The only thing which IS necessary is that you should do your duty. The past is past, there is no use worrying about it. Try, in bearing your karma, t… - Charles Webster Leadbeater

As I am writing in the main for students of theosophy, I shall feel myself at liberty to use, without detailed explanation, the ordinary theosophical terms, with which I may safely assume them to be familiar, since otherwise my little book would far exceed its allotted limits. Should it, however, fall into the hands of any to whom the occasional use of such terms constitutes a difficulty, I can only apologize to them, and refer them for these preliminary explanations to any elementary theosophical work, such as Mrs Besant's "The Ancient Wisdom", or "Man and his Bodies". Chapter 1: Introductory

This is a school in which no pupil ever fails; every one must go on to the end. He has no choice as to that; but the length of time which he will take in qualifying himself for the higher examinations is left entirely to his own discretion. The wise pupil, seeing that school-life is not a thing in itself, but only a preparation... endeavours to comprehend as fully as possible the rules of his school, and shapes his life in accordance with them as closely as he can, so that no time may be lost in the learning of whatever lessons are necessary... Theosophy explains to us the laws under which this school-life must be lived, and in that way gives a great advantage to its students. The first great law is that of evolution. Every man has to become a perfect man, to unfold to the fullest degree the divine possibilities which lie latent within him, for that unfoldment is the object of the entire scheme so far as he is concerned. Chapter VII

People apparently do not grasp the fact that by occultism we mean exactly what we say. It is like science If a scientific professor tells you to do certain things, to compound certain chemicals, and so on, to get certain results, you know that, if you follow his directions, you must obtain these results. If you vary the proportions, you will not only not get the results, but you may produce something undesirable—an explosion or something of that sort. In religious matters people seem to think a kind of vague approximation to the directions given is quite sufficient. Occultism must be taken not as religion, but as science, and although you all have heard so often about these qualifications, I yet hope that if we go through them carefully and really try to understand what is required, and to do it, we may after all achieve the result. (First Talk)