Bereft of intelligence, and depending upon brute force alone, of how much avail would be the strength of one man against the united sinews of his race, his nation, or even against his community? In exact proportion is the ratio of his Karma to that of his community, his nation, or his race. It is lost in the great whole; it is of account only before that tribunal which "numbers the hairs upon our heads." Let him who would attain personal "salvation," who would separate his Karma from that of a wicked, sinful race by retiring to the jungle, or within the recesses of his own selfish heart, and there practicing the most austere virtues, go out and push against the side of a mountain, in the hope of retarding the revolution of the earth from West to East, for the one effort will be of as much avail as the other.

Are there not thousands of men, whose personal Karma would entitle them to be born under conditions as delightful and just as ever depicted by a Bellamy, whose moral natures quiver under the outrageous ethics of our social system every hour of their lives, yet who are compelled by the national Karma which overwhelms them to do the very acts they loathe; to live by taking the very interest, profit, or rent which they abhor? Are there not tens of thousands, whose sincere efforts in other lives to attain to truth would have entitled them as units to its revelation, who are nevertheless born in Christian or pagan lands where the racial Karma offers only crude dogmas or childish creeds? But has the justice of Karma failed, then, because of this seeming injustice? Not so; the efforts of these, even in the direction of truth and purity, have been selfish; they have striven egotistically, not altruistically; have worked for their personal salvation, not to save others. They have created good personal Kama, and Karma repays them to the uttermost farthing, but they have done nothing to lighten the race or national Karma, and they are engulfed in its floods.

It was no chance thought, no accidental insertion of a "glittering generality," which declared the first object of the Theosophic Society to be the formation of a nucleus for an Universal Brotherhood. It evidences a wisdom and knowledge of the working of the law of Karma far transcending our petty conceptions. Altruistic effort is the law of spiritual progress because of the commingling of our Karmas; and even in selfish self-preservation, if from no higher motive, we ought to practice it. We recognize the injustice, the falsity, the hollow- ness of the social, ethical, and religious customs of our time, yet we accept them and raise no protesting voice, because the whole world is against us, or we fancy it is. Can we charge it to the injustice of this divine law, then, if our next incarnation find us the son of a money-changer, with the lust of gold tainting our very mothers' milk? If the world is too hard for us now, will it not be so then? Let us exercise a little common sense in our study of Karma; let us remember that it is simply "cause and effect," and cannot but be just.

There is too much of the Christian idea of the entire separation of earthly from heavenly concerns abroad in the land. If we find this world in a bad state morally and ethically, we must logically expect to find it in a similar one when we reincarnate, especially if we did nothing towards lightening the world Karma. Cause precedes effect, on all planes. Our first duty, to be sure, is to make ourselves personally pure, because this is always at hand, and always practicable; our next, to strive for the elevation of our community, then our state, our nation, our race; each member of which ascending series includes all below it, so that in working for humanity we are purifying our race, our nation, our community, and ourselves. And the effect of the causes we set up, or the Karma we generate, is the greater as we ascend the series in motive. It is this which gives the thought and the act force. Thought is creative, and that which aims at the elevation of the race will prove incomparably more potent a factor for good than that directed towards petty or selfish aims.

We are but as drops in the great ocean of life. Our very souls are tainted by the saltness and bitterness of the floods about us. The bitterness of the whole ocean can only be removed, and its waters made pleasant and sweet, by the sweetening and purification of each separate drop. No one can do this for another, and yet each can only purify himself by unselfish work for others. How beautifully grand is the Law! What a magnificent stride above and beyond the brute kingdom, where the Buchners, Tyn- dalls, Darwins, and Huxleys would perforce relegate us! The law of the animal kingdom is egotism; the survival of the fittest; the cruel struggle for existence. The law of Karma on the human plane is altruism and selflessness, and we must recognize it or perish. For cause and effect are at work in higher states of matter, employing subtle and unperceived forces. The childhood of our race has passed. We are fast reaching our majority, where we must take control of our own destinies, for weal or woe. No longer the created, borne helplessly yet safely along the mighty stream of evolution, we have become creators, and are karmically responsible for that which we create.

Our mouths have learned to voice the Word. Every thought and act is potent for good or evil; the finer, "unscientific" forces of nature yield obedience and obeisance, whether we are aware of it or not. It is not enough that we recognize the universal presence of cause and effect, the omnipotence and omniscience of Karma; we must realize that we are free to change and direct this divine law, to our preservation or our destruction. This is a most important aspect of Karma, which must not be lost sight of. As the whole Cosmos is the thought of the Absolute, reflected in matter, so we, as a part and portion of that Absolute, exercise and employ creative potencies every hour of our lives. Shall we continue to do this ignorantly and aimlessly, or shall we take a firm hold upon our destinies and guide our souls into the haven of immortality? Certain it is that we must make the decision soon, for we are pilgrims in the cycle of necessity; we must go forward either to safety or destruction. And this is not predicated upon the emotionalism of some wailing Jeremiah of ancient, or Buchanan of modern times; but simply and entirely for the reason that Effect follows Cause. One is the upper, the other the nether mill-stone of fate, and we are inextricably caught between them.