ENQ. And who will provide the funds for this?
THEO. Some of our Fellows who are just a little richer than the rest. The man who would speculate or make money on Theosophy would be unworthy to remain in our ranks.
ENQ. But you must surely make money by your books, magazines, and other publications?
THEO. The _Theosophist_ of Madras, alone among the magazines, pays a profit, and this has regularly been turned over to the Society, year by year, as the published accounts show. _Lucifer_ is slowly but steadily ingulfing money, never yet having paid expenses—thanks to its being boycotted by the pious booksellers and railway stalls. The _Lotus_, in France—started on the private and not very large means of a Theosophist, who has devoted to it his whole time and labour—has ceased to exist, owing to the same causes, alas! Nor does the New York _Path_ pay its way, while the _Revue Théosophique_ of Paris has only just been started, also from the private means of a lady-member. Moreover, whenever any of the works issued by the Theosophical Publishing Company in London do pay, the proceeds will be devoted to the service of the Society.
ENQ. And now please tell me all you can about the Mahatmas. So many absurd and contradictory things are said about them, that one does not know what to believe, and all sorts of ridiculous stories become current.
THEO. Well may you call them “ridiculous!”
ARE THEY “SPIRITS OF LIGHT” OR “GOBLINS DAMN’D”?
ENQ. Who are they, finally, those whom you call your “Masters”? Some say they are “Spirits,” or some other kind of supernatural beings, while others call them “myths.”
THEO. They are neither. I once heard one outsider say to another that they were a sort of _male mermaids_, whatever such a creature may be. But if you listen to what people say, you will never have a true conception of them. In the first place they are _living men_, born as we are born, and doomed to die like every other mortal.
ENQ. Yes, but it is rumoured that some of them are a thousand years old. Is this true?
THEO. As true as the miraculous growth of hair on the head of Meredith’s Shagpat. Truly, like the “Identical,” no Theosophical shaving has hitherto been able to crop it. The more we deny them, the more we try to set people right, the more absurd do the inventions become. I have heard of Methuselah being 969 years old; but, not being forced to believe in it, have laughed at the statement, for which I was forthwith regarded by many as a blasphemous heretic.