Belief in the protective power of the Overself is valid only if it is really the Overself with which you establish a connection. Otherwise you fall into mere superstition or, worse, into the hands of lying evil spirits making false promises. In one or the other of these classes were the following instances, the first two occurring in our own century and the last two in the previous one. The Tibetan army believed that it had been made invulnerable against the howitzers of General Younghusband's British forces. Their spiritual guides, the lamas, were responsible for this pathetic error. The Moplah rebels in southwest India were told that the bullets of their Indian army would be averted by magic power. Chembrasseri Thangal, their leader, made this promise. The Boers, in South Africa, following Van Hansburg, were convinced by him that they were under special divine protection. Lastly, those Maoris of New Zealand who adopted the new religion of Hauhavism were fully persuaded by their prophet, Te Va, that the English troops would be defeated and that the Angel Gabriel would cause the English guns to have no effect.
-- Notebooks Category 16: The Sensitives > Chapter 6 : Delusions and Painful Awakenings > # 73
