“Enq: And why do you call them “Masters”?
Theo: We call them “Masters” because they are our teachers; and because from them we have derived all the Theosophical truths, however inadequately some of us may have expressed, and others understood, them.
They are men of great learning, whom we term Initiates, and still greater holiness of life. They are not ascetics in the ordinary sense, though they certainly remain apart from the turmoil and strife of your western world.
Enq: But is it not selfish thus to isolate themselves?
Theo: Where is the selfishness? Does not the fate of the Theosophical Society sufficiently prove that the world is neither ready to recognize them nor to profit by their teaching? Of what use would Professor Clerk Maxwell have been to instruct a class of little boys in their multiplication-table?
Besides, they isolate themselves only from the West. In their own country they go about as publicly as other people do.
Enq: Don’t you ascribe to them supernatural powers?
Theo: We believe in nothing supernatural, as I have told you already. Had Edison lived and invented his photograph two hundred years ago, he would most probably have been burnt along with it, and the whole attributed to the devil.
The powers which they exercise are simply the development of potencies lying latent in every man and woman, and the existence of which even official science begins to recognize.”
H. P. Blavatsky
The Mark Of God: Understanding Your "I AM Presence" 