At about the age of fourteen, it occurred to him that God had no right to penalize him for failing to do anything he had not agreed to undertake. Two or three years later, he began to see visions, some of them containing figures of almost inconceivable grandeur recognizable as ancient Irish gods. These visions were associated with an adoration of nature which remained lifelong. A thinker by temperament, Russell brooded over his visions and became preoccupied with the character of the human soul. Combining his obsessions, he tried to paint a myth of his own invention representing the spiritual evolution of humanity. In mid-1884, in a class at the Metropolitan School of Art in Dublin, Russell met the young poet William Butler Yeats, who had similar preoccupations, and a year later he found himself moving in the newly emerged circle of young Dublin theosophists, among whom Yeats was one of the leading spirits. Russell, however, distrusted spiritual organizations and did not become a member of the Theosophical Lodge until 1889 or 1890. In 1888, he explained his views in a letter to the editor of
Lucifer signed "Aeon": the printer could read only the first two letters, and so Russell acquired his pseudonym.
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