Writings of H P Blavatsky
Cardiff Theosophical Society in
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Helena Petrovna
Blavatsky (1831 – 1891)
The Founder of
Modern Theosophy
A Case Of Obsession
By
H P Blavatsky
The particulars of
the case of "obsession," alluded to in the April number of this
magazine, are given in the following letter from a respectable English medical
man who is in attendance upon the victim:–
I take the liberty
of addressing you in the cause of humanity, with the intention of exciting your
sympathies and obtaining all the aid in your power to afford, in a case of
"control." You will understand that the gentleman is being made a
medium against his wish, through having attended a few séances for the purpose
of witnessing "materialization."
Ever since, he has
been more or less subject to a series of persecutions by the
"controlling" spirit and, in spite of every effort of his to throw
off the influence, he has been made to suffer most shamefully and painfully in
very many ways and under most trying and aggravating circumstances, especially
by his thoughts being forced into forbidden channels without external causes
being present – the bodily functions overruled, even being caused to bite his
tongue and cheeks severely whilst eating, &c., and subjected to every
species of petty annoyances which will serve as a means for the
"control" (unknown) to sustain and establish the connection. The
details are in their most painful features not such as I can write to you; but
if there be any means known to you whereby the influence can be diverted, and
it is thought necessary to be more particular in my description of this case, I
will send you all the information I possess.
So little is known
in India of the latest and most startling phase of Western mediumistic
phenomena – "materialization," – that a few words of explanation are
needed to make this case understood. Briefly, then, for several years, in the
presence of certain mediums in America and Europe, there have been seen, often
under good test conditions, apparitions of the dead, which in every respect
seem like living human beings. They walk about, write messages to present and
absent friends, speak audibly in the languages familiar to them in life, even
though the medium may be unacquainted with them, and are dressed in the garb
they wore when alive. Many cases of fraudulent personation of the dead have
been detected, pretended mediums have sometimes gone on for years deceiving the
credulous, and real ones, whose psychical powers have been apparently proved
beyond doubt, have been caught playing tricks in some evil hour when they have
yielded to either the love of money or notoriety. Still, making every allowance
for all these, there is a residuum of veritable cases of the materialization,
or the making visible, tangible and audible of portrait figures of dead people.
These wonderful phenomena have been variously regarded by investigators. Most
Spiritualists have looked upon them as the most precious proofs of the
soul-survival; while Theosophists, acquainted with the views of the ancient
Theurgists, and the still more ancient Aryan philosophers, have viewed them as at
best misleading deceptions of the senses, fraught with danger to the physical
and moral natures of both medium and spectator – if the latter chances to be
susceptible to certain psychical influences. These students of Occultism have
noticed that the mediums for materializations have too often been ruined in
health by the drain upon their systems, and wrecked in morals. They have over
and again warned the Spiritualistic public that mediumship was a most dangerous
gift, one only to be tolerated under great precautions. And for this they have
received much abuse and few thanks. Still one's duty must be done at every
cost, and the case now before us affords a valuable text for one more bit of
friendly counsel.
We need not stop to
discuss the question whether the so-called materialized forms above described
are or are not those of the deceased they look like. That may be held in
reserve until the bottom facts of Oriental psychical science are better
understood. Nor need we argue as to whether there has ever been an authentic
materialization. The London experiences of Mr. William Crookes, F.R.S., and the
American ones of Colonel Olcott, both so widely known and of so convincing a
character, give us a sufficient basis of fact to argue upon. We assume the reality
of materializations, and shall take the instance cited by the English physician
as a subject for diagnosis.
The patient then is
described as having been "controlled" since attending
"circles" where there were materializations, and as having become the
bond-slave of some evil powers which force him to say and do painful and even
disgusting things, despite his resistance. Why is this? How can a man be
compelled to so act against his will? What is Obsession? Three brief questions
these are, but most difficult to explain to an uninitiated public. The laws of
Obsession can only be well understood by him who has sounded the depths of
Indian philosophy. The only clue to the secret, which the West possesses, is
contained in that most beneficent science, Magnetism or Mesmerism. That does
teach the existence of a vital fluid within and about the human being; the fact
of different human polarities; and the possibility of one person projecting
this fluid or force at will, to and upon another person differently polarized.
Baron Reichenbach's theory of Odyle or Odic force shows us the existence of
this same fluid in the mineral and vegetable as well as the animal kingdoms. To
complete the chain of evidence, Buchanan's discovery of the psychometrical
faculty in man enables us to prove, by the help of this faculty, that a subtle
influence is exerted by people upon the houses and even the localities they
live in, the paper they write upon, the clothing they wear, the portion of the
Universal Ether (the Aryan Akása) they exist in – and that this is a permanent
influence, perceptible even at the most distant epochs from the time when the
individual lived and exerted this influence. In one word, we may say that the
discoveries of Western science corroborate most fully the hints thrown out by
Greek sages and the more defined theories of certain Indian philosophers.
Indians and
Buddhists believe alike that thought and deed are both material, that they
survive, that the evil desires and the good ones of a man environ him in a
world of his own making, that these desires and thoughts take on shapes that
become real to him after death, and that Moksha. in the one case, and Nirvana,
in the other, cannot be attained until the disembodied soul has passed quite
through this shadow-world of the haunting thoughts, and become divested of the
last spot of its earthly taint. The progress of Western discovery in this
direction has been and must ever be very gradual. From the phenomena of gross
to those of more sublimated matter, and thence on towards the mysteries of
spirit is the hard road made necessary by the precepts of Aristotle. Western
Science first ascertained that our outcoming breath is charged with carbonic
acid and, in excess, becomes fatal to human life; then, that certain dangerous
diseases are passed from person to person in the sporules thrown off into the
air from the sick body; then, that man projects upon every body and every thing
he encounters a magnetic aura, peculiar to himself; and, finally, the physical
disturbance set up in the Ether in the process of thought-evolution is now
postulated. Another step in advance will be to realize the magical creative
power of the human mind, and the fact that moral taint is just as transmissible
as physical. The "influence" of bad companions will then be
understood to imply a degrading personal magnetism, more subtle than the
impressions conveyed to the eye or the ear by the sights and sounds of a
vicious company. The latter may be repelled by resolutely avoiding to see or
hear what is bad; but the former enwraps the sensitive and penetrates his very
being if he but stop where the moral poison is floating in the air. Gregory's
"Animal Magnetism," Reichenbach's "Researches," and
Denton's "Soul of Things" will make much of this plain to the Western
inquirer, though neither of those authors traces the connection of his
favourite branch of science with the parent-stock – Indian Psychology.
Keeping the present
case in view, we see a man highly susceptible to magnetic impressions, ignorant
of the nature of the "materializations" and, therefore, unable to
protect himself against bad influences, brought in contact with promiscuous
circles where the impressionable medium has long been the unwitting nucleus of
evil magnetisms, his system saturated with the emanations of the surviving
thoughts and desires of those who are living and those who are dead. The reader
is referred to an interesting paper by Judge Gadgil of Baroda (see our December
number), on "Hindu Ideas about Communion with the Dead," for a plain
exposition of this question of earth-tied souls, or Pisachas. "It is
considered," says that writer, "that in this state, the soul, being
deprived of the means of enjoyment of sensual pleasures through its own
physical body, is perpetually tormented by hunger, appetite and other bodily
desires, and can have only vicarious enjoyment by entering into the living
physical bodies of others, or by absorbing the subtlest essences of libations
and oblations offered for their own sake." What is there to surprise us in
the fact that a negatively polarized man, a man of a susceptible temperament,
being suddenly brought into a current of foul emanations from some vicious
person, perhaps still living or perhaps dead, absorbes the insidious poison as
rapidly as quicklime does moisture, until he is saturated with it? Thus, a
susceptible body will absorb the virus of small-pox, or cholera, or typhus, and
we need only recall this to draw the analogy which Occult Science affirms to be
warranted.
Near the Earth's
surface there hangs over us – to use a convenient simile – a steamy moral fog,
composed of the undispersed exhalations of human vice and passion. This fog
penetrates the sensitive to the very soul's core; his psychic self absorbs it
as the sponge does water, or as fresh milk effluvia. It benumbs his moral
sense, spurs his baser instincts into activity, overpowers his good
resolutions. As the fumes of a wine-vault make the brain reel or as the
choke-damp stifles one's breath in a mine, so this heavy cloud of immoral
influences carries away the sensitive beyond the limits of self-control, and he
becomes "obsessed," like our English patient.
What remedy is
there to suggest? Does not our very diagnosis indicate that? The sensitive must
have his sensitiveness destroyed; the negative polarity must be changed to a
positive; he must become active instead of passive. He can be helped by a
magnetiser who understands the nature of obsession, and who is morally pure and
physically healthy; it must be a powerful magnetiser, a man of commanding
will-force. But the fight for freedom will, after all, have to be fought by the
patient himself. His will-power must be aroused. He must expel the poison from
his system. Inch by inch he must win back the lost ground. He must realize that
it is a question of life or death, salvation or ruin, and strive for victory,
like one who makes a last and heroic effort to save his life. His diet must be
of the simplest, he must neither eat animal food, nor touch any stimulant, nor put
himself in any company where there is the smallest chance for unclean thoughts
to be provoked. He should be alone as little as possible, but his companions
should be carefully chosen. He should take exercise and be much in the open
air; use wood-fire, instead of coals. Every indication that the bad influence
was still working within him should be taken as a challenge to control his
thoughts and compel them to dwell upon pure, elevating, spiritual things, at
every hazard and with a determination to suffer anything rather than give way.
If this man can have such a spirit infused into him, and his physician can
secure the benevolent help of a strong, healthy magnetiser, of pure character,
he may be saved. A case almost exactly like this one, except that the patient
was a lady, came under our notice in America; the same advice as the above was
given and followed, and the obsessing "devil" was driven out and has
been kept out ever since.
Theosophist, May, 1880
H. P. Blavatsky
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Preface
Theosophy and the Masters General Principles
The Earth Chain Body and Astral Body Kama – Desire
Manas Of Reincarnation Reincarnation Continued
Karma Kama Loka
Devachan
Cycles
Arguments Supporting Reincarnation
Differentiation Of Species Missing Links
Psychic Laws, Forces, and Phenomena
Psychic Phenomena and Spiritualism
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
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The Theosophical Order of
Service (TOS)
Glossaries of Theosophical Terms
Index of Searchable
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Theosophical Works
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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
(Selection of Articles by H P Blavatsky)
The Secret Doctrine – Volume 3
A compilation of H P Blavatsky’s
writings published after her death
Esoteric Christianity or the Lesser Mysteries
The Early Teachings of The Masters
A Collection of Fugitive Fragments
Fundamentals of the Esoteric Philosophy
Mystical, Philosophical,
Theosophical, Historical
and Scientific
Essays Selected from "The Theosophist"
Edited by George Robert Stow Mead
From Talks on the Path of Occultism - Vol. II
In the Twilight”
Series of Articles
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1898 in The
Theosophical Review and
from 1909-1913 in The Theosophist.
compiled from
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her relatives and friends and edited by A P Sinnett
Letters and
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Theosophische Schriften Auf Deutsch
An Outstanding
Introduction to Theosophy
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Elementary Theosophy Who is the Man? Body and Soul
Body, Soul and Spirit Reincarnation Karma
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