A Period of Scandal, Gloom and Unrest 1883-1887

 Helena Petrovna Blavatsky (1887)

The third volume of Old Diary Leaves (1904) by H. S. Olcott continued his six-book memoir chronicling the history of the Theosophical Society and events in his life as the Society's President-Founder.  In the first chapter Olcott attested to a cheerful afternoon at a London banquet:
 

. . . Madame Blavatsky  bubbled over with high spirits and kept the company in continual merriment.  Anon, a jest would be followed by an occult teaching, and that by the making of "spirit raps" on the table or silvery bell-tinkling in the air; and this party, like every other in which she had been present, broke up with the impression left on the guests that she was one of the most brilliant and entertaining, if eccentric, personages they had ever encountered. 

 
This passage shows that Olcott equated the phenomena occurring in HPB's presence as a trait fostered by her presumed occult powers.  There are also numerous descriptions of phenomenal events occurring to TS members when she was not present, with Olcott concluding, "But whatever the phenomena, their exhibition has always had for its object to prove the existence in all mankind of certain psychic potentialities, which, under favoring conditions, develop."  He further wondered: "Was it ever pretended that only certain chosen 'vessels of election' could have these powers, or that their exercise proved their possessors to be infallible teachers?"
 
Olcott suggested that pleasant afternoons for HPB were ephemeral.
 

At Ooty, as at Allahabad and Simla, persons of the most influential position were disposed to be friendly to her and to the Society, some of the most impressible ready to submit themselves wholly to her charm.  Here, as elsewhere, she spoilt her chances of full success by some sudden caprice of conduct, some passionate revolt against conventional narrow-mindedness, the uttering of strong language, or the indulgence of biting witticisms about some high-placed person.

 
Recurring throughout the book are descriptions of communications and brief visits from their mysterious 'Masters'/'Mahatmas'; Olcott's investigation of Mesmerism and hypnotism; 'psychopathic healing,' which he continued to occasionally facilitate; his public lectures; and diverse metaphysical reflections, including his belief in the powers of the "evil eye" and "the hateful will-current of a black magician." Curiously, he observed that there was "a recrudescence of superstitious belief as evidenced by the pilgrimages to Lourdes and other presumably favored shrines" without contemplating the metaphysical significance that can be construed from considering the basis for such events.  Among the many subjects investigated in chapters of the 'Third Series' of Old Diary Leaves are "The Painting of Adept Portraits," "Concerning Sibyls" (Sibylline Books) and "Phenomenal Memories of Pandits."
 
When Olcott was reunited with a patient who had gone blind again since having his vision restored, Olcott reported another effective treatment:
 

This case of Baidyanath teaches a great scientific fact, viz., that blindness, when due to suspended nerve action, may be removed by mesmeric treatment, provided that the right conditions as to mesmeriser and patient are given; that the sight, thus restored, may fade out after a time, when, presumably, the nerve-stimulus has subsided for lack of renewal; that, even after an interval of two years, the sight may be again restored and after even a very brief treatment.


The lesson to professional healers is that they should never despair if there should be a relapse after a first success.

 
Olcott also described observing the work of famous healer Zouave Jacob.  
 
The year 1884 was "the tenth since H. P. B, and I first met at that Vermont farm-house" and they now were "settled in a noble Indian bungalow amid enthusiastic Asiatic friends, every corner of India familiar to me, our Society's name known throughout the world, and its chartered Branches established in various countries: truly, a chapter of romance."
 
The opening of the library for the Adyar TS headquarters in 1886 inspired Olcott to reflect, "We have been 'making history' in a very real sense ever since we had that momentous drawing-room meeting in New York . . ."  He had previously declared his exciting perception of "the influence of Theosophy is travelling the whole earth, like a thrill of electric force that might run round the planet."  The ambitions of Olcott and HPB remind the reader that all spiritual and religious movements have been inspired by insights that have never offered a perfect knowledge of the human condition.
 
As chronicled in this third volume of Old Diary Leaves, during Olcott's discourse at the official opening of the Adyar Library, he recited two of the three declared aims of the Theosophical Society, as reported in the Madras Mail:
 

"The first is: 'To form a nucleus of the Universal Brotherhood of Humanity, without distinction of race, creed or color.'

"The second: 'To promote the study of Aryan and other Eastern literatures, religions and sciences.'"

 
Olcott also quoted from a discourse by Sir William Jones to the Asiatic Society of Calcutta in 1794.  Jones commented about Newton —
 

. . . the whole of his theology, and part of his philosophy, may be found in the Vedas, and even in the work of the Sufis.  The most subtle spirit, which he suspected to pervade natural bodies, and, lying concealed in them, to cause attraction and repulsion; the emission, reflection, and refraction of light; electricity, calefaction, sensation, and muscular motion, is described by the Hindus as a fifth element, endued with those very powers; and the Vedas abound with allusions to a force universally attractive, which they chiefly ascribe to the Sun, thence called Aditya, or the Attractor.

 
During 1884, HPB accompanied Olcott on a trip to London, where he represented the Buddhist Defence Committee as a Special Delegate.  During the trip he mentioned encountering such famous people as Robert Browning, William Crookes, Camille Flammarion, Earl Russell, Oscar Wilde, and F. W. H. Myers and Edmund Gurney of the Society for Psychical Research.
 
One of the mysterious appearances of a Mahatma letter to Olcott occurred while he was on the train to London reading statements prepared by members of the London Lodge in preparation for dealing with a dispute.
 

I had just come to a passage in the letter of Bertram Keightley, where he affirmed his entire confidence that the Masters would order all things well, when, from the roof of the railway carriage, above Mohini's head, a letter came fluttering down.  It proved to be addressed to me and be in the K. H. handwriting, giving me necessary advice for the treatment of the difficulty.

 
The contact with the SPR resulted with Olcott consenting to be examined by an SPR committee.  The resulting Report of the Committee appointed to investigate phenomena connected with the Theosophical Society (1885) concluded about Madame Blavatsky: "For our own part, we regard her neither as the mouthpiece of hidden seers, nor as a mere vulgar adventuress; we think that she has achieved a title to permanent remembrance as one of the most accomplished, ingenious, and interesting impostors in history."
 
Olcott was able to rationally consider the events that culminated with the report; however, HPB, felt tragically victimized.  About 'chief accuser' Mme. Coulomb, Olcott stated, ". . . I was as far as possible from suspecting that she had been a party to tricks, either with or without H. P. B.'s knowledge . . . She seemed to me a hard-working woman, who was doing all she possibly could to keep the house tidy and take care of H. P. B.'s physical comfort: she bought the food, had meals very properly served, and looked after the servants.  Often I felt quite sorry for her when H. P. B. scolded her for trifling faults and, I thought, showed ingratitude for her services."
 
The "Statement and Conclusions of the [SPR] Committee" included details of the events referred to as 'The Coulomb Missionary Conspiracy' by Olcott, who recalled that the first indication of a problem was presented when "we received from Adyar a lugubrious letter from Damodar, intimating that the Missionaries were hatching a plot, evidently with the help of Mme. Coulomb.  He said that this woman was going about here and there, breathing vengeance against H. P. B. and the Society."  The TS members of the Board of Control "tried to get her and her husband to go to Colorado" with the enticement of a gold-mine claim; however, "they spoilt everything by saying that they held compromising letters of H. P. B.'s, and that if they did not receive a bonus of Rs. 3,000, they should give the letters for publication."  The Coulombs were expelled from membership in the Society and weeks later were turned out of the compound.  The fall edition of the Madras Christian College Magazine published letters purported to have been written by HPB, implicating her in a conspiracy to produce marvelous phenomena fraudulently.  Nonetheless, Olcott reported that when HPB returned to Madras, her reception "was even more tumultuously joyous than mine had been."  On this occasion HPB made a speech that was the only one from a public platform that Olcott could remember ever having witnessed her deliver.
 

She said that "of all the letters published, not a single one, as it stood, had been written by her.  She would deny them all in toto . . . she would be the greatest fool in the world to commit herself so that she might be fairly accused of such vile, disgusting things . . . As for her accusers, she and the Colonel had treated them with all possible kindness, and what should she say of their going over to the enemy's camp, when her back was turned, and selling her like Judas Iscariot?  She had not done anything against India of which she should be ashamed, and she was determined to work for India while there was health in her."

 
A TS Committee reached a formal decision about what response should ensue.
 

. . . as these letters necessarily appear absurd to those who are acquainted with our philosophy and facts, and as those who are not acquainted with those facts could not have their opinion changed even by a judicial verdict given in favor of Madame Blavatsky, therefore it is the unanimous opinion of this Committee that Madame Blavatsky should not prosecute her defamers in a Court of Law.

 
Olcott observed:
 

What it was that was calculated upon seemed pretty clear from the fact that when the Missionaries saw that H. P. B. had been kept from walking into the trap, they caused Mme. Coulomb to bring an action for libel against General Morgan, intending to subpoena H. P. B. as a witness and cross-examine her, but immediately withdrew it when she was sent away to Europe by her attending physician . . .

 
Although a resignation the previous year had been withdrawn, HPB unconditionally renewed her resignation on March 21, 1885.  Olcott found this a "wise step" and acknowledged that "getting out of the psychic maelstrom that had been created about her at Adyar" made possible the subsequent publication of The Secret Doctrine and other of her writings.  HPB eventually resided in London.  Olcott mentioned that the Editor of the Christian College Magazine in the Madras Mail appealed to the public for money to send the Coulombs to Europe as it was impossible for them to earn a livelihood in India.  Months later, Olcott divulged HPB was "suffering privations that I had not the money to alleviate" while "packed away in a cheap little Italian inn on the slope of Mount Vesuvius."  He received "sharp and angry letters that naturally might be expected from her under the circumstances." 
 
There was further attention to the number 7 in the third volume of Old Diary Leaves.  Olcott explained:
 

H. P. B., as the reader of Mr. Sinnett's Incidents may recollect, being born in the seventh month of the year, went by the name of Sedmitchka, she who is connected with the number Seven.  Moreover, she was married on 7th July (1848), reached America on 7th July (1873), and died in the seventh month of the seventeenth year of our Theosophical collaboration; and when it is seen that the number seven has played and is playing a similar important part in the history of my own life, we find ourselves in a pretty tangle of fateful numerical relationships.

 
Many disagreements resulted from Olcott and HPB's relationship being circumscribed to the exchange of correspondence.  Eventually she started a new magazine: ". . . she said she was determined to have a magazine in which she could say what she pleased, and in due time Lucifer appeared as her personal organ, and I got on as well as I could without her."
 
Olcott considered what were the effects of the Coulomb scandal —
 

. . . so far as the great public is concerned, undoubtedly both H. P. B. and the movement were for a long time under a cloud.  It is so much easier to think ill of others than to judicially decide upon their merits and shortcomings, and "where much mud is thrown against a public person, some of it always sticks": a venerable truism.  Until the attacks of the Coulombs and the S. P. R. were made, H. P. B. was simply an exceptional, eccentric and brilliant woman sans pareil; after that , she was as one who had been arraigned before a Scottish jury and dismissed with the verdict "Not proven," which was very different from "Not guilty."  Among our members were quite a number, and some influential ones, who had acquired doubts of her perfect innocence . . .

 
Looking back at the events of 1884 nineteen years later, Olcott observed that "the relation of H. P. B. to the movement has greatly changed, and for the better.  She is now remembered and appreciated, not so much as the thaumaturge, but as the devoted agent of the Elder Brothers for the spreading of long-hidden truth to modern times."