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Taking Theosophical
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The
Karma of an Occultist
When
accused of fraud by Richard Hodgson in 1884,
H
P Blavatsky reveals in a letter that she sees this
setback
as Karma activated by the Path she has chosen
Posted
30/12/06
In this
letter to Mrs Sinnett, H P blavatsky speaks of the accusations of fraud against
her by Richard Hodgson and the forged letters by the Coulombs that Hodgson used
to discredit her. She concludes that Hodgson had already made his mind up when
he began his enquiry.
The series
of events she outlines are so calamitous that she has resigned herself to
accepting it all as Karma in action. She also says that anyone breaking new
ground in esoteric thought must expect such setbacks. The damage has already
been done and any attempt to defend herself will probably just make things
worse.
_________________________
Dated June
21.
No year
given but possibly 1885
MY DEAR
MRS. SINNETT,
The sight
of your familiar hand-writing was a welcome one, indeed, and the contents of
your letter still more so.
No, dear
Mrs. Sinnett, I never thought that you could have ever believed that I played
the tricks I am now accused of; neither you or any one of those who have
Masters in their heart, not on their brains. Nevertheless, here I am, and stand
accused, without any means to prove the contrary—of the most dirty, villainous
deceptions, ever practiced by a half starved medium.
What can
I, and what shall I do? Useless to either write, to persuade, or try to argue
with people who are bound to believe me guilty, to change their opinion.
Let it be.
The fuel in my heart is burnt to the last atom. Henceforth nothing is to be
found in it but cold ashes. I have so suffered that I can suffer no more—I
simply laugh at every new accusation.
“Notwithstanding
the expertise” you say. Ah, they must be famous those experts, who found the
Coulomb’s letters genuine. The whole world may bow before their decision and
acuteness; but there is one person, at least, in this wide world, whom they can
never convince that those stupid letters were written by me, and it is—H. P.
Blavatsky.
Were the
God of Israel and Moses, Mahomet and all the prophets, with Jesus and the
Virgin Mary to boot, come and tell me that I have written one line of the
infamous instructions to Coulomb—I would say then to their faces—“fiddlestick—I
have not.”
Now, look
here, I want you to know these facts. To this day I have never been allowed to
see one single of those letters. Why could not Mr. Hodgson come and show me one
of them at least. I suspect he has brought some of them to London—otherwise how
could the expertise have been made? Why has he never showed me one, at least,
at Adyar. And now, strong in their impunity the enemy has come out with still
more letters and still more wonderful. I leave it to you and all of you to
judge. There’s a letter shown, it seems, which they have not yet dared to publish,
but the contents of which are summarised by Patterson in the April No. of the
“C.C.M.” I am charged in it, and orally, of having written in 1880 a letter to
the Coulomb, then at Ceylon, in which what I say to her shows plainly that from
1852 till 1872 for twenty odd years I have been otherwise occupied than with
occult studies. Now who will ever believe—though even
my fraud
in phenomena were to be believed by the whole creation, that in 1880, I, who
was then at Bombay, bent upon proving the existence of Masters and with my
plans of imposture—if I had any—well matured already, that I should have
written such a letter to one whom I had hardly known 8 years before, who was no
friend of mine, only a casual acquaintance with whom since I left Cairo in 1871
I had never had any correspondence, and whose very name I had forgotten! In
that infamous letter I am made, nevertheless, to say that I had left my
husband, loved and lived with a man (whose wife was my dearest friend and who
died in 1870 -- a man who died too a year after his wife, and was buried by me
at Alexandria) HAD three children by him and others! ! ! (sic) and etc. etc.,
winding
the whole confession by asking her not to speak of me as she knew me, and so
on: sentences strung together, to show that I had never known the Masters,
never was in Tibet, was in fact an impostor.
It is only
wasting time to argue upon all this. Those who believe the published letters
genuine, have no reason to disbelieve in that one, and if there are such fools
in this world—or people so cunning as to play the part of a fool—who can
believe me capable of writing such a suicidal confession, to such a woman, a
perfect stranger to me with the exception of a few weeks I had known her at
Cairo—well
those people are welcome to do so.
The
Masters being involved in this also, and I, determined to RATHER DIE A THOUSAND
DEATHS than pronounce Their names, or answer questions about Them in a Court of
law—what can I do? Ah, Mrs. Sinnett, the plotters proved too cunning, too
crafty for the T.S. and especially for myself. She—that female fiend—knew well,
I would and could not defend myself in a Court because of the accusations, of
myself and friends, and the whole of my life being so intimately connected with
the Mahatmas. And to think that I should have been such a fool as to have
imagined, at one time, that in India it was as in Russia—that I could refuse to
answer questions that were matters too sacred for me to discuss about in
public.
I never
knew that the judge could, if he chose, sentence me to prison for contempt of
Court, unless I answered all the blackguardly questions about the Masters, the
padris had prepared. Well and I kicked and clamoured to be allowed to go into
Court to punish the villians and prove them liars. And now, I know better. I
have learned, at my expense, that there is neither justice nor truth, nor
charity for those who refuse to follow in the old tracks. I have learned the
whole extent and magnitude of the conspiracy against the belief in the
Mahatmas; it was a question of life or death to the Missions in India, and they
thought that by killing me they would kill Theosophy.
They very
nearly succeeded. At any rate they have succeeded in fooling Hume and the
S.P.R. Poor Myers! and still more poor Hodgson! How terribly they will be
laughed at some day. En attendant, they are busy crucifying me, it seems.
Psychic research indeed. “Hodgson’s” research, rather! But pray tell me.
Is it the
legal thing in England, to accuse publicly even a street sweeper in his absence?;
without giving him the chance of saying one single word in his defence?;
without letting him know even of what he is precisely accused of, or who it is
who accuses him and is brought forward as chief evidence.
For I do
not know the first word of all this. Hodgson came to Adyar; was received as a
friend;
examined and cross-examined all whom he wanted to; the “boys” -- (the Hindus)
at Adyar gave him all the information he needed. If he now finds discrepancies
and contradictions in their statements, it only shows that feeling as they all
did, that it was (in their sight) pure tomfoolery to doubt the phenomena and
the Masters, they had not prepared themselves for the scientific
cross-examination,
may have forgotten many of the circumstances; in short, that not feeling guilty
and having never either been my confederates or my dupes, they had not
rehearsed among themselves what they had to say, and thus, may very well have
created suspicions in a prejudiced mind. But the whole trouble with us is, that
we have never looked at Mr. Hodgson at first, as a prejudiced judge. Quite the
reverse.
Well I was
the first one to be punished for my confidence in his fairness. To think that
while I was laid up on my death-bed, he came daily as a friend of the C. Oakleys,
dined at the H.Q., abused and vilified, and betrayed me daily, in their
presence—and that I never knew the truth till the end! Ask him—has he ever
confronted me with my accusers? Has he ever tried to learn anything from me, or
given me a chance of defence and explanation? NEVER.
He acted
from the first day as though I was proven guilty beyond the shadow of a doubt.
He played traitor with me; and acted not like any honest enquirer would have
done, but as a Govt. prosecutor, an attorney general or whatever his legal
names. And now behold the results. It is disgusting, SICKENING to see how he
played into the hands of the padris and the padris in his. Oh for my prophetic
soul! I did foresee all this, in London.
Enough. It
is all dead and gone. Consummatum est.
Here I am.
Where I shall go next, I know no more than the man in the moon. The only friend
I have in life and death is poor little exiled Bowajee D. Nath in Europe; and
poor dear Damodar—in Tibet. D. Nath keeps at the foot of my bed, awake for
whole nights, mesmerising me, as prescribed by his Master. Why They should want
to keep me still in life is some- thing too strange for me to comprehend; but
Their ways are and always have
been—incomprehensible.
What good
am I now for the Cause? Besmeared with mud, spat upon, doubted and suspected by
the whole creation except a few—would I not do more good to the T.S. by dying
than by living? Their will be done not mine.
Yours in life and always,
H. P. B.
______________________
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