Meditation Alone Will Not Aid Spiritual Development

Helena P. Blavatsky, William Q. Judge, Damodar K. Mavalankar, Godolphin Mitford, Clara M. Codd, Proclus Lycaeus · Down to Earth Series · 78 pages

A seventy-eight page compilation drawing on William Quan Judge, Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, Godolphin Mitford, Damodar K. Mavalankar, Clara M. Codd and Proclus Lycaeus, opened by a foreword by a Philaletheian and a full abstract and train of thoughts with page references. The epigraph states the position the whole collection develops: that concentration is the devotion of an entire lifetime to a given end, that meditation implies the cessation of active external thought, and that instruction in practical occultism requires the power of concentration first and definite directions afterwards.

The material is arranged in stages. It opens with Judge in two parts on the power of prolonged and uninterrupted concentration, described as creative when energised by spiritual will. Blavatsky follows with the flat warning that sitting for yoga is invariably fatal, drawn from Esoteric Section Instructions III and V. Three key articles on meditation and contemplation form the centre: Mitford's The Elixir of Life; Blavatsky's Is the desire to “live” selfish?, whose argument is summarised in the abstract as holding that the only difference between the ordinary man, who works along with Nature in the course of cosmic evolution, and the occultist is that the latter adopts methods of training and discipline that quicken the process; and Damodar Mavalankar's three-part What is Contemplation? A section on dangers and pitfalls returns to sitting for yoga, after which Judge supplies the practical material — meditation, daily practice, the present age, meditation and the Word and colours, a section headed “Beware!” and a list of special aids. Two invocations close the sequence, one described as deeply devotional from Clara Codd and one as highly philosophical from Proclus, followed by a glossary of occult terms for meditation proper and a list of further reading.

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