We will now discuss another phase of the lower side of nature. As the devas stand in the presence of Truth and work constructively, so there are powerful forces, the lower counterpart of this devic creation, that have fallen deep into matter, who wage war, and bring destruction into the environments which they penetrate.
These lower aspects or devils are like men once good, who have fallen from their aspirations for truth and beauty and have been outlawed by humanity, and similarly there are elemental powers which have been evoked into the consciousness of humanity and which wage war upon all living beings. In nature we observe that there are constructive as well as destructive agents each following the law of his own being.
Within these planes there are entities which seek to draw out of the living and the dead those elements which provide them with food and vitality. When controlled by black magicians these agents are most dangerous to man, and in evoking them through ceremonial magic, the operator is often not able to control the power he seeks to enslave. I knew a man who intermittently had to defend himself against the onslaughts of such an entity; beads of perspiration would appear on his forehead at such moments and his entire physical organism was shaken by the struggle. This man was an authority upon theosophy and allied subjects yet was haunted by this secret fear which followed him to the grave.
When at so-called death a person’s remains are placed in the grave, the disintegrating intelligences of nature begin to draw out of the body and liberate those elements similar to their own composition. The physical body must be returned to its natural elements, and this is the work of these atoms of destruction. Then there is another type of entity which seeks nourishment from the decomposing bodies of human and animal nature, and by them the properties of the body are disintegrated and returned to their natural elements, just as a leaf which falls may fertilize the earth, or serve as food for some other form of expression.
We find these types of elementals about our graveyards, where they sometimes find an astral shell similar to their own nature which they enter. Since these astral shells are often enslaved by the animal soul in nature, these beings, through domination of this astral shell, seek to draw nourishment from the human plane which, through the medium of the astral shell, they can more readily contact.
Sensitive people are most prone to attacks of these vampire entities, different classes of which exist in the intermediate world of being. They vary from the octopus class, with body like quivering jelly, to beings somewhat human in form, standing about four feet high. True to their animal soul these beings often run in packs and their movements are far more rapid than human movements.
During our sleep, especially, these vampire beings seek to draw vitality from the human body, and mostly resort to places where licentiousness, hatred, and envy abound. They are particularly attracted to brothels, and to people who harbor licentious thoughts. A magician, having power over elemental life, can cause these beings to clothe themselves in any form of costume that he may desire. Magicians in Nepal sometimes convey a message or frighten a person by sending one of these four-foot beings to you clad in a devil mask. These elemental apparitions often display a strong sense of humor, but the octopus type, rearing itself upon its tentacles, always presents a face of horror. These lower beings always convey an atmosphere like an impressionistic painting, horizontal, diagonal, and vertical lines, each paint stroke separated by a partition from the natural atmosphere.
As distinguished from these forces, beings which serve the “white” magician are beings of light, while forces of the “black” magician belong to the twilight world beneath our feet, and the shapes of some are beyond human comprehension. Sometimes they embody animal forms, such as black dogs or black pigs, and so forth. In the form of snakes the head is generally beautifully bejewelled with pendants similar to earrings.
Many people are born into the world who have contacts with, or are overshadowed by, these vampire classes of elemental life. As they grow up, they become conscious that they have the power of absorbing vitality from others. One very dear friend, when complimented upon her color and appearance of health, said, “I was feeling a rag when I started out to visit you, but when I got on the bus, I saw a very vital and healthy man, and I was fortunate enough to be able to sit beside him. Whenever I am with people, I always look out for the healthiest person that I can find to sit beside, and then I pick up in no time.” Now this was a kind lady noted for her good works, but in this one aspect her personal selfishness predominated.
Another case was a so-called spiritual healer. She was a gentle lady known to many for her good works. When she left a room in which perhaps as many as eighteen people were sitting, everybody seemed to breathe a sigh of relief, because she had a habit of vampirizing the vitality of everybody in her presence.
On one occasion a lady came to me in great trouble; she was sorely in need of assistance. I went deeply inward, and I discovered her husband had recently passed over into a finer condition of life, and he asked me to give her this message, “When I was very ill from typhoid, you brought a healer into my room, and she ushered me out of my body, which was entered by the being who has treated you so shamefully for two years and a half—the beast who drank and gambled was not myself, but another being which the spiritual healer drew into my body. Remember that I have always loved you as I did before this thing happened, and I shall always love you.” The poor woman burst into tears and said, “This is all that I want to know! You have answered my prayers. When my supposed husband recovered from the fever, his personality seemed strange, and I was living with a stranger in my house whose life was such that I cannot describe it. You have lifted a load from my heart.” The spiritual healer who was called in at that time was the lady I have just mentioned who vampirized everyone.
As the atoms of destruction become stronger in old age, elderly people are often conscious of the vitality that they can absorb from the youth about them, but I have never yet discovered vampirism among people who do not lead selfish and self-centered lives.
Many black magicians have gained the power of giving life or death to individuals, and there comes a time in the student’s life when he is tempted. Great powers are promised him by these fallen angels of the underworld if he will surrender his soul into the keeping of these Princes of Darkness. If you wish to advance along the path you can only dedicate your life to the service of God. This is a critical moment in the student’s life, but if he earnestly aspires for Truth, he afterwards becomes aware that some of the greater beings of light stand ready to protect him. Out of the body the student learns to recognize the powers of evil. There is an understanding which passes between him and them, and if he goes deeply into the subject, he will discover that the deepest evil in nature will in time evolve to the higher good.
When the student has learned to use his own tools there is no animosity between himself and the craftsmen of the other path; they are like two fencers, each always balances his power and measures the power of his opponent. I have met great beings, brothers of the light, working in these depths to bring illumination to some occult student who lost his light through the ignorant use of experimental magic.
Just as we find black and white magicians working on the physical side of life, so we find them as denizens of the higher and also the lower states of being. The brilliance of intelligence in the fallen angels is fascinating, and they have great power over the minds which enslave humanity. Our great avatar has said, “The children of Mammon in their day and generation are wiser than the children of light.”1
Nature scourges the children of light by periods of suffering and experience, but this causes them to evolve into the perception of the truth of the Reality. The ranges of experience which we pass through bring us to self-thought, and the desire to know Truth. How dull life would be if one did not encounter opposition! Those who incarnate into a life of wealth often gain little real experience of life. It is from God that we came, so to God we shall return, and we ourselves can hasten or delay this pilgrimage of experience. The use of certain incense, a clean body and mind, a clean environment with natural surroundings, if possible, and devotion to God, will protect one from the approach of these lower animal entities in nature.
All forms of sex imagination and distortions of thought contact these vampire conditions from the world beneath our feet, attract them into our atmosphere and, since the spiritual man gains his power from his organs of generation, he is most prone, if his thoughts are not controlled, to contact these conditions of the vampire class. Through proper control of our creative forces we liberate the higher counterpart of our seminal energy. This is a form of static electricity which liberates the soul of man from the prison house—the body. The Eastern Yogi says, “Kill your passions and desires.” But the Western Yogis say you should control and govern them.
Often magicians, procuring the body of a person who has seemingly died, have held back the destructive elements from entering it, and have thus afforded an entrance for an animal soul. The body has retained its seeming health, but the mentality is of a lower order, able to do menial work only. Seabrook has described such beings in Haiti. It is a most pathetic thing to meet a person who has renounced his soul to the Prince of Darkness, for he hopes and longs for a chance to regain his lost estate.
Often such men are used to bring about the downfall of a country, that in the end a greater good or evil may result. They always have a look of martyrdom in their eyes which cannot easily be forgotten. Years ago a very holy man in a foreign country pointed out a man to me and said, “God sometimes brings about what is seemingly a great evil, but in time it brings about a common good.” This man whom he pointed out had just returned from a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, and when I looked into his face, he registered the great sorrow that was there, and I knew that this man would be a martyr.
We cannot judge people until we know both the cause and the effect. This knowledge brings one in touch with the sorrows that evil can sometimes reflect into the mind. Great evil can be at times very beautiful. These beings of evil in the lower worlds are most beautifully proportioned (but not according to the Greek canons), yet in spite of their beauty they have an intensity of evil in their eyes. Some of them possess two pairs of arms and are magnificently clothed, yet their proportions are beautiful when analyzed.
Today many of our painters and modern sculptors are influenced by entities from the moon. They portray the human body differently from the canons of our age. If you study their work, seeking the truth of its expression, you can learn something, for our ideals of canons of beauty evolve forward or backward as we seek the light or the darkness, and the painter whose work was rejected yesterday often becomes a celebrity in a later time.
What can man, chained to the machine or desk for fifty weeks of the year, know of real beauty! He is the servant of the octopus of Mammon, with an ever-growing fear of losing his job, and of poverty! No longer an independent individual, he is the slave of a company, often overshadowed by Luciferian beings of our underworld. “What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul?” Man sometimes thinks he is buying cheaply when he is buying dearly. The worth of a thing determines its merit, and the cast iron hammer cannot take the place of wrought steel. An instrument or tool which is of good appearance but has no worth, betrays its owner at the critical moment. People will learn in time to save their money till they can get real worth and will apply this lesson to the art of right living.
