The Theosophist. October 1903

[October The easiest way to understand it is to look back in thought to the earliest of our series of lectures in which I spoke of the various planes of Nature and the fact that man possesses a body corresponding to each of them by means of which he can observe it and receive vibrations and impressions from it. [...] THERE is a certain amount of satisfaction in finding in one of the so-called savage " and certainly obscure and unimporant races like the Maoris of New Zealand traces of the Ancient Wisdom and likenesses to some of the more important and great religions of the world. [...] The legend runs that Maui one of the heroes or demi-gods of Hawaiki while fishing in the South Pacific had drawn the islands to the surface; hence the Maori name for the North Island " Te Ika a Maui " " The Fish of Maui." The crews of the five canoes left Hawaiki with the intention of settling in these islands. [...] This was the dreaded institution of Makuln and so well known is the existence of this power that it is common among the Pakehas the strangers the European settlers if a man is taken ill or dies suddenly to say He has been Makutued." There was a popular belief in the continued existence of the soul after the death of the body and it was believed that after death the spirit entered into a l [...] In conclusion I would suggest that if ever the origin and history of the Maori People is as far as is practicable put into a connected form that history will point with the finger of fidelity to the great question of The origin of the human race.' " Here we have put forward by a man of Maori origin the idea of an ancient Pacific Continent ; and this idea is a common belief of the Pacific I