The second Messenger or Pronouncer of the Brahmanical faith, although subsequently associated with the Persian whom you know as Zoroaster, was none other than Zardusht, antedating Zoroaster by many thousands of years.

For the purposes of manifestation the Infinite BRAHM was expressed or manifested in three equal Divinities: Brahma, the Creator; Vishnu, Protector, Preserver; Siva, Disintegrator (destroyer). Neither of these was "first" or greater than the other. All were working together as the "Manifestation" of the Infinite, wherever Manifestation was required.

The Angel, or Power, of the first Manifestation of Brahma, the Creator, was "Mahat"; as taught in mis Religion, the first production of Nature, of Primal Intelligence, since in this sublime teaching there is and can be no "Manifestation" either of Matter or Mind without the direct action of Intelligence. Then came the manifestation of "qualities" or attributes, through Vishnu, the preserver of all that Brahma creates. And as all created things must ultimately pass, Siva, the Disintegrator, forever is at the gateway of life to institute change (miscalled death). The Vedas contain the essential doctrines today of this ancient announcement.

Zardusht constituted and established a complete system of teaching, that fame afterward to be known under the names of the Sacred Books, to be referred to later.

But the greater portion of his teaching was to those who already partially or wholly illumined, could understand, could both grasp his teachings by perception and by the powers of the mind. It is certainly safe to say, whether regarded in the light of "Religion" or "Philosophy," that the Brahmanical system of thought, including of course the teachings of Buddha Gautama, is the most complete system of abstract mental (spiritual) teaching in the world, and includes all metaphysical and philosophical solutions of that which relates to the Infinite Intelligence and to the Intelligence of Mankind.

Brahm, as previously stated, has three portrayals in the Brahmanical faith: Brahma, the creator; Vishnu, the preserver or savior; and Siva, the destroyer or disintegrator; these three expressions bear somewhat upon earlier Egyptian interpretations, but are in no sense borrowed from them. To understand this interpretation you should know that the second Messiah of this dispensation, or Zardusht, was called "one of the Divine Interpreters," and was supposed to belong to the true incarnations of Vishnu. Other expressions had not then been manifested; as previously intimated, the first Brahmanical Messiah, Vishnu, with his twofold life, is perpetually veiled. In the images that picture Vishnu, you would see a barge, as nearly as the early art of that period could portray, representing Vishnu sailing upon the waters of Celestial life, attended by his Bride who is forever the silent companion of his journeyings, but who remains veiled, while he is expressing as a Buddha the Light of Brahm in mortal form. The "Lotus Flower," which also was connected with the Egyptian Isis, uplifts the Bride and sustains her while Buddha (Vishnu incarnated) is teaching the world.

Nothing was recorded, as said before, of this First teaching, but those who receive anew these teachings know that the Infinite Om is not expressed in any forms of life except in the state of being, but is manifested in all life, and that all other names that apply to Deity are but to break the Infinite Sphere to the comprehension of man; and that whatever attributes the "Manifestation" may be said to possess, like those of Brahma, you recognize them; but they are unspoken and unwritten of Brahm. In the other characters;' Vishnu and Siva, however, they are revealed, and in the various stages of the culminations of the lesser Messiahs. No doubt all that you read of Vishnu, manifesting in the various Buddhas, must portray the expression of the Divine Power, under the "preserving" or "saving" forces. As that "saving force" illustrates the Divine Goodness, so every avatar that manifested the light was an incarnation of Vishnu; in other words, every separate Messianic expression in this revealed religion, is but to give added instruction concerning Divine Goodness; to know that Goodness stands revealed, to realize that it encompasses and surrounds all time and space.

This great Revealment was at first, as stated before, stamped on a few prepared lives, and by them held sacred, then revealed by Zardusht, the Second Messiah of that Dispensation (avatar of Vishnu), whose teachings are preserved in the Vedas and Shastra, and extending into Persia formed the basis of the Zends. The first contains the four glad songs of the Basic Truths; the second includes the Vedas, and also the laws or principles for personal and national (universal) government. The uppermost of the latter are: "Right being," "Right thinking," "Right doing." The center being right, nothing can be wrong. The primal basis of Religion, Philosophy and Moral Law of the world is handed down in those sacred books.

There were four principal distinct branches from the Brahman-ical religion; one comes to you from India, which is the primal channel; another comes from China through the Philosophy and interpretation of Confucius and other Chinese philosophers; the other comes from Persia through Zoroaster; and a fourth, though hidden partly, as we shall hereafter explain, through the "Children of Israel." These branches were each divided into more sects and cults than there are sects in Christendom or the world at the present time. All over that portion of the Orient, where the Brahmanical Faith first had its outpouring, all over Egypt and Northern Africa, Asia and Asia Minor, there may be at the present time, even when the original faith is almost dead, at least hundreds of different sects; it is possible there were more at that time, but there are many that are permanent.

The sacred tradition, that to a primal few who "were prepared," "who knew," "who were like unto Brahm in essence," became, in the decline of the second Messianic cycle, the basis for the forming of "Orders," "Cults," "Sects," and that abhorrent system of Caste that is the curse of India today.

In the beginning or foundation of the Religious system, there were indeed real "Sacred Orders," constituted of such lives as had the "innermost revealments," and by "Attainment" had reached certain spiritual heights; traces of those real orders are found in the "Magi," the "Mahatmas," and probably in the original "Yogis."

The "Brahtnans" or Priests, who now dominate in India over all who adhere to the mere name of the Brahmanical system, and who are the perpetuators of the "Caste," must not be confounded with the early Teachers, nor the later Avatars.

The period of time of one Dispensation permits not only various interpretations of, and departures from, the Primal perception or revelation, but the "Buddhas" that necessarily came to explain the divine purposes, were also variously interpreted; and each interpretation had its division. Thus the sects multiplied, and in the past several thousand years there have been futile attempts to "explain" the original doctrines of the Brahmanical system by the "interpretations" or "noninterpretations," of the teachings of the various Buddhas. The most ideal expressions are found in many of those teachers and sages with whose names you are not familiar. The traditions and histories of Oriental lands teem with the various presentations of this Oriental drama. The whole system of Thought and teaching, as we shall presently show, has come down to you through the sources mentioned, and through those to be named later. The Sublime teachings of Zardusht followed the Divine Silence of the first lesser cycle of this vast period, founding the sacred orders, the "Holy Men," "Angels," "Mahatmas," "Magi," who received Revelation; later each interpreted the ideal Silence or system of "Meditation" in his own way.

Then came other interpreters of a more external nature, whose names are lost to you in the mists of distance; but sufficient is known to show that those entitled to the name of "Buddha" after the Second (already named Zardusht) were the founders of different "Eras" or particular lines of teaching, based, it is true, on the original threefold manifestation: Brahma, Vishnu, Siva. These various, but still wonderful metaphysical, teachings form the basis for all the transcendentalism in the world. You have derived little that can be named poetry from Egypt; you have derived nothing so appealing to the imagination from any source as from this one vast Oriental drama; and as the impersonation or expression of the abstract idea of the Divine the early Brahmanical teachings, interpreted by the Buddhas, will stand as the epitomized idealism of the world. This sublime and beautiful Philosophy, this Religious system, those poems, have been infiltrated into all the later Systems of Religious teaching, including the Hebraic Bible, and have been handed down to you in snatches and fragments through the various interminglings of the ages, races and nations. The preceding Dispensation had outwrought all that was possible of material power and intellectual science and art upon the earth, including a Dispensation of Beauty which was realistic.

The Ideal Dream of Goodness, Harmony, and Beauty was embodied in all that is meant by the word Brahma; and the Brahmanical faith lighting up the Orient with its splendor, was the only torch of glory. Down the different steeps of time, including all that semi-history of which you are aware, even in the receding waves of the Brahmanical religion of which you hear today, there is that touch of wonderful poesy, the realm of perception and imagination first enkindled, and upon the wings of imagination if not of perception people followed the Buddhas in their Light.

With each new teacher, leader, prophet or Buddha, was the recognition and reconciliation of the world, even in the midst of shadow to the Infinite; then came the application of Divine Good to alt relations of life. Indeed, the first half of the Brahmanical dispensation was one of spreading the light, excepting among the nations that could not be included in that dispensation.