Theos-Talk Archives (May 2006 Message tt00669)

In the 1897 edition of Volume III of THE SECRET DOCTRINE,
there are (excluding H.P.B.'s esoteric papers at 
the back of this volume), 52 sections (or chapters) 
covering 432 pages of text.

40 of these sections or chapters of the SD Vol. III were SIMPLY 
transferred by Mr. de Zirkoff into HPB's COLLECTED WRITINGS (most of 
them into Vol. XIV).

It should be clearly stated here that the ONLY EXISTING copies of 
these 40 sections are the printed copies in SD Vol. III.  

Mr. de Zirkoff had NO OTHER versions of these 40 sections to rely on 
or work with.

Furthermore, these 40 sections constitute more than 300 pages of the 
text of SD III.

For the remaining 12 sections of SD III which have corresponding 
text in the EARLIER Wurzburg manuscript, Mr. de Zirkoff and his team 
compared the two sets of text, etc. and then decided what to publish 
in the COLLECTED WRITINGS. 

IN SUMMARY:

Mr. de Zirkoff transferred into the COLLECTED WRITINGS volumes (most 
of it into Volume XIV) these hundreds of pages of text DIRECTLY FROM 
Annie Besant's Vol. III.

In other words, COLLECTED WRITINGS, Vol. 14 is heavily DEPENDENT on 
Annie Besant's 3rd Volume.

Mr. Aveline may wish to ignore these important observations but I'm 
sure Dara Eklund, who was the assistant compiler of Vol. 14, can 
confirm these observations of mine.

And thank you, Ken Small, for your confirmation.

In fact, any reader interested in determining the truth of the 
matter can start by comparing the text of the 52 sections in Vol. 
III of the SD with Vol. XIV of HPB's COLLECTED WRITINGS.

Daniel H. Caldwell
Blavatsky Study Center
http://blavatskyarchives.com