Page:Isis very much unveiled - being the story of the great Mahatma hoax (IA b24884273).pdf/78

72 lodging at other people’s expense may be a governing one. With Mrs. Besant, who brings far more to the organisation in the shape of gate-money, no doubt, than she ever condescends to accept from it, the motives are subtler. Had she boldly cut herself free from the rottenness at the core of the Theosophic movement as soon as it was shown to her, she might have saved her reputation for straightforwardness, if not for intelligence. In choosing instead the equivocal policy of hushing up a scandal at all costs, she doubtless convinced herself that she was acting only for the ends of edification and the good of her church. That is the old, old story of priestcraft, and Mrs. Besant has been playing the high priestess now for three years. But were there not also some more personal motives at work? There is one thing which even the most candid hate to confess—and that is, that they have been thoroughly bamboozled. It does not improve matters when they have themselves helped in their own bamboozlement. To confess how recklessly inaccurate were her statements about “the same handwriting,” the “semi-miraculous precipitation,” the absolute assurance of her own senses, and so forth; to let the public see for itself the childish twaddle which she accepted, and helped to force upon others, as profound and oracular: all this would have been a sad come-down from the Delphic tripod. I do not wonder the poor lady shrank from it. I do wonder that Mrs. Besant cared to evade it at the expense of a sort of confidence-trick. To this has come the woman whom we once thought, whatever her other faults, at least fearless and open—the woman whose epitaph, so she tells us, is to be—

Lastly, a few words to the rank-and-file of the Theosophical Society, a large proportion of whom are now gathering open-mouthed at Adyar. In Madame Blavatsky few of the better-informed of the flock nowadays affect to believe—except in public. They cling to her gifts, perhaps; they have thrown over her morals. For fresh evidence has been coming to light, ever since that strange woman died, as to the tricks to which she condescended, and encouraged her chels to condescend; and poor Colonel Olcott, though he continues to work