Gain Your Copy Lucifer, Vol. 18: A Theosophical Magazine, Designed To Bring To Light The Hidden Things Of Darkness; March, 1896-August, 1896 (Classic Reprint) Designed And Illustrated By Annie Besant Ready In Readable Copy

from Lucifer, Vol.: A Theosophical Magazine, Designed to "Bring to Light the Hidden Things of Darkness" March,August,

With the general programme, however, of Mrs, Kingsford we are in entire sympathy her effort was to unify and interpret all the religions of the world known to us, especially directing her attention to the Grecian, Egyptian, Jewish and Christian.
The essentially oriental religions entered but slightly into the scheme of the Veda and Pitaka and Zend Avesta little is said, The leading idea of Mrs, Kingsford was that the Christian religion must trace its true origin to the Mysteries pre'e'minently the Mysteries of Bacchus and though we are strongly inclined to believe the main postulate, we can by no means endorse the details.
This much is certain, that no subject is of greater interest for the western world than the one pro posed by the authors of Tim Perfect Way, But for the satisfactory accomplishment of the task two things are absolutely necessary firstly, the faculty to read the old records of the worldmemory at will, the result of stern discipline and the exercise of that supreme common sense which so few mortals ever possess and secondly, a faculty of scholarly research, whereby the results arrived at may be fitly recommended to the minds of the students of religion and history.
It is the rarest thing on earth to come across the mystic who will submit to such training, or check his impressions by the stern discipline of research and though no one would deny that Mrs.
Kingsford had the ability, we look in vain for the results of that accurate research in her works,

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This book is a reproduction of an important historical work, Forgotten Books uses stateoftheart technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy, In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition, We do, however, repair the vast

majority of imperfections successfully any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works, Annie Wood BesantOctoberSeptemberwas a prominent British socialist, theosophist, womens rights activist, writer and orator and supporter of Irish and Indian self rule, She married agedto Frank Besant, but separated from him over religious differences, She then became a prominent speaker for the National Secular Society NSS and writer and a close friend of Charles Bradlaugh, Inthey were prosecuted for publishing a book by birth control campaigner Charles Knowlton, The scandal made them famous, and Bradlaugh was elected M, P. for Northampton in. She became involved with union actions including the Bloody Sunday demonstration and the London matchgirls strike of, She was a leading speaker for the Fabian Annie Wood BesantOctoberSeptemberwas a prominent British socialist, theosophist, women's rights activist, writer and orator and supporter of Irish and Indian self rule.
She married agedto Frank Besant, but separated from him over religious differences, She then became a prominent speaker for the National Secular Society NSS and writer and a close friend of Charles Bradlaugh, Inthey were prosecuted for publishing a book by birth control campaigner Charles Knowlton, The scandal made them famous, and Bradlaugh was elected M, P. for Northampton in. She became involved with union actions including the Bloody Sunday demonstration and the London matchgirls strike of, She was a leading speaker for the Fabian Society and the Marxist Social Democratic Federation SDF, She was elected to the London School Board for Tower Hamlets, topping the poll even though few women were qualified to vote at that time, InBesant met Helena Blavatsky and over the next few years her interest in theosophy grew while her interest in secular matters waned, She became a member of the Theosophical Society and a prominent lecturer on the subject, As part of her theosophy related work, she travelled to India, Inshe helped establish the Central Hindu College and inshe helped establish the Hyderabad Sind National Collegiate Board in Mumbai,India, In, she established the first overseas Lodge of the International Order of Co Freemasonry, Le Droit Humain, Over the next few years she established lodges in many parts of the British Empire, Inshe became president of the Theosophical Society, whose international headquarters were in Adyar, Madras, Chennai, She also became involved in politics in India, joining the Indian National Congress, When World War I broke out in, she helped launch the Home Rule League to campaign for democracy in India and dominion status within the Empire, This led to her election as president of the Indian National Congress in late, After the war, she continued to campaign for Indian independence and for the causes of theosophy, until her death in, She fought for the causes she thought were right, starting with freedom of thought, women's rights, secularism she was a leading member of the National Secular Society alongside Charles Bradlaugh, birth control, Fabian socialism and workers' rights.
Once free of Frank Besant and exposed to new currents of thought, she began to question not only her long held religious beliefs but also the whole of conventional thinking.
She began to write attacks on the churches and the way they controlled people's lives, In particular she attacked the status of the Church of England as a state sponsored faith, Soon she was earning a small weekly wage by writing a column for the National Reformer, the newspaper of the NSS, The NSS stood for a secular state and an end to the special status of Christianity, and allowed her to act as one of its public speakers, Public lectures were very popular entertainment in Victorian times, Besant was a brilliant speaker, and was soon in great demand, Using the railway, she crisscrossed the country, speaking on all of the most important issues of the day, always demanding improvement, reform and freedom, For many years Besant was a friend of the National Secular Society's leader, Charles Bradlaugh, Bradlaugh, a former soldier, had long been separated from his wife Besant lived with him and his daughters, and they worked together on many issues, He was an atheist and a republican he was also trying to get elected as Member of Parliament MP for Northampton, Besant and Bradlaugh became household names inwhen they published a book by the American birth control campaigner Charles Knowlton, It claimed that working class families could never be happy until they were able to decide how many children they wanted, It suggested ways to limit the size of their famil sitelink,