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The Truth About Madame Blavatsky.

By Walter A. Carrithers

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Endnotes

(1) Theosophical Glossary, P. 328

(2)  Vide Letter of reply, dated December 5, 1946. "If you would like to continue this discussion any further, we would suggest that you write to Mrs. Williams herself...Hugh D. Beach for the Editors of Newsweek magazine, HDB. BSW."

(3) Ibid.

(4)  See A Modern Panarion, London, 1895.

(5)  There is no record that H.P.B. ever called on Murray or anyone else to substantiate her claims, for fear of exposing them before the prejudiced blast of public ridicule -- she suffered, uncredited, in silence!

(6)  See Col. H. S. Olcott, Old Diary Leaves, Vol. I, pp. 264-5. Theosophical Publishing House, London, 1895, Adyar, 1941.

(7)  See The Canadian Theosophist, June, 1927.

(8)  Encyclopedia Britannica, Vol. XXIII, pp. 183-5. Edition of 1944.

(9)  Chief Interpreter to His Excellency, Lonchen Satra, the Tibetan Plenipotentiary to the Government of India; Political Staff Aide to H. H. the Dalai Lama; eminent Orientalist and, at the time of his death, Lecturer in Tibetan to the University of Calcutta. Op. cit.

(10)  See The Canadian Theosophist, June, 1933. p. 100.

(11)  Re: Tashi Lama, see the highest commendations of His late Holiness by Sir Charles Bell, recent British Political Representative to Tibet, Tibet, Past and Present, p. 84; and Sven Hedin, famed explorer, one of few Westerners to have received an audience with H. H., Trans-Himalaya, Macmillan & Co., 1909.

(12)  It is significant that Madame Blavatsky is the only Western scholar or religious leader ever to have received the endorsement or cooperation of the High Priests of the Northern and Southern Schools of Buddhism (Tibet and Ceylon), as well as the support of the leading native pandits of India. See H. S. Olcott, Old Diary Leaves, Vol. III, pp. 156-205, 277-79, 2nd Edition.

(13)  See The Voice of the Silence, being Chosen Fragments from the Book of the Golden Precepts, translated and annotated by "H.P.B.", reprinted and published under the auspices of The Chinese Buddhist Research Society, Peking, 1927.

(14)  See The Letters of H. P. Blavatsky to A. P. Sinnett, p. 4.

(15)  See Beware Familiar Spirits, John Mulholland, Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York and London, 1938, pp. 323-24.

(16)  The Tashi Lamas were described by H. P. Blavatsky as "High Initiates." See Isis Unveiled Vol. II, p. 618, and The Theosophical Glossary, p. 247.

(17)  See Studies in Occultism, Theosophical University Press, 1946, pp. 4-7.

(18)  Priestess of the Occult, p. 276.

(19)  Regarding the obscure origin of these perennial slanders, V. S. Solovioff, H.P.B.’s most virulent "exposer," wrote, "This is how it came: she had wished to save the honour of a friend, and had adopted the child of this friend as her own. She never parted from him, she educated him herself, and called him her son in the face of the world." See A Modern Priestess of Isis, p. 141.

(20)  See The Personal Memoirs of H. P. Blavatsky, compiled by Mary K. Neff, and published by E. P. Dutton & Co., 1938.

(21)  See Old Diary Leaves, by Olcott, Vol. III, pp. 319-21, et al.

(22)  See Sun Editorial, Sept. 26, 1892.

(23)  See William Q. Judge, a Co-Founder of the Theosophical Society, and H.P.B.’s attorney, in The Path, March, 1891.

(24)  Priestess of the Occult, pp. 238-39.

(25)  See Dr. Baron Von Schrenck-Notzing, The Phenomena of Materialization, Kegan Paul, Trench & Co., Ltd., London, 1923. E. P. Dutton & Co., New York, 1923. pp. 9-10, Eng. Ed.

(26)  See The Invisible World, Bernard Ackerman, Inc., New York, 1946.

(27)  Ibid.

(28)  See Eusapia Paladino, by H. Sidgwick, Journal of the Society for Psychical Research, Vol. VII, p. 148. This unfortunate "exposure" was later disowned by Hodgson’s own colleagues of the S. P. R. See Proceedings of the S. P. R., Vol. XXIII, Part LIX, 1909.

(29)  For Mme. Coulomb’s confession of falsehood and hypocrisy, see her pamphlet. She "confesses" to have been a confederate in the foulest of crimes, as an "accomplice of Mme. Blavatsky in her conjuring performances over a period of years." If it is proved that no such "fraud" existed, the characterization of Mme. Coulomb still stands! In anticipation of a court trial, H.P.B. secured from the Government at Cairo, Egypt, documentary evidence of Mme. Coulomb’s police records. See H.P.B., In Memory of H. P. Blavatsky, By some of her Pupils, London, 1891, p. 15. Reprinted as Centennial Edition, 1931.

(30)  Solovioff proved a poor witness for the S. P. R. when he specifically nullified Hodgson’s climaxing hypothesis, i.e., that Blavatsky was an undercover agent of the Czar, scheming to overthrow British rule in India. Hodgson gave pages of "valuable evidence" to prove his charge, which he considered the only possible explanation for her enduring sacrifices and hardships. Solovioff labeled the charge "baseless and impossible." See p. 114 A Modern Priestess of Isis, by V. S. Solovioff, abridged and translated on behalf of the S. P. R. by Walter Leaf, with an Introduction by H. Sidgwick. London, 1895. The charge was an obvious appeal by Hodgson for political hysteria to rescue his flimsy "case" from obscurity -- much as were Gertrude Marvin Williams’ breath-bated whisperings about Theosophical "swastikas" and Nazi "Aryans"! Hodgson’s "evidence was as valuable here as it was elsewhere"!

(31)  See Some Account of My Association with Madame Blavatsky from 1872 to 1884, by E. Coulomb, published at the Lawrence Asylum Press, Madras, India, 1884. p. 62.

(32)  See The Report of the Committee Appointed to Investigate the Phenomena connected with the Theosophical Society, Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research, No. IX, p. 310. Actually, the S. P. R. never investigated the psychic phenomena of H.P.B. It appointed a Committee for that purpose. But neither did the Committee do any investigating. It appointed an agent, Richard Hodgson, but neither did he investigate the phenomena -- for the phenomena in question had taken place months (and often years) before! He gathered dossiers of battered "testimony" from "witnesses" now under consideration.

(33)  See A Modern Priestess of Isis, p. 157.

(34)  Ibid.

(35)  Coulomb was expelled from the Theosophical Society on several charges, among them the misappropriation and embezzlement of official housekeeping funds. Neither she, nor her apologists, have ever denied or contested a single one of the charges, fully documented as they were by depositions and warrants! See Report of an Investigation into Charges against Madame Blavatsky, by the Indian T. S. Convention Committee, Madras, 1885.

(36)  The informant sought to substantiate these letters by "exposing" sliding panels and hidden doors in Mme. Blavatsky’s private rooms at the Headquarters. But it was proved that this fraudulent apparatus, allegedly constructed months and years before for the production of false phenomena, was really the handiwork of Mme. Coulomb’s husband, a professional carpenter; that the engineering had been done without H.P.B.’s knowledge and in her absence when the Coulombs had exclusive access to her quarters; and that the entire scheme was a crude attempt by the fabricators to extort money from unsuspecting Society officials. Even the missionaries’ own investigator admitted that the apparatus was "...made without the slightest attempt at concealment ... evidently of recent construction." J. D. B. Gribble, Report of an Examination into the Blavatsky Correspondence, Madras, 1884. p. 29. These "conjuror panels" were unplaned, unpainted, and unfinished, hence had not been available for "fake miracles" months and years before -- when the actual phenomena had occurred. Theosophists displayed the machinations for public examination for months, and exposed the "exposers" by dossiers of testimony from reputable witnesses. See T. S. Convention Report, 1885. See Kingsland, Besant, et al. See Defence of Madame Blavatsky, Beatrice Hastings, 1937.

(37)  The S. P. R. Committee claimed to have seen some letters allegedly written by H.P.B. to Mme. Coulomb, but their Report, (p. 204) for some mysterious reason, suspiciously and specifically fails to identify either these letters or any incriminating passages -- an inexcusable omission, seeing that Mme. Coulomb, as housekeeper at Headquarters, actually received some harmlessly innocent genuine messages. What the S.P.R. Committee never claimed to have seen were fraud-confessing telegrams, since their fabrication was beyond the talent of even the Coulombs. See Beatrice Hastings’ Defence of Madame Blavatsky, Vol II, p. 32. See also Was she a Charlatan?, appendix to The Real H. P. Blavatsky, William Kingsland, John M. Watkins, London, 1928.

(38)  See Priestess of the Occult, p. 255.

(39)  See Olcott’s Old Diary Leaves, Vol. III, p. 226. Et al.

(40)  There are evidences for H.P.B.’s supernormal powers that can only be discredited by imputing falsehood to socially prominent witnesses. See A. P. Sinnett’s The Occult World Phenomena and the S. P. R., George Redway, London, 1886, Annie Besant’s H. P. Blavatsky and the Masters of the Wisdom, T. P. H., London, 1907, et al. Even the S. P. R.’s Solovioff, in his book, admitted that "there is one thing, it is true, that I cannot explain: how she produced and stopped at will the various raps which were heard at a great distance all round her." Even this critic, styled by the S. P. R. editor as her "bitterest enemy," found the most simple of her phenomena inexplicable!

(41)  See W. Kingsland’s The Real H. P. Blavatsky, pp. 270-72.

(42)  Letters from Tibetan Initiates, to A. P. Sinnett and others, expounding the abstruse doctrines and philosophical subtleties of the Primordial Wisdom. See The Mahatma Letters to A. P. Sinnett, compiled by A. T. Barker, T. Fisher Unwin, Ltd., London, 1923. Et al.

(43)  In the Occult Review of 1926, William Loftus Hare boasted that, on his personal examination of the caligraphic and grammatical content of the Mahatma Letters, he could safely predict that their publication would soon bring the towers of Theosophical pretension to earth with a crash — the end of "Madame Blavatsky’s Theosophy" indeed! But his prophecy was as inappropriate as the S. P. R.’s previous predictions; and when the expected collapse failed to materialize, he marshalled an imposing attack ten years later to save himself: Who Wrote the Mahatma Letters? Williams & Norgate, Ltd., London, 1937. After twenty anxious years of waiting, Gertrude Marvin Williams comes to the "rescue" of this weary prophet!

(44) Mr. Jinarajadasa, on reviewing the original evidence, proves that letters were "precipitated" occultly, or "apported" in the terminology of modern Psychical Research, entirely without the physical intervention of H.P.B. — and oft-times without her knowledge, and even bearing messages sometimes contrary to her own opinions or desires.

(45)  See S. P. R Report, pp. 282-83.

(46)  See Some Incidents in the Life of Madame Blavatsky, A. P. Sinnett, G. Redway, London, 1886. Appendix.

(47)  See Report of the S. P. R. Committee, Appendix XV, Part 3, pp. 381-82.

(48)  P. 212-13, ff.

(49)  Old Diary Leaves, Vol. II, p.106.

(50)  It was shown by critics that one of the Mahatma Letters, received by A. P. Sinnett, Editor of India’s leading newspaper and prominent Theosophist, and later published in his The Occult World (June 1881) contained random phrases and sentences corresponding to an essay by Mr. H. Kiddle, previously printed in the Spiritualist Banner of Light (Sept. 1880). Kiddle charged piracy, but it was shown that there could have been no motive for plagiarism and the interpolated phrases in question were the product of telepathic confusion (in the letter’s occult transmission) — the unconscious assimilation of forgotten memories, the communicator having been familiar with Kiddle’s article, although Mme. Blavatsky herself had never seen it.

(51)  Mrs. Williams "carefully documents" her book by omitting Witte’s "recollections" that are manifestly contrary to fact, and recites his parade of "old rumors" that are related without corroboration or proof of any kind! There are only two instances which Witte mentioned that by his own account rested on his own knowledge. The first was his visits to Mme. Blavatsky’s flower shop; and the second — Mrs. Williams very conveniently fails to mention — "On one occasion she (H.P.B.) caused a closed piano in an adjacent room to emit sounds as if invisible hands were playing upon it. This was done in my presence, at the instance of one of the guests... Let him who still doubts the non-material origin and the independent existence of the soul in man consider the personality of Mme. Blavatski. During her earthly existence, she housed a spirit which was, no doubt, independent of physical of physiological being... I cannot help feeling that there was something demoniac in that extraordinary woman." (See Memoirs, New York, 1921, pp. 5-10.) Witte was decidedly "critical," and relates that as a young boy, "I looked on them as mere sleight-of-hand performances." But his mature conclusion was that there was "something demoniac" and independent of the physical in the strange phenomena! See Iverson L. Harris, "A Refutation of Slanders Against the Foundress of the Theosophical Society," in Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, by K. Tingley, Theosophical University Press, 1921.

(52)  That Mme. Blavatsky, far from deriving any financial benefits from her activities, only suffered therein; she possessed no financial or property interests, had no legal power in any of the monetary affairs of the Theosophical Society, and received no salaries. She was thoroughly vindicated of any malicious charge by the solicitors, Sanderson & Co., forcing a retraction of libel from one of Calcutta’s leading papers. See A. P. Sinnett’s Incidents, etc. Even the S. P. R. exonerated her from any financial-scheming. See Report of Committee, etc. p. 314.

(53)  Mahatma Letters to A. P. Sinnett, p. 421.

(54)  See A Modern Priestess of Isis, p. 285, ff.

(55)  Priestess of the Occult, Appendix A, p. 318.

(56)  Hodgson’s unscrupulous appeal to racial prejudice. Mme. Fadeef: an aunt, a Russian, ergo — a liar! A brilliant example of detective talent — Hodgson could not forget his "Russian spy" theory, even though H.P.B. had already been exonerated of the charge by the Foreign Department of the British Government of India, after extended investigation! See Olcott’s Old Diary Leaves, Vol. II, pp. 228-31, Vol. III, pp. 3-9.

(57)  See The Letters of H. P. Blavatsky to A. P. Sinnett, F. A. Stokes Co., New York, p. 154.

(58) Report of S. P. R. Committee, p. 292.

(59)  See Olcott’s Old Diary Leaves, Vol. I, p. 17, et seq.

(60)  Letters of H.P.B., etc., Letter CLXXXVIIa, p. 353.

(61)  Report of S. P. R. Committee, p. 275.

(62)  And well they might, for this "Theosophia" can solve more than one riddle that baffles Psychic Research, v.g., long before Professors Morselli, Schrenck-Notzing, and Geley discovered the "revolutionary fact" that the seance-room’s "phantoms" are principally the objective product of collective imagination and subconscious thought, H.P.B. taught that they were but rarely "spirit-entities." She called them "portrait-statutes" of the dead of living; and maintained that these "pictures in the Astral Light" were palpably objectified through the Linga Sharira, the Astral Body of the medium who "assimilat(es), unconsciously to himself, the pictures of the dead relatives and friends from the aura of the sitters." See A. P. Sinnett’s Incidents, etc., p. 175. Cf. Schrenck-Notzing, Phenomena of Materialisation, pp. 28-36.

(63)  See C. J. Ryan’s H. P. Blavatsky and the Theosophical Movement, Theosophical University Press, 1937, p. 200.

(64)  Ibid., p. 201.

(65)  See Dr. J. H. Cousins, The Theosophist, Oct., 1925