Reincarnation

Reincarnation, by Th. Pascal

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Title: Reincarnation A Study in Human Evolution
Author: Th. Pascal
Translator: Fred Rothwell
Release Date: May 19, 2007 [EBook #21533]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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REINCARNATION ***

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[Illustration: Docteur Pascal]

REINCARNATION
A STUDY IN HUMAN EVOLUTION
THE RESURRECTION OF THE BODY
AND
THE REINCARNATION OF THE SOUL

BY
DR. TH. PASCAL
TRANSLATED BY FRED ROTHWELL
"Were an Asiatic to ask me for a definition of Europe, I should be
forced to answer him:--It is that part of the world which is haunted by
the incredible delusion that man was created out of nothing, and that
his present birth is his first entrance into life."--SCHOPENHAUER.
(Parerga and Paralipomena, Vol. 2, Chap. 15)

LONDON
The Theosophical Publishing Society
161 NEW BOND STREET, W.
1910
* * * * *

CONTENTS

CHAP.
SKETCH OF THE AUTHOR'S LIFE
AUTHOR'S PREFACE
I. THE SOUL AND THE BODIES
II. REINCARNATION AND THE MORAL LAW
III. REINCARNATION AND SCIENCE
IV. REINCARNATION AND THE RELIGIOUS AND
PHILOSOPHICAL CONSENSUS OF THE AGES
CONCLUSION
* * * * *

SKETCH OF THE AUTHOR'S LIFE.
Théophile Pascal was born on the 11th of May, 1860, at Villecroze, a
village in the South of France. His childhood was spent amid the
pleasant surroundings of a country life. Shortly after his sixteenth
birthday, a relative of his, a Catholic priest ministering in Toulon,
seeing that the youth showed considerable ability, sent for him and
presided over his studies in this large maritime centre. Before many
years elapsed, he entered the Naval Medical School of the town, which
he left at the age of twenty-two, with first-class honours. In his
professional capacity, he took several trips on vessels belonging to the
Mediterranean squadron. Four years afterwards he married, resigned
active naval service, and devoted himself to building up a practice on
land, becoming a homoeopathic physician in the great seaport itself. It
was about this time that the young doctor became interested in
Theosophy, owing to the kindly services of a former patient,
Commander Courmes. The closest friendship and sympathetic interest
in theosophic thought thus began, and continued during their common

labours subsequently in Paris, Dr. Pascal entered the Theosophical
Society in 1891, and during the course of the following year wrote a
series of articles for the Revue Théosophique Française. These were
continued year after year, and dealt with the most varied subjects:
Psychic Powers; The Fall of the Angels; Kâma-Manasic Elementals;
Thought Forms; Christianity, Prehistoric Races, and many others.
The young doctor had previously made a deep study of human
magnetism, which proved a most fertile ground for the sowing of the
seed of the Ancient Wisdom.
In 1898 attacks of serious nervous depression became frequent, forcing
him to cease work of every kind. Mrs. Besant persuaded him to
accompany her to India, where his general health was gradually
restored, and he was enabled to return to France in the following year.
He decided to leave Toulon, where he had built up a considerable
practice, and to settle in Paris, hoping to provide for the needs of
himself and his family--his wife and only daughter--by the exercise of
his profession, and at the same time to fight the good fight for
Theosophy in the capital itself.
The French Section of the Theosophical Society was founded in 1900,
and Dr. Pascal was elected General Secretary. Throughout the next two
years a number of thoughtful articles and publications appeared from
his pen. The incessant labour and attention, however, which he
bestowed on the spreading of theosophic instruction began to have its
effect on a naturally delicate constitution, and in July, 1902, when
attending the meetings of the British Convention in London, he was
prostrated by an attack of congestion of the brain. The most devoted
care was lavished on him, both in London and in Paris, the result being
that a rapid, though only temporary, recovery took place. Had he
relaxed his efforts somewhat, the cure might have been a permanent
one, but Dr. Pascal, with the penetrating vision of the mystic, saw how
pressing were the needs of the age, and how few the pioneers of this
new presentation of the Truth, so that, at whatever cost of personal
sacrifice, he plunged