ing has now permeated its whole substance. That which I am about to put before the reader is esoteric Buddhism, and for European students approaching it for the first time, any other designation would be a misnomer.

The statement I have to make must be considered in its entirety before the reader will be able to comprehend why initiates in the esoteric doctrine regard the concession involved in the present disclosure of the general outlines of this doctrine as one of startling magnitude. One explanation of this feeling, however, may be readily seen to spring from the extreme sacredness that has always been attached by their ancient guardians to the inner vital truths of Nature. Hitherto this sacredness has always prescribed their absolute concealment from the profane herd. And so far as that policy of concealment,

-the tradition of countless ages, is now being given up, the new departure which the appearance of this volume signalizes will be contemplated with surprise and regret by a great many initiated disciples. The surrender to criticism which may sometimes perhaps be clumsy and irreverent, of doctrines which have hitherto been regarded by such persons as too majestic in their import to be talked of at all except under circumstances of

befitting solemnity, will seem to

profanation of the great mysteries.

them a terrible

From the Euro

pean point of view it would be unreasonable to expect that such a book as this can be exempt from the usual rough-and-tumble treatment of new ideas. And special convictions or common-place bigotry may sometimes render such treatment in the present case peculiarly inimical. But all that, though a matter of course to European exponents of the doctrine like myself, will seem very grievous and disgusting to its earlier and more regular representatives. They will appeal sadly to the wisdom of the timehonoured rule which, in the old symbolical way, forbade the initiates from casting pearls before swine.

Happily, as I think, the rule has not been allowed to operate any longer to the prejudice of those who, while still far from being initiated, in the occult sense of the term, will probably have become, by sheer force of modern culture, qualified to appreciate the concession.

Part of the information contained in the following pages has been thrown out in a fragmentary form during the last eighteen months in the Theosophist, a monthly magazine, published hitherto at Bombay, but now at Madras, by the leaders of the Theosophical Society. As almost all the articles re

ferred to have been my own writing, I have not hesitated to weld parts of them, when this course has been convenient, into the present volume. A certain advantage is gained by thus showing how the separate pieces of the mosaic as first presented to public notice, drop naturally into their places in the (comparatively) finished pavement.

The doctrine or system now disclosed in its broad outlines has been so jealously guarded hitherto, that no mere literary researches, though they might have curry-combed all India, could have brought to light any morsel of the information thus revealed. It is given out to the world at last by the free grace of those in whose keeping it has hitherto lain. Nothing could ever have extorted from them its very first letter. It is only after a perusal of the present explanations that their position generally, as regards their present disclosures or their previous reticence can be criticised or even comprehended. The views of Nature now put forward are altogether unfamiliar to European thinkers; the policy of the graduates in esoteric knowledge, which has grown out of their long intimacy with these views must be considered in connection with the peculiar bearings of the Doctrine itself.

As for the circumstances under which these re

velations were first foreshadowed in the Theosophist, and are now rounded off and expanded as my readers will perceive, it is enough for the moment to say, that the Theosophical Society, through my connexion with which the materials dealt with in this volume have come into my hands, owes its establishment to certain persons who are among the custodians of esoteric science. The information poured out at last for the benefit of all who are ripe to receive it, has been destined for communication to the world through the Theosophical Society since the foundation of that body, and later circumstances only have indicated myself as the agent through whom the communication could be conveniently made.

Let me add, that I do not regard myself as the sole exponent for the outer world, at this crisis, of esoteric truth. These teachings are the final outcome, as regards philosophical knowledge, of the relations with the outer world which have been established by the custodians of esoteric truth, through me. And it is only regarding the acts and intentions of those esoteric teachers who have chosen to work through me, that I can have any certain knowledge. But, in different ways, some other writers are engaged in expounding for the

benefit of the world-and, as I believe, in accordance with a great plan, of which this volume is a part the same truths, in different aspects, that I am commissioned to unfold. A remarkable book published within the last year or two, "The Perfect Way," may be specially mentioned, as showing how more roads than one may lead to a mountain top. The inner inspirations of "The Perfect Way" appear to me identical with the philosophy that I have learned. The symbols in which those inspirations are clothed, in my opinion, I am bound to add, are liable to mislead the student; but this is a natural consequence of the circumstances under which the inner inspiration has been received. Far more important and interesting to me than the discrepancies between the teachings of "The Perfect Way" and my own, are the identities that may be traced between the clear scientific explanations now conveyed to me on the plane of the physical intellect, and the ideas which manifestly underlie those communicated on an altogether different system to the authors of the book I mention. These identities are a great deal too close to be the result either of coincidence or parallel speculation.

Probably the great activity at present of mere ordinary literary speculation on problems lying