THEO. This is a fib, like many others. In the published accounts of January, 1889, you will find an exact statement of _all_ the money ever received from any source since 1879. The total received from all sources (entrance fees, donations, etc., etc.) during these ten years is under six thousand pounds, and of this a large part was contributed by the Founders themselves from the proceeds of their private resources and their literary work. All this has been openly and officially admitted, even by our enemies, the Psychic Research Society. And now both the Founders are penniless; one, too old and ill to work as she did before, unable to spare time for outside literary work to help the Society in money, can only write for the Theosophical cause; the other keeps labouring for it as before, and receives as little thanks for it.
THEO. Not at all. So long as they have food and lodging, even though they owe it to the devotion of a few friends, they need little more.
ENQ. But could not Madame Blavatsky, especially, make more than enough to live upon by her writings?
THEO. When in India she received on the average some thousand rupees a year for articles contributed to Russian and other papers, but gave it all away to the Society.
THEO. Never. Everything she has written throughout the seven years of her stay in India is all there in print. It deals only with the religions, ethnology, and customs of India, and with Theosophy—never with politics, of which she knows nothing and cares less. Again, two years ago she refused several contracts amounting together to about 1,200 roubles in gold per month; for she could not accept them without abandoning her work for the Society, which needed all her time and strength. She has documents to prove it.
ENQ. But why could not both she and Colonel Olcott do as others—notably many Theosophists—do; follow out their respective professions and devote the surplus of their time to the work of the Society?
THEO. Because by serving two masters, either the professional or the philanthropic work would have had to suffer. Every true Theosophist is morally bound to sacrifice the personal to the impersonal, his own _present_ good to the _future_ benefit of other people. If the Founders do not set the example, who will?