t friendship would follow justice, and that the two
countries, for the first time in history, would clasp hands. To
prevent this they dug a new gulf, which they hoped the English nation
would not span; they sent a river of blood across the road of
friendship, and they flung two corpses to bar the newly-opened gate of
reconciliation and peace. They have succeeded."

Into this whirl of political and social strife came the first whisper
to me of the Theosophical Society, in the shape of a statement of its
principles, which conveyed, I remarked, "no very definite idea of the
requirements for membership, beyond a dreamy, emotional, scholarly
interest in the religio-philosophic fancies of the past." Also a
report of an address by Colonel Olcott, which led me to suppose that
the society held to "some strange theory of 'apparitions' of the dead,
and to some existence outside the physical and apart from it." These
came to me from some Hindu Freethinkers, who asked my opinion as to
Secularists joining the Theosophical Society, and Theosophists being
admitted to the National Secular Society. I replied, judging from
these reports, that "while Secularists would have no right to refuse
to enrol Theosophists, if they desired it, among their members, there
is a radical difference between the mysticism of Theosophy and the
scientific materialism of Secularism. The exclusive devotion to this
world implied in the profession of Secularism leaves no room for
other-worldism; and consistent members of our body cannot join a
society which professes belief therein."[27]

H.P. Blavatsky penned a brief article in the _Theosophist_ for
August, 1882, in which she commented on my paragraph, remarking, in
her generous way, that it must have been written "while labouring
under entirely misconceived notions about the real nature of our
society. For one so highly intellectual and keen as that renowned
writer to dogmatise and issue autocratic ukases, after she has herself
suffered so cruelly and undeservedly at the hands of blind bigotry and
social prejudice in her lifelong struggle for _freedom of thought_
seems, to say the least, absurdly inconsistent." After quoting my
paragraph she went on: "Until proofs to the contrary, we prefer to
believe that the above lines were dictated to Mrs. Besant by some
crafty misrepresentations from Madras, inspired by a mean personal
revenge rather than a desire to remain consistent with the principles
of 'the scienti