Theos-Talk Archives (August 2002 Message tt00088)

Dallas, thanks for your remarks and observations. You raise some 
good points but to answer some of your questions and observations, I 
will have to go over a good amount of material and try to present 
each item one point at a time. Unless this is done, a great deal of 
additional confusion may be created.

For this posting I will reply to your statement which reads:

"2. If modified, and I assume it was, then why was it never
produced or mentioned clearly by Judge, her executor, the
Keightleys, or Mead ? After H P B's death, some of the MSS
of articles in her 'desk' were published in LUCIFER. But
nothing was said about the MSS of the THIRD VOLUME being
considered or edited for possible publication later on.
This omission is to me significant. I would have thought
that this would be of primary importance then (in 1891)."

But SOMETHING in fact was said in 1891 and later after HPB's death 
about "the MSS of the THIRD VOLUME being considered or edited for 
possible publication later on." 

If you turn to my essay at:

http://www.blavatskyarchives.com/sdiiipt6.htm

you will find that Isabel Cooper-Oakley wrote in THE PATH magazine, 
December 1891, page 295 the following:

"The H.P.B. Press...is developing into a regular printing office....A 
new edition of The Secret Doctrine is to lead the van, and last but 
not least the third volume is to be published." (Isabel's statement 
is dated in Oct. 1891 from London.)

And Dr. Archibald Keightley wrote in a letter to Bertram Keightley 
in October, 1891:

"There is some talk of entirely reprinting Secret Doctrine [Volumes I 
and II] and of correcting errors when the Third Volume is issued." 
(cited by C. Jinarajadasa in "Dr. Besant and Mutilation of the Secret 
Doctrine," Messenger, January 1926, page 166.)

And after Volumes I and II of the SD were reissued in late 1893, 
readers of Lucifer would have seen in the January, 1894 issue the 
following statement:

"The third volume of The Secret Doctrine is being typewritten from 
the MS."

There may be other statements to this effect during this time period 
in the various Theosophical journals. 

The above evidence shows that your statement is not accurate as 
given. 

More in later postings.

Daniel H. Caldwell
BLAVATSKY ARCHIVES
http://blavatskyarchives.com/introduction.htm
"...Contrast alone can enable us to appreciate things
at their right value; and unless a judge compares
notes and hears both sides he can hardly come to a
correct decision."
H.P. Blavatsky. The Theosophist, July, 1881, p. 218.