Excerpt
The Oriental View of Anthropology.
In the following essay, Dr. F. Hartmann, an enlightened author of the Theosophical and Occult school, presents the mystic or Oriental view of man, in an interesting manner, deducing therefrom a philosophy of the healing art. My readers will no doubt be interested in his exposition, and, as the ancient doctrine differs materially from the results of experimental investigation, I take the liberty of incorporating my comments in publishing the essay.
A RATIONAL SYSTEM OF MEDICINE.All lovers of truth, progress, and freedom of thought must be grateful to Dr. J. R. Buchanan for his discovery of the science of SARCOGNOMY. His system brings us nearer to a recognition of the true nature of man, his origin and his destiny, and of the relations which he bears to the Divine Source from which he emanated in the beginning, and to which he will ultimately return; for the enlightened ones of all nations agree that the real man, who resides temporarily in the physical human body, who feels through the instrumentality of the heart, and thinks through the instrumentality of the brain of the external body, does not originate in the womb of the mother from which the physical body is born, but is of a spiritual origin, again and again re-incarnating itself in physical masks and forms of flesh and blood, living and dying, and being reborn, until, having attained that state of perfection, which renders the inner man capable to exist in a state of spiritual consciousness without being encumbered by a gross earthly organization, which chains him to animal life.
[It should here be remarked that the great majority of those who are considered enlightened, and to whom the world is indebted for the sciences which it now possesses, do not accept this theory of re-incarnation. As commonly stated, it is liable to many decisive objections, and these objections, which I have clearly stated in the Religio-Philosophical Journal, have not been, and I think will not be, removed by the teachers of re-incarnation.]
It may perhaps not be premature to examine how far the doctrines of Dr. Buchanan correspond with the doctrines of occult science; that is to say, with that science which is based upon a perception and understanding of certain facts, which, to be perceived, require spiritual powers of perception, such as are not yet developed in the majority of mankind, but which are only in possession of those who have mentally risen above the sphere of external phenomena and accustomed themselves to look at spiritual things with the eye of the spirit. It is not my intention to enter at present into an elaborate review of the most prominent writers on occult subjects, and to quote passages from such authors to support the views expressed in the following pages, but rather to give a short statement of their doctrines in regard to the omnipotent power of Will and Life; both these powers being fundamentally identical; both being merely different modes of actions, or functions, of that universal, eternal, and divine Central Power of the universe, which is beyond the conception of mortals, and which the latter call God....