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must be furnished by the individual. Thrice fortunate they who can break through the vicious circle of modern influence and come up above the vapours!

To recur to your Degrees: Are you not drawing the lines too vaguely between the first three or four groups? What test do you apply to decide their respective mental states. How guard against mere "cramming? and copying? and substitute writing?" Many clever Jesuits might pass all your Degrees, even up to the 6th and 7th: would you, then, admit him into the second section? Remember the lessons of the past and Carter Black. It is quite possible — as Moorad Ali Bey said and Olcott confirmed to you — for one who had passed the first five stages to acquire "occult faculties" in the 6th. Nay, it can be done without the help of either — by adopting either the method of the Arhats, the Dasturs, the Yogis, or the Sufis; among each of which groups of mystics there have been many who did not even read or write. If the psychic idiosyncracy is lacking, no culture will supply it. And the highest theoretical as also practical school