on the want of self-surrender by the disciple. Bring all you have and all you are, lay it at the feet of the Master of the Wisdom; He will open the gateway, He will guide you along the path. But dream not that words are heard in that high atmosphere where the Master lives and breathes: only high thoughts can reach Him, only noble acts can speak the thoughts you have conceived; for voice there is the life that is lived, and only the life that speaks of sacrifice can claim the teaching at His hands. Lecture VIII The Place of Theosophy in the Coming Civilisation _A Public Lecture delivered in the Queen’s Hall, London, at the British Convention, July 2nd, 1909._ It has been my lot now for many years to visit England either every year or every other year, in order to try to spread throughout the country the truths of the ancient wisdom which in these days we call by its Greek name of Theosophy. This year it has been my special duty to place on record in the capital of the empire a certain line of teaching with regard to the changing conditions of the times, to draw the attention of the thoughtful to the signs all around us of a changing civilisation—signs of an age that is passing—signs of a dawning civilisation that may be seen on the far horizon of our day. And I had thought that I should only reach as to this the few thousands that may be gathered together Sunday after Sunday in a London hall, but by the generous kindness of the _Christian Commonwealth_ these lectures have been spread far and wide. To-night I am taking up something of the thought that there has been more fully expressed, with the special intention of showing you the part that Theosophy will play in that coming civilisation, the nature of the work that it is doing in preparation for the civilisation on the threshold. I have worked out in those lectures in some detail what here I must only state, that just as you can find in watching the evolution of a man that at different ages of his life he is dominated by different parts, as we may say, of his consciousness—as we find emotion dominating him in youth, mind dominating him in his maturity, the wisdom of the Spirit in his age—so we may see, in glancing abroad over the civilisations and the races of men, that a similar succession may be observed, and that hence an indication of the future may be obtained. For we can see in the race that preceded our own, and still is living and active, the great Keltic race, how high emotion is the dominant note, and how the expression of that emotion finds itself best in poetry and in art. We can see that in the Teutonic race intellect is the dominant note, and that mind in all the spheres of its triumph shows itself out among the peoples who grow from that stock, of which our own nation is a branch. That being of the past and the present, it is not irrational to look now in the unfolding humanity for the growth of the next principle, the next mark