Helena Petrovna Blavatsky

“ If thou would'st not be slain by them, then must thou harmless make thy own creations, the children of thy thoughts, unseen, impalpable, that swarm round humankind, the progeny and heirs to man and his terrestrial spoils. Thou hast to study the voidness of the seeming full, the fulness of the seeming void. O fearless Aspirant, look deep within the well of thine own heart, and answer. Knowest thou of Self the powers, O thou perceiver of external shadows? ”

“ The Path is one for all, the means to reach the goal must vary with the Pilgrims.
Which wilt thou choose, O thou of dauntless heart? The Samtan [4] of "eye Doctrine," four-fold Dhyâna, or thread thy way through Pâramitâs [5] , six in number, noble gates of virtue leading to Bodhi and to Prajñâ, seventh step of Wisdom?
The rugged Path of four-fold Dhyâna winds on uphill. Thrice great is he who climbs the lofty top.
The Pâramitâ heights are crossed by a still steeper path. Thou hast to fight thy way through portals seven, seven strongholds held by cruel crafty Powers — passions incarnate. ”

“ If thou its path would'st master, thou must keep thy mind and thy perceptions far freer than before from killing action.
Thou hast to saturate thyself with pure Alaya, become as one with Nature's Soul-Thought. At one with it thou art invincible; in separation, thou becomest the playground of Samvriti [16] , origin of all the world's delusions.
All is impermanent in man except the pure bright essence of Alaya. Man is its crystal ray ”

“ So shalt thou be in full accord with all that lives; bear love to men as though they were thy brother-pupils, disciples of one Teacher, the sons of one sweet mother.
Of teachers there are many; the MASTER-SOUL is one [8] , Alaya, the Universal Soul. Live in that MASTER as ITS ray in thee. Live in thy fellows as they live in IT.
Before thou standest on the threshold of the Path; before thou crossest the foremost Gate, thou hast to merge the two into the One and sacrifice the personal to SELF impersonal, and thus destroy the "path" between the two — Antahkarana [9] . ”

“ His mind, like a becalmed and boundless ocean, spreadeth out in shoreless space. He holdeth life and death in his strong hand.
Yea, He is mighty. The living power made free in him, that power which is HIMSELF, can raise the tabernacle of illusion high above the gods, above great Brahm and Indra. Now he shall surely reach his great reward!
Shall he not use the gifts which it confers for his own rest and bliss, his well-earn'd weal and glory — he, the subduer of the great Delusion?
Nay, O thou candidate for Nature's hidden lore! ”

“ Once thou hast passed the gate Srotâpatti [6] , "he who the stream hath entered"; once thy foot hath pressed the bed of the Nirvânic stream in this or any future life, thou hast but seven other births before thee, O thou of adamantine Will.
Look on. What see'st thou before thine eye, O aspirant to god-like Wisdom?
"The cloak of darkness is upon the deep of matter; within its folds I struggle. Beneath my gaze it deepens, Lord; it is dispelled beneath the waving of thy hand. A shadow moveth, creeping like the stretching serpent coils. . . . It grows, swells out and disappears in darkness." ”

“ The Dharmakâya body is that of a complete Buddha, i.e., no body at all, but an ideal breath: Consciousness merged in the Universal Consciousness, or Soul devoid of every attribute. Once a Dharmakâya, an Adept or Buddha leaves behind every possible relation with, or thought for this earth. Thus, to be enabled to help humanity, an Adept who has won the right to Nirvâna, "renounces the Dharmakâya body" in mystic parlance; keeps, of the Sambhogakâya, only the great and complete knowledge, and remains in his Nirmânakâya body. ”

“ Before thou canst approach the foremost gate thou hast to learn to part thy body from thy mind, to dissipate the shadow, and to live in the eternal. For this, thou hast to live and breathe in all, as all that thou perceivest breathes in thee ”

“ That beam is thy life-guide and thy true Self, the Watcher and the silent Thinker, the victim of thy lower Self. Thy Soul cannot be hurt but through thy erring body; control and master both, and thou art safe when crossing to the nearing "Gate of Balance." ”

“ Aye, build it strong, lest the fierce rush of battling waves, that mount and beat its shore from out the great World Mâyâ's Ocean, swallow up the pilgrim and the isle — yea, even when the victory's achieved. ”

“ Alas! when once thou hast become like the pure snow in mountain vales, cold and unfeeling to the touch, warm and protective to the seed that sleepeth deep beneath its bosom — 'tis now that snow which must receive the biting frost, the northern blasts, thus shielding from their sharp and cruel tooth the earth that holds the promised harvest, the harvest that will feed the hungry. ”

“ Dharmakâya.
The first is that ethereal form which one would assume when leaving his physical he would appear in his astral body — having in addition all the knowledge of an Adept. The Bodhisattva develops it in himself as he proceeds on the Path. Having reached the goal and refused its fruition, he remains on Earth, as an Adept; and when he dies, instead of going into Nirvâna, he remains in that glorious body he has woven for himself, invisible to uninitiated mankind, to watch over and protect it. ”

“ In Northern Buddhist countries, where the doctrine of Nirmânakâyas — those Bodhisattvas who renounce well-earned Nirvâna or the Dharmakâya vesture (both of which shut them out for ever from the world of men) in order to invisibly assist mankind and lead it finally to Paranirvâna — is taught, every new Bodhisattva or initiated great Adept is called the "liberator of mankind." ”

“ It is a well-known fact in Physical Science, as well as in Occultism, that the aggregate sound of Nature — such as heard in the roar of great rivers, the noise produced by the waving tops of trees in large forests, or that of a city heard at a distance — is a definite single tone of quite an appreciable pitch. ”

“ Invocations to the Buddhas of Confession," Part 1., iv.] "Yea; on the Ârya Path thou art no more Srotâpatti, thou art a Bodhisattva [33] . The stream is cross'd. 'Tis true thou hast a right to Dharmakâya vesture; but Sambhogakâya is greater than a Nirvânî, and greater still is a Nirmânakâya — the Buddha of Compassion [34] .
Now bend thy head and listen well, O Bodhisattva — Compassion speaks and saith: "Can there be bliss when all that lives must suffer? Shalt thou be saved and hear the whole world cry?" ”

“ He knoweth that the more his feet will bleed, the whiter will himself be washed. He knoweth well that after seven short and fleeting births Nirvâna will be his. . . .
Such is the Dhyâna Path, the haven of the Yogi, the blessed goal that Srotâpattis crave.
Not so when he hath crossed and won the Aryahata Path.*
[*From the Sanskrit Arhat or Arhan.] There Kleśa [29] is destroyed for ever, Tanhâ's [30] roots torn out. But stay, Disciple . . . Yet, one word. Canst thou destroy divine COMPASSION? Compassion is no attribute. It is the LAW of LAWS — eternal Harmony, Alaya's SELF ”

“ Remember, thou that fightest for man's liberation [20] , each failure is success, and each sincere attempt wins its reward in time. The holy germs that sprout and grow unseen in the disciple's soul, their stalks wax strong at each new trial, they bend like reeds but never break, nor can they e'er be lost. ”

“ They prefer to remain invisibly (in Spirit, so to speak) in the world, and contribute toward man's salvation by influencing them to follow the Good Law, i.e., lead them on the Path of Righteousness. It is part of the exoteric Northern Buddhism to honour all such great characters as Saints, and to offer even prayers to them, as the Greeks and Catholics do to their Saints and Patrons ”

“ It is taught that the accumulated efforts of long generations of Yogis, Saints and Adepts, especially of the Nirmânakâyas — have created, so to say, a wall of protection around mankind, which wall shields mankind invisibly from still worse evils. ”

“ Thus purified, the shrine must of all action, sound, or earthly light be void; e'en as the butterfly, o'ertaken by the frost, falls lifeless at the threshold — so must all earthly thoughts fall dead before the fane. ”

“ Śrâvaka — a listener, or student who attends to the religious instructions. From the root "Śru." When from theory they go into practice or performance of asceticism, they become Śramanas, "exercisers," from Śrama, action. As Hardy shows, the two appellations answer to the words akoustikoi and asketai of the Greeks.
↑ (4) . Samtan (Tibetan) , the same as the Sanskrit Dhyâna, or the state of meditation, of which there are four degrees. ”