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341 The next thing I notice, shall be Mr. Maitland's criticism with regard to the position assigned to the Dhyan Chohans in the scheme of Cosmic evolution. His objection relates first to the question—how the first Dhyan Chohans could evolve, if there be no personal God to produce them consciously? and then urges, "if the assistance of the Dhyan Chohans be indispensible to the production of the universe" how came "the universe to reach such perfection as to produce Dhyan Chohans in the first instance, when there were no Dhyan Chohans to aid it?" If Mr. Maitland has brought forward these objections for the purpose of eliciting further information, all I have to say is, that such information will be forthcoming when the ground is prepared for it by the doctrines which he now criticises. But if there are intended to imperil the position taken up by Mr. Sinnett, I have only to point out that Mr. Maitland puts entirely out of calculation the agency involved in the ideation of the Universal Mind, the Demiurgos of Western Mystics. It must not, however, be here understood, that the ideation of the Universal Mind is set in motion by an act of that mind's volition; quite the contrary. The ideation of the Demiurgos is governed by an eternal chain of causation, and is absolutely involuntary. A flood of light will be thrown on this subject by letter from one of the Mahatmas, now in the possession of Mr. Sinnett. Then, again, it must be remembered that all Dhyan Chohans are not evolved in one and the same way. It may as well be here remarked, that to talk of the first Dhyan Chohans—is slightly illogical. The chain of Manvantara and Pralaya—"Cosmic Day and Night"—is an endless one. As there can be no beginning of eternity, so there can be no first Dhyan Chohans.

I shall now pass to a question of great importance. The gifted President maintains that the septenary constitution of man is the same as the seven productive vikaras or products of Prakriti, as given by Kapila, in his Sankhya philosophy: only inverted and more materialized. I regret to have to