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SAINT-MARTIN, LOUIS CLAUDE. Born at Amboise, in France, January 18, 1743. A mystical writer of great influence. He originally entered the army, but after six years of service retired from an occupation so distasteful, and devoted himself to what was then called belles-lettres. He passed much of his time in travelling through Switzerland, Germany, England, and Italy, and for some years fixed himself in total retirement at Lyons. Afterwards he removed to Paris, and, unappalled by the terrors of the Freuch Revolution, continued his theosophical studies throughout that eventful period. He was an ardent disciple of Jacob Boehme, concerning whom an opportune poem has been written (Vol. XIII, p. 260.)

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Animated by such high ideas as portrayed, Saint Martin continued to labor at the mystical side of Freemasonry, which had been the work of Martinez Paschalis, and he subsequently thought to improve on the system of his master, adding also views taken from Swedenborgian philosophy. Saint Martin having published a book in 1775, On Error and Truth; or, Men Recalled to the Universal Principle of Science," the work became exceedingly popular, and passed through five editions between 1775 and 1784. The Rectified Rite of Saint Martin originally consisted of ten degrees, but was afterwards reduced to seven. Personally, Saint Martin was amiable, erudite, and charitable. He made but few enemies during his lengthened career. His system was introduced into Russia, and the Martinist Lodges of Masonry were ever held in high esteem. He adopted certain ideas evidently at variance with the archæological history of Freemasonry; but as a symbolical completion of the design, everything enunciated by him deserves the careful study of the theosophist.

The above account of Saint Martin is found in "The Royal Masonic Cyclopædia," by Kenneth R. H. Mackenzie, IX°, (Cryptonymus). Few of his works are extant in English. We have only two, whose . title pages are as follows:

Mystical Philosophy and Spirit Manifestations. Selections from the recently published correspondence between Louis Claude de Saint Martin ("Le Philosophe Inconnu,"), and Kirchberger, Baron de Liebistorf, (Member of the Grand Conseil of Berne), during the years 1792-97. Translated and edited by Edward Burton Penny, Topsham, Devon. 12mo.; pp. 392. Cloth. Exeter, 1863.

Man.

His True Nature and Destiny. Translated from the French of Louis Claude de Saint Martin ("Le Philosophe Inconnu.") By Edward Burton Penny. "L'homme est le mot de toutes les énigmes."DE L'ESPRIT DES CHOS. 12mo. pp. 100. Cloth. London, 1864. Saint-Martin wrote several other philosophical and theosophical works not as yet translated into English.

SALATHIEL THE WANDERING JEW. A story of the past, present, and future. By Rev. George Croly. There has appeared from time to time in various parts of the world during the last eighteen cen turies, a mysterious individual known as "Salathiel, The Wandering Jew," the one who drove Jesus, while bending beneath the weight of the cross, from his door, for which he was cursed to live forever, to have no place of rest or peace on earth, and in consequence he became a sojourner in all lands, yet a citizen of none; professing the profoundest secrets of opulence, yet generally living in a state of poverty, being conversant with the events of every age, without lineage, or possession, or pursuit on earth; a wanderer and unhappy, bearing the sorrows of centuries on his brow, and crying out at last, while withering in soul with remorse for the guilt of an act of madness: "I wandered to the deserts of Arabia; I joined a caravan journeying toward the Holy City; it lost its way; hunger and thirst tortured us, and put a brand, as it were, of hot iron upon our lips. My companions fell around me on the burning sand; our beasts of burden sank to rise no more; the simoon blew its poisonous breath over the parched and verdureless earth; the sun's heat dried the blood in my veins. I did not die, but I suffered alive that which killed my fellow-travellers. The elephant trampled me under his feet; the tiger gnawed my flesh with his iron teeth; the anaconda drew his mighty folds around my limbs, but in vain did they mangle me; a voice from above cried Live, Salathiel, live! 'Live, Salathiel, live! Pursue thy endless journey. On, on, forever!' My bones cracked, my flesh quivered, but the blessing of death was withheld from me; I cannot die; I cannot die; will there ever be any rest for me? Jesus of Nazareth, pardon! pardon! have mercy on me! At that moment a strain of heavenly music came down, as it were from the skies; the air was perfumed with the fragrance of unseen flowers; a stillness as of death followed the harmonious sounds, and a feeling of joy unfelt before came over my senses. I was told to close my eye and sleep." He obeyed. It was the sleep of death. The Wandering Jew was

called home.

"So many years it takes to form a man,

So many more it takes to form a woman;
So many months it takes to form a child;

So many centuries, until mankind is physically perfect;

So many centuries, before the Soul gets admittance in the brain;
So many centuries, before the Soul can receive the alphabet;

So many thousand years, before it makes its circle round the globe;
So many thousand
years, to grow Genius and Columbia;

So

many thousand years, to write a history;

So many thousand years, until the final battle." — G. VOGELSANG.

VEDANTA PHILOSOPHY.

In answer to "S. P. H.," we will say that the Vedanta Philosophy has had an ezponent in America for the past three years or more in the person of Swami Vivekananda of New York, who was sent by his friends and co-religionists to present their belief at the Congress of Religions that was held in connection with the World's Exposition at Chicago. Besides his efforts there, which have been published in the volumes of that Congress, he has taught publicly and privately, in person and by correspondence, audiences, classes, and single persons, the exoteric and esoteric phases of the Vedanta Philosophy. The latest published expositions by him were several addresses and lectures given in New York and Brooklyn the present year, published in pamphlet form, New York, as follows: The Ideal of a Universal Religion, January 12, 1896.

The Cosmos; two lectures, January 19 and 26, 1896.
Bakti Yoga. Devotion. February 9, 1896.

The Atman.

The Self. Brooklyn, February 16, 1896.

The Real and the Apparent Man, February 23, 1896.

Karma Yoga. Science of Work. Eight informal lectures.

The Vedanta Philosophy; an address before the Graduate Philosophical Society of Harvard College, March 25, 1896.

EARLY AMERICAN BIBLE. The first edition of the Bible printed in America is the version made by Rev. John Elict (1604-1690) into the Indian tongue. It is a work of great labor, and is said to have been all written by a single pen. It was printed at Cambridge, Mass., in 1663, and is now a literary curiosity commanding a remarkable price. The title, in part, is "Up Biblum God," and some of the words in it are very long and dissonant. Here is one of 32 letters, which simply signifies "our question": "Num-mat-che kod-tan-tam-oon-gan-un-no-nash."

"He finds not gold who will not stoop to seek;
He is not strong who is not first made weak ;
He is not good who would not better be ;
He never sees who never longs to see.

He shall have water who is sore athirst;
He shall have love who loves not self the first;
He shall have life who would for others live
He shall have all who freely all would give."

-JOHN NICHOLSON.

"THE SOUL, IMMORTAL, AS ITS SIRE, SHALL NEVER DIE." (Vol. XIV, p. 152.) This quotation is found in a hymn entitled The Grave, by James Montgomery. It is printed in "The Rhetorical Reader (p. 259), a work by Ebenezer Porter. New York, 1852.

"The sun is but a spark of fire, a transient meteor in the sky;
The soul, immortal as its Sire, shall never die."

"MANY ARE CALLED, BUT FEW CHOSEN," (MATT. XX, 16; XXII, 14). Plato puts it: Many rod-bearers there are, but few Baccthi (candidates." That is to say, there are many candidates, but few reach to real Initiation. Clement of Alexandria, in his work entitled Stroma. teis ("Miscellanies "), compares this saying of Plato with that form credited to Jesus.

I.

STORIES OF THE SU ERNATURAL AND THE Weird. (Vol. XIV, p. 184) In answer to the inquiry of " GREY MALCOLM " for stories on the supernatural and the weird, I would suggest the following: "The House and the Brain" - Bulwer. 2. "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" - Stevenson. 3. "Signal Man Charles Dickens. 4. "My Aunt Margaret's Mirror" Sir Walter Scott. 5. "The Tapestried Chamber Sir Walter Scott. 6. "Wandering Willie's Tale" Sir Walter Scott. 7. "Chinese Ghost Stories" — (forgot

the name of the translator.

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The following books may also be added to the short stories above mentioned:

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1. "A Strange Story" "Archibald Malmaion

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Bulwer.

- Julian Hawthorne. 4. "Asdath Marie Corelli. 5. "A romance of two worlds Marie Corelli "The house of the brain" and "A Strange Story " by Bulwer, are very powerful, while "Archibald Malmaison," by Hawthorne is very fine In answer to this correspondont's inquiry for works setting forth the probable nature of the future life, I would refer to Borderland, for January, 1896; also Allen Kardac's "Spiritism."

H. R. EVANS.

"One is born a Pagan, another a Jew, a third a Mussuliran. The true Philosopher sees in each a fellow seeking after God."-7. Estlin Carpenter, of Oxford, at Parliament of Religions, 1893.

"To me the meanest flower that blows can give thouohts that do often lie too deep for tears."-Wordsworth.

THE FUTURE LIFE. (Vol. XIV, p. 184.) In reply to Grey Malcolm I will give the following: Some years ago I was very successful in working out this problem, so far as to satisfy my own mind, by means of magnetic and mesmeric experiments, which I carefully embodied in three large MS. volumes, in the form of a Diary, which, at one time, I had a notion of printing. I made my notes in three forms: (1) After placing my patient in a state of trance I carefully minuted the exact time, and any notable act, or uttered words; (2) after restoration to the natural body state I took the Medium's Relation; (3) then, if I found the least thing unexplained in my first series, I put questions, and always had satisfactory replies. I proved to my own satisfaction, though previously a skeptic: (1) That we have what is generally denominated a spirit; (2) that this duplicate and invisible body may vacate the natural body; and (3) that the latter may be possessed, or filled, during such vacation, by the soul of another.

The doctrine which I thus acquired was pretty much that of the present Theosophical Society, though it had not then been established, to the extent of conditional immortality and reincarnation. It would bear out, further, their teachings as to the afterlife of Orientals under their discipline. But with regard to the Western supermundane planes, the views thus taught, were: That existence continued a state of active life and improvement, somewhat similar to an earth life where all were on the same level, except as to spiritual advancement and hierarchies, like being with like, and the bodily shapes entramelled by our slow methods of locomotion. That the residents of the several supermundane planes have bodily shapes like our own, but varying in density or appearance; as (1) dark or having an opacity; (2) bright, or even luminous, which appertains to a second death; (3) entities which could not be seen by my errant Medium, but said to be visible to other spirit entities. In other words we have the Astral, Manasic, and Bodistic bodies of the Theosophist's School.

Of course in such experiments we must allow for this: That all occurrences present themselves in a different aspect to spectators; but allowing for this variation in written accounts, such works as those of A. J. Davis in America, Cahaganet in France, etc., may be read with profit. Since the Theosophical Society was established I have read most of their books, and see no reason to alter the views I thus ac

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