“In the oldest documents now in our possession – the Vedas and the older laws of Manu – we find many magical rites practiced and permitted by the Brahmans. Tibet, Japan and China teach in the present age that which was taught by the oldest Chaldeans.
The clergy of these respective countries, prove moreover what they teach, namely: that the practice of moral and physical purity, and of certain austerities, develops the vital soul power of self-illumination. Affording to man the control over his own immortal spirit, it gives him truly magical powers over the elementary spirits inferior to himself.
In the West we find magic of as high an antiquity as in the East. The Druids of Great Britain practiced it in the silent crypts of their deep caves; and Pliny devotes many a chapter to the “wisdom” of the leader of the Celts.
The Semothees – the Druids of the Gauls, expounded the physical as well as the spiritual sciences. They taught the secrets of the universe, the harmonious progress of the heavenly bodies, the formation of the earth, and above all – the immortality of the soul.”
H. P. Blavatsky
The Mark Of God: Understanding Your "I AM Presence" 