The Mahatma Letters to A. P. Sinnett from the Mahatmas M. & K. H.

sophical Society and their practice by individual members, it must be remembered that as emphasized in these letters, the Masters neither guide nor control the actions of their disciples. By the rules of the Brotherhood, pupils must be given "the fullest liberty and freedom of action, the liberty of creating causes, even if those causes become in time their 'scourge and public pillory.'" "Our chelas are helped but when they are innocent of the Causes which led them into trouble."¹ The path of discipleship leads into the heart of Nature itself; the condition of entrance—an obedience to her laws—complete and absolute. Before those Immutable Laws even the highest Adept must bow in humility. To the candidate for discipleship all things are permitted which are natural to Man. No simple natural act can defile. But "Occult Science is a jealous mistress, which allows not even the shadow of self-indulgence," and if the higher levels of spiritual attainment are to be reached the disciple must be prepared to sacrifice and transcend the natural desires of the body, and lead a life which, in the Master K. H.'s own words "is fatal not only to the ordinary course of married life, but even to flesh and wine drinking."² Those who would hope to solve the problem of sex by means of formulae which contravert laws that are obvious and known, dig with their own hands the pit which must ultimately engulf all that is human in them. To dare to suggest that such doctrines could have the sanction of The Masters of The Wisdom (who are one with Nature) is to utter not only a blasphemy, but a self-evident absurdity which only a fool or a madman could be guilty of. If this question admits of any doubt in the minds of students of occultism in general, the same cannot be said of those who know anything of the inner mysteries of Astrology. That ancient Science can and will prove that no such formulae exist in the book of Nature, and any theories that are based on them can be regarded as Sorcery of the most vicious description. That such doctrines exist is one of the reasons for the lack of virility in the Society to-day. The consideration of the inner condition of The Theosophical Society, reminds one irresistibly of all that was written in the Secret Doctrine³ of the sublime allegory of Prometheus—the crucified Titan, gazing in his suffering towards his own "heaven appointed deliverer—Herakles," but so far alas ! in vain. At this momentous epoch in the history of the Society, those pages of Madame Blavatsky's have a message full of the profoundest sig-