greater than they, since we all strive to become Dhyan-Chohans in the end. Still, there have been adepts "greater" than the lower degrees of the Planetary. Thus your views are not against our doctrines, as he told you, but would be had you meant the "devas" or angels, "little gods." Occultism is certainly not necessary for a good, pure Ego to become an "Angel" or Spirit in or out of the Devachan since Angelhood is the result of Karma. I believe you will not complain of my letter being too short. It is going to be soon followed by another voluminous correspondence, "Answers to your many Questions." H.P.B. is mended, if not thoroughly at least for some time to come.
With real affectionate regard,
Yours,
K. H.
Letter No. 93A (ML-23A) Rec. October 1882
We have to deal with the following two letters together. The Mahatma K.H. mentioned in two previous letters that he would be answering Sinnett's questions in another letter soon. This is that letter.
Received at Simla: Oct. 1882.
Herewith — apologizing for their number, I send a few notes of interrogation. Perhaps you will be so kind as to take them up from time to time and answer them by ones and twos as leisure and time allow.
Memo — At convenience to send A.P.S. those unpublished notes of Eliphas Levi's with annotations by K.H.
Sent long ago to our "Jako" friend.199
I
(1) There is a very interesting allusion in your last; when speaking of Hume you speak of certain characteristics he brought back with him from his last incarnation.
(2) Have you the power of looking back to the former lives of persons now living, and identifying them?
(3) In that case would it be improper personal curiosity — to ask for any particulars of my own?
I
(1) All of us, we bring some characteristics from our previous incarnations. It is unavoidable.
(2) Unfortunately, some of us have. I, for one do not like to exercise it.
(3) "Man know thyself," said the Delphian oracle. There is nothing
"improper" — certainly in such a curiosity. Only would it not be still more proper to study our own present personality before attempting to learn anything of its creator, predecessor, and fashioner — the man that was? Well, some day I may treat you to a little story — no time now — only I promise no details; a simple sketch, and a hint or two to test your intuitional powers.
II200
(1) Is there any way of accounting for what seems the curious rush of human progress within the last two thousand years, as compared with the relatively stagnant condition of the fourth round people up to the beginning of modern progress?
(2) Or has there been at any former period during the habitation of the earth by fourth round men, civilizations as great as our own in regard to intellectual development that have utterly passed away?
(3) Even the fifth race (own) of the fourth round began in Asia a million years ago. What was it about for the 998,000 years preceding the last 2,000? During that period have greater civilizations than our own risen and decayed?
(4) To what epoch did the existence of the Continent of Atlantis belong, and did the cataclysmical change which produced its extinction come into any appointed place in the evolution of the round, — corresponding to the place occupied in the whole manvantaric evolution by obscurations?
(5) I find that the most common question asked about occult philosophy by fairly intelligent people who begin to enquire about it is "Does it give any explanation of the origin of evil?" That is a point on which you have formerly promised to touch, and which it might be worth while to take up before long.
(6) Closely allied to this question would be another often put. "What is the good of the whole cyclic process if spirit only emerges at the end of all things pure and impersonal as it was at first before its descent into matter?" (And the portions taken away from the fifth?) My answer is that I am not at present engaged in excusing, but in investigating the operations of Nature. But perhaps there may be a better answer available.
(7) Can you, i.e., is it permitted ever to answer any questions relating to matters of physical science? If so — here are some points that I should greatly like dealt with.
(8) Have magnetic conditions anything to do with the precipitation of rain, or is that due entirely to atmospheric currents at different temperatures encountering other currents of different humidities, the whole set of motions being established by pressures, expansions, etc., due in the first instance to solar energy? If magnetic conditions are engaged, how do they operate and how could they be tested?
(9) Is the sun's corona an atmosphere? of any known gases? and why does it assume the rayed shape always observed in eclipses?
(10) Is the photometric value of light emitted by stars a safe guide to their magnitude,201 and is it true as astronomy assumes faute de mieux in the way of a theory, that per square mile the sun's surface emits as much light as can be emitted from any body?
(11) Is Jupiter a hot and still partially luminous body, and to what cause, as solar energy has probably nothing to do with the matter, are the violent disturbances of Jupiter's atmosphere due?
(12) Is there any truth in the new Siemens theory of solar combustion, — i.e., that the sun in its passage through space gathers in at the poles combustible gas (which is diffused through all space in a highly attenuated condition), and throws it off again at the equator after the intense heat of that region has again dispersed the elements which combustion temporarily united?
(13) Could any clue be given to the causes of magnetic variations, — the daily changes at given places, and the apparently capricious curvature of the isogonic lines which show equal declinations? For example — why is there a region in Eastern Asia where the needle shows no variation from the true north, though variations are recorded all round that space? (Have your Lordships anything to do with this peculiar condition of things?)
(14) Could any other planets besides those known to modern astronomy (I do not mean mere planetoids) be discovered by physical instruments if properly directed?
(15) When you wrote "Have you experienced monotony during that moment which you considered then and now so consider it, — as the moment of the highest bliss you have ever felt?"
Did you refer to any specific moment and any specific event in my life, or were you merely referring to an X quantity — the happiest moment whatever it might have been?
(16) You say: — "Remember we create ourselves, our Devachan and our Avitchi, and mostly during the latter days and even moments of our sentient lives."
(17) But do the thoughts on which the mind may be engaged at the last moment necessarily hinge on to the predominant character of its past life? Otherwise it would seem as if the character of a person's Devachan or Avitchi might be capriciously and unjustly determined by the chance which brought some special thought uppermost at last?