Clairvoyance
by
C. W. Leadbeater
The Theosophical Publishing Society
26, Charing Cross, S.W, London
1899
Chapter 1
WHAT CLAIRVOYANCE IS
Clairvoyance means literally nothing more than "clear seeing", and it is a word
which has been sorely misused, and even degraded so far as to be employed to
describe the trickery of a mountebank in a variety show. Even in its more
restricted sense it covers a wide range of phenomena, differing so greatly in
character that it is not easy to give a definition of the word which shall be at
once succinct and accurate. It has been called "spiritual vision", but no
rendering could well be more misleading than that, for in the vast majority of
cases there is no faculty connected with it which has the slightest claim to be
honoured by so lofty a name.
For the purpose of this treatise we may, perhaps, define
it as the power to see what is hidden from ordinary physical sight. It will be
as well to premise that it is very frequently ( though by no means always )
accompanied by what is called clairaudience, or the power to hear what would be
inaudible to the ordinary physical [Page 6] ear; and we
will for the nonce take our title as covering this faculty also, in order to
avoid the clumsiness of perpetually using two long words where one will suffice.
Let me make two points clear before I begin. First, I am
not writing for those who do not believe that there is such a thing as
clairvoyance, nor am I seeking to convince those who are in doubt about the
matter. In so small a work as this I have no space for that; such people must
study the many books containing lists of cases, or make experiments for
themselves along mesmeric lines. I am addressing myself to the better-instructed
class who know that clairvoyance exists, and are sufficiently interested in the
subject to be glad of information as to its methods and possibilities; and I
would assure them that what I write is the result of much careful study and
experiment, and that though some of the powers which I shall have to describe
may seem new and wonderful to them, I mention no single one of which I have not
myself seen examples.
Secondly, though I shall endeavour to avoid technicalities
as far as possible, yet as I am writing in the main for students of Theosophy, I
shall feel myself at liberty sometimes to use, for brevity's sake and without
detailed explanation, the ordinary Theosophical terms with which I may safely
assume them to be familiar.
Should this document fall into the hands of any to whom
the occasional use of such terms constitutes a difficulty, I can only apologize
to them and refer them for these preliminary explanations to any elementary
Theosophical work, such as Mrs. Besant's
Ancient Wisdom [Page 7]
or Man and His Bodies. The truth is that the
whole Theosophical system hangs together so closely, and its various parts are
so interdependent, that to give a full explanation of every term used would
necessitate an exhaustive treatise on Theosophy as a preface even to this short
account of clairvoyance.
Before a detailed explanation of clairvoyance can usefully
be attempted, however, it will be necessary for us to devote a little time to
some preliminary considerations, in order that we may have clearly in mind a few
broad facts as to the different planes on which clairvoyant vision may be
exercised, and the conditions which renders its exercise possible.
We are constantly assured in Theosophical literature that
all these higher faculties are presently to be the heritage of mankind in
general - that the capacity of clairvoyance, for example, lies latent in every
one, and those in whom it already manifests itself are simply in that one
particular a little in advance of the rest of us. Now this statement is a true
one, and yet it seems quite vague and unreal to the majority of people, simply
because they regard such a faculty as something absolutely different from
anything they have yet experienced, and feel fairly confident that they
themselves, at any rate, are not within measurable distance of its development.
It may help to dispel this sense of unreality if we try to
understand that clairvoyance, like so many other things in nature is mainly a
question of vibrations, and is in fact nothing but an extension of powers which
we [Page 8] are all using every day of our lives. We are
living all the while surrounded by a vast sea of mingled air and ether, the
latter interpenetrating the former, as it does all physical matter; and it is
chiefly by means of vibrations in that vast sea of matter that impressions reach
us from the outside. This much we all know, but it may perhaps never have
occurred to many of us that the number of these vibrations to which we are
capable of responding is in reality quite infinitesimal.
Up among the exceedingly rapid vibrations which affect the
ether there is a certain small section - a very small section - to which the
retina of the human eye is capable of responding, and these particular
vibrations produce in us the sensation which we call light. That is to say, we
are capable of seeing only those objects from which light of that particular
kind can either issue or be reflected.
In exactly the same way the tympanum of the human ear is
capable of responding to a certain very small range of comparatively slow
vibrations - slow enough to affect the air which surrounds us; and so the only
sounds which we can hear are those made by objects which are able to vibrate at
some rate within that particular range.
In both cases it is a matter perfectly well known to
science that there are large numbers of vibrations both above and below these
two sections, and that consequently there is much light that we cannot see, and
there are many sounds to which our ears are deaf. In these case of light the
action of these higher and lower [Page 9] vibrations is
easily perceptible in the effects produced by the actinic rays at one end of the
spectrum and the heat rays at the other.
As a matter of fact there exist vibrations of every
conceivable degree of rapidity, filling the whole vast space intervening between
the slow sound waves and the swift light waves; nor is even that all, for there
are undoubtedly vibrations slower than those of sound, and a whole infinity of
them which are swifter than those know to us as light. So we begin to understand
that the vibrations by which we see and hear are only like two tiny groups of a
few strings selected from an enormous harp of practically infinite extent, and
when we think how much we have been able to learn and infer from the use of
those minute fragments, we see vaguely what possibilities might lie before us if
we were enabled to utilize the vast and wonderful whole.
Another fact which needs to be considered in this
connection is that different human beings vary considerably, though within
relatively narrow limits, in their capacity of response even to the very few
vibrations which are within reach of our physical senses. I am not referring to
the keenness of sight or of hearing that enables one man to see a fainter object
or hear a slighter sound than another; it is not in the least a question of
strength of vision, but of extent of susceptibility.
For example, if anyone will take a good bisulphide-of-carbon
prism, and by its means throw a clear spectrum [Page 10]
on a sheet of white paper, and then get a number of people to mark upon the
paper the extreme limits of the spectrum as it appears to them, he is fairly
certain to find that their powers of vision differ appreciably. Some will see
the violet extending much farther than the majority do; others will perhaps see
rather less violet than most, while gaining a corresponding extension of vision
at the red end. Some few there will perhaps be who can see farther than ordinary
at both ends, and these will almost certainly be what we call sensitive people -
susceptible in fact to a great range of vibrations than are most men of the
present day.
In hearing, the same difference can be tested by taking
some sound which is just not too high to be audible - on the very verge of
audibility as it were - and discovering how many among a given number of people
re able to hear it. The squeaks of a bat is a familiar instance of such a sound,
and experiment will show that on a summer evening, when the whole air is full of
the shrill, needle-like cries of these little animals, quite a large number of
men will be absolutely unconscious of them, and unable to hear anything at all.
Now these examples clearly show that there is no
hard-and-fast limit to man's power of response to either etheric or aerial
vibrations,but that some among us already have that power to a wider extent than
others; and it will even be found that the same man's capacity varies on
different occasions. It is therefore not difficult for us to imagine that it
might be possible for a man to develop this power, and thus in time to
[Page 11] learn to see much that is invisible to his
fellow-men, and hear much that is inaudible to them, since we know perfectly
well that enormous numbers of these additional vibrations do exist, and are
simply, as it were, awaiting recognition.
The experiments with the Röntgen rays give us an example
of the startling results which are produced when even a very few of these
additional vibrations are brought within human ken, and the transparency to
these rays of many substances hitherto considered opaque at once shows us one
way at least in which we may explain such elementary clairvoyance as is involved
in reading a letter inside a closed box, or describing those present in an
adjoining apartment. To learn to see by means of the Röntgen rays in addition to
those ordinarily employed would be quite sufficient to enable anyone to perform
a feat of magic of this order.
So far we have thought only of an extension of the purely
physical senses of man; and when we remember that a man's etheric body is in
reality merely the finer part of his physical frame, and that therefore all his
sense-organs contain a large amount of etheric matter of various degrees of
density, the capacities of which are still practically latent in most of us, we
shall see that even if we confine ourselves to this line of development alone
there are enormous possibilities of all kinds already opening out before us.
But besides and beyond all this we know that man possesses
an astral and a mental body, each of which can in process of time be aroused
into activity, and will [Page 12] respond in turn to the
vibrations of the matter of its own plane, thus opening up before the Ego, as he
learns to function through these vehicles, two entirely new and far wider worlds
of knowledge and power. Now these new worlds, though they are all around us and
freely interpenetrate one another, are not to be thought of as distinct and
entirely unconnected in substance, but rather as melting the one into the other,
the lowest astral forming a direct series with the highest physical, just as the
lowest mental in its turn forms a direct series with the highest astral. We are
not called upon in thinking of them to imagine some new and strange kind of
matter, but simply to think of the ordinary physical kind as subdivided so very
much more finely and vibrating so very much more rapidly as to introduce us to
what are practically entirely new conditions and qualities.
It is not then difficult for us to grasp the possibility
of a steady and progressive extension of our senses, so that both by sight and
by hearing we may be able to appreciate vibrations far higher and far lower than
those which are ordinarily recognized. A large section of these additional
vibrations will still belong to the physical plane, and will merely enable us to
obtain impressions from the etheric part of that plane, which is at present as a
closed book to us. Such impressions will still be received through the retina of
the eye; of course they will affect its etheric rather than its solid matter,
but we may nevertheless regard them as still appealing only to an organ
specialized to receive them, and not to the whole surface of the etheric body.
[Page 13]
There are some abnormal cases, however, in which other
parts of the etheric body respond to these additional vibrations as readily as,
or even more readily than, the eye. Such vagaries are explicable in various
ways, but principally as effects of some partial astral development, for it will
be found that the sensitive parts of the body almost invariably correspond with
one or other of the
chakrams, or centres of vitality in the astral body. And though, if
astral consciousness be not yet developed, these centres may not be available on
their own plane, they are still strong enough to stimulate into keener activity
the etheric matter which they interpenetrate.
When we come to deal with the astral senses themselves the
methods of working are very different. The astral body has not specialized
sense-organs - a fact which perhaps needs some explanation, since many students
who are trying to comprehend its physiology seem to find it difficult to
reconcile with the statements that have been made as to the perfect
interpenetration of the physical body by astral matter, the exact correspondence
between the two vehicles and the fact that every physical object has necessarily
its astral counterpart.
Now all these statements are true, and yet it is quite
possible for people who do not normally see astrally to misunderstand them.
Every order of physical matter has its corresponding order of astral matter in
constant association with it - not to be separated from it except by a very
considerable exertion of occult force, and [Page 14] even
then only to be held apart from it as long as force is being definitely exerted
to that end. But for all that the relation of the astral particles one to
another is far looser than is the case with their physical correspondences.
In a bar of iron, for example, we have a mass of physical
molecules in the solid condition - that is to say, capable of comparatively
little change in their relative positions, though each vibrating with immense
rapidity in its own sphere. The astral counterpart of this consists of what we
often call solid astral matter - that is, matter of the lowest and densest
sub-plane of the astral; but nevertheless its particles are constantly and
rapidly changing their relative positions, moving among one another as easily as
those of a liquid on the physical plane might do. So that there is no permanent
association between any one physical particle and that amount of astral matter
which happens at any given moment to be acting as its counter part.
This is equally true with respect to the astral body of
man, which for our purpose at the moment we may regard as consisting of two
parts - the denser aggregation which occupies the exact position of the physical
body, and the cloud of rarer astral matter which surrounds that aggregation. In
both these parts, and between them both, there is going on at every moment of
time the rapid inter-circulation of the particles which has been described, so
that as one watches the movement of the molecules in the astral body one is
reminded of the appearance of those in fiercely boiling water.
[Page 15]
This being so, it will be readily understood that though
any given organ of the physical body must always have as its counterpart a
certain amount of astral matter, it does not retain the same particles for more
than a few seconds at a time, and consequently there is nothing corresponding to
the specialization of physical nerve-matter into optic or auditory nerves, and
so on. So that though the physical eye or ear has undoubtedly always its
counterpart of astral matter, that particular fragment of astral matter is no
more ( and no less) capable of responding to the vibrations which produce astral
sight or astral hearing than any other part of the vehicle.
It must never be forgotten that though we constantly have
to speak of "astral sight" or "astral hearing" in order to make ourselves
intelligible, all that we mean by those expressions is the faculty of responding
to such vibrations as convey to the man's consciousness, when he is functioning
in his astral body, information of the same character as that conveyed to him by
his eyes and ears while he is in the physical body. But in the entirely
different astral conditions, specialized organs are not necessary for the
attainment of this result; there is matter in every part of the astral body
which is capable of such response,and consequently the man functioning in that
vehicle sees equally well objects behind him, beneath him, above him, without
needing to turn his head.
There is, however, another point which it would hardly be
fair to leave entirely out of account,and that [Page 16]
is the question of the chakrams referred to above. Theosophical students
are familiar with the idea of the existence in both the astral and the etheric
bodies of man of certain centres of force which have to vivified in turn by the
sacred serpent-fire as the man advances in evolution. Though these cannot be
described as organs in the ordinary sense of the word, since it is not through
them that the man sees and hears, as he does in physical life through eyes and
ears, yet it is apparently very largely upon their vivification that the power
of exercising these astral senses depends each of them as it is developed giving
to the whole astral body the power of response to a new set of vibrations.
Neither have these centres,however, any permanent
collection of astral matter connected with them. They are simply vortices in the
matter of the body - vortices through which all these particles pass in turn -
points, perhaps, at which the higher force from planes above impinges upon the
astral body. Even this description gives but a very partial idea of their
appearance, for they are in reality four dimensional vortices, so that the force
which comes through them and is the cause of their existence seems to well up
from nowhere. But at any rate, since all particles in turn pass through each of
them, it will be clear that it is thus possible for each in turn to evoke in all
the particles of the body the power of receptivity to a certain set of
vibrations, so that all the astral senses are equally active in all parts of the
body.
The vision of the mental plane is again
[Page 17] totally different, for in this case we can no longer speak of
separate senses such as sight and hearing, but rather have to postulate one
general sense which responds so fully to the vibrations reaching it that, when
any object comes within its cognition, it at once comprehends it fully, and as
it were sees it, hears it, feels it, and knows all there is to know about it by
the one instantaneous operation. Yet even this wonderful faculty differs in
degree only and not in kind from those which are at our command at the present
time; one the mental plane, just as on the physical, impressions are still
conveyed by means of vibrations traveling from the object seen to the seer.
On the buddhic plane we meet for the first time with a
quite new faculty having nothing in common with those of which we have spoken,
for there a man cognizes any object by an entirely different method, in which
external vibrations play no part. The object becomes part of himself, and he
studies it from the inside instead of from the outside. But with this
power ordinary clairvoyance has nothing to do.
The development, either entire or partial, of any one of
these faculties would come under our definition of clairvoyance - the power to
see what is hidden from ordinary physical sight. But these faculties may be
developed in various ways, and it will be well to say a few words as to these
different lines.
We may presume that if it were possible for a man to be
isolated during his evolution from all but the gentlest outside influences, and
to unfold from the beginning [Page 18] in perfectly
regular and normal fashion, he would probably develop his senses in regular
order also. He would find his physical senses gradually extending their scope
until they responded to all the physical vibrations, of etheric as well as of
denser matter; then in orderly sequence would come sensibility to the coarser
part of the astral plane, and presently the finer part also would be included,
until in due course the faculty of the mental plane dawned in its turn.
In real life, however, development so regular as this is
hardly ever known, and many a man has occasional flashes of astral consciousness
without any awakening of etheric vision at all. And this irregularity of
development is one of the principal causes of man's extraordinary liability to
error in matters of clairvoyance - a liability from which there is no escape
except by a long course of careful training under a qualified teacher.
Students of Theosophical literature are well aware that
there are such teachers to be found - that even in this materialistic nineteenth
century the old saying is still true, that "when the pupil is ready, the Master
is ready also" and that "in the hall of learning, when he is capable of entering
there, the disciple will always find his Master". They are well aware also that
only under such guidance can a man develop his latent powers in safety and with
certainty, since they know how fatally easy it is for the untrained clairvoyant
to deceive himself as to the meaning and value of what he sees, or even
absolutely to distort his vision completely in bringing it down into his
physical consciousness. [Page
19]
It does not follow that even the pupil who is receiving
regular instruction in the use of occult powers will find them unfolding
themselves exactly in the regular order which was suggested above as probably
idea. His previous progress may not have been such as to make this for him the
easiest or most desirable road; but at any rate he is in the hands of one who is
perfectly competent to be his guide in spiritual development, and he rests in
perfect contentment that the way along which he is taken will be that which is
the best way for him.
Another great advantage which he gains is that whatever
faculties he may acquire are definitely under his command and can be used fully
and constantly when he needs them for his Theosophical work; whereas in the case
of the untrained man such powers often manifest themselves only very partially
and spasmodically, and appear to come and go, as it were, at their own sweet
will.
It may reasonably be objected that if clairvoyant faculty
is, as stated, a part of the occult development of man, and so a sign of a
certain amount of progress along that line, it seems strange that it should
often be possessed by primitive peoples,or by the ignorant and uncultured among
our own race - persons who are obviously quite undeveloped, from whatever point
of view one regards them. No doubt this does appear remarkable at first sight;
but the fact is that the sensitiveness of the savage or of the coarse and vulgar
European ignoramus is not really at all the same thing as the
[Page 20] faculty of his properly trained brother, nor is it arrived at in
the same way.
An exact and detailed explanation of the difference would
lead us into rather recondite technicalities, but perhaps the general idea of
the distinction between the two may be caught from an example taken from the
very lowest plane of clairvoyance, in close contact with the denser physical.
The etheric double in man is in exceedingly close relation to his nervous
system, and any kind of action upon one of them speedily reacts on the other.
Now in the sporadic appearance of etheric sight in the savage, whether of
Central Africa or of Western Europe, it has been observed that the corresponding
nervous disturbance is almost entirely in the sympathetic system, and that the
whole affair is practically beyond the man's control - is in fact a sort of
massive sensation vaguely belonging to the whole etheric body, rather than an
exact and definite sense-perception communicated through a specialized organ.
As in later races and amid higher development the strength
of the man is more and more thrown into the evolution of the mental faculties,
this vague sensitiveness usually disappears; but still later, when the spiritual
man begins to unfold, he regains his clairvoyant power. This time, however, the
faculty is a precise and exact one, under the control of the man's will, and
exercised through a definite sense-organ; and it is noteworthy that any nervous
action set up in sympathy with it is now almost exclusively in the cerebro-spinal
system. [Page 21]
On this subject Mrs. Besant writes:
"The lower forms of psychism are more frequent in animals and in very
unintelligent human beings than in men and women in whom the intellectual
powers are well developed. They appear to be connected with the sympathetic
system, not with the cerebro-spinal. The large nucleated ganglionic cells in
this system contain a very large proportion of etheric matter, and are hence
more easily affected by the coarser astral vibrations than are the cells in
which the proportion is less. As the cerebro-spinal system develops, and the
brain becomes more highly evolved, the sympathetic system subsides into a
subordinate position, and the sensitiveness to psychic vibrations is
dominated by the stronger and more active vibrations of the higher nervous
system. It is true that at a later stage of evolution psychic sensitiveness
reappears but it is then developed in connection with the cerebro-spinal
centres, and is brought under the control of the will. But the hysterical
and ill-regulated psychism of which we see so many lamentable examples is
due to the small development of the brain and the dominance of the
sympathetic system."
Occasional flashes of clairvoyance do, however, sometimes
come to the highly cultured and spiritual-minded man, even though he may never
have heard of the possibility of training such a faculty. In his case such
glimpses usually signify that he is approaching that stage in his evolution when
these powers will naturally begin to manifest themselves, and their appearance
should serve as an additional stimulus to him strive to maintain that high
standard of moral purity and mental balance without which clairvoyance is a
curse and not a blessing to its possessor.
Between those who are entirely unimpressible and those who
are in full possession of clairvoyant power there are many intermediate stages.
One to which it will be worth while to give a passing glance is the stage in
which a man, though he has no clairvoyant faculty in ordinary life, yet exhibits
it more or less fully under the influence of mesmerism. This is a case in which
the psychic nature is already sensitive, but the consciousness is not yet
capable of functioning in it amidst the manifold distractions of physical life.
It needs to be set free by the temporary suspension of the outer senses in the
mesmeric trance before it can use the diviner faculties which are but just
beginning to dawn within it. But of course even in the mesmeric trance there are
innumerable degrees of lucidity, from the ordinary patient who is blankly
unintelligent to the man whose power of sight is fully under the control of the
operator, and can be directed whithersoever he wills, or to the more advanced
stage in which, when the [Page 22] consciousness is once
set free, it escapes altogether from the grasp of the magnetizer, and soars into
fields of exalted vision where it is entirely beyond his reach.
Another step along the same path is that upon which such
perfect suppression of the physical as that which occurs in the hypnotic trance
is not necessary,but the power of supernormal sight, though still out of reach
during waking life, becomes available when the body is held in the bonds of
ordinary sleep. At this stage of development stood many of the prophets and
seers of whom we read, who were "warned of God in a dream", or communed with
beings far higher than themselves in the silent watches of the night.
Most cultured people of the higher races of the world have
this development to some extent: that is to say, the senses of their astral
bodies are in full working order, and perfectly capable of receiving impressions
from objects and entities of their own plane. But to make that fact of any use
to them down here in the physical body, two changes are usually necessary:
first, the the Ego shall be awakened to the realities of the astral plane, and
induced to emerge from the chrysalis formed by his own waking thoughts, and look
round him to observe and to learn; and secondly, that the consciousness shall be
so far retained during the return of the Ego into his physical body as to enable
him to impress upon his physical brain the recollection of what he has seen or
learnt.
If the first of these changes has taken place, the second
is of little importance, since the Ego, the true [Page 23]
man, will be able to profit by the information to be obtained upon that plane,
even though he may not have the satisfaction of bringing through any remembrance
of it into his waking life down here.
Students often ask how this clairvoyant faculty will first
be manifested in themselves - how they may know when they have reached the stage
at which its first faint foreshadowings are beginning to be visible. Cases
differ so widely that it is impossible to give to this question any answer that
will be universally applicable.
Some people begin by a plunge, as it were, and under some
unusual stimulus become able just for once to see some striving vision; and very
often in such a case, because the experience does not repeat itself, the seer
comes in time to believe that on that occasion he must have been the victim of
hallucination. Others begin by becoming intermittently conscious of the
brilliant colours and vibrations of the human aura; yet others find themselves
with increasing frequency seeing and hearing something to which those around
them are blind and deaf; others, again, see faces, landscapes, or coloured
clouds floating before their eyes in the dark before they sink to rest; while
perhaps the commonest experience of all is that of those who begin to recollect
with greater and greater clearness what they have seen and heard on the other
planes during sleep.
Having now to some extent cleared our ground, we may
proceed to consider the various phenomena of clairvoyance.
[Page 24]
They differ so widely both in character and in degree that
it is not very easy to decide how they can most satisfactorily be classified. We
might, for example, arrange them according to the kind of sight employed -
whether it were mental, astral, or merely etheric. We might divine them
according to the capacity of the clairvoyant, taking into consideration whether
he was trained or untrained; whether his vision was regular and under his
command, or spasmodic and independent of his volition; whether he could exercise
it only when under mesmeric influence, or whether that assistance was
unnecessary for him; whether he was able to use his faculty when awake in the
physical body, or whether it was available only when he was temporarily away
from that body in sleep or trance.
All these distinctions are of importance, and we shall
have to take them all into consideration as we go on, but perhaps on the whole
the most useful classification will be one something on the lines of that
adopted by Mr.Sinnett in his Rationale of Mesmerism - a book, by the
way, which all students of clairvoyance ought to read. In dealing with the
phenomena, then, we will arrange them rather according to the capacity of the
sight employed than to the plane upon which it is exercised, so that we may
group instances of clairvoyance under some such headings as these:
1- Simple clairvoyance - that is to say, a mere opening of
sight, enabling its possessor to see whatever astral or etheric entities happen
to be present around him, but not including the power of observing either
distant [Page 25] places or scenes belonging to any other
time than the present.
2-Clairvoyance in space- the capacity to see scenes or
events removed from the seer in space, and either too far distant for ordinary
observation or concealed by intermediate objects.
3- Clairvoyance in time- that is to say, the capacity to
see objects or events which are removed from the seer in time, or, in other
words,the power of looking into the past or the future.
[Page 26]
CHAPTER -2-
SIMPLE CLAIRVOYANCE: FULL
We have defined this as a mere opening of etheric or
astral sight, which enables the possessor to see whatever may be present around
him on corresponding levels, but is not usually accompanied by the power of
seeing anything at a great distance or of reading either the past or the future.
It is hardly possible altogether to exclude these latter faculties, for astral
sight necessarily has considerably greater extension than physical, and
fragmentary pictures of both past and future are often casually visible even to
clairvoyants who do not know how to seek specially for them; but there is
nevertheless a very real distinction between such incidental glimpses and the
definite power of projection of the sight either in space or time.
We find among sensitive people all degrees of this kind of
clairvoyance, from that of the man who gets a vague impression which hardly
deserves the name of sight at all, up to the full possession of etheric and
astral vision respectively. Perhaps the simplest method will be for us to begin
by describing what would be visible in the case of this fuller development of
the [Page 27] power, as the cases of its partial
possession will then be seen to fall naturally into their places.
Let us take the etheric vision first. This consists
simply, as has already been said, in susceptibility to a far larger series of
physical vibrations than ordinary, but nevertheless its possession brings into
view a good deal to which the majority of the human race still remains blind.
Let us consider what changes its acquisition produces in the aspect of familiar
objects, animate and inanimate, and then see to what entirely new factors it
introduces us. But it must be remembered that what I am about to describe is the
result of the full and perfectly-controlled possession of the faculty only, and
that most of the instances met with in real life will be likely to fall far
short of it in one direction or another.
The most striking change produced in the appearance of
inanimate objects by the acquisition of this faculty is that most of them become
almost transparent, owing to the difference in wavelength of some of the
vibrations to which the man has now become susceptible. He finds himself capable
of performing with the utmost ease the proverbial feat of "seeing through a
brick wall," for to his newly-acquired vision the brick wall seems to have a
consistency no greater than that of a light mist. He therefore sees what is
going on in an adjoining room almost as though no intervening wall existed; he
can describe with accuracy the contents of a locked box, or read a sealed
letter; with a little practice he can find a given passage in a closed
[Page 28] book. This last feat, though perfectly easy to
astral vision, presents considerable difficulty to one using etheric sight,
because of the fact that each page has to be looked at through all those
which happen to be superimposed upon it.
It is often asked whether under these circumstances a man
sees always with this abnormal sight, or only when he wishes o do so. The answer
is that if the faculty is perfectly developed it will be entirely under his
control, and he can use that or his more ordinary vision at will. He changes
from one to the other as readily and naturally as we now change the focus of our
eyes when we look up from our book to follow the motions of some object a mile
away. It is, as it were,a focusing of consciousness on the one or the other
aspect of what is seen: and though the man would have quite clearly in his view
the aspect upon which his attention was for the moment fixed, he would always be
vaguely conscious of the other aspect too, just as when we focus our sight upon
any object held in our hands we yet vaguely see the opposite wall of the room as
a background.
Another curious change, which comes from the possession of
this sight, is that the solid ground upon which the man walks becomes to a
certain extent transparent to him, so that he is able to see down into it to a
considerable depth, much as we can now see into fairly clear water. This enables
him to watch a creature burrowing underground, to distinguish a vein of coal or
of metal if not too far below the surface, and so on.
[Page 29]
The limit of etheric sight when looking through solid
matter appears to be analogous to that imposed upon us when looking through
water or mist. We cannot see beyond a certain distance, because the medium
through which we are looking is not perfectly transparent.
The appearance of animate objects is also considerably
altered for the man who has increased his visual powers to this extent. The
bodies of men and animals are for him in the main transparent, so that he can
watch the action of the various internal organs, and to some extent diagnose
some of their diseases.
The extended sight also enables him to perceive, more or
less clearly, various classes of creatures, elemental and otherwise, whose
bodies are not capable of reflecting any of the rays within the limit of the
spectrum as ordinarily seen. Among the entities so seen will be some of the
lower orders of nature-spirits - those whose bodies are composed of the denser
etheric matter. To this class belong nearly all the fairies, gnomes, and
brownies, about whom there are still so many stories remaining among Scotch and
Irish mountains and in remote country places all over the world.
The vast kingdom of nature-spirits is in the main an
astral kingdom, but still there is a large section of it which appertains to the
etheric part of the physical plane, and this section, of course, is much more
likely to come within the ken of ordinary people than the others. Indeed, in
reading the common fairy stories one frequently comes across distinct
indications that it is [Page 30] with this class that we
are dealing. Any student of fairy lore will remember how often mention is made
of some mysterious ointment or drug, which when applied to a man's eyes enables
him to see the members of the fairy commonwealth whenever he happens to meet
them.
The story of such an application and its results occurs so
constantly and comes from so many different parts of the world that there must
certainly be some truth behind it, as there always is behind really universal
popular tradition. Now no such anointing of the eyes alone could by any
possibility open a man's astral vision, though certain ointment rubbed over the
whole body will very greatly assist the astral body to leave the physical in
full consciousness - a fact the knowledge of which seems to have survived even
to mediaeval times, as will be seen from the evidence given at some of the
trials for witchcraft. But the application to the physical eye might very easily
so stimulate its sensitiveness as to make it susceptible to some of the etheric
vibrations.
The story frequently goes on to relate how when the human
being who has used this mystical ointment betrays his extended vision in some
way to a fairy, the latter strikes or stabs him in the eye, thus depriving him
not only of the etheric sight, but of that of the denser physical plane as well.
(See The Science of Fairy Tales by E.S.Hartlane, in the "Contemporary
Science" series - or indeed almost any extensive collection of fairy stories.)
If the sight acquired had been astral, such a proceeding would have been
entirely unavailing, [Page 31] for no injury to the
physical apparatus would affect an astral faculty; but if the vision produced by
the ointment were etheric, the destruction of the physical eye would in most
cases at once distinguish it, since that is the mechanism by means of which it
works.
Anyone possessing this sight of which we are speaking
would also be able to perceive the etheric double of man; but since this is so
nearly identical in size with the physical, it would hardly be likely to attract
his attention unless it were partially protected in trance or under the
influence of anaesthetics. After death, when it withdraws entirely from the
dense body, it would be clearly visible to him, and he would frequently see it
hovering over newly-made graves as he passed through a church yard or cemetery.
If he were to attend a spiritualistic
séance he would see the etheric matter oozing out from the side of
the medium, and could observe the various ways in which the communicating
entities make use of it.
Another fact which could hardly fail soon to thrust itself
upon his notice would be the extension of his perception of colour. He would
find himself able to see several entirely new colours, not in the least
resembling any of those included in the spectrum as we at present know it, and
therefore of course quite indescribable in any terms at our command. And not
only would he see new objects that were wholly of these new colours, but he
would also discover that modifications had been introduced into the colour of
many objects with which he was quite familiar, according to whether they had
[Page 32] or had not some tinge of these new hues
intermingled with the old. So that two surfaces of colour which to ordinary eyes
appeared to match perfectly would often present distinctly different shades to
his keener sight.
We have now touched upon some of the principal changes
which would be introduced into a man's world when he gained etheric sight; and
it must always be remembered that in most cases a corresponding change would at
the same time be brought about in his other senses also, so that he would be
capable of hearing, and perhaps even of feeling, more than most of those around
him. Now supposing that in addition to this he obtained the sight of the astral
plane, what further changes would be observable?
Well, the changes would be many and great; in fact, a whole new world would
open before his eyes. Let us consider its wonders briefly in the same order as
before, and see first what difference there would be in the appearance of
inanimate objects. On this point I may begin by quoting a recent quaint answer
given in The Vâhan .
"There is a distinct difference between etheric sight and
astral sight, and it is the latter which seems to correspond to the fourth
dimension..
"The easiest way to understand he difference is to take an
example. If you looked at a man with both the sights in turn, you would see the
buttons at the back of his coat in both cases; only if you used etheric sight
you would see them through him, and would see the shank-side as nearest
to you, but if you looked astrally, [Page 33] you would
see it not only like that, but just as if you were standing behind the man as
well.
"Or if you were looking etherically at a wooden cube with
writing on all its sides, it would be as though the cube were glass, so that you
could see through it, and you would see the writing on the opposite side all
backwards, while that on the right and left sides would not be clear to you at
all unless you moved, because you see it edgewise. But if you looked at it
astrally you would see all the sides at once, and all the right way up, as
though the whole cube had been flattened out before you, and you would see every
particle of the inside as well - not through the others, but all all
flattened out. You would be looking at it from another direction, at right
angles to all the directions that we know.
"If you look at the back of a watch etherically you see
all the wheels through it, and the face through them, but backwards; if
you look at it astrally, you see the face right way up and all the wheels lying
separately, but nothing on the top of anything else."
Here we have at once the keynote, the principal factor of
the change; the man is looking at everything from an absolutely new point of
view, entirely outside of anything that he has ever imagined before. He has no
longer the slightest difficulty in reading any page in a closed book, because he
is not now looking at it through all the other pages before it or behind it, but
is looking straight down upon it as though it were the only page to be seen. The
depth at which a vein of [Page 34] metal or of coal may
lie is no longer a barrier to his sight of it, because he is not now looking
through the intervening depth of earth at all. The thickness of a wall, or the
number of walls intervening between the observer and the object, would make a
great deal of difference to the clearness of the etheric sight; they would make
no difference whatever to the astral sight, because on the astral plane they
would not intervene between the observer and the object. Of course that
sounds paradoxical and impossible, and it is quite inexplicable to a mind
not specially trained to grasp the idea; yet it is none the less absolutely
true.
This carries us straight into the middle of the much-vexed
question of the fourth dimension - a question of the deepest interest, though
one that we cannot pretend to discuss in the space at our disposal. Those who
wish to study it as it deserves are recommended to begin with Mr.C.H.Hinton's
Scientific Romances or Dr.A.T.Schofield's Another World, and then
follow on with the former author's larger work, A New Era of Thought.
Mr. Hinton not only claims to be able himself to grasp mentally some of the
simpler fourth dimensional figures, but also states that anyone who will take
the trouble to follow out his directions may with perseverance acquire that
mental grasp likewise. I am not certain that the power to do this is within the
reach of everyone, as he thinks, for it appears to me to require considerable
mathematical ability; but I can at any rate bear witness that he tesseract or
fourth-dimensional cube which he describes is a [Page 35]
reality, for it is quite a familiar figure upon the astral plane.
[
He has now perfected a new method of representing the several dimensions by
colours instead of by arbitrary written symbols. He states that his will very
much simplify the study, as the reader will be able to distinguish instantly by
sight any part or feature of the tesseract. A full description of this new
method, with plates, is said to be ready for the press, and is expected to
appear within a year, so that intending students of this fascinating subject
might do well to await its publication]
I know that Madame Blavatsky, in alluding to the theory of
the fourth dimension, has expressed an opinion that it is only a clumsy way of
stating the idea of the entire permeability of matter, and that Mr. W.T.Stead
has followed along the same lines, presenting the conception to his readers
under the name of throughth. Careful, oft-repeated and detailed
investigation does, however, seem to show quite conclusively that this
explanation does not cover all the facts. It is a perfect description of etheric
vision, but the further and quite different idea of the fourth dimension as
expounded by Mr.Hinton is the only one which gives any kind of explanation down
here of the constantly-observed facts of astral vision. I would therefore
venture deferentially to suggest that, when Madame Blavatsky wrote as she did,
she had in mind etheric vision and not astral, and that the extreme
applicability of the phrase to this other and higher faculty, of which she was
not at the moment thinking, did not occur to her.
The possession of this extraordinary and scarcely
expressible power, then, must always be borne in mind through all that follows.
It lays every point in the interior of every solid body absolutely open to the
gaze of the seer, just as every point in the interior of a circle lies open to
the gaze of a man looking down upon it.
But even this is by no means all that it gives to its
possessor. He see not only the inside as well as the outside of every object,
but also its astral counterpart. [Page 36] Every atom and
molecule of physical matter has its corresponding astral atoms and molecules,
and the mass which is built up out of these is clearly visible to our
clairvoyant. Usually the astral part of any object projects somewhat beyond the
physical part of it, and thus metals, stones and other things are seen
surrounded by an astral aura.
It will be seen at once that even in the study of
inorganic matter a man gains immensely by the acquisition of this vision. Not
only does he see the astral part of the object at which he looks, which before
was wholly hidden from him; not only does he see much more of its physical
constitution than he did before, but even what was visible to him before is now
seen much more clearly and truly. A moment's consideration will show that his
new vision approximates much more closely to true perception than does physical
sight. For example, if he looks astrally at a glass cube, its sides will all
appear equal, as we know they really are, whereas on the physical plane he sees
the further side in perspective - that is, it appears smaller than the nearer
side, which is, of course, a mere illusion due to his physical limitations.
When we come to consider the additional facilities which
it offers in the observation of animate objects we see still more clearly the
advantages of the astral vision. It exhibits to the clairvoyant the aura of
plants and animals, and thus in the case of the latter their desires and
emotions, and whatever thoughts they may have, are all plainly shown before his
eyes. [Page 37]
But it is in dealing with human beings that he will most
appreciate the value of this faculty, for he will often be able to help them far
more effectually when he guides himself by the information which it gives him.
He will be able to see the aura as far up as the astral
body, and though that leaves all the higher part of a man still hidden from his
gaze, he will nevertheless find it possible by careful observation to learn a
good deal about the higher part form what is within his reach. His capacity of
examining the etheric double will give him considerable advantage in locating
and classifying any defects or diseases of the nervous system, while from the
appearance of the astral body he will be at once aware of all the emotions,
passions, desires and tendencies of the man before him, and even of very many of
his thoughts also.
As he looks at a person he will see him surrounded by the
luminous mists of the astral aura, flashing with all sorts of brilliant colours,
and constantly changing in hue and brilliancy with every variation of the
person's thoughts and feelings. He will see this aura flooded with the beautiful
rose-colour of pure affection, the rich blue of devotional feeling, the hard,
dull brown of selfishness, the deep scarlet of angers, the horrible lurid red of
sensuality, the livid grey of fear, the black clouds of hatred and malice, or
any of the other hundredfold indications so easily to be read in it by a
practiced eye; and thus it will be impossible for any persons to conceal from
him the real state of their feelings on any subject.
[Page 38]
These varied indications of the aura are of themselves a
study of very deep interest, but I have no space to deal with them in detail
here. A much fuller account of them, together with a number of coloured
illustrations, will be found in my pamphlet on "The Aura" and the larger
work on the subject "Man, Visible and Invisible".
Not only does the astral aura show him the temporary
result of the emotion passing through it at the moment, but it also gives him,
by the arrangement and proportion of its colours when in a condition of
comparative rest, a clue to the general disposition and character of its owner.
For the astral body is the expression of as much of the man as can be manifested
on that plane, so that from what is seen in it much more which belongs to higher
planes may be inferred with considerable certainty.
In this judgment of character our clairvoyant will be much
helped by so much of the person's thought as expresses itself on the astral
plane, and consequently comes within his purview. The true home of thought is on
the devachanic [mental] plane, and all thought first manifests itself there as a
vibration of the mind-body. But if it be in any way a selfish thought, or if it
be connected in any way with an emotion or a desire, it immediately descends
into the astral plane, and takes to itself a visible form of astral matter.
In the case of the majority of men almost all thought
would fall under one or other of these heads, so that practically the whole of
their personality would like clearly before friend's astral vision, since their
astral bodies [Page 39] and the thought-forms constantly
radiating from them would be to him as an open book in which their
characteristics were writ so largely that he who ran might read. Anyone wishing
to gain some idea as to how the thought-forms present themselves to
clairvoyant vision may satisfy themselves to some extent by examining the
illustrations accompanying Mrs. Besant's valuable article on "Thought Forms" in
Lucifer of September 1896.
We have seen something of the alteration in the appearance
of both animate and inanimate objects when viewed by one possessed of full
clairvoyant sight as far as the astral plane is concerned; let us now consider
what entirely new objects he will see. He will be conscious of a far greater
fulness in nature in many directions, but chiefly his attention will be
attracted by the living denizens of this new world. No detailed account of them
can be attempted within the space at our disposal; for that the reader is
referred to No.5 [The Astral Plane] of the Theosophical Manuals. Here we can do
no more than barely enumerate a few classes only of the vast hosts of astral
inhabitants.
He will be impressed by the protean forms of the ceaseless
tide of elemental essence, ever swirling around him, menacing often, yet always
retiring before a determined effort of the will; he will marvel at the enormous
army of entities temporarily called out of this ocean into separate existence by
the thoughts and wishes of man, whether good or evil. He will watch the manifold
tribes of the nature-spirits at their work or at their [Page
40] play; he will sometimes be able to study with ever-increasing delight
the magnificent evolution of some of the lower orders of the glorious kingdom of
the Devas, which corresponds approximately to the angelic host of Christian
terminology.
But perhaps of even keener interests to him than any of
these will be the human denizens of the astral world, and he will find them
divisible into two great classes - those whom we call the living, and those
others, most of them infinitely more alive, whom we so foolishly misname the
dead. Among the former he will find here and there one wide awake and fully
conscious, perhaps sent to bring him some message, or examining him keenly to
see what progress he is making; while the majority of his neighbours, when away
from their physical bodies during sleep, will drift idly by, so wrapped up in
their own cogitations as to be practically unconscious of what is going on
around them.
Among the great host of the recently dead he will find all
degrees of consciousness and intelligence, and all shades of character - for
death, which seems to our limited vision so absolute a change, in reality alters
nothing of the man himself. On the day after his death he is precisely the same
man as he was the day before it, with the same disposition, the same qualities,
the same virtues and vices, save only that he has cast aside his physical body;
but the loss of that no more makes him in any way a different man than would the
removal of an overcoat. So among the dead our student will find men intelligent
and stupid, kind-hearted and morose, [Page 41] serious
and frivolous, spiritually-minded and sensually-minded, just as among the
living.
Since he can not only see the dead, but speak with them,
he can often be of very great use to them, and give them information and
guidance which is of the utmost value to them. Many of them are in a condition
of great surprise and perplexity, and sometimes even of acute distress, because
they the facts of the next world so unlike the childish legends which are all
that popular religion in the West has to offer with reference to this
transcendently important subject; and therefore a man who understands this new
world and can explain matters is distinctly a friend in need.
In many other ways a man who fully possesses this faculty
may be of use to the living as well as to the dead; but this side of the subject
I have already written in my little book on
Invisible Helpers. In addition to astral entities he will see astral corpses
- shades and shells in all stages of decay; but these need only be just
mentioned here, as the reader desiring a further account of them will find it in
our third (Death - and After?) and fifth (The Astral Plane) manuals.
Another wonderful result which the full enjoyment of
astral clairvoyance brings to a man is that he has no longer any break in
consciousness. When he lies down at night he leaves his physical body to the
rest which it requires, while he goes about his business in the far more
comfortable astral vehicle. In the morning he returns to and re-enters his
physical body, but without any loss of consciousness or memory between the two
states, and thus he is able to live, as it were, a double
[Page 42] life which yet is one, and to be usefully employed during the
whole of it, instead of losing one-third of his existence in blank
unconsciousness.
Another strange power of which he may find himself in
possession (though its full control belongs rather to the still higher
devachanic [mental] faculty) is that of magnifying at will the minutest physical
or astral particle to any desired size, as though by a microscope - though no
microscope ever made or ever likely to be made possesses even a thousandth part
of this psychic magnifying power. By its means the hypothetical molecule and
atom postulated by science becomes visible and living realities to the occult
student, and on this closer examination he finds them to be much more complex in
their structure than the scientific man has yet realized them to be. It also
enables him to follow with the closest attention and the most lively interest
all kinds of electrical, magnetic, and other etheric action; and when some of
the specialists in these branches of science are able to develop the power to
see those things whereof they write so facilely, some very wonderful and
beautiful revelations may be expected.
This is one of the
siddhis or powers described in Oriental books as accruing to the man
who devotes himself to spiritual development, though the name under which it is
there mentioned might not be immediately recognizable. It is referred to as "the
power of making oneself large or small at will", and the reason of a description
which appears so oddly to reverse the fact is that in reality the method by
which this feat is [Page 43] performed is precisely that
indicate in these ancient books. It is by the use of temporary visual machinery
of inconceivable minuteness that the world of the infinitely little is so
clearly seen; and in the same way (or rather in the opposite way) it is by
temporarily enormously increasing the size of the machinery used that it becomes
possible to increase the breadth of one's view - in the physical sense as well
as, let us hope, in the moral - far beyond anything that science has ever dreamt
of as possible for man. So that the alteration in size is really in the vehicle
of the student's consciousness, and not in anything outside of himself; and the
old Oriental book has, after all, put the case more accurately than we.
Psychometry and second-sight
in excelsis would also be among the faculties which our friend would
find at his command; but those will be more fitly dealt with under a later
heading, since in almost all their manifestations they involve clairvoyance
either in space or in time.
I have now indicated, though only in the roughest
outlines, what a trained student, possessed of full astral vision, would see in
the immensely wider world to which that vision introduced him; but I have said
nothing of the stupendous change in his mental attitude which comes from the
experiential certainty as to the existence of the soul, its survival after
death, the action of the law of karma, and other points of equally paramount
importance. The difference between even the profoundest intellectual conviction
and the precise knowledge gained by direct personal experience must be felt in
order to be appreciated. [Page
44]
CHAPTER -3-
SIMPLE CLAIRVOYANCE: PARTIAL
The experiences of the untrained clairvoyant - and be it
remembered that that class includes all European clairvoyants except a very few
- will, however, usually fall very far short of what I have attempted to
indicate; they will fall short in many different ways - in degree, in variety,
or in permanence, and above all in precision.
Sometimes, for example, a man's clairvoyance will be
permanent, but very partial, extending only perhaps to one or two classes of the
phenomena observable; he will find himself endowed with some isolated fragment
of higher vision, without apparently possessing other powers of sight which
ought normally to accompany that fragment, or even to precede it. For example,
one of my dearest friends has all his life had the power to see the atomic ether
and atomic astral matter, and to recognize their structure, alike in darkness or
in light, as interpenetrating everything else; yet he has only rarely seen
entities whose bodies are composed of the much more obvious lower ethers or
denser astral matter, and at any rate is certainly not permanently able to see
them. He simply finds himself in possession of this special faculty, without any
apparent reason to account for it, or any [Page 45]
recognizable relation to anything else; and beyond proving to him the existence
of these atomic planes and demonstrating their arrangement, it is difficult to
see of what particular use it is to him at present. Still, there the thing is,
and it is an earnest of greater things to come - of further powers still
awaiting development.
There are many similar cases - similar, I mean, not in the
possession of that particular form of sight (which is unique in my experience),
but in showing the development of some one small part of the full and clear
vision of the astral and etheric planes. In nine cases out of ten, however, such
partial clairvoyance will at the same time lack precision also - that it is to
say,there will be a good deal of vague impression and inference about it,
instead of the clear-cut definition and certainty of the trained man. Examples
of this type are constantly to be found, especially among those who advertise
themselves as "test and business clairvoyance".
Then, again, there are those who are only temporarily
clairvoyant under certain special conditions. Among these there are various
subdivisions, some being able to reproduce the state of clairvoyance at will by
again setting up the same conditions, while with others it comes sporadically,
without any observable reference to their surroundings and with yet others the
powers shows itself only once or twice in the whole course of their lives.
To the first of these subdivisions belong those who are
clairvoyant only when in the mesmeric trance - who when not so entranced are
incapable of seeing or [Page 46] hearing anything
abnormal. These may sometimes reach great heights of knowledge and be
exceedingly precise in their indications, but when that is so they are usually
undergoing a course of regular training, though for some reason unable as yet to
set themselves free from the leaden weight of earthly lie without assistance.
In the same class we may put those - chiefly Orientals -
who gain some temporary sight only under the influence of certain drugs, or by
means of the performance of certain ceremonies. The ceremonialist sometimes
hypnotizes himself by his repetitions, and in that condition becomes to some
extent clairvoyant; more often he simply reduces himself to a passive condition
in which some other entity can obsess him and speak through him. Sometimes,
again, his ceremonies are not intended to affect himself at all, but to invoke
some astral entity who will give him the required information; but of course
that is a case of magic, and not of clairvoyance. Both the drugs and the
ceremonies are methods emphatically to be avoided by any one who wishes to
approach clairvoyance from the higher side, and use it for his own progress and
for the helping of others. The Central African medicine-man or witch doctor and
some of the Tartar Shamans are good examples of the type.
Those to whom a certain amount of clairvoyant power has
come occasionally only, and without any reference to their own wish, have often
been hysterical or highly nervous persons, with whom the faculty was to a large
[Page 47] extent one of the symptoms of a disease. Its
appearance showed that the physical vehicle was weakened to such a degree that
it no longer presented any obstacle in the way of a certain modicum of etheric
or astral vision. An extreme example of this class is the man who drinks himself
into delirium tremens, and in the condition of absolute physical ruin and impure
psychic excitation brought about by the ravages of that fell disease, is able to
see for the time some of the loathsome elemental and other entities which he has
drawn round himself by his long course of degraded and bestial indulgence. There
are, however, others cases where the power of sight has appeared and disappeared
without apparent reference to the state of the physical health; but it seems
probable that even in those, if they could have been observed closely enough,
some alteration in the condition of the etheric double would have been noticed.
Those who have only one instance of clairvoyance to report
in the whole of heir lives are a difficult band to classify at all exhaustively,
because of the great variety of the contributory circumstances. There are many
among them to whom the experience has come at some supreme moment of their
lives, when it is comprehensible that there might have been a temporary
exaltation of faculty which would be sufficient to account for it.
In the case of another subdivision of them the solitary
case has been the seeing of an apparition most commonly of some friend or
relative at the point of death. Two possibilities are then offered for our
choice, and in each of them the strong wish of the dying man is the
[Page 48] impelling force. That force may have enabled
him to materialize himself for a moment, in which case of course no clairvoyance
was needed; or more probably it may have acted mesmerically upon the percipient,
and momentarily dulled his physical and stimulated his higher sensitiveness. In
either case the vision is the product of the emergency and is not repeated
simply because the necessary conditions are not repeated.
There remains, however, an irresolvable residuum of cases
in which a solitary instance occurs of the exercise of undoubted clairvoyance,
while yet the occasion seems to us wholly trivial and unimportant. About these
we can only frame hypotheses; the governing conditions are evidently not on the
physical plane, and a separate investigation of each case would be necessary
before we could speak with any certainty as to its causes. In some such it has
appeared that an astral entity was endeavouring to make some communication, and
was able to impress only some unimportant detail on its subject - the useful or
significant part of what it had to say failing to get through into the subject's
consciousness.
In the investigation of the phenomena of clairvoyance all
these varied types and many others will be encountered, and a certain number of
cases of mere hallucination will be almost sure to appear also, and will have to
be carefully weeded out from the list of examples. The student of such a subject
needs an inexhaustible fund of patience and steady perseverance, but if he goes
on long enough he will begin dimly to discern order behind the chaos, and will
gradually get some idea of the [Page 49] great laws under
which the whole evolution is working.
It will help him greatly in his efforts if he will adopt
the order which we have just followed - that is, if he will first take the
trouble to familiarize himself as thoroughly as may be with the actual facts
concerning the planes with which ordinary clairvoyance deals. If he will learn
what there really is to be seen with astral and etheric sight, and what their
respective limitations are, he will then have, as it were, a standard by which
to measure the cases which he observes. Since all instances of partial sight
must of necessity fit into some niche in this whole, if he has the outline of
the entire scheme in his head he will find it comparatively easy with a little
practice to classify the instances with which he is called upon to deal.
We have said nothing as yet as to the still more wonderful
possibilities of clairvoyance upon the mental plane, nor indeed is it necessary
that much should be said, as it is exceedingly improbable that the investigator
will ever meet with any examples of it except among pupils properly trained on
some of the very highest schools of Occultism. For them it opens up yet another
new world, vaster far than all those beneath it- a world in which all that we
can imagine of utmost glory and splendour is the commonplace of existence. Some
account of its marvelous faculty, its ineffable bliss, its magnificent
opportunities for learning and for work, is given in the sixth [The Devachanic
Plane] of our Theosophical manuals, and to that the student may be referred.
[Page 50]
All that it has to give - all of it at least that he can
assimilate - is within the reach of the trained pupil, but for the untrained
clairvoyant to touch it is hardly more than a bare possibility. It has been done
in mesmeric trance, but the occurrence is of exceeding rarity, for it needs
almost superhuman qualifications in the way of lofty spiritual aspiration and
absolute purity of thought and intention upon the part both of the subject and
the operator.
To a type of clairvoyance such as this, and still more
fully to that which belongs to the plane next above it, the name of spiritual
sight may reasonably be applied; and since the celestial world to which it opens
our eyes lies all round us here and now, it is fit that our passing reference to
it should be made under the heading of simple clairvoyance, thought it may be
necessary to allude to it again when dealing with clairvoyance in space, to
which we will now pass on. [Page
51]
CHAPTER -4-
CLAIRVOYANCE IN SPACE: INTENTIONAL
We have defined this as the capacity to see events or
scenes removed from the seer in space and too far distant for ordinary
observation. The instances of this are so numerous and so various that we shall
find it desirable to attempt a somewhat more detailed classification of them. It
does not much matter what particular arrangement we adopt, so long as it is
comprehensive enough to include all our cases; perhaps a convenient one will be
to group them under the broad divisions of intentional and unintentional
clairvoyance in space, with an intermediate class that might be described as
semi-intentional - a curious title, but I will explain it later.
As before, I will begin by stating what is possible along
this line for the fully-trained seer, and endeavouring to explain how his
faculty works and under what limitations it acts. After that we shall find
ourselves in a better position to try to understand the manifold examples of
partial and untrained sight. Let us then in the first place discuss intentional
clairvoyance.
It will be obvious from what has previously been
[Page 51] said as to the power of astral vision that any
one possessing it in its fulness will be able to see by its means practically
anything in this world that he wishes to see. The most secret places are open to
his gaze, and intervening obstacles have no existence for him, because of the
change in his point of view; so that if we grant him the power of moving about
in the astral body he can without difficulty go anywhere and see anything within
the limits of the planet. Indeed this is to a large extent possible to him even
without the necessity of moving the astral body at all, as we shall presently
see.
Let us consider a little more closely the methods by which
this super-physical sight may be used to observe events taking place at a
distance. When, for example, a man here in England sees in minutest detail
something which is happening at the same moment in India or America, how is it
done?
A very ingenious hypothesis has been offered to account
for the phenomenon. It has been suggested that every object is perpetually
throwing off radiations in all directions, similar in some respects to, though
infinitely finer than, rays of light, and that clairvoyance is nothing but the
power to see by means of these finer radiations. Distance would in that case no
bar to the sight, all intervening objects would be penetrable by these rays, and
they would be able to cross one another to infinity in all directions without
entanglement, precisely as the vibrations of ordinary light do.
Now though this is not exactly the way in which
[Page 53] clairvoyance works, the theory is nevertheless
quite true in most of its premises. Every object undoubtedly is throwing off
radiations in all directions, and it is precisely in this way, though on a
higher plane, that the âkâshic records seem to be formed. Of them it will be
necessary to say something under our next heading, so we will do no more than
mention them for the moment. The phenomena of psychometry are also dependent
upon these radiations, as will presently be explained.
There are however, certain practical difficulties in the
way of using these etheric vibrations (for that is, of course, what they are) as
the medium by means of which one may see anything taking place at a distance.
Intervening objects are not entirely transparent, and as the actors in the scene
which the experimenter tried to observe would probably be at least equally
transparent, it is obvious that serious confusion would be quite likely to
result.
The additional dimension which would come into play if
astral radiations were sensed instead of etheric would obviate some of the
difficulties, but would on the the other hand introduce some fresh complications
of its own; so that for practical purposes, in endeavouring to understand
clairvoyance, we may dismiss this hypothesis of radiations from our minds, and
turn to the methods of seeing at a distance which are actually at the disposal
of the student. It will be found that there are five, four of them being really
varieties of clairvoyance, while the fifth does not properly come under that
head [Page 54] at all, but belongs to the domain of
magic. Let us take this last one first, and get it out of our way.
1- By the assistance of a nature-spirit. This
method does not necessarily involve the possession of any psychic faculty at all
on the part of the experimenter; he need only know how to induce some denizen of
the astral world to undertake the investigation for him. This may be done either
by invocation or by evocation: that is to say, the operator may either persuade
his astral coadjutor by prayers and offerings to give him the help he desires,
or he may compel his aid by the determined exercise of a highly-developed will.
This method has been largely practiced in the East (where
the entity employed is usually a nature-spirit) and in old Atlantis, where "the
lords of the dark face" used a highly-specialized and peculiarly venomous
variety of artificial elemental for this purpose. Information is sometimes
obtained in the same sort of way at the spiritualistic séance of modern
days, but in that case the messenger employed is more likely to be a
recently-deceased human being functioning more or less freely on the astral
plane- though even here also it is sometimes an obliging nature-spirit, who is
amusing himself by posing as somebody's departed relative. In any case, as I
have said, this method is not clairvoyant at all, but magical; and it is
mentioned here only in order that the reader may not become confused in the
endeavour to classify cases of its use under some of the following headings.
2- By means of an astral current. This is a phrase
[Page 55] frequently and rather loosely employed in some
of our Theosophical literature to cover a considerable variety of phenomena, and
among others that which I wish to explain. What is really done by the student
who adopts this method is not so much the setting in motion of a current in
astral matter as the erection of a kind of temporary telephone through it.
It is impossible here to give an exhaustive disquisition
on astral physics, even had I the requisite knowledge to write it; all I need
say is that it is possible to make in astral matter a definite connecting-line
that shall act as a telegraph-wire to convey vibrations by means of which all
that is going on at the other end of it may be seen. Such a line is established,
be it understood, not by a direct projection through space of astral matter, but
by such action upon a line (or rather many lines) of particles of that matter as
will render them capable of forming a conductor for vibrations of the character
required.
This preliminary action can be set up in two ways - either
by the transmission of energy from particle to particle until the line is
formed, or by the use of a force from a higher plane which is capable of acting
upon the whole line simultaneously. Of course this latter method implies far
greater development, since it involves the knowledge of (and the power to use)
forces of a considerably higher level; so that the man who could make his line
in this way would not, for his own use, need a line at all, since he could see
far more easily and completely by means of an altogether higher faculty.
[Page 56]
Even the simpler and purely astral operation is a
difficult one to describe, though quite an easy one to perform. It may be said
to partake somewhat of the nature of the magnetization of a bar of steel; for it
consists in what we might call the polarization, by an effort of the human will,
of a number of parallel lines of astral atoms reaching from the operator to the
scene which he wishes to observe. All the atoms thus affected are held for the
time with their axes rigidly parallel to one another, so that they form a kind
of temporary tube along which the clairvoyant may look. This method has the
disadvantage that the telegraph line is liable to disarrangement or even
destruction by any sufficiently strong astral current which happens to cross its
path; but if the original effort of will were fairly definite, this would be a
contingency of only infrequent occurrence.
The view of a distant scene obtained by means of this
"astral current" is in many ways not unlike that seen through a telescope. Human
figures usually appear very small, like those on a distance stage, but in spite
of their diminutive size they are as clear as though they were close by.
Sometimes it is possible by this means to hear what is said as well as to see
what is done; but as in the majority of cases this does not happen, we must
consider it rather as the manifestation of an additional power than as a
necessary corollary of the faculty of sight.
It will be observed that in this case the seer does not
usually leave his physical body at all; there is no sort
[Page 57] of projection of his astral vehicle or of any part of himself
towards that at which he is looking, but he simply manufactures for himself a
temporary astral telescope. Consequently he has, to a certain extent, the use of
his physical powers even while he is examining the distant scene; for example,
his voice would usually still be under his control, so that he could describe
what he saw even while he was in the act of making his observations. The
consciousness of the man is, in fact, distinctly still at this end of the line.
This fact, however, has its limitations as well as its
advantages, and these again largely resemble the limitations of the man using a
telescope on the physical plane. The experimenter, for example, has no power to
shift this point of view; his telescope, so to speak, has a particular field of
view which cannot be enlarged or altered; he is looking at his scene from a
certain direction, and he cannot suddenly turn it all round and see how it looks
from the other side. If he has sufficient psychic energy to spare, he may drop
altogether the telescope that he is using and manufacture an entirely new one
for himself which will approach his objective somewhat differently; but this is
not a course at all likely to be adopted in practice.
But, it may be said, the mere fact that he is using astral
sight ought to enable him to see it from all sides at once. So it would if he
were using that sight in the normal way upon an object which was fairly near him
- within his astral reach, as it were; but at a distance of hundreds or
thousands of miles the case is very different. [Page 58]
Astral sight gives us the advantage of an additional dimension,but there is
still such a thing as position in that dimension, and it is naturally a potent
factor in limiting the use of the powers of its plane. Our ordinary
three-dimensional sight enables us to see at once every point of the interior of
a two-dimensional figure, such as a square, but in order to do that the square
must be within a reasonable distance from our eyes; the mere additional
dimension will avail a man in London but little in his endeavour to examine a
square in Calcutta.
Astral sight, when it is cramped by being directed along
what is practically a tube, is limited very much as physical sight would be
under similar circumstances; though if possessed in perfection it will still
continue to show, even at that distance, the auras, and therefore all the
emotions and most of the thoughts of the people under observation.
There are many people for whom this type of clairvoyance
is very much facilitated if they have at hand some physical object which can be
used as a starting-point for their astral tube - a convenient focus for their
will-power. A ball of crystal is the commonest and most effectual of such foci,
since it has the additional advantage of possessing within itself qualities
which stimulate psychic faculty; but other objects are also employed, to which
we shall find it necessary to refer more particularly when we come to consider
semi-intentional clairvoyance.
In connection with this astral-current form of
clairvoyance, as with others, we find that there are some
[Page 59] psychics who are unable to use it except when under the influence
of mesmerism. The peculiarity in this case is that among such psychics there are
two varieties - one in which by being thus set free the man is enabled to make a
telescope for himself, and another in which the magnetizer himself makes the
telescope and the subject is simply enabled to see through it. In this latter
case obviously the subject has not enough will to form a tube for himself, and
the operator, though possessed of the necessary will-power, is not clairvoyant,
or he could see through his own tube without needing help.
Occasionally, though rarely, the tube which is formed
possesses another of the attributes of a telescope - that of magnifying the
objects at which it is directed until they seem of life-size. Of course the
objects must always be magnified to some extent, or they would be absolutely
invisible, but usually the extent is determined by the size of the astral tube
and the whole thing is simply a tiny moving picture. In the few cases where the
figures are seen as a life-size by this method, it is probable that an
altogether new power is beginning to dawn; but when this happens, careful
observation is needed in order to distinguish them from examples of our next
class.
3- By the projection of a thought-form. The ability
to use this method of clairvoyance implies a development somewhat more advanced
than the last, since it necessitates a certain amount of control upon the mental
plane. All students of Theosophy are aware that [Page 60]
thought takes form, at any rate upon its own plane, and in the vast majority of
cases upon the astral plane also; but it may not be quite so generally known
that if a man thinks strongly of himself as present at any given place, the form
assumed by that particular thought will be a likeness of the thinker himself,
which will appear at the place in question.
Essentially this form must be composed of the matter of
the mental plane, but in very many cases it would draw round itself matter of
the astral plane also, and so would approach much nearer to visibility. There
are, in fact, many instances in which it has been seen by the person thought of
- most probably by means of the unconscious mesmeric influence emanating from
the original thinker. None of the consciousness of the thinker would, however,
be included within this thought-form. When once sent out from him, it would
normally be a quite separate entity - not indeed absolutely unconnected with its
maker, but practically so as far as the possibility of receiving any impression
through it is concerned.
This third type of clairvoyance consists, then, in the
power to retain so much connection with and so much hold over a newly-erected
thought-form as will render it possible to receive impressions by means of it.
Such impressions as were made upon the form would in this case be transmitted to
the thinker - not along an astral telegraph line, as before, but by sympathetic
vibration. In a perfect case of this kind of clairvoyance it is almost as though
the seer projected a part of his consciousness [Page 61]
into the thought-form, and used it as a kind of outpost, from which observation
was possible. He sees almost as well as he would if he himself stood in the
place of his thought-form.
The figures at which he is looking will appear to him as
of life-size and close at hand, instead of tiny and at a distance, as in the
previous case; and he will find it possible to shift his point of view if he
wishes to do so. Clairaudience is perhaps less frequently associated with this
type of clairvoyance than with the last, but its place is to some extent taken
by a kind of mental perception of the thoughts and intentions of those who are
seen.
Since the man's consciousness is still in the physical
body, he will be able (even while exercising the faculty) to hear and to speak,
in so far as he can do this without any distraction of his attention. The moment
that the intentness of his thought fails the whole vision is gone, and he will
have to construct a fresh thought-form before he can resume it. Instances in
which this kind of sight is possessed with any degree of perfection by untrained
people are naturally rarer than in the case of the previous type, because of the
capacity for mental control required, and the generally finer nature of the
forces employed.
4- By traveling in the astral body. We enter here
upon an entirely new variety of clairvoyance, in which the consciousness of the
seer no longer remains in or closely connected with his physical body, but is
definitely transferred to the scene which he is examining.
[Page 62] Though it has no doubt greater dangers for the untrained seer than
either of the methods previously described, it is yet quite the most
satisfactory form of clairvoyance open to him, for the immensely superior
variety which we shall consider under our fifth head is not available except for
specially trained students.
In this case the man's body is either asleep or in trance,
and its organs are consequently not available for use which the vision is going
on, so that all description of what is seen, and all questioning as to further
particulars, must be postponed until the wanderer returns to this plane. On the
other hand the sight is much fuller and more perfect; the man hears as well as
sees everything which passes before him, and can move about freely at will
within the very wide limits of the astral plane. He can see and study at leisure
all the other inhabitants of that plane, so that the great world of the
nature-spirits (of which the traditional fairy-land is but a very small part)
lies open before him, and even that of some of the lower devas.
He has also the immense advantage of being able to take
part, as it were, in the scenes which come before his eyes - of conversing at
will with these various astral entities from whom so much information that is
curious and interesting may be obtained. If in addition he can learn how to
materialize himself (a matter of no great difficulty for him when once the knack
is acquired), he will be able to take part in physical events or conversations
at a distance, and to show himself to an absent friend at will.
[Page 63]
Again, he has the additional power of being able to hunt
about for what he wants. By means of the varieties of clairvoyance previously
described, for all practical purposes he could find a person or a place only
when he was already acquainted with it, or when he was put en rapport
with it by touching something physically connected with it, as in psychometry.
It is true that by the third method a certain amount of motion is possible, but
the process is a tedious one except for quite short distances.
By the use of the astral body, however, a man can move
about quite freely and rapidly in any direction, and can (for example) find
without difficulty any place pointed out upon a map, without either any previous
knowledge of the spot or any object to establish a connection with it. He can
also readily rise high into the air so as to gain a bird's-eye view of the
country which he is examining, so as to observe its extent, the contour of its
coastline, or its general character. Indeed, in every way his power and freedom
are far greater when he uses this method than they have been in any of the
previous cases.
A good example of the full possession of this power is
given, on the authority of the German writer Jung Stilling, by Mrs. crow in
The Night Side of Nature (page 127). The story is related of a seer who is
stated to have resided in the neighbourhood of Philadelphia, in America. His
habits were retired, and he spoke little; he was grave, benevolent and pious,
and nothing was known against his character, except that he had
[Page 64] the reputation of possessing some secrets that
were considered not altogether lawful. Many extraordinary stories were told of
him, and amongst the rest the following:
"The wife of a ship captain (whose husband was on a
voyage to Europe and Africa, and from whom she had been long without
tidings), being overwhelmed with anxiety for his safety, was induced to
address herself to this person. Having listened to her story he begged her
to excuse him for a while, when he would bring her the intelligence she
required. He then passed into an inner room and she sat herself down to
wait; but his absence continuing longer than she expected, she became
impatient, thinking he had forgotten her, and softly approaching the door
she peeped through some aperture, and to her surprise beheld him lying on a
sofa as motionless as if he were dead. She of course did not think it
advisable to disturb him, but waited his return, when he told her that her
husband had not been able to write to her for such and such reasons, but
that he was then in a coffeehouse in London and would very shortly be home
again.
"Accordingly he arrived, and as the lady learnt from
him that the causes of his unusual silence had been precisely those alleged
by the man, she felt extremely desirous of ascertaining the truth of the
rest of the information. In this she was gratified, for he no sooner set his
eyes on the magician than he said that he had seen him before on a certain
day in a coffeehouse in London, and that he told him that his wife was
[Page 65] extremely uneasy about him, and that he,
the captain, had thereon mentioned how he had been prevented from writing,
adding that he was on the eve of embarking for America. He had then lost
sight of the stranger amongst the throng, and knew nothing more about him."
We have of course no means now of knowing what evidence
Jung Stilling had of the truth of this story, though he declares himself to have
been quite satisfied with the authority on which he relates it; but so many
similar things have happened that there is no reason to doubt its accuracy. The
seer, however, must either have developed his faculty for himself or learnt it
in some school other than that from which most of our Theosophical information
is derived; for in our case there is a well-understood regulation expressly
forbidding the pupils to give any manifestation of such power which can be
definitely proved at both ends in that way, and so constitute what is called a
"phenomenon". That this regulation is emphatically a wise one is proved to all
who know anything of the history of our Society by the disastrous results which
followed from a very slight temporary relaxation of it.
I will have given some quite modern cases almost exactly
parallel to the above in my little book on
Invisible Helpers. An instance of a lady well-known to myself, who
frequently thus appears to friends at a distance, is given by Mr.Stead in
Real Ghost Stories (page 27); and Mr. Andrew Lang gives, in his Dreams
and Ghosts (page 89) , an account of how Mr.Cleave, then at Portsmouth,
appeared, intentionally on two occasions to a young lady
[Page 66] in London, and alarmed her considerably. There is any amount of
evidence to be had on the subject by any one who cares to study it seriously.
This paying of intentional astral visits seems very often
to become possible when the principles are loosened at the approach of death for
people who were unable to perform such a feat at any other time. There are even
more examples of this class than of the other; I epitomize a good one given by
Mr. Andrew Lang on page 100 of the book last cited - one of which he himself
says, "Not many stories have such good evidence in their favour".
"Mary, the wife of John Goffe of Rochester, being
afflicted with a long illness, removed to her father's house at West Malling,
about nine miles from her own.
"The day before her death she grew very impatiently
desirous to see her two children, who she had left at home to the care of a
nurse. She was too ill to be moved, and between one and two o'clock in the
morning she fell into a trance. One widow Turner, who watched with her that
night, says that her eyes were open and fixed, and her jaw fallen. Mrs.Turner
put her hand upon her mouth, but could perceive no breath. She thought her to be
in a fit, and doubted whether she were dead or alive.
"The next morning the dying woman told her mother that she
had been at home with her children,saying, "I was with them last night when I
was asleep."
"The nurse at Rochester, widow Alexander by name,
[Page 67] affirms that a little before two o'clock that
morning she saw the likeness of the said Mary Goffe come out of the next chamber
(where the elder child lay in a bed by itself), the door being left open, and
stood by her bedside for about a quarter of an hour; the younger child was there
lying by her. Her eyes moved and her mouth went, but she said nothing. The
nurse, moreover, says that she was perfectly awake; it was then daylight, being
one of the longest days in the year. She sat up in bed and looked steadfastly on
the apparition. In that time she heard the bridge clock strike two, and a while
after said: "In the name of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, what art thou?"
Thereupon the apparition removed and went away; she slipped on her clothes and
followed, but what became on't she cannot tell."
The nurse apparently was more frightened by its appearance
than its presence, for after this she was afraid to stay in the house, and so
spent the rest of the time until six o'clock in walking up and down outside.
When the neighbours were awake she told her tale to them, and they of course
said she had dreamt it all; she naturally enough warmly repudiated that idea,
but could obtain no credence until the news of the other side of the story
arrived from West Malling,when people had to admit that there might have been
something in it.
A noteworthy circumstance in this story is that the mother
found it necessary to pass from ordinary sleep into the profounder trance
condition before she could consciously visit her children; it can, however, be
paralleled [Page 68] here and there among the large
number of similar accounts which may be found in the literature of the subject.
Two other stories of precisely the same type - in which a
dying mother, earnestly desiring to see her children, falls into a deep sleep,
visits them and returns to say that she has done so - are given by Dr. F.G.Lee.
In one of them the mother, when dying in Egypt, appears to her children at
Torquay, and is clearly seen in broad daylight by all five of the children and
also by the nurse-maid. (Glimpses of the Supernatural, Vol. II, page 64).
In the other a Quaker lady dying at Cockermouth is clearly seen and recognized
in daylight by her three children at Settle, the remainder of the story being
practically identical with the one given above. (Glimpses in the Twilight,
page 94) . Though these cases appear to be less widely known than that of Mary
Goffe, the evidence of their authenticity seems to be quite as good, as will be
seen by the attestations obtained by the reverend author of the works from which
they are quoted.
The man who fully possesses this fourth type o
clairvoyance has many and great advantages at his disposal, even in addition to
those already mentioned. Not only can he visit without trouble or expense all
the beautiful and famous places of the earth, but if he happens to be a scholar,
think what it must mean to him that he has access to all the libraries of the
world! What must it be for the scientifically-minded man to see taking place
before his eyes so many of the processes of the secret [Page
69] chemistry of nature, or for the philosopher to have revealed to him so
much more than ever before of the working of the great mysteries of life and
death? To him those who are gone from this plane are dead no longer, but living
and within reach for a long time to come; for him many of the conceptions of
religion are no longer matters of faith, but of knowledge. Above all, he can
join the army of invisible helpers,and really be of use on a large scale.
Undoubtedly clairvoyance, even when confined to the astral plane, is a great
boon to the student.
Certainly it has its dangers also, especially for the
untrained; danger from evil entities of various kinds, which may terrify or
injure those who allow themselves to lose the courage to face them boldly;
danger of deception of all sorts, of misconceiving and misinterpreting what is
seen; greatest of all the danger of becoming conceited about the thing and of
thinking it impossible to make a mistake. But a little commonsense and a little
experience should easily guard a man against these.
5- By traveling in the Mâyâvic-rupa [the mental body].
This is simply a higher and, as it were, glorified form of the last type. The
vehicle employed is no longer the astral body, but a substitute manufactured for
the occasion from the substance of the seer's mind-body - a vehicle, therefore,
belonging to the mental plane, and having within it all the potentialities of
the wonderful [devachanic] sense of that plane, so transcendent in its action
yet so impossible to describe. A man functioning in this leaves his astral body
behind him along with the physical, and if he wishes to show
[Page 70] himself upon the astral plane for any reason, he does not send for
his own astral vehicle, but just by a single action of his will materializes one
for his temporary need. [Such an astral materialization is sometimes
called the mayavi rupa, and to form it for the first time usually needs the
assistance of a qualified Master]
The enormous advantages given by the possession of this
power are the capacity of entering upon all the glory and the beauty of the
higher land of bliss, and the possession, even when working on the astral plane,
of the far more comprehensive [devachanic] mental sense which opens up to the
student such marvelous vistas of knowledge, and practically renders error all
but impossible. This higher flight, however, is possible for the trained man
only, since to form this Mâyâvi-rûpa for the first time, needs the assistance of
a qualified master.
Before leaving the subject of full and intentional
clairvoyance, it may be well to devote a few words to answering one or two
questions as to its limitations, which constantly occur to students. Is it
possible, we are often asked, for the seer to find any person with whom he
wishes to communicate, anywhere in the world, whether he be living or dead?
To this the reply must be a conditional affirmative. Yes,
it is possible to find any person if the experimenter can, in some way or other,
put himself en rapport with that person. It would be hopeless to plunge
vaguely into space to find a total stranger among all the millions around us
without any kind of clue; but, on the other hand, a very slight clue would
usually be sufficient.
If the clairvoyant knows anything of the man whom he
seeks, he will have no difficulty in finding him, for [Page
71] every man has what may be called a kind of musical chord of his own - a
chord which is the expression of him as a whole, produced perhaps by a sort of
average of the rates of vibration of all his different vehicles on their
respective planes. If the operator knows how to discern that chord and to strike
it, it will by sympathetic vibration attract the attention of the man instantly
wherever he may be, and will evoke an immediate response from him.
Whether the man were living or recently dead would make no
difference at all, and clairvoyance of the fifth class could at once find him
even among the countless millions in the heaven-world, though in that case the
man himself would be unconscious that he was under observation. Naturally a seer
whose consciousness did not range higher than the astral plane - who employed
therefore one of the earlier methods of seeing - would not be able to find a
person upon the [devachanic] mental plane at all; yet even he would at least be
able to tell that the man sought for was upon that plane, from the mere
fact that the striking of the chord as far up as the astral level produced no
response.
If the man sought be a stranger to the seeker, the latter
will need something connected with him to act as a clue - a photograph, a letter
written by him, an article which has belonged to him, and is impregnated with
his personal magnetism; any of these would do in the hands of a practiced seer.
Again I say, it must not therefore be supposed that pupils
who have been taught how to use this art are at [Page 72]
liberty to set up a kind of intelligence office through which communication can
be had with missing or dead relatives. A message given from this side to such an
one might or might not be handed on, according to circumstances, but even if it
were, no reply might be brought, lest the transaction should partake of the
nature of a phenomenon - something which could be proved on the physical plane
to have been an act of magic.
Another question often raised is as to whether,in the
action of psychic vision, there is any limitation as to distance. The reply
would seem to be that there should be no limit but that of the respective
planes. It must be remembered that the astral and [devachanic] mental planes of
our earth are as definitely its own as its atmosphere, though they extend
considerably further from it even in our three-dimensional space than does the
physical air. Consequently the passage to, or the detailed sight of, other
planets would not be possible for any system of clairvoyance connected with
these planes. It is quite possible and easy for the man who can raise his
consciousness to the buddhic plane to pass to any other globe belonging to our
chain of worlds, but that is outside our present subject.
Still a good deal of additional information about other
planets can be obtained by the use of such clairvoyant faculties as we have been
describing. It is possible to make sight enormously clearer by passing outside
of the constant disturbances of the earth's atmosphere, and it is also not
difficult to learn how to put on an exceedingly high magnifying power, so that
[Page 73] even by ordinary clairvoyance a good deal of
very interesting astronomical knowledge may be gained. But as far as this earth
and its immediate surroundings are concerned, there is practically no
limitation. [Page 74]
CHAPTER -5-
CLAIRVOYANCE IN SPACE: SEMI-INTENTIONAL
Under this rather curious title I am grouping together the
cases of all those people who definitely set themselves to see something, but
have no idea what the something will be, and no control over the sight after the
visions have begun - psychic Micawbers, who put themselves into a receptive
condition, and then simply wait for something to turn up. Many trance-mediums
would come under this heading; they either in some way hypnotize themselves or
are hypnotized by some "spirit-guide", and then they describe the scenes or
persons that happen to float before their vision. Sometimes however, when in
this condition they see what is taking place at a distance, and so they come to
have a place among our "clairvoyants in space".
But the largest and most widely-spread band of these
semi-intentional clairvoyants are the various kinds of crystal-gazers - those
who, as Mr. Andrew Lang puts it, "stare into a crystal ball, a cup, a mirror, a
bob of ink (Egypt and India), a drop of blood (among that Maories of New
Zealand), a bowl of water (Red Indian), a pond (Roman and African), water in a
[Page 75] glass bowl (in Fez), or almost any polished
surface". (Dreams and Ghosts, page 57)
Two pages later Mr.Lang gives us a very good example of
the kind of vision most frequently seen in this way. "I had given a glass ball,"
he says, "to a young lady, Miss Baillie, who had scarcely any success with it.
She lent it to Miss Leslie, who saw a large square, old-fashioned red sofa
covered with muslin, which she found in the next country-house she visited. Miss
Baillie's brother, a young athlete, laughed at these experiments, took the ball
into the study, and came back looking 'gey gash'. He admitted that he had seen a
vision - somebody he knew under a lamp. He would discover during the week
whether he saw right or not. This was at 5.30 on a Sunday afternoon.
"On Tuesday, Mr. Baillie was at a dance in a town some
forty miles from his home, and met a Miss Preston. 'On Sunday', he said, 'about
half-past five you were sitting under a standard lamp in a dress I never saw you
wear, a blue blouse with lace over the shoulders, pouring out tea for a man in
blue serge, whose back was towards me, so that I only saw the tip of his
moustache.'
"'Why, the blinds must have been up,' said Miss Preston.
"'I was at Dulby,' said Mr. Baillie, and he undeniably
was."
This is quite a typical case of crystal-gazing - the
picture correct in every detail, you see, and yet absolutely unimportant and
bearing no apparent signification [Page 76] of any sort
to either party, except that it served to prove to Mr. Baillie that there was
something in crystal-gazing. Perhaps more frequently the visions tend to be of a
romantic character - men in foreign dress, or beautiful though generally unknown
landscapes.
Now what is the rationale of this kind of clairvoyance? As
I have indicated above, it belongs usually to the "astral current" type, and the
crystal or other object simply acts as a focus for the willpower of the seer,
and a convenient starting-point for his astral tube. There are some who can
influence what they will see by their will, that is to say they have the power
of pointing their telescope as they wish; but the great majority just form a
fortuitous tube and see whatever happens to present itself at the end of it.
Sometimes it may be scene comparatively near at hand, as
in the case just quoted; at other times it will be a far-away Oriental
landscape; at others yet it may be a reflection of some fragment of an âkâshic
record, and then the picture will contain figures in some antique dress, and the
phenomenon belongs to our third large division of "clairvoyance in time". It is
said that visions of the future are sometimes seen in crystals also - a further
development to which we must refer later.
I have seen a clairvoyant use instead of the ordinary
shining surface a deal black one, produced by a handful of powdered charcoal in
a saucer. Indeed it does not seem to matter much what is used as a focus, except
that pure crystal has an undoubted advantage over [Page 77]
other substances in that its peculiar arrangement of elemental essence renders
it specially stimulating to the psychic faculties.
It seems probable, however, that in cases where a tiny
brilliant object is employed - such as a point of light, or the drop of blood
used by the Maories- the instance is in reality merely one of
self-hypnotization. Among non-European nations the experiment is very frequently
preceded or accompanied by magical ceremonies and invocations so that it is
quite likely that such sight as is gained may sometimes be really that of some
foreign entity, and so the phenomenon may in fact be merely a case of temporary
possession, and not of clairvoyance at all.
[Page 78]
CHAPTER -6-
CLAIRVOYANCE IN SPACE: UNINTENTIONAL
Under this heading we may group together all those cases
in which visions of some event which is taking place at a distance are seen
quite unexpectedly and without any kind of preparation. There are people who are
subject to such visions, while there are many others to whom such a thing will
happen only once in a life-time. The visions are of all kinds and of all degrees
of completeness, and apparently may be produced by various causes. Sometimes the
reason of the vision is obvious, and the subject-matter of the gravest
importance; at other times no reason at all is discoverable, and the events
shown seem of the most trivial nature.
Sometimes these glimpses of the superphysical faculty come
as waking visions, and sometimes they manifest during sleep as vivid or
oft-repeated dreams. In this latter case the sight employed is perhaps usually
of kind assigned to our fourth subdivision of clairvoyance in space, for the
sleeping man often travels in his astral body to some spot with which his
affections or interests are closely connected, and simply watches what takes
place there; in the former it seems probable that the second type of
clairvoyance, by means of the astral [Page 79] current,
is called into requisition. But in this case the current or tube is formed quite
unconsciously, and is often the automatic result of a strong thought or emotion
projected from one end or the other - either from the seer or the person who is
seen.
The simplest plan will be to give a few instances of the
different kinds, and to intersperse among them such further explanations as may
seem necessary. Mr. Stead has collected a large and varied assortment of recent
and well-authenticated cases in his
Real Ghost Stories, and I will select some of my examples from them,
occasionally condensing slightly to save space.
There are cases in which it is at once obvious to any
Theosophical student that the exceptional instance of clairvoyance was specially
brought about by one of the band whom we have called "Invisible Helpers" in
order that aid might be rendered to some one in sore need. To this class,
undoubtedly, belongs the story told by Captain Yonnt, of the Napa Valley in
California, to Dr. Bushnell, who repeats it in his Nature and the
Supernatural (page 14).
"About six or seven years previous, in a midwinter's
night, he had a dream in which he saw what appeared to be a company of emigrants
arrested by the snows of the mountains, and perishing rapidly by cold and
hunger. He noted the very cast of the scenery, marked by a huge, perpendicular
front of white rock cliff; he saw the men cutting off what appeared to be
treetops rising out of deep gulfs of snow; he distinguished the
[Page 80] very features of the persons and the look of
their particular distress.
"He awoke profoundly impressed by the distinctness and
apparent reality of the dream. He at length fell asleep, and dreamed exactly the
same dream over again. In the morning he could not expel it from his mind.
Falling in, shortly after which an old hunter comrade, he told his story, and
was only the more deeply impressed by his recognizing without hesitation the
scenery of the dream. This comrade came over the Sierra by the Carson Valley
Pass, and declared that a spot in the Pass exactly answered his description.
"By this the unsophistical patriarch was decided. He
immediately collected a company of men, with mules and blankets and all
necessary provisions. The neighbours were laughing meantime at this credulity.
'No matter', he said, 'I am able to do this, and I will, for I verily believe
that the fact is according to my dream'. The men were sent into the mountains
one hundred and fifty miles distant direct to the Carson Valley Pass. And there
they found the company exactly in the condition of the dream, and brought in the
remnant alive".
Since it is not stated that Captain Yonnt was in the habit
of seeing visions, it seems clear that some helper, observing the forlorn
condition of the emigrant party, took the nearest impressionable and otherwise
suitable person (who happened to be the Captain) to the spot in the astral body,
and aroused him sufficiently to fix the scene firmly in his memory. The helper
may [Page 81] possibly have arranged an "astral current"
for the Captain instead, but the former suggestion is more probable. At any rate
the motive, and broadly the method, of the work are obvious enough in this case.
Sometimes the "astral current" may be set going by a
strong emotional thought at the other end of the line, and this may haven even
though the thinker has no such intention in his mind. In the rather striking
story which I am about to quote, it is evident that the link was formed by the
doctor's frequent thought about Mrs. Broughton, yet he had clearly no especial
wish that she should see what he was going at the time. That it was this kind of
clairvoyance that was employed is shown by the fixity of her point of view -
which, be it observed, is not the doctor's point of view sympathetically
transferred (as it might have been), since she sees his back without recognizing
him. The story is to be found in the Proceedings of the Psychical Research
Society (Volume 2, page 160).
"Mrs. Broughton awoke one night in 1844, and roused her
husband, telling him that something dreadful had happened in France. He begged
her to go to sleep again, and not trouble him. She assured him that she was not
asleep when she saw what she insisted on telling him - what she saw in fact.
"First a carriage accident - which she did not actually
see, but what she saw was the result - a broken carriage, a crowd collected, a
figure gently raised and carried into the nearest house, then a figure lying on
a bed which she then recognized as the Duke of Orleans. [Page
82] Gradually friends collecting round the bed - among them several members
of the French royal family- the queen, then the king, all silently, tearfully,
watching the evidently dying duke. One man (she could see his back, but did not
know who he was) was a doctor. He stood bending over the duke, feeling his
pulse, with his watch in the other hand. And then all passed away, and she saw
no more.
"As soon as it was daylight she wrote down in her journal
all that she had seen. It was before the days of the electric telegraph, and two
or more days passed before the Times announced 'The Death of the Duke of
Orleans'. Visiting Paris a short time afterwards she saw and recognized the
place of the accident and received the explanation of her impression. The doctor
who attended the dying duke was an old friend of hers, and as he watched by the
bed his mind had been constantly occupied with her and her family".
A commoner instance is that in which strong affection sets
up the necessary current; probably a fairly steady stream of mutual thought is
constantly flowing between the two parties in the case, and some sudden need or
dire extremity on the part of one of them endues this stream temporarily with
the polarizing power which is needful to create the astral telescope. An
illustrative example is quoted from the same
Proceedings (volume I, page 30).
"On September 9th, 1848, at the siege of Mooltan,
Major-General R--------, C.B., then adjutant of his regiment, was most severely
and dangerously wounded; [Page 83] and, supposing himself
to be dying, asked one of the officers with him to take the ring off his finger
and send it to this wife, who at the time was fully one hundred and fifty miles
distant at Ferozepore.
"'On the night of September 9th, 1848', writes his wife,
'I was lying on my bed, between sleeping and waking, when I distinctly saw my
husband being carried off the field seriously wounded, and heard his voice
saying, "Take this ring off my finger and send it to my wife". All the next day
I could not get the sight or the voice of of my mind.
"'In due time I heard of General R---- having been
severely wounded in the assault of Mooltan. He survived, however, and is still
living. It was not for some time after the siege that I heard from General
L----, the officer who helped to carry my husband off the field, that the
request as to the ring was actually made by him, just as I heard it at
Ferozepore at that very time".
Then there is the very large class of casual clairvoyant
visions which have no traceable cause - which are apparently quite meaningless,
and have no recognizable relation to any events known to the seer. To this class
belong many of the landscapes seen by some people just before they fall asleep.
I quote a capital and very realistic account of an experience of this sort from
W.T.Stead's Real Ghost Stories (page 65).
"I got into bed but was not able to go to sleep, I shut my
eyes and waited for sleep to come; instead of sleep, however, there came to me a
succession of [Page 84] curiously vivid clairvoyant
pictures. There was no light in the room, and it was perfectly dark; I had my
eyes shut also. But notwithstanding the darkness I suddenly was conscious of
looking at a scene of singular beauty. It was as if I saw a living miniature
about the size of a magic-lantern slide. At this moment, I can recall the scene
as if I saw it again. It was a seaside piece. The moon was shining upon the
water, which rippled slowly on to the beach. Right before me a long mole ran
into the water.
"On either side of the mole irregular rocks stood up above
the sea-level. On the shore stood several houses, square and rude, which
resembled nothing that I had ever seen in house architecture. No one was
stirring, but the moon was there and the sea and the gleam of the moonlight on
the rippling waters, just as if I had been looking on the actual scene.
"It was so beautiful that I remember thinking that if it
continued I should be so interested in looking at it that I should never go to
sleep. I was wide awake, and at the same time that I saw the scene I distinctly
heard the dripping of the rain outside the window. Then suddenly, without any
apparent object or reason, the scene changed.
"The moonlit sea vanished, and in its place I was looking
right into the interior of a reading-room. It seemed as if it had been used as a
schoolroom in the daytime, and was employed as a reading-room in the evening. I
remember seeing one reader who had a curious resemble to Tim Harrington,
although it [Page 85] was not he, hold up a magazine or
book in his hand and laugh. It was not a picture - it was there.
"The scene was just as if you were looking through an
opera-glass; you saw the play of the muscles, the gleaming of the eye, every
movement of the unknown persons in the unnamed place into which you were gazing.
I saw all that without opening my eyes, nor did my eyes have anything to do with
it. You see such things as these as it were with another sense which is more
inside your head than in your eyes.
"This was a very poor and paltry experience, but it
enabled me to understand better how it is that clairvoyants see than any amount
of disquisition.
"The picture were a propos of nothing; they had
been suggested by nothing I had been reading or talking of; they simply came as
if I had been able to look through a glass at what was occurring somewhere else
in the world. I had my peep, and then it passed, nor have I had a recurrence of
a similar experience".
Mr. Stead regards that as a "poor and paltry experience",
and it may perhaps be considered so when compared with the greater
possibilities, yet I know many students who would be very thankful to have even
so much of direct personal experience to tell. Small though it may be in itself,
it at once gives the seer a clue to the whole thing, and clairvoyance would be a
living actuality to a man who had seen even that much in a way that it could
never have been without that little touch with the unseen world.
These pictures were much too clear to have been
[Page 86] mere reflections of the thought of others, and
besides, the description unmistakably shows that they were views seen through an
astral telescope; so either Mr. Stead must quite unconsciously have set a
current going for himself, or (which is much more probable) some kindly astral
entity set it in motion for him, and gave him, to while away a tedious delay,
any pictures that happened to come handy at the end of the tube.
[Page 87]
CHAPTER -7-
CLAIRVOYANCE IN TIME: THE PAST
Clairvoyance in time - that is to say, the power of
reading the past and the future- is, like all the other varieties, possessed by
different people in very varying degrees, ranging from the man who has both
faculties fully at his command, down to one who only occasionally gets
involuntary and very imperfect glimpses or reflections of these scenes of other
days. A person of the latter type might have, let us say, a vision of some event
in the past; but it would be liable to the most serious distortion, and even if
it happened to be fairly accurate it would almost certainly be a mere isolated
picture, and he would probably be quite unable to relate it to what had occurred
before or after it, or account for anything unusual which might appear in it.
The trained man, on the other hand, could follow the drama connected with his
picture backwards or forwards to any extent that might seem desirable, and trace
out with equal ease the causes which had led up to it or the results which it in
turn would produce.
We shall probably find it easier to grasp this somewhat
difficult section of our subject if we consider it in the subdivisions which
naturally suggest themselves, [Page 88] and deal first
with the vision which looks backwards into the past, leaving for later
examination that which pierces the veil of the future. In each case it will be
well for us to try to understand what we can of the modus operandi, even
though our success can at best be only very modified one, owing first to the
imperfect information on some parts of the subject at present possessed by our
investigators, and secondly to the recurring failure of physical words to
express a hundred part even of the little we do known about higher planes
and faculties.
In the case then of a detailed vision of the remote past,
how is it obtained, and to what plane of Nature does it really belong? The
answer to both these questions is contained in the reply that it is read from
the âkâshic records; but that statement in return will require a certain amount
of explanation for many readers. The word is in truth somewhat of a misnomer,
for though the records are undoubtedly read from the âkâsha, or matter of the
mental plane, yet it is not to it that they really belong. Still worse is the
alternative title, "records of the astral light", which has sometimes been
employed, for these records lie far beyond the astral plane, and all that can be
obtained on it are only broken glimpses of a kind of double reflection of them,
as will presently be explained.
Like so many others of our Theosophical terms, the word
âkâsha has been very loosely used. In some of our earlier books it was
considered as synonymous with astral light, and in others it was employed to
signify any kind [Page 89] of invisible matter, from
Mulaprakriti down to the physical ether. In later books its use has been
restricted to the matter of the mental plane, and it is in that sense that the
records may be spoken of as âkâshic, for although they are not originally made
on that plane any more than on the astral, yet it is there that we first come
definitely into contact with them and find it possible to do reliable work with
them.
This subject of the records is by no means an easy one to
deal with, for it is one of that numerous class which requires for its perfect
comprehension faculties of a far higher order than any which humanity has yet
evolved. The real solution of its problems lies on planes far beyond any that we
can possibly know at present, and any view that we take of it must necessarily
be of the most imperfect character, since we cannot but look at it from below
instead of from above. The idea which we form of it must therefore be only
partial, yet it need not mislead us unless we allow ourselves to think of the
tiny fragment which is all that we can see as though it were the perfect whole.
If we are careful that such conceptions as we may form shall be accurate as far
as they go, we shall have nothing to unlearn, though much to add, when in the
course of our further progress we gradually acquire the higher wisdom. Be it
understood then at the commencement that a thorough grasp of our subject is an
impossibility at the present stage of our evolution, and that many points will
arise as to which no exact explanation is yet obtainable, though it may often be
possible to suggest [Page 90] analogies and to indicate
the lines along which an explanation must lie.
Let us then try to carry back our thoughts to the
beginning of this solar system to which we belong. We are all familiar with the
ordinary astronomical theory of its origin - that which is commonly called the
nebular hypothesis - according to which it first came into existence as a
gigantic glowing nebula, of a diameter far exceeding that of the orbit of even
the outermost of the planets, and then, as in the course of countless ages that
enormous sphere gradually cooled and contracted, the system as we know it was
formed.
Occult science accepts that theory, in its broad outline,
as correctly representing the purely physical side of the evolution of our
system, but it would add that if we confine our attention to this physical side
only we shall have a very incomplete and incoherent idea of what really
happened. It would postulate, to begin with, that the exalted Being who
undertakes the formation of a system (whom we sometimes call the Logos of the
system) first of all forms in his mind a complete conception of the whole of it
with all its successive chains of worlds. By the very act of forming that
conception He calls the whole into simultaneous objective existence on the plane
of His thought - a plane of course far above all those of which we know anything
- from which the various globes descend when required into whatever state of
further objectivity may be respectively destined for them. Unless we constantly
bear in mind this fact of the real existence of the whole system
[Page 91] from the very beginning on a higher plane, we
shall be perpetually misunderstanding the physical evolution which we see taking
place down here.
But Occultism has more than this to teach us on the
subject. It tells us not only that all this wonderful system to which we belong
is called into existence by the Logos, both on lower and on higher planes, but
also that its relation to Him is closer even than that, for it is absolutely a
part of Him - a partial expression of Him upon the physical plane - and that the
movement and energy of the whole system is his energy, and is all carried on
within the limits of his aura. Stupendous as this conception is, it will yet not
be wholly unthinkable to those of us who have made any study of the subject of
the aura.
We are familiar with the idea that as a person progresses
on the upward path his causal body, which is the determining limit of his aura,
distinctly increases in size as well as in luminosity and purity of colour. Many
of us know from experience that the aura of a pupil who has already made
considerable advance on the Path is very much larger than that of one who is but
just setting his foot upon its first step, while in the case of an Adept the
proportional increase is far greater still. We read in quite exoteric Oriental
scriptures of the immense extension of the aura of the Buddha; I think that
three miles is mentioned on one occasion as its limit, but whatever the exact
measurement may be, it is obvious that we have here another record of this fact
of the extremely rapid growth of the causal body as [Page 92]
man passes on his upward way. There can be little doubt that the rate of this
growth would itself increase in geometrical progression, so that it need not
surprise us to hear of an Adept on a still higher level whose aura is capable of
including the entire world at once; and from this we may gradually lead our
minds up to the conception that there is a Being so exalted as to comprehend
within Himself the whole of our solar system. And we should remember that,
enormous as this seems to us, it is but as the tiniest drop in the vast ocean of
space.
So of the Logos (who has in Him all the capacities and
qualities with which we can possibly endow the highest God we can imagine) it is
literally true, as was said of old, that "of Him and through Him, and to Him are
all things", and "in Him we live and move and have our being".
Now if this be so, it is clear that whatever happens
within our system happens absolutely within the consciousness of its Logos, and
so we at once see that the true record must be His memory; and furthermore, it
is obvious that on whatever plane that wondrous memory exists, it cannot but be
far above anything that we know, and consequently whatever records we may find
ourselves able to read must be only a reflection of that great dominant fact,
mirrored in the denser media of the lower planes.
On the astral plane it is at once evident that this is so
- that what we are dealing with is only a reflection of a reflection, and an
exceedingly imperfect one, for such [Page 93] records as
can be reached there are fragmentary in the extreme, and often seriously
distorted. We know how universally water is used as a symbol of the astral
light, and in this particular case it is a remarkably apt one. From the surface
of still water we may get a clear reflection of the surrounding objects, just as
from a mirror; but at the best it is only a reflection - a representation in two
dimensions of three-dimensional objects, and therefore differing in all its
qualities, except colour, from that which it represents; and in addition to
this, it is always reversed.
But let the surface of the water be ruffled by the wind
and what do we find then? A reflection still, certainly, but so broken up and
distorted as to be quite useless or even misleading as a guide to the shape and
real appearance of the objects reflected. Here and there for a moment we might
happen to get a clear reflection of some minute part of the scene - of a single
leaf from a tree, for example; but it would need long labour and considerable
knowledge of natural laws to build up anything like a true conception of the
object reflected by putting together even a large number of such isolated
fragments of an image of it.
Now in the astral plane we can never have anything
approaching to what we have imaged as a still surface, but on the contrary we
have always to deal with one in rapid and bewildering motion; judge, therefore,
how little we can depend upon getting a clear and definite reflection. Thus a
clairvoyant who possesses only the faculty of astral sight can never rely upon
any [Page 94] picture of the past that comes before him
as being accurate and perfect; here and there some part of it may be so, but he
has no means of knowing which it is. If he is under the care of a competent
teacher he may, by long and careful training, be shown how to distinguish
between reliable and unreliable impressions, and to construct from the broken
reflections some kind of image of the object reflected; but usually long before
he has mastered those difficulties he will have developed the mental sight,
which renders such labour unnecessary.
On the next plane, which we call the [devachanic] mental,
conditions are very different. There the record is full and accurate, and it
would be impossible to make any mistake in the reading. That is to say, if three
clairvoyants possessing the powers of the mental plane agreed to examine a
certain record there, what would be presented to their vision would be
absolutely the same reflection in each case, and each would acquire a correct
impression from it in reading it. It does not, however, follow that when they
all compared notes later on the physical plane their reports would agree
exactly. It is well known that, if three people who witness an occurrence down
here in the physical world set to work to describe it afterwards, their accounts
will differ considerably, for each will have noticed especially those items
which most appeal to him, and will insensibly have made them the prominent
features of the event, sometimes ignoring other points which were in reality
much more important. [Page 95]
Now in the case of an observation on the mental plane this
personal equation would not appreciably affect the impressions received, for
since each would thoroughly grasp the entire subject it would be impossible for
him to see its parts out of due proportion; but, except in the case of carefully
trained and experienced persons, this factor does come into play in transferring
the impressions to the lower planes. It is in the nature of things impossible
that any account given down here of a [devachanic] mental vision or experience
on the mental plane can be complete, since nine-tenths of what is seen and felt
there could not be expressed by physical words at all; and, since all expression
must therefore be partial, there is obviously some possibility of selection as
to the part expressed. It is for this reason that in all our Theosophical
investigations of recent years so much stress has been laid upon the constant
checking and verifying of clairvoyant testimony, nothing which rests upon the
vision of one person only having been allowed to appear in our later books.
But even when the possibility of errors from this factor
of personal equation has been reduced to a minimum by a careful system of
counterchecking, there still remains the very serious difficulty which is
inherent in the operation of bringing down impressions from a higher plane to a
lower one. This is something analogous to the difficulty experienced by a
painter in his endeavour to reproduce a three-dimensional landscape on a flat
surface - that is, practically in two dimensions. Just as the artist needs long
and careful training of eye and [Page 96] hand before he
can produce a satisfactory representation of Nature, so does the clairvoyant
need long and careful training before he can describe accurately on a lower
plane what he sees on a higher one; and the probability of getting an exact
description from an untrained person is about equal to that of getting a
perfectly-finished landscape from one who has never learnt how to draw.
It must be remembered, too, that the most perfect picture
is in reality infinitely far from being a reproduction of the scene which it
represents, for hardly a single line or angle in it can ever be the same as
those in the object copied. It is simply a very ingenious attempt to make upon
only one of our five senses, by means of lines and colours on a flat surface, an
impression similar to that which would have been made if we had actually had
before us the scene depicted. Except by a suggestion dependent entirely on our
own previous experience, it can convey to us nothing of the roar of the sea, of
the scent of the flowers, of the taste of the fruit, of of the softness or
hardness of the surface drawn.
Of exactly similar nature, though far greater in degree,
are the difficulties experienced by a clairvoyant in his attempt to describe
upon the physical plane what he has seen upon the astral; and they are
furthermore greatly enhanced by the fact that, instead of having merely to
recall to the minds of his hearers conceptions with which they are already
familiar, as the artist does when he paints men or animals, fields or trees, he
has to endeavour by the very imperfect means at his disposal
[Page 97] to suggest to them conceptions which in most cases are absolutely
new to them.
Small wonder then that, however vivid and striking his
descriptions may seem to his audience, he himself should constantly be impressed
with their total inadequacy, and should feel that his best efforts have entirely
failed to convey any idea of what he really sees. And we must remember that in
the case of the report given down here of a record read on the mental plane,
this difficult operation of transference from the higher to the lower has taken
place not once but twice, since the memory has been brought through the
intervening astral plane. Even in a case where the investigator has the
advantage of having developed his mental faculties so that he has the use of
them while awake in the physical body, he is still hampered by the absolute
incapacity of physical language to express what he sees.
Try for a moment to realize fully what is called the
fourth dimension, of which we said something in an earlier chapter. It is easy
enough to think of our own three dimensions - to image in our minds the length,
breadth and height of any object; and we see that each of these three dimensions
is expressed by a line at right angles to both of the others. The idea of the
fourth dimension is that it might be possible to draw a fourth line which shall
be at right angles to all three of those already existing.
Now the ordinary mind cannot grasp this idea in the least,
though some few who have made a special study [Page 98]
of the subject have gradually come to be able to realize one or two very simple
four-dimensional figures.
Still, no words that they can use on this plane can bring
any image of these figures before the mind of others, and if any reader who has
not specially trained himself along that line will make the effort to visualize
such a shape he will find it quite impossible. Now to express such a form
clearly in physical words would be, in effect, to describe accurately a single
object of the astral plane; but in examining the records on the mental plane we
should have to face the additional difficulties of a fifth dimension! So that
the impossibility of fully explaining these records will be obvious to even the
most superficial observation.
We have spoken of the records as the memory of the Logos,
yet they are very much more than a memory in an ordinary sense of the word.
Hopeless as it may be to imagine how these images appear from His point of view,
we yet known that as we rise higher and higher we must be drawing nearer to the
true memory - must be seeing more nearly as He sees; so that great interest
attaches to the experience of the clairvoyant with reference to these records
when he stands upon the buddhic plane - the higher which his consciousness can
reach even when away from the physical body until he attains the level of the
Arhats.
Here time and space no longer limit him; he no longer
needs, as on the mental plane, to pass a series of events in review, for past,
present and future are all alike simultaneously present to him, meaningless
[Page 99] as that sounds down here. Indeed, infinitely
below the consciousness of the Logos as even that exalted plane is, it is yet
abundantly clear from what we see there that to Him the record must be far more
than what we call a memory, for all that has happened in the past and all that
will happen in the future is happening now before his eyes just as
are the events of what we call the present time. Utterly incredible, widely
incomprehensible, of course, to our limited understanding; yet absolutely true
for all that.
Naturally we could not expect to understand at our present
stage of knowledge how so marvelous a result is produced, and to attempt an
explanation would only be to involve ourselves in a mist of words from which we
should gain no real information. Yet a line of though recurs to my mind which
perhaps suggests the direction in which it is possible that that explanation may
lie; and whatever helps us to realize that so astounding a statement may after
all not be wholly impossible will be of assistance in broadening our minds.
Some thirty years ago I remember reading a very curious
little book, called, I think, The Stars and the Earth, the objects of
which was to endeavour to show how it was scientifically possible that to the
mind of God the past and the present might be absolutely simultaneous. Its
arguments struck me at the time as decidedly ingenious, and I will proceed to
summarize them, as I think they will be found somewhat suggestive in a
connection with the subject which we have been considering.
[Page 100]
When we see anything, whether it be the book which we hold
in our hands or a star millions of miles away, we do so by means of a vibration
in the ether, commonly called a ray of light, which passes from the object seen
to our eyes. Now the speed with which this vibration passes is so great - about
186,000 miles in a second - that when we are considering any object in our own
world we may regard it as practically instantaneous. When, however, we come to
deal with interplanetary distances we have to take the speed of light into
consideration, for an appreciable period is occupied in traversing these vast
spaces. For example it takes eight minutes and a quarter for light to travel to
us from the sun, so that when we look at the solar orb we see it by means of a
ray of light which left it more than eight minutes ago.
From this follows a very curious result. The ray of light
by which we see the sun can obviously report to us only the state of affairs
which existed in that luminary when it started on its journey, and would not be
in the least affected by anything that happened there after it left; so that we
really see the sun not as
he is, but as he was eight minutes ago. That is to say that if
anything important took place in the sun - the formation of a new sunspot, for
instance - an astronomer who was watching the orb through his telescope at the
time would be quite unaware of the incident while it was happening, since the
ray of light bearing the news would not reach him until more than eight minutes
later. [Page 101]
The difference is more striking when we consider the fixed
stars, because in their case the distances are so enormously greater. The pole
star, for example, is so far off that light, traveling at the inconceivable
speed above mentioned, takes a little more than fifty years to reach our eyes;
and from that follows the strange but inevitable inference that we see the pole
star no as and where it is at this moment, but as and where it was fifty years
ago. Nay, if tomorrow some cosmic catastrophe were to shatter the pole star into
fragments, we should still see it peacefully shining in the sky all the rest of
our lives; our children would grow up to middle age and gather their children
about them in turn before the news of that tremendous accident reached any
terrestrial eye. In the same way there are other stars so far distant that light
takes thousands of years to travel from them to us, and with reference to their
condition our information is therefore thousands of years behind time.
Now carry the argument a step farther. Suppose that we
were able to place a man at the distance of 186,000 miles form the earth, and
yet to endow him with the wonderful faculty of being able from that distance to
see what was happening here as clearly as though he were still close beside us.
It is evident that a man so placed would see everything a second later after the
time when it really happened, and so at the present moment he would be seeing
what happened a second ago. Double the distance, and he would be two seconds
behind time, and so on; remove him to the [Page 102]
distance of the sun (still allowing him to preserve the same mysterious power of
sight) and he would look down and watch you doing not what you are doing
now, but what you were doing eight minutes and a quarter ago. Carry him
away to the pole star, and he would see passing before his eyes the events of
fifty years ago; he would be watching the childish gambols of those who at the
very same moment were really middle-aged men. Marvelous as this may sound, it is
literally and scientifically true, and cannot be denied.
The little book went on to argue logically enough that
God, being almighty, must possess the wonderful power of sight which we have
been postulating for our observed; and further, that being omnipresent, He must
be at each of the stations which we mentioned, and also at every intermediate
point, not successively but simultaneously. Granting these premises, the
inevitable deduction follows that everything which has ever happened from the
very beginning of the world must be at this very moment taking place
before the eye of God - not a mere memory of it, but the actual occurrence
itself being under His observation.
All this is materialistic enough, and on the plane of
purely physical science, and we may therefore be assured that it is not
the way in which the memory of the Logos acts; yet it is neatly worked out and
absolutely incontrovertible, and as I have said before, it is not without its
use, since it gives us a glimpse of some possibilities which otherwise might not
occur to us. [Page 103]
But, it may be asked, how is it possible, amid the
bewildering confusion of these records of the past, to find any particular
picture when it is wanted? As a matter of fact, the untrained clairvoyant
usually cannot do so without some special link to put him en rapport with
the subject required. Psychometry is an instance in point, and it is quite
probable that our ordinary memory is really only another presentment of the same
idea. It seems as though there were a sort of magnetic attachment or affinity
between any particle of matter and the record which contains its history - an
affinity which enables it to act as a kind of conductor between that record and
the faculties of anyone who can read it.
For example, I once brought from Stonehenge a tiny
fragment of stone, not larger than a pin's head, and on putting this into an
envelope and handing it to a psychometer who had no idea what it was, she at
once began to describe that wonderful ruin and the desolate country surrounding
it, and then went on to picture vividly what were evidently scenes from its
early history, showing that that infinitesimal fragment had been sufficient to
put her into communication with the records connected with the spot from which
it came. The scenes through which we pass in the course of our life seem to act
in the same manner upon the cells of our brain as did the history of Stonehenge
upon that particle of stone; they establish a connection with those cells by
means of which our mind is put en rapport with that particular portion of
the records, and so we "remember" what we have seen.
[Page 104]
Even a trained clairvoyant needs some link to enable him
to find the record of an event of which he has no previous knowledge. If, for
example, he wished to observe the landing of Julius Caesar on the shores of
England, there are several ways in which he might approach the subject. If he
happened to have visited the scene of the occurrence, the simplest way would
probably be to call up the image of that spot, and then run back through its
records until he reached the period desired. If he had not seen the place, he
might run back in time to the date of the event, and then search the Channel for
a fleet of Roman galleys; or he might examine the records of Roman life at about
that period, where he would have no difficulty in identifying so prominent a
figure as Caesar, or in tracing him when found through all his Gallic wars until
he set his foot upon British land.
People often enquire as to the aspect of these records -
whether they appear near or far away from the eye, whether the figures in them
are large or small, whether the pictures follow one another as in a panorama or
melt into another like dissolving views, and so on. One can only reply that
their appearance varies to a certain extent according to the conditions under
which they are seen. Upon the astral plane the reflection is most often a simple
picture, though occasionally the figures seen would be endowed with motion; in
this latter case, instead of a mere snapshot a rather longer and more perfect
reflections has taken place.
On the mental plane they have two widely
[Page 105] different aspects. When the visitor to that
plane is not thinking specially of them in any way, the records simply form a
background to whatever is going on, just as the reflections in a pier-glass at
the end of a room might form a background to the life of the people in it. It
must always be borne in mind that under these conditions they are really merely
reflections from the ceaseless activity of a great Consciousness upon a far
higher plane, and have very much the appearance of an endless succession of the
recently invented cinematographer, or living photographs. They do not
melt into one another like dissolving views, nor do a series of ordinary
pictures follow one another; but the action of the reflection figures constantly
goes on, as though one were watching the actors on a distant stage.
But if the trained investigator turns his attention
specially to any one scene, or wishes to call it up before him, an extraordinary
change at once takes place, for this is the plane of thought, and to think of
anything is to bring it instantaneously before you. For example, if a man wills
to see the records of that event to which we before referred - the landing of
Julius Caesar - he finds himself in a moment not looking at any picture, but
standing on the shore among the legionaries, with the whole scene being enacted
around him, precisely in every respect as he would have seen it if he had stood
there in the flesh on that autumn morning in the year 55 B.C.. Since what he
sees is but a reflection, the actors are of course entirely unconscious of him,
nor can any effort of his change the course of their action in the
[Page 106] smallest degree, except only that he can
control the rate at which the drama shall pass before him - can have the events
of a whole year rehearsed before his eyes in a single hour, or can at any moment
stop the movement altogether, and hold any particular scene in view as a picture
as long as he chooses.
In truth he observes not only what he would have seen if
he had been there at the time in the flesh, but much more. He hears and
understands all that the people say, and he is conscious of all their thoughts
and motives; and one of the most interesting of the many possibilities which
open up before one who has learnt to read the records is the study of the
thought of ages long past - the thought of the cavemen and the lake-dwellers as
well as that which ruled the mighty civilisations of Atlantis, of Egypt or
Chaldea. What splendid possibilities open up before the man who is in full
possession of this power may easily be imagined. He has before him a field of
historical research of most entrancing interest. Not only can he review at his
leisure all history with which we are acquainted, correcting as he examines it
the many errors and misconceptions which have crept into the accounts handed
down to us; he can also range at will over the whole story of the world from its
very beginning, watching the slow development of intellect in man, the descent
of the Lords of the Flame, and the growth of the mighty civilisations which They
founded.
Nor is his study confined to the progress of humanity
alone; he has before him, as in a museum, all the [Page 107]
strange animal and vegetable forms which occupied the stage in days when the
world was young; he can follow all the wonderful geological changes which have
taken place, and watch the course of the great cataclysms which have altered the
whole face of the earth again and again.
In one especial case an even closer sympathy with the past
is possible to the reader of the records. If in the course of his enquiries he
has to look upon some scene in which he himself has in a former birth taken
part, he may deal with it in two ways: he can either regard it in in the usual
manner as a spectator (though always, be it remembered, as a spectator whose
insight and sympathy are perfect) or he may once more identify himself with that
long-dead personality of his - may throw himself back for the time into that
life of long ago, and absolutely experience over again the thoughts and the
emotions, the pleasures and the pains of a prehistoric past. No wilder and more
vivid adventures can be conceived than some of those through which he thus may
pass; yet though it all he must never lose hold of the consciousness of his own
individuality- must retain the power to return at will to his present
personality.
It is often asked how it is possible for an investigator
accurately to determine the date of any picture from the far-distance past which
he disinters from the records. The fact is that it is sometimes rather tedious
work to find an exact date, but the thing can usually be done if it is worth
while to spend the time and trouble over it. It we are dealing with Greek or
Roman times [Page 108] the simplest method is usually to
look into the mind of the most intelligent person present in the picture, and
see what date he supposes it to be; or the investigator might watch him writing
a letter, or other document and observe what date, if any, was included in what
was written. When once the Roman or Greek date is thus obtained, to reduce it to
our own system of chronology is merely a matter of calculation.
Another way which is frequently adopted is to turn from
the scene under examination to a contemporary picture in some great and
well-known city such as Rome, and note what monarch is reigning there, or who
are the consuls for the year; and when such data are discovered a glance at any
good history will give the rest. Sometimes a date can be obtained by examining
some public proclamation or some legal document; in fact in the times of which
we are speaking the difficulty is easily surmounted.
The matter is by no means so simple, however, when we come
to deal with periods much earlier than this - with a scene from early Egypt,
Chaldea, or China, or to go further back still, from Atlantis itself or any of
its numerous colonies. A date can still be obtained easily enough from the mind
of any educated man, but there is no longer any means of relating it to our own
system of dates, since the man will be reckoning by eras of which we know
nothing, or by the reigns of kings, whose history is lost in the night of time.
Our methods, nevertheless, are not yet exhausted. It must
be remembered that it is possible for the [Page 109]
investigator to pass the records before him at any speed that he may desire - at
the rate of a year in a second if he will, or even very much faster still. Now
there are one or two events in ancient history whose dates have already been
accurately fixed - as, for example, the sinking of Poseidonis in the year 9,564
B.C.. It is therefore obvious that if from the general appearance of the
surroundings it seems probable that a picture seen is within measurable distance
of one of these events, it can be related to that event by the simple process of
running through the record rapidly, and counting the years between the two as
they pass.
Still, if those years ran into a thousand, as they might
sometimes do, this plan would be insufferably tedious. In that case we are
driven back upon the astronomical method. In consequence of the movement which
is commonly called the precession of the equinoxes, though it might more
accurately be described as a kind of second rotation of the earth, the angle
between the equator and the ecliptic steadily but very slow varies. Thus, after
long intervals of time we find the pole of the earth no longer pointing towards
the same spot in the apparent sphere of the heavens, or in other words, our pole
star is not, as at present, a Ursae Minoris, but some other celestial body; and
from this position of the pole of the earth, which can easily be ascertained by
careful observation of the night-sky of the picture under consideration, an
approximate date can be calculated without difficulty.
In estimating the date of occurrences which took
[Page 110] place millions of years ago in earlier races,
the period of a secondary rotation (or the precession of the equinoxes) is
frequently used as a unit, but of course absolute accuracy is not usually
required in such cases, round numbers being sufficient for all practical
purposes in dealing with epochs so remote.
The accurate reading of the records, whether of one's own
past lives or those of others, must not, however, be thought of as an
achievement possible to anyone without careful previous training. As has been
already remarked, though occasional reflections may be had upon the astral
plane, the power to use the mental [devachanic] sense is necessary before any
reliable reading can be done. Indeed, to minimise the possibility of error, that
sense ought to be fully at the command of the investigator while awake in the
physical body; and to acquire that faculty needs years of ceaseless labour and
rigid self-discipline.
Many people seem to expect that as soon as they have
signed their application and joined the Theosophical Society they will at once
remember at least three or four of their past births; indeed, some of them
promptly begin to imagine recollections and declare that in their last
incarnation they were Mary Queen of Scots, Cleopatra, or Julius Caesar! Of
course such extravagant claims simply bring discredit upon those who are so
foolish as to make them; but unfortunately some of that discredit is liable to
be reflected, however unjustly, upon the Society to which they belong, so that a
man who feels seething within him [Page 111] the
conviction that he was Homer or Shakespeare would do well to pause and apply
commonsense tests on the physical plane before publishing the news to the world.
It is quite true that some people have had glimpses of
scenes from their past lives in dreams, but naturally these are usually
fragmentary and unreliable. I had myself in earlier life an experience of this
nature. Among my dreams I found that one was constantly recurring - a dream of a
house with a portico overlooking a beautiful bay, not far from a hill on the top
of which rose a graceful building. I knew that house perfectly, and was as
familiar with the position of its rooms and the view from its door as I was with
those of my home, in this present Life. In those days I knew nothing bout
reincarnation, so that it seemed to me simply a curious coincidence that this
dream should repeat itself so often; and it was not until some time after I had
joined the Society that, when one who knew was showing me some pictures of my
last incarnation, I discovered that this persistent dream had been in a reality
a partial recollection, and that the house which I knew so well was the one in I
was born more than two thousands years ago.
But although there are several cases on record in which
some well-remembered scene has thus come through from one life to another, a
considerable development of occult faculty is necessary before an investigator
can definitely trace a line of incarnations, whether they be his own or another
man's. This will be obvious if we [Page 112] remember the
conditions of the problem which has to be worked out. To follow a person from
this life to the one preceding it, it is necessary first of all to trace his
present life backwards to his birth and then to follow up in reverse order the
stages by which the Ego descended into incarnation.
This will obviously take us back eventually to the
condition of the Ego upon its own plane - the arûpa level of devachan [the
highest levels of the mental plane] the highest levels of the mental plane; so
it will be seen that to perform this task effectually the investigator must be
able to use the sense corresponding to that exalted level while awake in his
physical body - in other words, his consciousness must be centred in the
reincarnating Ego itself, and no longer in the lower personality. In that case,
the memory of the Ego being aroused, his own past incarnations will be spread
out before him like an open book, and he would be able, if he wished, to examine
the conditions of another ego upon that level and trace him backwards through
the devachanic [lower mental] and astral lives which led up to it, until he came
to the last physical death of that Ego, and through it to his previous life.
There is no way but this in which the chain of lives can
be followed through with absolute certainty; and consequently we may at once put
aside as conscious or unconscious impostors those people who advertise that they
are able to trace out anyone's past incarnations for so many shillings a head.
Needless to say, the true occultist does not advertise, and never under any
circumstances accepts money for any exhibition of his powers.
[Page 113]
Assuredly the student who wishes to acquire the power of
following up a line of incarnations can do so only by learning from a qualified
teacher how the work is to be done. There have been those who persistently
asserted that it was only necessary for a man to feel good and devotional and
"brotherly", and all the wisdom of the ages would immediately flow in upon him;
but a little common-sense will at once expose the absurdity of such a position.
However good a child may be, if he wants to know the multiplication table he
must set to work and learn it; and the case is precisely similar with the
capacity to use spiritual faculties. The faculties themselves will not doubt
manifest as the man evolves, but he can learn how use them reliably and to the
best advantage only by steady hard work and persevering effort.
Take the case of those who wish to help others while on
the astral plane during sleep; it is obvious that the more knowledge they
possess here, the more valuable will their services be on that higher plane. For
example, the knowledge of languages would be useful to them, for though on the
mental plane men can communicate directly by thought-transference, whatever
their languages may be, on the astral plane this is not so, and a thought must
be definitely formulated in words before it is comprehensible. If, therefore,
you wish to help a man on that plane,you must have some language in common by
means of which you can communicate with him, and consequently the more languages
you know the more widely useful you will be. In fact [Page
114] there is perhaps no kind of knowledge for which a use cannot be found
in the work of the occultist.
It would be well for all students to bear in mind that
occultism is the apotheosis of commonsense, and that every vision which comes to
them is not necessarily a picture from the âkâshic records, nor every experience
a revelation from on high. It is better far to err on the side of healthy
skepticism than of over-credulity; and it is an admirable rule never to hunt
about for an occult explanation of anything when a plain and obvious physical
one is available. Our duty is to endeavour to keep our balance always, and never
to lose our self-control, but to take a reasonable, commonsense view of whatever
may happen to us; so shall we be better Theosophists, wiser occultists, and more
useful helpers than we have ever been before.
As usual, we find examples of all degrees of the power to
see into this memory of nature, from the trained man who can consult the record
for himself at will, down to the person who gets nothing but occasional vague
glimpses, or has even perhaps had only one such glimpse. But even the man who
possesses this faculty only partially and occasionally still finds it of the
deepest interest. The psychometer, who needs an object physically connected with
the past in order to bring it all into life again around him, and the
crystal-gazer who can sometimes direct his less certain astral telescope to some
historic scene of long ago, may both derive the greatest enjoyment from the
exercise of their respective gifts, even thought they may not always
[Page 115] understand exactly how their results are
produced, and may not have them fully under control under all circumstances.
In many cases of the lower manifestations of these powers
we find that they are exercised unconsciously; many a crystal-gazer watches
scenes from the past without being able to distinguish them from visions of the
present, and many a vaguely-psychic person finds pictures constantly arising
before his eyes without ever realizing that he is in effect psychometrizing the
various objects around him as he happens to touch them or stand near them.
An interesting variant of this class of psychics is the
man who is able to psychometrize persons only, and not inanimate objects as is
more usual. In most cases this faculty shows itself erratically, so that such a
psychic will, when introduced to a stranger, often see in a flash some prominent
event in that stranger's earlier life, but on other similar occasions will
receive no special impression. More rarely we meet with someone who gets details
visions of the past life of everyone whom he encounters. Perhaps one of the best
examples of this class was the German writer Zschokke, who describes in his
autobiography this extraordinary power of which he found himself possessed. He
says:
"It has happened to me occasionally at the first meeting
with a total stranger, when I have been listening in silence to his
conversation, that his past life up to the present moment, with many minute
[Page 116] circumstances belonging to one or other
particular scene in it, has come across me like a dream, but distinctly,
entirely involuntarily and unsought, occupying in duration a few minutes.
"For a long time I was disposed to consider these fleeting
visions as a trick of the fancy - the more so as my dream-vision displayed to me
the dress and movements of the actors, the appearance of the room, the
furniture, and other accidents of the scene; till on one occasion, in a gamesome
mood, I narrated to my family the secret history of a sempstress who had just
before quitted the room. I had never seen the person before. Nevertheless the
hearers were astonished, and laughed and would not be persuaded but that I had a
previous acquaintance with the former life of the person, inasmuch as what I had
stated was perfectly true.
"I was not less astonished to find that my dream-vision
agreed with reality. I then gave more attention to the subject, and as often as
propriety allowed of it, I related to those whose lives had so passed before me
the substance of my dream-vision, to obtain from them its contradiction or
confirmation. On every occasion its confirmation followed, not without amazement
on the part of those who gave it.
"On a certain fair-day I went into the two of Waldshut
accompanied by two young foresters, who are still alive. It was evening, and,
tired with our walk, we went into an inn called the 'Vine'. We took our supper
with a numerous company at the public table, when it happened that they made
themselves merry [Page 117] over the peculiarities and
simplicity of the Swiss in connection with the belief in mesmerism. Lavater's
physiognomical system and the like. One of my companions,whose national pride
was touched by their raillery, begged me to make some reply, particularly in
answer to a young man of superior appearance who sat opposite, and had indulged
in unrestrained ridicule.
'It happened that the events of this person's life had
just previously passed before my mind. I turned to him with the question whether
he would reply to me with truth and candour if I narrated to him the most secret
passages of his history, he being as little known to me as I to him? That would,
I suggested, go something beyond Lavater's physiognomical skill. He promised if
I told the truth to admit it openly. Then I narrated the events with which my
dream vision had furnished me, and the stable learnt the history of the young
tradesman's life of his school years, his peccadilloes, and finally, of a little
act of roguery committed by him on the strongbox of his employer. I described
the uninhabited room with its white walls, where to the right of the brown door
there had stood upon the table the small back money-chest, etc. The man, much
struck, admitted the correctness of each circumstance - even, which I could not
expect, of the last".
And after narrating this incident, the worthy Zschokke
calmly goes on to wonder whether perhaps after all this remarkable power, which
he had so often displayed, might not really have been always the result of mere
chance coincidence! [Page 118]
Comparatively few accounts of persons possessing this
faculty of looking back into the past are to be found in the literature of the
subject, and it might therefore be supposed to be much less common than
prevision. I suspect, however, that the truth is rather that it is much less
commonly recognized. As I said before, it may very easily happen that a person
may see a picture of the past without recognizing it as such, unless there
happens to be in it something which attracts special attention, such as a figure
in armour or in antique costume. A prevision also might not always be recognized
as such at the time; but the occurrence of the event foreseen recalls it vividly
at the same time that it manifests its nature, so that it is unlikely to be
overlooked. It is probable, therefore, that occasional glimpses of these astral
reflections of the âkâshic records are commoner than the published accounts
would lead us to believe.
[Page 119]
CHAPTER -8-
CLAIRVOYANCE IN TIME: THE FUTURE
Even if, in a dim sort of way, we feel ourselves able to
grasp the idea that the whole of the past may be simultaneously and actively
present in a sufficiently exalted consciousness, we are confronted by a far
greater difficulty when we endeavour to realize how all the future may also be
comprehended in that consciousness. If we could believe in the Mohammedan
doctrine of kismet, or the Calvinistic theory of predestination, the conception
would be easy enough, but knowing as we do that both these are grotesque
distortions of the truth, we must look round for a more acceptable hypothesis.
There may still be some people who deny the possibility of
prevision, but such denial simply shows their ignorance of the evidence on the
subject. The large number of authenticated cases leaves no room for doubt as to
the fact, but many of them are of such a nature as to render a reasonable
explanation by no means easy to find. It is evident that the ego possesses a
certain amount of previsional faculty, and if the events foreseen were always of
great importance, one might suppose that an extraordinary stimulus had enabled
him for that occasion only to make a clear impression [Page
120] of what he saw upon his lower personality. No doubt that is the
explanation of many of the cases in which death or grave disaster is foreseen,
but there are a large number of instances on record to which it does not seem to
apply, since the events foretold are frequently exceedingly trivial and
unimportant.
A well-know story of second-sight in Scotland will
illustrate what I mean. A man who had no belief in the occult was forewarned by
a Highland seer of the approaching death of neighbour. The prophecy was given
with considerable wealth of detail, including a full description of the funeral,
with the names of the four pallbearers and others who would be present. The
auditor seems to have laughed at the whole story and promptly forgotten it, but
the death of his neighbour at the time foretold recalled the warning to mind,
and he determined to falsify part of the prediction at any rate by being one of
the pallbearers himself. He succeeded in getting matters arranged as he wished,
but just as the funeral was about to start he was called away from his post by
some small matter which detained him only a minute or two. As he came hurrying
back he saw with surprise that the procession had started without him, and that
the prediction had been exactly fulfilled, for the four pallbearers were those
who had been indicated in the vision.
Now here is a very trifling matter, which could have been
of no possible importance to anybody, definitely foreseen months beforehand; and
although a man makes a determined effort to alter the arrangement
[Page 121] indicated he fails entirely to affect it in
the least. Certainly this looks very much like predestination, even down to the
smallest detail, and it is only when we examine this question from higher planes
that we are able to see our way to escape that theory. Of course, as I said
before about another branch of the subject, a full explanation eludes us as yet,
and obviously must do so until our knowledge is infinitely greater than it is
now; the most that we can hope to do for the present is to indicate the line
along which an explanation may be found.
There is no doubt whatever that, just as what is happening
now is the result of causes set in motion in the past, so what will happen in
the future will be the result of causes already in operation. Even down here we
can calculate that if certain actions are performed certain results will follow,
but our reckoning is constantly liable to be disturbed by the interference of
factors which we have not been able to take into account. But if we raise our
consciousness to the mental plane we can see very much farther into the results
of our actions.
We can trace, for example, the effect of a casual word,
not only upon the person to whom it was addressed, but through him on many
others as it is passed on in widening circles, until it seems to have affected
the whole country; and one glimpse of such a vision is far more efficient than
any number of moral precepts in pressing upon us the necessity of extreme
circumspection in thought, word, and deed. Not only can we
[Page 122] from that plane see thus fully the result of every action, but we
can also see where and in what way the results of other actions apparently quite
unconnected with it will interfere with and modify it. In fact, it may be said
that the results of all causes at present in action are clearly visible - that
the future, as it would be if no entirely new causes should arise, lies open
before our gaze.
New causes of course do arise, because man's will is free;
but in the case of all ordinary people the use which they will make of their
freedom can be calculated beforehand with considerable accuracy. The average man
has so little real will that he is very much the creature of circumstances; his
action im previous lives places him amid certain surroundings, and their
influence upon him is so very much the most important factor in his life-story
that his future course may be predicted with almost mathematical certainty.
With the developed man the case is different; for him also
the main events of life are arranged by his past actions, but the way in which
he will allow them to affect him, the methods by which he will deal with them
and perhaps triumph over them - these are all his own, and they cannot be
foreseen even on the mental [devachanic] plane except as probabilities.
Looking down on man's life in this way from above, it
seems as though his free will could be exercised only at certain crises in his
career. He arrives at a point in his life where there are obviously two or three
alternative courses open before him; he is absolutely [Page
122] free to choose which of them he pleases, and although someone who knew
his nature thoroughly well might feel almost certain what his choice would be,
such knowledge on his friend's part is in no sense a compelling force.
But when he has chosen, he has to go through with
it and take the consequences; having entered upon a particular path he may, in
many cases, be forced to go on for a very long way before he has any opportunity
to turn aside. His position is somewhat like that of the driver of a train; when
he comes to a junction he may have the points set either this way or that, and
so can pass on to whichever line he pleases, but when he has passed on to one of
them he is compelled to run on along the line which he has selected until he
reaches another set of points, where again an opportunity of choice is offered
to him.
Now, in looking down from the mental plane, these points
of new departure would be clearly visible, and all the results of each choice
would lie open before us, certain to be worked out even to the smallest detail.
The only point which would remain uncertain would be the all-important one as to
which choice the man would make. We should, in fact, have not one but several
futures mapped out before our eyes, without necessarily being able to determine
which of them would materialize itself into accomplished fact. In most instances
we should see so strong a probability that we should not hesitate to come to a
decision, but the case which I have described is certainly theoretically
possible. [Page 124] Still, even this much knowledge
would enable us to do with safety a good deal of prediction; and it is not
difficult for us to imagine that a far higher power than ours might always be
able to foresee which way every choice would go, and consequently to prophesy
with absolute certainty.
On the buddhic plane, however, no such elaborate process
of conscious calculation is necessary, for, as I said before, in some manner
which down here is totally inexplicable, the past, the present, and the future
are there all existing simultaneously. One can only accept this fact, for its
cause lies in the faculty of the plane, and the way in which this higher faculty
works is naturally quite incomprehensible to the physical brain. Yet now and
then one may meet with a hint that seems to bring us a trifle nearer to a dim
possibility of comprehension. One such hint was given by Sir Olive Lodge in his
address to the British Association at Cardiff. He said;
"A luminous and helpful idea is that time is but a
relative mode of regarding things; we progress through phenomena at a
certain definite pace and this subjective advance we interpret in an
objective manner, as if events moved necessarily in this order and at this
precise rate. But that may be only one mode of regarding them. The events
may be in some sense in existence always, both past and future, and it may
be we who are arriving at them, not they which happening. The analogy of a
traveler in a railway train is useful; if he could never leave the train nor
alter its pace he [Page 125] would probably consider
the landscapes as necessarily successive and be unable to conceive their
coexistence... We perceive, therefore, a possible fourth dimensional aspect
about time, the inexorableness of whose flow may be a natural part of our
present limitations. And if we once grasp the idea that past and future may
be actually existing, we can recognize that they may have a controlling
influence on all present action, and the two together may constitute the
'higher plane' or totality of things after which, as it seems to me, we are
impelled to seek, in connection with the directing of form or determinism,
and the action of living beings consciously directed to a definite and
preconceived end".
Time is not in reality the fourth dimension at all; yet to
look at it for the moment from that point of view is some slight help towards
grasping the ungraspable. Suppose that we hold a wooden cone at right angles to
a sheet of paper, and slowly push it through its point first. A microbe living
on the surface of that sheet of paper, and having no power of conceiving
anything outside of that surface, could not only never see the cone as a whole,
but could form no sort of conception of such a body at all. All that he would
see would be the sudden appearance of a tiny circle, which would gradually and
mysteriously grow larger and larger until it vanished from his world as suddenly
and incomprehensibly as it had come into it.
Thus, what were in reality a series of sections of the
cone would appear to him to be successive stages in the [Page
126] life of a circle, and it would be impossible for him to grasp the idea
that these successive stages could be seen simultaneously. Yet it is, of course,
easy enough for us, looking down upon the transaction from another dimension, to
see that the microbe is simply under a delusion arising from its own
limitations, and that the cone exists as a whole all the while. Our own delusion
as to past, present, and future is possibly not dissimilar, and the view that is
gained of any sequence of events from the buddhic plane corresponds to the view
of the cone as a whole. Naturally, any attempt to work out this suggestion lands
us in a series of startling paradoxes; but the fact remains a fact,
nevertheless, and the time will come when it will be clear as noonday to our
comprehension.
When the pupil's consciousness is fully developed upon the
buddhic plane, therefore, perfect prevision is possible to him, though he may
not - nay, he certainly will not be able to bring the whole result of this sight
through fully and in order into this life. Still, a great deal of clear
foresight is obviously within his power, whenever he likes to exercise it; and
even when he is not exercising it, frequent flashes of foreknowledge come
through into his ordinary life, so that he often has an instantaneous intuition
as to how things will turn out even before their inception.
Short of this perfect prevision we find, as in the
previous cases, that all degrees of this type of clairvoyance exist, from the
occasional vague premonitions which cannot in any true sense be called sight at
[Page 127] all, up to frequent and fairly complete
second-sight. The faculty to which this latter somewhat misleading name has been
given is an extremely interesting one and would well repay more careful and
systematic study than has ever higher to been given to it.
It is best know to us as a not infrequent possession of
the Scottish Highlanders, though it is by no means confirmed to them. Occasional
instances of it have appeared in almost every nation, but it has always been
commonest among mountaineers and men of lonely life. With us in England it is
often spoken of as though it were the exclusive appanage of the Celtic race, but
in reality it has appeared among similarly situated peoples the world over. It
is stated, for example, to be very common among the Westphalian peasantry.
Sometimes the second-sight consists of a picture clearly
foreshowing some coming event; more frequently, perhaps, the glimpse of the
future is given by some symbolical appearance. It is noteworthy that the events
foreseen are invariably unpleasant ones - death being the commonest of all; I do
not recollect a single instance in which the second-sight has shown anything
which was not of the most gloomy nature. It has a ghastly symbolism which is all
its own - a symbolism of shrouds and corpse-candles, and other funeral horrors.
In some cases it appears to be to a certain extent dependent on locality, for it
is stated that inhabitants of the Isle of Skye who possess the faculty often
lose it when they leave the island, even though it be [Page
128] only to cross to the mainland. The gift of such sight is sometimes
hereditary in a family for generations, but this is not an invariable rule, for
it often appears sporadically in one member of a family otherwise free from its
lugubrious influence.
An example in which an accurate vision of a coming event
was seen some months beforehand by second-sight has already been given. Here is
another and perhaps a more striking one, which I give exactly as it was related
to me by one of the actors in the scene.
"We plunged into the jungle, and had walked on for
about an hour without much success, when Cameron, who happened to be next to
me, stopped suddenly, turned pale as death, and, pointing straight before
him, cried in accents of horror:
"'See! see! merciful heaven, look there!'
"'Where? what? what is it?' we all shouted confusedly,
as we rushed up to him and looked round in expectation of encountering a
tiger- a cobra- we hardly knew what, but assuredly something terrible, since
it had been sufficient to cause such evident emotion in our usually
self-contained comrade. But neither tiger nor cobra was visible - nothing
but Cameron pointing with ghastly, haggard face and staring eyeballs at
something we could not see.
"'Cameron! Cameron!' cried I, seizing his arm, 'for
heaven's sake, speak! What is the matter?'
"Scarcely were the words out of my mouth when a low,
but very peculiar sound struck on my ear, and Cameron, dropping his pointing
hand, said in a hoarse, [Page 129] strained voice,
'There! you heard it? Thank God it's over!' and fell to the ground
insensible.
"There was a momentary confusion while we unfastened
his collar, and I dashed in his face some water which I fortunately had in
my flask, while another tried to pour brandy between his clenched teeth; and
under cover of it, I whispered to the man next to me (one of our greatest
sceptics, by the way), " Beauchamp , did you hear anything?'
"'Why, yes,' he replied, ' a curious sound, very; a
sort of crash or rattle far away in the distance, yet very distinct; if the
thing were not utterly impossible, I could have sworn it was the rattle of
musketry'.
"'Just my impression', murmured I; 'but hush! he is
recovering'.
"In a minute or two he was able to speak feebly, and
began to thank us and apologize for giving trouble; and soon he sat up,
leaning against a tree, and in a firm, though still low voice said:
"'My dear friends, I feel I owe you an explanation of
my extraordinary behaviour. It is an explanation that I would fain avoid
giving; but it must come some time, and so may as well be given now. You may
perhaps have noticed that when during our voyage you all joined in scoffing
at dreams, portents and visions, I invariably avoided giving any opinion on
the subject. I did so because, while I had no desire to court ridicule or
provoke discussion, I was unable to agree with you, knowing only too well
from my own dread experience that the world which men agree to call that of
the [Page 130] supernatural is just as real as - nay,
perhaps, even far more real than this world we see about us. In other words,
I, like many of my country men, am cursed with the gift of second-sight -
that awful faculty which foretells in vision calamities that are shortly to
occur.
"'Such a vision I had just now, and its exceptional
horror moved me as you have seen. I saw before me a corpse - not that of one
who has died a peaceful natural death, but that of the victim of some
terrible accident; a ghastly, shapeless mass, with a face swollen, crushed,
unrecognisable. I saw this dreadful object placed in a coffin, and the
funeral service performed over it. I saw the burial ground, I saw the
clergyman; and though I had never seen either before, I can picture both
perfectly in my mind's eye now; I saw you, myself, Beauchamp, all of us and
many more, standing round as mourners; I saw the soldiers raise their
muskets after the service was over; I heard the volley they fired - and then
I knew no more'.
"As he spoke of that volley of musketry I glanced
across with a shudder at Beauchamp, and the look of stony horror on that
handsome sceptic's face was not to be forgotten".
This is only one incident (and by no means the principal
one) in a very remarkable story of psychic experience, but as for the moment we
are concerned merely with the example of second-sight which it gives us, I need
only say that later in the day the party of young soldiers discovered the body
of their commanding officer [Page 131] in the terrible
condition so graphically described by Mr.Cameron. The narrative continues:
"When, on the following evening, we arrived at our
destination, and our melancholy deposition had been taken down by the proper
authorities, Cameron and I went out for a quiet walk, to endeavour with the
assistance of the soothing influence of nature to shake off something of the
gloom which paralyzed our spirits. Suddenly he clutched my arm, and pointing
through some rude railings, said in a trembling voice. "Yes, there it is!
that is the burial-ground I saw yesterday'. And when later on we were
introduced to the chaplain of the post, I noticed, though my friends did
not, the irrepressible shudder with which Cameron took his hand, and I knew
that he had recognized the clergyman of his vision".
As for the occult rational of al this, I presume Mr.
Cameron's vision was a pure case of second-sight, and if so the fact that the
two men who were evidently nearest to him (certainly one - probably both -
actually touching him) participated in it to the limited extent of hearing the
concluding volley, while the others who were not so close did not, would show
that the intensity with which the vision impressed itself upon the seer
occasioned vibrations in his mind-body which were communicated to those of the
persons in contact with him, as in ordinary thought-transference. Anyone who
wishes to read the rest of the story will find it in the pages of Lucifer,
Vol. 2, page 457.
Scores of examples of similar nature to these might
[Page 132] easily be collected. With regard to the
symbolical variety of this sight, it is commonly stated among those who possess
it that if on meeting a living person they see a phantom shroud wrapped around
him, it is a sure prognostication of his death. The date of the approaching
decease is indicated either by the extent to which the shroud covers the body,
or by the time of day at which the vision is seen; for if it be in the early
morning they say that the man will die during the same day, but if it be in the
evening, then it will be only some time within a year.
Another variant (and a remarkable one) of the symbolic
form of second-sight is that in which the headless apparition of the person
whose death is foretold manifests itself to the seer. An example of that class
is given in Signs before Death as having happened in the family of Dr.
Ferrier, though in that case, if I recollect rightly, the vision did not occur
until the time of the death , or very near it.
Turning from seers who are regularly in possession of a
certain faculty, although its manifestations are only occasionally fully under
their control, we are confronted by a large number of isolated instances of
prevision in the case of people with whom it is not in any way a regular
faculty. Perhaps the majority of these occur in dreams, although examples of the
waking vision are by no means wanting. Sometimes the prevision refers to an
event of distinct importance to the seer, and so justifies the action of the Ego
in taking the trouble to impress it. In other cases, the event is one which is
[Page 133] of no apparent importance, or is not in any
way connected with the man to whom the vision comes. Sometimes it is clear that
the intention of the Ego (or the communicating entity, whatever it may be) is to
warn the lower self of the approach of some calamity, either in order that it
may be prevented or, if that be not possible, that the shock may be minimized by
preparation.
The event most frequently thus foreshadowed is, perhaps
not unnaturally, death - sometimes the death of the seer himself, sometimes that
of one dear to him. This type of prevision is so common in the literature of the
subject, and its object is so obvious, that we need hardly cite examples of it;
but one or two instances in which the prophetic sight, though clearly useful,
was yet of a less sombre character, will prove not uninteresting to the reader.
The following is culled from that storehouse of the student of the uncanny, Mrs.
Crowe's Night Side of Nature, page 72.
"A few years ago Dr. Watson, now residing at Glasgow,
dreamt that he received a summons to attend a patient at a place some miles from
where he was living; that he started on horseback, and that as he was crossing a
moor he saw a bull making furiously at him, whose horns he only escaped by
taking refuge on a spot inaccessible to the animal, where he waiting a long time
till some people, observing his situation, came to his assistance and released
him.
"Whilst at breakfast on the following morning the summons
came, and smiling at the odd coincidence (as [Page 134]
he thought it), he started on horseback. He was quite ignorant of the road he
had to go, but by and by he arrived at the moor, which he recognized, and
presently the bull appeared, coming full tilt towards him. But his dream had
shown him the place of refuge for which he instantly made, and there he spent
three or four hours, besieged by the animal, till the country people set him
free. Dr Watson declares that but for the dream he should not have known in what
direction to run for safety".
Another case, in which a much longer interval separated
the warning and its fulfillment, is given by Dr.F.G.Lee, in Glimpses of the
Supernatural, Volume 1, page 240.
"Mrs. Hannah Green, the housekeeper of a country
family in Oxfordshire, dreamt one night that she had been left alone in the
house upon a Sunday evening, and that hearing a knock at the door of the
chief entrance she went to it, and there found an ill-looking tramp armed
with a bludgeon, who insisted on forcing himself into the house. She thought
that she struggled for some time to prevent him so doing, but quite
ineffectually, and that, being struck down by him and rendered insensible,
he thereupon gained ingress to the mansion. On this she awoke.
"As nothing happened for a considerable period, the
circumstance of the dream was soon forgotten, and, as she herself asserts,
had altogether passed away from her mind. However, seven years afterwards
this same housekeeper was left with two other servants to take
[Page 135] charge of an isolated mansion at
Kensington (subsequently the town residence of the family), when on a
certain Sunday evening, her fellow-servants having gone out and left her
alone, she was suddenly startled by a loud knock at the front door.
"All of a sudden the remembrance of her former dream
returned to her with singular vividness and remarkable force, and she felt
her lonely isolation greatly. Accordingly, having at once lighted a lamp on
the hall table - during which act the loud knock was repeated with vigour -
she took the precaution to go up to a landing on the stair and throw up the
window; and there to her intense terror she saw in the flesh the very man
who years previously she had seen in her dream, armed with the bludgeon and
demanding an entrance.
"With great presence of mind she went down to the
chief entrance, made that and other doors and windows more secure, and then
rang the various bells of the house violently, and placed lights in the
upper rooms. It was concluded that by the acts the intruder was scared away.
Evidently in this case also the dream was of practical
use, as without it the worthy housekeeper would without doubt from sheer force
of habit have opened the door in the ordinary way in answer to the knock.
It is not, however, only in dream that the ego impresses
his lower self with what he thinks it well for it to know. Many instances
showing this might be taken from the books, but instead of quoting from them I
[Page 136] will give a case related only a few weeks ago
by a lady of my acquaintance - a case which, although not surrounded with any
romantics incident, has at least the merit of being new.
My friend, then, has two quite young children, and a
little while ago the elder of them caught (as was supposed) a bad cold, and
suffered for some days from a complete stoppage in the upper part of the nose.
The mother thought little of this, expecting it to pass off, until one day she
suddenly saw before her in the air what she describes as a picture of a room, in
the centre of which was a table on which her child was lying insensible or dead,
with some people bending over her. The minutest details of the scene were clear
to her, and she particularly noticed that the child wore a white nightdress,
whereas she knew that all garments of that description possessed by her little
daughter happened to be pink.
The vision impressed her considerably, and suggested to
her for the first time that the child might be suffering from something more
serious than a cold, so she carried her off to a hospital for examination. The
surgeon who attended to her discovered the presence of dangerous growth in the
nose, which he pronounced must be removed. A few days later the child was taken
to the hospital for the operation, and was put to bed. When the mother arrived
at the hospital she found she had forgotten to bring one of the child's
night-dresses, and so the nurses had to supply one, which was white. In
this white dress the operation [Page 137] was performed
on the girl the next day, in the room that her mother saw in her vision, every
circumstance being exactly reproduced.
In all these cases the prevision achieved its result, but
the books are full of stories of warnings neglected or scouted, and of the
disaster that consequently followed. In some cases the information is given to
someone who has practically no power to interfere in the matter, as in the
historic instance when John Williams, a Cornish mine-manager, foresaw in the
minutest detail, eight or nine days before it took place, the assassination of
Mr. Spencer Perceval, the then Chancellor of the Exchequer, in the lobby of the
House of Commons. Even in this case, however, it is just possible that something
might have been done, for we read that Mr. Williams was so much impressed that
he consulted his friends as to whether he ought not to go up to London to warn
Mr. Perceval. Unfortunately they dissuaded him, and the assassination took
place. It does not seem very probable that, even if he had gone up to town and
related his story, much attention would have been paid to him; still there is
just the possibility that some precautions might have been taken which would
have prevented the murder.
There is little to show us what particular action on
higher planes led to this curious prophetic vision. The parties were entirely
unknown to one another, so that it was not caused by any close sympathy between
them. If it was an attempt made by some helper to avert the threatened doom, it
seems strange that no one who was [Page 138] sufficiently
impressible could be found nearer than Cornwall. Perhaps Mr. Williams, when on
the astral plane during sleep, somehow came across this reflection of the
future, and being naturally horrified thereby, passed it on to his lower mind in
the hope that somehow something might be done to prevent it; but it is
impossible to diagnose the case with certainty without examining the âkâshic
records to see what actually took place.
A typical instance of the absolutely purposeless foresight
is that related by Mr. Stead, in his
Real Ghost Stories (page 83), of his friend Miss Freer, commonly
known as Miss X. When staying at a country house this lady, being wide awake and
fully conscious, once saw a dogcart drawn by a white horse standing at the hall
door, with two strangers in it, one of whom got out of the cart and stood
playing with a terrier. She noticed that he was wearing an ulster, and also
particularly observed the fresh wheel-marks made by the cart on the gravel.
Nevertheless there was no cart there at the time; but half an hour later two
strangers did drive up in such an equipage, and every detail of the lady's
vision was accurately fulfilled. Mr. Stead goes on to cite another instance of
equally purposeless prevision where seven years separated the dream (for in this
case it was a dream) and its fulfillment.
All these instances (and they are merely random selections
from many hundreds) show that a certain amount of prevision is undoubtedly
possible to the ego, and such cases would evidently be much more frequent if it
[Page 139] were not for the exceeding density and lack of
response in the lower vehicles of the majority of what we call civilized mankind
- qualities chiefly attributable to the gross practical materialism of the
present age. I am not thinking of any profession of materialistic belief as
common, but of the fact that in all practical affairs of daily life nearly
everyone is guided solely by considerations of worldly interest in some shape or
other.
In many cases the ego himself may be an undeveloped one,
and his prevision consequently very vague; in others he himself may see clearly,
but may find his lower vehicles so unimpressible that all he can succeed in
getting through into his physical brain may be an indefinite presage of coming
disaster. Again, there are cases in which a premonition is not the work of the
ego at all, but of some outside entity, who for some reasons takes a friendly
interest in the person to whom the feeling comes. In the work which I quote
above, Mr. Stead tells us of the certainty which he felt many months beforehand
that he would be left in change of the Pall Mall Gazette, through from an
ordinary point of view nothing seemed less probable. Whether that foreknowledge
was the result of an impression made by his own ego or of a friendly hint from
someone else it is impossible to say without definite investigation, but his
confidence in it was fully justified.
There is one more variety of clairvoyance in time which
ought not to be left without mention. It is a comparatively rare one, but there
are enough examples on record to claim our attention, though unfortunately
[Page 140] the particulars given do not usually include
those which we should require in order to be able to diagnose it with certainty.
I refer to the cases in which spectral armies or phantom flocks of animals have
been seen. In The Night Side of Nature (page 462
et seq.) we have accounts of several such visions. We are there told
how at Havarah Park, near Ripley, a body of soldiers in white uniform, amounting
to several hundreds, was seen by reputable people to go through various
evolutions and then vanish; and how some years earlier a similar visionary army
was seen in the neighbourhood of Inverness by a respectable farmer and his son.
In this case also the number of troops was very great, and
the spectators had not the slightest doubt at first that they were substantial
forms of flesh and blood. They counted at least sixteen pairs of columns, and
had abundance of time to observe every particular. The front ranks marched seven
abreast, and were accompanied by a good many women and children, who were
carrying tin cans and other implements of cookery. The men were clothed in red,
and their arms shone brightly in the sun. In the midst of them was an animal, a
deer or horse, they could not distinguish which, that they were driving
furiously forward with their bayonets.
The younger of the two men observed to the other that
every now and then the rear ranks were obliged to run to overtake the van; and
the elder one, who had been a soldier, remarked that that was always the case,
and recommended him if he ever served to try to march [Page
141] in the front. There was only one mounted officer; he rode a grey
dragoon horse, and wore a gold-laced hat and blue Hussar cloak, with wide open
sleeves lined with red. The two spectators observed him so particularly that
they said afterwards they should recognize him anywhere. They were, however,
afraid of being ill-treated or forced to go along with the troops, whom they
concluded to have come from Ireland, and landed at Hyntyre; and whilst they were
climbing over a dyke to get out of their way, the whole thing vanished.
A phenomenon of the same sort was observed in the earlier
part of this century at Paderborn in Westphalia, and seen by at least thirty
people; but as, some years later, a review of twenty thousand men was held on
the very same spot, it was concluded that the vision must have been some sort of
second-sight - a faculty not uncommon in the district.
Such spectral hosts, however, are sometimes seen where an
army of ordinary men could by no possibility have marched, either before or
after. One of the most remarkable accounts of such apparitions is given by Miss
Harriet Martineau, in her description of The English Lakes. She writes as
follows:
"This Souter or Soutra Fell is the mountain on which
ghosts appeared in myriads, at intervals during ten years of the last
century, presenting the same appearances to twenty-six chosen witnesses, and
to all the inhabitants of all the cottages within view of the mountain, and
for a space of two hours and a half at one time - the spectral show being
closed by darkness! [Page 142] The mountain, be it
remembered is full of precipices, which defy all marching of bodies of men;
and the north and west sides present a sheer perpendicular of 900 feet.
"On Midsummer Eve, 1735, a farm servant of
Mr.Lancaster, half a mile from the mountain, saw the eastern side of its
summit covered with troops, which pursued their onward march for an hour.
They came, indistinct bodies, from an eminence on the north and disappeared
in a niche in the summit. When the poor fellow told his tale, he was
insulted on all hands, as original observers usually are when they see
anything wonderful. Two years after, also on a Midsummer Eve, Mr. Lancaster
saw some men there, apparently following their horses, as if they had
returned from hunting. He thought nothing of this; but he happened to look
up again ten minutes after, and saw the figures, now mounted, and followed
by an interminable array of troops, five abreast, marching from the eminence
and over the cleft as before. All the family saw this, and the manoeuvres of
the force, as each company was kept in order by a mounted officer, who
galloped this way and that. As the shades of twilight came on, the disciple
appeared to relax, and the troops intermingled, and rode at unequal paces
till all was lost in darkness. Now of course all the Lancasters were
insulted, as their servant had been; but their justification was not long
delayed.
"On the Midsummer Eve of the fearful 1745, twenty-six
persons, expressly summoned by the family, saw all [Page
143] that had been seen before, and more. Carriages were now
interspersed with the troops; and everybody knew that no carriages had been,
or could be, on the summit of Souter Fell. The multitude was beyond
imagination; for the troops filled a space of half a mile, and marched
quickly till night hid them - still marching. There was nothing vaporous or
indistinct about the appearance of the spectres. So real did they seem, that
some of the people went up the next morning, to look for the hoof-marks of
the horses; and awful it was to them to find not one footprint on heather or
grass. The witnesses attested the whole story on oath before a magistrate;
and fearful were the expectations held by the whole countryside about the
coming events of the Scotch rebellion.
"It now comes out that two other persons had seen
something of the sort in the interval - viz., in 1743 - but had
concealed it, to escape the insults to which their neighbours were
subjected. Mr. Wren, of Wilton Hall, and his farm servant, saw, one summer
evening, a man and a dog on the mountain, pursuing some horses along a place
so steep that a horse could hardly by any possibility keep a footing on it.
Their speed was prodigious, and their disappearance at the south end of the
fell so rapid, that Mr. Wren and the servant went up, the next morning, to
find the body of the man who must have been killed. Of man, horse, or dog,
they found not a trace; and they came down and held their tongues. When they
did speak, they fared not much better for having twenty-six sworn comrades
in their disgrace. [Page
144]
"As for the explanation, the editor of the Lonsdale
Magazine declared (volume II, page 313) that it was discovered that on
the Midsummer Eve of 1745 the rebels were 'exercising on the western cost of
Scotland, whose movements had been reflected by some transparent vapour,
similar to the Fata Morgana'. This is not much in the way of explanation;
but it is, as far as we know, all that can be had at present. These facts,
however, brought out a good many more; as the spectral march of the same
kind seen in Leicestershire in 1707, and the tradition of the tramp of
armies over Helvellyn, on the eve of the battle of Marston Moor".
Other cases are cited in which flocks of spectral sheep
have been seen on certain roads, and there are of course various German stories
of phantom cavalcades of hunters and robbers.
Now in these cases, as so often happens in the
investigation of occult phenomena, there are several possible causes, any one of
which would be quite adequate to the production of the observed occurrences, but
in the absence of fuller information it is hardly feasible to do more than guess
as to which of these possible causes were in operation in any particular
instance.
The explanation usually suggested (whenever the whole
story is not ridiculed as a falsehood) is that what is seen is a reflection by
mirage of the movements of a real body and troops, taking place at a
considerable distance. I have myself seen the ordinary mirage on several
occasions and know something therefore of its wonderful powers of deception; but
it seems to me that [Page 145] we should need some
entirely new variety of mirage, quite different form that at present known to
science, to account for these tales of phantom armies, some of which pass the
spectator within a few years.
First of all, they may be, as apparently in the
Westphalian case above mentioned, simply instances of prevision on a gigantic
scale- by whom arranged, and for what purpose, it is not easy to divine. Again,
they may often belong to the past instead of the future, and be in fact the
reflection of scenes from the akashic records - though here again the reason and
method of such reflection is not obvious.
There are plenty of tribes of nature-spirits perfectly
capable, if for any reason they wished to do so, of producing such appearances
by their wonderful power of glamour ( See Theosophical Manual, No 5, page
86), and such action would be quite in keeping with their delight in mystifying
and impressing human beings. Or it may even sometimes be kindly intended by them
as a warning to their friends of events that they know to be about to take
place. It seems as though some explanation along these lines would be the most
reasonable method of accounting for the extraordinary series of phenomena
described by Miss Martineau - that is, if the stories told to her can be relied
upon.
Another possibility is that in some cases what have been
taken for soldiers were simply the nature-spirits themselves going through some
of the ordered evolutions in which they take so much delight, though it must be
admitted that these are rarely of a character which could
[Page 146] be mistaken for military manoeuvres except by the most ignorant.
The flocks of animals are probably in most instances mere
records, but there are cases where they, like the "wild huntsmen" of German
story, belong to an entirely different class of phenomena which is altogether
outside of our present subject. Students of the occult will be familiar with the
fact that the circumstances surrounding any scene of intense terror or passion,
such as an exceptionally horrible murder, are liable to be occasionally
reproduced in a form which it needs a very slight development of psychic faculty
to be able to see; and it has sometimes happened that various animals formed
part of such surroundings, and consequently they also are periodically
reproduced by the action of the guilty conscience of the murderer. (See Manual
5)
Probably whatever foundation of fact underlies the various
stories of spectral horsemen and hunting-troops may generally be referred to
this category. This is also the explanation, evidently, of some of the visions
of ghostly armies, such as that remarkable reenactment of the battle of Edgehill
which seems to have taken place at intervals for some months after the date of
the real struggle, as testified by a justice of the peace, a clergyman, and
other eyewitnesses in a curious contemporary pamphlet entitled Prodigious
Noises of War and Battle, at Edgehill, near Keinton, in Northamptonshire.
According to the pamphlet this case was investigated at the time by some
officers of the army, who clearly [Page 147] recognized
many of the phantom figures that they saw. This looks decidedly like an instance
of the terrible power of man's unrestrained passions to reproduce themselves,
and to cause in some strange way a kind of materialization of their record.
In some cases it is clear that the flocks of animals seen
have been simply hordes of unclean artificial elementals taking that form in
order to feed upon the loathsome emanations of peculiarly horrible places, such
as would be the site of a gallows. An instance of this kind is furnished by the
celebrated "Gyb Ghosts", or ghosts of the gibbet, describe in More Glimpses
of the World Unseen, page 109, as being repeatedly seen in the form of herds
of misshapen swine-like creatures, rushing, rooting and fighting night after
night on the site of that foul monument of crime. But these belong to the
subject of apparitions rather than to that of clairvoyance.
[Page 148]
CHAPTER -9-
METHODS OF DEVELOPMENT
When a men becomes convinced of the reality of the
valuable power of clairvoyance, his first question usually is, "How can I
develop in my own case this faculty which is said to be latent in everyone?"
Now the fact is that there are many methods by which it
may be developed, but only one which be at all safely recommended for general
use - that of which we shall speak last of all. Among the less advanced nations
of the world the clairvoyant state has been produced in various objectionable
ways; among some of the non-Aryan tribes of India, but the use of intoxicating
drugs or the inhaling of stupefying fumes; among the dervishes, by whirling in a
mad dance of religious fervour until vertigo and insensibility supervene; among
the followers of the abominable practice of the Voodoo cult, by frightful
sacrifices and loathsome rites of black magic. Methods such as these are happily
not in vogue in our race, yet even among us large numbers of dabblers in this
ancient art adopt some plan of self-hypnotization, such as gazing at a bright
spot or the repetition of some formula until a condition of semi-stupefaction is
produced; while yet [Page 149] another school among them
would endeavour to arrive at similar results by the use of some of the Indian
systems of regulation of the breath.
All these methods are unequivocally to be condemned as
quite unsafe for the practice of the ordinary man who has no idea of what he is
doing - who is simply making vague experiments in an unknown world. Even the
method of obtaining clairvoyance by allowing oneself to be mesmerized by another
person is one from which I should myself shrink with the most decided distaste;
and assuredly it should never be attempted except under conditions of absolute
trust and affection between the magnetizer and the magnetized, and a perfection
of purity in heart and soul, in mind and intention, such as is rarely to be seen
among any but the greatest of saints.
Experiments in connection with the mesmeric trance are of
the deepest interest, as offering (among other things) a possibility of proof of
the fact of clairvoyance to the sceptic, yet except under such conditions as I
have just mentioned - conditions, I quite admit, almost impossible to realize -
I should never counsel anyone to submit himself as a subject for them.
Curative mesmerism, (in which, without putting the patient
into the trance state at all, an effort is made to relieve his pain, to remove
his disease, or to pour vitality into him by magnetic passes) stands on an
entirely different footing; and if the mesmerizer, even though quite untrained,
is himself in good health and animated by pure intentions, no harm is likely to
be done to the [Page 150] subject. In so extreme a case
as that of a surgical operation, a man might reasonably submit himself even to
the mesmeric trance, but it is certainly not a condition with which one ought
lightly to experiment. Indeed, I should most strongly advise any one who did me
the honour to ask for my opinion on the subject, not to attempt any kind of
experimental investigation into what are still to him the abnormal forces of
nature, until he has first of all read carefully everything that has been
written on the subject, or- which is by far the best of all - until he is under
the guidance of a qualified teacher.
But where, it will be said, is the qualified teacher to be
found? Not, most assuredly, among any who advertise themselves as teachers, who
offer to impart for so many guineas or dollars the sacred mysteries of the ages,
or hold "developing circles" to which casual applicants are admitted at so much
per head.
Much has been said in this treatise of the necessity for
careful training - of the immense advantages of the trained over the untrained
clairvoyant; but that again brings us back to the same question- where is this
definite training to be had?
The answer is that the training may be had precisely where
it has always been to be found since the world's history began - at the hands of
the Great White Brotherhood of Adepts, which stands now, as it has always stood,
at the back of human evolution, guiding and helping it under the sway of the
great Cosmic Laws which represent to us the Will of the Eternal.
[Page 151]
But how, it may be asked, is access to be gained to them?
How is the aspirant thirsting for knowledge to signify to them his wish for
instruction?
Once more, by the time-honoured methods only. There is no
new patent whereby a man can qualify himself without trouble to become a pupil
in that School - no royal road to the learning which has to be acquired in it.
At the present day, just as in the mists of antiquity, the man who wishes to
attract Their notice must enter upon the slow and toilsome path of
self-development - must learn first of all to take himself in hand and make
himself all that he ought to be. The steps of that path are no secret; I have
given them in full details in Invisible Helpers,
so I need not repeat them here. But it is no easy road to follow, and yet sooner
or later all must follow it, for the great law of evolution sweeps mankind
slowly but resistlessly towards its goal.
From those who are pressing into this path the great
Masters select their pupils, and it is only by qualifying himself to be taught
that a man can put himself in the way of getting the teaching. Without that
qualification membership in any Lodge or Society, whether secret or otherwise,
will not advance his object in the slightest degree. It is true, as we all know,
that it was at the instance of some of these Masters that our Theosophical
Society was founded, and that from its ranks some have been chosen to pass into
closer relations with them. But that choice depends upon the earnestness of the
candidate, not upon his mere membership of the Society or of anybody within it.
[Page 152]
That, then, is the only absolutely safe way of developing
clairvoyance - to enter with all one's energy upon the path of moral and mental
evolution, at one stage of which this and other of the higher faculties will
spontaneously begin to show themselves. Yet there is one practice which is
advised by all the religions alike - which if adopted carefully and reverently
can do no harm to any human being, yet from which a very pure type of
clairvoyance has sometimes been developed and that is the practice of
meditation.
Let a man choose a certain time every day - a time when he
can rely upon being quiet and undisturbed, though preferably in the daytime
rather than at night - and set himself at that time to keep his mind for a few
minutes entirely free from all earthly thoughts of any kind whatever and, when
that is achieved, to direct the whole force of his being towards the highest
spiritual ideal that he happens to know. He will find that to gain such perfect
control of thought is enormously more difficult than he supposes, but when he
attains it, it cannot but be in every way most beneficial to him, and as he
grows more and more able to elevate and concentrate his thought, he may
gradually find that new worlds are opening before his sight.
[As a preliminary training towards the satisfactory
achievement of such meditation, he will find it desirable to make a practice of
concentration in the affairs of daily life - even in the smallest of them. If he
writes a letter, let him think of nothing else but that letter until it is
finished; if he reads a book, let him see to it that his thought is never
allowed to wander from his author's meaning. He must learn to hold his mind in
check, and to be master of that also, as well as of his lower passions; he must
patiently labour to acquire absolute control of his thoughts, so that he will
always know exactly what he is thinking about, and why - so that he can use his
mind, and turn it or hold it still, as a practised swordsman turns his weapon
where he wilt]
Yet after all, if those who so earnestly desire clairvoyance could possess it
temporarily for a day or even an hour, it is far from certain that they would
choose to retain the gift. True, it opens before them new worlds of study, new
powers of usefulness, and for this latter reason most of us feel it worth while;
but it should be [Page 153] remembered that for one whose
duty still calls him to live in the world it is by no means an unmixed blessing.
Upon one in whom that vision is opened the sorrow and the misery, the evil and
the greed of the world press as an ever-present burden, until in the earlier
days of his knowledge he often feels inclined to echo the passionate adjuration
contained in those rolling lines of Schiller's:
Dein Orakel zu verkünden, warum warfest du mich hin
In die Stadt der ewing Blinden, mit dem augfeschloss'nen Sinn?
Frommt's, den Schleier aufzuheben, wo das name Schreckniss droht?
Nur der Irrthum ist das Leben; dieses Wissen ist der Tod.
Nimm, O nimm die trau'ge Karlheit mir vom Aug' den blut'gen Schein!
Schrecklich ist es deiner Wahrheit sterbliches Gefäss zu seyn!
which may perhaps be translated,
"Why hast thou cast me thus into the town of the
ever-blind, to proclaim thine oracle by the opened sense?
What profits it to lift the veil where the near darkness threatens?
Only ignorance is life; this knowledge is death.
Take back this sad clear-sightedness; take from mine eyes this cruel light!
It is horrible to be the mortal channel of thy truth"
And again later he cries,
"Give me back my blindness, the happy darkness of my senses; take back
thy dreadful gift!".
But this of course is a feeling which passes, for the
higher sight soon shows the pupil something beyond the sorrow - soon bears in
upon his soul the overwhelming [Page 154] certainty that,
whatever appearances down here may seem to indicate, all things are without
shadows of doubt working together for the eventual good of all. He reflects that
the sin and the suffering are there, whether he is able to perceive them or not,
and that when he can see them he is after all better able to give efficient help
than he would be if he were working in the dark; and so by degrees he learns to
bear his share of the heavy karma of the world.
Some misguide mortals there are who, having the good
fortune to possess some slight touch of this higher power, are nevertheless so
absolutely destitute of all right feeling in connection with it as to use it for
the most sordid ends - actually even to advertise themselves as "test and
business clairvoyants!". Needless to say, such use of the faculty is a mere
prostitution and degradation of it, showing that its unfortunate possessor has
somehow got hold of it before the moral side of his nature has been sufficiently
developed to stand the strain which it imposes. A perception of the amount of
evil karma that may be generated by such action in a very short time changes
one's disgust into pity for the unhappy perpetrator of that sacrilegious folly.
It is sometimes object that the possession of clairvoyance
destroys all privacy, and confers a limitless ability to explore the secrets of
others. No doubt it does confer such an ability, but nevertheless the
suggestion is an amusing one to any one who knows anything practically about the
matter. Such an objection may possibly be well-founded as regards the very
limited [Page 155] powers of the "test and business
clairvoyant", but the man who brings it forward against those who have had the
faculty opened for them in the course of their instruction, and consequently
possess it fully, is forgetting three fundamental facts: first, that it is quite
inconceivable that anyone, having before him the splendid fields for
investigation which true clairvoyance opens up, could ever have the slightest
wish to pry into the trumpery little secrets of any individual man; secondly,
that even if by some impossible chance our clairvoyant had such indecent
curiosity about matters of petty gossip, there is, after all, such a thing as
the honour of a gentleman, which, on that plane as on this, would of course
prevent him from contemplating for an instant the idea of gratifying it; and
thirdly, in case, by any unheard-of possibility, one might encounter some
variety of low-class pitri with whom the above considerations would have no
weight, full instructions are always given to every pupil, as soon as he
develops any sign of faculty, as to the limitations which are placed upon its
use.
Put briefly, these restrictions are that there shall be no
prying, no selfish use of the power, and no displaying of phenomena. That is to
say, that the same considerations which would govern the actions of a man of
right feeling upon the physical plane are expected to apply upon the astral and
mental planes also; that the pupil is never under any circumstances to use the
power which his additional knowledge gives to him in order to promote his own
worldly advantage, or indeed [Page 156] in connection
with gain in any way; and that he is never to give what is called in
spiritualistic circle "a test" - that is, to do anything which will
incontestably prove to sceptics on the physical plane that he possesses what to
them would appear to be an abnormal power.
With regard to this latter proviso people often say, "But
why should he not? It would be so easy to confute and convince your sceptic, and
it would do him good!" Such critics lose sight of the fact that, in the first
place, none of those who know anything want to confute or convince
sceptics, or trouble themselves in the slightest degree about the sceptic's
attitude one way or the other; and in the second, they fail to understand how
much better it s for that sceptic that he should gradually grow into an
intellectual appreciation of the facts of nature, instead of being suddenly
introduced to them by a knockdown blow, as it were. But the subject was fully
considered many years ago in Mr. Sinnett's
Occult World, and it is needless to
repeat again the arguments there adduced.
It is very hard for some of our friends to realize that
the silly gossip and idle curiosity which so entirely fill the lives of the
brainless majority on earth can have no place in the more real life of the
disciple; and so they sometimes enquire whether, even without any special wish
to see, a clairvoyant might not casually observe some secret which another
person was trying to keep, in the same way as one's glance might casually fall
upon a sentence in someone else's letter which happened to be lying open upon
the table. Of course he might, [Page 157] but what if he
did? The man of honour would at once avert his eyes, in one case as in the
other, and it would be as thought he had not seen. If objectors could but grasp
the idea that no pupil cares about other people's business, except when
it comes within his province to try to help them, and that he has always a world
of work of his own to attend to, they would not be so hopelessly far from
understanding the facts of the wide life of the trained clairvoyant.
Even from the little that I have said with regard to the
restrictions laid upon the pupil, it will be obvious that in very many cases he
will know much more than he is at liberty to say. That is of course true in a
far wider sense of the great Masters of Wisdom themselves, and that is why those
who have the privilege of occasionally entering their presence pay so much
respect to their lightest word in subjects quite apart from the direct teaching.
For opinion of a master, or even of one of his higher pupils, upon any subject
is that of a man whose opportunity of judging accurately is out of all
proportion to ours.
His position and his extended faculties are in reality the
heritage of all mankind, and, far though we may now be from those grand powers,
they will none the less certainly be ours one day. Yet how different a place
will this old world be when humanity as a whole possesses the higher
clairvoyance! Think what the difference will be to history when all can read the
records; to science,when all the processes about which now men theorize can be
watched through all their [Page 158] course; to medicine,
when doctor and patients alike can see clearly and exactly all that is being
done; to philosophy, when there is no longer any possibility of discussion as to
its basis, because all alike can see a wider aspect of the truth; to labour,
when all work will be joy, because every man will be put only to that which he
can do best; to education, when the minds and hearts of the children are open to
the teacher who is trying to form their character; to religion, when there is no
longer any possibility of dispute as to its broad dogmas, since the truth about
the states after death, and the Great Law that governs the world, will be patent
to all eyes.
Above all, how far easier it will be then for the evolved
men to help one another under those so much freer conditions. The possibilities
that open before the mind are as glorious vistas stretching in all directions,
so that our seventh round should indeed be a veritable golden age. Well for us
that these grand faculties will not be possessed by all humanity until it has
evolved to a far higher level in morality as well as in wisdom, else should we
but repeat once more under still worse conditions the terrible downfall of the
great Atlantean civilization, whose members failed to realize that increased
power meant increased responsibility. Yet we ourselves were most of us among
those very men; let us hope that we have learnt wisdom by that failure, and that
when the possibilities of the wider life open before use once more, this time we
shall bear the trial better.
Information from different Glossaries
Devachan -- [Tibetan, bde-ba-can, pronounced de-wa-chen]
A translation of the Sanskrit sukhavati, the "happy place" or god-land.
It is the state between earth-lives into which the human entity, the human
monad, enters and there rests in bliss and repose.
When the second death after that of the physical body takes place -- and there
are many deaths, that is to say many changes of the vehicles of the ego -- the
higher part of the human entity withdraws into itself all that aspires towards
it, and takes that "all" with it into the devachan; and the atman, with the
buddhi and with the higher part of the manas, become thereupon the spiritual
monad of man. Devachan as a state applies not to the highest or heavenly or
divine monad, but only to the middle principles of man, to the personal ego or
the personal soul in man, overshadowed by atma-buddhi. There are many degrees in
devachan: the highest, the intermediate, and the lowest. Yet devachan is not a
locality, it is a state, a state of the beings in that spiritual condition.
Devachan is the fulfilling of all the unfulfilled spiritual hopes of the past
incarnation, and an efflorescence of all the spiritual and intellectual
yearnings of the past incarnation which in that past incarnation have not had an
opportunity for fulfillment. It is a period of unspeakable bliss and peace for
the human soul, until it has finished its rest time and stage of recuperation of
its own energies.
In the devachanic state, the reincarnating ego remains in the bosom of the monad
(or of the monadic essence) in a state of the most perfect and utter bliss and
peace, reviewing and constantly reviewing, and improving upon in its own
blissful imagination, all the unfulfilled spiritual and intellectual
possibilities of the life just closed that its naturally creative faculties
automatically suggest to the devachanic entity.
Man here is no longer a quaternary of substance-principles (for the second death
has taken place), but is now reduced to the monad with the reincarnating ego
sleeping in its bosom, and is therefore a spiritual triad.
Mayavi-Rupa -- (Sanskrit) This is a compound of two words: mayavi,
the adjectival form of the word maya, hence "illusory"; rupa,
"form"; the mayavi-rupa or thought-body, or illusory-body, a higher
astral-mental form. The mayavi can assume all forms or any form, at the will of
an Adept. A synonymous philosophical term is protean soul. In Germany medieval
mystics called it the doppelganger. There is a very mystical fact
connected with the mayavi-rupa: the Adept is enabled to project his
consciousness in the mayavi-rupa to what would seem to the uninitiated
incredible distances, while the physical body is left, as it were, intranced. In
Tibet this power of projecting the mayavi-rupa is called hpho-wa.
Mayavi-rupa, Mayavi, Hpho-wa The
Mayavi-rupa is the 'illusory body' or 'thought-body' of an Initiate; the 'higher
astral mental form'; not the lower astral form known as the Linga-sarira
or astral mental-body. This word is a compound of mayavi -- illusory,
the adjectival form of maya;and rupa -- form. This form is
created by the power of will and thought of an adept, and may be made an exact
double of the man or any other shape desired. It is called an illusory body
because it is only a temporary creation of the adept. When it has accomplished
the intended purpose of the adept it is withdrawn and dissolved. In the
Occult Glossary,G. de Purucker writes:
There is a very mystical fact connected with the mayavi-rupa, i.e.,the
Adept is enabled to project his consciousness in the mayavi-rupa to what
would seem to the uninitiated incredible distances, while the physical body
is left, as it were, intranced. In Tibet this power of projecting the
mayavi-rupa is called Hpho-wa.
In those mystical initiations which take a man into the starry spaces the
mayavi-rupa is the vehicle used.
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