“Enq: But this contentedness, which you praise so much, would do away with all motive for exertion and bring progress to a stand-still.
Theo: And we, Theosophists, say that your vaunted progress and civilization are no better than a host of will-o’-the-wisps, flickering over a marsh which exhales a poisonous and deadly miasma.
This, because we see selfishness, crime, immorality, and all the evils imaginable, pouncing upon unfortunate mankind from this Pandora’s box which you call an age of progress, and increasing pari passu with the growth of your material civilization.
At such a price, better the inertia and inactivity of Buddhist countries, which have arisen only as a consequence of ages of political slavery.
Enq: Then is all this metaphysics and mysticism with which you occupy yourself so much, of no importance?
Theo: To the masses, who need only practical guidance and support, they are not much consequence; but for the educated, the natural leaders of the masses, those whose modes of thought and action will sooner or later be adopted by those masses, they are the greatest importance.
It is only by means of the philosophy that an intelligent and educated man can avoid the intellectual suicide of believing on blind faith; and it is only by assimilating the strict continuity and logical coherence of the Eastern, if not esoteric, doctrines, that he can realize their truth.
Conviction breeds enthusiasm, and “Enthusiasm”, says Bulwer Lytton, “is the genius of sincerity, and truth accomplishes no victories without it”; while Emerson most truly remarks that “every great and commanding movement in the annals of the world is the triumph of enthusiasm.”
And what is more calculated to produce such a feeling than a philosophy so grand, so consistent, so logical, and so all-embracing as our Eastern Doctrines?”
H. P. Blavatsky
The Mark Of God: Understanding Your "I AM Presence" 