Wisdom of Life

H. P. Blavatsky: On the Wisdom of Life, Man & Spirit

“There is no religion higher than Truth.”

“That cruelest of tyrants – public opinion.”

“The Universe is worked and guided from within outwards.”

Who is the great man? He who is strongest in patience. He who patiently endures injury, and maintains a blameless life–he is a man indeed! Do not be afraid of your difficulties. Do not wish you could be in other circumstances than you are. For when you have made the best of an adversity, it becomes the stepping stone to a splendid opportunity.

Man is spiritual being — a soul, in other words — and that this soul takes on different bodies from life to life on earth to order at last to arrive at such perfect knowledge, through repeated experience, as to enable one to assume a body fit to be the dwelling-place of a Mahatma or perfected soul. Then, they say, that particular soul becomes a spiritual helper to mankind.

People keep repeating that the main things are love and compassion. Certainly love and compassion are the main things, but it takes knowledge to make love and compassion fruitful. … It takes just a second to say ‘love’. But to acquire knowledge for the well-being and blessing of humanity requires an eternity.

To act and act wisely when the time for action comes, to wait and wait patiently when it is time for repose, put man in accord with the rising and falling tides (of affairs). So that with nature and law at his back, and truth and beneficence as his beacon light, he may accomplish wonders. Ignorance of this law results in periods of unreasoning enthusiasm on the one hand, and depression on the other. Man thus becomes the victim of the tides when he should be their Master.

“Endurance is the free companion of Sorrow, and Patience her master.”

It stands proven that Satan, or the Red Fiery Dragon, the ‘Lord of Phosphorus,’ and Lucifer, or ‘Light-Bearer,’ is in us: it is our Mind. Reflect upon the defects of your character: thoroughly realize their evils and the transient pleasures they give you, and firmly will that you shall try your best not to yield to them the next time. Never allow any unnecessary or vain thought to occupy your mind. This is more easily said than done. You cannot make your mind a blank all at once. So in the beginning try to prevent evil or idle thoughts by occupying your mind with the analysis of your own faults, or the contemplation of the Perfect Ones. Strength your Soul against the stalk of the Ego, make it worth of the name of Diamond Soul.

Whatever plane our consciousness may be acting in, both we and the things belonging to that plane are, for the time being, our only realities. As we rise in the scale of development we perceive that during the stages through which we have passed we mistook shadows for realities, and the upward progress of the Ego is a series of progressive awakenings, each advance bringing with it the idea that now, at last, we have reached “reality”; but only when we shall have reached the absolute Consciousness, and blended our own with it, shall we be free from the delusions produced by Maya [illusion].

Help Nature and work on with her; and Nature will regard thee as one of her creators . . . she will lay bare before thy gaze the treasures hidden in the depths of her pure virgin bosom.

“Matter is spirit at its lowest level. Spirit is matter at its highest level.”

Theosophy blesses the world; Theology is its curse. The essence of Theosophy is the perfect harmonizing of the divine with the human in man, the adjustment of his god-like qualities and aspirations, and their sway over the terrestrial or animal passions in him. Kindness, absence of every ill feeling or selfishness, charity, goodwill to all beings, and perfect justice to others as to oneself, are its chief features. He who teaches Theosophy preaches the gospel of goodwill; and the converse of this is true also — he who preaches the gospel of goodwill, teaches Theosophy.

The exercise of magical power is the exercise of natural powers, but superior to the ordinary functions of Nature. A miracle is not a violation of the laws of Nature, except for ignorant people. Magic is but a science, a profound knowledge of the Occult forces in Nature, and of the laws governing the visible or the invisible world. Spiritualism in the hands of an adept becomes Magic, for he is learned in the art of blending together the laws of the Universe, without breaking any of them and thereby violating Nature.

The chief difficulty which prevents men of science from believing in divine as well as in nature Spirits is their materialism. The world is not prepared yet to understand the philosophy of Occult Sciences – let them assure themselves first of all that there are beings in an invisible world, whether ‘Spirits’ of the dead or Elementals; and that there are hidden powers in man, which are capable of making a God of him on earth.

“Everything in the Universe, throughout all its kingdoms, is conscious: i.e., endowed with a consciousness of its own kind and on its own plane of perception.”

“Be humble, if thou would’st attain to wisdom. Be humbler still, when wisdom thou hast mastered.”

“Prepare, and be forewarned in time. If thou hast tried and failed, O dauntless fighter, yet lose not courage: fight on, and to the charge return again and yet again…
Remember, thou that fightest for man’s liberation, each failure is success, and each sincere attempt wins its rewards in time.”

***

~Helena Petrovna Blavatsky was a Russian author who co-founded the Theosophical Society in 1875. She gained an international following as the leading theoretician of Theosophy.

Excerpts from H.P.Blavatsky’s works.

Excellence Reporter 2021

Categories: Wisdom of Life

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