The following letter has been received with a request for answer of the questions therein in the Students' Column:
As a student of Theosophy permit me to ask the following questions:
1. What do Theosophists think of God?
2. Is there a God in Theosophy?
3. If so, what are the proofs that there is a God?
4. What are the proofs that the soul of man is immortal?
5. How can a man, poor, and utterly dependent upon a not Theosophical Society be master of his own fate? — J. H., Syracuse, N. Y.
Questions 1 to 4 may he taken together, but before attempting an answer it must be premised that what is proof to one person is not necessarily proof to another, and furthermore that the ultimate tribunal of proof for each man is himself. Also, it must be mentioned that there are Theosophists who are adherents of all the great religions of the world and that consequently there are many different ideas held in regard to God among Theosophists, according to the philosophy or religion which each upholds. For Theosophy does not consist in the acceptance of any set of formulae or beliefs, but rather and essentially in living up to the highest that is in each. but on the whole Theosophists generally agree in the recognition of the divinity, unity, sacredness and interdependence of all life and the progressive development of all forms of life.
The first question is really answered in the above, that God or the divine is to be found within man's own heart. This is the teachings of all the Saviors of humanity. The proofs of the being and existence of God can be found only in the way pointed out by Christ in the following words: that "whoso doeth the will of the Father shall know of the doctrine:" and in the words of Krishna in the Bhagavad Gita: "Whoso is perfected in devotion findeth spiritual knowledge springing up spontaneously within himself in the progress of time."
Neither the existence of Cod nor the immortality of the soul can be proved to any one who has not developed within himself the power to perceive and recognize the divine, or who has not awakened to a sense of his own immortality. The proposition is exactly similar to that of trying to prove the glories of a sunset to a blind man or the transcendent powers of the mind to a stone. The consciousness in the stone through long ages and imperceptible degrees will develop through all the kingdoms of nature until, in the human kingdom, the higher human perceptions are possible. But it must wait the slow course of development for this divine unfolding to take place. So the man, incapable of recognizing divinity and immortality, must wait the slow growth and development of another sense by which these may be cognized, and the spiritually blind must wait the opening of the inner eye before the sublime powers and destiny of the soul can be conceived.
In answer to the last question I do not think that to be really master of one's fate depends on being either in or out of a Theosophical or Untheosophical Society, though certainly there is greater freedom to be found the nearer we are to the Truth and the more our surroundings conform thereto. To be master of one's fate requires that one shall be master of oneself and rule one's own kingdom of heart, mind and body. When this is done, and the doing of it does not depend on outer conditions, then one's fate is moulded accordingly and one realizes that he is free indeed though chains may shackle hands and feet. — Orion
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WHAT IS THE REAL OBJECT OF LIFE?
In a long and interesting conversation with a friend who is an enthusiastic Club woman and who claims among other advantages that Club Life and association will in time bring about a feeling of true Sisterhood among women, the above question was raised. I asked myself how many of these women, how many of all the people in the world, have formed any distinct idea of what the purpose of Life is, or of what the end is toward which they struggle with such effort and for which they alternate helplessly between happiness and misery, joy and despair?
Only the Student of Theosophy, it seems to me, can find a satisfactory answer to such questionings. It is probably true that Life itself through stress of overwhelming disappointments, through heart-break and sore distress, forces a man to fall back upon the hidden Truth which lies always at the center of his Soul so that he finds the Theosophical answer for himself. This can only happen to one who is strong. The weak are crushed out by such heroic treatment.
Study of Theosophy at once leads one to the sure understanding that the only real object of Life is the evolution of the perfect man — one who has reached spiritual wisdom — one who lives Brotherhood, who rays out from himself Love and Compassion for every creature that lives, just as a perfect flower breathes perfume to everything around. Each one gives in its own way and according to its own nature what it has for the world. Man gives compassion; the Flower fragrance, and both are one. — V. F.