Query (3) You must postulate an intercourse of entities in Devachan which applies only to the mutual relationship of physical existence. Two sympathetic souls will each work out its own devachanic sensations, making the other a sharer in its subjective bliss, but yet each is dissociated from the other as regards actual mutual intercourse. For what companionship could there be between two subjective entities which are not even as material as that ethereal body-shadow — the Mayavi-rupa?
Query (4) Devachan is a state, not a locality. Kama-Loka, Rupa-Loka, and Arupa-Loka are the three spheres of ascending spirituality in which the several groups of subjective entities find their attractions. In the Kama-Loka (semi-physical sphere) dwell the shells, the victims and suicides; and this sphere is divided into innumerable regions and sub-regions corresponding to the mental states of the comers at their hour of death. This is the glorious "Summer-land" of the Spiritualists, to whose horizons is limited the vision of their best seers — vision imperfect and deceptive because untrained and non-guided by Alaya Vijn~na (hidden knowledge). Who in the west knows anything of true Sahalokadhatu, the mysterious Chiliocosm out of the many regions of which but three can be given out to the outside world, the Tribhuvana (three worlds) namely: Kama, Rupa, and Arupa-Lokas. Yet see the sad mess produced in the Western minds by the mention of even those three! See "Light" of January 6th!
Behold your friend (M. A. Oxon) notifying the world of his readers that on your assumption in your "Secret doctrine" — "no graver indictment could be brought against any man by his bitterest foe" than the one you bring against us — "these mysterious unknown." It is not such bitter criticisms that are likely to draw out more of our knowledge, or to make the "unknown" more known. And then, the pleasure of teaching a public one of whose great authorities (Roden Noel) says a few pages further on, that theosophists are endowing "shells" with simulated consciousness. See the difference one word will make. If the word "assimilated" instead of "simulated" had been written the true idea would have been conveyed that the shells' consciousness is assimilated from the medium and living persons present, whereas now — ! But of course, it is not our European critics, but our Asiatic chelas' expositions that "seem absolutely Protean in their ever shifting variety." The man has to be answered and set right anyhow, whether by yourself or Mr. Massey. But alas! the latter knows but little, and you, — you look at our conception of Devachan with more than "discomfort"! But to resume.
From Kama-Loka, then, in the great Chiliocosm, once awakened from their post-mortem torpor the newly translated "Souls" go all (but the shells) according to their attractions, either to Devachan or Avitchi. And those two states are again differentiating ad infinitum — their ascending degrees of spirituality deriving their names from the lokas in which they are induced. For instance: the sensations, perceptions and ideation of a devachanee in Rupa-Loka, will, of course, be of a less subjective nature than they would be in Arupa-Loka, in both of which the devachanic experiences will vary in their presentation to the subject-entity, not only as regards form, colour, and substance, but also in their formative potentialities. But not even the most exalted experience of a monad in the highest devachanic state in Arupa-Loka (the last of the seven states) — is comparable to that perfectly subjective condition of pure spirituality from which the monad emerged to "descend into matter," and to which at the completion of the grand cycle it must return. Nor is Nirvana itself comparable to Para-Nirvana.
Query (5) Reviving consciousness begins after the struggle in Kama-Loka at the door of Devachan, and only after the "gestation period." Please turn to my responses upon the subject in your "Famous contradictions."
Query (6) Your deductions as to the indefinite prolongation in Devachan of some one moment of earthly bliss having been unwarranted, your question in the last paragraph of this interrogatory need not be considered. The stay in Devachan is proportioned to the unfinished psychic impulses originating in earth-life: those persons whose attractions were preponderatingly material will sooner be drawn back into rebirth by the force of Tanha. As our London opponent truly remarks, these subjects (metaphysical) are only partly for understanding. A higher faculty belonging to the higher life must see, and it is truly impossible to force it upon one's understanding — merely in words. One must see with his spiritual eye, hear with his Dharmakayic ear, feel with the sensations of his Ashta-vijnâna (spiritual "I") before he can comprehend this doctrine fully; otherwise it may but increase one's "discomfort," and add to his knowledge very little.
Query (7) The "reward provided by nature for men who are benevolent in a large, systematic way" and who have not focussed their affections upon an individual or speciality, is that — if pure — they pass the quicker for that through the Kama and Rupa Lokas into the higher sphere of Tribhuvana, since it is one where the formulation of abstract ideas and the consideration of general principles fill the thought of its occupants. Personality is the synonym for limitation, and the more contracted the person's ideas, the closer will he cling to the lower spheres of being, the longer loiter on the plane of selfish social intercourse. The social status of a being is, of course, a result of Karma; the law being that "like attracts like." The renascent being is drawn into the gestative current with which the preponderating attractions coming over from the last birth make him assimilate. Thus one who died a ryot may be reborn a king, and the dead sovereign may next see the light in a coolie's tent. This law of attraction asserts itself in a thousand "accidents of birth" — than which there could be no more flagrant misnomer. When you realize at least the following — that the skandhas are the elements of limited existence, then will you have realized also one of the conditions of Devachan which has now such a profoundly unsatisfactory outlook for you. Nor are your inferences (as regards the well-being and enjoyment of the upper classes being due to a better Karma) quite correct in their general application. They have a eudæ-monistic ring about them which is hardly reconcilable with Karmic Law, since those "well-being and enjoyment" are oftener the causes of a new and overloaded Karma than the production or effects of the latter. Even as a "broad rule" poverty and humble condition in life are less a cause of sorrow than wealth and high birth, but of that — later on. My answers are once more assuming the shape of a volume rather than the decent aspect of a letter. "Writing a new book, or for the Theosophist?" Well do you not think that (since your desire is to reach not merely the most but also the most receptive minds) you had better write the former, as well as for the latter? You might put into Esoteric Buddhism — an excellent title bye the bye — such matter as would be a sequel to, or amplification of what has appeared in the Theosophist, a systematic, thoughtful exposition of what was and will be given in the Journal in snatched out brief Fragments. I am specially anxious — on M.'s account — that the Journal should be made as much as possible a success; should be circulated more than it is now in England. Your new book drawing, as it is sure to, the attention of the most educated, thoughtful portion of the Western public to the organ of "Esoteric Buddhism" par excellence — would thus do it a world of good, and both would prove of mutual assistance. Do not lose sight of Lillie's Buddha and Early Buddhism when you write it. With its host of fallacies, unwarranted assumptions and distortion of facts and even Sanskrit and Pali words, this snobbish volume had nevertheless the greatest success with Spiritualists and even mystically inclined Christians. I will have it slightly reviewed by Subba Row or H.P.B., furnishing them with notes myself, but of this more in some future letter. You have ample materials to work upon in my notes and papers. You have given but a few of the many points touched by me and amplified and re-amplified in heaps of letters, as I do now. You could work out of them any number of new articles and Fragments for the magazine, and have enough and to spare — left over for the book. And these in their turn may be followed up in a third volume later on. It may be well to always keep this plan in mind.