on what basis this amazing claim to almost deific powers and knowledge rests. Let me here call M. Levy into the witness box once more; for he also had put the same question to himself nine years ago, and will provide the answer. It occurs in his chapter on "Mrs. Besant's 'Return of the Christ,'" where he is dealing with her position and actions in regard to Dr. Steiner, the German occultist and Christian Theosophist--with whose ideas, I should add, I am not in personal agreement. My teacher is H. P. Blavatsky and she alone: I follow no lesser light. M. Levy says:--

Our reason forces us to confess that all goes to suggest that Mrs. Besant, having herself ceased to believe in the ident.i.ty of her Jesus with the Christ [of the Gospels.--A. L. C.], would still continue to make others believe it.... Her pride ... her dominating mind, have driven her on this crusade of extermination of Dr. Steiner's teachings; it has induced her to collect, _without the least regard for truth, justice, or theosophic principles, no matter what weapons if they do but serve against her opponent; calumny, abuse of power, misstatement of facts, all combined in a subtle strategy_.

Italics are mine; for we find Mrs. Besant using precisely the same methods to-day, only in a form fortunately neither so "subtle" nor so Jesuitically plausible. Her powers are failing, as the manifesto under consideration clearly proves. M. Levy proceeds:--

And when she falls victim of some error in the course of her occult investigations--of which in theory she is always proclaiming the fallibility--it is again her pride that bars the way to admission, and makes her the slave of the most pitiful machinations ... which ... will shatter to fragments in all directions the confidence she had formerly inspired. For if she is not consciously defending her mistake, then what kind of a break-up of all her faculties are we witnessing?... The more deeply we study this [_i.e._, the "neo-theosophy" already described by M. Levy and Pandit Bhagavan Das.--A. L. C.], the more terrible appear the responsibilities of Adyar in this deplorable scheme; for we would still seek the origin of such fearless confidence [in Mrs. Besant's followers.--A. L. C.]

refusing, as it does, to be shaken by the eloquent appeal of the facts here set forth, and of which some, if not all, have been within the reach and open to examination of those members who profess such an enthusiastic confidence in Mrs. Besant. The result of our search is a yet further culpability, as overwhelming as it is unexpected.

For this confidence is not in the case of all the victims the result of the free use of their own inner faculties. It is in the case of the greater number, due to the influence of a strong suggestion _deliberately organised and cleverly carried out by the authors of this mystification themselves; by Mr.

Leadbeater who wrote, and by Mrs. Besant who published_, the following lines in the _Adyar Alb.u.m_, p. 45: "What can I say to you of your President that you do not know already? Her colossal [_sic_] intellect, her unfailing wisdom, her unrivalled eloquence, her splendid forgetfulness of self, her untiring devotion to work for others--all these are familiar to you. Yet these qualities, these powers, are but a small part of her greatness; they are on the surface, they may be seen by all, they leap to the eyes. But there are other qualities, other powers, of which you cannot know, because they pertain to the secrets of Initiation. She is a pupil of our Masters; from the fount of Their archaic wisdom she derives her own, the plans which she is carrying out are Their plans for the welfare of the world. Think, therefore, how great an honour it is for you that you should be permitted to work under her, for in doing so you are virtually working under Them. Think how watchful you should be to miss no hint which falls from her lips, to carry out exactly whatever instructions she may give you. Remember that because of her position as an Initiate she knows far more than you do; and precisely because her knowledge is occult, given under the seal of Initiation, she cannot share it with you. Therefore her actions must certainly be governed by considerations of which you have no conception. There will be times when you cannot understand her motives, for she is taking into account many things which you cannot see and of which she must not tell you. But whether you understand or not, you will be wise to follow her implicitly, just because she knows. This is no mere supposition on my part, no mere flight of the imagination; I have stood beside your President in the presence of the Supreme Director of evolution on this globe, and I know whereof I speak. Let the wise hear my words, and act accordingly."

It is easy to see how minds not gifted with a highly developed critical faculty, or the instinctive sense that discriminates the true from the false, would yield hopelessly to such a formidable a.s.sault. They cannot see that he who thus guarantees the infallibility of Mrs. Besant has himself need of guarantee.... _I do not think that any religion or man-made cult, even in the earliest ages, has ever promulgated superst.i.tion in its grossest form so openly and boldly as this ..._ [Italics mine.--A.L.C.]. Mr. Leadbeater ... demands _deliberate_ suppression of thought.... And having extolled such a deliberately induced mental torpor for Mrs. Besant's benefit, he immediately demands it for himself when he speaks of the "Supreme Director of evolution on this globe." Who is this administrative person? With whom is he to be identified in the scheme of evolution as it has been given to us by Mrs.

Besant and Mr. Leadbeater themselves?... What avenging G.o.d will come to confound this impious prophet who seeks to reduce humanity to the level of a troop of obedient automata!... A gentle and winning voice, infinitely rea.s.suring, rises out of the depths of my being ... a great light breaks forth, triumphant. Mr. Leadbeater hears the words of a judgment immediate and without appeal, p.r.o.nounced by the Buddha himself:--

"Believe not what you have heard said; believe not in traditions merely because they have been transmitted through many generations; believe not merely because a thing is repeated by many persons; ... believe not conjectures ...

_believe not solely upon the authority of your Masters and elders_. WHEN UPON OBSERVATION AND a.n.a.lYSIS A PRINCIPLE CONFORMS TO REASON AND LEADS TO THE BENEFIT AND WELFARE OF ALL, ACCEPT IT AND HOLD IT."--(Buddha, _Anguttura Nikaya_.)

What a royal refuge, what a n.o.ble support are the words of those who are the truly great! They are the perpetual safeguard of humanity.

We have seen that upon "observation and a.n.a.lysis" the "unfailing" wisdom of Mrs. Besant is no more than a ma.s.s of inconsistencies, injustices, sectarian tactics in administration, error and mystification in esoteric announcements. Far from leading to "the benefit and welfare of all," this "unfailing" wisdom is leading to the ... most miserable slavery of souls, the emasculation of minds, the creation of a terrible heresy. And at the present time we are all feeling that we shall not be living up to the wise exhortations of that great Being who was the Buddha, unless we clearly denounce the lamentable aberrations of these two occultists in the hope of drawing all the souls we possibly can away from their pernicious influence. With this end in view, and faithful to this duty, we shall calmly and firmly continue our investigation of facts.

Fortunately, the a.s.sertions of Mrs. Besant and Mr. Leadbeater have lately reached to such a pitch of extravagance and have so utterly defied common sense that they will rouse even the least critical minds and the most compliant hearts.

Then follows the section of M. Levy's book in which he quotes from _Man; Whence, How, and Whither_; much of this I have given earlier in this pamphlet. And M. Levy, one must remember, wrote all this _nine years ago_!

At this point it may serve a useful purpose if I specifically define my own position in regard to Mrs. Besant's claims. _I entirely and most emphatically reject them all._ Mr. Leadbeater's I was not even aware of, until I came to collect and examine the material for this pamphlet. They are so monstrous as not even to merit a specific "rejection"--it goes without saying. I practically lost all faith in Mrs. Besant when she dissimulated and tried to mislead the Inner Group Council on her return from her first visit to India in 1894. She then informed us that she had been "ordered by the Master to accuse Judge." On being closely cross-examined, however, she finally admitted that she had not received this "Order" _direct_, as she would have had us believe, but _through_ the Brahmin whom she then followed blindly[11], exactly as she now follows Leadbeater. But later, when taxed with this in public, she pretended that he had had nothing whatever to do with it! This is a typical example of Mrs. Besant's idea of a 'truthful' statement in a matter of the most vital importance involving the fate of a leader and many thousands of members. What confidence can be placed in such a woman--one whose mental processes are so warped, and whose ideas of 'truth' and 'honesty' are so peculiar? To inspire confidence a leader must be the very soul of truth and uprightness. Mrs. Besant has always been remarkable for a.s.serting herself to be this, and people have believed her. But a truly upright and honest person (even if aware of it, as in Occultism he has to be) would never draw attention to it--and that publicly and in print.

Because, for Mrs. Besant, Mr. ---- was _at this period_ her mouthpiece for the Master, she expected her colleagues to take the same view without question. This att.i.tude is typical, and can be applied to all that she now says about Leadbeater (see _ante_ p. 19.) From this time I found it impossible to believe in her or her statements; such, for instance, as that H. P. B. had reincarnated in Mr. ----'s little daughter!![12]--or in anyone else for that matter. H. P. B. herself, when someone asked her about reincarnating, jokingly replied--"Yes, in some mild Hindu youth with half a lobe to his brain!" _H. P. B. has not reincarnated._ On the ridiculous belief above mentioned Mrs. Besant based her "authority" for doing things in H. P. B.'s name after her death (see _post_ p. 71 for examples). It follows also that I absolutely reject her claim to be an "agent" of the Masters (_i.e._, the Trans-Himalayan Brotherhood), neither do I believe that she has had any communication whatsoever with Them since H. P. B.'s death.[13] Finally, I reject her most presumptuous claim that she is able, or in anyway fitted, to "expand," "verify," or "check" by psychic faculties H. P.

B.'s statements and teachings; still less to carry on independent occult investigations on the same, or any similar plane of consciousness.

Whether Mrs. Besant, in making these claims, is acting under the glamour of Mr. Leadbeater's "clairvoyant" delusions, as MM. Levy and Schure suggest, or is fully conscious and responsible, is not my part to judge, nor does it really matter. For me, her life may be summed up in some words she applied recently to Mr. Gandhi (_Theosophist_, April, 1922).

It is "the tragedy of a soul." Her criticisms on what she calls his "failure" apply fully and literally to _her own_.

There is really very little in the Manifesto (_Theosophist_, March, 1922), that is not sufficiently answered by the various extracts I have quoted from previous critics. Mrs. Besant opens with the usual disingenuous statements about the "Liberal Catholic Church." Her argument that all religions are on an equal footing in the T. S.

carries no weight when it is widely known that L. C. C. agents are everywhere at work pus.h.i.+ng its interests.

Coming next to Mr. Leadbeater, Mrs. Besant states that he was "cleared by a Committee in England"! But it is really a little too much, and altogether too brazen,[14] when she dares to compare his case with that of H. P. B. in the matter of slander. _There can be no possible comparison._ The worst ever suggested against H. P. B. was what has been said of many other women, including Mrs. Besant herself, who have had to work in the glare of publicity and champion an unpopular cause. No evidence was ever brought forward, and the New York _Sun_ promptly apologised for publis.h.i.+ng such statements on being shown that they were unfounded.[15] The grave charges against Mr. Leadbeater were supported by doc.u.mentary evidence _which has never been reb.u.t.ted_, and they have to do with something far worse than personal moral laxity, as we have seen. Mrs. Besant knows she cannot meet these charges, and so seeks to brush them aside by voluble talk about "hatred," "defamation," and "vilification." The only _justification_ she offers for having reinstated him in 1907 is that she had discovered that it was "a cruel lie that he had confessed to wrongdoing"! This is to argue that the "accused" should be "acquitted" because he refused to confess--in the face of evidence of no matter how d.a.m.ning a nature! Did Mrs. Besant follow this procedure in her "Case against W. Q. Judge"? Not at all; far from "acquitting" him when he refused to "confess to wrongdoing" and asked for production of the incriminating doc.u.ments, she calmly confessed that she had destroyed them! But _now_ that it is a case of her own guide and "intermediary" in the dock, her att.i.tude is entirely different, and it is quite enough for her that the "accused" did not "confess" his crime!

As Dr. Stokes, Editor of the _O. E. Critic_ (Was.h.i.+ngton, D.C.) has been fearlessly stating the facts and encouraging the "Back to Blavatsky"

movement for some time past, she next devotes a paragraph to an attempt to discredit him by suggesting his connection with an old enemy of H. P.

B.'s. Dr. Stokes's champions.h.i.+p of H. P. B., and relentless exposure of the Besant-Leadbeater imposture is the more effective since he persists in retaining his members.h.i.+p in the T. S.

The next to be dealt with is Pandit Bhagavan Das, and his criticisms about the Central Hindu College. Here again, all I have quoted from his pamphlet about the secret sections, underhand work, pledges, etc., are entirely ignored.

Mr. T. H. Martyn's letter, which has caused such a sensation in the Society (Holland alone asking for 500 copies) is dismissed as full of "untrue" statements. Truly a very simple method of dealing with matter which Mrs. Besant finds compromising or unpleasant (see _ante_ p. 18); but she can hardly believe it to be convincing.

It is when this profoundly disingenuous woman comes to an explanation of the motive behind her political work in India, that we find a typical specimen of the peculiar form of megalomania already so ably demonstrated by M. Levy. What must be the mental condition of a person who can sit down and solemnly write the following?

The work entrusted to me directly by the great Ris.h.i.+ who is--as one may say [_sic_]--the spiritual Viceroy[16] for India of the King of Kings of our world--is the bringing about of Home Rule in India, in close union with Great Britain, as part of a great Federation of Free Nations, a model of the future World Commonwealth...."

Why such a very mundane and political idea should need an order from a Ris.h.i.+ is not explained. The patent appeal both to the Government and the Indian people in this portentous announcement is not very happily conceived.

It is unfortunate for Mrs. Besant that her indignant denial that another of the notorious "Bishops" (Wedgwood) is "wanted" by the police was immediately followed by a priest's confession and the Bishop's resignation from the L. C. C., the T. S., and the Co-masons![17]

Finally we come to the most ominous part of the whole doc.u.ment, where Mrs. Besant refers to the present condition of the s.e.x problem, and indicates that Mr. Leadbeater's vile teachings to, and practices with boys--trying "to wean lads from evil practices" is her version of it--are part of a process necessary "to save mankind in the near future." The "lessening of the s.e.x impulse" on the "line of higher mental evolution" is "too slow." "Early marriage and birth-control"--preceded, one must a.s.sume, by Leadbeaterism--are now Mrs. Besant's inspired panaceas.

The appalling menace to _the evolution of the spiritual nature in man_, of the secret Leadbeater teaching known as the "X-system," is shown by the evidence of Dr. Eleanor M. Hiestand-Moore (M.D.), Editor of the _Theosophic Voice_ (Chicago), in which all the Leadbeater proceedings of 1906 were reported and discussed. In the August number, 1908, Dr.

Hiestand-Moore writes:--

During the winter of 1906-7 the Editor [herself] was in Chicago and in order to combat the widespread tendency to uphold self-abuse on the lines indicated by Mr. Leadbeater, a series of lectures on the psychology of s.e.x was given. There were members in the E. S., and out of it who upheld the X-system.

One person declared ... that _this system would, before many years, be taught in our public schools_. Still another insisted that _by self-abuse humanity was to return to the hermaphroditic type_ and that _this practice would be universal among Fifth Round Humanity_. A number declared that, while they did not pretend to know anything about such matters, they had understood this was _a highly occult teaching given to would-be disciples_! We could lay hands on a letter setting forth the claim that this teaching is purely "esoteric" and not to be estimated by exoteric standards--this, too, from a Branch president! [Italics mine.--A. L. C.].