rophet, to use two well-known words, have ever in later times
come into conflict one with the other. The priest carries on the
traditions of antiquity; too often he has lost the knowledge that made
them real. The prophet--coming forth from time to time with the divine
word hot as fire on his lips--speaks out the ancient truth and
illuminates tradition. But they who cling to the words of tradition are
apt to be blinded by the light of the fire and to call out "heretic"
against the one who speaks the truth that they have lost. Therefore, in
religion after religion, when some great teacher has arisen, there have
been opposition, clamour, rejection, because the truth he spoke was too
mighty to be narrowed within the limits of half-blinded men. And in such
a subject as we are to study to-day, certain grooves have been made,
certain ruts as it were, in which the human mind is running, and I know
that in laying before you the occult truth, I must needs, at some
points, come into clash with details of a tradition that is rather
repeated by memory than either understood or the truths beneath it
grasped. Pardon me then, my brothers, if in a speech on this great topic
I should sometimes come athwart some of the dividing lines of different
schools of Hindu thought; I may not, I dare not, narrow the truth I have
learnt, to suit the limitations that have grown up by the ignorance of
ages, nor make that which is the spiritual verity conform to the empty
traditions that are left in the faiths of the world. By the duty laid
upon me by the Master that I serve, by the truth that He has bidden me
speak in the ears of men of all the faiths that are in this modern
world; by these I must tell you what is true, no matter whether or not
you agree with it for the moment; for the truth that is spoken wins
submission afterwards, if not at the moment; and any one who speaks of
the Rishis of antiquity must speak the truths that they taught in
their days, and not repeat the mere commonplaces of commentators of
modern times and the petty orthodoxies that ring us in on every side and
divide man from man.

I propose in order to simplify this great subject to divide it under
certain heads. I propose first to remind you of the two great divisions
recognised by all who have thought on the subject; then to take up
especially, for this morning, the question, "What is an Avatara?"
To-morrow we shall put and strive to answer, partly at least, the
question, "Wh