Blavatsky on the Silent Brotherhood

Helena Petrovna Blavatsky · Mystic Verse and Insights Series · 2 pages

A short two-page extract drawn from "The Cycle Moveth" in Blavatsky Collected Writings volume XII, consisting of a single sustained paragraph.

The observation is that the enormous and ever-growing number of mystics at the time shows the occult working of the cycle better than anything else. The people meant are described precisely: thousands of men and women who belong to no church, sect or society, who are neither Theosophists nor Spiritualists, and who nonetheless are virtually members of a Silent Brotherhood whose units often do not know one another, belonging as they do to nations far and wide apart. What they have in common is said to be a mark on the brow — the mysterious Karmic seal that makes each of them a member of the Brotherhood of the Elect of Thought. Their history is given in one sentence: having failed to satisfy their aspirations within their own orthodox faiths, they have severed themselves from their churches in soul if not in body, and are devoting the rest of their lives to the worship of loftier and purer ideals than intellectual speculation can supply. The paragraph closes on the reason the brotherhood is called silent — that one meets such people rarely and they seem few by comparison, and yet their name is legion, if only they chose to reveal themselves.

Read the full text (PDF, 0.4 MB, 2 pages)