The main cause of pain lies in our perpetually seeking the permanent in the impermanent, and the trouble that comes upon us is always just the one we feel to be the hardest that could possibly happen, the one thing we feel we cannot possibly bear. Evil is often the result of anxiety, in anticipation of recognition and personal reward. The mission of the Theosophical Society is to rekindle the torch of truth by the formation of a fraternal union of mankind, the only soil in which the good seed can grow. To those who are keen to acquire psychic powers for private advantage we have nothing to say. Beware of quick and easy ways of acquiring psychic “gifts.” If in each of our branches we were able to establish a homeopathic dispensary, with the addition of mesmeric healing, we might contribute towards putting the science of medicine in this country on a sounder basis, and be the means of incalculable benefit to the people at large.

Oh, the unspeakable hypocrisy of our age! The age when everything under the Sun and Moon is for sale and bought! Though centuries lapse and decades of ages drop out of the lap of time, great reforms take place, empires rise and fall and rise again, and even whole races disappear before the triumphant march of civilization, in his terrific selfishness the “man” that was is the “man” that is. In their internal, or rather, essential constitution, both nature and man are at one, as their essence is identical. All grows and develops and strives towards perfection on the former planes of externality or, as well said by a philosopher, is “ever becoming”; but on the ultimate plane of the spiritual essence all is, and remains therefore immutable. It is towards this eternal Esse that everything, as every being, is gravitating gradually, almost imperceptibly, but as surely as the Universe of stars and worlds moves towards a mysterious point known to, yet still unnamed by, astronomy and called by the Occultists — the Central Spiritual Sun. Yet there are still men who, notwithstanding the present chaotic condition of the moral world and the sorry débris of the best human ideals, still persist in believing and teaching that the now ideal human perfection is no dream, but a law of divine nature; and that, had mankind to wait even millions of years, still it must someday reach it and rebecome a race of gods. For the loving essence cannot be extinguished but only perverted. Without this saving redemptive power, embodied in Satan, he simply appears as the nonsensical failure of omnipotent and omniscient imbecility which the opponents of theological Christianity sneeringly and very justly make him; with it, he becomes a thinkable Entity, the Asuras of the Puranic myths, the first breaths of Brahm?, who, after fighting the gods and defeating them, are finally themselves defeated and then hurled on to the earth where they incarnate in Humanity. Thus Satanic Humanity becomes comprehensible. After moving around his cycle of obstacles Satan may, with accumulated experiences, after all the throes of Humanity, emerge again into the light. The All-denying protestors, Atheists, Nihilists, and Anarchists men of Terror, they are just Satan himself; for he is the ideal synthesis of all discordant forces and each separate human vice or passion is but an atom of his totality. In the very depths of the heart of this Human Satanic totality burns the divine spark, all negations notwithstanding. It is called Love for Humanity, an ardent aspiration for a universal reign of Justice — hence a latent desire for light, harmony and goodness. Where do we find such a divine spark among the proud and the wealthy?

A survey of the contents and authenticity of “The Secret Doctrine, Volume III,” as published in 1897.