FORCES OF OPPOSITION
P.61-62
A less obvious opposition to the Theosophical Movement arose from the complex egotism of Western civilization, which was offended by the idea of a quest for truth not in the European centers of academic learning, nor in the laboratories of science, but in the “superstitious”-even the “barbarous”-East. There were at least three reasons for this Western conceit. First of all, European culture was nominally Christian, and if the ethics of Jesus have been ignored by Western nations, the Christian claim of exclusive Revelation, maintained through many centuries, had infected the people of both Europe and America with a moral arrogance which remained long after effective belief in Christian dogmas had died away. The epithet “heathen” or “pagan” still flatters its user with the presumption of a superior religion, regardless of his personal beliefs. Second, the triumph of science and technology in the West, as contrasted with the primitive ways of the Orient, gave practical justification to this feeling of superiority. Finally, the ease with which European arms subjected the East to modern imperialism made it virtually impossible for fighting and trading Westerners to respect the conquered nations-peoples which could be held in political bondage by a few regiments of troops belonging to the “superior” white race!
Today, in the perspective of nearly seventy-five years, the power of these psychological barriers to Theosophical ideals can be more easily appreciated than when Madame Blavatsky, assisted by a single American supporter, began her revolutionary labors in India in 1879. At the outset H.P.B. made no effort to attract the interest of members of the ruling race in India. Her time was wholly occupied in discussions of philosophy with Hindu scholars and pundits. “The soul,” Olcott writes, “was the burning topic of debate.” Questions of politics, color, business or wealth were scarcely mentioned. Because of this unconventional neglect of the European circle in Bombay, the Society was soon suspected by the British officials as being a cover for political machinations, and Government agents were set to watch Madame Blavatsky, whose Russian origin also excited suspicion. In view of the unpopularity of the Society with the ruling class, it was the more remarkable, therefore, that only nine days after the landing of the Founders at Bombay, Col. Olcott received a letter from Mr. A. P. Sinnett, the editor of the Allahabad Pioneer, expressing a desire to meet them and to publish any interesting facts concerning their work in India. The Pioneer was a strong pro-Government organ, and this attention of its editor to the purposes of the Theosophical Movement brought the Society to the notice of the more cosmopolitan English residents. Mr. Sinnett’s unusual interest in Theosophy, which soon became manifest, was also the means of disabusing officials of the British Government of the notion that Madame Blavatsky was a Russian spy, and Olcott her tool.
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