they will come, and you will bear them. Your duty, from moment to moment, will occupy all of your mind. If you allow yourself to worry about other things, other possibilities, other contingencies, you are trying to bear two things at once, and that is not God's plan for us. It means lack of faith, and other things. You are not "cut off", not being punished for being bad. I do not think you have been bad. On the contrary you have tried hard in a very difficult situation, and ought to be full of courage and hope. With kind regards, I am, Sincerely yours, C. A. GRISCOM. January 18th, 1917. Dear * I have already told you everything I can think of to write or say. I suggest, therefore, that when you get upset and unhappy over things, you re-read some old letters, as they apply with full force, as well now as when they were written. Our reaction to circumstances and events is nearly always just the same, and the remedy is the same, although the events may change. * Just take one rule of silence and stick to it, namely, Do not interrupt. Do not attempt any penances, or even think of them, until you are back. You can obey that one rule easily after a little practice. I am, as always, Every step forward is always taken by the soul alone.-We learn not so much by being taught, as by the moments in which we make our own the things we have heard. Each of those moments is like a conquest to the person who experiences it. That is why learning is the great adventure. The great lesson we have to learn then is that it is God Who is waiting to speak when the soul is left alone.-ROBERT Keable. The Ruin of The Ancient Civilization and The Triumph of Christianity; with Some Consideration of Conditions in The Europe of Today, by Guglielmo Ferrero; translated by Lady Whitehead (G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1921). Professor Ferrero continues to make valuable contributions to what we may call Comparative History, which is the effort to explain one century in terms of another. In the present work, he compares the Third Century and the Twentieth. He fears that Europe is in danger of collapse, and goes back to the earlier collapse of the Roman power, to discover, if possible, similar causes acting then and now. He wastes no time in seeking superficial resemblances, but makes it clear that the problem is ethical. The ascertainable causes of the rise and fall of civilizations must be essentially ethical: we reap as we sow. Ferrero's hypothesis is that the status of authority is the test by which we can judge the condition of a civilization. "The principle of authority is the key to all civilization; when the political system becomes disintegrated and falls into anarchy, civilization in its turn is rapidly broken up" (p. 207). There appears to come a time in every cycle, when the responsible elements in a society lose their hold on reality. They become obsessed with the desire for rest, for comfort, and are willing to let their duties slip into the control of others. During the Third Century, the Roman aristocracy seems to have yielded to such a temptation. The Senate simply stopped functioning, and as it had been the accepted instrument, the very incarnation of authority for the Western peoples, it dragged down in its inertia the whole Empire. When the established authority lost the confidence of the people, it became impossible to improvise a new order. In the absence of a recognized principle of authority, the first thing to happen was the emergence of the military with a claim to govern the Empire by right of force. The legions were ready to furnish Emperors-any number of them-but they could not agree as to the candidates. On all sides appeared anarchy, division, poverty. the infiltration of barbarian elements, the decay of the ancient culture. A great man, Diocletian, made an extraordinary effort to stem the tide, by using the army to carry out an administrative reform, and to reestablish the Empire on a new principle of authority borrowed from the East. He asked his subjects to regard him as the earthly representative of Mithras, the Sun-God, the dispenser of thrones. But Diocletian lived to see the collapse of his Oriental despotism, which was too alien to the nature of the West to succeed. The work of dissolution went on, for the principle of authority native to the West had been lost. Ferrero believes that Modern Europe is faced with the same problem. The principle of authority native to the West has been lost again, after having been recovered in the Middle Ages through the creation of a new hierarchy, through a reawakening of the spirit of trust and obedience. But now the forms of the mediaeval order, which made emergence from barbarism possible, have ceased to be living things. Divine Right of Kings, feudal aristocracy, chivalry, these things have ceased to be manifest even as ornaments. They have been succeeded by other forms called modern,-universal suffrage, the "Rights of Man," all the trappings of democracy. But Ferrero feels that democracy is too vague, too akin to anarchism, to be capable of preserving Europe from the final state of universal chaos. . He is pessimistic, because he cannot recognize anywhere a standard, about which the elements of law and order can gather. The ancient civilization was broken into fragments, but was still able to transmit some of its essence to a vehicle, which had been developed as if for that very purpose. Christianity was the ark, which saved the most precious seeds of antiquity. In a sense, it was not an ideal Christianity, which did this; it was Churchianity in its hardest and most dogmatic state. But it was the only basis of authority left, and it was a religious force binding men together. Ferrero suggests that we stop condemning the Church of Constantine's day long enough to ask why it was so intolerant, so bent on the suppression of heresies. Perhaps, it was only giving expression to the yearning of men everywhere for something fixed to cling to, for something irrevocable and authoritative, even though it were only a system of theology. But to-day, intellectual, moral, spiritual anarchy are as near to us as political anarchy. Chaos is imminent on every plane. Where is there anywhere a devotion to truth, a reverence for principle strong enough to provide a haven in the storm which is gathering? Students of Theosophy may well ask themselves that question. S. L. The Treasure of the Isle of Mist, by W. W. Tarn (Philip Allan, London), is a truly delightful fairy story, charmingly told, of lost treasure, caves, a magic amulet, a real villain, and a detailed description of a fairy gathering for All Hallows E'en. The fairies are real, and so are the heroine (in her early teens) and her younger companion, the Urchin. In fact all the characters, whether human, animal, or fairy, are vividly and realistically portrayed; and the action and reaction of the seen with the unseen world is made so natural as to seem more real than ordinary prosaic limitations. In addition to being a genuinely entertaining story, refined as few things written today are, the author has succeeded by light luminous touches and a rare suggestiveness, in conveying certain fundamental principles on which all true fairy stories are based. There is a quest, which turns out to bring more than the treasure originally sought. There is evil to be overcome, good to be achieved through sacrifice, and implicit obedience as the sole safeguard and only sesame. Success brings not only personal reward, but the redemption of even rebellious sinners. In other words, this little book is a true fairy story, full of wisdom, an allegory of the soul. That the fairies are described as the creation of past races of men, modelled by the thought-forms of by-gone days, will be of interest to students of Theosophy. The author is to be congratulated, not only for his literary and imaginative achievement, but also for his ability to create so attractive a setting for the deeper messages he has to convey,—such as: "If you don't make mistakes sometimes, you'll never make anything else," or "If you can't get what you want by beginning at the top, you should start again at the bottom." A. G. Buddhist Legends, Translated from the original Pali text of the Dhammapada Commentary, by E. W. Burlingame (Harvard University Press, 1921. 3 vols, $15). This appears to the present reviewer to be the most valuable book on Buddhism and the Buddha that has been published in the West. It breathes the very atmosphere and savour of the Buddha's India, the cities and forests, the mountains and the ocean, the hot season and the greater rains, the palm trees and the sunshine and the tinkly temple bells; its pages are packed with stories of disciples and the effort of discipleship, and the authentic person of the Buddha moves through it majestic, a presence that is not to be put by. The spirit of the whole book is summed up in one of the verses of the Dhammapada quoted after the dedication: The shunning of all evil, the doing of good, The cleansing of the heart: this is the Religion of the Buddhas. The Dhammapada consists of 423 Sayings of the Buddha in verse. The Commentary, compiled by an unknown disciple, perhaps a thousand years after the Buddha's death, undertakes to tell under what circumstances, to whom, when and why each of these Sayings was uttered. It thus carries with it a great body of personal tradition and atmosphere, handed down by loving hearts and the singularly retentive memories of the East, and brings to life again the scenes and persons and incidents in the midst of which the Buddha lived and taught. Of the 299 stories here admirably translated, there is room in this review for three only, and only for a summary of these. The first, like many of the stories, shows the Buddha possessing a keen sense of humour. It relates a former incarnation of one of the Buddha's elder disciples: Once upon a time, says the Buddha, there was a merchant who used to travel about Northern India with a donkey cart, selling pottery. While engaged in disposing of his wares, he allowed the donkey to run loose. On such an occasion, the donkey made the acquaintance of a lady donkey, who put discontent into his heart, so that, when the time came to go, the donkey refused to move, saying, "I will plant my fore feet, let fly with my hind feet, and knock out your teeth." The merchant, using persuasion, promised the donkey a consort with face like mother-of-pearl, whereupon the donkey went happily forward. When they reached home, the donkey claimed fulfilment of the promise. "Yes," said the merchant, "I will bring you home a mate. But I will provide food only for you. You will increase and multiply, but there will be food for one only. Decide for yourself." Desire thereupon departed from the heart of the donkey. Then comes the moral: "At that time, monks, the female donkey was JanapadaKalyani, the male donkey was the Elder Nanda, and I myself was the merchant. In former times, too, Nanda was won to obedience by the lure of the female sex." Here is a second story. Certain novices and others yet unconverted, on seeing the Elder Lakuntaka Bhaddiya, used to pull his hair and tweak his ears and nose, saying, "Uncle, you tire not of Religion? You take delight in it?" But the Elder showed no resentment, took no offence. The monks discussed the matter in the hearing of the Buddha, who said, "Yes, monks, they that have rid themselves of the Depravities show no anger or resentment, but are unmoved, unshaken, like a solid rock." Those who seek more of solemnity in the tradition of discipleship will find it in such a story as the following. As the Teacher walked side by side with the novice, he asked the novice the names of various places previously pointed out to him by the lay disciple, and the novice told him their names. When they had reached the place where the novice resided, the Teacher climbed to the top of a mountain. From the top of this mountain the Great Ocean is visible. The Teacher asked the novice, "Tissa, as you stand on the top of the mountain and look this way and that, what do you see?" "The Great Ocean, Reverend Sir." "What thought comes into your mind as you look upon the Great Ocean?" "Reverend Sir, this is the thought that comes into my mind, 'At times when I have wept over my sufferings, I must have shed tears more abundant than the waters contained in the four great oceans.'" Again he asked him, "Tissa, where do you reside?" "In this mountain cave, Reverend Sir." "What thought comes into your mind as you reside here?" "Reverend Sir, this is the thought that comes into my mind, 'There is no limit to the number of times I have died and my body been laid upon this ground.'" "Well said, well said, Tissa! It is even so. There is no spot where living beings we know have not lain down on the earth and died. Where truth is, and righteousness, where no injury is done to living beings, where self-restraint and self-command exist, thither resort holy men, there death is not." C. J. ANSWERS QUESTION NO. 266.-A young man of my acquaintance, who is a Church member (Episcopalian), has asked me how a friend of his, who died recently, and who was neither very good nor very bad, can possibly go either to heaven or to hell. Should I tell him about Reincarnation? ANSWER.-It depends upon the character, education, and real 'age' of the young man. To upset the faith of another is a grievous sin, as the Bhagavad Gita tells us. The need of a child of four is to regard its parents as final and infallible. Nothing is worse for a child of that age than to begin to doubt the wisdom and authority of its parents. It must have a fixed centre to which to look,-a centre from which knowledge and power proceed. The majority of grown-up people are about four years old. They need, and really need, a fixed and visible centre of authority to look to and to rely upon. To deprive them of it is cruel, and stunts their spiritual development. Further, because the need to rely upon a centre of authority is a real need, and because it is impossible for people of that 'age' to rely upon an unseen Master,-if they lose faith in the wisdom and (comparative) infallibility of their Church, they are certain to transfer their faith to some other external centre, possibly to Karl Marx, or to Lenine, or to Mrs. Eddy, or to some spiritualistic medium. Almost any Church would be better than that! It would be very unwise, therefore, to suggest to such people that there are truths of which their Church knows nothing, or of which it disapproves. If they were to accept the truth of Reincarnation from you, they would necessarily think themselves wiser than their Church, at least in that respect; and if they were to transfer their faith from their Church to you, in what way would they be any better off? You will die. What would they do then? The young man referred to by the questioner, shows that he does not know the teaching of his Church, and the best way to help him, at least to begin with, is to reinforce his faith in his Church, by telling him what his Church teaches in regard to the future life. The principle to insist upon is that of endless opportunity for growth, for progress. This, after all, is the principle which underlies the truth of Reincarnation, and to give him the principle is of much greater importance than to give him a particular method by which the principle is worked out. For Reincarnation is not the sole means of growth. There is opportunity for progress during the interval between two lives on earth, in the after-death state. And it is to this opportunity that the church calls attention in its standard treatises on Theology. Thus, in the course of reading which is obligatory for those who would be admitted to the Diaconate in the Episcopal Diocese of New York, first place is given to Dr. Martensen's Christian Dogmatics, and to Dr. Darwell Stone's Outlines of Christian Dogma. Martensen, who is a Danish Bishop, devotes several pages to "The Intermediate State in the Realm of the Dead." He says (p. 457): "Neither in Holy Scripture nor in the conception of an intermediate state is there any foundation for the notion of a sleep of the soul from the moment of death until the last day. As no soul leaves this present existence in a fully complete and prepared state, we must suppose that there is an intermediate state, a realm of progressive development, in which souls are prepared and matured for the final judgment. Though the Romish doctrine of Purgatory is repudiated because it is |