The ceremony, the rite, is a shadow in the world of sense of the truths in the world of Spirit; and every religion, every creed, has its ceremonies as the outward physical expression of some eternal spiritual truth.

Theosophy defends them, justifies them, by explaining them; and when they are understood they cease to be superstitions that blind, and become crutches that help the halting mind to climb to the spiritual life.
Let us pass from the world of religious thought, and pause for a moment on the world of artistic thought.

Now to Art, perhaps more than in any other department of the human intelligence, the ideal is necessary for life.

All men have wondered from time to time why the architecture--to take one case only--why the architecture of the past is so much more wonderful, so much more beautiful, than the architecture of the present.

When you want to build some great national building to-day you have to go back to Greece, or Rome, or the Middle Ages for your model.