Category: The Key To Theosophy (1889): H. P. Blavatsky

"Enq:  But why should not man be represented by two "principles" or two aspects, rather?   Theo:  Every man has these two principles in him, one more active than the other, and in rare cases, one of these is entirely stunted in its growth, so to say, or paralyzed by the strength and predominance of [...]

"Enq:  It is just that which is so difficult to understand.   Theo:  It seems to me very easy, on the contrary, once that you have seized the main idea, i.e., that man acts on this or another plane of consciousness, in strict accordance with his mental and spiritual condition.   But such is the [...]

"Enq:  I have heard a good deal about this constitution of the "inner man" as you call it, but could never make "head or tail on't" as Gabalis expresses it.   Theo:  Of course, it is most difficult, and, as you say, "puzzling" to understand correctly and distinguish between the various aspects, called by us [...]

"Enq:  Do you not lay yourself open to the accusation of preaching annihilation by the language you yourself use?  You have just spoken of the Soul of man to its primordial elements.   Theo:  But you forget that I have given you the difference between the various meanings of the word "Soul", and shown the [...]

"Theo (cont):  On the other hand, the interpreters of Buddha have failed to understand the meaning and object of the Buddhist four degrees of Dhyana.  Ask the Pythagoreans, "Can the spirit, which gives life and motion and partakes of the nature of light, be reduced to non-entity?"  "Can even the sensitive spirit in brutes which [...]

"Enq:  Yet there is no reincarnation spoken of in all this.   Theo:  A soul which pleads to be allowed to remain where she is, must be pre-existent, and not have been created for the occasion. In the Zohar (vol. iii., p.61), however, there is a still better proof.   Speaking of the reincarnating Egos [...]

"Enq:  Can you give me some instances as proof of this?   Theo:  Most decidedly I can. Philo Judaeus says (in "De Somniis", p. 455):  "The air is full of them (of souls); those which are nearest the earth, descending to be tied to mortal bodies, return to other bodies, being desirous to live in [...]

"Enq:  But where is the difficulty, once you accept a manifested principle, in believing that the soul of every new mortal is created by that Principle, as all the Souls before it have been so created?   Theo:  Because that which is impersonal can hardly create, plan and think, as its own sweet will and [...]

"Enq:   It is hardly necessary, I suppose, to ask you whether you believe in the Christian dogmas of Paradise and hell, or in future rewards and punishments as taught by the Orthodox churches?   Theo:   As described in your catechisms, we reject them absolutely; least of all would we accept their eternity. But we [...]

"Enq:  How can that which, if not breathed by God into man, yet is on your own confession of an identical substance with the divine, fail to be immortal?   Theo:  Every atom and speck of matter, not of substance only, is imperishable in its essence, but not in its individual consciousness. Immortality is but [...]