To Light a Thousand Lamps - The Theosophical Society

Remembering and Forgetting Past Lives / 53
It is remarkable that we have these testimonials of a
wisdom that speak to the immortal and not merely to the
ephemeral. The duty of Mnemosyne is plain: with vigor
and exactitude to waken us to our true heritage so that
consciously we will begin the ages-long task of loosening the
bonds of self-centered and matter-based thinking. Then,
prudently partaking of the spring of Forgetfulness, and
drinking deep of the cooling waters from the Lake of Memory,
we may rightfully utter the ancestral password:
I am a child of Earth and of Starry Heaven;
But my race is of Heaven (alone).
The descent into Hades completed, the successful candidate
returns to light clothed with the radiance of things seen
and remembered. That the independent experiences of
each might be recorded while still fresh in memory, upon
ascending from the grotto of Trophonius for example, the
one newly-born was required ‘‘to dedicate a tablet on which
is written all that each has heard or seen.’’* Thus Pausanias
reports what he had learned from personal experience and
also from others who had undergone the sacred rite.
So much for the daring disciple of ancient or modern
Mysteries. But what about you and me, who may feel genuine
nostalgia for knowledge of things unseen? Most of us
still require the sweet oblivion of sleep and partial nonawareness
until we have suªciently grown in self-knowledge,
judgment, and compassion. Imprisoned though we
may be by self-made bonds, a part of us longs to awaken our
‘‘mystic memory’’ of holy things.
*Pausanias: Description of Greece 4:355.