"With faith all things are possible." The sceptical laugh at faith and pride themselves on its absence from their own minds. The truth is that faith is a great engine, an enormous power, which in fact can accomplish all things. For it is the covenant or engagement between man's divine part and his lesser self.

—Light on the Path

Man is more important than any organization or belief and is responsible for any use he makes of either. "Believe nothing unless it conforms with reason and common sense," is one of the most important teachings ever given. It throws the whole responsibility on man, and it destroys all idea of infallibility.

Exclusive claims made by individuals and bodies of individuals, on their own behalf or on behalf of others, all arise from—belief. No real Sage ever claimed a unique position for himself, for his knowledge and insight tell him that Nature is uniform and universal and that there are no unique, solitary phenomena in any of her kingdoms. If a claim is made on behalf of any religion that its prophet or its position is unique, that claim carries its condemnation within itself. Any calm thinker cannot but come to this conclusion, as also see the absurdity of the belief held and the claim made by many that their own race, or political ideology, or social customs and way of life, are the best. These and other beliefs are held because people do not use the light of their intelligence in examining them. Beliefs are blind, and the blind have no breadth of vision, no liberality of view.

The progress of human consciousness takes this course—blind belief, reasoned knowledge, enlightened faith. When a person applies the light of his mind to his own beliefs, he finds out which among them are false and which can be justified at the bar of reason and knowledge. If anyone says that to matters of belief the test of reason and the light of knowledge should not be applied, then he falsifies the entire experience of history.

Blind belief is not to be mistaken for faith, and the latter is superior to reason. Faith may be defined as the instinct of the Soul; it is born of intuition and the latter is the power of the soul, direct perception, which impresses the consciousness from above, beyond or within, and which brings into manifestation some expression of one or more innate ideas native to the Soul. But, unless instinctive faith or intuition receives the support of reason, the faith remains unenlightened. Unenlightened faith is akin to blind belief. Loss of faith occurs through faulty reasoning and false knowledge. Enlightened faith arises in the mind freed from passion and prejudices and engaged in the consideration of true, ennobling ideas. When the mind is impressed with sense-data, and desires and passions press it into their service, it lends them its own power of reasoning. In our scientific civilization, which takes sense-data as the foundation for all knowledge and regards the soul as the ephemeral product of brain-processes, logic and reason are enthroned in the highest seats of judgment. It is well known that when the faith remains unenlightened, it is likely to fall prey to the machinations of reason.

In these days when head-learning is so much in demand and soul-wisdom at a discount, it is necessary for each to take precautions to distinguish between blind belief and faith and take measures to enlighten his faith. Men and women need some study of great ideas which widen the mental horizon and deepen human insight. Mental food is as necessary as bread and milk for the body, if not more so. There is a great deal of false knowledge abroad, in the domain of sciences as of religion, and some of it is highly dangerous.

Two difficulties beset men and women in the acquiring of knowledge. The first arises from their own mental laziness: how many would willingly take the trouble to question their own beliefs, to gather evidence, pro and con; to sit like an impartial judge and not to plead like a barrister for the side he is defending?

The second difficulty arises because we do not persist in pursuing our inquiry into our beliefs. Again and again man has freed himself from one set of beliefs, from one organization or another, only to find himself in the grip of others. Although in many countries the individual has freed himself greatly from the power of organized religion, has also freed himself to a certain extent in the realm of politics, he is becoming fast bound by the idea of the infallibility of science. He is giving his life over to science as his forefathers gave theirs over to the witch doctor or the Church or the State. Many an individual has abandoned reason and failed to apply the test of intelligence to so-called scientific facts.

Dogmatism about scientific theories is as great an evil as the dogmatism of religious beliefs. For instance, the evolution of man from the animals and the negation of soul, scientifically put forward, form the basis of the ordinary person's understanding of life and make him live rather like an evolving animal than as an unfolding god. That aspect of science which affects us most today is the medical, and how many use the results of scientific methods without studying the common-sense attitude towards body and disease! How many young men and women have been fooled by their own blindness about, for instance, the abomination of contraceptives and artificial birth prevention! They may have freed themselves from religious superstitions, but only to be caught in the trap of scientific ones!

Blind belief passing through the fire of reason emerges as enlightened faith, casting off the ashes of exclusiveness, fanaticism and bigotry. If a man of religious belief passed from blind belief to real knowledge and practised the ethics of his own creed, he would soon be forced to discard the exclusiveness of that creed and to embody its universal aspects. Thus enlightened faith comes to birth. In the words of Robert Crosbie:

If one places his faith on any externality, whatever it may be—gods or men, religions or systems of thought—he has placed it upon a broken reed; he has limited the very power of his own spirit to expand itself beyond the limitations of his ideal. When, for instance, we accept the idea that nothing is real but that which we can see or hear or taste or smell or touch, we have placed our faith on a very low basis. There is some reason for our falsity of thought and action, when we have assumed the present moment to be the only moment, the outward terrestrial world and this one existence to be the only life, from which we go, we know not where, nor to what purpose it all has been. To look on all beings according to one's own limitation of mind and range of perception, and to see only their externalities of speech or action in accordance, is not seeing them as they really are. An outside God, or an outside devil, and outside Law, and outside atonement for sins, the idea of sin being other than a denial of our own spiritual nature (the unpardonable sin), are all external faiths of the nature of tamas, or ignorance. Ignorance always leads to superstition. Superstition leads to false belief, and false belief to false faith.

We are all in constant conflict with each other because of false bases of faith, for the very reason that faith fixed on anything will bring results, and men are blinded to real and true faith by the results of even false faith. Yet so long as we have a false faith shall we continue to create for ourselves lives of misery. The results flowing from a false faith in a selfish ideal must bring us bad effects in wrong conditions. They are the very limitations we have imposed upon ourselves by external faiths in other lives, and we must come again and again into bodies until we have rid ourselves of the defects in our nature which those external faiths have engendered. We have to get a better basis for thought and action than the false faith of the likes and dislikes we have obtained by heredity. We have produced the effects we see, but we need not go on repeating the same mistakes life after life, if we will but change our ideals. We have to find a true basis of faith. We have to place our faith upon that which is not external, but internal. (The Friendly Philosopher, pp. 354-55)

Let each one look at himself and determine his own place on the ladder of evolution: Is he sunk in the mire of disbelief, acting for his own sense-pleasure according to what he calls his own principles, devoid of virtue—a blind man yet too conceited to follow anyone or anything? Is he standing on the rung of blind belief, acting without knowledge, groping in the dark after his own blind leader and yet satisfied with himself? Is he using his reason by obtaining knowledge, going so far and no further, or is he forging ahead, slowly but steadily, purifying his mind, practising virtue, controlling his senses and organs, developing the spirit in the cave of his own heart? Is he one who has found peace and contentment born of conviction and enlightened faith? Does he know why he should not have angry thoughts but should possess a gentle mind and thus be capable of exercising that mind; why he should have a pure heart free from the complexities which egotism brings in its train and so be able to exercise the simplicity of that heart? Does he understand that generosity in the small, plain duties of life will surely kill all selfishness, and is he therefore performing those duties in the right way?

How few are the men of enlightened faith in our midst! No wonder there is so much of strife and unrest in the world today! The man of true faith, who is of gracious mind and pure heart, is on his way to the haven of Peace that passeth understanding, of Bliss beyond compare.

Men and parties, sects and schools are but the mere ephemera of the world's day. Truth, high-seated upon its rock of adamant, is alone eternal and supreme.

—Isis Unveiled, Preface