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Compassion - The Spirit of Truth

By Helena Petrovna Blavatsky

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Compilers notes

Approach 
If taken as a course of instruction, the book should be studied from beginning to end so that its overall integrity and continuity of themes open the Spiritual Eye. The first four chapters set out certain key metaphysical ideas without an adequate grasp of which the untrained mind will not perceive the TRUTH of Truths: that Divine Love is the Heart and Pulse of the World. 

Construction 
The majority of excerpts are verbatim; in some instances the original text was edited or abridged. Side captions are provided for major selections. They function as subtitles and when read seriatim impart the salient points of the entire compilation. This is a key feature of the book.
The Compiler’s text is meant to introduce and interlink his selections but, as it does not detract from their inherent power and import, his text may be skipped altogether.

Orthography 
The first electronic edition featured diacriticised Sanskrit and Pali transliterations, and monotonic Greek. We have since realised that Internet search engines are confused by certain diacritical marks, particularly those of Asian languages, and certain typographical formats, for example, small capitals. Because the widest possible dissemination of the subject matter weighs far heavier for us than the provision of pronunciation aids, we abandoned diacritics — the only exception being a flat bar over the long vowel of masculine Brahma to distinguish it from the neuter. We also reduced formatting throughout.

Typography 
The book title, introductory chapter titles, and symbols are set in Philaletheians font; main chapter titles in BP Display; headings in Verdana; body text in Bookman Old Style 10.5 pt. Philaletheians has been specially designed by Associates for our Integrative Theosophical Studies Online Series.1 
The North American usage of double quotation marks and punctuation is adopted: commas and periods are placed inside quotation marks; colons and semicolons outside. Quotation marks are omitted from the main selections, unless a particular passage was a quotation itself and in inverted commas. The convention of italicising foreign words is abandoned in the Compiler’s text. Italics are used only for emphases, antitheses, and titles.

References 
Authorities and annotations are indicated by bold superscripted numbers in the text and at the foot of each page. The titles of frequently quoted works are abridged as indicated at the end of the book.