The Masters And The Path

THE existence of Perfected Men is one of the most important of the many
new facts which Theosophy puts before us. It follows logically from the
other great Theosophical teachings of karma and evolution by reincarnation.
As we look round us we see men obviously at all stages of their evolution--
many far below ourselves in development, and others who in one way or
another are distinctly in advance of us. Since that is so, there may well be
others who are very much further advanced; indeed, if men are steadily
growing better and better through a long series of successive lives, tending
towards a definite goal, there should certainly be some who have already
reached that goal. Some of us in the process of that development have
already succeeded in unfolding some of those higher senses which are latent
in every man, and will be the heritage of all in the future; and by means of
those senses we are enabled to see the ladder of evolution extending far
above us as well as far below us, and we can also see that there are men
standing upon every rung of that ladder.
2. There is a considerable amount of direct testimony to the existence of these
Perfected Men whom we call Masters, but I think that the first step which
each one of us should take is to make certain that there must be such men;
only as a later step will it follow that those with whom we have come into
contact belong to that class.
3. The historical records of every nation are full of the doings of men of genius
in all the different departments of human activity, men who in their special
lines of work and ability have stood far above the rest-- indeed, so far that at
times (and probably more often than we know) their ideals were utterly
beyond the comprehension of the people, so that not only the work that they
may have done has been lost to mankind, but their very names even have not
been preserved. It has been said that the history of every nation could be
written in the biography of a few individuals, and that it is always the few,
towering above the rest, who initiate the great forward steps in art, music,
literature, science, philosophy, philanthropy, statecraft, and religion. They
stand high sometimes in love of God and their fellow-men, as great saints
and philanthropists; sometimes in understanding of man and Nature, as great
philosophers, sages and scientists; sometimes in work for humanity, as great
liberators and reformers. Looking at these men, and realizing how high they
stand among humanity, how far they have gone in human evolution, is it not
logical to say that we cannot see the bounds of human attainment, and that
there may well have been, and even now may be, men far further developed
even than they, men great in spirituality as well as knowledge or artistic
power, men complete as regards human perfections-- men precisely such as
the Adepts or Supermen whom some of us have had the inestimable privilege
to encounter?
4. This galaxy of human genius that enriches and beautifies the pages of
history is at the same time the glory and the hope of all mankind, for we
know that these Greater Ones are the forerunners of the rest, and that They
flash out as beacons, as veritable light-bearers to show us the path which we
must tread if we wish to reach the glory which shall presently be revealed.
We have long accepted the doctrine of the evolution of the forms in which
dwells the Divine Life; here is the complementary and far greater idea of the
evolution of that Life itself, showing that the very reason for that wondrous
development of higher and higher forms is that the ever-swelling Life needs
them in order to express itself. Forms are born and die, forms grow, decay
and break; but the Spirit grows on eternally, ensouling those forms, and
developing by means of experience gained in and through them, and as each
form has served its turn and is outgrown, it is cast aside that another and
better form may take its place.
5. Behind the evolving form burgeons out ever the Life eternal, the Life
Divine. That Life of God permeates the whole of nature, which is but the
many-coloured cloak which He has donned; it is He who lives in the beauty
of the flower, in the strength of the tree, in the swiftness and grace of the
animal, as well as in the heart and soul of man. It is because His will is
evolution that all life everywhere is pressing onward and upward; and it is
therefore that the existence of Perfected Men at the end of this long line of
ever-unfolding power and wisdom and love is the most natural thing in the
world. Even beyond Them-- beyond our sight and our comprehension--
stretches a vista of still greater glory; some hint of that we may endeavour to
give later, but it is useless to...