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the Ancient," or Buddhi-Manas. For the Divine Spiritual "I," is alone eternal, and the same
throughout all births; whereas the "personalities" it informs in succession are evanescent,
changing like the shadows of a kaleidoscopic series of forms in a magic lantern. It is the
"Ancient," because, whether it be called Sophia, Krishna, Buddhi-Manas or Christos, it is ever
the "first-born" of Alaya-Mahat, the Universal Soul and the Intelligence of the Universe.
Esoterically then, Job's statement must read: "With the Ancient (man's Higher Ego) is Wisdom,
and in the length of days (or number of its re-incarnations) is understanding." No man can learn
true and final Wisdom in one birth; and every new rebirth, whether we be reincarnated for weal
or for woe, is one more lesson we receive at the hands of the stern yet ever just schoolmaster --
KARMIC LIFE.
But the world -- the Western world, at any rate -- knows nothing of this, and refuses to learn
anything. For it, any notion of the Divine Ego or the plurality of its births is "heathen
foolishness." The Western world rejects these truths, and will recognize no wise men except
those of its own making, created in its own image, born within its own Christian era and
teachings. The only "wisdom" it understands and practices is the psychic, the "terrestrial and
devilish" wisdom spoken of by James, thus making of the real Wisdom a misnomer and a
degradation. Yet, without considering her multiplied varieties, there are two kinds of even
"terrestrial" wisdom on our globe of mud -- the real and the apparent. Between the two, there is
even for the superficial observer of this busy wicked world, a wide chasm, and yet how very few
people will consent to see it! The reason for this is quite natural. So strong is human selfishness,
that wherever there is the smallest personal interest at stake, there men become deaf and blind to
the truth, as often consciously as not. Nor are many people capable of recognizing as speedily as
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STUDIES IN OCCULTISM
68
is advisable the difference between men who are wise and those who only seem wise, the latter
being chiefly regarded as such because they are very clever at blowing their own trumpet. So
much for "wisdom" in the profane world.
As to the world of the students in mystic lore, it is almost worse. Things have strangely altered
since the days of antiquity, when the truly wise made it their first duty to conceal their
knowledge, deeming it too sacred to even mention before the hoi polloi. While the mediaeval
Rosecroix, the true philosopher, keeping old Socrates in mind, repeated daily that all he knew
was that he knew nothing, his modern self-styled successor announces in our day, through press
and public, that those mysteries in Nature and her Occult laws of which he knows nothing, have
never existed at all. There was a time when the acquirement of Divine Wisdom (Sapientia)
required the sacrifice and devotion of a man's whole life. It depended on such things as the purity
of the candidate's motives, on his fearlessness and independence of spirit; but now, to receive a
patent for wisdom and adept-ship requires only unblushing impudence. A certificate of divine
wisdom is now decreed, and delivered to a self-styled "Adeptus" by a regular majority of votes of
profane and easily caught gulls, while a host of magpies driven away from the roof of the
Temple of Science will herald it to the world in every marketplace and fair. Tell the public that
now, even as of old, the genuine and sincere observer of life and its underlying phenomena, the
intelligent co-worker with nature, may, by becoming an expert in her mysteries thereby become a
"wise" man, in the terrestrial sense of the word, but that never will a materialist wrench from
nature any secret on a higher plane -- and you will be laughed to scorn. Add, that no "wisdom
from above" descends on any one save on the sine qua non condition of leaving at the threshold
of the Occult every atom of selfishness, or desire for personal ends and benefit -- and you will be
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