Gleaning of a Mystic
RT
y is genuine, and whether the initiations they offer to all comers who have the price are bona fide. For that reason it seems necessary to write
men by speaking in disparaging terms of others; neither are we laboring under the delusion that we have all the truth and other societies are plunged in Egyptian darkness. We reiterate what we have often said before, that all re8ligions have been given to mankind by the Recording Angels, who know
, and the Hindu or Chinese Initiate is on a correspondingly lower rung of the ladder of attainment than the Western Mystic. Please ponder this well so that you may not fall a victim to misguided people who try to persuade others that the Christian religion is crude compared with oriental cults. Ever westward in the wake of the shining sun, the light of the world, has gone the star of empire, and is it not reasonabl
are both beneficial and necessary to the unfoldment of the Hindu, but it is otherwise with the Western aspirant. To him it is dangerous to practice bre
vibrations are almost killed. This is, of course, particularly true of the backward races and the lower classes in the Western world. The atoms in such backward race bodies are vibrating at an exceedingly low rate, and when in the course of time one of these people develops to a point where it is possible to further him upon the path of attainment, it is necessary to
t where the atoms of their bodies have evolved to such a pitch of vibration that acceleration beyond the usual measure would injure them. Here the breathing exercises would do no harm; but if given to a person who is really at the point where he can en
him individually which will advance him on the proper path. If such a person at this critical period meets11 some one who ignorantly or unscrupulously gives him breathing exercises, and if he follows the instructions accurately in the hope of getting quick results, he will get them quickly but in a manner he has not looked for, since the vibratory rate of the atoms in his body will in a very short time become ac
osicrucian Fellowship has constantly taught that no spiritual gift may ever be traded for money. If you bear this in mind, you may know we have no connection with any order which demands money for the transference of spiritual power. He who has something to give of a truly spiritual nat
uce in their members an "occult feeling." Many revel in the adventures and experiences of the hero in "The Brother of the Third Degree," thinking that this is surely Initiation, but I tell you that it is very far from being the case. No ceremony can ever give to any one that inward experience which constitutes Initiation, no matter how much is charged
e he got his religion and how he got13 it. One may tell you that he received it upon the road as he was walking along; another says that the light and the change came to him in the solitude of his room; another that the light struck him as it struck Paul upon the road
es him with a mantle of authority that never can be taken from him. No matter what the circumstances in life, it sheds a light upon his whole being that is simply wonderful. Nor can any ceremony effect such a change. We therefore hold that anyone who offers initiation into an occult order by ceremonials to ever
ype="