AN EPILOGUE.

Otago Witness, Issue 2842, 2 September 1908, Page 81

AN EPILOGUE.

♦ — By Jessie Mackay. And this is the female Prester John of the New East, where crude wondertales of golden thrones, and- ivory balls, and suppliant kings holding the stirrup of their eacTed suzerain must now give Tray to more metaphysical marvels of trance and vision, and communion with mighty influences, half-way between gods and men? This is Mrs Besant, the teacher of pundits, the chosen of _tibe Mahatmas, the Illuminated, to whom history is a reversible shield, the inner devices of it es plain, to her eyes as the outer devices are to earthly stndents. She enters, in a manner, without observation — not stealthily, indeed, but without a fragment of platform pose or studied saurtiiness. [Her air ie brisk and preoccupied at the same moment as she comes in, talking with a. friend, but heading for the dais like one whose, "hour must sweat its 60 seconds to the death." She has spoken in. public last night ; she speaks again in public to-n^ght; this is bat an incidental semi-private "conversation" afternoon for Theoeophist and outer inquirers to profit by, if so disposed. Now «W is seated on the dias, and faces the assembly, not a .very alarming array— come 60 or 70 persons all told,, of whom 15 might be men. But 70 pairs of eyes are foenssed upon this woman, who for the better part of half a century has been a protester, a rebel against the stereotyped order of her time, a leader of forlorn hopes and AduUamites, spiritual and political. They ccc a short figure, shapely and rounded onee — now one erect but lifeless plumpness under the semi-Oriental robe of flowing natural-coloured eilkjT no ornaments fout one tiny scarlet amulet below the throat and the famous dark seal-ring of Madame Blavateky, which was to convey from her hand to the hand of her successor those mystic gifts it was reported to bring to herself. But the powerful head, with its almost fierce crown of short, grey hair, standing out negligently or defiantly, half in wave, half in curl. It ihas all the square masterfuiness that goes to negative the rounded femininity of the loose-robed figure. The forehead is broad, with three upright lines, approaching a natural Siva mark ; the eyes are deep-set and keen, the lips are firm and somewhat drawn, a healthy pallor is the dominant tone in colour. As ©he sits there, slightly huddled forward in a.. fashion a# un-Euro-pean as her dress, there is -a curious blending of ultra-West and ultra-East in her personality. Ultra-East in the indescribable Indian effect throughout ; ultra- West in the unexpected Irish traits that lurk still in curve and smile. For, clothed upon as she is with Pope-like or Lama-like authority, the gravest thing on earth, she smiles with unlooked-for frequency as the hour wiears on — a curiously tight-lipped, yet very human smile, not so much the risible emotion of one who sees a joke as the taut satisfaction "of one who scores a jwint. It is, as one remembere, only a reminiscent trick of the Irish curves, not anything with the soul of a smile behind at. If she had had humour as a grain of mustard seed the whole current of her life had been changed. The whole Mahatmic system is wrought out of a deadly metallic seriousness that bespeaks it brain-made, like Esperanto. ' Yet altogether a woman often among the prophets, good to hear and oft-times to heed. A harvest of hushed inquiry hae been gathered broadcast, and the Vala sits with a white sheaf of questions in her hand, turning them, over with a practised finger, and disposing of each in the same easy businesslike manner. Her voice carries /well ; her intonation is curious. She has wholly forgotten, the tang of the Western tongue while she Tolls out those obtuse •Hindu palatals in which "Buddhism" fills the mouth in a sort of soft smother, and "Mussulman" broadens into something so Oriental that, in comparison, it would turn pur© Berwick into something as fine as a scimitar's edge. Her enunciation is elaborate; at close quarters strained.; every word seems dragged up from depths unknown. She neads rapidly from the rarhite sheaf before her. "What is the meaning of In my Father's house are many mansions' ? These mansions are the myriad varieties of form in the Universe,*' she cays briefly. Then she goes on to- consider doctrine of noft-resistance of evil. "Evil," she says, "is only met effectually by corresponding good- StfD, non-resistance cart only be carried out partially at this stage; for < criminal-fl own sake, as well, aa for society's sake, he must be restrained in Ws evil ways. The Tolstoy doctrine," «he sums up, "can be carried out singly tyj private persons, not collectively by Citizens." ."■P 0^ c* ll the divining-rod be explained?" is the next query. "Affinities

I run through Nature," she says. "I think the secret is that the gift is in the person, not the Tod. In some, the watery element predominates ; in others, the metallic 'Hie effect of approaching these affinities rune through the person, and from them into lie rod. People who appear to have this affinity should consult their horoscope to see what elements predominate in it. Some persons, too, can grow flowers, and wear flowers, while they die with other people. . . . Doctore should study astrology ; planetary influences might change a prescription." At the word "horoscope" the one heretic present amid the faithful feels a ghostly waft from the Middle Ages straying about the room, and recalls that this . quiet woman on the dais, smiling with shut lips, hae seen fairies, and spoken with Masters fresh from the borders of Old Cathay. Now ohe is back from Faerie, and sitting down witfe the newest theologians of the twentieth century. clc 'l do not believe in the forgiveness of sins," she is saying. "God is never angry with man. Sod is Infinite Love. Man's nature is divine. When he (gets right with hia Creator he reflects his own feeling back on God, and eaye lie is forgiven." One has asked abont the nature of Adepts, and she replies : "Adepts are finished human incarnations ; they who come back~of their own free will to help their fellows. The world has been m existence so long ; evolution has been proceeding all the' time ; many souls must be far advanced. Thus reason demands that there should be suoh persons. Those of the dead who love us are near and helpful to us. But it is not well to set them to come to seances or to materialise." The heretic here comes to earth suddenly, with a Tasping Eddy-cum-Fox Yankee echo in the ear. The unfaltering voice proceeds: "Undeveloped souls generally come to slums. Some go there to help. The low souls need that experience. A criminal is really a young eoul, who has to learn not to do these things." "A hard saying, this," muses the heretic. "If man is a spark of divinity, how can he be most perverted when most lately come from the primeval Fire of Origins? ' " Every animal," she proceeds, "is an embodiment of spirit. For clearness, 'reincarnation' is used in speaking of the human, soul only ; but all life is - progressive. The higher animals persist for a short time on the astral plane before returning. All sufferings of animals, by flood, fire, snow, or otherwise, help in evolution." Something has been asked about environment. "Good surroundings only improve where there is already something to appeal to," is the 6hrewd reply. "The best environment is needed for a soul to improve in ; but restraint is needed, too. The acceptance of reincarnation would change the penal system and abolish slums." One ask 6 how Mrs Besant, coming to teach the West out of the wisdom of the East, reconciles Oriental superiority with the systematic and age-long degradation of woman by Hinduism. There is a stiffening of front in an instant, a contwaction of the deep vertical lines on the forehead. Battle is scented from afar. "She is not here," she says, "to impress the East upon the West, or to make converts from one to another. Metaphysics are best known in the East, science in the West; as a Theosophist, she comes to reconcile them for their mutual good. Women have not been degraded by Hinduism," she aeserts. The heretic starts ; but remembers that a Pope has spoken infallibly. One named Ramabai, born of that race and bred in that country, saidi otherwise ; but she spoke without authority. A thousand true-hearted Western women, working their lives out in the sombre inferno back of the Purdah, also 6aid otherwise. But had they been content to take their India reverently and philosophically, sitting at some pundit's feet, they had surely known tke wrongs, the diseases, the horrors they imagined a ere all a dream. "There are cu&toms in India, certainly, that are not advisable. W« Theosophists are fighting these customs. The missionaries do not help us ; they only tell you horrifying tales," she says sharply. ' " "Then it was the Masters and not Carey who led the anti-widow burning agitation ; the Masters who first built girls' schools, ' not the missionaries and Mary Carpenter. Verily, history needs revising*." "These customs," she is saying, "mainly rose at the time of the Mussulman invasion." I "So the pundits have said," muses the | heretic. "Yet the law of man pre-dated ■ that invasion some 1500 years, teaching ! man to keep the evil thing he called his j wife eecludid and busy for the sake of his ' own peace !" i From the dais a last triumphant refutation :— " Hinduism has not degraded ! women. In ancient times it gave them

a high place. In proof of it, know that many of the early Vedic hymns were written by women." ■It is enough. The pity of a misguided century of mission work ha 6 been thrown away. For two thousand, years and over some "customs," such" ' as -widow-burning and chilcl'murder, or Worse,, rhave prevailed,^indeed, but what 1 of that?_ 'Three years -ago .Indian! I'lvomen : were writing. hymns !. - Softly -and -ashamed, .the ■ heretic goes out,' musing,, whether, some missionary pundit may not pity our darkness and risk ■ the -Asiatic restriction laws on our- behalf. The Vala has spoken.