Theos-Talk Archives (September 1997 Message tt00003)

I have been following the discussion on the Neanderthals of
recent weeks.

Between pages 149 and 160 in "Mahatma Leters" [ Letter XXIIIb ]
1948 Edition Rider. We have a marvelous essay on the subject of
the pre-history of our present civilization, and, going back into
the times and events for which we have only some wisps and traces
of myth.

For those of us who own or can borrow a copy of that book, these
few pages could make very intersting reading. No doubt they
served as a prelude to much of the material given in explanatory
form in the 2nd volume of the Secret Doctrine.

Good reading.

PS HPB writes [ SD, I, p. 272-3 ]:

> The Secret Doctrine is the accumulated Wisdom of the Ages...It is
> useles to say that the system in question is no fancy of one or
> several isolated individuals...it is the uninterrupted record
> covering thousands of generations of Seers whose respective
> experiences were made to test and to verify the traditions passed
> orally by one early race to another...[They] passed their lives
> in learning, not teaching...by checking testing and verifying in
> every department of nature the traditions of old, by the
> independent vision of great adepts...No vision of one adept was
> accepted till it was checked and confirmed by the visions--so
> obtained as to stand as independent evidence--of other adepts,
> and by centuries of experiences.