Esoteric History 1875

Helena Blavatsky, along with W. Q. Judge and H. S. Olcott, form the Theosophical Society in New York.

H. P. Blavatsky writes many of her "most challenging articles" during this year for several Spiritualistic journals and New York newspapers.

Mary Baker Eddy publishes Science and Health.

Heinrich Schliemann publishes Troy and Its Remains.

May

May 31--Alphonse Louis Constant (Eliphas Levi) dies. Levi was 65.

June

H. P. Blavatsky moves away from Philadelphia. (Moves to New York City?)

Summer

H. P. Blavatsky starts writing Isis Unveiled.

"When I started to write that which developed later into Isis Unveiled, I had no more idea than the man in the moon what ould come of it. I had no plan; did not know whether it would be an essay, a pamphlet, a book, or an article. I knew that I had to write it, that was all."--H. P. Blavatsky

September 20th, H.P.B. mentions to N. A. Aksakov that she is working on a book called "Skeleton Key to Mysterious Gates." She says, "I'll show them up, your European and American men of science, Papists, Jesuits, and that race of half-learned, les chatres de la science, who destory everything without creating anything, and are incapable of creating."

Olcott wrote about Blavatsky's work, "If she had no plan, despite all her knowledge, does not that go to prove that the work was not of her own conception; that she was but the channel through which this tide fo fresh, vital essence was being poured into the stagnant poll of modern spritual thought?" [Obviously, this was a man who knew nothing about the working life of a writer.]

Olcott also wrote, "[Whence] did H. P. B. draw the materials which compose Isis, and which cannot be traced to accessible literary sources of quotation? From the Astral Light, and by her soul-senses, from her Teachers--the 'Brothers,' 'Adepts,' 'Sages,' 'Masters,' as they have been variously called."

[Was it a "tulku" mediator system that HPB used?]

October

October 12--Edward Alexander (Aliester) Crowley born at Leamington, Warwickshire (between eleven and midnight).

Mundane History

Mark Twain publishes The Adventures of Tom Sawyer.

Religious orders are abolished in Prussia.

London's main sewerage system is completed.

Occult history 1874

1874

Autumn--F. G. Irwin visits Eliphas Levi in Paris.

October 14--Helena P. Blavatsky meets Colonel Henry S. Olcott for the first time at Chittenden, Vermont. They start to correspond with one another; later, they will join forces to further the goals of Theosophy.

November--H. P. Blavatsky moves to Philadelphia.

December--S. N., Thomas Vaughan (F. G. Irwin) writes The Star Rising in the Est, or a Brilliant Light Revealed unto all Men. According to Darcy Kuntz, "It has similar initiation ceremonies as those contained in the Golden Dawn Cipher Manuscript."

Important historical note: Colonel H. S. Olcott will lose his diaries for the years 1874 to 1877. This makes his accounts of the events of these years less than one hundred percent reliable as recounted in Old Diary Leaves. The missing years are those in which Blavatsky writes Isis Unveiled.

In mundane history:

First impressionist exhibition takes place in Paris. The term "impressionism" comes from the title, "Impression: Sunrise," a painting by Monet.

H. Solomon introduces pressure-cooking methods for the canning of food in the United States.

The first American zoo is established in Philadelphia.