INVISIBLE HELPERS BY C. W. LEADBEATER AMERICAN REVISED EDITION WITH INDEX CHICAGO: THE THEOSOPHICAL BOOK CONCERN “Krotona,” Hollywood, LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA LONDON: THE THEOSOPHICAL PUBLISHING SOCIETY, 3 LANGHAM PLACE BENARES: THE THEOSOPHICAL PUBLISHING SOCIETY MADRAS, THE “THEOSOPHIST” OFFICE, ADYAR. 1915 CONTENTS. PAGE. CHAPTER I.--THE UNIVERSAL BELIEF IN THEM 5 CHAPTER II.--SOME MODERN INSTANCES 9 CHAPTER III.--A PERSONAL EXPERIENCE 18 CHAPTER IV.--THE HELPERS 25 CHAPTER V.--THE REALITY OF SUPERPHYSICAL LIFE 34 CHAPTER VI.--A TIMELY INTERVENTION 39 CHAPTER VII.--THE “ANGEL” STORY 42 CHAPTER VIII.--THE STORY OF A FIRE 50 CHAPTER IX.--MATERIALIZATION AND REPERCUSSION 56 CHAPTER X.--THE TWO BROTHERS 63 CHAPTER XI.--WRECKS AND CATASTROPHES 72 CHAPTER XII.--WORK AMONG THE DEAD 78 CHAPTER XIII.--OTHER BRANCHES OF THE WORK 92 CHAPTER XIV.--THE QUALIFICATIONS REQUIRED 97 CHAPTER XV.--THE PROBATIONARY PATH 108 CHAPTER XVI.--THE PATH PROPER 118 CHAPTER XVII.--WHAT LIES BEYOND 129 INDEX 135 INVISIBLE HELPERS CHAPTER I. THE UNIVERSAL BELIEF IN THEM. It is one of the most beautiful characteristics of Theosophy that it gives back to people in a more rational form everything which was really useful and helpful to them in the religions which they have outgrown. Many who have broken through the chrysalis of blind faith, and mounted on the wings of reason and intuition to the freer, nobler mental life of more exalted levels, nevertheless feel that in the process of this glorious gain a something has been lost--that in giving up the beliefs of their childhood they have also cast aside much of the beauty and the poetry of life. If, however, their lives in the past have been sufficiently good to earn for them the opportunity of coming under the benign influence of Theosophy, they very soon discover that even in this particular there has been no loss at all, but an exceeding great gain--that the glory and the beauty and the poetry are there in fuller measure than they had ever hoped before, and no longer as a mere pleasant dream from which the cold light of common-sense may at any time rudely awaken them, but as truths of nature which will bear investigation--which become only brighter, fuller and more perfect as they are more accurately understood.