[THE OUTER WORLD AS NATURAL ENEMY OF EVERY NEW TRUTH]

[Fragment from H.P.B.’s pen preserved in the Adyar Archives and originally published in The Theosophist, Vol. LXXV, September, 1954, p. 379.]

That, notwithstanding this clear confession of faith, the average public will still sneer at the Theosophical Society; and will still go on misrepresenting it, as it did before, is as sure as the axiom which teaches us that this world of ours is the natural enemy of every new truth, that unsettles its previous ideas, however erroneous these may be proved. As long as Society exists, it will have its party spirit, hence—its scapegoats and martyrs. But the Theosophical Society can bide its time and wait. No laugh can hurt it, and truth must prevail at last. In the civilized city of Boston in 1835, Wm. Lloyd Garrison was dragged by the mob, with a rope around his neck, through the streets to the City Hall; and, less than thirty years after that event, he was proclaimed as one of the benefactors of his free country who had, at last, abolished slavery. As Lloyd Garrison fought against physical slavery, chiefly supported by the clergy, so the Theosophical Society fights against mental slavery, solely advocated by the same priestcraft of whatever religion. Themis in her guise of human justice may be represented blindfolded; and satire more blind and cruel even than Themis herself—kills sometimes. Yet even in its blindness it is discriminating and forced to do justice, how-

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ever tardy. In Lucian’s famous Sale of the Philosophers,* where all the Greek celebrities are sold at auction, the great and pure Pythagoras is made to elbow the cynical Diogenes with his rags and filth. Yet while the Samian Sage brings ten gold minae, the Athenian Cynic is knocked down only for two oboli.
The Theosophical Society can hardly be judged and appreciated during the present generation; it is but in the future that it may expect—fair bidders.
H.P.B.

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* [Lucianus Samosatensis. This work may be found in many editions. See Lucian, Selected Works, tr. by Bryan Reardon, N.Y. Bobbs-Merrill Co., 1965. (In Loed ed. of Lucian, V. II, tr. as “Philosophies for Sale”).]
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