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system of physical, intellectual, moral, and spiritual training, as would enable him to reach the highest condition of development possible; it must furnish mankind with such a code of morals and such a system of political and social organization as would enable them en masse, to move on rapidly and smoothly with the current of progressive evolution, and to reach the desired goal—the condition of spiritual perfection. Such a system, when it reaches the maximum of elaboration, assumes the form of a deductive science in common with every particular branch of science. And just as every branch of science, entitled to the dignity of that name, has to adopt the inductive method in its infancy, so Esoteric Science must also pursue a similar method in the preliminary stages of its progress to be able to construct religion on a really scientific basis. As Mr. Sinnett had neither the knowledge nor the materials that would have enabled him to construct a complete system of Esoteric Science and Philosophy, he had to content himself with simply presenting, in a comprehensible form, to the members of the Theosophical Society and the intelligent public, a collection of interesting and useful information. This he did with regard to the nature and direction of planetary evolution and the constitution of man, and such kindred subjects as are calculated to throw some light, at least, on a few of the profoundest questions of religious philosophy, and indicating, in some measure, the lines on which further enquiry would prove profitable. He thought it prudent to abstain from recording in his book any decisive opinions regarding the real nature of the primal causes, operating in the Cosmos, the highest spiritual principle in man, and the first beginnings of cosmic evolution, or any other subject, equally momentous to religious metaphysics and dogmatic theology. Such isolated remarks as are to be found in his book touching them, are merely intended to convey to the reader's mind some conception, however imperfect, which it is necessary to realise for the purpose of clearly understanding the operation of particular laws, or the nature of a particular group of phenomena. But none of these are intended to supply the place of a
