result of all that have gone before in that line sufficiently
encouraging to prompt a renewal of the attempt?

A deep consideration of all that we have written, will also give the
Theosophists an idea of what they demand when they ask to be put in the
way of gaining practically "higher powers." Well, there, as plainly as
words can put it, is the PATH .... can they tread it?

Nor must it be disguised that what to the ordinary mortal are unexpected
dangers, temptations and enemies also beset the way of the neophyte.
And that for no fanciful cause, but the simple reason that he is, in
fact, acquiring new senses, has yet no practice in their use, and has
never before seen the things he sees. A man born blind suddenly endowed
with vision would not at once master the meaning of perspective, but
would, like a baby, imagine in one case, the moon to be within his
reach, and, in the other, grasp a live coal with the most reckless
confidence.

And what, it may be asked, is to recompense this abnegation of all the
pleasures of life, this cold surrender of all mundane interests, this
stretching forward to an unknown goal which seems ever more
unattainable? For, unlike some of the anthropomorphic creeds, Occultism
offers to its votaries no eternally permanent heaven of material
pleasure, to be gained at once by one quick dash through the grave. As
has, in fact, often been the case many would be prepared willingly to
die now for the sake of the paradise hereafter. But Occultism gives no
such prospect of cheaply and immediately gained infinitude of pleasure,
wisdom and existence. It only promises extensions of these, stretching
in successive arches obscured by successive veils, in an unbroken series
up the long vista which leads to NIRVANA. And this too, qualified by