Masonic, Occult and Esoteric Online Library
The Letters of H. P. Blavatsky to A. P. Sinnett - 1925
By A. T. Barker
Letter No. 77
{Wurzburg}
February 16th, 1886.
Mr dear Mr. Sinnett,
Read this with attention please; as I am DETERMINED to square my accounts wherever I have any, and put myself in a position for the few days I have to live — that would not be altogether that of the sick and old lion, made helpless, that every donkey can kick, that is hunted by all the hounds of hell and has the doors of every land and city shut before it or him.
My Karma — is my deserved Karma and I do not murmur or rebel against it. But, outside of Karma — and I know this for I was explained the difference — there is (a) duty and justice to myself as to any one else of my mankind; and (b) some means to be provided that I could finish or rather work on, until I finish the Secret Doctrine. Now in my present state it is thoroughly impossible.
The Countess is a witness to what I say. She wonders daily and hourly how a woman in my dilapidated and debilited state of health can bear all I do, daily and hourly too, and not either become insane or drop down dead of heart-rupture. I can bear and would bear anything that is the direct result of my own mistakes or sowing. I mean to kick against that which is entirely the result of human cowardice, selfishness, and injustice. I may have brought on myself Coulombs, Hodgsons, even Sellins — I have done nothing to deserve to lose my best friends and those most devoted to the Cause, through the intrigues of those who ought to be, if not quite ready to lay their life for Master and Cause, as I am — at any rate not to swell the ranks of those who keep on stoning me daily. Please put the question fairly and openly to Messrs. Bowaji and Mohini. Do they want me to live to finish my work, or do they, each for their own selfish ends, mean to finish me? For there is a limit when even one protected as I am, must give away in her human nature and either lay violent hands on herself, or on those who seek to kill her.
This will appear ridiculous and absurd to you. Perhaps you too fell a victim already to Tamil mantras and psychology as all the Gebhards have — especially Franz — as Miss A. has, and now as I see — Mohini? I would not feel surprised in the least, knowing what I do.
Now let me speak plain and say at once that if you have not yet arrived at such a blessed state of a marionette in the hands of one superlatively clever at creating such — you are in eminent danger to fall into it, even though you never saw Bowaji — never spoke with him, simply by the force of circumstances that this little creature is determined to create, that you will end by yielding to, because — a man of the world, you judge by the appearances created. Now I do not mean to sit and wait till I lose you and Mrs. Sinnett as I have lost the Gebhards, and now Mohini entirely in the hands of one, who has nothing more to lose, and who therefore can care little for what may be the result for himself. I beg you not to laugh; I pray you not to think I am writing in a hot passion, or in one of my fits of rage and irrepressible impulse — for I do not. I know what I say and therefore I mean to act thereupon.
Three days ago I had a letter from Hubbe Schleiden giving me the startling news that Sellin had conquered him, that he came to an agreement with M. Gebhard that he (H. S.) would send him back his diploma and Presidentship, would open the Sphinx to Mr. Sellin's vilifications against the Society, Olcott, myself (in the Hodgson style and worse) and remain only in his heart, a true and devoted theosophist working for the Society still, since by opening his columns to the enemy and resigning every connection with the T.S. he would thereby prevent Sellin from abusing and ruining the T.S. in all the German papers. In short he would sacrifice himself and his journal making of the latter a paratonnere — a lightning conductor. Now you may ask what has that to do with Bowaji? I say a good deal. It. M. Gebhard is in it, and was made to see things in this light. If asked, M. Gebhard will deny it very sincerely, he will explain it on other grounds. I maintain what I say. But that's nothing — let it go. It is only one of the many cases I know. Let me come to the last one.
Nothing sincerer, more affectionate than Mohini's letters to me to the day his friend B. (who hates him more bitterly now, than Coulomb ever hated me!) came to London. Result No. 1. A letter from Mohini, calm, moralising full of charges — every one of them utterly groundless and false — that he mentions in a highly dignified and forgiving tone. You may not see anything but very natural misconceptions generated through circumstances and Karma. I see things otherwise. Every charge in it, namely (1) that I had divulged a certain secret of Mohini's to Mme. Coulomb who told it to Hodgson, (2) that I told the same to Damodar, while I wrote to him (Mohini) now that I had never opened my mouth to any one upon the thing; (3) that I believed him guilty of —— with Miss----- as soon as I had read her letter to him at Wurzburg and then told to Solovioff, who went and told to Mme. de Morsier; who thus finding that I believed in Mohini's guilt believed it too, and then finding that I had turned front and said Mohini was not guilty, thought necessarily that I was lying and tried to cover him, and feeling indignant (as she well might, poor woman, if it were so) turned against me and Mohini and all; (4) that I had written to the Colonel a letter in which I had misrepresented, or told him about Mohini something dreadful etc. etc. etc. Enough we have to analyse now these charges.
Every one of them proceeds through Bowaji and his instrumentality. The charges and explanations with regard to Mme. de M. have been disentangled via Al. Gebhard, who went to Paris and is, at any rate, in daily correspondence with Mme. de M. I alone know how much there is in it of Mr. B.'s influence. He told all this to Mohini, at all events and thus poisoned his mind against me.
You know, for you were here at Wurzburg, at the time — whether I believed Mohini guilty; what I had said to you I had said to Solovioff regarding him the friend he was then — and NO MORE. I was mad to think that any woman would dare write to Mohini such letters and saw plainly that he was guilty not of sexual intercourse, but of yielding to an adoration that tickled his vanity, of corresponding with a woman in love with him. And you know that had I even believed in my heart that he was guilty I would screen him, a chela, one connected with Masters — with my own body, not for his own sake for I would have done everything secretly and underhand to rid the Society of such a hypocritical monster — but I would have cut off my tongue before saying or confessing it to any one. It would have been suicidal for the Society, myself, and thrown a new slur on the Masters. Therefore, I have never said such a thing to Solovioff. He LIED most positively. He gossiped, first out of pure love for mischief — as he gossiped to me about Mohini being this and that, having had intrigue in Paris with such and such a one, about Miss A. being madly in love with Mohini; about Mme. — herself, who, in one of her fits (magnetic trance) made love to him — Solovioff, and wanted TO RAVISH HIM (sic). He is a dirty unscrupulous liar and gossip. He did it at first without any evil intention against me, then was caught and forced to repeat his lies on official documents brought by Meltzer or — to proclaim himself a liar. He preferred sacrificing Mohini and me, that's all; I see it — Mohini does not, for he is deep under B.'s influence.
I never said, what he charges me with, either to the Coulomb or Damodar. Both were told by a party wronged by Mohini of that affair, one that happened before Mohini had even heard of the Theos. Soc. But, as Coulomb will swear to anything against me, and that Damodar is not there to answer it — hence Mr. Bowaji's safe charges against me, whom HE HATES — well in a way he did not conceal before the Countess.
I never wrote one word about Mohini to Olcott. I avoided and delayed it. It is only when the affair became serious, that I told it to him in a general way, asking him not to believe all that would be told to him about poor Mohini, who had been foolish but was innocent of the crime imputed to him. You have a letter from the Colonel, I sent you, in which he tells me "I knew all about Mohini" — to my great astonishment. Now I know how he learnt it. It was through Mrs. C. Oakley who wrote to her husband the gossip and scandal about town from our enemies. Hence Col.'s letter to which Mohini alludes, and of which I know nothing. Please show to Mohini Col.'s letter. It is the last one, I think I sent you.
Such are the facts. Judge of my position and try to realise that I, taking my theosophical vows in dead earnest, cannot act otherwise than I mean to with regard even to a woman that I fully despise. I do not believe Mohini guilty — never did of the consummation of the last criminal act. But if he has indeed written letters to Miss —— "nearly 100 in number" and "couched in the most extraordinary terms," I will retract the words "Potiphar" and other "libellous" terms and write to her through her lawyers the enclosed, [see Letter No. 77a. — Ed] which please correct and suggest anything else you think proper. I do not wish to incriminate Mohini, thereby, for I would be throwing slur on the Masters by it — if even it were the truth which I do not, cannot believe. But I wish it to be known plainly that it is the writing of even such letters that I do not approve of; and that if he gave her a certain right by flirting and flapdoodling with her in a way little behooving in a chela, I, had I known it at the time — would have never called her a "Potiphar" in writing, whatever my own personal opinion of her. I am perfectly aware that the threats of the lawyer are ridiculous; but I also know that though they cannot reach me here, they can create scandals and throw dirt at me in a hundred ways that no one would think of but unscrupulous lawyers; and I have had enough of dirt and scandals. Besides so long as I am not clean out of this whole affair I cannot even go to London where I HAVE to go absolutely, and whether I see you or not.
Thus if you are a friend, you will please employ a good lawyer (I have a few pounds from my aunt I can spend) to go to those wretches and have a good talk, and to tell them, that if they have indeed letters from Mohini to her "more than a hundred in number" and that if they can show the lawyer one endearing term showing love familiarity — then it is enough for me. As I had written letters to Mme. de M. under the impression that it was her who pursued him, and not he who answered or seemed to answer and countenance, if not encourage her love — and that Bowaji told me quite a different story, in which Mohini was made out the victim of more than one she-woman — with details; if now it is shown to me that it was not so, and that there is six of one and half a dozen of the other I am ready to acknowledge my mistake publicly. She is not a Potiphar — and he is not the Joseph — morally (if he is physically) that I took him for.
Now do not try and dissuade me from this. Show this letter to Mohini and let him ponder over it well and show it even to his friend B. if he likes it. I am determined, to square all my accounts. I have suffered that which none in the whole Society, and perhaps the world over, would be willing to suffer if he could help it — and to suffer any longer now would not injure me only but the Society, the Cause, the Masters' names. I know that, which you do not, cannot know, for you had no such personal experience as I have. I KNOW that I have to deal no more with the Bowaji D. N. who left me to go to Elberfeld but that I have to fight alone, and single handed a POWER — that acts through him; and which, if I do not conquer, will conquer (ruin) the whole Society, yourself, and ALL through me, though personally myself IT cannot harm. What occultist would be blind enough if he were a genuine occultist, not to perceive the impossibility, the utter unnaturalness that a boy (or man) so utterly devoted to the Cause, the Masters, and myself to a degree as I believe — should suddenly, without the least provocation, cause, or reason, develop such a HATRED, such a fierce, savage, fiendish thirst of revenge and desire to ruin one who, except kindness had done him nothing? His letter of contrition to me, which I sent you, was a sham, (or a temporary relief from the Power in him.) No sooner written he went on the same, only more cautiously. He set the Gebhards dead against me, and Franz and his wife against the Countess too. He meddled in everything, led the whole affairs at Elberfeld. He was the guiding and evil genius of the family as they will find out and he will be that of the A.'s, and any one whom he now approaches. He wrote to me since, two most impudent, impertinent letters which are not his (Bowaji's) but written in that crafty, cunning, jesuitical dugpa style I am so well acquainted with. It is Moorad Ali resurrected! I tell you all, and Mohini the first one, to beware. He speaks graciously of seeing me once more before he returns to India or goes to America. I will not see him, for I could not bear the horror — and if he does not change and the Power does not leave him I will not permit him to cross the threshold. How can I doubt — if all of you are foolish enough to — when, no sooner had we left Ceylon, this last March or April — that I saw the well known Form (I had already seen near him in Darjeeling, but this did not dare approach him then) ten yards off us four — (Hartm., Flynn, Bowaji and myself) — on deck shaking its fist at me, and saying: "You are four now, you will soon be three, then two — then you will remain alone, alone, ALONE!" The prophecy has come out pretty fully. Mary Flynn, losing suddenly without any cause or reason, her devotion — did not give a sign of life since she left, turned round. Then Bowaji went away to Elberfeld — and there foaming at the mouth screamed before the Countess "She will be left alone, I will prevent every one, Mohini and every one in India, to go to her. I hate, I HATE her — I would like to draw her heart's blood," etc. Yes I am left ALONE — the very words of the Form. When the Countess leaves me in three weeks or so, I will be as alone as in a prison cell solitary confinement. I may fall paralysed, die any day, with that poor fool around me alone who could not even notify any one of my relations or yourself of the fact. My papers, Masters' papers all to the mercy of any one. You may laugh — at the idea of the Form. I do not nor does the Countess — who read his letter to her. . . . "The Dweller of the Threshold is here, he is coming, coming. . . . Come and save me etc." We know what it all means if you do not.
Well, remember. It is not myself but all of you and the L.L. — as also the T.S. in general I want to save. After what was said by Hodgson — nothing in the world can throw an additional strain on me. But the L.L. can break up and theosophy in England go to pot. Choose — between your own worldly wisdom, Mohini's sweet philosophical indifference, Miss A.'s blindness — and my THIRTY years EXPERIENCE. I have seen the Form last night again, not in the house for there was Master's INFLULENCE in it — but across the garden through the walls, and the Countess has seen and felt it several times also though here she will not be hurt by it. And as I have seen it and received this morning the lawyer's letter and threats, I am determined. If, to save the Society and rid it from that Power — that can approach and theosophist and chela even, if he is not as staunch and true to the Masters as I am — I had to go to London with the next train and make friends with Miss L. and common cause with her, any Hodgson and all — I would do it without hesitation. Remember, then, my dear, faithful friend, who alone has remained such in all Europe. I will accuse myself, deliver myself to the jailor, to the Missionaries, accept the propositions made by the Jesuits anything. I have arrived to that point of indifference to moral personal suicide that I am ready for all. It is Mohini's last letter that showing me the terrific danger to which you are all blind that determined me. My love to dear Mrs. Sinnett — St. Patience — truly!
Yours to the consummation of the theosophical pralaya — ever
H. P. Blavatsky.
