THE THEOSOPHICAL SOCIETY.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 11199, 23 August 1898, Page 3

THE THEOSOPHICAL SOCIETY.

I A public meeting was held by the above so- ! ciety in the board roam of the Agricultural Hall last evening, when Mr A. W. Maurais de- ! livered an address on " Evolution and linnortaliiy." Evolution, the lecturer said, was not a groping in the dark for the most suitable j form, but an orderly development in 'which the evolving soul used vehicle after vehicle'lor the gaining of experience, building these bodies or vehicles from hosts of less evolved lives. This went on up to the human kingdom, in which the souls were individualised, and had leached that aspect of the divine life which was unchanging; and a conscious participation in this eternal aspect of life was immortality. It was spoken of in the Eastern scriptures as being " witness of the three divisions of time— the past, the present, and the future." Immortality, therefore, so far as man was concerned, might be said to be the outcome of evolution. Only the highly-evolved man could share the consciousness of his nous, or rational soul, which was eternal, and answered to the " spirit" mentioned by Paul in his tripartite division; the unsrolved remained among the illusions and error/! produced by the irrational soul. Continuing, the lecturer gave the Theosophicai division of man into seven principles, which wore, he said, but a detailed division of the three given by Paul; aud concluded by urging' upon his hearers'the necessity for helping in the work of evolution by gradually mastering the lower mind and | bringing the higher into activity. It remained true, said the speaker, notwithstanding tha sneers of a materialistic age, that d'evont thought—dwelling, for instance, on the nature and virtues of an ideally pure character such as Jesus—was a potent aid to the progress and development of man. Mr G. Richardson occupied the chair, and there v/as a fair attendance.

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